News  Vietnam

Vietnam sees decline in daily Covid-19 infections
A Public Interest Litigation (PIL) has been moved in the Delhi High Court seeking direction for the Centre to implement a Uniform Banking Code for foreign exchange transactions to control black money generation and benami transactions. Petitioner Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay, practising lawyer and BJP leader, also sought direction to ensure that Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS), National Electronic Funds Transfer (NEFT) and Instant Money Payment System (IMPS) are not used for depositing foreign money in Indian banks. He argued that it is not only harming the national interests of the foreign exchange reserve of India but is also being used to provide money to separatists, fundamentalists, Naxals, Maoists, terrorists, traitors, conversion mafias and radical organizations like SIMI, PFI. The petitioner submitted that the immigration rules for a visa are the same whether a foreigner comes in business class or economy class, uses Air India or British Airways, and comes from USA or Uganda. Likewise, Upadhyay said that the deposit details in Indian banks, including foreign bank branches for foreign exchange transactions, must be in the same format whether it is export payment in a current account or salary in a savings account or donation in charities current account or service charges payable in YouTuber's accounts. The format should be uniform whether it is converted by Western Union or National Bank or an India-based foreign bank. "Foreign Inward Remittance Certificate (FIRC) must be issued and All International and Indian banks must send the link through SMS to get FIRC automatically in case Foreign Exchange is being deposited in the account as converted INR," the plea stated. "Moreover, only a person or company should be permitted to send Indian Rupees from one bank account to another bank account inside the territory of India through the RTGS, NEFT and IMPS and international banks should not be allowed to use these domestic banking transactions tools," it added. The petitioner also sought direction that foreign exchange transactions through Indian banks including foreign bank branches in India viz. ICICI, HDFC, HSBC, etc must have information like the name and mobile number of the depositor, International Money Transfer (IMT) and not RTGS/NEFT/IMPS, name of currency e.g., AUD (Australian Dollars), USD (US Dollars), CNH (Chinese Yuan), GBP (Great British Pounds), EUR (Euro), etc. (ANI)
The Rajya Sabha on Monday faced a second consecutive adjournment till 2 pm following the ruckus created by the Opposition parties against rising prices of petroleum products and essential commodities across the country. The House was adjourned a few minutes after it assembled at noon following a similar adjournment over the issue. Some members from Opposition parties trooped into the well of the House as Question Hour was started by the chair. A Joint Opposition including Congress, Shiv Sena and Trinamool Congress members started sloganeering against the government seeking a discussion in the House over the price hike of petroleum products and essential commodities. Biju Janata Dal leader Sasmit Patra, who was on the chair, requested the members to go back to their seats and allow smooth functioning of the House. "Don't come into the Well. It's not the way. Please go back to your seat," Patra said. As the pandemonium continued even during the Question Hour, Patra adjourned the House till 2 pm. Earlier, soon after the House assembled for the day at 11 am, it faced a similar adjournment till noon after the notice of a few members under Rule 267 to hold a discussion over price rise was rejected by Rajya Sabha Chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu. Last month too, the Upper House faced a similar protest leading to adjournment over rising prices of fuel across the country. In the first hike in four months, the fuel prices have been raised in India. It was in November that the country saw the last fuel price surge. Petrol in the National Capital currently was retailing at Rs 103.81 per litre up from Rs 103.41 per litre on Sunday. This is the 12th increase in prices since they were first hiked on March. (ANI)
The accused allegedly attacked the police constables outside the gate of the Mutt and forcibly tried to enter the temple while raising religious slogans.

While speaking to ANI, Prashant Kumar, Additional director general (ADG), Law and Order, on Monday said, "A man forcibly tried to enter the temple premises and attacked the on-duty police personnel with a sharp weapon."

"The accused has been identified as Ahmed Murtaza Abbasi, a resident of Gorakhpur," added the ADG.

He further stated, "The case has been transferred to ATS as we cannot rule out the terror angle in the incident and a detailed investigation has been initiated."

Vipin Tada, SSP Gorakhpur, said, "The accused tried to forcibly enter the Gorakhnath Temple while raising religious slogans but he was stopped by the police."

"Two police personnel have been injured in the incident and treatment is being provided to them," Tada added.

The SSP further added, "Cases have been registered against the accused under Section 301 (Attempt to murder) of the Indian Penal code, Section 7 (Molesting a person to prejudice of employment or business) of the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1932 among others."

Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya said that the government has taken congnisance of the incident that took place on Sunday. (ANI)
Three accused of bank robbery of around Rs 18 lakh from a bank have been arrested with the joint effort of Police and Special Weapons And Tactics (SWAT) team, on Sunday. An operation was carried out on Sunday and the Siyana police along with the SWAT team solved the case in 36 hours. The three accused have been identified as Ravi Chowdhary, Chirag Ahlawat and Sagar Tyagi, police informed. Senior Superintendent of Police, Santosh Kumar Singh said that with the joint efforts of the SWAT team and the Siyana police the operation was carried out and the three accused were arrested. Adding further Singh said, "The three accused injured in an encounter were arrested by the Siyana police. The incident took place near Chingrawathi when the police were checking. Three youth on a bike were spotted moving towards the checking spot, on being stopped the accused tried to escape from the spot. As the police tries to siege them, the accused open fired on the police. In retaliation, the three accused were shot in their legs and got injured. Later, they were arrested and brought to the police station." He further said that "The accused Ravi has given Rs 1.5 lakh to his brother from the total robbed amount. Police are trying to recover that." Police have recovered three bags full of Rs 11, 73,500. A two-wheeler, one pistol of 32 bore with three cartridges, and two revolvers of 315 bore with four live cartridges and two shells were also recovered from their possession. The incident took place on Saturday when three armed masked youth riding on bikes robbed Ujjivan Small Finance Bank located in the city. The miscreants had looted Rs 18 lakh from the bank by taking bank employees and customers at gunpoint and fled from the spot. According to the police, the bank alleged the robbery of around Rs 18 lakh in FIR, but on further investigation, it was found that the robbed amount was Rs 13,23,500. The Police had registered the case under section 392 of the Indian Penal Code. Further investigation into the case is underway. (ANI)
The Supreme Court on Monday reserved its order on the plea seeking to cancel the bail granted to the son of Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Ajay Mishra Teni, Ashish Mishra, in Lakhimpur Kheri violence case. During the hearing, the Uttar Pradesh government today the apex court that although the offence is "grave", Mishra is "not a flight risk". Notably, the SC-appointed committee had recommended preferring the appeal to cancel the bail of Ashish Mishra. Senior Advocate Mahesh Jethmalani, appearing for the Uttar Pradesh government said, "It is a grave offence but accused Ashish Mishra is not a flight risk," while adding that the case is "serious" where 4-5 people have died and "is a matter of trial". A bench headed by Chief Justice NV Ramana reserved the order after hearing all the parties. The apex court was hearing a plea seeking to cancel bail to Ashish Mishra, who is the son of Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Ajay Mishra Teni, granted by the Allahabad High Court on February 10. During the hearing, Senior Advocate Dushyant Dave, appearing for petitioners, urged the Supreme Court that the Allahabad High Court order granting bail to Mishra should be set aside. Senior Advocate Ranjit Kumar, appearing for Ashish Mishra, justified the Allahabad High Court order. Senior Advocate Jethmalani submitted that all witnesses are under police protection and there is no possibility of witness tampering. He also apprised the Court that the state has vehemently opposed the bail plea of Ashish Mishra in Allahabad High Court. Senior Advocate Dushyant Dave, appearing for petitioners, had submitted that the order of Allahabad HC suffered from complete non-application of mind. Earlier, in an affidavit, Uttar Pradesh Government told the Supreme Court that the state has taken all efforts to protect the witnesses and families of victims of the Lakhimpur Kheri incident The Uttar Pradesh Government had told the Supreme Court that all the witnesses are regularly contacted by the police for appraisal of their security conditions. The submission of Uttar Pradesh came in an affidavit, replying to the petition seeking to cancel bail to Ashish Mishra. Uttar Pradesh government told the Supreme Court it had opposed the bail plea of Ashish Mishra in the Allahabad High Court and the submission of the petition that the State did not effectively oppose the bail application of the accused Ashish Mishra is completely untrue. In the earlier hearing advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for the petitioner, said that one of the prime protected witnesses was brutally attacked, a few days after bail was granted to Ashish Mishra. Family members of the victims of the Lakhimpur Kheri incident moved the Supreme Court challenging the Allahabad High Court order, which granted bail to Ashish Mishra. In the Special Leave Petition, family members of the deceased challenged the Allahabad High Court order dated February 10, 2022, wherein Ashish Mishra was granted regular bail. The petitioner said that the Allahabad HC order is unsustainable in law. They also said that they have approached the Apex Court as the State of Uttar Pradesh has failed to prefer any appeal against the impugned order. Ashish Mishra was released from jail in February followed by Allahabad High Court granting him bail. Eight people, including four farmers, had died in violence on October 3, 2020, in Lakhimpur Kheri. Earlier, the Supreme Court had appointed a committee headed by retired Punjab and Haryana high court judge Rakesh Kumar Jain to monitor the probe into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence. (ANI)
Amidst curfew across Karauli city, students appearing for Rajasthan board exams reached the examination center and gave their examination successfully on Monday. Curfew has been imposed on the district after it witnessed a stone-pelting incident during a religious procession including a bike rally on April 2. Students arrived at the examination center by showing their admit cards. Special arrangements were made by the education department and administration for the Rajasthan board examination. Apart from this, all government offices, courts, and banks have also been opened by the administration. Earlier on Monday, the Rajasthan police arrested 46 people and detained seven others for interrogation following a stone-pelting incident during a religious procession in Karauli on Saturday. The Inspector-General (IG) of Police, Bharatpur Range, Prasanna Kumar Khamesra had said, "After stone pelting took place during the procession in Futa Kot area Main Bazaar Karauli on Saturday, the police acted promptly and arrested 46 people and detained seven people for interrogation." "13 accused have been arrested in connection with the incident in the case registered at Police Station Karauli and 33 people have been arrested for violating curfew order. 07 people have been detained for questioning. A total of 21 two-wheelers and four-wheelers were also seized by the police," Khamesra had added. IG Prasanna Kumar Khmesra had said, "In view of the sensitivity of the incident, he immediately reached Karauli on the spot and took stock of the situation along with Superintendent of Police Karauli Shailendra Singh Indoliya, called the necessary police force and Rajasthan Armed Constabulary (RAC) from other districts of the range and imposed it on the spot for peace and order." Police Headquarters, for close supervision of the situation, had sent ADG Sanjib Kumar, IG Bharat Lal Meena, DIG (Crime branch) Jaipur Rahul Prakash, DCP Mridul Kachawa, and DCP Jaipur Narayan Togas to Karauli, informed the police. IG Khamesra had added, "To maintain law and order in the area, the situation is being closely monitored by police patrolling at various places in the city. A flag march was conducted in the city by the police force." Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) was imposed in the Karauli district of Rajasthan on Saturday and the internet was shut down after stones were pelted during a 'Shobha Yatra' procession that day. Section 144 was imposed in Karauli from 6:30 pm on April 2 till 12 am on April 4. (ANI)
A patrol party of the BSF Bhuj seized the boat 100 meters inside Indian territory near border pillar number 1160 in the Harami Nala area, BSF Gujarat Frontier said.

Giving a detailed account of the operation, the BSF said its patrolling unit noticed the movement of two Pakistani fishing boats and five Pakistani fishermen near border pillar number 1160 on Sunday around 8.30 pm while patrolling near border pillar number 1164 in the Harami Nala area.

"The BSF patrol party immediately rushed to the spot after crossing the swamps and Nalas on foot. The Pakistani fishermen saw the BSF patrol coming towards them, took advantage of marshy terrain and fled into Pakistani territory," said the BSF.

The BSF patrol chased them and seized one Pakistani fishing boat approximately 100 meters inside Indian territory near border pillar number 1160, the force said.

"The seized boat was thoroughly searched and nothing suspicious was recovered from the boat except some fish, fishing nets and fishing equipment. An intensive search of the area is on," added the BSF.

In February, the BSF seized 18 Pakistani fishing boats in the general area of Harami Nalla in the Creek area in Gujarat's Bhuj in two separate operations conducted within 10 days.

The operation then was carried out by BSF's Creek Crocodile Commando Teams and Army troops supported by Indian Air Force. Six Pakistani nationals were also held in the operation then. (ANI)
Two Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) jawans were injured in a terrorist attack in Srinagar, informed the officials on Monday. The attack took place at Maisuma in Lal Chowk. Earlier, a cache of arms and ammunition was recovered by the troops of the Indian Army and Special Operation Group (SOG) from a village along the Line of Control (LOC) in Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir, during a joint operation on Sunday. (ANI)
Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot lashed out at the Centre for Karauli communal violence on Saturday, and said that the Central government should take responsibility and condemn recent communal violence in Rajasthan. The Chief Minister urged the Prime Minister to react to the gruesome incident as soon as possible. Speaking to reporters today, Ashok Gehlot said, "PM Modi should take responsibility and condemn recent communal violence in Rajasthan. It's his duty to maintain law and order. I urge him to address the issue soon." "It is everyone's right to propagate the goodness of any religion. But the unrest spread by playing DJ, raising slogans in the procession, and anti-social elements sparked riots. In the process, innocent lives get trapped and those who are not involved in the riots die. To stop the violence and disturbance in the country, the central government should give a strong message," he said. The Chief Minister added, "The Prime Minister should condemn the anti-social elements, try to establish law and order in the country and anti-social elements should be punished." The Rajasthan police on Monday arrested 46 people and detained seven others for interrogation following a stone-pelting incident during a religious procession in Karauli on Saturday. The Inspector-General (IG) of Police, Bharatpur Range, Prasanna Kumar Khamesra said, "After stone pelting took place during the procession in Futa Kot area Main Bazaar Karauli on Saturday, the police acted promptly and arrested 46 people and detained seven people for interrogation." "13 accused have been arrested in connection with the incident in the case registered at Police Station Karauli and 33 people have been arrested for violating curfew order. 07 people have been detained for questioning. A total of 21 two-wheelers and four-wheelers were also seized by the police," Khamesra added. Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Sunday held a meeting with senior officials on the law and order situation in the state. This comes after violent clashes in Karauli city of Rajasthan. Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) was imposed in the Karauli district of Rajasthan on Saturday and the internet was shut down after stones were pelted during a religious procession that day. Section 144 was imposed in Karauli from 6:30 pm on April 2 till 12 am on April 4. "Section 144 has been imposed in Karauli from 6:30 pm, April 2, till 12 am on April 4, in connection with a case of stone-pelting at a 'Shobha Yatra' (bike rally) in the city. Internet services have also been shut in the area on April 2 and 3 (till midnight)," said Karauli DM Rajendra Singh Shekhawat. (ANI)
"From May 11 to June 11, he will travel to all the 32 districts in the state where he will participate in myriad programmes", said sources.

Apart from holding public interactions and public meetings, the Assam CM is scheduled to inaugurate and dedicate various projects to the people of the state.

Sarma's visit comes after he successfully bagged various achievements including the signing of the Bodo Accord and border peace accord with neighbouring state Meghalaya.

Sarma is also being accorded the victory of Bharatiya Janata Party and its ally United People's Party Liberal's (UPPL) candidates in the two Rajya Sabha seats that went to poll this month.

Many high-profile leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, are also slated to visit the North-East state in the coming month.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to visit the state on April 28. Apart from PM, President Ramnath Kovind, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh are also likely to visit Assam in the coming months.

BJP broke the Congress record of being the only party to form successive government in Assam by winning the 2021 Assembly poll. Himanta Biswa Sarma was sworn in as the Chief Minister of the BJP government on May 10. (ANI)
Delhi Police (DP) on Monday registered cases against some Twitter handles for tweets in circulation having content that could incite enmity, hatred, and ill-will between two communal groups. DP official informed today that cases have been registered in Mukherjee Nagar Police Station against some Twitter handles for tweets in circulation having content that could incite enmity, hatred, and ill-will between two communal groups. An investigation is underway. In the morning today, Delhi Police has registered three FIRs in connection with the alleged hate speech delivered at a Maha Panchayat organised on Sunday in New Delhi's Burari ground, and said that legal action is being taken against those spreading rumours on social media. The first FIR has been filed for organising the programme without due grant of permission from the police. The police have filed an FIR against the organiser of the event (Preet Singh, founder of the Save India Foundation). The second FIR has been filed against the alleged mishandling of journalists present at the event. The third FIR has been filed for spreading misinformation (hate speech) on social media. Further investigation is underway. On Sunday Yati Narsinghanand, the head priest of Ghaziabad's Dasna Devi Temple and an accused in the Haridwar hate speech case, triggered another controversy by allegedly promoting communal violence. Narsinghanand was speaking at an event organised by Preet Singh, founder of Save India Foundation, where around 200 people had gathered to participate in a "Hindu Mahapanchayat". The foundation had earlier held similar controversial events in Haridwar and at Jantar Mantar in the national capital, where anti-Muslim slogans were raised. (ANI)
Tanwar extended greetings to Kejriwal for giving him the opportunity to join the party and said that AAP stands for honest politics and robust governance. His decision to join the AAP came as the Arvind Kejriwal-led party is expanding its footprints in the country buoyed by electoral success in Punjab Assembly elections recently.

"My commitment to serve people is sacrosanct! As a step forward in my pursuit of public service, I am glad to commit myself to Aam Aadmi Party, which has stood for honest politics and robust governance. My gratitude to Arvind Kejriwal for giving me this opportunity," Tanwar tweeted.

"I call upon the youth, marginalized, peasants, poor, women to join this process of reawakening. Let's join hands to make a Brighter Haryana, a Better Haryana, a Bold Haryana," he added.

Tanwar, after quitting Congress in 2019, has been on a party-hopping spree while also launching his own party 'Apna Bharat Morcha' in February 2021. He had joined the Trinamool Congress (TMC) in November 2021.

He was once known to have been a close aide of the former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi when he was in-charge of the Indian National Youth Congress (INYC). Tanwar was the chief of INYC.

However, Tanwar after a prolonged turf war with the former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda quit Congress in October 2019 ahead of the state Assembly polls.

In the 2019 Haryana Assembly elections, Tanwar had extended his support to Dushyant Chautala's Jannayak Janata Party (JJP) and campaigned against Congress.

In 2009, he won the Lok Sabha elections from Sirsa in Haryana as a Congress candidate. However, he had lost the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. (ANI)
The Delhi High Court (HC) on Monday allowed Journalist Rana Ayyub to travel abroad and asked her to deposit a certain amount and share the itinerary with a contact number to the probe agency. Last week, Journalist Rana Ayyub had moved to the Delhi HC challenging Enforcement Directorate's (ED) decision to stop her from flying abroad. Journalist Rana Ayyub challenged the Enforcement Directorate's decision of not allowing her to travel abroad. The Bench of Justice CD Singh on Monday, while lifting the ban on travel restrictions, also observed that she is not accused of siphoning money of thousands of crores. Meanwhile, arguing for Enforcement Directorate (ED), ASG SV Raju submitted that we apprehend that she may go out and not come back. Our case is not going further. Money siphoned off in the name of COVID relief. Credit card details etc. not provided. Rana Ayyub's lawyer Vrinda Grover called it a clear case of harassment and stated that Ayub had fair reasons to come back to India as her family resided here. Why was Ayub not summoned earlier, she raised questions over the Enforcement Directorate (ED) investigation. On the last date of hearing, Enforcement Directorate said charges of money laundering are serious in nature while opposing the journalist Rana Ayyub's petition seeking quashing of Lookout Circular (LoC) and challenging ED's decision to stop her from flying abroad. According to the ED, she received the money in dollars along with Indian rupees for charity and for helping the poor and migrants during the covid period. We have found that the money for relief work has been siphoned off and fake bills have been submitted by her, argued the ED lawyer. The plea stated that, on March 29, 2022, the petitioner arrived at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport to board an Air India flight to London, Heathrow, scheduled to depart at 14:25 hours, to attend events about the global problem of cyber attacks on women journalists, as well as to deliver a keynote speech on the status of journalism in India. However, at around 12 noon, the petitioner was detained in a room adjacent to the immigration counter, and she was informed that the immigration officers of the Ministry of Home Affairs were seeking clarifications regarding some "remark" on the petitioner's file. The petitioner was then informed, over the course of the next hour, that the officers of MHA have instructions from the Enforcement Directorate not to allow the Petitioner to board her flight to London, and the immigration stamp on her passport was stamped as "Cancelled", plea alleges. Petitioner journalist alleges that she has been harassed, humiliated, and insulted by the malafide action of the Respondents, and the organisers of the journalist events in London and Italy have also suffered losses and experienced grave inconvenience and disturbance due to the arbitrary detention of the Petitioner at the airport on March 29, 2022. The petitioner is required professionally to frequently travel across the globe, and unreasonable, arbitrary, and mala fide restrictions on such travel are a direct violation of the Petitioner's right to free speech and expression, and right to practice her profession, as a member of the global and national media fraternity, plea read. The journalist sought directions from the court to enable her to travel out of India. She also sought quashing of the lookout circular issued against her. (ANI)
Indian Army eliminated the espionage by Pakistani terrorists in Naushera, Rajouri in the late-night hours of April 3.

A body with a cache of arms and ammunition was also recovered by the Army, informed the officials from White Knight Corps.

Earlier, two CRPF jawans suffered injuries in the terrorist attack at Maisuma in Lal Chowk in Srinagar. (ANI)
According to the official, the reason behind the crash is yet to be ascertained.

"The cause of the crash will be ascertained through an inquiry," the official said.More details are awaited. (ANI)
The Delhi High Court on Monday stayed the proceeding of the trial court against Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy in a defamation complaint filed by Delhi BJP leader Tajinder Bagga. The Bench of Justice Jasmeet Singh on Monday also stayed the summons issued against Swamy. The Rajya Sabha MP has approached the Delhi High Court challenging the Rouse Avenue Court proceedings and order which recently issued summons against him. The next date of hearing in the matter is fixed for September 6. Senior Advocate Maninder Singh along with Advocates Prabhas Bajaj, Satya Sabarwal, Ajay Sabharwal and Pranav Saigal appeared for Subramanian Swamy before the Delhi High Court in the matter. Bagga had recently had moved the court against Swamy for a controversial tweet. Bagga before the court had submitted that the contents of the said tweet were absolutely false and incorrect and were solely made to harm the reputation of the complainant and to defame him. The Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (ACMM) Dharmender Singh while issuing summons said that "the court is of the considered view that in the present case, there are sufficient grounds for proceedings against the respondent (Subramanian Swamy). "In view of allegations made in the complaint, testimonies of witnesses and material brought on record by them this court is prima facie satisfied that there are sufficient grounds for the summoning of the respondent as accused qua offence punishable u/s 500 IPC," the Court said. The complainant had alleged that on September 28, 2021, the respondent made the tweet "Delhi journalists inform me that before joining the BJP, Tajinder Bagga had been jailed many times for petty crimes by the New Delhi Mandir Marg Police Station. True? If so, Nadda should know." The complainant, Tajinder Bagga, submitted that the contents of the said tweet were absolutely false and incorrect and were solely made to harm the reputation of the complainant and to defame him. He also submitted that no FIR or any written complaint bearing any DD No was registered/lodged against the complainant at Mandir Marg Police Station. It is submitted that the complainant was never arrested for any crime by Mandir Marg Police Station. The complainant also submitted that after the publication of the said tweet, the complainant was summoned by his party senior, Parveen Shankar Kapoor (Head, Media Relations, Delhi BJP), and was asked to explain the truth and veracity of the said tweet, and the complainant refuted the contents of said tweet. It was alleged that tweet dated September 28 made by the respondent is absolutely false and incorrect and has been made to harm the reputation of the complainant and to defame him in the eyes of the general public and thereby, the respondent has committed the offence punishable by under section 500 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). By way of present complaint u/s 200 CrPC, prayer has been made to prosecute the respondent in respect of said offence, the court noted. (ANI)
Amid the overall cases and positivity rate declining in the country and states like Maharashtra, West Bengal and Himachal Pradesh revoking the COVID restrictions, Adar Poonawalla, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Serum Institute of India (SII), praised the Central Government for their work during the pandemic and hinted at the announcement of a booster dose policy. Speaking on the booster dose policy, he praised the Central government and said, "For the booster dose, we have appealed to the government for few months, as everyone who needs to travel needs to take booster dose, the government has already covered entire adult population with two doses and now, time for the booster has also come" He also mentioned that all the other countries have already initiated the booster dose and now it was India's turn to match the suit. He also compared the vaccines of India to the vaccines in Europe and America. "The Covid cases in India are less because we chose the right vaccine. If and when the fourth wave comes, it will be mild hopefully, I don't want to make any predictions but if you look at the way our nation has responded to the new mutant variant, our vaccines have been proven far better," said Poonawalla. Poonawala also cleared the air about the current vaccine's performance on a new variant. "Yes our vaccines will work, but you will have to take booster for the future variant, We have enough stocks," clarified Poonawalla. Adar Poonawalla was speaking at the Alternative Fuel Conclave in Pune. The Conclave highlighted Maharashtra's leadership role in the alternate fuel and automobile sector and was inaugurated by Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Monday. (ANI)
The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022 was passed after a reply by Home Minister Amit Shah. Several opposition members demanded that the bill should be referred to a standing committee.

Amit Shah said that those who are citing human rights should also think about the human rights of rape victims.

"They (Opposition) only worry about rapists, looters...But the Centre does worry about the human rights of law-abiding citizens," he said.

The bill, which seeks to replace the Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920, provides for legal sanction for taking appropriate body measurements of persons who are required to give such measurements to "make the investigation of crime more efficient and expeditious".

The bill seeks to define ''measurements'' to include finger-impressions, palm-print and foot-print impressions, photographs, iris and retina scan, physical, biological samples and their analysis.

It seeks to empower the National Crime Records Bureau of India to collect, store and preserve the record of measurements and for sharing, dissemination, destruction and disposal of records.

The bill also seeks to empower a Magistrate to direct any person to give measurements and empower police or prison officer to take measurements of any person who resists or refuses to give measurements. (ANI)
Allaying concerns of opposition parties in Lok Sabha over human rights violations due to possible misuse of the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday said they "worry about the rights of rapists and looters" and asserted that the government cares about law-abiding citizens. "Those who are citing human rights should also think about the human rights of rape victims. They (opposition) only worry about rapists and looters. What about the human right of the person who has been looted? This bill is brought in to ensure the safety of law-abiding citizens of the country," said Amit Shah in Lok Sabha while replying to the concerns raised by the opposition over the bill. "This bill has been brought for the safety of law-abiding citizens of the country. Don't try to paint it otherwise," he added. The Home Minister claimed that the bill has been brought to technologically enhance policing in the country. "In 2014, PM Narendra Modi put forward the concept of SMART policing. Where T meant Technology. We are here to fulfil that promise of T. England, Canada, South Africa, Australia and USA which are champions of human rights have more stringent laws than this," he said. The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022 seeks to replace the Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920. The bill provides for legal sanction for taking appropriate body measurements of persons who are required to give such measurements to "make the investigation of crime more efficient and expeditious". It seeks to define ''measurements'' to include finger impressions, palm-print and foot-print impressions, photographs, iris and retina scan, physical, and biological samples and their analysis. The bill seeks to empower the National Crime Records Bureau of India to collect, store and preserve the record of measurements and for sharing, dissemination, destruction and disposal of records. The bill also seeks to empower a Magistrate to direct any person to give measurements and empower police or prison officer to take measurements of any person who resists or refuses to give measurements. The bill was introduced in Lok Sabha by Minister of State for Home Affairs Ajay Mishra Teni. (ANI)
The Delhi High Court on Monday permitted Journalist Rana Ayyub to travel abroad and said there is no cogent reason for presuming that she would not appear before the investigation agency and hence, as no case is made out for issuing the impugned LOC. The Bench of Justice Chandra Dhari Singh on Monday said the impugned Lookout Circular (LOC) is accordingly liable to be set aside as being devoid of merits as well as for infringing the Human right of the Petitioner to travel abroad and to exercise her freedom of speech and expression. For the reasons discussed above, the impugned LOC is set aside and quashed. However, a balance has to be struck qua the right of the investigation agency to investigate the instant matter as well as the fundamental right of the petitioner of movement and free speech, said Justice Chandra Dhari Singh. The Court further added that it becomes evident that the LOC was issued in haste and despite the absence of any precondition necessitating such a measure. "A LOC is a coercive measure to make a person surrender and consequentially interferes with petitioner's right of personal liberty and free movement. It is to be issued in cases where the accused is deliberately evading summons/arrest or where such person fails to appear in Court despite a Non-Bailable Warrant. In the instant case, there is no contradiction by the respondent to the submission of the petitioner that she has appeared on each and every date before the Investigating Agency when summoned," the Court noted. The Court, while passing the order, said the instant petition stands allowed in the above terms with the conditions that the petitioner shall intimate her travel dates and detailed itinerary to the investigation agency forthwith along with the address of the places that the petitioner shall be visiting. "The petitioner shall deposit an FDR to the tune of Rs 1 lakh before the Enforcement Directorate in Mumbai. The petitioner shall not attempt to tamper with the evidence or influence the witnesses in any manner, the petitioner shall return to India on the date specified i.e. 11th April 2022; and the petitioner shall give an undertaking to appear before the Investigation Agency immediately on her return and on dates that might be fixed by the Investigation Agency for interrogation, if any, after the travel period," the court said. Ayyub has recently approached the Court to seek quashing of the Look Out Circular/Directions issued against her that has restrained her from travelling abroad. Advocate Vrinda Grover, counsel who appeared for the petitioner, submitted that the petitioner/journalist is being persecuted for speaking truth to power and being critical of the incumbent establishment. Advocate Grover submitted that on March 29, when the petitioner arrived at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, Mumbai, to board a flight to London to attend an event about the global problem of cyber-attacks on women journalists on 1st April in London, as well as to deliver a keynote speech in Rome on the status of journalism in India on April 5. She further submitted that it is ED's case that the petitioner had collected funds by crowdfunding for COVID relief work and has not done proper accounting. It was submitted that there is nothing on record to suggest that the petitioner was evading the legal process. Petitioner had been in regular communication with ED and had responded to each and every summons issued by the ED under the PMLA, that she had also joined the investigation and has been cooperating throughout. The Court noted that ED vehemently opposed the instant petition and argued that the petitioner has been involved in a very serious offence and has misappropriated funds collected in the name of relief work. It was submitted that the petitioner had submitted fake bills and thus the money raised for relief work has been siphoned off. ED also submitted that it had attached her assets worth Rs 1.77 crore in connection with alleged irregularities in the collection of charitable funds for COVID relief work. Further, it was submitted that the agency had issued summons to her earlier as well, but she did not respond and that it did not want her to leave the country because it would delay the probe and filing of chargesheet in court. (ANI)
Banerjee spoke to the families via video conferencing. She instructed the Birbhum District Magistrate to ensure that these ten people do not have any problem joining the work.

Briefing media persons, the Chief Minister said, "I kept my words. Today I am giving government jobs to 10 people in group D (who were affected by Birbhum violence). People whom we lost will never come back. But everyone needs to move forward in order to survive. This is a step in the right direction for those who are there."

As many as nine people were killed in the Rampurhat area of West Bengal's Birbhum last month after a mob allegedly set houses on fire following the killing of TMC leader Bhadu Sheikh.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) took over the probe of the Birbhum violence case following the Calcutta High Court order. Five accused have been arrested in the Birbhum violence incident. (ANI)
The Delhi High Court on Monday dismissed the petition challenging a notification appointing Delhi Chief Secretary Vijay Kumar Dev as Election Commissioner in the Election Commission of NCT of Delhi for conducting the elections to Municipal Corporations of Delhi. The Bench of Justice Vipin Sanghi and Justice Navin Chawla on Monday dismissed the plea after not being satisfied with the argument extended by Advocate Shashank Deo Sudhi, who appeared for the petitioner on the ground that the incumbent Chief Secretary does not hold two posts. Earlier, the Delhi Government, in its reply had opposed the plea and sought dismissal of the petition. The reply filed by the Delhi Government said, "a conscious mala fide attempt has been made to create prejudice by giving a misleading and slanted version of the corrected factual and legal position." The appointment was made bona fide by the Lieutenant Governor, who is a competent authority, in accordance with the extant statutory procedure and the most eligible and suitable person was selected after consideration of all eligible candidates, the reply submitted. It was also stated that the appointment does not fall foul of the judgement of the Supreme Court in Fouzia Imtiaz Shaikh case, in as much as the appointee will not be holding an additional charge and will cease to be a government servant prior to the date of which he assumes charge of the office of Election Commissioner. It was further stated that the appointment is not in violation of Article of the Constitution. Therefore, it is submitted that the Court may dismiss the petition with heavy and exemplary cost, the reply read. The Petition has sought direction from the Delhi Government to quash the withdrawal of the notification dated November 25, 2021, offered an appointment for the post of election commissioner of Municipal Corporation of Delhi to the working chief secretary Vijay Dev (IAS Officer) w.e.f. April 21, 2022. The plea stated that the said notification is in violation to the rule of law and settled principles of appointment procedure of the public office as the same being motivated towards vested interest in order to affect the forthcoming scheduled election of Municipal Corporation of Delhi as well as in clear violation to the Article 243K of the Constitution of India which enshrined the appointment of independent election Commissioner as interpreted and laid down by Supreme Court of India. Petitioner Dr Nand Kishore Garg, former BJP MLA through Advocate Shashank Deo Sudhi stated that the appointment is politically motivated as the Chief Secretary has been privy to all the administrative and policy decision of the Government of Delhi and hold a position like Election Commissioner at the Municipal Corporation of Delhi may be exposed to the possibility of manipulation of the outcome of the election process. It also stated that, said that notification is improper in as much as it had been announced prematurely even when the post of election commissioner is not vacant only to ensure unquestioned allegiance to the commands of the Delhi Government in lieu of extended service tenure of five year of the serving chief secretary of Delhi. The petitioner seeks court direction for a broad guideline for the appointment of election commissioner of Municipal Corporation of Delhi ensuring the impartiality and neutrality of the candidate who would be an independent person of high integrity being not entrusted with any kind of government assignment. (ANI)
Calling Punjab's resolution claiming Chandigarh as political rhetoric, senior Congress leader and former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Monday said Chandigarh belongs to Haryana and will always remain so. Hooda chaired the Congress Legislature Party meeting at Haryana Bhawan in Delhi on Monday. 24 MLAs were present in the meeting of the legislature party. "Today, in the CLP meeting, we discussed the resolution passed in Punjab Assembly regarding Chandigarh. We will oppose this resolution strongly because Chandigarh belongs to Haryana," Hooda said after the meeting. Hooda further said that on the basis of the report of the Shah Commission, Chandigarh belonged to Haryana and will remain so. He said that there are three issues between Punjab and Haryana - water, territory and Chandigarh. "There is an issue of water (SYL), territory and capital. We will first raise the issue of water. Punjab has passed this resolution many times but there is no meaning to this. This is just a political gimmick. The resolution passed by the Punjab Assembly is just political rhetoric. Apart from that in BBMP (Bhakra Beas Management Board), the conventional member used to be from Haryana. But the Central government has made an amendment. We will also raise this issue," Hooda said. He said a resolution will be brought in Haryana Assembly on Tuesday. "We will oppose this strongly. If needed, we will also go to the President of India," added Hooda. Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Friday moved a resolution in the assembly seeking the transfer of Chandigarh to the state. (ANI)
Congress leader KC Venugopal on Monday demanded that government should indulge in dialogue, deliberation and solution with regard to rising fuel prices across the country. "Congress is the only party agitating against these fuel prices all over India...What we are expecting from this govt is dialogue, deliberation and solution, which is not happening," said Venugopal. The Rajya Sabha MP alleged that whenever the opposition parties raise issues in Parliament related to common people like fuel price hikes, government adjourns the House instead of having the discussion. "Whenever common people's issue gets raised, govt adjourns the House. At least, have a discussion and identify the issue. Government should clarify its stand on price rise," he said. "This government has become merciless, cruel; increasing prices day by day...We moved an adjournment motion in Parliament House, especially on fertilizers and price rise, but they're not even allowing us to mention it. What is the use of Parliament then?" he added. The Rajya Sabha was on Monday too was adjourned for the day following repeated disruptions over rising prices of petroleum products and essential commodities with the Opposition protesting on the issue as their demand to hold a discussion on the matter was rejected. Last month too, the Upper House faced a similar protest leading to adjournment over rising prices of fuel across the country. In the first hike in four months, the fuel prices have been raised in India. Diesel and petrol prices have been hiked by 80 paise. It was in November when the country saw the last fuel price surge. Petrol in the National Capital currently retails at Rs 103.81 per litre up from Rs 103.41 per litre on Sunday. This is the 12th increase in prices since they were first hiked on March 22, ending a four-and-half-month long freeze since November 4, 2021. (ANI)
South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) Mayor Mukkesh Suryaan on Monday said that in the future, licenses for running meat shops will be issued if they agree not to operate during the Navaratri festival. Meanwhile, South Delhi Municipal Corporation on Monday ordered officers concerned to take action for the closure of meat shops during the nine-day period of the Navaratri festival that is being observed from April 2 to April 11. The Mayor informed that he has also written to the Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal to withdraw their discount on alcohol during Navratri, and if possible, stop the sale of liquor for nine days too. Speaking to ANI today, Suryaan said, "During Navratri, 99 per cent of households in Delhi don't even use garlic and onion, so we have decided that no meat shops will be open in South MCD. The decision will be implemented from tomorrow. Fine will be imposed on violators." "We will also issue licenses with this condition in the future. I have also written to the CM to withdraw their discount on alcohol during Navratri, and if possible, stop the sale of liquor for nine days too," he said. (ANI)
The father of the Goraknath Temple attack accused on Monday said his son is mentally not stable and had no planning to commit the offence. "He is not mentally stable. Since childhood, he is suffering from depression. He also received medical treatment. Due to some developments, he believed that police were after him. He had no planning and did this due to his current mental state," Munir Ahmed Abbasi, the father of the accused told ANI. Meanwhile, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Monday met the two police personnel who were injured in the Gorakhnath temple attack at BRD Medical College. According to Uttar Pradesh Police, a man forcibly tried to enter the Gorakhnath Temple premises and attacked the on-duty police personnel with a sharp weapon on Sunday. The accused has been identified as Ahmed Murtaza Abbasi, a resident of Gorakhpur. The Uttar Pradesh government has decided to hand over the probe to the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS). ADG (Law and Order) Prashant Kumar said the man who attacked two police personnel at Gorakhnath temple has been arrested. "He is a resident of Gorakhpur. A sickle has been recovered from him. An FIR has been lodged against him. There could be a terror angle in it. The case will be transferred to ATS," he said. Police said the accused Ahmed Murtaza Abbas, after being presented in court on Monday, has been sent to judicial custody. Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya said strict action will be taken based on the investigation. (ANI)
Lok Sabha will discuss the issue of the Ukraine crisis on Tuesday under Rule 193. Earlier in the Business Advisory Committee of the Lok Sabha, Speaker Om Birla had agreed to allow a discussion for a short term on the same after demand from several political parties. Notices for Rule 193 have been given by RSP Lok Sabha MP N.K. Premachandran and Congress MP Manish Tewari. Discussion is likely to happen for two hours following which a reply will be given by Minister of External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. The government is also mulling the option of asking Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia to intervene in the debate. Scindia as Civil Aviation Minister played a key role in coordinating efforts of various airlines including private airlines to fly aircraft to bring Indians back. While members of Parliament want to understand how the situation currently is in Ukraine and what is India's stand vis-a-vis Ukraine and Russia and also what the Indian government plans to do to accommodate the students who were brought back under Operation Ganga from war-hit Ukraine via special flights. Operation Ganga, under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership was launched on February 26. The first evacuation flight from Bucharest reached New Delhi with 249 nationals on 27 February. Op Ganga went on till March 11. Members also want to understand the government of India's stand with regards to Russia and Ukraine and also how it impacts geopolitical space. Fuel prices impacted because of the crisis is what members are likely to seek response on from the govt. Many students who were in their later years of college for medical education and see their future in a limbo with the college infrastructure completely destroyed in Ukraine. More than 22,000 Indians, majorly students were brought back on more than 80 flights. India also rescued several others including citizens from Bangladesh & Nepal. Four Union Ministers Kiren Rijiju, Hardeep Puri, Jyotiraditya Scindia and General VK Singh were dispatched to neighbouring countries to help coordinate evacuation efforts. (ANI)
The Delhi High Court on Monday reserved the order on pleas moved by Delhi police challenging the trial court's judgement that directed the registration of FIR against the Police personnel of Dwarka District. The Delhi Police stated that any direction to lodge an FIR against honest officers, acting bona fide to police a crime-ridden district is not only perverse but also violates the rights of those officers under Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution of India. Justice Yogesh Khanna reserved the order after hearing submissions by the counsel for Delhi Police. The Additional DCP, Dwarka District has challenged the order passed by the Court of Additional Session Judge (ASJ), Dwarka Court on March 24, 2022. Additional Standing Counsel (ASC) for Delhi Police Avi Singh argued that the trial court clubbed three separate FIRs related to separate cases, and through a common order granted bail to all accused without considering their antecedents, recoveries or the scope of their involvement in the crime. Avi Singh also argued the trial court judge stepped beyond the jurisdictional mandate of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) and directed that the handwritten complaint filed in the bail application unsupported by affidavit, be converted into Section 156(3) complaints and put up before the Metropolitan Magistrate (MM). The Counsel for Delhi Police further argued that the trial court judge erred by recording adverse findings against the raiding party on the basis of an ipse dixit (unproven) statement by the accused, and entirely prejudging the case against the Police. It was also argued that without recommending the matter for a vigilance enquiry or to the jurisdictional police complaints authority, the trial court judge virtually directed the MM to register an FIR against the police officials, which is entirely de hors (outside the scope of) the mandate of Section 156 (3) CrPC and against the principle of separation of powers underlined in the Constitution of India and the CrPC. ASC argued that the ASJ erred in law by seeking the registration of FIR without considering that a prior sanction under Section 140 of the Delhi Police Act is required for initiating an investigation under Section 156 (3) of the CrPC. The trial court while granting bail to accused Deepak Chauhan, Bablu and Aijaj had noted that accused Irshad, Aijaj, Deepak Chauhan, Bablu and Sachin had gunshot injuries in their knees while they were trying to flee after firing at the police party in different cases on different dates in 2021. (ANI)
Following the withdrawal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) from certain parts of the state, Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio on Monday said that the total abolition of AFSPA may take time, but the partial abolishment is a test. "During this crucial period, if law and order cannot be controlled, AFSPA may be reinstated," Rio said. Taking part in a consultative meeting with Tribal Hohos and Organizations of Nagaland which was held at Rhododendron Hall, Chumukedima on Monday, the Nagaland Chief Minister appealed to all the stakeholders to seriously ponder how to maintain law and order in the state and sought their co-operation with the government to ensure that no untoward incidents occur. Nagaland Chief Minister said that all stakeholders had appealed for the abolishment of the draconian law- AFSPA, and the Union Government has finally heard the appeals of the people. "The state government had formed a 22-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the Oting incident," he said. The Nagaland Chief Minister congratulated the members of the SIT for their prompt action in conducting investigations and submitting their preliminary reports. "Once the report is submitted and a case is filed, the contents of the report will be made known to the public. The Centre also formed its SIT and they have also submitted their report," Rio said. As the Naga solution is for all the Nagas, Rio appealed that the Nagas should harbour a sense of unity and oneness and not be selfish in their demands. He thanked the Civil Society Organizations, Tribal leaders and student bodies for always cooperating and supporting the government. Nagaland Chief Secretary J. Alam, IAS, welcomed all the members and briefed them that after almost three decades, AFSPA (Armed Forces Special Powers Act) was lifted from certain areas of Nagaland. T. R Zeliang, Chairman of the United Democratic Alliance (UDA) stated that partial lifting of AFSPA is an experimental phase with the end goal of completely removing AFSPA from the state and he appealed for joint responsibility and cooperation as the police would be handicapped without the peoples' support. Nagaland Home Commissioner Abhijit Sinha said that the earlier notification on AFSPA issued in December 2021 has been withdrawn and a fresh notification has been issued on the same. "Out of 72 Police Stations, AFSPA has been withdrawn in 15 Police Stations. This can be seen as the first step toward the total abolition of AFSPA in the state. Tribal leaders, leaders of Apex bodies, Hohos, CSOs, and Student Bodies will have to play an important role and will have to take responsibility for keeping the peace as AFSPA may be reinstated if law and order problems arise. This is a combined responsibility of all stakeholders involved," Abhijit Sinha said. Nagaland DGP John Longklumer maintained that once AFSPA is removed, the responsibility of law and order and maintaining peace will fall on the Nagaland Police. He informed that IRB personnel have been deployed at strategic locations to ensure the maintenance of Law and Order. The Eastern Naga Students Federation (ENSF) appealed for total justice to be delivered to all victims of the Oting incident and that the Nagaland Government should remind the Union Government in this regard. About 14 civilians were killed in a botched-up operation by the Indian Army on December 4 in the Mon district of Nagaland. (ANI)
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday lashed out at the West Bengal government for promoting 'land mafia raj' in the state. Speaking to ANI today, the BJP leader said that the Trinamool Congress government is planning to build a museum there at Presidency Jail in West Bengal where Britishers kept political prisoners including freedom fighter Subhas Chandra Bose lived. "For many years in West Bengal, an important prison is known as Presidency Jail, where Subhas Chandra Bose also lived, existed. The great importance of that place is that there were many freedom fighters. As on date, the country is celebrating the Amrit Kaal Mahotsav in remembrance of such freedom fighters. We are explaining to the people across the country that they should know their your history and in such a time, they are doing this." The BJP leader alleged that the TMC-led state government is planning to build a museum there. "When I did RTI about it, the answer came in vain. The answer came that the government does not know anything about it. The answer came that it is only in the planning stage." Ganguly claimed that trees are being cut off to build a museum there. "The TMC government should give a clarification on what is happening there? No, we have come to hear that the demolition has started. We are very angry about this," she said. She added, "It looks like the land mafia raj has been going on for many years here, this land in one of our jails is being captured due to the mafia rule." (ANI)
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.
"Strongly condemn dastardly terror attack on civilians and CRPF personnel. My deepest condolences to family of martyred HC Vishal Kumar & prayers for early recovery of injured. Our security forces will give a befitting reply to perpetrators of despicable attacks," tweeted the office of Lieutenant Governor's office.

In a series of terrorist attacks in the valley, a Kashmiri Pandit was shot at by terrorists in Shopian.

Earlier, two CRPF jawans suffered injuries in the terrorist attack at Maisuma in Lal Chowk in Srinagar. Later, one jawan, who was injured in the terrorist attack succumbed to his injuries. (ANI)
Feeling neglected in the coalition government of Jharkhand by its senior partner Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, a Congress leader on Monday said that no one should live under the illusion that they can run the government without their support. "No one should be under the illusion that they can run the government alone," said Congress Jharkhand in-charge Avinash Pandey on being asked about the Congress MLA being neglected by the CM. "We are committed to keeping the Jharkhand government stable, but if some government or party works maliciously against Congress, then we will not tolerate it. The sooner Hemant Soren becomes serious about the coalition, the better it will be for the government," said Pandey. Amid the tensions between coalition partners in Jharkhand, Congress has called a meeting in New Delhi of all party leaders associated with Jharkhand. "A total of 25 Jharkhand Congress leaders have been called to Delhi for a meeting on April 5. State Congress president, four Congress Ministers in the Jharkhand government, all former state presidents and the president of some wings have been called to Delhi for a meeting," said Jharkhand Congress chief Rajesh Thakur. Pandey said that this meeting has been called to decide the roadmap for strengthening the party ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The ruling alliance of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM), the Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has 47 legislators in the 81-member assembly. While the JMM has 30 MLAs, the Congress has 18 and the RJD 1 legislator. The Congress has four ministers in the coalition government. (ANI)
The Himachal Pradesh High Court on Monday expressed anguish that despite lapse of six months, not even a single charge sheet has been filed by the CBI in wrongful and illegal disbursement and misappropriation of the Centre-funded Post-Matric Scholarship Scheme. Earlier in the day, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) submitted its seventh status report in the high court. As per the report, the investigation found involvement of 1,176 institutions. Out of 266 private institutions, 28 have been found involved in the alleged scam. CBI counsel said the investigation against 17 institutions is still under progress. At this, the court expressed anguish, saying that a similar situation was reported when the case was listed for hearing on October 20, 2021. It noted that despite lapse of six months, not even a single charge sheet has been filed. Counsel tried to justify such position by contending that CBI has recorded the statements of 214 witnesses, but the court was not satisfied with such justification for not completing the investigation within six months. The division bench comprising Chief Justice Mohammad Rafiq and Justice Jyotsna Rewal Dua passed this order on a writ petition of Shyam Lal of Bilaspur district. The petitioner said Shakti Bhushan, who was appointed by the state government to inquire into misappropriation of the financial scholarships, lodged a first information report in 2018, and the inquiry report revealed that the huge sum of scholarship money was misappropriated and apart from the educational institutions within the state, scores of other educational institutions stationed in other states were also involved in the scam. Meanwhile, the bench granted one more opportunity to the CBI to expeditiously complete the investigation and file the charge sheets before the court of competent jurisdiction. Also, it directed the CBI to file a fresh status report on the next date of hearing on April 20. --IANS vg/vd ( 326 Words) 2022-04-04-19:00:07 (IANS)
Bharatiya Janata Party state president Satish Poonia on Monday termed the Karauli violence as an intelligence failure of the state. He said that there are two possibilities in the matter -- firstly, either the state government had clues about the violence or else it wanted such incidents to happen in the state. He advised the Chief Minister to strengthen security in the state instead of advising the Prime Minister to condemn the violence. Earlier in the day, CM Ashok Gehlot said, "Prime Minister should address the nation and condemn the violence. Let there be rule of law in the country. Today the biggest responsibility lies with the Prime Minister and the Home Minister. They should appeal to establish peace in the country. They should say that violence will not be tolerated," he stated while speaking on the Karauli violence. Replying to the CM's statement, Poonia said, "CM should strengthen security in the state instead of advising PM. Each time on the Hindu New Year, rally-processions are taken out all over Rajasthan and in many parts of the country. This incident happened in Karauli, Rajasthan which seems to be a well-planned event. Earlier to this procession, Section 144 was imposed in Bikaner, Kota and Bhilwara and section144 was also imposed in view of release of 'The Kashmir Files'." He said that in the Karauli incident, the matter was in the knowledge of the government and the government was wanting such incidents to happen to create fear among the people. Poonia who was in Delhi on Monday said that Gehlot adopts a policy of appeasement, in which he is concerned about his vote bank and there is no concern about the safety of the majority of the people. --IANS arc/bg ( 301 Words) 2022-04-04-19:18:05 (IANS)
Attorney General K.K. Venugopal on Monday told the Supreme Court that "tremendous amount of work" has been done by the Central government on creating awareness on fundamental duties to sensitise citizens and students. The AG submitted before a bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and M M Sundresh that the curriculum of schools contains the entire Article 51A with duties, which are taught to them, and debates have been held throughout the country. Responding to the PIL filed by advocate Durga Dutt, he contended that the PIL for enacting a law to enforce fundamental duties is not maintainable at all. "I have an objection to this petition. Tremendous amount of work has been done for the purpose of sensitising people," he said. The bench also noted: "We were also circumspect in issuing the notice and we said that it falls within the domain of political dispensation." Venugopal also added that the President, the Prime Minister, from time to time has addressed this aspect and a one-year awareness drive was also launched. He said the website of the Ministry of Justice has sufficient content in connection with the matter. The bench added that it wanted to understand the limited point whether any steps have been taken pursuant to the judgment in Ranganath Mishra case (2003). Venugopal urged the bench to ask the Central government to file an affidavit as he is appearing as the AG in the matter. A counsel separately representing the Central government sought time from the top court to file response in the matter within four weeks. The top court has scheduled the matter for further hearing in July. On February 21, the Supreme Court had sought the response from the Centre and state governments on a PIL seeking enforcement of fundamental duties set out in Article 51A of the Constitution. The plea said: "The Fundamental Duties are an important tool to protect the unity and integrity of several institutions including the judiciary." It contended that every citizen must learn how to respect the institutions of the country and added there have been cases where fundamental duties have been brazenly flouted by the people including the officers of the law. The plea argued that the need to enforce fundamental duty arises due to a new illegal trend of protest by the protestors in the garb of freedom of speech and expression, by way of blocking of road and rail routes, in order to compel the government to meet their demands. --IANS ss/vd ( 429 Words) 2022-04-04-19:24:02 (IANS)
The Russia-Ukraine war has entered its 40th day. Explosions were heard on Monday in the cities of Kherson and Odesa, in the south, while air raid sirens sounded across the east.

Modi conveyed his best wishes to Bennett for early recovery after his Covid-19 diagnosis. The Prime Minister also expressed his condolences for the loss of lives in the recent terrorist attacks in Israel.

"The leaders had a detailed discussion on recent geo-political developments, including the situation in Ukraine. They also reviewed the ongoing bilateral cooperation initiatives," the Prime Minister's Office said.

Modi also conveyed his eagerness to welcome Bennett in India at an early date.

On the Russia-Ukraine war, India has called for "restraint on all sides" and said that all issues between both the countries can only be resolved through "diplomatic dialogue".

Earlier, Modi had spoken to both Russia President Valdamir Putin and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky in an attempt to resolve the issue through "dialogue".

Modi had also welcomed the ongoing negotiations between Russia and Ukraine and expressed hope that they would lead to a cessation of the conflict.

Similarly, Bennett plays a peacemaker's role in the war and has made numerous calls to both Putin and Zelensky in an attempt to assist the efforts to resolve the conflict,

--IANS sk/arm

( 251 Words)

2022-04-04-19:44:07 (IANS)
Congress' Maharashtra President Nana Patole on Monday accused the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party of allegedly threatening voters with "Enforcement Directorate action" as it faces imminent defeat in the Kolhapur North seat assembly by-elections slated for April 12. He also slammed state BJP President Chandrakant Patil for his statements that some voters were getting money of Rs 1,000 transferred into their account via some online platforms. Warning the voters, Patil said that if they took the money, he would write to the ED to probe who has deposited amounts of Rs 1,000 into their bank accounts and initiate a probe into the matter. Patole said: "Now, Patil is directly threatening voters out of sheer frustration at the BJP's defeat... Will the ED enquire into transactions of Rs 500-Rs 1,000? Will it be probed at the behest of the BJP?" Patil asked the voters not to invite ED action by getting lured with such money transferred to their accounts through an online platform since they know from where the money has come. The BJP has already been targeting its political opponents using the central investigating agencies, and now it has gone to the level of threatening the ordinary voters and commoners with the name of ED, Patole claimed. He again slammed the ED for functioning as if it was a branch of the BJP and termed Patil's threats as "arising out of sheer desperation at losing power in the state to Maha Vikas Aghadi in 2019". Ruling ally and Nationalist Congress Party chief spokesperson Mahesh Tapase dismissed Patil's allegations as baseless and said he was talking such a language as the MVA candidate is romping towards victory in the bypolls. The by-election - necessitated by the death of Congress legislator Chandrakant Jadhav in December 2021 - is contested by his widow and Congress candidate Jayashree Jadhav against BJP's Satyajit Kadam. The MVA allies - Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress have targeted the BJP repeatedly for letting loose central probe agencies to scare and silence political opponents not only in Maharashtra but other non-BJP ruled states in the country. --IANS qn/vd ( 356 Words) 2022-04-04-19:48:06 (IANS)
The state president, all four working presidents, four Ministers in the Jharkhand government from Congress, all former state presidents and presidents of some wings will attend the meeting.

Pande will preside over the meeting. The presence of Rahul Gandhi in the meeting is still not confirmed.

Speaking to ANI on the development, Jharkhand Congress chief Rajesh Thakur termed the meeting a "pre-decided" programme.

"This is a pre-decided program. Recently our incharge Avinash Pande held a meeting in Ranchi with Jharkhand Congress leaders including all former presidents to further strengthen the party at booth levels," he said.

"During the meeting, it was decided to have a detailed meeting with ministers from the president and other important leaders in Delhi. In the meeting responsibilities of the leaders will be fixed," Thakur added.

However, this development has once again fuelled the speculation about the rift between the coalition government in the state. Discussion with respect to the JMM-Congress alliance's Common Minimum Programme (CMP) proposal given by Congress is likely to happen.

Notably, CM Hemant Soren is said to have not responded to the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) proposal sent by the Congress party even after 29 days.

"Our in charge met with the Chief Minister and gave the proposal of Common Minimum Programme proposal to him. The CM has yet not responded on it," Thakur added. (ANI)
According to BSF officials, at around 8.20 pm on Sunday, force personnel noticed the movement of two Pakistani fishing boats and four to five Pakistani fishermen near border pillar No. 1160.

After seeing the BSF patrol party approaching them, the Pakistani fishermen took advantage of the marshy terrain and fled to the Pakistani territory. However, the BSF troopers chased them and seized one Pakistani fishing boat, approximately 100 metres inside the Indian territory.

"The seized boat was thoroughly searched but nothing suspicious was recovered from the boat except some fish, fishing nets and fishing equipment. Intensive search of the area is on," an official said.

Earlier on March 17, the BSF had seized two Pakistani boats in the Sir Creek area in Bhuj.

Similarly, on February 10, the BSF had seized at least 11 Pakistani fishing boats from the creek area of Harami Nala in Bhuj.

--IANS ams/arm

( 188 Words)

2022-04-04-20:00:04 (IANS)
The Karnataka Control of Organised Crimes Act (KCOCA) Special Court awarded life imprisonment to international gangster and fugitive underworld don Bannanje Raja known as the 'threat king' and 7 other accused on Monday in connection with the killing of BJP leader and industrialist of coastal Karnataka, R.N. Nayak. The accused were pronounced guilty earlier by the special court. The court has also directed the authorities to pay Rs 30 lakh compensation to the wife of deceased industrialist Nayak. The court has asked the Superintendent of Police of Uttara Kannada district and the Police Commissioner of Mysuru City to ensure security to the woman and her son who gave evidence against the accused persons. K.G. Puranikamatha, the Special Public Prosecutor, stated after the verdict that the accused should have been given the capital punishment and they would go for an appeal demanding the death penalty in the High Court. Along with Bannanje Raja, the court has sentenced Jagadish Patel, the prime accused in the case from Uttar Pradesh, Abhi Bhandagar from Bengaluru, Ganesh Bhajanthri from Udupi, Mahesh Achangi from Hassan, M.B. Santhosh from Kerala, Jagadish Chandraraj from Bengaluru and Ankit Kumar Kashyap from Uttar Pradesh to life imprisonment. The fifth accused in the case K.M. Ismail from Kerala has been sentenced to 13 years' imprisonment and the court has imposed a fine of Rs 15,000 on him. Bannanje Raja is the 9th accused in the case. He was involved in several serious criminal cases in the coastal districts of Karnataka, Bengaluru and Maharashtra like murder, attempt to murder, kidnappings and extortion. Special Court judge C.M. Joshi pronounced the order. The court had earlier acquitted the 6th accused Rabdin Pichai, 11th accused Mohammad Shabandri, a resident of Bengaluru and 16th accused Anand Ramesh Nayak from Uttara Kannada in the case. The shootout occurred on December 21, 2013 in Ankola in Uttara Kannada district for refusing to shell out Rs 3 crore as protection money. The police had used the KCOCA Act against the accused persons and this was the first case registered under the KCOCA Act in the state. Special Public Prosecutor S.B. Puranik Math and Additional Public Prosecutor Shivaprasad Alva had argued against the accused. Alva had stated that through the judgment the court has sent a message to the society. The police and prosecution have successfully pursued the legal action against the anti-social elements. When asked whether he faced any threats since the case involved gangster Bannanje Raja, he stated that he has to deliver on the responsibilities placed on him by the government. This judgment shows that no one is above the law. The law takes its own course. If the police and prosecution pursue the case unitedly, legal action against any criminal is ensured, he said. Bannanje Raja had made an extortion call and demanded Rs 3 crore protection money from the deceased Nayak. When he refused to pay, the accused had him killed despite police protection. Furthermore, he had called up media houses from a foreign location and claimed that he had got Nayak killed, severely embarrassing the state and central investigation agencies. Various judges had heard the case for over 7 years. More than 210 witnesses recorded their statements and the prosecutors had produced 1,000 pages of documentary proof. The police had filed a charge sheet in 2013, with charges against 16 persons who were associates and sharp shooters of Bannanje Raja. Rajendra Shetty a.k.a Bannanje Raja is involved in 44 serious criminal offences including murder, extortion and kidnapping. The authorities had got an Interpol red corner notice issued against Raja and he was nabbed from Casablanca in Morocco. Later, he was extradited to Karnataka. Raja is an arts graduate and worked as a bus agent in Udupi and Bengaluru. He soon started calling businessmen for ransom and as his crime graph grew he went to Dubai and later settled in Morocco. --IANS mka/bg ( 663 Words) 2022-04-04-20:18:02 (IANS)
The Supreme Court on Monday stayed a Madhya Pradesh High Court order, directing an Arya Samaj organisation that while solemnising marriages, it must comply with the provisions of the Special Marriage Act. Senior advocate Shyam Divan and lawyer Vanshaja Shukla, representing the Madhya Bharat Arya Pratinidhi Sabha, contended that the high court committed an error by transgressing into the domain of legislature by directing that Arya Samaj marriages conducted by the Arya Samaj temples, under the jurisdiction of the petitioner society in MP, will have to solemnised in consonance of the provisions of the Special Marriage Act. The petitioner organization said it has jurisdiction over all Arya Samaj temples in Madhya Pradesh. Counsel argued that the high court wrongly directed that Arya Samaj temples should solemnise the marriages after complying with the provisions of Sections 5, 6, 7 and 8 of the Special Marriage Act, which provide for prerequisite conditions viz, notice of intended marriage, publication of notice, marriage notebook, objection to marriage, and the procedure. A bench of Justices K.M. Joseph and Hrishikesh Roy, after hearing arguments, stayed the Madhya Pradesh High Court order, which directed the organisation to amend its guidelines in accordance with the Act, and also issued notice to the Madhya Pradesh government. The matter originated from a plea filed by an inter-caste couple in the high court in 2020, claiming they got married according as per Arya Samaj tradition, and moved the court seeking direction to the state government to provide them protection. The petitioner organisation denied the couple's claim in the high court and added that the organisation, which helped them marry, was not linked to it. A single bench judge at the high court in December 2020, issued specific directions to the Sabha to amend its guidelines to incorporate sections 5, 6, 7 and 8 of the Special Marriage Act, within a month. This verdict was upheld by a division bench of the high court in December 2021. The plea contended that the high court's direction that marriage certificates will have to be issued by competent authority as per the Special Marriage Act, takes away power from Arya Samaj temples to issue certificates for marriage. "It is submitted that if Arya Samaj temples are solemnising a marriage of two Hindus, in consonance with Sections 5 and 7 of the Hindu Marriage Act, then there is absolutely no requirement to comply with the provisions of the Special Marriage Act," said the plea. "It is accordingly submitted that with respect to Arya Samaj marriages, it's the Hindu Marriage Act and that the Arya Marriage Act that holds the field and not the Special Marriage Act." --IANS ss/vd ( 459 Words) 2022-04-04-21:16:02 (IANS)
The Pakistan Army and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) might carry out a coup d'etat if the political situation in the country becomes more unstable, a defence expert has said. "In the coming days if we see a political or constitutional upheaval in Pakistan, or an increase in instability, then we cannot rule out the possibility of another coup in the country," said defence expert Sanjeev Srivastava. Talking about the events that transpired in Pakistan's National Assembly today, including the rejection of the no-confidence motion followed by the dissolution of the country's National Assembly, Srivastava said, "We have to see how the real rulers of Pakistan, that is the Army and the ISI respond to the events that transpired." "We have seen that whenever there has been political instability in Pakistan or there is any other kind of trouble, the Pakistan Army and the ISI project themselves as the saviour of the people," Srivastava said. Referring to the worsening economic situation in Pakistan, Srivastava said, "The real rulers of Pakistan want to maintain their control over the political system of the country, and in a worsening situation, they may not be able to maintain it, and hence, they might consider ruling the country directly, rather than from the sidelines like now. Therefore, we cannot deny the possibility of a fourth coup d'etat in Pakistan." In a televised address to the nation after the no-confidence motion against him was rejected in the National Assembly on "constitutional grounds", Imran Khan sought to take the Opposition by surprise by stating that he has advised President Arif Alvi to dissolve the National Assembly on a day when he was slated to face the no-confidence motion. Khan had said that he was given three options ahead of the no-trust vote by the "establishment" -- resignation, holding early elections or facing the no-confidence motion. Later today, the Director-General Inter-Services Public Relations (DG ISPR) denied Pakistan Army's role in the events that transpired in the National Assembly today. The military establishment however has denied the claim and said that it did not bring the Opposition's options, and rather it was the federal Government that telephoned the top brass while asking for a meeting to discuss the ongoing political scenario, The News International reported. The Chief of Pakistan Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa and the Directive General (DG) of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) had met Pakistan PM on Wednesday at the request of the ruling government, according to The News International citing sources. Imran Khan has seemingly lost support both in the Lower House of the legislature and the backing of the all-powerful Pakistan Army. Imran Khan received a massive blow when the PTI "lost the majority" in the National Assembly after losing its key ally in the coalition Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan (MQM-P). The MQM on Wednesday announced that it had struck a deal with the opposition Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and would support the no-trust vote in the 342-member National Assembly. (ANI)
This meeting comes amid tension between the two countries over the territorial dispute in the South China Sea (SCS).

Both have been involved in a confrontation over Beijing's intrusion into Manila's Exclusive economic zone. China claims it has the exclusive right to make, and execute its own laws, encapsulated by the creation of artificial islands.

China claims nearly the entire South China Sea based on its so-called 'nine-dash line' that the international court ruled without merit five years ago.

During the meeting between Wang Yi and Locsin on Sunday, the two sides exchanged views on the SCS issue and held that maritime issues should be placed in an appropriate position in bilateral relations.

Wang said China always takes the Philippines as a priority in its neighbourhood diplomacy, and China's good-neighbourly and friendly policy toward the Philippines has maintained continuity and stability, Xinhua News Agency reported.

The two sides should remove disturbances, calmly and properly manage differences and not let them affect the overall situation of China-Philippines relations, Wang said.

China is ready to speed up the construction of key infrastructure projects with the Philippines, and continue to provide COVID-19 vaccine assistance to the Philippines, Wang said. (ANI)
Amid the continuing concern over human rights violations in Afghanistan, a European think tank said that the Taliban has in recent weeks "begun to show its true colours." In a commentary published last week, the Netherland-based think tank stressed that the international community must redirect its attention to Afghanistan, where the situation has become dire. "Whether the hardening of the Taliban's attitude towards the legitimate and basic rights of the Afghan people, especially the women, is aimed at forcing the attention of the West towards it, or whether it is in reaction to the realization that it would never be acceptable to the world in its present avatar is, however, not yet clear," said European Foundation for South Asian Studies (EFSAS). According to the European think tank, people are being forced to sell their kidneys for as little as a couple of thousand dollars just to feed their starving children, and in which women are literally being reduced to rightless adjuncts. "Over the past few days, girls have been banned from going to school beyond the sixth grade, women have been barred from travelling by air unaccompanied by a male relative, and men and women have been ordered to visit public parks only on separate days of the week that have been earmarked for each," EFSAS said. This is in addition to the slew of restrictions imposed on women earlier, whereby they had been banned from many government jobs that they were otherwise fully qualified to do, told what they can and cannot wear, and prevented from travelling alone by road to other cities, the think tank said. Several women's rights activists have been detained. In effect, within a year of seizing Kabul, the Taliban has totally reversed two decades of gains made by Afghanistan's women. Afghan activists told Human Rights Watch (HRW) that the Taliban have increased their surveillance of individuals and groups they accuse of being "opposed to the Islamic Emirate." The threats follow a spate of attacks in which Taliban members have been abducted or killed. The Taliban have previously carried out revenge killings of former government officials and have been responsible for forcibly disappearances or summarily executing former members of the security forces and others they accuse of being their enemies. The statements heighten concerns that Taliban fighters in could use recent attacks as a pretext to commit abuses against perceived critics, including journalists and activists. (ANI)
Belgrade [Serbia], April 4 (ANI/Sputnik): Incumbent Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic has declared his victory in the presidential election, saying that he received around 60 per cent support. "I got 59.9% - 60.1% ...I now won about 2,245,000 votes in the first round," Vucic told his supporters, adding that voting data from about 85 per cent of the polling stations in Serbia had been processed. The president said that his ruling Serbian Progressive Party received over 40 per cent of voter support, which allows it to form a new government. Vucic said that the impact of the Ukraine crisis on the Serbian election results was "enormous" and that the country has "shifted dramatically to the 'right'." The president promised that Serbia will try to maintain friendly, partner relations with Russia and reiterated that Belgrade is neutral with regard to military alliances and that "this policy will continue." More than 6.5 million Serbs were eligible to vote in the Sunday general election. Apart from the president, parliament members and regional assembly members were also elected in dozens of cities, including the capital of Belgrade. Monitors from the Parliamentary Assembly of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (PA CSTO) said on Sunday that the Serbian elections were democratic and were held in compliance with the country's legislation and all international norms for organizing the electoral process. (ANI/Sputnik)
Three separate deadly attacks by Israeli Arabs in just a week in Be'er Sheva, Hadera and Bnei Brak caused fears of an unprecedented "terrorist onslaught" by ISIS sleepers or a repetition of the 2015-2016 "Intifada of Knives". These three attacks, in which 11 Israelis were killed, were the worst in six years. On March 22, a Bedouin named Ghaleb Abu al-Qi'an, from the village of Hura in the Negev drove to a gas station on the Hebron-Be'er Sheba road and stabbed an Israeli to death. Then he drove to a crowded shopping mall in the center of Be'er Sheba and stabbed two more civilians. He got back into the vehicle and rammed into a bicycle killing the rider. Soon after that, the assailant was killed by two civilians who shot him dead. Israeli Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai said the assailant was formerly a high school teacher who was a supporter of ISIS and tried to join its ranks and who was released from jail 18 months ago. In the past, ISIS had actively recruited Bedouins from the Negev. Five days later, on March 27, 2022, Ayman Ighbariah and Ibrahim Ighbariah, two Palestinian cousins, armed with automatic rifles and handguns drove their car in the central Israeli city of Hadera. They exited the vehicle and shot dead two Border Policemen and wounded two others. An undercover Border Police unit that happened to be at the site exchanged fire with the attackers and killed them. Another three people were wounded in the gunfight. Two years ago, Ibrahim had been released from an Israeli prison, after promising that he would not join the ranks of ISIS or any other terrorist organization. ISIS formally claimed responsibility for the assault and described it as a "sacrifice attack". The Palestinian Authority did not publicly comment on the attack, but Hamas, the militant group that controls the Gaza Strip, praised the attack and it called it "a heroic action". In the third attack in seven days, an attacker on 29 March dressed in black started firing an M16 assault rifle in the Bnei Brak, a city near Tel Aviv, killing two Ukrainian men sitting outside a grocery shop, then opening fire at a passing car, killing the Israeli driver and then killed a fourth man. Two police officers intervened and shot the assailant, who fatally wounded one of the Policemen. This time the assailant was not affiliated with ISIS, but with the armed wing of the Fatah Movement, at the helm of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah. Although Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was quick to condemn the Bnei Brak attack, other elements of the Fatah praised the attack and its perpetrator, and celebrations broke out in the Jenin area, processions were held, and locals handed out sweets. At the height of the Islamic State's power, it was estimated that about 50 Israeli Arabs joined ISIS and the other jihadist organizations. Some of them were killed in the fighting, while others returned to Israel and were brought to trial. Israeli Security forces, fearing a repetition of clashes that occurred in the past with Arabs during the holy month of Ramadan, increased their vigilance, stepped up security and carried out several arrests and raids in the West Bank. Last Thursday, Israeli Security Forces raided a refugee camp in Jenin in the occupied West Bank and fought a gun battle, killing two Palestinians and wounding more than a dozen. On the same day, a Palestinian who stabbed and wounded an Israeli man on a bus in the West Bank was killed by a bystander. Of course, Israel is not unaccustomed to violent attacks and gunfights between Palestinians and the Security Forces, however, it is the first time that assailants connected with ISIS carry out terrorist acts in the Jewish state. According to some reports in the Israeli media, security officials believe that in Israel there are between 20 and 30 terrorist ISIL cells. After the recent attacks, 12 supporters of the Islamic State have been arrested. The Police and the Shin Bet security service fear that the attacks on 22 and 27 March may inspire copycat attacks. Already, some Israelis are convinced that the Brei Brak attack was a copycat crime. As journalist Yossi Verter of the Haaretz newspaper points out: "Israel is a country learned in the ways of terror, in all its forms and styles. However, Arab Israelis who murder in the name of the Islamic State idea are an unknown species. Islamic State is a bit like the coronavirus; we're convinced that it's over and then a new variant crops up from a completely unexpected direction... The defense establishment is fighting an invisible enemy: Islamic State operatives in Israel are not united and act almost on their own." But it should be clear that what the Israeli Government is really scared about is if a new "intifada of the knives" breaks out during a confluence this April of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, the Jewish holiday of Passover and the Christian holiday of Easter. If there are Palestinian attacks, they may be followed by revenge killings by outraged Jews, thus perpetuating a cycle of violence. "The Intifada of the Knives" was the third intifada, (the first was called the Intifada of Stones in 1987, the second the al-Aqsa intifada in 2000). It took its name from the fact that 50 Israeli women and men were stabbed between September 2015 and October 2016. Danny Seidemann, an Israeli expert on Jerusalem says: Customarily, the Old City (Jerusalem) is the one location where these three often incompatible faiths cohabit and celebrate in the same limited space. But when tensions soar, as well they may this year, Jerusalem can transform "clash of civilizations" into local politics with global shockwaves." (ANI)
Geneva [Switzerland], April 4 (ANI/Sputnik): Nearly 100 migrants died in the Mediterranean waters after the boat carrying them from Libya got shipwrecked, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said. "More than 90 people have died in another Mediterranean tragedy. Europe has proven its ability to host 4 million refugees from Ukraine generously and effectively. It must now urgently consider how to apply this to other refugees and migrants knocking, in distress, at its doors," Grandi said on Twitter on Sunday. The Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF, or Doctors Without Borders) aid group said on Twitter that the overcrowded boat carrying migrants left Libya "many days ago." "The commercial tanker Alegria 1 rescued the only 4 survivors early this morning. We know from our initial contact with Alegria 1 that the survivors reported being at sea for at least four days on a boat with nearly 100 people on board," MSF said on Twitter on Saturday. The aid group urged coordination centers in Rome and Malta to assign a safe place for surviving migrants. The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor said in its annual report earlier this year that about 1,864 migrants died or disappeared in 2021 compared to 1,401 in 2020. In recent years, the EU has been struggling with an ongoing migration crisis as people try to cross the Mediterranean, fleeing poverty and war in Africa and the Middle East. Numerous organizations and human rights groups have been engaged in the effort to rescue migrants stranded at sea and to bring them to Europe. (ANI/Sputnik)
China under Xi Jinping will be cautious and calibrated in its behaviour towards Taiwan after witnessing the international community's unity and reaction after Russia's war on Ukraine. While similarities between Taiwan and Ukraine cannot be drawn in a linear fashion, strong deductions can be made with regard to China's behavior toward Taiwan and the Russia-Ukraine crisis. The Ukraine-Russia crisis has put forward the best worst-case scenario for Chinese President Xi Jinping to calculate their move for their future plan for Taiwan and could also expect what the international community can do if someone tries to invade in a peaceful life, analysed International Forum for Rights and Security (IFFRAS), Canada based international think tank. "For China, and Xi in particular, the big lessons will be drawn from a careful reading of the international community's reaction toward what Putin calls Russia's "special military operation" aiming to "demilitarize and de-Nazify Ukraine" under the logic that "Russia cannot feel safe, develop and exist with a constant threat emanating from the territory of modern Ukraine." The outcome has so far been international condemnation and boycotts of Russia, and the imposition of economic sanctions by the US and the EU -- resulting in Russia becoming a "pariah" state, International Forum for Rights and Security said. The unity in the international community in imposing punitive sanctions on Russia disturbs China's larger geopolitical plans that there is a growing united front between the US and Europe -- with the crisis in Ukraine bridging the gap, it added. If this united front strengthens, it will not only be a debacle for China's global ambitions; it will also have ramifications for China's plans for Taiwan. Besides, Taiwan will be a much harder bargain for China. At this juncture, Beijing -- given its leanings toward Moscow -- cannot afford to be caught in the crosshairs of the US and Europe. Notably, in 2020, the United States, Department of Defence said that the Chinese military is "likely preparing for a contingency to unify Taiwan with the mainland by force." Even this year, in January, the Chinese Ambassador to US Qin Gang warned the US and said that the US could face "military conflict" with China over the status of Taiwan. China's recent activities have only fuelled speculation about China's plan to invade Taiwan. According to the think-tanker, if this is the case, then the Ukraine-Russia crisis serves as a litmus test for China. Russian President Vladimir Putin's move in Ukraine is important for Xi's next move in Taiwan in two ways: First, Ukraine considers itself a sovereign nation while Putin adopts a "Soviet Union mentality" similarly, to China's "Middle Kingdom mentality" under the "Chinese dream" of "rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" through "reunification with Taiwan." The logic is to get all the foreign territories "back" into their country like Ukraine for Putin and Taiwan for Xi. And the second one is that both the countries with their respective leaders are the chieftain of all things under their autocratic political apparatus. According to the think tank, the Us has adopted a different approach towards Russia, as compared to North Korea, Iran, Cuba and Syria. The country has imposed financial sanctions and restrictions on a majority of Russian oligarchs and state-owned banking and financial service providers, as well as Putin and many of his associates, on the asset control office's Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List. The US Department of Commerce has targeted Russia's oil refining sector. Furthermore, the Us has also imposed a ban on Russian alcoholic beverages, seafood and non-industrial diamonds. To counter Russia, the US even imposed economic sanctions on Belarus which supports Russia. Not the only US but the EU and Japan have also imposed financial restrictions on Russia and Belarus. Russia's "most-favoured-nation" status was revoked on March 11 by the US along with its NATO allies, G7 and the EU, this was considered a major blow to Russia's economy. Notably, the international communities' reaction toward Russia's military operations carries a strong message for China. Ukraine-Russia crisis feared the US that there is the possibility that China could also use the same tactics as Russia and could attack Taiwan. Responding to the question of whether "the US would come to Taiwan's defence in the event of an attack by China, Biden in October answered, "Yes, we have a commitment to do that." Learning from the Ukraine-Russia crisis, China would be cautious to take any further steps against Taiwan, a think tank reported. (ANI)
Brussels [Belgium], April 4 (ANI/Sputnik): The European Union is mulling additional sanctions against Russia and relevant proposals will be discussed on Wednesday, The Financial Times reported. "Further EU sanctions & support are on their way," President of the European Council Charles Michel said on Twitter on Sunday, drawing attention to the events in Bucha. The Financial Times said on Sunday, citing a diplomat with knowledge of the plans, that EU ambassadors are expected to discuss a fresh round of anti-Russia sanctions on Wednesday. The new restrictions could target individuals, but could also include a ban on Russian ships using EU ports. Export and energy supply restrictions are also possible, The Financial Times said. Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said on Sunday that Western countries could introduce french sanctions against Russia over the Bucha incident. The Kiev authorities and the media have been spreading video footage, allegedly from the Ukrainian town of Bucha near Kiev, with the bodies of allegedly dead people lying along the road. The Russian Defense Ministry said that all photos and videos allegedly evidencing the Russian troops' crimes in Bucha are yet another provocation since Russian units completely withdrew from the town as early as March 30. Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said in an interview with Newsweek that the US is deliberately hushing up the fact that after the withdrawal of Russian troops, Ukrainian forces subjected the city of Bucha to artillery fire, which could have led to losses among the civilian population. According to Antonov, the Kiev authorities are shifting the blame on Russia in what concerns Bucha, where not a single civilian was injured while the town was under the control of the Russian forces. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Sunday that the crimes committed by Ukrainian radicals in Bucha are meant to escalate violence and disrupt the Russia-Ukraine peace negotiations. The West scaled up military assistance to Kiev, as well as anti-Russia sanctions, after Moscow launched a special military operation in Ukraine in the early hours of February 24. The move came after the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR) appealed for help in defending themselves against the Kiev forces. Russia said that the aim of its special operation is to demilitarize and "denazify" Ukraine and that only military infrastructure is being targeted. According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the goal is to protect the people of Donbas, "who have been subjected to abuse, genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years." (ANI/Sputnik)
Citing Chinese People's Liberation Army Daily, Global Times reported that the country dispatched more than 2,000 medical staff to Shanghai in one of its biggest-ever public health responses.

The medical staff were drawn from seven medical units affiliated with the army, navy and joint logistics support force. Upon arrival in Shanghai, they quickly carried out medical treatment, nucleic acid testing and other essential tasks, the newspaper said.

According to Global Times, a Chinese Air Force heavy transport Y-20 aircraft was parked at an airport in Shanghai early Monday morning.

Shanghai will conduct city-wide nucleic acid testing on Monday.

The city on Monday reported 425 confirmed and 8,581 asymptomatic domestically transmitted cases, the highest daily increases since the latest outbreak, bringing the total number of COVID-19 infections in the city to over 60,000.

Regions including East China's Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, and Jiangxi provinces, North China's Tianjin, and Central China's Hubei province have also sent medical teams to help Shanghai combat the outbreak, with the total number of medical staff from other regions supporting Shanghai reaching about 10,000 as of Sunday, as per Global Times.

Meanwhile, China reported 1,366 new local COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours.

Last month, China has faced its worst outbreak since the coronavirus was first detected in Wuhan. From March 1 to 24, the country had reported 56,000 infections -- more than the total cases in Wuhan two years ago. (ANI)
Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has revealed that Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Donald Lu had sent a threatening message to him through Pakistan's envoy Ambassador Asad Majeed. "US had sent a threatening message through Pakistan's envoy," Dawn quoting Imran Khan reported. During his remarks that were televised, Imran Khan told them that when the National Security Council (NSC) had condemned the involvement of an external force in no-trust resolution, counting (of votes on the motion) had become "irrelevant". He said that US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Donald Lu had reportedly in a meeting with Ambassador Asad Majeed warned there could be implications if he survived the opposition's no-confidence motion in the National Assembly. According to Dawn, the Prime Minister said he had reports that Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) dissidents had frequented the [US] embassy. "What were the reasons that the people, who have left us, met people of the embassy frequently in the last few days," he said. In an address to the nation last week, Imran Khan had raised a "foreign conspiracy" charge amid the opposition's growing confidence about the no-trust motion against his government. Imran Khan mentioned "United States" in this context and then immediately changed tack to say "foreign country". "On March 8 or before that on March 7, the US sent us a...not the US but a foreign country sent us a message. The reason why I talking about this...for an independent country to receive such a message... this is against me and the country," he had said. The United States has rejected Imran Khan's allegations regarding Washington's role in the alleged "foreign conspiracy" to oust him from power. Imran Khan is the third Prime Minister to face the no-confidence motion in Pakistan. However, Pakistan National Assembly Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri on Sunday had dismissed the no-trust motion against the PTI government, terming it a contradiction of Article 5 of the country's Constitution. Moreover, Pakistan President Arif Alvi dissolved the National Assembly on the proposal of Imran Khan. (ANI)
Claiming that the Cabinet Ministers' resignation is a melodrama, Sri Lankan Opposition leader and Member of Parliament (MP) Sajith Premadasa said the drama is being enacted to fool the people of the country. Speaking to ANI, the Opposition leader said, "The melodrama is being enacted to fool the people of the country. There's no genuine effort to bring sanity to our society and relief to the people. It's an exercise to fool the people." Reiterating opposition parties' demands, Premadasa said, "We're seeking immediate relief for the people. We want to protect the lives of the people and their rights." Sri Lanka is battling a severe economic crisis with food and fuel scarcity affecting a large number of the people in the island nation. The economy has been in a free-fall since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to the crash of tourism. Sri Lanka is also facing a foreign exchange shortage, which has, incidentally, affected its capacity to import food and fuel, leading to the power cuts in the country. The shortage of essential goods forced Sri Lanka to seek assistance from friendly countries. Premadasa said that the government isn't able to address the woes of the people. He said that the people in the country are asking for a change in the government to bring relief from the economic crisis. "The whole country is calling for wholesale change. What we ask for is a pathbreaking wholesale change that brings relief to the country, not relief to politicians. We don't want a game of musical chairs where politicians exchange their positions," he added. On Sunday, 26-member Sri Lankan Cabinet Ministers submitted resignations amid rising public anger against the government over the economic crisis. Sri Lankan Cabinet Ministers have all signed a general letter, consenting to resign paving the way for a new Cabinet to be formed, the English language newspaper Daily Mirror reported. Confirming this development, MP Dinesh Gunawardena said Mahinda Rajapaksa will continue to be in the office and all other members of the Cabinet have tendered their resignations to the PM, News Wire reported. Meanwhile, the 36-hour long curfew that was imposed on Sri Lanka on Saturday evening at 6 pm was lifted on Monday morning at 6 am but the country is still under a state of emergency. Sri Lanka is witnessing protests over the government's handling of the economic crisis. Earlier on Saturday, India delivered 40,000 MT of diesel to Sri Lanka to help ease the power crisis in the island country. As part of the US 500 million oil line of credit (LoC) extended by India to Sri Lanka, this was the fourth consignment of fuel delivered to Colombo. Further, India has supplied around 200,000 MT of fuel to the island nation over the last 50 days. (ANI)
Cabraal's statement comes seven months after he stepped into the role amid the worst economic and political crises in Sri Lanka in decades.

Cabraal announced his decision to step down from the post in a Twitter post today.

"In the context of all Cabinet Ministers resigning, I have today submitted my resignation as Governor, Central Bank, Sri Lanka to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa," tweeted Cabraal today.

Cabraal, a veteran policymaker who was named governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka in September amid a deepening foreign exchange crisis, favoured reducing reliance on foreign debt, especially from the Washington-based International Monetary Fund.

The 26-member Sri Lankan cabinet submitted letters of resignation - but not Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa amid rising public anger against the government over the economic crisis in the country.

They have all signed a general letter, consenting to resign paving the way for a new cabinet to be formed, the English language newspaper Daily Mirror reported.

The country is witnessing protests over the government's handling of the worst economic crisis in decades. Sri Lanka's economy has been in a free fall since the COVID-19 pandemic due to the crash of the tourism sector.

Sri Lanka is presently facing a foreign exchange shortage which has led to a food, fuel, power and gas shortage and has sought the assistance of friendly countries for economic assistance. (ANI)
The issue of enforced disappearances has plagued Pakistan, especially the Balochistan province and according to official data out of 22,600 cases of enforced disappearances, 348 names are from the Kohlu district of the province. There have been several protests across the world to highlight extra-judicial abductions and enforced disappearances by Pakistan's security agencies, especially by the spy agency ISI Inter-services Intelligence that is still continuing in Balochistan for over two decades. The cases of enforced disappearances are normal in Pakistan's Balochistan, as 348 people are reportedly missing from the Kohlu district of the province, according to official data. A list of enforced disappearances having 348 names was issued by Deputy Commissioner Kohlu district in Pakistan's Balochistan province, according to reports. The list reportedly contained 22,600 names of the people who were disappeared from Balochistan. Recently, students had held protests in front of the Press Club in the capital city of Pakistan, seeking the release of fellow student Hafeez Baloch, who was forcibly disappeared by Pakistani intelligence agencies. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) earlier had expressed alarm over reports of a fresh wave of enforced disappearances in Balochistan and the rest of Pakistan, including most recently, Hafeez Baloch, a postgraduate student at the university in Islamabad. In a statement, the commission said Baloch was allegedly disappeared while in Khuzdar, where he volunteers at a local school. Reports suggest that he was abducted in front of his students, the Dawn newspaper reported. Cases of enforced disappearances are endemic to Pakistan and there are reports of a fresh wave of "missing persons" in the country. Highlighting the gross human rights violations by Pakistan and China using the 'brutal military machines', the Baloch, Sindhi and other leaders provided insights about how the respective governments are exploiting the resources of the region and eliminating their communities by way of keeping them undernourished and illiterate. Speaking at the conference at the Press Club in Geneva, Dr Lakhumal Luhana, General Secretary of the World Sindhi Congress (WSC) said that during the partition in 1947, Sindh came to Pakistan and that was the start of a "very darkest era". Sindh, according to the official figures, provides 70 per cent of the resources of the wealth of the revenue of Pakistan. However, the situation is such that 7 million children under the age of 10 are out of education, he said. Luhana further said that the real figures are that 67 per cent of girls are out of education. About 80 per cent of the schools don't have water or sanitation facilities. Experts believe that the missing persons may be dead, their mutilated bodies dumped into ditches. They may be interned, locked in some detention centre of dubious legality. (ANI)
Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has invited all political parties in the country to accept ministerial portfolios and work together to find a solution to the national crisis. In a letter, the President said that the current crisis was the result of several economic and global concerns and that a solution needs to be found within the democratic process of the country. As one of the leading democracies in Asia, it needs to be addressed within the framework of democracy itself, the letter stated, adding that "together we must work together in the national interest for benefit of citizens and future generations." Sri Lanka is battling a severe economic crisis with food and fuel scarcity affecting a large number of the people in the island nation. The economy has been in a free-fall since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to a crash in the tourism sector. On Sunday, 26 Sri Lankan Cabinet Ministers resigned en masse from their positions amid rising public anger against the government over the economic crisis. All 26 of them signed a general letter, consenting to resign paving the way for a new Cabinet to be formed, the English language newspaper Daily Mirror reported. Mahinda Rajapaksa will continue to be in the office and all other members of the Cabinet have tendered their resignations to the PM, News Wire reported. Meanwhile, a 36-hour long curfew that was imposed on Sri Lanka on Saturday evening at 6 pm was lifted on Monday morning at 6 am but the country is still under a state of emergency. The country's government on Saturday blocked access to social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp and YouTube, but lifted the ban on Sunday afternoon after the PM's son Namal Rajapaksa spoke against it. Earlier on Saturday, India delivered 40,000 MT of diesel to Sri Lanka to help ease the power crisis in the island country. As part of the US 500 million oil line of credit (LoC) extended by India to Sri Lanka, this was the fourth consignment of fuel delivered to Colombo. Further, India has supplied around 200,000 MT of fuel to the island nation over the last 50 days. (ANI)
"On the first day of the visit, General MM Naravane #COAS laid a wreath at #Kranji War Memorial, #Singapore and paid tributes to the soldiers who laid down their lives during the 2nd World War in #Singapore," Indian Army tweeted on Monday.

General MM Naravane has proceeded on a three-day (April 4 to 6) visit to Singapore.

The Army Chief is also scheduled to call on with the Minister of Defence, Chief of Singapore Army and other senior dignitaries where he will discuss avenues for enhancing India-Singapore defence relations.

The COAS will also visit the Infantry Gunnery Tactical Simulation and Wargame Centre, Regional HADR Coordination Centre, Info Fusion Centre and the Changi Naval Base. (ANI)
People in Sri Lanka expressed uncertainty and demanded a new leader in the country amid the ongoing political instability and economic crisis in the country. Charles, a shopkeeper in Colombo, demanded a new leader in the country. He said, "We need a proper leader in our country. We are not happy with the ruling government." He further said that the ruling government doesn't care about them. A lady, who was dropping her child off in Methodist college (school), said over protest that the situation is very unpredictable and she doesn't know will she be able to find the transport to come and pick her up from the school or not. On Thursday, several protestors gathered outside the residence of Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa as the island nation faces an unprecedented economic crisis. Amidst the unrest, after protests, Sri Lanka imposed a curfew on Saturday from 6 pm in accordance with the powers vested in the President under the provisions of the Public Security Ordinance. After a 36-hours long curfew, Sri Lanka lifted the curfew on Monday morning at 6 am but the country is still under the effect of a state of emergency. The country is witnessing protests over the government's handling of the worst economic crisis in decades. Sri Lanka is battling a severe economic crisis with food and fuel scarcity affecting a large number of the people in the island nation. The economy has been in a free-fall since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to the crush of tourism. Sri Lanka is also facing a foreign exchange shortage, which has, incidentally, affected its capacity to import food and fuel, leading to the power cuts in the country. The shortage of essential goods forced Sri Lanka to seek assistance from friendly countries. (ANI)
Refering to Imran Khan's claim of threat by the US, Pakistan Muslim League (N) leader Shahbaz Sharif on Monday said that a no-confidence motion was submitted on March 8 and if there was a threat why wasn't it raised before March 24. Addressing a press conference today the PML-N chief said that Imran Khan along with his party members has blatantly challenged the Constitution of Pakistan. "Constitution was violated yesterday by Imran Khan Niazi and his group. Motion (No-Confidence) was submitted on March 8, if some message had come from the US while they claim that it was received on March 7, why did they not raise it on March 24?" he said. Reacting to the dissolution of the National Assembly and rejection of the no-confidence motion, he said that Khan has imposed a "civil martial law" in the country. He was accompanied by Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Chairperson Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) leader Asad Mehmood, Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan MQM-(P) convener Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, Balochistan National Party, Mengal (BNP-M) chief Akhtar Mengal and others in Islamabad. "In violation of the court's orders, the (then) Prime Minister and the President have taken extra-Constitutional steps," he said during the presser. The PML-N leader also said that it is true that no one could challenge the proceedings of the House but if the Constitution is violated there then will it not be protected? Referring to the dramatic turn of events in the Lower House yesterday, plunging the country into a Constitutional crisis, he said Fawad Chaudhry and the Speaker read out the written letters. The National Assembly of Pakistan was dissolved on Sunday. In a development that is likely to worsen the political crisis in the country, Pakistan President Arif Alvi has said that Imran Khan will continue as Prime Minister till the appointment of a caretaker PM under Article 224 A of the Pakistan Constitution. "Mr. Imran Ahmad Khan Niazi, shall continue as Prime Minister till the appointment of caretaker Prime Minister under Article 224 A (4) of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan," Alvi said in a tweet. This comes after Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan was de-notified as the Prime Minister of Pakistan. A statement was issued in this regard from the country's Cabinet Division after the dissolution of the National Assembly, Geo News reported. The de-notification comes after the Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly (NA) Qasim Suri dismissed the no-confidence motion against the PTI chairman and termed it "unconstitutional". Pakistan's Opposition parties have been contemplating their actions going forward after the no-confidence motion against Imran Khan was rejected and the National Assembly was dissolved. (ANI)
The CJP's remarks came as a five-member larger bench of the Supreme Court today resumed hearing into a suo-moto notice over National Assembly Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri dismissing the no-trust motion on Sunday, reported ARY News.

While noting that the court will only look into the proceedings of the National Assembly today, the chief justice said that they would issue an appropriate order on the matter today.

"We will not be listening to any other matter today," the media outlet quoted him as saying.

During his arguments, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) counsel stressed that the speaker has violated his mandate by dismissing the no-trust motion and pushing the country towards a constitutional crisis.

Meanwhile, Pakistan President Arif Alvi on Sunday dissolved the National Assembly on the proposal of Prime Minister Imran Khan, with the elections likely to be held in the next 90 days.

Further, Imran Khan has summoned a meeting of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Parliamentary Board on Tuesday to discuss ticket distribution in the next election, the media outlet reported citing sources. (ANI)
The meeting, which will be chaired by Khan, comes after President Arif Alvi dissolved the National Assembly on Sunday, reported ARY News.

Notably, while the federal cabinet stands dissolved, Imran Khan will continue to perform his duties as the prime minister, said Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry on Twitter.

The development comes as National Assembly Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri, who was chairing Sunday's session, dismissed the no-confidence motion against the Imran Khan-led government, terming it a contradiction of Article 5 of the Constitution.

Following this, Imran Khan in his address to the nation called the no-trust motion against him a 'foreign agenda'.

"It was a foreign agenda, I want to tell the people don't get disturbed the God is looking over the nation," the media outlet quoted him as saying.

"The Speaker has decided to use his authority. I have sent advice to the President for dissolution of the assemblies," he added.

In line with Khan's proposal, President Alvi also dissolved the National Assembly on Sunday with the elections likely to be held in the next 90 days. (ANI)
Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami met the legislators and coordinators of the Parliamentary Committee of Nepal and discussed multiple issues to cement ties. He, while talking to ANI after meeting the delegation of Nepal, said, "Nepal's delegation has come to the Forest Department. Many committees have come and have done a lot of studies. They have shared their experience. They also feel that today, a new India is being formed under the leadership of Modi Ji and the respect for India has risen globally. Nepal is our neighbour and we share a bread-daughter relationship that has evolved over generations. We have the border from Dharchula to Udham Singh Nagar. Nepal's delegation was led by Bharat Bahadur Khadka who is also an MLA of Nepal. He said that both Nepal and India share a strong political and cultural relationship for centuries. Earlier, on Friday, Nepal Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba arrived in India along with his wife Arzu Deuba. On his first day of the three-day official visit, he met Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) President JP Nadda at the party headquarters in Delhi, and then he went on to meet External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Foreign Secretary Harsh Shringla. On the second day, Deuba met PM Modi where both the Prime Ministers jointly launched multiple projects which are likely to boost connectivity between the two countries while they expressed hope that the key initiatives being taken by them would take India-Nepal relations to new heights. On the last day of his official visit, he came to Varanasi to offer prayer at the famous Kaal Bhairav temple and Kashi Vishwanath temple. (ANI)
"A pleasure to speak yesterday with @KarzaiH. We exchanged views re: the Afghan people's desire to see girls return to secondary school soonest, and the need for a national consultative process to determine country's future," West tweeted.

Earlier, West said he was hopeful that the Taliban will reverse their decision over banning teenage girls from going to schools and allowing them to get an education.

He also accused the Taliban of breaching the promises they had made to the Afghan people, as per Khaama Press.

The Taliban regime issued a decree banning female students above grade six from attending classes. The girls were further told to stay home until the Islamic Emirate announces its next decision.

The decision by the Islamic Emirate has drawn severe backlash across the world with the Foreign Ministers of Canada, France, Italy, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America condemning the Taliban's decision to deny so many Afghan girls the opportunity to finally go back to school. (ANI)
That the self-fabricated letter from a foreign country containing alleged threats against Imran Khan was an attempt to escape from accountability, The News International quoted Rehman as saying during his talks with a private TV channel on Sunday.

Terming the rejection of the no-confidence motion in the National Assembly "unconstitutional", the PDM chief said that the deputy speaker was not authorised to give this ruling.

"They came into power via unconstitutional means and are now using unconstitutional tactics instead of facing defeat," the media outlet quoted him as saying.

Meanwhile, Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader Chaudhry Qamar Zaman Kaira said that the premier not relinquishing his power shows his fascist tendency. "What kind of 'system of anarchy' Imran Khan wants to bring to Pakistan," he questioned.

"Imran Khan is like a spoiled child who, if not grasped by the ear and scolded, will damage the system," the media outlet quoted him as saying.

Notably, National Assembly Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri, who was chairing Sunday's session, dismissed the no-confidence motion against the Imran Khan-led government, terming it a contradiction of Article 5 of the Constitution.

Further, Pakistan President Arif Alvi also dissolved the National Assembly on the proposal of Imran Khan, with the elections likely to be held in the next 90 days. (ANI)
Australian High Commissioner to India Barry O'Farrell praised the Australia-India Economic Cooperation and Trade Agreement that was signed between both countries saying that the trade pact gives an opportunity to properly harness the complementary nature of both economies in areas such as critical minerals, professional services, education and tourism. While delivering the 2022 Australia-India Institute Oration in New Delhi, the envoy added, "Trade and investment underpin state and national economies, they determine the living standards our citizens enjoy and they provide the agency for government to deliver on strategic goals." He emphasized that a development of economic cooperation and a trade agreement between both countries is significant for the India-Australia relationship. "The trade agreement between India and Australia gives us an opportunity to properly harness the complementary nature of our economies in areas such as critical minerals, professional services, education and tourism," he said. He noted that Indian consumers and businesses will benefit from the immediate elimination of tariffs on 85 per cent of Australian goods exports to India. "While Australian consumers will benefit from almost 96 per cent of Indian goods imports entering Australia duty-free," he continued. The envoy said that this is an important step and a real testament to the great strength of the relationship. He stressed that countries remain committed to working towards a full Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement. (ANI)
During his visit, he was briefed on the cultural and historical significance of the place.

"General MM Naravane #COAS visited the Battle Box Bunker at Fort Canning, #Singapore & was briefed on the cultural & historical significance of the place. The Bunker was used as an emergency, bomb-proof Command Centre during World War II," tweeted Indian Army on Monday.

Earlier in the day, the Army Chief also laid a wreath at Kranji War Memorial in Singapore and paid tributes to the soldiers who laid down their lives during the Second World War in Singapore.

General MM Naravane is on a three-day (April 4 to 6) visit to Singapore.

The Army Chief is also scheduled to call on with the Minister of Defence, Chief of Singapore Army and other senior dignitaries where he will discuss avenues for enhancing India-Singapore defence relations.

The COAS will also visit the Infantry Gunnery Tactical Simulation and Wargame Centre, Regional HADR Coordination Centre, Info Fusion Centre and the Changi Naval Base. (ANI)
Minister of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality, Henk Staghouwer, received President Kovind at Airport.

Earlier on Wednesday, MEA's joint secretary Rudrendra Tandon said President Kovind, during the visit, will hold discussions with His Royal Majesties and PM Mark Rutte.

He will also host a cultural performance there to be graced by King Willem -Alexander and Queen Maxima, Tandon said.

This visit comes after President Kovind visited Turkmenistan.

During his visit, President Kovind met Turkmenistan President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow. Both sides also signed four MoUs in the field of Culture and Art, Disaster Management, Youth matters and Financial intelligence, Sanjay Verma, Secretary (West) informed.

Kovind's visit to Turkmenistan is not only the first visit by an Indian President to the country but this is also the first visit hosted by the newly elected President of Turkmenistan. (ANI)
The development came during a conversation between the two leaders, wherein both also discussed recent global events and reviewed India-Israel cooperation in various areas.

"Was happy to speak with PM @naftalibennett and to know that he is recovering well. We discussed recent global events, and also reviewed India-Israel cooperation in various areas. I look forward to welcoming him in India very soon to continue our discussions," tweeted PM Modi.

Naftali Bennett had tested positive for COVID-19 on March 28.

Following this, the visit of the Israeli PM to India, which was scheduled from April 3 to 5, was postponed and will be rescheduled, Muhamed Heib, informed the spokesperson of the Israel Embassy in India.

Israel had earlier announced Bennett's first India visit after assuming office as Prime Minister last year.

The visit was scheduled on the occasion of the commemoration of 30 years of diplomatic relations between India and Israel, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had said in an official statement.Meanwhile, Israel is experiencing a modest increase in COVID-19 infections as omicron spreads there as in many other countries. Bennett and nearly half of Israel have received three vaccinations, according to the Washington Post. (ANI)
Sagara kariyawasam, MP of the ruling party Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), on Monday praised India for always extending its support to the island nation and added that it seeks India's continuous support amid the deepening economic crisis. "India is our neighbour and it has always helped us. This time also, India is helping us and we are depending on it," he added. On seeking help from India, the MP refuted that Sri Lanka does not seek army assistance and it is not required adding that "We have been given vast support from India and we need support from India to support our economy." After the all-party meeting with President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the MP exuded confidence saying "the government is going to survive. We met the ruling party MPs. It was a successful meeting everyone has expressed their own opinion. Rajapaksa is not going to resign." Replying to the question of whether the opposition leaders denied joining the all-party government, he replied, "The formation of the government is up to the president of Sri Lanka. We have the majority in the parliament." When asked about the anger in the people on the street, he said, "we have foreign exchange issues in the country. We have to find a sustainable solution to this problem. We have to bring proper development to the country. We are doing the best to do that." (ANI)
Sri Lankans on Monday staged a protest at Independence Square in Colombo against the government of Sri Lanka and voiced their demand for the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Fatima, one of the protestors and a writer said, "We are protesting as we want our President to step down. Our economy has collapsed. We have no food to eat. We do not have cash. We do not have power." "The economy has crashed now. We want our president to return all the money from Rajapaksa family. These families have stolen from us and we want the Rajapaksa family to go away from the country. Actually, not only from the country, they should be behind the bars," she added. Moreover, Vijanta Mishra, a law student while expressing her thoughts on the current situation said, "We have been fed up. Since they came to power, they have not given anything except failed promises. Earlier, they told us that they will fulfill the promises in the country. Nothing has been done." "We are facing an economic crisis. No fuel is there in the country. There is no security in the country. No basic human rights. There are no options for them to go away to their home or else there will be no home in the country," she added. Sri Lanka is currently battling a deep economic crisis. On Sunday, 26 Sri Lankan Cabinet Ministers resigned en masse from their positions amid rising public anger against the government over the economic crisis. All 26 of them signed a general letter, consenting to resign paving the way for a new Cabinet to be formed. Mahinda Rajapaksa will continue to be in the office and all other members of the Cabinet have tendered their resignations to the PM. The country's government on Saturday blocked access to social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp and YouTube, but lifted the ban on Sunday afternoon after the PM's son Namal Rajapaksa spoke against it. (ANI)
Minister of State for External Affairs Dr Rajkumar Ranjan on Monday said that India is providing food and fuel to Sri Lanka to help them cope with the ongoing economic crisis in the Island Nation. "Indian principles have always been to help others. The situation is very bad in Sri Lanka. There may be several factors but on humanitarian grounds, we are giving food, and fuel to at least cope up with some of the issues faced by the people of Sri Lanka," said the MoS. On Sunday, 26 Sri Lankan Cabinet Ministers resigned en masse from their positions amid rising public anger against the government over the economic crisis. Following the mass resignation of his Cabinet ministers, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Monday named at least four ministers, to maintain legitimacy and stability of Parliament and other functions of the country until a full Cabinet is appointed, even as he asked opposition members to join a unity government in the face of protests against an economic crisis. The country's government on Saturday blocked access to social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp and YouTube, but lifted the ban on Sunday afternoon after the PM's son Namal Rajapaksa spoke against it. (ANI)
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Monday spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy about the atrocities in Bucha and elsewhere in Ukraine. "This afternoon I spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on the dreadful murders that have been uncovered in Bucha and other areas from which Russian troops have recently left," European Commission President said in a statement. European Commission President said that she has assured him of the European Commission's full support in these terrible times. "The harrowing images cannot and will not be left unanswered." "The perpetrators of these heinous crimes must not go unpunished. We agreed to ensure close coordination between us," the statement said. "The EU has set up a Joint Investigation Team with Ukraine to collect evidence and investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity. The EU is ready to reinforce this effort by sending investigation teams on the ground to support the Ukrainian Prosecution Services. Eurojust and Europol are ready to assist," read the statement. She said, "a global response is necessary. There are ongoing talks between Eurojust and the International Criminal Court to join forces and for the Court to be part of the Joint Investigation Team. Such a coordinated approach from the Ukrainian authorities, the EU, its Member States and agencies, and the International Criminal Court will allow for the evidence to be collected, analysed and processed in the most complete and effective way possible." "I have tasked Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders to follow up and take contact with the Ukrainian Prosecutor General. The Commission will provide all the necessary technical and financial support to all EU-led investigations," the statement added. Russian forces launched military operations in Ukraine on February 24, three days after Moscow recognized Ukraine's breakaway regions - Donetsk and Luhansk - as independent entities. Several countries including the UK, the US, Canada, and the European Union have condemned Russia's military operations in Ukraine and imposed sanctions on Moscow. These countries have also promised to help Ukraine with military aid to fight Russia. (ANI)
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Monday spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy about the atrocious murder of civilians in Bucha and elsewhere in Ukraine. "This afternoon I spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on the dreadful murders that have been uncovered in Bucha and other areas from which Russian troops have recently left," European Commission President said in a statement. European Commission President said that she has assured him of the European Commission's full support in these terrible times. "The harrowing images cannot and will not be left unanswered." "The perpetrators of these heinous crimes must not go unpunished. We agreed to ensure close coordination between us," the statement said. "The EU has set up a Joint Investigation Team with Ukraine to collect evidence and investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity. The EU is ready to reinforce this effort by sending investigation teams on the ground to support the Ukrainian Prosecution Services. Eurojust and Europol are ready to assist," read the statement. She said, "a global response is necessary. There are ongoing talks between Eurojust and the International Criminal Court to join forces and for the Court to be part of the Joint Investigation Team. Such a coordinated approach from the Ukrainian authorities, the EU, its Member States and agencies, and the International Criminal Court will allow for the evidence to be collected, analysed and processed in the most complete and effective way possible." "I have tasked Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders to follow up and take contact with the Ukrainian Prosecutor General. The Commission will provide all the necessary technical and financial support to all EU-led investigations," the statement added. Russian forces launched military operations in Ukraine on February 24, three days after Moscow recognized Ukraine's breakaway regions - Donetsk and Luhansk - as independent entities. Several countries including the UK, the US, Canada, and the European Union have condemned Russia's military operations in Ukraine and imposed sanctions on Moscow. These countries have also promised to help Ukraine with military aid to fight Russia. (ANI)
Berlin [Germany], April 4 (ANI/Sputnik): Work on reducing energy imports from Russia continues, there has been progress in recent weeks, it was possible to significantly reduce the volume of supplies, German Economy Minister Robert Habeck said. "We have been working towards independence from Russia in gas imports since I became a minister. We have been doing this in relation to coal, oil and gas. We have managed to significantly reduce imports in a few [last] weeks, and we will continue to do so," Habeck told reporters. He added that reducing dependence on Russian raw material imports was a matter of "national security" for Germany. (ANI/Sputnik)
Condemning Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid's visit to Damascus Gate in the Old City of East Jerusalem on Sunday, Nabil Abu Rudeineh said in a statement that this visit is "irresponsible."

"The ongoing behaviour of the Israeli army and police and the actions of the Israeli settlers are provocative," Abu Rudeineh added.

The continued Israeli escalation in East Jerusalem and the Israeli settlers' assaults on Al-Aqsa Mosque are "a clear and blatant violation that proves Israel's lack of commitment to the understandings and the signed agreements," the spokesman noted.

On Sunday night, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said in a statement that 19 Palestinians were injured by Israeli police during clashes outside Damascus Gate in East Jerusalem following Lapid's visit.

In the 1967 Middle East war, Israel occupied the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, which are all claimed by the Palestinians, and has controlled or besieged them ever since.

Since then, the Palestinians have been seeking self-determination in a bid to establish an independent state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. (ANI/Xinhua)
Amid the ongoing unrest in the island nation following the economic crisis, several protestors on Monday gathered outside the residence of Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa. "Protest outside Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa's residence on Wijerama Road, Colombo 07," Daily Mirror reported. Earlier today, Sri Lankans also protested at Independence Square in Colombo against the government of Sri Lanka and voiced their demand for the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Fatima, one of the protestors and a writer said, "We are protesting as we want our President to step down. Our economy has collapsed. We have no food to eat. We do not have cash. We do not have power." "The economy has crashed now. We want our president to return all the money from Rajapaksa family. These families have stolen from us and we want the Rajapaksa family to go away from the country. Actually, not only from the country, they should be behind the bars," she added. Moreover, Vijanta Mishra, a law student while expressing her thoughts on the current situation said, "We have been fed up. Since they came to power, they have not given anything except failed promises. Earlier, they told us that they will fulfill the promises in the country. Nothing has been done." "We are facing an economic crisis. No fuel is there in the country. There is no security in the country. No basic human rights. There are no options for them to go away to their home or else there will be no home in the country," she added. Sri Lanka is currently battling a deep economic crisis. On Sunday, 26 Sri Lankan Cabinet Ministers resigned en masse from their positions amid rising public anger against the government over the economic crisis. All 26 of them signed a general letter, consenting to resign paving the way for a new Cabinet to be formed. Mahinda Rajapaksa will continue to be in the office and all other members of the Cabinet have tendered their resignations to the PM. The country's government on Saturday blocked access to social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp and YouTube, but lifted the ban on Sunday afternoon after the PM's son Namal Rajapaksa spoke against it. (ANI)
In an online conversation on the future of Pakistan, Siegfried O. Wolf, Director of Research at South Asia Democratic Forum (SADF), said that political instability in Pakistan is endemic. South Asia Democratic Forum (SADF), a Brussels-based think tank, held an online session on the future of Pakistan and the human rights situation in the country, moderated by SADF's director Paulo Casaca. The conversation was focused on the human rights situation in the country and several complementary sides to the problem were addressed. Willy Fautre, Director and Co-Founder of 'Human Rights without Frontiers' (HRWF), had many concise numbers and facts to share on the situation in Pakistan and called it a 'grim' situation. He noted that Pakistan restains freedom of speech and has many unjustified restrictions. Among other issues, he pointed out that violent attacks on freedom of religion and on all minorities; the Ahmadi Muslim minority for instance which is banned, faces violence and jail. It was noted that Pakistan's 4,600 death row prisoners are mostly from marginalized sectors of society. A generalized lack of protection against all sorts of injustice and violence, from anonymous beatings to extrajudicial killings to law-enforced death row sentences linked to blasphemy laws, was also discussed. Tabassum Yousaf, a Karachi-based lawyer, defended the rights of minorities, children, and victims of various forms of discrimination. "The problem is that laws and mechanisms are either not enforced at all or enforced in such a way that victims of discrimination are not protected," the lawyer said adding, "It is hard to imagine the levels of injustice, violence, and indeed terror faced by minorities in Pakistan, namely female members of minority religions who are victims of kidnappings and forced marriages." Shahid Mobeen, founder of the 'Association of Pakistani Christians in Italy noted, "Islamabad serves the world with some of the most horrifying examples of Christianophobia and antisemitism while daring to accuse others of Islamophobia." "Islamabad's policies have done much to contribute to the type of religious extremism that can foster Islamophobia in less well-informed sections of the non-Muslim world," he concluded. (ANI)
Dar es Salaam [Tanzania], April 4 (ANI/Xinhua): At least six people were killed and 25 others were injured on Sunday in two separate road accidents in central Tanzania, police said on Monday. In one of the accidents, four people were killed and 19 others were injured on Sunday at 4:30 p.m. local time after a bus in which they were travelling collided head-on with a truck at Chamwino district in Dodoma region, said Onesmo Lyanga, the Dodoma regional police commander. Lyanga told a news conference in the capital Dodoma that the accident occurred along the Dodoma-Dar es Salaam highway, adding that the bus was plying from the commercial capital Dar es Salaam to Geita region in northwestern Tanzania. He said the collision occurred after the driver of the truck had attempted to overtake several cars and failed to control the truck. Lyanga said two people were killed in the second road accident and six others were injured when their bus overturned on the Mpwapwa and Kongwa districts road junction. He said the bus overturned on Sunday at 8:30 a.m. local time after its breaks failed to function.Lyanga said the injured persons from both accidents were rushed to hospitals for treatment. (ANI/Xinhua)
New York [US], April 4 (ANI/Sputnik): The United Nations has received no request from the US to remove Russia from the Human Rights Council, Paulina Kubiak, spokeswoman for the General Assembly president, said on Monday. "No, there is no request," Kubiak told reporters. Earlier in the day, US envoy to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said that Washington will push to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council. Over the weekend, the Ukrainian authorities and Western media distributed video allegedly showing the bodies of dead civilians strewn across Bucha and accused the Russian forces, which withdrew from the town on March 30, of the killings. The Russian Defense Ministry said the footage was a staged provocation and that no civilians were killed at the time the Russian forces controlled Bucha. (ANI/Sputnik)
"Russia is drawing from the playbook it used for Crimea & Aleppo: forced to defend the indefensible (here, the Bucha atrocities), Russia is calling a @UN Security Council meeting so it can feign outrage & call for accountability," tweeted US Agency for International Development (USAID) chief, Samantha Power, adding that "nobody is buying it".

The development comes after Russia on Sunday (local time) called for a UNSC meeting to address the alleged killings of Ukrainian civilians in Bucha, a town outside Kyiv.

"In the light of heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in #Bucha Russia requested a meeting of UN #SecurityCouncil on Monday April 4," Russia's deputy ambassador to the United Nations Dmitry Polyanskiy tweeted on Sunday (local time).

Notably, the move came after photos and video footage showed civilians' bodies strewn across the streets in Bucha. Reacting to this, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said "this is genocide."

Moreover, US President Joe Biden on Monday called the atrocities allegedly committed by Russia in Bucha, Ukraine, a "war crime" adding that Russian President Vladimir Putin is a "war criminal".

While the European Union also condemned the killings, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged on Sunday to conduct an independent probe of the killing of civilians in Bucha.

However, the Russian Defence Ministry has refuted the claims saying it is 'yet another provocation', reported Sputnik.

Notably, UN authorities are yet to announce if a Security Council meeting will take place as per Russia's request. (ANI)
Seoul [South Korea], April 4 (ANI/Sputnik): Ukrainians of Korean origin or family members of those who are on a long-term stay in South Korea will be eligible for a special travel document if they do not have passports to apply for a visa, the South Korean foreign ministry said on Monday. On March 9, South Korea simplified the visa application process for ethnic Koreans from Ukraine and families of its Ukrainian residents, but they would still need a passport to apply. Eligible family members include spouses, minors, parents, siblings and grandparents. "In light of the situation in Ukraine, the South Korean government decided to issue special entry permits to Ukrainians (ethnic Koreans and families of long-term residents in the Republic of Korea) who, during the process of urgent evacuation, could not obtain a passport and cannot apply for the special humanitarian entry measure enacted by our government to enable them to enter the country," the ministry said. The simplified procedure granted those Ukrainians and ethnic Koreans from Ukraine who have previously received a South Korean visa the right to receive exactly the same visa without additional documents and free of charge. Those who visit South Korea for the first time will receive a 90 day stay permit. On February 28, the South Korean government assigned a special humanitarian status to the Ukrainians living in the country, allowing them to remain in South Korea after the expiration of their legal stay. On February 24, Russia launched a military operation in Ukraine after the breakaway republics of Donetsk and Luhansk appealed for help in defending themselves against Ukrainian provocations. In response to Russia's operation, Western countries have rolled out a comprehensive sanctions campaign against Moscow. (ANI/Sputnik)
Amid the ongoing unrest in Sri Lanka following the economic crisis, the anti-government protests continue to take place in the island nation, demanding solutions to the current economic crisis. The protest continues across the island even after the entire cabinet of ministers resigned on Sunday and the beleaguered President Gotabaya Rajapaksa invited all political parties to join him to find solutions to the crisis, Colombo Page reported. Masses held protests in front of the houses of several former ministers today. A group of protesters in Kalutara also came in front of the Kalutara Public Meeting Office of former Minister Rohitha Abeygunawardena. The police used tear gas to disperse them, according to Colombo Page. It further reported that police also launched tear gas to disperse the protest in front of the Prime Minister's residence Carlton House in Tangalle. According to Colombo Page, police also used tear gas to disperse a large group of people demonstrating in front of former Energy Minister Gamini Lokuge's house. The rioters had set fire to a large advertisement in front of Lokuge's house and later pelted stones at the house. At that moment, tear gas was used to disperse the crowd. A protest was also held today in front of the house of former Minister Chamal Rajapaksa in Debarawewa. Another group staged a protest in front of former Minister Janaka Bandara Tennakoon's house in Dambulla demanding a solution to the crisis facing the country, Colombo page reported. People had organized a number of protests in Colombo at Independence Square, Lipton Roundabout, and other areas. The island nation is facing an unprecedented economic crisis. Sri Lanka's economy has been in a free fall since the COVID-19 pandemic due to the crash of the tourism sector. Sri Lanka is presently facing a foreign exchange shortage which has led to a food, fuel, power and gas shortage and has sought the assistance of friendly countries for economic assistance. Sri Lanka is witnessing at least 13-hour daily power cuts. Sri Lanka's currency has been also devalued by almost SLR 90 against the US dollar since March 8. (ANI)
With the aim to retain his power, Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has worked divisions in the key institutional leadership like Army to support his "coup". The plan also includes ensuring support from the mainstream media as well as his troll army. Making the situation unpredictable and fearful is the possible division within the powerful army, with one side, led by former ISI chief, Lt. General Faiz Hameed, who is currently Corps Commander, Peshawar. Hameed is said to be close to Imran Khan and has reportedly been plotting against his chief, General Javed Bajwa. In fact, it was Hameed who was instrumental in bringing Imran Khan to Islamabad and had supported his protege through thick and thin. It is said that Lt. General Hameed and other senior commanders miffed at Bajwa for pulling the rug under Imran Khan were waiting in the wing to help the premier escape guillotine. Bajwa, deeply suspicious of how some of his commanders would act in the next few days, has been coordinating with key commanders like the ISI chief, Rawalpindi Corps Commander, Director General of Military Operations and Brigade Commander, 111 Brigade. Imran Khan has lost no time in sowing seeds of distrust in the army through calculated media leaks about his meeting with the Army chief and other senior army commanders. The army leadership, according to select media leaks, gave Imran Khan three options. But the army officially clarified that it was the Prime Minister who sought a meeting with the Army chief as well as the ISI DG. Khan wanted the army to help him to thwart the imminent ouster. The growing suspicion between the Prime Minister and the Army came out in open on April 2 when General Bajwa spoke against Russia for the Ukraine war. This was a desperate attempt to thwart Imran Khan's ploy to get closer to Moscow, and please China, while accusing the US of a conspiracy to throw him out. Pakistan National Assembly Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri on Sunday dismissed the no-trust motion against the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government, terming it a contradiction of Article 5 of the country's Constitution. Moreover, Pakistan President Arif Alvi dissolved the National Assembly on the proposal of Imran Khan. Pakistan media has criticised the dissolution of the National Assembly in the country, saying that whatever happened on Sunday violated all rules governing proceedings in the House, particularly those dealing with the motion of no-confidence. In an editorial published on Monday, the Dawn newspaper said that Imran Khan could have played the political game like a true sportsperson and still emerged stronger from the loss given the sharp narrative he had spun leading up to the vote. "Instead, he chose to thrust the country into a constitutional crisis. The president, too, failed to act with wisdom: instead of looking into the constitutionality of the entire process, he acted as an Imran Khan loyalist and sullied his office with his partisan decision," the Dawn editorial said. The Pakistani newspaper argued that with the parliamentary process pulverised on the orders of a leader who continues to hold it in deep contempt, Pakistan has been thrown into the dark abyss of a constitutional crisis. (ANI)
Russia is revising its war aims and will redeploy forces from Northern Ukraine to the region around the Donbas in eastern Ukraine, rather than target most of the territory, said US National Security Advisor (NSA) Jake Sullivan. Speaking at a White House press briefing, NSA Sullivan said Russian forces will retreat from Kyiv to Belarus, with the plan to deploy dozens of additional battalion tactical troops, constituting tens of thousands of soldiers to the front line in Ukraine's east. "At this juncture, we believe that Russia is revising its war aims. Russia is repositioning its forces to concentrate its offensive operations in the Eastern and parts of Southern Ukraine, rather than target most of the territory," Sullivan told reporters at the White House. "All indications are that Russia will seek to surround and overwhelm Ukrainian forces in eastern Ukraine. We anticipate that Russian commanders are now executing the redeployment from Northern Ukraine to the region around the Donbas in eastern Ukraine," he added. At the White House presser, Sullivan said the US assess that Russia will focus on defeating Ukrainian forces in broader Luhansk and Donetsk provinces which encompasses significantly more territory than Russian proxies already controlled before the new invasion began in late February. "Russia could then use any tactical successes that it achieves to propagate a narrative of progress and mask or try to discount or downplay prior military failures. In order to protect any territory, it ceases in the east, we expect Russia could potentially extend its forces projection and presence even deeper into Ukraine," he said. Jake Sullivan said that images from Bucha, of the "atrocities" committed by Russia against Ukrainian civilians, underscore that "now is not the time for complacency." "The images from Bucha so powerfully reinforce now is not the time for complacency. The Ukrainians are defending their homeland courageously, and the United States will continue to back them with military assistance, humanitarian aid and economic support," Sullivan said. The US will announce new sanctions against Russia this week, he added. (ANI)
Three missing and endangered children from Marion County have been located.

Update: According to deputies, Kelton, Connor and Titus LaDuke have been located in Dooly County, Georgia. They are in good health and are now in the custody of the Department of Children and Families.

Original Story:

Marion County deputies are working to find three missing and endangered children on Saturday.

Deputies said they are looking for Kelton, Connor and Titus LaDuke.

The young children are 1 month, 18 months and 2 years old respectively.

On Friday, deputies responded to the 2100 block of NE 182nd Place in Citra to assist the Department of Children and Families (DCF) with a court order to take custody of the children.

Investigators said they believe the childrens safety is at risk, because their parents, Jarod LaDuke and Ashley Winningham, are avoiding DCFs efforts to assess the childrens well-being.

Read: Weather Alert Day: Saturday starts off dry with high winds and hail possible this afternoon

Deputies believe the childrens safety is at risk.

Channel 9 has reached out to the sheriffs office to find out more details about this case.

Read: 2022 Oscars: Will Smith resigns from Academy after backlash from slap

If you have any information on the whereabouts of Kelton, Connor, and Titus, please call 911.

Read: New York mobster who killed 3 escapes federal custody in Central Florida

Click here to download the free WFTV news and weather apps, click here to download the WFTV Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Channel 9 Eyewitness News live.
A Civil Guard stands by the yacht called Tango in Palma de Mallorca, Spain, Monday April 4, 2022 AP Photo/Francisco Ubilla

The US seized a $90-million superyacht on Monday, the US Department of Justice confirmed.

The vessel was seized in Spain and is believed to belong to Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg.

It was the first yacht to be seized by the US, but European governments have seized dozens.

The US seized a superyacht believed to belong to Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg in Spain on Monday.

The seizure was a first for the US government after imposing sanctions against Vekselberg and other Russian oligarchs linked to Russian President Vladimir Putin last month. The sanctions targeted the billionaires' largest assets, most notably their multi-million dollar superyachts.

The Associated Press was the first to report on the seizure, which was later confirmed by the US Department of Justice (DOJ). FBI and members of the Spanish Civil Guard searched the vessel on Monday morning, a spokesperson from the Spanish Civil Guard told Associated Press.

A spokesperson from the Spanish Civil Guard did not respond to a request for comment from Insider, but the DOJ said in a press release that Spanish law enforcement acted under a request of the DOJ, following a seizure warrant filed in the US District Court for the District of Columbia.

"Today marks our taskforce's first seizure of an asset belonging to a sanctioned individual with close ties to the Russian regime. It will not be the last," US Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said in the press release. "Together, with our international partners, we will do everything possible to hold accountable any individual whose criminal acts enable the Russian government to continue its unjust war."

The seized yacht, known as Tango, was seized at the Marina Real in Palma De Mallorca, Spain. The megayacht is 255-feet long and can accommodate about 14 guests alongside a crew of 22, according to Super Yacht Fan. The vessel is valued at $90 million, per the DOJ.

The Justice Department posted a video on YouTube of Spanish authorities and the FBI boarding the yacht.

Story continues

The DOJ said Vekselberg  a billionaire who leads Renova Group, a metals, mining, and energy conglomerate  bought the yacht in 2011, but used shell companies to hide his ownership and "avoid bank oversight into U.S. dollar transactions related thereto." Experts previously told Insider that it can be a difficult and lengthy process to tie a yacht to its owner, as the yachts are typically listed under the names of secretaries and third-party business managers.

Vekselberg is known to be a close ally to Putin and is worth about $16.9 billion, according to Bloomberg's Billionaire Index. Since March, the US has frozen Vekselberg's assets in the country and forbidden all US-based companies from doing business with the Russian billionaire.

After Russia began its invasion into Ukraine on February 24, the US government assembled a task force to enforce the sanctions against Russia's elite.

"We are joining with our European allies to find and seize your yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets," US President Joe Biden said in his State of The Union address on March 1. "We are coming for your ill-begotten gains."

It's not the first time that the billionaire has faced sanctions from the US. He was first sanctioned in 2018 and is currently facing sanctions from the EU and UK.

While it is the first successful US seizure of a Russian Oligarch's yacht, the governments in Spain, Italy, and France seized several yachts owned by Russia's elite over the past month.

The DOJ said it has obtained separate seizure warrants that target about $625,000 associated with other sanctioned parties in nine US financial institutions.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Apr. 4JUNEAU  With the state of Alaska struggling to hire and retain employees amid the "Great Resignation," state legislators are more earnestly considering new pension programs for state employees.

Lawmakers abolished pensions for new employees in 2006 amid a multibillion-dollar shortfall in the pension fund, replacing them with a 401(k)-style retirement system. Proposals to reverse that decision have been introduced with regularity since then, but none have come close to becoming law. This year, unprecedented hiring problems and a shrinking pension liability are changing the equation.

"The single biggest change is the desperate situation we have in recruiting and keeping everyone from troopers to teachers to firefighters to wastewater plant operators," said Sen. Jesse Kiehl, D-Juneau.

On Thursday, dozens of firefighters gathered on the steps of the Capitol to rally support for House Bill 55, a measure that would create a pension for police and firefighters. It passed the House last year and is now in the Senate.

If it becomes law, HB 55 would create a new pension fund for police and firefighters, who would be required to contribute at least 8% of their pay and could retire at age 55 if they work for 20 years.

An analysis published this month found the program would cost the state between $4 million and $7 million per year. Proponents say that's less than the cost of hiring and training replacements for public safety workers who leave the state because there's no pension.

"I think a lot of legislators are starting to realize that when they hear from these chiefs and heads of these departments that this is a real problem," said Paul Miranda, president of the Alaska Professional Fire Fighters Association.

In large part, the rally's goal was to convince Sen. Mia Costello, R-Anchorage, to advance the bill. Costello is the chair of the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee, which reviews pension legislation. Without her support, the bill won't move.

Story continues

She's scheduled the bill for a hearing on Monday but has no immediate plans to move it forward.

"We have to make sure we're doing the absolute right thing, and I'm not in any hurry. And I want to do a thorough review," Costello said.

That's a problem for proponents: Unless House Bill 55 advances, it will die with the end of the legislative session and have to start over from scratch at the start of 2023.

"There has never been a riskless system. There never will be, and right now, we're the only state without a defined benefit, and that's biting us hard," Kiehl said.

Right now, Alaska has what's known as a "defined contribution" retirement system. Employees pay a certain amount of money, the state pitches in a certain amount, and the retirement benefit depends on how well that money is invested.

Pensions are known as "defined benefit" retirement  the state assumes the responsibility for paying a certain amount of benefits, even if there's not enough money saved to pay for them.

In the early 2000s, a stock market slump, changes in benefits and new actuarial estimates created a huge shortfall in the state's pension system. By 2013, the gap exceeded $12 billion, and the state faced the prospect of paying up to $1 billion per year out of the state budget in order to fill it.

Improved investment returns, a $3 billion transfer from savings, and continued annual payments in the state budget shrank the shortfall by two-thirds, to $4 billion, in 2021.

That progress has encouraged the state to reduce the amount it spends on shrinking the gap, and it's provided additional arguments for those who want to revive pensions.

But Costello and other legislators, including Sen. Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, have deep memories of the shortfall.

"In general, I want to make sure there's no risk to the state," she said. "You know, we have an unfunded liability right now, and I just want to make sure that, you know, for the next 50, 100 years, we're doing right by our responsibility to keep the state not exposed to undue risk."

That view has been supported by libertarian antigovernment groups like the Reason Foundation, Alaska Policy Forum and Americans for Prosperity. The latter group also took out a Facebook ad thanking Costello for her position.

In Thursday's rally, legislator-turned-consultant Chuck Kopp took aim at the three groups.

"When tragedy comes and violence comes, it's not the Alaska Policy Forum, Americans for Prosperity, or Reason Foundation that's coming to stop the shooter, quench the flames and rescue the wounded," he said.

Police and firefighters aren't the only ones seeking pensions. NEA-Alaska, the state's largest teachers' union, has been supporting House Bill 220, from Rep. Grier Hopkins, D-Fairbanks. That bill would reopen the state's now-closed pension programs. That bill is in front of the House Finance Committee, and Hopkins said he intends to make changes to the proposal; an initial analysis suggested it could cost as much as $70 million per year.

Even that cost could be worthwhile, proponents argue. Teacher turnover  the issue of teachers leaving and having to be replaced year over year  is linked to poor performance by students.

"What we have been seeing is what some have coined 'education tourists,' where educators come up for their Alaskan adventure, and work for five years and get vested in the defined contribution system. And then they'll go back home to Michigan, or Minnesota or Washington, where they can still work a full career and receive a defined benefit retirement there," said Tom Klaameyer, president of NEA-Alaska.

In 2017, a study by the University of Alaska Anchorage Center for Alaska Education Policy Research concluded that every teacher who left the state cost their district more than $20,000, the cost to recruit, hire and train a replacement.

In May 2020, Gov. Mike Dunleavy's administration formed a group to study the causes of teacher turnover and recommend solutions.

A survey commissioned by the workgroup found that retirement was the No. 3 overall concern, behind salary and cost-of-living adjustments for rural teachers. In 2021, the group recommended six fixes. One of those six was a restructured retirement system for teachers.

The big question for legislators: What form will that restructured system take?

"I'm very hesitant to expose the state to a multiple-billion-dollar unfunded liability. That's just not a prudent thing to do," said Stedman, the co-chair of the Senate Finance Committee.

"I recognize that the employees would like a defined benefit plan. But citizens around the state don't want to create an unfunded liability," he said.

Rep. Andy Josephson, D-Anchorage, is the author of House Bill 55 and said if it passes the Legislature this year and is successful when implemented, it could serve as a model for other state agencies and employees.

Stedman said he has similar thoughts: If a system works for police and firefighters, why not offer it to all public employees?

"I don't see why it wouldn't go out to the whole system," he said.

Correction: The initial version of this article incorrectly labeled former state legislator Chuck Kopp a lobbyist. He is not a registered lobbyist and said he was hired on a consulting contract.
Amy Schumer. Marcus Price/Netflix

Amy Schumer shared a "Rust" joke she said her lawyer told her not to say at the Oscars.

She had written a joke about the accidental on-set shooting that left one person dead.

Schumer told it at a Saturday stand-up show in Las Vegas, which The Hollywood Reporter covered.

Amy Schumer said she wasn't allowed to make a joke about the "Rust" shooting during the Oscars last month, The Hollywood Reporter reported.

At a stand-up-comedy show Saturday in Las Vegas that The Hollywood Reporter covered, Schumer said her lawyer advised her not to say a list of jokes at the 94th Academy Awards, which she cohosted with Wanda Sykes and Regina Hall.

"I want to preface these Oscar jokes by saying that my lawyer said not to say these. Don't tell anybody, and don't get mad at me," she said before running through the jokes for a live crowd, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

"'Don't Look Up' is the name of a movie? More like don't look down the barrel of Alec Baldwin's shotgun," Schumer said, according to the magazine. "I wasn't allowed to say any of that, but you can just come up and [clock] someone."

Schumer was referring to an incident on the set of the movie "Rust" last year, when Baldwin fired a gun that he didn't know contained live ammo while rehearsing a scene, killing the cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and injuring the director Joel Souza.

Will Smith slapped Chris Rock on the Oscars stage after the comedian made a joke about the bald head of Smith's wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Pinkett Smith was diagnosed with alopecia, a hair-loss condition, and has been open about how it's affected her.

"It was just a fucking bummer," Schumer said of the slapping incident, according to The Hollywood Reporter. "All I can say is that it was really sad, and I think it says so much about toxic masculinity."

Insider previously reported the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences launched a formal investigation after the slapping incident and later sent a letter to its members saying its leadership was "upset and outraged."

Story continues

Smith resigned from the academy on Friday. The actor, who also took home the best-actor trophy during the awards ceremony, apologized to Rock, the academy, his fellow nominees, and the Williams family, whose story he helped portray in "King Richard."

Meanwhile, Rock hasn't spoken publicly about the incident, mentioning in a stand-up comedy show in Boston only that he's "still processing" what happened to him at the Oscars.

"So at some point, I'll talk about that shit," he said last week. "It'll be serious. It'll be funny, but right now, I'm going to tell some jokes."

Read the original article on Insider
The Daily Beast

Chingis Kondarov/ReutersChechen troops in Ukraine loyal to Ramzan Kadyrov have claimed a reputation for being the most brutal in Putins war, but a new report says theyre actually suffering major losses and going to great lengths to cover them up.According to an investigation by Russias independent news outlet IStories, the official figure of 13 Chechen soldiers killed in Ukraine is a major undercount; a source in the Chechen Health Ministry tells the outlet the true death toll of the so-calle
From left, Kyiv Director of IT Oleg Polovynko, Deputy IT Director Victoria Itskovich, and Kyiv Deputy Mayor and Chief Digital Transformation Officer Petro Olenych outside Kyivs city administration building on April 1 Credit - Samsonov Oleksii

When Oleg Polovynko thinks of the first days of the Russian invasion of his country, he looks down at his fitness watch. In normal times, the 38-year-old IT director in Kyivs city council used his Garmin watch to track his workouts. Right now, my heart rate is 62, he tells TIME, holding up his wrist. In the first five days after Feb. 24, it was never below 90.

For the past five weeks, Polovynko and his boss, Kyivs deputy mayor and chief digital transformation officer Petro Olenych, have led an exhaustive effort to adapt and repurpose everyday technology for a city that has found itself facing a 20th-century-style war. Their creative maneuvers are a key reason that most residents of the Ukrainian capital can connect to the Internet in underground bomb shelters, find open pharmacies and grocery stores, and go to sleep knowing their phone will alert them of incoming air raids before the physical sirens sound.

While President Volodymyr Zelensky and Ukrainian digital officials have been lauded for their success in galvanizing global support on social media and fending off the Kremlins disinformation campaigns, local officials like Olenych and Polovynko have focused on the practical.

Every day, we wake up and were thinking how we can keep people in the city alive and safe, says Olenych. The popular Kyiv Digital smartphone app, which residents previously used to pay utility bills and parking tickets, now gives them a map of the closest bomb shelters and places to get critical supplies like insulin, food or gasoline. Notifications for the closure of a local metro stop for repairs have given way to warnings of incoming air raids.

Screenshots from the Kyiv Digital smartphone app. Left shows bomb shelters with wifi; right shows start and stop alerts of air raids Courtesy Kyiv City Council

Read More: The Man on Ukraines Digital Frontline.

Even the apps logo reflects this shift. What was once a friendly sky-blue K for Kyiv has been redesigned into a black-and-gray military camo pattern. Speaking to TIME on a video call from an undisclosed location in the city, Olenych and Polovynko wore patches of the new logo taped to their olive green T-shirts.

Story continues

Its hard to grasp that just two months ago, the main problem their city council faced was complaints about traffic jams downtown. Municipal IT employees now carry guns, and only leave their offices to shower and catch a few hours of sleep whenever they can. (Olenych says hes been sleeping at Polovynkos house since a bomb landed near his own home.) On the day they spoke to TIME, employees of the city councils digital office were poring over mobile data to determine how to best ration food for those that remain.

I felt like I was part of a modern world, where all of these [technologies] were part of our everyday life, and now suddenly we need to use them for such basic purposes, for life or death, says Polovynko. I never imagined that I would develop software in 2022 to help people stay alive, to survive things like a missile attack. But of course, we can. And now were using all of our IT minds in Ukraine to help our people and our soldiers.

More from TIME

On Feb. 24, as the invasion began and air raid sirens blared over the city for the first time since World War II, employees of Kyivs digital transformation office held a meeting to decide what to do. They quickly agreed that they would not evacuate. A few employees who are mothers of young children left to work from western Ukraine, but the rest would stay in the city.

Over the next few days, Polovynkos team spent much of its time trying to restore their systems from backups after a wave of cyberattacks knocked out their online services. After that, we became like a big startup, where you always receive a lot of tasks and you only go to sleep when you are finished, Polovynko said about his IT team of roughly 20 employees. Then you wake up and go back to work.

Patches showing the Kyiv Digital app's new logo Courtesy Kyiv City Council

Read More: A Ukrainian Photographer Documents the Invasion of His Country.

The next step was to add functionality to the citys smartphone app so that it could warn residents about incoming missile attacks. The Kyiv Digital app, which had launched its most recent version in Jan. 2021, had more than a million users who subscribed to emergency notifications of everything from transit closures to COVID-19 cases. Now they set out to turn this feature into a potentially life-saving early-warning system.

In recent days, there have been 6 to 10 air raid alarms shared by the app per day, according to city officials. A red alarm icon shows the time and the message Air Warning! Head to the nearest shelter! Its followed by a green icon telling residents when the danger had passed, according to screenshots shared with TIME.

For Vira Gryaznova, a 49-year old non-profit worker who lives in Kyiv with her husband and two cats, the app has been a lifeline. Gryaznova doesnt have a television and finds it hard to hear the physical sirens from her home. I was not a user of the Kyiv Digital app before the war, she says. But I use it now to get information about air raid alerts.

The chaotic first week of the invasion produced long lines for basic goods, as thousands of residents desperately tried to stock up or flee the city. So Kyivs digital office quickly set up online forms that allowed business owners to report if they were able to open. This information was then added to a map on the app showing which grocery stores, pharmacies and gas stations still have supplies. Our team has readjusted to deliver new valuable services on an everyday basis, says Victoria Itskovich, who serves as the citys deputy IT director. The main thing Ive learned during this time is that there is no point in striving for the perfect solution. The best product is the one you can launch here and now.

With residents often sheltering underground and Internet providers frequently being knocked offline, connectivity became one of the most pressing problems. We realized we would have to spend a lot of time in these bomb shelters and there was nothing prepared for the long term, Polovynko says.

Olenych, the deputy mayor, reached out to Kyivs Internet providers and organized them into a group on a messaging app. Then his office added a feature to the citys app that allowed residents to request Internet access for their bomb shelters. More than 1,000 bomb shelters throughout the city did so. As of Thursday, city officials estimated that roughly 800 had been provided with a WiFi connection.

Chief Digital Transformation Officer Petro Olenych Samsonov Oleksii

City officials took mobile WiFi hotspots from empty offices in Kyivs government buildings to use in bomb shelters. They also got a boost from SpaceX founder Elon Musk, who donated Starlink satellite terminals to provide Internet access after a request from Ukraines national digital office. In a March 4 photo shared with TIME, Olenych and Polovynko posed with one of Musks satellite dishes, flashing a thumbs-up sign.

Read More: How Telegram Became the Digital Battlefield in the Russia-Ukraine War.

Other Western companies have come to their aid as well. Cloudflare, a San Francisco-based cybersecurity firm, offered the Kyiv city council its services for free, helping them to recover and protect from ongoing cyberattacks. Cloudflare is appalled by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, spokesperson Laurel Toney told TIME. Since the run up to the invasion, Cloudflare has worked to protect Ukrainian websites and networks [and] helped Ukrainian government websites come back online while under active cyberattack.

Kyivs digital office has also been working with Ukrainian mobile operators to arrange free roaming coverage for residents, no matter which provider they use. In recent days, they have also worked with providers on grimmer matters, using analytics of mobile users in Kyiv to get an approximate number of how many people are in the city in order to conserve food rations.

We really were like Alice in Wonderlandwe lived in another world, which was peaceful, friendly, and open, Polovynko says of his work in Kyivs digital office before the war. Now were in a new IT age, where we need to put all of our technology minds towards military goals.

The citys digital office has divided residents into two groups: those who are staying to fight, and those who are staying because they are old, sick, or have no way to escape. Both are relying on their digital services to keep them safeand prepared for what may come next.

Our main focus is to use any options that can help us save lives, to use the technology to first of all to protect our people  and to kill another people, says Polovynko. Its sad, but unfortunately this is the situation were now in. We cannot lose. Ukrainians will never, never give up, and you feel it when youre here in Kyiv, we will really fight to the end.
The overdose death rate in Delaware has risen 1.566% from 447 overdose deaths in 2020  to 454 overdose deaths in the twelve-month period from May of 2020 to May of 2021, according to the CDC. Although it may seem that Delawares approach to the overdose crisis is trying our best, Delaware must and can do better if we work together through harm reduction  as President Biden pointed out in the State of the Union Address:

So tonight Im offering a Unity Agenda for the Nation. Four big things we can do together.

First, beat the opioid epidemic.

There is so much we can do. Increase funding for prevention, treatment, harm reduction, and recovery.

Drug overdose deaths have reached a historic high, devastating families and communities. More than 104,000 Americans died due to a drug overdose in the 12-month period ending in September 2021. We grieve these losses, and commit to continuing our work to save lives.

Tonight, President Biden outlined the decisive actions his administration is taking to address addiction and the overdose epidemic and laid out a vision for how his administration will continue to expand evidence-based prevention, harm reduction, treatment, recovery, and supply reduction approaches to save lives. These efforts are bringing together Republicans and Democrats across the country because every community has been affected.

Specifically, the president outlined his comprehensive approach, including reducing harm and saving lives.

In reaction to the steep rise in overdose deaths and the increasingly lethal drug supply, the Biden-Harris administration has prioritized engaging and building trust with people who use drugs in order to save lives and provide care.

For the first time, harm reduction services  which include naloxone, fentanyl test strips, and syringe service programs  are a federal drug policy priority. These interventions are saving lives in red states and blue states, as years of research have demonstrated. People who use heroin and others who inject drugs who regularly utilize a Syringe Services Program (SSP) are five times more likely to initiate substance use disorder treatment, compared with those who have never used an SSP. Syringe services sites can be effective platforms to motivate people with opioid use disorder to enroll in substance use treatment and, over time, to reduce drug use and number of drug injections. Distribution of naloxone to reverse the effects of an opioid overdose saves lives and is cost-effective.

Story continues

The administration has prioritized funds for harm reduction. The American Rescue Plan included $30 million in support for harm reduction services  a historic amount that will enhance interventions like syringe services programs. Additionally, CDC and the SAMHSA announced that federal funding may now be used to purchase fentanyl test strips in an effort to help curb the dramatic spike in drug overdose deaths.

The administration is including the input of people who use drugs in designing harm reduction interventions that will help save lives. In December, ONDCP, SAMHSA, and the CDC convened the first-ever Harm Reduction Summit. A steering committee made up entirely of people with lived experience is working to provide guidance and input on future administration harm reduction efforts.

The administration plans to continue efforts to support syringe services programs through funding opportunities to provide these programs with needed supplies such as fentanyl test strips and sterile syringes, which have been proven to reduce diseases such as Hep-C and HIV. In addition, ensuring naloxone is easily and readily available to these programs will provide the overdose reversal medication to people who need it most.

In order to deliver resources to local communities, the administration is working with states and communities to elevate harm reduction best practices. Last year, ONDCP released model laws for states to help expand access to naloxone and SSPs. This year, ONDCP plans to elevate best practices for harm reduction organizations initiating low-threshold treatment through warm hand-offs to care or colocation of treatment. The administration plans to work with states to expand this strategy in communities most in need.

The overdose reversal medication naloxone is a critical tool for saving lives. However, equitable access to naloxone across the country is often defined by where you live. The Biden-Harris administration is examining barriers to the acquisition and distribution of naloxone at the local level in order to increase access and availability where it is most needed.

In an era when overdose deaths are soaring, how should the law balance letting physicians exercise their best judgment with stopping egregious outliers?

Get rid of outdated rules that stop doctors from prescribing treatments.

Medicine is that which is made and created by law. Hence, if the court system has failed and created the overdose crisis  medicine by proxy has and will continue to fail the overdose crisis if the court system is not reevaluated along with medicine. To reevaluate medicine, we should consider the intersection of medicine and law:

The United States and the world should be watching how the Department of Justice and the State of Pennsylvania rectify the missing lives, lives, and afterlives of the overdose crisis in the case of UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff, v. THE UNIFIED JUDICIAL SYSTEM OF PENNSYLVANIA, Defendant. This case doesnt matter just for this region, but precisely for the entirety of this country watching if harm reduction will be embraced or further suppressed from the state, national, and global level. Hence, if we continue to uphold court systems where Americans with disabilities are not given access to healthcare, the people, their belief in the system, and the system will not only die, but we as a country will die in their afterlives.

Today, the Justice Department filed suit against the Unified Judicial System of Pennsylvania (UJS) for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The department previously notified the UJS that its courts had engaged in discrimination by prohibiting or limiting the use of lawfully prescribed medication to treat Opioid Use Disorder (OUD) by individuals under court supervision. That letter of findings demanded that the UJS address the civil rights violations identified by the Justice Departments Civil Rights Division and the U.S. Attorneys Offices for the Eastern, Middle and Western Districts of Pennsylvania.

After getting out of rehab for the second time after graduation, before the summer even started, when I graduated from Delaware State University in 2017: I was not given medication for OUD when leaving Dover Behavioral Health in Dover, Delaware for my heroin addiction. Instead, I was strung out on suboxone the entire time I was there until I left and was forced upon release, with the weighted decision of getting sick and being sober  or getting high. In other words, when I was in rehab, I was given enough drugs to keep up with the suboxone and speedballs I shot to tolerate my nightmarish stints in rehab; furthermore, when I was told I was released, I was not given help besides an outpatient program that would not allow me any medication like suboxone to taper off of  even from my dose in rehab. Therefore, when I went to outpatient, I was shooting up even more and eventually overdosed  which could have and should have been prevented had I been given a clean supply  that the state clearly was in realms to do, since it did that very thing while I was in rehab at Dover Behavioral Health in the summer of 2017.

The Justice Department identified three individuals with OUD who were discriminated against by UJS Courts  specifically, the Northumberland and Jefferson County Courts of Common Pleas. Two individuals alleged that the Jefferson County Court ordered all probationers to stop using their prescribed medication for OUD. A third individual alleged that the Northumberland County Court required her to stop using her prescribed OUD medication to graduate from drug court. The departments investigation corroborated these allegations and additionally found evidence that other UJS Courts have policies that discriminate against individuals with OUD.

Now is the time to take action across this country and stop discriminating against those with opioid use disorder  but to make things a more even playing field for all, this lawsuit will determine more than anything the effectiveness of the states rhetoric and its red herrings of pills and overprescribing being the self-chasing problem and solution  the DEA and all forms of law enforcement and power in the United States throw to the forefront: as the problem and solution to the overdose crisis  because they create it under the guise of solving it. In that pursuit: the state and its agents of law enforcement believe they have solved the overdose crisis because they are state actors physically acting.

"This lawsuit aims to safeguard the rights of people with Opioid Use Disorder who are too often subject to discrimination rooted in stereotypes and myths rather than in science, said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Departments Civil Rights Division. Court-involved individuals with Opioid Use Disorder deserve access to medications needed to support their recovery and to break the cycles of addiction. We hope that this lawsuit against the Unified Judicial System of Pennsylvania sends a strong message about the need for courts to protect the rights of individuals with Opioid Use Disorder."

But let this be known, politicians and individuals are not to blame: everyone is trying their best on all fronts to fight this epidemic. Delaware and the rest of the United States need to have a national conversation on harm reduction  because without it, the current approach to drug overdoses is not only the cause of this overdose epidemic, but by continuing this old approach, we may never see the opportunities in recognizing that life is more important than condemning our neighbor for drug use.

A tentative settlement announced Thursday between nine attorneys general and the Sackler family  the owners of Purdue Pharma, which developed and manufactured the addictive opioid painkiller OxyContin  could mean nearly $50 million for Delaware opioid treatment and prevention programs.

The settlement, if approved by a bankruptcy court judge, would require the Sacklers to pay as much as $6 billion for their role in the opioid epidemic. The epidemic has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans over the last two decades  and thousands in Delaware alone.

The agreement adds at least $1 billion to a prior bankruptcy settlement worth about $4.5 billion," Delaware Attorney General Kathy Jennings said Thursday. A federal judge vacated that deal in December, questioning whether the lifetime legal shield granted to the Sacklers as part of the plan was legal.

"The opioid epidemic has caused immeasurable damage to our state, much of which we can never repay, Jennings said. She added that in recent years, more than 400 people annually have died from overdoses in Delaware  the second-worst per capita rate in the nation.

The bottom line is that Delawares families deserve the best deal possible. Jennings said Thursday's settlement does just that, not only through the additional millions of dollars secured for our state, but also through the acceptance of responsibility by the Sacklers, their permanent exile from the industry and the dismantling of a legacy bought with ill-gotten gains.

Still, it could be some time before Delaware and other states receive any of the nearly $6 billion.

The agreement must be approved by federal Judge Robert Drain, who presided over the previous bankruptcy hearings. It's also conditioned on several other factors.

If it does overcome these hurdles, Delaware could see up to $12 million in the first 18 months followed by yearly payments through 2039. The money received by the state must be put toward mitigating the effects of the opioid crisis and would be deposited into Delaware's Prescription Opioid Settlement Fund.

The overdose crisis is not a result of overprescribing or Big Pharma. Its the class divide in the United States. My cousin couldnt afford anything. The way the penal system in the United States renders drug users useless  made it so my cousin couldnt provide for his family. He couldnt provide for his kids. Take that away from any person, no matter how many times he got clean, and whats the narrative? There isnt. There is only the truth. And the truth of Delaware specifically being a macrocosm of the overdose crisis on a microcosmic level is that we are second in the United States in overdose mortality rates because all over Delaware, are people like my cousin used to be  before he ODd, riding the line between life and death, hustling any way possible so he could pay child support, and diapers, food, and clothes, and shooting between his neck when the moment felt right. Thats real life in Delaware. Thats real life in Dover, Delaware. And until you do something personally, about it, it will stay that way. Drive past the person begging for their life on the street, it could have been you, it used to be me  but it will always be us, Delaware  until we take action, each of us  the D in OverDose will always stand for Delaware.

We must take this a step further. We must hold all systems of law and power accountable for the overdose crisis. We must hold all of ourselves accountable for the overdose crisis. This is a threat to human life  existence itself. The overdose crisis is existential. Who are we as a nation? What does it mean to exist as an American? What does it mean to be human as an American? Until we ask ourselves why someone would put a needle in their arm, we will never have the compassion to see courage and hope in this crisis. Only together, through harm reduction can we end the War on Drugs and the overdose crisis together. As President Biden said in the State of the Union Address:

If youre suffering from addiction, know you are not alone. I believe in recovery, and I celebrate the 23 million Americans in recovery.

Jordan McClements is a resident of Felton.

This article originally appeared on Delaware News Journal: Biden administration working to reduce overdose deaths
President Biden on Monday condemned the slaughter of civilians in Bucha, Ukraine, amid the withdrawal of Russian forces from the region  and put the blame squarely on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

You may remember I got criticized for calling Putin a war criminal, Biden told reporters in Washington, D.C., after arriving back from Wilmington, Del., where he spent the weekend. Well, the truth of the matter, you saw what happened in Bucha. This warrants him  he is a war criminal.

Biden said administration officials were gathering evidence on the apparent atrocities from Putins invasion of Ukraine, now in its sixth week, for a possible war crimes trial.

We have to gather all the details so this can be an actual  have a war crimes trial, the president said. This guy is brutal, and whats happening in Bucha is outrageous, and everyones seen it.

He added that the United States would continue to sanction Russia and provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue the fight.

But Biden said he disagreed with the assessment by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that the killings of civilians amounted to genocide.

"No, I think it is a war crime," the president said.

President Biden speaks to reporters at the White House on Monday. (Leah Millis/Reuters)

Last month, Biden had similarly called Putin a war criminal, as the death toll from the Russian militarys bombardment of Ukrainian cities continued to mount. More than 4 million Ukrainian refugees have already fled the country.

Earlier in the day, Buchas mayor forcefully condemned all of Russia for the widespread civilian deaths there, the full extent of which became apparent only after the recent pullback of Russian forces from the Kyiv region.

Anatoliy Fedoruk, the mayor of the city, told CNN that he had remained in Bucha amid the Russian occupation and witnessed the subsequent atrocities.

We all were witnesses to the horrific events and the horrific crimes that the Russians committed here, Fedoruk said, speaking through an interpreter. And we will never forgive the Russian people  not personally, not individually, but on the whole  we will not forgive the Russian people for the atrocities that happened here.

Story continues

Russia has denied responsibility.

Over the weekend, Ukrainian officials and various media outlets shared shocking scenes emerging from Bucha, one of a number of suburbs abandoned by Russian forces as theyve pulled back from the capital, Kyiv. Dead bodies littered the streets, some with their hands tied behind their backs, apparently shot at close range.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks to reporters in Bucha, Ukraine, Monday. (Metin Aktas/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

The images sparked a fresh wave of condemnation from European leaders, who called for investigations into the alleged war crimes.

During a briefing Monday afternoon, White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said the mass killings in Bucha show further evidence of war crimes.

Based on what we have seen so far, we have seen atrocities, we have seen war crimes, Sullivan said, adding: We have not seen a level of systemic depravation of life of the Ukrainian people to rise to the level of genocide.

While speaking to reporters at the site of a mass grave site in Bucha Monday, Zelensky reiterated his view that the slaughter of civilians by Russian forces is "genocide."

These are war crimes and it will be recognized by the world as genocide, Zelensky said. You stand here today and see what happened. We know that thousands of people have been killed and tortured with extremities cut off, women raped, children killed ... its genocide.

_____

What happened this week in Ukraine? Check out this explainer from Yahoo Immersive to find out.
Billie Eilish wears a T-shirt featuring an image of Taylor Hawkins, the late Foo Fighters drummer, at Sunday's Grammy Awards. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press)

Billie Eilish paid tribute Sunday to Taylor Hawkins by wearing a shirt bearing the late Foo Fighters drummer's likeness at the Grammy Awards in Las Vegas.

While performing her nominated track "Happier Than Ever" alongside her brother and creative partner Finneas, at the MGM Grand Arena, the Gen Z pop star donned an oversized, black top with an image of Hawkins smiling behind his drum kit.

Hawkins was in Bogota, Colombia, to perform with the Foo Fighters last week when he died at age 50. According to a statement from the Colombian attorney general's office, an initial forensic medical examination and urine toxicology report revealed 10 substances in his system, including THC (marijuana), tricyclic antidepressants, benzodiazepines and opioids.

At the end of her passionate performance, Eilish proudly grabbed her shirt and waved it in honor of Hawkins. The Foo Fighters were also set to perform during Sunday's telecast but pulled out after Hawkins' death.

The band also canceled all of upcoming tour dates "in light of the staggering loss of our brother Taylor Hawkins." In November, Foo Fighters received three Grammy nominations  for rock performance, rock song and rock album  all of which they won Sunday.

Eilish landed seven nominations, including nods for record, song and album of the year.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
After Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins died at the age of 50 last week, the Grammy Awards and pop star Billie Eilish paid tribute to him during Sunday night's broadcast.

To the tune of the Foo Fighters hit "My Hero," the show's in memoriam segment began with several clips of Hawkins over his lengthy career as a musician.

During her performance, Eilish donned a black T-shirt with a photo of Hawkins face on the front and last name on the back. She held her shirt out as she took a bow at the end of her set to ensure the crowd giving her and her brother, Finneas, a standing ovation, would see.

It was a bittersweet night for the Foo Fighters, who swept the rock categories, taking home three awards for best rock performance, best rock song and best rock album.

64th Annual GRAMMY Awards - Telecast (Emma McIntyre / Getty Images for The Recording Academy)

The Foo Fighters  made up currently of Dave Grohl, Nate Mendel, Pat Smear, Chris Shiflett, and Rami Jaffee  were not in attendance on Sunday. Their awards were handed out at the daytime ceremony and presenter Jimmy Jam accepted all three awards on Foo Fighters behalf.

Hawkins died suddenly on March 25 in Colombia while on tour with the band.

The Foo Fighters family is devastated by the tragic and untimely loss of our beloved Taylor Hawkins. His musical spirit and infectious laughter will live on with all of us forever, the band said in a statement posted to social media at the time. Our hearts go out to his wife, children and family, and we ask that their privacy be treated with the utmost respect in this unimaginably difficult time.

Related: Stars pay tribute to Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins: Completely gutted

No cause of death was announced at the time, but the Attorney General of Colombia later tweeted that a preliminary toxicology test found substances including opioids, benzodiazepines, tricyclic antidepressants, and THC, the psychoactive compound in marijuana.

The office said that investigation is ongoing and results will be released after they are obtained.
Lady Gaga received a standing ovation from the audience at the Grammy Awards for her performance of Do I Love You from her joint album with Tony Bennett, Love for Sale.

Among those in the Las Vegas crowd showing their support on Sunday (3 April) was fellow nominee Billie Eilish, who was captured screaming and cheering at Gagas star turn.

Gaga dedicated the performance to Bennett, saying after the song: I love you Tony, we miss you.

Gagas tribute was also adored by fans who werent in the room. Lady Gaga honored Tony Bennett in the most beautiful way, one wrote on social media.

Lady Gaga honored Tony Bennett in the most beautiful way  pic.twitter.com/PNYfqntPfY  Ben (@sourbenji) April 4, 2022

Tony Bennett introduced Gaga via a pre-recorded video, but was unable to attend the Grammys in person due to his health.

Danny Bennett, his son and manager, shared a statement with Variety last week confirming Bennetts absence from the award show.

The statement read: Tony is beyond thrilled, particularly at the young age of 95, to once again be recognised along with his musical collaborator and dear friend Lady Gaga by the Recording Academy for their album Love for Sale.

To have the album nominated in six categories including Album of the Year and Record of the Year is an incredible honour.

Although the producers had invited both Tony and Gaga to perform in Sundays Grammys broadcast, it is unfortunate that due to his continuing struggle with Alzheimers, he was not able to accept.

Story continues

It was decided that it would be fitting for Lady Gaga to perform on her own to represent for both of them.

It concluded: There is no doubt, that she will offer up an impeccable performance from Love for Sale, which is Tonys final album. He will be cheering her on as he watches from his home in New York City.

The two performed a song from their first album, Cheek to Cheek, at the 2014 Grammys.

He is the oldest Album of the Year nominee ever.

Follow live updates from the Grammy Awards here. See the updated list of winners in full here.
Challenged Books (Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

Attempts to ban books reached a two-decade high in the US last year, a new report shows.

The American Library Association (ALA) monitored attempts to ban books in libraries, schools, and universities in 2021 and found 729 such challenges.

Those challenges resulted in more than 1,597 individual book challenges or removals, the ALA noted in a report released on Monday (4 April), noting that most targeted books were by or about Black or LGBTQIA+ persons.

The 729 challenges tracked by ALA represent the highest number of attempted book bans since we began compiling these lists 20 years ago, ALA President Patricia Wong said in a statement.

We support individual parents choices concerning their childs reading and believe that parents should not have those choices dictated by others. Young people need to have access to a variety of books from which they can learn about different perspectives. So, despite this organized effort to ban books, libraries remain ready to do what we always have: make knowledge and ideas available so people are free to choose what to read.

The tracking was done by ALAs Office for Intellectual Freedom.

The top 10 most challenged books according to the ALA include the memoir Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe, the coming-of-age novel Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison, the memoir-manifesto All Boys Arent Blue by George M Johnson, the historical young adult novel Out of Darkness by Ashley Hope Perez, and the young adult novel The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas.

Also on the list are Sherman Alexies The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Jesse Andrewss Me and Earl and the Dying Girl, Toni Morrisons The Bluest Eye, Juno Dawsons This Book is Gay, and Susan Kuklins Beyond Magenta.
(Reuters) - Canada said on Monday it will impose sanctions on nine Russian and nine Belarusian individuals for having "facilitated and enabled" Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.

"By enabling (Russian President) Vladimir Putin's senseless invasion of Ukraine, these close collaborators of the regime are complicit in the horrific events unfolding before our eyes," Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly said in a statement.

The individuals are close associates of the Russian and Belarusian regimes, according to the statement.

(Reporting by Ismail Shakil in Bengaluru; Editing by Chris Reese)
RoK waives quarantine, extends labour contracts for Vietnamese workers

The Republic of Korea (RoK) has decided to continue waiving the mandatory seven-day quarantine and extend labour contracts for eligible Vietnamese workers.













Vietnamese workers wait to handle entry procedures at Incheon International Airport of the RoK. (Photo: VNA)



The RoK Government recently removed Vietnam, along with Myanmar and Ukraine, from the list of countries subject to tightened COVID-19 control measures.



Accordingly, from April 1, Vietnamese workers entering the RoK continue to be exempted from seven-day quarantine if they have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Apart from vaccination certificates, they also need to have a certificate of negative COVID-19 test results prior to their departure and have their QR code checked when arriving in the RoK.



In addition, workers whose labour contracts expire from April 13 will have their contracts automatically extended.



This is the third consecutive extension since April 13, 2021, which is considered one of the solutions to the labour shortage in this Northeast Asian country amid serious impacts of the pandemic.



Talking to the Vietnam News Agency, Pham Minh Duc, head of the management office for Vietnamese workers under the RoKs Employment Permit System (EPS) programme, said since the start of 2022, there are about 100 workers going to the RoK under the EPS programme every week, but they are subject to concentrated quarantine.



After the RoK Government decided to relax anti-pandemic rules for foreigners on April 1, the number of Vietnamese workers entering this country under the EPS programme is likely to surge in the time ahead, he noted.
The number of women who are dying from and during childbirth is rising nationwide, with mortality rates disproportionately higher for Black and Hispanic women.

It was a fear of, Will me and my baby make it out of this situation alive? said Chelsea Lawyer as she described her birthing experience with her first child in 2014.

She said her OB-GYN was out of town when her water broke, so she had to see an on-call physician for delivery.

My natural birth was thrown out of the window, I was just sitting there having contractions and not progressing, said Lawyer. Like while Im pushing ... the on-call doctor was discussing my body in a less than positive way, while Im sitting there in my most vulnerable state.

READ: US airlines cancels more than 3,300 flights over weekend, citing weather in Florida, other issues

Fortunately, Lawyer is alive to share her story, but for many minority women, that isnt always the case.

Too many Black women have died, too many people, period. Too many birthing people period have died. One is too many, she said.

READ: 2022 Grammy Awards: See the complete winners list

A recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows 861 women died from maternal causes in 2020, with Black women dying at nearly three times the rate as white women.

Dr. Leonard Weather said some in health care view Black women differently. He said families should feel supported by their OB-GYN.

Make sure you understand that your doctor cares for you because if he or she doesnt act like they care, frankly, they probably dont so you may need to get another doctor, said Weather, an OB-GYN in Shreveport, Louisiana.

READ: Car dealership agrees to $10M settlement for allegedly charging Black clients more

President Joe Bidens 2022 budget request includes more than $200 million for implicit bias training for health care providers. It would also create pregnancy home medical programs for states.

Story continues

In addition to this, Lawyer believes doctors can improve trends by simply listening to Black women.

When we tell you that were in pain, its not for you to decide whether or not thats true. When we tell you whats happening, believe us and go from there, said Lawyer. It should not always be a situation of me having to advocate.

READ: What happens if there is a tie in the Senate committee vote on Ketanji Brown Jackson?

Because of her experience, Lawyer works with Being the Village, a support group for Black mothers in Washington, and virtually to mothers nationwide.

I think for Black women, there is a uniqueness to our experience, and so to be able to share that amongst a group of other Black women, and as we like to call it, a space of no apologies, said Lawyer. youre able to come as your full self with other women who look like you, who share the same sort of experiences; and you dont have to worry about that judgment.

The Biden administration is also pushing for states to provide continuous Medicaid coverage for 12 months postpartum to prevent gaps in health insurance after birth.

READ: Just horrific: 6 dead, 12 injured in Sacramento shooting, police say

The White House says states are currently only required to provide coverage for 60 days postpartum.

Click here to download the free WFTV news and weather apps, click here to download the WFTV Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Channel 9 Eyewitness News live.
By David Kirton

SHANGHAI (Reuters) -Shanghai will remain under lockdown as it reviews results of an exercise to test all of its 26 million residents for COVID-19, authorities said on Monday.

The city began its two-stage lockdown on March 28, initially in Shanghai's eastern districts, and later expanded to cover the whole city.

The curbs, which have massively disrupted daily life and business operations in China's financial hub, were initially scheduled to end at 5 a.m. local time (9 p.m. GMT) on Tuesday.

"The city will continue to implement seal and control management and strictly implement 'staying at home', except for medical treatment," the city government said on its official WeChat account.

It did not give an indication of when the curbs might lift.

The country sent the military and thousands of healthcare workers into Shanghai to help carry out COVID-19 tests for all of its 26 million residents on Monday, in one of the country's biggest-ever public health responses.

Some residents woke up before dawn to stand in queues for white-suited healthcare workers to swab their throats as part of nucleic acid testing at their housing compounds.

The People's Liberation Army (PLA) on Sunday dispatched more than 2,000 medical personnel from across the army, navy and joint logistics support forces to Shanghai, an armed forces newspaper reported.

About 38,000 healthcare workers from provinces such as Jiangsu, Zhejiang and the capital Beijing have been dispatched to Shanghai, according to state media, which showed them arriving, suitcase-laden and masked up, by high-speed rail and aircraft.

It is China's largest public health response since it tackled the initial COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, where the novel coronavirus was first discovered in late 2019. The State Council said the PLA dispatched more than 4,000 medical personnel to the province of Hubei, where Wuhan is, at that time.

Shanghai, which began a two-stage lockdown on March 28 that has been expanded to confine practically all residents to their homes, reported 8,581 asymptomatic COVID-19 cases and 425 symptomatic COVID cases for April 3. It also asked residents to self-test on Sunday.

Story continues

The city has emerged as a test of China's COVID elimination strategy based on testing, tracing and quarantining all positive cases and their close contacts.

The country has 12,400 institutions capable of processing tests from as many as 900 million people a day, a senior Chinese health official was reported as saying last month.

China's primarily uses pool testing, a process in which up to 20 swab samples are mixed together for more rapid processing.

The city has also converted multiple hospitals, gymnasiums, apartment blocks and other venues into central quarantine sites, including the Shanghai New International Expo Center which can hold 15,000 patients at full capacity.

Individuals who refuse to be tested for COVID for no justifiable reason will face administrative or criminal punishment, Shanghai police said on Saturday.

PUBLIC FRUSTRATION

The surge in state support for Shanghai comes as the city is straining under the demands of the country's "dynamic clearance" strategy, with some residents complaining of crowded and unsanitary central quarantine centres, as well as difficulties in securing food and medical help.

Some have begun to question the policies, asking why COVID-positive children are separated from their parents. Western diplomats have also urged China not to do so.

On Monday Shanghai official Wu Qianyu told a news conference that children could be accompanied by their parents if the parents were also infected, but separated if they were not, adding that policies were still being refined.

There has also been increasing public questioning why mild or asymptomatic infections - the majority of Shanghai's cases - cannot isolate at home.

A Shanghai resident, who declined to be named for privacy reasons, told Reuters he had been transported to a central quarantine facility on Sunday night after reporting a positive result on a self test more than a week ago.

Another antigen test on Saturday showed he was no longer infected, but authorities insisted on sending him to quarantine, where he has been put in a flat where he has to share a toilet with two other patients, both of whom are still testing positive.

"How is this isolation?" he said, adding that he was now afraid of being re-infected. "I'm not in any mood to do anything right now, I can't sleep."

On Monday, videos circulating on the WeChat messaging app showed scores of people rushing to grab bedding and supplies from the dirty floor of what the poster said was a quarantine centre whose premises were still littered with construction materials.

Reuters could not independently verify the footage.

WORKERS UNDER STRAIN

The pressure on the city's healthcare workers and Communist Party members has also been great, as they work around the clock to manage the city's lockdown and deal with residents' frustrations.

Photos and videos have gone viral on Chinese social media of exhausted workers and volunteers sleeping in plastic chairs or on the grass outside housing compounds, or being berated by residents.

On Saturday, the city's Pudong Chinese Center for Disease Control said it was investigating a leaked recording of a call between a staff member and the relative of a patient, who was perplexed by his father's COVID test results.

The CDC staff member, who local media identified as infectious disease expert Zhu Weiping, could be heard saying exasperatedly that she herself had raised concerns over the current quarantine and testing rules and that the virus had become a "political" one.

Reuters was not able to independently verify the recording which went viral on Chinese social media.

Users of the Weibo social media platform started a hashtag "protect Zhu Weiping," which by Monday had 2.9 million views, amid concerns that she could face punishment for speaking out against the official line.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has urged the country to curb the momentum of the outbreak as soon as possible while sticking to the "dynamic-clearance" policy.

On Saturday, Vice-Premier Sun Chunlan, who was sent to Shanghai by the central government, urged the city to "make resolute and swift moves" to curb the pandemic.

The eastern city of Suzhou said it had detected a version of the Omicron BA.1.1 subvariant that doesn't match any others in the domestic database or the international variant tracking database GISAID, state television reported.

The state-backed Science and Technology Daily said it remains unclear whether the virus is a new sub-branch of Omicron and that the emergence of one or two new versions is normal given the spread of Omicron in China, citing an unidentified expert with a national database.

(Reporting by Brenda Goh, David Kirton and the Shanghai Newsroom; Editing by Stephen Coates, Gerry Doyle, Raju Gopalakrishnan, Ed Osmond and Chizu Nomiyama)
A series of New York City billboards across Florida takes aim at the states co-called Dont Say Gay law while promoting the city as a welcome place for LGBT+ people.

This is the city of Stonewall, Mayor Eric Adams said from the steps of City Hall on 4 April, invoking the name of the citys LGBT+ uprising in 1969.

This is the city where we are proud to talk about how you can live in a comfortable setting and not be harassed, not be abused  not only as adults but also as young people, he said.

The billboards will run for eight weeks in Ft Lauderdale, Jacksonville, Orlando, Tampa and West Palm Beach.

The billboards include messages like Come to the city where you can say whatever you want (surrounded by the word gay) and People say a lot of ridiculous things in New York. Dont Say Gay isnt one of them.

The political showmanship of attempting to demonise a particular group or community is unacceptable, Mayor Adams said. We are going to loudly show our support and say to those who live in Florida, we want you here in New York  Its also standing up and aligning ourselves with the men and women of the LGBT+ community.

New York City is sponsoring billboards across Florida opposing the states so-called Dont Say Gay law. (City of New York)

Floridas Dont Say Gay bill is the latest shameful, extremist culture war targeting the LGBTQ+ community, Mayor Adams said in a statement. Today, we say to the families living in fear of this state-sponsored discrimination that you will always have a home in New York City.

New York Citys Ali Forney Center, the nations largest community centre supporting LGBT+ youth experiencing homelessness, serves more than 2,000 people each year, with more than 40 per cent coming from the south, according to executive director Alex Roque.

Ad content was donated on behalf of WPP Companies, WMLY&R, BCW, H+K Strategies and Kinetic, and Kinetic secured the ad space, according to City Hall.

This is costing New York City taxpayers nothing, Mayor Adams said. Its the right thing to do, because were New Yorkers.

Story continues

New York City is sponsoring billboards across Florida opposing the states so-called Dont Say Gay law. (City of New York)

Floridas Parental Rights in Education law prohibits classroom instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through third grade or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards in other grades.

Following passage of the Florida bill, similarly worded legislation was filed in state legislatures in Georgia and Louisiana, among dozens of bills targeting LGBT+ Americans in 2022, with most legislation aimed specifically at transgender youth.

A group of LGBT+ advocates, students, families and civil rights attorneys have filed a lawsuit against the law, alleging that the effort to control young minds through state censorship  and to demean LGBTQ lives by denying their reality  is a grave abuse of power that violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments, as well as federal provisions against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity under Tile IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.
Officers from the Marion Police Department and deputies from the Marion County Sheriff's Office seized 120 grams of fentanyl, a handgun, and $7,800 in cash on Sunday during the raid of a residence on Delaware Ave. in Marion. Law enforcement officers also arrested Kevin Guzman, age 25, Columbus, and charged him with trafficking in a fentanyl-related compound.

Marion County law enforcement officers arrested one man and seized drugs, a handgun, and cash during a raid on Sunday.

According to a press release issued Monday morning by the MARMET Drug Task Force, Kevin Guzman, age 25, Columbus, was arrested after officers from the Marion Police Department and deputies from the Marion County Sheriff's Office executed a search warrant on Sunday at a residence located in the 500 block of Delaware Ave. The search warrant was issued by Marion Municipal Court Judge Teresa Ballinger as a result of an investigation by detectives from the MARMET Drug Task Force.

Law enforcement officers seized approximately 120 grams of fentanyl, a handgun that was allegedly stolen, and $7,800 in cash from the residence where Guzman was arrested, according to the press release. Guzman was initially charged with trafficking in a fentanyl-base compound and was booked into the Multi-County Correctional Center in Marion.

This is again a large seizure of a deadly drug that pollutes our community and steals the lives from the citizens we serve," Marion Police chief Jay McDonald said. "With the Teamwork of the Officers and Deputies alongside the community, we are making an IMPACT. I want to thank the officers and detectives involved in this investigation."

The case has been referred to the Marion County Prosecutor's Office, which will file formal charges.

I am proud of the work and dedication of the MARMET Task Force, deputies and officers of Marion County along with the assistance from our community," Marion County Sheriff Matt Bayles said. "I believe that this seizure alone saved several lives, and we will not stop our efforts to combat this problem."

During four raids conducted in January 2022 by MARMET and Marion County law enforcement officers, agents seized approximately 156.2 grams of suspected heroin/fentanyl, 229.3 grams of suspected crack cocaine, 70.23 grams of suspected methamphetamine, 1,253 illegally-possessed pills, 471.95 grams of marijuana, two guns, and $13,493 in cash. Seven people were arrested during those raids, according to police reports.

Story continues

More: MARMET making impact on drug trade in Marion County

More: Four people arrested in two recent Marion County drug raids

More: Two people arrested, drugs and firearms seized in raid of Marion residence

More: Marion County law enforcement seizes crack cocaine, meth, ecstasy in Henry Street raid

According to statistics for the unit compiled by the Marion Police Department, from 2015 to 2020, MARMET investigated 3,234 cases and executed 1,274 search warrants which led to 3,144 indictments.

During that timeframe, officers seized 6,254.68 grams of heroin, 2,090.4 grams of cocaine, 2,364.72 grams of crack cocaine, and 15,289 prescription pills. They seized $1,340,341.84 in cash and 877 guns during that same timeframe. Officers also seized 23 vehicles with an estimated total value of $500,000.

McDonald and Bayles said Marion County citizens are encouraged to call in tips involving criminal activity to 740-375-TIPS (8477) or report tips online at mariontips.org. Tipsters may remain anonymous if they choose.

The MARMET Drug Task Force is comprised of members of the Marion City Police Department, Marion County Sheriffs Office, and the Marion County Prosecutors Office.

Email: ecarter@gannett.com | Twitter: @AndrewACCarter

This article originally appeared on Marion Star: Columbus man arrested, 120 grams of fentanyl seized in Marion raid
Authorities search the scene of a mass shooting Sunday in Sacramento. (Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press)

Father Michael O'Reilly stood on the steps of the Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament in his long, purple robes, looking at a crime scene just feet away where more than a dozen evidence markers were laid out.

It was surreal, he told me, and he felt bad that one of his first thoughts was whether the church would be able to welcome parishioners that morning, with a mass shooting shutting down streets for blocks around us.

But people were already wandering into this grand cathedral that lies within sight of the state Capitol, unaware of the shooting or maybe needing comfort because of it. Life goes on, even with six bodies still on the pavement. We accept the unacceptable, or at least endure it.

This is, after all, the 12th mass shooting in California this year. We all know what happens next. The process has already started. We are horrified. Outraged. Saddened. I've got a stack of press releases from politicians across the state who want voters to know this is unacceptable.

I won't be quoting any of them. I think you know why.

It's all sound and fury for a gun violence crisis that has long eaten at the soul of this country. People die every day, shot by those who don't respect laws or lives, or who are so unstable they shouldn't have guns in the first place. All the while, the rest of us argue over whether the 2nd Amendment protects the use of automatic weapons on our city streets.

But there was little discussion of gun rights among those I spoke with Sunday morning, as police collected bullet casings and bloody evidence and the corpses of three men and three women waited in the unseasonable heat to be collected.

I stood behind police tape, where family and friends tried to separate themselves from the dozens of television reporters whose cameras were trained on the tragedy, filing their reports for the afternoon news. Fred Harris, the father of Sergio Harris, one of the victims, pushed under the tape twice to confront officers and demand answers.

Story continues

But the truth is, there are no answers that will soothe his pain. His son is dead. I have spoken to too many family members who lost a loved one to violence. Many of them have shared this sorrowful reality with me: Nothing can make it right.

The people I spoke with said there are more guns on the street than ever. The pandemic, they said, pushed up the numbers of every kind of weapon  the legally owned ones, ghost guns that are Frankensteined together with untraceable parts and guns stolen, traded, imported or otherwise not part of the official system.

Police found a stolen handgun at the scene, they said, and multiple people who were there Sunday told me of rapid shots coming from a speeding car, the telltale sound of an automatic weapon being fired.

"Rat-a-tat-tat," said Timothy Langier, a homeless man who was in a nearby doorway.

"Everybody has a gun now," said Stevante Clark, a community activist who came to comfort the family members of victims. "Anyone who tells you otherwise is living under a rock."

Berry Accius, another community activist who has long worked on violence prevention, arrived downtown shortly after the 2 a.m. massacre and had been there for five hours by the time he and I spoke. He echoed Clark, telling me that at the start of the year, he cautioned that we should be "laser-focused" on guns after the pandemic. But no one was listening then.

Now, as Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg said at a press conference later in the day, "summer is coming." He said it like a warning, twice. "Summer is coming."

People are coming out of isolation, with all those guns. K Street, where the violence occurred, is home to some of Sacramento's most popular clubs. It's a walking street, and on warm weekend nights, it can be packed with revelers in the early morning hours, when those bars close and the patrons spill out.

Because Sacramento is small and there aren't many clubs of note, all kinds of people  some who don't get along  find themselves crammed together on K Street. Nearly every night, said Clark, there are fights. For years, ever since this strip of downtown has tried to revitalize itself after years of decline, there's been talk of how to keep peace on the Kay, as city marketers dubbed the stretch.

I don't know if gangs were involved in whatever happened Sunday night. But, as Leia Schenk, who also works on community issues, said, all those guns mean "you can't have a fist fight anymore."

Someone is going to pull out a gun, and "then all these bystanders are killed," she said.

Sacramento County Dist. Atty. Anne Marie Schubert, who is running for state attorney general on a get-tough-on-crime platform, told me that since 2019, her office has seen a 45% increase in the number of cases filed for felons in possession of a firearm. It's not just Sacramento that's seeing that rise, she said. It's happening across the country.

"I've been screaming about this for over a year, how many illegal guns there are on the streets," she said. "You talk to any chief of a major city across the country, they will tell you the same thing."

Schubert and I have been talking for months about that rise. She thinks it's from a combination of factors: people afraid during the pandemic, rising economic inequity, organized unemployment fraud that left criminals with millions in ill-gotten funds. It was, she said, inevitable that COVID-19 would make things worse.

"I'm not saying I'm a tarot card reader; I'm just saying it's a bad combination of things," Schubert said.

So, California, that's where we are at. A crisis of guns that was devastating before the pandemic has now been supercharged, regardless of who you ask. We all know it.

There is going to be a 13th mass shooting, and a 14th and a 15th. Steinberg called America's position on guns "one of the greatest signs of irrationality and sickness in our country."

If there's any way out of this very dark wormhole of gun violence, it's the possibility that an empowered majority of Americans are waking up to the truth. The truth is that the 2nd Amendment can be protected without enabling easy access to assault weapons.

These weapons have been mistaken as a fundamental value of our democracy, somehow enshrined in our Constitution and Bill of Rights, but they are not. Nobody needs a machine gun for self-defense or anything else. Nobody needs to fire 600 rounds in a minute.

Too often, these guns are about death, not self-protection. They are about taking away the most fundamental right: the right to exist, and to do it without fear.

As sunset turns downtown back to darkness, I am left with the image of Pamela Harris, Sergio's mother, bent in Clark's arm, yelling to no one, "Why did they do this to my baby?"

And I can't help but wonder, why do we do this to ourselves?

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP)  Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan approved a new congressional map Monday with more compact districts, after a judge struck down a previous map 10 days ago for being a product of extreme partisan gerrymandering.

The Republican governor, who has long pushed for redistricting reform, described the new map as a huge improvement over the one approved over his veto in December by the General Assembly, which is controlled by Democrats.

This is something that weve been focused on for eight years," Hogan told reporters after signing legislation with the newly drawn political boundaries. "Its a tremendous victory for democracy and for free and fair elections in Maryland. When these maps came out in December, I said they were unconstitutional and violated the law.

With Maryland's primary set for July 19, leaders in the legislature said voters, candidates, and election officials need to have certainty about the congressional district boundaries.

House Speaker Adrienne Jones and Senate President Bill Ferguson, who are both Democrats, said the judge's ruling contained new legal standards. They said continued delays, and a lack of clear direction in the appeals process were not in the publics best interest.

It is the job of the General Assembly to craft new maps after the census that comply with the law. We believe we have now done that with the Congressional map twice, Jones and Ferguson said in a joint statement. In the interest of democracy, we have presented the Governor with this new Congressional map and believe it complies with the trial court judges brand new legal standards.

A quickly redrawn congressional map was passed on Wednesday, five days after a judge struck down the one lawmakers approved in December as unconstitutional for diluting Republican votes. It was the first congressional map drawn by Democrats to be struck down this redistricting cycle.

Last week, a judge declared New Yorks new Democrat-drawn congressional and legislative district maps unconstitutional. Courts have previously intervened to block maps they found to be GOP gerrymanders in North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

Story continues

In Maryland, where Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1, Democrats hold a 7-1 advantage over the GOP in the state's U.S. House seats.

The initial map approved by Democrats over Hogan's veto made the lone Republican-held district held by Rep. Andy Harris more competitive. The new map takes away a portion that stretched from the Eastern Shore across the Chesapeake Bay into an area with more Democrats.

Republicans have long criticized the congressional map with its long, contorted lines as one of the most gerrymandered in the nation.

The new map for Maryland's eight U.S. House seats makes the districts more compact.

In her 94-page ruling, Judge Lynne Battaglia found the previous map violated the state constitutional requirement that legislative districts consist of adjoining territory and be compact in form, with due regard for natural boundaries and political subdivisions. It also violated the state constitutions free elections, free speech and equal protection clauses, she said.

Del. Neil Parrott, a Washington County Republican who brought a lawsuit against the map, said the new map is a much better map.

Now, I still think it's a gerrymandered map, however it's much, much better than the one in December, said Parrott, who is running for Congress in the 6th Congressional District, which had been held by a Republican until the last round of redistricting a decade ago.

Democratic Rep. David Trone, the incumbent in the western Maryland district, described the new map as a small but important step toward ending partisan gerrymandering.

Being disadvantaged by this process is a price I am willing to pay to move Maryland and our country forward, Trone said in a statement. "What we now need is a national solution  and for all elected officials across the country to get back to dealing with issues important to those we were elected to represent.

Meanwhile, a special magistrate filed a report Monday rejecting legal challenges to a separate map for state legislative districts. The recommendations from Alan Wilner, a retired judge, go to the Maryland Court of Appeals, the state's highest court.

We are not surprised by Judge Wilners reasoning in recommending denial of all challenges to the State legislative map, Jones and Ferguson said. We closely followed the legal standards that have been developed by the States highest court over last three redistricting cycles.

Doug Mayer, a spokesman for Fair Maps Maryland which is contesting the map, said Wilner's report represents the opinion of one person and we strongly disagree with his conclusions.

The Court of Appeals already had delayed the states primary for all elections from June 28 to July 19. This is a big election year: Voters will decide all 188 seats in the state legislature; statewide offices such as governor, attorney general and comptroller; a U.S. Senate seat and all eight congressional seats.
As head of the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority not once, but twice, Jim Reilly oversaw a redevelopment of popular Navy Pier and spearheaded efforts to build an arena and hotel near the McCormick Place convention center.

He guided the Regional Transportation Authority, which oversees the CTA, Metra and Pace, through transportation budget straits and the 2008 recession.

Advertisement

Reilly, who worked for decades in state politics and at Chicago transportation and tourism agencies, died Monday. He was 77.

A Springfield native, Reilly graduated from the University of Chicago Law School and worked for the downstate city of Jacksonville before he became a state representative in 1977. Before serving in the Illinois House, Reilly also taught grade school in Winchester, Illinois.

Advertisement

He was chief of staff to former Republican Gov. Jim Thompson, and returned to the same role during Gov. Jim Edgars reelection campaign.

He seemed to be a comfortable fit in making complex projects go from a behind-the-scenes role, Thompson told the Tribune at the time.

As Edgar recovered from emergency quadruple-bypass heart surgery, Reilly was a familiar and respected stand-in for the governor, the Tribune reported in 1994. The Tribune described Reilly as an administrator with a well-known contempt for inertia.

Reilly was also during the 1990s the chief executive officer of the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority, which owns McCormick Place and Navy Pier and oversees Chicagos trade show and convention business. He led the agency through an expansion of the convention center, the opening of the nearby Hyatt Regency hotel and a redevelopment project that turned Navy Pier into a tourist attraction.

Jim Reilly at McCormick Place in 2010. (William DeShazer / Chicago Tribune)

He returned to the agency known as McPier as trustee in 2010, when state legislation named him to lead a revamp of operations including moving the convention center and Navy Pier to private management. He backed controversial labor rule changes that he later said allowed the city to retain and bring new trade shows, the Tribune has reported.

He became CEO again the following year, and began efforts to build what is now Wintrust Arena and the Marriott Marquis hotel that border McCormick Place.

Between those stints, Reilly headed the citys convention and tourism bureau. Later, he was chairman of the RTA board as the regions transportation agencies sought to avoid financial doomsday. He helped avoid the worst-case scenario, and worked to plug a huge CTA pension shortfall, said Steve Schlickman, who was executive director of RTA at the time.

He was a guy that was so nonpartisan in that position, Schlickman said. He worked so easily with both sides of the aisle, and he had great relationships with Democratic leadership as well as the Republican.

Advertisement

Reilly led a consulting firm for a time and served on the boards of several organizations. He was most recently trustee of McPier and a life trustee of Navy Pier, Schlickman said.

Reilly had a deep appreciation for music and a commitment to the Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and rooted for the Bears, Bulls and St. Louis Cardinals, according to a family obituary. He traveled extensively.

He also had a passion for real and model trains, and enjoyed showing his train network to his nieces and nephews during holiday gatherings.

Jim Reilly lived life large, was kind and led a life filled with incredible accomplishments, the obituary said. He dedicated his life to public service. Beloved by his wife and extended family, he gave his time, attention and philanthropic support to multiple charitable and artistic endeavors.

He is survived by his wife, Veronica Lynch.

Chicago Tribunes Ray Long contributed.

Advertisement

sfreishtat@chicagotribune.com
(Reuters) - The government of Ontario introduced legislation on Monday to reduce taxes on gas and fuel that, if passed, would come into effect after a June 2 election in Canada's most populous province.

The legislation, if passed by the provincial legislature, would cut the tax rate on gas to 9 Canadian cents per litre from 14.7 cents per litre while the fuel tax would fall to 9 cents per litre from 14.3 cents per litre for six months from July 1.

Opinion polls show Progressive Conservative Premier Doug Ford's government is likely to be re-elected.

"Ongoing supply chain challenges and geopolitical conflicts are pushing up the cost of living from gas to groceries," Ontario Finance Minister Peter Bethlenfalvy said in a statement.

"That is why our government is bringing forward legislation to provide tax relief at the pumps and put money back into people's pockets," he added.

The government said the July 1 date was drafted to provide the gas and fuel industry time to adjust systems and business processes.

Russia, which produces about 10% of the world's oil, has been subjected to crippling sanctions by Western countries over its invasion of neighboring Ukraine, and fuel prices have soared globally during the war.

Ahead of the provincial election, Ford's government has announced a host of measures that it says are aimed at reducing living costs for Ontario residents.

In addition to removing tolls on some highways and eliminating vehicle license plate renewal fees, Ford has also announced an increase in the real estate speculation tax for foreign buyers to 20% from 15% and expanded it to the entire province.

(Reporting by Ismail Shakil in Bengaluru; Editing by Paul Simao)
Fred Greaves/Reuters/Facebook

A 26-year-old man taken into custody by Sacramento police in connection with the mass shooting on Sunday that left six dead and 12 wounded appears to have been posting on Facebook about the incident just hours after it occurred.

Dandrae Martin is facing charges of assault with a firearm and being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm, the Sacramento PD announced in a news release. (An initial news release incorrectly spelled Martins name as Dandre.)

He has not been charged with murder, but police said they were still sifting through information. As you know this is a complex investigation and were looking for multiple suspects, and so were currently working to identify what his role was the night of the shooting, Sacramento Police Chief Kathy Lester told local NBC affiliate KCRA on Monday.

Prior to his arrest, a Facebook account in Martins name, which identified the user as being located in Sacramento, was tagged by numerous friends who were posting about the Sunday night carnage on their pages.

Shortly before 8 a.m. Sunday morning, a post on Martins page said, Smh Im hit Multiple relatives and other associates asked Martin to contact them, with others wishing him luck. Soon after his arrest was announced, members of the public began flooding the comments section.

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=450637500193902&id=100057429676897

Martin also appears to be an aspiring rapper, who uses the name Dredamacc on Youtube. On a Soundcloud account, he went by Dremacc and said he was from Sacramento and Phoenix.

One video on his YouTube, for a song called Speaking on Me, opens with a still photo of a man holding a semi-automatic handgun. Another song, Cuttin up, has a photo of a man holding a rifle.

Mondays arrest was not Martins first brush with the law. In 2014, he was convicted of inflicting corporal injury on a spouse, according to court records reviewed by The Daily Beast. In 2016, he was convicted on state charges in Arizona for aggravated assault and domestic violence by impeding breathing, and was convicted two years later on one count of criminal damage in addition to a marijuana violation, The Sacramento Bee reported. He was also being held Monday on an outstanding warrant from Riverside County, according to the outlet.

Story continues

Two public defenders who have represented Martin in past cases were not immediately available for comment on Monday afternoon. Martin does not yet have a lawyer listed in court filings related to the Sacramento case.

Arizona Department of Corrections

Sundays shooting occurred around 2 a.m. amid a fight between a group of revelers outside a downtown bar. Lester said multiple shooters opened fire but it remains unknown as to whether they knew each other. A law enforcement source told the Sacramento Bee that the shooters are suspected to be gang members.

There was a large crowd of people in the area when the shots rang out, Lester said, but investigators dont know if the gunplay kicked off at a club or another event.

The six victims were identified by the Sacramento County Coroner as Yamile Martinez-Andrade, 21; Johntaya Alexander, 21; Devazia Turner, 29; Joshua Hoye-Lucchesi, 32; Sergio Harris, 38; and Melinda Davis, 57.

Police found a stolen handgun at the crime scene and more than 100 bullet casings, and at least three vehicles were hit by gunfire.

Officers from the Sacramento Police Department SWAT team and detectives executed search warrants at three homes in the area, cops said.

MASSACRE: At Least 2 Shooters Kill Six, Wound More in Sacramento

Sergio Harris mother, Pamela Harris, told reporters at the scene that her son was a very vivacious young man.

Fun to be around, liked to party, have fun, smiling all the time, didnt bother people, she said. For this to happen...its crazy. Im just to the point right now I dont know what to do. I dont even think this is real. I feel like its a dream.

Pop duo Aly and AJ said on Twitter that their tour bus was caught in the crossfire but we sheltered in place and everyone in our touring group is ok.

Distraught by the mass shooting last night outside the venue in Sacramento, the posting said. All of our thoughts are with the families of those who lost their lives and those recovering today. Were praying for the health care workers caring for them. We hope all our fans made it home safe.

In a statement, Sacramento County DA Anne Marie Schubert said that for the victims loved ones, the sunlight never looks the same for them.

After the shooting, California Gov. Gavin Newsom said on Twitter, Yet another mass casualty shootingleaving families with lost loved ones, people injured, and a community in grief. We are working closely with law enforcement to monitor the situation. We cannot continue to let gun violence be the new normal.

And the Sacramento Kings dedicated a moment of silence before their Sunday night game to those who died and their families.

Our game tonight will go on as planned and will be preceded by a moment of silence for those affected by today's tragedy.  Sacramento Kings (@SacramentoKings) April 3, 2022

The incident on Sunday was Sacramentos second mass shooting so far this year. In February, David Mora, 39, shot and killed his three young daughters and a court-appointed chaperone before taking his own life during a supervised visit at a local church.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here

Get the Daily Beast's biggest scoops and scandals delivered right to your inbox. Sign up now.

Stay informed and gain unlimited access to the Daily Beast's unmatched reporting. Subscribe now.
Throughout the latter half of 2021, as it became clear that Russia was massing a large portion of its conventional combat power on the eastern borders of Ukraine, analysts offered contrasting predictions about the role cyberspace would play in an armed conflict. These predictions capture an ongoing debate about whether conflict in cyberspace is destined to supplant conventional conflict or exacerbate it.

As the war has evolved, its clear that analysts on both sides of the debate got it wrong. Cyber operations did not replace the military invasion, and as far as we can tell, the Russian government has not yet used cyber operations as an integral part of its military campaign.

We are political scientists who study the role of cybersecurity and information in international conflict. Our research shows that the reason pundits on both sides of the argument got it wrong is because they failed to consider that cyber and military operations serve different political objectives.

Cyber operations are most effective in pursuing informational goals, such as gathering intelligence, stealing technology or winning public opinion or diplomatic debates. In contrast, nations use military operations to occupy territory, capture resources, diminish an opponents military capability and terrorize a population.

A tactical role for cyberattacks?

Its common in modern warfare for new technologies to substitute for traditional military tactics. For example, the U.S. has made extensive use of drones, including in conflicts in Yemen and Pakistan where crewed aircraft and ground forces would be difficult or impossible to use. Because drones allow the U.S. to fight on the cheap with much less risk, they substitute for other forms of warfare.

In theory, cyber operations could have played a similar tactical role in Russias invasion of Ukraine. But the Russian government has yet to use cyber operations in a manner that is clearly coordinated with military units and designed to smooth the advance of ground or air forces. When Russia invaded Ukraine, hackers disrupted access to satellite communications for thousands of people, and it was apparently a concern for Ukrainian defense officials. But overall, Ukraine has managed to maintain internet access and cellphone service for most of the country.

Story continues

Russia has sophisticated cyber capabilities, and its hackers have worked their way into Ukrainian networks for many years. This raises the question of why Russia has not, for the most part, used cyber operations to provide tactical support for its military campaigns in Ukraine, at least until this point.

Separate roles

In recent studies, we examined whether cyber operations mostly serve as complements to, or substitutes for, conventional conflict. In one analysis, we examined conventional military campaigns around the world over a 10-year period using the Militarized Interstate Disputes dataset of all armed conflicts. We also focused on the conflicts in Syria and eastern Ukraine. Our results suggest that cyber operations are generally not being used as either.

Instead, nations tend to use these two types of operations independently from each other because each mode of conflict serves different objectives, and cyberwarfare is most effective for gathering intelligence, stealing technology or winning public opinion or diplomatic debates.

In contrast, nations use traditional forms of conflict to control tangible assets, such as capturing resources or occupying territory. The various goals offered by Russian President Vladimir Putin for invading Ukraine, such as preventing Ukraine from joining NATO, replacing the government or countering fictitious Ukrainian weapons of mass destruction, require occupying territory.

There may be other reasons for the lack of overlap between cyber and conventional fronts in Ukraine. The Russian military could consider cyber operations ineffective for its purposes. The newness of cyber operations as a tool of war makes it difficult to coordinate with conventional military operations. Also, military targets might not be accessible to hackers because they might lack internet connectivity.

In any event, evidence that the Russian government intends to use cyber operations to complement military operations is thin. Our findings suggest hacking groups in previous conflicts faced considerable difficulties in responding to battlefield events, much less shaping them.

How Russia is using cyber operations

The main target of Russias digital campaign in Ukraine is ordinary Ukrainians. To date, Russian cyber operations have sought to sow panic and fear, destabilizing the country from within, by demonstrating the countrys inability to defend its infrastructure, for example, by defacing or disabling websites.

In addition, Russia has been using information campaigns to attempt to win the hearts and minds of Ukrainians. Prior to the start of the conflict, White House press secretary Jen Psaki warned of a 2,000% increase from the daily average in November in Russian-language social media content. This suggests that the purpose of these information operations was to make the case for Russias intervention on humanitarian grounds and to build support for intervention among the Ukrainian public. The Russian governments domestic actions emphasize the value its leadership places on information operations.

A supporting role

Hackers actions tend to occur out of the public eye, rather than in the flamboyantly violent manner favored by Hollywood cyber villains, which means its difficult to know for sure whats happening. Nevertheless, the lack of overlap between cyber and conventional military operations makes sense operationally and strategically. This is not to say that the informational focus of cyber operations has no effect on military operations. Good intelligence is essential for success in any military conflict.

We believe Russia is likely to continue conducting information campaigns to influence Ukrainians, its domestic public and international audiences. Russia is also likely to seek to further penetrate Ukrainian networks to access information that potentially assists its military operations. But because cyber operations have not been thoroughly integrated into its military campaigns so far, cyber operations are likely to continue playing a secondary role in the conflict.

[Understand new developments in science, health and technology, each week. Subscribe to The Conversations science newsletter.]

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Nadiya Kostyuk, Georgia Institute of Technology and Erik Gartzke, University of California San Diego.

Read more:



Erik Gartzke receives funding from DoD Minerva, the Hewlett Foundation and the Charles Koch Foundation.

Nadiya Kostyuk does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The man who police say shot his wife to death in front of her daughter, other children and parents at a Jewish community center pool in Northeast Miami-Dade had attacked and stabbed her a day earlier, but managed to elude arrest.

Carl Monty Watts Jr., 45, also has a long and troubling criminal history. He had been questioned in the mysterious 2014 disappearance of a previous girlfriend and mother of his child  a Fort Lauderdale woman who has never been found.

On Monday, Miami police supplied new details leading to the shocking shooting at the Michael-Ann Russell Jewish Community Center on Sunday afternoon. They said Watts had stabbed Shandell Harris early Saturday morning, then tried applying crude first aid before driving the woman to her mothers home.

Harris mother then convinced her daughter to call police around 3 p.m. but when officers got to the home, Watts had already fled. A team from the citys domestic violence unit was still searching for Watts when, less than 24 hours later, he gunned Harris down at the community pool.

Unfortunately, said Miami Assistant Chief of Police Armando Aguilar Jr., he found her before we found him.

Mother killed by husband while at a Miami-Dade JCC for her daughters swim lesson, cops say

Harris was with her daughter at swim lessons at the center when Watts approached around 2 p.m. According to an arrest report from Miami-Dade County Police, he began offering the victim money to drop the charges against him.

She refused and asked him to leave.

Watts then took out a firearm and began shooting the 30-year-old woman. When she collapsed, Watts stood over the victim and continued to shoot her until he ran out of live cartridges, the report said.

Private security guards soon captured Watts. Police said a gun was found in an open field adjacent to the JCC at 18900 NE 25th Ave.

Carl Monty Watts Jr. was arrested Sunday and charged with the shooting death of his wife at a Jewish Community Center in North Miami-Dade County, one day after he allegedly stabbed her.

She wouldnt hurt a fly

Lee Hanna, a friend of Harris who graduated from Miami Northwestern High School with her in 2010, said she had a brief conversation with Harris about Watts not long ago. Hanna said Harris told her they were having problems, but wouldnt elaborate.

Story continues

Hanna said her friend was preparing for the couples upcoming one-year anniversary party, which was going to take place at a banquet hall.

She was sweet, wouldnt hurt a fly, Hanna said. But I never heard her say she was scared or worried or anything.

Aguilar and arrest forms from Miami-Dade police provided a partial timeline of events over the weekend. Harris was first stabbed at about 7 a.m. Saturday in a home she shared with Watts. The couple married about a year ago. After he stabbed her, Aguilar said, he threatened to kill himself.

She talks him out of it, said Aguilar. He applies a pretty crude first aid to the knife wounds, then they run a few errands.

He said Miami police were notified of the stabbing by the call from her mothers home at about 3 p.m. An officer responded and called in a detective and crime scene technicians who photographed Harris injuries. The exact timing of those steps wasnt immediately clear.

The stabbing injuries to Harris were serious enough for her to visit the hospital, but not serious enough for her to be admitted, Aguilar said. It wasnt immediately clear how long she spent at the hospital.

Aguilar said the departments domestic violence apprehension team began searching for Watts Sunday morning, starting with the couples home. He wasnt there. It also wasnt immediately clear if police had put out a BOLO, or Be On The Lookout order between the time they first visited Harris at her mothers home Saturday and when the domestic violence apprehension team went searching for Watts the next morning.

Watts is jailed on charges of second-degree murder and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. He has a history of convictions that include fraud and grand theft. He also has long been considered a person of interest in the unsolved disappearance of a Fort Lauderdale woman and mother of two children nearly a decade ago.

Person of interest in 2014 case

Watts fathered a child with Trukita Jaquita Scott, who has been missing since she failed to pick up her two children from a day-care center in June 2014. She was last seen leaving her job at U-Haul in Miami Gardens and heading to Liberty City to meet up with Watts. Her missing car was later found in Liberty City.

Her father, Charles Scott, 52, said Watts acknowledged to the family that she visited his home to pick up money for their child, but denied having anything to do with her vanishing. Charles Scott said Watts has long been a suspect in his daughters vanishing  and he was sickened when he saw the news of his arrest Sunday.

Its unfortunate. Im sorry for the family of Ms. Harris  theyre going through what we went through, Charles Scott told the Herald on Monday, adding that he believed Watts knows where his daughter may be buried.

Watts turned himself in to police several weeks after Scotts disappearance, but to face charges of violating the conditions of his supervised release stemming from a federal weapons conviction. Watts pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 11 months in prison.

WTVJ Channel 6 reported at the time that Scotts supervisor said their relationship was so tumultuous, he had to file a restraining order against Watts just to keep him away from where she worked.

A month before Scott disappeared, Watts also had been arrested and charged with battery and false imprisonment for attempting to force a teenage girl at a bus stop into his car. That charge was later dropped.

Aguilar said Miami police are aware of his connection to the missing woman and will discuss that investigation with Fort Lauderdale police.
Good morning, Chicago.

In the first three months of 2022, both fatal and nonfatal shootings were down in Chicago. And while those are welcome statistics in the wake of a two-year surge in gun violence, the Tribunes Annie Sweeney reports, experts cautioned its too early to say whether the city is finally coming off a period of high crime.

Asiaha Butler, a longtime organizer in Englewood, has seen crime fluctuate over the years: It shouldnt be a story that crime is down. That should hopefully be the norm.

And in the latest from Ukraine, Russia is facing a fresh wave of condemnation after evidence emerged of what appeared to be deliberate killings of civilians.

Here are the top stories you need to know to start your day.

COVID-19 tracker | More newsletters | Puzzles & Games | Daily horoscope | Ask Amy | Todays eNewspaper edition

The Chicago Park District has filed a motion attempting to seal a lawsuit involving allegations that Mayor Lori Lightfoot berated a lawyer and used obscene language in a Zoom call over a Christopher Columbus statue  an unusual move that would keep the public in the dark about the case.

The Park District argues that the case should sealed to protect its interests as it defends a separate lawsuit brought by an Italian Americans group over Lightfoots removal of a Columbus statue in Little Italy. It is rare for a whole case to be sealed from public view, experts said.

With their condensed election-year session scheduled to wrap up Friday, Illinois lawmakers are eager to leave Springfield for the campaign trail, but theyll first have to tackle issues expected to play a significant role in the upcoming election: combating crime and crafting a state spending plan with a rare projected surplus.

Elections often create unanticipated dynamics, and amid both national and local concerns over an inflationary economy, violent crime and corruption, and an unending pandemic, Democrats have been forced to play defense after years of enjoying supermajorities in the General Assembly and extending their power into the once-Republican rich suburbs.

Story continues

A longtime teacher and former coach at Fenwick High School in Oak Park was placed on administrative leave in the wake of a complaint from a former student alleging inappropriate behavior.

In a letter sent to Fenwick parents, the Rev. Richard Peddicord, the Catholic high schools president, said a Fenwick alumna posted a video detailing her experience as a student at Fenwick and our handling of a serious matter involving a faculty member.

The Tribune is not naming the teacher because he has not been charged with a crime. The teacher issued a statement through an attorney denying the allegations.

After initially downplaying taxpayer subsidies for a proposed Chicago Bears stadium, the mayor of Arlington Heights is leaving the door open to limited public help for the project.

Such help might come in the form of a tax increment financing district or another local tax district that would use the sites property taxes to pay for roads, sewers and other infrastructure. Any proposal would be subject to a public hearing. With the Bears hoping to do a deal by early 2023, Mayor Tom Hayes said a public hearing would likely be before the end of this year.

Step up to the register at Taco Mucho in Oak Park, and youll see a number of familiar taco fillings like carnitas and carne asada.

Order both, because they are excellent. But trust Tribune critic Nick Kindelsperger: No order is complete without a roasted poblano con queso taco ($5), one of Chicagos very best vegetarian tacos.
By Kirsty Needham

SYDNEY (Reuters) -Digicel Group said it is considering legal options after Papua New Guinea (PNG) imposed a tax of almost $100 million that the telco said could affect its planned A$2.1 billion ($1.57 billion) sale of the Pacific's biggest mobile network to Australia's Telstra.

Telstra Corp Ltd said last October it would buy the Pacific operations of Jamaica-headquartered Digicel in a deal largely funded by the Australian government and seen by observers as a way to block China's rising influence in the region. The operations include 2.5 million mobile phone subscribers across PNG, Fiji, Vanuatu, Tonga, Samoa and Nauru.

Digicel's Irish founder, Denis O'Brien, met with PNG Prime Minister James Marape last week to try to resolve the matter, Digicel said in a statement emailed to Reuters on Monday.

"In parallel with these discussions, Digicel is also considering its legal options in the event that this discriminatory tax is not removed," Digicel said.

Its statement said a "new arbitrary, company-specific tax" was introduced on March 25, which was "perplexing not just for Digicel, but also for the Papua New Guinea economy given the reputational and credit rating implications of this sudden, bizarre and unprecedented tax".

The act imposes a one-time tax liability on Digicel of 350 million kina ($96.43 million) with a further penalty of 50 million kina for non-payment, the statement said.

"This matter requires urgent resolution given its implications for the sale of Digicel's Pacific operations to Telstra but also given the knock-on consequences for all foreign direct investment exiting Papua New Guinea," Digicel said.

The statement said the prime minister in the meeting assured Digicel the tax would not proceed and that "Digicel is now engaged in discussions with the Papua New Guinea Government and other relevant stakeholders."

Marape's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Story continues

Papua New Guinea treasurer Ian Ling-Stuckey told parliament last month it would impose a "fair tax" on Digicel Pacific as part of national budget repair measures, in recognition of the company's high historic level of profitability. The tax was half the rate of an ongoing levy on the company proposed last year, he said.

An official in Ling-Stuckey's office told Reuters on Monday there had been no announced change in this position, although "they have been deliberating over the past week on the tax".

Telstra has not changed its business plan for the deal since the new tax was announced. A Telstra spokesperson said in an emailed statement that the PNG tax was a matter for the current owner of Digicel Pacific. In response to Reuters' questions it said it was still awaiting PNG regulatory approvals for the deal.

"The acquisition of Digicel Pacific by Telstra in partnership with the Australian government has not yet received all of its regulatory approvals and has not (been) completed yet," it said.

The ongoing levy on Digicel Pacific, flagged by the government last November, would be dropped if the sale to Telstra went ahead, Ling-Stuckey told parliament in March. Telstra had agreed to invest in infrastructure including 115 mobile towers in Papua New Guinea, and other taxes worth more annually, he said.

Telstra is committed to investing to improve connectivity in the areas that Digicel Pacific operates in, including remote areas of PNG," Telstra said in a statement.

($1 = 1.3358 Australian dollars)

($1 = 3.6298 kinas)

(Reporting by Kirsty Needham; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell and Sam Holmes)
Dillon Francis brings Walgreens bag of snacks to Grammys (Getty)

Dillon Francis sparked confusion after arriving at the 64th annual Grammy Awards in a casual outfit and holding a plastic bag of snacks from Walgreens.

On Sunday, the musician arrived on the red carpet in Las Vegas, Nevada, in a pair of black jeans, a blue T-shirt, and Vans. He accessorised the informal red carpet look with a gray plastic bag from the pharmacy, which appeared to be filled to the brim with snacks including a box of Little Bites muffins.

The bag of food didnt deter the record producer from posing on the red carpet, however, as he stood for photographs alone and with fellow musician Diplo, who opted for a more-formal black suit, which he paired with blue hair.

On social media, the red carpet accessory was met with confusion and praise from viewers, who questioned and applauded the bag of Walgreens snacks.

Dillon Francis showing up to the Grammys with a Walgreens bag full of snacks was definitely the move, one person wrote, while another said: No way Dillon Francis came like this, Im CRYING.

Its nice to know both @DillonFrancis and I like the same flavour of Little Bites, someone else joked.

According to another viewer, Francis was really doing the least. However, someone else claimed the best Grammys red carpet look went to Francis hands down.

Dillon Francis has the best #GRAMMYs outfit. No further questions. https://t.co/nUExLaBhta  Trash Panda  (@rduran) April 4, 2022

Francis was not the only celebrity to arrive on the red carpet prepared with sustenance, as Doja Cat also posed on the red carpet with a purse filled with what appeared to be caramel candies.
Former US President Donald Trump said Sunday in a statement that he is throwing his support behind Sarah Palin in her bid for Alaskas US House seat.

The endorsement comes after reports surfaced last week that the former running mate in John McCains 2008 presidential campaign had spoken with Mr Trump ahead of her throwing her name in the race for the Alaska seat.

Wonderful patriot Sarah Palin of Alaska just announced that she is running for Congress, and that means there will be a true America First fighter on the ballot, Mr Trump said in a statement released on Sunday. Sarah shocked many when she endorsed me very early in 2016, and we won big. Now, its my turn!

Mr Trump also couldnt resist the opportunity to attack Mr McCain.

Sarah lifted the McCain presidential campaign out of the dumps despite the fact that she had to endure some very evil, stupid, and jealous people within the campaign itself. They were out to destroy her, but she didnt let that happen.

Sarah Palin is tough and smart and will never back down.

Mr Trump has been criticised over his continual attacks on McCain after his death.

The former Alaska governor joins a crowded field of more than 40 candidates seeking to fill the job left vacant since the death of Republican Rep Don Young, who passed away last month after holding the position for nearly 50 years.

Ms Palin famously was one of the first conservative figures within the GOP to publicly support the one-term president, and was nearly awarded for her loyalty when the Trump transition team floated her name for positions within the cabinet, with rumours initially speculating that she was under consideration for heading up Secretary of Veteran Affairs.

Join our campaign -> https://t.co/CrlfiG8MJn



Today Im announcing my candidacy for the U.S. House seat representing Alaska. Public service is a calling, and I would be honored to represent the men and women of Alaska in Congress, just as Rep. Young did for 49 years. - SP pic.twitter.com/pdMpeDGlRV  Sarah Palin (@SarahPalinUSA) April 2, 2022

Among the qualifications that Mr Trump considered worth noting in his endorsement of the former governor, included what he described as Ms Palins championing of Alaska values, Alaska energy, Alaska jobs and the great people of Alaska.

Story continues

He also highlighted what he saw as a noteworthy record of standing up to corruption in both State Government and the Fake News Media.

Sarah Palin is tough and smart and will never back down, and I am proud to give her my Complete and Total Endorsement, and encourage all Republicans to unite behind this wonderful person and her campaign to put America First!, Mr Trump said.

Thank you President Trump! Honored to have your support in our campaign for Alaska! https://t.co/CrlfiG8MJn pic.twitter.com/Ne1x7nFcAa  Sarah Palin (@SarahPalinUSA) April 4, 2022

For her part, Ms Palin said ahead of the Friday deadline to file for the 11 June special primary that she would be honoured to represent the men and women of Alaska in Congress.

I realise that I have very big shoes to fill, and I plan to honor Rep. Youngs legacy by offering myself up in the name of service to the state he loved and fought for, because I share that passion for Alaska and the United States of America, she said in a statement.

After the primary, the top four candidates from that will go on to take part in a special election, which will be held on 16 August with the winner being selected by ranked-choice voting.
Elon Musk has decided to acquire a substantial number of Twitter Inc. (NYSE:TWTR) shares, amounting to approximately 9.2% ownership of the American social media giant. The purchase comes only a short while after he publically implied that the company is a threat to democracy with its censorship being biased.

Like most, I believe Musk is making an active move on the company; why else would he be a contrarian and spend a significant amount of his money on buying shares in it two weeks later?





I feel it is necessary to cover a few basics on activist investing and speak about how it could influence the stock. It's evident that investors have once again reacted to a Musk event rather than seeking value, and it's likely that many will get burnt if they don't understand the dynamics of this move correctly.

Musk's investment remains a financial asset

Under U.S. GAAP accounting laws, an investment in a publicly traded company that holds less than 20% ownership is considered a financial asset rather than minority or majority ownership. The owner of a financial asset has voting abilities, but doesn't yield significant influence over daily operations. Furthermore, Musk's Twitter shares will likely be classified as "available-for-sale" securities, meaning it's unclear whether he'll look for a short-term price discrepancy or hold the securities until maturity.

It's only when Musk reaches the 20% ownership level that he'll be eligible for board representation under the investment in associates classification. He would then have the ability to make significant related party transactions, yield control over daily operations and essentially be Twitter's new boss.

The likelihood is Musk will probably end up buying more shares of Twitter to yield more influence, but it's not set it stone just yet and, even if it was, then what? Would you necessarily be invested in a better stock?

Story continues

An alternative here would be Musk gaining significant control over the company as an invited board member rather than buying his way in. But why would he first need to invest a substantial amount if the board wanted him around organically?

Final word

Twitter's stock has risen substantially on the news that Musk has invested in the stock. However, matters need to be looked at out of isolation and investors need to understand that just because he is the company's largest shareholder doesn't mean he's the orchestrator of daily operations.

This article first appeared on GuruFocus.


Yelp users will now be able to access restaurant inspection ratings from the Chicago Department of Public Health on the restaurant reviewing platform. (Richard Vogel/AP)

Yelp users in Chicago will now be able to access restaurant inspection ratings from the Chicago Department of Public Health on the restaurant reviewing platform.

Advertisement

Yelp is posting publicly available health department data on its site through a partnership with Hazel Analytics, a Seattle-based data company focused on food safety and public health, in certain municipalities across 48 U.S. states and Canada. In the Chicago area, the city of Evanston and suburban DuPage and McHenry counties are also included.

Advertisement

The information users will see on Yelps platform varies depending on how the health department in each municipality grades restaurants and publishes its findings. In Chicago, restaurants receive either a pass, fail, or pass with conditions grade. In jurisdictions that do not publish a score, Hazel Analytics estimates one based on a 100-point scoring system. After clicking on the restaurants rating, Yelp users can also view a restaurants past and current health code violations, if that data is published by a municipality.

The ratings come from public health department data collected by Hazel Analytics. Data is only available for restaurants in municipalities that either post inspection information online in a format accessible to Hazel or provide their data directly to Yelp. Previously, more than 60,000 business pages on Yelp included health inspection data available directly from their local health departments. Yelp has added inspection data to almost 700,000 more business pages, according to company spokesperson Kathleen Liu. Yelp says almost 70% of the U.S. population lives in jurisdictions where Hazel is collecting data.

Some municipalities, such as the Cook County Department of Public Health, which has jurisdiction over restaurants in unincorporated Cook County, are not included because they do not make restaurant inspection data available online.

Liu said Yelp had no current timeline to expand to additional municipalities in Illinois. The program currently includes 13 counties as well as Chicago and Evanston.

Health scores started going live Thursday morning, Liu said, and were slowly rolling out to as many restaurants as we have coverage for. In Chicago, Yelp users will be able to see health inspection data for nearly 12,000 business pages across the city.

Luther Lowe, Yelps senior vice president for public policy, said the company has been working to find a way to add more comprehensive health data to its listings for nearly a decade, calling it a huge win for consumers.

Advertisement

Initially, Lowe said, Yelp somewhat naively thought cities would voluntarily partner with Yelp to make their health inspection data easily accessible on its platform. Some jurisdictions, such as Los Angeles County, did opt in, but Lowe said to include more areas, the company needed to be more aggressive than I thought we would ever have to be.

Yelp cites a 2020 study published in the Journal of Industrial Economics that found the partnership between Yelp and the city of Louisville, Kentucky, caused substantial hygiene improvements in non-chain restaurants in Louisville. The study found that, when compared with the rest of the state, the partnership significantly reduced rates of severe food poisoning in Louisville. The study found consumers were less reliant on Yelp to learn about chain restaurants.

In Chicago, restaurants categorized as the highest risk level by the citys health department are routinely inspected once a year, said Virginia Castaneda, manager of food protection services for the Chicago Department of Public Health. That includes restaurants that prepare food from scratch, she said. (Fast food restaurants are typically categorized at a lower risk level and are also inspected about once a year, she said. The lowest risk establishments sell prepackaged foods and are inspected about once every other year.) Restaurants may also be inspected more frequently if the department receives complaints, or if the restaurant does not pass an inspection. Restaurants are required to display a summary of their health inspection results in a place visible to the public.

If a restaurant is found to have either an imminent health hazard or continued noncompliance with health department inspections, its license can be suspended.

Advertisement

Were aware of what Yelp is doing, and were generally supportive of any type of data like this being available to the public, said Janna Kerins, medical director for foodborne disease with the Chicago Department of Public Health. Kerins said she did not have enough detail about Yelps project to comment on its use of the citys data.

A spokesperson for the DuPage County Health Department did not comment directly on the program but said the department encouraged residents to use health inspection information it posts online.

.

Advertisement

In January 2020, Yelp rolled out a separate health alerts program that flagged restaurants in the bottom 1% of health and safety violations. Chicago was one of the cities included in that program, which ended last year. The program was more limited in scope than the new one; only about 30 Chicago restaurants were flagged at the start.

Sam Toia, president of the Illinois Restaurant Association, said he hoped Yelp would provide consumers context about health scores and violations and that the platform would keep health scores up to date.

Health inspection is a snapshot in time, its not an overall assessment of what restaurants do every single day, Toia said.

Lowe said new inspection results would appear on Yelps platform within 24 hours of a municipality adding them to its own data set.

tasoglin@chicagotribune.com
WASHINGTON  European governments are expected to discuss their part in security guarantees that could be promised to Ukraine under a potential peace deal following Russias increasingly brutal attack on the country, according to a senior European Union official.

The comments come as talks between Ukrainian and Russian negotiators last week teed up the question of alternative assurances  outside of NATOs Article 5 mutual-assistance clause  the West is willing to underwrite after Moscow stops its assault.

As soon as the war is over  or perhaps, in connection with the cessation of hostilities  we need to think what kind of guarantees will be offered to Ukraine, said Charles Fries, the deputy secretary-general for common security and defense policy and crisis response at the European External Action Service. He was speaking April 4 at an event in Washington organized by the Atlantic Council think tank.

Fries described the sweet spot of security guarantees as being something between more than Budapest, but, of course, less than Article 5, referring to the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, a now-obsolete treaty crafted to guarantee Ukraines security after Kyiv gave up its nuclear weapons per the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

So thats a question for the next weeks, which has to be addressed, Fries said.

Its a key issue, but the EU as such is not directly involved, he said. Rather, select nations might take action individually, Fries added, noting that he hadnt seen a list of who might come forward.

The Budapest Memorandums original signatories include the United States and the United Kingdom on the Western side, as well as Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus.

Last week, Olha Stefanishyna, Ukraines deputy prime minister for European and Euro-Atlantic integration, said her government envisions a security-guarantees regime endorsed by Budapest Memorandum signatories as well as the United Nations Security Council.

We have already confirmed agreement on that from Great Britain, from Germany and from Turkey, Stefanishyna said during a March 31 online event sponsored by the German Marshall Fund of the United States think tank. She was speaking from Kyiv.

Story continues

Sean Monaghan, an analyst with the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the legal format of whatever security guarantees the West can muster for Ukraine will be ultimately secondary. More important, and difficult, he told Defense News, will be the willingness of European populations to back them by military force.

The power and commitment of NATO Article 5 has had time to grow for more than 70 years, Monaghan said. With Ukraine, that would have to happen overnight.

Meanwhile, the Ukrainian government has drawn a red line around the countrys territorial integrity and sovereignty in whatever post-war negotiations may bring, Stefanishyna said. Kyiv also would not support an agreement aimed at whitewashing Russian war crimes during the invasion, she added.

As Ukrainian officials come to terms with NATO benefits being off the table, they are doubling down on the European Union and a potential fast-tracked membership plan.

Stefanishyna hopes that by years end the European Commission will publish its assessment of whether Ukraine is an eligible candidate, per the so-called Copenhagen criteria. Those criteria prescribe examining aspiring members state of democracy, rule of law, human rights and monetary and economic fitness.
Former Housing Minister Esther McVey. WIktor Szymanowicz/NurPhoto via Getty Images

An ex-UK housing minister made a second "minor breach" of revolving door rules, the government says.

Esther McVey was previously found in breach of the rules for work as a GB News presenter.

McVey gave a speech on "tips and tricks to get an industry message across to government" but denied it concerned lobbying.

A former UK housing minister who gave a 3,000 speech to a construction trade association about how to "get an industry message across to government" has been found in "minor breach" of the UK's revolving door rules designed to stop ex-ministers cashing in on their time in government.

Esther McVey's breach of the rules concerned her failing to seek advice before joining the speakers' agency through which she was paid for her speech  not for giving the speech itself. She previously denied that her talk involved helping special interests more effectively lobby government.

It is McVey's second breach of the rules after she was found in December 2021 to have failed to follow the Business Appointment Rules by not consulting the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (ACOBA) before taking a role as a presenter on GB News. In addition to her role as a GB News presenter, McVey is a Conservative MP for Tatton.

As a housing minister until February 2020, McVey was required to consult ACOBA before taking up any appointments until February 2022.

Insider first revealed McVey's October 2021 speech to the Council for Aluminium in Building. A LinkedIn post by the Council for Aluminium in Building described her speech as providing "an excellent range of hints, tips and tricks to get an industry message across to government, officials and the press."

Esther McVey at the Council for Aluminium in Building's meeting in Leeds, 14th October 2021. Council for Aluminium in Building

When contacted by ACOBA, McVey denied her speech was about lobbying. Instead, she said it was about "'how to run a successful campaign' as a backbench MP".

The head of the UK's professional lobbying association, Francis Ingham, told Insider that such a speech is "clearly advice on lobbying", and described it as "completely unethical" for McVey to make the speech.

Story continues

"There is no other way to describe it. It is ludicrous to say otherwise. It's treating people as fools to pretend it's something else," Ingham said.

Insider did not immediately receive a response from McVey's office.

The government seems to have accepted McVey's explanation of her speech.

Cabinet Office minister Lord True told ACOBA chair Lord Pickles in a letter published Monday that he notes "Ms McVey's confirmation that, contrary to the press coverage of this speech, she did not provide advice on lobbying or discuss her former Ministerial role during this engagement."

McVey will face no punishment or censure despite her breaching government rules twice. And now that two years have passed, she is no longer bound by the government rules, leaving her free to give speeches advising on lobbying.

The opposition Labour party criticised McVey for what they characterised as a "cavalier approach towards the rules."

Fleur Anderson, shadow Cabinet Office minister, told Insider: "This is just the latest in a long line of examples of the Tories demonstrating a cavalier attitude towards the rules.

"Just over the last couple of weeks, we've seen that the Chancellor has not declared his wife's shareholdings in a company operating out of Russia. We've also seen the Prime Minister's WhatsApp messages go missing before April 2021, which would have been crucial evidence in the Covid Inquiry.

"This may seem small by comparison, but the rules are unambiguous, and the Tories just can't seem to abide by them."

In a separate letter, True wrote that former health minister Steve Brine breached the rules by failing to seek permission from ACOBA before taking a role as a lobbyist paid 20,000-a-year for 8 hours a month for a pharmaceutical firm, Sigma.

As part of his work, Brine organised meetings between the firm and vaccine minister Nadhim Zahawi.

The firm later received a 100,000 government contract.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Mikhail Khodorkovsky told CNN that Vladimir Putin was at war "not with Ukraine" but with NATO.

The exiled oligarch said propagandists were preparing Russians "for an attack on NATO countries."

Khodorkovsky said Putin would prepare to invade the Baltics if he concluded he'd won in Ukraine.

The exiled Russian oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky said in an interview with CNN on Sunday that the next step in Russian President Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine might be the invasion of the Baltic countries of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

"We must understand that, in his head, Putin is at war not with Ukraine," Khodorkovsky said. "He's at war with the United States and NATO. He said this more than once."

Khodorkovsky, a former oil tycoon, was considered the wealthiest man in Russia until 2003 when, for what he says were political reasons, Putin charged him with financial crimes and imprisoned him for nine years. Since Khodorkovsky's release in 2013, he has been an outspoken critic of the Kremlin and Putin's government.

"His propagandists have already been started to prepare Russian society for an attack on NATO countries. They're constantly talking about this," Khodorkovsky said. "And this is the preparation of Russian public opinion for this."

Early last month, Khodorkovsky predicted the invasion of Ukraine would end Putin's government. In his Sunday interview with Fareed Zakaria, however, he expressed concern that Putin went "insane" when Ukrainians resisted the invasion and that the attacks could escalate.

"I'm absolutely convinced that, if Putin decides that he has won in Ukraine, this is not going to be the last step, the last war," Khodorkovsky said. "The next steps will be the Baltic countries."

Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are all members of NATO. President Joe Biden said early after Russia invaded Ukraine that the US would "defend every inch of NATO territory," and he's moved American troops into the region.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Sharika Palmer, center, is comforted by friends and family during the War Cry 4 Peace candlelight vigil for her fiance Jacorie McCullough, who was shot and killed March 25 in the parking lot at the 7 Days Food Store. [Alan Youngblood/Special to the Ocala Star-Banner]

Family, friends and members of the community gathered at a northwest Ocala convenience store Sunday afternoon for a candlelight vigil to honor and remember 23-year-old Jacorie McCullough, who died as the result of a shooting during an apparent robbery attempt at the location on March 25.

At least 75 people, including McCullough's fiancee, Sharika Palmer and a 14-year-old boy identified as McCulloughs stepson, gathered at 7 Days Food Store at 2002 NW First Ave. to pray and share memories of their lost friend and loved one.

Many in the group offered support to Palmer and the young man by way of hugs and testimony.

"(Jacorie) was a great person, he didn't deserve this," Palmer said before the vigil.

Palmer indicated McCullough worked as a forklift operator and was involved in the cosmetics profession.

Taukiya Chaver, a friend of McCullough's, said he was a "jokester" and was nicknamed "Cheese" for the big smile he flashed.

"He was very cool," she said.

Friends and family join hands in love during the War Cry 4 Peace candlelight vigil for Jacorie McCullough, on Sunday in Ocala. McCullough was killed March 25 in the parking lot at the 7 Days Food Store. War Cry 4 Peace is an organization that supports the families of those killed by gun violence.

More: Surviving family member of crash that killed 2 sues Ocala bar for serving alcohol to driver

Courts: Man, 55, sentenced to 50 years for sex offense on teen

More: 17-year-old charged as adult for allegedly firing shots at a family in Ocala

Deon Hunt, 22, of Ocala, a friend of McCullough's, said he worked with him in a warehouse and had known him since I was 18.

Derek Ponder stepped forward to address the group.

"This (tragedy) has left a void. God will fill the void. Choose life," Ponder said as he decried violence among youth.

Kim Pompey Wilkerson, head of War Cry 4 Peace, a gun violence prevention and community outreach, conducted the vigil, which saw many hold lighted candles.

A family member came forward and lighted six large candles.

Friends and family gather for the War Cry 4 Peace candlelight vigil for Jacorie McCullough, on Sunday in Ocala.

"Jacorie's candle shone, now we have to shine. It is sort of like a baton in a relay race," Wilkerson said.

"We don't understand a lot of things, Wilkerson said about the tragedy.

Story continues

Wilkerson asked the group to offer support to the family even in the weeks and months to come by way of calls, texts and visits because the need for support will continue.

At the close of the vigil, Palmer was overcome by emotion and was consoled by several people.

According to an Ocala Police Department news release, the shooting took place at 7 Days Food Store after what appeared to be a robbery involving a backpack and a confrontation between McCullough and two of the three defendants, one of whom pulled out a firearm and shot McCullough.

The news release states that 18-year-old Leandre Cox is seen in surveillance tapes approaching McCullough with a firearm and two 14-year-olds also have been implicated in the crime.

The news release states McCullough and Cox are seen to engage in a short physical fight until Cox fires the gun at McCullough."

Cox surrendered himself at the OPD on March 29 and the two 14-year-olds have been arrested.

According to Marion County Jail records, Leandre Rashad Cox was booked on March 30 on a charge of felony murder in the first degree.

Kimberly Wilkerson, left, lights the candles for friends and family during the War Cry 4 Peace candlelight vigil for Jacorie McCullough, on Sunday in Ocala.

This article originally appeared on Ocala Star-Banner: Family, friends remember Ocala man killed at 7 Days Food Store
WARWICK, RI  After a weekend of headaches for air travelers across the country, only a few flights into and out of Rhode Island were delayed on Monday.

As of about 11:30 a.m., just a handful of flights into and out of Rhode Island T.F. Green International Airport were delayed or canceled. Check the arrivals or departures boards for the latest information about specific flights.

Many of the weekend delays at nearby Logan Airport in Boston and for travelers across the country were from JetBlue, which had about half of the Boston delays over the weekend.

"Over the past several days, severe weather in the southeast and multiple air traffic control delay programs have created significant impacts on the industry," a JetBlue spokesman said in a written statement. "We have unfortunately had to cancel flights this weekend, and today's cancellations will help us reset our operation and safely move our crews and aircraft back in to position."

Ed Baklor, head of JetBlue's Customer Care and Programs, also issued a statement last week, saying that operational problems at JetBlue are happening because flight attendants are refusing to accept assignments.

But Transport Workers Union of America referenced Baklor's statement about his staff, adding that "this could not be further from the truth."

The TWU issued its own statement on March 28 titled, "Hey, JetBlue: Stop Blaming Flight Attendants for Your Incompetent Management," singling out both JetBlue and Baklor for not addressing the real problems.

"JetBlue has a history of blaming its flight attendants for issues largely caused by poor decisions by management," the TWU statement reads. "For example, last summer Baklor made arbitrary changes to the Company's attendance policy, which doubled the discipline for flight attendants while ignoring the realities of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, resulting in flight attendant terminations."

Story continues

Across the country, JetBlue canceled 353 flights on Sunday. The airline's cancellations at Logan alone made up around 20 percent of them.

Another spokesperson for JetBlue blamed severe weather in parts of the Southeast on multiple air traffic control delay problems leading to bigger impacts across the industry over the past few days.

Other airlines with cancellations and delays at Logan over the weekend included American, Alaska, Allegiant, Delta, Frontier, Spirit, and Southwest  with Southwest accounting for the most amount of national cancellations overall Sunday (399).

"We are experiencing flight disruptions across our network today due to briefly pausing our service earlier this morning as we worked to resolve an intermittent technology issue, as well as ongoing weather challenges impacting multiple areas within our system," Southwest tweeted over the weekend.

Dozens of upset travelers swarmed Twitter over the weekend searching for some accountability from the airlines, including political commentator Bill O'Reilly, who said "Trying to fly Jet Blue JFK-Turks Caicos. Flight now 3 hours late. No explanation. Weather is fine. This airline is blatantly irresponsible."

Patch editor Haley Cornell contributed to this article.

This article originally appeared on the Cranston Patch
Finnish flag naumoid/iStock

Finland's government expects to submit a national security analysis, which could lead to a NATO membership process, to the country's parliament by mid-April, Reuters reported Monday.

Per Reuters, the country of 5.5 million, which shares an 800-mile border with Russia, began moving aggressively toward membership after Russia invaded aspiring NATO member Ukraine and threatened "serious military and political consequences" if Finland attempted to join the alliance.

In Finland, public support for NATO membership stood at 60 percent in March, a 34 percent increase since the autumn of 2021, according to Newsweek. Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin said Russia is "not the neighbor we thought it was" and that Russia's invasion of Ukraine and threats against Finland have changed the countries' relationship in an "irreversible" way.

Although Finland is not now a NATO member, Reuters explains, it maintains close ties with the alliance. Finnish miliary units aided in NATO operations in Afghanistan and Kosovo, participate in frequent military exercises with NATO forces, and form part of the NATO Response Force.

After World War II, during which Finland fought against the Soviet Union, Finland declined to join NATO, instead pursuing a policy known as the Paasikivi-Kekkonen doctrine. This policy "positioned Finland as a neutral country during the Cold War while maintaining good relations with" the Soviets, Wilson Center scholars Robin Forsberg and Jason C. Moyer write.

In Sweden, a country that has not fought a war since 1814, support for joining NATO has also increased, but Sweden is not moving toward membership nearly as rapidly as Finland, Reuters reports.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misstated the steps Finland is taking in any potential decision to join NATO. We regret the error.

You may also like

Secret Service is renting $30,000-a-month Malibu mansion to protect Hunter Biden, ABC News reports

7 brutally funny cartoons about Will Smith's Oscars slap

How did Russia's oligarchs become so powerful?
PARIS (Reuters) -French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday that a new round of sanctions targetting Russia were needed and that there were clear indications Russian forces were responsible for the killings of civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha.

"There are very clear clues pointing to war crimes. It is more or less established that the Russian army is responsible (for the Bucha killings)," Macron told France Inter radio.

"What happened in Bucha demands a new round of sanctions and very clear measures," Macron added.

Those new sanctions should target coal and oil, said Macron who faces a re-election battle this month.

Russia on Sunday denied its forces were responsible for the deaths of civilians in the town of Bucha and said Ukraine had staged a performance for the Western media.

Russia's economy is facing the gravest crisis since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union after the United States and its allies imposed crippling sanctions due to Putin's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine.

(Reporting by Dominique Vidalon;Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Richard Lough)
Another man died after being shot multiple times over the weekend in Fresno following one other fatal shooting, according to police.

Police said they received a ShotSpotter notification of about 10 rounds and discovered Brando Smith, 29, suffering from multiple wounds about 12:45 a.m. Saturday.

Smith was lying in the road in the area of Jackson and Nevada avenues after officers were dispatched, police said. It is not clear if he was walking in the area or had arrived in a car, police said.

He died several hours later at Community Regional Medical Center, police said. Officers are still looking for information and evidence, police said.

The deadly shooting followed another late Friday in central Fresno that killed one man.

Smiths life was the 13th homicide so far this year, according to police.

Anyone reporting information on the incident can remain anonymous by contacting Crime Stoppers at 559-498-7867. Reference Fresno police Case No. 2204010997.
WASHINGTON  President Joe Biden on Monday called for a war crimes trial against Russia President Vladimir Putin and said hed seek more sanctions after reported atrocities in Ukraine.

You saw what happened in Bucha, Biden said. He added that Putin is a war criminal.

Advertisement

Bidens comments to reporters came after Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Bucha, one of the towns surrounding Kyiv where Ukrainian officials say the bodies of civilians have been found. Zelenskyy called the Russian actions genocide and called for the West to apply tougher sanctions against Russia.

We do not believe that this is just a random accident, or the rogue act of a particular individual, said U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan of the images of bound civilians killed. He noted the U.S. had warned that Russia would seek to imprison or kill dissidents or others it viewed as threats to its attempted occupation of Ukraine. We believe that this was part of the plan, he added.

Advertisement

Biden and U.S. officials, however, stopped short of calling the actions genocide.

We have seen atrocities, we have seen war crimes, we have not yet seen a level of systematic deprivation of life of the Ukrainian people to rise to the level of genocide, Sullivan said.

The bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Kyiv-area towns that were recently retaken from Russian forces, Ukraines prosecutor-general, Iryna Venediktova, said. Associated Press journalists saw the bodies of at least 21 people in various spots around Bucha, northwest of the capital.

We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue the fight. And we have to gather all the detail so this can be an actual -- have a war crimes trial, Biden said.

Biden lashed out at Putin as brutal.

President Joe Biden pauses to answer a question from a reporter after he spoke about strengthening the supply chain with improvements in the trucking industry, on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Monday, April 4, 2022. (Andrew Harnik/AP)

Whats happening in Bucha is outrageous and everyone sees it, Biden added.

Sullivan said Monday that Russia was shifting its focus in its war in Ukraine to the countrys east and south, after experiencing a stronger-than-expected defense by Ukrainians supported by Western allies.

Sullivan said the Russians have now realized that the West will not break in its support of the Ukrainian government. But he warned that Russia was redoubling its offensive in other parts of the country after pulling many troops from around the capital of Kyiv.

Advertisement

White House officials said talks about ramping up new sanctions against Russia intensified after reports of alleged atrocities emerged. Biden said Monday that he would continue to add sanctions but did not detail what sectors the U.S. may target next. Sullivan said the additional sanctions would come this week.

After unveiling an avalanche of sanctions in the first weeks of the war, administration officials in recent days have put more focus on closing loopholes that Russia might try to use to avoid sanctions.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen tweeted Monday that the European Union will send investigators to Ukraine to help the local prosecutor general document war crimes.

A Russian law enforcement agency says it has launched its own investigation into allegations that Ukrainian civilians were massacred in suburbs of Kyiv that were held by Russian troops, focusing on what it calls false information about Russian forces.

The Investigative Committee claims Ukrainian authorities made the allegations with the aim of discrediting Russian troops and that those involved should be investigated over possible breaches of a new Russian law banning what the government deems to be false information about its forces.

Biden noted that he faced pushback last month when he described Putin as a war criminal for the unfolding onslaught in Ukraine after hospitals and maternity wards were bombed. In his remarks on Monday, Biden made clear that label still applied.

Advertisement

This guy is brutal and whats happening to Bucha is outrageous, and everyones seen it, Biden said.

Investigations into Putins actions had begun before the new allegations of atrocities outside Kyiv.

The U.S. and more than 40 other countries are working together to investigate possible violations and abuses, after the passage of a resolution by the United Nations Human Rights Council to establish a commission of inquiry. There is another probe by the International Criminal Court, an independent body based in the Netherlands. The U.S. Senate unanimously approved a resolution last month seeking investigations of Putin and elements of his government for war crimes over the invasion of Ukraine.

Meanwhile, Bidens chief envoy to the United Nations, Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, announced Monday that the U.S. plans to seek a suspension of Russia from its seat on the U.N.s top human rights body in the wake of more indications Russian forces may have committed war crimes in Ukraine. That would require a decision by the U.N. General Assembly.

Russia and the other four permanent members of the U.N. Security Council  Britain, China, France and the United States  all currently have seats on the 47-member-state rights council, which is based in Geneva. The United States rejoined the council this year.

My message to those 140 countries who have courageously stood together is simple: the images out of Bucha and devastation across Ukraine require us now to match our words with action, Thomas-Greenfield said. We cannot let a Member State that is subverting every principle we hold dear to continue to sit on the UN Human Rights Council.

Advertisement

Associated Press chief congressional correspondent Lisa Mascaro contributed reporting to this article.
A German man allegedly got himself vaccinated against Covid-19 about 90 times in a bid to sell fake vaccination certificates carrying real vaccine batch numbers for people against inoculation.

The 60-year-old from central Germanys Magdeburg received close to a hundred doses for months at vaccination centres in the Saxony state but was caught by police earlier this month.

Officials caught the sexagenarian at a vaccination centre in Eilenburg when he turned up for a Covid shot for the second day in a row. The police found several blank vaccination cards on him and have initiated criminal proceedings.

His name has not been disclosed due to the countrys privacy rules. The accused has not been arrested but is under investigation for issuing vaccination cards illegally and forging documents.

The man has received dozens of Covid jabs from different brands, and it is not immediately clear how these would impact his health.

Police in Germany have been carrying out several raids in the wake of reports about an increase in forged Covid vaccination passports in recent months amid vaccine hesitancy.

The European country has recorded a fresh wave of infections in the last one month, which health experts and authorities have blamed on BA.2 Omicron subvariant.

The countrys disease control agency confirmed 74,053 new Covid cases on Sunday due to the dominant Covid variant.

A total of 130,029 Covid deaths have been recorded since the beginning of the pandemic in Germany, official data shows.

Officials from the disease control body, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), said Germany appears to have crossed the peak of its Omicron wave.

The peak of the wave has probably been reached, but the infection pressure remains very high with more than 1.5 million Covid-19 cases reported to the RKI within one week, the institute said last week.

Additional reporting by agencies
(AP)

Warning: This article contains content relating to suicide.

True crime buffs, listen up. The Girl from Plainville has just dropped on Hulu in the US and follows the true story of the texting suicide case where Michelle Carter was charged with manslaughter for boyfriend Conrad Roys death.

The series is set to explore the young couples relationship, the circumstances surrounding Roys death and the medias coverage of the case.

It stars Elle Fanning as Carter and Colton Ryan as Roy. Chloe Sevigny is also in the cast, playing Roys mother Lynn.

While the first few episodes of the series are now available in the US, there is no word yet on when it will be available for UK audiences. Although, with Hulu shows such as The Dropout available on Disney+ in the UK, its likely The Girl from Plainville will drop on the platform in the coming weeks.

Who is Michelle Carter and what happened to Conrad Roy?

On 13 July 2014, the body of Conrad Roy was found in his truck in a parking lot in Massachussetts, US. It was determined that he had killed himself by carbon monoxide asphyxiation.

Roy, who was 18 when he died, had been suffering from anxiety and depression. Carter, who was 17 at the time, was his long-distance girlfriend.

The pair met in 2012 in Florida where both of their families were holidaying, and they maintained a long-distance, mostly text-based relationship, despite living just an hour away from each other.

An investigation by authorities found a string of text messages between Roy and Carter in the weeks leading to his death. The texts showed Carter encouraging Roy to commit suicide.

On the day of Roys death, Carter sent a message to him which read: You keep pushing [sic] it off and say youll do it but you never do. Its always gonna be that way if you dont take action.

An investigation by Esquire, which the new series is based on, found that Roy had told Carter that he was feeling suicidal in June. He told Carter they should be like Romeo and Juliet to which Carter said: WE ARE NOT DYING. Thats not funny. I thought you were trying to be romantic.

Story continues

However, her tune changed later that month, as she began suggesting different ways to commit suicide to Roy. After Roy told her he was going to do it on July 3, Carter told him that carbon monoxide was the best option.

You better not be bullshitting me and saying youre gonna do this and then purposely get caught, Carter wrote. She also asked him if she could tell people she was his girlfriend when he died.

Roy spoke to Carter on the phone before he died and detectives discovered what was said through a text from Carter to her friend. It read: I could have stopped him. I was on the phone with him and he got out of the car because it was working and he got scared and I f***ing told him to get back in. I could of stopped him but I f***ing didnt. All I had to say was I love you.

In February 2015, Carter was indicted for involuntary manslaughter which is to kill someone unlawfully but unintentionally.

What was Michelle Carters sentence?

At her trial in August 2017, Carter was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to two and a half years in prison, but just 15 months of this was made mandatory by the judge.

She was also sentenced to an additional five years probation. She was initially granted a stay of execution of her sentence and ended up starting her jail time in February 2019.

However, Carter only ended up serving just 11 months of her sentence due to good behaviour and was released in January 2020.

A spokesperson for the Bristol County Sheriffs Office told Buzzfeed at the time: Ms. Carter has been a model inmate in Bristol County. She has attended programs, had a job inside the jail, has been polite to our staff and volunteers, has gotten along with other inmates, and weve had no discipline issues with her whatsoever.

Where is Michelle Carter now?

Now 25, Carter has kept a low profile since her prison release over two years ago. Conditions of her release have meant she has been on probation until this year, which makes it unlikely that she has left the US.

Her probation ends in August this year and it also prevents her from profiting from any publicity surrounding the case, but she will be able to make money from it when her parole ends.

If youve been affected by anything in this article and dont know who to turn to there are free helplines available to support you. In the UK and Ireland  call Samaritans UK at 116 123.
U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) (R) meets with U.S. Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson (L) on March 29, 2022. Win McNamee/Getty Images

Sen. Mitt Romney announced that he will vote to confirm Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court.

Romney is the third Republican to announce his support for President Joe Biden's nominee.

GOP Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska have also said they'll support Jackson.

Sen. Mitt Romney on Monday announced that he'll vote to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court, becoming the third Republican to pledge his support for President Joe Biden's nominee.

The Utah Republican said in a statement that Jackson is "a well-qualified jurist and a person of honor."

"While I do not expect to agree with every decision she may make on the Court, I believe that she more than meets the standard of excellence and integrity," Romney said. "I congratulate Judge Jackson on her expected confirmation and look forward to her continued service to our nation."

Romney joins Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who have also said they'll vote to confirm Jackson, the first Black woman nominated to the high court.

Collins revealed her support for Jackson last week. Murkowski, like Romney, announced her support on Monday evening as the Senate held a procedural vote to bring Jackson's nomination out of a committee deadlock. The Senate Judiciary Committee tied 11-11 earlier Monday on Jackson's nomination, with all Democrats in support and all Republicans opposed.

The news comes as Democrats and the White House had been hoping to peel off some Republican votes for a bipartisan Supreme Court confirmation vote, which will likely take place later this week.

Romney, a moderate Republican, was widely considered to be a swing vote for Jackson's nomination. His support comes amid widespread Republican opposition to Jackson. Most Republicans last week announced they intend to vote against Jackson for a seat on the nation's high court following her confirmation hearings.

Yet after he met with Jackson last week, Romney still did not say if he'd vote for her. "I appreciate the time she spent answering my questions, which was helpful as I continue my review of her record and testimony," he said in a statement last Tuesday.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Ukraines president Volodymyr Zelensky made a special virtual appearance at the 64th annual Grammy Awards, where he urged musicians to tell our story during a powerful speech.

The Ukrainian leader delivered his message amid Russias ongoing attacks against his country.

The war. Whats more opposite to music. The silence of ruined cities and killed people, he said in an emotional message.

Our loved ones dont know if we will be together again. The war doesnt let us choose who survives and who stays in eternal silence.

Our musicians wear body armour instead of tuxedos. They sing to the wounded. In hospitals. Even to those who cant hear them but the music will break through anyway.

We defend our freedom to live, to love, to sound.

On our land we are fighting Russia, which brings horrible silence with its bombs. The dead silence.

Fill the silence with your music. Fill it today. To tell our story.

Follow live updates from the Grammy Awards here. See the updated list of winners in full here.

On Sunday 3 April, prosecutors in Ukraine began investigating potential Russian war crimes after 410 bodies were discovered in towns near Kyiv.

It comes after images emerged of dead civilians found on the streets of the small city of Bucha and the Kyiv suburb Irpin, in what an adviser to Zelensky said resembled a horror movie.

The Independent has a proud history of campaigning for the rights of the most vulnerable, and we first ran our Refugees Welcome campaign during the war in Syria in 2015. Now, as we renew our campaign and launch this petition in the wake of the unfolding Ukrainian crisis, we are calling on the government to go further and faster to ensure help is delivered. To find out more about our Refugees Welcome campaign, click here. To sign the petition click here. If you would like to donate then please click here for our GoFundMe page.
Apr. 4HAITI  For more than a decade, Bruce Blumer trekked to Haiti with a mission to improve the lives of people who are living in extreme poverty.

While each trip provides a meaningful experience, Blumer's most recent trek to the small Haitian island was one he'll never forget. As he made it to the La Gonave island on the northwest side of Haiti in late February, a fully finished school building named in honor of his longtime Mitchell friend, Rob Marchand, greeted Blumer.

"He'd really be honored with how the school turned out. It looks great," Blumer said of the Rob Marchand Education Center that began construction in 2017. "We're still adding pieces to it as we go, but it's special to see the kids with smiling faces getting to receive an education."

Blumer, a former Mitchell resident, is a leader of a nonprofit organization called La Gonave Alive that has helped provide the island with basic resources such as education supplies, health care, food and clothing since 2013.

After

Marchand died in 2014, Blumer and members of the missionary organization set out to build a school for the Haitian youth and name it in honor of the late Marchand,

who was a youth leader at Mitchell's Recreation Center for several decades. The two-story school building was built by local Haitians and missionaries like Blumer for Haitian students in grades first through seventh to attend.

"In America, we are fortunate enough to have schools all around us that kids are able to attend. Getting an education in parts of Haiti is not an option for many kids, especially in rural parts of the country," Blumer said. "This school is having such a big impact on the community. It really gives the kids a path to a brighter future."

According to the United Nations Children's Fund, an estimated 50% of Haitian children do not attend primary school, and 80% fail to reach secondary school.

As a college professor and former principal at Mitchell Middle School, Blumer knows how vital education is for youth. And giving Haitian children an opportunity to receive an education is one way Blumer said Haiti can make gains in the poverty level the small country has been in for decades. A 2020 report from worldbank.org ranked Haiti as the poorest country in the Latin America and Caribbean region, and one of the poorest nations in the world.

Story continues

In the first few years of the Rob Marchand Education Center's existence, Blumer said kids have also learned how to be more resourceful with the limited resources available. From developing ways of collecting clean water to using solar energy as a power source for the school, students are learning new methods to stretch the limited resources further on the small island.

"We started collecting water off of the school building to allow it to go into a cistern. Clean water is a really hard thing to come by there," he said. "We just added a solar battery system, and that way we don't have to put gas in the generator for our computers and lights."

Among the recent additions to the school are a new computer lab, a bus and a medical clinic that La Gonave Alive helped bring to the island.

"Something as small as a cut can become life-threatening in Haiti because they just don't have access to basic medical needs," Blumer said.

Although

cancer took Marchand's life nearly a decade ago, his legacy of inspiring youth to grow into contributing members of society lives on

through the confines of the Haitian school. For Blumer, keeping Marchand's legacy alive for future generations holds just as much importance as helping the Haitian community he's grown to love.

Seeing Blumer's efforts to make the school a reality has been a powerful experience for Marchand's kids and wife, Mary Marchand, who were able to take part in dedicating the school in 2018.

"When I saw some of the Haitian kids wearing their shirts with Rob's name on them prior to the dedication ceremony, I got very emotional," Marchand said. "Having the opportunity to see how happy these kids were to start their education and future was so uplifting."

Now that the Rob Marchand school is complete, La Gonave Alive is already gearing up for a new mission. With the lack of health care resources and safe living quarters for the Haitian women of La Gonave, Blumer said the missionary organization is planning to build a women's village that will bring around 100 small homes for local families.

Thanks to a land donation from a Haitian native, the women's village is now taking flight. The audacious plan for the women's village is aiming to build four small homes in 30 days, Blumer said.

"This donor has also dedicated that he will build the first 16 homes, and we're very excited about the women's village," he said. "Another organization has also stepped in to help us with the women's village,

The success of the Rob Marchand Education Center has caught the attention of Haitian leaders, who are helping La Gonave Alive continue bringing more development to the island.

"The mayor of the town we are working in also wanted to give us some land for us to build a market area. It would be kind of an open air market with small areas where people can sell food like mangos and fruit," Blumer said.

Blumer said the pandemic exacerbated the poverty Haitians are dealing with. Over the past few years, Haiti has become increasingly dangerous for missionary work, as gangs have begun taking hostages for ransom.

The recent hostage situation that took place in Haiti, in which a Haitian gang held a group of American missionaries in captivity until they managed to escape didn't stop Blumer and missionaries with La Gonave Alive from going back to the island to continue giving back to the community.

"Doing missionary work now requires more planning with what's been going on with the gangs. But people are as desperate as I've ever seen them, and I know our group and many others will not let that stop us from taking the risks to help these grateful people in need," Blumer said.
ELIZABETH  A Highland Park man admitted Monday to losing control of his emotions and killing his ex-girlfriend with a wrestling move by putting his forearm across her throat until she stopped breathing.

Tyler Rios pleaded guilty before Superior Court Judge John M. Deitch in Union County to aggravated manslaughter, a first-degree crime, in the killing of his former girlfriend Yasemin Uyar in 2021. He also pleaded guilty to desecration of human remains, a second-degree crime.

Rios faces 25 years in prison on the aggravated manslaughter charge and five more years on the desecration of human remains charge when he is sentenced in June, Union County Assistant Prosecutor Robert Grady said about the plea agreement.

Tyler Rios, 27, of Highland Park, who is facing murder and kidnapping charges in connection with the July 2021 death of his ex-girlfriend Yasemin Uyar and the kidnapping of the couple's then 2-year-old son, Sebastian, appears before Superior Court Judge John M. Deitch during a court hearing in the annex of the Union County Courthouse in Elizabeth, NJ Monday, April 4, 2022. Rios plead guilty to two crimes, aggravated manslaughter in the first degree and desecrating human remains in the second degree.

The sentence will run concurrent to the five-year sentence he is serving at Northern State Prison for choking Uyar in 2017. Rios, 27, was sentenced in January for aggravated assault and resisting arrest in that Nov. 30, 2017 incident.

Karen Uyar, Yasemins mother who was joined in court by a group of supporters, said it was devastating to hear Rios confess to what happened in her daughter's Rahway apartment on July 8, 2021.

It was really hard, you know what it was in your mind but to hear him say it and so matter of factly, there was no emotion to it, thats hard, its really hard to hear, she said.

While Karen Uyar believes Rios should spend the rest of his life in prison, she is satisfied that he will serve 30 years behind bars because that means her grandson, Sebastian, will be 33 years old when his father is released.

More: After daughter's slaying, NJ mom is on a mission to help domestic violence victims

More: Rally for Yazzi's Law seeks protection for domestic violence victims

Thirty-three is a mature, good age to make a competent, responsible decision about if he wants to have a relationship with his father. That was my goal, said the victims mother who during the court hearing held a crocheted gray hat her daughter had made while pregnant. She also was holding the T-shirt with the words moms little dude her grandson was wearing when he was rescued in Tennessee last summer, so she would have them together with her.

Story continues

Karen Uyar of Highland Park, the mother of victim Yasemin Uyar, listens in the courtroom. as Tyler Rios, 27, of Highland Park, who is facing murder and kidnapping charges in connection with the July 2021 death of his ex-girlfriend Yasemin Uyar and the kidnapping of the couple's then 2-year-old son, Sebastian, appears before Superior Court Judge John M. Deitch during a court hearing in the annex of the Union County Courthouse in Elizabeth, NJ Monday, April 4, 2022. Rios plead guilty to two crimes, aggravated manslaughter in the first degree and desecrating human remains in the second degree.

She said Sebastian, 3, is awesome and has some traits of his late mothers personality.

Rios was initially charged with the murder of Uyar, 24, and kidnapping the couple's then 2-year-old son.

Karen Uyar believes that because there was no custody agreement, even though her daughter had custody of the toddler, the kidnapping charge was not pursued.

Answering yes to a series of questions posed by his attorney Nicholas Kormann, Rios said on July 8, 2021 he was at Uyars Westfield Avenue apartment when they got into a heated argument about where Sebastian would be living.

And during that argument you lost control of your emotions. Kormann asked.

Yes, Rios responded.

And Rios agreed that the argument became physical, and he put his forearm across her throat in an arm bar.

Kormann described Uyar as about 5-foot-3 and 120 pounds while Rios, a former Highland Park High School wrestler, weighs about 230 pounds, and knew how to apply wrestling holds.

Rios said the arm bar was done with force to end the argument, but he didnt intend to end her life.

Kormann said that applying the arm bar with a significant amount of force for some period demonstrated an extreme indifference to the value of human life,

Do you agree? Kormann said.

Yes, Rios responded.

After Uyar was motionless and laying on the floor, Rios said he realized he had taken her life. He panicked, picked up her body and put it in a duffle bag, placed the bag in the back of Uyars car, took her keys and drove to Tennessee where he took her body and put it in a field.

Rios was arrested July 10, 2021 in Tennessee after a New Jersey State Police issued an Amber Alert following the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend and their son. Uyar failed to show up at work and the boy at day care.

An investigation found Rios called someone he knew from a blocked number and admitted to having his son and allegedly said he killed Uyar, and that her body "had been in the vehicle for days, until he disposed of her remains off of a highway," according to court papers.

New Jersey State Police traced the phone call to Monterey, Tennessee, where the local sheriff's office found Uyar's car in a hotel parking lot and found Rios in a room with the boy, according to court papers.

Sebastian was found unharmed in the hotel early on July 10, and Rios was taken into custody when he refused to leave the room while the boy was safely rescued, court papers say.

Yasemin Uyar

Later in the day, Rios led investigators to Uyars body in a wooded area nearby, off Interstate 40, according to court papers.

Uyar's half-naked body was found stuffed in a duffel bag and discarded in the woods in Tennessee, not far from a hotel where Rios and the boy were found, according to court papers. An autopsy revealed Uyar was strangled and suffered blunt-force trauma two days before her body was found on July 8, court papers say.

Rios was extradited to Union County where he was charged.

Family and friends have said Uyar battled an abusive relationship with Rios whom she met when they were students at Highland Park High School. Court papers say Rios had a history of stalking, harassment and terroristic threats, and a restraining order had been issued.

Email: srussell@gannettnj.com

Suzanne Russell is a breaking news reporter for MyCentralJersey.com covering crime, courts and other mayhem. To get unlimited access, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: Highland Park man admits killing ex-girlfriend with wrestling move
Watch: 'I have found a second home': Holocaust survivor, 98, finds refuge in Germany

A 98-year-old holocaust survivor has defied the odds to escape Ukraine and reach safety in Germany, saying she has now found a "second home".

Raisa Valiushkevych fled Kyiv with her son Vadym, 70, and now lives in a Jewish care home for elderly people in Frankfurt.

She was forced from her home eight decades after first fleeing Ukraine to escape Nazi Germany's invasion.

Retired teacher Raisa said it felt strange to have found such a refuge in the land of her former persecutors, but that she had been made to feel welcome and was grateful.

Holocaust survivor Raisa Valiushkevych, 98, who has recently escaped Russian bombing of her hometown Kyiv. (Reuters)

She is one of around 50 Holocaust survivors that Jewish organisations have helped evacuate from Ukraine since Russia's invasion.

Raisa and her son were living in Ukraine's capital city, which has been under almost constant attack since Vladimir Putin ordered his troops to invade.

Speaking of her first experience as a young refugee, she explained that she, her sister and her parents first fled Ukraine in 1941 by foot and then by train to Kazahkhastan.

Raisa said: "Well, there was a war, the Germans were attacking, and we fled. There was a front and we fled. From the war, we were running from the war."

They escaped the Nazi Holocaust which virtually wiped out Ukraine's pre-war Jewish population of about 1.5 million.

Raisa Valiushkevych fled Kyiv with her son Vadym, 70, and now lives in a Jewish care home for elderly people in Frankfurt. (Reuters)

Speaking from her new care home, she added: "I have found a second home here and I feel good here. I am well welcomed here. Thank you, I'm very grateful. And I don't even think about going back to Kyiv."

Vadym said he and his mother managed to pack up their lives and escape in only a matter of hours.

He said: "Well, we had got ready generally speaking. So we started to get ready quietly. And then the next day we were called in the morning.

Click on this image to see all Yahoo News UK's latest content on the Ukraine crisi

"We urgently needed (to decide) to go or not to go, we had three hours to pack. So we thought about it and decided that we should go. So we got ready and went.

Story continues

"If it wasn't for my mother, I probably would have stayed. But my mother had to be taken away because the bomb shelter was 300 meters away - by the time you got there, either the alarm would be over, or you would be hit.

"But to wait... Anyway, we had such an opportunity, we decided to go."

The mother and son accepted the offer of evacuation by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, or JDC, a humanitarian group which has spent decades supporting Jews in Ukraine.

An ambulance took her to the Polish border where she was transferred to another that took her to Frankfurt, with an overnight stay at a care home on the way.

As a young woman Rasia fled the horrors of the Nazis. (Reuters)

Back in Ukraine, reports of widespread atrocities carried out by Russian troops have begun to emerge in recent days.

Putin has been accused of carrying out a genocide in Ukraine, after Ukraine's Ministry of Defence released images on Sunday showing what was left behind in the city of Bucha following a retreat of Russian forces.

Footage showed bodies left lying in the street, some with their hands tied behind their backs and shot in the head.

Ukrainian authorities have claimed 410 civilians were killed in Bucha and Irpin, with mass graves being dug for the victims.

Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba said Russian troops had instigated a "deliberate massacre" in Bucha and said they were "worse than ISIS".

Journalists who have visited the area since the Russians retreat have said there is "clear evidence" of war crimes being left behind, including torture and rape.

Read more: Odesa locals undergo military training to prepare for Russian attack

In the village of Motyzhyn, around 20 miles west of the city of Bucha, the mayor and her family were reportedly discovered in a mass grave.

Ukraine's former ambassador to Austria Olexander Scherba said Olga Sukhenko was found buried with her husband and son.

Ukrainian Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russian forces of torturing and executing hundreds of people in a Facebook post after the bodies were discovered.

I want every mother of every Russian soldier to see the bodies of the killed people in Bucha, in Irpin, in Hostomel, Zelensky said. What did they do? Why were they killed?

War crimes in Bucha and other cities during the Russian occupation will also be considered by the UN Security Council on Tuesday, he added.
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam said on Monday she will not run for a second term as chief executive of the global financial hub in a leadership election due to take place on May 8.

(Reporting by Anne Marie Roantree, Twinnie Siu and James Pomfret; Editing by Christopher Cushing)
WASHINGTON  Republican Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Mitt Romney announced Monday night they will vote to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jacksons historic elevation to the Supreme Court, giving President Joe Bidens nominee a burst of bipartisan support and all but assuring shell become the first Black female justice.

The senators from Alaska and Utah announced their decisions ahead of a procedural vote to advance the nomination and as Democrats pressed to confirm Jackson by the end of the week. GOP Sen. Susan Collins of Maine announced last week that she would back Jackson.

Advertisement

All three Republicans said they did not expect to agree with all of Jacksons decisions, but that they found her well qualified. Romney said she more than meets the standard of excellence and integrity.

With three Republicans supporting her in the 50-50 split Senate, Jackson is on a glidepath to confirmation and on the brink of making history as the third Black justice and only the sixth woman in the courts more than 200-year history. Beyond the historic element, Democrats have cited her deep experience in nine years on the federal bench and the chance for her to become the first former public defender on the court.

Advertisement

Both Collins and Murkowski said they believed that the Senate nomination process has become broken as it has become more partisan in the past several decades.

Murkowski said her decision partly rests on my rejection of the corrosive politicization of the review process for Supreme Court nominees, which, on both sides of the aisle, is growing worse and more detached from reality by the year.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, talks to reporters about her decision to vote to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's historic nomination to the Supreme Court, as the Senate holds a procedural vote to advance the nomination, at the Capitol in Washington, Monday, April 4, 2022. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)

Biden nominated Jackson to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer. Biden has sought bipartisan backing for his pick, making repeated calls to senators and inviting Republicans to the White House.

The Senates 53-47 vote Monday evening was to discharge Jacksons nomination from the Senate Judiciary Committee after the panel deadlocked, 11-11, on whether to send the nomination to the Senate floor.

The committee vote, split along party lines, was the first deadlock on a Supreme Court nomination in three decades.

Judge Jackson will bring extraordinary qualifications, deep experience and intellect, and a rigorous judicial record to the Supreme Court, Biden tweeted earlier Monday. She deserves to be confirmed as the next justice.

The Judiciary committees top Republican, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, said he was opposing Jacksons nomination because she and I have fundamental, different views on the role of judges and the role that they should play in our system of government.

The committee hadnt deadlocked since 1991, when Biden was chairman and a motion to send the nomination of current Justice Clarence Thomas to the floor with a favorable recommendation failed on a 7-7 vote. The committee then voted to send the nomination to the floor without a recommendation, meaning it could still be brought up for a vote.

Advertisement

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky set the tone for most of his party last week when he said he cannot and will not support Jackson, citing GOP concerns raised in hearings about her sentencing record and her backing from liberal advocacy groups.

Republicans on the Judiciary panel continued their push Monday to paint Jackson as soft on crime, defending their repeated questions about her sentencing on sex crimes.

Questions are not attacks, said Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, one of several GOP senators on the panel who hammered the point in the hearings two weeks ago.

Jackson pushed back on the GOP narrative, declaring that nothing could be further from the truth. Democrats said she was in line with other judges in her decisions. And on Monday they criticized their GOP counterparts questioning.

You could try and create a straw man here, but it does not hold, said New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker.

The questioning was filled with absurdities of disrespect, said Booker, who also is Black, and he said he will rejoice when she is confirmed.

Advertisement

Derrick Johnson, president and chief executive officer of the NAACP, expressed disappointment with the tie, even as he noted that Jackson had cleared an important hurdle. He said history will be watching during the full Senate vote later this week.

Associated Press writers Zeke Miller, Farnoush Amiri and Lisa Mascaro in Washington and Becky Bohrer in Alaska contributed.
Illinois plans to use $17 million in federal coronavirus relief money to fund Freedom Schools, a literacy and cultural enrichment program rooted in the civil rights movement of the 1960s, as part of an effort to close the achievement gap for struggling students.

The initiative, which will be funded with federal Coronavirus Urgent Remediation Emergency dollars, will supplement student learning taking place in the classroom with a research-based, multicultural curriculum offered during the summer or after-school hours, Illinois State Board of Education officials said.

The programs are being offered through the Childrens Defense Fund, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit. While the Springfield Urban League has partnered with the organization to offer Freedom Schools for more than 10 years, and has hosted several sites across Illinois, the ISBE initiative marks the first time the programs are being funded entirely by the state.

Freedom Schools have a profound impact on the communities they serve, and this funding will expand their reach, bringing the benefits of a research-backed education grounded in the civil rights movement to more Illinois learners this summer and next school year, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said in a statement.

ISBE is inviting schools and nonprofits to apply for funding to establish Freedom Schools through the Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant, with the goal of supporting low-income students by addressing the achievement gap and learning loss caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Low-income students last year experienced rates of chronic absenteeism 50% higher than the state average, ISBE officials said, while the number of students meeting or exceeding standards in math or English language arts also fell by twice as much as the state average.

ISBE officials said the program will provide historically disadvantaged students, including African American students and other students of color, with quality instruction that fosters student confidence, critical thinking, and social and emotional development.

Story continues

State Superintendent of Education Carmen Ayala said as a Latina, I am intimately aware of the intrinsic value of an educational environment that honors and respects your ethnic heritage.

Im excited that these special programs will reach the children who have been hardest hit by the pandemic and provide a safe and empowering learning experience for them, Ayala said in a statement.

Senate Majority Leader Kimberly A. Lightford, one of the sponsors of the legislation behind the initiative, said Freedom Schools have a proud history and a profound significance for African Americans.

The state plans to issue 45 grant awards in the amount of $350,000 each, officials said.

The states Freedom Schools initiative will carry on a tradition that dates to the Mississippi Freedom Summer project of 1964, when civil rights leaders joined forces to create a summer enrichment program for children, said Kristal Moore Clemons, national director of the Childrens Defense Fund Freedom Schools.

They realized if they could crack the inequality in the Mississippi school system, they could bring the program to the rest of the South, keeping children engaged in learning, and building up the next generation of leaders and voters, said Clemons, a former Chicago resident whose first experience with Freedom Schools was during her junior year at DePaul University, when she was recruited as a servant leader intern for the program.

They were investing in me. ... I had a chance to meet Alice Walker, Marian Wright Edelman and all of these civil rights icons, Clemons said. It was truly transformative for me, and changed my life.

Clemons said students attending Freedom Schools begin their day with Harambee, an African tradition of bringing people together, followed by age-appropriate literacy activities with a strong emphasis on culturally relevant childrens literature.

For every 10 students, the program assigns one servant leader intern, who along with the site directors, receives specialized Freedom Schools training at the CDF Haley Farm in Clinton, Tennessee, the former home of the late author Alex Haley, author of Roots: The Sage of an American Family.

The students dont sit in rows, they all sit in a circle, and everyone realizes every voice matters, Clemons said.

Students have the option to take a basic reading assessment at the start and end of the program, which Clemons said last summer showed 80% of children increased or maintained their reading proficiency during the six-week program.

ISBE officials said they are aiming for students who opt into the pre- and post-assessments to have a 2.5% increase in proficiency in literacy and other objectives by the end of the program. Officials anticipate parent and community engagement rates will also be higher for student participants, as the program provides support for the entire family.

Childrens Defense Fund was founded in 1973 by Edelman, a graduate of Spelman College and Yale Law School, and the nonprofits president emerita. The groups Freedom Schools are not affiliated with the South Loop-based Chicago Freedom School, which builds on the freedom school model by seeking to enhance Chicago youths connection to their histories and serving as a catalyst for youth-led social change, according to the organizations website.

In 2021, Childrens Defense Funds Freedom Schools served more than 7,200 students at 152 sites in 26 states and 75 cities, including Cedar Rapids, Iowa, which welcomed 30 students last summer to its inaugural program at a local middle school.

The kids really enjoyed the program, and they made amazing progress, said Crystal Hall, director of community based and prevention services at Tanager Place, a nonprofit organization that is doubling the number of students participating in a Freedom Schools six-week summer program at McKinley Steam Academy.

The Freedom Schools program in Cedar Rapids began with a partnership between the local school district and Tanager Place, with the school district offering the middle school as a site, and providing breakfast and lunch to students in sixth through eighth grade, Hall said.

Its not just about reading a book, its about engaging with a book, and engage all of the students different learning styles, Hall said.

The program, which is offered to families free of charge, includes field trips and traditional summer camp activities such as swimming, hiking and archery.

ISBE officials said the Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant application is open to Illinois public schools, public universities, community colleges, and not-for-profit, community-based organizations.

The Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant is named after African American leader and educator Phillip Jackson, the founder of the Black Star Project, an organization that closes achievement gaps and supports economic empowerment for African American and Hispanic youth and families through community-based support programs like tutoring, mentoring, parent advocacy and development, and college preparation, officials said.

Gloria Smith, executive director of the Black Star Project, and the late Jacksons sister, said Friday her organization plans to apply for a Freedom Schools grant with hopes of expanding the Kimberly Lightford Saturday University program at Irving Middle School in Maywood.

We are excited, and also overwhelmed, as the program is named after Phillip, and will keep his legacy alive, Smith said.

Interested groups can find the application on the ISBE website or email asosina@isbe.net. Applications are due by 4:30 p.m. April 29.

kcullotta@chicagotribune.com
DUBAI (Reuters) -The United States is responsible for the pause in talks between Tehran and world powers in Vienna aimed at reviving their 2015 nuclear deal, an Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson said on Monday.

"America is responsible for the halt of these talks ... a deal is very much within reach," Saeed Khatibzadeh told a weekly news conference.

"Washington should make political decision for the deal's revival," he said, adding that Tehran would "not wait forever".

The U.S. State Department said on Thursday that a small number of outstanding issues remain in the nuclear talks, adding that the onus was on Tehran to make those decisions.

Iran has said that there are still outstanding issues, including Washington removing a foreign terrorist organisation (FTO) designation against Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

Also Tehran has been pushing for guarantees that any future U.S. president would not withdraw from the agreement. The extent to which sanctions would be rolled back is another unresolved issue.

Khatibzadeh also said Tehran was ready to resume talks with its key regional rival, Saudi Arabia, if Riyadh showed willingness to resolve outstanding bilateral issues.

A Russian demand forced world powers to pause nuclear negotiations in early March, But Moscow later said it had written guarantees that its trade with Iran would not be affected by Ukraine-related sanctions, suggesting Moscow could allow a revival of the tattered pact to go forward.

(Writing by Parisa HafeziEditing by Raissa Kasolowsky and John Stonestreet)
HBO Maxs new drama series Julia looks at the life of famed American cook and TV personality Julia Child.

Portrayed by British actor Sarah Lancashire, the first three episodes were released on 31 March.

While most versions of Childs story to date have spotlighted her successful, long-running cooking show, this eight part drama uses it merely as window dressing. Instead, it focuses on the celebrity chefs relationships, particularly her marriage to Paul Child (David Hyde Pierce) and its shifting power dynamics as she rises to fame.

Given that Child wrote over a dozen autobiographies and cookbooks and gave countless interviews, the shows creator Daniel Goldfarb had plenty of material to work with.

However, Goldfarb admitted to The Washington Post that part of his process involved reading between the lines, as long as it didnt alter the course of the biography.

Weve broken down some crucial moments to see what is fact and what is fiction.

Julia Child

In the first episode were introduced to Child just as her career is starting to establish itself  with news of a book deal with publishing company Alfred A Knopf.

In real life Child did indeed sign her first cookbook deal with Knopf, which in turn led to an invitation to promote her book on Bostons WGBH television programme Ive Been Reading, hosted by Albert Duhamel.

Paul Child on Julia HBO Max (HBO Max)

Childs personal life with her husband is also true to life. Paul firmly supported Childs cooking show, going so far as to hold cue cards to help during filming, just as the new series depicts.

A secondary storyline highlights Childs struggles with menopause and the end of her fertile years. As her character is seen wondering at what could have been, Child really did have moments in which she commiserated her lack of progeny, as reported in an excerpt from The French Chef in America, penned by her grandnephew, Alex Prud'homme.

One of Childs key trademarks was her unusual voice, a combination of strange intonations and a Mid-Atlantic accent, despite her California roots. This is something thats mentioned in the show and a trait Lancashire does a decent job of recreating.

Story continues

Russell Morash

Acting as the storys antagonist is Russell Morash (Fran Kranz), the top producer of WGBH, who is initially against the idea of featuring a cooking show on public television, especially one with an older woman. Although he seems to accept the idea at the end of the first episode, he quickly changes his mind in the second, after Childs pilot doesnt go as planned.

In reality, Child reflected fondly upon her pilot episode in her biography, My Life In France, describing it as a bit of a high-wire act, but it suited me. While she added that it was partly chaotic, nowhere did she mention any disaster so extreme as was pictured in the series. Its safe to assume that her pan only caught on fire for comedic effect.

Russell Morash is a real person, but nowhere has it been written that he was opposed to producing Childs show, The French Chef.

Alice Naman

Heavily featured in the first few episodes is Alice Naman (Brittany Bradford), the only woman producer at WGBH, whos shown to be a major force in championing Childs cooking show at the station.

Alice Naman on Julia HBO Max (HBO Max)

There was no real-life Alice Naman at WGBH, and HBO have confirmed Namans character largely took inspiration from Ruth Lockwood, an assistant producer at WGBH who became an integral part of Childs team.

A subtle nod to Lockwood can be found in one scene when Namans mother is lecturing her and resorts to using her full name, Alice Ruth Naman.

Judith Jones

A famous American editor, Judith Jones (Fiona Glascott) discovered Child and her iconic book Mastering the Art of French Cooking. At one point, Jones colleague mentions the author Updike, a direct reference to American author John Updike, whose body of work Jones is credited with shepherding.

She is best known for rescuing Anne Franks diary from a publishers reject pile, another component that the series alludes to in passing.

The first three episodes of Julia are on HBO Max now, with single episodes released weekly until 5 May.
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution

Ken Burns is cinema's foremost chronicler of American history, and thus it was only a matter of time before he turned his attention to the astounding life of the countrys iconic founding father. Benjamin Franklin is a celebration of a man whose creations were so numerous and world-changing, whose ideas were so revolutionary, and whose legacy is so monumental that revisiting them is apt to make one feel downright unambitious by comparison. Yet at the core of Burns latest PBS documentary is a sense of Franklin as not only a genius, but as a flesh-and-blood, self-made individual who was as accessible and relatable as his achievements were momentous. He was an everyman who was also an extraordinary titan, and therefore rightly considered, both then and now, one of the greatestif not the greatestof all Americans.

The CIA, Hypnosis, and Cocaine: Why a Pilot Faked His Own Death in Front of His Family in 1977

Premiering April 4 on PBS, the two-part, four-hour Benjamin Franklin adheres to a traditional Burns format. As the acclaimed filmmakers camera pans slowly over archival paintings and close-ups of handwritten documents and newspaper articles, talking-head historians provide narrative and contextual commentary while the story proper is propelled forward by narration (courtesy of Peter Coyote) and from actors reading missives and speeches. That cast is led by Mandy Patinkin as Franklin and rounded out by the likes of Josh Lucas, Liam Neeson, Paul Giamatti and Adam Arkin, all of whom help bring to life Franklins transformation from teenage runaway to famous pioneer to elder statesman. Its a style that Burns has employed for decades, and while it prevents the material from ever exploding with energetic life, it exudes a measure of gravity, precision and comprehensiveness thats well-suited to the scholastic task at hand.

Benjamin Franklin convincingly suggests that, when it comes to the United States, Franklin was the GOAT, and not just because of his primary role in the colonies fight for independence. By all accounts, Franklin wasand remainsthe ideal embodiment of the nations character, at once industrious, curious, ambitious, creative, forward-thinking. and self-reliant, and his rise from humble origins to the heights of global renown made him as close as anyone has ever come to the personification of the American Dream. That journey began when, following a successful if combative apprenticeship at his brothers fledgling Boston newspaper, Franklinwith only two years of formal education under his beltfled to Philadelphia. An avid reader with an unquenchable thirst for knowledge, Franklin made something of himself as a printer. After a subsequent trip to London further introduced him to enlightenment thinking, he returned to Philly to start his own business, guided by four basic rules he had concocted for himself: be extremely frugal; endeavor to speak the truth; apply himself industriously; and speak ill of no man.

Story continues

Franklins ensuing triumphs are the stuff of legend, from establishing the countrys first Library Company of America, to founding its initial non-sectarian college, the Public Academy of Philadelphia (now known as the University of Pennsylvania), to penning the ubiquitous Poor Richards Almanacwhich solidified his unparalleled gift for witty, homespun aphorisms such as God helps those who help themselves and Haste makes wasteto being appointed the continents maiden official postmaster, which allowed him to simultaneously unite the disparate colonies and to attain an incomparable understanding of their citizens. He fashioned the Dont Tread on Me flag as a symbol of American solidarity and strength, and made innovative discoveries regarding the Gulf Stream. To say he was a jack of all trades is putting it mildlyand thats even before one gets to his groundbreaking work as a scientist, replete with earning the nickname the Modern Prometheus for uncovering the mysteries of electricity through his experiment with kite and key.

Equally at home in the company of the working class and at court, a champion of self-sufficiency as well as cooperation, a writer and a scientist, and a believer in freedom who nevertheless owned slaves (a practice which he came to denounce late in life), Franklin was a man of myriad contradictions, and Burns documentary recognizes that these dualities were a fundamental aspect of his complex nature. Even when it came to his loved ones, Franklin was defined by conflicting attitudes and ideals, at once loyal to his common-law wife Deborah and yet also habitually absent from her side, and wholly devoted to the success of his son William until they suffered a horrific, irreparable rift caused by Williamserving as the governor of New Jerseychoosing to stick by the Crown, and consequently oppose his father during the Revolutionary War. Charming and shrewd, intellectual and adaptable, he was dynamic through and through, and Benjamin Franklin authoritatively captures his vibrant personality, his inquisitiveness and open-mindedness, and his persistent desire to know everything about everything.

Burns and writer Dayton Duncan sharply detail both how Franklin shaped the future of his homeland and how larger geopolitical events altered his worldview. Arguably the most significant incident in his 84 years took place on Jan. 29, 1774, during his lengthy stay in London, whenin the immediate aftermath of the Boston Tea Partyhe was called to the Cockpit in Whitehall to meet with the Privy Council (a group of advisers to King George III), and was roundly mocked and accused as an instigator of American insurrectionism. Suffering this abuse in stoic silence, Franklin realized that, though he had always staunchly supported the monarchy, England would never view him (or his fellow colonials) as one of their own. It was at that moment that he truly became an American patriot, committed to the cause of sovereignty and, moreover, to the principles he and the founders would later lay out in the Declaration of Independence and Constitution.

Benjamin Franklin may not be as flashy as most docuseries, and it doesnt break particularly new ground or strain to comprehend its subject in contemporary terms. Rather, its simply a straightforward and well-rounded portrait of one of the 18th centurys most notable luminaries, whose towering mind helped give birth to a nation, radically altered the future of humanityvia the notion that liberty could, and should, triumph over tyrannyand ultimately inspired so many great thinkers in so many fields (science, industry, media, politics) that its difficult to name a single American who ever accomplished more.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Get the Daily Beast's biggest scoops and scandals delivered right to your inbox. Sign up now.

Stay informed and gain unlimited access to the Daily Beast's unmatched reporting. Subscribe now.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on Monday said he will schedule a final vote later this week on President Joe Biden's nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to be a Supreme Court justice.

In a speech on the Senate floor, Schumer, a Democrat, said he will "set in motion a process that will set up a final confirmation vote by the end of this week."

(Reporting by Richard Cowan)
Authorities have charged three people with capital murder in Mississippi for their alleged roles in the kidnapping, sexual assault, and fatal shooting of 18-year-old Amya Carey.

According to WLBT, Deputy Chief Deric Hearn announced the arrest and detailed the crime at a press briefing Friday afternoon. Dewitt Anderson, 34, Cedric Banks, 37, and Kaymia Blackmon, 19, are suspected of the murder.

Kaymia Blackmon, Dewitt Anderson and Cedric Banks Credit: Harris County

Hearn revealed that in Feb., police responded to a scene near Clay Street in reference to a deceased female body. They shot Carey multiple times. However, it wasnt until last month that the coroners office identified the body as Carey.

A family member of Careys told detectives that she was picking up a friend, Blackmon, and her boyfriend, Anderson.

According to Hearn, the four people went to several locations that night. And at one point, Blackmon, Anderson, and Andersons brother, Banks, all tried to have sex with Carey. Blackmon and Carey allegedly fought after Carey refused. Anderson then reportedly shot Carey. And with the teenager critically injured, they placed her inside a car, and one of them sexually assaulted her.

Detectives contacted Blackmon and Anderson and summoned them to Jackson Police Department headquarters last week. During their interview, Blackmon and Anderson described the events of that night. As a result, all three suspects have been denied bond.

The murdered teens friends and family paid tribute to her on social media; two Facebook users revealed that her family laid her to rest over the weekend.

The three suspects court date has yet to be released to the public. We will keep you updated as the story develops.
Lara Trump decided to take aim at the playground industry by drawing a shaky line between the structures being constructed nowadays and a recent incident where crowds of spring breakers overwhelmed Santa Barbara balconies to dangerous levels.

Ms Trump appeared as a contributor on the Fox News program The Big Sunday Show alongside a panel to discuss recent news stories from the week, including the war in Ukraine, carjackings in America and one particular story that caught the attention of the daughter-in-law to the former US president: a deck that was swarmed by hundreds of out of control spring break crowds, as the Fox chyron labelled them.

I gotta say for a bunch of college kids  a lot these kids look pretty dumb with some of the things theyre doing, Ms Trump began. Like packing onto these outdoor decks, like thousands of people on there.

The event that Ms Trump was referring to, known locally as Deltopia, occurs in Santa Barbara each year, but this past weekend was the first time the spring break attraction had run in the past two years due to the pandemic.

It attracted thousands of students, with videos circulating of students spilling out onto the street and clambering onto overpacked balconies and roofs leading to authorities to declare a multi casualty incident after several medical emergencies were phoned into the block where the party was being held.

On Friday 4/1 law enforcement in #IslaVista had 3 arrests, 20 citations, 7 reports and 1 traffic collision. Today has been much busier pic.twitter.com/WnRBJcbFEP  PIO Raquel Zick (@SBSOPIO) April 3, 2022

As quickly as Ms Trump brought up the weekend party chaos, she pivoted to connect the overcrowding balconies to a study shed read about how the construction of too safe playgrounds was leading to children not developing a proper sense of risk, and these structures were to blame for the reckless spring break behaviour witnessed over the weekend in California.

Story continues

So, the idea is that  you know we used to have metal slides where youd burn yourself going down and those sort of things. That taught us a lesson. That taught us how to take risks  what was riskier behaviour, Ms Trump began, while fellow co-host former pro-wrestler George Tyrus Murdoch fought off giggles.

Our kids today have been so coddled that maybe you dont know that if you put 500 people on an outdoor deck it may collapse and these are not great ideas.

Ms Trump went on to note that social media was also to blame for the students poorly executed logic when it came to assessing how many people could fit on a deck, and also went on to fault society at large for giving out too many participation trophies.

Let them fall down and hurt themselves a few times and maybe they wont hurt themselves. I dont know. And now Im officially old.
SACRAMENTO, Calif.  After the governor of Texas ordered state agencies to investigate parents for child abuse if they provide certain medical treatments to their transgender children, California lawmakers proposed a law making the state a refuge for transgender youths and their families.

When Idaho proposed a ban on abortions that empowers relatives to sue anyone who helps terminate a pregnancy after six weeks, nearby Oregon approved $15 million to help cover the abortion expenses of patients from out of state.

Advertisement

As Republican activists aggressively pursue conservative social policies in state legislatures across the country, liberal states are taking defensive actions. Spurred by a U.S. Supreme Court that is expected to soon upend an array of long-standing rights, including the constitutional right to abortion, left-leaning lawmakers from Washington to Vermont have begun to expand access to abortion, bolster voting rights and denounce laws in conservative states targeting LGBTQ minors.

The flurry of action, particularly in the West, is intensifying already marked differences between life in liberal- and conservative-led parts of the country. And its a sign of the consequences when state governments are controlled increasingly by single parties. Control of legislative chambers is split between parties now in only two states  Minnesota and Virginia  compared with 15 states 30 years ago.

Advertisement

Were further and further polarizing and fragmenting, so that blue states and red states are becoming not only a little different but radically different, said Jon Michaels, a law professor who studies government at UCLA.

Americans have been sorting into opposing partisan camps for at least a generation, choosing more and more to live among like-minded neighbors, while legislatures, through gerrymandering, are reinforcing their states political identities by solidifying one-party rule.

As states become more red or blue, its politically easier for them to pass legislation, said Ryan D. Enos, a Harvard political scientist who studies partisan segregation. Does that create a feedback loop where more sorting happens? Thats the part we dont know yet.

With some 30 legislatures in Republican hands, conservative lawmakers, working in many cases with shared legislative language, have begun to enact a tsunami of restrictions that for years were blocked by Democrats and moderate Republicans at the federal level. A recent wave of anti-abortion bills, for instance, has been the largest since the landmark 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade.

Similar moves have recently been aimed at LGBTQ protections and voting rights. In Florida and Texas, teams of election police have been created to crack down on the rare crime of voter fraud, fallout from former President Donald Trumps specious claims after he lost the 2020 presidential election.

Carrying concealed guns without a permit is now legal in nearly half of the country. Bounty laws  enforced not by governments, which can be sued in federal court, but by rewards to private citizens for filing lawsuits  have proliferated on issues from classroom speech to vaccination since the U.S. Supreme Court declined to strike down the legal tactic in Texas.

The moves, in an election year, have raised questions about the extent to which they are performative, as opposed to substantial. Some Republican bills are bold at first glance but vaguely worded. Some appear designed largely to energize base voters.

Anti-abortion activists along the National Mall in Washington, Jan. 21, 2022. (Kenny Holston/The New York Times)

Many, however, send a strong cultural message. And divisions will widen further, said Peverill Squire, an expert on state legislatures at the University of Missouri, if the Supreme Court hands more power over to the states on issues like abortion and voting, as it did when it said in 2019 that partisan gerrymandering was beyond federal jurisdiction.

Advertisement

Some legal analysts also say the anticipated rollback of abortion rights could throw a host of other privacy rights into state-level turmoil, from contraception to health care. Meanwhile, entrenched partisanship, which has already hobbled federal decision-making, could block attempts to impose strong national standards in Congress.

Were potentially entering a new era of state-centered policymaking, said Karthick Ramakrishnan, a professor of public policy and political science at the University of California, Riverside. We may be heading into a future where you could have conservative states and progressive states deciding they are better off pushing their own visions of what government should be.

In recent weeks, several states including Colorado and Vermont have moved to codify a right to abortion. More  Maryland and Washington, for example  have expanded access or legal protection in anticipation of out-of-state patients.

But no state has been as aggressive as California in shoring up alternatives to the Republican legislation.

One package of pending California bills would expand access to California abortions and protect abortion providers from out-of-state legal action. Another proposal would thwart enforcement of out-of-state court judgments removing children from the custody of parents who get them gender-affirming health services.

Yet another would enforce a ban on ghost guns and assault weapons with a California version of Texas recent six-week ban on abortion, featuring $10,000 bounties to encourage lawsuits from private citizens against anyone who sells, distributes or manufactures those types of firearms.

Advertisement

In a State of the State address last month, Gov. Gavin Newsom took more than a half-dozen swipes at Florida and Texas, comparing Californias expanded sick leave, family leave and Medicaid coverage during the pandemic with the higher COVID-19 death rates in the two Republican-led states, and alluding to states where theyre banning books and where you can sue your history teacher for teaching history.

After Disney World employees protested the corporations initial reluctance to condemn the Florida bill that opponents call Dont Say Gay, Newsom suggested Disney cancel the relocation of some 2,000 West Coast positions to a new Florida campus, saying on Twitter that the door is open to bring those jobs back to California  the state that actually represents the values of your workers.

Dan Schnur, a former Republican strategist who teaches political science now at the University of Southern California and the University of California, Berkeley, said that without strong Republican opposition, Newsom has been using the governors of Texas and Florida as straw men.

Its an effective way of strengthening himself at home and elevating his name in Democratic presidential conversations, Schnur said.

Conservatives in and outside California have criticized the governor for stoking division.

A spokesperson for Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who is a Republican presidential contender, noted in an email that Disneyland was closed three times longer than Disney World during the pandemic, and that hundreds of thousands of Americans moved to Florida between April 2020 and July 2021 while hundreds of thousands left California. Newsom, she wrote, is doing a better job as a U-Haul salesman.

Advertisement

Politicians in California do not have veto power over legislation passed in Florida, the spokesperson, Christina Pushaw, added. Gov. Newsom should focus on solving the problems in his own state.

The office of Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas  who, in 2018, ran on the slogan Dont California My Texas  did not respond to emails and calls requesting comment.

Newsom noted that California has been grappling for decades with the cultural and demographic changes that are only now hitting other parts of the country, including early battles over such issues as gay rights and immigration. Im very concerned broadly about whats happening and whether or not its fully understood by the majority, not just of the American people but people within my own party, he said.

We are not going to sit back and neutrally watch the progress of the 20th century get erased, he added, decrying the zest for demonization and an anti-democratic tilt in recent policies to restrict voting and LGBTQ protections.

If you say nothing, youre complicit, Newsom said. You have to take these guys on and push back.

Californias stance has broad implications. Although U.S. census figures showed stalled growth in the state in 2020, its population of nearly 40 million is the nations largest, encompassing 1 in 9 U.S. residents.

Advertisement

In a world in which the federal government has abdicated some of its core responsibility, states like California have to figure out what their responsibilities are, said Michaels, the UCLA professor. The hard question is: Where does it end?

For example, he noted, the fallout could mean that federal rights that generations have taken for granted could become available only to those who can afford to uproot their lives and move to the states that guarantee them.

Its easy for Gov. Newsom to tell struggling Alabamians, I feel your pain, but then what? Come rent a studio apartment in San Francisco for $4,000 a month? "

Violet Augustine, 37, an artist, art teacher and single parent in Dallas, worries about the limits of interstate refuge. For months, she said, she considered moving away from Texas with her trans daughter, a kindergartner, to a state where she doesnt constantly fear for their safety. When Abbott and Texas attorney general directed the state to investigate parents with transgender children for possible child abuse, her plan solidified.

An appeal on GoFundMe has raised some $23,000, and she recently made a visit to Los Angeles, staying at a hotel in the heart of the citys Koreatown and meeting with leaders of a community group that describes itself as radically inclusive of LGBTQ families.

The city itself just felt like a safe haven, Augustine said. But, she added, her $60,000 salary, which allows her to rent a house in Texas, would scarcely cover a California apartment: Were going to have to downsize.

Advertisement

c.2021 The New York Times Company
One Pennsylvania school is taking a stand against snacking after an excessive amount of goodies was brought in, according to school officials.

Shopping bags full of chips, candy and an assortment of drinks have been brought into the school, and the Aliquippa School District will not stand for it any longer.

Aliquippa Junior/Senior High School will now be limiting what each student can bring to school, the district statement said.

Beginning on Monday, April 4, 2022, each student will only be permitted one bag (up to 4 oz. in size) of such items as potato chips, Cheetos, Doritos, etc., and one bottled or canned beverage (up to 20 oz.), the school system announced.

If the snack is opened before entering the school building or the student has more than what is permitted, officials will throw the snack away.

Additionally, if a student packs a lunch, the same restriction applies, and lunches will be searched.

This announcement set off an uproar of comments and shares on Facebook.

Youre going to tell parents what they can and cannot send for their child to eat? Thats absurd! Maybe if school lunches werent so tiny and gross they wouldnt need to bring extra snacks, one person commented on the Facebook announcement.

Lunch Police, another commenter added. Maybe they should stay out of the parenting business and focus on giving our kids a quality education.

Some agreed with the policy.

I dont remember being allowed to have food outside of the cafeteria when I was in school, so I find it weird that the school district even has to request this one person said.

The school district had a message to all their commenters.

Thank you all for your feedback. If you have children in the district please contact your building principal, the district wrote. If you are an internet heckler, continue as you were.

Aliquippa is about 22 miles northwest of Pittsburgh.
A man was killed in a crash on Elliott Avenue West in Seattle Monday morning.

The Seattle Fire Department first tweeted about the crash at Elliott and West Mercer Place at about 6:15 a.m.

Firefighters said the driver of a truck crashed into a pole. He was reported to be trapped inside the truck.

Fire crews extricated the man from truck. Medics tried to save the mans life, but he was pronounced dead at the scene.

As of noon, the two right northbound lanes of Elliott remained blocked. The left northbound lane is open.

More news from KIRO 7
A New Orleans man was sentenced to eight years in prison in Assumption Parish after pleading guilty to his fourth DWI.

Charles Burbank, 38, also pleaded guilty to driving with a suspended license and driving without a vehicle registration, prosecutors said.

After Burbank entered his pleas last week, state District Judge Alvin Turner Jr. handed down the eight-year sentence with credit for time served. The maximum penalty for a fourth DWI in Louisiana is 30 years in prison.

More: Houma driver charged with DWI after head-on crash kills New Orleans man, police say

Prosecutors said the plea resulted from a traffic stop two years ago in Pierre Part. State Police responded March 14, 2020, to investigate a possible impaired driver later identified as Burbank, prosecutors said.

Upon making contact with Burbank, the trooper detected the odor of an alcoholic beverage emitting from Burbanks breath, prosecutors said. Burbank admitted to consuming alcohol hours before being stopped. Burbank submitted to a series of standardized field of sobriety tests which he performed poorly on.

Burbank was taken to the Assumption Parish jail, where he submitted to a breath test that showed a blood-alcohol level of .157%, nearly twice the legal limit, officials said. He was then booked into the jail, where he was held without bail.

Assistant District Attorney Lana Chaney prosecuted the case.

 Staff Writer Dan Copp can be reached at 448-7639 or at dan.copp@houmatoday.com. Follow him on Twitter @DanVCopp.

This article originally appeared on The Courier: Man gets 8 years after pleading to 4th DWI in Assumption Parish
In this photo illustration, a man looks at his supplies for type-1 diabetes management, including tubed insulin pump, insulin vial, syringe, needle, insulin cartridge, and infusion site applicator. Matt Harbicht/Getty Images for Tandem Diabetes Care

Recent studies show an increased risk of diabetes for those who recovered from COVID-19, CNN reported.

Studies also found that up to 40% of those who died from COVID-19 had diabetes, The New York Times reported.

Experts told The Times they hope this leads policymakers to invest more in addressing diabetes.

Somewhere between 30% to 40% of those who died from COVID-19 in the US had diabetes, and health experts are hoping that could lead policymakers to pay more attention to the disease, The New York Times reported.

"It's hard to overstate just how devastating the pandemic has been for Americans with diabetes," Dr. Giuseppina Imperatore, who oversees diabetes prevention and treatment at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention told the paper in a story published on Sunday.

According to data from the National Institute of Health, diabetes draws less funding than diseases like cancer and heart disease despite impacting 37 million Americans.

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention found that the number of adults diagnosed with diabetes more than doubled in the past 20 years and 96 million Americans have prediabetes.

The Times reported that diabetes also disproportionally impacts Blacks and Latino Americans, who are more than twice as likely to get a diabetes diagnosis than white Americans. The illness which increases the risks of other ailments across the entire body needs to be closely monitored and treated, and the lack of access to healthcare for those in poorer communities means their diabetes remains uncontrolled, which makes them vulnerable to severe illness and death from COVID-19.

A recent study published earlier this month suggested that those with mild infections had a 28% chance of developing diabetes compared to those who never got COVID-19. Another study published in the Lancet, also found that people who had low to no risk factors for diabetes had a 38% increased risk after a COVID-19 infection.

Story continues

CNN also reported that another study found that people who recovered from COVID-19 had a 40% increased risk of diabetes a year after infection.

These findings come as the House recently passed The Affordable Insulin Now Act, which would cap insulin prices at $35 a month starting next year. The bill, however, has the pass the Senate.

Insider reported that the measure is not likely to pass in the Senate as GOP lawmakers generally opposed government price controls in healthcare. Insulin is a necessary medication for managing diabetes and studies have found that high costs have meant patients had to ration their drugs.

Experts told The Times that state and local governments should also invest in creating programs that subsidize fresh produce and bring in supermarkets to low-earning areas. Additionally, they said policymakers should properly fund campaigns to educate the public about healthy eating and exercise.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Label News has just wrapped the production of Marilyn, Her Final Secret, an investigative documentary shedding light on the identity of Marilyn Monroes biological father whom she never met.

Directed by Francois Pomes, the documentary is based on an exclusive DNA research conducted by Ludovic Orlando, an expert in molecular archaeology working in Southern France. Orlando used a hair sample from Monroe which was provided by John Reznikoff, a renown auctioneer and authenticator, as well a saliva sample from the great-grandchild of Monroes suspected father, Charles Stanley Gifford.

More from Variety

The documentary weaves archive footage and interviews chronicling Monroes desperate efforts to find her father and connect with him, as well as the scientific journey to come up with DNA evidence.

The hair that we used from Monroe was collected by the person who embalmed her body the day she died and we were able to draw up 22% of her genetic profile from that thanks to a DNA fragment found in the keratin, said Pomes, who is also producing the documentary for Label News.

The director-producer said he spent years and sleepless nights to deliver this one-hour documentary and reveal once and for all who Monroes father was, as well as break a family secret. The thing that I touched me the most was seeing the reaction of Giffords family who were overwhelmed by this irrefutable evidence, Pomes said.

Marilyn, Her Final Secret will premiere in June on French channel Toute lHistoire. It has been sold by Mediawan Rights to RTBF (Belgium), RTS (Switzerland), SBS (Australia), Canal Plus/Iti Neovision (Poland), RTVE (Espagne), HRT (Croatie), Channel 8 (Israel), Welt (Germany), Radio Canada  RDI (Canada) and Air France.

Story continues

Mediawan Rights, the commercial arm of the media group, is selling both the French and English-language versions.

Label News is developing a documentary sequel exploring other aspects revealed by Monroes DNA research.

Best of Variety

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Click here to read the full article.
Maryland appears set to become the second state to ban declawing of cats, something animal welfare advocates consider a barbaric practice. Critics say declawing is already rare, though, and that the measure would infringe on the judgment of veterinarians.

The General Assembly approved a bill Monday that would outlaw any procedure removing a portion of a cats claws or paws, except in the case of a medical condition compromising the animals well-being. It would not affect practices to file or trim cat claws.

The legislation goes next to Gov. Larry Hogan for his consideration. It passed by veto-proof majorities in each legislative chamber, but its possible a veto could occur after the General Assembly has adjourned for the year April 11.

Similar policies are already in place in cities including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, St. Louis and Pittsburgh, but Maryland would join only New York in adopting a statewide declawing ban. The United Kingdom, Germany, Norway, Austria and Sweden also have laws prohibiting declawing.

Sen. Cheryl Kagan, a Montgomery County Democrat who sponsored the bill, said it was needed to end a practice of barbaric mutilation that can cause long-term health issues for cats. It typically involves amputating bone from the end of cats toes.

Pet owners have pursued it to address behavior issues like scratching of people or furniture, but animal rights advocates say it can lead to long-term pain for cats and can create other behavioral issues, such as biting.

Some veterinarians opposed the bill on principle, raising concerns in legislative hearings that the bill would limit their ability to exercise their own judgment and act in their patients best interest. They said declawing is rarely practiced and that veterinary groups strongly discourage it, but that the legislation sets a precedent that could encourage more actions that might affect vets ability to make independent decisions about the health of animals.

Story continues

Some lawmakers also questioned whether a declawing ban might make cat owners more likely to euthanize or abandon their pets.

Kagan said amendments to the bill ensured flexibility for veterinarians, allowing for a hearing process through the State Board of Veterinary Medical Examiners should any vets express a need to declaw any cats in the future. Under the bill, willful violation of the ban could result in penalties ranging from suspension to revocation of veterinary licensure and fines of up to $5,000 for a first offense and $10,000 for a second or other subsequent offense.

Animal welfare groups cheered the bills passage Monday. Maryland Votes for Animals called it a historic bill and urged Hogan to sign the declawing ban into law.

This is not a little feline manicure. This is truly removing the first knuckle on their paw, Kagan said. We want to protect our kitties who have no voice.
Maryland Democrats have reached a deal with Gov. Larry Hogan (R) to implement new congressional district map lines that could give Republicans the ability to win at least one of the states eight seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, ending one of the last battles over political boundary lines that remained after last years decennial Census.

Hogan on Monday agreed to sign congressional district lines approved late last week, after a state judge threw out a previous map passed last year by the Democratic-controlled General Assembly. In exchange, Democrats and Attorney General Brian Frosh (D) agreed to drop their appeal of the judges ruling.

Its a tremendous victory for democracy and for free and fair elections in Maryland, Hogan told reporters in Annapolis. I think gerrymandering is a cancer on our democracy regardless of which party does it.

The initial maps, passed in December, would have added thousands of Democratic voters in Anne Arundel County to an Eastern Shore district currently held by Rep. Andy Harris (R), connected only by the Bay Bridge. It represented one of the most aggressive gerrymanders of the redistricting cycle as Democrats made a play to win control of Marylands entire delegation.

Legislators overrode Hogans veto of that first version. But the judges ruling last month threw their plans into disarray.

To comply with the judges orders, Democrats approved a new map last week that left Harriss district largely untouched, aside from population adjustments on its northern border. That new map also made significant changes to a district held by Rep. David Trone (D), whose heavily Democratic seat is now likely to be much more competitive.

The bill that legislators passed would have snapped the more aggressive map back into play if a higher court had overruled Judge Lynne Battaglias decision.

But Frosh, who had been defending the legislatures first maps, dropped the appeal.

We are pleased Gov. Hogan has agreed to sign the proposed congressional redistricting map approved by the General Assembly. This map, like the one previously passed by the General Assembly, is constitutional and fair, Frosh said in a statement. Both sides have agreed to dismiss their appeals, and our state can move forward to the primary election.

Story continues

Hogan said the new maps were not perfect. A decade ago, Democrats substantially redrew a Republican-leaning district in western Maryland, ousting then-Rep. Roscoe Bartlett (R) in the process. But Hogan said the version he planned to sign was a step in the right direction.

Its miles away from the really incredibly gerrymandered map that was thrown out by the court, Hogan said.

Maryland was one of two states where aggressive Democratic gerrymanders lost in court last month. A New York judge nixed Democratic maps there last week, though most Democrats believe they will win in subsequent appeals.

Several Republican-drawn maps in other states have been struck down by courts in recent months, including in North Carolina and Ohio. A Kansas court is hearing arguments Monday over the Republican-drawn map that slices up a seat held by Rep. Sharice Davids (D), and some expect litigation in other states to drag on for months or years.

The deal in Maryland is a win for Hogan, who has campaigned against gerrymanders for several years. Hogan set up an alternative citizens commission to draw its own maps, though the legislature ignored that submission.

Last week, Hogan signed a major package of tax cuts, including cuts on taxes paid by retired couples and sales tax exemptions on childrens products like diapers, car seats and baby bottles.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
Former McDonalds workers who alleged rampant sexual harassment at their Michigan restaurant have reached a $1.5 million settlement agreement with the restaurants former owner.

The American Civil Liberties Unions Women's Rights Project, which helped represent the employees, announced the settlement deal Monday. It must still be approved by a federal judge.

Former McDonalds worker Jenna Ries sued the Michigan-based franchisee, which operated under the names MLMLM Corp. and Maaks Inc., and Chicago-based McDonalds Corp. in 2019.

Ries, who worked at a Mason, Michigan, McDonalds for three years, alleged that a general manager ignored her male co-workers repeated harassment of her and other female workers, including groping, physical assault and verbal epithets.

Ries said she often cried on her way to work and felt physically ill. Eventually she transferred to another location, but the co-worker who allegedly harassed her remained at the original location.

Ries said she sued so that other women wouldn't have to go through what she endured.

No one should have to put up with sexual harassment to get a paycheck, Ries said in a statement.

Last year, a federal judge granted class-action status to the lawsuit, based on evidence showing that the same male worker consistently and severely harassed approximately 100 women and teen girls who worked at the store. If the settlement is approved, workers will be eligible to claim an average award of $10,000 depending on the extent of the harassment they endured.

Ries initially sought at least $5 million in damages for herself and other female employees. But McDonalds Corp. successfully argued that it didnt employ the women directly. Around 95% of McDonalds 14,000 U.S. stores are owned and operated by franchisees.

Attorneys for Ries said they had hoped McDonald's would accept more responsibility.

It is unconscionable that McDonalds continues to say not it when it comes to sexual harassment of workers at its franchise locations, said Darcie Brault, an attorney for Ries and other plaintiffs.

Story continues

Email and phone messages seeking comment were left with attorneys for the franchisee, who no longer owns the Mason, Michigan, restaurant.

McDonalds said it had no comment on the proposed settlement.

The lawsuit came amid a larger reckoning for McDonalds over sexual harassment in its stores and corporate offices.

Since 2016, at least 100 formal complaints and lawsuits have been filed alleging workplace harassment in McDonald's restaurants, the ACLU said. In 2019, the company also fired its former CEO Steve Easterbrook for violating a policy forbidding relationships between supervisors and their subordinates.

Last April, the company announced that it would mandate worker training and reporting procedures to combat harassment, discrimination and violence in its restaurants worldwide starting this year.
Apr. 4A McMinn County, Tennessee, man remained in critical condition Monday after being shot by sheriff's deputies early Sunday during a police call in the Riceville community. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is looking into the incident.

Officers from the McMinn County Sheriff's Office were dispatched to the 300 block of County Road 116 around 2 a.m. Sunday on a report of loud music and gunshots being fired, TBI spokesperson Leslie Earhart said in a news release issued Sunday.

Earhart said responding deputies "encountered a man who brandished a weapon and pointed it at them. Two deputies fired shots, striking the man."

The man was airlifted to a Chattanooga hospital for treatment and no officers were injured during the incident, Earhart said.

Sheriff Joe Guy said Monday in a text message the man's identity isn't being released until his family is notified. Guy said he's now listed in critical but stable condition.

Guy said the officers found themselves in what is believed to have been an unavoidable situation.

"It was at that point the male suspect approached the officers with a firearm, which he pointed at them," Guy said in a statement on the shooting. "The three officers gave warning but the suspect did not stop, which resulted in two of the officers discharging their firearms to defend themselves. The preliminary investigation supports the officers' actions."

Guy said officers "called for an ambulance and administered live-saving measures" until he was transported to the hospital.

The two officers were placed on paid administrative leave, standard policy for such situations, Guy said.

"This incident shows how dangerous the job of law enforcement continues to be," Guy said. "A simple loud noise complaint, which is normally handled peacefully, escalated into a deadly force encounter for my officers. They acted professionally and I'm glad they went home safely. We regret the actions of the suspect, and our prayers are for his family and for his recovery."

TBI agents are working to independently determine the series of events leading to the shooting, including collecting evidence and conducting interviews, Earhart said. Findings will be provided to 10th Judicial District Attorney General Stephen Crump for his review and consideration as the investigation continues.

Contact Ben Benton at bbenton@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6569. Follow him on Twitter @BenBenton.
BUCHA, Ukraine  Moscow faced global revulsion and accusations of war crimes Monday after the Russian pullout from the outskirts of Kyiv revealed streets strewn with corpses of what appeared to be civilians, some of whom had seemingly been killed at close range.

The grisly images of battered bodies left out in the open or hastily buried led to calls for tougher sanctions against the Kremlin, namely a cutoff of fuel imports from Russia. Germany reacted by expelling 40 Russian diplomats, and Lithuania threw out its Russian ambassador.

Advertisement

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy left the capital, Kyiv, for his first reported trip since the war began nearly six weeks ago to see for himself what he called the genocide and war crimes in the town of Bucha, the site of some of the horrors.

Dead people have been found in barrels, basements, strangled, tortured, said Zelenskyy, who again called on Russia to move quickly to negotiate an end to the war.

Advertisement

In Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, bodies wrapped in black plastic were piled on one end of a mass grave in a churchyard. Many of the victims had been shot in cars or killed in explosions trying to flee the city, and with the morgue full and the cemetery impossible to reach, it was the only place to keep the dead, Father Andrii Galavin said.

Tanya Nedashkivska said she buried her husband in a garden outside their apartment building after he was detained by Russian troops and was found dead with two others in a stairwell.

Please, I am begging you, do something! she said. Its me talking, a Ukrainian woman, a Ukrainian woman, a mother of two kids and one grandchild. For all the wives and mothers, make peace on Earth so no one ever grieves again.

Other European leaders and the United Nations human rights chief condemned the bloodshed, and U.S. President Joe Biden said Russian President Vladimir Putin should face a war crimes trial.

This guy is brutal, and whats happening in Bucha is outrageous, said Biden, who also promised to increase sanctions against Moscow.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov dismissed the scenes outside Kyiv as a stage-managed anti-Russian provocation. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the images contained signs of video forgery and various fakes.

Russia similarly rejected previous allegations of atrocities as fabrications on Ukraines part.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy examines the site of a recent battle in Bucha, close to Kyiv, Ukraine, April 4, 2022. (Efrem Lukatsky/AP)

Ukrainian officials said the bodies of 410 civilians were found in towns around Kyiv that were recaptured from Russian forces in recent days.

Advertisement

In Bucha, Associated Press journalists saw 21 bodies, including a group of nine in civilian clothes who appeared to have been shot at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs. A bag of groceries was spilled by one of the dead.

The full extent of the bloodshed in the Kyiv area has yet to emerge. By all accounts, the horrors in the shattered southern port city of Mariupol are likely to be far worse.

This is a war of murders, a lot of blood. A lot of civilians are dying, said Natalia Svitlova, a refugee from Dnipro in eastern Ukraine who fled to Poland. I dont understand why this is possible in the 21st century and why no one can stop it.

Russia withdrew many of its forces from the capital area in recent days after being thwarted in its bid to swiftly capture Kyiv. It has instead poured troops and mercenaries into the countrys east in a stepped-up bid to gain control of the Donbas, the largely Russian-speaking industrial region that includes Mariupol, which has seen some of the heaviest fighting and worst suffering of the war.

About two-thirds of the Russian troops around Kyiv have now left and are either in Belarus or on their way there, probably getting more supplies and reinforcements, said a senior U.S. defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an intelligence assessment.

Russian forces also appear to be repositioning artillery and troops to try to take the city of Izyum, which lies on a key route to the Donbas, the official said.

Advertisement

Dmytro Zhyvystskyy, governor of Ukraines northern Sumy Region, said Russian troops who took over the area on the way toward Kyiv had also retreated back to Russia, with Ukrainian forces capturing small groups left behind.

European allies, though united in outrage over the aftermath outside Kyiv, appeared split on how to respond.

Poland, which is on Ukraines border and has taken in large numbers of refugees, angrily singled out France and Germany for not taking tougher action and urged Europe to quickly wean itself off Russian energy. But Germany said it would stick with a more gradual approach of phasing out coal and oil imports over the next several months.

Journalists stand by a mass grave in Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, April 4, 2022. (Rodrigo Abd/AP)

Western and Ukrainian leaders have accused Russia of war crimes before, and the International Criminal Courts prosecutor has already opened an investigation. But the latest reports ratcheted up the condemnation.

French President Emmanuel Macron said there is clear evidence of war crimes in Bucha that demand new punitive measures.

Im in favor of a new round of sanctions and in particular on coal and gasoline. We need to act, he said on France-Inter radio.

Advertisement

But Polands prime minister described Russia under Putin as a totalitarian-fascist state and called for actions that will finally break Putins war machine.

Would you negotiate with Hitler, with Stalin, with Pol Pot? Mateusz Morawiecki asked of Macron.

In announcing Germanys expulsion of Russian diplomats, Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said the images from Bucha reveal the unbelievable brutality of the Russian leadership and those who follow its propaganda.

We must fear similar images from many other places occupied by Russian troops in Ukraine, she added.

The U.S. and its allies have sought to punish Russia for the invasion by imposing sweeping sanctions but fear further harm to the global economy, which is still recovering from the pandemic. Europe is in a particular bind, since it gets 40% of its gas and 25% of its oil from Russia.

Putins Feb. 24 invasion has left thousands of people dead and forced more than 4 million Ukrainians to flee their country.

Advertisement

The horrors that weve seen in Bucha are just the tip of the iceberg of all the crimes that have been committed by the Russian army on the territory of Ukraine so far, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.

And I can tell you without exaggeration but with great sorrow that the situation in Mariupol is much worse compared to what weve seen in Bucha and other cities, towns, and villages nearby Kyiv.

Qena reported from Motyzhyn, Ukraine. Yuras Karmanau in Lviv, Ukraine. Lolita Baldor in Washington and Associated Press journalists around the world contributed.
WASHINGTON HEIGHTS, NY  The Democratic primary for the New York state elections will take place on June. 28, and one of the most influential races in Upper Manhattan will be for the State Senate seat Robert Jackson currently holds.

The district, which is currently the 31st but is expected to become the 33rd after redistricting, covers Marble Hill, Inwood, Washington Heights, Hamilton Heights, Morningside Heights and the Upper West Side.

Jackson has held the position since 2018. Challenging him in the 2022 Democratic primary will be Angel Vasquez.

Vasquez immigrated from the Dominican Republic to Washington Heights at the age of four, before graduating from Cornell University and becoming a middle school teacher in Colorado.

He eventually returned to Washington Heights in 2013 to obtain a Master of Public Administration from Columbia University, and after graduation, first served as an education policy analyst in the New York State Senate.

Vasquez would go on to become the chief of staff to Marisol Alcantara, who is the first Dominican woman to be elected to the State Senate, however, was defeated in 2018 by Jackson in the same Senate district that Vasquez will be running for.

Alcantara had a tough time winning her reelection in part due to her decision to join the Independent Democratic Conference shortly after she was elected to the Upper Manhattan seat, which was a group of state senate Democrats that allied with the Senate Republications, allowing the party to control the chamber.

Vasquez now works as the senior policy advisor and deputy political director in the legislative and political action at the United Federation of Teachers, a union of over 190,000 members.

He is also an appointed board member of Community Board 12 in Manhattan where he serves as 2nd vice-chair of the board and vice-chair of the licensing committee.



Patch reached out to Vasquez to get a better understanding of his ideas for the office, here are his answers.

Story continues

1) What pushed you to run now as a first-time elected official?

"I believe the district deserves bold new leadership that will serve as a modern and balanced voice in the community and Albany. We need someone who is interested in being an effective legislator in Albany and we need a representative who wants to service the entire community and is committed to keeping all residents safe and affordably housed. Residents, particularly in the predominantly immigrant part of the district who have very serious needs, feel neglected, while many others do not see an active legislator who wants to author legislation and see it move from bill draft to law. Serving as an advocate on issues is not enough; we deserve more. I believe I can create a culture of unity and work to deliver meaningful and tangible results for the districts students, families, and workers."

2) How do you differentiate yourself from incumbent Mr. Jackson?

"With a Master of Public Administration from Columbia University and over seven years of professional experience in public policy, I will be an effective, active, and practical legislator. I am interested in bringing all stakeholders to the table to create sensible solutions, not simply pushing out solutions that grab headlines that do not get to the heart of the problem. For example, Mr. Jackson wants to ban suspensions in schools to close the school-to-prison pipeline. As a former middle school teacher, I know first-hand that banning suspensions doesnt get to the heart of the disciplinary issues we see in schools. Instead, we need to improve school climate by embedding sustainable restorative justice practices; hiring more social workers, school psychologists, and guidance counselors; and diversifying our teacher workforce. In other words, we need to give schools the tools and resources they need to address disciplinary issues if we want to close the school-to-prison pipeline.

Additionally, as someone who has lived in the margins of our society whether it be because of my race, ethnicity, sexuality, or immigration status, I know what it takes to have to fight to have your voice heard. I will always serve as a champion for those most in need. I will work to properly fund our community-based organizations (CBOs) and build strong relationships between my district office and our CBOs to expand services for all residents of the district."

The Inwood rezoning plan was a longtime controversial plan within the Upper Manhattan community. Where do/did you stand on the issue, and how would you balance the addition of new affordable housing and other developments in Upper Manhattan while still preserving the existing neighborhood?

"We need to reform 421-a. The program was written in the 1970s to motivate developers to build housing that would bring back the middle class. We are no longer in the 1970s and the housing and economic needs of our city are different. The 80/20 (market rate/affordable housing) split does not work. With too many new market-rate units, rents go up in surrounding residential buildings and entire communities are displaced. New housing development is necessary, but it needs to be new housing thats affordable for the existing community. With that said, I ultimately believe the Inwood Rezoning will bring too many market-rate units to the neighborhood and will speed up the displacement of the existing community."



2) Some Upper Manhattan community members complain that the neighborhood has seen an uptick in noise pollution, and are pushing for more enforcement around the issue. Other community members say that the majority of neighbors complaining about noise are gentrifiers and added enforcement will only lead to more people of color getting treated unfairly by police. What concrete steps, if any, would you take to address the noise pollution issue in Upper Manhattan?

"New York City is a global city of immigrants from across the world. We have people from very different backgrounds, races, and ethnicities living next to each other, and that could not be truer than in northern Manhattan. I find that we are failing to build community among neighbors. I would like to see government funding that incentivizes the creation of neighborhood, community, and block associations. The purpose is to have neighbors working together to come up with solutions that tackle hyper local issues, including noise. Noise pollution affects us all and blaming one another does not solve the problem. Instead, dwellers and local business owners should have spaces for healthy conversations where government agencies can be invited, if necessary to develop solutions."

3) Washington Heights and Inwood were hit harder than other Manhattan neighborhoods by the coronavirus pandemic. What concrete steps would you take to make sure businesses in the community are able to flourish as the pandemic hopefully comes to an end?

"We are seeing more entrepreneurs selling on the streets while brick-and-mortar stores continue to close. For those selling on the streets, we must fuel their entrepreneurial spirit by opening up doors of opportunity. I propose we create enclosed market spaces where street vendors can rent booths to sell their goods. As for reversing the closure of our brick-and-mortar stores, we need to tackle skyrocketing commercial rents. All new developments should include affordable commercial spaces and we should explore the idea of a commercial rent control program."

Here are the links to learn more about Vasquez and Jackson.

This article originally appeared on the Washington Heights-Inwood Patch
Marcus Spanevelo

Santa Rosa County Sheriff's Office Florida

The body of a missing Florida woman has been found one week after she went missing, according to authorities.

Cassie Carli, 37, was discovered by police Saturday evening in a shallow grave found inside a barn in Alabama while executing a search warrant on the property, Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob Johnson said at a Sunday press conference that aired on WEAR-TV.

Carli's ex-boyfriend Marcus Spanevelo has "a connection" to the property, Johnson said at Sunday's press conference. Authorities confirmed Carli's identity by using a tattoo on her body, Johnson noted. An autopsy will be conducted on Monday.

RELATED: Naomi Irion's Accused Kidnapper Charged with Murder After Missing Teen's Body Was Found

"It's not the ending that we wanted obviously, but we're hoping to provide a little closure to the family," the sheriff explained.

Carli was last seen on March 27 with her 4-year-old daughter Saylor around 7 p.m. local time on Navarre Beach, where she was expected to conduct a custody exchange with Spanevelo, PEOPLE previously reported.

Both the mom and Saylor vanished afterward, though Saylor was found safe two days later, according to officials.

Carli's ex, Spanevelo, was arrested Friday in Lebanon, Tenn., by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigations and the Tennessee Highway Patrol, the Santa Rosa County Sheriff's Office announced in a press release shared on Facebook.

RELATED: Cause of Deaths for Model and Architect, Dumped Outside at Hospitals by Masked Men, Confirmed

The Maury County Sheriff's Office told WEAR-TV that Spanevelo was booked into jail Friday evening around 11 p.m. local time.

Spanevelo was booked into jail on three charges: tampering with evidence, giving false information concerning a missing persons investigation, and destruction of evidence.

cassie carli

cassie carli/facebook Cassie Carli

Johnson told reporters Sunday that Spanevelo allegedly took Carli's cell phone and disposed of the item, which has since been recovered from an undisclosed location. The sheriff alleged that Spanevelo "lied a couple times in different scenarios" and "never cooperated" with authorities investigating Carli's case.

Story continues

Regarding Spanevelo's alleged resistance to the investigation, Johnson said, "It's your baby mother and she's missing  and you're not going to cooperate with authorities? That's kind of tell-tale."

Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.

Relatives and friends told detectives that no one had heard from Carli since 10 p.m. Sunday night when the woman's father received a text message from her phone that said she was experiencing car and phone trouble.

On Tuesday, Carli's car was recovered from Juana's Boat Ramp on Navarre Beach. That same day, the SRCSO officially announced Carli as a missing and endangered person.

At Sunday's press conference, Johnson told reporters that officials believe Spanevelo acted alone and expect him to be extradited in the future. He later alluded to further charges being filed against Spanevelo.

RELATED: Pa. Pizza Shop Owner Accused of Murdering Her Longtime Partner, Telling Victim's Son He Was Away 'on Business'

"We have definitely got a great case, and I think that once the autopsy's done and you see the charges filed, you'll understand," Johnson said. "But I think we have a great case and I think he's going to either spend the rest of his life in prison or get the needle. Hopefully the needle."

The investigation into the case remains ongoing.
JACKSON, Miss. (AP)  Mississippi is the latest Republican-led state to ban election offices from accepting donations from private groups for voting operations  a movement fueled by conservatives' suspicion of donations by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in 2020.

Mississippi Republican Gov. Tate Reeves signed House Bill 1365 on Friday, and it will become law July 1. It says state or local officials who conduct elections cannot solicit or accept donations from any private group for voter education, voter outreach or voter registration programs."

Reeves said in a video posted to Facebook on Monday that he was deeply disturbed by big tech's attempt to influence the 2020 elections.

Whether it was their attempt to silence conservative voices or suppress information they don't agree with, California's technology elites will stop at nothing to push their woke ideology on the American people," Reeves said. "Our elections cannot be left up to billionaires like Mark Zuckerberg, especially when groups like Facebook systematically silence conservative voices on their platforms."

Republicans control the Mississippi House and Senate. The final version of the bill passed the Senate 49-2 with bipartisan support. It passed the House 78-38 with opposition from Democrats.

Jessica Anderson is executive director of the conservative Heritage Action For America, which has pushed for such bans. She said in a statement Monday that the new law will prohibit the use of Zuck Bucks."

Mississippians deserve to have fair elections free from the outside influence of Big Tech billionaires, Anderson said.

Zuckerberg and his wife, Patricia Chan, donated $400 million for elections operations across the U.S. in 2020 as officials were trying to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2020, the nonprofit Center for Tech and Civic Life distributed grants to 2,500 election offices nationwide. The money was spent in a wide variety of ways  protective gear for poll workers, public education campaigns promoting new methods to vote during the pandemic, and new trucks to haul voting equipment.

Louisiana's Republican attorney general in 2020 ordered his states election offices to reject grants from the Center for Tech and Civic Life, which distributed $350 million of the Zuckerberg money.

By 2021, at least eight Republican-led states had passed bans on private donations to elections offices. South Dakota Republican Gov. Kristi Noem signed a ban in March.
Two women who were dumped unconscious at different Los Angeles hospitals late last year by masked men died of multiple drug intoxication, the Los Angeles County coroner has ruled.

Christy Giles, 24, a model, and her friend Hilda Marcela Cabrales Arzola, 26, were dropped off at the hospitals on Nov. 13 by men in a black Toyota Prius without license plates, Los Angeles police said at the time.

Christy Giles. (@christygilesx via Instagram)

Investigators had said they believed the women were given drugs and overdosed at a home on Olympic Boulevard on Nov. 12.

The Los Angeles County medical examiner-coroner has ruled both deaths to be homicides, according to online records.

Giles, 24, died the same day she was dropped at the hospital of multiple drug intoxication, with cocaine, fentanyl, gamma-hydroxybutyric acid  GHB, a date rape drug  and ketamine in her system, the medical examiner-coroner ruled.

Arzola died Nov. 24 of multiple organ failure, as well as multiple drug intoxication. She had cocaine, MDMA and probable other undetermined drugs in her system, the medical examiner-coroner ruled.

Three men  David Pearce, 37; Michael Ansbach, 47; and Brandt Osborn, 42  were arrested in December, police announced. They have not been formally charged.

Police said in a statement at the time of the arrests that they were concerned that other victims could have been drugged by one or more of these men.

The police department said at that time that cases for the three men were presented to the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office for filing consideration. The district attorneys office said Monday it has asked for further investigation.

Ansbach and Osborn were later released, according to jail records.

The district attorneys office charged Pearce on Dec. 17 in a separate case, accusing him of sexually assaulting four women from 2010 to 2020. He was charged with two counts of forcible rape and one count each of rape of an unconscious or asleep person and sexual penetration by a foreign object. He has pleaded not guilty to those counts, according to court records.

Story continues

Pearce remains at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in Los Angeles in lieu of $3.4 million bail, jail records show. His next court date is scheduled for April 25 in the case of the four sexual assaults.

NBC News has reached out to Pearce's lawyer for comment.

Giles husband, Jan Cilliers, has told NBC Los Angeles that Giles and Cabrales Arzola were out party-hopping Nov. 12 and that when he checked his wifes location the next morning, it pinged at the emergency room in Culver City, where she died.

We assume that the way the girls got in the car with them was that they were all going to go to the after-party, that everyone wanted to go to together, Cilliers said. And they never ended up making it there.

NBC News has reached out to the police for an update on the case.
Morbius director Daniel Espinosa knew there was a lot to sink his teeth into as he made a movie about Marvels living vampire.

The Swedish filmmaker was 8 years old when he began reading comic books featuring Morbius, and watched the complicated character evolve from a small part of the superhero stories to something much more complex.

His new movie brings the characters dark origin story to the big screen, with Oscar-winning actor Jared Leto suiting up as Morbius.

I thought it would be fun to do this outsider kind of a superhero and antihero that exists in the borderlines of the Marvel universe, Espinosa told the Daily News.

My movie was a bit of a darker version of Marvel, but has a bit of trippiness in it.

Now playing in theaters, the film introduces Letos Dr. Michael Morbius as a renowned scientist who suffers from a deadly blood disease and dedicated his life to finding a cure.

He believes using the DNA of vampire bats could be the key to solving the illness and creates an experimental serum that he uses on himself, giving him superhuman strength and speed  along with an insatiable hunger for blood.

It gives him these awesome powers but it also changes him, and there are sides of him that come out that are much more violent and that are very negative and abusive, Espinosa, 45, said.

He has to deal with if thats his new self, and if this good person hes been before, is that all bulls--- or is there a way to kind of meld those two ideas?

The Morbius character debuted in the Marvel comic books in 1971 as an adversary of the web-slinging superhero Spider-Man, but later transitioned into more of an antihero.

Michael Morbius, the private person, is regarded within the Marvel community as one of the most altruistic characters of that world, Espinosa said. He works solely to help other people.

He believes using the DNA of vampire bats could be the key to solving the illness and creates an experimental serum that he uses on himself, giving him superhuman strength and speed  along with an insatiable hunger for blood.

Story continues

It gives him these awesome powers but it also changes him, and there are sides of him that come out that are much more violent and that are very negative and abusive, Espinosa, 45, said.

He has to deal with if thats his new self, and if this good person hes been before, is that all bulls  or is there a way to kind of meld those two ideas?

The Morbius character debuted in the Marvel comic books in 1971 as an adversary of the web-slinging superhero Spider-Man, but later transitioned into more of an antihero.

Michael Morbius, the private person, is regarded within the Marvel community as one of the most altruistic characters of that world, Espinosa said. He works solely to help other people.

Letos dedication was on full display when he shot a particularly intense scene in which his character tries to resist an overwhelming urge for blood, Espinosa said.

He just really went for it in there, and you could just see that the whole crew grew silent and stood up, Epinosa said. People got ready to run into the room as soon as I called cut to see that he wasnt hurt. I could feel that they grew in the strength, and they were like, OK, this guy is ready to fight for us. Well fight for him.


CARACAS, Venezuela (AP)  The ground shook at the instant the voice of Mexican music star Alejandro Fernandez collided with the deafening cheers of fans gathered for his first concert in Venezuela in over a decade.

After an initial shocked pause at seeing the artist finally take the stage, the crowd, cellphones in hand, joined him in singing Sin Tantita Pena  Without Too Much Pity.

Its beautiful to be in Venezuela, he said to screams and whistles from the sold-out audience, some of whom had taken out loans to see him perform last month at a 5,000-capacity theater in Caracas, the capital. Beautiful, dear, Venezuela that I always carry in my heart.

Prominent artists are returning to stages in the South American country this year after leaving it out of tours for years. Multilingual vocal group Il Divo and Latin Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Kany Garcia are among those with scheduled concerts.

But with ticket prices ranging from $55 to upward of $600, the events are symbols of great inequality in an impoverished nation.

Superstars like the Backstreet Boys once drew fans to sleep outside a Caracas arena for days as they lined up for tickets. Guns N Roses and Shakira came to town. So did Juanes, whose 2008 tour included multiple cities in Venezuela.

Major concerts, however, became more sporadic starting around 2010. They vanished almost completely a few years later when the country fell into a political, social and economic crisis that eliminated jobs even as inflation collapsed the purchasing power of millions.

Today, about three quarters of Venezuelas population still lives on less than $1.90 a day, considered the international standard for extreme poverty. But for those who have found good private-sector jobs, entered the gig economy or have a business, particularly in Caracas, things are looking up.

The change is partly due to the governments decision to give up its long and complicated efforts to restrict transactions in U.S. dollars in favor of the local bolivar, whose value has been obliterated by inflation.

Story continues

That means promoters once again sense people have money to spend on music  and the changed rules make it possible again to finance the events.

Theyre going to book cities and venues based on venues they could sell, said Jeffrey Dorenfeld, music industry professor at Berklee College of Music in Boston. Artists are not going to want to play the half houses. They dont like to see empty chairs. The objective is to fill the room with paid attendance.

Business administrator Edgar Villanueva attended the Fernandez concert with his wife, two daughters and a son-in-law. One of his daughters had learned of the concert on Instagram and immediately bought the tickets.

Waiting to enter the theater, Villanueva acknowledged his countrys challenges, but said hes not a politician and simply wanted to have a good time with his family. They were hoping Fernandez would sing A Que Sabe El Olvido  What is The Taste of Being Forgotten.

Well, we decided to address our own issues, and from time to time, we as a family get together and say lets enjoy this concert, Villanueva said. We have always been fans of Alejandro. We are passionate about his songs.

An equally enthusiastic fan, Mileydi Villamizar, came with friends who were all smiles while in line. She loves live music, and before the crisis, attended concerts roughly every other month.

Making it to this one was not so easy.

Yes, it is expensive. There is a part of the population that can still afford it, and there is another that, like us, has had to scrape together and even get a loan, said Villamizar, who paid around $75 for her ticket. For many years, they have not taken us into account for concerts or for anything like that, so whoever can indulge will do it.

She hopes to see the Backstreet Boys return to Venezuela one day. Mexican rock band Mana is also on her list.

These days, more than 60% of transactions in Venezuela are in U.S. dollars. So public-sector employees, who are paid in local bolivars, are struggling. Their monthly minimum wage was raised from about $2 to around $30 last month, but that is still not enough to buy groceries and inflation  while slower  still steadily erodes it.

The changed currency policy also has helped make concerts a reality by making it possible for promoters to again get dollars needed to pay performers.

The government used to subsidize official exchange rates with oil revenues, but it became increasingly hard for concert promoters to get dollars at a preferential rate as the states revenue began to collapse with the economic crisis around 2012-2013, said Asdrubal Oliveros, managing partner of the Caracas-based firm Ecoanalitica.

So, it is a process that began even before hyperinflation and has more to do with the gradual disappearance of the foreign exchange subsidy, he added.

Now, clearly some Venezuelans, at least, still have money to spend.

At Fernandezs concert, a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue Label whisky cost $500 while thriftier types could spend $180 for a Buchanans Special Reserve. A burger cost $10 and water $2.

Fernandez performed for more than two hours as the crowd sang along song after song. Those up front were seated at tables while behind them  in the parking lot of a mall  it was standing room only. People also watched from the windows of nearby office buildings.

During the concert, a fan reached out to hand Fernandez a rosary  a symbol perhaps of the joy many felt at the return of the musicians.

They had abandoned us, Villamizar said.
Abbey Wick, North Dakota State University (NDSU) associate professor and soil health specialist, has been elected as chair of the Soil Use and Management division of the International Union of Soil Sciences (IUSS), a scientific organization comprised of soil scientists from around the world.

Abbey Wick, NDSU associate professor and soil health specialist, will lead an international team of soil scientists.

More: NDSU engineering students win awards at Clean Snowmobile Challenge

She will serve a four-year term beginning in August at the World Congress of Soil Science (WCSS) held in Glasgow, United Kingdom. The WCSS brings soil scientists from around the world together to discuss soil issues, exchange knowledge and find solutions for current problems.

More: NDSU and UMN Extension to Host Sheep and Goat Marketing Webinar

More: NDSU Woody Plant Improvement Program releases new tree selection

As chair of the Soil Use and Management division, Wick will lead a team of 12 internationally-known soil scientists from 10 different countries serving as chairs or vice-chairs of the divisions six commissions. The divisions focus is applying soil science to solve high-priority social, economic and environmental challenges. The team will determine relevant topics globally and coordinate sessions related to soil use and management at the next WCSS. Topics will address agricultural production, forestry, grazing lands and the broader environmental context.

Wicks top priority is to connect global efforts related to soil management.

Whether it is finding similarities or differences, there is always something to be learned and also shared, says Wick.

The other scientists in Wicks division are from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, Germany, India, Japan, Norway, Poland and Spain. Wick is the sole representative from the U.S. in this division.

She also looks forward to supporting the scientific community on a global scale.

Being in an Extension and outreach role at NDSU, I want to take some of those programming skills to the scientific community and work with others in the division to better facilitate the sharing of outstanding research within the scientific community and with the public, says Wick.

Dr. Wicks appointment as chair of the Soil Use and Management division highlights the success she has achieved as a globally-known expert in soil health and providing outstanding educational programs for agricultural producers and land managers, says Greg Lardy, vice president for Agricultural Affairs at NDSU.

This article originally appeared on Devils Lake Journal: NDSU soil scientist elected to global soil science organization
Hamilton County has bought property in Noblesville that will be the site of the countys first domestic violence shelter.

The planned $5 million shelter will be in a wooded area next to Cicero Creek on State Road 38 between Hauge Road and River Road. The county paid $500,000 for two houses that will be demolished and replaced with 20,000- square-foot building.

County Commissioner Mark Heirbrandt said the county will fund the construction, which could begin in five months and would take about year. Prevail of Central Indiana, the countys non-profit abuse service provider, will manage the shelter.

This is something we have needed for years and have been talking about for a long time, he said. It is now moving forward.

'People's hearts are hurting': Indianapolis artist, children's cartoon creator, fatally shot

Though the county has abuse services, it doesnt have a shelter of its own. Instead, Prevail and other organization send violence and sex abuse victims to housing in Marion and Madison counties, which adds another layer of displacement to a volatile situation.

When youve been subjected to abuse, it is difficult to maintain a stable lifestyle if you are temporarily staying somewhere so far away? Heirbrandt said.

The shelter would have six family suites with four beds each and the capacity to build six more in the future. Prevails administrative offices would also be at the at the site and half of its eight acres would be outdoor space for residents.

Prevail Executive Director Melinda Konrath-Fielding said the location, which is secluded and slopes down to the creek, is ideal for abuse victims recovering from trauma.

It helps with healing to be in a natural area and feel secure, Konrath-Fielding said.

She said stable temporary housing is crucial for abuse victims.

"It is the first step toward safety and freedom and self-determination, Konrath-Fielding said.

The Noblesville Board of Zoning Appeals has approved a change in zoning for the shelter by a 4-0 vote. The zoning staff had recommended that it be approved, writing in a report that it provides a community benefit by giving victims the chance to "get out of abusive situations and begin a pathway to healing and break the cycle of abuse.

Story continues

Related: Hamilton County is moving toward building its 1st domestic violence shelter

It is in the best interest of the proposed use to preserve as much of the natural habitat as possible as it will add tranquility to the facility, which can promote abuse recovery, the zoning staff wrote.

A little more than half of Prevails clients are domestic violence victims, about a quarter are sexual assault victims and the rest are escaping stalking, battery, harassment or intimidation.

The county in the past has made other attempts at finding a shelter. Most recently, it considered building one next to the Hamilton County Jail, then ditched the plan because commissioners were unsure that would be a safe location.

Konrath-Fielding said Prevail would start a campaign to raise money to run the shelter.

Hamilton County housing unattainable for many, partnership seeks $51M to help

This is something new to us and it will require a big increase in our operating budget, she said. The cost is yet to be determined but Prevail officials are visiting other shelters to get an idea of how much it could be.

Heirbrandt said the county will likely pay for the construction from the county reserve fund.

Call IndyStar reporter John Tuohy at 317-444-6418. Email at john.tuohy@indystar.com and follow on Twitter and Facebook.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Hamilton County's first domestic abuse shelter closer to reality
GREENLAND  The suspect in an armed robbery in Maine was arrested Sunday on Interstate 95 after driving the wrong way on the highway, according to New Hampshire State Police.

Maine State Police initiated a pursuit after identifying the driver as a suspect in an armed robbery in Auburn, Maine, according to police. Troopers in New Hampshire were informed about 12:30 p.m.

Residents hear 'loud bang': Hours later, police confirm a body in a car submerged in Lee pond

Upon entering New Hampshire, the vehicle continued eluding troopers, police said, driving the wrong way on the interstate and crossing the center median. Several attempts were made to stop the vehicle, police said.

The vehicle ultimately came to a stop in the center median near mile marker 10.2 in Greenland, police said. The suspect was taken into custody.

In Portsmouth: Developers for major project sue city, say board acted in 'bad faith'

The 27-year-old man was charged with felony reckless conduct, disobeying a police officer, disorderly conduct, reckless operation and indecent exposure. He was transported to Rockingham County House of Corrections pending arraignment in Rockingham County Superior Court, police said.

Police departments in Kittery, Maine, Portsmouth, Greenland, and North Hampton assisted.

The investigation is ongoing. Police ask anyone with information to contact Trooper Petros Lazos at (603) 223-3828 or Petros.Lazos@dos.nh.gov.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Wrong-way driver on I-95 in NH suspect in Auburn, ME armed robbery
JoAnn Cunningham, 37, reacts as a sentence of 35 years is announced, July 17, 2020, for the murder of son, AJ Freund. (John Starks/Daily Herald)

AJ Freunds mother, who was convicted in her 5-year-old sons murder in Crystal Lake, has asked the court to reconsider her case based on her claim that she thought she was seeing and hearing demons at the time of the crime.

JoAnn Cunningham wrote to the court that her participation in the offense was a direct result of her suffering from postpartum depression or postpartum psychosis.

Advertisement

Cunningham also claimed lack of due legal process and ineffective counsel by her attorneys, since she said her claims were never brought up in court. Though Cunningham did not specify what result she was seeking, her request could challenge her conviction and sentencing in the case.

Last year, Cunningham was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to 35 years in prison for her sons death.

Advertisement

AJs body was found buried in a shallow grave, days after his parents had reported him missing in April 2019. His father, Andrew Freund Sr., told investigators that AJs mother had forced him into a cold shower as punishment for soiling his clothes, and that he fell in the tub.

A coroner concluded that AJ had died from head injuries, with marks consistent with being hit with a detachable shower head.

His father pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, aggravated battery and concealment of a homicidal death, and was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

At the time of Cunninghams sentencing, a psychologist diagnosed Cunningham with significant personality dysfunction, including anti-social and narcissistic traits, as well as depression and anxiety disorders, and extreme emotional and impulse control issues.

Neither prosecutors nor defense attorneys in the case immediately responded to requests for comment. But Cunninghams defense team, Assistant Public Defenders Rick Behof and Angelo Mourelatos, said at her sentencing that it was clear in cellphone videos of AJs earlier abuse that she was not in her right mind.

JoAnn Cunningham, mother of Andrew "AJ" Freund, leaves her home with her attorney George Killis on April 19, 2019, in Crystal Lake. (Stacey Wescott / Chicago Tribune)

Cunningham filed her post-conviction petition on her own behalf in neat handwritten print, without an attorney, and asked that one be appointed for her. She copied language from the relevant state law she cited, which provides for reconsideration of a conviction or sentence if evidence shows postpartum depression or psychosis. News of the filing was first reported by the Northwest Herald.

The law defines postpartum depression as a mood disorder that strikes many women during pregnancy and up to a year after delivery. Psychosis is an extreme form of the condition, and can include losing touch with reality, distorted thinking, delusions, and hallucinations.

Under criminal procedures, prosecutors may oppose Cunninghams request, and Judge Robert Wilbrandt would consider whether to dismiss it or hold an evidentiary hearing, according to Illinois Legal Aid Online.

Advertisement

A Tribune review of AJs case found evidence of 10 phone calls since 2012 questioning Cunninghams care of children.

The former DCFS workers on the case, McHenry County board member Carlos Acosta and his former supervisor, Andrew Polovin, were charged with endangering the life of a child and reckless conduct for their handling of the investigation into AJs abuse. They pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial.

rmccoppin@chicagotribune.com
One month ago, defense companies and oil producers were considered some of the least socially admirable businesses on the planet. ESG research firms, like Morningstar Sustainalytics, rated even the most responsible defense and oil companies above average ESG risks, and most fared much worse than that. Institutions, such as the Harvard endowment and the Ford Foundation, announced plans to divest from fossil fuels in response to outside pressure, and many other investment firms with ESG credentials promised to avoid investments in either industry. All told, ESG considerations effectively amounted to a broad-based withholding of capital from defense and oil companies.





Fast forward one month and Russias invasion of Ukraine has many market participants rethinking their ESG criteria. Swedish bank SEB removed its ban on defense stocks for several of its ESG funds. Citigroup published research arguing for broad-based inclusion of defense companies in ESG mandates. And the European Union is expected to categorize defense companies as socially desirable businesses in its upcoming social taxonomy (i.e., its guidelines for socially beneficial investment). A similar re-evaluation is underway in oil, where dependence on Russian exports is driving renewed calls for energy independence and greater U.S. and European investment in both renewables and hydrocarbons. Suddenly, the defense and oil industries can access pools of funding that were off limits just one month ago.

Its worth asking: what did these investors learn over the last month to justify such dramatic change? It doesnt take much imagination to envision the products of defense companies being used for both good and evil, depending on the circumstances. And it doesnt take much foresight to realize oil will be essential to society for years to come, even as we rapidly invest in renewables. Moreover, the output of these businesses cannot shift anywhere near as quickly as the viewpoints of these investors. It takes years to research, develop and manufacture advanced weapons systems. It takes even longer to replace the energy exports of a major producer like Russia. So while the companies sudden access to funding may influence output years down the road, it is unlikely to help resolve the crises of today.

Story continues

The trouble is most investors do not have long enough time horizons to actually see ESG considerations flow through to business results. As a result, many of these investors make do with shortcuts, force-fitting businesses into good and bad ESG buckets and simply divesting the bad. Divestment, though, is a blunt tool with potentially severe consequences, and binary ESG buckets betray the nuanced impacts these businesses actually have on society.

The reality is all business investments come with trade-offs. Defense companies are beneficial when they protect the innocent and harmful when they enable the guilty. Fossil fuels are harmful to the environment and critical to the functioning of current society. Rather than gloss over this complexity, we believe the role of the ESG-conscious investor should be to balance trade-offs and make decisions that drive the best possible outcomes over the long term. This means recognizing oil production will remain essential to society over the medium term and that environmental costs should eventually lead to declining demand. Both of these conflicting factors must be incorporated into the pricing of oil and gas investments today. When oil companies can be purchased at prices that compensate for these considerations, even ESG-conscious investors should be willing to invest.

We have long taken this more thoughtful approach. As long-term value investors, we make investment decisions through the lens of a long-term business owner. ESG considerations, like all factors that influence business value, are an important component of our research process. After all, a company cannot short-change its stakeholders or the environment for long without a bill coming due to owners like ourselves. As Bill Nygren (Trades, Portfolio) explained in his third quarter commentary of 2021, with a long enough time horizon there is no difference between actions in the best interest of stakeholders and actions in the best interests of shareholders; what maximizes value for one typically maximizes value for the other.

Our long-term approach is what Bill referred to as an and solution one that effectively addresses the interests of both shareholders and stakeholders. By recognizing that environmental costs will eventually cut into oil demand and correspondingly reducing our business value estimates, we are raising the bar for oil investment. It follows that we also tend to see more value in firms like ConocoPhillips and EOG Resources, which are planning for a less oil-intensive future and have production in lower emissions areas, such as the shale fields of the U.S. Importantly, we are exerting this influence without resorting to all-or-nothing divestment decisions that risk harming other stakeholders, like the consumers who rely on oil to meet energy needs today. Finally, we make these investments with a long time horizon and all-encompassing focus on business value, which makes us, in our view, a stabilizing force for corporate decision-makers who are so often whipsawed by changing market fads and trends. Altogether, it is no wonder we believe that long-term value investing is the most effective form of ESG investing.

The holdings mentioned comprise the following percentages of the Funds total net assets as of 02/28/2022:

Security Oakmark Fund Oakmark Select Fund Oakmark Global Fund Oakmark Global Select Fund Oakmark Equity and Income Fund Citigroup, Inc. (NYSE:C) 2.4% 4.3% 0.4% 4.6% 2.0% ConocoPhillips (NYSE:COP) 2.7% 0% 0% 0% 0% EOG Resources, Inc. (NYSE:EOG) 3.6% 4.1% 0% 0% 0% SEB 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%







Portfolio holdings are not intended as recommendations of individual stocks and are subject to change. The Funds disclaim any obligation to advise shareholders of such changes. Information about portfolio holdings does not represent a recommendation or an endorsement to Fund shareholders or other members of the public to buy or sell any security contained in the Funds portfolios. Portfolio holdings are current to the date listed but are subject to change any time. There are no assurances that the securities will remain in the Funds portfolios after the date listed or that the securities that were previously sold may not be repurchased.

This article first appeared on GuruFocus.


Former President Obama is set to participate in an event celebrating the Affordable Care Act at the White House on Tuesday, an agenda from the White House said.

Obama, alongside President Biden and Vice President Harris, is scheduled to deliver remarks celebrating the success of the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid in extending affordable health insurance to millions of Americans as part of the Presidents agenda to cut costs for American families, according to the White House.

The agenda added that Biden is expected to announce additional measures to strengthen the legislation, which was signed into law 12 years ago during Obamas first term in office.

The event will mark the first time Obama has publicly appeared at the White House since leaving office in early 2017 at the end of his second term.

Twelve years ago, I proudly stood beside President Barack Obama as he signed into law the most consequential expansion of health care in generations: the Affordable Care Act, Biden said in a statement last month marking the anniversary of the laws signing.

With the stroke of a pen  after decades of tireless efforts  millions of Americans gained peace of mind. And because of my Administrations efforts, including passing the landmark American Rescue Plan, we have lowered health care costs and made coverage more accessible than ever before  even amid a global pandemic, the president added.

Obama also celebrated the anniversary on Twitter by noting that more than 30 million Americans have health coverage thanks to the Affordable Care Act.

During the pandemic, the Affordable Care Act helped make vaccines and COVID-19 tests available for free, covered emergency hospitalizations, and prevented insurance companies from denying anyone coverage based on a pre-existing condition, Obamas tweet added on the anniversary.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
BUDAPEST (Reuters) - Ubiquitous government advertising paid by the state gave Prime Minister Viktor Orban's ruling Fidesz party an undue advantage in the run-up to Sunday's vote, which gave Orban a fourth consecutive term in office, the OSCE election monitor said on Monday.

Nationalist Orban defied polls suggesting a tight race to score another landslide as voters endorsed his vision of a conservative, "illiberal" state and shrugged off concerns over Budapest's close ties with Moscow.

Preliminary results with 99% votes counted showed Orban's Fidesz party winning 135 seats in the 199-member parliament, a joint opposition party alliance with 56 seats and the far-right Our Homeland party getting 7 seats.

The election process was well run and competitive, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said in a statement. It said, however, the process was marred by what it called the pervasive overlapping of government and ruling coalition's messaging, as well as by media bias and opaque campaign funding.

"The observation mission noted that widespread government advertisement campaigns paid from the state budget reinforced the main ruling party campaign messages, providing an undue advantage," it said.

"The campaign itself was characterised by a pervasive overlap between the ruling coalition's campaign messages and the government's information campaigns, amplifying the advantage of the ruling coalition and blurring the line between state and party."

"Whatever credibility OSCE ODIHR may have had left is now gone," government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs tweeted in response to the report, dismissing its criticism of Fidesz' media advantage.

Opposition leader Peter Marki-Zay also blamed Fidesz's media dominance as a key factor behind the election defeat.

When asked if based on their observations Sunday's ballot could be considered a free election, Mark Pritchard, Head of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly delegation declined to offer such judgement.

"Our time here is to assess the process of how the election was conducted... Our role here is just to observe, to analyse what we see from our observations ...so it's not to comment on the actual election itself".

(Reporting by Anita Komuves and Gergely Szakacs; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)
Detective Gabrio Badolati has been named Officer of the Year for the Palm Beach Police Department March 30, 2022.

The 2021 Palm Beach Police Officer of the Year award has been given to Detective Gabrio Badolati, who is credited with two life-saving rescues.

In both cases, my police training kicked right in. Police and rescue personnel worked together. Teamwork made the rescues successful, said Badolati, a 13-year police veteran and native of New York City.

Badolati, 52, saved a choking baby boy at The Breakers in the first rescue in March 2021. The other rescue was a husband and wife who almost drowned near Gulfstream Road after being pulled out in an undertow Dec. 19.

"You are commended for your quick response and calmness in a stressful situation. Your performance and training prevented a loss of life, specifically an infant. Your commitment to excellence brought this critical incident to a positive conclusion, said Palm Beach Police Chief Nicholas Caristo.

Chief Nicholas Caristo, from left, Tim Moran, Michael Belisle, and David Mack present Gabrio Badolati with the officer of the year award during the 16th annual Policemen's and Firefighters' Ball.

An avid motorcycle rider, Badolati was drawn to police work while he was employed as an insurance fraud investigator with a private firm in New York.

I love investigations. Following leads. Looking for crumbs. Tracing the trail. Getting to the outcome, he said.

When not on duty, Badolati likes to ride his black 2019 Harley-Davidson on trips with his friends and sometimes alone. Destinations have included Daytona, the Carolinas, Tennessee and Alabama.

I love the freedom you have when you ride. It s just you and the motorcycle and the wind in your face. No phone. Nothing to bother you, he said.

Climbing aboard his rig was a relief after both of his rescues, he said.

In the first incident, a crying mother wearing her pajamas handed her choking infant to Badolati as he stood in The Breakers lobby. Badolati was on special assignment detail at the hotel.

The boy was struggling to breathe. He had blue lips. He was unresponsive, said Badolati.

Badolati turned the year-old infant on his stomach. He placed him on his left forearm. He patted the childs back. He performed CPR.

The child began to breathe normally. He began to cry. His skin color returned to normal.

Story continues

The baby was transported to St. Marys Medical Center. Badolatis actions had moved the obstruction from the babys throat into his belly, doctors said. The baby was medically cleared after medical evaluation.

The teamwork required to save the baby boy also clicked in with the ocean rescue, said Badolati.

The couple were about 100 yards out. The seas pretty rough. I took off my equipment. I grabbed a flotation device and tied it to my waist. I swam out, said Badolati.

Town Manager Kirk Blouin, Gabrio Badolati and Mayor Danielle Moore at the 16th annual Policemen's and Firefighters' Ball on March 19.

As Badolati towed the 41-year-old man ashore, other rescue personnel arrived. Badolati directed them toward the woman, who was about 20 yards farther out than the man. Life guards were not on duty because it was after 5 p.m.

When rescue workers reached the 52-year-old woman, she was unconscious. They brought her ashore. She was transported to Good Samaritan Medical Center for treatment.

While on the beach, the male subject embraced Officer Badolati and thanked him for saving his life, according to Caristo.

The couple recovered. The man told rescue officials they were separated while swimming and were unable to get back to shore.

The Palm Beach Police and Fire Foundation raises money from contributions from the community for the annual award for $10,000 to the police officer of the year. Funds for the police award were raised by Tom and Devon Roush.

Badolati said he will use the money to help with a family members education.

She wants to help young children, he said.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Detective Gabrio Badolati honored at Mar-a-Lago ceremony
(POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

The only official photographer who documented the Duke of Edinburghs memorial service last week has revealed how the event unfolded when Prince Andrew was given a surprisingly prominent role.

The service of thanksgiving at Westminster Abbey on Tuesday 29 March saw the Duke of York make his first public appearance since he reached a settlement on his sexual assault case in the US.

Andrew settled the case brought against him by Virginia Giuffre, who accused him of sexual abuse when she was 17. He previously denied ever meeting her and has vehemently denied the allegations.

Despite having stepped back from public duties, Andrew arrived at the service together with the Queen and escorted her to her seat at the front of the congregation of 1,800 people, including the Prince and Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Richard Pohle, staff photographer at The Times, was chosen as the rota photographer who would provide national and international media with images of the service from inside Westminster Abbey.

Writing in The Times, he revealed that the event began in a high state of panic and his initial instructions were not to photograph the Queen until she was seated.

(Getty Images)

However, everything changed when it was discovered that Andrew would accompany Her Majesty down the aisle.

He recalled telling Palace officials that he would absolutely need to photograph the moment the Queen arrived with the Duke, as it was now the major news event.

The 95-year-old monarchs decision to allow Andrew to accompany her was highly criticised by the media and members of the public following the event, with royal commentator Omid Scobie commenting that it completely overshadowed a beautiful service.

The memorial was broadcast live on BBC One on the day, and Pohle argued that he would be in a hell of a lot of trouble if there was blanket TV coverage of the Queen openly showing support for Prince Andrew but no photographs.

Story continues

The photographer was eventually given permission to capture the moment, but he revealed how he nearly lost the opportunity.

I had forgotten that when the Queen enters a room everyone stands up, he wrote, describing how he was blocked by rows of dignitaries and ladies hats.

(REUTERS)

Thinking quickly, he moved away from his official position to a better spot. However, Pohle described this as the most cardinal of sins as a royal rota photographer.

I brushed past the press officer and could feel a hand reach out to try and stop me but I rushed past and crouched in the centre of the aisle, he said.

It was from this spot that Pohle was able to clearly photograph the Queen walking arm in arm with Andrew, behind the row of clergy.

He later returned to his official spot to the frowning press officer and whispered his apologies for moving away.

The image of Andrew walking his mother through the abbey was splashed on newspapers the following day, with headlines like The pain and the stain fronting The Mirror and Royal fallout over the Queens ultimate act of love on the front of the Daily Express.

The Dukes prominent role at the memorial has raised questions over whether he would attend the Queens Platinum Jubilee weekend in June.

The banished royal, who was stripped of his honorary military titles and HRH style in January, may make an appearance at the Jubilee service of thanksgiving in St Pauls Cathedral on 3 June if it is considered a family occasion.

However, Buckingham Palace has said its position on the matter hasnt changed since our statement in January, when it issued a statement confirming that Andrew will continue not to undertake any public duties.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki joint press conference with President of the European Parliament Roberta Metsola at Primary School No. 12 in Otwock, Poland on April 2, 2022. Mateusz Wlodarczyk/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki called Russia's actions in Ukraine a "genocide."

Morawiecki called out Germany and France for not doing enough to stop Putin.

He said Germany was the biggest roadblock to tougher sanctions.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki called on the European Union to take "take immediate and decisive action" towards Russia, specifically calling out France and Germany.

Morawiecki during a news conference on Monday said Germany was the main roadblock to tougher sanctions against Russia, Reuters reported.

"We have to see that, regardless of how we approach Hungary, this is the fourth such win and we have to respect democratic elections ... it's Germany that is the main roadblock on sanctions. Hungary is for the sanctions," Morawiecki said.

Morawiecki was referencing Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who won his election despite criticism of not being tough enough on Russia. Morawiecki said unlike Germany, Hungary was in support of sanctions.

Reuters reported that German Finance Minister Christian Lindner on Monday rejected calls to sanctions Russian gas, which Germany heavily relies on.

"We are dealing with a criminal war," Lindner said before talks with his EU colleagues in Brussels. "It is clear we must end as quickly as possible all economic ties to Russia. We must plan tough sanctions, but gas cannot be substituted in the short term. We would inflict more damage on ourselves than on them."

The Associated Press reported that Morawiecki also called out French and German leaders by name for not doing enough including, French President Emmanuel Macron.

"President Macron, how many times have you negotiated with Putin? What have you achieved? ... Would you negotiate with Hitler, with Stalin, with Pol Pot?" Mateusz Morawiecki asked. "Chancellor Scholz, Olaf, it is not the voices of German businesses that should be heard aloud in Berlin today. It is the voice of these innocent women and children."

Story continues

Morawiecki called Russian President Vladimir Putin's rule of Russia a "totalitarian-fascist state," and described the atrocities in Bucha as a "genocide."

In an interview with France-Inter radio on Monday, translated by the AP Macron said there was "clear evidence" of war crimes in Ukraine and that he's "in favor of a new round of sanctions and in particular on coal and gasoline,"

In a Facebook post on Monday, Morawiecki said the West can no longer "turn their eyes away" from what Russia is doing in Ukraine.

"Leadership isn't cowardice or calculations. It's an uncompromising fight against evil. It commits us to do everything we can to prevent further genocide crimes," he wrote.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Two people, including a child, were hurt in a shooting at an Orlando restaurant over the weekend.

The Juicy Crab was open when bullets went flying, just before midnight Saturday.

People were inside eating when a shooter unloaded at least a dozen rounds into the restaurant.

The two people who were shot are going to be OK.

READ: 1 adult, 1 juvenile shot in drive-by shooting at Orlando restaurant

Orlando police are searching for the person who fired shots into the busy restaurant off Kirkman Road.

Eyewitness News spoke to a mother who was a few stores down just before the shooting.

I cant believe what happened here. Oh my God, Im so stressed about it. Its so sad, said Glory Rosado.

Read: Just horrific: 6 dead, 9 injured in Sacramento shooting, police say

Investigators have not released a suspect description or a possible motive.

Well be checking in with police for any updates.

WATCH: Meteorologist pauses live weather report to call kids about tornado warning

Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call the police department.

The Juicy Crab Restaurant off Kirkman Rd. is boarded up this morning. Police say a shooter unloaded at least a dozen rounds into the restaurant while people were inside eating. Two people, including a child, were hurt. Both in stable condition. Suspect is still out there. @WFTV pic.twitter.com/D6NnlwxME0  Christy Turner (@CTurnerWFTV) April 4, 2022

Click here to download the free WFTV news and weather apps, click here to download the WFTV Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Channel 9 Eyewitness News live.
A Phoenix police vehicle on Dec. 7, 2021.

The Phoenix Police Department is investigating the death of a 33-year-old man inside an apartment that was on fire on Saturday.

Phoenix fire crews and police officers arrived at the scene near 51st Avenue and Encanto Boulevard around 3 p.m. where they found an apartment on fire and a man trying to extinguish the flames, according to police.

The man was identified as Ishmael Williams, 32, police said in a statement.

After the fire was put out, a 33-year-old man was found inside the residence with "obvious signs of trauma." His identity was not released.

According to Phoenix police, evidence at the scene and interviews led detectives to arrest Williams.

An investigation is ongoing to determine what led to the incident.

Reach breaking news reporter Haleigh Kochanski at hkochanski@arizonarepublic.com or on Twitter @HaleighKochans.

Support local journalism. Subscribe to azcentral.com today.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Police: Man found dead inside apartment on fire in Phoenix
A man has died after a shooting in Carrick on Sunday night.

Police tell 11 News that the call came in just before 9 p.m., for a person shot in the 500 block of Maytide Street.

Responding units found 48-year old Michael E. Flaherty with a gunshot wound to the chest. He was pronounced dead by paramedics a short time later.

Right now, the major crimes detectives and the crime scene unit are on the scene processing evidence and talking to neighbors to try and find out what transpired here, said Cara Cruz, a public information officer with Pittsburgh police.

This shooting is one of many over the last week in the Pittsburgh area. 11 News asked Cruz about the uptick and violence, and what residents can do in response.

Really, try to be aware of how your neighbors are, how theyre doing and how theyre faring, she said. People really seem to be struggling out there right now.

Police said they are still searching for suspects.

Stay with 11 News for the latest on this breaking story.

TOP STORIES:

1 person killed, 1 injured in car accident in Baldwin Borough Car dealership agrees to $10M settlement for allegedly charging Black clients more Aliquippa Junior Senior High School enforcing limits on snacks starting Monday VIDEO: Bieber fever in Pittsburgh: Justin Bieber stops in the steel city on his Justice World Tour DOWNLOAD the Channel 11 News app for breaking news alerts
The city of Chicago will host two large gun buybacks later this year and launch a program giving rebates to residents who purchase private security cameras, Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced Monday.

As of now, the city has budgeted $5.3 million through 2024 for a rebate program that will pay residents up to $225 per camera for a total of $450 at a home. The city will also pay $100 per safety light and vehicular GPS tracking up to $50 per device, among other costs, the city said.

Advertisement

A Chicago police officer inspects guns during a buyback program in 2016. (Abel Uribe / Chicago Tribune)

More details will be announced later this year, the city said.

Lightfoot officials are also in the process of raising $1 million from businesses and philanthropic donations to host large gun buybacks.

Advertisement

[ Shootings, homicides down so far this year compared with 2021 ]

Specific times, locations and eligibility criteria wont be announced until a later date, the city said. But one event is scheduled for the summer and another for the fall, officials said.

Sign up for The Spin to get the top stories in politics delivered to your inbox weekday afternoons.

Lightfoot made the announcements Monday as she continues to field criticism over Chicagos gun violence. The city experienced major crime spikes in 2020 and 2021. Crime has gone down in the first quarter of 2022, though Lightfoot, who faces reelection early next year, has said the administration will continue pushing to reduce street violence.

gpratt@chicagotribune.com
Pope Francis two-day visit to the tiny European country of Malta, a strongly Catholic island just south of Sicily, in April, 2022 put a spotlight on Maltas complicated history and important contemporary concerns. Chief among these is the sharp increase in the number of asylum-seekers from Africa and the Middle East, and criticism of how Malta has treated them.

As a scholar of Catholic history and ritual, I have studied the development of the church in several European countries, and the important role that the lives of people venerated as saints have played in the way Catholics address contemporary issues.

Tradition has it that the first Maltese saint was St. Publius, the first-century bishop of the early Christian community in Malta. He was venerated as a saint long before saints were officially proclaimed by the pope. However, historians have raised questions whether Publius ever existed or served as bishop.

The only Maltese person to be officially named a saint by a pope is St. George Preca, a priest of the archdiocese of Malta in the first half of the 20th century. Preca was beatified, or given the title of Blessed, the second-to-last step in being proclaimed a saint, in 2001 by Pope John Paul II. In 2007 he was canonized  the last step in achieving sainthood  by Pope Benedict XVI.

Early life

Preca was born in 1880 in Maltas capital city, Valetta, and was brought up in a town just outside of the city. After primary and secondary school, he entered the seminary of Malta and, despite severe lung problems that threatened his life, was ordained to the priesthood in 1906.

Ordinary Catholics in Malta at the time were largely uneducated. Most did not know the Bible well and instead focused on devotional practices that some priests considered almost superstitious. As a seminarian, Preca became increasingly convinced that the focus of his ministry was to be training laymen  and later, laywomen  to teach other Catholics, both children and adults, about their Catholic faith and the Bible.

Story continues

A new order

Training laypeople to educate others like themselves about their faith was a revolutionary idea at the time, since usually only seminarians or priests, and sometimes nuns, would be involved in that kind of education. Before his ordination, Preca himself had become active in discussing religious topics with ordinary working men, and then teaching catechism  the principles of Catholic beliefs  to younger boys in a nearby town.

That group of young men would become the core of the new religious society for laypeople, The Society of Christian Doctrine, which Preca soon founded. Later, this society was nicknamed Museum because of the dilapidated building that was its original meeting place. These unordained teachers  called catechists  were later divided into two branches, one for men and one for women.

As time went on, they established educational centers for children and adults in almost every parish in Malta. These centers are still active today in Malta and in several other countries as well, especially Australia.

Resistance to teachings

But at the beginning of the 20th century, Precas ideas were not immediately accepted by his more conservative superiors. Within a few years of their founding, his archbishop ordered his catechetical centers in Malta to be closed. Though they were reopened a few years later after deeper investigation, his group was not given final, official approval in Rome until 1932. During that time, and for the remainder of his life, he encouraged members of his society to remain humble and kind in the face of hardship and criticism.

Preca died in July 1962. In October 1962, the Second Vatican Council, which was called by Pope John XXIII to modernize the Catholic Church, began in Rome. Among the reforms the council stressed was the importance of both Scripture and tradition as the foundations for Catholic Christian life, and it encouraged all Catholics to study the Bible.

Preca was a pioneer in training laypeople to become religious educators for both children and adults, focusing on Gospel teaching while encouraging them to live their lives according to its values. In fact, at Precas beatification in 2001, Pope John Paul II referred to him as Maltas second father in faith.

In 2010 Pope Benedict XVI proposed a new evangelization movement for all members of the Catholic Church in the 21st century. This movement placed a renewed emphasis on preaching and teaching in the contemporary world, very much in line with Precas work in the early 20th century. Both Pope Benedict and Pope Francis have expanded the idea of this new focus on preaching and teaching the Gospel to include explicit concern for the welfare of refugees and migrants.

The popes visit to Malta draws new attention to the work of St. George Preca. His focus on educating Catholics more deeply on the meaning of Jesus teaching may provide some guidance for Malta and other countries in confronting this global issue.

[Explore the intersection of faith, politics, arts and culture. Sign up for This Week in Religion.]

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Joanne M. Pierce, College of the Holy Cross.

Read more:



Joanne M. Pierce does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Diana, Princess of Wales met actors Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman at the premiere of "Far and Away" at the Leicester Square Empire Cinema. (Getty Images)

She has been hailed as the most beautiful royal of all time, and he was once named the sexiest man alive.

But Princess Diana once said she would not date Tom Cruise, it is claimed - because he was too short.

Former royal chef Darren McGrady says the princess and the actor met on the set of Mission: Impossible years ago.

Read more: Lily Collins admits she once pulled a bouquet off Princess Diana as a child

Tom Cruise with Princess Diana in 1992. (SWNS)

Read more: How Prince William plans to 'reinvent' his future royal title

Apparently she had taken her sons, William and Harry, to see the action film being made - which they "loved".

But Darren claims that, after meeting Cruise, Diana joked she would take him "off the list" - because of his height.

The A-lister's exact size is hard to pinpoint, but it is thought that he stands at around 5ft 7ins.

Darren, who cooked at Buckingham Palace for 11 years, said: "I remember Princess Diana taking the boys to the set of Mission Impossible and to meet Tom Cruise.

"Wills and Harry loved the pyrotechnics. But Princess Diana 'Thats another one off the list Darren. Hes too short!'.

I remember Princess Diana taking the boys to the set of Mission Impossible and to meet Tom Cruise. Wills and Harry loved the pyrotechnics. But Princess Diana Thats another one off the list Darren. Hes too short! https://t.co/MZTfO9xwQs  Darren McGrady (@DarrenMcGrady) April 1, 2022

Darren's Twitter post came after it was revealed Cruise gave William and wife Kate Middleton an exclusive preview screening of his new Top Gun film.

Watch Now: Duke and Duchess of Cambridge attend world's first screening of Top Gun sequel

Read more: Kate Middleton and Prince William Given Special Screening of Top Gun Sequel by Tom Cruise

The actor invited the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to watch the sequel after learning that Prince William was a huge fan of the original move, according to The Sun.

The Prince, 39, a trained RAF helicopter pilot, and Kate, 40, were apparently joined at the secret viewing of Top Gun: Maverick by Sophie Wessex, 57, and Princesses Eugenie, 32, and Beatrice, 33.

Additional reporting by SWNS
Puerto Ricos health care industry is raising the alarm over disparities in how the territorys Medicare plans are funded, hurting the quality of services for around 630,000 senior citizens.

In a joint letter to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, a coalition of Puerto Rican medical, pharmaceutical, hospital, business and insurance associations called on the Biden administration to close a funding gap thats undercutting the islands medical services.

In their letter, the groups referenced an explicit campaign promise made by President Biden to address the territorys growing Medicare funding gap.

Biden will address historically low Medicare Advantage payment rates and their consequences to Puerto Ricos health system by directing the HHS Secretary to develop and recommend payment reforms and enhancements to the program, reads the Biden-Harris Plan for Recovery, Renewal & Respect for Puerto Rico.

President Biden promised to address historically low Medicare Advantage payment rates and their consequences to Puerto Ricos healthcare system, said Roberto Pando, president of the Medicaid & Medicare Advantage Products Association of Puerto Rico.

We hope HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra takes positive actions and implements policies that provide a path to fair treatment and equity on healthcare funding for Medicare beneficiaries in the Island, added Pando.

The Hill has reached out to Becerras office for comment.

Puerto Ricos Medicare system is heavily reliant on Medicare Advantage, a program that allows private insurers to provide Medicare services.

More than 90 percent of Puerto Ricans who use Medicare rely on Medicare Advantage programs, but the federal government funds Puerto Ricos Medicare Advantage at 42 percent below the average national rate.

That gap has nearly doubled over the past decade  in 2011, Puerto Ricos Medicare Advantage funding lagged 24 percent behind the national rate  and Puerto Rico not only lags behind states, but behind other territories.

Story continues

In their letter to Becerra and Brooks-LaSure, Puerto Ricos health care providers noted that Puerto Ricos funding rate is 37 percent below that of Hawaii, the lowest-funded state in the program, and 23 percent below the next-lowest jurisdiction (U.S. Virgin Islands).

While Medicare Advantage is enormously popular in Puerto Rico, it is not as widely used on the mainland.

Still, Medicare Advantage usage has been growing throughout the United States, and it is estimated that about half of all Medicare users will be on an Advantage plan by 2030, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

The discrepancy in funding rates for Puerto Rico has contributed to underservicing of seniors and other Medicare beneficiaries on the island, but also to emigration from the island both of patients seeking better care and of medical professionals seeking better working conditions.

According to the letter, there are 280,000 dually-eligible seniors in Puerto Rico, who are immediately eligible to receive medical services on the island or in one of the states.

Now is the time to end funding disparities for Medicare beneficiaries in Puerto Rico and U.S. territories, said Elliot Pacheco, president of Entrepreneurs for Puerto Rico, a local business association.

Puerto Ricos health care industry has long warned that continued shortchanging of the islands medical system could prompt more out-migration with costs to the states.

A reduction in the funding gap, they argue, would instead prompt seniors and medical professionals to stay on the island, where costs of living are lower and every Medicare dollar can be stretched further.

Such action would also reduce the rate of provider migration to the states, strengthen the islands healthcare infrastructure while fulfilling the administrations overall commitment to equity for underserved areas, they wrote.

Last month, a bipartisan group of 11 House members penned a similar letter to Becerra, warning that failing to close the [Medicare Advantage] funding gap between Puerto Rico and the states effectively relegates the Puerto Rico health care system to second-tier status.

That letter, led by Puerto Rico Resident Commissioner Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon (R), included among its signatories the late Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), a longtime proponent of equal treatment for territories and of statehood for Puerto Rico.

The letter, signed on May 18, the day of Youngs death, called on Becerra to fix these long-standing inequities once and for all.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was so out of touch with reality when he launched the Ukraine invasion that he was incensed his troops werent welcomed with flowers, an exiled Russian oligarch revealed Sunday.

At first he wanted to change the power in Kyiv ... and was expecting that this would be met with flowers thrown in the streets by Ukrainian people, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, onetime CEO of Russian oil giant Yukos, said on CNN.

But when Ukrainians fought back as the invasion was launched, Putin went insane, said Khodorkovsky, an outspoken Putin critic who spent nine years in a Russian prison.

Watch: Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko attacks Putin - 'He's sick, he's an unhealthy man'

The fact that the people in Kharkiv [also failed to] meet him with flowers, it not only just angered him, I really think it drove him literally insane. Thats when he started bombing Kharkiv and Kyiv, Khodorkovsky said.

Former Russian Deputy Energy Minister Vladimir Milov told CNN on Saturday that the surprising war in Ukraine has devastated top officials in the Kremlin and that many Russian elites may lose faith in Putin. Thats risky for Putin, who could be forced from power in a matter of months, he warned.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

Related...
Retired Gen. Wesley Clark says Russian President Vladimir Putin's true goals are to seize "control over Eastern Europe" and to "shatter NATO." Getty Images

A former NATO commander says Russian President Vladimir Putin wants "control over Eastern Europe."

Retired Gen. Wesley Clark said the best way to protect NATO was thus to help Ukraine defeat Russia.

He called on the US to strengthen military aid to Ukraine, especially with fighter aircraft.

A former commander of NATO is warning that Russian President Vladimir Putin's actual goals in attacking Ukraine are to establish "control over Eastern Europe" and to "shatter" the Western military alliance.

During an interview with CNN on Sunday, Wesley Clark, a retired US four-star general, also urged the West to provide more arms to Kyiv.

"He wants Ukraine," Clark said. "He wants the Baltic states. He wants control over Eastern Europe. He wants to shatter NATO, and he wants the United States out."

Clark, a military analyst for CNN who previously served as NATO's supreme allied commander for Europe from 1997 to 2000, said Putin sought to "disrupt the international system" and have the West "emotionally" and "morally disarmed" into believing that his ambitions would extend only to Ukraine.

He also called on the US and its NATO allies to bolster military aid for Ukraine, particularly with fighter aircraft  an area the Pentagon has declined to help with thus far, having rejected a Polish plan to supply Kyiv with MiG-29 jets.

"Ukraine is just the current battlefield. But if Ukrainians defeat Russia on this battlefield, everything changes," Clark said. "So the best way to protect NATO, the best way to protect the international system, is to give Ukraine the assistance it says it needs and let them handle Russia on the battlefield."

He said that while US military campaigns over the past 50 years involved helping countries "who weren't that prepared to fight," the war in Ukraine was different.

"Their soldiers have education just as good as ours," Clark said. "They're just as good technically as we are. We give them our modern weapons, they can use them in 24 hours."

Story continues

"So we're going to have to do a better job of listening to the Ukrainians for what they need and get them the equipment they say they need," he added.

The retired general said Russian forces would next seek to capture the city of Dnipro in eastern Ukraine to cut off Ukrainian troops in the Donbas region, where Moscow has recognized two separatist territories as independent states.

Clark said Russia's next objective was to take the city of Dnipro to cut off Ukrainian forces in the Donbas, where Russia declared the territories of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states. Screenshot/Google Maps

Clark said to drive off Russia's advance to Dnipro, Ukraine would need "heavy fighting equipment" beyond what the US had supplied so far.

"Not Javelins, not Stingers  that's fine for helping defend cities," he told CNN, referring to Javelin anti-tank and Stinger anti-aircraft missiles. "They need tanks, they need mobile artillery, they need lots of ammunition. They need fuel, they need repairs. We don't have that for them."

The war in Ukraine is set to enter its 39th day on Monday. At least 1,417 Ukrainian civilians have been killed in the fighting and bombardment, with at least 2,038 more injured, according to the United Nations, which has said the actual figures are probably far higher.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Even when a business is losing money, it's possible for shareholders to make money if they buy a good business at the right price. Indeed, Queensland Pacific Metals (ASX:QPM) stock is up 109% in the last year, providing strong gains for shareholders. Having said that, unprofitable companies are risky because they could potentially burn through all their cash and become distressed.

So notwithstanding the buoyant share price, we think it's well worth asking whether Queensland Pacific Metals' cash burn is too risky. In this report, we will consider the company's annual negative free cash flow, henceforth referring to it as the 'cash burn'. We'll start by comparing its cash burn with its cash reserves in order to calculate its cash runway.

View our latest analysis for Queensland Pacific Metals

When Might Queensland Pacific Metals Run Out Of Money?

A company's cash runway is the amount of time it would take to burn through its cash reserves at its current cash burn rate. When Queensland Pacific Metals last reported its balance sheet in December 2021, it had zero debt and cash worth AU$47m. Importantly, its cash burn was AU$24m over the trailing twelve months. Therefore, from December 2021 it had 2.0 years of cash runway. While that cash runway isn't too concerning, sensible holders would be peering into the distance, and considering what happens if the company runs out of cash. You can see how its cash balance has changed over time in the image below.

How Is Queensland Pacific Metals' Cash Burn Changing Over Time?

While Queensland Pacific Metals did record statutory revenue of AU$2.0m over the last year, it didn't have any revenue from operations. To us, that makes it a pre-revenue company, so we'll look to its cash burn trajectory as an assessment of its cash burn situation. Remarkably, it actually increased its cash burn by 1,152% in the last year. With that kind of spending growth its cash runway will shorten quickly, as it simultaneously uses its cash while increasing the burn rate. Admittedly, we're a bit cautious of Queensland Pacific Metals due to its lack of significant operating revenues. We prefer most of the stocks on this list of stocks that analysts expect to grow.

How Easily Can Queensland Pacific Metals Raise Cash?

Story continues

Given its cash burn trajectory, Queensland Pacific Metals shareholders may wish to consider how easily it could raise more cash, despite its solid cash runway. Issuing new shares, or taking on debt, are the most common ways for a listed company to raise more money for its business. Commonly, a business will sell new shares in itself to raise cash and drive growth. We can compare a company's cash burn to its market capitalisation to get a sense for how many new shares a company would have to issue to fund one year's operations.

Since it has a market capitalisation of AU$293m, Queensland Pacific Metals' AU$24m in cash burn equates to about 8.2% of its market value. Given that is a rather small percentage, it would probably be really easy for the company to fund another year's growth by issuing some new shares to investors, or even by taking out a loan.

So, Should We Worry About Queensland Pacific Metals' Cash Burn?

On this analysis of Queensland Pacific Metals' cash burn, we think its cash burn relative to its market cap was reassuring, while its increasing cash burn has us a bit worried. Cash burning companies are always on the riskier side of things, but after considering all of the factors discussed in this short piece, we're not too worried about its rate of cash burn. Separately, we looked at different risks affecting the company and spotted 4 warning signs for Queensland Pacific Metals (of which 1 shouldn't be ignored!) you should know about.

Of course Queensland Pacific Metals may not be the best stock to buy. So you may wish to see this free collection of companies boasting high return on equity, or this list of stocks that insiders are buying.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.



This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.
New Hampshire Republican Gov. Chris Sununu speaks to the media about a hand written birthday card for President Joe Biden as he awaited Biden's arrival on Air Force One Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021, in Manchester, N.H. Mary Schwalm/Associated Press

New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu went after Trump at a dinner of Washington, DC, elite on Saturday.

After pretending to praise Trump, Sununu said "Nah, I'm just kidding! He's fucking crazy!"

The Gridiron Club dinner is held annually and is attended by lawmakers and often the president.

New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu roasted former President Donald Trump during a dinner of Washington A-listers on Saturday night.

Sununu, a Republican, was speaking at the Gridiron Club dinner, an annual event that hasn't been held since the pandemic. Put on by a prestigious journalistic organization, the dinner draws politicians from both parties, oftentimes including the president.

"You know, he's probably going to be the next president," Sununu began in his remarks on Trump, according to Politico, adding that Trump tweeted with "rationale" and had "experience" and a "sense of integrity."

"Nah, I'm just kidding! He's fucking crazy!" Sununu continued, prompting laughter from the crowd.

"The press often will ask me if I think Donald Trump is crazy. And I'll say it this way: I don't think he's so crazy that you could put him in a mental institution. But I think if he were in one, he ain't getting out!" Sununu said, according to Politico.

Trump's office did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Only two Republican senators attended the dinner, which Trump himself spoke at in 2018, and no Republicans from the House were there, The Washington Post reported.

Insider's Jake Lahut reported in February that former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said Trump had given him an assignment to oust Sununu. Lewandowski said Trump was "very unhappy" with the governor and that he wasn't "loyal" to him.

Sununu, for his part, said in January he doesn't need an endorsement from anyone to get reelected, including Trump.

Read the original article on Business Insider
(Reuters) - Russia's chief investigator on Monday ordered an official examination of what he called a Ukrainian "provocation" after Kyiv accused the Russian military of massacring civilians in the town of Bucha.

Alexander Bastrykin, head of the Russian Investigative Committee, ordered that a probe be opened on the basis that Ukraine had spread "deliberately false information" about Russian armed forces in Bucha, the committee said in a statement.

(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
Chicago police fatally shot a man Sunday afternoon after he allegedly fired at officers and struck two people in a hostage situation in Ford City on the Southwest Side, authorities said.

At about 1:15 p.m. in the 4200 block of West Ford City Drive, officers responded to a call of a person shot, according to Chicago police, and they found a 48-year-old woman whod suffered a gunshot wound to the neck.

Advertisement

Police tried to make contact with the suspected shooter, who barricaded himself and fired at police, authorities said. Officers were not struck.

A SWAT team responded to the scene and attempted to de-escalate and negotiate with the shooter, police said.

Advertisement

Officers eventually shot the man, police said. He was taken into custody and then to Advocate Christ Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.

The 48-year-old woman was also taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center, where she was in critical condition, along with a 78-year-old man taken hostage, who suffered a gunshot wound to the shoulder.

A gun was recovered at the scene; police spokesman Tom Ahern posted a photo on Twitter.

The shooting was being investigated by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability.

The officers involved in the shooting will be placed on administrative duties for 30 days, which is routine.
(Reuters) - Russian former military reporter Ivan Safronov on Monday dismissed treason charges against him as a "travesty" as his trial was set to begin behind closed doors in Moscow.

Safronov was a prominent journalist and part of the pool of officially accredited Kremlin reporters until shortly before his arrest in July 2020, when his detention sent a chill through Russia's already tightly controlled media landscape.

"Just put yourself in my place  they are telling you that you have committed a crime, but they are not telling you what crime exactly," he said in a statement published by the English-language Moscow Times.

"How will you defend yourself against this absurdity? ... This is a complete travesty of justice and common sense!"

Ivan Pavlov, formerly one of Safronov's lawyers, said after the arrest that investigators had accused Safronov of disclosing secrets about Russian arms deliveries to the Middle East and Africa in 2017, while he was working for the Kommersant newspaper. He cited investigators as saying the secrets had later been shared with the United States.

Pavlov himself came under criminal investigation after being accused of disclosing classified information while defending Safronov and fled Russia last September, saying he had been placed on a wanted list.

Safronov could be jailed for up to 20 years if found guilty.

"For a year and nine months I have been forced to say that I am guilty of high treason," he added in his statement. "But I repeat and will repeat  I am not guilty."

Russia has for years been clamping down on media that report critically on the government, yet after Safronov was arrested reporters from the Kremlin pool itself posted a video in which they spoke out in his defence.

Since sending troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24, Moscow has outlawed reporting on the conflict that departs from the official line, and forced the closure of the few significant independent media outlets still operating from Russian soil.

Two months before he was arrested, Safronov quit journalism and became an adviser to the head of Russia's space agency, Roscosmos.

(Writing by Kevin Liffey; Editing by Alex Richardson)
Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich and his $600 million yacht Solaris. Mark Thompson/Ali Balli/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Roman Abramovich's $600 million yacht left a Turkish port for a "scenic cruise," tracking data shows.

The yacht, Solaris, left Bodrum, southwest Turkey, on Monday after docking there for two weeks.

Solaris has avoided European countries that sanctioned Abramovich after Russia invaded Ukraine.

A $600 million superyacht owned by Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich set sail on a "scenic cruise" in the Mediterranean on Monday, tracking data shows.

The 460-foot Solaris departed the port of Bodrum in southwest Turkey on Monday morning, having been docked there for two weeks, according to the ship-tracking service Marine Traffic.

Solaris' destination was last reported by Marine Traffic as "scenic cruise." As of 5:21 a.m. ET on Monday, Solaris was heading north-east after rounding a headland on the Turkish coast.

Abramovich, the billionaire owner of Chelsea Football Club, was among the oligarchs sanctioned by the European Union on March 15, meaning his assets were frozen and he was banned from doing business in the bloc. The sanctions were imposed as part of Western efforts to punish Russia and President Vladimir Putin over the invasion of Ukraine.

Having been docked in Spain in early March, the Solaris has since been avoiding European countries that sanctioned Abramovich, of which Spain is one.

In late 2021, the Solaris was under repair in a shipyard in Barcelona. It set sail from there on March 8, 2022, some 12 days after Russia invaded Ukraine. The Solaris arrived in Tivat, Montenegro, on March 12  two days after Abramovich was sanctioned by the UK and three days before the EU sanctions were imposed on March 15.

Solaris left Tivat a day after it arrived and headed towards Turkey. The yacht arrived in Bodrum on March 21, per Marine Traffic data cited in an earlier report by Insider.

The Solaris can accommodate up to 96 guests and crew members and has a price tag of $600 million, according to SuperYacht Fan.

Governments in Europe have seized some vessels linked to rich Russians, including the UK detaining a $50 million yacht and Gibraltar's government impounding a $75 million vessel.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Satellite imagery released Sunday provided new information about a mass grave in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, which has become a global focus due to shocking images of civilian deaths.

The images from Maxar Technologies indicated the gravesite was located at the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in the suburb of the capital Kyiv.

The company said that the first signs of excavation occurred on March 10, about two weeks into the war, while images from March 31 showed an approximately 45-foot long trench near the church.

Maxar Technologies also cited social media footage showing dozens of dead civilians being buried in mass the grave.

Bucha was the site of five weeks of firefights between Russian and Ukrainian forces before Moscow withdrew troops from the town as part what it says is a shift away from Kyiv.

The gruesome images and reports coming out of Bucha has sparked calls for harsher action against Russia for alleged war crimes.

The Ukrainian city of Bucha was in the hands of [Russian] animals for several weeks. Local civilians were being executed arbitrarily, some with hands tied behind their backs, their bodies scattered in the streets of the city, Ukraines defense ministry said in a statement.

Other satellite imagery from earlier this month showed the vast damage that Ukrainian cities have endured as a result of the attacks.

Extensive damage is noted to the civilian infrastructure in and around the city, including residential homes, high-rise apartment buildings, grocery stores and shopping centers, Maxar said in a statement about the city of Mariupol, which has endured heavy damages amid the invasion.

The satellite imagery has also been used to show developments like troop tents and military vehicles as well as a Russian military convoy outside Kyiv earlier in the attacks.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
By Uditha Jayasinghe and Devjyot Ghoshal

COLOMBO (Reuters) - Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa dropped his brother as finance minister and sought a new central bank governor on Monday, as crowds angry over the country's deepening economic crisis surrounded the homes of several lawmakers.

The debt-laden country, run by Rajapaksa and members of his family since 2019, is struggling to pay for imports of fuel and other goods due to a scarcity of foreign exchange, leading to hours-long power cuts and a shortage of essentials.

Police used tear gas to disperse hundreds of protesters who gathered outside Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa's private residence in Tangalle, in southern Sri Lanka. Mahinda, the president's elder brother, was away at the time in Colombo, the country's commercial capital, where peaceful protests continued into the night.

"Protesters broke through two barricades that had been placed near the residence and police had to use tear gas to move the protesters away," police spokesperson Nihal Thalduwa said.

Crowds also gathered outside the homes of six lawmakers and the party office of a former state minister spread across the country, he said.

"Police continue to provide security to the houses of parliamentarians," Thalduwa said.

After many protesters demanded the total ouster of the Rajapaksas, the president's media office said in a statement that four new ministers had been appointed "to ensure parliament and other tasks can be conducted in a lawful manner until a full Cabinet can be sworn in."

The president's nephew resigned as sports minister in the government that was disbanded while the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) governor offered to quit. The CBSL delayed its monetary policy announcement scheduled for Tuesday.

Former CBSL official P. Nandalal Weerasinghe said on Monday that he had accepted an offer from Rajapaksa to become the central bank's next governor.

Story continues

"The president called me and made the offer, and I have accepted," Weerasinghe told Reuters.

The president's media office said Justice Minister Ali Sabry was named finance minister, replacing Basil Rajapaksa, the president's younger brother, who was due to visit Washington this month for talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on a loan programme.

Ministers of foreign affairs, education and highways will keep their positions.

"The president invites all political parties representing in the parliament to come together to accept ministerial portfolios in order to find solutions to this national crisis," the media office said.

Udaya Gammanpila, chief of one of the 11 political parties comprising the ruling coalition, called the new Cabinet "old wine in a new bottle".

"Our demand is for an all-party interim government to restore essential services and to hold a parliamentary election," Gammanpila, of the Pivithuru Hela Urumaya party, wrote on Twitter. "People should decide their next leaders, not anybody else."

Sajith Premadasa, leader of Sri Lanka's main opposition, rejected Rajapaksa's offer to form a unity government. "This is a crooked and corrupt government that has brought the people to their knees. The demand of the people is a government like this must go home immediately," he said in a video statement.

Graphic: Protests spread across Sri Lanka over economic crisis https://graphics.reuters.com/SRILANKA-CRISIS/lbpgnmzkbvq/graphic.jpg

'THIS GOVERNMENT IS OVER'

The developments come after the president declared a state of emergency on Friday, following street protests in the island nation of 22 million.

The power regulator said daily power cuts would be reduced to 6-1/2 hours for the rest of the week from about seven now, after the Energy Ministry pledged to release 26,000 tonnes of diesel and furnace oil to multiple power plants.

Charmara Nakandala, a protester, dismissed the Cabinet changes as meaningless.

"This cabinet change is to try and fool the people," Nakandala, a marketing executive, said at a protest in Colombo. "This government is over. Rajapaksas no longer can save this by playing musical chairs."

Sri Lanka, off India's southern tip, is also grappling with soaring inflation after the government steeply devalued its currency last month ahead of the IMF talks.

Sri Lanka's expenditure has exceeded its income under successive governments while its production of tradable goods and services has been inadequate. The twin deficits were badly exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic that crippled tourism, its economic mainstay.

(Reporting by Uditha Jayasinghe and Devjyot Ghoshal; Additional reporting by Waruna Karunatilake in Colombo and Karin Strohecker in London; Writing by Krishna N. Das; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan, David Holmes and Leslie Adler)
6 dead, at least 9 wounded in Sacramento shooting

Xinhua) 10:34, April 04, 2022

A road is closed near the site of a shooting in Sacramento, California, the United States, April 3, 2022. Six people were killed and at least nine others were wounded in a shooting in downtown Sacramento, the capital city of the U.S. state of California, local police said Sunday. (Photo by Li Jianguo/Xinhua)

SAN FRANCISCO, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Six people were killed and at least nine others were wounded in a shooting in downtown Sacramento, the capital city of the U.S. state of California, local police said Sunday.

"Officers located at least 15 shooting victims, including six who are deceased," a spokesperson for the Sacramento Police Department said in a statement.

The suspect opened fire outside a restaurant and fled the scene, the police said.

The incident occurred at 2 a.m. (0900 GMT) when police officers were called for an active shooter in the area of 10th Street and K Street in downtown Sacramento. They closed several streets after the shooting happened.

Witnesses said a man in a car fired with an automatic weapon at a crowd near El Santo restaurant. As many as 50 gunshots were heard, local media reported.

The identity of the suspect was not immediately known and police have not released any details about a possible motive.

Gun violence has been on the rise across the United States in the past few years, a trend fueled by a confluence of factors, from the economic and social disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic to the unrest during the 2020 elections, as well as a surge in gun sales.

More than 17,000 people have died or been injured due to gun violence in the country so far this year, during which America has seen at least 110 mass shootings, according to a database run by the nonprofit research group Gun Violence Archive.

Police officers investigate at the site of a shooting in Sacramento, California, the United States, April 3, 2022. Six people were killed and at least nine others were wounded in a shooting in downtown Sacramento, the capital city of the U.S. state of California, local police said Sunday. (Photo by Li Jianguo/Xinhua)

Photo taken on April 3, 2022 shows the site of a shooting in Sacramento, California, the United States. Six people were killed and at least nine others were wounded in a shooting in downtown Sacramento, the capital city of the U.S. state of California, local police said Sunday. (Photo by Li Jianguo/Xinhua)

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
Students and staff at Fenwick High School in Oak Park were cleared to return to their school building after being evacuated on Monday morning.

Peter Groom issued a message on the schools website earlier in the day stating that the Oak Park police had informed faculty about a bomb threat. Students and staff were evacuated shortly after.

Advertisement

Fenwick has implemented its crisis protocols and the building has been evacuated until a thorough investigation can occur, the message read. All students, faculty and staff are currently safe and away from the building, and there is no immediate threat to their well-being.

Oak Park police investigate a possible bomb threat at Fenwick Catholic High School in Oak Park on April 4, 2022. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)

Groom posted a second message to the schools website shortly after noon stating that the Oak Park police gave Fenwick the all clear.

Advertisement

Students are returning on foot from Ascension Church where they congregated during the search, Groom wrote. Students will return to the class from which they departed, where they will receive further instruction for the remaining schedule of the day.

tatturner@chicagotribune.com
A 43-year-old former state employee in Georgia accused of concocting an elaborate sham pregnancy that included a made-up father and pretend baby bump wont go to prison after she pleaded guilty to criminal charges.

Robin Folsom  who was indicted in February  pleaded guilty to charges of identity theft and making false statements on Monday, April 4, in Fulton County court. A judge sentenced her to five years of probation and 40 hours of community service as a result. She was also ordered to pay $12,307 in restitution.

Folsom is accused of lying about her pregnancies to receive 265 hours of paid leave under the Family Medical Leave Act, according to Georgias Office of the Attorney General.

Those who work for the taxpayers of Georgia are expected to uphold high ethical standards and to fulfill their roles in an honest and transparent manner, Attorney General Chris Carr said in a news release. State employees who break this trust in the course of their employment will be held accountable for their actions. Fraud and deception committed on state time and in association with ones job is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.

A defense attorney representing Folsom declined to comment in a statement to McClatchy News after the sentencing.

Folsom was the former director of external affairs at the Georgia Vocational Rehabilitation Agency, or GVRA, which helps residents with disabilities find work and live independently. Posts on the GVRA Facebook page show she was hired in a marketing role in February 2016 but it wasnt immediately clear when she became director of external affairs or how long she held the position.

The alleged fraud began in July 2020, when Folsom first claimed to have given birth. Three months later, investigators said, she told Human Resources that she was pregnant again.

Folsom said she gave birth a second time in May 2021, at which point the supposed father emailed her employers claiming she needed to take several weeks of rest following the delivery. According to the attorney generals office, Folsom created a fictitious identity for the alleged father.

Story continues

Officials said Folsom then received 265 hours of paid leave that she would not have otherwise been eligible to receive.

During the course of the investigation, the State Inspector Generals office said a coworker reported witnessing the lower portion of Folsoms stomach come away from her body a few months before she seemingly gave birth. Her colleagues also reportedly told investigators that the pictures she sent seemed to show babies with different skin tones.

Investigators found no record of any birth certificate in which Folsom was listed as the mother, and officials said her medical and insurance records also lacked evidence she ever gave birth.

A grand jury indicted Folsom on one count of identity theft and three counts of making false statements on Feb. 10. She pleaded guilty to all four charges.

Doctor lied about hypothermia for airlift off Alaska mountain, feds say. Hes banned now

Man duped victims into donating 2,000 cars for fake veteran charities, feds say

Fire chief charged city $22,000 for overtime he never worked, Louisiana police say

SC couple try to pass off baby as their own  then abandon her overseas, feds say
For millions of Americans who took out loans to pay for college, the past two years have offered a chance to live without the burden of their education debt.

The pause on federal student loan payments introduced and extended during the pandemic meant borrowers could redirect money - potentially hundreds of dollars a month - that would have gone toward repaying their debt to other needs.

Subscribe to The Post Most newsletter for the most important and interesting stories from The Washington Post.

"It almost feels like a raise," said Lisa Jackson, 56, who owes $175,000 for her son and daughter's college educations. "With the money I would have given towards the loans, I paid off a little outstanding tax debt, which I don't know I could have done otherwise."

The payment moratorium has touched the lives of many Americans, but it has perhaps meant the most to the group who stood the most to gain from it - Black women, like Jackson, who shoulder a disproportionate share of the $1.7 trillion student debt burden.

Women hold two-thirds of education debt, an analysis of federal data by American Association of University Women shows, but Black women have the highest average total at $41,466 for undergraduate and $75,085 for graduate school one year out from graduation. The study found that women overall borrowed an average of $31,276 - for undergrad and $51,035 for graduate studies.

"A lot of Black women are pursuing additional credentials, going back for graduate work and having to take on debt to do so," said Fenaba R. Addo, an associate professor of public policy at the University of North Carolina. "It's a contributing factor to their debt levels."

We talked to Black women about what the payment pause meant for them. Some purchased homes or opened savings accounts. Others invested for their retirement or caught up on other bills. There was an overwhelming appreciation for the reprieve and some dread as it is set to end in May (though the Biden administration has been urged to extend it again).

Story continues

- - -

Between her undergraduate studies at the University of Virginia and a graduate degree from the University of Maryland, Joy Omenyi, 27, has amassed $72,000 in student debt. Her education has helped her land a job as a product manager at Comcast, she said, but at a hefty cost.

Everything changed when the pandemic forced people to shelter in place. Omenyi decided to move in with her parents in Ellicott City, Md., when her job in North Carolina went remote and her lease was up. Sharing a house with mom and dad meant she could pocket the money that would have gone to rent, and couple the savings with the money that would have gone to repaying her student loans.

With the additional funds, Omenyi purchased a fixer-upper that she is renting out. The Maryland native also upped the contributions to her 401(k) retirement account, funded a Roth IRA, built up emergency savings and began investing in the stock market.

"I'm being bullish with the money because I want to get to a point where the things I've invested in can pay [my student loan] off," Omenyi said. "With the property, I know that when rent comes in it is just going to go directly to the Department of Education."

- - -

With an eye toward family, Lamesha Brown and her husband used some of the money they saved on their student loans to purchase a second home in Alabama for her sister-in-law to live in. When she recently moved out, the couple began accepting Section 8 vouchers.

Brown, whose family relied on public assistance growing up, said she hopes to give other families an opportunity to live in a safe, secure home, as she did as a child.

The pandemic struck a few months after Brown, 34, earned a PhD in college student affairs administration from the University of Georgia. Federal student loan borrowers typically have six months before they begin repaying their debt. But the pandemic payment freeze turned that grace period into a two-year stretch for Brown, who owes roughly $31,000.

During that time, Brown opened a Roth IRA to save for retirement. Having moved into a higher paying job in education technology in the last year, Brown is confident she and her husband can make an annual contribution of $6,000 to the retirement account - the maximum limit.

"If there is a possibility to retire early, we would love that," said Brown, who lives in St. Cloud, Minn. "And we really want to set something up for our parents to help them out financially. They don't have retirement accounts, so it's going to be on us and our siblings to take care of them."

There has been an increase in first-time homebuying among student loan borrowers during the payment moratorium, according to an Urban Institute analysis of credit bureau data. The Washington think tank, which conducts economic and social policy research, found student loan borrowers were more likely to become homeowners during the pandemic than people without education debt.

Still, a National Association of Realtors study found homeownership rates for Black Americans, at 43.4% in 2020, lagged other racial groups and was actually lower than the prior decade. Researchers attribute the gap, in part, to a decline in housing affordability and hefty student debt held by Black Americans making it difficult to save.

Wealth inequality - the lack of savings, investments or other financial assets - created the need for Black women to borrow, and borrowing can exacerbate economic disparities, said Addo at North Carolina.

"The racial wealth disparity grows across young adulthood, with Black borrowers - both men and women - paying down their debt slower [than other groups] or not at all after leaving college," Addo said.

The glacial pace of repayment is linked to glaring pay inequity, as Black women with a bachelor's degree earn 63 cents for every dollar earned by White men with the same credential. Those with advanced degrees have median weekly earnings less than White men with only a bachelor's degree.

Add to those challenges the propensity for providing financial support to extended family, and the economic promise of college credentials can wane for Black women.

"There's a harmful, false narrative out there that for too long has not included us, erased us," said Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., a Black woman who is championing debt cancellation as a racial justice issue. "Black women carry 20% more [student loan] debt, and that has to do with a lack of pay equity and discriminatory policies."

Efforts to address pay inequity have yielded mixed results. The Biden administration has taken steps to close gender and racial wealth gaps for new federal workers and employees of federal contractors, but Congress has failed to advance legislation that would broadly protect pay transparency.

The congresswoman from Massachusetts said she struggled with her own student loans and defaulted on the debt before recently paying them off. Pressley worked multiple jobs, she said, and still had a hard time getting ahead.

Army veteran Alphi Coleman, 38, can relate. The stress of working unfulfilling jobs to get ahead was wearing her down before the pandemic.

"All I was doing was working to pay my student debt," said Coleman, who owes nearly $90,000 from attending the University of Phoenix. "The pandemic allowed me to realign and reassess . . . take a pause, rest."

Coleman, who lives in Los Angeles, left her job in human resources early on in the pandemic. The decision put her in a precarious financial state, but she said she needed a reset. The federal loan pause covered half of Coleman's loans. She was able to defer payments on the remaining debt through an unemployment deferment.

The reprieve, Coleman said, also gave her a chance to explore something she has always wanted to do: develop a meditation and mindfulness program for neurodivergent people of color, like herself. She worries her student debt could hinder her from qualifying for a business loan down the road because of her debt-to-income ratio.

"I don't want to step back into the corporate nine-to-five and try to fit into that culture," Coleman said. "I would love to . . . create enough financial security to thrive."

- - -

The $152,000 in student debt that Crystal Elliott-O'Connor, 53, owes had made it nearly impossible to set aside any money. The suspension of payments changed that.

"It was a blessing for me to catch my breath and figure things out," said Elliott-O'Connor, a pastor in rural Illinois who acquired the bulk of her debt pursuing a master's in divinity at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary (now known as Northern Seminary).

Still, she is worried about what will happen when the freeze lifts. She is on an income-driven payment plan, and her salary has gone up in the past two years: "I'm fearful because I make more than I did before the pandemic so my bill is going to be even bigger than the $445 a month I used to pay."

Student loans have shaped much of Elliott-O'Connor's adult life. They gave her a chance at an education that her family could not afford. They kept her working as an educator with the promise of public service debt forgiveness when she was ready to strike out on her own. And they helped her family survive - covering food, housing and the care of her disabled mother - while she attended seminary.

Elliott-O'Connor suspects her debt will remain a part of her life for the foreseeable future. But for a brief moment, she got a chance to live without it.

- - - -

For Jackson, a single mother of two in Odenton, Md., the reprieve from her Parent Plus loan payments elicited a mix of emotions.

"I rejoiced," she said, "yet the debt is still looming in the background, like a monster that's being kept at bay for now."

Jackson, a statistician for the federal government, will be paying over $1,000 a month on her loans - the equivalent of rent in many American cities - when the payment suspension ends. Her children also took out loans themselves and received scholarships to pay for school, and her daughter attended a local public university. Without financial support from her ex-husband, Jackson said, the responsibility of her children's education fell to her.

In addition to helping Jackson clear away tax debt, the extra money from the pause made it easier to afford last-minute plane tickets to check on her elderly parents.

"I was able to do it at the drop of a hat, which felt like a luxury," Jackson said of the trip. "I look at my parents - they're in their eighties - and I'm trying to envision myself still having this loan payment at their age. I just can't fathom it, but that's probably my reality."

---

Video Embed Code

Video: Black women shoulder a disproportionate share of the $1.7 trillion student debt burden. The pandemic paused federal student loans for two years, giving many Black women a chance for financial relief and opportunity.(REF:fergusonam/The Washington Post)

Embed code:

Related Content

In Bucha, the scope of Russian barbarity is coming into focus

During Ramadan, fasting restaurant workers juggle food and faith

Alexis Martin, sex trafficking survivor and activist, is back in prison
On the evening of February 23, just a few hours before Vladimir Putin's army crossed into Ukrainian territory, a message from Amazon arrived in the inbox of Vladimir Smirnov, a programmer from St. Petersburg. It was a work permit for a software engineer position in Ireland. Smirnov had begun interviewing for the position at Amazon in January, when U.S. intelligence first stepped up its concerns about Putins plans for war in Ukraine.

The fact that war was truly coming became clear to Smirnov two days earlier during Putin's televised address to the nation, in which he recognized the independence of the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics, Ukrainian territories that have been under Russian control since 2014.

He gave his verdict to the nation and, indirectly, declared war, Smirnov said. My whole family watched that vicious speech and trembled.

It's one thing to know that war has been declared. It's quite another to wake up on February 24 to the news of bombings.

On the very same morning, Smirnov was in no doubt that he needed to leave Russia. Having dressed, he went to take a COVID-19 test so he could fly to neighboring Georgia as soon as possible, after which he would travel on to Ireland.

Nik Shevchenko, the 22-year-old chief executive of the startup WeLoveNoCode, also decided to leave Russia. Fearing that martial law would be introduced in Russia, forcing the borders shut, Shevchenko bought a plane ticket to Portugal, where he remains now. First they close the borders, Shevchenko said, and then they force you to kill. Im fit for military service, unfortunately, but I dont want to kill innocent people.

Natalia Chebotar, a former top manager at Yandex and one of the leading Russian specialists in edtech, left Russia with her family when Putin ordered the placement of all nuclear deterrence forces in a special regime, a veiled threat of nuclear posturing not seen since the Cold War. Yuri Malyugin, a former lead product designer at technology company SberAutoTech, bought a ticket to Georgia  where Russians can stay for up to a year without a visa  when, one by one, IT companies and services began leaving Russia.

Story continues

A user experience designer from Moscow who wishes to remain anonymous recounted how, a couple of days into the war, his work computer became a useless piece of plastic. The software stopped working, and his company could no longer receive payments from foreign colleagues or pay its employees in Europe after Russia was disconnected from SWIFT in early March.

The last straw was when we tried to transfer the salary to our employee in Ukraine, the designer said. At that moment, he was at home in Mariupol. The city was already under bombardment and a curfew had been imposed. The last message we received from him was: I have no money left. Im looking out the window and see mobile crematoria approaching my house. After that we heard nothing more from him.

According to estimates by the Russian Association for Electronic Communications, or RAEK, some 70,000 IT specialists fled Russia in February and March. RAEK experts predict that Russia may lose a further 100,000 specialists in April, who are currently held back by the need to tie up affairs in Moscow, as well as high ticket prices. (After the start of the war, more than 30 countries closed their airspace to Russian aircraft, while Boeing and Airbus stopped servicing Russian fleets and began recalling leased aircraft.) Behind the scenes, Google is already pulling its team out of Russia. The British startup Arrival relocated its Russian employees to other countries. The Miro platform, according to Kommersant, transferred its team from the Russian city of Perm to Amsterdam.

After February 24, charter flights began taking IT professionals out of Russia, said Anastasia Mirolyubova, co-founder of Immigram, an immigration platform for IT specialists and entrepreneurs.

But the second wave of emigration, anticipated in April, may not come to be. From the very beginning of the war, departing tech IT specialists have attracted the special attention of Russia's FSB  a government organization associated with contract killings and poisonings of Russians who oppose Putins regime.

Let's leave the motherlands secrets in the motherland

Once the war had started in Ukraine, interrogation of IT specialists crossing the Russian border became commonplace. One CGI artist from Moscow recalls how on February 28 he was detained by customs officers at passport control in Sheremetyevo Airport, where he was taken to a room and questioned by an FSB officer. He was asked about his opinion on the special military operation in Ukraine and whether he knew anything about hackers associated with Anonymous.

On March 8, before departing from an airport in Novosibirsk, a staff member in plain clothes questioned a manager from another IT company. He asked what languages I can write in, if I can hack into programs, if I know about white, gray or black hats. I said that Im not involved with hacking, to which he answered: Thats a pity.

IT people who have fled Russia do not want to waste their abilities on war and other crap that negatively affects humanity. IT is the internet, and the internet is freedom. Nik Shevchenko, WeLoveNoCode CEO

Following the news about interrogations on the border, a channel titled Russian Border Control appeared on Telegram  at the time of writing, it had more than 24,000 subscribers  to allow users to share their experiences. The channels administrator, who wishes to remain anonymous, said he posted more than 500 border crossing stories in the course of a month, most of which featured the IT industry in one way or another.

On March 8, more than a week after the war broke out, a programmer who flew from Moscow to Tbilisi noted that everyone is allowed through the border, but if guards hear the word IT, then people are taken away for questioning.

Another programmer recalled a scene at the airport in the southern Russian city of Mineralnye Vody on March 9: There were six of us flying out, but when two of us uttered the phrases software tester and online platform while talking with the border guards, they were immediately sent to some room. A system administrator flying from Russia to Bahrain on March 12 said that airport employees in plain clothes pressed him for the names of the services for which he works and also checked his phone, looking for protest, Ukraine, Putin, and war in his chat and browser history.

Another traveler, who asked not to be named, said that once the war had started in Ukraine, interrogation of tech workers crossing the Russian border became commonplace. One IT specialist said his devices were taken away from him, with the promise to return them upon arrival and the words: "Let's leave the motherlands secrets in the motherland.

The FSB has not commented on these inspections. A former employee of Russia's Ministry of Internal Affairs K Department  the ministry's unit dedicated to investigating cybercrime  said he knows nothing about it. According to him, such checks can only be explained if they concern public officials. The ongoing registration of IT specialists at the border looks like an orchestrated campaign that, like the war, may quickly escalate to something worse.

Nailya Aglickaya, a public relations manager from Moscow, said she left Russia on March 8, and after a two-hour interrogation, the border guard told her: So youre not an IT specialist? You should have said so. We only detain IT specialists.

A programmer from St. Petersburg, who relocated to the Armenian capital Yerevan in early March, recalled how a computer monitor with an open Excel sheet was slightly turned toward him during his interrogation, so he could see the border guard entering data. The table listed the names of all those interrogated, their phone numbers, addresses, and attitude towards the situation in Ukraine, he recalled. But in the column marked type of activity, they entered only one of two options: IT or not IT.

I don't care about being arrested

The rise of the IT sector in Russia is widely attributed to the presidency of Dmitry Medvedev, the "geek president" who took office in 2008. Medvedev traveled around the U.S., where he toured Silicon Valley, dined with then-U.S. President Barack Obama, and marveled at the possibilities of the recently debuted iPhone.

In 2010, Medvedev initiated the construction in Russia of something in between Californias IT mecca and Soviet science cities: the Skolkovo Innovation Center. One technocrat at the top was followed by more. Former Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich became the president of the Skolkovo Foundation. The head of the Federal Tax Service, Mikhail Mishustin, digitized the bureaucratic system under his control and soon became Russia's prime minister. The policy of Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin was aimed at making the capital a technological city, the example of Singapore providing a source of inspiration.

But since February 24  the day Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine  the rhetoric of the authorities has changed. Medvedev, who in 2009 declared that the most important thing in life is love, now no longer precludes the possibility that the death penalty may return to Russia. On March 18, Arkady Dvorkovich left his post as head of Skolkovo after giving an anti-war speech. Anatoly Chubais, the head of the Rosnanotech state corporation and Putin's climate envoy, became another emigre; journalists found him trying to withdraw money from an ATM in Istanbul. On the Moscow metro, people no longer have to wear masks, allowing the Sphere facial recognition system to identify the faces of citizens who attend anti-war protests. Under a recently enacted anti-"fake news law, Russians can face up to 15 years in prison.

Police officers block access to Red Square during a protest against Russia's invasion of Ukraine in central Moscow on March 2, 2022.

Police officers block access to Red Square during a protest against Russia's invasion of Ukraine in central Moscow on March 2, 2022. Russians can face up to 15 years in prison for protesting in violation of a new anti-fake news law. Image Credits: Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP via Getty Images.

After leaving Russia, WeLoveNoCode's Shevchenko announced that 10% of margin revenue in March would go to Ukrainian charities working with refugees and the wounded. Under the treason article of Russias Criminal Code, the startups actions could lead to a 20-year prison sentence.

But fuck it, Shevchenko said. I feel very sorry for the people who are dying. I don't care about being arrested."

According to a migration specialist who asked not to be named for fear of retribution from the Russian government, interrogations at the border are another way of intimidating citizens. Intellectuals are leaving Russia  people who have access to a great amount of information and critical thinking. 99.9% of them are IT professionals. What does this mean for the government? It views them as extremists and enemies of the state who need additional checks, she said. Besides, the situation in the country will be much easier to control once the brains are abroad. The migration specialist said they are certain that IT specialists who left Russia in February and March will return to the country in the coming months. Those who are unable to find international projects will return, as will those who lose hope.

But the old life they knew in a country abandoned by AMD, Adobe, Apple, General Electric, IBM, Intel, MasterCard, Visa and others no longer exists.

Russian IT people face a new reality, said a senior machine learning engineer who worked in Moscow remotely for an American company. The best way of describing it is as a digital gulag.

The internet is freedom

To keep specialists in Russia, Putin signed a decree on incentives for IT companies on March 8. Income tax will be reduced from 3% to zero and IT workers under the age of 27 will receive deferments from military service  a major incentive in a country where all men aged 18 to 27 are subject to Russia's obligatory military conscription, especially in a time of war.

Following this news, the leading online education platform in Russia, Skillbox, noted a sharp rise in interest in courses relating to programming. In other areas such as management, marketing and design, we did not see a similar increase, said Artem Kazakov, Skillbox's commercial director.

But concessions for IT are of no interest to those who have already left Russia.

IT can no longer exist in its usual form, said Yuri Malyugin, a lead product designer. Russia's attractiveness for corporate investment has been lost for a long time to come. We will not have access to familiar technologies. Software will not work. We are talking about a rollback to 10 to 15 years ago.

Read more on TechCrunch

Anastasia Mirolyubova also talked about an isolated and government-controlled IT cluster inside Russia. The examples of North Korea and Iran show that it is possible to create new technologies within closed countries, but they will not go beyond the countrys borders.

WeLoveNoCode CEO Shevchenko predicts a similar lunge backward in Russia's tech capabilities: "Theoretically, we could return for a while to ordering a taxi over the phone, rather than online," he said.

Shevchenko interviews Russian no-coders for jobs every day. And, according to him, the people who left Russia after February 24 display better skills than those who do not plan to leave the country. IT people who have fled Russia do not want to waste their abilities on war and other crap that negatively affects humanity. IT is the internet, and the internet is freedom.

According to the recruitment service HeadHunter, since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the government demand for IT specialists in wartime Russia has already increased by 100%. The shortage of specialists, according to former Yandex top manager Natalia Chebotar, will be easy to remedy.

I have been aware of the federal program for [the] digital economy for three months now, she said. A goal of this program is to have 1 million IT specialists in Russia. But the experts are leaving, so what needs to be done to prevent [key performance indicators] from decreasing? Stop IT specialists from leaving the country. I think this could happen in a few days or weeks. So far everything that I predicted has come true.

On March 24, Concord -- the company owned by businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin and the alleged owner of the troll factory in St. Petersburg that is believed to have interfered with the U.S. presidential election in 2016 -- published on the social network Vkontakte a version of a proposed bill to keep IT people in Russia. On the same day, Putin's press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, called Prigozhin's project a groundless rumor and explained that a ban on the exit of citizens would be a violation of constitutional rights. Curiously, the same Putin spokesman publicly stated on February 20 that Russia had no plans to invade Ukraine.

According to our president, those leaving Russia are people whose hearts already live in the West, concluded Vladimir Smirnov, the programmer from St. Petersburg who left for Ireland. But were just afraid of losing contact with the wider world.
Ted Baker has more than 500 shops and concessions around the world. Photo: PA

Ted Baker (TED.L) has launched a formal sale process after rejecting a series of unsolicited takeover bids.

The fashion retailer turned down two proposals from US private equity group Sycamore Partners, the latter of which valued the business at 254m.

The first proposals were rejected after they significantly undervalued Ted Baker, the company board said.

This Monday, it said Sycamore has come back with a third, higher bid, while it also received another unsolicited approach by an unnamed party.

Read more: European markets mixed as EU prepares fresh Russia sanctions

Given the level of interest, the fashion house has decided to invite offers, although a sale is not certain.

The sale process allows talks with interested bidders to take place on a confidential basis.

"The board has decided to conduct an orderly process to establish whether there is a bidder prepared to offer a value that the board considers attractive relative to the standalone prospects of Ted Baker as a listed company, it said in a statement.

Ted Baker added that interested parties will be invited to submit non-binding offers to its financial advisers, Evercore and Blackdown Partners.

It said a select number of these will move to a second phase.

Ted Baker share price jumped 14%. Chart: Yahoo Finance UK

Ted Baker added that it has not yet had discussions with Sycamore regarding whether the US investment firm will participate in the sale process.

The company was hammered by the pandemic, but it had also gone into COVID in a weak spot following years of decline.

Read more: Pizza Express staff win campaign for larger slice of tips

Most notably founder and chief executive Ray Kelvin stepped away from his position after accusations of inappropriate behaviour.

Kelvin, who denies the allegations, is still a shareholder in the business with an 11.48% stake.

Commenting on the bid interest Sophie Lund-Yates, equity analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "The structural decline in retail, coupled with Ted's exposure to occasionwear, which was one of the worst hit areas during lockdowns, have made for very challenging conditions.

Story continues

"The price that Ted Baker will accept from a buyer is clearly more ambitious than what the existing bids offer.

"Ted is keen to point out the potential growth for the brand, including around the benefits of a new leaner, more digital operation.

"There may well be a disconnect between Ted Baker's valuation of itself and the amount a third party is willing to spend on a much improved, but nevertheless struggling, bricks and mortar retailer."

Watch: Why your bank statements might say buy-now-pay-later without you realising
(Reuters) - Shelling in Ukraine's southern city of Mykolaiv has killed 10 people, including a child, and injured 46, the head of the regional administration said.

Oleksandr Senkevich said the toll included nine killed in shelling in the evening. "Over today, a total of 10 people have been killed during the shelling and 46 injured," Senkevich said in a video posted on social media.

Reuters was not immediately able to verify the report.

(Reporting by Ron Popeski; Editing by Lidia Kelly and Chris Reese)
Airlines canceled thousands of flights over the weekend, many due to severe weather in Florida, according to a flight tracking site.

FlightAware reported over 3,600 flights were canceled on Sunday, after more than 4,000 had been were canceled on Saturday  in addition to thousands of delays.

The severe thunderstorms in the southeast came as people flocked to the Sunshine State for spring break vacations and warm temperatures.

The weather-related delays and cancelations began on Saturday and continued into Sunday amid hard-to-predict thunderstorms that complicated air traffic control operations.

On Sunday, 35 percent of Spirit Airlines flights, or about 300 trips, were canceled nationwide, while 33 percent of JetBlue flights, accounting for over 360 flights, were canceled. Meanwhile, 400 Southwest Airlines flights, or 10 percent of their trips scheduled for the day, were canceled.

With 80 cancellations, Miami International Airport had more canceled flights than any other on Sunday. Another 76 flights were canceled out of Orlando International Airport amid severe storms in Florida over the weekend.

JetBlue, Southwest and American airlines all confirmed to the Associated Press on Sunday that weather in the southeast was a factor in their flight cancellations.

The Hill has reached out to the airlines for comment.

The cancellations come as surging fuel prices have driven airline ticket prices up, though demand for travel has been resilient and is only expected to increase as summer approaches.

Weve not seen a stronger demand  in my career, Delta Chief Executive Ed Bastian said earlier this month despite the rising costs of flying.

At that time, United and American Airlines had also reported more demand than ever before for flights.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
This was the moment of the show when I was supposed to be introducing the Foo Fighters, ceremony host Trevor Noah announced somberly during the third hour of the 64th annual Grammy Awards, held Sunday at Las Vegass MGM Grand Garden Arena. We would have been celebrating with them, as they won three Grammy Awards earlier today. But they are of course not here due to the tragic passing of their legendary drummer, Taylor Hawkins. Our thoughts go out to Taylor's family, his friends, the Foo Fighters family, and all the fans around the globe. We would like to take a moment now to remember Taylor and those in the music community we lost this past year.

The Foo Fighters arrive at the 58th Grammy Awards in 2016. (Photo: Reuters/Danny Moloshok)

The Foo Fighters had won three Grammys during Sunday's pre-show Premiere Ceremony  Best Rock Album for Medicine at Midnight, Best Rock Song for Waiting on a War, and Best Rock Performance for Making a Fire  making them officially the most-awarded American band in Grammy history, with 15 total wins. The Foo Fighters three Grammys were bittersweetly accepted by Premiere Ceremony presenter Jimmy Jam, who sent prayers to the band and their loved ones.

Sundays In Memoriam segment at the Grammy was preceded by a highlight reel of charming Hawkins moments, but that was not the only onstage tribute that evening. When Billie Eilish performed her hit Happier Than Ever, she wore a T-shirt emblazoned with Hawkinss photo.

Billie Eilish performs in a Taylor Hawkins T-shirt at the 64th Annual Grammy Awards. (Photo: Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)

The Foos had been scheduled to perform on the Grammys prime-time CBS telecast April 3, but then 50-year-old Hawkins shockingly died nine days earlier during the groups South American tour, just hours before they were set to perform at the Estereo Picnic Festival in Bogota, Colombia. The Foo Fighters subsequently canceled all upcoming performances, including their Grammys appearance, in light of the staggering loss of our brother. A cause of death has still not been revealed.

Story continues

Hawkins's final performance with the Foo Fighters was at Lollapalooza Argentina on March 20, five days before his passing. The bands scheduled performance at Bogotas Festival Estereo became a vigil instead, as candles were placed on the stage and Colombian fans gathered to mourn.

Read more from Yahoo Entertainment:

Follow Lyndsey on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Amazon
After a judge last week acquitted two of the four suspects on trial for killing a Columbus rapper over 16 pounds of marijuana, attorneys made closing arguments Monday in the case against the remaining two.

Featured prominently in those arguments was the trials key witness, Eric Spencer Jr., an accomplice in the case who testified against his former codefendants, after pleading guilty, then took the stand as a witness for the defense, claiming he lied about everything he said earlier.

We acknowledge to you that Eric Spencer is a liar. I dont think theres any doubt about that in this courtroom, Assistant District Attorney Peter Hoffman told jurors Monday.

But that doesnt mean everything Spencer said was untrue, Hoffman added: Even liars will tell the truth periodically, he said.

Other evidence corroborates what Spencer told police happened the night Branden Denson was gunned down outside a Buena Vista Road Pizza Hut as robbers took a suitcase full of marijuana from his Jeep Wrangler, Hoffman said, That evidence is sufficient to find Dover Bartlett Coppins and Tommie Jamal Mullins Jr. guilty of murder and armed robbery, he said.

Senior Judge David Emerson is presiding over the murder trial.

The jury will weigh only the case against Coppins and Mullins, because Senior Judge David Emerson dismissed charges Friday against defendants Tyree Jaquan Smith and Johnathon Lemorris Swift, finding insufficient evidence to sustain either case.

Defense attorneys were set to make their closing arguments Friday morning when they first asked Emerson to acquit their clients, basing their arguments on Spencers conflicting testimony.

Sneaky, scamming

Columbus attorney Shevon Thomas, who represents Coppins, slammed Spencer in his closing Monday, calling the witness a sneaky, scamming storyteller.

Spencer can be charming and deceptive, and thats how he persuaded police to believe his account of the robbery and shooting, Thomas said.

Defense attorney Shevon Thomas, who is representing Dover Bartlett Coppins, makes his closing argument Monday morning. 04/04/2022

Eric Spencer gave them a narrative and they built a case around it, Thomas said, later emphasizing, He has been lying from day one.

Story continues

Once charged with murder like his cohorts, Spencer pleaded guilty to lesser charges and agreed to testify truthfully against the other suspects. He testified March 24 and 25, giving a detailed account of each suspects role in the heist.

Spencer said Mullins arranged the rendezvous with Denson; Swift drove the rented Elantra they used; Smith took the marijuana from Densons Jeep; and Coppins fired the fatal shots as they drove away. He said his role was checking Denson for weapons as Coppins held Denson at gunpoint.

After the robbery, the suspects again met with Mullins, who divided the marijuana among them, keeping 10 to 12 pounds for himself, Spencer said.

While recanting that testimony Wednesday, Spencer said he lied about everything that I said that they did.

Defense attorney Stacey Jackson, who represents Mullins, told jurors in his closing that police never found any of the marijuana allegedly taken that night, so prosecutors cant prove his client committed murder in the course of a robbery.

Defense attorney Stacey Jackson, who is representing Tommie Jamal Mullins Jr., 28, makes his closing argument Monday morning. 04/04/2023

Both Jackson and Thomas argued the evidence shows Spencer shot Denson, just as police suspected in the beginning, before they re-evaluated the case.

The only suspects fingerprint found on Densons Jeep was Spencers, near a door handle on the rear drivers side, they said. Denson was shot through that open door, leaving bullet holes in the back seat, but none penetrating the exterior of the car, police said, so the evidence put Spencer in a position to shoot Denson.

Thomas noted also that Spencer and Denson had dealt marijuana together before, and Denson was not as familiar with the other suspects. Denson waited in the parking lot at the Pizza Hut for up to 20 minutes for the rendezvous, and did not flee when the Elantra pulled up, though he had pounds of marijuana with him, Thomas said.

That shows he recognized the car as one Spencer had been using, because Spencers girlfriend had rented it, Thomas added: Yall put it together, he told the jury.

Police found seven other fingerprints on Densons Jeep, but they didnt match any of the suspects or any prints in a law enforcement database, Thomas said. That means Spencer had accomplices who have not been arrested for any offense that would leave their prints on file, he said.

Convict Coppins and Mullins, and the real culprits fingerprints eventually will be filed, and prove Coppins and Mullins were innocent, Thomas said: These boys are on trial for their lives.

The other homicide

Jackson pointed out trial testimony revealed Spencer misled police about another Columbus homicide that happened just weeks after Denson was killed April 6, 2018.

That was the April 28, 2018, death of 74-year-old William Meadows, found shot behind his right ear while sitting in the drivers seat of his car, in his garage on Alta Vista Drive.

Police investigating that case decided Meadows was hit by a stray bullet fired from a passing car, a Hyundai Veloster that Spencers girlfriend also had rented. This led them to Spencer, who told them he was in the car with his girlfriend and Raphael Raymond.

Spencer claimed Raymond fired the 9-millimeter pistol out the car window to test it, because he was thinking of buying the gun, police said. Raymond was held for years on a murder charge, before he pleaded to a misdemeanor, leaving Spencer the only remaining suspect. He is charged with involuntary manslaughter in Meadows death.

Raymonds defense attorney said Spencer was the one buying the pistol, so he was the one testing it, and blamed Raymond to avoid responsibility.

The Meadows case further illustrates that Spencer lies to blame others for his crimes, Jackson told jurors.

Other evidence

Densons robbery and shooting were recorded by a security camera on a nearby grocery store, but the blurry video does not show the robbers faces. Police said it still corroborates what Spencer told them had happened.

Hoffman told the jury two witnesses corroborated Spencers testimony that Denson was robbed of a case full of marijuana: The victims mother, Marcia Denson, testified that she saw her son packing the suitcase with vacuum-sealed bags of the drug, and she recognized the smell.

Assistant District Attorney Peter Hoffman makes his closing argument Monday morning. 04/04/2023

The father, Billy Denson, was recorded in a police interview telling a detective that he also saw the marijuana, and that his son told him he was going to meet someone by the name KOK and TJ, both street names for Mullins. The father died in December 2020, but Judge Emerson allowed the recorded interview into evidence.

Hoffman noted also that the last text police found on Branden Densons phone came from a phone Mullins used, and it said OTW for on the way, showing Denson expected to meet Mullins at the Pizza Hut.

Cell phone data showed some of the suspects also were in contact with each other that night, supporting Spencers account of what happened.

Too much happened in this case for it to be mere coincidence, Hoffman told jurors, later reiterating: This was planned and orchestrated. It was not mere coincidence.

The security camera video proved the people who robbed Denson knew their roles in advance and executed their plan without hesitation, as the robbery and shooting took only 50 seconds, Hoffman said.

The videos clear enough to show one of the robbers took something from Densons Jeep, and the suitcase of marijuana his parents saw was not in the vehicle, proving thats what was stolen, the prosecutor said: It wasnt a bag of old clothes.

Acting District Attorney Sheneka Terry makes her closing argument in the murder trial.

The last to address the jury was Acting District Attorney Sheneka Terry, who said Spencer would have needed other witnesses to cooperate in a scheme to set up his former codefendants, had he lied about how Denson was robbed and shot.

Spencer pleaded guilty and testified for the prosecution because police had all the evidence against him that they needed, she said.

Eric Spencer knew that the evidence against him was overwhelming, so he took a deal, she said.

But prosecutors did not make that deal under the belief that Spencer killed Denson, she said: The state would not make a deal with who we believe to be the shooter.

Like Hoffman, she asked jurors to examine all the evidence, arguing the cell phone records and security camera video, along with statements from Densons parents, corroborate what Spencer first testified to in regard to the defendants on trial.
Officials have released the name of the shooter on Turner Turnpike.

On Saturday, Oklahoma Highway Patrol and SWAT teams shut down the Turner Turnpike after a pursuit with a dangerous suspect who has now been identified as Charles Carswell, an armed robbery suspect wanted by the police in Sedona, Arizona.

The incident started when OHP tried to stop Carswell who was wanted for armed robbery out of Sedona, Arizona.

OHP tried to stop the car at Interstate 40 and Council Road when Carswell took off at a high speed and got off on the Turner Turnpike.

Officials say Carswell started shooting back at pursuing troopers through the back glass of his own car.

Troopers got the car stopped around mile marker 140 on the turnpike but Carswell got out of the car and kept shooting, but was later killed.
Illinois plans to use $17 million in federal coronavirus relief money to fund Freedom Schools, a literacy and cultural enrichment program rooted in the civil rights movement of the 1960s, as part of an effort to close the achievement gap for struggling students.

Advertisement

The initiative, which will be funded with federal Coronavirus Urgent Remediation Emergency dollars, will supplement student learning taking place in the classroom with a research-based, multicultural curriculum offered during the summer or after-school hours, Illinois State Board of Education officials said.

The programs are being offered through the Childrens Defense Fund, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit. While the Springfield Urban League has partnered with the organization to offer Freedom Schools for more than 10 years, and has hosted several sites across Illinois, the ISBE initiative marks the first time the programs are being funded entirely by the state.

Advertisement

Freedom Schools have a profound impact on the communities they serve, and this funding will expand their reach, bringing the benefits of a research-backed education grounded in the civil rights movement to more Illinois learners this summer and next school year, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said in a statement.

ISBE is inviting schools and nonprofits to apply for funding to establish Freedom Schools through the Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant, with the goal of supporting low-income students by addressing the achievement gap and learning loss caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Advertisement

Low-income students last year experienced rates of chronic absenteeism 50% higher than the state average, ISBE officials said, while the number of students meeting or exceeding standards in math or English language arts also fell by twice as much as the state average.

ISBE officials said the program will provide historically disadvantaged students, including African American students and other students of color, with quality instruction that fosters student confidence, critical thinking, and social and emotional development.

State Superintendent of Education Carmen Ayala said as a Latina, I am intimately aware of the intrinsic value of an educational environment that honors and respects your ethnic heritage.

Im excited that these special programs will reach the children who have been hardest hit by the pandemic and provide a safe and empowering learning experience for them, Ayala said in a statement.

Senate Majority Leader Kimberly A. Lightford, one of the sponsors of the legislation behind the initiative, said Freedom Schools have a proud history and a profound significance for African Americans.

Advertisement

The state plans to issue 45 grant awards in the amount of $350,000 each, officials said.

The states Freedom Schools initiative will carry on a tradition that dates to the Mississippi Freedom Summer project of 1964, when civil rights leaders joined forces to create a summer enrichment program for children, said Kristal Moore Clemons, national director of the Childrens Defense Fund Freedom Schools.

They realized if they could crack the inequality in the Mississippi school system, they could bring the program to the rest of the South, keeping children engaged in learning, and building up the next generation of leaders and voters, said Clemons, a former Chicago resident whose first experience with Freedom Schools was during her junior year at DePaul University, when she was recruited as a servant leader intern for the program.

They were investing in me. ... I had a chance to meet Alice Walker, Marian Wright Edelman and all of these civil rights icons, Clemons said. It was truly transformative for me, and changed my life.

Clemons said students attending Freedom Schools begin their day with Harambee, an African tradition of bringing people together, followed by age-appropriate literacy activities with a strong emphasis on culturally relevant childrens literature.

For every 10 students, the program assigns one servant leader intern, who along with the site directors, receives specialized Freedom Schools training at the CDF Haley Farm in Clinton, Tennessee, the former home of the late author Alex Haley, author of Roots: The Sage of an American Family.

Advertisement

The students dont sit in rows, they all sit in a circle, and everyone realizes every voice matters, Clemons said.

Students have the option to take a basic reading assessment at the start and end of the program, which Clemons said last summer showed 80% of children increased or maintained their reading proficiency during the six-week program.

ISBE officials said they are aiming for students who opt into the pre- and post-assessments to have a 2.5% increase in proficiency in literacy and other objectives by the end of the program. Officials anticipate parent and community engagement rates will also be higher for student participants, as the program provides support for the entire family.

Childrens Defense Fund was founded in 1973 by Edelman, a graduate of Spelman College and Yale Law School, and the nonprofits president emerita. The groups Freedom Schools are not affiliated with the South Loop-based Chicago Freedom School, which builds on the freedom school model by seeking to enhance Chicago youths connection to their histories and serving as a catalyst for youth-led social change, according to the organizations website.

Advertisement

In 2021, Childrens Defense Funds Freedom Schools served more than 7,200 students at 152 sites in 26 states and 75 cities, including Cedar Rapids, Iowa, which welcomed 30 students last summer to its inaugural program at a local middle school.

The kids really enjoyed the program, and they made amazing progress, said Crystal Hall, director of community based and prevention services at Tanager Place, a nonprofit organization that is doubling the number of students participating in a Freedom Schools six-week summer program at McKinley Steam Academy.

The Freedom Schools program in Cedar Rapids began with a partnership between the local school district and Tanager Place, with the school district offering the middle school as a site, and providing breakfast and lunch to students in sixth through eighth grade, Hall said.

Its not just about reading a book, its about engaging with a book, and engage all of the students different learning styles, Hall said.

The program, which is offered to families free of charge, includes field trips and traditional summer camp activities such as swimming, hiking and archery.

Advertisement

ISBE officials said the Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant application is open to Illinois public schools, public universities, community colleges, and not-for-profit, community-based organizations.

Phillip Jackson, founder of the Black Star Project, speaks during a graduation ceremony in 2013. The Illinois State Board of Education is inviting schools and nonprofits to apply for funding to establish Freedom Schools through the Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant, with the goal of supporting low-income students by addressing the achievement gap and learning loss caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. (Anthony Souffle / Chicago Tribune)

The Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant is named after African American leader and educator Phillip Jackson, the founder of the Black Star Project, an organization that closes achievement gaps and supports economic empowerment for African American and Hispanic youth and families through community-based support programs like tutoring, mentoring, parent advocacy and development, and college preparation, officials said.

Gloria Smith, executive director of the Black Star Project, and the late Jacksons sister, said Friday her organization plans to apply for a Freedom Schools grant with hopes of expanding the Kimberly Lightford Saturday University program at Irving Middle School in Maywood.

We are excited, and also overwhelmed, as the program is named after Phillip, and will keep his legacy alive, Smith said.

Interested groups can find the application on the ISBE website or email asosina@isbe.net. Applications are due by 4:30 p.m. April 29.

Advertisement

kcullotta@chicagotribune.com
Former President Donald Trumps Truth Social may have lost its best chance at success. According to Reuters , two executives seen as critical to the platforms success, chief technology officer Josh Adams and chief product officer Billy Boozer, recently resigned from their positions. The departures reportedly came shortly after Truth Socials rocky launch on February 21st.

Since becoming available on iOS devices, the platform has seemingly struggled with technical glitches , including a lengthy waiting list that has prevented many from accessing the social media network. After an initial rush, it has also seen downloads drop precipitously. According to data mobile analytics firm Sensor Tower shared with Reuters, Truth Social has secured approximately 1.2 million downloads since launching, a number that puts it far behind not only mainstream platforms like Facebook and Twitter but right-leaning alternatives like Parler as well.

Sources close to the company told Reuters the departures could hurt the app as it tries to compete with Twitter and Facebook. If Josh has left all bets are off, one person told the outlet. Reuters notes it wasnt able to determine the circumstances surrounding the resignations of Adams and Boozer, nor if the two are still working on Truth Social in a different capacity. Its also unclear exactly what Trumps involvement with the venture is at this stage. So far, he has only posted once to the platform, writing Get Ready! Your favorite President will see you soon! on February 14th.
By Michelle Nichols

BUCHAREST (Reuters) -The United States will ask the U.N. General Assembly to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said on Monday, after Ukraine accused Russian troops of killing dozens of civilians in the town of Bucha.

A two-thirds majority vote by the 193-member assembly in New York can suspend a state for persistently committing gross and systematic violations of human rights.

"Russia's participation on the Human Rights Council is a farce," U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said on a visit to Romania.

"And it is wrong, which is why we believe it is time the UN General Assembly vote to remove them."

Ukraine said that it will use all "available UN mechanisms" to collect evidence on Russia's crimes in the country.

"No place for Russia on the UN Human Rights Council," Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.

Thomas-Greenfield said she wants to have the vote this week.

Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine began on Feb. 24, the Assembly has adopted two resolutions denouncing Russia with 140 votes in favour. Moscow says it is carrying out a "special operation" to demilitarise Ukraine.

"My message to those 140 countries who have courageously stood together is: the images out of Bucha and devastation across Ukraine require us to now match our words with action," Thomas-Greenfield told reporters on a visit to Romania.

In New York, a visibly irritated Vassily Nebenzia, Russia's ambassador to the United Nations, called the attempt to exclude Russia from the council as "unbelievable", adding that it was not going to be helpful for peace talks.

"This is again unprecedented and this will not facilitate or encourage or be helpful to what is happening between Russia and the Ukrainian peace talks," Nebenzia said at a press conference.

He repeated Russian denials of the accusations of atrocities in Bucha, saying the footage presented was "staged." He said Russia was going to present more evidence on the issue at Tuesday's planned U.N. Security Council meeting.

Story continues

Bucha's deputy mayor said around 50 bodies found after Russian forces withdrew were the victims of extra-judicial killings by Russian troops.

Reuters was not able to independently verify who was responsible for killing those Bucha residents.

Ukrainian authorities said they were investigating possible war crimes there. The Kremlin denied accusations related to the murder of civilians in the town.

Russia is in its second year of a three-year term on the 47-member council, which cannot make legally binding decisions but its decisions send important political messages and it can authorise investigations.

Last month it opened an investigation into allegations of rights violations, including possible war crimes, in Ukraine since Russia's invasion. Thirty-two members voted in favour of the resolution, brought by Ukraine. Russia and Eritrea voted against while 13, including China, abstained.

The United States has said war crimes have been committed in Ukraine and U.S. experts were gathering evidence to prove it.

The General Assembly has previously suspended a country from the council. In March 2011, it unanimously suspended Libya because of violence against protesters by forces loyal to then leader Muammar Gaddafi.

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols in Bucharest, additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Daphne Psaledakis in Washington, Emma Farge in Geneva and Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; editing by John Stonestreet and Grant McCool)
By Katanga Johnson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Gary Gensler, the head of the U.S. securities regulator, said on Monday the agency is weighing how it could extend investor protections afforded to users of exchanges and alternative trading platforms to crypto trading platforms.

The expanded Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) oversight would see the agency regulate platforms on which the trading of securities and non-securities is "intertwined" by requiring them to register with the SEC, Gensler said in a virtual speech to an audience at the University of Pennsylvania, his alma mater.

The agency will also collaborate with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission - its sister market regulator - to scrutinize platforms that trade both crypto-based security tokens and commodity tokens, said Gensler, adding that a potential "segregation" of token custody between trading platform assets and customers' assets would also be considered to help stave off theft.

"The crypto market is highly concentrated, with the bulk of trading taking place on only a handful of platforms...which play roles similar to those of traditional regulated exchanges. Thus, investors should be protected in the same way," Gensler said.

"Any token that is a security must play by the same market integrity rulebook as other securities under our laws."

Much of crypto trading is based in offshore jurisdictions and operates in a regulatory gray area because they do not have a centralised system of oversight, which allows such trading to bypass the traditional gatekeepers of finance such as banks and exchanges.

While some platforms, like decentralised finance - or DeFi - platforms, allow users to lend, borrow and save in digital assets without many requirements, they lack a central operator.

SEC Chair Gary Gensler, who has previously likened trading on these platforms as that of a "Wild West," said Monday's move is aimed to better protect retail investors using all crypto trading platforms.

(Reporting by Katanga Johnson in Washington; Editing by Andrea Ricci)
(Reuters) - Russian forces continue to consolidate and reorganise as they refocus their offensive into the Donbas region in the east of Ukraine, British military intelligence said on Monday.

Russian troops, including mercenaries from the Russian state-linked Wagner private military company, are being moved into the area, the Ministry of Defence tweeted https://twitter.com/DefenceHQ/status/1510844313017765888 in a regular bulletin.

Reuters could not immediately verify the report.

(Reporting by Baranjot Kaur in Bengaluru; Editing by Kim Coghill)
(Reuters) - Ukraine's defence ministry said on Monday Russia is preparing to launch a fresh assault in eastern Ukraine to try to take the city of Kharkiv and encircle Ukraine's heavily fortified eastern frontline.

Russia was attacking the towns of Rubizhne and Popasna in Luhansk region to lay the way for an assault on the regional capital of Severodonetsk and also massing forces to capture the besieged port of Mariupol, defence ministry spokesman Oleksandr Motuzyanyk said.

Reuters could not confirm the reports and Motuzyanyk did not provide any evidence to back up his account.

Severodonetsk and Mariupol lie at the northernmost and southernmost ends of Ukraine's several-hundred kilometre "line of contact", the ceasefire line that Ukrainian forces have held against Russian-backed separatist forces in Donbas since 2015.

Motuzyanyk said Russian units were moving out of Belarus and into Russia, and Moscow was readying fuel and ammunition stockpiles in areas bordering east Ukraine.

Russia was also preparing medical facilities for a potential influx of casualties among its troops, he said at a briefing.

(Reporting by Max Hunder; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
Nominee Wolfgang Van Halen brought girlfriend Andraia Allsop and his mom, actress Valerie Bertinelli, to the Grammy Awards. (Photo: ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images)

Actress Valerie Bertinelli hit the red carpet for Sunday's Grammy Awards on the arm of Wolfgang Van Halen, her son with late rocker Eddie Van Halen.

Wolfgang also brought his girlfriend, Andraia Allsop, along for his big night: His solo project, Mammoth WVH, was nominated for Best Rock Song for a track called "Distance," which he wrote about his late father, a founding member of rock band Van Halen. Although he didn't win, his mom was very proud.

"It is really emotional," the One Day at a Time alum told ET on the red carpet. "I mean, the song that Wolfie wrote is absolutely stunning, gorgeous and it's really beautiful that he was honored for it, and for songwriting. Because that is the first thing that really stuck out to me, was like, 'Wolf, you are a songwriter. That is the hardest part about being a musician.'"

The elder Van Halen died in October 2020, and both his son and former wife have been open about their grief. She wrote about it in her book Enough Already.

Meanwhile, Wolfgang's song includes lyrics such as, "I'm still cryin'" and "I don't think I'll ever move on." The video for it features his own vintage family photos.

When asked what his dad would have said about the nod, Wolfgang answered, "He would be losing his mind, but also, at the same time, he would be like, 'duh,' because that's how much he believed in me."

He noted that, after he's created more music, he'd like to collaborate with Dave Grohl.

And Grohl's band, the Foo Fighters, were actually the ones who took home the award for which he was nominated, for their song "Waiting on a War."

Wolfgang, 31, noted that Mammoth WVH is regularly paying tribute to Foo Fighters member Taylor Hawkins, who died March 25.

"It was absolutely terrible," he said. "I got to meet him once, and he was such a phenomenal dude. We are on tour right now. We are playing a Foo Fighters song in his honor every night, so, it's just like, the least I can do."
Acting Mayor Cavalier Johnson, left, and Bob Donovan on Tuesday, Feb. 15, 2022, in Milwaukee.

Milwaukee voters on Tuesday will elect their first new mayor in 18 years.

Acting Mayor Cavalier Johnson and former Ald. Bob Donovan will face off for the remaining two years of the term of former Mayor Tom Barrett, who resigned in December to become U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg.

The pair beat out five other candidates in the Feb. 15 primary. Johnson received 42% of the vote to Donovan's 22%, with Johnson winning all but three of the city's 15 aldermanic districts and Donovan seeing less support than the last time he ran for mayor six years ago.

Voters across Milwaukee County will also be deciding County Board seats, including contested races in six districts.

And in suburban Milwaukee, voters have contested races for mayor in Brookfield, Cudahy, Delafield, Oconomowoc and Waukesha along with a village president race in Mukwonago. Several school districts have hotly contested board elections, including in Cedarburg, Menomonee Falls, Mequon-Thiensville, Pewaukee and Waukesha.

West Allis-West Milwaukee School District voters are deciding a $150 million referendum question that would see two high schools closed and consolidated into a new high school. Nicolet Union High School District voters are deciding on $77.4 million in facilities upgrades.

More: What you should know about the spring election in Milwaukee, how to register to vote, Milwaukee's mayor race and more

More: County Republicans have poured thousands of dollars into the campaigns of three Waukesha School Board candidates

In the Milwaukee mayoral race, Johnson has been seen as the frontrunner in Tuesday's election, based on that citywide support he received in the primary and the strength of his fundraising compared with Donovan's. (Donovan has also criticized Johnson over the financial support he has received, including from a secretive group, Fair Future Action, that has spent at least $150,000 on TV ads backing Johnson's campaign.)

Still, only about 22% of registered voters cast ballots in the primary.

Story continues

Milwaukee Election Commission Executive Director Claire Woodall-Vogg said last week that she hoped a last-minute increase in early voters and absentee ballot drop-offs would signal higher voter turnout in this election than in February.

More than 28,000 absentee ballots cast

Figures from the city Election Commission Monday afternoon showed Milwaukee voters had returned 28,270 absentee ballots out of 35,340 issued.

Woodall-Vogg expected more would still come in Tuesday.

Of those, 8,600 were cast at the city's nine in-person absentee voting locations between March 22 and Saturday.

The city also offered staffed, drive-up drop boxes for Milwaukee voters on the last two Saturdays before Tuesday's election. The move came in response to the state Supreme Court's February ruling against the 24-hour, unstaffed drop boxes that residents had become accustomed to since the 2020 pandemic elections.

With the drop boxes unavailable on Tuesday, voters who still have their absentee ballots on election day can:

Vote in person at the polls and not vote their absentee ballots.

Drop absentee ballots off at the city's central count location, 1901 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. or

Drop absentee ballots off at City Hall (either Monday or Tuesday)

Absentee ballots cannot be dropped off at polling places in Milwaukee.

Because no drop box deliveries will be coming in, Woodall-Vogg said she expected the counting of absentee ballots to be done by 9 p.m. Tuesday.

Donovan has said if he were elected he would get rid of the city's drop boxes, a position with which Johnson disagrees.

Elisabeth Johnson, a ballot drop-off attendant, makes sure the addresses are the same while Norman and Lou Jane Gatford wait for the confirmation March 26 at Good Hope Library in Milwaukee. It was the final day of early voting in Milwaukee.

Candidates offer juxtaposition

The candidates have offered voters a juxtaposition of a 35-year-old Democratic north side alderman who has moved up quickly at City Hall since his first election win in 2016 and a 65-year-old conservative former council member who spent 20 years representing a south side district before retiring in 2020.

Both men have their roots in the city, but the life experiences they'd bring to the job are anything but similar.

Johnson, one of 10 kids in a family of step- and half-siblings, has highlighted the challenges he faced as a child growing up in poverty in Milwaukee and the opportunities that helped him reach the highest echelons of power here.

He was just four years into his tenure representing District 2 on the Common Council when he was elected council president in 2020 on a split vote that laid bare the divisions between his colleagues. Less than two years later, his role as council president automatically positioned him to become acting mayor when Barrett resigned.

If he wins Tuesday, Johnson will make history as the first Black elected mayor in Milwaukee. But he'd be breaking that barrier without the public backing of any of the other African Americans on the Common Council.

Donovan decided to come out of retirement because he didn't want to live with the regret of not running for the city's highest political position at the rare moment when there was no incumbent in office. He unsuccessfully ran against Barrett in 2016, becoming yet another challenger who was unable to unseat the former mayor.

Between 2000 and 2020, Donovan built a reputation as a conservative voice in a Democratic city as he served as alderman of the same area in which he grew up. The former chairman of the Public Safety and Health Committee has made public safety and his support of police a central tenet in his career and campaign.

It's an issue over which the pair have sought to undercut each other in the four-month campaign, as the city in 2022 has seen double the number of homicides compared with the same point in 2021  itself the second year in a row of record-breaking homicides.

Both have put forward plans to address public safety  though Johnson said recently he has not had time to fully implement his plan and Donovan has fielded criticism from his opponent over his offering of a 2016 proposal without updates.

But the candidates have also made their differences known on other issues over the course of eight forums and debates between Feb. 20 and March 31.

They sparred on the proposed breakup of Milwaukee Public Schools, cops in schools, inquiries into the 2020 presidential election and more.

Contact Alison Dirr at 414-224-2383 or adirr@jrn.com. Follow her on Twitter @AlisonDirr.

More: What you should know about Bob Donovan and Cavalier Johnson ahead of the Milwaukee mayor's race

Our subscribers make this reporting possible. Please consider supporting local journalism by subscribing to the Journal Sentinel at jsonline.com/deal.

DOWNLOAD THE APP: Get the latest news, sports and more

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Milwaukee voters head to the polls Tuesday to elect new mayor
Workers remove the Christopher Columbus statue from Chicago's Grant Park during the early morning hours of July 24, 2020. (Armando L. Sanchez / Chicago Tribune)

The Chicago Park District has filed a motion attempting to seal a lawsuit involving allegations that Mayor Lori Lightfoot berated a lawyer and used obscene language in a Zoom call over a Christopher Columbus statue  an unusual move that would keep the public in the dark about the case.

Former Park District attorney George Smyrniotis filed the lawsuit against the city last month alleging Lightfoot blocked a deal the district made with an Italian American group to allow a Columbus statue to be displayed in a parade. The suit also claims Lightfoot made obscene remarks aimed at government lawyers during a contentious meeting.

Advertisement

Lightfoot has broadly blasted the complaint as wholly lacking in merit and called his claims ridiculous.

The Park Districts motion to seal the case acknowledges a Zoom call occurred involving high-ranking city lawyers Celia Meza and John Hendricks, then-Park Board President Avis LaVelle and parks Chief Operating Officer Patrick Levar, as well as Smyrniotis, who was the Park Districts deputy general counsel, and then-general counsel Timothy King.

Advertisement

The Park District argues that the case should be sealed to protect its interests as it defends a separate lawsuit brought by an Italian Americans group over Lightfoots removal of a Columbus statue in Little Italy.

Sign up for The Spin to get the top stories in politics delivered to your inbox weekday afternoons.

It is rare for a whole case to be sealed from public view, experts said.

Mike Rathsack, a veteran appellate lawyer, said the significant public interest in a case involving taxpayer-funded entities is another hurdle the Park District would have to clear.

If I was the judge sitting on this case, the fact that it is a fight between public entities would give me even more pause before I put a blanket on the whole thing, Rathsack said.

Enrico Mirabelli, attorney for an Italian Americans group that is also suing the city, said the request to seal an entire court file is a drastic measure and does little to promote transparency in the litigation or the manner in which the Columbus statues were removed.

The (lawsuits) by Mr. Smyrniotis and the (Italian Americans) both seek the truth about the Mayors statements and her actions and any attempts to cloak one of the proceedings in secrecy does damage to the publics rights of access to the judicial system, Mirabelli said.

Mirabellis suit, filed against the Park District last July on behalf of the Joint Civic Committee of Italian Americans, asserts that the removal of a Columbus statue in Little Italy following unrest in the summer of 2020 violated a deal signed in 1973 to keep the monument on display.

Advertisement

Park District spokeswoman Michele Lemons in a statement said the district took the necessary steps to protect matters covered by the attorney-client privilege but she did not address questions about the publics interest in the case.

The Motion to Seal the court file is necessary in order for the Park District to protect its interest in the privilege, Lemons said.

The mayors office also released a statement following a Tribune inquiry about the Park District motion: As Mayor Lightfoot said weeks ago, she will have no further comment on this ongoing litigation. In general, parties routinely assert privilege protections, so nothing unusual there, and it would be misleading to assert otherwise.

Meanwhile, the statement continued, there are significant and complicated issues that need to be addressed which impact the lives of real people. So, the Mayor remains focused on the things that are actually important to the people of Chicago: keeping our communities safe, providing essential city services, and making an equitable recovery and not the palace intrigue of her text messages.

Parties will often fight in court over issues related to privilege but its unusual for a case to be sealed entirely.

Advertisement

A statue of Christopher Columbus is covered before the faith leaders and politicians participate in the Juneteenth faith led peaceful demonstration in Grant Park, June 19, 2020. (Zbigniew Bzdak / Chicago Tribune)

Lightfoot has said she ordered the removal of Columbus monuments after activists forcibly attempted to remove the prominent statue of Columbus in Grant Park, leading to violent clashes between police and protesters.

Nearly a week later, Lightfoot took down Columbus statues in Grant Park and Little Italy. Lightfoot later removed a lesser-known statue in the South Chicago neighborhood.

Arrigo Park, where a statue of Columbus once stood, Oct. 12, 2020. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)

In his lawsuit, Smyrniotis alleges he was told by King, then the Park Districts top lawyer, and then-Superintendent Michael Kelly that they wanted the lawsuit over the statues settled as soon as possible.

Smyrniotis alleges he then worked with lawyers for the Italian Americans to make a deal. As part of negotiations, the group wanted to display the Columbus statue in its annual Columbus parade last fall and proposed putting the statue last in the parade and covered until the end, according to Smyrniotis lawsuit.

King approved the request, according to the suit, because the Park District thought it would generate goodwill with the Italian Americans.

Park District lawyers and the Italian Americans group were also negotiating a deal to remove the statue from the city permanently.

Advertisement

When Lightfoot learned about the plan, Smyrniotis alleges in his lawsuit, she threatened to pull the permit for the parade and ordered Park District officials to attend a hastily called Zoom meeting.

At the meeting, Smyrniotis alleges, Lightfoot proceeded to berate and defame the lawyers and asked them, Where did you go to law school? Did you even go to law school? Do you even have a law license?

Lightfoot told them that they had to submit their pleadings to a city lawyer for approval and were told not to do a f------ thing with that statue without my approval.

Get that f------ statue back before noon tomorrow or I am going to have you fired, Lightfoot said, according to the complaint.

Lightfoot also made obscene comments to Smyrniotis and King, according to the lawsuit, which alleges she called them d---- and asked, What the f--- were you thinking?

You make some kind of secret agreement with Italians. ... You are out there stroking your d---- over the Columbus statue, I am trying to keep Chicago police officers from being shot and you are trying to get them shot, Lightfoot said, according to the complaint. My d--- is bigger than yours and the Italians, I have the biggest d--- in Chicago.

Advertisement

Smyrniotis asserts the alleged comments defamed him by imputing that he lacked the ability to perform his job duties. He resigned from the Park District in February, according to the lawsuit. King has also since left the Park District.

I am aware of the lawsuit that has been filed by a former Chicago Park District employee, Lightfoot said in a statement after the lawsuit was filed. While I will continue my practice of not commenting on the specific claims alleged in pending litigation, I feel compelled to state that the deeply offensive and ridiculous claims are wholly lacking in merit, and I welcome the opportunity to prove that fact in court. Furthermore, to be clear, I never have and never will harbor any animus toward Italians or Italian Americans.

Lightfoot is known for her often combative approach to politics and internal staff matters. Recently released public records also show Lightfoot has used graphic language to refer to attorneys doing their work. On Dec. 6, for instance, Lightfoot texted Ald. Gilbert Villegas to complain about Latino Caucus attorney Burt Odelson threatening a lawsuit over the ward map.

Odelson stroking himself in public and claiming he is ready to file suit is not helpful, Lightfoot texted Villegas, according to messages released to the Tribune in response to a public records request.

gpratt@chicagotribune.com
Ron Klain, the White House chief of staff, and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. Chip Somodevilla, Win McNamee/Getty Images

Ron Klain, the White House chief of staff, on Monday called out Sen. Ted Cruz.

Cruz had said the Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson would be "the most extreme" justice.

Klain said that "nothing" in Jackson's record "supports this assertion."

The White House chief of staff, Ron Klain, on Monday called out Republican Sen. Ted Cruz's comments about Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, President Joe Biden's Supreme Court nominee.

In response to a clip of Cruz claiming that Jackson would be "the furthest-left justice" in the Supreme Court's 233-year history, Klain tweeted, "Nothing in Judge Jackson's record, experience, or temperament supports this assertion."

Cruz, who's said he opposes Jackson's confirmation and grilled her during her confirmation hearings, made the statement as the Senate Judiciary Committee met to consider Jackson's nomination on Monday.

"There have been 115 men and women who have served on the Supreme Court. If Judge Jackson is confirmed, I believe she will prove to be the most extreme and the furthest-left justice ever to serve on the United States Supreme Court," Cruz said during the panel's hearing.

Since Biden announced Jackson as his nominee in late February, the White House has forcefully dismissed GOP criticisms of her and her record.

Cruz and several other Republican senators have alleged that Jackson is "soft on crime" because of her sentencing record on child-pornography cases while she served as a federal district judge. Republicans have seized on a handful of cases in which Jackson imposed shorter sentences than those recommended by the federal guidelines to claim that she's lenient toward offenders.

Legal experts, however, have widely described the accusations as baseless, saying they lack key context and data that shows Jackson's record mirrors that of most federal judges, and described the sentencing guidelines as outdated and overly severe.

Story continues

During the confirmation hearings, Cruz pressed Jackson for her views on culture-war issues including critical race theory. Jackson repeatedly emphasized that critical race theory plays no part in her jurisprudence.

A spokesperson for Cruz slammed Klain, telling Insider in a statement on Monday that the White House chief of staff "is firing out tweets to distract from the fact that he is overseeing an administration that is flailing both domestically and internationally."

"Judge Jackson has a disturbing record of being soft-on-crime, including handing down lenient sentences in child pornography cases below national averages," the spokesperson said. "Judge Jackson has also embraced Critical Race Theory in formulating sentencing policy and refused to define what a 'woman' was during her confirmation hearing."

Jackson defended her record at her confirmation hearings, saying she decides cases from a "neutral posture" and "without fear or favor."

She's received endorsements from top law-enforcement officials and organizations, which have rebuked the GOP accusations against her. Legal figures on the left and the right, including both Democratic- and Republican-appointed judges, have also supported Jackson's nomination.

J. Michael Luttig, a retired federal judge and high-profile conservative legal figure who has endorsed Jackson's nomination, also criticized Cruz's claims.

"I would not hesitate to retract my endorsement of Judge Jackson for the Supreme Court if there were anything at all to Senator Cruz's statement, but there is not," Luttig tweeted on Monday. "In fact, quite the opposite is the case."

Cruz is widely considered a potential 2024 White House contender, should Donald Trump not run. His criticism of Jackson during the confirmation hearings was seen in part as an appeal to likely voters in the next presidential race, Insider's Warren Rojas reported.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is set to vote on Jackson's nomination on Monday; the panel is expected to be tied 11-11. That would force Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to invoke special procedures to push Jackson's nomination forward. Her final confirmation vote before the full Senate is likely to take place later this week. If confirmed, Jackson would make history as the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.

Read the original article on Business Insider
(AP)

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Floridas so-called Dont Say Gay law reflects misinformed, hateful policies that do absolutely nothing to address the real issues as LGBT+ students and families

Parents across the country are looking to national, state and district leaders to support our nations students, to ensure that kids are treated equally in schools, and this is not a reflection of that, she said on 4 April.

Ms Psaki responded to a series of questions from Fox News correspondent Peter Doocy, who asked whether Joe Bidens administration believes it is fair that biological males are competing against women in university sports, and at what age does the White House think that students should be taught about sexual orientation or gender identity.

He also asked whether the White House supports classroom instruction of sexual orientation and gender identity before kindergarten; Floridas Parental Rights in Education law prohibits classroom instruction sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards in other grades.

Proponents of the measure, including Governor Ron DeSantis, have repeatedly claimed that the law only applies to younger students, despite its text. The bills own author admitted the law applies in all grades.

Do you have examples of schools in Florida that are teaching kindergarteners about sex education? she replied. I think thats a relevant question. I think this is a politically charged, harsh law putting parents and LGBT+ kids in a very difficult, heart-breaking circumstance.

She said the US Department of Education is well positioned and ready to evaluate what to do next, following statements from Secretary Miguel Cardona suggesting that Floridas law could violate federal civil rights law, including Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which protects against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Story continues

A group of Florida LGBT+ advocates, civil rights attorneys, students and families have sued the state, also alleging Title IX violations as well as violations of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

The US Department of Justice also issued a letter to all state attorneys general last week reminding them of federal constitutional and statutory provisions that protect transgender people from discrimination.

The Department of Justice is committed to ensuring that all children are able to live free from discrimination, abuse and harassment, Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke for the Justice Departments Civil Rights Division said in a statement.

The letter reaffirms state and local officials obligation to ensure that their laws and policies do not undermine or harm the health and safety of children, regardless of a childs gender identity, she said.

Last week, Ms Psaki criticised four bills signed into law in Arizona and Oklahoma targeting abortion rights and transgender athletes as extreme and harmful.

These laws are unacceptable and we wont stop fighting for justice and equality, she said on Twitter.

More follows...
CHICAGO  Shortly before 11 a.m. Sunday in the 6000 block of 159th Street, Oak Forest police responded to a motorist possibly needing assistance, according to a news release from the south suburban police department.

Police determined that the driver, Ketura Wilson, 21, of Calumet City, was armed, authorities said.

Officers attempted to take the woman to a hospital for a mental health evaluation, according to a news release from Illinois State Police, but she fled the scene.

Police followed Wilson and attempted to negotiate as she took out a gun, authorities said. Wilson then entered the Food4Less grocery store, where she exchanged gunfire with officers, police said.

Wilson and an officer were wounded and taken to area hospitals. The officer was stabilized and Wilson was pronounced dead, according to police.

The shooting was being investigated by the Illinois Public Integrity Task Force and the Oak Forest Police Department.

Residents initially were urged to stay away from the area of 159th Street and Central Avenue because of police activity, according to an Oak Forest police alert.

In an earlier post on Twitter, Oak Forest officials said the shooter was reported to be a woman who had been taken into custody. Although officials said there is no longer a threat to the public, residents were asked to stay away from the intersection where officials expected a prolonged heavy police presence.


CHICAGO -- When Daiana Torres, 26, saw that her playful 19-month-old daughter was not moving much, she sensed something was wrong. It had been two days since Torres had last seen her toddler, Vanessa Lopez, be energetic by doing things like climbing on tables and chairs.

Her baby had a fever and within hours, Torres, who is Latina, found herself sitting in an emergency room waiting on a prognosis.

Its hard for a mom taking a kid to the ER not knowing what theyre going to do, Torres said.

Seeking medical attention is a decision Torres would not have ordinarily made. She prefers to avoid doctors and hospitals, based on negative experiences. But not knowing whether her daughter had a virus or was simply teething scared her. It was one of the moments she felt like parenting, especially as a first-time mom, was difficult to navigate.

When Torres started to feel alone, she made a phone call to someone who had been by her side since her early stages of pregnancy.

That person was Kristy Brown, a registered nurse who works for a nonprofit organization called Nurse-Family Partnership.

The organization pairs expecting mothers with a nurse who would be a resource from pregnancy all the way through the childs second birthday.

Brown stayed on the phone with Torres for hours providing comfort and advice. It turned out Vanessa had an infection. Before sending the mother and daughter home, the doctor suggested Torres give her daughter Motrin twice a day and continue to monitor her fever.

Sometimes doctors dont go into deep explanation about whats going on, but Kristy took the time to explain to me what to do and what to look out for, Torres said. I feel like Kristy has been a great help and new moms should be able to have a nurse like I do.

Jordan Wildermuth, the senior government affairs manager for Nurse-Family Partnership, said such organizations are needed to support moms and families during a vulnerable time in their lives.

Nurse-Family Partnership serves 40 states, according to its website. The organization launched in Illinois in 2000.

Story continues

We really need to invest in programs like this one that would move the needle by helping pregnant women get the prenatal care they need, providing parenting support, postnatal care, and providing ongoing screening support during the critical stages of the babys development and prior to delivery, Wildermuth said.

Once a nurse is paired with an expecting mother, the two create a schedule that works for them to perform wellness checks. Some women prefer to have a weekly visit while others prefer once a month.

The organization says consistent check-ins help prevent maternal morbidity and mortality, particularly for women of color.

Every year in the United States, an average of 700 women die during pregnancy or in the year after, according to a 2020 report from the Centers for Disease Control or Prevention. The report also states that Black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related condition than white women.

The number of maternal deaths rose nationally during the pandemic from 754 in 2019 to 861 in 2020, according to the CDCs National Center for Health Statistics.

And in Illinois, an average of 75 women died while pregnant or within one year of pregnancy each year between 2008 and 2017, according to an April 2021 report from the Illinois Department of Public Health.

In Illinois, the Nurse-Family Partnership, which is specifically for first-time moms, serves 11 out of the 102 counties, according to Wildermuth. In those 11 counties, about 500 families are being supported by the organization.

We are really not even scratching the surface with the number of families that could benefit from the Nurse-Family Partnership services, Wildermuth said.

There are approximately 24,000 eligible families who can benefit from the Nurse-Family Partnership, according to Wildermuth.

And we base that number off Medicaid eligible births in Illinois, Wildermuth said. A first-time pregnancy can be a scary time not really knowing what to expect. So with families and parents that are facing economic inequity and other barriers, its especially important to make sure they have the support that they need.

When Torres learned she was pregnant in December 2019, her mother suggested she apply for WIC, a food assistance program for women, infants and children.

We talked to Kristy by accident because we were looking for the WIC number but we got where she works at instead, Torres said. I decided to stay with her because she gave more information than an OB would give.

Brown has been a registered nurse for 27 years and worked with the Nurse-Family Partnership organization for 16 years.

Brown had experience working with children in clinics and in an urban hospital pediatric unit.

She decided to pursue a bachelors degree in nursing and, shortly after obtaining it, Brown saw that Nurse-Family Partnership was being implemented by the Kane County Health Department.

The idea that Im offering services where I grew up is what made me say yeah, this is where I want to work, Brown said.

When Brown met Torres, she was excited that the expecting mom was open to learning more about Nurse-Family-Partnership even though it wasnt Torres intention to seek those services.

The two formed a quick bond, but it was when Torres was facing trials while seeking prenatal care that their relationship grew stronger.

Within the first month of learning she was pregnant, Torres knew which obstetrician she wanted services from, but had to seek another doctor because that doctor did not deliver in her area.

Torres was told to seek another obstetrician, but that was not a simple task. She met with four doctors in a two-month period before finding an obstetrician.

One doctor judged her for her weight, and another refused to see her because she did not confirm her pregnancy at that particular clinic. Torres was willing to seek different doctors until she felt like she found the right one for her. But doing so was a tedious process that she admits brought her to tears.

She was being bounced around and that was very stressful for her, Brown said. But that allowed us to build our relationship so she could learn how to better advocate for herself so she can receive the quality care she deserved.

Once she settled with a consistent doctor, Torres spoke with Brown on the phone and on FaceTime at least once a week for a wellness check. Usually, wellness checks would take place in-person but due to COVID-19, their check-ins had to be virtual.

Nonetheless, Torres grew more comfortable with Brown, who would listen to any concerns and offer a shoulder to cry on when overwhelmed.

In July 2020, Torres was full-term and was feeling ready to give birth to her daughter.

She was prepared for the labor experience but there were some curveballs that were out of her control, such as COVID, Brown said.

On the morning of July 23, Torres woke up at 3 a.m. in labor. She said everything was seamless until she got to the hospital.

When the soon-to-be mom arrived, she was given a COVID test and to her surprise, Torres tested positive.

When I was told I had COVID, I broke down in tears, Torres said. Because I had COVID, only the doctor and the nurse were allowed into the delivery room.

When Vanessa was born, the happy moment came to a halt. Torres started hemorrhaging and her newborn stopped breathing.

As more of the medical staff, mostly unfamiliar faces, entered the room, Torres found comfort in Brown who talked to her on FaceTime.

I was proud of how strong she was through all of those obstacles, Brown said. (Daiana) was prepared for the hospital experience but she also had to grapple with unexpected emotional elements.

Torres and Vanessa were able to leave the hospital two days after delivery. But the new mom had to take extra precautions until a COVID test came back negative.

Vanessas father, Miguel, and extended family members all tested negative so Torres watched others have a physical connection with her newborn daughter that she was not yet able to have.

It would be a week and a half before Id be able to give my daughter a kiss, Torres said.

The bond between Brown and Torres continued to grow.

In the beginning, she was quite shy, but now we talk all day nonstop with nice, open discussions, Brown said.

Its the kind of closeness she aims to maintain with the other 19 new and expecting moms she works with.

I tell all the moms I am honored to be part of their journey, Brown said. I love the fact that they can say for two and a half years we are going to have a partnership.

Even though the nurses are no longer obligated to do check-ins after two years, Brown said she does not completely cut ties.

If a family I used to work with is in the same neighborhood Im doing visits in, Ill stop by, Brown said. One day, I walked a child that I visited to school and he was a 7-year-old in first grade.

In four months, Torres daughter, Vanessa, will be turning two.

Lets say my child is 5 years old and I need help with something, I know Kristy would be there, Torres said.

Watching a woman gain confidence as she transitions into motherhood is what Brown said keeps her working with Nurse-Family Partnership.

This program and the moms I work with will always have a special place in my heart, Brown said. I hope when I visit them, they know how much they mean to me.

____
Five Florida cities, including Jacksonville, soon will see billboards criticizing the passage of the so-called Dont Say Gay bill.

The campaign was launched by New York City Mayor Eric Adams.

The purpose of the campaign is to tout Adams support of the LGBTQ+ community, according to a news release sent out Monday.

The bill, actually called the Parental Rights in Education bill, was signed into law last week by Fla. Gov. Ron DeSantis.

It prohibits classroom instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through third grade.

Parents rights have been increasingly under assault around the nation, but in Florida, we stand up for the rights of parents and the fundamental role they play in the education of their children, DeSantis said in a news release March 28. Parents have every right to be informed about services offered to their child at school, and should be protected from schools using classroom instruction to sexualize their kids as young as 5 years old.

Adams said, Floridas Dont Say Gay bill is the latest shameful, extremist culture war targeting the LGBTQ+ community. Today, we say to the families living in fear of this state-sponsored discrimination that you will always have a home in New York City.

New York City's mayor invites Floridians to move to New York if they don't like Florida's

New York City's mayor invites Floridians to move to New York if they don't like Florida's

New York City's mayor invites Floridians to move to New York if they don't like Florida's

New York City's mayor invites Floridians to move to New York if they don't like Florida's

New York City's mayor invites Floridians to move to New York if they don't like Florida's

Action News Jax contacted DeSantis office for a comment on the billboard campaign.

His press secretary, Christina Pushaw, sent the following statement:

Thousands of New Yorkers have moved to Florida since the pandemic began, and I doubt many will leave Florida because theyre so upset about the lack of classroom instruction on gender theory and sexuality for children in grades K-3.

Mayor Adams is doing Florida a favor. If anyone is so upset about our governor defending parental rights that they want to leave Florida for a crime-ridden socialist dystopia, our state will be better off without them. In fact, the mayor should pay for their flights to NYC!

If Mayor Adams feels that political grandstanding is the best way to spend city funds, instead of addressing the real problems the city is struggling with, the taxpayers of New York may have their own thoughts to share with him.

Story continues

The digital billboards can be seen in Jacksonville, Fort Lauderdale, Orlando, Tampa and West Palm Beach from April 4 through May 29.

STAY UPDATED: Download the Action News Jax app for live updates on breaking stories

Download WJAX Apps




Zara McDermott is the host of Love In The Flesh (BBC)

Love In The Flesh host Zara McDermott admits she is not the 'confident, outspoken' person she comes across as on screen and is always battling the 'inner her' who is 'quite an introvert'.

The former Love Island contestant, who appeared on the show's fourth series at the age of 21, said she's trying to 'change herself for the better' and be more confident and told Kate Thornton on White Wine Question Time she thought people might be surprised to hear what she is really like.

She is currently presenting BBC Three show Love In The Flesh, where couples in online relationships meet face-to-face for the first time.

"I'm not the biggest talker," she told Thornton. "So it's actually interesting when you see me in the work environment when I'm presenting, when I'm doing Love In The Flesh, I look like the most confident girl, and the most outspoken person who can just do anything.

"But actually, all of the time I'm battling with this inner actual me, who's actually not the loudest person, I'm not an extrovert, quite an introvert, and I am all of those things."

WATCH: Zara McDermott on overcoming reality TV stereotypes, educating young people, and renovating her first home

Her boyfriend, Made In Chelsea's Sam Thompson, often has to nudge her into speaking, and McDermott said she gets 'overwhelmed' in a group of people.

She said: "I love reality TV, I always have. But I never thought I was the kind of person who would be able to go on it because I'm not the loudest person in the room.

"I'm not the most outspoken person and maybe you'd be surprised at that about me. I'm not very good in big groups of people. I'm quite withdrawn and shy."

Listen to the full episode to hear Zara talk all things 'Love in the Flesh', her ambitions to tackle more hard-hitting subjects in her documentaries, and about her house renovations

Story continues

The 25-year-old told Thornton she is trying to 'change for the better', be more confident and be able to say no to things if she doesn't 'feel comfortable'.

She said her life on social media was not how she is all the time but was 'just a part of me that I'm trying to work on'. She also told Thornton she believed that people were starting to use TV and social media less as an escape or in terms of aesthetics, and more for 'relatable situations' and education.

Zara McDermott met the Duchess of Cornwall at a Clarence House event in January, 2022 (Getty)

McDermott has made two BBC documentaries, one on revenge porn and one on rape culture, and is currently working on a third about disordered eating.

Read more: Zara McDermott won't be 'kept in a box' after 'Love Island'

She said: "I believe that we're moving out of an age where people want to look at people's idyllic lives on social media and on the TV. People actually want to see genuine, real relatable situations.

"And rather than using TV as a means of escape, they're starting to use TV as a means to educate. I think people are becoming a lot more receptive to things like that.

Love Island contestant Zara McDermot in 2018 (PA Wire)

"It's so weird how social media as well changes, it was all about how you look and aesthetics and sometimes it still is.

"But I think people are becoming so much more open to using social media to learn and to understand things. And I think that's brilliant, because it means that there's so many more people open to listening."

WATCH: Zara McDermott on the challenges of renovating her first home with boyfriend Sam Thompson
Excavation is continuing at 262 Fifth Avenue, the site of a 1,043-foot residential supertall skyscraper in NoMad. Designed by Meganom with SLCE Architects as the executive architect and developed by Boris Kuzinez of Five Points Development under the Five Points 262 Project, LLC, the 60-story tower will yield 41 residential units spread across 139,168 square feet and 10,850 square feet of retail space on the first two floors. CM & Associates Construction Management, LLC is the general contractor for the property, which is located at the corner of Fifth Avenue and West 29th Street.

Workers and excavators are well below street level and it shouldnt be too long before we start to see the formation of the concrete foundations. Excavation should conclude toward the end of spring and the relatively small parcel could allow the superstructure to begin to climb above street level sometime in the latter half of 2022. From there will be a repetitive stack of floor plates with varying heights as crews build the typical mix of residential and mechanical levels.

The adjacent 12-story structure at 260 Fifth Avenue immediately south of the building footprint is reportedly part of the property, and could possibly house the retail space. The prewar edifice features a limestone exterior with a high level of ornamental detailing and stone craftsmanship. The windows on the northern face would be covered once 262 Fifth Avenue surpasses its height.

Renderings by DBOX of 262 Fifth Avenue were first released in late 2017 and demonstrate the visual impact of the supertall on the southern section of the Midtown skyline, as well as its use of triple-glazed glass curtain wall system on the northern and southern walls. One unique design feature are numerous porthole-shaped windows facing Fifth Avenue, surrounded by aluminum and glass. The opposite western side will concentrate the vertical core walls, mechanical systems, elevators, and egress staircases and would likely not have any windows.

Surrounding the upper habitable floors are two outdoor terraces, with the very top capped by a hollow rectangular box that partially encloses a private residential observation deck. This will provide prime views looking north at the Empire State Building and south toward the World Trade Center over Lower Manhattan. Residences will have the option of customizable open floor plans due to the lack of interior columns.

262 Fifth Avenue is slated for completion in summer 2023.

Subscribe to YIMBYs daily e-mail



Follow YIMBYgram for real-time photo updates

Like YIMBY on Facebook

Follow YIMBYs Twitter for the latest in YIMBYnews
After significant delays caused by the DOBs abrupt shift to Build Now which temporarily left the Five Boroughs without a functional Department of Buildings Website in March of 2021, YIMBYs 2022 construction report is in, and the results are positively encouraging. The annual report tracks and analyzes permits filed for new buildings in New York City over the course of the year 2021. The data shows that in 2021, builders throughout the city filed permits for 2,017 structures, ranging from single-car garages to towering skyscrapers. The figure represents a 14-percent increase compared to the 2020 total of 1,774 permits. The 2021 filings will boost the citys built stock by 53,344,472 million square feet and yield a combined total of 45,019 residential and hotel units. The full report is available with a subscription to YIMBYs Building Wire service.

Number of permit filings by borough

In 2021, the general breakdown of permit filings has remained very consistent with 2020 figures. Queens leads the pack with 783 permits, which account for over a third (37 percent) of the citys total. Brooklyn comes next with 556 permits, which make up just over a quarter (28 percent) of the total. Staten Island is next with 430 permits, making up just over one-fifth (21 percent) of the total and scoring slightly above the citys 403-filing borough average. The Bronx comes in fourth with 195 filings, representing ten percent of the total. Manhattan, which is defined by fewer yet generally larger projects, again came in last with 93 permit filings, which accounts for just under five percent of the citys total.

Compared to 2020, the number of permit filings has increased by 13 percent, from 1,772 to 2,017. Counts for The Bronx and Staten Island both dipped slightly, by 17 and one filings, respectively. Manhattans count has increased by seven filings since last year. Brooklyns figure rose by 58, a nearly 12-percent increase.

Queens emerged as the biggest winner both in terms of raw numbers and percentage increase, with a permit count growing by 191 filings, or 35 percent, since the previous year. This stratospheric growth may in part be attributed to the enormous latent development potential in the Worlds Borough, as compared to densely built-out Manhattan, Brooklyn, and The Bronx, and the sprawling yet transit-underserved Staten Island.

In the future, we hope to see Queens transit capacity boosted further by the proposed Interboro Line and LaGuardia Air Train, as well as possible restoration of passenger train service along the Lower Montauk and Rockaway Beach lines, which would allow for further large-scale development in the citys largest and second-most-populous borough.

Units by building size

Though New York Citys majestic skyline is recognized around the world, the city predominantly consists of low-rise residences and mid-sized apartment buildings, and the 2021 permit filings continue to reflect this fact. As anticipated, as buildings grow smaller in scale, the number of their filings increases nearly exponentially.

In all, the residential and hotel unit count in 2021 permit filings adds up to 45,019 units.

Please note that, due to changes in the way the Department of Buildings tallies data since around the start of 2021, the entries are no longer separated by program, hence the data above combines both residential and hotel unit counts. It should be noted, however, that residential units comprise the vast majority of the total unit count.

The chart may make it seem that the overwhelming majority of new residential and hotel stock will arrive in the form of single-family residences and small multi-unit buildings; in fact, the opposite is true. The two buildings with the highest unit counts (265 South Street with 1,803 units and 495 Eleventh Avenue with 1,041 units) comprise a paltry 0.01 percent of the total residential/hotel filings, yet their unit count accounts for more than 6 percent of the total 45,019 planned in 2021.

Likewise, 36,500 units, or more than four-fifths (81 percent) of the total, will be located in large apartment buildings and hotels with 50 and more units in each structure. If we extend the definition of a large apartment building or hotel to any structure with ten or more units, then the category will hold 42,118 units, or 94 percent of the new unit stock. Only 871, or just under two percent, of the total unit count will be built in single- and two-family houses throughout the city.

Number of residential and hotel units per borough

In 2021, permits were filed for a combined total of 45,019 residential and hotel units (the figure is bundled together due to the new way that the Department of Buildings tallies data). Of these, 16,515 units, or more than one-third (37 percent), were filed in Brooklyn, which will further boost the capacity of what is already the citys most populous borough. The overall borough share is comparable to 2020, when Brooklyn also accounted for one-third (35 percent) of the total. The boroughs largest filing is listed at 589 Fulton Street, which will house 592 residences in a 52-story skyscraper.

This time around, reversing last years placement, Manhattan comes in second, with 11,502 units, or just over a quarter (26 percent) of the citys total. Though the inclusion of hotel rooms within the category is definitely making an impact, the threefold jump in Manhattan filings from last years 3,862 is largely attributed to a surge in residential proposals. In particular, just two developments, namely 265 South Street (73 stories, 1,803 units) and 495 Eleventh Avenue (61 stories, 1,041 units), account for one-quarter of Manhattans total unit filings.

Queens comes in third with 9,433 units, or just over one-fifth (21 percent), of the citys total. The count adds 705 units to the previous years figure, although the increase is likely partially attributable to inclusion of hotel proposals in the count. The largest number of units (818) in the boroughs permit filings registers at 42-02 Orchard Street, which will also become the boroughs tallest at 800-plus feet and 69 stories.

The fourth place goes to The Bronx, the only borough to experience a significant unit count drop from the previous year, sliding from 8,298 down to 6,719 units. The units account for 15 percent of the citys total, a figure that is incidentally similar to the boroughs 17-percent share of citys total population. The largest permit filing by unit count in The Bronx is the 17-story, 602-unit structure planned at 320 West Fordham Road.

In last place comes Staten island, the least populous borough, with a total of 850 unit filings, or just under two percent of the citys total. And although the overwhelming majority of fillings is of the low-density variety, the unit bulk supplied by apartment buildings is evident. Although only 13 out of the 300-plus residential buildings proposed in the borough will hold more than two units, four of these buildings supply 39 percent of the total units filed for in the borough. One of these, the eight-story development planned at 560 Bay Street in Stapleton, accounts for nearly a quarter (24 percent) of the boroughs total.

Average unit count per filing per borough

In 2021, the average residential/hotel filing registered 28 units, five above the previous years average of 23, although the latter tallied residential filings only.

Going by previous years trends, as well as judging by the general urban fabric of the borough, we expected Manhattan to once again boast the highest number of units per average residential/hotel development. What came as a surprise, however, is the nearly three-fold increase of the unit count per average filing, which surged from 50 in 2020 to 148 in 2021. While inclusion of hotels, which tend to pack hundreds of rooms each, is likely a contributing factor for this increase, so is the addition of several extra-large residential developments.

Manhattan features two project filings with 1,000-plus units, two with 500 to 1,000 units, five with 400 to 500 units, and three with 300 to 400 units. The top entries are 265 South Street (1,803 units), 495 Eleventh Avenue (1,041 units), 259 Clinton Street (706 units), 1710 Broadway (670 units), 407 West 206th Street (470 units), 1637 First Avenue (459 units), 550 Tenth Avenue (453 units), and 201 West 54th Street and 711 Seventh Avenue (400 units each).

As was the case last year, The Bronx is the runner-up, with an average of 40 units per filing. However, although the borough was nearly tied with Manhattan last year, this time around the boroughs eight-point dip and Manhattans three-fold surge put a distance of over 108 units between the two boroughs averages.

The five permit filings with the highest unit counts in The Bronx may be found at 320 West Fordham Road (602 units), 138 Bruckner Boulevard (447 units), 40 Bruckner Boulevard (365 units), 586 Gerard Avenue (197 units), and 3250 Westchester Avenue (187 units).

Brooklyns 11-point surge since last year brings its average residential/hotel filing up to 35 units, catching up to The Bronx. The borough boasts one project filing with 500-plus units, five with 400 to 500 units, and ten with 300 to 400 units.

Brooklyns five permit filings with the highest unit counts are 589 Fulton Street (592 units), 477 Smith Street (496 units), 1 Java Street (477 units), 71 Prince Street (465 units), and 254 Euclid Avenue.

Queens, notable for its balanced spread between high- and low-density development, averages at 18 units per residential/hotel filing, dipping five points below last years average of 23 and ten points below the city average.

Queens registered three filings between 500 and 1,000 units: 42-02 Orchard Street (818 units), 61-10 Junction Boulevard (573 units), and 30-05 Queens Boulevard (518 units). One more, at 2-33 50th Avenue, ranked just below, at 499 units. Five registered between 300 and 400 units: 144-02 135th Avenue (369 units), 26-32 Jackson Avenue (363 units), 44-01 Northern Boulevard (354 units), 133-25 37th Avenue (352 units), and 41-34 27th Street (317 units). One more entry, at 143-16 135th Avenue, ranked just beneath the latter category, with 297 units.

Traditionally sprawling Staten Island registered only 13 filings with three or more residential or hotel units. The top-ranking filings are 560 Bay Street (201 units), 160 Richmond Terrace (77 units), 197 Canal Street (27 units), 1239 Forest Hill Road (24 units), and 430 St. Marks Place, 23 and 31 Cunard Avenue, and 1028 Van Duzer Street (eight units each).

Number of filings per floor count category

Compared to 2020, permit filings have shown marked increases in certain categories. While filings for single-story buildings and structures with four to 19 floors (which make up about half of the total filings) has remained very similar, buildings in the two-story category have received a 30-percent boost, increasing from 367 to 479, and a 19-percent boost in the three-story category, rising from 393 to 466.

Also notable, particularly for skyline watchers, are the gains among filings with 20 stories and above. Filings for high-rise buildings with 20 to 29, 30 to 39, and 40 to 49 stories increased by half again, growing from from 15 to 24, six to nine, and five to eight, respectively.

In a triumphant show of confidence in the citys vertical future, permits list nine filings that surpass the highest category from last year, with two filings with buildings ranging from 50 to 59 floors, four filings for buildings with 60 to 69 floors, and filings for two behemoths rising 70 to 79 floors.

The proposal with the most floors is the 79-story tower slated for 265 South Street in Two Bridges on the Lower East Side. The project will boast nearly 1.3 million square feet and offer 1,803 residential units, significantly boosting the citys still-scarce housing stock. Next on the list is the 70-story, 98-unit tower proposed at 520 Fifth Avenue, bringing a new supertall to Midtowns Grand Central Terminal area.

Next on the list are the 69-story 42-02 Orchard Street in Long Island City, which will become the tallest building in Queens, and the 69-story 100 West 37th Street, which will further transform the rapidly growing skyline of Midtown South.

Rounding off the 50-story plus list are 259 Clinton Street in Two Bridges (62 stories), 495 Eleventh Avenue in Hudson Yards (61 stories), 1710 Broadway in the Theater District (54 stories), and 589 Fulton Street in Downtown Brooklyn. The project proposed at 26-32 Jackson Avenue in Long Island City, Queens, almost made the cut at 49 stories.

Average number of floors per filing

In general, the floor count development pattern has persisted from last year, with Manhattan leading with high-rise numbers, The Bronx and Brooklyn sitting solidly in mid-rise territory, and Queens and Staten Island tending toward the low-rise.

The Bronx and Queens both dipped slightly, lowering from 5.8 to 5.2 and from 3.2 to 3.0 average floors per filing, respectively. Staten Island has maintained its 2.3-story average. Brooklyns average rose by half a floor, from 4.8 to 5.3. The biggest gain, in terms of both overall and relative numbers, has been observed in Manhattan, where a boost from 11.5 to 15.1 floors per average filing reflects an increase of 31 percent.

In Manhattan, the filing with the highest floor count is the 79-story tower proposed at 265 South Street in Two Bridges on the Lower East Side. One more building (520 Fifth Avenue) will rise 70 stories. Three will stand within the 60-story range (100 West 37th Street, 69 floors; 259 Clinton Street, 62 floors; and 495 Eleventh Avenue, 61 floors). The only other building in the 50-story-plus range will rise at 1710 Broadway, with 54 stories. In all, there were 45 filings for buildings with ten and more stories in Manhattan.

The Bronx tallies 13 filings with ten and more stories, with the highest floor counts observed at 3250 Westchester Avenue and 320 West Fordham Road, with 17 floors each.

By comparison, Brooklyn packs a much stronger skyline punch with eight 30-story-plus filings (589 Fulton Street, 52 floors; 570 Fulton Street, 45 floors; 356 Fulton Street, 46 floors; 105 River Street, 42 floors; 16 DuPont Street, 40 floors; 55 Willoughby Street, 38 floors; 15 Hanover Place, 34 floors; and 71 Prince Street, 33 floors). In all, Brooklyn tallies 43 ten-story-plus filings, nearly matching Manhattan. However, it also has a greater number of low-rise filings than The Bronx does, leading to a nearly identical average for the two boroughs.

The total number of ten-story-plus filings in Queens adds up to 25, nearly double the figure for The Bronx and just over half those of Brooklyn and Manhattan. However, the borough is about to welcome its new tallest building at 42-02 Orchard Street in Long Island City, where a 69-story tower will become the first skyscraper in the borough to rise over 800 feet. Four more buildings will stand above 30 stories, with three also sited in Long Island City (26-32 Jackson Avenue, 49 stories; 30-05 Queens Boulevard, 46 stories; and 23-08 42nd Road, 35 stories) and one in Rego Park (61-10 Junction Boulevard, 32 stories).

The tallest permit filing in Staten Island, which registers at eight stories, is located at 560 Bay Street. Two buildings are slated to rise seven stories and two more five stories, with the rest of the permits following the boroughs prevailing mid- and low-rise typology.

Floor area per filing

The year 2021 saw a total volume of project filings equaling 53.3 million square feet, an eight-percent drop from the previous years total of 57.6 million square feet. The size of the average filing has also shrunk from 32,514 square feet to 26,447 square feet, a 23-percent decrease. As before, the majority of the filings fall in the smaller area range, with 1,800 filings, or 89 percent of the total, spanning under 50,000 square feet, which also happens to match the percentage of filings within the same range from the previous year.

While the general distribution remains relatively similar between the two years, the numbers have decreased in the 1,000 to 3,000-square-foot and 1,000 to 100,000-square-foot categories, and increased in the categories spanning under 1,000 square feet, 3,000 to 5,000 square feet (which has become the largest category), and 100,000 to 500,000 square feet.

At the top end of the range, the filing count has remained relatively stable within the half-million to one-million-square-foot category, rising from 11 to 12. Curiously, the number of filings spanning over one million square feet has plummeted from eight to just one.

The top filings are relatively evenly spread between three of the citys northern boroughs. The five largest filings submitted in 2021 are 265 South Street (1,274,280 square feet) in Manhattan, 950 East 149th Street (986,360 square feet) in The Bronx, 61-10 Junction Boulevard (824,183 square feet) and 42-02 Orchard Street (796,245 square feet) in Queens, and 495 Eleventh Avenue (794,671 square feet) in Manhattan.

Total filing floor area by borough

In 2021, Brooklyns 20.5 million square feet accounted for 38 percent of the citys 53.3-million-square-foot total, which is by far the largest share of any borough. The figure nearly doubles the square footage of either Manhattan or Queens, which are nearly tied for second place at 11.9 million and 11.7 million square feet, respectively. The Bronx trails behind at 7.3 million square feet, yet the count still more than triples Staten Islands 2-million-square-foot total.

Compared to last year, the volume of square footage per borough has been shaken up completely. The total for The Bronx has dropped by more than half from 15.3 million square feet. Inversely, Brooklyns total nearly doubled its previous-year 11.8-million-square-foot total, as did Manhattan, which registered 6.7 million square feet of filings in 2020. Queens share has shrunk somewhat from its last years leading count of 15.7 million square feet. Relatively speaking, Staten Island has experienced the steepest drop, with a figure that now accounts to only one-quarter of its 2020 total.

The largest 2021 filings per borough are as follows: 265 South Street (1,274,280 square feet) in Manhattan, 950 East 149th Street (986,360 square feet) in The Bronx, 61-10 Junction Boulevard (824,183 square feet), 105 River Street (515,739 square feet) in Brooklyn, and 1 Nassau Place (332,009 square feet) in Staten Island. The latter development, proposed in Tottenville near the islands southern tip, is one of the boroughs two 100,000-square-foot-plus filings, with the other being 560 Bay Street (263,379 square feet) in Stapleton.

Average floor area per filing per borough

In 2021, the square footage per typical permit filing in New York City has averaged 26,447 square feet, roughly equivalent to a mid-sized apartment building. Since 2020, Manhattan has drastically increased its lead over the other boroughs in terms of the size of the average floor area per filing, surging from an already impressive 82,344 square feet to a massive 128,176 square feet. By contrast, the average filing size in The Bronx, which last year nearly tied Manhattan with an average of 72,401 square feet, has now shrunk by roughly half, down to 37,311 square feet.

Brooklyns average has increased considerably, by 56 percent, rising from the previous years 23,630 square feet to 36,883 square feet, nearly matching the total for The Bronx. The size of the average filing in Queens, which in the previous year outpaced Brooklyn with an average of 28,532 square feet, has dropped to fourth place after a 55-percent decrease down to an average of 15,681 percent. Staten Island, which in 2020 held the smallest average filing size in the city at 18,832 square feet, has since seen its average filing size shrink nearly four times down to 4,628 square feet.

Number of permit filings per month

In 2020, the number of permit filings per month remained generally constant, with an average of 148 and a slight dip around the summer. By contrast, the tally for 2021 showed sustained upward momentum in monthly filing count averages throughout the year, a curious yet highly encouraging trend further boosted by an increase in monthly averages by 20 points, rising up to 168.

In the first half of 2021, monthly figures hovered around around the 2020 averages. 2021s lowest count, observed in March at 103 filings, was lower than any seen in the previous year; the highest count in the first half of 2021, registered in May with 178 filings, nearly matched 2020s record 189 monthly filings, which also, coincidentally, also took place in May.

The steady growth over the course of 2021 meant that the second half of the year well exceeded anything observed in 2020, with each month in 2021 outpacing all but the highest-ranking figures from 2020, and the last three months of the year beating 2020s records altogether. The highest volume of permit filings was observed in December, where a count of 219 filings represents 16-percent growth compared to the highest tally from 2020.

In our 2020 report, which tracked one of New York Citys most difficult periods in recent memory, we expressed optimism in the citys stalwart endurance and forward progress. The 2021 report shows that such notions were not grounded in hollow boosterism, but rather in what turned out to be an accurate prognosis of the citys improving fortunes.

As the numbers show, hundreds more construction permits have been filed in 2021 than in the previous year, with thousands more residential and hotel units as compared to the previous year. Notably, there has also been an increase in the height and number of proposed skyscrapers, which are a physical manifestation of New York Citys unrelenting economic dynamo and persevering spirit of progress.

Subscribe to YIMBYs daily e-mail



Follow YIMBYgram for real-time photo updates

Like YIMBY on Facebook

Follow YIMBYs Twitter for the latest in YIMBYnews
China will locate and effectively supervise all sewers that empty into the sea and watercourses in its seven major river basins before the end of 2025, according to a recent guideline from the State Council, China's Cabinet.

By that time, violations regarding sewage draining into trunks of the seven rivers, including the Yangtze, Yellow, Pearl and Haihe, will be essentially rectified, the document said.

It said the same progress should be made in their major tributaries, key lakes in their basins and key bays.

A sound and effective supervision system will have been established for all drainage pipe outlets by then, supported by laws, regulations and advanced technologies, it said.

Qiu Qiwen, vice-minister of ecology and environment, said the ministry will classify all drainage pipe outlets and take different measures accordingly.

Those located in key protected areas, such as drinking water source areas and natural reserves, for example, will be removed, he said at a news conference organized by the State Council Information Office on Saturday.

Only one drainage pipe outlet will be left for each industrial park, he said. All wastewater in these parks will be collected for concentrated disposal before being discharged.

Factories outside industrial parks will have to apply to local environmental authorities if they want to have more than one sewage drain, he continued.

The ministry will also strive to address drainage pipe outlets that directly discharge household wastewater, he said.

In areas covered by urban sewage pipe networks, all household sewage will be diverted for concentrated disposal.

Qiu said the guideline was drafted based on experiences from pilot programs launched in 2019 in the Yangtze and Yellow rivers, the country's longest watercourses, as well as the Bohai Sea, the largest enclosed sea in China.

In the Yangtze, 60,292 outlets have been located, which is 30 times the previously registered number, he said. The number of outlets that empty into Bohai has been updated to 18,886, compared with less than 800 before.

As of the end of 2021, the sources of 80 percent of the outlets in the Yangtze and Bohai had been identified, he said. Over 8,000 violations related to sewage discharge have been addressed.

The work "has vigorously promoted the improvement of the water environment", he stressed.

The Yangtze saw water quality of Grade II, the second-best level in the country's five-tier quality system for surface water, in all sections of its trunk all through last year.

"This is a historic breakthrough," he said.
Iowa Republican U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley voted against confirming Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, Democratic President Joe Bidens nominee to fill an upcoming vacancy to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Grassley, the ranking Republican member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, took issue with some of Jackson's judicial decisions while calling her "very personable and engaging" in a statement issued Monday ahead of the committee's vote on her nomination.

"Having carefully studied her record, unfortunately, I think she and I have fundamentally different views on the role judges should play in our system of government," Grassley said, according to prepared remarks posted Monday morning ahead of the committee meeting. "Because of those disagreements, I can't support her nomination."

Grassley, in shared prepared remarks, said she was evasive under questioning and that he disagreed with Jackson's interpretation of provisions put into law by the First Step Act. The 2018 bipartisan criminal justice reform legislation, which Grassley sponsored, reformed sentencing laws and made a number of reforms aimed at reducing recidivism and improving conditions in federal prisons.

Under a "compassionate release" provision in the First Step Act, Jackson reduced the sentence of Keith Young, who was convicted in 2018 of drug and weapons trafficking charges, from a previously mandated 20 years to 12 years.

Grassley argues that part of the law wasn't retroactive.

"Judge Jackson misused a motion for compassionate release to re-sentence a dangerous drug kingpin," Grassley said of the legislation he sponsored.

The committee, which is made up of 11 Democrats and 11 Republicans, deadlocked on the confirmation vote. Under Senate rules, Democratic leadership can still move the vote forward to the full Senate. A procedural vote to dislodge the nomination from the committee is expected to happen Monday night, with a final vote likely to be Thursday or Friday.

Jackson needs a simple majority to be confirmed in the evenly divided U.S. Senate, where three GOP senators, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah say they plan to vote for Jackson. Moderate Democratic U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia has also indicated he will support Jackson's confirmation, providing four swing votes that all but guarantee her confirmation.

Previously, Grassley said Jackson was "very graceful, very smart in her answers," and said he was gratified that Jackson outlined a stricter judicial interpretation in answers to questions from Grassley.

He'd also praised Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., for "running a fair hearing." Though he did take issue with some documents not being provided to the committee, a sentiment he reiterated on Monday in his statement.

Grassley chaired the Judiciary Committee from chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee from 2015 to 2019, overseeing several confirmation hearings including the hearings of now-Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

"Throughout this process, Ive focused on thoroughly and fairly assessing Judge Jacksons record. I think Ive done that. We need confidence that judges will interpret the laws as they are written. Judge Jacksons re-interpretation of laws Ive helped write does not give me that confidence," Grassley wrote.
Sen. Chuck Grassley is a no vote on confirming Ketanji Brown Jackson as a Supreme Court justice.

Grassley, an Iowa Republican, announced his decision Monday morning at a meeting of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Having carefully studied her record, unfortunately, I think she and I have fundamentally different views on the role judges should play in our system of government. Because of those disagreements, I cant support her nomination, said Grassley, the ranking Republican on the committee.

Jackson appears to be on track in the 50-50 split Senate for confirmation as President Joe Bidens first Supreme Court appointment. One Republican, Maine Sen. Susan Collins, has announced she will vote for Jacksons confirmation.
Rep. Ras Smith, a Democrat from Waterloo who ran for governor before dropping out of the race, has joined the leadership team for Mike Frankens campaign for the U.S. Senate.

Smith will serve as political director, according to a news release from the Franken campaign.

Franken, a retired admiral from Sioux City, is one of three Democrats running for the partys nomination in Iowas U.S. Senate election this year.

The others are former U.S. Rep. Abby Finkenauer of Cedar Rapids and Minden physician Glenn Hurst.

In addition to his work over three terms in the Iowa Legislature, Smith aided President Joe Bidens 2020 campaign in Iowa and Bidens campaign leading up to the 2020 Iowa caucuses.

The Franken campaign also has added Ellen Goodmann Miller to its communications team. Miller, from Dubuque, worked on Smiths gubernatorial campaign. She also worked on Bidens 2020 presidential campaign in Iowa and his caucus campaign.

VETS ENDORSE FRANKEN: VoteVets, a progressive advocacy organization, endorsed Mike Franken in Iowas U.S. Senate race.

Franken, a U.S. Navy veteran from Sioux City, is one of three Democrats running for the partys nomination in Iowas U.S. Senate election this year.

The others are former U.S. Rep. Abby Finkenauer of Cedar Rapids and Minden physician Glenn Hurst.

These candidates have a wealth of knowledge and experience to keep our country and communities safe, but also have demonstrated a commitment to others above self, which is what we need more of in our public officials, Jon Soltz, an Iraq War veteran and chairman of VoteVets, said in a news release.

SENATE PRIMARY FORUM: Mike Franken and Glenn Hurst, two of the three Democrats running in Iowas U.S. Senate primary, are scheduled to participate in a candidate forum April 16 at Maquoketa Valley High School in Delhi.

The event is scheduled to run from 1 to 3 p.m.; doors open at 12:30 p.m. Face masks are recommended and appreciated, according to event organizers.

The event is being hosted by the Democratic parties in Delaware, Dubuque, Jackson and Jones counties.

UNION ENDORSES MATHIS: The Transport Workers Union of America, AFL-CIO, endorsed state Sen. Liz Mathis of Hiawatha, the Democratic candidate for Congress in Eastern Iowas new 2nd Congressional District.

The union represents more than 150,000 workers nationally, including mechanics, baggage handlers, disease control inspectors, bus operators, dispatchers, ramp agents, flight attendants and bike share workers.

BLACKBURN KEYNOTES: U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, a Tennessee Republican, will headline the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalitions 22nd Annual Spring Kick-Off on Saturday in Clive.

The event is scheduled to be held in the Horizon Event Center and will begin at 5:30 p.m.

Iowa Republican leaders also expected to speak include Iowa U.S. Sens. Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst, and Iowa U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks.
AURORA  I am a member of Nebraska law enforcement and will be voting for Charles W. Herbster for governor in the May 10 primary. I will be doing so because I know Herbster, as governor, will have my back and will provide me the resources that my colleagues and I will need to make and keep N
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.
Relations between Morocco and Spain are entering a new stage that is founded on renewed partnership, transparency, mutual respect and permanent consultation.

This new stage was officially sealed at the phone conversation between King Mohammed VI and the President of the Spanish government, Pedro Sanchez, last week.

The phone call confirmed, if need be, how the Sovereign has been closely following the diplomatic crisis with the Northern neighbor and how he set the stage for its resolution.

The Sovereigns decisive role was crowned by Spains new position on the Sahara issue when it announced in a letter addressed by the Head of the Spanish government to King Mohammed VI on March 14 that it considers the Moroccan Autonomy Initiative as the most serious, realistic and credible basis for resolving the dispute over the Sahara.

By expressing its position in such a clear way, Spain has adopted the most advanced stand at the European level, a stand of great significance given its historic role in the Sahara issue, a stand that translates Spains desire to contribute to resolving this issue that has lasted too long.

This historic development in Moroccan-Spanish relations takes place thanks to the leadership of the King, who works tirelessly so that the Kingdom keeps its standing as a great geostrategic country at the regional and international scales. Morocco is thus reaping the fruits of its thoughtful and assumed positions.

In a royal speech he delivered on August 20, 2021, King Mohammed VI explained that some people claim that Morocco is being attacked because it has changed its political and strategic direction, or because of the way it is handling some diplomatic issues. That is simply not the caseMorocco does not accept that its best interests be trampled on. At the same time, Morocco is keen to have strong, constructive and balanced relations, especially with its neighbors, the Sovereign said, pointing out that this same logic is governing our policy today regarding the relationship with our neighbor, Spain. It is a fact that these relations have recently come up against an unprecedented crisis, which shook mutual trust and raised many questions as to their future.

However, we have worked with the Spanish side in a composed, clear and responsible way. In addition to the traditional immutable values on which these relations are based, we are keen, today, to strengthen them, bearing in mind the need for a common understanding of the two nations interests, the King stated, noting that he had personally and directly followed the progress of the dialogue and discussions between the two countries.

The goal of these discussions was not merely to overcome this crisis, but to turn the situation into an opportunity to reconsider the foundations and determinants of these relations to usher in a new, unprecedented phase in the relations between the two countries, on the basis of trust, transparency, mutual respect and the fulfilment of obligations.

Actually, the message Pedro Sanchez sent to the King falls in line with the spirit of the Royal Speech of August 20, 2021 and the Kings call to build strong and constructive relations with neighboring countries, especially Spain.

Morocco and Spain are now clearly moving on to a new path, to build a new relationship based on permanent contact and mutual respect between two allies, two neighbors and two friends, and this will surely be confirmed during the visit the Head of the Spanish Government will pay shortly to Morocco at the invitation of King Mohammed VI.

Spains backing of Moroccos territorial integrity and its description of the autonomy initiative as the most serious, credible and realistic basis for finding a political solution to the Sahara dispute adds to similar positions by the US, Germany, France, and more recently Israel and shows that the autonomy proposal is gaining traction as the ultimate political solution of an artificial dispute and a relic of colonialism that has long lasted.

However, these new unambiguous geostrategic positions constitute a scathing setback for Algeria and its puppet, the Polisario which considered Spain as its comfort zone.
Guizhou province launched a free training session for tea farmers in Yanhe county before the spring picking season earlier last month to promote disease prevention techniques and help boost the local industry.

Tea experts and professors from Guizhou University held seminars to demonstrate the growth and disease prevention of tea trees, as well as tea farm management. Thirty-nine trainees, including tea farmers and personnel from tea enterprises, practiced on a tea farm in the county.

Huang Yaqin, an agronomist with the local agriculture bureau, said unlike previous indoor lectures delivered mainly by teachers, this training session moved the class onto the farmland. "With the teachers' guidance, trainees operated by themselves and obtained impressive learning results," she said.

Jin Linhong, a tea expert in the province and a professor at Guizhou University, said most farmers in the county had misunderstandings about growing tea.

"They managed a tea farm and controlled pests using their experience planting other crops, resulting in the misuse of pesticides and posing risks in the tea business," Jin said.

Jin and her team decided to organize a farmland school, with four training sessions, and teach local talent systematically to improve their problem-solving ability instead of helping them with single issues.

Guizhou is the first province in the country to comprehensively prohibit herbicides in tea, and it has forbidden the use of more than 128 pesticides, twice the number the nation requires, which ensures that the tea is clean and of good quality.

The training aims to explain why the tea industry should implement a high standard to achieve a sustainable goal, Jin said.

"Tea leaves and trees are not only what we focus on, but also the ecology of a tea farm including grass, flowers, soil, climate, pests and microorganisms," he said, adding that tea farm owners can make their own management plans after practicing on the farmland.

The field school is trainee-oriented, and the teachers mainly guided farmers and businessmen to conduct surveys, discuss problems and summarize methods.

"The agricultural talent nurtured from the farmland school will be the leading group of tea farm management. They will play an important role in developing the local tea industry, ensuring safety and quality, and creating tea brands," Jin said.

Jin and other experts replied to questions and gave suggestions on tea farm management through a WeChat group. A tea farmer sent a photo of a tree suffering from disease and asked for help in the group chat last month.

"After discussions with some experts, we believe wood rot is occurring in that tree," Jin said in the group chat.

"Proper soil condition is more important than good fertilizer, but we need time and patience to cultivate and protect proper soil," Jin suggested in the group chat the other day.

Tea farm operator Li Hongtao took part in the three-day training session and said he improved his ability to take care of a tea farm.

Li said they gained useful knowledge and experience during the practice on farmland. "Some previous lectures, which cost us a lot of time and money, were actually monotonous and had little effect."

Li started a tea business in 2012 and now has a 53-hectare base, making a profit of 1.6 million yuan ($251,000) last year.

"Many tea farm owners like me run a large base but lack standardized management, so we actively participate in the training session in search of experience," he said.

So far, three farmland school projects have been launched in three counties. Each school will include 12 classes and finish all curricula in four sessions. Jin said they plan to open more than 10 schools this year.












Members of the UN Security Council will convene this month for a briefing on the Sahara issue.

The Security Councils monthly forecast for April indicates that both the Special Representative for the Sahara and head of MINURSO, Russian Alexander Ivanko, and the UN Secretary-Generals Personal Envoy for the Sahara Staffan de Mistura will brief the Security Council.

This will be the first time for Staffan de Mistura to address the Security Council since his appointment last November as the UN Secretary Generals personal envoy for the Sahara, according to the monthly forecast.

Staffan de Mistura is expected to outline the conclusions of his first tour in the region, which took place last January and which led him to Morocco, Algeria, and Mauritania, as well as the outcome of his various meetings with international actors involved in the Sahara conflict, according to the United Nations Security Council.

The key issue for Council members to consider is how to bring all parties to the negotiating table, says a security council report, regarding the upcoming meeting.

Resolution 2602 of 29 October 2021 called on all parties to resume negotiations with a view to achieving a just, lasting, and mutually acceptable political solution.

While in Rabat last January, the veteran Italian diplomat held talks with Minister of Foreign Affairs Nasser Bourita and Moroccos permanent representative in the UN, Omar Hilale.

During the meeting, the Moroccan delegation reiterated Moroccos fundamentals in the Sahara dispute, recalling King Mohammed VIs speeches on the 45th and 46th anniversaries of the Green March.

In his 45th speech, the King of Morocco renewed Moroccos commitment to work together with the UN within the framework of the relevant Security Council resolutions so as to achieve a final solution based on the Autonomy Initiative.

The Moroccan King notably said, Morocco will not waiver in its position. Nor will it be affected, in any way, by the useless provocations and desperate scenes of the other parties, which attest to a headlong rush, now that their outdated claims have failed.

King Mohammed VI emphasized the same points during his speech for the 46th anniversary of the Green March, recalling Moroccos adherence to a compromise-based and realism-driven political settlement under the aegis of the UN.

The Security Council meeting will take place on the backdrop of the various diplomatic gains scored by Morocco lately, including Spains backing of Moroccos territorial integrity and its description of the autonomy initiative as the most serious, credible and realistic basis for finding a political solution to the Sahara dispute. This adds to similar positions by the US, Germany, France, and more recently Israel and shows that the autonomy proposal is gaining traction as the ultimate political solution of an artificial dispute and a relic of colonialism that has long lasted.
Palin gives Trump a key endorsement in 2016. Photo: Mary Altaffer/AP/Shutterstock/Mary Altaffer/AP/Shutterstock

The past few days have been a whirlwind for Sarah Palin. On Friday, she entered Alaskas special election to finish the U.S. House term of the late Don Young an hour before the deadline. Two days later, her effort to become more than a blast-from-the-past nostalgia item got a serious boost: an endorsement from Donald Trump. Heres the former presidents effusive statement, extending the usual Complete and Total Endorsement:

Wonderful patriot Sarah Palin of Alaska just announced that she is running for Congress, and that means there will be a true America First fighter on the ballot to replace the late and legendary Congressman Don Young. Sarah shocked many when she endorsed me very early in 2016, and we won big. Now, its my turn! Sarah has been a champion for Alaska values, Alaska energy, Alaska jobs, and the great people of Alaska. She was one of the most popular Governors because she stood up to corruption in both State Government and the Fake News Media. Sarah lifted the McCain presidential campaign out of the dumps despite the fact that she had to endure some very evil, stupid, and jealous people within the campaign itself. They were out to destroy her, but she didnt let that happen. Sarah Palin is tough and smart and will never back down, and I am proud to give her my Complete and Total Endorsement, and encourage all Republicans to unite behind this wonderful person and her campaign to put America First!

Note how quickly Trump focused on himself: Sarah shocked many when she endorsed me very early in 2016, and we won big. Now, its my turn!

If this really is payback for Palins pre-Iowa 2016 endorsement of Trump, he took his sweet time getting around to it. She was widely reported as expressing interest in joining Trumps Cabinet after his improbable election, and there was talk of her being considered for secretary of Veterans Affairs. But it came to nothing. One theory is that Sarah Barracuda angered Trump by publicly criticizing as crony capitalism a deal that he cut in December of 2016 with the Carrier Company to keep jobs from going to Mexico. In any event, she really began to fade from the limelight during the Trump administration, having already lost a high-profile, lucrative perch at Fox News.

Its possible Trump is rewarding Palin for a more recent favor: her willingness to promote his election fables. She was one of several Republicans who undermined the partys candidates in Georgias 2021 Senate elections; while campaigning for David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, Palin couldnt stop complaining about how Joe Bidens presidential win was rigged. She later defended Trumps conduct during the January 6 insurrection.

Whatever Trumps motivation, the endorsement raises his already significant stakes in Alaska politics this year. He has repeatedly denounced Republican senator Lisa Murkowski (who, among other sins, voted for his removal from office after his second impeachment) and endorsed her MAGA rival, Kelly Tshibaka. The new election system Alaska voters created in a 2020 ballot initiative, featuring a nonpartisan top-four primary followed by a general election with ranked-choice voting, has probably made Murkowski even harder to beat than before (and she already survived a conservative purge effort in 2010). This same system could given Palin a manageable path to a general election: If shes among the top four in the nonpartisan June 11 primary, she will move on to the special general election on August 16.

Still, winning the seat could be tough for Palin. Is the woman who resigned from her gubernatorial position barely two and a half years into her single term an appropriate successor to Young, who doggedly held his House seat and accumulated seniority for 49 years? And is a show horse like Palin ultimately what Alaskans  who are unusually dependent on the federal government and federal policies  want for their sole representative in the House? One of Palins first big flaps after John McCain made her his 2008 running mate was her repudiation of the so-called Bridge to Nowhere earmark that Young and Republican senator Ted Stevens secured for Alaska (she had supported the project earlier). Even if Alaskans agreed with Palin about that one earmark, its unlikely that they want an abstemious anti-Washington extremist carrying their flag in the distant capital, much less someone who, for a long while, was a global figure of ridicule. But Trumps support gives her a chance to join the MAGA caucus in the House, in which she would barely stand out at all.
LOUISVILLE, Ky., April 04, 2022--(BUSINESS WIRE)--BrightSpring Health Services is proud to announce that nine of its Direct Support Professionals (DSPs) have received 2022 DSP of the Year Awards from the American Network of Community Options and Resources (ANCOR). Each year, ANCOR honors a DSP from each state who has gone above and beyond to ensure the safety, well-being and inclusion in the community of the people they support. DSPs serve a critical role in communities nationwide, providing compassionate, quality, and around-the-clock care to individuals with disabilities.

This years recipients include the following BrightSpring DSPs:

"Direct Support Professionals are essential and, in my opinion, the most unsung caregivers in our health care system. They truly do the most with high-need and often medically-complex clients to directly keep them more safe in their homes  by addressing key activities of daily living and social determinants of health  and out of emergent, hospital and institutional settings. Our DSPs allow those living with disabilities to live a much better life in their community, and this recognition is extremely well-deserved," said BrightSpring CEO and President Jon Rousseau. "Our team members recognized exemplify the meaning of quality care, and we are thankful to have them with our organization. They make it possible for more people to live their best life."

The nine BrightSpring DSP honorees were selected out of hundreds of nominees and hundreds of thousands of such caregivers in the country. Nominees are evaluated by ANCOR based on their person-centered nature, leadership in thought and action, relationships built, and innovation in care and service delivery. From throwing BBQs and birthday parties, to ensuring medications are followed, to building life skills, or to driving clients to cancer treatment, this years DSP of the Year Award recipients have stepped up in big ways to support the individuals in their care, day in and day out.

Story continues

Award recipients will be recognized at the 2022 ANCOR Annual Conference this month.

To learn more about this years award recipients, please visit our website.

About BrightSpring Health Services

BrightSpring Health Services is a leading provider of complementary home and community-based pharmacy and health services for complex populations in need of chronic and/or specialized care. Through the companys pharmacy and provider services to seniors and specialty (including behavioral) populations, we provide comprehensive care and clinical services in 50 states to over 350,000 customers, clients and patients daily. The companys services foster greater patient and family satisfaction, improve outcomes and reduce health care system costs, and are supported by industry-leading quality outcomes. For more information, visit brightspringhealth.com. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005583/en/

Contacts

Leigh White

leigh.white@brightspringhealth.com

502.630.7412
Event Brings Together Key Industry Leaders and Healthcare Organizations to Confront Leading Patient Safety Issues

IRVINE, Calif., April 04, 2022--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The Patient Safety Movement Foundation (PSMF) will host the 8th annual World Patient Safety, Science and Technology Summit (WPSSTS) virtually April 29 and April 30, 2022. The event is co-convened by the American Society of Anesthesiologists, the European Society of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care, the International Society for Quality in Health Care and the World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiologists. Creating a powerful forum for industry leaders and healthcare organizations to confront leading patient safety issues with actionable ideas and innovations to transform the continuum of care, the event supports PSMFs mission to reach zero preventable patient harm and death across the world by 2030.

"The last two years have been taxing on the healthcare sector to say the least. The global pandemic placed relentless stress on health systems and medical personnel, which resulted in an increase in preventable medical errors," said Dr. Michael Ramsay, CEO of PSMF. "Our organization is eager to bring key stakeholders together to help develop solutions to dramatically improve patient safety and eliminate preventable patient harm and death."

The summit will include a fireside chat with patient safety luminaries, seven keynote addresses, as well as five panel sessions covering various topics in patient safety led by esteemed healthcare leaders. This years WPSSTS sessions focus on key issues impacting the healthcare industry, including:

Overcoming Obstacles for Applying High Reliability Principles in Healthcare

Embracing the Science of Human Factors to Unleash Safety Innovation in Healthcare

Patient Advocacy: The Compass for Innovation

How Regulation Can Support Quality and Value in Healthcare

Healthcare Safety During the Pandemic

Attendees will have the opportunity to network with top hospital executives, patients and family members who have been impacted by medical error, public policymakers and government officials, as well as leaders across the healthcare continuum. Keynote speakers include:

Story continues

Randall Clark, MD, FASA, president of the American Society of Anesthesiologists

Edoardo de Robertis, MD, PhD and president of the European Society of Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care (ESAIC)

Neelam Dhingra-Kumar, MD, unit head of the WHO Patient Safety Flagship

Carsten Engel, MD, CEO of the International Society for Quality in Health Care

Joe Kiani, founder & immediate past chairman of the Patient Safety Movement Foundation, as well as founder, chairman & CEO of Masimo

Peter Pronovost, MD, PhD, chief clinical transformation officer at University Hospitals

Thomas Zeltner MD, chairman of the WHO Foundation, Geneva (Switzerland) and deputy chair of the University Council of the Medical University of Vienna (Austria)

The summit is open to anyone interested in actively planning solutions around the leading patient safety challenges that cause preventable patient deaths in hospitals and healthcare organizations worldwide. Discounted registration is offered for students, patients and family members. To register for the 2022 WPSSTS or to learn more about the event, visit: https://patient.sm/WPSSTS.

About the Patient Safety Movement Foundation: The Patient Safety Movement Foundation (PSMF), a global non-profit organization founded in 2012, is celebrating 10 years of bringing awareness and creating action to eliminate preventable medical errors. Some estimates predict that one in 12 patients are impacted by a preventable medical error, but that number could be even higher as there is no central database tracking these figures in most countries, including the U.S. Over the last decade, there had been major strides to improve patient safety, but the COVID-19 pandemic stressed the system and it proved not to be resilient and took a step backwards. PSMF has a vision to eliminate preventable patient harm and death across the globe by 2030  and that starts with raising awareness of this critical issue. It unites patients, advocates, health workers, medical technology companies, government, employers and private payers in support of this cause. From its evidence-based best practice solutions (Actionable Patient Safety Solutions) and industry Open Data Pledge to its World Patient Safety, Science & Technology Summit and more, PSMF wont stop fighting until it achieves zero. For more information, please visit patientsafetymovement.org, and follow PSMF on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005206/en/

Contacts

Leslie Licano, Beyond Fifteen Communications, Inc.

psmf@beyondfifteen.com | (949) 733-8679 ext.101
The Opelika Police Department and Lee County SWAT Team recovered a large amount of narcotics, firearms and gambling devices on Saturday while executing a search warrant on a residence on Morgan Avenue, off South Long Street, according to a press release from the OPD.

Ten people were arrested on the scene.

Montavious Antwon Bulger, 35, of Opelika, was charged with trafficking in methamphetamine, trafficking in cocaine, trafficking in marijuana, certain persons forbidden to possess a firearm and possession of drug paraphernalia.

The following were arrested and charged with possession with intent to distribute (cocaine) and possession of drug paraphernalia: LeQuinton Obryan Alghanee, 34, from Auburn; Luevenia Ponepa Hughley, 41, from Opelika; and Steve Simpson, 33, from Opelika. Lacey Tati Lewis, 38, from Opelika, was charged with possession of marijuana second degree and simple gambling.

The following were charged with simple gambling: Quenteze Dernard Barnes, 46, from Salem; Shaneka Terell Butler, 41, from Opelika; Norris Ansley Morgan, 55, from Opelika; Olivia Denise Preston, 20, from Opelika; and Jawaskia Nigee Summers, 31, from Opelika.

In addition to the Lee County SWAT Team, the OPD credited the Aviation Unit of the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency and the Lee County District Attorneys Office for helping to safely execute these warrants.

The case is still under investigation and additional charges may be pending, according to the release from OPD. If you have any information about this case, please contact the Vice & Narcotics Unit at 334-705-5220, or the Secret Witness hotline at 334-745-8665.

Tips can also be submitted through the Opelika Police Mobile App, and the OPD said that anyone who wishes to remain anonymous may do so.
Decrease Font Size Font Size Increase Font Size

Notice body

Wednesday, April 6, will be the third of the Alabama Prison Arts + Education Project's, or APAEP, 2022 Community Conversation series. This talk will be moderated by Adelle Sefton-Rowston, current Fulbright Scholar with the Alabama Prison Arts + Education Project.

Join us to learn more about the social context of justice impact in the Northern Territory in Australia and how prison arts can potentially offer a design for a new world. Hear about her innovative teaching methods using themes of graffiti and street art to build worlds of color, text and paint to disrupt and positively transform material worlds inside and outside the prison.

Adelle Sefton-Rowston is a Fulbright scholar from Australia. She lectures in literary studies at Charles Darwin University and teaches arts education in Darwin Correctional Centre. Adelle is a critic, poet and award-winning essayist, and her debut book, Polities and Poetics: race relations and reconciliation in Australian Literature is published by Peter Lang (2021).

Color, Text, and Paint: Building a World that is Full-and-Bright

Build the World You Want to See: A Community Conversation of the Alabama Prison Arts + Education Project at Auburn University

Wednesday, April 6, 2022

12-1 p.m.

Click here to join.
Decrease Font Size Font Size Increase Font Size

Article body

Auburn University is establishing a more permanent presence in the nations capital with the creation of a new Office of Federal Relations in Washington, D.C., being headed by an Auburn alumnus with many years of federal government experience.

Andrew Newton, who most recently served as the staff director of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government, was recently named the director of federal relations for Auburns newly created office. He began in the role on April 1.

Newton earned a bachelors of science degree in accounting from Auburn in 2007 and a masters degree in higher education administration, also from Auburn, in 2008. Following graduation, he began a career in Washington, D.C., serving in the Alabama congressional delegation and then assuming senior staff positions on the Senate Appropriations Committee and at the United States Treasury Department. Newton said he is excited to serve Auburn in this new capacity, and he looks forward to the many opportunities it poses for the university.

My love for Auburn University runs deep, and it is an honor to lead this initiative aimed at further growing the universitys relationships in the nations capital while advancing Auburn programs that intersect with the federal government, he said.

The new office in Washington, D.C., will serve as the chief liaison hub between the university and both elected and appointed officials from the federal legislative and executive branches, helping bring Auburn expertise and capabilities to bear on federal priorities.

Auburn has always maintained strong relations with our representatives at the federal level, and true to its land-grant mission it has sought to collaborate on government initiatives for the betterment of our communities and nation as a whole, said Lt. Gen. (ret.) Ron Burgess, Auburns executive vice president. This heightened focus of collaboration at the highest level only further strengthens those efforts and sets Auburn apart as a leader in innovation and discovery primed to propel our state and nation forward.

Among its goals, the new office is designed to better connect policymakers with faculty, administrators and students, to include identifying opportunities for faculty to participate in congressional hearings, federal advisory panels, review boards and other related activities. The office will likewise establish a process for identifying federal grant opportunities in support of Auburn research and sponsored programs. Another focus of the office will be in outreach efforts to Auburns alumni who work in Washington, D.C., and have an interest in key policy positions. The office also will assist federal officials in helping translate complex research and academic scholarship.

Those wanting to contact Auburns Office of Federal Relations can do so by emailing to Andrew.newton@auburn.edu.
Decrease Font Size Font Size Increase Font Size

Article body

The brain behind FarmBeatsan agricultural research project developed by Microsoft using solar-powered, white space-based Internet connectivity to record soil temperature and moisture levels and track them with cloud-based computing modelswill visit Auburn University in April.

The College of Agriculture E.T. York Distinguished Lecturer Series will host Ranveer Chandra, chief technical officer of Agri-Food at Microsoft, at 4 p.m. Wednesday, April 20, at The Hotel at Auburn University and Dixon Conference Center. The lecture will be held in the auditorium and is free and open to the public. Those wishing to attend are asked to RSVP at https://auburn.campuslabs.com/ENGAGE/EVENT/7936535.

Chandra leads research and innovation across different industry verticals at Microsoft, including retail, floor space index, or FSI, and energy. His research has shipped in multiple Microsoft products, including XBOX, Azure, Windows and Visual Studio.

He started the FarmBeats project in 2015, which shipped as a Microsoft product in 2019. Bill Gates featured Chandras FarmBeats work on GatesNotes, and Chandra has been invited to present to the Secretary of Agriculture.

Chandra has published over 90 research papers and has over 100 patents granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. He is an Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers fellow and has won several awards, including best paper awards in computer science conferences and the MIT Technology Reviews Top Innovators Under 35 Award in 2010. Chandra has an undergraduate degree from the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur and a doctorate in computer science from Cornell University.

We are grateful to have Dr. Chandra visiting Auburn University to share his research and expertise with our faculty, staff and students," said Amy Wright, associate dean for instruction and chair of the E.T. York Distinguished Lecturer Series Committee. This E.T. York Lecture will feature Dr. Chandras exciting work on the future of technological innovations in agriculture and how affordable digital techniques can empower farmers to succeed in both local and global agricultural enterprises.

The E.T. York Distinguished Lecturer Series features internationally known speakers addressing issues related to agriculture, food, the environment and natural resources. It was established in the Auburn College of Agriculture in 1981 through a gift from E.T. and Vam Cardwell York; both are native Alabamians and Auburn University graduates.

York served as director of the Alabama Cooperative Extension Service from 1959 until 1962; he then went on to head the USDA Federal Extension Service in Washington, D.C. Later, he served as provost and vice president for agriculture at the University of Florida and then chancellor of the State University System of Florida until his retirement in 1980.

(Written by Kristen Bowman)
James Rudberg, a young Canadian graduate, recently shared his insights on China as well as his diplomatic aspirations to help improve Sino-Canadian relationships.

Rudberg, 26, who is from Toronto, has just completed his master's degree at Carleton University in political science. Self-taught, he has been studying Chinese for 13 years. He also goes by his Chinese name Luo Zixu ().



He traveled to China three times through academic exchanges and also had various exposure to the country as a tourist. In 2015, he studied at Fudan University in Shanghai. Learning how to work in another culture and seeing one of the top universities in China for the first time taught him to step outside of his shell, he said.

"I discovered new places and made lifelong friendships. Taking the course in the summer of 2015 was not only one of the most amazing life experiences I have had but, more importantly, it gave me a real taste of China," Rudberg told China.org.cn. "I understood that going to China was not only an opportunity I could not refuse, but such things do not come easy in life, especially in regards to travel and seeing other parts of the world."

Then in August 2016, he had another opportunity to participate in a one-term exchange program at the University of Hong Kong.

"While at the University of Hong Kong, I was not only immersed in Chinese language and culture but was also able to meet international students from around the globe. One of my top experiences while meeting international students was learning about their interests, goals, thoughts, and opinions about Hong Kong culture," he noted.

His third trip to China was in June of 2018. He called the two-week trip, which included stops in Beijing, Wuhan, Enshi, as well as Shenzhen, "amazing" and "life-changing."

"I would have to say the Great Wall of China is the one sight which impressed me most. Not only because it is considered a wonder of the world, but because of the vast beauty and depth of what this ancient structure has to offer tourists and the world," he said.

Rudberg explained his fascination with China began in 2000, when he was still in kindergarten, where his two best friends were a brother and sister from Hong Kong. They exposed him to the Cantonese language, cultural events, malls, theaters, and, of course, restaurants.

"They are still my friends to this day. By 2009, at the age of 13, my passion for China was further ignited by learning to speak Chinese. From that time on, I have devoted much of my energy to learning everything I can about China's history, culture, and its current world status."

In his opinion, since the reform and opening-up began in 1978, China has made not only a tremendous amount of progress in economics and infrastructure but, more importantly, has lifted numerous people out of poverty. "I believe by 2030, China will become the world's number one economy by GDP and economic wealth," he predicted.

As to the image and portrayals of China by Western media outlets, he said, "I am smart enough not to only listen to what Western media has to say about China. It Is extremely biased and does not discuss the real concrete facts about the amazing growth and development that is currently taking place in China."



At the moment, Rudberg is job hunting, as well as in the process of writing a research proposal for a China-based think tank in Alberta, Canada. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, he has not visited China for a long time, but he's yearning to return. "I endure by setting goals for myself and never losing hope for a brighter future."

Rudberg has always intended to work with China through diplomacy. "I aspire to gain both a deep understanding and working knowledge of foreign policy, in combination with formulating new skills for working in Canada and in the foreign service. Ultimately, my ambition is to serve the diplomatic community and, specifically, represent Canadian interests in China. I have long been fascinated by the dynamics of Chinese-Canadian affairs and believe that it is vital for both sides to try and understand each other's grievances to work toward a more prosperous relationship."
When he said he had plans for his own Twitter, this wasn't what I asked for.

Reply

Thread

Link

He can fuck off to Truth Social, they need all the help they can get anyway.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

Read a schadefreunde delicious article about that: wish them Elon Musk.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

Bigots and the like claim they want their own space but they really don't want that; they want to be on other platforms harassing people.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

this is... THE BAD PLACE

Reply

Thread

Link

I think its really really bad that the power of public discourse is in the hands of a short list of billionaires

Reply

Thread

Link

Absolutely - this is Peter Thiel and Gawker all over again.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

I honestly worry for all of us in terms of what this country will be like when we're older and no longer considered valuable to society. The trajectory we are on scares me.

Reply

Thread

Link

Between that and the housing crisis, I feel like returning to multigenerational homes or group housing is one small way for us all not to fade into total obscurity and poverty.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

yea, as someone who doesn't want children, I find the idea of living alone as I age a bit daunting and would definitely be down for a Golden Girls style situation.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link





https://news.google.com/articles/CBMiiwFodHRwczovL3d3dy5mb3JiZXMuY29tL3NpdGVzL2pvaG53YWtlLzIwMjIvMDQvMDEvdGhlLXJlYWwtcmVhc29uLWhvdXNlLXByaWNlcy1hcmUtc2t5cm9ja2V0aW5nLXdoYXQtdGhlLXJlYWwtZXN0YXRlLWluZHVzdHJ5LXdvbnQtdGVsbC15b3Uv0gGPAWh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmZvcmJlcy5jb20vc2l0ZXMvam9obndha2UvMjAyMi8wNC8wMS90aGUtcmVhbC1yZWFzb24taG91c2UtcHJpY2VzLWFyZS1za3lyb2NrZXRpbmctd2hhdC10aGUtcmVhbC1lc3RhdGUtaW5kdXN0cnktd29udC10ZWxsLXlvdS9hbXAv?hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US%3Aen I read this Forbes article on housing prices earlier and it makes a lot of frustrating sense...

Reply

Parent

Thread

Expand

Link

There are 10,000 properties to purchase in all of Ireland right now. The government is introducing a pension scheme to assist people who will grow old because they'll never be able to afford a home. They didn't even try to disguise it.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

What is the Chrome extension that allows me to block him out of my life?

Reply

Thread

Link

So I guess it's a countdown to trump returning

Reply

Thread

Link

Yes, freedom of speech is in danger until someone says something you don't like.



This is going to work out SO well!



Also, I wouldn't be surprised if Elon is making plans to run for office one day.

Reply

Thread

Link

Freedom of speech is in danger and cancel culture is real and thats why Louis CK won a Grammy last night.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

Well at least he can never become president of the US thank god.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

Lol this from the same guy who keeps claiming his assets arent liquid and hes not convinced of the benefit of giving big sums of money to charity.





Reply

Thread

Link

My fucking thoughts exactly.

Reply

Parent

Thread



Link

So because some people dont believe Twitter promotes free speech that /he/ must be the one assigned to fix it??



Fall off the face of the earth already in your little rocket ship

Reply

Thread

Link

*insert You-Keep-Using-That-Word,-I-Do-Not-Think-I t -Means-What-You-Think-It-Means.gif *

Reply

Thread

Link

And majority of the response to his poll are from delusional male blow-hard fans so it really ought not to mean a goddamn thing.

Reply

Thread

Link

what could possibly go wrong?

Reply

Thread

Link

So, even more bigotry, misinformation, and radical right-wing terrorism is coming? Cool. Cool, cool, cool.

Reply

Thread

Link
The recent slump in oil prices does not reflect the actual risk of Russian supply disruption, a senior executive of Vitol has warned.

Brent crude dropped from close to $140 per barrel right after the start of the war in Ukraine to $104 per barrel last week as the United States and the International Energy Agency announced massive reserve releases. However, this would not be able to offset lost Russian barrels over the next few months, Bloomberg quoted Mike Muller, head of Vitols Asian operations, as saying.

Oil feels cheaper than most wouldve predicted, Muller said on a podcast produced by Gulf Intelligence. Oil prices could be higher given the risk of disruption of supplies from Russia. But people are still lost figuring out those numbers.

In the third quarter, Muller said, Russian oil and oil product exports could be down by between 1 and 3 million barrels daily, from 7.5 million barrels daily under normal circumstances.

Muller also noted that demand was going to continue to strengthen despite Chinas recent dip because of the resurgence of the coronavirus.

China will throw the kitchen sink at making sure the economy delivers, Muller said. We are going to see China put a massive effort into infrastructure spending and propping up the economy. Youre going to see a big outlay.

At the same time, any additional supply from Iran will be slow in coming. This weekend, Irans foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said the parties at the nuclear deal negotiating table were close to an agreement, adding, We have passed on our proposals on the remaining issues to the American side through the EU senior negotiator, and now the ball is in US court.

Oil started the week with a decline after the Houthi rebel group in Yemen and the Saudi-led coalition agreed to a truce that alleviated some Saudi oil supply concerns sparked last month by a string of Houthi attacks on Saudi oil targets.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
An increase in heating demand added extra stress to Frances electricity grid, forcing power prices to climb to a shocking 3,000 per megawatt-hour.

Half of the countrys nuclear reactors are offline, and much of the EU is preparing for Russian natural gas supplies to dry up.

A cold snap swept across France Monday morning, forcing the country's electricity grid manager to request businesses and households to reduce power consumption as energy prices spiked. This is happening as half of the country's nuclear reactors are offline, and parts of Europe are preparing for Russian natural gas supplies to dry up.

The fragility of Europe's power grid is on full display today, even as spring arrives. French power prices spiked to 3,000 euros, a 13-year high, due to an increase in heating demand as grid operator RTE requested households and businesses to reduce energy-intensive devices.

The severe power crunch comes as 25 of Electricite de France SA's 56 nuclear reactors are offline. For some context, France's primary power source is nuclear, contributing at least 70% of total production.

RTE said power consumption could reach as much as 73,000 megawatts on Monday morning. Power generation will only be 65,000 megawatts. However, the grid operator said that power imports would be as much as 11,000 megawatts.

France and other European countries have been struggling with an energy crisis that appears to be continuing and may last through summer as energy supplies from Russia decline. The conflict in Ukraine has exacerbated energy disruptions as European countries plan to reduce their dependency on Russian gas (we suspect this will be a hard transition, if not, impossible).

Bloomberg's commodity analyst Javier Blas reminds people, "Europe's energy problems predate Russia's invasion of Ukraine."

ELECTRICITY MARKET: Don't forget that Europe's energy problems predate Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Short-term electricity prices in France will hit on Monday 551 per MWh, **the 2nd highest ever price**, as it faces a cold snap just when nuclear power production is low ???????????? pic.twitter.com/P2j74oRuwa  Javier Blas (@JavierBlas) April 3, 2022



Even with nuclear power, the largest source of electricity in France, what continues to amaze us is the number of reactors that remain offline.

Besides energy woes in France, the cold weather is threatening vineyards in the country's wine-producing areas. The frost is a similar phenomenon that hit last year, causing upwards of 2 billion euros in losses.

By Zerohedge.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
The demand for Rubles does not make much economic sense, but it may simply be a way for Russia to skirt sanctions.

The Kremlin has announced that this is a prototype and expressed confidence that the same policy will be extended to other goods and exports.

Vladimir Putins demand for unfriendly nations to pay for natural gas in Rubles has yet to impact gas flows.

Vladimir Putins insistence that unfriendly nations pay in rubles for natural gas is just the beginning of a Russian export policy that will see fewer U.S. dollars being used in transactions for goods, especially for energy, according to the Kremlin.

Russia has set a March 31 deadline for the countries it considers hostile - including the United States, all EU member states, Switzerland, Canada, Norway, South Korea, Japan, and many others - to start paying in rubles for natural gas.

Still, Europe continued to receive Russian natural gas via pipelines on Friday, even after Putin threatened European countries that Moscow would cut off gas flows unless buyers complied with Russias gas-for-rubles-only demand.

Throughout last week, the Kremlin issued unclear - and at times, contradictory - messages, while European economies started to activate emergency plans in anticipation of a potential disruption to gas supply from Russia. Germany and Italy - major European economies and major importers of Russian gas - said last week that they had received assurances from Russia that they could continue paying in euros for the gas coming from Russia.

Russia did not immediately cut off the gas supply to Europe partly because it is dependent on revenues from gas and partly because payments for gas delivered after April 1 are not due until later this month or early May.

The continued gas supply to Europe eased concerns that Europe would find itself cut off from Russian gas, but those concerns could intensify again later this month and in May when payments to Moscow are due.

The Kremlin, for its part, signals the gas-for-rubles demand is just the beginning of a switch to the Russian currency for Russian exports.

It is the prototype of the system, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said over the weekend on Russian state television, referring to the gas-for-rubles scheme.

I have no doubt that it will be extended to new groups of goods, Reuters quoted Peskov as saying. The Kremlin spokesman did not provide any timeline for extending the rubles payments to exports of other goods.

Last week, the Kremlin signaled that it could work on an idea to price all energy and commodity exports of Russia in rubles.

This weekend, Peskov said Moscow was seeking a new global system that would not have the U.S. dollar as the dominant currency.

It is obvious that - even if this is currently a distant prospect - that we will come to some new system - different from the Bretton Woods system, Peskov said.

Russias demand for rubles for gas goes beyond economics, analysts told CBC News and The Associated Press.

By demanding rubles for natural gas, Russia wants to score a kind of political victory, Stefan Meister, head of the program on international order and democracy at the German Council on Foreign Relations, told The Associated Press.

It wants to show that Putin dictates the conditions under which it exports gas, Meister told AP.

Payments in rubles could also send a message in Russia that the ruble is strong and Putins war in Ukraine is going according to plan, analysts also said.

However, from an economic standpoint, the ruble payment is strange, other analysts note.

Under normal circumstances, a country that is trying to prop up its currency and maintain imports from abroad would seek payments in hard currencies such as dollars and euros rather than its own currency, Eswar Prasad, the Tolani Senior Professor of Trade Policy and professor of economics at Cornell University, told CBC News.

It is possible that Russia could be using the demand for payments in ruble as a way to skirt Western sanctions, Prasad and other experts say.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Following two recent landmark legal rulings by the Supreme Court of the Federal Government of Iraq (FGI) in Baghdad, news emerged last week that Iraqs Oil Ministry is proposing the creation of a Kurdistan National Oil Company under the federal ownership of the government in the south of Iraq. This is aimed at stripping any authority that the government of the semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan (the KRG) in Iraqs north has over its heavily Russian-dominated oil industry and would render all previous contracts entered into between the KRG and oil companies subject to review. In fact, Iraqs Baghdad-based Oil Ministry has now ordered the KRG to supply copies of all oil and gas contracts signed between the regions government and external parties over the past 18 years, as well as statements of related revenues. In an apparent show of support for Iraqs Federal Government in Baghdad, the U.S. government last week granted Baghdad one of its longest-ever waivers to continue to import gas and electricity from Iran as an interim solution to its domestic energy supply problems.

Russia has long been a thorn in the side of any and all attempts by the U.S. to adopt a constructive realignment of its relationship with Iraq, having effectively taken control of the oil infrastructure in the northern region of Kurdistan in 2017, as examined in depth in my new book on the global oil markets. Spotting an opportunity to project its own power into the chaos that followed the Kurdistan yes vote on independence from the rest of Iraq in 2017, Russia  via its corporate oil proxy, Rosneft  at first provided the KRG government with US$1.5 billion in financing through forward oil sales payable in the next three to five years. Then it took an 80 percent working interest in five potentially major oil blocks in the region together with corollary investment and technical, technology, and equipment assistance. Finally, it established 60 percent ownership of the vital KRG-Turkey pipeline by dint of a commitment to invest US$1.8 billion to increase its capacity to one million barrels per day. Moscow considered itself well-placed at that point to leverage this presence into a similarly powerful position in the south of the country, in particular by striking new oil and gas field exploration and development deals with Baghdad. These new deals were to follow Russias role in intermediating in the perennial dispute between Kurdistan and the Federal Government of Iraq in Baghdad on the budget disbursements-for-oil deal. In reality, Russia  far from mediating effectively to find a solution  instead sought to sow further discord between the two sides, which has undermined the efficacy of the budget disbursements-for-oil deal since Rosneft effectively took over control of Kurdistans oil sector in 2017.

According to sources close to Iraqs Oil Ministry, spoken to exclusively by OilPrice.com at the time, Moscow insisted through the KRG that oil flows would not restart until pipeline transit fees and pumping tariffs were paid to Rosneft, which by that point had its 60 percent stake in the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline, through which much of Iraqs oil was exported. Moscow also wanted the FGI to look again at its decision to deem invalid the assignment to Rosneft by the KRG of five exploration blocks in Kurdish territory. These are estimated to have aggregate 3P reserves of 670 million barrels, and Rosneft has an 80 percent stake in each. Rosnefts demands when allied to its central involvement in the Kurdistan region of Iraq not only threatened Iraqs plans to meet its new in-house oil production targets but also its potential export routes for the new flows. The original Kirkuk to Ceyhan Pipeline  the Iraq-Turkey Pipeline (ITP)  consisted of two pipes, which had a nameplate capacity of 1.6 million bpd combined. The FGI-controlled pipelines export capacity reached between 250,000 and 400,000 bpd when running normally, although it was subject to regular sabotage by militants of various descriptions. The KRG, in response to the regular attacks on the FGI pipeline, completed its own single-side track Taq field-Khurmala-Kirkuk/Ceyhan pipeline in the border town of Fishkhabur. This was part of its drive to raise oil exports above 1 million bpd.

Under the FGI administration of Haider al-Abadi, the signs were that some accommodation of the demands of Rosneft and the KRG might be in the offing. There had been some movement on the percentage basis for the budget compensation to be paid to the KRG, up from just under 13 percent. There had also been a ratification of the idea that Baghdad would return significant volumes of oil to Kurdistan for local refining and it had even been acknowledged that a pumping tariff might be paid to Rosneft. At that time, then-Oil Minister Jabar al-Luaibi even said that he was willing to accommodate Rosneft in the Kirkuk oil hub itself, highlighting that Baghdad did not want to close the doors in the face of anyone who wanted to help. The only condition at that point was that Rosneft should work with BP which, as BP owned a 19.75 percent stake in Rosneft, did not appear to be an insurmountable requirement. The view of the KRG at the time was that the de facto leader of Iraq, Moqtada al-Sadr, would eventually go along with what had been agreed, as the KRG thought that he was more likely to do deals with Russia than deal with the U.S., which regards him as a dangerous enemy combatant at best and an out and out terrorist at worst.

All of this contributed to a constant lack of adherence on both sides to the budget disbursements-for-oil deal, exacerbated by the lack of legal clarity on the issue. According to the KRG, it has authority under Articles 112 and 115 of the Iraq Constitution to manage oil and gas in the Kurdistan Region extracted from fields that were not in production in 2005 the year that the Constitution was adopted by referendum. In addition, the KRG maintains that Article 115 states: All powers not stipulated in the exclusive powers of the federal government belong to the authorities of the regions and governorates that are not organized in a region. As such, the KRG maintains that as relevant powers are not otherwise stipulated in the Constitution, it has the authority to sell and receive revenue from its oil and gas exports. The KRG also highlights that the Constitution provides that, should a dispute arise, priority shall be given to the law of the regions and governorates. However, the FGI and SOMO argue that under Article 111 of the Constitution oil and gas are under the ownership of all the people of Iraq in all the regions and governorates.

The new stridency of Iraqs Oil Ministry in proposing the creation of a Kurdistan National Oil Company under the federal ownership of the government in the south of Iraq underlines it is extremely serious about implementing the earlier rulings of the Supreme Court of the Federal Government of Iraq (FGI) in Baghdad. These rulings were that sales of oil and gas by the KRG, independent of the central government in Baghdad, are unconstitutional and that the KRG must hand overall oil production to the Federal Government of Iraq, represented by the Ministry of Oil. Additionally, the Supreme Court ruled that the Oil Ministry has the right to: Follow up on the invalidity of oil contracts concluded by the Kurdistan Regional Government with foreign parties, countries, and companies regarding oil exploration, extraction, export and sale.

By Simon Watkins for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has delayed the release and presentation of the latest report on how policymakers could act to slow global warming as nations continued to negotiate a final summary of recommendations through the weekend.

The IPCC press conference to present the Summary for Policymakers of the report Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change is still scheduled for Monday, but has been delayed because the working group needed more time to agree unanimously on a summary for policymakers.

The report will also be published later on Monday.

Scientists and nations have held virtual meetings throughout the weekend to complete the wording of the final documents, but differing viewpoints on how to finance climate change policies remain a sticking point among members.

Countries are bringing the ongoing battles of UNFCCC into this space, Doreen Stabinsky, a global environmental politics professor at the College of the Atlantic and a contributing IPCC author, told Bloomberg. It is unavoidable, of course, and unfortunately could be really destructive to the credibility if IPCC proceeded, Stabinsky added.

Talks on finalizing the report on Sunday were held on the huge investments necessary to dramatically change the way the world produces and consumes energy, participants in the discussions told AFP this weekend.

Everybody has something to lose and everybody has something to gain in those talks and recommendations, a participant monitoring the process told AFP.

The wording of the so-called Summary for Policymakers, which is some 40 pages long, was around 90 percent approved on Sunday but finance was holding things up, a source tracking the discussions told AFP.

The IPCC is the United Nations body for assessing the science related to climate change. It was established by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) in 1988 to provide political leaders with periodic scientific assessments concerning climate change, its implications and risks, as well as to put forward adaptation and mitigation strategies.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
The European Union condemned on Monday the killing of unarmed civilians by Russian forces while retreating from Ukrainian towns and vowed a new wave of severe sanctions would follow against Russia in a matter of days, including potential sanctions against Russias oil, gas, or coal exports.

Haunting images of large numbers of civilian deaths and casualties, as well as destruction of civilian infrastructures show the true face of the brutal war of aggression Russia is waging against Ukraine and its people. The massacres in the town of Bucha and other Ukrainian towns will be inscribed in the list of atrocities committed on European soil, the EU said in a statement on Monday.

The EU will continue to firmly support Ukraine and will advance, as a matter of urgency, work on further sanctions against Russia. President Putin must stop this war immediately and unconditionally, the EU said.

Europe  which collectively depends on Russian natural gas and oil for around one-third and one-fourth of its demand, respectively  has refrained from targeting directly Russian energy exports fearing that sanctions or an embargo could lead to a deep recession in the major European economies, including the biggest one, Germany.

Germany has so far been one of the staunchest opponents to an energy embargo on Russia, but after photos of Russian atrocities in Bucha and other Ukrainian towns emerged, the mood appears to be shifting even in Berlin.

The EU should discuss a ban on the import of Russian natural gas, Germanys defense minister Christine Lambrecht was quoted as saying on Sunday.

There has to be a response. Such crimes must not remain unanswered, Lambrecht said.

According to Wolfgang Buechner, a spokesman for the German government, it is early to talk about which sectors the new sanctions would target, Bloomberg quoted the spokesman as saying on Monday.

Frances President Emmanuel Macron told a local radio: I am in favor of a round of sanctions, particularly on coal and oil, which we know are particularly harmful.

France will coordinate with EU partners, especially Germany, about which steps to take next, Macron added.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
The three Baltic statesLithuania, Latvia, and Estoniahave suspended all purchases of Russian gas, government officials said. For now, the needs of the three tiny nations will be satisfied from storage in Latvia, UAWire reported this weekend.

"If there were still any doubts about whether there may be any trust in deliveries from Russia, current events clearly show us that there is no more trust," said the head of Latvia's gas storage operator, Uldis Bariss, as quoted by local media.

On Sunday, Latvia's gas company, Latvijas G?ze, said that it had closed an eight-year supply contract with Gazprom, "which provides for settlements for natural gas in euros."

Lithuania's President, Gitanas Nauseda, called on the rest of the European Union to follow the Baltics' example, saying, "A year ago, my country made decisions that today allow us to break energy ties with the aggressor without pain. If we can do it, the rest of Europe can do it too!"

Lithuania imports all the gas it needs via the liquefied natural gas in Klaipeda. It can also import pipeline gas from Latvia and Poland through an interconnector, UAWire reported.

Last week, Russia's president announced that it will no longer accept payment for its natural gas in dollars or euros but will only accept rubles. This sparked panic across Europe, with governments preparing for shortages as they refused to pay for Russian gas in rubles.

The move concerns "unfriendly" states participating in anti-Russian sanctions, including the whole of the European Union, the United States, Switzerland, Canada, Norway, South Korea, and Japan, among others.

Immediately after the Russian announcement, European economies began to prepare for a potential shortage, although Russian gas is still flowing at normal rates. Disruptions, if any, could begin later this month when the first payments for gas fall due.

Russia's ruble mechanism involves the buyer of gas opening two accounts with Gazprombank, one in foreign currency and one in rubles. It pays for gas deliveries in foreign currency, which the bank then converts into rubles before transferring them to the second account, from where the actual payment for the gas received is made.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Drivers in the UK have been queuing for fuel in recent hours after several days of climate protests culminated on Monday with a blockade of an oil facility near Heathrow in London.

Some gas stations in London and the southeast of England are closed because they have run out of fuel, while drivers are queuing for hours at the stations that still sell gasoline and diesel.

A Tesco forecourt in the town of Saffron Walden, Essex, is closed, the supermarket chain said on Monday, replying to a question from a customer when fuel would be available. "The Petrol filling station can't advise when the next delivery will be at present," Tesco's customer service said.

Many drivers took to Twitter to say that some gas stations are sold out of all kinds of fuel.

The lack of fuel at gas stations is the result of several days of protests by climate activists. On Monday, campaigners from Extinction Rebellion and from Just Stop Oil blocked the entrance to the Esso West oil facility near Heathrow Airport in London. The facility is operated by U.S. supermajor ExxonMobil.

"This is the fourth day in a row in which oil facilities across the UK have been blocked as part of ongoing action by Extinction Rebellion and the Just Stop Oil coalition. Over the weekend Just Stop Oil continued to block oil depots in Grays, Purfleet, Buncefield, Tamworth and Central Birmingham," Extinction Rebellion said on Monday.

"We will continue to block oil facilities until the government agrees to stop all new fossil fuel investments immediately," the group added.

"Right now, governments are choosing to exploit the crisis in Ukraine to hand out oil licences and continue the fossil fuel economy that's destroying us," Andrew Smith from Extinction Rebellion said in a statement.

Despite the UK's net-zero pledge and its ambitious renewable electricity targets, the country will continue to rely on oil and gas from the North Sea. After Russia invaded Ukraine at the end of February, the UK doubled down on its commitment to net-zero by 2050, but it also reiterated its support for its domestic oil and gas resources.

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
The auditorium at Bellevue West High School had an extreme makeover into a courtroom on March 30.

The Nebraska Supreme Court held oral arguments at the home of the Thunderbirds as part of its ongoing outreach and education efforts, according to a press release.

The visit marks the first time that the Supreme Court has held arguments in the City of Bellevue.

Before the justices waltzed onto the stage, the students were given a overview of the court system by someone more local to the area. Sarpy County Trial Court Judge Todd Hutton discussed with the students the differences between the trial and appellate court systems and provided a background for what an oral arguments session is like.

The argument being held at Bellevue West High School revolved around an employee being denied unemployment benefits. There is no resolution to a case during an oral arguments session  the Supreme Court justices will take what was said by both parties legal counsel under advisement and issue a written opinion later on.

Chief Justice Mike Heavican think its important for students to understand the inner workings of institutions such as the Nebraska Supreme Court.

It is critical that our students understand the workings of our democratic institutions and have confidence in our court system, Heavican said in a press release.

For over 40 years, the Supreme Court has traveled annually to each of Nebraskas law schools for the purpose of making the Courts business accessible to students on their campuses.

Justices spend time after argument sessions talking to students about the appellate process and career opportunities as lawyers. Cases are selected to demonstrate the variety of legal arguments that face the court system on a regular basis.

Grace Merkle, junior Bellevue West student and mock trial team member, said she is appreciative of the experience.

It was amazing to witness; it was really cool to just see the law in action, Merkle said. We have a lot of stereotypes from movies that obviously dont uphold in real life, but actually seeing the real Supreme Court and then a physical case going on was just really amazing.

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Theres a connection between a commonly prescribed drug for diabetes and a higher risk for birth defects if a father uses it within three months of conceiving a baby, a new study has found.

The drug metformin, one of the top treatments for type 2 diabetes, is linked to this heightened risk, according to researchers from Stanford University and Denmark. The drug helps control high blood sugar, according to WebMD.

Specifically, theres as much as a 40% greater chance of babies being born with birth defects, including genital, digestive, urinary, heart, chromosomal and limb defects if a father uses it within the certain time frame, according to the work published March 29 in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine.

A higher risk of developing genital birth defects was found only in baby boys, the study found.

While many health risk factors for women conceiving children are understood, theres a limited but growing understanding of how paternal factors can affect a childs health, a Stanford Medicine news release on the research said.

Given that men contribute half the DNA to a child, it makes sense that there could be some effects that travel through paternal pathways as well, Dr. Michael Eisenberg, Stanford urology professor and a senior author of the study, said in a statement.

It wasnt just taking metformin at any time in a mans life; it really has to do with taking it in that window when the sperm that is going to become the child is being developed.

The study was based on health-registry data from Denmark on more than 1 million births between 1997 and 2016.

When I saw the paper  I thought: Yup, this is gonna go viral, Dr. Germaine Buck Louis, a reproductive and perinatal epidemiologist at George Mason University, told Science about the work.

Metformin is often the first medication prescribed for type 2 diabetes, according to Mayo Clinic.

In the U.S., type 2 diabetes affects roughly 90-95% of people with diabetes, typically adults, while type 1 diabetes affects about 5% of those with the condition, typically first diagnosed in kids and teens, according to Johns Hopkins University.

More on the research

An analysis of 1,116,779 birth records revealed 36,585 babies born in Denmark between 1997 and 2016, or 3.3%, had 1 or more major birth defects, according to the study. Additionally, 51.4% of these babies were male.

The median ages of the mothers and fathers were 30 and 33, researchers noted. Babies born to women who had diabetes or hypertension werent included in the study, according to the news release.

Of this group, 1,451 babies born to fathers who used metformin within three months of conception were identified. It was found that 5.2% of these children had birth defects.

Offspring of fathers who filled a metformin prescription during the 3 months before conception, also known as the time when sperm develop, were considered exposed, according to the work.

These rates mean that, in Denmark, where today approximately 120 babies per year are exposed through their fathers, metformin use may account for two additional babies born with birth defects every year, the news release notes.

Of the 1,451 metformin-exposed babies, genital birth defects were more common and only seen in male offspring, but fewer boys were born overall, according to the research.

Researchers compared metformin-exposed babies with those who were insulin-exposed, with unexposed siblings and with babies whose fathers took metformin before or after sperm development. They didnt find elevated birth defect frequencies in those groups unlike the children exposed to metformin during sperm development.

Ultimately, its not exactly clear why a fathers metformin use while sperm is maturing is linked to birth defects in offspring, the news release said. However, prior studies in mice have shown that the drug can cause reproductive harm.

Birth defects are responsible for roughly 20% of infant deaths in the U.S., according to Buck Louis, who wrote an editorial on the study.

Given the prevalence of metformin use as first-line therapy for type 2 diabetes, corroboration of these findings is urgently needed.

Buck Louis said the research calls for a more conclusive study of the potential risks for paternal use of diabetes drugs to offspring.

When asked whether men planning to become fathers should avoid metformin, Eisenberg said in a statement, I think that its a single study, so its hard to change clinical practice based on that.

But for somebody considering fatherhood, this study emphasizes the importance of a fathers health on the health of a child.

One study limitation included how information on underlying disease status was limited, according to the research.

The work received funding from the National Institutes of Health.

More on metformin

Metformin was approved in 1995 as a type 2 diabetes treatment by the Food and Drug Administration.

[Metformin] is widely used even by young men because of the obesity issue that we have. So that is potentially a huge source of exposure for the next generation, Buck Louis told Science.

Also, doctors have long prescribed (metformin) off-label  that is, to treat conditions outside its approved use for diabetes, according to Harvard University.

The drug is known for cardiovascular benefits and has been prescribed for prediabetes, gestational diabetes, polycystic ovary syndrome and antipsychotic medicine-induced weight gain, the university points out.

Its also being investigated for its potential to decrease the risk breast, colon and prostate cancer for those living with type 2 diabetes, according to Harvard. Additionally, researchers are looking into whether it can lower dementia and stroke risks, as well as slow down aging and prolong life-expectancy.

When we think about reproduction, we still mostly think about maternal factors, so this study brings further awareness that paternal factors can make a difference, Eisenberg said in the news release.

Dont forget the father.
 Flash

Pakistani President Arif Alvi on Sunday dissolved the country's National Assembly, or the lower house of the parliament, on the advice of Prime Minister Imran Khan after a motion of no-confidence by joint opposition against Khan was declared unconstitutional.



The session to vote on the no-confidence motion was convened on Sunday morning, during which the country's Minister of Information Fawad Chaudhry said that the motion is an "effective operation of regime change by a foreign government," which has joined hands with the local parties to topple the Pakistani government through the no-confidence motion.

Chaudhry said that the Constitution asks every citizen of Pakistan to be loyal to the country rather than a foreign power, questioning the constitutional validity of the motion brought on the directives of a foreign power, amid the chants of "the friend of the United States is a traitor" from the government benches.

Approving Chaudhry's argument, Deputy Speaker Qasim Khan Suri, who was chairing the session, rejected the no-confidence motion, citing article 5 of the Constitution that "no foreign government is allowed to conduct regime change operations against an elected government."

Following the rejection of the motion, Khan said in a televised address to the nation that he has sent an advice to the president to dissolve the National Assembly, calling for an interim government before going for fresh elections.

"Today, the deputy speaker foiled that agenda by rejecting no-confidence motion... A conspiracy was being hatched ... The nation will not let such kind of conspiracies succeed," Khan said.

The prime minister said that the Pakistani public will now use its right to choose its government through elections, adding that no foreign power should be allowed to make decisions through conspiracies.

"I want to tell my nation to start preparing for elections and not let any foreign power decide the future of Pakistan."

The no-confidence motion was moved by an alliance of major opposition parties of the country, which claimed to have 177 member representations in the National Assembly, five votes more than the required to de-seat the prime minister.

On March 27, while addressing a public gathering in Islamabad, Khan mentioned receiving a letter on March 7, a day prior to the filing of the motion in the National Assembly, from a Pakistani ambassador to a "powerful country" stating that the ambassador was informed about the motion even before it was moved, and warned of consequences if the country failed to de-seat Khan.

Khan later revealed that the United States showed displeasure when he visited Russia in February, telling Pakistani officials, in official communication with them, of regime change through the no-confidence motion.

A meeting of the National Security Committee on March 31 also took notice of the foreign attempt to topple the government and an official demarche was made through official channels to the U.S. embassy in Pakistan, Khan said.

Reacting to the government's move to call for early elections following the dissolution of the assembly, the leader of the opposition in the lower house Shahbaz Sharif said that the rejection of the motion by the deputy speaker of the National Assembly is unconstitutional.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, chairman of the opposition Pakistan Peoples Party, said that the government has violated the Constitution by not allowing voting to take place.

The opposition alliance refused to accept the dissolution of the National Assembly and submitted a petition to the Supreme Court of Pakistan, pleading to review the ruling given by Suri, set aside the prime minister's advice to the president to dissolve the National Assembly, and that parliament session should be summoned again to conduct voting on the no-confidence motion.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court of Pakistan took a suo-moto notice of the ongoing situation in the country, with Chief Justice of Pakistan Umar Ata Bandial holding an important meeting with their fellow judges to deliberate on the current political and constitutional crisis evolved after the opposition's no-confidence motion was rejected.
Bill Fries, the former Omaha advertising executive who won a Clio Award in 1974 for the Old Home Bread ad campaign and had a No. 1 song with Convoy, died Friday in Ouray, Colorado, at age 93.

The family will hold a private service in Colorado at a later time, said granddaughter Laura Terry of Omaha. Terry said Fries had entered hospice care at home while fighting cancer. Memorials are suggested to the Ouray Volunteer Fire Department.

Fries (pronounced Freeze) was born in Audubon, Iowa, and in the 1950s moved to Omaha, where he worked as a set designer at KETV. He joined Bozell & Jacobs as an ad executive in 1961.

At the advertising company, now simply called Bozell, he helped create a series of television commercials for Old Home Bread. They centered on a trucker named C.W. McCall and waitress named Mavis at the Old Home Filler-up an Keep on a-Truckin Cafe in Pisgah, Iowa.

We were just trying to sell bread, Fries told The World-Herald in 2001. It was something that just took off and spoke to the right things at the right time.

Fries tapped Bozells resident jingle writer, Chip Davis, who later founded Mannheim Steamroller, to create a soundtrack. The commercials chronicled the life of trucker C.W. McCall with a rip-roarin country beat. Fries provided the voice-over narration for the commercials as each spot and advanced the romance between C.W. and Mavis.

The commercials ran in Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota and South Dakota, the heart of Old Homes customer base. People called television stations to find out when the next commercial was going to run.

Kim Mickelsen, the chief executive for the advertising firm that now goes simply by Bozell, said Fries became a legend in the advertising industry.

His amazing contributions to numerous iconic ad campaigns, including Old Home Bread, live on even today, Mickelsen said. He will be greatly missed. As C.W. McCall would say, keep on a trucking, Bill.

Bill Fries III, of Ouray, said his father was also very proud of other accounts including Mutual of Omaha and the Union Pacific Railroad. The elder Fries penned his first song when he wrote A Great Big Rollin Railroad for U.P., a song that became the basic music track for all the railroads TV commercials.

Under the McCall name, Fries and Davis founded the label American Gramaphone and cut a record called Wolf Creek Pass, with the single, Old Home Filler-up an Keep on a-Truckin Cafe, which compiled bits of the Old Home commercial narration.

The record sold 20,000 copies in the Midlands in two weeks. Those sales caught the eye of record executives at MGM. Old Home eventually sold 300,000 copies. MGM asked the duo to make another McCall record with Black Bear Road and Convoy on side 2.

Released in 1975, Convoy rode to No. 1 on the country and western and pop charts in the middle of the CB radio craze. Truckers used CB radios to keep in touch on long, lonely stretches of road, to warn each other of upcoming bear traps (radar traps) and to recommend brown bottle shops (bars) along the routes.

Bill Fries (saying) Breaker Breaker 19 is how that big song started and sold millions of copies worldwide, Davis said. It made an impressive impact on so many people. I had a great time writing with Willy. Id go over to his house and wed talk about the topic of a song while having a silver bullet  Bills name for a martini.

I wrote the music separately and I never heard his words until we got into the studio. What a wordsmith and what a voice. He wont have to keep the pedal to the metal anymore. Rest up, Willy  you deserve it.

Fries son said his father was proud of having served as mayor of Ouray from 1986 until 1992. He and his wife, Rena, celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary there on Valentines Day.

In addition to his wife and son, Fries is survived by another son, Mark Fries of Ouray; daughter Nancy Fries of Arizona; four grandchildren, six great-grandchildren and one great-great grandchild.

Omaha World-Herald: Afternoon Update The latest headlines sent at 4:45 p.m. daily. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Prise Yates wants potential customers to know that his mother makes the best cookies ever.

Grady Johnson plans to contribute two cakes.

Probably with a little assistance from my mom, he said.

They and their classmates at A Latere Academy in southwest Omaha are holding a bake sale Wednesday April 6to support math and homeroom teacher Barb Baumert, whose husband, Kim, was paralyzed from the chest down 11 years ago in a fall while re-siding their Elkhorn home.

They hope to raise $6,000 to help the Baumerts replace the motor of Kims special air mattress.

Shes just always so caring, and Im so appreciative of what she does, said Grady, a sixth grader at the school, which works with home-schooled students. The time and effort she puts in day in and day out just to help us out is really cool.

After a 30-year career with the Elkhorn school district, Baumert returned to teaching at A Latere and is a substitute teacher in Elkhorn to support herself and her husband, who is retired.

People in Elkhorn raised thousands to help them buy a handicap-accessible van and outfit their home for Kim after the accident. He also taught in Elkhorn.

The couple had been doing OK until the motor on the air mattress that Kim uses conked out after 10 years. It helps rotate him at night, and is crucial to avoid bedsores, which usually require hospitalization.

They paid for a replacement motor, but it worked only five days. The company in California where it was purchased said the warranty didnt cover a broken casing. So, they paid for it to be fixed, but it worked only two months. Now, no one from the company will return their emails and calls.

Barb has been fighting to resolve the situation since early January.

People with these kinds of disabilities have these kinds of complications all the time, she said. Its never simple.

Shes thrilled that Mobilis Inc. in Council Bluffs gave them a mattress that someone donated, but it doesnt work as well for Kims needs.

Medicare wont pay for a replacement, and neither will their supplemental insurance. Each transaction has cost them thousands, and Baumert still doesnt know where to find a motor besides that one company.

Shes not sure where to turn. With no motor, she must rotate Kim at night herself or risk the chance that he will develop an open wound or ulcer.

As you might imagine, I dont get much sleep. Its been 11 years, and we have managed, she said. But Kim and I both know down the road I wont be able to do everything, and we are hoping to be able to provide for all of Kims needs for as many years as possible.

Ellen Miller, director at A Latere, said Baumert didnt ask for help, but said she is a trouper and the 167-pupil school wants to help any way possible.

When Barb Baumert started working here, people started telling me she was one of their teachers and how much she and her husband had meant to them. She has just made an incredible impact on my life, Miller said.

The middle school students at the school are excited about their efforts.

Posters are going up and special T-shirts will arrive soon to wear the day of the bake sale.

I think we came up with some clever sayings during study halls and free class periods, Grady said. Were making signs so hopefully a lot of people can hear about it.

It was supposed to be a surprise, but Baumert has heard the kids talking.

I told our director there are so many people who are so much worse off than us, she said. Its so sweet. Its just so nice.

Want to see more like this? Get our local education coverage delivered directly to your inbox. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
 Flash

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi held talks on Sunday with visiting Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province.



Wang said China always takes the Philippines as a priority in its neighborhood diplomacy, and China's good-neighborly and friendly policy toward the Philippines has maintained continuity and stability.

The two sides should remove disturbances, calmly and properly manage differences and not let them affect the overall situation of China-Philippines relations, Wang said.

China is ready to speed up the construction of key infrastructure projects with the Philippines, and continue to provide COVID-19 vaccine assistance and enhance public health cooperation according to the need of the Philippines, Wang said.

Locsin said Philippine-China relations have become increasingly mature and bilateral practical cooperation has achieved historic results, bringing lasting benefits to both sides.

As a responsible major country, China is committed to independence and peaceful development, setting a new example in a turbulent world, Locsin said, adding that China has long promoted the development of other countries in the region through its own development and played an irreplaceable role in global economic growth.

The two sides exchanged views on the South China Sea issue and held that maritime issues should be placed in an appropriate position in bilateral relations.
Bands played, flags waved and the chests of northwest Iowans puffed up with pride when the Navy commissioned the 11th in its line of new littoral combat ships, the USS Sioux City, just 3 years ago in Annapolis, Maryland.

This ship is the tangible result of talented people coming together U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, told a crowd of 5,000  including many Iowans  gathered at the Nov. 17, 2018, ceremony. It speaks volumes that this ship will carry the name of USS Sioux City as it performs critical missions around the globe.

Built to last for 30 years, the ship now appears headed for the scrapyard. The Biden administrations 2023 defense budget plan, released March 28, calls for the decommissioning of the Sioux City and eight other hulls in the Navys trouble-plagued Freedom class of littoral combat ships, known in the Navy as LCS, during the next five years. All are less than 10 years old.

The ships have been plagued with problems  cost overruns, production delays, mechanical breakdowns  since it was conceived in the early 2000s as a way to bulk up the Navy fleet with small, fast ships designed for use in shallow waters near shorelines.

It was a bad decision, bad engineering, bad maintenance. Everything that could go wrong, did, said Scott Truver, a Washington-based naval analyst.

The USS Omaha, also a littoral combat ship, is of a different design and isnt on the Pentagons hit list for 2023. But some Navy watchers expect the whole class of 35 LCS to get the ax before long.

The LCS is going to go down the tubes faster, rather than slower, predicted Norman Friedman, a defense analyst, a historian and the author of more than 40 books on the military. My guess is, in five years these things will be gone.

The news came as a shock in Sioux City, where the Siouxland Chamber of Commerce has promoted ties with its Florida-based namesake, bringing crew members on visits to Iowa. The city even raised a $250,000 fund to help USS Sioux City crew members and their families pay for educational expenses, the Sioux City Journal reported.

Its amazing they can spend that amount of money and then decommission it. Its unbelievable, Mayor Bob Scott told the newspaper.

We have a relationship with a lot of people who have served on that ship, he added. Its hard to believe that ship is unsalvageable.

Former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, who represented Nebraska as a Republican U.S. senator for two terms, said he isnt surprised by the Navys decision.

Hagel said he initially decided to cut the program from 52 ships to 32 during his term while he was serving as President Barack Obamas defense chief from 2013 to 2015. (Later the number was set at 35.)

I just found too many problems with it, Hagel told The World-Herald last week. I thought at one time about canceling the whole program. But we were so far into it.

The Navy launched the LCS program in late 2001, hoping to field a fleet of fast, agile ships, and do it quickly, in line with then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfelds philosophy of a smaller, lighter military force.

They would be highly automated, so they could operate with a small crew of 40 sailors, less than one-fourth the complement of other ships their size.

The hulls themselves would be bare-bones, and equipped to carry interchangeable mission modules for anti-submarine, counter-mine, and surface warfare that could be easily swapped out  an entirely new concept for the Navy. LCS boosters likened the ship to a Swiss army knife.

Because the Navy had a history of delays and cost overruns, officials also wanted to show they could deliver this new ship quickly.

They pushed the technology, and they pushed the calendar, Truver said. They always said, We need it with the speed of heat.

But cutting through red tape turned out to be expensive. Plans were developed on the fly. Senior Navy leaders pushed for design changes, hundreds of them.

The Navy had intended for two builders, Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics, to design and build two prototypes. The Navy would test them and select one builder to produce the entire run of 55 ships.

Lockheed Martin designed a slim steel monohull, while General Dynamics  in partnership with Austal Ltd., an Australian shipbuilder  came up with a futuristic aluminum trimaran. Each company designed separate combat systems.

Instead of choosing between the models the Navy decided in 2010 to build both.

But the troubles just piled up. The Government Accountability Office detailed a long list of failings in February  the latest in a series of critical audits.

Overruns more than doubled the original cost of each ship, from $220 million, to $478 million.

Ship production fell far behind. The first ship was not operational until 2014, seven years behind schedule. The Navy originally expected 55 ships to be delivered by 2018. Although the production run was cut to 35, only 23 have been delivered to date.

The innovative mission modules fell even further behind. All three types were supposed to be operational by 2010. Twelve years later, only one  the surface-warfare module  is in use. The cost ballooned from $36 million to $138 million per package.

Tests found the lightly armored ships would be easy to sink in combat and didnt have enough guns to defend themselves.

The 40-sailor crews proved too small to handle necessary force protection, shore patrol and maintenance duties as well as their regular jobs on the ship, forcing expansion of the crews to 70.

The Independence-class ships (including the USS Omaha) lacked adequate fenders, so their soft aluminum hulls were easily damaged. Hangar doors dont close properly, leaving hangars vulnerable to flooding.

The Freedom-class ships (including the USS Sioux City) have suffered from a defective propulsion system that has caused engine failures on 10 of 11 deployments by the ships to date.

A shortage of spare parts has forced the crews to cannibalize parts from other ships.

What a bloody mess. Its a total boondoggle, said Norman Polmar, a naval analyst, historian, author and adviser to three past Navy secretaries. The mistakes keep getting worse and worse and worse.

The need for a costly fix to the Freedom-class propulsion system led to the decision to mothball the USS Sioux City and eight sister ships  all but one of which are homeported in Mayport, Florida, near Jacksonville. Six new ships already in the pipeline will still be delivered, with the systems redesigned. (The Independence-class ships, including the USS Omaha, are assigned to San Diego.)

The Navy also announced it plans to move the planned anti-submarine warfare mission planned for LCS to another type of ship, making these nine expendable.

This is about opportunity cost, said Rear Adm. John Gumbleton, deputy assistant secretary of the Navy for Budget, noting that the move would save $50 million a year in support costs. It speaks to a return on investment to get at the lethality we need for our near peer competitor.

The USS Sioux City appears to have fared better than some of the other ships in its class. The ship suffered no publicly reported breakdowns while completing three-month deployments to the Caribbean Sea in both 2020 and 2021 for the Miami-based U.S. Southern Command, focusing on drug interdiction. On the 2021 deployment, its crew seized or disrupted the shipment of 3.7 tons of cocaine with a street value estimated at $235 million, according to a Navy press release.

The scrapping of the ships is far from a done deal. Congress must approve the cuts. In the 2022 budget, passed just last month, the Navys request to scrap three littoral combat ships was rejected. Legislators representing the cities whose namesake ships are on the chopping block may be inclined to take a hard look at these plans.

This has a long time to play out, retired Rear Adm. Frank Thorp IV, who co-chaired the USS Sioux Citys commissioning committee in 2018, told the Sioux City Journal. If USS Sioux City and the other Freedom class LCS are approved for decommissioning, it will take some time to make that happen.

Hagel believes the needs of the Navy have to come first. It would be very foolish, he said, to keep operating ships that cant carry out the missions they were built for.

I never made decisions based on who ships were named after, he said. A legitimate question is, should we keep putting money into it, and hope it will get better?

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
2021-04-25 2021-04-26 electronics, hardware

Just to start this off on a fun note: this article is not a review. This fact will become clear later on, but I figured its worth highlighting that just in case somebody finds this text via their search engine of least distrust.

I have one of those laptops lacking a lot of accessory ports. In fact, Im writing this on an Apple MacBook Pro, and all I got was four lousy USB-C ports. If I want to connect pretty much anything, I need some sort of adapter or some sort of hub. USB-C hubs are a great idea: not only do they usually offer a power supply pass-through, but they also allow you to plug in some USB devices, an ethernet cable, and maybe even a monitor. Some even have fancy stuff like an SD card reader or a secondary audio output! And all of that over a single USB-C connection, which makes everything super comfortable if you frequently carry your laptop around your home, but you also have a desk with fixed devices set up.

Unfortunately, since 2018, Ive worked through three USB-C hubs, and theyre all kinda bad. To vent my frustration, I want to share a little rant with yall! So lets start.

Satechi Multiport Adapter V2

So, the first hub in my possession was a Satechi branded one. I bought two of them; one for my desk and one for my cable pouch for mobile use. Mid 2018, I paid around 90 euros each on Amazon. Not particularly cheap, but Satechi is a brand that was and still is sold on the official Apple.com accessory store. Interestingly, Apple still sells one Satechi USB-C hub, but only one model without Ethernet. Youll learn in a bit why I find that notable. But anyway, surely, if I buy something that expensive from a brand even sold by Apple, Ill get something good?

Heres a photo.

[full resolution]

It worked great for about a year or so. Eventually, I experienced frequent HDMI cut-outs, the Ethernet connection was unreliable, and ultimately, both hubs just died. The Ethernet issues were particularly annoying because the hub sometimes decided to downgrade its Gigabit connection to 100baseTX. I didnt notice that too much while browsing, but backups to my NAS, in-home streaming of games,  those applications really suffered. It didnt even tell you that, even if I forced it to 1000baseT in the macOS network preferences, it only ever negotiated 100baseTX. I was able to see that via my switches LEDs and its control panel, but there was no indication to the operating system.

I tested the same hub on my Windows desktop machine, and it sometimes had the same issues there, so I figured it probably was just a hardware issue. One of those hubs landed in a trashcan in some hotel in some large city in the USA, and the other one ended up in a drawer.

For reasons that will become a bit clearer later on, I I destructively took it apart. Heres the PCB.

[full resolution]

To the system, the USB hub in it identified as vendor 0x2109 (VIA Labs, Inc.) , product 0x0817 , which is the USB 3.0 hub used for the three USB ports and the Ethernet interface. Theres also a second USB hub, but only a 2.0 one, same vendor, but 0x2817 as the product ID. That slower hub was used for the SD and microSD card reader.

The Ethernet portion is interesting. Its vendor ID is 0x0bda (Realtek Semiconductor Corp.) , and the product ID 0x8153 . Ah, so its a Realtek RTL8153! I always found Intel NICs to be way more reliable and stable, but okay, thats a reasonably popular chip.

Notable components on the board:

Genesys Logic GL3224 - a card reader chip, doing the SD and microSD support.

Heling MT24-S1T1 - an RJ45 transformer apparently, converting the internal logic levels to something in line with the Ethernet specs.

Parade PS176HDM - a DisplayPort to HDMI converter, used to convert the DisplayPort signals to HDMI .

. Realtek RTL8153B - we already knew that one.

Realtek RTS5411 - a USB 3.0 HUB Controller, looks like this is connected to the SD cards, so thats probably the chip identifying as a Via Labs VL820 here?! Im slightly confused because there is no VL820 on the board. I dont see this Realtek controller showing up anywhere in the running system.

VIA Labs VL102-Q4 - a USB-C DisplayPort alt-mode controller (used to get video signals out of the USB-C port).

VIA Labs VL817-Q7 - a 4-port USB 3.0 hub. Makes sense; three ports are exposed, one is used for the Ethernet port.

A couple of Boyamicro flash chips.

Interesting component selection. Even more interesting, though: the MAC address! Its 48:65:ee:1a:1b:60 , and if you throw that into an OUI lookup database, youll get Gopod Group Limited . Wait what? Thats neither Satechi nor Realtek! So I threw that name into Google. According to their website, Gopod is a company

Specializing in ODM/OEM custom-made mobile & tablets accessories

 oh. If we look around, its easy to notice that the Satechi hub is just a rebranded version of a product still available on their website. Thats actually really disappointing, to be honest. Searching on Aliexpress, I found several USB-C hubs with the same case, same specs, and probably the same components for 10 euros a piece. Paying 90 euros just because some company printed their logo on it feels wrong. Ah, whatever.

As I said, both of those hubs died, so I had to purchase new ones. This time, I went for the

ICY BOX USB-C Dock

Icy Box is a brand of the German RaidSonic Technology GmbH, and I figured buying something sold from a German company is at least an indication that I might get some helpful support if something goes wrong. So, in early 2020, I purchased two of those hubs for 70 euros each on Amazon.

Photos!

[full resolution]

Its very similar to the first one, but this time with a headphone jack and an additional VGA port, I guess if you need to plug in an ancient beamer or something? The headphone jack is actually a headset jack, including a line-in - I only discovered that looking up the datasheets of its components, though.

Unfortunately it did not work too well. I mean, the monitor output and the power pass-through worked fine all the time. However, the Ethernet port caused some issues. Sometimes, the port degraded to 100baseTX and simply refused to do Gigabit ethernet at all, with no indication. Oh no, Ive heard that before Looking at the Ethernet USB interface, this one identified with vendor ID 0x0bda (Realtek Semiconductor Corp.) and product ID 0x8153  yikes, another Realtek RTL8153, with precisely the same issue as my Satechi hubs this isnt great.

This time, I decided to contact the support. I even got a fast response from a RaidSonic staff member with the initials AS. Unfortunately, thats all of the positive things I have to say. In my initial ticket, I explained in much detail that the hub claims its running Gigabit while the switch and the actual connection speed disagree. Ive also mentioned that Ive replaced the Ethernet cable, tried different switch ports, tested the hub on another machine with Windows where the problem sometimes reproduced,  and the first response I got was asking me to replace my cables, try a different switch port, and to reboot my laptop! Oh well, I replied that I already did that. Unfortunately, the conversation didnt really improve afterward. The support staff appeared to just brute-force all the macOS hardware troubleshooting guides (including reset your SMC), completely ignoring the fact that the issue reproduces on multiple machines

They eventually stopped responding, and I stopped pinging them because  the hub wasnt expensive enough to spend more time on that. Since I had two of them, I could just switch out the hub, as the other one pretty much always worked after it had a couple of days of downtime (hey, without resetting my SMC or resetting all my network preferences).

Last week, that little hub may have attempted to destroy my MacBook and burn down my house. Im not even joking! While I was live-streaming and chatting to some friends, my MacBook just took down all its USB ports and displayed the because a USB device was drawing too much power, USB devices have been disabled message. I had nothing else plugged in at that time, so it was clear whats causing it. I re-plugged the hub, rebooted my macOS, unplugged the devices attached to the hub,  nothing worked. Ultimately, I decided to switch out the hub with the second one, and on touching it, I almost burned my hand. At that point, probably 10mins after turning it off, it was still reading 75 degrees on the outside. So thats fun. Clearly, something broke.

In an angry twist, I threw the hub into the bin and purchased a new one (more about that later). Luckily, I still had a second one to temporarily use, which means here are some PCB photos!

[full resolution]

Lets have a look at whats on the board!

C S FS240800005 1944J - I couldnt actually find anything on that chip, but given its placement and connection, thats the RJ45 transformer.

FE1.1S - a USB 2.0 hub controller, looks exclusively for the audio device.

Genesys Logic GL3224 - same card reader chip as seen in the Satechi.

ITE Tech IT6564FN - thats a DisplayPort to HDMI and VGA converter.

Realtek RTL8153 - yeahhh, I knew.

Solid State System SSS1629A5 - the audio controller.

VIA Labs VL102-Q4 - ah yeah, thats also in the Satechi - its the USB DisplayPort alt mode controller.

VIA Labs VL817-Q7 - weve also seen that one before. Its the same USB 3.0 hub.

A couple of Boyamicro flash chips.

So except for the few parts needed for the hardware differences (the additional VGA port and the headset jack), its more or less the same board. In fact, even though the board layout is different, the connections are not really. Almost looks like its based on the same reference design.

You know whats coming next the MAC address. This time, its 34:29:8f:7c:ec:00 , and if you throw that into an OUI database, you get Dongguan Kingtron Electronics Tech Co., Ltd . Thats thats not Icy Box or RaidSonic, is it?

Okay, lets google that one again, and sure enough, according to their website, they are another company building all kinds of rebrandable computer accessories urgh. Browsing their website a bit, I found this hub, which has the same ports, and a few other hubs like this one with a similar case to the Icy Box one. Searching the product name printed on the PCB returned no results, so its possible that RaidSonic customized the hub a bit (take this product and put it in this other case you already have), but thats  still kinda crap?

Again, I found multiple identical-looking products on Aliexpress for 10 to 15 euros. I appear to be paying a lot of money for products that I could buy for cheap on random websites is starting to piss me off a bit at this point. I dont really care about paying too much - Id be perfectly fine with that if the product did its job. Unfortunately, it doesnt do that.

Also, failing in a way that causing some internal short circuit and overheating to a point where it could have actually started a fire is kinda uncool. But maybe thats just me.

Little excursion: The issue with Realtek RTL8153

Ive now had two kinds of hubs from (maybe) different manufactures and different companies selling the stuff. Both had the same networking chip, and unfortunately, the same problem.

As it turns out, Im not the only one with such issues. Even back in 2019, people have complained about problems with RTL8153s on macOS randomly disappearing, dropping 50% of all traffic, dropping down to 100mbit. Searching the apple discussion forums for that chip yields several people having issues, from as early as 2017 to just a couple of days ago. There is even a realtek-rtl-8153-driver-osx-info.md on GitHub Gist which contains some debugging information and, at the time of writing this, 60 comments from people having all sorts of weird issues.

Sometimes, these problems go away by installing Realteks own drivers. However, looking at Realteks official driver download site, macOS users will notice that there actually are no drivers for macOS 11, aka Big Sur. Now, macOS 11 changed a couple of things around how Kernel Extensions work and how they need to be signed, and its easy to blame Apple for that. However, if you are - according to Wikipedia - a two-billion-dollar company like Realtek, then I expect you to get your shit together. There are exactly zero excuses for Realtek to not have a driver release ready almost a year after Big Sur has been announced. Zero.

Now, I dont know exactly whats going on there. It is possible that somehow macOS built-in driver is setting a flag that the RTL8153 really doesnt like and then semi-permanently downgrades to 100mbit until its been out of power for a while. Its possible that the driver isnt even to blame, and its just a hardware issue. You can install the 10.15 macOS drivers on Big Sur if you disable kext signing (which you have to do by disabling the System Integrity Protection, so you should absolutely not do that), but even that didnt immediately fix my issue. I was only testing in a lab environment and didnt have a new hub to test. Who knows whats really going on.

Ultimately, I should not have to care. If you market your device with plug-and-play support for macOS 11 and below, then  it should work. I suspect, however, these issues may also be why Apple is no longer selling any ethernet dongles besides their own on Apple.com - but obviously, well never know what Apple does.

Because one of my Icy Box hubs failed spectacularly and my second one wasnt trustworthy anymore because of that, I had to buy a new hub. This time, I went with

Anker PowerExpand 8-in-1

I only bought one this time you might say that Ive been burned before. Hahaha. Oh god. This one has been relatively cheap at 55 euros on Amazon. It also only has two USB ports, but to make up for it, there are two HDMI ports. Given I have more than one monitor on my desk, thats just about perfect. Ive only had good experiences with Ankers power banks, so that felt like a good purchase overall.

Here are some photos!

[full resolution]

And here, this post ends. Everything is awesome. There is nothing to complain about this hub. Im happy!

Yeah, okay, I know that nobody believed that.

The first time plugging everything in, the hub worked fine. The monitors were working, the Ethernet port managed to send 988mbit, and the SD card reader worked just fine. Unfortunately, looking at the hardware information,  its another Realtek RTL8153  and looking at the MAC address, something deep in my head popped very audibly and pushed me into writing this post. Unfortunately, I decided not to take this one apart, as I wanted to send it back to Amazon, and I knew that there is no way to take it apart without damaging the case. So no PCB photos and no part list this time, Im afraid.

Who am I kidding. Lets throw all reasonability out the window and ruin one more device For Science(tm). Here is the PCB.

[full resolution]

Disassembling this one actually surprised me a bit. Firstly, I managed to get it out of the case without cutting the cable. Even the case is still alive, although its a bit scratched up and slightly deformed, so no way for me to return this. But most interestingly, the case is made of plastic, but the whole PCB assembly is encased in a metal case. I didnt take a good photo of it, but you can see what Im talking about in the glamor-shot arrangement I posted for social media. The case was connected to most of the larger ICs via those blue heatsink pad glue sponge thingies. Also, the solder mask is green, which is fantastic .

We already know that theres an RTL8153 on the board, but lets look at the other components. Its worth noting that everything was super hard to read. It almost felt like they had a lousy attempt at lasering off the labels (they sometimes do that for funny reasons), but its probably just caused by the heatsink pads. Heres whats on the board:

AppS G2401CG - while I couldnt actually find the AppS company, that chip is another RJ45 transformer.

Genesys Logic GL3224 - the card reader chip weve seen twice already.

Realtek RTL8153 - oh well.

Southchip SC8903QDHR - a buck converter, but with four MOSFETs embedded to implement some basic power management.

Synaptics VMM5200 - the DisplayPort to dual-HDMI converter. Actually, a good one, because it supports 4K 60fps on both channels, not just on one. Also, fun fact: firmware upgradeable over I2C.

VIA Labs VL103-Q4 - weve seen the VL102-Q4 in the other hubs, and the VL103 also is a USB alt-mode controller.

VIA Labs VL817-Q7 - our old friend, the USB 3 hub.

A couple of flash chips from Fudan Micro, Macronix, and Puya.

This one is interesting. We can see a couple of our old friends, but also a couple of new components. Although I have no idea if/how power management is actually implemented, the buck converter is interesting. Also, the Synaptics video interface seems to be quite well picked here and delivers adequate performance. The case design is odd; I dont know how effective their thermal management is if they enclose the metal body in plastic, but hey.

You kinda already know what happens if I check the MAC address. This time, its a0:ce:c8:e4:4d:d4 , which resolves to Ce Link Limited . On their website, they call themselves the leading manufacturer with strong R&D team and they sell, well, rebrandable computer accessories. Not only USB-C hubs, though, but also lots of power banks that look suspiciously like Ankers entire product lineup. I could not find the exact model on CE-Links website, but it seems like the Anker hub is the love-child of this and this hub. And once again, you can find practically identical products on Aliexpress for really cheap.

Ugh.

Conclusion

At this point, I dont really know what to say. It honestly feels like no matter what you buy, you get more or less the same hardware, and youre most likely getting a heavily overpriced product just because some company printed their logo on it.

Outsourcing your production to China and even outsourcing/moving your R&D to local people with lots of experience in part sourcing and manufacturing is one thing. There are a lot of great arguments for it, and Im generally supportive of that. However, I cant help but feel a little bit cheated by companies just buying off-the-shelf products, slightly modifying the case layout, and then quadruple the price because its from a reputable company.

Im slightly concerned about the fact that some of the products use electrolytic capacitors. Those hubs get pretty warm, even if youre not routing your laptops power through the hub, and electrolytic capacitors dont like warm environments, and thatll significantly shorten their life. However, thats probably negligible, since lots of resistors are also designed just barely around their load ratings, all the chips run amazingly hot,  it just feels like another product family intended to be used barely one year until it dies, just to end up in the landfill.

The fact that most USB-C hubs tend to use the same RTL8153 networking stack is also very annoying, especially since this is known to break on macOS, and it looks like Realtek just doesnt care. Thats not really great if youre promoting your hub primarily to MacBook owners. And the fact that most of those quirks (especially the silent network downgrade) are things that most people wont even notice, those companies appear to be getting away with it just fine - its not like one annoying blog post and a couple of nerds complaining online is going to change anything.

Personally, Ive now purchased the Elgato Thunderbolt 3 Pro hub, a not-mobile Thunderbolt hub. The good news is that its an actual Thunderbolt device; it comes with its own beefy power supply that can even charge my power-hungry laptop, the NIC in it appears to be an Intel NIC, and they at least bothered to get their own MAC OUI. Ive seen a couple of those desktop Thunderbolt hubs on the OEMs websites, so I wouldnt be surprised if the Elgato hub is also just another off-the-shelf product, but at least they cared enough to make it less obvious. They also offer a mini hub, which might be suitable for traveling - but at around 100 euros, I just dont feel like buying (and destroying while opening) another piece of hardware. So Ill probably just keep using the Anker hub until it dies.

If you are in the market for a new USB-C hub, then well, Im sorry. I cant tell you what to buy. Its probably not the worst idea just to buy a couple of cheap hubs on eBay and Aliexpress, see which one works the best, and keep the others around as backups. Chances are high youll get the same hardware as the one in the expensive hubs anyway. If you buy the branded version of those off-the-shelf products, you might get devices that have passed additional quality control measurements. You might have an easier time returning them or getting in touch with the support folks if something goes wrong, but in my humble opinion, its hard to say if thats worth the massive markup. Id also say avoid the RTL8153 at all costs, but given that chip appears to be everywhere good luck with that!

Okay, I vented enough.

Amendments
OTTAWA  In 1858, an estimated 10,000 people gathered in Ottawa to hear the first Lincoln-Douglas debate. You can walk in their footsteps, viewing statues and a mural commemorating that event, enjoy other murals downtown, see the last remaining toll collectors house along the Illinois and Michigan canal and ride or hike along the I&M Canal State Trail.

Ottawa is a true immigrant community. People came from all over the world to forge their path, to succeed, prosper and live a better life, said Thomas Aussem of Awesome Ottawa Tours.

Aussem said his tours focus on people and achievements, tragedy and triumphs. He notes that Ottawa was a major hub on the Underground Railroad. In addition to parks within the city along the Fox and Illinois rivers, it is close to Buffalo Rock, Starved Rock and Matthiessen state parks.

The I&M Canal ran 96 miles from Chicago to Peru, starting in 1848 and remaining in use for about 50 years. The adjacent tow path, once used by mules and horses to tow barges in the canal, has been developed into a recreational path for hiking and biking. The recreation trail covers about 61 miles.

Most of the trail is a crushed rock or packed dirt surface, better suited to a hybrid or mountain bike than a narrow-tired road bike.

Sign posts along the way provide not only mileage but informative facts about the trail. For example, a sign at Mile 79 tells you that several women worked as locktenders, including one who operated Lock 11 on the west edge of Ottawa, for 19 years.

A good place to start you exploration of the trail in Ottawa is at the I&M Canal Toll House, 1221 Columbus St., Ottawa.

Volunteers are present from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. April through October to show you the inside of the building, explain canal operations and answer questions. Theres even a model of a lock inside to show how those worked, and a replica of a barge outside.

There once were four toll houses where fees were collected based on the amount and type of cargo being carried or number of passengers, explained Arnie Bandstra, president of the Ottawa Canal Association. This is the only one left.

This building is believed to date back to 1849.

Our purpose is to preserve, restore and promote the I&M Canal within Ottawa, he said.

The I&M Canal and a feeder canal that brought water from the Fox River to maintain water levels in the I&M Canal were keys to the development of Ottawa.

Barges carried things like grain, coal, stone of various kinds and food products like barreled pork, salt, just about anything that could be put in a barrel, said Bandstra.

Aussem says, The I&M canal is the only reason Ottawa is here.

Even if you visit on day when the toll house isnt open, it is still interesting to see the historic structure and the barge replica outside.

Plans are in the works to rewater a portion of the old canal in Ottawa to allow for kayaking and canoeing.

From the toll house, head east about a mile to cross the Fox River on a bridge. This is where the canal was carried over the river by an aqueduct. Continue as far as you like before turning around.

You may also want to stop at Fox River Park, next to the trail at the aqueduct bridge.

Going west from the toll house, you will find the remains of Lock 11. Although the gates are gone, the stonework is still visible.

Buffalo Rock State Park is about 5 miles from Ottawa along the canal trail.

The portion of the trail through Ottawa is more urban and industrial than, for example, the section from Utica to LaSalle. But you will still see birds, trees and  soon  wildflowers. And I was serenaded by a chorus of frogs during my bike ride the last week of March.

After your ride or walk along the trail, go into the downtown area to see the many murals, including one commemorating the Lincoln-Douglas debate. Washington Square, at the corner of LaSalle and West Jackson streets, has statues of Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas.

The downtown also has an eclectic mix of restaurants and shops, including antique stores.

For more information, contact the Ottawa Visitors Center at 815-434-2737 or check out these websites: www.pickusottawail.com and www.awesomeottawatours.com. A video on the building of the I&M canal is called Prairie Tides and includes the replica barge in Ottawa. There is also a book by Tom Willcockson titled Passage to Chicago: A Journey on the Illinois & Michigan Canal in the Year 1860."

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
PANA  A man wanted for a double homicide in Collinsville has died after leading multiple police agencies on a chase Saturday afternoon that ended with a shooting on U.S. 51 in Christian County.

In a press conference early Sunday evening, Maj. Jeff Connor, chief deputy with the Madison County Sheriff's Office, said a 911 call was received at 10:26 a.m. Saturday by the Collinsville Police Department and routed to the Madison County Sheriff's Department. During the call, a female could be heard screaming in the background, followed by the sound of gunshots, Connor said.

Because sheriff's deputies were already on the scene of another unrelated incident, the Collinsville Police Department was first to arrive on the scene, where they found two deceased females outside of a home at 1075 McDonough Lake Road in unincorporated Collinsville, Connor said.

The women have been identified as Jamie L. Joiner, 30, who lived at the residence, and her sister, Jessica Joiner, 34, who had flown in the day before from California, according to Connor. Both were found with gunshot wounds to the head and neck areas, he said. A family dog had also been shot and was found deceased.

The man suspected in the shooting was identified as Adam Cobb, 32, also of the residence on McDonough Lake Road, Connor said.

During the news conference, Connor said Jamie Joiner and Adam Cobb were going through a separation, and Jessica Joiner had come to help her sister move out of the residence. A U-Haul arrived at the residence and a disturbance ensued, in which Cobb shot both women and the dog, then fled the scene, Connor said.

At about 11:14 a.m. Saturday, the Illinois State Police Collinsville Communications Center sent information via the ISP Emergency Radio Network about a subject, now identified as Adam Cobb, wanted by the Madison County Sheriff's Office for the double homicide in Collinsville, according to a news release issued by the Illinois State Police.

Shortly after 1 p.m., local law enforcement spotted Cobb's vehicle heading north on Route 127 near Hillsboro in Montgomery County, ISP stated. A pursuit began after officers attempted a traffic stop, and they were later joined by ISP troopers. The pursuit continued on Illinois 16, passing through Nokomis and into Christian County, which is when the Christian County Sheriff's Office also assisted in attempting to pull Cobb over, Sheriff Bruce Kettelkamp said. The pursuit continued north onto U.S. 51.

At about 1:53 p.m., Cobb's vehicle became partially disabled and came to a stop on U.S. 51 just north of Pana, the ISP release stated. Cobb exited the vehicle and pointed a firearm in the direction of an ISP trooper, the news release continued. The ISP trooper discharged their duty weapon in the direction of the suspect.

Kettelkamp confirmed the subject was shot and apprehended before being airlifted to a Springfield-area hospital. ISP said Saturday night that the subject was being treated for serious, life-threatening injuries. Cobb was pronounced dead at 4:40 a.m. Sunday, Connor said.

No officers or other individuals were injured in the Christian County incident, Kettelkamp said.

"I believe that law enforcement conducted themselves in a professional manner and did the right thing," he said.

Connor said Madison County will continue to investigate the case, but he added that there were no witnesses to the double homicide, which occurred in a rural area, and that all parties involved in Saturday's incident in Collinsville are now deceased.

"This is just a tragic event, and our thoughts and prayers go out to the Joiner family, and also to the Cobb family," Connor said during the press conference. "Several families' lives have been turned upside down because of these events."

Special agents of the ISP Division of Internal Investigation continue to investigate the shooting in Christian County, while the Madison County Sheriffs Office is handling the double homicide in the Collinsville area.

Contact Robyn Skaggs at (309) 820-3244.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Two old friends of mine once sat on opposite ends of the political spectrum. One used to be pro-American  a liberal Cold Warrior and defender of the Vietnam War. The other was very much in the leftist camp, a lifelong opponent of American imperialism and a committed anti-Zionist. Both are now keen promoters of Vladimir Putins propaganda: Ukraine is a U.S. puppet state dominated by Nazis, Putin is a man of peace, Russia must defend itself against a warmongering North Atlantic Treaty Organization and so forth.

One could easily dismiss their blog posts and YouTube performances as the rantings of bitter old men. But that wont quite do. For their views echo those of prominent politicians on the far reaches of both left and right. And they are amplified in major media such as Fox News as well as, of course, on countless social media outlets well beyond the United States and Europe.

Until quite recently, far-right French presidential candidate Eric Zemmour called Putin a brave nationalist defending his country against NATO. I would dream of a French Putin, he once said. His far-left rival Jean-Luc Melenchon defended Russian atrocities in Syria and blamed NATO for the invasion of Ukraine.

Former President Donald Trump famously called Putin a genius. Tucker Carlson, the political showman of Fox News, described Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as an obedient puppet of the  State Department, praised Putin as a defender of white Christian values and repeated Russian propaganda about U.S. biological warfare labs in Ukraine.

What possesses these parrots of Putins propaganda? For the most part, their defense of the indefensible has less to do with any real love for Putin or Russia than with domestic politics. Zemmour wants to be the French Putin. Melenchon wants France to leave NATO.

Carlson and his hero Trump hate President Joe Biden so much that they will defend his greatest enemy. In this, they resemble the America Firsters in the 1930s, who saw Franklin D. Roosevelt as a more dangerous enemy than Adolf Hitler.

Even noxious ideas sometimes contain a kernel of truth. Americas catastrophic wars in the Middle East, touted by Republicans as well as hawkish Democrats as great battles for democracy, were dreadful mistakes. Poor Americans rightly resented the politicians who sent them to fight abroad. That helps explain why NATO, which once had bipartisan support, is now viewed on the Trumpist right with almost as much hostility as it is on the anti-imperialist left.

Yet the most important thing extremists on either side of the political spectrum have in common is a sense of deep self-pity. In their minds, they are always being marginalized, or dominated or threatened by a seemingly omnipotent establishment. In the U.S., inevitably, race plays a large role in such feelings, though for opposite reasons on the left and right.

Both Putin and Trump like to portray themselves as victims  or, at least, as leaders who speak for the victims of liberal elites, arrogant internationalists, critical race theorists or people who fail to respect Russian or American greatness.

Real victims exist, of course. But when powerful men exploit a fear of impotence to stoke popular anger, it becomes a dangerous force, for it is always bent on vengeance. When there is vengeance, there will always be blood.

Ian Buruma is professor of human rights at Bard College.

Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
100 years ago

April 4, 1922: Ralph Hawthorne and S. J. Curlee, both of Bloomington, have the Lesher Drug Co. in Galesburg. Leshers is one of Galesburgs oldest drug stores. The two now run the Curlee Drug Co. in Bloomington. Curlee will tend store here while Hawthorne goes to Galesburg.

75 years ago

April 4, 1947: Omaha police arrested Carl Pruett, wanted in Normal for passing bad checks. Business owners have all signed warrants asking Pruetts return to face charges. But Lincoln, Nebraska has first crack at him. He faces sentencing there for running a confidence game.

50 years ago

April 4, 1972: The McLean village board voted down a proposal to contract with the sheriffs department for police protection. The main factor in the decision was the cost. Meanwhile McLean is moving ahead with plans to hire its own town marshal and to buy a police car.

25 years ago

April 4, 1997: Murder suspect Willie Freight Train Gautney, 75, has died in a Kansas mental hospital. Gautney was a suspect in the murder of a Bloomington boy and a Pekin boy in 1978. He was also implicated in a similar Topeka, Kansas crime, where police had the strongest case.

Compiled by Jack Keefe; jkeefe@coldwellhomes.com.
 Flash

European experts have spoken highly of the 23rd China-European Union (EU) leaders' meeting held on Friday, during which Chinese President Xi Jinping met via video link with President Charles Michel of the European Council and President Ursula von der Leyen of the European Commission.



Experts and scholars applauded Xi's remarks on China-EU relations and the Ukraine crisis, saying that the meeting has provided strategic guidance for sustained and sound development of the China-EU relationship, while adding stability and positive energy to a turbulent world.

Frederic Baldan, CEO of Belgian consulting company CEBiz, said he appreciates Xi's remarks on the development of China-EU relations.

China's proposal "meets the interests of the European people" and would benefit the world, Baldan told Xinhua on Saturday.

Leon Laulusa, executive vice president of the Paris-based ESCP Business School, said China and the EU are "two key players" on the international stage, and that their roles "are therefore essential to ensure world peace and security."

China and the EU have cooperated for many years, especially in the areas of peace, security, prosperity, sustainable development and people-to-people exchanges, said Laulusa.

Bernard Accoyer, former president of the French National Assembly, called himself "a defender of friendship" between the EU and China, noting that the "friendship is essential for progress in any field" regarding China-EU cooperation.

Timo Vuori, director of International Trade and Trade Policy, the Confederation of Finnish Industries, said "it is important that leaders of the EU and China have regular high-level political dialogue," as China and Europe are "close trading partners."



The virtual meeting on Friday "is just one but important milestone in our dialogue which must continue in the future at all levels," Vuori said, adding that the two sides can overcome various challenges they face via "open dialogue and committed common action."

Uros Lipuscek, a Slovenian political scientist, told Xinhua that "neither the EU nor China as two leading economic partners can progress without increased cooperation on all levels," adding that China and the EU "need a new pragmatic approach" to promote cooperation.

Horst Loechel, a professor at the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management, said the EU and China, being each other's important trading partners, should develop their trade ties further "in the benefit of the people and the companies."



"A closer relationship between the EU and China will maintain and perhaps even leverage the economic benefits for Europe and China as well ... it will make a significant contribution to global political and economic stability in difficult times," said Loechel.

Xulio Rios, director of the Observatory of Chinese Politics in Spain, said both Europe and China hope the Ukraine crisis can "cease as soon as possible," and they should work together with other members of the international community for a diplomatic solution to the crisis and lay the foundation for a European security architecture.
Huawei Ghana has donated ICT devices and equipment worth GHC 125,000 to facilitate the teaching and learning of students living with hearing loss at the Mampong Akuapem Senior High Technical School for the Deaf in the Eastern Region of Ghana.



The items donated to the school included; 7 HD projectors to facilitate digital teaching, 2 pieces of 65 inches Television Sets, 2 sets of Public Address systems, 20 desktop computers and 20 pairs of Office Desks and Chairs.



The donation which affirms the leading ICT Companys commitment to promoting inclusive education for all at all levels was aimed at giving the hearing impaired students at Mampong Akuapem an opportunity to enhance their skills with a more practical learning experience. It will also seek to facilitate the overall teaching and learning processes of the school.



Speaking during the ceremony, the Director of Public and Government Affairs at Huawei Ghana, Mrs., Jenny Zhou, mentioned that as a company, Huawei prioritizes social contributions geared towards ICT and Education and as a result will continue to consciously invest in more of such initiatives to help in the development of inclusive education the country.



She disclosed that Huawei is currently working with UNESCO and the Ministry of Education through the Ghana Education Service (GES) and partners in Ghana to implement the pilot of the Technology Enabled Open School System (TeOSS) through which robust systems that can connect schools and home-based learning at the Basic School level are being built to ensure the continuity and quality of learning under normal or crisis situations.



I am happy to say that we have included the Akropong School for the Blind or the Visually Impaired as we like to call it, as part of the first beneficiaries for the project and our team of Engineers and Project coordinators from Huawei UNESCO, GES and CENDLOS have visited the school for a comprehensive assessment and site survey.



According to her, Huaweis just ended the Seeds for the Future Women in Tech program also for the first time in Ghana also saw the successful participation of a female student with a hearing impairment who impressively emerged as one of the top scorers and best participants during the training.



Mrs. Zhou, in line with this, encouraged the students to avoid being defined by any predicament and never give up in pursuing their dream as there are endless and equal opportunities out there for them.



The Deputy Minister of Education, Rev Ntim Fordjour, commended Huawei and other supporting companies like Meinergy Technologies and Green House International for their benevolence.



According to him, between 2017 and 2020, a total of 2009 infrastructure projects were initiated by H.E. Nana Addo Dankwa Akuffo-Addos government out of which 70% have since been completed and handed over with the rest at various are stages of completion and as such, the gesture by the three companies is a step in the right direction.



He, therefore, called on other corporate players to also augment on the effort government is putting in place to provide support for special students in education to ensure that every child in Ghana has equal access to quality education.



The Eastern Regional Minister, Hon. Seth Kwame Acheampong, commended Huawei, Meinergy Technology and Green House International for supporting them in the delivery of their community service to the students and management of Mampong Akuapem Senior High Technical School for the Deaf. He encouraged the students to learn more and enjoy the nurturing they are being given as disability is no disadvantage in our local community today.

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 public relations officer of the ministry of education of Ghana, Kwasi Kwarteng has donated food items to the Muslim community within the Asante Akyim North municipal, Domeabra to be precise in the early hours of April 3, 2022.



The donation was made to support the Muslim community as they commence this years Ramadan.



The food items donated included bags of rice ,gallons of oil,packets of spaghetti,cups of sugar,tins of mackerel and sachets of tomato paste.



In attendance to support the presentation were representatives of the Hudai foundation,the traditional council of domeabra,the assembly members and members of the community.



The Krontihene (nana afum agyarko) who spoke on behalf of the community commended Kwasi Kwarteng and Hudai and was grateful for their kind gesture and entreated them to make this a stepping stone to more greater opportunities.



He further used the opportunity to request for a library facility and an Islamic school within the community.



The chief imam Suleiman musah who received the items on behalf of the aged expressed his profound gratitude to Kwasi Kwarteng and The entire Hudai Foundation.



Walui Nambe the assistant project coordinator assured them of Hudais unflinching support to the community going forward.

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
Prestigious property investment developers, Lakeside Village yesterday held a diplomatic dinner at the residence of the France Ambassador in Accra.



The well organized event was under the distinguished patronage of the French Ambassador to Ghana, Her Excellency Anne Sophie Ave, who in collaboration with @twinsdntbeg presented the TwinsDntBeg Premier Photo Exhibition & Creative Showcase and dinner night.



The night of artistic displays, diplomatic and business conversation saw patons watching and admiring the plethora of beautiful handiworks of the twin photographers at gallery.



The Second Lady Mrs Samira Bawumia was among the high profile personalities who graced the event.



Also in attendance for the well attended show were members from the Diplomatic Corp, top business executives, politicians and other high profile personalities.



The Second Lady lauded the organizers of the top notch event, Lakeside Village for their delivery and celebrating the works of the young gifted photographers.



In like manner, the France Ambassador commended the organizers and the twins for following their passion with keen interest.



The event was climaxed with the cutting of a special birthday cake donated by the Second Lady to twinzdntbeg to mark their birthday which coincided with the event.



The Second Lady said, "I am happy to be part of your success story, you have worked hard, happy birthday, I am proud of you."









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 acting mission Director United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Ghana, Janean Davis, has announced $24.7 million in new funding to Ghana to support vaccination efforts nationwide as part of the Initiative for Global Vaccine Access (Global VAX).



The funding, provided through USAID will accelerate the delivery of safe and effective COVID-19 vaccinations in every part of Ghana.



The acting mission Director also announced the recent arrival of nearly two million more Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines, which arrived in Ghana the week of March 21.



Since September 2021, the United States has donated more than 9.6 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to Ghana, representing more than 30 percent of all vaccines available in Ghana. Worldwide, the United States has donated more than 500 million vaccine doses, including 144 million doses to 43 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa.



Speaking at an event at the Ridge hospital, Janean Davis indicated that the bottom line is that vaccines are safe, effective, and readily available in Ghana".



However, the donation of vaccines are not enough. Thats why, today, I am excited to announce on behalf of the U.S. government, an additional $24.7 million dollars to Ghana to accelerate the delivery of safe and effective COVID-19 vaccinations as part of Global VAX, she added.



The Director General of the Ghana Health Service Dr. Patrick Kuma-Aboagye and other Ghana Health Service officials joined USAID Ghana Acting Mission Director Janean Davis at the Greater Accra Regional (Ridge) Hospital to make the announcement.



The group toured the hospitals maternity ward, emphasizing the need for expecting mothers to get vaccinated as well.



GLOBAL VAX



Global VAX is a U.S. Government effort to contribute to the global goal to vaccinate 70% of the population of every country against COVID-19 in 2022. It is a whole-of-government approach that builds on the extraordinary commitment President Biden has made to donate more than 1.2 billion vaccine doses by the end of 2022 and intensifies efforts to get shots in arms.



It also encompasses the U.S. Governments work with more than 100 countries in every region of the world to increase uptake of COVID-19 vaccines. It will also incorporate an intensive surge of financial, technical, and diplomatic engagement in an initial group of countries with both significant need and potential for rapid progress, with an initial focus on sub-Saharan Africa.













Source: Isaac Kwame Owusu/Peacefmonline/[email protected]









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
The Chairman of the Appiatse Support Fund Committee, Rev. Dr. Joyce Aryee says the over GHc35 Million received as donations to the Appiatse Support Fund is not sufficient to rebuild the community.



According to her, although it is not sufficient, she is, however, grateful to all contributors for their enormous contributions so far.



Addressing Journalists in Accra on Monday, she said "This amount notwithstanding, we are far from reaching what we would call sufficient funds. This is because the extent of damage to the Appiatse Township cannot be overemphasized and this amount raised so far will not be adequate"



Dr. Joyce Aryee made this declaration when the Appiatse Support Fund Committee held a Press Briefing on Monday, 4th April, 2022 to among others update the general public on funds received so far and to deliberate on how to develop concrete proposals for soliciting more funds to be able to support the project which is set to begin by end of April 2022.



She also stated clearly that the monies collected does not include the 5 million dollar fine allotted to Maxam Company to pay into the fund, disclosing that Maxam is yet to pay that Fine through the Minerals Commission.



She further opined that, for the purpose of utmost transparency, the committee will at an appropriate time, make available to the Press and the general public the list of Corporate Institutions and Patriotic Individuals who have donated both in cash and kind to the fund and captured in the Bank Statements of the Fund.



The Chairman of the Support Fund Committee, Rev. Dr. Joyce Aryee also made a passionate appeal to all who are yet to donate, to do so and enable a fast and steady reconstruction of the town in order to ensure that the people of Appiatse, are relieved from the untold hardship and damage to their properties.



"We are still insisting on our hashtag: obiara entuabi to enable us to make this project a reality"



She hoped that every means available will be employed to equip the Reconstruction Implementation Team with the requisite funds to construct an Eco-Friendly, Green and Sustainable town that is energy efficient while reecohing the account details to the support fund.



"Monetary contributions may be deposited in the name of APPIATSE SUPPORT FUND at GCB Bank account number 1011130036123 or Stanbic Bank account Number 9040009974967 and We encourage you to kindly send your donations through MTN, Vodafone, AirtelTigo to G-Cash short code *422*530# or Stanbic short code *718*25*096#"



She expressed her profound gratitude on behalf of her team and the people of Appiatse to all those who have donated and assured us that her Committee will work collaboratively with the Reconstruction Implementation Committee to bring Appiatse back on its feet.



The Deputy Minister for Lands and Natural Resources and Chairman of the Appiatse Reconstruction Implementation Team who joined the ASF for the Briefing further explained that the amount of work to be done at Appiatse would determine the exact amount the Fund would need to raise for completion of the project.



He asked Ghanaians through the media to be patient while they put together an inventory to know how much will be needed, adding that the exact quotation of the amount will also depend on the contractor who is awarded the contract to reconstruct the community.



Mr. Blankson Hermans, a member of the Appiatse Reconstruction Implementation Team and a representative from the Ghana Institute of Architects gave a summary of the activities of the Reconstruction Implementation Committee, to give the media and Ghanaians a fair idea of the work done so far.



"For the time period that we've been working, we've come up with a land-use plan which was developed by the Land Use and Spatial Planning Authority. It forms the basis for the design that will be used for the provision of the housing and commercial facilities for the community" He said



"So we've inspected a root going through the main town and out of it, we've got about 120 of 126 bedroom houses to reconstruct. But essentially, as we develop, what we are doing now is to start with the road networks by April ending and we hope to meet that deadline" he concluded.























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
General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress, Johnson Asiedu Nketia, believes all roads in Ghana should be completed by now if President Akufo Addo's claim to have constructed over ten thousand kilometers of road network across the country is anything to go by.



To him, the President appears to be a windbag and bent on making mockery of the intelligence of Ghanaians, since an asphalt overlay, does not constitute road construction.



"Ten thousand kilometers of road is just like doing a trip to London and back.



"There are a lot of roads in this country that have not been constructed. Farmers are finding it difficult to even transport their farm produce from their farms to the various markets and you claim to have constructed 10,000km of road net work in the country.



"Roads are not projects that can be hidden so just give Ghanaians proof of the road network you have constructed and we will verify. But I can tell you that the NDC under president John Dramani Mahama alone constructed more roads than all Akufo-Addo's years in office as president.



".....am very sure the president does not know what it means to construct 10,000km of roads and i think that's why he was tickling himself, and being such a braggart" he said in an interview on OkayFM's "Ade Akye Abia" show.



The NDC General Secretary further accused the current government of having "borrowed over GHS300 billion and yet has nothing to show for it in terms of infrastructure".



He pointed out that even the Tamale interchange in the Northern region that was commissioned last week by the president was constructed in phases and has not been fully completed.



This government is on record to have declared year of roads since 2019 and yet Ghanaians are still complaining about the state of their bad roads," he added.



Watch Video Below







My government has constructed over 10,000 kilometres of new roads since 2017'  Akufo-Addo



The President of the Republic, H.E Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has indicated that his government has constructed over 10,000 kilometres of new roads since 2017.



According to the President, more roads have been built, improved, and upgraded in the last five years of his administration than any other government in the history of the country.



It is in the road sector that we have registered the greatest infrastructure achievement. I know that the word unprecedented is often used with careless abandon in our public discourse, but I use it carefully and purposefully. In the five years of my government, so far, more roads have been built, improved and upgraded than at any other equivalent period under any government in the history of Ghana.



Some ten thousand, eight hundred and seventy-five (10,875) kilometres of new roads have been constructed in these five (5) years, H.E Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo said during a state of the nations address on Wednesday, March 30, 2022, in Parliament.



Having commissioned the Tamale interchange on Tuesday, the President told Parliament it was the most satisfying birthday present for him that day.









10,000 kilometres of New Roads Constructed since 2017?



Last week, the President of the Republic indicated that his government has constructed over 10,000 kilometres of new roads since 2017.



According to the President, more roads have been built, improved, and upgraded in the last five years of his administration than any other government in the history of the country.



It is in the road sector that we have registered the greatest infrastructure achievement. I know that the word unprecedented is often used with careless abandon in our public discourse, but I use it carefully and purposefully. In the five years of my government, so far, more roads have been built, improved and upgraded than at any other equivalent period under any government in the history of Ghana.



Some ten thousand, eight hundred and seventy-five (10,875) kilometres of new roads have been constructed in these five (5) years, H.E Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo said during a state of the nations address on Wednesday, March 30, 2022, in Parliament.







Source: Isaac Kwame Owusu/Peacefmonline/[email protected]









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
STC Chief Executive Officer, Nana Akomea, has asked former President John Mahama to elevate his debate and speak like a Statesman.



This follows John Mahama's critique of the Judiciary at the United States Chapter of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) at Bentley University on Sunday, March 27, 2022.



He said the NDC has a problem with the judiciary.



We do have problems with the judiciary, I must say. I think that it is necessary for some internal reforms to take place there. It is necessary for the Chief Justice or whoever is responsible to make some reforms. Most of the governance institutions have been politicized. I give the example of the judiciary. It is only in Ghana that a Supreme Court will make a decision that a birth certificate is not proof of citizenship.



There are many such funny judgements that have been given. I remember at one time, our colleague Professor Raymond Atuguba said that from a research he had done, judges turn to give their judgements in favour of the political party or leader that appointed them. He was subjected to such a whirlwind of indignation by the judiciary but if you bring it down to what is happening today, and you look at it and see who appointed who, you will find that there was some truth in the research.



The thing is, our constitution gives security of tenure to judges. Once you have been appointed you cannot be removed. That is why we give security of tenure so that you will have the courage no matter who appointed you to give judgement according to your conscience. That is what our judges should do. They must rise up to the occasion, he said.



Speaking to Kwami Sefa Kayi on Peace FM's Morning show 'Kokrokoo' Nana Akomea asked the former President to be consistent and avoid making comments that "can easily be seen as Hypocrisy".



"What Mahama said about the Judiciary is not good . . . I just don't understand. I'll plead with the former President; you're a Statesman. let your words bring us together not the one that can easily be seen as hypocrisy. He has to elevate his debate," to told the former President.



Listen to him in the video below





Source: Peacefmonline.com









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
NPP MP for Nhyiaeso Constituency, Dr Stephen Amoah says some words he used to describe Ghanas ailing economy were unacceptable and unfortunate.



He has, however, rendered an unqualified apology to that effect and maintained, such mistake will not happen again.



Dr Stephen Amoah whiles discussing issues concerning Ghanas economy described the current state of the economy to a child diagnosed with sickle cell disease.



His comment has been condemned by many including the Sickle Life and Sickle Cell Awareness Initiative (SCAI).



The SCAI said the comment was sensitive.



However, Dr Stephen Amoah in an interview with NEAT FMs morning show, 'Ghana Montie', retracted and apologised for the comments made.



I am sorry, he said.

Source: King Edward Ambrose Washman Addo/peacefmonline.com/ghana









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
A leading member of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Dr Kwabena Duffuor, is set to launch an NDC grassroots empowerment and self-financing project dubbed the NDC Ahot Project for the grassroots.



Ahot means relief in the Akan language.



In a statement, the project manager stated that the former Governor of the Bank of Ghana, who is one of Ghanas few business magnates, makes it clear that the main aim of the project is geared toward setting up micro-businesses in all the 275 constituencies in order to create the much-needed but currently unavailable local funding for the day-to-day running of the NDC party at the grassroots level.



This initiative, according to the statement, is a direct response to the recommendations of a business feasibility studies commissioned by Dr Duffuor and carried out by a team across the country.



It was to establish the most feasible and sustainable business idea capable of helping to finance the NDC party activities at the local level, the statement said.



The former finance minister in the erstwhile NDC government of Professor Evans Atta Mills, the statement noted, bemoans the present situation where the responsibility of raising resources for grassroots activities of the NDC is either left in the hands of branch and constituency executives whose work for the party is purely voluntary, thus, affecting their personal businesses and families; or in the hands of sitting MPs who are also overwhelmed by financial demands of their constituents, is not a sustainable way for financing a modern-day political organisation.



This project, which is yet to be implemented, is meant to lessen the burden on MPs, relieve local executives of the huge financial difficulties they face in running the party, the statement clarified.



It is believed that the NDC Ahot Project will create a medium for the local party machinery to be financially self-sustaining through regular income streams to help support their ongoing initiatives.



It is also to empower and reposition the NDC and make it battle-ready for election 2024 and beyond, the statement explained.



According to the project manager, the NDC Ahot Project will mainly be about micro-businesses focusing on social events such as funerals, naming ceremonies, marriage ceremonies, durbars, political campaigns, and rallies, which are mostly outdoor activities.



The nature of these activities places high demands on the use of plastic chairs, canopies, public address systems, power generators, podiums, and mobile toilets among others.



A local rental business of the accessories owned and run by the party at various constituency levels, will create employment opportunities and generate income which will bring relief (Ahot) to the grassroots, the statement mentioned.



Dr Kwabena Duffuor is, therefore, sponsoring and financing all the 275 constituencies with all the equipment and accessories necessary to set up a rental business.



The pilot phase of the project is set to be launched at the Ashaiman Constituency in the Greater Accra Region on Thursday, 7 April.

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 selection of executives mandated by the partys constitution is due and NPP - UK branch is will soon be at the polls.



It is interesting to note that the NPP UK branch in its history will have the first young woman aspirant contesting for the seat of 2nd vice-chair.



Rosemary Afia Animwaa Agyemang popularly known in party circles as Afia NPP is diligent with an affable personality who has served this great tradition since her school days; she was the womens organiser 2008 (Tescon Knust), Treasurer (NUGS KNUST), Deputy Electoral commissioner (National NUGS Congress 2010 Wa), Research/Special Assistant in parliament, Polling Agent, was of various committees, and has contributed towards many courses in the party.



Afia believes female representation on the executive board is not something the party can boast about as a premier branch in the diaspora hence her resolve to contest in this election to encourage other women who feel they can serve with their skills in the day-to-day development task at hand and ultimately to help contribute to nation-building.



She has been a part of grassroots since school days, participated in the adoption of polling stations, campaign team member, a polling agent, participated in donation events etc.



When given the nod, she is poised to work towards the acquisition of an ultramodern office space that will serve members in this jurisdiction. She also believes effective communication and mobilisation through the use of social media and the adoption of digitalisation will boost activities and as well help in record keeping and serve as a repository of information for the next generation.



She is confident that her election will inspire other women to take up the mantle of leadership to bring their best in support of the New patriotic party and the people.



She is hereby counting on all voters to let the feminine voice be heard at the table of men in NPP UK.









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
Plateau railway new engine for Tibet's economic growth

Xinhua) 16:20, April 04, 2022

LHASA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- On a sunny spring day, a green Fuxing bullet train ran through the mountains along the Yarlung Zangbo River, heading for Nyingchi, a city known for its peach blossoms in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region.

Liu Lili didn't want to miss the peach blossom season. Working in a clothing store in the city of Xigaze, she bought a C893 train ticket from Xigaze to Nyingchi, planning to visit her sister there and enjoy the peach blossoms together with her.

"When the train passed through the Lhasa station, I thought most passengers on the carriage would get off. To my surprise, they also headed to Nyingchi to see the flowers like me," said Liu, 25.

This was the first spring since the Lhasa-Nyingchi Railway opened for operation on June 25, 2021. The first electrified railway in Tibet, with a designed train speed of 160 kph, has cut the travel time from some five hours by bus to three and a half hours.

On the platform of the Lhasa railway station, 36-year-old station worker Tashi Dondrup watched passengers board the C893 train.

Tashi Dondrup, a native of the regional capital Lhasa, had to take a plane in 2002 when he headed to school in Wuhan, capital of central China's Hubei Province, because there were no trains in Tibet. After he started working in 2006, he witnessed the development of rail transport in the plateau region.

In July 2006, the Qinghai-Tibet Railway linking Lhasa and Xining, capital of Qinghai Province, went operational, ending the pre-railways period in Tibet. In August 2014, the Lhasa-Xigaze Railway opened for operation as the first extension line of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway. In June 2021, when the Lhasa-Nyingchi Railway was put into operation, Fuxing bullet trains ran in the plateau region for the first time.

The Lhasa railway station has witnessed explosive growth in passenger flow, surging from 2.24 million in 2007 to more than 4 million in 2021.

"The original four waiting halls can no longer meet the demand. We are now renovating the station to provide another two rooms for passengers to wait for trains," Tashi Dondrup said.

Now, bullet trains have connected Lhasa, Nyingchi, Shannan and Xigaze, whose combined GDP accounts for more than 70 percent of the region's total. Railway transportation has further driven the economic growth of the cities.

Sonam Tobgye, a farmer from Changzhug Township, Nedong District in the city of Shannan, often takes the train to Lhasa to visit his daughter. His home is located at the foot of Yumbulagang, Tibet's first palace, dating back more than 2,000 years, which is a popular tourist attraction in Shannan.

The 67-year-old said the new railway not only makes travel easier, but also brings more tourists, as well as tourism revenue, to his hometown.

"Some of my fellow villagers sell souvenirs, some run tea houses and some provide horse-riding services for tourists. Their wallets have become much fatter," he said.

Near the Nyingchi railway station, Nyima Chodron operates a Tibetan restaurant with her husband. The farmer from a nearby village said their restaurant has received more customers since the operation of the Lhasa-Nyingchi Railway, with the profit reaching 100,000 yuan (about 15,746 U.S. dollars) last year.

"I believe more guests will come when the epidemic ends," she said.

Government figures show that the per capita disposable income of urban and rural residents in the city of Nyingchi reached 41,346 yuan and 21,767 yuan, respectively, in 2021, up 13.3 percent and 15.8 percent over the previous year. The number of tourists in the city exceeded 10 million, and the tourism income reached a record high of 8.3 billion yuan.

Railway figures show that the Lhasa-Nyingchi Railway has transported 977,100 passengers since its opening. Up to 40,000 tonnes of cargo has arrived in Nyingchi by train.

Local villager Penpa, 38, used to transport materials for the construction of the railway. After the railway opened, he started a logistics company, with four trucks delivering cargo, such as daily necessities, feedstuff and construction materials, from the railway station to elsewhere in the city.

"The railway freight charge is at least one-third lower than road transportation. I believe I will have more business in the future," he said.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
From the street with the hustle life to the project life, Ghanaian sensational musician, Joseph Luminary Adzrago, known in music circles as Luminary DMR on the first day of April 2022, donated to his hometown people of Adidome in the Volta region of Ghana as the man known for his high character of reputable antecedents embarked on yet another charitable journey of giving.



Lumi-DMR, known for his philanthropic routines, proceeded on a donation dubbed Donate and Support for Brilliant Students aimed at supporting the much less-privileged in complicated occasions embarked on his charitable activities to the small town of Tswala Adidome in the North Volta of Ghana where he hails from.



The artiste/songwriter, philanthropist and CEO of Development Means Reform Records (DMR Records) seemed to have a resounding success in rapidly improving the music system and championing youth empowerment as he was recently honored with an award by the ECOWAS YOUTH COUNCIL as an ECOWAS Youth Ambassador for his philanthropic gesture in May 2020 during the COVID-19 lockdown in Ghana.



One of which was when he partnered with media houses to give out and donate relief items and food to the less privilege and vulnerable through his Lumi-DMR Foundation.



The skilled entrepreneur and musician is known for his hit songs, AGYEIWAA, CANABIS, BOBOBO and a lot more. His latest song titled I DEY BUY ALL features young legendary Afrobeat musician, Tic, which is equally enjoying massive rotation on both radio and television following his 5 years distribution deal with Universal Music Group.

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
Cleveland's HealthLine helped increase values of nearby multi-family properties. Credit: Wikimedia Commons/Public Domain

A new study reveals that while few cities in the U.S. have high-quality bus rapid transit systems, those that do see benefits to nearby property values.

Researchers investigated the impact of bus rapid transit (or BRT) systems on property values near 11 BRT systems in 10 U.S. cities, noting previous research had found that traditional bus services generally have a minor negative impact on nearby land values and apartment rent prices.

While BRT didn't have a negative impact in most of the cities studied, it did improve multi-family property values in some cities such as Cleveland, which may be a model that some other cities can follow, said Blake Acton, who led the study as a graduate student at The Ohio State University.

"What we saw in Cleveland is something that's new and desirable, and people really want to live near the BRT system there," Acton said. "That demonstrates that it's possible to build premium BRT infrastructure and stimulate transit-oriented development in the United States."

The study was published in the Journal of Transport Geography.

"Our results show that locations near BRT systems in congested, growing cities with high transit ridership can see property value increases," said study co-author Harvey Miller, professor of geography and director of the Center for Urban and Regional Analysis at Ohio State. "But high-quality BRT can have positive impacts in more cities."

BRT is distinguished from traditional bus service by seeking to deliver faster and more efficient service through amenities such as dedicated lanes for buses, greater service frequency, traffic signal priority, off-board fare collection, elevated platforms and enhanced stations.

However, most BRT systems in the United States lack key featuresmost importantly, dedicated bus lanesand often are often referred to as "BRT-lite." In contrast, high-quality full BRT systems include dedicated lanes.

BRT gained popularity around the world at the beginning of the century, but only 438 of these systems exist in the U.S todayabout 8.2% of the entire world's system length.

"BRT exists all over the world, and not just dense mega cities," Acton said. "BRT can link together walkable areas in cities that historically have been very isolated."

By comparing the before-and-after effect of BRT systems in 10 cities across the U.S on property price data from 1990-2016, the study was able to determine that unlike traditional bus services, amenity-filled BRT routes don't generally harm property values. In addition to Cleveland, the study examined BRT systems in Seattle, Eugene (Oregon), Oakland, Los Angeles, Kansas City, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Boston and Miami. The study also controlled for neighborhood attributes that might change over time such as race, income, education, in addition to proximity to jobs and green space. Results showed that three of the 11 BRT systems experienced property value increases near stations, one system experienced a decrease and the remaining seven showed no significant changes.

BRT can especially benefit the value of multi-family residences, the study found.

"We created separate models where we looked at just single-family properties and multi-family properties, wherever there was enough to do that in the city," said Acton. "When we looked at Cleveland, we found an enormous difference between the two."

Their findings showed while single-family homes along the Cleveland Healthline system saw no change to their values, multi-family residences saw a 41.5% increase to their property values, compared to properties located in similar neighborhoods farther away.

Acton said that such a result suggests that bus rapid transit systems can have an overall positive impact on their nearby communities.

The researchers said the success of the Cleveland Healthline service in increasing property values may be credited to the fact that it operates along a major thoroughfare, it has dedicated bus lanes, and the corridor experienced $7 billion of new investments, including major streetscape renovations. That helped lead to a 138% increase in ridership compared to the bus service it replaced.

Multi-family properties may be the main beneficiary of rising property values linked to BRTs because these bus systems make commuting without cars easier and thus encourage more dense housing.

Findings also indicated that a car-oriented BRT station design can be more of a nuisance rather than a benefit to the neighborhood, Miller said.

"The only time BRT harms property values is if you have stations surrounded by parking. That means that the BRT stations are not walkable and not well integrated into the city," he said.

Overall, the study results suggest BRT, if done right, can encourage more dense housing and improve some property values, Miller said.

"Public transit is the backbone of a sustainable urban transportation system. I hope our study encourages more communities to consider high-quality BRT as a viable option," he said.

Explore further Surrounding real estate shows increase in value if near transit station

More information: Blake Acton et al, Impacts of bus rapid transit (BRT) on residential property values: A comparative analysis of 11 US BRT systems, Journal of Transport Geography (2022). Journal information: Journal of Transport Geography Blake Acton et al, Impacts of bus rapid transit (BRT) on residential property values: A comparative analysis of 11 US BRT systems,(2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2022.103324
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

In mid-March, as the Russian invasion of Ukraine crept into its third week, an unusual video started making the rounds on social media and was even broadcast on the television channel Ukraine 24 due to the efforts of hackers.

The video appeared to show Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, stilted with his head moving and his body largely motionless, calling on the citizens of his country to stop fighting Russian soldiers and to surrender their weapons. He had already fled Kyiv, the video claimed.

Except, those weren't the words of the real Zelenskyy. The video was a "deepfake," or content constructed using artificial intelligence. In a deepfake, individuals train computers to mimic real people to make what appears to be an authentic video. Shortly after the deepfake was broadcast, it was debunked by Zelenskyy himself, removed from prominent online sources like Facebook and YouTube, and ridiculed by Ukrainians for its poor quality, according to the Atlantic Council.

However, just because the video was quickly discredited doesn't mean it didn't cause harm. In a world increasingly politically polarized, in which consumers of media may believe information that reinforces their biases, regardless of the content's apparent legitimacy, deepfakes pose a significant threat, warns Northeastern University computer science and philosophy professor Don Fallis.

"It's sort of interesting the respect in which it wasn't a particularly high-quality deepfake. There were all sorts of indicators that the individual consumer of information might think, "This doesn't look right,'" Fallis says about the deepfake of Zelenskyy. "That being said, with all of these sources of misinformation, no matter how credible the information looks, if you have a strong leaning toward a particular viewpoint, if you receive information confirming that pre-existing bias, the source of that informationand the plausibility of that informationmay not matter."

In his research, Falliswho studies epistemology, or the theory of knowledgetries to put modern issues, like deepfakes and fake news, into the larger philosophical context of how individuals acquire and digest true knowledge, as well as misinformation.

In 2018, he co-authored an article, titled, "Fake news is counterfeit news," with Northeastern philosophy professor Kay Mathiesen. The article looked at the threat to democracy and knowledge that fake news poses and sought to define the concept. Two years later, he wrote an article about deepfakes, "The Epistemic Threat of Deepfakes," in which he concluded that deepfakes can lead to false beliefs, undermine the justification for true beliefs, and prevent people from acquiring true beliefs.

Fallis argues both fake news and deepfakes have the negative effect of delegitimizing real news. He says they decrease the amount of true information available, reduce consumers' trust in authentic media, and put an added burden on fact-checkers to authenticate the vast amount of content online.

"In the case of fake news, you're creating this online presence that's supposed to look like a legitimate news site," Fallis says. "Similarly, in the case of deepfakes, you're creating video and audio that are also supposed to look like legit media."

Additionally, in combination with tools used to collect individual users' personal information en masse, deepfakes also can be used maliciously to target large audiences and manipulate them by playing on their ingrained biases, Fallis says.

"It may not just be this one killer technology," he says. "It's not like deepfakes are going to be the one thing that takes us over the cliff. It's a whole suite of potentially problematic technology."

Increased political division has a similar impact on the way in which people interpret fake news, where users are clearly seeking out and accepting information that's compatible with their prior biases, notes Northeastern political science and computer sciences professor David Lazer. However, it's unclear just how much one drops their critical-thinking skills when encountering media that reinforces their worldview.

"Certainly, we've seen an increased polarization in the public's opinions, and that's clearly one of the factors that may be at play with the spread of misinformation," Lazer says. "It's quite plausible that the political polarization and spread of misinformation are going hand in hand, but that's an area of needed research."

Director of Northeastern's Lazer Lab, which conducts research on social influence and networks, Lazer's studies focus primarily on the proliferation of misinformation on social media. In 2019, he co-authored a study on the prevalence of fake news on Twitter during the 2016 presidential election cycle.

Deepfake technology is also "quite relevant" to his studies, Lazer says, but there needs to be more research on the different types of misinformation, how they spread, and their psychological impact on consumers of media. The rise in political polarization and its impact on the consumption of media is also a high-priority area of study, he adds.

"We can certainly say over the last 40 years there has been increased polarization of many kinds, and that's concerning," Lazer says.

Beyond the issue of users failing to question the deepfakes they come across if the content confirms their existing worldview, the technology poses other significant concerns.

One of the most problematic uses of the technology is when an individual's likeness, typically a woman's, is manipulated and put on a sexually explicit video, making it appear as if the individual they are targeting is participating in the sexual activity, says Marc Berkman, the executive director of the Organization for Social Media Safety, a nonprofit dedicated to making social media safe through advocacy and education.

Additionally, as in the case of the deepfake of Zelenskyy, the world is witnessing the technology's political impact, Berkman says. Deepfakes can potentially interfere with democratic elections and be used as propaganda to sow division and doubt, he says.

Fallis and Berkman emphasize the importance of users cultivating critical-thinking skills when venturing online. One way for people to protect themselves against deepfakes is to engage in safe social-media use: Approach content, particularly news, with a critical eye.

The Organization for Social Media Safety is currently supporting media training in public schools, helping children understand news sources so they can take a non-partisan approach to evaluating and understanding the credibility of content.

"It's incredibly important for our democracy to understand what is real and what is not," Berkman says. "Limiting time on social media to healthy amounts is also important, so people can avoid deepfakes used for propaganda purposes."

However, Fallis and Berkman note, individual efforts can't replace structural change in businesses and governments aimed at combating the proliferation of this potentially dangerous technology.

Social-media giants, like Facebook, have adopted policies vowing to remove deepfakes from their platforms if they meet certain criteria, and some state governments, like California's, have adopted laws imposing civil liability on creators of intentionally harmful deepfakes.

In California, Berkman says, his organization is working on getting a state law passed that would also impose criminal punishment on the creators of malicious pornographic deepfakes, with the hope that this kind of law expands to other states and that the federal government adopts similar legislation.

Explore further 1 in 3 who are aware of deepfakes say they have inadvertently shared them on social media
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

It's a major source of California's water supply and a vital habitat for fish, migratory birds and other species.

But the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta watershed is also a fragile ecosystem in decline, with human demands for water taking a harsh toll on the environment.

With a third year of severe drought straining water resources and pushing endangered salmon and other fish closer to extinction, California officials have announced a controversial $2.6 billion deal with the federal government and major water suppliers that they say will bolster the ecosystem.

The new pact, called a memorandum of understanding, reflects a realization that with climate change, "the system is collapsing quicker than the laws and regulations that exist can manage or heal that system," said Jared Blumenfeld, California's environmental protection secretary.

The proposed agreement lays out plans over the next eight years whereby agencies that supply cities and farms would give up water or secure additional supplies to help threatened species, while state, federal and local agencies would fund projects to improve habitat in the watershed.

State officials called the deal an important milestone in their efforts to balance the delta's ecological needs with the water needs of Californians, and a key step toward larger "voluntary agreements" that can help ensure substantial flows for the health of the estuary.

Gov. Gavin Newsom declared the plan a historic rejection of "old binaries" in favor of new solutions, while Blumenfeld said it would "move us away from 'water wars' of yesteryear."

Those claims drew strong criticism, however.

Immediately after the plan's announcement this week, environmental advocates and salmon conservationists condemned it as a set of backroom deals negotiated out of the public eye that wouldn't provide nearly enough water for threatened fish or the overall health of the watershed.

"Nothing has been achieved through backroom negotiations with water districts," said Jon Rosenfield, senior scientist with the group San Francisco Baykeeper. "The state's latest scheme promises only a tiny fraction of the relief our rivers, fisheries and delta communities need, according to a wealth of researchand it leaves all the hard questions unanswered."

The San Francisco Bay Delta is the largest estuary on the West Coast. Formed by the convergence of California's two largest rivers, the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta lies at the heart of the state's water system.

Two huge government-run pumping plants draw water from the delta's southern edge and send it flowing through the canals of the State Water Project and the Central Valley Project, supplying vast farmlands and cities to the south.

The delta's ecosystem has been ailing for decades, and the export of large quantities of freshwater has been a major reason. Climate change has added to the stresses on the ecosystem by intensifying droughts.

Fish have suffered. The delta smelt is now on the brink of extinction. And endangered winter-run Chinook salmon have struggled to reproduce in the Sacramento River when the water flowing from Shasta Dam has warmed up so much that many eggs fail to hatch.

State officials said the agreement aims to meet water-quality objectives in the Delta through additional flows for the environment, projects that restore and improve thousands of acres of aquatic habitat, and funding to purchase water and carry out habitat projects. They said these projects would include creating more spawning habitat for salmon and smelt, restoring floodplains and side channels, and removing barriers that hinder fish, among other things.

Wade Crowfoot, California's natural resources secretary, said the steps toward voluntary agreements among water agencies "hold promise to improve environmental conditions more quickly and holistically than regulatory requirements."

But the plan still needs to be endorsed by the State Water Resources Control Board, which is required to update its water-quality plan for the delta. Heavy criticism of the announcement also suggests Newsom and his administration will face opposition as they continue pushing for voluntary water deals.

The agreement's signatories included more than a dozen water agencies, among them the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California and Westlands Water District, some of the nation's largest water suppliers. Water agencies have agreed to provide varying flows, depending on whether conditions are wet, above average, below average, dry or critically dry.

Amounts of water contributed annually by the signatories could range between 150,000 acre-feet to 825,000 acre-feet. The largest amount of water, if spread out across the city of Los Angeles, would cover the area more than 2 feet deep.

Baykeeper's Rosenfield pointed out that would be much less than the average of approximately 1.5 million to 1.6 million acre-feet that the state water board had contemplated in a 2018 document, and far less than what the board had indicated would be needed to protect imperiled fish in the delta watershed as well as the state's commercial and recreational fisheries.

Rosenfield and other critics noted that the agreement uses a water baseline laid down in 2019 by the Trump administration, so much of the additional water made available under the proposal would simply restore the flows that had been called for under federal biological opinions a decade earlier.

Rosenfield also criticized provisions of the deal that involve purchasing water for environmental purposes, essentially using taxpayer money to "subsidize" the water districts' obligations.

"We don't need to pay water districts for water that belongs to the people of California," Rosenfield said.

However, state officials stressed that the agreement would send a significant amount of water flowing through the delta that otherwise wouldn't be helping the ecosystem. And they said the collaborative approach, worked out through years of meetings and negotiations, can avoid protracted fights.

"You can get a lot more done at a bigger scale when you're trying to do it collaboratively, because you step around what tends to be decades' worth of litigation, when people don't want to voluntarily talk about leaving water in the rivers," said Chuck Bonham, director of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

"Instead of fighting about what to do, we now have a commitment for one of the largest habitat restoration efforts conceivable," Bonham said.

He said large-scale habitat restoration efforts in the watershed can make a big difference in recovering fish and other species that are at risk.

The state's traditional approach has been to adopt regulations and then deal with lawsuits, and the proposed agreement aims to circumvent that approach to reduce uncertainty, said Jeffrey Mount, a senior fellow with the Public Policy Institute of California.

"For the water user community, it meets one of their great needs, and that is regulatory certainty," Mount said. "It's so that there is not an annual, difficult regulatory battle."

Mount said he supports the approach generally and has been calling for something like this for years as a more effective strategy.

"But it would have been better if they could have actually brought in the environmental community and had them as part of these negotiations," Mount said.

What will ultimately come out of the plan is uncertain, he said, because some agencies haven't signed on to the terms and the deal will need to undergo a lengthy review.

The plan laid out in the agreement calls for environmental monitoring, and if key indicators aren't met through the voluntary agreement by the sixth year, Blumenfeld said, the state could change course and instead work toward those goals through regulation. State regulators could determine if the voluntary agreements should be continued, modified or ended.

"So there's a backstop," Blumenfeld said. "There's a lot at stake to make it work. But if it doesn't, we get to implement the more traditional regulatory pathway."

Water districts that do not agree to the voluntary approach will be required to comply with requirements set by the state water board. The agencies that haven't signed on include those that draw water from the lower San Joaquin River and its tributaries, among them the Merced Irrigation District, Modesto Irrigation District, Friant Water Authority and San Francisco Public Utilities Commission.

State officials have told managers of these agencies that their proposals fall short of what's needed, and that the door is open for them to participate if they agree to enough additional water and support for habitat projects.

Mount said the state may be taking a "divide and conquer strategy," but it most certainly won't end the conflicts.

"The water wars will continue because we're talking about tradeoffs in use in a zero-sum game," Mount said.

The water agencies that have joined the deal have committed to restoring or creating 20,000 acres of floodplain habitat, and nearly 3,300 acres of additional habitat where fish can spawn.

A breakdown of the implementation costs under the agreement lists $858 million for habitat restoration and construction in the watershed, plus additional amounts for scientific monitoring, water purchases and payments for some growers to leave farmlands dry and fallow.

Managers of water districts that signed the agreement this week have committed to taking the terms to their boards for endorsement.

Adel Hagekhalil, general manager of the Metropolitan Water District, said the agreement represents a milestone first step in a joint effort to develop a watershed-wide approach to address the challenges in the delta.

"We need to work collaboratively with all of our state, federal, environmental and water agency partners to ensure we have a comprehensive action plan that improves water reliability and delivers real results for the environment," Hagekhalil said in a statement.

The Newsom administration is pushing for the voluntary deals while also pursuing a controversial plan for rerouting the state's water system by building a huge water tunnel beneath the delta.

Environmental advocates said they're concerned about the estimated $2.6 billion that would be spent on implementation, with funds coming from water suppliers and the state and federal governments. They also said that there is no enforcement mechanism if the expected funding doesn't come through, and that the document outlining the deal counts water supplies that have yet to be secured.

"Of course, we support floodplain restoration," said Regina Chichizola, executive director of the group Save California Salmon. But she said research has shown that the health of the delta ecosystem demands much more water than this agreement would provide.

"This to me doesn't seem like it's dealing with drought or climate change or what the actual needs of [the] delta are. So I'm disappointed," Chichizola said.

She said it's also concerning that instead of having an open, democratic process guided by science, "it's just the most elite water users" that were in the room to negotiate.

John McManus, president of the Golden State Salmon Assn., said that nobody from the salmon fishing industry was invited to participate in the talks.

"I think many in California will wonder why taxpayers have to pay to gain basic environmental protections for our fish and wildlife," McManus said. "Don't we already have regulations that should ensure the protection of our fish and wildlife?"

Explore further As drought persists in California, minimal water deliveries announced for the Central Valley Project

2022 Los Angeles Times.

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Researchers at PSI have observed for the first time how tiny magnets in a special layout align themselves solely as a result of temperature changes. This view into processes that take place within so-called artificial spin ice could play an important role in the development of novel high-performance computers. The results were published today in the journal Nature Physics.

When water freezes to form ice, the water molecules, with their hydrogen and oxygen atoms, arrange themselves in a complex structure. Water and ice are different phases, and the transformation from water to ice is called a phase transition. In the laboratory, crystals can be produced in which the elementary magnetic moments, the so-called spins, form structures comparable to ice. That is why researchers also refer to these structures as spin ice. "We have produced artificial spin ice, which essentially consists of nanomagnets that are so small that their orientation can only change as a result of temperature," explains physicist Kevin Hofhuis, who has just completed his doctoral thesis at PSI and now works at Yale University in the U.S..

In the material the researchers used, the nanomagnets are arranged in hexagonal structuresa pattern that is known from the Japanese art of basket weaving under the name kagome. "Magnetic phase transitions had been theoretically predicted for artificial kagome spin ice, but they have never been observed before," says Laura Heyderman, the head of the Laboratory for Multiscale Materials Experiments at PSI and a professor at ETH Zurich. "The detection of phase transitions has only been made possible now thanks to the use of state-of-the-art lithography to produce the material in the PSI clean room as well as a special microscopy method at the Swiss Light Source SLS." The journal Nature Physics is now publishing the results of these experiments.

The trick: Tiny magnetic bridges

For their samples, the researchers used a nickel-iron compound called permalloy, which was coated as a thin film on a silicon substrate. They used a lithography process to repeatedly form a small, hexagonal pattern of nanomagnets, with each nanomagnet being approximately half a micrometer (millionths of a meter) long and one-sixth of a micrometer wide. But that's not all. "The trick was that we connected the nanomagnets with tiny magnetic bridges," says Hofhuis. "This led to small changes in the system that made it possible for us to tune the phase transition in such a way that we could observe it. However, these bridges had to be really small, because we didn't want to change the system too much."

The physicist is still amazed that this undertaking actually succeeded. With the creation of the nanobridges, he was pushing up against the limits of the technically possible spatial resolution of today's lithography methods. Some of the bridges are only ten nanometers (billionths of a meter) across. The orders of magnitude in this experiment are indeed impressive, says Hofhuis: "While the smallest structures on our sample are in the nanometer range, the instrument for imaging themSLShas a circumference of almost 300 meters." Heyderman adds: "The structures that we examine are 30 billion times smaller than the instruments with which we examine them."

Microscopy and theory

At the SIM beamline of SLS, the team used a special method called photoemission electron microscopy that made it possible to observe the magnetic state of each individual nanomagnet in the array. They were actively supported by Armin Kleibert, the scientist in charge of SIM. "We were able to record a video that shows how the nanomagnets interact with each other as we change the temperature," summarizes Hofhuis. The original images simply contain black and white contrast that switched from time to time. From this, the researchers were able to deduce the configuration of the spins, that is, the alignment of the magnetic moments.

"If you watch a video like this, you don't know what phase you're in," explains Hofhuis. This called for theoretical consideration, which was contributed by Peter Derlet, PSI physicist and adjunct professor at ETH Zurich. His simulations showed what should theoretically happen at the phase transitions. Only the comparison of the recorded images with these simulations proved that the processes observed under the microscope actually are phase transitions.

Manipulating phase transitions

The new study is another achievement in the investigation of artificial spin ice that Laura Heyderman's group has been pursuing for more than a decade. "The great thing about these materials is that we can tailor them and see directly what is happening inside them," the physicist says. "We can observe all sorts of fascinating behavior, including the phase transitions and ordering that depend on the layout of the nanomagnets. This is not possible with spin systems in conventional crystals." Although these investigations are still pure fundamental research at the moment, the researchers are already thinking about possible applications. "Now we know that we can see and manipulate different phases in these materials, new possibilities are opening up," says Hofhuis.

Controlling different magnetic phases could be interesting for novel types of data processing. Researchers at PSI and elsewhere are investigating how the complexity of artificial spin ice could be used for novel high-speed computers with low power consumption. "The process is based on the information processing in the brain and takes advantage of how the artificial spin ice reacts to a stimulus such as a magnetic field or an electric current," explains Heyderman.

Explore further Printing circuits on rare nanomagnets puts a new spin on computing

More information: Kevin Hofhuis et al, Real-space imaging of phase transitions in bridged artificial kagome spin ice, Nature Physics (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41567-022-01564-5 , Journal information: Nature Physics Kevin Hofhuis et al, Real-space imaging of phase transitions in bridged artificial kagome spin ice,(2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41567-022-01564-5 , www.nature.com/articles/s41567-022-01564-5
The X-ray spectra of RX J0134.2-4258 observed by XMM-Newton. The ROSAT (orange) and ASCA (green) spectra are also plotted for comparison. Credit: Jin et al., 2022.

Using XMM-Newton and NuSTAR satellites, astronomers have conducted a comprehensive, long-term multiwavelength study of an active galaxy known as RXJ0134.2-4258. Results of the observational campaign, published March 25 on arXiv.org, shed more light on the nature of this source, revealing its peculiar properties.

Active galactic nuclei (AGNs) are accreting, supermassive black holes residing at the centers of some galaxies, emitting powerful, high-energy radiation as they accrete gas and dust. These nuclei can form jets, having mostly cylindrical, conical or parabolic shapes, which are observed even on megaparsec scales.

Narrow-line Seyfert1 (NLS1) galaxies are a subclass of AGN, characterized by a Balmer (H) line-width, which is narrow compared to standard broad line AGN, but still broader than the narrow lines. They usually have smaller black hole masses and higher Eddington ratios when compared to the entire AGN population, however, some NLS1s may accrete with normal or low Eddington ratios.

At a redshift of 0.237, RXJ0134.2-4258 is one of such NLS1 galaxies. Discovered in 1999 by the ROSAT all sky survey, the galaxy showcases a typical optical spectrum of an extreme NLS1, including narrow Balmer lines. The mass of the black hole in this system is estimated to be about 15 million solar masses, while its Eddington ratio was calculated to be relatively highat a level of approximately 10.0.

Previous observations of RXJ0134.2-4258 have found that it exhibits some highly unusual properties when compared to other typical NLSs. For instance, it showcases dramatic X-ray variability, resembling an X-ray complex NLS1, but the spectrum becomes harder-when-brighter, which is not normally observed in AGNs with high Eddington ratios. A team of astronomers led by Chichuan Jin of University of Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, China, inspected this source in X-rays using XMM-Newton and NuSTAR, hoping to shed more light on this perplexing nature.

The two space telescopes observed RXJ0134.2-4258 in one of its lowest X-ray ux states. It was found that X-ray time-average spectra of this source exhibited dramatic variations in terms of both ux and spectral shape during the past 23 years. It was added that no signicant soft excess was detected in any of these spectra.

The researchers underlined that the time-average spectrum from XMM-Newton observations showcased a steep rise above 4 keV, suggesting the presence of a separate hard X-ray component. They also performed a time lag analysis, finding that this component lags behind the soft X-rays by about 4,000 seconds in the low frequency band. No other lags were found below 4 keV.

Furthermore, the astronomers compared their results to previous studies of RXJ0134.2-4258. In result, it was found that this NLS1 experienced very dierent X-ray spectral-timing properties during its X-ray low and high-ux states, which includes much weaker X-ray variability in the low-ux state.

The authors of the paper concluded that the observed properties and X-ray variability of RXJ0134.2-4258 may indicate the presence of a clumpy disk wind in this source. They added that such winds are expected in highly super-Eddington NLS1s.

More information: Chichuan Jin et al, Multi-wavelength Campaign on the Super-Eddington NLS1 RX J0134.2-4258  I. Peculiar X-ray Spectra and Variability. arXiv:2203.13419v1 [astro-ph.HE], Chichuan Jin et al, Multi-wavelength Campaign on the Super-Eddington NLS1 RX J0134.2-4258  I. Peculiar X-ray Spectra and Variability. arXiv:2203.13419v1 [astro-ph.HE], arxiv.org/abs/2203.13419

 2022 Science X Network
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Lesbian, gay, and bisexual people who leave a place hostile to LGB people don't necessarily move to a place known for its acceptance, report researchers at UC Riverside. Heterosexuals, on the other hand, do tend to move to places that match their positive or negative feelings about sexuality. The surprising findings, published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, complicate the notion of gay migration, which holds that LGB people prefer to move to gay-friendly places when possible.

"This project came about from popular ideas about how people migrate throughout the US," said first author Emily Esposito, a doctoral student in psychology. "We were curious to learn if LGB people migrate based on gay friendliness. For example, when they come out do they move to a gay-friendly city if they don't already live in one? We also wondered if feelings about sexuality influenced migration for straight people."

Esposito and co-author Jimmy Calanchini, an assistant professor of psychology, designed two studies to investigate these questions. The first study used data from over 1,300,000 US residents who completed a detailed survey about migration. This study found that lesbians and gay men were, indeed, likely to leave gay-unfriendly places, regardless of their own feelings toward sexuality. However, they did not necessarily move to gay-friendly places. Straight people were more likely to leave places that did not match their feelings about sexuality and migrate to places that do.

The second study recruited participants to view a series of Google Street View images taken from 15 cities across the US that reflected gay culture, such as bars, bookstores, or other images that depicted gay communities in those cities. Participants also viewed similar images from the same city that did not reflect gay culture, along with images of neutral places likely to be frequented by LGB and straight people alike.

Participants were asked about their desire to move to the place shown in each picture, whether they would feel a sense of belonging there, and how likely they thought gay or straight people would be to spend time there. They were also asked to rate how warm they felt toward different social groups on a sliding scale.

LGB participants generally wanted to migrate to places with greater perceived gay culture. Straight participants wanted to migrate to places where they thought there was more straight culturebut only when they preferred straight people over gay people. Straight people with pro-gay preferences did not prefer locations they perceived as straight. Interestingly, the preferences stated by LGB people when looking at the pictures contrasted with the researchers' real-world migration data, in which LGB people did not necessarily move to places known for gay-friendliness.

"One possible interpretation of these findings is that it is easier to leave a bad place than it is to end up in a good place," said Esposito. "LGB people might hypothetically prefer to live in a gay-friendly place but real-world constraints, such as employment or affordable housing, might limit their choices."

Although both studies showed a general preference of both LGB and straight people to live in an environment that fit either their sexual orientation or their feelings about sexuality, some differences stood out. Lesbians and bisexual women always expressed a strong desire to move to gay-friendly places, as did gay and bisexual men with pro-gay feelings. Gay and bisexual men with pro-straight feelings, possibly as a result of internalized homophobia, expressed interest in migration that was unrelated to their perceptions of the gay or straight culture of the place.

"One of the interesting contributions of this project is that we separate identity from feelings, and examine when the two compete, like when a gay person internalizes homophobia," said Calanchini. "It turns out that gay people are leaving places that aren't friendly to them and going places that they think might be more friendly, even if their own feelings toward gay people are not favorable."

Explore further Why some straight men have sex with other men

More information: Emily Esposito et al, Examining selective migration as attitudinal fit versus gay migration, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology (2022). Journal information: Journal of Experimental Social Psychology Emily Esposito et al, Examining selective migration as attitudinal fit versus gay migration,(2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2022.104307
The EnMAP satellite flies around the earth - animation. Credit: OHB System AG, GFZ

The German environmental satellite EnMAP was successfully launched into space on Friday evening from Cape Canaveral in Florida on board a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The "science" team of the EnMAP mission at the German Research Centre for Geosciences Potsdam celebrated the exciting minutes before and during the launch with a diverse and informative event. Lectures, talks and live broadcasts gave an impression of the scientific background, many years of preparations and various current and future fields of application of the mission. Also joining the event was Potsdam's Lord Mayor Mike Schubert, who was equally excited and congratulated on the successful launch.

Over the next few years, the hyperspectral mission will take pictures of the Earth's surface in around 250 colors ("spectral bands") and thus provide information on the condition of vegetation, soils and waters more precisely than ever before. Even short-term changes can be recorded with the help of the satellite, which is about the size of a wardrobe. The EnMAP environmental mission is led by the German Space Agency at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Economics and Climate Protection (BMWK). The mission is under the scientific management of the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ) in Potsdam. The satellite and the hyperspectral instrument were developed and built by OHB-System AG. The total cost is around 300 million euros.

Anna Christmann: "The innovative mission helps to record the effects of the climate crisis and environmental pollution"

"Without Earth observation from space, it would be very difficult to quantify the global extent of the climate crisis and its consequences," says the Federal Government Commissioner for Aerospace, MdB Dr. Anna Christmann. "The innovative and powerful EnMAP satellite mission of DLR and GFZ will give us precise information about the state of the Earth's ecosystems with its hyperspectral images. This will help us to record the effects of the climate crisis, biodiversity loss and environmental pollution. With EnMAP, Germany is making an important contribution to European space technology and to an intact planet."

The EnMAP satellite in the test chamber. Credit: OHB System AG, GFZ

Niels Hovius: "The launch marks a milestone in GFZ history"

The Scientific Director (interim) of the GFZ, Prof. Niels Hovius, emphasizes the scientific importance of the mission and the diverse applications: These ranged "from the exploration of deposits and soil mapping to the monitoring of water quality, the early detection of plant stress and the recording of environmental pollution. EnMAP will provide important data to accurately determine the consequences of climate change and other environmental changes on Earth." Hovius added: "The launch marks a milestone in GFZ history. Colleagues at the GFZ have been working on the mission's research program together with the international EnMAP Science Advisory Group for many years." The Potsdam team is also coordinating the large EnMAP-PI project for the scientific preparation and support of the mission. This includes, among other things, the development of open source software tools for hyperspectral data analysis, the independent validation of EnMAP data, and a wide range of training and networking activities for the user community. EnMAP-PI is jointly supported by the partner institutions Humboldt University Berlin, University of Greifswald, AWI Bremerhaven and LMU Munich.

Manja Schule: "Forward-looking and indispensable impulses for international geo, environmental and climate research"

Brandenburg's Minister of Research, Dr. Manja Schule, was pleased with the successful launch and commented: "A completely new view of our Earth: thanks to the EnMAP satellite mission, we will receive even more reliable information about man-made changes and damage to our ecosystems in the future. These are the best prerequisites for developing innovative measures to adapt to climate change. The launch vehicle was launched in Cape Canaveralthe scientific management of the research project is in Potsdam. Once again, the GeoForschungsZentrum is providing such forward-looking and indispensable impulses for international geo, environmental and climate research."

Illustration of different areas of application of hyperspectral measurement data. Credit: GFZ

About the EnMAP satellite

The special cameras on board provide images of the Earth's surface in more than two hundred narrow, contiguous wavelength bands, so-called hyperspectral images or imaging spectroscopy. With these spectrally high-resolution data, the Earth can be observed in a previously unattained level of detail. Minerals or pollutants can be detected and identified, plants can be determined and their nutrient supply monitored, or the degree of pollution of bodies of water can be detected.

Explore further Remote sensing is becoming increasingly important in biodiversity research
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

The challenges of building a sustainable society are unprecedented. But the Dutch municipalities cannot be faulted for their commitment. They are working hard, conclude Professor Eefje Cuppen and Lian Merkx, program manager for energy at the Association of Netherlands Municipalities (VNG). To exchange local knowledge and ideas about what does and does not work in energy transition, the University and VNG are holding the symposium "Liveable Planet: Local Policies for a Liveable Planet" on 14 April.

The Liveable Planet program has been running at Leiden University for two years now. All the faculties are now participating and new interfaculty research on sustainability is being developed. It's really interesting for us researchers to bring together all this knowledge and to see how the individual pieces reinforce the whole," says Professor Eefje Cuppen, who is on the core team for Public Administration. "But besides being interesting, it is also very necessary because creating a sustainable society is complex. Everyone needs to look at what others are doing. Otherwise we won't achieve it."

Broad view

Liveable Planet is a tangible example of this in its two living labs: one at Vrouw Vennepolder in Oud Ade and the other in The Hague. Here master's students investigate what the task is, what parties are involved and what the possible solutions are. The two living labs are different, with one being in a natural environment and the other in an urban environment. "That difference will undoubtedly be reflected in the research questions, but all the disciplines are needed everywhere. This broad perspective is what makes it so interesting because new perspectives, new strategies, emerge from it."

Local level

The common denominator in all the research is the local level, says Cuppen. "That's where all the different disciplines meet and where all the sustainability issues come together. The energy transition, adapting to climate change, the nitrogen problem, the housing crisis, mobility problems, social inequality: it all has to be done in the same area, and municipalities often have limited resources as well. Municipalities therefore face an enormous task. Them trying to work together to solve this task together is new. They've never done that before."

Knowledge sharing

Another goal of Liveable Planet is to share knowledge about sustainability transitions and to bring together what is already happening. The University and the Association of Netherlands Municipalities (VNG) are therefore holding a symposium in Museum Volkenkunde on 14 April for politicians, civil servants, students and anyone involved in local sustainability policy. The symposium will give an overview of and insight into sustainability goals that can be worked on at a local level. What works and what doesn't?

Cuppen is impressed by local initiatives in the field of sustainability. "We are moving too slowly in many respects in the Netherlands, but manynot allmunicipalities are taking very progressive steps."

Russian gas

Lian Merkx, program manager for energy at VNG, shares this view. "Compared with five to ten years ago, a number of developments really are moving fast. There is no longer a single municipality that thinks it's not necessary, that energy transition. Everyone is working hard and the shared level of ambition is impressive. The plans (such as the Transition Visions for Heating and Renewable Energy) are satisfactory and they were also drawn up within the deadlines, which is very positive."

The implementation is always trickier, says Merkx. "All the more so because everyone now wants to accelerate things to stop being dependent on Russian gas for their energy supply. That requires a great deal from municipalities, grid operators, contractors, technicians, draftspeople and all those other hands that are needed to implement this. So the pressure is increasing but the labor market can't handle it, which is a concern."

Knowledge development and the practical implementation of that knowledge, as the University is doing with its Living Labs, is something Merkx applauds. "That a university like Leiden is taking a practical approach across the board is new and interesting. I think you can generate breakthroughs with such a cross-disciplinary approach. And, equally important, that you know where to find each other if things get really difficult. Because that's what we're going to need."

Explore further Evaluating sustainability progress requires a broad and long look
'Le Regime du corps' described a variety of ways to maintain health by keeping the body in balance. The Bute Painter, circa 1285, MS Arsenal 2510. Credit: Bibliotheque nationale de France

What type of images come to mind when you think of medieval art? Knights and ladies? Biblical scenes? Cathedrals? It's probably not some unfortunate man in the throes of vomiting.

It might surprise you to learn this scene is found in a luxurious book from the Middle Ages made with the highest-quality materials, including abundant gold leaf. Known as an illustrated manuscript, it was made entirely by hand, as virtually all books were before the adoption of the printing press.

Why would such an opulent art form depict such a mundane topic?

Scholars believe that around 1256, a French countess commissioned the creation of a health manual to share with her four daughters just as they were forming their own households. Known as the "Regime du corps," or "regimen of the body," the book was widely copied and became extremely popular across Europe in the late Middle Ages, specifically between the 13th and 15th centuries. Over 70 unique manuscripts survive today. They offer a window into many aspects of everyday medieval lifefrom sleeping, bathing and preparing food to bloodletting, leeching and purging.

I'm an art historian who recently published a book called "Visualizing Household Health: Medieval Women, Art, and Knowledge in the Regime du corps" about these magnificent illustrated copies. What's fascinating to me about the "Regime du corps" is how it depicts the responsibilities of women in wealthy medieval householdsand how domestic management advice was passed down among them.

In a chapter on caring for one's complexion, two women exchange a remedy. 'Le Regime du corps,' circa 1265-70. British Library, MS Sloane 2435. Credit: The British Library Board

Glimpsing relationships

The illustrations, which are usually located at the start of each chapter, convey information not often found in other historical records. Even if the images are idealized, they reveal an extraordinary amount about the clothes, objects and furnishings of the period. They also show interactions among people that reflect the culture and society in which these books were made.

In a scene accompanying the chapter on caring for one's newborn, two women are depicted opposite each other. Closer inspection shows the well-dressed woman on the right is reaching across and grabbing the exposed breast of the woman in more simple attire. This sceneseemingly one of aggression and violationdepicts the evaluation of a potential wet nurse.

Wet nurses were used throughout the Middle Ages by some elite families who could afford them, but choosing a good wet nurse was critical, loaded with life-and-death implications. Aldobrandino of Siena, the author of the "Regime du corps," warns that an unhealthy nurse can "kill children straight away," pointing to very real anxiety around this important decision. The different clothing and headwear communicate each woman's social status. The elite woman's gesture also makes clear who has the power in the scene.

A potential wet nurse is assessed by another woman. 'Le Regime du corps,' 14th century. MS Fr. 12323. Credit: Bibliotheque nationale de France.

Across "Regime du corps" manuscripts, upper-class women are presented with clothing, objects and gestures that convey authority, often in dialog with those who are shown as laborers of various kinds. Servants within elite households are also illustrated, especially in the chapters about various foods and their health benefits.

Both men and women are shown sifting rice, making wine and managing livestock. The manuscripts' creators chose not only to make such mundane and repetitive work visible but to treat the high-status physician and milkmaid as equally valid subjects for depiction.

Medieval health maintenance

In the Middle Ages, the health of family members, from infancy to old age, was maintained through a variety of strategies that aimed for balance in the body. The "Regime du corps" recommended a wide range of treatments, including the release of bodily fluids through purging or bloodletting to maintain such balance.

Two servants with sacks of grain. The Bute Painter, 'Le Regime du corps,' circa 1285. MS Arsenal 2510,. Credit: Bibliotheque nationale de France.

Cupping, or the placement of heated glass cups onto the skin, was among the procedures overseen by surgeons, because it involved scratching or perforating the skin before applying suction. Across "Regime du corps" manuscripts, it is not uncommon to see physicians and other male practitioners represented, implying that elite households made use of such professionals.

But women are also shown administering treatments, including in several cupping scenes. A practitioner's humble clothing and headdress signal her class as a worker.

A 15th-century copy of the 'Regime du corps' open to a section on food. British Library, MS Sloane 2401. Credit: The British Library Board

Such images show that medieval health care involved many toolsmedicine, surgical treatments, food, prayer and charmsand a wide range of individuals offered their services both within and outside of the home. Women sometimes administered such care professionally, but they also did so through oversight of their own households.

The "Regime du corps" offered owners images that reflected their worldshowing women asserting authority over the care of their families, providing treatment and contributing to a well-run household. The elite owners of these exquisite books were also provided with an added benefit: Possession of such manuscripts was undoubtedly a symbol of status and evidence of conspicuous consumption.

Explore further 90% of medieval chivalry and heroism manuscripts have been lost

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

According to a study by researchers from the Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin) and the University of Munster, millionaires are more risk-tolerant, emotionally stable, open, extroverted, and conscientious than the general population. The study is published in the journal Humanities and Social Sciences Communications.

The data used for the analysis of personality traits come from the SOEP, a representative random sample of the German population. In 2019, a subsample of more than 2,000 high-wealth individuals was added to the SOEP. The SOEP now surveys more than 1,100 millionaires whose net worth averages around 4 million euros. "This means that the very wealthy are now overrepresented in the SOEP, making it possible to analyze this very small population in a meaningful way," explains SOEP researcher Carsten Schroder, who initiated the top-wealth subsample.

The results show that the typical millionaire personality profile is especially pronounced among self-made millionaires, who see themselves as having made their money on their own rather than through inheritance. The profile is less pronounced among millionaires who attribute their wealth primarily to inheritance.

Within the sample of millionaires, those whose personality traits correspond most closely to the typical profile have the highest wealth. In the rest of the population, a weaker form of this personality profile can be found in individuals who have worked their way up through their own efforts: Although they are not millionaires yet, they see themselves as having earned their money on their own, and therefore, as self-made. Johannes Konig, research associate at SOEP and lead author of the study, explains, "Taken together, the results suggest that personality is a relevant factor in wealth accumulation."

Coauthor Mitja Back, Professor of Psychological Diagnostics and Personality Psychology at the University of Munster, adds, "This is the first study to describe the personality of millionaires using robust data. Since the rich wield particular influence over societal decision-making processes, and since personality has a determining influence on the way people think and behave, the investigation of millionaires' personality traits is of great social relevance."

More information: Marius Leckelt et al, The personality traits of self-made and inherited millionaires, Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (2022). Marius Leckelt et al, The personality traits of self-made and inherited millionaires,(2022). DOI: 10.1057/s41599-022-01099-3
NASAs Psyche spacecraft is seen on its way to the vacuum chamber at the agencys Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

To prepare for its launch in August, the Psyche spacecraft has been tested to ensure it can operate in the extreme conditions it will face on its trip to a metal-rich asteroid.

The conditions that a NASA spacecraft endures are extreme: the violent shaking and cacophony of a rocket launch, the jolt of separating from the launch vehicle, the extreme temperature fluctuations in and out of the sun's rays, the unforgiving vacuum of space.

Before launch, engineers do their best to replicate these harsh conditions in a rigorous series of tests to ensure the spacecraft can withstand them. NASA's Psyche spacecraft has just completed its own gauntlet of electromagnetic, thermal-vacuum, vibration, shock, and acoustic testing at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. Psyche was deemed healthy and ready to proceed toward launch.

"This is the proof that everybody's done their job right. Not only those who have brought flight hardware into assembly, test, and launch operations [ATLO] but also the ATLO team in putting it all together," said Randy Lindemann, the JPL engineer who oversaw Psyche's dynamics testing, which includes vibration, separation shock, and acoustic testing. "The tests show that yes, the spacecraft is flightworthy."

This spring, the spacecraft will be shipped from JPL to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where it will be prepared to launch from Cape Canaveral. The launch period opens Aug. 1, and nine months after leaving Earth's atmosphere, Psyche will sail past Mars. It will use the Red Planet's gravitational force to slingshot it toward its target, a metal-rich asteroid, also named Psyche, that lies in the main asteroid belt.

It's a journey of about 1.5 billion miles (2.4 billion kilometers). The spacecraft will reach the asteroid in 2026 and will spend 21 months collecting science data during progressively lower orbits. Scientists believe the asteroid may consist largely of metal from the core of a planetesimal, a building block of the rocky planets in our solar system. Learning more about it could tell us more about how our own planet formed.

Put through its paces

But to learn about the asteroid, the orbiter has to get there first, which is why testing is so critical. Engineers call this particular regimen "environmental tests," as the spacecraft is subjected to a simulation of the harsh environment it will have to survive.

The campaign began in December with electromagnetic testing, to ensure the spacecraft will operate correctly in the electrical and magnetic conditions of spaceand that the electrical and magnetic components that make up the spacecraft are compatible and don't interfere with one another.

The team then rolled the spacecraft into JPL's 85-foot-tall, 25-foot-wide (26-meter-by-8-meter) ultra-sturdy vacuum chamber for thermal-vacuum (TVAC) testing. All of the air was sucked out of the chamber to replicate the airless vacuum of space. This test ensures that the spacecraft can survive the vacuum of space, and it helps engineers see how the spacecraft heats and cools itself without the movement of air to help it regulate temperature.

NASAs Psyche spacecraft is placed into the ultra-sturdy vacuum chamber at the agencys Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

"Here on Earth, when you have air around the spacecraft, that changes how heat moves around it. Picture having a fan blowing on you that changes your temperature. In space, we don't have that kind of heat movement," said JPL's Kristina Hogstrom, a flight systems engineer who helped lead Psyche's TVAC testing.

The temperatures around the spacecraft will fluctuate wildly. The hardware will be hot in the hours after launch, when it's still close to Earth and facing the sun, especially with its electronics running. Later, when the spacecraft gets farther from the sun, it faces intense cold, especially when flying in the asteroid's shadow.

Over 18 days of TVAC testing, engineers exposed the spacecraft to the coldest and warmest conditions it will experience in flight, to prove that it is capable of regulating its own temperature. The orbiter has louvers that open and close, insulation blankets, electric heaters, and a network of tubing that carries fluid to move heat around; all of these devices are tested to be sure they'll work in flight.

TVAC isn't just an endurance test. The data about how the spacecraft performs helps engineers refine models they'll use when Psyche is in flight so they can better understand how the spacecraft is performing.

After Psyche's ordeal in the TVAC chamber came dynamics testing, which included vibration, shock, and acoustics. In vibration testing, the spacecraft gets shaken repeatedlyup and down and side to side. Shock testing ensures that the spacecraft won't be damaged by the sudden push the orbiter will get when it separates from the rocket after launch.

Finally, acoustic testing ensures Psyche can withstand the noise of launch, when the rumbling of the rocket is so loud it can actually damage the hardware if a spacecraft isn't sturdy enough. In JPL's acoustic chamber, the spacecraft was strapped in and blasted with noise a hundred times louder than a typical rock concert.

Explore further NASA's Psyche mission moves closer to launch

More information: For more information about NASA's Psyche mission, go to: For more information about NASA's Psyche mission, go to: www.nasa.gov/psyche and psyche.asu.edu/
Credit: Dr Nahid Shokri Bousjien, Flinders University

Like disease in humans, parasites can wage a deadly evolutionary "arms race" against their hosts, even driving small populations to extinction if they mutate more quickly and gain the upper hand.

Now a new study led by Flinders University describes how Australian native parasite bee populations have been able to compete in a race with their adaptive social hosts by evolving at similar rates.

The research focused on bees collected in Victoria's Dandenong Ranges, notably the social parasite bee species (genus Inquilina) which rarely infests more than 5% of host colonies (genus Exoneura).

"These parasitic species spend almost their entire life cycle within the nest of the host species and have extreme adaptations to social parasitism, including strongly reduced mouth parts and pollen-collecting scopae," says first author Dr. Nahid Shokri Bousjien in an article in Ecology and Evolution.

"They are completely dependent on their host's colony for brood rearing, with Allodapine host and parasite life history having similar traits such as body size and generate times.

"In our previous studies, we found that the population sizes of parasite species are at least an order of magnitude lower than their host. However, this case study shows that they have been able to persist for long periods of evolutionary time (about 15 million years ago)presumably following their hosts through multiple speciation events."

The new study tests the idea that the long-term evolutionary persistence of these parasites might be due to an accelerated rate of molecular evolution, despite their reduced population sizes.

"Surprisingly, our analysis of molecular data showed that rates of evolution were similar between host and parasite."

Flinders University Associate Professor Mike Schwarz says that "evolutionary wars between species and their enemies may be much more complex that we thought."

"Large population sizes might allow more strategies to arise but maybe the critical issue is how effective those strategies are.

"Species like these bee social parasites are on the very edge of survival. They might tell us something about how you can survive when your very existence is under threat."

The researchers conclude that other scenarios should be consideredincluding the evolution of high-stake arms races into more benign relationships such as symbiosis or mildly deleterious association.

"The ability of species to adapt to existential challenges depends on the host's ability to 'discover' new strategies via random mutations, and the greater the number of individuals in a species, the greater the likelihood that a favorable mutation will arise from them," Associate Professor Schwarz says.

"Around us today, we see this in terms of new COVID-19 variants emerging and then spreading at ever increasing levels."

More information: Nahid Shokri Bousjein et al, Does effective population size affect rates of molecular evolution: Mitochondrial data for host/parasite species pairs in bees suggests not, Ecology and Evolution (2022). Journal information: Ecology and Evolution Nahid Shokri Bousjein et al, Does effective population size affect rates of molecular evolution: Mitochondrial data for host/parasite species pairs in bees suggests not,(2022). DOI: 10.1002/ece3.8562
In this photo provided by the Nevada Department of Wildlife, a Dixie Valley toad sits atop grass in Dixie Valley, Nev., on April 6, 2009. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service temporarily listed a rare northern Nevada toad as endangered on an emergency basis partly because of threats a geothermal plant in the works poses to its habitat in the only place its known to live in the world about 100 miles east of Reno. Credit: Matt Maples/Nevada Department of Wildlife via AP, File

In a rare emergency move, the U.S government temporarily declared a northern Nevada toad endangered Monday, saying a geothermal power plant in the works could result in its extinction.

The Fish and Wildlife Service announced it is formally proposing a rule to list the Dixie Valley toad as an endangered species subject to 60 days of public comment under the Endangered Species Act's normal rulemaking process.

But it said the emergency listing goes into effect immediately and will continue for eight months while more permanent protections are considered for the toad at the only place it is known to exist in the world.

It marks only the second time in 20 years the service has listed a species as endangered on an emergency basis.

"Protecting small population species like this ensures the continued biodiversity necessary to maintain climate resilient landscapes in one of the driest states in the country," the agency said.

It wasn't immediately clear how the toad's listing might affect construction of the power plant about 100 miles (160 kilometers) east of Reno. Conservationists and tribal members are trying to block the project in a lawsuit currently before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The dispute is among a growing number of conflicts over wildlife protection and tribal rights on federal lands that the Biden administration faces as it pursues its agenda to combat climate change by replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy.

Officials for Reno-based Ormat Technologies Inc., which broke ground on the power plant last month, have said they don't believe a listing would impact the project because the company spent six years developing a mitigation plan to offset any potential environmental impacts.

"Ormat long recognized the importance of conserving the Dixie Valley toad, regardless of its legal status," Ormat Vice President Paul Thomsen said Monday in an email to The Associated Press.

"Ormat will coordinate with relevant agencies to ensure that any additional required process is met while we continue our work on this important renewable energy project," he said.

Geothermal power is generated from hot water deep beneath the earth.

The Dixie Valley toad lives in wetlands around hot springs next to the construction site. In addition to geothermal development, other primary threats to one of the smallest toads in the western U.S. include disease, predation by non-native frog species, groundwater pumping for human and agricultural uses and climate change, the service said.

The agency agreed last month to expedite consideration of a federal listing of the toad as part of a settlement with conservationists and the Fallon Paiute-Shoshone Tribe, who are suing to block the power plant. The Nevada tribe says the site is sacred to its people who have lived there for thousands of years.

The Center for Biological Diversity first petitioned for the toad's listing in 2017.

Monday's decision "comes just in the nick of time for the Dixie Valley toads, which are staring down the barrel of extinction," said Patrick Donnelly, the center's Great Basin director.

"We've been saying for five years that the Dixie Meadows geothermal project could wipe out these tiny toads, and I'm thankful those concerns have been heard," he said in a statement emailed to The Associated Press.

The center for Biological Diversity and the tribe won a federal court order in Reno in January temporarily blocking construction of Ormat's project on U.S. Bureau of Land Management land east of Fallon.

But the 9th U.S. Circuit of Appeals stayed that order Feb. 4 pending full consideration of Ormat's appeal. The San Francisco-based appellate court is considering hearing arguments on the appeal in June.

The last time a species was declared endangered on an emergency basis was in 2011, when the the Obama administration took action on the Miami blue butterfly in southern Florida. Before that, an emergency listing was granted for the California tiger salamander under the Bush administration in 2002.

Other species listed as endangered on an emergency basis over the years include the California bighorn sheep in the Sierra Nevada in 1999, steller sea lions in 1990, and the Sacramento River winter migration run of chinook salmon and Mojave desert tortoise, both in 1989.

Explore further Endangered species listing considered for rare Nevada toad

 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

On March 21, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed rules requiring publicly traded companies to disclose their climate risk. According to the SEC Press Release:

"The Securities and Exchange Commission today proposed rule changes that would require registrants to include certain climate-related disclosures in their registration statements and periodic reports, including information about climate-related risks that are reasonably likely to have a material impact on their business, results of operations, or financial condition, and certain climate-related financial statement metrics in a note to their audited financial statements. The required information about climate-related risks also would include disclosure of a registrant's greenhouse gas emissions, which have become a commonly used metric to assess a registrant's exposure to such risks."

I am delighted to see this recognition of the material impact of one of many financial risks posed by environmental conditions. When Wall Street pays attention, we know that serious money is at stake. There will certainly be ideologues in the U.S. Congress and editorial writers in the Wall Street Journal who believe that these risks are over-stated and simply expressions of an opposing ideology. It's true that there is an ideological component to the climate finance debate. Still, investors must be provided with information to assess and understand the exposure to risk present in a company's external setting. Some of these risks relate to market conditions, and some relate to social, cultural, political, and environmental conditions. Companies that are abandoning their Russian operations in the face of Russia's cruel and senseless invasion of Ukraine will be disclosing the losses and prospects of recovery in their next financial reports. Politics creates financial risk, and our ecological environment creates financial risk as well.

My only objection to the SEC proposal is that it is limited to climate risk and does not encompass the full range of environmental risk. The need for a broader framework of environmental sustainability metrics was highlighted in a recent Wall Street Journal interview conducted by reporter Ed Ballard of Alison Bewick, the head of risk management at Nestle. According to Ballard:

"A Nestle SA executive who helped put together a new framework for biodiversity reporting said that companies should release integrated disclosures related to climate change and nature, because the two things are so interconnected. Alison Bewick, head of risk management at Nestle, was one of the executives involved in creating the initial framework from the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures that was published last week. The framework, devised by businesses working in collaboration with scientific organizations and nonprofit sustainability standard-setters, is meant to serve as a guide for companies about reporting on nature-related risks and opportunities. It follows the model of the climate-risk framework devised by the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures."

As Ms. Bewick clearly understands, the overall issue is environmental risk. Climate change is seen by some as the most important risk and an "existential" threat as well, but it's a little silly to hold a contest between environmental risks. At any one time, any number of risks could threaten us. Recently we started to think about the risk of radioactive contamination from nuclear power plants damaged by war. We are still living through the risk posed by an invasive virus called COVID-19. There are no shortages of environmental risks caused by the unanticipated impacts of modern technology. Nestle's Bewick concretely calls for integrating the biodiversity measurement and disclosure framework with the climate framework. In the Wall Street Journal interview, she observed that:

"When we think about how we can address our carbon footprint, a lot of it's through nature-based solutions. It's beyond just the greenhouse-gas measurement, it's around the availability of water, it could be the soil profile, how you approach land-use in terms of rotation of crops, that type of thing. I think the underlying principle is that this should be ultimately an integrated disclosure, because there's a very strong interconnectivity and dependency between nature and climate."

The resistance to climate science we see in the political world and in fossil fuel companies reminds me of the resistance to medical science's connection between smoking tobacco and cancer. The relationship is clear and has been established for many years, but economic interests continue to dominate health concerns. In 2019, 1.1 billion people smoked, and 7.7 million people died from tobacco. So much for scienceClimate change is similar, and if anything, the economic interests threatened are far more powerful than the tobacco industry. Perhaps that is why climate change is such a dominant environmental issue. Mitigating climate change requires fundamental changes in the technologies that drive our economic system.

Climate science is relatively straight forward and some of the impacts of climate change are well understood. But at a certain point, the relatively simple physics of climate change intersect with far more complex biological and ecological systems. Those changes and the damage to ecosystems caused by non-climate related human impacts are not as well understood and are far more difficult to measure. The web of relationships in the living world of ecology is more subtle and complex than the massive impact of greenhouse gasses on our climate. And yet millions of subtle changes to our biosphere can add up to an impact easily as massive as that caused by climate change.

Ms. Bewick's call for integrating climate and biodiversity measures in a single framework makes sense because the two sets of impacts are interconnected. It is also a way for the relatively less "popular" biodiversity impacts to cash in on the currency and "fame" of climate impacts. What is most important is that we get beyond this improvisational stage in environmental sustainability metrics. In the world of corporate finance, accounting terms are defined and regulated by the government, not by NGOs. When the SEC began during the New Deal, it was responsible for the development of Generally Accepted Accounting Practices. The SEC or some other part of the U.S. federal government needs to start the process of developing Generally Accepted Environmental Sustainability Metrics. If these are to become routine elements of corporate disclosure, companies need clear definitions of what they must disclose. This might begin with the climate disclosures now proposed but should then expand into broader measures of environmental impact and risk.

The aim of the SEC rule is precisely to provide clearer metrics for climate disclosure. According to Richard Vanderford's report in the Wall Street Journal:

"The [SEC Climate Disclosure] rule is meant to bring order to what has been uneven climate reporting by different public companies. In place of voluntary sustainability reports which use handpicked metrics, companies would have to disclose in much greater detail how much carbon they emit and how they plan to address looming climate risks. In theory, investors could then make more informed comparisons of businesses."

He notes, however that the rule would open up firms to litigation for mistakes in reporting, and he also commented that the "500-page proposal for a set of climate disclosure requirements that would, if adopted, be among the most expansive and complex disclosure requirements the agency has yet put forwardObservers already have noted that the new regime would require companies to expend considerable resources to craft these disclosures."

There is little question that adding sustainability metrics to management will be complicated, and we will make mistakes as we learn how to do this. Just as financial reporting keeps accounting firms in business, complying with environmental sustainability metric reporting requirements will cost companies serious amounts of cash and fund a growing profession of sustainability professionals. But if we want to grow our economy without destroying our planet, we need to do a better job of measuring and managing our environmental impacts. I am encouraged by the fact that these disclosure and measurement issues have finally reached the political agenda. To quote a "Druckerism," "in order to manage something, you must be able to measure it." Without measurement, you can't tell if the actions management takes are making things better or worse. We will not have adequate management of environmental sustainability without these measures. The SEC proposal is an important first step. It must proceed but then be built on and improved.

Explore further Climate change disclosures driving awareness and action among companies and investors

This story is republished courtesy of Earth Institute, Columbia University http://blogs.ei.columbia.edu.
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Knowledge creationthe generation of new ideas and patentsis an important driver of economic growth. Understanding how knowledge moves across industry sectors and regions can inform research and development (R&D) efforts, promote university-industry partnerships for innovation, and impact private businesses' location decisions. A new study from the University of Illinois in collaboration with Stockholm University and Korea Labor Institute provides a thorough look at the flow of knowledge in five industrial sectors across the United States.

"Our work provides a sort of cooking recipe for patent creation, with a list of ingredients that vary by industrial sector," says Sandy Dall'erba, professor in the University of Illinois Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics (ACE) and director of the Center for Climate, Regional, Environmental and Trade Economics (CREATE) at U of I. Dall'erba is a co-author on the study.

"Some sectors depend very much on local input factors, such as the presence of a university, versus elements located further away, such as spending in R&D by another private company. In some cases, this type of collaboration takes place across companies located thousands of miles apart as virtual meetings increasingly have replaced face-to-face meetings," Dall'erba states.

"In addition, our research measures the extent to which innovation in one sector depends on R&D in the same sector or other sectors. For instance, new patents in the drug and medical industry depend on local and distant R&D in the chemical industry."

Traditionally, geographical proximity was considered essential for knowledge flows. Clusters such as Silicon Valley's high-tech industry or Detroit's automobile industry facilitate face-to-face interactions and informal networking. Economists now acknowledge innovations may be shared across greater distances, but most studies have looked at aggregate results rather than location- and industry-specific patterns.

"We wanted to see the importance of geography for the patterns of knowledge creation in specific industries. We also wanted to examine how information flows across similar or different industries. Finally, we look at spillovers from private and university research and development activities," says lead author Orsa Kekezi, a scholar at the Swedish Institute for Social Research at Stockholm University. Kekezi began working on this research while she was a visiting scholar at Illinois.

The researchers analyzed knowledge transfers across 853 metropolitan U.S. counties in five manufacturing industries: chemical, drugs and medical, mechanical, computer and communication, and electrical and electronic.

The study uses patent applications as a proxy for knowledge creation, tracking the flow from where patents are created to where they are cited (based on data from the U.S. Patent and Trade Office). This measures the directionality of innovation and identifies the role of external factors in knowledge output.

The core elements in the analysis are intra- and inter-sectoral knowledge spillovers, as well as intra- and interregional flows, defined as local (within county), short distance (neighboring counties in 50-mile radius), and the rest of U.S. (beyond 50 miles). The researchers also looked at the presence of university and private research and development, as well as other factors, such as the number of graduate degree holders and the industrial diversity in a county.

"Overall, the local environment matters greatly for all the sectors. The industry structure in the region, the size of firms, whether there is a universitythese elements all matter for innovation. All sectors benefit from the local environment," Kekezi states.

But the specifics vary by sector and provide a complex picture of interactions. There is no one-size-fits-all approach for the development of patents, and if you look at average results, you'll miss the intricate details and patterns across sectors and regions.

"While university research matters for all the sectors, there is large heterogeneity here as well," says study co-author Dongwoo Kang, a research fellow at the Korea Labor Institute, South Korea. "For example, it matters more for the chemical industry and the drugs and medical industry; those sectors really benefit from basic research.

"Universities provide the core research that is needed for the chemical industry to work. Unlike perhaps the mechanical or electric industries, the chemical industry relies more on faculty scholars who are looking at basic processes," he adds.

Interregional spillovers matter less in the chemical industry, so face-to-face contact is important. On the other hand, for the drugs and medical industry, both inter-sectoral and long-distance regional spillovers matter, so geographic proximity is not as necessary. And for the electrical and electronic industry, inter-sectoral short-distance spillovers play a significant role.

The study findings can help companies decide where to locate their establishments.

"The idea that a company values proximity to a university, or where research and development are already happening, still holds true. But we also show the network of innovation is not completely local," Dall'erba states.

"The main takeaway from the paper is that we should not only look at local spillovers. We should look at knowledge that comes from further away, and from other industries," Kekezi notes. "New ideas don't come only by looking at what has been done in one's field, but also from looking at the broader picture and how we can combine different types of knowledge to create something new."

The development of COVID-19 vaccines serves as an example, Kang adds.

"The U.S. invested a lot of money in research and development to stimulate innovation in creating the first COVID-19 vaccines. This is typically done through a central cluster that serves as a basis for innovation. But there are also other networks making new COVID-19 vaccines. Our findings imply that not only local activities, but also research and development in other places are important for making new COVID-19 vaccines," he explains.

The findings can also help improve the design of future local and national innovation policies.

"We need to move away from an approach whereby everything is driven by similar mechanisms and instead understand much better what really works for one industry might be quite different from what works for another industry. It's not just about promoting industry clusters; it's more complicated than that. When governments try to promote innovation, they need to define a strategy that works for a specific industry and a specific location," Dall'erba says.

Explore further New research identifies the most important global supply chain linkages

More information: Orsa Kekezi et al, The role of interregional and inter-sectoral knowledge spillovers on regional knowledge creation across US metropolitan counties, Spatial Economic Analysis (2022). Orsa Kekezi et al, The role of interregional and inter-sectoral knowledge spillovers on regional knowledge creation across US metropolitan counties,(2022). DOI: 10.1080/17421772.2022.2045344
The key characters in this love story? A bee (euglossa heterosticta), a coffee plant, and a bird (rufous capped warbler). Images courtesy of CATIE and John van Dort. Composite by Mary Kueser. Credit: CATIE and John van Dort. Composite by Mary Kueser.

A groundbreaking new study finds that coffee beans are bigger and more plentiful when birds and bees team up to protect and pollinate coffee plants.

Without these winged helpers, some traveling thousands of miles, coffee farmers would see a 25% drop in crop yields, a loss of roughly $1,066 per hectare of coffee.

That's important for the $26 billion coffee industryincluding consumers, farmers, and corporations who depend on nature's unpaid labor for their morning buzzbut the research has even broader implications.

The forthcoming study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is the first to show, using real-world experiments at 30 coffee farms, that the contributions of naturein this case, bee pollination and pest control by birdsare larger combined than their individual contributions.

"Until now, researchers have typically calculated the benefits of nature separately, and then simply added them up," says lead author Alejandra Martinez-Salinas of the Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center (CATIE). "But nature is an interacting system, full of important synergies and trade-offs. We show the ecological and economic importance of these interactions, in one of the first experiments at realistic scales in actual farms."

"These results suggest that past assessments of individual ecological servicesincluding major global efforts like IPBESmay actually underestimate the benefits biodiversity provides to agriculture and human wellbeing," says Taylor Ricketts of the University of Vermont's Gund Institute for Environment. "These positive interactions mean ecosystem services are more valuable together than separately."

For the experiment, researchers from Latin America and the U.S. manipulated coffee plants across 30 farms, excluding birds and bees with a combination of large nets and small lace bags. They tested for four key scenarios: bird activity alone (pest control), bee activity alone (pollination), no bird and bee activity at all, and finally, a natural environment, where bees and birds were free to pollinate and eat insects like the coffee berry borer, one of the most damaging pests affecting coffee production worldwide.

The combined positive effects of birds and bees on fruit set, fruit weight, and fruit uniformitykey factors in quality and pricewere greater than their individual effects, the study shows. Without birds and bees, the average yield declined nearly 25%, valued at roughly $1,066 per hectare.

"One important reason we measure these contributions is to help protect and conserve the many species that we depend on, and sometimes take for granted," says Natalia Aristizabal, a Ph.D. candidate at UVM's Gund Institute for Environment and Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources. "Birds, bees, and millions of other species support our lives and livelihoods, but face threats like habitat destruction and climate change."

One of the most surprising aspects of the study was that many birds providing pest control to coffee plants in Costa Rica had migrated thousands of miles from Canada and the U.S., including Vermont, where the UVM team is based. The team is also studying how changing farm landscapes impact birds' and bees' ability to deliver benefits to coffee production. They are supported by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service through the Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act.

In addition to Martinez-Salinas (Nicaragua), Ricketts (U.S.), Aristizabal (Colombia), the international research team from CATIE included Adina Chain-Guadarrama (Mexico), Sergio Vilchez Mendoza (Nicaragua), and Rolando Cerda (Bolivia).

The study will be published by PNAS between April 4-8.

Explore further Climate change a buzzkill for coffee lovers

More information: Interacting pest control and pollination services in coffee systems, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2119959119 , Journal information: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Interacting pest control and pollination services in coffee systems,(2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2119959119 , www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2119959119
Over a 44-year study, University of Illinois researchers observed significant declines in common tropical bird species, including the Ocellated antbird (pictured), in a protected area in Panama's Parque Nacional Soberania. The researchers can't definitively point to causes for the decline, but call it a concerning trend. Credit: John Whitelaw

Deep in a Panamanian rain forest, bird populations have been quietly declining for 44 years. A new University of Illinois-led study shows a whopping 70% of understory bird species declined in the forest between 1977 and 2020. And the vast majority of those are down by half or more.

"Many of these are species you would expect to be doing fine in a 22,000-hectare national park that has experienced no major land use change for at least 50 years," says Henry Pollock, postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences (NRES) at U of I and lead author on the study. "It was very surprising."

Concerning is Jeff Brawn's word for it. Brawn is Levenick Chair in Sustainability in NRES and a co-author on the study. He's also investigated birds at the study site, Parque Nacional Soberania, for more than 30 years.

"This is one of the longest, if not the longest, study of its kind in the Neotropics," Brawn says. "Of course, it's only one park. We can't necessarily generalize to the whole region and say the sky is falling, but it's quite concerning."

Loss of birds from any habitat can threaten the integrity of the entire ecosystem, Pollock says. In the Neotropics, these birds are key seed dispersers, pollinators, and insect consumers. Fewer birds could threaten tree reproduction and regeneration, impacting the entire structure of the forest, a pattern shown elsewhere after major bird declines.

But the researchers haven't looked at the impacts or the underlying causes yet. Putting first things first, Pollock, Brawn, and their colleagues focused on documenting the numbers.

Back in 1977, then-U of I faculty member Jim Karr, now emeritus faculty at the University of Washington, initiated a twice-yearly bird sampling effort. Each year, members of the team set up mist nets in the rainy and dry seasons to capture birds moving through the study site. Mist nets gently entangle birds, allowing researchers to carefully pluck them out. They then identify, measure, and band the birds before releasing them, unharmed, back into the forest.

Over 43 years and more than 84,000 sampling hours, the researchers captured more than 15,000 unique birds representing nearly 150 species and gathered sufficient data to track 57 of those. The researchers noted declines in 40 species, or 70%, and 35 species lost at least half of their initial numbers. Only two speciesa hummingbird and a puffbirdincreased.

"At the beginning of the study in 1977, we'd catch 10 or 15 of many species. And then by 2020, for a lot of species, that would be down to five or six individuals," Pollock says.

Although the birds represented a wide variety of guildsgroups that specialize on the same food resourcesthe researchers noted declines across three broader categories: common forest birds; species that migrate seasonally across elevations; and "edge" species that specialize in transition zones between open and closed-canopy forest.

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Brawn says the decline among common species is most alarming.

"The bottom line is these are birds that should be doing well in that forest. And for whatever reason, they aren't. We were very surprised."

Declines in the other two groups were less remarkable. Birds that migrate to high elevations require some degree of forest connectivity to be successful, but forest in Panamalike most placesbecame increasingly fragmented in the last several decades.

Edge species were hardest hit, most declining by 90% or more. But Pollock and Brawn weren't surprised. In fact, the disappearance of edge species boosted their confidence in their results. That's because, 40 years ago, a paved access road cut through the site. It created the ideal edge habitat for birds that like openings in the forest canopy. But over time, the road stopped being maintained and has since turned into a small gravel road and the forest canopy filled in overhead.

"The fact that edge species went away when the road did is not concerning," Pollock says. "It shows what we would expect with forest maturation and the loss of those successional habitats."

The researchers are reluctant to generalize their results beyond their study site, pointing out the scarcity of similar sampling efforts throughout the tropics.

"Right now, this is really the only window we have into what's going on in tropical bird populations," Pollock says. "Our results beg the question of whether this is happening across the region, but unfortunately we can't answer that. Instead, our study highlights the lack of data in the tropics and how important these long-term studies are."

The study wasn't designed to explain why birds are declining in the forest, but the researchers have some ideas they want to follow up on. Things like changing amounts of rainfall, food resources, and reproductive rates, many of which may be tied to climate change.

But whatever the cause, the researchers expressed urgency to figure it out.

"Almost half the world's birds are in the Neotropics, but we really don't have a good handle on the trajectories of their populations. So, I think it's very important more ecological studies be done where we can establish trends and mechanisms of decline in these populations," Brawn says. "And we need to do it damn quick."

The article, "Long-term monitoring reveals widespread and severe declines of understory birds in a protected Neotropical forest," is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Authors include Henry Pollock, Judith Toms, Corey Tarwater, Thomas Benson, James Karr, and Jeffrey Brawn.

Explore further Hummingbirds show up when tropical trees fall down

More information: Long-term monitoring reveals widespread and severe declines of understory birds in a protected Neotropical forest, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2022). Journal information: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Long-term monitoring reveals widespread and severe declines of understory birds in a protected Neotropical forest,(2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2108731119
Warren County recorded 11 new positive COVID cases out of the 357 residents tested on Saturday, according to New York state data on Sunday.

The rolling positivity rate stood at 4.1%.

As of Sunday, 75.3% of the population has completed the COVID vaccine series. Out of 64,265 county residents, 51,512 have received one dose of the vaccine and 48,361 have completed the vaccine series.

Free COVID-19 home test kits remain available for the public at Warren County Municipal Center (entrances to DMV and Human Services buildings), town halls around Warren County and City Hall in Glens Falls.

Warren County Health Services also operates a COVID testing site at the Warren County Municipal Center that is in operation weekdays, 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. The site is open, by appointment only, to residents of Warren, Washington, Saratoga, Essex and Hamilton counties. Those with questions can call Warren County Health Services at 518-761-6580 or log on to

Washington County

Washington County also recorded 11 new cases on Saturday out of the 279 test results reported, according to state data.

The seven-day rolling positivity rate was at 2.8%.

According to New York state data on Sunday, 39,105 have completed the vaccine series and 41,286 county residents have received one dose of the COVID vaccine. Of the 61,197 people living in Washington County, 63.9% have completed the vaccine series.

Statewide

The New York state COVID data website showed on Sunday that 3,683 new COVID cases were recorded on Saturday out of the 125,777 test results reported.

Statewide, 825 residents were in the hospital, with 125 in the ICU.

As of Sunday, 14,772,863 New Yorkers have completed the COVID vaccine series and 16,487,032 have received one dose.

Jana DeCamilla is a staff writer who covers Moreau, Queensbury, and Lake George. She can be reached at 518-742-3272 or jdecamilla@poststar.com.

Love 0 Funny 2 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 0

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
PLEASE BE ADVISED: Soon we will no longer integrate with Facebook for story comments. The commenting option is not going away, however, readers will need to register for a FREE site account to continue sharing their thoughts and feedback on stories. If you already have an account (i.e. current subscribers, posting in obituary guestbooks, for submitting community events), you may use that login, otherwise, you will be prompted to create a new account.
BRIDGETON  A 66-year-old city man was arrested Friday afternoon after he became unruly inside a store and threatened an employee with a knife, police said.

Herman Woods is charged with aggravated assault, defiant trespass and possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose. He was released on his own recognizance, police said.

Police said Woods was in Sal's Market on Pamphylia Avenue when they received reports that he became disruptive, throwing items from shelves after one of his cards was declined.

Woods was asked to leave the store, which he did before returning moments later with a knife, police said.

The employee told officers Woods pointed the weapon as he if were going to stab him, police said.

Woods was arrested after the altercation, police said.

Contact Eric Conklin: 609-272-7261 econklin@pressofac.com Twitter @ACPressConklin

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
LOWER TOWNSHIP  Weeks after Cape May officials raised questions about a disused railroad bridge leading over the Cape May Canal, a section of that bridge collapsed. The wooden structure was not part of the bridge supports, but instead protected the bridge from boat traffic.

Lt. Daniel Nelson, the commanding officer of Coast Guard Station Cape May, said the section was reported blocking the channel on Thursday. He said the Coast Guard notified New Jersey Transit and the section has been removed.

Its free and clear now, Nelson said on Monday.

A crew from Sea Tow Cape May cleared debris from the main channel of the canal over the weekend. Jack Moran, the owner of the marine service company, said the nine pilings had collapsed, connected together by a horizontal timber.

The section served as a fender to prevent boats from damaging bridge supports. Moran thinks likely a passing boat struck the section. He said the pilings below the surface were badly eroded.

Im sure its been struck dozens of times, he said. You may see a full piling on the surface and it will be like a toothpick on the bottom.

He said he was contracted by Cape Seashore Lines to remove the timber from the channel.

After cutting the section free with a chainsaw, they towed it to a nearby ramp where it was loaded onto a flatbed.

The train bridge has not been used in years. According to officials with NJ Transit, it would need extensive repairs or replacement before it could be put back into operation if rail service were to ever return to Cape May.

NJ Transit is not currently working on restoring the bridge, reads a recent email from the agencys public information office.

The bridge, and the railroad tracks leading from it into Cape May, were recently discussed by members of City Council after an update on plans for the citys Welcome Center at 609 Lafayette St.

The city is in discussion with NJ Transit on improvements to that property, where city officials want to add more parking spaces. The city has been told the railroad tracks cannot be removed.

Its been years since a train has run on the tracks, but they were in use last summer and are expected to be again this year, with a private company renting rail bikes for tours of the marsh and natural areas along the tracks.

Regular rail service was once vital to beach towns in Cape May County, including Cape May. The regular commuter rail service to Cape May ended in the 1980s.

The tracks belong to NJ Transit, which leases them to Cape May Seashore Lines, which has in turn contracted with Revolution Rail for the use of the tracks for the rail bike operation. Cape May Seashore Lines operates a number of freight and passenger lines in South Jersey, including an Easter Bunny Express tourist train from Richland and from the Tuckahoe Train Station.

The company used to operate a tourist line between Cold Spring Village in Lower Township over the canal and into the former train station in Cape May, which now serves as the citys welcome center. That service relied on the swing bridge.

Company founder Tony Macrie did not respond Monday to a request for comment. He founded Cape May Seashore Lines in the 1980s. The company subleases the track south of the Cape May Canal to Revolution Rail, which plans to again offer tours this year on rail cart that can be peddled by passengers, which they describe as rail bikes.

The guided rail bike tours did not use the bridge, instead turning back at the canal.

Cape May Seashore Lines is responsible for the maintenance of the track. Moran said the rail line hired his company to remove the debris.

It is not yet certain what caused the section of bridge to collapse.

NJ Transit, the city of Cape May and Cape May Seashore Lines are working collaboratively with the U.S. Coast Guard in investigating the cause of the incident and identifying repair options to ensure boat traffic is not impeded, NJ Transit spokesman Jim L. Smith said Monday.

Cape May officials have suggested removing the tracks entirely, with Council member Shaine P. Meier saying they would be better used as walking trails.

After the damage to the bridge, Cape May Mayor Zack Mullock suggested at least removing the bridge, since it no longer functions.

Even if rail service came back to Cape May, the first thing theyll do is remove that old bridge, Mullock said on Monday. They would remove it to build new.

The bridge is entirely within Lower Township. There are two automobile bridges over the canal as well. Mullock said he was surprised the boaters have not been more vocal about removing the bridge.

There is precedent for the removal of out-of-use railroad bridges.

In Ocean City, a swing bridge over Crook Horn Creek built in 1910 and abandoned in 1981 was removed in 1992 after it was declared a hazard to navigation. Later, much of the steel was removed from the tracks leading out past 52nd Street into the marsh. A rutted dirt road along the tracks remains in use by pedestrians, but the route has been blocked to vehicles.

According to Nelson, the Coast Guard lieutenant, the railroad bridge at the Cape May Canal is not in the way of navigation. He said the bridge sections are properly marked and lit at night and the channel is passible now that the damaged section has been removed.

Theres nothing now thats deeming it not navigable, Nelson said.

Contact Bill Barlow: 609-272-7290 bbarlow@pressofac.com Twitter @jerseynews_bill

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.
UPPER TOWNSHIP  An investigation continues into a fatal two-car collision on Tuckahoe Road on Saturday afternoon.

State Police say John Creamer, 56, of the Marmora section of Upper Township was pronounced dead at the scene.

He was driving a Honda sedan east when the vehicle collided with a Mercedes SUV heading west, according to Sgt. Philip Curry with the State Police public information office.

The driver and the passenger of the Mercedes were injured, but those injuries were not life threatening, Curry said Monday.

The crash took place at 1:15 p.m. between Church Road and Butter Road, according to members of the Marmora Volunteer Fire Company. Members responded to the scene, along with the Upper Township Division of EMS, and volunteers with Seaville Fire and Rescue and the Tuckahoe Volunteer Fire Company, with reports of entrapment and fire.

The fire was contained to the engine compartment, firefighters reported in a social media post, and was quickly extinguished. One person had to be extricated from a vehicle and two were taken to a local hospital.

Firefighters remained on the scene for over five hours assisting the N.J. State Police and the medical examiners office with the investigation, reads the post to the companys page.

Fire police officers from Marmora and Seaville diverted traffic on Tuckahoe Road at Butter and Church roads.

Marmora Fire Chief Jay Newman, who also serves on Township Committee, said those involved were all local residents, and familiar to the crew members. He expressed sympathy to the family members and said accidents like this have an emotional impact on the emergency responders.

Its always hard on the volunteers, he said Monday. It was a horrific accident and it affects our local community.

Contact Bill Barlow: 609-272-7290 bbarlow@pressofac.com Twitter @jerseynews_bill

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.
A sheriff's deputy in western Illinois setting up spike strips on a roadway was killed Friday morning when he was struck by a car driven by suspect who was fleeing authorities after allegedly being spotted at a store with a gun, officials said.
CHICAGO - Two men in their 80s were shot during separate attacks in Chicago on Saturday afternoon, police said.

An 80-year-old man was in a car parked in the 5200 block of South Marshfield Avenue in the Back of the Yards neighborhood when an assailant the victim did not know shot him in the chest shortly after 3 p.m., police said.

The 80-year-old was rushed to University of Chicago Medical Center, where he was listed in critical condition, police said.

Also on Saturday, an 82-year-old man suffered a graze wound to the leg by an unknown assailant on the West Side about an hour earlier.

The 82-year-old was on the sidewalk around 2:15 p.m. in the 1700 block of North Monitor Avenue in the North Austin neighborhood, police said in a media notifcation.

He was transported to West Suburban Hospital in Oak Park in good condition, police said.

No further details were given by police.

Area detectives are investigating.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
A Clinton man sentenced less than a month ago to probation for a gun crime has been arrested by Clinton police for peddling methamphetamine.

Darryl Calvin Holmes Jr., 34, is charged with possession with the intent to deliver more than 5 grams of methamphetamine, a Class B felony under Iowa law that carries a prison sentence of 25 years.

Holmes also is charged with violating Iowas drug tax stamp law, a Class D felony that carries a prison sentence of five years.

According to the arrest affidavit filed by Clinton Police Officer Brett Johnson, at 12:46 a.m. Saturday, Johnson and Clinton Police Sgt. Brett Schwandt saw Holmes in the parking lot of the Quality Inn, 2300 Lincoln Way.

Holmes had an active warrant for his arrest for assault and was stopped by Johnson and Schwandt.

While searching Holmes, Johnson located a plastic bag that contained a crystal-like substance. The methamphetamine totaled 14.4 grams.

Police have said the normal dose of meth is one-tenth of a gram, meaning that Holmes had in his possession enough meth for 144 doses. Holmes also had $542 in cash.

Holmes was being held Sunday night in the Clinton County Jail on a $25,000 cash-only bond.

Holmes was sentenced March 10  23 days before he was arrested on the meth-related charges  to a term of three years on probation by District Judge Patrick McElyea.

Holmes had been arrested Oct. 24, 2021, on a charge of being a felon in possession of a handgun. He pleaded guilty to the charge on Jan. 3 during a hearing in Clinton County District Court.

According to Clinton County District Court electronic records, as part of his probation Holmes was required to obtain a substance abuse evaluation and successfully complete any recommended treatment; not use illicit drugs; submit to random urinalysis testing to ensure compliance; and obtain and maintain employment.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 2

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Angie Normoyle, Democratic candidate for Illinois 17th Congressional District, has scored a national endorsement from Leadership Now, a nonpartisan organization focused on increased voter participation and protection; competitive, fair, and secure elections; and transparency in politics.

Normoyle is one of six Congressional candidates nationwide to receive an endorsement from Leadership Now and was named in the group's "Candidates to Watch" list, joining Illinois' representatives Sean Casten and Lauren Underwood and California Congresswoman Katie Porter, among others.

"We are happy to have Angie included as one of our new leaders," Daniella Ballou-Aares, CEO and Co-Founder of Leadership Now said in a news release. "(Normoyle) represents the principles aligned with Leadership Now and is the kind of leader needed to strengthen our democracy  one who is willing to work across the aisle and focus on policy good for our country."

Normoyle faces a crowded field of Democratic primary candidates competing to fill the seat of outgoing U.S. Rep. Cheri Bustos, D-Moline, who announced last April that she would not seek a sixth term.

Normoyle is opposing Rockford Alderwoman Linda McNeely, Rockford Alderman Jonathan Logemann, Rockford resident and former Illinois State Rep. Litesa Wallace, Marsha Williams of Channahon and former WQAD meteorologist Eric Sorensen in the June 28 Democratic primary election.

"It is an honor to earn Leadership Now's endorsement," Normoyle said in a news release. "I am honored to be listed alongside dutiful representatives who work tirelessly to defend our democracy and promote our values, from improving our economy to protecting our environment."

Normoyle graduated from Augustana College with a Bachelor of Arts degree in communications and went on to earn master's and doctorate degrees in communications from Northwestern University.

Normoyle has worked part-time as an assistant professor at Augustana College teaching communications for 19 years and currently serves as a Rock Island County board member representing the 14th District.

Love 0 Funny 2 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Iowa Republican U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley voted against confirming Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, Democratic President Joe Bidens nominee to fill an upcoming vacancy to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Grassley, the ranking Republican member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, took issue with some of Jackson's judicial decisions while calling her "very personable and engaging" in a statement issued Monday ahead of the committee's vote on her nomination.

"Having carefully studied her record, unfortunately, I think she and I have fundamentally different views on the role judges should play in our system of government," Grassley said, according to prepared remarks posted Monday morning ahead of the committee meeting. "Because of those disagreements, I can't support her nomination."

Grassley, in shared prepared remarks, said she was evasive under questioning and that he disagreed with Jackson's interpretation of provisions put into law by the First Step Act. The 2018 bipartisan criminal justice reform legislation, which Grassley sponsored, reformed sentencing laws and made a number of reforms aimed at reducing recidivism and improving conditions in federal prisons.

Under a "compassionate release" provision in the First Step Act, Jackson reduced the sentence of Keith Young, who was convicted in 2018 of drug and weapons trafficking charges, from a previously mandated 20 years to 12 years.

Grassley argues that part of the law wasn't retroactive.

"Judge Jackson misused a motion for compassionate release to re-sentence a dangerous drug kingpin," Grassley said of the legislation he sponsored.

The committee, which is made up of 11 Democrats and 11 Republicans, deadlocked on the confirmation vote. Under Senate rules, Democratic leadership can still move the vote forward to the full Senate. A procedural vote to dislodge the nomination from the committee is expected to happen Monday night, with a final vote likely to be Thursday or Friday.

Jackson needs a simple majority to be confirmed in the evenly divided U.S. Senate, where three GOP senators, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah say they plan to vote for Jackson. Moderate Democratic U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia has also indicated he will support Jackson's confirmation, providing four swing votes that all but guarantee her confirmation.

Previously, Grassley said Jackson was "very graceful, very smart in her answers," and said he was gratified that Jackson outlined a stricter judicial interpretation in answers to questions from Grassley.

He'd also praised Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., for "running a fair hearing." Though he did take issue with some documents not being provided to the committee, a sentiment he reiterated on Monday in his statement.

Grassley chaired the Judiciary Committee from chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee from 2015 to 2019, overseeing several confirmation hearings including the hearings of now-Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

"Throughout this process, Ive focused on thoroughly and fairly assessing Judge Jacksons record. I think Ive done that. We need confidence that judges will interpret the laws as they are written. Judge Jacksons re-interpretation of laws Ive helped write does not give me that confidence," Grassley wrote.

Love 2 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 8

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg's errant driving in 2020 twice caused police officers to hit their brakes to avoid collisions, records released by the states Highway Patrol showed Monday, but he just received warnings until he struck and killed a pedestrian on the shoulder of a highway.

The Highway Patrol's scrutiny of the attorney general's driving record is coming to light ahead of the state House meeting next week. Lawmakers will consider a majority report from a Republican-controlled impeachment investigation committee that recommended he not be impeached. However, Gov. Kristi Noem is pushing for Ravnsborg's ouster, and the Highway Patrol is offering a public briefing for lawmakers on Wednesday.

The Highway Patrol records showed that a week before the Republican attorney general hit Joseph Boever walking on the shoulder of state Highway 14, he had been pulled over on the same highway for illegally pulling out in front of a police car at an intersection in Huron, roughly 70 miles from where the fatal accident happened. Ravnsborg displayed his badge identifying himself as the state's top law enforcement officer and later told Huron police officer Tanner Dornacher that he thought the intersection had a four-way stop sign.

Dornacher gave Ravnsborg a verbal warning, but he also noted in a written account roughly seven weeks later that Ravnsborg seemed unsure about the highway's driving lanes, stopping his vehicle in a weird spot inside one of the lanes. Before driving away, Ravnsborg asked Dornacher if the highway had two lanes and whether he could drive in either of them. Dornacher told him he could.

As the attorney general has recounted the fatal crash to the public and criminal investigators, he has been unable to explain how his car hit Boever on the shoulder of Highway 14 in a spot where the highway narrows to a single driving lane in either direction.

Ravnsborg last year pleaded no contest to a pair of misdemeanors in the crash, including making an illegal lane change. He has cast the crash as a tragic accident, insisting he did not realize he hit a man until he returned to the scene the next day and found his body. A spokesman for Ravnsborg did not immediately respond to a request for comment on his driving record.

Ravnsborg had also been issued a warning for making an improper lane change less than two months before the crash. Highway Patrol Trooper Nathan Moore wrote in an account of a July traffic stop that Ravnsborg drove out of his lane on a road in Sioux Falls, nearly causing a collision.

I had to hit my brakes and swerve to avoid being struck by the SUV," Moore stated in his account.

Ravnsborg racked up eight traffic stops, mostly for speeding, between taking office in 2019 and the crash, but had only been issued warnings. In five of those stops, Ravnsborg either identified himself as the attorney general or displayed his badge, the Highway Patrol found.

Those traffic stops came on top of a long history of driving violations. Ravnsborg had been pulled over more than 25 times, crash investigators found. However, he was in no danger of having his license suspended in South Dakota, where accumulated speeding tickets do not count against a driver's record.

The attorney general's driving record may also not matter much to lawmakers deciding whether to impeach him. The South Dakota House tasked the impeachment investigation committee with looking at Ravnsborg's conduct specifically surrounding Boever's death. Republicans on the committee last week all voted for a majority report that argued his actions in the crash did not rise to the level of impeachment because they were not done as part of his official duties as attorney general.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 3 Sad 0 Angry 16
The leader of the South Dakota House says impeachment proceedings into Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg will cost state taxpayers at least $87,000.

Republican South Dakota House Speaker Spencer Gosch said Friday the House Select Committee on Investigation racked up the bills on attorney fees while it looked into the events surrounding a fatal crash with a pedestrian in 2020, the Argus Leader reported.

The committee this week issued a formal recommendation that Ravnsborg, 45, should not face impeachment. Before its decision, a special counsel directed the nine representatives through 10 separate meetings and hundreds of documents, videos, recordings and other materials.

Rapid City attorney Sara Frankenstein, the special prosecutor, said in an email Saturday that she personally logged 208 hours working with the House Select Committee on Investigation. A paralegal working under her also billed 84 hours. Additional clerical work is not reflected in those hours, Frankenstein said.

That file was over 10,000 pages, not to mention how many hours of video and audio recordings, said Gosch, who also served as committee chairman. She and her team did a thorough and meticulous job.

A House committee concluded its months-long inquiry last week by voting 6-2 on party lines to recommend that Ravnsborg, a Republican, be cleared in the death of Joseph Boever, who was walking near a rural highway. The attorney general last year pleaded no contest to a pair of misdemeanors and was required to pay fines.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 2
614 feet.

Thats the distance the Attorney Generals car traveled after hitting Joseph Boever at approximately 10:23 p.m. about one mile west of Highmore on September 12, 2020, according to South Dakota Highway Patrolman Sargent Kinney and his staff. Sgt. Kinney further testified to our Impeachment Committee that the average distance a vehicle travels in a similar collision, like with a deer, is 200 feet. The South Dakota Highway Patrol concluded that this discrepancy, in addition to the fact that the Attorney Generals car was completely on the shoulder, showed that the Attorney General was distracted by something at the time his car hit Mr. Boever.

According to their report, Mr. Boevers face smashed through the passenger side front windshield, and became stuck there until velocity forced his face out.

No one knows how long.

Mr. Boevers glasses flew off his face with part of his glasses dropping to the floor of the front passenger side and the other portions landing in the back seat. Mr. Boevers mostly naked body, half of his clothes were torn away, then rolled into the ditch, about two feet from the shoulder. Mr. Boevers right leg was found approximately 40 feet northwest from his body.

Sargent Kinney and his staff were trained by John Daily. Mr. Daily is the nations pre-eminent traffic crash re-constructionist. He literally wrote the book on it, called "Fundamentals of Traffic Crash Reconstruction." He trains law enforcement across the country, including the South Dakota Highway Patrol. We were able to question Mr. Daily during our investigation. Mr. Daily confirmed the South Dakota Highway Patrols report, concluding, with 95% confidence, that its conclusions were correct.

Based on the investigation, the Attorney General was charged with a lane violation under SDCL 32-26-6. He did not contest the charge and was found guilty. Moreover, he never offered an explanation for driving on the shoulder.

In his interrogation, which was not under oath, the Attorney General stated that he thought he may have glanced a deer and he wondered if the deer may have hopped over to the other side of the road after impact. This is why the Attorney General went back to the accident scene early the next morning, according to the Attorney General.

However, on the night of the accident, the Attorney General tells the 911 dispatcher that he does not know what he hit. In response to the 911 dispatchers question about what he thought he hit, he stated, I have no idea. After the 911 call, he sent a photo of his car on the side of the road to his chief of staff, Tim Bormann. Mr. Bormann also asks about a deer. Again, the Attorney General states he hit something, but he does not confirm that it was a deer.

The North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation Agents Rummel and Arenz believed that the Attorney General was not being truthful to them in the interrogations. During the second interrogation, the Attorney General is asked several times about his cell phone use. He does not remember using his cell phone to text or access data. He says this several times.

Of course, approximately one minute before the crash, he was on his phone, reading news articles and checking his emails. It was not until his interrogators told him they knew about his phone use that he acknowledged using it.

We interviewed North Dakota Agents Rummel and Arenz as part of our investigation. Mr. Arenz testified, under oath, that the Attorney General made statements during the interrogation that indicated the Attorney General knew at the time of the accident that he did not hit a deer. This is consistent with the Attorney Generals own private statements discussed above at the time of the accident. Agent Rummel noted that the Attorney General would slam his hands down and get emphatic after he made a mistake. He also testified that the Attorney General was uncomfortable throughout the interrogations. In his experience, witnesses typically exhibit this behavior when they are not being truthful.

Agent Rummel also testified that the Attorney Generals recollection were too inconsistent with the facts to be believable. Mr. Boever lay naked off the shoulder with no color to him. Cell phone records indicate that the Attorney General walked by Mr. Boevers body when he either reporting the crash to the 911 operator or was looking for what he hit in the ditch with his cellphone flashlight. Agent Rummel testified that it would have been impossible not to see Mr. Boevers dead body under those circumstances.

As attorney general, Jason Ravnsborg had a unique and special duty to fully cooperate in the investigation of the fatal crash. The record indicates, however, that he was less than forthcoming, and perhaps even lied, during his interview with the law enforcement officers investigating the crash.

He used the privileges of his office to learn about how the investigation would be conducted. Early in the investigation, the Attorney General asked a South Dakota special agent questions about law enforcements ability to extract cell phone data from cell phones in the office of the Special Agents supervisor. The Special Agent immediately documented this strange interaction. The average suspect would not be able to learn the techniques of those investigating him. Based on the evidence and the conclusions of all law enforcement involved, I have concluded that the Attorney General was not truthful or transparent with law enforcement during the course of the investigation.

The Attorney General also mislead to the public. Less than two days after the accident, on his official state letterhead, the Attorney General issued a public statement on the accident. The Attorney General represented that his statement was a full and factual account of what happened, despite the fact that his statement includes several misleading or false statements meant to sway or confuse the public.

For instance, the statement says he believed he hit a large animal (likely a deer); although, immediately after the crash, he would only say that he hit something. He does not disclose in this letter that he was on his cell phone approximately one minute before the accident or that he was on the shoulder of the road at the time of the accident. In fact, he says he was in the middle of the road despite ultimately pleading guilty to a lane violation.

It was inappropriate for our states top law enforcement officer to issue this statement to the public during a pending investigation. At the time he released it, he had not been fully interrogated by investigators.

Our committee also interviewed two of the four prosecutors who worked on the criminal trial.

These interviews did not have any impact on my decision to recommend impeachment. Impeachment is not a criminal trial, and the type of charges that may come from a criminal investigation are inherently different from impeachment, which is for censure and removal of public officials.

Driving onto the shoulder of the road is a common place occurrence. Failing to stop at a stop sign is another common place occurrence. I agree that these types of traffic offenses, standing alone, should not serve as the basis for impeachment. But when any traffic offense results in the death of a pedestrian, it should not be considered a commonplace occurrence. In such cases, the consequences of the traffic offense simply cannot be ignored. The death of a pedestrian transforms a routine traffic offense into a serious incident regardless of whether the driver is charged with homicide.

But for Attorney Generals lane violation, Mr. Boever would not have been killed.

The Attorney General is not an average citizen. He is the chief law enforcement officer of the state. He is responsible for prosecuting persons who violate state law. Whether or not the Attorney General is acting in his official capacity, he should be held to a high standard of conduct with respect to obedience of the law. Unlawfully driving on the shoulder of the road with no excuse and causing the death of a pedestrian falls well below the standard of conduct to be expected from the states chief law enforcement officer, even if he was not engaged in official business at the time of the crash.

The Attorney General had the opportunity to appear before the House Investigation Committee to present his version of the facts. He could have disputed the evidence in the reports and dispelled the investigators opinions that he was not truthful during his post-crash interviews. He failed to do so. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, there was no reason for the Committee not to accept as true all the facts in the record.

Based on the totality of these circumstances, I believe it is reasonable to conclude that the criminal act which lead to Mr. Boevers death, albeit a class 2 misdemeanor, and his subsequent actions are grounds for the Attorney Generals impeachment under Art. XVI,  3.

Rep. Ryan Cwach is an attorney from Yankton who represents District 18 in the South Dakota House of Representatives. He was one of eight lawmakers on the House Investigation Committee.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 0
Henrico County-based Altria Group Inc. has agreed to buy power from a wind power energy development in Texas that the company said is aimed at offsetting emissions from all of Altrias electricity demand at its U.S. operations.

Altria, the parent company of top U.S. tobacco company Philip Morris USA and one of the Richmond regions largest employers, said it signed a virtual power purchase agreement, or VPPA, to buy energy produced by a new wind farm project in Haskell and Throckmorton counties, Texas.

The wind power farm in Texas is being developed by, owned and operated by a subsidiary of NextEra Energy Resources LLC, a Florida-based company that says it is the worlds largest operator of wind and solar energy projects.

The deal is Altrias first-ever virtual power purchase agreement, said Sal Mancuso, the companys executive vice president and chief financial officer.

Altria has set a goal of achieving 100% renewable electricity and reducing its greenhouse-gas emissions by 55% by 2030. The company has operations in the Richmond area, including Henrico, where its headquarters office is, and a manufacturing plant in Richmond as well as subsidiary operations in Kentucky and Tennessee.

When the project is operational, we expect we will hit both those targets  ahead of schedule, Mancuso said. Were proud to support a project that will bring additional renewable energy to the electricity grid, contributing to positive climate action.

Under the virtual power purchase deal, Altria will buy the power generated by the wind farm, which then goes onto the electricity grid. The power does not go directly to an Altria facility, but the renewable energy offsets Altrias use of energy from other sources at its locations.

Altria did not disclose the financial value of the agreement.

NextEra Energy Resources LLC said the wind power project is expected to be operational by the end of 2022 with a total generation capacity of 301 megawatts. The company did not respond to other requests for comment from a call and an email.

Altria said its agreement equates to around 400,000 megawatt hours of renewable electricity per year  the equivalent of the power used by more than 51,000 homes. It also is expected to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by about 283,000 metric tons, or equivalent to the emissions from more than 61,000 passenger vehicles being driven each year.
Two single-story retail shops on West Grace Street in the Virginia Commonwealth University area may soon rise to four stories, catching up with the size of newer developments in the corridor.

On Monday, the Richmond Planning Commission unanimously endorsed a special-use permit application for a father-son development team to build three additional stories  creating a four-story, mixed-use building with 21 market-rate apartment units along with the two ground-floor commercial spaces at 931 and 933 W. Grace St.

Located near the core of VCUs Monroe Ward campus, the new development is slated to rise where new university facilities and student housing have sprung up in the past decade.

Nael Abouzaki, a real estate investor and Henrico County assistant commonwealths attorney, said he and his father, Antar Abouzaki, had previously owned a restaurant on the same property before purchasing the land. Property records show the 6,400-square-feet parcel sold for $875,000 in 2020.

After we sold the restaurant, we kept an eye on the building and kept on reaching out to the landlord, and it was purchased off the market, said Nael Abouzaki. Given its proximity to VCU and the need for housing, we decided that were just going to go out and develop it.

City code allows a four-story, mixed-use building on the property by right, but a special permit is required because the development plan does not include a rear yard thats normally required by city code for B-4 central business district properties adjacent to residential zones.

No one from the public spoke against the project in a public hearing on the permit Monday, but a few civic organizations had raised some concerns before the Fan District Association last weekend decided not to oppose the project.

In January, representatives for the Monument Avenue Preservation Society and the Fan District, West Avenue Improvement and Historic West Grace Street associations called on city officials to reject the permit after a representative for the developers said last year that they would not consult neighbors west of Harrison Street at the end of the 900 block of West Grace Street.

The civic groups noted that the developers had cited a 1990 memorandum of understanding between VCU and Fan District civic groups that includes assurances about development and community engagement regarding properties west of Harrison Street, but contested that the Fan District is bounded to the east by Belvidere Street.

On Saturday, however, the Fan District Association relayed to city officials that it had voted not to oppose the project after meeting with the developers representative last week.

We feel compelled to reiterate the position articulated in the letter we have attached, that the eastern boundary of the Fan District is Belvidere, not Harrison, said Melissa Loughridge Savenko, co-chair of the Fan Districts zoning committee, in an email Saturday to city planning officials who attached it to staff papers on the ordinance. We continue to assert that the FDA and other neighborhood associations as appropriate should have the opportunity to comment on any project within the Fan District boundaries.

Deputy Planning Director Maritza Pechin said in Mondays meeting that the city does not have an official process for determining the boundaries of civic associations.

Pending approval of the special-use permit by the City Council, Nael Abouzaki said he expects to break ground on the project this summer with the hope of completing construction next year.
Surrounded by almost a dozen beagles, Gov. Glenn Youngkin on Monday signed legislation to protect dogs and cats at breeding facilities  a legislative effort that stemmed from a series of animal welfare violations at a Cumberland County beagle mill.

The five beagle bills Youngkin signed will restrict some breeders with tainted records from engaging in future sales, and increase state oversight over facilities that breed animals for research purposes.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has cited a Cumberland beagle breeding facility  Envigo  for over 70 animal treatment violations. The agency found dogs with significant dental and skin disease, incidents of dogs euthanized without pain relief, and more. Video released last year by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, showed dogs in poor condition at the facility, which it described as a prison-like factory.

These historic bills that we will sign today clarify that dogs and cats that are bred and sold for experimental purposes are protected by Virginias cruelty to animals laws, Youngkin said in a ceremony outside the Executive Mansion. It will also help us ensure that animal welfare standards and the actions necessary to save the lives of animals are fully enforced.

Sens. Bill Stanley, R-Franklin, and Jennifer Boysko, D-Fairfax, and Del. Rob Bell, R-Albemarle, championed the legislation and appeared alongside Youngkin on Monday. The bills cleared the legislature without opposition.

The bills Youngkin signed are:

 HB 1350 and SB 87, which will prohibit a dealer or breeder with certain violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act after July 1, 2023, from engaging in further sales of dogs or cats;

 SB 88, which will require breeders of cats and dogs for an animal testing facility to keep records of the animal for two years and submit quarterly reports to the state veterinarian;

 SB 90, which will require a breeder of unneeded dogs or cats to offer them for adoption before they are euthanized; and

 SB 604, which will tighten language in the state code that exempts federally regulated research animals from state animal welfare laws. The new language makes clear that dogs and cats in the possession of breeders are protected by Virginia law.

Daphna Nachminovitch, PETA senior vice president of cruelty investigations, said: Once these laws go into effect, Envigo wont be able to get away with depriving nursing mother dogs of food for days, letting puppies freeze to death or fall down drains and die, or allowing beagles to suffer with painful and untreated conditions.

Envigo has said that over the past four months, it has reduced the number of older, non-breeding dogs on-site by more 1,300, and its goal is to have fewer than 100 at any time. Envigo also said it has improved the ratio of caretakers to dogs and expects to achieve its goal of 100:1 in the second quarter of 2022.

The company also launched an effort to find homes for 480 of its dogs through partnerships with adoption agencies. On Monday, Youngkin said many of those dogs are still without homes.

Stanley, who adopted two of the dogs, has helped with the adoption efforts. Anyone interested in adopting a dog from the site can contact his office at (804) 698-7520 or email district20@senate.virginia.gov.
A juvenile charged in the fatal shooting of a Vinton restaurant manager in the fall was indicted by a Roanoke County Circuit Court grand jury Friday.

Jeremiah Unique Pannell, 16, of Roanoke faces three felony charges: aggravated murder, robbery causing death and using a firearm in the commission of a felony.

Although Pannell is a juvenile, Roanoke County Commonwealths Attorney Brian Holohan said Monday that he is being tried as an adult.

While he couldnt disclose his reasoning for filing the motion to move the case from juvenile to circuit court, Holohan said that the statutory criteria weighed heavily in favor of transferring.

Pannells charges are connected to the death of Gary Lamont McMiller, 38, of Vinton, who was shot in the parking lot of the McDonalds on Hardy Road at approximately 9:40 p.m. Oct. 11.

Police responded to the scene and found McMiller inside the restaurant with a gunshot wound. He was taken to Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital and died two days later from his injuries.

Search warrants indicate that McDonalds surveillance video captured the incident in its entirety.

The night of the shooting, three males arrived in the parking lot in a silver Toyota Camry and backed into a parking space. There, McMiller, a juvenile witness and the three males held a conversation.

An altercation ensued that appeared both verbal and physical, a search warrant reads. One of the vehicle occupants produces a firearm and shoots the victim in the chest.

Police investigated the incident and developed Pannell as a suspect. His identity was confirmed by the juvenile witness, who is an acquaintance and was expected to arrive at the location of the shooting, a search warrant reads.

The witness later told police that he had arranged the sale of an ounce of marijuana in the parking lot, and that McMiller was the seller, according to the search warrant

A friend from high school had contacted him [the witness] asking if he knew anyone that could sell him weed, the search warrants reads. The juvenile witness told the friend that Gary McMiller could sell to him.

Holohan said Pannells jury trial is scheduled for Sept. 8. The commonwealths attorney indicated that Pannell intends to enter a not guilty plea.

Holohan also said Monday that the other two suspects sought in the case still have not been identified.
Animal welfare protections were signed into state law on Monday, as politicians and activist groups are barking for better treatment of beagle dogs bred for experiment in Virginia.

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin on Monday signed five animal welfare bills into law, including four laws proposed by Sen. Bill Stanley, R-Franklin County, aimed at protecting animals bred and sold for experimental uses.

The laws signed Monday resulted from repeated and critical animal welfare violations uncovered at a beagle dog breeding facility in Cumberland County, owned and operated by a life science research company called Envigo, Stanley said previously.

Today we put all breeders on notice to ensure protocols for the humane treatment of dogs and cats, Stanley said in a news release Monday. They deserve the utmost of care throughout every aspect of their lives, and it is therefore both our duty and responsibility to ensure these obligations that we have to mans best friend are never compromised.

During routine federal inspections at Envigo in November 2021, animal care specialists found records indicating that 25 puppies had died of cold exposure in the prior two months, with other puppies visibly damp and shivering. Those are examples of 26 total violations found at Envigo in a November 2021 report released last month, while a focused inspection in March found five non-compliant items, according to reports available for download from the United States Department of Agriculture website.

Those recent inspections at Envigo horrified Democrat U.S. Senators Mark Warner and Tim Kaine of Virginia, according to a letter they addressed to the USDAs Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, in which the senators requested aggressive enforcement actions against the breeder.

Youngkin on Monday said protecting Virginias four-legged constituents brought every single Republican and Democrat together.

This historic package of bills I signed today clarifies that dogs and cats bred and sold for experimental purposes are protected by Virginias cruelty-to-animals law, will help ensure welfare standards and save lives, and will give Virginia the authority to take action when welfare violations occur, Youngkin said, according to a news release Monday.

Laws signed Monday aim to close loopholes in Virginias animal welfare code, and require more stringent recordkeeping for experimental breeders. All five laws passed through the state House and Senate with unanimous final votes.

There are 140 legislators in the Commonwealth of Virginia, and every single one voted at least one time for these bills, Stanley said previously. That says something about a significant change in policy in Virginia, and I think its a good change. Its a good day to be a dog or cat in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Senate Bill 87 and its companion House Bill 1350, introduced by Del. Rob Bell, R-Albemarle, provides for the state to impose penalties as a result of animal welfare citations found during inspections, according to an email from Stanley. Language in SB 87 also seeks to prevent dealers or commercial dog breeders from hiring people convicted of animal abuse.

In SB 88, experimental cat and dog breeders are required to keep detailed records on animals for two years after the date of sale. Breeders must provide a quarterly summary of those records to the state veterinarian, and at the request of other state agencies.

Under SB 90, experimental dog and cat breeders are required to first offer animals for adoption before the animal is euthanized. Only animal testing facilities were previously subject to this requirement, according to information from Youngkins office.

With SB 604, the definition of a companion animal is expanded to include dogs and cats bred for experiments, thus protecting them under the states animal cruelty laws. Previously, experimental cats and dogs were exempted from some welfare laws due to their classification as research animals.

Undercover investigating by People for Ethical Treatment of Animals, commonly known as PETA, helped reveal conditions at the Envigo breeding facility in Cumberland. PETA Senior Vice President of Cruelty Investigations Daphna Nachminovitch said Virginia made history Monday by signing the new animal welfare protections.

Once these laws go into effect, Envigo wont be able to get away with depriving nursing mother dogs of food for days, letting puppies freeze to death or fall down drains and die, or allowing beagles to suffer with painful and untreated conditions, Nachminovitch said in a news release.

A watchdog group called Stop Animal Exploitation Now monitors research facilities nationwide, according to a news release commenting on the laws signage.

This will force Envigo and other criminal breeders to either follow the law, or go out of business, said Michael Budkie, co-founder of SAEN, in the news release.

The Envigo facility in Cumberland County has not returned previous requests for comment. Stanley said he too was horrified by recently released inspection reports.

If Envigo fails to make the needed corrections, then these new laws will prevent them from ever doing business here in the Commonwealth again, Stanley said. With the new regulations being in place, we have created a framework that will protect these wonderful beagles in the future.

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Five of the nations and the regions leading historical groups weighed in this week on the fracas at James Madisons Montpelier over how the presidential site shares its governance with descendants of the Madison familys enslaved people.

The public commitments museums make to their communities are not to be taken lightly, AAM said in a statement Wednesday. Swaying from those commitments only undermines trust between our countrys museums and the public, causing irreparable harm to the descendant and underserved communities they aim to serve.

The alliance, the leading organization in the history-museum world, urged the foundation to find a solution that honors the commitments they have made and respects the partnership and legacy of the Montpelier Descendants Committee.

The AASLH said the foundation board of directors reversal of its earlier stance can be seen as taking a big step backward in the fight for inclusion, instead of pushing our field forward in a way that makes a difference at the core of this historic property.

In a statement Tuesday, the association noted that the board announced it will begin deciding for itself who represents the descendant community instead of accepting the committees recommendations for new board members as it agreed to last year.

This is a sharp and unfortunate turn from the foundations highly publicized decision in June 2021 to restructure itself by approving bylaws to establish equality with the Montpelier Descendants Committee in the governance of James Madisons Montpelier, AASLH said. Indeed, at the time, the foundation emphasized how the unprecedented decision was the result of a yearlong process by the Board with tremendous leadership from, and collaboration with, MDC and represents an important step toward equity and reckoning with histories of racism.

The actions put forth by the organization in 2021 placed Montpelier at the forefront of the movement to recognize the descendants of the enslaved at historic sites by offering a real voice in the governance of the organization, the association said. It was welcomed and shared with AASLH members as a national model hopefully to be replicated in other historic sites.

AASLH reaction to the foundations 2021 decision and its flip-flop was shared by other groups of history professionals.

As allies and Japanese American survivors and descendants of the World War II United States concentration camps, we felt deep pain and anguish after reading about the recent Montpelier Foundation Boards vote altering the original co-stewardship agreement concerning equitable representation on the Montpelier Board, the Wakasa Memorial Committee said.

Wakasa said the Descendants Committees leadership, and its creation of The Rubric guidelines for historic-site governance, has been an inspiration in helping to guide our own preservation and interpretation efforts and challenging White-centered narratives.

In considering the recent unconscionable action of the Montpelier Board, rejecting the equity and social justice work of the past years, we want to support the Descendant community and help amplify your voices, the Memorial Committees leaders wrote.

AASLH noted that the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which leases James Madisons Montpelier to the foundation, recently highlighted the boards June 2021 commitmentnow rescindedwhich specifically acknowledged the right of the descendant community to define itself, rather than be defined by the foundation.

The foundation now says it is broadening the pool of candidates from the descendants community, not just limiting ourselves to those who are favored by the committee and its chair.

But the effect will be the opposite, the AASLH said. Whereas before the MDC was choosing new members of the board to move that body toward 50-50 parity, it now will only be making recommendations that the board might or might not consider. The foundations maneuver alienates the MDC, the major representative of descendants, erodes trust between historical institutions and their descendant communities at Montpelier and elsewhere, and discounts the expertise of staff members who have worked for years building relationships with the descendants.

AASLH urged the foundation to honor its June 2021 commitment to treat the Montpelier Descendants Committee as its full partner in restructuring its board.

As disappointing as it is to see the foundation completely reverse direction on working with the Montpelier Descendants Committee, they can still do the right thing, AASLH President and CEO John R. Dichtl told the Culpeper Star-Exponent on Thursday. The foundation can still choose to move forward together.

In a statement Thursday, titled Another Promise Broken, the American Anthropological Association said Montpelier had been recognized by its peers as a pioneer in descendant engagement.

But now, nine months after the foundation pledged to share governance, only three MDC-nominated board members have been appointed to its 16-member board, the AAA said. The board also declined to review an MDC-submitted list of 40 highly qualified board prospects, including persons of national prominence in the fields of philanthropy, history, government and businesses, the association said.

The reversal has caused an uproar, as well it should, the AAA said. Nearly 5,000 members of the visiting public and donors have signed a petition opposing the boards action, it noted.

The National Trust warned of irreparable harm to Montpeliers legacy, and a majority of the estates full-time staff members issued a statement rebuking their employer for breaking its commitment to the MDC, the association said.

The decision is more than disrespectful, the AAA said. It dismisses the right of the descendants to define themselves and how their enslaved ancestors experiences are represented, rather than being defined by the foundation. The descendants participation is an acknowledgment of the importance that documentation, interpretation, and preservation of this heritage resource benefit from the central involvement of the people still living with the legacies of a painful past. Their voices, their perspectives, and their demands should be given shared weight.

After hundreds of years of empty and unfulfilled agreements and assurances, the descendant communities are experiencing yet another broken promise, the association concluded. The Montpelier Foundation should honor its previous agreement to share power equally with the Montpelier Descendants Committee.

COVA, which is dedicated to the preservation and study of Virginias archaeological resources, commended Montpeliers team of educators, curators, historians, archaeologists, descendants and museum professionals who built its pioneering reputation and advocated for systemic change in the foundation.

COVA stands in full support of the Montpelier Descendant Committee who have honorably represented their ancestors, fought for equal representation, and sacrificed much despite personal and historical traumas to help The Montpelier Foundation thoughtfully and honestly engage with its past and inspire national efforts to maintain its representation on Montpeliers Board of Directors, the council said.

Last month, The Montpelier Foundation board stripped 50-50 power sharing from the Montpelier Descendants Committee representing African Americans who trace their roots to the plantations community.

The controversy has outraged Montpelier curators, historians and archaeologists. They say the Descendants Committee is their crucial partner in interpreting the complicated past of the Father of the Constitution, his family and the 300-some enslaved people who toiled on the Madison familys plantation over 140 years.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation warned foundation board chair Eugene Hickok that the boards action would undermine decades of important work to repair the relationship between the broader African American community and Montpelier.
RICHMOND  Last fall, a Virginia Commonwealth University initiative called Medicines for All discovered a way to reduce the cost of Mercks COVID-19 therapy from $2,000 a kilogram to $200. Now, Medicines for All is working to lower the cost to produce Pfizers COVID pill.

In an unusual three-way partnership, VCU has joined forces with pharmaceutical companies and a large charitable institution  the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation  to reduce the cost of COVID medications and increase access to health care.

But the $40 million funding VCU has received from the Gates Foundation is due to run out at the end of this year, clouding the future of the research.

On Friday, Sen. Tim Kaine toured the facility and met with leaders from the university, local drug company Phlow and other stakeholders, who petitioned the senator for continued funding to solidify their work, lower drug costs and prepare for the next pandemic.

Too often, Kaine said politicians debate the source of high drug costs without investing in the research and development that can lower the costs.

This model of innovation to drive down cost is going to be very compelling to my colleagues on the health committee, both Democrats and Republicans, Kaine said.

In May 2020, Phlow received $354 million federal contract to build a national reserve of essential medicines and to make the building blocks for more than a dozen drugs used for treating COVID-19.

Phlow was co-founded by Eric Edwards, a Richmond entrepreneur and doctor, and VCU professor Frank Gupton, who also leads Medicines for All.

The organizations also partner with AMPAC Fine Chemicals, a pharmaceuticals maker in Petersburg, and Civica Inc., a nonprofit focused on addressing chronic generic drug shortages. Civica is opening a $125 million facility, which Kaine also toured, in Petersburg near the AMPAC factory.

Medicines for All has devoted much of its energy since its inception in 2017 to developing cheaper drugs for HIV, malaria and tuberculosis.

When COVID hit, it pivoted, reimagining how the COVID drug remdesivir was built. Then it shifted to Mercks COVID pill, molnupiravir, which was made with an expensive molecule called uridine. But VCUs researchers determined the medicine could be made using a molecule thats one-third the cost, cytidine.

What was a six-step process to synthesizing molnupiravir became a two-step process. In just three months, VCU surpassed its goal of reducing the medicines price 40%.

VCU has not unlocked a solution to reducing the price of Pfizers COVID pill, Paxlovid, but it is making progress, Gupton said Friday.

Under the agreement between VCU, the pharmaceutical companies and the Gates Foundation, VCU will publish its research, giving open access to other countries or companies to manufacture the drug. Pharmaceutical companies allow this, reasoning they cannot make money selling COVID medicines to Africa and Asia. And they can still produce their medicine cheaper and provide greater access to medicine around the world.

I think its pretty unheard of, Gupton said of the three-way arrangement.

Yes, VCU is sacrificing its intellectual property, but its doing so for the common good, and its getting paid along the way. Gupton said its like working for a living instead of playing the lottery. VCU gets its funding from the Gates Foundation whether it hits a home run or not. In exchange for that security, it gives open access to its discoveries.

If were going to move the needle on reducing the cost of health care, weve got to be able to get these innovations out into the marketplace so people can take advantage of them, Gupton said.

Reducing drug costs is perhaps the top issue before the Senate health committee, Kaine said. The work being done at VCU shows the issue of drug pricing goes beyond regulation. It includes investing in innovation.

Kaine recently co-sponsored a bill called the Affordable Insulin Now Act, which would cap the out-of-pocket cost of insulin to $35 per patient. The federal government would serve as a backstop, paying whatevers left. Medicines for All is not currently working on insulin.

The Gates Foundation doesnt typically renew its grants, but Gupton is holding out hope. Should the foundation end its funding, there are other global health organizations VCU can solicit, said a spokesperson for the institute.

Medicines for All is located in leased space in the Virginia Bio+Tech Park along the northern edge of downtown. Its just feet from VCU Healths growing campus and the Coliseum, a major redevelopment project for the city.

For too long, Virginia has fallen behind North Carolina in attracting business and technology, Gupton said. Investments made by the federal government and the Gates Foundation could change that.

What would make Virginia stand out is its ability not only to innovate new drugs but also to manufacture them. There are plenty of research parks across the country, Gupton said, but no development parks.

I dont want to be where other people are, he added. I want to be where we can create our own brand and capability that no one else can catch up to.

Edwards, the co-founder of Phlow, said the government has made a down payment on manufacturing medicines and building a national stockpile for key medicine ingredients. A potential end to the pandemic would be an easy excuse for the government to neglect making future investments in medicine, something Edwards urged Kaine not to let happen.

The Richmond areas drug development and manufacturing industry could become a new pillar of economic development for the area, similar to the level of spending brought by the state government, Kaine said.

Now, this will be a brand-new pillar.
The building that houses Matt Hurts office rests where a street crossing covers a creek in the 3,000-population town of Wise, far closer to the Kentucky border than the Star City.

The director of the Comprehensive Instructional Program, a consortium of 46 of Virginias smallest public school divisions, Hurt has spent the last eight years helping teachers and students tackle the states Standards of Learning tests, and he wants to shatter the stereotypes about who can do well on SOLs and who cant.

Heres a simple way to express his message: children of all backgrounds have the potential to pass and even excel at the SOLs. No one should presume a child is destined to fail those tests, especially not because of factors such as race or poverty or learning disability.

There should be no reason why we should allow a kids ZIP code to make it OK that theyre not being successful while kids in another ZIP code are successful, he said. There is no reason why we should have such disparate outcomes among the subgroups of kids.

If you followed his nine-part series that appeared in The Roanoke Times opinion pages through the month of March, then you know Hurt has done the data gathering and the number crunching to back that claim up, bolstered further by his discussions with other participants and his own hands-on experience.

A Wise County native, Hurt fears that policymakers on both the right and left of the political divide have veered off course in pursuit of ideology-driven silly stuff when it comes to education. Meanwhile, he and the members of the consortium have been laboring for years to help students in the states most underfunded schools master the SOLs  and they have been consistently succeeding.

Publishing Hurts series was something of an experiment for us, especially as Hurts writing is geared more toward fellow education professionals than the general public. Yet here was a wealth of information generated by an innovative Southwest Virginia education program that could have considerable positive effects if the right people  policymakers in Richmond, educators across the state  pay attention to the lessons offered.

Meeting a need

If education leaders discussed in plain terms, what is it that we want? What is the desired outcome? And had somebody to referee that conversation, I believe that we could come up with a desired end result that the vast majority of us could get behind, Hurt said.

His explanation of how more and more complicated requirements are added to educators responsibilities year after year  with no steps ever taken to reduce the workload in order to make meeting all those requirements possible  drew feedback of the so glad someone finally said this variety.

Several charts ran with Hurts essays. Should you visit the site where they originally appeared (see https://bit.ly/MattHurt) youll see many, many more charts. Hurt had to trim down the installments in his series considerably to fit our specifications. The fact that he undertook that task shows his determination to get the word out.

Intriguingly, Hurt took no stance on the often-criticized SOLs, opting for a practical approach: we have to deal with the SOLs because thats the assessment method we have. Theres a lot of folks across the commonwealth that really dont put a whole lot of stock into the SOL tests, maybe rightfully so, he said. But the way that I look at it is that these tests, especially the reading and math tests, they measure some very, very important skills. This is not something that you can give a kid a list of things to memorize, and then they do well on those particular tests. Theyre skills. And those skills are fairly marketable skills.

Wise County Public Schools serves as the fiscal agent of the Comprehensive Instructional Program, which was founded in 2014 in response to changes to the SOLs. The standards for reading and math had become more rigorous, and the state added components involving interaction with technology. In Region 7, consisting of Southwest Virginia school districts, students results bottomed out, jeopardizing accreditation. The regions superintendents decided that, with the state offering little that was genuinely helpful, they had to help themselves.

The first thing that the consortium did was ask for the data from the divisions that had the highest SOL scores, determining which ones were getting the best results on which tests. Then from those divisions, we recruited some of their most successful teachers of their most at-risk kids. We wanted the ones that had economically disadvantaged kids, that had the special ed kids, Hurt said. We spent that whole first year stealing their stuff. We got their activities, we got their pacing guides, we got their assessments, we put all those things online. Those teachers put together our first set of benchmarks.

Walking through walls

SOL results in Region 7 rose to the top of the heap. And not only that: as other school districts from outside Region 7 joined the consortium, 10 of those divisions, that very first year, asked their teachers to follow our pacing guides, and to administer our quarterly benchmark assessments. And at the end of that year, those 10 divisions in aggregate saw greater gains in reading, writing, math, science and history than anybody else in the state. And then you know, those successes have continued.

The programs recommendations come from the ground up, putting teachers from different districts in the same room to share how theyve solved problems. We just bring those teachers together and make them the kings and queens of our curriculum and they rule by decree and what they say, we do, Hurt said. That has served us extremely well.

One of the most challenging parts is that teachers have to hold students  all students  to high expectations, and teachers themselves have to be held to high standards, for the approach to work. This adoption of high expectations has to exist at every level of the district.

Anecdotally, where we dont see acceptable performance, we tend to see low expectations, which seem to be driven by an idea that thats as good as those kids or that school can do. Those performances can always be improved, Hurt said, and no one should assume otherwise.

His program is based on the work of teachers who dependably produce phenomenal results with disadvantaged children. Many of their kids could not give one care about a grade. Theyve made bad grades in the past, they expect to make bad grades  but if that teacher causes that kid to believe that she cares about him, then that kid will walk through the wall for that teacher.
FLORENCE, S.C.  Florence County Sheriffs deputies arrested two Florida residents and seized more than $3 million worth of cocaine, cash, pills and a gun on March 31.

Deputies made the initial stop at the 170 mile marker in the northbound lanes of Interstate 95 for a moving violation.

After deputies received a consent to search the vehicle they discovered an electronic after market compartment that had in it 57 pounds of cocaine, prescription pills, $66,000 in US currency and a 9 mm handgun, according to a release from the sheriff office.

In the release, Maj. Mike Nunn said the estimated street value of the drugs was about $3.4 million.

Deputies arrested Miguel Angel Valazquez, 37, of 14 Sawfish, Kissimmee, Fla., and charged him with trafficking in cocaine and possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime.

Deputies also arrested Sarah Valentin, 31, of the same address, and charged her with trafficking in cocaine and possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime.

The pair is currently free on $50,000 surety bond and face between 25-30 years in prison if convicted.
FLORENCE  The Salvation Army in Florence celebrated its 135th anniversary this year by joining the Greater Florence Chamber of Commerce with a ribbon cutting on Monday.

Cake and hot dogs were provided for visitors during the noon hour to celebrate.

Cutting the ribbon were Capt. Tim Scott and Major Melissa Scott of The Salvation Army.

Scott, command officer serving the Pee Dee region, said The Salvation Army in Florence is older than the city itself. The actual beginning date of the Salvation Armys in Florence was March 23. Scott said they waited to celebrate the anniversary and ribbon cutting on the same day.

We just closed our West Palmetto Street location, Scott said, consolidating those services at the 2111 S. Irby Street location.

Scott said they were renting the Palmetto Street location, and they own the Irby Street building. With the closing of the Palmetto Street location, the Salvation Army is taking a breather before making plans.

The clothing store and drop-off of donated goods is at the Irby Street location. The Salvation Army on Hoffmeyer Road houses the emergency shelter, social services, food pantry, administrative offices, the church and the womens and mens shelters.

A large portion of what is in the store is given away with vouchers. Scott said. As well as feeding and clothing people in need, we also help with drug and alcohol rehab services.

He said he sent a woman to their rehab center in Tampa, Florida, this past weekend. She only had the clothes she was wearing, and they provided her with clothes to take with her. He said the nearest mens rehab center is in Charlotte, North Carolina.

The Salvation Army also helps people with rent and utilities.

It serves six Pee Dee counties, Scott said.

He and his wife, Melissa, are ordained ministers who minister at the Salvation Army Church on Hoffmeyer Road. They have church services, Bible study, youth programs, music and other church activities at this location.

There is a youth camp located in Denton, North Carolina, that serves the Pee Dee area. Scott said they have summer camp for children in music, Bible study, the Salvation Armys version of Boys and Girls Scouts, and Military Kids Camp. The camp in Denton serves North and South Carolina.

We are an international church in 132 countries, Scott said. It is great to be a part of the Florence community.

The Scotts have served the Florence locations for almost two years.

He said, There is a lot of homeless folks here and drug and alcohol use here. There is a lot of need here. Lots of people are working paycheck-to-paycheck.

He said COVID just intensified the situation. When people are living on the edge and their business shuts down or the place where they work shuts down, there becomes a need, he said.

Since the rise in gasoline and food prices this year, he said their food pantry requests have increased.

People are feeling pressured with everything. They are feeling squeezed in every direction, he said. It started big with COVID. We hear from people now who say they have never been here before.

He said an elderly woman came in recently who said she didnt know how to be homeless. He said a lot of people dont know how to navigate the system.

We do some education on how to navigate the waters, the whole system of agencies, Scott said.

Scott said they joined the chamber to be more community-minded as they go forth in this 135th anniversary year. The Salvation Army tries to do what the community tells it is needed. The Salvation Army operates with an advisory board made up of local members.

The Salvation Army advisory board chair Libby Cooper said, I believe very strongly in what the Salvation Army does, not just in Florence but all over the world. I am glad to be a part of an organization that serves the people of Florence County.

The Salvation Army has new hours that were put into place Monday. The Irby Street location is open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday.

Scott said they are always in need of volunteer support and donations.

To make a donation, send to P.O. Box 4108, Florence, S.C. 29502. For additional information, call 843-662-4461 or 843-610-0770.

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.
Grab Holdings and Sea Ltd. stocks have lost a combined US$71 billion in market value this year.(PHOTO: REUTERS/Edgar Su)

By Ishika Mookerjee

(Bloomberg)  Singapores two largest new-economy firms have been touted as the next big thing for years. A US$71 billion rout in their share prices in 2022 seems to show investors arent buying the story.

Shares of ride-hailing company Grab Holdings Ltd. have more than halved since the start of the year while gaming and e-commerce giant Sea Ltd.s stock price has tumbled by 46%. The two U.S.-listed firms are languishing at the bottom of the MSCI Asean Index, with Grab among the biggest losers on the Asia Pacific stock benchmark as well.

The slump comes months after MSCI Inc. added the shares to its indexes amid much fanfare as it sought to give its regional gauges more exposure to new economy stocks. The tech selloff and waning global interest in special purpose acquisition companies have taken a toll on the firms.

Passive investors would have lost a fair bit of money on these stocks, said Brian Freitas, an analyst who publishes research on independent research website Smartkarma. Future price action depends on how the companies perform and the global macro environment  neither of which look terribly encouraging at the moment.

(Source: Bloomberg)

Grab was added to the MSCI Asean Index in February, hot on the heels of its merger with blank-check company Altimeter Growth Corp. Seas inclusion in the gauge began in May last year.

Freitas estimates that passive holdings of Sea and Grab are close to US$2.8 billion and US$280 million, respectively. The stocks have lost a combined US$71 billion in market value this year.

Judging by the earnings outlook, there may be little respite in store. Sea, which counts Chinese social media leader Tencent Holdings Ltd. as its biggest shareholder, is betting on growth at its online retail unit Shopee as its gaming arm faces slower bookings. But, Sea shut its main e-commerce operation in India on March 29, soon after the country banned its marquee flagship game Free Fire along with dozens of apps it says are of Chinese origin, citing security concerns.

Story continues

Shopees growth trajectory is flattening rapidly alongside India and France exits, said Oshadhi Kumarasiri, an equity analyst with LightStream Research. For a company priced expensively based on its future growth, its difficult to brush off the impact of an exit from a huge market like India. The growth story of Sea is falling apart

Read more about the two companies

Seas Billionaire CEO Opens Up After 75% Stock Crash

Grab Shares Plunge 37% to Lowest Ever as Losses Mount

Meanwhile, Grabs losses are mounting and the firm continues to splurge on subsidies.

Still, analysts have been slow to cut target prices given the two companies status as market leaders in Southeast Asia. They expect a return of at least 68% on both stocks over the next 12 months, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

With assistance from Yoolim Lee.

 2022 Bloomberg L.P.
Shijiazhuang Yiling Pharmaceutical Co., maker of Lianhua Qingwen, is listed on the Shenzhen stock exchange. (Photo by Liu Junfeng/VCG via Getty Images)

By Bloomberg News

(Bloomberg)  As Hong Kongs outbreak became the deadliest in the world, among the aid Beijing sent to the financial hub were 1 million packets of honeysuckle, rhubarb root, sweet wormwood herb and other natural ingredients, all mixed according to principles of traditional Chinese medicine.

Practitioners of the centuries-old medicinal system argue such herbal combinations can be just as effective as antiviral pills like Pfizer Inc.s Paxlovid.

Unlike Western medicine that targets the virus itself, the way TCM works against Covid is to first effect change in the environment of our human body, said Liu Qingquan, dean of Beijing Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Once the environment changes, the virus can no longer survive.

President Xi Jinping wants other countries to give Chinas herbal cures a chance. His government is promoting TCM to allies worldwide, sending traditional medicine specialists to Cambodia and supporting clinical trials in Pakistan, both countries that rely heavily on Chinese aid.

Russia in 2020 allowed pharmacies to sell Lianhua Qingwen, one of the most popular types of TCM used to treat Covid patients, and the government of another authoritarian leader, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, agreed last year to establish a centre to produce TCM near Minsk.

Making TCM globally acceptable as a treatment option for Covid is an important part of Xis strategy to use the pandemic to elevate Chinese innovations and inventions. China has still not approved widely used vaccines from AstraZeneca Plc and Pfizer, instead developing its own vaccines and making them easily available worldwide.

To advance its soft-power goals, China needs locally developed vaccines and treatments, says Michael Shoebridge, director of defence, strategy and national security at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a think tank in Canberra. This is part of creating a Sino-centred world, he says. Its a door opener.

Story continues

Active Ingredients

China is struggling to persuade skeptics to put aside doubts about medication that hasnt gone through the large, standardised clinical trials required by regulators with global credibility like the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or the European Medicines Agency.

Western medicine explicitly explains how the active ingredients of a drug are processed in the body, but TCMs proponents face challenges showing how the various components in a concoction work. While studies done in China claim TCM has benefits for Covid patients, critics say there are problems in the way the trials are designed and executed, and these prevent researchers from reaching unbiased and convincing conclusions.

Even Singapore, with a large ethnic-Chinese population accustomed to traditional medicines, has warned citizens not to take Lianhua Qingwen as a Covid treatment. To date, there is no scientific evidence from randomised clinical trials to show that any herbal product, including Lianhua Qingwen products, can be used to prevent or treat COVID-19, Singapores Health Sciences Authority said on Nov. 17. We strongly advise members of the public not to fall prey to unsubstantiated claims or spread unfounded rumours that herbal products can be used to prevent or treat COVID-19.

The U.S. FDA in 2020 sent at least six warning letters to companies selling Lianhua Qingwen and other TCM-based products purported to be Covid cures, telling vendors that the products were unapproved and misbranded drugs.

National Treasure

Such warnings ignore the results of a clinical trial published in May 2020, according to Lianhua Qingwens producer, Shijiazhuang Yiling Pharmaceutical Co.

Its found in the study in terms of clinical use that Lianhua Qingwen proved to be both safe and effective in treating COVID-19 in conjunction with conventional therapy as it could significantly relieve clinical symptoms of COVID-19 such as fever, debilitation, and cough, greatly improve pulmonary lesions, shorten the duration of symptoms, and increase the clinical recovery rate, the company said in a statement last June.

Lianhua Qingwen products generated revenue of about 4.3 billion yuan (US$676 million) in 2020, with year-on-year growth of 150%, according to Yilings annual report from last April.

Yiling declined to comment on regulatory warnings against claims of TCMs efficacy against Covid-19 but said the company has never exported Lianhua Qingwen to countries where the drug has yet to get regulatory approval.

Meanwhile, researchers in China have published studies purporting to show the efficacy of herbal treatments and state media frequently quote Xi calling TCM a treasure of the Chinese nation. In May 2021, he said the Covid outbreak had helped people gain a deeper understanding of TCM.

TCM promotion is about geopolitics, not science, according to Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at SOAS University of London. If TCM is proved to be an effective cure, I am sure the whole world will rejoice, he said. The problem is that there is no solid evidence that it is.

A TCM component may not have any effect when used singularly but could work when combined with others, said Danny Wong, chairman of Hong Kong-based Medisun Holdings Ltd., one of the partners promoting the TCM therapy Jinhuaqinggan as a Covid drug outside the mainland. The drug was approved in 2020 for treating Covid after domestic studies claimed it relieved symptoms such as fever, muscle pain and headaches.

The challenge to explain and unpack the working mechanism of TCM is like trying to figure out what exactly propels an automobile, said Wong. Is it the tires or the engine? They all contributed to moving the car forward.

Friendly Nations

Given such challenges in establishing TCMs efficacy, there are limits to what even friendly countries will do to help.

One of Chinas closest friends in Europe is Serbia, which in March 2021 reached a deal to manufacture state-owned Sinopharms Covid vaccines as well as TCM treatments and services. A year later, though, pharmacies in Belgrade have done little to boost sales of TCM cures and hospitals havent added TCM to protocols for Covid patients.

Even China isnt betting entirely on TCM, approving in February Paxlovid, the first foreign pharmaceutical product for Covid to win acceptance from regulators.

With generic drugmakers worldwide now making inexpensive versions of Pfizer and Mercks antivirals, interest in Chinas herbal cures that pre-date Covid will likely fade, argues University of Liverpool professor of pharmacology and therapeutics Saye Khoo. Early in the pandemic, we went for the drugs we already had, and we didnt get a huge amount of antiviral benefit, he said. Now, we are not in that era.

#HongKong will double down on the application of traditional Chinese medicine in #COVID19 treatment, with the help of another group of mainland TCM experts set to arrive in HK, HKSAR Chief Executive Carrie Lam said Thursday. pic.twitter.com/5w7s4S9cpA  People's Daily - Hong Kong (@PDChinaHK) March 25, 2022

Back in Hong Kong, officials are planning to send herbal remedies to every household. The city recently started receiving significant supplies of antivirals, creating a chance to compare them with TCM, said Dennis Lam, convener of the Hong Kong Alliance of Integrated Medicine Against Covid. This provides an opportunity for us to make a good randomized controlled trial, he said, so maybe we will be able to share more about how good they are.

With assistance from Misha Savic, Faseeh Mangi and Shirley Zhao.

 2022 Bloomberg L.P.
ReportLinker

Major companies in the market include Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. , Haier Smart Home Co. Ltd. , LG Electronics, Qingdao Haier Co. Ltd. , Daikin Industries Ltd, Whirlpool Corp, Midea Group co ltd, Robert Bosch GmbH, Apple and Electrolux AB.

New York, March 25, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Household Appliances Global Market Report 2022" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06247437/?utm_source=GNW





The global household appliances market is expected to grow from $502.28 billion in 2021 to $557.70 billion in 2022 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.0%. The growth is mainly due to the companies rearranging their operations and recovering from the COVID-19 impact, which had earlier led to restrictive containment measures involving social distancing, remote working, and the closure of commercial activities that resulted in operational challenges. The market is expected to reach $818.87 billion in 2026 at a CAGR of 10.1%.



The household appliance market consists of sales of household appliances by entities (organizations, sole traders and partnerships) that produce small electric appliances, electric housewares, and major household appliances.



The main types of household appliance are small electrical appliance, household cooking appliance, household refrigerator and home freezer, household laundry equipment and other major household appliance.Household laundry equipment refers to machinery and equipment that includes residential laundry equipment such as washing machines and dryers.



The appliances are operated by online and offline mode and are used for cooking, cleaning, and other applications.



Asia Pacific was the largest region in the household appliances market in 2021.Western Europe was the second largest region in the household appliances market.



The regions covered in this report are Asia-Pacific, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, South America, Middle East and Africa.



The rising trend of outdoor parties and cookouts on weekends and holiday is expected to drive the market for barbeques and grills in the forecast period.Rapidly evolving lifestyle along with the increasing outdoor recreational activities will increase the demand for barbeque machines and grills.



The Europe barbeque grill market is expected to grow to $5.98 million by 2026. Increasing access to unique camping sites, and increasing adventure camping, coupled with the rising disposable income will drive the market for barbeques globally, which in turn will boost the market for household appliances in the forecast period.



Increasing demand for online on demand laundry services is expected to restrain the market for household washing machines in the forecast period.The on-demand laundry services market is expected to be aided by stable economic growth forecast in many developed and developing countries.



The International Monetary Fund (IMF) stated that the global real GDP growth was 3.7% over 2019 and 2020, and 3.6% from 2021 to 2023. Additionally, emerging markets are expected to continue to grow slightly faster than the developed markets in the forecast period. For instance, China is forecast to register GDP growth of 6.2% in 2019. Stable economic growth, increasing internet penetration, and rising disposable income coupled with hectic lifestyle of individuals will lead to an increase in on demand laundry services, thereby decreasing the market for household washing machines.



Household appliance manufacturers are embedding LED lights in their products to minimize power consumption.LED lights require lesser wattage as compared to CFL or incandescent light bulbs.



Household appliance manufacturers are more focused on introducing products with LED lighting for minimal power consumption and improved visual appearance.For instance, GEs LED refrigerator lighting systems minimizes power consumption by 80% compared to halogen lamps.



The company has introduced products such as cafes French door refrigerators and profile wall ovens with this lighting. For instance, some of the major companies manufacturing LED lighting include Philip Electronics N.V., Osram Opto, Digital Lumens Inc and Cree Corporation.



The countries covered in the household appliances market report are Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, UAE, UK, USA, Venezuela and Vietnam.





Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06247437/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



__________________________

Story continues

CONTACT: Clare: clare@reportlinker.com US: (339)-368-6001 Intl: +1 339-368-6001




The Russian Defence Ministry has rejected Ukraines accusation of an alleged massacre of civilians in Bucha, saying that Russian armed forces completely left the town as early as March 30.

Sergei Lavrov, Russias Foreign Minister, has called the situation in the Ukrainian town a fake attack aimed at undermining Moscow, the TASS news agency reported.

Ukrainian authorities said on Sunday they were investigating possible crimes by Russian forces after finding hundreds of bodies scattered around towns like Bucha outside the capital Kyiv, after the Russian troops withdrew from the area.

An AFP reporter said they had seen at least 20 bodies in Bucha, while the towns mayor, Anatoliy Fedoruk, said more than 300 residents had been killed.

Mr Lavrov claims the dead bodies were staged and that images of them had been spread on social media by Western countries and Ukraine.

During talks in Moscow with the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Mr Lavrov said: The other day another fake attack was carried out in the city of Bucha in the Kyiv region after the Russian servicemen left the area in accordance with the plans and agreements reached.

A fake attack was staged there a few days later, and its being fomented on all channels and social media by Ukrainian representatives and their Western patrons.

Mr Lavrov also stressed that on March 31, Mr Fedoruk confirmed in a video message that there were no Russian soldiers in the city, and did not mention locals shot in the streets.

Two days later we saw the same staging organised in the streets, which they are now trying to use for anti-Russian purposes, he said.

A couple of weeks ago there were attempts to present the situation in a maternity hospital in Mariupol as a crime by the Russian military. As it later turned out, the attempts were made with a blatantly provocative purpose, and fake materials were presented, which were exposed, he concluded.

Russias top diplomat also called on Britain, which holds the presidency of the UN Security Council for April, to fulfil its responsibilities in that role after it rejected a Russian request to convene a meeting over Bucha.

The Independent has a proud history of campaigning for the rights of the most vulnerable, and we first ran our Refugees Welcome campaign during the war in Syria in 2015. Now, as we renew our campaign and launch this petition in the wake of the unfolding Ukrainian crisis, we are calling on the government to go further and faster to ensure help is delivered. To find out more about our Refugees Welcome campaign, click here. To sign the petition click here. If you would like to donate then please click here for our GoFundMe page.
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
       7.07 13.9% 245.68 482.9 4226.4 Spriver Tech Limited10 -SW526 7.8498  4226.4 57 NFT40%  7  Crew-34177 59 10  3    2023        Art Basel 
Sign up for our newsletter to keep reading.

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! Already a Subscriber? Already a Subscriber? Sign in Terms of Service Privacy Policy
Naomi Judd died Saturday at age 76. Here are some of the entertainers, leaders, athletes and other notable people we've lost so far this year.
SIOUX CITY -- A Sioux City man has been charged with attempted murder, among other felony charges, related to an incident occurring late Sunday night.

Sioux City Police responded to a 911 call at 10:40 p.m. Sunday after a female said her boyfriend, Agustin J. Sanchez Jr., 35, of Sioux City, pointed a gun at her, proceeding to shoot it next to her head.

Police say the woman ran for help in a westside neighborhood while Sanchez chased her with the gun.

Sanchez allegedly fled the scene in a vehicle while eluding officers. He crashed his vehicle in the 4000 block of Jackson Street, where he was taken into custody without incident. Officers located the gun inside of the vehicle.

Sanchez received medical care for minor injuries. He has been arrested for attempted murder; going armed with intent; assault while participating in a felony; and intimidation of a dangerous weapon, all class D felonies. He also faces traffic charges.

Officers say this investigation is ongoing and nothing further is being released.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Sioux City Police responded to a call at 10:40 p.m. Sunday after a female said her boyfriend pointed a gun at her and proceeded to shoot it next to her head. Police say the woman ran for help in a westside neighborhood while the suspect chased her with the gun.
Jared Wolthuis, 32, of Milford, Iowa, was sentenced to 36 months in prison. Meghan Renken, 29, of Spirit Lake, Iowa, received a 31-month sentence. Both had pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Sioux City to conspiring to distribute methamphetamine.

According to the U.S. Attorney's Office, the two were involved in a conspiracy that sold more than 3 pounds of meth in the Dickinson County area from July 2018 through March 2020. On March 17, 2020, authorities searching a co-conspirator's property seized 20 pounds of meth from an outbuilding. Wolthuis and Renken were stopped in a vehicle driving away from the home, and 3 pounds of meth were found inside the vehicle.
SIBLEY, Iowa -- A Lake Park, Iowa, man has pleaded guilty of vehicular homicide in connection with a 2020 utility vehicle rollover in which a woman was killed.

Christopher Bosma, 49, entered a written plea Monday in Osceola County District Court to vehicular homicide  reckless driving.

According to court documents, Osceola County Attorney Nolan McGowan will recommend that Bosma be sentenced to 10 years in prison, one of the terms of a plea agreement. Bosma also will be ordered to pay $150,000 in restitution to the estate of Kelsie Sturm, who was killed in the July 18, 2020, incident.

A charge of vehicular homicide  intoxication will be dismissed.

Bosma was arrested in March 2021, eight months after the rollover. According to court documents, Bosma was intoxicated while participating in a UTV poker ride that involved bar hopping in several towns.

Bosma was driving a Polaris Ranger on a trail west of Harris, Iowa, at about 4:15 p.m., when he turned onto another road and lost control of the vehicle. Sturm, 34, of Lake Park, was thrown from the vehicle, which tipped over on top of her. She was transported to a hospital, where she later died.

A blood sample taken nearly three hours after the accident showed Bosma's blood-alcohol concentration was 0.165%. The state crime lab estimates his BAC at the time of the accident was between 0.19% and 0.22%. Iowa's legal limit is 0.08%.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
SIOUX CITY -- A Sioux City man with numerous previous felony convictions has been sentenced to more than two years in federal prison for illegally possessing a gun.

Jamaal Ferguson, 22, pleaded guilty in December in U.S. District Court in Sioux City to being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm. He was sentenced Friday to 33 months in prison. He will be on supervised release for three years after completing his prison sentence.

Ferguson was arrested in August in possession of a loaded handgun and 28 grams of marijuana.

He has a history of convictions for violent crime dating back to 2016, when he committed an armed robbery during a home invasion. He was adjudicated as a juvenile of that and another home invasion. He was convicted of home invasions and assaults again in 2018 and 2019.

Because of his felony convictions, he was prohibited from legally possessing a gun.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
STORM LAKE, Iowa -- A Storm Lake man accused of sexually abusing two children has pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor charge and credited for time served in jail.

Pway Htoo, 43, pleaded guilty in February in Buena Vista County District Court to one count of assault, a simple misdemeanor, that was amended from second-degree sexual abuse.

District Judge John Sandy on March 22 sentenced Htoo to 30 days in jail and gave him credit for time already served. Htoo was fined $105. Other charges of sexual abuse, lascivious acts with a child, indecent contact with a child, incest, assault with intent to commit sexual abuse and child endangerment were dismissed.

Htoo had been charged with having sexual contact with the children, who were under age 12, several times from July 2013 through July 2017.

He was arrested July 21 after police began investigating a report of alleged abuse at a Storm Lake residence.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
SIOUX CITY -- The Siouxland Soup Kitchen is launching a campaign to raise money for a new building.

The facility will be built in a parking lot at the corner of Ninth and Nebraska streets, directly adjacent to The Warming Shelter. Lyn Armentrout, the Soup Kitchen's executive director, said the nonprofit has outgrown its current building at 717 West Seventh St., where it has been since 2013.

The West Seventh Street building, a painted brick structure built in 1928, was once an auto repair garage and later housed other businesses. Siouxland Community Soup Kitchen LLC purchased the property in 2007 for $128,500.

The nonprofit is in the "very early stages" of the project and does not yet have a final dollar figure for the new building, according to Armentrout. A capital fundraising campaign will begin this spring to assist with construction costs.

The new building will provide more dining, as well as kitchen space. Currently, the Soup Kitchen is serving between 125 to 150 meals per night.

"It will be one level, pretty much double the size of what we have now, so we can serve more people at once," Armentrout said. "Right now, we're kind of serving in waves. We let the first group of 50 or 60 in and, then, we have to wait until they're done eating and clear out and let another group in. This will allow us to fed everybody more efficiently."

Armentrout said the location is ideal, since it's along bus lines and within a few blocks of Siouxland Community Health Center and Siouxland District Health Department, both of which provide services to the less fortunate.

"We picked that new spot because it's more convenient for most of the people who would use our services," said Armentrout, who noted that the Soup Kitchen is independent of The Warming Shelter. "It will just be more centrally located to other services."

Armentrout said the nonprofit hopes to keep Erik's Closet, a clothing giveaway area in the Soup Kitchen, going. Where it will be located has not yet been determined.

"We haven't nailed down the details on Erik's Closet yet -- where that will move to or if it'll be inside the same building or if we have to come up with another building," she said.

The Siouxland Soup Kitchen was founded in 1987 with the goal of addressing food insecurity in the community. Since that time, the Soup Kitchen has been 100% reliant on the generosity of the Siouxland community to help fulfill its mission of providing a free, hot meal to anyone, no questions asked. The Soup Kitchen operates solely through donations and volunteers from local businesses, churches, and others in the community.

"We serve anyone who's hungry, no questions asked. Not just homeless," Armentrout said. "We have low income or widows, or some people are just lonely and don't have any other family, so we're kind of their pseudo-family. We serve anyone and everyone."

Armentrout said there are various ways individuals can donate to the project. Visit siouxlandsoupkitchen.com or call 712-258-0027 for more information.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
ROCK VALLEY, Iowa -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has fined a Rock Valley company $90,000 for federal Clean Air Act violations.

D&K Repair agreed to the fine for selling illegal "defeat devices" designed to render automobile emission controls inoperative, the EPA said in a news release.

As part of a settlement, the company agreed to demolish its inventory of defeat device components and has certified that it has stopped selling devices that disable vehicle emission controls.

Installation of the devices on a vehicle results in higher releases of nitrogen oxides and particulate matter, all of which can contribute to health problems such as respiratory diseases.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 2

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Here's a look at COVID-related news for today, April 4.

Senate has reached $10B COVID agreement

Senate bargainers have reached agreement on a slimmed-down $10 billion package for countering COVID-19, the top Democratic and Republican negotiators said Monday, but the measure dropped all funding to help nations abroad combat the pandemic.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said the deal would give the government the tools we need" to continue battling the disease. Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, trumpeted budget savings in the measure that he said meant it will not cost the American people a single additional dollar." Read more here:

Chinese military dispatched to help with virus outbreak in Shanghai

China has sent more than 10,000 health workers from around the country to Shanghai, including 2,000 from the military, as it struggles to stamp out a rapidly spreading outbreak in its largest city under its zero-COVID strategy.

Shanghai was conducting a mass testing of its 25 million residents Monday as what was announced as a two-phase lockdown entered its second week. Most of eastern Shanghai, which was supposed to re-open last Friday, remained locked down along with the western half of the city. Read more here:

German man gets dozens of COVID shots to sell fraudulent passes

A 60-year-old man allegedly had himself vaccinated against COVID-19 dozens of times in Germany in order to sell forged vaccination cards with real vaccine batch numbers to people not wanting to get vaccinated themselves.

The man from the eastern Germany city of Magdeburg, whose name was not released in line with German privacy rules, is said to have received up to 90 shots against COVID-19 at vaccination centers in the eastern state of Saxony for months until criminal police caught him this month, the German news agency dpa reported Sunday. Read more here:

Judge blocks Air Force discipline over vaccine objections

A federal judge has blocked the military from disciplining a dozen U.S. Air Force officers who are asking for religious exemptions to the mandatory COVID-19 vaccine.

The officers, mostly from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, along with a handful of airmen and reservists, filed a lawsuit in February after their exemption requests were denied.

U.S. District Court Judge Matthew McFarland in Cincinnati granted a preliminary injunction last Thursday that stops the Air Force from acting against the officers, airmen and reservists until their lawsuit is resolved. Read more here:

***

Check out more of today's COVID-19 news here:
Amy Schumer found Will Smith's clash with Chris Rock to be "really upsetting".

The 40-year-old star co-hosted the Oscars with Wanda Sykes and Regina Hall, and she now looks back on the controversial incident with a feeling of sadness.

During her 'Amy Schumer and Friends' comedy show in Las Vegas, she shared: "I don't even know what to say about the Oscars. I have no jokes about it.

"All I can say is that, I don't know if you saw this, but Will Smith slapped Chris Rock. Did that cross your newsfeed?"

Amy later added that the on-stage clash was "upsetting".

She reflected: "All I can say is that it was really just sad. It says so much about race, about toxic masculinity, it's just, everything. It was just really upsetting."

By contrast, Amy was actually feeling upbeat about the ceremony and how it was unfolding prior to the dramatic incident.

The 'Trainwreck' star said: "I was kind of like, feeling myself.

"I was like, Oooh, somebody's monologue went well.' And then, all of a sudden, [Will] was making his way up and just [motions a slap]."

Meanwhile, Amy previously joked she was planning to get in some "trouble" during the Oscars.

The Hollywood star said she would "burn all bridges" when she took to the stage to co-host the awards ceremony.

Amy explained at the time: "I'm going to get myself in some trouble as per the [usual].

"Wanda, Regina are hilarious, and we're having a blast preparing. I mean, I don't know who made the decision to let me personally be a host, but it's not a good one  because it'll burn all bridges. I'll burn every bridge."

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Originally published on celebretainment.com, part of the TownNews Content Exchange.
Netflix has reportedly backed away from Will Smith's latest project.

The 53-year-old actor was previously cast in 'Fast and Loose', but the movie has been quietly put on the back-burner after Will smacked Chris Rock at the Oscars.

Netflix is now wary of pressing ahead with the film, according to The Hollywood Reporter. It's been suggested that the streaming service could still make the project but with another actor in the lead role.

The proposed movie focuses on a crime boss who loses his memory after being attacked. The central character then pieces together the clues and discovers that he's led a double life as a kingpin and a CIA agent.

Elsewhere, work on 'Bad Boys 4' has been paused by Sony, while other projects in pre-production are likely to follow suit.

Meanwhile, Will recently resigned from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences after he smacked Chris at the Oscars.

The Hollywood star - who won the Best Actor gong after the on-stage confrontation - also insisted he would accept "any further consequences" the organization imposed.

He said in a statement: "I have directly responded to the academy's disciplinary hearing notice, and I will fully accept any and all consequences for my conduct.

"My actions at the 94th Academy Awards presentation were shocking, painful, and inexcusable.

"The list of those I have hurt is long and includes Chris, his family, many of my dear friends and loved ones, all those in attendance, and global audiences at home.

"I betrayed the trust of the academy. I deprived other nominees and winners of their opportunity to celebrate and be celebrated for their extraordinary work. I am heartbroken.

"I want to put the focus back on those who deserve attention for their achievements and allow the academy to get back to the incredible work it does to support creativity and artistry in film.

"So, I am resigning from membership in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and will accept any further consequences the board deems appropriate.

"Change takes time and I am committed to doing the work to ensure that I never again allow violence to overtake reason."

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Originally published on celebretainment.com, part of the TownNews Content Exchange.
The Supreme Court has spent years debating whether the Fourth Amendment prohibits malicious prosecutions, or the filing of bogus criminal charges, without arriving at an answer. On Monday, Kavanaugh finally broke this impasse with an unexpectedly great decision that underscores his talent for dressing up major decisions in the guise of minor ones. His opinion in Thompson v. Clark declared that the court has already recognized a Fourth Amendment right against malicious prosecutions, which he defined as the wrongful initiation of charges without probable cause. Kavanaughs assertion is not actually true, but it doesnt matter: The Supreme Court has now willed this protection into existence, establishing a federal shield against falsified charges.

Advertisement

Any parent would shudder at the injustice that gave rise to the lawsuit at the heart of Thompson. (Indeed, Kavanaughs own recitation of the facts evinces an empathy thats lacking in much of his jurisprudence.) Larry Thompson and his wife, Talleta, lived in Brooklyn with their newborn baby, Nala, and Talletas sister, Camille Watson, who has cognitive impairments. The Thompsons took care of Watson because of her developmental disabilities. When Nala was just one week old, Watson covertly called the police and accused Larry Thompson of sexually abusing his baby.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

After EMTs arrived, Thompson told them they must have the wrong address; no one in the apartment, he said, had dialed 911. The EMTs then returned with four NYPD officers. Thompson refused to let them enter the apartment, insisting that they first obtain a warrant. The officers tackled Thompson, handcuffed him on the floor, and conducted a warrantless search of his apartment and child. They found no evidence of abuse. The EMTs took the baby to the hospital, where doctors found no evidence of abuseonly diaper rash.

Advertisement

Advertisement

To justify their own violence, NYPD officers filed a criminal complaint against Thompson. They accused him of violently resisting arrest and obstructing government administration, holding him in jail for two days. (Its no secret that many cops who violate peoples rights later falsely accuse their victims of crimes to shield themselves from liabilitythe quintessential malicious prosecution.) These charges were clear retaliation against Thompson for asserting his Fourth Amendment right against a warrantless search, and prosecutors later dropped them without explanation. Thompson then sued the officers for malicious prosecution in violation of his constitutional rights.

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.

For centuries, most states have recognized malicious prosecution as a tort, or a civil violation that incurs damages. Yet the Supreme Court has long refused to say whether its forbidden by the Fourth Amendment, too. The justices have previously passed up the opportunity to answer this question in two notoriously muddled decisions. In the intervening years, lower courts have divided hopelessly over what, exactly, qualifies as an unconstitutional malicious prosecutionif it exists at all. For instance, in this case, the appeals court held that Thompson could not claim malicious prosecution. Why? Because his case ended with dropped charges rather than some affirmative indications of innocence, like an acquittal or a statement from the judge.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

In his opinion for the court on Monday, Kavanaugh rejected this reasoning. For support, he turned to the judicial consensus in 1871, when Congress passed the civil rights law that lets individuals sue local law enforcement. At that time, courts authorized claims against malicious prosecution if the charges were filed without probable cause, for a purpose other than bringing the defendant to justice, and ended without a conviction. If a prosecutor abandoned the case or a court dismissed it without explanation, an individual could still file suit. This formulation of malicious prosecution, Kavanaugh concluded, is also housed in the Fourth Amendment. As a result, prosecutors decision to drop charges against Thompson does not prevent him from suing the police.

Kavanaughs decision is both excellent and confusing. Excellent because it allows victims of police misconduct to sue in federal court even if prosecutors scuttle all charges; confusing because it begs the question at the heart of the case. Rather than explain why the Fourth Amendment bars malicious prosecutions, Kavanaugh simply asserted: This courts precedents recognize such a claim. He then cited two precedents that did no such thing. Then he cited a heap of lower court decisions recognizing a Fourth Amendment right against malicious prosecutions, none of which binds SCOTUS.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

In dissent, Justice Sam Alito, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch, fumed that this court has never held that the Fourth Amendment houses a malicious-prosecution claim. But just because the court hasnt doesnt mean that it shouldnt. In a 2020 decision that Kavanaugh praised as comprehensive, Judge William Pryorusually a law-and-order conservativefound ample historical evidence that the Constitution allows such claims. After all, bogus charges typically lead to wrongful arrest and imprisonment, the kind of seizure forbidden by the Fourth Amendment. The term malicious prosecution, Pryor explained, is just shorthand for a seizure pursuant to legal process that is tainted by false statements or omitted information. An arrest (or seizure) is unconstitutional when it is the product of cops lies.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Kavanaughalong with Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, and the three liberalsgrasped this fact. Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch did not. What accounts for this rift? One possibility is that Kavanaugh, Roberts, and Barrett understood the troubling, real-world implications of Alitos position. Its no coincidence that this case involves a baby: Law enforcement routinely accuses parents of harming their children on the basis of dubious or nonexistent evidence. A brief filed on behalf of the conservative Home School Legal Defense Association elucidated this problem with alarming detail. (The brief was authored by the anti-LGBTQ Alliance Defending Freedom, which rarely finds itself on the same side as the ACLU.) Countless parents, including evangelical home-schoolers, have been subjected to baseless child-welfare investigations that spiral into criminal probes. Zealous police and prosecutors may bring charges against parents with nothing more than a hunch. Perhaps this brief forced several conservative justices to confront the reality that no onenot even their own storybook familyis safe from malicious prosecution.

Whatever the reason for the conservative blocs fissure, its a good result for justice. The Constitution cannot possibly condone the horror that Thompson suffered at the hands of the NYPD. Fraudulent charges are a betrayal of an officers most basic duties. Its long past time that the Supreme Court recognize them as a betrayal of the Constitution, as well.
Last fall, Politico reporter Alex Thompson wrote a short news story about President Bidens then-science adviser, Eric Lander, and how he was driving everyone in the White House crazy. Then, after writing that article, Thompson got an anonymous tip about Landers mistreatment of his staff, which included lawyer Rachel Wallace. Wallace alleged that Lander bullied her and retaliated against her for raising ethical red flags about his behavior. One of those red flags was about Eric Landers closeness with another Eric, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, and Landers desire for Schmidts foundation, Schmidt Futures, to help fund the White House science office.

Advertisement

After Thompson wrote about the bullying allegations, Lander resigned from the administration under pressure. But Schmidts influence remains. According to Thompson, at least two staff members from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy were paid indirectly through Eric Schmidts foundation, and roughly a dozen staffers in the 150-person office were associates of Schmidts.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

On Fridays episode of What Next: TBD, I spoke with Thompson about the murky web between Eric Schmidt and the White House science office. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Lizzie OLeary: Can you describe the relationship history between Eric Lander and Eric Schmidt?

Alex Thompson: Eric Schmidt and Eric Lander are incredibly close. Since 2012, Eric Schmidt has been on the board of the Broad Institute, where Eric Lander was the founding director. They both served together on the presidents science council during the Obama administration. They were on the Defense Innovation Board at the Pentagon.

Advertisement

Advertisement

How far back does Eric Schmidts involvement in White House policy go?

His interest in White House politics and forming relationships with the White House goes all the way back to the Clinton administration. The Clinton administration created the first White House website, whitehouse.gov, and Eric Schmidt, as a high executive at then-Sun Microsystems, came in and helped them with that.

Now, thats just a little bit of a taste. Starting with the Obama administration, really the 2008 campaign, Eric Schmidt is basically all over it. In October of 2008, while hes the CEO of Google, he goes on the campaign trail for Barack Obama. Over the course of the Obama administration, there was an analysis done that found that a member of Google had met with White House personnel on average of once a week for the first seven years of the Obama administration. During the 2012 campaign, Eric Schmidt was very involved with Obamas re-election efforton Election Night, he was in the campaign boiler room. He also helped found a data company called Civis Analytics that helps Democratic campaigns, including Joe Bidens 2020 primary campaign.

Advertisement

Advertisement

What does he want? Is it just to be close to power? Is it to get a policy outcome that is favorable for his companies? Or is it something more nebulous?

Advertisement

Advertisement

It really depends who you ask; there are two main compelling arguments. There are some people that believe hes doing this because hes corrupt. That even though hes worth about $23 billion, him having a role or a voice in science policy is a way for him to further enrich himself. He is on the board of a lot of artificial intelligence companies. He still has a lot of Google stock. He has a 20 percent stake in this huge hedge fund with over $60 billion in assets.

Advertisement

Advertisement

The people that are more sympathetic say that Eric Schmidt has a very strong belief that the future of American supremacy is based largely around the future of artificial intelligence policy. Essentially, Eric Schmidt has the conviction that whichever country is the most dominant in artificial intelligence policy is going to win the 21st century. And so, he wants to have a very strong role in the future of American science policy because he believes its necessary for the country.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Are there concrete ways that he has affected government science and tech policy that we can point to?

During the Trump administration, he ended up serving as chair of this Congress-created commission called the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence. Basically, their job was to help set priorities for artificial intelligence in national security. And he was the chair of it. They produced this huge 700-something page report that was released last year and is now, in some ways, the map forward for how the defense establishment especially but also a lot of the country is thinking about the future of artificial intelligence policy.

Advertisement

Where Schmidt comes together with the Office of Science and Technology Policy is kind of complicated. What does OSTP do in its most simple iteration?

Advertisement

It is the science office within the White House. Now, you have departments, you have the health department, you have other places that deal with health. But OSTP is located within the executive office of the president. Now, the priorities of the office, which was created in 1976, differs with every president. In the Biden administration office, they have been tasked with planning for future pandemics; artificial intelligence policy writ large, especially how to think about civil rights and algorithmic discrimination; and Bidens Cancer Moonshot, which is one of his most personal priorities. And with dealing with climate change writ large.

Advertisement

Advertisement

President Biden pledged that he was going to make science a focus of his administration, and he elevated the Office of Science and Technology Policy to a Cabinet-level office. What is the connection between OSTP and Eric Schmidt?

We already know that over a dozen associates of Schmidts, including current and former employees, landed at the science office, which is only about 150 people. He has close relationships with Eric Lander. Several of the people that worked on the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence that he chaired also landed at OSTP. Former Google employees landed at OSTP. And also, over the summer for about four months, the chief innovations officer at Schmidt Futures, a man named Tom Kalil, who had worked at OSTP in the past, was brought on to OSTP as an unpaid consultant while he was still being paid and working full time at Schmidt Futures.

Advertisement

Schmidt Futures is also very involved in many of the events and in many of the initiatives that OSTP is doing. And the number of Schmidt Futures connections, and people that recently worked for Schmidt Futures, is pretty significant considering that the office is relatively small.

The links between Eric Schmidt and OSTP feel slightly opaque. Is that intentional?

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Its supposed to be complicated. These relationships and dynamics are supposed to be difficult to unravel. Its intentionally dense. It is not meant to be easily traced back to Eric Schmidt. Some of these financial connections and connections to other people are meant to be one person removed.

For example, the Federation of American Scientists fellowship. Now, when these fellows are sent to OSTP, they say that theyre coming in as a fellow for the Federation of American Scientists. But I received internal emails that showed that when they were trying to bring on a specific personMarc Aidinoff, who is now the chief of staffinternally, the deputy chief of staff of workforce put in writing, Oh, the Energy Department has now secured Schmidt Futures funding for this fellow. So there was an understanding that, yes, that theyre coming through FAS, but this is a Schmidt Futures-funded person.

Advertisement

When you talked to people within the science office, what was it that stuck out to them? Was it the funding, or was it the relationships that went way back?

The funding is what raised the first red flags. In the words of Rachel Wallace, it raised significant ethical concerns. In particular, when they wrote in that email that they had secured Schmidt Futures funding for this person, in that email they also noted that they had looped in Tom Kalil, who was still working at Schmidt Futures. So Rachel Wallace said her urgent and immediate advice is, You need to get Tom Kalil away from anything dealing with Schmidt Futures. And also, Schmidt Futures and Eric Schmidt himself have significant conflicts of interests with what OSTPs work is.

Advertisement

Advertisement

What was happening in the office of OSTP while these ethical concerns were being raised?

The ethics officials in the office felt like they were playing Whac-A-Mole: A Schmidt Futures thing comes up here, they have to smash it down. Another Schmidt Futures thing comes over here, they have to smash it down. They had to repeatedly tell people, Hey, Schmidt Futures and Eric Schmidt have significant financial overlap and financial interest in the work that OSTP does. You have to withdraw from this fellowship. Tom Kalil cannot be involved in helping bringing on Schmidt Futures-backed personnel.

Advertisement

There was this repeated back and forth and tension between the ethics officials and some of the higher-ups at OSTP. Now, to their credit, sometimes they listened. For example, the then-chief of staff of the office pushed Tom Kalil out. I think both sides probably feel like theyre the good guys. If youre these higher-ups, youre like, We have to do so many things at this office, and we need to get it done, and we need these people. This philanthropy is willing to help bring on extra hands while were doing really important work. The ethics officials are like, Yes, but they have their own interests. And there is a clear conflict of interest here.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

It seems pretty strange that a private foundation would be paying for public servants to work in the White House. But I learned from your reporting thats not completely unusual in this office?

People in the office would say that its chronically underfunded. They only have an annual budget of about $5 million. Even the founding statute said that they should utilize consultants. And as a result, people from the Federation of American Scientists, from universities, send fellows to OSTP to supplement the work. Whats raised ethical flags is that it seems Schmidt Futures was using this mechanismthat I think was very earnestly created to help supplement the work of places that are underfunded and understaffedto get his foot in the door.

Advertisement

The White House told you that there was nothing unusual about its ties to Schmidt, and that the ethical issues that were raised were properly handled. In a statement after your story came out, Eric Schmidts foundation said that it had worked with the science office for years to address funding issues, and that there was no undue influence on policy. Do you see this as a story about the Biden administration, or one about Eric Schmidt and his desire to influence policy?

Advertisement

Advertisement

I think its much more the latter. But I think its striking that even as the politics around some of these tech titans have changed a lot in the last six yearspeople forget that during the Obama administration, Eric Schmidts influence didnt raise any eyebrows because tech was cooleven as the politics have changed, Eric Schmidts influence within Democratic administrations has not. I think what makes this story distinct is that this is a guy with a clear ideology about the future of science policy in America. And so, its beyond just him having influence. The way in which he has endeared himself to powerful Democrats over the last 15 years is distinct from the normal rich person.

Disclosure: Schmidt is the former chairman of the board of New America, a think tank that partners with Slate and Arizona State University in Future Tense, a project about emerging technologies. Schmidt, his family foundation, and Google have all donated money to New America. In August 2017 a former New America employee who was critical of Google alleged that he was fired because Schmidt held undue influence at the organization, a charge New America denied.

Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society.
Ketanji Brown Jackson is on the path to becoming the first Black woman to sit on the nations highest court. But theres another less-discussed first about Judge Jacksons background: Shell be the first Supreme Court justice in more than 30 years to have served as a public defender.

This might seem like a bit of CV esoterica, but judges backgrounds are important for how justice does, or doesnt, get served. Public defenders safeguard the constitutional right to be represented by a lawyer, regardless of the defendants means. In an adversarial system, they are one team, or half the system.

Advertisement

And yet, across the nation, surprisingly few judges have a background as defense attorneys. According to the Cato Institute, former prosecutors outnumber former defense attorneys by a factor of 4 at the federal level. At the federal appeals court level, according to the Center for American Progress, that proportion is whittled down even further, to 1 in 100. This matters because ex-prosecutor judges tend to sympathize with prosecutors. Former prosecutors are more likely to incarcerate defendants, and a prosecutor-dominated justice system could explain why criminal courts are less likely to view evidence skeptically and more likely to drag their feet to overturn wrongful convictions.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

This judicial bias is a huge problem because America has a troubling wrongful conviction rate. Even in death penalty caseswhich receive far more post-conviction scrutiny than do other cases1 in 25 people set to be executed will have been wrongfully convicted. For non-capital cases, the wrongful conviction rate is likely to be much higher, meaning tens of thousands of innocent individuals languish in Americas vast carceral state.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Many factors contribute to wrongful convictions, but one of the more pernicious forces is the sorry state of forensic science. Despite their acceptance in the courtroom, prominent scientists and criminal justice experts have raised serious doubts about the validity of many of the pattern-matching disciplines that rely on comparisons of bite marks, hairs, shoe prints, tire tracks, or even fingerprints. According to the Innocence Project, junk forensic science factored into about half of all wrongful convictions in which the defendants were later exonerated by DNA testing. Judges are supposed to keep flawed science out of the courts, yet theyve failed repeatedly. One reason may be that former prosecutors are reluctant to root out what used to be one of their most powerful tools in the courtroomand may even call into question some of their own past convictions.

Advertisement

Advertisement

To learn about what the confirmation of Judge Jackson means for forensic science, wrongful convictions, and public defense, I spoke with M. Chris Fabricant. Fabricant is the Innocence Projects director of strategic litigation, a former public defender in the Bronx, and author of a new book, Junk Science and the American Criminal Justice System, which is publishing on Tuesday. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Tim Requarth: It seems like for all of the shortcomings of the legal system, forensic science would be on solid ground. Its science, right? But in your new book, you say thats wrong. So could you break that down at a high level for someone whose knowledge of forensic science mostly comes from CSI?

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

M. Chris Fabricant: Its interesting you mention CSI. Shows like CSI that propagate the infallibility of forensics have been around for a long, long time, and as a result, judges and juries are less likely to question forensic expert testimony. People in my industry even have a name for it: the CSI effect. In my book, I try to dispel this myth of infallibility that has led to wrongful convictions and wrongful executions.

So is this more about more people misusing solid science, or are there problems with the science itself?

Advertisement

Advertisement

Well, it really depends on the technique that were discussing. Forensic techniques such as matching bite marks, or matching microscope patterns on hair, they really have no business being used in criminal trials at all because there is no valid scientific foundation.

Advertisement

Fingerprints have been used to identify people successfully for more than 100 years. But do we know whether a partial print discovered from a crime scene could only have come from a specific person to the exclusion of everybody thats ever been born? Theres no statistical basis to make those claims, so thats exaggerated testimony. And then theres DNA analysis, which, if done correctly, is scientifically valid.

In your book you talk a lot about bite mark matching, where forensic analysts take a dental mold of a suspects teeth and match it to a bite mark on a victims body. Even some bite mark analysts now acknowledge that the technique is junk science. Why is that?

Advertisement

Matching bite marks is not possible. And thats not just an opinionthats what the literature now demonstrates. Even trained forensic dentists are no better than flipping a coin. They misidentify other marks like animal bites as alleged human bite marks. There are a lot of issues, but one major problem is that human skin changes, either through decomposition or healing, and that really torpedoes the entire field.

Advertisement

Advertisement

So are you saying that all of forensic dentistry is a hoax? I thought we identified plane crash victims by dental records all the time.

These two fields have been conflated deliberately in court to piggyback junk science on a valid technique to identity human remains. Its like a geologist claiming that because they can identify rocks, they can identify the exact rock that was used to bash in somebodys skull.

Advertisement

Could you walk me through how junk science like bite mark analysis gets into court?

The Food and Drug Administration requires clinical trials before a toothpaste is introduced into the general population [if it includes an ingredient that is connected to specific health claims]. But theres no FDA for forensics. Theres no research to see whether a forensic technique is capable of the claims that the experts are making.

So we make life-and-death decisions with forensic science and yet hold toothpaste to higher standards.

Exactly.

OK, so if theres no FDA for forensic science, who allows junk science into the courtroom?

Judges are the gatekeepers. A lot of forensic techniquesand bite mark analysis is no exceptionemerged not from a laboratory but from a crime scene. Prosecutors and forensic scientists present a new technique to the judge, theres a hearing on its admissibility, and then the judge decides if the evidence can be used in court. And once a judge accepts a type of evidence into court, it generally stays in court because other judges rely on precedent from previous rulings. So a single ruling by a scientifically illiterate judge thats sympathetic to the prosecution can have a huge effect on the entire court system. Bite mark analysis, for example, was introduced in a 1974 manslaughter case, People v. Marx. Marx has been cited in hundreds of cases and even sent people to death row.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Since then, bite mark analysis has been discredited by virtually every scientific entity thats ever examined the foundational assumptions of the technique. But still today, as you and I sit here talking in 2022, not a single published opinion in American criminal courts excludes bite mark evidence from use in trial. Not one.

We make life-and-death decisions with forensic science and yet hold toothpaste to higher standards.  Tim Requarth

Thats astonishing.

Let me give you an example of what were up against. Right now, Im working on the case of a man named Charles McCrory, who was convicted of murdering his wife in 1985. The original analyst had testified in the case that hed matched McCrory to a bite mark on his wifes dead body, which was the only physical evidence in the case. About a year ago, the original analyst recanted his opinion. The presiding judge cut and pasted the prosecutions brief that relied on this case called Hadley in the Alabama Supreme Court that cites back to the Marx case, saying that this stuff is so elemental, that it doesnt even require an expert witness, that the jurors themselves can eyeball it. The judge renders the experts recantation meaningless, so Charles McCrory, an innocent man, remains in prison. Thats how important and impactful a precedent-establishing case like Marx is.

Advertisement

Advertisement

So it seems like most judges tend to be unskeptical of forensic techniques in the first place, and then reluctant to change their minds once the science changes. How does the fact that most judges are former prosecutors play into this?

Prosecutors and forensic analysts work closely together. Youre a prosecutorare you going to follow the scientific method and not tell the forensic analyst any of the facts of your case because you want to have a blinded analysis? Or are you going to tell this forensic analyst that this is the only evidence that we have against this guy, hes gotten away with this twice before, and we need to get him off the streets, so hey, does this bloody fingerprint match his? So in the routine course of investigation, prosecutors bias the analyst towards a certain conclusion, and then because none of the science is ever really challenged in court, the defendant gets convicted, which prosecutors declare is vindication of the science. Its all a bit circular. I dont think most prosecutors knowingly use shoddy science. They are true believers because, from their perspective, its been perfectly reliable.

Advertisement

Advertisement

OK, but its an adversarial system. Prosecutors can say what they will, but arent public defenders supposed to challenge them?

Advertisement

Advertisement

Let me tell you about my time as a public defender in the Bronx. At my first arraignment shift, I must have had seven, eight people who had done absolutely nothing wrong, were entirely innocent of any crime. And that happened in every arraignment shift I went to. I was just astonished by it. It was suddenly as if the entire criminal legal system exploded all around me. It was a real eye-opener. Virtually all of my clients were people of color. All of them were indigent. So many of them were innocent. And virtually none of them actually get a trial.

Advertisement

I became a triage lawyer, and I was juggling crisis after crisis after crisis after crisis. And so the notion that I would be able to sit down and really unpack scientific evidence that was being leveled against a client of mineeven something like a presumptive drug test, which is notoriously unreliable and used all the timeit would be very hard to find the time or the platform to even make an argument against the science.

So the background of a judge would influence their view of forensic scienceand even whether someone is likely innocent or guilty. Why are most judges former prosecutors?

Advertisement

One of the most significant is the fact that judges, by and large at the state level, are elected judges. And despite current progressiveness in left-leaning cities around the country, overwhelmingly, judges run on law-and-order platforms. There are very clear steppingstones for political power, and those run through prosecutor offices, not through public defender offices.

Advertisement

This is anecdotal, but every public defender I know didnt get into the work with an eye toward running for office. But I know a whole lot of prosecutors who have done that. They come into court, and they wear blue suits, and they have American flags on their lapels, and theyre all law and order. And that messaging has traditionally won elections.

Advertisement

Id imagine another factor is attack ads.

The Constitution requires that everybody is entitled to a lawyer, and you as a lawyer are required to do your best to defend your clients. Thats just the way our Constitution works, and you can be attacked for it. Just look at Judge Jacksons confirmation hearings [where senators have brought up her past cases defending child pornographers and terrorists]. Shes attacked just for doing her job.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Despite the attacks, its looking like Judge Jackson will be confirmed. How would her confirmation affect the state of forensic science?

When youve experienced the triage work of public defense firsthand, and you sat in those arraignment cells, it gives you a view of really whats happening with mass incarceration and our legal system. Its a view that I think every Supreme Court justice should have, every judge should have.

When I was a clinical law professor, I would have students that were largely privileged, and they had never really had any experience in criminal trials or in criminal court, or really had any understanding of the criminal legal system outside of shows like CSI, even though they were law students. So I had this clinic that we worked in the South Bronx for the experience of representing people, guilty or innocent. And there were plenty of innocent people, which was a radicalizing, transformative experience for the students.

Advertisement

And although Judge Jackson was a federal public defender, which is a little different, she will certainly have much more of that perspective than anybody else in the court. As it relates to the use of unreliable evidence in criminal trials, I can only hope that her background will give her an eye toward the ultimate target of those forensics, which is the criminal defendants. Although a single judge cant make a difference alone, Im hopeful that her perspective will offer an important voice, as the Supreme Court weighs matters of life and liberty, and the sciences used to deprive people of their life and liberty.

In an ideal world, what could the Supreme Court actually do to improve the state of forensic science?

What they should do is create and establish due process right to be convicted on reliable scientific evidence. A Supreme Court case in 1959 created a due process right not to be convicted on false testimony. And that doctrine should be extended to include not just witnesses that are lying on the witness stand, but science thats lying in court. If a technique has been discredited by the progress of science, using it should be a due process violation.
This article is part of a series form Future Tense and New Americas Future of Land and Housing Program on reimagining how America will adapt to climate change and sea level rise.

Pacifica, California, is a beautiful coastal town located 12 miles south of San Francisco.

But the exquisite Pacific Ocean is now turning on it. As sea levels rise due to global warming, the occasional backyard falls into the water. In 2018, the town proposed a response: the relocation of houses, businesses, and public assets away from areas under threat. There was resistance. Naturally, people dont want to leave their local communities and homes, which some residents originally paid a lot for. But the language may have made it worse. The proposal used the term managed retreatthe most widely used name in English for this practice and one that brings to mind defeat. One local stated:  Managed retreat is a code word for give upon our homes and the town itself. Some community members demanded the removal of managed retreat from the wider plans, which occurred. Pacifica returned to extending sea walls. Four years later, people are still unsure what will happen in their town as climate change unfolds.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Citizens in many places may be more receptive to such programs under different names. Coasts will inevitably be battered, but why needlessly batter egos? Possibilities abound for an alternative phrasing, such as planned relocation and graceful withdrawal. Some are more convincing than others and could genuinely help convince people to relocate when necessary.

Yet policy makers and experts need to recognize the limits of prescribing specific language. Shifting the conversation about the policy involves more than just a rebrand. Clear and targeted communication about climate change can persuade and empower people in places in peril.

The phrase managed retreat was coined by coastal engineers in the early 1990s. It initially referred to the removal of infrastructure, such as sea walls, so the rising ocean could encroach, particularly in Australia and the U.K. (One well-known example took place on the Essex coast.) In the U.K., the name was gradually replaced throughout the 1990s with managed realignment, which is less confronting, but more euphemistic.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Nevertheless, by the mid-aughts, the name managed retreat remained in use and had broadened to include stipulating people live in safer places. Today, people interpret retreat to mean moving away from the coast or, also, more recently, other places under threat from climate disasters, such as heatwaves and wildfires. The managed part suggests that authorities will carefully coordinate relocations to reduce climate risk and any potential inequities.

Advertisement

Policies of this kind have a long history in the United States, where they have gone under a number of names. The government has used buyouts, an older and narrower term from emergency management, which some say is a more piecemeal approach. For example, in 2000, some floodplain residents in Austin, Minnesota, participated in a process similar to what goes by the name managed retreat. Community relocation has whole towns essentially being picked up, then put down in a safer place. For instance, Newtok (Niugtaq), an Indigenous Yupik village, is one of a number of places in Alaska in danger from erosion via melting permafrost. Residents voted in 2003 on a process by the name community relocation, although plan documents also utilize Yupik language terminology. In the past 10 years, governments have proposed managed retreat to communities including Del Mar, California; Camp Ellis, Maine; and Napakiak, Alaska. Its been suggested for places in Hawaii. Sometimes, higher up documents use the name managed retreat, yet materials presented to communities dont.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

The resistance to and criticisms of managed retreat focus on the pain and loss of leaving. Abandoning your home is difficult under any circumstances, but the language seems to rub salt in the wound. This could apply to residents in low-income areas of Lismore, New South Wales, Australia; First Nations communities in Lake St. Martin, Manitoba, Canada; or seaside mansion dwellers in Miami. The word retreat emphasizes that youre moving away from your home and land rather than a new place or future that youre moving to. Managed can suggest too much top-down control and put off individuals or communities who distrust governments.

Advertisement

Advertisement

To my mind, the strongest alternative phrases are those using resettlement, which point to the possibilities of the new home. Community-led resettlement or tribal resettlement, used in the context of towns of Indigenous groups or others who are marginalized, emphasize the direction of the people involved in achieving a just outcome. Planned resettlement suggests a more authority-led process, which, in some contexts, may be apt. Plain labels using relocation, either community or planned, have the advantage of being transparent about what is going to occur. Corrective shoreline planning and hazard avoidance point to the language of science and expertise, which could lessen their broad appeal. Proactive labels, like aggressive resilience and strategic advance, have been proposed to portray agency and strength. Though well-meaning, suggestions of this kind risk of coming off as Orwellian.

Advertisement

Advertisement

One reason that changing the name is not a cure-all is that people in the places concerned have already heard managed retreat and formed an opinion. Some proposals using the term managed retreat have been embraced. They tend to be ones where the loss is not so great, such as Marina, California, where there were limited amounts of private property.

Advertisement

Managed retreat and its alternatives point to a larger problem in climate change communication. They are all snappy two-word expressionsbut people do not know exactly what they actually mean. Theyre jargon and thus less likely to sink in. One way to address this is to add simple explanations that sit closer to the heart. To illustrate, the town of Hampton, New Hampshire, which is threatened by sea level rise and more frequent storms, is engaging in discussions with community members about three different kinds of climate adaptation: keep the water out (protections such as levees), live with water (accommodation such as building flood-resistant homes), and get out of the waters way (managed retreat or relocation).

Advertisement

Advertisement

Public communication about these kinds of resettlement schemes can also be enhanced by using locally relatable words and avoiding contentious ones. For example, temperature increase in some parts of remote Australia will lead to more exits from communities. Outback residents may prefer to talk about the heat as opposed to admitting to climate change, which they associate with affluent, left-leaning city dwellers. Some in the threatened town of King Salmon in Northern California object to the expression sea level rise, even though they acknowledge that flooding has worsened over the years. Meeting people where they are at now would be a good starting point.

Effective messaging about how relocation will unfold and how lives can be rebuilt is also essential. After recent Australian floods in towns graced by eucalypt forests, an official said: Youve got people who want to live among the gum treeswhat do you think is going to happen? Their house falls in the river, and they say its the governments fault. Such insensitive words that criticize attachment to place can set back the case for climate-informed planning. Leveraging love of place, for example, talking about the possibilities for new, shared uses for land, such as public parks for recreation, can provide hope for the future.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Moving away from places facing high climate risk can have promising results. Ashley Tom, a new resident of Mertarvik, Alaska, the town built to replace the now perilous Newtok, told the Guardian that , despite the sadness of leaving home, Its just a blessing to be in a better environment  , and I feel more safe over here since were on higher ground. Faced by climate change, our survival depends on changing our ways of life, including where we live. Policy makers and experts should get rid of language barriers in the same way they propose to remove sea walls. The terrible term managed retreat must be abandoned and more resonant words used instead.

Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society.
The amendment adopted by the parliament responds to the Russian attack on Ukraine.

Font size: A - | A + Comments disabled

Bidders coming from countries hostile towards Slovakia and its inhabitants will be excluded from trade with the state or will be prevented from entering business fields considered to be critical, such as the energy sector and defence contracts.

Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement

This stems from an amendment to the law on public procurement adopted by the parliament on March 23. The MPs discussed the amendment in a fast-tracked proceeding, the TASR newswire reported.

The amendment will enable the government to respond to situations in which it will be necessary, particularly in terms of security point, for public procurers and procurers from certain fields not to enter business relations with suppliers from certain countries labelled risky.

At the same time, it will be possible to order procurers not to close contracts on certain types of commodities from suppliers residing in a certain country or use capacities of such subjects.

The changes come into force on April 1, 2022.

Response to the Russian invasion

Investments Minister Veronika Remisova (Za Ludi), who drafted the amendment with Deputy PM for Legislation Stefan Holy (Sme Rodina), said the change is a response to the Russian attack on Ukraine.

In this situation, it is better for the orders financed from public sources to be given to Slovak companies, and not companies from countries with hostile and aggressive behaviour towards Slovakia, she commented.

Apart from the war in Ukraine, the amendment will enable Slovakia to respond to other potential security threats the country may face in the future, she added.

Slovakia is following the same direction as the European Union, which plans to introduce a common trade policy towards countries that treat companies from its member states according to a lower standard than the EU standard.

It also gives the Slovak government another tool to protect Slovak entrepreneurs and the interests of Slovakia, the Investments Ministry said.
First Czech soldiers arriving to Slovakia. Another Slovak carmaker facing a lack of components.

Font size: A - | A + Comments disabled

Good evening. The Monday, April 4 edition of Today in Slovakia is ready with the main news of the day in less than five minutes.

No registration form or quarantine for the unvaccinated after arrival

Wearing FFP2 respirators will be mandatory indoors. (Source: SME)

Unvaccinated people arriving to Slovakia from abroad will not have to quarantine anymore. Neither will they have to fill the eHranica form upon arrival.

Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement

These changes made by Public Health Authority will become valid as of April 6.

Hygienists changed the rules regarding the outdoor use of respirators. Until now they had been mandatory outside in crowded spaces - if a person was less than two metres from a person belonging to another household.



As of April 6, people will not have to wear respirators outside. The exception is mass outdoor events. However, respirators are still mandatory indoors.

For a deeper insight into current affairs, check out our Last Week in Slovakia piece published earlier today. You can sign up for the newsletter here.

Economy minister earns criticism for statements on gas

Economy Minister Richard Sulik (SaS) (Source: TASR)

Russia's demand to pay for gas supplies in rubles is a breach of closed contracts. But Slovakia needs this gas and if necessary should pay in rubles, opined Economy Minister Richard Sulik (SaS).

The gas cannot stop [flowing], Sulik said on a Sunday discussion on the public service RTVS network. Thats why I say it, maybe it's too pragmatic a position for some. If there is a condition to pay in rubles, lets pay in rubles.

Coalition party Za Ludi as well as some MPs of OLaNO caucus criticsed him for this stance.

MP Andrej Stancik (OLaNO) cited reports revealing the massacre of Ukrainian civilians and emphasised the need for a united and clear stance within the EU.

Russian media immediately noticed Richard Sulik's words and spread it as pro-Russian propaganda, Stancik said, as quoted by the TASR newswire.

PM Eduard Heger (OLaNO) said that Slovakia will coordinate its steps when purchasing gas from Russia along with other EU states.

Refugees from Ukraine

6,804 Ukrainian children have been enrolled in the Slovak educational system so far. 5,599 are in primary schools and 679 in secondary schools.

so far. 5,599 are in primary schools and 679 in secondary schools. On Monday the Bratislava borough of Dubravka opened a temporary day centre on Sekurisova Street for children from Ukraine aged between three and six years. The centre should help people fleeing war and the parents of small children to gain enough time to handle residential bureaucracy, a job search and the learning of Slovak.

The centre should help people fleeing war and the parents of small children to gain enough time to handle residential bureaucracy, a job search and the learning of Slovak. More than 300,000 refugees have crossed the Slovak-Ukrainian border since the beginning of the war. Almost 61,000 have asked for temporary protection in Slovakia.

If you like what we are doing and want to support good journalism, buy our online subscription. Thank you.

Photo of the day

Hikers walking the trails in the Volovske Vrchy Mountains this summer will have a place to stay at overnight.

The wooden shelter, designed by GRAU Architects, promises to be a comfortable retreat for hikers, where they can eat and warm up. The construction will be equipped with eight beds and a small oven.

Feature story for today

Every summer, they pack their suitcase, take the car and set off to various regions of Slovakia. They meet and talk to locals, learning more about the folk tradition and heritage of families.

These journeys transform into unique collections of jewellery depicting the elements distinctive for the given region and its folk costumes.

Folk costumes are no rugs, says jewellery maker and designer Petra Toth. Theres always a story behind them and the heritage of an entire family. But many people still don't understand this.

Jewellery maker breathes new life into Slovak folk designs Read more

In other news

1,465 people were newly diagnosed as Covid positive out of 4,041 PCR tests performed on Sunday. The number of people in hospitals is 1,995. 23 more deaths were reported on Sunday. The vaccination rate is at 51.28 percent, 2,820,241 people having received the first dose of the vaccine. More stats on Covid-19 in Slovakia here.

out of 4,041 PCR tests performed on Sunday. The number of people in hospitals is 1,995. 23 more deaths were reported on Sunday. The vaccination rate is at 51.28 percent, 2,820,241 people having received the first dose of the vaccine. More stats on Covid-19 in Slovakia here. Cooperating witnesses Ludovit Mako and Boris Bena are being prosecuted for perjury . The prosecutor submitted a proposal to prosecute both in custody.

. The prosecutor submitted a proposal to prosecute both in custody. Russians living in Slovakia organised a protest against the war in Ukraine on Sunday in Bratislava. About 120 people participated.

on Sunday in Bratislava. About 120 people participated. The first Czech soldiers arrived in Slovakia on Monday to strengthen NATO's eastern border . There should be 200 soldiers and they will gradually arrive to the Lest training centre, Defence Minister Jaroslav Nad (OLaNO) announced.

. There should be 200 soldiers and they will gradually arrive to the Lest training centre, Defence Minister Jaroslav Nad (OLaNO) announced. A shortage of components will suspend production at another Slovak carmaker. The Nitra-based Jaguar Land Rover will not manufacture between April 4 and 6.

PM Eduard Heger (OLaNO), Foreign Affairs Minister Ivan Korcok (SaS nominee) and Defence Minister Jaroslav Nad (OLaNO) commemorated the liberation of Bratislava on April 4, 1945 by the soldiers of the second Ukrainian front along with Romanian soldiers. Heger said on this occasion that democracy is tolerant and free, but cannot be naive and benevolent towards those who want to overthrow and replace it with a totalitarian regime.

Do not miss on Spectator.sk today

They reached popularity with ads starring hamsters, now Dedoles lays off hundreds Read more

Steep increase of cooking oil prices expected, Tesco limits sale Read more

Hungary purchases fourth building in centre of Kosice Read more

If you have suggestions on how this news overview can be improved, you can reach us at editorial@spectator.sk.
The connections of O'Brien Award winner Lauras Love have announced the five-year-old pacing mare has been retired from racing.

"Lauras racing career has unfortunately come to an end," said co-owner Gracie Mae Barr. "Earlier than we wanted but we will definitely remember all of the memories and experiences she gave us."

The decision to retire Lauras Love was made in the best interest of the beloved mare after she sustained a fluke injury while training over the weekend. Barr indicated Lauras Love will be bred to Captaintreacherous.

Owned by trainer John Pentland and Barr, Lauras Love was named Canada's top three-year-old pacing filly in her debut campaign in 2020 when she earned the bulk of her $486,863 bankroll. A nine-time winner that year, the daughter of Betterthancheddar out of Fit N Bad won a division of the Simcoe Stakes in a career-best 1:50.3 and was placed first in the Ontario Sires Stakes Super Final at Woodbine Mohawk Park.

She was maybe the fastest horse Ive ever trained for a piece, Pentland told Trot Insider. She paced a :25.1 quarter one night in the elims for the Fan Hanover. She was just fast. And she raced her whole life with sort of nagging ankles. She was just always a real gutsy horse.

Pentlands favourite racing highlight is proof of the speedy and determined mares top qualities.

My favourite race ever with her was when she won Gold in Grand River as a three-year-old, recalled Pentland. The Simcoe was awesome but that one Gold race she was a favourite but she had to come first-up early and it was that day at Grand River there a couple of years ago when they had a horrible storm. She had every reason to lose that horse race, and she would not lose.

Barr recalls the excitement in the barn around her first win and an early streak in the non-winners of two class at Mohawk, but notes it was a race that Lauras Love did not win that tops her list of memorable moments.

My favourite race is definitely the Fan Hanover because there is a chance that was the biggest race Ill ever have a horse in and she was my first horse, so to have her in there was really special, said the Thamesford, Ont. teen. She didnt win it but to race against that calibre of horses was really big for me.

In addition to her gutsy performances, Lauras Love was a special mare for reasons beyond the racetrack.

She was a really good horse, noted Pentland, who is no stranger to training top talent, but to have the Barrs involved, it made it a lot more special.

I'm so close with Gracies dad Scott Barr, who is a such a good horseman  we've been best friends for 30 years  and it brought them back into the racing game. Their whole family was right into it and now Scott and Gracie both work for me part time and are a huge help to my stable. It really meant a lot to have them in it, and you know, they'll stay in it.

Barr is quick to credit her grandfather for her unforgettable endeavour into horse ownership with Lauras Love.

My grandfather, Russell Baker, bought a percentage of her for me because he knew how much I loved her and so that I could learn more about the business side of the industry, said Barr. She gave my whole family something to look forward to, especially during the pandemic.

She is the first horse I ever harnessed. I dont know if I will ever have another horse that loved to race more than she did. It was a lot of fun to have a horse that no one ever counted out of the race right up to the wire. We both learned a lot from each other.

Barr also acknowledged the horsepeople who contributed to Lauras Love's successful racing career.

Bob McClure always made sure to take care of her on the track. More recently, Paul MacDonell also did amazing with her while Bob was sidelined. Many people have shipped, driven, warmed up and we have an amazing team that always looked out for her. It was lot of fun meeting the people I did because of her.

John [Pentland] has done a terrific job managing her and Ive learned so much from him. It has been the greatest privilege of my life to care for this sweet girl who always gave 100 per cent for our team.

Lauras Love hit the board in three recent Mares Preferred starts at Mohawk including her last race on March 18. She added one final victory to her resume a week prior on March 11, scoring in 1:53.4 in a high-end conditioned pace, and retires with a career record reading 13-12-4 from 49 starts.


Nevele R Stud has announced the passing of Live Or Die, who was euthanized over the weekend due to a severe bout of colic.

A wonderful horse to do anything with, the 29-year-old stallion was a firm farm favourite, much loved by the Nevele R staff and will be greatly missed.

A world champion two-year-old trained by Hall of Famer Bob McIntosh, Live Or Die attracted the attention of Nevele R co-founder Bob McArdle with his tough as teak racing style, often sitting in the death and still kicking on to win a number of Americas biggest juvenile races, including the Governors Cup and the International Stallion Stakes in a then world record-equalling 1:51.4.

He was purchased outright by the stud in 1997 and brought down to New Zealand that year.

A dream stallion, he was as successful with his progeny as he was popular with breeders, becoming the backbone of Nevele R through the late 90s and the 2000s, serving triple figures in New Zealand alone for 13 straight seasons, including a record 435 mares in 2001.

He was New Zealands leading pacing stallion in 2007 and was also three times the runner-up to Holmes Hanover and Christian Cullen.

He became just the second, solely New Zealand-based stallion, to sire over 1,000 winners and in total left 1,315 winners of over $67 million worldwide  a remarkable feat for a single hemisphere stallion.

He sired 18 Group 1 winners, with his stand out performers including the Miracle Mile and four-time Derby winner Divisive, the dual New Zealand Cup winner Just An Excuse, and the outstanding first crop filly Elect To Live, who was crowned the New Zealand Harness Horse of the Year as a three-year-old.

He also had that rare ability to lift a maternal family, and as a broodmare sire continues to have a significant impact on Australasian harness racing, and indeed further afield, with his daughters leaving the likes of the 2019 U.S. Harness Horse of the Year Shartin N, the three-time New Zealand Cup winner Terror To Love and current open class star and 2021 New Zealand Cup winner Copy That.

Live Or Die was the sire for everyone," said Ged Mooar, Nevele Rs General Manager. "His pedigree suited most mares throughout Australasia, and he was extremely fertile. He sired tough, determined racehorses. He had a great personality; we never had any problems with him whilst he was at Nevele R for 25 years. A true gentleman, hell be sorely missed by our team and anyone who had anything to do with him. It wont be the same going down to his empty paddock. Thank you for the memories champ.

He has been laid to rest next to his fellow Nevele R luminaries, Falcon Seelster and Holmes Hanover.

Please join Standardbred Canada in offering condolences to the connections of Live Or Die.

(With files from Nevele R Stud)
In an angry sea of rioters that engulfed the U.S. Capitol, it was not obvious that a man wearing jeans, a dark pullover and a blue daypack was a police officer.

Thomas T.J. Robertson, who is charged with federal crimes that include wielding a wooden stick at police officers who were trying to turn back the mob, was off duty at the time from his job with the Rocky Mount Police Department.

But the 49-year-olds law enforcement background will play a prominent role in his trial, scheduled to begin Monday with jury selection in Washington D.C.s federal court.

Prosecutors say in court papers that Robertson abused his position of public trust by siding with hundreds of Donald Trump supporters in one of the most riotous acts of insurrection the nation has ever seen.

To show Robertsons role in the events of Jan. 6, 2021, the government will rely on footage from surveillance cameras, photographs that turned up on social media and the defendants own incriminating words on Facebook, according to a list of exhibits filed in U.S. District Court.

Also included on the list are excerpts of Robertsons personnel files from the Rocky Mount Police Department, which fired him following his arrest.

Although details of the records are not included in court documents, prosecutors are expected to use them in an effort to show that Robertson was well aware  through his experience and training  that his activities interfered with law enforcements efforts to control the volatile crowd.

Robertson has said he entered the building peacefully, at the invitation of Capitol police officers on the scene, and did nothing wrong in posing for a selfie photograph with a fellow police officer and then walking away.

Defense attorney Mark Rollins of Washington wants the jury to hear about Robertsons accomplishments as a police officer, which include being promoted to sergeant and receiving a medal of valor in 2017.

The jury will have to make the decision of whether Mr. Robertson was in possession of a dangerous weapon and they should be allowed to know all aspects of Mr. Robertsons life, Rollins wrote in court papers.

Details about the lawmans professionalism, dedication and commitment to public service should be allowed, the document states, to show that he would never use a walking stick in a nefarious manner.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Elizabeth Aloi countered that body cameras worn by Metropolitan Police Department officers clearly show Robertson using his stick to block their efforts to defend the Capitols lower west terrace from the advancing mob.

Character evidence about Robertsons career as a police officer should not be admitted, she wrote in a motion asking U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper to exclude the evidence.

Should Robertson maintain that his stick was for walking and nothing else, Aloi said she is prepared to present evidence that he usually did not require assistance from a cane or other support, and had not been seen using one prior to the riots.

Usually, character evidence is limited to a general description of the defendants reputation  and cannot be used to disprove a specific part of the case against him, the motion stated.

Cooper has yet to rule on Alois request to exclude character evidence, according to a check of court records late Friday afternoon.

Pros and cons of a trial

Robertson is one of about 775 people from across the country charged with participating in the uprising.

The insurrection began shortly after then-President Trump urged his supporters to fight like hell against an election he claims was stolen from him. Courts have found no credible evidence of widespread voter fraud.

Ten of the individuals charged were current or former police officers or correctional guards, according to the Insurrection Index, a searchable database compiled by a coalition of nonprofit groups.

Four other defendants are from Western Virginia. They include former Rocky Mount police officer Jacob Fracker, who accompanied Robertson on a trip to to hear Trump speak. Last month, Fracker pleaded guilty to conspiring to obstruct a special session of Congress held to certify the election of President Joe Biden.

Despite strong evidence against them, some of the accused have refused to plead guilty.

Of course, he has a constitutional right to ask a jury to decide his case, Melanie Wilson, a law professor at the University of Tennessee, said of Robertson

Wilson, a former federal and state prosecutor who has accepted a job as dean of Washington and Lee Universitys law school effective July 1, said Robertson may be hoping just to get one juror to side with him, which would result in a hung jury.

His status as a military veteran and former police officer could help. I think there are a number of citizens who serve on juries who would still give the benefit of doubt to police officers, Wilson said.

The flip side, she said, is that someone with a background in law enforcement could be seen by a jury of their peers as more accountable than the average rioter.

Knowing the challenges that were facing the on-duty officers, who were vastly outnumbered by the horde, makes him more dangerous, and yet he still participated, Wilson said.

Federal authorities say about 140 police officers were assaulted during the revolt, which forced members of Congress to flee for their safety before the special session was reconvened later that night. The insurrection caused an estimated $1.5 million in damage to the Capitol.

More than 100 defendants have been sentenced so far, with about half of them receiving prison sentences. The rest were placed on probation or home detention.

Fracker faces a maximum sentence of five years at a hearing that has yet to be scheduled.

Meanwhile, an investigation by federal authorities continues. The most recent arrest came last week, when a Missouri man was charged with assaulting police officers.

Going to the jury box

Last August, Robertson rejected a plea agreement offered by prosecutors.

Authorities did not say at the time what concessions  such as a reduction of charges or a lower sentence  had been offered in exchange for a guilty plea.

Since then, government attorneys have twice increased the severity of the charges against Robertson. In January, a new indictment charged that the former police officer was armed with a deadly and dangerous weapon, that is, a large wooden stick.

A second superseding indictment was returned by a grand jury last month, alleging that after returning home to Franklin County, Robertson destroyed a cell phone knowing that it held incriminating evidence against him.

In all, Robertson faces six charges: Obstructing an official proceeding, participating in a civil disorder, entering a restricted building, disorderly conduct in a restricted building, violent entry of the Capitol and tampering with evidence.

The trial is expected to last all week.

Robertson and Fracker were arrested one week after the riots, following the posting on Facebook of a selfie photograph that showed them posing in front of a statue of John Stark, a Revolutionary War hero, in the vaulted Crypt of the Capitol.

At the time, both were allowed to remain free on bond.

But Robertson ran into trouble last July, after authorities say he ordered about 35 assault-style weapons online, despite orders from a judge not to have anything to do with guns. His bond was revoked and he has been held in custody since.

Pointing to Robertsons often harsh online rhetoric, prosecutors say he has shown a sincere commitment to violence.

One week after the November 2020 election, Robertson wrote on Facebook: A legitimate republic stands on 4 boxes. The soapbox, the ballot box, the jury box and then the cartridge box.

We just moved to step 3. Step 4 will not be pretty, the post continued, according to court records. I cannot speak for others, but being disenfranchised by fraud is my hard line. Ive spent most of my adult life fighting a counter insurgency. Im about to become part of one, and a very effective one.

Starting Monday, the case will reach what Robertson called step 3  the jury box.
Experts say China-EU leaders' meeting injects stability into global situation

Xinhua) 09:16, April 04, 2022

A China-Europe freight train is towed into Guoyuan Port in Chongqing, southwest China, Feb. 19, 2022. (Xinhua/Tang Yi)

Experts and scholars applauded Xi's remarks on China-EU relations and the Ukraine crisis, saying that the meeting has provided strategic guidance for sustained and sound development of the China-EU relationship, while adding stability and positive energy to a turbulent world.

BEIJING, April 3 (Xinhua) -- European experts have spoken highly of the 23rd China-European Union (EU) leaders' meeting held on Friday, during which Chinese President Xi Jinping met via video link with President Charles Michel of the European Council and President Ursula von der Leyen of the European Commission.

Experts and scholars applauded Xi's remarks on China-EU relations and the Ukraine crisis, saying that the meeting has provided strategic guidance for sustained and sound development of the China-EU relationship, while adding stability and positive energy to a turbulent world.

Frederic Baldan, CEO of Belgian consulting company CEBiz, said he appreciates Xi's remarks on the development of China-EU relations.

China's proposal "meets the interests of the European people" and would benefit the world, Baldan told Xinhua on Saturday.

Leon Laulusa, executive vice president of the Paris-based ESCP Business School, said China and the EU are "two key players" on the international stage, and that their roles "are therefore essential to ensure world peace and security."

China and the EU have cooperated for many years, especially in the areas of peace, security, prosperity, sustainable development and people-to-people exchanges, said Laulusa.

Bernard Accoyer, former president of the French National Assembly, called himself "a defender of friendship" between the EU and China, noting that the "friendship is essential for progress in any field" regarding China-EU cooperation.

Photo taken on Dec. 21, 2021 shows the inside of the new Tiexi Plant of BMW Brilliance Automotive (BBA) in Shenyang, northeast China's Liaoning Province. (Xinhua)

Timo Vuori, director of International Trade and Trade Policy, the Confederation of Finnish Industries, said "it is important that leaders of the EU and China have regular high-level political dialogue," as China and Europe are "close trading partners."

The virtual meeting on Friday "is just one but important milestone in our dialogue which must continue in the future at all levels," Vuori said, adding that the two sides can overcome various challenges they face via "open dialogue and committed common action."

Uros Lipuscek, a Slovenian political scientist, told Xinhua that "neither the EU nor China as two leading economic partners can progress without increased cooperation on all levels," adding that China and the EU "need a new pragmatic approach" to promote cooperation.

Photo taken on March 23, 2022 shows a general view of the vineyard at Remy Martin house in Cognac, southwestern France. Cognac/eau-de-vie de cognac/eau-de-vie des charentes is listed in the China-EU agreement on geographical indications. (Xinhua/Gao Jing)

Horst Loechel, a professor at the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management, said the EU and China, being each other's important trading partners, should develop their trade ties further "in the benefit of the people and the companies."

"A closer relationship between the EU and China will maintain and perhaps even leverage the economic benefits for Europe and China as well ... it will make a significant contribution to global political and economic stability in difficult times," said Loechel.

Xulio Rios, director of the Observatory of Chinese Politics in Spain, said both Europe and China hope the Ukraine crisis can "cease as soon as possible," and they should work together with other members of the international community for a diplomatic solution to the crisis and lay the foundation for a European security architecture.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
TEHRAN, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Iran is ready to resume talks with Saudi Arabia to solve differences, the Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman announced Monday.

"We are ready for the continuation of talks and for the settlement of differences. We have submitted our views in written form to the Saudi side, and they should express their views," Saeed Khatibzadeh said in his weekly press briefing.

Repeating Iran's welcome of a cease-fire in Yemen, he said this "should be completed with the beginning of intra-Yemeni dialogue and we should wait for the results."

Following the UN-backed two-month truce in Yemen, Khatibzadeh on Saturday expressed hope that the peace initiative can be a prelude to completely lifting the siege on the Yemeni people and the establishment of a permanent cease-fire to find a political solution to the crisis.

Yemen has been mired in a civil war since late 2014 when the Iran-backed Houthi militia seized control of several northern provinces and forced the Saudi-backed government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi out of the capital Sanaa.

According to the United Nations, the war has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced 4 million, and pushed the country to the brink of starvation. 
Celebration of Memorial Day is expected to be back like before the pandemic with flags, a parade, speakers and special patriotic programs. It is one of Marions biggest events of the year.

Members of VFW Post 4667, its auxiliary, and Marion Mayor David Helms met recently to begin plans for the recognition of Memorial Day from May 26-30.

It all begins with the placement of American flags at the county courthouse and Royal Oak Presbyterian Church. With more than 50 new applications for flags this year, the VFW is anticipating placing between 1,375 and 1,400 flags and crosses.

Again this year, the flags and accompanying crosses with veterans names will be placed by members of the Marion town crew. They will be setting up the flags May 23-25. Those in honor of veterans killed in combat and with a gold star will be placed in front of the church.

The flags are expected to remain in place through early June in order to be there during the performance of a U.S. Army Band on June 5 at the Lincoln Theatre and for the anniversary of D-Day on June 6.

Memorial Day as a national holiday was established to honor those who have died in American wars. It was originally called Decoration Day. It originated during the American Civil War, when citizens would place flowers on the graves of those who had been killed in battle.

Memorial Day today is observed on the last Monday of May. It was observed on May 30 from 1868 to 1970.

D-Day is the day (June 6, 1944) in World War II on which Allied forces invaded northern France by means of beach landings in Normandy. With a force of more than 150,000 soldiers, the Allies attacked and gained a victory over the German Nazi regime that became the turning point for World War II in Europe. The D in D-Day merely stands for Day. This coded designation was used for the day of any important invasion or military operation.

The Memorial Day weekend events in Marion will include a special patriotic program on Sunday afternoon, May 29, at the Lincoln Theatre. Gov. Glenn Youngkin and Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears have been invited to come and speak at events. Another program and/or a hot dog lunch may be held at the VFW Post following a parade on Monday, May 30.

The parade on Monday morning along Main Street will feature floats carrying members of the VFW Post 4667 and auxiliary along with special guests.

Anyone who wishes to participate in the parade with a float, walking unit, classic vehicle, and especially any patriotic display is invited to just show up and join in. Lineup will take place on the south end of town below the Blue Ridge Job Corps Center. There is no fee to participate.

Grand marshals for the 2022 Memorial Day Parade will be Herbert Turk Johnson, veteran of the Vietnam War, District 9 senior vice-commander, and former commander of VFW Post 4667, and his wife, Penny, president of the VFW Post 4667 Auxiliary and District 9 Auxiliary.

The Rolling Thunder motorcycle riders organization from Tennessee, which performs a ceremony at the courthouse remembering veterans missing in action and prisoners of war, has been invited to participate again this year. The group was formed following the Vietnam War era to bring attention to members of the American military who were killed or missing in action, whose remains were not returned home or respectfully buried, and those prisoners of war who were left behind.

Anyone wishing to buy a flag and accompanying cross for placement this year can call the VFW at 276-783-7971 or the Marion Town Hall at 276-783-4113. Cost is $35. Deadline is early May.

Royal Mouldings has donated material for the crosses and students at Marion Senior High School have built them with lettering by David Delp.

The Memorial Day recognition is funded by town, county, business, industry, civic club and individual donations. Anyone who would like to contribute to this years event can contact the VFW or mail checks, designated for the Memorial Day event, to VFW Post 4667, 861 Goolsby Street, Marion, VA 24354.

New American and Virginia flags will be appearing on light poles in downtown Marion this year thanks to Ballad Health, which is paying for the flags. Cost of brackets will be covered by the VFW. Donations are welcome. These are expected to be on display through the summer.
Editors note: Information is provided by the Cowlitz County Corrections Department and local law enforcement agencies. Each individual named in this report is presumed to be innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

Fugitive  Longview police Saturday arrested Joseph Lee Brown, 41, of Longview, on suspicion of being a fugitive from justice.

Malicious mischief  Kelso police Sunday arrested Raquel Louise S. Cervantes, 35, of Kelso on suspicion of second-degree malicious mischief and disorderly conduct.

Burglary  Longview police Saturday arrested Luis Lemus Frausto, 28, of Longview, on suspicion of residential burglary.

Fugitive  Cowlitz County sheriffs deputies Sunday arrested James Robert Menning, 59, of Kalama, on suspicion of being a fugitive from justice.

Robbery  Longview police Sunday arrested Joseph Duran Rangel, 29, of Longview, on suspicion of second-degree possession of stolen property and first-degree robbery.

Theft  Longview police Sunday arrested Adam Wayne Fisher, 36, of Kelso, on suspicion of organized retail theft.

Burglary  Longview police Sunday arrested Matthew John Gunnels, 36, of unknown residence, on suspicion of second-degree burglary.

Burglaries

300 block of Nevada Drive, Longview. Sunday. Resident arrived home to find a man in her bedroom. He took a vape pen and pain medication.

2400 block of Allen Street, Kelso. Sunday. Clothes and food taken sometime after 9 a.m. Saturday.

1200 block of 10th Avenue, Longview. Sunday. Suspect took a weed-eater from the garage.

600 block of 23rd Avenue, Longview. Sunday. Sometime overnight someone took items from the garage.

Stolen vehicle

100 block of Solomon Road, Kelso. Saturday. Green 2000 Ford Escort. Washington BEJ2257. Dent above the passenger side wheel and a cracked windshield.

Thefts

200 block of Owl Creek Road, Kelso. Sunday. Daughter used bank card information and took money.

300 block of Michner Street, Castle Rock. Sunday. Around 4 a.m., two men came onto the property, attempted to get into the garage and took a bicycle from the side yard.

1500 block of Down River Drive, Woodland. Sunday. Catalytic converter taken between 7 p.m. Friday and 2 p.m. Sunday.

Vandalism/malicious mischief

100 block of Minor Road, Kelso. Saturday. Man broke the window to the room.

200 block of 20th Avenue, Longview. Saturday. Man threw a longboard at the vehicle, scratching it.

500 block of Kelso Drive, Kelso. Sunday. Someone tried to set toilet paper on fire in the restroom.

Vehicle prowls

600 block of Frontage Road, Kalama. Saturday. Items stolen.

500 block of Burcham Street, Kelso. Sunday. Sub woofers and amp stolen.

Love 0 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
A Woodland man was arrested Saturday afternoon after allegedly attempting to hit a Kalama police officer with his vehicle and leading a chase down Interstate 5.

At about 2:15 p.m., Kalama Police Officer Jordan Lange was investigating a road rage incident between two parties that started on I-5 and contacted the suspect, John Charles Sturdivan, at North First Street and Elm Street.

Strudivan abruptly sped off and "willfully and intentionally" drove at the officer and the victim, who took "evasive steps" to avoid getting hit, according to the police department.

Lange and other law enforcement officers chased Sturdivan down I-5. The pursuit ended in heavy traffic off exit 16 near the ilani, according to police.

Sturdivan, 62, was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence, attempt to elude and first-degree assault and booked in the Cowlitz County Jail.

Anyone with information about the incident is asked to email the Kalama Police Department at jlange@kalamapolice.com or call 360-673-2165 and reference case No. K22-94.

Love 1 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 2 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
When two ferromagnets are placed on the top and bottom surfaces of a topological insulator, a gap is opened in the topological surface state, whilst the edge allows electrons to flow without resistance. Credit: Monash University

A Monash University-led research team has discovered that a structure comprising an ultra-thin topological insulator sandwiched between two 2D ferromagnetic insulators becomes a large-bandgap quantum anomalous Hall insulator.

Such a heterostructure provides an avenue towards viable ultra-low energy future electronics, or even topological photovoltaics.

Topological insulator: The filling in the sandwich

In the researchers' new heterostructure, a ferromagnetic material forms the "bread" of the sandwich, while a topological insulator (ie, a material displaying nontrivial topology) takes the place of the "filling."

Combining magnetism and nontrivial band topology gives rise to quantum anomalous Hall (QAH) insulators, as well as exotic quantum phases such as the QAH effect where current flows without dissipation along quantized edge states.

Inducing magnetic order in topological insulators via proximity to a magnetic material offers a promising pathway towards achieving QAH effect at higher temperatures (approaching or exceeding room temperature) for lossless transport applications.

One promising architecture involves a sandwich structure comprising two single layers of MnBi 2 Te 4 (a 2D ferromagnetic insulator) either side of ultra-thin Bi 2 Te 3 in the middle (a topological insulator). This structure has been predicted to yield a robust QAH insulator phase with a bandgap well above the thermal energy available at room temperature (25 meV).

The new Monash-led study demonstrated the growth of a MnBi 2 Te 4 / Bi 2 Te 3 /MnBi 2 Te 4 heterostructure via molecular beam epitaxy, and probed the structure's electronic structure using angle resolved photoelectron spectroscopy.

"We observed strong, hexagonally-warped massive Dirac fermions and a bandgap of 75 meV," says lead author Monash Ph.D. candidate Qile Li.

Angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy measurements allow direct measurement of the size of the bandgap opening in the topological surface state, as well as visualization of the strength of the hexagonal warping. Credit: Monash University

The magnetic origin of the gap was confirmed by the observing the bandgap vanishing above the Curie temperature, as well as broken time-reversal symmetry and the exchange-Rashba effect, in excellent agreement with density functional theory calculations.

"These findings provide insights into magnetic proximity effects in topological insulators, which will move lossless transport in topological insulators towards higher temperature," says Monash group leader and lead author Dr. Mark Edmonds.

How it works

The 2D MnBi 2 Te 4 ferromagnets induce magnetic order (i.e., an exchange interaction with the 2D Dirac electrons) in the ultra-thin topological insulator Bi 2 Te 3 via magnetic proximity.

This creates a large magnetic gap, with the heterostructure becoming a quantum anomalous Hall (QAH) insulator, such that the material becomes metallic (i.e., electrically conducting) along its one-dimensional edges, whilst remaining electrically insulating in its interior. The almost-zero resistance along the 1D edges of the QAH insulator are what make it such a promising pathway towards next-generation, low-energy electronics.

To date, several strategies have been used to realize the QAH effect, such as introducing dilute amounts of magnetic dopants into ultrathin films of 3D topological insulators. However, introducing magnetic dopants into the crystal lattice can be challenging and results in magnetic disorder, which greatly suppresses the temperature at which the QAH effect can be observed and limits future applications.

Rather than incorporating 3D transition metals into the crystal lattice, a more advantageous strategy is to place two ferromagnetic materials on the top and bottom surfaces of a 3D topological insulator. This breaks time-reversal symmetry in the topological insulator with magnetic order, and thereby opens a bandgap in the surface state of the topological insulator and gives rise to a QAH insulator.

Making the right kind of sandwich

Yet, inducing sufficient magnetic order to open a sizable gap via magnetic proximity effects is challenging due to the undesired influence of the abrupt interface potential that arises due to lattice mismatch between the magnetic materials and topological insulator.

A proposed topological transistor would utilise lossless paths flowing on a topological insulators edges. Credit: Monash University

"To minimize the interface potential when inducing magnetic order via proximity, we needed to find a 2D ferromagnet that possessed similar chemical and structural properties to the 3D topological insulator" says Qile Li, who is also a Ph.D. student with the Australian Research Council Center for Excellence in Future Low-Energy Electronic Technologies (FLEET).

"This way, instead of an abrupt interface potential, there is a magnetic extension of the topological surface state into the magnetic layer. This strong interaction results in a significant exchange splitting in the topological surface state of the thin film and opens a large gap," says Li.

A single-septuple layer of the intrinsic magnetic topological insulator MnBi 2 Te 4 is particularly promising, as it is a ferromagnetic insulator with a Curie temperature of 20 K.

"More importantly, this setup is structurally very similar to the well-known 3D topological insulator Bi 2 Te 3 , with a lattice mismatch of only 1%" says Dr. Mark Edmonds, who is an associate investigator in FLEET.

The research team traveled to the Advanced Light Source part of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, U.S., where they grew the ferromagnet/topological/ferromagnet heterostructures and investigated their electronic band structure in collaboration with beamline staff scientist Dr. Sung-Kwan Mo.

"Although we cannot directly observe the QAH effect using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES), we could use this technique to probe the size of the bandgap opening, and then confirm it is magnetic in origin," says Dr. Edmonds.

"By using angle-resolved photoemission we could also probe the hexagonal warping in the surface state. It turns out, the strength of the warping in the Dirac fermions in our heterostructure is almost twice as large as in Bi 2 Te 3 ," says Dr. Edmonds

The research team was also able to confirm the electronic structure, gap size and the temperature at which this MnBi 2 Te 4 /Bi 2 Te 3 /MnBi 2 Te 4 heterostructure is likely to support the QHE effect by combining experimental ARPES observations with magnetic measurements to determine the Curie temperature (performed by FLEET associate investigator Dr. David Cortie at the University of Wollongong) and first-principles density functional theory calculations performed by the group of Dr. Shengyuan Yang (Singapore University of Technology and Design).

The growth for this heterostructure was initially found in Edmonds Electronic Structure Laboratory at Monash University. Afterward, the heterostructure films were grown and characterized using ARPES measurements at the Advanced Light Source (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) in California.

The study, "Large magnetic gap in a designer ferromagnettopological insulatorferromagnet heterostructure," was published in Advanced Materials in March 2022.

Explore further Electrons on the edge: The story of an intrinsic magnetic topological insulator

More information: Qile Li et al, Large Magnetic Gap in a Designer FerromagnetTopological InsulatorFerromagnet Heterostructure, Advanced Materials (2022). Journal information: Advanced Materials Qile Li et al, Large Magnetic Gap in a Designer FerromagnetTopological InsulatorFerromagnet Heterostructure,(2022). DOI: 10.1002/adma.202107520

Provided by FLEET
Tesla CEO Elon Musk attends the opening of the Tesla factory Berlin Brandenburg in Gruenheide, Germany, Tuesday, March 22, 2022. Elon Musk is taking a 9.2% stake in Twitter. Musk purchased approximately 73.5 million shares, according to a regulatory filing. Credit: Patrick Pleul/Pool via AP, File

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has acquired a 9% stake in Twitter to become its largest shareholder while joining other critics in questioning the social media platform's dedication to free speech and the First Amendment.

Musk's ultimate aim in acquiring 73.5 million shares, worth about $3 billion, isn't clear. Yet in late March Musk, who has 80 million Twitter followers and is active on the site, questioned free speech on Twitter and whether the platform is undermining democracy.

In years past, Twitter and other social platforms have taken fire for allowing harmful speech ranging from incitement to violence to coordinated harassment and racial abuse. More recently, these platforms have made concerted efforts to rein in such behavior, often drawing criticism similar to Musk's from the political right. Both Twitter and Facebook faced blowback after suspending the accounts run by former President Donald Trump following the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection last year.

It's unclear just when Musk bought the stake. A U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing made public on Monday says the event triggering the filing happened March 14. Musk has also raised the possibility with his massive and loyal Twitter following, that he could create a rival social media network.

Industry analysts and legal experts say Musk could begin advocating for changes at Twitter immediately if he chooses. In a note to investors, CFRA Analyst Angelo Zino wrote that Twitter could be viewed as an acquisition target because the value of its shares have been falling since early last year.

Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey stepped down as CEO in November. Musk's stake in Twitter is now more than four times the size of Dorsey's, who had been the largest individual shareholder.

"Musk's actual investment is a very small percentage of his wealth, and an all-out buyout should not be ruled out," wrote Zino, who covers Twitter and social media.

Musk could see Twitter as an investment with big growth ahead, or he could have noninvestment reasons for the purchase, such as buying to make sure the platform doesn't restrain his speech, said Erik Gordon, a law and business professor at the University of Michigan.

"What he could be worried about is if enough of his tweets start to look like disinformation, that Twitter says 'we're doing our job against disinformation.'" Gordon said. No CEO would refuse to take a call from the company's top shareholder, so the purchase gives Musk access to Twitter's top management, he said.

Tesla and SpaceX Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk speaks at the SATELLITE Conference and Exhibition in Washington, Monday, March 9, 2020. Musk has purchased a 9.2% stake in Twitter, approximately 73.5 million shares, according to a regulatory filing, Monday, April 4, 2022. Credit: AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File

Musk has not spoken specifically about any Twitter rule changes he might push, but the social media platform's history of suspensions and bans is well documented.

Trump's suspension from both Twitter and Facebook has raised difficult questions about free speech in a social media industry dominated by a few tech giantsan issue that Trump and conservative media have seized upon. There was broad praise for Musk from those circles Monday.

Michael Flynn, the retired general who served briefly as Donald Trump's national security adviser, and who was suspended from Twitter in January 2021, sent Musk some free advice via Telegram.

"Hey Elon, how about letting all of those dropped from twitter for being America First and Pro-Trump back on Twitter!!!," Flynn wrote.

Twitter earlier this year banned the personal account of far-right U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene for multiple violations of the platform's COVID-19 misinformation policy. Other people banned in recent years include Steve Bannon, for suggesting the beheading of Dr. Anthony Fauci, former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke for breaking the social media site's rules forbidding hate speech, and right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his Infowars show for abusive behavior.

Musk recently described himself on Twitter as a "free speech absolutist" in explaining why the Starlink satellite internet servicepart of his aerospace company SpaceXwould not block Russian state media outlets, which have spread propaganda and misinformation in line with the Kremlin's narrative on its war in Ukraine.

But such absolutism would not be welcome by advertisers who are Twitter's chief revenue source, said Brian Wieser, global president of business intelligence at GroupM. Brands that advertise on Twitter strongly prefer some content standards because a toxic platform can drive many other users away.

"Certain kinds of speech, such as advocating an insurrection or advocating hurting people, are not the kinds of things most advertisers want to support," said Wieser, who analyzes the media industry for advertisers.

Twitter's stock surged nearly 30% Monday. Since March 14, the date listed on filing by Twitter, its shares are up nearly 50%, meaning that Musk's investment has paid handsomelyso far.

The logo for Twitter appears above a trading post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Monday, Nov. 29, 2021. Elon Musk is taking a 9.2% stake in Twitter. Musk purchased approximately 73.5 million shares, according to a regulatory filing. Credit: AP Photo/Richard Drew, File

Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In March, Musk told his millions of followers on Twitter that he was " giving serious thought " to creating his own social media platform, and has clashed repeatedly with financial regulators about his use of Twitter.

Musk is locked into a bitter dispute with the SEC over his ability to post on Twitter. His lawyer has contended in court motions that the SEC is infringing on the Tesla CEO's First Amendment rights.

In October of 2018, Musk and Tesla agreed to pay $40 million in civil fines and for Musk to have his tweets approved by a corporate lawyer after he tweeted about having the money to take Tesla private at $420 per share.

The funding was far from secured and the electric vehicle company remains public, but Tesla's stock price jumped. The settlement came after the SEC brought a securities fraud charge. It specified governance changes, including Musk's ouster as board chairman, as well as pre-approval of his tweets.

Musk's lawyer is now asking a U.S. District Court judge in Manhattan to throw out the settlement, contending that the SEC is harassing him and infringing on his First Amendment rights.

The SEC says it has legal authority to subpoena Tesla and Musk about his tweets, and that Musk's move to throw out the settlement is not valid.

The SEC also disclosed that it is investigating Musk's Nov. 6, 2021 tweets that asked followers whether he should sell 10% of his Tesla stake. The commission said it issued administrative subpoenas while investigating whether Musk and Tesla are complying with disclosure controls in the 2018 agreement.

Musk ended up selling more than 15 million shares worth roughly $16.4 billion. With some sales in late December, Musk is close to selling 10%.

Explore further Elon Musk buys large stake in Twitter, sending stock soaring

 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Technology developed at Argonne National Laboratory optimizes solar energy to keep microgrids operating for up to five days, offering critical backup during outages. Credit: Shutterstock/Sergii Molchenko

During a power outage, we might not think of using the sun as a backup generator. But solar energy is playing a key role in keeping the lights on when the power is knocked out.

Due to extreme weather events like floods, storms and wildfires, widespread power outages are increasing in number and intensity. While connected to the larger U.S. electric grid, smaller microgrids that draw on local energy sources like solar panels can also disconnect from the grid and operate independently to keep the power going.

Because the sun is not always shining, the question remains: How long can solar-powered microgrids keep power flowing? Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory have designed a novel building-solar controller that optimizes solar energy with smart technology to keep microgrids operating for up to five days. The Argonne project was funded by the DOE Solar Energy Technologies Office to advance research in solar energy technologies.

Utility companies can restore most power outages within 710 days of a natural disaster. But a five-day power supply is a reasonable threshold to allow isolated microgrids to provide power during most outages, said principal investigator, Bo Chen, an Argonne computational scientist.

"Our goal was to improve grid resilienceor reduce outage duration and restore power supply as soon as possibleby leveraging solar energy and buildings," said co-principal investigator Jianzhe Liu, an Argonne energy system scientist. "The increasing risks and power losses caused by natural disasters led the Solar Energy Technologies Office to solicit grid integration technologies that keep power going for five days isolated from the main grid."

Microgrids come in a variety of sizes and can generate enough power for a few homes or an entire community. The grids offer the opportunity to use more zero-emission electricity sources which reduces greenhouse gas emissions.

As technology gets smarter, the buildings themselves can essentially be transformed into microgrids, or grid-interactive efficient buildings. These buildings use smart controls, sensors and analytics to communicate with the electrical grid.

Argonne's novel building-solar controller is an algorithm and framework that coordinates multiple grid-interactive buildings, solar energy and other energy resources in one integrated network. "Multiple building microgrids enhance the efficiency and resiliency of electric grids. Various types of buildings can adopt the framework if the building's resources can be remotely monitored and controlled," Liu said.

While solar power is environmentally friendly, the renewable energy source is dependent on weather and is not available continuously. To ensure a consistent, reliable energy supply for five days, the Argonne team relied on an energy storage system that captures energy for later use.

"Energy storage works as a buffer that absorbs power when there is a surplus and releases power when there is a deficit," said Chen. "In this way, we can continuously balance electricity supply and demand to ensure a reliable power supply."

Argonne worked with public and private partners including utilities and educational and research centers on the three-year project completed in late 2021.

The team successfully tested the framework in a real-world microgrid at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) in Chicago. The demonstration was led by Mohammad Shahidehpour, the IIT Carl Bodine Distinguished Professor and chairman of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, and Zuyi Li, IIT professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and associate director of the Robert W. Galvin Center for Electricity Innovation.

The team applied the framework to the real-world microgrid on the IIT campus. Chen said the team demonstrated in real time how solar, wind, energy storage and variable power loads keep the lights on in various power outage scenarios.

"Another key takeaway is that our field testing demonstrated that the buildings can be coordinated to support grid operation under various power outage conditions that might occur in the real world," Chen said.

A single building microgrid is limited by capacity, response speed and other factors. The team showed that multiple building microgrids can complement each other to expand grid service capability and restore power more quickly.

The framework is primarily targeted for use by utility companies, which can directly embed the framework into their control centers. Private vendors can also incorporate the flexible network into existing products. Still in the early stages, the framework will eventually be available in a free, open-source format. As extreme weather events ratchet up and power outages continue, the Argonne framework will play a valuable role in ensuring continuous power flow.

"A safe, reliable and resilient distribution system is urgently needed to modernize the electric grid and ensure operational continuity," Liu said.

Explore further Floods left thousands without power. Microgrids could help communities weather the next disaster
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Could your smartphone be spying on you?

Hopefully not, and if so, not for long, thanks to a team of researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering.

Their recent study found that the Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) in some Android smartphones could be used to eavesdrop on a user's credentials when the user types these credentials using the smartphone's on-screen keyboard, making it an effective target for hacking. This hardware security vulnerability exposes a much more serious threat to user's sensitive personal data, compared to the previous attacks that can only infer the user's coarse-grained activities, such as the website being visited or the length of the password being typed.

"Our experiments show that our attack can correctly infer a user's credential inputs, such as their username and password, without requiring any system privilege or causing any noticeable shift in the device's operations or performance. Users wouldn't be able to tell when it's happening," said Wei Gao, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, whose lab led the study. "It was important to let manufacturers know that the phone is vulnerable to eavesdropping so that they can make changes to the hardware."

A phone's GPU processes all of the images that appear on the screen, including the pop-up animations when a letter of the on-screen keyboard is pressed. The researchers were able to correctly infer which letters or numbers were pressed more than 80 percent of the time, based only on how the GPU produces the displayed keyboard animations.

"If someone were to take advantage of this weakness, they could build a benign applicationlike a game or other appand embed malicious code into it that would run silently in the background after it's installed," said Gao. "Our experimental version of this attack could successfully target usernames and passwords being entered in online banking, investment, and credit reporting apps and websites, and we have proved that the embedded malicious codes in the app cannot be correctly detected by the Google Play Store."

The researchers focused their experiments on the Qualcomm Adreno GPU, but this method could potentially be used for other GPUs, as well. The team reported their findings to Google and Qualcomm, and Google confirmed that they will release an Android security update later this year to address the concern.

The paper, "Eavesdropping User Credentials via GPU Side Channels on Smartphones," was coauthored by Boyuan Yang, Ruirong Chen, Kai Huang, Jun Yang, and Wei Gao. It was presented at the ASPLOS Conference, held Feb. 28 through March 4, 2022, in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi (R) holds talks with Panamanian Foreign Minister Erika Mouynes in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province, April 4, 2022. (Xinhua/Zhou Mu)

HEFEI, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi held talks with Panamanian Foreign Minister Erika Mouynes on Monday in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province.

Wang said that since China and Panama officially established diplomatic relations five years ago based on the affirmation of the one-China principle, bilateral ties have ushered in a new chapter.

China is willing to take the fifth anniversary of diplomatic relations as an opportunity to facilitate political mutual trust, pragmatic cooperation, people-to-people exchanges and multilateral coordination, to foster more propellers of China-Panama friendly ties, Wang said.

Noting that facts have proved that the establishment of diplomatic ties between Panama and China was the correct decision, Mouynes said that Panama values mutual trust with China and will firmly adhere to the one-China principle.

The two sides also exchanged views on the Ukraine issue, among other issues. 

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi holds talks with Panamanian Foreign Minister Erika Mouynes in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province, April 4, 2022. (Xinhua/Zhou Mu)
by Nurul Ramadhan

JAKARTA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Lia Hariyanti, a 34-year-old nurse working in Indonesia's capital city Jakarta, bought a train ticket to Malang, East Java province, on Sunday, the first day of Ramadan in Indonesia.

The trip scheduled on April 24 would be her first time after two years to gather again with her family to celebrate Eid al-Fitr, a festivity which marks the end of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

"I am super excited and cannot wait for the Eid holiday, although I had to queue for more than 24 hours to be able to book the ticket. I have also taken an one-month leave from work so that I can spend longer time with my family," Lia told Xinhua.

Final-year accounting student Teguh Hanafi plans to buy a plane ticket to travel to his hometown in Padang, West Sumatra province, expecting to fly one week before the Eid al-Fitr day, which is supposed to fall on May 2 or May 3.

"I want to stay with my family for some time whilst doing my thesis research. I don't want to be away from them for such a long time again," Teguh said.

Lia and Teguh would be among millions of people in Indonesia to join the annual tradition of homecoming exodus, locally known as "mudik", a family gathering moment which is highly associated with Ramadan in Indonesia.

It is already estimated that around 79 million people would travel across the Southeast Asia's most populated nation for the exodus, according to Indonesia's Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi.

The past two years have become challenges for many Indonesians as the country has implemented public mobility restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which limited domestic and international travelers.

Last year, thousands of people violated the exodus ban and travelled home. In the weeks after the holidays, the country saw a surge in COVID-19 cases and fatalities, according to Indonesia's health ministry.

This year, with more people having been vaccinated and drops in daily COVID-19 cases, the authorities have eased a number of restrictions and allowed the "mudik" back.

Starting April 2, home bound travelers who have received booster shots are no longer required to show swab test results, according to a circular issued by Indonesia's COVID-19 task force.

Meanwhile, travelers who have received two doses of vaccines are required to show negative results of antigen tests, and those who have only received one dose have to show negative RT-PCR test results.

Lia and Teguh have decided to buy tickets early as they are afraid that the tickets would be sold out earlier than usual.

Bayu Sutanto, secretary general of the Indonesia National Air Carrier Association, has said that airline companies predicted the surging demands, and is confident that the current air flights are enough to accommodate passengers.

"I expected the ticket prices would jump high, but it doesn't really matter for me as long as I can meet my family, particularly my mother," Teguh said.

"I really miss my mother. I have already bought many new clothes for her and some other family members. I can't wait to fly home," Teguh said. 
Country

United States of America US Virgin Islands United States Minor Outlying Islands Canada Mexico, United Mexican States Bahamas, Commonwealth of the Cuba, Republic of Dominican Republic Haiti, Republic of Jamaica Afghanistan Albania, People's Socialist Republic of Algeria, People's Democratic Republic of American Samoa Andorra, Principality of Angola, Republic of Anguilla Antarctica (the territory South of 60 deg S) Antigua and Barbuda Argentina, Argentine Republic Armenia Aruba Australia, Commonwealth of Austria, Republic of Azerbaijan, Republic of Bahrain, Kingdom of Bangladesh, People's Republic of Barbados Belarus Belgium, Kingdom of Belize Benin, People's Republic of Bermuda Bhutan, Kingdom of Bolivia, Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana, Republic of Bouvet Island (Bouvetoya) Brazil, Federative Republic of British Indian Ocean Territory (Chagos Archipelago) British Virgin Islands Brunei Darussalam Bulgaria, People's Republic of Burkina Faso Burundi, Republic of Cambodia, Kingdom of Cameroon, United Republic of Cape Verde, Republic of Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad, Republic of Chile, Republic of China, People's Republic of Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands Colombia, Republic of Comoros, Union of the Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, People's Republic of Cook Islands Costa Rica, Republic of Cote D'Ivoire, Ivory Coast, Republic of the Cyprus, Republic of Czech Republic Denmark, Kingdom of Djibouti, Republic of Dominica, Commonwealth of Ecuador, Republic of Egypt, Arab Republic of El Salvador, Republic of Equatorial Guinea, Republic of Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Faeroe Islands Falkland Islands (Malvinas) Fiji, Republic of the Fiji Islands Finland, Republic of France, French Republic French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories Gabon, Gabonese Republic Gambia, Republic of the Georgia Germany Ghana, Republic of Gibraltar Greece, Hellenic Republic Greenland Grenada Guadaloupe Guam Guatemala, Republic of Guinea, Revolutionary People's Rep'c of Guinea-Bissau, Republic of Guyana, Republic of Heard and McDonald Islands Holy See (Vatican City State) Honduras, Republic of Hong Kong, Special Administrative Region of China Hrvatska (Croatia) Hungary, Hungarian People's Republic Iceland, Republic of India, Republic of Indonesia, Republic of Iran, Islamic Republic of Iraq, Republic of Ireland Israel, State of Italy, Italian Republic Japan Jordan, Hashemite Kingdom of Kazakhstan, Republic of Kenya, Republic of Kiribati, Republic of Korea, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Republic of Kuwait, State of Kyrgyz Republic Lao People's Democratic Republic Latvia Lebanon, Lebanese Republic Lesotho, Kingdom of Liberia, Republic of Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Liechtenstein, Principality of Lithuania Luxembourg, Grand Duchy of Macao, Special Administrative Region of China Macedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Madagascar, Republic of Malawi, Republic of Malaysia Maldives, Republic of Mali, Republic of Malta, Republic of Marshall Islands Martinique Mauritania, Islamic Republic of Mauritius Mayotte Micronesia, Federated States of Moldova, Republic of Monaco, Principality of Mongolia, Mongolian People's Republic Montserrat Morocco, Kingdom of Mozambique, People's Republic of Myanmar Namibia Nauru, Republic of Nepal, Kingdom of Netherlands Antilles Netherlands, Kingdom of the New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua, Republic of Niger, Republic of the Nigeria, Federal Republic of Niue, Republic of Norfolk Island Northern Mariana Islands Norway, Kingdom of Oman, Sultanate of Pakistan, Islamic Republic of Palau Palestinian Territory, Occupied Panama, Republic of Papua New Guinea Paraguay, Republic of Peru, Republic of Philippines, Republic of the Pitcairn Island Poland, Polish People's Republic Portugal, Portuguese Republic Puerto Rico Qatar, State of Reunion Romania, Socialist Republic of Russian Federation Rwanda, Rwandese Republic Samoa, Independent State of San Marino, Republic of Sao Tome and Principe, Democratic Republic of Saudi Arabia, Kingdom of Senegal, Republic of Serbia and Montenegro Seychelles, Republic of Sierra Leone, Republic of Singapore, Republic of Slovakia (Slovak Republic) Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia, Somali Republic South Africa, Republic of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands Spain, Spanish State Sri Lanka, Democratic Socialist Republic of St. Helena St. Kitts and Nevis St. Lucia St. Pierre and Miquelon St. Vincent and the Grenadines Sudan, Democratic Republic of the Suriname, Republic of Svalbard & Jan Mayen Islands Swaziland, Kingdom of Sweden, Kingdom of Switzerland, Swiss Confederation Syrian Arab Republic Taiwan, Province of China Tajikistan Tanzania, United Republic of Thailand, Kingdom of Timor-Leste, Democratic Republic of Togo, Togolese Republic Tokelau (Tokelau Islands) Tonga, Kingdom of Trinidad and Tobago, Republic of Tunisia, Republic of Turkey, Republic of Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda, Republic of Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom of Great Britain & N. Ireland Uruguay, Eastern Republic of Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of Viet Nam, Socialist Republic of Wallis and Futuna Islands Western Sahara Yemen Zambia, Republic of Zimbabwe
Tina Bollman approaches her craft like any other artist. She looks at her medium and imagines what it could be, and at her disposal are a wide variety of tools, each with a specific purpose.

However, unlike many of her colleagues in the art world, Bollmans attire is specialized: safety glasses, hearing protection and protective chaps. Her tools are different, too: gasoline-powered chainsaws in a variety of sizes and power.

Bollman, a second-generation chainsaw artist, is nonetheless an artist and her work can be seen at businesses, homes and special events all around the region, just like the work of her father, noted artist Art Boatright, who died earlier this year.

Bollman says it was about 20 years ago that she wanted him to do a carving for her.

I asked him, Can you make me this?" she recalled, And he said, No, but I can show you. He bought me a small chainsaw and we started doing it together.

Today, chainsaw carving is Bollmans full-time job, carving everything from hummingbirds and eagles to bears and historical figures. They range from table-top size to towering, two-story carvings.

Many are carved at her Marion outdoor studio from logs left over from work her husband, Scott Bollman, owner of Scottys Tree Service, has done; others are carved on-site from the remnants of a tree.

A complete carving can take between a few hours to a week or more, depending on the size and complexity, Bollman said. For her, the carving is a way to connect to her father  as well as her son, Joey Phillips, who is learning the craft from her.

The pair has ten saws at their disposal, all of varying lengths and with chain bars specifically designed for carving. She said her preference is carving cedar and pine, but on-site, you get what you get.

Bollmans work is impressive  so much so that she is often called upon to demonstrate as part of lumberjack shoes and other events, but she said she is still learning.

Compared to a lot of carvers, we are novices; very novice, she said.

'Thought I'd give it a shot'

Carterville chainsaw artist Evan Kern calls himself a hobbyist. He said he began carving with a chainsaw about five years ago when his uncle purchased a cabin that needed decoration.

Im cheap and I had a chainsaw, so I thought Id give it a shot, Kern said.

The grandson of artisans and the son of someone who dabbled in chainsaw art, Kern said he had been operating a chainsaw for years, just never had tried carving with it. Thanks to a couple of books of his fathers and a lot of time watching YouTube videos, Kern tried it.

The final product for his uncles cabin looked like a bear  so much so that Kern still uses it as an example of his work.

I love doing caricature bears, he said. Im not good enough to do realistic looking bears. I did an owl for a woman, but mostly I stick with bears and pumpkins.

Kerns pumpkins range from small autumnal decorations to ones so big they require a forklift to move. He can carve the small pumpkins in a few minutes. His bears, take much longer.

I never do a bear in one sitting, he said, adding that he prefers to take his time, making sure everything is right. There are many times I dont like how the nose or mouth turns out. Ill chop it off and hell end up with a little smaller head because I want the nose to look different. The trouble is that it is really easy to accidentally make a bear look like a pig.

Both Bollman and Kern approach their art with safety foremost in mind.

Probably the hardest part was to learn how to use the saw without hurting myself, Bollman said. My dad helped me with that, but basically, once you get the technique on how to hold the saw and what you're not supposed to do, the rest of it is practice like anything else. The more you do it, the better you get.

Kern said there is a passion for chainsaw carving among artists.

Like any artist, this is not something we do for the money. I do it because I love seeing the bear come out of something someone else would throw in their fireplace and burn. Its nice to create something out of practically nothing and its extremely satisfying, he said.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
ZEIGLER  One man has been arrested and charged after allegedly breaking into a gun safe to steal firearms and ammunition from a Zeigler home.

Dakota Rushing, whose age and hometown was not specified, surrendered at 1 p.m. March 30 after a task force was deployed to his location, police said.

Rushing has been charged with burglary, theft over $500, and criminal damage to property.

The felonies are Class 2, 3 and 4 respectively.

On March 24, the chief of the Zeigler Police Department responded to a burglary call at a house on North Main Street.

The previous night, someone broke into the house, cut open the gun safe and stole several firearms along with ammunition.

Due to the number of firearms missing and the size of the ammunition boxes, the police suspected that more than one individual could have been involved in the burglary, police said.

Police received a tip March 28 that Rushing allegedly fled Zeigler with stolen guns and ammo to hide out in Carbondale.

On March 29, the police were able to locate Rushing's exact location in Carbondale.

The Illinois State Polices Southern Illinois Drug Task Force was requested to help apprehend Rushing and seize the stolen guns.

While some guns were seized at the location, Rushing was nowhere to be found, police said.

The following day, police received another tip that said Rushing had allegedly returned to Zeigler, and the police considered him to be dangerous.

Given that he was desperate and may have possessed one (or more) reported stolen handguns on his person, this represented a very real threat to the citizens of Zeigler, and it was urgent he be apprehended, police said in a social media post on March 31.

The police then assembled an ad hoc task force, and with the help of dispatchers they were able to narrow down Rushings location to approximately a one-block radius of Main Street and Railroad Street.

Rushing surrendered later that day and has been incarcerated in the Franklin County Jail.

The following departments aided the Zeigler Police Department in the case: Franklin County State's Attorney Abby Dinn, Jackson County State's Attorney Joe Cervantez, Sesser Police Department, Christopher Police Department, Illinois State Police Southern Illinois Drug Task Force, Illinois State Police District 13, Illinois State Police SWAT, Illinois Secretary of State Police, Franklin County Sheriff's Office, Franklin County Emergency Management Agency, Zeigler Fire Department, Zeigler Street Department and Central Dispatch of West Franklin County.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Born nearly a century ago, Walter Blass has experienced much in his lifetime, including being displaced from his country, surviving the Holocaust after his father was arrested on the first day of World War II, serving as a Peace Corps director in Afghanistan and much more.

He will share some of his life stories and insights during an April 7 appearance at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.

A Conversation with Walter Blass: Holocaust Survivor, Refugee, Peace Corps Director, Business Executive is at 4:30 p.m. April 7 in the University Museum Auditorium at Faner Hall, Room 1526.

Admission is free, and no tickets are required. Seating is limited and available on a first-come, first-seated basis.

Blass will touch on several topics that have not only impacted his life, but that are also quite relevant in todays world, including immigration, what it is like to be a refugee, European reparations and survivors guilt.

SIU faculty members with expertise on these subjects will join Blass for a panel discussion. A question-and-answer session will follow. The presentation will wrap up with a reception in the lobby outside the auditorium.

From refugee to business executive

Blass was uprooted at the tender age of 5 in 1935 when his family of Jewish heritage fled his native Germany after the Nazi party took control.

His lawyer father had doubts about Adolf Hitler and moved the family to Belgium. That wasnt far enough, though, as Walters father was arrested and sent to a concentration camp, leading Blass and his mother to flee to France where they were arrested and jailed in Agen.

Seeing the young boy was apparently destined for a concentration camp, the jailer instead sent Blass to a home for delinquent children, likely saving his life. Eventually, the family reunited in the United States.

Young Walter learned English, became a Quaker and graduated from Choate, Swarthmore, Princeton and Columbia. He was one of the first economists hired in the Bell System but interrupted his career to volunteer with the Peace Corps.

He went on to become a director for AT&T, and in his 92 years, has also been a university professor and trustee, taught in France, China and beyond, and spoken around the world. In addition, he founded Strategic Plans Unlimited, a consulting firm.

To learn more

Sponsors of the presentation include the Office of Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; Library Affairs; University Museum and the School of History and Philosophy.

For more information about the presentation by Walter Blass or the numerous diversity initiatives at SIU, visit the website for the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, email diversity@siu.edu or call 618-453-1186.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Orangeburg County Sheriffs Office

The driver of a Honda Accord was injured in a crash after he allegedly fired a shot at another vehicle at about 2 a.m. Sunday, according to a sheriffs office incident report.

The driver of a Dodge Ram 3500 called deputies after the incident.

The Rams driver reported that he and his girlfriend were riding on Interstate 95 when the Accord cut them off, the report states.

The Rams driver flashed his bright headlights at the Accord and they both exited I-95 at U.S. Highway 301, toward Orangeburg.

The Accord pulled beside the truck and the driver allegedly fired a shot.

The bullet went through the passengers window, where the drivers girlfriend was sitting, and exited the rear drivers window, the report said.

The Rams driver said he tried to run the Accord off the road so it driver wouldnt shoot at them again, the report states.

Both vehicles crashed on the side of the road at U.S. 301 and Carriage Hill Road.

The driver of the Honda fled the scene prior to deputies arrival.

A deputy allegedly found a Taurus handgun on the passenger floorboard of the Honda.

The occupants of the Ram said they didnt need medical treatment.

Dispatchers sent deputies to another location on U.S. 301 where the Accords driver made a 911 call due to a medical emergency, the report said.

Orangeburg County EMS transported the Accords driver to the Regional Medical Center for treatment.

In other reports:

 A man alleges a woman fired a weapon in his direction outside the Crown Inn motel, located at 2805 Bamberg Road, in Orangeburg, at 4:15 a.m. Sunday.

He identified the alleged shooter and told deputies the room number where they could find her.

Deputies went to the room and asked the woman if she had a firearm, but she replied that shes a three-time felon and isnt allowed to be around firearms, the report said. She left the scene.

Deputies then reviewed surveillance footage at the motel and saw a woman, matching her description, fire a gun twice.

Investigators are following leads about the womans location.

 Someone stole a black, 2015 Kia Optima from Wisterwood Circle in North.

The theft was reported on Saturday.

The Optima is valued at $10,000.

 A catalytic converter was stolen from a 2001 Honda Accord parked at a Fannie Mae Lane residence in Orangeburg.

The theft was reported on Saturday.

The value of the catalytic converter is $500 and the damage to the Accord is valued at $500.

Contact the writer: mbrown@timesanddemocrat.com or 803-533-5545. Follow on Twitter: @MRBrownTandD

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 3 Sad 2 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
The Harold Powell Speech and Hearing Clinic offers free speech, language and hearing services for adults and children in Orangeburg and surrounding areas. The services are offered and performed by South Carolina State University speech pathology and audiology undergraduate and graduate students preparing for their externships.

Most schools don't have a clinic on campus, and if they do  we may be the only one that allow undergraduates to participate. Were getting the experience now. We get different clients, different clinical educators so they bring their knowledge. We get the whole package, undergraduate student Jyla Lee said.

Shirlain J. Darby, director of the Harold Powell Speech and Hearing Clinic and two-time SC State graduate, has practiced speech pathology for over 30 years. She is elated with the progression and future of the clinic for the students and the program.

The clinic is like their second home because when they're in speech pathology and audiology, all of those skills that they've learned in the classroom, they get to apply them here, Darby said.

The clinic provides a local opportunity for students to gain their curriculum-required clock hours. Externships give participants practical experiences working with clients with various disorders.

They do so while providing experience with clients coming in with an array of disorders.

Some have difficulty with articulation, which is sound production. There may be some difficulty with language skills in both children and or adults, Darby said. And also we serve adults who may have difficulty with cognitive issues, for example, stroke victims, Parkinson's, and so forth.

While gaining real-world work experience, students working in the clinic give back to surrounding communities, which is a major plus for them.

My very first time, I was a little nervous. We both were nervous because I didn't know what to expect. He didn't know what to expect. When I built rapport with him, it got a lot better. And he was excited about therapy, graduate student Shula Brailsford said. He is 11 and he told me one day I used my strategies in school, and I felt so much better about it. So just being able to see improvement and then having them tell you that they use what you taught them, I thought that's like a bit of a hurrah moment for the client and for me.

Offering diagnostic services like screenings and evaluations and therapy services for speech-language disorders, the program makes the time spent worthwhile. The clinic is seen less as a job and more as a tool for what the future holds for the program's students.

All the skills, they are practicing working with clients so they're able to perform those skills when they go out to the different sites  and ultimately get their degree and go off to working on their own, Darby said.

TeDajia Davenport, senior speech pathology and audiology major from Aiken, South Carolina, is grateful for the clinic because it has allowed her to pursue her passion for working with kids without having to major in education.

Follow your heart and always keep the faith and stay encouraged because it's really easy, especially if you're in school, to get discouraged, Davenport said.

All students who attend SC State must take the English Proficiency Exam in order to graduate. Graduate and undergraduate students in the Harold Powell Speech and Hearing Clinic are responsible for delivering the speech and hearing portions of the English proficiency exam.

The clinic is always accepting referrals from local schools, physicians offices and private citizens who are interested in receiving speech and language services.

Love 2 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
The Tri-County Regional Chamber of Commerce, in partnership with Argos, Giant Cement, Holcim and Dorchester/Allendale Biomass, is awarding scholarships.

A $1,000 scholarship is awarded to one student at each of the six high schools in the chambers region, who will be attending either a four-year college/university or a technical college. This is a scholarship emphasizing moral integrity, need and the individuals potential to become a productive citizen. To be eligible for this scholarship, students do not need to qualify for the Life

Scholarship or Hope Scholarship but have the potential and desire to further their education. The award is for one year.

Eligibility: Senior students attending one of the six participating schools. Bethune-Bowman High School, Branchville High School, Dorchester Academy, Holly Hill Academy, Lake Marion High School & Technology Center and Woodland High School/Dorchester County Career & Technology Center.

The Chambers Education/Scholarship Committee will consider the following: scholastics, school and civic involvement, need, experience and college ability.

Application deadline is April 15, 2022, at 4 p.m.

Application packet must include:

Completed application (application available at school guidance office)

Two recommendations from counselors/teachers

One recommendation from a community member

Official transcript from the school

Signature from school guidance counselor/principal

An essay, no longer than 500 words, outlining educational and personal goals, why you would like to be considered for this scholarship, and any personal or financial needs.

Send application packet to:

Tri-County Regional Chamber of Commerce

Education/Scholarship Division

225 N. Parler Ave.

St. George, SC 29477

Each student awarded a scholarship is required to contact the Tri-County Regional Chamber of Commerce with applicable college information.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Monday sent a message of congratulation to his Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orban on his Fidesz party's re-winning parliamentary elections.

In the message, Li stressed that as China and Hungary enjoy profound traditional friendship, their bilateral relations have maintained high-level development in recent years.

He said China is ready to work with Hungary to maintain the momentum of high-level exchanges, further enhance mutual strategic trust, and deepen practical cooperation in all areas, so as to lift the China-Hungary comprehensive strategic partnership to higher levels. 
(TBTCO) - Bao hien xa hoi (BHXH) tu nguyen la chinh sach bao hiem cua ang va Nha nuoc vi quyen loi cua nguoi lao ong va Nhan dan, uoc Nha nuoc bao ho, do co quan BHXH thuc hien voi nhieu loi ich thiet thuc giup nguoi tham gia co cho dua on inh khi het tuoi lao ong.
Patrick Lawson of Riverton was in the drivers seat of a Tesla Model S 100D Ludicrous between Rawlins and Laramie on Interstate 80 last week, but it was the car that was doing the driving.

Its passing a semi truck right now because [the semi is] going too slow, Lawson told WyoFile.

Cross-winds of up to 60 mph were chewing into mileage, Lawson said. But after departing from home in Riverton with a full battery hed topped it off at a high-speed electric vehicle (EV) charging station during a stop in Rawlins. A full charge will propel the Tesla over 300 miles of road, he said.

However, relying on an electric vehicle in Wyoming can be challenging. There are many dead zones  especially in the central portion of the state, Lawson said. Also, most all the existing charging stations available to the public are exclusively designed to charge Tesla vehicles.

That will soon change, thanks to a new federal EV infrastructure initiative. Wyoming has access to nearly $24 million in federal money to begin electrifying its roadways, beginning with the three interstates in the state.

We need more fast-charging stations that are open to all brands, Lawson said.

There are other considerations besides battery-draining wind when piloting an EV in Wyoming. Driving up mountains, hills and long inclines will reduce mileage  the same for petrol-propelled vehicles, Lawson said. The benefit of an EV, however, is as long as you have enough juice to crest an incline, the vehicle gains mileage on the decline by recharging the battery.

He learned that lesson the hard way during a drive through Utah when his vehicle ran out of power near the top of a climb just outside a town with EV charging stations. He had to call for a tow.

It was kind of embarrassing, he said.

Yet for all of the elevation, wind gusts, extreme weather and long distances between charging stations, Wyoming is a good place to be an EV owner, said Lawson, who boasts being part of an all-EV family. His wife drives a 2017 Tesla Model X 100D and his son drives a 2012 Nissan Leaf. His mother and sister also drive EVs in Wyoming. The bottom line for Lawson is EVs save money.

It costs around $10 to add 200 miles of range, according to Lawson. Thats less than a third the cost of a gasoline-powered vehicle, at $3 per gallon. His home charging station cost less than $2,000 to install, and he estimates the extra power load nudged up his home electric bill by about $50 per month.

Its worth it for me because I drive a lot of miles, said Lawson, who serves as executive manager for Wind River Internet.

However, Wyoming needs a major buildout to shorten the distance between EV charging stations. Another urgent need is for charging stations to accommodate all brands and models of EVs. Theres an all-brand EV charging station in Jackson. The Harley-Davidson dealership in Cheyenne has a charging station for Harleys. But almost all other existing EV stations in Wyoming are designed exclusively for Tesla vehicles because Tesla paid for them.

Thats one of the mandates of the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program thats driving billions in federal dollars to states. Wyoming already has a federal NEVI allocation of $3.9 million, and will receive another $5 million each year for the next four years. The Wyoming Department of Transportation just released its draft Zero Emission Vehicle Strategy under the NEVI program, and will launch a series of public meetings across the state to fine-tune the strategy, beginning Monday in Cheyenne.

We want to know, how do we make this plan better? Wyoming Department of Transportation Director Luke Reiner said.

Theres only 460 EVs currently registered in Wyoming, and about 360 of those are Teslas, according to WYDOT. But tens of thousands of EVs  of all varieties  travel Wyoming roadways, and the numbers are quickly increasing for both commercial and tourism traffic.

Tourism is our second-largest industry in terms of the states economy, Reiner said. So its really important for us to set the conditions to allow tourists with electric vehicles to visit our great state and to see the sights.

The federal NEVI program mandates states to first electrify main corridors. In order, thats [Interstate] 80, I-25 and I-90, thats how were going to tackle that, Reiner said. Along those routes charging stations must be within 50 miles of each other, must accommodate a minimum of four simultaneously charging vehicles, and must be located within a mile of an interstate exit.

Other federal priorities for Wyoming include main tourism routes to Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks, which mostly rely on public input to determine. Secondary routes for general connectivity across the state rank third in the list of federal EV infrastructure priorities. WYDOT is going to stretch the federal NEVI dollars as far as possible, Reiner said, but there are other funds available to continue the EV infrastructure buildout.

Discretionary grants are available via the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Plus, Wyoming has access to more than $8 million from the Volkswagen Clean Air Act Civil Settlement. Those programs include various matching requirements, but communities can already apply for the funds, which is an important option, Reiner said. The NEVI program mostly focuses on the installation of charging stations along corridors and routes, not necessarily within cities and towns.

WYDOT will begin accepting proposals from contractors within the year, Reiner said. The EV infrastructure effort is another example of a federal program that provides an opportunity for entrepreneurs to specialize in a growing industry, and Reiner said he hopes some of those businesses will be located in Wyoming.

Another vital piece of the NEVI program is broadband, Reiner said. Charging stations must be connected to the internet  thats how customers pay for the electricity.

Given the recent gasoline price shock spurred by Russias invasion of Ukraine, Lawson said he expects EVs will quickly become more socially acceptable in Wyoming. Especially as carmakers produce more trucks and SUVs with towing power, like the Ford F-150 Lightning and the Rivian R1T.

Lawson said his company, Wind River Internet, has been shifting its fleet from petrol to electric vehicles.

Its great because we were spending a fortune on gas, he said. We drive 100 miles a day and we were spending like $500. Now were spending like $50 or $60 on electricity.

WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.

Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 2
An Amber Alert has been issued for two children who were last seen in Buffalo.

Authorities say Aspen Marie Roth, 4, and Serenity Ann Naslaund, 2, were taken by their non-custodial mother, Alexis Roth.

They were last seen at 10 a.m. in Buffalo and may be traveling to Grand Prairie, Texas, according to the alert. They are apparently traveling with a 3-month old that Alexis Roth does have custody of.

Alexis Roth is described as a white female, 5 feet, 5 inches tall, weighing 120 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes. She was driving a white, 2009 Dodge Caravan with Wyoming license plate 16-9068.

Anyone with information is asked to call 911.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 0
Two children have been found safe following an Amber Alert, authorities said Monday.

Aspen Marie Roth, 4, and Serenity Ann Naslaund, 2, were located and in good condition, according to the Wyoming Highway Patrol.

Authorities on Sunday issued an Amber Alert for the pair, who were allegedly taken by their non-custodial mother, Alexis Roth.

The children were last seen at 10 a.m. Sunday in Buffalo, and authorities suspected they may have been traveling to Grand Prairie, Texas, according to the alert. The children were found in Texas.

Love 9 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0
CHEYENNE (AP)  A Laramie County sheriff's deputy is expected to recover from a gunshot wound he sustained in an exchange of fire with a person suspected of assaulting and robbing a student at Laramie County Community College, the sheriff's office says. The suspect was killed in the exchange, which occurred off-campus.

Sheriff's Capt. Don Hollingshead told The Wyoming Tribune Eagle that the deputy, whose name was not released, was wounded after a brief vehicle chase in Cheyenne following the alleged assault and robbery on Saturday. The deputy was listed in stable condition at Cheyenne Regional Medical Center and is expected to recover, Hollingshead said.

The name of the person killed and other information about the incident were being withheld Sunday, the sheriff's office said. The state Division of Criminal Investigation was investigating the officer-involved shooting.

The incident began when a community college student reported a robbery and assault to campus police. Campus safety officials asked the alleged assailant, who was not a student, to leave the college grounds, then notified the sheriff's office, said college spokesperson Lisa Trimble.

For copyright information, check with the distributor of this item, Wyoming Tribune Eagle.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 0
BUFFALO  Gov. Mark Gordon announced his reelection bid Monday, offering an upbeat message after a first term dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic and economic challenges.

I do believe that Wyoming is the best place on the Earth bar none, and I believe Wyomings best days are ahead of it, said Gordon, a moderate Republican. And thats because of you: the people of Wyoming.

Gordons time in office has been challenging, and hes faced criticism from his partys right wing. He angered many Wyomingites with a statewide mask mandate enacted during a COVID spike in December 2020. He lifted it four months later. Midway through 2021, as COVID was surging in the state, Gordon said Wyoming would not implement another statewide mask order or require vaccines. That promise held true.

Despite criticism from Gordons right flank, there is not a well-known, hard-line conservative challenging him.

Challenging an incumbent is already tough, but time is starting to run out for a formidable candidate to raise money and spread awareness about his or her candidacy.

Its way too late, said Bill Novotny, a county commissioner and political consultant.

The primary is in August.

Scott Madsen, a Buffalo City Council member and Gordon supporter who attended Mondays announcement, said opinions of Gordon in the northern Wyoming town are fairly positive.

Politicians often have strong support in their hometowns (Gordon grew up on a ranch near Kaycee), but the measures the governors office took to combat COVID-19 angered people across the board.

He wasnt very well liked during the state of emergency and the mandates, Madsen said. He wasnt fully responsible. I think he was getting bad advice.

Most recently, Gordon successfully pushed for pay raises for state workers because state agencies are experiencing difficulty hiring and retaining workers.

Gordons 2018 primary race was crowded with candidates, and he came out on top with 33.4% of the vote.

He beat out five other Republican candidates including the late GOP megadonor Foster Friess and natural resources lawyer Harriet Hageman. Hageman is now the Donald Trump-endorsed candidate running against Rep. Liz Cheney for Wyomings lone House seat.

Gordon coasted to victory in the general election, defeating Democrat Mary Throne.

The 2018 gubernatorial primary sparked calls for changes in Wyomings electoral system. Some on the far right pushed for a runoff system so that candidates would need majority support to win, though that effort was ultimately unsuccessful. Friess also blamed his loss on whats called crossover voting, the practice of Democrats and independents changing their affiliation on primary day, typically to vote for more moderate Republicans. The data does not back up Friess claim, but the issue has remained a concern for some with the upcoming midterms.

While Wyoming is a deeply red state with the most Republican legislature in the nation, three of the last six governors were Democrats. The state Democratic Party has not yet announced a candidate.

Gordon was appointed to serve as Wyomings treasurer in 2012 after the death of then-treasurer Joseph Meyer. Two years later, Gordon was elected to the post. Hes also a small businessman and rancher. The governor was born in New York City and attended college in Vermont. Since moving to Wyoming early in his life, he has predominantly lived in Johnson County.

Most of the crowd in attendance at Gordons campaign announcement were supporters and longtime friends of the Gordon family.

The entrance to the event was surrounded by Gordon yard signs that read, Wyoming Right. The slogan can be interpreted a number of ways, but its meant to send a positive message about the state.

Its just Wyoming gets everything right. We do, said Tom Wiblemo, Gordons campaign coordinator.

The slogan matches the message the incumbent delivered Monday. It was positive, hopeful and complimentary of the states residents.

Follow state politics reporter Victoria Eavis on Twitter @Victoria_Eavis

Love 2 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
The omicron subvariant BA.2 now constitutes over half of COVID-19 cases in the region that includes Wyoming. That means the U.S. Food and Drug Administration might deauthorize the COVID treatment sotrovimab for the state.

The World Health Organization highlighted the omicron subvariant BA.2 as a subvariant of concern in a February statement.

According to the World Health Organization, initial data suggests that BA.2 is more transmissible than BA.1, the other most common omicron subvariant. But the difference in transmissibility seems to be much smaller than that between BA.1 and the earlier delta variant.

There were 17 sequenced BA.2 cases in Wyoming as of Saturday. But Wyoming Department of Health spokesperson Kim Deti said variant sequencing takes some time. There are likely more BA.2 cases out there than the number of cases that have been sequenced.

Thats why the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates for variant prevalence are important, she said.

The omicron BA.2 variant now makes up 52.7% of cases in the CDC region 8, according to data collected through the week ending Saturday. Region 8 includes Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah and Colorado.

The proportion of BA.2 cases in the same region was 21% early last week.

But COVID cases overall in Wyoming continue to decline even as the proportion of BA.2 cases is increasing.

There were 60 confirmed active COVID cases in Wyoming as of the health departments latest update Thursday. In comparison, the health department reported 267 active cases on March 3 and a high of 5,792 active cases in late January. There were 12 COVID hospitalizations in Wyoming as of Friday, down by 31 from a month prior.

Even so, the FDA will likely deauthorize the monoclonal antibody treatment sotrovimab for Wyoming as it has already done in other states. Deti said, however, that its unclear when the FDA will make such a determination.

Sotrovimab is used to treat mild-to-moderate COVID after an individual has already tested positive, according to the FDA. Only non-hospitalized adults and children 12 years or older who are at risk of progressing to severe illness can use the treatment. Its an intravenous infusion that has to be administered within 10 days of symptom onset. Although sotrovimab still has emergency use authorization in some areas, its not FDA approved.

The treatment appears to be ineffective against BA.2, so the FDA rescinded sotrovimabs emergency use authorization in states where over half the cases come from the subvariant.

According to the latest FDA update, sotrovimab is deauthorized in most of the Northeast, Midwest and U.S. territories. The proportion of BA.2 cases is rapidly increasing in the West. None of the West Coast states have authorization to administer sotrovimab, including Alaska. Wyomings neighbor Idaho no longer offers the treatment.

Even though sotrovimab is still authorized in Wyoming, Deti said the health department will send information to providers updating them on the prevalence of BA.2 so they are aware and can consider the risks, in light of the current situation, of administering the treatment.

If the FDA deauthorizes sotrovimab, Wyoming will no longer receive the treatment from the federal government. But providers would continue to store the treatment in case its found to be effective against a future dominant variant.

Its also possible that in the future well find this treatment to be effective with future variants, Deti said. Its something that will be monitored on an ongoing basis.

Wyoming went through this process when the FDA announced earlier this year that the monoclonal antibody treatments REGEN-COV (casirivimab and imdevimab) as well as bamlanivimab and etesevimab, which are administered together, were not effective against omicron.

Another monoclonal antibody treatment, bebtelovimab, is currently available in Wyoming and has been shown to be effective against omicron BA.2.

There are also several other non-monoclonal antibody treatments in Wyoming.

The COVID pills paxlovid and molnupiravir has been available in Wyoming for some time, although molnupiravir is less effective against BA.2.

Remdesivir, an antiviral medication that is administered via IV infusions over three consecutive days, has been shown to prevent severe disease in people who have tested positive for COVID.

The Wyoming Department of Health is trying to increase the availability of these treatments.

Deti said the department is working to sign up additional providers who can order and receive the treatments at locations such as long-term care facilities and federally qualified health centers. It has also identified some providers for a test-to-treat program, which is meant to provide patients access to testing and medications in the same visit.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
CHEYENNE (WNE)  A 66-year-old man died Thursday afternoon following a high-speed pursuit that crossed from Wyoming into northern Colorado, the Colorado State Patrol said.

At about 2:45 p.m. Thursday, the Colorado State Patrol began pursuing the vehicle, which was traveling south on U.S. Highway 85.

Scanner traffic indicated speeds reached 118 mph during the chase, which extended for many miles.

Master Trooper Gary Cutler of CSP said the man had been wanted for a parole violation out of Minnesota, and had previously been in jail for murder. His name has not been released.

According to a CSP news release about the incident, a Colorado state trooper and Ault, Colorado, police officer deployed stop sticks, a tire deflation tool. The suspect continued to drive south, but then swerved into a CSP vehicle, causing the CSP vehicle to roll.

The pursuit came to an end in Weld County when the suspects vehicle left the road and went into a drainage ditch, the release said. The suspect died from injuries caused by the crash, and its believed he was not wearing a seatbelt.

A Colorado state trooper sustained minor injuries in the crash. He was taken to an area hospital as a precaution, but Cutler said Friday afternoon that the trooper had been released.

Highway 85 was closed for about three hours following the pursuit, Cutler said.

The Wyoming Highway Patrol began the pursuit, but it was unclear Friday where in Wyoming the chase started and why it was initiated in the first place.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 3 Sad 0 Angry 0
University of Wyoming students and other community members will be hosting a Saturday rally in support of Ukraine.

The rally will take place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at First Street Plaza in Laramie.

University of Wyoming students Anastasiia Pereverten and Katherine Fitch, as well as Feeding Laramie Valley AmeriCorps VISTA member Allen Gonzales-Willert, will distribute fliers and share information about the origins of the Russo-Ukrainian war, organizations that take donations  with descriptions of how the money will be spent  and the best news sources for accurate information about the invasion.

The organizers will also speak about their personal experiences in Ukraine.

Pereverten is a culture studies major and international student from the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, who has been studying abroad at the University of Wyoming since January.

She has spearheaded efforts at the university to educate the public about Ukraine and correct misinformation regarding the war. She has also talked with numerous Wyoming journalists about the invasion.

Fitch and Gonzales-Willert are former Peace Corps volunteers who served in Ukraine for multiple years. Both speak Ukrainian fluently.

Fitch, a first-year international studies graduate student, spent three years working at a regional youth center in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv. She also worked for a year in Dnipro, a city in the eastern part of the country. Gonzales-Willert taught English at a school in Sokal, a town about two hours away from the city of Lviv. He also lived for some time in the Zhytomyr region near Kyiv.

Fitch and Gonzales-Willert said other returned PeaceCorps volunteers in Colorado may also come and speak at the rally.

The three organized a similar rally last month in the UW Agricultural Building along with other students, faculty members and staff at the university.

They plan to host other rallies, panels and lectures about Ukraine at the university and in Laramie.

Fitch said she also hopes to organize a showing of Winter on Fire at the university. Winter on Fire is a documentary about the unrest in Ukraine in 2013 and 2014. That was around the time that Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula  a territory that formerly belonged to Ukraine  and sparked the beginning of the Russo-Ukrainian war.

Community members who are interested in attending the rally on Saturday can find more information on the Facebook page Stand With Ukraine Laramie. There will also be a signup sheet available on the page for those who want to volunteer to help facilitate the event.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
TEHRAN, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman said on Monday that the United States is responsible for the halt in Vienna talks aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

Iran has transmitted its "clear" message to the United States through Enrique Mora, the European Union coordinator for the Vienna talks, but no new response has been received from them yet, Saeed Khatibzadeh said during his press weekly conference.

"Washington has not yet made a decision on the remaining issues. We do not wait forever. The United States should make its political decisions," he noted.

"The United States is responsible for the pause in the negotiations today, (as) in the final stages (of talks), Washington tries to prevent Tehran from the economic benefits of the JCPOA," Khatibzadeh said.

"If the United States makes a political decision, an agreement is available," he concluded.

On Sunday, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian said Iran has submitted its proposals concerning the remaining unresolved issues to the United States through Enrique Mora and now the ball is in the U.S. court.

Iran signed the JCPOA with the world powers in July 2015. However, former U.S. President Donald Trump pulled the Washington out of the agreement in May 2018 and reimposed unilateral sanctions on Tehran, prompting the latter to drop part of its nuclear commitments under the agreement.

Since April 2021, eight rounds of talks have been held in Vienna between Iran and the remaining JCPOA parties, namely China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany, to revive the deal.

Over the past weeks, reports from Vienna suggested that the negotiators were "close" to an agreement but a few key issues remain unsolved pending "political decisions" of the parties. 
Mothers will get extra special treatment on Sundaylavish lunches, concerts and gifts of perfumes and roses.

Meanwhile, mere days before the celebration, Port of Spain businesspeoplevendors and huckstersare reporting slow sales. They are cautiously optimistic that it will pick up today.
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.
There are no more visa appointments at the United States Embassy in Trinidad for 2022, so be
When Dr Eric Williams decided to lay down his bucket here in the islands after his release from the Caribbean Commission and his debates with Dom Basil Matthews in the Public Library, he held lectures in Woodford Square, which he called The University of Woodford Square. We who were alive then felt happy.

He attracted people of like mind for the betterment of the islands, so he formed the PNMthe Peoples National Movement.
NEW DELHI, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Nepali Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba concluded his three-day visit to India on Sunday, during which various agreements were signed.

Deuba held a meeting with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi in Delhi.

Besides signing a series of agreements, the two sides also launched newly-developed projects, including a railway line and the 90-km long 132 KVDC Solu Corridor Transmission line.

The border issue between the two neighbors was also discussed, with the Nepali side urging India to resolve the issue through the establishment of a bilateral mechanism. The latter appreciated the general understanding that the issue needed to be addressed in a responsible manner through dialogue, and that "politicization" of such an issue should be avoided.

In addition, both sides issued a statement on power sector cooperation. Deuba invited Indian companies to invest in the power sector in Nepal.

The two leaders also reviewed progress in implementation of Indian projects in Nepal, including cross-border rail-link projects connecting towns and cities on both sides of the border.

Another highlight of Deuba's visit was the launch of Indian "RuPay" card in Nepal, which would open a new way for cooperation in financial connectivity and is expected to facilitate tourist flows and people-to-people exchanges between India and Nepal. 
Once upon a time, Tucson had a plethora of networking opportunities to choose from. Every week there were options to expand your sphere and generate new sources of referral business. Seasoned networkers polished their skills and generated significant value as a result. Then, the pandemic systematically destroyed those opportunities.

For more than two years, good networking opportunities were nearly extinct. Virtual meetings were available, but they were not as effective. Now, things are returning to a more normal state. Groups are beginning to meet again, so it is time to polish the rust off your networking skills.

This break in the action is a blessing in disguise. Networking is a powerful way to grow your business, but it can also be a waste of time. This forced reset allows you to get more from your networking efforts than ever before.

Time is your most precious resource. It is important to develop an effective networking strategy before you invest your networking time. Otherwise, you will collect business cards, but not a lot of business. An effective networking strategy delivers the highest possible return for every hour you invest.

The foundation of a good networking strategy uses the concept of group dynamics. Simply put, groups are the most important and powerful networking tool there is. Groups create incredible efficiencies and economies of scale. Think of a group of people, their collective connections and the opportunities they could create for you. Leveraging that potential is what delivers the highest return on your networking investment.

An important part of your networking strategy is selecting the right group. Not all groups are created equally. If you join the wrong group, it could still be a complete waste of time. Which group will produce the greatest return on your networking investment?

In next weeks Biz Tip article, we will examine how to select the right networking group.

Bill Nordbrock is vice president of community relations for SCORE Southern Arizona, a nonprofit that offers free small-business counseling. For more information, go to southernarizona.score.org or call 520-505-3636.

Subscribe to stay connected to Tucson. A subscription helps you access more of the local stories that keep you connected to the community.


GOODYEAR  Standing on the tarmac of Phoenix Goodyear Airport, more than 1,800 miles from her two children, Ricki Foster has chosen to chase a dream she never thought was possible: becoming a pilot.

I didnt aspire to be a pilot, it wasnt a path that was accessible to me in my mind, Foster said. I didnt see many female pilots, and I definitely didnt see any Black female pilots at the airline I was working at.

According to a 2021 report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, only 3.9% of aircraft pilots and flight engineers were Black, and only 5.3% were women.

Growing up in Jamaica, Foster, 38, believed that becoming a flight attendant was her only path to the sky, but even that wasnt easy. It wasnt until a friend pushed her to take a chance at becoming a pilot  after more than 10 years as a flight attendant  that she truly thought she could take that leap.

Foster began the journey by trying to obtain her private pilots license.

I had to stop for financial reasons, but it never left me  it was just in my soul, Foster recalled. And I decided, OK, Im going to make this happen one way or another.

That dream culminated in the United Aviate Academy, where Foster is one of 30 pilots in training in the inaugural class.

In the first year of the program, students complete their pilot training. Over the next 18 months, they must meet flight-hour requirements to earn an airline transport pilot certification.

United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby, in a statement, said the airline hopes to train more than 5,000 pilots over the next decade.

Capt. Curtis Brunjes, managing director of the academy, explained that the program is aimed at ensuring an adequate supply of pilots at United and fulfilling (the airlines) commitment to diversity.

Brunjes said United and JPMorgan Chase are offering $2.4 million in scholarships to first-year students to make the program more financially accessible.

Foster appreciates the programs commitment to diversity.

This has been a male-dominated field for a very long time and predominantly white men, but our passengers dont necessarily look like that, Foster said. So were changing it. And Im a part of that change.

A pioneering pilot

On a surprisingly cool August night in 1960, William Norwood sat at a red light on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, on his way back to Craig Air Force Base near Selma, Alabama. To Norwoods left were two cars topped with crosses lit by incandescent bulbs.

I didnt look at them, but within my peripheral vision I can see the little dunce hats, the little white hats the (Ku Klux) Klan wore, said Norwood, who was in advanced pilot training at Craig.

That moment was just one of many that Norwood would experience on his path to becoming United Airlines first Black pilot in 1965.

His pilot journey was harder for him than most candidates, he said. Norwood recalled being with his wife and two sons when an airline executive told him, You cannot afford to tie your shoes incorrectly because theyre looking for a way to fire you.

His wife, Molly Norwood, also felt the pressure of being the first Black family to break the cockpit color barrier at United Airlines.

You have to be good, and you cant do anything wrong, she said. We had to be super qualified.

The family handled every obstacle placed in their path, and William Norwood went on to spend 31 years with United. Today, on display at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, one of Uniteds Boeing 727 jets carries William Norwoods name in honor of his legacy.

Paving the way

In the living room of his Mesa home, which bathes in warm yellow light, Norwood tears up as he watches the video made for his retirement in 1996. As faces and names from his past flicker by, telling stories of how he impacted their lives, Molly Norwood said her husband still is a mentor to others, just as others had helped on his own journey.

That is his passion; speaking to young people, she said. You would be surprised that at 86 years old, young people are still calling him.

After retiring from United, Norwood shifted his focus to giving back to the next generation of pilots. From funding scholarships at his alma mater, Southern Illinois University, to visiting schools to speaking to young students that may one day be pilots, Norwood aims to give others the same support that he got.

I do it because when we have been successful, were never successful by ourselves, he said. So we have to get to the point where we all stand on others shoulders.

Foster is hoping to continue the legacy for future generations, including her 6-year-old daughter, Marley.

That inspiration is for all of the little girls that could have become a pilot but didnt think it was possible, Foster said.

Although her daughters dreams may not be taking to the sky like her mother, Foster said the obstacles she has overcome to pursue her dream will teach her daughter that anything is possible.

What she will learn from watching me is that she can be anything she wants to be, she can accomplish any goal, Foster said. And there are barriers of course, but theres always ways to overcome them.

Subscribe to stay connected to Tucson. A subscription helps you access more of the local stories that keep you connected to the community.


Principal of the Year honoree: Bixby High School Principal Terry Adams was named the Oklahoma High School Principal of the Year Tuesday by the Oklahoma Association of Secondary School Principals.

Adams has been with the district for a decade, and under his leadership, Bixby High School has expanded its programming for students for students exploring options for life after high school.

Among the initiatives launched during his tenure is a concurrent enrollment partnership with Oklahoma State University Institute of Technology to offer introductory level courses at Bixby High School starting with the 2022-23 school year.

Adams will be formally recognized at a ceremony in June and will be eligible to become a potential finalist for the National Principal of the Year award.

Teacher of the Year honoree: Grace McEndarfer is Owasso Public Schools 2022 Teacher of the Year.

McEndarfer received the award Tuesday night in a ceremony at the Mary Glass Performing Arts Center. She will go on to represent the district in the Oklahoma Teacher of the Year competition.

The team lead among the second grade teachers at Bailey Elementary School, McEndarfer has been with the district since the 2018-19 school year. She is Owassos first Teacher of the Year honoree from Bailey Elementary School.

Help wanted: Broken Arrow Public Schools is hosting a job fair for teachers from 2-5 p.m. Thursday at the Central on Main Ballroom, 210 N. Main St.

Stay home: Monday is a previously scheduled distance-learning day for Broken Arrow Public Schools. In-person instruction will resume on Tuesday.

COVID-19 by the numbers: Several local school districts published updated COVID-19 case counts by the close of business Friday.

Tulsa Public Schools reported three cases among its students and two among its employees. Campuses with at least one positive case include Cooper and Eliot elementary schools and Carver Middle School.

Bartlesville Public Schools reported no cases among its students or staff and two students in quarantine due to close-contact exposure.

Broken Arrow Public Schools reported two cases among its students and one case among its employees.

Collinsville Public Schools had one reported case among its staff and students.

Jenks Public Schools reported no cases among its students and two cases among its employees. Both staff cases were reported at West Elementary School.

Owasso Public Schools reported one case among its students and none among its employees. The district does not distinguish among sites in its public-facing reporting.

Skiatook Public Schools reported one case among its students and none among its employees. The lone confirmed case was at Skiatook High School.

Sand Springs Public Schools reported zero cases last week.

Bixby did not publish case count updates by the close of business Friday.

Berryhill, Glenpool, Sapulpa and Union have stopped publishing regular case-count updates.

School board calendar: The board of education for Tulsa Public Schools is scheduled to meet Monday. The agenda includes the districts proposed 2022-23 academic calendar.

The Board of Education for Bartlesville Public Schools is scheduled to meet Thursday afternoon.

 Lenzy Krehbiel-Burton, Tulsa World

Want to see more like this? Get our local education coverage delivered directly to your inbox. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
MANILA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Leftist rebels ambushed a team of government forces in Northern Samar province in the central Philippines before dawn on Monday, killing a police officer and wounding five other people, including two soldiers.

The national police said the team was heading for a village when the New People's Army (NPA) rebels attacked them using an improvised explosive device (IED).

Monday's attack is the second of its kind in the province so far this year. The rebels also detonated an IED last month injuring a soldier.

The NPA rebels have been fighting the government troops since 1969. They concentrate their attacks in rural areas and small-scale skirmishes with the military.

The NPA strength is currently estimated at 3,000 personnel, significantly lower than its peak in the 1980s. 
The city this week is holding a series of public meetings on two large and consequential redevelopment projects planned for north Tulsa.

On Tuesday, the two finalists vying to redevelop the south 11 acres of the Evans-Fintube site just north of downtown will present their development plans at the 36th Street North Event Center, 1125 E. 36th St. North. The meeting begins at 5:30 p.m. Tulsans can also access the meeting on Zoom.

Kian Kamas, executive director of the Tulsa Authority for Economic Opportunity, said the project will be one of the  if not the  largest private developments in the downtown area.

We really wanted to see a transformational development that helps create economic opportunity and really builds on the legacy of Greenwood, Kamas said.

The (request for proposals) was very clear in outlining key principles that related to those items  I think particularly the opportunity to build wealth, and thats really the vision that we are hoping to see come to life through this project.

The Tulsa Authority for Economic Opportunity initiated a search for Evans-Fintube development teams a year ago. After two public-engagement meetings at which developers shared their visions for the land and received public input, a community-led steering committee narrowed the field of prospective developers to Team Alchemy and Greenwood Phoenix.

After Tuesdays meeting, we will compile the feedback and give the themes or averages to the steering committee so they can get a sense of what the overall sentiment was from attendees for each of the proposals, Kamas said. Our goal is just that we want as many people as possible to have the chance to see the full concepts for both proposals. We are excited for both of the teams to have the chance to present them publicly.

Later in the week, the focus shifts to the Kirkpatrick Heights neighborhood. Community meetings are scheduled for Thursday and Saturday as part of the citys effort to create a master plan for the area.

The master plan will provide development strategies for the 56 acres of land returned to the Tulsa Development Authority in a 2018 settlement with the University Center at Tulsa Authority.

The mixed-use project is intended to serve as a model for equitable and inclusive development.

Kamas said the master plan has a chance to make a tremendous impact in north Tulsa.

We are excited to begin translating the countless ideas and key themes weve heard over the past several months into design ideas for the built environment, as we advance toward developing the plan for redeveloping this historic area of Greenwood, she said.

Thursdays meeting is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. at the Greenwood Cultural Center, 322 N. Greenwood Ave. It will include a discussion on community ownership models as well as an update on the master plan process and an opportunity for the public to give its input.

Saturdays interactive design workshop will run from 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at Carver Middle School, 624 E. Oklahoma Place. The workshop will focus on density and desirable uses for the land and how the historic areas heritage and culture should be reflected in the development.

Both of the planned developments will be constructed in the historic Greenwood District, site of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre.

For more information on Evans-Fintube, visit cityoftulsa.org/EvansFintube. Go to OurLegacyTulsa.org to learn more about the community-led process to create a Kirkpatrick Heights/Greenwood Master Plan.

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Any beef the state of Oklahoma has with the U.S. Supreme Courts McGirt ruling should be handled through Congress rather than the court system, the Five Tribes assert in a friend-of-the-court brief.

The Supreme Court brief, filed Monday by the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee and Seminole nations, urged the court to dismiss claims by the state that it was undergoing a criminal-justice crisis since the court released its McGirt decision in July 2020.

Instead of supporting funding requests, engaging with Congress, or negotiating with the Nations, the Governor and his counsel tout litigation to circumvent and undermine McGirt as the States primary effort, the tribes claim in their brief.

The U.S. Supreme Court is considering the last of the state of Oklahomas challenges to the courts McGirt decision: whether it has authority to prosecute non-Indians who commit crimes against Indians in Indian Country.

The U.S. Supreme Court in March turned away the states request that it overturn its McGirt ruling entirely, instead focusing on the jurisdictional issue.

The landmark decision recognized that the Muscogee Nation reservation, which includes much of Tulsa, had never been disestablished by Congress.

The ruling meant that since statehood, the state of Oklahoma has not had jurisdiction to try a case that involved a member of a federally recognized tribe and a crime within the Muscogee Nation reservation. Jurisdiction in those cases rests with the federal government or tribal government, depending on the facts of the case.

The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals, in a series of decisions, has since ruled that five other eastern Oklahoma tribes reservations with similar treaties with the U.S. government also were never disestablished.

As a result, much of the eastern half of Oklahoma has been acknowledged to be Indian Country when it comes to criminal jurisdiction, leaving the state out of the jurisdictional loop when a case involves an American Indian.

The acknowledged tribal reservations are those of the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee, Quapaw and Seminole nations.

The state of Oklahoma is appealing an Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals decision in the case of Victor Manuel Castro-Huerta and several others where the victim was Indian and the defendant was a non-Indian.

The state of Oklahoma claims it still has the authority to prosecute Castro-Huerta, while the tribes and others disagree.

The tribes brief was one of five filed in recent days in opposition to the state of Oklahomas claim that it has the authority to prosecute non-Indians who commit crimes against Indians in Indian Country.

Others challenging the states claim include a group of former U.S. attorneys, including Trent Shores, former U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Oklahoma.

The U.S. attorneys didnt mince words in the opening sentence of their brief filed Monday.

It is black-letter law that the states have no jurisdiction over crimes committed by Indians or against Indians in Indian Country, the former federal prosecutors state in their brief, authored by Shores and former U.S. attorneys from Montana, Tennessee, Idaho, New Mexico, Colorado, Minnesota, Maine, South Dakota and North Dakota.

Oklahoma attempts to create the misimpression that state jurisdiction is the normal jurisdictional default role even when crimes arise in Indian country, and that the holding of the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals was an aberration, the prosecutors continued.

Shores was U.S. attorney in the Tulsa office for about 3 years until 2021, when the political appointee left to enter private practice. Shores, a member of the Choctaw Nation, is also chief justice for the Kaw Nation.

Meanwhile, the Five Tribes claim the state of Oklahomas assertion that it has authority to prosecute non-Indians who commit crimes against tribal members in Indian Country threatens the Nations exercise of tribal self-government to improve public safety and well-being on their reservations and resurrects the threat of state encroachment on tribal sovereignty.

Contrary to the States and its amicis (friend of the court) claims, the federal government is prosecuting both violent and non-violent crimes, as shown by U.S. Attorneys announcements for grand jury indictments, the tribes state.

The tribes are also increasing their law enforcement resources and capabilities. The Cherokee Nation spent $10 million last fiscal year to expand its justice system, according to the tribes.

The Choctaw Nation says it has spent over $24.8 million in response to the affirmation of its reservation, according to the tribes.

The Muscogee Nation claims it has more than doubled its Lighthorse police budget from 2020 to 2022.

The Seminole Nation has increased its court funding by more than 117% since the McGirt ruling.

The Chickasaw Nation, meanwhile, has more than 30 new personnel in its Lighthorse Police Department, more than doubled its prosecutorial staff, and hired a new criminal investigator and a new supervisory probation officer.

The tribes are also increasing their physical infrastructure, with the Muscogee Nation planning three new police substations and a new 23,000-square-foot courthouse, according to court records.

The tribes together have filed nearly 13,000 criminal cases in their respective courts, according to the brief.

The states tale of a criminal dystopia in eastern Oklahoma is just that  a tale, according to the tribes.

The States slanted telling provides no warrant for upsetting the law in Oklahoma  much less nationwide  regarding the allocation of criminal jurisdiction in Indian country, the tribes argue.

While defending their sovereign right to prosecute cases involving their citizens, the Five Tribes argue that state prosecutors dont do a great job themselves in their handling of existing cases, noting that the state cleared only about 36% of reported murders, rapes, robberies and violent crimes in 2019.

A study found that where states and federal jurisdiction is concurrent, States often have proven to be less cooperative and predictable than the federal government in their exercise of authority, a cited study found.

The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on the matter April 27 followed by a decision expected by sometime mid-year.

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
The first time I went mountain biking was somewhere between a laugh-fest and a disaster. I was out of shape, trying to keep up with two experienced cyclists. They were riding higher-end bikes while I was muddling through on a borrowed off-brand rig with a seat that wouldnt stay put.

My second attempt wasnt much better. Just getting up the first hill was more than my faint lil heart could handle.

Mountain biking was not my friend, and I considered this a personal affront. Ive fished, skied, hiked and backpacked for years now. To me, happiness is a hard-earned Rocky Mountain summit. Closer to home, running and hiking trails will do.

But mountain biking? Not so much.

A few years back, I bought a used mountain bike from a friend. I figured it would be great for commuting to work, seeing how close I lived to the office. Bigger, more rugged tires would handle downtowns sketchy pavement far better than the slender wheels of a road bike.

And besides, if I ever got my courage up, maybe I could take this new-to-me mountain bike on some local trails.

One problem, though: Here in town, the mountain biking hot spot has long been Turkey Mountain. And Turkey Mountains trails arent for beginners. Theyre tough.

I envisioned myself rumbling along, hitting a rocky patch and flying over my handlebars. Cyclists have been the ones who have named most of Turkey Mountains trails, and one of them is dubbed Lipbuster for a reason.

But Turkey Mountains trails are undergoing a major makeover. Tulsas River Parks Authority is working with Bentonville, Ark.-based Progressive Trail Design to make better, more sustainable trails that cyclists, runners and hikers can enjoy for years to come.

Some of the old trails are being rebuilt, and new paths are being created. The new trails are more erosion proof than the old ones. Many are being designed in a way to expand the number of people who can ride them.

Progressive Trail Design has years of experience in this, honed on the numerous trail projects that have turned northwest Arkansas into a mountain biking mecca. The magic that makes those Ozark trails such a success is now here in Tulsa, with several miles of new trails open and many more miles coming soon.

Ive hiked some of these new trails. Run on them, too. Theyre great for both, even if they are less wild than the rocky, rooty paths were used to. But I had yet to ride them until a recent sunny Saturday afternoon.

Im in better shape now than I was when I last took a bike on trails. Maybe a better cyclist. My bike, a late-90s model Trek, has none of the comforts of newer bikes  steel frame instead of carbon, and no suspension. Its rigid frame guarantees Ill feel every bump.

But really, it was now or never. If I was going to jump into mountain biking and exorcise the demons of old, now is the time.

So I rode Turkey Mountain. I eased over rollers (humps in the trail that are kind of like roller coaster ups-and-downs), careened off banked turns and shifted into low gears for long climbs. Ill confess to avoiding the jumps. Im a mountain biking newbie, after all.

I finished off a loop on two of Turkey Mountains new trails, and I didnt die. Didnt embarrass myself, either. Dare I say, I had fun and got a little exercise.

I enjoyed it so much I rode another loop on one of the parks older trails. They were rockier, and had anyone been nearby, they would have seen me clumsily dump over once after failing to negotiate a downhill turn around a small boulder. Im a newbie, after all.

But I left Turkey Mountain appreciating the long process that RPA and a number of Turkey Mountain stakeholders have undergone to make this project happen. Some of us joked that RPA would create a magnificent master plan for Turkey Mountain only to watch it gather dust in binders comfortably shelved in a back office somewhere.

But what is happening is the opposite of that. Some public money and a lot of private donations are transforming the park. Elsewhere in the Tulsa area, similar projects are underway or have been completed.

The magic of northwest Arkansas is happening here, and it got me to (finally) enjoy mountain biking.

Subscribe to Daily Headlines Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.

Catch the latest in Opinion Get opinion pieces, letters and editorials sent directly to your inbox weekly! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Police in Da Nang said on Sunday evening that they were investigating a case where a seven-seater car crashed into a bakery on Dien Bien Phu Street in Thanh Khe District, injuring six people.

The accident happened at around 6:30 pm on Sunday when the car was traveling on Dien Bien Phu Street in the direction from Da Nangs center to Thanh Khe District.

The seven-seater vehicle suddenly accelerated near a road tunnel at the intersection of Dien Bien Phu and Nguyen Tri Phuong Streets before making a wide sweeping turn directly into Dong Thanh Bakery at the corner of the intersection.

This video shows a car speeding for a few seconds before rushing straight into a bakery in Thanh Khe District, Da Nang City, Vietnam, April 3, 2022. Video: H.H. - N.D. / Tuoi Tre

Videos capturing the car speeding for a few seconds before crashing straight into the bakery recorded by passers-by also went viral on social media.

Functional forces were present at the scene shortly after to regulate traffic and investigate the crash.

Thanh Khe District police said that the accident left six people injured, all of whom have been hospitalized.

An investigation into the case is underway.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!
A new strain of the COVID-19 Omicron variant, XE, first detected in the UK over two months ago and possibly 10 percent more contagious than any previous mutants, has yet to be found in Vietnam, health authorities reported on Sunday.

The new mutation XE is a recombinant of the two sub-variants BA.1 and BA.2 of the Omicron, which was designated by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a variant of concern in November 2021 and has since spread as the most transmissible across the world.

Weekly COVID-19 reports in Vietnam have yet to record the appearance of the XE variant, while the Omicron sub-variant BA.2 has dominated new infections nationwide, the Ministry of Health said.

The Omicron variant, first detected in Vietnam in a case imported from the UK on December 19 last year, is more than twice more infectious than its preceding strain Delta, and in unvaccinated people, this rate is even higher, according to the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology.

Vietnam has documented 9,818,328 COVID-19 cases, with 7,787,962 recoveries and 42,600 fatalities since the pandemic erupted in the Southeast Asian nation since early 2020, the ministry reported on Sunday.

Currently, the BA.2 sub-variant is also the dominant strain of the coronavirus worldwide, representing nearly 86 percent of all sequenced cases, according to the WHO.

The WHO has recently issued a report outlining their initial findings of XE, a potentially new variant of concern.

Early-day estimates indicate a community growth rate advantage of 10 percent as compared to BA.2, however, this finding requires further confirmation," the report said.

The XE strain was first detected in the UK on January 19, and more than 600 XE cases have been confirmed since then, according to UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA).

Recombinant variants are not an unusual occurrence and several have been identified over the course of the pandemic to date, said Professor Susan Hopkins, chief medical advisor at UKHSA.

This particular recombinant, XE, has shown a variable growth rate and we cannot yet confirm whether it has a true growth advantage, Hopkins said.

There is not enough evidence to come to conclusions about transmissibility, severity or vaccine effectiveness so far, she added.

The WHO said it will continue to closely monitor and assess the public health risk related to recombinant variants like the XE, and will provide updates as further evidence becomes available.

Presently, there is no indication that this new variant is strong enough to cause a dangerous wave, according to the WHO.

Some more time is needed to make comments on how transmissible the XE can be, said India-based Tata Institute for Genetics and Society Director Rakesh Mishra.

I believe that there is no need to push a panic button, he added.

Besides the XE, two other hybrid or recombinant strains of the coronavirus have been recently detected, including the XD and XF, which are derived from a combination of Delta and Omicron, the WHO said.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!
This week in Foreign Correspondent Michael Rowland travels through France, visiting Paris and the regions, on the eve of an unprecedented election for his report March to the Right.

We have a history. We have a past we care about and its very threatened.

Thais is a social media influencer and a fierce supporter of extreme-right presidential candidate, Eric Zemmour.

Shes been convicted of causing public disorder and banned from TikTok. Now, shes promoting her anti-immigration message on YouTube.

We live in a multicultural society, and weve just seen thatmulticulturalism doesnt work, says Thais.

A few years ago, Thais views were considered toxic. Now many in France fear theyre becoming mainstream.

In the upcoming presidential race, candidates on the far-right are polling higher than ever before, around 30%.

The candidacy of Zemmour, a high-profile media commentator, has been a game changer. Hes been convicted of hate speech three times and promotes the Great Replacement  a debunked conspiracy theory that a master plan exists for Muslims to replace Europeans.

Marine Le Pen, daughter of Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founding father of Frances modern far-right movement, is currently polling in second place, after incumbent President Macron.

The divisive rhetoric of Zemmour, Le Pen and their followers is making many in Frances immigrant communities uneasy.

Im really concerned about the fact that people like Eric Zemmour are really pushing the boundaries of what is acceptable or not, says Ahmed, a deputy mayor on the outskirts of Lyon in Frances southeast.

Reporter Michael Rowland takes a break from the News Breakfast couch to travel through France on the eve of an unprecedented election.

He visits Paris and the regions, talking with social media influencers, community leaders, workers and commentators.

In a nation where voter apathy means low turnout, the far-rights ability to galvanise people gives it a real advantage. Days out from the election, Le Pen is closing the gap with Macron. The results of this election could change France forever.

8pm Thursday on ABC.
MOSCOW, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree introducing visa restrictions for citizens from "unfriendly countries," a decision made in retaliation to hostile measures taken by the European Union, the Kremlin said Monday.

According to the decree, Russia will partially suspend its simplified visa agreements with EU member countries along with Norway, Iceland, Switzerland and Liechtenstein.

The Kremlin said that the decree also ordered the country's foreign ministry to impose individual entry restrictions on foreigners and stateless persons who commit hostile acts against Russia, its citizens or legal entities. 
By Eve Wolynes

In times of strife and conflict, faith and devotion often serve as emotional bastions for the faithful. On a terrestrial level, churches often do the same during times of war. On March 2, the Assumption Cathedral of Kharkiv, Ukraine, built in 1659, offered itself as shelter for all Kharkiv residents until a missile struck it, shattering its historic stained-glass windows but protecting those within from harm.

(Photo is of the Holy Spirit Chapel of the Greek Catholic Theological Seminary of Lviv, Ukraine with artwork by painter Petro Kholodny and sculptor Andriy Koverko.)

The destruction of art and architectures of faith is not always the tragic byproduct of warfare; it can also be a wanton and cruel tool to silence ideologies contrary or subversive to those in power. Consider the work of Ukrainian artist Petro Kholodny. The Holy Spirit Chapel of the Greek Catholic Theological Seminary of Lviv, Ukraine houses a rare surviving piece of his artwork, an iconostasis depicting Mary at a writing desk and holding a scroll  objects more typically associated with prophets and apostles rather than the Blessed Mother.

Kholodny was an artist  but he was also involved in the 1917-20 fight for Ukrainian independence from the Russian Empire and was the deputy minister of education under the Ukrainian National Republic until 1920. He went into exile after the Soviet victory and ultimately settled in Lviv, then part of Poland. There, he continued to produce religious art for churches, largely inspired by traditional Ukrainian styles that combined folk art and Greek Byzantine iconography.

Thanks to his alignment with Ukrainian independence, however, many of his works, both secular and spiritual, were destroyed during Soviet occupation of Lviv for allegedly having ideologically harmful Ukrainian nationalist elements. The Holy Spirit Chapel, which provides valuable artistic, religious and architectural representation of the cultural heritage of Ukraine and its Byzantine roots, could also have become a casualty of the political censorship, violence and destruction of art and artifacts in the wake of Soviet attempts to erase culture and identity. A German bomb struck the building in 1939, and the Soviet state closed the seminary and and seized its property in 1944.

The building reopened as a theological seminary shortly after the Declaration of State Sovereignty of Ukraine in 1990, and today, it stands as a testament to the resilience that both architectures and institutions of faith can embody in difficult times.

Now Lviv plays a similar role for refugees from eastern Ukraine that it once played for Kholodny, taking in some 200,000 displaced Ukrainians and serving as a safe haven against war  for the time being.

Other examples of Ukrainian architecture

Elsewhere in our collection we can see further examples of Ukrainian architectures complex and intersecting qualities: its material vulnerability; its enduring strength for providing safe haven and refuge; and its embodiment of the varying cultural heritages of the Ukrainian people. In prints depicting the wooden Churches of the Nativity in Velyke and Mikhova, Ukraine, we see an architectural style that reflects rural peasant culture with origins in the 11th century, rather than the wealthier  and sturdier  constructions of stone we normally associate with urban church architectures that have survived the centuries. While the examples here date to the early 20th century, the oldest wooden church that survives, the Church of the Descent of the Holy Spirit, was built in 1502. Because of their vulnerability to fire and decay compared to stone buildings, fewer than 500 wood-construction churches in Ukraine built before 1800 survive today. On March 8, Russian shelling destroyed an 1862 wooden church near Viazivka that had withstood time and threats of fire for over 150 years.

 Eve Wolynes is an intern in the Marian Library working toward her masters in library and information science from Kent State University, specializing in cultural heritage stewardship and preservation.
ReportLinker

Major players in the modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) market are ABB, Eaton, Schneider Electric, Huawei, Delta Electronics, AEG Power Solutions, Vertiv, Emerson Electric, Rittal, Toshiba International Corporation (TIC), Gamatronic, and Tripp-Lite.

New York, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Modular Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) Global Market Report 2022" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06248538/?utm_source=GNW





The global modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) market is expected to grow from $3.12 billion in 2021 to $3.53 billion in 2022 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 13.1%. The growth is mainly due to the companies resuming their operations and adapting to the new normal while recovering from the COVID-19 impact, which had earlier led to restrictive containment measures involving social distancing, remote working, and the closure of commercial activities that resulted in operational challenges. The market is expected to reach $4.98 billion in 2026 at a CAGR of 9.0%.



The modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) market consists of sales of modular UPS and related services by entities (organizations, sole traders, and partnerships) that manufacture modular UPS where each module in modular UPS is being embedded with hardware and software required for autonomous operation.In modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) each module is provided with critical components and thereby eliminating the weak points.



Through decentralized static bypass switches and controls, modular UPS systems eliminate single points of failure.



The main types of products in modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) are online or double-conversion, line-interactive and off-line or standby.Modular online or double conversion UPS systems provide continuous power to critical loads by sorting and transferring incoming utility power to DC power, which is then converted to a perfect AC output from the inverter.



The power capacities in modular UPS systems vary from 0-50kVA, 51-100kVA, 101-300kVA, and 301-and above kVA. These systems are implemented in various verticals such as data centers, industries, telecommunications, commercial, BFSI, government and other end-users.



North America was the largest region in the modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) market in 2021.Asia Pacific is expected to be the fastest-growing region in the forecast period.



The regions covered in this report are Asia-Pacific, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, South America, Middle East and Africa.



An increasing number of data centers is contributing to the modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) market growth.The upcoming and existing data centers are being provided with modular UPS systems to attain higher standardization, greater flexibility, and expandability.



Data centers are also being assisted with modular UPSs for ensuring continuous and reliable power supply and support of the systems during power outrage.For instance, in 2020, Amazon bought 100 acres in Virginia, the USA to build data centers, Iron Mountain is constructing three buildings in 40 acres near Phoenix, USA.



According to a survey conducted by Turner & Townsend, in 2020, 85% of the survey respondents believed that data construction demand in 2021 will be more than it was in 2020. Therefore, the increasing number of data centers is expected to propel the growth of the modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) market.



The modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) manufacturers are developing innovative products to meet the future infrastructure development trend and demand from modular data centers.For instance, in January 2021, Huawei, a China-based provider of information and communication technology (ICT) and smart devices launched next-generation of large- and medium-sized UPS5000-H series products which are part of the ultra-high density UPS series.



The modular UPS has a high-capacity configuration of a 1Mmega watt power cabinet with the installation of 10 modular UPS 100KW@ 3U in one cabinet.



In March 2021, Eaton Corporation Plc, an Ireland-based company involved in offering power management systems acquired Tripp Lite for an undisclosed amount.The acquisition by Eaton Corporation Plc is focused on expanding its product offering and business presence in computing and distributed IT portfolio, and single-phase UPS sector.



Tripp Lite is a US-based provider of power quality products and connectivity solutions including single-phase uninterruptible power supply systems, rack power distribution units, surge protectors, and enclosures for data centers.



The countries covered in the modular uninterruptible power supply (UPS) market report are Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Russia, South Korea, UK and USA.





Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06248538/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



__________________________

Story continues

CONTACT: Clare: clare@reportlinker.com US: (339)-368-6001 Intl: +1 339-368-6001




A general view of the liquefied natural gas plant operated by Sakhalin Energy at Prigorodnoye on the Pacific island of Sakhalin

(Corrects minimum impact for Germany to read 0.3% (not 0.15%) of gross national income)

PARIS (Reuters) -A hefty EU-wide tariff on Russian energy imports could prove more efficient than an outright ban although even a full embargo would have a limited impact on most countries, France's economic analysis council said on Monday.

The discovery of civilian deaths in Ukraine where Russian forces have recently withdrawn is fuelling fresh calls for tougher sanctions on Russia.

While a full embargo would be "manageable" for EU economies, the cost would vary widely, hitting Lithuania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Finland, Czech Republic the hardest, the Conseil d'Analyse Economique, which is attached to the French prime minister's office, said.

"It (a tariff) could allow the small but most exposed countries ...to continue to access some Russian gas imports, while drying up imports to larger and less exposed countries that are more able to substitute away from Russian imports," the council said in a study.

For example, a 40% tariff could reduce the impact on countries most exposed to Russia energy imports to between a quarter and a third of the impact of an outright embargo, the study found.

Baltic countries and Poland have been pushing for energy imports from Russia to be halted outright, while Germany has been reluctant.

However Berlin has said it is gradually moving towards an embargo.

The Conseil d'Analyse Economique said that a full energy ban could on average cause a loss of gross national income of 0.2-0.3%, working out to a 100 euros ($110) per adult.

In Germany, the EU's biggest economy, the hit to gross national income could range from as little as 0.3% to as much as 3%, the council said.

France, the bloc's second-biggest economy, would be among the countries least impacted with an economic loss of 0.15-0.3% as it is far less dependent on Russian energy imports.

($1 = 0.9083 euros)

(Reporting by Leigh Thomas; editing by Jason Neely)
Nemeth Kicks Off Triton Poker Special Edition Series With a Win; Addamo Atop of the Pack in Event #2

April 04 2022 Matt Hansen Calum Grant

Hungary's Andras Nemeth defeated fellow Hungarian Laszlo Bujtas in heads-up play to outlast 82 runners and win Event #1: $50,000 6-Handed NLH in the Triton Poker Special Edition Series at Merit Crystal Cove Resort and Casino in North Cyprus. Nemeth took home $1,082,000 from a total prize pool of $3,936,000 for the victory.

Laszlo and Bujtas were joined by Dong Hyun Kim, Phil Ivey, and Jason Koon in the top five. Other notables that cashed include Michael Addamo in 11th and Sam Greenwood in eighth.

Triton Poker Special Edition Series Event #1: $50,000 6-Handed NLH Payouts

Place Player Country Prize (USD) 1 Andras Nemeth Hungary $1,082,000 2 Laszlo Bujtas Hungary $770,000 3 Dong Hyun Kim South Korea $503,800 4 Phil Ivey USA $387,100 5 Jason Koon USA $307,000 6 Elton Tsang Hong Kong $240,100 7 Stephen Chidwick United Kingdom $188,000 8 Sam Greenwood Canada $147,000 9 Michael Soyza Malaysia $113,000 10 Eng Siang Ewe Malaysia $99,000 11 Michael Addamo Australia $99,000

Free to Play Slots in the US

Winners Reaction

Nemeths win is the latest in his hot run on the high roller scene that started with two victories at EPT Prague in March. The European Tour regular made the trip to North Cyprus to compete in the Triton Poker series, and he was pleased with his result.

Its so surreal, Nemeth said in his post-win interview. To play for the first time and actually win.

I want to pinch myself, he continued.

Nemeth has an opportunity to join the $100,000 event with late registration extended until the first round of Day 2, but he may have his sights set on Wednesdays Short Deck tournament.

Its expensive, and I know a few guys who know how to play, and it seems very complicated, he said when asked about his plans for the rest of the series.

Winning this tournament helps. So maybe. Well see.

Nemeth Does it Again, Wins Second High Roller at EPT Prague

Free to Play Slots in the US

Final Table Action

The unofficial table was started with seven players, and Stephen Chidwick was the first to go when he made a set of deuces but ran into Elton Tsang's flush.

Six-handed play went on for nearly two hours until Day 1 chip leader Tsang bowed out in sixth place when he couldnt improve against a charging Nemeth. The elimination of Tsang brought Nemeth near 10 million in chips and the rest of the table trying to outrun the ever-growing blinds.

Shortly after, Koon was next to go in fifth place when his king-queen ran into the pocket queens of Bujtas. On the very next hand it was Ivey who hit the rail when he got his money in with ace-jack but watched Bujtas catch up with a suited seven-five to eliminated him in fourth place.

The eliminations continued in rapid succession as players were in a position to either shove or fold, due to the escalating blinds. Kim was the eliminated in third when he got it in good with pocket sevens, but Nemeth called with pocket fours and made a straight on the river.

Heads-up play was an All-Hungarian matchup, but it didnt last long. While six-handed play went on for nearly two hours, the final five eliminations occurred over just 35 minutes, and the big moment came when Nemeth made a pair of aces to beat the king-queen of Bujtas.

Free to Play Slots in the US

Addamo Continues High Roller Hot Streak

Michael Addamo

Day 2 of Event #2: $100,000 8-Handed NLH is currently underway, with Australian superstar Michael Addamo being the start of day chip leader.

Addamo's high roller hot streak in 2021 was one of the top stories of last year, and was capped off with his fourth WSOP bracelet win.

Tom Vogelsang and Teun Mulder are his closest opponents and are the only players to return for Day 2 with chip stacks north of 100 big blinds.

The event is stacked with pokers biggest names like Phil Ivey, Ali Imsirovic and Jason Koon. Be sure to follow all the action, as the PokerNews live reporting team are providing all the latest updates.

Event #2: $100,000 NLH 8-Handed Day 1 Top Ten Chip Counts

Seat Player Country Chip Count Big Blinds 1 Michael Addamo Australia 1,058,000 132 2 Tom Vogelsang Netherlands 1,019,000 127 3 Teun Mulder Netherlands 826,000 103 4 Danny Tang Hong Kong 569,000 71 5 Chris Brewer United States 567,000 71 6 Ali Imsirovic Bosnia and Herzegovina 562,000 70 7 Stephen Chidwick United Kingdom 486,000 61 8 Ben Heath United Kingdom 472,000 59 9 Jake Schindler United States 461,000 58 10 Mike Watson United States 424,000 53

Matt Hansen
A 32st 6lb beautician who so feared getting stuck in a plane seat that she bought two to fly to Portugal shed 19st 4lb after 5,450 gastric bypass surgery in Lithuania and is now returning to have her fatty apron removed.

Despite a lifetime struggle with weight that saw her needing a tailor made communion gown, aged seven, as she was already too big for off the peg versions, Haleigh Walsh, 25, forged ahead  opening a beauty salon in the Irish county of Tipperary in 2020.

But, horribly conscious of her size 28 bulk, despite being complimented on her pretty face, Haleigh recalls her turning point on the July 2019 holiday to Portugal, saying: Id tried every diet under the sun and an old friend told me a horror story of a man whod been so big he was marched out of his seat to the back of the plane.

At her biggest, Haleigh weighed 32st 6lbs. (Collect/PA Real Life)

I was so terrified of that happening to me that I bought a second seat, so I wouldnt be impacting anyone. I remember sitting there on the plane and thinking, I am never doing this again.

At her 32st 6lb heaviest, 5ft 7in Haleighs body mass index (BMI) used to gauge a healthy weight, was 71.11  nearly triple the top of the NHS healthy range of between 18.5 to 24.9, meaning she was severely obese.

She said: I was always overweight. I couldnt get a communion dress in the shops. It had to be specially made for me. Thats one of the earliest memories I have.

Before her weight loss, Haleigh wore a size 28. (Collect/PA Real Life)

I ate big portions and am shocked now looking back at just how much I could get through. Id starve all day then have takeaways, share bags of crisps, chocolates, anything I wanted. And I refused to exercise. Even walking would cause pain in my back.

I always got compliments. People would tell me I had a beautiful face. But I knew my weight was a problem.

Haleigh, who is single, knew her eating habits were dramatically unhealthy, but lacked the drive to lose weight and keep it off.

Prior to her weight loss, Haleigh says she had tried every diet under the sun. (Collect/PA Real Life)

So, when a relative had successful weight loss surgery, her interest was piqued.

She said: I saw how much their body had changed since the procedure.

Story continues

Then I was doing a womans make-up for her 40th birthday and she explained that shed been waiting for a gastric bypass in Ireland for nine years.

Haleigh says that walking would cause her back pain. (Collect/PA Real Life)

I realised that I wanted to do it too, but didnt want to waste my 20s waiting for the operation and began researching private clinics.

Just as she was considering bariatric surgery, she boarded her life changing flight to Portugal, which gave her the push she needed to contact the clinic in Lithuania on her return.

Just a month after the holiday in August 2019, Haleigh applied to the Nordbariatric Clinic in Kaunas, Lithuania for a gastric bypass operation  but was told she first needed to lose over 3st before the op could go ahead to make the operation less risky.

In July 2020, having brought her weight down to 29st 2lbs with a primarily liquid diet, Haleigh had a 5,450 gastric bypass. (Collect/PA Real Life)

Finally, in July 2020, having brought her weight down to 29st 2lb with a primarily liquid diet, she had a 5,450 gastric bypass.

The procedure to create a small pouch at the top of the stomach connected to the small intestines makes patients feel fuller after eating less food and means they absorb fewer calories.

Now delighted to be a 13st 2lb size 12, Haleigh said: I wasnt nervous at all about the operation.

Even when the surgeon came to see me, I didnt have any questions. I felt so confident after watching the surgery being done on the clinics Facebook page and reading testimonials about it.

The surgeon performed 12 procedures in the two days I was in the clinic. He was so experienced that I knew I was in safe hands.

Luckily, Haleigh did not have any medical conditions related to her obesity, so her procedure went without a hitch.

Haleigh ate baby food while recovering from her operation. (Collect/PA Real Life)

After taking some liquid paracetamol, she felt able to drink water on the day of surgery, before moving on to yoghurt and baby food the next day.

Two days after her operation, she was allowed back to her accommodation and, just a week later, she returned to Ireland  already 20lb slimmer than she had been on the flight out.

Within months, Haleigh had lost sufficient weight to begin cardio exercise at home.

Now the 25-year-old is returning to Lithuania to have her excess skin removed. (Collect/PA Real Life)

And last summer, she joined a gym and added weight training to her workouts.

The only drawback is that her rapid weight loss has left her with apron-like, loose excess skin on her stomach, back, legs and arms.

She said: Since Ive been training properly in the gym, Ive really noticed how bad my loose skin is.

Haleigh hopes to have her excess skin removed this year. (Collect/PA Real Life)

I just want it off me now. My body is toning up underneath, but then I have these great folds and flaps of skin. Its my arms that are the worst.

Im really confident with my size and shape, but still have to have something covering my arms at all times as they bother me so much.

Determined to look and feel her best, Haleigh is investing around 6,000 in further surgery at the same clinic in October to remove the baggy skin.

Haleigh lost 19st 4lbs. (Collect/PA Real Life)

She said: I just have so much more confidence now.

I love going for walks and out on adventures.

Before all this I couldnt even walk down the road without getting out of breath or my back hurting.

Now I love taking exercise. Im the complete opposite of what I was.
VILNIUS, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Lithuania removed the indoor mask mandate on Monday and reduced the self-isolation requirement for COVID-19 patients to five days because the predominant strain of coronavirus has a shorter incubation period, the country's Health Ministry has said.

The ministry added that the use of face masks remains recommended for everyday life and mandatory in health, nursing and care facilities and on public transport.

The ministry cited the recommendations of the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), which identify the wearing of masks (along with hand hygiene, social distancing and adequate ventilation) among the measures that can help contain the spread of the virus. 
Actress Brittany Ishibashi will serve as keynote speaker for the University of North Georgia's (UNG) Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month celebrations in April. Her keynote address will be held virtually at noon April 13, with watch parties on UNG's Gainesville, Dahlonega Cumming, and Oconee campuses.

Ishibashi is best known for her roles in Marvel's hit show "Runaways" on Hulu and "Hawaii Five-0." Aside from working in front of the camera, Ishibashi has a passion for producing innovative, engaging content. She launched her comedic, female-driven production company, Mana Moments, in 2015.

The month's celebrations kick off on April 7 at noon with Kahoot, a virtual game of trivia to test students' knowledge of AAPI history, with $50 prizes on the line.
WASHINGTON, April 3 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Senator Ted Cruz's alleged role in the Capitol riot is "of interest" to the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, according to The Washington Post, as the high-stakes probe zeroed in on more associates of former President Donald Trump.

The U.S. newspaper, in a lengthy investigative piece published recently, revealed that the select House panel is particularly interested in whether Cruz was in contact with John Eastman, a Trump legal adviser "who wrote key legal memos aimed at denying" the victory of Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election.

"As Eastman outlined a scenario in which Vice President Mike Pence could deny certifying Biden's election, Cruz crafted a complementary plan in the Senate," the article wrote.

Pence has reiterated that Trump has been wrong that the vice president has the right to overturn the election.

Federal judge David Carter in California said last week that the court finds it "more likely than not that President Trump corruptly attempted to obstruct the Joint Session of Congress on January 6, 2021."

"The illegality of the plan was obvious," Carter wrote in a 44-page ruling. "President Trump vigorously campaigned for the Vice President to single-handedly determine the results of the 2020 election."

The judge also ordered Eastman to turn over a subset of documents that the Jan. 6 committee had demanded in its subpoena.

Charles Burnham, Eastman's attorney, responded that his client would comply with the judge's order, but added that Carter's ruling "relied on evidence cherry-picked by the committee, supplemented by news articles."

Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich denounced the ruling as "absurd" and "baseless," while accusing Democrats of "weaponizing every branch of government against" the former Republican president.

His closest allies and staunch supporters have charged the House inquiry as a political "witch hunt" designed to tar Trump and the Republican Party as a whole.

The Jan. 6 committee, The Washington Post noted, has also asked a number of people about Cruz's actions in the lead-up to the insurrection on Capitol Hill, adding that "among the questions the committee may address is whether Cruz talked with Trump or the president's lawyers and aides as the events unfolded on Jan. 6."

"Sen. Cruz has been friends with John Eastman since they clerked together in 1995," a spokesperson for the Texas Republican said in an email to the newspaper. "To the best of his recollection, he did not read the Eastman memo until months after Jan. 6, when it was publicly reported."

The select House panel, which includes seven Democrats and two Republicans, virtually interviewed Trump's son-in-law and former senior White House adviser Jared Kushner last week.

A source familiar with the situation told NBC News described Kushner as being cooperative and friendly, adding that he did the talking, as opposed to having his lawyers speak for him.

U.S. Congresswoman and Democrat Elaine Luria from Virginia, a member of the Jan. 6 committee, said that Kushner "was able to voluntarily provide information to us to verify, substantiate, provide his own take on this different reporting."

The committee has also recently voted to recommend criminal contempt of Congress against former Trump White House advisers Dan Scavino Jr. and Peter Navarro over their refusals to comply with the investigation.

Scavino and Navarro have argued that executive privilege prevents their cooperation with subpoenas from the Democratic-led committee.

On Jan. 6, 2021, thousands of individuals, mostly Trump supporters, stormed the U.S. Capitol and disrupted a joint session of Congress in the process of affirming the 2020 presidential election results.

Over the course of about seven hours on that day, the mob assaulted police officers, including about 114 Capitol Police officers who reported injuries. Dozens of other police officers were also injured during the incident.

Five deaths have been linked by authorities to the mayhem. Four officers who responded to the attack reportedly died by suicide within the next several months.

The worst attack on Congress in more than 200 years, the "siege" led to Trump's second impeachment by the House shortly before his term officially ended.

At a rally in a town in the U.S. state of Michigan on Saturday, Trump continued political rhetoric and unsubstantiated claims that the 2020 presidential election "was rigged and stolen."

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is also working on cases related to the Capitol Riot.

In the 14 months since the attack, more than 775 individuals have been arrested in nearly all 50 states for crimes related to the breach of the Capitol, including over 245 individuals charged with assaulting or impeding law enforcement, according to the DOJ. 
Prolific documentarian and historian Ken Burns spends four hours over the next two nights recalling Benjamin Franklin (8 p.m., PBS, concludes Tuesday).

Franklin emerges as the most interesting and accessible of the Founding Fathers, a character with a sophisticated sense of humor and a bawdy history with the ladies. Forced to leave school after only a few years, he emerged as one of the leading intellectuals of the 18th century, inspiring admiration and awe on both sides of the Atlantic.

Well before the founding of the United States as an independent nation, Franklin became an ambassador for the New World. European elitists who had considered colonists to be uncultivated roughnecks had to recognize a man who had revolutionized the study of electricity.

Franklins reputation as a modern Prometheus, a man who had tamed heavenly fire, cemented association of the founders with Enlightenment values. Franklin, along with Thomas Jefferson, represented a worldview that valued science over superstition and the educated pursuit of knowledge over a priesthood that enforced orthodoxy. Neither man could be defined or described as Christian, a historical fact that many have tried to obscure.

Franklin had learned early that the commingling of religion and institutional power had grim implications for personal freedom and expression. As a young printing apprentice, he had seen his brother sent to prison without trial for the temerity of criticizing and lampooning Cotton Mather and Bostons Puritan elite.

Benjamin Franklin catalogs his remarkable life and achievements, including pretty much the invention of American society, the founding of libraries and fire companies, and the enshrinement of efficient postal delivery as a service and a right. Along the way, he created the Franklin Stove, an invention that would bring efficient warmth to many American homes, a device he steadfastly refused to patent.

And all that was before he became an essential player in the drafting of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and diplomatic efforts on behalf of the American cause.

Franklin does not shy away from revealing his faults, including his failures as a husband and father as well as sharing attitudes and behaviors common among English and American white males in the 18th century. He owned slaves, but would evolve into an abolitionist. He studied, admired and even proposed copying a Native American form of legislature, but he also considered them savages whose lands should be taken by white settlers. Like generations of nativists who would follow him, Franklin saw English settlers as superior and took a dim view of Southern Europeans, Swedes and other swarthy immigrants.

But the notion that 18th-century values are not our own cuts several ways. For at least the past half-century, fundamentalists have been preaching that we have deserted the Christian values of the Founding Fathers. Thats rather rich, considering most of the important Founders shared Franklins and Jeffersons deism. They believed in a creator, but not in a deity who interfered in human affairs.

Franklins and Jeffersons battles with the religious bullies of their time may seem distant, but there are many parallels to our own day, among them efforts by religious zealots to demonize medical advances and vaccines and to see needless suffering and preventable disease as Gods will.

Once again, Ken Burns has chosen a rich and resonant subject.

Other highlights

 A commander mourned on NCIS (8 p.m., CBS, TV-14).

 A pilots suicide sheds light on a secret smuggling service in the new series The Invisible Pilot (8 p.m., HBO).

 A biohackers experiments backfire on The Good Doctor (9 p.m., ABC, TV-14).

Cult choice

A priest (Heath Ledger) encounters an immortal sin eater in the 2003 shocker The Order (9 p.m., Cinemax).

Series notes

A teachers credentials seem fishy on The Neighborhood (7 p.m., CBS, r, TV-PG) ... American Song Contest (7 p.m., NBC, TV-PG) ... The need for Speed on 9-1-1 (7 p.m., Fox, r, TV-14) ... American Idol (7 p.m., ABC, TV-PG) ... Practice gets gruesome on All American (7 p.m., CW, r, TV-14) ... A womans touch on Bob Hearts Abishola (7:30 p.m., CBS, r, TV-PG).

Temperatures plunge on 9-1-1: Lone Star (8 p.m., Fox, r, TV-14) ... Morale-building on All American: Homecoming (8 p.m., CW, r, TV-14) ... Evidence goes missing on NCIS: Hawaii (9 p.m., CBS, r, TV-14) ... Vals backstory complicates an operation on The Endgame (9 p.m., NBC, TV-PG).
The SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo is once again taking to the skies over Lakeland April 5th  10th celebrating the annual comradery of aviation. Raising the bar each year, this years Expo will be celebrating the 75th anniversary of the U. S. Air Force which will be highlighted by a demonstration from the U.S.A.F. Thunderbirds in their first appearance since 2016. Marking its 48th year, this event is the primary fundraiser for the Aerospace Center for Excellence which enables the delivery of STEM-related and aerospace education programs and scholarships engaging over 50,000 local youth each year.

The Thunderbirds will be in the Lakeland airspace between 1:00 pm  1:45 pm. Media is encouraged to be in place at the airport to capture the excitement of their arrival by 1:00pm.

Once on the ground and arrival procedures complete, the team will be accessible for a Media Event. It is estimated that this opportunity will be for 30 minutes. The media will have an opportunity to meet with and interview the various officers, pilots, and crew.

Address:

Lakeland Linder International Airport Terminal

3900 Don Emerson Drive

Lakeland, FL

Arrival: 1300  1345

Media Event Immediately Following

This is on the Northside of the Airport off of Dranefield Rd.

This event will NOT be taking place at SUN n FUN.

Transportation from SUN n FUN to the Lakeland Terminal is available with a limited number of seats. Signup will be available at the Media Center. Departure will be 12:30pm.

Mark your calendar for Thursday, April 7th for the Hometown Hero Ride which will celebrate our local police departments! Currently scheduled for 3:30pm, an extremely deserving officer will have the ride of his life representing all his brothers and sisters in blue. A separate press announcement with details will be released this week.

For media inquiries:

Carol Cali

Media and Public Relations

SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo
CEDAR FALLS  A Raymond woman has been arrested in connection with a chase in a stolen truck following a theft at a Cedar Falls store Sunday afternoon.

Police were called to a larceny at Fleet Farm on West Ridgeway Avenue around 4:40 p.m., and officers attempted to stop the suspect, who was driving Dodge Ram pickup truck.

The driver didnt stop, leading authorities from Cedar Falls and Hudson police departments, the Grundy County Sheriffs Office and the Iowa State Patrol on a pursuit until finally pulling over in Grundy County, according to police.

Police determined the truck had been reported stolen from Waterloo. It had also been spray painted.

Police arrested Corrie Lynn Hall, 46, on charges of eluding, second-degree theft and second-degree criminal mischief along with numerous traffic citations. Bond was set at $12,000.

Love 0 Funny 2 Wow 1 Sad 1 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
LA PORTE CITY  A former La Porte City man has been found guilty of killing his infant son in a California fire more than a decade ago.

Jurors in San Bernardino County Court found Lucas Noble Dingman, 36, guilty of second-degree murder Friday following more than a month of trial. They found him not guilty of the more serious charge of first-degree murder.

Sentencing is scheduled for May, and second-degree murder is punishable by 15 years to life in prison under California law.

Dingman had been living in an Apple Valley, Calif., apartment in May 2011, when his 11-month-old son, Bradley, died in fire that started in his crib.

Statements by law enforcement indicate a neighbor had heard a smoke alarm and put out the fire. Bradley was found with smoke inhalation and burns over 70% of his body and died the following day.

Investigators said the fire was intentionally set.

After the fire Dingman, a Minnesota native, moved in with family in La Porte City, Iowa, and he held a trucking job.

In May 2015, San Bernardino County sheriffs deputies traveled to Iowa and arrested Dingman. He was returned to California to face murder charges, and the case had been pending since then.

Jury selection began in February, and closing arguments in the case were March 25.

During trial, Dingman took the stand and denied setting the fire.

Former neighbor Brittany Sorensen, who had lived near Dingman in California and babysat Bradley, said she was pleased about the verdict and cried when she heard the decision. She has been following the case since before the arrest and testified for the prosecution.

Its been exhausting year after year, Sorensen said. He didnt deserve this. No child deserves this. ... Im glad I got closure, and Im glad he got the justice he deserves.

Bradleys mother had sided with Lucas Dingman, calling him an innocent man in a Facebook post after the verdict.

Justices for Bradley Dingman has not been gotten. There wont be none until the truth comes out, the mother wrote in the post.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 2

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Iowa Republican U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley voted against confirming Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, Democratic President Joe Bidens nominee to fill an upcoming vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court.

But Republican Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Mitt Romney announced Monday night they will vote to confirm Jacksons historic elevation to the Supreme Court, giving President Joe Bidens nominee a burst of bipartisan support and all but assuring shell become the first Black female justice.

The senators from Alaska and Utah announced their decisions ahead of a procedural vote to advance the nomination and as Democrats pressed to confirm Jackson by the end of the week. GOP Sen. Susan Collins of Maine announced last week that she would back Jackson.

Grassley, the ranking Republican member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, took issue with some of Jacksons judicial decisions while calling her very personable and engaging in a statement issued Monday ahead of the committees vote on her nomination.

Having carefully studied her record, unfortunately, I think she and I have fundamentally different views on the role judges should play in our system of government, Grassley said, according to prepared remarks posted Monday morning ahead of the committee meeting. Because of those disagreements, I cant support her nomination.

Previously, Grassley said Jackson was very graceful, very smart in her answers, and said he was gratified that Jackson outlined a stricter judicial interpretation in answers to questions from Grassley.

The committee, which is made up of 11 Democrats and 11 Republicans, deadlocked on the confirmation vote. Under Senate rules, Democratic leadership can still move the vote forward to the full Senate. A procedural vote to dislodge the nomination from the committee was expected to happen Monday night, with a final vote likely to be Thursday or Friday.

Jackson needs a simple majority to be confirmed in the evenly divided U.S. Senate, where at least one GOP Senator, In addition to Romney, Murkowski and Collins, moderate Democratic U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia has also indicated he will support Jacksons confirmation, providing swing votes that all but guarantee her confirmation.

After more than 30 hours of hearings and interrogation from Republicans over her record, Jackson is on the brink of making history as the third Black justice and only the sixth woman in the courts more than 200-year history. Democrats cite her deep experience in her nine years on the federal bench and the chance for her to become the first former public defender on the court.

Judge Jackson will bring extraordinary qualifications, deep experience and intellect, and a rigorous judicial record to the Supreme Court, Biden tweeted Monday. She deserves to be confirmed as the next justice.

The chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said at Mondays meeting that Jackson has the highest level of skill, integrity, civility and grace.

This committees action today in nothing less than making history, Durbin said. Im honored to be a part of it. I will strongly and proudly support Judge Jacksons nomination.

The committee hadnt deadlocked since 1991, when Biden was chairman and a motion to send the nomination of current Justice Clarence Thomas to the floor with a favorable recommendation failed on a 7-7 vote. The committee then voted to send the nomination to the floor without a recommendation, meaning it could still be brought up for a vote.

Delaware Sen. Chris Coons, a Democrat on the committee, said last week that a panel tie vote on Jackson would be a truly unfortunate signal of the continued descent into dysfunction of our confirmation process,

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky set the tone for the party last week when he said he cannot and will not support Jackson, citing GOP concerns raised in the hearing about her sentencing record and her backing from liberal advocacy groups.

Republicans on the Judiciary panel continued their push Monday to paint Jackson as soft on crime, defending their repeated questions about her sentencing on sex crimes.

Questions are not attacks, said Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, one of several GOP senators on the panel who hammered the point in the hearings two weeks ago.

Jackson pushed back on the GOP narrative, declaring that nothing could be further from the truth. Democrats said she was in line with other judges in her decisions. And on Monday they criticized their GOP counterparts questioning.

You could try and create a straw man here, but it does not hold, said New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker.

The questioning was filled with absurdities of disrespect, said Booker, who also is Black, and he said he will rejoice when she is confirmed.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 2
The friends were out catfishing when they came across the vehicle. They fear the man could have gotten hypothermia, or perished if his vehicle had reached the well-known Sans Souci Island wing dam.
CEDAR FALLS  The University of Northern Iowa Department of History invites the community to participate in the 48th Carl L. Becker Memorial Lecture, Dividing the City: Private Racial Restrictions and the Architecture of Segregation in the Midwest.

The lecture will take place at 7 p.m. Wednesday in UNIs Seerley Hall, Room 115. It will additionally be available via Zoom, with advanced registration at bit.ly/UNI-Becker2022.

The featured speaker, professor Colin Gordon from University of Iowas department of history, will discuss the efforts of developers, realtors and white homeowners to restrict property by race in the first half of the 20th century. Drawing on archival research in property records in St. Louis City and St. Louis County in Missouri, and Black Hawk and Johnson Counties in Iowa, Gordon will underscore the scope, intensity and impact of such restrictions  both on contemporary housing opportunities and on patterns of racial segregation and racial inequality that run to the present day.

Gordon is the author of several books, including, Citizen Brown: Race, Democracy and Inequality in the St. Louis Suburbs, Growing Apart: A Political History of American Inequality, and many others. He has written for the Nation, In These Times and Jacobin and Dissent (where he is a regular contributor). His recent research support includes a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship (2021-22) and a visiting scholar fellowship at the Russell Sage Foundation (2022-23).

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1
Shanghai launches citywide antigen testing amid COVID-19 resurgence

Xinhua) 09:17, April 04, 2022

A medical worker guides a resident to do antigen home-testing in Shanghai, east China, April 3, 2022. Shanghai launched citywide antigen testing on Sunday and will conduct nucleic acid testing on Monday amid efforts to contain the recent resurgence of COVID-19 cases in the metropolis, according to local authorities. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

SHANGHAI, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Shanghai will conduct citywide antigen testing on Sunday and nucleic acid testing on Monday amid efforts to contain the recent resurgence of COVID-19 cases in the metropolis, according to local authorities.

The measures were aimed at completely eliminating potential risks, cutting off the chain of transmission, curbing the spread of the virus, and achieving dynamic zero-COVID as soon as possible, Wu Qianyu, an official with the Shanghai Municipal Health Commission, told a press conference on Sunday.

Shanghai reported 438 confirmed locally transmitted COVID-19 cases and 7,788 asymptomatic carriers on Saturday.

Zhang Hongying, a resident of the Jing'an District, received an urgent message on WeChat sent by her subdistrict office at around 2:00 p.m. Sunday, requiring residents in the community to undergo antigen testing.

"They asked us to place a paper bag or basket outside the door, and volunteers would distribute antigen home-testing kits door-to-door. We also need to post a note on the door showing all the names of the people in the house," Zhang said.

She said that antigen home-testing kits were sent to her home at 3:00 p.m. and the five family members did the tests just in a few minutes.

"The results are all negative. We have uploaded the photos to the subdistrict office," Zhang said.

Medical teams coming from the nearby provinces of Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Anhui have already arrived in Shanghai to help the fight against the epidemic, according to the Shanghai Municipal Health Commission.

At around 9:30 a.m. Sunday, the first batch of nine COVID-19 patients was discharged from the makeshift hospital of the Shanghai World Expo Exhibition and Convention Center, after they produced negative nucleic acid test results.

More than 200 patients aged from 11 to over 80 are expected to be discharged from the makeshift hospital on Sunday.

Opened on March 25, the makeshift hospital has received and treated more than 7,100 asymptomatic carriers and patients with mild symptoms. About 910 medical staff are working there to provide medical support.

Other makeshift facilities in Shanghai have also seen patients recovering and being discharged since Sunday.

Yang Jiapei, 27, a PhD student at Shanghai Jiao Tong University left a makeshift hospital on Sunday afternoon. However, she must undergo another seven days of quarantine at a designated hotel before returning to the campus.

"I just had a slight cough, and the symptoms were even milder than a normal cold," recalled Yang, who was classified into an asymptomatic carrier and began to receive treatment on March 15.

"I was overwhelmed when I learned that I was infected with the virus. But after experiencing the whole treatment process, I'd like to say that it isn't so terrible. All you need to do is remain cheerful and receive the treatment, and you'll soon be back on your feet," Yang said.

A resident does antigen testing in Shanghai, east China, April 3, 2022.

Shanghai launched citywide antigen testing on Sunday and will conduct nucleic acid testing on Monday amid efforts to contain the recent resurgence of COVID-19 cases in the metropolis, according to local authorities. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

A medical worker conducts antigen testing for an elder resident in Shanghai, east China, April 3, 2022.

Shanghai launched citywide antigen testing on Sunday and will conduct nucleic acid testing on Monday amid efforts to contain the recent resurgence of COVID-19 cases in the metropolis, according to local authorities. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

Medical workers guide a resident to do antigen home-testing in Shanghai, east China, April 3, 2022.

Shanghai launched citywide antigen testing on Sunday and will conduct nucleic acid testing on Monday amid efforts to contain the recent resurgence of COVID-19 cases in the metropolis, according to local authorities. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

A medical worker conducts antigen testing for an elder resident in Shanghai, east China, April 3, 2022.

Shanghai launched citywide antigen testing on Sunday and will conduct nucleic acid testing on Monday amid efforts to contain the recent resurgence of COVID-19 cases in the metropolis, according to local authorities. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
No it was not an April Fools joke and Russia does not joke as the EU is finding out. Pay Rubles please or find your gas somewhere else

JSC Latvijas Gaze has entered into a valid long-term agreement on the supply of natural gas until 2030 with PJSC Gazprom, which provides for settlements for natural gas in euros.

According to the changes in the legislation of the Russian Federation, starting from April 1, 2022, settlements for natural gas supplies made after April 1, 2022 in accordance with the foreign trade agreements of PJSC Gazprom for the supply of natural gas abroad (to a number of countries) shall be made only in Russian rubles.

Assessing the compliance of the said change of the settlement procedure with the previously established sanction regime, the first impression is that such settlement procedure  in Russian rubles  does not formally violate the sanction regime and is possible. At present, Latvijas Gaze continues to analyze in depth the change in the proposed settlement method both from the legal point of view and from the point of view of the Groups business interests.

JSC Latvijas Gaze Chairman of the Board Aigars Kalvitis we would like to emphasize that the amount of natural gas reserves of JSC Latvijas Gaze in the natural gas storage facility is sufficient to fulfill its contractual obligations to households and other customers by supplying the natural gas pumped into the storage facility. The decision not to pump gas through pipelines in April was taken in view of the historically high natural gas prices in April, which would lead to disproportionately high natural gas sales prices to our customers and make such offers uncompetitive.

As before  JSC Latvijas Gaze continues to supply natural gas to households and other customers in accordance with the obligations of the concluded contracts and within the terms stipulated in the contract and is fully prepared to do so below.

On behalf of the JSC Latvijas Gaze,

Chairman of the Board

Aigars Kalvitis
If you take a walk down Marina Boulevard just across from Marina Green, you can't help but notice one standout housea 1930 Spanish Revival home that's been brought dizzyingly into the 21st century thanks to a tattoo of kaleidoscopic swirls on its otherwise white and gray-shuttered facade.

The installation signals the opening of the 2018 San Francisco Decorator Showcase, which has transformed the house with the help of 20 top Northern California interior and landscape designers. Now in its 41st year, this is also the first year that the design-y fundraiserthis year benefitting the financial aid program of San Francisco University High Schoolhas popped up in the Marina.

Built by the architect George McCrea, the home now brims with decor as thoughtful and stunning as its expansive views of the Golden Gate Bridge and SF Bay. Announced by the aforementioned exterior painting by Seattle native turned SF local AJ Oishi, in collaboration with Simon Breitbard Fine Arts, each of its rooms pops with a unique theme and a name to match.

In Lararia Guest Refuge, San Mateobased Kari McIntosh channels her recent honeymoon to Italy's Herculaneum ruins with black clay and 24-karat gold snakes, created by Linda Fahey of Yonder, that spiral above the bed, flanked by charred nightstands and overlooked by a dramatic chandelier.

In designer Dina Bandman's Lemondrop Lullaby nursery, we were swaddled in an intricate but calming paradise with vines growing over mint walls and hand-embroidered lemons with sequins blossoming; the wall design flows seamlessly onto the custom curtains so the tree continues to flourish uninterrupted. A custom-made Lucite Plexi-Craft four poster crib stands as the perfect centerpiecestylish, but allowing for the pattern of the room to shine.

A retro reverie takes place in Tangerine dream by Willem Racke Studio and Susan Chastain, with fabulous mid-century modern furniture, ombre patterns in the curtains, and wall art from Dolby Chadwick Gallery.

Upstairs, the rose lounge by Coddington Design has plum and pink walls, a plush Adrian Pearsall tufted sofa to match, and a chic DeMuro Das mirror made from glossy black lacquer and hand-carved gilded copper.

Across the hall, Jeff Schlarb's Ten Thousand Dreams nails the ultra luxe master bedroomscreaming character, it drips with rich sapphire and saffron hues. Minimalists, meanwhile, would drool over A Room of Her Own by Heather Deragon. Inspired by moments of stillness in the morning, the hygge space looks like a page straight out of Kinfolk.

(Photography by Gillian Walsworth) The facade of the 1930 Spanish Revival home was given a surprising coat of paint by SF artist AJ Oishi, in collaboration with Simon Breitbard Fine Arts.

// April 28  May 28, 2018; 10am to 3pm (Tuesday-Thursday, Saturday), 10am to 7pm (Friday), 11am to 4pm (Sunday and Memorial Day); 465 Marina Blvd. (Marina). Tickets ($40) are available at the door, and all funds raised directly support the San Francisco University High School Financial Aid Program, decoratorshowcase.org.
Courtesy Susam Moeller

En espanol

As the executive director of an independent living community for older adults, Dorcas McGurrin spent time with people approaching the end of their lives.



Now, as the driver of a big yellow school bus, shes surrounded by those who are just getting started.

Ive always loved kids, says McGurrin, 70, who lives on Cape Cod, in Massachusetts, and drives six routes a day for the Dennis-Yarmouth Regional School District, which serves two towns. I was the oldest of nine and always around kids. I thought: I learned to drive in a Ford Country Squire station wagon with eight young siblings in the back. How different could it be to drive a 40-foot bus with 50 kids in the back?

McGurrin began her career in hospital administration, but for 27 years she was executive director of Heatherwood at Kings Way, a 235-unit complex in Yarmouth Port that offers condominium apartments along with services such as meals, transportation and activities for older adults. She managed a $4 million budget, as well as 65 staff and 285 residents, and was on duty pretty much 24/7, including through several blizzards and one hurricane. When she retired in 2016, she thought shed enjoy the slower pace. Instead, she got bored  drifting, as she describes it. When a friend suggested driving a school bus, she was skeptical but decided to give it a shot.

McGurrins been driving a full-size school bus since October 2019. Every school day, she navigates three routes to and from the districts schools, starting at 6:20 a.m. by inspecting her bus and then doing the high school pickups. Thats followed by the middle school and elementary routes, which she usually wraps up by 9:45 a.m., giving her until 1:20 p.m., when shes back on the bus running the same three routes and taking students home. She finishes about 4:45 p.m., having driven roughly 70 miles.

The little kids are the last ones on the bus, so in November, December, its not uncommon for me to have to wake up kids when we get home because were getting home in the dark, she says.

On a recent school day, McGurrin took a few minutes in between routes to answer questions about what its like to drive a bus full of kids.

What was the hardest part of learning to drive a school bus?

Backing up. It took me forever to learn how to back up that bloody bus. Thats scary. One of the things you have to be able to do is alley docking  you need to back the bus up and then turn to the left, turn to the right and back it right into a parking spot. I just thought, looking at that 40-foot bus, 10 feet wide and 12 feet high, theres no way on Gods green earth Im ever going to be able to do this. And I did.

What are the most important qualifications for a driver?

You have to like kids. If you dont like kids, find something else to do, because thats key. And then, patience. And being able to put up with noise, because theres definitely going to be noise.

How do you keep things under control?

Theres a lot of yelling knock it off. Theres literally stopping the bus and giving them an icy glare in the mirror, which works probably better than anything else. Sometimes Ive had to actually return to school. I just tell them, OK, were going back. You dont seem to know how to behave today, so were going back and have the principal talk to you. That, to me, is a defeat. Id rather be able to take care of it myself.

One of the first things that I try to do at the beginning of the year is to learn all their names. Now, remember, there are 50 kids on the bus. But the quicker you learn their names, the better in control youll be, because if you look at them and yell out Robert! that has more of an effect than Hey you, sit down.
En espanol



AARP Foundation attorneys have joined a class-action lawsuit as cocounsel on behalf of about 5,000 African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church former and current clergy and other employees, whose fiduciaries allegedly mishandled and lost nearly $90 million in retirement funds.

Founded in 1816, the AME Church is the oldest Black church in the United States and one of the largest Protestant denominations in the country with more than 2.5 million members. AME clergy and other participants in its retirement plan had been told for years that contributions from individual churches were being conservatively invested in a life insurance company. According to the lawsuit, the plans participants also were told that the fund was covered by the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), which offers federal insurance protections.

But an audit in 2021 found that contrary to regular audits that had been presented to the AME board and church membership at large, two-thirds of the retirement funds  approximately $90 million  were instead placed in a risky venture capital company and a real estate deal, both of which are now essentially worthless. When they disclosed the loss of funds in February, AME leaders also told participants that the retirement plan actually was not covered by ERISA due to a religious exemption, so the plan did not have federal insurance to protect against the loss of funds.


STL welcomes Port of Bundaberg funding

Sydney, April 4, 2022 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Sugar Terminals Limited ( NSX:SUG ) has welcomed a further provisional $7.7 million funding boost for new infrastructure at the Port of Bundaberg.STL Chairman Mark Gray said he was very pleased to see the Federal Government increase its funding commitment for a joint project currently being progressed between STL and Gladstone Ports Corporation (GPC) under a project agreement signed by the Australian and Queensland Governments in October 2020.This will assist in the development of new infrastructure at the Port of Bundaberg to attract bulk export orientated mineral and agricultural commodities and drive further investment in the region.The additional funding is provisional pending a number of conditions being addressed by the parties."The Federal Government's funding commitment to the project is now up to $17.7 million. Together with additional funding already committed by GPC and STL, this gives us confidence that the project will stack up financially and can be delivered in the short term," Mr Gray said.The project, which is in the final stages of procurement and approvals will involve the construction of common user infrastructure at the Port of Bundaberg to handle bulk commodities other than raw sugar.Mr Gray said the new infrastructure was crucial for the long-term future of the Port and economic development of the region."We are focused on supporting new, export-focused industries in the Wide Bay Burnett region. This new infrastructure, coupled with our existing export facilities, will allow us to handle a variety of commodities, including minerals, timber products and agricultural products," he said.About Sugar Terminals Limited

Sugar Terminals Limited (NSX:SUG) (STL) owns and operates six bulk commodity terminals in Queensland and plays a vital role in Australia's sugar market, handling over 90% of the raw sugar produced in Australia each year. STL's terminals provide 2.5 million tonnes of storage capacity and handle more than 4.6 million tonnes of commodities each year. In addition to around 4 million tonnes of bulk sugar, STL also handles more than half a million tonnes of other commodities annually, including molasses, wood pellets, gypsum and silica sands. STL has over $350 million in assets in strategic port locations across Queensland. We have in place 100 year leases with the port authorities at each of our six terminals. These leases include rolling options to extend for a further 100 year period.


Board and Management Update

Perth, April 4, 2022 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Yandal Resources Ltd ( ASX:YRL ) advises that in accordance with our announcement on 17 February 2022, Mr Tim Kennedy has today assumed the position of Managing Director and CEO taking over from Mr Lorry Hughes. Mr Hughes will continue with the company as a Non-Executive Director until the 17th May 2022 to assist with a smooth management transition.The Board of Yandal Resources is also very pleased to advise that highly regarded corporate executive Mr Gregory Evans has been appointed as Non-Executive Chairman of the Company commencing 4 April 2022.Mr Evans has over 25 years in advising corporates, boards, directors, executive management teams, and providers of debt and equity and other financial sponsors on capital raisings, mergers and acquisition transactions, equity and debt structuring, public offers, takeover defence, strategic options and growth strategies. He specialises in energy and natural resources with a particular focus on the mining sector. He has a Bachelor of Commerce, a Diploma in Applied Finance and is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.Mr Evans is currently part-time Principal Director - Mergers and Acquisitions with KPMG Australia as well as Chief Investment Officer/Executive Director of a Private Family office.Commenting on these changes, Mr Kennedy said:"Yandal Resources is entering an exciting new phase. Thanks to the outstanding efforts of Lorry and the team we have a strong pipeline of projects ranging from early-stage targets through to the definition of initial resources. Importantly we have a number of prospects where recent first pass and follow-up drilling has confirmed high grade gold mineralisation indicating high potential for significant discoveries."We are very pleased that Greg has accepted the position of Chairman for this important new phase for the company. His extensive experience in working with resource companies to pursue successful growth strategies together with his strong network in the commercial and finance sector will be a great asset to the company."We have a very busy year of exploration mapped out for 2022 and we look forward to updating shareholders as to our progress."About Yandal Resources Ltd

Yandal Resources (ASX:YRL) listed on the ASX in December 2018 and has a portfolio of advanced gold exploration projects in the highly prospective Yandal and Norseman-Wiluna Greenstone Belts of Western Australia. Yandal Resources' Board has a track record of successful discovery, mine development and production.


Okapi Receives Approval to Drill at Rattler Uranium Project

Perth, April 4, 2022 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Okapi Resources Limited ( ASX:OKR ) ( FRA:26O ) ( OTCMKTS:OKPRF ) is pleased to announce that it has received a Decision Notice from the Bureau of Land Management's (BLM) Moab Field Office in Moab, Utah that the Notice of Intent to Conduct Exploration (NoI) filed on 23rd February 2022 was complete, meeting all the information required by surface management regulations.Key Points- Okapi receives BLM & State of Utah approval to drill at Rattler Uranium Project in Utah- Drill permit comprises 100 shallow drillholes- Purpose of the program is to test the mineralisation historically mined at Rattlesnake- Recently returned positive rock samples at both Rattlesnake and Sunnyside- Expected drilling to commence in Q3 2022The State of Utah, Division of Oil, Gas & Mining has also approved the NoI as required by state law; drilling can proceed subject to filing of the reclamation surety bond.The jointly received notices approve Okapi's reverse-circulation exploration drill program on the Rattler Uranium Project that comprises 100 shallow drill holes to test the extent and nature of the Uranium mineralisation historically mined at the Rattlesnake Mine and confirmed by recent rock sample results (ASX announcement dated 10th March 2022).Rattler Uranium ProjectThe Rattler Uranium Project comprises 98 Bureau of Land Management (BLM) unpatented Federal mining claims (encompassing approximately 1,960 acres) located approximately 85km north of Energy Fuels Inc's White Mesa Uranium/Vanadium mill in Utah - the only operating conventional uranium mill in the USA.The project area includes the historical Rattlesnake open pit mine, which was discovered around 1948 and operated through until about 1954. Historic production from the Rattlesnake pit reportedly totalled 285,000 tonnes of ore @ 2,800ppm U3O8 and 10,000ppm V2O5 for 1.6 million pounds of U3O8 and 4.5 million pounds of V2O5.Proposed Drill Hole Location- Up to 100 reverse circulation holes employing a face-sampling center-return downhole hammer will be drilled on the project; the total number of holes drilled will be based upon results obtained as drilling proceeds.- All Drill holes will be oriented vertically to target relatively flat-lying structures with inclinations of less than 30 degrees from horizontal.- Negotiation of a drill contract with an internationally experienced reverse circulation drilling company is underway; this is expected to result in a drilling start of Q3 2022.- Sampling will employ real-time on-site hand-held X-ray fluorescence (XRF) detectors to directly evaluate Uranium content as well as Scintillometer / Geiger Counter measurements.- In addition to on-site analysis, chip samples will be collected from all mineralised intervals and sent to certified assay laboratories for comparative analysis and quality assurance / quality control.Rattler Uranium Project LocationThe Rattler Uranium Project is located in San Jan County in eastern Utah, approximately 5km west of the town of La Sal and 40kms southeast of Moab, Utah. The project is located within the historic La Sal Mining District that hosts a number of mines in-care-and-maintenance as well as numerous abandoned mines.The Rattler Uranium Project is also located approximately 85km north of Energy Fuels Inc's White Mesa Uranium/Vanadium mill in Utah - the only operating conventional uranium mill in the USA.*To view tables and figures, please visit:About Okapi Resources Limited

Okapi Resources Limited (ASX:OKR) recently acquired a portfolio of advanced, high grade uranium assets located in the United States of America and in the Athabasca Basin, Canada.

Assets include a strategic position in one of the most prolific uranium districts in the USA - the Tallahassee Creek Uranium District in Colorado. The Tallahassee Uranium Project contains a JORC 2012 Mineral Resource estimate of 27.6 million pounds of U3O8 at a grade of 490ppm U3O8 with significant exploration upside. The greater Tallahassee Creek Uranium District hosts more than 100 million pounds of U3O8 with considerable opportunity to expand the existing resource base by acquiring additional complementary assets in the district.

The portfolio of assets also includes an option to acquire 100% of the high-grade Rattler Uranium Project in Utah, which includes the historical Rattlesnake open pit mine. The Rattler Uranium Project is located 85km from the White Mesa Uranium Mill, the only operating conventional uranium mill in the USA hence provides a near term, low-capital development opportunity.

In January 2022, Okapi acquired a portfolio of high-grade exploration assets in the world's premier uranium district, the Athabasca Basin. The Athabasca Basin is home to the world's largest and highest-grade uranium mines.

Okapi's clear strategy is to become a new leader in North American carbon-free nuclear energy by assembling a portfolio of high-quality uranium assets through accretive acquisitions and exploration.


Crowd Licences AI Talking Head Platform to PangaMed

Melbourne, April 4, 2022 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Crowd Media Holdings Limited ( ASX:CM8 ) ( FRA:CM3 ) is pleased to announce that is has executed a Marketing and Development Agreement effective immediately to license its Talking Head platform to South African healthcare company Pangea Med (PangeaMed) (Company number: 2014/172328/07). In the first year of the agreement, the fee will be AUD $32,000 for the base license to the AI 'Talking Head' platform. Additional chatbots and services will attract further fees of a minimum AUD $332,860, depending on scale, and contingent upon PangeaMed funding.PangeaMed (www.pangeamed.com) is a South African patient-focused medical company specialising in enhanced recovery, health advocacy, patient awareness, data, innovation, and training. PangeaMed currently delivers their programs across 50 African countries.The Agreement outlines the licensing arrangement to Crowd's Talking Head Platform on a SaaS model. The platform will enable patients in developing countries to access immediate, reliable medical information before and after receiving medical treatment. The term of the contract is for 2 years with no right to terminate without cause.This Agreement marks an important milestone in Company's strategy to develop 'voice-and-visual' products the next frontier of conversational commerce applications.Crowd Media's CEO Idan Schmorak said: "This agreement cements our partnership and kicks off the next step in our collaboration. PangeaMed will be integrating our technology with theirs to improve medical services in South Africa, initially. After later we can roll it out more broadly - the opportunity has no boundaries."About Crowd Media Holdings Limited

Crowd Media Holdings Ltd (ASX:CM8) (FRA:CM3) is an Artificial Intelligence company that is leveraging its AI platform for applications in Conversational Commerce.
Did you know the American Red Cross provides services to New Mexico? Thats right. The American Red Cross provides various services to all four corners of the state, such as emergency disaster response, emergency assistance and disaster preparedness education.

Each year the Red Cross responds to over 70,000 calls including single-family and apartment home fires, hurricanes, tornadoes, hazardous material spills, transportation accidents, explosions, and other natural and human disasters. In the last fiscal year alone the Red Cross responded to over 218 emergency calls, assisted 312 families and installed 428 smoke alarms in New Mexico.

The Red Cross received its first congressional charter in 1900 and a second in 1905. The most recent version of the charter was adopted in May 2007 and restates the traditional purposes, including giving relief to and serving as a medium of communication between members of the American armed forces and their families and providing national and international disaster relief and mitigation. Since then, the American Red Cross has provided services in wars, disasters and other emergencies.

Today, the American Red Cross operates in all 50 states and American territories and has a volunteer population of over 300,000 who are supported by over 30,000 staff.

Often the organization is called to provide emergency services in foreign countries. As fighting intensifies in Ukraine, the global Red Cross network is helping families impacted by the conflict. For its part, the American Red Cross has deployed international crises responders to Poland, Moldova, Hungary and Romania to provide humanitarian relief in support of the International Red Cross operation helping families who fled their homes. These highly trained crises responders are supporting on-the-ground relief efforts alongside local teams including the Polish Red Cross and the Moldovan Red Cross.

People often ask how they may contribute to the American Red Cross. As you can well understand, with last years wildfires, tornadoes, floods and hurricanes, Red Cross volunteers and staff have been pretty busy.

Many Red Cross volunteers and staff have been dispatched to disaster areas in the United States, missing the opportunity of spending the holidays at home with their families. However, you can help too.

The American Red Cross blood supply remains vulnerable. Individuals are urged to schedule a blood or platelet donation to help ensure patients receive the care they need. You can donate blood by scheduling an appointment at redcrossblood.org.

We are grateful to the hundreds of thousands of individuals who have rolled up a sleeve to help alleviate the immediate blood crisis in early 2022. In the days and weeks ahead, its critically important the Red Cross maintains a readily available blood supply for hospital patients.

Monetary tax deductible contributions are also needed to help defray the costs of these disaster responses. In 2020, more than 24,000 people were assisted each day, 900,000 meals were served, and snacks were provided with our partners and 207,200 overnight shelters and hotels were also provided with the partners. The American Red Cross is a 503(c) organization. You may contribute funds by logging on to redcross.org.

Finally, if circumstances permit, you may consider becoming a Red Cross volunteer to more personally serve your community. The first step to becoming a Red Cross volunteer is to apply at redcross.org/volunteer and begin the volunteer process. You will be required to create a profile, which takes less than five minutes, and submit your volunteer application through the system. You will also be required to submit to a background check.
The longer one lives, the more things can cause you to think, It seemed like a good idea at the time.

In 1986, as part of a tax reform movement, Congress eliminated or restricted the deductibility of certain types of interest expense.

Personal interest cannot be deducted, unless incurred for a residence. Investment interest can offset investment income. Business interest can be deducted in full, although reforms that are more recent limit the deduction for very large taxpayers.

What Congress left out was how one classifies their interest expense. Treasury had to fill in the gaps, which they did by regulation. These regulations were drafted in July of 1987 and revised in July of 1997.

Back in 1987, the newly issued regulations were of great interest. Tax practitioners attended seminars to learn the rules. Journal articles probed the details of the many examples found in the regulations.

The regulations said to trace the use of loan proceeds to classify the attendant interest. If borrowed money is used to buy an investment, the interest is classified as investment, and so on.

When a lender disburses funds directly to the seller of property, such as occurs in real estate closings, tracing is not too difficult.

What mucks things up is that money is fungible. When loan proceeds are deposited into an account, mixed with other funds, and then expenditures are made from that account, which funds are traced to the expenditure?

When a partnership is the borrower and distributions are then made to partners, did those distributions come from the loan proceeds or from some other funds the partnership may have?

If the distributions came from the loan proceeds, the partnership cannot trace the interest. The partner must now do the tracing. Yet the partnership pays the interest and must classify it.

Sound familiar? I thought not. That is a problem. The tax treatment of post-1986 interest must use these tracing rules. If they are not familiar to borrowers, or even their tax advisers, what exactly is showing up on those tax returns?

Tracing can be easy in two situations. First, the lender transfers funds directly to the intended use, such as purchase of real estate. Second, the borrower has assumed existing debt on property he or she acquires.

When loan proceeds are received in cash or deposited to an account, any use of the funds within 15 days may be traced to the loan. This is so even if the account has nonborrowed funds in addition to the borrowings.

Refinanced debt is traced to the same use as the debt that it replaces, but only up to the principal balance at the refinance date. Excess refinance proceeds are traced just like any new debt.

A single loan may be traced to multiple uses. As the debt is repaid there must be an ordering rule applied to determine which debt category was repaid.

The regulations are taxpayer-friendly and reduce categories of debt in an order that first targets nondeductible personal interest while preserving deductible business interest for the last step.

Perhaps the trickiest tracing is for a partnership debt. Partnerships are said to be pass through entities because they simply tell each partner what his or her share of each reported item is.

Items that are treated the same for all partners are reported in a single ordinary income or loss category. Any items that might be treated differently based on each partners situation must be separately reported.

Lets say a partnership borrows $1 million. If the partnership retains or uses all funds then the partnership traces the uses and reports the interest classification to the partners.

If the partnership distributes some of the loan proceeds, the partnership cannot trace the use of the distributed funds.

If $300,000 of the $1 million debt proceeds is distributed to the partners, the partnership has to report 30% of its interest separately to the partners. The partnership simply calls this debt-financed distribution interest.

Each partner then has to determine what was done with the distribution. The tracing at the partner level then determines the tax result.

Does your chewing gum lose its flavor on the bedpost overnight? 35-year-old regulations may be ignored for the same reason.

Jim Hamill is the director of Tax Practice at Reynolds, Hix & Co. in Albuquerque. He can be reached at jimhamill@rhcocpa.com.
CHEYENNE, Wyo.  A Laramie County sheriffs deputy is expected to recover from a gunshot wound he sustained in an exchange of fire with a person suspected of assaulting and robbing a student at Laramie County Community College, the sheriffs office says. The suspect was killed in the exchange, which occurred off-campus.

Sheriffs Capt. Don Hollingshead told The Wyoming Tribune Eagle that the deputy, whose name was not released, was wounded after a brief vehicle chase in Cheyenne following the alleged assault and robbery on Saturday. The deputy was listed in stable condition at Cheyenne Regional Medical Center and is expected to recover, Hollingshead said.

The name of the person killed and other information about the incident were being withheld Sunday, the sheriffs office said. The state Division of Criminal Investigation was investigating the officer-involved shooting.

The incident began when a community college student reported a robbery and assault to campus police. Campus safety officials asked the alleged assailant, who was not a student, to leave the college grounds, then notified the sheriffs office, said college spokesperson Lisa Trimble.
HOUSTON  A suspected drunk driver has been charged in the death of a Houston area deputy constable after being accused of slamming into the back of the officers vehicle, causing it to burst into flames, officials said Sunday.

At around 6 p.m. Saturday, authorities received calls about a possibly intoxicated driver in a large truck who had fled an accident, said Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez.

Harris County Precinct 7 Deputy Constable Jennifer Chavis parked her patrol vehicle on the side of a Houston freeway and waited for the driver to pass so she could then follow and pull him over, authorities said.

But the driver ended up crashing into the back of Chavis patrol car, said Harris County Sheriffs Office Capt. Anthony McConnell.

After the collision, several witnesses jumped out and prevented the suspected drunk driver, later identified as Adolfo Serrano, from leaving.

My heart is hurting and I just ask you that you pray for the family and the friends of this constable, McConnell said.

Serrano was injured in the crash and taken to a hospital.

Serrano, 36, was charged with intoxication manslaughter of a peace officer.

Court records did not list an attorney who could speak on Serranos behalf.
PHOENIX  One 18-year-old man died and another was injured after a shooting following a large party in Phoenix, police said Sunday.

They say officers received a call around 3:15 a.m. Saturday about shots being fired.

When police arrived on the scene, officers found a vacant home where a large party had taken place.

Investigators learned there was a shooting involving two men who ended up at separate hospitals.

According to police, Bryson Footracer later died from his injuries while the other man suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

Police said their investigation of the fatal shooting was ongoing.
SALT LAKE CITY  Top leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints addressed COVID-19, the churchs support of non-discrimination laws, war in Ukraine and legacies of racism at the faiths first in-person conference since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.

The nearly 17 million-member faith, which is widely known as the Mormon church, is hosting about 13,000 people at its 21,000-seat Salt Lake City conference center over two sessions on Saturday. Though its signature conference regularly reached full capacity pre-pandemic, for two years, it has been held mostly remotely, with the majority of viewers watching livestreams from afar.

President Russell Nelson, the Latter-day Saints 97-year-old prophet, on Saturday told listeners gathered at the churchs Utah headquarters and those tuning in remotely that the troubles afflicting the world reaffirmed the need for faith and devotion.

Contention violates everything the Savior stood for and taught, he said.

He and other leaders mostly eschewed political issues, focused their remarks on spiritual matters and stressed unity and faith amid worldwide struggles. However, when high-ranking officials addressed current events and politics, they centered their remarks on denouncing polarization. They urged members of the faith to put their energy toward solution-oriented work rather than heated debates or criticism focused on the past.

The forward-looking perspective echoes prior remarks from church leaders, who have disavowed racism and expressed regret for past church positions, while stopping short of formally apologizing and avoiding opening up debate about church doctrines being reversed.

Church leader Neil L. Andersen implored members of the faith to focus on healing divisions, rather than dwelling on historical injustices or other divisive matters. Andersen encouraged tolerance and acceptance, highlighting the churchs support for non-discrimination legislation in Arizona designed to protect LGBTQ individuals.

We genuinely love and care for all our neighbors, whether or not they believe as we do, Andersen, a member of a top governing church panel called the Quorum of Twelve Apostles, said.

The church has backed anti-discrimination laws in Arizona and Utah and over the past decade softened its stances toward LGBTQ members of the faith and their families. However, it remains opposed to same-sex marriage on theological grounds.

Unlike prior conferences, most church leaders did not explicitly address the nationwide reckoning over racial injustice. Andersen encouraged listeners to summon the inner strength to cool, calm, and quench the fiery darts aimed toward the truths we love.

As an example of such a dart, he referenced a Salt Lake Tribune opinion piece that connected contemporary racism in Utah to historical examples of prejudice, including the churchs ban on Black members serving in the priesthood that was lifted nearly half a century ago.

Andersen urged listeners to avoid shrinking before those who disparage us and share the faith in ways void of anger or malice.

Church officials announced a series of personnel changes Saturday, including the addition of Tracy Y. Browning to a leadership role. When she takes her post in August, shell become the first Black woman to serve on an all-women leadership panel focused on families and children.

Women cannot serve in the priesthood or top leadership positions in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, though some have pushed to expand womens roles in leadership.

Demanding revelation from God is both arrogant and unproductive. Instead, we wait on the Lord and his timetable to reveal his truths through the means that he has established, high-ranking church official Dale G. Renlund told a womens-only session Saturday evening.

Jeffrey R. Holland, another high-ranking church official, geared remarks toward young people struggling amid the pandemic, shedding light on the risk of suicide and urging kids to seek help and counsel. His remarks come after the number of emergency department visits for suspected suicide attempts spiked during the first year of the pandemic and parallel concerns raised last month by Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Latter-day Saint himself, about transgender youth and suicide.

Watch for signs of depression, despair, or anything hinting of self-harm. Offer your help. Listen. Make some kind of intervention as appropriate, Holland told conference-goers.

Though high-ranking officials generally focus on spirituality at the churchs signature twice-yearly conference, they have in the past announced major shifts including the lifting of a ban on baptisms for children of same-sex couples.

While disagreement exists among members of the faith, throughout the pandemic, Nelson and other high-ranking church officials have repeatedly encouraged vaccinations and adherence to public health guidelines like masks. For a period of time, they closed temples, suspended in-person services and sent missionaries back home.

Church leaders on Saturday commended missionaries for adapting to the challenges presented by COVID-19, which for many included pivoting to remote service, and acknowledged it had not been easy. They encouraged young men eligible to serve missions, but who may not have done so yet because of the pandemic, to prepare.

I know it has not been easy, said high-ranking church official M. Russell Ballard.

__

This story has been corrected to show that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints plans to host about 13,000 members of the faith at its twice-yearly conference over two sessions on Saturday, not 10,000 people.
HOUSTON  During hours of relentless questioning, Melissa Lucio more than 100 times had denied fatally beating her 2-year-old daughter.

But worn down from a lifetime of abuse and the grief of losing her daughter Mariah, her lawyers say, the Texas woman finally acquiesced to investigators. I guess I did it, Lucio responded when asked if she was responsible for some of Mariahs injuries.

Her lawyers say that statement was wrongly interpreted by prosecutors as a murder confession  tainting the rest of the investigation into Mariahs 2007 death, with evidence gathered only to prove that conclusion, and helping lead to her capital murder conviction. They contend Mariah died from injuries from a fall down the 14 steps of a steep staircase outside the familys apartment in the South Texas city of Harlingen.

As her April 27 execution date nears, Lucios lawyers are hopeful that new evidence, along with growing public support  including from jurors who now doubt the conviction and from more than half the Texas House of Representatives  will persuade the states Board of Pardons and Paroles and Gov. Greg Abbott to grant an execution reprieve or commute her sentence.

Mariahs death was a tragedy not a murder.  It would be an absolutely devastating message for this execution to go forward. It would send a message that innocence doesnt matter, said Vanessa Potkin, one of Lucios attorneys who is with the Innocence Project.

Lucios lawyers say jurors never heard forensic evidence that would have explained that Mariahs various injuries were actually caused by a fall days earlier. They also say Lucio wasnt allowed to present evidence questioning the validity of her confession.

The Texas Attorney Generals Office maintains evidence shows Mariah suffered the absolute worst case of child abuse her emergency room doctor had seen in 30 years.

Lucio still advances no evidence that is reliable and supportive of her acquittal, the office wrote in court documents last month.

The Cameron County District Attorneys Office, which prosecuted Lucio, declined to comment.

Lucio, 53, would be the first Latina executed by Texas and the first woman since 2014. Only 17 women have been executed in the U.S. since the Supreme Court lifted its ban on the death penalty in 1976, most recently in January 2021.

In their clemency petition, Lucios lawyers say that while she had used drugs, leading her to temporarily lose custody of her children, she was a loving mother who worked to remain drug-free and provide for her family. Lucio has 14 children and was pregnant with the youngest two when Mariah died.

Lucio and her children struggled through poverty. At times, they were homeless and relied on food banks for meals, according to the petition. Child Protective Services was present in the familys life, but there was never an accusation of abuse by any of her children, Potkin said.

Lucio had been sexually assaulted multiple times, starting at age 6, and had been physically and emotionally abused by two husbands. Her lawyers say this lifelong trauma made her susceptible to giving a false confession.

In the 2020 documentary The State of Texas vs. Melissa, Lucio said investigators kept pushing her to say she had hurt Mariah.

I was not gonna admit to causing her death because I wasnt responsible, Lucio said.

Her lawyers say Lucios sentence was disproportionate to what her husband and Mariahs father, Robert Alvarez, received. He got a four-year sentence for causing injury to a child by omission even though he also was responsible for Mariahs care, Lucios lawyers argue.

In 2019, a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned Lucios conviction, ruling she was deprived of her constitutional right to present a meaningful defense. However, the full court in 2021 said the conviction had to be upheld for procedural reasons, despite the difficult issue of the exclusion of testimony that might have cast doubt on the credibility of Lucios confession.

Three jurors and one alternate in Lucios trial have signed affidavits expressing doubts about her conviction.

She was not evil. She was just struggling.  If we had heard passionately from the defense defending her in some way, we might have reached a different decision, juror Johnny Galvan wrote in an affidavit.

In a letter last month to the Board of Pardons and Paroles and to Abbott, 83 Texas House members said executing Lucio would be a miscarriage of justice.

As a conservative Republican myself, who has long been a supporter of the death penalty in the most heinous cases  I have never seen a more troubling case than the case of Melissa Lucio, said state Rep. Jeff Leach, who signed the letter.

Abbott can grant a one-time, 30-day reprieve. He can grant clemency if a majority of the paroles board recommends it.

The board plans to vote on Lucios clemency petition two days before the scheduled execution, Rachel Alderete, the boards director of support operations, said in an email. A spokeswoman for Abbotts office did not return an email seeking comment.

Abbott has granted clemency to only one death row inmate, Thomas Whitaker, since taking office in 2015. Whitaker was convicted of masterminding the fatal shootings of his mother and brother. His father, who survived, led the effort to save Whitaker, saying he would be victimized again if his son was executed.

Lucios supporters have said her clemency request is similar in that her family would be retraumatized if shes executed.

Please allow us to reconcile with Mariahs death and remember her without fresh pain, anguish and grief. Please spare the life of our mother, Lucios children wrote in a letter to Abbott and the board.

___

Follow Juan A. Lozano on Twitter: https://twitter.com/juanlozano70
Copyright  2022 Albuquerque Journal

O n a muddy spring afternoon in Corrales, Jessica Andrews inspects lettuce rows inside a warm greenhouse at Silver Leaf Farms.

The U.S. Navy veteran is starting a new career in agriculture now that she has returned to New Mexico from her post in Hawaii.

Andrews is hoping to reinvigorate a plot of family land in Espanola as a small farm.

I really love the idea of growing my own food to sustain myself and the local community, she said.

Andrews and 30 other New Mexico residents gathered in Albuquerque for Armed to Farm, a weeklong program that teaches military veterans how to run an agricultural business.

The National Center for Appropriate Technology has trained 900 veterans in the last decade through the free initiative.

A mix of classroom instruction and site visits gives the beginning farmers confidence and connections, said program director Margo Hale, who also leads the agriculture organizations southeastern region.

Theyre getting to see successful farms in action and get their hands dirty, Hale said. Its great for them to pick up ideas of things that might work for their own farms and ranches.

Training sessions include recordkeeping and goal setting, funding opportunities, soil health, planning and risk, beekeeping, water conservation and marketing.

The group visited local cattle ranches and hog farms to learn about selling products at farmers markets and restaurants.

Several urban farms taught the group how to make the most of small spaces and limited water.

Hale enjoys seeing the participants connect over shared experiences of military service and farming goals.

Veterans make really great farmers, she said, and we always need more people growing awesome food for their communities.

For Ashley Cook, an Army veteran who grew up on a Fort Sumner hay farm, the training will help her and her husband tackle challenges as they grow produce and raise chickens in a dry climate.

Weve learned so much in the classroom and at the farms that we never knew, and never knew to even ask about, Cook said.

The program showcases federal programs to fund rural businesses.

A focus on sustainability encourages the group not to just rely on the old way of doing things, Cook said.

We didnt realize that some of the practices that are currently being used on the farm are actually damaging the soil, and its something we can take back to help us improve, she said.

Amanda Cordero and Jon Erickson married after meeting while deployed on a Navy ship near Guam.

They joined the program to learn how to transform their barren plot of land north of Hatch back into a farming operation.

Its so important to have a connection to our food, Cordero said. Especially in this climate, learning about soil health and nutrients has been amazing.

This year the program is also hosting trainings in Texas, California and North Carolina.

The veterans said they feel a similar sense of community and mission in agriculture as they did during their time in the military.

Program participants can access NCATs consultations, technical assistance and webinars.

The agriculture community in New Mexico is so willing to help the newbies coming into it, Andrews said. Theyre like, this is what we know, this is where we messed up, these are lessons learned. Everybodys working together.

Theresa Davis is a Report for America corps member covering water and the environment for the Albuquerque Journal.
Copyright  2022 Albuquerque Journal

As New Mexico was given the green light on recreational cannabis sales Friday, law enforcement addressed the elephant in the room: a possible uptick in stoned drivers.

Authorities advised those partaking in pot to not get behind the wheel and, if they do, warned that the long arm of the law is ready.

Jason Bowie, state Public Safety secretary, said in a release that driving high on cannabis puts others at risk  plain and simple.

In 2021, the department secured funding from legislators to get State Police officers trained in the Drug Recognition Expert, or DRE, certification program. State Police currently have 12 officers trained in DRE, which can determine impairment from a variety of drugs.

Defense attorneys say the DRE test is the best way to determine impairment, but they will watch for instances of over prosecution.

Meanwhile, prosecutors confront the nuances of getting convictions on cannabis-addled drivers in a state with laws geared toward alcohol.

Officer Tim McCarson of the Albuquerque Police Departments DWI Unit isnt sounding the alarm just yet.

Its not like were not ready for drug-impaired drivers. Its something that we do as a DWI unit daily, said McCarson, who has been DRE-trained for more than 24 years. So, to be honest, nothings really changing for us.

He said the unit discussed the possible effects of recreational cannabis on driving enforcement, just as they did when it became legal last year.

McCarson said in 2021 they had eight DWI cases due to just cannabis and 17 where cannabis was part of a mix of alcohol or other drugs.

With dispensaries popping up across the city, its a wait-and-see approach.

Is it really going to change that dramatically from what we do day-to-day? McCarson asked. Of course its possible, but theres no way to really predict it.

Either way, he said, the unit is ready for it.

McCarson said five of the seven DWI Unit officers are DRE-trained and the remaining two start training Monday. He said DRE tests take 30 to 50 minutes, unlike field sobriety tests, which take 7 to 10.

Although nothing is 100%, McCarson said the test can positively tell if someone is actively high or it can clear the driver of impairment.

A DRE test includes question-and-answer, observations of eye movement and balance along with blood pressure and heart rate. If the offense is a felony, due to it being a serious crash or otherwise, an officer can get a warrant for a blood draw to show the levels of cannabis in the system.

But McCarson said drivers are often very forthcoming about cannabis use.

Even to a point that, in some evaluations that I have done, theyve admitted to cannabis use and their toxicology comes back with no cannabis in their system, he said. Its just become so socially acceptable that people will admit to it even when they havent used it.

Stepping up enforcement

Kim Chavez Cook, an appellate defender with the Law Offices of the Public Defender, said they requested that DPS have enough DRE-trained officers if they wanted to step up enforcement.

Unlike blood and field sobriety tests, Cook said DRE is the best way for an officer to detect impairment from cannabis and other drugs. But she said LOPD will be keeping an eye on if DRE investigations are following federal standards and making sure officers understand how cannabis impairment manifests itself in drivers.

I want to make sure that the officers who are out there in the field doing these are properly trained in the DRE protocols, and are not just being sort of rubber stamped with being certified or what have you, Cook said.

She said officers also need to make the right cases to avoid over prosecution.

Cook said that means charging someone based on erratic driving rather than the smell of cannabis or a positive blood test.

Consumption alone is not impairment, she said. If they try to just rely on the fact that, well, they had marijuana in their system, then thats going to be a harder case to win.

Cook said that, most often, cannabis is involved in DWI cases where alcohol or other drugs are the primary factor.

I do think thats important to keep in mind, as well, that it is a rare case where someone is accused of DUI solely based on cannabis. Its much, much less frequent, she said.

Limitations, challenges

Joshua Boone, deputy district attorney of the Metro Division, said there will always be a special challenge with drug-impaired driving.

Its a lot harder to prove a marijuana case, he said, mainly because the laws havent been updated to account for it.

A standard DWI prosecution often looks at a breathalyzer result, which has a set level of impairment. Such a test doesnt exist for marijuana.

Theres no sense of like at this level  you are under the influence,' Boone said.

Cannabis levels can be measured in blood but authorities cannot forcibly draw someones blood unless it is a felony DWI, like a serious crash or fourth offense.

Boone said there are also limitations on the penalty when it comes to cannabis.

With alcohol, those who refuse a breath or field sobriety test get charged with an aggravated DWI, which involves serving mandatory jail time.

Boone said, as the law stands, drivers can refuse to take a DRE or blood test and it doesnt aggravate the penalty.

The only thing that we can use if people refuse to do a DRE examination or anything like that is we can use it for consciousness of guilt, he said.

Boone said a DRE test is mostly a tool for officers to determine impairment and prosecutors often want more to convict someone of driving while impaired by drugs.

He said he doesnt think the prosecution of cannabis-related DWIs was fully thought out when lawmakers legalized cannabis in New Mexico and other states. Boone said a conversation may need to happen in the future on, among other things, when a cannabis or drug-related DWI becomes aggravated.

I dont think New Mexico is alone on this. I dont know that many other states even really tried to contemplate what might be the possible solution, Boone said.
ITS ALL ABOUT IMPAIRMENT: If you thought you could get away with driving a little high because cops are limited to Breathalyzers looking for liquor levels of .08% or higher, think again.

Recreational marijuana sales became legal Friday. The same day, the New Mexico Department of Transportation launched a new drugged endwi campaign.

And as with alcohol, driving while high really boils down to impairment.

NMDOT Secretary Mike Sandoval says in a news release announcing the new ad campaign impairment is impairment. It doesnt matter whether its alcohol or cannabis  driving while intoxicated on any substance is dangerous and illegal. If you are impaired and driving erratically or unsafely, you could be arrested for DWI. The law is the same.

Thats important, because NMDOT cites University of New Mexico data showing crashes involving only drug use have increased over the last 10 years and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) reports show drugs were present in 43% of drivers who were fatally injured with a known test result.

In 2021, alcohol was involved in 111 of the states 479 traffic deaths. Stay tuned to see if the data from UNM/NMDOT will parse out drugged driving.

In the meantime, State Police has 12 drug recognition expert-trained officers to combat drugged driving. The Albuquerque Police Department has eight, plus 87 advanced roadside impaired driving enforcement officers, and APD spokeswoman Rebecca Atkins says the DRE-certified officers are ready to assist the field officers with any DRE-specific requests 24/7 with either on-duty or call-out investigations.

NMDOT says officers will evaluate signs of impairment rather than relying on the smell of cannabis. They will likely administer the standard field sobriety tests, which dont necessarily look for a specific drug, but rather help officers determine how incapacitated someone is.

MVD ONLY SHOWS EMISSIONS STATUS IF NEEDED: Ron Nelson shares I bought a new car a year ago, my registration was due this past month, and (I) renewed it online for two years. Received it back in the mail last week and happened to glance at the page the sticker comes on.

Allegedly my emissions certificate from when I bought my car new goes well beyond the (every-two-years checks required in Bernalillo County). Even more concerning is the (MVD) web link they use to check the status is non-functional.  Where (can I) check my emissions certificate information?

Charlie Moore of the state Taxation and Revenue Department, which oversees the Motor Vehicle Division, says of Rons paperwork that he doesnt need emissions until 2026 is correct because his car is brand new and he cites the state administrative code, Exempt Vehicle 20.11.100.2 (B): 1. All new motor vehicles for four years following initial registration from the date of the manufacturers certificate of origin (MCO).

As for checking your vehicle registration and emissions status at mvd.newmexico.gov, Moore says because Rons vehicle is brand new and has not had a test yet it is not popping up. It only shows if you need (an emissions test) or have previously had a test.

DRIVERS NOT MAINTAINING MLK LANES: Darrell Frisse called to say at MLK, the northbound Interstate 25 frontage roads left lane turns left and the center and right lanes go through onto the interstate.

But the through lanes jog to the left and there are many near-collisions because drivers do not follow suit.

Kim Gallegos of NMDOTs District 3 office informed NMDOTs traffic section so that it can be added to the list of needed puppy tracks around the D3 area. Puppy tracks are the dotted lines that run through an intersection to help drivers maintain their lane.

SAN MATEO A MESS NEAR THE VA: Fred Aragon called to report patients who go to the VA Medical Center are up in arms at how rough San Mateo is because the patches have fallen apart.

Scott Cilke, public information officer for the citys Department of Municipal Development, says that area is scheduled to be rehabbed in  the summer of 2023. In the meantime, our maintenance team is going to send a crew out to see if theres anything we can fix more immediately.

Editorial page editor DVal Westphal tackles commuter issues for the metro area on Mondays. Reach her at 823-3858; dwestphal@abqjournal.com; or 7777 Jefferson NE, Albuquerque, NM, 87109.
NEW YORK  Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the American Library Associations Office for Intellectual Freedom, has never been so busy.

A year ago, we might have been receiving one, maybe two reports a day about a book being challenged at a library. And usually those calls would be for guidance on how to handle a challenge or for materials that support the value of the work being challenged, Caldwell-Stone told The Associated Press. Now, were getting three, four, five reports a day, many in need of support and some in need of a great deal of support.

Were on the phone constantly, she added.

Accounts of book bannings and attempted book bannings, along with threats against librarians, have soared over the past year and the ALA has included some numbers in its annual State of Americas Libraries Report, released Monday. The association found 729 challenges  affecting nearly 1,600 books  at public schools and libraries in 2021, more than double 2020s figures and the highest since the ALA began compiling challenges more than 20 years ago.

The actual total for last year is likely much higher  the ALA collects data through media accounts and through cases it learns about from librarians and educators and other community members. Books preemptively pulled by librarians  out of fear of community protest or concern for their jobs  and challenges never reported by libraries are not included.

The number could well grow again in 2022, Caldwell-Stone said, as conservative-led school boards and legislatures enact more restrictions. Last week, the Georgia legislature passed a bill that would accelerate the process for removing books seen as harmful to minors.

Nothing would surprise me, Caldwell-Stone says.

The two most challenged books on the ALAs top 10 list have been in the news often: Maia Kobabes graphic memoir about sexual identity, Gender Queer, and Jonathan Evisons Lawn Boy, a coming-of-age novel narrated by a young gay man. Both have been singled out by Republican officials.

Last fall in Virginia, Glenn Youngkin backed a local school boards banning of the two books during his successful run for governor. Around the same time, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster supported a school boards decision to remove Gender Queer.

In Florida recently, Gov. Ron DeSantis criticized Gender Queer and Lawn Boy upon signing a law that would force elementary schools to provide a searchable list of every book available in their libraries or used in instruction and allow parents, DeSantis said, to blow the whistle.

Kobabe and Evison noted during recent interviews an irony of their books being targeted: Neither set out to write a story for young people. But they gained a following among students with the help of the American Library Association, which has given each book an Alex Award for works written for adults that have special appeal to young adults, ages 12 through 18.

I think a big part of our books getting so much attention is that theyre award winners and ended up being purchased by libraries all over the country, Kobabe said.

Others on the ALA list, virtually all cited for LGBTQ or racial themes, include Angie Thomas bestselling The Hate U Give, centered on a police shooting of a Black teen; George Johnsons All Boys Arent Blue, Juno Dawsons This Book Is Gay and Susan Kuklins Beyond Magenta. Two older works that have been on the list before also appear: Sherman Alexies autobiographical novel The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian and Nobel laureate Toni Morrisons debut novel The Bluest Eye.

The library association defines a challenge as a formal, written complaint filed with a library or school requesting that materials be removed because of content or appropriateness. The ALA doesnt keep a precise figure for how many books have actually been removed, but cases have come up routinely over the past year. Last December, a school district in San Antonio, Texas, pulled hundreds of library books to ensure they did not have any obscene or vulgar material in them.

___

https://www.ala.org/news/state-americas-libraries-report-2022
SAN FRANCISCO  As Benito Luna-Herrera teaches his seventh-grade social studies classes, he is on alert for signs of inner turmoil. And there is so much of it these days.

One of his 12-year-old students felt her world was falling apart. Distance learning had upended her friendships. Things with her boyfriend were verging on violent. Her home life was stressful. Im just done with it, the girl told Luna-Herrera during the pandemic, and shared a detailed plan to kill herself.

Another student was typically a big jokester and full of confidence. But one day she told him she didnt want to live anymore. She, too, had a plan in place to end her life.

Luna-Herrera is just one teacher, in one Southern California middle school, but stories of students in distress are increasingly common around the country. The silver lining is that special training helped him know what to look for and how to respond when he saw the signs of a mental emergency.

Since the pandemic started, experts have warned of a mental health crisis facing American children. That is now playing out at schools in the form of increased childhood depression, anxiety, panic attacks, eating disorders, fights and thoughts of suicide at alarming levels, according to interviews with teachers, administrators, education officials and mental health experts.

In low-income areas, where adverse childhood experiences were high before the pandemic, the crisis is even more acute and compounded by a shortage of school staff and mental health professionals.

Luna-Herrera, who teaches in a high poverty area of the Mojave Desert, is among a small but growing number of California teachers to take a course called Youth Mental Health First Aid. It teaches adults how to spot warning signs of mental health risks and substance abuse in children, and how to prevent a tragedy.

The California Department of Education funds the program for any school district requesting it, and the pandemic has accelerated moves to make such courses a requirement. The training program is operated by the National Council for Mental Wellbeing and available in every state.

I dont want to read about another teenager where there were warning signs and we looked the other way, said Sen. Anthony Portantino, author of a bill that would require all California middle and high schools to train at least 75% of employees in behavioral health. Teachers and school staff are on the front lines of a crisis, and need to be trained to spot students who are suffering.

Experts say while childhood depression and anxiety had been on the rise for years, the pandemics unrelenting stress and grief amplified the problems, particularly for those already experiencing mental health issues who were cut off from counselors and other school resources during distance learning.

For children, the issues with distance learning were not just academic, said Sharon Hoover, professor of child psychiatry at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and co-director of the National Center for School Mental Health.

Child abuse and and neglect increased during the pandemic, according to Hoover. For children in troubled homes, with alcoholic or abusive parents, distance learning meant they had no escape. Those who lacked technology or had spotty internet connections were isolated even more than their peers and fell further behind academically and socially.

Many children bounced back after the extended isolation, but for others it will take longer, and mental health problems often lag a stressor.

We cant assume that OK were back in school, its been a few months and now everyone should be back to normal. That is not the case, said Hoover.

Returning to school after months of isolation intensified the anxiety for some children. Teachers say students have greater difficulty focusing, concentrating, sitting still and many need to relearn how to socialize and resolve conflicts face-to-face after prolonged immersion in screens.

Kids expected to pick up where they left off but some found friendships, and their ability to cope with social stress, had changed. Educators say they also see a concerning increase in apathy  about grades, how students treat each other and themselves  and a lot less empathy.

I have never seen kids be so mean to each other in my life, said Terrin Musbach, who trains teachers in mental health awareness and other social-emotional programs at the Del Norte Unified School District, a high-poverty district in rural Northern California. Theres more school violence, theres more vaping, theres more substance abuse, theres more sexual activity, theres more suicide ideation, theres more of every single behavior that we would be worried about in kids.

Many states have mandated teacher training on suicide prevention over the last decade and the pandemic prompted some to broaden the scope to include mental health awareness and supporting behavioral health needs.

But school districts nationwide also say they need more psychologists and counselors. The Hopeful Futures Campaign, a coalition of national mental health organizations, last month published a report that found most states are struggling with mental health support in schools. Only Idaho and the District of Columbia exceed the nationally recommended ratio of one psychologist per 500 students.

In some states, including West Virginia, Missouri, Texas and Georgia, there is only one school psychologist for over 4,000 students, the report says. Similarly, few states meet the goal of one counselor per 250 students.

President Joe Biden has proposed $1 billion in new federal funding to help schools hire more counselors and psychologists and bolster suicide prevention programs. That followed a rare pubic advisory in December from U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy on the urgent need to address the nations youth mental health crisis.

In early 2021, emergency room visits in the U.S. for suspected suicide attempts were 51% higher for adolescent girls and 4% higher for adolescent boys compared to the same period in 2019, according to research cited in the advisory.

Since California began offering the Youth Mental Health First Aid course in 2014, more than 8,000 teachers, administrators and school staff have been trained, said Monica Nepomuceno, who oversees mental health programming at the California Department of Education.

She said much more needs to be done in the countrys largest state, which employs over 600,000 K-12 staff at schools.

The course helps distinguish typical adolescent ways of dealing with stress  slamming doors, crying, bursts of anger  from warning signs of mental distress, which can be blatant or subtle.

Red flags include when a child talks about dying or suicide, but can be more nuanced like: I cant do this anymore, or Im tired of this, said Tramaine El-Amin, a spokesperson for the National Council for Mental Wellbeing. More than 550,000 K-12 educators across the country have taken the Youth Mental Health First Aid course since it launched in 2012, she said.

Changes in behavior could be cause for concern  a child who stops a sport or activity they were passionate about without replacing it with another one; a typically put together child who starts to look regularly unkempt; a student whose grades plummet or who stops handing in homework; a child who eats lunch alone and has stopped palling around with their friends.

After noticing something might be wrong, the course teaches the next step is to ask the student without pressuring or casting judgment and letting them know you care and want to help.

Sometimes an adult can ask a question that causes more harm than good, said Luna-Herrera, the social studies teacher at California City Middle School, a two-hour drive into the desert from Los Angeles.

He took the course in spring 2021 and two weeks later put it to use. It was during distance learning and a student had failed to show up for online tutoring but he spotted her chatting online on the schools distance learning platform, having a heated dispute with her then-boyfriend. Luna reached out to her privately.

I asked her if she was OK, he said. Little by little, the girl told Luna-Herrera about problems with friends and her boyfriend and problems at home that left her feeling alone and desperately unanchored.

The course tells adults to ask open-ended questions that keep the conversation going, and not to project themselves into an adolescents problems with comments like: Youll be fine; Its not that bad; I went through that; Try to ignore it. What might seem trivial to an adult can feel overwhelming for a young person, and failure to recognize that can be a conversation stopper.

The 12-year old told Luna-Herrera she had considered hurting herself. Is that a recurring thought? he asked, recalling how his heart started racing as she revealed her suicide plan.

Like CPR first-aid training, the course teaches how to handle a crisis: Raise the alarm and get expert help. Do not leave a person contemplating suicide alone. As Luna-Herrera continued talking to the girl, he texted his school superintendent, who got the principal on the line, they called 911 and police rushed to the home, where they spoke to the girl and her mother, who was startled and unaware.

He absolutely saved that childs life, said Mojave Unified Superintendent Katherine Aguirre, who oversees the district of about 3,000 students, the majority of whom are Latino and Black children from economically disadvantaged families.

Aguirre recognized the need for behavioral heath training early in the pandemic and through the Department of Education trained all of her employees, from teachers to yard supervisors and cafeteria workers.

Its about awareness. And that Sandy Hook promise: If you see something, say something, she said.

That did not happen with 14-year-old Taya Bruell.

Taya was a bright, precocious student who had started struggling with mental health issues at about 11, according to her father, Harry Bruell. At the time, the family lived in Boulder, Colorado where Taya was hospitalized at one point for psychiatric care but kept up the trappings of a model student: She got straight As, was co-leader of her high school writing club and in her spare time taught senior citizens to use computers.

For a literature class, Taya was assigned to keep a journal. In it, she drew a disturbing portrait that showed self-harm and wrote about how much she hated her body and was hearing voices she wanted to silence.

Her teacher read the assignment and wrote: Taya, very thorough journal. I loved reading the entries. A+

Three months later in February 2016, Taya killed herself. After her death, Tayas parents discovered the journal in her room and brought it to the school, where they learned Tayas teacher had not informed the school counselor or administrators of what she had seen. They dont blame the teacher but will always wonder what if she had not ignored the signs of danger.

I dont think the teacher wanted to hurt our daughter. I think she had no idea what to do when she read those stark warning signs in Tayas journal, said her father, who has since relocated with the family to Santa Barbara, California.

He believes legislation to require teacher training in behavioral health will save lives. It teaches you to raise the alarm, and not just walk away, which is what happened to Taya.
Copyright  2022 Albuquerque Journal

An Isleta Police Department officer shot at, but did not hit, a man suspected of fleeing a traffic stop in a stolen car and driving the wrong way on Interstate 25 south of Albuquerque around 1 a.m. Monday.

The suspect, 33-year-old Jason Ramirez of Los Lunas, was arrested after a short foot chase and is charged with aggravated assault on a peace officer, aggravated fleeing from a law enforcement officer, receiving or transferring a stolen motor vehicle, and other crimes. He was taken to a hospital to be treated for injuries that a New Mexico State Police spokesman said were not related to the incident. Its unclear who his attorney will be.

No officers or deputies were injured.

Officer Dusty Francisco, a spokesman for New Mexico State Police, said that, around 12:30 a.m., Los Lunas Police Department officers tried to stop a red Hyundai sedan that had been reported stolen.

The car fled and officers  with the help of the Valencia County Sheriffs Office  began to pursue it until the driver merged onto Interstate 25 heading north. At that point, the officers notified the Isleta Police Department and the Bernalillo County Sheriffs Office.

A short time later, an officer from Isleta spotted the Hyundai on Broadway and tried to stop it. Again, the driver fled, driving southbound onto northbound I-25, nearly striking an officer, Francisco wrote in a news release.

As the Hyundai approached milepost 213, the driver drove toward two IPD officers who were parked on the northbound shoulder, he said. At that time, one IPD officer discharged his department-issued firearm toward the Hyundai.

The driver continued to flee and exited the interstate at Isleta. Thats where BCSO joined the chase and set up tire deflation devices  which Francisco said were successful, although the driver did not stop.

As the driver tried to get on the interstate again at Rio Bravo, deputies conducted a pursuit intervention technique and the Hyundai came to a stop.

The driver, later identified as Ramirez, got out and fled on foot, Francisco said. After a chase, he was taken into custody.

There were three passengers in the Hyundai, a woman and two men. One of the men, 37-year-old Daniel Sanchez of Los Lunas, was arrested on an unrelated felony warrant. The other passengers were released.
PALMA DE MALLORCA, Spain  The U.S. government on Monday seized a 254-foot yacht in Spain owned by an oligarch with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, a first by the Biden administration under sanctions imposed after the Kremlins invasion of Ukraine and targeting pricey assets of Russian elites.

Spains Civil Guard and U.S. federal agents descended on the Tango at the Marina Real in the port of Palma de Mallorca, the capital of Spains Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean Sea. Associated Press reporters at the scene saw police going in and out of the boat.

The U.S. Justice Department, which obtained a warrant from a federal judge in Washington, alleges the yacht should be forfeited for violating U.S. bank fraud, money laundering and sanctions statutes.

Superyachtfan.com, a specialized website that tracks the worlds largest and most exclusive recreational boats, values the 78-meter vessel, which carries the Cook Islands flag, at $120 million.

The yacht is among the assets linked to Viktor Vekselberg, a billionaire and close Putin ally who heads the Moscow-based Renova Group, a conglomerate encompassing metals, mining, tech and other assets, according to U.S. Treasury Department documents.

All of Vekselbergs assets in the United States are frozen and American companies are barred from doing business with him and his entities. The Ukrainian-born businessman built his fortune by investing in the aluminum and oil industries in the post-Soviet era.

Prosecutors allege Vekselberg bought the Tango in 2011 and has owned it since then, though they believe he has used shell companies to try to obfuscate his ownership and to avoid financial oversight.

They contend Vekselberg and those working for him continued to make payments using U.S. banks to support and maintain the yacht, even after sanctions were imposed on him in 2018. Those payments included a stay in December 2020 at a luxury water villa resort in the Maldives and fees to moor the yacht.

Its the first U.S. seizure of an oligarchs yacht since U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland and U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen assembled a task force known as REPO  short for Russian Elites, Proxies and Oligarchs  as an effort to enforce sanctions after Russia invaded Ukraine in late February.

It will not be the last. Garland said in a statement. Together, with our international partners, we will do everything possible to hold accountable any individual whose criminal acts enable the Russian government to continue its unjust war.

Vekselberg has long had ties to the U.S., including a green card he once held and homes in New York and Connecticut. He was also questioned in special counsel Robert Muellers investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and has worked closely with his American cousin, Andrew Intrater, who heads the New York investment management firm Columbus Nova.

Vekselberg and Intrater were thrust into the spotlight in that investigation after the lawyer for adult film star Stormy Daniels released a memo that claimed $500,000 in hush money was routed through Columbus Nova to a shell company set up by Donald Trumps personal attorney, Michael Cohen. Columbus Nova denied that Vekselberg played any role in its payments to Cohen.

Vekselberg and Intrater met with Cohen at Trump Tower, one of several meetings between members of Trumps inner circle and high-level Russians during Trumps 2016 campaign and the transition before his presidency.

The 64-year-old Vekselberg founded Renova Group more than three decades ago. The group holds the largest stake in United Co. Rusal, Russias biggest aluminum producer, among other investments.

Vekselberg was first sanctioned by the U.S. in 2018, and again in March of this year, shortly after the invasion of Ukraine began. Vekselberg has also been sanctioned by authorities in the United Kingdom.

The yacht sails under the Cook Islands flag and is owned by a company registered in the British Virgin Islands administered by different societies in Panama, the Civil Guard said, following a complicated financial and societal web to conceal its truthful ownership.

Agents confiscated documents and computers inside the yacht that will be analyzed to confirm he real identity of the owner, it said.

The U.S. Justice Department has also launched a sanctions enforcement task force known as KleptoCapture, which also aims to enforce financial restrictions in the U.S. imposed on Russia and its billionaires, working with the FBI, the U.S. Treasury and other federal agencies. That task force will also target financial institutions and entities that have helped oligarchs move money to dodge sanctions.

The White House has said that many allied countries, including German, the United Kingdom, France, Italy and others are involved in trying to collect and share information against Russians targeted for sanctions. In his State of the Union address on March 1, President Joe Biden warned oligarchs that the U.S. and European allies would find and seize your yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets.

We are coming for your ill-begotten gains, he said.

Mondays capture is not the first time Spanish authorities have been involved in the seizure of a Russian oligarchs superyacht. Officials said they had seized a vessel valued at over $140 million owned by the CEO of a state-owned defense conglomerate and a close Putin ally.

French authorities have seized superyachts, including one believed to belong to Igor Sechin, a Putin ally who runs Russian oil giant Rosneft, which has been on the U.S. sanctions list since Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.

Italy has seized several yachts and other assets.

Italian financial police moved quickly seizing the superyacht Lena belonging to Gennady Timchenko, an oligarch close to Putin, in the port of San Remo; the 65-meter (215-foot) Lady M owned by Alexei Mordashov in nearby Imperia, featuring six suites and estimated to be worth 65 million euros; as well as villas in Tuscany and Como, according to government officials.

___

Parra reported from Madrid and Balsamo reported from Washington.
A woman New Mexico authorities describe as a violent serial shoplifter was arrested in Oklahoma and will be extradited back to Albuquerque.

Brianna Garcia, 23, has been indicted on 20 counts, including shoplifting, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, and shooting at or from a motor vehicle. Its unclear who her attorney will be.

Jerri Mares, a spokeswoman for the state Attorney Generals Office which is prosecuting the case, said Garcia Garcia shoplifted a number of times in Albuquerque and the incidents quickly devolved into violence when Garcia was confronted by store associates.

Garcia brandished a handgun on several occasions, pointing it at store employees as she made her escape, and even discharging her firearm in the parking lot after walking out of one store, Mares said. Those acts of violence culminated on February 1, 2022 when Garcia fired a number of shots at the front door of a busy neighborhood Walmart after being confronted over a petty misdemeanor theft.

A warrant was issued for Garcias arrest in early February and she was pulled over in Beckham County, Oklahoma on March 15.
PHOENIX  A judge has certified the Iraqi governments extradition request for a Phoenix driving school owner on charges that he participated in the killings of two police officers 15 years ago in the Iraqi city of Fallujah as the leader of an al-Qaida group, sending the extradition decision to Washington to decide.

In the decision issued Friday in Arizona, U.S. Magistrate Judge Michael Morrissey concluded there was probable cause that Ali Yousif Ahmed Al-Nouri, who came to the United States as a refugee in 2009 and became a U.S. citizen in 2015, participated in the killings carried out by masked men in June 2006 and October 2006.

The U.S. Department of Justice confirmed it has no record of having ever before extradited anyone to Iraq under a decades-old U.S.-Iraq treaty.

Despite inconsistencies in statements by people interviewed about both attacks, Morrissey ordered the extradition request be sent to Washington. He said an inconsistency from a person cooperating with authorities wasnt enough to undermine probable cause in one case and that other statements made by a cooperator in the other killing are consistent in many significant details, even though there was an inconsistency in that persons account.

The magistrate judge rejected Ahmeds claim that his extradition isnt allowed under a U.S.-Iraq treaty provision that bars extraditions for offenses that are political in nature. He concluded al-Qaida wasnt part of an internal uprising or violent political disturbance under one court standard and instead that the killings were acts of international terrorism.

David Eisenberg, an attorney who represented Ahmed, said extradition carries the potential risk of execution for his client and that he intends on filing a petition with the court seeking a review of Morrisseys order.

Morrissey didnt make conclusions about whether Ahmed is innocent or guilty of the charges or whether his extradition is warranted. Instead, he determined there was evidence of probable cause to support each charge and certified the request.

The decision on whether to extradite Ahmed to Iraq is ultimately up to Secretary of State Antony Blinkens office, though the Justice Department typically plays a driving role in the extradition process. The Justice Department declined to comment on the decision.

Morrissey said the decision over whether humanitarian justifications should be used to refuse extradition is left up to the secretary of state, not the courts.

Prosecutors say Ahmed was seen by witnesses at the killings and later fled Iraq to avoid prosecution.

They questioned Ahmeds credibility, saying he gave conflicting explanations on how he suffered gunshot wounds while in Iraq and that they could not determine why he spent time in a Syrian prison before moving to the United States.

Ahmed denied involvement in the killings and being a member of a terror group. His lawyers argued Ahmed wouldnt get a fair trial amid the corruption in the Iraqi justice system and would likely face execution if he were forced back to his native country.

One of Ahmeds earlier attorneys had questioned why it took more than a decade for Iraqi authorities to formally accuse her client and criticized accounts of the killings from informants who had everything to gain by delivering the Trump administration a supposed terrorist refugee in an election year.

President Donald Trumps administration had sharply criticized the Obama-era settlement program, questioning whether enough was done to weed out those with terrorist ties.

Nearly a year ago, a judge in Northern California refused to allow the extradition of Omar Abdulsattar Ameen, who was accused of committing a killing for the Islamic State, to Iraq. The judge said cellphone evidence showed Ameen, who was granted refugee status in the United States in 2014 on the grounds he was a victim of terrorism, was in Turkey at the time of the slaying.

In the first shooting in which Ahmed is charged, authorities say an attacker held a gun to a witness head, while another attacker who started to fire on a police officer experienced a malfunction with his gun.

Another attacker then killed police Lt. Issam Ahmed Hussein. The witness later identified Ahmed, who wasnt wearing a mask, as the groups leader, according to court records.

Four months later, Iraqi authorities say Ahmed and other men fatally shot Officer Khalid Ibrahim Mohammad as the officer was outside a store.

A person who witnessed the shooting recognized Ahmed, whose mask had fallen off, as one of the assailants, according to court records.

Ahmeds attorneys had said the violence and turmoil in Iraq prompted their client to flee to Syria, where he lived in a refugee camp for three years before moving to the United States. Authorities said Ahmed spent time in a Syrian prison, though they couldnt determine what landed him behind bars.

Defense attorneys say Ahmed volunteered in Phoenixs refugee community and worked as a cultural adviser to the U.S. military, traveling to bases in other states to help military personnel as they prepared to deploy to the Middle East.

Ahmed bought a home on the northwestern edge of metro Phoenix and operated a driving school serving largely Middle Eastern immigrants. He has been detained since his arrest in January 2020.

___

This story has been updated to correct the spelling of the first name of Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

___

Associated Press writer Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report.
UNITED NATIONS  A top official in the global campaign against the use of land mines is urging Russia to halt the use in Ukraine of these weapons that too often kill and maim civilians.

Alicia Arango Olmos, Colombias ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva and this years president of the state parties to the 1997 convention banning the production and use of land mines, expressed deep concern at media reports that Russia is using land mines in its war in Ukraine.

She pointed to Human Rights Watch which said on March 29 that Ukrainian explosive ordnance disposal technician located banned ant-personnel mines in the eastern Kharkiv region a day earlier.

The rights group said Russia is known to possess the type of mines that were discovered, but Ukraine doesnt have them.

Arango Olmos told a news conference Monday that Ukraine is one of the 164 state parties to the convention, but Russia is not.

Monday was the International Day for Mine Awareness and Assistance in Mine Action.

___

KEY DEVELOPMENTS IN THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR:

 Russia faces growing outrage amid new evidence of atrocities

 Ukraine accuses Russia of massacre, city strewn with bodies

 World reacts with horror at images of slain civilians in Ukraine towns

 Drug shortages persist in Russia after start of Ukraine war

 Ukrainian refugees find jobs, kindness as they settle in

 Russian, Ukrainian ballet stars to dance together in Naples

 Go to https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine for more coverage

___

OTHER DEVELOPMENTS:

LVIV, Ukraine  Ukraines foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba said he spoke Monday with U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres about events in Bucha in what appear to be deliberate killings in the town on the outskirts of the capital Kyiv.

No place for Russia on the UN Human Rights Council, Kuleba said on Twitter. Ukraine will use all available UN mechanisms to collect evidence and hold Russian war criminals to account.

Videos and photos of streets in Bucha strewn with corpses of what appeared to be civilians, some with their hands tied behind their back, have led to global revulsion, calls for tougher sanctions, and Russias suspension from the U.N.s premiere human rights body, the Human Rights Council.

According to Ukraines prosecutor-general Iryna Venediktova, the bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Kyiv-area towns that were recently retaken from Russian forces.

Associated Press journalists have reported seeing dozens of the bodies in various spots around Bucha, northwest of the capital.



PARIS  The French foreign ministry announced Monday that France has decided to expel numerous Russian diplomats, saying their activities were contrary to our security interests.

The announcement came hours after Germany said it was expelling 40 diplomat and Lithuania said it expelled the Russian ambassador and will recall its envoy in Moscow. No number was immediately given for how many are being expelled by France.

German news agency dpa quoted German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser as saying that the diplomats being expelled are those whom we attribute to the Russian intelligence services.

Faeser says that we wont allow this criminal war of aggression to also be conducted as an information war in Germany.



UNITED NATIONS  Britains U.N. ambassador says a previously planned U.N. Security Council meeting Tuesday is certain to focus front and center on the killing of large numbers of civilians in Ukraine.

Some of the dead were found with their hands tied behind their backs after Russian troops left the Ukrainian town of Bucha on the outskirts of the capital Kyiv.

The United Kingdom holds the council presidency in April, and Ambassador Barbara Woodward said Britain didnt grant Russias request for a meeting on the situation in Bucha on Monday because we didnt see a good reason to have two meetings back to back on Ukraine.

She told reporters that the Security Council will be briefed Tuesday by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths and U.N. political chief Rosemary DiCarlo.

Woodward said that the images that we saw coming out of Bucha over the weekend were harrowing, appalling, probable evidence of war crimes and possibly a genocide.

___

MOSCOW  Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev says the country feels no impact from the expulsion of its diplomats by various European countries, and indicates Russia will respond in kind.

Medvedev was Russias president from 2008 through 2012 and is now deputy chairman of the security council under President Vladimir Putin. Writing on the messaging app Telegram, Medvedev says that everyone knows the response: it will be symmetrical and destructive for bilateral relations.

His comments came after Germany expelled 40 Russian diplomats Monday and Lithuania expelled the Russian ambassador and said it would recall its envoy in Moscow. France on Monday also announced it will expel numerous Russian diplomats.

___

LVIV, Ukraine  Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk says more than 1,550 civilians were evacuated on Monday from the besieged port of Mariupol in southeastern Ukraine.

Vereshchuk said a total of 2,405 people were evacuated along a humanitarian corridor route running from Mariupol to the Ukraine-held city of Zaporizhzhia, with 1,553 of those coming from Mariupol itself and the rest from other locations in the heavily contested area.

She said the people used the dwindling number of private vehicles left in the area to get out of Mariupol and that a convoy of seven buses sent to help remained unable to enter the city to collect people.

Mariupol, on the Sea of Azov, is a key Russian military objective that has faced horrific bombardment.

Vereshchuk added that 971 other people were evacuated from five locations in the eastern Luhansk region, where Russia is now focusing much of its military efforts. She accused Russia of systematically breaching a local cease-fire planned to facilitate evacuations there.

___

LVIV, Ukraine  Ukrainian prosecutor-general Iryna Venediktova told Ukrainian TV today that a similar humanitarian situation to Bucha exists in other parts of the country where Russian forces recently left, such as the areas around the northern cities of Sumy and Chernihiv.

Ukrainian authorities said the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in areas outside the Ukrainian capital, including Bucha, after last weeks withdrawal of Russian troops, many with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture.

She also said the situation in Borodyanka, which is further from Kyiv and was also held by Russian forces until recently, may be even worse.

Venediktova didnt specify what exactly had happened in Borodyanka but said the worst situation in terms of the victims is there.

___

BUCHAREST, Romania  Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed Romanias parliament Monday evening in a video call in which the leader said had Ukraine not defended itself, Russia would have carried out atrocities like that of Bucha all over Ukraine.

Zelenskyy, who visited the town of Bucha on Monday to see the alleged crimes of Russias forces against Ukrainian civilians, shared grim video footage during his address that showed areas strewn with dead bodies. The Bucha killings  which Zelenskyy labeled a genocide  have become the center of worldwide outrage against Russia.

The military tortured people and we have every reason to believe that there are many more people killed, Zelenskyy said. Much more than we know now.

The Ukrainian leader also called for tougher sanctions, saying Russia must be deprived of all resources, primarily economic and said that the fate of the region will be decided by the outcome of the war in Ukraine.

Before the Ukrainian leaders address, the president of Romanias Chamber of Deputies, Marcel Ciolacu, said the last few days have shown us horrible images that have overwhelmed and revolted us all.

I support a speedy investigation by the International Criminal Court, Ciolacu said.

___

KYIV, Ukraine  The Ukrainian government says that 18 journalists have been killed in the country since Russias invasion began on Feb. 24.

The Ukrainian Culture and Information Ministry said in a statement on social media Monday that each of the deaths and other crimes against media representatives will be investigated.

The ministry added that another 13 journalists had been wounded, eight had been abducted or taken prisoner and three journalists were still missing. It said that several crimes had been committed against journalists from 11 countries, including Ukraine.

___

LVIV, Ukraine  The governor of Ukraines northern Sumy region says Russian forces no longer control any settlements in the area following their retreat, although some small groups of Russian troops remain.

The city of Sumy is near the border with Russia and was besieged by Russian troops when the invasion began in February, as other Russian forces pushed onward to join efforts to attack the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, from the northeast. Russia began withdrawing troops from the area around Kyiv last week and says it is now focusing its efforts on the fighting in eastern Ukraine.

Sumy Gov. Dmytro Zhyvystskyy said on Ukrainian TV that currently there are no occupied settlements and that invading forces have pulled back across the border into Russia with their vehicles and artillery.

However, he added, there are still individual units and small groups of Russian troops and now they are being caught by the Ukrainian army and local Territorial Defense volunteers.

A clean-up is happening across the whole territory of the region, he said.

___

THE HAGUE, Netherlands  The United States is allocating $250,000 to the global chemical weapons watchdog to provide assistance and protection to Ukraine if it is targeted or threatened with chemical weapons.

The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons announced the contribution Monday, following a meeting last Thursday between Marc Shaw, deputy assistant secretary at the State Departments Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance and OPCW Director-General Fernando Arias.

Western nations have warned of possible chemical weapons attacks by Russian forces since Moscow launched its invasion of its neighbor in late February.

Shaw said in a statement that the United States stands with Ukraine and all those who face the threat of chemical weapons use.

He says he hopes the money will allow the organization to quickly assist Ukraine as it seeks protection against chemical threats from the Russian government.

___

WASHINGTON  U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday called for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin and additional sanctions following reported atrocities in Bucha, one of the towns surrounding the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv where Ukrainian officials say the bodies of civilians have been found.

Whats happening in Bucha is outrageous and everyone sees it, Biden said.

Bidens comments came after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited the city called the Russian actions genocide. Zelenskyy also called for the West to apply tougher sanctions against Russia.

Biden, however, stopped short of calling the actions genocide.

The bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Kyiv-area towns that were recently retaken from Russian forces, said Ukraines prosecutor-general, Iryna Venediktova. Associated Press journalists saw the bodies of at least 21 people in various spots around Bucha, northwest of the capital.

We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue the fight. And we have to gather all the detail so this can be an actual  have a war crimes trial, Biden said.

___

WASHINGTON  A senior U.S. defense official says about two-thirds of the roughly 20 Russian battalion groups that had been located around Kyiv have now left and are either in Belarus or on their way there.

The U.S. has said that the vast majority of Russias approximately 125 battalion groups had been in Ukraine overall during the early fighting.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a military assessment, said the U.S. assesses that Russian forces are being resupplied and reinforced in Belarus and would then go back into Ukraine, potentially in the Donbas region in the east.

In addition, Russian troops have been moving out of Sumy and back into Russia. But they have been reinforcing and repositioning their artillery and putting more energy into the fight around the city of Izyum, which lies on a key route to the Donbas.

The official said overall, Russia has launched more than 1,400 missiles into Ukraine since the war began. In recent days, those strikes have been more focused on the east and on Mariupol. The defense official said the U.S. cant independently verify details of the atrocities in Bucha, but has no reason to doubt the claims. U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was speaking with Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov on Monday morning.

 AP writer Lolita Baldor in Washington contributed to this report.

___

VILNIUS, Lithuania  Lithuania on Monday announced that it will expel Russias ambassador and recall its envoy in Moscow in reaction to increasing signs that Russian forces may have committed war crimes in Ukraine.

The Baltic country also decided to close a Russian consulate in the port city of Klaipeda, where it has a large offshore LNG import terminal.

Lithuania strongly condemned the atrocities committed by the Russian armed forces in occupied Ukrainian cities, including the brutal massacres in Bucha. All war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the Russian armed forces in Ukraine will not be forgotten, Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said Monday.

He added that Lithuanias ambassador to Ukraine was returning to Kyiv and that Lithuanias European Union and NATO partners have been informed of its decision to expel the Russian ambassador. He called on them to do the same.

In neighboring Latvia, Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics said that Riga will narrow diplomatic relations with the Russian Federation, according to the Baltic News Service. No decision was made regarding reducing the ties.

___

A Russian law enforcement agency says it has launched its own investigation into allegations that Ukrainian civilians were massacred in suburbs of Kyiv which were held by Russian troops, focusing on what it calls false information about Russian forces.

The Investigative Committee claims Ukrainian authorities made the allegations with the aim of discrediting Russian troops and that those involved should be investigated over possible breaches of a new Russian law banning what the government deems to be false information about its forces.

Russian law enforcement has launched several investigations since Russian troops entered Ukraine, typically into incidents such as the shelling of areas held by Russia-backed separatists.

___

KYIV, Ukraine  Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that Russia needs to move quickly to negotiate an agreement to end the war.

Speaking on a visit Monday to the town of Bucha outside Kyiv, where hundreds of civilians were found dead after Russian troops retreat last week, Zelenskyy said the evidence of atrocities makes it hard to conduct talks with Russia.

Its very difficult to conduct negotiations when you see what they did here, Zelenskyy said, adding that in Bucha and other places dead people have been found in barrels, basements, strangled, tortured. He added that the Russian leadership needs to think faster if it has what to think with.

Zelenskyy added that the longer the Russian Federation drags it out, the worse it will exacerbate its own situation and this war. Zelenskyy reaffirmed his criticism of former German Chancellor Angela Merkels opposition to Ukraines bid to join NATO, saying that she and other Western leaders who resisted the move should come to Bucha to see what the flirting with the Russian Federation leads to.

___

GENEVA  The United States plans to seek a suspension of Russia from its seat on the U.N.s top human rights body in the wake of rising signs that Russian forces may have committed war crimes in Ukraine, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said Monday.

According to a statement from her office, Thomas-Greenfield made the call for Russia to be stripped of its seat in the Human Rights Council in the wake of reports over the weekend about violence against civilians in the town of Bucha, near the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, after Russian forces pulled out.

Any decision to suspend Russia would require a decision by the U.N. General Assembly in New York.

Russia and the other four permanent members of the U.N. Security Council  Britain, China, France and the United States  all currently have seats on the 47-member rights council, which is based in Geneva. The United States rejoined the council this year.

Thomas-Greenfield mentioned the U.S. plan in a meeting with Romanian Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca, her office said.

In New York, General Assembly spokeswoman Paulina Kubiak said on Monday that no request for a meeting on the issue has been received yet.

___

GENEVA  The United Nations top human rights official is calling for independent and effective investigations into what happened in the Ukrainian town of Bucha.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said in a statement Monday that she is horrified by the images of civilians lying dead on the streets and in improvised graves.

She added that reports emerging from this and other areas raise serious and disturbing questions about possible war crimes, grave breaches of international humanitarian law and serious violations of international human rights law.

Bachelet said its essential that all bodies be exhumed and identified so that victims families can be informed and the exact causes of death determined. She said all measures should be taken to preserve evidence.

It is vital that all efforts are made to ensure there are independent and effective investigations into what happened in Bucha to ensure truth, justice and accountability, as well as reparations and remedy for victims and their families, Bachelet said.

___

LONDON  Britain has condemned Russias barbaric killing of civilians in Ukraine, though it stopped short of calling Moscows actions genocide.

Prime Minister Boris Johnsons spokesman, Max Blain, said bodies found in areas recently recaptured from Russia showed despicable attacks against innocent civilians, and they are yet more evidence that Putin and his army are committing what appear to be war crimes in Ukraine.

Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and some Western leaders have accused Russia of committing genocide.

Blain said the prime ministers view is that Putin crossed the threshold of barbarism some time ago, but added that only a court can make a determination of genocide.

Britain is urging Western allies to enforce tougher sanctions to ratchet up pressure on Russia, including cutting it off completely from t

___

MOSCOW  Russias top diplomat has dismissed Ukraines accusations that Russian troops committed atrocities against its civilians as a staged provocation.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the start of his talks Monday with U.N. Under-Secretary-General Martin Griffiths that Moscow sees the Ukrainian claim of a massacre of civilians in Bucha outside Kyiv as a provocation that posed a direct threat to global peace and security.

Lavrov noted that Russia has called for an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council but the U.K. that currently chairs it refused to convene it. He vowed to press the demand for holding the meeting.

Ukrainian authorities said the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in areas outside the Ukrainian capital after last weeks withdrawal of Russian troops, many with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture. A growing number of world leaders have voiced outrage and called for tougher sanctions against Moscow.

Lavrov charged that the mayor of Bucha made no mention of atrocities against civilians a day after Russian troops left Bucha on Wednesday, but two days later scores of bodies were photographed scattered in the streets in what the Russian minister described as a stage-managed anti-Russian provocation.

___

MOSCOW  The Kremlin has strongly rejected the accusations that Russian troops committed atrocities against civilians in Ukraine and pushed for a meeting of the United Nations Security Council.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that the Ukrainian claims that Russian troops had killed hundreds of civilians outside Kyiv cant be trusted, adding that we categorically reject the accusations. Peskovs comment in a conference call with reporters followed the Russian Defense Ministrys statement accusing the Ukrainian authorities of stage-managing what it described as a provocation to smear Russia.

Ukrainian authorities have said the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in areas outside the Ukrainian capital after last weeks withdrawal of Russian troops, many with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture. International leaders have condemned the reported atrocities and called for tougher sanctions against Moscow.

Peskov said that photo and video materials from the area reflected unspecified manipulations and urged international leaders to carefully analyze the facts and hear the Russian arguments before rushing to blame Moscow.

Russia has called for an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council but the U.K. which currently chairs it refused to convene it, according to Mikhail Ulyanov, the Russian envoy at the international organizations offices in Vienna.

Peskov said that Russia will keep pushing for the meeting, noting that Russia wants the issue to be discussed at the highest level.

___

BRUSSELS  The European Unions top diplomat has joined a growing chorus of international criticism blaming the Russian armed forces for alleged atrocities committed against civilians in Ukraine.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell says the Russian authorities are responsible for these atrocities, committed while they had effective control of the area. They are subject to the international law of occupation.

Borrell said Monday that the haunting images of large numbers of civilian deaths and casualties, as well as destruction of civilian infrastructures show the true face of the brutal war of aggression Russia is waging against Ukraine and its people.

Working with the U.S., U.K. and other international partners, the EU has been ramping up sanctions against Russia since it invaded Ukraine in February. Borrell says the 27-country bloc will advance, as a matter of urgency, work on further sanctions against Russia.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has acquired a 9% stake in Twitter to become its largest shareholder while joining other critics in questioning the social media platforms dedication to free speech and the First Amendment.

Musks ultimate aim in acquiring 73.5 million shares, worth about $3 billion, isnt clear. Yet in late March Musk, who has 80 million Twitter followers and is active on the site, questioned free speech on Twitter and whether the platform is undermining democracy.

In years past, Twitter and other social platforms have taken fire for allowing harmful speech ranging from incitement to violence to coordinated harassment and racial abuse. More recently, these platforms have made concerted efforts to rein in such behavior, often drawing criticism similar to Musks from the political right. Both Twitter and Facebook faced blowback after suspending the accounts run by former President Donald Trump following the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection last year.

Its unclear just when Musk bought the stake. A U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing made public on Monday says the event triggering the filing happened March 14. Musk has also raised the possibility with his massive and loyal Twitter following, that he could create a rival social media network.

Industry analysts and legal experts say Musk could begin advocating for changes at Twitter immediately if he chooses. In a note to investors, CFRA Analyst Angelo Zino wrote that Twitter could be viewed as an acquisition target because the value of its shares have been falling since early last year.

Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey stepped down as CEO in November. Musks stake in Twitter is now more than four times the size of Dorseys, who had been the largest individual shareholder.

Musks actual investment is a very small percentage of his wealth, and an all-out buyout should not be ruled out, wrote Zino, who covers Twitter and social media.

Musk could see Twitter as an investment with big growth ahead, or he could have noninvestment reasons for the purchase, such as buying to make sure the platform doesnt restrain his speech, said Erik Gordon, a law and business professor at the University of Michigan.

What he could be worried about is if enough of his tweets start to look like disinformation, that Twitter says were doing our job against disinformation.' Gordon said. No CEO would refuse to take a call from the companys top shareholder, so the purchase gives Musk access to Twitters top management, he said.

Musk has not spoken specifically about any Twitter rule changes he might push, but the social media platforms history of suspensions and bans is well documented.

Trumps suspension from both Twitter and Facebook has raised difficult questions about free speech in a social media industry dominated by a few tech giants  an issue that Trump and conservative media have seized upon. There was broad praise for Musk from those circles Monday.

Michael Flynn, the retired general who served briefly as Donald Trumps national security adviser, and who was suspended from Twitter in January 2021, sent Musk some free advice via Telegram.

Hey Elon, how about letting all of those dropped from twitter for being America First and Pro-Trump back on Twitter!!!, Flynn wrote.

Twitter earlier this year banned the personal account of far-right U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene for multiple violations of the platforms COVID-19 misinformation policy. Other people banned in recent years include Steve Bannon, for suggesting the beheading of Dr. Anthony Fauci, former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke for breaking the social media sites rules forbidding hate speech, and right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his Infowars show for abusive behavior.

Musk recently described himself on Twitter as a free speech absolutist in explaining why the Starlink satellite internet service  part of his aerospace company SpaceX  would not block Russian state media outlets, which have spread propaganda and misinformation in line with the Kremlins narrative on its war in Ukraine.

But such absolutism would not be welcome by advertisers who are Twitters chief revenue source, said Brian Wieser, global president of business intelligence at GroupM. Brands that advertise on Twitter strongly prefer some content standards because a toxic platform can drive many other users away.

Certain kinds of speech, such as advocating an insurrection or advocating hurting people, are not the kinds of things most advertisers want to support, said Wieser, who analyzes the media industry for advertisers.

Twitters stock surged nearly 30% Monday. Since March 14, the date listed on filing by Twitter, its shares are up nearly 50%, meaning that Musks investment has paid handsomely  so far.

Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In March, Musk told his millions of followers on Twitter that he was  giving serious thought  to creating his own social media platform, and has clashed repeatedly with financial regulators about his use of Twitter.

Musk is locked into a bitter dispute with the SEC over his ability to post on Twitter. His lawyer has contended in court motions that the SEC is infringing on the Tesla CEOs First Amendment rights.

In October of 2018, Musk and Tesla agreed to pay $40 million in civil fines and for Musk to have his tweets approved by a corporate lawyer after he tweeted about having the money to take Tesla private at $420 per share.

The funding was far from secured and the electric vehicle company remains public, but Teslas stock price jumped. The settlement came after the SEC brought a securities fraud charge. It specified governance changes, including Musks ouster as board chairman, as well as pre-approval of his tweets.

Musks lawyer is now asking a U.S. District Court judge in Manhattan to throw out the settlement, contending that the SEC is harassing him and infringing on his First Amendment rights.

The SEC says it has legal authority to subpoena Tesla and Musk about his tweets, and that Musks move to throw out the settlement is not valid.

The SEC also disclosed that it is investigating Musks Nov. 6, 2021 tweets that asked followers whether he should sell 10% of his Tesla stake. The commission said it issued administrative subpoenas while investigating whether Musk and Tesla are complying with disclosure controls in the 2018 agreement.

Musk ended up selling more than 15 million shares worth roughly $16.4 billion. With some sales in late December, Musk is close to selling 10%.

____

Matt OBrien and Michelle R. Smith contributed from Providence, Rhode Island. Krisher reported from Detroit.
Copyright  2022 Albuquerque Journal

It's officially spring in New Mexico  so, naturally, the state will be on a roller coaster of fluctuating temperatures, high winds and blowing dust this week.

Scott Overpeck, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said that wind gusts of 40-50 mph could hinder road travel along I-40 Tuesday.

I wouldn't be surprised if we had some tree damage and isolated power outages, he said.

Temperatures across New Mexico are expected to climb 10 to 20 degrees above normal on Tuesday, with Albuquerque possibly reaching 80 degrees.

Eastern New Mexico will likely bear the brunt of Tuesday's heat, with Roswell perhaps reaching 93 degrees and Clovis maybe seeing a high of 87.

Low humidity and dry vegetation will fuel fire weather warnings for most of the state.

With those really high winds, it's going to make for conditions where, if fire does form, it could really get out of hand in a hurry, Overpeck said.

The City of Albuquerque's Environmental Health Department warns that winds in the metro area could reach 30 mph, with higher gusts in the afternoon.

Contractors and businesses that generate dust should water loose soils and piles, and be prepared to shut down operations early, the department said in a news release.

Temperatures should drop statewide on Wednesday, but high winds could linger.

Albuquerque is expected to reach 66 degrees, but Thursday morning temperatures could dip to 33 degrees.

If there is any tender vegetation or anything that's greening up that you want to protect, Thursday morning and Friday morning are when you want to do that, Overpeck said. It's going to be pretty cold for the beginning of April.

Thursday temperatures could reach 65 degrees in Albuquerque.

A warming trend begins Friday, with a high temperature of 71 degrees forecast for the metro.

The weekend should be sunny in the city, with Saturday possibly reaching 78 degrees and Sunday seeing a high of 76.

Theresa Davis is a Report for America corps member covering water and the environment for the Albuquerque Journal.
PHOENIX  Dick Kelsey, a retired Associated Press broadcast editor who was revered as much for his humor as his hardworking nature, has died after a seven-year battle with cancer. He was 76.

Kelsey died Thursday surrounded by loved ones at his Phoenix home.

The longtime editor never sought attention in the newsroom of APs West Regional Desk in Phoenix unless it was to share a funny story or sly observation. From the glint in his eye, it was clear when he was about to toss out a joke or his own funny spin on the days news.

A storyteller at heart, Kelsey regaled co-workers with anecdotes of his exploits in AM radio in Buffalo, New York, in the 1970s and coverage of decades-old stories. He also had an encyclopedic knowledge of rock n roll and an uncanny ability to recite an apt lyric from Chuck Berry, Bruce Springsteen or Bob Dylan that connected with the dominant news story of the day, said Josh Hoffner, AP news editor for national beats and one of Kelseys former managers.

Dick was a talented journalist, a gleeful storyteller and a terrific all-around person who was absolutely adored by his many colleagues and friends at the AP, Hoffner said. He loved nothing more than rolling up his sleeves and going to work on a big breaking story. His presence in the newsroom was legendary, with his infectious sense of humor, sharp wit and love of puns that never disappointed (even the bad ones).

Kelsey worked primarily in broadcast during his time in Arizona, editing state news summaries sent to radio and TV stations across the Western U.S. Even when the West Regional Desk  which includes a team of Phoenix reporters  was a hectic hub over a major story, he remained calm.

Dick was a steady presence on the APs west region broadcast desk, said Chris Havlik, an AP video producer and former broadcast supervisor. He could always be counted on to keep things light in the newsroom even when he was in the middle of writing and updating news summaries for 13 different states seemingly all at once.

J. Richard Kelsey was born in Buffalo, New York, and grew up in nearby Lockport. He fell in love with radio and television at a young age. Overcoming a childhood stutter fueled his mission to someday be on the air in whatever medium so people would listen to his voice, said his wife, Sharon.

Thats all he ever wanted to be, she said. How many other people are that lucky to get to do exactly what they wanted to do with their life?

At Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, Kelsey decided to minor in radio-TV and ended up in a few classes with a young David Letterman. Kelsey would confirm that the former Late Show TV host was just as hilarious then.

Upon graduation, he was hired at his hometown radio station, WUSJ. He thrived as a disc jockey, newsman and talk show host. From there, Kelsey went to radio stations in Buffalo and Erie, Pennsylvania. By 1980, he moved westward and had broadcast stints in Denver and Austin, Texas.

Kelsey then made the leap into print journalism and spent a few years at the United Press International in Dallas. By the 1990s, he moved to its Denver office and was covering some of the biggest news stories. Among them were 6-year-old JonBenet Ramseys killing and the Oklahoma City bombing trials.

I think he was quite proud of that  that he was able to juggle all that and get the information, help everybody, Sharon Kelsey said.

When the UPI/Denver bureau closed, Kelsey took a job as a news director at a radio station and then as a writer/assignment editor at a TV station. In 2005, he landed at the AP as a broadcast editor in Kansas City, Missouri.

Jim Clarke, APs managing director of local markets, was the news editor who hired Kelsey. Clarke recalls getting a call from Kelsey his first day in town. His new hire had gotten into an accident, and his car  with all his belongings  was totaled. But what stuck out was Kelseys resilience.

He instantly fell into the routine. I mean, Ive on-boarded a few reporters and editors in my life at the AP, but this guy took to it absolutely like a fish to water, Clarke said. The broadcast report instantly improved because he wanted to do a good job.

Kelsey also enjoyed keeping in touch with anyone he mentored  and not just in journalism. He was very proud of being 28 years sober and using his experience when being a sponsor for someone else.

He helped other people shine, Sharon Kelsey said. He was brilliant in his own way. But it was an unassuming way.  And I think thats a real quality.

Besides his wife, Kelsey is survived by his daughter, Jennifer, son-in-law Eric, grandson Cooper and sister M. Jane Kelsey. A private service is planned.

On his last day before retiring in 2017, Kelsey sent a parting note to colleagues saying he was, for once, speechless.

This has been a bittersweet day for me, but the sweet part is all the kind words Ive received by phone, email and IM, Kelsey wrote. The past 12 years, 8 months and 15 days (give or take) at The Associated Press have given me a ringside seat to real journalism alongside the best in the business. Stay cool everyone.
The recent twitter thread between Chennai Super Kings official fan club  Whistle Podu Army, Equitas Bank and Chennai Super Kings went buzzing in twitter today with the announcement of CSKs meet and greet for its super fans on April 4th. The tweet thread began as the official fans club tweeted asking if all the fans could meet their favourite Super Kings to which Equitas Bank tweeted with When we can launch a CSK Debit Card for the Super Fans, why not this? The fans on twitter took this over guessing on the execution of this! When Chennai Super Kings joined the twitter thread, asking what is happening here, the fans just could not stop the excitement!

Equitas is partnering with Chennai Super Kings for the 4th time for IPL with the banks logo at the back of their helmet and cap, carrying the message of #BankBehindEveryChampion. When the official fans club tweeted their wish, the bank pitched in to make it happen by fulfilling the wish of the super fans! The CSK meet and greet will be a virtual event, going live from Whistle Podu Armys Facebook handle and Equitas Small Finance Banks Youtube channel on April 4th, 5 PM.

Equitas has recently launched their limited edition CSK Debit Card for the super fans to flaunt their yellove while also earning upto 7%* interest on savings for balances above Rs 5 lakhs upto Rs 2 Crores. To add on to the Yellove, the bank has launched this debit card on a virtual world www.equiverse.in where the visitors can enter and experience the dressing room of the CSK team, walk around the hallway and the match stadium, arrive at the launch of the debit card and take one by creating an account. This was built keeping the customer experience in mind and the shared space provided to the audience in the virtual world with the teams players avatars doubled the excitement of the fans.

Apart from the beyond banking initiatives that focuses on making the society a better place to live for all, this virtual experience sets a new room for the customers to experience a first-of-a-kind banking experience in a virtual world along with the feel-good factor of knowing what your money does to the society while banking with Equitas.
Rebel Foods, the worlds largest internet restaurant company, recently announced achieving the milestone of opening 500+ restaurants in 10 countries under their popular brand, Faasos. This achievement made the brand the largest Indian-origin QSR chain, globally by scale. To celebrate this achievement, Faasos has collaborated with rapper MC Heam to produce a rap video celebrating the phenomenal growth of its new digital campaign.

Faasos inspirational brand campaign captures the brands journey, its innovations, and the customer love received. The video features MC Heam along with Faasos employees dancing together following a hook step. The rap further speaks about the brand's belief in trying new things, breaking age-old stereotypes and surprising the world.

To create a buzz on social media, Faasos has also started a Hook Step Challenge, a signature dance step from the music video featuring MC Heam. The brand is further partnering with fellow dance influencers like Rupesh Soni and Sagar Bora as well as Bigg Boss finalist Pratik Sehajpal to participate in the hook step challenge.

To add to this celebration and give customers the chance to get more for their money, Faasos is offering Great Deals Under 500 (Faasos 500 Bash) limited time wrap combos from now until April 10, 2022. The combos include delightful flavours including Smoked Butter Chicken Tikka Wrap, Baked Pizza Wrap (Veg), and sides like the Cheese Melt Rice Bowl! Sweet Potato Wedges, Choco Lava, and coke.

Sharing his thoughts on the campaign Indrajit Ghosh - VP of Marketing and Communication, Rebel Foods said - Faasos crossing 500 restaurants mark is a remarkable achievement for us. With our collaboration with MC Heam, we have further defined Faasos persona while reaching out to our audience through the video and rap. Customer-first is what Rebel Foods is all about, hence, as a celebration to this feat achieved by the brand, we are offering "great deals under 500" for our customers at Faasos.

MC Heam said, It was a wonderful experience collaborating with Faasos. And especially for a milestone like this where an Indian brand has achieved a feat of going global with 500 restaurants across 10 countries its a project I will cherish forever. I really hope this rap receives a lot of love from people all over the world.
HDFC Ltd, India's biggest housing financing firm, is going to merge with HDFC Bank, the largest private sector bank in the country, to form a corporation with a net worth of Rs 3.3 lakh crore and a combined balance sheet of Rs 17.87 lakh crore.

HDFC Bank will remain India's second-largest lender after State Bank of India, its size will be more than double that of the country's third-largest lender, ICICI bank, after the merger.

The deal is scheduled to close in 18 months, conditioned to regulatory approvals, and in Q2 or Q3 of FY24. The amalgamated organisation would be led by Sashi Jagdishan, CEO and MD of HDFC Bank, while the present CEO of HDFC, Keki Mistry will join the board of directors as a the director. Deepak Parekh, the chairman of HDFC since 1978, will retire. According to the chairman of HDFC Bank, Atanu Chakraborty, board composition will be discussed with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

Parekh said: We had to find a home for ourselves after 45 years in housing finance, supplying 9 million homes to Indians. We found it within our own family in our own bank."

"Several regulations for banks and NBFCs have been coordinated over the past few years, allowing for a potential merger." Furthermore, the ensuing larger balance sheet would enable for the underwriting of large ticket infrastructure loans, accelerate credit development in the economy, enhance affordable housing, and increase lending to priority sectors, including agriculture," he added. HDFC's subsidiaries and affiliates will become HDFC Bank subsidiaries and associates once the programme is fully implemented. HDFC shareholders will get 42 HDFC Bank shares, each with a nominal value of Rs 1 for 25 shares placed in HDFC Ltd.

According to the proposal, HDFC's equity shares in HDFC Bank will be cancelled. From the first year onwards, the merger will be EPS positive. Public shareholders would own 100% of HDFC Bank, with existing HDFC shareholders owning 41%.

The RBI's clearance will be crucial because the merger bank will possess 48 percent of life insurance, 50 percent of general insurance, and 69 percent of the group's AMC businesses, as found out by Macquarie Research.

In a letter to the RBI, HDFC has requested more time and a gradual outlook to meet SLR, CRR, and priority sector lending requirements. Permission has also been acquired for the bank to maintain and, if necessary, expand its position in HDFC Life Insurance and continue to have a stake in HDB Financial Services. The RBI is taking these requests into account.

The requested transaction checks all the boxes in terms of product completion, product, home loans product leadership and other retail assets products, a customer base and distribution strength that can be used to cross-sell a full suite of financial products according to Shashi Jagdishan.Given that HDFC Bank is India's largest mortgage lender, analysts predict that the merger will result in considerable market share gains for HDFC Bank. The largest and most transformative merger in the Indian financial services sector, according to Samir Bahl, CEO, Anand Rathi Advisors' Investment Banking. "Through this acquisition, HDFC Bank gains an unrivalled advantage in the mortgage portfolio, offering it with a massive jump in distribution to rural and semi urban areas, as well as a large chance to cross-sell," says the statement.

According to S&P Global Ratings, the merger will increase HDFC Bank's loans by 42% to Rs 18 lakh crore, boosting its market share to 15% from 11% currently. The announcement evidently enthralled investors, as HDFC scrip ended 9.3% higher at 2,678.9 per share on BSE, while HDFC Bank finished 9.97% higher at 1,656.45 per share.




The Association of India Magazines is pleased to announce that after months of collaborative working with the Indian Post, the postal department has launched a brand new product called the Magazine Post, specifically tailored to bring greater efficiencies for magazine deliveries. The new service was launched nationally on April 1, 2022, from ten regional circles across the country.

Magazine Post is an outcome of long deliberations between AIM and Indian Post, with an aim to bring efficiency of deliveries to near 100%, and to ensure time bound delivery of magazines. The new service will, in essence, carry all the features of a Speed Post delivery at nearly a third of the commercial rate-

Multiple point tracking,

Live updates to readers through SMS,

API integration with publishers database for seamless tracking,

Promise of guaranteed delivery

Delivery within 48 hours in all major cities, and within 72 hours in regions

New Era for subscription potential

Speaking about the launch, B Srinivasan, President of AIM and MD of Vikatan Group said, For years magazines in India have faced chronic problems in subscription deliveries as copies were either late or in many cases undelivered. We are immensely thankful to Indian Post for introducing this new tech enabled product to resolve all our delivery problems, and with a promise to ensure near 100% success rate.

Anant Nath, General Secretary of AIM and Executive publisher of Delhi Press remarked, In most evolved magazine markets, subscriptions account for upto 80% of magazine sales, whereas in India it has been other way round. The subscription eco-system in India has been historically underserviced on account of lack of trust amongst readers with respect to deliveries. We feel that there is a scope of at least ten-fold increase in subscription numbers if we are able to guarantee delivery. We are confident that with the launch of this new product, publishers can realise the untapped potential of subscriptions

Manoj Sharma, CEO of India Today and AIM treasurer further added, Multiple reader surveys have highlighted that there is immense appetite for reading print copies if deliveries are guaranteed. With the launch of Magazine Post, which offers super fast deliveries at economical rate, we hope to fulfil much of this underlying reader demand.

AIM initiatives for re-building print sales

DVS Rama Rao, circulation veteran and GM of AIM also added, Over the past year and half, we at AIM have put in motion multiple initiatives to improve magazine sales and to even cross pre-pandemic numbers. These include creating a WhatsApp platform for joint subscription marketing, a common accredited agency network, and a tech enabled platform for subscription sales through morning centre vendors. With the launch of Magazine Post, we have confidence that we will be able to fulfil all the subscription orders with great efficiency and thereby bring about a paradigm shift in magazine publishing.

Roll out of new product by Indian Post

Indian Post did a trial run of the new product in March in Delhi and Mumbai circles. Delhi Press and India Today participated in the trial run. After the overwhelming success, the service has been launched nationally from April 1. All the ten circles have rolled out the product. The Chennai circle in fact organised a grand launch on April 1 (pics attached).
A recent study done on the businesses of India has found that businesses owned by women entrepreneurs are likely to witness a growth of 90% over the next 5 years. In addition to that, around 80% of women from semi-urban and rural India feel a significant improvement in their socioeconomic and cultural status after starting an enterprise. However, the skill gap still continues to be a big hurdle.

In the wake of the pandemic, the world is largely moving to digital. Hence, communicating with the right consumer, with the right approach and creating the right perception about a product, has become more important than ever before. Keeping this at the core, Isobar India group, a part of dentsu Creative India, that houses the agencies - Isobar, WATConsult and Perfect Relations, has launched a unique first-of-its-kind initiative titled The Queenpreneur. The three agencies under the Isobar India group have come together and designed this program to not only promote small businesses but also unlock their potential by choosing one-woman entrepreneur every 6 months. They will further help the woman entrepreneur build her business ground up through mentoring and support.

It is pertinent to note here that EarthPoorna, a healthy food product company, is the first recipient of the Queenpreneur initiative. Founded by Pune-based Sucheta Bhandare, EarthPoorna was established to provide healthy, wholesome and natural food products at affordable rates. The company procures millets directly from farmers, ensuring and supporting the livelihood of farmers, women and their families. EarthPoorna has a team of dedicated and well-trained women who make delicious, healthy and nutritious ragi ladoos. This venture has bought about a change in the life of the women and improved their livelihood status. EarthPoorna is currently supported and marketed by Mitti Ke Rang, a Social Venture that works towards generating livelihood for women through their E-commerce portal.

Heeru Dingra, CEO, Isobar India group said, "They say, a rising tide lifts all boats. We believe when women come together to support one another, it creates a powerful space for collaboration, innovation and the collective advancement of society. Out of all the campaigns and initiatives we have rolled out in the past, The Queenpreneur holds a special place in my heart. I hope our expertise and guidance take these budding women entrepreneurs to the next level.

Sucheta Bhandare, Founder, EarthPoorna added, I grew up in a farmer's family. My siblings and I used to help our parents with some farm activities. I have seen all the processes very closely and one thing I noticed is the farm-to-market gap, which causes many problems. There are many reasons for this problem, however, the farmers are the ones who suffer the most. We are working towards the sustainable development of farmers and providing wholesome, healthy food for our customers. All recipes are designed by a nutrition expert. We make laddoos in small batches as per order, so every customer gets freshly made tasty laddoos. This initiative will help us in unlocking the all-round potential of marketing.

Speaking about EarthPoorna, Amit Jain, Co-Founder, Mitti Ke Rang commented, EarthPoorna is a golden combination of health and taste. It is not only light on the stomach but also on your pockets. It has transformed the lives of all stakeholders such as customers, farmers, and women entrepreneurs. The Queenpreneur is an initiative that Ive never heard of before and it is amazing that women will help women in fulfilling this.
Kassio, a crypto for everyone platform that allows users to buy, sell, borrow, earn and utilize cryptos, successfully raised a funding of 1.6 million US Dollars in the pre-seed round. Kassio received its funding in February 2022 from two major European investment funds and the round was successfully led by Aalto Capital.

Kassio is a comprehensive crypto platform that instantly unlocks all the benefits of crypto through a simple and secure app, where there is something for everyone. The platform offers options where a user can stick to the earn feature if the trading feels risky, and earn up to 13% profits simply by converting funds into a stablecoin pegged to the USD. Alternatively, crypto users can instantly buy and trade in real-time and use the crypto they already own as collateral to receive instantly approved low-interest loans. Kassio also offers a unique crypto card that enables users to utilize their crypto in daily life.

The platform consists of an international team and was founded in October 2020 by Sachin Singh, Anuj Yadav, and Bharat Vivek, who have strong experience in product development and blockchain technology. Speaking about the funding, Sachin Singh, CEO and co-founder of Kassio, said, This successful pre-seed funding round is a testimony to the strength of our project Kassio, its roadmap, offerings, and the innovative product that brings together crypto investment and much-required crypto utility features.

Swedish Investors at Aalto Capital, along with two major European investment funds, immediately saw the potential of Kassio and its team. In February of 2022, they decided to invest 1.6 million US Dollars in the company's pre-seed round of funding to accelerate and globally scale the company's mission of making crypto mainstream. Shayan Khan, Partner at Aalto Capital added, While crypto is the next biggest equalizer after the internet revolution, Kassio with its strong offerings, is a project that changes the whole dynamics of the community. I am confident that Kassio will be instrumental in providing quality crypto offerings to end-users and bring about the change that the world has been waiting for in this ecosystem.

While the product is set to exit private beta in mid-April in India and mid-May in the EU, the platform already has an AUM(Digital Assets under Management) worth 16M US dollars and a loan playbook of 9M US dollars. Kassio will use the funds to launch its operation in the Indian and European markets, further strengthening its product development process and adding more talent to the senior management across its legal, compliance, institutional relationships, and design functions.
The Indian candy market is at USD 1643.64 Million and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 15.40% in value terms to reach USD 3661.68 Million by FY2026 owing to increasing disposable incomes bringing brand consciousness, inclination towards imported products, growing organised retail and e-commerce channels along with robust supply chain networks. The emergence of premium candy segments and the entry of foreign players are further fueling the candy market in India. However, there is a lot of potential for the vegan and no added sugar candy segments that is currently untapped.

Niblerzz, a home-grown D2C brand co-founded by Sandhya Seshadri and Aashnee Gajaria are reinventing this category with their Niblerzz Real Fruit Gummies which is their first product in the candy portfolio. Gravity Integrated, the hybrid consulting x communications company has been given the integrated mandate for building the brand.

Speaking on the launch, Co-founder & Director of Niblerzz, Sandhya Seshadri said, Vitamin gummies have seen a massive boom in the Indian market. They have become a new and easy way to get one's nutrition. However, the joy and nostalgia that people of all age groups have for candies are completely lost. This is also because of the nasties that come with them. People are looking for candy that they can indulge in without thinking. We at Niblerzz wanted to bring back that joy of nibbling on candies guilt-free. Our products have no added sugar, no preservatives, all-natural and are totally vegan & plant-based.

Speaking on behalf of Gravity Integrated, Aastha Mantri  Managing Partner & Director of Client Relationships said, We are very excited to collaborate with Niblerzz. With people getting more and more conscious of what they're consuming, a brand like Niblerzz fits right into the need gap of candy that is tasty, vegan, all-natural and gelatin free. As their integrated marketing solutions partner, together, our aim is to crack the D2C space with innovative ideas to drive sales and build a guilt-free candy brand in the snacking space

Gravity Integrated is focused on solving complex business problems for brands like Pillsbury, Nature Valley, Haagen-Dazs, Betty Crocker, Diageo, Snapin Seasonings and Dell among others via strategy, creativity, technology and common sense.










Indias central bank  the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has launched another interesting Ad campaign with 9XM. Part of the RBI Kehta Hai initiative, the campaign aims at creating awareness among the common man about RBIs Ombudsman facility. This is 9X Medias third collaboration with the RBI which launched a series of multi-media campaigns to create awareness among people about good practices, regulations and initiatives in banking and financial sector.

The latest campaign shows RBIs popular mascot MoneyKumar as a shayar who makes viewers aware about the Banks services where aggrieved customers can file their complaints against any irregularities or fraudulent transaction in banking sector. This short yet impactful consumer awareness campaign uses music as a route to convey RBIs message of Jaankaar Baniye, Satark Rahiye! This campaign is created in association with dentsu X.

Mr. Prabhat Naik, Sr Partner at dentsu X said, It was an excellent integration curated by 9XM team to amplify the campaign message, an out-of-the-box idea bringing together serious financial conversation with melodious music offering of the channel.

9XM is a leader in music and short format content, having created iconic animated characters, rib-tickling short-format shows with Bollywood celebrities and interesting vignettes that completely resonate with the youth. In the recent past, 9XM has collaborated with many prestigious brands giving their marketing and ad campaigns the much needed edge in achieving their campaign objectives.

Commenting on the integration with RBI, 9X Medias Chief Business Officer, Mr. Punit Pandey said, We are happy to present RBIs popular mascot MoneyKumar in a unique avatar, that of a shayar. We have taken the Shayari Route to drive the important message of Jaankaar Baniye, Satark Rahiye! From creating just a song with artist Virus in our first integration to animating MoneyKumar and creating a song which was used in all prime time shows like KBC, Indians Super Dancer etc ., to now presenting him as a shayar, our long term association with RBI has been extremely memorable. It has also been a great experience partnering with dentsu, Lodestar and Prachar to build all the creatives of RBI. The shayar avatar of MoneyKumar will definitely resonate with the viewers. Music is Good, Music is Fun. Haq Se!
Rediffusion today announced the promotion of Kalyani Srivastava to Joint President of the advertising agency. Kalyani will continue to be based out of Mumbai. Besides continuing to oversee the Mumbai operations of the agency, she will also take charge of Rediffusion Studios.

I am delighted that Kalyani Srivastava is moving to a bigger role within the agency and will be shouldering more and more responsibilities in the days and months ahead. Ever since I took over at Rediffusion last year, I have leaned heavily on Kalyani both for continuity of business on existing clients, as well as for the growth of new businesses. Kalyani is an inspiring leader, and one who leads by personal example. Over the past one year, together, we have revamped the agency, inducted new talent, and sharpened our deliveries to clients. Kalyani, I am sure, will take Rediffusion to much greater heights with all her sharp thinking, untiring hardwork and the warmth of her client relationships, says Dr. Sandeep Goyal, Managing Director of Rediffusion.

Kalyani will join Navonil Chatterjee at the Joint President level. Navonil, who heads Strategy Planning, has been Joint President for the past three years.

I am really happy to bestowed and rewarded with greater responsibilities at Rediffusion where I have now completed over a decade. Mumbai is our flagship office, and leading it into the future is a singular privilege. It is my continued endeavour to produce cutting edge work for our clients; recruit, train and retain good talent and grow the Rediffusion franchise further, adds Kalyani Srivastava.

Kalyani spent a longish innings as Chief of Staff to Chairman Diwan Arun Nanda in her initial years at Rediffusion. She then played a pivotal role in managing the Tata groups PR business at Rediffusion-Edelman. She took charge of Rediffusion Mumbai two years ago as Executive Vice President.
Rajul Kulshreshtha has joined TV9 as Consultant. Prior to this he was CEO at Madison Media Plus.

Kulshreshtha has over twenty years of leadership experience in the media industry, and agencies.

Kulshreshtha began his career in Anthem Communications. Within a year, he was working with McCann-Erickson, an agency he joined as a trainee and left as VP of media after 11 years. There, he worked on marquee brands such as GM, Nestle, Gillette, Reckitt, Coca Cola to name a few.

In 2002, Kulshreshtha left for Indonesia where he worked with Publicis as the MD of Indonesia. It was a short stint and 2003 saw him as head of sales at CNBC Asia, based out of Singapore. He returned to India in 2004 with GroupM where he looked after the LG business for a period of two years and then was made the MD of Motivator, an agency that was started by him.

In 2012, Kulshreshtha started his own agency Xposure and launched a number of marquee brands, including Gionee, Cardekho.com, UC Browser, Mobikwik, Shopclues.com. In 2018, he exited Xposure and started a media consulting company called Consilium with PWC as one of his clients.

Rajul holds an MA degree from St. Stephen's College,Delhi
Hon'ble Vice President, Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu unveiled the much-awaited documentary titled Sanjeevani - The Journey which captured the essence of Network18s Sanjeevani - A Shot Of Life, a Federal Bank CSR initiative, with NGO partners United Way Mumbai, and it's a journey from conceptualisation to execution. He even delivered a keynote address supporting the initiative. The event was held at his residence at 7 pm.

On April 7, 2021, Network18 launched this initiative, just as India was fighting a devastating second wave of COVID-19 infections. What followed over the next twelve months was India's largest vaccine awareness drive, and the documentary showcases just that.

Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu expressed his happiness to be a part of this programme. He says, Sanjeevani is an initiative for the larger good of the people of the country, which requires commitment, conviction and passion. This vaccination is the need of the hour, back then and even now. Due to various reasons, people had doubts and hesitated to take the vaccine. In this situation, this initiative by Network18 along with Federal Bank is praiseworthy to reach out to people, educate them and remove the misgivings from their minds. It is the responsibility of the government. At the same time peoples participation and cooperation from well meaning organisations is very much required to see that this programme gets momentum and becomes a successful one. I convey my deepest appreciation to all the doctors, scientists and frontline health workers for the spirit of sacrifice displayed by them for fighting the pandemic and serving the people. I would also like to appreciate and salute our Indian scientists to come out with Indian made vaccines. It is the collective effort of the government and the citizens that 183 crore Covid-19 vaccines have been administered so far. Its a remarkable achievement.

Santosh Menon, Chief Content Officer, Network 18, says, Through 'Sanjeevani  A shot of life, we tried to reach the furthest corners of India and do our bit to fight against this deadly Covid-19 virus. And now, through this documentary, we want to celebrate the work done by our frontline warriors, whether it be doctors, paramedics, Anganwadi or Asha workers, who helped vaccinate India's huge population. This documentary throws light on the efforts taken to raise awareness around Covid-19 vaccinations and mobilise efforts to ensure the vaccination of every Indian in Indias remote corners. It encapsulates the journey from its conceptualisation to the execution of driving an on-ground vaccine awareness including busting myths and helping some of the worst COVID-hit districts of India.

Puneet Singhvi, CEO - Digital & President - Corporate Strategy at Network18 Media & Investments Limited, says, As one is aware, there was a lot of hesitancy on vaccination and even more in the countrys remote corners. Through Sanjeevani  A shot of life, in collaboration with Federal Bank and NGO United Way, we crossed this hurdle of vaccine hesitancy and covered over 1000 villages across India, through mass awareness drives, transportation and other registration assistance, among others. The documentary is an extension of this initiative which we are proud and honoured to have the Vice President launch it at his residence. With its digital launch we hope it to reach across the country.

Anil Parmar, Vice President, Community Investment, United Way Mumbai, Since many of the people werent even aware of the vaccination, registration was all the more challenging. The most arduous task was the accessibility, creating an awareness drive and busting myths around vaccination as these are remote corners of the country. Through our Sanjeevani  A shot of life, in joint effort with Network18 and Federal Bank, we managed to overcome this challenge by bringing all the stakeholders together by mobilising efforts around awareness. The documentary illustrates these efforts, right from conception to its execution, portraying all the challenges and achievements.

Shyam Srinivasan, MD & CEO, Federal Bank India, As an organisation, we have always been working towards the welfare of the people. Sanjeevani  A shot of life with Network18 and United Way, once again, gave us the platform to come together and help in the cause to make India a safer place with our vaccination awareness drives and other efforts like masking up and social distancing. We managed to access 1000 villages across India, reaching lakhs of Indians and helping them achieve a state of normalcy. With the countrys Vice President launching the Sanjeevani documentary at his residence, it is indeed a proud moment for us.

Sanjeevani  a shot of Life initiative, which covered over 1000 villages, starting from Wagah Border in Punjab, reached out to nearly 5 lakh people, helping them back to normalcy. The initiative worked towards busting myths, overcoming vaccination hesitancy and helping some of the worst COVID-hit districts of India, with over 1 lakh beneficiaries registered for the vaccine.

While the documentary captures the essence of the work done towards vaccinating India, it also pays tribute to frontline warriors like doctors, nurses, ANMS, Asha and Anganwadi workers along with social workers and acknowledges Sanjeevani Champions who went beyond the call of duty.

The initiative during its roll out had seen massive support from all walks of life, including Indias biggest policymakers like Mansukh Mandaviya  Union Health Minister, Anurag Thakur  Minister Information and Broadcasting, Aditya Thackeray  Cabinet Minister of Tourism and Environment for the Government of Maharashtra, and Bollywood celebrities like Sarah Ali Khan, Kirti Kulhari, and more. The initiative was taken to greater heights with a dedicated anthem Tika Laga, composed by music director Shankar Mahadevan and sung by him, Harshdeep Kaur and others, to encourage vaccination.

The documentary is now available for public viewing on Network18s social media channels.
Sterling Holiday Resorts Limited, one of Indias leading leisure hospitality brands announced the appointment of Mr. Vikram Lalvani as the new Managing Director and CEO of the company with effect from 1st April, 2022.

After seven years of overseeing various strategic responsibilities at Sterling, which included, Customer Engagement, Revenue maximization, Hotel Sales and Resort Operations, Mr. Vikram Lalvani will be taking on the role of Managing Director of Sterling Holiday Resorts Ltd, a post which was effectively held by Mr. Ramesh Ramanathan since 2011, who will now continue to guide the company as its Chairman.

As CMD for Sterling, Mr. Ramesh Ramanathan has been instrumental in steering the companys turn-around and making it profitable and establishing the Sterling Brand in the Leisure Holiday space. During his time, he has also transformed the company from being a major player only in the time-share segment to a strong Leisure Hospitality player across all customer segment. Over the past decade, Sterling has expanded its footprint from 10 resorts to over 38 resorts with over 2,500 rooms, spread across hills, beaches, jungles, rivers, heritage, pilgrimage and drive-to locations, pan-India.

Continuing to serve the company as the Chairman, Ramesh Ramanathan, said, I am extremely pleased on the appointment of Vikram as Managing Director & CEO, to lead Sterling towards newer avenues. I look forward to working with him towards our common vision of making Sterling the No. 1 Leisure Hospitality brand in India. On behalf of the board and the team, we are confident that Vikrams vast experience in the hospitality industry will be a huge advantage for us. His energy, passion and eye for detail will also boost the team in delivering exceptional services and make Sterling the preferred brand for our guests. I congratulate him and wish him all the best for his next chapter.

Commenting on his new role, Mr. Vikram Lalvani, Managing Director & CEO, Sterling Holiday Resorts Ltd. said, I am honored to be given this responsibility. We will continue on the growth path set for us and drive to double our inventory and footprint to over 5,000+ rooms by 2025. With focus on Digitization, we will bring innovation in services for our guests and create a unique place for Sterling in the leisure space. I look forward to further strengthening the brand and building market leadership in the coming years.

In his previous role as COO, of Sterling Holidays, Vikram has been responsible for successfully strengthening the preferred partners network, launching new revenue focused projects, spearheading the expansion plans across the country which now includes 38 plus resorts in operation and many more in the pipe-line.

Mr Lalvani has over 25 years of leadership experience in Hospitality, Leisure and ITeS industries with a proven expertise in revenue maximization and technology solutions. In the past, Mr Lalvani has held crucial positions in companies such as The Indian Hotels Co. Ltd. and Sutherland Global Services.
Dr. Rogers shocks the senses in sharing, Even though Pfizers clinical trials of the genetically modified mRNA shot have already failed twice in this age group, Pfizer is planning to submit another application for Emergency Use Authorization WHAT?...you may ask? How is this possible?

Dr. Peter McCullough, MD, MPH and has estimated that 85% of COVID deaths could have been prevented had this truthful information been promoted instead of censored by the powers-that-be and their lackies in the media. This attempted pharmaceutical capture of mankind represents the greatest crime against humanity in the entirety of world history.

The manipulation and law breaking in granting these EUAs is breathtaking, and on full display for all to see. Successful early and home treatment are reported all over the internet at such websites as flccc.net , c19protocols.com , myfreedoctor.com , aflds.org/covid/treatment-options/ , aflds.org/covid/early-treatment/ , aapsonline.org/

The pharmaceutical industry greatly profits by these liability-free, taxpayer-funded vaccines, especially for COVID-19, given their hope to use them repeatedly, and possibly annually, on the entire 7.8 billion population of earth! This appears to explain the aggressive suppression of treatment of any sort, as an emergency use authorization (EUA) cannot legally be granted unless there are no reasonable treatment options.

So, what could possibly justify risking our entire nations 73.4 million children this way? We all know the adage follow the money. Dr. Toby Rogers tells us,  if Pfizer can get the mRNA shot added to the childhood vaccine schedule, then it will enjoy permanent liability protection under the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act . 

The U.S. has about 73.4 million people from age 0-17. Want to guess how many have died of COVID? CDC reports a total of 1112 as of 3/26/22! While any child death is a tragedy, 1112 children is 0.0015% of our kidsa statistical zero. Multiple researchers report that no healthy kids were among those who died of COVID. Those deaths were children with serious co-morbidities, and some of those deaths may have been WITH COVID rather than FROM it.

How does this title strike you? COVID-19 shots effects on fertility, targeting children with social pressure and coercion to get jabbed: Robert Malone and Candace Owens Interview at www.globalresearch.ca/covid-19-shots-effects-on-fertility-targeting-children-with-social-pressure-and-coercion-to-get-jabbed-robert-malone-and-candace-owens-interview/5774685

How is it even possible that Pfizer is pursuing FDA authorization and approval to inject even more children with this poison death shot as Dr. Vladimir Zelenko calls the COVID-19 shots? They are currently planning on injecting babies 6-months through 4-years with this highly experimental technology, for which we have NO long-term safety data and plenty of short-term damage and horror stories, for children that have virtually zero risk of COVID death or disability.

Well, the agendas run wide and deep, but these greed-driven pharmaceutical companies offer up the claim that children can transmit COVID-19 to adults who do carry a risk of death. But heres the catch. Despite many surveys there are virtually zero reports of teachers getting COVID from students, which demonstrates that transmission from children to adults is of little concern; plus, we now know that these shots fail to prevent infection and transmission anyway, and their presumed protection quickly wanes within a few months! Then theres the well documented fact that COVID-19 deaths are mostly among those above 70 years, with the overwhelming age being 80 and beyond.

Dr. Rogers also says, We now have to add Moderna into the conversation because they are trying to get their mRNA shot authorized for kids as well  even though it does not work against Covid and has a 15% adverse event rate.

These shots for kids are totally unnecessary, offering nothing but health risk. As Dr. Rogers so aptly points out: tobyrogers.substack.com/p/urgent-call-to-action-3-contact-your?s=r

There is no Covid emergency for children under five years old.

Children have a 99.997% recovery rate and a body of medical literature indicates that almost zero healthy children under five years old have died from Covid.

A large study conducted in Germany showed zero deaths for children under 5 and a case fatality rate of three out of a million in children without comorbidities.

A Johns Hopkins study monitoring 48,000 children diagnosed with Covid showed a zero mortality rate in children under 18 without comorbidities.

A study in Nature demonstrated that children under 18 with no comorbidities have virtually no risk of death.

Real world evidence shows that after one month, the Pfizer shot was only 12% effective in kids 5 to 11; after 6 weeks vaccine effectiveness was a shocking MINUS 41% (meaning vaccinated children were significantly more likely to catch Covid than the unvaccinated). Recommending a shot with negative efficacy is insanity.

The Moderna mRNA shot made no difference in hospitalizations or deaths from Covid in kids. The Moderna mRNA shot caused a 15% adverse event rate and has been linked with myocarditis (which is why Modernas application to inject teenagers has been stalled since last June).

In testimony before Senator Ron Johnsons recent senate hearing entitled, COVID19: A Second Opinion, Peter McCullough, MD, MPH states, I will tell you as a cardiologist, it is crystal clear that these vaccines cause myocarditis (heart damage) far in excess of what the CDC ever imagined. It is clear the risks of the vaccines are far greater than the risks of COVID-19. Under NO circumstances, under ANY circumstances, should a young person ever receive one of these vaccines, let alone ever be pressured, let alone ever be mandated. When they do MRIs on suspected myocarditis, 100% have heart damage.

So, we are coerced and possibly mandated to sacrifice our 73 million children and the better part of our 330 million total U.S. population that have many years of life ahead of them, to protect folks that could have largely been protected by early treatment and whose projected remaining life span is in the middle single digits! When have we ever sacrificed children to protect elderly? It has always been the other way around. Weirdest of all, with world leaders and eugenicists predicting climate change and other horrors to result from the impact of what they deem as overpopulation of earth, why would with interfere with the deaths of elderly folks, particularly noting the grim pending bankruptcy of Social Security and Medicare upon which the elderly depend? You would think theyd welcome a pandemic as a population reducer!

Looking back to our little ones, even the recommended kid boosters shots wane after a few months and have little to no benefit against omicron and newer variants. It makes zero scientific sense for Pfizer or Moderna to be granted authorization or approval for any of their COVID shots when early treatment is highly successful.

Weve all seen break through infections become been rampant after injected doses. Breakthrough infection is the industrys name for what everyone else calls a failed vaccine. These so-called vaccines are failing all over the world, resulting in more COVID hospitalizations than among the unvaccinated.

After two years of real-life data, we are no longer guessing about the issues with Covid-19 or the vaccines. We have the information. We have the numbers. WE NOW KNOW THAT

THE COVID-19 VACCINES AND BOOSTER DO NOT WORK! Here are the details at MAMM.org:. By now youre likely convinced to keep your child as far away as possible from COVID shots, but for additional reinforcement explore these websites.

CHD  Protect the Kids: Demand the FDA Vote No on EUA for 6 month olds up to 5 years!

CHD  Moderna to Seek Authorization for COVID Shots for Kids Despite No Proven Efficacy Against Omicron (PK)

CHD - 12-Year-Old Suffers Life-Threatening Pericarditis After COVID Jab (PK)

Worst Fears Realized: Pfizer mRNA Transcribes into DNA

Steve Kirsh - Moderna vaccine for kids 6 months to under 6 years doesn't meet the FDA's own bar

Steve Kirsch - How can they explain any of this data?

Dr. John Campbell - The Pfizer documents (PK)
February 22, 2013

Religious fundamentalism and its zealous followers are failing to find their desired echo within Mauritanian civil society, which is proving to be increasingly deaf and sealed off to them.

Political leaders and heads of associations have recently decided to move against what they see as a "radical and obscurantist ideological movement." Human rights organizations support the leaders in this new mass movement, which is firmly committed to blocking the invasive advance of the Salafist movement in the country of the former Almoravid dynasty.

"We oppose fundamentalism, and we completely reject the idea. This trend is widespread in Mauritania, within parties and in other segments of society," said Ms. Boutrika, who was responsible for a gathering discussing the protection of democracy and human rights in Mauritania.

In this country, which has one foot in the Arab Maghreb and another in the Sahel, religious intolerance began to disproportionately spread in all segments of society. This creates concerns at all levels, hence this initiative to shrink the contours of this intolerance. Two forms of Salafism are threatening society, finding fertile ground in places of worship. The mosques in Mauritania are frequented by faithful people who do not usually have the required level of education and experience to cope with such an invasion. They leave zawiyas (assemblies or groups), where knowledge is limited to the teaching of Islamic law. Thus, the Salafist preachers of the Maliki or Wahhabi schools are finding the desired echo of their doctrine among these faithful people.

In such a situation, the security services are reproached for their shortcomings in facing this threatening progression of a movement that spreads hatred and division. Religious fundamentalism, a generator of terrorism and violence, is condemned by the ruling class of the country. A conference has been recently organized to assure that violence has no place in Mauritania. "We have recently organized an international symposium where we highlighted the Mauritanian experience and approach vis-a-vis terrorism and violence," Ahmed al-Mehdi, a senior scholar at the Mauritanian Institute for Strategic Studies (INES) told Al-Monitor in a phone interview.

Fatwas legitimizing jihad or holy war against what they commonly call the "crusaders" also tarnish the nation's religious image, which is grappling with uncertainties at the highest levels of the state. The recent position adopted by civil society associations comes at a very crucial time in the history of the country, which is trying to protect itself from the negative impact of the crisis in Mali. This is an ideal opportunity for associations to stand out from the radical movement that incites hatred and divisions in society.

Thus, several human rights organizations decided to take action and announce their intransigent opposition to the Salafist movement, which is deemed as an element that is totally different from the "social and cultural structure" of the country. In this same perspective, a statement denouncing religious fundamentalism has been made public. In this statement, the organizations in question took the initiative to distinguish themselves from troublemakers and Salafist preachers, whose numbers continue to increase. The Mauritanian League of Human Rights (LMDH), SOS-Esclaves, IRA-Mauritania, the Association of Women Heads of Households (AFCF), Conscience and Resistance (CR), the Mauritanian Human Rights Association (AMDH) and the National Forum of Human Rights Organizations (FONADH) are among the signatories of the denunciation document.

Mauritania's NGOs fiercely oppose the ideology in question, which they consider to go against innovation and freedom of thought. For them, "This world of excellence that mirrors Wahhabi jihadism is only ornamented with bad blocks," whereas Islam is the true advocate of tolerance and peace.

In Mauritania and in other parts of North Africa, the most widespread Salafist trend is represented by al-Qaeda. Its commitment to the principles of original Islam makes its followers, the jihadists, advocate political violence as a Machiavellian way to achieve their ends. By opposing the terrorist action theories that are being conveyed through sermons and media broadcasts, Mauritanian civil society organizations intend to change the face of the country and prove their commitment to human values based on equality between people. Everyone in this country, where Islam is the state religion, condemns these violent acts regardless of their source. They have taken a final stance, in a society where intellectuals and human-rights activists categorically refuse the foundations of these acts.

Kaci Racelma is an Algerian journalist with Inter Press Service news agency and Afrik.com, an online magazine. He is based in Algiers and covers the North African region.
Last week the Russian government held a press conference where it aired accusations of breathtaking corruption on the part of Joe Biden and his family.

Unfortunately, this event was no fake news Russian propaganda. The incriminating evidence presented at the event came straight from the hard drive that belonged to Joe Bidens son Hunter.

As you may know, in 2019 Hunter Biden carelessly abandoned his laptop at a computer repair shop in Delaware. This was an act of astounding recklessness, since the emails, text messages, files, photos, and videos contained on that computer provided extensive record of greed, corruption, bribery and graft, not only on his part but also on the part of his father and other members of their family.

When the New York Post tried to report on the hard drive in October 2020, the America mainstream media and law enforcement authorities refused to acknowledge it or take appropriate action. Rather than commencing an investigation, the establishment falsely claimed that the hard drive was a product of Russian disinformation. They did this even though they knew it was real. The staff of the New York Post conducted an extensive, multi-level authentication process to ensure that the hard drive was genuine, and they made the details of this process available to anyone who cared to check.

The establishment, however, banded together and refused to act. Instead of investigating the guilty party, they attacked the messenger and went into overdrive to censor the incriminating information under the cover of the Russian disinformation canard. With the collaboration of Big Tech and the legacy media, they managed to suppress the truth and left most voters unaware of the hard drives contents. Most of those who managed to hear of it still believed that it was Russian disinformation. That they fell for the establishments lie is not so surprising, given the revelations seemed too outrageous to be factual.

Needless to say, it was all true. In the months following the November 2020 election, various individuals and media outlets were gradually forced to admit that the hard drive was, indeed, real. The hyper partisan New York Times and the Washington Post are among the latest to confirm this fact.

But even though the establishment has largely succeeded in keeping this information from the American public, their malfeasance is now coming to back to bite us. This is because foreign entities and governments also have Hunter Bidens hard drive, and they are now using it to point out the obvious corruption of our president and the whole of the Washington establishment. In other words, they will do the job that our media and legal system refused to do when the scandal was first brought up in America.

They will do this before the eyes of the whole world and will bring shame on what the international community now increasingly views as a corrupt American president who leads a corrupt administration.

We got a taste of this last Thursday when the Kremlin used Hunters messages to show he apparently facilitated and financially benefited from bioweapons research in Ukraine. And even though the American mainstream media  true to form  refused to report on it, the rest of the world saw the evidence clear and loud. This is the headline from the British MailOnline:

To make matters worse, Hunter did this while his father was vice president of the United States. He thus used his fathers influence to put himself in a position where he could benefit from these kinds of illicit ventures.

How do you think will the rest of the world will look at our president and country in light of such information? They will see us as a double-faced hypocrite who breaks the rules and laws that it punishes others for breaking.

But they will go further. They will completely discredit our president  who claims to lead the free world  as an unscrupulous and unconscionable man who has sold out his own country. They will then imply that the whole Western system is corrupt and degenerate because it is led by a person like that.

Several foreign outlets have already reported on the Bidens connection to a shady Ukrainian company Burisma. As you may have heard, in 2014 Hunter Biden was put on the board of that shady outfit and paid one million dollars a year in compensation. At that time his father happened to be vice president of the United States. Because of his background in foreign affairs, Joe Biden functioned as President Obamas point man when it came to matters of Americas foreign policy. Joe Biden relished the assignment and took deep personal interest in countries such as Ukraine, Russia, and China.

Since Hunter Biden does not appear to know much about oil or gas, he was obviously given his Burisma appointment and lavish pay because the companys owners believed he could influence  through his father  American policy in ways that were favorable to the company.

Joe Biden would get a cut from Hunters takings, a fact which was communicated by Hunter in his emails. In their drive to enrich themselves, the Bidens would enter relationships with some of the shadiest characters around. Burisma, for instance, was co-founded by a well-known corrupt Ukrainian oligarch who is now a fugitive from justice.

When Burisma was being investigated for money laundering, tax evasion and other serious offences by Ukraines top prosecutor, one of Burismas top executives sent an email to Hunter Biden asking him how he could use his political influence on Burismas behalf. This is what he wrote, in part, to Hunter:

"We urgently need your advice on how you could use your influence to convey a message / signal, etc. to stop what we consider to be politically motivated actions."

When Joe Biden subsequently visited Ukraine in his role as vice president of the United States, he pressured Ukrainian government officials to have the prosecutor fired. This he did by threatening to withhold one billion dollars in US aid which had been promised by Barack Obama. After some resistance, the Ukrainian government officials caved in and fired the prosecutor. Joe Biden later boasted about it in a talk that was recorded on video.

Joe Biden boasts about having effected the firing of a Ukrainian prosecutor who was investigating a company by which his son was paid a million dollars per year

Notice what Joe Biden was doing: He was using US taxpayers money to bully a foreign government for the purpose of enriching his own family.

The offense the Bidens committed in this instance is called influence peddling. By directing US foreign policy in ways that would benefit foreign entities who kept his family on lavish pay, Joe Biden sold out his country and betrayed the trust of the high office he held.

While Joe Biden served as vice president of the United States, the Bidens apparently ran their influence peddling ploy in numerous places across the world.

The Bidens brazen influence peddling is being openly discussed in the foreign press. Just last week, for example, the UK Guardian ran a story titled Stealth Hunter: Bidens tangled business dealings are becoming hard to ignore. The subtitle of the piece read as follows: Influence-peddling is Washingtons spectator sport  but now theres an interest in taking a closer look at the presidents son.

Former New York prosecutor Rudy Giuliani called the Bidens a crime family. This may sound harsh, but the evidence suggests that his description is quite accurate.

Watch Rudy Giuliani to discuss some of the misdeeds of the Biden family

Shamelessly leveraging Joe Bidens public office into financial gain through influence peddling and shady deals is apparently the Biden family practice.

This has, in fact, been admitted by none other than Hunter Biden himself in one of the most astounding self-confessions ever recorded on video. The incident was reported on in considerable detail by MailOnline last year.

One of Hunters hobbies is filming himself while being engaged in sexual relations with prostitutes. After one such escapade in 2019, he left his camera running, and it recorded a conversation he had with his woman of the night. He informed her that his father was planning to run for president and then described to her his familys modus operandi: Hunter told the lady that if Joe Biden wins Hunter will make like a gazillion dollars.

Now that whole world knows about this, you can only imagine the contempt in which Biden is held by foreign leaders. They know him to be a man who sends his venal son around the world to charge money as he sells out his own country. They see him as a man without character or conscience who personally enriches himself at the expense of his own nation.

How can such a compromised man lead anyone much less the world?

It was reported recently that the leaders of Saudi Arabia and UAE refused to take Bidens phone calls when he tried to speak to them regarding Russia sanctions.

It was also reported that when Biden tried to convince Chinese president Xi to join the sanctions regime against Russia, Xi refused and then changed the subject and lectured Biden on Taiwan instead.

Are we surprised that Biden is treated like this by foreign dignitaries given what they know about him? You can be sure they have been thoroughly briefed by their staff about the evidence of his misdeeds, since their access to this information is not censored by the American legacy media or Big Tech.

But we must not be angry with foreigners for treating Biden with contempt. The problem is with Americas corrupt establishment that did not take care of this problem when it first surfaced. Instead of investigating the mischief of the Biden family, they put him in the White House.

And now this malfeasance and dereliction of duty by those who should have known better is coming back to haunt us.

Photo credit: YouTube screengrab

Vasko Kohlmayer was born and grew up in former communist Czechoslovakia. You can follow his writings by subscribing to his Substack newsletter Notes from the Twilight Zone. He is the author of The West in Crisis: Civilizations and Their Death Drives.
For the second time in as many years, Joe Biden was right. Putin cannot remain in power in Moscow. Bidens other correct statement was his choice of Chocolate Chip as the best ice cream. The problem is that Bidens latest comment verifies perilous times for all of us.

As predicted here months ago, Putin has now painted himself into an inescapable box. His Ukrainian adventurism had three possible outcomes. First, by massing Russian troops on the border, Putin might have scared Ukraine and the West into significant concessions without firing a shot. Putin would then have been hailed as the most powerful man in the world. That title goes well with his 495-foot yacht with the gold toilet paper dispensers.

If that didnt work, the Russian invasion plan predicted leading elements of Moscows 1st Guards Tank Army enjoying lunch at Le Cosmopolite on Vladimirskaya Street in Kyiv within a week of crossing the border. The borscht with garlic fritters, followed by Chicken Kyiv in the main dining room there, is not to be missed.

The third possibility was so remote that it was quickly dismissed. Defeat or a stalemate was never seriously considered. Putins advisors told him the Ukrainians would either welcome their Slavic Brothers with open arms or Ukrainian army resistance would evaporate in mere moments, just like Bidens thought patterns. Of course, everyone expected wimpy NATO would do nothing. Even better for Russia, the easy victory in Ukraine would open the way for a Red Army march west to the Baltic. That would fulfill Putins dream of reclaiming the glory of a reunited Soviet Union as Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia again became Russian puppets.

One of Tom Clancys characters once correctly stated, Russians dont take a dump without a plan. Putins plan predicted easy success. But Putins generals forgot Erwin Rommels military maxim; No battle plan ever survives the first contact with the enemy. George Armstrong Custer proved how correct that is.

Now, the nightly news leads with stories of how Putins plan has failed. A previously unknown Ukrainian sitcom star turned politician became a symbol of a smaller nation sending the Russian bear stumbling into a stalemate with its tail tucked between its legs.

Putin must now make a critical decision. One possible answer is a personal calamity for him. Another is a catastrophe for Europe and the rest of the world.

Its important to remember that there is no middle ground in Russian politics. The power of membership in the nomenklatura is immense. Back in the day, the bosses at the Central Committee and Presidium level lived in the lap of Soviet socialist luxury. Access to Western goods, the finest caviar, and beautiful young women every night was theirs.

While the average Russian would never think of owning a car, the big bosses were all chauffeured through special reserved Moscow traffic lanes in their Zils. Zils were the Russian idea of a home-grown luxury car. To imagine one, think of a 1947 Packard with the chrome copied from a 58 Oldsmobile. American cars are evaluated in miles per gallon. Zils were measured in miles between breakdowns.

Actually, the very top of the Soviet political food chain did not have to settle for Zils. Instead, quietly, they all got Cadillacs.

But reaching for the top rung in Russias ruling class and then failing was never forgiven. When Leon Trotsky angered Stalin, he fled to Mexico City. Trotsky felt safe there until he died at the angry end of an ice ax wielded by a communist assassin whom Stalin sent.

Image made using a photo from Operation Crossroads Baker (colorized). Public domain.

Failed American politicians get seven-figure book advances, but Khrushchev was lucky to escape into obscurity after embarrassing Russia by removing his missiles from Cuba.

At least it was better for Gorbachev. No bullet in the head in the basement of Lubyanka for him. His embarrassment was having to do a Pizza Hut commercial, so he had enough money to live on. No, Im not kidding about Pizza Hut. Check out Gorbys last 60 seconds of fame on Youtube.

But flacking fast food will not be an option for Putin. He will either be liquidated by those he trusts, deposed into infamy, or conquer Ukraine using weapons of mass destruction. He has no middle ground options.

Deposed into exile is the least likely. Any agreement to flee Russia would require an American, British, and Ukrainian understanding that he would be safe there. That would mean locating himself somewhere as exciting as Uganda. China could be a possibility but the PRC would not want the ongoing diplomatic problems caused by cradling a deposed dictator who destroyed his country and sent 40,000 of his own soldiers home in body bags.

Assassination is a possibility. If the other real Russian power brokers, the oligarchs, decide Putin threatens their wealth and lifestyles, there could always be a helicopter accident or something of that nature. Those who destroy businesses in modern Russia do not get a golden parachute. They get a pine box.

The other outcome, winning in Ukraine, requires Putin to make a quantum increase in battlefield power and weapons. He cannot do that with conventional forces. Sophisticated Western weapons have taken their toll on Russian tanks and morale. The Russian soldiers will to fight is gone. In addition, advanced weaponry, such as ground-launched British Brimstone missiles, is finding its way onto the battlefield. These weapons can kill a tank from 40 miles away.

Putins only avenue to battlefield victory is to escalate to chemical or nuclear weapons. Although we in the West see this as a huge increase in the level of conflict, Kremlin insiders do not. Putin already killed thousands of Syrians using Sarin. He freely employed the deadly nerve gas to keep his friend Bashar Assad in power.

Putin also had no moral problem when killing defector Alexander Litvinenko in England using radioactively poisoned tea. Another Russian nerve agent, Novichok, poisoned a Putin opponent and his daughter in the idyllic town of Salisbury, just 85 miles from London.

Regarding an escalation to nuclear weapons, Putin would not see that as nearly as significant as the West would. Mention nuclear and we think of city-killers such as those employed at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. One person can carry modern small, limited power, fission weapons. In 1965, the U.S. Armys W48 low-yield nuclear artillery shell measured 6 inches by 34 inches and weighed 120 pounds. Its modern Russian equivalent would be perfect for the Russian version of FedEx to have in Kyiv absolutely, positively overnight.

Putin could easily sell the Russian citizenry on the view that it was no big thing. The West would panic.

To us, going atomic is unthinkable. Putin thinks about it every day.

The long-range problem of either a chemical or atomic escalation is how the West would react. That answer takes a crystal ball. Of course, the World would condemn Putin, but how much more than we already do? Such a weapons use would open the door to the next one, and the next one after that.

So Joe Biden is right; Putin cannot remain in power. Everyone sees the need. But no one sees the answer as to how.

Ed Sherdlu is the pen name of a former CBS television network reporter. He uses a pen name because his mother would be so embarrassed to know that Eds 12-Step Journalism Recovery Program had been a failure.
Among the many questionable actions of California governor Gavin Newsom was his signing of A.B. 979, a bill requiring publicly held companies with headquarters in the state to have board members from underrepresented communities. (Since the phrase "underrepresented communities" does not exactly roll off the tongue, going forward, I shall use "U.C." instead.) Thankfully, a California court put the kybosh on this intrusion into corporate affairs.

The law specified how many U.C. members had to be included based on the size of the board. A similar law in 2018 required more women on boards. A company could tick off several boxes if it got a woman who was also a member of one or more of the U.C., which must have been a relief, as the fines for not complying with AB 979 ran into hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The new law immediately ran into problems. There were murky areas about what constituted a U.C. The law required the U.C. board member to be seated for only a portion of the year but did not define how small a portion counted for compliance. And what about biracial or multi-racial board members? Would they automatically count, or did they have to formally identify themselves as the member of the desirable U.C. to satisfy the law?



Image: Board meeting by rawpixel. Freepik license.

It was all so confusing that a Harvard Law School Forum recommended:

Do not state a specific intent to comply with AB 979, and do not cite the statute as a reason for selecting one board candidate over another (and do not let your recruiter do so).

Given the expected legal challenges to AB 979, stating specific compliance with the law could put the company at risk for getting involved in a public controversy and in potentially expensive litigation.

Instead, consider a general statement to the effect that the company is complying with all legal requirements and that the company seeks the best qualified candidate to suit the needs of the company, the board and its stockholders, and takes into consideration many factors, including diversity.

Considering that A.B. 979 required companies to select board members based on physical characteristics rather than their qualifications, the bill was on shaky ground from the moment it was signed into law in 2020. Judicial Watch, a non-partisan organization dedicated to transparency and accountability in the government, filed a lawsuit alleging discrimination because of the bill's creation of racial quotas.

On April 1, a California court granted summary judgment, holding that the law was unconstitutional on the grounds that "[l]aws that explicitly distinguish between individuals on racial or ethnic, sexual preference, and transgender status grounds fall within the core of the prohibition of the equal protection clause." In other words, companies are now free to consider how qualified candidates are based on their education and experience rather than fretting about whether they fill the U.C. quota du jour.

Pandra Selivanov is the author of Future Slave, a story about a 21st-century black teenager who goes back in time and becomes a slave in the Old South.
Most people remember last year's Met Gala, which the New York Times called "the party of the year" not only for the ostentatious display, but for the blatant hypocrisy displayed by myriad Democrat attendees.

A perfect example of this band of hypocrites is the leader of "The Squad," Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

During the day, she pontificates about the dire need to uplift the poor, the downtrodden, minorities, and her favorite illegal aliens. AOC relentlessly whines about income inequality and the need for draconian tax measures against the affluent.

The issues she stands for always have three-word slogans such as 'Tax the Rich," "Defund the Police," etc.

AOC even pulled a Smollett when she exaggerated her "traumatic experience" from the Capitol protests, claiming that Trump-supporters were hunting for her and that she feared rape. Later, facts emerged that she was not at the site, but at a nearby office building.

She also has an inflated opinion of herself. After being mocked on Twitter for being maskless at a restaurant in Florida, despite being a fervent advocate of masks, and for her boyfriend's garish choice of footwear, AOC, devoid of any self-awareness or hesitation, declared that her critics are angry since they can't date her.

Despite being a prominent member of Congress, AOC is in permanent victimhood mode, especially when anybody offers a valid critique of her word salads. She frequently refers to herself as a persecuted non-white woman, clubbing herself with other persecuted groups.

But when the media are away and the cameras are turned off, matters are drastically different.

AOC is seen prancing around in very expensive designer dresses at parties such as the Met Gala, where tickets are priced at $35,000 per head.

AOC also didn't care about the class divide at the Met Gala, where regular staffers were compelled to suffocate under their masks while she was busy posing for photos.

The gala was occurring just yards from where the NYPD was arresting "defund the police" protesters  a cause that AOC claims to support. Again, no concern at all.

Just to avoid complete outrage, the three syllables "Tax the Rich" appeared in red on the back of her dress.



Maskless AOC appearing with unnamed masked helpers (YouTube screen grab).

How would AOC have reacted if someone such as Ivanka Trump had attended such a gala? AOC likely would have called it insensitive, claiming that poor Americans could have been fed or educated or supported or been given life-saving medical help with the cost of the ticket.

How does she fare when her claims are put to test?

Recently, the Amazon labor union held a successful union vote at an Amazon facility on New York City's Staten Island. The union tweeted that it had won by a 400-vote margin.

Eager to side with the winner and in the process steal some credit, AOC tweeted in support of the Amazon labor union's emphatic victory with emojis of a clench-fisted arm.

However, journalist Krystal Ball was keeping track of it all and confronted AOC with proof that AOC has lied about postponing public appearances weeks before she attended the high-profile Met Gala.

"Here's the guy who organized the union drive talking about how you left them high and dry. These are your constituents, and you couldn't be bothered to show up until they're on the cusp of victory," Ball tweeted to AOC with a video interview with Amazon labor organizer Christian Smalls.

In the video, Smalls said AOC claimed to be "really excited" to rally for Amazon workers, but days prior to the event, she abruptly withdrew.

AOC responded with a defiant excuse.

The warehouse isn't in my district and maybe you should look at a map before claiming so. One scheduling conflict aside, we have requested oversight investigations into Amazon, met with Amazon workers in the Woodside warehouses, and more. Hope you do more due diligence next time...

Journalist Jordan Chariton fact-checked AOC, and he tweeted he was "told by workers that your (AOC's) folks told them at last minute it was a security issue  not a scheduling conflict."

Despite initially blaming scheduling conflicts AOC, conceded that security was also an issue:

Security was an issue as well. 2021 included a lot of high-level threats to my life, which limited what activities I was able to do, especially those outside. The combination of that + when we are able to get resources/time to secure them creates scheduling + logistical conflicts...

However, the same AOC has little concern for the security and well-being of regular people. If her "defund the police" agenda is implemented, it will devastate working-class localities. AOC herself is surrounded by law enforcement officials at her place of work and at her home. She also has free private security, since her campaign foots the bill.

Amazon labor organizer Christian Smalls reminded AOC that people from her district definitely commute to Staten Island for work. Hence, it was incumbent upon AOC to support the union and actively participate in the rally.

Mere weeks after she failed to rally in support of Amazon workers, AOC attended the Met Gala along with hundreds of fellow elites, in her infamous "tax the rich" outfit. Journalist Krystal Ball questioned how Ocasio-Cortez didn't seem to fear for her life at the Gala.

Records show that AOC received $13,216 from Amazon from 2021 to 2022. Could that have been the price of not attending the rally?

So what does one make of this?

Obviously, AOC is a total hypocrite and the only cause she consistently cares for is, you guess it right, herself. Nobody else matters.

We know that Al Pacino is not the don of a crime family, Daniel Day-Lewis is not Abraham Lincoln, and Harrison Ford is not an adventurer archeologist. They were merely playing parts.

We must also add AOC to the list.

She is not a kind, compassionate, empathetic progressive who cares for the downtrodden. She merely plays that part in Washington (rather unconvincingly) and on TV.

What is unfortunate is that despite her blatant sanctimoniousness, her disingenuousness, and her act, her progressive constituents will vote her back to power over and over again. Unless she finds career activism rather than politics more lucrative, she may even end up becoming speaker of the House someday.

If the Democrats remain in power, they will continue with the open borders that allow a considerable influx of illegal aliens. Border states such as Texas that are Republican will be transformed into a Democrat bastion. The U.S. may someday have a President AOC. The thought is enough to cause feverish shudders.

This is another reason for citizens not only to vote Republican, but to participate in the political process and ensure that only principled, incorruptible, uncompromised, brave, and honest conservatives Republicans end up in Washington.
Deep blue Flint, Michigan is famous for the filthy water that comes from its taps.

But is Flint is hardly the only water-challenged city in the one-party blue paradises across the U.S.

There's also Baltimore, which is all about bad water, bad wastewater, bad service, bad billing, bad pipes, and bad pollution. Its problems dwarf Flint's.

According to the Baltimore Sun:

Maryland's Secretary of the Environment Ben Grumbles on Sunday directed the state to take charge of operations at Baltimore City's troubled Back River Wastewater Treatment plant in Dundalk  the largest such facility in the state. The extraordinary step came after the Maryland Department of the Environment "determined that the decline in the proper maintenance and operation of the Plant risks catastrophic failures," according to Grumbles' directive. An inspection report released last week showed widespread maintenance issues at the city-run facility, all preventing it from adequately treating the sewage flowing in from both the city and Baltimore County. Environmental regulators believe that has resulted in massive discharges of partially treated sewage into the Back River, complete with nutrients and dangerous bacteria that harm the Chesapeake Bay.

So these characters have basically been put into state receivership, given the potential for "catastrophic failures."

That's the Baltimore wastewater. The regular water is all about chaos, too  with massive water breaks, massive water waste, zero infrastructure improvements, and crazed billing that can hurl a $61,000 bill at a consumer who had been paying a reasonable amount earlier while "forgetting" to bill the Ritz-Carlton.

Baltimore has been governed by Democrats since World War II (House speaker Nancy Pelosi, nee D'Alesandro, comes from Baltimore's entrenched Democrat political royalty, and has brought that Baltimore Way national, to judge by how she runs Congress). It hasn't seen political competition since maybe the 1950s. The Democrat party is entrenched there. It's famous for its crime and bad schools, but it should also be famous for its Flint-like water record, because that has everything to do with the place being a one-party blue city.

Steve Hanke is a Johns Hopkins University professor of applied economics who is best known for his monetary expertise, but he's actually one of the world's top experts on water resource management, with massive research on how water is managed and mismanaged. His international water experience is in developed countries such as France, Australia, and Israel. But the Baltimore mismanagement must have reminded him more of the third-world basket cases he's advised in monetary matters. Baltimore's blue-city water mismanagement would give those places a run for their money.

The Maryland Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission invited him to testify on why poor and minority residents of Baltimore have such high water bills and such bad service.

He explained to them that the problem was in the city's unimproved infrastructure (dating from 1855), its mismanaged finances, and its failure to privatize its resources. Baltimore actually has a clause in its constitution stating that the city's water can never be privatized  which means the city's water problems can never be fixed to anything resembling normalcy, based on what's known about how to fix such things.

The overall deterioration of the systems, inadequate capital management, and operation problems are symptomatic of the fact that the Baltimore City Department of Public Works lacks proper accounts, including a balance sheet. Despite these glaring flaws, the systems have been politicized and are now protected by an amendment to the Baltimore City Charter that prohibits the assistance of privatize enterprise and markets in addressing Baltimore's endemic water and wastewater problems by tapping the competency and skills available in the private marketplace. In order to reverse the politicization of Baltimore's water system, which will only make operation and capital mismanagement problems worse as well as increase costs for the citizens of Baltimore, the charter amendment must be eliminated[.]

That's his conclusion from a big piece he wrote for a scholarly water journal called Water Economics & Policy based on his testimony and the research that came of it. It's set to come out for the April issue. He sent me an advance galley of the article. The details would make anyone blanch.

How bad is the infrastructure?

Well, Baltimore has had 4,234 water main breaks over a three year period from 2015 to 2018, according to one study. By contrast, New York City, whose water system is even older, but which is relatively well maintained, had a mere 347 breaks with a system more than three times the size of Baltimore's that serves five times as many people.

How much water did they lose? Turns out a lot  26% of it, with another 2% unbilled, so no revenue from that.

He found that the city resisted audits of its water waste and then fought letting them go public when there were audits. Seems they were hiding something.

Then there were the billing issues. Meters were broken, and 95% of requests for repairs drew no response from the city. That meant no bills went out at all, costing enormous revenue. Sound like some kind of politics, based on who didn't get billed? Quite possibly.

He also found that the system was vulnerable to hacking.

Wastewater was a total disaster as well. In 2004, there were 622 sewage backups. In 2015, there were more than 5,000. Naturally, sewage was all over the waterways, and dead fish were all over too as algae bloomed, according to media reports. The city was slapped with a federal consent decree to clean it up, and it turned out the city had no complete map of its actual wastewater pipes and no idea of their condition.

Nor did they have a...balance sheet. The city's Department of Public Works was spending 56% of its operating budget on water and wastewater, which is a huge proportion, equivalent to the size of the city's police force, and these guys didn't even have a balance sheet. Blue-city politics, see? Looks a lot like third world politics. A passage:

After all, our view is the same as that of the high priest of economic theory and Nobelist Sir John Hicks: there is nothing more important than a balance sheet (Klamer 1989). But, as it turns out, the Baltimore DPW does not even have a balance sheet in its possession. We know this because we engaged in an attempt to obtain those records. It is worth elaborating on those efforts. In early January 2022, we began to contact a variety of personnel employed by Baltimore City via telephone. On January 20, 2022, after many calls, we were finally directed to submit a written request under the Maryland Public Information Act in order to review or obtain copies of records in the custody of the Baltimore City DPW. So, on January 21, 2022 we submitted a request for the DPW's dis- aggregated balance sheet to the DPW's Public Information Act representative via email. After a follow-up email sent on January 25th, we received a response confirming receipt of our request. Then, finally, on February 7, 2022, after another email inquiring as to the status of our request, we received notice that: "In your January 21, 2022 message to the Baltimore City Department of Public Works ("DPW"), you requested a copy of DPW's disaggregated balance sheet... This response is on behalf of DPW. After review, DPW has determined that it has no records that are responsive to your request... .You may contest this response by filing a complaint in Circuit Court pursuant to GP 4-362" (D. Lamartina, personal communication, February 7, 2022).

Well.

Blue-city politics looks even more like third-world politics than most people might imagine.

The last point he makes is that political activists fluttering around the blue-city entrenchments have made privatization a dirty word throughout the city, which politicizes the water situation hugely. In 2018, they got voters to pass a charter amendment to the city prohibiting privatization of water resources, on the fear-factor politics that private businesses might raise prices for consumers. They patted themselves on the back as water "heroes" when they got that done, but the end result was that poor and minority voters got worse water and more expensive water than ever, as well as a lot of third-world sewage. Way to go, blue-city Baltimore. A recent editorial in the wokester Baltimore Sun dismissed privatization as "off the table." They didn't understand that that was the problem.

What we have here is a city that can't solve its problems, can't even release a basic audit or balance sheet, let alone keep a working map of the city in its charge, yet it blames the private sector for its own corruption and incompetence and uses that to entrench itself further.

Here's the way Baltimore's mayor laid blame for the wastewater takeover:

"The Back River and Patapsco Wastewater Treatment Plants have had issues that long predate my administration," [Baltimore Mayor Brandon ] Scott said.

He seems to think someone else did it, despite the fact that Baltimore has been in blue control since World War II and that's his party.

It's like Flint cubed. Of course, it's a cautionary tale about the dangers of one-party blue cities for the rest of the country, which isn't run as badly as this. But the scary thing about it is that we can see that within the U.S., the blue cities aren't all that different from third-world hellholes, and voters are less cognizant of this than they realize. When this blue-city model is taken national, as the Biden administration is trying to do, the result is not going to be at al different in the long run from what we see in Baltimore and all the third-world basket cases it's mirroring.

Image: Pixabay, Pixabay License.
America has two seminal documents: the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. The former states the fundamental predicates justifying America's creation as an independent nation. The latter is a contract that sees the federal government and the People define the government's function and limit its powers. Both articulate principles that Biden's nominee to the Supreme Court, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, rejects. Her rejection should instantly disqualify her.

In the prelude to the Declaration of Independence (the bulk of which is concerned with the wrongs George III had inflicted on the colonies, justifying their separation from Great Britain), Thomas Jefferson wrote some of the most famous words in the English language (emphasis mine):

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Those emphasized words are the fundamental premise underlying America's entire constitutional political system: all people have inherent rights upon which government cannot infringe.

When the Founders enacted the Constitution, they were originally concerned solely with setting out a system of government. However, within a few years of the Constitution's ratification, they were so concerned that future governments might destroy those "unalienable Rights" that they ratified the first ten amendments, now known as the Bill of Rights. None of those amendments expands the government's power, nor does any of them discuss mere privileges, which are revocable. Each, instead, defines rights each person is born with, upon which the government cannot infringe or may infringe upon only in the least intrusive, most limited way. The Fourteenth Amendment extends these principles to state governments.

Each new Supreme Court justice swears an oath that begins "I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; [and] that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same[.]" With that oath, the justice affirms his acceptance that people have unalienable (i.e., inherent) rights: life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness; freedom of speech, worship, assembly, and the press; the right to bear arms; the right to a swift trial and one by jury; and the whole panoply of inherent rights that their federal and state governments can deny them only if they demonstrate an overwhelming, legitimate need that cannot be met in any other way.



Image by Andrea Widburg using a YouTube screen grab.

For a judge to deny these unalienable, inherent rights should instantly disqualify him from sitting on a federal bench, especially the Supreme Court. Yet deny those rights is exactly what Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson did.

Sen. Ted Cruz served her with a set of written questions, two of which revealed Jackson's constitutional nihilism. The first question asked her to explain the Founders' belief in natural rights. Jackson responded, not in an intelligent, substantive way, but simply by quoting Jefferson's language that "We hold these truths to be self-evident ..." It was a silly, shallow response from someone who studied for the exam only the night before.

It was the next question-and-answer that revealed that Jackson has no place on the Supreme Court (emphasis added):

Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson testifies: "I do not hold a position on whether individuals possess natural rights." (From response to post-hearing written questions.) pic.twitter.com/NwH9vjsTLr  Ed Whelan (@EdWhelanEPPC) April 1, 2022

Question: Do you hold a position on whether individuals possess natural rights, yes or no? Response: I do not hold a position on whether individuals possess natural rights.

Jackson's answer is the judicial equivalent of a priest seeking a bishopric while disclaiming a belief in God  it renders the person unfit for the position sought. You cannot "support and defend the Constitution ... [and] bear true faith and allegiance to the same" while refusing to accept its core premise.

A person who claims to be a woman yet has no idea what a woman is ("I'm not a biologist") and who desperately wants to swear an oath to support and defend the Constitution while refusing to acknowledge its most basic principle doesn't even belong on a Democrat city's municipal court. She most certainly does not belong on the United States Supreme Court to which Chief Justice Marshall long ago assigned the power (unstated in the Constitution) to determine constitutional questions.

Given this response, Sen. Susan Collins would do well to reconsider her previously voiced support for Jackson, and every other Republican senator needs to get on board with a resounding "NO." Sadly, we already know that the Constitution means nothing to Democrat senators, who rely upon it and dismiss it based solely on their political needs. They've already locked in their votes for this dismal excuse for a federal judge.
Who among us would leave the comfort of his home to go and protest a government that's gone off the rails? Probably not that many. Not after all the intimidation and threats leveled against conservatives and Trump-supporters. That seems to have been the plan all along. We've learned what becomes of patriots who didn't for one moment believe they would be risking everything to attend a protest in support of a sitting president. By simply exercising their God-given rights, a great many of them have ended up as political prisoners.

Political movements aren't usually carried out by members of a comfortable and still fairly complacent population. Liberty gave rise to the overwhelmingly dominant middle class that has been the hallmark of modern America. Even as the American dream starts to dissolve, we'll still cling tightly to what remains and pretend not to be witnessing the demise of history's most beautiful child.

We're told that the precious gift was actually a demon seed and that we must purge all remembrance from our treacherous minds. As our past is erased, we're taught to hate the present and the future. Only in feudal serfdom and communism can happiness be found, so we must turn back the clock. Freedom and modernity are the devils that must be cast into the pit. They have wrecked the planet and led us off the path of conformity and obsequiousness.

It is, however, the idealists and true believers who are responsible for much of the despair and misery in the world. Their utopian schemes are an all-out war against human nature. Authoritarianism is the product of their ill conceived notions of a perfect society. "Perfect" societies can be sustained only by cruelty and brute force.

People desire the freedom to live their lives in peace. We charter governments to resolve disputes, punish those who step across moral and legal barriers, and protect the nation from foreign threats. The United States has, from its founding, held the belief that governments are a "necessary evil." They are destructive by nature and should be severely limited in size and scope lest their growth escapes the bounds of service and become, as is their wont, dictatorial and oppressive.



Image: Scene at the Signing of the Constitution of the United States by Howard Chandler Christy. Public domain.

That is what our Founding Fathers knew to be the reality of governance. They pressed up against the limits of their understanding to erase that fear from the struggles of a fledgling republic. If there must be a "necessary evil," then their posterity should have the tools to control it  to limit its size and growth. It is our great failing that we have lost the will to employ the tools bequeathed to us.

The true believers are now running the show in America. A license to kill belongs to their bloated and immoral government  not just to kill the physical body, but the soul-crushing torture of the spirit that is imprisonment and loss.

To force their perfect society on America, the utopians must first do away with the Constitution. This is no small undertaking. But when the government can wantonly incarcerate, ruin, or gun down its citizens with impunity, then there is little left of the free state. Ashli Babbitt was executed by a Capitol Police officer who was then sheltered from the public by government officials and the media. An internal investigation found that the shooting was justified and that the officer would not face any charges.

That decision created two polar realities. The Capitol Police used one to exonerate the officer, and another was clearly illustrated by the video recording of the event.

This duplicity mirrors what is now happening throughout our society. If you're not parroting government-sanctioned speech, no matter how false, absurd, or outrageous, you risk being "canceled" by the technocracy or persecuted by the state and their media allies. Parents who stand up at school board meetings and question the teaching of Critical Race Theory or transgenderism are now labeled as terrorists by the Department of Justice, while all the crime and corruption sweeping across the country are tolerated, excused, and often encouraged.

This is a far cry from our constitutional government. It is also an unsustainable state of affairs for even a comfortable middle-class population. The rising tide of anger and frustration can't be sidelined forever, and it won't be derailed by perpetual wars, endless "pandemics," or climate change scams.

Frank Liberato is a pseudonym.
"The most magical place on Earth" is now the queerest.

Walt Disney believed in the sanctity of the family and the power of imagination. He said of his grandest creation, "Disneyland is the star, everything else is in the supporting role." He lived by his credo: "Laughter is timeless, imagination has no age, dreams are forever."

Walt Disney passed away in 1966. And, ironically, so did his dream.

The company he created has effectively changed his credo to: "Gayness is timeless, sexual adventurism has no age, transgenderism is forever."

Florida governor Ron DeSantis recently signed into law the Parental Rights in Education bill. The legislation prohibits the instruction of sexual education and gender orientation to school children under eight years old, those in pre-K through grade 3. Democrats and other so-called progressives immediately and preposterously dubbed the legislation the "Don't Say Gay Bill." A more accurate moniker would be the "Doesn't Say Gay Bill," since the word "gay" literally never appears in the bill. But let's not let the truth stand in the way of a good narrative, right?

In any case, leftists, progressives, Democrats (but I repeat myself), and other assorted morons went ballistic when they discovered they may no longer legally be able to indoctrinate young children into the LGBTQIA++++++ lifestyle/community...or even simply describe what they did in or out of bed with their significant others over the past weekend to their young and inquisitive classroom charges on any given Monday morning. Repression! Oppression! The white, male, Christian patriarchy at its evil worst! The insatiable desire of many of today's teachers to talk to  and with  young kids about sexuality and "gender fluidity" is shocking, creepy, abusive...and borderline criminal.

Disney issued a statement roundly condemning the bill.

DeSantis then called out Disney for issuing the statement, declaring: "This state is governed by the interests of the people of the state of Florida. It is not based on the demands of California corporate executives. They do not run this state. They do not control this state."

Imagine if U.S.-based multi-national corporations like, say, Amazon, Google, Disney, or Pfizer could influence or even dictate U.S. policy! Ridiculous! Preposterous! Could never happen. Why, if it did, the United States would be an oligarchy, much like Russia. Hah!

Chasten Buttigieg, who considers himself the husband of U.S. transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, took to Twitter to indignantly state: "Every LGBTQ student, teacher, parent, nurse, astronaut, mechanic, soldier, etc., in Florida is still LGBTQ. The governor can sign a bill making it illegal to acknowledge their existence, but he can't make them disappear with a pen. Love will always win, friends. Onward."

"Every LGBTQ student, teacher, parent, nurse, astronaut, mechanic, soldier, etc., in Florida is still LGBTQ"? All of them? Wow. And what of electricians, plumbers, secretaries, check-out clerks, professional athletes, veterinarians, and waitresses? Does DeSantis's bill make it illegal to acknowledge their existence, too? What if you happen to be a bisexual parent who is also a teacher and in the National Guard? Does DeSantis's bill make you disappear? Call for your execution? Such preposterous poppycock should be beneath even the "husband" of a member of the Biden administration.

Disney corporate president Karey Burke boldly stated that she wants a minimum of 50% of Disney's characters to be LGBTQIA and/or racial minorities going forward. And how is Disney going to make it queer clear to the kiddies that all these characters are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender?

Disney has already done away with all gendered greetings and messages at its American parks, replacing them with "hello 'dreamers,'" etc.

Worse yet, Disney production coordinator Allen March says his team is utterly committed to "exploring queer stories" and "canonical trans characters," as well as "canonical bisexual characters." Canonical?

Here is the definition of "canonical:"

According to or ordered by canon law.

"the canonical rites of the Roman Church"

Included in the list of sacred books officially accepted as genuine.

"the canonical Gospels of the New Testament"

relating to a cathedral chapter or a member of it.

Do we really wish to conflate sodomy, bisexuality, transgenderism, and gender dysphoria with the "sacred?"

Not to be outdone, Disney executive producer Latoya Raveneau was caught on video stating: "I was just, wherever I could, just basically adding queerness." Yay! Queering Disney! Yay! "Gay, gay, gay, gay!"

And Disney's activism partner Nadine Smith, of Equality Florida, told the company's LGBTQ employees that DeSantis and Republicans want to "erase you," "criminalize your existence," and "take your kids." In reality, it is conservatives who routinely get canceled and erased, and whose very existence is criminalized. Talk about fake news and disinformation! Republicans want to take the kids from members of the LGBTQ community? Really? Has this ever happened? Even once before? What would they do with them if they kidnapped them? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? (This is precisely the kind of BS that the mainstream media adore and traffic in  literally fake news. It is more than biased. It is disingenuous, it is untrue, it is deliberately malicious, and it does immeasurable and permanent harm to society at large on several levels. It is why, tragically, the mainstream media as presently constituted are truly the enemy of the people.)

Imagine the possibilities of this gay new world! Buzz Lightyear and Sheriff Woody would be so good together, if you know what I mean! We can dream about magical moments between Jasmine and Elsa! That's what I'm talkin' 'bout! Tarzan, Jane, Tinkerbell, Cruella de Ville, Captain Hook, Ariel, Minnie, Mickey, Goofy...the delicious permutations are endless!

And I'm sure our kids will enjoy it all! Remember, love will always win, friends. Onward.

Photo credit: Gay Days Mickey Mouse Hat, Amazon.com.
On September 19, 2019, accepting the Defender of Western Civilization award from the Intercollegiate Studies Institute at the fourteenth annual Gala for Western Civilization, Sir Roger Scruton gave a splendid address, his last one before he left this world after battling cancer. The core message of the speech was that if Western civilization is under attack, this is happening precisely because it's Western, and "the word Western has been taken to be a standard term of abuse by so many people in the world today." Yet, he explained, Western civilization is not even close to what its detractors think it is  namely, some narrow, small-minded thing called Western. It is instead "an inheritance, constantly expanding, constantly including new things. It is something which has given us the knowledge of the human heart, which has enabled us to produce not just wonderful economies and the wonderful ways of living in the world that are ours, but also the great works of art, the religions, the systems of law and government, all the other things which make it actually possible for us to recognize that we live in this world, insofar as possible, successfully." That's why "we shouldn't despair of Western civilization." We're talking about, he concluded, "an open, generous, and creative thing called civilization."

Sir Roger's remarks came to my mind as soon as I read the first pages of Suicidio occidentale (Western Suicide), the new book by Federico Rampini, a prominent Italian journalist who lives in the U.S. and holds Italian and American citizenship. If an attack in the heart of Europe caught us unprepared, he argues with reference to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it is because we were engaged in our own cultural disarmament and self-destruction. The dominant ideology spread by elites in universities and in the media requires us to demolish self-esteem and blame ourselves for almost everything that goes wrong in the world. According to this ideological dictatorship, he says, we Western countries no longer have values to offer the world and the new generations; we only have sins to expiate and lessons to learn.

This is the suicide of the West. In many U.S. universities, Rampini notes, it is impossible for non-extremists on issues of sex and gender to have freedom of speech. The New York Times in particular, says Rampini, bears heavy responsibility in this regard for playing a central role in the creation of Critical Race Theory. Putin's aggression on Ukraine, backed by Xi Jinping, he concludes, is a consequence of the fact that the two major autocracies know we are sabotaging ourselves.

Well, that makes perfect sense, does it not? After all, isn't it true that Putin wouldn't have dared to attack Ukraine if the 45th president had gotten a second term? And this not only because of Trump's personal charisma, but also  if not mainly  because of his philosophy and antipolitically correct narrative. From this point of view, too, the change at the White House was a disaster: Joe Biden's "woke" presidency is a luxury the West couldn't and can't afford.

The subtitle of Rampini's new book, however, is as hopeful as the aforementioned Roger Scruton's exhortation: "Why it is wrong to erase our values and history." From this perspective, the war in Ukraine could prove an opportunity for the West. It could pave the way to a new self-consciousness and a better understanding of our collective past, present, and future. There's othing (or very little) to do, however, with the Industrial-Military complex and what Sharon Beder called business-managed democracies  namely, "democracies where the politics and cultural life of nations are managed in the interests of business."

If America and the West are such horrible, racist, and bigoted places, then why aren't people trying to escape? And why so many migrants are trying to cross our borders illegally? Why are Ukrainians so eager to enter the E.U. and NATO? The answers to these and other similar questions are to be found in a correct understanding of what the West really is  of its soul, which makes its body alive.

"Whatever we do," said Sir Roger,

we must fight back against this accusation that somehow our civilization is narrow, dogmatic, bigoted, and exclusive. It is not so. ... Why are we now being forced into a defensive position when it's so obviously the case to anybody who knows anything about it that what we call Western civilization is another name for civilization as such, and for all the achievements of civilization that young people need to know about and if possible to acquire. The problem, it seems to me, extends largely from the invasion of the academic and intellectual world by activist groups who do not take the trouble to learn enough to know what they're up against but nevertheless define their position in terms of political agendas. ... I think this invasion of political activism into universities and into the humanities and into all those channels of civilization is one of the great disasters of our age.

What you need to do, Sir Roger concluded, "is engage in dialogue, which is what civilization is about."

Try to understand the human condition in all its complexity. And when people try to radicalize and politicize the curriculum and what is taught and thought about in universities, you don't have to go along with this. You can even laugh at them. It still actually is legally permitted to laugh at people in our country and in our civilization. After all, comedy is one of the great gifts of civilization. And it's up to you, I think, to exercise it.

What a masterful teaching!

Samuel Robert Piccoli is a blogger and the author of the books Being Conservative from A to Z (2014) and Blessed Are the Free in Spirit (2021). He is Italian and lives in the Venice area.
Hundreds of towns and villages have perished due to massive earth-moving projects such as the construction of dams. But the temples at Abu Simbel, in Egypt, were historically and culturally far too important to let that happen. So when the newly built Aswan High Dam and reservoir threatened to swallow the 3,300-year-old temples, the international community banded together for an extraordinary salvage operation.

The Abu Simbel temples were originally located along the Nile river, carved out of the solid mountain rock. They were commissioned by Ramesses II, the third pharaoh of the Nineteenth Dynasty of Egypt, who is often regarded as the greatest and the most powerful pharaoh of the New Kingdom. During his reign, Ramesses II built many temples throughout Egypt and Nubia, particularly Nubia, in order to impress upon the Nubian people the might of the Egyptians. The most famous of these are the rock-cut temples near the modern village of Abu Simbel.

The Great Temple of Abu Simbel. Photo: Anton_Ivanov/Shutterstock.com

Ramesses II built two colossal temples herethe bigger one, called the Great Temple, is incredible to behold. Four epic statues depicting the pharaoh himself seated on a throne face the entrance. Each statue is twenty meters tall. The facade behind the seated statues is largely blank, but on the upper edge is a frieze depicting an army of baboons worshipping the rising sun. Between the statues lie the entrance surmounted by a bas-relief of the king worshipping the falcon-headed god Ra Horakhty. Inside the great hall of the temple are eight columns, each carved in the resemblance of Ramesses. The spacious interior is decorated from floor to the ceiling with heliographic glorifying Ramessess military campaigns. In the middle of the complex is the sacred inner sanctuary, where Ramesses is shown sharing the throne with the three godsRa-Horakhty, Amun Ra and Ptah.

Ramesses built another temple, the so-called Small Temple, dedicated to his wife Nefertari and goddess Hathor. This was only the second time in ancient Egyptian history that a temple was dedicated to a queen, the first being Nefertiti. Like the Great Temple, the entrance to the Small Temple is flanked by statues of the pharaoh and his queen, most remarkably, built in equal size. Usually, queens are depicted no taller than the knee of the pharaoh. The interior of the Small Temple is decorated with scenes showing the queen playing the sistrum and making offerings to the goddesses Hathor and Mut.

The Small Temple of Abu Simbel. Photo: Ad Meskens / Wikimedia Commons

Over the millennia the temples became buried in sand and was forgotten. When they were rediscovered in the early 19th century, only the top frieze of the main temple was visible above the sand. The temple was dug out and for a while it appeared that Ramessess immortality was assured, but in the late 1950s, another disaster loomed.

The government was planning a new dam across the Nile, about 230 km upstream from where Ramessess colossal statues stood. At 4 km long and 110 meters tall, the new Aswan High Dam was to be the largest embankment dam in the world. Egypt needed it because the earlier dam was proving to be incapable of controlling the annual flooding of the Nile. The new dam would not only allow Egypt to tame the river, but the reservoir created would help sustain the farmlands and the people of the region during periods of drought.

There was, however, one major drawback. The 5,250-square-km reservoir named Lake Nasser would require the resettlement of some 90,000 people, and if possible, the magnificent temples of Abu Simbel.

The temples during excavation, circa 1853  1854. Photo: John Beasly Greene

In 1959, the Egyptian government approached UNESCO for help. Thankfully, the international community was familiar with the region of ancient Nubia and the countless archeological sites it contained. Recognizing the seriousness of the problem, UNESCO embarked on its first-ever collaborative international rescue effort. An international fund-raising project was launched in 1960. To drum up support for the campaign, Egypt organized a travelling exhibition of several objects from the tomb of Tutankhamun. The Tutankhamun Treasures exhibition was featured across North America, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and Japan. The money generated helped finance not only the Abu Simbel project but many future UNESCO campaigns.

Numerous ideas on how to save the temples were proposed. One involved creating a gigantic aquarium around the temples with elevator-accessible underwater viewing chambers for visitors. This idea was rejected. Another proposed raising the temples on hydraulic jacks, but the cost would have been immense. Eventually, it was decided to cut up the rocks into manageable chunks, transport them to higher ground and reassemble them like Lego blocks.

Work began in November 1963. First, a cofferdam was erected around Abu Simbel in order to gain additional time in which to work on the temples while water was collecting in the Aswan dams reservoir. The greatest care was needed while cutting up the stones. Power saws could not be used because they made the cuts too wideanything wider than 8 millimeters would have been visible when the blocks were put back together. Instead, hand saws and steel wires were used to slice up the rocks into blocks each 20 to 30 tons in weight. In the end, the larger temple yielded 807 blocks and the smaller one 235. Once cut, each block was coated to protect it against splitting and fracturing during transport.

The new site was located about 200 meters further inland and 65 meters higher up. Before reassembly could begin, an artificial hill was created using some 330,000 cubic meters of rock to resemble the natural stony hill against which the temples stood at the original site. Then the blocks were put back together with extreme precision, secured to one another with reinforcement bars and the joints filled with an artificial material. Care was taken to maintain the temples original alignment to the cardinal directions, so that the rays of the sun would continue to penetrate the sanctuary and illuminate the sculptures on the back wall during certain hours of the spring and autumn.

The successful relocation of the Abu Simbel temples set the momentum for further rescue efforts. Within the Nubian valley itself, UNESCO rescued as many as 22 different monuments from inundation, including Ramessess temples. One monument, the Temple of Amada, had to be moved whole because it couldnt be cut up as it would have damaged the structure. Other sites that were successfully transferred include Wadi es-Sebua, another temple built by Ramesses II, the Roman-era Temple of Kalabsha, and the Temple of Philae. Buoyed by these successes, UNESCO moved to Venice to protect its lagoons, then to Mohenjodaro in Pakistan to help excavate the ruins and then to Indonesia to preserve the Borobodur Temple.

The completion of such an enormous and complex project helped UNESCO realise that we were capable of three main things, explained Dr. Mechtild Rossler, director of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre and the Heritage Division. First, bringing together the best expertise the world has to offer. Second, securing the international cooperation of its members. And third: assuring the responsibility of the international community to bring together funding and support that would help the world's heritage as a whole. We recognized that one country alone is just not capable.

The success of the Nubian campaign was directly responsible for the creation of the World Heritage Trust in 1965, and subsequently, the UNESCOs World Heritage Sites List. The Galapagos Islands became the first World Heritage Site in 1978. The Nubian Monuments were added to the list in 1979.

A scale model at the Nubian Museum, Aswan, showing the original location of the Abu Simbel temples (under the glass, depicting the surface of the reservoir) and the rescued and relocated temples' new higher sites. Photo: Zureks/Wikimedia Commons

References:

# A salvage operation that inspired the world: Abu Simbel and the World Heritage, https://www.saratprojesi.com/en/resources/sarats-features/a-salvage-operation-that-inspired-the-world-abu-simbel-and-the-world-heritage

# Abu Simbel  Unparalleled relocation project, https://www.atlascopco.com/history/en/evolution/landmark-projects/abu-simbel

# Esther Pons, Epic engineering rescued colossal ancient Egyptian temples from floodwaters, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/magazine/2019/07-08/egyptian-temples-excavation-abu-simbel/

# Laura Kiniry, Egypts exquisite temples that had to be moved, http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20180409-egypts-exquisite-temples-that-had-to-be-moved
Ask anyone, what won the war against Japan during the Second World War, and the answer would invariably be the atomic bomb, but truth be told, it was the Boeing B-29 Superfortress that broke Japans back. Months before Bockscar delivered the final payload of the war, hundreds of American B-29s had flown across the Pacific in thousands of sorties to destroy Japanese cities as well as their ability to fight.

The Boeing B-29 Superfortress was every nations envy. It was the most advanced aircraft of the time, with state-of-the-art technology, such as remote controlled guns, pressurized compartments, dual-wheeled, tricycle landing gear, and extraordinarily powerful engines. It could carry up to 20,000 pounds of bomb and drop them on targets 3,000 miles away. It could fly at 350 mph at an altitude of over 30,000 feetcomfortably out of reach of most Japanese planes and guns. The B-29 was a generation ahead of the Luftwaffe's Junkers Ju 290, and even Boeings own B-17 and B-24. Japan did not even have a heavy bomber, and the most advanced bomber in the Soviet inventory used fabric-covered ailerons, compared to the B-29s all-aluminum marvel.

Several times Stalin asked President Roosevelt to supply the Soviet Union with B-29s under the US military aid programan understanding among Allied nations to share food, oil, and materials among themselves. Under the program, the US sent Soviet $11 billion in materials, including over 400,000 jeeps and trucks, 12,000 armored vehicles, 11,400 aircraft, nearly 2,000 locomotives, 2.6 million tons of gasoline and oil, and 1.75 million tons of food. The only item they refused was heavy bombers.

Soviet Union was not exactly a friend. The only reason America and Britain were willing to fulfil Soviets demands was because they all faced a common enemy. Both America and Britain sent the Soviet Union massive amounts of military aid in order to shore them up. They needed Stalins troops to fight the Nazis on the Eastern Front, to draw them away from the fight along the English Channel and thwart a possible invasion of Britain. For this purpose America and Britain supplied Stalin with M3 Lees and M4 Shermans, as well as the American Airacobra fighter jets and British Hurricanes. But heavy bombers capable of flying over a continent and across an ocean, were a different matter. The US did not trust Stalin enough to equip him with a technology that might be used against them.

The B-29 Flight Deck. Photo: 900hp/Flickr

Luckily for Stalin, B-29 crews were instructed to land in Russia in case of emergencies, and in the summer of 1944, exactly such an emergency befell three B-29s during a bombing raid to Japan. The three aircraftsGeneral H.H. Arnold Special, Ding How, and Ramp Tramplanded in Vladivostok, and at once, the Soviet whisked them away to a facility in Moscow. The crews were sent back home, but not after desperate pleas from the US. Demands for the return of the planes were ignored.

With these three aircrafts, Soviet engineers began one of the most complex and audacious reverse-engineering projects ever. Of the three, one was dismantled. To keep track of the growing mountain of parts, the second one was use as reference. The third was used for test flight.

Stalin ordered that the B-29 be copied exactly, down to the smallest detail. But that was easier said than done. The Soviet Union did not have the manufacturing ability to reproduce many parts. For instance, the B-29 used a 1/16 aluminum skin, but the Soviets used the metric system, so sheet aluminium in that thicknesses was unavailable to them. The Soviet ended up using aluminium of a different thickness. Many alloys and other materials new to the Soviet Union had to be brought into production. Parts had to be re-engineered to compensate for the minor differences and then made sure they fitted and the entire aircraft worked as expected. Compromise had to be made. The .50 caliber machine guns used in the B-29 could not be sourced, and had to be replaced with cannons instead. For tires, agents scoured the western war surplus market.

The biggest challenge was duplicating the complicated central fire-control system. The B-29 used five General Electric analog computers to control the five gunsights located in the nose and tail positions of the airplane within Plexiglas blisters. These interconnected controls allowed a single gunner to remotely operate the B-29s guns simultaneously. All weapons were aimed optically with targeting computed by the analog computers by taking into consideration the speed of the aircraft, gravity, temperature and humidity, among other things, allowing for increased weapons' accuracy. The system was so complicated, that even Andrei Tupolev, the lead engineer of the project, was surprised when his engineers pulled off the impossible.

A surviving Tupolev Tu-4 at the Monino Central Air Force Museum, Moscow. Photo: Andrey Korchagin/Flickr

In less than two years, the Soviet Superfortress Tupolev Tu-4, was ready. Despite the many challenges, the prototype Tu-4 weighed only about 340 kg more than the B-29, a difference of less than 1 percent. It looked virtually identical to the B-29. It had the same wingspan and same fuselage length. It had the same speed, the same range, the same payload and a slightly higher service ceiling.

Tupolev and his team was so meticulous in their duplication effort that they copied every last detail including the fuselage patch and the color scheme. Some rumors circulated that even flak damage on the wings had been carefully copied, and that a misplaced typewriter within the B-29 was included as standard equipment on every Soviet copy of the plane.

While some of these stories were certainly exaggerated, there was an element of truth behind them. According to Leonid Kerber, an engineer who worked alongside Tupolev in the Tu-4 project, Tupolev was so scared of Stalin and Lavrentiy Beria, the chief of Stalins secret police, that he made sure that every minor detail was copied, lest he be accused of ignoring Stalins precise instructions.

The first batch of Tu-4s rolled off the assembly line on schedule in 1947. It flew for the first time on 19 May 1947.

On August 3, the same year, the Soviet Union held Aviation Day at the Tushino airfield northwest of Moscow. Representatives from all major air forces were present. As the American diplomats stood watching, they heard a familiar drone. Looking up they saw what appeared to be the three captured B-29s that the Soviets had refused to return years earlier. Only when a fourth aircraft appeared, that the world new that the Soviets had successfully copied the Superfortress.

The Tu-4 eventually went into mass production, and by 1952, when production ended, around 850 bombers had been made. The valuable experience gained during its design launched the Soviet strategic bomber program, and by the early 1960s, the Tu-4s were already withdrawn, replaced by more advanced aircrafts. A variant of the Tu-4, the Tu-4A, was used to carry and drop the first Soviet nuclear bomb.

References:

# Brian Benchoff, STOLEN TECH: THE SOVIET SUPERFORTRESS, https://hackaday.com/2016/03/10/stolen-tech-the-soviet-superfortress/

# Von Hardesty, Made in the U.S.S.R., https://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/made-in-the-ussr-38442437/?all

# Wayland Mayo, Russian B-29 Clone  The TU-4 Story, http://www.rb-29.net/HTML/03RelatedStories/03.03shortstories/03.03.10contss.htm

# Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-4
At the other end of the sea from where Queen Elizabeth sits on her throne in England, photos of her husband holding a unique club rest safely under the supervision of two tribal villages. These are Yakel and Yaohnanen, settlements in the Vanuatu archipelago of the south Pacific where the Duke of Edinburgh has been worshiped as god for decades.

Photo: Roman Kalyakin/Flickr

At its peak, the reverence had thousands of followers under its wing, though now the numbers have dwindled to a few hundreds. Despite the linguistic, geographical and cultural differences between the two lands, the tribals of Tanna island have come to worship Prince Philip as a god-like entity. This is a man who is accepted as one of their ownthe son of the mountain god, a warrior descended from the slopes of the land to make his way to England. Why? To fulfill the prophecy that a tribesman would leave the island in his real spiritual form to look for a wife in a powerful position overseas. As the spiritual leader made his way forward, the choppy waters pushed him against merciless coral reefs, chafing his dark skin to reveal the pale skin underneath. Once successful in his quest, he was expected to return to his land in Tanna.

The Duke, who ruled over the United Kingdom next to Queen Elizabeth until his death in 2021, seemed like the perfect embodiment of this Tanna kastom (or cultural customs). But various theories have been developed as to why the tribes cherry picked the British monarch in particular. Kirk Huffman, an anthropologist who has been working in Vanuatu for years, suggests pictures of Prince Philip next to the Queen across the land may have triggered this Prince Philip Movement. Another idea is that the attribution is a way of seizing back a semblance of authority on the tribals part by relating themselves to the head of the British regime.

Queen Elizabeth with her husband the duke of Edinburgh. Photo: Gabriella Comaschi/Flickr

The spotting of the movement began around the 1950s, but was accelerated by the royal visit of the Queen and the duke in 1974. Back then, Vanuatu was called New Hebrides, and was under colonisation as part of the British Commonwealth. An unaware Philip had engaged in a kava drinking ceremony that year while the royal couple was sailing past the island of Tanna. Otherwise known for his cultural indifference, he was soon after found commanding that an official photograph of him be sent to the sect in Tanna for worship. It was unlikely, yet very real: the Duke of Edinburgh had officially acknowledged his ancient followers. It was also purported that several letters and photographs were exchanged between him and the villagers over time.

Photo: Breaking Asia/Flickr

A present to the duke from the tribes soon went down in history as a testimony of confirmation of the rumours. It was a pig-bashing club called a nal-nal. A meeting was convened, and the British resident commissioner took the stage to present photos of the British deity to a glue-eyed crowd staring mouth agape. It was right after the show that one of the village chiefs handed him the club, to be passed along to Prince Philip. And none of it was for pomp or show; it was pure, honest reverence, which demanded proof that their god had received the offering. Thousands of miles away, the club was presented to the duke in the UK, and a photograph of him holding it in his hands was clicked and sent back to Tanna. This image, along with all others, have been preserved in the villages till date. While the revered entity has passed on, the onus of being the leader has been unanimously passed on to his son, Prince Charles.

Photo: Roman Kalyakin/Flickr

These tribal men and women speak the Navhaal language, one spoken by only about 4,500 people across the world. Though well connected by air with the rest of the world, their community has detached itself from the shenanigans of the modern world, and finds succour in age old traditions that go back to some 3,000 years. You may not find electronic devices or modern clothing in the villages, but cultural activities abound here. Upon hearing of the Princes demise, the locals executed elaborate ceremonies to recognise the passing of the physical form of their spiritual god. Funerary speeches were held and dances were performed as a powerful way of expressing mourning. The most integral aspect of these traditions was the kava drinking, which is considered a sacred activity. This divine drink is used as a medium to transcend beyond the material world and communicate with other-worldly spirits. For in the Melanesian lands, which Vanuatu is a part of, the belief is that the physical body is of no consequence, and the spirit can in fact be reincarnated over the years to take on a new body. Will the Duke finally make his way back to his homeland in Tanna as believed?

References

# BBC News

# Independent.co.uk

# Dailymail.co.uk

# The Guardian
According to The Verge (via Bloomberg), Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk have acquired 9.2 percent of Twitter stake. The news is confirmed based on the recently revealed 13G filing.

Elon Musk is one of the most active Twitter users and has more than 80 million followers on this platform. His tweets are always very popular with users and receive tons of engagement.

As per the report, Musk acquired 9.2 percent of Twitter on March 14th and paid $2.89 billion based on Fridays closing price. Although the Musk stakes are known as a passive stakes, an analyst at Wedbush told CNBC that the purchase could lead to some sort of buyout.

Advertisement

Elon Musks purchase of Twitter shares is notable for the fact that he recently asked his followers about the platforms adherence to free speech. On March 25th, Musk created a poll on his account and asked, Free speech is essential to a functioning democracy. Do you believe Twitter rigorously adheres to this principle? Then he said the consequences of this poll would be very important and asked the voters to vote carefully.

Does Elon Musk want to turn Twitter into a free speech advocate?

Since the latest presidential election in the United States, Twitter has been under fire for labeling and removing Donald Trumps tweets. Then, Twitter even closed Trumps account and didnt allow him to open any new account. Trumps request to the court has not yet reached a specific result.

Musks poll of his followers seems to have influenced his decision to buy Twitter shares. Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy, he said in another tweet shortly after the poll.

Advertisement

At the beginning of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Musk claimed that he had refused the request of some governments to block access to Russian news sources through Starlink. Musk said he considered himself a free speech absolutist.

Following the presidential election controversy, some sources even reported that Musk was seeking to establish a new social platform. However, he now owns 9.2 percent of Twitter shares, and well have to wait and see what he is going to do with that. As a major shareholder, Musk may want to reconsider Twitter strategies and policies over free speech.
Chinese FM holds talks with Philippine counterpart on bilateral ties

Xinhua) 09:58, April 04, 2022

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi holds talks with Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Zhou Mu)

HEFEI, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi held talks on Sunday with visiting Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province.

Wang said China always takes the Philippines as a priority in its neighborhood diplomacy, and China's good-neighborly and friendly policy toward the Philippines has maintained continuity and stability.

The two sides should remove disturbances, calmly and properly manage differences and not let them affect the overall situation of China-Philippines relations, Wang said.

China is ready to speed up the construction of key infrastructure projects with the Philippines, and continue to provide COVID-19 vaccine assistance and enhance public health cooperation according to the need of the Philippines, Wang said.

Locsin said Philippine-China relations have become increasingly mature and bilateral practical cooperation has achieved historic results, bringing lasting benefits to both sides.

As a responsible major country, China is committed to independence and peaceful development, setting a new example in a turbulent world, Locsin said, adding that China has long promoted the development of other countries in the region through its own development and played an irreplaceable role in global economic growth.

The two sides exchanged views on the South China Sea issue and held that maritime issues should be placed in an appropriate position in bilateral relations.

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi holds talks with Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Zhou Mu)

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
Italy's FM, western Balkans are strategic,full EU membership 'Russian aggression calls for a renewed commitment to stability'

(ANSA) - ROME, APR 4 - "Russian aggression requires renewed attention and concrete engagement to preserve the stability'' of the Western Balkans region, "strategic for Europe's security." So said Italy's Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio in Zagreb, at the end of the Trilateral of the Upper Adriatic with his Slovenian and Croatian counterparts. "The region is called upon to make every reasonable effort to definitively overcome the divisions of the past through tangible progress in the path of regional reconciliation that remains the main road to approach Europe.



The full integration of this region into the European Union should remain the strategic objective to achieve", said Di Maio, underlining that "if the EU wants to be a global player, it's fundamental to complete the construction of the common European house with the membership of all the Balkan countries." The EU presidencies of Croatia in 2020 and Slovenia in 2021 have made an essential contribution in this direction," he added. "We must accelerate the process of enlargement to the Balkans through concrete steps, beginning with the immediate opening of accession negotiations with Albania and North Macedonia." (ANSA).





 Copyright ANSA - All rights reserved
Hungary PM Orban claims 'great victory' in general election Hungarian leader wins fourth term with comfortable victory

(ANSA-AFP) - BUDAPEST, APR 4 - Nationalist Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban claimed a "great victory" in Sunday's general election, as partial results gave his Fidesz party the lead. Addressing a jubilant crowd chanting his name, Orban said: "We have won a great victory -- a victory so great you can perhaps see it from the moon and certainly from Brussels".



Nationalist Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban won a fourth term in office Sunday as his Fidesz party emerged triumphant, official figures showed, after a campaign overshadowed by the war in neighbouring Ukraine. Addressing a jubilant crowd chanting his name, Orban said: "We have won a great victory -- a victory so great you can perhaps see it from the moon and certainly from Brussels". Orban's administration has presided over repeated confrontations with the European Union, including over the neutering of the press and judiciary, and measures targeting the LGBTQ community -- also the subject of a vote on Sunday. The 58-year-old, already the longest-serving head of government in the EU, was challenged by six united opposition parties seeking to roll back the "illiberal" revolution Orban's Fidesz party has pursued during 12 consecutive years in office.



But with more than three-quarters of votes counted, Fidesz was on 54 percent compared to 33 percent for the opposition coalition, according to results from the national election office -- an unassailable lead. Peter Marki-Zay, 49, the conservative leading the opposition list, had characterised the election as a battle against "unfair and impossible circumstances" after casting his vote earlier in the day.



(ANSA-AFP).





 Copyright ANSA - All rights reserved
ISTANBUL - Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said "channels of dialogue with Greece are today more open than they ever were in the past", according to the daily Sabah. The minister was speaking at a conference organized by Turkish think tank Seta in the capital Ankara. Cavusoglu mentioned a "positive agenda", as far as bilateral relations were concerned, and said Ankara is playing "its part in this direction and we expect Greece to show the same sincerity and the same political will". The Turkish minister quoted an increase in the economic exchange between the two countries of 70% (5.2 billion euros) between 2020 and 2021 as the results of a policy of rapprochement promoted by Ankara and Athens.



Starting from last year, Turkey and Greece initiated a period of reconciliation after strong tensions between 2019 and 2020 due to various matters, including disputes on territorial waters separating the two countries in the Aegean sea and energy resources disputed off the coast of Cyprus, an island that has been divided for nearly 50 years, whose northern part is recognized as an independent republic exclusively by Ankara.
North Adriatic cooperation widens with security, Italy FM Third meeting Italy-Croatia-Slovenia, 'positive results'

(ANSAmed) - ROME, APRIL 4 - Italian Foreign Minister Luigi di Maio said Monday that "the one held today was the third meeting of the cooperation mechanism between Italy, Croatia and Slovenia, started in 2020 in Trieste, at Italy's initiative, which aims to promote the area of the High Adriatic as an epicenter of growth and development". Di Maio was speaking at the end of a trilateral summit with his Slovenian and Croatian counterparts in Zagreb, Croatia.



"Last year in Brdo, Slovenia, we had given ourselves precise objectives, and I feel that I can say the results obtained so far are very positive. Together, we have selected further areas of cooperation, starting with internal security, and given further impulse to sectors on which our countries are already working, in particular connectivity, environmental protection and the Blue Economy", he added.(ANSAmed).




BELGRADE - "The next government will be very strong and stable", said Aleksandar Vucic after an electoral triumph yesterday that will guarantee to his party 122 seats out of a total of 250. He went on to say that the alliance with the Union of Hungarians of Voivodina will continue, with which the absolute majority will be guaranteed. He did not make any reference to the Socialist party of Ivica Dacic, also allied to the outgoing government, which will probably continue to be part of the government coalition.



Vucic said he was proud of winning the presidential election for the second time in the first round, stressing that his success went well beyond that obtained by his predecessors Tomislav Nikolic and Boris Tadic, who won in the first round respectively 950,000 and 850,000 votes. Vucic also thanked Serbians of Kosovo and the Republika Srpska, 90% of whom voted for him.



The president said that Serbia intends to maintain good relations in many sectors with the Russian Federation, but that it will continue with its policy of military neutrality. "We must see what to do regarding oil, there will be talks on gas.



We will continue to deal with such problems, but what is important for Europeans, for Russians and for Americans is that we will continue with a policy of military neutrality and we will not adhere to any military alliance", said Vucic, replying to a Russian journalist at the end of his speech late at night at the headquarters of his Sns party to comment the results of the election day. And he added that he guaranteed nobody in Serbia would ever ban Dostoevsky or Tchaikovsky.



In parliamentary elections on Sunday, after 91.02% of ballots were counted by the electoral commission (Rik), the victory of the Serbian Progressive party (Sns, conservative) of Vucic obtained 43.45% of the vote and 122 seats in Parliament out of a total of 250. The second place, well behind the winner, was won by the opposition cartel (United for the victory of Serbia' with 13.07% and 36 seats, followed by the Serbian Socialist Party (Sps) of the speaker and former foreign minister Ivica Dacic that obtained 11.68% and 32 seats. Among groups representing minorities, the Union of Hungarians of Voivodina, with which Vucic confirmed the alliance, obtained 1.71% of the vote.



In presidential elections, after 90.71% of votes were counted by the electoral commission (Rik), Vucic's victory in the first round was confirmed with 59.55%. Zdravko Ponos, the candidate of the 'United opposition', came in second with 17.53%, followed by Milos Jovanovic of the coalition Nada (Hope for Serbia) which obtained 5.82%.



Vucic's party also won in administrative elections in the capital Belgrade. According to the Center for free elections and democracy (CeSID), based on the elaboration of 79% of sample data in its possession, Sns won 48 seats in the municipal assembly, while the cartel United opposition garnered 26 mandates.




A serving Metropolitan Police officer has been charged with sexually assaulting a colleague while on duty.

PC Joseph Demir, attached to the North West Basic Command Unit, was charged with sexual assault by post on March 9, the force said in a statement.

The incident is alleged to have occurred on March 10, 2020, when Mr Demir was a student officer at Hendon Training School. The offence was reported on July 1, 2020.

Mr Demir, who has been placed on restricted duties, was charged following an investigation by the Mets Directorate of Professional Standards.

He is due to appear at Willesden Magistrates Court on Tuesday.
It has been just over a week since the altercation at the 94th Academy Awards in which actor Will Smith stormed the stage and lashed out at comedian Chris Rock.

Here, the PA news agency takes a look back at the major developments in the story of the slap that was heard around the world.

 Sunday March 27

The 94th Academy Awards takes place, with comedian Chris Rock presenting the award for best documentary feature.

Before the announcement he makes a joke about actress Jada Pinkett Smith and her shaved head as a result of her medical condition, alopecia.

Her husband and best actor nominee Will Smith takes to the stage following the gag and slaps Rock across the face, before returning to his seat and shouting at the comedian to get my wifes name out of your f****** mouth.

Smith later returns to the stage after winning the top gong and gives a tearful acceptance speech, in which he apologises to the Academy and his fellow nominees, but not Rock.

He is later pictured celebrating and dancing with his family at the Vanity Fair afterparty.

Smith is later pictured celebrating and dancing with his family at the Vanity Fair afterparty (Doug Peters/PA)

The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) says it is aware of the incident, but no report has been filed.

 Monday March 28

Smiths actions are heavily criticised by everyone from his Hollywood contemporaries to the UK Government, with Downing Street saying that striking someone is never the answer.

The Academy, which previously said it does not condone violence of any form, announces it has launched a formal review into the incident.

A statement shared with media states: We will explore further action and consequences in accordance with our bylaws, standards of conduct and California law.

The Academy does not condone violence of any form. Tonight we are delighted to celebrate our 94th Academy Awards winners, who deserve this moment of recognition from their peers and movie lovers around the world.  The Academy (@TheAcademy) March 28, 2022

 Tuesday March 29

Smith issues a public apology to Rock and the Oscars production team in which he admits he reacted emotionally to the joke, but says that violence in all its forms is poisonous and destructive.

I am embarrassed and my actions were not indicative of the man I want to be. There is no place for violence in a world of love and kindness, his statement reads.

I deeply regret that my behaviour has stained what has been an otherwise gorgeous journey for all of usI am a work in progress.

Pinkett Smith also calls for a season of healing on her own social media post.

 Wednesday March 30

Reports surface that Smith was asked by Oscars organisers to leave the event after the incident, but he refused to do so.

The Academy board of governors meet and afterwards say that disciplinary action for Smith was discussed.

A statement from the organisation says consequences could include suspension, expulsion or other sanctions, adding: Things unfolded in a way we could not have anticipated.

Rock addresses the incident publicly for the first time on Wednesday at a stand-up show in Boston, where he is reportedly given a standing ovation (Chris Pizzello/AP)

The Academy also apologise to Rock for his experience and thank him for his resilience in that moment.

The comedian also addresses the incident publicly for the first time at a stand-up show in Boston, where he is reportedly given a standing ovation.

According to audio shared by Variety he tells his audience he is still kind of processing what happened but promises that when he does address the issue it will be serious and funny.

 Thursday March 31

Hollywood trade outlet Variety reports Smith attended a meeting with the Academys chief executive Dawn Hudson and president David Rubin, to discuss the outburst on Tuesday.

Show-runner Will Packer reveals that the LAPD were prepared to arrest the actor following the altercation and told Rock that his ordeal was classed as battery.

In a clip of an interview with Good Morning America (GMA), Packer says Rock was very dismissive of the options given to him by officers when they spoke with him and refused to press charges against the actor.

Even Oscars producer Will Packer thought Will Smith slapping Chris Rock was a bit at first. Heres what he says went through his mind the moment he realized it wasnt.https://t.co/QyvIpNv5Qr pic.twitter.com/C61BuDaiFy  Good Morning America (@GMA) April 1, 2022

 Friday April 1

The full interview with Packer airs on GMA where he reveals Rock had not wanted to make a bad situation worse and that he had initially thought the altercation was pre-planned between the pair.

Smith later announces his resignation from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences saying he betrayed the trust of the organisation with his shocking, painful and inexcusable behaviour.

In a statement, Smith apologises again to his fellow nominees and winners for having deprived them of the opportunity to celebrate their achievements on the night and says he will accept all consequences for his actions.

On Friday Smith announces his resignation from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences saying he betrayed the trust of the organisation (Chris Pizzello/AP)

He adds: Change takes time and I am committed to doing the work to ensure that I never again allow violence to overtake reason.

A subsequent statement from Academy president David Rubin says Smiths immediate resignation has been accepted and they will push ahead with disciplinary proceedings him ahead of the board meeting on April 18.

 Saturday April 2

The incident becomes the subject of the opening monologue by Jerrod Carmichael on popular US comedy show Saturday Night Live (SNL), who says it feels like it happened years ago.

The actor/comedian repeatedly states he is not gonna talk about it and pleads with former president Barack Obama to address the issue.

Can you believe its been six days? It was a week ago. Doesnt it feel like it happened years ago? he says.

 Sunday April 3

References to the Oscars altercation are still being made by presenters at the 64th Grammy Awards (Chris Pizzello/AP)

References to the altercation are made by presenters at the 64th Grammy Awards.

Ahmir Questlove Thompson, the recipient of the best documentary Oscar, presents the award for best song, telling audiences to stay at least 500 feet away from me.

Ceremony host Trevor Noah adds the Grammys will be a beautiful evening adding: Were going dancing, were going to be singing, were going to be keeping peoples names out of our mouths.
The world has moved on from the partygate saga, a minister has claimed, as his Cabinet colleague said some of the rules imposed on the country were inhuman and Boris Johnson was given the wrong information over rule-breaking.

Welsh Secretary Simon Hart said his constituents were not calling for resignations over parties held in No 10 and across Whitehall during Covid restrictions, as it was revealed the Governments former ethics chief had received a fine.

Helen MacNamara, the former deputy cabinet secretary, was reported to be among those to receive a fixed-penalty notice (FPN) from Scotland Yard as part of its investigation into alleged lockdown-breaching parties.

The Daily Telegraph reported that Ms MacNamara received a 50 fine on Friday in connection with a leaving do held in the Cabinet Office on June 18 2020 to mark the departure of a private secretary.

Jacob Rees-Mogg suggested Boris Johnson had been handed incorrect information about the gatherings (Stefan Rousseau/PA)

Meanwhile, The Guardian reported others had been fined for a gathering held on the eve of the Duke of Edinburghs funeral last year.

But No 10 still declined to say whether Mr Johnson believes coronavirus laws were broken.

The Prime Ministers official spokesman said: The Prime Minister wants to comment at the conclusion of the process and not at the middle of it.

Welsh Secretary Simon Hart said on Monday that of course the allegations of partying did not sit comfortably with him, but he dismissed calls that anyone should resign if they were issued with a penalty.

I have 65,000 constituents in west Wales, where I represent, and they are not shy in coming forward and expressing a view about this and a number of other subjects, he told Sky News.

Welsh Secretary Simon Hart (Kirsty OConnor/PA)

And throughout all of this saga of the Downing Street parties they have said one thing very clearly, and in a vast majority they say they want contrition and they want an apology, but they dont want a resignation.

Mr Hart said the world has moved on a considerable distance and he told TalkRadio: Looking at how this interview started and what were seeing in Ukraine, that helps contextualise all of this in my head.

And I think were now dealing with something of such seriousness and such horror that what went on maybe two years ago clearly needs to be dealt with, and should be  its a source of irritation for a lot of people still  but Im glad that this thing is now coming to a conclusion.

Asked if the PM agreed with Mr Harts assessment, Mr Johnsons spokesman said: We recognise the strength of feeling around this issue which is why the Prime Minister came to the House to apologise and has talked about the mistakes made.

Well have more to say at the conclusion of the process.

It comes as Brexit opportunities minister Jacob Rees-Mogg suggested Prime Minister Mr Johnson had been handed incorrect information about the gatherings before he told MPs no rules had been broken.

The Prime Minister said that he was told the rules were followed, but that turns out not to be correct and we know that fines have now been issued, but the Prime Minister can only work on the information he is given, he told LBC.

Mr Rees-Mogg also defended his dismissal of the partygate row as fluff in the context of the war in Ukraine and the cost-of-living crisis.

He said some of the coronavirus restrictions imposed during lockdown were inhuman.

I think those words in the context of whats going on in Ukraine are completely reasonable, he said.

I dont think the issue of what may or may not have happened in Downing Street and what we are now finding out is fundamental.

What I think is fundamental is that we look in the (Covid-19) inquiry at how the rules were devised and the effect that they had, because I think some of those rules were inhuman.

But Downing Street did not back that view.

The Prime Ministers official spokesman said: I think at all times the Government took action to save both lives and livelihoods and that was always a balanced judgment that sought to be informed by the latest evidence we had.

We have established an inquiry to take a proper view and learn lessons about what happened and there will be more to say then. But certainly at all times the Government sought to act in the best interests of the United Kingdom.

Mr Rees-Mogg acknowledged that people were undeniably cross but insisted that Mr Johnson had not misled Parliament about the situation.

Conservative MP Steve Brine on Sunday night called for transparency about who has been issued with fines.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4s Westminster Hour on Sunday, the MP for Winchester said: They should just be honest about whos been tipped off with what and put it all out there and say, you know what, we got this wrong, or this persons got this fine, because these guys in the press, they wont focus on the issues of the local election, theyll scratch around and try and dig all this stuff up again.

The Met is investigating 12 events, including as many as six that Mr Johnson is said to have attended, and has sent out more than 100 questionnaires.
As the latest COVID subvariant, BA.2, makes the rounds across the nation, congressional leaders have agreed on a scaled-back $10 billion bill to continue funding the national response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The accord, announced on Monday, represents a deep cut from the $22.5 billion that President Biden initially requested and a $15 billion version that both Republicans and Democrats had negotiated last month. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) abandoned that plan after Democratic lawmakers rejected proposed cuts in state pandemic aid to help pay for the package.

At least half the measure would have to be used to research and produce therapeutics to treat the disease, according to a fact sheet distributed by the chief GOP bargainer, Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah. And at least $750 million would be used to research new COVID-19 variants and to expand vaccine production, the description said.

A nursing student administers the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination center at UNLV in Las Vegas, Nevada on April 26, 2021.





A nursing student administers the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination center at UNLV in Las Vegas, Nevada on April 26, 2021. (John Locher/)

The deal was reached between Republicans and Democrats after a weekend of haggling over details with the hope of passing the COVID legislation before the House and Senate leave town for a two-week Easter break.

Federal officials said they already had to delay purchases of lifesaving monoclonal antibodies and warned that failure to reach a deal could eventually lead to possible shortages of vaccine booster shots, especially now that all Americans over 50 have received a green light to get a fourth shot

The $15 billion plan had included about $5 billion for the global effort to fight COVID-19, which has run rampant in many countries, especially poorer ones.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, leader of the House Progressive Caucus, said erasing the global assistance from the package is a big problem, adding that she and other supporters of helping other countries have voiced their objections to House leadership and Senate negotiators.

People leave a testing and vaccination clinic for COVID-19 Wednesday, March 30, 2022, in Long Beach, Calif.





People leave a testing and vaccination clinic for COVID-19 Wednesday, March 30, 2022, in Long Beach, Calif. (Ashley Landis/)

Some Democrats said it was unclear whether the emerging package would attract the minimum 10 GOP votes needed for the measure to move through the 50-50 Senate.

The measure would provide additional funds for treatments, tests and vaccines and would be fully paid for by pulling back unspent funds from previous pandemic relief bills that have been enacted, bargainers said.

With News Wire Services
Much of the 64th annual Grammy Awards ceremony, held Sunday at Las Vegass MGM Grand Garden Arena, celebrated younger artists, with dazzling performances by Best New Artist winner Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish, BTS, Lil Nas X, J. Balvin, H.E.R., and Justin Bieber. But 95-year-old Tony Bennett and 78-year-old Joni Mitchell practically stole the show with their rare public appearances.

Bennett was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2016, and he released his swan-song studio album, the Love for Sale duets collection with Lady Gaga, in November 2021. He celebrated that albums release with two final performances, filmed last summer at Radio City Music Hall for the TV special One Last Time, and has been off the scene ever since. But with Love for Sale up for five Grammys this Sunday, he briefly came out of retirement to introduce Gagas Grammy performance.

In a statement Friday, Bennetts son Danny said, Although the producers had invited both Tony and Gaga to perform in Sundays Grammys broadcast, it is unfortunate that due to his continuing struggle with Alzheimers, he was not able to accept. It was decided that it would be fitting for Lady Gaga to perform on her own to represent for both of them.  He will be cheering her on as he watches from his home in New York City.

Sunday, in a pre-taped video message, the grinning crooner enthusiastically blew a kiss to Gaga as she took the stage for a jazzy, classy medley of Love for Sale and Do I Love You. Following her emotional performance in front a backdrop of video footage of her and Bennett, Gaga sat on the edge of the stage, paused, and teared up, resting her palm on her shoulder as if in place of Bennetts hand. I love you, Tony! We miss you, she called out to the camera. On Sunday, Love for Sale picked up an award  Bennetts 20th Grammy overall  for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album, making Bennett the second-oldest winner in Grammy history.

Mitchell, who was honored as 2022s MusiCares Person of the Year Friday, made her first Sunday Grammys appearance during the pre-show Premiere Ceremony, at which her compilation Joni Mitchells Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 1: The Early Years (1963-1967) won for Best Historical Album. The legendary singer-songwriter, who has made few public appearances since she suffered a brain aneurism in 2015, received a standing ovation as her accepted the honor in person. Looking adorable in her red beret and matching beaded necklace, Mitchell thanked her dream team, including her assistant, physical therapist, manager, and dear friend Cameron Crowe (who wrote the projects liner notes). Mitchell later received an equally rapturous reception on CBSs prime-time telecast, when she appeared alongside 2022 Lifetime Achievement Award recipient Bonnie Raitt to introduce a performance by another dear friend, Brandi Carlile. Host Trevor Noah introduced Mitchell as one of the truest and most important artists in history, a musician who set the standard for all those who have followed.

MusiCares 2022 Person of the Year Joni Mitchell and Bonnie Raitt (R) introduce Brandi Carlile to perform during the 64th Annual Grammy Awards show in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S., April 3, 2022. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni

While neither Bennett not Mitchell performed at Sundays Grammys, the night was packed with dynamite musical numbers, as well as a few lighthearted podium moments. Below are the other highlights of the 64thannual Grammy Awards ceremony:

Its an evening with Silk Sonic

An Evening With Silk Sonic, the debut album by the throwback-soul superduo comprising Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak, wasnt released during the eligibility window for this years Grammys, but Silk Sonic still pulled off a clean sweep of the four categories in which they were nominated, including Record and Song of the Year for Leave the Door Open. And they were celebrating as soon as the show got started, opening the ceremony with a glitzy, lounge-suited 777 that was basically the best commercial ever for their upcoming Vegas residency at the Park MGM.

Oliva Rodrigo revs it up

Olivia was widely predicted to win in all of the Big Four categories, but while she lost both Record and Song to Silk Sonic and surprisingly lost in the Album of the Year category to Jon Batiste, the 19-year-old still had a great night  picking up trophies Best New Artist, Best Pop Solo Performance, and Best Pop Vocal Album, and sharing an adorable onscreen moment with BTS (more on that later). Her performance of Drivers License on a West Side Story-style set felt like a charming production of Sour: The Musical, so maybe there are a few Tony Awards in this talented young womans future too.

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA - APRIL 03: Olivia Rodrigo performs onstage during the 64th Annual GRAMMY Awards at MGM Grand Garden Arena on April 03, 2022 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images)

BTS brings the Vegas dynamite

BTS didnt win the award for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance (they lost to Doja Cat featuring SZA  more on that later!), but they won everyones hearts, including Olivia Rodrigos, with their espionage/Vegas-themed Butter number. Rocking James Bond tuxedos and paying homage to Oceans Eleven, Mission: Impossible, and maybe even The Pink Panther, the BTS boys practically broke the internet when member V flirted with Rodrigo at the beginning of the suave performance.

Doja Cat takes the piss

Doja Cat has been threatening to quit the music business lately, so when she almost didnt show up to accept her Pop Duo/Group Performance award for Kiss Me More, it seemed like a deliberate boycott at first. But as it turned out, shed just returned from a last-minute bathroom break and almost missed the announcement. Ive never taken such a fast piss in my whole life, she blurted, in one of the funniest unscripted moments of the night.

Doja Cat after running from the bathroom to the stage: "I have never taken such a fast piss in my whole life"  #GRAMMYs@DojaCatpic.twitter.com/zQYU3Hxuzh  HipHopDX (@HipHopDX) April 4, 2022

Dua and Megan are the new Whitney and Mariah

When past winners Dua Lipa and Megan Thee Stallion presented the Best New Artist category, they reenacted Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey's famous stunt from the 1998 MTV Video Music Awards, showing up in identical dresses. I'm going to have to have a talk with Donatella, Dua mock-threatened and right on cue, designer Donatella Versace hopped onstage and ripped off the ladies skirts to instantly customize their individual looks. Now we both look like winners, Megan said. This podium moment was most definitely scripted, but it sure was cute.

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA - APRIL 03: (L-R) Dua Lipa, Donatella Versace, and Megan Thee Stallion speak onstage during the 64th Annual GRAMMY Awards at MGM Grand Garden Arena on April 03, 2022 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Rich Fury/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)

Questlove keeps his distance

Last week at the Oscars, Questloves Summer of Soulwon for Best Documentary, but his thunder was stolen when category presenter Chris Rock was shockingly slapped by Will Smith. Questlove got another shot at awards-show glory when Summer of Soul won Best Music Film at the Grammys this weekend, and then, in another funny podium moment, when he presented the Song of the Year award, he quipped to the MGM crowd, I trust that you people will stay 500 feet away from me. Just playing.

Lil Nas X upsets your homophobic uncle

He raps, he sings he upsets your homophobic uncle! host Noah proclaimed before the provocateurs flashy performance of Dead Right Now, Montero (Call Me By Your Name), and Industry Baby with Jack Harlow. Although the seemingly My Chemical Romance-inspired drum corps number was tame compared to Lil Nas Xs racier appearance on the VMAs and BET Awards, Noahs cheeky introduction alone made this performance stand out.

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA - APRIL 03: Lil Nas X performs onstage during the 64th Annual GRAMMY Awards at MGM Grand Garden Arena on April 03, 2022 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Rich Fury/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelenskyy makes a powerful plea

In a much more serious and somber moment, Zelensky appeared virtually  introducing John Legends special tribute to Ukraine with Ukrainian musicians Siuzanna Iglidan and Mika Newton and poet Lyuba Yakimchuk  and begged the audience not to be silent amid Russia's attacks on his country. In the video, which was shot within the last 48 hours in a bunker in Kyiv, Zelensky stated: Our musicians wear body armor instead of tuxedos. They sing to the wounded. In hospitals. Even to those who can't hear them. But the music will break through anyway. We defend our freedom. To live. To love. To sound. On our land, we are fighting Russia which brings horrible silence with its bombs. The dead silence. Fill the silence with your music! Fill it today. To tell our story. Tell the truth about this war on your social networks, on TV. Support us in any way you can. Any  but not silence. And then peace will come. To all our cities the war is destroying, Chernihiv, Kharkiv, Volnovakha, Mariupol and others. They are legends already. But I have a dream of them living. And free. Free like you on the Grammy stage.

Billie Eilish honors her hero

Many Grammy stars rocked outlandish outfits on the red carpet, but Eilish totally deserved Best Dressed honors for donning a T-shirt emblazoned with late Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkinss face during her Happier Than Ever performance. The Foo Fighters were supposed to perform at this years ceremony, but withdrew from the telecast and all other scheduled performances after Hawkins suddenly died on March 25. Bittersweetly, the band won three Grammys in absentia at Sundays Premiere Ceremony.

It aint over til its over with H.E.R. and Lenny Kravitz

With the Foo Fighters canceling their performance, this years ceremony was almost entirely rock-free. Thankfully, H.E.R. and Lenny Kravitz brought the guitars (and the rock n roll jumpsuits) for their vivacious Damage/Are You Gonna Go My Way medley. Adding to the rock fun was Travis Barker on drums and Jimmy Jam on keytar. It was just the jolt viewers needed as the telecast neared the three-hour mark.

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA - APRIL 03: (L-R) H.E.R. and Lenny Kravitz perform onstage during the 64th Annual GRAMMY Awards at MGM Grand Garden Arena on April 03, 2022 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)

LAS VEGAS - APRIL 3: H.E.R. with LENNY KRAVITZ, TRAVIS BARKER, JIMMY JAM and TERRY LEWIS performing at THE 64TH ANNUAL GRAMMY AWARDS, broadcasting live Sunday, April 3 (8:00-11:30 PM, LIVE ET/5:00-8:30 PM, LIVE PT) on the CBS Television Network, and available to stream live and on demand on Paramount+*. (Photo by Cliff Lipson/CBS via Getty Images)

The Weeknd actually wins a Grammy

Following his shocking snub last year, the Weeknd vowed to boycott the Grammys from now on. But that didnt stop the Recording Academy from awarding his collaboration with Kanye West and Lil Baby, Hurricane, the Grammy for Best Melodic Rap Performance. Unsurprisingly, neither the Weeknd nor the uninvitedWest were there to accept in person.

The Grammys salute the industrys true superstars

With the 2022 Grammys following two difficult pandemic years in which the live music industry was completely disrupted, the show put the spotlight on the behind-the-scenes workers who make live music so special. So, along with all of the nights superstar presenters, Eilishs tour manager Nicole Massey, Chris Stapletons assistant tour manager Katie Wilkinson, H.E.R.s manager Misha Hedman Mayes, and Carrie Underwood stylist Joan Lee all got their much-deserved moments on the Grammy stage.

Read more from Yahoo Entertainment:

Follow Lyndsey on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Amazon
Michael Bay was not watching the Oscars live last Sunday when Will Smith charged the stage and smacked the s*** out of Chris Rock, in the comedian-presenters own words.

But the director and producer famously synonymous with mega-action movies (aka Bayhem) was quickly flooded with texts, likely because of his shared history with Smith.

Before helming movies like The Rock, Armageddon, Pearl Harbor and Transformers, Bay made his directorial debut with the Will Smith-Martin Lawrence action comedy Bad Boys, then later directed its 2003 sequel Bad Boys II.

First of all, its wrong to begin with, Bay tells us while promoting his latest actioner, the bank heist-gone-wrong thriller Ambulance (watch above). But thats all people are talking about. And I dont really care. Hollywood gets really self-absorbed. There are babies getting blown up in Ukraine right now. We should be talking about that.

More than 100 children have died since Russia invaded Ukraine, according to UNICEF.

From left are Michael Bay, Will Smith, Gabrielle Union and producer Jerry Bruckheimer, pictured in 2003 to promote their new movie Bad Boys II. (Photo: KAZUHIRO NOGI/AFP via Getty Images)

Bay did vouch for Smith, whom Bad Boys helped turn into one of the biggest stars on the planet  and whose reputation as one of the nicest guys in Hollywood has taken a hit in the wake of his assault on Rock.

Ive worked with him, he is not that guy, says Bay, who like many people, thought the slap was a comedy bit until he saw Smith yelling at Rock from his seat. Ive never seen him lose his cool like that. I thought it was set up cause I saw the smirk, and Ive been on set when Will screws with people, when hes joking with people.

Listen, it was a slap. It wasnt a punch. Hes very good at fighting, hes trained at that  But its wrong to begin with.

Ambulance opens in theaters Friday, April 8.

Video produced by Jen Kucsak and edited by Jimmie Rhee

Watch the trailer:
Nick and Vanessa Lachey are opening up about one important conversation that got them to where they are today.

In PEOPLE's exclusive look at the upcoming Love Is Blind spinoff, The Ultimatum: Marry or Move On, the longtime couple share what ultimately allowed them to move forward in their relationship.

"I always said I was going to be that girl that would never give a man an ultimatum," says Vanessa, 41, tells the contestants of the new show.

Nick, 48, jokingly chimes in to say that his now-wife "was lying" to herself. From there, Vanessa explains how presenting the former 98 Degrees crooner with an ultimatum brought them closer together.

"We dated for five years. So I finally said, 'What are we doing?' she continues. "I have now moved in with him, I renovated his entire bachelor pad, there was a bar in the pool. I'm like, 'Whatever you want!' Now I'm like, 'Okay, well, I want to put kids in the pool.'"

Adds Nick, "I think that's what put the deal in the coffin."

RELATED: Netflix's The Ultimatum Cast Revealed: Meet the Couples Deciding Whether to Get Married or Split

Being even more candid with the contestants, Vanessa reveals that the pair even "took a break" from their relationship before realizing they wanted to make it work.

"We both saw one other person and we realized that if we got out of our own way, we could be amazing together," she says. "But it took seeing somebody else and me realizing I don't mind the things that I thought bugged me or were holding me back. I don't mind all that."

"Like, the bigger picture is how I feel about this person and their values of wanting to be with me and knowing everything about me," she adds.

nick lachey, vanessa lachey

Netflix

Nick, in turn, suggests that the experience gave them both "perspective."

Nick and Vanessa tied the knot in July 2011 at Richard Branson's property on the British Virgin Islands. Now, they are parents to daughter Brooklyn, 7, as well as sons Camden, 9, and Phoenix, 5.

In addition to co-hosting Netflix's popular Love Is Blind series together, the longtime duo also now co-hosts its upcoming The Ultimatum spinoff.

The new series will follow six couples who are on the verge of marriage. While one partner is ready to wed and presents their love with an ultimatum, the other isn't quite sure they're ready to take that step.

nick lachey, vanessa lachey

Netflix

Never miss a story  sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from juicy celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

All couples will split up for three weeks and explore a love connection with someone else. Once they are back together, they will decide whether they want to get married to their original partner or break up for good.

The Ultimatum: Marry or Move On's first eight episodes premiere on April 6 on Netflix. The final two episodes will air on April 13.
The former ethics chief for the Government has reportedly been fined over the partygate scandal.

Helen MacNamara, who used to be the deputy cabinet secretary, is said to be among the first group of people to receive a fixed-penalty notice (FPN) from Scotland Yard as part of its investigation into alleged lockdown-breaching parties in Downing Street and Whitehall.

The Daily Telegraph reported that Ms MacNamara received a 50 fine on Friday in connection with a leaving do held in the Cabinet Office on June 18 2020 to mark the departure of a private secretary.

Meanwhile, several reports suggest people have also received fines linked with a gathering that took place on the eve of the Duke of Edinburghs funeral last year. These FPNs were among the initial round of 20 issued by the Metropolitan Police.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been accused of attending lockdown-breaking parties (Andrew Milligan/PA)

Ms MacNamara was the director general of propriety and ethics in the Cabinet Office from 2018 to 2020.

The purpose of the role was to ensure the highest standards of propriety, integrity and governance within Government.

She was promoted to the post of deputy cabinet secretary in March 2020 and later left Government to work for the Premier League.

The leaving do in 70 Whitehall on June 18 2020 was reportedly held for Hannah Young, a former home affairs policy adviser who was taking up the post of deputy consul general in New York.

There were said to be about 20 people present, with alcohol consumed.

It was reported that advisers and civil servants gathered after work for two separate events on April 16 2021, as the country was in mourning after the death of the Duke of Edinburgh.

One was for former Downing Street director of communications James Slack and the second for a photographer, and they were later reported to have merged.

No 10 staff were said to have partied until the early hours of the morning in a seven-hour drinking session.

Takeaway pizzas were reported to have been ordered in and some of the revellers were said to have used a slide belonging to Mr and Mrs Johnsons son, Wilfred.

The following day, the Queen sat alone  socially distanced from her family  as she said goodbye to her husband.

No 10 previously said an apology had been extended to Buckingham Palace.

It has also been suggested by ITV News that Mr Johnson will not be interviewed by the Metropolitan Police as part of their partygate investigation.

This is because the force is not interviewing those who have received questionnaires as part of the inquiries, and could potentially be fined, the broadcaster said.

Conservative MP Steve Brine on Sunday night called for transparency about who has been issued with fines.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4s Westminster Hour, the MP for Winchester said: They should just be honest about whos been tipped off with what and put it all out there and say, you know what, we got this wrong, or this persons got this fine, because these guys in the press, they wont focus on the issues of the local election, theyll scratch around and try and dig all this stuff up again.

The Met is investigating 12 events, including as many as six that Mr Johnson is said to have attended, and has sent out more than 100 questionnaires.

The PM received his in February.

ITV said the only officials being interviewed are witnesses, whose role is to help the police interpret questionnaires submitted by other people.

The Met are not interviewing those who received questionnaires and are in the frame to be fined, it said.

No 10 has so far only promised to confirm if Mr Johnson or Cabinet Secretary Simon Case are given an FPN.

The PM is not said to have attended either the June 18 2020 gathering or the events on April 16 2021.

The Met declined to comment. The Cabinet Office also said it had nothing to add, beyond pointing to a statement from Scotland Yard issued earlier this week.
A baby girl who has been living in a Chicago hospital with her parents for the last six months while waiting for a new heart finally received one last week.

Elodie Carmen Baker received a heart transplant at The Heart Center at Lurie Children's Hospital on March 27. Elodie was about 7 weeks old when she was diagnosed with a rare heart condition in August 2021 called dilated cardiomyopathy. She had been on the waitlist for a new heart for over 200 days.

PHOTO: Elodie's doctor says she has been recovering well since receiving a heart transplant on March 27, 2022. (Courtesy of Collin Baker)

Elodie's mother, Kate Baker, still remembers the moment she knew something was wrong.

"Our pregnancy was normal and we had an uncomplicated delivery and actually went home with Elodie," the first-time mom said in an interview with "Good Morning America." "So she was with us in Minnesota at home for seven weeks and one night, she wouldn't feed. I was nursing and she let out this cry and my heart just sank and I said to (my husband) Collin, 'Something's wrong. We need to take her in.'"

At the emergency room, Baker said doctors initially didn't see anything that stood out to them.

"I think they were considering maybe sending us home but they said, 'Let's just get an X-ray to be sure,'" she said. "Then the X-ray came back. They saw her heart was enlarged and that was on Aug. 21. And we haven't been home since."

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, children and adults with dilated cardiomyopathy have an enlarged heart chamber (ventricle), which can make the muscle unable to pump blood throughout the body sufficiently. There are other types of cardiomyopathy as well as varying symptoms of disease, and some may not even see symptoms arise during their lifetime.

Dr. Anna Joong, the medical director of the pediatric ventricular assist device program at Lurie Children's, has been caring for Elodie for the past several months.

"In Elodie's case, the genetic test did not reveal an answer for why she developed this kind of cardiomyopathy and in that situation, it's called idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy, meaning at this point in time, we don't really know why this happened to her," Joong told "GMA."

Doctors would later tell the Bakers that their daughter would need a new heart. "The muscle in hers is really weak. And so it's expanded over time, it hasn't been able to push the blood out, pump it out to the rest of the body and so it's dilated, and now hers looks more like a pancake," Baker said.

PHOTO: Since last August, Elodie has lived with her parents at Lurie Children's Hospital in Chicago. (Collin Baker)

Two months after the diagnosis, Elodie was flown to Lurie Children's Hospital in Illinois from her home state of Minnesota, where she underwent surgery to have a Berlin EXCOR pediatric ventricular assist device (VAD) placed.

The VAD essentially acted as a heart for Elodie, pumping blood for her while she waited for a transplant.

"Her heart was so sick, that the IV medicines just weren't enough and she needed a VAD," Joong said. "We use this device as a way to bridge her to transplant so it's a way to support her heart, to help get her stronger in the time that she's waiting for her donor heart."

As Elodie waited for a new heart, she started eating more, both with and without a feeding tube. Nora Hammond, a nurse practitioner at Lurie's who has also cared for Elodie, explained to "GMA," "Post-VAD, Elodie was able to tolerate feeds through a feeding tube to provide her with the calories she needed to grow, but also was able to try a lot of foods by mouth which she loved! Lots of avocado."

Elodie also participated in various therapies to help her get stronger day by day  from occupational and physical to speech therapy  and along the way, she has reached many of the milestones typical for a baby her age.

"She has learned how to sit. She's starting to crawl. She's starting to stand  and she's done all those things on the Berlin, which is truly incredible," her mother said.

PHOTO: Elodie has been meeting milestones while in the hospital, including learning to sit up. (Collin Baker)

Dr. Michael Monge, surgical director of the Heart Failure/Heart Transplant Program at Lurie Children's, operated on Elodie and noted that Elodie's care has been an enormous collective effort. "The entire team of physical therapists, hematologists, cardiologists, intensive care doctors, surgeons, all participated in her care, which I think really contributed to how well she has done both since arrival here at Lurie and following VAD implant."

Elodie has been recovering following her transplant and is receiving medication as well.

"She will continue to use a (feeding) tube after transplant but after she recovers, will slowly try to decrease the amount of food through the tube to encourage her to be able to meet caloric needs by mouth," Hammond told "GMA."

"The breathing tube was able to come out within hours of coming out of the operating room. Her new heart works beautifully and is really strong," Joong added. "She is getting routine immunosuppression medications to prevent rejection. She has already been transferred out of ICU level care and is sitting up. She is one strong kid and we are so grateful to the donor family."

PHOTO: Elodie has had to wear a Berlin VAD or ventricular assist device, which acts like a heart and helps pump blood through her body. (Collin Baker)

Joong, Monge and the Bakers all hope that Elodie's story will inspire others to consider organ donation, especially since April is National Donate Life Month, an initiative by the nonprofit Donate Life America to raise awareness about giving the gift of an organ or tissue.

PHOTO: According to her mom, Elodie is 'so happy all the time' despite being in the hospital. (Collin Baker)

"We've both been donors our whole lives. But I've never thought much about it. It's just a box that I've checked when I renewed my driver's license," Kate Baker said. Now, we spend a lot of time educating ourselves on the subject and we try to use our CaringBridge site to raise awareness."

"(Elodie's story) highlights the importance of organ donation and people being organ donors. The waitlist times have increased over time," Monge added.

"The number of organs available each year is relatively constant whereas more and more children continue to get admitted to the hospital and in heart failure. So it really is important to stress the need for people to be organ donors so that people like Elodie can receive a transplant," Monge said.

Baby with rare condition gets heart transplant after waiting 218 days originally appeared on goodmorningamerica.com
The killing of Ukrainian civilians committed by Russian forces in Ukraine is a war crime, President Joe Biden said Monday -- repeating his accusation that Russian President Vladimir Putin is a "war criminal" who needs to be held "accountable."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia of "genocide" on Sunday after hundreds of Ukrainian civilians were found killed in Bucha, a suburb of the capital Kyiv that was retaken by Ukrainian forces. Some of the civilians were buried in mass graves, others found dead in the street with their hands tied behind their backs.

"These are war crimes, and they will be recognized by the world as genocide. You are here today and can see what happened. We know of thousands of people killed and tortured, with severed limbs, raped women, murdered children. I think it is more than -- this is a genocide," Zelenskyy told reporters in Bucha Monday.

MORE: Russia-Ukraine live updates: Kremlin reacts to images of dead bodies in Bucha

PHOTO: President Volodymyr Zelenskyy tours the town of Bucha, just northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, April 4, 2022. (Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP via Getty Images)

The U.S. has stopped short of using the term "genocide" because of its strict legal definition and the heavy implications it carries. Asked whether the latest reported atrocities are genocide, Biden told reporters, "No, I think it is a war crime."

He called again for an investigation and trial, even seeming to suggest that Putin himself should face trial himself.

PHOTO: President Joe Biden speaks to reporters upon arrival at Fort McNair in Washington, D.C., April 4, 2022. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

"We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue the fight, and we have to gather all the detail so this can be an actual -- have a war crimes trial," Biden said.

"This guy is brutal and what's happening with Bucha is outrageous, and everyone's seeing it," he added.

BREAKING: Pres. Biden: "You may remember I got criticized for calling Putin a war criminal. Well, the truth of the matteryou saw what happened in Bucha...He is a war criminal. But we have to gather the information." https://t.co/zUHHG9gT17pic.twitter.com/nSNqpPknXt  ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) April 4, 2022

While stopping short of labeling it "genocide," Biden's call for for a possible war crimes trial raises the pressure on the international community's response to Russia's war, which has killed thousands and displaced more than 10 million people in less than six weeks.

Biden said he would seek more sanctions against Putin and his government over the atrocities in Bucha, although it's unclear if more economic pressure will do anything to bring an end to Putin's campaign, even as it has shifted away from the Kyiv area to the south and east.

MORE: 'Sickening' atrocities in Bucha, nearly 70% of Russian troops near Kyiv have withdrawn: Pentagon

In Bucha and other towns outside Kyiv, the U.S. has also seen "credible reports of torture, rape, and civilians executed alongside their families," according to State Department spokesperson Ned Price -- all of which would be considered war crimes under international law. In southern Ukraine, especially around the besieged city Mariupol, the U.S. is aware of "reports of tens of thousands abducted or deported by Russia's forces and shocking descriptions of rape, assaults, and murders perpetrated by Russia's forces," Price added.

The Kremlin has suggested that the scenes out of Bucha, reported publicly by eyewitnesses, reporters, and Ukrainian government officials, were fabricated -- a tactic used repeatedly by Russian officials.

PHOTO: Neighbors gather next to a mass grave near the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, April 3, 2022. (Rodrigo Abd/AP)

Last month, the State Department announced it had made a legal assessment that Russian forces were committing war crimes in Ukraine, including targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure and indiscriminately firing on civilian areas. That assessment was based on public reporting and U.S. intelligence, including intercepted communications between Russian forces, according to U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for Global Criminal Justice Beth Van Schaack.

MORE: US formally accuses Russian forces of committing war crimes in Ukraine

That could implicate Putin himself, according to Van Schaack, who told reporters it depended on what jurisdiction was hearing cases. Her office at the State Department has continued to document and analyze evidence in preparation for trials.

But while her office also assists in genocide determinations, U.S. officials have so far avoided using the term.

PHOTO: White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan talks to reporters during the daily news conference in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House, on April 4, 2022, in Washington, D.C. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

"We have seen atrocities. We have seen war crimes. We have not yet seen a level of systematic deprivation of life of the Ukrainian people to rise to the level of genocide, but again, that's something we'll continue to monitor," Biden's national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Monday.

Genocide is an attempt "to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group," according to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, the 1948 treaty that banned it.

It can involve acts of killing or harm, as well as preventing births, forcibly transferring children, or imposing dire conditions that are "calculated to bring about its physical destruction," per the treaty.

While Russian forces have targeted Ukrainian civilians, including now with executions, it seems that for U.S. officials, the scale is at this point not large enough to prove an intent to destroy the Ukrainian people.

Sullivan used the terms "mass death" and "mass incarceration" and added that if there is "a level of atrocity, a level of killing, a level of intentional activity that rises to meet our definition of genocide, we'll call it for what it is."

PHOTO: Communal workers carry a body of a civilian man killed in the town of Bucha, not far from the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on April 3, 2022. (Sergei Supinsky/AFP via Getty Images)

There are several international investigations underway right now into potential war crimes in Ukraine. The International Criminal Court, which conducts individual prosecutions, launched an investigation in early March, while the United Nations Human Rights Council voted to create a panel of experts to investigate, finally naming its members last week.

The U.S. is also supporting a multinational team of independent war crimes investigators, including American experts, that are working with Ukraine's prosecutor-general on her office's probe of Russian war crimes, Price announced.

But while the State Department supports those various investigations, its genocide determinations can take years to complete.

Last month, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced he had determined that Myanmar's military had committed genocide against the Rohingya -- nearly five years after the Muslim ethnic minority faced a campaign of terror that killed thousands and displaced nearly one million to neighboring Bangladesh.

ABC News' Molly Nagle contributed to this report from the White House.

Biden calls Russia's killing of Ukrainian civilians a war crime but not genocide originally appeared on abcnews.go.com
Last month, a group of parents in Orlando, Florida, demanded consequences against sixth grade science teacher Robert Thollander. His crime? Thollander acknowledged his marriage at school.

He married a man. This alone is not an issue. Sharing the details  with all his 6th grade students is the issue, the parents wrote in a letter sent to their childrens school board, which was shared with NBC News. It was not appropriate. Many of these students felt very uncomfortable with the conversations and shared this with their families.

Had Thollander just said he will be out for a few days because he was getting married, no problem, the letter continued, but to discuss the details and create an uncomfortable situation for the students with no benefit to teaching his subject matter is inappropriate.

Sixth grade science teacher Robert Thollander. (Courtesy Robert Thollander)

Thollander denied having discussed his marriage since he and his husband tied the knot in March of last year, aside from acknowledging it when he was asked. No action was taken against him by school leaders, who defended him several days later with a letter of their own, he said.

Nevertheless, the incident prompted Thollander to make this school year his last after 11 years of working in Florida as a teacher.

A lot of trust is given to teachers, and it made it seem like I wasnt trusted because theres something wrong with me for being gay, he said. It makes it seem like being gay is something vile or disturbing or disgusting when its described as making children uncomfortable knowing that Im married to a man. It hurt.

While the Orlando parents did not succeed in having Thollander disciplined or ousted, he and other LGBTQ teachers in the state worry that newly signed state law  titled Parental Rights in Education but dubbed by critics as the Dont Say Gay law  will galvanize parents to take similar action against them. In fact, Thollander said he believes the parents who complained about him were emboldened by the bill even before it was signed into law.

With the new law in place, teachers fear that in talking about their families or LGBTQ issues more broadly, pointed letters will be the least of their worries.

The law, HB 1557, bans instruction about sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed it into law Monday. Parents will be able to sue school districts for alleged violations, damages or attorneys fees when the law goes into effect July 1.

Lawmakers who support the law have repeatedly stressed that it would not prohibit teachers and students from talking about their LGBTQ families or bar classroom discussions about LGBTQ history, including events like the 2016 attack at the Pulse nightclub, a gay club in Orlando. Instead, they argue, it is about giving parents more jurisdiction over their childrens education.

But legal experts have said the broad language of the law could open districts and teachers to lawsuits from parents who believe any conversation about LGBTQ people or issues is inappropriate.

Nicolette Solomon said Florida's new education bill was

Nicolette Solomon, 28, taught fourth grade in Miami-Dade County for more than four years. As HB 1557 passed through the Legislature, she quit. Solomon, a lesbian, said that after months of having taught virtually through the coronavirus pandemic, the law was the straw that broke the camels back.

The law would erase me as an LGBTQ teacher, she said. Nobody would be able to know, which then puts me in the closet, and Im there seven hours a day, if not more, five days a week. I wouldnt be able to be who I am.

And I dont think I can bear to see the students struggle and want to ask me about these things and then have to deny them that knowledge, she added. Thats not who I am as a teacher.

Some Florida teachers also worry that the law will worsen the disproportionate rates of bullying, harassment and mental health issues plaguing their LGBTQ students.

A survey last year by The Trevor Project, an LGBTQ youth suicide prevention and crisis intervention organization, found that 42 percent of the nearly 35,000 LGBTQ youths who were surveyed seriously considered suicide within the previous year. More than half of transgender and nonbinary youths who were surveyed seriously considered suicide, it also found.

Will other students interpret that as Hey, now I have a pass to bully or mistreat certain students? asked Brian Kerekes, who teaches math at a high school in Osceola County, referring to the law. Its not out of the realm of imagination that that could now be an issue.

A separate survey conducted by The Trevor Project last year found that LGBTQ youths who reported having at least one LGBTQ-affirming space reported lower rates of attempting suicide.

With that in mind, he said, Kerekes asks his students for their preferred pronouns at the beginning of every school year. He also places other LGBTQ-affirming symbols in his classroom, including a rainbow Pride flag and a sign that says safe space.

Our students need to see that the educators in their community are as diverse as the rest of that community. They need educators that look and resemble them, said Kerekes, who is gay. We want them to know that we see them and respect them so that they can focus on what it is that theyre learning in class and not have to worry about how theyre going to be treated because of who they are.

Building successful teacher-to-student relationships has become increasingly important in recent years, Kerekes said, in light of remote learning during coronavirus lockdowns and the rise in school shootings nationally.

With the passage of the new Florida law, Kerekes worries that most teachers will now hesitate to be the advocates and the mentors for LGBTQ kids who may confide in them.

Supporters of the measure say exposing kids to LGBTQ symbols and identities is part of the problem.

DeSantis, who is widely seen as considering a run for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, said Monday that the law will ensure that parents can send their kids to school to get an education, not an indoctrination.

Syndication: Treasure Coast (Leah Voss / TCPALM / USA Today Network file)

Tiffany Justice, who served on a Florida school board for four years and co-founded a national network of about 80,000 parents, Moms for Liberty, agreed, saying the law is needed to fight a transgender contagion sweeping the country.

This is parents pushing back, Justice, a mom of four school-aged children, said. Theyve had enough. Weve seen enough nonsense. The kids are not learning to read in schools, and what I have said before is Before you activate our children into social justice warriors, could you just teach them how to read?

She added, Teachers really need to get back and focus on what theyre supposed to be teaching in schools.

Michael Woods, a special education teacher in Palm Beach County, said legislators and parents are looking for a solution to a problem that doesnt exist.

Teachers do not go out of their way to create these moments where were indoctrinating students, said Woods, who is gay. If I could indoctrinate a student, it would be to bring a pencil and a piece of paper, and if I was really good at indoctrinating, I would be able to get them to do their homework.

Some educators are also concerned about a section in the law that will require them to notify parents of a childs mental, emotional, or physical health or well-being ... unless a reasonably prudent person would believe that such disclosure would result in abuse, abandonment, or neglect.

Michael Woods. (Courtesy Michael Woods)

Critics have said the provision will force teachers to out their LGBTQ students to their parents, potentially leaving them vulnerable to rejection at home.

From her first week on the job, Solomon said, so many kids throughout her elementary school  even those she did not teach directly  came out to her.

They want to go to someone like a teacher who they might not know for the rest of their lives or someone who they know wont judge them or wont tell anybody, she said. Theyre kids. They cant just call a therapist and make an appointment.

I dont want to be in that situation where, instead of helping the students, Im going to be hurting them, she added.

On Monday, the American Federation of Teachers, the countrys second largest teachers labor union, slammed the measure, calling it an assault on students and teachers.

Make no mistake, this bill will have devastating real-world consequencesespecially for LGBTQIA+ youth who already experience higher rates of bullying and suicide, Randi Weingarten, the groups president, said in a statement. And for teachers and school staff who work tirelessly to support and care for their students, this bill is just another gross political attack on their professionalism.

U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona met in private with LGBTQ students and their family members Thursday to discuss the impacts of the law.

Earlier in the week, Cardona issued a statement saying the Education Department would monitor the law upon its implementation and evaluate whether it violates federal civil rights law.

In the meantime, Thollander will be putting his new real estate license to work, and Solomon will be working on her newly launched LGBTQ family-focused podcast, Flying the Coop.

I would teach in another state, but I cannot teach in Florida, Solomon said. Its just so horrible.

Beyond Florida, legislators in several other states  including Georgia, Tennessee, Kansas and Indiana  are weighing measures similar to the Florida law, which Justice said was just the beginning.

Were not stopping here, Justice said. If they think they have a problem with HB 1557 in Florida, wait until its in all 50 states. And we wont stop until it is.

Follow NBC Out on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram.
FILE - Josh Mandel, a Republican former Ohio treasurer running for an open U.S. Senate seat in Ohio, speaks during a debate against Morgan Harper, a progressive Democrat, Jan. 27, 2022, in Columbus, Ohio. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is endorsing former state treasurer Josh Mandel in the heated Republican primary for Ohio's open U.S. Senate seat. Cruzs move could be particularly valuable among conservative voters in the absence of an endorsement in the race by Donald Trump, who has yet to weigh in despite candidates working hard to woo him  and he may not. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete, File)

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP)  Texas Sen. Ted Cruz endorsed former Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel on Monday in the heated Republican primary for an open U.S. Senate seat, a potentially critical campaign boost just as early voting is set to begin in the Midwestern battleground.

Cruz's decision could be particularly valuable among conservative voters in the absence of an endorsement in the race by Donald Trump, who has yet to weigh in despite candidates working hard to woo him  and he may not.

Cruz, who sought the GOP presidential nomination in 2016 that Trump won and may run again in 2024, is one of the highest-profile Republicans in the Senate. He and Mandel share an affinity for trying to exploit cultural divisions for political gain.

Polling shows Cleveland investment banker Mike Gibbons slightly edging Mandel at the top of the crowded GOP field vying to replace retiring Republican Sen. Rob Portman. Also running in the May 3 primary are former state Republican chair Jane Timken, author and venture capitalist J.D. Vance, state Sen. Matt Dolan and entrepreneurs Mark Pukita and Neil Patel.

Early voting begins Tuesday.

In a statement to The Associated Press, Cruz said he chose Mandel because he will stand up to radical democrats who want to exploit crises facing the nation to deliver socialism to America.

A United States Marine, Josh is a proven fighter for our American way of life, a champion for the unborn, and a stalwart advocate for our religious liberties, Cruz said.

In an interview, Mandel said that if he is elected, he looks forward to being reinforcements for conservative fighters like Ted Cruz.

As weve seen in his 10 years in the Senate, he takes on squishy establishment Republicans just as fast as he takes on leftist Democrats, Mandel said. Because for Ted, and for me, this is not about (a) Republican vs. Democrat, shirts vs. skins type game. This is about standing up for the Constitution, for traditional American values, and saving the country for our kids and grandkids.

Cruz has made a series of endorsements in this years primaries as he looks to the future. For the Senate, he is backing businessman David McCormick in Pennsylvania and Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt.

The conservative group Club for Growth helped elect Cruz in 2012 in a competitive race and it's working this year to put Mandel in office. President David McIntosh said the group's polling shows Gibbons and Mandel neck and neck.

One of the things weve seen is, probably second to Trump, an endorsement from Ted Cruz signals the person hes endorsing is a true believer and a fighter for the things they believe in, he said.

Mandel has also been endorsed by North Carolina Rep. Madison Cawthorn, who has received criticism from a larger swath of Republicans for recent comments, including one in which he called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a thug. Utah Sen. Mike Lee, a conservative ally of Cruz, is also supporting Mandel.

Vance has the backing of Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley and Reps. Jim Banks of Indiana and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia. Gibbons has the support of Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul.

Portman endorsed Timken in February, as did former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway. Timken also has the support of Sens. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, Joni Ernst of Iowa and Deb Fischer of Nebraska.

___

Colvin reported from New York.
Jonas Poher Rasmussen, who directed the Oscar-nominated animated documentary "Flee," was photographed at the London Hotel in West Hollywood. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

Embedded in every hand-drawn line of the animated documentary Flee is a poignantly unfiltered humanism that has galvanized viewers worldwide. Spotlighting a young Afghan man crossing borders to find a safe haven, this portrait based on a real-life story combats the superficial tropes around refugee stories with profound curiosity for the people beyond the headlines and their inner predicaments.

In vivid 2D animation, Flee, now streaming on Hulu, chronicles the displacement of Amin (a pseudonym used to protect the subjects identity), who traversing oceans and continents to reach relative safety in Denmark. Aside from the perils of human trafficking and undocumented migration, Amin wrestles with his sexual orientation, a heavy burden in a traditionally minded society.

With numerous awards and festivals since its premiere in early 2021, Flee made history with three Academy Award nominations for international feature film, documentary feature and animated feature. It didn't win an Oscar at the March 27 ceremony, but it was the first film to amass nominations in all three categories.

Danish director Jonas Poher Rasmussen  Amins close friend entrusted with turning his open-hearted testimony into a sublimely lyrical vision  reminisced recently on some of the landmark moments that transported Flee from the casual energy of a virtual Sundance Film Festival to Oscar contender.

A Sundance premiere at home

Completed in early 2020, Flee was set to premiere that year at the Cannes Film Festival. But the event never took place as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Months later, a bittersweet second chance emerged with "Flee's" acceptance into the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, the first edition of a major cinema gathering to go entirely virtual.

When Cannes got canceled and when I learned that Sundance was going to be virtual, it was a heartbreak because I was really looking forward to having that experience of a premiere in a room with an audience on a big screen, Poher Rasmussen says. But to understand that this film about a very dear friend of mine, on which I worked for almost a decade, was going to premiere on such a big stage, was also amazing.

On the date of the premiere, Jan. 28, 2021, despite a seven-hour difference and while on lockdown in Denmark, Poher Rasmussen watched the fruit of his labor with a small group of family and friends. Overwhelmingly positive reactions quickly came his way. Amin wasnt there that night but joined his filmmaker friend to celebrate in the subsequent days.

While working on the film I had a feeling that we had done something special," Poher Rasmussen says, "but Ive had that feeling with other projects before and people didnt feel the same as me, so it was a little nerve-racking going into the festival.

For the director, this initial chapter in what would become an extensive festival run was a disorienting back and forth between his personal and artistic facets. During the day I was homeschooling my daughter, taking care of the home," he says, "and then at nighttime I was a filmmaker premiering my work at Sundance.

When Flee was awarded the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize for Documentary, he accepted from the comfort of his home. We had the call for the award show around 1 a.m. local time, he says. I was in the kitchen with my wife, and it was surreal. Then I called some members of the team and woke them up to tell them the news.

One pivotal element in the equation that led to the success of Flee in the U.S. was its distribution by Neon and Participant Media, which came on board immediately after the film's first Sundance screening. Following a Zoom celebration with key collaborators and Champagne in the early-morning hours after the premiere, a bidding war ensued. At this point, voice actors Riz Ahmed and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau had already joined Flee as executive producers, making it an even more appealing title.

I had never done that before. I was having meetings at 6 a.m. local time," Poher Rasmussen says. "People started to put bids on the film, and we were trying to figure out what to do. But when the call with Neon came around, the team quickly connected with the companys beautiful thoughts on what they wanted to do with the project.

They seemed like a perfect fit from the very beginning, he says. This was a film made in Denmark and done in Danish, in Dari and in Russian, so to see that it could travel abroad  and that people got it and appreciated it  was a boost of confidence. A deciding factor in choosing Neon was its ability to think of Flee not just as a refugee story, but as a human narrative first and foremost. Neon saw right away that this is a universal story about home," the director says, "and about finding a place where you can be who you are.

As part of that mission, Participant Media, the films co-distributor, implemented a comprehensive impact campaign centered on the global refugee crisis with a specific focus on Afghans and LGBTQ asylum seekers. Its efforts included screenings in partnership with organizations such as the Afghan Relocation Efforts (CARE) and Film AID, as well as content highlighting Afghan artists Sara Rahmani, Ajmal (AJ) Subat and Roya Heydari.

An in-person standing ovation

Halfway through 2021, as COVID-related restrictions loosened and vaccines provided a stronger sense of safety, Poher Rasmussen and his team finally attended an in-person festival with Flee. And it happened to be the worlds most prestigious platform for the animation medium: Annecy International Animation Film Festival in southeastern France.

The crowd at Annecy are very much people who know the craft of animation and they really loved the film. There was a standing ovation for 10 minutes afterward, said the director. That was a very teary-eyed moment that is going to stay with me for the rest of my life. The film was almost done before the pandemic hit, so wed been waiting for so long to be together and to see it on a big screen with an audience.

When Flee won the Cristal Award for feature filmmaking, the main prize at Annecy, Poher Rasmussen was welcomed into the global animation community. Coming from documentary, Ive been used to doing a lot of stuff on my own, being very isolated," the director says. "So to jump on board this project and have a big team of artists working on your film, bringing ideas and their artistry to the project, gives you a feeling of being a team.

A few weeks ago, the support was reaffirmed when Flee earned the Annie Award for indie feature from ASIFA Hollywood (International Animated Film Assn.).

Denmarks support is a contradiction

Last summer, already with some hardware to its name, Flee had its homecoming in Denmark. The premiere took place at Poher Rasmussens local cinema, where he was at long last able to show the final product to a larger number of important people in his life. It was like a seven-minute walk from where I live," he says of the theater. "Me and my wife put on our best clothes and just walked down there.

However, the rave reviews from the local press sharply contrasted with how divisive its central topic is within Danish society.

This is a very tough subject in Denmark, unfortunately," Poher Rasmussen says. "Its been polarized, like it is in the States and all of Europe. I really try to stay out of the political discussions around it because it really fast becomes a debate about systems, about how you can avoid taking refugees in, or how you would take refugees in, he says. And I really wanted to stay clean on the fact that being a refugee is about losing your home and looking for a new place to call home.

Convinced that theres nothing to gain from heated arguments with those holding an extreme position, the filmmaker has always exalted the human aspect. But though he felt incredibly proud that Denmark selected Flee as its Oscar entry for international feature film, he found a reaction from Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen insincere, considering her governments stance on the matter.

She posted on social media about how proud she was that the film was selected for the Oscars but didnt comment on the harsh laws and policies that her government inflicts on refugees, he says. I really hope that she can see the hypocrisy in it and think, Maybe we need to look at ourselves first for just a second before we celebrate this film.

Luckily for him and the film, in his Scandinavian homeland there exists a marked separation between the state and the cultural entities in charge of putting forward the national pick for the Academy Awards. It also made me extremely proud because Denmark has quite a strong history with the Oscars, he says. They took a chance by selecting an animated documentary and Im so happy that it paid off with the nomination.

Instead of engaging detractors on social media or the press, Poher Rasmussen has partnered with the Danish Refugee Council to host conversations across the country and beyond, as well as collecting funds for their crucial work by selling posters of the film. I want everyone to see the film, not just people I agree with, he says. We have to create awareness and say that being a refugee is not an identity. We must look at refugees as being humans, and not as being refugees because thats not who they are. They are individuals like the rest of us.

Friends made along the way

During the last six months of 2021 and the early part of 2022, Poher Rasmussen has traveled the world to present Flee at film festivals or to put it in front of awards voters. From these many encounters with audiences, he shared three that resonated:

At New York Film Festival, two young queer men from the Dominican Republic came up to me afterward and said, This is not just Amins story, this is also our story. From all the things that have been happening with the film, and the glitz and glamour, to me what is the most meaningful is to meet audiences who feel seen, those who take ownership of the story, and those two Dominican men took ownership of it.

The same thing happened in Mexico, at the Guadalajara International Film Festival, where a young queer man came to me and said that he found it so difficult to be queer in Mexico and he really struggled with it. For him to share in the experience of Amin, of being queer and the struggle to come out, made him feel safe for 85 minutes."

In Los Angeles, I met an Afghan who had made almost the same journey, but the other way around  he went through Asia, and he told me, This is also my story. Unfortunately, there are millions and millions of people who have similar stories. No matter if you are from Afghanistan, or Syria or now Ukraine, the stories are very similar in the experience of losing your home. Its been so meaningful to meet people who have said, Thank you for sharing a nuanced portrait of the refugee story and showing that we are all humans with hopes, dreams, sexuality, and that we are not just refugees.

Poher Rasmussen confesses that what surprised him most about this journey was the number of awards shows there are in the United States and some of the recurrent questions he encountered during Q&A sessions or after screenings. People wanted to know why he chose animation as a preferred medium for Flee, how Amin is doing today and, perhaps more peculiarly, why the directors alter ego in the film doesnt look like he does.

Just as Amins depiction in the hand-drawn animation doesnt match his real physical appearance to protect his anonymity, Poher Rasmussen made himself blond in the film.

For me, growing up in a small village in Denmark, most of my friends were blond, so when I was 10 or 11 years old, I really wanted to be blond myself to fit in. But more important, I wanted to create contrast between the two of us in the film, I didnt want people to start questioning where Im from, explains the director. I do have a refugee background a couple of generations back, but this is not my story, its Amins story and I wanted to make sure that people would focus on him and not on me.

Making history at the Oscars

Just over a year after viewers were first moved by Flee at Sundance, the team gathered at the Sun Creature Studio in Copenhagen to hear the announcement of the Academy Awards nominations. There had been so much buzz building around the film that we would have been disappointed if it didnt get nominated. Just to say that seems crazy, but that was how I felt, says the director. When the first nomination came, it was a huge relief like, OK, we made it after all that work.

Amid tears and screams as the other two nominations confirmed Flee had made history, Poher Rasmussen left the room to call Amin, the person without whom a single frame of the film wouldnt exist. He was at work, and in his lunch break he had seen the stream and then had to go back to work and pretend like nothing happened, Poher Rasmussen recalls. It was surreal for us, but it must have been even more surreal for him.

The film crosses borders, both between countries but also between mediums, he adds. As for his time on the awards circuit, he says, Im not used to this. We are just trying to enjoy this wonderful, weird and wild circus. Its crazy to be part of this. I never imagined I would be there.

While Poher Rasmussen doesnt discard the possibility of working in animation again if the project warrants its use, hes currently considering an influx of opportunities.

Neither Marvel nor Disney have approached me yet, but there has been a lot of interest and I have different offers that Im looking at and seeing if I want to work on them," he says. "I have some ideas about things I want to work on. To me, its really important to keep my personal voice. Thats where Im starting, so if I find projects, I need to make them my own. If Hollywood is OK with that, Im really looking forward to seeing what can happen.

Amins gift

Born of trust built over a 25-year friendship between the director and Amin, the making and promotion of Flee has helped Poher Rasmussen revalue the notion of home, both as main theme in the film and in missing his family during many months of commitments abroad. In turn, it has strengthened the bond these two men have shared since they were teenagers.

First of all, him sharing his story with me was the first step in having an even closer relationship, because when you keep secrets you keep people at a certain distance because you are afraid of getting exposed, says Poher Rasmussen. "Hes done that for a big part of his life, so for him to finally be able to share these things  and not feeling like he needs to keep secrets anymore  brought us closer.

Director Jonas Poher Rasmussen of "Flee." (Jay L. Clendenin/Los Angeles Times)

At every step of the process, during the creation of the film and in sharing it with the world, the director has always remained in constant contact with Amin about his storys reach. I visit him and his boyfriend with my family in that house [where] they end up in the film. Its a wonderful place, Poher Rasmussen says. I try to go there as often as I can with my girls, and they love it there as well.

Just a few weeks ago, Neon and Poher Rasmussen figured out a more concrete manner to include Amin in the campaign via a conversation with Riz Ahmed. Although Amin was nervous, the interview preserved his anonymity using animation and didnt ask him to elaborate on his painful memories further, but only to talk about the making of Flee.

"Growing up, he didnt have a lot of stories that he could relate to, so the fact that he gave his story to all the people whove had similar experiences so they have something they can relate to in their life now or when they grow up, thats very meaningful to him, Poher Rasmussen says. Im trying to keep him as involved as possible so he can see how important it is that he shared his story.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is not shy with his LeBron James opinions.

On Sunday, he laid into the fellow Los Angeles Lakers great during an appearance to celebrate James' teammate Carmelo Anthony. Abdul-Jabbar showed up to Crypto.com Arena ahead of Sunday's Lakers game against the Denver Nuggets to present Anthony with the NBA's Social Justice Champion Award. Anthony is the inaugural winner of the award that comes with a trophy named after Abdul-Jabbar.

'Really beneath him'

Abdul-Jabbar used the appearance to continue to voice his displeasure over James' social stances, among other complaints.

"Some of the things he's done and said are really beneath him, as far as I can see," Abdul-Jabbar said, per ESPN. "Some of the great things that he's done, he's standing on both sides of the fence almost, you know? It makes it hard for me to accept that when he's committed himself to a different take on everything. It's hard to figure out where he's standing. You've got to check him out every time."

Later on Sunday, Abdul-Jabbar said he regretted his comments about James.

Today a reporter asked me a question about Lebron James and I regret my off-handed response which has been blown out of proportion. For years Ive expressed my deep admiration and respect for LeBron as a community leader and athlete. That hasnt changed and never will. -@kaj33https://t.co/QEWed5YovX  Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (@kaj33) April 4, 2022

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar with a follow-up statement on his LeBron James criticisms pic.twitter.com/lO34a2rkWL  Mark Medina (@MarkG_Medina) April 4, 2022

Over the years, Ive been asked to comment on and write about LeBron James. A couple years ago, I wrote an article for Sports Illustrated about LeBron as a Sportsperson of the Year in which I said: "[T]his generation couldnt do any better in the hero department than LeBron James. Part of being a hero is to have both the modesty to feel unworthy of such a heavy word and the strength to accept the responsibility that comes with others looking to you to be that hero. What is a hero but someone who stands up for those who cant? Who embodies our cherished ideals of sportsmanship: fair play, hard work and compassion? That pretty much describes the LeBron James Ive watched and come to know since he was the No. 1 pick in the 2003 NBA draft and was named Rookie of the Year. In the two years since I wrote that, my respect and admiration has only grown for LeBron as I watched him champion worthwhile causes while maintaining his status as an elite athlete. As he closes is on my all-time scoring record, I have been a cheerleader urging him on, happy to pass the mantle to someone so worthy as an athlete and a person.

LeBron is still the daunting hero I described two years ago. Hes still a major force in improving lives in the Black Community. Hes still one of the greatest basketball players in history. Hes still a man who has earned the overwhelming admiration of millions. And every day he goes out and proves why he deserves that admiration.

On occasion I have chided LeBron when I thought he was dropping the ball when it came to supporting the community. But I did so in the spirit of a loving older brother offering guidance, whether wanted or not. So, when I said that he has done some things he should be embarrassed about, that wasnt a slam or a barb or even a finger wag, it was me recapping some of what Id said in the past. The Sports Illustrated article was an homage to LeBron for winning the Muhammad Ali Legacy Award for his role in social activism. So, when I think he may be veering from the path that made him win that award, Ill mention it. Im a journalist. Thats what I do. But I believe LeBron is strong enough and gracious enough to understand that I have only love for him in my heart.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

Abdul-Jabbar has repeatedly taken James to task, including December criticism that James "encouraged vaccine hesitancy." James used the pointing Spiderman meme on Instagram with a caption reading "help me out" in an apparent effort to downplay the impact of COVID-19 by comparing it to the cold and flu. Abdul-Jabbar responded with an 1,100-world Substack essay titled: "Dear LeBron: Heres the COVID-19 Help You Requested in Your Spider-Man Meme." In it, he criticized James' post as "a blow to his worthy legacy."

LeBron James is once again the target of criticism from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill)

Two months prior, Abdul-Jabbar wrote another essay criticizing James for "honoring the unvaccinated" and "opinions that contribute to their deaths." James said he was initially "very skeptical" of COVID-19 vaccines before announcing in September that he and the Lakers were fully vaccinated. Abdul-Jabbar has been a vocal advocate of COVID-19 vaccines while working to tamp down skepticism in Black communities.

'He should be embarrassed'

Abdul-Jabbar praised James on Sunday for some of his social efforts, including his "I Promise" school for at-risk students in his hometown of Akron, Ohio. Other things Abdul-Jabbar believes James "should be embarrassed about?"

I admire the things that he's done that have gotten all our attention," Abdul-Jabbar said, per the Los Angeles Times. "Sending a whole school to college? Wow. That's amazing. His thoughtfulness and willingness to back it up with his wallet, you got to give him credit for that.

So I'm not throwing stones. I just wish he wouldn't  you know, some of the things he's done, he should be embarrassed about. That's just where I'm coming from.

Abdul-Jabbar also recalled a 2021 celebration from James against the Indiana Pacers that drew a $15,000 fine from the NBA, which deemed his action as an "obscene gesture."

The NBA has fined LeBron James $15,000 for making an "obscene gesture" during the Lakers' win over Indiana pic.twitter.com/7Wqts1RklV  Sports Illustrated (@SInow) November 27, 2021

I think he has so much going for him in terms of respect and accomplishment, and he shouldn't stoop to those moments, Abdul-Jabbar said.

Kareem's thoughts on LeBron breaking his scoring record

James recently surpassed Karl Malone for second place all-time on the NBA's scoring list and is within striking distance of passing Abdul-Jabbar as the league's all-time scoring leader. As of Sunday, James' career scoring tally of 37,062 points trails Abdul-Jabbar's total of 38,387 by 1,325 points. His career scoring average of 27.1 points per game puts him on pace to pass Abdul-Jabbar in 49 games. Abdul-Jabbar said he would be happy to see James break his record  as long as he's "careful" about other issues.

I'm all for him doing it," Abdul-Jabbar said. "There's no envy there. I just  with the issues I was talking about, things that really affect the Black community, he should be careful. That's all I'm asking.

James previously downplayed Abdul-Jabbar's criticism, telling reporters in December, "I don't have a response to Kareem" before attempting to explain his social media post as "trying to figure this pandemic out."

James missed Sunday's 129-118 loss to the Nuggets with an ankle injury. He didn't immediately respond to Abdul-Jabbar's latest round of criticism.
In this image from video provided by the Ukrainian Presidential Press Office, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaks from Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022. (Ukrainian Presidential Press Office via AP)

BRUSSELS  The European Unions top diplomat has joined a growing chorus of international criticism blaming the Russian armed forces for alleged atrocities committed against civilians in Ukraine.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell says the Russian authorities are responsible for these atrocities, committed while they had effective control of the area. They are subject to the international law of occupation.

Borrell said Monday that the haunting images of large numbers of civilian deaths and casualties, as well as destruction of civilian infrastructures show the true face of the brutal war of aggression Russia is waging against Ukraine and its people.

Working with the U.S., U.K. and other international partners, the EU has been ramping up sanctions against Russia since it invaded Ukraine in February. Borrell says the 27-country bloc will advance, as a matter of urgency, work on further sanctions against Russia.

__

KEY DEVELOPMENTS IN THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR:

 Ukraine accuses Russia of massacre, city strewn with bodies

 Fill the silence with your music, Zelenskyy tells Grammys

 Drug shortages persist in Russia after start of Ukraine war

 Ukrainian refugees find jobs, kindness as they settle in

 Go to https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine for more coverage

___

OTHER DEVELOPMENTS:

WARSAW, Poland  Polands prime minister has described Russia as a totalitarian fascist that has carried out atrocities against civilians in Ukraine.

Mateusz Morawiecki called Monday for a international commission to be formed to investigate the evidence emerging that Russians soldiers carried out executions of Ukrainian civilians.

Russia is already a totalitarian-fascist state today, Mateusz Morawiecki said at a news conference in Warsaw.

The bloody massacres perpetrated by Russian soldiers deserve to be called by name: This is genocide and this crime must be tried as the crime of genocide, Morawiecki said.

He called on other Western powers to impose even heavier sanctions on Russia in order to weaken its war machine, saying that Germany in particular should do to more to support sanctions.

___

COPENHAGEN, Denmark  Estonia Prime Minister Kaja Kallas said the photos of bodies scattered in a city on the outskirts of Kyiv recall the mass killings by Soviet and Nazi regimes.

This is not a battlefield, its a crime scene. Mass killings of Ukrainian civilians by #Russia are clear war crime, Kallas said on Twitter and called for a 5th round of strong EU sanctions as soon as possible.

The Baltic countrys Foreign Minister Eva-Maria Liimets said the pictures from Bucha were  appalling, the Baltic News Service reported.

___

PARIS  French President Emmanuel Macron condemned with utmost strength the reported torture and killings of Ukrainian civilians by Russian troops in an interview Monday on France-Inter radio.

There is clear evidence of war crimes. It was the Russian army that was in Bucha," Macron said. We have told Ukrainian authorities that we were at their disposal to help with the investigation theyre carrying out. International justice must prevail. Those who committed these crimes will have to answer for them.

Macron joined leaders from around the world who are calling for stronger sanctions in response to the reports.

What just happened in Bucha calls for a new round of sanctions and very clear measures. We will coordinate with our European partners, especially Germany and we will take further individual measures," Macron said. "In particular on coal and petrol, we need to act.

It is our collective dignity and it is our values that we need to defend," he added.

___

LONDON  Britains Defense Ministry says Russia is continuing to build up both its soldiers and mercenaries in eastern Ukraine.

Russian forces are continuing to consolidate and reorganize as they refocus their offensive into the Donbas region in the east of Ukraine, the ministry said in an intelligence update posted on social media Monday.

It says Russian troops are being moved into the area, along with mercenaries from the Wagner private military group.

Overnight, the U.K. said Russia was still trying to take the southern port city of Mariupol, which has seen weeks of intense fighting. It said the city continues to be subject to intense, indiscriminate strikes, but Ukrainian Forces maintain a staunch resistance, retaining control in central areas.

The update added that Mariupol is almost certainly a key objective of the Russian invasion as it will secure a land corridor from Russia to the occupied territory of Crimea, which it annexed in 2014.

___

KYIV, Ukraine  Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the country will conduct a probe into alleged atrocities against civilians by Russian troops involving international investigators.

Zelenskyy said in an address that the world has seen many war crimes, adding that the time has come to make the war crimes committed by Russian troops the last such evil on Earth. He said that a special justice mechanism will be created to investigate the Russian atrocities with participation of international prosecutors and judges.

Ukrainian authorities have said that the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in areas outside the Ukrainian capital after last weeks withdrawal of Russian troops  many with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture. International leaders have condemned the reported atrocities and called for tougher sanctions against Moscow.

Russia has rejected the accusations of killing civilians as a provocation by Ukrainian authorities and initiated a meeting of the U.N. Security Council to discuss the issue.

___

KYIV, Ukraine  Ukrainian authorities are reporting more civilian casualties from the Russian barrage.

At least seven people were killed and 34, including three children, were wounded in a Russian rocket attack on Ukraines second-largest city of Kharkiv late Sunday, according to the regional prosecutors office. It said that 10 buildings were destroyed.

In the Black Sea port of Mykolaiv, regional Gov. Vitaliy Kim said at least one resident was killed and 14 others were wounded by Russian shelling late Sunday. Local authorities also reported more Russian strikes on Mykolaiv early Monday, but there was no immediate word of casualties.

___

TOKYO  Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said he was deeply shocked by Russias alleged attacks on civilians in the Ukrainian towns and called for firm investigations by the International Criminal Court over Moscows war crimes, echoing Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's earlier condemnation of the reported attacks as violation to international law.

We are deeply shocked by revelations of Russias extremely ghastly actions that victimized many Ukrainian citizens, Matsuno told reporters Monday. Attacks on innocent citizens violate international human rights law and are absolutely unforgivable.

Matsuno noted that Tokyo had filed a formal complaint with the International Criminal Court against Russia over its war on Ukraine in March and that Japan expects the court to fully investigate the war crimes allegedly committed by Moscow.

Matsuno said Japan will continue to cooperate with the other members of the Group of Seven advanced economies and the international society in possible further sanctions against Russia, but he did not elaborate.

___

WELLINGTON, New Zealand  New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Monday described reports of rape and other atrocities by Russian troops in Ukraine as reprehensible.

Bodies with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture lay scattered in a city on the outskirts of Kyiv after Russian soldiers withdrew from the area. Ukrainian authorities accused the departing forces on Sunday of committing war crimes and leaving behind a scene from a horror movie.

The reports of Ukrainian civilians who have been killed, raped and severely wounded by Russian troops is beyond reprehensible, Ardern told reporters in the New Zealand capital Wellington.

Russia must answer to the world for what theyve done, she said.

She said her Cabinet considered on Monday further measures New Zealand could take to support Ukraine and send a strong message to Russia. Further details would be outlined this week.

Certainly, what we as an international community are seeing are evidence of war crimes at the hands of Russia, Ardern said.

Ultimately it is for the International Criminal Court to make that determination, but the evidence is there and New Zealand is supporting the prosecutors in gathering that evidence and making sure that Russia is held to account, she added.

___

LAS VEGAS  Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has appeared in a video at the Grammy Awards asking for support in telling the story of Ukraines invasion by Russia.

During the pre-recorded message that aired on the show Sunday night, he spoke in English, likening the attack to a deadly silence threatening to extinguish the dreams and lives of the Ukrainian people, including children.

In his words: Our musicians wear body armor instead of tuxedos. They sing to the wounded in hospitals, even to those who cant hear them. But the music will break through anyway.

The Recording Academy, with its partner Global Citizen, prior to the ceremony highlighted a social media campaign called Stand Up For Ukraine to raise money and humanitarian support.

Zelenskyy told the audience: Fill the silence with your music. Fill it today to tell our story. Tell the truth about the war on your social networks, on TV, support us in any way you can any, but not silence. And then peace will come to all our cities.

Following Zelenskyys message, John Legend performed his song Free with Ukrainian musicians Siuzanna Iglidan and Mika Newton and poet Lyuba Yakimchuk as images from the war were shown on screens behind them.

___

KYIV, Ukraine  The Ukrainian military says that its forces have retaken some towns in the Chernihiv region and that humanitarian aid is being delivered.

The news agency RBK Ukraina says the road between Chernihiv and the capital of Kyiv is to reopen to some traffic later Monday.

Chernihiv is a city 130 kilometers (80 miles) north of Kyiv and it had been cut off from shipments of food and other supplies for weeks. The mayor said Sunday that relentless Russian shelling had destroyed 70% of the city.

Russian forces also withdrew from the Sumy region, in Ukraines northeast, local administrator Dmitry Zhivitsky said in a video message carried by Ukrainian news agencies Sunday. The troops had occupied the area for nearly a month.

In other areas recently retaken from Russian troops, Ukrainian officials say they have recovered hundreds of slain civilians in the past few days. Ukraines prosecutor-general says the bodies of 410 civilians have been recovered from Kyiv-area towns.

___

KYIV, Ukraine  Ukraines prosecutor-general says the bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Kyiv-area towns that were recently retaken from Russian troops.

Iryna Venediktova says on Facebook that the bodies were recovered Friday, Saturday and Sunday. She says 140 of them have undergone examination by prosecutors and other specialists.

Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk says the mayor of the village of Motyzhyn in the Kyiv region was murdered while being held by Russian forces. Vereshchuk adds that there are 11 mayors and community heads in Russian captivity across Ukraine.

In a video address Sunday, Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denounced the allegedly targeted killings of civilians in towns that the Russians occupied, calling the killers freaks who do not know how to do otherwise. He warns that more atrocities may be revealed if Russian forces are driven out of other occupied areas.

International leaders have condemned the reported attacks in the Kyiv-area towns after harrowing accounts from civilians and graphic images of bodies with hands tied behind their backs.

Russias Defense Ministry has rejected the claims of atrocities against civilians in Bucha and other suburbs of Kyiv.
Far more Americans still support (42%) than oppose (27%) Judge Ketanji Brown Jacksons confirmation to the Supreme Court, according to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll. Nearly one-third of Americans (31%) say theyre not sure whether they support or oppose Jackson.

Jacksons nomination took a major step forward Monday when Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee advanced it to a floor vote scheduled for later this week. With unanimous Democratic support  and at least one Republican backer  Jackson is widely expected to be confirmed to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer.

Yet even as Jackson continued her steady march toward confirmation, rising partisanship and polarization was evident Monday when all 11 Republicans on the evenly divided Judiciary Committee voted to block her nomination  forcing Senate Democrats to file a special procedural motion to advance her nomination to the full Senate.

That partisan divide is also apparent in the new Yahoo News/YouGov survey of 1,618 U.S. adults, which was conducted from March 31 to April 4.

Right before President Biden nominated Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court, a full 57% of Republicans said she was qualified to serve when shown a summary of her attributes and experiences. But after two months of GOP attacks culminating in last weeks contentious Senate confirmation hearings, that number has plummeted to just 31%  meaning that nearly half of Republicans who considered Jackson qualified in February no longer do so today.

Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson arrives for a meeting with Sen. Mark Warner on Capitol Hill on Monday. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a member of the committee who voted last year to confirm Jackson to her current position on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, went so far as to say Republicans would have refused to even consider Bidens nominee if they controlled the Senate.

If we get back the Senate and we are in charge of this body and there is judicial openings, we will talk to our colleagues on the other side, Graham said. But if we are in charge, she would not have been before this committee.

A few weeks before Biden nominated Jackson, Yahoo News and YouGov asked respondents to assess her qualifications, listing her as 51 years old, a graduate of Harvard Law School, a former clerk for a Supreme Court justice, and a current judge on the D.C. Circuit Court. In response, 69% of Americans said Jackson was qualified to sit on the Supreme Court, including 57% of Republicans.

At the time, just 11% of Americans  and just 19% of Republicans  said that Jackson was not qualified.

When asked the same question today, however  in the immediate aftermath of confirmation hearings that saw Republican senators falsely accusing Bidens nominee of leniency for child porn offenders and questioning whether she believes babies are racist  respondents revert to their predictable partisan corners. (Given that Jackson is now a more familiar figure, they were not provided with another summary of her resume, which may have influenced some of the shift.)

Democrats, for their part, have barely budged, with 77% now considering Jackson qualified versus 81% then. More independents continue to consider her qualified (41%) than unqualified (31%), even though they previously considered her qualified by a greater margin (64% to 11%).

But it is Republicans who have moved the most, flipping from 57% qualified versus 19% unqualified in February to 31% qualified versus 47% unqualified today.

Although Americans as a whole are still 15 percentage points more likely to support Jacksons confirmation, the reversal among Republicans illustrates how quickly and effectively the political process can transform perceptions of something as seemingly objective as qualifications, at least among partisans.

These same partisan patterns also surface in views about the confirmation process itself. A full 41% of Democrats, for instance, say the questioning during Jacksons hearings was mostly inappropriate versus just 16% who say it was mostly appropriate.

In contrast, Democrats now say the opposite about the 2018 hearings for Brett Kavanaugh, who was accused of sexual assault by a former classmate after being nominated to the high court by then-President Donald Trump. Just 10% of Democrats recall the Kavanaugh hearings as mostly inappropriate; 46% remember them as mostly appropriate.

Unsurprisingly, Republicans disagree, claiming by a 49% to 8% margin that the Jackson hearings were mostly appropriate  and by a 46% to 11% margin that the Kavanaugh hearings were mostly inappropriate.

Later this week Jackson will likely scrape by with minimal bipartisan backing  much like her recent predecessors Kavanaugh (who was confirmed by a 50-48 Senate vote), Neil Gorsuch (54-45) and Amy Coney Barrett (52-48), who were all nominated by Trump and confirmed by a Republican-controlled Senate.

Earlier nominees such as Breyer (87-9) and Chief Justice John Roberts (78-22) attracted far more support from the opposing party  as did former Justices Anthony Kennedy and Antonin Scalia, both Republican appointees who sailed through an earlier, less partisan process without a single nay.

_______________

The Yahoo News survey was conducted by YouGov using a nationally representative sample of 1,618 U.S. adults interviewed online from March 31 to April 4, 2022. This sample was weighted according to gender, age, race and education based on the American Community Survey, conducted by the U.S. Bureau of the Census, as well as 2020 presidential vote (or non-vote) and voter registration status. Respondents were selected from YouGovs opt-in panel to be representative of all U.S. adults. The margin of error is approximately 2.7%.
Republican politicians routinely claim that cities run by Democrats have been experiencing crime waves caused by failed governance, but a new study shows murder rates are actually higher in states and cities controlled by Republicans.

Were seeing murders in our cities, all Democrat-run, former President Donald Trump asserted at a March 26 rally in Georgia. People are afraid to go out.

In February, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., blamed Democrats for a 2018 law that reduced some federal prison sentences  even though it was signed by Trump after passing a GOP-controlled Congress. Its your party who voted in lockstep for the First Step Act that let thousands of violent felons on the street who have now committed innumerable violent crimes, Cotton said during a speech in the Senate.

Last December, Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, told Fox News viewers, Americas most beautiful cities are indeed being ruined by liberal policies: Theres a direct line between death and decay and liberal policies.

Former President Donald Trump speaks at a rally at a rally on March 26 in Commerce, Ga. (Megan Varner/Getty Images)

But a comparison of violent crime rates in jurisdictions controlled by Democrats and Republicans tells a very different story. In fact, a new study from the center-left think tank Third Way shows that states won by Trump in the 2020 election have higher murder rates than those carried by Joe Biden. The highest murder rates, the study found, are often in conservative, rural states.

The study found that murder rates in the 25 states Trump carried in 2020 are 40% higher overall than in the states Biden won. (The report used 2020 data because 2021 data is not yet fully available.) The five states with the highest per capita murder rate  Mississippi, Louisiana, Kentucky, Alabama and Missouri  all lean Republican and voted for Trump.

There are some examples of states Biden won in 2020 that also have high per capita murder rates, including New Mexico and Georgia, which have the seventh- and eighth-highest murder rates, respectively. And there are Trump-supporting states with low murder rates, such as Idaho and Utah. Broadly speaking, the South, and to a lesser extent the Midwest, has more murders per capita than the Northeast, interior West and West Coast, the study found.

Those findings are consistent with a pattern that has existed for decades, in which the South has had higher rates of violent crime than the nation as a whole.

Demonstrators march in Atlanta on April 14, 2021, to protest the shooting death of Daunte Wright three days earlier. (Megan Varner/Getty Images)

We as criminologists have known this for quite some time, Jennifer Ortiz, a professor of criminology at Indiana University Southeast, told Yahoo News. States like Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama have historically had high crime rates.

Criminologists say research shows higher rates of violent crime are found in areas that have low average education levels, high rates of poverty and relatively modest access to government assistance. Those conditions characterize some portions of the American South.

They are among the poorest states in our union, Ortiz said of the Deep South. They have among the highest rates of child poverty. They are among the least-educated states. They are among the states with the highest levels of substance abuse. All of those factors contribute to people engaging in criminal behavior.

I thought that was a very good study, Richard Rosenfeld, a professor of criminology at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and former president of the American Society of Criminology, told Yahoo News about the Third Way report. In Republican states, states with Republican governors, crime rates tend to be higher. Im not certain thats related to the fact that the governor is a Republican, but its a fact nonetheless.

Police and emergency personnel work on a crime scene in Waukesha, Wis., in November 2021. (Jim Vondruska/Getty Images)

(While the Third Way study divided states by presidential vote in 2020, using gubernatorial party affiliation leads to similar results because most states have recently chosen the same party for governor and for president. Based on presidential vote, eight of the 10 states with the highest murder rates lean Republican, versus seven of the top 10 if one uses the governors party.)

Although murder rates tend to be highest in the South, the biggest increases in 2020 were found in the Great Plains and Midwest, according to Third Way. The largest jumps were in Wyoming (91.7% higher than in 2019), South Dakota (69%), Wisconsin (63.2%), Nebraska (59.1%) and Minnesota (58.1%). Wyoming, South Dakota and Nebraska all voted for Trump and have Republican governors. Wisconsin and Minnesota voted for Biden and are led by Democrats.

Few large cities are governed by Republicans  only 26 of the 100 largest U.S. cities have Republican mayors  making apples-to-apples comparisons difficult. But cities that do have Republican mayors do not have lower murder rates than similarly sized Democratic-led cities, the study found.

Some experts warn against the impulse to use crime data to score quick political points.

Being a Republican or Democratic state or city is correlated with many other issues, David Weisburd, a professor of criminology and executive director of the Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy at George Mason University, wrote in an email to Yahoo News. That means that the murder rate may be due to the state being Republican, or it may be due to the fact that Republican states have many other risk factors related to crime or murder rates. Even with a very comprehensive modeling of all of these factors, it is very difficult to get a valid causal result for explaining crime rates.

Police tape blocks a street where a person was shot in a drug-related incident in Philadelphia in 2021. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

That argument cuts both ways, however. Weisburd also thinks the claims of Trump and other Republicans who say Democrats have caused a crime wave in the cities and states they govern are unfounded. I don't think this argument can be supported no matter which way you go, Weisburd said.

Murder rates in the U.S. rose dramatically in 2020 from record lows, and the increases are similar across states  regardless of partisan preference. For homicides in 2020, Third Way found a 32.2% uptick in Trump-backing states versus a 30.8% rise in those that voted for Biden. Some states with large cities, such as New York and Pennsylvania, saw larger-than-average increases: New York went up 47% and Pennsylvania is up 39%. But the largest increases were in rural, Republican-led states, including Montana (+84%) and South Dakota (+81%).

The higher national murder rate is naturally causing public concern, although violent crime does remain far below its early 1990s high point. Using the FBI data, the violent crime rate fell 49% between 1993 and 2019, from 757 incidents per 100,000 people to 379 per 100,000, the Pew Research Center noted last November. Between 2019 and 2020, the murder rate jumped from 6 homicides per 100,000 people to 7.8 homicides per 100,000, but that was still 22% below the rate in 1991 of 10 homicides per 100,000.
WASHINGTON  Russia is revising its war aims in Ukraine, seeking to consolidate gains in southern and eastern regions while continuing its wanton and brazen attacks on civilian targets elsewhere across the country, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said at a White House briefing on Monday.

Sullivan spoke as images continued to circulate of an apparent massacre of Ukrainian citizens in Bucha, a suburb of the capital city, Kyiv. Earlier in the day, President Biden reiterated his previous assertion that Russian President Vladimir Putin should be treated as a war criminal for his invasion of Ukraine.

This guy is brutal, Biden said of his Kremlin counterpart.

Although peace talks conducted in Istanbul last week appeared to be making headway, the Bucha killings could complicate efforts at achieving a ceasefire. They were seemingly committed as Russian forces retreated from Kyiv, part of what Sullivan described as consolidation around the regions that Russia has occupied since 2014, when it seized the Crimean Peninsula and Russian-backed militias seized control in Luhansk and Donetsk, two regions on Ukraines eastern border with large populations of ethnic Russians.

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan at a press briefing at the White House on Monday. (Andrew Harnik/AP)

All indications are that Russia will seek to surround and overwhelm Ukrainian forces in eastern Ukraine, Sullivan said. We anticipate that Russian commanders are now executing the redeployment from Kyiv and elsewhere in the north, he added.

And even as Sullivan praised the extraordinary and courageous effort of the Ukrainian military, which has thus far repelled a much larger force, he warned of a protracted next stage of the war that could see Russia pulling troops back from some areas and redoubling efforts in others, particularly those it has controlled for the past eight years.

He added that although Ukraine has reclaimed land lost in late February and early March, Russia can be expected to launch air and missile strikes across the rest of the country to cause military and economic damage and, frankly, to cause terror. Such aerial assaults have devastated the port of Mariupol, as well as the city of Kharkiv, near the Russian border.

Russia still has forces available to outnumber Ukraine, Sullivan cautioned, a reminder that Russias army is much bigger. The Kremlin is accustomed to long occupations of the sort it most recently oversaw in Chechnya.

The Biden administration is working around the clock to fulfill Ukraines main security requests, Sullivan said, describing an aid package approved last Friday that includes Puma drones, laser-guided systems and medical supplies, as well as other military equipment.

_____

How are Ukrainian forces taking out so many Russian tanks? Use this embed to learn about some of the weapons systems the U.S. is sending to the Ukrainian army.
(Reuters) - Russia's foreign ministry said that footage of dead civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha had been "ordered" by the United States as part of a plot to blame Russia.

"Who are the masters of provocation? Of course the United States and NATO," ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in an interview on state television late on Sunday.

Zakharova said the immediate Western outcry over the images of dead civilians indicated the story had been part of a plan to sully Russia's reputation.

"In this case, it seems to me that the fact that these statements (about Russia) were made in the first minutes after these materials appeared leaves no doubt as to who 'ordered' this story."

Ukrainian authorities said on Sunday they were investigating possible war crimes by Russia after finding hundreds of bodies, some bound and shot at close range, strewn around towns outside the capital Kyiv after Russian troops withdrew from the area.

Taras Shapravskyi, deputy mayor of Bucha, a town around 40 km (25 miles) northwest of Kyiv city, said 50 of some 300 bodies found after the Kremlin's forces withdrew late last week were the victims of extra-judicial killings carried out by Russian troops.

Reuters reporters saw one man sprawled by the roadside, his hands tied behind his back and a bullet wound to his head, though Reuters could not independently verify those figures or who was responsible for the killings.

A satellite image shows the grave site near the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints, in Bucha

Pictures of the destruction and apparent killings of civilians sparked shock and condemnation and looked set to galvanise the United States and Europe into fresh sanctions against Moscow, but it was not clear how quickly a new package could come together or if it would included Russian energy exports.

Russian authorities have said the photographs and footage broadcast from Bucha are a "provocation" designed to disrupt peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv. The Russian defence ministry said the images were "another staged performance by the Kyiv regime."

Footage and photographs of dead civilians strewn across the town have prompted Western countries to call for those responsible for war crimes in Ukraine to be punished.

The atrocities were also set to overshadow peace talks between Russia and Ukraine due to restart by video link on Monday.

Asked whether Russian President Vladimir Putin would be held accountable for the civilian killings , Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said others also shared the blame.

"I think all the military commanders, everyone who gave instructions and orders should be punished," he told CBS' "Face the Nation" news program.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken described the images as "a punch in the gut," while United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for an independent investigation.

"Putin and his supporters will feel the consequences," said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, adding that Western allies would agree on further sanctions in the coming days.

A Ukrainian service member inspects a compound of the Antonov airfield in the settlement of Hostomel

Germany's Defence Minister Christine Lambrecht said the European Union must discuss banning the import of Russian gas - a departure from Berlin's prior resistance to that idea.

French President Emmanuel Macron said there were very "clear clues pointing to war crimes" by Russian forces and that new sanctions was needed, and Japan said it would consult with allies on that issue. Macron said new sanctions should include oil and coal.

The U.N. Security Council will discuss Ukraine on Tuesday and will not meet on Monday as requested by Russia, said Britain's mission to the United Nations, which holds the presidency of the 15-member council for April.

Russia sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24 in what it called a special operation to degrade its southern neighbour's military capabilities and root out people it called dangerous nationalists.

Ukrainian forces have mounted stiff resistance and the West has imposed sweeping sanctions on Russia in an effort to force it to withdraw its forces.
By Tom Polansek

CHICAGO (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Agriculture is looking into vaccines as an option to protect poultry against deadly bird flu, the agency's chief veterinary officer said as the country faces its worst outbreak since 2015.

Supporters say vaccines could help keep poultry alive, prevent financial losses and control food costs, though shots would be too late to stop the current outbreak that has wiped out 22 million chickens and turkeys in commercial flocks since February.

Previously, the United States has eschewed vaccines, worried that importers will ban U.S. poultry shipments because they cannot distinguish infected birds from vaccinated ones. The United States is the world's second-largest poultry meat exporter a major egg producer, with shipments reaching $4.2 billion in 2020.

However, the USDA's Agricultural Research Service is investigating the potential for a vaccine that could be distinguished from the wild type of virus spread to poultry, Chief Veterinary Officer Rosemary Sifford said in an interview.

"We feel strongly that if we could develop a vaccine like that, that would have less of a trade impact," Sifford said. Researchers estimate that would take at least nine months to develop, she said.

Bird flu has hit poultry in Europe and Asia in addition to North America, and Sifford said the USDA is working with other countries on options for vaccines. Trading has suffered, as importers like China have blocked imports from more than a dozen U.S. states with outbreaks.

Though vaccines could protect poultry, some producers worry they would be cost prohibitive for chickens raised for meat, which only live about five to seven weeks.

Still the International Poultry Council, an industry group representing producers worldwide, is reviewing the possibilities, said Jim Sumner, a council member and president of the USA Poultry & Egg Export Council.

"We recognize that in some extreme cases of severe outbreaks, maybe vaccination needs to be considered as an option," Sumner said.

(Reporting by Tom Polansek; Editing by David Gregorio)
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has said he has confidence in a shadow Foreign Office minister who said he would be quite happy for Russia to be able to hack into the UKs Trident nuclear missile system and render it useless.

Sir Keir gave his backing to Fabian Hamilton after the Mail on Sunday reported on a video clip from September 2019 in which the shadow minister made the remarks at a rally by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

The Labour leader also stressed that the opposition was absolutely unshaken in its support for Nato and Trident.

Asked by broadcasters about Mr Hamiltons 2019 remarks, the Labour leader said: Look, he made some comments a number of years ago. I have confidence in him but the Labour Party position is absolutely clear.

I went to Brussels myself to see the secretary general to talk about Ukraine and to make clear our unshakeable commitment to Nato and of course to the deterrent that comes with being part of Nato.

Sir Keir also said: I have been very clear in relation to my position and the Labour Party position in favour of deterrence as a strong ally of Nato. We were there when the treaty was first signed and Nato was set up.

Our support for Nato is absolutely unshaken. I dont think I could have been clearer in the last few weeks about the Labour Party position on either Trident or Nato.

The video from 2019 shows Mr Hamilton, then serving as both a shadow defence minister and shadow Foreign Office minister, speaking about whether Russia has the capability to hack into the UKs independent nuclear deterrent.

Mr Hamilton said he did not know whether it was true or not that Russian hackers could render the nuclear deterrent entirely useless as had been suggested to him by an unnamed Labour colleague, but added he would be quite happy for Russia to do this, as long as we could do the same to theirs.

The Labour MP for Leeds North East was criticised by Defence Secretary Ben Wallace for his remarks, according to the Mail on Sunday, with the minister suggesting Mr Hamilton was backing Britains enemies.

During a visit to a nursery in north west London, Sir Keir also stressed the UK needed a proper energy strategy from the Government rather than going cap in hand to dictators.

During the visit, in which the Labour leader met with parents to ask them about the rising cost of living, he said: We dont need energy rationing. We do need an energy strategy. And going from one dictator in Russia for your oil and gas, cap in hand to another dictator in Saudi Arabia is not an energy strategy.

We need a strategy that is fast-forwarding on renewables and on nuclear, retrofitting so that we can actually keep our houses and our homes warmer.

That is the strategy, the security strategy, that we need for this country and we dont have it from this Government.
Thank you for reading!

Please log in, or sign up for a new account and purchase a subscription to continue reading.
YEREVAN, APRIL 4, ARMENPRESS. 38 journalists have been killed in the first three months of 2022 in 15 countries, Press Emblem Campaign (PEC) said in a statement.

Press Emblem Campaign (PEC) is alarmed by the large number of journalists killed in the first three months of 2022. The year-on-year increase is 153% with 38 victims in 15 countries since January (3 per week) compared to 15 deaths in the same period last year, the statement says.

This dramatic rise is very worrying, while the number of journalists killed had decreased in previous years. The war in Ukraine and the rampant criminality in Mexico are the main reasons of this appalling deterioration, said PEC President Blaise Lempen.

In Ukraine, the conflict has already claimed 9 victims among media workers, and nearly 20 journalists have been injured. In addition at least 10 others were detained.

In three months, Mexico with 9 victims has almost reached its toll for the whole of last year (10 killed). Haiti has seen an increase in violence with 3 journalists killed. India and Pakistan followed with 3 victims in each country. Two media workers were killed in Yemen, the statement adds.

PEC also recorded one victim in each of the following countries: Brazil, Chad, Guatemala, Honduras, Kazakhstan, Myanmar, Philippines, Turkey and the United States.
YEREVAN, APRIL 4, ARMENPRESS. The Armenian military denies the Azerbaijani Defense Ministrys accusations on opening fire in the evening of April 3.

The Azerbaijani Defense Ministrys statement claiming that the Armenian Armed Forces shelled the Azerbaijani positions in the north-eastern border zone of the Republic of Armenia in the evening of April 3 is false, the Armenian Defense Ministry said.

The Armenian side did not open fire, it stressed.

The Defense Ministry added that the situation at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border is relatively stable and is under the full control of the Armenian Armed Forces.
YEREVAN, APRIL 4, ARMENPRESS. Its already the 10th day the surrounding of the Armenian village of Parukh in Artsakh is illegally occupied by Azerbaijan, journalist Jean-Christophe Buisson, who is the deputy director of the French La Figaro Magazine, said on Twitter.

Hundreds of villagers, including children, still live far from home. But the Azerbaijani army is not withdrawing its forces. Moreover, it strengthens its positions, the journalist said.

Member of the Senate of France, vice-chair of the France-Armenia friendship group Valerie Boyer shared the post of journalist Jean-Christophe Buisson on Twitter and reminded that during the 2020 large-scale aggression Azerbaijan, with the support of Turkey, massacred the Armenians of Artsakh through Turkish bombs, white phosphorus and drones.

The genocidal spirit has awakened in them. And the world is silently watching without doing anything. Encroachments continue in an atmosphere of indifference, Valerie Boyer said.
Pakistan's Opposition leaders have ridiculed Khan's allegation, and the US has dismissed it

Islamabad: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Sunday named senior US diplomat Donald Lu as the person who was allegedly involved in the "foreign conspiracy" to topple his government through a no-confidence vote tabled by the Opposition.

Addressing a meeting of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leaders here after the National Assembly Deputy Speaker rejected the no-trust motion, citing national security, said that during the National Security Committee's meeting, the country's highest security body, it was also noted that a foreign interference was made into the internal politics of the country through a no-confidence motion.

He then claimed that Lu, the top American official dealing with South Asia in the US State Department, was involved in the foreign conspiracy' to topple his government.

Pakistan's Opposition leaders have ridiculed Khan's allegation, and the US has dismissed it.

Khan claimed that Lu warned the Pakistani envoy to the US, Asad Majeed, that there would be "implications" if the Pakistan Prime Minister survived the no-trust vote in the National Assembly.

He said minutes of the communique regarding a meeting between the ambassador of Pakistan in the US and the US officials were shared in the NSC's meeting.

A plan was perpetrated outside Pakistan to interfere into internal politics of the country, adding when the highest national security body confirmed it, it became irrelevant as to how many numbers the opposition had in the assembly, the official APP news agency quoted Khan as saying.

The embassy officials of the said country were also in contact with the PTI members who had defected, he claimed.

Khan said that the no-confidence motion against him was a foreign conspiracy and he thanked Allah that it failed.

The prime minister referring to his announcement early in the day, said that the Opposition was in a state of shock and they did not know what had happened to them.

On Saturday, Prime Minister Khan openly held the US responsible for the foreign conspiracy to overthrow his government.

Ok I'm taking the name of US, the conspiracy has been hatched with the help of America to remove me, PM Imran had said while addressing the participants of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf parliamentary party in Islamabad.

Earlier, National Assembly Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri termed the no-confidence motion against the premier unconstitutional, saying that it was backed by foreign powers.

Khan claims the US is leading a conspiracy to remove him because of his criticism of US policy and other foreign policy decisions he has taken.

Khan visited Moscow to meet President Vladimir Putin as Russia was launching the invasion of Ukraine. He has previously criticised America's "War on Terror".

Pakistan's ties with Russia have moved past the bitter Cold War hostilities in recent years and the chill in the relations between Pakistan and the US has further pushed the country towards Russia and China.

US President Joe Biden is yet to make a customary call to Prime Minister Khan since he assumed office in January 2021.
In today's headlines: Jordan's King Abdullah's younger half-brother relinquishes royal title; An 81-year-old Tibetan sets himself on fire in protest against the Chinese regime; Presidential candidates in the Philippines attack Beijing; Han Duck-soo will be South Korea's new premier; Russian elites press Putin to end war with Ukraine.

AFGHANISTAN

The Taliban government yesterday announced a ban on the cultivation of narcotics, including the opium poppy, of which it is the world's leading producer. The ban is one of the main demands of the international community to provide assistance to the Islamist regime. Prohibited also the production, transport and use of drugs.

JORDAN

King Abdullah's younger half-brother, Prince Hamza bin Hussein, has renounced his royal title. He explained the move by saying his personal beliefs are not in line with "modern methods" of Jordanian institutions. Hamza ended up under arrest last year after accusing the country's leaders of corruption, incompetence and persecution.

CHINA

An 81-year-old Tibetan man died after setting himself on fire in a police station in Sichuan province. Identified as Taphun, he was protesting the Chinese government's crackdown on the Tibetan community in Tibet, Sichuan and Qinghai. The incident took place on March 27, but did not emerge until the weekend. It is the 160th such case since 2009.

PHILIPPINES-CHINA

All of the candidates in the May 9 presidential election, except favorite Ferdinand Marcos Jr, yesterday called for a tougher stance on China over disputed territories in the South China Sea. Vice President Leni Robredo is calling for a united Asean stance to finally establish a code of conduct for shipping in the region.

SOUTH KOREA

Han Duck-soo is President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol's choice for prime minister. An expert in economics and business, Han previously served as premier in 2007-2008 during the Roh Moo-hyun presidency. The new executive will take office next month.

HOLY LAND-UKRAINE

Letters from representatives of the Ukrainian people to the Most High, inserted between the cracks of the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, increased dramatically in March. Ukraine rose to 14th place in the ranking of prayers in the holy city, surpassing Americans and British. The Wall letter is the most effective prayer according to Jewish tradition.

RUSSIA

An advisor to the Interior Minister, Vadim Denisenko, spoke on Russian TV channel 24, revealing that pressure on Putin to end military operations is increasing among the Russian elite. That is why "he is isolating himself more and more, he does not like to be pressured", and insists on gas payments in rubles, "which lead to war with the whole world".
For the prelate, the flame lit by the popes visit must be kept alive by bearing witness and evangelisation. Building walls is a sad sight. Solidarity towards Ukrainians highlights the plight of refugees coming from developing countries, treated as second class. Francis was transfigured by his meeting with the sick, prisoners, and the marginalised.

Valletta (AsiaNews)  Over the week-end Pope Francis undertook an apostolic visit to Malta.

During his stay, the pontiff highlighted the countrys history as a place of refuge, noted Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta, who hopes to keep the flame that the Holy Father lit alive and burning.

For Malta, migration is part of its genetic makeup, part and parcel of its culture and nature, a safe harbour since the times of Saint Paul.

All Maltese are children of migrants and migrations" who want to live this identity as a source of hope.

During his short visit, less than 48 hours, Franciss agenda was highly charged meeting migrants and sick people, leading Mass in one of the island's iconic religious sites, St Pauls Grotto in Rabat.

The pope used the liturgical service to touch two issues dear to him: peace and migration. The quest for peace is emphasised in his condemnation of war, most notably in Ukraine, while his focus on migration included a call that migrants should be met with open arms and help when in need.

For Archbishop Scicluna, the past few years have seen the sad show of countries raising walls to stem the flow of migrants coming from the worlds south and east.

Even in the current historical period, we see examples of great solidarity towards our brothers and sisters from Ukraine, but not so much from for those who come from the south (Africa and the Middle East) who are almost treated as second-class.

This should motivate us because it is necessary to show solidarity to everyone. To this end, the pope's visit ought to lead us to look in the right direction and provide adequate answers.

Asked about the value of the apostolic journey for Malta for the local Catholic community, Archbishop Scicluna noted how, at various moments, people warmly and enthusiastically embraced him, happy to see the pope in person, the man in white who represents the successor of Peter and today embodies Christ on the Earth.

This was visible when he met the disabled, the sick, prisoners, the outcast, and the marginalised at the end of the prayer in the grotto.

Caritas helps all these people who embody human suffering. When he me them, the pope was like transfigured, all tenderness and sympathy, the prelate told AsiaNews. It was a deep experience of compassion that touched me.

As soon as he got off the plane, I asked the pope for the gift of spiritual and physical reconciliation and healing for the community, bearing myself the pleas of those who asked me to pray for difficult situations, illnesses and personal and family sufferings.

Yesterday afternoon, Francis left Malta after meeting around 200 migrants at the John XXIII Peace Lab Centre at Hal Far.

Let me say a word for those in our society who reject racism and are signs of hope and humanity, said Archbishop Scicluna.

The pope came to give comfort to people of good will, who go against the tide, counteracting latent racism and showing that rare humanity and that spirit of generosity which, for me, are a source of hope.

I see goodness in our people, which must be sustained, not lost, and the pontiffs presence has been a source of encouragement.

In Malta, the pope condemned the war in Ukraine, calling it sacrilegious. For Archbishop Scicluna, we look at the conflict with great apprehension. Older Maltese still remember the bombings, the destruction of our island, he noted.

The pope celebrated Mass at the Granaries, in Pjazza San Publju (St Publius Square) in Floriana, where a church was destroyed by Axis planes.

Unfortunately, it seems that today we are not wise enough to have learnt anything from the past and this is a source of real anguish. . . We are helplessly watching slaughter.

Lastly, Archbishop Scicluna said that he hoped that the great grace received from the visit will be turned into deeds to keep alive the torch he lit.

We must continue to bear witness, welcome others, evangelise, and proclaim with joy the Gospel that is born of the encounter with Jesus, the primary task of the Church. The pope came to confirm and strengthen the flock in their mission.
by Marta Ottaviani

Azerbaijan also began the holy month differently from Iran. Aliyev is using the war in Ukraine to boost relations with Turkeys Erdogan, questioning Russias military presence in his country after the war with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh. For Turkey, this is an opportunity to fill any vacuum left by a weaker Russia in the Caucasus.

Milan (AsiaNews)  Power relations are shifting in the Caucasus and, for Baku, what better time to send a strong message than Ramadan. To this end, Azerbaijan used the opportunity to start the holy month of fasting at the same time as Turkey rather than Iran, as it usually did.

In the past, Azeri President Ilham Aliyev rhetorically referred to his country and Turkey as one nation, two states, an expression Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan likes very much.

Referring to the phrase, some media outlets referred to the Ramadan decision as Two states, one eid timetable.

Irony aside, this is an important moment, bound to change the balance of power in the South Caucasus, with Russia currently engaged in the war in Ukraine, but carefully monitoring what is going on because its presence in the Caucasus could be greatly diminished.

Russian forces were deployed to Azerbaijan following the Second Nagorno-Karabakh war, a major irritant to Azeri leaders, who are more and more determined to develop their own foreign policy and not depend too much on Moscow.

The Kremlin is expected to keep one foot in the country until 2025, during which it will try to consolidate its presence and influence.

But Aliyev has no intention of wasting so much time and has found in Erdogan  useful for years to his extremely fickle and pragmatic foreign policy  an important partner to free himself, at least partially, from the Russian yoke.

For Baku, this is a necessary but not easy step to take. A more independent foreign policy by Azerbaijan can only irritate both Moscow and Tehran.

In fact, caution not to upset anyone remains de rigueur. Azerbaijans decision to recognise the autonomy of the Donbass republics is a case in point.

The message is clear: even with an autonomous foreign policy, Baku has no intention of getting in Russias way.

The difficult part, however, now is to convince Moscow that the rapprochement with Turkey is not due to Russias diminished role in the Caucasus.

This is borderline impossible since Erdogan has been seeking this goal for years and Aliyev himself would not mind a Caucasus with a smaller Russian footprint.

For his part, the Turkish president waits patiently, cognizant before anyone else that the war against Ukraine could turn into a great opportunity for Turkey, and not only in relation to the difficult negotiations Ankara is carrying out.

A Russia engaged in the war in Ukraine is a weak Russia, as evinced by the decision of many former Soviet republics in Central Asia to distance themselves from Moscow.

The time has come for Turkey to step in and fill the gaps created by Russia in countries with which it has strong religious and cultural ties.

What is more, when this war is over, the Kremlin may be forced to revise its map of spheres of influence, and take note that its great Turkish partner dug hole if not a pit under its feet.
Her mandate expires on 30 June. Her successor will be picked on 8 May by a pro-Beijing select committee. For analysts, Lam lost Xi Jinping's support. Second highest official John Lee is favoured to win. Hong Kong residents are increasingly dissatisfied with the lack of press freedom.

Hong Kong (AsiaNews) - Carrie Lam today announced that she will not run for re-election as Hong Kongs city executive, ending, as of 30 June 30, her 42-year government career.

After postponement due another COVID-19 outbreak, the election to pick a successor will be held on 8 May but it will be far from meeting democratic criteria since it will be the task of an election committee of 1,462-member who are mostly aligned with Beijing rather than the territorys seven million residents.

In making her announcement, Lam thanked the central government for supporting her in the face of "unprecedented" challenges, a reference to pro-democracy protests, the COVID-19 pandemic, and foreign criticisms ("interference" in her words her) of her work.

Lam, a Catholic, explained that she made her decision for family reasons. However, several observers believe she had lost the support of Chinese President Xi Jinping, especially after her poor handling of the latest pandemic outbreak.

Faced with the growing support for the pro-democracy movement, China imposed a draconian law on national security in June 2020.

In doing, Xi virtually eliminated Hong Kong's traditional freedoms and autonomy vis-a-vis the mainland based on the agreements that led to Hong Kongs return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997 after more than a century of British colonial rule.

According to the police, as of late January, 162 people have been arrested on charges of threatening national security with more than 100 still waiting to go on trial.

The crackdown has led to the closure of several pro-democracy newspapers, organisations and trade unions.

Hong Kong Chief Secretary John Lee, the governments second most senior office holder, is favoured to take over from Lam. As Secretary for Security, he enforced the national security legislation.

Other candidates are Financial Secretary Paul Chan and former Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying.

So far no one has yet officially announced that they are running, which requires the formal support of at least 188 members of the election committee.

Residents of the former British colony remain uneasy about the current situation. Yesterday, the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute published the results of a survey concerning local media.

Regarding press freedom, citizen satisfaction stood at 28 per cent, an all-time low since 1997. Overall, only 2 per cent of respondents said they liked local newspapers, TV and radio (now almost all pro-establishment).
by Melani Manel Perera

Despite a curfew, protests against the economic crisis continued during the weekend. Over 600 people have been arrested. The Christian Solidarity Movement wants more than ousting current leaders. We must act to change this system that has impoverished the country.

Colombo (AsiaNews)  Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has called on the opposition to join a government of national unity; his aim is to stop protests that have been sweeping the country for days due to its serious economic crisis.

The presidents appeal follows the resignation last night of all 26 ministers from the cabinet headed by the presidents brother, Mahinda Rajapaksa. The governor of the central bank, Ajith Nivard Cabraal, also quit. However, both the president and his brother prime minister remain in office at present.

The time has come to work together for the sake of all the citizens and future generations, Rajapaksas office said in a statement

Despite a 36-hour curfew imposed across the island at 6 pm on April 2, thousands of people  mostly university students  continued their protest. Attempts to muzzle social media was thwarted by people using VPN.

What all those involved in protest want is for President Rajapaksa to resign in a country where essential goods such as petrol, gas and milk are now in short supply and blackouts can last up to 13 hours. At least, 600 people were taken into custody over the weekend.

The Christian Solidarity Movement (CSM) also held a rally on Saturday in Negombo.

Fathima Cader, a rights activist who attended the rally, told AsiaNews that at home we suffer from food shortages. I came to do my duty for the people because of the anger and pain felt by my family.

We did not come to oust the existing leaders and appoint new ones, said lawyer and Holy Family Sister Ramani Fernando.

The leaders who have ruled this country since independence should all be held responsible for todays suffering, pain and crisis, she explained. Those who suffer cannot be allowed to die. We must act to change this system.

Ajith Hadley, a school teacher, human rights defender and a member of the Negombo Citizen's group, told AsiaNews: We ask the government: Why was this very religious island turned into a debtor nation and the country was emptied of its assets? What have people done wrong to be punished like this?

A government that cannot provide the food, fuel, gas and electricity that people need should not be in power, said Fr Sarath Iddamalgoda, rights advocate and member of the CSM, in his address to the protesters.

If the country's land and forests cannot be protected, this government has not moral right to remain in power, he explained. Therefore, we publicly ask the president to resign.
AWD

SUV

The Japanese automaker has said nothing about the 2023 GR Corolla being exclusive to North America, just that it is Gazoo Racings first wholly developed and manufactured model for the market. As such, other hot-hatchback aficionados around the world are probably hoping the 300-hp, six-speed manual GR-Fourcompact will also reach their regions soon.We feel that Toyota would be foolish to omit the sale of GR Corollas in Japan or Europe, for example, especially since they did not make it with a special three-door body as they did with GR Yaris  perhaps especially out of fear of overlapping issues. However, that has never stopped virtual automotive artists from having their way, right?Alongside other prolific pixel masters, the virtual artist better known as X-Tomi Design on social media has quickly imagined a couple of sportier or family-oriented derivatives for GR Corolla. Naturally, the first rendering idea went down the logical, traditional 3-Door route already shown by the smaller GR Yaris. And the 2023 GR Corolla does look inherently sportier like this but also deftly shows why the companys designers and engineers kept the more practical five-door hatchback body style.Still, we have already seen enough of what three-door GR Corollas might have been. So, we really wanted to discuss the more recent Toyota GR Corolla Touring version, instead. Well, a 300-hp, AWD, manual transmission-equipped grocery getter is probably just wishful thinking at this point, especially in a world of crossover,, and truck love but we can still hope they might one day become fashionable all over again, right?Also, is it just us or are we witnessing the birth of yet another CGI transformation series from this author?
Yes, our little ones have things to carry too, and the Now bike was designed so that kids can have a more pleasant ride, whether it is to school, practice, or simply to the park. It is a utilitarian vehicle that doesnt make compromises in terms of style either.Wooms Now is available in three models, which vary in terms of wheels sizes and age recommendations. One of them is the Now 4, with a 16 (40 cm) front wheel and a 20 (50.8 cm) one in the rear. It is built for kids between 6 and 8 years old, with heights between 46 and 52 (116 and 132 cm). It is the lightest one, tipping the scales at 23 lb (10.4 kg). Next, we have the Now 5, which has a 20 (50.8 cm) wheel in the front and a 24 wheel in the rear (60.9 cm). It is suitable for kids aged 7 and 11. Then theres also the Now 6, which has the same-sized 20 (50.8 cm) wheel in the front and a 26 (66 cm) wheel in the rear. It is for kids aged 10 and 14 and weighs 28.3 lb (12.8 kg).Because it is designed for mini riders, the Now cargo bike is easy to handle and keeps the weight of the cargo down low. The bike comes with an aluminum frame, wide handlebars, a comfy seat, hydraulic brakes, an 8-speed twist shifter, Schwalbe tires, and an aluminum front rack with an adjustable strap. The rack offers a payload capacity of 22 lb (around 10 kg).Wooms new Now cargo bike for children starts at $750 for the Now 4 model and goes as high as $850 for the bigger Now 6 model. You can order it on the manufacturers website and take a better look at it in the video below.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

NHTSA

In as few words as possible, the vehicles in question were assembled with defective second-row latches that wont secure the seats to the floor as intended. As a result, these fail to comply with the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard #225. This is an alarming problem, as usually, parents use those seats for their kids, especially in a minivan.A document released by the) late last month reveals that occupants may notice a rattle coming from the second row during driving. The problem, which affects 1,094 units of the 2021-2022 Chrysler Pacifica , built from October 4 to 28, 2021, and 66 copies of the Voyager, made between October 7 and 20, is blamed on the component manufacturer, Magna International, in Canada.As far as the fix goes, the companys authorized technicians will inspect the second-row assemblies, replacing the seat cushion frame with a seat-to-floor mounting latch that properly secures it to the floor. This action will be performed free of charge, and owners of the defective vehicles who may have already fixed theirs will be reimbursed, assuming that they can prove it via the original receipt and/or other proof of payment.The recall is expected to kick off next month, with the planned dealer and owner notification scheduled for May 13. The official number for this voluntary safety campaign is Z22, and owners will have to use it should they want to get in touch with the FCA customer service at 1-800-853-1403. The NHTSA can also answer different questions on the topic, and their vehicle safety hotline can be reached at 1-888-327-4236.
Peace. Peace? I hate the word. Those who do care about peace (myself aspirationally included) dont need to hear it. And those who dont care about peace? Well   Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 3, 2022

Musk admitted a while back in an interview with Business Insider that he sometimes feels lonely. Hes just human after all and being the worlds richest man doesnt make it easy on him. Being in Berlin over the weekend, its understandable why he wanted to combat loneliness with a healthy dose of euphoria in the most-raved about club out there, Berghain. Judging by his following tweets , euphoria is all he got.They wrote PEACE on the wall at Berghain! I refused enter, wrote Elon Musk at 5:51 am (Berlin time). The issue kept tormenting him and, three and a half hours later, he was still fixated on the subject. Peace. Peace? I hate the word. Those who do care about peace (myself aspirationally included) dont need to hear it. And those who dont care about peace? Well Admittedly, Berghain is one of the most difficult to access clubs in the world, but being Elon Musk, youd expect to carry some perks. Nonetheless, as people started to react to Musks messages, it seems that Musk was indeed refused entry into the club.Tell me you didn't make it into Berghain without telling me you didn't make it into Berghain, replied one user. Elon Musk apparently drunk tweeting about being refused entry to Berghain is very funny, wrote another.According to people familiar with the club, Berghain doesnt care how much money you have or what your name is. Instead, entrance is granted based on coolness, outfits, and aesthetics. It might be that Musk was judged as not cool enough for the Berghain, it happened to millions of people before. But pretending you did not want to enter because of the peace lettering on the wall is just lame.Nevertheless, it seems that Musk, later on, woke up to better sentiments. At 11:10 am local time, he concluded his spat with a  Berlin rocks  message. Some 20 minutes later, his Gulfstream jet took off from Berlin Brandenburg, according to SpaceX Jets
SUV

TDI

Time flies, and Lil Scrappys eldest daughter, Emani Richardson, is now 17. She is the only child of the famous couple, who seems to be doing great at co-parenting. Besides Emani, Lil Scrappy has three other children.The two threw a marvelous birthday party for their daughter, and to top it off, they also chipped in and bought her a car. Since the teenager is 17, the two seemingly decided shes now responsible enough to have her own vehicle, and they bought her an Audi Q5 They shared several videos from when they surprised Emani with her birthday gift, which had a bow on its windscreen that read happy birthday.The 17-year-old was all smiles when she saw it and also started taking photos of her car. She posed next to the vehicle and also with her parents, who gave her a tour of the GermanLil Scrappy and Erica Dixon went to great lengths to offer their daughter a luxurious birthday party. While the car was the cherry on top, they also had a lavish celebration at an elegant venue. Both Erica and Lil Scrappy took it to social media to pen beautiful tributes for their daughter.Of course, at seventeen, youre pretty young to own a new car, and the Audi Emani received isnt brand-new, but from the Q5s first generation.The premium German brand introduced the Q5 in 2008, and the first generation remained on the market until 2016. The early model range included versions such as the 2.0 TFSI Quattro, 2.0Quattro, 3.2 TDI Quattro, and, for the U.S., Canada, and Brazil, there was also a 3.2 FSI option.There is no information on which engine Erica and Scrappy chose for their daughter, but it seems like a nice choice for a first car.
EV

ICE

Theres a strong divide between people who consider that electric vehicles are the only way to save our planet and those that dont even consider them real cars. Even so, theres been a tectonic shift in interest toward electric vehicles in the past month. This is due to increased fuel prices , proposed infrastructure legislation, the war in Ukraine, and supply chain issues wreaking havoc on the car market. Nevertheless, despite increased interest,sales are still low because of the limited supply.According to a new study by Cars.com , searches for all-electric vehicles in the U.S. are up 173 percent in the last month. This comes even though electric vehicles have steep entry prices that stifle adoption. People are truly desperate to buy an electric vehicle today and they see it as a purchase that hedges against market swings, especially gas prices.Despite the perception that Americans dont want electric vehicles, the study shows that 55% of non-EV owners consider buying an electric vehicle as their next ride. If gas prices keep rising , the figure would climb closer to 70%. Moreover, half of those that bought an electric car in the past months cite gas savings as the primary reason for their choice. The EVs proved to be incredibly good too since a vast majority (85%) of current EV owners would not go back to anvehicle.This is not to say that electric vehicle adoption has come to a turning point. The same study shows that factors like cost, availability, infrastructure, education, and awareness still present barriers to widespread EV adoption. More than half (52%) of Americans consider the high EV prices as a significant obstacle to buying one. Also, most people (70%) dont have a 240-volt outlet or an EV charging unit at home. But the biggest obstacle is the limited supply of electric vehicles in the market.
For all intents and purposes, Peresild and Shipenko became the planets first civilians to visit the space station. The Russians somehow managed to beat to the prize all the American space startups seeking to do the same, becoming the first nation to send people that are not cosmonauts or astronauts by trade up there.By the end of this week, the U.S. is poised to become the second. If all goes according to plan, a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft will take off on April 8 from Launch Complex 39A at NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Florida, atop a Falcon 9 rocket, and carrying with it a crew of four that will enter the history books.The launch is scheduled for Friday at 11:17 a.m. EDT, and the mission is officially called Ax-1 . The crew comprises Michael Lopez-Alegria (former NASA astronaut and mission commander), Larry Connor (entrepreneur and pilot for Ax-1), Mark Pathy (investor), and Eytan Stibbe (investor)  both acting as mission specialists for this particular mission.Ax-1 is scheduled to stay in space for ten days, eight of which will be spent by the crew on the space station itself. As per the announced mission profile, they will conduct science, education, and commercial activities.Its unclear for how long the Russian Soyuz people trained for their stint in orbit, but as far as the Americans go, they have been undergoing specialized training since August 2021, both at the NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston and over at SpaceX facilities.Currently, the crew continue their quarantine in Florida and are awaiting the spaceships rollout (April 5), the static fire test (April 6), and then the actual trip to space.
Last year, GE was selected by NASA to further develop a hybrid-electric powertrain and to demonstrate flight readiness for a single-aisle aircraft within the EPFD (Electric Powertrain Flight Demonstration) program. Now, it was also awarded a development contract by the Army for a megawatt (MW) class electrified powerplant.The new $5.1 million contract was awarded by the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command, Army Research Laboratory (DEVCOM ARL), and the program is called ARC-STEP (Applied Research Collaborative Systematic Turboshaft Electrification Project).The Army wants its Future Vertical Lift (FVL) helicopters to benefit from hybrid and electric power systems. The goal of ARC-STEP is to explore the performance of such alternative systems while still meeting the military requirements in terms of payload, range, and endurance.Experts from both GE and the Army will work together to develop hybrid-electric propulsions systems that are meant to be lightweight but also durable and powerful. According to GE, future tests will be conducted at its research facility in Niskayuna, New York. The systems will combine the GE CT7 turboshaft engine with an electric machine and power electronics developed by the same company.The CT7 family includes turboprop and turboshaft engines that currently power 25 types of helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft, having accumulated more than 100 flight hours.GE began its research on hybrid-electric propulsion technology back in 2009 when it participated in the Boeing Subsonic Ultra Green Aircraft Research (SUGAR) study. A few years later, it started operating a dedicated facility for aircraft electric power systems in Dayton, Ohio. In 2019, it hit a milestone with the demonstration of an MW class motor/generator at altitude conditions of 36,000 feet (10,970 meters) together with NASA.This new Army contract will help GE take its expertise related to electric propulsion even further and to develop future military helicopters that are emissions-free.
Needless to say, Google has introduced all kinds of extra tools for the transit mode, including a schedule explorer that few people even know existed.Its not hard to figure out what schedule explorer was supposed to do, given its pretty self-explanatory name, but as it turns out, its limited usage ended up becoming quite a concern for Google.The search giant has therefore decided to drop the feature entirely, surprisingly, without telling anyone about it.Posts all over the web ask about the availability of the schedule explorer in the transit mode, with some users claiming the feature went dark in January before returning in February, only to go missing once again in March. This time, however, it seems its permanent, as the schedule explorer has been removed on purpose by Google.The confirmation comes from a Platinum Product Expert on Googles forums , as they claim theyve been in contact with Google, with the company confirming the feature was removed due to the very limited usage.At this point, no replacement is available, so it goes without saying that many are very disappointed to see the feature go. On the other hand, as said, few users even know such a feature existed in the first place, so Google probably had a very good reason to drop it once and for all.More surprising is that the company hasnt released an official announcement in this regard. There are plenty of users out there trying all kinds of workarounds because they think its all just a glitch, so maybe a public statement on this helps set things straight.Weve reached out to Google specifically for some comments on the removal of the schedule explorer and will update the article when and if we hear back.
He was immediately ruled out of the Grand Prix, which came as a major blow seen as how Schumacher was expecting to be in contention for his first-ever F1 points, being fresh off a career best P11 at the Bahrain season opener.Going forward, Haas team boss Gunther Steiner believes that Schumachers confidence will not be impacted by the crash and that his driver will bounce back.I dont think that hell lose confidence, said Steiner, as quoted by Motorsport . Obviously now the target is set a little bit higher than last year. Last year there was no question at all, we contended to be 19th and 20th. Because that was where we were  consistently, by the way.Steiner does, however, believe that analyzing what caused Schumachers crash will be key to helping him understand what happened, while also making sure his confidence isnt impacted.We need to talk it through, but I think he needs to do that, because we didnt drive the car, we need to show what he wants to see. And I think [we need to] compare the data with Kevin, and I havent compared the data. So, did he try too hard? I dont know what it was. Was the tire not warm enough? We need to find out.Americas only Formula 1 team has already scored more points in two races so far in 2022 than in the previous two seasons combined  all thanks to Kevin Magnussen finishing within the top 10 in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.
AWD

kWh

Hyundai notified the safety boffins of this condition on March 14th, following an inspection of newly built vehicles with cracks on the aforementioned pipe. The oil may find its way onto adjoining components in the engine bay. In the worst-case scenario, customers may experience a vehicle fire although the manufacturer isnt aware of any thermal events.No fewer than 16 vehicles were delivered to dealers prior to Hyundais investigation, all produced between March 2nd and March 7th. These vehicles comprise 11 units of the Santa Cruz unibody pickup truck and 5 units of the Santa Fe mid-size sport utility vehicle with the 2.5-liter mill.Part number 282402S304 will be replaced with the same component produced to the correct material specification, free of any cracks or abrasions. Dealers and owners will be notified of the recall on May 27th.Named after the largest city of Santa Cruz County in Northern California, the crossover-based pickup is available from $24,140 for the non-turbo engine that produces 191 horsepower at 6,100 rpm and 181 pound-feet (245 Nm) of torque at 4,000 rpm. The turbo version levels up to 281 horsepower at 5,800 rpm and 311 pound-feet (422 Nm) from 1,700 to 4,000 rpm.Hyundai quotes 3,500 pounds (1,588 kilograms) as the towing capacity for the non-turbo model while payload tops 1,753 pounds (795 kilograms). The turbochargedmodel tows up to 5,000 pounds (2,268 kilograms).The Santa Fe is available from $27,400 excluding destination charge. The Hybrid and Plug-In Hybrid retail at $33,900 and $39,500. The latter flaunts a federal tax credit of up to $6,587 and an electric range of 30 miles (48 kilometers) thanks to a 12.4-battery and a 90-hp electric motor.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

The pawl material used on Sonata-equipped trunk latches was changed in April 2020, according to Hyundai. According to documents filed with the, similar pawls were installed in certain Genesis G70 vehicles produced for the 2019 MY.A damaged trunk latch pawl may compromise the operation of the emergency release lever, which results in a noncompliance with Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 401. Based on these findings, Hyundai didnt have a choice but to recall a grand total of 63,461 vehicles. The company is aware of at least 169 reports in the U.S. market alone. No injuries have been related to the recall condition as per the South Korean automaker.The recalled population comprises the 2020 model year Sonatas built from October 22nd, 2019, through April 30th, 2020, and the 2019 model year Genesis G70s built from May 2nd, 2018, and May 7th, 2019. The faulty trunk latch assembly comes from South Korean supplier Pyeong Hwa Automotive.Owners of the subject vehicles will be notified by first class mail on May 20th, the same day authorized retailers will be informed of the remedy. As expected, the remedy component is a trunk latch base pawl that contains improved material, which increases resistance to thermal contraction.Currently priced from $24,350 excluding destination charge, the combustion-engined Sonata is joined by the $27,200 Hybrid and the go-faster N Line that retails at $33,600 before taxes. Over at Genesis, the G70 can be had from $37,775 with rear-wheel drive and a 2.0-liter turbo. The V6 powerplant with all-wheel drive is presently listed at a pretty reasonable $44,450.
When used as a noun, the word Reventon translates as "small explosion" or "burst" in Spanish. A small explosion is more than fitting for the 6.5-liter naturally aspirated V12 mounted behind the cabin. The drool-worthy engine was used as something like a canvas. A strong foundation on which either a six-speed e-gear automatic or six-speed manual gearbox is paired to drastically change the nature of the car depending on the chosen transmission.641 bhp crazed horsepower and 487 pound-feet of torque (660 Nm ) are cranked out of this German-funded Italian psycho supercar. But let's be real, if you didn't know Lamborghini was owned by Audi these days, you'd have no indication whatsoever that this was funded via Ingolstadt and not Sant'Agata Bolognese. Not the least bit because it bears a striking similarity to the latest fifth-generation fighter jets.In something like an F-22 Raptor stealth fighter, for example, the jagged, angular lines that provide its striking appearance serve a very important purpose. Known as Planform Alignment, every angle of the control surfaces from the wings to the rudders and even the tips of its twin jet engine doesn't change throughout the airframe. When radar beams bounce off the Raptor, the energy is concentrated and disperses away from the targeting radar base.To say the same effect is true with the Reventon probably wouldn't hold up under scrutiny. Then again, no one's bothered to bounce radar beams off a Reventon to find out. Even so, it's easy to see the striking resemblance between this limited edition Lambo and that of the prized American stealth fighter. If nothing else, the angular and aggressive styling makes for a vehicle that a Raptor pilot would feel right at home behind the wheel inside.Not the least bit because Reventon's triple TFT liquid crystal display used similar technology that you'd find in the multifunctional display system inside an F-22's cockpit. As it happens, both the Raptor and Reventon have a G-force indicator.On the other hand, the rear LED taillights are not inspired by a stealth fighter. It's innovating in itself, especially when the same design cues made their way onto the modern Aventador. Zero to 60 miles per hour is taken care of in 3.4 seconds in the Reventon Coupe. Not quite the sub-three seconds you can muster in even the oldest Aventador LP-700, but let's be real.It's not like Lambo was going to let the swansong of the Murcielago be faster than the newer model. The Italians can be pretty "animated" folks, but they're no fools, and it really shows here. The first of the 21 Reventon coupes were delivered starting in late 2007. But just in case you don't really care if your Reventon has the same radar profile as an F-22 Raptor, the even more exclusive Reventon Roadster was showcased at the 2009 Frankfurt Motor Show.Based on the Murcielago LP 6704 Super Veloce, any added performance is lost with the weight of the convertible arrangement and added strengthening beams. Only 15 Reventon roadsters were built for the entire planet. But is anybody really going to complain about that if they're blessed enough to drive one of these beauties? Not us. That's a whole fact.The Roadster adds integrated deployable roll hoops that can extend to save the life and limb of its occupants in a rollover situation. It's a safety feature that's worth a few tenths of a second off the zero to 60 time. That added weight isn't worth being maimed over.With an MSRP of around US$2,100,000 for the Roadster and not all that much less for the coupe, these special Lamborghinis are destined to do nothing but appreciate in value from now until the end of time.Assuming you don't put 150,000 miles on it and don't crash it, it's a rich people's investment almost as safe and sound as precious metals. Because to a certain sect of people, Lamborghinis really are worth their weight in both silver and gold.Check back for more Limited Edition Month here on autoevolution.
Lachlan Murdoch is not only the heir of Rupert Murdochs media fortune, adding up to billions, but he also knows more about yachts than your average billionaire, having participated in two races. He also enjoys spending time onboard superyachts together with his equally famous wife, model, TV star Sarah Lachlan, and their children.Their upcoming luxury toy, according to the Daily Mail , is a Royal Huisman 60-meter (196 feet) sailing yacht worth around $130 million. But, as they wait for that massive vessel to be completed, they will be enjoying the newly-rebuilt classic jewel Istros, worth only $21.5 million. Originally built in 1954, this 138-footer (42 meters) had several famous owners and was awarded for its timeless elegance. However, by 2015, it was mostly neglected, left in a Maltese port, where its future captain would notice it and then convince Murdoch to rescue it.This turned out to be a complex rebuilding process , which not only upgraded the ship to all the luxury standards of today but also made it one of the eco-friendliest superyachts available. The original steel superstructure was replaced with a lighter, aluminum one. The original engines were also much heavier, so the Feadship team had to also add a lot of lead ballast in order to maintain stability.It was equipped with the first Lloyds-approved microturbine, serving as the main generator together with a 600 V battery bank. Its also equipped with advanced sewage treatment facilities, thermal insulation, and premium air conditioning with heat recovery. According to Feadship, the refitted Istros is also remarkably silent. It can accommodate up to ten guests in five cabins, and the Scandinavian interiors are bright and comfortable.The refitting process lasted more than two years, and it seems that the media mogul will be enjoying this classic beauty from now on. Istros will probably take a step back once the billionaires new custom sailing yacht is ready, but until then, it basks in the spotlight.
Today, the high-performance editions of BMWs 3 Series are some of the most revered cars to ever come out of Europe. It all started in 1986 when the manufacturers in-house motorsport division developed a road-legal homologation special of the E30 that was meant to comply with the Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft (DTM) and FIA Group A Touring rules.Dubbed M3, the rabid little monster brought home numerous titles in race car guise, while its road-worthy counterpart exceeded the carmakers expectations in terms of sales.In 1992, two years after the introduction of the second-generation 3 Series, the new M3 hit the streets. No longer a homologation special, but still an outright high-performance vehicle, the E36 M3 ditched its predecessors S14 four-pot in favor of a larger, M-built, naturally-aspirated, inline-six. The combination of power, drivability, and practicality (boosted by the availability of a four-door sedan variant) was appreciated by enthusiasts all across the world, which translated into record-setting sale figures for an M-badged model Determined to replicate the marketing success of the E36 M3, BMWs M division ramped up its efforts for the third generation. Unveiled in the fall of 2000 as a 2001 model, the beefed-up E46 was thoroughly revised in terms of style and performance, boasting an all-new S54 straight-six that upped the power past the 300 hp mark for the first time in model history.While the standard E46 M3 was a joy to drive and undoubtedly superior to its predecessor in every way, it got even better in the second half of 2003, when the Germans launched a track-friendly limited edition that continues to soothe the soul of high-performance aficionados nineteen years later.Produced in only 1,383 units, it was christened CSL (Coupe Sport Leichtbau, or Coupe Sport Lightweight) as a homage to the legendary 1972 3.0 CSL, and, as the name implies, it was given a weight-saving treatment, as well as a bunch of performance-enhancing upgrades.When viewed from the outside, it became clear that this was no ordinary M3 . Apart from those three special letters found on the front fender grilles and trunk lid, the car received a distinct front bumper that didnt feature fog lights (like the standard M3), but instead, came with a single porthole on one side that redirected fresh air to the engines enlarged intake duct. In addition, the CSL got a new curved spoiler lip integrated into the trunk lid and a set of bigger, yet lighter 19-inch wheels wrapped in Michelin Pilot Sport Cup semi-slicks. The highlight, however, was the exposed carbon-fiber roof that made the CSL the first M model to sport such an element.To shed more weight, engineers employed a host of motorsport-derived fabrication methods that were less visible to the naked eye. For example, the hood was made from aluminum, glass-reinforced plastics were utilized in various structural points, much of the sound insulation was taken out, and the rear window was thinner thanks to the use of a special type of glass.The lightweight treatment continued inside where the electric seats were swapped with a pair of slim buckets seats and the door panels were thinner and thus, much more spartan. Some of the standard M3s upscale features like the navigation system, stereo, or electronic climate control were also taken out and replaced with an analog air conditioning system and a bunch of carbon fiber sections. However, unlike the electric seats , door panels and navigation, the stereo and climate control unit were available as no-cost options for those who didnt mind the extra weight.Other distinct interior elements were the steering wheel that came with a single button for the M track mode, whereas the buttons for cruise control, stereo, and phone found on the regular M3 were removed. Moreover, the wheel rim was covered in Alcantara, the same material used for the seats and handbrake lever.All these features made this limited-edition model 243 pounds (110 kg) lighter than its standard M-badged sibling, but shedding weight wasnt the engineers' only objective. They also made improvements to the suspension , steering rack, and braking system.Under the hood, the CSL hid a unique version of the 3.2-liter S54 straight-six designated S54B32HP. It came with upgrades such as a revised carbon fiber intake, slightly more aggressive camshafts, a performance MAP sensor (instead of the regular S54s MAF sensor), a straightened intake manifold, or a lighter exhaust manifold.In terms of performance, these modifications amounted to 355 ponies, a gain of only 17 hp over the conventional, European-market M3. But, with less weight and a host of chassis improvements, the CSL became a different kind of beast. Whether it was driven on a track or a nice, dry, twisty road, the car behaved exceptionally well, inducing goosebumps and a wide smile in the process. You can see exactly what Im talking about In the YouTube video below by Novitec Group.In the years that followed, BMWs M division has released a multitude of terrific models , some of which are lighter and noticeably more powerful than the 2003 M3 CSL. That being said, the lightweight, limited-edition E46 with its high-pitched, naturally-aspirated six and spartan, track-focused interior still manages to provide a distinctive driving experience that becomes instantly addictive, which is why it remains one of the best M-badged models ever built.




But as far as the police forces across the world are concerned, such technology has until been an unexplored part of what could be a new-gen arsenal helping them respond to emergency calls faster.The WA Police officers will be the first in the entire world to use CarPlay in their patrol vehicles, all in an attempt to arrive at the scene of an incident faster and also get critical information on their way to the destination.The CarPlay support is being provided thanks to a partnership with Apple and Motorola Solutions, and it includes not only turn-by-turn navigation powered by Apple Maps but also the support for voice commands via Siri.As users out there know, such capabilities are rather common in the CarPlay world, but officers are provided with a more straightforward system that allows them to set the destination in Apple Maps based on the incident report received on their mobile devices.The voice control obviously is an essential part of the entire experience, as officers can interact with CarPlay and the navigation system on the go as theyre heading to a specific address.Now that CarPlay is stepping into professional use territory lets just hope Apple no longer ships updates that make the whole thing a huge mess. The release of iOS 15 last fall wreaked havoc on CarPlay, leading to all kinds of problems, from app crashes to random disconnects.Most of these glitches have already been resolved, but its pretty clear that Apple needs to focus a little bit more on the reliability side of things. Just imagine how awful itd be for Apple Maps to stop working in the middle of the drive for these police officers, as a reliable system is critical for their daily tasks.
SUV

There have been a lot of famous burglaries on celebrities, leaving them with substantial losses. One of the stars that fell victim to such thefts was Kim Kardashian, who was famously robbed in Paris. Most recently, it was David and Victoria Beckham , as thieves entered their home in West London without them even knowing. Their son, Cruz, discovered the theft when he returned home, and they called the police.Now, Real Housewives of New Jersey star Jennifer Aydin found herself in a similar predicament. The reality star took it to social media and asked her fans to help locate her husbands red Ferrari California convertible, as it was stolen from their property in Paramus, New Jersey, on April 3.The 44-year-old reality star wrote that the robbery happened before 11 pm. She captioned the video showing the robbery: They stole the Ferrari. My kids and parents and other friends were all home. Please send any info to Paramus PD.The footage from the security camera, posted on her Instagram account, shows the thief entering the garage and heading to the Ferrari, which had a red cover all over it. The thief proceeds to take off the cover, steals some shoes, and ends up leaving in the supercar.At the moment of the robbery, Aydin and her husband were out of town, previously sharing photos from their trip to Miami. The thieves must have known about them being away.She urged her followers in the Paramus area to message her with any information to shed light on what happened, adding that the red Ferrari California was followed by a white. She posted a message she received from one of her followers, which wrote: Ferrari is in Elizabeth! My bf is a cop here and they attempted to pull it over but it took off.In a second video shared later, she revealed her 17-year-old son Justin pulled up right as they were leaving their property. However, he didnt see who the thieves were. Thank God he wasnt there 30 seconds earlier to cross their path while in the act, she captioned footage of the robbery. She concluded: My family is safe. Scared, but safe. Mommy and Daddy will be home tomorrow.Her plastic surgeon husband showed off his ride in a couple of episodes of the Bravo show.
In #Spain, the 77-meter yacht of the #Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg was arrested. Its cost is estimated at 120 million dollars. pic.twitter.com/EALbVTR7w3  NEXTA (@nexta_tv) April 4, 2022

Its been over a month since Russia invaded Ukraine, and things are far from over. Both sides have been suffering, although Russias loss includes a lot of material goods, too. Since the war outbreak, the U.S. and EU have been imposing sanctions on Russias billionaires who aided the State Leader Vladimir Putin.And the latest victim of it all is Viktor Vekselberg, as his $120 million yacht, Tango, has just been seized in Spain.It all happened on April 4 at the Marina Real in the port of Palma de Mallorca, the capital of Spains Balearic Islands. The Civil Guard and U.S. federal agents reportedly descended on the yacht at the U.S. request, and confirmed that the vessel in question is Tango, and it carried the flag of the Cook Islands. According to official documents, the U.S. investigation alleges that Vekselberg bought the Tango in 2011 and has owned it continuously since that time. It further claims that Vekselberg used shell companies to obfuscate his interest in the Tango to avoid bank oversight into U.S. dollar transactions.Todays seizure of Viktor Vekselbergs yacht, the Tango, in Spain is the result of an unprecedented multinational effort to enforce U.S. sanctions targeting those elites who have enabled Russias unprovoked and illegal invasion of Ukraine, said Director Andrew Adams of Task Force KleptoCapture.The mega yacht measures 254 ft (74 m), and it can fit up to 14 guests in seven cabins, besides a crew of 22 in 11 cabins. The vessel, which is estimated at $120 million according to SuperYachtFan , was built in 2011 by Feadship, and Harrison Eidsgaard was in charge of the design for its exterior and interior.Tango is powered by four MTU engines that give out 1,730 hp diesel engines each, and take it to a speed of 21 knots (24 mph/39 kph), and a cruise speed of 10 knots (11.5 mph/ 18.5 kph).It looks like Roman Abramovichs both yachts, Eclipse and Solaris, have found solace and escaped seizing , but others werent so lucky. Alisher Usmanovs Dilbar was among the first to be seized, and, just last week, they also seized his armored Mercedes-Maybach S-Class . Andrey Melnichenkos Sailing Yacht A has also been seized, as well as Phi and The Flying Fox , among others.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

In March 2021, MBAG discovered this fault during a test drive. Mercedes implemented a plant action to update the software of all potentially affected vehicles that were still within the companys reach. In parallel, the Stuttgart-based automaker launched an investigation into how the overhead control panel may affect safety and compliance in the event of a deactivation.Come March 2022, the star-branded marque determined that a safety risk could not be ruled out even though no warranty complaints were reported. According to documents filed with the, pressing the SOS button would not be registered by the communication module only in the case of manual initiation. First responders may not be guided to the vehicle, increasing response time.The overhead control panel deactivates if an under voltage occurs and the battery disconnect activates. This condition is easily noticeable thanks to a warning message in the instrument cluster according to Mercedes-Benz.Updated software rolled out sometime in August 2021, which pretty much confirms that Mercedes couldnt care less about their best or nothing promise. Dealers have been informed of the recall on April 1st, whereas known customers will have to wait for notification letters until May 24th.A grand total of eight vehicles are listed, EQS 450+ and EQS 580 vehicles produced between February 15th and March 20th last year. Obviously enough, dealers have been instructed to update the software to the latest version, which is dubbed A0009028182 according to the manufacturer.The S-Class of electric vehicles , the EQS is a five-door liftback rather than a four-door sedan. Codenamed V297, the all-electric flagship is currently available from $102,310 for the 450+ and $125,900 for the 580 variant.
The Beechcraft piston aircraft has received some enhancements that focus on functionality. The maximum takeoff weight of the new production Beechcraft Bonanza G36 has been increased by 155 lbs (70 kg), allowing the six-seater to have a maximum usable load of 1,213 lbs (550 kg) in its standard seating configuration.New Bonanzas, together with Beechcraft Baron G58 aircraft, will also have a redesigned cockpit arrangement that includes a standalone autopilot controller. Moreover, they will be equipped with a GI 275 electronic display, USB ports for every seat, powered headset plugs, and will feature three new interior schemes. The aircraft will also come with new LED exterior lighting that will offer enhanced visibility. All of these will be available in the new aircraft scheduled for delivery in mid-2022.The modernized cockpit will also be one of the main features included in the new production of Cessna high wing piston aircraft. They will incorporate the Garmin GI 275 electronic standby, which replaces three analog standby instruments and offers additional flight data. The cockpit now has a backlit USB A/C port, and the interior features Alcantara inserts in the seats.Textrons iconic piston lineup will land at this weeks Sun n Fun International Fly-in & Aerospace Expo, one of the largest aviation events in the world. Aviation enthusiasts will be able to feast their eyes on the Beechcraft Bonanza G36 and Beechcraft Baron G58. The Cessna Caravan, Cessna Turbo Stationair HD, and a Cessna Skylane will also be on display. The event will take place in Lakeland, Florida, between April 5th and April 10th.This is an ideal opportunity for us share the significant advancements we are making with our piston products, said Chris Crow, vice president of Piston Sales.
HP

HMS Sabre and Scimitar have been fulfilling their protective duty in the Gibraltar area for almost two decades, so it was time for newer vessels to take over this role. The two venerable boats returned to the UK in 2020. Until the new models were completed, HMS Dasher and Pursuer kept an eye on all the vessels operating around the area, together with the Pacific 24 RIBs (Rigid Inflatable Boats) that are also part of the Squadron. HMS Cutlass kicked off sea trials last year and was recently declared fully operational. Now, its time for HMS Dagger to undergo safety checks and complex trials before becoming operational by the middle of this year. That is when the new Royal Navy Gibraltar Squadron will be complete.Both of these new patrol boats are worth around $6.5 million (5 million), and they are 19-meter-long (62 feet). Three Volvo D13-1000 engines (adding up to 3,000) plus three MJP350X water jets get these ships to hit the waves as fast as 40 knots (46 mph/74 kph). They can accommodate six crew members and up to six passengers. In terms of weapons, they will initially carry three purpose machine guns, one on the foredeck and two off-deck. But they will also be fitted for heavy machine guns.HMS Dagger is not only the newest patrol boat to be delivered to the Gibraltar Squadron but also the first in the Royal Navy to sport this name. A weapon-class anti-submarine escort was supposed to receive this name by the end of World War II, but it ended up being canceled when the war stopped. A brand-new name seems fitting for a brand-new boat that will protect Gibraltar for decades to come.
In the latest Drivetribe video, The Stig is showing what car he drives. Surprising many, his daily driver is a Porsche 911 Turbo. Its a 997 Gen 2, to be precise. Hes explaining why he made this choice, even though he acknowledges that some people might find it a bit controversial.To be perfectly honest, we weren't expecting anything else from the man who verified supercars and hypercars and has done a lot of incredible stunts during the reign of the British television show. Porsches are known for making almost everyone feel like they can control the car better than they're used to. The brand's vehicles might not provide the same Italian-specific feelings and emotions, but its engineering is top-notch.Ben Collins (not Michael Schumacher, as some still think hes The Stig) says he has driven a lot of cars during his tenure at Top Gear , but this Porsche made a strong impression on him. He recalls a Top Gear trip to the Isle of Man, where he had to drive the TT Mountain Course. The day they were there to film, the weather was foggy, and he recalls the Porsche giving him the most confidence immediately.But thats not when he made the decision to buy a Porsche 911 for himself. Collins explains that he went on a working trip to Poland where he drove the 997 Gen 2 and thought hell never need anything faster than this. The Stig liked back then that he was able to feel what happened with the car, it gave him the confidence needed to drive without worries in any kind of weather, and it provided him with a great drivers experience. That's when he decided to go ahead and buy it.Now he relives the same feelings every time because his own 911 is also a manual, and it comes with a handbrake thats not a button.Ben Collins also admits having a soft spot for Ferrari, but he points out theyre really shouty and not that practical. He needed four seats.This idea that the German carmaker makes the most fun, easy to drive, and precise machines is even continued today by Top Gear's current hosts. Porsche remains a manufacturer envied by many and loved by customers. We can't wait to see them in Formula 1!
Uldas Yacht Design recently shared on its Instagram some pics and a video of its new luxury motor yacht, as well as one of the first concept sketches for Ada 60 Z. The vessel looks grandiose and full of amenities that only big bucks can buy.The motor yacht will most likely be built in Turkey by Ada Yacht Works and will offer 498 GT of interior space. It will measure 197 ft (60 m) in length and will feature a Grade A steel hull and an aluminum superstructure. As for its appearance, Ada 60 Z looks sleek and sporty, with sharp lines from bow to stern. Both its exterior and interior design are entrusted to Uldas.Ada 60 Z will be equipped with two 1,300-hp engines and will be able to reach a top cruising speed of 15 knots (17 mph/27 kph).What makes this luxury motor yacht appealing are its generous outdoor spaces, with the Ada 60 Z featuring no less than three pools across its decks and a helipad on its upper deck. Theres an open, large beach club on the main deck that offers stunning panoramic views, and the feeling of spaciousness continues inside, where you can find a large saloon and dining area, with big windows, and a large bar.Up to 12 guests can enjoy a cruise in style onboard Ada 60 Z, which offers six large and fully equipped staterooms. The luxury yacht is scheduled for launch in June 2025.
Denmark is looking to go ahead with liquid wind fuel, which is best known as e-methanol. You might have heard of it. Its produced from captured carbon dioxide, renewable electricity, and hydrogen. The product is burned by internal combustion engines to make power. It still releases some gases that contribute to the greenhouse effect thats warming up our planet, but not as much as trucks, ships, or cars do.Geely, according to Autovista , wants to see if its feasible to use e-methanol instead of hydrogen because its cheaper and more environmentally friendly to make liquid wind than to apply electrolysis to water.The cars and trucks used in this test wear the Geely badge, but theyre produced using Volvos know-how. The units will run for an unspecified period, during which data will be collected and analyzed. If the test shows that e-methanol has a proper chance of reducing the release of harmful gasses in the atmosphere, then we might see a new type of fuel being created.The nickname liquid wind is used for e-methanol mostly in northern Europe thanks to a Swedish company that works on making this carbon-neutral fuel. Its name literally is Liquid Wind, and it inspired the new proprietary eponym, exactly like the term xerox, derived from the producer Xerox, which replaced copiers. Sooner or later, youll hear about it, too, because its easier to identify e-methanol as liquid wind. It sounds cooler too.It isnt the first time e-methanol is used in the transport sector. Maersk did it in 2021 to lower emissions for freighting. It was used on only one ship, and the project was also started in Denmark. The country wants to remain at the forefront of combating climate change. While doing this, theyre also securing private investments in new technologies.Siemens Energy considers e-methanol a universal green fuel, but different methods of producing it have turned companies away from it. Geely hopes to change that with its tests supported by the Danish government. The European country wants new fuels for the transport sector.Well have to wait for the results, as attempts at keeping the internal combustion engine are made in virtually any country with car industry. Maybe hopes not lost yet.
Palmdale, CA (93550)

Today

Windy with a mix of clouds and sun. High 86F. Winds WSW at 20 to 30 mph. Winds could occasionally gust over 40 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy skies. Low 59F. Winds WSW at 15 to 25 mph. Winds could occasionally gust over 40 mph.
Hayk Khanumian, the Karabakh minister for local government and public infrastructures, said this is what is fuelling calls by some Karabakh Armenians for a referendum on becoming part of Russia.

The Republic of Armenia used to be the guarantor of our security, and in essence it cannot perform that function anymore, Khanumian told RFE/RLs Armenian Service in an interview. The Russian peacekeeping contingent does not have a mandate to ensure such protection. So people are just trying to raise security issues. They want to be protected.

Defense is not just about weapons and ammunition, he said. Its a whole set of measures. Diplomacy, diplomatic service is an important part of that, and it is quite dire straits these days. Im talking about Armenia.

Often times not only does it not carry out tasks but also does not receive tasks. The bodies formulating [Armenias] foreign policy, whose orders the diplomatic service is supposed to execute, are confused or do not operate normally on the issue of Artsakh and defense.

Khanumian spoke two days before Prime Minister Nikol Pashinians scheduled talks with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev that will be hosted by European Council President Charles Michel. The talks are expected to focus on an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty sought by Azerbaijan.

Baku wants the treaty to be based on five elements, including a mutual recognition of each others territorial integrity. Pashinian publicly stated on March 31 that Yerevan is ready to negotiate a deal along these lines.

Pashinian did not explicitly mention the question of Karabakhs status, speaking instead of the need to protect the rights of Nagorno-Karabakhs Armenians. His remarks were construed by Armenian opposition leaders and other critics as a further indication that the Armenian government is ready to recognize Azerbaijani sovereignty over Karabakh.

Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan insisted on April 1 that Yerevan will seek to include the issue of the status on the agenda of negotiations on the peace accord.

On March 26, Karabakhs leadership appealed to Russian President Vladimir Putin to deploy more Russian soldiers in Karabakh. It said that Russias 2,000-strong peacekeeping contingent is too small to carry out its mission.

The appeal came two days after Azerbaijani forces seized a village in eastern Karabakh and surrounding territory before engaging in deadly fighting with Karabakh Armenian troops. The fighting stopped following the peacekeepers intervention.

Khanumian said that the current situation in the conflict zone leaves the Karabakh Armenians with no choice but to primarily rely on their military and other security forces.

The Russian peacekeepers were deployed in Karabakh under the terms of a Russian-brokered ceasefire agreement that stopped the Armenian-Azerbaijani war in November 2020.
Supply concerns in Europe amid Russias invasion of Ukraine highlight the increasingly important role natural gas is playing in providing energy to the world.

Combine that with continued growing concerns about the energy industrys impact on the environment, and natural gas proponents continue to point to the commodity as a "bridge fuel" to a cleaner world.

Even so, there remains significant skepticism about the cleanliness of natural gas, prompting producers to prove its environmental credibility. To do so, theyre turning to third-party companies, from MiQ to Equitable Origin to Project Canary, to certify their natural gas production as responsibly-sourced.

A report on responsibly-sourced gas issued by Enverus Intelligence Research found that Appalachia leads in supplying certified gas, followed by the Haynesville. The Permian is taking part in the trend as XTO Energy, Laredo and Chisholm Energy have announced plans to have their production certified and Chevron and Project Canary have a pilot project in the Permian and Denver-Julesberg basins.

We do expect the list of companies in the Permian to continue expanding with the primary goal of seeking environmental credibility, Jon Gutentag, associate at Enverus Intelligence Research and an author of the report, told the Reporter-Telegram by email. At this point, we are skeptical that a potential customer response will be the main driver of RSG certification, it is a supply-saturated market.

The report found the supply of producer-certified responsibly-sourced gas will grow from 8.7 billion cubic feet per day in 2021 to about 20 Bcf per day by the end of this year, or about 18 percent of the North American market, based on announced projects. As Gutentag said, those commitments are driven more by a desire to demonstrate environmental credibility than expectations of higher prices for certified gas in the near-term.

Project Canary is the most active certifier with a 38 percent market share across 13 partnerships, with seven more pilot projects announced. MiQ and Equitable Origin co-certify 42 percent of RSG volumes.

In promoting natural gas as a bridge fuel, Gutentag said, We think that reducing the uncertainty around methane leakage across the natural gas value chain is an integral step in solidifying natural gas as a bridge fuel. RSG certification has the potential to provide more credibility to reported values, especially when paired with transparent disclosure, continuous monitoring and third-party verification.

There are potential barriers to increasing acceptance of RSG, he noted. Those potential barriers include transparency as the current certification process is fairly opaque to the public. Standardization of what constitutes RSG is also a barrier as each certifier uses different standards and grading systems. There is also the need to move beyond primarily upstream certification to include gathering, processing and transmission in the process, allowing for wellhead to end-use certification and monitoring. Currently there is a lack of demand growth for certified natural gas.

Gutentag said he and his fellow analysts and Enverus Intelligence Research are seeing signs that natural gas pipelines are already important to the process.

First, there is the ongoing debate with FERC, Kinder Morgan and other interested parties as Kinder Morgan is trying to establish a process for pooling RSG separately from traditional natural gas, he wrote. We also saw the Rockies Express Pipeline commit to monitoring all compressor stations with continuous monitoring equipment. Lastly, we are seeing commitments from companies to operate net-zero pipelines where all emissions are reduced with the residual emissions being offset from various projects. The bottom line is we are seeing a rapid supply chain optimization as all companies seek ways to reduce their direct Scope 1 emissions.

The report noted that roughly 90 percent or 18.6 Bcf per day of estimated 2022 certified gas volumes had been announced last year, highlighting the significant increase in producer interest in RSG over the past year. This year, Gutentag predicted, he expects expanded midstream certification along with more development surrounding the marketing of RSG.
Click here to read the full article.

June Brown, who memorably played the role of Dot Cotton in long-running BBC soap EastEnders, died on Sunday. She was 95.

Browns family said she died very peacefully at her home. A cause of death was not provided.

An EastEnders spokesperson said: There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humor will never be forgotten. June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2884 episodes, Junes remarkable performances created some of EastEnders finest moments.

Brown joined the cast of EastEnders in 1985, when she was in her 50s. She was nominated for a best actress BAFTA for her role as Cotton in 2009. She won the lifetime achievement award at the British Soap Awards in 2005. In Feb. 2020 Brown decided to step away from EastEnders.

Browns first credited role was in The Case of the Frightened Lady (1957) and other highlights of her career include Psychomania (1971), Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971), Sitting Target (1972), The 14 (1973), Murder by Decree (1979), Nijinsky (1980) The Prince and the Pauper (1976), Misunderstood (1984), The Mambo Kings (1992) and Bean (1997). She also had a long television career and was active in theater.

In 2008, Brown was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) and Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2022, both for services to drama and to charity.

We are deeply saddened to announce our beloved mother, June, passed away very peacefully at her home in Surrey on Sunday evening, with her family by her side. We would kindly ask that our privacy is respected at this very difficult time, Browns family said in a statement.

U.K. Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries tweeted: There was nobody quite like June Brown. She captured the zeitgeist of British culture like no other in her many years on our screens. Today weve lost a true national treasure but my goodness what a life she has led. Rest in peace.

There was nobody quite like June Brown. She captured the zeitgeist of British culture like no other in her many years on our screens. Today weve lost a true national treasure but my goodness what a life she has led. Rest in peace. https://t.co/2ivYG6rk1N  Nadine Dorries (@NadineDorries) April 4, 2022

BBC director general Tim Davie said: June Brown was a brilliantly talented actor who was loved by millions. Her performances as the incomparable Dot Cotton delivered some of the most memorable moments in soap history. June was hugely loved by the cast and crew and she will always hold a special place in the publics affections. Our thoughts are with her family and many friends.

Actor and writer Stephen Fry tweeted: June Brown, amongst all her other wonderful human qualities and achievements, will be remembered as a tireless and fearless LGBT ally  especially during the darkest days of HIV/AIDS and Section 28 it was a privilege to know her

June Brown, amongst all her other wonderful human qualities and achievements, will be remembered as a tireless and fearless LGBT ally  especially during the darkest days of HIV/AIDS and Section 28 it was a privilege to know her  Stephen Fry (@stephenfry) April 4, 2022

Media personality Piers Morgan described Brown as a wonderfully talented actress whose long-time portrayal of irascible fag-puffing Dot Cotton in EastEnders was one of the all-time great performances in British Television.

RIP June Brown, 95.

A wonderfully talented actress whose long-time portrayal of irascible fag-puffing Dot Cotton in EastEnders was one of the all-time great performances in British Television.

June was such a funny, feisty, fabulous lady off screen too. Very sad news. pic.twitter.com/qhg2qqUdcd  Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) April 4, 2022

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
The Jasper City Council's regular monthly meeting on Monday, March 14 had a full house of residents present, and most were there to show their opposition to the City Councils plan to construct a broadband internet service that would be owned by the city.

Early in the meeting during public comments, five people rose to voice opposition to the bid from Kramer Service Group that was accepted at the last regularly scheduled council meeting.

There was an agenda item towards the end of the meeting was a vote to sign the contract and to begin the construction phase of the project.

Public comments were directed at Mayor Randy Sayers and two councilmen, Michael Daniel and David Shultz. The most adamant comments came from Debbie Foster, the sales director of KJAS radio.

Last Friday, Foster was at a meeting at the Jasper Sam Rayburn Chamber of Commerce office when she happened to hear and walk in on a meeting with the mayor and the two councilmen. According to a police report filed by Jasper police officer Mike Peters, when Foster came into the Chamber conference room Sayers began to use all manner of profanity and went nose to nose with Foster.

Foster left the conference room and went into another office in the building. Sayers did apologize to Foster for his outburst, but was written up on an assault (offensive touch) against the elderly, due to Fosters age of 67.

When the broadband item came up on the agenda, Councilman Anderson Land, Jr. made a motion to postpone action on the signing of the contract with Kramer Service Group indefinitely. The motion was seconded by Councilman DeMarcus Holmes.

I am in favor of the broadband project, but that there were to many unanswered questions that she and citizens have on the issue." Councilwoman Laura Golden said. She also asked to table the issue. Three votes to postpone won, and the issue for the time being has been set aside.

On the issue of the assault charge against Sayers, Foster has filed a criminal charge against the mayor.

There were calls from those assembled in the Council Chamber for Sayers to step down. At one point in the public comments, Jay Sharp told the Council, You need to listen to the people!

Not to you, Sayers replied.

Later in the week, Rev. Rodney Norsworthy began an effort to recall Sayers. The reverend said that Sayers' conduct is inappropriate unlawful conduct, and that is the basis for beginning the recall effort.

Sayers is in his second stint as the Jasper's mayor. He was a city councilman from 2007 to 2015 before he was first elected mayor. He served as mayor from 2015 to 2019, and was reelected to the position in 2021. He will be up for reelection in 2023.
From an elementary school teacher, to overseeing all 16 elementary campuses in Beaumont ISD, Assistant Superintendent for Elementary Administration Anita Frank is committed to serving students.

She's homegrown -- a 1994 BISD Central High School graduate herself -- and she's doing what she believes she was meant to do.

The Beaumont Enterprise spoke with Frank to learn more about just want she does:

Q: You're the Assistant Superintendent for Elementary Administration. What was the journey to get you to this point?

A: My journey has been full of joy. I am a product of the Beaumont community and a proud graduate of BISD -- I always knew that I wanted to work in my community and make a difference.

I started my teaching career as a kindergarten teacher at Martin Elementary. I was the type of teacher that wore an outfit that matched my lessons and tried things even when I was told they probably wouldn't work. I loved being a part of the Martin Elementary team. At Martin, I was surrounded by seasoned teachers that loved students and made every effort to meet their needs -- physical, mental and academic. These seasoned teachers also took pride in mentoring and training new teachers. I received the best support from my Martin team. My principal was also supportive and challenged me to learn and grow. It was because of his belief in me that I went back to school to pursue my master's in educational administration.

Before moving into an administrative role, I taught for nine years at Martin and was a member of the team that helped Martin become a (Texas Education Agency) Acceptable Campus. I left Martin to become the curriculum coordinator at Homer Drive Elementary. Again, I became a member of a hard-working team with a fabulous leader that helped me grow. This experience only lasted a year, but I learned so much. I left Homer Drive to become the assistant principal at Fletcher Elementary. This part of my journey solidified my desire to become a principal and, when the opportunity presented itself for me to step into the role, I embraced it with open arms.

I (was) the principal at Fletcher Elementary for four-and-a-half years. During this time, I was able to work with all stakeholders to create a climate and culture of high expectations that resulted in high student performance. During my fifth year at Fletcher, I was reassigned to Pietzsch-MacArthur Elementary. The Pietzsch-MacArthur community welcomed me with open arms and during my brief stay (there), the campus achieved a TEA Met Standard rating.

My love for elementary schools helped me decide to apply for the assistant superintendent for elementary administration job, and I have enjoyed supporting all 16 elementary campus in BISD for the last five years.

Q: We can look at a title and kind of assume what it means, but what do you actually do? What does a day in your life look like?

A: I work closely with the superintendent to ensure that district initiatives are implemented and executed. I also supervise the department of School Administration, which includes Student Services, Testing and Accountability and Instructional Materials. Each of these departments supports all elementary and secondary campus administrators in building successful schools that are inviting and effective places for our students to learn. Additionally, I support the teaching staff and administrators at our elementary schools and pre-k centers. It is my job to ensure that elementary campuses have the necessary resources they need to provide the best education possible that will help our elementary students reach their full potential.

Q: Are you originally from Beaumont? What made you want to make your career here?

A: Yes, I am a native of Beaumont. I grew up in the north end and attended French Elementary, James Bowie Middle School and Central High School. I always knew that I wanted to work in my community and make a difference.

Q: What is your favorite aspect of your job?

A: Visiting campuses and seeing our teachers teach and students learn.

Q: What are the toughest challenges of your job?

A: The toughest challenges I face center around changing the mindset of students, staff and parents. It is easy to see the challenges in a situation, but it takes courage to always look for possibilities.

Q: What is your personal philosophy for education?

A: My personal philosophy for education begins with acknowledging that I don't wake up every morning and report to a job. Instead, I am stepping into my purpose. My purpose is to make a difference, one child at a time. It is my belief that every child can reach their full potential when they are given positive experiences and teachers set high expectations. Knowing that every child is a story yet to be told,' I believe that the experience that we provide our students can positively change their live trajectory. Our students will become what we think they can and will be.

Q: What do you hope for the future of Beaumont ISD?

A: The definition of hope is to desire with expectation of obtainment or fulfillment. My hope for Beaumont ISD is simple: that the hard work of our teachers, staff and students (will) be manifested in the overall growth of our students.

Know someone interesting we should write a story about? Loading

If you want to nominate someone for our weekly 7 questions with feature, send their name and why youd like to see them profiled to news@beaumontenterprise.com.

olivia.malick@hearst.com

twitter.com/OliviaMalick
Sacramento police believe multiple shooters were involved in a mass shooting early Sunday in downtown Sacramento that killed six adults and left 12 other people injured.

Sacramento police Chief Kathy Lester said Sunday afternoon that the shootings broke out after a large fight and killed three men and three women.

Nearby buildings were hit by gunfire and a stolen handgun was recovered at the scene, Lester said.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom called the shooting "yet another horrendous act of gun violence" and said his administration was working with local and state law enforcement "as we monitor the situation."

What we do know at this point is that another mass casualty shooting has occurred, leaving families with lost loved ones, multiple individuals injured and a community in grief," he said. "The scourge of gun violence continues to be a crisis in our country, and we must resolve to bring an end to this carnage."

Gunfire breaks out after 2 a.m. More than 70 shots heard on video. What else we know.

Lester said police were patrolling the area at about 2 a.m. when they heard gunfire. When they arrived at the scene, they found a large crowd gathered on the street.

"Officers began lifesaving measures to multiple victims on scene," police said. "Despite these efforts, six victims were pronounced deceased at the scene."

Another 12 people had varying degrees of injuries, police said in an update after earlier saying 10 people were hurt. No information was given on their conditions.

Four of the shooting victims were taken to UC Davis Medical Center and one to Sutter hospital, KCRA 3 has confirmed.

Authorities are asking for the public's help in identifying who is responsible. Beyond saying that a stolen gun was recovered and multiple shooters were involved, Lester did not give specifics on the type of guns used and details about possible suspects.

Forty evidence markers could be seen on the street on Sunday and investigators seemed to be focused on an area outside of the Sharif Fine Jewelry store.

In video shared with KCRA 3, more than 70 gunshots could be heard as people ran to safety.

Police have since received multiple videos as part of their investigation. A police camera at 10th Street and K Street also captured video.

Witnesses describe the Sacramento shooting. Family members wait for news on their loved ones.

Danni Chisick, a guest on the fourth floor of the Citizen Hotel, said she awoke to the sounds of gunfire.

"Eventually the shots stopped and then we realized that this was really, really bad. It wasn't just a little shooting," she said.

When the gunfire stopped, she and her partner saw a woman.

"She was running down the street right in front of the Citizen Hotel. And she kind of fell back and over, and her friends were kind of crowded around her and it looked like she was shot in the stomach area," Chisick said. "And they started to put pressure on the wound."

Police had to use batons and their bicycles to push a line back out of the way of the crime scene, she said.



Berry Accius, a community activist, said he came to the scene shortly after the shooting happened.

The first thing I saw was like victims. I saw a young girl with a whole bunch of blood in her body, a girl taking off glass from her, a young girl screaming saying, They killed my sister. A mother running up, Wheres my son, has my son been shot? he said.

Accius called the shooting mind-boggling and "tragic."

Its something that you never want to wake up to, Accius said.



Other family members of possible victims were gathering out at the scene Sunday morning and many mentioned London, a nightclub at 1009 10th Street, as being connected to the shooting location. But the nightclub said the shooting didn't happen inside or outside the club.



Dezaray Johnson told KCRA 3 she was shooting pool with her cousin last night "and now he's gone."

Pamela Harris was hoping for information about her 38-year-old son, Sergio, and on Sunday morning was frustrated that police had not shared details.

"I just think its a damn shame that the Sacramento Police Department hasnt confirmed anything to any of the families," she said. "Im not standing out here to be nosy. I want some answers."

She later got confirmation that her son, a father of three, had been killed.

"My son was a very vivacious young man," Harris said. "For this to happen is crazy. I dont know what to do. I dont even feel like this is real. I feel like this is a dream."

Another person who died was DeVazia Turner, KCRA 3 has confirmed from family.

Sacramento police said they would open City Hall as an information center for families.

Meanwhile, pop performers Aly & AJ said their bus was caught in the crossfire of the shooting but they were OK. The duo had performed at the Crest Theatre nearby on Saturday.

Public officials respond to the shooting.

Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg tweeted that "words can't express my shock & sadness this morning" and called gun violence "the scourge of our city, state and nation."

He spoke alongside other city leaders later Sunday morning and said that "this morning our city has a broken heart."

"This is a senseless and unacceptable tragedy and I emphasize the word unacceptable," he said. "Thoughts and prayers of course are appropriate for the victims and their families and the people who are fighting for their lives in the hospital. But thoughts and prayers are not nearly enough. We must do more, as a city, as a state and as a nation. This senseless epidemic of gun violence must be addressed."

He called gun violence "a sickness."

City Council member Katie Valenzuela, who represents the area where the shooting happened, talked about getting a call "that no elected official wants to get." She said she was heartbroken and outraged.

"Our community deserves better than this," she said. "I know this is a national epidemic. This is not unique to Sacramento but we can stop it here. We can stop it here. I believe that we have the tools to do this.  Enough is enough. I will travel anywhere I need to travel and I will talk to whoever I need to talk to to get these guns off these streets and give our youth what we need so they can be successful and they dont get shot down on K Street when theyre out trying to have a good time. See more of her reaction in the video below.

"Gun violence is truly a crisis in our community and has increased not only here in Sacramento but across the nation, Lester said.

Accius, the neighborhood activist, appeared at a press conference with local officials Sunday afternoon and responded to a question about what is needed in the community after the shooting.

"In this moment, in this time, theres nothing that could have been done to stop what was going to end up happening," he said. "This was going to end up happening, whether there was community leaders there or even police officers in the site because some of these things are happening are isolated incidents in isolated situations where certain people have issues and unfortunately this was a cowardly act where an issue hurt innocent bystanders."

Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert said there had been "an extraordinary response by law enforcement." She said she wanted people to know that "if and when an arrest is made, we're going to make sure that we hold those individuals fully accountable for these horrific crimes."

Click here for more reaction from elected leaders and other officials and organizations.

--The Associated Press contributed to this report.


Harmony Public Schools is one step closer to adding a new Beaumont campus.

At a city council meeting late last month, members voted unanimously to approved the charter operator's request for a specific use permit to build a new middle and high school in the Colonnade Shopping Center.

The vote came after a joint public hearing March 21 where the city planning commission recommended 9-0 to approve the request on five conditions, according to interim City Manager Chris Boone.

RELATED: Harmony Schools looking to expand Beaumont presence

The five conditions are:

Provide calculations that show no negative impact to surrounding area and no increased water runoff.

Provide a left turn bay median cut for eastbound traffic on Phelan Boulevard.

Provide a traffic analysis showing no significant negative impact on the surrounding area.

Provide landscaping that meets city ordinance requirements.

Provide lighting designed to minimize the impact on surrounding residential properties.

The facility is expected to be 100,000 square feet and house up to 750 students and 100 staff members.

The new campus would join Harmony's current location, which houses students in kindergarten through 12th grade, located at 4055 Calder Ave. in Beaumont.

RELATED: Beaumont music store gets new home after nearly seven decades

Ward IV Councilmember Charles Durio at the March 29 meeting said that the decision to approve the request was an informed decision.

"To the citizens, in case they weren't informed, when they have a planning and zoning commission meeting, the council is there also," he said. "So, we get to speak to the owner, neighbors, whoever wants to come, and we get to talk to all and hear their side of it. We don't just come here and get it and approve it."

Boone said Harmony did not provide a timeline on when the school is expected to be completed. However, he noted that the specific use permit has to be acted upon within two years, otherwise the partner would have to resubmit its application and restart the process.

The school would be located at 6490 Phelan Blvd. in Beaumont, currently the home of Faith Christian Center Church.

olivia.malick@hearst.com

twitter.com/OliviaMalick
VIJAYAWADA: Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on Monday inaugurated 13 new districts, doubling their number to 26 in the state as part of plan to decentralise administration for better governance, transparent administration and effective functioning of delivery mechanisms.

He formally announced from his camp office in Tadepalli birth of the new districts  Parvathipuram, Alluri Sitaramaraju, Anakapalli, Kakinada, Konaseema, Eluru, NTR, Palnadu, Bapatla, Nandyala, Sri Satya Sai, Annamayya and Tirupati.

Speaking on the occasion, the CM said the new integrated administrative office complexes will make administration available in every district under one roof. People will thus not have to knock doors of one office after another. He reiterated: Decentralisation of governance from village to capital cities is our policy. I am hopeful that the formation of new districts will provide better governance and transparent administration, improve business and employment opportunities, and ensure the maintenance of law and order. I am launching the decentralisation seeking Gods grace and peoples support.

The Chief Minister pointed out that after restructuring of districts, average population of a district has come down to 19.7 lakh from 38.15 lakh. Except for two tribal districts, all districts, with population ranging between 18 lakh to 23 lakh, have six to eight assembly segments each.

Jagan Mohan Reddy said unlike collectors of British era, who just collected revenue, collectors at present have multiple talks, ranging from implementation of welfare schemes to executing development programmes. Underlining door-to-door administration being provided in the state with introduction of village and ward secretariats, he pointed out that this has brought about transparency and ruled out corruption.

The CM said localised secretariat system is helping deliver birth certificates, ration cards, caste certificates, pension cards, Arogyasri cards and other facilities at doorsteps of people within a prescribed time. Social pensions are being delivered by volunteers to beneficiaries at their doorstep at sun rise on the first day of every month, even if that day is a holiday, he declared.

The Chief Minister said as part of administrative reforms, they are giving facelift to government schools and hospitals, and setting up 16 new government medical colleges, in addition to the 11 medical colleges set up a long time ago.

Jagan Mohan Reddy went on to say that based on request from the local MLA (Chandrababu Naidu), they have set up Kuppam as a revenue division, which the former CM failed to do during 14 years of his rule.
A recent report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas shows that real house prices, which are adjusted for inflation, have steadily increased since 2012, with further acceleration in the pace of house-price appreciation beginning before the pandemic but strengthening since early 2020.

The underlying causes of the run-up differ from those during the last housing boom, preceding the 2007-09 Global Financial Crisis, economists at the Federal Reserve wrote, but there is growing concern that U.S. housing prices are "becoming unhinged from fundamentals," and showing signs of a "brewing U.S. housing bubble."

Mortgage rates are quickly increasing, reaching an average of 4.67% for a fixed 30-year loan for the week ending March 31, the highest since 2018 according to Freddie Mac. The national median listing price for a home has jumped to a record $405,000, Realtor.com found, with the typical listing price increasing almost 27% in the past two years.

RELATED: Housing prices reach record high in March

"Real house prices can diverge from market fundamentals when there is widespread belief that today's robust price increases will continue," Dallas Fed economists wrote. "If many buyers share this belief, purchases arising from a 'fear of missing out' can drive up prices and heighten expectations of strong house-price gains," although a rapid rise in home values doesn't necessarily signal a bubble, the Dallas Fed noted.

Shifts in disposable income, the cost of credit and access to it, supply disruptions and rising labor and raw construction materials costs are among the economic reasons for sustained real house-price gains, the Dallas Fed wrote.

The self-fulfilling mechanism of belief that housing prices will continue to rise resulting in more buyers purchasing at higher costs may become exponential, economists noted, potentially resulting in a progressively misaligned housing market that may lead to more cautious investors, policymaker intervention and the flow of money into housing drying up and a housing correction or even bust occurring.

The U.S. housing market has been showing signs of exuberance, or prices growing at an exponential rate exceeding what economic fundamentals would justify, for more than five consecutive quarters through the third quarter of 2021, the report found. The U.S. is not the only country experiencing that exuberance, as 11 of the 25 countries in the Dallas Fed's International House Prices Database show signs of real house-price exuberance.

The Dallas Fed noted that evidence points to "abnormal U.S. housing market behavior" for the first time since the boom of the early 2000s. Certain economic indicators including the price-to-rent ratio and the price-to-income ratio show signs that 2021 house prices appear increasingly out of step with fundamentals.

"Based on present evidence, there is no expectation that fallout from a housing correction would be comparable to the 2007-09 Global Financial Crisis in terms of magnitude or macroeconomic gravity," the economists wrote, however. "Among other things, household balance sheets appear in better shape and excessive borrowing doesn't appear to be fueling the housing market boom."

Market participants, banks, policymakers and regulators are all better equipped to assess in real-time the significance of a housing boom, the Dallas Fed further noted. That's due to the development of advanced tools for early detection and deployment of warning indicators. This means that those involved with the housing market are more able to react quickly and avoid the most severe, negative consequences of a housing correction.
Trustees with the Beaumont ISD recently heard a familiar request from a major company: Grant us tax abatement so were more inclined to locate major project in your jurisdiction. You will gain tax valuation once the incentives expire, and in the meantime, good-paying jobs will be created.

Its a valid tradeoff  as long as some key points are clarified.

District 2 Trustee Stacey Lewis Jr. spoke for many when he asked the company representatives, Im all for supporting (the proposal). But for me, being a citizen of Beaumont, how can we make sure that we have assurance that those jobs (go) to people who live (in) and are from Beaumont first? We have our plants where people will go to Beaumont and then travel to Louisiana, Nederland, Port Neches and we never receive that, but we are always the housing unit for jobs.

Its the same thing that city officials or school board trustees have said in other places in Southeast Texas: Were being asked to forego taxes for several years, but we dont receive enough of the jobs in the meantime. That doesnt seem right.

It isnt, and this company (as yet unnamed) needs to provide assurances to BISD trustees that Beaumont residents will get as many of the new jobs as possible. It may not be feasible for every one of these new positions to be filled by Beaumonters, but the number should be high. The company must put forth a strong, good-faith effort to seek Beaumont residents for these new jobs  and then actually put them to work.

BISD trustees heard a presentation recently from the local consulting firm GMJ, Inc. about the two proposed plants  Project Mercury and Project Deep Blue  and the proposals seem encouraging. The firm has made similar presentations to the other local taxing entities such as the Beaumont City Council and Jefferson County commissioners court. GMJ representatives said Beaumont is being eyed by the company for the new plants, but it is considering other locations too.

Local officials were told that the type of tax abatement deals offered here will have a big impact on where the plants are built. Former Beaumont mayor and GMJ Vice President of Strategic Alliances Becky Ames said bluntly, If we dont try to get it (with tax abatement) we wont get it.

The plants would cost $4 billion to construct  big even for our regions industrial scale  and create 1,800 construction jobs (which also should go to many Beaumont residents, by the way.)

Project Mercury, a $1.7 billion to $2.1 billion bio-gasoline plant, would be located south of Beaumont off Twin City Highway at the former DuPont Elastomers plant site. Project Deep Blue, a fertilizer manufacturing facility, would cost $2.4 billion to $2.8 billion.

But the real prizes are the 120 permanent jobs and the plants inventory, which would be fully taxed.

The average salary would range from $85,000 to $90,000, said GMJ Chief Financial Officer Megan Gallien. Its estimated that the inventory level (of the plant) annually would be about $26 million. That is inventory that would create tax revenue that would not be part of this agreement to the district.

High-paying jobs like that are certainly needed in the region. Our petrochemical base is supplying a lot of them now, but a region cant have too many paychecks like that rippling through our economy.

But again, if the Beaumont City Council and BISD are going to provide the tax abatement to make this project a reality, their city deserve a big portion of those lucrative permanent jobs. The company should understand this reasonable request, and be prepared to act on it.
The good news about Vladimir Putins attempt to conquer Ukraine by military force is that it has failed. And make that failed miserably for the Russians, and succeeded magnificently for the Ukrainians. Putins demoralized troops are bogged down in most places and flat-out retreating in some.

Given this reality, at some point Putin will probably agree to a political settlement and call his foolish venture a win. And he will get enough concessions to sell it like that to the Russian people, such as a pledge by Ukraine not to join NATO and not have any long-range missiles, which it doesnt need anyway.

For that matter, Ukraine was not going to join NATO soon or possibly ever because of Russias opposition, so thats another easy concession to make. As long as Ukraines security is guaranteed, and it will be because neither Putin nor a future Russian leader would be foolish enough to try to invade again, Ukraine does not really need to be in NATO. All it needs  and will get  is a generous supply of NATOs anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons it used so effectively to stop the Russians this time.

But getting from here to there, from war to peace, will not be easy.

The fighting will probably drag a few more weeks at least. Putin is taking way more casualties than he ever envisioned, but that doesnt bother him or any other dictator that much. He basically regards Russian soldiers  even generals, losing seven so far  as disposable items in his grand plans.

He can keep fighting for a while, content to keep bombing or shelling Ukrainian cities from a distance and causing horrendous damage. He does want to punish Ukraine for humiliating him in the worlds eyes, even if his propaganda is still pushing lies inside Russia about how well everything is going.

But thats the real problem here. Every day Russian troops remain in Ukraine  and there will be many of them  countless civilians are killed (and some Ukrainian soldiers too) and more houses and buildings are destroyed. Ukraine will not be conquered, but it will suffer inconceivable damage until the Russians finally leave. And what has already happened to the brave country is outrageous.

So both sides are locked in a deadly waiting game. Putin will lose a few more soldiers  again, dont be silly enough to think that he cares about any of them  but no Russian towns are being bombarded. Hell let the war drag on into the spring, maybe hoping to conquer the eastern part of Ukraine that he is trying to redefine as independent republics that love Mother Russia. But Ukraine is unlikely to want to give up any more territory in eastern Ukraine since Putin took the entire Crimean peninsula in 2014.

All of this is a sad prescription for more fighting and death  and thats presuming that there is some kind of reasonable settlement Putin would agree to. He probably will, but hes in no hurry and enjoys pummeling Ukraine in the meantime.

All the Ukrainians can do is keep doing what theyve done since Feb. 24  fighting heroically and inflicting much heavier losses on the invaders. It will all end at some point, but it wont end soon enough. They will need all the courage and perseverance they can muster in the coming weeks, because they will be tested.

Thomas Taschinger, TTaschinger@BeaumontEnterprise.com, is the editorial page editor of The Beaumont Enterprise. Follow him on Twitter at @PoliticalTom
Anas Abdulrahman (also known as Hipni Mareh), the head of a panel representing BRN rebels at Malaysian-brokered peace talks with Thailand, speaks during a press conference as other BRN officials sit beside him at a hotel near Kuala Lumpur, April 1, 2022.

On the surface, the latest peace talks between Thai government negotiators and representatives of the BRN rebel group seem promising for people in Thailands far south, where violence linked to a separatist insurgency has claimed more than 7,300 lives since 2004. But it is not clear if Barisan Revolusi Nasional combatants will embrace the direction of the talks.

Just last Wednesday, on the eve of the talks, a powerful roadside bomb and gunfight left two police officers dead and wounded two others in Yala province  a reminder that the end is nowhere in sight in this predominantly Malay-speaking region.

The March 31-April 1 negotiations picked up where they had left off in January, when the two sides agreed to work towards greater public consultations, reduction of violence and finding political solutions to this separatist insurgency.

Meanwhile, it has emerged that in the course of secret discussions since late last year, a working paper came out that outlined the General Principles for future talks. Both sides agreed that future discussions would be conducted under the Unitary State of Thailand in accordance with the Constitution.

The clause showed up again in a press statement issued by Thailands negotiating team to mark the end of the latest round of in-person talks.

It sounds like a breakthrough but in reality, it is a cheap and pretentious effort that has no bearing on reality on the ground, said Artef Sohko, president of The Patani, a political action group that promote rights to self-determination for Thailands Malay-speaking Deep South.

The first article of the Thai Constitution stipulates clearly that the kingdom is inseparable. For the BRN combatants  or any ordinary person on the street, for that matter  BRN negotiators embracing Thailands Constitution means an end to the quest for independence.

When reporters asked them about this after the two-day meeting in Malaysia, neither rebel nor Thai negotiators would confirm or deny that BRN, which controls virtually all of the combatants in the field, is willing to settle for something less than independence.

For the past 18 years, since the violence in this historically contested region surfaced, combatants have been told that their fight is nothing less than a moral obligation and sacred duty to liberate a historically Malay homeland from invading Siamese/Thai forces.

Fighters in the field are now learning about the move to embrace the Thai Constitution. BRN leadership has advised them to remain calm, saying the engagement with Thai negotiators is part of a diplomatic exercise, said a source with knowledge of such conversations.

Relatives and mourners carry the body of two Thai Muslim policeman who were abducted and killed by suspected militants, for burial rites at a cemetery in the southern Thai province of Narathiwat, Feb. 27, 2019. [AFP]

Artef believes the BRN military wing could splinter if combatants believe their political goal and sacred values have been compromised. Like any other splinter groups in a sub-national conflict, a splinter group in Thailands far south would want to demonstrate their capability.

Subnational groups like the Basque Homeland and Liberty (ETA) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) took years to develop a narrative acceptable to their combatants before they went to the negotiating table. Conflict resolution for southern Thailand, abnormally, is the opposite.

The recent annual Ramadan statement posted on YouTube in mid-March 2022 by Abdulkarim Khalid, a member of BRNs Information Department, expressed hope that the years holy month would be peaceful.

The Thai Army, meanwhile, says it will stand down during this years Ramadan if combatants do the same, as part of confidence-building measures. All mosques in the region will become a sanctuary ground during the last 10 days of Ramadan so combatants can meet with their families.

In the current atmosphere, a ceasefire during Ramadan is a big leap of faith.

BRN fighters have been targeted in relentless search-and-kill operations over the past two years, after the group declared a unilateral ceasefire in April 2020 so that public health officials wouldnt have to worry about getting caught in crossfire while working to contain the spread of COVID-19. Since then, at least 50 combatants have been killed by Thai security forces, who did not reciprocate the BRN goodwill gesture.

With that in mind, Artef and other activists in his circle believe the Army has a long way to go to earn the trust of the BRN.

Moreover, there is nothing to suggest that Thai security forces will not resume their search-and-kill operations after Ramadan.

At the same time, BRN leaders and negotiators dont seem to have the courage to tell their fighters that their original political objective may have been compromised.

What is needed is a new narrative to explain and justify the course of actions taken by the BRN leaders and the Thai negotiators.

They dont need to explain or convince the public and the donor community that they are moving in the right direction. But both the Thais and the BRN negotiators need to think about how to get their soldiers and fighters on board this peace process and move forward as one.

Don Pathan is a Thailand-based security analyst.
Islamic boarding school principal Herry Wirawan (center), is escorted by security officers during his original sentencing hearing in Bandung, Indonesia, Feb. 15, 2022.

An Indonesian appeals court sentenced an Islamic boarding school principal to death Monday for raping at least 13 students, granting the prosecutors appeal for a harsher punishment than a lower courts life sentence.

The Bandung High Court judges said Herry Wirawan had caused suffering to the victims and tarnished the reputation of Islamic boarding schools.

We hereby sentence the defendant to death, chief judge Herri Swantoro ruled. The defendants actions have caused trauma and suffering to the victims and their parents.

The court also ordered the seizure of Herrys assets to be used to compensate the victims, whose ages ranged from 14 to 20 at the time of the assaults, and pay for the education of their children.

On Feb. 15, a district court panel sentenced Herry to life in prison and ordered the Ministry of Women Empowerment and Child Protection to take temporary custody of nine children who were born to his victims between 2016 and 2021.

Following the High Court ruling, Herrys attorney, Ira Mambo, declined to comment, saying she and her client had not received the official court document. Herry can appeal the sentence in the Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, Mohammad Choirul Anam, a member of the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), questioned the harsher sentence.

Komnas HAM always rejects the death penalty because it is not in accordance with human rights principles, Anam told BenarNews.

Prosecutors had sought the death penalty and chemical castration for Herry, saying the harshest punishment was necessary to deter the recurrence of such crimes. But the lower court judges ruled against castration, saying it was unnecessary because they were condemning him to spend the rest of his days behind bars.

The rapes at the boarding school in Bandung came to light last year after a victims parents filed a complaint with police after learning their daughter was pregnant, authorities said.

Herry was arrested in May 2021. He admitted wrongdoing and apologized to his victims during his trial.

His case prompted calls for the Indonesian parliament to speed up passage of a bill to prevent sexual violence. Still, new complaints of alleged sexual abuse at Islamic boarding schools like Herrys in Bandung, the capital of West Java province, have surfaced since his arrest.

In January, Deputy Religious Affairs Minister Zainut Tauhid Saadi said President Joko Jokowi Widodo was concerned about cases of sexual abuse in Islamic boarding schools, traditionally known as pesantren.

Zainut called on parliament to review the law on pesantren passed in 2019 to allow tighter monitoring.

Bill under deliberation

In 2016 following outcry over a string of sexual attacks against minors, including the killing of a student on Sumatra Island, Jokowi introduced an emergency decree in lieu of law on child protection. It allowed new punishments, including chemical castration and/or the death penalty, for child-sex offenses.

In parliament, deliberations on a separate bill on sexual violence have been delayed partly because of opposition from Islamic groups in the worlds largest Muslim-majority country who argue that it promotes promiscuity. Additionally, conservative lawmakers want the bill to include prohibitions on extramarital sex and homosexual relations.

On Monday, the Republika daily reported that a committee working on the draft bill had agreed to recognize eight forms of sexual violence  physical sexual harassment, non-physical sexual harassment, forced use of contraceptives, forced sterilization, forced marriage, sexual slavery, sexual torture and online sexual harassment.

Activists have said women and girls are often blamed despite being victims of sexual violence. At least 8,800 cases of sexual violence occurred between January and November 2021, according to the Women Empowerment and Child Protection Ministry.
Islamic cleric Aman Abdurrahman is seen inside a courtroom in Jakarta, May 18, 2018.

An Indonesian militant leader on death row for his role in Islamic State-inspired terrorism acts said in a video that he opposed terror attacks linked to his group in 2016-2018, and chided followers for using women and children in some of them.

In a video posted on YouTube on March 31, Aman Abdurrahman, the chief ideologue for the Jamaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD) militant group, claimed his followers had disobeyed him by launching the attacks, and complained that he had to take the blame for their actions.

When Muslims live in an unbelieving nation, practice patience, stay true to monotheism and refrain from disturbing others, Aman, 50, said in the video.

Dont apply [Quranic] verses on war, he added.

He also condemned the involvement of women in jihad, or holy war, saying it was not an Islamic tenet.

Jihad for women is performing the Hajj properly, he said, referring to the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia.

In 2018, a Jakarta court sentenced Aman to death after finding him guilty of ordering militants to launch several terror attacks since 2016.

Prosecutors said the cleric masterminded deadly terror attacks from behind bars, while he was serving time for an earlier conviction.

On Jan. 14, 2016, militants launched gun and bomb attacks near a shopping center and a coffee shop in Central Jakarta. The attacks, the first terror strike claimed by Islamic State (IS) in Southeast Asia, killed eight people including four militants.

Prosecutors said Aman had also inspired militants in a suicide attack that killed three police officers at a bus station in Jakarta in 2017, as well as a Molotov cocktail blast that killed a two-year-old and injured three other children at a church in East Kalimantan province in November 2016.

Death row inmate Aman Abdurrahman is seen condemning terror attacks in a video screengrab taken from a YouTube channel.

In the video, Aman complained that that he had to suffer the consequences of his followers refusal to listen to him.

Who are you following? The Prophet or your lust? You follow your lust as if lives belonged to you, not to Allah, he said.

From the beginning I have taught you. What part [of my teachings] did you not understand? he said. You listened to other people and now Im left with all the bad things.

In January 2017, the U.S. government designated Aman a global terrorist, alleging he had founded JAD, composed of two dozen pro-IS groups. American officials have also described him as the de facto leader of IS supporters in Indonesia.

JAD was also involved in suicide bombings in 2018 in Surabaya, Indonesias second largest city, authorities said, but Aman has not been charged in those attacks. These involved three families, including girls aged 12 and nine, who blew themselves up, officials said.

Twenty-seven people died, including 13 suspects.

No question that Aman Abdurrahman is Indonesias most important extremist ideologue, whose writings and sermons, disseminated online and over social media, influenced thousands, Sidney Jones, then the director of the Jakarta-based Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC), told BenarNews in 2018.

Video can indirectly have an effect

Hendro Fernando, 38, a former militant convict who posted the video on his YouTube channel, said it was filmed by a friend while Aman was being treated for COVID-19 at a hospital in Cilacap, near the island prison of Nusakambangan where Aman is incarcerated.

Hendro said he believed Amans statement was genuine and not coerced.

Many people used his name even though the orders didnt come from him, causing harm to Aman who didnt know anything, said Hendro, who served time in prison for involvement with the Eastern Indonesia Mujahideen, or MIT, a group linked to IS.

Hendro said the video had been the subject of discussions among Amans followers, some of whom questioned his motive.

Dyah Ayu Kartika, a researcher at IPAC, said Amans video message might influence some of his followers but others might have their own justifications for engaging in terrorism.

And it should also be remembered that there are many ways women can get involved in terrorism, not just direct involvement in jihad, but also in other important roles, Dyah told BenarNews.

Ardi Putra Prasetya, an analyst with the directorate of deradicalization at the National Counter-Terrorism Agency (BNPT) expressed the hope that Aman distancing himself from the attacks could stem terrorist acts.

It can indirectly have an effect as factions within the JAD that are already divided can become even smaller, he told BenarNews.

But there could be members who disagree with Aman or hate him and decide to leave the group and carry out [attacks] by themselves, Ardi said.

Indonesia, the most populous Muslim-majority nation, suffered its worst terror attack in 2002 when militants detonated bombs on the island of Bali, killing 202 people.
A Filipino Muslim washes his feet before entering a mosque in the southern Philippine city of Cotabato to observe the first full day of Ramadan, April 3, 2022.

Two suspected pro-Islamic State militants were killed while five others and four soldiers were injured in a clash in the southern Philippines over the weekend, as local Muslims prepared for the holy month of Ramadan, the military said Monday.

The militants, members of the IS-linked Abu Sayyaf Group, attacked and injured the soldiers who were on patrol in Sumisip, a town in the island province of Basilan, on Saturday morning, military officials said.

The violent extremists withdrew shortly after the engagement, but responding government forces caught up with them while they were fleeing which led to another armed confrontation, Maj. Andrew Linao, spokesman for the militarys Western Mindanao Command, told reporters.

The militants were led by sub-leader Pasil Bayali, an Abu Sayyaf militant known for harassing police and military forces on Basilan, Linao said.

Brig. Gen. Domingo Gobway, commander of the Joint Task Force Basilan, said the four injured soldiers were moved from the area and received medical attention.

They are all in stable condition now, he said, adding two enemy fighters were killed and five others wounded.

Sunday marked the first fasting day of Ramadan, which commemorates the revelation of the Quran to Prophet Muhammad, the founder of Islam. Fasting during the holy month is one of the religions five pillars.

The nations Muslims, who live mostly in the south, began their annual month-long fasting, which requires them to refrain from eating and drinking, smoking and sex during daylight hours and to aim for general restraint in thought, word and deed. Children, the elderly, those who are sick, women who are pregnant, nursing or menstruating and people traveling are exempted.

Ahod Ebrahim, the head of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front who also serves as interim chief minister of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, greeted his fellow Muslims on Sunday and urged them to set aside their differences about politics ahead of the May 9 general election.

Lets continue to strengthen our love for each other, especially now there is still risk of acquiring COVID-19 virus. We must observe health protocols in our activities within Ramadan, he said.

Abu Sayyaf

The Abu Sayyaf, or Bearers of the Sword, a militant group based in the southern Philippines and linked to the Islamic State, is blamed for the countrys worst terrorist attacks, including bombings of military camps and civilian targets. Founded by an Afghan-trained militant in the 1990s, the group later began raising funds through kidnappings for ransom.

The group is divided into several factions  one is led by Hatib Hajan Sawadjaan and is based on another southern island. While Sawadjaan is considered the top Islamic State militant in the country and has been blamed for deadly bombings on Jolo Island in 2019 and 2020, he has not been heard from since July 2020 and is believed to have been killed in a shootout with government troops.

Last week, government security forces killed Radzmil Jannatul (also known as Khubayb), a suspected top-ranking Abu Sayyaf Group leader who succeeded Basilan group leader Furuji Indama after his death in late 2020.

After the latest clash, regional military commander Lt. Gen. Alfredo Rosario Jr. vowed to intensify combat and non-combat operations to curb the threat of terrorism in Mindanao.

The remaining members of the terror group who refuse to return to the fold of the law are doing desperate moves to gain popular support after theyve lost it due to the neutralization of their top leader, Rosario said.
[Photo courtesy Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples Republic of China]

[Photo courtesy Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples Republic of China]

Filipino Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. (left) sits across from Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi during a meeting in the district of Tunxi in Anhui province, China, April 3, 2022.

The top diplomats of the Philippines and China met over the weekend in a Chinese district and exchanged views on the South China Sea, Beijing said, amid fresh accusations from Manila over alleged Chinese aggression in the disputed waterway.

Filipino Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. and Chinese counterpart Wang Yi held talks on Sunday in Tunxi, Anhui province, days after Manila and Washington launched one of the their biggest joint military exercises in years that observers described as a show of force.

On April 3, 2022, State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi held talks with visiting Philippine Foreign Minister Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, Anhui province, said a statement on the meeting posted on the Chinese foreign ministrys website.

The two sides believe that maritime issues should be put in a proper place in bilateral relations, the statement added, without giving details.

Also without naming any nations or parties, Wang said Manila and Beijing should eliminate interference, and calmly and properly manage differences, so as to prevent the overall China-Philippines relations from being affected.

Wang added that China was willing to fast track key infrastructure projects in the Philippines and continue providing COVID-19 vaccine assistance, the Chinese foreign ministry statement said.

Locsins office did not immediately return calls for comment on the meeting.

The talks came amid this years joint Balikatan military exercises between the Philippines and the United States that involve about 9,000 troops from both sides. The exercises in the Philippines will go till April 8.

Wang and Locsins meeting comes after the Philippines in late March lodged a new diplomatic protest against China alleging that a Chinese coast guard ship maneuvered dangerously close to a Filipino vessel in the contested Scarborough Shoal earlier last month.

Chinas foreign ministry, meanwhile, insisted that it was within its rights when its ship allegedly engaged in what the Philippine Coast Guard described as close distance maneuvering in South China Sea waters.

Chinas envoy to Manila, Huang Xilian, did not say whether the issue of the Chinese coast guard ship was discussed at Sundays talks, but noted that the meeting of the two nations top diplomats produced fruitful results.

The talks included Chinas reaffirmation of its priority neighborhood diplomacy with the Philippines, the maintenance of amicable policies for continued and stable bilateral relations, and the peaceful and proper resolution of differences, Huang said.

China also reiterated its readiness to streamline key infrastructure projects construction with the Philippines.
China embraces digital future with growing computing power

Xinhua) 10:25, April 04, 2022

BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- A recent industry report has highlighted China's impressive advances in computing power, ranking the country as one of the best among major economies in the field.

The report, jointly released by the Tsinghua University, the International Data Corporation and Chinese IT firm Inspur Information, comprehensively assesses the computing power, efficiency, application and infrastructure of 15 major economies.

Noting that computing power has become the driving force in promoting the digital economy, the report said increasing investment in this sector will have an amplified and long-term effect on economic growth.

In the context of the booming cloud computing, artificial intelligence, 5G, among other emerging technologies, analysts believe that computing power has become an important infrastructure that will shape China's future technological landscape.

OPTIMIZED INFRASTRUCTURE

According to a recent policy announcement, China has started work on a mega project to build an integrated national big data system to improve overall computing power and resource efficiency.

The project involves establishing eight national computing hubs in the country's economic powerhouses and less developed yet resource-rich regions, plus 10 national data center clusters, according to the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).

The move comes amid a surge of demand for computing capacity as the country rides the digitalization wave, but shortages of energy and land resources have limited the expansion of data centers in the more developed regions.

"Computing power has already become an important infrastructure for the national economic development," the NDRC stated on its website, estimating China's demand for computing power to surge by over 20 percent annually in upcoming years.

By creating a national computing power network, the project will support the less developed regions with abundant renewable energy resources to store and process data transmitted from the economically advanced areas to address the soaring demand and the regional capacity imbalance.

"Innovation activities of enterprises need to be backed by computing power," said Peng Zhen, CEO of Inspur Information, adding that the future featuring massive data and high efficiency calls for a smarter computing power framework to support more enterprises.

EMPOWERED FUTURE

"How to improve computing power to utilize the massive data and benefit economic development is a question that we have to address," said Li Donghong, a researcher at Tsinghua University.

Statistics have shown that the scale of China's cloud computing market, which offers a glimpse of the country's overall computing power, exceeded 300 billion yuan (about 47.24 billion U.S. dollars) in 2021, according to the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT).

"In the next few years, China's cloud computing market is expected to maintain an average annual growth rate of 30 to 40 percent, with the market size reaching 1 trillion yuan by 2025," said He Baohong, a researcher with the CAICT.

Looking ahead, analysts expect the cloud computing industry to grasp the development opportunities brought by the country's accelerated digitalization drive.

According to a five-year plan released earlier this year, China aims to raise the proportion of the added value of core digital economy industries in its GDP to 10 percent in 2025, up from 7.8 percent in 2020.

By 2025, China will see the digital transformation of industries reach a new level, digital public services will become more inclusive, and the digital economy governance system will improve noticeably, per the plan.

China will strengthen its support of 6G research and development, enhance innovation in strategic fields such as integrated circuits and artificial intelligence, and facilitate the development of new business modes, according to the plan.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
Hyderabad: Chief Minister Chandrashekar Rao on Monday initiated steps to make the Chalo Delhi on April 11 a grand success. This will be the TRS's first protest rally in Delhi after coming to power in the state in 2014, and is aimed at stepping up pressure on the Centre to procure paddy from Telangana during the rabi season.

The CM, who landed in Delhi on Sunday evening, held a meeting with TRS MPs on Monday to discuss details of the rally. However, he did not make clear whether he would take part in the dharna in Delhi on April 11.

Official sources said the CM discussed with the MPs the plans to invite leaders of regional parties besides leaders of farmers unions like Rakesh Tikait of Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) and Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), who spearheaded the agitation in Delhi against the Centre's farm laws.

KCR discussed the arrangements for nearly 10,000 TRS leaders from mandal-level to state-level to sit on dharna in Delhi, including state ministers, TRS MLAs, MLCs, MPs, chairpersons of municipalities, zilla parishads, mandal parishads, mayors of municipal corporations, chairpersons of PACS (primary agriculture credit societies) and Rythu Bandhu Samithi leaders from mandal to state-level.

The Chief Minister's Office (CMO) has sought a meeting with Prime Minister Modi and Union food minister Piyush Goyal for TRS representatives to discuss the issue of paddy procurement. The PMO is yet to confirm the appointment.

The CM is likely to wait in Delhi for one more day for PM's appointment. If there is no response from PMO, he would return to Hyderabad either on Tuesday night or Wednesday morning. KCR and his wife Shobha underwent medical checkups in Delhi on Monday.

The CM would visit Delhi again between April 7 and 9 to review arrangements for the Chalo Delhi, or April 11.

TRS sources feel the chances of CM getting PM's appointment on Tuesday are remote as Modi had already given an appointment to Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Jaganmohan Reddy around 4.30 pm on Tuesday.
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.
Gina Divola, 32, of Pittsfield, said that she left her job as a nursing assistant because she felt a COVID-19 vaccination requirement infringed on her medical and personal freedom. Divola, who now runs a business called Maga Cleaning Services, is running as a Republican for the seat held by state Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier, D-Pittsfield.
You have permission to edit this article.

Edit Close
Decades ago, during the sit-ins at segregated lunch counters, it occurred to me that it would be the Black community that saved democracy whenever it needed saving. Over the decades, a people granted fewer rights and privileges of democracy always defended democracy. It seemed ironic but it wasnt. Black Americans lived next door to democracy but never in its midst. They understood better and valued more what they were being denied than whites understood what they were being handed.

This country divided years ago. In 1877, Rutherford B. Hayes traded decency and fairness for the presidency, and as a result, the Black community lost its rights  again. This country divided into a people who enjoyed democracy and its benefits, and a people prevented from that enjoyment.

Langston Hughes wrote, America never was America to me. And yet he urged, Let America Be America Again.

Black people never stopped fighting for the promise. Some white people never stopped fighting to withhold that promise. In that way, the Black community continually revealed the full promise of democracy; those few whites continually revealed the American fault line. That is what was on display for three days last month.

I do not know who is reading this or where any reader stands on white privilege or Black Lives Matter; on the underpinnings of democracy, truth, equal justice and the right to vote; the need to defend everyones rights equally or lose them universally; the necessity to observe the simple decencies that do as much as any law to keep democracy working.

Wherever we stand, we all saw Sens. Lindsey Graham, Josh Hawley, Tom Cotton and Ted Cruz being rude, dishonest, hypocritical and bullying. For whatever reason they chose to do it, it was unacceptable behavior. On the floor of our Senate, it was sacrilege. It was as destructive and reprehensible as Jan. 6, 2021.

Ketanji Brown Jackson was highly praised for being cool under fire, for not rising to the bait, for offering dignified response. Brava! But how about withholding the dignity of any response? What if questions decently and respectfully posed were fully and cheerfully answered, and the others were ignored, allowing silence to be eloquent. Or what if 

The right answers to the wrong questions

Asked her religion? Answer: Senator, the question posed is unconstitutional. According to Article Six: No religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States. So, Senator, my question is, do you believe the Constitution applies to all citizens including Black females?

Asked why she sentenced X too leniently although within the guidelines? Answer: That question is more properly posed to you and your colleagues, since it is Congress that sets the guidelines. If now you consider the guidelines too lenient, only Congress can make them more stringent. If Congress does, the judges will comply, as I did in the cases you cite.

Asked how she feels about X? Answer: Ask me first if I am comfortable with your intrusion into my constitutionally protected right to privacy  of which feelings are the most protected.

Asked a question but then repeatedly interrupted? Answer: Fold hands and sit quietly, as no response was necessary to complete this particular clown act designed to raise money by tickling the base.

This wasnt deliberation, it was politics. It was not a hearing; it was an outrage. It was not acceptable behavior. It was more than embarrassing, it was gut-wrenching. And, regardless of political affiliation, all of us would agree if sitting in her seat.

And where were the Democrats? Sen. Dick Durbin complained afterward that Republican behavior was out of order, but where was his gavel during the proceedings? As chairman of the Judiciary Committee, stop them from being out of order; maintain the dignity of our legislative body. There are no rules without adherence, no law without consequences. Were the Democrats being as political as the Republicans? Did they think their constituents would be outraged by Republican behavior and vote Democratic? Both sides should lay aside politics and do the jobs to which they were elected or never be reelected. If the Republicans appear to be the enemy of the good, then the Democrats appear to be their enablers.

Carole Owens: Don't let the absurd strategy of democracy's enemies prevail It is easy to get confused because it is so hard to take seriously. It is easy to dismiss because no one piece seems to make sense. No specifi

Earlier this year, I wrote that this is a new world and a new civil war. It is a campaign of lies and absurdities designed to appeal to the emotions. You cannot fight absurdities with logic. You cannot fight lunacy with policy. Lunacy is theater. It is defeated by better theater.

No one could have guessed better theater would be the televised battle for Ukraine. Now, however, the world has a front row seat to what happens if and when bullies demand your freedom and security. No, not just the bombs  the suppression of truth, the perversion of a free press, the lies that attempt to justify the abuse, the absurdities meant to justify the egregious.

The world united against Putin. Why cant our country unite against those who demonstrate their belief that democracy, its rights and privileges, dignified response to fellow human beings and fairness are reserved for them, and do not belong to the Black woman sitting in the well?
Architects are all about space and how the space makes one feel as you walk through it, so its this reactionary piece of functional art.

ARCH 6220 is a studio course that centers around sustainability, and the common thread for students is the challenge of designing something viable that fits in a given space.

Hansford said students also have to consider integrated design aspects that they will encounter in real-world settings such as building and accessibility codes, structure and mechanical systems.

Grace truly embraced the project, Hansford said. She began her design at the urban scale and worked to resolve the idea of creating better spaces and buildings for North Campus. She always saw her building being a gateway to the Technology Village that North Campus could become. Her urban plan truly drove her building design.

As she worked on her original concept, you could see that she was switching back and forth from the urban scale to the building scale and adjusting her design at both scales, all the while addressing issues of sustainability.

Hansford said Links work during the course showed her potential in the field going forward.

Grace has a great future ahead of her and she will definitely have an impact on her community as she continues into the profession, Hansford said. She is a self-starter who is driven to do the highest quality of work within her means.
BOISE - Due to a growing office deficit, Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin might have to work for free the rest of the budget year, Boise State Public Radio reported Friday.

Even if McGeachin halts all vendor payments, her office might run an end-of-year deficit exceeding $22,000, Chief Deputy Controller Joshua Whitworth said in a March 22 letter obtained by James Dawson of Boise State Public Radio.

Previously, the shortfall was projected at about $15,000  a budget gap that prompted former chief of staff Jordan Watters to resign.

McGeachin, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment, is owed $18,642 in salary and benefits for the remainder of the budget year, which ends June 30.

The shortfall in McGeachins $188,700-a-year budget is the result of a public records dispute. McGeachin refused to fully release comments to her education task force, requested by Idaho Education News and other media outlets. The Idaho Press Club sued McGeachin and won, and McGeachin was ordered to pay the Press Clubs legal fees of close to $29,000.

McGeachin has blamed the media for her budget shortfall, saying news organizations could have paid fees of $500 or more for redacted comments.

Its the press that actually cost taxpayer dollars, McGeachin said last month.
Government has reached an agreement with Maputo that will see South Africa getting a supply of gas from Mozambique. This is according to Deputy President David Mabuza who said this while responding to questions at a sitting of the National Assembly late last week.

New generation capacity

Discussions between our minister here of mineral resources [and energy] and Mozambique are quite advanced in terms of gas that we should transport from Mozambique to the country.I can safely say that we have reached an agreement, he said.Mabuza said alternative energy generation measures are being explored and implemented to augment electricity supply and improve the stability of the grid.He told MPs that currently, 292 small-scale generators have registered with the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) and have generation capacity of 187MW.The Independent Power Producers Office is processing offers by independent power producers for approval by Eskom and National Treasury.He said the DMRE minister has issued determinations on the required new generation capacity, in concurrence with the Nersa.The determinations made resulted in the procurement of more than 7,309MW from renewable and non-renewable energy.Most of these power plants are already in operation, with less than 400MW still under construction, he said.
Having joined JG Afrika in 2003, Duane Petersen has been promoted to the position of director. He was appointed an associate in 2014 and offered a position as an executive associate in 2016, while also sharing management duties of the Cape Town offices' municipal division.

Duane Petersen, director of JG Afrika

Some of Petersens career highlights includes his recent participation in overseeing the construction of the Prince George Drive Solid Waste Drop-off Facility in Parkwood, as well as the Gordons Bay and Wynberg Chipping Facilities.He led the development of a management plan for the Stellenbosch Rivers on behalf of the Stellenbosch Local Municipality. Completed in 2011, the document is still being referenced by the client.Moreover, Petersen assisted with the planning of major upgrades to the stormwater system in Mitchells Plain. The project entailed extensive infield work and intense modelling to provide a 10-year horizon that also considered climate change.In his new capacity, Petersen will help steer JG Afrika onto its next growth path. While I remain cautiously optimistic about the state of the South African market, considering governments focus on large infrastructure development to kick-start the post-Covid-19 economy, we are also exploring other growth areas. Many of these opportunities are emerging in other countries and could potentially harness our 23 different disciplines and fields of expertise, Petersen says.He will also be responsible for the Western and Eastern Cape regions.
Uganda has lifted the last remaining Covid-19 restrictions on economic activity. This allowed boda-bodas (motorcycle taxis) to fully operate again beyond their 6pm curfew. The past two years saw restrictions on boda-bodas as well as other forms of transportation, such as 14-seater minibuses, which make the bulk of the city's paratransit operators. They provide the primary form of public transportation, as in many other African cities. The minbuses and boda-bodas operate with minimal government oversight and regulation.
The University of Pretoria Campus Tours (UPCT) team just received their branded outfit, courtesy of Enterprises University of Pretoria (Enterprises UP). UPCT is a particularly significant initiative that Enterprises UP continue to support year after year. This year's student-managed business venture is led by 16 students from the Department of Historical and Heritage Studies based on the University's Hatfield Campus. The initiative is run under the guidance of the Director of the University of Pretoria Archives and forms a vital practical component of their degree qualification.

2022 UP Campus Tours team with Prof Karen Harris, the founder of UPCT), Mr Deon Herbst (CEO, Enterprises UP), and Elanie Bell (Enterprises UP; Brand and Communication Manager).

The objective of UPCT is to provide unique tours of the University's Gardens/ Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums to prospective students, new university staff, international visitors, and the general public. The team takes pride in providing the most engaging tours of the University's wondrous world, not only from an academic standpoint, but also as an exciting experience for everyone who wishes to broaden their horizons at the University and learn its history.Deon Herbst, CEO of Enterprises UP, complimented Prof Karen Harris, the founder of UPCT, on carrying the programme forward, saying, "It is fantastic for us to see the team thriving and energised, as that is what we are looking forward to in 2022. I am certain that you will be the best ambassadors ever for this University, the Faculty, and the Department.""The leadership with Prof Harris is exceptional; you are honoured to be working so closely with such an industry thought leader," Mr Herbst said as he addressed the team.Covid-19 provided UPCT the opportunity to diversify their services and create a more exciting way of showcasing the University of Pretoria's past and promising future. When joining the team in person is not an option, the team now offers virtual tours. Participants get unlimited access to virtual tours customised to their unique interests. There are virtual tours of all of the University of Pretoria's campuses accessible.Prof Karen Harris expressed gratitude to Enterprises UP for their ongoing support, stating that We were the first adopted programme by Enterprises UP. Mr Herbst's recognition of the programmes entrepreneurial potential saved the project from extinction. We wish to express our gratitude for all of your assistance throughout the years."We wish you all the best Campus Tours Team!
Vaal Cannabis Consortium co-ordinator, MK Malefane confirmed that he and the Gauteng Premier, David Makhura - together with relevant ministers of parliament - will soon be meeting with SA President, Cyril Ramaphosa for a high-level round-table meeting regarding the drafting of a new Cannabis National Masterplan.

Source: iStock.

Objectives of the new Cannabis National Masterplan

Increasing the volumes and variety of cannabis products destined for both local and export markets;

Establishing and increasing the capacity of South African farmers to produce dagga and hemp;

Creating opportunities for the creation of small-and medium-sized enterprises across the cannabis value chain;

Establishing and increasing the manufacturing capacity of the South African cannabis industry and designating cannabis and hemp products with the designated local content legislative framework.

The Vaal Cannabis Capital

The Vaal River Smart City

A new logistics sector;

A hub of the cannabis industry;

A hub for the hydrogen economy in the Gauteng region.

Training and education in the cannabis sector

This follows the Constitutional Court Ruling in September 2018, which declared legislation criminalising the use, possession, purchase and cultivation of cannabis unconstitutional.Malefane was speaking at the Cannabis Expo at GrandWest Casino in Cape Town, where he was in a panel discussion clarifying government's investment into cannabis.Malefane said relevant industry stakeholders were not happy with the current draft of the Cannabis National Masterplan, and that a clear way forward was needed on the role cannabis would play in South Africa and how it would be regulated.Consensus, he said, needed to be achieved with The South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA) on the regulation of cannabis. SAHPRA is tasked with regulating (monitoring, evaluating, investigating, inspecting and registering) all health products and clinical trials in South Africa.Key objectives of the Cannabis National Master Plan include, among others:Negotiations regarding the Cannabis National Master Plan will unpack how agricultural land is to be earmarked and prepared for cannabis cultivation and, within this framework, clarify the public-safety benchmarks of growing cannabis as a medicine as opposed to growing it for the purposes of industrialised hemp in South Africa.Within this context, the Drug and Drug Control Act will be taken into account as will the legislation for industrial hemp which falls under the Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (and whose role it is to issue and monitor permits for the production of hemp in South Africa), and the Private Use Act.There is currently no legislation for adult use of cannabis.Consensus is needed from all stakeholders, Malefane said."The Cannabis Masterplan will unlock the full potential of the regulatory framework which is conducive to unlocking the full potential of the cannabis industry. SAHPRA will be brought into the equation to make sure they do what is required.""To this end, The Vaal Cannabis Capital is set to launch in three months," Malefane added."The future of the Gauteng Economic corridor is the Vaal and we are spearheading the Vaal Cannabis Capital with an initial funding commitment of R3bn."We are focusing great attention on the large-scale cultivation of 100ha of land as well as on processing, construction and manufacturing facilities so that [cannabis] growers throughout the country - even across the border in African countries - can have a place where their quality product can have a buyer and a market, both locally and in exports."In the process we will have launched a cannabis health and wellness resort, the first and best of its kind in the world. We're laying the groundwork and have acquired existing lodges to incorporate into a single resort destination with cannabis and health and wellness in the offering."Already we've raised R45bn in investment commitment to the Vaal and our target in the next three month is to reach a R100bn investment commitment with cannabis as the anchor."Malefane said the Vaal Cannabis Capital is an anchor project to the soon to be Vaal River Smart City, a multi-billion investment in the Vaal triangle earmarked as Gauteng's Special Economic Zone (SEZ).SA President, Cyril Ramaphosa announced in his 2019 and 2020 SONAs that South Africa will be looking to develop the formation of a number of smart-city developments for the country.In 2019 at the second SA Investment Conference, in an interview Malefane said : "A smart city is to imagine a Dubai and a Singapore combined in terms of Fourth Industrial Revolution, new technology, but most importantly sustainability." smart city therefore is a municipality that uses information and communication technologies (ICT) to increase operational efficiency, share information with the public and improve both the quality of government services and citizen welfare.Broadly speaking , a smart city is a technologically modern urban area that uses different types of electronic methods, voice-activation methods and sensors to collect specific data.This includes data collected from citizens, devices, buildings and assets that is processed and analysed to monitor and manage traffic and transportation systems, power plants, utilities, water supply networks, waste, crime detection, information systems, schools, libraries, hospitals, and other community services.At the time Malefane said the Vaal River Smart City would include major research and development campuses for pharmaceutical, medicinal and health products and hospitals.In October 2021, in a report Gauteng Premier David Makhura noted that the Vaal River Smart City would focus on emerging technologies, including:The Department of Trade, Industry and Competition and Gauteng provincial government, in collaboration with Sedibeng District Municipality, have already established the Vaal River SEZ Company and the programme management unit, in line with applicable legislation, to help co-ordinate and fast-track all the planning and rollout of specific shovel-ready projects that will catalyse the entire smart city and SEZ, Makhura said.The launch of The Vaal River Smart City will potentially see South Africa aim to align itself over time with some of the world's most efficient smart cities in the world. Topping most lists when it comes to smart cities is often Singapore. Since launching its Smart Nation initiative in 2014, Singapore has introduced a wide range of smart technologies in both its public and private sectors.Laying the foundation for this, Malefane lauded PSL Training, which has its campus in Gauteng, as being the only accredited academy offering training in growing medicinal cannabis. PSL Training alongside its industry partners (Dicla training farms, Boabab Training Group and ODB NPC), officially launched the NQF Level 4 course on Medicinal Cannabis Plant Production.This is an AgriSETA accredited skills programme that awards successful students with a nationally recognised certificate of competency."We're also finalising the design and launch of the Vaal Cannabis Agency, which will focus on research and development, training and education, and on the empowerment of emergent [cannabis] growers and SMMEs in the cannabis and hemp sector."To this end, Malefane said the Democratic Republic of the Congo has asked for mentorship so they can participate. He said the country has set aside 250 000ha of land for this sector."We're going to train and bring the best of African brains to South Africa," Malefane said. "This is to ensure that people of African descent globally finally have a leading city that is sustainable, very profitable; commercial."This is not just for South Africa's benefit, but for the benefit of Africa and people of African descent."
South African entrepreneurs flew the flag high after they were recognised for their contributions at the Forty Under 40 Africa Awards. The awards took place on Saturday, 26 March in Accra, Ghana.

Reginald Pillay, Group CEO of Ariston Global. | Source: Supplied.

Recognising young business leaders

The aim of the Forty under 40 awards is to identify, honour and celebrate a cross-section of the continents most influential and accomplished young business leaders under the age of forty.The nominees are from a wide range of industries and are committed to business growth, professional excellence and community service and have risen to the ranks of their companies or industries at a relatively young age as a result of this. The event was attended by dignitaries from about 16 African countries with about 65 nominees.The award winners for this years event were from South Africa, Niger, Egypt, Zimbabwe, Uganda, Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, Tanzania, Togo, Namibia, Cameron, South Sudan, Swaziland and Morocco. First to accept an award from South Africa was group CEO and founder of Ariston Global, Reginald Pillay.The business advisor wizard walked away with the Honorary Award for Business Support Services, leaving South African beaming with pride. With close to two decades worth of experience in the business advisory sector, it was a no-brainer that Pillay would come out top.Commenting on winning the award, Pillay said: I am honoured to have been awarded the Honorary Business Advisor Award. The award recognises the impact Ariston Global has made in the Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises (SMMEs) sector, both locally and abroad. It was such an honour to be acknowledged, particularly in front of all my fellow entrepreneurs, who have done exceptionally amazing things in Africa.According to Pillay, the Ariston Teams ethos is to make business simple for entrepreneurs. He adds that SMMEs are the largest contributors to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and his contribution is to cater to SMMES to promote sustainability, thus contributing to the economy and keeping the level of unemployment at a minimum.Among other South African winners was Ngela Ntabiseng Senosha, founder and CEO of Positive Switch Pty (Ltd), who won the Human Resource Development (Female Category) Divide award while CEO of Tharika M Health, Dr Eurika Mogane, walked away with the Entrepreneurship Honorary Award.Others winners include Mondli Kunene (Mondli Art Projects), Nakeledi Pule Malahlela (Turfloop Football Club), Kwanele Boltina (Riley Auctioneers LTD) and Masonwabe Fuma (Youth Empowerment and Development, Mentorship).The Forty under 40 event organisers believe that putting the spotlight on these young achievers will not only celebrate them but also build a strong platform for them by giving a voice and opportunities to the next generation of industry pacesetters while building a positive attitude in our youth to strive for excellence at a tender age.
Showjumper Piet Van Genugten marked his return to the Royal Manitoba Winter Fair after 20 years by winning the biggest showjumping prizes.

Advertisement Advertise With Us

Showjumper Piet Van Genugten marked his return to the Royal Manitoba Winter Fair after 20 years by winning the biggest showjumping prizes.

The veteran jumper from Okotoks, Alta., won Saturday nights Wawanesa Insurance Grand Prix to become the KT MacPherson Memorial High Point open jumper champion.

He showed three horses in the competition, with two of them racking up too many faults to move on to the jump-off.

His third, Haido, a seasoned and energetic jumping horse, swept the first course with a time of 64.9 seconds and no faults. They moved on to the jump-off, sweeping that course with a time of 43.44 seconds and no faults.

Van Genugten couldnt contain his excitement upon finishing the jump-off to deafening cheers from the crowd, with a few fist-pumps and removing his helmet to salute the crowd.

His success netted him a $7,500 purse.

Most of the praise went to Haido. Van Genugten said was a fast runner and very in tune with his riding and what was going on around him on the course.

"He moves faster than I can think. He knows what I want and he does it without hesitating," Van Genugten said. "I brought five horses to this fair, and some of them are green and babies, but he is very eager and smart. He just lives to jump and loves the crowd."

On that critical jump-off, Van Genugten said it was a relatively long one.

He was initially worried because he had to do some tight circles. But he trusted Haidos abilities.

"I just said to myself, Piet, dont go off course here, this is the big one," he said. "But in the end, you just have to pretend you are home and you just have to go fast, stay calm, not make mistakes and just be lucky at the same time."

Van Genugten added he loved being at the Winter Fair and wished his family would have joined him, but his wife had to work during the week.

He is returning to Alberta to prepare for competition at Spruce Meadows. This is the final indoor show for him for the year.

The top 10 riders at the Wawanesa Insurance Grand Prix received cash purses.

The other winners are: Second, Kate Curry on Irvine, $5,500; third, Erin McPhail on Jimmy Choo, $3,000; fourth, Femke Courchaine, Jalapeno BF, $2,250; fifth, Danielle Urban, VDL Byacinthe, $1,750; sixth, Karissa Enders on Ginny Fizz, $1,500; seventh, Karissa Enders on Fort Knox Wf, $1,250; eighth, Jayden Stettner on Ielinea JTL, $1,000; ninth, Lorrie Jaimeson on Hooz Da Kat, $750; 10th, Justin Prather on EZ Ace, $500.

Urban, originally from Alberta, has been living in Omaha, Neb., for 18 years. Travelling to the fair was easy for her and her horses because she, the students she brought along and her team are all vaccinated, so there were no problems for them at the border.

In comments before the Grand Prix, Urban said she was feeling in top shape due to restrictions not being as strict in the United States as they were in Canada, meaning they could show and practise more frequently.

"We werent as locked down as Canada, but we were showing in other states with no problems. However, we werent able to come to Brandon for two years," she said. "Its a huge relief that we can travel to Canada again. I have family in Alberta and not being able to travel to see them for a year and a half was really tough."

The Winter Fair offers a lot more variety in horse shows and classes than a typical horse show, so Urban said she was eager to come. The shows themselves are more fun for the horses and ultimately the audience watching and cheering them on.

She added it was also fun to ride in front of a crowd again and will be continuing with more horse shows over the coming months.

 kmckinley@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @karenleighmcki1
SIOUX VALLEY  The Wipazoka Wakpa Winter Culture Camp offered three exciting days of in-person activities at Sioux Valley Dakota Nation, bringing the community together in a celebration of culture, traditions and fun.

Advertisement Advertise With Us

SIOUX VALLEY  The Wipazoka Wakpa Winter Culture Camp offered three exciting days of in-person activities at Sioux Valley Dakota Nation, bringing the community together in a celebration of culture, traditions and fun.

The Winter Culture Camp was designed to weave together climate change, community and overall wellness, said Wakpa McKay, Sioux Valley Wipazoka Wakpa Climate Change and Environment Wipazoka Wakpa research assistant. The main goal was to integrate culture into family-friendly activities while talking about the environment and Dakota culture.

"It was fantastic. The Winter Culture Camp, it couldnt have gone any smoother," McKay said.

Organizers were pleased with the turnout and participation from community members, he said. Nation members enthusiasm has spurred the Wipazoka Wakpa working group to create more activities based on the needs of the community.

The Winter Culture Camp offered an important opportunity for people to meet the Wipazoka Wakpa team and hopefully consider becoming a member of the initiative, he said. McKay added he hopes to continue engaging with community members during future events.

CHELSEA KEMP/THE BRANDON SUN Youth play in the mud during the Wipazoka Wakpa Winter Culture Camp on Saturday.

One of the highlights of the camp was the Dakota Amazing Race. McKay said it proved popular with the five teams of two competing in a series of different obstacles based on traditional Dakota activities.

Teams began the race with sloshing  walking together using a piece of plywood  3D archery and finishing off by lighting a fire with flint and steel to warm a cup of tea for an elder.

"Were going to make the next one even more fantastic," McKay said. "It was great watching. It was great seeing everyone laughing and smiling."

CHELSEA KEMP/THE BRANDON SUN Dakota Amazing Race teams try their feet at sloshing.

Being able to gather as a community during the Culture Camp was a welcomed return to normal, said elder Margaret Roscelli.

"Weve been apart for so long," Roscelli said. "Were a close-knit community. We share in our joys, in our sorrows as a community."

Social gatherings, powwows and ceremonies have been greatly missed during the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, she said.

CHELSEA KEMP/THE BRANDON SUN Dakota Amazing Race competitor Infinity Blacksmith-Tacan lights a fire at the Wipazoka Wakpa Winter Culture Camp at Sioux Valley Dakota Nation on Saturday.

"Coming together like this is really enjoyable and healthy for us because were establishing contact with our friends and our relatives and having an enjoyable time because weve come through the pandemic," Roscelli said.

It has been a challenging time in the community because the experience of trauma and stress has only been heightened by the isolation created by COVID-19.

The Winter Culture Camp marked a time for celebration and healing, she said, with the community coming together to create good and positive energy.

CHELSEA KEMP/THE BRANDON SUN Desiree Wasicuna competes in the women's hatchet-throwing contest.

Roscelli enjoyed watching the young people of the community laughing and enjoying themselves exploring the different activities set up by the climate council. She was on hand for the Culture Camp to share stories and traditions with those in attendance.

The goal was to talk to youth passing on Dakota stories, legends and teachings.

This can be a tricky task, she added, because traditionally stories have been passed down in the Dakota language.

"Because of the language barrier, the young people dont know Dakota. If I tell those stories that have been passed on for generations, its usually told in Dakota," Roscelli said. "We have a very descriptive language, and once you translate it into English, it doesnt do it justice. It loses its humour completely."

She adapted to the adversity and shared her experiences of growing up in Sioux Valley, passing on the knowledge she has gained over 70 years. Roscelli spoke about what it was like growing up without electricity, phones and travelling by horse team.

Adele Sinclair and Jonathan Courchene were riding high on Saturday, taking home first place in the Dakota Amazing Race contest and first place in the mens and womens hatchet-throwing contest.

Being at the Culture Camp felt like a reunion, Sinclair said, because they were able to reconnect with people they have not seen in two years due to COVID-19 lockdowns.

The duo was especially excited for Saturdays activities  Sinclair carefully crafted "Amazing Race Sioux Valley" T-shirts in preparation for the big day.

Saturday marked their first day attending the culture camp, Courchene said, and it brought back fond memories of the Sioux Valley Winter Carnival they attended in the past.

They especially enjoyed the Dakota Amazing Race, he said, but it proved to be a challenging task to take on. He added that starting and keeping the fire going to boil water was especially difficult.

Courchene said they got the fire going five times before the blaze finally stayed lit. Courchene even cut his hand in the frantic rush to take home first place during the race.

Sinclair said they loved the Dakota Amazing Race competition, adding they planned their weekend around ensuring they would be able to participate.

"Its always fun to do activities like this with the whole community," Courchene said.

 ckemp@brandonsun.com

 Twitter: @The_ChelseaKemp
Its fair to call Pine Castle a dynasty, with five generations involved in horses and a barn family that numbers in the hundreds.

Advertisement Advertise With Us

Its fair to call Pine Castle a dynasty, with five generations involved in horses and a "barn family" that numbers in the hundreds.

They have been a staple at The Royal Manitoba Winter Fair and after the two-year pandemic shutdown and brutal winter, the family and riding team is happy to be back competing.

KAREN MCKINLEY/THE BRANDON SUN Some of the members of the Pine Castle "family" from left: Jonathan Dowling, Haley Stewart (with newest member Maverick), Jett Decorte, Erin Anderson, Bryon Decorte, Rylee Kehler and Kylie Andries. The equestrian school and riding stable goes back five generations at the Royal Manitoba Winter Fair.

"Its wonderful to have the Fair going again, and I think our horses and riders have done a wonderful job, considering it was a difficult winter to train and everything else that was going on," said Erin Anderson, a third-generation competitor. "We have a lot of ribbons out there."

The Winter Fair has been one of the main events Pine Castle attends every year. Anderson said her mother and grandmother showed horses at the fair, and this year she had a granddaughter and son in jumping.

Even though they have been doing well, Anderson said the pandemic took a toll on the stables overall performance. Restrictions at certain times meant they couldnt run lessons. Consistent training is paramount for horses and students to improve and condition themselves for competition.

With that hopefully behind them, Anderson said they are looking to the future.

Now that restrictions have been lifted and shows are being planned across the province and Canada, they are getting ready for their first "normal" show season. There are definitely plans to attend a few in Winnipeg, as well as host a few at their facility just south of Brandon on First Street.

They are also looking at some shows in Alberta this year, if all goes well.

While it was a rebuilding year for the Winter Fair and Pine Castle, Anderson said the crowds were smaller, but she was pleasantly surprised to hear the enthusiastic shouts and cheers.

"They were really into every competition," she said. "I think people want to just get out and enjoy stuff again."

She added riders share that sentiment. There is a joy she has not seen in years resonating among them to be back in live events.

Pine Castle was originally the Moore Farm, founded by Bill Moore and his wife Dorothy. The Moore familys first Winter Fair appearance was in 1954, with Bill and Dorothy taking part in the jumping class. The next year they introduced their Clydesdales into the fold. Their kids Karri, Wayne, Valerie (Erins mother) and Dena followed in their footsteps.

Wayne soon took over the reins on showing Clydesdales with a six-horse hitch, with the help of his three kids Dari, Warren and Leon.

They stopped showing Clydesdales 12 years ago, when Wayne was unable to drive the hitch due to arthritis.

The familys connections to showjumping have grown. Jett Decorte competed all week and rated his performance overall as good. There were ups and downs and some learning curves, but that just showed him what he had to work on going forward.

"No one is ever going to be 100 per cent accurate every time," he said. "Every course you do, you find out what you did wrong and try not to do it next time and figure out what you can do better."

He has been riding since his parents put him on the back of a horse when he was two years old. Ever since, he has had a strong connection with the sport and the animals they work with.

Even those who used to ride with Pine Castle are still considered family and welcome in their stall. Kylie Andries was busy during the Winter Fair shadowing the veterinarian, but still stopped by to say hello and lend a hand managing their horses. She said she misses riding with her fellow students, but her studies and preparing for her career leaves her no time.

But she is still happy to see everyone else in the show ring.

"It sucks seeing everyone else riding. I wish I could kick Jett off his horse and get on myself," joked Andries. "But it is great to be back with some type of farm family thing."

Even though she cant ride at the moment, Andries said she is going back as soon as she is able. She learned more than riding from Pine Castle. All the time she spent riding and working with the family taught her a lot about horses, she said, giving her a knowledge base for her veterinary career.

 kmckinley@brandonsun.com, with Brandon Sun files

 Twitter: @karenleighmcki1
If you are still needing a COVID vaccine, Prairie Mountain Health will be running walk-in clinics for ages five years old and up for first, second and third doses if eligible.

Advertisement Advertise With Us

If you are still needing a COVID vaccine, Prairie Mountain Health will be running walk-in clinics for ages five years old and up for first, second and third doses if eligible.

A clinic is scheduled on Tuesday from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. at the Brandon Friendship Centre (205 College Ave.) This clinic will have both walk-in and booked appointments.

To book by phone, call 1-844-626-8222 daily from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Book online at patient.petal-health.com/login?groupId=6032

A clinic is scheduled for the Southquill Food Bank in Erickson (46 Main St.) on April 6 from noon to 3 p.m. On Friday, there will be a clinic at Tanners Crossing School in Minnedosa (90 Armitage Ave.) from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Eligibility criteria are subject to change; please check gov.mb.ca/covid19/vaccine/eligibility-criteria.html#third for updates.

For up-to-date information on booked clinics and walk-ins, continue to check the Prairie Mountain Health website at pmh-mb.ca/vaccine-schedule.

 The Brandon Sun
A handful of ranchers in British Columbia's Interior are getting readyto graze their cattle in concentrated areas near homes and community infrastructure, where they'll eat the grasses that dry over the summer and heighten the wildfire risk.

Cattle graze, as shown in this 2020 handout image, near Cranbrook as part of a program led by the B.C. Cattlemen's Association to reduce the wildfire risk near communities. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO-Columbia Basin Trust-Tyler Zhao*MANDATORY CREDIT *

A handful of ranchers in British Columbia's Interior are getting readyto graze their cattle in concentrated areas near homes and community infrastructure, where they'll eat the grasses that dry over the summer and heighten the wildfire risk.

As part of a pilot program led by the B.C. Cattlemen's Association, ranchers around Kelowna, Peachland, Summerland and Cranbrook will corral their cattle in targeted areas for two to three weeks, explained general manager Kevin Boon.

The cattle eat grasses that could serve as potential fuel for fires, which promotes new, green growth that doesn't burn with the speed and intensity of grasses left to grow taller, drier and more likely to catch brush and trees on fire, he said.

"So, if we can keep that fine fuel down ... it won't burn with the heat, the intensity or the speed and we've got a better chance of controlling it."

The B.C. government contributed $500,000 in 2019 to help launch the pilot project. Targeted grazing is not a solution to all fuel management challenges, the province said in a statement at the time, but "it is a powerful tool when used in combination with other methods, such as prescribed burning and selective tree harvesting."

Amanda Miller, an ecologist who's working as a researcher on the grazing project, said the idea stemmed from the severe 2017 and 2018 wildfire seasons, which each saw more than 12,000 square kilometres of forests and land burn.

"We've found time and time again, as a fire comes through, that often it will meet a fence line to a pasture that had just been grazed and the fire will stop," Miller said.

"So, anecdotally, I think we've always known this, but of course you do need actual data and science to back up any recommendations that you're making."

Boon said he hopes the pilot project can serve as a model to scale up across B.C. in partnership with the province, ranchers and local communities.

In the last two seasons, each grazing site typically saw around a 30 per cent reduction in grassy biomass, amounting to a substantial reduction in fine fuels, said Miller.

"That has impact on things like rate of spread and intensity. It just reduces those metrics and makes it easier to action a fire, if it's moving slower and it's not as hot."

The program has a monitoring protocol to assess the effects of targeted grazing on the grassy and forested environments, Miller noted.

"We do have a lot of data to back up the fact that what we're doing is not negatively impacting the ecosystem," she said.

That was still the case in one area where cattle were able to eat 40 per cent of the grassy biomass last year, she added.

Cattle are also useful in grazing areas where forests have been thinned out to reduce the risk of a dangerous crown fire, where the entire length of a tree burns. Miller said it's harder to fight and control a wildfire when the entire tree canopy is set ablaze.

Grasses flourish as more sunlight reaches the forest floor, but they dry out and become tinder, raising the risk of a potential wildfire spark, she said.

"We use cattle to address that fine fuel concern, so you've hit your wildfire risk in two different ways. You've removed some of the danger associated with those overstorey canopies, and then you have a complementary tool in targeted grazing."

After two years of below-average fire activity in B.C., the 2021 season saw more than 1,600 fires scorch close to 8,700 square kilometres of land.

Much of the Village of Lytton was destroyed by fire just one day after the temperature in the community southwest of Kamloops hit an all-time Canadian high of 49.6 C. Fires also razed properties between Kamloops and Vernon, and near West Kelowna.

Boon said the scorching late-June heat dome dried out the land, creating the right conditions for a destructive wildfire season.

"We've seen these things happen before," he said of the fires, extreme heat and floods in B.C. last year. "Just not with the intensity and not one on top of the other."

This year's provincial budget allocated $145 million for B.C.'s wildfire and emergency management services through 2025 with the goal of moving from a reactive to a proactive approach to wildfires, including increases in year-round staffing.

At a news conference last month, the director of provincial operations for the wildfire service said B.C. needs a large-scale program to reduce risk, starting in backyards, moving to communities and extending into forested lands.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 3, 2022.
New Life Worship - Our God Is Over All | Merge PR / Integrity Music

Nashville, TN / Colorado Springs, CO - Today, New Life Worship releases their long-awaited live album, Over It All. After twenty years of worship ministry and seven years since their last project, the worship team of New Life Church based in Colorado Springs is back with music that exudes spirit-fueled energy, joy, and surrender to the Lord.

Worship is at the core of New Life Church. Of the eleven songs found on Over It All, each carries fresh hope and holy defiance, birthed directly from the heart of their community. The recording invites the listener to join with the unshakeable Kingdom of God where each voice brings their song of praise, declaring truth, hope, and light in the face of our cultural moment.

Worship leader Jon Egan notes, Worship is a response based on revelation and choice based on conviction. This resonates from the jubilant album opener "There Is A Savior" to more meditative titles such as "Gloria Patri."

It is the hope of New Life Worship that Over It All would sound like their church. Egan explains, If it's big sounding, its because we are bursting to describe Gods holiness. If it's aggressive, its because we are interceding with all we are. If its sweet, its because there is nothing like His presence.

The new music video for "There Is A Savior" just went live today - click HERE to check it out. To listen to the new album, click HERE, and be sure to follow New Life Worship on Instagram.

ABOUT NEW LIFE WORSHIP: New Life Worship is a collective of worship leaders and musicians that serve at New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado. With a rich history of serving the church with songs like "Strong God," "Great I Am," "I Am Free," and "Here In Your Presence," New Life Worship is stepping into a fresh season of new songs being birthed in the church.

The group exists to nourish a biblically- faithful, historically-rooted, musically-skilled, and vibrantly prophetic multi-generational worship culture. They focus on encountering the living God - both in the here and now and in the confidence of what is to come. Their voice is communal, formed with the belief that their collective efforts yield more than just the sum of their individual contributions, working at shaping their songs to bring formation to the soul with a message that is packaged in beauty and creativity. They seek to make their voice ancient and new - ancient by honoring and referencing rich church history and those who have gone before us, and new by knowing that in the Hebrew texts of the Psalms, God desires new songs to be emanating from his people. To stay up to date, follow New Life Worship here.

ABOUT INTEGRITY MUSIC: Integrity Music is part of the David C. Cook family, a nonprofit global resource provider serving the Church with life-transforming materials. With offices in both the U.S. and the U.K., Nashville, Tennessee and Brighton, East Sussex, Integrity Music is committed to taking songs of substance to the local church and its leaders around the world.

Integrity publishes many of the top songs in the Church, including Great Are You Lord, Revelation Song, Open The Eyes Of My Heart, In Christ Alone, 10,000 Reasons, Here I Am To Worship, The Lion And The Lamb, Great I Am, and We Believe, among others. Integrity Music artists include Matt Redman, Lincoln Brewster, Darlene Zschech, Leeland, William McDowell, Paul Baloche, David and Nicole Binion, Sandra McCracken, Nashville Life Music, Selah, Thrive Worship, Local Sound, Sarah Kroger, Kees Kraeynoord, ICF Church, Matt Marvane, InSalvation, Phil Thompson, Village Lights, Tim Timmons, Mission House, among others. Additional information is available at integritymusic.com.
After two years of COVID-19, followed by a crazy, crazy start to the year with floods, Jules Jackson noticed her three daughters were showing signs of anxiety.

It manifested in different ways. My eldest one is quite dramatic, whereas the middle one internalises a lot more and the youngest one appears very easy-going but is really sensitive and a quiet crier.

Jules Jackson has three daughters who were displaying signs of anxiety after two difficult years. Credit:Glenn Hunt

One day, while waiting at school drop-off, Ms Jackson came across a friend doing a module of online program Fear-Less Triple P, aimed at parents of children who have anxiety affecting their everyday life.

The fact that it was in small, digestible bits was very appealing to me, Ms Jackson said. It was very practical and timely, I suppose, because these last three years have been pretty crazy as a parent.
Nothing foreshadows a federal election like a stampede of friendly appointments by a government getting its house in order in the dying days of its parliamentary term  just in case it doesnt crawl back into power come polling day.

Michaelia Cash and Pru Goward. Credit:John Shakespeare

Simply put, the cavalcade of names  more than 120 in the past fortnight  looked nothing less that a Liberal Party Christmas card list, and even includes a recently departed NSW government minister.

And on Monday we were handed a most excellent example of this practice of patronage and privilege by Attorney-General Michaelia Cashs latest appointments to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, which independently reviews government decisions.

Most notable, was the appointment to the AAT of former NSW Coalition minister Pru Goward. Goward and husband David Barnett are close friends of Janette and John Howard, and Barnett even wrote a biography of PM25.
Attorney-General Michaelia Cash has been ordered to decide for a third time if Arsalan Khawaja should be granted parole, after two previous decisions to refuse it were set aside by the Federal Court because they were unlawful.

In a judgment on Monday, Justice Tom Thawley said a fresh decision to grant or deny Khawajas parole should be made expeditiously.

Arsalan Khawaja pictured in 2018. Credit:Lucy Cormack

Khawaja, 42, the brother of cricketer Usman Khawaja, was jailed in November 2020 for at least two-and-a-half years after he attempted to frame two men as terrorists because he perceived them as rivals for the romantic attention of two women.

In 2018, Khawaja wrote 20 pages of threats in a notebook belonging to his University of NSW colleague Mohamed Kamer Nizamdeen, resulting in Mr Nizamdeen being charged and held in maximum-security prison. Authorities later determined the threats were fake.
GPs have asked older Australians who are yet to receive a COVID-19 booster to book one alongside their flu shot amid concern about dwindling immunity in the 1.8 million people who did not return for a third dose.

More than 450,000 vaccinated Australians have very little protection against an Omicron infection after they received the AstraZeneca vaccine last year but did not have a booster.

People aged 65 and over became eligible for a free flu shot this week, which can now be administered at the same appointment as a COVID-19 booster. Credit:Eddie Jim

People aged 65 and over, who received the bulk of AstraZeneca vaccines during the nations rollout last year, also became eligible for a free flu shot this week, which can be administered at the same appointment.

Data from the Australian Immunisation Register showed by the end of March 1.815 million COVID-19 vaccine recipients were considered overdue for their booster shot, meaning more than six months had passed since their second dose.
West Australian Police Commissioner Chris Dawson has been announced as the states next Governor, with outgoing Governor Kim Beazleys four-year term due end in May.

Mr Dawson, who will be sworn in in July, has dedicated his 46-year career to public service and will become the first police officer to act in the role of Governor.

WA Police Commissioner Chris Dawson. Credit:Hamish Hastie

Flanked by his wife and two children, the 63-year-old  who in recent years as acted as the State Emergency Coordinator and Vaccine Commander  said he was honoured to accept the appointment.

I love Western Australia and its people. When the Premier first asked me if I would consider the role, Ill admit to being somewhat taken aback and certainly surprised by the offer.
The number of flights over Moreton Bay could increase by 60 per cent to allow more simultaneous arrivals and departures away from residential areas, an international air traffic consultancy has recommended.

It is the latest in a series of measures aimed at mitigating the impact of additional aircraft noise over the suburbs since the parallel runway opened at Brisbane Airport in July 2020.

Brisbane Airport faces even more changes to placate angry residents. Credit:Glenn Hunt

Residents had originally been assured the runway would allow for more flights over Moreton Bay, but flight paths over residential areas resulted in a seven-fold escalation in aircraft noise complaints.

Consultancy firm Trax International - which recently reviewed flight operations at Londons Heathrow Airport, and were brought in by Australian authorities to look at Brisbane - has now ruled the flight paths should be redrawn.
A killer sent a message thanking her four alleged accomplices the day after a Brisbane mother was shot dead in a shipping container during a robbery gone wrong, a court has heard.

Megan Kirley, 40, was shot in the neck at a semi-rural property on Wembley Road in Karawatha, on Brisbanes southern outskirts, about 3am on February 9, 2019.

The victim, Brisbane mother-of-two Megan Kirley. Credit:Facebook

Police allege five people were involved in the attack.

Two offenders have already been jailed for their involvement.
When setting out for a neighbourhood stroll, its the Australian way to throw on an old jumper, tracksuit pants and runners.

Not for Michelle Trebilco. The 64-year-old self-styled thriftilicious fashionista is turning heads in the Dandenong Ranges and winning admirers on social media for her colourful outfits, which she pieces together for a pittance at op shops.

Walking gear: Michelle Trebilco steps out every day in fabulous clothes she bought in op shops. Credit:Scott McNaughton

She likes to dress up to walk to the shops and doesnt stint on the wow factor. She once stepped out in a cartoon-print tutu dress, pink Mickey Mouse ears, unicorn framed sunglasses and multicoloured tights.

Another day, she wore a floral ankle-length, cheongsam dress and pastel flat shoes with dolls head prints.
Detectives have arrested two men after a high-speed chase through Melbournes south-eastern suburbs, during which a car was allegedly travelling on the wrong side of the road.

Victoria Police said they were first alerted to a grey Hyundai station wagon at Cheltenham about 9.45am on Monday.

The police air wing, along with units on the ground, tracked the stolen car to Cranbourne Park Shopping Centre car park, where its two occupants allegedly got out of the vehicle and ran.

Police said the Hyundai travelled on the wrong side of the road at times, and at speeds estimated at more than 150km/h. Callers to Melbourne radio station 3AW reported seeing the car on the wrong side of the EastLink and the Peninsula Link.
China has built, or is seeking to build, new bases in all three regions. None starts out as overtly military, but Beijing specialises in building infrastructure that is supposedly civilian, only to add military functions later. This has been a highly effective tactic in its incremental expansion. The artificial islands built by Beijing in the South China Sea are a case in point. Chinas President Xi Jinping said that Beijing never would militarise the islands, all of which are in maritime territories also claimed by Chinas neighbours. Illustration: Dyson Credit:The Age Beijing started to build bases on the islands, but swore that they were for civilian shipping and maritime surveillance only. Now some of those islands bristle with missile arsenals, hardened aircraft hangers and other military hardware. Two weeks ago, the commander of US forces in the Indo-Pacific, Admiral John Aquilino, said that China apparently had finished building its military bases on three of the islands of the South China Sea. Those are Mischief Reef, Subi Reef and Fiery Cross Reef.

The function of those islands is to expand the offensive capability of the PRC [Peoples Republic of China] beyond their continental shores, said Aquilino. They can fly fighters, bombers plus all those offensive capabilities of missile systems. Loading The news from Solomon Islands was that its government had drafted a secret security cooperation agreement with China. The deal would create a framework to allow China to send its police forces to the Solomons and for its navy to visit and replenish. Conceivably, it could be extended to allow China a naval base in the country. If so, Chinas closest naval base, now 6000 kilometres away from Australia, suddenly would be 2000 kilometres away.

Imperial Japan had to fight its way to the Solomons in 1942 to establish a base there as part of its campaign for the conquest of the entire Asia-Pacific. China is making good progress towards buying its way to a Solomons base. New Zealands Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern described this as gravely concerning as a potential militarisation of the region. Australia and the US also raised objections. But Solomons Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare says that hell proceed with the agreement as a matter of the countrys sovereign choice. Fiery Cross Reef in the Spratly Islands has been fully developed by China . Credit:Maxar/AP Canberra had plenty of notice. For instance, Solomons Opposition Leader Matthew Wale told the ABC that hed warned Australia around August 2021 that such a deal was in the works. The whole Pacific step-up hasnt worked, says the ANUs Stephen Howes, an expert on Pacific aid, referring to the Morrison governments signature Pacific islands policy. Its inevitable that there will be more of this type of agreement. First, China is more powerful and, second, theres no consequence for these countries. As soon as we found out about this agreement, the Foreign Minister Marise Payne put out a press release announcing more aid money for the Solomons.

Indeed, Australia is by far the biggest aid donor to Solomon Islands, a low-income country of some 650,000 people. But Beijing is the biggest donor to its government members of parliament. One example: The Sogavare government controversially switched the Solomons diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to Beijing in 2019. The unpopularity of the decision helped sparked unrest in December last year. The opposition moved a motion of no confidence against Sogavare as a result. The government paid 250,000 Solomon Islands dollars, about $40,000, to each MP who voted to support Sogavare in successfully surviving the motion. The money, all declared and paid from the National Development Fund, is funded by the Chinese government. And then theres the Antarctic, 42 per cent of which is Australian territory. Anne-Marie Brady first warned five years ago that Canberra was being blindsided by Beijing, which had conducted undeclared military activities and mineral exploration on Australian territory under the guise of scientific expeditions.

Antarctica is essential to Beijings plan. Chinas recently completed satellite-based global positioning system, Baidou, depends on its ground stations there. Loading Beyond that, Brady says that China has designs on the continents rich resources and its strategic value for key transport routes. Most of Chinas Antarctic activities are on Australian territory, says Brady: They got to places on Australian territory Australia couldnt even get to because of a lack of resources. Theyve got what they want now. She points out that Beijing policy documents assert the right to make a formal territorial claim there. While Putins hurricane rages in Ukraine, Xi quietly is changing the entire geostrategic climate. Australia increasingly will find it uncomfortable to live in a climate where the weather is controlled from Beijing. Peter Hartcher is international editor.
A new property data report shows house prices in Australia are growing at the slowest rate since May 2020.

The new PropTrack Home Price Index, which launched on Friday, revealed property price growth in March increased by just 0.34%.

The report, provided by property data analysis firm PropTrack (part of REA Group), is a monthly revised residential property price index aimed at delivering timely insights on home prices and market trends.

Marchs results indicated growth falling slightly in Melbourne (-0.02%) while larger falls were recorded in Perth (-0.11%) and the Northern Territory (-0.13%).

Mortgage Choice national sales director David Zammit (pictured) said brokers could benefit from Australias home price growth slowing.

Although house prices arent growing at the same pace as they did in 2021, the housing market remains strong, Zammit said.

A deceleration in house price growth and increased supply means some buyers wont rush into purchasing decisions as quickly as they have been over the past year and then struggle to find lenders who can look after those financing needs within such tight time frames.

Read more: Australia's home price growth slowed in March  report

Zammit said each quarter he was seeing more Australians engage mortgage brokers and the trend looked likely to increase with a greater choice of brokers available for buyers at no cost.

Whether its slowing house price growth, the pandemic, or the RBA changing the cash rate, borrowers want trusted advice and to understand their options  and are increasingly turning to brokers as the trusted experts in property finance, he said.

Zammit encouraged brokers to be adaptable in a changing property price market and to connect with their clients.

Sharing information such as the PropTrack Home Price Index, making proactive outbound calls to offer a rate review, or using some of your aggregators marketing tools (think blogs, videos, how-tos etc) are all things you can do to let clients know youre there for them, he said.

In times of change, property purchasers want to understand their options and look for trusted advice from industry professionals who have their best interests at heart.

Read more: Australia's smallest cities drive growth in national housing values  CoreLogic

Zammit said the PropTrack Home Price Index was an example of how brokers across the country can use REA Group data to provide new insights to clients.

This monthly report will strengthen the property market insights our brokers provide to local, national and international clients ensuring prospective buyers can make the most informed property decisions, he said.

Despite the slow price growth in March, there were areas showing impressive price growth over the 2021 calendar year, including Brisbane with a 27.02% increase, regional NSW at 26.85% and the ACT at 26.4%.

Zammit said the slight falls in house prices seen in March were unlikely to change the conversations brokers had with their clients.

Brokers and their clients will hear a lot of noise about property markets and headwinds such as the federal election, rate rises, flood recovery and the rising cost of living, he said. This is the time to be checking in with your clients and completing a home loan health check to make sure theyre in the best position no matter what happens in the wider market.
Latest News 24 lenders raise interest rates Read the full list here

Clients seek advice on interest rate rise City brokers field many enquiries

HomeStart, a government-backed organisation that provides home loans to South Australians, has boosted its executive team with the appointment of Braden Naylor as chief financial officer.

Naylors appointment follows CFO Andrew Mills promotion to HomeStarts CEO.

Naylor joins HomeStart from Renewal SA, where he had been finance director for more than five years. His career spans more than two decades in senior finance, commercial, and strategy roles within government and major utilities, including a key role in property and infrastructure development.

Mills said Braden brought a wealth of experience in both finance and property.

His expertise will be invaluable as HomeStart seeks to expand its reach to help more South Australians into their own home, Mills said. Sound financial management underpins our reputation as a responsible lender and prudent financial manager, which continues to deliver significant returns to the South Australian community and government.

A qualified accountant, Braden is a fellow and divisional councillor with peak body CPA Australia. Hes also chair of the board of management of HomePlace Living Supports, a not-for-profit provider of high-quality accommodation and support to people with a disability.
and have agreed to appear before the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC), the parties informed the Supreme Court (SC) on Monday.

Both the parties have also been directed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) N V Ramana to file a joint memo in the Supreme Court on Tuesday with regards to this.

In its order, the CJI also requested the tribunal to expedite the proceedings.

It is stated and agreed by both parties that they wish to appear before the Singapore International Arbitration Centre and request that the proceedings, pending adjudication before it, be expedited on the issues agreed upon between them, the top court said in its order.

In the hearing, the Supreme Court has also asked both parties to request the Delhi High Court to hear the case of the enforcement of the emergency arbitration award passed by SIAC on priority basis.

Bank of Indias counsel also said in the Supreme Court that it would like to withdraw its intervention application. The three-judge bench also permitted the banks application to be withdrawn.

The intervention application filed on behalf of the applicant/intervenor  Bank of India  is permitted to be withdrawn without prejudice to the rights and contentions of the applicant, the order said.

The apex court also asked both the parties to inform the Bench, in the next hearing, which is scheduled on April 6, about the developments in the Delhi High Court.

Currently, the high court is hearing a bunch of pleas filed by both the parties.

In the previous hearing last week, the Supreme Court asked if it could pass an interim order on a plea of that Future Retail (FRL) assets, including Big Bazaar shops, not be alienated till the dispute over its merger with is decided by the arbitral tribunal.

It also said, If tenants or landlords are not before us, how can the court pass an order injuncting them from taking possession (of shops).

Over the weekend, submitted a special leave petition to the Supreme Court against Future Retail.

It alleged that the retailer is making false statements before Indian courts, including the top court, related to its Rs 24,713-crore deal with Reliance Industries.

The applicant (Amazon) is currently faced with a situation where it has valid, binding, subsisting, and operating injunctions in its favour, but is not being able to prevent Future Retails utter disregard of the binding injunctions, said Amazons petition, dated April 2, submitted to the Supreme Court.

The proceedings before the arbitral tribunal are stayed, while Future Retail is alienating its retail assets to the Mukesh Dhirubhai Ambani Group in the garb of forceful takeover by making false statements before Indian courts, including the Supreme Court, it said in its special leave petition.

Amazon made a plea for interim relief, which mentioned there should be no alienation or disposal of Future Retail stores to Mukesh Dhirubhai Ambani Group, pending the final award in the arbitration proceedings.

It also made a prayer that Future Retail stores remain in control of Future Retail. Amazon said that in the event Future Retail succeeds in the arbitration proceedings, it shall be able to transfer retail assets in accordance with the scheme and upon final sanction by the National Law National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT).

Future Retail also replied to Amazons special leave petition over the weekend and opposed the grant of interim relief to Amazon.

It said in its response that Amazon is seeking to circumvent the jurisdiction of the Delhi High Court and deprives Future Retail of its statutory right of appeal against interim orders passed by any arbitral tribunal. It added that the application is based on the false premise that Future Retail has alienated its retail assets in violation of orders of an arbitral tribunal.

The present application, on the other hand, not only seeks the grant of various interim reliefs travelling far beyond the resumption of arbitration proceedings, but additionally prays that such reliefs be directed to operate till the final award is pronounced by the tribunal, FRL said in its response.
In a boost to the efforts of construction of stalled projects of Amrapali, the was on Monday told that a consortium of seven banks have granted final approval to infuse Rs 1500 crore out of which Rs 150 has been directly paid to National Buildings Construction Corporation (NBCC).

A bench of Justices UU Lalit and Bela M Trivedi was told by court receiver R Venkataramani that the rest of the amount could not be released as banks said that for the purposes of disbursal of funds they would require equitable mortgage by deposit of title deeds as a pre-condition.

The top court was told that one of the reasons pertains to some of the observations made by this court in its judgement dated July 23, 2019, in one of the paragraphs of the judgement and some clarification was sought.

Venkataramani in his note pointed out that the top court had in its judgement said that all leases in favour of Group of stand cancelled which in effect would mean that there would be no title document that could be deposited in the banks.

The court receiver and counsel appearing for the consortium of banks said that the situation could be salvaged if the name of the Group of could be substituted by the court receiver.

The bench said that it was precisely for which reasons the expression used in the judgement is vest in court receiver or right of the lessee shall rest in court receiver.

The bench noted the agreement of advocate Ravindra Kumar, appearing for NOIDA and Greater Noida authority, and directed the authorities to withdraw the lease deeds of Projects with respect to NOIDA and Greater NOIDA and make available these deeds to the court receiver, so that equitable mortgage could be created in favour of the consortium.

Let the needful be done within seven days from today, the bench said.

It also dealt with one other objection of the banks which pertained to statutory approvals which according to the banks are required for the disbursal of further funds.

The statutory approvals could be those which are required at the initial stage of inception before the stage of construction or those which are required before issuance of final completion certificate is accorded, the bench said.

It said that since the projects are still in the stage of construction, Thus all the statutory approvals which are required before the construction can be taken or started shall be obtained as early as possible and the same may be provided to the receiver for further action in this regard.

The top court also asked the court receiver that where construction is completed he shall execute appropriate documents in favour of the association of buyers.

You must also get out of the scenario. The receiver is not supposed to be there for eternity. Rest is for the association of owners to do, the bench said.

Venkataramani said he has some plans for the issue and would be placed before the court after a couple of weeks.

The bench said that home buyers also have some apprehensions with regard to the structural safety of buildings now constructed by the NBCC and it needs to be clarified that when such structural safety exercises were undertaken an NBCC and court receiver had to address the court on the issue.

On March 28, the top court had directed the Bank of Baroda-led consortium of seven banks to effectuate disbursal of Rs 1,500 crore for the construction of stalled real estate projects of .

It had noted that six banks -- Bank of Baroda, State Bank of India, Bank of India, Punjab National Bank, Punjab and Sindh Bank, and UCO Bank -- have granted in-principle approval for disbursal of funds, while Indian Bank was about to give the final approval.

The National Buildings Construction Corporation (NBCC) has been entrusted by the top court with completing stalled projects of .

On March 21, the top court had said its number one priority is to ensure that every Amrapali home buyer gets a flat.

The top court was told by the court receiver, that initially they had issued a list of around 8,000 flats which were not claimed by any buyer or which were booked under bogus names or were undervalued.

On February 21, the NBCC had assured the top court that the construction of stalled projects of will be of good quality and independent experts will assess the safety and quality standards.

The NBCC had earlier told the top court that at present, 10 projects in Noida and 12 projects in Greater Noida are under execution involving 45,957 units with a sanctioned project cost of Rs 8,025.78 crore.

The apex court in its July 23, 2019, verdict had cracked the whip on errant builders for breaching the trust reposed by home buyers and ordered the cancellation of the registration of Amrapali Group under real estate law RERA and ousted it from prime properties in the NCR by nixing the land leases.

Former group directors of Amrapali -- Anil Kumar Sharma, Shiv Priya, and Ajay Kumar -- are in prison on the top court's order.

The court had directed a probe by the Enforcement Directorate into alleged money laundering by realtors, providing relief to over 42,000 home buyers of Amrapali Group with the verdict.

The top court, which is trying to bring in funds for the stalled projects, had then directed the state-run NBCC to complete the stalled projects of Amrapali Group.

(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.)
Top airline bosses agreed on many things at the Wings India airshow in Hyderabad last month: taxes should be reduced and airport capacity must be ramped up. One thing they couldnt settle upon: whether unfair competition is keeping fares artificially low in whats already a brutally competitive market.



Sunil Bhaskaran, the chief executive officer of AirAsia India, was upfront. Indian is suffering from irresponsible competition thats kept fares low despite high taxes and fuel prices, he said. Bhaskaran didnt single out who he was referring to. But the one carrier capable of making the entire market dance to its tune is IndiGo, Indias largest airline.





An IndiGo jet prepares to land at Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport in Kolkata. Photo: Bloomberg

IndiGo, operated by InterGlobe Ltd., controls more than 50% of the domestic market. Nine other compete for the rest, giving the fast-growing low-cost carrier commanding power over fares. Competition is set to heat up even further, with two other preparing to launch services later this year in a market where tickets are often sold below operational costs -- a situation that has led to the demise of several high-profile carriers.

IndiGo, however, is unperturbed by criticism as well as calls from smaller rival SpiceJet Ltd. for to work together to increase fares, even if that results in a slight dip in bookings.

Im sorry, but this is not about working together to raise fares, Ronojoy Dutta, IndiGos CEO, said in response to a suggestion that other airlines can increase fares if IndiGo takes the lead. Look, ultimately IndiGos strategy is to provide superior customer service and get a disproportionate part of the revenue, Dutta said, to laughter and applause.





Ronojoy Dutta. Photo: Bloomberg

IndiGos vow to remain very, very competitive going forward is bad for everyone, including the local affiliate of Singapore Airlines Ltd., IPO-bound Go First and formerly state-run Air India Ltd. Cut-throat pricing has already forced many including Kingfisher Airlines Ltd. and Jet Airways India Ltd. to fold unceremoniously or go through court-run bankruptcy processes.

IndiGo, the worlds biggest customer for Airbus SEs best-selling A320neo jets, is a rare exception, managing to make money while keeping a tight lid on costs. Its also inked lucrative long-term maintenance and engineering contracts that were negotiated as part of large aircraft orders.

Its got to do with the sheer size they are. IndiGo is a gigantic revenue machine, said Mark Martin, founder of Dubai-based Martin Consulting LLC, which advises the industry. Naivety and ignorance can be devastating and wreak havoc in the system and this isnt a good time for IndiGo to display bravado, he said. At some point IndiGo will have to raise fares or balance their fares to some degree.

Sydney-based CAPA Centre for Aviation said last year that it has run out of words to describe the state of Indian airlines, arguing the industry is standing on the edge of a cliff. Assuming oil at $70 a barrel and a rupee-dollar exchange rate of 75, CAPA forecast Indian carriers could lose about $8 billion in the two years through March 2022.

Brent oil is now trading at more than $100 a barrel and the Indian rupee tumbled to a record low 76.9812 per dollar last month.

There are some signs of fares rising in recent times, but thats got more to do with surging oil prices because of the war in Ukraine. For April, tickets from New Delhi to Mumbai -- one of the worlds busiest domestic routes -- are selling at levels 42% higher than before the war, according to online travel agency Yatra.com.

At the same conference, SpiceJet Chairman Ajay Singh, whos credited with turning around a carrier that almost failed after running out of cash, said higher oil prices present a tremendous opportunity for airlines to earn more revenue. But he also said he got messages from customers complaining SpiceJets fare hikes were extortionate.





Ajay Singh. Photo: Bloomberg

The problem is price-sensitive passengers, who are now used to notoriously cheap fares, and that mindset has to change, Singh said.

We need to be very cognizant of the fact that the aviation sector has suffered huge losses as its a chronically-ill industry, and I dont know what the hell Vinay Dube is trying to do by booking more airplanes and creating a new airline at this time, Singh said, referring to the chief executive of upcoming carrier Akasa, which is backed by billionaire Rakesh Jhunjhunwala.

Aviation fuel prices in India have been perennially high and are moving higher, which will either compress margins further, limiting cash flow that should be used to repay Covid-incurred debt or forcing price increases, which may crimp travel demand, according to Robert Mann, the New York-based head of aviation consulting firm R.W. Mann & Co.

That demand loss will also imperil the carriers with the least available liquidity and some will fail, said Mann. It will be an interesting decade in Indian aviation.
Embassy Office Parks REIT has raised Rs 1,000 crore through five-year bonds to fund its operations, market sources said. The coupon rate on these bonds is 7.35 per cent.

A Investment Trust (REIT) is an entity created with the main purpose to invest funds in the operation or ownership of the to further generate income for investors.

These bonds floated by carry AAA rating, reflecting the trusts comfortable loan-to-value (LTV) ratio, which is supported by a cap on incremental borrowings and is driven by low debt and strong debt protection metrics.

is registered as an irrevocable trust under the Indian Trust Act of 1882 and as a REIT with SEBIs Investment Trust Regulations of 2014. The REIT is sponsored by BRE Mauritius Investments (part of the Blackstone group) and Embassy Property Development (part of the Embassy group).

Meanwhile, Torrent Power raised Rs 600 crore through medium-term bonds with maturities ranging from two to five years. The bonds carry a coupon of 6.2 per cent for two years, 6.70 per cent for three years, 7.10 per cent for four years, and 7.45 per cent for five years. In February, CRISIL had upgraded ratings for Torrent Powers debentures from AA to AA+, reflecting the companys continued strong profitability.
studio Bombay Play has raised $7 million in a round led by .

Other participants in the round included existing investors Lumikai Fund, Leo Capital and PlayCo, and new investors Winzo, AdvantEdge VC and AMEA Venture, among others.

Bombay Play is a game publisher pioneering the hypersocial genre and has developed popular games like Dice Merge Puzzle, Card Party, and Daily Word Puzzle that have over 40 million players worldwide.

Oliver Jones, CEO of Bombay Play, said: Since the inception of Bombay Play, our aim has been to create games that you can play with your friends seamlessly. Our teams ambition is to disrupt the current casual games market with hypersocial game designs by leveraging our cross platform distribution channels.

The company has now raised over $9.5 million of capital in total since its Pre-Series A round in 2020.

Vani Kola, Managing Director, Kalaari Capital, who led this round, said, We were highly impressed with what Oliver and Abhas have been able to achieve and they are definitely one of the most experienced entrepreneurs in the country today. We are very excited about how they are disrupting the casual gaming industry with their hypersocial model and are delighted to partner with them in this journey."

Founded in 2018 by Oliver Jones and Abhas Saroha, Bombay Play is currently headquartered in Bangalore and has been growing 3X annually since the beginning of its operations, the company said.
India's largest private lender Bank will merge with housing finance firm Ltd, the said on Monday.

As part of the deal, shareholders of Ltd will receive 42 shares of the bank for 25 shares held. Existing shareholders of HDFC Ltd will own 41 per cent of . Shares held by the housing finance company in the lender will be extinguished, making a full-fledged public company, Reuters reported.

The subsidiaries and associates of HDFC Ltd will shift to HDFC Bank, the said in a regulatory filing. "The mergersubject to regulatory approval--is coming together of equals. The customer will be the biggest gainer," said Keki Mistry, vice chairman and chief executive officer of HDFC, in an investor call.

Deepak Parekh, Chairman of HDFC Limited, called the arrangement "a merger of equals".

"Over the last few years, various regulations for banks and NBFCs have been harmonised, thereby enabling the potential merger. Further, the resulting larger balance sheet would allow underwriting of large ticket infrastructure loans, accelerate the pace of credit growth in the economy, boost affordable housing and increase the quantum of credit to the priority sector, including credit to the agriculture sector, said Parekh, according to moneycontrol.com.

Rajnish Kumar, a former chairperson of State Bank of India, told CNBC-TV18 the combined entity will give "advantage of cost efficiencies".
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
Palestinian PM calls for international initiative to fill the current political vacuum

Xinhua) 11:21, April 04, 2022

RAMALLAH, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Ishtaye on Sunday said there is a need for an international initiative to fill the current political vacuum in light of Israel's destruction of the possibility of establishing a Palestinian state.

An official statement said that Ishtaye made the remarks during a meeting with the Swiss envoy to the Middle East Wolfgang Amadeus Brulhart.

During the meeting held in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Ishtaye accused the Israeli government of accelerating settlements building, confiscating land, and demolishing Palestinian homes in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

According to the statement, Ishtaye said that "it is necessary to compel Israel to abide by international law and respect the signed accords and treaties," adding that international law "must be indivisible and applicable everywhere and to all."

The Palestinians are looking forward to having a different approach from the international community towards finding a serious and quick solution in dealing with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Israeli settlement is the thorniest issue in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and one of the main reasons for the disruption of the last round of direct peace negotiations between the two sides in 2014.

In the June 1967 Middle East war, Israel occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which are claimed by the Palestinians, and has controlled them ever since.

Since then, the Palestinians have been seeking self-determination in a bid to establish a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
The defence ministry on Monday said import of defence equipment from a foreign industry, irrespective of value and type of acquisition, should only be an exception, and it will require prior approval at the top level.

Minister of State for Defence Ajay Bhatt, replying to a question in the Rajya Sabha, said the approval for such import has to be accorded by the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) or by the defence minister.

He said an amendment incorporating the provision in the Defence Procurement Procedure (DAP), 2020 was approved by the DAC last month with an aim to provide further impetus to the domestic defence industry.

The DAC headed by the defence minister is the highest decision-making body of the ministry on procurement.

"It has been decided that any import of defence equipment/sourcing from foreign industry, irrespective of value and type of acquisition should only be an exception requiring specific approval of DAC/Raksha Mantri," Bhatt said.

He also said that the requirement 'Integrity Pact Bank Guarantee' (IPBG) has been dispensed with to reduce financial burden on Indian industry involved in supply of defence equipment.

"Earnest Money Deposit (EMD) has been introduced as a bid security and pre-contract integrity pact (PCIP) cover till the conclusion of the contract," he said.

"Post conclusion of contract, Performance cum Warranty Bank Guarantee(PWBG) to provide the PCIP cover. For projects up to Rs 100 crore and for MSMEs and Start-ups, EMD requirement has been waived," he added.

In the last few years, the government has taken a series of measures to promote domestic defence production.

India is one of the largest importers of arms globally. According to estimates, the Indian armed forces are projected to spend around USD 130 billion (one billion is equal to Rs 100 crore) in capital procurement in the next five years.

The government now wants to reduce dependence on imported military platforms and has decided to support domestic defence manufacturing.

The Defence Ministry has set a goal of a turnover of USD 25 billion (Rs 1.75 lakh crore) in defence manufacturing in the next five years, including an export target of USD 5 billion (Rs 35,000 crore) worth of military hardware.

(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.)
Rashtra Samithi (TRS) working president K.T. Rama Rao on Monday claimed that can be lowered by at least 30 per cent if the Central government does away with cesses.

He remarked that the fuel price hike for 12th time in 14 days outdoes any torture. "Read about Chinese torture only in books. This consecutive 80 paisa fuel price hike, 12th hike in 14 days outdoes any torture & a record of sorts," tweeted Rama Rao.

"Why hesitate to debate in Parliament on crude oil prices, the cesses that we can do away with to reduce prices," he asked Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.

KTR, as the state minister is popularly known, claimed that can be lowered by at least 30 per cent if the Central government does away with cesses.

"Any to those who rant about how states can reduce state taxes, in we have not enhanced VAT in the last 7 years (2015 Jan)," he wrote.

"Our demand is to do away with indiscriminate Cesses imposed by NDA Govt which will lower by 30 per cent at least," he added.

Meanwhile, in another tweet, the minister for information technology and industries called for a healthy competition between Hyderabad and Bengaluru. He was responding to a tweet by Karnataka Congress chief D. K. Shivakumar.

"I accept your challenge. By the end of 2023, with Congress back in power in Karnataka, we will restore the glory of Bengaluru as India's best city," Shivakumar tweeted while reacting to KTR's 'pack your bags and move to Hyderabad' suggestion to Khatabook founder Ravish Naresh, who recently flagged bad roads, power cuts, poor quality water supply and other problems in the Karnataka capital.

"I don't know much about politics of Karnataka & who will win but challenge accepted," KTR replied to Congress leader.

"Let Hyderabad & Bengaluru compete healthily on creating jobs for our youngsters & prosperity for our great nation. Let's focus on infra, IT&BT, not on Halal & Hijab," wrote KTR referring to the controversies in the neighbouring state.

--IANS

ms/shb/

(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 continues to remain the highest receiver of the FDI, finance minister Nirmala Sitaraman told on Monday while replying to a question by Congress member .

"The FIIs and FPIs would come and go. But, today the Indian retail investors have proven that even if they come and go any shock that may come in is now taken care of because of the shock absorbing capacity that the Indian retailers have brought into the Indian market," she said during Question Hour.

"We in the House should stand up and appreciate the Indian retailer who has invested a lot of confidence in the markets today in India," she added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, who had to postpone his trip to India after contracting COVID-19, on Monday discussed global and regional issues in a telephonic conversation with his Indian counterpart who enquired about his health.

"It was great speaking to you my friend, @NarendraModi. I look forward to seeing you soon!" Bennett tweeted while replying to a tweet from Prime Minister Modi.

The two "discussed global and regional issues, including the Iranian nuclear issue, Israeli PM's media adviser said in a statement here.

It was the first call between the two leaders after Bennett had to postpone his trip to India scheduled between April 3 and 5 after testing positive for COVID-19.

The two leaders agreed to work on another date for the visit which comes at a time when they are celebrating 30 years of establishment of diplomatic ties.

It was not clear when the trip would take place.

"Prime Minister Bennett thanked Prime Minister Modi for his condemnation of the recent terrorist attacks in Israel, and for expressing sorrow, in his name and on behalf of the Indian people, for the loss of life as a result of those events, the Israeli official added.

Eleven Israelis were killed in three separate attacks recently in different parts of the country over a seven day period.

The India visit of Bennett who became prime minister in June last year was also aimed at expanding the cooperation between the two countries in the areas of innovation and technology, security and cyber, and agriculture and climate change.

"I am delighted to pay my first official visit to India at the invitation of my friend, Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi, and together we will continue leading the way for our countries' relations," Bennett had said while announcing his visit last month.

"Modi restarted relations between India and Israel, and this is of historic importance. The relations between our two unique cultures - the Indian culture and the Jewish culture - are deep, and they rely on deep appreciation and meaningful collaborations," he had said.

The two leaders had first met on the sidelines of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow in November last year during which they reviewed the bilateral ties besides exchanging views about expanding cooperation in areas of high-technology and innovation.

India and Israel elevated their bilateral relations to a strategic partnership during the historic visit of Prime Minister Modi to Israel in July 2017.

Since then, the relationship between the two countries has focused on expanding knowledge-based partnership, which includes collaboration in innovation and research, including boosting the 'Make in India' initiative.

Prime Minister Bennett has earlier described the "deep relationship" between India and Israel as one coming from the heart and not being about interests and urged Prime Minister Modi to work together to take the bilateral ties to "a whole new level".

Though India recognised Israel in 1950, full diplomatic relations were established in 1992.

(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.)
Madhya Pradesh, in the last 15 years, has traversed the path from a "BIMARU" state to emerge as a developing state, and will soon figure in the list of the developed states of India, Chief Minister said on Monday.

Launching the first edition of the " Sushashan and Development Report (MPSDR) 2022", prepared by the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Good Governance and Policy Analysis (AIGGPA), in presence of Union Ministers Jyotiraditya Scindia, Jitendra Singh, Narendra Tomar, various ambassadors, and UN agency officials, he said that his state is the fastest growing state in the country with a growth rate of 19.70 per cent.

"The state contribution in Indian economy has increased from 2.6 per cent to 3.6 per cent. We are working under the guidance of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi. We used to be called a 'BIMARU' state, if we see the journey of 15 years, has become a developing state out of Bimaru state," he said.

Chouhan noted that the special efforts are being made for wheat to be recognised across the world, while the state is number one in the production of pulses and oilseeds, and has outpaced Punjab and Haryana in rice production.

About the state government efforts for encouraging agricultural production, he said that the increase in irrigatedn area is behind the bumper production of crops in Madhya Pradesh. Seven and a half lakhs areas were irrigated which has been increased to 43 lakh hectares in the state, he said.

Chouhan, however, said that there are some areas like education and health where more work needs to be done.

The Madhya Pradesh Sushashan and Development Report 2022 is the first of its kind document that brings forth the unique governance practices of Madhya Pradesh which includes community engagement and participation, robust policy measures, efficient delivery systems, evidence-based decision-making and comprehensive monitoring. It aims to document and discuss the features of good governance, its monitoring framework, and its implications in key sectors in the state.

The MPSDR 2022 comprises 12 chapters categorised into five sections. The first section on Good Governance comprises two chapters including an introduction to good governance and various initiatives undertaken by the state over the last 15 years. Some of the initiatives taken by the Madhya Pradesh government in this context includes the establishment of the School of Good Governance and Policy Analysis, Madhya Pradesh Public Service Guarantee Act, 2010, the Atma Nirbhar Madhya Pradesh Roadmap, Samadhan Online, CM Helpline, Lok Sewa Kendra, Ankur Mission, Jan Sunvai Programme, ease of doing business, etc. have been detailed out in this section.

--IANS

avr/vd

(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 Payments Bank has not yet appointed a firm which will conduct an audit of its information technology (IT) systems, minister of state for finance Bhagwat Karad said in the on Monday.

"The Reserve Bank of India (rbi) has further informed that the Payments Bank Limited has not yet appointed the IT audit firm to conduct a comprehensive System Audit of the IT system of the bank," Karad said.

On March 11, the Reserve Bank of India had barred SoftBank-backed Payments Bank from adding new customers due to likely gaps in its technology systems.

The RBI is keen on building a failsafe payments system in India where transactions are being increasingly done digitally.
President on Monday arrived in Amsterdam on the final leg of his two-nation visit - the first presidential to the after 34 years - during which he hold discussions with top leadership of the European country.

President Kovind arrived here from Turkmenistan where held talks with his Turkmen counterpart Serdar Berdimuhamedov and the two sides agreed to expand bilateral trade and energy cooperation to further strengthen the multifaceted partnership. He is the first Indian President to visit independent Turkmenistan.

"Goedemiddag Nederland! President arrives in Amsterdam on the final part of his two-nation visit. The presidential visit to the comes after 34 years since the visit of President Venkataraman in 1988," the president's office tweeted.

During his visit to the from April 4 to 7 at the invitation of King Willem Alexander and Queen Maxima, President Kovind will hold discussions with them and Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

His visit assumes significance as India and the Netherlands are celebrating 75 years of the establishment of diplomatic relations in 2022.

In 2021, during the Virtual Summit between the Prime Ministers of the two countries, a Strategic Partnership on Water was launched to enhance the level of engagement between the two sides in this important sector.

Cooperation in sectors such as agriculture, health, urban development, science and technology are other important pillars of the bilateral relationship.

The Netherlands is also an important economic and commercial partner of India with the country being India's fourth largest FDI source. It also hosts the largest Indian diaspora in continental Europe.

(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 Monday completed nucleic acid tests of its over 26 million residents, the largest exercise of its kind in any city in the country and perhaps the world to stem COVID-19 surge, while another city Suzhou reported a new variant of .

had ordered mass antigen tests followed by nucleic acid tests on Monday for all 26.30 million residents of its largest city amid efforts to contain the recent resurgence of COVID-19 cases in the metropolis.

city has completed "mission impossible" of sampling as of around 7 pm, ahead of schedule, according to city health authorities, state-run Global Times reported.

The aim of this nucleic acid testing in is to help recover the city's dynamic zero-COVID state, experts told the daily.

Also, a new variant of COVID-19 has been identified in Suzhou, Global Times reported.

Suzhou in east China's Jiangsu Province, which borders Shanghai, discovered a confirmed disease patient infected with a mutation VOC/Omicron variant BA.1.1, unidentified in previously found strains worldwide, posing new threats to the already dangerous situation in the region, the report said.

Like in Wuhan where first emerged in December 2019, mobilised about 38,000 medical workers from across the country to aid Shanghai in the fight against the Omicron variant, the largest number of nationwide medical aid since Wuhan in early 2020, official media here reported.

When the coronavirus engulfed Wuhan, had mobilised thousands of medical personnel from all over the country and built special facilities to cope up with the most contagious virus.

A similar effort is being made in Shanghai where the citizens have been ordered to take twin tests.

A total of 15 province-level regions have sent medical teams to help Shanghai to combat the city's worst outbreak since 2020, according to Chinese media reports.

Most of the medical staff have arrived in Shanghai by military planes and trains to help with the mass nucleic acid testing, while others will help ease the burden on staff at makeshift hospitals.

China dispatched similar teams to Hong Kong which is also battling a massive outbreak.

Experts and residents also believe Shanghai's situation is completely different from Wuhan two years ago, recognizing apparently improved diagnostic capacity and efficiency during the current wave, as well as more diversified, pragmatic and targeted treatment methods, the report said.

In what was stated to be a big surge of Omicron cases, China reported 13,228 cases on Sunday - the highest during the recent outbreak.

Of the local confirmed cases reported on Sunday, 836 were in Jilin, 425 in Shanghai, and 16 in Fujian, China's health commission said.

Besides, a total of 39 new imported COVID-19 cases were reported across the mainland, compared with 51 in the previous day.

The number of COVID-19 patients currently undergoing treatment stood at 25,724, including 54 in critical conditions, it said.

There was no new COVID-19 death and the toll has remained unchanged at 4,638.

Sunday also saw 11,862 new asymptomatic cases on the Chinese mainland including 8,581 in Shanghai and 2,742 in Jilin.

(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 auction of spectrum will be held on schedule and within the stipulated timeline, Minister for Communications Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Monday.

His affirmation comes at a time when regulator Trai's recommendations on spectrum pricing and other nuances, which were widely expected to come by March-end, have spilled over by a few days to early April.

Asked if auction will be held as per schedule, Vaishnaw said, "absolutely".

He was speaking to reporters on the sidelines of an event -- 2nd national conference on cyber crime investigation and digital forensics.

The spectrum auctions are slated to be conducted in 2022, to facilitate the rollout of 5G mobile services within 2022-23, by private providers.

Trai's views on 5G auction and related nuances are crucial since they will serve as building blocks, and set the pace for the auctions and subsequent rollout of the fifth-generation services that will usher in ultra-high-speed and spawn new-age services and business models.

On March 29, a senior Trai official had told PTI that the recommendations (on 5G spectrum pricing and other modalities) will come out within the next 7-10 days.

The regulator, in November last year, had released a detailed consultation paper to discuss threadbare the modalities for auction of spectrum across multiple bands, including pricing, quantum and other conditions -- preparing the groundwork for upcoming 5G auctions.

Trai's comprehensive consultation paper ran into 207 pages and posed 74 questions for industry-wide discussion, touching on crucial aspects like valuation and reserve price of 5G spectrum, quantum of the spectrum, block size, eligibility conditions for participation in the auction, rollout obligations, spectrum cap, and surrender of the spectrum.

Norms will also be worked out for new frequencies such as 526-698 MHz and millimetre band that is 24.25 - 28.5 GHz, in addition to bands like 700 MHz, 800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, 2100 MHz, 2300 MHz, 2500 MHz, and 3300-3670 MHz.

As the country gears up for the mega auction, the industry players have been making an aggressive pitch for lowering spectrum pricing.

Telecom service providers are conducting 5G trials in Delhi, Mumbai, Jamnagar, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Lucknow, Gurugram, Gandhinagar, Chandigarh, Pune and Varanasi including urban, semi-urban and rural areas.

(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 palm oil imports jumped 21% in March from the previous month as traders moved to secure alternatives to sunflower oil that can no longer be bought from Ukraine, four dealers told Reuters.

A poor soyoil crop in South America, meanwhile has limited India's ability to rely on that edible oil as a substitute for Ukrainian sunflower oil.

Indian demand contributed to the palm oil price, as indicated by the futures contract, reaching an all-time record of 7,268 ringgit per tonne on March 9, although it has since fallen to 5,741 ringgit per tonne.

In March, 550,000 tonnes of palm oil landed in India, up from 454,794 tonnes in February, said a Mumbai-based dealer with a global trading firm.

Even in April, palm oil imports will remain robust, as sunflower oil imports are expected to fall because of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, said Govindbhai Patel, managing director of trading firm G.G. Patel & Nikhil Research Co.

More than 90% of India's imported sunflower oil usually comes from Ukraine and Russia, mainly Ukraine.

India imported 210,000 tonnes of sunflower oil in March, up from 152,220 tonnes in February, helped by the arrival of a few ships that had left Ukraine before the war, Patel said.

Now that Ukrainian sunflower oil supplies have ceased, Indian refiners have been trying to import more from Russia and Argentina, said Sandeep Bajoria, chief executive of Sunvin Group, a vegetable oil brokerage and consultancy.

"But there are limitations. We cannot import more than 100,000 tonnes per month in Ukraine's absence. Demand is there for 200,000 tonnes," Bajoria said.

India has contracted for 45,000 tonnes of Russian sunflower oil at a record high price for shipments in April as edible oil prices in the local market have surged because of the cessation of Ukrainian supply.

The Solvent Extractors' Association of India, a trade body based in the commercial capital of Mumbai, is likely to publish March's import figure in mid-April.

India imported about 310,000 tonnes of soyoil in March, 18% less than in February, dealers said.

India buys palm oil from top producers Indonesia and Malaysia and soyoil mainly from Argentina and Brazil.

(Reporting by Rajendra Jadhav; Editing by Bradley Perrett)

(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.)
Candy Bomber lessons for Ukraine  and daily life By Paul Driessen

web posted April 4, 2022 The COVID pandemic severely disrupted schools, commerce, and public and private services of every description. Russias invasion of Ukraine and the Wests focus on the manmade climate crisis continue to drive energy and food prices ever higher. Western energy, healthcare and national security policies are increasingly exposed as weak, confused and feckless. In Europe they are hugely exacerbated by the needs of millions of Ukrainian refugees trying to escape Vladimir Putins brutality by fleeing to Europe, the UK, America, Turkey and Israel. Practical solutions are essential. But we dont have to address or solve this or any entire crisis with one approach. Successful interventions can come in small, inexpensive, incremental packages, rather than massive government programs, prohibitively expensive prescription-only drugs, or total transformations of our energy and economy. U.S. Air Force Colonel Gail Seymour Halvorsen understood that. If he saw these women and children fleeing Russian aggression, hed probably airdrop chocolates and chewing gum. Really. Because thats what he did in 1948, when Joe Stalin blockaded West Berlin, deep inside East Germany, to freeze and starve its people and intimidate the Allies into submission. This history is real and inspirational for me. I was born in 1948. My father served three years in WWIIs Pacific Theater, and many years afterward in the Army Reserves as a command sergeant major. I spent time in East and West Berlin in 1969, where I saw the stark contrasts between the two sectors, in recovery levels, prosperity and freedoms. West Berlin was already quite dynamic and prosperous. It had rebuilt, preserving Kaiser Wilhelm Gedaechtnis Kirche as a memorial to wartime horrors, and turning 98,000,000 cubic yards of rubble into the 260-foot-tall Teufelsberg (Devils Mountain) and ski slope. East Berlin was personified by spies and repression, Soviet-style apartments, and restored historic buildings that were just facades with acres of rubble behind them. East Berliners were doomed to 44 years of Russian domination, following the devastation, rapes and butchery inflicted by Soviet troops in reprisal for Nazi devastation, rapes and butchery in Russia. West Berliners didnt love American-British-French rule, but they wanted nothing of Russian rule. The Allies responded to Stalins threats with the 1948-49 Berlin Airlift. With planes landing every 90 seconds at its peak, the airlift delivered nearly 2.5 million tons of food, medicines, coal and other supplies, averted a humanitarian disaster, and kept West Berlin alive and free. Col. Halvorsen flew some of those C-47 and C-54 cargo planes. He became known as the Berlin Candy Bomber and Chocolate Pilot, because he went beyond the call of duty to launch Operation Little Vittles. He began dropping candy bars and chewing gum attached to miniature parachutes, to lift the spirits of Berlins children during the airlift. With his commanders support  and thanks to the generosity of American families and companies that donated gum, chocolate and handkerchiefs  little Berliners shared 23 tons of candy dropped on 250,000 tiny homemade parachutes. Halverson had ingenuity, empathy and common sense in abundance. He didnt have modern research to support his Little Vittles concept. He just knew instinctively that the candy drops would help. Incredibly, or perhaps not, recent scientific studies have found that chewing gum actually can help reduce stress and keep anxiety and panic at bay, for kids and adults alike. Some therapists even recommend that schools and parents keep little  coping tool boxes  handy and stock them with gum and chocolate for anxious kids  preferably sugar-free, of course. Chocolate and chewing gum are certainly not the answer to every stressful situation, but they may help in many. They might even calm nerves a little and bring a few smiles among kids and parents enduring Putins fury, fleeing from it, coping with refugee life in strange lands, or praying he wont obliterate their maternity ward, school, home or bomb shelter. An even more amazing study has come out of the Texas Childrens Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine. The researchers colleagues must have thought them daft when they proposed to assess the effectiveness of xylitol-sweetened chewing gum in preventing preterm birth among pregnant poor rural East African women who faced high risks of premature birth. But they pressed ahead, believing that simple, accessible, affordable, even tasty healthcare possibilities should at least be investigated, and not rejected out of hand. Moreover, theres a clear, well-known connection between the oral health benefits of sugar-free gum (SFG), the impact of good oral health on human biological systems, and the correlation between periodontitis and premature birth. Lo and behold, they discovered that the gum actually cut preterm births nearly by a quarter! Far fewer babies were born too early or too small. There is some real science behind the choice of xylitol chewing gum to improve oral health, said lead author Dr. Kjersti Aagaard, and our novel application to improving birth outcomes is exciting. It certainly is, especially in a world where governments, charitable foundations and companies routinely spend billions or even trillions of dollars, pounds and euros on fancy, complicated programs that often invite waste and corruption. (For other benefits of chewing SFG, check this out, and this and this .) As economist and author of The White Mans Burden William Easterly famously observed, during five decades the West spent $2.3 trillion in foreign aid to poor countries  but proved unable to distribute $4 mosquito nets to help prevent malaria in Africa. As I have often noted, the West was equally unable to get behind spraying inexpensive DDT on the walls and doorways of cinderblock and mud-and-thatch homes, to keep deadly malaria-infected mosquitoes out for six months or more with a single spray. At $41 per pregnancy, Dr. Aagaards chewing gum is one of those humble but ingenious and fantastically effective interventions that ought to be contemplated and implemented early and often. Its clearly a product of the Chocolate Pilot School of Problem Solving. But does it have to be sugar-free gum and candy? Sugar-free wasnt even available in 1948. And to suppose Berlin or Ukrainian moms should worry about tooth cavities under their dire circumstances is as preposterous as saying John Kerry would worry that Putins butchery might distract the world from the existential threat of fossil-fuel-driven climate change. Still, sugar-free is definitely preferable. Col. Halvorsen was right to think that simple solutions may offer real answers, especially in a crisis when lives are at stake. As we ponder the war, our stretched resources and Europes humanitarian crisis, we should keep that in mind. Not every remedy has to be national or global in scope; not every program has to be expensive or complicated to be effective. Common sense and can-do ingenuity can go a long way  and both are resources we have in greater abundance than do our totalitarian adversaries. Following his Berlin exploits, the  Candy Bomber  spent 25 years advocating for children in conflict zones and performing candy drops in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Albania, Iraq and elsewhere. After logging over 8,000 flying hours, he retired and went on to help develop reusable manned spacecraft, become a college dean, and serve as a Mormon missionary in London and St. Petersburg, Russia. Among his many awards was the Congressional Gold Medal. Col. Halvorsen remained a hero in Germany, as well. When he died this year at age 101, a week before Russia invaded Ukraine, Berlin mayor Francisca Giffey said his deeply human act has never been forgotten. The Allied Museum in Berlin called him an immensely charismatic and lovable person. We salute him, his legacy, and the concept of simple yet effective solutions. Paul Driessen is senior policy advisor for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow ( www.CFACT.org ) and author of articles and books on energy, climate change, human rights and environmental issues. Home
Indian mills have signed contracts to export 7.2 million tonnes of in the 2021/22 marketing year without government subsidies, a leading trade body said on Monday.

Mills have already dispatched around 5.7 million tonnes since the start of the marketing year on Oct. 1, the Indian Mills Association (ISMA) said in a statement.

Mills have so far produced 31 million tonnes of in the current year, up from last year's 27.87 million tonnes, the trade body said.

(Reporting by Rajendra Jadhav; editing by Jason Neely)

(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.)
Try booking a room at a five-star hotel in Mumbai and you could be in for a disappointment. You may have to settle in for a four- or even a three-star. But since those will not be easy on pocket either, be prepared to fork out more.

Most of the premium business hotels operated by the marquee brands are all booked by the teams of the Indian Premier League for a month as the matches are being held in two cities  Mumbai and Pune. It isn't IPL alone. A full-fledged return of some of the big ticket conferences like HICSA (Hotel Industry Conference South Asia) EXCON 2021, ...
The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has rolled out an aggressive target and timeline to investigate tax evasion matters, especially those involving undisclosed foreign assets. The Cabinet in has resigned succumbing to pressure from protests over the country's economic crisis. Scroll further down for more on these and other top stories this morning.



Income in US on I-T radar in FY23, non-disclosure to invite action



Indians having undisclosed income in the United States (US) may face proceedings under Black Money (Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets) and Imposition of Tax Act, 2015, this financial year. Also, those named in global leaks may be searched, show-caused, and prosecuted, according to the FY23 internal action plan of the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT). Read more



India is open for biz; to expand global footprint, says Piyush Goyal



Since February, India has inked two key trade pacts  with the United Arab Emirates and Australia  in line with its revamped foreign trade strategy. Piyush Goyal, Union minister for commerce and industry, tells Shreya Nandi in an interview that this indicates Indias openness to business, and that the country wants to expand its international footprint. He also said the government will soon find a solution to payments-related challenges being faced by exporters amid the Russia-Ukraine war. Read more





Sri Lankan Cabinet resigns amid protests over economic crisis; PM to stay

Sri Lanka's Cabinet of Ministers resigned with immediate effect late on Sunday night, as the country experienced its worst economic crisis of all time. Speaking to reporters, Education Minister and Leader of the House, Dinesh Gunawardena said the Cabinet ministers handed over their resignations to Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa. Read more

As EVs catch fire, batteries remain at the heart of the problem





Over the past week or so, images of electric two-wheelers going up in flames have sparked concern over the safety of these vehicles. And days after an Ola Electric scooter caught fire and caused a social media uproar about the growth-at-all-costs nature of unicorn companies, two-wheelers of two more electric vehicle (EV) startups  Okinawa and Pure  suffered the same fate.

Read more



exchanges feel pinch as India's new tax regime starts





Domestic exchanges have witnessed a sharp fall in volumes on the first three days of April following the implementation of the new tax regime. The fall in volumes is between 15 and 55 per cent among various crypto exchanges. Even the number of visitors on these exchanges has fallen. Read more
Jio Institute on Monday announced the appointment of Prof. Guruswami Ravichandran from California Institute of Technology (Caltech) as the Provost to further strengthen its academic leadership.

Jio Institute is a multi-disciplinary higher institute set up as a philanthropic initiative by Reliance Industries Ltd. and Reliance Foundation.

He will join Jio Institute as its founding Provost and professor of engineering from July 1. Prof. Ravichandran has served as the Otis Booth Leadership Chair of the Division of Engineering and Applied Science at Caltech.

He holds a Ph.D. in Engineering and M.S. in Engineering both from Brown University and a B.E. (honors) degree in Mechanical Engineering from Regional Engineering College (NIT), Trichy.

It gives me pleasure to welcome Dr. Ravichandran in the Jio Institute and Reliance family. I am sure we all will immensely benefit from his vast experience in academia and that he will accelerate our mission of preparing the next generation of global leaders, who can contribute to the advancement of India and the world. With faculty drawn from top-notch institutions across the world, Jio Institute is envisioned to be global while retaining its Indian essence, said Nita Ambani, Founder Chairperson, Reliance Foundation.

Jio Institute has also announced admissions to its Post-Graduate (PG) Certificate Programmes in the emerging areas of artificial intelligence & data science and digital media & marketing communications.
After 45 years of housing and nine million homes provided to Indians, we had to find a home for ourselves. We have found it within our own family and in our own bank, said Deepak Parekh, chairman-HDFC Ltd while announcing the long speculated merger with its offspring, the 28-year-old .

The we that Parekh referred to is a many-million-strong family, and includes the housing companys employees, shareholders, and customers. Its said that anything more than two is a crowd, but a lack of togetherness will not be an issue, Parekh made that clear upfront: This is a merger of equals.

It must truly have been an emotional moment for Parekh. Fifty-five years ago, Hasmukh Thakordas Parekh set up HDFC Ltd, which went on to become a marquee name in India Inc. His nephew  the Parekh of our times  had the foresight to set up when the first set of private bank licences were issued in the early 1990s.

Come to think of it: What would HDFC Ltds fate have been had Parekh not set up a bank. It would have been just a very successful home-loan vendor. And, it might have been on the lookout to enter a bigger league, like many other non-bank financial companies (NBFCs).

For, its hard to find another instance of a mono-line business entity (HDFC Ltd) morphing into a financial conglomerate anywhere in the world during this period. Yes, you had a GE Capital and Jack Welch, but thats history. Even as comparable mergers go, the HDFC Ltd- deal is far removed from the ICICI-ICICI Bank merger in 2001, basically an exit route for the parent whose business model was well beyond its expiry date.

Incidentally, it was H T Parekh who took ICICI to dizzying heights during the era of development financial institutions (DFIs)  he was chairman and managing director from 1972-1976.

Look at the talent pool he created. While Aditya Puri and his A-team made HDFC Bank what it is today, what if Parekh had made a wrong call? Many private from the 1990s had hit more than an air-pocket, says a senior banker close to Parekh.

Another senior banker said: The culture that Parekh fostered at HDFC Ltd is also familial. If you have stayed on for the first five years, its most likely you would also retire from there. And off the top of the mind, its Keki Mistry and Renu Karnad Sood who fit such a profile.

The other newsmaker is the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das.

Theres nothing in the regulatory architecture that was a barrier to the HDFC Ltd-HDFC Bank transaction. Yes, there is the issue of forbearance on the reserve front  the cash reserve ratio, statutory liquidity ratio and priority sector targets  for the new entity. (That said, the effective date of the merger is well into the future as the nod of a host of financial sector regulators is awaited).

Its well known that in the past, the central bank was not inclined to bless HDFC Ltd-HDFC Bank with relaxations. In the case of ICICI Ltd-ICICI Bank and later at IDBI Ltd-IDBI Bank (2005), exemptions were in order as they were transitioning from DFIs.

Parekh said the central banks view has been sought, but it would be safe to assume that he would have got some level of comfort from the RBI before the deal was made public. This opens the door for other NBFCs seeking to become a bank.

And here it would not be out of place to speculate that the central bank may be relatively okay to grandfather such transitions. While the RBIs Internal Working Group (IWG) to Review Extant Ownership Guidelines and Corporate Structure for Indian Private Sector Banks did not explicitly say so, its now logical to read into the HDFC Ltd-HDFC Bank transaction and say the central bank will be accommodative, said a senior banker.

The RBI appears to have moved away from its stated position that cant spawn subsidiaries. The to-be merged entity will have scores of them. Then, you also have the IWGs stance that the non-operative financial holding company (NOFHC) should continue to be the preferred structure for all new licences to be issued for universal . But the NOFHC may be mandatory only in cases where the individual promoters, promoting entities and converting entities have other group entities. Is this also up for a review now?

All said, the first working day of the new financial year has been eventful.

Parekh said the last two nights were sleepless. He will be relaxed now.
China sent the military and thousands of healthcare workers into to help execute COVID-19 tests for all of its 26 million residents on Monday, in one of its biggest ever public health responses.

Some residents were asked to wake up before dawn for nucleic acid testing at their housing compounds, many queuing up in their pyjamas.

The People's Liberation Army (PLA) on Sunday dispatched more than 2,000 medical personnel recruited from across the army, navy and joint logistics support forces to Shanghai, an armed forces newspaper reported.

Multiple provinces such Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Beijing have sent healthcare workers to Shanghai, according to media reports, with some estimates putting the total number at more than 10,000.

It is China's largest public health response since it tackled the initial COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, where the novel was first discovered in early 2020. The State Council said the PLA dispatched over 4,000 medical personnel to the province of Hubei, where Wuhan is, back then.

Shanghai, which began a two-stage lockdown last Monday that has been expanded to confine practically all residents to their homes, reported 8,581 asymptomatic COVID-19 cases and 425 symptomatic COVID cases for April 3. It also asked residents to self-test using antigen tests for COVID-19 on Sunday.

While the outbreak is small by global standards, the city has emerged as a test of China's elimination strategy based on testing, tracing and quarantining all positive cases and their close contacts.

The strategy has shown signs of strain, with residents complaining of crowded and unsanitary central quarantine centres, as well as difficulties in securing food supplies and essential medical help.

Still, Chinese President Xi Jinping has urged the country to curb the momentum of the outbreak as soon as possible while sticking to the "dynamic-clearance" policy.

On Saturday, Vice-Premier Sun Chunlan, who was sent to by the central government, urged the city to "make resolute and swift moves" to curb the pandemic.

(Reporting by Brenda Goh; Editing by Stephen Coates)

(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 is mulling additional sanctions against and relevant proposals will be discussed on Wednesday, The Financial Times reported.

"Further EU sanctions & support are on their way," President of the European Council Charles Michel said on Twitter on Sunday, drawing attention to the events in Bucha.

The Financial Times said on Sunday, citing a diplomat with knowledge of the plans, that EU ambassadors are expected to discuss a fresh round of anti- sanctions on Wednesday.

The new restrictions could target individuals, but could also include a ban on Russian ships using EU ports. Export and energy supply restrictions are also possible, The Financial Times said.

Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said on Sunday that Western countries could introduce french sanctions against over the Bucha incident.

The Kiev authorities and the media have been spreading video footage, allegedly from the Ukrainian town of Bucha near Kiev, with the bodies of allegedly dead people lying along the road. The Russian Defense Ministry said that all photos and videos allegedly evidencing the Russian troops' crimes in Bucha are yet another provocation since Russian units completely withdrew from the town as early as March 30.

Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said in an interview with Newsweek that the US is deliberately hushing up the fact that after the withdrawal of Russian troops, Ukrainian forces subjected the city of Bucha to artillery fire, which could have led to losses among the civilian population. According to Antonov, the Kiev authorities are shifting the blame on Russia in what concerns Bucha, where not a single civilian was injured while the town was under the control of the Russian forces.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Sunday that the crimes committed by Ukrainian radicals in Bucha are meant to escalate violence and disrupt the Russia-Ukraine peace negotiations.

The West scaled up military assistance to Kiev, as well as anti-Russia sanctions, after Moscow launched a special military operation in Ukraine in the early hours of February 24. The move came after the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR) appealed for help in defending themselves against the Kiev forces. Russia said that the aim of its special operation is to demilitarize and "denazify" Ukraine and that only military infrastructure is being targeted. According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the goal is to protect the people of Donbas, "who have been subjected to abuse, genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years.

(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.)
Mobil Corp. signaled its highest profit since 2008 as Russias war in Ukraine upended global commodity markets.

Exxons announcement that first-quarter results may have reached almost $11 billion augurs booming profits across the oil industry as trade sanctions, shipping disruptions and surging demand strain supply lines.

The windfall doesnt come without risks, however. Political leaders are under pressure to alleviate sky-high energy prices and the specter of shortages, and some already have accused oil drillers of gouging and profiteering.

U.S. President Joe Biden last week pleaded with the industry to reinvest profits in new wells to help plug the supply gap from shunned Russian crude. At the same time, he warned of punishing financial penalties for slow-walking projects involving federally owned oil prospects.

said Monday that first-quarter results may have been as much as $2 billion higher than earnings during the final three months of 2021, when the company raked in $8.8 billion, according to a filing.

Surging were the main driver, with natural gas and fatter refining margins also contributing. crude futures touched a 14-year high of almost $140 a barrel during the quarter.

Separately, formally approved the $10 billion Yellowtail development off the coast of Guyana after receiving government and regulatory approvals. The project is the fourth and largest in an area known as the Stabroek Block, and is expected to pump about 250,000 barrels a day starting in 2025.

Exxon also disclosed that exiting the Sakhalin-1 oil development in Russias Far East may trigger a writedown of as much as $4 billion. The company recently pledged to quit Russia due to sanctions and what the companys Chief Executive Officer Darren Woods described as the nations needless destruction in Ukraine.

Exxon shares fell 0.7% to at $82.55 11:23 a.m. in New York.
French President said on Monday that a new round of sanctions targetting were needed and that there were clear indications Russian forces were responsible for the killings of civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha.

"There are very clear clues pointing to war crimes. It is more or less established that the Russian army is responsible (for the Bucha killings)," Macron told France Inter radio.

"What happened in Bucha demands a new round of sanctions and very clear measures," Macron added.

Those new sanctions should target coal and oil, said Macron who faces a re-election battle this month.

on Sunday denied its forces were responsible for the deaths of civilians in the town of Bucha and said Ukraine had staged a performance for the Western media.

Russia's economy is facing the gravest crisis since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union after the United States and its allies imposed crippling sanctions due to Putin's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine.

(Reporting by Dominique Vidalon;

Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Richard Lough)

(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.)
What impact will the Liberal-NDP alliance have on the Conservative leadership race? By Mark Wegierski

web posted April 4, 2022 The somewhat unexpected Liberal-New Democratic Party alliance might have a profound impact on the federal Tory leadership race. First of all, it will tend to strengthen those contenders who are currently sitting M.P.s, as they will not have to rely on a sitting member to resign, so they can run to enter Parliament in a by-election  or, even worse, actually wait until 2025 to run in the general federal election. To be an M.P. currently in place would be a distinct advantage. Secondly, the Liberal-NDP alliance will probably contribute to a climate of increased polarization, so that will tend to help those candidates who are perceived to be more right-wing. That would most obviously be Pierre Poilievre and Leslyn Lewis. However, it could also be argued that with the Liberals becoming less centrist, it might make a centrist candidate more attractive, as he or she would be more likely to attract disaffected Liberals who are least somewhat fiscally conservative. A more conservative leader would probably be unable to appeal to that group, who are repelled by ideological stridency and/or social conservatism. The predominant strain in the current Conservative Party is probably to support a more small-c conservative candidate. However, the two main moderate contenders, Jean Charest and Patrick Brown, might be able to sign up a large number of new members (they have until June 3), which would change the ideological complexion of the Party. It is also important to consider (because of the structure of the Conservative leadership selection process) the possible down-ballot support of different candidates. This might be an area of weakness for Poilievre  whereas the moderate contenders may be stronger in that regard. Indeed, Charest and Brown have some kind of deal to support each other in the leadership battle. Both Charest and Brown are definitely outsider candidates, who are not currently sitting in the federal Parliament. As the leadership race continues, it will be important to see how the Liberal-NDP alliance unfolds. If it leads to radical measures, or a radicalization of the Liberal Party, the more conservative candidates in the leadership race will have an opportunity to launch pointed attacks on the socialist coalition. If the Liberal-NDP alliance is perceived as being dominated by the Liberals, and as not being especially radical, this will probably help the more centrist candidates in the leadership race  as they will not have to engage in ideologically strident arguments that are not to their taste. It has been argued that the Liberal-NDP alliance (if it holds) would be a good thing for whoever is chosen as Conservative leader, as he or she would have a solid two to three years to build up their brand and Party. However, if the alliance happens to break down (for whatever reason), the Conservatives could be thrust into an election they are ill-prepared for. It is arguable whether the Liberal-NDP alliance actually guarantees political stability until 2025  there are too many imponderables involved. Perhaps if the polling numbers are especially good, the Liberals will want to have a federal election, so they will provoke the NDP into jettisoning the alliance. Some Liberals have said that they would prefer Poilievre rather than Charest or Brown to win the Conservative leadership  as Poilievre can easily be painted as a far-right extremist  and, so, handily defeated in the federal election. However, it is not entirely certain that Poilievre can be easily pejoritized so thoroughly. He is an excellent debater. Should Charest win the leadership, there is the possibility that some small-c conservatives will bolt to Maxime Berniers Peoples Party of Canada. However, Charests supporters would argue that he would gain far more of centrist Liberal voters, than he would lose of hardcore conservatives. This would especially be the case in Ontario and Quebec, where Canadian elections are usually decided. The Liberal-NDP alliance might have a large influence on the federal Conservative leadership race, time will tell. Mark Wegierski is a Toronto-based, Canadian writer and historical researcher, published in Alberta Report, Calgary Herald, Ottawa Citizen, and The Hill Times (Ottawa), among others. His article about Canada was reprinted in Annual Editions: World Politics, 1998-99 (Dushkin/McGraw-Hill, 1998). Home
leader Carrie Lam, who has governed the global financial hub through the unprecedented upheaval of anti-government protests and COVID-19, said on Monday she will not seek a second five-year term of office.

Lam's announcement came as media said Chief Secretary John Lee, Hong Kong's second most senior official, was set to resign to join the race to replace Lam in May and become the Chinese-ruled city's next leader.

"There's only one consideration and that is family. I have told everyone before that family is my first priority in terms of my consideration. They think it's time for me to go home," Lam told a regular press briefing.

Lam, born in British-ruled in 1957 and a life-long civil servant who describes herself as a devout Catholic, took office in 2017 with a pledge to unite a city that was growing increasingly resentful of Beijing's tightening grip.

Two years later, millions took to the streets in sometimes violent anti-government protests that ultimately led Beijing to impose a sweeping national security law in June 2020, giving it more power than ever to shape life in .

City leaders are selected by a small election committee stacked with Beijing loyalists so whoever becomes the next leader of the former British colony will do so with Beijing's tacit approval.

Lee, 64, a security official during the prolonged and often violent 2019 pro-democracy protests, was promoted in 2021 in a move some analysts said signalled Beijing's priorities for the city related to security rather than finance or the economy.

Lee did not immediately respond to a request for comment.





The leadership election was pushed back from March 27 to give the government time to battle a COVID outbreak that has infected more than a million of the 7.4 million people in the former British colony.

Since Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule in 1997, it has had four chief executives, who all struggled to balance the democratic aspirations of some residents with the vision of China's Communist Party leaders.

(Reporting by Anne Marie Roantree, Jessie Pang, James Pomfret, Twinnie Siu; Editing by Robert Birsel)

(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.)
Pakistan Prime Minister blocked a no-confidence vote he looked sure to lose on Sunday and advised the president to order fresh elections, fueling anger among the opposition and deepening the country's political crisis.

His actions have created huge uncertainty in Islamabad, with constitutional experts debating their legality and pondering whether Khan and his rivals can find a way forward.

The nuclear-armed nation of more than 220 million people lies between Afghanistan to the west, China to the northeast and nuclear rival India to the east, making it of vital strategic importance.

Since coming to power in 2018, Khan's rhetoric has become more anti-American and he has expressed a desire to move closer to China and, recently, Russia - including talks with President Vladimir Putin on the day the invasion of Ukraine began.

At the same time, U.S. and Asian foreign policy experts said that Pakistan's powerful military has traditionally controlled foreign and defence policy, thereby limiting the impact of political instability.

Here is what the upheaval, which many expect to lead to Khan's exit, means for countries closely involved in Pakistan:



Afghanistan



Ties between Pakistan's military intelligence agency and the Islamist militant Taliban have loosened in recent years.

Now the Taliban are back in power, and facing an economic and humanitarian crisis due to a lack of money and isolation, Qatar is arguably their most important foreign partner.

"We (the United States) don't need Pakistan as a conduit to the Taliban. Qatar is definitely playing that role now," said Lisa Curtis, director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security think-tank.

Tensions have risen between the Taliban and Pakistan's military, which has lost several soldiers in attacks close to their mutual border. Pakistan wants the Taliban to do more to crack down on extremist groups and worries they will spread violence into Pakistan. That has begun to happen already.

Khan has been less critical of the Taliban over human rights than most foreign leaders.

China



Khan has consistently emphasised China's positive role in Pakistan and in the world at large.

At the same time, the $60-billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) which binds the neighbours together was actually conceptualised and launched under Pakistan's two established political parties, both of which want Khan out of power.

Opposition leader and potential successor Shehbaz Sharif struck deals with China directly as leader of the eastern province of Punjab, and his reputation for getting major infrastructure projects off the ground while avoiding political grandstanding could in fact be music to Beijing's ears.

India

The neighbours have fought three wars since independence in 1947, two of them over the disputed Muslim-majority territory of Kashmir.

As with Afghanistan, it is Pakistan's military that controls policy in the sensitive area, and tensions along the de facto border there are at their lowest level since 2021.

But there have been no formal diplomatic talks between the rivals for years because of deep distrust over a range of issues including Khan's extreme criticism of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his handling of attacks on minority Muslims in India.

Karan Thapar, an Indian political commentator who has closely followed India-Pakistan ties, said the Pakistani military could put pressure on a new civilian government in Islamabad to build on the successful ceasefire in Kashmir.

On Saturday, Pakistan's powerful army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa said his country was ready to move forward on Kashmir if India agrees.

The Sharif political dynasty has been at the forefront of several dovish overtures towards India over the years.

United States



U.S.-based South Asia experts said that Pakistan's political crisis is unlikely to be a priority for President Joe Biden, who is grappling with the war in Ukraine, unless it led to mass unrest or rising tensions with India.

"We have so many other fish to fry," said Robin Raphel, a former assistant secretary of State for South Asia who is a senior associate with the Center for Strategic and Studies think-tank.

With the Pakistani military maintaining its behind-the-scenes control of foreign and security policies, Khan's political fate was not a major concern, according to some analysts.

"Since it's the military that calls the shots on the policies that the U.S. really cares about, i.e. Afghanistan, India and nuclear weapons, internal Pakistani political developments are largely irrelevant for the U.S.," said Curtis, who served as former U.S. President Donald Trump's National Security Council senior director for South Asia.

She added that Khan's visit to Moscow had been a "disaster" in terms of U.S. relations, and that a new government in Islamabad could at least help mend ties "to some degree".

Khan has blamed the United States for the current political crisis, saying that Washington wanted him removed because of the recent Moscow trip.

(Additional reporting and writing by Sanjeev Miglani; Editing by Mike Collett-White)

(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 shared more details about the threat he said he had been facing since early last month.

After the house was prorogued on Sunday, a number of PTI leaders rushed to the Prime Minister's Office and felicitated Khan on the "success of his surprise move", Dawn reported.

In remarks that were televised, he told them that when the National Security Council (NSC) had condemned the involvement of an external force in no-trust resolution, counting (of votes on the motion) had become "irrelevant".

Khan revealed that the US had sent a threatening message through Pakistan's envoy.

He was quoted as saying that US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Donald Lu had reportedly in a meeting with Ambassador Asad Majeed warned there could be implications if he survived the opposition's no-confidence motion in the National Assembly, Dawn reported.

The premier said he had reports that PTI dissidents had frequented the (US) embassy.

"What were the reasons that the people, who have left us, met people of the embassy frequently in the last few days?" he wondered.

He termed the Deputy Speaker's ruling as "shocking" to the opposition.

In fact, Khan said the opposition was unable to understand what had happened.

If he had told them (opposition) about his surprise a day earlier, they would not have been shocked this much, he added.

--IANS

san/ksk/

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
will continue to be the Prime Minister of until the appointment of a caretaker premier, according to a notification issued by President Arif Alvi on Monday.

The incumbent Prime Minister shall continue to hold office till appointment of the caretaker premier, the notification said.

President Alvi has also written a letter to Prime Minister Khan and Leader of the Opposition in the outgoing National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif, asking them to propose names of suitable persons for appointment as the caretaker premier, the Dawn newspaper reported.

The letter said that the National Assembly (NA) and the federal Cabinet had been dissolved on Sunday as per the Constitution.

Alvi told them in case they do not agree on the appointment within three days of the dissolution of the NA, they shall forward two nominees each to a committee to be constituted by the speaker, comprising eight members of the outgoing NA, or the Senate, or both, having equal representation from the treasury and the opposition, it said.

The members of that committee from the treasury and Opposition benches are to be nominated by the prime minister and the leader of the Opposition.

The Constitution has empowered the president to appoint a caretaker prime minister in consultation with the prime minister and the leader of the Opposition in the outgoing NA, the President's Secretariat said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Shehbaz said that he would not take part in the process and termed it "illegal", saying that the president and the prime minister had broken the law and questioned how they could approach the Opposition.

Reacting to Shehbaz's decision, outgoing information minister Fawad Chaudhry said: is gearing up for the elections... Shehbaz has said he will not be a part of the process, that's his choice.

We have sent two names (to the president) today. If (Shehbaz) does not send the names within seven days, one of these will be finalised".

Earlier in the day, the Cabinet Secretariat issued a notification stating that Khan had "ceased to hold the office of the prime minister of with immediate effect".

However, under Article 94 of the Constitution, the president "may ask the Prime Minister to continue to hold office until his successor enters upon the office of Prime Minister".

"Mr. Imran Ahmad Khan Niazi, shall continue as Prime Minister till the appointment of caretaker Prime Minister under Article 224 A (4) of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan," the President said on Twitter.

President Alvi had dissolved the NA on the advice of Prime Minister Khan, minutes after Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri rejected a no-confidence motion against the premier, who had effectively lost the majority in the 342-member lower house of Parliament.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, after taking a suo motu cognizance of the current political situation in the country, said that all orders and actions initiated by the prime minister and the president regarding the dissolution of the National Assembly will be subject to the court's order as he adjourned for one day the hearing of the high-profile case.

A three-member bench held the initial hearing despite the weekend and issued notices to all the respondents, including President Alvi and Deputy Speaker of the NA Suri.

The Supreme Court ordered all parties not to take any "unconstitutional" measures and adjourned the hearing until Monday.

Ahsan Bhoon, President, Supreme Court Bar, said that the action of the prime minister and deputy speaker was against the constitution and they should be prosecuted for treason under Article 6 of the constitution.

The crisis erupted after Suri rejected the no-confidence motion, providing Prime Minister Khan to send an advice to the president of the country to dissolve Parliament, which he could not do until any outcome of the no-confidence vote.

Leading constitutional lawyer Salman Akram Raja said that the entire procure by the deputy speaker and the advice by the premier to dissolve the assembly was unconstitutional.

Raja said the illegality of the ruling would also make the advice as illegal as the prime minister cannot give advice to the assembly after a no-confidence motion was presented in the parliament against him.

(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.)
under Xi Jinping will be cautious and calibrated in its behaviour towards after witnessing the community's unity and reaction after Russia's war on Ukraine.

While similarities between and Ukraine cannot be drawn in a linear fashion, strong deductions can be made with regard to China's behavior toward and the Russia-Ukraine crisis.

The Ukraine-Russia crisis has put forward the best worst-case scenario for Chinese President Xi Jinping to calculate their move for their future plan for Taiwan and could also expect what the community can do if someone tries to invade in a peaceful life, analysed Forum for Rights and Security (IFFRAS), Canada based international think tank.

"For China, and Xi in particular, the big lessons will be drawn from a careful reading of the international community's reaction toward what Putin calls Russia's "special military operation" aiming to "demilitarize and de-Nazify Ukraine" under the logic that "Russia cannot feel safe, develop and exist with a constant threat emanating from the territory of modern Ukraine." The outcome has so far been international condemnation and boycotts of Russia, and the imposition of economic sanctions by the US and the EU -- resulting in Russia becoming a "pariah" state, International Forum for Rights and Security said.

The unity in the international community in imposing punitive sanctions on Russia disturbs China's larger geopolitical plans that there is a growing united front between the US and Europe -- with the crisis in Ukraine bridging the gap, it added.

If this united front strengthens, it will not only be a debacle for China's global ambitions; it will also have ramifications for China's plans for Taiwan.

Besides, Taiwan will be a much harder bargain for . At this juncture, Beijing -- given its leanings toward Moscow -- cannot afford to be caught in the crosshairs of the US and Europe.

Notably, in 2020, the United States, Department of Defence said that the Chinese military is "likely preparing for a contingency to unify Taiwan with the mainland by force."

Even this year, in January, the Chinese Ambassador to US Qin Gang warned the US and said that the US could face "military conflict" with over the status of Taiwan.

China's recent activities have only fuelled speculation about China's plan to invade Taiwan.

According to the think-tanker, if this is the case, then the Ukraine-Russia crisis serves as a litmus test for China.

Russian President Vladimir Putin's move in Ukraine is important for Xi's next move in Taiwan in two ways:

First, Ukraine considers itself a sovereign nation while Putin adopts a "Soviet Union mentality" similarly, to China's "Middle Kingdom mentality" under the "Chinese dream" of "rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" through "reunification with Taiwan."

The logic is to get all the foreign territories "back" into their country like Ukraine for Putin and Taiwan for Xi.

And the second one is that both the countries with their respective leaders are the chieftain of all things under their autocratic political apparatus.

According to the think tank, the Us has adopted a different approach towards Russia, as compared to North Korea, Iran, Cuba and Syria. The country has imposed financial sanctions and restrictions on a majority of Russian oligarchs and state-owned banking and financial service providers, as well as Putin and many of his associates, on the asset control office's Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List.

The US Department of Commerce has targeted Russia's oil refining sector. Furthermore, the Us has also imposed a ban on Russian alcoholic beverages, seafood and non-industrial diamonds. To counter Russia, the US even imposed economic sanctions on Belarus which supports Russia. Not the only US but the EU and Japan have also imposed financial restrictions on Russia and Belarus.

Russia's "most-favoured-nation" status was revoked on March 11 by the US along with its NATO allies, G7 and the EU, this was considered a major blow to Russia's economy.

Notably, the international communities' reaction toward Russia's military operations carries a strong message for China.

Ukraine-Russia crisis feared the US that there is the possibility that China could also use the same tactics as Russia and could attack Taiwan. Responding to the question of whether "the US would come to Taiwan's defence in the event of an attack by China, Biden in October answered, "Yes, we have a commitment to do that."

Learning from the Ukraine-Russia crisis, China would be cautious to take any further steps against Taiwan, a think tank reported.

(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.)
By Alex Lawler

LONDON (Reuters) - Oil rose above $105 a barrel on Monday as concern about tight supply arising from Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the lack of an Iranian nuclear deal persisted despite countries releasing oil from strategic reserves.

The invasion of Ukraine in February sharply ramped up supply worries that were already underpinning . Sanctions imposed on Russia and buyers' avoidance of Russian oil have raised fears of larger supply losses from this month. [IEA/M]

Brent crude was up 63 cents, or 0.6%, to $105.02 a barrel by 0805 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude gained $1.08, or 1.1%, to $100.35. Both contracts slipped $1 when opened on Monday.

"Will the release of barrels from strategic reserves fill a shortfall caused by sanctions and buyer aversion to Russian oil? In a word, no," said Stephen Brennock of oil broker PVM.

Brent dropped by about 13% last week after U.S. President Joe Biden announced a record U.S. oil reserves release and Energy Agency members committed to further tapping reserves. Crude had hit $139 last month, its highest since 2008.

"This short-term measure to target lower ... doesn't resolve the long-term problem," said Naeem Aslam of Avatrade.

Oil also gained support from a pause in talks to revive the Iranian nuclear deal, which would allow a lifting of sanctions on Iranian oil. Iran on Monday blamed the United States for the halt.

Some downward pressure on prices came from a truce in Yemen, which could ease threats to supply in the Middle East.

The United Nations has brokered a two-month truce between a Saudi-led coalition and the Houthi group aligned with Iran for the first time in the seven-year conflict.

Saudi oil facilities have come under attack by the Houthis during the conflict, adding to supply disruption from Russia.

(Reporting by Alex Lawler; Additional reporting by Florence Tan and Isabel Kua in Singapore; Editing by David Goodman)

(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 on Monday blasted the Opposition parties for looking towards the Supreme Court for relief instead of preparing for elections.

On Sunday, members of Tehreek-e-Insaf party blocked a vote of no-confidence against Khan in the National Assembly and got President Arif Alvi to dissolve the lower house. Pakistan's Supreme Court on Monday adjourned the hearing in the matter.

Taking part in a live programme "Aap Ka Wazir-e-Azam, Aap Kay Saath" (Your Minister, with you) from Islamabad on Monday, Khan answered the questions from the general public.

The Opposition parties are afraid of the reaction of the public and avoiding the elections which they were demanding, he said.

In order to increase his contact with the people, he announced to take part in a protest rally at D-Chowk, just outside the capital's red zone, being held by his supporters. "The peaceful protest will be staged after Isha (night) prayers against treason by [opposition] politicians," he said.

Khan also defended the decision of the National Assembly's deputy speaker, Qasim Suri, to reject the no-confidence motion by saying it was based on a "foreign conspiracy".

"I want this trend to end where anyone with Rs 20 billion could topple the government. This is unacceptable and tantamount to discrediting democracy," he said.

He accused the Opposition that it was using money to buy loyalty of provincial lawmakers in Lahore where the assembly would elect a new chief minister this week.

Talking about new elections, Khan said he would interview all candidates seeking the ticket of his Tehreek-i-Insaf.

Responding to a question, he rejected the impression of being against any country. I am not against any country. I am not anti-Indian or anti-American. But we can be against policies. I want friendship with them and there should be respect, he said.

But hastened to add that he was against countries that disrespect other sovereign countries and simply issue orders, an oblique reference to the US. Khan's comments came a day after he named senior US diplomat Donald Lu as the person who was allegedly involved in the "foreign conspiracy" to topple his government through a no-confidence vote tabled by the Opposition.

He said a nation should never "become slaves" to any country just because of being under debt. "In that case, death is better than slavery, he said.

Khan also said his party will win the elections.

(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.)
Claiming that he was not "anti-Indian or anti-American" or against any country, Prime Minister on Monday said he wanted good relations with all nations based on mutual respect.

Addressing a televised public interaction programme, a day after members of his Tehreek-e-Insaf party blocked a vote of no-confidence against him in the National Assembly and got President Arif Alvi to dissolve the lower house, Khan attacked the Opposition parties.

The joint opposition's strategy of looking towards the Supreme Court instead of preparing for elections following the dissolution of the National Assembly was a sign that it "fears the reaction of the public," he said.

Responding to a question amidst the controversy over an alleged foreign letter that threatened his government, Khan, who has been asked to continue as prime minister by the president till a caretaker premier was appointed, said he was not against foreign countries.

"I am not against any country. I am not anti-Indian or anti-American. But we can be against policies. I want friendship with them and there should be respect," Khan was quoted as saying by the Dawn newspaper.

Khan said that he did not feel mal-intent towards the US, but rather aimed towards a mutual friendship with the superpower, free from interference in domestic affairs against public interest, The Express Tribune reported.

He said he was against countries that disrespect other sovereign countries and simply issue orders. He called out Opposition parties, alleging that "they served these foreign countries as their yes man".

Khan's comments came a day after he named senior US diplomat Donald Lu as the person who was allegedly involved in the "foreign conspiracy" to topple his government through a no-confidence vote tabled by the Opposition.

In recent days, Khan, known for his anti-India rhetoric, has been praising New Delhi's independent foreign policy.

Imran, in his Q&A session said he wanted to tell his nation to never "become slaves" to any country just because of being under debt.

"In that case, death is better than slavery."



Khan said he opposed the US-led war in Afghanistan, but he had never been anti-US.

He further said that he wanted good relations with all the countries based on mutual respect, adding that he would not accept any policies which were against the interests of the people of . Death is better than such servitude, he was quoted as saying by the official APP news agency.

The prime minister said that it was an insult to the whole country when a ruler of 220 million people held talks with the president of a powerful country by holding a paper in his hand.

(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 the main roadblock to imposing tougher sanctions on Russia, Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Monday during a news conference, adding that Hungary was not blocking them.

His comment comes after Prime Minister Viktor Orban won a national election on Sunday after facing criticism over an insufficiently tough stance on Russian aggression in Ukraine.

"We have to see that, regardless of how we approach Hungary, this is the fourth such win and we have to respect democratic elections ... it's that is the main roadblock on sanctions. Hungary is for the sanctions," Morawiecki said.

(Reporting by Joanna Plucinska, Pawel Florkiewicz, Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk; Editing by Alison Williams)

(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.)
Russia's foreign ministry said that footage of dead civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha had been "ordered" by the United States as part of a plot to blame .

"Who are the masters of provocation? Of course the United States and NATO," ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in an interview on state television late on Sunday.

Zakharova said the immediate Western outcry over the images of dead civilians indicated the story had been part of a plan to sully Russia's reputation.

"In this case, it seems to me that the fact that these statements (about Russia) were made in the first minutes after these materials appeared leaves no doubt as to who 'ordered' this story."

Ukrainian authorities said on Sunday they were investigating possible war crimes by after finding hundreds of bodies, some bound and shot at close range, strewn around towns outside the capital Kyiv after Russian troops withdrew from the area.

Russian authorities have said the photographs and footage broadcast from Bucha are a "provocation" designed to disrupt peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv. The Russian defence ministry said the images were "another staged performance by the Kyiv regime."

Footage and photographs of dead civilians strewn across the town have prompted Western countries to call for those responsible for war crimes in to be punished.

Russia, in turn, requested that the United Nations Security Council convene on Monday to discuss what it called a "provocation by Ukrainian radicals" in Bucha.

sent tens of thousands of troops into on Feb 24 in what it called a special operation to degrade its southern neighbour's military capabilities and root out people it called dangerous nationalists.

Ukrainian forces have mounted stiff resistance and the West has imposed sweeping sanctions on Russia in an effort to force it to withdraw its forces.

(Reporting by Reuters; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
This 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.
Moscow faced global revulsion and accusations of war crimes Monday after the Russian pullout from the outskirts of Kyiv revealed streets strewn with corpses of what appeared to be civilians, some of whom had seemingly been killed deliberately at close range.

The images of battered bodies out in the open or in hastily dug graves led to calls for tougher sanctions against the Kremlin, namely a cutoff of fuel imports from Russia. Germany reacted by expelling 40 Russian diplomats, and Lithuania threw out its Russian ambassador.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy left the capital, Kyiv, for his first reported trip since the war began nearly six weeks ago to see for himself what he called the genocide and war crimes in the town of Bucha, the site of some of the horrors.

Dead people have been found in barrels, basements, strangled, tortured, said Zelenskyy, who again called on Russia to move quickly to negotiate an agreement to end to the war.

European leaders and the United Nations human rights chief condemned the bloodshed, some of them also branding it genocide, and U.S. President Joe Biden said Russian President should face a war crimes trial.

This guy is brutal, and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous, said Biden, who also promised to increase sanctions against Moscow.

Russian Foreign Minister dismissed the scenes outside Kyiv as a stage-managed anti-Russian provocation. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the images contained signs of video forgery and various fakes." Russia similarly rejected previous allegations of atrocities as fabrications on Ukraine's part.

Ukrainian officials said the bodies of 410 civilians were found in towns around Kyiv that were recaptured from Russian forces in recent days.

In Bucha, northwest of the capital, Associated Press journalists saw 21 bodies, including a group of nine in civilian clothes who appeared to have been shot at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs. A bag of groceries were spilled by one of the dead.

The full extent of the bloodshed in the Kyiv area has yet to emerge, but by all accounts the horrors in the shattered southern port city of Mariupol are likely to be even worse.

This is a war of murders, a lot of blood. A lot of civilians are dying, said Natalia Svitlova, a refugee from Dnipro in eastern Ukraine who fled to Poland. I don't understand why this is possible in the 21st century and why no one can stop it.

Moscow continued to press its offensive in eastern Ukraine, where little news has made it to the outside world since the war began Feb. 24. Russia, in withdrawing from the capital area in recent days, has said its main focus is gaining control the Donbas, the largely Russian-speaking industrial region in the country's east that includes Mariupol.

About two-thirds of the Russian troops around Kyiv have now left and are either in Belarus or on their way there, probably getting more supplies and reinforcements, said a senior U.S. defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an intelligence assessment.

Russian forces also appear to be repositioning artillery and troops to try to take the city of Izyum, which lies on a key route to the Donbas, the official said.

European allies, though united in outrage over the aftermath outside Kyiv, appeared split on how to respond.

Poland, which is on Ukraine's border and has taken in large numbers of refugees, angrily singled out France and Germany for not taking tougher action and urged Europe to quickly wean itself off Russian energy. But Germany said it would stick with a more gradual approach of phasing out coal and oil imports over the next several months.

Western and Ukrainian leaders have accused Russia of war crimes before, and the Criminal Court's prosecutor has opened an investigation. But the latest reports ratcheted up the condemnation.

European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the Russian authorities are responsible for these atrocities, committed while they had effective control of the area.

French President Emmanuel Macron said there is clear evidence of war crimes in Bucha that demand new punitive measures. I'm in favor of a new round of sanctions and in particular on coal and gasoline. We need to act, he said on France-Inter radio.

But Poland's prime minister, who described Russia under Putin as a totalitarian-fascist state, called for actions that will finally break Putin's war machine."



"Would you negotiate with Hitler, with Stalin, with Pol Pot? Mateusz Morawiecki asked of Macron.

In announcing Germany's expulsion of Russian diplomats, Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said Germany will take further punitive measures. She said the images from Bucha reveal the unbelievable brutality of the Russian leadership and those who follow its propaganda."



We must fear similar images from many other places occupied by Russian troops in Ukraine, she added.

The U.S. and its allies have sought to punish Russia for the invasion by imposing sweeping sanctions but fear further harm to the global economy, which is still recovering from the pandemic. Europe is in a particular bind, since it gets 40% of its gas and 25% of its oil from Russia.

Putin's Feb. 24 invasion has left thousands of people dead and forced more than 4 million Ukrainians to flee their country.

Putin has said the attack is aimed at eliminating a security threat and has demanded that Ukraine drop its bid to join NATO. Ukraine insists it never posed any threat but has offered to declare itself neutral.

While Putin's initial goal apparently was to take Kyiv and install a Kremlin-friendly government, Russian forces faced stiff resistance outside the capital and on other fronts and have now retreated from some areas.

Britain's Defense Ministry said Russia continues to flood soldiers and mercenaries from the Wagner military group into the Donbas. It said Russian troops are still trying to take Mariupol, which has seen weeks of heavy fighting and some of the worst suffering of the 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.)
Sri Lanka's Cabinet of Ministers resigned with immediate effect late on Sunday night, as the country experienced its worst economic crisis of all time.

Speaking to reporters, Education Minister and Leader of the House, Dinesh Gunawardena said the Cabinet ministers handed over their resignations to Prime Minister .

He proffered no reason for the mass resignation.

However, political experts here said the ministers came under intense pressure from the public over the government's alleged "mishandling" of the economic crisis, triggered by the shortage in the foreign exchange reserve.

Wide spread public protests were seen throughout the evening in spite of the imposition of curfew which is due to end on Monday morning.

The enraged public has been demanding the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

The government declared a state of emergency after an angry mob surrounded the private residence of Rajapaksa on March 31.

A planned social media triggered mass protest was scheduled for Sunday. However, the government responded by imposing a 36-hour curfew.

Since evening, rumours have been floating to the effect that Rajapaksa may opt for an interim government to handle the economic crisis.

(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.)
Corp's longtime former chief executive announced on Monday the suspension of the company's stock repurchasing program, as he returns this week to lead the global coffee chain for the third time.

Shares fell nearly 4% in pre-market trading.

The suspension, effective immediately, will allow to invest more in employees and stores, Schultz said in a letter to workers, customers and shareholders.

The move comes as Starbucks faces a growing unionization of its U.S. workforce. Employees at 10 U.S. Starbucks locations have voted in recent months to join Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees Union.

Baristas at more than 170 U.S. locations have petitioned a federal labor board for union elections since August, when the union drive went public.

Starbucks announced last month that Schultz would take over as interim CEO, following the retirement of Kevin Johnson. Shares of the coffee chain shot up about 5% on March 16, the day of the announcement.

By suspending share buybacks, Schultz is signaling that he wants to make bold moves and shift the company's cash flow to invest in growth and employees as he tries to fend off unions, said Ivan Feinseth, chief investment officer of Tigress Financial Partners, which holds Starbucks stock in its clients' accounts.

"You have to take the opportunity to invest money where it will get the best return on multiple levels both as a direct investment and to show what the company's current focus is," Feinseth said.

Schultz is practically synonymous with the company he took over in 1987. During his previous four decades as chief executive and chairman, the company grew from 11 stores to more than 28,000 in 77 worldwide, according to a news release.

Schultz said in the letter that he will travel in coming weeks to meet with employees.

"I am returning to the company to work with all of you to design that next Starbucks - an evolution of our company deep with purpose, where we each have agency and where we work together to create a positive impact in the world," he wrote.

(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.)
South and held their regular phone call via the liaison hotlines on Monday, despite Pyongyang's warning of serious consequences, an official at Seoul's Unification Ministry said.

"South and North Korea's daily call at 9 a.m. took place normally via the inter-Korean liaison office," Yonhap News Agency quoted the official as saying.

Over the weekend, Kim Yo-jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, strongly criticised South Korean Defence Minister Suh Wook for mentioning the country's "preemptive strike" capabilities.

She even described him as a "senseless and scum-like guy" and added that Pyongyang will "reconsider a lot of things concerning South Korea".

Last week, Suh had stated that his troops have the capabilities to "accurately and swiftly" strike the origin of North Korea's missile firing as well as command and support facilities in the case of clear signs of a launch toward the South.

--IANS

ksk/

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Ukrainian authorities were investigating possible war crimes by after finding hundreds of bodies, some bound and shot at close range, strewn around towns near Kyiv after Kremlin forces withdrew to refocus their attacks in other parts of the country.

In the town of Bucha, 37 km (23 miles) northwest of Kyiv's city centre, Reuters reporters saw a man lay sprawled by the roadside, his hands tied behind his back and a bullet wound to his head.

Bucha's deputy mayor, Taras Shapravskyi, said 50 of some 300 bodies, found after Russian forces withdrew from the city late last week, were the victims of extra-judicial killings carried out by Russian troops.

Reuters could not independently verify those figures or who was responsible for the killings.

Russia's defence ministry said in a statement issued on Sunday that all photographs and videos published by the Ukrainian authorities alleging "crimes" by Russian troops in Bucha were a "provocation," and no resident of Bucha suffered violence at the hands of Russian troops.

Satellite images showed a 45-foot-long trench dug into the grounds of a Ukrainian church where a mass grave was found this week. Reuters reporters in Bucha visited a mass grave at one church that was still open, with hands and feet poking through the red clay heaped on top.

Pictures of the destruction and apparent violence towards civilians sparked widespread condemnation of and leader Vladimir Putin. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken described the images as "a punch in the gut," while United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for an independent investigation.

"Putin and his supporters will feel the consequences," said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, adding that Western allies would agree on further sanctions in the coming days.

Germany's Defence Minister Christine Lambrecht said the European Union must discuss banning the import of Russian gas - a departure from Berlin's prior resistance to the idea of an embargo on Russian energy imports.

requested the U.N. Security Council convene on Monday to discuss what Moscow called a "provocation by Ukrainian radicals" in Bucha.

Russia has previously denied targeting civilians and has rejected allegations of war crimes in what it calls a "special military operation" aimed at demilitarising and "denazifying" . says it was invaded without provocation.

Human Rights Watch said it had documented "several cases of Russian military forces committing laws-of-war violations" in the Ukrainian regions of Chernihiv, Kharkiv and Kyiv.

Ukraine's foreign minister called on the Criminal Court to collect evidence of what he called Russian war crimes. The foreign ministers of France and Britain said their countries would support any such probe.

However, legal experts say a prosecution of Putin or other Russian leaders would face high hurdles and could take years.

Widespread fighting



Russia has pulled back forces that had threatened Kyiv from the north, saying it intends to focus on eastern .

Explosions were heard in the early hours of Monday in the cities of Kherson and Odesa, in the south, while air raid sirens sounded across the country's east.

Missiles struck near Odesa on Sunday, with Russia saying it had destroyed an oil refinery used by the Ukrainian military.

The Odesa city council said "critical infrastructure facilities" were hit.

The governor of the eastern Donetsk region said on Sunday shelling had continued throughout the night and day. Russian shelling killed seven people in Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city, according to the regional prosecutor's office.

Ukraine evacuated more than 2,600 people from the southeastern port of Mariupol and the region of Luhansk on Sunday, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.

Ukrainian officials were in talks with Russia to allow several Red Cross buses to enter Mariupol, she added.

The Red Cross abandoned earlier attempts due to security concerns. Russia blamed the charity for the delays.

Mariupol is Russia's main target in Ukraine's southeastern region of Donbas, and tens of thousands of civilians there have been trapped for weeks with scant access to food and water.

There was little sign of a breakthrough in efforts to negotiate an end to the war, although Russia's chief negotiator, Vladimir Medinsky, said talks were due to resume on Monday via videoconference.

(Additional reporting by Zohra Bensemra and Abdelaziz Boumzar in Bucha, Pavel Polityuk in Lviv, Issam Abdallah in Odesa, Natalia Zinets in Mukachevo, Lidia Kelly in Melbourne and Reuters bureaus in Europe and Washington

Writing by Andy Sullivan and Lincoln Feast Editing by Michael Perry)

(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.)
Another round of negotiations between and Ukraine in Turkey has brought little progress towards a ceasefire, let alone a peace agreement. Based on statements by both Moscow and Kyiv, it appears that there is some consensus on the issues that need to be negotiated, but little on what the sides might consider acceptable solutions.

The current Ukrainian position is centred around two main issues: neutrality and territorial integrity. The former will require an amendment to the Ukrainian constitution that changes the current commitment to the irreversibility of the  Euro-Atlantic course of Ukraine and instead provides for the countrys permanent neutral status.

While the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, has already committed to a referendum on any agreement with Russia, this will not remove the need for a two-thirds majority in the Ukrainian parliament  the Verkhovna Rada  and a favourable opinion of the constitutional court on whether the amendments are are oriented toward the liquidation of the independence or violation of the territorial indivisibility of Ukraine. Both of these are required for constitutional amendments. Moreover, no constitutional amendments are allowed in conditions of martial law or a state of emergency.

On the one hand, the referendum and the super-majority in the Rada will ensure that any approved deal will have the necessary support in Ukraine. On the other it limits the bargaining space that Zelensky has in his negotiations.

Neutrality will also require security guarantees. Again, this is something that both Russia and Ukraine agree on. But the two sides differ in how they view this. What wants guaranteed is Ukrainian neutrality  what Ukraine wants guaranteed is its territorial integrity. These are not the same, and they will require different guarantors and guarantee mechanisms.

What the Ukrainian side has in mind is an treaty under which the guarantor countries are legally obliged to provide military assistance to our country, in particular in the form of armaments and the closure of the skies in case of any aggression against Ukraine.

Potential guarantor countries  apart from the five permanent members of the UN Security Council  would include Turkey, Germany, Canada, Italy, Poland and Israel. As a consequence of this, there would then also need to be two separate, or overlapping, negotiation formats, one between and Ukraine on the substance of neutrality status and one involving them and likely guarantor countries.

The second issue on the agenda concerns the countrys territorial integrity. Here, Zelensky previously ruled out compromises on the status of Crimea and Donbas  as well as any territories acquired by Russia since the invasion. At least concerning Crimea, there now seems to be some more flexibility on the Ukrainian side.

Kyiv appears willing to decouple negotiations on the peninsulas future status from those on neutrality and address them separately in a bilateral format with Russia over the course of the next 15 years. But even this would require some minimum consensus with the Kremlin. The two sides would need to agree on the conditions under which these negotiations are delayed, what kind of interim status would apply, and what a final settlement would look like.

Ukraines neutrality, demilitarisation, and recognition of Russian territorial gains are still on the table, while denazification (or, more literally, regime change) is off the table. According to Putins press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, the sides are currently discussing an Austrian or Swedish version of a demilitarised state in Ukraine.

The Swedish and Austrian neutrality regimes are in essence voluntary, lack security guarantees for the two countries, and allow them to decide what is permissible under their commitments to neutrality. This has allowed both of them to join the EU in 1995 and participate in the Unions Common Foreign and Security Policy. Given the gulf between these arrangements  and thus Ukraines vision of its own future armed neutrality  and what Russia envisages in terms of a demilitarised neutrality, it is not clear what room for compromise there might be.

Will a deal be possible and how soon?

A lot will depend on the extent to which Russia and Ukraine are willing to make concessions on or across the main issue areas and the extent to which they and the presumptive security guarantors are willing and able to deliver on any deal that might ultimately shape up.

The Russian announcement that it would be scaling back its military operation around Kyiv and shift to the south and east has been met with heavy scepticism by Ukraine and its western partners.

But the announcement also looks like a tentative Russian timeline before negotiations will get serious. Once Russia has established a land bridge to Crimea and satisfied further territorial ambitions east of the River Dnipro in central Ukraine, there might be progress towards a ceasefire and eventually a peace agreement. Yet, the likely cost of intensified operations in this area to both sides will additionally complicate their negotiations.

Putins signing of a decree ordering the mobilisation of almost 150,000 new conscripts as part of the annual spring military draft is an ominous sign. It appears that the Russian president is far from finished with his disastrous war in Ukraine.

Stefan Wolff, Professor of International Security, University of Birmingham

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that Russia needs to move quickly to negotiate an agreement to end the war.

Speaking on a visit on Monday to the town of Bucha outside Kyiv, where hundreds of civilians were found dead after Russian troops' retreat last week, Zelenskyy said the evidence of atrocities makes it hard to conduct talks with Russia.

It's very difficult to conduct negotiations when you see what they did here, Zelenskyy said, adding that in Bucha and other places dead people have been found in barrels, basements, strangled, tortured.

He added that the Russian leadership needs to think faster if it has what to think with.

Zelenskyy added that the longer the Russian Federation drags it out, the worse it will exacerbate its own situation and this war.

Zelenskyy reaffirmed his criticism of former German Chancellor Angela Merkel's opposition to Ukraine's bid to join NATO, saying that she and other Western leaders who resisted the move should come to Bucha to see what the flirting with the Russian Federation leads to.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
President said on Monday it had become harder for Ukraine to negotiate with Russia since Kyiv became aware of the scale of atrocities carried out by Russian troops in Ukraine. Zelensky spoke on national television from the town of Bucha in the Kyiv region, where tied bodies shot at close range, a mass grave and other signs of executions have been found in territory retaken from Russian troops.



Moscow has denied any accusations related to the killing of civilians in Bucha.



"These are war crimes and will be recognised by the world as genocide," Zelensky said, wearing body armour and surrounded by military personnel.



"It's very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here," he said. "The longer the Russian Federation drags out the negotiating process, the worse it is for them and for this situation and for this war."



"We know of thousands of people killed and tortured, with severed limbs, raped women and murdered children," he said.

After Zelensky spoke, Ukrainian officials took journalists to the basement of what they said was a summer residence for children and showed them the bodies of five men with their hands tied behind their backs.





ALSO READ: 'Fill the silence with your music,' Ukraine's Zelenskyy tells Grammys

The officials said the five people, who all wore civilian clothes, had been killed by occupying Russian soldiers before Ukrainian troops retook control of the town.



"They were shot, shot either in their head or in their chest. They were tortured before they were killed," said Anton Herashchenko, an adviser to the Ukrainian interior ministry.



"Now we are investigating this and we show (it) to the press."



He said Russian soldiers had set up camp inside the building and stayed there for three weeks.

Reuters could not independently verify his account.



Bucha's deputy mayor said on Sunday that 50 residents had been victims of extra-judicial killings carried out by Russian troops. Russia denies targeting civilians since invading Ukraine on Feb. 24 in what it calls a "special military operation" aimed at demilitarising and "denazifying" Ukraine. Ukraine says it was invaded without provocation.

The Kremlin said on Monday it categorically denied any accusations related to the murder of civilians in Bucha.



"This information must be seriously questioned," Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters. "From what we have seen, our experts have identified signs of video falsification and other fakes."



The destruction and civilian deaths in Bucha looks set to galvanise the United States and Europe into additional sanctions against Moscow, with officials raising the prospect of restrictions on Russia's energy exports.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The frontline indices jumped more than 2 per cent on Monday as the announcement of the plan to merge into Bank set their stocks soaring. The and the reclaimed the 60,000 and 18,000 levels for the first time since January 18.

The ended the session at 60,611.7, following a gain of 1,335 points or 2.3 per cent  most since March 9. The index added 383 points, or 2.2 per cent, to end at 18,053. and surged more than 9 per cent each and accounted for over two-thirds of the gains in both indices.

While the HDFC twins accounted for the bulk of the gains, the overall market mood was buoyant.

We have seen a series of acquisitions in the past six months by some of Indias smartest capital allocators. They are all sending a message that this is a good time to acquire well-run companies with reasonable valuations, and reap the full benefit of the economic upturn, said Saurabh Mukherjea, founder, Marcellus Investment Managers.

The economic recovery continues to progress, and we have the GST collections and corporate earnings data to vouch for that. All of this suggests that a fairly robust economic recovery is underway. Indias smart capital allocators understand the need to consolidate to make the most of recovery, he added.

The market breadth was strong, with only two and three Nifty components ending with losses. Overall, 2,647 stocks advanced and only 877 declined, thanks to robust buying by both domestic and foreign investors.

Overseas funds extended their recent buying streak, pumping in Rs 1,152 crore on Monday, while domestic funds raked in Rs 1,675 crore. Global cues were positive amid Chinas move to ease a dispute with the US. The Brent crude held steady at around $106 per barrel as traders weighed the outlook for demand after the Covid surge in China.

US Treasury yields went up ahead of the release of Fed minutes this week. Fed minutes are likely to give some direction regarding whether the US central bank is going for a half percentage-point rate increase in May, and how the central bank will shrink its balance sheet.

"Bond yields continue to rise, so we can see people jumping into bonds. In the short term, people can stick to equities. As soon as the slowdown happens, they will go back to bonds. Earnings will take a hit across the board because of supply constraints and rising raw material costs. And this has been exacerbated by lockdowns in China and extension of the conflict in Ukraine. But the market at the moment has got liquidity," said Andrew Holland, CEO of Avendus Capital Alternate Strategies.

From this years low of 52,843 on March 7, the Sensex has now rallied 14.7 per cent. India is one of the best-performing major globally this year.
Dozens of members of the Kurdish community gathered in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, to celebrate the birth of leader Abdullah Ocalan, where the celebration hall was decorated with pictures of the leader, flags and Kurdish symbols.

The celebration began with a minute of silence in honor of the souls of the martyrs, then I read several statements on behalf of the "Democratic Union Party, Conference Star, Democratic Union Party Youth, Newroz Cultural and Social Association, and Jin's Women's Association." The leader means the birth of freedom for the peoples and components of the Middle East in general and the Kurdish people in particular.

This was followed by the performance of the revolutionary song by the Walati Roji group, which sings the birth of the leader Ocalan, while the Martyr Rojinda Dance Company performed several Kurdish folklore dances.

The celebration ended with the participants holding dabkeh circles, while chanting slogans calling for the freedom of leader Ocalan.

A

ANHA
Upon the Scheme becoming effective, HDFC Bank will be 100% owned by public shareholders and existing shareholders of HDFC will own 41% of HDFC Bank.

Following the announcement, shares of HDFC surged 12.14% to Rs 2,748.45 and shares of HDFC Bank surged 9.06% to Rs 1642.80 on the BSE.

The board of Housing Development Finance Corporation (HDFC) on Monday (4th April) approved a composite scheme of amalgamation of HDFC into HDFC Bank, and their respective shareholders and creditors. The subsidiaries and associates of HDFC will shift to HDFC Bank.

Shareholders of HDFC as on the record date will receive 42 shares of HDFC Bank (each of face value of Re 1), for 25 shares held in HDFC (each of face value of Rs 2), and the equity share(s) held by HDFC in HDFC Bank will be extinguished as per the Scheme.

As a result of this, upon the Scheme becoming effective, HDFC Bank will be 100% owned by public shareholders and existing shareholders of HDFC will own 41% of HDFC Bank.

"The proposed transaction is to create a large balance sheet and net-worth that would allow greater flow of credit into the economy. It will also enable underwriting of larger ticket loans, including infrastructure loans -- an urgent need of the country," HDFC said in a statement.

As of 31 December 2021, HDFC Bank's total advances stood at Rs 12,68,863 crore and HDFC's total advances stood at Rs 5,25,806 crore.

Post merger, pro forma total advances of the combined entity is expected to be Rs 17,86,669 crore.

The proposed transaction will result in reducing HDFC Bank's proportion of exposure to unsecured loans. The merger is expected to result in bolstering the capital base and bringing in resiliency in the balance sheet of HDFC Bank.

Post the combination, HDFC Bank's customers will be offered mortgages as a core product in a seamless manner. HDFC Bank will also leverage the long tenor mortgage relationship to offer varied credit and deposit products enabled through better insights through-out the customer life-cycle. This will result in an enhanced value proposition and customer experience for all customers of the combined entity.

The boards of HDFC and HDFC Bank believe that the merger will create long-term value for all stakeholders, including customers, employees and shareholders of both entities. The amalgamation of the two entities will provide further impetus to the Government's vision of Housing for All.

Deepak Parekh, chairman HDFC, said, "This is a merger of equals. We believe that the housing finance business is poised to grow in leaps and bounds due to the implementation of RERA, infrastructure status to the housing sector, government initiatives like affordable housing for all, amongst others. Over the last few years, various regulations for banks and NBFCs have been harmonised, thereby enabling the potential merger. Further, the resulting larger balance sheet would allow underwriting of large ticket infrastructure loans, accelerate the pace of credit growth in the economy, boost affordable housing and increase the quantum of credit to the priority sector, including credit to the agriculture sector."

The merger is expected to close within 18 months (Q2 / Q3 FY24), subject to completion of regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions.

HDFC had total assets of Rs 6,23,420.03 crore, turnover Rs 35,681.74 crore and net worth of Rs 1,15,400.48 crore as on 31 December 2021.

HDFC Bank had total assets Rs 19,38,285.95 crore, turnover of Rs 1,16,177.23 crore (includes other income) and net worth of Rs 2,23,394 crore, as on 31 December 2021.

HDFC Investments and HDFC Holdings are wholly-owned unlisted subsidiaries of HDFC. These two firms are non-banking finance companies, registered with RBI, engaged in the business of investments in stocks, shares, debentures and other securities.

HDFC Investments had total assets of Rs 341.37 crore, turnover Rs 200.11 crore and net worth of Rs 292.41 crore as on 31 December 2021. HDFC Holdings had total assets of Rs 244.43 crore turnover Rs 20.88 crore and net worth of Rs 241.80 crore as on 31 December 2021.

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 company said that the decision was in the best interest of the company and all its stakeholders.

Kolkata-based IFB Agro Industries' board approved contributing upto Rs 40 crore to political parties in the financial year 2022-23 by subscribing to the electoral bonds in one or more tranches.

In the exchange filing Friday (1 April), signed by IFB Agro's chief financial officer Rahul Choudhary, the company said it was making the disclosure "in continuation to our earlier letters to the Stock Exchanges wherein it has intimated about excise related issues being faced by/ affecting the company."

The board of directors in its meeting dated 31 March 2022, considered "such issues" and in the best interest of the company and all its stakeholders, decided to approve contributions to political parties by way of subscription to the electoral bonds in one or more tranches aggregating not more than Rs 40 crore for the financial year 2022-23, the company said in the filing on Friday.

Earlier on 7 October 2021, it had made a similarly disclosure pertaining to subscription of electoral bonds "aggregating not more than Rs 25 crore for the financial year 2021-22." Even at that time, it cited excise-related issues.

On 26 June 2020, the company informed that its distillery in Noorpur, South 24 parganas, West Bengal was attacked on 25 June 2020, by a group of more than 150 armed goons. The distillery was forced to shut down and its workers were asked to vacate the factory at gun point. A police complaint was made to the local police station and operations resumed on 2 July 2020 after the police protection was provided.

Later on 22 December 2020, the company informed that "till date no offenders had been brought to book."

IFB Agro Industries is engaged in the business of manufacturing alcohol Indian Made Indian Liquor (IMIL), as well as processed and packed marine foods both for domestic and export markets.

On a consolidated basis, net profit of IFB Agro Industries declined 49.38% to Rs 8.59 crore on 27.68% rise in net sales to Rs 257.47 crore in Q3 December 2021 over Q3 December 2020.

Shares of IFB Agro Industries were up 4.21% at Rs 687 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.)
Vedanta Ltd is quoting at Rs 417.85, up 2.97% on the day as on 12:54 IST on the NSE. The stock is up 80.3% in last one year as compared to a 22.25% jump in NIFTY and a 55.5% jump in the Nifty Metal index.

Vedanta Ltd gained for a third straight session today. The stock is quoting at Rs 417.85, up 2.97% on the day as on 12:54 IST on the NSE. The benchmark NIFTY is up around 1.27% on the day, quoting at 17895.1. The Sensex is at 60096.75, up 1.38%. Vedanta Ltd has gained around 7.86% in last one month.

Meanwhile, Nifty Metal index of which Vedanta Ltd is a constituent, has gained around 7.1% in last one month and is currently quoting at 6477.2, up 1.46% on the day. The volume in the stock stood at 61.39 lakh shares today, compared to the daily average of 118.29 lakh shares in last one month.

The benchmark April futures contract for the stock is quoting at Rs 416.95, up 2.21% on the day. Vedanta Ltd is up 80.3% in last one year as compared to a 22.25% jump in NIFTY and a 55.5% jump in the Nifty Metal index.

The PE of the stock is 10.26 based on TTM earnings ending December 21.

Powered by Capital Market - Live News

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Wipro: Wipro announced a three-year collaboration with the University of South Carolina and the Indian Institute of Technology, Patna (IIT, Patna) under a co-innovation model for AI research.

Maruti Suzuki India: The car major sold a total of 170,395 units in March 2022. Total sales in the month include domestic sales of 137,658 units, sales to other OEM of 6,241 units and its highest ever monthly exports of 26,496 units.

Hero MotoCorp: Hero MotoCorp sold 4, 50,154 units in March 2022. This is a sequential growth over the volume sales in the month of February, when Hero MotoCorp dispatched 358,254 units of motorcycles and scooters.

Lupin: Lupin has signed definitive agreement with Anglo-French Drugs & Industries for acquiring a portfolio of brands (including all rights and interests associated with such products), to strengthen the company's presence in Vitamins, Minerals & Supplements and CNS segments.

Dr. Reddy's Laboratories: Dr. Reddy's Laboratories has entered into an agreement with Novartis AG to acquire the cardiovascular brand Cidmus in India. Under the agreement, Dr. Reddy's will be assigned and transferred the Cidmus trademark in India from Novartis AG for a consideration of $61 million.

TVS Motor Company: TVS Motor (Singapore) Pte. Limited (TVSM Singapore), a wholly-owned subsidiary of the company has acquired a majority stake (70%) in EBCO Limited, a British company providing smart connected mobility solutions, based in United Kingdom.

Bharat Dynamics: The company recorded a turnover of Rs.2700 crore approx. (provisional and unaudited) for the financial year ended on 31 March 2022 (corresponding figure for the previous year was Rs.1913.76 crore).

Lemon Tree Hotels: The company has signed a license agreement for a 47 room hotel at Jaipur, Rajasthan under its brand Keys Lite by Lemon Tree Hotels. The hotel is expected to be operational by December 2022.

Powered by Capital Market - Live News

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
With few signs of an end to the war in Ukraine, India will find it tough to keep its ties with Russia intact and also protect its alliance with the United States.

Had India been neutral or non-aligned then its present position on Ukraine would have had some moral basis. However, having played military footsie with the US in the Quad, provoked China with the belief that US was watching its back and then escalating tensions further by the reorganisation of J&K which led to Chinese incursions in Ladakh, India now is seen by Washington to be standing with one foot firmly in the Russian ...
As makes another crucial political transition, it faces a major risk of macroeconomic instability. Minimising that risk will depend, above all, on whether the countrys newly elected president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, can defy his reputation and embrace inclusive politics.

This idyllic island in the Indian Ocean was once a star performer. In the years following independence in 1948, progress on leading social indicators such as poverty, infant mortality, and primary education put well ahead of its neighbours  India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh  and was the envy of much of the developing world. But, for several decades now, divisiveness and conflict have been the serpent in this paradise.

As a result, has been strikingly prone to macroeconomic instability. According to data compiled by Carmen Reinhart and Christoph Trebesch, the country has spent nearly 70 per cent of the last four decades in macroeconomic stabilisation programmes with the International Monetary Fund. In South Asia, only Pakistan has spent a greater proportion of this period under the IMFs supervision. Bangladesh has had Fund programmes around 50 per cent of the time, and appears to have graduated from IMF tutelage in 2015.

And India has had IMF programmes only about 15 per cent of the time, and none since 1995.

Macroeconomic instability reflects deeper social and political factors. According to the late Albert Hirschman, one of the leading thinkers on economic development, It has long been obvious that the roots of inflation ... lie deep in the social and political structure in general, and in social and political conflict and conflict management in particular. Even Milton Friedman, who famously said that inflation was always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon, conceded that it had deeper social causes.

Essentially, macroeconomic pathologies arise from conflicts over how to divide the economic pie. Unless these conflicts are resolved, they lead to unsustainable fiscal deficits, excessive foreign borrowing, inflation, and exchange-rate instability. Latin American macroeconomic irresponsibility, exemplified by Peronism in Argentina, involved favouring urban and government workers. Sub-Saharan Africas periodic crises, meanwhile, often reflect ethnic and regional conflicts. More generally, Dani Rodrik has shown that external shocks give rise to macroeconomic instability when a societys mechanisms for burden-sharing do not work effectively.

Sri Lanka suffers from cleavages along many different lines, notably ideology, ethnicity, language, and religion. Michael Ondaatjes gorgeously sensitive novel, Anils Ghost, captures the human, personal consequences of these conflicts.

Arguably, Sri Lankas original sin was the assertion of linguistic dominance in enshrining Sinhala as the only official language in the 1956 constitution. By the 1970s, Sri Lanka was facing a communist insurgency. Then came the decades-long ethnic conflict involving the Tamils, which nearly tore the island asunder. After that wars brutal conclusion in 2009, religious cleavages came to the fore, reflected in the Easter bombings in 2019 by Islamic extremists.

These conflicts have exacted a heavy economic toll. Societies with stable social and economic compacts between citizens and the state tend to have healthy rates of tax collection, reflecting a broad willingness to share the burden of paying for the services the state provides. But in Sri Lanka, the ratio of tax revenue to GDP is less than 12 per cent, with income taxes accounting for less than a quarter; these are extraordinarily low figures given the countrys relative prosperity.

This revenue was manifestly insufficient to cover the governments spending needs, especially toward the end of the civil war and afterwards. Sri Lanka therefore embarked on a binge of foreign borrowing in the early part of this century, propelling its debt-to-exports ratio to a whopping 270 per cent. Moreover, this debt has become increasingly onerous, with the share of non-concessional borrowing rising from about 25 per cent to close to 70 per cent. The debt has already proved unmanageable, and Sri Lanka has had to pay a humiliating price, handing over the Hambantota port and land to China in order to settle some of it.

A final factor adding to Sri Lankas vulnerability has been a sharp deceleration in export growth since 2000, well before the collapse in world trade. In fact, Sri Lanka was deglobalising for nearly a decade while the rest of the world was hyper-globalising. That, too, was related to social conflict.

It remains to be seen what political direction Sri Lanka will take under Rajapaksa. But if the government pursues non-inclusive policies, this almost certainly will lead to weak resource mobilisation, continuing dependence on external financing on onerous terms, low rates of foreign direct investment, and stagnant export growth. In these circumstances, macroeconomic stability will remain elusive.

The challenge for Sri Lankas new president is as simple as it is stark: to prevent South Asias one-time Scandinavia from becoming its Argentina.

(This piece was written many months before the current crisis in Sri Lanka, but provides an analysis that is relevant)





Arvind Subramanian is a senior fellow at Brown University and a distinguished non-resident fellow at the Center for Global Development
Corporate and business houses donated Rs 921.95 crore to parties in the financial year 2019-20, with the BJP receiving the highest share of Rs 720.407 crore, according to a report.

Donations from corporates to the parties increased by 109 per cent between FY 2017-18 and 2018-19, said an analysis by the (ADR), an NGO working for bringing in transparency in electoral .

The analysis was done on the basis of details given by the parties to the Election Commission of India of donors who have made donations above Rs 20,000 in a financial year.

The five parties whose donations were analysed include the (BJP), the Indian Congress (INC), the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) and the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM).

According to the report, out of the five national parties, the BJP received the maximum donations of Rs 720.407 crore from 2,025 corporate donors during FY 2019-20, followed by the INC which received a total contribution of Rs 133.04 crore from 154 donors, and the NCP with Rs 57.086 crore from 36 corporate donors.

The CPM declared no income from corporate donations for 2019-20, it said.

The report said Prudent Electoral Trust was the top donor to the BJP and the Congress in 2019-20. The Trust donated 38 times in a single year to the two parties each, amounting to a total of Rs 247.75 crore.

"The BJP declared receiving Rs 216.75 crore and Congress received Rs 31.00 crore from Prudent Electoral Trust. B G Shirke Construction Technology Pvt. Ltd. was the top donor to NCP in 2019-20," it said.

During the period from 2012-13 to 2019-20, the national parties received the maximum corporate donations of Rs 921.95 crore in 2019-20 (during which the 17th Lok Sabha elections were held), followed by Rs 881.26 crore in 2018-19 and Rs 573.18 crore in 2014-15 (during which the 16th Lok Sabha elections were held), the report said.

Corporate donations received in 2019-20 constituted 24.62 per cent of the total corporate donations made between 2012-13 and 2019-20. Between 2012-13 and 2019-20, donations from corporate and business houses to the national parties increased by 1,024 per cent, the report noted.

The contributions from corporate/business houses were divided into 15 sectors/categories by ADR and do not form a part of the submission by parties to ECI. The sectors include trusts and group of companies, manufacturing, power and oil, mining, construction, exports/imports, and real estate, among others.

"Out of the total of Rs 921.95 crore donated by the corporate/business houses to the five national parties in FY 2019-20, Rs 22.312 crore was received from the unsegregated category, which includes companies with no details available online or whose nature of work is unclear," the report said.

During 2019-20, electoral trusts were the biggest donors to the national parties, contributing a total amount of Rs 397.82 crore (about 43 per cent). The manufacturing sector was the second highest overall contributor in 2019-20, contributing a total amount of Rs 146.388 crore, the report said.

During 2019-20, BJP, Congress, AITC and NCP received the maximum contributions from electoral trusts. The BJP received the highest amount of Rs 323.32 crore, followed by INC (Rs 71.00 crore), AITC (Rs 2.00 crore) and NCP (Rs 1.50 crore).

(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.)
Congress leader on Monday said Chandigarh belongs to and will always remain so and predicted that its next big battle with Haryana will be over river waters.

Sidhu's comments came after recent remarks by Haryana leaders demanding the completion of the Sutlej-Yamuna Link canal for getting the state's river water share from . They have also sought the transfer of 400 Hindi-speaking villages to Haryana.

The Haryana government has summoned a special session of the assembly here on Tuesday, days after the assembly passed a resolution seeking immediate transfer of Chandigarh to the AAP-ruled state.

The Union Territory of Chandigarh is the common capital of Punjab and Haryana.

Built on 27 villages of Punjab, Chandigarh belonged to Punjab and will remain so, he tweeted in Hindi.

Kahin pe nigahein, kahin pe nishana, Sidhu tweeted, suggesting that the real target for Haryana was not Chandigarh, but the river waters.

Chandigarh is just an excuse, the target is Punjab's river waters. Beware the next big battle is for the river waters of Punjab, he said.

Sidhu, who lost during the recent Punjab assembly elections from Amritsar East, also tagged AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal, state Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann and Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar with his tweet.

The SYL canal issue has been a bone of contention between Punjab and Haryana for several decades.

In the past, Punjab had been demanding a reassessment of its share of the Ravi-Beas river waters while Haryana had been seeking completion of the SYL canal to get its share of 3.5 million acre-feet (MAF) of water.

The Punjab government's move to bring a resolution in the state assembly came in the wake of the Centre's announcement that the Central Service Rules will apply to the employees of the Union Territory of Chandigarh.

(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.)
MP from Ravneet Singh Bittu met Prime Minister on Monday and is learnt to have discussed issues related to the state's development.

"Today met the Hon'ble Prime Minister of India, Sh. @narendramodi ji and discussed issues of Punjab," Bittu tweeted after the meeting.

Bittu, who is the Lok Sabha MP from Ludhiana and is the grandson of former chief minister Beant Singh, met the prime minister at his Parliament office.

Sources said Bittu had earlier sought time from the prime minister to discuss issues concerning .

(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.)
B Bhaskar Rao, a 1990-batch cadre IPS officer and a native of Bengaluru, joined the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) here on Monday after serving the police force for 32 years in various capacities.

He was welcomed to the party fold by senior leader and Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia.

AAP's unit convenor Prithvi Reddy, election in-charge for the state and Timarpur MLA Dilip Pandey, organisation secretary Damodaran and other leaders were present on the occasion at the party headquarters here.

Rao, who was serving as the Additional Director General of Police (Railways), had resigned from the service in September last year, citing personal reasons.

He demitted his office on Friday to join the after the government accepted his resignation and relieved him of his duties.

Rao's joining is seen as a shot in the arm of the with the Arvind Kejriwal-led party preparing for the Karnataka Assembly elections next year, starting with the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (Greater Bengaluru Municipal Corporation) polls this year.

The party leaders believe that the popularity and clout of the former IPS officer would help the AAP better execute its expansion plan in the run up to the assembly elections in the state, currently ruled by the BJP.

The AAP had contested the Karnataka assembly polls for the first time in 2018, fielding candidates in 28 out of total 124 assembly seats, but could not open its account.

Riding high on its stupendous victory in Punjab, the party is hoping to gain its toehold in the southern state this time.

During his service, Rao held various positions and served as Bengaluru Police Commissioner, State Transport Commissioner and Additional Director General of Police (ADGP)-Internal Security.

He received the President's Police Medal for Distinguished Service in 2015, Police Medal for Meritorious Service in 2008 and United Nations Medal for the Services rendered in International Peacekeeping in a warzone in 2000.

(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 ISIS threats and dangers came to the surface again, in the Hol Camp in eastern Hasaka City an attack was carried out on 28 March by a cell of ISIS that was repelled by the Internal Security Forces of North and East Syria. That attack as the first of its kind since the Sina'a break jail in the city of Hasaka in January the last.

in a statement made to ANHA researcher on the Jihadi Islamic groups Mustafa Amin said:

''the repositioning process of the ISIS was done by sleeper cells in many areas of the Syrian territory and more particularly in the Syrian Desert and in areas on the frontlines with the Syrian Army forces. while in areas of the Syrian Democratic Forces the presence was intensified specifically and ambushes were laid and attacks were carried out against the Syrian Democratic Forces the SDF. It was activated in Iraq too, in the Anbar Province desert and in Diyala and Kirkuk. These all are precursors to a big assault by the ISIS organization''.

Mustafa noted the ISIS mercenaries adopted the attrition style of strategy, that was done effectively with the Iraqi state, as the power poles were destroyed and subsequent attacks were carried out against the Iraqi forces. Mustafa noted that took place in Iraq was in line with attacks carried out in North and East Syria.

The operation in the Sina'a prison in the city of Hasaka was to lift siege on the prisoners of the so-called 'Ani call that was planned in the reign of the terrorist Abu Ibrahim Hashemi, the former caliph of the group that was killed in the town of Atmeh in Syria and created the sought gossip. But the groups reorganized itself and chose another caliph, Hesen Hashemi, in an attempt to give an impression that the group still exists and able to continue and carry out operations''.

Mustafa Amin said the presence of ISIS in Arab and Islamic countries was a result of troubles and problems existing, '' the creation of ISIS was well planned of the former Jihadi salafist groups up to the Islamic State in Iraq then the Islamic State in Iraq and Syrian and up to the declaration of the caliphate in Mosul in 2014 and the geography it swept into and controlled up to 2017 then the expulsion of the organization from its bastions in Mosul and Raqqa.

Regarding the security approach to the group Mustafa Amin says that approach is not effective and it ought to be dealt with the ideology the groups advocates, and to instruct people of the dangers the ideology of the groups poses'' this is a very complicated issue, the local community has to bear responsibilities to stand up to the organization on security and on the ideology aspect too, while the international community has to adopt strategies that prevent these groups to spread or cross borders''.

Amin said this is a very difficult task amid economic, financial and social hardship these communities live in''.

On the role played by Turkey Amin says:

Turkey is responsible in a way or another for the continuation of the organization. At the first it dealt with it as a Sunni-Shi'ite struggle as it was the passage of extremists from many countries in the world to the region. Turkey aided the group to commit a lot of appalling crimes against humanity. Turkey aided the organization by economic help indirectly via oil and trafficking and antiques too. Turkey proceeded to subvert the Syrian Democratic Forces SDF that fights the group and all areas under its control in North and East Syrian and Iraq to safe havens for the ISIS commanders. This was very clear when Abu Bakr Baghdadi was present in the town of Barisha and Abu Ibrahim Hashemi in Atmeh where he was killed''.

Mustafa said holding Turkey accountable needs an international will '' the international community is not clear and not serious in this''.

l..a

ANHA
West Bengal Chief Minister Monday accused Governor Jagdeep Dhakhar of dilly-dallying over files related to appointments to key state government posts.

Banerjee said documents pertaining to appointments of Lokayukta member, chairman of the Human Rights Commission and Right to Information commissioners have been lying with Dhankhar for his approval since six months.

"The governor is not clearing files. Even a day before, he refused clear the budget. I had to ring him up to remind the governor that it's his obligation... For approving the budget, too, he has queries. What is going on?



Everywhere (in non-BJP ruled states), they are running a parallel government by appointing governors, the Trinamool Congress boss told reporters at the state secretariat.

She also said the apex court sometimes directs the state government to fill up important vacancies, but with Dhankhar not clearing files, the appointments are stuck.

Dhankhar had earlier said the West Bengal government's recommendation for appointment of former Director General of Police Virendra and former Additional Chief Secretary Naveen Prakash as information commissioners was "flawed".

Alleging that the BJP-led central government was using agencies like the CBI and ED against opposition parties, Banerjee said in order to safeguard democracy in the country, she has written to chief ministers of all non-BJP ruled states and other leaders.

Banerjee also said she received a letter from her Chhattisgarh counterpart Bhupesh Baghel on Monday, in which he has mentioned that the state was not getting its share of the GST.

"He (Baghel) asked me to flag this matter. I have already done that and sent a copy to him. If we have coordination among all the CMs, we will be able to highlight our point of view.

"... In Maharashtra, too, they (the BJP) is disturbing (the state government) through the governor. The same is the case in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh... Some can protest while some cannot. But, this cannot be allowed to continue," she 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.)
Bihar Chief Minister on Monday categorically dismissed reports that that he is eyeing a stint in and said these are "baselss" and "mere speculations".

There have been rumours after Kumar's March 30 comment at an informal chat with media persons that his wish to go to was not yet fulfilled. It created ripples in the Bihar political scenario and reports had started doing rounds that he would become the vice-president.

Senior leaders of JD(U), to which Kumar belongs, have already clarified that the chief minister, who is serving his fourth term in office, will complete his five-year-tenure and is not going anywhere.

Kumar, who was speaking to reporters after casting his vote for the legislative council poll, said, Anything is getting published. I was also surprised to see such reports. These are baseless and mere speculations.

Polling was held on Monday for 24 seats of the 75-strong Bihar legislative council, the biennial election for which took place nearly a year behind schedule due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

To querries on the prospect of ruling NDA candidates in the legislative council polls, Kumar said, I am sure that our alliance will win all 24 seats of the legislative council.

On the prevailing law and order situation in the state, he said it is "completely under control".

"Let me tell you that crime cannot be extirpated completely from society but can be effectively brought under control through proper policing. Bihar police is doing that, he said.

The opposition members had protested in Bihar assembly during the recently concluded budget session over the killing of JD(U) leader Deepak Mehta in Danapur on March 28.

(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 the upcoming to the Asansol Lok Sabha seat in West Bengal's Burdwan district see the first ever victory for Trinamool Congress from there? That's the question doing the rounds in the political circles of the state.

In fact, Trinamool supremo and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee herself is keen to see the party win the seat in the crucial industrial and coal belt of the state, which has a sizeable Hindi-speaking population.

During the closing hours of campaigning for the bypolls, Banerjee will conduct a mega rally in Asansol on April 10. A day before that, her nephew and general secretary of Trinamool Congress, Abhishek Banerjee, will participate in a 3-km road show in Asansol.

The are scheduled on April 12 and the counting of votes will take place on April 16.

Despite tasting electoral success in different pockets of the state, Trinamool has never been able to win from Asansol.

From 1957 to 1967, the Asansol Lok Sabha seat belonged to the Congress. From 1967 to 1971, the Lok Sabha constituency was under the control of Samyukta Socialist Party. From 1971 to 1980, CPI(M) held the seat, before the Congress made a comeback and held the crucial constituency till 1989. From 1989 to 2014, the seat belonged to the CPI(M).

In the 2014 general elections, BJP won the seat for the first time when Babul Supriyo got elected from Asansol. Supriyo won again on a BJP ticket in 2019 following which he also became a minister in the Narendra Modi-led Union government.

However, soon after the 2021 Assembly polls in West Bengal, Supriyo left the BJP and joined the Trinamool Congress, resigning as the Asansol Lok Sabha member, which necessitated the .

While Trinamool has fielded popular Bollywood actor-turned-politician Shatrughan Sinha from Asansol this time, BJP has fielded fashion designer-turned politician, Agnimitra Paul, who is already a sitting BJP legislator from the Asansol (South) Assembly constituency. The CPI(M) has fielded Partha Mukherjee from Asansol.

Supriyo is the Trinamool candidate for the bypolls in the Ballygunge Assembly constituency in Kolkata, the elections for which is also scheduled on April 12.

The by-polls for the Ballygunge Assembly constituency was necessitated by the sudden demise of Trinamool legislator Subrata Mukherjee, who passed away in November 2021.

--IANS

sumanta

(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 on Monday congratulated music composer Ricky Kej, based out of Bengaluru, for winning Grammy and expressed his best wishes to him.

Kej has won his second Grammy in the best new album category for 'Divine Tides'.

The US-born musician shared the award with Stewart Copeland, the drummer of the iconic British rock band The Police, who collaborated with Kej on the album.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A Lucknow-bound flight on Monday returned safely to the airport from where it had taken off for its destination following a suspected technical snag, the private airline said.

An statement here said its flight 6E-7074, operating from to Lucknow, "returned to origin after take-off following a suspected momentary technical snag."



The pilots followed the standard operating procedures and returned safely to the Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar International Airport here, it said. "All passengers are safe and the aircraft is under further inspection," the airline said. The statement did not provide further details.

(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.)
Q. We have an Oriented Unit (EOU) and a Domestic Tariff Area (DTA) unit. When we send goods from our DTA unit to a unit in the (SEZ), we make an invoice in accordance with the Goods and Services Tax (GST) laws and file a bill of at the SEZ Customs Station. For sending goods from our EOU, we have to follow the procedure prescribed at Rule 30(12) of the SEZ Rules, 2006. It means that first the SEZ unit must file a bill of entry at the SEZ Customs station, and then we make an ex-bond shipping bill and send the goods to the SEZ unit under a GST invoice. Can we follow a simpler procedure?

The SEZ Rules, 2006, were notified when the EOUs were required to function under the bonded warehouse provisions at Chapter IX of the Customs Act, 1962. However, EOUs were de-licensed as warehouses under Customs Act, 1962, with effect from August 13, 2016. They have to adhere to the provisions of Notification 52/2003-Customs, dated March 31, 2003, FTP, HBP and other applicable notifications.

Apparently, the is not yet aware of these changes, and so, the SEZ Rules, 2006, remain unchanged. I suggest you write to the drawing its attention to the CBEC Circular no.35/2016-Cus dated June 2, 2016.

Q. We had made two advance remittances for imports of goods from China and Saudi Arabia, without bank guarantees from the foreign parties banks, in accordance with Para C.1.1 of the RBI Master Directions on Imports of Goods and Services. Both parties have not shipped the goods. The Chinese vendor has shut down his business and is untraceable. The party in Saudi Arabia says that their Customs authorities are not allowing exports due to some technicalities and is refusing to return the advance. What are our options?

First, these are commercial disputes, so you must consult a suitable lawyer and explore legal options to recover the money you remitted as advance payment for goods. Second, you can file a complaint with the government in accordance with the provisions of Chapter 8 of the Foreign Trade Policy (FTP) and follow the procedures prescribed in Chapter 8 of the Handbook of Procedures, Vol.1 (HBP).

Please note that this mechanism only provides an additional window for resolution of complaints/disputes. The idea is to make efforts to resolve the complaints amicably and expeditiously. It does not preclude your option to pursue any other course of action, including legal action, against the erring party. Third, you must immediately inform your bank of the circumstances leading to non-shipment against your advance, and your failure to get back the advance.

Q. Can we change the name of the buyer/consignee after an shipment?

Yes. Please refer to Para C.18 of RBI Master Direction no.16/2015-16 dated January 1, 2016, on Import of Goods and Services.





Business Standard invites readers queries related to GST, export and import matters. You can write to us at smechat@bsmail.in
After a period of prolonged uncertainty -- marked by the government and the RBIs scepticism towards virtual digital assets -- a new tax regime for cryptocurrencies was finally unfurled in this years budget. And it came into force with the onset of this financial year last week. GFX in Text on screen: India has 15-20 million crypto investors with holdings of $6 billion, according to industry estimates. GFX out The introduction of a separate taxation system was seen as a relief by the industry, as it gave an air of legitimacy to cryptocurrencies. But it looks like it wasnt much of a relief. The new norms effected a flat 30% tax on profits made from the transfer of crypto assets and NFTs --irrespective of the holding period. The gains from virtual digital assets are being taxed in the same way as from those made in gambling, lottery or horse racing. No deduction except the cost of acquisition is allowed. Crypto gifts are also taxable at the slab rate if their value exceeds Rs 50,000. And if that was not enough, a far harsher Tax Deducted at Source (TDS) at the rate of 1% for every trade will be levied from July 1 if the aggregate transaction value in the financial year crosses Rs 50,000. The buyer must withhold the TDS on behalf of the seller. Experts warn that the TDS will suck liquidity from the market by forcing high-frequency traders to curtail their trading. Some even warn that the governments decision not to permit offsetting of trading losses in digital assets may lead to an exodus of crypto companies from India. Meanwhile, Indian crypto exchanges have been witnessing higher volumes in the past week for multiple reasons. New investors are entering the crypto market as they view the tax as a tacit recognition of the asset class by the government.

Some traders have booked profits to take advantage of the prevailing system, which, unlike the new framework, allowed set-off and carry forward of capital losses in crypto. While some investors are squaring off their positions to start the new year with a clean slate.

In a way, the tax puts an end to the constant uncertainty that plagued the sector in India for half a decade now. The industry welcomed the move even as they bemoaned the prohibitive taxes which threatens to accelerate the brain drain and discourage innovation.

Experts have highlighted the impracticality of enforcing the TDS provision, especially on foreign exchanges and in the case of crypto-to-crypto trades where there is no clarity on who will be designated as the buyer.

Given the nature of the industry, which lives by the ethos of decentralization, enforcing the TDS becomes arduous. As the TDS will dry up liquidity on exchanges, investors will neither get the best prices nor quick execution of trades.

This may also push traders to the grey market and devise ways to evade taxes.

While, individuals with resources, high-frequency traders as well as start-ups and entrepreneurs in the cryptocurrency and Web 3.0 ecosystem are now being incentivized to shift their base to crypto-friendly jurisdictions like Singapore and Dubai in the UAE. India may see a brain drain of thousands of highly-skilled developers.

The tax has come as a body blow to an industry that was starting to thrive. Venture capital funding into Indian cryptocurrency and Web 3.0 start-ups grew 28 times to $500 million in 2021, according to a Bain & Co report. Indian crypto exchanges CoinSwitch Kuber and CoinDCX turned unicorns in quick succession last year.

Polygon, a decentralized scaling platform for the Ethereum blockchain, raised $450 million through a private sale of its native token MATIC to venture capital firms in February.

Polygon was founded in Bengaluru by three Indians as Matic Network in 2017. However, in order to derisk its business from geography-specific regulatory concerns, Polygon has distributed its operations between several countries keeping only a limited presence in India.

Giottus Co-founder Arjun Vijay says India will be forced to play catch up a few years down the line if it lets go of an opportunity thats presenting itself now. With three months to go for the TDS provision to take effect, the industry is hoping the government will heed its warnings.

Watch video
Workday today announced that it intends to create 1,000 new jobs over the next two years at its European headquarters in Dublin, increasing its Ireland-based workforce by approximately 60%. In addition, to support its future growth and deepen its local community partnerships, Workday announced plans to construct its new European headquarters at Grangegorman, Dublin 7.



Workday is a global provider of enterprise cloud applications for finance and human resources. As part of its growth in the region, Workday will be hiring in roles across product development, engineering and data science, sales, services and user experience. Workdays Dublin team has played a central role in the companys global product development and innovation efforts since the company first opened its office in Ireland in 2008. Workday currently employs more than 1,700 people in Dublin, helping support the organisations more than 9,500 customers worldwide. As design planning for the new European headquarters begins, Workday will become the anchor tenant of the Dockline Building in Dublin 1, helping augment its existing headquarters at Kings Building.



The news was shared at an event at Workdays European Headquarters that was attended by Taoiseach Micheal Martin TD and Martin Shanahan, CEO, IDA Ireland, and Workday Co-CEO Chano Fernandez, Executive Vice President, Product and Technology, Sayan Chakraborty and Senior Vice President, Chris Byrne.



Welcoming the news today, Taoiseach Micheal Martin said, "Todays announcement of 1,000 new jobs by Workday is a very significant endorsement of Ireland as a place to do business and in our reputation as a leading tech hub in Europe. It is a vote of confidence in the skills and talent of our workforce and in our continued attractiveness to leading global companies. I also welcome the companys decision to construct its new European headquarters at Grangegorman in Dublin."



Co-CEO at Workday, Chano Fernandez added, "I was thrilled to join the Taoiseach in Dublin today to announce our continued investment in our workforce and workplace in Ireland. Our presence in Dublin, and the incredible talent weve been able to hire here, have been critical components of our innovation and customer service efforts  both core values at Workday. We see great opportunity ahead as we help some of the worlds largest organisations with their digital transformation efforts, including how they adapt to change, plan for the future, and support their employees in the changing world of work."

Source: www.businessworld.ie
More than 5 in 10 Irish people do not claim the tax reliefs and refunds they are owed on a yearly basis. This is one of the headline findings from the latest Taxback.com Taxpayer Sentiment Survey 2022. The survey of 1,200 Irish consumers also found that almost 8 in 10 people are unaware of Flat Rate Expenses (FREs)  the tax relief that exist to help tens of thousands of workers across a broad range of professions to offset costs of uniforms and equipment required for the course of their work.

Seventeen percent of people said theyve only ever claimed tax refunds once in their life, while 11% said they only do it very sporadically. One in five have either not set up a Revenue online account and/or do not know what this is.

Taxback.com launched its Employee Financial Wellbeing initiative last year, in order to equip employees with the knowledge and know-how to enable them to put their personal tax affairs in order, and to ensure they are in receipt of any and all refunds and reliefs available to them. Taxback.com say discussions with employees showed that people are slow to act when it comes to tax.

However, Taxback.com have since submitted tax returns for thousands of workers who participated in the programme and the average refund amount received to date amounts to 1,250, with the highest individual refund being 7,400. Furthermore, Taxback.com say the longer consumers leave it the less likely they are to apply at all, and they also run the risk of going past the 4-year deadline.



The Employee Wellbeing Summit 2022 aims to explore these issues in detail, as well as highlighting actionable tools for employers to help them support staff through the transition. Speakers at this years Summit include Eoin McGee, Principal at Prosperous Financial Planning, Fania Stoney, CEO & Co-Founder of Healthy Place to Work, Triona Desmond, Group Wellbeing Partner at AIB, Claire Hellen, HR Strategy Specialist at Ibec, and Joanna Murphy, CEO at Taxback.com.



Commenting on the research, Director of Taxback.coms Employee Financial Wellbeing Service, Barry Cahill said, "Its surprising, and somewhat alarming, to find that almost half of us are still not claiming back our tax refund at the end of the year. This figure should be much, much higher. However, the data speaks for itself  its clear that people remain uncertain, reticent, and/or unwilling to approach the topic of their taxes, often for fear of the process complicating their lives more. This is a misnomer we very much want to quash as, for the vast majority of people, we find that there is money owed to, not by, the taxpayer."

Source: www.businessworld.ie
Joe Biden's US Presidential campaign in 2020 also emphasized valuing family. It highlighted Biden's strong relationship with his current wife Jill, his children, and his grandkids. There was also a narrative on how he allows quality time for his grandchildren.

When he became the President of the United States, Biden noted, though, that his family members have no involvement in the White House unlike during former US President Donald Trump's term.

So what are his children doing in life? Who are they? Here is some key information:

Naomi Biden

Biden's first wife, Neilia, gave birth to a daughter named Naomi. Neilia and Naomi died in an automobile accident in 1972, which had a huge impact on Biden's life.

Neilia was traveling westbound on rural Valley Road in Hockessin with her three children in the family station wagon, according to Biography. She sped past a stop sign and straight into the path of a tractor-trailer speeding along Route 7 into Pennsylvania.

The family was rescued from the wreckage of the car and taken to Wilmington General Hospital, but Neilia and the 13-month-old baby were already dead when they arrived.

Beau and Hunter Biden, Biden's two sons, fortunately, survived the accident, but they were injured.

Joseph 'Beau' Biden

Biden named his eldest son after himself but he was popularly known by the nickname "Beau". Beau married Hallie Olivere in 2002 and had two kids: Natalie and Robert II. In 2003, he became a member of the Army National Guard as a major in the Judge Advocate General's Corps.

He followed the footsteps of his father in politics and served as the 44th attorney general of Delaware from 2007 to 2015. Beau announced his desire to serve as governor of Delaware and announced his desire to run in the 2016 election. Unfortunately, he was not able to fulfill that as he died in 2015 due to brain cancer at the age of 46.

Read Also: Macron Says Biden's Remark That Putin Is a Butcher Makes it Harder To End the Ukraine Conflict

Robert Hunter Biden

Hunter Biden, President Joe Biden's second son, has worked as a lawyer in New York. He's also the founder of Eudora Global, a venture financing business, From 2011 to 2015, he served as the chairman of the World Food Program USA board. Hunter joined the board of directors of Burisma, a Ukrainian oil firm, in 2014.

Hunter's finances are currently the subject of a federal inquiry. There also were disputed rumors concerning his foreign ties and financial dealings in 2020, but some major media publications, including Politico, disproved them.

Hunter's personal life had also become a public topic due to his issues with drugs and alcohol, as well as his 2017 divorce from ex-wife Kathleen Buhle per Women's Health report. The former couple is the co-parents of Naomi, Finnegan, and Maisey Biden.

Ashley Blazer Biden

Ashley Biden is the youngest child of the current President of the United States, with a bachelor's degree in social work from Tulane University in New Orleans and a master's in social work from the University of Pennsylvania. She is married to Dr. Howard Krein, a plastic surgeon.

She brings decades of expertise as a social worker and social champion to her duty as First Daughter. Ashley served as executive director of a nonprofit advocacy group Delaware Center for Justice and holds the position of social worker for the Department of Services for Children, Youth, and Their Families.

Ashley has pivoted to the fashion industry, as per Harpers Bazaar. In 2017, she founded Livelihood, an American-made clothing company that also aims to address income inequality and racial inequality in the country.

Related Article: Kamala Harris: 5 Facts You May Not Know About the US Vice President

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
China has set up the worlds highest automatic weather station on Mount Everest as part of the Peak Mission scientific expedition launched April 28. The weather station sits over 8,800 meters above sea level on the worlds highest mountain, known locally as Mount Qomolangma. More than 270 researchers participated in the expedition, among whom 13 reached the summit on Wednesday. The team is the first to make the famous climb from China this year

May 06, 2022 08:15 PM
New photographs of killed citizens in the streets of a suburb of Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, emerged on Sunday, prompting Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to declare, "Indeed, this is genocide."

At least 20 civilians' dead bodies litter a single street in Bucha, a town near Kyiv, Ukraine. Others are sprawled on their backs, mouths open, in a heartbreaking tribute to the brutality of Russian rule. A French outlet obtained the horrifying photographs of the slaughter in Bucha on Saturday, the same day Ukraine declared the town free of Russian soldiers.

Russian Crimes Against Ukrainian Civilians Emerge

As Russian soldiers retreat from regions surrounding Kyiv following a failed attempt to encircle the capital, reports of alleged Russian crimes are surfacing. A piece of white fabric is knotted behind the back of one man's hands. Another guy sits alone along a grassy bank, tangled in a bicycle.

A third guy rests amid the charred wreckage of a burned-out automobile in the center of the road. Bucha has been in the midst of near-constant combat for the past five weeks. Officials and human rights organizations are now blaming the departing Russian military for the civilian killings.

Western politicians, including US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have called for war crimes probes and further penalties on Russia in response to the alleged atrocities. The Russian Ministry of Defense called the tape false, claiming that throughout Russia's takeover of Bucha, not a single local civilian was subjected to any violent activities.

Russian military soldiers transported and issued 452 tons of humanitarian assistance to residents in the villages of the Kyiv region, it stated in a statement. Allegations of the Russian military inflicting civilian fatalities have always been met with sweeping denials from the Russian government.

Russian authorities sought to cast doubt on widespread media accounts after the Russian air force struck a maternity facility on March 9, with one Russian ambassador accusing a bombing victim - a woman who fled the strike, injured and yet pregnant - of being a fake and not a real victim. The toll of the Russian invasion was apparent at a mass grave in Bucha. People cried as they attempted to locate the bodies of lost loved ones at a grave located on the grounds of the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints on Sunday, according to a CNN.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, dressed in dark green, records a video speech to the Ukrainian people almost every day, sometimes seated at a desk, other times standing outside in the dead of night. He has recently been warning of impending challenges.

As the war enters its sixth week and peace discussions between Ukrainian and Russian diplomats continue, Zelensky is confronted with fresh problems. Despite military deaths, economic ruin, and widespread human suffering, he must maintain morale and the desire to fight. To guarantee that weapons continue to flow, he must maintain Western nations' trust in Ukraine's ability to win.

Read Also: Macron Diplomatically Leads NATO in Dealing With the Ukraine Crisis Despite Potshots From EU Members

Ukraine Fails to Negotiate With Vladimir Putin

For months, Zelensky has been unsuccessful in meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin to address Moscow's numerous requests. The Ukrainian delegation's leader, David Arakhamia, said on Saturday that Kyiv is preparing for a possible meeting between Zelensky and Putin in Turkey.

Zelensky has been laying the foundation with Ukrainians to put a stop to the country's constitutionally mandated pursuit of NATO membership, pointing out that the alliance is unwilling to accept Kyiv. Instead, he has concentrated his efforts on gaining European Union membership, as per The Washington Post via MSN.

Children, women raped and set afire, and men tortured and killed by being shot in the head while their hands were tied behind their backs were among the dead recovered after Russian soldiers left Bucha, Ukraine reported. Local authorities were among the deceased.

"In the streets, hundreds of cowardly murdered civilians. ... The Russian authorities will have to answer for these crimes," he tweeted.

According to Vladyslav Atroshekno, the mayor of Chernihiv in northern Ukraine, the city is currently around 70% devastated as a result of Russian force attacks, New York Post reported.

Related Article: Russia-Ukraine War: Volodymyr Zelensky Fires 2 Top Generals, Calls Them 'Antiheroes' and 'Traitors'

@YouTube

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Hungarian authoritarian leader, Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who recently won the region's nationwide election, signaled his support for Russia after calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky an "opponent."

The prime minister's remarks come after he declared victory on Sunday with partial results that showed that his Fidesz party was leading the vote by a wide margin. Orban is planning to get a fourth consecutive term in office. The preliminary results suggest his party will have control of 135 seats of the 199-seat Parliament.

Longtime Support for Russia

The numbers showed that Orban's party had a considerable lead ahead of the opposition alliance United for Hungary, which is expected to get control of only 57 seats. The data comes from 80% of the votes being counted.

In previous years, the country's election involving Orban had been predicted to be closer but still had Fidesz leading by roughly 5% to 6%. The authoritarian leader is known to be the most pro-Kremlin official of the 27 nations of the European Union and has spent 12 years in power in Budapest. Orban has been the country's longest-serving leader since the fall of communism in 1989 and has been considered a hindrance by the EU, as per CNBC.

Hungary's election campaign was dominated by Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, prompting intense scrutiny of Orban's longtime association with Russian President Vladimir Putin. In his victory speech, the prime minister said that Zelensky was an opponent that he had to overcome during the campaign.

Read Also: Russia-Ukraine War: US Confirms Ukraine Strike on Russian Oil Depot

The region is highly dependent on the Russian energy supply, and for a long time, Orban has avoided opportunities to condemn Putin's assault on its neighboring state. The situation complicated the EU's efforts to present a united front against him.

According to CNN, Orban said, during his victory speech, that his party had such an overwhelming lead you could see it from the Moon and from Brussels. His remarks referenced his long-running tensions with EU leaders.

Hungarian Authoritarian Leader

With Orban's expected constitutional majority, he could have the power to continue making deep unilateral changes to the Central European nation. State secretary Zoltan Kovacs said that the participation of many parties in the election at an event on the Danube river showed the strength of Hungary's democracy.

Opposition leader Peter Marki-Zay was not able to win a majority vote in his home district, trailing Fidesz incumbent Janos Lazar by more than 12 points. The situation became discouraging for the prime ministerial candidate who had promised the people to end what he claimed was rampant government corruption.

Furthermore, the radical right-wing party Our Homeland Movement appeared to have gained more than 6% of the vote, a surprising performance that exceeded the 5% threshold needed to gain seats in parliament. Opposition parties and international observers have alleged that there were structural impediments to defeating Orban.

They noted that there was pervasive pro-government bias in the public media, the domination of commercial news outlets by Orban allies, and a heavily gerrymandered electoral map. A political scientist at the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, Edit Zgut, predicted Orban's clear victory would further give him the power to move in an autocratic direction by sidelining dissidents and capturing new areas of the economy, the Associated Press reported.

Related Article: Russia-Ukraine War: Volodymyr Zelensky Fires 2 Top Generals, Calls Them 'Antiheroes' and 'Traitors'

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Germany's gas supply drops to zero as Gazprom shuts the taps after the warning by the Kremlin. Berlin is left scrambling as their contracts are annulled due to the crisis in Ukraine and how Russian President Vladimir Putin called countries unfriendly due to sanctions.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has sought to find a middle ground with Moscow but ended up as the first block member as first getting cut off from Russian natural gas.

Russia Cuts Gas Supply to Germany

German leaders need to keep the gas tap on for the 40 percent of its natural gas needs; they were initially hesitant by joining other western countries in sanctioning Russia due to the Ukraine incursion, reported Express UK.

Berlin is tied into the Nord Stream 2 Baltic gas pipe, which should pump in twice as much natural gas directly.

The Russian gas provider pulled out of the deal indicated it's not part of Gazprom Germania anymore, and other firms like Gazprom Marketing & Trading Ltd.

Katja Yafimava, an expert in Energy Studies from Oxford University, mentioned these statements in Reuters. She said that Gazprom is opting to end as a leading provider for the gas market in Europe, where it has been a longtime player. After what happened to its business in the wake of the Ukraine incursion, it pulled out.

Gazprom knows how the hostile political and regulatory environment will worsen in Europe. Hence, it gathers and consolidates, doing all the business in St Petersburg with the political support of the Russian government.

Germany's gas supply is linked with Moscow, and Berlin became complicated with the decree concerning the payment of natural gas supplies.

Read Also: Vladimir Putin Net Worth 2022: Does Anyone Know Russian President's Hidden Wealth?

President Vladimir Putin approved a decree that all gas buyers pay in Rubles; most notably, the US and the European Union states called unfriendly.

Putin's Demands

Last Thursday, the decree was signed by Putin, which was against nations opposed to Russia; the shift of payment from Euros and Dollars to Rubles is the currency for payment, cited Nikkei Asia.

In a broadcasted high-level government meeting, opening ruble accounts with Russian banks is necessary. Once the special accounts did, it will be where gas payments are forwarded but must be done before April 1.

Putin added that if the payments are not yet done, it violates the buyers' contract. What happens next is to the buyers what consequences are to follow. This move was alleged to have been done to consolidate the ruble. Both Berlin and Paris said that the Russian leaders commanded to pay in rubles, especially for foreign customers.

Germany's Economy Minister, Robert Habeck, made it clear how the suspension of Russian energy supplies to Europe will have a backup plan. Blackmailing by Putin, he added, is not acceptable.

Remarks by French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire made it clear that Paris and Berlin will not justify the unwanted demand; if Gazprom stops all contracts.

Ironically, despite the sanction of Russian Energy by Washington, the EU did not allow stoppage of natural gas and oil deliveries.

All payments via a Gazprombank account or 'K account' that converts foreign currency to rubles to complete gas transactions only. The west claims that sanctions are biting.

Gazprom shutting down Germany's gas supply comes as the Kremlin pushes back and uses energy to strangle the bloc.

Related Article: Vladimir Putin Threatens Zero Gas Supply to Unfriendly Nations If Not Paid in Roubles

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
After its global unveil in India last November and subsequent spy shots showing it landing at the Batangas Port and on its way to dealers...
DPRK slams S. Korea for defense minister's "preemptive strike" remarks

Xinhua) 13:29, April 04, 2022

PYONGYANG, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Kim Yo Jong, a senior official of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), said on Saturday the South Korean defense minister's reckless rhetoric would worsen bilateral relations, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Sunday.

"His reckless and intemperate rhetoric about the 'preemptive strike' has further worsened the inter-Korean relations and the military tension on the Korean Peninsula," said Kim, vice department director of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea and younger sister of DPRK's top leader Kim Jong Un.

South Korea's Defense Minister Suh Wook on Friday publicly said that his troops have the capabilities to "accurately and swiftly" strike the origin of DPRK's missile firing as well as command and support facilities upon clear signs of a launch toward South Korea.

"South Korea may face a serious threat owing to the reckless remarks made by its defense minister," Kim said.

She also said Pyongyang would reconsider many things concerning Seoul, and South Korea should discipline itself to stave off disaster.

Pak Jong Chon, secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, was quoted by the KCNA in a separate report on Sunday in which he warned strong retaliation if South Korea dares to conduct a "preemptive strike" against the DPRK.

"If the South Korean army engages in a dangerous military action as a preemptive strike against the DPRK, being guided by misjudgment, our army will mercilessly direct all its military force into destroying major targets in Seoul and the South Korean army," Pak said.

"The South Korean military must not ramp up the tension with its confrontational acts," he said.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
During a ceremony to commission the Navy's newest nuclear submarine, President Joe Biden experienced another brain cramp, claiming that the first lady previously served as Vice President during the Obama administration.

After being designated as the sponsor of the USS Delaware during her commissioning in Wilmington, Delaware, on Saturday, President Joe Biden praised his wife Jill Biden for her work and devotion to military families.

US President's Fresh Blunders

Republicans have blamed Biden's cognitive deterioration for the current administration's backtracking on the president's other recent linguistic gaffes, like informing US troops in Warsaw, Poland, that they were about to travel to Ukraine before hinting that the US may use chemical weapons against Russia.

In late March, Biden urged for a change of government in Moscow, saying, "For God's sake, this man [Putin] cannot remain in power."

Biden commissioned the USS Delaware, a nuclear assault submarine, on Saturday, claiming it will improve national security though he made no mention of the worldwide upheaval caused by Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The First Lady was picked as the submarine's sponsor, a position that is said to bring good luck to the vessel.

The President also lauded his wife's performance at the event. When discussing his wife's accomplishments as the US's second lady, the President made the mistake of incorrectly stating that she was vice president, Dail Mail reported.

Another blunder by the president was viewed as a considerably more hazardous error when he attacked Vladimir Putin without fully comprehending the consequences. Biden stated in an address that Putin "cannot continue in power," which analysts believe could prolong the conflict in Ukraine.

The comment reportedly enraged Moscow officials, who said it might be taken as an attempt by the US to destabilize Putin's administration. During a speech commemorating Equal Pay Day, the president apparently mistook VP Kamala Harris for his wife Jill, as per The Sun.

Read Also: Tokyo Will Not Quit the Energy Projects With Russia Despite Sanctions Imposed on Moscow

Joe Biden's Capacity To Lead the US Is Questioned

Biden's European journey was coming to a close, and he had captured some compelling photos that countered the myth that his administration had been lost at sea. However, nine impromptu words in Warsaw raised new doubts about Biden's ability to lead the West in its standoff with Vladimir Putin.

They can't believe their good fortune in the Kremlin. Putin recently warned Russians that the US was attempting to cancel Russia and his administration. Putin's spokeswoman immediately accused Biden of undermining Russian democracy, claiming that only Russian voters have the power to elect the country's leader.

White House officials are well aware of the hazards that Biden's statements have generated as they clean up another Biden catastrophe. Dmitry Peskov, the press secretary for the Kremlin, stated last Monday that Putin would only deploy nuclear weapons if he saw an "existential threat" to Russia. Putin might readily apply such interpretation to Biden's remark.

The President's blunder will also hurt his efforts to persuade skeptics to accept America's position that the crisis in Ukraine is a proxy war between democracies and autocracies. When the UN General Assembly voted earlier this month, 35 nations refrained from choosing a side. The President's remark does little to persuade them to change their minds.

The Allies are concerned. Biden's portrayal of Putin as a 'butcher' might be perceived as a hazardous act of escalation, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Sunday, according to INews.

Related Article: New Details on Hunter Biden's Federal Investigation Emerge as Washington Post Joins The New York Times in Admitting Laptop's Authenticity

@YouTube

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
By Hampton Stall, Senior Program Associate, The Carter Center

After the Mozambique civil war ended in 1992, demining experts needed 23 years to clear the 86,000 unexploded weapons left behind. A just-released Carter Center report suggests that there could be more than three times that amount of unexploded ordnance in Syria, where demining efforts have yet to begin.

The presence of unexploded ordnance is a critical impediment to Syrias recovery and development, affecting the ability to farm, use roads, repair housing, or access schools, hospitals, and other essential infrastructure. Explosive remnants of war have a resounding impact on civilian life, economic activity, and environmental health.

The need to remove them is one of the few things that Syrias warring parties and their international backers agree on, and the issue deserves the attention of the larger international community.

The Carter Centers report is based on painstaking analysis of data collected by the Carter Center and obtained from the Armed Conflict Location Event Data Project. Researchers looked at conflict events across Syria dating back to 2012 and extrapolated the likely amount of unexploded ordnance in different areas based on reports of how many of each of a variety of types of weapons were used during a particular skirmish.

The result is an analysis that can be used to inform recovery efforts and negotiations. It illustrates why the international community should prioritize this issue and how it can address the problem.

The study recorded at least 972,051 uses of explosive munitions from 99,194 conflict events between December 2012 and May 2021. About 62% (599,954) of the total explosive munitions used in Syria were ground-launched munitions, and 37% (363,807) were air-launched munitions.

Estimates suggest that during a conflict, between 10% and 30% of weapons dont explode. Applying that percentage to the data that the Center reviewed means that between 100,000 and 300,000 explosive munitions failed to detonate in Syria between December 2012 and May 2021. (And the count is likely much higher.)

Explosive munition contamination in Syria is likely to affect multiple generations of Syrians, and its impacts are manyfold, including:

Loss of life or limb through encounters with live munitions years after conflict subsides, particularly among children.

Disruptions to economic development, especially related to rebuilding in urban areas and agriculture in rural areas.

Environmental degradation as munitions break down and chemicals and rust seep into the ground and groundwater.

These weapons need to be cleared to safeguard civilians, permit humanitarian aid, and ultimately encourage economic recovery. Demining efforts dont just benefit the economy; they can also serve as confidence-building measures between warring factions and help build peace.

To begin to address this issue, The Carter Center recommends that:

Nations grant sanctions waivers to humanitarian demining organizations.

The government of Syria facilitate a swifter and less arbitrary humanitarian registration process to encourage an earlier start to clearance.

The international community prioritize demining efforts alongside other humanitarian endeavors, including in the recovery planning for specific cities for which data can be provided.

Syrian and international actors make the problem of unexploded ordnance a common theme in which actors could be engaged to move forward on solutions related to resolving the Syria crisis.

Analysts and demining organizations use the Carter Centers methodology to estimate unexploded weapons contamination down to the community level to better concentrate demining efforts. The underlying UXO data be used by humanitarian organizations to better coordinate demining action and humanitarian aid delivery.

Authors note: The full report is available here, and the data set is more detailed than what is presented in the report. The Carter Center is available and willing to share more detailed analysis on this issue with potential partners.
Photo: The Canadian Press Elmwood-Transcona NDP MP Daniel Blaikie delivers remarks at the Canadian National Prayer Breakfast in Ottawa on Thursday, May 2, 2019. The NDP finance spokesman says his party is watching to see that spending pledges made in a deal with the Liberals are honoured by the government in this week's budget. THE CANADIAN PRESS/David Kawai

The NDP is watching to see that spending pledges made in a deal with the Liberals are honoured by the government in this week's federal budget, says a finance spokesman.

Daniel Blaikie said the budget is "the first important moment" for its confidence deal with the Liberals, which included a number of NDP policy priorities requiring government funds.

The New Democrats want to see indications that the Liberals are moving on pledges in the deal, such as a $500 one-time top-up to the Canada Housing Benefit and funding for dental care for low-income families, starting with children, he said.

Last month, Jagmeet Singh's party agreed to support the Liberals stay in power until 2025 with a confidence-and-supply agreement that includes support for the Liberal budget.

In return they got Liberal backing for some of their priorities, including affordable medication in a pharmacare program.

The deal includes more immediate measures, including scaling back subsidies for oil and gas companies.

The NDP said a significant injection of cash in Indigenous housing is a priority.

It also wants more funding in home energy efficiency to cut Canadians' bills and help the environment, it said.

The NDP said it will be watching out for a surtax on the profits of banks and insurance companies in the budget, which is expected to be tabled Thursday.

Blaikie said in an interview Sunday with The Canadian Press that the first budget following the deal "is an important moment for New Democrats and for Canadians."

The NDP was disappointed there were not more "revenue raising" measures in the text of the pact, he said.

"We would have liked to have seen more of the tax fairness measures."

The NDP said it favours raising taxes for the rich and to tax excess profits by companies, including oil and gas. But they could not get an agreement from the Liberals on their entire policy wish list, including proportional representation for elections, it added.

The deal, however, did include an agreement to act in "the near term on tax changes on financial institutions that have made strong profits during the pandemic."

It also pledged to make "early moves in 2022" to "phaseout public financing of the fossil fuel sector, including from Crown corporations."

Under the terms of the deal, the NDP will have to vote for the Liberal budget even if they do not agree with all of it, and if it includes millions in military spending.

Some Conservative MPs have expressed concerns that the NDP-Liberal pact will lead to a big increase in public spending in the budget to pay for NDP priorities such as subsidized dental care.
Photo: DriveBC Coquihalla Summit - N Hwy 5, about 7 km north of Zopkios Brake Check, looking north.

More snow in the mountain passes Monday morning.

Environment Canada has issued a winter storm warning in effect for the Coquihalla Highway - Hope to Merritt with a prolonged snowfall event is expected right through Tuesday afternoon.

As much as 40 cm of snow is expected to fall over the course of the next 30 hours.

"An approaching Pacific system is expected to bring significant amounts of snow across higher elevation passes," states the warning from Environment Canada.

Snow at times heavy will continue through today before tapering off to a few flurries Tuesday afternoon.

Environment Canada is telling motorists to consider postponing non-essential travel if possible.

Rapidly accumulating snow will make travel difficult. Visibility may be suddenly reduced at times in heavy snow.

Additionally, significant snowfall will fall on Highway 3, with up to 35 cm forecast to fall between Paulson Summit and Kootenay Pass through to Monday afternoon.
President Joe Biden is certain that his son Hunter Biden didn't breach the law, according to Chief of Staff Ron Klain, as the federal investigation into the 52-year-old recovering drug addict's overseas business transactions heats up.

A federal grand jury has been hearing testimony in recent months about Hunter Biden's cash flow while serving on the board of Ukraine energy company Burisma, according to reports. The senior White House official appeared on ABC's This Week two days after it was reported.

Hunter Biden's Foreign Dealings With Ukraine, China

Klain fiercely disputed during his television appearance that the White House had contacted the Justice Department about the investigation, which is being handled in the president's home state of Delaware. Klain was also questioned about a recent Washington Post revelation revealing that a Chinese energy business paid roughly $5 million to organizations owned by Hunter and his uncle James Biden over 14 months.

CEFC China Energy, a business with close links to Beijing's communist leadership, reportedly began making payments in 2017. The Post highlighted freshly released government papers, bank statements, and emails recovered from a hard drive allegedly belonging to Hunter in its piece, which had previously been dismissed as Russian misinformation by major media outlets.

The contents of the laptop reportedly belonging to Hunter were initially revealed in October 2020 by the New York Post and were later verified by DailyMail.com early the following year. It includes a large number of emails detailing Hunter's business transactions in Ukraine and China, many of which occurred while his father was vice president, as well as filthy photographs of sex acts, prostitution, and drug usage.

The New York Post was suspended from Twitter during the 2020 presidential election after they were the first to report on Hunter's emails. The Washington Post, among other prominent news sites, either downplayed the story or accused it of being Russian misinformation.

The editorial board of the Washington Post, on the other hand, claimed that there was more to the media's reluctance to cover the subject, and the magazine recognized that there was.

Although the Post offered no answers or retaliation for the Hunter Biden laptop claims, it did acknowledge burying an otherwise factual and timely item ahead of the 2020 election, according to Fox News.

Read Also: Donald Trump Wins by 6 Points Over Joe Biden in a Snap Elections According to Recent Poll

Joe Biden Previously Denies Hunter's Profit With Chinese Companies

At the time, the Biden-Harris transition team stated that the president-elect was extremely proud of his son, who had overcome several hurdles, including savage personal assaults in recent months, to emerge stronger. Hunter Biden stated in early December 2020 that he was confident in the legal and ethical handling of his affairs.

During the October 2020 debate, Biden claimed that "[his] son has not made money" in China. Last week, Senators Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson elaborated on the findings of a September 2020 report they released that detailed extensive financial connections between Hunter Biden and China, Ukraine, and other countries - a report dismissed by Democrats as part of a Russian disinformation campaign.

The Hunter Biden laptop story was rejected by Joe Biden's 2020 campaign, as well as many in the media, as a Russian disinformation effort. Biden is extremely proud of the attorney general's work in this administration and has no participation in investigating objectives or conclusions, according to White House spokesman Andrew Bates.

Joe Biden asked the Justice Department in October to punish anybody who refused to comply with Capitol riot investigators' subpoenas. At the time, the Justice Department took steps to separate itself from the president, as per Washington Examiner.

Related Article: Joe Biden Children: Who Are the POTUS' Kids? Does He Have a Daughter?

@YouTube

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Photo: CTV News

In January of this year, B.C announced the extension of its controversial wolf reduction program for another five years and is set to target the Kootenay, Cariboo, Omineca, Skeena and Peace regions of the province.

The aerial wolf reduction program was created in 2015 to combat the decline of caribou herds in the province, as B.C. believed wolves were the main cause of the dwindling caribou population.

The program consists of shooting wolves from a helicopter  which the province says is the most humane reduction tactic for wolf populations in remote areas.

Since the creation of the program, approximately 1,429 wolves have been killed.

B.C. estimates that there are currently 8,500 wolves in the province and anticipates 200 to 300 wolves will be killed through the program annually.

The decision to carry out wolf culls is not taken lightly, but science and past results show that this recovery action is an effective way to decrease predator pressure on B.C.s threatened caribou herds, said the Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development.

In September 2021, the province was said to have sought input from B.C. residents on the program and found that, after more than 15,000 surveys, 59 per cent were against predator reduction and 37 per cent were in support.

Moreover, 98 per cent said the caribou population recovery was important.

However, the top three listed tactics for caribou recovery were habitat protection, habitat restoration, and habitat management. One in six participants in the survey also believed B.C.s resource development was the main cause of the caribou decline.

The Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs (UBCIC) believes so too; in February they passed a resolution calling for an end to the wolf reduction program and to allow the First Nations in the province to handle the territorys wildlife.

UBCIC Chiefs Council urges the provincial government to stop imposing unilateral state decisions on wolf culling and caribou recovery, and to recognize that territorial management must be up to the proper Title Holders whose laws, jurisdiction, and legal orders must be recognized and upheld, the resolution says.

 protecting wildlife from any killing contests and unethical hunting and culling practices that oppose Indigenous traditional values, ways of life, and fundamental rights.

All of the caribou herds in southern woodland B.C. are incredibly close to extinction, with provincial figures estimating that just 1,254 caribou are left  down from 2,500 in 1995.

On a more positive note, there is one herd in Northern B.C. that is designated as increasing with 184 members.

However, the provincial government is currently approving logging cutbacks in caribou habitat and creating roads that allow predators easier access to herds.

It is important to note that B.C. is one of the few provinces in Canada that does not have provincial endangered species legislation. The federal government even threatened to step in to protect the provincial caribou population in 2018, forcing the province to take some action such as a recovery plan creation and a partnership agreement with First Nations.

It is pretty significant stuff, said Eddie Petryshen, a conservation specialist with the environmental advocacy organization Wildsight, in an interview with The Narwhal.

Petryshen explained that provincial legislation allows cutblocks that overlap with protected areas to be approved so long as they dont exceed five hectares.

So what I am finding is a bunch of these cutblocks that overlap by two or three or four hectares. They are nibbling at these protections and doing it without actually replacing it.

Its kind of shocking, he said.

If we cant protect caribou within provincially designated caribou habitat, where can we protect them?
Re. Oil and gas

Our prime minister recently announced a 30 to 40 percent reduction in carbon by 2030. I think if I were the Premier of Alberta, I would announce a 40 percent reduction by the end of the year, by not selling any oil or gas related products to the rest of Canada, and only selling it to the U.S. to top up their reserves.

That would allow approximately 20 million cars from Ontario, Quebec and B.C. to sit idle and would not be putting carbon into our Canadian air space from these provinces.

It would also solve the prime ministers objective and he could be the hero he wants to be to the world and it would solve the problems of pipelines.

(It would be ) a sort of a two birds with one stone kind of scenario.

Wake up Canada, most of the oil and gas companies would not have a problem selling half their product at twice the price and then would be compliant with the federal government mandates.

Lets be careful what we wish for. Remember these are independent companies and they can decide who and to where their products go.

Lets not push that sector into a corner as (the companies) might decide to fight back and it may not be pretty.

Calvin Thomas
Photo: The Canadian Press Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault listens to his introduction before delivering a speech on an emissions reduction plan, at the Canadian Club in Toronto on Wednesday, March 9, 2022. Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault says a new report from the United Nations' climate agency shows the oil and gas sector "cannot do business as usual." THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young

Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault says a new report from the United Nations' climate agency shows the oil and gas sector "cannot do business as usual."

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change urges more aggressive cuts to greenhouse-gas emissions to limit global warming to the 1.5 degrees in the 2015 Paris Accord.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says despite what political leaders have promised, countries are on track to see that warming double.

The report points to the ongoing investment in fossil fuels as exacerbating the issue.

Canada revealed last week how it plans to hit its emissions-reductions target for 2030, projecting its oil and gas industry must slash its carbon-related pollution by 42 per cent from current levels.

Guilbeault calls the U.N. report "sobering," and says his government knows it must move quickly to put its added emissions-reducing measures into place if it hopes to reach its goal.
Photo: The Canadian Press Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, right, speaks with scientist Krishnaraj Tiwari during a visit to the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) Royalmount Human Health Therapeutics Research Centre facility in Montreal, Monday, Aug 31, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes

Post-secondary schools and students are looking to the Liberals to make a down payment in the post-pandemic economy by boosting research spending in the federal budget coming this week.

Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland will deliver the government's next fiscal plan on April 7.

Universities Canada president Paul Davidson is expecting it to include some of the promises on research spending made during last fall's election, including funding 1,000 new Canada Research Chairs, and spending millions more annually on cutting-edge and "moonshot" research.

Davidson said making good on those promises could keep a cohort of researchers in Canada into the next decade rather than being snapped up in the global competition for talent that has heated up through the pandemic.

It would also keep Canada from falling behind peer nations like the U.S. and U.K. that have made funding research a pillar of their post-pandemic growth plans, he said.

"It's not all about the immediate relief," he said. "We're building a research ecosystem that supports Canada's innovation agenda, that supports our economic growth agenda, and that's why we're looking for investments."

It has been five years since a scientific advisory panel commissioned by the Liberals delivered a report showing how to boost funding for research and development that domestically had been slowly declining over the previous 15 years.

Multiple submissions on research funding were made to the House of Commons finance committee during its pre-budget consultations, collectively asking for billions in new spending on research scholarships, post-doctoral fellowships and granting agencies.

In its final report released in mid-March, the committee recommended $120 million more on a recurring basis for student scholarships, $40 million more annually to expand research capacity at colleges, and expand publicly funded intellectual property to maximize the benefits of COVID-related research.

Denise Amyot, president and CEO of Colleges and Institutes Canada, said industries and institutions need help to commercialize research more easily. She also said the funding pool should be separate for universities and for colleges to recognize there is a difference in their research focus.

"If we're serious about competitiveness, if we're serious about productivity, we need a specific fund to our colleges and universities to commercialize leading research," she said.

Davidson also said he expects the government to invest money into cybersecurity for researchers.

But the pressure to get all this spending committed now has waned since the Liberals struck a deal with the NDP to get support in key votes, including the budget, in exchange for NDP priorities like pharmacare and dental care.

The deal is designed to keep the minority Liberal government in office until 2025, which gives the government a longer runway to fulfil its election promises than previously expected.

Davidson said the government could therefore use this budget to start a longer-term plan for research but spread out spending over subsequent years.

A longer time frame should give the government a chance to consider what research areas the country should focus on and the skills training required to get there over the next 10 to 15 years, said Elliot Hughes, who was an adviser to former finance minister Bill Morneau.

"Before we rush into saying we're going to do 'research,' let's try and tie that to a broader economic and skills training strategy so that there is some coherence, an alignment on all of those pieces," said Hughes, now a senior adviser at Summa Strategies.

"That takes time, and it takes focus, and it takes effort from a broad range of ministers and engagement from them."
Photo: Gary Smith Gary Smith of Grand Forks has already received a letter from ICBC saying the pirate hat is "unacceptable."

The B.C. leader of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster continues to battle ICBC in his bid to wear a pirate hat for a driver's licence photo.

Gary Smith of Grand Forks, also known as the churchs captain, argues his pirate hat is part of his churchs religious headwear.

Smith identifies himself as a Pastafarian and a member of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Members are known to wear either a pasta colander or a three-cornered hat known as a pirates tricorn on their heads.

Smith claims ICBC should allow the photo request just as it has already been allowed for his ID as a marriage commissioner and for his firearms acquisition licence.

I will have you know that as the captain of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster of B.C., a legally constituted religious organization in good standing under the B.C. Society Act, I have successfully argued the right to wear religious headgear in conformance with my beliefs on three other occasions, Smith said in an April 4 email to ICBC fair practices officer Debby Raffard.

Ahoy, Debbie, Smith greeted her in the missive.

Smith had already received a letter from ICBC saying the pirate hat was unacceptable.

The head covering you wore in Feb. 17, 2022, which is the same brown tricorn hat you have worn on previous occasions for drivers licence photo applications, was again deemed unacceptable for the purpose of printing on a B.C. drivers licence, B.C. identification or BC Services Card, wrote Mario Bourdages, ICBC manager of driver licensing integrity and oversight.

Bourdages wrote Feb. 18 that ICBC endeavours to accommodate customers whose faith prohibits them from removing a head covering for a photo identification purposes.

We do not recognize you as a member of a religious group that requires accommodation in the context of a service customarily available to the public under the British Columbia Human Rights Code, Bourdage wrote.

However, Smith questions what allows government to decide what set of religious beliefs requires accommodation and what dont.

What qualifications grant ICBC the ability to weigh the merits of any faith whatsoever? Hubris! Smith said.

The sheer arrogance in only willing to make accommodation if required under the Human Rights Code is shocking in its audacity.

Ultimately, it remains for us to determine what ICBC is trying to protect in denying me and my crewmates the accommodation we seek, Smith said.

And its not just ICBC Smith finds himself at odds with. Hes also been trying to wear his pirate hat for a security guard licence ID.

I stridently reassert my right to be depicted in the fashion consistent with my beliefs, he said in a March letter to licensing authorities.

Smith has already had a skirmish with the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal.

In a complaint, Smith said members of other faiths  such as Sikhs  are allowed to wear headgear in licence photos.

There is no test of faith that any government agency, including ICBC, can apply to judge whether or not a person earnestly believes what they profess when they ask to be photographed with a religious head covering, Smith told the tribunal.

So, what relief did he seek?

That ICBC allow qualified citizens who self-identify as Pastafarians, or as members of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, to wear religious headgear of a form and type of their choosing, insofar as such headgear does not interfere with (facial recognition technology), for the purposes of obtaining either, or both, a drivers licence and a BC Services Card.

However, the tribunal dismissed the complaint, saying Smith was not sincere.

You are a Pastafarian and member of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster which mocks religious beliefs and certain religious practices, the March 2020 decision said. Pastafarians wear colanders as religious head gear.

While the protection against discrimination on the ground of religion in the [Human Rights] Code includes protecting the expression of non-belief and the refusal to participate in religious practice, the protection does not require accommodation of a practice satirizing religious practice in providing a service customarily available to the public, the decision said. It would not further the purposes of the code to proceed with a complaint in these circumstances.

Smith took that decision to court for a judicial review where, in 2021, Justice Gordon Weatherill noted Smith conceded some of his arguments were satirical.

Weatherill dismissed the review petition, saying the code had not been violated.
Photo: Victoria Police VicPD's Strike Force seized eight kilograms of drugs, including 1.5 kilograms of fentanyl, 3.5 kilograms of cocaine, and three kilograms of methamphetamine. In addition, officers sized eight rifles and one handgun, accompanied by magazines and ammunition, as well as more than $105,000 in currency.

Victoria police have arrested two people and seized eight kilograms of drugs  including fentanyl  as well as several firearms and more than $105,000 in cash that they say are linked to gangs on the Lower Mainland.

The operation was led by VicPDs Strike Force team, working with the Greater Victoria Emergency Response Team and VicPDs Analysis and Intelligence Section.

VicPDs Strike Force began an investigation in February into suspected drug traffickers with ties to the Lower Mainland operating in Victoria.

On March 15, VicPDs Strike Force and emergency response officers arrested a man and executed search warrants on his residence in the 500-block of Heatherly Road in Colwood, and another residence in the 1000-block of Tolmie Street in Victoria.

Officers also executed search warrants on two vehicles associated with the man.

Police seized eight kilograms of drugs, including 1.5 kilograms of fentanyl, 3.5 kilograms of cocaine and three kilograms of methamphetamine. In addition, officers seized eight rifles, one handgun, magazines and ammunition, as well as more than $105,000 in Canadian currency.

A day later, police arrested a woman associated with the man and executed a search warrant on a suite in a multi-unit residential building in the 800-block of Fort Street, where officers seized additional trafficking-level quantities of fentanyl.

The suspects were released pending further investigation. Investigators are recommending drug-trafficking charges against both.

The case remains under investigation. Police are asking anyone who has information about the incident and has not spoken to officers to call the VicPD Report Desk at 250-995-7654, extension 1. To report anonymously, call Greater Victoria Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477.
Photo: The Canadian Press Minister of Defence Anita Anand rises during Question Period, on March 30, 2022 in Ottawa. Anand is promising to introduce a "robust package of investments" for North America's aging defences in the coming months. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld

Defence Minister Anita Anand is promising a "robust package of investments" for North America's aging defences in the coming months, as Ottawa faces growing pressure to boost military spending and work with Washington to protect the continent.

Anand made the commitment during an appearance before the Senate defence committee on Monday, only days before the Liberal government is to unveil a federal budget that many expect will include new money for the Canadian Armed Forces.

The current defence and security climate also has underscored that we need to do more to bolster our defences in Canada and North America at large, the minister told senators in reference to Russias attack on Ukraine.

To that end, in the coming months, we will be bringing forward a robust package of investments to bolster our continental defence in close co-operation with the United States.

Yet defence officials appearing before the committee after Anand could not say when actual work could begin on modernizing the North American Aerospace Defence Command, which is controlled by both the U.S. and Canada.

That is despite military officials and experts having warned for years about the state of Norad, parts of which are now obsolete as Russia and other adversaries have developed more advanced weapons.

It is also despite Canada facing pressure from the NATO military alliance to increase its defence spending, with an injection of funds for Norad seen as the easiest and most likely scenario when the Liberals unveil their budget on Thursday.

That's because while the government has already planned and costed out most expected military purchases over the next 15 years, there has been no budget or significant work started on Norad modernization.

Defence Department deputy minister Bill Matthews told senators the specific timeline would depend on when officials get direction from Ottawa and Washington on what they want with Norad in its new form.

While Matthews didnt spell out any specifics, Canada and the U.S. have in the past differed on ballistic missile defence. The new system is expected to detect and potentially eliminate threats from air, water, space and cyberspace.

You're looking at a multi-year endeavour here, obviously working hand in hand with our allies to prioritize and land on specific plans, Matthews said. But until there's been formal decisions made, we cannot be more specific than that.

Successive Canadian and American governments have been promising for years to modernize Norad, which was first created during the Cold War to protect against a Soviet attack.

Yet despite increasingly urgent warnings from senior military commanders on both sides of the border about the need to address a growing number of gaps in North Americas defences, many are still waiting for Canada to act.

During a trip to Ottawa in December, Norad commander U.S. Gen. Glen VanHerck said he was awaiting political direction on upgrading Canadas key contribution, a string of radars built in the Canadian Arctic in the 1980s called the North Warning System.

Military officials have been cautioning for years that the system, built to detect Russian bombers approaching North America from over the Arctic, is obsolete because of the development of missiles with increasingly longer ranges.

The U.S., meanwhile, has been pressing ahead on a number of fronts, including the deployment of new missile interceptors and artificial intelligence to merge data from a variety of different sources to detect an attack.

Anand told the committee she has had several discussions with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, and pointed to investments in last years federal budget that have been used to research long-range communications and radar.

Our efforts to keep our countries and our continent secure are closely intertwined, including through Norad and our joint efforts in the Arctic region, she said. Its important we remain full and equal partners.

Chief of the defence staff Gen. Wayne Eyre also spoke about his instructive visit to Norad headquarters in Colorado last week.

The threat to our continent is very clear and is rapidly advancing as we take a look at technological advances that our adversaries are making, he said. We are no longer as safe as we once were in North America.

Anand also revealed during the committee hearing that she expects to receive a report on sexual misconduct in the military from retired Supreme Court justice Louise Arbour on May 20.

The report, which is intended to identify ways for the military to better handle such cases and issues, is supposed to be made public one week later.
Is Islam a religion of peace? Is it compatible with Western liberalism? Or does Islam need a reformation? Somali-born author and activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali explains.

I was raised a practicing Muslim and remained one for almost half my life. I attended madrassas, that is, Islamic schools, and memorized large parts of the Qur'an. As a child, I lived in Mecca for a time and frequently visited the Grand Mosque. As a teenager, I sympathized with the Muslim Brotherhood.

At 22 while my family was living in Kenya, my father arranged my marriage to a member of our family clan, a man that I had never met. I ran away, made my way to Holland, studied there and eventually was elected a member of the Dutch parliament. Now I live in the United States.

In short, I have seen Islam from the inside and the outside.

I believe that a reform of Islam is necessary and possible. And only Muslims can make that reform a reality. But we in the West cannot remain on the sidelines as though the outcome of this struggle has nothing to do with us. If the jihadists win and the hope for a reformed Islam dies, the rest of the world will pay a terrible price. The terror attacks in New York, London, Madrid, Paris and many other places are only a preview for what is to come.

For this reason, I believe that it's foolish to insist, as Western leaders habitually do, that the violent acts committed in the name of Islam can somehow be divorced from the religion itself. For more than a decade, my message has been simple: Islam is not a religion of peace.

When I assert this, I do not mean that Islamic belief makes all Muslims violent. This is manifestly not the case: There are many millions of peaceful Muslims in the world. What I do say is that the call to violence and the justification for it are explicitly stated in the sacred texts of Islam. Moreover, this theologically sanctioned violence is there to be activated by any number of offenses, including but not limited to adultery, blasphemy, homosexuality and apostasy  that is to leave Islam.

Those who tolerate this intolerance do so at their peril.

As someone who has known what it is to live without freedom, I watch in amazement as those who call themselves liberals and progressives  people who claim to believe so fervently in individual liberty and minority rights  make common cause with the forces in the world that manifestly pose the greatest threats to that very freedom and those very minorities.

In 2014 I was invited to accept an honorary degree from Brandeis University for the work I have done on behalf of women's rights in the Muslim world. That invitation was withdrawn after professors and students protested my criticism of Islam. My subsequent "disinvitation," as it came to be called, was no favor to Muslims  just the opposite. By labeling critical examination of Islam as inherently "racist," we make the chances of reformation far less likely. There are no limits on criticism of Christianity at American universities or anywhere else, for that matter; why should there be of Islam?

Instead of contorting Western intellectual traditions so as not to offend our Muslim fellow citizens, we need to defend both those traditions and the Muslim dissidents who take great risks to promote them. We should support these brave men and women in every way possible.

Imagine a platform for Muslim dissidents that communicated their message through YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. These are the Muslims we should be supporting  for our sake as much for the sake of Islam.

In the Cold War, the West celebrated dissidents such as Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Andrei Sakharov, and Vaclav Havel, who had the courage to challenge the Soviet system from within. Today, there are many dissidents who challenge Islam, but the West either ignores them or dismisses them as "not representative." This is a grave mistake. Reformers such as Tawfiq Hamid, Asra Nomani & Zuhdi Jasser and many others must be supported and protected. They should be as well known as Solzhenitsyn, Sakharov, and Havel were in the 1980s.

If we do in fact support political, social and religious freedom, then we cannot in good conscience give Islam a free pass on the grounds of multicultural sensitivity. We need to say to Muslims living in the West: If you want to live in our societies, to share in their material benefits, then you need to accept that our freedoms are not optional.

Islam is at a cross roads of reformation or self-destruction.

But so is the West.

I'm Ayaan Hirsi Ali of Harvard University for Prager University.
Why were there no hospitals, for anyone and everyone, in the ancient world? Because Jesus had yet to give mankind, through his Church, the great directive.

Join the worldwide Magnificat family by subscribing now: Your prayer life will never be the same!

The medieval Saint John's

Hospital in Bruges

One day, as Jesus was entering Capernaum in Galilee, a Roman centurion sent for him, and pleaded with him to heal his dying servant whom he dearly loved.

The Jewish elders joined in the plea, because this centurion was a friend of the Jews. He may have been, in his heart, a convert to the faith in the one God. "He loves our nation," they said, "and has built a synagogue for us!" Seeming to take no note of that reason, Jesus approaches the centurion's house, but the centurion, abashed because he knows that he is a pagan and a sinner, says, "Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant shall be healed."

Jesus marvels, saying, "I have not found such faith in all of Israel!" And the servant was healed from that moment.

But the scene prompts a question. The centurion is rich enough to build a synagogue at his own expense. He lives in the bustling town of Capernaum, on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee; and the new Roman city of Caesarea Philippi is not far away. Why hasn't he brought his servant to the hospital?

You will answer, "Because there were no hospitals in those days," and you will be right, in part. There were health resorts, often built up around natural hot springs in those lands perched atop the volcanic ring of fire. Wherever the Romans found hot springs, they built resorts, even as far north as England: Bath. But there was no such thing as a hospital, where you could go if you were ill and needed care and were not rich enough to get to the spas, and had no money to hire the learned physicians. Apparently there was nowhere to go in Capernaum, even for a centurion with means.

And that prompts another question: "Why were there no hospitals?" It cannot be for want of funds. The Romans were energetic at public works, and when their armies were not busy fighting, they were employed as a corps of engineers and construction workers, building aqueducts, theaters, the civic halls we know as basilicas, temples, roads, and bridges. They could have built hospitals also. Nor was it for want of medical knowledge. The Greeks had learned medicine from the traditions of the Egyptians, whose accumulated knowledge spanned two thousand years. The Greek Hippocrates had bequeathed to the world the oath that bears his name, enjoining a sacred code upon all physicians. "The art takes a long time to learn," said Hippocrates, "and life is short." Those are not the words of a quack.

So why were there no hospitals, for anyone and everyone? Because Jesus had yet to give mankind, through his Church, the great directive. "I was sick, and you visited me," says the Lord at the final judgment, and when the righteous reply, "But Lord, we never saw you sick," the answer comes, "Whatsoever you do to the least of these my brothers, the same have you done unto me." Every human being is of inestimable worth; not because he is rich or powerful, or dear to someone who is rich or powerful. Christians are commanded to see in the face of every human being the face of their brother  the face of Jesus. That transforms the world.

Christians are commanded to see in the face of every human being the face of their brother  the face of Jesus. That transforms the world.

What do we suppose the Christians built, soon after Constantine issued the Edict of Milan in 314, legalizing Christian worship throughout the Roman Empire? They built churches, of course; and hospitals were not far behind. Saint Basil, the great theologian and bishop of Cappadocia, founded an enormous complex of buildings and streets just outside of his city of Caesarea for the care of the sick. It was so large, it came to be called the New Town. There were buildings for different kinds of patients, a home for infants, a home for the aged, and a lazaretto for people afflicted with contagious diseases. There were dwellings for physicians and nurses, so they could be always near the people they were treating. There were even workshops and schools where men crippled by disease or injury might learn a trade, to support themselves and their families.

It wasn't the only such place. In Constantinople alone, during the reign of Justinian, there were thirty-five hospital foundations. In the Middle Ages, religious orders were established, such as the Knights Hospitalers of Saint John, whose vocation was to care for strangers and pilgrims and the sick. Wherever they went, they were bound by vow to build a hospital. When, in the thirteenth century, town life returned to Europe with great vigor (for the Vikings and other Germanic and Slavic pagans had been converted to Christianity, and no longer made life on the borderlands or on the seacoasts precarious), new hospitals were founded everywhere, so that in Germany every small town of five thousand persons had its hospital. Pope Innocent III himself commissioned the construction of the Santo Spirito hospital, near the Vatican, hiring a hospital architect from France to do the job; and when bishops from other parts of the world came to the Vatican, Innocent urged them to visit the Santo Spirito and to go back home and build hospitals on that model.

And that prompts still another question: "What was the model for a hospital?" We are apt to think that the places must have been dim, miserable, and filthy, where nobody but beggars and desperate men would go. Such is the residue of the prejudice against the Middle Ages engrained in us, who are instructed to fall in worship of new things because they are new.

There's no doubt that medical science can accomplish things that would stun the beholder with wonder  not just a medieval man, but even someone from the days of our grandparents. But that's no reason to suppose that the Church did not do her utmost, in the hospitals, to cure disease, and to comfort the dying, according to the best medical knowledge then available. And more: in some ways the hospitals the Church built were superior to ours.

Sometimes I believe that the evil attraction to euthanasia arises from a natural horror of hospitals such as they are. When my wife's mother was dying, we stayed with her at the hospital for several days, in the white sterile impersonal room, hearing the blips of the machines, the drone of the television, and the calls on the intercom. The doctors and nurses were quite efficient  one might say, coldly and mechanically efficient. Of course, since she was going to die, they wanted her to do it as soon as possible, with as little trouble as possible to anybody else, and to that effect they wanted to prescribe morphine, even though she was in no pain. We told them to keep their morphine to themselves. After a few days, though they did not need the bed, and though it could only harm my mother-in-law, they ordered her removed to a local hospice, where she soon died.

It is hard for us to imagine, but the Church built hospitals that were beautiful. Well, these were medieval men, who had not yet acquired the modern knack of building things intended to be ugly; every chance they had, they surrounded themselves with things of beauty. But they also believed that a sick or dying person above all should be comforted with beauty. They built lovely hospitals, usually outside of the town walls, for fresher air. It was the custom, says Dr. James Walsh in The World's Debt to the Catholic Church, "to decorate the hospitals with beautiful frescoes and the result was that patients had much more occupation of mind than they have in our bare walled hospitals." Imagine that you are lying on the bed from which you will not rise, and seeing, near to you in more ways than one, a painting of The Mystical Marriage of Saint Catherine, with the Christ Child enthroned in the bosom of Mary, placing a golden ring upon the finger of that young saint who suffered so much in her body as she prayed and labored for the welfare of the Church.

I'm not making that up. That is what you might have seen if you lay in the Hospital of Saint John, in Bruges. And it was no local child they hired to decorate the walls with some garish cartoon. It was the exquisite Hans Memmling, who knew how to make the countenance of a holy woman like that of a queen. If you were not in Bruges, but in the Hospital of Charity in Seville, you would have seen the work of Murillo, the kindly and gentle genius. Perhaps you'd have seen his Return of the Prodigal Son, with the old father embracing the poor bedraggled lad, while a small white dog, tail held high, leaps up to greet him.

For the Christians who built these hospitals never forgot that man has a soul as well as a body, and that he longs to leave his bed of illness to return to one home, or to another.
Time magazine and Francis Fukuyama, Raquel Welch and a series of popes, some of the world's leading scientists, and many other unlikely allies all agree: No single event since Eve took the apple has been as consequential for relations between the sexes as the arrival of modern contraception. Moreover, there is good reason for their agreement. By rendering fertile women infertile with nearly 100 percent accuracy, the Pill and related devices have transformed the lives and families of the great majority of people born after their invention. Modern contraception is not only a fact of our time; it may even be the central fact, in the sense that it is hard to think of any other whose demographic, social, behavioral, and personal fallout has been as profound.

For many decades now, prescient people have understood as much. Though these days contraception as such attracts little interest in secular academia, being more or less simply taken for granted as a fact of life, such neglect was not always the rule. As early as I929, for example, fabled social observer Walter Lippmann was calling attention to the radical implications of reliable birth control  even explicitly agreeing with the Catholic Church in his classic book A Preface to Morals that modern contraception "is the most revolutionary practice in the history of sexual morals." In 2010  the year that the Pill celebrated its fiftieth anniversary  that early verdict appeared wholly vindicated, as an outpouring of reflections on that anniversary affirmed the ongoing and colossal changes that optional and intentional sterility in women has wrought.

The technological revolution of modern contraception has in turn fueled the equally widely noted "sexual revolution"  defined here and elsewhere as the ongoing destigmatization of all varieties of nonmarital sexual activity, accompanied by a sharp rise in such sexual activity, in diverse societies around the world (most notably, in the most advanced). And though professional nitpickers can and do quibble about the exact nature of the connection between the two epochal events, the overall cause and effect is plain enough. It may be possible to imagine the Pill being invented without the sexual revolution that followed, but imagining the sexual revolution without the Pill and other modern contraceptives simply cannot be done.

Like the technological revolution that occasioned it, this sexual revolution, too, has long attracted the attention of social observers. In I956, for example, the towering twentieth-century sociologist Pitirim Sorokin  founder of Harvard's Department of Sociology  published a short book called The American Sex Revolution. Written for a general audience and much discussed in its time, it forcefully linked what Sorokin variously called "sex freedom" and "sex anarchy" to a long list of what he argued were critical social ills, including rising rates of divorce and illegitimacy, abandoned and neglected children, a coarsening of the arts high and low, and much more, including the apparent increase in mental disorders. "Sex obsession", argued Sorokin, now "bombards us continuously, from cradle to grave, from all points of our living space, at almost every step of our activity, feeling, and thinking."

Around the same time, another celebrated secular Harvard sociologist, Carle Zimmerman, published his masterwork of history and sociology called Family and Civilization. Though less immediately concerned with the sexual revolution as such than Sorokin had been in his more popularized text, Zimmerman's work likewise casts obvious, albeit tacit, criticism upon the social changes unleashed by modern contraception. Family and Civilization repeatedly linked declines in civilization to the features of what the author called "the atomistic family" type, including rising divorce rates, increasing promiscuity, juvenile delinquency, and neglect of children and other family responsibilities. These were features of modern society that Zimmerman, like Sorokin (and many other people in those days), judged to be self-evidently malignant. "The United States", Zimmerman concluded, "will reach the final phases of a great family crisis between now [1947] and the last of this century"  one "identical in nature to the two previous crises in Greece and Rome".

The evidence presented in the following chapters, I believe, roundly confirms two propositions that are  or ought to be  deeply troubling to serious people.

Of course one need not be a Harvard sociologist to grasp that the technological severing of nature from nurture has changed some of the most elemental connections among human beings. Yet plainly, the atmosphere surrounding discussion of these changes has changed radically between our own time and that of the mid-twentieth century. What Zimmerman felt free to say in the 1940s and Sorokin in the 1950s about the downside of changing mores are by and large not things that most people feel free to say about our changed moral code today  not unless they strive to be written off as religious zealots or as the blogosphere's laughingstock du jour. Again, as the celebrations of the Pill's fiftieth anniversary went to show, the sexual revolution is now not only a fait accompli for the vast majority of modern men and women; it is also one that many people openly embrace. Fifty years after the Pill's approval and counting, it is beyond question that liberationists and not traditionalists have written the revolution's public legacy across the West.

In this standard celebratory rendition, the sexual revolution has been a nearly unmitigated boon for all humanity. Along with its permanent backup plan, abortion, it has liberated women from the slavery of their fertility, thus freeing them for personal and professional opportunities they could not have enjoyed before. It has liberated men, too, from their former chains, many would argue  chiefly from the bondage of having to take responsibility for the women they had sex with and/or for the children that resulted. It has also enriched children, some would posit, by making it easier to limit family size, and hence share the pie of family wealth and attention among fewer claimants. "In my mind," as one modern historian summarized the standard script, "there can be no doubt that, on the whole, the sexual revolution of the '60s and '70s improved the quality of life for most Americans."

It is the contention of this book that such benign renditions of the story of the sexual revolution are wrong. That is to say, they are critically incomplete when measured against the weight of the evidence now before us.

Thus the chapters ahead tell a different version of what the sexual revolution has wrought than the Panglossian version that is standard today. They examine from different angles a wide body of empirical and literary and other evidence about what really happened once nurture was divorced from nature as never before in history. My aim in these pages is to understand in a new way certain of the human fallout of our post-Pill world  to shed light on what Sorokin once provocatively and probably correctly called a revolution "more far-reaching than those of almost all other revolutions, except perhaps the total revolutions such as the Russian".

The evidence presented in the following chapters, I believe, roundly confirms two propositions that are  or ought to be  deeply troubling to serious people. First, and contrary to conventional depiction, the sexual revolution has proved a disaster for many men and women; and second, its weight has fallen heaviest on the smallest and weakest shoulders in society  even as it has given extra strength to those already strongest and most predatory. For decades now, and apparently out of view of many people telling the tale, a compelling record has been building of the real costs that have been mounting since procreation became so effectively amputated from sexual behavior for so many people. It is a record rich now in detail from a variety of sources ranging from the social sciences  especially psychology and sociology  to more microscopic accounts of the revolution's real and permanent consequences in many lives. Like a mosaic, it is also a record that reveals and sheds light variously depending on which angle we choose to view.

Revealing that mosaic is the substance of this book. Chapter 1 concerns the contemporary secular intellectual backdrop inherited from the tumultuous 1960s. For decades now, it argues, the negative empirical fallout from the sexual revolution, while plain to see, has persistently been met with deep and entrenched denial among academic and other cultural authorities. So thoroughgoing is this denial, the chapter details, that it bears comparison to the deep denial among Western intellectuals that was characteristic of the last great debate that ran for decades  namely, the Cold War. Hence, the subtitle is "The Will to Disbelieve", which takes its name from a famous essay on intellectual denial from that other debate past. This opening of the book examines the evidence of such intellectual denial and the probable reasons for it.

The book then moves from theory to the ground, as it were, to examine the effects of the sexual revolution on actual human beings: women, children, and men. "What Is the Sexual Revolution Doing to Women? What Does Woman Want?", a chapter examining trends in current fashionable writing about women and marriage, exhumes the pervasive themes of anger and loss that underlie much of today's writing on romance. This chapter includes discussion of the latest sociological literature arguing for the "paradox of declining female happiness"  that is, the unexplained gap between the unprecedented freedoms enjoyed by today's women and their simultaneous increasing unhappiness as measured by social science. The fact that women disproportionately bear the burdens of the sexual revolution, I argue here, might explain that hitherto unexplained paradox.

The following chapter, "What Is the Sexual Revolution Doing to Men? Peter Pan and the Weight of Smut", examines more paradoxical fallout from the revolution. Even as widely available contraception and abortion have liberated men from husbandhood and fatherhood, it has also encouraged in many a new and problematic phase of prolonged adolescence  what sociologist Kay S. Hymowitz has perspicaciously identified as "pre-adulthood". Then there is the other paradoxical consequence of sexual liberation: widespread pornography on a scale and with a verisimilitude never seen before. This chapter cites interesting and recent work by psychologists, psychiatrists, sociologists, and other experts on a range of issues relating to Internet pornography: the sharp rise in pornographic addiction, the evidence of serious psychological problems of the addicted, the chilling effect of increasing pornography in the public square, and other measures of social harm.

Chapter 4, "What Is the Sexual Revolution Doing to Children? The 'Pedophilia Chic', Then and Now", covers one uniquely disturbing legacy of sexual liberation, which is the assault unleashed from the 1960s onward on the taboo against sexual seduction or exploitation of the young. This chapter argues that ironically, the Catholic priest-boy sex scandals that erupted in 2002  which evoked widespread revulsion across the West at these repeated violations of the taboo against sex with the young  have effectively served to interrupt this profoundly destructive former trend. Interestingly, this makes the taboo against sex with youngsters the only one of those considered in this book in which some "rollback" of the sexual revolution has been demonstrated.

Adam and Eve after the Pill

by Mary Eberstadt by Mary Eberstadt

Chapter 5, "What Is the Sexual Revolution Doing to Young Adults? What to Do about Toxic U?", examines in detail what may be ground zero of the sexual revolution today: the secular American campus. Using sources ranging from social science to popular culture, it sifts the ingredients of the toxic collegiate social brew made possible by the sexual revolution. The feral rates of date rapes, hookups, and binge drinking now documented on many campuses, this chapter argues, are direct descendants of the sexual revolution  one whose central promise is that women can and should be sexually available in the name of liberation, which translated into the reality of the modern campus has empowered and largely exonerated predatory men as never before.

Chapters 6 and 7 move back from the ground to a more abstract plane to examine other society-wide changes wrought by the revolution  in particular, its effect on social mores. They focus on what Friedrich Nietzsche called "the trans-valuation of values", meaning the ways in which the existing moral code would become transformed in a social order no longer centered on Judeo-Christianity. Such a transvaluation, I argue, is being wrought by the revolution in ways we are only beginning to understand. Chapter 6, subtitled "Is Food the New Sex?", argues that the morality once attached to sexual behavior has been transferred onto an unlikely yet fascinating substitute  matters of food. Chapter 7, subtitled "Is Pornography the New Tobacco?", similarly traces the stunning parallels between yesteryear's laissez-faire attitudes about one widely accepted substance  tobacco  and today's laissez-faire attitudes about the substance of pornography.

The book's closing chapter examines what may be the ultimate of the many paradoxes ushered in by the collision between the sexual revolution and human nature itself. "The Vindication of Humanae Vitae" examines the remarkable predictions made in that watershed document just a few years after the Pill itself appeared and examines a large historical irony: that one of the most reviled documents of modern times, the Catholic Church's reiteration of traditional Christian moral teaching, would also turn out to be the most prophetic in its understanding of the nature of the changes that the revolution would ring in. This chapter explores the extraordinary irony of our own particular moment in time, half a century after the sexual revolution  one in which every prediction made by Paul VI has been vindicated, even as the traditional Christian teaching against artificial contraception has come to be reviled by its adversaries and abandoned by Christians themselves as never before.

One final note: These chapters are indeed, as the title suggests, reflections  not manifestos or screeds or roadmaps to activism. It is my hope that readers will bring to them the same spirit with which the pages ahead were written: that of seeking sincerely and without cant to understand something of the manifold and unprecedented fallout of what may yet turn out to be the most consequential social revolution of all.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made a surprise appearance during the Grammys 2022 awards event, delivering a heartfelt speech via video requesting help amid the brutal Russia-Ukraine war.

The remarks were made via a pre-recorded clip that Zelensky filmed while inside a bunker in Ukraine's capital, Kyiv. The leader said, "war doesn't let us choose who survives and who stays in eternal silence. Our musicians wear body armor instead of tuxedos. They sing to the wounded in hospitals. Even to those who can't hear them. But the music will break through anyway."

Zelensky's Heartfelt Speech

Zelensky added that his government and the people of Ukraine will continue to protect their country's freedom and continue the fight against Russia's unprovoked invasion. Many people who watched the pre-recorded message quickly took to social media platforms to share their awe of the Ukrainian president's speech.

.@RecordingAcad played a video message from Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. #GRAMMYs pic.twitter.com/Hk2EsWV5qe  Jerold Chinn  (@Jerold_Chinn) April 4, 2022

One online user said they were not expecting Zelensky to make a sudden appearance at the Grammys 2022. Another person said that the Ukrainian president was the undisputed winner of the events with his sincere remarks, as per Unilad.

During his speech, Zelensky also encouraged everyone who was listening to his statements to spread the truth about the war. He urged everyone to be active on social networks and TV and asked for support in any way possible, all except silence.

Read Also: Russia-Ukraine War: Volodymyr Zelensky Calls Russian Attack as 'Genocide' as Pile of Corpses Appear in Bucha

The Ukrainian president said that with the world working together against Russia's war on his country peace will eventually come. He called the cities of Chernihiv, Kharkiv, Volnovakha, Mariupol, and several others, legends for enduring the attacks of Moscow's military forces.

According to CNN, Zelensky noted that the war with Russia has already resulted in ruined cities and many casualties. The Ukrainian president said the children of the country were drawing rockets and not shooting stars. He revealed that there have been more than 400 children were injured and 153 who have been killed during the invasion.

Russia-Ukraine War

The situation comes as Human Rights Watch said it has documented several cases of Russian military troops conducting laws-of-war violations against Ukrainian civilians in Chernihiv, Kharkiv, and Kyiv. The allegations include a case of repeated rape, two cases of summary execution, one of six men, the other of one man, and several other unlawful violence and threats against civilians.

The dates of the alleged acts were from Feb. 27 to Mar. 14 and Russian soldiers were also implicated in looting civilian property, including food, clothing, and firewood. The agency said that the troops who were responsible for the acts committed war crimes.

The organization interviewed 10 people, made up of witnesses, victims, and local residents of Russia-occupied territories in Ukraine, by telephone. Some of the individuals asked to be identified only by their first names or pseudonyms for fear of their lives.

Russian forces in Bucha allegedly rounded five men on Mar. 4 and summarily executed one of them. One of the witnesses said that the military troops forced the five men to kneel on the side of the road, pulled their T-shirts over their heads, and shot one of them in the back of the head, HRW reported.



Related Article: Russia-Ukraine War: Volodymyr Zelensky Fires 2 Top Generals, Calls Them 'Antiheroes' and 'Traitors'

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Yamama Cement signs SAR1.633bn financing agreement

04 April 2022

Yamama Cement Co signed a Shariah-compliant financing agreement on 31 March for SAR1.663bn (US$435.4m) with Saudi National Bank, the cement producer said in a statement to the Tadawul.

The agreement covers long-term financing of SAR800m, for a period of eight years (including three years of grace period), and refinancing part of the existing long-term loans amounting to SAR563m, for a period of four years to repay part of existing loans.

It also includes short-term financing of SAR300m, for a period of one year (revolving loan on demand). The financing agreement is guaranteed by promissory note, the statement noted. The long-term loan is aimed towards financing the transfer and installation of the seventh line from the old plant in south Riyadh to the new plants location in Al-Kharj governorate. The production capacity of the line is 10,000tpd of clinker. By the end of 2024, the clinker production capacity at the new site is expected to reach 30,000tpd.

The long-term loan also aims to repay a part of existing loan obligation, and improve financial efficiency. The purpose of the short term loan is to finance the working capital.

Published under
Sinai Cement reports higher sales, narrow loss in 2021

ICR Newsroom By 04 April 2022

Egypt-based Sinai Cement Co, owned by Vicat, reported a 61.9 per cent increase in sales to EGP1.44bn (US$78.8m) in 2021 when compared with 2020 when the company sold to a value of EGP889.2m.



The company also narrowed its loss to EGP354m in 2021 from EGP560.3m in 2020.

Published under
Colombian cement market expands 3% in February

ICR Newsroom By 04 April 2022

Domestic dispatches in Colombia edged up by 2.6 per cent to 1.107Mt in February 2022 from 1.079Mt in February 2021, according to the countrys statistics office, DANE.



Dispatches were up 9.2 per cent YoY in terms of bulk cement but slipped 0.2 per cent for bagged cement, reflecting the seven per cent advance in dispatches to ready-mix concrete companies. However, construction companies and contractors reduced their off-take by 4.9 per cent YoY in February 2022. Sales to the retail sector remained stable.



Cement production in Colombia remained largely stable at 1.137Mt in February 2022 when compared with February 2021.



January-February 2022

In the first two months of 2022 cement dispatches to the domestic market increased 0.1 per cent YoY to 2.071Mt.



Bulk deliveries increased 8.7 per cent YoY while cement in bags saw a 3.3 per cent fall in dispatches. Ready-mix concrete companies increased their oftake in the 2M22 by nine per cent YoY, offsetting the 7.7 per cent drop in sales to construction companies and contractors. Retail sales fell by 3.4 per cent YoY.



Production from Colombias cement plants was up by 0.1 per cent YoY to 2.177Mt in the 2M22.

Published under


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 manager of Ridgeway Apartments at 1230 Poplar St. said a tenant came to the office door and began banging on the door. Then the tenant grabbed a hammer and started hitting the columns to the awning, demanding that someone fix her front door. There were no damages but the manager wanted to make a report for her records due to the irrational behavior of the tenant.

* * *

A man at the India Mahal Restaurant at 5970 Brainerd Road told police he discovered a yellow box containing a chain and magnet underneath his shed. He said he has no idea how the items got there. He turned them over to police and police placed them into Property.

* * *

The Los Angeles Police Department located a firearm stolen from Chattanooga. Dispatch left a voicemail for the original owner and removed the firearm from NCIC.

* * *

A woman on Tennessee Avenue called police and said she let her friend borrow her vehicle. The woman said the man told her the car had been stolen from East 11th Street where he had parked it. The man said two females had possibly stolen it. Police entered the vehicle as stolen in NCIC.

* * *

A woman on Cherokee Boulevard was hysterical and told police that while she was parked on the top-level floor sitting in her car, an unknown white male approached her and banged on her window and pulled on door handles. The woman said she drove off while the unknown male made contact with her. She was concerned she might have struck a vehicle while fleeing the man. She had no new damage on the vehicle beside the broken door handle from the man pulling on it. The woman didnt wish to file a property damage report. Police escorted her to her apartment safely. While on scene an additional complainant contacted police about multiple men attempting to sneak in the garage around the time of the incident.

* * *





A man on Signal Mountain Road initially called dispatch to report his vehicle stolen. Upon further investigation it was determined his car was towed by Doug Yates Towing. He was instructed to contact Doug Yates for information about recovering his car.

* * *

An officer responded to a suspicious person walking in the parking lot of Motel 6, 5505 Brainerd Road. The officer found the man sitting on the curb behind CVS and could tell he was intoxicated and had thrown up on himself. He said he was staying at the motel and locked himself out of his room. The officer was able to find his room and have his friend escort him back up to his room.

* * *

While on patrol, an officer observed a suspicious silver GMC Terrain with no tag backed into a parking space and left unlocked at the Scenic Community Credit Union at 4503 Hixson Pike. The officer checked the vehicle's information against records and found it to be unregistered. Info channel found that the only hit came back through Maryland as not stolen. The vehicle's brake discs were rusty indicating that it has been sitting at this location for several days. The officer didnt see anything suspicious inside the car. It had some damage to the driver's side front bumper.

* * *

A woman who works the third shift at Total Manufacturing Network, 8005 Volkswagen Dr., said sometime during her shift someone stole her bag from her locker. The bag was thrown behind the locker station. Her Georgia driver license, her Chime credit card and her Cashapp debit card were stolen. The Chime credit card was used twice before she could get it turned off. The Cashapp debit card had a zero balance so it could not be used.

* * *

A man said he went to Chestnut Flats Apartments at 2120 Chestnut St. to visit a friend and left his car parked on the street. When he got back in the car to drive home, he noticed the headlight was not shining on the passenger side. When he got home, he discovered that the headlight was busted out and the bumper and fender were torn up. No estimates for repairs have been done yet. There is no proof of how the damage was done or if it was intentional.

* * *

Police responded to Sylvan Avenue in reference to a complaint of harassment and threats. The woman said she has been continuously getting harassed by another woman due to a love triangle relationship with the first womans ex-girlfriend. She has social media messages of harassment which she will present to the judge during court.

* * *

A man on East Main Street said someone broke the right-side rear window of his 2005 Buick La Cross. He said his left shoe, a jacket and a sweatshirt were stolen.
Morning Pointe Senior Living announces the grand opening celebration of Morning Pointe of Hardin Valley, a new assisted living and Alzheimers memory care community located at 2449 Reagan Road in Knoxville. Local dignitaries and guest speakers from the Knox County area will gather for a formal dedication ceremony on Thursday, May 5 at 4:30 p.m.

Nestled between Oak Ridge and west Knox County just minutes from Pellissippi State Community College, Morning Pointe of Hardin Valley is now open and welcoming new residents daily.



Officials said, "The initial phase of the 20-acre senior campus features a community with 77 spacious apartments nestled among a desirable one-level layout designed with seniors in mind, including a secure wing specially planned for residents with Alzheimers disease and other memory care needs.

"Amenities like a library, exercise room and sitting nooks offer solace and encourage socialization among friends. Beautiful, secure courtyards showcase walking paths, sitting areas and gathering spots for residents to enjoy the outdoors.

"Morning Pointes purposeful programming fosters independence and support with a

strong focus on clinical care including physical and occupational therapies, life enrichment and wellness offerings. Farm-to-Table fresh dining and intergenerational activities help residents live their best."



Morning Pointe has served East Tennessee for 25 years, and the Knoxville area has been a wonderful place to grow as we provide seniors and their families more options for quality senior care, said Greg A. Vital, president of Morning Pointe Senior Living. Additionally, we remain committed to workforce development in the region as Morning Pointe continues to expand throughout Knox, Anderson and Loudon counties.

"For the past five years, the Morning Pointe Foundation has served over a dozen students at TCAT Jacksboro with nursing scholarships as we help build the future pipeline of nurses in

the region," officials said.



Ben Stiefel, a graduate of Lee University, is the executive director at Morning Pointe of Hardin Valley, bringing over 14 years of experience in senior healthcare. I have a deeply-rooted desire to serve the seniors of my community. I find fulfillment in providing them with a comfortable and safe environment where they feel loved and valued, as well as having an active and engaged community, said Mr. Stiefel.



"Morning Pointe is the regions choice for assisted living and memory care, serving seniors across

Tennessee for 25 years," officials said. "In addition to the Hardin Valley assisted living and Alzheimers memory care community in East Tennessee, Morning Pointe operates assisted living and memory care communities in Knoxville, Clinton, Lenoir City and Powell."


North Korea has expressed dissatisfaction with a statement made by a top South Korean official, warning that the country may face a severe threat, according to an official.

Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of North Korean ruler Kim Jong Un, slammed South Korea's defense minister, labeling him a "scum-like guy" for suggesting that his country would launch a preemptive strike on their northern neighbors. She also warned that reprisal might be forthcoming after South Korean Defense Minister Suh Wook bragged on Friday that his nation could execute precise attacks on North Korea if it feels a missile strike is imminent.

North Korea Warns Dangerous Clash With the South Against Any Misjudgment

Suh Wook's remark occurred amid North Korean missile tests, and it's especially odd at a time when South Korean President Moon Jae-in is pushing for peace on the Korean Peninsula. Pak Jong Chon, a North Korean government official, also cautioned that under the current scenario, any minor misjudgment and poor comment rattling the other party might lead to a hazardous clash and a full-blown war, according to Fox News.

South Korean Defense Minister Suh Wook has talked of a preemptive strike on North Korea, according to North Korean claims released by KCNA. Suh Wook spoke about the country's ability to hit targets in the north accurately and rapidly, as well as perform precise attacks on the source of any assault, according to Yonhap News Agency on Friday. He did not mention preemptive strikes.

"He must be crazy or silly to speak of 'preemptive attack' on the nuclear weapons state," said Pak Jong Chon, secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea. North Korea's army will mercilessly direct all its military force into destroying major targets in Seoul and the South Korean army, according to Pak Jong Chon if South Korea attempted a preemptive attack.

Read Also: Pope Francis Considers Visiting Ukraine Amid Ongoing Russian Attacks

South Korean Claims the North Would Mercilessly Destroy Sites in Seoul

Suh Wook's comments come after weeks of escalating tensions with North Korea. Since warning in January that it would abandon the testing moratorium, Pyongyang has increased activity at major missile and nuclear weapons sites, and this month fired a new, bigger intercontinental ballistic missile, Bloomberg via MSN reported.

If the South Korean army participates in a risky military operation such as a preemptive attack, Pak Jong Chon, secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea's Central Committee, vowed the North would mercilessly direct all its military power toward destroying important sites in Seoul and the South Korean army. The warnings came after North Korea fired two ballistic missiles, one of which was a new intercontinental ballistic missile system that the nation is building, on February 26 and March 4.

Last Monday, the hermit nation performed its first comprehensive ICBM test in 2017, as a result, the US placed penalties on five organizations suspected of assisting Kim Jong-un in the development of weapons of mass devastation, plans for ballistic missiles. On May 10, President-elect Yoon Suk Yeol of South Korea will be sworn in. Yoon campaigned on scrapping a military pact between South Korea and North Korea, as well as restoring joint US military drills that had been reduced or eliminated, as per Mirror.

Related Article: Russia, China Meets Ahead of EU Summit Surely To Cause Upset to the Bloc

@YouTube

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
John Kerns, CEO of Chattanooga-based New Bloom Labs, will testify on Wednesday in front of the Tennessee House of Representatives Criminal Justice Committee in a special hearing on hemp-derived cannabinoids.

Some members are concerned about new products that contain hemp-derived cannabinoids like Delta-8 THC, and it's important that the industry demonstrates that it is serious about consumer safety and conducting business in an ethical way, Mr. Kerns said.

Specifically, Mr. Kerns will speak to his companys work in testing hemp-derived products. New Bloom Labs provides the chemical analysis of cannabis and hemp-derived products for the purposes of legal compliance, quality control, and consumer safety. The companys laboratories are ISO 17025 certified and registered with the United States D.E.A.

Of particular concern is House Bill 1927, which would effectively prohibit the production, sale, and possession of hemp-derived cannabinoids in spite of federal law that sanctions this new industry.

If it passes, House Bill 1927 would devastate our industry, and Tennessee would relinquish its standing as a worldwide leader in hemp production - thats not to mention the thousands of businesses and jobs that would be eliminated practically immediately, Mr. Kerns said.

Rather than prohibition, Mr. Kerns says that legislation demanding consumer protections and ethical marketing practices is the right approach. Measures like tamper-proof packaging, product testing requirements, and disallowing marketing techniques that appeal to minors are the right way to stabilize the industry and allow it to continue to meet the high consumer demand for these products, Mr. Kerns said.

The hemp industry has already proposed these regulations, and is eager to dialogue with lawmakers on all issues that are critical to the future of hemp as well as Tennessees continued reputation as a small business-friendly state, said officials.

New Bloom Labs does not support cannabis prohibition, but our supply chains must be effective and safe. The right path forward is to regulate hemp, not ban it, Mr. Kerns said.
The Bethlehem Center will host its second annual Southside Juneteenth Jubilee on Saturday, June 18, from 1-4 p.m. at the centers location in Chattanoogas Southside at 200 W. 38th St.

In honor of the commemoration of African-American emancipation celebrated annually across the United States, the Bethlehem Center originally decided to host a Juneteenth jubilee with the goal of bringing Chattanooga communities together for a great day of celebration, fellowship, and to support locally owned African American small businesses. This year there will be food trucks and over 40 vendors selling art, handmade jewelry, holistic skin products, and more onsite at the jubilee.

We are so excited to host our Southside Juneteenth Jubilee this year, said Shari Watson, director of Marketing for the Bethlehem Center. Last year, not only did we showcase over 40 African American business owners, we also celebrated Juneteenth with over 400 attendees from Chattanooga, Atlanta, and Alabama. It was an honor to provide a space where all communities came together to support local businesses and participate in a cultural heritage event in the Greater Chattanooga area.

For more information about the Southside Juneteenth Jubilee or to learn about vendor and partnership opportunities, please contact Ms. Watson at 266-1384 ext. 103 or send an email to swatson@thebeth.org
Chef Marcos Spaziani wanted to feel the adrenaline rush of baking on a tilt so he signed up to be the chef on Below Deck Sailing Yacht and said he loved the challenge.

Spaziani recently opened up about his career path, admitting he never intended to become a chef. I wanted to be a Marine, he revealed to Showbiz Cheat Sheet. To be a Marine back then in Venezuela was super, super difficult. You have to be like, I dont know  a superhero or whatever. And I couldnt make it, but I knew chefs dressed in white like Marines.

Chef Marcos originally wanted to be a Marine

He joked that one reason why he wanted to be a Marine was because of the uniform. So thats why I picked chef! he laughed. Back then in the 90s, chefs, theyre all dressed up in white. Now they are different. Crazy stuff. Tattoos. But back then, you had to be very clean, and sharp. Actually, when I started cooking in the 90s, it was like military stuff. You had to be super sharp, and clean. No wrinkles, nothing. You had to be on top of your game.

Chef Marcos Spaziani | Laurent Basset/Bravo

Spaziani is a classicly trained chef who attended a French culinary school in Venezuela in 1997. I started being a chef in Venezuela and I was actually the youngest chef in Caracas at one point. When I was 21, or something like that, I was the chef at a five-star hotel.

He revealed on an episode of Below Deck Sailing Yacht that he ended up cooking for a powerful dictator in Venezuela. And then  A lot of things happened, he said. So I had to leave the country. Politicians in my country back then 

The Below Deck chef reveals how he discovered yachting

Spaziani moved to the United States and continued his career, working for celebrity clients in Miami, Florida. At one point in my career, I was maybe 11 years cooking already and I met somebody when I was a chef of a catering business in Miami. Very famous called Le Basque catering, he recalled.

I met this chick who used to work in boats, he continued. She was telling me how much money they make and I didnt believe it. So one day she got sick. She said, Can you cover for me? And I went to cover her. Were talking about many years ago. But I remember they paid me $300 per day and I said, s***, she was right!

Below Deck Sailing Yacht is Chef Marcoss first sailing experience

From there, I started doing all my tickets and I started booking jobs, the Below Deck chef said. And then I realized that I have more experience than a lot of people on boats because Im coming from land, from hotels. That was a plus for me. The pastry, the baking, most cuisines. So I did great in this industry.

He was a master chef on motor yachts, but being an adrenaline seeker, Spaziani wanted to challenge himself. So he booked the gig on Below Deck Sailing Yacht and said Parsifal III is his first sailing yacht experience.

So for me, moving like that, I love it! Adrenaline, you know? Things like that are a challenge. So cooking when were sailing, for me, it was a very good experience and I actually love it. Everyone says youre not going to be able to cook on a sailing yacht. And I said, well, try me! Actually, I think I baked when we were sideways. Stuff like that. And yeah, its a little bit dangerous, but I like that.

He reveals why he is successful cooking in a small space

I always worked in motor yachts, he said. And I did a lot of crossings. I was very famous for doing crossings. No chef wants to be on a crossing for 22 days. Me  opposite. I want to be there. No internet. Cooking  Training. Its a good time for you.

Spaziani actually welcomed rough conditions. Its a challenge too if you have bad weather to cook that way. Ive been in very rough weather, so for me, being on a sailboat, yes, its different because its really crazy. But, I know the logistics. You have to prepare, you need to be careful with a lot of stuff.

Long day of work ready to go home sleep and repeat #belowdecksailing #BelowDeckSailingYacht pic.twitter.com/22UkpQLm7P  MARCOS SPAZIANI (@marcos_spaziani) March 23, 2022

So Im used to it, you know? he added. Even when I worked in catering, which I did a lot, sometimes you cook on the stairs. In the emergency stairs, you have to put up a table and level it. Just make it happen. So cooking in a small space its been in my career. So thats why probably you see me as very OCD organized because thats the way I am. If you dont work like that, youre never going to perform well.

Watch chef Marcos Spaziani rock out another charter on Below Deck Sailing Yacht every Monday at 8 pm ET on Bravo.

RELATED: Chef Marcos From Below Deck Sailing Yacht Worked Like Crazy on No Sleep  Jamie Sayed Exclusive Interview
Julia Child is the undisputed star of The Food Network limited series, The Julia Child Challenge. However, she shared the spotlight with her husband Paul Child when they first met in the mid-1940s. Paul was the more worldly of the two, having served overseas in France as a teacher first, followed by a job with the United States Government in the Office of Strategic Servies. A willing Julia learned about the world and French gastronomy through Pauls teaching. She led a family member to compare their romance to the film My Fair Lady, likening Julia to the character of Eliza Doolittle.

Paul and Julia Child, Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison | Gerald Martineau/United Archives/Getty Images

How did Julia and Paul Child meet?

Julia and Paul Child met after she joined the Office of Strategic Services, the United States intelligence agency, during World War II. After a brief station in Washington, D.C., Julia headed to Sri Lanka, where she met Paul, ten years her senior.

At the time, Paul was not impressed by Julia. He wrote to his twin brother Charlie that he had met a woman but did not appear to have very many positive things to say about Julia.

He described Julia as an extremely sloppy thinker with an unbecoming blond mustache who was unable to sustain ideas for long, reported The LA Times.

However, while Paul admired Julias vitality, their love story began as friends. They visited local food markets and learned more about each other

Paul would later write to Charlie, It wasnt like lightning striking the barn on fire. I just began to think, God, this is a hell of a nice woman.

Julias nephew said Julia and Pauls relationship mirrored My Fair Ladys Eliza Doolittle and Henry Higgins

Paul and Julia Child | Janet Fries/Getty Images

After the U.S. Government stationed Paul in Paris, France, in 1948, Julia had her first taste of life in the City of Lights. After disembarking from the boat that brought them to France, Julia and Paul packed up their car and drove to their new home but not before stopping for lunch and changing Julias life.

Paul brought Julia to lunch at La Couronne, where they had a meal that she called the most important of her life, Sole Meuniere, which changed the way she looked at French cuisine.

I often compare their relationship to My Fair Lady. Shes the willing student like Eliza Doolittle, and hes the sophisticated older man like Henry Higgins who tutors her in culture and art and politics, said Alex Prudhomme, Julias grand-nephew, to The LA Times.

Paul was the leader of their relationship during the first half, and when he retired, everything flipped. It was very intentional. He described himself as the iceberg beneath the water, where you see the tip, but hes playing this massive role as the ballast. You cant have one without the other.

Julia and Paul would collaborate personally and professionally

Mastering the Art of French Cooking Cookbook | Allison Long/Kansas City Star/Tribune News Service via Getty Images

Julia and Paul Child would collaborate both personally and professionally.

She always credited Paul as being the one responsible for all her success.

To Smithsonian Magazine, food writer Ruth Reichl spoke of the couples joint success in changing the culinary landscape of America.

Reichl said Julia once told her that Paul was responsible for everything I did.

Paul took close-up photographs of Julias hands as she cut, diced, and sliced her way into culinary history.

These images were translated into line drawings by illustrator Sidonie Coryn for Julias history-making cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking.

Julia introduced recipes like Beef Bourguignon to American homemakers in this cookbook.

He also designed Julias kitchen, raising the countertops to accommodate her 62 body and developing a pegboard with outlines. Hence, she knew where every pot, pan, knife, and kitchen gadget went in their kitchen. He also arranged Julias knives on magnetic strips so she could grab one without looking through a drawer.

Up to this point in their union, Pauls military career dominated their lives. Julia followed him from one State Department posting to the next.

After Julias cookbook success, the two would reverse roles. Paul threw himself into her life with the same enthusiasm with which she had shared his.

She would star in the PBS series, The French Chef, where she became a household name and a culinary trendsetter.

RELATED: Julia Childs Grave Is in the Most Astonishing Place
In last weeks episode of Sanditon Season 2 on PBS, Charlotte nearly talked herself out of her job as a governess. But she and her employer grew closer in the April 3 installment of the Austen-inspired period drama. Meanwhile, Tom Parker lost his elephant, Lockhart sent a gift to Georgiana, and Captain Carter tried to woo Alison with some borrowed words.

[Warning: This article contains spoilers for Sanditon Season 2 Episode 3.]

Charlotte has a breakthrough with her employer in Sanditon Season 2 Episode 3

Sanditon | Courtesy of Joss Barratt  Red Planet

RELATED: Sanditon Season 2 Premiere Reveals Sidneys (Theo James) Fate

Charlotte (Rose Williams) and her charge Augusta (Eloise Webb) bonded at the end of Sanditon Seaosn 2s second episode. But any good feelings on the sullen teens part were short-lived. This week, Augusta is back to her usual, difficult self. She corrects Charlottes French and is unhelpful when it comes to finding Leonora (Flora Mitchell), whos run off somewhere.

As Charlotte searches for her youngest charge, she happens upon Mr. Colbourne (Ben Lloyd-Hughes) trying to calm his horse, who was spooked by the armys gunfire. Does Charlotte have a way with animals? Of course she does. After Charlotte demonstrates her horse-whispering skills, she and Colbourne have their longest conversation yet. He wants her to put her skills to use taming Augusta and Leonara. Charlotte bluntly asks him why hes so reluctant to spend time with his niece and daughter.

Colbourne doesnt answer, but later, he joins Charlotte and the girls for a picnic. Augusta tries to stir things up by bringing up Colbournes late wife, but he shuts her down, fast. They move on to the less-fraught subject of wildflowers. When Charlotte mentions that cornflowers Leonora picked are her favorite, Colbourne hands them to her. Even Leonara can sense something is up between her dad and her governess.

Georgiana and Lockhart reach an agreement

Think a lot of us would love to have this portrait of Arthur #SanditonPBS pic.twitter.com/F9hqc9v4Lw  MASTERPIECE | PBS (@masterpiecepbs) March 28, 2022

After last weeks eyebrow-raising toast to Napoleon, Charles Lockhart (Alexander Vlahos) continues to push social boundaries. He sends Georgiana (Crystal Clarke) a sketch he drew of her. Its not a welcome gift.

You dont know what its like  to spend your whole life being gazed at, she says to Arthur (Turlough Convery). Georgiana is a mixed-race woman who sees her difference reflected in the eyes of every person shes met since her arrival in England. Lockharts sketch is the stare I am used to, rendered palpable.

Arthur  whos been not-so-subtly coded as gay  has a different reaction to being drawn by Lockhart. For a person whos often been overlooked, even by his family, its a form of recognition and a chance to be seen for who I am, or perhaps who I would like to be.

Arthur urges Georgiana to give Lockhart a chance, arguing that he sees things with a rare clarity. She eventually decides to let him paint her portrait, but only on her terms. Lockhart agrees, saucily telling her that he shall not rest until we are both satisfied.

Tom loses his elephant

Its time for Sanditons midsummer fair and Tom (Kris Marshall) is facing disaster, again. Another town outbid him for the elephant that was supposed to be the events main attraction. Hes struggling to come up with an equally impressive alternative when Colonel Lennox (Tom Weston-Jones) steps in and loans Tom a military spy balloon.

Unfortunately, no one is game for taking to the skies. That is, until Charlotte volunteers. Colonel Lennox accompanies her, despite his fear of heights. But what should be a romantic moment turns dangerous when the soldiers on the ground lose control of the balloon. Surprisingly, Arthur saves the day and prevents Charlotte and Colonel Lennox from drifting off to France.

Once theyre back on solid ground, Lennox pulls Charlotte aside to warn her to be on her guard against Mr. Colbourne. When Charlotte asks why, he reluctantly tells her that Colbourne stole the woman he loved  a woman very much like Charlotte. That explains Lennoxs obvious animosity toward Colbourne. But is he telling the whole story? Plus, Lennoxs way of referring to this other woman as if she were his property is off-putting, as least to modern ears.

Captain Carter boasts of his bravery

Captain Carter (Maxim Ays) is making swift progress in his efforts to woo Alison (Rose Graham). But when she sends him a poem, he panics. Fortunately, Captain Fraser (Frank Blake) is on hand to lend him a book of verse so he can impress Alison.

Captain Carter already rescued Alison from a carriage accident, so shes more than ready to believe him capable of other heroic exploits. When she mentions that he must have shown great courage during the war, he first tries to deny it. But she presses, and he references a battle where he saved many men from drowning.

Later, Alison mentions the battle to Captain Fraser. Hes less impressed by Carters tale of bravery than she is, and it soon becomes clear why. Captain Carter is bragging about being in a battle that happened when he was a child. Fraser angrily tells his fellow soldier to fess up to Alison.

Clara has her baby

A very pregnant Clara (Lily Sacofsky) has taken refuge with Esther (Charlotte Spencer) and Lady Denham (Anne Reid). She tries to ingratiate herself with her relatives, but neither of the other women believes shes telling the whole truth about her situation, especially given Claras history of scheming. (Esthers response to nearly every word out of Claras mouth is a dramatic eye roll.) But when they announce theyre going to invite Edward (Jack Fox), the babys purported father, to the house to explain himself, she seems genuinely stunned to learn hes in Sanditon.

When he arrives, Edward is just as surprised to see Clara. Hes even more shocked to learn hell soon be a father. At first, he denies responsibility. But by the end of the episode, the wheels are turning as he tries to figure out how to spin this situation to his advantage.

Lady Denham gives her servants the day off for the fair, then heads out for the festivities. Esther stays to watch Clara, whom she doesnt trust not to steal the silver. But Clara goes into labor, and Esther has no choice but to help deliver the baby. Clara has no interest in her infant. That leaves poor Esther, who may never be able to have a child, to cradle the baby she wishes was hers.

What else happened in this episode of Sanditon

Elsewhere in this episode of Sanditon:

Georgiana is still trying to figure out why Sidney was in Antigua on her behalf.

Charlotte received flowers from both Lennox and Colbourne. The colonel sent a splashy bouquet, but we know he sent Captain Fraser to pick the blooms. (This guy is doing everyones work for them.) Colbourne handed her a couple of wildflowers, but the gesture is far more heartfelt.

The army is running up debts all over town, but Tom is convinced it will all work out. Were not so sure.

When Tom does try to talk to Lennox about the money the regiment owes, the colonel talks him into another dice game. This time he loses 100, which he doesnt have.

The herbs Esther received from the midwife made her sick, but Dr. Fuchs gives her a tincture he says might help.

Edward steals one of Esthers letters.

New episodes of Sanditon Season 2 air Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on PBS.

Check out Showbiz Cheat Sheet on Facebook!

RELATED: Sanditon Season 2: What Happened to Young Stringer (Leo Suter)?
True-crime fans rejoice, another thrilling addition to the hit genre is coming to Hulu next month with Under the Banner of Heaven, starring Yellowstone actor Gil Birmingham. The series joins recent true-crime hits like Netflixs The Tinder Swindler, Amazon Primes Inventing Anna, and fellow Hulu show, The Dropout, as audiences continue their hot love affair with true stories of people at their worst.

Under the Banner of Heaven will debut with two episodes on April 28, followed by single episodes weekly for five subsequent weeks, with new episodes available on Thursdays.

Gil Birmingham | Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic

Who will Birmingham play on Under the Banner of Heaven?

Birmingham will play Bill Taba in Under the Banner of Heaven, though little is known about the role so far.

Birmingham currently plays Chief of the Broken Rock Reservation, Thomas Rainwater, on the hit series Yellowstone, a character he tells Town & Country is his dream role due to the characters ill-defined morals. [Yellowstone] seems to be filled with what might be described as antiheroes, but theyre just a multi-dimensional characters that are all flawed, which is true to the essence of being a human being, Birmingham says. Ive been asked before, what would your perfect character be that youre going to portray? I think Thomas Rainwater is it at this point.

Known for roles that reflect his Native-American heritage, Birmingham has also been seen in 2016s Hell or High Water and 2017s Wind River, and is also currently starring with Toni Collette in this years Pieces of Her, however, Birminghams role on Yellowstone is undoubtedly what he is best known for after the Yellowstone season 4 finale saw a staggering 9.3 million viewers.

What is Under the Banner of Heaven about?

Based on the New York Times bestseller, Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer, the series tells the story of a devout Mormon detective whose faith is tested when he investigates a case in connection with the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

The true-crime story follows the murder of a young Mormon wife and her infant daughter in 1984, and is set in a suburb of Salt Lake City, Utah. The series focus, however, will likely be on the effect the investigation has on Detective Jeb Pyre, a devout Mormon himself.

Under the Banner of Heaven has an impressive cast

Official poster for FXs UNDER THE BANNER OF HEAVEN, starring Andrew Garfield, Daisy Edgar-Jones and Sam Worthington. pic.twitter.com/o7yWGo7yJm  DiscussingFilm (@DiscussingFilm) March 28, 2022

Oscar-nominated actor Andrew Garfield will play Under the Banner of Heavens lead role, Detective Jeb Pyre, described by What to Watch as an LDS elder who is committed to his Church and family but begins to question some of the Churchs teachings through his contact with a suspected murderer.

Garfield was most recently nominated for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role at the Academy Awards for his portrayal of playwright Jonathan Larson in tick, tick Boom! and is best known for his role as Peter Parker in The Amazing Spider-Man. He will star opposite Daisy Edgar-Jones who is also playing the lead role in this years highly-anticipated screen adaptation of Where the Crawdads Sing.

Other stars include Sam Worthington as Ron Lafferty and The Falcon and the Winter Soldiers Wyatt Russel as Dan Lafferty. The Peacemakers Christopher Heyerdahl, Adelaide Clemens (Rectify), Rory Culkin (Waco), and Chloe Pirrie (The Queens Gambit) will also appear in the limited series making for an outstanding cast, but the series big names dont stop there.

Variety reports that Under the Banner of Heaven is created by Dustin Lance Black (Milk, Big Love, and J. Edgar) and has Brian Grazer, Ron Howard, and Jason Bateman among others listed as executive producers.

As a veritable magnet for stars, Under the Banner of Heaven, will surely be a huge hit for Hulu, beginning April 28.

RELATED: Yellowstone Star Gil Birmingham Calls These 2 Episodes the More Profound in the Entire Series (Exclusive)
As a way to help school districts when there is lack of teachers, the state Department of Education came up with a program to send college students into area school districts.

The state education department and Connecticut State Colleges and Universities created NextGen to help alleviate COVID-related staffing issues in all grades.

Students who participate get classroom experience while being paid.

They are employed by the district, but at the same time, theyre college students that are getting experiences beyond the field experiences and clinical experiences that theyre getting through their (college) programming to really solidify the fact that they want to be educators, said Marilu Rochefort, assistant director in the office of educational services at Southern Connecticut State University.

SCSU has been partnered with Cheshire Public Schools, but is hoping to expand to other districts.

As time goes on, well see where the needs go and then see how we can continue to be an asset for our students that are participating, Rochefort said.

Jeffrey Solan, superintendent of Cheshire Public Schools, said the college students have worked well with students and faculty members.

The students resonate really well with our students, being young people themselves, in the classroom and they have connected well with the teachers in our building as part of the schools community, Solan said.

Rickqueal Warren, a senior at SCSU participating in the program, said he has had opportunities to experience different roles in the classroom.

Ive been the head teacher, Ive been the assistant teacher, Ive been able to work one-on-one with kids in the special education program, Warren said.

I just have had very different experiences inside the school system that I wouldnt have been able to get if it wasnt for the program.

Stephen Hegedus, dean of the College of Education at SCSU, said the program helps the public schools and the university.

Anything we can do to increase the numbers of students interested in education and getting them into that pathway toward being an educator sooner is something that is very much a part of our mission at the College of (Education), Hegedus said.

Recently, Meriden Public Schools partnered with Wesleyan University to give college students field work opportunities.

They do some shadowing for a certain number of hours over a semester, said Louis Bronk, assistant superintendent for personnel and talent development.

They can be a second set of hands in the classroom to help with small groups.

Jesse Torgerson, assistant professor of letters at Wesleyan, said his class worked with Maloney High School in Meriden this fall on an initiative focusing on the eastern Roman empire during the Middle Ages.

Torgersons class used what they learned to create lessons for ninth grade world history classes.

The (Wesleyan) students created a unit that focused on the city of Constantinople by having the students at Maloney imagine a fictional character who is showing up at the city, Torgerson said. I had 20 students in my class and they were divided into teaching teams.

The college students worked with 10 different classes at the high school.

Torgerson feels the experience helped normalize what a college student is for the high school freshmen.

I think when youre in ninth grade, college seems a million miles away, Torgerson said. I think the students getting to spend two and a half weeks with some extremely friendly and personable college students  made a difference.
A convicted Libyan gun smuggler allegedly linked Prince Andrew to an accused fraudster who gave him 1 million ($1.3 million).

According to reports, the Duke of York and his former wife Sarah Ferguson received unusual payments from Selman Turk, a former Goldman Sachs banker, as part of a 40 million ($52.5 million) worldwide scam.

More Details Emerge on Prince Andrew Links With Selman Turk

Tarek Kaituni was found guilty of bringing a submachine gun into France in 2005. In August 2009, he was invited to Princess Beatrice's 21st birthday party in Spain, where he also presented her with a 18,000 ($23,620) diamond pendant, and in 2018, he attended Princess Eugenie's wedding.

Kaituni, a US citizen, subsequently boasted about his power over the Duke of York and assisted in the setting up of covert meetings with Libyan ruler Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. According to the Telegraph, Turk was introduced to Prince Andrew by Tarek Kaituni at a birthday celebration at Windsor Castle in the early summer of 2019.

Turk and Kaituni had met through mutual acquaintances just a few months before. During a visit to Windsor Great Park in February 2020, Turk uploaded photos of himself and Kaituni inside what seems to be Frogmore House, the royal palace. Turk and Kaituni met with Prince Andrew in London on at least two occasions after the original encounter. On December 5, 2019, the Duke hosted a dinner for possible investors at Turk apartment in South Kensington.

Prince Andrew's spokesperson declined to comment on the allegation. Prince Andrew is entangled in an unprecedented High Court dispute over allegations that he was handed money by a Turkish millionaire who was accused of defrauding her of her 40 million ($52.5 million) wealth.

According to court documents, Nebahat Isbilen sent the royal family a 750,000 ($984,281) gift. The 76-year-old was allegedly informed that the money would be used to help her obtain a passport so she could avoid Turkey's political persecution.

An additional 350,000 ($459,350) payment was reportedly sent to Prince Andrew through a third-party account, which was linked to Turk. The Duke of Edinburgh has refunded the 750,000 ($984,281) and there is no evidence that he was involved in the alleged scam, The Sun reported.

Read Also: Giant Blobs Inside the Earth Were Detected by Scientists Trying To Investigate Their Nature, How it Affects the Planet

Prince Andrew Was Pictured With Turk Fraudster in 2019

Turk, Kaitani, and the Duke met on at least two occasions after that, including a dinner with possible investors in December 2019 at the suspected fraudster's residence in South Kensington, West London. Prince Andrew and Turk were last seen together in public in November 2019, when the latter received an award at the Duke of York's Dragons' Den-style competition Pitch@Palace.

He explained how he was launching Heyman Al, a new consumer-focused digital bank targeting millennials, in a video shared on the Pitch@Palace Twitter account. The next evening, Heyman AI received the People's Choice Award, and he was spotted shaking hands with the event's presenter, the Duke of Edinburgh.

But days later, Turk told an official from Isbilen's private bank that the 750,000 ($984,281) payment was a wedding gift. In court documents, Isbilen, who also attended the Pitch@Palace event has suggested the transfer could be connected to the award Turk won that evening. The prince has since repaid the cash after she alleged it was a scam, as per Daily Mail.

Related Article: Bruce Willis' Illness: What Is Aphasia, Is it Dangerous?

@YouTube

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
For Ukraine, Europe, bread is a way of life. Ukraines flagnow displayed around the world in solidarityproclaims the nations agricultural heritage, with the yellow representing wheat fields and the blue representing the sky above.

Bread is very important in our culture, but Jesus has said that we do not live by bread alone, said pastor Fedir Raychynets, the head of the theology department at Ukrainian Evangelical Theological Seminary (UETS). There is something invisible, something intangible, something that is beyond just physical bread.

As the war continues, pastors and churches across Ukraine are working to bring people both the bread they need to feed their bodies and the bread they need for their souls.

Inspired by the line in Isaiah 58:7 about sharing bread with the hungry and housing the poor, BREADtrust is one of several ministries helping get loaves into the hands of Ukrainians.

The UK-based charity funds local pastors who have remained in the country to continue to serve. Theyre able to purchase bread, other food, and supplies for neighbors in need.

There are those that feel deeply committed and called to where they are, said BREADtrust project coordinator Phil Downward. One pastor and his family stayed until their apartment building was bombed and they had no choice but to leave. That takes a level of faithfulness and courage that is utterly remarkable.

Some ministries continue to bake the bread they distribute. In the days after the war broke out, a Dutch outreach through Oekraine Zending, located outside Kyiv in Brovary, wanted to rally enough bakers to continue baking bread 24/7. They pass out loaves to hospitals and the army, along with notes containing Bible verses. (When Russia took over Crimea several years ago, CT highlighted the Bread of Life ministry in Maryinka, a bakery that gave away one-fourth of its 2,000 loaves of daily bread, alongside Bibles.)

Slavic Missionary Outreach, in an update sent in March, said that since grocery stores have not been open as much, its staff has tried to buy bread wholesale or make it themselves. Some of their neighbors had been going days without food.

We have our own small bread factory that bakes 1,700 loaves of bread daily, which are then distributed to hungry people by our staff, they wrote in a letter soliciting support. We don't know how much longer we can do this. We are trying to buy leftover flour stocks from large bread factories that have closed.

Ukraine is known as the breadbasket of Europe. The wars impact on its wheat crop will extend globally. Already, reports expect the disruption will affect Lebanon and Egypt, which rely on imports for government-subsidized bread to feed the hungry. Together, Russia and Ukraine provide almost a third of the worlds wheat and barley exports.

And as the Russian invaders attempt to cut off Ukrainians from their own crops and supplies, the oldest generations recall the deadly famine caused by Joseph Stalins seizure of goods the century before. The Soviet dictator had seized crops, livestock, and food itself.

Following the conflict in Crimea, Ivan Rusyn, president of UETS, reflected on this history in Bible Study Magazine:

For Ukrainians, bread is very significant. In 1932 and 1933, we had the Holodomora man-made famine. Up to six million Ukrainians starved to death.  Because of this, bread is sacred in our culture. You cant throw bread away. The metaphor of Jesus as the bread of life has a lot of meaning for Ukrainians, and the image that the Bible is bread for our souls is very important. We use this to help others understand how vital the Bible is to our lives.

In September, some Ukrainian churches celebrate Harvest Day. During the church service, one pastor will hold up a loaf of bread while another holds up an open Bible. They pray for both, recognizing the need for both. The physical and spiritual needs for bread are not competing but complementary.

Sergey Nakul, pastor of Grace Reformed Church in Kyiv, recently posted a video showing how certain parts of the supermarket, like the meat and seafood counters, were completely empty but thanking God that there was still bread.

Yes, we have bread, he said, but in this period of time we better understand words of Lord Jesus, I am the Bread of Life.

Ukrainian churches have developed a network for sharing supplies during the war. In the early days, they helped people evacuate. Now, theyre distributing supplies to those who are staying, like the elderly who have nowhere to go or refuse to leave their homes.

The sirens go off so frequently that some of them simply remain in the basements of the buildings instead of going up and down the stairs each time. It's there that volunteers distribute bread and offer whatever encouragement they can. Additionally, the team distributes supplies to families of soldiers.

Among the military, bread again offers them a reminder of hope when Raychynets offers Communion. His team brings New Testaments with highlighted passages of hope and encouragement. Around two or three dozen soldiers typically take copies.

From his background during the Balkan War and visits to other countries like Lebanon, Israel, and Northern Ireland, Raychynets has experienced the uncertainty, fear, and pain of people in traumatic circumstances. He never tries to impose his faith on them, but when people come to him with questions about God and suffering, he engages them in a conversation.

I personally dont believe in answers. I believe in good questions. When they ask me questions, I can ask counter-questions to [encourage] them to think further, to think deeper, to think wider about the situation, Raychynets said.

Many Ukrainians dont know where their next meal will come from. Many of their famed wheat fields may not bear a crop this year. However, those faithfully serving in Ukraine hope that there will be a harvest in the country all the same.

When you are in a situation like these people, you are more sensitive to the divine, to something that is beyond our humanity, Raychynets said. We need a physical bread as nourishment for our bodies, but then we need also a spiritual bread. The Word of God feeds our souls.
5 Chinese Christians fined, arrested for attending event where Tim Keller spoke released

Five Chinese Christians from a house church in Shanxi Province, who were sentenced to prison for illegally crossing the national border after attending a Christian conference in Malaysia where Pastors Tim Keller and D.A. Carson were speakers, have been released, according to a report.

Members of Xuncheng Reformed Church in Taiyuan city received the five Christians  Zhang Ligong, Wang Runyun, Wang Shiqiang, Zhang Yaowen and Song Shoushan  at the detention center last Wednesday, the U.S.-based group ChinaAid, which monitors human rights in China, said.

The five Christians, who were arrested last July for taking part in KL2020 Gospel and Culture conference hosted by a Chinese Indonesian Pastor Stephen Tong, appeared to be full of peace and joy after their release, the group noted.

Dear family, we are back home safely. Thank you for your prayers. I am very grateful! Wang Runyun wrote on social media after his release alongside a photo with his son and daughter.

The five had traveled together to Malaysia to attend the conference from Jan. 2831, 2020.

Keller, a theologian and bestselling author, and Carson, emeritus professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and co-founder of The Gospel Coalition, were among the speakers at the international conference.

The five had legally traveled to Malaysia with their valid passports, but they were sentenced to prison sentences ranging from six months to eight months and fines up to $475.

In recent years, Xuncheng Church has been heavily targeted and subjected to constant harassment, including the detention of a preacher and several members.

Open Doors USA, which monitors persecution in over 60 countries, estimates that there are about 97 million Christians in China. A large percentage of these Christians worship in what Chinas communist government considers to be illegal and unregistered underground house churches.

The group has also warned that many unregistered churches have been forced to split up into small groups and gather in different locations, keeping a low profile so as not to be detected by the sub-district officer or neighborhood committee.

As Beijing hosted the Winter Olympics earlier this year, many expressed outrage about Chinas treatment of religious minority communities. While China was accused of genocide for its detainment of Uyghur and other ethnic Muslims in western China, human rights activists had voiced concern for years about the Chinese governments longtime crackdown on unregistered churches and house church movements.

Gina Goh from the U.S.-based persecution watchdog International Christian Concern earlier said, Since the Revised Regulations on Religious Affairs took effect in February 2018, the Chinese government has added more laws seeking to curb religious activities that are not state-sanctioned.

Goh added: Beijing is paranoid about Chinese Christians interaction with Christians overseas. As a result, they are penalizing Christians to deter them from receiving foreign influence. It is a shame that the Chinese government constantly manipulates laws to violate the religious freedom of its citizens.
Hillsong founder Brian Houston apologizes but says he has no intention of retiring

Hillsong Church founder Brian Houston, who resigned last month after the evangelical megachurch network revealed two misconduct allegations against him, has apologized to church members for letting them down but says he has no intention of retiring.

Houston reportedly wrote an email to church members last week vowing that despite all the allegations facing him and other Hillsong pastors in recent weeks, the best is yet to come for Hillsong Church.

I am so deeply sorry, Houston wrote in the email obtained by the Australian outlet Eternity News.

To those impacted directly by my actions, I am sorry for the pain I have caused you. To my wonderful, forgiving and gracious family who I love more than anything, I hate hurting you.

Hillsong reported in a March 18 statement that it investigated two complaints against Houstons behavior that date back nearly a decade. The church said that Houston, who co-founded Hillsong in 1983, breached its pastoral code of conduct when he entered the hotel room of an unidentified woman while under the influence of alcohol and prescription medication during Hillsongs annual conference in 2019.

While it is unclear what occurred in the hotel room, Houston was said to have been in the room for 40 minutes.

Additionally, Houston was accused of exchanging an inappropriate text message with a staffer in 2013 that led to the Hillsong staff member resigning. On March 23, Hillsong announced Houstons resignation.

In his email to church members, Houston wrote that he let them down so badly and that sorry will never be enough to express my sorrow.

As hollow as it may sound, I believe I am the person and pastor you believed me to be, he declared. Imperfect and flawed, but genuinely passionate about God, people, calling and life. I am determined that my mistakes will not define me.

Houston stated that he accepts full responsibility for his actions and has no one to blame but myself for the position I find myself in.

It may be some time before we see light at the end of this tunnel, but I know God has not finished with us yet, he said. And what now you may ask? We are living day by day right now. Bobbie and I are unified and we are believing together that this year will be a year of respite and restoration to our souls, as I continue to prepare to fight for my innocence in the legal proceedings ahead of me.

I still have a sense of bright hope for the future and I know God is not finished with me yet, he added. We have no intention of retiring. As Bobbie would say, the final chapters of our lives are not yet written.

Houston called his wife, Bobbie, is the most Christ-like, beautiful, loyal and faithful person alive today.

It crushes me to see your heart breaking as we navigate this season, letting go of so much that is precious to you, Houston told his wife. I love my family and it pains me deeply to see you navigating these waters.

In a recording of a recent meeting with 800 Hillsong staffers cited by Crikey, Hillsong Interim Global Senior Pastor Phil Dooley said Houston doesnt recall having sex with the unidentified woman in the hotel room in 2019.

Houston reportedly met the woman, a non-member of Hillsong, in the foyer of the Pullman Hotel while several Hillsong officials were drinking.

It was after one of the conference nights, and he [Houston] was drinking with a group, Dooley said, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Later that evening, he went to go to his room, didnt have his room key and ended up knocking on the door of this womans room, and she opened the door, and he went into her room.

Dooley said the woman in question did not say if there were any sexual activity, and Houston claimed there was no sexual activity.

But he was in the womans room for 40 minutes, Dooley said. He doesnt have much of a recollection because of the mixture of the anxiety tablets and the alcohol. This woman had also been drinking, so her recollection is not completely coherent.

Houstons resignation followed a series of misconduct scandals involving Hillsong leaders in the U.S.

Hillsong East Coast has faced a litany of allegations related to financial and sexual scandals surrounding former pastors at Hillsong NYC, formerly led by Pastor Carl Lentz, who was terminated in late 2020 for moral failures. Lentz later admitted to being unfaithful to his wife.

Last April, Hillsong paused its Dallas campus after Pastors Reed and Jess Bogard resigned in January as they were investigated for leadership failures. The Bogards also served at Hillsongs New York City campus, where they were alleged to have misused church expense cards. Reed Bogard was also investigated for having an extramarital affair with a junior-level staffer.

Another Hillsong resignation is that of Darnell Barrett, the former creative director of Hillsong Church Montclair in New Jersey. He was accused of sending explicit photos to a Hillsong volunteer.

Former Hillsong pastors Zhenya and Vera Kasevich recently alleged that Houston was made aware of allegations concerning Lentzs immoral behavior yet refused to address his actions due to the churchs culture of secrecy.

Dooley took over for Houston earlier this year as Houston fights criminal charges of allegedly concealing allegations of sex abuse committed by his father decades earlier. Houston has maintained his innocence.

Houstons resignation came just a day before Discovery Plus aired its docuseries Hillsong: A Megachurch Exposed.
Hungary PM Orban says re-election validates 'Christian democratic, conservative politics'

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has won re-election, attributing his victory to the popularity of his brand of Christian democratic, conservative, patriotic politics.

According to Hungarys National Election Office, with more than 98% of votes counted, Orbans Fidesz party captured 53.29% of the vote and 135 seats in the parliamentary elections held Sunday, enough to secure a supermajority in the 199-seat Parliament.

A coalition of opposition political parties titled United for Hungary received the second-highest share of votes and seats, accumulating 34.89% of the vote and 56 seats.

Seven of the remaining eight seats in Parliament went to the Our Country party, which captured 6.15% of the vote in the election. The eighth seat went to a minor political party, the National Self-Government of Hungarian Germans.

Addressing supporters after his victory, Orban proclaimed that the whole world has seen tonight in Budapest that our brand of Christian democratic, conservative, patriotic politics has won.

Orban addressed the influence of liberal Hungarian-born billionaire George Soros and other international forces in the election.

We had to fight the biggest, overwhelming force: the left at home, the international left, the Brussels bureaucrats, the Soros empire with all its money, the international mainstream media and in the end, the Ukrainian president, Orban stated.

In Sundays election, Hungarian voters also weighed in on several referendums related to LGBT issues.

Voters in the eastern European country overwhelmingly rejected ballot measures that would have allowed sexual orientation sessions for minor children in public education without parental consent, the promotion of gender reassignment surgery for minors, the unrestricted introduction of sexual media content to minors and the display of gender-sensitive media content to minors.

More than 90% of Hungarians voted against adopting each policy proposal.

The promotion of sex changes for minors had the highest level of opposition (95.89%), followed by the exposure of minor children to sexually explicit material (95.32%), the display of gender-sensitive media content to minors (95.17%) and counseling children about their sexual orientation and gender identity without parental consent (92.34%).

Orbans re-election comes three weeks after the Hungarian Parliament elected Katalin Novak, an Orban ally, to become the countrys first female president.

In a 2019 interview with The Christian Post in her capacity as Hungarys Minister of State for family, youth and international affairs in the Orban administration, Novak said the Hungarian government was working closely with the Trump administration. She said the administration wanted to get some detail on our pro-family policies and the measures that we have introduced in the last nine years.

Throughout his tenure as prime minister, Orbans government has enacted policies designed to make it easier for people to raise families. They contend this was necessary to reverse the declining birthrates that have plagued Hungary and Europe as a whole in recent years.

Specifically, the Hungarian government created the Family Housing Allowance Program, which provides subsidies so parents can buy or build a new home.

The amount of money a family receives under the Family Housing Allowance Program increases based on the number of children. While a family with one child can receive a subsidy of $2,160.72, families with three or more children can receive $36,000.

Additional pro-natalist policies embraced by the Hungarian government include free daycare, three years of paid parental leave, free kindergarten, assistance with student loan payments and the exemption of mothers with four or more children from paying an income tax.

Additionally, in 2020, the government passed an amendment to the Fundamental Law of Hungary, the countrys equivalent of a constitution, that recognizes marriage as an institution between one man and woman and bans same-sex couples from adopting children.

Under the new policy, only married couples in a heterosexual relationship can adopt children.

Previously, the Hungarian Parliament passed a measure defining gender as biological sex based on primary sex characteristics and chromosomes. Hungary was also one of 31 countries to sign the Geneva Consensus Declaration, which asserts that there is no international right to abortion.

While Orban has received praise from former President Donald Trump and other conservatives in the U.S. for enacting conservative policies as much of western Europe embraces secularism and socialism, critics have decried Orban as a threat to democracy.

On the campaign trail ahead of the 2020 presidential election, then-candidate Joe Biden listed Hungary as one of several totalitarian regimes in the world and lambasted his opponent, then-President Donald Trump for his embrace of all the thugs in the world.

Orban reacted to Bidens characterization of Hungary in a 2021 interview with Fox News.

The prime minister contended that the hostile rhetoric directed at Hungary by liberal politicians and thinkers in other Western countries stems from jealousy that the country is a success story as a conservative national alternative that is even more successful than a leftist liberal government.

Meanwhile, critics of Orban insist that their aversion to the Hungarian leader is based on genuine concerns.

Writing for The Bulwark, a website founded by Republican critics of former President Donald Trump, Texas Lutheran University Theology Professor H. David Baer suggested that Orban won re-election because the system is rigged.

Hungary left the democratic station long ago and is well down the road to competitive autocracy, Baer maintained. Orban controls the media; he controls the educational system; he controls large segments of the economy; he controls regional politics through a system of patronage.

Orban has also faced pushback for his position on the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine. He has voiced opposition to European Union sanctions on Russian oil and gas imports.

Orban has described keeping Hungary out of this war as the most important priority.

We condemn the war; especially, that it is here in our neighborhood; we say no to violence, we stand together with our allies, and all this is important, the prime minister remarked.
Atheist group pressures Tennessee town to remove cross display from mountain

Correction Appended

A national secular legal organization has renewed its demand that a town in Tennessee remove a prominent cross display on a mountain that overlooks the community, claiming that it violates the separation of church and state.

Over the past couple of years, the Wisconsin-based Freedom From Religion Foundation has tried to get officials in Elizabethton to remove three crosses that have been on display on nearby Lynn Mountain since the 1950s. On certain occasions, the crosses are lit up.

Two residents contacted the FFRF about the display, as the legal group is known for its advocacy work to halt any perceived church-state separation issues.

I dont know the facts of the funding and everything, but we did in 2018 look at land surveys to confirm that [the crosses] are on city property, and that certainly has not been argued, said FFRF legal fellow Karen Heineman in an interview with The Christian Post.

Our concern is we have these three Latin crosses, which are ... defined as being religiously associated with Christianity. And we suspect at least some city funds are going to maintain them, lighting them up. And thats our concern. We feel the Constitution says otherwise, that thats not OK.

In response to the two complaints from residents, Heineman said that FFRF wrote a letter to the city in 2018 expressing their belief that the crosses may violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution if they are being paid for with taxpayer money. The Establishment Clause prohibits governments from making any law respecting an establishment of religion.

Heineman said that FFRF received a response acknowledging the letter, but the town didnt provide further information on if the crosses would be maintained or taken down.

The city attorney was going to talk to the city manager and get back to us shortly, and then we have never heard anything since, Heineman said, contending that the FFRF gave the municipality ample time to respond.

Although legal action has not yet been taken, Heineman said if the two residents who complained choose to take legal action, there are many things courts tend to take into consideration when deciding if monuments should be removed from public properties.

When something that may have a religious expressive symbolism monument has been long-standing, there are these four considerations to look at, and that includes: so much time has passed, can we really determine what the governments purpose was?" Heineman said. "Some of these monuments, even though there might have been a religious purpose initially, have attained other secular messages or purposes. Over time, that is not just a religious monument anymore."

She said it can be confusing to know what a court will decide with monuments that are not considered long-standing and have not acquired other means.

Also, the fact that you have a monument that is long-standing, and thats a little bit concerning because the Supreme Court has not defined what long-standing means, Heineman said.

Removing these monuments could be seen to be anti-religious. So youre kind of in a position there, where, you know, maybe putting this up was pro-religion. But now taking it down is anti-religion.

The crosses have what Heineman described as a strange history because they were put up as a Sunday school church exercise by a few boys on an Easter Sunday back in the 1950s.

It was not a governments decision to put them up in the first place. But it has been a government decision to leave them up, to repair them. They are also illuminated at times. So theyre paying for the electricity for that. Theyve apparently [also] made an access road up there, Heineman said.

So our complainants biggest concern is, as taxpayers, [they] dont want to pay for a Christian symbol on city property. And thats really where our complainant is coming from.

The FRFFs possible legal action has stirred up much resistance in Elizabethton, with multiple protests taking place and at least one church erecting a cross on their property last month as a sign of solidarity with the Lynn Mountain display.

First Liberty Institute, a nonprofit religious liberty organization that engages in litigation related to evangelical Christian values, calls for the crosses to be kept on public property.

Roger Byron, a senior counsel for First Liberty, told CP that he believes there is nothing unconstitutional about the religious symbols being on public property.

Byron referenced the 2019 Supreme Court case American Legion v. American Humanist Association. The high court ruled 7-2 that a 40-foot tall cross built to honor World War I veterans could remain on public property in Bladensburg, Maryland.

When you have an established display or established monument like the three cross display there in Elizabethton, Tennessee, it is presumed to be constitutional, Byron contends. Its strongly presented as constitutional; unless it can be proven otherwise. And to prove it unconstitutional is a very difficult thing to do.

Byron also alluded to another case known as FFRF et al. v County of Lehigh, in which an appeals court ruled that a Pennsylvania county seal could include a cross.

Theyre wrong. Under the American Legion [ruling], its very clear that such an established religiously expressive monument, as the Elizabethton cross display, is constitutional, he added.

If a Latin cross as a central component of the county seal is constitutional, then certainly the cross display in Elizabethton, Tennessee is constitutional.

Heineman said the FFRF does not have anything against crosses erected on privately-owned land, but they are concerned when crosses are on public land.

As far as all of the crosses that are being put up all over the city now, we have no concerns about that. A cross put up on private property is absolutely what the Constitution protects, she said. So a church putting up a cross, thats where a cross should be. Your original religious beliefs should be personal, private.

No city should be labeled a Christian city, Heineman argues, because you cant have freedom of religion without having a government free from religion.

Everybody is rallying together, that Elizabethtown is a Christian city. And we would say our Constitution says no city can be Christian, no city can be Jewish. There is a separation there, and for good reason, she continued.

You have to be careful if you start letting the government make religious decisions. That opens the door for them to think they can come into your church and make decisions.

Correction: When it was published on April 4, 2022, this article mistakenly referred to the First Liberty Institute as the Liberty Counsel, which is a different legal organization. The story was corrected on April 5, 2022.
Hillsong pastors say they warned Brian Houston about Carl Lentz's immoral behavior, were ignored

Former Hillsong pastors Zhenya and Vera Kasevich allege that Hillsong founder Brian Houston was made aware of Carl Lentzs immoral behavior, yet refused to address his actions due to the church's culture of "secrecy."

Months after Lentz, the former pastor of Hillsong NYC, was fired, a leaked audio call between Houston and the Hillsong leadership made its rounds online. In the audio clip, Houston said up until that point, he had never heard of any moral" issues during Lentz's tenure as pastor.

The new Discovery Plus docuseries, Hillsong: A Megachurch Exposed, however, tells a different story. The Kasevichs, who previously led a Hillsong church in Kyiv, Ukraine, claimed they warned Houston about some of Lentzs immoral behavior from the start.

"The audio from Brian did not just pop up, Vera Kasevich said in the documentary. If you want people to know something, you find a way how to bring this narrative and how to groom people.

In the leaked audio clip, Houston, who at the time was Hillsong's global senior pastor, said, I can honestly say, before God, the first time I ever heard any moral complaint against Carl was when Tolu contacted me.

Lentz was fired from Hillsong after Tolu Badders, executive pastor at Hillsong East Coast, found text messages on the pastor's computer between him and his mistress. In a statement sent to The Christian Post by Hillsong at the time, Houston revealed that Lentzs termination was due to leadership issues and breaches of trust, plus a recent revelation of moral failures.

Lentz owned up to the affair in an Instagram post after his firing from Hillsong. The church then launched an investigation after additional details of his affair with a Muslim designer were made public.

Vera Kasevich said Houston should not have been surprised about Lentz and suggested the leaked audio was his own doing to control the media narrative.

"Brian probably wanted people to know that he did not know. But he knew because I told him so personally, she maintained.

Zhenya Kasevich recalled how the couple saw red flags with Hillsong as early as 2010.

"We were senior pastors of Hillsong Church in Kyiv for 17 years. We left Hillsong in 2014, he revealed. New York started about 2010 [and] we saw some things even back then.

Lentz led all Hillsong campuses across the East Coast and was often pegged as a celebrity pastor in mainstream media. His friends and congregants included A-list stars such as Justin and Hailey Bieber, Kevin Durant, Selena Gomez, Kylie Jenner and others.

"I saw some inappropriate behavior and I saw some even immoral behavior, Vera Kasevich said of Lentz in the documentary.

The former Hillsong Kyiv leader later clarified that she trusted many of the people around Lentz during her time at Hillsong. She said a source told her that they witnessed Lentz behaving in an unpastorly manner, including smoking and drinking.

Zhenya Kasevich explained that his wife was brave enough to go to the General Manager in Sydney and say, 'This is what we hear[d]. We need [to] deal with it because this is going to get ugly for all of us.'

Yet, Vera Kasevich shared that "no one paid attention, and they were shut down.

"There were double standards in this situation, and it was like this with Carl for sure, she said.

Producers of the series spoke with two former volunteers of the popular church who brought multiple reports of sexual impropriety against Lentz to Hillsong leadership in 2017. The sources alleged that they were accused of fabricating the accusations and were dismissed from their positions in the church.

According to the docuseries, Houston claimed church leadership looked into the allegations against Lentz and found no evidence to substantiate those claims.

"Church leadership needs to take responsibility for their decisions and for their mistakes, Vera Kasev declared. Covering up and dealing in secrecy  it's a pattern for Hillsong Church, and that's why we've got so many scandals.

The Discovery Plus three-episode docuseries contends how the Australia-based global Evangelical church network has toed the fine line between cult and culture.

With more than 150,000 global members, Hillsong has recently been entangled in scandal. Hillsong: A Megachurch Exposed will profile numerous ex-members of the church who have come forward to share harrowing allegations of the trauma, abuse, financial and labor exploitation that created a culture of chaos within the church, the synopsis of the project reads.

Houston, who co-founded Hillsong in 1983, resigned last week after it was revealed that two women made serious complaints of misconduct against him in the last 10 years. His resignation also followed a series of misconduct scandals involving other Hillsong Church leaders in the U.S. and Australia.
Dan Celia, notable Christian financial advisor, dies at 68

Dan Celia, a prominent Christian financial advisor and radio personality who served as president of Financial Issues Stewardship Ministries, has died following a lengthy illness. He was 68.

Financial Issues released a statement last week saying that Celia passed away on March 30 from long-term health issues, while Charisma News noted that he had spent six weeks in the hospital battling COVID-19 before his death.

Celia leaves behind his wife of 42 years, Yvonne; his daughter, Jeanne, and her husband, Kae; daughter, Ann, and her husband, Matt; and eight grandchildren.

When it came to honoring God, Dans faith was fervent, stated Financial Issues. Many Americans rejoice as a dear and true friend is now in the arms of Jesus and these same people deeply feel the loss of one of Gods most faithful servants.

Financial Issues Live hosted a special program, A Tribute to Dan, on Friday in which people called in to give their condolences, while others took to social media to do the same.

Dan Celia, a good friend, has passed into GOD's hands, stated Dan McKenrick of TVLD, in a Facebook post last Friday, calling Celia a remarkable man.

[Celia] put forth an incredible effort to help people with their financial issues while focused on a primary goal, to witness the gift of eternal salvation through JESUS CHRIST! How blessed I am to have known him and have had the opportunity to, in a very small way, assist him toward his goal.

According to his official biography, Celia served in the United States military from 1971-1977, and then became a businessman and started eight companies on his own.

In 1997, he began a radio ministry and in 1999 he sold his Small Trust Company, which managed over $900 million, to fully commit himself to ministry work.

His regular broadcast program on financial matters from a Christian perspective was carried by more than 600 stations and boasted of getting support from 17 different countries.

Celia was also the author of six books, a regular guest on various news programs, a board member of the American Family Association, and was featured in The Christian Post.

We have a deep fear of money, he wrote in a piece titled, "Have we separated finances from faith?"

He wrote: "There is the fear of not making enough, the fear of losing it, perhaps the fear of not getting rid of our debt. Fear pervades most of our thoughts about money.

I truly believe that when you apply the principles of biblical stewardship to your money, you will overcome this fear. You will walk day by day, trusting the Lord in all of your circumstances and opportunities, with all that you have, and knowing it is God in whom you place your trust.
NASA's new giant moon rocket suffered pressurization issues that made technicians unable to safely load propellants into the craft, forcing authorities to delay the last major test of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket.

The test is known as a "wet dress rehearsal" and has been pushed back to Monday, Apr. 4 at the earliest, the agency said in a post on the Artemis I live blog. NASA said that its teams opted to scrub tanking operations for the wet dress rehearsal because of the inability of technicians to pressurize the mobile launcher.

NASA's New Moon Rocket

The incident resulted in some fans on the mobile launcher, which was the platform that gives support for the rocket up until launch, being unable to maintain positive pressure. This was crucial in keeping away hazardous gases that could build up.

Authorities call the delayed test launch a "wet" rehearsal because the agency runs through all its procedures needed in the actual launch of the SLS. This includes the filling of the 322-foot rocket with 700,000 gallons of propellant, as per The Verge.

On Sunday evening, NASA had a press conference and said that its team was currently on the launchpad and trying to troubleshoot the issue. Authorities said that they were on track to resume the wet dress rehearsal tomorrow.

Furthermore, on Saturday afternoon, severe thunderstorms passed over the rocket's launch site, with four lightning bolts hitting protective towers around the rocket and the launcher. Officials had to pause preparation work at the launcher due to the weather. The agency later assessed that there was no damage and continued the countdown.

Read Also: NASA Hubble Image Shows Stunning View of Farthest Star Seen; Is it Also the Oldest?

According to the New York Times, the launch director of the rocket, Charlie Blackwell-Thompson, said that the launcher's fan has been running since it was moved to the site last month. He noted that it continued to operate during the thunderstorm.

The deputy manager of the exploration ground systems program at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, Jeremy Parsons, tweeted that the fourth lightning strike on the launchpad was the "strongest we have seen since we installed the new lightning protection system."

Working Out the Problems

Each of the towers surrounding the pad is topped with a fiberglass mast and a series of overhead, or catenary, wires, and conductors. They help divert lightning strikes away from the rocket itself, said Parsons.

The new system also provided more protection than the one that officials used during the Shuttle program. Furthermore, it has an array of sensors that can determine the condition of the rocket after lightning strikes and could prevent delays that could be caused when teams need to assess the craft.

Blackwell-Thompson said that authorities did not believe that the fan issue was in any way related to the storm or the lightning event during the weekend. He said that the pad continued to run normally despite the weather phenomena and the morning after for several hours.

Parsons noted that the delay was part of the reason why they conducted the wet dress rehearsal, to figure out any problems that could be hiding in plain sight. He noted that since it was only a test launch, officials had enough time to work through the issues, CNN reported.



Related Article: Argon Gas Trapped in Ice Core From Antarctica Found To Exist in Ancient Earth Atmosphere, Study Says

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Myanmar military destroy over 47 churches in 2 predominantly Christian states, rights groups say

Myanmars military has destroyed at least 47 churches and more than a dozen affiliated buildings in its attacks in the predominantly Christian states of Chin and Kayah since it staged a coup last February, human rights groups have said.

About 35 churches and 15 buildings associated with churches were destroyed in Chin State and about 12 churches were destroyed in Kayah State (formerly known as Karenni) between February 2021 and January 2022, The Irrawaddy reported, citing the Chin Human Rights Organization and the Karenni Human Rights Group.

Christians are a majority in Chin State, which borders India, and make up a substantial part of the population of Kayah State, which borders Thailand. Christians in conflict zones, including these two states, are ethnic minorities who live in the various conflict zones across the countrys borders.

Formerly known as Burma, the Southeast Asian country is home to the worlds longest Civil War, which began in 1948.

The conflict between the countrys military, locally known as Tatmadaw, and ethnic minority militias escalated after the military coup on Feb. 1, 2021, as the ethnic militias have been morally supporting pro-democracy protesters.

Since late last year, the Buddhist nationalist junta has carried out artillery and airstrikes on civilian areas in Chin State and Kayah State because of strong resistance from local people in those areas, the Irrawaddy said, adding that religious buildings in Christian areas  and Buddhist areas  were targeted because civilians often take shelter in them when clashes erupt.

Most recently, troops from Light Infantry Battalion 266 operating under Hakha-based Tactical Operations Command late last month vandalized and looted Sang Fen Memorial Church in Zokhua Village in Chin States capital of Hakha, the CHRO reported.

On Christmas Eve last year, the military burned alive at least 35 internally displaced people, including elders, women and children, in a village in Kayah State.

The KHRG said it discovered the victims bodies the day after the massacre near the Mo So village of Hpruso town. We were so shocked at seeing that all the dead bodies were different sizes, including children, women and old people, a commander from the Karenni National Defense Force, one of the largest of several civilian militias opposing the junta, told Reuters at the time.

I went to see this morning. I saw dead bodies that had been burned, and also the clothes of children and women spread around, a local villager was quoted as saying.

They are attacking the churches intentionally to suppress the spirit of Christian people by attacking their sacred churches. I condemn their bad intentions, the Irrawaddy quoted a Karenni Christian leader as saying.

Hundreds of thousands of civilians, many of them Christians, have been displaced due to the escalation of conflicts.

The presence of the military makes civilians and militias in conflict-ridden states nervous. The military has been accused of vandalizing places of worship and civilians homes, raping girls and women, abducting civilians to be used for forced labor and shooting civilians to death.

Christians make up just over 7% of the majority-Buddhist nation.

Myanmar is ranked No. 12 on Open Doors USAs 2022 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.

The military is notorious for its relations with the ultranationalist ultra-Buddhist group the Ma Ba Tha, ICCs Southeast Asia Regional Manager, Gina Goh, said in a statement earlier. The military together with Ma Ba Tha (a Buddhist nationalist movement) has targeted the Muslims in the country, but they also go after Christians. Once they get a hold of the power, they might resort to things they were doing before they passed the power to the civilian government. They kill. They rape minority Christians.
Justice Department indicts 9 people for attempting to block access to abortion clinic Pro-life activists may face up to 11 years in prison, as much as $350K in fines if found guilty

The Justice Department announced Wednesday that it plans to indict nine people for trying to block access to an abortion clinic in Washington, D.C.

In a statement released yesterday, the department said it was issuing a two-count indictment against nine people, charging them with conspiracy against rights and violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.

If they are found guilty, according to the DOJ, they will each face 11 years in prison, three years of supervised release, and a fine not to exceed $350,000.

Those indicted include: Lauren Handy, 28, of Alexandria, Virginia; Joan Bell, 74, of Montague, New Jersey; Jonathan Darnel, 40, of Arlington, Virginia; William Goodman, 52, of Bronx, New York; Paulette Harlow, 73, of Kingston, Massachusetts; John Hinshaw, 67, of Levittown, New York; Heather Idoni, 61, of Linden, Michigan; Jean Marshall, 72, of Kingston, Massachusetts; and Jay Smith, 32, of Freeport, New York.

At issue was an incident from October 2020 in which the nine indicted individuals allegedly organized an effort to stop people from accessing an abortion clinic.

According to the indictment, as part of the conspiracy, Smith, Harlow, Marshall, Hinshaw, Idoni, Goodman and Bell traveled to Washington, D.C. from various Northeast and Midwestern states to participate in a clinic blockade that was directed by Handy and was broadcast on Facebook by Darnel, according to the DOJ.

Handy, Smith, Harlow, Marshall, Hinshaw, Idoni, Goodman and Bell forcefully entered the clinic and set about blockading two clinic doors using their bodies, furniture, chains and ropes. Once the blockade was established, Darnel live-streamed footage of his co-defendants activities.

Last November, Handy was arrested alongside other pro-life activists outside the Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital in California under the charge of trespassing.

Days later, Handy, Bell and Darnell, along with other like-minded activists, were arrested while handing out roses to women seeking abortions at a clinic in Alexandria, Virginia.

Terrisa Bukovinac of the group Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising, who was among those arrested at both the San Francisco hospital and the Alexandria facility, told The Christian Post in an earlier interview that she and her fellow activists will not be silenced.

We are at a precipice now. We are so close to a victory, and its going to require an immense amount of bravery from those within our movement, said Bukovinac.

I think that its important that the pro-life movement move past our fear of sanctions.  The abortion industrial complex is a totalitarian regime, and we must use every tool in non-violent struggle in order to resist this regime.
NYC Mayor Adams fires Christian education adviser over 'anti-gay' writings: 'I feel bullied'

Christian conservatives have spoken out against New York City Mayor Eric Adams dismissal of one of his education advisors, who also serves as a pastor, after The New York Daily News reported on some of her past writings on sexuality and gender.

Last week, Adams announced nine picks to the citys Panel for Education Policy, which replaced the former Board of Education in 2022 and is part of the governance structure responsible for the citys public schools.

Initially, the list of appointments included Rev. Kathlyn Barrett-Layne, the leader of Staten Islands Reach Out and Touch Ministries.

In the initial announcement, the mayors office touted Barrett-Layne as a seasoned minister who spends her time inspiring people with her speaking and teaching in Bible studies.

After Adams announced Barrett-Laynes appointment to the panel, The New York Daily News published an article highlighting what it characterized as anti-gay remarks from her past.

Specifically, the tabloid publication took issue with Barrett-Laynes 2013 book Challenging Your Disappointments, which listed homosexuality alongside several other sins, including fornication, adultery, pedophilia, stealing, lying, envy, [and] covetousness.

In the book, Barrett-Layne contended that incarcerated young people live in the grip of fornicating homosexual lifestyles with the risk of being infected with the AIDS virus and other sexually transmitted diseases.

In a 2004 book titled When Your Mess Becomes the Message, the pastor recalled how her 3-year-old daughter determined that she was a boy after overhearing her mother provide counsel to a lesbian. After her daughters declaration, Barrett-Layne said she and her husband began to militantly and violently pray for, with and over our daughter and prayed against every spirit that was not of God, including the spirit of homosexuality.

She wrote that the time when her daughter experienced gender confusion was one of the most frightening experiences I had with my little girl.

Members of the citys LGBT community put pressure on Adams to remove Barrett-Layne from his administration in wake of the article.

On the same day that Adams announced Barrett-Layne as one of his picks for the citys equivalent of a Board of Education, the administration indicated that it had asked for her dismissal.

In a letter sent to Barret-Layne on March 25, Adams claimed that her past published statements are not compatible with a public education system that is open and welcoming to all New Yorkers, regardless of background or identity. The letter stated that her removal would be effective on April 7.

Adams spokeswoman Amaris Cockfield told The New York Daily News via email that We were unaware of these writings and weve asked her to resign.

The city scrubbed Barrett-Laynes name from the statement announcing new members of the Panel for Education Policy.

Barrett-Layne reacted to the development in an interview with The New York Times.

I feel bullied. I believe that the city is being bullied, she asserted. I feel as though my character, my name, my church have been defamed with lies and that everything was taken out of context.

Conservative Christian activists cited Barrett-Laynes dismissal as another example of what they see as intolerance toward Christians with beliefs that correspond with biblical teachings about human sexuality.

Tony Perkins, the president of the Washington, D.C.-based lobbying organization Family Research Council, wrote in an op-ed that by [pulling] the plug on Barrett-Layne and withdrawing her name, the Adams administration was sending a chilling message that people of faith need not apply.

The controversy over a Christian with a Christian perspective should be another wake-up call to parents with children in government schools, he added. Dont think that the iron grip LGBT activists have on public education is limited to big-city schools.

Perkins maintained that Barrett-Layne would have had direct input in the local curriculum as a member of the citys school panel.

What does this say to Christian moms and dads in the area who have kids in the public schools? Simple: their views will not be tolerated, Perkins wrote.

Radio host and author Michael Brown, a messianic Jewish believer, noted in a blog post Tuesday that Adams had previously faced pushback from LGBT activists for hiring three people with histories of homophobic views and statements to his Office of Faith-Based and Community Partnerships.

While Brown praised Adams for declining to fire his appointees under pressure, he lamented that Barrett-Laynes previous comments on homosexuality were too much for Adams and his team.

God forbid they should allow yet another Bible-believing Christian to darken the doors of their administration. This was a step too far, he wrote.

Brown concluded by declaring Adams actions as anti-Christian discrimination that must be confronted head on, without compromise or capitulation.

Adams, a Democrat first elected to office last November, has worked to establish himself as an ally of the LGBT community.

After Florida passed a bill banning school officials from discussing sexual orientation and gender identity with kindergarten through third-grade students, Adams issued a statement condemning the legislation as the Dont Say Gay Bill.

The extremist culture war targeting our LGBTQ+ community is hateful and harmful. Floridas Dont Say Gay bill is the latest shameful measure, he said. Were the city of Stonewall. We fight for our LGBTQ+ neighbors, especially our children.

Adams informed families leaving in fear of this state-sponsored discrimination that they were welcome in New York City. He described the arms and hearts of the city as wide open, embracing every child of every identity.

Barrett-Laynes removal comes after then-mayor Kasim Reed of Atlanta fired Fire Chief Kelvin Cochran in 2015 over objections to a mens devotional he wrote for his church that he also distributed at work. The book highlighted Cochrans views on sexual morality. Reed claimed that Cochran had violated city policy by promoting the book while on the job.

But in 2018, after Cochran filed a lawsuit claiming discrimination, the city agreed to pay $1.2 million as part of a legal settlement in the case.

Given my history and work throughout my career and with the city of Atlanta, I was shocked that writing a book and encouraging Christian men to be the husbands and fathers and men that God had called us to be, would jeopardize my 34-year career, Cochran said in a statement.

The Christian Post reached out to the Alliance Defending Freedom, the legal group that represented Cochran, for comment on Barrett-Laynes case. ADF wasnt able to issue a public statement on the matter.

ADF has maintained, however, that the government cant force its employees to get its permission before they engage in free speech.

It also cant fire them for exercising that First Amendment freedom, causing them to lose both their freedom and their livelihoods, ADF Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot said in a 2018 statement.
Being on the wrong side of Gods history

The constant parade of prominent church leader failures is painful to watch. Take your pick from the recent events surrounding Hillsong or other pastors who have been caught robbing their churches, its a news stream that never seems to bottom out.

Christian or not, its head-scratching to watch people fall into the same traps by which theyve seen others ensnared. How many political, corporate, or church leaders see their peers lose everything due to sexual wrongdoings and infidelity, excesses of alcohol, financial thievery, and so on? If their mindset is, that wont be me, Ive got news for them.

Yes, it will.

Like Paul said, But do you suppose this, O man, when you pass judgment on those who practice such things and do the same yourself, that you will escape the judgment of God? There will be tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil (Rom. 2:3, 9).

The German philosopher Hegel is credited with first saying, We learn from history that we do not learn from history and that certainly seems to be true as we watch so many take spectacular falls from grace. The Bible tells us that such an axiom is painful enough to experience in this life, but is infinitely worse in the next.

Hey Jude

The book of Jude hammers home this fact multiple times, starting in verses 5-7:

Now I desire to remind you, though you know all things once for all, that the Lord, after saving a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe. And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire. (Jude 5-7)

In these verses, Jude reminds us of three historical examples that we can learn from when it comes to ignoring God and His moral pronouncements. All three have the same thing in common: simply put, they abandoned what God said was right and pursued what God forbade.

With Israel it was idolatry; with the angels, it was the boundary between their world and ours; with Sodom and Gomorrah, it was violent sexual perversion.

And their end result? Destroyed; kept in eternal bonds under darkness; undergoing the punishment of eternal fire. Its safe to say that no one intends to sign up for those things.

Speaking of just Israels failures, Paul says the same thing twice about heeding their example to emphasize its importance: Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they also cravedNow these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction (1 Cor. 10:6, 11).

The question is, will we listen to that instruction?

Portrait of failing Gods history lesson

The most popular smear cry today, especially in politics, is, youre on the wrong side of history. The phrase belongs to what some call the Whig school of history, a term coined in 1931 by historian Herbert Butterfield, that says the world progresses toward the inevitable victory of liberalism and anti-God enlightenment philosophy.

Such a stance is seen in the morally bankrupt portrait described by Jude in his letter: Yet in the same way these men, also by dreaming, defile the flesh, and reject authority, and revile angelic majesties (Jude 8).

Those on the wrong side of Gods history typically portray themselves as visionaries (dreaming), but in reality, they end up promoting the same old mistakes of those who have been on the receiving end of Gods wrath in the past: physical immorality, rejection of Gods authority and speaking evil of (what the term revile translates to in the Greek) Gods moral code, which Jude represents as angels  the ones tasked with communicating Gods moral law (see Deut. 33:2; cf. Acts 7:53; Gal. 3:19; Heb. 2:12).

Theres no permanently concealing things once you mount that horse as many in very visible church leadership positions have recently discovered. Scripture plainly says, be sure your sin will find you out (Deut. 32:23). A. W. Tozer puts it like this: The wheels of Gods judgment may grind slow but they grind exceedingly fine.

Being on the wrong side of Gods history means that, sooner or later, youll experience the temporal and possibly eternal consequences of what Paul tells us in his letter to the Galatians: Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap (6:7).

In other words, you either learn from bad examples or become one yourself.
Don't. Erase. Women.

Were constantly told, amusingly, by the Left to follow the science! When we follow actual science, we get shouted down, censored, purged, and called terrorists.

There are only two genders: male and female. I know this triggers those with progressive fragility. For anyone struggling with gender dysphoria, there is help and hope in counseling (as long as its still legal). There is an all-out assault on women, and its global. Its a rhetorical, social and political attack intent on erasing objective truths such as what makes women beautifully and biologically different.

Modern feminists decry the Patriarchy that keeps women from being equal. Those same fake feminists then celebrate when the Patriarchy pretends to be a woman and eviscerates centuries-long efforts of equality. William Lia Thomas. Richard Rachel Levine. Bruce Caitlyn Jenner. Roderick Laverne Cox. The list goes on and on of the co-optation of women.

These men can be women, but a white woman (e.g. Rachel Dolezal) cant identify as a black woman? Why not?

If self-identity is reality and confers upon you all the rights and privileges of the co-opted identification, why did we bother even having confirmation hearings for Ketanji Brown Jackson? Couldnt she just identify as a Supreme Court Justice? How can a jurist claim, I am a woman and then infamously fail to offer any definition of what a woman is?

Im not a mechanic, but I can define a car. No one needs to be a biologist to know what a boy is, what a girl is, what a man is, or what a woman is. Only progressives, who want to mangle language and deny basic science, pretend they dont know the obvious. A judge must be able to rule on objective criteria. Judge Jackson calls herself a woman insisting there should be meaningful numbers of women on the Supreme Court, yet she has no objective definition for a woman?

The American Medical Association is following the science by insisting that our sex designation be removed from our public birth certificates. Why? Well, sex is determined at birth they say, defying over a century of scientific knowledge.

That fave mantra of the pro-abortion Left, No uterus! No say!, is now rendered meaningless because anyone can identify as a woman. Whoops. Sorry. I meant a non-prostate owner. At least thats what Teen Vogue is preaching to young girls (or whoever reads the soft-porn mag targeting kids).

The leader of this erasure of women is the self-anointed leading womens healthcare provider, Planned Parenthood. Theyre super sciency of course. Your genitals dont make you a boy or a girl, the nations leading abortion business falsely claims. You know, because our genitals arent based on our sex which is determined by our DNA at fertilization  the moment human life begins.

Years ago, Planned Parenthood Action  the political arm that is indistinguishable from its 501c3 parent organization  tweeted a classic erasure of women. Menstruators in New York started to #TweetTheReceipt celebrating the repealed tampon tax.

Planned Parenthoods web pages dealing with pregnancy have purged every reference to the biological label. The abortion giants president, Alexis McGill Johnson, wont even refer to women as women. In warning people-formerly-known-as-women of Idahos six-week abortion ban (which protects mothers and their unborn children), Johnson tweeted: it will harm pregnant people and disproportionately impact marginalized communities.

Women are now the marginalized community.

The highly political CDC also refers to women as pregnant people. In pushing their distorted COVID propaganda, the Centers for Dialogue Control tweeted: Pregnantpeople with symptomatic COVID-19 have a 70% increased risk of death.

Youve got the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine wanting to use the term chestfeeding to be inclusive of lactating people. Im not making this up! They claim that fathers experience complications while chestfeeding too. Yes. Because we dont lactate. That would be a definite biological complication.

The Senate Committee on Oversight and Reform (led by Democrats) declared that Health equity for Black birthing people is attainable. How can (fake) equity be attainable if a simple definition of women is so escapable?

President Bidens FY2022 budget deleted women, too, referring to mothers as birthing people. Im sure hes used that term affectionately with the First Lady (or is it First Person?), calling the mother of his children one of those pregnant people or Jill-the-birthing-person.

Dont erase women. Just. Dont.

Interestingly, the Left is doing what Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger accused the so-called Patriarchy of doing. She wrote in her book Women and the New Race: Womans role has been that of an incubator and little more. Well. Welcome to 2022. Where womens biological designation is being eviscerated to appease biological men who can never share in the experience of the natural acts of pregnancy and birth.

The ACLU even changed a famous quote from the late pro-abortion Ruth Bader Ginsburg to erase the very people she was talking about. Their tweet changed the clearly offensive parts that mentioned woman and her to: The decision whether or not to bear a child is central to a [persons] life, to [their] well-being and dignity  When the government controls that decision for [people], [they are] being treated as less than a fully adult human responsible for [their] own choices.

Im no fan of RBG or her actual quote because the undignified act of harming or killing another innocent human being never gives anyone equality. But this global progressive campaign to erase women sees binary gender as an oppressive biological reality that must be excised from our lexicon.

So, follow the pseudoscience or be branded a hater. Too many Americans cower in fear of being called some form of -phobic. Who cares? Love people enough to speak the truth. When did confusion become the virtue we uphold instead of clarity and compassion?

These attacks on the dignity of women are rooted in a lie. Politicians know it. Planned Parenthood knows it. And so does a dangerously leftist judge who may tragically sit, for generations, on a Supreme Court currently made up of men and, yes, women.

Originally published at Radiance Foundation.
We are called to be disciples, not consumers

Richard and Sabina Wurmbrand were Jewish Christians from Romania who were imprisoned, mistreated, and (especially Richard) brutally tortured for their unwavering faith. They would not bow the knee to the spirit of the age. They would not submit to the godless Communist agenda (or any other godless agenda). They would only bow their knee to Jesus.

But they did not suffer hardship and imprisonment because of a one-time, cavalier act. They did not just wake up one day and say, Lets do something radical for Jesus. Instead, year after year, they determined to obey the Lord, regardless of cost or consequence. Then, when the great crisis came, they were ready to obey once again.

When the Nazis occupied Romania, Richard risked his life preaching the Gospel, being arrested and beaten for his unflinching faith. Then, in 1944, the Nazis were displaced by the Russians, who began to establish their Communist regime in Romania, with one million soldiers occupying the country. Then, the great test came.

Richard and Sabina were attending the government-sponsored Congress of Cults along with other national religious leaders, and the event was being broadcast on live, national radio. As one religious leader after another publicly praised communism  Im talking about Christian leaders praising an atheistic regime, in the name of Christianity  the Wurmbrands became sickened in their spirits.

Sabina said to her husband, who by then was well known in Romania, Richard, stand up and wash away this shame from the face of Christ! They are spitting in His face.

He replied, If I do so, you lose your husband.

She answered, I don't wish to have a coward as a husband.

So, he made his way forward to the podium and prepared to deliver his remarks (and I remind you: this was airing live on national radio). As reported by the Christian History Institute,

When Wurmbrand stepped forward to speak at the congress, there was a hush as everyone anticipated his endorsement of the new government. Into the electrifying silence fell Wurmbrands proclamation to 4,000 delegates that their duty as Christians was to glorify God and Christ alone. He was hustled from the podium and from that moment became a marked man. As he continued his ministry, the government watched him.

Three years later, On the morning of February 29, 1948, as Wurmbrand walked to church to prepare for the morning service, a secret police van pulled up beside him. Two men pushed him into the van, which quickly drove away. Thrown into prison Wurmbrand ceased to exist as though he had disappeared from the face of the earth. His name was registered as Vasile Georgescu, and he was forbidden to pronounce his real name, even when speaking to the guards. When foreign ambassadors or family members inquired about him, Wurmbrand did not appear on any list.

But that was not the end of the story. Hardly.

Richard Wurmbrand endured two terms of prison totaling 14 years. Sabina continued their underground church work but was also incarcerated for three years in Romanias terrible labor camps. Wurmbrand became so ill in prison that he was put into what was called the dying room, where guards sent prisoners who were expected to live no longer than a few days. Wurmbrand survived for more than two years before being released from the dying room. During that time, he ministered to many people before their deaths.

Finally, in 1965, friends ransomed the now-freed Wurmbrand family from Romania.

Richard Wurmbrands most famous book, Tortured for Christ, has been distributed worldwide, having been translated into scores of different languages. (When I asked him in 1993 if his book was the most translated book of the 20th century, he smiled at me and said, No, the books of Agatha Christie!)

Wurmbrand also founded the Voice of the Martyrs, a ministry that for decades has brought awareness of the suffering church to believers across the globe. And so, what was meant to destroy the Church only made it stronger.

As Wurmbrand said in Tortured for Christ, Persecution has always produced a better Christian  a witnessing Christian, a soul-winning Christian. Communist persecution has backfired and produced serious, dedicated Christians such as are rarely seen in free lands. These people cannot understand how anyone can be a Christian and not want to win every soul they meet.

For these persecuted believers, following Jesus was not a matter of convenience or comfort. It was not simply the choice of a better, more prosperous life. Rather, as he said, A man who visits a barber to be shaved, or who orders a suit from a tailor, is not a disciple, but a customer. So, one who comes to the Savior only to be saved is the Saviors customer, not His disciple. A disciple is one who says to Christ, How I long to do work like Yours! To go from place to place taking away fear; bringing instead joy, truth, comfort and life eternal! (From his book In Gods Underground.)

We are called to be disciples, not customers, not consumers, not casual seekers of carnal convenience. Instead, with joy, we deny ourselves and take up our cross daily (see Luke 9:23). And by Gods grace, we walk worthy of our Lord. That means that we love Him more than father or mother, more than son or daughter, even more than our own lives. Thats what disciples do. (See Matthew 10:37-39; Luke 14:25-33.)

We only bow the knee to Jesus!

(Excerpted from Michael L. Brown, The Silencing of the Lambs: The Ominous Rise of Cancel Culture and How We Can Overcome.)
Finnish MP, bishop cleared of hate crime charges for views on homosexuality

Correction Appended

A Finish court has dismissed all hate speech charges filed against Member of Parliament Paivi Rasanen and Bishop Juhana Pohjola of the Evangelical Lutheran Mission Diocese of Finland over their religious beliefs that marriage is a union between one man and one woman.

A three-judge panel on the Helsinki District Court determined in a unanimous ruling Wednesday that the government should not be interpreting biblical concepts.

The court reasoned that statements made by the former interior minister and Christian Democratic Party leader didnt constitute hate speech even though they may have offended members of the LGBT community.

The court ordered the prosecution to pay the legal costs associated with the trial.

Rasanen said she felt a weight lifted off her shoulders after being acquitted. She hopes the ruling will prevent others from having to go through the same ordeal.

Im relieved. Im happy and grateful to God and to all the people that have supported me, Rasanen proclaimed at a press conference Wednesday.

Alliance Defending Freedom International, which is representing Pohjola and Rasanen, said in a statement Wednesday that the district court upheld the right to free speech.

Rasanen and Pohjola faced prosecution for their roles in creating and publishing a 2004 pamphlet titled Male and Female He Created Them: Homosexual relationships challenge the Christian concept of humanity.

The indictment accused Rasanen and Pohjola of incitement to hatred against a group. The bishop explained at a press conference last year that the charges fall under the section of war crimes and crimes against humanity. He said they were accused of sharing opinions and allegations defaming and insulting homosexuals as a group based on their sexual orientation.

In addition to the pamphlet, Rasanen faced criminal charges for a 2019 tweet criticizing the leadership of the Finnish Lutheran Church for supporting LGBT pride month and sharing her beliefs about homosexuality in a radio show appearance that same year.

Rasanen could have faced two years in prison and a fine if convicted.

Paul Coleman, the executive director of ADF International, praised the courts ruling as an important decision, which upholds the fundamental right to freedom of speech in Finland.

He described the ability for people to share their beliefs without fear of censorship as the foundation of every free and democratic society.

Criminalizing speech through so-called hate-speech laws shuts down important public debates and poses a grave threat to our democracies, Coleman said.

Rasanen said that the ruling was not what she expected.

Not for a second did I believe that I had committed anything illegal in my writings and statements, she said.

She believes that the prosecutors will likely appeal the ruling.

If it happens, Im ready to defend freedom of speech and religion in all necessary courts, also in [the] European Court of Human Rights if needed, Rasanen said.

The lawmaker praised the international outcry she received after being charged last year.

I have received thousands of supporting messages through different channels, letters, she said. Still, every day, I get messages from many countries about how people are praying for me and praying for Finland and several churches, congregations and Christian communities have expressed their concern for the situation.

She said the international interest in her case comes from the surprise to many that the questioning of free speech is possible in a country like Finland, which has a good reputation internationally. She believes many worldwide believe that if such a prosecution could happen in Finland, the same is possible anywhere.

While she lamented the ordeal she has had to go through for nearly three years, she acknowledged that she felt great joy about being able to speak about the Gospel and the atonement of Jesus during these couple of years.

My writings and statements under investigation are all linked to the Bibles teaching on marriage, living as a man and a woman, as well as the Apostle Pauls teaching on sin, she said. The points of view over which I stood accused do not deviate from so-called classical Christianity and nor does my view on marriage deviate from the official policy of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland.

She believes her prosecution has made some people afraid of the consequences of expressing their faith and convictions in public.

Coleman quoted from the Helsinki District Courts 28-page decision, where the three-judge panel ruled that the district court considers that the purpose of Rasanens writing was not to insult or offend homosexuals but to defend the concept of family and marriage between a man and a woman according to Rasanens religious beliefs.

Coleman said the judges also ruled that all Rasanen did during her radio appearance was answered questions that were posed and tried to justify her opinions as part of the debate.

Rasanens answers have represented the view of the faith, Coleman said, translating the ruling written in Finnish. There must be an overriding social reason for interfering with and restricting freedom of expression.

Sam Brownback, who formerly served as the U.S. Ambassador for International Religious Freedom, stressed in a tweet that the case "should never have gone this far."

"It is a scandal that this case was prosecuted in the first place," Brownback tweeted.

Correction:Wednesday, March 30, 2022

This article has been corrected to state that Bishop Juhana Pohjola is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Mission Diocese of Finland, not the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland.
Ukrainian American pastor freed from Russian forces over a week after abduction: 'God is good'

A Ukrainian American pastor residing in war-torn eastern Ukraine has been released from detention more than a week after Russian forces captured him during the ongoing invasion of Ukraine.

The wife of Dmitry Bodyu, who was reportedly abducted by Russian forces from a home in the Russian-controlled city of Melitopol on March 19, announced on Facebook Monday that her husband had been released.

Dmitry is home, Helen Bodyu wrote. Hes doing well. Thank you for your participation, for your concern, help and love! God is good!!! Praise the Lord!

The pastor's family had previously told media that Russian forces stormed their home, confiscated her husband's American passport along with their phones and other devices. After the abduction, the pastor hadn't been heard from for days.

According to NBC Dallas-Fort Worth, Bodyu emigrated to the United States from the Soviet Union in 1990 along with his family.

He settled in Burleson, Texas, located near Dallas. Pastor Otis Gillaspie of Open Door Church in Burleson sponsored Bodyu and his family, enabling them to come to the U.S.

Although Bodyu and his family became American citizens, he opted to return to Ukraine along with his wife to establish several churches.

Bodyu serves as the pastor of the Word of Life Church in Melitopol. Gillaspie told the local news outlet that despite the danger he currently faces by remaining in Ukraine, Bodyu wont leave ... his flock because he feels a mandate from God to do what God has told him to do, no matter what is happening around him.

I really feel like prayer makes a difference, and its made a difference in this case, Gillaspie added. You cant meet him and not like him. I felt like he [captured] those who captured him.

Bodyus abduction came a day after he posted a video lamenting that the city is full of Russian troops.

Our routine has changed, Bodyu said in the video. Were ministering outside, were trying to collect anything we can: groceries, vegetables, water, medicine and were trying to distribute around the city.

The pastor noted that many people were sheltering in the church as as it served as a place of fellowship" and enabled people to pray together so they can cheer up each other.

We cook hot meals all the time so people can eat, and this is our routine now, he explained. Mobile connection is very, very slow. A couple of days ago, we didnt have electricity, water, internet, mobile connection [for] almost two days.

Bodyu addressed the atmosphere outside the church and touched on the fighting in the last month.

Today is OK, he said. There is no shootings around. Yesterday, there were some rockets flying to  our city but we are holding on.

Bodyu concluded the video by expressing hope that everything will be finished soon.

We believe in this, were praying about this and I believe that God can help us, the pastor stated, adding that Ukrainians in other cities have it even worse than he does.

On March 11, Reuters reported that Russian forces kidnapped the mayor of Melitopol, later releasing him in exchange for the return of nine captured Russian soldiers.

According to the latest civilian casualty update published Wednesday by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, 1,189 civilians have been killed since Russia first invaded its eastern European neighbor on Feb. 24.

An additional 1,901 civilians in Ukraine have been injured since the Russia-Ukraine conflict began. The casualties in Ukraine include 108 children while an additional 142 children are among those injured.

The agency indicated that most of the civilian casualties recorded were caused by the use of explosive weapons with a wide impact area, including shelling from heavy artillery and multiple launch rocket systems, and missile and air strikes.

Since the invasion began, over 10 million people have been forced to flee their homes.
Metas recent announcement that its senior management will work remotely from different corners of the world, from Israel and New York, to California and the UK, symbolizes an exciting new era. The decision goes beyond embracing remote work; it's a testament to the efficacy of the metaverse, central to Metas growth aspirations. By working in the metaverse, the company seeks to prove that teams can effectively collaborate and operate in an interactive, conversational and life-like internet. If successful, the move will once again upend the return to the physical office.

But heres what's interesting. The metaverse could upend not just the physical office, but also asset classes across real estate. Look at luxury retail landlords and mall owners, and then luxury apartment builders  all of them should begin examining how an immersive internet can redefine the way they sell property and engender customer loyalty. Heres a peek into what that means.

Related: 3 Ways to Build Sustainable Wealth in the Metaverse

Retail spaces and the metaverse

The pandemic and ecommerces onward march has presented continued hardships for retail landlords and mall owners. In the face of record vacancies and store closures, tenants are increasingly in search of something more to lure customers back to physical spaces.

Look at Gucci, Burberry, Louis Vuitton, Balenciaga and Nike: Their exciting launches in the metaverse range from an ensemble of immersive experiences to limited-edition digital handbags. Other retail brands are quickly realizing they need to do something similar, and renting space in a virtual store that helps curate and build community is a surefire way to do it. But not everyone is Gucci, Burberry, Louis Vuitton, Balenciaga or Nike. And herein lies the opportunity.

Retail landlords and mall owners should build digital replicas of their assets in the metaverse, and then rent both the virtual and physical space together. By doing so, they enable tenants to create a robust interplay between the real and virtual worlds.

Buy our limited-edition shirt in our virtual store to access our exclusive event at our flagship store creates a fresh conversation with a customer and gives him or her a new reason to come back to the physical store. Of course, both the landlord and tenant benefit when that happens.

Related: Target Will Open Mini Apple Stores to Attract Post-Pandemic Shoppers

Luxury apartments meet the metaverse

When do luxury condos sell well? When they've managed to generate significant buzz  and the metaverse serves as a way for them to do just that.

Heres one way to approach it: Build a virtual replica of an ongoing residential development and allow interested buyers to own pieces of the virtual development through limited-edition NFTs, which then unlock preferential pricing and access for physical condos.

NFTs encode proof of ownership and can be rationed based on demand, helping developers reimagine the conventional wait list. Further, the same NFTs can be leveraged to create even more buzz, tying their ownership to exclusive perks, as the physical development goes live on market.

Scarcity and exclusivity enhance mimetic desires, and NFTs tied to virtual developments amplify that. Its a marketing strategy that we will see more of in the years to come.

Related: NFTs: The New Bedrock of the Virtual Economy

Hotels and the metaverse

Hotels work assiduously to differentiate their brands, and the metaverse offers a new way for them to accomplish that. Lets take the Four Seasons in Bali as an example and envision a digital wellness retreat hosted by the management in the hotels new metaverse property. Thousands of users log in, walk around the digital property and partake in the activities online. Several share it with their friends and register this digital experience subconsciously.

Now, imagine a given percentage of these thousands of users (and their friends) plan a trip to Bali in real life. Are they more or less likely to book at the Four Seasons? More likely, of course. Digital familiarity enhances brand awareness, and the metaverse will enable hotels to improve their existing conversion funnel  a lifeline for their businesses.

The internet is entering a new, immersive era built on the metaverse, and it will have ramifications for stakeholders in the built world. Though its early days, retail mall owners, condo developers and hotel operators who take note of the opportunity will see enormous benefits in the long term.

Copyright 2022 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved
Dreamstime /TNS

No more unnecessary connections. Southwest Airlines has launched new nonstop flights out of San Antonio International Airport to Oklahoma. The airline launched its first 143-seat flight on a 737-700 aircraft to Will Rogers World Airport in Oklahoma City on Sunday, April 3, marking the occasion with a ribbon cutting ceremony, according to a news release.

The low cost carrier will operate six times a week, flying every day except Saturday. Tickets cost between $171 to $282, according to Southwest Airline's website.
Russia's space program again threatened its partners, particularly the West, with non-cooperation within the International Space Station (ISS) unless they lifted the economic sanctions against Russia.

Roscosmos Director General Dmitry Rogozin recently tweeted in Russian that the economic sanctions placed against Russia are "unacceptable" and that normal relations between Russia and the West can only be achieved through "the complete and unconditional lifting of illegal sanctions."

Rogozin's tweet named the United States, Japan, Canada, and the European Union as its partners within the ISS. His tweet was translated using Google Translate.

Rogozin's Tweet Details

According to Rogozin's tweet, the responses of Roscosmos' partners to his complaint regarding the sanctions confirmed that they would not lift the economic sanctions placed on Russia and that, in reality, sanctions in terms of work in the interests of the ISS would also not work.

"I consider this state of affairs unacceptable," Rogozin said in his tweet. "Sanctions from the United States, Canada, the European Union, and Japan... is to kill the Russian economy, plunge our people into despair and hunger, and bring our country to its knees."

Rogozin also added that the sanctions are also affecting its high-tech enterprises to the point that the sanctions hinder their financial, economic, and production activities.

Read More: 2023 Toyota GR Corolla Hatchback is Finally Ready To Race: The Circuit Edition, Core Models, Release Date, Specs and More

Furthermore, Rogozin mentioned that specific Rocosmos proposals on the timing of the completion of cooperation within the framework of the ISS with its partner space agencies would be reported to the Russian leadership in the near future.

Rogozin did not specify what the effects of its reporting of their ISS proposals would be. However, Space.com mentioned in its article that Rogozin's tweets do not necessarily mean that the ISS program is in immediate danger of dissolution, adding that the Russian space chief is "a blustery figure with a history of hyperbolic statements."

Roscosmos' Previous Threat

Roscosmos' latest threat was not the first; it previously threatened to leave NASA Astronaut Mark Vande Hei behind in the ISS while the two Russian cosmonauts who accompanied Vande Hei in the space station were sent back to Earth through a Russian spacecraft as previously scheduled. It also threatened to detach Russia's segment of the ISS due to the sanctions placed on Russia.

This previous threat was recorded on video by Rogozin on February 26.

However, Space.com reported that it was business as usual in the ISS, with Vande Hei being able to return to Earth with the two cosmonauts in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft that landed in Kazakhstan on March 30 as planned.

International Space Station Details

The ISS is a space station assembled largely by the U.S. and Russia in low Earth orbit with assistance and components from other countries, according to Britannica.

The space station began as an all-American project named Freedom but was delayed due to funding and technical problems. It was later redesigned in 1990 to reduce costs and expand international involvement, which is a move that eventually led to the project's renaming to the ISS.

Aside from the space station's American and Russian modules, which were named Zarya and Unity, respectively, the ISS also features contributions from the European Space Agency and Japan.

Related Article: NASA's Astronaut Might Be Left in the International Space Station Due to U.S. and Russia's Conflicting Partnership
The Houston Barbecue Festival was the latest event to delight hungry Houstonians with its return after a two-year pandemic hiatus.

On Sunday, about 2,000 barbecue enthusiasts gathered at the Humble Civic Center to sample small bites from the city's best pitmasters, plus a handful more who traveled from across Southeast Texas.

Many barbecue joints opted to showcase their classics with tiny sausage links, rib chunks or brisket slices, while others were more creative with their fare, offering eaters tacos, nachos, chimichangas and more.

Here are some of the best bites from the Houston Barbecue Festival and where to get them now that the event is over. Many can be found at the restaurants, but for any festival exclusives listed here, we'll give you the next best thing on the menu.

Emma Balter

Blood Bros. BBQ

The bite: Chino-changa

How to get it: Blood Bros. BBQ presented a twist on a chimichanga, a Chino-changa with brisket bulgogi and kimchi aioli. This was a festival exclusive, but you can get the three chefs Asian-influenced, push-the-envelope barbecue at their shop in Bellaire. The menu changes often, but the brisket fried rice is a staple.

Emma Balter

Burns Original BBQ

The bites: Chopped beef and sausage

How to get it: Burns Original has been an Acres Home institution since 1973. The classic tangy-sweet chopped beef and East Texas-style sausages the team served at the festival are available on the restaurants regular menu, and if you have cravings for Burns barbecue sauce, you can find bottles of it at any local Kroger.

Emma Balter

Corkscrew BBQ

The bites: Stuffed potato salad and slaw

How to get it: These two items were way more decadent than they sound, as both were layered with chopped brisket and cheesy sauce. Head to Corkscrew BBQ in Spring for the stuffed potato salad, which comes with your meat of choice, homemade cheese sauce between the potato and the meat, and is topped with green chile ranch and green onions. The restaurant serves the slaw on its own as a side, still accented by the brightness and crunch of leafy greens in the cabbage mix. And of course, brisketjust make sure you show up right at opening time at 11 a.m.

Emma Balter

J-Bar-M Barbecue

The bite: Brisket, pimento cheese and pickled jalapeno on a firecracker

How to get it: The mix of flavors and textures in this small bite were a hit. Pitmaster Willow Villareal and chef Jasmine Barela opened their swanky new East Downtown restaurant, J-Bar-M Barbecue, in November 2021. This exact bite isnt on J-Bar-Ms menu, but theres always brisket at the restaurant, andpro tipthe pimento cheese and firecrackers are on the bar bites menu, which appears Fridays and Saturdays only from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Emma Balter

JQs Tex Mex BBQ

The bite: Smoked pork tamale with roasted green chile and queso blanco

How to get it: The diversity in Houstons barbecue scene is unparalleled. Case in point: JQs Tex Mex, which calls its food Chicano-style Texas BBQ, serving its smoked meats on tacos, tamales and more. Unfortunately for Houstonians, JQs is a pop-up without a regular schedule or location, but its worth watching their Instagram and Facebook pages like a hawk to see where theyll be next.

Emma Balter

Pinkertons Barbecue

The bite: Memphis-style chopped pork nachos

How to get it: The Heights joint brought a little taste of Tennessee to Texas on Sunday, and we werent mad about itespecially as the Memphis-style pork was chopped up onto nachos with melted and shredded cheese, green bell peppers, tomatoes and Pinkertons signature barbecue sauce. We hate to break it to you: This was another festival exclusive. A trip to Pinkertons never disappoints, though, where you can load up on pulled pork or pork ribs, available glazed or dry-rubbed. And the South Texas beans are bound to scratch the itch those nachos left.

Emma Balter

The Pit Room

The bite: Chopped brisket tacos with cheddar, sour cream and salsa roja

How to get it: This Montrose mainstays breakfast tacos are available seven days a week, 7 a.m. to 10:30 a.m., including brisket and egg tacos and pulled pork hash and egg tacos. For even more of a Tex Mex fix, head to Candente next door, which is also owned by pitmaster Michael Sambrooks.

Emma Balter

Tejas Chocolate & Barbecue

The bites: Chile relleno sausage, carrot souffle and chocolate panna cotta

How to get it: This Tomball hotspot is just as proud of its handcrafted chocolates as its perfectly smoked cue. The chocolate panna cotta with pecan-praline whipped cream and candied pecans is available on the regular menu, as is the legendary moist and spongy carrot souffle. The chile relleno sausage, also a fixture, is a link stuffed with chile and tons of cheese.
Last week authorities finally located and identified an escaped fugitive who had been sought for several years.

In this case the fugitive was not a prisoner who escaped from the penitentiary, but a bird that escaped from a zoo. If you ask any animals in a zoo, they would tell you its the same thing. This zoo happened to be in the middle of Kansas. And if youve ever lived in Kansas, it feels like a penitentiary. As any of the animals will tell you, its a jungle in there.

The bird was originally held in Wichita, Kansas at the Sedgwick County Zoo and had been brought to the US from Tanzania in Africa. And if youve ever been to Wichita, youd know why he fled.

Normally, zookeepers clip the wings of newly arrived birds so they cant fly away. However, in this case the zookeepers were evidently too busy taking long lunch breaks smoking Camels, eating animal crackers, and making fun of all the caged animals to get around to it. So the bird, realizing it was now or never decided to hatch a plot to fly the coop before the zoo imposed a no-fly zone on it.

It partnered with another jailbird and waited until there was a storm to attempt their flight. Once the weather cleared and the zoo did a cell count, they were discovered missing. The elephants have never forgotten it and the hyenas have never stopped laughing about it.

Once clear of the compound the flamingos first stopped to ask directions for the way back to Tanzania before realizing no one in Kansas had ever heard of the place.

Since they were birds, they hatched a new plan. They decided to fly south to Texas, because Texas is warmer and besides, its too far to walk. Pretty smart for a couple of birdbrains. I dont think Canada would be a very forgiving climate for a long, thin-legged animal that stands out like a sore thumb and would make a quick lunch for a polar bear.

Being flamingos they decided to get a leg up on the authorities by splitting up once they exited the zoo. Their distinctive pink color and long legs however made it difficult for the birds to go unnoticed especially among all the turkey buzzards and crows inundating Kansas.

Authorities believe the birds had been able to avoid detection for so long, because they traveled at night and slept during the day concealing themselves among homeowners plastic lawn flamingos along the way. The birds escaped partner hasnt ever been located to this day leading authorities to believe he fell victim to flamingo traffickers who prey on runaways.

However, after almost 17 years one of the flamingos was recently sighted in Texas attempting to pass himself off as a pink chicken. Authorities attempted to swoop in and arrest the bird and return him to the Kansas zoo, but the bird cried fowl and pleaded that it wasnt fair.

Since the bird had been on the run for so long, authorities decided to drop the charges and let him go since unlike the flamingo, they didnt have a leg to stand on.

When informed of his new-found freedom, the flamingo was naturally tickled pink.
A scene from Saturday's episode of the series, "Twenty Five Twenty One," showing Back Yi-jin (Nam Joo-hyuk) reporting from New York about the Sept. 11 terrorist attack. / Screenshot from Naver TV





By Lee Gyu-lee







TvN's popular romance series, "Twenty Five Twenty One," has stirred up controversy after its episode inappropriately featured the Sept. 11 terrorist attack that killed thousands in New York City in 2001.







The romance series follows a love story between a high school girl, Na Hee-do (Kim Tae-ri), who grows up to become a fencing medalist, and a college dropout, Back Yi-jin (Nam Joo-hyuk), who later becomes a news reporter.







Saturday's episode showed the pair's dating life while both trying to juggle their lives: Hee-do as a national fencing team member traveling abroad for international games, and Yi-jin as a newly-transferred reporter to a local news team.







Toward the end of the episode, Yi-jin is sent to New York to cover the Sept. 11 attack as a correspondent, and the pair's relationship starts to face difficulties as they struggle to manage their long-distance relationship while balancing their professional lives.







However, after the episode aired, many viewers complained that it was inappropriate to use the tragic attack as the backdrop for a love story. The parts they pointed out were scenes like where Hee-do would laugh after seeing Yi-jin through TV reporting about the attack, and where Yi-jin called Hee-do from New York to tell her that he dressed up for his reporting to look nice for her.







The viewers criticized the writer and the production team for being inconsiderate not only by bringing up the deadly terrorist attack, which might still be a horrible trauma for the victims and their families, but also by using it to portray the struggling relationship of the characters.







"Twenty Five Twenty One" follows a romance between a fencing medalist and a news reporter. Courtesy of tvN





"9/11 was such a globally shocking incident. How could they use it like that? ... It is such a horrifying attack that cost the lives of those on the plane, in the building," a user wrote on the internet. "Even though it is another country's tragedy, it should still not be taken lightly and be used to make heart-fluttering scenes. It was a very inconsiderate move, especially as the series is being streamed globally through Netflix."







Another user wrote: "I don't understand why it had to be the 9/11 attack. The point is that (Yi-jin) had to go away as a foreign correspondent. So they could have just made up a fictional incident. It was very uncomfortable to watch that."







The 16-part series, which started with a 6.4-percent viewership rating on Feb. 12, garnered popularity with its coming-of-age, cute love story of the two leads through the late 1990s when the country was hit by a major financial crisis. The rating continued to grow, almost doubling at its final episode on Sunday, at 11.5 percent.







However, the show also raised concern from some viewers for putting too much emphasis on a romantic relationship between a minor and an adult, until the story progressed toward the end of the series.


This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

Midland County Department of Public Health will begin offering residents ages 50 and up, and moderately or severely immunocompromised individuals over age 12, a second booster vaccine.

No appointment is necessary for either clinic; just bring your COVID vaccine card.

Two drive-thru clinics will be held this week:

From 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. Thursday at Senior Services  Trailside Center, which is located at 4700 Dublin Ave.

From 9-11 a.m. Friday at Homer Township Fire Department, which is located at 222 S. Homer Rd.

Pfizer remains the only COVID-19 vaccine currently authorized for those under age 18. COVID-19 booster doses may be given at the same time as other vaccines. Individuals may choose which vaccine they receive as a booster dose.

Four months after receipt of a first booster dose, the following options are available to individuals who choose to receive a second dose:

A second booster dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine or Moderna COVID-19 vaccine may be administered to individuals 50 years of age and older.

A second booster dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine may be administered to moderately or severely immunocompromised individuals 12 years of age and older.

A second booster dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine may be administered to moderately or severely immunocompromised individuals 18 years of age and older.

Vaccination continues to be our best strategy to minimize the risk of severe outcomes from COVID-19, said Fred Yanoski, Midland County health officer. Our team has been working to make COVID vaccination as easy as possible. Vaccine is widely available at local provider offices and pharmacies, please make an appointment wherever is most convenient for you.

Midland County Dept. of Public Health also offers weekly COVID vaccine clinics on Tuesdays from 10 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. in the County Services Building on the second floor, 220 W. Ellsworth St., Midland. Make an appointment at www.co.midland.mi.us/health or call 989-832-6665. Walk-ins are also welcome.

The health department continues to encourage all residents to complete their vaccine series, or to initiate being vaccinated, if they have not already done so.

For more information, contact the health department at 989-832-6380 or visit the county of Midland's website with backslash "health."
National Tax Service (NTS) Commissioner Kim Dae-ji, left, shakes hands with his Vietnamese counterpart, Cao Ahn Tuan, after a meeting in Seoul, Monday. The tax agencies of the two countries agreed to cooperate in taxation policies, sharing Korea's know-how in the digitalization of taxation and resolving the problem of dual taxation faced by Korean businesses operating in Vietnam. Courtesy of NTS
A shooting at an outdoor music festival in southeast Dallas over the weekend has left one man dead and 11 others injured, including three kids, according to police reports from the scene.

Just after midnight on Sunday, police responded to a call of shots fired at an open field in Oak Cliff where the Second Annual Epic Easter Bike Out & Field Party, hosted by Bossman Bubba, was taking place. Upon arrival, officers discovered Kealon Dejuane Gilmore, 26, lying near the stage having suffered a gunshot wound to the head. Gilmore was pronounced dead at the scene.

According to police interviews, the shooting was prompted when a fight broke out among a group of concert-goers. During the melee, one man fired his gun into the air and then another turned his weapon on the crowd of about 2,000 in attendance, including children, firing indiscriminately and sending people fleeing, creating a stampede.

"Everybody was running," Lulu Smith, who attended the event with her daughter, told WFAA in Dallas. "It was so jam-packed right here, you couldn't get in or out. When I got to my car, somebody was shooting. I rolled down my window and I heard [shots]."

As of Monday morning, no arrests have been made as police continue to investigate.

"Last nights violence was horrific and unacceptable, said Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson in a statement. I am praying for the victims, and I look forward to our police department bringing those responsible to justice. Public safety remains our top priority, and I will be conferring with Police Chief Eddie Garcia to see what more can be done to stop this kind of violence in our city."

Fliers for the event, an all-ages show that included an Easter egg hunt for kids and was meant to be headlined by rapper Big Boogie, who never made it to the stage due to the shooting, suggest Dallas police would be on site to provide security. The Dallas Police Department is looking into the claim, according to reports by the Daily Mail.

This is the second such shooting at an event in the city over the past two weeks, following a random shooting at The Space Dallas where 10 people were injured and one 18-year-old was left in critical condition when a man opened fire on a large crowd waiting to get inside.

Gilmore, 26, was a TikTok creator who made videos with chill and funny vibes for his more than 20,000 followers, according to his profile.

I never thought it would be one of my friends, Dallas rapper Tspeed, a friend of Gilmores, said in a video on his Facebook page after the shooting. Its so sad, man it's so sad. I wouldn't even expect for nothing to happen to you like that. Seems like the good ones always go first. I actually knew this dude, actually went to school with this dude. This is a great kid, man.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

MADISON  Brand new winter coats, socks, T-shirts, toiletries and first aid kits are will soon be on their way to Ukrainian soldiers after a successful collection on the Madison green.

The donations, coordinated by Michael Clark, were delivered to New Havens St. Michael the Archangel Ukrainian Catholic Church to be sorted and delivered to war-torn Ukraine.

To further assist with shipping, some $3,000 was collected, in addition to packing boxes and tape.

Clark took it upon himself to collect the items after watching television news.

Im watching the news and Im sitting home, safe, and I felt guilty, the Madison resident said.

New Havens St. Michaels Ukrainian Catholic Church has been actively collecting goods to be shipped to their mother country. Their basement is chock full of goods for soldiers and Ukrainian people, alike.

A truckload of medical supplies from the church, including wheelchairs, walkers, aspirin and Tylenol, is already enroute.

Clarks contribution will be added to the churchs growing collection of donations.

It was nonstop for almost four hours, said Clark, hours after he sat on the Madison green greeting generous donors. It was just overwhelming.

Gladys Waltemade spent the better part of the day before the drive shopping for donations. She arrived with six fleece coats, socks, underwear, sweaters, a winter coat and a box of N-95 masks.

Growing up in New York City, amongst immigrants, with grandparents from Sweden and Germany, Waltemade feels a connection with the Ukrainian people.

Im going to get emotional about this, the Clinton resident said. I spend so much of my life with immigrants and with people who have had to flee their country. Like everybody, Im just sick about this war.

I think volunteering and getting involved with a cause or nonprofits is such a win-win, she added.

St. Michaels parishioner Paul Zalonski, who is helping coordinate this project, said drives like this make him feel hopeful.

Today theres a lot of darkness in the world, the East Haven resident said.

For me, its a great thing that people are coming together and standing up for Democracy, for faith, for compassion, for understanding, for refugees, he added. Yahoo News, the other day, said there were 2 million refugees. Thats a lot of people who are now displaced, without comforts of homes, friends, just basic human needs.

One obstacle with the collections is the shipping. The cost to send is estimated at $2.30 a pound. The Madison monetary donations will help with this.

For Bill Gargone it was overwhelming to assist Clark with the project.

This four-time combat veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, and was a former New Haven policeman said the images he is seeing coming from Ukraine are worse than anything he saw in his wartime days.

Ive seen destruction, this Madison resident said. Ive seen IED blasts and what they can do, but Ive never seen a country take on a super power like this and everybodys chipping in.

I can definitely relate, he added. Ive seen war, but to have images and combat like this against civilians is  as everyone else who came said  What can we do? We need to help.

Clark is hopeful that this community effort encourages others to seek out ways to help.

I think people, we get a little too complacent, and the world is getting smaller and a more dangerous place and we all have to contribute something and if we all do contribute something it could make a difference, he said.

Rev. Sarah Vetter, minister at the First Congregational Church, gave Clark permission to use the green and also assisted him with finding volunteers to help deliver four carloads of goods to New Haven.

Vetter applauded Clarks effort.

I thought it was a wonderful way to partner with the Ukrainian Catholic church and help the community come together and express our concern and desire to reach out and effect some good in the world, she said.

St. Michaels Archangel Ukrainian Catholic Church, 569 George Street, New Haven; 203-865- 0388; stmichaelchurchgc@gmail.com; stmichaeluktrainian.org

Donations can be sent to Carl Harvey, Ukrainian American Veterans Post 33, 841 Alling Road, Orange, CT 06477; 203-530-8232

Contact Sarah Page Kyrcz at suzipage1@aol.com
ZZ Top pulled into the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium Wednesday evening for a rocking performance. The band has been together for over five decades and sold over 30 million records across 15 studio albums. The loss of long-time bassist Dusty Hill in 2021 did not stop the band as his spot o




Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will deliver a virtual address to Korean lawmakers next week, the chairman of the parliamentary foreign affairs committee said Monday.







Zelenskyy's speech will be delivered virtually at the National Assembly Library at 5 p.m. on April 11, Rep. Lee Kwang-jae of the ruling Democratic Party said on MBC radio.







"We need to clearly raise our voice (against Russia's invasion of Ukraine) in the international community," he said. "Parliamentary speeches (by Zelenskyy) are being held worldwide."







Zelenskyy has delivered virtual addresses to the legislatures of countries including the United States, Canada and Japan to rally international support for Ukraine's war against Russia.







Lee also said he plans to leave for Poland this Friday to help Ukrainian refugees of Korean descent flee to South Korea.







"Of the 4 million Ukrainian refugees, there are 1,000 ethnic Koreans in refugee camps in Poland alone," he said. "I will take a look at the refugee camps and then would like to be of practical help by discussing with our government what kind of humanitarian assistance is needed." (Yonhap)






You may be eligible to work anywhere in Canada while waiting to be approved for spousal sponsorship.

The benefits of a spousal open work permit You may be eligible to work anywhere in Canada while waiting to be approved for spousal sponsorship.

The benefits of a spousal open work permit You may be eligible to work anywhere in Canada while waiting to be approved for spousal sponsorship.

The benefits of a spousal open work permit You may be eligible to work anywhere in Canada while waiting to be approved for spousal sponsorship. Shelby Thevenot Aa Accessibility Font Style Serif

Sans Font Size A

A

Canada offers an open work permit to foreign nationals who are waiting for a decision on their inland spousal or common-law sponsorship application.

The Spousal Open Work Permit (SOWP) specifically provides inland sponsorship applicants with the opportunity to work while their immigration application is processing.

The following are among the major benefits of getting a SOWP:

Sponsor your spouse for Canadian immigration

Work in Canada while you wait

The SOWP allows spousal sponsorship applicants to stay in Canada while they wait for a decision on their immigration application. It can take Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) about 12 months to process a spousal sponsorship application. The SOWP allows foreign nationals to work in Canada during this time.

Work anywhere, skip the LMIA

As opposed to closed work permits that only allow foreign nationals to work for one employer or in one type of occupation, open work permits allow holders the freedom to do any job for any employer in Canada.

Further, employers who hire SOWP holders do not need to get a Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA).

Live with your partner

Without the SOWP, or another form of temporary status, spousal sponsorship applicants would have to complete the process outside of Canada. The SOWP makes it easier for couples to live together while their sponsorship application is pending.

Gain Canadian experience

Getting Canadian work experience before you become a permanent resident can help support your career growth in Canada. If you do get permanent residence, you will already have some work experience under your belt. Studies have shown that more Canadian work experience translates to higher earnings.

Not only that, being in Canada provides you with the opportunity to network, create meaningful relationships, and improve your language skills if needed.

Eligibility for the SOWP

Inland sponsorship is for spouses and common-law partners who are already living together in Canada. The foreign partner needs to already have temporary status in Canada as a worker, student, or visitor.

In order to get a spousal open work permit, sponsorship candidates need to meet the following requirements:

submit a permanent residence application under the Spouse Common-Law Partner Class;

have a Canadian citizen or permanent resident spouse or common-law partner who has submitted a sponsorship application on their behalf;

live at the same address as their sponsor; and

have valid temporary resident status in Canada or an approved application for restoration status with authorization to work.

Foreign spouses can apply for the open work permit at the same time or any time after they apply for permanent residence through spousal sponsorship.

If applicants have already received approval in principle on their permanent residence application, they can apply for the SOWP online. Approval in principle means the spouse or partner has received a letter from IRCC stating that they meet the permanent residence eligibility requirements, but they have not yet passed the medical, security, and background checks.

The SOWP may be extended if the immigration decision has not been made before it expires. SOWP holders will have to apply to extend their permits before the expiry date.

If you are eligible, getting a SOWP can be a major benefit. Not only can you stay with your partner in Canada, but you can work and start building your career here.

Schedule a Free Work Permit Consultation with the Cohen Immigration Law Firm

 CIC News All Rights Reserved. Visit CanadaVisa.com to discover your Canadian immigration options.
Wilkes Barre, PA (18701)

Today

Rain likely. High 56F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch..

Tonight

Cloudy with periods of rain. Low 49F. Winds ENE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch.
Late British translator of Communist Manifesto commemorated in Britain

Xinhua) 13:34, April 04, 2022

CHESHIRE, the United Kingdom, April 3 (Xinhua) -- The late translator of the first English version of the Communist Manifesto, Helen Macfarlane, was commemorated by members of the British Communist Party on Sunday.

During the commemorative event in Cheshire, northwest England, members of the British Communist Party laid flowers on Macfarlane's tombstone, hailing her historical contribution in spreading Marxism.

Born in Scotland in 1818, Macfarlane was a revolutionary journalist and columnist. In February 1848, the Communist Manifesto, written in German, was published in London. Two years later, Macfarlane's English translation of the Communist Manifesto was published.

In a statement, Zheng Xiyuan, the Chinese Consul General in Manchester, paid tribute to the life and legacy of Macfarlane, describing her work "had a major impact on the international communist movement and the development of human history. It is well-known that the Chinese version of the Communist Manifesto was translated from the English and Japanese versions."

According to Kevan Nelson, the international secretary of Communist Party of Britain, Macfarlane's English translation of the Communist Manifesto impacted the British working-class movement at that time. Marxism still plays an important role in British society, helping people to better understand the problems of capitalism and inequalities.

Nelson noted that he was impressed by China's development led by the Communist Party of China and the Chinese government during the past years, acknowledging China's role in helping other countries' development through mutual cooperation.

"China's contribution to human development, not just within China, is profound," he said.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
Fair Trade Commission Chairperson Joh Sung-wook announces the antitrust regulator's decision to fine 23 shipping companies with a combined 96.2 billion won for 15 years of alleged collusion, during a press conference at the Government Complex Sejong in this Jan. 18 file photo. Newsis



By Park Jae-hyuk



China has warned of potential retaliation against the Korea Fair Trade Commission's (FTC) attempt to fine shipping companies, including dozens of Chinese firms, for their alleged collusion to fix the freight rates for sea routes between the two countries over more than a decade.



According to industry officials, Monday, Korea's antitrust watchdog sent its review report on March 25 to around 20 shipping companies from Korea, China and Japan to inform them of its plan to fine them for simultaneously raising freight rates for the Korea-China and Korea-Japan routes.



The measure was taken about two months after the FTC decided in January to fine 23 shipping companies, including 11 foreign firms, a combined 96.2 billion won ($79 million) for 15 years of alleged collusion to fix the freight rates for sea routes between Korea and Southeast Asia.



The watchdog plans to hold a meeting on April 27 to determine the amount of the fines for the shipping companies that sailed the Korea-China route. The penalties on the shipping companies that sailed the Korea-Japan route will be determined at its April 28 meeting.



The Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, which supervises the shipping industry, has maintained a negative stance on the FTC's sanctions, saying it is unreasonable and thoughtless to prohibit "collaborative actions" that are allowed by international law.



"We have continued persuading the FTC, using all possible measures," said a government official from the maritime ministry's shipping policy division.



The ministry has been especially worried about possible diplomatic friction with China, because the Chinese government sent letters last May and July to the Korean government, expressing its concerns over the FTC's investigation into shipping companies that sailed the Korea-China route.



"If the FTC fines shipping companies for fixing freight rates for the Korea-China route, the shipping agreement between the two countries will become virtually invalid," the ministry said in its press release. "We are concerned about possible protest from the Chinese government and annulment of the shipping agreement between the two countries."



The FTC, however, has remained silent on the maritime ministry's claim.



Shipping companies have threatened to file an administrative lawsuit against the FTC.



"We hired a law firm to discuss possible countermeasures," a Korea Shipowners' Association official said. "We will file a lawsuit, as soon as the FTC determines sanctions on shipping companies that sailed the Korea-China and Korea-Japan routes."



The association has also been engaging in a petition campaign to collect 10 million signatures urging the FTC to withdraw its decision. In addition, it plans to send a letter to President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol, hoping for him to side with shipping companies, based on his business-friendly stance.



There is greater likelihood of Yoon supporting shipping companies, since the maritime ministry sent its shipping and logistics bureau head to the presidential transition committee's second economy division in charge of industrial policies.



The incoming administration has also been urged to make efforts for the passage of revisions to the Marine Transportation Act, which will exempt collaborative actions among shipping companies from antitrust regulations.



If the National Assembly passes the revised bill, the FTC's sanctions will be nullified.


From left, embroidery artist Anatoli Georgiev, Greek Ambassador to Korea Ekaterini Loupas and photographer Vangelis Kyris pose in front of "Costume of Dimitrios Mavromichalis, 19th century" at the "Raiment of the Soul" exhibition at the KF Gallery in central Seoul, March 29. Korea Times photo by Choi Won-suk



By Kwon Mee-yoo



Greece is well-known in Korea for its ancient civilization which gave birth to the Olympic Games and classical Greek philosophers such as Socrates and Aristotle. However, the country also has a vibrant modern history, including the 1821 Greek Revolution, also known as the Greek War of Independence, which helped shape the modern political landscape of Europe.



A photo exhibition at the KF Gallery in central Seoul, held under the auspices of the Embassy of Greece in Korea, brings a piece of Greek modern history, interpreted through the lens of Greek photographer Vangelis Kyris and the needle of Bulgarian embroidery artist Anatoli Georgiev.



The exhibit weaves Greek modern history exquisitely with a contemporary perspective, featuring a series of portraits by Kyris, taking inspiration from the costume collection of the National Historical Museum of Athens. The photos are printed on cotton canvases and then adorned by Georgiev's embroidery of gold and metal cords and sequins.



Greek Ambassador to Korea Ekaterini Loupas began by explaining the origins of Greece's Independence Day on March 25, which commemorates the start of Greece's war of independence against the Ottoman Empire.



"In 1453, the Ottomans occupied Constantinople (Istanbul), ending the Byzantine Empire. After 400 years of occupation, the Greeks started the independence war in 1821. We celebrated 200 years from that war last year. In the frame for this celebration, I had an opportunity to see an exhibition and thought that could be very nice for Korea," Ambassador Loupas said, March 24, explaining how she brought the exhibition here.





Greek photographer Vangelis Kyris poses with his camera at the "Raiment of the Soul" exhibition at the KF Gallery in central Seoul, March 29. Kyris reinterprets traditional Greek garments from the Greek Independent War era from the collection of the National Historical Museum of Athens. Korea Times photo by Choi Won-suk



As the National Historical Museum of Athens had shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it commissioned Kyris to reinterpret traditional costumes, and he pulled off them off with a modern twist.



Kyris photographed models wearing garments from the museum's collection, mostly created in the 18th and 19th centuries, including those worn by prominent figures of the Greek Revolution such as Otto, the first modern king of Greece, and other generals and political leaders.



Kyris, dubbed a "fashion world rebel refusing to compromise his personal vision for the sake of commerciality," makes the moment important again by feeling it and capturing something from it.



"When he captures the image, somehow he captures also the psychology of the person... So you can see this (figure) has hope, has belief, but you also can see that it has all the bad moments of the past. This is the talent of Vangelis," said Haik Kourdoglanian of the Kourd Gallery in Athens, which manages the artistic duo.



"Costume of King Otto" emphasizes the young king's ambition to become the first king of Greece at the age of 17 in a grand red costume with delicate gold embroidery.



Another highlight is the "Costume of Kyra Frosyni" from 18th-century Ioannina city. Wearing the oldest surviving such dress in Europe, the model's gaze captures the strength of Greeks under the Ottoman rule after the fall of Byzantium.



The costume style is closely related to the turbulent history of modern Greece and its geography of having thousands of islands. One example is "Costume from Zante Island, 18th century." Zante Island was not under Ottoman rule during the time and the costume is more in Victorian style, closer to Europe.





Bulgarian embroidery artist Anatoli Georgiev embroiders a photo by Vangelis Kyris printed on a cotton canvas at the "Raiment of the Soul" exhibition at the KF Gallery in central Seoul, March 29. Georgiev breathes new life into the traditional costumes by adding embroidery on the photo inspired by the original garment. Korea Times photo by Choi Won-suk
Primeste notificari pe email

Contractare si Achizitie Bunuri Anunturi de Angajare Granturi - Finantari Burse de studiu Stagii Profesionale Oportunitati de voluntariat Toate Articolele
Raspunsul la criza refugiatilor: Apel de propuneri, lansat de MAD-Aid in parteneriat cu Camera de Comert Britanica din Moldova
The tragedy of the war in Ukraine is truly heartbreaking to watch. The harrowing scenes of devastation and destruction have cast a long shadow.

The courage of the Ukrainians fighting for their countrys survival has been remarkable. So too has been their success in holding back the far larger and better resourced Russian army. On paper, it should be no real contest, with the Russian troops quickly overpowering Ukraine  but the reality has been very different.

Not that Putin will admit that. Alongside its military might, Russias propaganda machine has been in full swing, attempting to convince Russian citizens that the war (although that word isnt used) is going to plan and that the Russian army is a liberating force.

Politics in the UK may have been highly divisive in recent years, but these events are a reminder of how lucky we are to live in peace in a liberal democracy with a free press.

In light of such troubling and dark events, it can seem difficult to find positive things to focus on. Yet, there have been some rays of light and acts of kindness. Many charities have raised significant sums to help support humanitarian relief efforts in Ukraine and for Ukrainian refugees. As is so often the case, the British public have been incredibly generous in their support.

For example, in its first two weeks the Disasters Emergency Committees (DEC) Ukraine appeal raised 200m, which the charity said was the equivalent of 3 for every person in the UK. No doubt by the time you read this the total raised by this and other appeals will have increased substantially.

Given that there is a cost-of-living crisis in the UK, this generosity is particularly meaningful. Along with the number of people signing up to house Ukrainian refugees, it shows that the British public are still willing to step up and help those in dire need of support.

This generosity is the lifeblood of many charities and is something that the whole sector should be grateful for  perhaps even more so than ever in the aftermath of the pandemic.

As we continue to do what we can to help, let us hope that Russian troops withdraw and Ukraine can start to rebuild its peaceful society soon. Russias war on Ukraine is casting a long shadow.

Tristan Blythe is the editor of Charity Finance

Charity Finance is packed with practical articles and analysis of the latest financial trends, as well as in-depth briefings on technical and legal changes, and benchmarking surveys to help busy finance teams get value for money. Find more information here and subscribe today! is packed with practical articles and analysis of the latest financial trends, as well as in-depth briefings on technical and legal changes, and benchmarking surveys to help busy finance teams get value for money.
On March 11, Maks Levin, a Ukrainian photojournalist, posted a series of images to his Facebook page showing people evacuating Chervone, a village near Kyiv that had been occupied by Russian forces. Many of them had swaddled themselves in white clothes or sheets to show that they were civilians. Levin wrote that the scene was like a horror movie. The next day, March 12, Levin posted a photo, taken nearby, that showed smiling Ukrainian soldiers huddled by a fire next to the ruins of a bunker from World War II. Levin wrote that the present Ukrainian line of defense north of Kyiv traced the Soviet line from back then. On other side of the river Irpin stood the troops of Nazi Germany, he noted. Nowrussian army.

The day after that, March 13, Levin went missing. He was last seen in a village close to Chervone to which he had traveled to cover fighting between Russian and Ukrainian troops. Oleksiy Chernyshov, a photographer turned serviceman (according to the Committee to Protect Journalists), was traveling with Levin, and went missing, too.

Related: Brent Renaud, Yevhenii Sakun, and the grave dangers on the ground in Ukraine

March 13 was a bleak day for press freedom in Ukraine: in a different area near Kyiv, Brent Renaud, a US filmmaker, was killed when Russian forces opened fire on a car he was traveling in; Juan Arredondo, another US journalist who was in the car, was wounded. Renaud was the first foreign media worker to be killed on the job since Russia invaded Ukraine, and the second media worker overall; Yevhenii Sakun, a camera operator for a Ukrainian broadcaster, was killed early in the war when Russia shelled a TV tower in Kyiv. (At least two Ukrainian journalists died while serving in the countrys defense forces.) In the three weeks since Renaud was killed, the death toll among working journalists has climbed. On March 14, Pierre Zakrzewski, a Franco-Irish cameraman for Fox News, and Oleksandra Kuvshynova, his Ukrainian colleague, were killed when their vehicle was hit, also in the Kyiv area; Benjamin Hall, a Fox correspondent, was injured in the same attack, but survived. The following week, Oksana Baulina, a Russian journalist with the independent Russian news site The Insider, was killed in a Russian shelling attack in Kyiv itself. She had been filming damage caused by a shelling attack.

Many other reporters on the ground have had narrow escapes or otherwise been threatened in the course of their work. Several Ukrainian journalists have, like Levin, disappeared. On March 11, Viktoria Roshchina, a reporter for the independent TV station Hromadske, went missing while en route to the besieged southeastern city of Mariupol. On March 12, Oleh Baturin, a journalist living near the Russian-occupied city of Kherson, left home for a meeting with an acquaintance and didnt come back. On March 26, Iryna Dubchenko, a journalist in the southeastern city of Rozivka, disappeared after Russian soldiers searched her home. On March 30, Konstantin Ryzhenko, the editor of a local news site in Kherson, disappeared; Russian soldiers raided his familys apartment and detained his brother. Baturin and Roshchina, it would transpire, had been detained by Russian occupiers. They were released after eight and ten days of detention, respectively. Dubchenko is thought to be in Russian detention in Donetsk. The whereabouts of Ryzhenko are unclear. His last, prescheduled post on the messaging app Telegram says: if you are reading this text, it means that something has happened.

Levin is no longer missing. On Friday, his body was found in the Vyshhorod area near Kyiv, not far from where he was last seen alive. His death was announced on Saturday by LB.ua, a news site where Levin worked. He also collaborated with international outlets including Reuters, the BBC, and, recently, Der Spiegel; he was forty, and had four children. According to the office of Ukraines prosecutor general, Russian soldiers shot Levin with small arms fire. Chernyshov, the man with whom Levin had been traveling, is reportedly still missing.

Sign up for CJR 's daily email

In recent days, Russian forces have withdrawn troops from the Kyiv region. Levins was not the only body they left behindfar from it. Yesterday, the prosecutor general said that the bodies of more than four hundred civilians have so far been found in the area. Journalists have not been able to confirm the toll, but have followed Ukrainian forces into liberated villages and townsBucha, most prominentlyand fed back reports and photos of mass graves and corpses strewn across the ground. Some had their hands tied behind their backs. The sickening photos sparked renewed international condemnation of Russia. A senior European Union official cited the haunting images as he pledged further sanctions. Volodymyr Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, said on CBS yesterday that Russia has committed genocide. Russia denied harming a single civilian and said the images were faked.

Lie as it might, Russia, with its pullback, has begun to shine a ghastly, clarifying light on its devastation of the Kyiv area, the scale of which could only previously be glimpsed through a suffocating fog of war. Journalists on the ground worked bravely to pierce that fog where they were able. Levin, Renaud, and the others paid with their lives. In the aftermath of Renauds killing three weeks ago, I noted that press groups were still figuring out whether the journalists attacked in Ukraine to that point had been targeted because they were journalists, or whether, as one observer put it to CJR, they had gotten caught up in the broader context of Russias absolute disregard for civilian life. The killings and kidnappings since then seem to show that, across different cases, both things can be true. They also remind us that both can be true in an individual case: journalists, after all, are civilians. Every murdered reporter deserves for the circumstances of their death to be established; Levins killing is already being investigated. The same is true of everybody in the mass grave in Bucha.

Its not yet totally clear what Russias withdrawal from the Kyiv region means for its faltering war in Ukraine, but it would seem to presage a renewed offensive on the south and east of the country. The danger is far from over. On Saturday, Mantas Kvedaravicius, a Lithuanian filmmaker, became, by my count, the first working journalist to be killed outside of the Kyiv area since the war began, reportedly in an attack by Russian forces as he tried to leave Mariupol. Kvedaravicius had long chronicled the city, which saw fighting between Ukrainian forces and Russia-backed militants in 2014, including in a documentary, Mariupolis. His aim, he once said, was to show how regular people carry on with their everyday lives mere steps away from a war zone, gunshots, explosions, and death. Mariupolis is not about war, but about life next to war and lived in spite of war.

Levin had also covered the war in eastern Ukraine dating back to 2014, not just in recent weeks. Announcing his death, LB.ua quoted him as once having said that every Ukrainian photographer dreams of taking a photo that will stop the war. In a past interview with LensCulture, he struck a different tone, saying that it would be naive to think that his photos might change the world, and that he was driven to keep covering conflict out of a sense of duty and a commitment to honesty. He was right both times, of course. Photos dont tend to stop wars, not even when theyre as horrible as those out of Bucha. But they can achieve more than simply forcing the world to bear witness. The dream, at any rate, is worth clinging to.

Below, more on the war in Ukraine:

Torture: Over the weekend, Baturin, the Ukrainian journalist who was kidnapped by Russian forces in the Kherson region but later released, spoke with The Observer about his experience. The meeting for which Baturin left home turned out to be a trap, he said, with Russian soldiers having abducted his acquaintance and forced him to lure Baturin to a meeting. Baturin was subsequently held captive with little water, food, or medicine, The Observer reports. He was interrogated, tortured, threatened with mutilation and death, and told that his family would suffer. He had four ribs broken, he said.

Over the weekend, Baturin, the Ukrainian journalist who was kidnapped by Russian forces in the Kherson region but later released, spoke with The Observer about his experience. The meeting for which Baturin left home turned out to be a trap, he said, with Russian soldiers having abducted his acquaintance and forced him to lure Baturin to a meeting. Baturin was subsequently held captive with little water, food, or medicine, The Observer reports. He was interrogated, tortured, threatened with mutilation and death, and told that his family would suffer. He had four ribs broken, he said. The Russian journalists in Ukraine: The Guardians Shaun Walker spoke with independent Russian journalists wholike Baulina, prior to her deathhave worked to cover the war from the ground and break the Kremlins stranglehold on information. Elena Kostyuchenko, a reporter for the newspaper Novaya Gazeta (which recently ceased publishing for the duration of the war), said that every day, I see the crimes my country is committing. Every day I see injured people, dead people, destroyed houses, I spoke in Kherson with people who lived through kidnappings. Its morally difficult, but I think it would have been morally more difficult to sit in Moscow and follow it on internet.

The Guardians Shaun Walker spoke with independent Russian journalists wholike Baulina, prior to her deathhave worked to cover the war from the ground and break the Kremlins stranglehold on information. Elena Kostyuchenko, a reporter for the newspaper Novaya Gazeta (which recently ceased publishing for the duration of the war), said that every day, I see the crimes my country is committing. Every day I see injured people, dead people, destroyed houses, I spoke in Kherson with people who lived through kidnappings. Its morally difficult, but I think it would have been morally more difficult to sit in Moscow and follow it on internet. The Belarusian journalists in Ukraine: Reporters Without Borders (RSF) spoke with four journalists who fled Belaruswhose authoritarian, Russian-allied president, Alexander Lukashenko, has recently annihilated press freedomfor Ukraine. The journalists said that despite the war, they still feel safer in Ukraine than in Belarus, though all of them have become the collateral victims of the sanctions that the Ukrainian authorities have imposed on Belarus, RSF reports. All four journalists confirmed that the Ukrainian central bank has blocked all bank accounts and bank cards held by Belarusian citizens.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) spoke with four journalists who fled Belaruswhose authoritarian, Russian-allied president, Alexander Lukashenko, has recently annihilated press freedomfor Ukraine. The journalists said that despite the war, they still feel safer in Ukraine than in Belarus, though all of them have become the collateral victims of the sanctions that the Ukrainian authorities have imposed on Belarus, RSF reports. All four journalists confirmed that the Ukrainian central bank has blocked all bank accounts and bank cards held by Belarusian citizens. Propaganda? International news organizations have regularly used images captured by Maxar Technologies, a US satellite company and government defense contractor, to illustrate the situation on the ground in Ukraine, and did so again over the weekend, with Maxar imagery appearing to show that the digging of the mass grave in Bucha began in the early phases of Russian forces occupation of the town. Writing for The New Republic last week, Jordan G. Teicher assessed whether Maxars images constitute war propaganda. They have indeed proven an effective tool, Teicher wrote. But Maxar is by no means a neutral player when it comes to global conflict, and thus there are limits to what these images alone can tell us.



Other notable stories:

ICYMI: WNYC removes dozens of articles over attribution issues

Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today

Jon Allsop is a freelance journalist whose work has appeared in the New York Review of Books, Foreign Policy, and The Nation, among other outlets. He writes CJRs newsletter The Media Today. Find him on Twitter @Jon_Allsop.
BEIJING (AP)  U.S. accident investigators arrived in China on Saturday to help authorities look for clues into what caused last months crash of a Boeing jetliner with 132 people aboard.

The seven-member team from the National Transportation Safety Board will participate in the Civil Aviation Administration of Chinas investigation of the March 21 crash of a China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800 because the aircraft was manufactured in the U.S.

As part of that assistance, the planes cockpit voice recorder is being downloaded and analyzed at a U.S. lab in Washington, federal officials said Friday.

Investigators hope the recording will explain why the plane went into a nosedive from about 8,800 meters (29,000 feet) over a mountainous region in southeastern China.

Chinese officials have said that air traffic controllers were unable to get a response from the pilots while the plane was descending.

The cockpit voice recorder would pick up voices and other sounds from microphones worn by the pilots and another stationed over their heads.

Searchers also recovered the planes flight-data recorder, which constantly captures speed, altitude, heading and other information and the performance of key systems on the aircraft, but that recorder was not being evaluated in Washington on Friday.

The NTSB said its investigators will limit contact with people outside the investigation so that they can start their work immediately without going through a quarantine period.

The plane that crashed was not a 737 Max, a newer model that was temporarily grounded worldwide following two deadly crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia.

The impact caused by the crash in China created a 20-meter- (65-foot-) deep crater, set off a fire in the surrounding forest and smashed the plane into small parts scattered over a wide area, some of them buried underground. More than 49,000 pieces of debris have been recovered, along with some human remains and personal items.

A Chinese aviation safety official said a preliminary investigation report would be completed within 30 days of the crash.

Flight MU5735 with 123 passengers and nine crew members was headed from the southwestern city of Kunming, the capital of Yunnan province, to Guangzhou, a major city and export manufacturing hub near Hong Kong in southeastern China.

The 737-800 has an excellent safety record and the Chinese airline industry has had relatively few mishaps in recent years.

Before last months accident, the last fatal crash of a Chinese airliner occurred in August 2010, when an Embraer ERJ 190-100 operated by Henan Airlines hit the ground short of the runway in the northeastern city of Yichun and caught fire, killing 44 people. Investigators blamed pilot error.

About the photo: Passengers wait for their flight as a China Eastern flight takes off from the runway of Baiyun Airport on Friday, March 25, 2022, in southern Chinas Guangzhou province. The National Transportation Safety Board said the team departed for China on Friday, April 1, to participate in the Civil Aviation Administration of Chinaas investigation of the March 21 crash of a China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800 in which all 132 people on board were killed. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Taking a calculated risk by selling a hazardous product isnt the same as intentionally causing harm. For that reason, insurers must cover a court judgment that requires the company that sold Dutch Boy lead paint to pay $101 million into a California abatement fund, a New York appellate court ruled on March 24.

The 1st Department of the New York Appellate Division affirmed a decision that found Lloyds of London and other insurers liable for NL Industries claim. The appellate panel rejected the insurers argument that the award was excluded from coverage because the paint manufacturer promoted the use of lead paint despite knowing that it posed a serious risk.

That is not a clear finding that NL either expected or intended to harm any person or property, the opinion says.

Santa Clara County filed a lawsuit in 2000 against NL Industries, ConAgra Grocery Products Co. and Sherwin-Williams Co. under the Californias public nuisance law. Nine other California cities and counties joined the action, which sought to hold manufacturers responsible for promoting lead paint for use in homes despite their knowledge that the product was highly toxic.

NL was a member of the Lead Industries Association, a trade group that sponsored an advertising campaign in the 1930s that promoted the use of white lead carbonate pigment in paint. At the time, it was already widely known that lead dust is poisonous. In fact, NLs representative was present when LIAs board of directors in 1930 discussed an article in the U.S. Daily that reported babies were contracting lead poisoning from chewing paint from toys, cradles and woodwork more frequently than previously thought.

After a six-week trial, the Santa Clara County Superior Court ordered the three companies to pay $1.1 billion into a lead paint abatement fund. The 6th District Court of Appeal amended the ruling to require the companies to pay for abatement of only homes built before 1951, reducing the abatement fund amount to $409 million.

The companies appealed, but the California Supreme Court refused to hear the case. The defendants agreed to pay $305 million to settle the lawsuit in 2017. NLs share is $101.6 million.

When NL Industries turned to its former insurers for coverage, Ace and Lloyds refused. They said the company had intentionally caused the harm that prompted Santa Clara Countys lawsuit.

Lloyds and 15 other insurers filed a lawsuit in the New York County Supreme Court seeking a declaration that NLs insurance policies did not provide coverage. The action involves 320 insurance policies spanning over 70 years, according to court documents.

The insurers argued, 1, that NL Industries actions were intentional; 2, the court order was not for damages or expenses as required by the policy; and 3, the liability was not imposed because of property damage or bodily injury.

Supreme Court Judge Andrea Masley found that the order to pay into the abatement fund was covered by the policies. She said in her order that some of the insurance policies did not contain an exclusion for intentional acts. And she said even the polices that exclude damages caused by intentional acts still provide coverage for NLs actions.

Masley, citing prior case law, said in New York there is a distinction between knowledge of a risk of hazardous consequences of ones actions and the intention to cause harm.

She also rejected the argument that the court order wasnt a result of damages. The order says that the fund was created to remediate the danger caused by deteriorated lead paint on an estimated 5 million California homes. That amounts to damages under the relevant policy language, the order says.

Finally, Masley disagreed with the insurers argument that there was no covered property damage.

While this court agrees that property damage and bodily injury are not elements of the representative public nuisance claim, there is a connection between the lead poison injuries to the children residing in the buildings containing the lead paints promoted by NL and the property damage to those buildings as a result of NLs promotion of lead paint, the order states.

That finding directly conflicts with a decision by the Ohio Court of Common Pleas in 2013, which found that insurers had no duty to pay into the abatement fund on behalf of the company that manufactured Glidden paint because there was no property damage covered by the policies.

The appellate panel said in its opinion that it agrees with Masley that the Ohio decision was incorrect, assuming that insurance policies issued to Gliddens manufacturer had the exact same language as NL Industries policies.

The nuisance liability is based on the widespread bodily injury/property damage that the hazard of lead paint in homes caused and continues to cause, the appellate court said.
AUGUSTA, Ga. (AP) _ Three men have been sentenced to federal prison as part of a broad investigation into what authorities said was a wide-ranging conspiracy to bring workers from Central America to the United States for forced labor on south Georgia farms.

The three men were charged in separate but related cases related to a federal investigation dubbed Blooming Onion, prosecutors said in a news release. Authorities say the farm workers were brought into the U.S. on the H-2A agricultural visa program and then the men profited from their work by underpaying them and forcing them to live in substandard conditions.

These men engaged in facilitating modern-day slavery, U.S. Attorney David Estes said in a news release. Our law enforcement partners have exposed an underworld of human trafficking, and we will continue to identify and bring to justice those who would exploit others whose labors provide the fuel for their greed.

Javier Sanchez Mendoza Jr., 24, of Jesup, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to engage in forced labor and was sentenced to serve 30 years in prison. Aurelio Medina, 42, of Brunswick, pleaded guilty to forced labor and was sentenced to five years and four months. Yordon Velazquez Victoria, 45, of Brunswick, received a sentence of 15 months after pleading guilty to conspiracy.

Mendoza and Medina are Mexican citizens living illegally in the U.S. and are subject to deportation once they serve their prison terms, prosecutors said.

Mendoza admitted that from August 2018 to November 2019, he was a leader in a scheme to provide labor and services for farms and other businesses in Glynn, Ware and Pierce counties, the release says. He recruited more than 500 people from Central America and unlawfully charged them for H-2A visas and withheld their identification papers and forced them to work for little or no pay in terrible conditions by threatening them and their families back home, prosecutors said.

One victim testified during sentencing that Mendoza picked her from a work crew after she arrived from Mexico and brought her to live with him, making her believe falsely that she had married him. He controlled her using threats and intimidation, repeatedly raping her, for more than a year, prosecutors said.

After she escaped, Mendoza kidnapped her at knifepoint from the front yard of a home where she was babysitting, prosecutors said. Law enforcement officers who found her at Mendozas mobile home in Jesup and rescued her found a shrine to Santa Muerte, Saint Death, decorated with her hair and blood, the release says. Mendoza faces state aggravated assault charges related to that.

Medina admitted that from April to October 2020, he charged foreign workers for H-2A visas and then withheld their identification documents in Glynn and Effingham counties. Victoria, a naturalized U.S. citizen, admitted that he allowed Medina to use his name to apply to use H-2A workers and was paid $600 a week to bring the workers from their housing to work.

Prosecutors said the investigation into forced labor in south Georgia and elsewhere is continuing through a federal case in which 23 people are charged in an alleged conspiracy to commit labor trafficking, visa fraud and money laundering.

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
A decision handed down Thursday by the Florida Supreme Court, along with a recent ruling by state regulators, could give insurers another tool that could be used to stem the tide of claims litigation.

In AirBnB Inc. vs. John Doe, the court overturned a Florida appellate court decision and essentially found that an arbitration clause in a contract was binding and that the arbitrator, not a court, can decide when a claim should be handled outside of a courtroom.

Find exactly what you need. Search our database of more than 700 companies and 22,000 market listings.

The case had little to do with property insurance: The original plaintiffs, given a fictitious name by the courts to protect their identities, had sued AirBnB after hidden cameras were discovered in the vacation rental home in Longboat Key, Florida. The contract with AirBnB required that claims be settled by binding arbitration. The couple objected, arguing that the wording of the contracts arbitration clause wasnt clear on who decides which disputes must be arbitrated.

The March 31 court opinion came a month after the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation gave approval to a filing by American Integrity Insurance. The carrier, one of the largest property-casualty insurers in the state, had requested approval for a mandatory arbitration and mediation endorsement in homeowners multi-peril policies, starting April 22 for new business and June 21 for renewals.

The approval signals a major shift in OIRs longstanding view on arbitration, sources said.

All disputes, including disputes arising out of or related to this agreement, between us and you, or any additional insured, omnibus insured, other person making a claim under the policy, or an assignee of post-loss benefits  shall be exclusively and finally resolved through confidential binding arbitration, American Integritys approved endorsement language reads.

Taken together, the court ruling and the OIR approval could give a green light to more insurers seeking to use arbitration as a way to reduce claims litigation and legal costs, attorneys and insurance industry insiders said Thursday. At least a few other Florida insurance companies are now considering following American Integritys lead and filing their own arbitration endorsements.

It is encouraging to see the Florida OIR approve an arbitration endorsement as another means of addressing the rampant litigation causing Floridas property insurance market crisis, said Logan McFaddin, vice president for Florida government relations at the American Property Casualty Insurers Association. Given this development, it would not be surprising to see more insurers consider filing for an arbitration endorsement to curb litigation and help rein in costs for consumers.

Arbitration is generally seen as much less expensive for the defense side. Proceedings are faster than litigation and usually cannot be appealed to a higher court, which can take years and can burn through extensive legal fees.

A number of Florida P/C insurers already require that some claims be decided by appraisal, usually when the amount of losses is in dispute. But arbitration can take it a step further, said Joseph Mackey, an insurance defense attorney with Marshall Dennehey in Jacksonville.

If insurance companies had arbitration provisions instead of appraisal provisions in their contracts, I think it would cut down on claim litigation because arbitration is more ironclad than appraisal, from what I can tell, Mackey said in an email. In other words, if these claim disputes went to arbitration, I think the question of both damages and coverage could be considered and it would be less likely that plaintiffs could challenge a final arbitration award.

The American Integrity endorsement provision makes it clear that arbitration would not preclude lawsuits brought over alleged bad faith actions by the insurer, or lack of action on claims when it is clear that payment is due, as spelled out by Florida law. The endorsement wording does address attorneys fees, something Florida insurers have said are driving unprecedented litigation expenses in the state.

The parties agree that the award of attorneys fees and costs under  the binding arbitration agreement do not include payment for attorney time and costs incurred during the arbitration proceeding, it reads.

The American Integrity vice president whose name is on the filing could not be reached for comment Thursday.

The Supreme Court opinion in the AirBnB case did not name the liability insurer for AirBnB, nor did it indicate the potential compensatory and punitive damages involved. The case has been in the news for more than five years and has gained fame around the country.

The Texas couple in 2016 had rented the home in Longboat Key through AirBnB. After discovering that videos had been made of them, the couple alleged that property owner Wayne Natt had secretly recorded their entire stay in his unit, including some private and intimate interactions, the high court explained.

News reports said other cases came to light, and the voyeurism had gone on for years. The couple argued that AirBnB had failed to warn them of previous invasions of privacy at other properties and failed to ensure that the Longboat Key house was free of recording devices.

In response to the couples lawsuit, AirBnB filed a motion in the circuit court to compel arbitration. The court in Manatee County granted the motion and stayed the lawsuit. The plaintiffs appealed, arguing that the terms of service in the contract with AirBnB did not make it clear that only an arbitrator could decide if the matter was meant for arbitration.

Floridas 2nd District Court of Appeal agreed with the spied-upon couple and concluded that the rental agreement contained an arguably permissive and clearly nonexclusive conferral of an adjudicative power to an arbitrator, found within a body of rules that were not attached to the agreement, that itself did nothing more than identify the applicability of that body of rules if an arbitration is convened.

But the state Supreme Court, in the opinion written by Justice Ricky Polston, found that AirBnBs terms of service incorporate by reference the rules of the American Arbitration Association, which expressly delegate arbitrability determinations to an arbitrator.

The agreement clearly and unmistakably evidences the parties intent to empower an arbitrator, rather than a court, to resolve questions of arbitrability, the justice wrote.

The high court remanded the case to the district court of appeals for further proceedings in keeping with the opinion.
DENVER (AP)  The Rainbow Gathering of the Tribes plans to return to Colorado this summer to celebrate its 50th anniversary. The weeks-long confab that draws tens of thousands of hippie campers to public lands announced this week that the national gathering of possibly 30,000 would be returning to Colorado.

The groups national bacchanal was last in Colorado in 2006, with about 10,000 people camping on Forest Service land in north Routt County outside Steamboat Springs. Before that, they were 19,000-strong outside Paonia in 1992. The first national gathering was near Granby in 1972.

The Rainbow Gathering has not said where in Colorado they plan to land for the late-June, early-July festival. But in fire-fearing mountain communities already cracking down on camping and crowds, opposition to the event is mounting, with a focus on how tens of thousands of people camping together in the woods could spark a wildfire. (This post on Reddit  Take Action Against the Rainbow Gathering  spurred 670+ comments in less than 24 hours. You can guess the tone of those comments.)

There are no leaders of the Rainbow Family. They dont have an HQ or even a formal website. No one to call and ask questions. Todays Rainbow is as loose as any other internet-connected community. They call themselves the largest non-organization of non-members in the world. And they closed their Reddit forum to outsiders on Thursday as hundreds of commenters piled on with less-than-enthusiastic responses to the 50th annual gathering in Colorado. Many of the groups websites crashed Thursday as news spread of the Colorado events.

The loose structure makes it hard for federal land managers and local communities to address impacts and plan for the pending party of hippies. The Forest Service, citing online chatter and posts, suspects the group could be planning to gather in Grand County in June and July.

The original 1972 gathering occurred up there so I think there is some potential desire to come back to Grand County for their 50th, said Reid Armstrong with the Arapaho and Roosevelt national forests.

Without a leadership structure, the Forest Service has not been able to enforce its rules requiring a permit for gatherings of more than 75 people on public land. The agency typically writes tickets for illegal camping during big Rainbow rallies but, obviously, rangers dont pen 10,000-plus citations at every gathering. The Rainbow group has since the 1970s argued that it has a right to assemble on public lands.

The National Forest has a national incident team that follows the Rainbow Familys annual gatherings, which typically peak over the July 4th holiday. (Last years gathering was in the Carson National Forest near Taos, New Mexico.) That team _ mostly Forest Service law enforcement officers _ works with local communities and local police.

While the specific location wont be known until the Rainbow Family sends a scouting party to find a spot that provides open spaces near a water supply, the Forest Service and Grand County law enforcement are aware of the possible gathering.

We bring, historically, a lot of resources to help protect the local community and help reduce the impact on the community and natural resources, Armstrong said.

In 2006, a scouting report from the Rainbow Gathering explored possibly returning to Grand County and identified a handful of possible locations on Forest Service land, including Church Park, Red Dirt Reservoir and Buffalo Park.

One upside for the Rainbow Gathering impact: The Forest Service knows its coming, unlike major wildfires like Cameron Peak and East Troublesome, the two largest wildfires in Colorado history that raged through portions of the Arapaho National Forest in 2020.

So we can plan for it and prepare for it, Armstrong said. The impacts, however, can be the same. Slightly different, but the extent of the natural resource impacts can be similar, which is why we bring in an incident management team.

2 overdoses, three babies at 1992 gathering

The 2006 gathering in the Routt National Forests Big Red Park near Clark drew 10,000 to 15,000 campers. The Forest Service had 42 members of its National Incident Management Team watching the gathering and reported 218 citations in the weeks before the July 4 holiday peak. By the end of the event that number would top 500. Forest Service officials told The Denver Post they spent about $800,000 managing the event.

The 1992 Rainbow Gathering on the Gunnison National Forest near Overland Reservoir above Paonia drew about 19,000 campers. The National Forest, which compiled a comprehensive report following the event, knew the exact location in early June and began working with about 500 Rainbow Family members by the middle of June. By July 1, there were 4,000 cars parked in meadows around the reservoir.

The 1992 gathering had medical facilities and 35 kitchens spread across about 2,500 acres for the gathering. Campers were dispersed into smaller camps aligned with different values. (For example there was a Sisters Camp, a Faire Camp, a Krishna Camp and many camps for residents of specific areas. Theres even an A Camp for people who drink alcohol, which is discouraged by the Rainbow Family.)

The report counted 310 traffic violations issued by the Forest Service, Delta County Sheriffs Office and Colorado State Patrol. The report showed 43 arrests, mostly for traffic issues and drugs. Two people were found dead from a prescription drug overdose. The report showed three babies were born during the gathering. A combination of federal, state and local agencies reported spending more than $573,000 to manage the event.

The Forest Service reported about 500 members of the group remained after everyone left to fill in 200 trenches that had been used as toilets and to plant shrubs and grasses damaged during the gathering.

The damage really is minimal and our assessment is no long-term or irreparable damage was done, Forest Service spokesman Matt Glasgow told the Rocky Mountain News after the event.

The New York Times wrote about the first gathering near Strawberry Lake above Granby in July 1972. The event, which was on both private and Forest Service land, was billed as a religious festival and about 3,000 people walked more than 7 miles up to the remote location. Colorados Gov. John Love promised to prevent the gathering, but the blockade collapsed as thousands of young people hiked across the mountains to get there, reads the article.

Local lawmakers in Grand County hastily assembled rules around sanitation and large gatherings in hopes of blocking the event. A local judge ruled no more participants could climb to the remote parcel in late June, but was ignored.

Theyll have to carry us out, a determined young girl told a Denver Post reporter. And they wont have enough jails to put us all in.

About the photo: Forest Service officers, county medical staff and Rainbow Gathering volunteers transfer an elderly patient from a pickup truck to an ambulance on Friday, July 2, 2021, in the Carson National Forest, outside of Taos, N.M. The condition of the man was not immediately known. He was flow out of the area by helicopter. (AP Photo/Cedar Attanasio)

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


South Korea has decided to issue travel documents for Ukrainians of Korean descent and other locals with families in South Korea, even if they have no passports, a related ministry said Monday.





The measure is meant to support their entry into South Korea from the humanitarian perspective amid the Ukraine-Russia war, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.





It said the government will simplify the entry procedure for Ukrainians without a passport or visa, as the issuance of passports has been suspended since Russia's invasion of Ukraine.





Earlier this month, South Korea simplified the visa application process for ethnic Koreans in Ukraine, who are called "Koryoin," and families of Ukrainians staying here. But those without passports have not benefited from the program. (Yonhap)


The parents of Lee Yae-ram grieve at a public funeral altar set up for Lee in front of the Ministry of National Defense's headquarters in Seoul's Yongsan District, Oct. 20, 2021. Lee is shown in pictures held by her mother and hanging around her father's neck. Newsis



Politicians agree on independent counsel for military sexual harassment case



By Ko Dong-hwan



The ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) and the main opposition People Power Party (PPP) agreed Monday to launch an independent counsel to investigate the death of a female Air Force officer who killed herself after reporting sexual assault last year.



The bipartisan decision by the National Assembly Legislation and Judiciary Committee came after DPK floor leader Rep. Bak Hong-geun and PPP head Rep. Kim Ki-hyun reached an agreement on April 3. An independent counsel had been requested previously in the National Assembly by the DPK, PPP, Justice Party, People's Party and Basic Income Party.



However, the agreement comes almost a year after Lee Yae-ram, a sergeant first class serving in the Republic of Korea Air Force, killed herself in May 2021. She was in extreme psychological distress after having reported being sexual assaulted by a fellow officer. But there was more to the case than the original offense alone.



Lee's case of sexual assault was worsened by the military's inadequate response. What reportedly drove Lee to commit suicide was systematic collusion within the military, which was more eager to cover up the incident than actually address the case, by properly investigating and disciplining the perpetrator.



It all started with a dinner party in March 2021 joined by members of the Air Force's 20th Fighter Wing, including Lee, 24, and several other officers. Following the party, a fellow sergeant first class non-commissioned officer who had joined the party  identified by his surname of Jang  sexually assaulted her as they were in a car heading to the division's base in Seosan, South Chungcheong Province.



Lee kept resisting and exited the vehicle before it reached her dormitory inside the base. She then called a fellow officer she trusted and told him what had happened. Then, Jang, concerned that she might divulge what he had done to her, blackmailed her not to report the case to the authorities. Afraid that he wouldn't leave her alone unless he was assured she would keep his actions secret, she promised to do so.





President Moon Jae-in, right, meets the parents of Lee Yae-ram in front of Myeongdong Cathedral in Seoul's Jung District, Nov. 25, 2021. The parents were holding a protest demanding to meet with President Moon regarding their lost daughter. Joint Press Corps.



Secondary victimization



The incident was reported to the division's superior officers, who met both Jang and Lee the day after to confirm the incident had occurred. But the superior officers, instead of punishing Jang, explained why they would not report the incident to the military police: the police and higher Air Force officers would find out about the dinner party that had broken the country's social distancing regulations during the COVID-19 pandemic and question everyone involved. They also tried to persuade Lee that what she had gone through had been "a negligible thing one could come across and let go of."



Lee, who had hoped her superiors would advocate for her, felt betrayed by them. Their lax response to her case victimized her a second time, compounding the initial trauma of the assault.





Her family learned about the incident too, and eventually, the division's warrant officer could no longer delay reporting Jang to the military police.



But the police decided to investigate Jang without detaining him  which remains yet another morally and legally questionable part about the way the case was handled. Observers ask why Jang as the perpetrator wasn't arrested despite video evidence recorded in the vehicle during the incident. During the investigation, the division's officers even contacted Lee's fiance, another officer from the 20th Fighter Wing, asking him to persuade her to forgive Jang.



Learning about all of these attempts to neglect her case, Lee sank even deeper into despair. Meanwhile, Jang sought out his fellow officers and asked for letters of support requesting that the military police drop the charges against him.



Seventy days after the incident, Lee was transferred to the 15th Fighters Wing stationed at Seoul Airport in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province. There, she hoped to start a new life. But she soon realized that some of the division's members were already aware of what had happened to her and the reason she had been transferred. Ashamed of her past, she felt that she herself was viewed by a criminal by her new fellow officers.





Republic of Korea Air Force Chief of Staff Park In-ho answers a question during the National Assembly Legislation and Judiciary Committee's audit for a general military court last Oct. 19 regarding the death of Air Force Sergeant First Class Lee Yae-ram. Korea Times
Clifford Chance advises EQT on majority stake acquisition of Guardian

Leading international law firm Clifford Chance has advised EQT Private Equity on its majority stake acquisition of Guardian Shanghai Hygiene Service Ltd. (Guardian).

Founded in 2011, Guardian is the largest local Chinese pest control operator with a strong presence in eastern and southern provinces of China. It maintains a strong position in high-end commercials verticals such as restaurant chains, supermarkets, shopping malls, airports, hotels and food production facilities.

The transaction was led by partner Bryan Koo (Hong Kong), with support from partner Tom Lin (Singapore), counsel Fang Bao (Beijing), senior associate Cynthia Zhang, associates George Lau (Hong Kong), Victor Leung (Singapore) and trainee solicitors Winky Su and Amanda Liu (Hong Kong).

The transaction marks EQT's support for Guardian's next phase of growth by driving consolidation in China's fragmented pest control market. Leveraging EQT's in-house digitalisation and sustainability capabilities, Guardian continues to improve living conditions in Chinese cities through efficient pest control, thereby decreasing negative environmental and human impacts.






Police on Monday raided the Gyeonggi provincial government building as part of an investigation into allegations that the wife of former ruling party presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung misused local government credit cards when Lee was governor.







Kim Hye-kyung, Lee's wife, came under fire weeks ahead of the March 9 presidential election following revelations that she used credit cards of the Gyeonggi government for personal shopping and eating. Lee was Gyeonggi governor from 2018-2021.







Investigators from the Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency searched a number of offices at the provincial government, including the general administration bureau and the inspections office, for evidence in connection with the allegations.







Kim issued an apology in February, saying she took full responsibility for what transpired as she should have drawn a line between personal and official business.







The case has been under police probe since the main opposition People Power Party filed a complaint against Lee, Kim and an aide in December. The provincial government has launched a separate audit into the allegations. (Yonhap)


A court on Monday sentenced a man to 23 years in prison for killing his girlfriend following their breakup.







Cho Hyun-jin, 27, was arrested in January after he stabbed his girlfriend several times in the bathroom of her home in Cheonan, about 90 kilometers south of Seoul, while her mother was at home. She later died while being treated at a hospital.







A district court in the central city of Daejeon sentenced him to 23-year imprisonment and five-year probation. The prosecution had demanded life imprisonment.







During police interrogation, Cho said he committed the crime because the victim told him she wanted to break up.







Police later disclosed his identity because of the heinousness of the crime. (Yonhap)






The number of male victims of digital sex crimes compiled by a state support agency doubled last year from the previous year, the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family said Monday.







The Digital Sexual Crime Victim Support Center extended assistance to 1,843 male victims in 2021, marking a near twofold increase from 926 in the previous year, the ministry said.







The spike in the number of male victims of digital sex crimes is attributed to the rising prevalence of illegal photographing and filming, the ministry said.







The center, established in 2018 by the Korean Women's Human Rights Promotion Agency under the ministry, provided a total of 6,952 victims with about 188,000 cases of support, including consultation, assistance in having videos and photos deleted, post-deletion monitoring and legal and medical assistance, last year.







The number of victims and support service cases increased 39.8 percent and 10.2 percent, respectively, from the previous year, the ministry said, attributing the increases to the operation of a 24-hour consultation system and the advancement of the deletion support system.







By gender, women accounted for 73.5 percent, or 5,109, of the entire victims, compared with the 1,843 male victims, it noted.







By age group, teenagers and those in their 20s accounted for 21.3 percent and 21 percent, respectively, of all victims, it said.







Notably, over half of the victims, 51.7 percent, did not know who the perpetrators were and another 28.2 percent were victimized by people in temporary relationships, the ministry said.







Types of damage compiled by the state support center included anxiety over dissemination of photos and videos (25.7 percent), illegal photographing or filming (21.5 percent) and distribution of illegal content (20.3 percent).







Last year, the center provided 169,820 cases of support for the deletion of illegal videos and photos, marking a year-on-year rise of 7 percent, the ministry added. (Yonhap)






Colorado could become the first legislature in the country to have a formal law in place that grants paid family leave to legislators.

A month ago, Senate President Steve Fenberg of Boulder toyed with the idea of paid leave for lawmakers, but wondered whether it would be constitutional, given that lawmakers cannot obligate future legislatures on funding matters.

Last week, Fenberg introduced Senate Bill 184, which would modify the existing statute regarding compensation for lawmakers who need to take time off for parental leave.

Current law allows a member of the General Assembly to be gone for long-term illness. That law has been applied several times in the last two years to women lawmakers who gave birth.

About a dozen current lawmakers have added babies to their families in the last six years, including Fenberg, House Speaker Alec Garnett, House Majority Leader Daneya Esgar of Pueblo, two Democratic senators, and six other members of the House on both sides of the aisle.

The existing statute deals with compensation. If a lawmaker is gone for one-third or more of the session  a minimum of 40 days  that portion of their pay would be forfeited. However, that can be waived by the Speaker of the House or Senate President, and that's what happened for long-term absences for both Sen. Brittany Pettersen, D-Lakewood, who took a leave during the 2020 session, and Sen. Jessie Danielson, D-Wheat Ridge, who did the same this session. Pettersen was excused for 36 days out of the 84-day session, which got shortened during the pandemic. Danielson, meanwhile, was excused for 53 out of the first 54 days this year.

The statute appears to date back to 1953.

SB 184 removes long-term illness from one portion of the statute and replaces it with absence "for any purpose." But what makes SB 184 unique is that it allows lawmakers to take a maximum of 12 weeks of parental leave, plus an additional four weeks for a serious health condition related to pregnancy or childbirth complications, and do so during the session. The leave would also apply out of session, which would cover lawmakers who have extensive duties outside of session, including leadership.

Twelve weeks of paid leave during the legislature equates to 84 days, which would be more than two-thirds of the 120-day session.

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, only Massachusetts offers language around pregnancy, but it isn't really about leave or pregnancy. Instead, it's about who answers roll call on behalf of the absent lawmaker.

Massachusetts Senate Rule 57 says if a member is prevented from voting in the Senate because of disability or due to a condition related to pregnancy, childbirth or nursing a child, the chamber's president shall assign a court officer to answer the roll call on behalf of the member so long as the disability continues.

"We are an interesting workplace," Fenberg told Colorado Politics, referring to the fact that legislators are elected and technically not employed by the speaker or Senate president. So, lawmakers don't answer to bosses within the building. They also don't clock in, and, as a result, a different set of human resource policies applies to elected officials.

"We are accountable to our constituents," Fenberg said.

But the General Assembly wants to be inclusive and not intentionally  or unintentionally  create barriers for who can run or serve, the Senate's top leader said, adding, "I see this as a step toward a more inclusive democracy in terms of who can run and serve."

What his bill says is, if a lawmaker is absent because of parental leave, the lawmaker's pay won't get docked. That statute is not about whether someone can be absent; it's about forfeiting pay, Fenberg said.

"This says no one will be penalized for having a child while serving in the legislature," he said, noting that, because the General Assembly is a citizen legislature with a fixed 120-day session, lawmakers can't take 40 days off and make up that time during the summer.

"It's important that no matter who's in charge, and who the member is, that everyone knows that to be a legislator you don't forfeit the ability to have a family, and we want to be sure it's clear in policy," Fenberg said.

The bill's fiscal note says it codifies existing practice  no lawmaker has been penalized for missing extended periods of the session in recent history  and hence would not result in a fiscal impact.

The sponsors of the legislation are all lawmakers who have had children since joining the General Assembly: Fenberg, Pettersen, Esgar and Rep. Kerry Tipper, D-Lakewood.

The bill gets its first hearing on Tuesday in the Senate State, Veterans and Military Affairs Committee.
Colorado Politics is published both in print and online. Our website features subscriber-only news stories daily, designed for public policy arena professionals. Member subscribers also receive the weekly print edition of our award-winning newspaper, containing outstanding features and news stories, in their mailboxes every Saturday.
From left are Choo Kyung-ho, Choi Sang-mok, Park Jin, Shin Won-sik and Kwon Young-se. Korea Times photo



Choo Kyung-ho, leading candidate for deputy prime minister for economic affairs



By Kang Seung-woo



President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol is set to follow up his nomination for prime minister with the designation of ministers by the end of next week, according to his spokesperson, Monday.



Yoon, scheduled to take office, May 10, tapped former Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, Sunday, to serve as the first premier in his administration, kicking off the process of nominating Cabinet members.



"Given that about three weeks are required for the National Assembly confirmation process, we need to announce the full list of Cabinet nominees by the end of next week," Kim Eun-hye said during a press briefing.



"This week, the president-elect will be committed to making selections for his incoming Cabinet."



With the appointment of the prime minister in the rearview mirror, attention is now on who will be named deputy prime minister for economic affairs and chairman of the Financial Services Commission (FSC). Yoon wants these people to work together with the prime minister as "one economic team" to stabilize the economy.



Rep. Choo Kyung-ho of the main opposition People Power Party is mentioned as the most likely candidate for the deputy prime minister post thanks to his past career



The two-term lawmaker, who served as the first vice finance minister and the FSC vice chairman, is regarded as the perfect fit as he has a full grasp of overall economic policy. In addition, he is now in charge of the subcommittee for planning and coordination at Yoon's transition committee.






The idea of a four-day workweek has been gaining traction, and hospitality gig-work platform Qwick is the latest to try out the idea. The Phoenix, Ariz.-based company kicked off a pilot project today for most of its 200-strong workforce, with the aim of boosting staff well-being and even productivity.

The five-day, 40-hour workweek has been the norm for most workers since the early part of the 20th century. While there have been calls for a shorter week for decades, the idea has yet to gain mainstream acceptance. But it is getting more serious consideration from companies in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced many businesses to take a fresh look at work practices. Unilever, Bolt, and Kickstarter are among the companies that have either trialed the idea recently or adopted it permanently.

At Qwick, workers will switch from the typical five-day, 38-hour week in place since the company launched in 2018, to 32 hours a week spread over four days. (Employees will receive the same pay as they did for a five-day week.) The trial, which applies to Qwicks full-time staffers, will run until July 2022.

Qwick Jamie Baxter, Qwick's co-founder and CEO.

Qwicks workers handle a range of common business roles, including sales, marketing, finance, and IT. Account managers and operational staff also interact with Qwicks hospitality industry clients and workers (or business partners and professionals, as Qwick calls them), as part of its online staffing business. Most staff involved in the trial will now work Monday through Thursday, though some will work over the weekend on a rotating basis to meet customer needs.
We know the tech industry wants to convince us we need augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR) solutions, and while gaming experiences seem to dominate the discussion today, the greater opportunity comes in digital transformation of the enterprise.

Growing GDP one AR experience at a time

Recent analysis from PwC estimates VR/AR will boost global GDP by $1.5 trillion by 2030. Librestream and IDC believe AR will be key to the next stage of workplace digital transformation. In a recent report, they note multiple scenarios where the technology has already made a difference, including an auto manufacturer who managed to reduce machine downtime and maintenance by 15% with it.

But for most enterprises, the opportunity to develop virtual training solutions makes great sense. Hybrid working posed onboarding problems for some firms; AR/VR can support this journey. Accenture, for example, invested in 60,000 VR headsets, building a virtual global campus featuring digital twins to help in onboarding employees.

Other companies use QR symbols to link employees to information or training about that area, a product, or business process using an existing handset, such as an iPhone.

AR and VR are used to deliver critical training in a number of ways.

We know this kind of training is effective. Boeing says VR can reduce training time by 75%, and that's is just one of the benefits the tech can bring to enterprise users. All this interest recently promised internet giant, Alibaba to invest $60 million in AR glasses manufacturer, Nreal

Who benefits?

The idea is that staff can pick up training at their own pace. Thats a nice-to-have that becomes a must-have when you consider the need to build skills to handle dangerous or expensive equipment.

Virti, a UK-based immersive training start up, describes its work as providing an opportunity for learners to learn and practice skills in low-stake, virtual worlds. Working with virtual items eradicates risk, and maximizes active time, as precious infrastructure doesnt need to be taken offline to support a training session.

[Also read: How will we use Apple's AR glasses  and with what UI?]

Steven Ayer, an assoicate professor at Arizona State University, studies deployment of these technologies in construction and facilities management. He sees impacts in both training and safety.

We see a lot of times where we use very antiquated modes of teaching safety courses that are chalk-and-talk lecture-style learning, which by almost any accounts have been ineffective, and, by empirical data on sites, still dont stop injuries, he said.

On-demand, overlaid training doesnt replace the human touch, of course, but certainly makes it easier for employees to learn what they need to learn where they are  or to familiarize themselves with new equipment.

Who can build them?

Apple is certainly exploring the opportunity. Its stable of products can work together to help create these experiences and the company's relatively recent (Aug. 21) AR in Business guide evangelizes use; it also explains how Xcode, RealityKit, and ARKit mean developers have a powerful (and evolving) suite of tools with which to implement solutions of this kind.

That report highlights Apple-based training solutions such as Splunk AR, or SAPs own Tech Trainer app, which lets remote trainers and students work together on virtual challenges using an on-screen display mirrored across two remote iPads.

Empowering new training sounds great on paper, but acquiring the skills to develop these training solutions is a real problem when there just arent enough developers to go round. But tools are evolving that may help plug this gap.

Scope ARs WorkLink Create is a browser-based, no-code authoring platform to create remote training and assistance tools. It's already used by Lockheed Martin to create that companys own in-house training experiences.

Whats ahead?

New opportunity also means new challenges will emerge. Inevitable software flaws will make for new attack vectors. The same tools used to create surveillance-based ads models on social media will be 10 times more effective within realistic virtual environments, exposing brand new privacy problems.

The worlds smartest criminals will already be figuring out how to exploit these environments to steal information, exfiltrate data, and support their main business in crime. Its quite plausible to think state actors will be considering how to build virtual honeypot traps to gather kompromat, too.

This new wild frontier will introduce a host of new wild problems, as Charlie Bell, Microsoft vice president for security, compliance, identity, and management, recently warned.

Given this has been the case each time new tech has hit town, dont be too surprised to see 21st Century repeats of late 20th century scare stories. Thats why any enterprise working in virtual space will need to take steps before problems happen, rather than move fast and act surprised when things inevitably break.

Things will break and you have been warned  but at least VR/AR training may make it possible to break things in virtual worlds before you get down to breaking your real world business. That may be an argument to consider within the ROI for any company seeking to exploit AR/VR to test and explore new business opportunity.

Please follow me on Twitter, or join me in the AppleHolics bar & grill and Apple Discussions groups on MeWe.
President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol, front row second from left, and National Assembly Speaker Park Byeong-seog, left, listen as an unidentified person, not seen in this photo, explains Korea Times photojournalist Shim Hyun-chul's award-winning photo, titled, "2021, Earthlings Buried Under Plastic," during the opening ceremony of the 58th Korea Press Photo Exhibition at the Press Center in central Seoul, Monday. Courtesy of the Korea Press Photographers' Association
India to witness massive demand for tech talent

Digital transformation across telecom, engineering, and healthcare sectors has made software, big-tech, and data professionals roles the most in-demand in the market. Together, the sectors are expected to add 12 million jobs by the 2025-26 financial year, 8 million of them in engineering, according to a TeamLease report.

These sectors are likely to be the first to adopt Industry 4.0 technologies, accelerated by the pandemic, the report said.

Employers prefer hiring a mix of core domain and technological skills. However, skills in AI and machine learning top the list, looked for by one-in-eight employers. The country is witnessing a 60% surge in hiring for data scientists as compared to the 2021-22 financial year. The automotive industry is hiring nearly 50% more IT, data science, and data engineering professionals today compared to pre-Covid levels.

The report also highlights that the telecom, engineering, and healthcare sectors together comprise a $1.5 trillion in market size and employ about 42 million people currently, accounting for approximately 8.7% of Indias entire workforce.

Google devises a dual billing system for app developers

Google will soon allow developers of apps delivered through its Play Store to accept payments either through the store or another billing system.

The company is facing investigation by the Competition Commission of India, the statutory body responsible for enforcing Indias 2002 Competition Act, for alleged manipulative practices in its payment services. The accusation is that Google is rerouting purchases and in-app transactions via its own billing system and charging a mandatory commission on each sale.

Google is also said to have unfairly privileged its app over those of competitors on the Play Store, Android OS, and Android-based smartphones by skewing search results and rigging featured app lists in favour of Google Pay.

Developers have to give Google a 15% cut of their first $1 million in sales through the store, and 30% thereafter. Its likely that other payment processors would charge less. However, it is still not clear if the apps will have to pay Google a fee for payments made through a third-party billing system.

The dual payment system is not new: It is already functioning in South Korea to comply with local government laws. Spotify, a music streaming app, has expressed interest in the new system.

ONDC to launch in April in five cities

Open Network Digital Commerce (ONDC), a shared infrastructure for e-commerce built along the same lines as the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) for mobile payments, is set to launch in April. Ten companies, including Phone Pe, Dunzo, Good Box and Paytm, have integrated with it. Service will initially be available in Bengaluru, Delhi, Bhopal, Coimbatore, and Shillong. The government is also planning a massive expansion of the network in the next three to four months.

ONDC is an initiative by the Department of Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. It was formed in December 2021 with the aim of creating an open public digital infrastructure to transform the digital commerce ecosystem in the country, which is currently dominated by big players such as Amazon and Flipkart.

SIDBI, the apex regulatory body for licensing and regulation of MSM enterprise finance companies, recently bought a 7.84 % stake in ONDC for 10 crores. PNB, SBI, Kotak Mahindra Bank, HDFC Bank, and Axis Bank too have acquired stakes in ONDC.

RBI received complaints against illegal digital lending apps

Fintech services such as digital lending apps have gained popularity during the past few years, especially after demonetization and the pandemic, so skilled developers may be considering a job with one. However, job applicants should verify that companies offering online lending have the necessary license to operate, as the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has been receiving complaints again a number of them that dont.

A total of 2562 complaints against digital lending apps were received by Digital Lending Application  Sachet, a portal established by the RBI for registering complaints by the public, between January 2020 and March 2021.

Around 600 out of 1100 lending apps available were illegal, according to an RBI report released in November 2021 and recently cited in the Lok Sabha. This number would further increase as a user downloading a lending app cannot confirm the apps legitimacy. Maharashtra tops the list, followed by Karnataka, Delhi, Haryana, and Telangana.
Lenovo has committed to hiring 12,000 new research and development (R&D) professionals over the next three years.

The announcement was made during Lenovos annual company kick-off, where chairman and CEO Yuanqing Yang set out the companys vision for the year ahead. Alongside the hiring commitment, Yang also said that R&D investment will be doubled during the 2022/23 financial year, as the company looks to stay ahead of new and emerging IT architectures.

Last year, the Chinese-American tech giant hired 5,000 R&D workers to support research into what it calls Client-Edge-Cloud-Network-Intelligence. The newly announced hires will work on new hardware and software to help customers stay ahead of emerging technology trends, such as edge computing and the metaverse.

Our intention is to optimize between technology with quick market returns and foundational research, and between continuous improvement and breakthrough innovation, Yang said.

Yang also outlined Lenovos ongoing pledge to reaching net-zero emissions by 2050, in line with the companys Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG) commitments.

While Yang didnt speak specifically about diversity and inclusion at todays event, in Lenovos 2020/21 Environmental, Social, and Governance Report from earlier this year the company showed that it had managed to broaden its recruiting efforts and improve its onboarding process to hire tech workers from a wider variety of backgrounds.
Pakistan President dissolves Assembly as opposition parties protest; Imran Khan de-notified as PM

According to media reports, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan has been denotified as the prime minister of Pakistan.

The move comes after the no-confidence motion against the Imran Khan was dismissed by the deputy speaker in the National Assembly. Photo courtesy: Twitter/@ians_india

A statement was issued in this regard from the country's Cabinet Division after the dissolution of the National Assembly, Geo News reported.

The denotification comes after the deputy speaker of the National Assembly (NA) Qasim Suri dismissed the no-confidence motion against the PTI chairman and termed it "unconstitutional".

Pakistan Opposition parties staged a sit-in protest in the Assembly chamber and elected their own Speaker.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, chairman of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), said that the opposition will "initiate a legal battle" against the "unconstitutional ruling by the NA Deputy Speaker".

Pakistan will probably stage elections within three months after the countrys president Arif Alvi yesterday dissolved the national assembly and the provincial assemblies on the advice of prime minister Imran Khan.

Pakistan minister Fawad Chaudhry tweeted that the federal cabinet has been dissolved and Imran Khan will continue his duties as per the countrys Constitution.

As per this clause, on dissolution of the Assembly on completion of the term or if President dissolves it in his discretion that electorate is necessary (Article 58), a caretaker cabinet shall be appointed under a care-taker prime minister. The care-taker PM shall be appointed by the President in consultation with the incumbent PM and the leader of opposition in the outgoing assembly.

The move comes after the no-confidence motion against the Imran Khan was dismissed by the deputy speaker in the National Assembly. The Punjab Assembly also met for six minutes and has been adjourned till April 6. The Pakistan Army has denied role in the events that unfolded in the national assembly.

The opposition has called the rejection of no-confidence motion unconstitutional and declared it would move to the Supreme Court.

It is nothing short of high treason. IK has pushed the country into anarchy. Niazi & his cohort will not be allowed to go scot-free. There will be consequences for blatant & brazen violation of the Constitution. Hope SC will play it's role to uphold the Constitution, Shehbaz Sharif, the leader of opposition in National Assembly, tweeted.

Government has violated the Constitution, didn't allow voting on the no-confidence motion. The united opposition is not leaving parliament. Our lawyers are on their way to Supreme Court, Pakistan People's Party chairperson Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said in a video message.

Soon after the no-confidence motion was rejected, the Prime Minister in his address to the nation not only called the people to prepare for elections but reiterated that the foreign conspiracy to topple his government had failed.

"The no-confidence motion was a foreign conspiracy against us. The nation should decide who should govern them... not the corrupt people who conspire with foreign powers... Prepare for elections. You will decide," Khan said.

In the history of Pakistan's politics, no prime minister has completed a full-term.

Khan, who came to power in 2018 with promises to create a Naya Pakistan, is at a critical juncture of his political career as he has lost majority after defection from his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party. Two of his allied parties also withdrew their support and joined the ranks of the rejuvenated Opposition.

Global News
04/04/2022

Photo (c) Catherine Falls Commercial - Getty Images With pandemic troubles continuing to subside, more people are venturing out and looking to travel. It's a fact thats making everyone in the travel food chain  from amusement parks to airlines  excited about the prospects of 2022s summer travel season.

But those prospects come loaded with questions when it comes to airlines. Which carriers offer the best fares, what frequent flyer programs are the best, and who do travelers consider the best airlines? To help travelers arrive at the best decisions for their budgets, WalletHub has released its 2022 report for one of those segments  frequent flyer programs.

The winners

WalletHub analysts ranked the 10 largest U.S. airlines based on 21 key metrics, ranging from the value of a point/mile to blackout dates for reward flights. Here are the points/miles programs that WalletHub scored the highest:

Best Frequent Flyer Program: Overall, the WalletHub researchers gave Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan the nod for the best frequent flyer program of 2022, beating last years winner -- United MileagePlus.

Best Bang for the Buck: When it comes to value spent, the analysts found that Hawaiian Airlines offers the most rewards value, at $24.78 per $100 spent. Alaska Airlines came in second, with $24.65 per $100 spent. Rounding out the top five in that category were Frontier Airlines ($14.67 per $100 spent), Delta Air Lines ($10.35), and United Airlines ($10.30).

Best Airline Credit Card: The JetBlue Plus Card is 2022s best airline credit card, according to the WalletHub editors. Also ranked high on that list were co-branded credit cards from American, Delta, United, Southwest, and Alaska Airlines. Most of those also ranked high on ConsumerAffairs list of the Best Airline Credit Cards of 2022.

Should travelers try to shoot for elite status?

Travelers often wonder whether it's really worth it to try to reach an airlines elite status level. When that question was posed to Charles R. Taylor, the John A. Murphy Professor of Marketing at the Villanova School of Business, he said the benefits are good  and plentiful.

While it can be difficult (and probably more difficult than it should be) in some programs to redeem free flights, consumers willing to be flexible in the time of the reward flights will generally come out okay. For elite flyers, the benefits of shorter check-in lines, free baggage, customer service hotlines, and occasional or frequent complimentary upgrades are very real, Taylor commented.

There is little question that most of the major carriers have skewed more benefits to those who are the most frequent flyers. While this has ruffled some feathers due to some benefits being rolled back for general members, it does make sense in the sense that the elite flyers spend considerably more on air travel than most every day flyers.
04/04/2022

Photo (c) ATU Images - Getty Images COVID-19 tally as compiled by Johns Hopkins University. (Previous numbers in parentheses.)

Total U.S. confirmed cases: 80,155,446 (80,150,811)

Total U.S. deaths: 982,566 (982,233)

Total global cases: 491,572,015 (490,825,132)

Total global deaths: 6,153,616 (6,151,961)

Medicare now covers over-the-counter COVID-19

Starting today, Medicare will cover the cost of an over-the-counter, self-administered COVID-19 test. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) says Medicare will cover up to eight over-the-counter COVID-19 tests each calendar month.

If you are in a Medicare Advantage plan, the tests covered under this initiative will be covered outside of your existing plans coverage and in addition to any over-the-counter tests that may be covered under the plan as a supplemental benefit.

There should be no out-of-pocket expense. Medicare says participating pharmacies will distribute the tests kits to Medicare recipients and then bill Medicare.

Omicron less severe for young children, study finds

Researchers at Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) School of Medicine have published a study that suggests young children below age 5 who are infected with the COVID-19 Omicron variant have less risk of severe health outcomes than those infected with the Delta variant.

The study, published in JAMA Pediatrics, compares the health outcomes of coronavirus infection from Omicron to Delta in children aged 4 and younger. That age group is not eligible for vaccination.

The findings show that the Omicron variant is six to eight times more infectious than the Delta variant. The severe clinical outcomes ranged from a 16% lower risk for emergency room visits to 85% less risk for mechanical ventilation. Researchers found that about 1.8% of children infected with the Omicron variant were hospitalized, compared to 3.3% who were infected with the Delta variant.

China extends Shanghai lockdown

The Chinese government has extended the COVID-19 lockdown in Shanghai after the Herculean task of testing all 25 million residents of Chinas largest city. Thousands of medical personnel from all over the country poured into the city over the weekend to perform the tests.

Monday was supposed to be the final day of the lockdown, which was imposed to get a spike in new cases of the virus under control. City officials said the lockdown will continue while health authorities assess the situation.

The lockdown is likely to be felt by American consumers because Shanghai has many factories that produce goods for export. Economists say the production disruption is likely to make supply chain issues worse.

Around the nation
Relogiosimportadossp.com.br scored 46 Social Media Impact. Social Media Impact score is a measure of how much a site is popular on social networks. 2.5/5.0 Stars by Social Team

This CoolSocial report was updated on 10 Oct 2013, you can refresh this analysis whenever you want.

This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared the relogiosimportadossp homepage on Twitter + the total number of relogiosimportadossp followers (if relogiosimportadossp has a Twitter account). The total number of people who shared the relogiosimportadossp homepage on StumbleUpon. The total number of people who shared the relogiosimportadossp homepage on Google Plus by a google +1 button. The total number of people who shared the relogiosimportadossp homepage on Delicious. This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared, liked or recommended the relogiosimportadossp homepage on Facebook + the total number of page likes (if relogiosimportadossp has a Facebook fan page).

Basic Information

PAGE TITLE Relogios Importados SP - Site de Replicas de Relogios. DESCRIPTION Replicas de Relogios Italianos, mais de 1700 modelos e 50 marcas famosas com fotos e videos. Lindas replicas por um preco justo e qualidade AAA. KEYWORDS replicas de relogios, relogios importados sp, relogiosimportadosp, relogios famosos, replicas italianas, relogios, replicas, relogios replicas, relogios importados, relogio replica, site replicas de relogios, importados relogios, replica relogio. OTHER KEYWORDS agora, compre agora, relgio, compre, rolex, price, hublot



The keywords meta-tag found in the head section of the homepage. The title found in the head section of the homepage. CoolSocial advanced keyword analysis tool is able to detect and analyze every keyword on each page of a site. The description meta-tag found in the head section of the homepage. The URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is the address of the site.

Domain and Server

DOCTYPE HTML 5.0 CHARSET AND LANGUAGE Portuguese UTF-8Portuguese DETECTED LANGUAGE English English SERVER Apache OPERATIVE SYSTEM Linux Linux

Operative System running on the server. Character set and language of the site. The language of relogiosimportadossp.com.br as detected by CoolSocial algorithms. Type of server and offered services. Represents HTML declared type (e.g.: XHTML 1.1, HTML 4.0, the new HTML 5.0)

Site Traffic trend during the last year. Only available for sites ranked <= 100000 in the world.

Referring domains for relogiosimportadossp.com.br by MajesticSeo. High values are a sign of site importance over the web and on web engines.

Facebook link

FACEBOOK PAGE LINK NOT FOUND

The total number of people who tagged or talked about website Facebook page in the last 7-10 days. The URL of the found Facebook page. The type of Facebook page. Facebook Timeline is the new layout of Facebook pages. A Facebook page link can be found in the homepage or in the robots.txt file. The total number of people who like website Facebook page. The description of the Facebook page describes website and its services to the social media users.

Twitter account link

TWITTER PAGE LINK NOT FOUND
Prime Minister nominee Han Duck-soo answers reporters' questions while entering his office in Jongno District, Seoul, Monday. Yonhap



Han denies involvement in representing Lone Star Funds



By Nam Hyun-woo



President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol's nomination of Han Duck-soo as his first prime minister has received mixed reactions. He is a veteran bureaucrat who served in key posts during previous administrations. But some believe he is too old to push for changes in the incoming administration.



Yoon dropped hints about allowing the 72-year-old former prime minister to have a greater say in nominations of Cabinet ministers and key policy areas than his predecessors did. Despite the possibility of having more discretion, the road ahead for Han is murky as a tough confirmation hearing is expected in the National Assembly. Even if he passes that test, it also remains uncertain whether he can function smoothly and turn the tide in favor of the nation during the fast-changing digital era.



Although Yoon has pinned high hopes on Han's varied experience, given his background of serving in key government posts in both conservative and liberal administrations, there are skeptics who are doubtful of his capability to proceed as a free-willed prime minister who aggressively fulfills his role in striking a power balance with his boss, the president.



"I believe it is time that the prime minster actively exercises his right to recommend Cabinet ministers to the president, rather than staying as a ceremonial leader," Yoon's spokesperson, Rep. Kim Eun-hye, told reporters Monday.



"There have been efforts to give greater discretion and responsibilities to prime ministers in previous administrations, but it was difficult to see a noticeable outcome.  We will take that as a lesson and make efforts to have a more responsible prime minister."



Han was named as the first prime minister of the Yoon government on Sunday. While announcing him, Yoon told reporters that he and Han have agreed on the prime minister having greater discretion and responsibilities, such as allowing him to recommend ministers and other Cabinet members to Yoon.



According to the Constitution, ministers and other Cabinet members can be appointed by the president upon the recommendation of the prime minister. Despite its purpose of distributing the power of the president, the prime minister has long been considered as the ceremonial No. 2 person in the government. That's because the president has dominated nominations and has the right to appoint or sack the prime minister.



During the 2012 presidential election, then-presidential candidates Park Geun-hye and Moon Jae-in both pledged to introduce what was called the "responsible prime minister system," which is aimed at bolstering the No. 2 official's rights, but did not see tangible outcomes.



Yoon's intention to bolster the prime minister's discretion is in line with his campaign pledge to depart from Korea's legacy of "imperial" presidencies and delegate many rights of the president to the prime minister or ministers.



However, doubts have been raised as to whether Han will be able to exercise his discretion to stand up to Yoon himself.



During a radio interview, Monday, Rep. Woo Sang-ho of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) said, "Han is not a suitable figure for this quasi-dual executive system."



"He is a bureaucratic manager, and it seems difficult for Han to make outspoken comments to President-elect Yoon," Woo said.





President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol nominates Han Duck-soo, right, as the prime minister of the incoming administration during a press conference at the presidential transition committee office in Jongno District, Seoul, Sunday. Joint Press Corps
On April 4, 1968, James Earl Ray came at the king, and tragically, he did not miss. Well, maybe it was James Earl Ray. Well get to that, because it's just one of a number of amazing details about that day and its aftermath. Advertisement

15 Jesse Jackson Was There (Library of Congress/Wikimedia Commons) It turns out he was one of closest aides. In fact, he had a front row seat to the atrocity, as King was leaning over the balcony of his Memphis hotel room talking to Jackson when he was shot.

14 He Was There to Support Sanitation Workers (Denisse Leon/Unsplash) The only reason King was even in Memphis that day was to support a strike of the citys sanitation workers, because no walkout was too dirty for King. It was to these workers that he delivered his now famous Ive Been to the Mountaintop speech, and within a week of Kings death, the city gave in to their demands. After all, they would have looked real bad if they didnt. Continue Reading Below Advertisement
Continue Reading Below Advertisement

Yeah, some people apparently took the mention of the Armenian genocide as their cue to clutch an imaginary pearl and yell, Propaganda! before swiftly review bombing the film because, according to these people, the Armenian genocide never happened. According to the Armenian genocide deniers, Marvel, Disney, and Ethan Hawke are now spreading false information to the masses through a show about a guy who just wants to go on a date. Honestly, youd think these trolls would be able to relate more.

It seems that IMDb has been swift in scrubbing the reviews featuring Armenian genocide denialists spreading all this false information, but some of these reviews were caught early and published. And they all pretty much sound like a version of this one:

Continue Reading Below Advertisement

Nowadays US film industry likes to pump false historical information about the fake armenian genocide b*t. Obviously armenian lobby works hard and influences these false information all over the world. This title is another piece of this lobbying effort, nothing more. Strong thumbs down! You can even see brainwashed morons here still trying to pump this false info here. We are living in the lands of where this so called genocide, there are tons of objective resources in the net, which proves the facts, yet they still choose to show this stupidity for the sake of their lobbies.

Its as cringingly predictable as youd expect. How anyone still takes these kinds of internet posts/toxic bandwagons seriously in the year 2022 is, well, pretty depressing.

We guess the truth is that there are people in this world whose brains are just all eaten out from (ironically) all that conspiracy propaganda theyve been swallowing for so long.

Top Image: Disney Platform Distribution
Qingming, time for remembering heroes and observing traditions

Xinhua) 13:45, April 04, 2022

BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- As Tomb Sweeping Day falls on Tuesday this year, Chinese people are preparing to worship ancestors and pay tribute to their loved ones who died.

This day is also known in China as Qingming, literally "clear and bright." It is one of the 24 dates that divide the solar year and has been observed for thousands of years.

The tomb-sweeping tradition has its poetic twist, inspiring Chinese poets through the centuries to create verses that blend the joy of springtime with the sorrows of the mourning.

Writer of the famous poem "Qingming," Du Mu of the Tang Dynasty (618-907) once wrote:

"A drizzling rain falls like tears on the mourning day; The mourner's heart is going to break on his way. Where can a wine shop be found to drown my sad hours? A cowherd points to a cot amid apricot flowers."

On Qingming, Chinese people also pay their respects to heroes and martyrs.

President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, often emphasized the importance of remembering heroes, carrying forward their spirit, and honoring revolutionary martyrs.

"The Chinese nation is a nation that worships heroes, makes heroes and has numerous heroes in its history. The spirit of heroes still exists in the age of peace. We must uphold the spirit of heroes, who sacrificed their lives for the Party, the country as well as the Chinese people," Xi said.

As the country's top leader, Xi led by example. During his domestic inspections, Xi often took time to pay tribute to memorial facilities dedicated to revolutionary heroes, present floral baskets, tour museums and visit families of the martyrs.

Heroes emerge in peacetime, too. Doctors, nurses and first responders are considered heroes in the country's fight against the COVID-19 epidemic.

At a meeting to commend anti-virus role models in 2020, Xi paid his respects to those who died fighting the virus.

"I would like to take a moment to mourn the loss of the heroes who gave their lives in the fight against the virus, and our fellow countrymen and women whose lives it has taken. Our thoughts are with them," he said.

Poverty fighters are on Xi's mind too. Under his leadership, China launched a "war" that eliminated absolute poverty in eight years. The battle was hard fought, with over 1,800 people -- many of whom were cadres who assisted in the fight -- sacrificing their lives on the front lines.

At a gathering in early 2021 to mark poverty relief results, Xi acknowledged the fallen heroes, saying that their sacrifices will "never be forgotten by the Party, the people and the republic."

Throughout the past decade, more attention was given to heroes and martyrs. A date was designated as Martyrs' Day. Laws and regulations were passed to better protect the martyrs' reputation and their families' rights and interests.

SPRING OUTING

As Qingming heralds in the warm weather and regular rainy showers, it presents an opportune time for plowing and sowing.

The Chinese term "Taqing" refers to a spring outing when people get out and enjoy the spring blossoms. It is one of the most important and long-lasting customs of Qingming.

After families sweep tombs, they often take a moment to savor springtime. Activities like planting trees are usually associated with this season.

Last week, Xi and other Chinese leaders took part in a tree-planting activity in Beijing. Xi participated in this activity as China's top leader for 10 years in a row.

Xi stressed that he also wanted to make a personal contribution to building a beautiful China and to encourage the whole of society, especially young people, to push for ecological advancement and for China's environment to continue to improve.

"Since the 18th CPC National Congress, we have adhered to the notion that lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets to fully promote the development of ecological civilization, advance afforestation and improve living environment in both urban and rural areas," Xi said. "A beautiful China is becoming a reality."

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)




Former opposition lawmaker Yoo Seong-min and former finance minister Kim Dong-yeon are running neck and neck in a hypothetical two-way race for governorship of Gyeonggi Province in the June local elections, a survey showed Monday.





According to the survey of 1,009 adults, conducted by Realmeter from last Friday and Saturday, Yoo led Kim 37.6 percent to 36 percent, which was within the margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points at a 95 percent confidence level.





Yoo received high support from people in their 20s, 30s and 60 and older, while Kim earned high support from people in their 40s and 50s, the survey showed.



Yoo of the conservative People Power Party declared his bid for the top post of South Korea's most populous province last week.





Kim, head of the minor New Wave Party, withdrew his candidacy in this year's presidential election to support the liberal Democratic Party's Lee Jae-myung, also announced his bid for the Gyeonggi governorship.





Meanwhile, a former lawmaker Kang Yong-suk, who runs a right-wing YouTube channel, declared his bid for Gyeonggi Governor earlier in the day, claiming that he wants to achieve "dream" of former President Park Geun-hye in Gyeonggi Province. (Yonhap)


The existence of policies and procedures surrounding the implementation of a business strategy are the hallmarks of maturity within a companys growth. When insiders make business decisions that violate the law, or those policies, the potential for increased risk to the business is present. We see this most often when individuals in positions of trust violate policy or procedural constraints, whether on purpose (theft) or accidentally (human error) and data goes missing or flies out the door into the public domain.

A recent settlement order, dated March 3, between the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Weight Watchers International and its wholly owned subsidiary Kurbo demonstrates what may occur if those insiders evolve a business model that ignores the law. Weight Watchers and Kurbo agreed to pay a fine of $1.5 million, delete information illegally collected from children under 13, and destroy any algorithms derived from the data.

Self-inflicted wounds, lost intellectual property

In 2017, Volkswagen made a business decision to cheat U.S. emissions tests, was fined $4.3 billion, was forced to buy back millions of vehicles, and found six of its employees indicted. The business decision of Kurbo/Weight Watchers also has consequences. At this time the consequences affect the business. Whether the Department of Justice (DOJ) will pursue criminal charges against personnel has not yet been determined.

DTEX Systems SVP engineering and cyber intelligence, Raj Koo observes how he had never seen an instance where a company agrees to destroy its intellectual property as part of a settlement with the government. This settlement carries with it a significant audit trail, he says.

While DTEXs director, security and business intelligence, Armaan Mahbod, says, The world is shifting; we can expect to see more of this. Mahbod notes as the EU and U.S. data protection laws continue to evolve in the direction of individual control over their information, more transparency in the life of data retention and the right to be forgotten will be the norm.

Kurbos violation of COPPA

According to the FTC, Kurbo focused its marketing efforts on children under the age of 13 in direct violation of the Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). In 2014 Kurbo (then an independent entity) began marketing a weight management and tracking service designed for use by children ages eight and older, teenagers and families. In 2018, Weight Watchers acquired Kurbo and rebranded the Kurbo offering targeting children as young as eight. The court documents show that from 2014 through February 2020, over 279,500 people used Kurbo and at least 18,600 were children under the age of 13.

Kurbos app solicited personal identifying information (PII) from registered users, such as name, sex, date of birth, weight, height, phone number, food intake, and activity level on an ongoing basis. Prior to August 2021, data on users, even defunct users, were retained indefinitely. In August 2021, the policy was adjusted and a childs data was retained for three years, or when a parent requested to deleted it.

The DOJ complaint of February 16, 2022, requested that Kurbo/Weight Watchers be permanently enjoined and given a monetary civil penalty. FTC Chair Lina M. Khan commented on the settlement, Weight Watchers and Kurbo marketed weight management services for use by children as young as eight, and then illegally harvested their personal and sensitive health information. Our order against these companies requires them to delete their ill-gotten data, destroy any algorithms derived from it, and pay a penalty for their lawbreaking.

Destruction of algroithms part of Kurbos settlement

Kurbo, it would appear, opted early on to ignore COPPA, then strategized how to circumvent the law created to protect minors. The fact that the entity agreed to destroy its own intellectual property speaks volumes, and in fact, may turn out to be more damaging than the monetary fine that the company agreed to pay. As the algorithms were created, one would presume they were market differentiating to engage with users over the age of 13.

Kurbo and Weight Watchers are required to submit a compliance report after one year to the FTC. Additionally, the company has agreed to significant administrative oversight. For a period of ten years, they must create certain records as directed by the FTC and retain those records for a period of five years. These records include personnel records of each person providing services (employee or otherwise), records necessary to demonstrate full compliance, all consumer complaints, copies of all marketing information including screenshots.

Koos advice to all companies, How well a company communicates their policies and ensuring review of the code development lifecycle is key to assuring companies minimize their risk of running afoul of data protection laws.
Devsecops adoption is widely underway, with many organizations looking to break down silos among development, security and operations while leveraging cloud-native architectures to drive secure software outcomes for organizations. That said, one problem is still pervasive throughout this devsecops journey and thats the case of secrets management.

Secrets consist of information organizations desire to keep private, most notably credentials, access keys or certificates of some form. As evident from previous data breach reports, such as IBMs, credentials and secrets remain among the top factors involved in incidents and data breaches, often giving malicious actors initial or lateral access in environments.

Poor secret management practices have been tied to or exploited in several breaches, including Codecov and Twitch. Recent activity around the Samsung data breach that exposed portions of Samsungs source code included over 6,000 secret keys.

Secrets management has been a challenge in years past and the problem only seems to be escalating. In a recent State of Secrets Sprawl 2022 report from GitGuardian, over 6 million secrets were detected in scans of public GitHub repositories in 2021, which is twice as many compared to 2020.

Some of the problems are that organizations lack maturity around secrets management, particularly in cloud-native devsecops oriented environments. This includes gaps around inventorying secrets, centralized approaches, controlling access, and preparing to respond to secret incidents when, not if, they occur.

Other factors exacerbating the secret sprawl problem include the growing popularity of open-source solutions and associated repositories. Source code, images and infrastructure-as-code (IaC) manifests are but a few sources where secrets can inadvertently or unknowingly be committed and subsequently exposed.

Organizations widespread use of open source-technologies container images and IaC templatized manifests can save a lot of time and expedite innovation, but it also can serve as an avenue of secret exposure, particularly when committed back to the community in public repositories.

Public repositories arent the only source of concern. As organizations continue to experience data breaches that compromise their internal private repositories or even continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) build systems and pipelines, secrets can also be exposed to malicious actors. Application security teams are struggling to keep pace with the activity of development teams and others when it comes to implementing secret management practices and maturity.

Secrets management best practices

Organizations need to mature their secret management practices. Failing to do so can impact not only a single organization but have a cascading impact across the supply chain and ecosystem if the exposed secrets belong to a software vendor or cloud/managed service provider.

Part of the challenge are the diverse locations and methods in which secrets can be inadvertently shared, stored or exposed. In modern technology environments this includes in source-code repositories, CI/CD pipelines, container images, IaC templates and even a developers local workstation. Lets discuss methods to mitigate some of these concerns.

Open-source and commercial tools

When it comes to repositories and CI/CD pipelines, you have both open-source and proprietary vendor solutions to choose from. Some of the most popular open-source options include Gitleaks and Trufflehog. Both can help support scanning Git repositories for stored secrets and be integrated with popular CI platforms like GitHub and GitLab to catch secrets flowing through the pipeline before they ever make it to a repository or worse, runtime environments. Theyre able to search for secrets such as passwords, API keys and personal access tokens, all of which can be abused by malicious actors to impact not just your organization but also any customers, business partners or others whom you may interact with from a digital perspective.

These open-source solutions also support the use of pre-commit hooks, which can be run prior to something actually being committed, for example. While both options support the use of built-in rules, they also can create custom secret detection rules, which can be useful depending on the type of data your organization may be responsible for safeguarding.

It is important to tune these tools, because while they are extremely helpful in identifying potential exposed secrets, they also can be very noisy and frustrate the development team as they try to tackle the slew of alerts and findings to determine false positives versus real issues.

Emerging leaders in the vendor space include GitGuardian, which was cited earlier in some of their associated studies and findings on secret sprawl. GitGuard provides a code security policy engine which can be integrated with version control systems, DevOps tooling and IaC configurations to prevent secrets from being exposed. They also actively monitor every public GitHub commit and scan them, which currently has over 70 million active users, albeit not all of them are using public repositories. However, GitGuardians activity of doing this monitoring on public repositories helps inform some of the metrics cited earlier regarding the state of secret sprawl and just how big of a problem it actually is.

Developer education

Another recommendation is just developer education from the AppSec team. While tooling can go a long way and is a must to ensure you catch what you can, in the name of shifting left, starting with the developer is a great place to begin. Educating developers on the perils of leaked secrets and the ramifications it can have on not just your organization but others associated with you, either as customers or partners is also critical.

Include leaked secrets scenarios in your incident response plan

As with much of cybersecurity, it is not a matter of if, but when secrets are compromised. This is why your incident response plan and associated playbooks should cover scenarios of leaked secrets. If secrets are exposed, how does the organization respond? Who is involved? How do you invalidate those secrets to minimize the impact? How do you communicate with customers or partners who are impacted? These are key considerations when it comes to the problem of secrets sprawl and associated security incidents.

Taking a multi-faceted approach as discussed above through tools, processes and people can help your organization mitigate the risks associated with leaked secrets and the subsequent fallout. Implementing the items discussed above will be key for developers, AppSec engineers and cloud-native organizations to mitigate the risks associated with secrets. Keeping a secret is no trivial matter, particularly in the age of cloud and devsecops.
The U.S. State Department announced that its Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy (CDP) began operations on Monday as part of Secretary Antony Blinkens modernization agenda. The Department says the CDP will address the national security challenges, economic opportunities, and implications for U.S. values associated with cyberspace, digital technologies, and digital policy.

The Bureau, ultimately to be led by a Senate-confirmed ambassador-at-Large, will, in the interim, be guided by Jennifer Bachus, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, as principal deputy assistant secretary for the Bureau. The CDP will include three policy units led by acting deputy assistant secretaries, including international cyberspace security, international information and communications policy, and digital freedom.

Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy a significant accomplishment

Congressman Jim Langevin (D-RI), chairman of the House Armed Services Committees Subcommittee on Cyber, Innovative Technologies, and Information Systems (CITI), and co-chair of the Congressional Cybersecurity Caucus, praised the CDPs creation, which has been months in the making. I congratulate Secretary Blinken and Deputy Secretary [Wendy] Sherman for this significant accomplishment, and I thank them for working closely with Congress in its efforts, Langevin said. Langevin also served on the Cyberspace Solarium Commission, which recommended the creation of a similar bureau at the State Department.

But the work of the CDP, expected to have nearly 100 employees, has just begun, Langevin said, pointing to the need for funding for such a substantial operation. Yet the work does not end here, he said. Moving forward, I will be working ardently to ensure that Congress provides the Bureau the resources it needs to fulfill its essential mission. According to reports, the Biden administration has requested a budget of $37 million for the Bureau.

Achieves many goals of the Cyber Diplomacy Act

Finally, Langevin urged Congress to pass the Cyber Diplomacy Act to enshrine this new Bureau in statute, ensuring its long-term viability and the preservation of cyber as a key foreign policy priority for the coming decades. That bill, passed by the House with bipartisan support in February 2021 only to languish ever since, would have created a Bureau of International Cyberspace Policy in the Undersecretary of Political Affairs offices to guide policy across a diverse range of areas touched by cyberspace.

The importance of the Cyber Diplomacy Act is that it would have created a more powerful bureaucratic structure within the State Department to tackle cybersecurity issues, making the ambassador a direct report to the under secretary for political affairs or an official holding a higher position in the Department of State than the under secretary for political affairs. It also would have allowed the new bureau to engage other State Department experts on other matters, including human rights, economic competitiveness, and arms control.

In the dying days of the Trump administration, then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo sought to rectify Donald Trumps obliteration of a standalone cybersecurity apparatus at the Department by creating a new Bureau of Cyberspace Security and Emerging Technologies (CSET). At the time, Representative Gregory W. Meeks (D-NY), chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, blasted Pompeos ill-suited plan in part because that bureau would not coordinate responsibility for the security, economic, and human rights aspects of cyber policy, which are all essential to effective diplomatic engagement on these issues. As it turns out, Pompeos creation was never formed following a blistering report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) for its failure to use data and evidence to develop its proposal.

Blinkens new bureau may achieve most if not all of what the Cyber Diplomacy Act set out to fix. I think it makes a lot of sense, Chris Painter, the State Department's first-ever coordinator for cybersecurity, tells CSO. The Bureau is at a high enough level of the state department so that you can crosscut across the Department and among very different things because these issues are not dealt with in silos. Also, its mandate is broad, which is good. Everything from hard security and international security issues to economic issues to human rights issues. Those things often overlap, and you have to be able to coordinate all of them.

Lisa Plaggemier, interim executive director at the National Cybersecurity Alliance, agrees that the wide range of topics the new bureau will encompass is a promising development. Cybersecurity is a multifaceted challenge, and this new [bureau] looks like it has been built in a way that will enable the government to address these areas, including things such as digital freedom and traditional technology, she tells CSO.

A critical role to play if Russia violates the rules of the road

The U.S. created this field of diplomatic expertise back in 2011 under Painter, but Trumps first secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, buried it in the bureaucracy, Painter says. With this new Bureau, the U.S. could reclaim its leadership status and ability to work with other nations that have also elevated cybersecurity in the diplomatic realm, including several European countries, such as Estonia, France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands as well as Japan, Korea, India, and even China and Russia.

In terms of the current crisis in Ukraine and Russias yet-to-fully-materialize malicious cyber activity, Painter thinks the CDP can play an essential role if Russia exercises its capability to wreak digital damage. We haven't seen as much cyber from Russia as we thought we would, but that doesn't mean we should be complacent. It's certainly possible that Russia will use cyber more to project power or go after countries that sanction them, Painter says.

What the State Department can do now is help foster international cybersecurity rules of the road. The most important part of that role is its ability to mount a collective way to ensure accountability for those countries that violate the rules of the road, says Painter. And so that's where I think the State Department plays a vital role in working with our allies and partners to do the things we've seen in even the physical world with sanctions and other stuff such as law enforcement tools.

The timing seems good given the support Ukraine has received globally. I think given the solidarity that has been shown with Europe and Japan and other parts of the world on Ukraine, that's a good stepping stone to continue to build the cyber alliances, Painter says.

The bottom line is that cybersecurity will be an important long-term issue to our national security and economic security and foreign policy, according to Painter. We can't afford to go through a cycle as we did four years ago where it caused a lot of our friends to wonder what was going on and our adversaries to become more emboldened. The State Department has made the right move in creating this bureau. It creates the kind of momentum that I think we need to see.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

GUILFORD  Get your favorite canine ready for an evening of fun for both pet owners and their special pooches.

Mark your calendar for the Puppy-Opossum Palooza to held on Sunday, April 24 at Ballous Wine Bar in Guilford.

Branfords Dan Cosgrove Animal Shelter, which serves the shoreline, and East Havens East Havens Farm River Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation are collaborating on this unique fundraiser.

For people planning on bringing their dog to the event, Laura Burban, director of the Branford animal shelter, had some advice.

They want to make sure that their dogs extremely social and friendly, not only with other dogs, but people, too, she said. Obviously, they want to make sure that they bring their dog on a leash and that they have poopy bags for their dog and that they have their dogs up-to-date on the rabies vaccine.

Farm River Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation is a nonprofit wildlife rehabilitator.

In addition, the wildlife rescue organization has its federal USDA license that allows them to be animal exhibitors, which allows us to keep medically non-releasable animals to do public education, said Karyn Putney, director of Farm River.

Attending the event will be Farm Rivers long-whiskered education ambassador, Dahlia. The Virginia opossum has a physical defect  one leg longer than the other  that makes her non-releasable and currently lives with Putney.

We really use her to show that shes our only marsupial in North America, Putney said. A lot of people, I think, were afraid of them. So, she really shows them theres nothing to be afraid of. Shes not hissy, shes not going to growl, shes not going to show her teeth.

With live acoustic music playing, guests will be treated to an assortment of Ballous vegan appetizers, including a hummus platter, beet salad, and cheese plates. In addition, there will be vegan cake pops for dessert, donated by Guilfords Three Girls Vegan Creamery.

The ticket price will include one raffle ticket.

Antonio Antollino, manager at Ballous, has taken on the responsibility of collecting raffle items and, at press time, two Guilford businesses have donated items.

These include a haircut from A Hair Of The Dog LLC and homemade doggie treats and a bed from Triple R Dog Bakery and Accessories.

Ballous is donating all the food for this event.

I always say, Animals have no voice, so we as humans need to help them, Antollino said.

Burban is looking forward to having the fundraiser in Guilford, to spread the word about the shelter.

We will help anyone, anywhere that we can, said Burban. Whether its assisting them with foods for their own animals because they cant afford it or if its that they need to release their dog or cat, we assist them that way.

We offer services to people from all over the place, she added. We always say, Animals dont see borders.

The money raised will be split equally between the two animal groups.

Burban is inspired by Ballous generosity.

Some days its hard, she said. You sort of feel down because you see things people do to animals and when people give back like this, just because they care and theyre willing to donate their own time or donate their services or their food, its inspiring.

It inspires you to do more and do better and to be better for not only the animals, but for the people who all care, too, Burban said.

Puppy and Opossum-Palooza will take place Sunday, April 24, with two seatings,12  2 p.m. and 2 p.m.  4 p.m. at Ballous Wine Bar, 51 Whitfield St., Guilford. Tickets are $25 and can be purchased by visiting https://www.branford-ct.gov/departments/animal-shelter/donation.
Approval of prime minister-nominee first test for Yoon



President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol nominated former Prime Minister Han Duck-soo as the first prime minister of his incoming administration. Highlighting Han's competence and expertise in administration, Yoon said, "Han is most suitable for overseeing the Cabinet with his abundant experience in the economy, foreign affairs and security." During a press conference Sunday, he added, "Han has been recognized for his capabilities regardless of partisan differences."



As Yoon noted it, Han is recognized as a promising candidate for the premiership thanks to the richness of his career serving in major posts for previous administrations. He served as prime minister and deputy prime minister under President Roh Moo-hyun, and Korean ambassador to the United States under the Lee Myung-bak administration. He also served as chairman of the Korea International Trade Association during the Park Geun-hye government.



As trade minister in 2001, he helped pave the way for the Korea-U.S. free trade agreement struck in 2006. While serving as prime minister in 2007, he held inter-Korean prime ministerial talks with his North Korean counterpart Kim Young-il. All of this shows that Han is well-qualified to become prime minister of the new administration.



In the press conference, Han addressed the four key agenda items he will focus on  diplomacy and defense for the sake of the national interest, fortifying fiscal integrity, maintaining trade balances and enhancing productivity  in an apparent move to show he is well prepared for the post. Han, if appointed, should make efforts to rejuvenate the economy reeling from the resurgent COVID-19 pandemic and lay the groundwork for the smooth sailing of the new administration.



Hailing from Jeonju, North Jeolla Province, there is the expectation that Han will devote himself to promoting national unity in the wake of the hard-fought presidential election, and elicit cooperation from the majority Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) that now controls the 300-member National Assembly with 172 seats. Yet, as Han's appointment needs Assembly approval, it is natural that the DPK is poised to strictly verify Han regarding his qualifications. But this does not mean the party should delay or hamper the approval process to "tame" the new administration.



Despite expectations for the nominee, there is skepticism over Han's alleged lack of fresh ideas and ability to cope with the rapidly changing environment at home and abroad such as the new industrial paradigm of the forthcoming Fourth Industrial Revolution. Han, 72, who began his career as a civil servant in 1970, should double down on clearing away such anxiety with a totally new mindset.



Given this, the formation of a new Cabinet will be the first litmus test for the Yoon administration. It is necessary to pick capable figures who can meet the people's aspirations for a better future. As both Yoon and Han promised to strengthen national integration and cooperation with the opposition, they should pursue "inclusive politics" to embrace all people regardless of their political persuasion. Collaboration with the DPK, in particular, is a must for the new administration to get off to a good start.






This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

DANBURY  Work was underway this week to convert an empty drive-thru eatery across the street from Western Connecticut State Universitys downtown campus into a Sonic restaurant.

The fast-food drive-thru, which has five locations in Connecticut, has been wooed by the city for a decade.

This is a franchise the city has been looking to attract and its at a great location, said P.J. Prunty, executive director of the Greater Danbury Chamber of Commerce. It is a prime spot across from Western Connecticut State University on a heavily trafficked White Street.

How soon the new restaurant would open was not immediately clear on Friday, except that it is expected to open by mid-summer, a Sonic spokesperson said.

Were excited to bring the Sonic brand and all the craveable flavors our menu offers to the Danbury community, said spokesman Brent Reams.

When Sonic opens, it is required to arrange for its own traffic control.

(Sonic) shall be required to hire a private duty police officer to manage traffic at the driveway entrance during the grand opening, reads a letter from the citys Planning and Zoning Department. The timing details, including the daily shifts and the number of days, shall be determined by the City of Danbury Traffic Authority.

On Friday, workers were renovating the facade of the empty brick-faced building at 172 White St. that has housed a handful of eateries over the years, dating to an Arthur Treachers Fish and Chips in 1975.

The facade work is part of $150,000 worth of renovations planned for the restaurant and the 1-acre lot.

A decade ago, the city was courting a Sonic restaurant on Newtown Road, but the deal fell through. An enthusiastic then-Mayor Mark Boughton said the disappointment among residents who were looking forward to Sonic in Danbury was overwhelming.

The new location across the street from WestConns entrance gate is a four-minute walk from the Danbury Courthouse.

Its been at the top of the communitys mind to see something positive move in there, and its exciting to see Sonic is moving forward, Prunty said. This speaks to the growth of the local economy as it pertains to restaurants and hospitality.

Sonics newest Connecticut site in Danbury will join other Sonic locations in New Milford, Milford, Bristol, Manchester and Wallingford.

rryser@newstimes.com 203-731-3342
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

STRATFORD  Officials at Health Care Advocates International, a hybrid doctors office and LGBTQ+ and HIV advocacy center, are focused on one thing among their many campaigns: Fighting the stigma.

Everything is about fighting the stigma and discrimination, said Gary Blick, the practices chief medical officer.

Blick, who has been practicing in town since 2016, first met with an HIV patient in 1987. Then one became two, two became four and before he knew it, Blick had 150 HIV patients. He also practiced in Greenwich and Norwalk before opening a practice in Stratford.

HCAIs medical office, located on the second floor at 2595 Main St., serves as a primary care office with a focus on LGBTQ+ and HIV patients.

Its mission is to inform, empower, mobilize, and engage populations and communities who are currently being left behind in order to see an end to HIV/AIDS as a global health threat by 2030, its website says.

One of those campaigns, the Zimbabwe Aids Project, started with an AIDS conference held in Africa in 2000 that Blick had attended, he said. At the time, he thought he would never go back to the continent, so he visited Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe and Gaborone, Botswana for a safari while he was there.

Along his journey he met a man named Cryface, who would later send him a letter saying he was HIV positive. He was trying to have a child with his wife, but they lost the child to AIDS two months later, Blick said.

After further communication, Blick sent the couple treatments. They were then able to have a son who was HIV negative, Tichaona, who is Blicks godson. A picture of his seventh birthday party hangs on the wall at the practice.

From there, Blick started ZAP, a campaign that includes an HIV treatment center in Victoria Falls where they have provided healthcare to nearly 9,000 people, according to practices website.

Getting the clinic back to being an HIV treatment center  after serving as a COVID-19 isolation ward in recent years  is one of its upcoming projects.

I just think for all of us to keep on our mission, its really important to get back to the basics, Blick said. And thats what we do in Zimbabwe is the basics of saving lives, saving one child at a time and getting antiviral therapy out there.

While the medical services are upstairs, there are also other services on the ground level. There is the Koop Community Pharmacy, named after former surgeon general C. Everett Koop, and the expression space.

The expression space is a donation center where people can give clothing, books, shoes or even luggage in some cases, Executive Director Pattie McKnight said. It serves as a clothing pantry of sorts, she said.

It is styled similarly to a store, with an organized area with racks and shelves to get closer to a shopping experience, said Lenny Courtemanche, director of global prevention, outreach and advocacy. This is to help keep some dignity in the experience for the people who need it, he said.

You could come in and know that its cleaned, its pressed, you were noticed, he said. If we dont have it, well try and get it for you.

McKnight, who oversees the practices advocacy side, said the group is running multiple campaigns right now, including transgender community sensitivity training events with schools and corporate organizations and a binder drive where they have collected over 200 binders. A binder is a piece of clothing often used by transgender, gender fluid and gender non-conforming people to flatten breast tissue.

The practice will also have a float in New York Citys Pride Parade on June 26, McKnight said.

The clinic has also supported local youth gay-straight alliances and LGBTQ+ groups, like those at Stratford and Bunnell high schools, McKnight said. They go to these groups and ask them what they want and need funded, like gay proms, dinner events and other parties.

We want to support that so that they know that someone chose them, McKnight said. And it doesn't matter how they identify, we just want to help them.

mike.mavredakis@hearstmediact.com
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

A Brookfield woman has been accused of breaking into dozens of cars and injuring seven officers during a chase from Waterbury to Monroe on Sunday, police said.

Waterbury police said they took Hannah Casperson, 25, into custody Sunday in Monroe where she had crashed a Hummer she had used to ram several cruisers earlier that morning to evade authorities.

Casperson was originally wanted in Wolcott where police said she and a man broke into 41 vehicles early Friday morning.

This is a terrible situation that we just had to deal with, Waterbury Police Chief Fernando Spagnolo said Monday. I think that all the officers involved did a spectacular job.

He said the seven officers, whose injuries included contusions and strained backs, have been released from the hospital, but they all have not yet returned to work. Those injuries were caused by motor vehicle crashes and airbags going off, the chief said.

Eight Waterbury police vehicles were struck during the pursuit, with damages totaling around $135,000, according to Spagnolo.

The pursuit ended in Monroe early Sunday after Casperson attempted to make a turn on Route 111, striking several Waterbury police cruisers, Spagnolo said Monday. She veered-off one of the police vehicles, causing the Hummer she was driving to roll and strike a utility pole, the chief said.

The chief said Casperson was apprehended after she tried to run away from the crash. She was hospitalized with injuries that included a broken femur and a dislocated hip and was in stable condition on Monday, police said.

Those were injuries that were caused by the accident, Spagnolo said.

At one point during the pursuit, an officer had cornered Casperson on a dead-end road off East Main Street in Waterbury, using his cruiser to block the end of the street and approached the car on foot, according to body-camera footage released Monday.

I got the street blocked, youre not going anywhere, the officer says, according to the video.

The officer tried to open the Hummers door, which appears to be locked. The Hummer then takes off away from the officer as he runs in pursuit. The white SUV rams the officers car, driving up onto the side of the cruiser, the video shows.

While aiming his handgun at the SUV, the officer can be heard shouting at the driver to put the vehicle in park, the video shows. The SUV then drives through a gap between the cruiser and a building, the video shows.

The chief commended that officer, whom he did not identify, for not firing his weapon.

There came a point in time where this officers life was in jeopardy, he feared for his life, he drew his weapon. He had the fortitude, he had the stamina not to use deadly physical force although he was faced with deadly physical force, and I commend that officers actions, Spagnolo said.

A spokesperson for Inspector General Robert Devlin, the state official charged with investigating police use-of-force incidents, said Monday the office is not investigating the incident.

Waterbury police said Casperson has been charged with assault on a police officer, engaging in a pursuit, reckless endangerment, disobeying an officers signal, interfering with an officer, and criminal attempt at an assault on a police officer. She is also facing a number of motor vehicle offenses, according to police.

The Hummer is registered to a member of Caspersons family, according to police, and city officials are looking into what might be covered by the vehicles insurance.

Its unclear if Wolcott police have charged Casperson for her alleged role in the break-ins. However, they have charged the man they said smashed the windows of the vehicles that were broken into.

Police identified the man as 31-year-old Thomas Crawford, of Naugatuck. Spagnolo said he did not know if the two were a couple, but said they are believed to be tied to thefts in the Waterbury area that have occurred in the past month.

Those alleged crimes include the thefts of parking meters and what Spagnolo described as smash-and-grab thefts in Waterbury.

Casperson has not yet been interviewed by police, Spagnolo said.

But officials said Crawford has been cooperating with their investigation. Crawford was charged with 41 counts each of third-degree burglary, conspiracy at third-degree burglary, conspiracy at and sixth-degree larceny and second-degree criminal mischief.

He admitted everything, Wollcott Police Chief Edward Stephens said during Mondays press conference.

Wolcott police said Crawford was arrested around 11:30 a.m. Friday at a grocery store as he was heading toward the exit with a cartload of meat. Waterbury police had informed authorities that the white Hummer believed to have been involved in the car burglaries had been seen heading north into Wolcott.

He had been wearing the same coat that he wore when committing crimes in area towns, Wolcott police said.

Crawford had a device for breaking car windows in his pocket when he was taken into custody, Stephens said.

He was ready to go out the door, but evidently (Casperson) had seen the police pulling into the lot. She fled, Stephens said, describing Crawfords arrest. My detectives got out, they knew theres only one person in the car, so they figured he was in the store. He added that Crawford was found near the door with a carriage containing a pile of meat.

Stephens said Wolcott police pursued Casperson as she fled the parking lot, but the chase was called off because it was not a violent crime.

On Sunday morning, Waterbury police said they received information about the location of the Hummer and Casperson.

Police said they responded to the area of Rutledge and East Main streets where Casperson was located behind the wheel of the Hummer. From there, officials said, the chase ensued.

Following the chase, Casperson was taken into custody by Waterbury police and transported to St. Vincents Medical Center in Bridgeport.

Court records on the states judicial website show Casperson has one previous case pending in Danbury Superior Court for interfering with an officer/resisting. Casperson has pleaded not guilty to the charge stemming from the incident that occurred Nov. 20, 2021, court records show.
Great Rooms A visual diary by Design Editor Wendy Goodman. Exterior: Architect Paul Lester Wiener built the courtyard glass-and-steel house for Robert and Ethel Scull in 1962. Lisa Perry discovered it for sale on Instagram and was determined to save it. Photo: Jordan Tiberio

In the middle of the pandemic, a bit restless in her country home in North Haven, Lisa Perry was itching for a new project. I wasnt looking to buy another house; that was the last thing I needed, the designer and collector told me. But I wanted somewhere to go that was creative and inspirational and just an office studio. Then one day, while scrolling real-estate agent Esteban Gomezs Instagram account, she found a challenge she was uniquely suited for in the form of a listing: While its in need of repairs and restoration, the qualities of the design, the provenance, and its history really do give it merit for you to tackle this assignment.

The modernist glass-and-steel courtyard home in question was designed by architect Paul Lester Wiener, a German-emigre architect and planner whose projects included the high modernist slabs of Washington Square Village. He and his family spent summers on Long Island during the 50s up to his death in 1967; it was there that he designed elegant glass pavilions for clients including longtime Vogue editor Beatrice Simpson (known as Babs) in 1963.

This one was originally designed for the influential Pop Art collectors Ethel and Robert Scull in 1962  great pedigree given that Lisa and her husband, Richard Perry, are themselves collectors. Not only that but the design had an uncanny resemblance to the house Perry grew up in, with its glass walls and steel beams. It made me feel like I was home, she says.

Another less attuned buyer might not have respected the house, but I decided to stay true to the original architecture and design as much as possible, Perry says. She did expand a kitchen and created a breakfast area by taking over of one of the bedrooms. She also repurposed the dilapidated laundry and storage room into guest quarters too, adding a kitchen there.

Perry decided to use it as a gallery and artist in residency for women creatives and named it Onna House, which is open by appointment. The mid-century Hamptons was full of artists, but it was a male-dominated scene. How about they were setting up the shows! Perry says, referring to artists Lee Krasner and Elaine de Kooning. They were doing their own work at that time and they werent able to show it. The work Perry is exhibiting includes pieces from a mix of local and international artists, including Almond Zigmund, Toni Ross, Kelly Behun, Nodoka Yamaura, and Nina Cho.

Perrys enclave of artists keeps growing thanks in part to the help and guidance of friends including Russ Steele, an antiques dealer in East Hampton; Tripoli Patterson, who runs the Tripoli Gallery; Joh Siff; and Patricia Assui Reed, the owner of Matriark in Sag Harbor.

The Living Room has many of its original details including the aluminum sliding doors. The lighting you see here, the beautiful black sconces, the little shelves that the sculptures sit on, the floors  theyre all original, says Perry. The table, chairs, and backbench at the far wall are by Anna Karlin; the hand-knotted rug was designed by Anni Albers; and the freestanding bench is by Charlotte Perriand. Mary Little did the white textile on the back wall. The Tea Room: In the tearoom, Janine Abraham designed the sculptural 60s rattan chairs; the silk-and-bamboo wall hanging is by Mitsuko Asakura (2016). The porcelain teapot is by Isabel Rower.

The Gallery: Kyoto-based artist Nodoka Yamauras piece, Circle of Life (2021), made with panels of Japanese mulberry/kozo paper, is in the center of the window. Lisbeth McCoys Epistrophy (2021), black collage on board and wood, is on the right wall, and behind that is her hanging sculpture, Bumppo II (2017), in the corner, made of plaster on burlap, wax, paper, painted wire, and string. Nina Chos Recess Table (2020) is beneath Lisbeth McCoys You Neednt (2021), which is paint on wood panel, mounted on canvas.

The Kitchen: The site-specific installation between the windows was done by Almond Zigmund, applying mulberry paper and acrylic paint directly on the walls. The 1970s ebonized ash table and chairs are Charles Rennie MacKintosh designs, made by Cassina. The working side of the kitchen features a regimen of open shelving and an edited palette. The Guest Quarters features Natalie Munks Little Blue Dragon (2005), acrylic and enamel on canvas to the left of the bed, and her Carmen (2002) to the right. The other side of the guest quarters has a new kitchen. The artwork on the wall is by Bastienne Schmidt. Photographs by Jordan Tiberio
A group of Google apps, including Chrome, is seen in this file photo. gettyimagesbank



By Park Jae-hyuk



Google faced criticism from Korea's internet users once again for not fixing an error in Chrome promptly, despite their continuous complaints over the past few days.



After the U.S. tech giant updated its web browser to version 100 last week to enhance security, Korean users complained about a problem when doing a search for Korean words through Chrome's address bar, in which it autocompleted their previous search words without erasing them automatically, even if users wanted to search different words.



The error did not occur when typing Roman letters into Chrome's address bar.



According to users, Microsoft Edge and Naver Whale showed the same problems, as the web browsers are also based on Google's Chromium open-source web browser project.



Some Korean users of Chrome said that they had tried to fix the error by deleting their web browser histories and turning off the autocomplete function.



However, their efforts did not work, aggravating the inconvenience.



Although some users reported the bug to Google Chrome Help Center last week, the company did not respond immediately.



"I returned Chrome to the previous version, due to the autocomplete function," one internet user wrote online.



This is not the first time Koreans have complained about Chrome when doing searches of Korean words.



In 2020, when users typed in Korean words on Google's search engine using Chrome, the web browser's autocomplete function caused the duplication of the first letter.



As a result, users had to erase the first letter manually, whenever they did a search for a Korean word.



Back then, there was also no problem when users typed in Roman letters.



"Those errors caused speculation that Google is indifferent to the Korean market," another user said.



Data compiled by a web traffic analysis website, StatCounter, showed that Chrome accounted for 52.75 percent of Korea's web browser market in January, followed by Apple Safari with 13.5 percent, Samsung Internet with 13.22 percent, Naver Whale with 9.43 percent, Microsoft Edge with 7.29 percent and Microsoft Internet Explorer with 1.23 percent.




By Kim Hyun-bin



Major conglomerates have been emphasizing the need for investment diversification during their regular general shareholders' meetings, vowing to strengthen growth engines through mergers and acquisitions (M&A).



SK hynix Vice Chairman Park Jung-ho met with reporters after a regular shareholders' meeting held last week and said, "We are discussing ways to jointly invest with other companies for an M&A deal concerning Arm."





SK hynix Vice Chairman Park Jung-ho

A world-class U.K. semiconductor design company, Arm is an intellectual property seller that makes basic semiconductor designs and provides them to manufacturing companies for royalties. Arm's blueprint is used in the application processors of 90 percent of smartphones worldwide and 85 percent of tablets.



If SK hynix jointly acquires Arm, it can take control of its core technologies. The largest shareholder of Arm is SoftBank of Japan.



SK hynix already signed an acquisition agreement last October with Key Foundry, an 8-inch foundry semiconductor consignment production company, and completed the first acquisition of Intel's NAND division for $9 billion in December.



Investment and business diversification have also been popping up as major issues at the shareholders' meetings.



"We will diversify our investment portfolio into mobility and future technology-based industries," Cho Hyun-bum, chairman of Hankook & Company, said during his company's shareholders' meeting last week.



Hankook & Company announced a new business development plan to acquire a stake in Preciseley Microtechnology, a Canadian micro-precision machinery company.



Preciseley Microtechnology specializes in the design of optical microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), which are used for LiDAR, 5G optical communication network, autonomous driving and medical imaging equipment.



Through the acquisition, Hankook & Company plans to expand to solutions and parts for autonomous vehicles, including optical communication parts.



LG Group Chairman Koo Kwang-mo also announced that his group will focus on upgrading its business portfolio this year.





LG Group Chairman Koo Kwang-mo
There are some tales so harrowing that, try as you might, you can never forget them.

Perhaps you shouldnt. The ordeal of Natalya, a Ukrainian woman, is such a story.

Until recently, Natalya  not her real name  lived in a rural cottage not far from Kyiv, with her husband Andrey and their four-year old son Oleksii.

On March 8, Russian troops entered their village. Natalya hung a white sheet outside their house to show that a harmless family lived there.

But the next morning her nightmare began. First, the Russians shot the family dog; then they shot Andrey, leaving his body by the gate.

They shut Oleksii in the boiler room and told him they would kill Natalya if he came out.

Then they raped Natalya, one after the other. They left, then returned, and raped her again.

By the third time they were so drunk they could barely stand.

Pictured: People gather outside the Ukrainian embassy in Yerevan, Armenia to mourn civilians found dead in the town of Bucha, to the northwest of Kyiv, on April 4, 2022

That gave Natalya her chance to escape, she told a British newspaper last week, ushering her terrified little boy past his fathers body, out of the gate and down the road to safety.

Even amid the horror of Russias war in Ukraine  where new images of atrocities and devastation emerge every day  Natalyas story makes heartrending reading.

It is said that the country is now a giant crime scene.

On Sunday, Human Rights Watch revealed it had found evidence of war crimes being committed by Russian troops in Ukraine, including rapes and summary executions.

Mass executions are alleged in Bucha and other towns. Across Ukraine, crimes such as those committed against Natalyas family are, sadly, likely to be all too common.

Sources in the country have reported dozens of women being gang-raped by Russian soldiers, from young girls to pensioners.

Some have allegedly been executed afterwards; others have taken their lives.

War is hell, said the US Civil War general William Sherman. He was right, but sadly the most terrible circle of that inferno is often reserved for people who least deserve it  women and children caught up in the conflict.

Rape and war have always gone hand-in-hand. In one of the first written works of history, Herodotuss Histories, the author describes how the Phoenicians and Greeks kidnapped their enemies wives and daughters, turning them into chattels.

Similarly, one of the foundational moments of Roman history, recorded by the historian Livy, was the Rape of the Sabine Women.

The story goes that the Romans had run out of young women of their own so they kidnapped virgins from neighbouring cities.

For generations, people thought this a wonderfully entertaining subject, fit for small boys Latin lessons.

It was so popular with painters that there are numerous celebrated versions, from Rubens and Poussin to Degas and Picasso.

Once again, though, its worth considering what this event actually involved.

The screaming, the terror, the brutality and the trauma would be only too familiar to millions of women in human history.

Some of the worst atrocities are so dreadful that you shrink from picturing them.

When the central Asian warlord Timur the Lame  better known as Tamerlane  burst out of the steppes in the late 14th century, his troops became notorious for their violence to women.

Sacking Aleppo in the autumn of 1400, for example, his Tatar soldiers herded all the female citizens into the courtyard of the Great Mosque and gang-raped them for hours on end.

Then they slaughtered them, piling their heads into pyramids of skulls.

Where does violence like this come from? Is it an inevitable part of war?

Or does it reflect something deeper, more primal, some terrible evolutionary impulse?

In essence, there are really three schools of thought.

The first is that wartime rape is a form of male bonding, tying soldiers together through violent rituals.

By humiliating their enemies wives and daughters, young men build a stronger group identity of their own.

The second is that rape is basically political  a deliberate, coldblooded policy of breaking the enemys morale, destroying their sense of identity and, in the long term, replacing one gene pool with another.

And the third  and perhaps most disturbing  is that rape is rooted in masculinity itself.

Sickening: A woman lies dead in Bucha where hundreds of civilians were massacred

This was the argument of the US feminist writer Susan Brownmiller, who suggested that war provides men with the perfect psychological backdrop to give vent to their contempt for women.

Men who rape, she wrote, are ordinary Joes, made unordinary by entry into the most exclusive male-only club in the world.

Perhaps the answer is some combination of all of them, depending on the circumstances.

But to the victims  dehumanised, humiliated, brutalised by the ultimate demonstration of male power over women  the effect is the same, whatever the cause.

In case youre wondering whether some races have been worse than others, by the way, the answer is no.

Europeans, Africans and Asians are all as guilty as each other.

Ill come later to the horrific atrocities carried out by the Red Army in Germany in 1945, but its worth emphasising that this wasnt the first time such things had happened on central European soil.

Europes history is littered with outrages such as the Sack of Magdeburg in 1631, when the troops of the Holy Roman Empire rampaged unchecked for four days, gang-raping thousands of women and children.

Afterwards they slaughtered their victims without the slightest pity.

To prevent disease, their commanders ordered them to dump the bodies into the River Elbe, but there were so many that it took them two weeks.

Beforehand, the population of Magdeburg had been 25,000. Afterwards, it was 449.

The centuries go by; the terrible stories pile up, from French and, yes, British atrocities during the Napoleonic Wars to assaults by Union and Confederate soldiers alike during the American Civil War.

But the most detailed and horrific accounts in war come from the 20th century, the age of the world wars.

Entirely understandably, we remember the Second World War as a noble crusade against the forces of evil.

But its worth stressing that no army was entirely innocent.

We rarely remember that British soldiers raped local women in liberated Italy, Belgium and Holland or that French colonial troops were accused of raping 7,000 women after the battle of Monte Cassino.

Nor do we remember that American GIs are estimated to have raped 11,400 women and children in occupied Germany.

But the most notorious acts of rape in wartime Europe were carried out by the Russians.

When the Red Army tore into Hitlers Germany, their commanders ordered them to show no mercy and treat the vanquished as wild beasts  and they did.

Reading the historian Antony Beevors account of the fall of the Third Reich, the shocking thing is the unbridled impunity with which the Soviet forces raped their way through Germany.

Soldiers dont believe in individual liaisons with German women, one Soviet major wrote in his diary. Nine, ten, 12 men at a time  they rape them on a collective basis.

In Berlin, writes Beevor, nuns, young girls, old women, pregnant women and mothers who had just given birth were all raped without pity... Sometimes the greatest danger came from one mother giving away the hiding place of other girls in a desperate bid to save her own daughter. Older Berliners still remember the screams every night.

Some women attached themselves to individual Russian soldiers in a desperate attempt to escape the mobs.

But when their protectors were on patrol, the women were hauled out of their hiding places for collective torture.

The figures are truly horrifying. Estimates of rape victims from Berlins two main hospitals range from 95,000 to 130,000.

A German doctor worked out that perhaps 10,000 Berlin women died afterwards.

Some died from internal injuries, but most died by their own hand, such was their trauma and shame.

Altogether, says Beevor, at least two million German women are thought to have been raped, and a substantial minority, if not a majority, appear to have suffered multiple rape.

Afterwards, in Russia, there was a widespread sick joke about a Red Army officer who came home after the war, but couldnt perform in bed.

The punchline was that he was only cured after his wife put her clothes on and began to fight back.

Volunteers unload from a van bags containing bodies of civilians, who according to residents were killed by Russian army soldiers, after they collected them from the streets to gather them at a cemetery before they take them to the morgue, amid Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in Bucha, the Kyiv region

Yet even now the Kremlin denies the rapes happened at all and the Russian authorities ban books that argue otherwise.

As this weeks story from Ukraine suggests, things havent changed.

A basic rule, I think, is that the more chaotic and undisciplined the army, the more cruel and bullying its officers, the more likely it is that its soldiers will descend into barbarism.

In her harrowing book Our Bodies, Their Battlefield, the war correspondent Christina Lamb recounts the stories of rape victims in more recent conflicts.

During the Rwandan genocide of the 1990s, for instance, there were hundreds of rapes every day, with the victims ages ranging from two to 75.

Behind each of these statistics was a real person, abused and humiliated.

Lamb kicks off her account with the appalling story of a Yazidi girl called Naima, who was captured by ISIS in Iraq just after she turned 18.

Taken to the city of Mosul, Naima was bought in a grotesque auction by a fat 60-year-old man with a vicious curl to his lips who paid $200.

For the next few weeks, the fat man raped her. Then he sold her to another Iraqi, who also raped her before selling her on.

By now, the price had reached $8,000. On and on it went. In all, Naima passed through the homes of 12 men, all of whom raped her.

She tried to kill herself, swallowing a vial of tablets. But still I woke up, she says. I felt even death didnt want me.

In this case, there was an obvious ideological dimension.

For these ISIS fanatics, rape was a way of dehumanising the Yazidis, stripping them of their honour and impregnating them with future Muslims.

But when you survey the landscape of 20th and 21st century warfare, the disturbing thing is that there isnt an obvious pattern.

Before war began, many rapists had been perfectly ordinary civilians.

But when the shackles were off, they yielded to their basest impulses, as if the experience of battle had unleashed some dormant beast.

The Norwegian scholar Inger Skjelsbk studied the cases of soldiers accused of rape in Bosnia in the 1990s.

By and large, they generally considered rape something normal that happens in war.

Some thought they had behaved chivalrously because they had let their victims live.

Others quite seriously claimed their victims had been in love with them.

None of this, of course, excuses the behaviour of Vladimir Putins barbarians.

Taught to hate and trained to kill, the Russians have behaved in Ukraine with appalling ferocity, making a mockery of their flimsy claims to Slavic brotherhood.

One day, I hope, Putins killers will face justice alongside the bullies and kleptocrats who threw them into battle.

And I pray that one day Natalya finds peace after her dreadful ordeal. Yet the deeper lesson is more disturbing.

Most historians agree that war is an indelible part of the human condition. Yet at the same time most believe rape is a grimly inevitable element of war.

So what does that tell you about the nature of man? I wouldnt go as far as the radical feminist Marilyn French, who famously claimed that all men were rapists.

But, as Antony Beevor once remarked when discussing the Red Armys crimes in Germany, its only too easy to point the finger at the atrocities of others.

Can any of us be certain, beyond any possible doubt, that if we were similarly brutalised and exhausted, far from home, with a gun in our hands and our comrades urging us on, we would turn and walk away?

Given what we know about so many people in human history, can we be sure that wed do the right thing?

That, surely, is the most frightening thought of all.
Sophie Delezio won the hearts of millions around Australia after surviving two horrific car accidents as a toddler.

Now an ambitious young woman, Ms Delezio celebrated her 21st birthday on Sunday alongside her partner and childhood friend Joseph Salerno.

'Turning 21 does feel huge,' Ms Delezio told Woman's Day.

'I had no idea where I was going to be (at this age), mainly because of my journey. But I've tried to not have too many expectations and just live in the moment.'

At just two years old in 2003 Ms Delezio was involved in a serious car crash when a vehicle rammed into her Sydney childcare centre.

Sophie Delezio (pictured), who was lucky to make it past 5 years of age after two horrific car accidents, celebrated her 21st birthday on Sunday

Last year Ms Delezio and boyfriend Joseph Salerno (left) confirmed they have been in a relationship for a year, after first meeting as children 15 years ago

The brave toddler was left fighting for her life and suffered third degree burns to 85 per cent of her body.

She lost an ear, the fingers on her right hand and both feet as she was placed in a coma for three months.

But after a remarkable recovery, disaster struck again in 2006 when Sophie was thrown 18 metres from her wheelchair as she crossed a road.

She suffered bleeding on the brain, a heart attack and severe injuries, including a broken jaw, fractured shoulder, and a tear to her lung. She also lost her sense of smell.

She went on to get her driver's license before moving to London to study sociology and international relations at SOAS University.

In February she celebrated Valentine's Day sharing a photo of herself holding a rose from an admirer on Instagram.

The then-two-year-old was left fighting for her life at the age of two after she was trapped beneath a burning car, which crashed into her daycare centre in 2003 (pictured leaving hospital after recovering from the horrific crash in 2004)

Last year Ms Delezio and Mr Salerno confirmed they have been in a relationship for a year, after first meeting as children 15 years ago.

'Everyone's dream is to fall in love with their best friend. It's something you often only see in the movies,' Sophie told Woman's Day previously.

The pair were close friends as teenagers but a romance only developed when she returned from studying in the United Kingdom last year.

'It was around two weeks after she had come home, we were hanging out a lot and I remember it was one night I was cooking her pasta and I thought to myself, ''Hang on, I think I feel something here'',' Joseph said.

Sophie added: 'I awkward laugh a lot when I don't know what to say or do. I was so shocked, I had no clue. But I knew I had felt something for him and I've always wanted him in my life. He's my best friend.'

Sophie and Joseph plan to move in together, after a trip to meet his grandparents in New Zealand, and admit they enjoy a 'quiet life' together, playing cards, cooking, watching movies and going away for long weekends.

She called this latest chapter in her tumultuous life 'a beautiful restart'.

Sophie Delezio (pictured right in both photos) has been close friends with her now-boyfriend Joseph Salerno (left in both) for many years

Sophie has lived in the spotlight since she was a child, after surviving two devastating car accidents.

Sophie has been the poster girl for the Day of Difference Foundation since 2004, which raised over $14million for child accident victims.

Last year her remarkable survival story featured again on national TV, drawing over 600,000 viewers on Ahn's Brush With Fame.

Sophie feels lucky all the media attention hasn't been a barrier for Joseph.

'I know a lot of people would be scared of that. So that's why I wanted to leave it up to him to announce it, because while I've accepted that my life has been in the media, it's new to him, and I didn't want to make him uncomfortable.'

Sophie Delezio (pictured at front, far right) with teenage friends. Her boyfriend Joseph Salerno is pictured back row, top left

Sophie Delezio (pictured at 19) appeared on the ABC program Anh's brush with fame to discuss her life

She has been the focal point for road safety media coverage and campaigns for many years - but Joseph is used to it since the couple were close friends since high school.

They did drama class together at Oxford Falls Grammar when they were both 14.

He said people are drawn to Sophie because she is 'a joyful' person.
Confectionary brand Chupa Chups is launching an ice cream version of its popular Strawberry & Cream flavoured lollipops.

The delicious strawberry and vanilla ice cream swirl is scooped into a waffle cone and sold in a four pack for $8.50.

The ice cream will be distributed by Australian dairy company Bulla Dairy Foods and will feature chunks of crushed candy and a delectable strawberry sauce drizzled atop.

Confectionary brand Chupa Chups is launching an ice cream version of its popular Strawberry & Cream flavoured lollipops

The ice cream will be distributed by Australian dairy company Bulla Dairy Foods and will feature chunks of crushed candy and a delectable strawberry sauce drizzled atop

Poll Are you excited for the new Chupa Chups ice cream? YES, I love Strawberries and Cream NO, I prefer my Chupa Chups in lollipop form Are you excited for the new Chupa Chups ice cream? YES, I love Strawberries and Cream 16 votes

NO, I prefer my Chupa Chups in lollipop form 3 votes Now share your opinion





Bulla Dairy Foods is one of Australia's oldest family dairy companies and has ensured each product is made with fresh, local milk and cream.

The ice cream packs are presently available in independent grocers and will be distributed Australia wide by Woolworths from May 2.

Many are excited to get their hands on the popular ice cream.

'I'm so excited for this,' wrote one woman. 'I'm going straight to the ice cream aisle during my next trip to Woolies.'

'My kids are going to eat me out of house and home with this,' said another. 'But at least it looks delicious!'

The strawberry and vanilla swirl is scooped into a waffle cone and sold in a four-pack for $8.50

But others weren't as pleased with the Chupa Chups's latest release.

'Why is it a bad thing to specialise nowadays?' asked one man. 'They should stick to lollipops.'

'It's really not like we needed ANOTHER strawberries and cream flavoured ice cream,' said another. 'It would be news if they had a new flavour.'

A third complained, 'why are candy companies coming out with new ways to rot our teeth faster?'
Crown Princess Mary of Denmark has made a sentimental alteration to her engagement ring since her wedding to Prince Frederik in 2004.

The ring was designed to match the national flag of Denmark and originally featured a 1.5 carat emerald-cut diamond positioned between two emerald cut rubies.

But over time, Princess Mary has updated the ring by adding two diamond baguettes, said to represent the couple's four children.

The ring has increased in value by around $17,468 since she made these additions.

Taking a close look at the stunning ring, the jewellery experts at Steven Stone Jewellers reveal what the alteration could symbolise.

Since her wedding to Prince Frederik in 2004, Crown Princess Mary of Denmark has made a sentimental alteration to her engagement ring

THEN: The ring was designed to match the national flag of Denmark and originally featured a 1.5 carat emerald-cut diamond positioned between two emerald cut rubies (pictured)

NOW: The ring has increased in value by around 10,000 GBP ($17,468 AUD) since she made some small additions

Steven Stone Jewellers diamond expert Maxwell Stone said: 'With a 1.50 carat emerald-cut diamond centre stone, sat between two 70-point emerald cut rubies, Princess Mary of Denmark's stunning engagement ring originally had an estimated value of $40,000.

'Since her wedding, the Crown Princess has added two 50-point diamond baguettes, which have undoubtedly increased the value and I'd estimate this to be $50,000.

'When we see a ring with multiple stones like this, they typically represent something and it's likely that Princess Mary's alteration is a sentimental one, with the four stones reportedly representing the couple's four children.'

He added that Meghan Markle also opted to tweak her eternity ring by 'updating it' with the birthstones of Prince Harry and Archie.

Last week Princess Mary shocked royal fans after she was spotted having lunch and shopping in Melbourne with her long-time best friend Amber Petty, who was also a bridesmaid at her wedding to Prince Frederik.

The 50-year-old from Hobart, Tasmania, returned to Australia flying a Thai Airways flight several days ago, as reported by the Sydney Morning Herald.

On Friday she was spotted wandering Brighton, 11km south-east of Melbourne, with Petty and another acquaintance.

A relaxed Princess Mary was spotted wandering Brighton in Melbourne with friends

Romantic: On May 14, 2004, Mary married her Prince in a lavish ceremony attended by royals - and media - from across the globe in Copenhagen Cathedral in the Danish capital

The three friends appeared relaxed as they spoke on the corner in front of Brighton Schoolhouse down St Andrews Street - opposite where Princess Mary and Petty dined for lunch two days ago.

The Danish royal opted for a comfortable, casual look wearing blue flared jeans, a white button-up shirt and the small textured-leather Gate shoulder bag from Loewe worth $3,550.

The Australian advertising executive, who remains close to Princess Mary, saw the beginning of her friend's fairytale romance with Frederik, 52, which she details in her new book, This Is Not A Love Song

On Wednesday the royal graced Brighton's The Pantry with her presence as she dined on a light lunch before traipsing down the suburb's main shopping district for some retail therapy.

Wearing Chanel ballet flats, a white blouse and high waisted white denim trousers she looked angelic according to onlookers, reports The Herald Sun, pausing to browse in HOSS, Carla Zampatti, Saba and Morrisson.

One fan who was in Scanlan Theodore at the time the royal strode in said she walked out with a new designer suit.

With only a small security detail and her bridesmaid Petty by her side the surprise visit went unnoticed by plenty of royal fans.

Amber Petty (right image: in bright pink) was a bridesmaid at Princess Mary's nuptials in 2004

It is understood by the publication that Princess Mary will fly on to Tasmania, where she was born and raised, to see family before heading back to Denmark.

She was last seen publicly at a media competition in Denmark on March 22, just over a week before her Melbourne jaunt.

Her last known visit to Australia was in 2017 on another private family holiday.
Beauty lovers are raving about a budget buy which is a perfect dupe for Charlotte Tilbury's much-hyped highlighter and contour wands.

Makeup fanatics are rushing to Woolworths to get their hands on MCoBeauty's $32 Highlight and Glow and Instant Contour Beauty Wands with one flying off the shelf every 30 seconds.

Beauty buffs on TikTok are going viral with their videos endorsing the wands and comparing the $32 buy to Charlotte Tilbury's $56 highlighter and contouring sticks.

Scroll down for video

Makeup enthusiasts are raving about MCoBeauty's $32 Highlight and Glow and Instant Contour Wands they claim is a perfect dupe of mega-popular Charlotte Tilbury products

A woman who goes by taydeee on TikTok, racked up more than 79,400 views for her review of MCoBeauty's dupe which she called 'stunning'.

Dozens of makeup lovers on TikTok have been causing a stir on the site after sharing their glowing reviews of the highlighting and contour wands.

A woman who goes by taydeee on TikTok, racked up more than 79,400 views for her take on MCoBeauty's dupes which she called 'stunning'.

She applied both the contour and the highlighting blush to her cheeks and pointed out the packaging and volume is near-identical to the Charlotte Tilbury version.

In her clip, the TikToker said the packaging, volume and application of the MCoBeauty wands were similar to that of Charlotte Tilbury's $56 version

'Look how similar the packaging is! And the same amount of product. Its got the same sponge tip like the Charlotte Tilbury one does,' she said in the clip.

'It's subtle - I really like it. First impression is that you need to buy this immediately.'

Many viewers in the comments were impressed with the end results and said they keen to get their hands on the wands themselves.

'Love your review! I will be on the lookout for these!' one fan said.

'Sis you just did us a public service thank you,' said another.

'Wow off to Woolworths I go,' commented a third.

MCoBeauty's Instant Contour Wand comes in two colours and is currently sold out on the website but some lucky shoppers may still be able to find it in stores

Other viewers from across Australia were saying the products have been quick to sell out at their local Woolworths.

In a second video, she showed how the her makeup fared through the day and called the blush highlighter a 'showstopper' for its durability.

Beauty influencer Ali Rose Gray said she was 'impressed' with the dupes in her video directly comparing the MCoBeauty wands with Charlotte Tilbury's.

'It's just so blendable and buildable like the blush dupe that they have,' she said about the contour cream.

MCoBeauty's Instant Contour Wand comes in two colours, light/medium and medium/dark, and is currently sold out on the website but some lucky shoppers may still be able to find it in stores.

The Highlight and Glow Beauty Wand is available in three shades, champagne, peach and pink and has been attracting rave reviews from buyers.

'Very nice formula, I love that this is so easy to blend but can also be layered up to where it looks blinding! Obsessed!' one person said.

MCoBeauty products are all under $40 and can be found at Woolworths, Big W, Best and Less and on their website.
A defiant mother has claimed her 10-week-old son is the 'UK's youngest student' after she ignored her university's ban and began taking him to every lecture.

Janine Adamson, 34, from Southampton, fell pregnant while applying for university and since little Tommy was born in January, she has been determined on not losing precious time with her newborn.

The student had initially planned to return to Solent University when Tommy was just two weeks old, but senior staff blocked the move branding it 'inappropriate'.

However, resilient Janine has disregarded their advice and now carries her baby to lectures in a sling, saying: 'It's more about our attachment than a financial decision. He's my baby and I want him close. I didn't want to jeopardise my son's bond with me because I still wanted an education, I'm trying to balance it all.'

The breastfeeding mother-of-three confessed defying the university left her fearing she would be 'kicked off the course', but she has now settled into a routine.

Janine Adamson, 34, from Southampton, has claimed her 10-week-old son is the 'UK's youngest student' after she ignored her university's 'ban' on babies and began taking him to every lecture

The mother-of-three fell pregnant while applying for university and since little Tommy was born in January, she has been determined on not losing precious time with her newborn

Janine had already deferred her plans to go to university when she was younger after having her two older children Bradley, now 16, and Maizie, 11, and now they were older she was ready to return to education.

The mother-of-three finished her watch-fixing job during the 2020 lockdown and decided to return to college to study criminal investigation with forensic psychology.

Janine said being on furlough during the 2020 lockdown gave her time to 're-evaluate her life'.

She joined a college access course in social science and humanities in 2020, before starting university for two days a week in October 2021.

Janine was met with reluctance from the university when she emailed them about bringing her young son to class

However, when she and partner Owen Roundell-Prince, 25, found out they were expecting a baby she was determined to not let this pregnancy halt any of her plans.

She explained: 'I started college because my other children were older, then I found I was pregnant, but I wasn't going to let that affect myself achieving what I set out to do.'

The 34-year-old planned to return to Solent University, with Tommy just two weeks after giving birth in January but senior staff sought to block the move by branding it inappropriate.

An email sent to Janine from a senior member of staff said: 'Having spoken with the criminology team and taken advice from the university more widely, including the Student Hub, I am afraid that our decision remains the same.

The mother-of-three finished her watch-fixing job during the 2020 lockdown and decided to return to college to study criminal investigation with forensic psychology

When she and partner Owen Roundell-Prince, 25, found out they were expecting a baby she was determined to not let this pregnancy halt any of her plans

'It is not appropriate for students to bring a baby to class on a regular basis. I appreciate that this is not the outcome you wanted and I am sorry that I'm not able to agree to your request.'

Solent University has since claimed they do permit babies and children on campus but requests are granted on a case-by-case basis and are subject to a risk assessment.

However, Janine emailed the university saying most of her work is done at home and she's only in class for a couple of hours a week for group discussions.

Despite the university's objections, the mother-of-three was determined, and even shared a TikTok video online of her first day back at university with Tommy.

After emailing the university with her objections about leaving her baby at home, the mother-of-three decided to start bringing him to lectures

The clip went viral with users clamouring to praise the mum's resilience and commitment to achieving her dream.

Janine said: 'At first I felt like I wasn't accepted there (in class), and I felt like any noise he made would get me kicked off the course.

'At week eight he started to be awake a lot more during lessons but because I'd been going long enough, I felt more comfortable and more at ease.'

'However, it's not the same as before. I do feel very isolated. My friends aren't the same anymore and I sit alone and do my own thing because my priority is Tommy now. I'm okay with that.

Janine said she was determined that having a young son wouldn't get in the way of her education at the university (pictured, baby Tommy)

'He'll be three when I graduate and I'll get a graduation cap and gown. Hopefully he'll graduate with me.'

However the mother-of-three has described Solent University's reluctance to allow her to bring Tommy into university as 'stressful' and worse than trying to juggle education with motherhood.

Janine added: 'I've felt like the university wanted to kick me out but there is no policy in place, so I've carried going with Tommy regardless.

'I asked my lecturers if they had any issues and they said it was fine. One of them wanted to confirm with [other senior staff], and then I got an email telling me I can't return with my baby.

She went on to share a video on TikTok as she brought her newborn into lectures, with the clip quickly going viral

'They said it wasn't fair on other students. When my lecturer told me I just broke down in tears and thought everything I've worked hard for has gone to waste.

'They told me that other students defer for a year, but I'm not most students. I've already deferred my life.

'They kept telling me to focus on my recovery so I just stopped communicating with them and went.

'I've not asked the university to support me in any other way apart from me just getting on with it.

Janine explained she feared the university 'wanted to kick her out' after she began taking her son to lectures, but said there was 'no policy in place'

'I didn't want anything from anyone, just to put my baby in a sling and carry on.'

Janine said one lecturer asked the class if anyone objected to the baby being in the class, but nobody spoke up so she stayed.

She explained: 'They're supporting me now but I feel like it's short term and I feel like eventually I'll have to find childcare, but I'm hoping something changes by then. I take each day as it comes.'

Janine hopes sharing her TikTok video will encourage universities to implement supportive policies for mums who would like to bring children to uni.

Janine said one lecturer asked the class if anyone objected to the baby being in the class, but nobody spoke up so she stayed

Her video has been viewed more than 1.5million times on TikTok with users full of admiration for the mother.

One user said: 'Wow. Amazing mama!!! You are unbelievably strong. I'm going back to uni after having my twins too.'

A second added: 'Such a beautiful thing. Would be such a special memory to have gone through uni with your little one!'

A third said: 'You're an amazing mum who wants to progress and make the best life.'

Janine hopes sharing her TikTok video, which has been watched 1.5m times, will encourage universities to implement supportive policies for mothers who would like to take babies to lectures

However, some users appeared to back Solent University's initial reluctance.

One user said: 'I'm not sure how I feel about this. Is it good for the baby to be squished up all day and when he cries, which he will? And that distracts the whole class.'

Another called Erika added: 'Pretty sure it's just in case the baby cries and causes a distraction that they don't want kids in there.'

A third added: 'I support you going back and it looks like the baby was lovely, quiet and asleep but what happens when he isn't? Those other students are also paying to be there.'

A spokesperson for Solent University said: 'The university is committed to supporting all students who are parents and permits babies and children on campus. However, the primary function and design of our campus is to provide teaching, learning and support for students.

Little Tommy is now ten-weeks-old and Janine has even declared he is the 'UK's youngest student' (pictured left and right)

'Babies are currently permitted in class if the student has pre-arranged this and has an agreement from the course team. A risk assessment, that includes health and safety considerations and an understanding of any potential disruptions to learning, is part of the process.

'Babies being on campus is currently managed on a case-by-case basis following discussions between the student (with baby) and course team.

'Students are encouraged to consider suspension of studies if they have a baby during the academic year. This is in line with maternity policies within the workplace and recognises the demands on new mothers and academic study.

'Should a student with a new-born not wish to suspend their studies, a discussion between them and the course team is necessary to establish how this will take place. This has always worked well in the past and we are looking to introduce a policy that will formalise our approach.'
Viewers said there are 'lessons to be learned' from Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan's hardline stance against Soviet Russia amid the current Ukraine crisis following a BBC documentary on the Cold War.

Thatcher and Reagan: A Very Special Relationship, which aired last night, examined the extremely close working relationship between the two leaders and their shared 'we win, they lose' philosophy'.

It prompted viewers to draw parallels between the Cold War and current conflict following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, saying the documentary makes them 'wonder where all the real politicians have gone'.

BBC viewers said there are 'lessons to be learned' from Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan's hardline stance on Soviet Russia amid the current Ukraine crisis

Viewers drew parallels between the Cold War and current conflict following Russia's invasion of Ukraine - saying the documentary serves as a 'poignant reminder of where we are today'

One tweeted: 'Just watching how Reagan and Thatcher dealt with Russia in the 80s worth watching, lessons to be learned!'

'Excellent programme on @BBC2 on Thatcher & Reagan .. A very special relationship leading up to and post the Falklands ! A poignant reminder of where we are today!' said another.

A third wrote: 'BBC2 really interesting about Thatcher / Reagan and how they dealt with Russia and Falklands etc. I was far too young to remember. A lesson or two could be learnt today I feel.'

'Thatcher and Reagan on @BBC2 makes interesting viewing in terms of how they stood militarily strong against a belligerent USSR. How times have changed,' said another.

Moore met Richard Allen, Raegan's Foreign policy Advisor, who shed light on the special relationship which saw the pair agree on 'nearly everything'. Reagan is pictured with Thatcher walking outside White House in July 1987

The politicians first met when Thatcher, then the Conservative Party's opposition leader, visited Raegan, the then governor of California, at the House of Commons in 1975.

Charles Moore, who wrote the former Prime Minister's authorised biography, said Reagan and Thatcher both believed the West had to deal with the Soviet threat from a position of strength, requiring massive expansion of the US nuclear arsenal and placement of missiles on British soil.

'The Cold War always constituted a tremendous threat to the future of the planet,' said Moore.

'It wasn't stable and I think many people thought you could not win the Cold War. By which I don't mean the West would therefore lose it, I think many people thought it was a given about the modern world and you couldn't really imagine it ending.

Viewers drew parallels between the Cold War and the invasion of Ukraine, and questioned whether Raegan and Thatcher's hardline approach would stand in good stead. Pictured, residents draw water from a well in Mariupol, in the south of the country, over the weekend

'Raegan and Thatcher, I think, thought they could, and this made them unusual.

'I think a lot of leaders were treading water about the Cold War and didn't think about how everything could open up and change, so Raegan and Thatcher were on to that which made them different.'

During the documentary, Moore met Richard Allen, Raegan's Foreign Policy Advisor, who shed light on the special relationship which saw the pair agree on 'nearly everything'.

'[They were] enormously at ease with each other from the get go,' Mr Allen said said.

'From the very start, they quickly became "Margaret and Ron". The personalities sparked, they were two peas in a pod which is a crude way of expressing how close their views were nearly about everything.

'The famous line that has come to characterise Raegan was his early theory about the Russians, the Soviets, "We win and they lose". Mrs. Thatcher shared that view completely.'

As Malcolm Rifkind, the Former Secretary of State for Scotland, explained, it was Thatcher's assertiveness in speeches against Soviet Russia which earned her the nickname 'The Iron Lady' in a Soviet military newspaper.

'Her instincts and basic convictions about the world as a whole and of how society should be operated made her very determined to take a firm, strong position if she ever became Prime Minister,' he said.

Viewers suggested a similarly hardline stance could be adopted when dealing with Putin (pictured last week)

In 1979, Thatcher was voted into power, with presenter Moore explaining that 'the general expectation is this wasn't going to work, that she wouldn't even last one term'.

By 1981, Raegan had followed Thatcher onto the world stage and ensured Thatcher was the first world leader he greeted officially.

Allen explained: 'We were in the Oval office I was giving a briefing and said "now Mr President, we have to make some decisions about the sequence in which leaders would be received". And our first thought was "Mrs. Thatcher".'

Raegan's Chief of Staff Joanne Drake added: 'I heard the President say many times, the first time he met her as president he wasn't nervous - because he felt like he was going to see an old friend, but I think the two of them shared an innate understanding of each other'.

Allen says that during their first official meeting: 'What to do about Eastern Europe was an important consideration', with both concerned about their predecessors failure to stop Soviet Russia expanding its nuclear arsenal.

They succeeded in installing cruise and Pershing missiles in Western Europe, meaning US missiles were installed in the UK in a deal to strengthen Natos nuclear deterrent.

Ken Adelman explained: 'The whole idea of the Euro missiles [the INF intermediate nuclear force] started because they had missiles aimed at our allies capitals.

'Therefore we're going to have to threaten their capitals. It was a very bold decision and Prime Minster Thatcher supported that decision.'

With nuclear resilience achieved, Raegan and Thatcher could bargain with Soviet Russia from a place of strength, as Lord Robin Butler explained: 'The posting of the intermediate nuclear weapons was an operation of which Margaret Thatcher attached great importance.

'Because it went to the heart of her belief that you negotiated with the Russians through strength'.

BBC2's Thatcher and Reagan: A Very Special Relationship is available on BBC iPlayer
A man who owns the 'world's smallest cars' has revealed how it's the 'most hilarious vehicle' to have as it 'gets lots of attention' - and it costs just 7 to fill up.

Alex Orchin, 31, drives around his Sussex village in his quirky blue Peel P50 and appeared on This Morning today to showcase the three-wheeler, which is the worlds smallest passenger car.

Co-presenter Dermot O'Leary drove around the TV studio in the vehicle, which is a replica of the 1960s classic motor, with the originals selling for over 100,000.

A man who owns the 'world's smallest cars' (pictured) has revealed how it's the 'most hilarious vehicle' to have as it 'gets lots of attention' - and it costs just 7 to fill up

Alex Orchin (pictured), 31, drives around his Sussex village in his quirky blue Peel P50 and appeared on This Morning today to showcase the three-wheeler, which is the worlds smallest passenger car

Explaining his purchase of the car in 2018, Alex said: 'I love weird cars, old cars, anything that's quirky and alternative basically.

'This is a reproduction, they were originally made in the 60s. It was Jeremy Clarkson who made them famous on Top Gear, he drove it through the BBC office and as a result the few that were left were going for a 100,000.

'But for people like me, replicas are an option. I got this and I've been using it and enjoying it and it's just been the most hilarious car, it gets a lot of attention.

'It's fun to own, people are always asking questions, you can't go anywhere, and I've answered the same questions millions of times... how do you get in it... can you go on motorways, all those kind of things.'

Co-presenter Dermot O'Leary (pictured left) drove around the TV studio in the vehicle, which is a replica of the 1960s classic motor, with the originals selling for over 100,000

Explaining his purchase of the car in 2018, Alex said: 'I love weird cars, old cars, anything that's quirky and alternative basically'

Explaining that it costs around 7 to fill up, Alex also recalled how he travelled from John OGroats in Scotland to Lands End to raise 11,000 for Children In Need last year.

Not only is the P50 just 1.3 metres long but also the same in height and less than a metre wide.

In 2010, the Peel was listed in the Guinness World records and given the title of the smallest production car ever made.

The highest figure on record for a P50 is almost 122,000, achieved at an RM Sotheby's Florida sale in March 2016, with bidding for the car described as hotly contested at the time.

Explaining that it costs around 7 to fill up, Alex also recalled how he travelled from John OGroats in Scotland to Lands End to raise 11,000 for Children In Need last year

An extremely basic motor, they have no onboard instruments or odometer and just three forward gears. The P50s are not fitted with a reverse gear

Fitted with a 49cc single-cylinder petrol engine, the Peel is capable of a maximum speed of just 38mph and can return around 100mpg, thanks to its featherweight 59kg of bulk (minus a driver, of course).

Peel Engineering Limited on the Isle of Man launched the P50 - designed and built by Cyril Cannell and Henry Kissack - at the 1962 Earls Court Motorcycle Show, with the vehicle so small that it qualified as a motorcycle.

An extremely basic motor, they have no onboard instruments or odometer and just three forward gears. The P50s are not fitted with a reverse gear.

The Peel shot to recent fame in the 2007 during season 10 of Top Gear, with Jeremy Clarkson driving the vehicle into the BBC's studios and around the broadcaster's head office.
Revealed US society duped into believing Maxwell had the royal seal of approval

Prince Andrew's friendship with Ghislaine Maxwell gave her a 'veneer of respectability' and royal approval in elite social circles, a society columnist has claimed.

Couri Hay worked as the society columnist for New York's Hamptons and Avenue magazines in the 1990s, where he met Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein at a number of glitzy, exclusive parties.

He says that Maxwell 'dealt in the commerce of important people' and that she would 'go out with an invisible butterfly net' into the social scenes of New York and London to 'capture the beautiful people'.

Speaking in BBC2 series House of Maxwell, which premieres tonight, Hay claimed her relationship with the Duke of York 'elevated' her because it appeared the former socialite had the 'blessing of the Queen'.

Prince Andrew denied being a close friend of convicted sex trafficker Maxwell in a legal response to Virginia Giuffre, to whom he paid 12million to settle a US civil sexual assault case.

Prince Andrew's friendship with Ghislaine Maxwell coated her with a 'veneer of respectability' and royal approval in elite social circles, a society columnist has claimed. Prince Andrew and Ghislaine Maxwell are pictured at Royal Ascot in 2000

Photos emerged last year of Epstein and Maxwell spending time at the Queen's log cabin at Glen Beg at her Balmoral residence

'Her big card was Prince Andrew, that was her main calling card. Everywhere she went, Prince Andrew this, Prince Andrew that,' said Hay.

'There's no question Prince Andrew elevated Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffery Epstein it just gave her this veneer, she's in the royal court, she's a friend of the prince. She has the blessing of the Queen.

'It coated her with a veneer of respectability. But I don't believe the society people I know whose names I can't even speak because they would kill me, knew, we just didn't know. People weren't paying attention.'

There is no evidence any other member of the Royal Family had a relationship with Maxwell and Andrew previously stated that he had 'let down the Royal Family' by maintaining a relationship with Epstein.

Couri Hay worked as the society columnist for New York's Hamptons and Avenue magazines in the 1990s, where he met Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein at a number of glitzy, exclusive parties

Photos emerged last year of Epstein and Maxwell spending time at the Queen's Balmoral residence and reports in 2019 claimed Ghislaine made several secret visits to Buckingham Palace to visit Andrew.

Hay spoke about their relationship in upcoming documentary House of Maxwell, which charts how Ghislaine Maxwell went from a multi-millionaires daughter to a woman convicted of grooming and trafficking underage girls.

The society columnist and PR guru worked as a gossip columnist for the National Enquirer from 1976 to 1983, later writing a monthly society column for Avenue Magazine and becoming society editor for Hamptons Magazine.

Speaking in the documentary, he said: 'Her little black book was everything to her. She dealt in the commerce of introductions.

'She really was a connector. She had this invisible butterfly net and she would go out in the social scene and capture the beautiful people.

'She had this posh accent, she was well educated, she was witty and she was fun and she deliberately set out to make friends with important people and she used her royal rolodex to do that.'

Ghislaine Maxwell's legal team launch bids for retrial for convicted child sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted of grooming and trafficking underage girls last year. However Maxwell's legal team requested that her sex trafficking conviction be overturned and the case be retried in January. Maxwell is hoping for a retrial after it emerged that one juror failed to disclose that he was sexually abused as a child before the trial. In February, lawyers for the disgraced socialite filed another 37-page appeal at a New York court claiming 'erroneous' jury instructions made her conviction unfair. Jurors seemingly believed one victim  who gave her name only as Jane  who said she was abused by Epstein and Maxwell at his ranch in New Mexico when she was 16. The appeal documents say: 'A jury note sent during deliberations indicated that the jurors were considering convicting Ms Maxwellbased solely on the New Mexico conduct.' Maxwell's lawyers argue that the judge should have explained to jurors that under New Mexico law 'Jane' was not underage and should have instructed them to focus only on alleged sex assaults in New York where the age of consent is 18. Maxwell, 60, faces up to 65 years in jail when she is sentenced on June 28 after being found guilty in December on five charges. Advertisement

He said that while Ghislaine was 'effervescent' and performative, Epstein was quiet and shy and that Maxwell acted as a 'social secretary' of sorts for the billionaire paedophile.

'When Ghislaine Maxwell was in the room you knew she was there and she wanted you to know she was there,' he said. 'She performed. She was on she was effervescent and I felt she knew she was being watched, wanted to be watched.

'But Jeffery Epstein was another case, he was shy, he didn't really stand out. So Ghislaine filed the idea of being his social director, it was almost like she was his social secretary.'

Hay, who also runs a public relations firm, says that Epstein turned to him for advice following his 2008 conviction for solicitation of prostitution involving a minor.

'Jeffery Epstein calls me. My office freaked out, it was embarrassing to even get the call. Jeffery wanted crisis management, he wanted advice. So I put my tie on and trotted over to the house, because I wanted to see the house.

'This very grand house, supposedly worth $77million and there's this very grand foyer with a big curving staircase.

I did notice throughout the house there were a lot of very heavy, velvet drapes. Out walks Jeffery.

Hay says he had 'no intention' of representing Epstein and he never paid him for advice.

The PR guru says he asked him how to avoid having "Paedophile billionaire engraved on my tombstone, every story starts off with Paedophile billionaire Jeffery Epstein".

'In some cases you can't do it,' said Hay. 'You simply can't explain Ghislaine or Jeffery Epstein.'

While he never represented Epstein, Hay suggested he meet with the Pope as a way of 'showing contrition' - however was baffled to discover both Maxwell and the sex offender had already received private audience with John Paul II at the Vatican in 2003.

'I said "it starts with really showing contrition, confessing".

'I said, "Jeffery, who better than the highest power on earth in communication with God. Why don't I get you an audience with the Pope? But of course he's already thought of it years ago.

'I said, "why don't you give money, there's an arts foundation and people have given away lots and lots of money to whitewash their images". So Ghislaine of course started her own charity.'

As part of their PR charm offensive, Ghislaine launched a marine conservation non-profit, The TerraMar Project, in early 2012.

'It was potentially, possibly to help the oceans but what she was really helping was herself,' said Hay.

House of Maxwell begins Monday at 9pm on BBC Two.




Asiana Airline, Korea's second-biggest carrier, said Monday it has resumed flights to Hawaii as authorities eased travel curbs this month.







Asiana reopened its Incheon-Honolulu route on Sunday, 25 months after its suspension in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.







The flight resumption comes as fully vaccinated Korean passengers are now exempt from a seven-day self-quarantine, which went into effect Friday, when they return to the country.







Asiana plans to operate three flights a week  on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays  to absorb pent-up travel demand, the company said in a statement. (Yonhap)






A woman who became suicidal after being bullied for being born with a rare condition that left her unable to move her mouth and eyes has now signed a contract with a leading modelling agency.

Tayla Clement, 24, who lives in New Zealand, was born with moebius syndrome, a condition that causes facial paralysis due to the underdevelopment of certain nerves.

She is unable to lift the corners of her mouth into a smile, move her eyes from side to side, raise her eyebrows, or move her top lip.

Tayla was bullied throughout school because she was unable to show facial expressions, with the torment becoming physical at age 11 after an eight-hour operation to ignite a new nerve connection in her face was unsuccessful.

Having survived six attempts at trying to take her life, Tayla is now embracing her looks with an Instagram account that boasts almost 24,000 followers and a contract with international modelling agency Zebedee.

Tayla Clement, 24, (pictured) who lives in New Zealand, has signed a modelling contract with international agency Zebedee

Tayla was born with moebius syndrome, a rare condition that causes facial paralysis due to the underdevelopment of certain nerves

Tayla told 7Life that she wants to be an example to her younger self and show that being unique doesn't make you unworthy.

The model explained that she can't remember a time at school where she wasn't bulling, being called names and even pushed down hills.

She revealed the bullying was at its worst after an operation to give her the ability to smile was unsuccessful.

Tayla said she was bullied throughout school, with the torment becoming worse after she had an eight-hour operation at age 11

Tayla said children would kick her and put a plastic bag over her head, leaving her feeling alone at school. Pictured left: At school, right: After the operation

WHAT IS MOEBIUS SYNDROME? Moebius syndrome is a rare neurological condition that affects the muscles that control facial expressions and eye movement. The symptoms are present from birth as patients are unable to smile, frown or raise their eyebrows. They often also have a small chin and mouth and a short tongue while dental abnormalities are also common. The condition also affects the muscles that control the eyes so patients have to move their heads to look from side to side. In some cases, patients are unable to blink or close their eyes which can cause eye dryness or irritation. Other features of the syndrome include bone abnormalities in the hands and feet, week muscles, hearing loss and delayed development. Moebius syndrome is thought to affect between one in 50,000 and one in 500,000 people - but its cause is unknown. Advertisement

The intensive surgery involved having tissue from her right thigh added to both corners of her mouth and up to her temple.

'I looked so horrible that nurses and my parents wouldn't let me look in the mirror for a week and a half after the surgery,' Tayla said.

'I thought the surgery would solve all my issues because I was bullied so much. But it didn't.'

Tayla said it took 12 months to recover from the operation and she tried to put on a brave face when she returned to school.

Tayla began having seizures at age 17 due to the stress that she had experienced. Pictured: Tayla being photographed for her modelling portfolio

Tayla said her younger self would be 'proud' as she now boasts almost 24,000 followers on Instagram and has a modelling contract

However, children would put plastic bags over her head and kick her until she fell. She recalls avoiding school because she felt alone and trying to take her own life six times.

The severe traumatic stress triggered dissociative seizures at age 17, with Tayla having up to 10 seizures a day over five months.

Tayla said: 'I had such severe depression that doctors told me my mental health was as bad as a solider suffering from PTSD.'

She went on to spend the next few years working on embracing her individuality after joining a gym, taking up walking and meditation.

Tayla also took control of her situation by setting up Instagram account The Girl Who Cant Smile, where she shares photos from her daily life alongside insight into having moebius syndrome and type one diabetes.

She explained that not seeing people who looked like her in the media while she was growing up left her feeling 'outcast'.

However, having signed a modelling contract has made it difficult to resonate with the person who she used to be.

Tayla added: 'I think little Tayla would be so proud.'
A new BBC One Second World War drama will be 'mainly about men' and will not feature women in lead roles because it would not be historically accurate, a producer has confirmed.

Mini series SAS: Rogue Heroes, from Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, stars Jack O'Connell and Dominic West and will tell the story of the foundation of the special force unit in a male dominated warzone.

It is produced by independent production company Kudos, which wanted to put accuracy at the forefront of the project.

SAS: Rogue Heroes, a new mini-series set to air on BBC One later this year, will tell the story of how the special force unit came to be during World War II and will not have women in leading roles

The 2019 BBC adaptation of HG Wells' The War of the Worlds, which starred Eleanor Tomlinson in a leading role that does not exist in the source material, was slammed by fans

Some fans felt that World on Fire, which aired on BBC One in 2019 starring Matthew Romain, pictured, had a cast that was too diverse for the time era it was set in

'There is no getting away from it, it is a story mainly about men,' managing director Martin Haines told the C21 Media podcast.

'We were clear, and the BBC recognised, that it wasnt something where you could pretend that it wasnt the case, so we sort of lent into it and celebrated it.'

It comes after several BBC period dramas, including War of the Worlds and World on Fire, were criticised for putting diversity above the realities of the times they depicted.

Speaking on the C21 Media podcast, the producer went on to say that the show would reflect the lives of the early SAS servicemen, describing them as often violent, and tough.

Algerian actress Sofia Boutella holds one of the show's few female roles, playing a spy named Eve, a female counterpoint to the men.

Haines said Boutella's character is a 'combination of real-life women who played pivotal roles in the espionage and security services in North Africa.'

The BBC's period dramas have been criticised in recent years for not accurately depicting the time periods they are set in.

In 2019, the broadcaster's adaption of HG Wells' The War of the Worlds, which takes place in Edwardian times, was slammed after the minor character of Amy was turned into the heroine of the show, played by Eleanor Tomlinson.

More recently, the Second World War drama World on Fire drew criticism for its diverse cast, which some viewers felt was not representative of the population of the 1940s.

Algerian actress Sofia Boutella is one of the very few female roles appearing in SAS: Rogue Heroes

Boutella plays Eve, a north African spy which is based on real women who played a pivotal roles in the espionage and security services in North Africa

Meanwhile, a 2020 version of A Christmas Carol also raised eyebrows after the BBC decided to give Victorian clerk Bob Cratchit a mixed-race family.

Time will tell how SAS: Rogue Heroes, which is based on a novel of the same name by Ben Macintyre, will be received by viewers.

The six-part drama is written and executive produced by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight and will focus on how warfare was changed after one officer - David Stirling (Connor Swindells) - decided to form his own squad to infiltrate enemy lines in a bid to gain the British infantry an upper hand

A synopsis for the show reads: 'Cairo, 1941. David Stirling (Connor Swindells) - an eccentric young officer, hospitalised after a training exercise went wrong - is bored

'Convinced that traditional commando units don't work, he creates a radical plan that flies in the face of all accepted rules of modern warfare.

The Affair star Dominic West plays spy Dudley Clarke, pictured, in the upcoming World War two drama

The show focuses on the early day of the SAS, picturing the tough and violent men who were the first on the service (pictured: Jack O'Connell as Paddy Mayne and Connor Swindells as David Stirling)

'He fights for permission to recruit the toughest, boldest and brightest soldiers for a small undercover unit that will create mayhem behind enemy lines.

'More rebels than soldiers, Stirling's team are every bit as complicated, flawed and reckless as they are astonishingly brave and heroic.'

In a statement, Steven said of the programme: 'It has been a privilege to work on a project which tells the story of a renegade band of soldiers who used wit and imagination as much as firepower to halt the march of Fascism across North Africa during the darkest days of World War Two.

'This is a war story like no other, told in a way that is at once inspired by the facts and true to the spirit of this legendary brigade of misfits and adventurers.'

While producer Karen Wilson added: 'With filming now complete, we're incredibly excited to give the world a first look at our Rogue Heroes.

The show has decided to steer clear of token female roles and is focusing its plot on the men of the SAS (the cast on a jeep in the desert)

'A huge thank you to the series' peerless cast and crew for bringing Steven Knight's ambitious, extraordinary scripts to life with such skill and style.'

Connor Swindells' character, Colonel David Stirling, was a founding member of the SAS, a commando force that operated behind enemy lines during the North African campaign of the Second World War.

The SAS began with five officers and 60 other ranks when it was conceived, and their first mission was a parachute drop supporting Operation Crusader in 1941 which ended in disaster, and may well be what Jack and Connor were filming.

During their first skirmish 22 men were killed or captured, however their second mission was a huge success after the SAS successfully destroyed 60 aircraft over three airfields.

Stirling, who Connor plays, was captured by enemy combatants in 1943 and Paddy Mayne, played by Jack, replaced him as commanding officer of the SAS, which was split into two factions the Special Raiding Squadron (SRS) and the Special Boat Section.
The Earl and Countess of Wessex will take lessons from Prince William and Kate Middleton's 'missteps' on Caribbean trip for their own Jubilee tour, a royal reporter has claimed.

Last week, the Duke, 39, and Duchess of Cambridge, 40, faced calls to issue a public apology for slavery during the eight-day tour, with the barrage of criticism ranging from accusations Belize locals were not consulted about a royal engagement to calls for slavery reparations from the monarchy in Jamaica.

And on April 22, Prince Edward and Sophie will visit Antigua and Barbuda, Grenada, St Lucia, and St Vincent and the Grenadines for a week.

Victoria Ward has now revealed the couple will learn from any mistakes made during the Cambridges tour, writing in The Telegraph: 'Palace officials desperate to avoid further PR pitfalls have been carefully studying the Wessexes itinerary ahead of their tour later this month of Antigua and Barbuda, Grenada, St Lucia and St Vincent and the Grenadines.

The Earl and Countess of Wessex will take lessons from Prince William and Kate Middleton's 'missteps' on Caribbean trip for their own Jubilee tour, a royal expert has claimed

'While the Wessexes will certainly want to ensure the focus remains on the Queens historic seven-decade reign, any potential plans to echo their movements in Grenada by greeting the crowds in an open top car, as Her Majesty and Prince Philip did on their first visit to the country in 1966, will have been quietly shelved.'

The Cambridge's last week landed back in Britain from their troubled tour of the Caribbean, which was blighted by protests against Britain's colonial past.

The Duke of Cambridge denounced slavery as 'abhorrent' and said 'it should never have happened'. He is attending the service for the life of Prince Philip as he looks to now move the monarchy into the future amid the criticism.

William is said to want to do things 'the Cambridge way' following his Caribbean tour with Kate that saw the couple heavily criticised for images that smacked of 'colonialism' but also welcomed with warmth by Caribbeans.

Last week, the Duke, 39, and Duchess of Cambridge, 40, faced calls to issue a public apology for slavery during the eight-day tour

The couple faced criticism ranging from accusations Belize locals were not consulted about a royal engagement to calls for slavery reparations from the monarchy in Jamaica (pictured, the Duchess)

The visit is likely to be judged as a landmark moment for years to come  when the growing awareness of racial equality, in light of the Black Lives Matter movement, meant future Commonwealth tours would have to be sensitive to these issues.

The Duke addressed the issue of slavery during a speech in Jamaica, denouncing it as 'abhorrent' and saying 'it should never have happened'.

Ending their trip to Belize, Jamaica and the Bahamas at the weekend, the future king acknowledged the monarchy's days in those nations may be numbered as he stated the future 'is for the people to decide upon', and that he may not become head of the Commonwealth.

In a statement reflecting on the tour, William said who the Commonwealth chooses to be its leader 'isn't what is on my mind', but what concerned him was its potential to 'create a better future for the people who form it'.

Earlier this year, a royal expert claimed Sophie 'undoubtedly benefits' from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle stepping back from royal life because it has 'raised her profile'

He stressed that he and his wife Kate were 'committed to service' and saw their role as supporting people, 'not telling them what to do'.

Victoria's comments come after a royal expert claimed Sophie 'undoubtedly benefits' from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle stepping back from royal life because it has 'raised her profile'.

The Countess, who is often been noted as the monarch's 'favourite' family member, has embarked on a rare high profile solo trip of New York in recent weeks, cementing her position as the Queen's secret weapon within the new look monarchy.

Royal expert Russel Myers explained how the mother-of-two has seen her star rise after the Duke, 38, and Duchess of Sussex, 40, stepped down as senior royals and moved to California last year.

The Countess has embarked on a high profile solo trip of New Yok in recent weeks in another glimpse into the new look monarchy

Speaking on True Royalty TVs The Royal Beat, he explained: 'Are the Instagram generation going to be as obsessed with Sophie and Edward Wessex as they are with the Sussexes? Obviously not.

'However, when youre dealing with them Sophies really across her subject matter.

'Its not just for show and she has really grown into that. With the Sussexes not here, the Wessexes will undoubtedly benefit.'

Meanwhile he also pointed to how similar the Meghan and Sophie's interests are, saying: 'The similarities between Sophie and Meghan are there to be seen.

'Sophies working with girls education, shes done a lot of stuff about violence against females in Africa.'
BBC podcast host Deborah James, who has incurable bowel cancer, has revealed she had a 'rough few days' as she shared a snap from hospital over the weekend.

The former deputy head teacher turned cancer campaigner, 40, from London, has been living with stage four bowel cancer since she was diagnosed in December 2016, and was told early on that she might not live beyond five years - a milestone that passed in the autumn of 2021.

At the start of the year, the mother-of-two announced she had 'nearly died' in hospital, calling it the 'hardest' part of her 5-year cancer battle, and was admitted as an in-patient earlier this month.

In an Instagram post shared yesterday, Deborah wrote had 'a rough few days' as she underwent a 'good few procedures.'

BBC podcast host Deborah James, 40, from London, who has incurable bowel cancer, worried fans on Saturday as she shared a snap to Instagram from her hospital bed

Posting online, she wrote: 'Ive had a rough few days. A good few procedures including treatment, rebanding of my varices, drain changes, dealing with pain, and a million and one other things has really taken it out of me.

'Im just resting up and recovering from it all.'

She continued: 'Right now this for me Is Bowel cancer. And honestly Its not fun in the slightest.'

She continued: 'April is Bowel Cancer Awareness Month. Every 15 minutes somebody is diagnosed with bowel cancer in the UK, thats nearly 43,000 people each year. And sadly its the second largest cancer killer in the U.K.

The cancer campaigner, who has been living with stage four bowel cancer since she was diagnosed in December 2016, took to Instagram to update her followers on her journey

'This month Ill be sharing lots of information on the things you need to be looking for when it comes to all things bowel and guts.

'But for now, please join me in sharing your bowel cancer story alongside @bowelcanceruk using the hashtag #thisisbowelcancer

'Everyone affected by bowel cancer has their own unique story to tell. We can be such a strong and supportive community.

'One that helps each other through the good days and the bad days - the rollercoaster that is bowel cancer.

The mother-of-two revealed she had 'a rough few days' as she underwent a 'good few procedures

'Whether youre a patient, family member, friend, colleague, healthcare professional or researcher @bowelcanceruk want to bring the varied and many people affected by bowel cancer together this Bowel Cancer Awareness Month to shine a light on your stories and experiences.'

Fans rushed to the comments to share their love and support for the campaigner., with one writing: 'Sending so much love and healing wishes to you.'

Another wrote: 'You are an amazing strong lady Deborah. Praying you feel better soon. Rest up you've been through so much. Sending love, strength and healing.'

A third added: 'Sending love to your brave heart, you show us so much about the strength and vulnerability of being in a human body.'

It's been a difficult year so far for the mother-of-two, who is currently receiving in-patient treatment in hospital.

It is understood she continues to receive in-patient treatment, but was allowed home over the weekend to spend Mother's Day with her family.

Fans rushed to the comments to share their love and support for the campaigner, with one saying she hopes she gets a 'break from all this soon'

She has spent months recovering after she almost died in January due to a medical emergency.

In January, she said the 'trauma' of nearly dying was still 'very raw and real' as she returned home after three weeks in hospital.

Posting on Instagram earlier this year, the mother-of-two spoke of enduring the 'hardest, most heartbreaking and scariest' period of her cancer battle in the last week, which has involved three operations and 'a lot more procedures' to come.

She told how her husband watched as doctors fought to save her life after she 'crashed' in resuscitation.

It's been a difficult year so far for the mother-of-two, who is currently receiving in-patient treatment in hospital

'A week ago at this time in the evening I nearly died in what was an acute medical emergency,' she wrote. 'I'm not ready to discuss what happened yet as the trauma of it all has been incredibly intense - but it's thanks to an unbelievable team of NHS specialists who worked all through the night and the next day to save me.

BOWEL CANCER: THE SYMPTOMS YOU SHOULDN'T IGNORE Bowel, or colorectal, cancer affects the large bowel, which is made up of the colon and rectum. Such tumours usually develop from pre-cancerous growths, called polyps. Symptoms include: Bleeding from the bottom

Blood in stools

A change in bowel habits lasting at least three weeks

Unexplained weight loss

Extreme, unexplained tiredness

Abdominal pain Most cases have no clear cause, however, people are more at risk if they: Are over 50

Have a family history of the condition

Have a personal history of polyps in their bowel

Suffer from inflammatory bowel disease, such as Crohn's disease

Lead an unhealthy lifestyle Treatment usually involves surgery, and chemo- and radiotherapy. More than nine out of 10 people with stage one bowel cancer survive five years or more after their diagnosis. This drops significantly if it is diagnosed in later stages. According to Bowel Cancer UK figures, more than 41,200 people are diagnosed with bowel cancer every year in the UK. It affects around 40 per 100,000 adults per year in the US, according to the National Cancer Institute. Advertisement

'I cannot be more grateful. I'm still not out of danger and I have a lot more procedures to deal with. But I'm now out of intensive care. And for the first time felt able to briefly update you.'

Sharing a photo of her giving a thumbs up from a hospital bed, she continued: 'This is me yesterday having just come round from my 3rd operation this week. I have another operation tomorrow.

'In 5 years of having stage 4 Cancer - this has been the hardest, most heartbreaking and scariest of them all. I'd always prepared for my death, but I wasn't prepared for something so blindsiding and traumatic to happen.

'I can't quite believe I'm here to write this. A week ago my whole family was praying I'd pull through the night. I'm getting a lot of help and support to come to terms with the trauma I've been through.

'My family have been incredible. I don't know how my husband held it together seeing me crash as an army of doctors stabilised me in resus.'

After thanking followers for their support, she added: 'Do me a favour and go tell your loved ones how much you love them. To realise in a sudden split moment that you are unlikely to see the next day is utterly heartbreaking. Have no regrets.'

Discussing how difficult the last six months have been, James said while she was really happy that the 'big gun chemo' she endured has slowed her cancer's growth, which had been 'on the march', it had been an exhausting time.

In the summer, James was told she had an aggressive new tumour that had wrapped itself around her bile duct - requiring a life-saving stay in hospital - and a stent fitted to stop her liver from failing.

The stent fitted to stop her liver failing 'stopped working' in December.

She explained to her followers at the time how hopes at having a 'quick replacement operation' had turned into a 'nightmare'.

She said: 'I'm now at the mercy of hopefully some super 'magic medicine miracle' - but then I always have been, and any chance is a chance right?

'All I ever say Is all I want is hope and options.'

Last year, James shared that her cancer, which has been kept at bay by pioneering treatment, was back again and she was forced to endure a 12th operation.

The West London mother-of-two, a deputy head, was diagnosed 'late' with incurable bowel cancer in 2016.

Deborah, who has incurable bowel cancer, revealed how she 'nearly died' in January in an 'acute medical emergency'. She shared this photo from hospital

She has frequently said that as a vegetarian runner, she was the last person doctors expected to get the disease.

After sharing her experiences on living with the disease on social media, Deborah became known as the 'Bowel Babe' and began writing a column for the Sun.

In 2018, Deborah joined Lauren Mahon and Rachael Bland to present the award-winning podcast You, Me and the Big C on Radio 5 Live.

Bland tragically died of breast cancer on September 5th that year; her husband Steve Bland now co-presents the show.
Prince Carl Philip of Sweden has been pictured in full action man attire while visiting the armed forces at a military base today.

The royal, 41, a former Major in the Swedish Navy, sported a green camouflage jacket and matching trousers for his solo outing, with the father-of-three appearing without his wife Princess Sofia.

Located in Eksjo, in the southern part of the country, the garrison has been within the Swedish Armed Forces since 1906, operating in various forms.

As snow fell onto the camp, the father-of-three looked relaxed in full uniform as he learned more about the garrison's training regime.

Prince Carl Philip of Sweden, 42, has been pictured in full action man attire visiting Eskjo Garrison in Sweden

The father-of-three looked ruggedly handsome in his combat wear as he learned more about the garrison's training regime

Prince Carl, the only son of and the second of three children of King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia, looked ruggedly handsome in his combat wear.

The prince was taken around the surrounding woodland and even shown some of the machinery used by the groups.

Wearing black boots fit for the occasion, the royal appeared to mean business as he walked across the grounds with a military hat covering his locks.

He was pictured wearing full field uniform, which includes camouflage jacket and combat trousers, black sturdy boots and emerald beret.

Fourth in line for the throne Carl Philip kept a watchful eye on the troops as they carried out their exercise in Eksjo today

Soldiers in full black camouflage and with a rifle in hand completed the training exercise this morning

The royal also got to watch as servicemen conducted a mock operation in black camouflage.

Holding their rifles on their shoulders, some of the men took position underwater as they practiced the move.

Carl Philip, meanwhile, remained on dry land, keeping a watchful eye on the troops.

The father of three is no stranger to the armed forces. Known for his military interests, he completed his military service at the Amphibious Battalion at Vaxholm Coastal Artillery Regiment as a combat boat commander (Combat Boat 90) in the autumn of 2000.

The garrison is Eksjo municipality's third largest workplace with about 500 employees.

While the prince looked in his element as he donned his uniform, last week, he put on a very different get up for his new official portrait.

Soldiers in full body camouflage went shoulder-deep into water during the exercise, which they took very seriously

In spite of the demand of the training, Carl Philip kept the atmosphere relaxed and enjoyed a few chats with the servicemen during his visit

The Swedish royal family have launched a new website and for the occasion, they showcased newly-shot portraits of the entire family in full formal attire.

As the brother of Crown Princess Victoria, Carl Philip was among the royals who got their photographs taken by Linda Brostrom of the Royal Court.

He looked typically dapper in a three-piece-suit. His ensemble featured a white waistcoat and he donned many royal medals on his blazer.

His wife, Princess Sofia, 37, oozed glamour in a floral full length gown which featured long sleeves and a cinched waist.
Model Lauren Scruggs has welcomed her first child, a baby son, with husband Jason Kennedy, just over a year after they announced they were undergoing IVF having faced more than four years of infertility struggles.

The 33-year-old influencer and model, who famously lost an arm and an eye in a horrific plane propeller accident in 2011, shared the news about their bundle of joy in a sweet Instagram post on Monday, revealing that they have named their son Ryver Rhodes.

Lauren posted a series of sweet photos taken inside the hospital shortly after Ryver's April 3 birth, including an intimate snap of herself and 40-year-old former E! host Jason proudly cradling their newborn son.

Speaking to Access Hollywood about Ryver's birth, Jason said the experience of seeing his son for the first time 'felt like a movie', while adding that both mother and child are 'doing great'.

Model Lauren Scruggs has given birth to her first child with husband Jason Kennedy, a son named Ryver Rhodes, born on April 3

The 33-year-old model shared several sweet images of her newborn son on Instagram on Monday, while revealing the newborn's precious name

Former E! host Jason, 40, also posted some photo of his newborn boy, while telling Access Hollywood of his arrival that it 'felt like a movie'

'Trying to come up with words to fully process the last 48 hours arent possible,' Jason said of his first hours of fatherhood

'Trying to come up with words to fully process the last 48 hours arent possible,' he told the outlet.

'Seeing my son for the first time felt like a movie, I kept closing my eyes and finally realized it was true. We love this boy so much and are so thankful for this time together. Lo and Ryver are doing great.'

As well as posting several images of his bouncing baby boy on Instagram, Jason also shared a video of the newborn carefully swaddled in a hospital blanket, which he set to the Leon Bridges son 'River' in a nod to his child's name.

Although Lauren and Jason did not share any further details about Ryver's birth, the new mother previously opened up about her desire to do a natural birth, revealing in a previous blog post that she was practicing 'learning how to open your body and rest into waves of discomfort' to get through childbirth'.

'It takes practice to avoid tightening your body during pain,' she wrote. 'Sinking into it allows your body to innately undergo a smooth delivery.'

She admitted that she initially thought she'd give birth in a hospital with an epidural, but after she began 'not feeling totally comfy with my OB,' she turned to midwifery and met with a doula.

'First of all, midwives are just incredible. they take the place of an OB in the pregnancy and our two midwives will replace the nurses and doctors at birth,' she said.

Proud dad Jason shared a video of his newborn son on his Instagram Stories, setting the sweet clip to Leon Bridge's son 'River' in honor of his baby boy's name

Lauren shared a final photo of her baby bump on March 31 (pictured), three days before she welcomed son Ryver

Lauren (pictured in March), who famously lost an eye and an arm in a 2011 plane propeller accident, announced that she was pregnant in September, after struggling with fertility issues

'Our doula is an angel on earth, and she teaches us about birth for about two hours a week  she covers everything from the physical happenings to the mind/body connection, and everything in between.'

'Our doula has helped me replace fear with the beauty of birth, letting go of control, accepting support, and sinking and opening into the pain because the joy is ahead,' she said.

She added her favorite part is that Jason 'has a major role the entire time instead of feeling slightly helpless on the sidelines cheering me on.'

Lauren added that she had been preparing for her natural with ayurvedic treatments, prenatal lymphatic drainage treatments, prenatal chiropractic care, and pelvic floor therapy.

She also began drinking raspberry leaf tea 'to tone and strengthen the uterus,' eating up to six dates a day 'to soften the cervix,' and sitting on a bosu ball to 'open [her] hips and strengthen [her] back.'

The new mother has not shared specific details about her labor and birth experience, however it looks as though she ended up delivering Ryver in a hospital, with images showing the new family of three cuddling up in a bed inside a private room.

Lauren was quickly flooded with congratulatory messages in the comments section of her post, where sweet sentiments poured in from a host of high-profile friends and followers, including Jenna Bush Hager, Heather Dubrow, Derek Hough, and Liana Liberato.

The pair revealed in January last year that they were undergoing IVF in order to help them conceive, having battled infertility for several years

Lauren revealed that she was planning on a natural birth, and had been practicing 'learning how to open your body and rest into waves of discomfort' to get through childbirth

Although Lauren (seen during a check-up) shared her desire to have a natural birth with a doula, her birth announcement suggests that she delivered Ryver in the hospital

'Yay!!!!!! Congrats! Welcome to the world beautiful Ryver,' Today host Jenna wrote, while actress Liana chimed in: 'My heart! Congrats you two!'

Lauren and Jason first announced that they were expecting in September, a thrilling development after years of infertility and IVF treatments started early last year.

'PREGNANT!' Jason wrote on Instagram at the time. 'So many of you have prayed for us and wished us well on this 4 1/2 year journey. Our hope is that this news encourages anyone going thru IVF or any fertility struggle.'

'It's always tough when a doctor tells you you can't have kids naturally and you keep running into complications, but we didn't sit and wallow in that. We were really blessed to meet with some amazing doctors and specialists,' Kennedy added.

'And one time Lauren had to be rushed to the ER because of unbearable pain a few days after the egg retrieval. Not to sound cliche, but it really has brought us even closer together because we have never been through this before, and it's been really special supporting each other.'

Kennedy said their faith helped.

'There is an overall sense of peace because of our faith in God, and then it just comes down to our incredible friends and family who walked closely with us through it all,' he said.

Lauren shared multiple pregnancy updates on social media, showing off her baby bump in a series of photos ahead of Ryver's arrival

In January 2021, they started IVF, and in March of that year, Jason discussed Lauren's egg complications on social media

They also shared that Lauren's twin sister  they were both conceived with IVF  was the first person they told they were expecting.

It had been a difficult journey to parenthood, with the couple starting to try to have a family four years after their 2014 nuptials.

In January 2021, they started IVF, and in March of that year, Jason discussed Lauren's egg complications on social media.

'Well this one right here gave me a scare last night,' he posted on Instagram. 'A trip to the ER for severe pain post egg retrieval but our doctor assured us this morning that everything will be ok.

'Shes STRONG and will be back on her feet in no time. This is where nurse Jason steps in with that 24/7 love and care. Oh and slide 2 is bunny, she requested he stay close at all times.'

In July 2021, Lauren told People that it was a 'blessing' to have IVF.

'I'm committed to this journey, and it's a blessing, no matter what, because this could result in something so incredible,' she said.

Scruggs' happy news comes just months after the ten-year anniversary of her horrific plane propeller accident, in which she lost an eye and an arm. She is seen revealing her facial scars during an appearance on NBC in 2012

The model climbed out of a two-seater plane (similar is pictured) at Aero County Airport in McKinney and walked into the propeller

After the crash, Lauren opened up about how she was learning to use a prosthetic arm, which she continues to wear

'It's such an amazing method of enhancing your fertility and having a sweet baby come into the world ... [I'm] really just trying to make the best of it by being grateful and flipping the script and just embracing it fully.'

Scruggs' positive attitude has helped her through trials before.

In 2011, she had climbed out of a two-seater plane at Aero County Airport in McKinney, Texas, after a flight to see Christmas lights when she walked into one of the plane's propellers, which was still running.

She suffered a fractured skull, broken collarbone, and brain injuries, and lost her left hand. Two weeks after the tragic accident, doctors decided that they had to remove Lauren's eye.

After the terrifying incident, she started blogging and she wrote her first book, Still Lolo: A Spinning Propeller, A Horrific Accident, and a Family's Journey of Hope in 2012.

She also wrote a second book, Your Beautiful Heart, which was published in 2015.

She now heads up the Lauren Scruggs Kennedy Foundation, which raises money for girls and women to 'receive cosmetic silicone coverings for their prostheses, with the hope that they will experience both physical and spiritual restoration and healing.'
The relationship between sisters is often tricky.

Parents going through the hair-pulling one minute, allies against the world the next stage are invariably told that time has a way of smoothing out the bumps.

With Sinead Watson and her big sister Andrea, this is certainly true.

Their bump, however, is anything but typical. For them, enjoying each others sisterly company is a precious privilege, hard won.

Because from the age of 23, Sinead lived as a man  having privately thought of herself as transgender from the age of 21  only realising four years ago at 27 that she had made a terrible mistake, and detransitioning at 28.

But some damage is irreversible. She had a full mastectomy and, owing to the testosterone she took for years, she has been left with a gruff voice and facial hair she removes every two days.

Im still trying to forgive myself and the medical profession, she says quietly.

When I told doctors at the gender clinic I hated my body and wanted to be a man, they never questioned why. If they had, they might have discovered that my body dysphoria wasnt the cause of my problems. It was the symptom. I was about to make the biggest decision of my life but I wasnt offered in-depth counselling. Instead, I was effectively left to self-diagnose.

Sineads anger and her pointed accusations against the doctors and psychiatrists who enabled her transition as a frightened and deeply unhappy young woman are incendiary and, as many have discovered to their cost, sure to provoke fierce, opposing reactions.

But what no one can dispute is that Sineads scars, physical and psychological, run very deep.

The relationship between sisters is often tricky. Parents going through the hair-pulling one minute, allies against the world the next stage are invariably told that time has a way of smoothing out the bumps. With Sinead Watson and her big sister Andrea, this is certainly true. Pictured: Before, Sinead (left) and her sibling (right)

Less obvious, and rarely acknowledged, are those inflicted on her sister Andrea.

The impact of these colossal decisions on a persons family is often totally eclipsed and ignored.

As Andrea, 34, puts it: The collateral damage has been horrific. My sister was eviscerated. In her place I got this nasty, arrogant stranger who called himself my brother. I never even got to mourn the sister I lost.

The sisters experience is particularly pertinent when you consider the rise in referrals to adult Gender Identity Clinics in the UK  which in some cases have quadrupled in the past decade.

That adds up to a lot of families who might be in pain. This week, it was revealed that doctors in Sussex will be incentivised with 178 a year for every adult they prescribe hormone therapy.

The news has outraged Sinead: There should be no monetary incentive to prescribe a patient cross-sex hormones. A patient with gender dysphoria should only ever be prescribed cross-sex hormones after proper, ongoing exploratory therapy.

It is important to remember that not every patient who has gender dysphoria is trans, and not every patient who transitions will benefit from it. Cross-sex hormones are powerful, largely irreversible, and come with health risks. GPs shouldnt be paid for every patient they prescribe them to.

A happy girl, Sinead, now 31, was born in January 1991 to Andrew, a steel worker, and Brenda, a personal trainer, in Glasgow.

We were just normal little girls, who enjoyed making dens and playing with our Barbies, she says.

Mum and Dad worked relentlessly and so Andrea became my mini mum.

However, when Sinead was 13, everything changed.

After a petty row with their parents, Andrea, then 17, moved to the other side of the city and Sinead barely saw her. The loss had a profound effect on her.

I was turning into a teenager without my big sister to guide me, she says.

When I started growing huge breasts, I was mortified. Barely into my teens, and just 5 ft 5 in tall, Id been saddled with a 34 DD bust. I loathed my body. I became a beacon for men of all ages.

Even family friends started commenting and finding excuses to hug me extra tight. Inside I was still a little girl, frightened and abandoned. All the unwanted attention, the ogling and the wolf whistles, was constant.

Things got even worse when, aged 16, Sinead got a Saturday job.

A staff member started groping me, she recalls. I was too timid to stop him. He would kiss me and grab my bottom every chance he got. I didnt dare tell Mum because she had helped get me the job.

Nor did she confide in Andrea, by now reconciled with the family.

Andrea had married Barry and their first son, Raithin, arrived in 2008, followed by Caelen, in 2011.

Their daughter, Alyssa, was born in 2014. I was too busy to see what Sinead was enduring, Andrea says. I have to live with that.

I just saw this gorgeous young woman with shiny black hair and porcelain skin. She was such a head-turner I was insanely proud of her. When we went out together, I would bask in all the attention she got. I never guessed that she was suffering and hated every minute of it.

Aged 19, Sinead escaped to start a four-year degree course in history and archaeology at Glasgow University, planning to become an archivist.

But the damage had been done. Even when nice-looking, kind boys showed an interest in her, she was scared and filled with self-disgust.

I began to loathe my body, she says. I started wishing I had been born a boy just so this would stop.

Deciding she must be gay, Sinead started a relationship with a woman, news she broke to a surprised, but accepting, Andrea.

When she told her older sister about the abuse she had suffered as a 16- year-old, however, she wasnt so sympathetic.

I thought it was just typical sexist behaviour all women learn to tolerate, says Andrea.

I told her to forget it and move on. It was stupid of me. I should have asked more questions, taken it m o r e seriously and perhaps suggested counselling.

Its impossible to know whether things would have turned out differently if she had.

Instead, feeling rejected by Andrea, when her relationship started falling apart after eight months, Sinead turned to the internet.

I started with a simple Google search, typing, I hate being a woman. What can I do? she explains.

I expected to find coping strategies and emotional stories. Instead, I found myself bombarded with information about transitioning.

I was only 20 and pretty naive. Until then, I didnt even know it was possible to change gender.

Sinead grabbed on to the idea like a life raft. Within days, she became convinced she was a trans man.

Astonishingly, none of the professionals Sinead Watson, pictured after treatment, was to meet over the next crucial years ever questioned her self-diagnosis.

Astonishingly, none of the professionals she was to meet over the next crucial years ever questioned her self-diagnosis.

I had read that you needed to live as a man before you could start treatment so I cut my shoulder-length hair immediately and started wearing baggy jeans and shirts and binding my chest to disguise my breasts, she says.

I was ecstatic when, in my first year at university, I asked a cleaner to direct me to the toilets  and he directed me to the gents.

Andrea didnt suspect a thing. Alarm bells didnt even ring when one night Sinead told me I want to be a boy, she says.

She was only 21, and as my husband Barry, who has always adored Sinead, put it, she was still trying to figure out who she was.

But in early 2014 Sinead referred herself to Sandyford, Glasgows gender clinic, and after brief counselling was put on a 12-month waiting list for treatment.

By now, I was convinced all my problems would disappear when I became a man. I was so devastated by the wait that I became suicidal. I was drinking heavily and misdirecting so much of my self-hatred against my family. I wouldnt even answer Andreas phone calls.

When I finally started treatment at Sandyford in early 2015, Id changed my name to Sean and identified completely as male. Telling the doctor about my suicide attempt, I blamed it entirely on my body dysphoria.

Weeks later Sinead  now Sean  was prescribed testosterone.

I was euphoric. I was convinced that I was about to live the life I was meant to, in the body I should have been born in, she says.

Within weeks my voice grew gruff and masculine. My curves started disappearing and my body grew angular. Seven months in, around my 25th birthday, stubble started appearing on my chin.

Andrea was silently horrified. I was terrified of upsetting her and risking another mental breakdown. Selfishly, I was also terrified she would turn her back on me for good.

But the biggest challenge was Sineads personality change. Testosterone made her angry, moody and aggressive.

My little sister had been wiped out, says Andrea. Sinead was funny, quirky and loving. Sean was a woman-hater with a foul temper. Sinead had always loved me and looked up to me. Sean sneered at me and treated me like dirt.

Our whole past was obliterated. Sean wanted to pretend Sinead had never existed and with it our entire childhood. It was as though I didnt exist either.

Andrea also had to explain to her children why they had lost an aunty.

Raithin, who was only seven, had loved Sinead but was scared of Sean. Mum and I attended a support group for families at the gender clinic, but we got no answers, nothing. In desperation I even turned to a Facebook support group and I was called small-minded and transphobic just because I was worried for her.

It affected us all. Mum was confused and worried. Dad was angry and point-blank refused to call his daughter Sean. In fact, he only relented when he tried to introduce the burly young man with stubble as his daughter and his mates burst out laughing.

Sinead was 26 and had been taking testosterone for two years when she was referred by Sandyford clinic for a double mastectomy.

I was furious with the doctors who had mutilated her, says Andrea. What were they thinking?

A creeping realisation started to haunt Sinead. Becoming a man was supposed to make her feel powerful and complete.

But she still felt scared, ashamed and inadequate.

This time there was no life raft to cling to. Id transitioned and I still hated myself, she says.

I was so angry and ashamed. How had I been so stupid, blinkered and selfish? Why had no professional tried to stop me?

Her anguish lends weight to the argument that saw a dramatic government U-turn last week on a complete ban on so - called conversion therapy for transgender people.

Speaking out: Our voices need to be heard if we are to protect vulnerable girls and young women, says Sinead, pictured today

It had been argued that doctors would be unable to question young people, like Sinead, about their decision.

Sinead was so depressed she quit her degree course just two months before her final exams.

Then  seeing no way out  she tried to take her life. Luckily, Andrea found her in time.

Sobbing, Sinead told Andrea she had made a terrible mistake.

I was devastated at what shed done to herself, says Andrea.

I was worried what would happen next because I knew there was no quick fix. But I was also so relieved to get my sister back.

Sinead reached out through the internet to other women who had detransitioned. They are a small but supportive group.

They helped me understand all the regret and rage I was feeling, she says. I know of at least 100 women like me. We are just the tip of the iceberg.

In October 2019, without talking to the clinic that she feels badly let her down, Sinead stopped taking testosterone.

The first year was horrendous. I had horrific mood swings. I sounded like a man but every day I looked more like a woman with stubble. Strangers didnt know what to make of me. I felt like a freak.

After putting her through so much, Sinead wasnt sure Andrea would stick by her.

There was no question, says Andrea. Shes my sister. I detested Sean. But that doesnt mean I love Sinead any less. In my mind they are two completely separate people. We talk on the phone most days and are the closest we have ever been.

Sinead has a boyfriend, a 28-year-old delivery driver, who, she says, loves me for who I am and thats given me huge confidence. Im thankful I didnt go as far as a hysterectomy and reassignment surgery [to create male genitals]...

Without Andreas unwavering love Im not sure I would have come through this. But I worry for all the others out there who dont have supportive families.

I know there are many women like me, too intimidated to speak out. But our voices need to be heard if we are to protect vulnerable girls and young women from unnecessary and irreversible treatments.

When approached by the Mail, a spokesman for the Sandyford clinic said: Patients attending Sandyfords Gender Identity Service undergo a full assessment by a multi-disciplinary team of psychiatrists, sexual health doctors, psychology and occupational therapists.

The evaluation takes multiple engagements over an extended period of time to ensure patients fully understand the process, are aware of all implications and are enabled to make fully informed choices.

While we cant go into individual patient details, we can confirm all patients undergo this extended evaluation. Were sorry to hear Ms Watson feels that she didnt receive adequate support and would be happy to discuss her care with her directly.'
Raphael was one of the greatest artists of the Renaissance  and he died from having too much sex. Well, that was the story put about by Giorgio Vasari, the 16th-century art historian.

Vasari told of Raphaels pursuit of... carnal pleasures, adding that he was a very amorous person, delighting much in women, and ever ready to serve them.

He said Raphael died in 1520 aged just 37, thanks to some unwise bloodletting prescribed for a fever, brought on by Raphaels more than usual [sexual] excess.

Sex doesnt normally bring on a fever  but still, it is true that Raphael was a vigorous lover, with a long-suffering fiancee and a mistress.

When he was painting his sublime frescoes in the Villa Farnesina, on the banks of the Tiber in Rome, he ached for his stunning mistress Margherita Luti, known as La Fornarina, the Bakers Daughter.

Now Raphaels greatest works, including his highly charged portrait of La Fornarina, are to go on show in a major new exhibition at the National Gallery in London.

Raphaels greatest works, including his highly charged portrait of La Fornarina (pictured), are to go on show in a major new exhibition at the National Gallery in London

The artist is most often associated with his serene paintings of the Madonna in pastoral settings against a blue sky. But in La Fornarina, we see a very different side to the great master.

The exhibition, delayed by Covid, was scheduled for 2020, the 500th anniversary of Raphaels death. And it reveals just how much the painter packed into his short life.

In a 20-year career, Raphael revolutionised Western art and his impact was felt for hundreds of years, arguably shaping the European tradition more than any other artist before or since, says David Ekserdjian, co-curator of the National Gallery show and co-author of Raphael, the book that accompanies the show.

Vasari, as well as pointing out Raphaels taste for sexual excess, acknowledged he was the ottimo universale or universal artist.

When he died  of whatever cause  he was buried in Romes holy of holies, the Pantheon, the ancient temple in the heart of the city. There he still lies today and his Latin epitaph translates as: Here lies that famous Raphael, whom Nature feared shed been defeated by while he was alive. When he was dying, she feared she, too, would die.

Raphael was so revered, some mourners wrongly claimed that, rather than being 37, he was 33  the same age as Jesus on his death. That he died on Good Friday only added to his semi-divine status.

The painter was born Raphael Santi in Urbino in 1483  he called himself Raphael da Urbino (from Urbino) throughout his life.

When he was painting his sublime frescoes in the Villa Farnesina, on the banks of the Tiber in Rome, he ached for his stunning mistress Margherita Luti, known as La Fornarina, the Bakers Daughter (pictured)

His mother died when he was only eight. His father, Giovanni Santi, was a painter well-known in Urbinos court circles. He gave Raphael a solid artistic foundation before he, too, died when his son was only 11.

Raphaels big break was being appointed a boy-apprentice to Perugino, one of Italys greatest painters, and he heavily influenced Raphaels early style.

One of the rumours that dogged Raphael was that he was a plagiarist. His deadly rival Michelangelo certainly thought so.

Michelangelo even suspected that Raphael conned his way into the Sistine Chapel to copy the ceiling he had painted there.

So envied was Raphaels success, in fact, that some people think his early death was due to arsenic poisoning by a rival, not too much sex.

In truth, Raphael was utterly original. As Vasari said, Raphael through studying the efforts of the old and modern masters, took the best from each of them and, by gathering all this together, enriched the art of painting.

The artist is most often associated with his serene paintings of the Madonna in pastoral settings against a blue sky. But in La Fornarina, we see a very different side to the great master (Raphael and Foranina)

By the age of 17, he was already being described as a magister (master). While living in Perugia, he showed he had mastered Peruginos style in his Coronation of the Virgin for the Oddi Chapel.

When he moved to Florence in his early 20s, he improved his skills by drawing copies of works by Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo. He diversified into red chalk, and pen and ink, and mastered the art of the tondo  the round painting.

In Florence, he painted some of his finest pictures of the Virgin and Child, including The Madonna of the Pinks, The Hermitage Holy Family, The Madonna Of The Meadow and Madonna Of The Goldfinch.

But it was in Rome that Raphael reached his peak, thanks to his great patron Pope Julius II, whose portrait is in the National Gallery show.

Julius II commissioned Raphael to decorate the Vatican Stanze (rooms). His frescoes there included his most famous picture: The School Of Athens, a much-imitated collection of the greatest thinkers of Ancient Greece, gathered round the philosophers Plato and Aristotle.

A mystery hovers over the late addition of a brooding character in the foreground, leaning on a stone. Officially, he is Heraclitus, another Greek philosopher. But some experts suggest it is, in fact, a miserable Michelangelo, angry that his younger rival was acquiring some of the best commissions in Rome.

Michelangelo had a point. Young Raphael wasnt just working for the Pope.

By 1510 he was painting the personal chapel of Agostino Chigi, one of the citys richest men. Soon after, he was painting frescoes at Chigis villa, now the Villa Farnesina. Here, he developed his gift for female and male nudes as well as mythological subjects.

Raphael was so revered, some mourners wrongly claimed that, rather than being 37, he was 33  the same age as Jesus on his death. That he died on Good Friday only added to his semi-divine status (Raphael and Foranina)

Again and again in Raphaels work, you get the sense of a questing mind, hungry for knowledge and new techniques. Continuing his work in the Vatican Stanze, he painted scenes that harmoniously brought together clashing light sources: natural light from the window combined with moonlight, firelight, torches, candles and the celestial light that clung to divine figures.

The world of painting could not confine him, however, and he was continually exploring new fields, becoming a master printmaker. In 1514, aged 31, he became the architect of the most important building in the city, St Peters Cathedral.

Raphael became the favourite of the new Pope, Leo X, who entrusted him with looking after the ancient antiquities in Rome. It was for Leo X that Raphael produced his next masterstroke  the tapestries for the Sistine Chapel.

With his breathtaking appetite for work, Raphael made drawings and cartoons for the tapestries.

Portrait of Raphael Sanzio, Italian Renaissance painter. He was appointed chief architect of St. Peter's Basilica before Michelangelo

The cartoons, which belong to the Queen, are on display in the Victoria & Albert Museum, but a copy appears in the National Gallery show.

Leo Xs commissions came thick and fast. His gallery at the Vatican included so many biblical scenes  48 from the Old Testament and four from the New Testament  that it became known as Raphaels Bible.

Then, all of a sudden, the end came. On his death, a Roman, Pandolfo Pico, declared that, just like at the death of Christ in the New Testament, the rocks rent  that is, the very walls of Rome split apart.

As he lay dying, Pope Leo X sent word to Raphael six times to show his devotion to him.

His favourite artist had packed several lifetimes worth of art  and love  into his brief 37 years.

Raphael is at the National Gallery from April 9 until July 31.
Billions of people are breathing unhealthy air and could be at risk of heart and lung conditions, a major report warned today.

Ninety-nine per cent of the world's population live in areas which exceed the World Health Organization's (WHO) air quality guidelines.

The figure is higher than the 90 per cent figure from its report four years ago, but it has since tightened the limits for the amount of pollution nations should allow.

Air quality is poorest in WHO's Eastern Mediterranean and South East Asia regions, followed by Africa, it said.

Dr Maria Neira, WHO director for environment, climate change and health, said it is 'unacceptable' pollution is still killing millions every year and taking away 'countless' years of good health.

'Too many investments' are being made into 'a polluted environment rather than in clean, healthy air', she warned.

Countries are rushing to reduce their imports of Russian oil following its invasion of Ukraine. This has triggered concerns leaders will turn to fossil fuels  such as coal or liquified gas  to plug the gap in supply.

But WHO and United Nations leaders have warned the move is putting the climate at even more risk.

The graph shows the WHO's guidelines for particulate matter (PM 2.5 and PM 10), ozone (O3), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), sulfur dioxide (SO2) and carbon monoxide (CO). The health body warned 99 per cent of the world's population breathes air that exceeds these guidelines. The PM 2.5, PM 10 and NO2 figures are annual recommendations, while the O3 level is the maximum that people should be exposed to during the six months when concentrations are at their highest level. The SO2 and CO figures are 24-hour exposure maximums

The map shows the regional particulate matter concentration equal to or smaller than 2.5 m (PM2.5). The WHO guidelines set out that levels should be no higher than 5 g/m per year (marked with green dots). Areas with concentration levels about this are marked in yellow, orange and red dots

The map shows the regional particulate matter concentration equal to or smaller than 10 m (PM10). The WHO guidelines set out that levels should be no higher than 15 g/m per year (marked with green dots). Areas with concentration levels about this are marked in yellow, orange and red dots

The map shows the regional nitrogen dioxide concentration. The WHO guidelines set out that levels should be no higher than 10 g/m per year (marked with green dots). Areas with concentration levels about this are marked in yellow, orange and red dots

The WHO examined data from more than 6,000 cities in 117 countries, as part of an update to its air quality database update.

For the first time, the health body examined annual average concentrations of NO2  which originates mainly from human-generated burning of fuel, such as through road traffic.

WHAT ACTIONS DOES THE WHO WANT COUNTRIES TO TAKE? Steps governments can take to improve air quality and health, according to the WHO: Adopt or revise and implement national air quality standards according to the latest WHO Air Quality Guidelines

Monitor air quality and identify sources of air pollution

Support the transition to exclusive use of clean household energy for cooking, heating and lighting

Build safe and affordable public transport systems and pedestrian- and cycle-friendly networks

Implement stricter vehicle emissions and efficiency standards; and enforce mandatory inspection and maintenance for vehicle

Invest in energy-efficient housing and power generation

Improve industry and municipal waste management

Reduce agricultural waste incineration, forest fires and certain agro-forestry activities (e.g. charcoal production)

Include air pollution in curricula for health professionals and providing tools for the health sector to engage Advertisement

It also looked at particulate matter (PM) with diameters equal or smaller than 10 m (PM 10) or 2.5 m (PM 2.5).

Tiny particulate matter are some of the most dangerous pollutants because they are capable of penetrating deep into the lungs and bloodstream. They have been linked with cardiovascular problems, strokes, respiratory conditions and cancer.

Meanwhile, NO2 has been found to trigger respiratory problems that can cause hospital and emergency department admissions, such as asthma and symptoms including coughing, wheezing and difficulty breathing.

Both dangerous pollutants are mainly made from burning fuel for transport, energy and agriculture.

WHO guidelines set out people shouldn't be exposed to levels of PM 2.5 higher than 5 g/m on average per year, while levels of PM10 shouldn't top 15 g/m.

Concentrations of NO2 should not exceed 10 g/m.

But its report found air quality in 17 per cent of cities in high-income countries do not meet the standards.

And in low-income countries, fewer than one per cent of cities recorded levels in line with the guidelines.

But the WHO found NO2 levels were largely the same across the globe, regardless of how rich a nation was.

On average, 77 per cent of people in the 4,000 cities where NO2 data was collected are breathing in too much of the pollutant.

The WHO said its findings show billions of people are still breathing 'unhealthy' levels of PM and NO2, with those in the poorest countries being the worst affected.

It claimed the evidence base for the damage air pollution does to humans 'has been growing rapidly and points to significant harm caused by even low levels of many air pollutants.

The WHO said its findings show the importance of curbing fossil fuel use and taking action to reduce air pollution levels.

Air pollution increases the risk of several conditions, including heart attack, stroke and diabetes

Three of the most problematic pollutants  nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10)  dropped to all-time low concentrations last year in the UK. Pictured, the level of PM2.5 since records began in 2009 for urban areas (purple) and by roads (red)

PM10, larger particles which pose less of a health risk to people, dropped from 15g/m3 in urban areas in 2019 to 13.2g/m3 last year  a 12 per cent drop (pictured)

Pictured, a graph showing three measures of nitrogen dioxide, a pollutant primarily produced by engines and the burning of fossil fuels. The urban background annual average (purple) dropped by almost a quarter (23 per cent) in 2020

It urged leaders to help all households move to sustainable energy, improve public transport and build cycle-friendly roads and energy-efficient homes.

And the body also called for nations to identify sources of pollution, enforce stricter vehicle emission standards and checks and teach health professionals about the effects of air pollution.

Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO's director-general, said: 'Current energy concerns highlight the importance of speeding up the transition to cleaner, healthier energy system.

'High fossil fuel prices, energy security, and the urgency of addressing the twin health challenges of air pollution and climate change, underscore the pressing need to move faster towards a world that is much less dependent on fossil fuels.'

Dr Neira added: 'After surviving a pandemic, it is unacceptable to still have 7million preventable deaths and countless preventable lost years of good health due to air pollution.

'That's what we're saying when we look at the mountain of air pollution data, evidence, and solutions available.

'Yet too many investments are still being sunk into a polluted environment rather than in clean, healthy air.'
Warning signs of breast cancer could be spotted in breast milk and blood, scientists say.

Doctors hope the discovery could lead to a test for breast cancer in women who are not routinely offered mammograms.

The finding, by experts from New York's Clarkson University, was made by analysing breast milk samples from six women.

Three were battling one of the most common types of breast cancer, called invasive ductal carcinoma.

Women with the disease were found to have similar levels of 23 specific proteins in their breastmilk, compared to those who did not have a tumour.

Danielle Whitham, one of the authors, said the proteins are also 'detectable in blood', meaning it won't just apply to women who are pregnant or new mothers.

She said the results  if proven in bigger trials  means 'screening could potentially be done in women of any age'. Mammograms are not usually recommended to low-risk women aged under 40.

Mammograms could be replaced by breast milk and blood tests in the future, researchers claimed today. Graphic shows: How breast milk or blood tests can be used to show whether a woman has breast cancer

Around 400,000 women are invited to mammograms every year in the UK. Every women aged 50 to 70 is invited for a screening every three years

Around 2million women are invited to mammograms every year in the UK. The NHS invites women aged 50 to 71 every three years.

Women in the US are encouraged to get on every year between the ages of 40 to 54, before switching to screenings every two years until they are 75.

Around 55,000 women and hundreds of men are told they have breast cancer each year in the UK.

Around 288,000 new cases of breast cancer are expected to be diagnosed in the US this year.

More than 85 per cent survive the disease for five years or more. But it is still crucial to spot tumours early, which can be helped with the new tests.

Ms Witham said: 'Although mammograms are useful for catching breast cancer early, they arent typically recommended for low-risk women under 40.

'Because the biomarkers found in breast milk are also detectable in blood, screening could potentially be done in women of any age using blood or breast milk.'

Breast milk contains proteins, epithelial cells and immune cells.

Ms Witham said they all 'provide a great deal of information about what is happening in a womans body during a crucial time in breast development'.

The research was presented at the Experimental Biology 2022 meeting in Philadelphia.

Experts said wider studies are now needed to confirm the findings. They claimed the approach could also be used for other types of breast cancer as well.

Ms Witham added: 'If our future studies are successful, it could change how women are monitored for breast cancer and aid in earlier diagnosis. This could even lead to a higher survival rate in women.'

She said similar tests can be done on blood samples so women who are not lactating can also be scanned for the disease.
Korean Air's B747-8f / Courtesy of Korean Air



By Kim Hyun-bin



Korean Air has won Air Transport World's (ATW) 2022 Cargo Operator of the Year Award, which is considered one of the most prestigious aviation awards, the company said Monday.



This award is Korean Air's second consecutive ATW prize, proving the fact that it has been one of the world's most successful airlines during the pandemic.



"To see Korean Air named the 2022 Cargo Operator of the Year after winning the ATW 2021 Airline of the Year really speaks to the consistently outstanding, all-around performance of Korean Air. The industry's huge pivot to air cargo and importance to the global economy made this a very competitive category this year and we sincerely congratulate the Korean Air leadership and entire team," ATW Editor-in-Chief Karen Walker said.



Launched in 1974, ATW's annual Airline Industry Achievement Awards are described as the most coveted honor an airline can receive. The 48th awards ceremony will be held in Doha, Qatar on June 21.



When deciding on the winner of the Cargo Operator of the Year award, ATW's global judging panel of editors and analysts cited, "strong financial performance, its continued innovation and agility, its wider initiatives in humane disaster relief, and in animal/wildlife conservation." The judges also noted that "the airline's investment and application of technology & digitalization is particularly impressive and it sets the bar for the air cargo industry."



"We are honored to win one of ATW's renowned awards for the second consecutive year, especially in these difficult times,'' said Eum Jae-dong, senior vice president and head of the cargo business division at Korean Air. "This achievement was made possible by the efforts of not only our cargo teams, but by the concerted efforts of our entire company. Korean Air remains committed to delivering excellence in service to our customers as a global leading airline."



Korean Air Cargo, with its 50 years of history, is one of the world's top five air freight operators.


Advertisement

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is receiving mounting opposition to its approval of fourth COVID-19 vaccine doses for all Americans aged 50 and older.

The agency broke standard practice when it made the decision last month, electing not to take advice from a panel of independent experts. Some of those who would have advised on the decision are now voicing their objections to the authorization, and the lack of transparency the FDA displayed in the lead up to it.

Dr Marty Makary, a medical commentator and public policy expert from Johns Hopkins University, wrote an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) this week criticizing the FDA and its lack of transparency in the process of approving the additional shot.

The FDA made the decision quickly, only days after applications were submitted for review, and it also granted Pfizer a wider eligibility for its approval than the firm asked for.

While federal regulators push for more Covid vaccines, cases in the U.S. have fallen below 30,000 per day once again and deaths from the virus remain low as well.

A growing list of experts are criticizing the FDA for its processes in rolling out a fourth dose of the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines. Dr Marty Makary (left), a public health expert at Johns Hopkins, writes that the FDA circumvented standard processes for the approval of the fourth COVID-19 vaccine shots. Dr Eric Rubin (middle), editor in chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, believes that there is not enough data supporting the shots for Americans as young as 50. Dr Cody Meissner (right), the chief of pediatrics at Tufts Children's Hospital and member of VRBPAC, is unsure whether the virus poses enough of a risk at the moment to make a fourth shot necessary

'Some of the FDA's own experts disagree with the decision, but the agency simply ignored them,' Makary wrote.

Last week, the FDA approved second booster shots, or fourth doses overall, of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines for all Americans aged 50 and older. Immunocompromised people 12 and older can receive the Pfizer jab as well. Severely vulnerable people are also now eligible to receive a fifth dose of the vaccine.

Authorization came quickly after the companies submitted information regarding the shots to regulators. The Pfizer shot's authorization was especially bizarre, as the company had only requested in for Americans 65 and older, but received it for people as young as 50.

The agency made the decision citing the waning immunity against infection provided by the shots. It is believed that the vaccine is only acceptably effective against infection for a few months after receival, and with the first booster approved as far back as September, much of the protection early recipients received has waned.

Makary points out that, while the immunity against infection has waned, boosted Americans are still very unlikely to suffer hospitalization or death from the virus.

'At the crux of the broad opposition to second boosters is the recognition of B- and T-cells, which public-health officials have long ignored,' Makary writes.

'They talk only about antibody levels, which tend to decline in the months after vaccination. B- and T-cells, activated by the primary vaccine series or an infection (and augmented by a single booster in older patients), are highly and durably effective at preventing serious illness from Covid.'

There is growing support for Makary's position as well.

Upon the approval of the shots, multiple health experts arose criticizing the decision from the FDA and its refusal to hold an advisory committee meeting.

Dr Anna Durbin is an international public health expert at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, has been a critic of Pfizer, Moderna and the White House's insistence to rollout COVID-19 booster shots before they are needed. She told ABC last week that she does not believe many Americans will benefit from additional shots.

'There are very few, if any, people who, in my opinion require a fourth dose,' she said.

'In general, it's too early to recommend a fourth dose, except for those who are immune compromised,' Dr Paul Goepfert, professor of medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, also told ABC.

Dr Eric Rubin, editor in chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, and member of the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) - which usually advises on these decisions, said last month he did not see enough data to support the need for the shots.

'The only data that I've seen has been for participants followed for just a few weeks,' Rubin told CNN.

'The most important information is going to be how well a fourth dose protects highly vulnerable people against serious disease and death, and I don't know when that will be available.'

Dr Paul Offit, also a VRBPAC member and the director of the vaccine education center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, was a critic of the rollout of the first booster dose and takes issue with this approval as well.

'Where's the evidence that somebody over 50 benefits from a fourth dose? Because the evidence to date appears to support the possibility for those over 65, although I haven't, we haven't, seen all the data... but where's the evidence for a 50 to 64 year old? Where's that evidence? Because absent that evidence, then there shouldn't be this recommendation' he told CNN.

Many of these experts will have a chance to speak their opinion on April 6, when the FDA will hold a VRBPAC meeting to discuss the general future rollout of COVID-19 vaccines and boosters going forward.

Makary does not see much use for that meeting at this point, though.

'Thats like having lawyers present arguments to a judge whos already issued a verdict,' he said of the meeting in his WSJ column.

There is also the question of whether Americans will even be willing to receive the additional shot. The country's Covid booster shot rollout has slowed to a halt after a surge of demand for the additional shots in early 2022.

America's vaccine coverage is among the best in the world, though, with nearly 90 percent of adults having received at least one shot.

The successful vaccine rollout has translated into a greater control over the virus as well. Cases and deaths from the virus in the U.S. have plummeted in recent months. The nation is currently averaging 29,226 daily infections, down eight percent over the past week. Deaths have stayed flat over that period, with the virus costing 835 deaths daily.

Officials from the FDA expect to roll out the shots to even more Americans in the near future.

Last week, Dr Peter Marks, who leads the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, making him the top vaccine regulator in the agency, said he believes all Americans will need the fourth jab as early as this fall.

'It would not be surprising if there is a potential need for people to get an additional booster in the fall along with a more general booster campaign if that takes place,' Marks told reporters during a news briefing after the FDA's authorization of the fourth jab.

'It may be that a decision is made that rather than the vaccines we currently have, which are called vaccines against the prototype virus, that we will move to a vaccine that is either against one of the variants or something else.'
A young girl who waited over 200 days for a new heart after being diagnosed with a rare, deadly, heart condition, has finally received the life-saving transplant.

Elodie Baker, who is still under a year old, received the transplant on March 27 after a long 100 day stay in a Chicago hospital.

In August, she was diagnosed with dilated cardiomyopathy, a condition that is hard for doctors to detect but often deadly.

Doctors nearly missed her condition when her mother brought her in for a checkup, but now with the transplant she is expected to live a healthy life going forward.

Elodie Baker (pictured) required a heart transplant after it was discovered that she had dilated cardiomyopathy

Baker's parents (pictured) took her to the hospital after she was crying while her mother nursed her and she was having trouble feeding

Doctors initially could not figure out what was wrong with Baker (pictured), but an x-ray revealed that she was suffering from a rare but deadly heart condition

'Our pregnancy was normal and we had an uncomplicated delivery and actually went home with Elodie,' Katie, Elodie's mother, told Good Morning America during an interview this week.

Baker knew something was wrong with her daughter when she had trouble feeding, and would start crying while her mother nursed her.

'She was with us in Minnesota at home for seven weeks and one night, she wouldn't feed. I was nursing and she let out this cry and my heart just sank and I said to [my husband] Collin, 'Something's wrong. We need to take her in,'' she explained.

Doctors originally told Baker that they were not sure what was wrong with her daughter, as nothing stood out to them.

Just before the Baker's went back home, doctors recommended ax x-ray, which ended up being a life saving decision.

'I think they were considering maybe sending us home but they said, 'Let's just get an x-ray to be sure,'' Baker said.

'Then the x-ray came back. They saw her heart was enlarged and that was on August 21. And we haven't been home since.'

After her diagnosis, Elodie Baker (pictured) was moved from Minnesota to Chicago for treatment. She used a breathing and feeding tube and a device to help her heart pump blood

On March 27, Elodie (center) successfully received a heart transplant, over 200 days from her diagnosis and after 100 days in the hospital

Baker (pictured) is now doing fine, and undergoing therapy to catch up to her peers on developmental milestones

Doctors who worked on Elodie's case had trouble determining the cause of the condition, which occurs when a person's heart chamber becomes enlarged and struggles to pump blood.

Baker would eventually be transferred from her home in Minnesota to a hospital in Chicago, Illinois, where she would receive care.

'In Elodie's case, the genetic test did not reveal an answer for why she developed this kind of cardiomyopathy and in that situation, it's called idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy, meaning at this point in time, we don't really know why this happened to her,' Dr Anna Joong, who has cared for Elodie for months at Lurie Children's in Chicago, told GMA.

Doctors quickly determined that she would need a heart transplant, which can be a challenge for a young child since the typical adult organs that become available can not properly fit in their chest.

During the wait, doctors implanted a pediatric ventricular assist device (VAD) into Elodie to serve as an artificial heart in the meanwhile.

The infant also required a feeding tube to eat and breathing tube, as those remained a challenge for her as she received treatment.

Pictured: Elodie Baker receives treatment in Chicago's Lurie's Hospital

Pictured: Elodie Baker receives treatment in Chicago's Lurie's Hospital

'Her heart was so sick, that the IV medicines just weren't enough and she needed a VAD,' Joong said.

'We use this device as a way to bridge her to transplant so it's a way to support her heart, to help get her stronger in the time that she's waiting for her donor heart.'

A heart did eventually become available, though, and the operation was successfully completed last month.

While she is still on a feeding tube for the time being, doctors told GMA, but she has had a breathing tube removed and has gone through physical and speech therapy to help her catch up to developmental goals for her age.

'She has already been transferred out of ICU level care and is sitting up,' Joong explained.

'She is one strong kid and we are so grateful to the donor family.'

In 2010, researchers found that the condition makes up around 403,000 global deaths every year, and that the figure is trending upwards.
Russias war on Ukraine underlines the need for resolve in maintaining Britains technological edge in national security.

The Commons foreign affairs committee deserves credit for drawing attention to the Governments tardiness in scrutinising the proposed purchase of the semiconductor maker Newport Wafer Fab by Chinese-controlled Nexperia.

It questions why a UK firm, which is part of critical security infrastructure, should be allowed to fall into the hands of China. It might have added at a time when Beijing has refused to distance itself from the inhuman assault by Russia on Ukrainian citizens.

Security fears: Chinese-owned Nexperia acquired the Newport Wafer Fab semiconductor maker in July 2021 for 63m, but the deal is now being investigated

There is a broader issue at stake. The National Security and Investments Act was meant to ensure that the UKs exceptional defence technologies stay where they belong.

It is hard to imagine that a wartime Churchill government would have allowed vital UK tech, such as radar and Enigma, to fall into uncertain ownership.

But that is precisely what is now happening. Instead of blocking a series of defence takeovers, Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng and the Government appear prepared to allow critical defence technology to be transferred into unsafe hands.

The sonar detectors developed by Ultra Electronics enable Nato to track the movement of Russian submarines.

It is critical work at a time when Moscows expansionism threatens Baltic countries and Russian subs are on unwanted missions in UK waters.

Yet the Government is conducting negotiations with would-be buyer Cobham, a private equity firm in the disguise, of a great British defence name, which would see command and control sacrificed. The idea that pledges about staffing, R&D and UK headquarters can keep Ultra tech out of harms way is fantasy.

A range of UK defence technology stocks currently are in jeopardy. There is increased confidence that US rival Parker-Hannifin will land control of Meggitt which has been part of Britains aerospace supply chain since the 19th century.

Satellite pioneer Inmarsat is in sight of being swallowed by American competitor Viasat. Melrose has made no secret of its desire to dispose of GKNs aerospace arm when time is right.

What is certain at present is that whatever the outcome of the security reviews, and other negotiations taking place, anything which diminishes the UKs defence sector in wartime conditions would be negligent.

The UK needs all the levers it can muster in challenging the Chinese and Russian menace.

With defence spending ratcheting up all over Europe and the Middle East (because of the Iran threat), not only do UK national security firms provide Britain with a home-grown shield against aggressive enemies but offer a stirring manufacturing and export opportunity.

Boris Johnson must cancel or suspend any such transactions until the current war in Ukraine has been ended and Irans aggression across the Gulf curtailed.

#Musk

There is an inherent conflict in Elon Musks purchase of a 9.2 per cent stake in Twitter for 2.2billion.

His stake-building bears similarity to Remington entrepreneur Victor Kiam. He liked the shave so much he bought the company.

Musk, an addicted tweeter, is irritated by limits Twitter places on free speech. And in the recent past he has been punished by Americas Securities and Exchange Commission for using Twitter as a test bed for Tesla corporate actions.

Grabbing a dominant stake in a core media outlet does not spell greater independence. It focuses attention on the immense market power of the 21st-century tech giants.

For the moment Musks manoeuvre is seen by investors as a blessing by reinvigorating share prices in a sector punished this year.

If Musk were to go the whole hog and buy all of Twitter  a mere bagatelle given his immense wealth  it could prove a move too far. It would spur US anti-trust authorities into decisive action against tech power.

Nickel and dime

The London Metal Exchange and its settlement arm LME Clear were not known for good governance and safety long before it fell into the hands of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

The nickel crisis and the threat it poses to financial stability have placed procedures firmly in the spotlight.

Whether the LME would have proved more durable if it hadnt fallen into overseas hands is hard to say.

That there is a governance and skills deficit is evident. Is that the sound of the FCA and Bank of England slamming the stable door again?
Wizz Air carried five times more passengers in March than in the same month last year as the airline sector continued its recovery from Covid-19.

The Hungarian budget air carrier revealed that nearly 2.5 million flights were booked by its customers last month, compared to just 480,200 in March 2021, when many European countries were under strict national lockdowns.

It takes the number of passengers who have flown with the airline in the last 12 months to over 27 million, which was still around a third lower than in the year leading up to the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

Recovery: The Hungarian budget air carrier revealed that nearly 2.5 million flights were booked by its customers last month, compared to just 480,200 in March 2021

Load factor levels additionally grew by 23.7 percentage points year-on-year to 86.2 per cent in March, while its seat capacity shot up more than threefold to 2.9 million.

Last month saw Wizz Air launch 18 new routes to popular holiday destinations such as Milan, Mallorca and Vienna from London Gatwick Airport, and announce three new routes between Italy and the Greek island of Skiathos.

In addition, it declared that from July and August, another Airbus A321 aircraft would be added to its Bucharest and Cluj-Napoca bases in Romania, as well as one in Tirana, Albania.

The company has been expanding its operations despite the significant financial turmoil caused by the plunge in airline travel, which led to the group recording a massive 576million loss in the last financial year.

These expansion efforts contributed to the firm posting a 267.5million loss in its most recent quarterly results covering the final three months of 2021, although the emergence of the Omicron variant also had a substantial impact.

Wizz Air's trading update comes amidst mass flight cancellations and delays affecting holidaymakers travelling from London Heathrow and Manchester Airport.

New destinations: Last month saw Wizz Air launch 18 new routes from London Gatwick Airport and announce three new routes between Italy and the Greek island of Skiathos

British Airways (BA) and EasyJet have both blamed high Covid-enforced absence levels amongst employees for the problems, with the former scrapping dozens of flights today and the latter having nixed more than 220 flights since last Friday.

Monday marks the first day of the Easter school holidays without international travel curbs in England since the pandemic started, but the lack of staff has meant airlines are struggling to cope with the surge in demand.

In the last three days, passengers journeying through Manchester Airport have reported queueing for more than three hours to check-in, waiting a long time to reclaim their baggage, and missing flights because of delays.

Shares in both EasyJet and BA's parent company International Airlines Group (IAG) declined in early trading on the FTSE 250 Index today, but recovered to modest gains just before trading closed today.

However, in spite of a late rally, Wizz Air shares ended trading on Monday just 0.1 per cent, or 3 points, lower at 28.60.

Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, said: 'News bulletins showing long queues of people waiting to get on planes will put many people off from jet-setting to a different location.

'Together, these forces could result in tens of thousands of people saying they won't bother with flying again this year, and best to wait until everything has settled down.

He added: 'Making matters worse is the fact that oil prices remain stubbornly high, which is putting pressure on fuel costs...The soaring price of fuel could weigh on corporate earnings in the airline sector unless extra costs are passed on to the customer.

'Doing so is a big risk given how consumers are under considerable pressure from the rising cost of living and may not be able to stomach higher ticket prices, but many airlines have significant debts which they are desperate to reduce.'
Challenger bank and former peer-to-peer lender Zopa has reported its first profit less than two years after gaining a full banking licence.

The financial technology firm has followed in the footsteps of Starling and OakNorth to become the latest - and one of the few - British digital banks to have broken even.

Having only been granted a full banking licence in the summer of 2020 as it sought to diversify its services and compete with larger financial institutions, this also makes it one of the quickest online banks to reach profitability.

Select Few: Zopa Bank has followed in the footsteps of Starling and OakNorth to become the latest - and one of the few - British digital banks to have broken even

Zopa added that it expects to remain profitable going forward while continuing its rapid growth, which has already seen it lend over 1billion, gain 1billion in deposits and become one of Britain's largest credit card lenders.

Before its transition into banking, the company helped pioneer peer-to-peer lending, a service that allows borrowers to obtain money directly from other people or businesses without going through a financial institution.

A decade after being started by former employees of the defunct internet bank Egg, it had lent out its first 1billion to customers, and two years later, it became the first P2P platform in the UK to lend more than 2billion to customers.

P2P was billed as essentially cutting the middleman out of the lending equation - AKA, the banks.

In more recent times, though, the P2P industry has come under increasing scrutiny from regulators like the Financial Conduct Authority following the collapse of prominent lenders, such as Funding Secure and Lendy.

The FCA has labelled the practice a 'high-risk' investment alongside mini-bonds and cryptocurrencies and finished a consultation on their promotion a fortnight ago.

Amid this environment, Zopa shut down its peer-to-peer lending operations in December and handed back money to around 60,000 P2P investors, who saw their loans purchased at face value.

Leader: 'Hitting profitability in just 21 months is a testament to our unique model that meets customer needs by focusing on how they borrow and save,' said Zopa CEO Jaidev Janardana

In a statement, the firm said: 'Sadly, over the last few years, customer trust in P2P investing has been damaged by a small number of businesses whose approach led to material losses for customers investing in those platforms.

'Linked to this, the changing regulation in the sector has made it challenging to grow and remain commercially viable.'

The group is now focusing on growing its banking business, whose products range from personal loans to car finance and fixed-rate savings accounts, and launching an initial public offering later this year.

To help achieve this, the company raised 220million from investors in a funding round that was led by Japanese conglomerate Softbank and included hedge funds Davidson Kempner and Chimera Capital.

Following this fundraise, London-based Zopa became the newest British fintech giant to achieve 'unicorn' status - a privately-held firm worth at least $1billion.

Jaidev Janardana, the group's chief executive, said: 'The past year has been a highly successful one for Zopa as we've exceeded our targets across new and existing products and raised $300million led by Softbank to fuel our accelerated growth.

'Hitting profitability in just 21 months is a testament to our unique model that meets customer needs by focusing on how they borrow and save - the two things with the most impact on finances.

'Today's news makes Zopa one of the fastest digital banks to achieve profitability ever and reinforces our thesis on the importance of sustainable growth as a catalyst for accelerated product and market expansion.'
Retirement savings invested in Russian state-owned energy firms and banks helped Vladimir Putin amass 480billion in foreign reserves to fund the invasion of Ukraine.

Staff at British Airways, the Church Of England and scores of councils and government departments were among those who had some of their pension contributions put into these schemes even after Russian troops had annexed Crimea in March 2014, a joint investigation by the Daily Mail and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism has found.

Despite initial good returns, share prices plummeted as Russian tanks prepared to roll into Ukraine earlier this year.

Dirty money? UK pensions may have helped Russian leader Vladimir Putin pay for hardware such as these tanks

Global sanctions and shuttered markets have now left many investors unable to sell.

Pension campaigners warned these investments meant British employees had unknowingly enabled Putins war and jeopardised the very futures [they were] saving for.

Kira Rudik, the leader of Ukraines Voice party, said: It was clear that Putin was a tyrant eight years ago and the fact that the whole modern world was still continuing doing business with him, and making money there, results in what we see right now.

Companies and public sector employers usually hire a specialist firm to invest their staff pension funds in a portfolio of shares, bonds or other assets.

These include BlackRock, which manages pensions for more than 10m British employees, and is also among the top shareholders in Russias biggest companies.

Since 2014 it has earned 1billion in dividends for its clients through its shareholdings in ten of the countrys most important firms that form the mainstay of Russias economy, our analysis found.

During the same period, the Russian government received 35billion in dividends from its holdings in six of these companies  Gazprom, Rosneft, Sberbank, VTB, Transneft and Alrosa  which are part state-owned.

Putin (pictured) enjoyed hefty tax returns on the four non-state owned companies  Lukoil, Tatneft, Novatek and Nornickel

Putin also enjoyed hefty tax returns on the four non-state owned companies  Lukoil, Tatneft, Novatek and Nornickel  which had also benefited from investments from UK pension funds. Many of these businesses have now been sanctioned by western nations.

There is no suggestion BlackRock has acted unlawfully or breached any sanctions and initially said it was selling Russian investments following the annexing of Ukraine, with chief executive Larry Fink declaring: I would not invest in Russia at this time, not until it wants to be part of the global community.

The firm said clients held more than 13.87billion in Russian assets at the end of January this year.

But since the invasion of Ukraine, it has marked the value of its Russian assets down to zero  although these could rise again when markets reopen and if sanctions lift.

BlackRock said: Prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the exposure to Russia in our clients portfolios represented less than 0.2 per cent of BlackRocks assets under management.

BA Pensions said one of its schemes, the New Airways Pension Scheme (NAPS), had a minor exposure to Russian investments with a total allocation of less than 0.02 per cent of assets at the end of February 2022, which were marked to zero following Government sanctions.

It said because of the small exposure its members would not be affected by plunging returns on Russian investments.

The Church of England has said it sold all its Russian assets on February 24, as the invasion of Ukraine began. It is not clear if the CofE investments were made via BlackRock.
Aviva has appointed a female finance boss making it the second firm in the FTSE 100 after NatWest to have women in the top two jobs.

Charlotte Jones, 53, who is chief financial officer at RSA Insurance and has held the same job at Jupiter Fund Management, starts in September.

The mother of three, who is a keen runner and cyclist from Bury, Lancashire, and has also had senior roles at Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank, will work with chief executive Amanda Blanc.
City regulators are investigating the London Metal Exchange (LME) over trading chaos that brought the nickel market to a standstill last month.

The LME suspended trading in the green metal for a week and cancelled billions of pounds of business in a humiliating move that has threatened to destroy the 145-year-old exchange's reputation.

It stepped in after prices rocketed by 250 per cent in just two days to a record high over $100,000 a tonne.

Shutdown: The London Metal Exchange (pictured) suspended nickel trading for a week in a humiliating move that has threatened to destroy the 145-year-old exchange's reputation

Now the Bank of England and Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) have waded into the debacle, saying they will look at how the LME allowed events to spiral out of control and suggest what it should do to prevent a 'disorderly market' occurring again.

The Bank will also look into LME Clear, the exchange's clearing house that ensures trades go through.

The LME is likely to see a board shake-up  with regulators saying in a statement it has already 'agreed the benefits of appointing independent directors'.

Fines could follow at some stage, but that is not part of the remit of the initial investigation.

Separately, the LME put in limits for metals trading that only allow prices to rise or fall by a maximum of 15 per cent a day. It said it would kick off its own review into the chaos, which could result in fines and reprimands.

The LME's probe will look at how transparency could be improved. This was thought to be a key stumbling block that fuelled the crisis, as the LME was unaware that Chinese group Tsingshan Holdings had built up a huge short position  a bet that prices would fall.

The price of nickel  which is a key material used in electric cars and stainless steel  shot higher when Russia, a major producer, invaded Ukraine.

Traders feared sanctions would lead to a global shortage. But the rally was made worse by panicked short-sellers exiting their positions, which cranked up prices even further.

At the height of the crisis the LME essentially cancelled a day's worth of trades worth billions of pounds to undo a large part of the rise, which critics say amounted to a bailout of Tsingshan while depriving many other traders of huge wins.

The LME is thought to be facing lawsuits from companies who lost out.

Regulators say they will also speak to 'firms who held significant positions in the market', which could include Tsingshan and banking groups JP Morgan, BNP Paribas and Standard Chartered.

The bourse has been owned by HKEX, the owner of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, since 2012.

A trading source said the Bank of England was especially keen to get to the bottom of the nickel debacle in case something similar happens again in the near future.

At its height during the frenzied rally, nickel prices hit $100,365 a tonne. Yesterday it was worth $33,585.

The exchange runs one of the last 'open-outcry' marketplaces in Europe, where traders bark 'buy' and 'sell' orders to one another around a circular red sofa.
Elon Musk has become the biggest shareholder in Twitter after snapping up a 9.2 per cent stake.

The Tesla boss  the worlds richest man and a prolific user of the social media site  spent 2.2billionn buying around 73.5million Twitter shares.

The 50-year-old is now the companys largest shareholder and has a holding more than four times bigger than founder Jack Dorsey.

Tesla boss Elon Musk (pictured)  the worlds richest man and a prolific Twitter user of the spent 2.2bn buying around 73.5m shares in social media site

Twitter shares soared 27.1 per cent to nearly $50 as the purchase sent shockwaves through Wall Street and Silicon Valley.

The surge in the share price immediately made Musks stake worth 2.8billion  a 600million paper profit in one day.

Analysts speculated that Musk  who has a fortune of over 200billion  could even seek to buy the whole of Twitter in future.

Musks actual investment is a very small percentage of his wealth and an all-out buyout should not be ruled out, said CFRA Research analyst Angelo Zino.

The worlds richest man is a frequent user of Twitter and has more than 80m followers, but he has recently been critical of its approach to free speech.

It reached the point last month when he all but threatened to set up his own rival platform.

Musk, whose tweets have got him into trouble in the past, asked his followers whether they thought the social media platform encouraged free speech, tweeting: Free speech is essential to a functioning democracy. Do you believe Twitter rigorously adheres to this principle?

Is a new platform needed?

Analysts at Los Angeles-based investment firm Wedbush Securities said: Given Musks long-standing critical view of Twitter and social media platforms, it was viewed that Musk could look to build a new social media platform to compete with Twitter and others.

Instead, it looks like Elon has his eyes laser set on Twitter and we would expect this passive stake as just the start of broader conversations with the Twitter board/management that could ultimately lead to an active stake and a potential more aggressive ownership role of Twitter.

The South African-born father-of-seven is locked in a legal battle to free himself from a deal he made with US regulators in 2018 and regain control over his tweets.

The agreement forces him to have his messages about Tesla pre-approved by a lawyer to avoid breaking rules around the disclosure of market sensitive information.

Musk signed the agreement with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) after he claimed, in a tweet, that he had secured funding to take the company private at 325 a share.

His announcement roiled the shares and led the SEC to sue him. He eventually settled the dispute by paying a 30million fine.

He also landed himself in hot water in 2018 after he called a British caver who helped in the rescue of trapped Thai schoolboys a pedo guy on Twitter.

The tweet caused a furious storm but a US jury in 2019 found that Musk did not defame caver Vernon Unsworth.

Musk saw the valuation of his Tesla car company surpass a market value of $1 trillion last autumn, making it the fifth such firm to reach the milestone, after Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Google-owner Alphabet.
Ministers are facing fresh calls to intervene in the Chinese takeover of a Welsh microchip maker amid a row over national security.

Boris Johnson instructed National Security Adviser Sir Stephen Lovegrove to investigate the 63million buyout of Newport Wafer Fab by a Chinese-owned firm last year.

Last week it was claimed Lovegrove has looked into the deal but concluded it posed no threat. But Parliaments foreign affairs committee said there was so little evidence that Lovegrove had done so that it was left with the unfortunate conclusion that no review has taken place.

Boris Johnson instructed National Security Adviser Sir Stephen Lovegrove to investigate the 63m buyout of Newport Wafer Fab by a Chinese-owned firm last year

The row has put Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng under even more pressure to use new powers to intervene and unwind the takeover.

Kwarteng is understood to be considering using the new National Security and Investment Act which allows ministers to call in buyouts of strategic companies even after they have gone through.

An investigation could be launched within months, though it is thought it would focus more on the impact of the sale on Britains manufacturing industry than national security.

But, as the law came into force in January, critics have been left confused about why he has not already stepped in.

Newport Wafer Fab is the UKs biggest producer of microchips, which are an essential part of all electronic devices.

Dutch group Nexperia  which is owned by Chinese firm Wingtech and has links to the Communist Party in Beijing  took over Newport Wafer Fab last year.

Tom Tugendhat, chairman of the foreign affairs committee, said: For over a year, the committee has voiced its concern over the takeover of semiconductor manufacturer Newport Wafer Fab.

Semiconductors are essential to every aspect of modern life and Newport Wafer Fab is one of the countrys leading manufacturers.

Their takeover by Nexperia left many wondering why we are, seemingly, handing over critical security infrastructure to overseas companies with well-documented links to the Chinese state.

The committee asked the Government to clarify why Lovegrove was asked to inspect the deal and why he did not undertake such a review.

The MPs said they were extremely concerned about the Governments apparent lack of appetite to use the powers at its disposal to protect British companies in this industry.

Former Conservative party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith said yesterday: It beggars belief that the Government is going to stand idly by whilst Nexperia, a Chinese-controlled company, attempts to take over Britains largest microchip factory.

A Government spokesman said: The Government is considering the case and no decisions have been made.




Prime Minister-designate Han Duck-soo. Korea Times file
It's the new property boom which is set to turn millennials into millionaires - but none of the new homes they're snapping up actually exist, and never will.

Digital real estate in the virtual metaverse is the hottest property on the market and tipped to be worth trillions of dollars within just two to three years.

'It's going to be huge,' Curtin University digital expert Professor Vidy Potdar predicted. 'People are going to make a lot of money on it.'

It's the new property boom which is set to turn millennials into millionaires - but none of the new homes they're snapping up - like this one - actually exist...and never will

Early adopters are already paying millions to get in on the action to snap up tracts of digital land to build virtual online homes which they will then sell to new users.

Some say that it may already be too late to get on board to make the biggest profits as prices are already starting to soar worldwide.

But others predict even a small investment now could pay huge dividends - and may be enough to put down the deposit on a real home...or even buy it outright.

'Some might see it as owning something that doesn't actually exist - but the more savvy ones will see it as a very big investment,' says Sydney-based metaverse developer, Colina Demirdjian.

'Ultimately if you're getting in early, it becomes an investment that can grow exponentially quicker than owning a real home in the in the real world.'

Colina Demirdjian and her identical twin Hripsy are applying the finishing touches to their own metaverse, Diverse, created by their Sydney-based app company Double Trouble

In the US, the Sandbox metaverse has seen virtual land prices soar from US$25 for a plot to US$30,000 after rap star Snoop Dog moved in and set up a presence.

Digital real estate developer Everyrealm paid a staggering US$4.3 million for a tract of land in Sandbox too, a record amount in the sector which is dominated by Sandbox, Decentraland, Cryptovoxels and Somnium.

The virtual property bubble is exploding on the back of massive investments by Bitcoin millionaires who made huge cryptocurrency profits after small investments a few years ago turned into life-changing fortunes.

They are now ploughing their cash into the newly-emerging metaverses in the hope of repeating their digital speculation success.

It has been further fuelled by Facebook's parent company rebranding as Meta and founder Mark Zuckerberg pledging to invest massively in the virtual world.

The sprawling, realistically-rendered 3D environments aim to be better than real life, and somewhere users will want to live, work, play, socialise and shop.

The sprawling, realistically-rendered 3D environments aim to be better than real life, and somewhere users will want to live, work, play, socialise and shop

UN-REAL ESTATE Futurist Mark Pesce warns the virtual world is all about perceived value only. 'I call it un-real estate,' the honorary associate of University of Sydney's digital cultures program. 'It's a property deed to a place that doesn't exist in the real world. It's only redeemable in that particular plot. So it's like a store credit that you can only spend in one store. 'You might be able to get someone else to buy it - but that's basically it. 'The idea of where it gets its value from and how it holds that value is based entirely on how much bubbling ferment there is around a particular metaverse - and how much they can stir up people to make them think that these places are valuable.' Advertisement

Most importantly for many millennials is the ability to reinvent yourself into any form you like without the need for cosmetic surgery, as a tweaked version of their real-life form or a complete transformation.

The worlds will be accessed by augmented reality glasses - where the real world and virtual world can merge seamlessly - or virtual reality headsets which immerse users completely in their artificial world.

But all that immersion will come at a price - and experts are predicting the values of virtual possessions will soar on the back of increasing demand and deliberate limitations to preserve value.

Everything will be for sale in the virtual worlds too - from virtual homes to virtual gadgets to virtual furniture and most especially virtual fashion.

The commercial side of the metaverse has already attracted global brands like Nike and JP Morgan who are setting up presences at the centre of metaverse world - which in turn drives up the value of virtual homes near the virtual CBDs.

Colina Demirdjian and her identical twin Hripsy are in the process of applying the finishing touches to their own metaverse, Diverse, created by their Sydney-based app company Double Trouble.

The former law students made a fortune in their 20s through a mobile phone app that created lifelike cartoon avatars and they are now ploughing the profits back into their new virtual universe.

It's projected to be home to 30 million users with land prices already starting at $10,000 - and they are passionate advocates of the brave new online world.

Most importantly for many millennials is the ability to reinvent yourself into any form you like without the need for cosmetic surgery, as a tweaked version of their real-life form or a complete transformation

'Last year alone, virtual real estate was worth $500 million in sales and this year it's expected to hit $1 billion,' said Colina.

She believes many companies will intertwine the real world with the digital world - and give you a virtual version of anything you order in the real world to have in your metaverse... and vice-versa.

TITLE DEEDS OR NFTS Underpinning the virtual world are NFTs - non-fungible tokens - which are digital assets with ownership logged by blockchain. Blockchains are complex algorithms which keep a secure log of digital items and who paid for them. But they are essentially only a digital receipt - and because of the very nature of the internet, they do not give the owners copyright of their digital asset, which requires copies to be transmitted over the internet. 'There was a case a couple of months ago of some folks who bought the NFT of a script draft of an early version of sci-fi movie Dune,' revealed futurist Mark Pesce. 'They thought that actually gave them rights to produce a Dune film. 'They really had no idea that just because they owned this NFT, that they didn't actually own the copyrights to the source material.' But Colina Demirdjian compares NFTs to collectible trading cards which can often dramatically increase in value. 'There's a mindset shift that needs to be done for the general public,' she says. 'When you are buying something in the digital space, you are owning something of value. 'It's not tangible, but it's still valuable. You can buy something, keep it, collect similar things or sell it someone else. 'And it may give you prestige or access to certain groups or communities, or it can substantially increase in value. 'And it's yours to do with whatever you like.' Advertisement

McDonalds have already begun work on creating a metaverse restaurant which will deliver whatever you order in the virtual world to your real world front door.

Adidas, Samsung and Coca Cola have also been quick to get in at ground level to expand their brands into the new online worlds.

Colina sees a day where you could buy an outfit at Big W - and instantly have the same clothes available in your virtual wardrobe too.

Likewise furniture from Temple and Webster or a television from Harvey Norman - or you could test drive owning a fishtank online before taking the plunge for real.

The biggest challenge for metaverse creators is attracting users and then making them stay - and Diverse aims to do it by making dreams come true.

'We want to make it better than life,' said Colina. 'We plan on allowing everyone to live out their dream lifestyle and live their best life.

'We want to bring a lot of realism where people can connect with individuals and inhabit a new land and just enjoy what we can do with technology.'

Professor Vidy Potdar says there will be an even simpler reason people will log in.

'It's fun!' he insisted. 'It's a place you can go when you can't go anywhere.

'You can meet new people in the metaverse which you otherwise would not meet in real world.

'It's a different kind of experience for people and especially the younger crowd. They want to try something new.'

He added: 'We are just at the beginning of what could be something really big and something quite transforming going into the future.

'We are at that initial stage, the hype stage at the moment, where everyone is kind of excited. There is a lot of investment that is being poured into the startups currently.'

Others are more sceptical - but say if you are lucky enough to have some money you can afford to lose completely, it could be worth a gamble.

But they warn the window may already have closed on making massive money.

'I would not advise people to make this investment,' said Sydney futurist Mark Pesce.

'If someone wants to take a punt and spend a couple bucks or even 100 bucks because it's a risky investment - and maybe it'll pay off big someday, but maybe it'll go to zero - then there's no problem.

'If you go in knowing all of that, then you're an informed investor and it's your own money. You're a grown up and you can make your own decisions.

Futurist Mark Pesce, honorary associate of University of Sydney's digital cultures program, warns the virtual world is only about perceived value

'But if someone is naive and being told, "Oh my god! There's real estate here! You can make a real estate investment! You can afford it! It's going to appreciate..."

'Then that's probably crossing a line...'

He added: 'It is no longer early in terms of Metaverse land pricing.

'It's not like Bitcoin which is probably at the top of its market now - but it's not early, and my gut feeling is that it's already too late to make the really big profits.'

Either way, Colina insists it's the future.

'It's going to be the next world,' she says. 'It's the internet, but it's web three. We're making a transition from 2D to 3D

'So if you want to be like socially and culturally cool, you will need to be in the metaverse.

'It's not going to happen on your phone. It's no longer going to happen on Instagram. People are looking for more immersive realism and escapism.

'You want to wear beautiful clothes, you want to buy beautiful property. This is going to be the place where you'll have all those dreams come to life.

'And that's why the investment is going to be huge.'

Former law students Colina and Hripsy Demirdjian made a fortune in their 20s through a mobile phone app that created lifelike cartoon avatars like these ones of themselves seen here
Two women and three men have been committed to stand trial over the alleged murder of a young plumber who was allegedly stabbed to death after a cocaine-fuelled Tinder threesome went horribly wrong.

Luke Lembryk died from a stab wound to the heart after allegedly being attacked by three men at his mother's Condell Park home in western Sydney in December, 2019.

The 29-year-old tradie collapsed on the floor in front of his mother Robyn, who was terminally ill with bone cancer, and said 'I'm going to die, mum, I'm going to die' before passing away.

It is alleged that earlier that year, in August, Mr Lembryk had matched on Tinder with Lisa Anne Price, and the two had started texting.

Price allegedly sent him a text with a photo of herself and another woman she said she planned to bring along to Mr Lembryk's mother's home.

Police allege Ms Price and her friend attended the Condell Park unit where all three did lines of cocaine.

While the trio were in his bedroom drinking and chatting, Mr Lembryk was showing off a stack of $50 notes, reportedly amounting to $15,000, and a blazer which also had cash spilling from the pocket.

Tradie Luke Lembryk (above) met a young woman on Tinder and organised a date but four months later he was attacked with a knife to his heart and told his mother, 'I'm going to die, mum'

A knife with no handle recovered by police (above) had blood on it which was later confirmed to be Luke Lembryk's

Inside the Condell Park home (above) where Luke Lembryk was allegedly fatally attacked with stab wounds to his heart on the morning of December 7, 2019

Police allege the show of cash gave Price the idea to 'do this guy over' and that three men raided Mr Lembryks in the early hours of December 7 and stabbed him to death.

Police were called to the unit at 2.45am on that Saturday morning, and found Mr Lembryk with multiple stab wounds.

Following Mr Lembryk's death, his devastated cousin Bretto said the family had 'suffered a terrible loss to a great human', saying he was 'heartbroken and shattered'.

Popular plumber Luke Lembryk, 29, (above, left) had been on a Tinder date with two woman while staying with his mother in Condell Park where he was later allegedly murdered

The devastated family of Luke Lembryk (pictured) paid tribute to him, with his cousin Bretto saying he was a 'great human'

'I was so proud to call you my cousin,' he added.

In the NSW Supreme Court on Friday, Justice Robert Hulme ordered Joseph Nehme, Bilal Rahim and Viliami Taufahema to stand trial for Mr Lembryk's alleged murder and two women to be tried on other charges.

The three men are also charged with aggravated break and enter with intent to commit a serious indictable offence in company, and Taufahema and Nehme are charged with assault with intent to rob and wound or inflict grievous bodily harm while armed with an offensive weapon.

Paramedics arriving at the scene on the morning after Luke Lembryk was stabbed inside his mother's home at Condell Park in western Sydney in December, 2019

Bilal Rahim is also charged with aggravated break and enter dwelling in company intending to steal an amount less or equal to $60,000.

Lisa Anne Price, 35, will go to trial charged with one count each of being an accessory before the fact to murder, aggravated break and enter commit serious indictable offence in company, and aggravated break and enter dwelling in company intending to steal an amount less or equal to $60,000.

Sherene Rizk, 46, charged with being an accessory before the fact of murder, is the only one of the five defendants currently on bail.

Justice Hulme ordered that bail for Ms Rizk continue and for the five accused to go to trial in February 2023.
The 'Nazi grandma' who married an SS official and has spent decades denying the Holocaust was locked up just months after she was released.

Ursula Haverbeck, 93, has been jailed three times in the past five years for Holocaust denial, a criminal offence in Germany.

Haverbeck was locked up in 2017 and again late 2020, with a Berlin judge convicting her once again on Friday after she again denied the Holocaust in public.

Haverbeck, pictured in court on November 17, 2020, refuses to rescind her Holocaust denials

The west German woman, 93, describes herself as a 'Holocaust researcher' - but few buy it

She believes Auschwitz was a 'labour camp' with no gas chambers. In fact, 1.1million Jews were murdered at the biggest Nazi death camp.

The judge rejected her appeals to convert her prison term to fines on the grounds that she has shown no remorse, nor any sign of changing her views.

He said: 'You're not a Holocaust researcher, you're a Holocaust denier and it's not knowledge you're spreading, it's poison.'

'There's nothing that will stop you. We won't have any impact on you with words.'

Haverbeck failed to turn up to prison in Verden, western Germany in May 2018, prompting a week-long police hunt.

Haverbeck briefly ran from cops in May 2018 after refusing to show up to prison in Verden

Cops finally found her after she had returned home.

After marrying former SS official Werner Georg Haverbeck in 1970, Haverbeck spent decades in charge of a 'Holocaust research centre' which published antisemitic and Holocaust-denying material.

It was finally shut down in 2008.

Since then, Haverbeck has continued to make public appearances to deny the Holocaust - despite convictions in states across Germany.

The 93-year-old has already served two-and-a-half years behind bars over the past five years.

She once prompted a magistrate to declare: 'It is deplorable that this woman, who is still so active given her age, uses her energy to spread such hair-raising nonsense.'

Haverbeck is unable to appeal this sentence and will serve a further year locked up.


A gay couple from Pennsylvania adopted six siblings so they could grow up together, after neglect and abuse at the hands of their biological parents and over four years in the foster care system.

Steve Anderson-McLean and Rob Anderson-McLean, of Michigan, adopted all six children to make sure they weren't split up after leaving the foster system - something that often happens with large sets of siblings.

The couple adopted Carlos, 14, Guadalupe, 13, Maria, 12, Selena, 10, Nasa, 9, and Max, 7, on May 23, 2019, which Steve recalled in an emotional interview with Good Morning America this week.

'I finally have a real family,' said one of the brothers following the adoption.

'I'm adopted,' another brother, Max declared after the ceremony. 'You can't get unadopted right?'

Steve and Rob Anderson-McLean have been together for 18 years, after sharing a commitment ceremony in 2006 and getting legally married in Maryland in 2013.

The couple had already raised two sons together, Parker, 25 and Noah, 21, from a previous marriage before going forward with the adoptions.

Scroll down for video

Steve Anderson-McLean and husband Rob Anderson-McLean with their six children after an adoption ceremony held May 23, 2019

The Michigan family, pictured above at a 2019 adoption ceremony, is a party of 10 after opening their hearts to six siblings in need of a home. The pair of fathers already raised two sons together: Parker, 25 and Noah, 21

Steve Anderson-McLean and husband Rob Anderson-McLean with their six adopted children - and two children from previous marriages: Carlos, 14, Guadalupe, 13, Maria, 12, Selena, 10, Nasa, 9, and Max, 7, Parker, 25 and Noah, 21

When asked about the gravity of the moment, Steve recalled being moved while looking into his new children's eyes during the adoption ceremony.

'The judge asked, "Do you understand at this point forward they are your children? They are just as much as your biological children,"' Steve Anderson-McLean told GMA.

'Obviously, we knew that, but when I looked up and saw all those eyes, it was very emotional.' he added.

'We never imagined we'd be lucky enough or blessed enough to have six.'

Steve is currently a stay-at-home father to the six children after leaving his career as a wedding planner. Rob, meanwhile, is an engineer for Norfolk Southern Railway.

The pair told Fox 5 in New York that one of their first investments in their new family was a 'soccer dad' minivan that would allow them to more easily transport their much-larger family.

The couple adopted Carlos, 14, Guadalupe, 13, Maria, 12, Selena, 10, Nasa, 9, and Max, 7, pictured, on May 23, 2019

Steve, left, and Rob Anderson-McLean, right, have been together for 18 years, after sharing a commitment ceremony in 2006 and getting legally married in Maryland in 2013

The couple said the siblings had endured a difficult childhood before being entered into the foster system back in 2017.

'It was a bad background, a sad story -- there was neglect and abuse,' Steve added.

After matching with the children in June of 2018, the six siblings moved in with Steve and Rob a month later.

'After the first week they were asking if they could stay forever,' Steve recalled in an interview with Today.

Steve also spoke of the emotional moment when Max asked the couple if they could unadopt him after the ceremony.

'I had to reassure him that he will always be our son,' Steven said.

'It feels as if our emotional bonds were years in the making,' Rob added. 'There are no rules as to what can constitute a family and the love that we share.'
The head of Chicago's Film Office was rushed to intensive care after being beaten by three car thieves described as children - as the very mayor who appointed him claimed carjackers only struck because they feel unloved.

Kwame Amoaku, 51, was attacked twice by three people just before 8am Wednesday morning outside his home in the centre of Chicago, near the National Museum of Mexican Art.

Chicago police reported that Amoaku saw three young men inside his car as he walked toward it at 7:46am, on the 2100 block of West 22nd Place.

He confronted the intruders, who then attacked him and fled in a gray Dodge Caravan that was waiting nearby.

Moments later, they returned to the scene, beating Amoaku a second time and robbing him, before driving off in his car.

'This AM I was attacked, beaten, and my car stolen by three kids,' he wrote on Facebook.

'Thanks to all who have reached out. I'm in the ICU, I'm going to be OK.'

Kwame Amoaku, 51, was beaten and robbed outside his Chicago home on Wednesday morning by three youths, who stole his car

His daughter wrote on Facebook: 'My dad was viciously attacked outside his home.

'He will be unable to work or cook for himself. Please donate if you are able.

'You never think this would happen to your family. Until it does.'

Amoaku was appointed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot to head the city's film promotion agency in July 2019.

And on Saturday Lightfoot, who was elected in May 2019 and appointed Amoaku two months later, said that young people were stealing cars because they were 'unloved'.

The number of people carjacked - 499 - is up 3 percent.

Chicago police said 57 percent of carjacking suspects are juveniles.

'There are too many young people in this room that feel unloved, and we need to change that if we are going to change the trajectory of their lives,' Lightfoot said, addressing an event at Harold Washington Library for young people, focused on how to reduce crime.

The mayor said Chicago cannot 'arrest ourselves' out of public safety problems.

Lightfoot in February said the city's carjacking spikes were linked to remote learning, during the pandemic.

Amoaku, a veteran film industry professional, was location manager from 2014 for the NBC series, Chicago Fire, and for the 2019 Netflix movie based on Chicago's hip-hop scene, Beats. In July 2019 he was appointed head of the city's Film Office, set up to promote filming in Chicago

Amoaku has worked in the film industry for 25 years before heading up the city's Film Office

Lori Lightfoot, the mayor of Chicago, is pictured on Saturday at a town hall event in a library to discuss young people and crime. She said carjackings were carried out because young people 'feel unloved'

'We started seeing this rise in cases in 2020,' she said.

'And I'll be frank and say in Chicago there was a correlation we believe between remote learning and the rise in carjackings.'

Shootings and homicides are down in the city so far this year.

There were 508 shootings as of the end of March this year, compared to 582 shootings during the same time period this time last year.

There have been 128 homicides so far this year - a seven percent decline over the same time period last year.

The West Side and South Side have seen a 24 percent decrease in the number of people shot, or 110 fewer than last year, accounting for nearly all of this year's decrease in shootings.

Lightfoot has battled criticism over her vow to defund the police, then refund it as crime soared, and has also clashed with cops over her imposition of a COVID vaccine mandate on the crime-ridden city's public workers.

Amoaku was described as bringing '25 years of experience as an executive producer, director, assistant director, production manager, location manager, actor, and writer to the position.'

Amoaku was location manager from 2014 for the NBC series, Chicago Fire, and for the 2019 Netflix movie based on Chicago's hip-hop scene, Beats.

He also had acting roles including in Chicago Fire, ER, and Prison Break.

'I'm honored to join Chicago in this pivotal role to showcase the talent, creativity and beauty found here,' said Amoaku at the time.

'The entire city is a show-stopping stage for amazing productions in both TV and movies and I'm excited to lead this office and continue to bring significant projects that impact Chicago both artistically and economically.'
Kate and Prince William 'will move to Windsor this summer to be closer to the Queen and are even looking at schools in the area', according to reports.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are reportedly looking at private homes after ruling out royal mansions, including Prince Andrew's Royal Lodge and Fort Belvedere, the former home of King Edward VIII.

Sources claimed the couple have also considered Frogmore Cottage, located in the grounds of Windsor Castle, and Adelaide Cottage, nestled in the heart of the Home Park in Windsor, which is currently lived in.

They have also been said to be looking at schools in Buckinghamshire, Windsor and Surrey having looked around Lambrook School, in Ascot.

Earlier this month it was reported that the Queen had decided to make Windsor Castle her permanent home and main residence.

Kate and Prince William 'want to move to Windsor to be closer to the Queen and are also looking at schools in the area', according to reports

Earlier this month it was reported that the Queen had decided to make Windsor Castle her permanent home and main residence

There were concerns this week that Prince Andrew, who has been getting close to the Queen in recent weeks, is angling for a role at the Platinum Jubilee events this summer after he escorted her at the Duke of Edinburgh's memorial service on Tuesday

There were concerns this week that Prince Andrew, who has been getting close to the Queen in recent weeks, is angling for a role at the Platinum Jubilee events this summer after he escorted her at the Duke of Edinburgh's memorial service on Tuesday.

The Duke of York took centre stage when he walked his mother through Westminster Abbey to her seat in full view of the live broadcast cameras - to the shock of many in the congregation.

It was the shamed royal's first public appearance since he paid a reported 12million settlement to Jeffrey Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre to end a highly-damaging civil sexual assault case in New York.

A source told The Sun that the need for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to move to Windsor was growing 'more and more' because Andrew 'spends a lot of time with the Queen'.

They told the newspaper: 'There is not a man, woman or child who would not say he had every right to be at Philips thanksgiving. But the family have been adamant theres no way back.

'There are real fears that despite being banished from The Firm in January, he is using his closeness to the Queen as a springboard back into public life.'

Andrew has been forced to step back from public life over his association with late paedophile Epstein.

Sources claimed the couple have also considered Frogmore Cottage, located in the grounds of Windsor Castle

They are reportedly looking at private homes after ruling out royal mansions, including Prince Andrew's Royal Lodge (pictured)

It is reported that Princes Charles and William raised concerns 'on more than one occasion' about the optics of allowing the duke to escort the 95-year-old monarch down to her seat at such a well-publicised event.

The future kings were 'absolutely united' that it was 'unnecessary' for him to have the high profile role, according to The Mirror.

But their protests were overruled by The Queen, who made it her 'wish and final decision' in choosing for Andrew to have a special role on the occasion.

Senior royals - including Charles and William - are said to have been left 'shocked and dismayed' by the decision.

The Duke of York is understood to have got his way after lobbying to take his 95-year-old mother to her seat because she 'couldn't say no to her favourite son' despite objections from William and Charles, sources claimed.

The Dean of Westminster had been expected to take the Monarch to her seat while the Prince followed behind, according to the order of service, but footage captured shortly after they entered the Abbey shows Andrew clinging to his mother's arm.
Anthony Albanese took the stage on Sunday night to DJ for a crowd of supporters in a sure sign the election campaign is effectively under way.

Meanwhile, Scott Morrison pulled on a hard hat and high-vis jacket before posing for photos at the Devil's Gate Hydroelectric Power Station in Tasmania.

Mr Albanese, who loves '80s and '90s music, treated his cheering fans to The Killers hit Mr Brightside at the Kedron-Wavell Services Club in Brisbane where he headed a campaign rally.

Anthony Albanese took the stage on Sunday night to DJ for a crowd of supporters in a sure sign the election campaign is effectively under way

The Labor leader posted a picture of him on the decks to his Instagram profile and immediately received support from Aussie electronic duo Peking Duk

The Labor leader posted a picture of him on the decks to his Instagram profile and immediately received support from Aussie electronic duo Peking Duk.

'Might get ya to give us a few pointers Albo,' they wrote.

Mr Albanese has previously spoken about how Mr Brightside is his go-to track to 'salvage' a dancefloor.

Mr Morrison is expected to call the election in the coming days for May 14 or 21, kicking off a five or six week campaign which will see the leaders jet around the country to marginal seats in every state and territory.

It comes after the latest Newspoll found the Coalition was still trailing Labor by a massive eight points on a two-party basis.

This would equate to Labor winning 17 seats in a landslide victory.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison at Devil's Gate Hydroelectric Power Station in Barrington, Tasmania on Sunday

YouGov's latest Newspoll Primary vote: Labor - fell from 35 per cent to 38 percent Coalition - Rose from 35 per cent to 36 per cent Two-party preferred: Labor - 54 per cent Coalition - 46 per cent Who would make a better PM? APPROVAL: Anthony Albanese - One point fall to 43 per cent Scott Morrison - One point up to 42 per cent DISSATISFACTION: Anthony Albanese - two point increase to 44 per cent Scott Morrison - One point decrease to 54 per cent Advertisement

The poll found Labor's primary vote had fallen by three points to 38 per cent, while the Coalition grew by one point to 36 per cent - shrinking ALP's margin to two from its six-point edge last month.

However, when preferences are allocated, Labor has maintained an election-winning two-party preferred result of 54-46.

The Coalition's two-party preferred result rose by a point to 46 per cent, while Labor fell by one point to 54 per cent.

Compared to the last election, the variations represent a national swing of 5.5 per cent and could lead to a landslide victory for the ALP if the LNP's decline in popularity was reflected equally across all seats.

The results, yielded from 1,531 voters through an online survey, took into consideration Mr Albanese's reply speech, in which he pledged more aged care support.

They also covered major fallouts for both parties in recent weeks as each side of the political divide has faced bombshell in-house accusations.

Over the past few weeks, Labor has come under fire for refusing to launch an inquiry into allegations late Senator Kimberley Kitching had been bullied by female colleagues before her death.

Meanwhile, Mr Morrison has come under attack from Liberal Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells who described him as unfit to be the PM.

Under parliamentary privilege, she last week claimed Mr Morrison was a 'bully' and 'autocrat' who had made racist comment against his opponent during his preselection for the seat of Cook in 2007.

Mr Morrison has repeatedly denied the accusations, telling reporters on Sunday: 'These are quite malicious and bitter slurs, which are deeply offensive, and I reject them absolutely.'

Despite the recent scandals, the approval levels for Mr Morrison and Mr Albanese remained stable, with the PM's approval rising a point to 42 per cent and the opposition leader's falling by one to 43 per cent.

Those dissatisfied with Mr Morrison's leadership dropped a point to 54 per cent, while the same rating for Mr Albanese increased by two points to 44 per cent.

The LNP's poll rise comes amid predictions Scott Morrison will call the election on Sunday April 10 for May 21 after NSW preselection delays due to factional infighting made an earlier date harder to execute.
Advertisement

Joe Biden has called for new gun laws hours after six people were killed in a shooting outside a Sacramento bar.

'Ban ghost guns,' the president said Sunday. 'Require background checks for all gun sales. Ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. Repeal gun manufacturers immunity from liability.'

Biden's push for gun reform comes as Sacramento police continue to search for two gunmen who opened fire on a group of bargoers in downtown.

Police said an unidentified gunman in a car opened fire into the crowd before fleeing. A second person fired a gun but authorities do not yet know if he was in the crowd or in the car.

The killings happened in the city's lively entertainment district in the early hours of Sunday after a brawl broke out on 10th street outside a number of popular bars. Witness video showed rapid gunfire of at least 76 shots ringing out over the course of 54 seconds as people screamed and ran for cover.

A total of six people, three men and three women, died in the 2am attack. Cops are yet to officially confirm the identities of the victims, but two of the dead have been named as Sergio Harris, 38, and DeVasia Turner, 29.

'They were cousins  Sergio and DeVazia were cousins,' Turner's father, Frank Turner, told Fox 40. 'Theres just nothing to say. Im just here. Im grief, thats all  grief. You know what Im saying? Thats all I can say.'

Sergio Harris, left, and DeVazia Turner, right have been named as two of the six people killed during a mass shooting outside a Sacramento bar in the early hours of Sunday

Bystander video shows the moment rapid gunfire struck in downtown Sacramento early Sunday morning. A large group of people are seen outside a bar in an apparent fight, yelling and pushing each other. The fight breaks up as shots are fired into the crowd, causing people to duck and run

The body of a man lies on a sidewalk in downtown Sacramento Sunday, next to the remains of a woman. Those corpses lay there for at least 15 hours in 80f weather as cops probed the shooting in the early hours of Sunday

Harris' wife Leticia (center) and mother Pamela (right) weep after being informed that he was one of six killed in Sunday morning's shooting

A police evidence technician photographs the crime scene after an early-morning shooting in a stretch of downtown near the Golden 1 Center arena

Police said the investigation is still 'very preliminary' and it is unclear if the victims were deliberately targeted, pictured helping a victim at the scene on Sunday morning

Screaming bystanders are seen hiding behind buildings and in alleyways, taking cover behind dumpsters, as the gunmen continue to fire shots. Seventy-six shots are heard in the 54 second clip

The shootings took place in downtown near the California State Capitol, outside a number of popular bars on 10th Street

A mass shooting in downtown Sacramento, California left at least six people killed and 12 others injured early Sunday morning. @Guadvenegas has the latest. pic.twitter.com/3zRMgaS0va  TODAY (@TODAYshow) April 4, 2022

Bystander video shows the moment rapid gunfire struck in downtown Sacramento early Sunday morning.

A large group of people are seen outside a bar in an apparent fight, yelling and pushing each other. The fight breaks up as shots are fired into the crowd, causing people to duck and run.

Screaming civilians are seen hiding behind buildings and in alleyways, taking cover behind dumpsters, as the gunmen continue to fire shots. Seventy-six shots are heard in the 54 second clip.

After the gunfire seemingly ceases, sounds of car horns and sirens fill the air.

Another video, shared Monday morning on the TODAY Show, shows bystanders racing away as shots are fired into the crowd. A white vehicle rush past the the group as chaos erupts in the streets.

It is unclear if the vehicle pictured in the footage belonged to the suspect and authorities did not immediately respond to DailyMail.com's request for comment.

However, on Sunday, Sacramento Police Chief Kathy Lester said law enforcement was 'asking for the public's help' with the investigation.

'If anyone saw anything, has video or can provide any information to the police department, we are asking for their assistance,' she said.

Another video, shared Monday morning on the TODAY Show, shows bystanders racing away as shots are fired into the crowd. A white vehicle rush past the the group as chaos erupts in the streets

It is unclear if the vehicle pictured in the footage belonged to the suspect

The female victim's foot can be seen just above the pink item of clothing. Six were killed in Sunday's shooting - three men and three women, with two victims so-far identified

A cloth covered in what appears to be dried blood lies close to two shell casings in downtown Sacramento

Joe Biden's Sacramento statement in full Today, America once again mourns for another community devastated by gun violence. In a single act in Sacramento, six individuals left dead and at least a dozen more injured. Families forever changed. Survivors left to heal wounds both visible and invisible. I want to thank the first responders in Sacramento, and all those across the United States, who act every day to save lives. We know these lives were not the only lives impacted by gun violence last night. And we equally mourn for those victims and families who do not make national headlines. President Joe Biden released a statement mourning the death of six at a shooting outside a Sacramento bar and called for legislative action to curtail gun violence in America But we must do more than mourn; we must act. That is why my Administration has taken historic executive action to implement my comprehensive gun crime reduction strategy  from standing up gun trafficking strike forces to helping cities across the country expand community violence interventions and hire more police officers for community policing. We also continue to call on Congress to act. Ban ghost guns. Require background checks for all gun sales. Ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. Repeal gun manufacturers immunity from liability. Pass my budget proposal, which would give cities more of the funding they need to fund the police and fund the crime prevention and intervention strategies that can make our cities safer. These are just a few of the steps Congress urgently needs to take to save lives. Advertisement

Biden, 79, thanked the first responders in Sacramento Sunday and then noted that it was likely they weren't the only victims of gun violence across the country overnight, saying America needed to do something about it.

'We equally mourn for those victims and families who do not make national headlines,' he said in a statement. 'But we must do more than mourn; we must act.'

He cited his administration's work implementing gun reforms, including attempting to stop those trafficking firearms, plus expanding funds for police.

Pop stars Alyson, 33, and AJ Michalka, 30, said their tour bus was caught in the crossfire

Biden implored Congress to pass his budget proposal, which 'would give cities more of the funding they need to fund the police and fund the crime prevention and intervention strategies that can make our cities safer.'

Th president's statement came as the bodies of four of the victims were still lying on the street in 80f weather 15 hours after the massacre, the third this year to kill at least six people.

Harrowing DailyMail.com photos showed the body of one of the male victims and the foot of a second on the floor outside Pre Flite Lounge  one of two bars where a huge brawl kicked off in the minutes before the shooting happened.

Cheryl Keyes, 58, who lives above the bar told DailyMail.com that the foot belonged to a woman who was lying on the street next to him, but largely out of view.

She said the bodies of a further two victims were also still on the street below her home and had been there all day, in spite of temperatures that topped out at 80f.

Keyes, distraught, said: Those are peoples sons and daughters lying out there. I have six kids of my own and I cant imagine how Id feel if that were them.

As of Monday morning, it remains unclear why the bodies had been left on the street all day or if they have yet been cleared. DailyMail.com has contacted Sacramento Police Department for further information.

Pop stars Alyson, 33, and AJ Michalka, 30, who held a concert in Sacramento Saturday night, said they were forced to take shelter during the shooting as their tour bus was caught in the chaos.

'Our bus was caught in the crossfire but we sheltered in place and everyone in our touring group is ok. Thank you for everyone reaching out,' the sisters tweeted on Sunday.

'A reminder to keep your loved ones extra close today. We have to do something about gun violence in this country.'

The former Disney stars added: 'All of our thoughts are with the families of those who lost their lives and those recovering today. Were praying for the health care workers caring for them. We hope all our fans made it home safe.'

Tyler, the Creator performed at nearby Golden 1 Center Saturday night, just blocks away from the shooting site. The rapper has not publicly commented on the incident yet.

Steve Hicks, who attended Tyler's show, told PBS that he was staying at a hotel close by with his fiancee and two daughters. The family did not hear the gunfire, but was awoken by the sounds of sirens.

Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr slammed federal and local politicians for failing to pass 'common-sense' gun legislation as the nations mourns amid the lives lost in Sunday's massacre.

'I dont think moments of silence are going to do anything,' Kerr said during a Sunday press conference, The Hill reported. 'At some pointour government has to decide are we going to have some common sense gun laws, its not going to solve everything, but it will save lives'

The basketball coach cited a gun control bill proposed by Congressman Mike Thompson, a California Democrat, that never made it to the Senate Chamber.

'Despite the fact that 80 to 90 percent of Americans support background checks and you know, you think about all of the common sense laws we could and should put in place,' Kerr argued.

'If we had any guts, if our government had any guts, if people put others in front of their own career paths, you know, in front of their own reelection campaigns, in front of their own propaganda to manipulate people. Its right there in front of us.'

Kerr also issued his condolences to the victims, their families and the city of Sacramento as a whole.

Cheryl Keyes, whose apartment overlooks the scene of the shooting, said four bodies were lying on the ground outside her home

Two women hug each other at the scene of a mass shooting in Sacramento on Sunday with the city in mourning after six were killed

A gunman with a semi-automatic rifle opened fired on a group of revelers fighting outside a bar (pictured)

Leticia Fields-Harris, whose husband Sergio Harris, 38, died in the mass shooting is seen crying near the crime scene on Sunday morning

DailyMail.com photos revealed how the destruction spanned two city blocks, with markers indicating that more than 250 shots were fired.

Bloody cloths could still be seen littering the ground outside London, a popular Sacramento bar, late Sunday while at the far end  across the street from the California State Capitol  the families of the victims waited for news.

Most were too shattered to speak with DailyMail.com but Eunice Appling, whose cousin is Sergio Harris, 38, said she was devastated.

Appling, who was at the scene when the shooting happened, told DailyMail.com that her overwhelming memory was of blood. The multiple stitched up cuts on her forehead were, she said, caused when she tripped up while trying to get away.

Keyes told DailyMail.com she had spent time with Harris earlier that evening and said: We had been there chatting and at the end he started calling me aunty.

He was a good guy. I never thought something like this would happen to him.

Police are still searching for multiple suspects, believe at least two guns were fired. They recovered a stolen handgun at the scene.

A law enforcement source told the Los Angeles Times that the shooting involved gang members and associates.

Exclusive DailyMail.com photos show upwards of 220 spent shell casings found lying on the ground around the scene of Sunday morning's shooting, which is believed to be gang-related

Shattered glass lies on the sidewalk hours after Sunday morning's shooting in Sacramento. Multiple suspects who used a machine gun are still on the loose, with 12 injured

A worried loved-one checked her phone for updates in the wake of Sunday's shooting

A group of women console each other at the scene of the mass shooting in California with police still on the hunt for two gunmen

Harris had been out at the London nightclub before the shooting, his wife Leticia said Sunday. The couple have three children together.

Leticia and Harris's mom, Pamela Harris, both combed the streets for information about their missing loved one before being given the bad news after his remains were discovered.

The women were seen sobbing after being informed of Harris's death. Speaking before learning of her son's fate, Pamela told NBC Bay Area: 'We just want to know what happened to him. Not knowing anything is just hard to face.'

Pamela, speaking to Fox 40, said her son was one of the victims whose body was lying on the ground hours after the shooting.

'My child is out there on that ground, you know? This dont make any sense and theres other peoples children thats out there on the ground. And they wont tell us nothing, and its heartbreaking,' she said, crying.

'Its heartbreaking to see whats going on out here and theyre not telling us anything.'

Turner's father said his son had been out drinking at a bar on K Street around the time of his death. As their family navigates this tragedy, Frank said he wants the public to know the type of person Turner was.

'He was being a good father. Hes a good father. Thats it. I dont have another son  OK,' Frank told the tv station.

Sacramento Police crime scene investigators place evidence markers on 10th street at the scene of the massacre

A Sacramento City Police Officer stands near a field of evidence markers following the horrific attack on Sunday

Sacramento police said shots rang out near 10th and J Streets, about two blocks from the capitol building, around 2am, prompting officers to rush to the scene.

Frank said the news of his son's tragic murder had been broken brusquely by cops.

He said: 'They [police] didnt tell me nothing. They just confirmed that hes a body over there.'

Turner's mom Penny also told of how she'd received a call in the early hours of Sunday morning breaking the news of her son's tragic death.

When police arrived to the area, known for its strip of nightclubs and bars, they found a large group gathered and six dead in the street. Ten other victims were transported to area hospitals by ambulance and private vehicles. Their conditions remain unknown.

Police Chief Kathy Lester, noting the investigation is still 'very preliminary,' said it is unclear if the victims were deliberately targeted, The Sacramento Bee reported.

Lester, calling the shooting 'a really tragic, unfortunate situation,' said the 'complex is now secure' but the gunman remains at large.

She has asked for the public's help in identifying the suspect or suspects responsible for the tragedy.

At least six people were killed and ten injured after shots rang out in California's capital city early Sunday morning, Sacramento police confirmed

Sacramento police said shots rang out near 10th and J Streets, about two blocks from the capitol building, around 2am. A gunman with a semi-automatic rifle opened fired on a group of revelers fighting outside a bar

Police work the scene on the corner of 10th and L street of a shooting that occurred in the early morning hours on April 3, 2022 in Sacramento

Public Safety News, an independent media agency that responded to the scene, reported that shots were fired around 2am, shortly after last call for bars in the area.

There are 'victims all over the corner,' a PSN journalist said in a Facebook live report.

Witnesses reported seeing a person in a car pull out a semi-automatic weapon and begin shooting into a crowd gathered outside the El Santo Restaurant & Ultralounge.

Multiple ambulances responded to the scene as paramedics provided CPR and other treatment to victims on the sidewalks while authorities ushered crowds of people to safety.

At least two videos circulating on social media captured sounds of shots fired.

Bystanders told California-based reporter Malik Earnest they heard more than fifty shots ring out before the gunman's vehicle screeched away from the chaotic scene.

Family members of victims are seen embracing each other at the scene of Sunday's mass shooting

Police officials investigate the scene dotted with bullet casings after a mass shooting in downtown Sacramento

Witnesses reported seeing a person in a car pull out a semi-automatic weapon and begin shooting into a crowd gathered outside the El Santo Restaurant & Ultralounge

A police vehicle is seen after an early-morning shooting in a stretch of the downtown near the Golden 1 Center arena in Sacramento

One of the videos shows multiple people fighting on the sidewalk as rapid gunfire strikes, prompting people to run through the streets.

Berry Accius, of Sacramento's Voice of the Youth, told KXTV he arrived to the 'chaotic' scene around 2.30am.

'A lot of victims with blood, just watching some of the families that didn't know if their loved one was alive, running, trying to figure out what was happening, people distraught, people discombobulated,' Accius said. 'It was just horrific.'

'I saw a young girl with a whole bunch of blood in her body, a girl taking off glass from her, a young girl screaming saying, 'They killed my sister.''

The community activist also recalled a mother running up to the scene, asking: 'Where's my son, has my son been shot?'

Accius said the area, which is known for its nightlife, should've been a safe space.

'I'm just shocked that somebody would come here to a place where it should be safe and do something as heinous as this with multiple victims, not only just shot but dead in our city,' he added. 'Right here in downtown, in a safe space.'

Police have asked members of the public to share any information and photos or video footage captured at the scene

A police officer ties barricade tape at the crime scene after an early-morning shooting in a stretch of downtown near the Golden 1 Center arena in Sacramento

Police are seen after an early-morning shooting in a stretch of the downtown near the Golden 1 Center arena in Sacramento

Authorities search area of the scene of a mass shooting with multiple deaths in Sacramento early Sunday morning

Paramedics provided CPR and other treatment to victims on the sidewalks while authorities ushered crowds of people to safety

Kay Harris, a Sacramento resident, said she was asleep when one of her family members called to say they thought her brother had been killed. He had reportedly gone out to London, a nightclub located on 10th Street.

'Very much so a senseless violent act,' she told the Associated Press.

Harris, 32, said she has been to the club a few times and described it as a place for 'the younger crowd.'

California Governor Gavin Newsom, in a statement Sunday, described the shooting as 'yet another horrendous act of gun violence' in the state.

His administration is working with law enforcement 'as we monitor the situation.'

Bystanders comfort each other at the scene after a mass shooting in downtown Sacramento

A sheet is used to block the view as the body of one of victims killed in a mass shooting is loaded into a coroner's van

Members of the Coroner's Office prepare to move one of the victims from the scene after a mass shooting in downtown Sacramento

'What we do know at this point is that another mass casualty shooting has occurred, leaving families with lost loved ones, multiple individuals injured and a community in grief,' Newsom said. 'The scourge of gun violence continues to be a crisis in our country, and we must resolve to bring an end to this carnage.'

Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg offered his thoughts to the community, while also promising that Lester has made battling gun violence a 'top priority'.

'Words cant express my shock & sadness this morning. The numbers of dead and wounded are difficult to comprehend. We await more information about exactly what transpired in this tragic incident,' he tweeted.

'Rising gun violence is the scourge of our city, state and nation, and I support all actions to reduce it. Our new Police Chief, Kathy Lester, has made it a top priority, and I stand firmly behind her.'

California leaders have spoken out against gun violence in wake of the shooting

Sacramento City Council member Katie Valenzuela took to Twitter early Sunday morning to issue her support for the community amid the tragedy.

'Around 2.30am, I got the call no elected official wants to get. Another shooting. More lives lost,' she wrote.

'The national gun violence epidemic has hit our community - again. I won't release any specifics until @SacPolicedoes. Until then, please take care of each other.'

'Horrified and deeply saddened by the gun violence we witnessed this morning in Sacramento,' echoed U.S. Senator Alex Padilla, of California.

'My prayers are with the victims and their families  and the entire Sacramento community. Our team is continuing to monitor the situation closely as we await further updates.'
More than half of diners are likely to order healthier food when restaurants are forced to put calories on their menus from this week, a study suggests.

Some 57 per cent said the new nutritional information is likely to influence their choices but only 21 per cent believe it will help combat the nations obesity crisis.

The new rules require cafes, restaurants and takeaways run by firms with more than 250 employees to put calories on their menus from Wednesday.

It is part of a wider Government strategy to cut obesity and promote healthy eating.

More than half of diners are likely to order healthier food when restaurants are forced to put calories on their menus from this week, a study suggests (File image)

Conditions related to being overweight or obese across the UK cost the NHS an estimated 6.1billion each year.

Almost two-thirds (63 per cent) of adults in England are overweight or obese and one in three children leaves primary school too fat.

Vita Mojo, whose technology powers ordering systems for over 90 UK restaurant brands including Leon and Nandos, polled 1,000 adults about the changes. It found 48 per cent already track or have an awareness of their calorie intake, with women and younger people more likely to do so.

However, campaigners at Beat, which supports people with eating disorders, warns the policy risks causing great distress to those affected. The charity says focusing on weight, rather than health, is counter-productive.

Thomasina Miers, the former MasterChef winner and co-founder of Wahaca, the Mexican restaurant chain, described calorie counting as a blunt tool for assessing goodness in food.

She added: I would love to see more emphasis on how food is grown, what chemicals were used and whether whole, fibre-rich ingredients were used.

Almost two-thirds (63 per cent) of adults in England are overweight or obese and one in three children leaves primary school too fat (File image)

But Hugo Engel, from Leon, said: In the future, we see calorie and allergen labelling being just as important as being transparent about the environmental impact of our menu.

Official guidance to businesses on the new rules says: In addition to helping consumers make healthier decisions, calorie labelling aims to encourage businesses to reformulate the food and drink they offer and provide lower calorie options.

Stefan Catoiu, co-founder of Vita Mojo, said: Our research shows consumers want to know more about what they eat as well as where the food comes from.

This is only going to increase, with younger generations taking even more interest.
The man who allegedly cornered and sexually assaulted a 15-year-old boy at a busy train station has been charged with rape.

The 75-year-old was led away by police from his home in Mortdale, in Sydney's south, on Monday morning after a long manhunt.

He allegedly detained the boy in a toilet at the Country Concourse of Central Station about 3pm on Saturday and raped him.

Police released CCTV footage from the station and asked the public for help tracking down a man who may be able to assist with inquiries

The 75-year-old was led away by police from his Mortdale home on Monday morning after he allegedly detained the boy in a toilet of the train station and assaulted him on Saturday

The boy told his mother who immediately reported the man to police, with officers locating him at the property in Sydney's south.

The suspect left the toilet after the assault and boarded a train heading south. He disembarked at Mortdale Railway Station and left the station.

Police released CCTV footage from the station and asked the public for help tracking down down the alleged predator.

Police want to speak to this man as they investigate the sexual assault of a teenage boy at Central station on Saturday

Police raided his unit on Monday morning where they seized electronic devices and clothing.

He was taken to Kogarah Police Station and charged with aggravated sexual intercourse child between 14 and 16, and intentionally sexually touching a child between 10 and 16.

He was refused bail and is due to appear before Sutherland Local Court later on Monday.
An HMM container ship / Courtesy of HMM





By Kim Hyun-bin







A move by the European Union to strengthen its carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) is expected to hurt Korea's exports to the world's largest economic bloc, as more local exporters face the EU's carbon taxes, according to market analysts Monday.







The CBAM is linked to the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) as a carbon-pricing system for imports into the region. It is aimed at adjusting the price of certain imported products to the amount of CO2 emissions incorporated, in order to equalize carbon costs between EU products and imports.







The International Institute of Trade, a research body under the Korea International Trade Association (KITA), released a report on Sunday titled, "Evaluation and Implications of the EU's CBAM Amendment," pointing out that the CBAM amendment issued by the EU Parliament last December is aimed at strengthening regulatory levels.







The amendment expanded CBAM application categories. In the initial draft, CBAM was applied to five categories  steel, electricity, fertilizer, aluminum and cement  but the parliamentary revision process added four items  organic chemicals, plastics, hydrogen and ammonia  increasing the total regulatory categories to nine.







"The EU Parliament is expected to draw up a final draft within the first half of this year," said Shin Ki-seop, a researcher at KITA. "It is not known how much the amendment will be reflected in the final bill, but it is necessary for the relevant industry and institutions to carefully evaluate the impact and come up with countermeasures as it contains contents that increase the burden on exporters compared to the initial draft."







The research found that from 2019 to 2021 the five draft categories under CBAM regulations amounted to $3 billion annually, accounting for 5.4 percent of Korea's exports to the EU.







However, if the scope is expanded to nine items under the amendment, it will account for $5.51 billion, an increase to 15.3 percent of total EU exports during the same period, which is nearly triple what's in the draft, and will result in a heavier burden for related Korean industries.







In addition, the initial draft included only direct emissions, which are emitted during the production process of goods. But the amendment also includes indirect emissions, which will include greenhouse gases emitted during the generation of electricity for the production of goods.







As of 2020, when producing 1 kilowatt-hour (kWh) of electricity, Korea emits 472.4 grams of carbon dioxide, which is two to four times higher compared to advanced markets such as the EU which stood at 215.7 grams and Canada with 123.5 grams.







The amendment also aims for the full implementation of CBAM one year earlier, from 2026 to 2025.






Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson once handed a child rapist a light sentence which freed him to strike again shortly afterwards - but the attack could have been avoided had she heeded prosecutors' requests for a longer sentence.

Leo Weekes was handed a 12 month sentence by Brown Jackson in February 2014 after failing to register as a sex offender following his 2010 conviction for raping his 13 year-old niece.

With time served, he ended up behind bars for just five months, and was freed in July that year.

In June 2015 he sexually assaulted his sister-in-law, plying her with drink before attacking her.

He was arrested, but she decided not to press charges - prosecutors said he paid $2,500 to drop her allegations, The New York Post reported. Had Brown Jackson gone along with prosecutors' requests to jail him for two years, the attack on Weekes' sister-in-law would not have taken place when it did, and may have been avoided altogether.

Weekes, of Washington DC, was freed over the initial child rape in early 2013, but ignored an order to register as a sex offender for 10 years.

Leo Weekes was convicted in 2010 of raping his 13-year-old niece. On his release, he violated his probation, and Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson declined to sentence him to the two years prosecutors requested. He offended again 14 months after being sentenced

Brown Jackson is seen on March 23 at the third day of her nomination hearings on Capitol Hill

Weekes was charged with multiple probation violations, and in February 2017 appeared once again before Brown Jackson for sentencing.

Prosecutors asked for two years to be added to his DC sentence, but Jackson once again opted for a lenient sentence, imposing her 24-month sentence to partially overlap with his punishment in connection with the assault on his sister-in-law.

Republicans have expressed concern about Brown Jackson's record, in particular her lenient sentencing of those accused of possessing child pornography.

But they seized upon the revelations of the Weekes case - disclosed in a tranche of court filings and transcripts sent to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Friday - as further cause for alarm.

'This case is yet another example of information coming to light after the nomination hearing concluded because of the Democrats' rushed vetting process,' a Republican Judiciary Committee aide told The New York Post on Saturday.

A final confirmation vote is expected this week.

Jackson would be the first black woman on the high court in its more than 200-year history, and the sixth woman.

On Thursday, Lindsay Graham, senator for South Carolina, said he would not be voting to confirm her.

She will likely be confirmed, because Democrats control the House and Senate.

Brown Jackson, 51, would be the first black woman appointed to the Supreme Court, if as expected she is approved this week

In a speech on the Senate floor, Graham said his decision is based partly on what he sees as a 'flawed sentencing methodology regarding child pornography cases,' echoing a line of questioning by some Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee last week.

Several senators, some eyeing a run for president, repeatedly asked her about her sentencing decisions in her nine years as a federal judge in an effort to paint her as too lenient on sex criminals.

Jackson told the committee that 'nothing could be further from the truth' and explained her sentencing decisions in detail.

She said some of the cases have given her nightmares and were 'among the worst that I have seen.'

Democrats pointed to testimony last week by the chair of the American Bar Association committee that makes recommendations on federal judges.

Ann Claire Williams, the head of that ABA panel, said the idea that Jackson is out of the mainstream on sentencing 'never came up' in a review of more than 250 judges and lawyers.

The review found Jackson and her record to be 'outstanding, excellent, superior, superb,' Williams said.

Graham also mentioned Jackson's her legal advocacy on behalf of terror suspects held at Guantanamo Bay more than a decade ago and her support from liberal groups.

'After a thorough review of Judge Jackson's record and information gained at the hearing from an evasive witness, I now know why Judge Jackson was the favorite of the radical left,' Graham said.
A pharmacist spent weeks in a coma in hospital after he accidentally drank meth oil that was slipped into a wine bottle.

Hans Morkos, 43, collapsed in his Healthsave pharmacy in Annandale, in Sydney's inner-west, on January 31 after unknowingly consuming the toxic drug in liquid form.

His family is furious police have not fully investigated how the oil came to be in the wine and where it came from.

Mr Morkos' Annandale chemist received a package from overseas that contained the wine bottle with the oil towards the beginning of 2022.

Sydney pharmacist Hans Morkos (pictured centre) remains in a grim state in hospital months after he accidentally drank meth oil that was slipped into a wine bottle, leaving his family both concerned and furious that police have not investigated the incident further

The parcel was not addressed to the father-of-two and was left unopened for several weeks before he opened it and took a few sips from the bottle inside.

Police believe the wine bottle was part of a drug drop off.

The experienced pharmacist fell to the floor and was found by a 37-year-old female staffer who called NSW Ambulance paramedics.

Mr Morkos was rushed to Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Camperdown and put in an induced coma.

He has since awoken from his coma but remains in a serious condition in hospital months after he drank from the bottle.

Police called off their investigation and will not pursue the case further, which angered Mr Morkos' relatives, who want answers.

'He's still in hospital but he's out of a coma, the police have said they're no longer investigating,' one family member told The Daily Telegraph.

The 43-year-old collapsed on the floor of his pharmacy Healthsave Annandale in Sydney 's inner-west on January 31 after unknowingly consuming the toxic drug - also known as ice - in liquid form

The father-of-two has awoken from his coma but remains in a serious condition in hospital - months after he drank from the bottle. Police have called off their investigation and will not pursue the matter, which has angered relatives who are seeking answers

A police source explained that detectives ruled the incident a 'medical episode' and would not pursue it further.

'We've closed the case, it's a case of misadventure, the man in question drank meth oil believing it was wine,' they said.

'The family are very upset by what has happened, understandably. The parcel wasn't meant for him, the drug was an import from abroad and was meth oil.'

Meth is often imported from overseas in liquid form, and then turned into the crystallised variety.

Mr Morkos' Healthsave pharmacy offers a parcel delivery service and frequently receives and posts packages.

Morkos reportedly owns three pharmacies.

According to his social media, he is a qualified compounding pharmacist, and has his own lab to manufacture medicine.
Gladys Berejiklian has resurfaced on the campaign trail for Scott Morrison's team - despite sending scathing text messages where she labelled the Prime Minister a 'horrible, horrible person'.

Pictures showed Ms Berejiklian has been campaigning with her mate and close former colleague Andrew Constance, as the former NSW transport minister vies for the federal seat of Gilmore.

In an image posted to Facebook, Mr Constance described the former NSW premier - who was the master of ceremonies at one of his weddings - as a 'true friend' and thanked her for her support ahead of the imminent federal election.

Ms Berejiklian (left) was pictured with Maggie Havu (middle) and Liberal MP Mr Constance (right) as he lobbied for the federal seat of Gilmore ahead of the federal poll

'Great to have a true friend of mine down to say thank you to for incredible leadership of our region ! Love Glad,' Mr Constance captioned the image.

The image, which is now the former Liberal MP's profile picture, shows Mr Constance smiling along side Ms Berejiklian and staffer Maggie Havu.

Mr Constance's supporters expressed their support for the candidate and their admiration for Ms Berejiklian.

'Best of luck with your Campaign Andrew. Nice to see Gladys supporting you. We do miss you both in the NSW Government .Thank you so much Gladys for your time as NSW Premier!!!!,' one comment read.

'Wish we could have the two of you running our precious state. We miss you so much Gladys. We knew you were there for us,' another wrote.

A leaked text exchange emerged earlier this year where Ms Berejiklian described Mr Morrison a 'horrible, horrible' person who was 'more concerned with politics than people'.

Ten News political journalist Peter van Onselen blindsided Mr Morrison on live television with the messages allegedly sent between Ms Berejiklian and a cabinet minister.

Ms Berejiklian came under fire after a leaked text exchange with a fellow cabinet minister allegedly showed her calling Prime Minister Scott Morrison a 'horrible, horrible person' who was 'more concerned with politics than people'

It's also alleged she said that she 'did not trust' Mr Morrison. The cabinet minister allegedly replied describing Mr Morrison as a 'fraud' and a 'complete psycho'.

It was reported Ms Berejiklian accused the Prime Minister in a text of 'actively spreading lies' about her, to which the unnamed minister replied Mr Morrison was 'desperate and jealous.'

In texts allegedly sent at the height of the Black Summer bushfires, Ms Berejiklian said she was 'so disappointed and gutted' by Mr Morrison's controversial trip to Hawaii.

She also allegedly claimed Mr Morrison was ' obsessed with petty political point-scoring' while lives were endangered by the fires.

In a statement, Ms Berejiklian said she had 'no recollection of such messages.'

'I understand there has been some commentary ... concerning myself and the PM,' she said at the time.

'I have no recollection of such messages. Let me reiterate my very strong support for Prime Minister Morrison and all he is doing for our nation during these very challenging times.

'I also strongly believe he is the best person to lead our nation for years to come.'

Since quitting politics, Ms Berejiklian has taken up a new job at Optus as the telco's managing director for 'enterprise, business and institutional' affairs.

Ms Berejiklian resigned as NSW state premier last October when it emerged she was under investigation by the Independent Commission Against Corruption.

The ICAC announced the probe into whether Ms Berijiklan breached public trust with respect to grants awarded to community organisations while she was in a secret relationship with ex-Wagga Wagga MP Daryl Maguire.

The anti-corruption watchdog issued an update on its website saying 'certain parties' had requested an extension, which was granted. Submissions were previously due on Monday but will now be accepted by May 9.

In a statement , Ms Berejiklian said she had 'no recollection of such messages' and reiterated her strong support for Prime Minister Scott Morrison (left)

ICAC investigations generally take years to wrap up and the commission has given no indication how long it will take before it publishes its findings.

Mr Constance resigned from his position as NSW minister for transport just two days after Ms Berejiklian quit her post as NSW premier.

Although his switch to federal politics was no secret, Mr Constance made it clear the exit of his close friend was a contributing factor.

'With Glad going it's a bit of an end of an era,' Mr Constance said.

'We walked into Parliament together. I'm very proud to be walking out of Parliament with Gladys together.'

Labor won the seat of Gilmore off the Coalition at the last election, but local liberals hope that the Mr Constance's 17 years of experience and local popularity will win Gilmore back in the upcoming federal poll.

Gilmore includes areas of the NSW Shoalhaven and Illawarra coasts and includes communities like Batemans Bay, Kiama and Ulladulla. It is currently represented by Labor MP Fiona Phillips.
Egg prices are skyrocketing as a bird-flu outbreak ravages commercial chicken flocks in the U.S., with the price of a dozen large eggs spiking more than 52% in just under two months.

The avian flu outbreak also threatens to raise prices on other poultry products in the coming months as deaths from the disease continue to mount.

Shell egg prices are currently sitting at $2.88 a dozen on average - the highest since the beginning of the pandemic, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing market research firm Urner Barry.

Prices for a dozen eggs have spiked a staggering 52 percent since February 8, when the USDA confirmed the first case in a US commercial flock in Indiana.

To make matters worse, the price increase comes during one of the biggest periods of the year for egg sales: Easter.

'Egg availability heading into Easter is sure to be hampered,' Brian Earnest, an animal protein economist at CoBank, told the Journal.

The population of egg-laying chickens in the U.S. has also been declining for years, going from more than 340 million in April 2019 to around 322 million in February 2022, Earnest said.

The price of a dozen large eggs spiked more than 52% in just under two months due to a bird-flu outbreak that has decimated commercial chicken flocks in the United States

Shell egg prices are currently sitting at $2.88 a dozen on average - the highest since the beginning of the pandemic

Microbiologist Martha Kuka works on testing poultry samples collected from a farm located in a control area for the presence of bird flu at the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory. As many as 11 million chickens and two million turkeys have died this year during the outbreak

But despite the price hike and supply issues, analysts don't expect any immediate store shortages, claiming retailers are buying up eggs in anticipation that supplies could tighten in the coming weeks.

Over 17 million birds have died as commercial flocks continue to succumb to the deadly virus, according to USDA data.

Roughly 3% of the total US flock - more than 11 million egg-laying chickens - have died as a result of the disease.

Another two million commercially raised turkeys have suffered the same fate.

Over 17 million birds have died as commercial flocks continue to succumb to the deadly virus, according to USDA data. Above, a scientist holds a rapid screening test for the avian flu

Roughly 3% of the total US flock - more than 11 million egg-laying chickens - have died as a result of the outbreak

In the last two months, dozens of bird-flu cases have been reported across the US, from Maryland to South Dakota.

The USDA confirmed the diseases presence in five new US states on Wednesday alone.

In the UK, families will finally be able to start buying free-range eggs again after they disappeared from supermarkets, just as millions of chickens were put under a bird flu lockdown.'

Around 35 million of Britains hens have spent the last four months cooped up after an unprecedented spike in case numbers led to the largest ever outbreak of H5N1, also known as avian flu, on UK soil.

A sign at St James's Park in London warns of avian influenza, as the UK faces another outbreak of the deadly virus

Around 35 million of Britains hens have spent the last four months cooped up after an unprecedented spike in case numbers led to the largest ever outbreak of H5N1, also known as avian flu, on UK soil

Officials at the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) ordered millions of egg-laying hens in Britain indoors on November 3, then brought additional housing measures into force on November 29.

Because the birds have been housed for more than 16 weeks, poultry keepers were not able to retain their free-range status for eggs and meat, and the eggs had to be marketed as barn eggs from Monday, March 21.

Farmers had hoped that the Government would lift the indoor housing order next week, but officials decided to keep it in place after the total number of bird flu outbreaks hit 80.

But the British Egg Industry Council has now said that they expect the housing order will be lifted in a couple of weeks.

A spokesman added: We remain in ongoing dialogue with Defra who will make the final decision on when the housing order is going to be lifted.
The firm that owns Cadbury is facing allegations that children as young as ten are being used to harvest cocoa on its farms.

Footage has emerged showing youngsters with machetes cutting down cocoa pods on farms in Ghana that supply Mondelez International.

Activists said the farmers can't afford adult workers. Ayn Riggs, of Slave Free Chocolate, said it was 'horrifying' to see children using knives 'sometimes half their height' in clips obtained by Channel 4's Dispatches.

The firm that owns Cadbury is facing allegations that children as young as ten are being used to harvest cocoa on its farms

'Chocolate companies promised to clean up over 20 years ago,' she told The Observer. 'They knew they were profiting from child labour and have shirked their promises.'

Mondelez's sustainability programme, called Cocoa Life, states: 'No amount of child labour in the cocoa supply chain should be acceptable.'

The firm said it was 'concerned' and was investigating. Cadbury Exposed: Dispatches is on Channel 4 at 8pm tonight.

The revelations have emerged ahead of the chocolate industry's busiest time of year, when more than 300million is spent on chocolate Easter eggs and treats in the UK.

On one of the farms alleged to be supplying Mondelez, two children with machetes were filmed by the documentary team weeding the plantations.

Children were also filmed using sharp knives to open cocoa pods and harvest them from trees.

None of the children were wearing protective clothing.

The daughter of one farmer, claimed to be supplying Mondelez, said she had sliced her foot open while using a long machete.

Another said she was 'too afraid' to speak out about being forced to work on the farm.

A Mondelez spokesman said: 'We explicitly prohibit child labour in our operations and have been working relentlessly to take a stand against this.'
Vladimir Putin hopes to have a battlefield win in eastern Ukraine within the next month so he can celebrate it on Russia's annual Victory Day parade in Moscow.

US officials said the alleged war criminal wants to coincide a victory with the parade in Red Square on May 9, which is held to mark the Nazis' surrender in WWII.

They said it could explain why the Russian despot's forces have pulled back from the Kyiv region to concentrate on the east of Ukraine after weeks of fighting, The Times reported.

Vladimir Putin hopes to have a battlefield win in eastern Ukraine within the next month so he can celebrate it on Russia's annual Victory Day parade in Moscow. Pictured: Victory Day parade in Moscow, 2021

US officials said the alleged war criminal wants to coincide a victory with the parade in Red Square on May 9 that is held to mark the Nazis' surrender in WWII. Pictured: Russian President Vladimir Putin greets veterans before a military parade on Victory Day in 2021

Russian service members march during a military parade on Victory Day, which marks the 76th anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two, in Red Square in central Moscow, Russia May 9, 2021

TOS-1A Solntsepyok (Blazing Sun) multiple thermobaric rocket launchers during the Victory Day military parade in Red Square marking the 75th anniversary of the victory in World War II, on June 24, 2020 in Moscow, Russia

It is unknown whether Russia will be able to hold a fullscale victory parade as so many of its troops and much of its equipment are being used in the war against Ukraine

The Yars mobile intercontinental ballistic missile launcher moves to Red Square during the military parade marking the 75th anniversary of the victory in the Great Patriotic War on June 24, 2020 in Moscow, Russia

It is likely Putin thinks a battlefield win in the Donbas region in the east of Ukraine is more realistic because more of the existing Ukrainian population there is pro-Russian.

Officials also think the relocation of Russian troops could be in anticipation of warmer weather that will make it harder to move tanks and armoured vehicles through the Ukrainian countryside.

They believe if Russia focuses on the east of Ukraine, Putin's forces could remain there for a number of months.

Ukrainian officials also think the Victory Day parade will be central to Putin's Plan B for the invasion, after the Russian tyrant's original strategy failed.

Brave Ukrainains have led a strong resistance against Russian invaders, who were hoping to take the capital of Kyiv and the rest of the country.

Arseniy Yatsenyuk, a former Ukrainian prime minister, told CNN: '[Putin's] ultimate goal is, was and will be to take over Ukraine but he failed.

Ukrainian Soldiers inspect destroyed Russian military machinery in Bucha after recapturing the town from Russian forces

A Ukrainian soldier waves the country's flag at a checkpoint in Bucha, not far from the capital city of Kyiv, on Saturday, April 2

Ukrainian soldiers inspect destroyed Russian military machinery in the areas recaptured by the Ukrainian army on Sunday

A man walks with bags of food gave for the Ukranian army in Bucha. Former heavyweight champion boxer Wladimir Klitschko visited Bucha to accuse Putin of 'genocide' after mass graves filled with civilian corpses were found after Russian troops left the Kyiv suburb

A Ukrainian soldier passes by destroyed Russian tanks in the village of Dmytrivka close to Kyiv, Ukraine, Saturday, Apr. 2, 2022. As Russian forces pull back from Ukraine's capital region, retreating troops are creating a 'catastrophic' situation for civilians by leaving mines around homes, abandoned equipment and 'even the bodies of those killed,' Zelensky warned Saturday

One shows a solitary woman walking past burnt-out Russian tanks amid the flattened buildings of Bucha, near Kyiv, the suburban town now almost unrecognisable from a few short weeks ago

A third image (pictured above) portrays female soldiers returned to Ukraine in a prisoner swap. Their heads have been shaved by Russian military troops in humiliation by captors trying to strip them of dignity

'He failed due to a very strong resolve of Ukrainian military and very strong unity of Ukraine and the western world, and the sanctions that have been imposed by the United States, G7 and the European Union.

'So now, as far as I see, Putin switched to plan B. My take is that plan B has a deadline. The deadline is May 9.'

It came as Moscow was accused of genocide last night after retreating Russian forces left behind horrific evidence of rapes, civilian executions and mass graves.

The barbarity of Vladimir Putin's soldiers was compared to the atrocities of the Nazis and Stalin's Great Terror as the horrors of WWII returned to Europe.

Ukrainian prosecutors said they had found 410 bodies in towns near the capital Kyiv. They said some witnesses were too traumatised to speak.

Two mass graves were discovered in Bucha, one of more than 30 towns and suburbs liberated in recent days.

Bodies of civilians, their hands bound and bullet wounds in the back of their heads, littered the streets of the small commuter town north of Kyiv.

Survivors emerging from basements after weeks underground told of summary executions, sexual violence and terror not seen since Joseph Stalin's Soviet rule of terror in the 1930s.
On the face of it, David Warburton's behaviour epitomises everything distasteful about certain members of our political elite, who seem to consider Parliament a vehicle to satisfy their own personal vanity and base desires.

Once there, they appear to regard themselves as being above the rules that they piously foist upon the rest of us. Well, they're only for the little people to obey.

Like many of this breed, middle-aged Tory backbencher Mr Warburton appears to have seen himself as not only God's gift to younger women, but also exempt from the laws of the land.

For the married father-of-two faces allegations of sexual misconduct towards three females as well as wild drug-taking.

On the face of it, David Warburton's behaviour epitomises everything distasteful about certain members of our political elite, who seem to consider Parliament a vehicle to satisfy their own personal vanity and base desires

Two of the women, both Commons aides, have lodged formal complaints with Westminster's harassment watchdog.

The third, believed to have photographed the MP next to lines of cocaine, claims he snorted the illegal powder before climbing uninvited into her bed and molesting her.

For his part Mr Warburton, who has lost the party whip, denies wrongdoing.

Of course, it goes without saying that any allegations of sexual assault and drug use should be passed to the police and the Parliamentary authorities and merit the most thorough investigation. But whatever the outcome, this unedifying episode is a cautionary tale for all MPs and Peers.

Perhaps on this occasion the images and audio recordings were made by an exasperated woman fed up of the unwanted attentions of a lascivious older man and determined to teach him a lesson.

But much as Mr Warburton appears to deserve the ignominy being heaped upon him, there could be a bigger picture. And a deeply concerning one at that.

The brain is supposed to be the body's biggest organ. Isn't it time incorrigibly gullible MPs like Mr Warburton started using theirs?

Is it possible that he has been the victim of an elaborate 'honeytrap' sting? The security services have explicitly warned politicians to be on heightened alert for efforts at entrapment by hostile foreign regimes.

Russia, China and others are working constantly to infiltrate the inner sanctum of British politics. Enemy spies will exploit the vainglorious stupidity of our politicians to steal secrets to undermine this country.

Why, only weeks ago it was revealed agents linked to the Chinese Communist Party had infiltrated Parliament, pumping in donations  mostly to Labour  in the hope its MPs would spew out pro-Beijing propaganda.

Whatever inducements work best, they'll deploy: Money, prestige or the old-fashioned sexual promise.

The brain is supposed to be the body's biggest organ. Isn't it time incorrigibly gullible MPs like Mr Warburton started using theirs?

Barbarity beyond belief

It is a profoundly sick joke that Vladimir Putin denounces his enemies in the war on Ukraine as 'neo-Nazis'.

Because the horrors committed by routed and retreating Russian troops echo the barbarism perpetrated by the SS during the Second World War.

Evidence of genocide and the summary execution of civilians, hands bound, in the streets. Mass graves containing slaughtered hundreds in towns liberated by Ukrainian fighters.

It is a profoundly sick joke that Vladimir Putin denounces his enemies in the war on Ukraine as 'neo-Nazis'

The wholesale rape of women. And children used as human shields.

This is worse than soldiers going rogue. It is the premeditated infliction of terror.

The ex-Archbishop of York says Putin will 'answer to God' for his despicable brutality. Before then, the evil tyrant must answer to a war crimes tribunal.
Tory whips were told about sexual assault and cocaine abuse allegations against a Conservative MP two weeks ago - but waited until the allegations were leaked to the press before suspending him.

David Warburton, 56, was suspended by the Conservative Party on the weekend after a picture of him sitting alongside what is claimed to be lines of cocaine emerged - as he stands accused of inappropriately touching three women.

Party whips told two of Mr Warburton's alleged victims, women who worked in the MP for Somerset & Frome's office, to take their complaints through the Independent Complaints and Grievance Scheme, according to The Times.

The Tory party whips learnt about the two alleged victims through another staff member weeks ago, but did not kick Mr Warburton out of the Conservative Party until the claims were published by The Sunday Times.

One female staffer alleges that he coerced her into visiting his taxpayer-funded flat with him in Westminster, where he proceeded to kiss and grope her, according to The Times.

Tory whips were told about sexual assault and cocaine abuse allegations against David Warburton two weeks ago - but waited until the allegations were leaked to the press before suspending the MP for Somerset & Frome

David Warburton, 56, has been accused of sexually assaulting three women - two of whom worked in his office. According to The Times, Tory whips learnt about his female staffers' allegations a fortnight ago, but did not kick him out of the party until his scandal became public on the weekend

She alleges that Mr Warburton touched her bottom and thigh in separate incidents.

A second staffer alleges that Mr Warburton had caressed her and physically stopped her from escaping his flat, even using physical force to direct her to his bedroom.

Meanwhile, a third woman - the only one of the three complainants not to be employed by Mr Warburton - said he came over to her home while drunk, snorted 'line after line after line' of cocaine and then stripped.

While naked, Mr Warburton is alleged to have got into bed with the complainant and groped her - later sending apologetic texts, saying 'promise I won't remove my clothes again'.

In the same text in which Mr Warburton is said to have apologised, he went on to detail his plans to get more cocaine as he had a day off from his duties in parliament, according to The Times.

Despite the gravity of the scandal in which Mr Warburton has found himself embroiled, his wife was said to still be standing by him - according to her brother.

Mr Warburton told friends he had been through sheer hell as he was admitted to a psychiatric hospital suffering from severe shock and stress.

Mr Warburtons wife of 20 years, Harriet, 52, was said to be fully backing her husband, who denies all wrongdoing.

David Warburtons wife of 20 years, Harriet, 52, was said to be fully backing her husband, who denies accusations of abusing the cocaine and inappropriately touching three women

The Conservative Party suspended David Warburton at the weekend after a picture of him sitting alongside what is claimed to be lines of cocaine emerged

Her brother Jonathan Baker-Bates said: Absolutely, theyre standing by each other at the moment ... Theyve always been a very happy couple for as long as Ive known them. Harriet is obviously affected herself ... I think she is obviously finding it hard.

I got a call from my sister last night. Thats the first time Ive heard of it. She seems to be surprised by it as much as anyone else. Her line is as his  hes not done anything wrong and these things have explanations.

Mr Warburtons father-in-law was equally shocked.

Merrick Baker-Bates, 82, the former deputy high commissioner to Malaysia and British consul general in Los Angeles, said: When I saw the paper this morning I thought it was an April Fool joke.

Mr Warburton and his wife live with their two teenage children in a six-bedroom detached house in the village of Baltonsborough, near Glastonbury, which they bought last year for 1.3million.

PR professional Mrs Warburton, the cousin of former Cabinet secretary Lord Butler, confirmed her husbands hospital admission, said to be a private facility, but refused to comment herself. She is also her husbands publicly funded personal assistant and communications officer.

Her brother, 55, from north London, said he saw Mr Warburton only a few weeks ago and he seemed to be normal David.

Davids a nice guy. It came as a shock to all of us. I would imagine he has good reasons for why he is saying he is denying it, he added.

Mr Warburton, who has had the Tory whip withdrawn, has said he plans to launch a robust defence to counter the allegations.

When asked about the photograph supposedly showing the MP posing next to white powder, Mr Baker-Bates said: As far as I know, that behaviour is out of character and the wider allegations appear out of character.

He was always very conscious that he is an MP so it is surprising in that context, he said.

Mr Warburton with then Prime Minister Theresa May at the Bath and West Show in 2017

He also questioned whether the allegations could be part of a fix-up following claims that the MP might have been the victim of a sting by a foreign power. He said: It does seem to have a lot of ingredients of something.

MI5 chiefs warned this year that hostile countries could target MPs. But Whitehall sources suggested there was no malign state involvement in this instance.

Nevertheless, officials have referred the case to MI6 out of an abundance of caution, The Daily Telegraph reported.

Mr Warburton is now being investigated by Parliaments new #MeToo harassment watchdog, the Independent Complaints Grievance Scheme.

He also allegedly failed to declare a 100,000 loan in 2017 from a Russian businessman.

London-based Roman Joukovski, 52, whom the MP has since repaid, was named in High Court papers last year as a defendant in an alleged cryptocurrency fraud. The case appears to have been settled and was closed in January.
A man sexually abused as a child by wealthy paedophile art collector John Wayne Millwood may be cheated of his record sex abuse damages award of more than $5 million.

Millwood, a pathology service boss and the owner of a priceless art collection, began selling or giving away his properties and shares on the same day he was sent to prison in 2016 for sex abuse.

The Tasmanian Supreme Court awarded $5.313m last December to Millwood's victim, known in court as ZAB, has now uncovered the trail of assets worth up to $8m Millwood has been divesting for years to family and friends.

The 76-year-old convicted child sex abuser has been declared bankrupt and ZAB faces a long battle to recover the assets so that his Supreme Court civil payout can be honoured.

Once a respected art patron and owner of a priceless art collection, Millwood has transferred assets to companies run by his daughter, to her directly, and to his former partner and her son.

ZAB told The Australian that Millwood, described by the Tasmanian Parole Board as 'narcissistic', is also 'morally bankrupt',

'Clearly Millwood has capacity to pay, but he seems to think that in his case, payment of damages awarded by the Supreme Court is optional,' ZAB said.

'His contempt for the court and for me, the victim of his sexual abuse, is disgraceful.

Depraved Tasmanian art collector John Wayne Millwood (pictured) abused a boy aged ten to 15 in the 1980s, who was awarded a record damages payout of $5.3m

ZAB was abused by Millwood under the guise of medical examinations, then spent years being stalked and harassed by Millwood who threatened to sue him and hired private detectives to place witnesses under surveillance.

At the time, Millwood was feted in Tasmanian society as the owner of a prized colonial artwork collection and was instrumental in establishing the John Glover Society.

Glover was the famed 19th-century landscape painter who emigrated from Britain to Evandale in northern Tasmania in 1831.

Millwood was convicted for his sexual assaults of ZAB and jailed for a maximum four years in 2016, but released in 2019 on parole after serving just over half his sentence.

Members of the John Glover society have campaigned for the removal of a $110,000 bronze statue of Glover that Millwood had installed at Evandale which critics claimed looked more like Millwood than the artist.

John Millwood was a wealthy art collector and secret paedophile who began divesting himself of assets like this Launceston property to family and friends the day he went to jail

ZAB launched civil action against Millwood in 2017 after changes in Tasmanian law around the statute of limitations were introduced.

The Australian reported that Millwood owned $4m in shares in the company Realba Investments which owned properties in which his Sonic Healthcare operated in Launceston and Hobart.

Those shares have since been transferred to a company called Mazus Holdings, which is owned by Milsone Pty Ltd, whose sole director is Millwood's daughter, Sarah Kate Millwood.

ZAB has written to Sonic Healthcare, saying 'you must realise how morally reprehensible it would be if a convicted paedophile's divestment of assets ... were to deny compensation to child abuse survivors'.

Millwood 'gifted' his share of a beach house worth around $500,000 he owned in Low Head, Tasmania with former partner Sonia Finlay to her son Duncan

The convicted child sex abuser was credited with co-founding the John Glover Society which honoured the 19th century painter who moved to this house in Evandale, Tasmania (above)

Millwood also owned a building at 159-161 St John Street, Launceston, worth about $2.5m, which was sold to Milsone and then onsold.

Shares have been divested to Ms Millwood, to the paedophile's former partner Sonia Ann Finlay and a share in a beach house was 'gifted' to her son, Duncan Thomas Alexander Finlay.

ZAB will fight to claw back the assets under the Bankruptcy Act.

Supreme Court of Tasmania Chief Justice Alan Blow said last December that ZAB had suffered complex post-traumatic stress disorder and a major depressive disorder as a result of the abuse.

In awarding him the record damages sum, he found the man's earning capacity in his corporate career had been impaired since 1999 when he confronted Millwood about the abuse.

Justice Blow said Millwood's contact with his victim escalated over the following four years.

ZAB would come out of his office to find Millwood standing on the street, sometimes Millwood would call him up, and when he changed his phone number, still manage to track him down.

Millwood would make unpleasant comments about ZAB in the comment sections of newspapers and on social media, claiming the man was delusional and mentally ill.

ZAB said Millwood had doubled down while in prison, writing letters claiming to be the victim of a set up and conspiracy.

'As a result I was the subject of the most malevolent gossip ... these lies became so deeply entrenched that warped versions of them began appearing in social media from people who do not even known me,' ZAB said.

Calls to have this bronze statue commissioned by Millwood of famed painter John Glover removed arose after his imprisonment amid claims it looked more like him than the artist

Child sex abuser John Millwood was feted in Tasmanian society for founding the group which honoured painter John Glover (above) who moved to Evandale in the island's north in 1831

The damages awarded to ZAB include more than $1.5m for loss of past earning capacity and $2m for future earning capacity. He was also slated to receive nearly $150,000 for medical expenses, and $360,000 for non-economic harm.

At the time, ZAB said the judgment was a 'victory for all child abuse survivors'.

'This judgment recognises the lifelong impact of child sexual abuse,' he said in a statement.

'This impact is felt in every facet of life, directly causes physical and psychological injury, and has negative long-term economic consequences.'
Incredible footage shows the terrifying moment a man is wiped out by a freak wave that crashed across a Sydney lagoon.

A father is heard calling to his children to flee the water as the giant wave rolled across Manly lagoon in Sydney's Northern Beaches on Saturday.

'Boys, come back quick,' he yells, as the wave gains momentum before crashing across the surface of the normally peaceful lagoon.

A nearby pedestrian realises he is about to be swept up by the wave and breaks into a run but is soon sent tumbling downstream by the powerful swell.

Children were seen running for safety (left) before a man was swept up by the powerful swell and carried downstream - seen at one point grabbing hold of a picnic bench (right)

Children are heard screaming as the man flails helplessly in the water and attempts to grab hold of a picnic bench as he is carried downstream.

He is eventually able to recover and stand up in the waist-deep water as the wave continues to wash over surrounding parkland.

'I hope he's alright,' the man behind the camera says as the mega-wave subsides.

The pedestrian slowly wades out of the overflowing lagoon and confirms to amazed spectators that while soaking wet, he is uninjured.

The freak wave comes as Manly and other parts of Sydney were battered with monster waves, wild winds and giant swells on Saturday.

A number of dinghies and boats were swept away including some moored at Manly, but they are believed to have been unoccupied.

The giant wave rolled across Manly lagoon located in Sydney's Northern Beaches

The freak waves comes as Manly and other parts of Sydney were battered with monster waves, wild winds and giant swells on Saturday (pictured is the flooded Manly lagoon on March 9)

A number of dinghies and boats were reported as being swept away including some moored at Manly, but they are also believed to have been unoccupied (pictured, the lagoon on March 9)

In extraordinary scenes, countless waves crashed past blockades and onto the foreshore in Sydney's eastern suburbs, with the popular swimming pool at Bondi Icebergs virtually invisible due to ocean foam.

The Bureau of Meteorology issued an urgent surf warning for NSW coastal areas on both Saturday and Sunday following this week's relentless downpour.

'Surf and swell conditions are expected to be hazardous for coastal activities such as rock fishing, boating, and swimming,' the bureau said.

At Avoca on the NSW central coast, a king tide described as a 'mini tsunami' has shocked scores of locals.

Shocking footage of a monster wave on Saturday shows the surging torrent dwarfing two dog-walkers on a beach as they are swept in the wave (pictured)

Shocking footage of a monster wave shows the surging torrent dwarfing two dog-walkers on a beach as they are swept in the wave and deposited dozens of metres further inshore.

Furniture and other debris has been reportedly washed into waterfront properties across the NSW coastline, with some children heard screaming as they fled to safety.

In nearby Terrigal, five people were pulled from the water after ambulances and the Toll Rescue Helicopter responded to reports people had been swept up by the surf.

Two were transported to Gosford Hospital in a stable condition, though one has possible spinal injuries.

Dozens of Sydneysiders rushed to the coastline over the weekend to watch giant waves (pictured, Bondi residents check out the swell)

On Sunday, millions of Sydneysiders rushed to their local beach or park to enjoy a rare glimpse of the sun as temperatures hit 27C.

After suffering through the wettest March on record and enduring weeks of relentless rain, residents finally awoke to blue skies and balmy conditions.

However, Jordan Notara from the Bureau of Meteorology told Daily Mail Australia the unexpected sunshine would disappear as early as Wednesday.

Mr Notara said there was a high chance of showers across the city on Wednesday with wet conditions to linger for the rest of the week.

Furniture and other debris has been reportedly washed into waterfront properties across the NSW coastline (pictured, onlookers watch the giant waves at Bronte Beach on Saturday)

He said temperatures would drop to the low 20's with highs of 24C to 25C degrees on the coast and 27C in the city's west.

Across the rest of the country, Melbourne is in for a cloudy week with possible showers and temperatures in the low 20s.

Brisbane will be warmer with the mercury reaching the high 20s but could also see scattered showers.

Adelaide will see similar temperatures and be mostly sunny, while Perth will also be sunny and hot with the temperature hovering around the 30C mark for the week.
The Starbucks logo is seen outside the new Starbucks cafe in Warsaw, in this March 6, 2011, file photo. Starbucks's longtime former chief executive Howard Schultz announced on Monday the suspension of the company's stock repurchasing program, as he returns this week to lead the global coffee chain for the third time. Reuters-Yonhap



Starbucks's longtime former chief executive Howard Schultz announced on Monday the suspension of the company's stock repurchasing program, as he returns this week to lead the global coffee chain for the third time.



The suspension, effective immediately, will allow Starbucks to invest more in the company's people and its stores, Schultz said in a letter to Starbucks stakeholders.



The move comes as the company faces realities including pinched supply chains, effects from the coronavirus pandemic and heightened tensions and political unrest, Schultz added.



Starbucks is facing a growing unionization of its U.S. workforce. Employees at 10 U.S. Starbucks locations have voted in recent months to join Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union.



Baristas at more than 170 U.S. locations have petitioned a federal labor board for union elections since August, when the union drive went public.





In this Dec. 7, 2016, file photo, Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz delivers remarks at the Starbucks Investor Day in Manhattan, New York. Reuters-Yonhap
Prince Andrew 'told bankers to call his Buckingham Palace office if they were concerned over a 750,000 payment from an alleged fraudster'.

The Duke of York 'received payments of more than 1 million' from Selman Turk after they met through the duke's gun smuggler friend Tarek Kaituni - who attended Fergie's surprise 60th birthday bash and Eugenie's wedding.

The payments included a 750,000 'wedding gift' to Princess Beatrice.

According to the Telegraph, Mr Turk told officials looking into the 750,000 payment that Prince Andrew had 'authorised him to pass on the details of palace aides'.

Mr Kaituni has previously boasted of his influence over the Duke and attended the wedding of Prince Andrew's daughter Princess Eugenie in 2018.

The convicted smuggler is also understood to have previously helped broker secret meetings for the Duke with the late dictator Colonel Gaddafi and once told undercover reporters he played a key role in the release of the Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi.

A selfie taken by Selman Turk alongside Tarek Kaituni during a visit to what appears to be Frogmore House, the royal residence in Windsor Great Park, in February 2020

Prince Andrew has allegedly received payments of more than 1million from Turkish businessman Mr Turk

Turkish businessman Selman Turk, 35, is alleged to have made payments of more than 1 million to Prince Andrew after being introduce to the duke by Tarek Kaitun

Tarek Kaituni, 54, attended the surprise 60th birthday party and Princess Eugenie's wedding despite a conviction for gun smuggling

Andrew first became involved with Kaituni, who now has US citizenship, in 2005. Kaituni (pictured with his former wife Lisa van Goinga at their wedding) brokered meetings between the Duke and Gaddafi

Sarah, Duchess of York, Princess Beatrice and Prince Andrew, Duke of York pictured together at Royal Ascot in 2018

Mystery of payments in excess of 1.3million to the House of York Tarek Kaituni, 58, is said to have met the Duke of York and alleged Turkish conman Selman Turk, 35, in 2019. Turk is at the centre of a mystery over payments of 350,000 to Andrew, 225,000 to the Duchess of York, 25,000 to Princess Eugenie and a 750,000 gift for Princess Beatrices wedding in 2018. Last week, Eugenie became the first member of the York family to offer an explanation for the cash they received from Turk, who is being sued in the High Court over it amid claims of apparent money laundering. She said the 25,000 given to her had been to help pay for her mothers birthday celebrations. Eugenie said she did not know Turk, who is accused of misappropriating millions of pounds from a fortune belonging to a Turkish woman. In the High Court case, Turk is being sued by Nebahat Isbilen, 77, who fled Turkey with a 70million fortune. She alleges she entrusted former Goldman Sachs banker Turk with her money but now claims he is a fraudster and is demanding it back. She insists that he hoodwinked her into sending a 750,000 wedding gift for Beatrice. Advertisement

Kaituni introduced Andrew to Selman Turk, 35, in the early summer of 2019, before the pair became friendly and shared dinners at the alleged fraudster's South Kensington home.

It previously emerged that Fergie's surprise 60th birthday party, which took place just months after their introduction, was partially funded by Mr Turk, The Sunday Telegraph reported.

And months later, Mr Turk and Kaitani took a selfie photograph together during a visit to what appears to be Frogmore House, the royal residence in Windsor Great Park, in February 2020.

Since their introduction less than three years ago, Mr Turk is alleged to have made payments totalling 1.1m to Andrew, of 250,000 to Sarah and 25,000 to Princess Eugenie.

Of the sum allegedly paid to the princess, $15,000 had been listed as a birthday gift, but it is understood to have actually been used to pay for the surprise party.

However, it is alleged that the this money was stolen by Mr Turk from Turkish millionairess Nebahat Evyap Isbilen, who had entrusted him with helping her move $87 million out of Turkey as she attempted to avoid political persecution.

Prince Andrew and his family have been named in the High Court battle, the Telegraph reported.

The complex case is ongoing, no trial has taken place and the allegations have not been resolved. Mr Turk denies all allegations of wrongdoing.

In preliminary hearings, it was alleged 'substantial sums' were paid to the Duke and Duchess of York, but there has been no suggestion they have any involvement in the allegations.

The party was attended by the likes of Ellie Goulding, Robbie Williams and Julian Fellowes.

Mr Turk currently lives in a multi-million-pound flat in Mayfair. The flat is owned by 'The Queen's Most Excellent Majesty In Right Of Her Crown care of The Crown Estate Commissioners', Land Registry documents suggest

The 76-year-old Turkish millionairess suing an alleged Turkish conman in case that has named Andrew and his family Nebahat Isbilen is the wealthy wife of a Turkish MP jailed in their homeland in what was said to be a politically motivated imprisonment. She describes herself in court documents as a member of a prominent Turkish family which owns the Evyap Group manufacturing company. Her father founded the firm and passed it on to her and her five siblings. Mrs Isbilen, 77, worked for the company in cosmetics production and was later on the board. She married her husband Ilhan Isbilen in 1996. He has been close friends since childhood with Fethullah Gulen, a US-based Muslim preacher whose movement, she says, advocates progressive Islam and socially-conscious politics. Mrs Isbilen says between 2002 and 2013 the ruling Justice and Development Party of Turkey (AKP), led by president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was strategically allied with the Gulen movement. But relations deteriorated, and since 2016 the AKP has proscribed the Gulen movement as a terrorist organisation. Mr Isbilen was an AKP member of parliament but resigned in 2014. His wife said: Following a political investigation and prosecution, my husband was imprisoned in December 2015 for his affiliation with the Gulen movement. Following my husbands arrest, I became more concerned about my own well-being and assets. I was worried that I might be prosecuted or have my assets seized. It also became increasingly difficult and unpleasant for her to have dealings with the Evyap Group as other members of my family disapproved of my husbands and my political beliefs so she decided to sell her Evyap shares in 2015. Feeling extremely vulnerable, Mrs Isbilen, who describes herself in the court documents as speaking very little English, fled to London in 2017 with the help of Selman Turk via the Greek island of Samos to avoid political persecution herself, and gave him almost total control of her financial affairs. Advertisement

Princess Eugenie has said she believed the payments to be 'gifts' from family friends to assist with the cost of the surprise bash.

In a statement, she said: 'In early October 2019 I had received a call from our family friend saying that he wanted to make a financial contribution towards my mothers birthday party to assist with the catering costs.

'I suggested that any contribution could be made directly to the caterers, but in the event provided my account details to which two payments were made totalling 25,000, which I then transferred on to the company organising my mothers party.'

Kaituni was among 100 guests at the party and enjoyed regular access to Andrew, with photographs showing the duke sitting near him at the event.

Andrew first became involved with Kaituni in 2005, the same year he was caught trying to smuggle a submachine gun from the Netherlands to France.

Kaituni has previously demonstrated his willingness to trade on their friendship and has claimed he could influence Andrew into backing commercial projects

He was among 800 guests at St Georges Chapel, Windsor, for the wedding of Andrews daughter Princess Eugenie to Jack Brooksbank. Later he was a guest at the exclusive black-tie reception for the couples closest friends and family at the Royal Lodge in Windsor Great Park.

The Libyan once gave Eugenies sister Beatrice an 18,000 diamond necklace months before the Duke allegedly lobbied a British company on his behalf.

Mr Turk currently lives in a multi-million-pound flat in a prestigious Mayfair property owned by the Queen.

He is understood to have been introduced to Kaitani in early 2019, before then meeting Andrew for the first time in May or June later the same year.

Mr Turk, Kaitani and the duke subsequently met on at least two occasions, including a dinner with potential investors at the alleged fraudster's South Kensington home in west London in December 2019.

The only time Andrew and Mr Turk have been pictured together in public was when the latter won an award at the Duke of York's Dragons' Den-style competition Pitch@Palace in November 2019.

In a video posted on the Pitch@Palace Twitter account, he outlined how he was creating a new consumer-focused digital bank aimed at millennials named Heyman Al.

The next evening Heyman AI won the People's Choice Award and he was photographed shaking hands with the duke, who hosted the event.

But days later, Mr Turk told an official from Mrs Isbilens private bank that the 750,000 payment was a 'wedding gift'.

In court documents, Mrs Isbilen, who also attended the Pitch@Palace event has suggested the transfer could be connected to the award Mr Turk won that evening.

The prince has since repaid the cash after she alleged it was a scam.

A spokeswoman for the Duke of York said: 'We will not be commenting on an ongoing legal matter.'

Sarah Ferguson has no plans to hand back 225,000 as it was a fee for her work as 'brand ambassador' for green energy firm, sources say

The Duchess of York does not plan to repay the 225,000 she received from the company of Selman Turk whom she regarded as a perfectly bona fide banker, it is understood.

Sarah got the payment from Alphabet Capital Ltd, which the High Court heard was a fraudulent front for apparent money laundering.

In legal documents before the court, Turk is claimed to be a conman who set up Alphabet to move dirty money around the world.

He denies the allegations.

The Duchess of York does not plan to repay the 225,000 she received from the company of Selman Turk whom she regarded as a perfectly bona fide banker, it is understood. Pictured left next to ex-husband Prince Andrew, Duke of York in 2019

The Duchess has not issued any statement about the money she received but sources close to her have offered an explanation.

They say it relates to her work as a brand ambassador for US green energy company Pegasus Group Holdings.

The 225,000 was apparently her fee for work, but was offered in instalments rather than a single payment.

Turk was suggested as someone who would take on the debt and pay the duchess in full, with Pegasus then paying him in instalments.

Insiders say she knew Turk through the duke and regarded him as a banker and a perfectly bona fide person to deal with.

A spokesman for Sarah said: The duchess was completely unaware of the allegations that have since emerged against Mr Turk.

She is naturally concerned by what has been alleged against him.

Pegasus was unavailable for comment.
A British plane owned by a City of London executive that crashed into the English Channel with two people onboard was on a day trip to France organised by the South Warwickshire Flying School, it emerged today.

The 46-year-old Piper PA-28R-200 Cherokee Arrow II came down on Saturday morning just over an hour after leaving Wellesbourne Mountford Airfield, near Stratford-upon-Avon.

It comes as the second day of searching for survivors was unsuccessful on Sunday.

The single-engine plane was owned by Flying Instructor Guy Wakeley, 51, who is also a well-known financial services boss.

Mr Wakeley is part of the instructing and examining team at the South Warwickshire Flying School, which is based at Wellesbourne.

Guy Wakeley is Chief Executive of Equinity plc. He owns the 46-year-old Piper PA-28R-200 Cherokee Arrow II that came down in the English Channel on Saturday morning

He is a former Chief Executive of Morrison Facilities Services, and financial services company Equiniti. Mr Wakeley is a Cambridge graduate with a PhD in engineering.

He is currently listed as a non-executive director at City of London equity investment company HgCapital Trust plc.

Mr Wakeley's plane was in a group of six planes linked to the South Warwickshire Flying School.

Pilots and passengers on the other planes were on Sunday assisting the authorities with enquiries, said an emergency services source in France.

The Flying School had publicised Saturday's trip to France as a 'Club Fly-Out to Le Touquet'.

By 3pm on Sunday, there was still no sign of the plane, or any related debris or survivors.

Ray Stock, head of training at the Flying School, on Sunday refused to discuss who was on board the plane at the time of the crash.

No comment, said Mr Stock.

An emergency air-and-sea rescue operation was launched in the Channel minutes after the crash on Saturday.

The Piper PA-28 was in a group of aircraft which was heading to the northern France resort of Le Touquet.

'It crashed into British waters for an unknown reason,' said a spokesman for the French emergency services.

'British Coastguard launched an operation supported by French aircraft and boats including the Abeille-Languedoc (Languedoc Bee) tug, which has been chartered by the French Navy,' he added.

A spokesman for the Maritime Prefecture in France said the wide-ranging search was suspended overnight Saturday, as rescuers said it would resume at first light on Sunday.

'The plane was travelling from Wellesbourne to Le Touquet, with two people on board, before it disappeared off radars,' said the Prefecture spokesman.

Flight records show that that the Piper PA-28R-200 Cherokee Arrow II, registration number G-EGVA left Wellesbourne at 7.56am on Saturday and appeared to go off radar over the Channel at 09.02am.

It has been due to land at Le Touquet, France, but failed to arrive. The plane was built in 1976 and has four seats.

As well as the Abeille Languedoc, the major search involved a French Navy Falcon 50 jet and a Dauphin helicopter.

Ships in the Channel were also alerted to the disappearance, but by nightfall there was no sign of the plane, or any debris.

'The search continued all afternoon, without being able to locate any debris or aircraft wreckage,' said the Prefecture spokesman.

The Piper PA-28 was in a group of aircraft which was heading to the northern France resort of Le Touquet on Saturday morning (file image, Piper PA-28)

He added: 'At the beginning of Saturday evening, without additional elements and the probable sector of disappearance having been fully investigated, the searches were suspended.

'They will resume on Sunday morning morning with a flight by the Dauphin helicopter'.

Those travelling in small planes such as the Piper PA-28 are usually equipped with lifejackets and a life raft.

While the plane may have sunk in the Channel, rescuers are accordingly hoping to find the pilot and passenger on the surface.

The PA-28 is a two or four-seat aircraft built by the U.S. firm, Piper, as a trainer, air taxi, or for personal transport.

It has been in production since 1960 and various models have been involved in a number of high-profile accidents in that time.

In August 1972, Prince William of Gloucester, the Queen's cousin, was killed along with his co-pilot in a Piper Cherokee Arrow after crashing on take-off from Halfpenny Green, near Wolverhampton, during an air race.
Six-worded applications and anti-vaxxer ramblings are among the resumes welfare rorters are deliberately handing in to recruitment agencies to avoid employment.

An Australian and NZ recruitment firm, Superior People Recruitment, has shared some of the worst examples of resumes they have received from welfare cheats who have no intention of working.

The agency - which operates in Victoria, NSW, Queensland and NZ - said the rorters are handing in their bogus resumes to meet requirements which require them to apply for a large number of jobs so they can continue to receive payments, such as JobSeeker.

Anti-vaxxers, part-time university students and unmotivated high school dropouts are among the welfare cheats who have been caught rorting the system. Some are deliberately applying for jobs they are under-qualified for.

One resume contained six measly words - and one of the words was an abbreviation.

'I don't have a resume atm,' it read.

Six-worded applications and anti-vaxxer ramblings are among the resumes dole bludgers are deliberately handing into recruitment agencies to meet welfare requirements

Anti-vaxxers, part-time university students and unmotivated high school dropouts are among the welfare cheats who have been caught out rorting the system to meet welfare requirements

Another person wrote in their application: 'I am fulfilling my jobseeker requirements by applying for this role.'

Superior People Recruitment's Graham Wynn said 20 per cent of applications sent to the recruitment agency comes from Aussies trying to cheat the system.

More than 2,000 applicants have been reported to authorities in as little as two months.

An anti-vaxxer blamed their unemployment on the state government for mandating the vaccine and refused to receive 'an experiment drug'.

'I was a hard and honest "essential worker" until the Victorian Government mandated that I should not work in Victoria without taking an experiment drug and relinquishing power over my own body,' it read.

'Meanwhile the Federal Government insist that there are no Medical Mandates in Australia.

'In order to maintain the measly amount that I receive in Centrelink, I must apply for 20 jobs per month, even though it is unlikely that an employer in Victoria could put me on. Sorry for wasting your time in advance.'

A part-time university student said they currently had two casual jobs and could not accept another job or else they would lose their Centrelink payment

Some applicants have deliberately applied for jobs they are under-qualified for including a cleaner who was applying for a Materials Engineer position

Another person applied for a sheetmetal worker position, even though they only had experience working as a babysitter, cleaner and retail worker

One applicant was applying for a customer service/administration role that required two years experience

A fake resume submitted by another welfare cheat said he had 'made it 10th grade' and that he has 'absolutely no skills whatsoever'.

Some applicants have deliberately applied for jobs they are underqualified for including a cleaner who was applying for a Materials Engineer position.

The role required the applicant to have experience in laboratory testing and to be accredited by the National Association of Testing Authorities.

The applicant only had experience as a delivery driver and cleaning assistant.

Another person applied for a sheetmetal worker position, even though they only had experience working as a babysitter, cleaner and retail worker.

One applicant was applying for a customer service/administration role that required two years experience.

They simply wrote on their resume: 'Great communication skills. Customer service.'

Mr Wynn said the majority of bogus applications were being sent to his recruitment agency by young men.

Ben Fordham slammed 'dole bludgers' for deliberately handing in bogus resumes to jobs so they can continue to receive Centrelink payments

'I would say the bulk of them are under 25s and under 26s generally,' he told Daily Mail Australia.

'They are predominantly male rather than female, definitely under 30s for sure. The more mature ones we get are rarer.'

He noted one of the more frustrating groups were anti-vaxxers who had no valid health or religious excuse to get vaccinated.

Mr Wynn questioned whether they should be receiving taxpayer handouts.

'There are one who say, "I refuse to be vaccinated", those against government mandates, conspiracy theorists,' he said.

'If youre not vaccinated, not for health or religious reasons, then seriously, you wont get a job. Should you be getting handouts?'

2GB host Ben Fordham read out one insincere resume written by a woman called Alannah.

The 2GB host unloaded on welfare recipients who were not putting in enough effort to find work and intentionally handing in rubbish CVs to potential employers

'I'm currently employed with two cash jobs,' he read. 'I'm only applying for this position to complete my job plan with Centrelink. Apologies for any time wasted.'

Fordham said he had spoken to an employer who complained welfare recipients who had applied for a role five years ago, were sending in the same resume today.

She said 'curiosity' got the better of her and she attempted to call the applicants.

'Most didn't return my call. Some had incorrect mobile numbers and email addresses on their resumes. One said, 'You actually want me to come in for an interview?''

Mr Wynn said his agency has dobbed in thousands of welfare cheats in the past two months.

'I've been getting these [resumes] for many, many years. And it's increased dramatically since Covid kicked in,' he said.

'Since the 8th of February, nearly 2,000 people we've reported to Centrelink, in our opinion, is not a serious attempt to find work, 'It's just to fulfil my obligation, I've applied for a job, I get my money'.'

A recruitment agency has dobbed in 2,000 'dole bludgers' in two months (stock image)

Fordham said in March new data had revealed there were up to 900,000 Australians currently receiving JobSeeker payments

'The ones I do like the best are the ones that say, 'I really don't want a job, but I have to apply for a job. Sorry for wasting your time.'

'Now I like their honesty. But seriously, that's what they send me. Nobody checks this.'

The comments made by Fordham marks his latest spray against dole bludgers with the radio host partly blaming them for a massive shortage in workers.

Fordham said in March new data had revealed there were up to 900,000 Australians currently receiving JobSeeker payments.

He said to be eligible for the scheme, recipients had to be actively seeking employment and be physically able to work.

The comments made by Fordham marks his latest spray against dole bludgers with the radio host partly blaming them for a massive shortage in workers

'But let's be real here - not everyone is looking for a job,' Fordham said.

'Not everyone wants a job and the measures in place are not working. Every day we hear another story about staff shortages.'

The radio host said despite moves to bolster the workforce with 175,000 foreign workers, backpackers and international students, it wouldn't fix the issue.

'The truth is, there are Australians who should be working but won't. They've become accustomed to welfare, they've become addicted to it,' he said.

'We've made it too easy for people to sit around while others do the heavy lifting and the workers are paying for it.'

Fordham in February urged Australians to rat on 'dole bludgers' refusing to work by calling the Employer Reporting Line.

'[The number is] 1300 361 241,' Fordham said. 'This is for if you know about people who refuse to get off their backside.'
The Greens are calling for masks to be reintroduced in Tasmania as Covid cases skyrocket in the island.

Tasmania has more than 13,000 active cases, with 1,840 new infections on Saturday and 1,683 on Sunday.

If the state were a country its average cases over the past seven days would make it the fourth-highest in the world per capita.

Health experts are calling for masks to be reintroduced in Tasmania as the island state experiences skyrocketing Covid cases

Epidemiologist Rosalie Woodruff said the government should consider re-introducing masks to battle rising infections.

'When you compare Tasmania's case rate per capita, it's shocking,' the Greens health spokeswoman said.

'Tasmania is up with the worst in the world, which makes the likelihood of contracting Covid is significantly increased.

'We have thousands of people a day getting Covid, and in the context of our small population that's massive.'

Surging cases are putting serious strain on hospitals, schools, hospitality, and the public service with so many staff sick or in insolation.

Epidemiologist Dr Rosalie Woodruff says officials should consider re-introducing masks to battle rising infections

Only the Cook Islands, South Korea, and Cyprus have more cases per capita over the past week.

Dr Julie Graham, the state's public health deputy director, said hospitalisations remained low and it was premature to reintroduce restrictions like masks.

However, Dr Woodruff said masks were 'very effective' at limiting transmission and they should be recommended for all Tasmanians.

'Tasmania's high rates of vaccination, however, are keeping the levels of hospitalisation and ICU admissions to one of the lowest in the country,' she said.

'Mask wearing is one component of a number of important public health measures which help to prevent the spread of Covid-19 infection.'
Pictured: Ali Khamis Moh'd, who is accused of sexual assault

The male nurse accused of raping a young heart surgery patient and sexually touching two others can be unmasked as a globe-trotting, internationally-educated heart specialist.

Ali Khamis Moh'd, 42, has been charged with raping a 25-year-old woman as she recovered from surgery at Norwest Private Hospital, in Sydney's north-west, last September.

Moh'd is also accused of sexually touching a 67-year-old woman while she awaited heart surgery at the nearby Nepean surgery last month, and of groping a 21-year-old nursing student at that same hospital in December.

Moh'd was arrested last Friday and was granted bail after a loved one coughed up a $50,000 surety, with TV footage showing him covering his face and sprinting from TV cameras.

Daily Mail Australia can on Tuesday reveal fresh details of the prosecution case against Moh'd - a highly qualified specialist who studied at both the Jordanian University of Science and Technology in Ar-Ramtha, north-west Jordan, and the University of Technology, Sydney.

Ali Khamis Moh'd was released on bail on Friday, and was filmed running from police custody (pictured)

Two of the three alleged victims, age 25 and 67, were cardiac patients when Moh'd allegedly assaulted them.

During his studies, Moh'd specialised in cardiac catheterization - a procedure where a thin tube, called a catheter, is guided through a blood vessel to the heart to diagnose or treat heart conditions, such as clogged arteries or an irregular heartbeat.

According to court documents seen by Daily Mail Australia, Magistrate James Viney said during Moh'd's bail hearing last week that the accused had access to 'vulnerable patients as a consequence of the high trust model under which he is employed'.

'The accused has shown he targets vulnerable persons in an isolated location in obvious attempts to conceal his offences.

'He is in a position of trust,' Mr Viney said, adding that Moh'd allegedly took advantage of said trust.

Mr Viney said the case against Moh'd is 'strong' with credible witnesses.

One of the alleged victims 'provided an account on several occasions to several different sources where the account of events have not wavered', the court heard.

Ali Khamis Moh'd has twice been arrested in the past month and has been charged with sexual intercourse without consent and two separate counts of sexual touching

Mr Viney also noted that Moh'd has no criminal history in Australia. Moh'd is unable to to work as a nurse until criminal proceedings conclude, or teach them.

Bail conditions state that Moh'd is banned from contacting the alleged victims and all employees from each hospital.

He had to surrender his passport and is also not allowed to leave NSW, or go within 1km of an international point of departure.

He is also required to report to Macquarie Fields Police Station three times per week.

Healthscope, the company which operated both hospitals where Moh'd worked, said in a statement that the incidents were investigated.

'The individual is no longer employed at Healthscope,' a spokesperson said.

The male nurse, who has worked at two hospitals in Sydney's west and north-west, was loaded into the back of a police van on Friday

Moh'd will face one charge of sexual intercourse without consent before Parramatta Local Court on May 19.

He will front Liverpool Local Court on April 22 for two counts of sexually touching another person (in circumstances of aggravation) and inciting another to sexually touch them (aggravated), and sexually touch another person without consent.

Police released video of the nurse being taken in custody for the second time in weeks on Friday morning.

That video shows the handcuffed accused being calmly escorted by two plain clothes officers from a modern suburban home into the back of a waiting police van parked on the kerb.

Moh'd declined to comment when approached by Daily Mail Australia on Monday.
NYC mayor Eric Adams was confronted by parents furious at his decision to extend a mask mandate for under-5s as he hit the town for a Broadway show.

Adams, who has quickly become known for rubbing shoulders with celebrities, was met with angry chants of 'Unmask our kids!' as he attended the Paradise Square Broadway Musical at Ethel Barrymore Theater Sunday night.

A handful of women held up signs as Adams entered the building wearing a gray KN95 mask. The latest twist in New York City's masking saga for under-5's began Friday, when Adams said he was delaying plans to lift the rule from April 4.

A state judge struck down the indefinite mask rule for under5-s the same day.

That lawmaker called it 'arbitrary, capricious, and unreasonable' and therefore 'void and unenforceable.'

But Adams successfully requested a stay to pursue an appeal just hours later.

He has angered parents with a whirl of social events, including a party with Cara Delevingne at the new One Vanderbilt skyscraper last week, as well as a trip to see Sarah Jessica Parker and her husband Matthew Broderick appear in Broadway play Plaza Suite.

Adams also attended the white tie Gridiron Dinner on Saturday in Washington D.C. with a long list of politicians and journalists.

Angry parents are pictured on Sunday evening confronting the mayor as he arrived for a Broadway show

Parents demanding that the mask mandate be lifted confronted Adams on Sunday

'Unmask our babies!' they yelled, as the 61-year-old entered the Barrymore Theater for a performance of Paradise Square.

Since the pandemic begun two years ago, nationwide 363 children aged four and under have died of COVID-19, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) notes.

Of the 979,158 to have died in the United States, over half - 503,404 - were aged 75 or older.

The vast majority of the rest - 434,457 people - were aged 45 to 74.

On Twitter, parents voiced their frustration at Adams's clinging to the mask mandates for the youngest - who are still not eligible for the COVID vaccine.

'RECALL Eric Adams @NYCMayor @NYCMayorsOffice. He is a fraud and a fake,' tweeted one, with a video of the mayor dancing alongside model Cara Delevingne at a promotional event for a Wells Fargo credit card on March 28.

'He lied to get elected and now he has attacked our children & CONDEMNED THEM TO SUFFOCATING MASKS WHILE HE FRICKING PARTIES MASKLESS all night long.

'Parents stand up for your children.'

Adams and new New York City Health Commissioner Ashwin Vasan (pictured) made the announcement that the masks would remain at a press briefing on Friday

Adams has continued to impose a face mask rule for NYC kids while enjoying a busy social life, including this March 29 party with supermodel Cara Delevingne

Adams walked the red carpet later the same evening to attend the opening night of Sarah Jessica Parker's new play Broadway Suite

COVID cases have ticked slightly upwards in NYC in recent weeks, but still fall far short of their festive Omicron peak

Children are NOT at serious risk from Covid, multiple studies show Multiple studies have shown young children are not at serious risk from Covid-19. Data from from American Academy of Pediatrics shows children accounted for about 19 percent of all COVID cases, but less than 0.26% of cases resulted in death. A study from October found that around half of pediatric Covid cases are asymptomatic, and that was before the more mild Omicron variant became dominant in the U.S. Hospitalizations of pediatric COVID patients are also rare. A study in February, found the Pfizer vaccine was only 12% effective at preventing Omicron in five- to 11- year-olds. The main argument in favor of vaccinating children is to prevent them from spreading the virus but researchers from University of Berlin found, on average, children release less Covid particles into the air. Experts believe people who release lower amounts of aerosol particles when speaking have smaller viral loads, which also means they do not spread the virus at the same level. Advertisement

Another added: 'You force masks on children. F*** you, you belong in prison.'

Campaigner Emma Woodhouse said: 'Toddlers in NYC will be forcibly masked in Monday, and the unmasked man on the left is responsible.'

New York Post columnist Karol Markowicz, meanwhile, tweeted: 'I can't believe I have to say this in April of 2022: unmask the toddlers, you lunatics.'

Adams said that he decided to reinstate masks for the youngsters amid concern about the latest variant, BA.2.

'We're recommending to wait a little bit longer before making masks optional for this age group,' said the city's health commissioner, Dr Ashwin Vasan.

'We're looking for the earliest opportunity to do this safely and we can assure you the day is coming for your children.'

New York City's 'alert level' is green, indicating a low risk.

COVID hospitalizations for children under 18 have remained steady 0.5 per 100,000.

Markowicz wrote: 'Meanwhile, the over-70 set is at 4.7 per 100,000, and they can traipse around the city maskless licking lampposts and snogging strangers.

'If it sounds like it doesn't make sense, that's because it doesn't and never has.'

Michael Chessa, attorney for the parents challenging Adams's mandate, was also angered.

He told The New York Post: 'These mandates are anti-science, anti-child, anti-parent and, according to last week's court decision, against the law.

'Each day that goes by where Mayor Adams keeps these mandates in place is a stain on his legacy.'

Children wearing face masks are seen leaving school, as the mask mandate remains
Poland has said it would be 'open' to having nuclear weapons stationed in the country and would also welcome a 50 percent increase in the number of U.S. troops stationed in Europe, the leader of the country's ruling party said on Sunday.

Warsaw is also calling for tougher action against Moscow over the conflict in Ukraine.

If Poland decides to take on the responsibility of hosting American nuclear warheads, it would be a significant escalation in the new Cold War with Russia.

Putin would likely see the move as a provocative one.

Poland's deputy prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski, pictured last month, has said he is 'open' to the idea of the U.S deploying tactical nuclear weapons in his country

Kaczynski called for Washington to send tens of thousands more American troops to Europe to send a message of strength to Moscow. Pictured, Army soldiers assigned to the 82nd Airborne carry military equipment as they take part in an exercise in Wola Korzeniecka, Poland, in March

Air-launched tactical nuclear bombs are kept by the US Air Force at two bases in Italy with one each in Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and Turkey. Pictured, Two F-15E Strike Eagles from the 336th Fighter Squadron at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina, perform an intercept of a B-52H Stratofortress in Poland

The invasion, which Russian President Vladimir Putin called a 'special military operation' to demilitarize its neighbor, has fueled security fears in states on NATO's eastern flank.

The alliance has responded by increasing its presence in the region, announcing four more multinational battle groups in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia last month.

'Poland would be pleased if the Americans increased their presence in Europe from the current 100,000 soldiers up to 150,000 in the future due to Russia's increasing aggressiveness,' Jaroslaw Kaczynski, 72, told German newspaper Welt am Sonntag.

'If the Americans asked us to store US nuclear weapons in Poland, we would be open to that. It would significantly increase deterrence towards Moscow.

U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin meets with Polish Defence Minister Mariusz Blaszczak, pictured in Warsaw

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has long called for a no-fly zone to be enforced in the skies above Ukraine but it is not something the U.S. believes is a realistic option

'Of these, 75,000 soldiers should be stationed on the eastern flank; ie, on the border with Russia; 50,000 soldiers in the Baltic states and Poland,' he said in the interview, which was also published on the website of Poland's ruling party Law and Justice (PiS).

'That would send a clear signal to Moscow: the Nato leadership is now also present in the east,' he said.

'With or without nukes, Poland is wanting to see a large'a large operational Nato command in Poland', Kaczynski said,

Kaczynski also said that while Poland would not object having nuclear weapons in the country it is not something currently being considered.

There were roughly 80,000 U.S. troops in Europe before Russian troops moved into Ukraine.

Kaczynski also called out Germany and France for what he claimed was a 'strong bias in Moscow's favor'.

'I am very dissatisfied with the behavior of the German government. Poland is not pleased with Germany's role in Europe. Germany could supply more weapons. And Germany could speak out in favor of an oil embargo in the EU. Over the years the German government did not want to see what Russia was doing under the leadership of Putin and we see the result today.'

Germany is very much dependent on Russia for its oil supply from which it inputs a third.

Warsaw is calling for tougher action against Moscow over the conflict in Ukraine. Above, smoke rises from a fuel storage tank on fire after a missile attack in Odessa

Burnt cars are seen in the parking lot of the Retroville trade center in Kyiv, Ukraine. After more than five weeks of war, Russia appears to have abandoned its goal of encircling the Ukrainian capital. However, Ukraine expects a renewed fight in the east and south

The invasion of Ukraine, which Russian President Vladimir Putin called a 'special military operation' to demilitarize its neighbor, has fueled security fears in states on NATO's eastern flank

'We cannot continue permanently to support a great power like Russia by paying it billions,' Kaczynski said. 'This is inadmissible from a political and moral point of view. This has to come to an end, and Germany should finally take a clear stance on this.'

Four other countries in Europe already have American nuclear weapons on their soil.

Air-launched tactical nuclear bombs are kept by the US Air Force at two bases in Italy with one each in Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and Turkey.

Greece hosted US nuclear weapons until 2001 while the UK has hosted nuclear-capable aircraft in the country since 1949 although U.S. nuclear weapons were withdrawn in 2006.

The bombs are kept in vaults, under guard and are able to be deployed by the national air force. Britain and France also have their own nuclear weapons.

Seven other European nations, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Greece, Hungary, Norway, Poland and Romania are part of the Support of Nuclear Operations With Conventional Air Tactics (SNOWCAT) group and able to provide air support.
Barnaby Joyce has had text messages he sent about Scott Morrison being a 'hypocrite and a liar' thrown in his face during a heated TV stoush.

The Deputy Prime Minister on Monday faced off with Sunrise's Natalie Barr over claims Mr Morrison made comments a decade-and-a-half ago urging Liberal pre-selectors not to vote for the 'Lebanese guy because his family background will put off voters'.

Mr Morrison has emphatically denied the allegations - made in two signed statutory declarations.

Mr Joyce said the timing of the claims, just before a federal election, showed they were part of a political 'hit job'.

But Barr pointed out leaked texts sent earlier this year showed Mr Joyce has disparaged the PM as 'hypocrite and a liar' who 'earnestly rearranges the truth to be a lie'.

Mr Joyce today defended his comments, saying his texts were meant to be private.

'What people say publicly and what people say in messages that should be kept private,' Mr Joyce said.

The messages in question were sent by a third party to former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins after the PM claimed he did not know about the rape allegations in Parliament House.

Mr Joyce said in the messages: 'Tell BH (Brittany Higgins, that Morrison) is a hypocrite and a liar from my observations and that is over a long time.

'I have never trusted him and I dislike how he earnestly rearranges the truth to a lie.'

Mr Joyce (right) has rallied around Prime Minister, Scott Morrison amid racism allegations ahead of the federal election. However, Ms Barr was quick to point out that Mr Joyce had called the PM a 'hypocrite and a liar'

Ms Barr went on to ask the Deputy Prime Minister what he thought of the accusations of racism against the PM.

'If you're going to call someone a racist and they're not you're actually using racism as your weapon, ' Mr Joyce said.

'If this is the honest view, then they could have litigated this years ago, but it wasnt. Its come out now because theyre orchestrating a political hit.'

Mr Joyce has been at pains to insist he backs Mr Morrison in the wake of his text messages leaking earlier this year.

He said that comments against the Prime Minister are detracting from real political debate.
A man and woman have been arrested on the NSW border over the fatal stabbing of a 58-year-old man in northwest Victoria.

Victorian detectives arrested a West Albury man, 41, and woman, 36, on Monday morning, aided by NSW Police.

Both will be interviewed by homicide detectives.

The arrests follow the death of a man, who was found with critical injuries on a property in Wattle Street (pictured) in Manangatang on March 30

The arrests follow the death of a man, who was found with critical injuries in Manangatang near Swan Hill on March 30.

Emergency services were called in response to reports of a stabbing at a property on Wattle Street.

Paramedics tried to save the man but he died at the scene.
Torrential rain, storms, devastating floods and warnings of a cyclone could throw school holiday plans into chaos as wild weather lashes Australia's east coast.

Queensland's Scenic Rim is the latest region on alert as floods inundate the state's south-east and northern NSW.

Two major highways in the Darling Downs have been cut by floodwaters with major warnings for the Condamine and Balonne Rivers, forcing residents in low-lying areas around Warwick to evacuate.

There are also fears of a possible cyclone could form in the Coral Sea off the Sunshine State, 16 years after one of the state's most powerful storms in almost a century caused $1.5 billion damage bill.

More rain will lash Australia's east coast in the coming day (pictured, recent wet weather in Brisbane)

Kim Edwards (pictured) was stranded at Condamine in Queensland's Western Downs. She has since made it home in Roma by backtracking several hundred kilometres

Brisbane Weather chief David Taylor said the cyclone warning brought a threat of more wild weather as the Easter school holidays began.

'There will be one, possibly two systems that will develop into a cyclone, it just boils down to timing,' he told the Courier Mail.

The Bureau of Meteorology said the likelihood of a tropical cyclone hitting Australia in the coming days was low and would be closer to Fijian waters.

'There are currently no tropical lows in the region and no tropical cyclone impacts are expected for the Queensland coast in the next week,' the bureau stated on its website.

A developing tropical low north-west of Vanuatu was forecast to move south-west on Monday before slowing down and turning south on Tuesday.

'There is a slight chance it moves further west inside the region for a period on Tuesday or Wednesday as a tropical cyclone before before moving south-east away from the Australian region,' the weather bureau added.

'By the weekend the system will pass to the north of Norfolk Island causing an increase to the east south-easterlies.

'A weak low may form in the Solomon Sea and move south during the week well away from the coast. At this stage is not expected to develop into a tropical cyclone.'

Much of Australia's east coast will be lashed by more wild weather on Tuesday. Areas in purple and dark blue will worst hit

Many roads in the Western Downs town of Condamine (pictured) are underwater due to torrential rain

The category five Cyclone Larry in late March 2006 was one of Queensland's most powerful cyclones in almost a century.

The cyclone made hundreds of people homeless and knocked out power to thousands of homes, resulting in a $1.5 billion damage bill.

Larry was at the time the costliest tropical cyclone to ever hit Australia before it was surpassed by Cyclone Yasi five years later with a damage bill of $3.5 billion.

Yasi remains Australia's most costliest cyclone, even after Cyclone Debbie in 2017.

Major floods are expected in the Upper Condamine River at Warwick, 130km southwest of Brisbane on Monday night.

A severe thunderstorm warning remains in place in Queensland's south-east inland regions, including the Darling Downs and Granite Belt.

Damaging winds gusts, large hail, and heavy rainfall may cause flash flooding, the bureau warned.

The town of Boonah 100km inland from the Gold Coast is expected to be inundated with major flooding after 60-95 mm of rain was recorded in the upper Teviot Brook and Logan River catchments within 24 hours.

'River level rises are likely further downstream along the Logan River but are not expected to reach minor flood levels at forecast locations at this stage,' the weather bureau said.

'Possible showers with thunderstorm activity are forecast for the remainder of Monday, which may cause further river and creek level rises.'

Queenslanders have been warned of the chance of a possible later this week. Pictured are emergency crews inspecting the widespread damage of Cyclone Larry near Innisfail in 2006

Wild surf lashed the NSW coastline over the weekend, resulting in six-metre waves in Sydney while a 'mini tsunami' hit the Central Coast.

Queensland and NSW aren't the only states being pummelled by wild weather.

Heavy rains and gale-force winds cut off power to towns across eastern Victoria and closed a major highway with flooding.

The State Emergency Service said it received 62 calls for help, fewer than expected, in East Gippsland in the past 24 hours.

Numerous homes in the region are without power, with Mallacoota, Cann River and Marlo the worst affected.

Teams, in including helicopters, were unable to get into the region overnight due to heavy rain and road closures.

Ausnet won't know the extent of damage or expected time frames to return power until crews access affected areas soon after lunch on Monday.

Residents in low-lying areas have been forced to evacuate after the flooded Condamine River turned parks into rivers

Elsewhere across Australia, Sydneysiders make the most of the mid-autumn sunshine as temperatures hit 27C on Monday.

Rain is forecast every day from Wednesday until early next week.

While most of Tuesday is expected to remain sunny, clouds will appear in the afternoon with predictions of a late shower.

Up to 25mm is expected to drench the Harbour City on Wednesday, following another soaking of up to 100mm on Thursday.

Melbourne is in for a cloudy week with possible showers and temperatures in the low 20s.

Brisbane will be warmer with the mercury reaching the high 20s but could also see scattered showers.

Adelaide will see similar temperatures and be mostly sunny, while Perth will also be sunny and hot with the temperature hovering around the 30C mark for the week.

Playgrounds in flooded south-east Queensland regions have transformed into rivers, including this one in Warwick
In this image from video provided by the Ukrainian presidential press office, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaks from Kyiv, April 2. AP-Yonhap



Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Sunday said Russia's leadership was responsible for civilian killings in Bucha, outside Kyiv, where bodies were found lying in the street after the town was retaken by Ukrainian forces.



He also vowed to investigate and prosecute all Russian "crimes" in Ukraine, saying he had created a "special mechanism" to do so.



He spoke as global outrage mounted after the discovery of civilians killings in Bucha, outside Kyiv.



"I want all the leaders of the Russian Federation to see how their orders are being fulfilled. These kinds of orders. This kind of fulfilment. And there is a common responsibility. For these killings, for this torture, for arms blown off by blasts.... For the shots in the back of the head," Zelenskyy said, switching from Ukrainian to Russian, in a video address.



"This is how the Russian state will be seen now."



Russia has denied killing civilians in Bucha, which it controlled since the first days of its invasion launched on February 24.






A contested report that Scott Morrison wanted to exploit anti-Muslim sentiment to win votes has been dredged up again, eleven years after it was first published.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported allegations from unnamed MPs that during a December 2010 cabinet meeting Mr Morrison said he wanted to 'capitalise' on concerns about 'Muslim immigration'.

The Prime Minister refuted the claims during a TV interview with Waleed Aly in 2019, saying his words had been twisted into a lie.

'I was acknowledging there were fears, and we had to address them. Not exploit them,' he told The Project.

A contested report that Scott Morrison (pictured on Monday) wanted to exploit anti-Muslim sentiment to win votes has been dredged up again, eleven years after it was first published

Now the claims have resurfaced, with two anonymous ministers at the meeting telling news.com.au they did not believe Mr Morrison raised the matter just to address voter fears.

One claimed then-PM Malcolm Turnbull 'genuinely ripped into him' when he brought up the issue.

A spokesman for the Prime Minister did not comment, saying he has already denied the claims.

It comes as Mr Morrison also denies claims he told party members they shouldn't have a Lebanese person as a candidate for his NSW seat of Cook following the 2005 Cronulla riots.

Outgoing Liberal senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells aired the allegations in a furious speech last week in which she called him 'unfit' to be Prime Minister.

'I been very clear, I absolutely reject that as malicious slurs. It is outrageous. I have dealt with it, time and again,' Mr Morrison said on Monday.

Daniel Abdallah and wife Leila

The Prime Minister said he was supported by the Lebanese community.

Prominent Western Sydney doctor Jamal Rifi told the Daily Telegraph the claims 'defy everything I have known of the man'.

In an online video, Danny Abdallah, the father of three children killed by a drug driver in 2020, said Mr Morrison should be 'judged on his actions, not the accusations of others'.

He has appeared publicly with Mr Morrison several times since the tragedy.

Two Liberals involved in the 2007 Cook preselection process - including Lebanese Catholic challenger Michael Towke - have signed statutory declarations saying Mr Morrison racially vilified his opponent.

But Mr Morrison's direct predecessor Bruce Baird has rejected allegations.

Mr Baird, the former member for Mr Morrison's seat of Cook, says he never heard any racist comments, or allegations of bullying or dirty tricks.

'I'm not aware of any and I was as close as anybody to it,' Mr Baird told the ABC.

Mr Baird says that while he is a friend of Mr Morrison, he is trying to be objective and honest.

'I don't agree with all that has happened in terms of the government,' he said.

'But yes, I am a friend, and I'm doing it because this is the truth. I am not about spin, I'm just stating it like it is, and to claim as others have that Scott is racist and a bully I think is wrong.'

Mr Towke initially won the 2007 preselection battle with more than 80 votes to Mr Morrison's eight - although Mr Morrison was then selected after a second ballot.

Outgoing Liberal senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (pictured) aired the allegations in a furious speech last week in which she called him 'unfit' to be Prime Minister

Mr Towke successfully sued a media outlet for defamation and was cleared of any wrongdoing by the NSW Liberals.

Mr Baird said the allegations made by Mr Towke came after he was 'ceremoniously dumped as the candidate'.

'He dumped some 450 members into one branch not that long before the preselection and that's called outright stacking, whether it's Labor or Liberal,' he said, referring to usual branch sizes of 30 to 40 members.

'There was an investigation of some of those who were put in and I won't go into the details, but it decided to that he should be just disendorsed, so obviously he has a few bones (to pick) in terms of the preselection.'

Senior Labor MP Michelle Rowland says it's important to note that the attacks on the prime minister's character were coming from his own side.

'It seems to be a pattern of behaviour that the people who seem to know Scott Morrison the best like him the least,' she told Sky News.

'I have no special insights into the internal factional wars going on within the Liberal Party, where they are completely focused on themselves rather than Australians, but let's be very clear - there is a clear pattern of Scott Morrison not being trustworthy.'

The federal Liberal body has overridden the state division to install a number of candidates for NSW seats ahead of the federal election, which is expected to be called this week.

A court challenge has been launched over the intervention, with a decision expected as early as Monday.

Senior government minister and the Nationals deputy leader David Littleproud says while the NSW Liberal division needed to address its problems, voters were more focused on what policy both sides were putting forward.

'As a Queenslander, we don't we don't take kindly to other states telling us what to do so I'll let the NSW Liberal Party sort their own stuff out for themselves,' he said.

'But even though it's messy, I don't think people are looking at that. They're actually looking at the policy and they're running the ruler over both in who's best to protect their job and who's best to keep them safe.'
An elderly woman had her purse violently stolen from her Saturday after a gang of three New York City muggers followed her into her apartment building and hurled her to the ground.

The disturbing incident - caught on surveillance video from the building's lobby - is just the latest shocking robbery amid skyrocketing crime in the five boroughs.

The incident, which happened near Roberts and Hobart Avenues in the Bronx around 12:30 a.m., left the 76-year-old victim with minor injuries, according to authorities.

Video of the violent mugging was posted by the NYPD on Twitter Sunday, showing the three suspects run up behind the woman as she enters her building.

She attempts to force the door closed with her hands but the three quickly overpower her and make their way into the building.

One of the suspects, who appears to be a young female, then grabs the woman's purse before swinging her to the ground and running off.

No arrests have been made as of Monday, and the NYPD is offering a reward of up to $3,500 for any information that leads to an arrest.

Scroll down for video

The victim 76, attempts to force the door closed with her hands but the three quickly overpower her and are seen as they make their way into the building

Video of the violent mugging was posted by the NYPD on Sunday showing as the three suspects run up behind the woman as she enters her building

One of the suspects, who appears to be a young female, then grabs the woman's purses before swinging her to the ground as she makes off with it

The incident, which happened by Roberts & Hobart Avenue in the Bronx around 12:30 am, left the 76-year-old victim with minor injuries, according to authorities

Pictured: several of the suspects wanted for mugging a 76year-old woman in the Bronx on Sunday

Those with any information are being asked to call 800-577-TIPS or anonymously post a tip on the NYPD's website as police look to identify the three suspects involved in Sunday morning's strong arm robbery.

Another elderly woman was left with bruises, a black eye and a chipped tooth after a separate incident over the weekend when a criminal intentionally tripped her after arriving at Penn Station for a theater trip - a Christmas gift from the woman's daughters.

New York City tourist Cyndi Gradwell, 72, of Ocean City, Maryland, saw her dream trip to the city quickly turn into a nightmare Friday.

As the trio was walking down Ninth Avenue between 35th and 36th streets in Hell's Kitchen, a career criminal named Kelvin Winfield started yelling at Gradwell's daughters.

He said: 'Where are you going? Where are you going?' as he walked closely behind the two women, according to ABC 7.

One of the suspects wanted for Sunday's violent mugging of an elderly woman. The suspect pictured was responsible for hurling the victim to the ground before making off with her purse

All areas of violent crime, except murder, are up with shooting victims, rape and robbery up 16.9, 23.7 and 46.1 percent, respectively

He then stuck out his leg to trip Gradwell, causing a number of injuries.

'My mouth hurts a little bit, because a couple of my teeth were knocked [loose]. I need to go to a dental surgeon, so I can't eat,' she told ABC 7.

Police have reportedly arrested Winfield, who has six prior arrests, including a 2019 assault at Penn Station, according to the New York Post.

Gradwell, who has been in the city many times and enjoys the theater district, said she won't be returning to New York after the assault. It was unclear if she was in town to watch a specific play or musical.

Gradwell isn't the only one hesitant to return to the Big Apple due to crime, which is up almost 45 percent with felony assaults up 19 percent compared to the same time last year.

All areas of violent crime, except murder, are up with shooting victims, rape and robbery up 16.9, 23.7 and 46.1 percent, respectively.

Cyndi Gradwell, 72, of Ocean City, Maryland, was left with a black eye, a chipped tooth, and bruises after criminal Kelvin Winfield intentionally tripped her as she and her daughters walked down Ninth Avenue in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen district

Winfield, who has six prior arrests, reportedly shouted: 'Where are you going' to her daughters as she tried to veer around him

He intentionally moved toward her (pictured) before sticking his foot out to trip her

Winfield (pictured in a white and black coat) tripped Gradwell (pictured on the ground) as she walked down the street

Meanwhile, a 12-year-old died in Brooklyn earlier this week as he and his 20-year-old cousin Jenna Ellis and another female relative, 8, were sitting in a car eating Boston Market when a shooter shot several bullets into their car.

Kade Lewin was shot in the head and chest with multiple bullets after he and two relatives pulled over to eat their Boston Market food on East 56th Street and Linden Boulevard in East Flatbush at around 7:45 p.m. on Thursday. He was pronounced dead at the scene after the shooter fired 11 bullets into the Toyota Corolla.

His cousin Jenna Ellis, 20, who was sitting in the driver's seat, was hit in the upper leg and right cheek. She was rushed to Kings County Hospital where she is expected to survive, but remains in critical condition. She had recently gotten her license and was driving Lewin's mother's car. Lewin and Ellis were reportedly very close and saw each other frequently.

The eight-year-old relative was left uninjured.

Investigators believe the family was not targeted. A source told the New York Daily News that the gunman was targeting someone who drives a similar make and model car.

Immediately after the shooting, two black sedans were reported to have fled the scene at high speeds.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg says he is the victim of 'obscene' vandalism after one of his election corflutes was graffitied with a swastika.

The Jewish MP for Kooyong shared a picture of a vandalised election poster on Monday.

'It doesn't matter which political group is on the receiving end, it's just not on. Our community deserves better,' he said.

'Swastikas are a reminder of a dark past and it's our collective duty to say 'never again'.'

Josh Frydenberg shared a picture of one of his corflutes where a swastika was graffitied on top of his corflute

Late last year, Prime Minister Scott Morrison told Parliament Mr Frydenberg still requires 24/7 protection because of anti-semitic threats against him.

Mr Frydenberg was bombarded with a series of racist threats during the first round of Covid lockdowns.

Frydenberg's mother was a Jewish Hungarian who survived the Holocaust and emigrated to Australia in 1950. His father was also Jewish, arriving Down Under from Poland.

Mr Frydenberg, who was born in Melbourne, has previously warned 'antisemitism is on the rise, not just here but around the world.'

Frydenberg is currently under 24/7 security protection because of threats against him due to his Jewish faith, the prime minister said last year

Dr Dvir Abramovich, Chairman of the Anti-Defamation Commission, said: 'This is not Nazi Germany, and this escalating virus of antisemitism and bigotry has to stop.

'Another day, another sickening and abhorrent outburst of neo-Nazi vandalism, and if this hate spree continues, Melbourne will soon be known as the swastika capital of Australia.'

Dr Abramovich said the intention of those who carried out the attack was to intimidate and frighten, and called on people from all walks of religion and politics to condemn the vandalism.
Hong Kong's leader Carrie Lam announced Monday that she will step down in June, ending a divisive term that saw democracy protests squashed and strict pandemic curbs plunge the business hub into international isolation.

Ending months of speculation, Lam confirmed she would not seek a second term when a committee made up of the city's political elite chooses a new leader next month.

'I will complete my five-year term as chief executive on June 30, and officially conclude my 42-year career in government,' Lam told reporters.

Ending months of speculation, Carrie Lam (pictured) confirmed she would not seek a second term

Lam said China's leaders 'understood and respected' her choice not to seek another term and that she wanted to spend more time with her family.

A career bureaucrat, Lam became Hong Kong's first woman leader in 2017.

The 64-year-old had dodged questions for months over whether she would run again and during Monday's announcement she revealed that had informed Beijing of her plans to quit more than a year ago.

Hong Kongers and businesses based in the finance hub currently have little clarity on who will be the next leader.

The chief executive position is not popularly elected, one of the core demands of years of democracy protests which have since been crushed.

Instead, the position is selected by a 1,500-strong pro-Beijing committee, the equivalent of 0.02 percent of the city's 7.4 million population.

The city's next chief executive will be chosen on May 8 but so far no one with a realistic prospect has publicly thrown their hat into the ring.

Politics and pandemic

Hong Kong's number two official, John Lee, who has a background in the security services, has been tipped by local press as the most likely contender.

Another potential front runner is finance chief Paul Chan.

Lam said on Monday morning that she has not yet received any resignations from her ministers, a step that Lee and Chan would need to make before running.

Lam's successor will take office on July 1, the 25th anniversary of Hong Kong's handover by Britain to China.

Supporters see Lam as a staunch Beijing loyalist who steered the city through huge democracy protests and a debilitating pandemic

She leaves office a controversial figure.

Supporters see her as a staunch Beijing loyalist who steered the city through huge democracy protests and a debilitating pandemic.

Critics, including many western powers, view her as someone who oversaw the collapse of Hong Kong's political freedoms and its reputation as a stable regional business hub.

After huge and sometimes violent protests swept Hong Kong in 2019 Beijing responded with a crackdown that has remoulded the once outspoken city into a mirror of the authoritarian mainland.

Lam became the first Hong Kong leader to be sanctioned by the United States because of her support for the crackdown which has seen most of the city's prominent democracy supporters arrested, jailed or flee overseas.

Her administration also hewed to China's zero-Covid model, implementing some of the world's toughest anti-coronavirus measures and exasperating international businesses.

The largely closed borders and strict quarantine rules kept infections at bay for some 18 months at the expense of Hong Kong being cut off internationally.

But the zero-Covid strategy collapsed when the highly transmissible Omicron variant broke through earlier this year leaving Hong Kong with one of the developed world's highest fatality rates.

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam announced that she will not seek another term

Hong Kongers have been leaving the city over the last two years at a rate not seen since the period before the handover.

Thousands of foreign residents have also departed, especially in the first quarter of this year when the Omicron outbreak raged and it became clear the city would remain cut-off.

Lam is currently on track to leave office as the least popular leader in Hong Kong's post-handover period, according to regular polling by the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute.

The Hong Kong stock exchange was trading up 1.4 percent after her announcement.

But Lam predicted her successor would have an easier ride.

'Compared to this term of government, the next government will be seeing a more stable political environment,' she told reporters.
Unlucky-in-love actress Jodi Gordon will find herself before the courts after police took out an interim apprehended domestic violence order against her.

The 37-year-old Home and Away and Neighbours alumni has been in a 'tumultuous on-off relationship' with 31-year-old banker Sebastian Blackler since November 2020.

On Sunday, the pair were both hit with AVOs on one another's behalf and warned they must not stalk, harass or intimidate each other.

Friends have tried to save both Blackler and Gordon from the heartache of the 'toxic' relationship but now fear they'll have to let it 'run its course naturally'.

Gordon has had a string of high profile relationships over the years, most recently her turbulent love affair with Blackler.

She first felt heartbreak at just 21, when her boyfriend at the time Christopher Burkhardt died of leukemia aged 23. They were high school sweethearts.

The 37-year-old Home and Away and Neighbours alumni has been in a 'tumultuous on-off relationship' with 31-year-old banker Sebastian Blackler since November 2020

Gordon began dating Christopher Burkhardt in 2005, whom she described as her 'beloved soulmate'. Jodi was by his side in 2007 when he died from acute myeloid leukemia aged 23

Ryan Stokes

Gordon found love with Channel Seven heir Ryan Stokes in 2007 - the son of billionaire businessman Kerry Stokes.

At the time, Gordon's star was rising thanks to her blossoming career on Home and Away, where she was crowned Most Popular New Female Talent at the 2006 Logie Awards.

The pair dated for about two years, and appeared to be the picture of happiness on red carpets. They were engaged in 2009.

The relationship fell apart shortly after, when Gordon was embroiled in a bizarre drug scandal with bikie associate and Kings Cross identity Mark Judge.

Gordon called police from Judge's Bellevue Hill home, convinced armed intruders had entered the home and were threatening her life.

Following Christopher's death, Jodi found love in 2007 with Channel Seven heir Ryan Stokes (right), who is the son of billionaire businessman Kerry Stokes

An emergency operation ensued, and police found both Gordon and Judge huddled together in the corner of a bedroom in the property.

Police reviewed CCTV footage and found no sign of any intruders. It's alleged Gordon later told police cocaine had been consumed earlier in the night.

It later emerged that Gordon's new fiance had called Kings Cross police to report her missing after a night out.

They quietly separated within weeks of the incident.

Unlucky-in-love actress Jodi Gordon will find herself before the courts after police took out an interim apprehended domestic violence order against her

Braith Anasta

Following her split from Stokes, Gordon went on to date rugby league player Braith Anasta.

By July 2011, the pair were engaged. They married in Bali in October of the next year.

Just 10 months after the ceremony, Gordon and Anasta announced they were expecting their first child together.

The couple separated in 2015 but still co-parent their daughter, Aleeia, who is now eight years old.

A year after their split, Gordon cited 'differing priorities' as the primary cause.

'There were many people who were surprised, but it wasn't for us or our immediate family,' she said.

Following her split from Ryan, Jodi went on to date the man who would become her husband: rugby league player Braith Anasta (left). They split in 2015 and now share custody of daughter, Aleeia

Sebastian Blackler

After a string of other short-lived romances, Jodi confirmed she was dating British banker Sebastian Blackler.

Within days of publicly confirming their relationship, Gordon and Blackler made headlines for all the wrong reasons after police took out an apprehended violence order for the soap star's safety.

Police filed for the AVO after responding to reports of a disturbance between the pair at Gordon's Double Bay home in November 2020.

The AVO was put in place to prevent Blackler from assaulting, threatening, stalking, harassing or intimidating Gordon.

After a string of other short-lived romances, Jodi confirmed she was dating British banker Sebastian Blackler (left)

Blackler consented to a one-year order when he appeared in Sydney's Downing Centre Local Court on December 9 that year, without making any admissions of wrongdoing.

Even so, the pair appeared loved up when they left court that same day.

It's understood the pair separated in May 2021, but rekindled their relationship in February 2022.

On Sunday, police took matching AVOs out against both Blackler and Gordon to protect them from each other.

Gordon's order also bars her from being in Blackler's company for at least 12 hours after drinking alcohol or taking illicit drugs.

The duo will both face Windsor Local Court on April 21.

It's understood the pair separated in May 2021, but rekindled their relationship in February 2022

Aidan Walsh

Prior to reigniting her relationship with Blackler, Gordon briefly dated entrepreneur Aidan Walsh.

The Neighbours star was first seen packing on the PDA with Walsh back in June 2021 during a romantic holiday in the Hunter Valley.

A week later, the couple made their red carpet debut at a GQ event in Sydney.

The pair subsequently travelled to Western Australia for what appeared to be their second romantic jaunt in a matter of weeks.

But they quietly unfollowed one another on social media in December 2021 and removed all trace of each other online.

While neither has commented on the relationship, it's understood they are no longer in contact.

Prior to reigniting her relationship with Blackler, Gordon briefly dated entrepreneur Aidan Walsh

Warren Ginsberg

In 2016, Gordon struck up a brief relationship with eastern suburbs socialite and real estate agent, Warren Ginsberg.

The pair dated for just four months before calling it quits, amid reports 'there was too much friction' between them.

'The relationship is done,' a source told Woman's Day in April 2017.

'Warren has told friends that he and Jodi are no longer an item. They might have looked good on each other's arms but there was too much friction,' they added.

In August 2021, Ginsberg was caught up in a police crack down on drugs. He was charged with cocaine possession and appeared before a magistrate at Waverley Local Court.

He pleaded guilty to drug possession on September 14 and was fined $500.

This was the third time he had been charged with drug possession since 2007, however it was the first time he had been convicted of the offence.

It's understood Ginsberg was hoping to appeal the conviction.
The number of cops shot in the line of duty in America has risen by 43% in a year, from 58 struck by bullets in the first three months of 2021 to 101 shot during the same period of 2022.

The National Fraternal Order of Police claims that 101 officers have been wounded in the line of duty, with 17 killed through the beginning of April this year.

Those numbers are up 43 percent from the same time period in 2021 and up 63 percent from the same time in 2020.

'We are in the midst of a real crisis. The violence directed at law enforcement officers is unlike anything I've seen in my 36 years of law enforcement,' National FOP President Patrick Yoes said in a statement.

'Last year was one of the most dangerous years for law enforcement, with more officers shot in the line of duty since the National Fraternal Order of Police began recording this data,' he added.

The National Fraternal Order of Police claims that 101 officers have been wounded in the line of duty, with 17 killed through the beginning of April. Those numbers are up 43 percent from the same time period in 2021 and up 63 percent from the same time in 2020

Among this year's dead are NYPD cops Jason Rivera, left, and Wilbert Mora, right, who were both shot and killed by a suspect in January

Double cop killer Lashawn McNeill, 47, was shot by a third officer on the night of the two fatal shootings, and died three days later

Yoes said that at this rate, they are also outpacing the number of officers killed on the job versus last year.

'It is important to remember that when we look at these numbers, they represent people who are fathers, mothers, sons, and daughters,' he said. 'We must also be aware that the lethality of these attacks would be much greater but for dramatic improvements in medical trauma science and anti-ballistic technology.'

A total of 19 of the 101 officers shot happened in what the FOP calls 'ambush-style' attacks, a rise of 36 percent from 2021. Five officers died and 32 were wounded from those attacks.

Perhaps most infamously in January, two NYPD officers were killed in the line of duty, making national headlines and sending President Joe Biden to New York to discuss the killings with new Mayor Eric Adams, himself an ex-cop.

Mora is pictured being laid to rest at St Patrick's Cathedral in Manhattan on February 2

Officer Jason Rivera, 22, died the night of the shooting. His partner, Wilbert Mora, 27, was removed from life support four days later.

The officers were fatally wounded after they were called to a Harlem apartment by a woman who said she needed help with her adult son.

Authorities said the man, Lashawn J. McNeil, 47, opened a bedroom door and shot the officers as they walked down a narrow hall.

A third officer shot McNeil as he tried to flee. He died three days later.

New York is among the five states with the highest number of officers killed in 2022, alongside Arizona, Texas, Georgia and Washington.

'This violence is completely unacceptable,' Yoes said. 'It's a stain on our society, and it must end. It is incumbent upon our elected officials and community leaders to stand up and speak out against the violence against law enforcement officers.'

In total, 346 officers were shot in the line of duty and 63 killed, up from 312 and 47 in 2020. In 2019, 293 officers were shot and 50 were killed, according to the FOP.

Last year, the five states with the highest numbers of officers shot in the line of duty were Texas and Georgia, who are on this year's list, as well as Illinois, California and Florida.
A serving Metropolitan Police officer has been charged with sexually assaulting a colleague while on duty.

PC Joseph Demir, attached to the North West Basic Command Unit, was charged with sexual assault on March 9, the force said in a statement.

The incident is alleged to have occurred on March 10, 2020, when Mr Demir was a student officer at Hendon Training School. The offence was reported on July 1, 2020.

A serving Metropolitan Police (pictured: Library image of Scotland Yard) officer has been charged with sexually assaulting a colleague while on duty

Mr Demir, who has been placed on restricted duties, was charged following an investigation by the Mets Directorate of Professional Standards.

He is due to appear at Willesden Magistrates Court on Tuesday.
The Project host Jan Fran has unleashed an explosive attack on Prime Minister Scott Morrison and branded Australia as being 'full of racists'.

The TV presenter lashed out in the wake of the row about the PM allegedly using a political rival's Lebanese heritage as a weapon against him in a pre-selection battle.

When Mr Morrison was vying with Michael Towke in 2007 to to be the Liberal candidate in the south Sydney seat of Cook, he was accused of trying to smear Mr Towke by saying he was a Lebanese Muslim.

Now Ms Fran, 36, who is Australian-Lebanese, says the row shows 'racism is alive and well in politics'.

The Project host Jan Fran has unleashed an explosive attack on Prime Minister Scott Morrison and branded Australia as being 'full of racists'

The 15-year-old accusations were resurrected last week when dumped Liberal senator Connie Fierravanti-Wells unloaded on the PM in her farewell speech in parliament, reviving the row and calling Mr Morrison a 'bully and an autocrat'.

It was revealed at the weekend that Mr Towke made a legally-binding statutory declaration in 2016 accusing the PM of 'racial vilification' during the pre-selection battle.

Mr Morrison is alleged to have told locals in the constituency that no-one Lebanese would be able to hold the seat after the 2005 Cronulla race riots, and allegedly spread the rumour Mr Towke was Muslim. Mr Towke is a Maronite Catholic.

Mr Towke added at the weekend: 'I stand by the declarations I asserted in my statutory declaration.

'Among many unedifying tactics used to unseat me from my preselection victory for Morrison, racial vilification was front and centre and he was directly involved.'

Michael Towke made a legally-binding statutory declaration in 2016 accusing the PM of 'racial vilification' during the pre-selection battle

Mr Morrison has strenuously denied all the claims as categorically untrue and has said he would sign a statutory declaration saying just that.

On Sunday Ms Fran took to Instagram and Twitter to hit out in a full-frontal attack on the PM and Australians, in a post that began: 'Strap in, babes!'

She branded the row almost comical as Lebanese people can tell someone's religion and their village from their surname.

'But a lack of nuance is the least of our worries here,' she wrote, before treating the denied allegation against Mr Morrison as a fact.

The pregnant mum-to-be branded previous visits by PM Scott Morrison to Lebanese Catholic churches in Adelaide and Sydney's Punchbowl as insincere attempts to win votes

'Morrison seems to believe that being a Muslim is so terrible a thing he can use it to ruin someone's good standing. He can use it as a weapon. A smear!

'And worse than that  its effective. We all know what this says about our country and its leadership but Ill spell it out.

'Were full of racists and there are people ready to exploit that.'

The pregnant mum-to-be branded previous visits by the PM to Lebanese Catholic churches in Adelaide and Sydney's Punchbowl as insincere attempts to win votes.

'Lemme tell you what ethnic minorities have known since forever in this country.,' she wrote.

'Those in power (and it aint just Morrison) will use you when its politically expedient.

'The solidarity, appreciation, respect they show is always, ALWAYS conditional. They will turn on a dime.

She added: 'Theyll come to your church and wax lyrical about the deep appreciation they have for your heritage.

'And then theyll use that very heritage  the one they so deeply appreciate  to throw you under the bus the second they need to.'

'The next time politicians come to your church or mosque or community organisation with a camera (or not)...take it with the largest pinch of salt possible.'

The outburst was liked more than 4,000 times on Instagram with many replies agreeing with her.

'Instead of having representation from our ACTUAL community, he eliminates the competition that is in fact a Lebanese Maronite, then breaks bread with his people,' wrote one.

'And because we are looking for any kind of representation, any kind of sign of acceptance... we take it.

'You cannot be rumoured to be of a certain religion. What even is that??! The better guy didn't win because he was sabotaged, as with many of us who a rumoured to be Middle Easterners.

'Just look at my eyebrows honey the rumours are true. I am furious. Thanks for sharing Jan, means so much to give a hoot. A big Middle Eastern honking one!'
Advertisement

Environmental protesters from Extinction Rebellion and Just Stop Oil caused mayhem for the fourth day in a row this morning as a group of 30 blockaded an oil terminal in London with two bamboo structures.

The demonstrators gathered outside the Esso West London Oil Terminal near Heathrow Airport from the early hours of today as they continued to urge the Government to 'stop all new fossil fuel investments immediately'.

The activists, who first gathered at 4am, used two large banners which said 'Stop Fossil Fuels Now' and 'Join Us: London 9th April' - the latter referring to their planned protests starting at London's Hyde Park from this Saturday.

Activists have been blocking access to oil terminals over the last three days in the likes of London, Birmingham, Southampton, Grays in Essex and Tamworth in Staffordshire - with more than 200 people arrested so far.

It comes as UK motorists continue to suffer at the pumps with petrol prices hitting record levels in recent weeks after Brent crude oil hit a high of $128 last month - up from lows of $19 seen at the peak of the pandemic.

Also today, protesters from the Ocean Rebellion group gathered outside the International Maritime Organization offices in London to protest against its 'continued support of the oil industry, dirty shipping and plastics pollution'.

They released fake 'plastic' nurdle pellets in the doorway of the offices, before others arrived carrying ghost fishing nets and banners reading 'pellets of mass destruction', 'all plastic is poison' and 'stop shipping pollution'.

Extinction Rebellion activists protest outside the Esso West London Oil Terminal near Heathrow Airport today

A group of 30 environmental activists blockade the Esso West London Oil Terminal near Heathrow Airport this morning

The demonstrators gather outside the Esso West London Oil Terminal near Heathrow Airport from 4am this morning

A group of 30 blockade the Esso West London Oil Terminal with two bamboo structures during their latest protest today

The activists in London today continue to urge the Government to 'stop all new fossil fuel investments immediately'

The demonstrators put up signs outside the Esso West London Oil Terminal near Heathrow Airport this morning

Environmental protesters from Extinction Rebellion blockade the Esso West London Oil Terminal this morning

The activists in London this morning are telling the Government to 'stop all new fossil fuel investments immediately'

A group of 30 blockade the Esso West London Oil Terminal near Heathrow Airport this morning

Environmental protesters from Extinction Rebellion are taking part in the action at the Esso West London Oil Terminal today

As for the oil protests, Warwickshire Police said it has made 54 arrests for offences including criminal damage, obstructing the highway and public order in relation to a protest at Kingsbury Oil Terminal near Tamworth.

In Essex, officers arrested 155 people following protests in the Thurrock district around Grays and Purfleet. The force said 63 arrests were made on Friday, 57 on Saturday and a further 35 yesterday, for a variety of offences.

The Metropolitan Police have arrested 14 activists who broke into the Esso West London Oil Terminal and West Midlands Police arrested six people at the Esso Birmingham Fuel Terminal in the Tyburn area of the city.

Hampshire Police said a number of protests took place at Hythe Terminal and at BP in Hamble Lane and Copse Lane near Southampton, and officers made four arrests. Two people were arrested on suspicion of aggravated trespass while two others were held on suspicion of aggravated trespass and failing to comply with conditions.

Protesters have glued on to roads, suspended on bamboo tripods and locked onto oil drums and each other. The activists from Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion want to the Government to stop new oil and gas projects.

Elsewhere today, Ocean Rebellion activists stage a protest with items representing nurdles and plastic waste outside the International Maritime Organisation in London

Ocean Rebellion activists stage a protest outside the International Maritime Organisation in London this morning

Ocean Rebellion activist falls onto items representing plastic nurdles that are found polluting seas, in London today

Ocean Rebellion activists stage a protest outside the International Maritime Organisation in London this morning

Ocean Rebellion activists stage a protest outside the International Maritime Organisation in London this morning

Ocean Rebellion activists stage a protest outside the International Maritime Organisation in London this morning

As the activists carried out their protest at the Esso West London Oil Terminal today, XR spokesman Andrew Smith said in a statement: 'We're here to say that climate action cannot wait. Right now, governments are choosing to exploit the crisis in Ukraine to hand out oil licences and continue the fossil fuel economy that's destroying us.

'They are exploiting public fear and disorientation at a time of crisis when people's bills are going up to advance corporate-friendly policies incapable of attracting democratic support.

'The reality is, the UK public wants faster action on climate as the energy crisis hits. We know what is happening and what needs to be done  by acting in favour of corporate interest over the will of the people, the government is showing contempt for the people who elected them.

'How long ago did our Prime Minister say COP26 was our last chance to save humanity? And now they're sidelining climate policy once again. This is not living in reality.'
Sky News host Peta Credlin has slammed the 'quiet' passing of a law that will allow IVF babies to have a third 'parent'.

The chief of staff to Tony Abbott turned influential media commentator wrote in The Sunday Telegraph that the new law relating to the prevention of generational disease in IVF children was rushed through parliament without enough public debate.

She raised concern that the law could open the door for 'designer babies'.

Maeve's Law - named after six-year-old Maeve Hood - will now allow parents conceiving with IVF to use a donor's DNA to replace a baby's mitochondria so it does not inherit generational diseases from the parents.

Political commentator Peta Credlin said the newly passed Maeve's Law was passed without enough public debate

Maeve's Law - named after six-year-old Maeve Hood - will now allow parents conceiving with IVF to use a donor's DNA to replace a baby's mitochondria so it does not inherit generational diseases from the parents

Mitochondria diseases affect how a person's cells produce energy which often impacts growth and development, resulting in muscle weakness and chronic fatigue.

Under the new law the third party's DNA will not change the IVF baby's physical features - like hair or eye colour.

The law was passed 37 to 17 on a conscience vote in Senate on Wednesday night.

Maeve's Law will mean couples like Shelley Beverley (left) - who suffers from a mitochondria condition - and her husband (right), 42, will finally be able to have a healthy baby

Mrs Beverley (pictured with her husband) only discovered she had the condition in 2016 after her mother, 63, and brother, 34, died just 16 months apart due to implications of the disease

Mitochondria diseases affect how a person's cells produce energy which often impacts growth and development, resulting in muscle weakness and chronic fatigue

The passing meant a law prohibiting the use of more than two people's DNA in IVF had to be amended.

The practice has already been legalised in the UK.

Ms Credlin writes the law was done in a sneaky manner and without enough 'public debate'.

'The fact that it was buried in the House of Representatives and only debated in the dying days of this parliament in the Senate tells me everything,' she wrote.

'Advocates say this doesn't open the door to 'designer babies' but that's what is always said every time the law changes to permit things once unimaginable. Next, it will be same sex couples wanting to ensure that both partners' DNA are included in their IVF children.

Mrs Beverley said the passing of Maeve's Law was a win for all future parents suffering a mitochondria disease

What is IVF? 'IVF (In Vitro Fertilisation) is a procedure, used to overcome a range of fertility issues, by which an egg and sperm are joined together outside the body, in a specialised laboratory. 'The fertilised egg (embryo) is allowed to grow in a protected environment for some days before being transferred into the woman's uterus increasing the chance that a pregnancy will occur. 'In Vitro Fertilisation (IVF) can be used to overcome a range of fertility issues and for many couples, gives them the best chance of having a baby.' IVF Australia Advertisement

'They didn't want us to understand what was happening and what it really means beyond the issue of mitochondria disease.'

Maeve's Law will mean couples like Shelley Beverley, 37, and her husband, 42, will finally be able to have a healthy baby.

Mrs Beverley told The Daily Telegraph she and her husband had spent $70,000 on IVF treatments but were unable to conceive due to her hereditary mitochondria condition.

Mrs Beverley only discovered she had the condition in 2016 after her mother, 63, and brother, 34, died just 16 months apart due to implications of the disease.

Now Mrs Beverley herself suffers from a heart condition, muscle weakness and diabetes linked to the mitochondria disease.

The first five cycles of the couple's embryos were tested for the disease and all returned too high of a mutation load to proceed with the treatment.

Now Mrs Beverley is hopeful Maeve's Law will mean she can finally have the healthy baby her and her husband have dreamed of.

'It's a dream come true to see this technology become a reality for patients,' she said.

'To have your own child, healthy and free of illness is a basic human right.'

Mrs Beverley told Daily Mail Australia the passing of Maeve's Law was a win for all future parents suffering a mitochondria disease.

'It's a massive achievement for those with mitochondrial disease,' she said.

'This new law will finally provide families who carry this disease a choice to use this procedure to stop this from being passed on.'
Xi's remarks on boosting China-EU cooperation for world stability

Xinhua) 13:47, April 04, 2022

BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping met via video link with European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

Experts and scholars applauded Xi's remarks on China-European Union (EU) relations and the Ukraine crisis, saying that the meeting has provided strategic guidance for sustained and sound development of the China-EU relationship, while adding stability and positive energy to a turbulent world.

During the meeting, Xi stressed that China and the EU should act as two major forces upholding world peace, and offset uncertainties in the international landscape with the stability of China-EU relations.

The two sides need to take the lead in defending 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, and jointly reject the resurrection of rival-bloc mentality and oppose attempts at a new Cold War, with a view to maintaining world peace and stability, Xi said.

Leon Laulusa, executive vice president of the Paris-based ESCP Business School, said China and the EU are "two key players" on the international stage, and that their roles "are therefore essential to ensure world peace and security."

China and the EU have cooperated for many years, especially in the areas of peace, security, prosperity, sustainable development and people-to-people exchanges, said Laulusa.

Frederic Baldan, CEO of Belgian consulting company CEBiz, said Xi's proposal on the development of China-EU relations "meets the interests of the European people" and would benefit the world.

Xi also said that China and the EU should act as two big markets promoting shared development, and deepen economic globalization through open cooperation. China will stay committed to deepening reform and further opening up. China welcomes European business investment and expects the EU to provide a fair, transparent and nondiscriminatory environment for Chinese business investment and development in Europe.

He added that the two sides need to seek greater synergy between their development strategies and explore more complementarity between China's new development philosophy and paradigm and the EU's trade policy for open strategic autonomy.

Bernard Accoyer, former president of the French National Assembly, called himself "a defender of friendship" between the EU and China, noting that the "friendship is essential for progress in any field" regarding China-EU cooperation.

Horst Loechel, a professor at the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management, said the EU and China, being each other's important trading partners, should develop their trade ties further "in the benefit of the people and the companies."

"A closer relationship between the EU and China will maintain and perhaps even leverage the economic benefits for Europe and China as well ... it will make a significant contribution to global political and economic stability in difficult times," said Loechel.

During the meeting, the Chinese president underscored that China and the EU should act as two great civilizations promoting human progress, and meet global challenges through solidarity and collaboration.

The two sides need to follow true multilateralism, advocate a vision of global governance featuring the principle of extensive consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits, continue to spearhead international cooperation on climate change and biodiversity, and work together to defeat COVID-19, he said.

Timo Vuori, director of International Trade and Trade Policy, the Confederation of Finnish Industries, said the virtual meeting "is just one but important milestone in our dialogue which must continue in the future at all levels," adding that the two sides can overcome various challenges they face via "open dialogue and committed common action."

Uros Lipuscek, a Slovenian political scientist, said that "neither the EU nor China as two leading economic partners can progress without increased cooperation on all levels," adding that China and the EU "need a new pragmatic approach" to promote cooperation.

Xi also expounded China's position on the Ukraine issue during the meeting. He said China's position is consistent and clear-cut. China always stands on the side of peace and draws its conclusion independently based on the merits of each matter.

China calls for upholding international law and universally recognized norms governing international relations, acts in accordance with the purposes and principles of the UN Charter, and advocates the vision of common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security, Xi added.

Xulio Rios, director of the Observatory of Chinese Politics in Spain, said both Europe and China hope the Ukraine crisis can "cease as soon as possible," and they should work together with other members of the international community for a diplomatic solution to the crisis and lay the foundation for a European security architecture.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
Soldiers walk amid destroyed Russian tanks in Bucha, Ukraine, Sunday. AP-Yonhap



EU officials said Monday they were weighing new sanctions targeting Moscow in response to alleged atrocities against Ukrainian civilians by Russian forces that sparked a wave of international outrage.



Despite Russian denials of responsibility, condemnation was swift, with Western leaders, NATO and the UN all voicing horror at images of dead bodies in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, and elsewhere.



Local authorities said they had been forced to dig communal graves to bury the dead accumulating in the streets, including one in Bucha found with his hands bound behind his back.



Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky called Russian troops "murderers, torturers, rapists, looters" and warned in his nightly video message that "concentrated evil has come to our land."



EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the bloc was urgently discussing a new round of sanctions as it condemned "atrocities" reported in Ukrainian towns that have been occupied by troops sent in by Russian President Vladimir Putin five weeks ago.



The proposals, which French President Emmanuel Macron said could target Russia's oil and coal sectors, could be discussed by foreign ministers on the sidelines of a NATO meeting on Wednesday and Thursday, or at their regular meeting early next week, an EU official told AFP.



Borrell also offered EU assistance in documenting evidence of the alleged atrocities, and Zelensky said he had created a special body to investigate.



The scale of the killings is still being pieced together, but Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered so far.



And Bucha's mayor Anatoly Fedoruk told AFP that 280 bodies were placed in mass graves because it was impossible to bury them in cemeteries still within firing range of Russian forces.



Satellite imagery firm Maxar released pictures it said showed a mass grave located in the grounds of a church in the town.



Municipal worker Serhii Kaplychnyi told AFP that Russian troops initially refused to allow residents to bury the dead in Bucha.



"They said while it was cold to let them lie there."



Eventually, they were able to retrieve the bodies, he said. "We dug a mass grave with a tractor and buried everyone."



AFP reporters in the town saw at least 20 bodies, all in civilian clothing, strewn across a single street.



'Clear indications of war crimes'



Zelensky's spokesman, Sergiy Nikiforov, said the scene in Bucha "looks exactly like war crimes."



Moscow rejected the accusations and suggested the images of corpses were "fakes" while calling for a UN Security Council meeting on what its deputy ambassador to the body called a "heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha."



"We categorically reject all allegations," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists.



But Macron said he was in favour of fresh sanctions since "there are very clear indications of war crimes. It was the Russian army that was in Bucha," he told France Inter radio.



In Germany, Chancellor Olaf Scholz's defence minister raised the possibility of an end to gas imports.



"President Putin and his supporters will feel the consequences," Scholz said.



Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki of Poland, whose country has welcomed millions of Ukrainians fleeing the violence, called for an international investigation into what he termed a "genocide."



'Even worse things'



Zelensky warned that the worst could be yet to come as Moscow refocuses its attention on the south and east of the country, in a bid to create a land link between occupied Crimea and the Russian-backed separatist statelets of Donetsk and Lugansk.



"Russian troops still control the occupied areas of other regions, and after the expulsion of the occupiers, even worse things could be found there, even more deaths and tortures," he said.



Eight people were killed and 34 wounded in Russian attacks on two towns in southern Ukraine on Sunday, prosecutors in Kyiv said.



Europe's worst conflict in decades, sparked by Russia's invasion on February 24, has already killed 20,000 people, according to Ukrainian estimates.



Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainians have fled the country, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighboring countries in the last 24 hours alone, the UN refugee agency said.



In the eastern city of Kramatorsk, women, children and elderly people were boarding trains to flee the Donbas region.



"The rumor is that something terrible is coming," said Svetlana, a volunteer organizing the crowd on the station platform.



Russia has redoubled its efforts in Ukraine's south and east, including carrying out several strikes Sunday on the strategic Black Sea port of Odessa, which Moscow said targeted an oil refinery and fuel depots.



"We were woken up by the first explosion, then we saw a flash in the sky, then another, then another. I lost count," a 22-year-old resident, Mykola, told AFP.



Britain's defense ministry said recent Russian air activity had been focused on southeastern Ukraine, adding that heavy fighting was continuing in the devastated and besieged southern city of Mariupol.



"The city continues to be subject to intense, indiscriminate strikes," the ministry said in an update on Twitter.



The UN's top humanitarian envoy Martin Griffiths is expected in Kyiv soon after arriving in Moscow on Sunday in an attempt to halt the fighting.



And peace talks are scheduled to resume by video on Monday, though Russia's chief negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said it was too early for a top-level meeting between Zelensky and Putin.



He said Kyiv had become "more realistic" in its approach to issues related to the neutral and non-nuclear status of Ukraine, but a draft agreement for submission to a summit meeting was not ready. (AFP)


A drunken young woman who knocked a man unconscious during a confrontation in the street has been cleared of causing his death.

Kelsea O'Hara, then aged 19, attacked Andrew Turner, 58, after he refused to apologise for bumping into her friend on a night out in Bridlington, East Yorkshire.

Mr Turner fell to the ground, hit his head, and died six days later on September 3 last year, Hull Crown Court heard.

After his death, Humberside Police launched a murder investigation.

Despite Mr Turner passing away within a week of the attack, a pathologist and a neuropathologist confirmed that O'Hara was not responsible for his death.

Mr Turner's cause of death was not mentioned by the court.

Kelsea O'Hara, then aged 19, punched Andrew Turner, 58, in the face. He hit the floor and had a five to seven inch cut on the back of his head

Andrew Turner, 58, died six days after the attack in Bridlington last year

The court heard that O'Hara attacked Mr Turner after he didn't apologise for bumping into her friend on August 28 last year.

O'Hara, now 20, of Trinity Road, Bridlington, pleaded guilty to wounding. She was spared an immediate jail term for the attack and given a six-month curfew.

Andrew Espley, prosecuting, said that Mr Turner went out for drinks in Bridlington with a friend where O'Hara and four of her friends were also out drinking.

Mr Turner's friend knew one of O'Hara's friends and he apologised to her for an incident a couple of weeks earlier.

At around 1.30am, O'Hara confronted Mr Turner in Marlborough Terrace and asked him if he would apologise to one of her friends, whom he had accidentally walked into, but he refused.

Mr Espley said: 'O'Hara threw her purse onto the floor and launched herself at Mr Turner, punching him in the face once and causing him to lose consciousness when he fell to the floor, hitting his head in the process when he fell.'

Mr Turner, of Bridlington, suffered a cut of five to seven inches to the back of his head and was bleeding.

Mr Espley said: 'He tried to get up when he regained consciousness but could not do so.'

Police and paramedics arrived but Mr Turner refused to go to hospital, where his injuries were not initially believed to be life-threatening.

They next day, O'Hara was arrested. She made no comment during the police interview.

Mr Espley said: 'Mr Turner did not die until September 3 so she would not have been asked about causing his death.

Police and paramedics arrived after Mr Turner was knocked to the ground, but he refused to go to hospital

'The punch seems to have been impulsive and spontaneous and it was one punch.'

There was no evidence that the death of Mr Turner had 'anything to do with' O'Hara and this had been confirmed after investigations by a pathologist and a neuropathologist, the court heard.

Dale Brook, mitigating, said it was a single punch and O'Hara had originally been charged with causing grievous bodily harm with intent but she had denied this.

Mr Brook said: 'She has expressed heartfelt and genuine remorse for what she did that night and what happened to the victim.

'It has taken a substantial toll on her. She has understandably thought a great deal about whether she is the cause of what happened to the victim. This is a tragic case.'

He said O'Hara, who has no previous convictions, had suffered 'stress and trauma' but this was nothing in comparison to what happened to the victim.

She spent a night of 'young abandon' drinking too much, the court heard.

Judge Sophie McKone told O'Hara at Hull Crown Court (above) that she bears no responsibility for Mr Turner's death, following investigations by a pathologist and a neuropathologist

Mr Brook said: 'She behaved in an inexcusable way, which had serious consequences for everyone involved.

'It was out of character and it is likely that she has learned a very painful lesson as a result of what happened that night.'

Mr Brook said that his client had 'an awful start in life,' and her father and former boyfriend had both been jailed for serious offences.

Judge Sophie McKone told O'Hara: 'Mr Turner has since died but I make it absolutely clear that you bear no responsibility for that.

'There is evidence from two experts, a pathologist and a neuropathologist, who concluded that your actions did not contribute to his death.

'You were violent towards him. You had been drinking. You asked Mr Turner to apologise because you say that he had bumped into a friend of yours.

'It may be that he refused to apologise but that was no reason to resort to violence and punch somebody because you were not happy about that. It is absolutely no excuse whatsoever.'

O'Hara was given a six-month suspended prison sentence, a six-month 7pm to 6am curfew, and 20 days of rehabilitation.

Since his death, Mr Turner's family have raised more than 300 in his memory for Macmillan Cancer Support.

His niece thanked those that came to her uncle's 'send off' and described the occasion as lovely.

She said in a Facebook post: 'Cheers to you uncle Andy, you'll be sadly missed but never forgotten.'
The price of milk is to rise by 50 per cent and butter by 30 per cent amid a worsening cost of living crisis, it has been claimed.

Industry bosses fear that surging costs from feed, fertiliser and fuel will cause an increase in prices not seen in decades.

It comes as dairy farmers flew into Brussels last week for crisis talks over soaring costs and supply chain disruption.

The cost of four pints of milk will rise from around 1.15 to between 1.60 and 1.70, according to the UK's leading adviser to dairy farmers Kite Consulting.

Meanwhile a typical pack of butter could increase from 1.55 to more than 2. The war in Ukraine is also said to be impacting prices.

A dairy farmer takes fresh milk from a storage tank at a dairy farm in Devon on March 25

Experts from Kite also say that cheese could go up in price by about 20 per cent from around 8/kg to 10/kg because milk is such a big component of the manufacturing process.

There could also be an increase in the price of yoghurts, although this is harder to estimate because they have a much bigger range of cost in inputs such as raspberries and apricots which have also gone up in a value.

And while four pints of milk at Aldi is still at 1.15 - well below the average of 1.30 seen at most other supermarkets - experts say the supermarket is likely to be increasing the prices of other products to make up for the loss it is facing on milk.

Michael Oakes, the dairy board chair of the National Farmers' Union, told the Daily Telegraph: 'I was paying about 7,000 for an artic [articulated lorry] load of fertiliser, and this year it's 28,000.

'It would have been a little bit less before Ukraine happened, but it made another big jump because we'd already seen higher gas prices, which have implications for fertiliser costs.'

UK dairy bosses have raised concerns over their costs to the Government but the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) is said to be only in 'listening mode'.

A dairy farmer tends to his herd in Devon on March 25. Industry bosses fear that surging costs from feed, fertiliser and fuel will cause an increase in prices not seen in decades

Last week, the British Egg Industry Council (BEIC) said consumers could see egg shortages within 'a matter of weeks' unless retailers raise prices to cover rapidly increasing production costs.

The industry body warned that customers were likely to see shortages without urgent action.

It predicted 10 per cent to 15 per cent of farmers could leave the industry, with many on the brink of bankruptcy due to the unprecedented rises in the cost of production.

It said farmers were losing money on every egg they produced due to feed cost increases, exacerbated by the war in Ukraine, which had added 25p to 30p per dozen.

Last week, the British Egg Industry Council said consumers could see egg shortages within 'a matter of weeks' unless retailers raise prices to cover rapidly increasing production costs.

Yesterday, Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said Chancellor Rishi Sunak will always be looking at what else he can do to support people, amid criticism of the Government's handling of the cost-of-living crisis.

Mr Shapps insisted Mr Sunak has 'already provided billions and billions of pounds to try to relieve the pressure'.

But Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has lambasted the Government for what he claims are 'pathetic' attempts to ease the burden on people struggling with rising bills.

That sentiment was echoed by shadow business secretary Jonathan Reynolds, who said yesterday he is 'angry' at the scale of the crisis, arguing that ministers have not done enough to tackle the problem.
Finland may make the call on whether to join NATO in just weeks following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, with a decision possible 'during this spring'.

The country may join the transatlantic military alliance despite warnings of retaliation and 'military and political consequences' from the Kremlin.

Prime Minister Sanna Marin this weekend said: 'Both joining (NATO) and not joining are choices that have consequences.

'We need to assess both the short-term and long-term effects. At the same time, we must keep in mind our goal: ensuring the security of Finland and Finns in all situations.'

Marin added that Finland's relationship with neighboring Russia has changed irreversibly after the assault on Ukraine, and 'it takes a lot of time and work for confidence to be restored'.

Prime Minister Sanna Marin this weekend said: 'Both joining (NATO) and not joining are choices that have consequences'

Finland shares an 830-mile (1,340-kilometre) border with Russia, the longest by any European Union member.

It has remained militarily non-aligned, therefore not engaging in war or conflict, since the end of the Cold War for fear of provoking Moscow.

This weekend the country's foreign minister Pekka Haavisto said Russia's actions in Ukraine have 'totally changed the security landscape in Finland'.

He told Kyodo News that Finland must be prepared for 'more negative military scenarios'.

This comes despite hints of retaliation from Moscow should the country join NATO.

Last month a Russian politician warned of 'serious military and political consequences' if Finland and Sweden joined the alliance.

Russian Foreign Ministry Second European Department Director Sergei Belyayev told Interfax: 'It is obvious that Finland and Sweden's joining NATO, which is a military organization in the first place, would have serious military and political consequences requiring use to revise the entire range of relations with these countries and take retaliatory measures.'

Last month Finland also detected interference with passenger jets' GPS signals near Russia's Kaliningrad enclave and the country's eastern border with Moscow.

Finnish airline Finnair said its pilots had noticed the disturbances near Kaliningrad, which is sandwiched between NATO members Lithuania and Poland on the Baltic Sea's east coast.

Other aircraft reported unusual disturbances in GPS signals near Finland's eastern border with Russia, with planes unable to land at Savonlinna airport due to the interference.

The interference with planes' GPS signals began soon after Finland's President Sauli Niinisto met his US counterpart Joe Biden in Washington on March 4

In February Helsinki also received letters from Russia, demanding clarity on the Nordic nation's future regarding security.

Haavisto then told The Times the instance 'reminded (him) of the Cold War', when the country was used to 'this kind of Russian letter asking for 'consultations'.

Until now, nothing was able to persuade Finland or Sweden to join NATO, throughout the Cold War from 1947 to 1989, and in the decades since.

But in March it appeared that Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine increased public support in Finland for joining the NATO alliance to record levels, according to a poll.

A total of 62 percent of respondents in Finland had supported their government applying for NATO membership.

According to the survey which was commissioned by Finland's public broadcaster Yle, this is up from 53 percent in the same poll which had been released two weeks ago.

Later that month another poll from newspaper Helsingin Sanomat also suggested a majority of the nation is in favour of joining NATO, with 54 per cent responding they would back the decision.

This weekend the country's foreign minister Pekka Haavisto said Russia's actions in Ukraine have 'totally changed the security landscape in Finland'

In neighboring Sweden, a similar recent poll showed those in favor of NATO membership outnumber those against.

It comes as Finland's president Sauli Niinisto said he believes there is consistent 'popular support' for joining the alliance.

Speaking to Yle on Wednesday, he said: 'NATO needs to know that there is popular support. We already have that, in my view.'

However last month he warned that Finland could face 'disruptive' Russian behaviour including cyber hacks and potential border violations if it tries to join.

Niinisto said: 'We dont even know all the possibilities for hybrid influencing that someone may invent. The entire world of information technology is vulnerable', according to AP.

Vladimir Putin has used NATO's eastward expansion as one of several justifications for his brutal war, and has demanded Ukraine pursues neutrality as a condition to withdraw.

Were Finland to join NATO, it would become the sixth state to share a land border with Russia

Meanwhile, NATO countries have repeatedly refused requests from Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky to directly aid his country's fight against Moscow's invading forces out of fear of being dragged into a wider conflict with Russia.

One week into the Russian invasion, Marin said a planned debate in parliament the following day would cover the situation in Ukraine and was not intended as a 'wider conversation on Finland's policy regarding military alignment or non-alignment'.

Since the assault on Ukraine, Finnish leaders have held multiple meetings with their US and Nordic counterparts regarding Finnish defence and security.
Body aches, a runny nose and diarrhoea are among the nine new signs of Covid that have been added to the NHS symptom list.

The health service quietly expanded its list of all the tell-tale signs of the virus to also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache.

Since the start of the pandemic, officials have only accepted three symptoms: a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell, despite other countries and health bodies including up to 14.

The move  which critics claim has come two years too late  comes just days after No10 ended free Covid tests for all, with infections hitting an all-time high.

Only health and social care workers, the elderly and the most vulnerable Britons are still able to access the tests for free.

Since the start of the pandemic, the NHS has only listed three Covid symptoms: a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell. But it has now quietly expanded its list of all the tell-tale signs of the virus to also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache. Shortness of breath, feeling tired, an aching body, a sore throat, a blocked or runny nose and diarrhoea were also added to the list

The health service on Friday expanded its list of the tell-tale signs of the virus to also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache. Since the start of the pandemic, health chiefs have pointed to a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell as the only three symptoms of the virus

The NHS notes on its website that the symptoms are 'very similar to symptoms of other illnesses, such as colds and flu'.

People experiencing these symptoms should 'try to stay at home and avoid contact with other people', as well as taking 'extra care' to avoid contact with anyone at higher risk from the virus.

Professor Tim Spector, lead scientist of the Zoe Covid symptom tracker app, wrote on Twitter that the change comes after two years of urging health chiefs to expand the list.

WHAT IS THE FULL LIST OF COVID SYMPTOMS? According to the NHS updated list, symptoms of Covid in adults can include: a high temperature or shivering (chills)  a high temperature means you feel hot to touch on your chest or back (you do not need to measure your temperature)

a new, continuous cough  this means coughing a lot for more than an hour, or 3 or more coughing episodes in 24 hours

a loss or change to your sense of smell or taste

shortness of breath

feeling tired or exhausted

an aching body

a headache

a sore throat

a blocked or runny nose

loss of appetite

diarrhoea

feeling sick or being sick Advertisement

He said: 'NHS official main symptoms of coronavirus (COVID-19) have finally changed after two years of lobbying and Zoe app user input  hurrah!

'Pity they have the order wrong  but it's a start and could help reduce infections.'

It is understood that the Government's chief medical officer would have needed to sign off on the expanded list of symptoms.

In March, Professor Spector was highly critical of the Government for not recognising a broader list of virus symptoms.

He said at the time: 'The Government's refusal to recognise the wide array of symptoms and to drop isolation advice and testing is likely driving the incredible number of cases we see today.

'Many people are no longer isolating when they have symptoms, either because they feel they don't have to anymore or because they or their employers still don't recognise symptoms like runny nose or sore throat as Covid.'

The World Health Organization lists 13 symptoms of the virus, including four not listed by the NHS: a rash or discolouration of the fingers or toes, red or irritated eyes, loss of speech or mobility and chest pain.

Meanwhile, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention symptom list is the same as the NHS website, although it does not include a loss of appetite.

And the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control lists 12 symptoms, while Germany acknowledges 14.

Professor Spector told MailOnline adding more symptoms to the NHS list 'is definitely a step in the right direction and it could help reduce infections as we go forward'.

'However, whilst this is good news, I'd like to see the order of the symptoms changed, as the NHS list puts far too much emphasis on symptoms like fever, and anosmia, which we know are much less common since the Omicron variant emerged,' he said.

Professor Spector added: 'According to the ZOE COVID Study, the top five symptoms being reported by contributors with a positive Covid test are; runny nose (83 per cent), fatigue (71 per cent), sore throat (69 per cent), headache (69 per cent) and sneezing (68 per cent).'

'It seems this decision has been made in light of the changes to testing.

'We were always told that the barrier to expanding the list was that adding more symptoms could overwhelm the testing capacity, so it makes sense that since free testing has now stopped, the list has been updated.'

The move for the UK to recognise more symptoms comes as Covid tests are now only available for certain groups.

Most people will now have to purchase the swabs from high street stores, where they are available for about 2 each.

England has ended its offer of free swabs under its plans to 'live with' the virus and following pressure from the Treasury over the bill  which ministers claimed cost 2billion in January at the height of the Omicron wave.

Scotland will end its offer next month, while Wales is to stop handing out the swabs this summer.

Experts argued the timing of the end of free testing 'couldn't really be worse', and that the country would now have to rely on the public 'doing the right thing' and getting tested when unwell.

But ministers have insisted it is the 'right' moment to scrap the mass-testing regime, which cost No10 up to 2bn-a-month. Only the most vulnerable and health care workers are still able to get free swabs.

It comes as the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which runs the UK's biggest Covid prevalence study, estimated more than 4.1million people had the virus on any given day over the week to March 26, equivalent to one in 13 being infected.

The figure is the highest ever recorded in England, topping the previous peak of 3.7m at the height of the Omicron wave in January. It is also 18 per cent higher than one week earlier.

In the most Covid-ridden towns of Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch, as many as one in nine people were thought to have the virus. And infections have soared to pandemic highs in all over-35s.

Britain's outbreak as a whole is also bigger than ever, with 4.9million now thought to be infected  up from 4.3million last week.

Statisticians said England's surge was being driven by the more transmissible version of Omicron, scientifically named BA. Although, ministers admit that ditching the final Covid restrictions last month also fueled the uptick.
A Scottish Nationalist has been suspended from Nicola Sturgeon's party after allegedly threatening to 'lynch' a former Labour strategist.

Mark Fagan faced being booted out of the SNP for good for saying Blair McDougall should be 'swinging from a lamp post'.

The troll blasted the former Better Together campaign director in a vile Twitter post and accused him of being a 'lying red Tory'.

But the speechwriter said he did not expect the party to 'lift a finger' and claimed it was not the first time he had been threatened.

The SNP later announced it had suspended Fagan's membership of the Glasgow Central branch and said 'there is no place in politics for abuse'.

It comes at an awkward time for the party, with its Westminster leader over the weekend calling for 'keyboard warriors' on social media to be rooted out.

Mark Fagan (right) faced being booted out of the SNP for good for saying Blair McDougall (left) should be 'swinging from a lamp post'

Earlier this year he accused Ms Sturgeon (pictured) of deliberately ignoring online abuse by members of her party

Labour strategist who gave TV hardman Ross Kemp election success at university... who is Blair McDougall? Blair McDougall was best known for leading the victorious Better Together campaign during the Scottish Independence Referendum in 2014. The Glasgow University-educated strategist was also special adviser to minister Sir Ian McCartney under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. And as a student he was TV hardman Ross Kemp's campaign manager for the Rectorial election in 1999. Meanwhile he also coordinated David Miliband's attempt to lead Labour in 2010 as well as Scotland adviser for Jess Phillips when she tried to win the part over in 2020. He describes himself as: 'A strategic thinker, creative campaigner and effective speechwriter. 'More than 20 years of experience working around the world in government, politics and NGOs. 'A leader with a record of delivery in the most challenging situations.' Advertisement

Fagan had tweeted: 'Tell us again the benefits of voting no. Lying Red Tory. You actually boast about this, you should be swinging from a lamp post.'

Mr McDougall said on Twitter: 'Wake up to another SNP member talking about executing me.

'He says he's in the same seat as two SNP politicians who follow me. I don't expect they'll lift a finger.

'No SNP member ever has any of the other times I've shared SNP members posting fantasies about this. Just another day.'

He said Fagan had 'panicked and deleted his tweet about executing me,' continued: 'Unfortunately for you the internet isn't written in pencil.'

In a thread on Twitter today, he said: 'The papers this morning report that the SNP member who posted about me being hung from a lamp post has been suspended.

'Good. Now that they've set the precedent that it's wrong to talk about the execution of your opponents (a low bar, I know) let's test if they mean it.

'Below are five other self-declared SNP members who have posted about the execution of their opponents by hanging.

'First, there's the SNP member in Perth and North Perthshire who messaged an MP to warn them to put their affairs in order as it was ''another day closer to being strung up and hanged from the Forth Bridge''.

'Second, we have the SNP member in Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock who messaged an opposing MP to say they ''should be hung for treason'', specifically by the genitals.

'Third, there's the SNP member in Edinburgh Southern who, when he isn't compiling lists of English neighbours (no, really) is bemoaning that I have not been executed ''for your traitorous crimes against your country of birth''.

'Fourth, there's the SNP member in Moray who has identified not one, but three ''f***ing traitor'' MPs who ''should be hung for treason''.

'Finally (for now) there is the member in Kate Forbes constituency who posts about how an opposing MP should ''be hung drawn and quartered in independence square''. He also posts about trees and lamposts as being suitable gallows.'

He added to the Herald: 'Reluctantly suspending one member, and only when the media get involved, isn't enough.

'We need to see SNP politicians on the record, speaking out against their own members who fantasise about executing their opponents, label them as traitors, and fill their social media profiles with hatred.'

Earlier this year he accused Ms Sturgeon of deliberately ignoring online abuse by members of her party.

He likened the SNP's issue with Labour's 'antagonising internal struggles' with 'racists from within our ranks'.

Mr McDougall was best known for leading the victorious Better Together campaign during the Scottish Independence Referendum in 2014.

The Glasgow University-educated strategist was also special adviser to minister Sir Ian McCartney under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

Over the weekend Ian Blackford (pictured last week) fired a warning shot at 'keyboard warriors' as he called for those inside and outside of his party to be rooted out

And as a student he was TV hardman Ross Kemp's campaign manager for the Rectorial election in 1999.

A spokesman for the SNP said last night: 'The individual has had their membership suspended.

'There is no place in politics for abuse, threats or violence - be that online or offline. Attitudes like this are not welcome in the SNP.'

Over the weekend Ian Blackford fired a warning shot at 'keyboard warriors' as he called for those inside and outside of his party to be rooted out.

He told the Sunday Times: 'Almost every MP that I know from every party has been subjected to violent threats or death threats  some on a regular basis.'

He added: 'It is not long since the tragic deaths of David Amess and Jo Cox, and there is hardly a day goes past without threats of violence against politicians and intolerance at scale against others in the political space. People need to be allowed to do their jobs.'
Liam Gallagher has said '99% of judges are massive c***z' in a furious Twitter rant after his 'entitled' son was criticised in court over a drunken fight at a Tesco Express.

Gene Appleton Gallagher, 21, and Ringo Starr's grandson Sonny Starkey, 20, had charges for assault and affray dropped after agreeing to be bound over.

However, judge Joanna Greenberg, described them as 'entitled' and said their behaviour was 'completely out of order, no doubt as a result of having been drinking'.

The incident happened at a Tesco Express in Hampstead, north London on 17 May 2019 after their friend, former IMG model Noah Ponte, 21, was accused of stealing a can of gin and tonic. He was acquitted of theft by a jury.

Despite his son being spared formal punishment, Oasis star Liam Gallagher still took issue with the judge's comments, and criticised her during a Twitter tirade.

'Judge Judy can kiss my a*** hole,' he wrote. 'From one entitled p**** to another, as you were LG x.'

He continued: 'Funny thing is 99 per cent of judges are massive C**** LG. Asking folk to sit down, stand up, rise, f*** off with your noncey wig.'

He added: 'If ya can't steal from Tescos, where can you steal from eh? This country is over.'

Gene Gallagher leaving Wood Green Crown Court. He had charges of assault and affray dropped against him in return for them agreeing to be bound over

Despite his son being spared formal punishment, Oasis star Liam Gallagher still took issue with the judge's comments, and criticised her during a Twitter tirade

'Judge Judy can kiss my a*** hole,' he wrote. 'From one entitled p**** to another, as you were LG x'

Gallagher and Starkey have now been made the subject of a binder - meaning they have promised to 'keep the peace and be of good behaviour' for 12 months or pay 500.

The pair and their friend, Ponte, denied all charges against them. They faced affray and assault by beating charges, while Gallagher and Ponte were accused of racially aggravated assault. Ponte was also charged with theft.

The trio attempted to get all charges thrown out against them in November 2020, but were unsuccessful barring one charge against Gallagher of common assault which was dismissed.

Wood Green Crown Court heard the trio had been drinking at an 18th birthday party but then went to the Tesco Express store on their way.

Ponte, a UCL architecture student, said he picked up a can of a 1.70 gin and tonic but knew it could not be sold because the store did not sell alcohol after 11pm.

He also said he paid 1.70 for two packets of salt and pepper nuts on the self-service till, then left them there, and attempted to leave the store with the can.

CCTV played to jurors showed two Tesco workers tried to stop the men from leaving including a moment when Ponte claimed a Tesco worker grabbed him by the arm and pulled him back into the store.

Starkey and Gallagher were then accused to have thrown 'kicks and punches' down the aisle at the shop worker trying to stop them from leaving.

Noah Ponte (left) was acquitted of an allegation of theft of a gin and tonic can in the Tesco Express in Hampstead, north London on 17 May 2019. Sonny Starkey (right) had charges of assault and affray dropped

Liam and son Gene Gallagher wearing Burberry at the Burberry February 2018 show during London Fashion Week at Dimco Buildings

Duty manager Hiram Rajput claimed to have heard the phrase, 'You bloody Indians. Go back to where you came from.'

However, this was denied by Gallagher and Ponte at an earlier hearing, with Ponte's representative claiming they said 'bloody idiots'.

What is a bind over? A bind over, also known as a bind over to keep the peace, is a type of 'civil disposal' available in the Criminal Courts in England and Wales. It means that a person must undertake not to engage in specific conduct or activities for a certain period of time, If they are in breach they will be required to pay a specified sum of money. According to the CPS bind overs can 'in the right circumstances provide an effective means of dealing with low-level disorder'. Bind overs can be used in both magistrates courts and in crown courts. However a bind over is not a conviction in itself and the making of a bind over is not dependent on a conviction for an offence. Advertisement

Following the accused bad behaviour in the store, Starkey was placed in a headlock by a Tesco shop worker for 'several minutes'.

The Crown Prosecution Service were forced to accept that Starkey was 'lawfully defending himself' and Gallagher was lawfully defending his friend against further assault.

A fourth friend was not charged because he acted as a 'moderating influence'.

During the trial for the theft of the gin and tonic, prosecutor Alexander Agbamu said the incident involved three phases: the alleged theft by Ponte, the kicks and punches said to have been delivered by Gallagher and Starkey, and the restraint of Starkey by a Tesco worker.

Earlier, prosecutors said they received two previously unseen pieces of evidence that meant they were unable to proceed to trial for Gallagher and Starkey.

Mr Agbamu said: '[A customer who now lives in Peru] described young men throwing groceries around and also saw a member of Tesco staff hitting and grabbing Mr Starkey and appearing to target him.

'[She] described the actions of the Tesco member of staff and described him as being the aggressor.

'Mr Gallagher and Mr Starkey have a strong case to the effect that Mr Starkey was lawfully defending himself and Mr Gallagher was lawfully defending Mr Starkey against further assault.

'[The customer] did provide the police with her contact details and in July 2019 and subsequently the police wrote to her at her address but all correspondence came back to the police returned to sender.

'The Crown understands [the customer] is now in Peru and would have been giving evidence via TV link.

'That has called the Crown to reassess the case against Mr Gallagher and Mr Starkey.'

Ringo Starr at the opening of Liverpool as the European Capital Of Culture at New Echo Arena on January 12, 2008 in Liverpool, England. On the left are grandchildren, Sonny and Louie Starkey

The prosecutor said there was another witness, a member of security of staff, who said: 'I think the whole situation was avoidable. I can see both sides of the argument.

'[The defendants] were the ones who started the problem. However, I believe that the staff should have been more patient with the males.

'[The males] were clearly young, and drunk, and [the staff] could have let me deal with the situation.

'As I said my role is to deal with security issues within the store. [The Tesco staff] did not allow me to handle the situation.

'[The males] came in and the situation went from a discussion with me to a fight with all the staff.

'In my opinion, both sides could have handled this situation better. Although there is no dispute in my mind the males were the people that started the problem.'

Mr Agbamu concluded: 'The Crown wishes to offer no further evidence against Mr Gallagher and Mr Starkey and to ask for a bind over, in recognition of their contribution to this incident as unpleasant and unnecessary.'

The alleged incident is said to have happened on Heath Street in Hampstead Heath

The trial continued for the theft and Ponte admitted that the way he attempted to get around licensing laws was 'daft'.

Ponte, who gave live evidence during his trial, said: 'I went back to the chiller cabinet to make sure that I was paying the exact value.

'I just assumed I would be scanned or I needed to be ID'd. I never attempted to scan the drink.

'Essentially I thought I'd created a way to pay for it.

'[If I had been told to put it back] I wouldn't be so bold to not put it back after being told.

'It was a long or confusing way to pay for it but I didn't want to steal it.'

Ponte, who was supported by his father during the trial, breathed a sigh of relief when the jury foreman acquitted him.

Judge Joanna Greenberg told Gallagher and Starkey: 'Your behaviour on this occasion when you entered the Tesco store was in my view completely out of order and no doubt as a result of drinking.

'It's hard enough when people running a late-night store encounter entitled young men thinking they can get what they want by misbehaving.

'The prosecution has taken the view things got out of hand because Tesco staff overreacted.

'In those circumstances, while the prosecution has offered no evidence on counts two to six, and I enter not guilty pleas, I'm going to bind you over to keep the peace and with a recognizance of 500 pounds.

'If you fail to comply you are ordered to forfeit that 500.'
A sport climber who represented Australia in the Youth Olympics has been accused of 'stealth' rape.

Ned Middlehurst, 21, on Monday faced Melbourne Magistrates Court charged with raping a woman after allegedly having sex with her without a condom when he said he would use protection.

He has also been charged with making a false or misleading misrepresentation after he allegedly removed a condom from its packaging but did not use it.

Ned Middlehurst, 21, on Monday faced Melbourne Magistrates Court charged with raping a woman after allegedly having sex with her without a condom when he said he would

Middlehurst has also been charged with making a false or misleading misrepresentation after he allegedly removed a condom from its packaging but did not use it

'The charge of rape is obviously incredibly serious,' Middlehurst's lawyer Sam Norton told the court.

'Of any view (the woman) consented to sexual penetration - the issue from the Crown's perspective is that she didn't consent to sexual penetration without a condom.'

Middlehurst represented Australia in sport climbing at the 2018 Youth Olympics in Buenos Aires.

He is expected to face court again on April 27.
A self-exiled oligarch who was once Russia's richest man has called out the country's billionaire elites, saying they must publicly declare Vladimir Putin a war criminal to prove they are not in cahoots with the Kremlin.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a former oil tycoon who fled Russia to London in 2013 after falling foul of Putin and being jailed for nearly a decade, said high-profile Russians who left amid the invasion of Ukraine cannot stay silent about the atrocities being committed by Russian forces.

'Public figures cannot leave quietly and then sit quietly. If you have left, then you should publicly dissociate yourself,' Khodorkovsky told The Washington Post in an interview last week.

'You should step up to the microphone and say that Putin is a war criminal and that what he is doing is a crime, that the war against Ukraine is a crime.

'Say this, and then we'll understand that Putin doesn't have a hold over you,' Khodorkovsky continued.

The exiled oligarch's comments referred to a number of Russian elites, who since the invasion began have left their homeland but have thus far not openly condemned Putin's war.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a former oil tycoon who fled Russia to London in 2013 after falling foul of Putin and being jailed for nearly a decade, said high-profile Russians who left amid the invasion of Ukraine cannot stay silent about the atrocities being committed by Russian forces

Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) talks to chairman of the board of Yukas oil company, Mikhail Khodorkovsky (R) during a meeting with members of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs in the Kremlin, Moscow 31 May 2001. Khodorkovsky was imprisoned in 2003 for nearly a decade before fleeing to London in 2013

Khodorkovsky has called out the country's billionaire elites, saying they must publicly declare Vladimir Putin (pictured) a war criminal to prove they are not in cahoots with the Kremlin

A woman walks amid destroyed Russian tanks in Bucha, in the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022

One man referred to by Khodorkovsky is Anatoly Chubais, an economist who was instrumental in the development of Russia's post-Soviet economy - and the privatisation programmes which allowed Russia's oligarchs to cultivate their vast fortunes.

Chubais was serving as Putin's international envoy before stepping down and leaving Russia last month - the first high-ranking official to do so after Russian tanks rolled across the Ukrainian border in late February - but he has not made any public comments since his resignation.

Khodorkovsky also singled out two other elites, Mikhail Fridman and Petr Aven of Alfa Group, who left Russia amid the invasion of Ukraine but are among Putin's most high-profile oligarchs.

The pair were part of an exclusive group of tycoons who amassed incredible sums of wealth in the years following the collapse of the Soviet Union and controlled much of the economy.

Both Fridman and Aven have invested millions in the UK and Europe, building up a diverse portfolio of companies and assets beyond Russian shores, but have been hit by crippling sanctions despite choosing to flee Russia.

The oligarchs have given awkward interviews to Western media in which they clearly appeared uncomfortable about the situation in Ukraine, with Ukrainian-born Fridman going so far as to call the invasion a 'huge tragedy which should be stopped as soon as possible.'

But they have refused to criticise Putin and have been careful not to refer to the war as such.

Veteran Kremlin envoy Anatoly Chubais (pictured right, with Russian President Vladimir Putin in December 2016) has quit and left the country with no intention to return allegedly in a protest over Russia's invasion of Ukraine

Khodorkovsky also singled out two other elites, Mikhail Fridman (pictured) and Petr Aven of Alfa Group, who left Russia amid the invasion of Ukraine but are among Putin's most high-profile oligarchs. Ukrainian-born Fridman has gone so far as to call the invasion a 'huge tragedy which should be stopped as soon as possible.' But they have refused to criticise Putin and have been careful not to refer to the war as such

Alfa Bank Chairman of the Board Petr Aven (L) is pictured alongside Roman Abramovich at a meeting of Russia's President Vladimir Putin with Russian business community representatives, at the Moscow Kremlin, 2016

In a recent interview with El Pais, Fridman even cited Khodorkovsky as an example of what consequences meddling in political affairs could have for a Russian oligarch.

In 2003, when Putin drew a line for Khodorkovsky, it became clear that 'any participation in political life was unacceptable,' Fridman said.

'After that, we did not back any politician, because we felt that it would have been a transgression of the framework that the Kremlin demanded from the business world.'

Khodorkovsky, an outspoken Putin critic, was once Russia's richest man as the head of oil company Yukas, but he was arrested in 2003 on charges of fraud and tax evasion and jailed for almost 10 years while Yukas was taken over by the state.

Since his release and subsequent self-exile to London in 2013, Khodorkovsky has maintained the charges were trumped up as part of a Putin ploy to seize his company, and has remained one of Putin's staunchest critics.

In an interview with BBC R4 last month, Khodorkovsky claimed the Russian tyrant 'nowadays lives in his own world' and insisted that 'in the world he has created around him over the last 20 years he really believed he would be welcomed by people in the former Soviet republic as a liberator'.

Rubbishing allegations that Putin has gone 'mad', the former oil tycoon said that 'everything that is happening today, is totally unexpected [to Putin]'.

In an interview with BBC R4 last month, Khodorkovsky claimed the Russian tyrant 'nowadays lives in his own world' and insisted that 'in the world he has created around him over the last 20 years he really believed he would be welcomed by people in the former Soviet republic as a liberator'

'Has he has put a limit on his time in power because of his aggression? That is for sure. Can he close off Russia in the way Iran has closed itself off, to be in a castle under siege? I doubt that very much. Russia is not like Iran. So in a year or two or three years, he will clearly lose power.'

Khodorkovsky has also been one of the most vocal advocates of strong economic sanctions against Russia to cripple Putin and the Russian elite, reasoning that Russian citizens would eventually rise up if their income dried up.

'I think that the West has taken a very important action. The blocking of the accounts of the central bank is, in my opinion, the only sanction which can in the short-term stop the aggression in the short term, but this is not enough,' the former tycoon said.

'In order not to waste this first step, all the Kremlin's options for using currency should be blocked. I would never have said this before, but now, when people close to me are being killed, in Kharkiv for example, I say that Putin's troops should be forced out of Ukraine by any available means.

Khodorkovsky added: 'In Ukraine, Putin is using the same troops that he uses to suppress people in Russia. If a situation arises where currency resources in Russia are limited and people will not be able to hold out until the end of the month for their salary, and people go out into the streets, Putin will have to withdraw the troops.'

Though Russia's top oligarchs have generally remained silent on the war in Ukraine, there have been a number of high-profile figures who have left the country and spoken out about the invasion.

Arkady Dvorkovich, who once served as Russia's deputy prime minister and is currently chairman of the International Chess Federation (FIDE), criticised the war with Ukraine in comments made to Mother Jones magazine on March 14 and came under fire from the Kremlin.

'Wars are the worst things one might face in life. Any war. Anywhere. Wars do not just kill priceless lives. Wars kill hopes and aspirations, freeze or destroy relationships and connections. Including this war,' he said.

Dvorkovich added that FIDE was 'making sure there are no official chess activities in Russia or Belarus, and that players are not allowed to represent Russia or Belarus in official or rated events until the war is over and Ukrainian players are back in chess.'

FIDE banned a top Russian player for six months for his vocal support of Putin and the invasion.

Two days after Dvorkovich's comments, a top official in the United Russia party demanded that he be fired as chair of the state-backed Skolkovo Foundation. Last week, the foundation reported that Dvorkovich decided to step down.

Arkady Dvorkovich, who once served as Russia's deputy prime minister and is currently chairman of the International Chess Federation (FIDE), criticised the war with Ukraine in comments made to Mother Jones magazine on March 14 and came under fire from the Kremlin

Lilia Gildeyeva (L) - a longtime anchor at the state-funded NTV channel, which for two decades has carefully toed the Kremlin line - quit her job and left Russia shortly after the invasion. Another Russian journalist, Zhanna Agalakova (R), also quit after spending more than 20 years working with state-run TV broadcast Channel One, and gave an interview in Paris about the decision

Meanwhile, Lilia Gildeyeva - a longtime anchor at the state-funded NTV channel, which for two decades has carefully toed the Kremlin line - quit her job and left Russia shortly after the invasion.

She told the independent news site The Insider last week that she decided 'to stop all this' on the first day of the Feb. 24 invasion.

'It was an immediate nervous breakdown,' she said. 'For several days I couldn't pull myself together. The decision was probably obvious right away. There won't be any more work.'

Gildeyeva said news coverage on state TV channels was tightly controlled by the authorities, with channels getting orders from officials. She admitted to going along with it since 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea and began supporting a separatist insurgency in Ukraine.

'When you gradually give in to yourself, you don't notice the depth of the fall. And at some point, you find yourself face to face with the picture that leads to Feb. 24,' she said.

Another leading Russian journalist, Zhanna Agalakova, also quit after spending more than 20 years working with state-run TV broadcast Channel One, and gave an interview in Paris about the decision.

'We have come to a point when on TV, on the news, we're seeing the story of only one person - or the group of people around him. All we see are those in power. In our news, we don't have the country. In our news, we don't have Russia,' Agalakova said.

Referring to the 2014 annexation of Crimea and the support of the separatists in Ukraine, she said that she 'could not hide from the propaganda anymore,' even as a foreign correspondent. Agalakova said she had to 'only talk about the bad things happening in the U.S.'

'My reports didn't contain lies, but that's exactly how propaganda works: You take reliable facts, mix them up, and a big lie comes together. Facts are true, but their mix is propaganda,' she said.
Prince Andrew's aides were 'blindsided' by his now-deleted Falklands War statement that was signed off as 'HRH' despite Buckingham Palace saying the disgraced duke would no longer use the title.

The duke, 62, wrote more than 700 words about his experience in the Falklands in posts on his ex-wife's Instagram account on Saturday - before they were hurriedly taken down.

Andrew flew missions as a Sea King helicopter pilot during the conflict and recalled being shot at.

But Buckingham Palace and the duke's aides were unaware he had published the posts, it is now claimed.

The musings were initially signed off as 'written by HRH The Duke of York', despite the Queen having stripped Andrew of his honorary military titles in January following the dramatic fallout from his civil sex case.

At the time, a royal source said Andrew, who was born a HRH, would no longer use it in any official capacity.

The 'HRH' was removed from the posts, before the reflection was deleted in its entirety two hours later.

The Duke of York said he returned from the Falklands War 'a changed man' in a piece of writing posted to his ex-wife's Instagram account - before it was hurriedly taken down

Andrew's reflection appeared in three posts on the Instagram account of his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson and were signed off 'HRH The Duke of York'. The post was then apparently changed to remove the HRH before being deleted

Andrew had been forced to step back from public life over his association with late paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, but made a surprising centre-stage appearance with the Queen at a memorial service for Prince Philip last week

Prince Andrew returns from the Falklands War on September 17, 1982, on board HMS Invincible at Portsmouth Harbour, where he was met by the Queen and Prince Philip with Princess Anne

Sarah, Duchess of York and Prince Andrew pictured together at Royal Ascot in June 2019. The posts were uploaded on Fergie's Instagram account

In the first Instagram post, Sarah wrote: 'I asked Andrew this morning for his reflections on the anniversary of his sailing from Portsmouth to the Falkland Islands 40 years ago.'

Andrew's account begins: 'As I sit here at my desk on this cold crisp spring morning thinking back to April 1982 I've tried to think what was going through my mind as we sailed out of Portsmouth lining the flight deck of HMS INVINCIBLE.'

It concluded: 'So whilst I think back to a day when a young man went to war, full of bravado, I returned a changed man.

'I put away childish things and false bravado and returned a man full in the knowledge of human frailty and suffering.

'My reflection makes me think even harder and pray even more fervently for those in conflict today, for those family's (sic) torn apart by the horrors they have witnessed.

'And, i'm (sic) afraid to say, that the historical perspective my short war has taught me is this  war is failure to keep peace; war is failure of human judgement; war is failure to recognise we need to seek permission to understand another persons perspective or reality, whether or not we agree or disagree with that perspective or reality.'

Andrew also recalled being shot at, writing: 'I was flying and saw a chaff shell fired from one of our ships that passed not that far in front of us.

'For a moment it was on a steady bearing before it began to cross to our left.

'The terror that that was going to be that, just for a moment, has had a lasting and permanent effect on me.'

The Queen stripped Andrew of his honorary military roles in January and he gave up his HRH style in a dramatic fallout from his civil sex case

Prince Andrew, who reached a reported 12million out-of-court settlement in a civil sexual assault case a few weeks ago, flew missions as a Sea King helicopter pilot during the conflict

It was the shamed royal's first social media post since he paid a reported 12million settlement to Jeffrey Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre to end a highly-damaging civil sexual assault case in New York

It comes after the Royal Family was left 'dismayed' by Andrew demanding to take centre stage at his father Philip's memorial service last week - amid suggestions The Queen was giving a sign of 'endorsement' in her son.

The shamed royal insisted on accompanying the Queen from Windsor Castle to the thanksgiving event at Westminster Abbey.

To the shock of many in the congregation, though, he then escorted his mother all the way to her front-row position  in full view of the live broadcast cameras.

It had been expected that the Dean of Westminster would take the Queen to her seat, with Andrew behind.

But a Palace source told The Sunday Times the duke is 'delusional if he thinks what happened on Tuesday means he has any chance of resuming a public role'.

It also follows plans for the Duke to escort his mother to the Epsom Derby over the Platinum Jubilee weekend later this year, despite one source telling The Sun that he was meant to 'stay invisible' during the celebrations in June.

Buckingham Palace said it did not want to comment.
Furious residents near a railway bridge that is one of the most smashed into structures in Britain want big lorries banned after it suffered its 102nd hit since 2000.

The latest articulated lorry to end up on its side is the fifth at the spot in the past 11 months  although height warning signs and flashing lights have slightly improved on the figure of 12 smashes four years ago.

After the lorry ploughed into the bridge on the A325 near Wrecclesham close to Farnham, Surrey, the road was closed again while the huge vehicle was righted.

Only minutes earlier, children had been walking to their nearby school along the pavement where the lorry toppled.

The bridge on the A325 near Wrecclesham has been hit by lorry drivers 102 times since 2000. The latest lorry to topple went down minute after children had been walking to school along the pavement

Villagers in Wrecclesham have been campaigning for more than 60 years for a by-pass, and parents who fear a child could one day be killed have previously written to the area's MP, former Cabinet Minister Jeremy Hunt, asking for better safety on the stretch of road.

Lorry drivers ignoring warnings has become a huge nationwide headache for Network Rail with latest figures for the 2020-21 year showing more than 1,600 bridges were hit across the rail network  and in the last five financial years there have been a staggering 9,178 strikes.

They have cost Network Rail more than 5.5million in delay and cancellation fees for passengers as services have been disrupted  and millions more were spent on repairs which are often handed on to hauliers' insurers.

Police asked the lorry driver how they did not see the height limit sign further up the road, said resident Gerard Greaves

The most struck bridge in Britain in 2020-21 was at Coddenham Road, in Needham Market, Suffolk  hit 19 times  but Network Rail spokesman Chris Denham said the Wrecclesham one 'has traditionally been one of our most struck bridges'.

Resident Gerard Greaves said: 'We've nicknamed it the Bridge of Sighs. But maybe it should be Bridge of Highs due to the number of dopey drivers of high-sided vehicles who ignore the height sign.'

Mr Denham added: 'We have tried to find a way of building a turning circle for lorries that see the over-height signs and need to turn round, so they don't have to reverse, but as yet we've not been able to do that.'

Mr Greaves, 59, added: 'I've only lived here five years and I've come by and seen at least 20 to 30 lorries that have smashed into it. It happens all the time.

'The artics are always keeling over on their side. We get so many of these big vehicles using that road because it's a cut through between the A3 and M3, but they don't seem to take any notice of the sign  or don't know the height of their vehicles.

'Even if the drivers do notice the height sign when they go past, the road often has to be closed and there's chaos as they can't reverse and cars back up and the police have to be called,' said resident Mr Greaves

A three-inch thick metal girder has been placed a few inches before each entrance to take the first impact and protect the bridge from each hit

Network Rail has pleaded with lorry drivers to end the 'entirely avoidable stupidity' of bridge crashes. Above, the latest crash on the A325

'So their hope for short cut ends up as a very time consuming and expensive mistake.

'When I was there the police who attended were saying to the lorry driver how could you have not seen the sign saying the height limit.

'A few minutes before that there would have been children going under that so it's lucky none of them were hit.'

Mr Greaves said that a three-inch thick metal girder has been placed a few inches before each entrance to take the first impact and protect the bridge.

'It does mean the lorries take the brunt of the impact before the bridge itself and is why a lot of them jackknife and topple over and some have had their roof ripped off,' he said.

'Even if the drivers do notice the height sign when they go past, the road often has to be closed and there's chaos as they can't reverse and cars back up and the police have to be called. That's also happened again this week. The sat navs bring them here.'

Accidents at the A325 blackspot have caused injuries to drivers and disruption for road and rail users, and taken up fire crews' time trying to right overturned vehicles.

Network Rail has pleaded with lorry drivers to end the 'entirely avoidable stupidity' of bridge crashes.

Flashing lights warn drivers on the A325 if their lorry is over the Wrecclesham bridge's 4m 20cm height

Drivers now hitting the Wrecclesham bridge are warned before reaching it by flashing lights that their vehicle is over the wrought iron bridge's height of 4m 20cm.

Mr Denham said: 'We seek to find evidence of negligence and recover costs.

'Last weekend a bridge on the A24 Horsham bypass was hit for the second time recently and the repair bill has been 750,000. The road and the rail line had to be closed.

'All lorries must have their height in metres and feet on a plate in their cab, with the ability to adjust it according to the height of their loads.

The Horsham bridge in West Sussex had to be jacked up to take the weight off damaged girders before putting new bolts in place

'When a bridge is struck, one of the things we do is check the plate height and then the bridge height warning signs and note them for insurance claims.'

Mr Denham said that drivers often forget the extra height of the load they are carrying, adding that although in a recent hit in Bromley, south east London, the vehicle unloaded was below the bridge maximum height, the driver had left the arm of the excavator on the back up.

Despite the protective girder beam taking the initial impact the whole of the bridge parapet was ripped off.

The Horsham bridge in West Sussex had to be entirely jacked up to take the weight off damaged girders before putting new bolts in place.

Sir Peter Hendy, chair of Network Rail said: 'Bridge strikes cause unnecessary delays, costs, and safety issues for road and rail users.

'To compound matters, they drain public funds which should be used on upgrading and improving our network.

'In recent years we've done a lot of work with partners across the industry to tackle the problem and while it's encouraging to see numbers on the decline, there's a lot more work to be done.

'We urge professional operators and drivers to properly plan their routes, know the height of their vehicles and look out for road signs warning of oncoming bridges.

'Those who don't are at risk of losing their driver's and operator's licences, and Network Rail looks to recover the entire repair and delay costs from the driver's employer.'
In this picture taken on March 9, sanitation worker Shafiq Masih, center, offers prayers along with his family at a church in Lahore, Pakistan. AFP-Yonhap



Nearly naked and covered with a black, foul-smelling muck, Shafiq Masih struggles out of a sewer he has just cleaned by hand in an upmarket district of Lahore, Pakistan's second biggest city.



Every day the 44-year-old descends into the city's sewers, braving toxic gases emitted by excrement, pollutants and other waste, to manually unblock the drains of the city.



"When someone goes down, they have to sacrifice all self-respect," he told AFP.



"People go to the toilet, flush the toilet, and all the dirt gets dumped on us."



Like the vast majority of sanitation workers in Pakistan, Shafiq is a Christian, and doing a job that comes with strong social stigma  one considered impure by many Muslims.



Even in death there is no dignity.



In 2017 Muslim doctors sparked outrage and protests in Umerkot when they refused to treat a Christian sewage worker overcome by toxic gases, saying they could not touch his soiled body because they had to remain pure during Ramadan.



Caste discrimination



Most Christians in Pakistan are descendants of lower-caste Hindus who converted during the British colonial era in the hope of escaping a system that frequently forced them into a life of toil almost from birth.



They make up less than two percent of the population, but occupy more than 80 percent of jobs involving refuse collection, sewage work and street sweeping, according to figures cited regularly by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC).



The remainder are filled mostly by Hindus, another tiny community in the Muslim-majority nation.



Even though the caste system doesn't officially exist in Pakistan, it persists in these occupations, experts say.



The word "chuhra", traditionally used to describe those working in the sanitation industry  and considered extremely derogatory  is now synonymous with being a Christian.



Institutionalized discrimination is also rampant: some job adverts from public bodies have specified menial cleaning jobs are reserved for "non-Muslims", with the Centre for Law and Justice, a local NGO, identifying nearly 300 such announcements over the past decade.



The NCHR has recently launched a campaign to protest against this practice.





In this picture taken on March 9, sanitation worker Shafiq Masih, center, cleans a sewer with the help of colleagues in a residential area in Lahore, Pakistan. AFP-Yonhap
The widow and son of a black motorist shot in the head by a white state trooper during a traffic stop over a broken tail light will receive a settlement of nearly $5 million.

Julian Lewis, 60, was shot and killed by trooper Jacob Thompson, 28, in the countryside 60 miles south of Savannah, Georgia in August 2020.

After the state cop signaled Lewis to pull over and he failed to do so, Thompson rammed his car into a ditch.

Julian Lewis is survived by son Brook Bacon (Photo of Julian released by Lewis family law firm)

When Lewis began driving out of the trench and toward the trooper, Thompson pulled the trigger.

The state of Georgia will pay the sizeable settlement of $4.8m to Lewis's family months after a grand jury decided not to indict Thompson for felony murder and aggravated assault.

Thompson was fired from the Georgia State Patrol a week after the killing.

He was arrested and taken to Screven County Jail before being charged.

But prosecutors failed to get an indictment from a grand jury, who in July 2021 decided not to bring proceedings forward.

Brook Bacon (front right) leads a 63-mile march from where his father was killed to the US Attorney's Office in Savannah, Georgia in September 2021. Brook said he 'will not rest' until his father's killer is jailed

Betty Lewis (centre) wears a t-shirt embossed with late husband Julian's face outside court flanked by lawyers Francys Johnson (left) and Mawuli Davis (right) on November 23, 2020

Last summer U.S. Attorney David Estes said federal prosecutors were 'examining' Lewiss killing 'in consultation with the FBI'. No updates have been given since.

Lewis was shot once through the head and died instantly after the routine traffic stop escalated.

In a statement released last Thursday by the Lewis family's law firm Hall & Lampros, they said 'it is believed' Lewis kept driving despite Thompson's signal because he wanted to go 'where he knew other people would be present'.

Lawyers for Jacob Thompson, 28, argue he was acting in self-defense. He was arrested one week after the killing (left, mugshot) and fired from his job at the State Patrol (right, in uniform)

And though $4.8m is no small fee, the Lewis family continues to seek justice in the form of criminal punishment for Thompson.

Lewis's son Brook Bacon said: 'This settlement is further proof that Georgia recognizes the wrongs committed against my father, Julian Lewis.

'My father deserved to survive his encounter with ex-Georgia State Patrol Jacob Gordon Thompson on August 7, 2020.

'This is another step toward accountability but we will not rest until his killer is behind bars.'

Widow Betty Lewis added she is 'hopeful but frustrated' that Thompson has not been brought to justice.

Lewis family lawyer Andrew Lampros added: 'This is a classic case of driving while black.

'That is all that Mr. Lewis, I believe, was guilty of.'

The family's lawyers have pressed officials to release video footage of the killing, which he says will strengthen the case for criminal prosecution of Thompson.

He said: 'Citizens should see the video evidence in this case and they will have a clear understanding of why the State of Georgia paid 4.8 million dollars to resolve the civil case.

'The notion that something terribly wrong didnt happen out on that dusty dirt road by the hand of ex-Trooper Jacob Gordon Thompson is simply unbelievable.'

Thompson's attorney Keith Barber has maintained that the former trooper committed no crime and shot Lewis in self-defense.
Refugees fleeing besieged Ukrainian cities have told how drunk Russian troops kicked down doors to loot their houses and pulled women out to rape them.

A grandmother living in the town of Irpin, 13 miles north of Kyiv, said she saw several soldiers rape a mother and her 15-year-old daughter.

Branding the Russian soldiers 'animals', Anna Schevchenko, 63, accused the Kremlin of war crimes and told MailOnline: 'You would not believe what we have lived through there.

Dasha Haityna, 18 (pictured with Vitalik Navrotskgi, 24) said: 'I live near an airfield that was bombed here in Kyiv. I was so scared with the bombs and gunfire'

'The Russians were animals. They shot people trying to escape and left them in the street.

'Drunk Russians kicked down the doors of cellars and pulled women out and raped them. One girl aged just 15 was raped with her mother by several soldiers.

'They are animals. I hate them. One of my neighbours was shot in the back of the head by the Russians as he had shot a stray dog to eat as we were so hungry.

'But they looked at his hands and thought he had been shooting at them so they killed him despite him being an old man.'

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Russia of committing human atrocities in Bucha and Irpin on the outskirts of the capital where at least 410 innocent civilians have been slaughtered in the massacre, their bodies left by the roadsides and in basements where they sheltered from the shelling.

Branding the Russian soldiers 'animals', Anna Schevchenko (pictured), 63, accused the Kremlin of war crimes and told MailOnline: 'You would not believe what we have lived through there'

Mykola Kovalenko, 71, has just escaped from Bucha where he was trapped in heavy fighting.

'I thought I would never see my family again,' he said. 'They shot people trying to escape. I saw bodies in the street that had been run over by tanks.

'Putin must be made to pay for his soldiers have done. I saw an old woman in a nearby house who had been shot. What harm could she possibly have done to them?

'They raped many women as well. It was hell.'

In Bovary, east of Kyiv one resident also told how drunk Russians had looted, beaten and raped residents.

Olga Bundarov, 58, said: 'They dragged women out when they were drunk. Sometimes old women too. I had to hide as I was so scared.

'One of my neighbours saw several women who had been hung after being raped.

'I don't know if the Russians had done it or they killed themselves after what they had done.'

Special forces soldier David Zhvania, 21, from Geogia, was recuperating in Kyiv after fighting in the heavily besieged city of Mariupol.

David, who volunteered to fight, said: 'It is hell there. You get the chance to fire off a few rounds and then all hell breaks loose and you have to take cover from all the Russian fire.

Mykola Kovalenko (pictured), 71, has just escaped from Bucha where he was trapped in heavy fighting

'It is terrible there. I saw women and children dead in the street. Even babies. Putin has a lot to answer for.

'I came because I was wondered he will do to Georgia what he has done here.'

In Kyiv there are still nightly air raid sirens and distant bombing can be heard despite the Russain withdrawal.

There are few shops or cafes open and military roadblocks span roads.

Homemade roadblocks with broken down cars and even old trams block roads. People hope the war will end soon.

Student Dasha Haityna, 18, said: 'I live near an airfield that was bombed here in Kyiv.

'I was so scared with the bombs and gunfire. I hope it will be over soon but I don't know.'

Her friend Vitalik Navrotskgi, 24, said: 'I hope the war will end next month. But you never know. Putin is not human.'
Grace Tame will appear on stage as part of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.

The former Australian of the Year will feature as a guest on the panel for comedy news podcast 'A Rational Fear' hosted by comedians Dan Ilic and Lewis Hobba.

Their show takes a look at the some of the more worrying issues in our democracy, which they list as including 'climate change and text messages from Clive Palmer'.

The show, which Ilic has been hosting for a decade, won the best comedy podcast at both the 2020 and 2021 Australian Podcast Awards.

2021 Australian of the Year Grace Tame (pictured) will try her hand on stage at the Melbourne Comedy Festival

She will appear on comedian Dan Ilic's (pictured) live show for his comedy news podcast

Originally a quarterly podcast, the pair changed the format to weekly during Covid lockdowns which has only seen their fanbase grow.

A particularly memorable guests for Ilic was former Obama staffer Ben Rhodes.

He revealed that whenever Obama's team got frustrated dealing with former PM Tony Abbot they would watch Julia Gillard's parliamentary speech on misogyny - in which he was a prime target - to cheer them up.

Tame will join other guests on the show including Gabbi Bolt from The Chaser, Vidya Rajan from The Feed and Dane Simpson from Have You Been Paying Attention.

While Tame herself has not had any comedy experience, the 28-year-old lists comedy legend John Cleese as a personal friend.

She befriended Cleese's daughter Camilla when she briefly moved to the United States after finishing high school in Australia.

The talented artist was also commissioned to sketch artwork for Cleese which he sold on one of his recent tours.

While Ms Tame (pictured) has not previously tried comedy, she is friends with Monty Python comedy great John Cleese

She is also no stranger to cracking the occasional joke on Twitter, once claiming there was 'no higher honour' than being called 'toxic' by outspoken right wing commentator Andrew Bolt.

The Melbourne International Comedy Festival will kick off on March 30 and run until April 24 with more than 300 shows across multiple venues in the city.

After being cancelled in 2020 and a socially-distanced version going ahead in 2021, this year marks the return for the southern hemisphere's biggest comedy event.
Boris Johnson has shelved plans to double or even treble the number of wind turbines in the countryside and approve plans for up to seven new nuclear reactors instead.

The Prime Minister is said to have rejected ambitious targets presented by Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng to double the UK's onshore output to 30GW by 2030.

Instead, Tory opposition in the party's shire England heartlands and within the Cabinet means that new atomic power sites in rural areas are likely to get Government backing.

The decommissioned power station at Wylfa, on Anglesey, has been suggested as a possible location for the first of a series of small reactor plants.

Mr Johnson is expected to finally unveil his much-delayed new energy strategy on Thursday without any hard targets for onshore wind. But it is expected to lift a moratorium in place since 2015 to allow them to be built were there is local support.

It came after Transport Secretary Grant Shapps publicly opposed new wind farms yesterday in favour of new nuclear sites.

Boris Johnson has shelved plans to double or even treble the number of wind turbines in the countryside and approve plans for up to seven new nuclear reactors instead, as well as those already in the pipeline (above).

The Prime Minister is said to have rejected ambitious targets presented by Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng to double the UK's onshore output to 30GW by 2030.

The Prime Minister is expected to unveil his much-delayed energy strategy on Thursday, as millions of Britons feel the pinch from a surge in power prices.

Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng wants to double onshore wind production to 30GW by 2030. But Transport Secretary Grant Shapps today said he was opposed to more wind farms on land, claiming turbines were an 'eyesore' and often noisy.

Price of dairy products set to SOAR The price of milk is to rise by 50 per cent and butter by 30 per cent amid a worsening cost of living crisis, it has been claimed. Industry bosses fear that surging costs from feed, fertiliser and fuel will cause an increase in prices not seen in decades. It comes as dairy farmers flew into Brussels last week for crisis talks over soaring costs and supply chain disruption. The cost of four pints of milk will rise from around 1.15 to between 1.60 and 1.70, according to the UK's leading adviser to dairy farmers Kite Consulting. Meanwhile a typical pack of butter could increase from 1.55 to more than 2. The war in Ukraine is also said to be impacting prices. Advertisement

Asked if planning laws should be relaxed to allow for more onshore wind, he told Sky's Sophy Ridge On Sunday programme: 'I don't favour a vast increase in onshore wind farms, for pretty obvious reasons - they sit on the hills there and can create something of an eyesore for communities as well as actual problems of noise as well.

'So I think for reasons of environmental protection, the way to go with this is largely, not entirely, but largely off-sea.'

He has also suggested a 'colossal' floating offshore windfarm could be built in the Irish sea, when he met industry leaders last week.

It comes as polling, both privately for the Tories and public surveys, show strong support for wind farms in greenfield sites - as long as the locals are given cut-price or free power from them.

Ed Miliband, Labour's shadow climate change and net zero secretary, said: 'Families across the country are paying more on their energy bills because of the government's moratorium on onshore wind, the cheapest power available.

'Now the government seems to be backing off rumoured plans to scrap the ban, all because of pressure from the same Tory backbenchers who got it imposed in the first place.

'Britain deserves better than the Conservatives, who are incapable of acting in the public interest.

'For our energy security, to cut bills and to tackle the climate crisis, we need a green energy sprint. But this government is showing day by day they cannot deliver it.'

The International Trade Secretary is to argue the UK must build its green economy to 'eliminate Russian fuel from our energy mix once and for all'.

The decommissioned power station at Wylfa, on Anglesey, has been suggested as a possible location for the first of a series of small reactor plants.

Speaking during a visit to Norway, Anne-Marie Trevelyan will say the UK must first use its relationships with 'reliable energy partners' to 'meet our needs, protect our supply chains, and steady the global market'.

But it must also invest in more sustainable sources, she will say, as green energy is out of the 'malign reach' of Vladimir Putin.

It comes as Russia's invasion of Ukraine has caused turmoil in global energy markets.

The International Trade Secretary will make the remarks at a keynote speech at the Nor-Shipping Ocean Leadership conference on Monday.

Her trip to Norway will also involve meetings with senior figures in Norwegian industry and government.

Rishi's popularity with Tory activists slumps amid cost-of-living crisis and backlash at mini-Budget... while Ben Wallace stays top

Rishi Sunak's popularity with Tory grassroots appears to have taken an alarming dive in the wake of his mini-Budget.

The latest ratings for the ConservativeHome website show the Chancellor slumping from eleventh to third from bottom.

As the cost-of-living crisis continues to bite, his score on the monthly survey of readers was just 7.9, compared to 38.8 previously.

At one point he was top of the regular chart - a position now held by Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, who has earned plaudits for the Ukraine response.

Although the poll is not scientific it is closely watched by ministers and MPs, and will set alarm bells ringing in No11.

Priti Patel is the only senior figure in negative territory, with a rating of minus 13.6 after anger at the Channel migrant situation and slow progress on Ukraine refugee visas.

Boris Johnson has seen his position improve slightly, rising to a score of 33 despite anxiously waiting to hear whether he has been fined over Partygate.

The latest ratings for the ConservativeHome website show the Chancellor slumping from eleventh to third from bottom

Ben Wallace (right) was top of the regular ConHome chart, while Priti Patel (left) was bottom

Mr Sunak has been scrambling to defuse a furious backlash for failing to do enough to help struggling families.

He was accused of being an 'illusionist' after hailing his 'tax-cutting' Spring Statement, despite the burden being on course to reach the highest level since the 1940s.

The government's own watchdog has predicted that this year will see the biggest fall in disposable incomes since records began in the 1950s.

There are claims Mr Sunak is already having to draw up a new support package, as he struggles to keep a lid on the UK's 2.3trillion debt mountain and rising interest payments.

He was also ridiculed for photo-ops after the mini-Budget, including posing putting fuel into a Kia Rio owned by a Sainsbury's staff member.
Advertisement

Britain is set for an unsettled week of further snow, heavy rain and sub-zero temperatures during the first week of the Easter school holidays with daytime highs only just getting to average levels for the time of year.

Windy conditions and downpours will feature in most areas this week, although it will be slightly milder for the next few days with temperatures at between 12C (54F) to 14C (57F) before it turns colder again on Thursday.

The Met Office has issued a snow warning for Scotland affecting Aberdeen and Inverness from 4pm tomorrow until 11am on Wednesday with up to 6in (15cm) settling on high ground and 2in (5cm) at lower levels.

It comes after a very cold weekend which saw temperatures drop to -7.5C (18.5F) and daytime highs of just 13.9C (57F) - less than a fortnight after the warmest day of 2022 so far when London got to 20.8C (69.4F) on March 23.

Later this week, overnight temperatures could again drop below 0C (32F). Met Office forecaster Jonathan Vautrey said: 'The general theme is for the weather to be unsettled. There will be a damp and cloudy start to the working week for most with further outbreaks of rain on Tuesday and Wednesday in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Northern England. There will also be a more persistent band of rain across southern areas by Thursday.'

Commuters shelter under umbrellas as they walk through Westminster during the morning rush hour today

A Ryanair aircraft struggles to land this morning at Leeds Bradford Airport amid strong winds battering the North of England

The week got off to a very soggy start across the UK this morning with the heaviest of rain in Scotland and Northern Ireland, although rain will turn to isolated showers for England into this afternoon.

Today will be generally cloudy with few outbreaks of sunshine, and there will be a strong breeze. Highs of 14C (57F) are expected in England and Scotland, 13C (55F) in Wales and 12C (54F) in Northern Ireland.

There will be a dry and partly clear start to this evening for southern England but it will be staying wet elsewhere, while showers will increase after midnight for southern areas as well as Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Similar conditions are expected tomorrow when it will be mostly cloudy with a band of rain developing for northern England, preceded by hill snow for Scotland  for which the Met Office has issued a warning .

This warning alerts the public to disruption and states that 'persistent rain over northern Scotland will increasingly turn to snow over high ground during Tuesday, then perhaps to lower levels in the afternoon and evening'.

Forecasters say up to 2.8in (7cm) is expected between 100m (330ft) and 200m (650ft), and possibly 4in (10cm) above 300m (985ft). By tomorrow night, rain and snow is likely to become focused further north across Scotland.

The Met Office has issued a snow warning for tomorrow

There is also a chance of up to 2in (5cm) settling at low levels by Wednesday morning and 6in (15cm) above 300m (985ft) - which the Met Office said is most likely across Caithness, Sutherland and Ross and Cromarty.

Temperatures tomorrow are expected to get up to 13C (55F) in southern England, 12C (54F) in the North, 9C (48F) in Scotland, and 11C (52F) in Cardiff and Belfast.

The band of rain and snow is then likely to move back southwards across Scotland during Wednesday, slowly easing. It will be drier further south but staying cloudy for all, with moderate winds in England and Wales.

Forecasters expect a wet start for most places on Wednesday, with the South staying dry for some time. There will also be more widespread showers in the afternoon with a moderate breeze.

Wednesday's top temperatures are set to be 12C (54F) in southern England, 10C (50F) in the North, 8C (46F) in Scotland and 10C (50F) in Northern Ireland.

Thursday will be a wet day for the South of England, with some wintry showers in Scotland  but it will be dry elsewhere with sunny spells further North. Temperatures will be 12C (54F) in southern England, 9C (48F) in the North, 9C (48F) in Wales and 8C (46F) in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Advertisement

French winemakers lit thousands of candles in their fields to warm vines and protect them from plunging temperatures.

Vineyards across the country were hit by the freezing conditions in what is becoming a worrying weather pattern for producers around this time of year.

Chablis vineyards of northeast Burgundy have been hit by the third big frost in six years, with winemakers concerned about how the volume of production may be affected.

A wine grower lights heaters early in the morning, to protect vineyards from frost damage outside Chablis, France, yesterday as overnight frosts sweep the nation

Winegrowers warm themselves around a fire as anti-frost candles burn in a vineyard to protect blooming buds and flowers from the frost, in Chablis, Burgundy region today

A winegrower pictured today as he checks anti-frost candles that protect blooming buds and flowers from the frost, in a vineyard in Chablis, Burgundy region

Thomas Ventoura, 34, who is among the multiple winemakers who rushed out to warm his well-developed shoots with candles, said the changing weather threatens not only production but is also pushing up his insurance coverage for loss of harvest.

Chablis is a very dry white wine that is produced only in the Yonne region of Burgundy due to the area's specific climate.

But the emergence of mild weather early in the year followed by a spring frost, previously unusual, is now making the future of harvests uncertain.

Heaters are lit early in the morning to protect vineyards from frost damage outside Chablis, France, yesterday as worrying weather patterns threaten the future of production

Ice covered vineyards are seen early in the morning after water was sprayed to protect them from frost damage outside Chablis, France

Mr Ventoura said: 'Since 2016, there have been three big frosts. We're now starting to wonder about the future of our business at this time of the year.'

In Yonne, north of France, two thirds of the harvest was destroyed as a result of the frost last year, according to the farm ministry.

'There's a lot to be done in changing viticulture practices...in the context of climate change,' said Mathilde Civet, 25, a viticulture adviser to the Chambre d'Agriculture in Yonne, the local representative body for the farming sector.

A French winegrower lights anti-frost candles among vineyard fields to protect blooming buds in Chablis, Burgundy, France, today

Water is sprayed in a vineyard to protect blooming buds and flowers from the overnight frost, in Chablis, Burgundy region, pictured today

The emergence of mild weather early in the year followed by a spring frost, previously unusual, is now making the future of harvests uncertain. Pictured, vine buds near Chablis today

Winemakers were starting to join forces to invest in new tools, such as heating cables, to help mitigate the effects of such frosts, she said.

However, many in the industry are still reluctant to face up to the fact that the impact of climate change could be long lasting, Civet said.

'The recent episodes of drought and frosts have been a wake-up call for some, but in previous years there was a sort of denial.'

It comes as overnight frosts affected most of France yesterday, especially wrecking the Champagne area in the north which saw temperatures of -9C(15.8F).

Vineyards across the country were hit by the freezing conditions in what is becoming a worrying weather pattern for producers around this time of year. Pictured, a vineyard in Chablis today

Chablis vineyards (pictured today) of northeast Burgundy have been hit by the third big frost in six years, with winemakers concerned about how the volume of production may be affected

A French winegrower lights anti-frost candles among vineyards to protect blooming buds in Chablis, Burgundy in the north of France today

Heaters are lit early in the morning to protect vineyards from frost damage outside Chablis, France, yesterday. The president of the first French agricultural union FNSEA warned the frost will likely have 'very serious' consequences

Even areas further down in the south went as low as -5C(23F), with winemakers affected alongside farmers and fruit producers, The Local.fr reports.

The president of the first French agricultural union FNSEA warned the frost will likely have 'very serious' consequences.

Christiane Lambert told Le Parisien: 'It hit hard last night, the night was faithful to what Meteo France had announced, the temperature dropped to minus five.

'There are many regions affected such as Dordogne, Burgundy, Alsace, Center-Val de Loire, Lot-et-Garonne, Maine-et-Loire.'

She added state support will be needed once the extent of the damage to potential harvests becomes clear.
This is the emotional moment a British woman welcomed a Ukrainian mother and son to the UK after meeting her through Facebook.

Natalie Dyson burst into tears when she picked Krystyna Kozbar and Sasha, ten, up from the airport last Friday.

She flung her arms around the pair before taking them to her Somerset home to meet her three children.

Appearing on ITV this morning, they described the nightmare of getting the family out of the worn-torn country and into Britain.

They said the visa process had been 'very long' and 'really difficult' but added they were glad to have been placed with each other.

It comes as ministers are being urged to slash the 'needless bureaucracy' from the UK's refugee schemes for Ukrainians.

Natalie Dyson (left) picked Krystyna Kozbar (right) and Sasha, ten, up from the airport last Friday

Ms Dyson said: 'It was difficult because the form is very long, it's in English, and it's really difficult to kind of find the right match because I think it's very important to find the right match for the Ukrainian family coming over.

'And also for the person who is hosting too. But once I'd found Krystyna and chatted to her on social media there was an instant connection, and instant bond and her and Sasha would fit into our family dynamics really well.

'So having completed the visa application I think there was a wait of around five days for Krystyna's visa to come through and then another two days waiting for Sasha's visa to come through.

'So that was quite nerve racking thinking whether I'd filled the form in wrong or something.

'Then there was a slight complication that they have a little Yorkshire Terrier called Lucy so we had to wait to get the paperwork for her.'

Ms Dyson's son Oscar said: 'It feels great to have Sasha over because now I have someone to play with.

'My sisters don't really play with me that much. It's just great to be saving people from wars, it feels good.'

Ms Kozbar's translator added: 'When she posted her request on Facebook, so many people was putting themselves forward to help it overwhelmed her and she was amazed British people were ready to help her, to share her pain and offer their homes.

'When she saw Natalie's photo with kids her heart knew instantly that that was the person she can have instant connection with.'

She flung her arms around the pair before taking them to her Somerset home to meet her three children

Appearing on ITV this morning, they described the nightmare of getting the family out of the worn-torn country and into Britain

They said the visa process had been 'very long' and 'really difficult' but added they were glad to have been placed with each other

Single, older men flock online with offers to young and desperate escapees  as experts warn Whitehall scheme could be 'Tinder for sex traffickers' Scores of single, middle-aged British men are sponsoring young Ukrainian women to live with them in the UK  leading to fears that vulnerable refugees could be exploited. A senior council worker responsible for her local refugee scheme is concerned there will be 'a massive abuse case' due to a lack of safeguarding measures to protect evacuees. The whistleblower said more than one in four of the 40 matches passed from the Home Office to her local authority are between men aged over 50 and women in their twenties or early thirties. Experts have warned the British government visa scheme  in which would-be hosts are matched with Ukrainians seeking refuge  could become 'Tinder for sex traffickers'. One housing charity claimed the scheme was being exploited before it opened, with young women offered 'arrangements' in exchange for accommodation. It comes as female Ukrainian refugees described being harassed by men online after posting on Facebook groups in search of a sponsor. Last night politicians and charities urged the Government to close 'dangerous loopholes' and put proper safeguarding measures in place to prevent vulnerable refugees being exploited. On Friday the Government launched a matching scheme  linking UK sponsors with Ukrainian refugees  despite warnings that predators could exploit the initiative. But it comes two weeks after the Homes for Ukraine scheme first opened for applications, meaning thousands of refugees have already been driven to use unregulated social media groups to find a sponsor. Once Ukrainians find a British host, they can apply for a visa. This is initially processed by the Home Office and then passed to the relevant local authority, which is responsible for ensuring the accommodation is fit for purpose. But the whistleblower, who works for a council in the Midlands, said she fears the scheme could become 'a completely assisted exploitation exercise'. While she is sure the majority of people offering their homes are doing so out of kindness, she is worried a minority may have ill intentions. Advertisement

The pair got to know each other through Facebook and bonded using Google Translate and a dictation device.

But they admitted there had been trouble with the visa scheme which was 'very long' and 'really difficult'.

Ministers are being urged to cut the 'needless bureaucracy' from the UK's refugee schemes and make it easier for Ukrainians to get into the country.

Figures published on Friday showed only 4,700 visas have been granted under Homes for Ukraine, with a backlog of 27,500.

Meanwhile a separate scheme for Ukrainians with relatives in the UK has awarded 24,400 visas.

The minister in charge of the scheme vowed over the weekend visas for refugees will be processed within 48 hours.

Lord Harrington said the Government's emergency routes will soon be bringing in 15,000 evacuees a week.

The minister also confirmed so far only 'hundreds' of Ukrainians have arrived in Britain under the Homes for Ukraine scheme.

Some visa applicants fleeing the war have been waiting weeks for a response. He said: 'I want to get this process down to a reasonable amount of time.

'I am happy to say publicly that my target is 48 hours from when they download the application form to when they are given permission to travel.'

Last Wednesday he told MPs 'two or three days' would be a 'reasonable target', but at that stage did not offer an official target for processing times.

Lord Harrington applied to be a sponsor himself, offering a London flat he owns with his fiancee, the former Tory MP Jessica Lee, he told The Sunday Times.

A government-backed scheme to match Ukrainian refugees with British families who have offered to open up their homes was finally launched on Friday.

A charity oversee the pairing of evacuees with 'suitable' hosts, three weeks after Britons were first asked to volunteer their help under Homes for Ukraine.

It means UK residents who have not managed to link up with Ukrainians by informal means - such as through social media - can now apply to an officially-endorsed programme.

Shadow levelling up secretary Lisa Nandy said the government's inability to move between different schemes 'needlessly bureaucratic'.

It comes amid fears of exploitation as scores of single, middle-aged British men are sponsoring young Ukrainian women to live with them in the UK.

A senior council worker responsible for her local refugee scheme is concerned there will be 'a massive abuse case' due to a lack of safeguarding measures.

The whistleblower said more than one in four of the 40 matches passed from the Home Office to her local authority are between men aged over 50 and women in their twenties or early thirties.

Experts warn the British government visa scheme  in which would-be hosts are matched with Ukrainians seeking refuge  could become 'Tinder for sex traffickers'.

One housing charity claimed the scheme was being exploited before it opened, with young women offered 'arrangements' in exchange for accommodation.

One female Ukrainian refugees described being harassed by men online after posting on Facebook groups in search of a sponsor.

Last night politicians and charities urged the Government to close 'dangerous loopholes' and put proper safeguarding measures in place.

On Friday the Government launched a matching scheme  linking UK sponsors with Ukrainian refugees  despite warnings predators could exploit the initiative.

It comes as female Ukrainian refugees described being harassed by men online after posting on Facebook groups in search of a sponsor. Pictured: Ukrainian refugee Julia Skubenko was offered a room in exchange for marriage

But it comes two weeks after the Homes for Ukraine scheme first opened for applications, meaning thousands of refugees have already been driven to use unregulated social media groups to find a sponsor.

Once Ukrainians find a British host, they can apply for a visa.

This is initially processed by the Home Office and then passed to the relevant local authority, which is responsible for ensuring the accommodation is fit for purpose.

But the whistleblower, who works for a council in the Midlands, said she fears the scheme could become 'a completely assisted exploitation exercise'.

While she is sure the majority of people offering their homes are doing so out of kindness, she is worried a minority may have ill intentions.

The worker is concerned the results of Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks carried out on hosts will not come back before the Ukrainian refugees arrive, although Home Office sources said they would be 'expedited'.

When an evacuee arrives in this country they will probably go straight to their host's home regardless of the status of the host's official approval, meaning it is possible that safeguarding issues will not be picked up in time, the whistleblower warned.

The host, however, will not be able to claim the 350-per-month compensation until they have been vetted.

Last night politicians and charities urged the Government to close 'dangerous loopholes' and put proper safeguarding measures in place to prevent vulnerable refugees being exploited.

The worker is concerned the results of Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks carried out on hosts will not come back before the Ukrainian refugees arrive, although Home Office sources said they would be 'expedited'

I was offered a room... in exchange for marriage Julia Skubenko didn't know what to expect when she posted on a Facebook group in the desperate hope of finding a host in the UK. Sharing a picture of herself smiling, she told the group's 18,000 members she never imagined she would 'be forced to move to England.... [but] I have to start over'. The 30-year-old shared links to her social media profiles and her mobile number. Miss Skubenko, who moved to Kyiv from a poor village and started her own cleaning business, said she loves horse riding, dancing and reading, and would 'get on her feet' as quickly as possible if she found a sponsor to help her set up in the UK. But along with an outpouring of generosity, Miss Skubenko  who has now found a host  was bombarded with messages from single men offering her a room, with some asking for 'marriage'. When she told one man she was only interested in homes with women living there, he wrote: 'Too bad, we could have started a family.' Another claimed to own an oil company and a bank and offered to employ her as her 'assistant'. She said she did not believe these men were 'writing out of compassion', adding: 'I'm worried about the girls from my country.' But along with an outpouring of generosity, Miss Skubenko  who has now found a host  was bombarded with messages from single men offering her a room, with some asking for 'marriage' Advertisement

The council worker said: 'All of this has been put on local authorities to make decisions without the right frameworks. And without that safety net, I can imagine that somehow this will go wrong.

'I worry there'll be a massive abuse case that happens within my local authority and it will be us who come under fire for failing safeguarding duties, when actually we did everything we possibly could.'

The council staffer said there are an 'awful lot of very young, very beautiful girls' looking for a sponsor on platforms such as Facebook, and they are flooded with responses.

She added: 'It doesn't inspire confidence that these people are in it for the right reasons.'

Positive Action in Housing, a homelessness charity, said men had been targeting young Ukrainian women who posted on Facebook looking for information about the scheme.

One 'host' claimed to be a doctor with a 'big empty house', and offered accommodation, food, expenses and a monthly allowance as part of an 'arrangement'  a term often used to imply sexual activity.

Ukrainian evacuee, Olena, 25, found her sponsor through Facebook after posting a picture of herself along with some brief details.

While she was overwhelmed by how many generous responses she received, she was also alarmed to receive messages from single men wanting to host her.

One man wrote: 'I have a small space in my apartment... I am single and live alone. I hope it's not a problem. My apartment is small but I can help you or someone alone.'

Another said: 'I live alone in a three-bedroom, three-floor house in central London and would be happy to help you with accommodation and anything else that you will need.'

Some continued to message her even after she announced she had found a host, pressing for details of the address she would be moving to.

A search on one Facebook group showed one man, who was single and offering a room in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, had liked three posts in the group  all by women aged 23, 30 and 33.

Labour peer Baroness Kennedy of Cradley said it is 'desperately worrying' that some women have been targeted online by men who have tried to 'coerce' information from them about their location.

'It is also worrying that councils are receiving matches via the Home Office between single men over 50 and single women in their 20s,' she added.

'The Government needs to ensure there are proper safeguards in place for all the women and girls fleeing war and seeking sanctuary here.'

Robina Qureshi, director of Positive Action in Housing, said: 'So-called 'sponsors' registered with Homes for Ukraine have gone on to social media to offer shelter for sex to war refugees. We expect to see much worse in the coming weeks and months.'

Louise Calvey, from Refugee Action, said: 'We are concerned that issues with the scheme mean that it risks being a Tinder for sex traffickers.'

A government spokesman said: 'We have designed our Homes for Ukraine scheme specifically to have safeguards in place  including robust security and background checks on all sponsors.

'No visa will be issued until the Home Office has completed checks on all adults in a sponsor's household as well as on the applicants from Ukraine.

'At the time of application, local authorities are notified to begin DBS checks, which will be expedited by the Home Office, so they can arrange in-person visits.'
A trainee surgeon has been struck off after she waged a smear campaign against innocent senior colleagues when she was exposed for falsifying a major clinical study at Cambridge University.

Dr Zoe Sun, 37, accused two doctors of being sex pests and made false complaints about other colleagues after she wrongly took credit for a research project funded by pharmaceutical giants GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).

She reported the innocent medics to two police forces and, when detectives told her there was no evidence against them, instead told supervisors the pair were facing arrest as a criminal probe into her allegations was 'still ongoing'.

The research Sun took credit for later had to be reanalysed and resubmitted after it was found to contain errors.

She has now been struck off the doctors' register after a Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) hearing found her guilty of 'persistent and deliberate' dishonesty.

Dr Zoe Sun has been struck off for waging a smear campaign against innocent senior colleagues after she was exposed for falsifying a major clinical study

A misconduct panel heard the incidents began in April 2017 when Sun, who was a trainee in Vascular Surgery at Leeds Teaching Hospitals, was assigned to work at Cambridge as a Clinical Research Associate on a study called OPERA.

Sun's role within the study was to collect data from the human subjects, analyse the results and report them to a senior medic in charge of the whole project before they were to be presented to GSK.

But in September 2018, she submitted a draft manuscript of the study to the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (JASN): 'Recombinant erythropoietin reduces endothelium-mediated vasodilation in pre-dialysis patients with CKD - a prospective controlled study.'

It was submitted without permission and she had removed the names of her co-authors.

When told to withdraw the draft manuscript, Sun ignored the instruction and instead emailed a Cambridge University professor saying: 'Neither of them did a thing. GSK has seen the last version and given their permission.'

She subsequently quit Cambridge University, before lodging 'wide-ranging and inaccurate' complaints against her colleagues and wrongly claiming they had agreed to the manuscripts publication.

Sun also claimed the professor was 'not fit to be in education, research or clinical work'.

When told she was being referred to the General Medical Council (GMC) for misconduct, she then made a formal complaint against her supervisor - the Deputy Medical Director at Addenbrookes Hospital in Cambridge.

During July and August 2019, she made various report of harassment against the doctor and two other colleagues to both West Yorkshire Police and Cambridgeshire Police.

Both police forces told her they would not be pursuing her allegations due to a lack of evidence, but she instead told the GMC that two of her colleagues had 'criminal proceedings against them with a warning by the police for sexual harassment and slandering of a female trainee'.

She added: 'The investigation is ongoing and they have been issued with a warning by the police and they will be arrested if their actions continue.'

A misconduct panel heard that the incidents began in April 2017 when Sun, who was a trainee in Vascular Surgery at Leeds Teaching Hospitals, was assigned to work at Cambridge University (pictured) as a Clinical Research Associate on a study called OPERA

Sun then made an online report to Cambridgeshire Police that one of the doctors had assaulted her in the operating theatre.

She falsely claimed the doctor was 'issued with a formal warning to stop his actions and made untrue assertions about police actions against the doctors.

Jane Oldfield, counsel for GMC at the tribunal, said: 'Dr Suns repeated, varied, and far-reaching acts of dishonesty are both individually and collectively extremely serious.

'Doctors are expected to abide by research governance principles, not place important studies in jeopardy by failing to hand over data and that they will not risk the good name of a study team and institution by submitting manuscripts which are effectively unverified and incomplete.

She added: 'This represented a pattern of repeated behaviour over a period of 16 months which caused personal upset and distress to many and had the potential to result in harm to their professional reputation. It is notoriously difficult to remediate dishonesty, and to rebuild trust where relationships have been irrevocably damaged.'

One of the falsely accused doctors, a post-graduate dean at Health Education England also said: 'Dr Suns behaviour has affected me deeply on a personal level. I have never received an apology or expression of regret from Dr Sun in relation to the allegations she made against me.'

Marios Lambis, representing Sun, told the panel that the trainee medic's 'ethnic and cultural background' may have contributed to to the case.

She said Sun has 'recognised her actions and dishonesty were serious and wrong', adding it was a 'tragic story of mistakes and missed opportunities'.

Sun, meanwhile, apologised, saying: 'I misinterpreted events and perceived a conspiracy of malice against me when there was none.

'I am devastated by my actions and the pain I have caused.

But MPTS chairman Paul Curtis told the hearing that a striking off order was the most appropriate action to take.

He said: 'Dishonest actions have serious implications for a doctor and the profession as a whole. Whilst the Tribunal noted Dr Suns actions did not result in direct harm to patients, her dishonesty related to providing false statements which was particularly serious and caused distress and had significant consequences on her colleagues.

The dishonesty included false statements made to Cambridge University, to colleagues, two separate police forces and to the GMC.

Dr Sun submitted a research document which, when her results were re-analysed, they were found to be inaccurate and could be misleading.

'Doctors must be honest and trustworthy and must make sure that their conduct justifies their patients trust in them. Dr Suns dishonesty was persistent, deliberate and continued over a period of 16 months.

Whilst the Tribunal noted that Dr Sun does not present a risk to patient safety, it considered that action is necessary to maintain public confidence in the profession.

Dr Suns dishonest actions have undermined the trust the public place in the medical profession. It is mindful that patients should be able to trust the integrity of doctors, and where a doctor undermines that trust, there is a risk to public confidence in the profession.

'The nature, breadth and seriousness of her dishonesty was such that only erasure could be the appropriate and proportionate sanction.'
Shanghai health officials have defended a policy of separating babies and young children from their parents if they test positive for Covid-19, amid growing frustration at the city's brutal zero-Covid policies.

Around 25 million people in Shanghai, China's largest city and financial centre, remain locked down as authorities try to snuff out the country's most severe virus outbreak since the end of the first pandemic wave in early 2020.

Under China's unbending virus controls, anyone found positive - even if they are asymptomatic or have a mild infection - must be isolated from non-infected people.

That includes children who test positive but whose family members do not, health officials confirmed on Monday, defending a policy which has spread anxiety and outrage across the city.

'If the child is younger than seven years old, those children will receive treatment in a public health centre,' Wu Qianyu, an official from the Shanghai Municipal Health Commission, said Monday.

'For older children or teenagers... we are mainly isolating them in centralised (quarantine) places.'

Parents and guardians meanwhile have taken to social media to voice their anger at the policy.

Several children piled into a metal-barred cot are wheeled through the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Centre as they are separated from their families after having contracted Covid

Shanghai health officials have defended a policy of separating babies and young children from their parents if they test positive for Covid-19 , amid growing frustration at the city's brutal zero-Covid policies

Covid-infected children are being separated from their parents in Shanghai amid a fresh outbreak of the virus

Footage from a hospital in Shanghai shared on social media shows rows of beds containing Covid-infected kids who are being kept from their parents

Under China's unbending virus controls, anyone found positive - even if they are asymptomatic or have a mild infection - must be isolated from non-infected people. That includes children who test positive but whose family members do not, health officials confirmed on Monday, defending a policy which has spread anxiety and outrage across the city

In this photo released by China's Xinhua News Agency, people with mild and symptomatic cases of COVID-19 quarantine at the Shanghai New International Expo Center in Shanghai, Friday, April 1, 2022

Medical workers in protective suits walk at the Shanghai New International Expo Center, which has been converted to a quarantine facility for people with mild and asymptomatic cases of COVID-19

Workers and volunteers look on in a compound where residents are tested for the Covid-19 coronavirus during the second stage of a pandemic lockdown in Jing' an district in Shanghai on April 4, 2022

'Parents need to meet ''conditions'' to accompany their children? That's absurd... it should be their most basic right,' one unnamed commenter wrote on social media platform Weibo.

Unverified videos of babies and young children in state-run wards have been widely shared.

But Shanghai official Wu said the policy was integral to virus 'prevention and control work'.

'We have made it clear that children whose parents are also positive... can live in the same place as the children,' she added.

Shanghai resident Esther Zhao brought her daughter, two, to hospital with a fever on March 26 and they both tested positive for Covid three days later.

Doctors attempted to take Zhao's child away to a quarantine centre alone and threatened Zhao when she didn't comply.

After her daughter was taken to Shanghai Public Health Clinical Centre, Zhao only received one brief piece of information from doctors about her daughter despite pleas from her and her husband.

Zhao told Reuters over the weekend: 'There have been no photos at all... I'm so anxious, I have no idea what situation my daughter is in.

'The doctor said Shanghai rules is that children must be sent to designated points, adults to quarantine centres and you're not allowed to accompany the children.'

Frustration is mounting in Shanghai, which on Monday recorded 9,000 new virus cases and is the epicentre of China's outbreak.

Authorities initially promised not to lock down the whole city, instead targeting virus clusters with localised lockdowns of specific compounds or districts.

After weeks of growing case numbers, city officials last week gave a rare admission of failure of their tactics.

They introduced a two-stage lockdown, initially billed as lasting four days each to mass test both sides of the city.

Several days on, residents fear they are under a prolonged stay-at-home order by stealth, unable to exercise outside or walk dogs and with limited access to fresh food.

China's zero-Covid strategy is under extreme pressure as the virus whips across the country, with another outbreak in the northeast.

Until March, China had successfully kept the daily caseload down to double or triple digits, with harsh localised lockdowns, mass testing and travel restrictions.

On Monday the nationwide caseload topped 13,000 for a second day, as the daily infection tally hit rates unseen since mid-February 2020.

Western diplomats today expressed their concern over the policy of separating children from their parents, while requesting assurances that their ambassadors and diplomats would not be subject to such stringent controls.

In this photo released by Xinhua News Agency, a medical worker conducts antigen testing for an elder resident in Shanghai, China, on Sunday, April 3, 2022

A worker wearing protective gear sprays disinfectant over colleagues at the entrance of a neighbourhood in the Jing'an district during the second stage of a Covid-19 lockdown in Shanghai on April 2, 2022

Medical workers gather near a banner which reads 'Unite as one, resolutely win the battle against epidemic prevention and control' during a departure ceremony before leaving for Shanghai, in Jinan, east China's Shandong Province on Sunday, April 3, 2022

Diplomats from more than 30 countries have written to the Chinese foreign ministry urging authorities not to continue the brutal policy.

'We request that under no circumstances should parents and children be separated,' said a letter written by the French consulate in Shanghai that was addressed to the foreign affairs office of Shanghai on March 31.

In a separate letter to the Chinese foreign ministry dated the same day, the British embassy in Beijing said it was concerned by 'recent instances when local authorities have sought to separate minors who tested positive for COVID-19 from their parents' and requested assurances that this would not happen to diplomatic staff.

The French consulate and British embassy both said they were writing the letters on behalf of other countries, including European Union states as well as others including Norway, Switzerland, Australia and New Zealand after hearing about difficulties caused by Shanghai's lockdown, which the city started carrying out in two stages starting March 28.

Asymptomatic or mild cases should be sent to 'a specialised isolation environment with staff who can communicate in English,' said the French consulate letter, a copy of which was verified by Reuters.

Currently, asymptomatic cases are sent to centralised quarantine centres, some of which have been described as unsanitary and overcrowded.

Authorities in Shanghai are struggling to meet requirements for a lockdown on many of the city's 26 million residents - the largest such undertaking by China since the virus was first detected in the central city of Wuhan in late 2019. Those who test positive are being forced to remain in quarantine warehouses

Medical workers conduct mass testing for residents in a lockdown area in the Jingan district of western Shanghai, Monday, April 4, 2022

The British embassy said there were concerns over the conditions and lack of privacy in recently deployed mobile hospital facilities, adding that isolating in diplomatic housing was a 'preferable solution and consistent with our Vienna Convention privileges,' in the letter seen by Reuters and verified by two sources.

'The British Consulate-General in Shanghai has been raising its concerns about various aspects of the current COVID policies in relation to all British Nationals in China, with the relevant Chinese authorities,' a spokesperson for the consulate said.

The French consulate declined to comment on the letter. The Australian Consulate General in Shanghai, which was cited in the letters, also declined to comment but said it had been engaging with local authorities on the COVID-19 restrictions.

The U.S. did not appear as a signatory on either letter.

However, the U.S. Consul General in Shanghai, Jim Heller, told members of a private chat group for U.S. citizens that the consulate had been underscoring many of the concerns raised by the European letter with the Shanghai government.

A U.S. embassy spokesperson declined to comment on Heller's remarks but said that the way embassy staff were treated in the COVID pandemic was 'job one' and that the embassy was engaging on COVID-related policy with the Chinese government.

The Chinese foreign ministry did not respond to a request for comment.
Hong Kong's leader Carrie Lam attends a press conference in Hong Kong, April 4. AFP-Yonhap



Hong Kong's embattled leader Carrie Lam, who has governed the global financial hub through the unprecedented upheaval of anti-government protests and COVID-19, said on Monday she will not seek a second five-year term of office.



Lam's announcement came as media said Chief Secretary John Lee, Hong Kong's second most senior official, was set to resign to join the race to replace Lam in May as the Chinese-ruled city's next leader.



"There's only one consideration and that is family. I have told everyone before that family is my first priority," Lam told a regular press briefing.



"They think it's time for me to go home."



She declined to comment on possible candidates to replace her and said she had not decided on her future plans.



Lam, born in British-ruled Hong Kong in 1957 and a life-long civil servant who describes herself as a devout Catholic, took office in 2017 with a pledge to unite a city that was growing increasingly resentful of Beijing's tightening grip.



Two years later, millions of democracy supporters took to the streets in sometimes violent anti-government protests. The unrest led to Beijing imposing a sweeping national security law in June 2020, giving it more power than ever to shape life in Hong Kong.



An exasperated Lam said at the height of the unrest in 2019 that if she had the choice she would quit, adding in remarks to a group of business people that the chief executive "has to serve two masters by constitution, that is the central people's government and the people of Hong Kong".



"Political room for manoeuvring is very, very, very limited," she added, according to an audio recording of her comments obtained by Reuters.



Lam said on Monday she had proposed a government restructuring to mainland authorities that would include new policy departments but it would be up to the city's next leader to decide whether to go ahead with the plan.



City leaders are selected by a small election committee stacked with Beijing loyalists so whoever becomes the next leader of the former British colony will do so with Beijing's tacit approval.



Lee, 64, a security official during the prolonged and often violent 2019 pro-democracy protests, was promoted in 2021 in a move some analysts said signaled Beijing's renewed focus on security rather than the economy.



Lee did not immediately respond to a request for comment.



Other possible contenders mentioned in media include the city's financial secretary, Paul Chan, as well as former leader Leung Chun-ying. None has yet to announce a bid.



Hong Kong returned from British to Chinese rule in 1997 with the guarantee of wide-ranging freedoms, including an independent judiciary and right to public assembly, for at least 50 years.



The United States sanctioned both Lam and Lee, among other officials, in 2020, saying they had undermined Hong Kong's high degree of autonomy from Beijing and curtailed political freedoms with the national security law that punishes offences like subversion and secession with up to life imprisonment.



Chinese and Hong Kong authorities deny individual rights are being eroded and say the security law was needed to restore the stability necessary for economic success after the prolonged unrest.



The leadership election was pushed back from March to May 8 to give the government time to battle a COVID outbreak that has infected more than a million of the 7.4 million people in the city. Lam's term ends on June 30.



Since Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule it has had four chief executives, who all struggled to balance the democratic and liberal aspirations of many residents with the vision of China's Communist Party leadership. (Reuters)


A father-of-two wrongfully convicted over his pregnant girlfriend's murder was freed from prison after an eagle-eyed lawyer re-examining crime scene photos discovered key evidence had been planted.

Stacey Thorne, 34, was 22 weeks pregnant when she was found dead with 21 stab wounds on a neighbours lawn in Boddington, southeast of Perth, in 2007.

Days later, police arrested her partner Scott Austic, 45, and would allege in court he killed his partner because he did not want her to keep his baby.

Mr Austic was sentenced to life behind bars in 2009 after a jury found him guilty of murder based on key items - a blood soaked knife, cigarette pack, and Jim Beam can - officers claimed to have found near the scene.

But after spending 12 years behind bars - and missing crucial chunks of his daughters lives - he was acquitted in November 2020 after the integrity of the three pieces of evidence came into question.

Stacey Thorne (pictured) was found stabbed to death in her Boddington home, south east of Perth, in 2007

'I could feel tears running down my face hearing those two words - "not guilty",' Mr Austic told ABC's Australian Story.

On the night of Ms Thorne's death, Mr Austic went to a pub for a drink but was refused service, instead deciding to then visit his partner at her home.

'We had a chat for a bit and then we'd had sex and then a little chat again. Then I'd gone home,' Mr Austic said.

Later that night, Ms Thorne, a teacher's aide and Aboriginal Laison officer at the local primary school, was found dead near her home after staggering down the street calling for help.

Police prosecutors claimed Mr Austic returned on foot to her home some time after he first left and killed her with a 10cm folding knife.

In court, police argued three items found near the scene implicated Mr Austic in his girlfriend's murder, alleging text messages he'd sent her days earlier pleading with her not to have the baby was proof of a motive.

Scott Austic (pictured) spent 12 years in prison before being acquitted over his ex-girlfriend's murder

Police alleged Mr Austic (pictured) was motivated to kill his girlfriend because he wanted her to terminate his baby

A knife covered in Ms Thorne's blood was found in a paddock between their homes, and a Jim Beam can with Mr Austic's DNA was located near her residence.

A cigarette packet covered with Ms Thorne's blood was also found on a table at Mr Austic's house.

Mr Austic, who has always maintained his innocence, appealed his conviction in 2010 but failed.

That same year, his mother Robyn, determined to prove her son's innocence, sought the help of Dr Clint Hampson, a lawyer who specialises in forensic pathology, after meeting him at a Justice WA dinner.

She begged him to check out the case, and Dr Hampson obliged - albeit warning he was not a 'gun for hire' and would give her his honest opinion.

But just months later, the pro-bono lawyer noticed the cigarette packet was only visible in digital photos of the scene, not in video footage of the table taken a day earlier, suggesting it had been placed there at a later time.

A blood-spattered cigarette packet on a table in Mr Austic's backyard was not in the original photos taken of the area hours earlier

The concerning discovery sparked alarm bells for Dr Hampson, who soon found other inconsistencies in the police's initial case - including the details surrounding the Jim Beam can and alleged murder weapon.

Both areas where the items had been found had previously been searched by WA Police and SES specialists - but were not found until later.

In 2020, the Criminal Court of Appeal found that there was 'credible, cogent and plausible evidence' that the evidence had been planted at the scene.

Mr Austic's conviction was quashed in May - however the court found the circumstantial evidence in the case was still strong and ordered him to face a retrial.

At the trial in November that year, the defence argued the evidence had been tampered.

UK forensic pathologist Richard Shepherd testified some of Ms Thorne's wounds measured between 13cm and 15cm, which meant they were 'very unlikely' to be caused by the weapon.

He said the evidence presented in the initial case did not add up at all.

'In 40 years, I've seen many things, but I've never, ever seen such a blatant attempt to plant incriminating evidence in a case,' Dr Shepherd told Australian Story.

'I've seen evidence lost. I've seen evidence mislaid. I've seen evidence misinterpreted, but never such a blatant attempt to try to pervert the course of justice.'

A UK forensic pathologist said the alleged murder weapon, a 10cm long knife (pictured), was too short to have inflicted the wounds found on Ms Thorne

Later that year, the jury found him not guilty, and after the 12-year saga, Mr Austic was finally acquitted of Ms Thorne's murder.

Mr Austic was a long-time friend of Ms Thorne's, growing up together and attending the same school, before they began dating shortly after he broke up with his daughters' mother.

The tragedy has rocked both of the families lives as Ms Thorne's relatives continue to seek justice while Mr Austic, currently living with his mother, tries to rebuild his life and make up for lost time with his children.

Despite Mr Austic being cleared of the crime, the West Australian police have not reopened the case.

Both Mr Austic and Ms Thorne's family are fighting for police to reinvestigate the matter to look into the Noongar woman's murder.

Ms Thorne's family have now hired a private investigator to try and find answers.

'There's people out there know what happened. And we want them to just come forward  come forward and tell me what happened to my baby sister,' Stacey's older sister, Brenda Thorne, said.
Advertisement

The port city of Mariupol in Ukraine has been '90 percent destroyed' after being besieged by Russian forces, its mayor Vadym Boichenko said Monday.

'The sad news is that 90 percent of the infrastructure in the city is destroyed and 40 percent is unrecoverable,' Boichenko told a press conference. Around 130,000 people remained trapped in the city, he said.

Mariupol has been under constant Russian bombardment for more than a month, and is the site of perhaps the most egregious examples of war crimes committed by Putin's forces.

Indiscriminate bombing campaigns and ground attacks have reduced acres of the city to rubble and have likely left thousands dead, though an official civilian death toll for the city is yet to be announced.

Russia has also continued its attacks on other civilian areas over the weekend, with eight people killed and 34 wounded after shelling hit the southern Ukrainian cities of Mykolaiv and Ochakiv on Sunday, prosecutors in Kyiv said.

'The Russian armed forces attacked the cities of Ochakiv and Mykolaiv. Shelling damaged residents' homes, vehicles and civilian infrastructure,' the Ukrainian prosecutor general said in a statement today.

However, Putin's invasion suffered another devastating blow this weekend after it was revealed his force's death toll rose to 18,300 yesterday, according to Kyiv's estimates, while battling Ukrainian troops reclaimed more towns in the north.

Russia has only admitted to the deaths of 1,351 of its troops since Putin invaded on February 24, but this is a fraction of the figures estimated by Ukraine's armed forces and Western defence officials.

According to Ukrainian reports as of April 3, the Russian forces have lost over 18,000 soldiers and officers, including seven generals, 644 tanks, 1,830 armoured combat vehicles, 325 artillery systems, 105 MLR systems, 54 air defence units, 143 warplanes, 134 helicopters, 1,249 vehicles, seven warships, 76 fuel tank trucks, 89 operational and tactical-level UAVs, 24 units of special equipment, and four mobile SRBM systems.

Video footage emerged of the defenders launching a series of blistering attacks on Russian tanks and armoured vehicles.

A pair of videos released today appeared to show two Russian convoys being decimated by missiles fired by Ukrainian armed forces, who were thought to be using British-supplied Javelin anti-tank weapons.

The missiles can be seen streaking through the air over rolling fields before slamming into a set of Russian armoured vehicles trundling in single file down a slim road.

Several of the military machines erupted into flames as they were brought to a halt in the aftermath of the attack, while another video showed a huge explosion and raging fireball which came as a result of a Ukrainian strike on a Russian fuel tanker.

Ukraine's forces have taken to blitzing Russian resupply convoys in an effort to disrupt deliveries of fuel and supplies to Putin's troops on the frontline - a tactic which helped the defenders to repel repeated Russian assaults on the outskirts of Kyiv in recent weeks before Putin's troops began to retreat.

The Command of the Special Operations Forces (SSO) of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said: 'This is how soldiers of the SSO of Ukraine are fighting to bring down the enemy, by cutting off the Russian occupiers from what is needed, we are weakening their units.'

In a further blow to Putin's war, Ukrainian forces have also retaken some towns in the northern Chernihiv region, whilst Russian forces no longer occupied any areas in the Sumy region, in Ukraine's northeast. The governor of Zhytomyr also declared today that Russian troops had been expelled from the region.

'They left, leaving part of their vehicles, leaving part of their munitions,' Governor Vitaliy Bunechko said in an online post.

The port city of Mariupol in the south-east of the country has been '90 percent' destroyed after being besieged by Russian forces, its mayor Vadym Boichenko said Monday. 'The sad news is that 90 percent of the infrastructure in the city is destroyed and 40 percent is unrecoverable,' Boichenko told a press conference. Around 130,000 people remained trapped in the city, he said

Mariupol has been under constant Russian bombardment for more than a month, and is the site of perhaps the most egregious examples of war crimes committed by Putin's forces. Indiscriminate bombing campaigns and ground attacks have reduced acres of the city to rubble and have likely left thousands dead, though an official civilian death toll for the city is yet to be announced

However, Putin 's invasion suffered another devastating blow this weekend after it was revealed his force's death toll rose to 18,300 yesterday, according to Kyiv 's estimates, while battling Ukrainian troops reclaimed more towns in the north. According to Ukrainian reports as of April 3, the Russian forces have lost over 18,000 soldiers and officers, including seven generals, 644 tanks, 1,830 armoured combat vehicles (Soldiers walk amid destroyed Russian tanks in Bucha, in the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022)

Ukrainian soldiers also blitzed a Russian military convoy in an effort to disrupt deliveries of fuel and supplies to Putin's troops on the frontline, with video showing a military tanker being hit by what appears to be a rocket before bursting into flames

Video shows a convoy of Russian vehicles being blown up by Ukrainian troops in UkraineMariupol has been under constant Russian bombardment for more than a month, and is the site of perhaps the most egregious examples of war crimes committed by Putin's forces. Indiscriminate bombing campaigns and ground attacks have reduced acres of the city to rubble and have likely left thousands dead, though an official civilian death toll for the city is yet to be announced.

Russian missiles struck near the southern port of Odesa on Sunday, with Russia saying it had destroyed an oil refinery used by the Ukrainian military

Burnt cars are seen in the parking lot of the Retroville trade centre in Kyiv on Sunday following Russian bombardment

Ukrainian firefighters work at a scene of a destroyed building after shelling in Odesa on Sunday

Russia is continuing to build up both its soldiers and mercenaries from the notorious Wagner Group, a private military company known as 'Putin's private army', in eastern Ukraine, British intelligence chiefs said.

Across the country, Ukrainian forces are also preparing for what its general staff said were about 60,000 Russian reservists called in to reinforce the offensive there.

'Russian forces are continuing to consolidate and reorganize as they refocus their offensive into the Donbas region in the east of Ukraine,' Britain's Ministry of Defence said in an intelligence briefing today.

It said Russian troops are being moved into the area, along with mercenaries from the Wagner private military group. Moscow says it is currently focusing its offensive on the Donbas, where Russian-backed separatists have been fighting Ukrainian forces for years.

Meanwhile Russian shelling hit the eastern city of Kharkiv on Sunday, killing at least seven people and wounding 34, including three children, local prosecutors said.

Missiles also struck near the southern port of Odesa, with Russia saying it had destroyed an oil refinery used by the Ukrainian military. The Odesa city council said 'critical infrastructure facilities' were hit.

Serhiy Gaidai, the governor of eastern Luhansk region, said Russia was building up forces to break through Ukrainian defences.

'I am urging residents to evacuate. The enemy will not stop, it will destroy everything in its path,' he said in comments carried on Ukrainian television.

Overnight, the UK said Russia was still trying to take the southern port city of Mariupol, which has seen weeks of intense fighting.

Intelligence chiefs said 'the city continues to be subject to intense, indiscriminate strikes, but Ukrainian Forces maintain a staunch resistance, retaining control in central areas.'

'Mariupol is almost certainly a key objective of the Russian invasion,' the MoD said, 'as it will secure a land corridor from Russia to the occupied territory of Crimea,' in the south, which Moscow annexed in 2014.

Ukraine says it has evacuated thousands of civilians in recent days from the port city of Mariupol, which has been decimated from a siege and bombardment over a month, with only the skeletons of residential tower blocks remaining on some streets after the shelling.

Convoys of armoured vehicles belonging to pro-Russia forces have been seen near Mariupol.

Valentina Trubnikov rests in a shelter for displaced people after having to flee her hometown of Mariupol on Monday

A view shows buildings damaged in Mariupol in the course of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in the southern city of Mariupol

Local residents walk along a street next to a building damaged during Russia's invasion of Ukraine on Sunday

Communal workers carry body bags in the town of Bucha, not far from the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Sunday, after 410 civilian bodies were found there

The wreckage of vehicles is seen at the military airport in the town of Hostomel, on the outskirts of Kyiv, after the Ukrainian army secured the area following the withdrawal of the Russian army from the Kyiv region on Sunday

Larisa Savenko 72, stands outside her damaged home with Andriy Leshbon in war torn Bucha, Ukraine where destroyed Russian tanks, armored vehicles and other equipment litter the road on Sunday

A woman is overcome with emotion as a train leaves the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, in the Donbas region on Sunday

Soldiers carry the coffin of 41-year-old soldier Simakov Oleksandr, during his funeral ceremony, after he was killed in action, at the Lychakiv cemetery, in Lviv, western Ukraine on Monday

Ukraine evacuated more than 2,600 people from Mariupol and the region of Luhansk on Sunday, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.

But a Red Cross team were not able to reach the besieged city on Monday to evacuate civilians, a spokesperson said, citing security conditions.

'Due to security conditions, our team has not been able to reach Mariupol today,' spokesperson Jason Straziuso said in emailed comments to Reuters.

Previous attempts by the Red Cross to reach the city over recent days and weeks have not succeeded. Russia has blamed the charity for the delays.

Battling Ukrainian forces have also retaken some towns in the Chernihiv region, with the road between the city of Chernihiv and the capital Kyiv said to be reopening to some traffic later today, news agency RBK Ukraina reported.

Chernihiv has been cut off from from shipments of food and other supplies for weeks. The mayor said Sunday that relentless Russian shelling had destroyed 70 per cent of the city.

Russian forces also no longer occupy any towns or villages in the Sumy region and had mostly withdrawn, while Ukrainian troops were working to push out the remaining units, the regional governor said today. The troops had occupied the area for nearly a month.

Speaking on national television, Governor Dmytro Zhyvytskyi said Russian troops had abandoned a lot of equipment in the region, which lies on Ukraine's border with Belarus.

While Western officials initially said they believed Putin's goal was to take Kyiv and potentially install a Kremlin-friendly government, Russian forces faced stiff resistance outside the capital and on other fronts, and have now retreated from some areas.

In some areas recently retaken from Russian troops, Ukrainian officials say they have recovered hundreds of slain civilians in the past few days.

Ukraine's prosecutor-general says the bodies of 410 civilians, many with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture, have been recovered from towns surrounding Kyiv.

In Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, Associated Press journalists saw 21 bodies. One group of nine, all in civilian clothes, were scattered around a site that residents said Russian troops used as a base. They appeared to have been shot at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs.

In Motyzhyn, to the west of Kyiv, AP journalists saw the bodies of four people who appeared to have been shot at close range and thrown into a pit. Residents said the mayor, her son, and her husband - who had been bound and blindfolded - were among them.

A view of the mass grave discovered close to a church in Bucha, which was uncovered by Ukrainian forces as Russian troops withdrew from the area around the capital

Soldiers prepare to place the Ukrainian flag on the coffin of 41-year-old soldier Simakov Oleksandr, during his funeral ceremony in Lviv on Monday

The family of 41-year-old soldier Simakov Oleksandr, pray in front of his grave, during his funeral ceremony, after he was killed in action, at the Lychakiv cemetery, in Lviv, on Monday

Women mourn during the funeral of 44-year-old soldier Tereshko Volodymyr, and 41-year-old soldier Simakov Oleksandr, who were killed in action, at the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul Church in Lviv on Monday

A collapsed bridge is seen in the town of Irpin, on the outskirts of Kyiv, after the Ukrainian army secured the area on Sunday

A view of devastation in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol under the control of Russian military and pro-Russian separatists on Monday

Ukrainian soldier inspects the wreckage of a destroyed Russian armored column on a road in Bucha, a suburb just north of the Capital, Kyiv, on Sunday

In a video address Sunday, Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denounced the alleged targeted killings of civilians in towns that the Russians occupied, calling the killers 'freaks who do not know how to do otherwise.'

He warns that more atrocities may be revealed if Russian forces are driven out of other occupied areas.

International leaders have condemned the reported attacks in the Kyiv-area towns after harrowing accounts from civilians and graphic images of bodies with hands tied behind their backs.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov rejected the allegations, describing the scenes outside Kyiv as a 'stage-managed anti-Russian provocation.' He said the mayor of Bucha made no mention of atrocities a day after Russian troops left last week, but two days later scores of bodies were photographed scattered in the streets.

He said Russia is pushing for an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council to discuss the matter, but the UK, which currently chairs the body, has refused to convene it. The United States and Britain have accused Russia in recent weeks of using Security Council meetings to spread disinformation.

European leaders, meanwhile, left no doubt about who they thought was behind the killings.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said 'the Russian authorities are responsible for these atrocities, committed while they had effective control of the area.'

'The perpetrators of war crimes and other serious violations as well as the responsible government officials and military leaders will be held accountable,' he added.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Monday that there is 'clear evidence of war crimes' in Bucha that demand new measures. 'I'm in favor of a new round of sanctions and in particular on coal and petrol. We need to act,' he said on France-Inter radio.
A Seattle museum will host a drag camp for kids as young as 12 with camp-goers taught 'hair and makeup techniques'.

Led by local drag artist Joshua Hancock, 'Summer Camp: the Art of Drag' has run for the past two summers at the West Coast city's Museum of Pop Culture (MoPOP).

Formerly known as EMP (the Experience Music Project), MoPOP is famous for having the world's largest memorabilia collections on Seattle musicians Jimi Hendrix and Nirvana - and a Sky Church venue in the shape of one of Hendrix's guitars.

Seattle performer Joshua Hancock is leading summer camp 'the Art of Drag' at MoPOP, Seattle

The 'Art of Drag' camp description states: 'Calling all current and future kings and queens! Explore self-expression in MoPOP's week-long, drag-tastic summer camp!

'Led by Seattle performer Joshua Hancock, you'll investigate drag history and work together with local artists to create your own personas.

'You'll choose your name, explore hair and makeup techniques, and develop your character's stage presence.

'At the end of the week, celebrate your new drag personas with a private showcase!'

The event is open to 'Youth of all gender expressions and identities'.

Hancock also ran last year's activities.

'Summer Camp: the Art of Drag' runs from August 18-22 and costs $370 if you register before May 31, or $400 after that.

A spokesperson for MoPOP told Fox News: 'We are proud to offer an opportunity for young people to use drag to explore self-expression through creating characters and performances that express and uplift their unique identities.'

MoPOP sits above the Seattle Monorail, a mile-long raised rail track in the Washington city

MoPOP (left), which lies beneath the Space Needle, hosted camp 'the Art of Drag' in June 2021

Created by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, MoPOP is one of Seattle's best loved museums

According to MoPOP's website, Hancock has been working in drag, burlesque and theatre for 30 years.

It states: 'He believes drag is for everyone, it is more than one thing, and can be used to heal and to bring joy, sadness, and love to people.

'He has a Master of Arts from Texas Womans University in Theatre, and has worked in Ireland, Canada, Mexico, Czech Republic, and coast to coast in the United States.

'Joshua bases his drag character Parton, on none other than Dolly Parton, and uses Partons voice to spread love and open minds.'
Energy bills will continue to rise for at least the next four years, a group of leading economists warned today.

The Centre for Economics and Business Research has predicted that household finances will be strangled until 2026 in more grim news for millions of Britons who face a 'tsunami' of more expensive bills.

Douglas McWilliams, deputy chairman of the Cebr, said: 'People can put up with high costs if only for a short period, but what our model suggests is, unless the Ukraine situation resolves itself, prices are likely to be high but falling for three or four years.'

Mr McWilliams believe that it will not change at all until Britain gets a grip on its energy security, particularly for gas.

'It is a tough scenario for people to live with,' he told the Daily Telegraph, adding: 'They are going to have to get used to higher prices. They are going to have to learn to economise.'

The Cepr believes that a therm of gas, that spiked at 800p after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, will drop to an average of 180p by the end of the year. It will then drop to 160p in 2023 and 2024, down 10p to 150p in 2025 and then down to 118p in 2026.

Households' sky-high energy costs could reach nearly 400 for gas and electricity in a single month next winter, experts have warned.

The Centre for Economics and Business Research has predicted that gas prices per therm (pictured) will drop in the next four years but remain exceptionally high

The price cap for a duel is now at just under 2,000 - up 700 since October. Some experts predict another 600 could be added next October

Around 22million homes saw their gas and electricity bills increase by 54 per cent as the new price cap came into force last week.

Price of dairy products set to SOAR: Four pints of milk to increase by 50% from 1.15 to 1.70 while pack of butter will rise from 1.55 to 2 The price of milk is to rise by 50 per cent and butter by 30 per cent amid a worsening cost of living crisis, it has been claimed. Industry bosses fear that surging costs from feed, fertiliser and fuel will cause an increase in prices not seen in decades. It comes as dairy farmers flew into Brussels last week for crisis talks over soaring costs and supply chain disruption. The cost of four pints of milk will rise from around 1.15 to between 1.60 and 1.70, according to the UK's leading adviser to dairy farmers Kite Consulting. Meanwhile a typical pack of butter could increase from 1.55 to more than 2. The war in Ukraine is also said to be impacting prices. Michael Oakes, the dairy board chair of the National Farmers' Union, told the Daily Telegraph: 'I was paying about 7,000 for an artic [articulated lorry] load of fertiliser, and this year it's 28,000. 'It would have been a little bit less before Ukraine happened, but it made another big jump because we'd already seen higher gas prices, which have implications for fertiliser costs.' UK dairy bosses have raised concerns over their costs to the Government but the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) is said to be only in 'listening mode'. Advertisement

The rise, which came as temperatures fell below freezing again, will add nearly 700 to the average annual bill as the nation battles a cost of living crisis.

But many customers say suppliers have hiked their direct debit payments by even more than this  with some demands doubling.

Government economists have forecast that the Ukraine crisis and soaring cost of wholesale energy means the price cap will have to rise another 42 per cent in October to reach 2,800 for the average household.

It means those living solely off the state pension could see their income obliterated by heating costs.

Comparison site The Energy Shop said heating and powering the average home will cost 1,859 between October and March  peaking at 395 in January when temperatures hit their lowest.

Several supplier websites crashed on Thursday as customers rushed to submit meter readings before prices rocketed.

The price cap stood at 1,138 for the average family last year but was lifted to 1,277 in October.

If it is hiked again to 2,800 in October, as predicted by the Office for Budget Responsibility last week, older households will be forced to put most of their state pension towards heating.

Onshore wind farms will not be forced on rural areas in England despite a drive to expand domestic energy generation, the Government has said.

Ministers are leaving the door open to relaxing planning laws that have largely prevented their development since 2015  but communities must consent to them.

It means new sites will likely be confined to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, where planning rules are less restrictive.

Boris Johnson also wants more offshore wind and is said to have called for a 'colossal wind farm you can float out into the middle of the Irish Sea'.

The Prime Minister is expected to finally unveil his delayed energy security strategy on Thursday after weeks of wrangling over the cost of a massive push for nuclear.

Up to seven new nuclear power stations could be built by 2050 as part of the Government's ambition to reduce Britain's reliance on the international energy market following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng said the UK should 'aspire' to nuclear making up a quarter of the energy generation mix.

'But obviously, you're not going to suddenly have six new nuclear stations in the first three years.

'I mean, it's physically impossible to do that,' he told the Sunday Telegraph.

A record rise in energy bills kicks off a year of economic pain for millions

The OBR has warned that families face the worst squeeze on living standards since records began in the 1950s this year

Eco-mob block oil depot for FOURTH day in row: Extinction Rebellion set up bamboo barricades outside Esso site near Heathrow A group of 30 environmental activists blockade the Esso West London Oil Terminal near Heathrow Airport this morning Environmental protesters from Extinction Rebellion and Just Stop Oil caused mayhem for the fourth day in a row this morning as a group of 30 blockaded an oil terminal in London with two bamboo structures. The demonstrators gathered outside the Esso West London Oil Terminal near Heathrow Airport from the early hours of today as they continued to urge the Government to 'stop all new fossil fuel investments immediately'. The activists, who first gathered at 4am, used two large banners which said 'Stop Fossil Fuels Now' and 'Join Us: London 9th April' - the latter referring to their planned protests starting at London's Hyde Park from this Saturday. Activists have been blocking access to oil terminals over the last three days in the likes of London, Birmingham, Southampton, Grays in Essex and Tamworth in Staffordshire - with more than 200 people arrested so far. It comes as UK motorists continue to suffer at the pumps with petrol prices hitting record levels in recent weeks after Brent crude oil hit a high of $128 last month - up from lows of $19 seen at the peak of the pandemic. Warwickshire Police said the force has so far made 54 arrests for offences including criminal damage, obstructing the highway and public order in relation to a protest at Kingsbury Oil Terminal near Tamworth. In Essex, officers arrested 155 people following protests in the Thurrock district around Grays and Purfleet. The force said 63 arrests were made on Friday, 57 on Saturday and a further 35 yesterday, for a variety of offences. Advertisement

Ministers will also launch a development vehicle called Great British Nuclear to identify potential sites, cut through planning red tape and raise private finance for developments.

And Mr Kwarteng said onshore wind and fracking could form part of the energy mix as long as there is 'community consent'.

He added: 'We don't live in a totalitarian country where the Government, the man or woman in Whitehall, can say 'right, we're going to do this', without some large measure of consent from local communities.

'And in both of those technologies, frankly, there has been considerable local opposition. That doesn't mean to say we're shutting the door on both, but it does mean that any movement has to have a large measure of local consent.'

But his Cabinet colleague Grant Shapps yesterday called onshore wind turbines an 'eyesore' and said he does not want to see a flurry of new ones.

The Transport Secretary told Sky's Sophy Ridge on Sunday programme: 'I don't favour a vast increase in onshore wind farms, for pretty obvious reasons  they sit on the hills there and can create something of an eyesore for communities as well as actual problems of noise.

'So I think for reasons of environmental protection, the way to go with this is largely, not entirely, but largely off-sea.'

He suggested nuclear and offshore wind would be more prominent in the energy strategy, adding: 'I don't think you want a huge expansion of onshore wind.' But Labour's business spokesman Jonathan Reynolds told LBC radio: 'I would have no objection at all to living close to an onshore wind farm.'

Sources said last night that ministers had not yet finalised the strategy but that would be done early this week.

A Government spokesman said: 'Next week we will set out an ambitious plan to supercharge our use of a diverse range of renewables, including offshore wind, solar and hydrogen, all underpinned by nuclear and continued support for our North Sea oil and gas sector. Any decisions on onshore wind will always be subject to consent from local communities.'

Labour was yesterday forced into a rapid U-turn after suggesting Britain should look at rationing energy supplies.

The party's business spokesman Jonathan Reynolds said ministers should be making plans to ration oil and gas in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. But he quickly reversed his position and admitted rationing energy would be a 'disaster'.

Mr Reynolds initially told BBC 1's Sunday Morning programme: 'We should be making those plans and the Government should be preparing for that situation.

'There's a lot of complacency in this country about the relative lower exposure to Russian gas that we have. But we should bear in mind that part of the supply that comes to this country from, for instance, Norway or from the liquefied natural gas that goes into the terminals and wells, that is partly because Russian gas is fulfilling the demands of central Europe.

'I think what the Government should announce is a plan which is not simply shopping from one authoritarian regime to the next for fossil fuels, but that long-term plan that would make the difference.'

But he swiftly carried out a U-turn, telling Times Radio an hour later that rationing energy 'would be a disaster for households and for businesses'.

He then told LBC that Labour believes 'a successful plan would absolutely mean we did not have to consider' rationing energy. He said: 'We should be making plans to make sure our energy supplies are secure, consistent with net-zero and delivered at the best possible price.

'And what we have put forward would do that, but what the Government are yet to tell us is their plan to do that.'

Some European countries are considering rationing power after Russia demanded they pay for fuel with roubles or risk losing their supply. But Transport Secretary Grant Shapps ruled out such a move in Britain, telling the BBC: 'It is not the route that we want to go down.'

Yesterday Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the rouble payment scheme for natural gas was a prototype that will be extended to other major exports.
Baby's P cancer-stricken grandmother has revealed her dying wish is for her daughter to stay locked up in prison for life over the toddler's death.

Mary O'Connor, 72, said her daughter Tracey Connelly 'should not be (allowed) out (of prison)', despite the Parole Board's decision to grant her freedom within weeks.

It comes as it was claimed Connelly is 'paranoid' she will be 'knifed' by her fellow inmates after a Parole Board agreed to free her within weeks.

The 40-year-old is said to be 'afraid' to venture out of her cell after the Parole Board's decision cast a fresh spotlight on the horrific case of her baby son's death.

Connelly was jailed in 2008 for the death of her son Peter Connelly, the 17-month-old, who came to be known in reports as Baby P.

He was found dead in his home in north London in August 2007 after having sustained 50 injuries, including a snapped spine and eight broken ribs, over the course of eight months.

That was despite being on the at-risk register and receiving 60 visits from social workers in Haringey Council, police and health professionals over the final eight months of his life.

Also found guilty at the hands of his death were Connelly's lover, Steven Barker and his brother Jason Owen.

Connelly had been imprisoned indefinitely with a minimum term of five years in 2009 for causing or allowing her son's death.

She was released in 2013 but recalled in 2015 for breaching her life licence. She is currently serving in a prison in the north-west of England.

But last week, more than seven years after she was recalled to jail, the board found she does not pose a risk to the public, and could therefore be free within weeks.

Tracey Connelly (pictured), 40, is said to be 'afraid' to venture out of her cell after the Parole Board's decision cast a fresh spotlight on the horrific case of her baby son's death.

Connelly was jailed in 2008 for the death of her son Peter Connelly (pictured), the 17-month-old, who came to be known in reports as Baby P

Connelly's mother Mary O'Connor today said her daughter will 'not have changed' and urged that she remains behind bars.

The 72-year-old, who is suffering from cancer, told The Sun: 'She needs to be in jail for life, she shouldn't be out.

'She won't have changed. To let her out for what she did? You have to be joking.'

Justice Secretary Dominic Raab is now the only person who can stop her release, by launching an appeal against the Parole Board's decision.

Speaking about the possibility of an appeal, Ms O'Connor, of North London, told the paper: 'I'd love to go up to him and say, "Don't let her out'. She's a b****. Peter died because of her.'

It comes after it was claimed that Connelly is 'paranoid' that she will be attacked by inmates following the Parole Board's decision to set her free.

A source told the Mirror: 'The publicity around her parole has provoked renewed anger towards her in the prison.

'She is a marked woman again after keeping her head down for years. Tracey believes she will be knifed and is almost afraid to venture out of her cell.'

But a former prisoner who served time with Connelly HMP Low Newton in Durham City today said no one could ever get close enough to harm her.

Julie McAllister, who spent time with Connelly in prison, said her claims of fear are an attempt to get a new identity after her release.

The 44-year-old, from Newcastle, also revealed how she struggled to control her own rage when she watched Connelly laugh and joke during a prison reading group session.

Ms McAllister, from Kenton, said: 'It's absolute rubbish that people would try to attack her. No one would get a chance. She's a very manipulative woman.

'There's no chance of anybody being able to get to her. She's very manipulative, and that's what she's doing now.'

Ms McAllister says Connelly and other women convicted of serious crimes against children are kept segregated in a different ring from other inmates at HMP Low Newton.

And she says it is a constant source of anger that the most evil prisoners live in the best conditions.

Ms McAllister (pictured) says Connelly and other women convicted of serious crimes against children are kept segregated in a different ring from other inmates at HMP Low Newton

'You never even see them,' she said. 'She's in F-Wing, it's self-contained flats. They are all in for murders or harming children. One left her baby to die.

'People talk about them, but no one can get near them. They get the best conditions, but they have committed the worst crimes. They have their own flats with showers and carpets. If you kill kids you are laughing it seems.'

Ms McAllister, who once punched serial child killer Rose West in the face in the prison's dining hall, was released from her most recent sentence at Low Newton just two weeks ago.

During a previous spell in jail she once came face-to-face with Connelly when they both joined the prison's reading group.

And she describes how she and other inmates watched in anger as controlling Connelly laughed and joked and shouted orders at others.

'She's an evil woman. I'm a mam myself and to think of what she's done is horrific,' said Ms McAllister.

She said: 'I have seen how she manipulates people. I signed up for a reading group and she decided to come. She's fat with thick hair, she's very very loud and very manipulative.

Connelly's parole hearing - her fourth since being recalled to prison - took place on March 15 and 16 via video. The Parole Board approved her release and it is thought she will be freed in the coming weeks

'She was dictating to other prisoners. She would just look at a book and say 'get me that book'. She was treating people like puppets.

'She was laughing her head off and I just thought; 'How can you have done something like that to a baby and be laughing?'

'If I had ever hurt a baby I wouldn't be able to laugh for the rest of my life. Seeing her laughing just made me mad. I had to stop myself from jumping over the table.'

'But you have to be nice to her in prison because you don't want to lose your privileges.'

Baby P's death and the missed opportunities to prevent it left the nation horrified.

Despite 60 visits, social workers never attempted to remove Peter from his mother's care.

Connelly was convicted of causing or allowing the death of Peter in 2009 and handed an indefinite prison sentence with a minimum of five years.

She was released in 2013, but recalled to jail in 2015 after breaching the terms of her licence by selling naked pictures of herself.

Connelly's parole hearing - her fourth since being recalled to prison - took place on March 15 and 16 via video.

The Parole Board approved her release and it is thought she will be freed in the coming weeks.

A report on the parole hearing said: 'At the time of her offending, risk factors had included Ms Connelly not managing certain aspects of her personality, entering into relationships quickly, prioritising those relationships above anything else, thinking about sex a lot and using sex to help her feel better about herself.

'The panel also considered risk factors to include Ms Connelly's inability to control extreme emotions, her way of life, her decision making, her low self-esteem, manipulative behaviour, dishonesty, a lack of victim empathy and her difficulties in coping with feelings of anger.'

The report concluded: 'After considering the circumstances of her offending and time on licence, progress made in custody, evidence presented at the hearing and the recommendations of witnesses, the panel was satisfied Ms Connelly was suitable for release.'

Connelly's partner Steven Barker, who was cleared of murder but convicted of causing Baby P's death, is still serving a life term.

His brother, Jason Owen got a minimum three years but returned to jail briefly in 2013 after a parole breach. He is believed to be living under a new identity.
A pregnant woman who was suffering from an extreme morning sickness condition, also suffered by Kate Middleton, was sacked from her job at a Glasgow firm.

The worker was dismissed from her job at Home Appliance Engineers in August 2021 after calling in sick to work, an employment tribunal heard.

The manager claimed to not know of the worker's pregnancy at the time of her dismissal, however the hearing ruled in her favour, awarding her 6,479.30 in compensation.

The employee had learnt of her pregnancy in July 2021, and informed her manager, Syma Iqbal, on August 16.

A pregnant woman was sacked from her job (pictured) while suffering from a version of extreme morning sickness, her employer claimed to be unaware but was ordered to pay 6,479.30 in compensation

Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton, famously suffered from extreme morning sickness during her pregnancies, to the point she even went to hospital when pregnant with Prince George (pictured: pregnant with Prince Louis in 2018)

The hearing statement reads: 'The claimant had booked a holiday to get a tattoo but was unable to do so because of her pregnancy.

'Ms Iqbal asked the claimant on 16 August 2021 to see the tattoo and the claimant explained that she had not gone ahead with this because she was pregnant.

'Ms Iqbal congratulated the claimant and asked if her family was pleased with the news.'

What is hyperemesis gravidarum? Extreme nausea and vomiting while pregnant could be a sign of hyperemesis gravidarum Hyperemesis gravidarum (HG) is excessive nausea and vomiting in pregnancy. Sickness in pregnancy is common, around 8 out of every 10 pregnant women feel or are sick during pregnancy. Many women feel sick during pregnancy, but for most this improves or stops completely by around weeks 16 to 20. If it continues and is very severe, it may be HG. Exactly how many pregnant women get HG is not known, but it's thought to be around 1 to 3 in every 100. Unlike regular pregnancy sickness, HG may not get better by 16 to 20 weeks or even until the baby is born. It's not known what causes HG, or why some women get it and others do not. Some experts believe it is linked to the changing hormones in your body that occur during pregnancy. Advertisement

It was then confirmed that Ms Iqbal was shown a scan of the baby two days later on August 18.

Texts were sent by the worker and her mother on August 23 and 24 stating she was unable to work as she 'cannot stop being sick and cannot even keep water down', with the text adding 'as you already know she [a reference to the Claimant] is expecting'.

It was later confirmed by a doctor that the woman was suffering from hyperemesis gravidarum (HG) - a condition that causes severe vomiting while pregnant.

While sickness during pregnancy is common, HG is much less so - it did famously affect the Duchess of Cambridge with all of her pregnancies.

She was provided with certificates from her doctor confirming she was unfit for work from August 26 to November 26.

On August 24, Ms Iqbal sent a text to the worker telling her 'I would need to let you go' because there was not enough work for two people and that the claimant was not 'very reliable'.'

When the worker argued she was being unfairly dismissed due to her sickness, Ms Iqbal responded: 'Am not sacking you because your (sic) pregnant my dad has every right to know. The reason is that ur (sic) not reliable turning up to work and there not enough work for 2 people working at my office so please don't take this out of context'.

The company argued she was fired due to 'a lack of work and the claimant's alleged unreliability' regarding her timekeeping and attendance.

In their decision to rule in favour of the worker, the tribunal said she was 'unfairly dismissed' and 'discriminated against'.

It continued: 'It was clear from the evidence that it was the claimant's absences on 23 and 24 August 2021 which triggered Ms Iqbal's decision to dismiss.

'There was no evidence to suggest that the claimant's employment was in jeopardy prior to this and the immediate proximity of those absences to when the decision to dismiss was made leads the Tribunal to conclude that, on the balance of probabilities, it was these absences which were the operative cause of the decision to dismiss the claimant and she would not have been dismissed if she had not been absent on those dates.

'The Tribunal concludes that those absences were as a result of a pregnancy related illness.'

The 6,479.30 awarded to the claimant includes compensation for loss of earnings and injury to feelings.
The trial of an alleged Islamist terrorist accused of murdering Tory MP Sir David Amess was today halted again after the judge tested positive for Covid.

The defence case for Ali Harbi Ali had been due to start today at the Old Bailey, having previously been delayed for a week when three jurors tested positive.

But it was put back for a second time this morning after Mr Justice Sweeney came down with Covid, though he is symptomless.

The trial of Ali Harbi Ali (pictured in court sketch), an alleged terrorist accused of murdering MP Sir David Amess, has been halted again after the judge tested positive for Covid

Addressing jurors during a five-minute hearing, the Recorder of London, Judge Mark Lucraft, said: 'The eagle-eyed amongst you will have spotted that I'm not Mr Justice Sweeney.

'I'm sorry to say he tested positive for Covid at the weekend. He has no symptoms.'

One juror continues to test positive for Covid, the judge said.

The trial is listed to resume on Thursday.

Ali, 26, is accused of stabbing 69-year-old Sir David, the MP for Southend West, to death during a constituency surgery in Leigh-on-Sea on October 15 last year.

The defendant, from Kentish Town, north London, denies murder and preparing acts of terrorism.
Kinder Surprise eggs have been recalled by the chocolate giant Ferrero over a 'potential link to Salmonella' after 63 people who were mostly young children fell ill.

The Food Standards Agency advised consumers not to eat the Kinder Surprise egg with best before dates between 11 July 2022 and 7 October 2022 after investigators found a link between the popular children's treat and reported cases of salmonella poisoning across the UK.

More cases have reportedly been recorded in Europe, including Ireland, France, Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands.

No deaths have been reported in the UK but around 77 per cent of the cases involve children aged five and under.

Inspections, led by the UK Health Security Agency, Public Health Scotland, Public Health Wales and Public Health Agency Northern Ireland found 'a number of these cases have been young children.'

The products affected are the 20g eggs or the three-pack of eggs and were manufactured in Belgium.

Salmonella is a bacterial disease that infects the gut and can cause gastroenteritis. Symptoms include diarrhea, stomach cramps and sometimes vomiting and fever.

It takes on average between 12 and 72 hours for the symptoms to develop after swallowing an infectious dose of salmonella. Symptoms usually last for four to seven days and most people recover without treatment.

Kinder Surprise eggs have been recalled by the chocolate giant Ferrero over a 'potential link to Salmonella' after 63 people who were mostly young children fell ill, the FDA has found (file image)

The Food Standards Agency advised consumers not to eat certain Kinder products with best before dates between 11 July 2022 and 7 October 2022 after investigators found a link between the popular children's treat and reported cases of salmonella poisoning across the UK (file image)

Ferrero has recalled selected batches of Kinder Surprise eggs because of the possible presence of salmonella.



If you have bought the below product, do not eat it. Instead, please contact Ferrero to obtain a full refund.



Read more: https://t.co/DKq1817qze https://t.co/wd2yNtOtac pic.twitter.com/j5ZmHUZZPP  UK Health Security Agency (@UKHSA) April 4, 2022

As a precautionary measure, Ferrero has recalled the products and people are being advised not to eat them.

Anyone who has bought products with those use-by dates can contact the Ferrero consumer careline on consumers.uk@ferrero.com or 0330 053 8943 to obtain a full refund.

The FSA said the eggs have all been manufactured at the same factory. Other Ferrero products are not thought to be affected.

Tina Potter, FSA head of incidents, said: 'We welcome the precautionary approach being taken by Ferrero and are advising consumers not to eat any of the products listed in the FSA alert.

'It is really important that consumers follow this advice to avoid the risk of becoming ill with salmonella poisoning.

'We know that these particular products are popular with young children, especially as Easter approaches, so we would urge parents and guardians of children to check if any products already in their home are affected by this recall.

Chocolate firm Ferrero is recalling some batches of Kinder Surprise eggs due to a link with salmonella (Centres for Disease Control and Prevention/PA)

Salmonella: A bacteria that can cause diarrhea, stomach cramps and fever Salmonella are a group of bacteria that infect the gut. They live in animal and human intestines and are shed through feces. Humans become infected most frequently through contaminated water or food. Contamination is possible if raw and cooked foods are stored together. Symptoms of salmonella infections include diarrhea, stomach cramps and sometimes vomiting and fever. On average, it takes from 12 to 72 hours for the symptoms to develop after swallowing an infectious dose of salmonella. They usually last for four to seven days and most people recover without treatment. But if you become seriously ill, you may need hospital care because the dehydration caused by the illness can be life-threatening. Source: NHS Choices Advertisement

'The food business involved has voluntarily carried out this product withdrawal and recall and we are working closely with them and their competent authorities to identify the precise cause of this outbreak.'

Dr Lesley Larkin, a surveillance lead at the UKHSA, said: 'Anybody with concerns that they have symptoms of salmonellosis should contact their GP or call NHS 111.

'Salmonella can be spread from person to person, so anyone affected should adhere to good hygiene practice such as washing hands thoroughly after using the bathroom and avoiding handling food for others where possible, if you have symptoms.'

In a statement, Ferrero told MailOnline: 'Ferrero is co-operating with the UK Food Standards Agency and the Food Safety Authority of Ireland on a possible link to a number of reported cases of salmonella.

'Although none of our Kinder products released to market have tested positive for salmonella, and we have received no consumer complaints, we are taking this extremely seriously as consumer care is our top priority.

'As a precaution, we have taken the decision to voluntarily recall Kinder Surprise 20g and Kinder Surprise 20g x 3 pack in the UK and Ireland with Best Before Dates between 11th July 2022 and 7th October 2022. These products are manufactured in Belgium.

'We are working with retailers to ensure that these products are no longer available for purchase. If you have one of the products, you are advised not to consume it. Please keep the product and contact our consumer care team on consumers.uk@ferrero.com or 0330 053 8943 UK or +44 (0)330 053 8943 Ireland.

'We take matters of food safety extremely seriously and we sincerely apologise for this matter.'
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said he wants Russian mothers to see the bodies of civilians slaughtered in Ukraine at the hands of their sons.

In a solemn presidential address published on his official Telegram channel last night, a visibly upset Zelensky spoke about the mass graves discovered on the outskirts of Kyiv and savagely condemned the perpetrators of what he called a 'concentrated evil'.

It comes as scores of corpses were found over the weekend in several towns just north of the capital, where Russian troops had waged war against Ukraine's armed forces and territorial defence units before retreating last week.

'I want every mother of every Russian soldier to see the bodies of those killed in Bucha, Irpin and Hostomel. Why were innocent civilians in a peaceful town tortured to death?', the President asked.

'How could women be raped in front of their children? How could they be strangled after having their earrings ripped out? What did the people of the Ukrainian city Bucha do to you?'

Zelensky went on to address Russian mothers personally, telling them that their children 'have no heart, no soul, and killed deliberately, with pleasure,' before directing his ire towards former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and former French President Nicholas Sarkozy.

The pair represented the European contingent of NATO at a meeting in Bucharest 14 years ago on April 3, 2008, in which it was declared that Ukraine could become a member of the security bloc.

But in the years that followed, Ukraine was never offered membership and still remains in the so called 'grey area' between Europe and Russia - something Zelensky argued is down to Merkel and Sarkozy's 'absurd fear of Russia' and led to the deaths of thousands of Ukrainian civilians.

Angela Merkel's office meanwhile said the former German chancellor stands by decisions made in 2008 not to put Ukraine directly on track to join NATO, but insisted that all efforts to help Ukraine defend itself against Russian aggression had her full support.

The Ukrainian president last night condemned what he says are 'war crimes of the Russian military' in the settlements around the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, after some cities and villages had recently been recaptured by the Ukrainian army from Russian forces

A mass grave is seen behind a church in the town of Bucha, northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on April 3, 2022

A Ukrainian policeman walks by a pit in the village of Motyzhyn, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022 where the bodies of the the village's mayor and over a dozen other people were found buried

Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, left, and former French President Nicolas Sarkozy, right, walk to their seats during a session with invitees, at the NATO Summit conference in Bucharest, Romania, April 3, 2008

Targeting the former European leaders, Zelensky said: 'They thought that by refusing Ukraine, they would be able to appease Russia. Now we are fighting for our lives the in most horrific war in Europe since WWII.

'I invite Mrs Merkel and Mr Sarkozy to visit Bucha and see what the policy of their concessions to Russia has led to in the last 14 years,' he quipped.

'I want to be understood correctly - we do not blame the West, we only blame the Russian military who did this against our people... But we have the right to talk about indecision.

'We shouldn't have had to ask for help, for weapons to defend ourselves against the evil that came to our country. These should have been given to us anyway, without request.'

Despite the best efforts of Ukrainian authorities, Western media directors and social media firms, many Russian mothers are unlikely to have seen the results of Putin's war in Ukraine.

Russia's communications regulator Roskomnadzor has implemented widespread bans on Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms, and has restricted its citizens' access to foreign media websites in an attempt to control the narrative surrounding the conflict.

The Kremlin maintains that Russia's 'special military operation' was launched to 'denazify' Ukraine, and state-run media channels have continually blamed much of the destruction on Ukrainian neo-nazi and nationalist groups.

It was also revealed last week that 'Find Your Own' - a Ukrainian government initiative set up to help Russian families locate and learn more about the fates of their family members sent to war - was also blocked by Roskomnadzor.

The initiative posts images of captured or killed Russian soldiers along with their personal details and identity cards, informing Russian families that the POWs are safe and alive and helping them to arrange the collection of the bodies of the dead.

Radio Liberty's Andrey Sharogradsky announced on Friday that the service had been banned in Russia, further preventing Russian citizens from learning about the war, and was later confirmed by the operators of 'Find Your Own' on its website.

Another view of the mass grave discovered close to a church in Bucha, which was uncovered by Ukrainian forces as Russian troops withdrew from the area around the capital

A satellite image taken on March 31 shows the mass grave - a 45ft-long pit - dug behind the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, during the time that Russian forces were in control of the region

Zelensky's comments come after several mass graves in towns on the northern outskirts of Kyiv were discovered over the weekend in the latest evidence of Russian war crimes.

One pit was uncovered in woodland near the town of Motyzhyn and contained the bodies of local mayor Olga Sukhenko, her husband and son, and over a dozen other Ukrainian citizens according to Ukraine's former ambassador to Austria Olexander Scherba.

That discovery was made shortly after 45ft pit containing the bodies of at least 57 civilians was uncovered in Bucha - a city on the outskirts of Kyiv where hundreds of civilians have been found dead.

The grave had been dug into a grassy area to the rear of the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints, with Serhii Kaplychnyi, head of the local rescue services, saying at least 57 civilians had been buried in the 45ft pit.

Satellite images taken on March 31, while Russian troops were still in control of the area, clearly show the existence of the grave, while satellite firm Maxar said images taken as far back as March 10 show what appear to be preparations to construct the pit.

Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine's foreign minister, said Russian troops had instigated a 'deliberate massacre' in Bucha and branded them 'worse than ISIS'.

Dead bodies litter the streets near Bucha, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, after Russian forces withdrew from the region - leaving evidence of 'war crimes' in their wake

A white van with the word 'children' written on the bonnet - intended as a warning to Russian troops that youngsters were inside - is seen riddled with bullet holes in the city of Bucha

A man and two women weep as they stand next to a mass grave filled with the bodies of Ukrainian civilians dug into the ground of one of Bucha's largest churches

Photos from the ground showed bodies left to rot alongside roads, some of them with their hands tied, others piled on top of car tyres as if to be burned. Witnesses gave horrifying accounts of torture and rape by Putin's men.

Civilian survivors said some bodies left on the streets had been run over by Russian tanks and 'squashed like animal skin rugs'. Others reported seeing soldiers shoot dead elderly civilians in front of their relatives.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson led world leaders in condemning the violence at the weekend, pledging to send funding and specialist investigators to the International Criminal Court at The Hauge to compile evidence for a war crimes tribunal.

'We will not rest until justice is served,' he vowed, before a spokesman for the PM added today: 'It's clear that Putin crossed the threshold of barbarism some time ago.'

'It's certainly evidence that Putin's army is committing war crimes,' the spokesman said, adding that the Government now wants 'to look beyond what we have already provided' in terms of fresh arms shipments to Ukraine.

'Whatever equipment we send will obviously allow Ukraine to defend itself. We are aware of the requests from the Ukrainians for equipment to defend themselves from ships and we are looking into what we can do,' he said.
A teacher who raped 13 girls at an Islamic boarding school in Indonesia now faces the death penalty, a court has today said, after he had initially been sentenced to life in prison.

Herry Wirawan - who judges said sexually groomed 13 girls, aged between 12 and 16 years old and impregnated at least nine of his victims - was sentenced to life in jail in February but prosecutors who filed for the death penalty filed an appeal.

The shocking case has spotlighted the need to protect children from sexual violence in Indonesia's religious boarding schools.

Herry Wirawan - who judges said sexually groomed 13 girls, aged between 12 and 16 years old and impregnated at least nine of his victims - was sentenced to life in jail in February

'(We) hereby punish the defendant with the death penalty,' the judge said in a statement on Monday posted on the Bandung High Court's website.

Ira Mambo, Herry's lawyer, declined to comment on whether there would be an appeal, citing a need to see the full ruling from the court.

A spokesperson for the local prosecutor's office also said it would wait to receive the final ruling before commenting.

Between 2016 and 2021, Herry sexually groomed the 13 girls, who were between 12 and 16 years old, and impregnated eight of his victims, a judge said in February.

Indonesian officials, including the country's child protection minister, had also backed calls for the death penalty, though the nation's human rights commission, which opposes the death penalty, said it was not appropriate.

Indonesia, the world's biggest Muslim majority country, has tens of thousands of Islamic boarding schools and other religious schools that often provide the only way for the children of poorer families to get an education.

The shocking case has spotlighted the need to protect children from sexual violence in Indonesia's religious boarding schools

Wirawan had arrived in court in handcuffs and kept his head down as the judge sentenced him. The court said restitution for the victims will be paid by the government.

While the chairman of Indonesia's Child Protection Commission said the initial verdict meant 'justice for the victims has been served', a family member of one of the victims told AFP news agency he was 'very disappointed' that Wirawan did not receive a harsher sentence and warned that leniency would embolden other abusers.

'This wound will never be healed as long as we live, maybe until we die. The pain we are feeling is indescribable. We don't feel heard,' said Hidmat Dijaya, an uncle of one of the 13 victims.

'If the sentence is lenient like this, there will be more Islamic teachers who will abuse children,' he added.

'We will let God as the highest judge punish him. We can only pray because those judges failed to represent our hurt and pain.'

Between 2016 and 2021, Herry sexually groomed the 13 girls, who were between 12 and 16 years old, and impregnated eight of his victims, a judge said in February

Dedeh Marlina, a 42-year-old housewife living near the school where Herry taught, had said she was relieved the perpetrator had been stopped but that the damage had been done.

'I know most of them came from poor families in remote areas...unfortunately they are now carrying the burden of what happened,' she said.

The case drew a public outcry over the number of rapes and the length of time they occurred.

Officials said many of the victims did not report their rapes for fear of having to relive the traumatic experience, and their parents had trusted that the boarding school was guiding their children to become good and religious people.

Some of Wirawan's victims had also suffered injuries from the rapes.

West Java police began to investigate the case and arrested Wirawan last May when parents of a victim went to the police after their daughter returned home on a holiday and admitted she had just given birth.

Wirawan had arrived in court in handcuffs and kept his head down as the judge sentenced him

The judges also ruled that nine children born to the victims should be handed over to the Children and Women Protection Agency with periodic evaluation 'until the victims are mentally ready to care for their children, and the situation allows for their children to be returned to the victims.'

Indonesia, the world's biggest Muslim majority country, has tens of thousands of Islamic boarding schools and other religious schools that often provide the only way for the children of poorer families to get an education.

More than 25,000 Islamic boarding schools - known as 'pesantren' - are dotted across the country, with nearly five million students living and studying in the dorms.

The Bandung rape case shone a light on the problem of sexual abuse in some of the schools, with 14 out of the 18 cases reported to the Child Protection Commission last year taking place in pesantren.

Last year two teachers at a boarding school in South Sumatra were arrested for sexually abusing 26 male students over the course of a year.

And in 2020, a boarding school teacher in East Java was sentenced to 15 years in prison for sexually assaulting 15 female students.
Elon Musk has become Twitter's largest shareholder after buying a 9.2 per cent stake in the social media company.

The world's richest man worth an estimated $273billion bought nearly 73.5 million shares, a document filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission shows.

It means the Tesla co-founder has more than quadruple the shares of Twitter's founder Jack Dorsey, who owns 2.25 per cent.

His passive stake in the company is valued at up to $2.9billion based on the stock's Friday close, and the estimated cost of the deal was $2.4billion, according to the stock price on March 14 when he bought the shares.

The news prompted Twitter's stock to soar by more than 26 per cent in pre-market trade before Wall Street opened on Monday, meaning his shares are now worth around $3.6billion, earning him an interested $1.2billion in three weeks.

Elon Musk has become Twitter's largest shareholder, with a 9.2 per cent stake in the social media company

The news prompted Twitter's stock to soar by more than 26 per cent in pre-market trade before Wall Street opened on Monday

The world's richest man bought nearly 73.5 million shares, a document filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission shows

Shares of other social media firms, including Meta Platforms and Snapchat owner Snap Inc, were also trading higher.

Musk's stake in Twitter is considered a passive investment, which means he is a long-term investor that's looking to minimize his buying and selling of the shares.

'We would expect this passive stake as just the start of broader conversations with the Twitter board/management that could ultimately lead to an active stake and a potential more aggressive ownership role of Twitter,' Dan Ives of WedBush Securities wrote in a client note early Monday.

Twitter's share price has rocketed since Musk's investment on March 14

Passive investment is a strategy for slowly building wealth by long-term ownership of stocks rather than engaging in frequent trading, which is often accompanies by additional fees and can be more volatile.

Ives also told CNBC: 'Musk could try to take a more aggressive stance here on Twitter.

'This eventually could lead to some sort of buyout.

'This makes sense given what Musk has at least been talking about, at least from a social media perspective.'

The shares are held by the Elon Musk Revocable Trust, of which he is the sole trustee.

On the same day as the filing of the SEC document, Musk challenged Vladimir Putin to a fight on Twitter and posted a meme about supporting current trends.

The mogul has been raising questions about the ability to communicate freely on Twitter, tweeting last month about free speech and the social media platform.

On the same day as the filing of the SEC document, Musk challenged Vladimir Putin to a fight on Twitter

The mogul has been raising questions about the ability to communicate freely on Twitter, and on March 26 he asked what should be done about Twitter's free speech principles and if a new platform is needed

A day earlier, he made a poll asking whether Twitter adheres to the principle of free speech, warning the results will be 'important'

'Free speech is essential to a functioning democracy. Do you believe Twitter rigorously adheres to this principle?' he tweeted.

He accompanied it with a poll on March 25, with 70 per cent of two million users responding that the platform does not adhere to free speech.

Musk said: 'The consequences of this poll will be important. Please vote carefully.'

In a separate tweet, Musk said that he was 'giving serious thought' to creating a new social media platform.

Musk was responding to a Twitter user's question on whether he would consider building a social media platform consisting of an open source algorithm and one that would prioritize free speech and where propaganda was minimal.

Also last month, Musk asked a federal judge to nullify a subpoena from securities regulators and throw out a 2018 court agreement in which Musk had to have someone pre-approve his posts on Twitter.

US securities regulators said they had legal authority to subpoena Tesla and Musk about his tweets, and that Musk's move to throw out a 2018 court agreement that his tweets be pre-approved is not valid.

The entrepreneur is a frequent user of Twitter although his posts have occasionally landed him in hot water.

He has over 80 million followers on the site since joining in 2009 and has used the platform to make several announcements, including teasing a go-private deal for Tesla that landed him in regulatory scrutiny.

It means the Tesla co-founder has more than quadruple the shares of Twitter's founder Jack Dorsey (pictured), who owns 2.25 per cent

In 2018, the tech CEO was slammed after calling a British diver who helped rescue a group of Thai boys stuck in a cave a 'pedo'.

His Twitter posting has also led to accusations of stock manipulation, regularly sharing polls and information about his companies online.

In August 2018, he wrote that he was 'considering taking Tesla private at $420. Funding secured,' a nod to Musk's well-known interest in marijuana.

The issue was, he didn't actually have funding secured - but the stock price soared at the time, and it was later revealed that Musk apparently wrote the tweet because he 'thought his girlfriend would "find it funny."'

He later tweeted how 'high' the stock had gone later in 2019 when it did, in fact, hit $420 a share.

Musk's revelation about his stake in Twitter shares comes two days after Tesla Inc. posted lackluster first-quarter production numbers.

While the company delivered 310,000 vehicles in the period, the figure was slightly below expectations.

Musk has been selling his stake in Tesla since November, when he said he would offload 10 per cent of his holding in the electric-car maker. He has already sold $16.4 billion worth of shares since then.

Twitter was the target of activist investor Elliott Management Corp in 2020, when the hedge fund argued its then-boss and co-founder, Jack Dorsey, was paying too little attention to Twitter while also running Square.

Musk and Dorsey have had some common ground in terms of dismissing the so-called Web3, a vague term for a utopian version of the internet that is decentralized.

Musk is also the founder and CEO of SpaceX, and leads brain-chip startup Neuralink and infrastructure firm The Boring Company.

Dorsey resigned as Twitter CEO in November after 15 years at the helm.

He remains remains the CEO of Square Inc, the hugely successful financial payments company that he co-founded in 2010, and is the sixth largest shareholder in Twitter.
An 18-year-old woman has been charged with murdering a newborn baby that was found dead three years ago.

Paris Mayo, 18, from Ruardean, Gloucestershire, was arrested over the death of the youngster near Ross-on-Wye in Herefordshire in March 2019.

A neighbour had raised the alarm and five police cars turned up at the semi-detached house.

The woman, then 15, was arrested at the family home but was released on police bail. Mayo is due to appear at Kidderminster Magistrates' Court today or tomorrow.

Paris Mayo, 18, from Ruardean, Gloucestershire, was arrested over the death of the youngster in near Ross-on-Wye near Herefordshire (pictured, one of the roads in the area) in March 2019

Superintendent Sue Thomas, Police Commander for Herefordshire, said in 2019: 'Police were called at around 8.40am Sunday 24 March to reports of a concern for welfare for a newborn baby at a property in Ross-on-Wye.

'On attendance, the body of a baby was discovered. The baby's next of kin and the coroner have been informed.

'The death is being treated as suspicious and investigations are ongoing to establish the circumstances surrounding the baby's death.

'A 15-year-old girl from Ross-on-Wye has been arrested in connection with this incident and has been released on police bail while investigations are ongoing.'
Dawn French earned a mouth-watering profit after selling her stunning Cornwall mansion to one of Britains leading biotech businessmen for 6.6 million - triple what she bought it for in 2006.

Dawn purchased the property for 2.3 million but now walks away with a hefty 4.3 million profit.

While it was reported last year that Dawn had sold the historic three-storey Point Neptune House which overlooks the harbour in Fowey, Cornwall, because the area was becoming too cool and trendy, details of the price and buyer had not been disclosed.

Land Registry documents show the hefty sale price, and that the new owner is Professor Sir Christopher Evans OBE, who is worth an estimated 208 million and made his fortune through setting up and running a number of life sciences companies. He was knighted in 2001.

The Vicar of Dibley star, 64 moved into the Grade-II listed building in 2006 with her then-husband Sir Lenny Henry and their daughter Billie.

The couple divorced in 2010.

The Vicar of Dibley star moved into the historic three-storey Point Neptune House (pictured) in Cornwall 16 years ago

French pictured in attendance at An Audience with Adele at the London Palladium in November last year

French moved into the Grade-II listed building in 2006 with her then-husband Sir Lenny Henry and their daughter Billie

The gates leading to the property overlooking the sea in Fowey, Cornwall, which was built by prisoners during the Napoleonic Wars

French purchased the property for 2.3 million but now walks away with a hefty 4.3 million profit

Sir Christopher Evans OBE (pictured) is worth an estimated 208 million and made his fortune through setting up and running a number of life sciences companies

In 2013, she married therapist Mark Bignell in the coastal resort of Mawgan Porth but she continued to live in the home with her new husband and Billie.

Point Neptune House boasts huge, arched windows and stunning sea views.

The property is widely considered one of the most desirable houses in the town, but it is clearly visible to the growing hordes of tourists that visit, which also put Dawn off from living there.

Dawn is believed to have remained in Cornwall but has opted to live in a more low key part of the county.

After reports emerged that she was planning to sell Point Neptune House, a source revealed: Yes, Dawn is selling up, but shes very much staying in Cornwall. She just wanted a change.

Dawn is low-profile. The fact that Fowey has recently become cool and trendy isnt what she finds appealing per se.

'It can get very busy now during summer. Dawn will always love Fowey and had 15 wonderful years living there.

'She will miss all the locals who made her feel so welcome.
A van driver who killed a young brother and sister was high on drink and drugs in the tragic crash, a court heard.

Gracie-Ann Lucas, four, and brother Jayden-Lee, three, were sat in the back of their family car travelling home from a birthday party when it was hit by van driver Martin Newman, 41.

The family had pulled over onto the hard shoulder of the M4 motorway - and their car was stationary when it was hit by the Ford Transit van.

Both children suffered multiple injuries in the crash at Newport, Gwent, and died later in hospital.

Newman, who has admitted to death by dangerous driving, has now been charged with driving while under the influence of drink and drugs at Newport Magistrates' Court.

Jayden-Lee Lucas, three, and Gracie-Ann Lucas, four, were in their family car when it was hit by Martin Newman, 41, on the M4 motorway on February 5

Martin Newman has pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving in relation to the crash, and a court heard he was high on drink and drugs at the time (pictured: Cars queued on the motorway following the collision)

Jayden and Gracie-Ann (both pictured), and their parents, were rushed to the intensive care unit (ICU) of University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff, following the crash

Newman, 41, of Croeserw, near Neath, previously pleaded guilty to causing the deaths of the children by dangerous driving - which carries a sentence of up to 14 years in jail.

He also admitted seriously injuring their mother, Rhiannon Lucas, in the crash on the M4 in Newport in February.

No plea was entered for the drink and drug driving charges and Newman is due to appear at Newport Crown Court for sentencing on Friday, April 8.

An inquest heard Newman smashed into the stationary car while driving his Ford Transit van near Tredegar Park in Newport, Gwent, on February 5.

A post mortem carried out by Dr Stephen Leadbeatter found Gracie-Ann died as a result of multiple injuries at 4.45am the following day.

Jayden (left) died after five days in intensive care, while Gracie-Ann (right) suffered a cardiac arrest due to the severity of her injuries and died the day after the crash at around 5am

Brother Jayden-Lee was also rushed to the University of Wales Hospital in Cardiff but died five days later.

A post-mortem examination found he died as a result of a blunt force head injury. He was identified by his parents.

The siblings, also known by the surname Wheaton, had been in the car with mum Rhiannon Lucas and her partner.

Newman appeared in Newport magistrates on Friday on the drink and drug charges. He will be sentenced on April 8 before Judge Daniel Williams at Cardiff Crown Court.

Tributes were paid to Gracie-Ann and Jayden-Lee following their deaths.

The brother and sister were described as 'special' children who always lit up any room they walked into

Headteacher Huw Waythe, of Deighton Primary School, described them as two 'special children.'

He said: 'Everyone at the school is immensely sad to hear of the passing of a second pupil following a road traffic collision on 5th February 2022.

'Our thoughts remain with members of the family, and words cannot adequately express the shock and pain which they must be feeling.

'We are shocked and saddened by the loss of two of our own. We will never forget how special the children were to our school community.

'They both put a smile on all our faces daily. They were a delight to have and both always lit up any room with their positive personality and beaming smiles.

'Gracie-Ann and Jayden-Lee's lives will continue to be celebrated and remembered by us all. They both have a special place in our hearts and Deighton Primary School will never forget them.

'We will support each other through this, seeking and providing further specific professional assistance for those pupils and staff who find this time the most upsetting.

'We ask that you give us your support by allowing us some time to process our thoughts and feelings.'

In a family statement, cousin Jamie Lucas, 19, from Abergavenny, said: 'He was wonderful, creative and a kind soul. Turned the grey skies blue.

'She was so young. She had a bright future ahead of her. She was such a wonderful child.'
An elderly couple have spoken out after being scammed out $52,000 by fraudsters who targeted their real estate agent.

Margaret and Pat Hailey from Browns Plains, Brisbane, had decided to sell their beloved family home after Mrs Hailey battled against both breast and stomach cancer - which saw her entire stomach removed - and Mr Hailey's kidney transplant.

The couple had sold their home and were planning their move when they noticed a large chunk of money was missing.

Scroll down for the video

Margaret and Pat Hailey from Browns Plains, Brisbane, were victims of an email scam that saw $52,757 transferred from their home deposit to an unknown bank account in September

The couple immediately contacted their real estate agent Philip Rsnikoff from Crafted Property to figure out where their funds had gone.

The real estate agent then told them he had received an email from Mr Hailey requesting the large sum be transferred to an ANZ bank account.

He had transferred the money in good faith but Mrs Hailey insists it's impossible her husband sent the email.

Their real estate agent said he had received an email from Mr Hailey requesting the large sum be transferred to an ANZ bank account

'It came on Patrick's phone and Patrick doesn't know how to email, Patrick doesn't know how to text,' she told A Current Affair.

'It's not our bank account, not our bank.'

Browns Plains Police began their investigation and found the most likely explanation for the email was that the couple were hacked.

The Australian Cyber Security Centre issued a warning last year that all parties involved in real estate transactions were at risk of high-level scams.

'Cybercriminals are targeting all parties involved in the real estate sector, with a particular focus on impersonating conveyancing lawyers and communication with their clients,' the statement said.

It is recommended people who recieve an email asking for large sums of money call the sender and verify they have asked for the funds before transferring.

Fortunately after a six month investigation the bank was able to reverse the transaction and retrieve Mr and Mrs Hailey's $52,757

Fortunately after a six month investigation the bank was able to reverse the transaction and retrieve Mr and Mrs Hailey's $52,757.

'It's a big relief, a massive relief because for us it's all about the customer and the client and that's a big responsibility with their money,' the couple's real estate agent Mr Rsnikoff said.

Mr and Mrs Hailey have sworn to never use email again.
More than 750 commuters were stranded under the East River for two hours and had to be evacuated by fire crews after smoke billowed into the subway cars when their Manhattan-bound train struck an unknown object.

The New York Fire Department said the incident happened around 5.30pm on Sunday when a 7 train ran over debris after pulling out of the Vernon Boulevard-Jackson Avenue station in Long Island City.

The train heading to Grand Central Station was disabled under the East River, with some passengers reporting they saw flames on the tracks.

'Everybody was like ''Whoa'' and then it happened again. It was just crazy. It was scary...A lady started praying for us. I got kind of scared after that,' passenger Resit Sihan told NBC.

Hundreds of straphangers had to be evacuated by fire crews from the smoke-filled subway cars but had to wait for a rescue train to arrive to bring them back to the Queens station.

No injuries were reported, FDNY Deputy Chief Francis McCarthy said after the accident.

Fire officials said the emergency might have been caused by a metal door on the tracks. DailyMail.com has reached out to the FDNY for comment.

More than 750 commuters in Queen were stranded for hours and had to be evacuated by fire crews after a 7 train ran over debris after pulling out of the Vernon Boulevard-Jackson Avenue station in Long Island City

The train was disabled and came to an abrupt halt, with some passengers reporting they even saw flames on the tracks

Power was briefly shut off after false reports of passengers walking on the tracks and an 'all-hands' alert was issued by the FDNY

Power was briefly shut off after false reports of passengers walking on the tracks and an 'all-hands' alert was issued by the FDNY.

'Once it was confirmed no one was on the tracks we had to put the power back on and get the rescue train out there to rescue the people trapped in the tunnel,' McCarthy said.

After the incident, the evidently distraught passengers could be seen getting off the subway platform at the Vernon Boulevard-Jackson Avenue station.

'We are all fine. We are all okay, but we were there for two hours. Two hours, two long hours,' Natalie Wermers told NBC.

'What we noticed when we were in the car was a lot of smoke and a lot of the passengers were running towards the other end of the train,' Sony Abraham also told the outlet.

Commuters were stranded for two hours before they were escorted by firefighters to the rescue train

After the incident, the passengers could be seen getting out of the Vernon Boulevard-Jackson Avenue station

'The train stopped and all of a sudden the emergency brakes ... I was in the back car of the train and then the next thing we see is another train pulling up behind us and they send us all the way back to Queens,' another passenger told CBS.

For hours, service on the 7 line was suspended as MTA crews removed debris from the tracks.

The New York City Subway alert Twitter account said that crews were investigating what exactly caused the incident.

The 7 line was up and running by late Sunday night, with some delays. Monday's morning commute was not impacted.
Downing Street today insisted universal free coronavirus tests will not be coming back, saying lateral flow spending was 'simply unsustainable'.

The move to scrap tests for everyone other than health and social care workers, the elderly and the most vulnerable in England came into effect on Friday.

An Office for National Statistics (ONS) report published on the same day estimated that England's outbreak was bigger than ever, with 4.1million people infected on any given day.

The Prime Minister's official spokesman said: 'I think we need to look at where we are in the course of this pandemic.

'We know there is relatively high prevalence of Covid at the moment but because of vaccines, because of therapeutics and other approaches, we are not seeing it have the knock-on impact when it comes to requiring the most intensive hospital treatment.

'At the same time, the provision of free tests was costing taxpayers 2billion a month and that is simply unsustainable.'

It comes after the NHS quietly expanded its symptom-list to include body aches, a runny nose and diarrhoea.

Nine new official symptoms also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache.

Since the start of the pandemic, officials have only accepted three symptoms: a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell, despite other countries and health bodies including up to 14.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) estimated more than 4.1million people had the virus on any given day over the week to March 26, equivalent to one in 13 being infected. The figure is the highest ever recorded in England, topping the previous peak of 3.7m at the height of the Omicron wave in January. It is also 18 per cent higher than last week

The move to axe tests for everyone other than health and social care workers, the elderly and the most vulnerable in England  which critics claim has come two years too late  came into effect on Friday. Graph shows: The number of lateral flow tests reported in England over time

Since the start of the pandemic, the NHS has only listed three Covid symptoms: a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell. But it has now quietly expanded its list of all the tell-tale signs of the virus to also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache. Shortness of breath, feeling tired, an aching body, a sore throat, a blocked or runny nose and diarrhoea were also added to the list

The health service on Friday expanded its list of the tell-tale signs of the virus to also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache. Since the start of the pandemic, health chiefs have pointed to a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell as the only three symptoms of the virus

No10's spokesperson said ministers expect the public to use their 'good judgment' on whether to go out if they have symptoms.

He said: 'I think anyone, even pre-Covid, would recognise if they have symptoms of an infectious disease, something like flu, they should stay home and not infect their loved ones or colleagues, and it is that sort of good judgment that we expect to see going forward.'

Covid tests now cost around 2 for the majority of the public.

The NHS notes on its website that the symptoms are 'very similar to symptoms of other illnesses, such as colds and flu'.

People experiencing these symptoms should 'try to stay at home and avoid contact with other people', as well as taking 'extra care' to avoid contact with anyone at higher risk from the virus.

Professor Tim Spector, lead scientist of the Zoe Covid symptom tracker app, wrote on Twitter that the change comes after two years of urging health chiefs to expand the list.

WHAT IS THE FULL LIST OF COVID SYMPTOMS? According to the NHS updated list, symptoms of Covid in adults can include: a high temperature or shivering (chills)  a high temperature means you feel hot to touch on your chest or back (you do not need to measure your temperature)

a new, continuous cough  this means coughing a lot for more than an hour, or 3 or more coughing episodes in 24 hours

a loss or change to your sense of smell or taste

shortness of breath

feeling tired or exhausted

an aching body

a headache

a sore throat

a blocked or runny nose

loss of appetite

diarrhoea

feeling sick or being sick Advertisement

He said: 'NHS official main symptoms of coronavirus (COVID-19) have finally changed after two years of lobbying and Zoe app user input  hurrah!

'Pity they have the order wrong  but it's a start and could help reduce infections.'

It is understood that the Government's chief medical officer would have needed to sign off on the expanded list of symptoms.

In March, Professor Spector was highly critical of the Government for not recognising a broader list of virus symptoms.

He said at the time: 'The Government's refusal to recognise the wide array of symptoms and to drop isolation advice and testing is likely driving the incredible number of cases we see today.

'Many people are no longer isolating when they have symptoms, either because they feel they don't have to anymore or because they or their employers still don't recognise symptoms like runny nose or sore throat as Covid.'

The World Health Organization lists 13 symptoms of the virus, including four not listed by the NHS: a rash or discolouration of the fingers or toes, red or irritated eyes, loss of speech or mobility and chest pain.

Meanwhile, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention symptom list is the same as the NHS website, although it does not include a loss of appetite.

And the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control lists 12 symptoms, while Germany acknowledges 14.

Professor Spector told MailOnline adding more symptoms to the NHS list 'is definitely a step in the right direction and it could help reduce infections as we go forward'.

'However, whilst this is good news, I'd like to see the order of the symptoms changed, as the NHS list puts far too much emphasis on symptoms like fever, and anosmia, which we know are much less common since the Omicron variant emerged,' he said.

Professor Spector added: 'According to the ZOE COVID Study, the top five symptoms being reported by contributors with a positive Covid test are; runny nose (83 per cent), fatigue (71 per cent), sore throat (69 per cent), headache (69 per cent) and sneezing (68 per cent).'

'It seems this decision has been made in light of the changes to testing.

'We were always told that the barrier to expanding the list was that adding more symptoms could overwhelm the testing capacity, so it makes sense that since free testing has now stopped, the list has been updated.'

The move for the UK to recognise more symptoms comes as Covid tests are now only available for certain groups.

Most people will now have to purchase the swabs from high street stores, where they are available for about 2 each.

England has ended its offer of free swabs under its plans to 'live with' the virus and following pressure from the Treasury over the bill  which ministers claimed cost 2billion in January at the height of the Omicron wave.

Scotland will end its offer next month, while Wales is to stop handing out the swabs this summer.

Experts argued the timing of the end of free testing 'couldn't really be worse', and that the country would now have to rely on the public 'doing the right thing' and getting tested when unwell.

But ministers have insisted it is the 'right' moment to scrap the mass-testing regime, which cost No10 up to 2bn-a-month. Only the most vulnerable and health care workers are still able to get free swabs.

It comes as the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which runs the UK's biggest Covid prevalence study, estimated more than 4.1million people had the virus on any given day over the week to March 26, equivalent to one in 13 being infected.

The figure is the highest ever recorded in England, topping the previous peak of 3.7m at the height of the Omicron wave in January. It is also 18 per cent higher than one week earlier.

In the most Covid-ridden towns of Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch, as many as one in nine people were thought to have the virus. And infections have soared to pandemic highs in all over-35s.

Britain's outbreak as a whole is also bigger than ever, with 4.9million now thought to be infected  up from 4.3million last week.

Statisticians said England's surge was being driven by the more transmissible version of Omicron, scientifically named BA. Although, ministers admit that ditching the final Covid restrictions last month also fueled the uptick.
Advertisement

Actor Adam Woodyatt has shared his heartbreak that British soap legend June Brown, who played Dot Cotton on Eastenders for 35 years, was never made a dame before her death at the age of 95.

Woodyatt, who has played Ian Beale on the soap since 1985, was the first to pay tribute to the actress after her death was announced by her family this morning.

Leading the tributes, Adam Woodyatt said: 'I'm lost for words, something June never was. So many memories, so much fun. Just purely and simply an incredible woman who had the most incredible life and career, I was fortunate to have shared a small part of it.

'They never made you a Dame (we did try), but to me you will always be Dame Brown.'

June was made an MBE for services to drama and charity at Buckingham Palace in 2008 and was then included in the 2022 New Year's honours list to be made an OBE.

The actress, a mother-of-six born in rural Suffolk in 1927, died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side, two years after her final appearance on the soap and 35 years after her debut.

Other fellow stars including Gillian Taylforth, who plays Kathy Beale in the show and Letitia Dean, best known as Sharon Watts, hailed their friend and colleague as 'an amazing woman and a truly wonderful actress'.

BBC director general Tim Davie said: 'June Brown was a brilliantly talented actor who was loved by millions' and 'delivered some of the most memorable moments in soap history'.

Actor and writer Stephen Fry said June Brown will be remembered 'as a tireless and fearless LGBT ally'. He tweeted: 'June Brown, amongst all her other wonderful human qualities and achievements, will be remembered as a tireless and fearless LGBT ally - especially during the darkest days of HIV/AIDS and Section 28... it was a privilege to know her.'

Ms Brown's family revealed they were with her when she died peacefully last night, while the BBC urged fans to raise a glass of sweet sherry in her memory. The star still loved a tipple and a cigarette well into her 90s.

For decades she was one of the most famous faces on British TV, playing the devout Christian famed on Albert Square for her chain smoking, gossiping and mothering of those in need while working in the launderette.

Incredibly she began her career on Coronation Street and it was at the age of 58 that she landed the role that would turn her into a household name. Actor Leslie Grantham, who famously played Dirty Den in the soap, put June forward for the part after seeing her in the comedy drama Minder. She became so popular on the soap that she remained there for the next 30 years, except for a four-year break between 1993 and 1997.

Her relationship with her tearaway son Nasty Nick Cotton, played by John Altman, would captivate millions who watched in horror and sympathy as she forgave and forgave him for his crimes. But in 2015 Dot finally gave up on him after he cut the brakes on Roxy's car and he died after consuming a bad batch of heroin bought for him by his very own mother.

Dot's loving relationship with Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, saw the on-screen couple win a host of awards and left heartbroken fans in tears as she said goodbye to him following a stroke.

EastEnders star June Brown, pictured in 2020 aged 93, who was best known for her role as Dot Cotton, has died at the age of 95

June enjoyed 35 years on the show, joining in 1985 and filming her final scenes in 2020 (far right)

Her most memorable moments included helping her best friend Ethel end her life in 2000, which proved highly controversial

June Brown shares a cuddle with Lady Gaga, who she became close to after bonding backstage at the Graham Norton Show

June Brown and John Bardon in their roles as Dot and Jim Branning in EastEnders. They became one of the show's most beloved couples

Viewers were captivated by her relationship with her tearaway son Nick, played by John Altman, who would die from a heroin overdose bought for him by Dot (pictured right)

June Brown is pictured at her book signing at Easons store in Dublin, Ireland.She is joined by two of her daughters Sophie and Naomi in 2013

June Brown with her husband Robert and children. The actress was a mother-of-six born in rural Suffolk in 1927

An EastEnders spokesman said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved June Brown, OBE, MBE, sadly passed away last night.

'There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humour will never be forgotten.

'June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2,884 episodes, June's remarkable performances created some of EastEnders' finest moments.

'We send all our love and deepest sympathies to June's family and friends. A very bright light has gone out at EastEnders today but we shall all be raising a sweet sherry in June's memory.

'Rest in peace, our dearest June. You will never be forgotten.'

A statement from Brown's family said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce our beloved mother, June, passed away very peacefully at her home in Surrey on Sunday evening, with her family by her side.

'We would kindly ask that our privacy is respected at this very difficult time.'

Members of the EastEnders cast have paid tribute to June Brown. Gillian Taylforth, who plays Kathy Beale in the show, hailed Brown as 'an amazing woman and a truly wonderful actress'.

She said: 'I'm truly heartbroken by this news. June Brown OBE, MBE, was an amazing woman and a truly wonderful actress.

'I shared many scenes with her over the years and she was always someone I looked up to and learnt from.

'There will never be another June Brown and I'm sending all my love to her family.'

Adam Woodyatt, who plays Taylforth's on-screen son Ian Beale, also paid tribute to the actress, who died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side.

He said: 'I'm lost for words, something June never was.

'So many memories, so much fun. Just purely and simply an incredible woman who had the most incredible life and career, I was fortunate to have shared a small part of it.

'They never made you a Dame (we did try), but to me you will always be Dame Brown.'

June Brown began her career after the war, training at the Old Vic in South London

Dot would always be taken advantage of by her son Nick, and he would always be forgiven by his Christian mother

Dot would find love with Jim, who proposed on the London Eye overlooking the Houses of Parliament

Eastenders actress June Brown stands outside Buckingham Palace in London after receiving an MBE for services to Drama and Charity in 2008

Eastenders cast with the award for TV Soap of the year during the 2017 Television and Radio Industries Club Awards, three years before she left the show

'No, I wouldn't vote Labour, dear, if you paid me': How straight-talking June Brown became a British cultural fixture - but only landed the job as Dot aged 58 (with some help from Dirty Den) As Dot Cotton in the long-running EastEnders, June Brown provided Albert Square with one of its best-loved and most memorable characters. For many viewers, her cockney creation felt like a family member who appeared, with regularity, four times a week on BBC One. She became a British cultural fixture, winning several awards and a Bafta nomination during her decades-long career, as well as being awarded an MBE in 2008 for her services to drama and charity. Brown's career was one of two halves. As a stage actor, she had the credentials. The late actor Nigel Hawthorne described her as 'one of the most beautiful creatures I've seen on stage' after seeing her play the titular role in Ibsen's Hedda Gabler when she was in her 20s. But for much of the British public she will always be known as the chain-smoking Cotton. Brown was also politically aware, preferring tough investigative features like Newsnight and Panorama to lighter fare. Her politics were equally unbending. In an interview with the Guardian, she was asked if she voted Labour. 'No, I wouldn't vote Labour, dear, if you paid me,' she replied. 'I vote Conservative.' Brown grew up in Suffolk nearly 200 miles from the fictional Albert Square in east London. Born in Needham Market in 1927, she was one of five. Her baby brother died at 15 days from pneumonia and her elder sister, Marise, died aged eight from a meningitis-like illness. She would later discover during filming for Who Do You Think You Are? that she was of Irish, Scottish, Italian and Sephardic descent. On her maternal grandmother's side she was descended from the famous bare knuckle boxer Isaac Bitton, who reportedly once took part in a fight that lasted 74 rounds. She was educated in Ipswich at St John's Church of England school, then won a scholarship to Ipswich High School. During the Second World War she served in the women's branch of the Royal Navy, often called the Wrens. After, she went to the Old Vic Theatre School in London, hoping to launch a career on the stage. The early 1970s saw her take small roles in Coronation Street, Mrs Parsons, Doctor Who and The Bill. In the 80s and 90s she secured larger parts in comedies like Ain't Misbehavin (1997) and played Nanny Slagg in the BBC's adaptation of Gormenghast in 2000. But these were eclipsed by her ubiquitous performance as Cotton in the long-running soap. The part that would come to define her was offered by one of the soap's original cast, Leslie Grantham, who played the equally well-known 'Dirty' Den Watts. On his recommendation she joined the cast in 1985, taking a break between 1993 and 1997. In 2008 she became the first EastEnders actress to carry an entire episode single-handed. In it Cotton dictated her life story to a cassette, so her husband could listen to it in hospital following a stroke. This was made more poignant by the fact that her co-star and close friend John Bardon was then in hospital after also suffering a stroke. It took Brown more than one attempt to find lasting love. Aged 23 she met actor John Garley at the Old Vic and they soon married. Garley took his own life seven years later in 1957. He had been suffering from depression but Brown expressed her guilt at having been unfaithful during their time together. The next year Brown married again and this time the relationship would last 45 years. Robert Arnold played Pc Swain in the long-running police programme Dixon Of Dock Green and they had their first child, Louise, in 1959. Soon after she fell pregnant again but the baby, Chloe, was born prematurely and died after 16 days. She had another four children and Arnold died in 2003 of Lewy body dementia, a progressive form of the brain disease. Foreshadowing her eventual decline in a 2017 episode of Desert Island Discs, Brown told host Kirsty Young that she thought retirement would kill her. 'I can be feeling like death warmed up when I come in (to work), and then I'm alive. It keeps me alive,' she said weeks before turning 90. 'I think that's why a lot of people are very lonely and get ill when they're older, because I think loneliness and having no motivation, nothing to work towards - I think it kills you.' In December 2021 Brown was made an OBE in the New Year Honours, as she was recognised for services to drama and to charity. She was previously made an MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours in 2008 for services to drama and charity. Advertisement

Letitia Dean, best known as Sharon Watts, said: 'My beloved June, I truly loved you. Not just a phenomenal actress but a very dear friend.

'Oh the fun we have had over the years! I will never stop loving you, THANK YOU for your kindness and your generosity and for loving me the way you did.

'Sending all my dearest love to June's family at this devastating time. God bless you June.'

EastEnders actor and musician Martin Kemp has called June Brown 'a huge inspiration'.

Kemp, who played Steve Owen on the programme, wrote in a tweet: 'June Brown... I was such a very small part of your 35 years at Eastenders but you were a massive part of my time there.

'Such a huge inspiration.

'I am so glad our paths crossed.

'Rest in Peace June love goes out to your family and everyone at Enders that I know are hurting right now.'

Milly Zero, who plays Brown's on-screen granddaughter Dotty Cotton, also expressed her love and respect for Brown, describing her as a 'national treasure'.

Zero, 22, tweeted: 'Rest in perfect peace 'Grandma Dot'. I have never met anyone who cared about their craft so deeply.

'An artist, a national treasure, an icon & an inspiration to us all. You will always live on in the hearts of everybody you touched. There will never be anyone quite like June.'

Danniella Westbrook said her heart was broken following EastEnders star June Brown's death at the age of 95.

Westbrook wrote in a tweet: 'My hearts broken... good bye my darling June brown xxx #ripjunebrown'.

The husband of late EastEnders star Dame Barbara Windsor has described June Brown as 'a true force of nature' and a 'one-off' after her death at 95.

Scott Mitchell, who was married to Dame Barbara from 2000 until her death aged 83 in December 2020, was close friends with Brown and worked as her agent for several years.

He said he will now picture Dame Barbara, Brown and On The Buses actress Anna Karen, who played Aunt Sal in EastEnders and who died in a house fire at the age of 85 earlier this year, in heaven together.

He told the PA news agency: 'I am so sad to hear about June's passing. Not only was she a close, dear friend to Barbara and I, but I also had the privilege of being June's agent for a number of years.

'A true force of nature who created one of soap's most iconic soap characters ever in Dot Cotton. Up there with the greats.

'Talking of which, I am imagining a cloud in heaven with June, Barbara and Anna Karen now sitting on it.

'My advice to all angels nearby would be approach with caution.

'Rest in peace dearest June, you were a one-off, and love to all her family.'

After Dame Barbara's death, Brown said she became 'great friends' with 'Babs' while they worked together on the soap.

She told the PA news agency: 'We had adjoining dressing rooms and she was always popping in for coffee, and we'd go to lunch together. She kept me up to date with all the gossip.

'I wished we'd had more scenes together but our only one was in her last episode, when Dot said goodbye to Peggy, knowing she was dying.'

Brown said they spoke regularly on the phone following Dame Barbara's departure from the soap.

'In our last phone call she asked me several times where I was - I finally said 'I'm at home' and her comment was 'I'd like to come to your home', but it was too late for that.'

She added that her friend would 'always be alive in my mind'.

The actress's 35-year run as the Albert Square mainstay began in 1985. before she left the show in 2020.

Brown was perhaps EastEnders' best-known star and larger-than-life Dot was known for her devout Christian faith and hypochondria, as well as her endless cigarette addiction.

The veteran actress, who had a long career in television and theatre, arrived on Albert Square shortly after the soap began in 1985, and aside from a break between 1993 and 1997, was a regular for more than three decades.

On January 31 2008 she single-handedly starred in an episode called Pretty Baby, in which she spoke to a cassette recorder about her life so that her husband could listen to it as he lay in hospital following a stroke.

Brown served in the Women's Royal Naval Service at the end of the Second World War, and then left to train at London's Old Vic Theatre School in Lambeth.

After joining Albert Square she also starred in comedy Ain't Misbehavin in 1997, and played Nanny Slagg in the BBC's production of Gormenghast in 2000.

She announced the bombshell news of her exit from EastEnders in 2020 with little fanfare, revealing her decision on a podcast with a former co-star.

Dot had not featured in the soap for a month, when she left a voicemail for Sonia Fowler saying she had moved to Ireland.

At the time an EastEnders' spokesman said the door remained open for a comeback, appearing to leave the decision in Brown's hands.

Some of Dot's biggest storylines explored controversial issues such as euthanasia, cancer and homophobia.

Her marriage to Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, was popular among fans - while she was also mother to the notorious criminal Nick Cotton, played by John Altman.

Brown won several awards for her portrayal of Dot, including a lifetime achievement honour at the 2005 British Soap Awards.

In 2009, she was nominated for the best actress prize at the TV Baftas for her standalone episode of the soap.

In December 2021 Brown was made an OBE in the New Year Honours, as she was recognised for services to drama and to charity.

She was previously made an MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours in 2008 for services to drama and charity.

Brown married her first husband, John Garley, in 1950.

After his death she married actor Robert Arnold in 1958 and had six children with him.

'Beautiful inside and out': Maisie Smith and Jake Wood leads the tributes to EastEnders icon June Brown as BBC confirms actress famed for her role as chain-smoking Dot Cotton has died aged 95

Maisie Smith and Jake Wood have led the tributes to EastEnders icon June Brown after her death at the age of 95 was confirmed by the BBC on Monday afternoon.

The actress, a mother-of-six, died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side, two years after her final appearance as chain-smoking Dot Cotton, a role she played for 35 years.

Taking to Instagram, Maisie - who departed the soap in 2021 after becoming a household name as Tiffany Butcher - shared a behind-the-scenes photo of herself during her early years on the soap alongside screen veteran June.

Captioning the photo, she wrote: 'Beautiful inside and out. Rest in peace June Brown.'

Rest in peace: Maisie Smit has led the tributes to EastEnders icon June Brown after her death at the age of 95 was confirmed by the BBC on Monday afternoon

Remembering the actress during her years on the show, Jake Wood - best known for his role as Max Branning - shared a photo of Brown on set as she prepared to shoot a scene.

He wrote: 'RIP June. Here she is on set in her element. A true pro and EastEnders legend. Lucky to have met and worked with her, I'll always remember her kindness and the many laughs.'

On-screen granddaughter Milly Zero paid tribute to the actress with a series of images, among them a backstage shot of Brown's legendary meeting with Lady Gaga on The Graham Norton Show.

In an accompanying caption, the actress - who plays Dotty Cotton on the long-running soap - paid tribute to her 'Grandma Dot.'

She added: 'I have never met anyone who cared about their craft so deeply. An artist, a national treasure, an icon & an inspiration to us all. You will always live on in the hearts of everybody you touched. There will never be anyone quite like June

'A huge, huge loss. Today and always my thoughts are with her family, friends & the whole team at @eastenders.'

Tragic: Remembering the actress during her years on the show, Jake Wood - best known for his role as Max Branning - shared a photo of Brown on set as she prepared to shoot a scene

Gone but not forgotten: Current cast-member Milly Zero remembered the actress in a series of images, among them a shot of June during her legendary meeting with Lady Gaga on The Graham Norton Show

Adam Woodyatt, the show's longest serving cast-member as Ian Beale, remembered the actress fondly alongside a photo of Brown taken during her EastEnders heyday.

He wrote: 'I'm lost for words, something June never was. So many memories, so much fun. Just purely and simply an incredible woman who had the most incredible life and career, I was fortunate to have shared a small part of it. They never made you a Dame (we did try), but to me you will always be Dame Brown.'

Former cast-member Jacqueline Jossa - best known for her role as Lauren Branning - wrote: 'I am so heartbroken. You will be so missed. Sharing the screen with you, a family with you, was a dream come true, something I will never ever forget.

'Most of all though, your stories, your humour and just such calming words when I needed them. You made my joining the show so welcoming. I will keep these memories close to my heart. Rest in peace June.'

Devastated: Adam Woodyatt, the show's longest serving cast-member as Ian Beale, remembered the actress fondly alongside a photo of Brown taken during her EastEnders heyday

For decades Brown was one of the most famous faces on British TV, playing the devout Christian famed on Albert Square for her chain smoking, gossiping and mothering of those in need.

Her relationship with her tearaway son Nasty Nick Cotton, John Altman, who she forgave and forgave for his crimes until she gave up on him and he died after consuming a bad batch of heroin bought for him by his very own mother.

Her loving relationship with Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, would captivate millions, leaving fans in tears as she said goodbye to him following a stroke.

Brown's family revealed she died peacefully last night while the BBC urged fans to raise a glass of sweet sherry in her memory. The star still loved a tipple and a cigarette well into her 90s.

An EastEnders spokesman said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved June Brown, OBE, MBE, sadly passed away last night.

'There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humour will never be forgotten.

'June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2,884 episodes, June's remarkable performances created some of EastEnders' finest moments.

'We send all our love and deepest sympathies to June's family and friends. A very bright light has gone out at EastEnders today but we shall all be raising a sweet sherry in June's memory.

'Rest in peace, our dearest June. You will never be forgotten.'
Hundreds of New York City prosecutors have left their jobs because of low pay and high workloads in recent years, putting more stress on an already overburdened justice system as crime continues to skyrocket in the Big Apple.

Assistant district attorneys are burned out because of two laws that took effect in January 2020, right as the pandemic was about to send crime soaring.

The laws require prosecutors to quickly share evidence with defense attorneys in order to ensure a speedy trial.

But the high volumes of paperwork - sometimes hundreds of pages per case - combined with a load of up to 100 cases at once and low starting pay have sent prosecutors fleeing for the private sector, the New York Times reports.

So far this year, 36 prosecutors in Brooklyn have quit, along with 44 in Manhattan, at least 28 in the Bronx and nine on Staten Island.

The low morale and dwindling workforce adds to the soft-on-crime approach of Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, who has vowed that armed robbery would be treated as a misdemeanor if the firearm didn't 'create a genuine risk of physical harm.'

Meanwhile, a 2020 law that ended cash bail for most misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies has returned more criminals to the street. The law, meant to stop people from languishing in jails just because they can't make bail, is now meeting pushback from high-level city officials, including Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell and Gov. Kathy Hochul.

Crime in New York City is up 45 percent from last year, according to the latest figures released on March 27. Felony assault is up 19.1 percent and robberies are up 46.1 percent from last year. Both of those offenses are eligible for bail.

Manhattan Da Albin Bragg has been criticized for his 'soft-on-crime' approach. Forty-four prosecutors have quit his office this year alone

The exodus comes as New York City continues to battle a rise in crime, which is up 44 percent from this time last year. Felony assault is up 19.1 percent

Caitlin Nola spent over 11 years as a prosecutor in Manhattan. She left in January, citing the burdensome evidence-sharing discovery laws, and is now an attorney at a private law firm

Prosecutors in NYC are citing burnout during the pandemic and recent laws that require them to share evidence with defendants as reasons for their departures.

The laws were meant to make sure that defendants, most of them people of color, don't take plea deals just because they don't know what the evidence against them looks like.

They've led to prosecutors spending countless hours gathering and uploading documents, some of which have little to do with the case at hand, on the dozens of cases they handle at a time.

A spokesperson for one of the city's district attorney's office told DailyMail.com that prosecutors have 90 days to go after misdemeanors and 180 days to go after a felony.

Some defense lawyers, he says, are waiting until the clock runs out to claim they didn't receive a certain piece of evidence, leading to a pile of dismissed cases and a 'clogged' system that keeps some defendants at Rikers even longer.

Prosecutors are also complaining of low pay.

The starting salary for an assistant DA is $72,000 in Manhattan and $75,000 in the Bronx.

'They just simply can't do it anymore,' Bronx DA Darcel Clark told the New York Times. 'The money is not where it should be, and the work-life balance is just unmanageable.'

In the past year, Manhattan and Brooklyn - which have about 500 prosecutors each - have lost about a fifth of their prosecutorial workforce. Queens says it's on track to double last year's resignations.

'When they have all this pressure on them, they'd rather go somewhere else where their quality of life is better,' she said. 'They don't have to work nights, weekends, holidays and do all this discovery.'

Caitlin Nola spent over 11 years as a prosecutor in Manhattan. She left in January and is now an attorney at the private firm Porzio Bromberg & Newman, P.C, according to her LinkedIn. She said she was frustrated with the evidence-sharing laws.

Public safety was a huge campaign issue for Mayor Eric Adams, who is now dealing with fewer prosecutors and more crime. Above, Adams at the opening of the Paradise Square musical on Sunday

'It was difficult to comply with because there was so much we were expected to produce,' she said.

She added that having to share information about witnesses who were scared that defendants would know their identities was a cause for concern.

Last month, Gov. Hochul proposed changes to the discovery law that would prevent a judge from dismissing a case if prosecutors are in 'substantial compliance' with it.

What offenses are 'bail-eligible' in NYC? In 2020, a new law took effect that limited the kinds of crimes judges could set bail for. The law was meant to stop people from languishing in jail just because they couldn't pay, but some have criticized it for allowing criminals to run loose. Offenses that are still eligible for bail include: - Any violent felony - Robbery aided by another person - Burglary where property is defined as a 'dwelling' - Witness intimidation or tampering - Any felony sex crime or offense and some misdemeanor sex offenses - First and second degree money laundering - Child sex crimes The law was amended that same year to include misdemeanors involving harm to a person or property and felonies committed while on probation or supervised release. Sources: new-york-lawyers.org; NY State Advertisement

Public safety, a huge campaign issue for Mayor Eric Adams, has also been affected by the city's new laws that make most misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies ineligible for bail, meaning that the judge is required to set the least restrictive conditions to ensure that defendants return to court.

The law took effect in January 2020 but was quickly amended a few months later to include misdemeanors involving harm to a person or property, felonies committed while on probation or supervised release and other crimes.

Democrats say the current rise in crime has nothing to do with the bail polices, but instead reflects growing national trends of rising homicide and gun crimes during the pandemic.

'Bail reform is working,' said New York State Sen. Brad Hoylman, who represents parts of Manhattan, in a statement released in February. 'Current data show that the vast majority of people released were not rearrested. In fact, only 2 percent of those released without bail were re-arrested for violent felonies. This number is slightly lower than those re-arrested for violent felonies after posting bail.'

Last month, Police Commissioner Keechant Sewel spoke out against the bail reform laws.

Speaking to WABC Radio's John Catsimatidis, she said: 'The criminal justice reform law that took effect in 2020, I think, that is definitely part of the thinking that needs to change.

'We can keep most of the important elements of the reform, but there are absolutely some things that need to be adjusted,' she explained of the 2019 bail reform laws - which were rolled back in 2020 to add to the list of crimes for which bail can be set.

Sewell also seemed to decry the decriminalization of quality of life crimes, like turnstile jumping at the subway stations, marijuana use and drinking in public.

'There are entire categories of serious crimes that we can no longer make an arrest for,' Sewell told Catsimatidis. 'We can only issue a summons.

'We have used discretion in the past. Now we don't even have that,' she said.

Elaborating further, she added: 'There are entire categories of crimes where we can make an arrest , but the judges are prohibited from ever setting bail - even if the same burglar or car thief commits the same crime every day and ends up in front of the same judge.

'They used to have that discretion, and in many cases we don't anymore.'

New York Governor Kathy Hochul is set to propose reforms to the city's bail laws.

Her 10-point plan will make more crimes bail eligible and give judges greater discretion to lock up criminals based on whether or not they're repeat offenders, the New York Post reported.

New York City Police Commissioner has called for an end to New York's woke bail reform laws

Governor of New York Kathy Hochul and Attorney General of New York Letitia James march on the parade route at the St. Patrick's Day Parade on Fifth Avenue in New York City

Hochul, who faces election in 2022 after replacing the disgraced Andrew Cuomo last August, is going to attempt to include the plan in the state's budget, which is due April 1.

Perpetrators of gun crimes, as well as subway and transit crimes, would become eligible to be detained and held for bail if the plan is enacted.

The laws would allow cops and judges to bypass Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, who has been widely criticized for his soft-on-crime stance, which involves only applying cash bonds in the most serious cases.

Meanwhile, crime continues to go up in a trend that began during the worst days of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

On Friday, a 72-year-old tourist was tripped after she left a lunch with her daughters in Manhattan.

Cyndi Gradwell of Ocean City, Maryland, arrived in NYC with her two daughters on Friday.

Cyndi Gradwell, 72, of Ocean City, Maryland, was left with a black eye, a chipped tooth, and bruises after criminal Kelvin Winfield intentionally tripped her as she and her daughters walked down Ninth Avenue in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen district on Friday

Her daughters gifted her a trip to New York City as a Christmas present and the ladies were walking down the street with their suitcases after enjoying a nice lunch together when Winfield started yelling at Gradwell's daughters before cutting her off and tripping her

As the trio was walking down Ninth Avenue between 35th and 36th streets in Hell's Kitchen with their suitcases after enjoying a nice lunch, Kelvin Winfield started yelling at Gradwell's daughters.

He said: 'Where are you going? Where are you going?' as he walked closely behind the two women, with Gradwell behind them, according to ABC 7.

Surveillance footage, obtained by the New York Post, shows Gradwell trying to move to go around him when he sticks his foot out and trips her, causing her to fall flat on her face, hitting her teeth.

Gradwell suffered a black eye and bruises, and said she had several of her teeth 'knocked [loose],' causing her to only to be able to eat mashed potatoes, eggs, and 'spaghetti strands one at a time.'

Another tourist was shot multiple times in the leg and groin on March 18.

French-born Pierrick Jamaux, who is visiting from Hong Kong, was getting out of an Uber with his Australian model wife, Sarah Watts, 26, and another person at their hotel in Midtown when a man approached them and demanded Jamaux hand over his Richard Mille watch, the New York Post reported.

Jamaux, 33, is a French-born cryptocurrency expert visiting from Hong Kong with his wife, Watts, an Australian born model

Pierrick Jamaux, 33, (pictured inside the ambulance) was shot multiple times in the legs and groin during an attempted robbery outside his hotel in NYC

The attacked occurred on March 18 as the couple and another woman got out of an Uber outside the Fifty Hotel and Suites in Manhattan

Jamaux told police the man then opened fire before he could react, striking his legs and groin and causing him to fall to the ground as the man tried to rob him.

Police said the other person with the couple, a 25-year-old woman, jumped on the gunman's back to try and stop him before the shooter pushed her off and fled.

New York Police Department officials said five shell casing were recovered from the scene and that Jamaux had multiple entry and exit wounds on both legs. He was taken to the nearby Bellevue Hospital where he was reported in stable condition.
A married police sergeant had a secret affair with a young student constable before sending an intimate photo of her to his friend with the message 'probationers are class, game as f***'.

The 38-year-old supervisor began a sexual relationship with the young recruit, who was in her early 20s, a disciplinary tribunal heard. He also photographed a confidential briefing document on a murder investigation and sent it to his wife.

Despite being disciplined for humiliating his junior colleague and being brought before a court for the serious data breach, the officer has been allowed to keep his anonymity.

The 38-year-old supervisor began a sexual relationship with the young recruit, who was in her early 20s, a disciplinary tribunal heard. Pictured: The Cleveland Police HQ

A police disciplinary hearing declined an application for the officer - referred to as PC A - to be held publicly accountable for his actions.

Weeks before his wrongdoing began he had been hauled before senior officers over a previous breach of confidentiality on a training course and was given a warning about his behaviour.

Stephen Morley, counsel acting for the troubled Cleveland Police Force, outlined the four offences which led to the officer resigning from the force.

He told the hearing in Hartlepool: 'At the time, PC A was aged 38 and was a police officer with 14 years experience on the force. He was an acting sergeant when he entered into a sexual relationship with student PC X.

'She was a young officer in her early 20s and had been a student officer for 16 or 17 months.

'One concern is the imbalance of power between an older male police officer in a position of rank and a young female student officer who had been training for about 17 months.

'What happened was that a relationship developed between the two of them. PC A and PC X began communicating by text and Whatsapp and began a sexual relationship.

'PC X says that they had sexual relations on one occasion at her home address and PC A when he was interviewed agreed with that.

'During that relationship PC A sent a sexual image of the female officer to another man who was not a police officer, a friend and someone he knew outside the police.

'This intimate photograph was sent to this other man without PC X's knowledge. In it she was in a state of undress and exposing parts of her body.

'PC X confirmed it was her and that she had sent it to PC A. She was very upset to find it had been sent to someone else.

'He made derogatory comments in messages he sent along with the picture. Those were; ''probationers are class'', ''she is on my shift'' and ''game as f***''.'

'These were completely inappropriate derogatory comments made by a male officer in a position of responsibility.

'He was effectively the line manager for this student officer and he made comments about her that were completely inappropriate and unbecoming of an acting police sergeant.'

The officer refused to answer questions but gave a written statement in which he admitted what he'd done, putting it down to 'showing off and self ego'.

Mr Morley added: 'This poor young lady who entered into this sexual relationship with a supervisor had her trust and confidence breached and had comments made about her which discredits the organisation as a whole.'

PC A did not attend the hearing and did not dispute the four charges against him. The panel was told he had resigned following his criminal conviction before magistrates for the data breach regarding the murder enquiry.

The first two charges dealt with his relationship with the student officer, firstly that he did not disclose their relationship, leading to complaints that she had received preferential treatment from her regarding overtime and a taser course.

The second was that he breached standards of respect and courtesy by forwarding her picture to his friend.

Then, on May 17, 2020, he breached the force's confidentiality standards by sending a picture of a highly sensitive internal document to his wife.

The acting sergeant was spotted doing it by a constable who reported the matter.

Mr Morley said: 'He was on duty as an acting sergeant at a police station in the Cleveland force area and was seen by another officer taking a photograph of a confidential internal briefing sheet containing information about a murder.'

When he was questioned by senior officers he admitted taking the picture and said he had sent it to his wife because they had been talking about the case.

Mr Morley said: 'He said his wife was not a police officer and this had been a personal matter between the two of them.

'He deleted the photo from his phone and handed his phone to a senior officer.'

The confidentiality and data breach led to the officer being charged and put before magistrates where he admitted an offence under the data protection act in December 2020 and was fined 400

The criminal conviction formed the last of the four charges of discreditable conduct.

Mr Morley said: 'It is our case that PC A would have been dismissed for gross misconduct had he not resigned.

'These are serious failings involving multiple breaches of the standards expected.'
Three Republican-led states have filed a lawsuit against President Joe Biden's administration to stop it from lifting the Title 42 health order for the southern border amid concerns it will bring in a huge flux of migrants.

The attorneys general in Arizona, Louisiana and Missouri argued the move was unlawful and will have a devastating impact on the states.

'This suit challenges an imminent, man-made, self-inflicted calamity: the abrupt elimination of the only safety valve preventing this administration's disastrous border policies from devolving into an unmitigated catastrophe,' the complaint read.

Mark Brnovich, the Republican attorney general of Arizonia who is running for Senate, claimed the recension of the order will bring in half a million migrants over a one-month period.

'Literally if the Biden administration rescinds this policy it will result in more than half a million people it's estimated to illegally cross our border in just one month. That's like the entire population of Baltimore, Atlanta, Georgia,' he told Fox & Friends on Monday morning.

'We want to stop the Biden administration from rescinding Title 42. Because it may be one of the most bone headed decisions of this administration. And they have done a lot of dumb things,' he said.

Three Republican-led states have filed a lawsuit against President Joe Biden's administration to stop it from lifting the Title 42 health order for the southern border - above migrants stranded in Tapachula take part in a caravan towards the U.S.

There is concern lifting Title 42 will led to a massive influx of migrants - above asylum seekers from Ukraine walk towards the Mexico-US San Ysidro Crossing port in Tijuan

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced on Friday they would rescind the publich health order known as Title 42 on May 23. Since March 2020, the Department of Homeland Security has used it to quickly expel migrants at the border due to health concerns related to the coronavirus pandemic.

In February, 55% of the more than 164,000 migrants encountered at the border were expelled under the order.

The lawsuit from the attorneys general, filed in a U.S. District Court in Louisiana, claims that the administration failed to estimate for the costs to the states.

They cite 'increased health care costs for aliens infected with COVID-19 and the cost of increased illegal immigration caused by the Termination Order, and the presence of much greater numbers of paroled aliens with non-meritorious asylum claims who were induced to enter the United States because of the Termination Order.'

They argue the move was illegal as it wasn't enacted under the required notice and comment period required under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and called the removal 'arbitrary and capricious.'

The three states are asking the Western District Court of Louisiana to force the Biden Administration to keep Title 42 in place until it conducts the comment period.

Republican states have been using the legal system to try and counter Biden administration policies on the southern border.

Arizona secured a preliminary injunction that partially blocked the use of the administration's narrowed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) guidance. And Missouri and Texas filed suit against the Biden administration for rescinding the Migrant Protection Protocols, or the 'Remain in Mexico' Policy.

The controversial public health order dates back to the Donald Trump administration. Progressives had pushed the Biden administration to end it.

DHS has admitted lifting the order will 'will likely cause a significant increase in arrivals' of migrants.

'We need to be prepared for what we're considering a potential contingency, which is that the lifting of Title 42 could increase flows,' said a senior DHS official told reporters last week.

The officials estimated the number could be as high as 18,000 border apprehensions per day  more than twice the average number of daily apprehensions last summer.

And some reports last month show estimates where at least 170,000 migrants are waiting on the Mexico side of the border ready to claim asylum on the U.S. side once Title 42 is lifted.

'It may be one of the most bone headed decisions of this administration. And they have done a lot of dumb things,' Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich said of the Biden administration's decision to lift Title 42

White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain seemed to suggest Sunday that Congress is to blame for the southern border crisis

Since Biden took office in January 2021, CBP has encountered more than 2.2 million migrants and the border  and that number could as much as triple with the end of Title 42

But White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain on Sunday morning blamed the ongoing migrant crisis on Congress, claiming they have not approved requested aid to secure the southern border.

'Look, we need to do more work at the border,' he told ABC's This Week.

'The president sent an immigration plan to Congress on his first day in office,' he explained. 'We've asked consistently for more resources.'

And some Democrats broke last week with the administration after news broke of the end of the policy.

Moderate Democratic Senator Kyrsten Sinema said that she and fellow Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, also a Democrat, spoke with DHS about not ending Title 42 until there are other safeguards in place at the border.

'We spoke with the @DHSgov Secretary about the administration's Title 42 contingency plans following our letter to the President urging him not to end Title 42 without a comprehensive plan to support border communities,' Sinema tweeted Wednesday of her and Kelly's meeting.

She said in a statement following the meeting of her border state constituents and illegal border crossers: 'Ending Title 42 without a comprehensive plan in place puts at risk the health and safety of migrants and Arizona communities.'

Kelly said there needs to be a better plan to deal with the situation at the border.

'There is still not an adequate plan or sufficient coordination to end Title 42 without further straining our law enforcement, border communities, and nonprofits providing humanitarian assistance to migrants,' he said.

'We'll continue to push the Biden administration for the resources and support Arizona needs amid this crisis at our southern border,' Kelly added.

Republicans are expected to make the southern border a big issue in the upcoming midterm election, which will decide the control of Congress.

House Republicans will receive a briefing on the border and the lifting of Title 42 on Monday evening after which they will hold a press conference.

House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy criticized the administration's move in a statement on Friday.

'This decision is wrong and will invite a lawless surge of illegal border crossings to enrich human traffickers and overwhelm our Border Patrol,' he said. 'This will inflict suffering, pain, and tragedy throughout our country.'
Dinosaur tracks as old as 112 million years have been wiped from history in southeastern Utah by heavy machinery used to rebuild a boardwalk at the popular tourist area, U.S. officials say.

The damage at the Mill Canyon Dinosaur Tracksite, near Moab, includes several of the footprints getting fractured around the rims, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) recently said in a report.

The agency claims the damage is minor but a non-profit group that monitors the popular tourist site disagrees.

Construction equipment provided by the bureau, including a backhoe, had 'driven directly over the fossil dinosaur tracks, permanently destroying as much as 30 percent of the site,' according to a letter from the non-profit Center for Biological Diversity.

The agency also said an area where a prehistoric crocodile crossed a mud flat appeared to have been driven over multiple times by the backhoe, causing fracturing, the Salt Lake Tribune reported.

The site is considered among the most important dinosaur track areas in the nation, containing 200 prints from at least ten different species, including those of sharp-clawed raptors like the three-toed theropods, as well as long-necked sauropods and ancient relatives of the crocodile.

More than 200 separate footprints of dinosaurs, and ancient crocodiles, have left their mark at the Mill Canyon Dinosaur Tracksite

A backhoe and parts of a torn-up boardwalk at Mill Canyon Dinosaur Tracksite, near Moab, Utah, contributed to the damage done to several ancient dinosaur footprints in January

The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, a scientific non-profit organization, sent an open letter to the Bureau's state director in Utah, Greg Sheehan, saying it was afraid that 'irreparable and avoidable, damage' had been done and that more caution could have been taken if 'qualified paleontologists had been on your staff.'

The Center for Biological Diversity also voiced its concerns, sending a cease-and-desist letter to Sheehan, indicating grounds for legal action if the construction didn't stop.

In response, the federal agency said the project should be reevaluated, the area clearly marked and work crews briefed on where they can and can't go.

The report also noted that the agency should fill a vacancy for a regional paleontologist that has been vacant since 2018.

'To ensure this does not happen again, we will follow the recommendations in the assessment, seek public input, and work with the paleontology community as we collectively move forward on constructing boardwalks at the interpretive site,' the agency said.

The site contains tracks from the Postosuchus, one of the crocodile's ancient ancestors shared in common with dinosaurs

The Deinonychus,a genus of dromaeosaurid theropod dinosaur, was also in North America during the early Cretaceous Period, about 115-108 million years ago

That revised report should be done this summer.

'It's good that we stopped more damage from happening,' said Jeremy Roberts, among those who sought to have the Bureau of Land Management pause the project. 'But this will continue to plague the state until we get a paleontologist.'

Concerns over construction in the area have previously existed with a raised boardwalk being built at the site in 2015. Used by thousands of visitors on a yearly basis, the walkway 'would ensure that the public would not walk directory on the tracks and would also improve safety,' an assessment regarding plans to build a new metal and concrete trail read in October 2021.

'Reconstruction of the walkway has the potential to disturb existing paleontological resources,' the assessment added, referring to the necessity of regular inspections to 'safeguard the paleontological resource.'

'There would be no risk to the trackway from construction activities,' the assessment further read.

Paleontologists and non-profit organizations with a focus on fossil preservation have voiced their concerns to the US. Bureau of of Land Management about the agency's plans to construct in the area, seeing them as a potential threat to the tracks

In response, the US. Bureau of of Land Management has said that it will revise its plans to build a brand new walkway. Pictured: The walkway at the Mill Canyon Dinosaur Tracksite, covering 1.80 miles

The Bureau's Moab Field Office didn't consult with professional paleontologists or even notify the Gastonia Chapter, which had been helping maintain and watch over the site. The apparent damage reported was done by a demolition contractor crew without on-site supervision.

The first concern regarding the construction crew's work at the site emerged in late January when a former volunteer steward at Mill Canyon, Susan Sternberg, noticed a backhoe at the site before getting in touch with Lee Shenton, president of the Moab chapter of Utah Friends of Paleontology.

The chapter's president and other geologists emphasized on the lack consultation from a paleontologist, although they did not yet know the impact of the damage done to the fossils by construction.

'There is damage and there is no reason there should be any damage,' said Utah state paleontologist Jim Kirkland in his report provided to Deseret News. 'It is not completely destroyed as some people were suggesting, but I was pretty scared.'

He added that the done damage could have been completely avoidable.

Shenton, who helped document the damage, said he noticed the boardwalk - usually shaped in the form of a horseshoe - being dissimilated and its parts being set aside on top of the fossils. He also observed tire tracks on the ground that had smothered ichnofossils, which are fossil records of biologic activity, noticeably those of three-toed theropods, long necked sauropods and primitive relatives of crocodiles.

Fossils at the site can be easily damaged due to severe weather conditions, humans stepping on them or even dirt.
Advertisement

Maisie Smith, Jake Wood, Adam Woodyatt and Jacqueline Jossa have led the tributes to EastEnders icon June Brown after her death at the age of 95 was confirmed by the BBC on Monday afternoon.

The actress, a mother-of-six, died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side, two years after her final appearance as chain-smoking Dot Cotton, a role she played for 35 years.

Taking to Instagram, Maisie - who departed the soap in 2021 after becoming a household name as Tiffany Butcher - was among the first to remember the star by sharing a behind-the-scenes photo of herself and Brown, taken during her early years on the soap.

Captioning the photo, she wrote: 'Beautiful inside and out. Rest in peace June Brown.'

Rest in peace: Maisie Smith paid tribute to EastEnders icon June Brown after her death at the age of 95 was confirmed by the BBC on Monday afternoon

Remembering the actress during her years on the show, Jake Wood - best known for his role as Max Branning - shared a photo of Brown on set as she prepared to shoot a scene.

He wrote: 'RIP June. Here she is on set in her element. A true pro and EastEnders legend. Lucky to have met and worked with her, Ill always remember her kindness and the many laughs.'

On-screen granddaughter Milly Zero paid tribute to the actress with a series of images, among them a backstage shot of Brown's legendary meeting with Lady Gaga on The Graham Norton Show in 2013.

In an accompanying caption, the actress - who plays Dotty Cotton on the long-running soap - paid tribute to her 'Grandma Dot.'

She added: 'I have never met anyone who cared about their craft so deeply. An artist, a national treasure, an icon & an inspiration to us all. You will always live on in the hearts of everybody you touched. There will never be anyone quite like June

'A huge, huge loss. Today and always my thoughts are with her family, friends & the whole team at @eastenders.'

Tragic: Remembering the actress during her years on the show, Jake Wood - best known for his role as Max Branning - shared a photo of Brown on set as she prepared to shoot a scene

Gone but not forgotten: Current cast-member Milly Zero remembered the actress in a series of images, among them a shot of June during her legendary meeting with Lady Gaga on The Graham Norton Show

Adam Woodyatt, the show's longest serving cast-member as Ian Beale, remembered the actress fondly alongside a photo of Brown taken during her EastEnders heyday.

He wrote: 'Im lost for words, something June never was. So many memories, so much fun. Just purely and simply an incredible woman who had the most incredible life and career, I was fortunate to have shared a small part of it. They never made you a Dame (we did try), but to me you will always be Dame Brown.'

Former cast-member Jacqueline Jossa - best known for her role as Lauren Branning - wrote: 'I am so heartbroken. You will be so missed. Sharing the screen with you, a family with you, was a dream come true, something I will never ever forget.

'Most of all though, your stories, your humour and just such calming words when I needed them. You made my joining the show so welcoming. I will keep these memories close to my heart. Rest in peace June.'

Admitting it was an honour to star alongside the legendary actress, Danny Dyer - a show stalwart thanks to his role as Queen Vic landlord Mick Carter - wrote: 'Rest in peace June. So privileged to have graced the screen with ya. An icon in its truest form.'

Devastated: Adam Woodyatt, the show's longest serving cast-member as Ian Beale, remembered the actress fondly alongside a photo of Brown taken during her EastEnders heyday

Shock: Former cast-member Jacqueline Jossa - best known for her role as Lauren Branning - admitted June's death had left her 'heartbroken'

Jessie Wallace - better known as Albert Square resident Kat Slater - was also among the first to pay tribute to the actress on Monday afternoon.

Remembering their time together on the soap, she wrote: 'I loved June. She was such a character and a great talent. So many storys and she always made me laugh. June will always be a Dame in my eyes. RIP lovely lady.'

Patsy Palmer - an EastEnders icon in her own right thanks to her former role as Bianca Jackson - shared a series of photos as she looked back at Brown's life, among them her appearance with the late Dame Barbara Windsor at the TRIC Awards.

She wrote: 'Oh June... what words can I say about such a wonderful woman !!!! I honestly thought you would be here forever. Such a BRILLIANT ACTRESS !!!!! YOU ARE EASTENDERS ! Such an ICON and so much fun to work with. I loved working on scenes with you. Your silence, your clever delivery of even the most terrible scripts. I WILL NEVER FORGET YOU.

'You brought joy to so many for many years. June I love you have a safe transition. Barbara Is surely waiting for you to take care of you up there. RIP you beautiful woman. You always get the award for best actress in my book. Stunning, professional to the core!

'A true actress from those wonderful days of inspiration for the younger generation that wanted to act. I loved your storys. Always had a fag hanging out your mouth but you wouldnt be you without it.'

Privileged: Current cast-member Danny Dyer admitted it was an honour to share the screen with the legendary actress

Then and now: Patsy Palmer - an EastEnders legend in her own right - shared images of Brown during her early years as an actress alongside more recent photos from Albert Square, as well as a shot of June with Dame Barbara Windsor

Great talent: Jessie Wallace also had fond memories of the actress from her time on the long-running soap opera

Elsewhere broadcaster Piers Morgan remembered the actress after meeting for his ITV show Life Stories.

Sharing a photo of himself with Brown on set, he wrote: 'RIP June Brown, 95. A wonderfully talented actress whose long-time portrayal of irascible fag-puffing Dot Cotton in EastEnders was one of the all-time great performances in British Television.

'June was such a funny, feisty, fabulous lady off screen too. I loved our Life Stories show together, especially after she moaned on arrival that shed had to forego partying with Lady Gaga the night before to be there! Very sad news.'

Former Emmerdale star and ex-Loose Women panellist Lisa Riley added: 'LEGEND... full stop rest in peace..and have a lot of FUN whilst you are resting!!!'

For decades Brown was one of the most famous faces on British TV, playing the devout Christian famed on Albert Square for her chain smoking, gossiping and mothering of those in need.

Her relationship with her tearaway son Nasty Nick Cotton, John Altman, who she forgave and forgave for his crimes until she gave up on him and he died after consuming a bad batch of heroin bought for him by his very own mother.

Her loving relationship with Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, would captivate millions, leaving fans in tears as she said goodbye to him following a stroke.

Brown's family revealed she died peacefully last night while the BBC urged fans to raise a glass of sweet sherry in her memory. The star still loved a tipple and a cigarette well into her 90s.

Old times: Broadcaster Piers Morgan remembered the actress having previously interviewed her for his popular Life Stories TV show

Legend: Former Emmerdale star and Loose Women panellist Lisa Riley was also among the tributes on Thursday afternoon

Kind: During an appearance on Monday's The One Show, June's co-star Natalie Cassidy, who plays Sonia Fowler on the soap, said: 'I dunno where to start really, it's a really sad day. She was an absolute powerhouse, she was incredible to work with'

During an appearance on Monday's The One Show, June's co-star Natalie Cassidy, who plays Sonia Fowler on the soap, said: 'I dunno where to start really, it's a really sad day. She was an absolute powerhouse, she was incredible to work with.

'She was fun, she was professional, she was cheeky and naughty at the same time, she is just gonna be so dearly missed by all.'

An EastEnders spokesman said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved June Brown, OBE, MBE, sadly passed away last night.

'There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humour will never be forgotten.

'June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2,884 episodes, June's remarkable performances created some of EastEnders' finest moments.

'We send all our love and deepest sympathies to June's family and friends. A very bright light has gone out at EastEnders today but we shall all be raising a sweet sherry in June's memory.

'Rest in peace, our dearest June. You will never be forgotten.'

Farewell: EastEnders star June, pictured in 2020 aged 93, has died at the age of 95

Legendary: June enjoyed 35 years on the show - filming her final scenes in 2020 (right)

A statement from her family said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce our beloved mother, June, passed away very peacefully at her home in Surrey on Sunday evening, with her family by her side.

'We would kindly ask that our privacy is respected at this very difficult time.'

The actress's 35-year run as the Albert Square mainstay began in 1985. before she left the show in 2020.

Brown was perhaps EastEnders' best-known star and larger-than-life Dot was known for her devout Christian faith and hypochondria, as well as her endless cigarette addiction.

The veteran actress, who had a long career in television and theatre, arrived on Albert Square shortly after the soap began in 1985, and aside from a break between 1993 and 1997, was a regular for more than three decades.

On January 31 2008 she single-handedly starred in an episode called Pretty Baby, in which she spoke to a cassette recorder about her life so that her husband could listen to it as he lay in hospital following a stroke.

Brown served in the Women's Royal Naval Service at the end of the Second World War, and then left to train at London's Old Vic Theatre School in Lambeth.

Before joining EastEnders she had roles in Coronation Street, Doctor Who, Minder and The Bill, as well as costume dramas The Duchess Of Duke Street and Oliver Twist.

After joining Albert Square she also starred in comedy Ain't Misbehavin in 1997, and played Nanny Slagg in the BBC's production of Gormenghast in 2000.

Dot Cotton's Biggest Storylines History: Dot has been involved in a number of dramatic storylines throughout her years in Walford Dot's debut - 1985: Dot Cotton made her debut in EastEnders in July of that year as the mother of notorious criminal Nick Cotton and the best friend of Ethel Skinner. Despite Nick stealing from his mother and attempting to poison her, Dot believes he can be redeemed. Dot temporarily leaves Albert Square - 1993: Nick's girlfriend Zoe Newton arrives in Walford and introduces Dot to their nine-year-old son, Ashley Cotton. Dot becomes close with her grandson and Zoe asks her to move to Gravesend with them. Nick is thrown behind bars when Dot returns - 1997: Dot moves back to the square after Nigel Bates tracks her down. Nick has been arrested for drug possession and she is shocked when he returns unexpectedly. He begins stealing from her again and falsely claims to have AIDS. Dot discovers the lie and reports him to the police. Dot helps her friend Ethel to die - 2000: Ethel begs Dot to help end her life after she comes terminally ill. Torn between her deeply held Christian beliefs against euthanasia and her friend's wishes, Dot ultimately helps Ethel to die with pills, but later thinks she should be jailed for murder. Feeling she should be punished, Dot ends up in court for shoplifting. She is jailed for 14 days for contempt of court following an outburst in the courtroom. Dot ties the knot for a second time - 2002: Dot starts a relationship with neighbour Jim Branning. When he proposes, she is overwhelmed and leaves Walford. Jim perseveres and proposes to Dot a second time when they visit the London Eye on Christmas Eve. They decide to have a platonic marital relationship. Dot appears in EastEnders' first ever single-handed episode - 2008: In an emotional episode, Dot recorded a message for her husband Jim after he suffered a stroke. The episode featured only her character and June was praised by viewers for her emotional performance. Dot watches on as Nick dies - 2015: After years of forgiving him for his crimes, Dot accepts Nick's inability to change. After he asks her to buy him heroin, she agrees and gives it to him. Nick confesses he murdered Reg Cox as he lays dying and Dot decides not to call an ambulance to save him. Sonia steals from Dot - 2019: Sonia resorts to stealing from her step-grandmother after a blackmail threat from Martin's hit-and-run victim. She covers her tracks by claiming hackers are to blame after trying to steal thousands from Dot's bank account. Advertisement

For the ages: Hard-nosed Dot's relationship with Jim Branning warmed viewers' hearts throughout her time on the soap, until Jim was sadly written out in 2011 after actor John Bardon suffered a strok

She announced the bombshell news of her exit from EastEnders in 2020 with little fanfare, revealing her decision on a podcast with a former co-star.

Dot had not featured in the soap for a month, when she left a voicemail for Sonia Fowler saying she had moved to Ireland.

At the time an EastEnders' spokesman said the door remained open for a comeback, appearing to leave the decision in Brown's hands.

Sad: EastEnders star June Brown led a life that was as dramatic and tragic off-screen as her on-screen character Dot Cotton, as the actress' death was announced by the BBC on Monday at the age of 95

Iconic: Despite originally joining the EastEnders cast for three months, June won an army of fans with her role as chain-smoking gossip Dot, who was forever tormented by her villainous son Nick

Some of Dot's biggest storylines explored controversial issues such as euthanasia, cancer and homophobia.

Her marriage to Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, was popular among fans - while she was also mother to the notorious criminal Nick Cotton, played by John Altman.

Brown won several awards for her portrayal of Dot, including a lifetime achievement honour at the 2005 British Soap Awards.

In 2009, she was nominated for the best actress prize at the TV Baftas for her standalone episode of the soap.

In December 2021 Brown was made an OBE in the New Year Honours, as she was recognised for services to drama and to charity.

She was previously made an MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours in 2008 for services to drama and charity.

Brown married her first husband, John Garley, in 1950. After his death she married actor Robert Arnold in 1958 and had six children with him.
Spring Breakers faced travel misery when they were left stranded for hours over the weekend as thousands of flights were canceled in the U.S. - some due to bad weather while some Southwest flights were grounded because of tech issues.

More than 3,500 U.S. flights were canceled this weekend, according to FlightAware, a website that tracks flights.

The site noted major disruptions at several Florida airports - where spring breakers have been fleeing to for weeks, including in Miami, Ft. Lauderdale, Tampa and Orlando, as well as Baltimore, New York and other airports around the country.

JetBlue, Southwest, Alaska Airlines, Frontier, Spirit and American Airlines were most affected, according to FlightAware, with JetBlue and Spirit canceling one-third of Sunday's scheduled flights.

Local news reported storms in Florida on Saturday. Several airlines said Sunday that operations are returning to normal.

Travelers waited hours in line to rebook after more than 3,500 U.S. flights were canceled this weekend, according to FlightAware

Travelers posted to social media about their hours spent in the airport, 'Our bed for the night. Thanks Southwest'

Hundreds of Southwest Airlines flights were delayed and canceled throughout the weekend

The airline cited 'intermittent performance issues following routine overnight maintenance of some of its backend technology'

The spate of cancellations arrived as air travel is rebounding from the pandemic, with strong demand for spring break flights.

Travelers on social media complained about waiting on hold or in lines for hours to get their canceled flights rescheduled and being stranded for days.

'Our bed for the night. Thanks Southwest. @SouthwestAir,' one traveler sarcastically noted in a post on Twitter, with a photo of two people sitting uncomfortably on hard airport seats, their legs propped up on the seats across from them.

Another posted a photo on Twitter of his mother sleeping beside several suitcases, and tagged Southwest, pointing out they had nowhere to sleep.

'Thanks 4 teaching me how to provide a homeless camp for my mom since we can't get a hotel in Austin & we can't get to Dallas until tomorrow. But more than anything thanks so much for 1 blanket that I let us borrow so we don't have to lay on the tile. Your the best.'

'Severe weather in the Southeast and multiple air traffic control delay programs have created significant impacts on the industry,' a JetBlue spokesperson said in an email. 'Todays cancellations will help us reset our operation and safely move our crews and aircraft back in to position.'

Southwest Airlines also cited 'weather and airspace congestion' Saturday in Florida, as well as a 'technology issue.' It canceled more than 1,000 flights over the weekend.

As of Sunday evening, the airline had canceled 400 for the day and had 1,442 delays. On Monday morning, there had been 12 canceled fights and 143 delays.

Spring Breakers spent at least 12 hours in the airport in Tampa after thousands of flights were canceled over the weekend due to weather and tech issues with Southwest Airlines

Travelers posted to social media photos of people sleeping in the Tampa airport after thousands of flights were canceled and hotels and rental cars were fully booked

Some travelers posted on social media that there were no trans or buses to get of Florida after thousands of flights were canceled and delayed over the weekend

Southwest issued a statement over the weekend saying that the delays and cancelations took place 'after we experienced intermittent technology issues following routine overnight maintenance.'

'We offer heartfelt apologies to our Customers for any inconvenience, and gratitude to our Employees who are working diligently to make it up to them. We'll continue to update Customers whose journey with us today might be delayed as result of the now-resolved issues.'

American said Florida weather Saturday affected its operations, and it was recovering today.

More than 3,500 U.S. flights were canceled this weekend, according to FlightAware, a website that tracks flights

JetBlue, Southwest, Alaska Airlines, Frontier, Spirit and American Airlines were most affected, according to FlightAware, with JetBlue and Spirit canceling one-third of Sunday's flights

Alaska Airlines seemed to be dealing with a separate issue. The airline said Sunday that weekend flight cancellations that began Friday have affected more than 37,000 customers and, further cancellations were possible.

The airline declined to say why it canceled flights, but referred in its statement to contract negotiations with its pilots.

Off-duty pilots picketed in several U.S. cities Friday over stalled negotiations. They have been without a new contract for three years.

'Alaska Airlines failed to properly plan for increased travel demand and take the steps necessary to ensure it attracted and retained pilots,' the pilots union said in a Friday press release.
The concluding chapter of a mini-series based on the life of Sydney fraudster Melissa Caddick has left viewers divided after exploring some of the more bizarre theories around her disappearance.

Underbelly: Vanishing Act part two aired on Monday night and picks up after 49-year-old Caddick's $6.8million Dover Heights mansion was raided by authorities.

Australian Securities and Investments Commission officers did raid the real Caddick's home on November 11, 2020 after they had cracked open her $30miilion Ponzi scheme fraud.

The show begins with actor Kate Atkinson as Caddick putting on a brave face to enjoy dinner with her son Josh, played by Otis Dhanji, and husband Anthony, played by Jerome Velinsky, assuring them she will 'sort everything out'.

Melissa Caddick (pictured with husband Anthony Koletti) vanished a day after her Dover Heights house was raided by corporate watchdog ASIC

The story is fictionalised in the new installment of Underbelly starring Kate Atkinson (pictured)

At one point in the evening, however, while alone in a bathroom the scope of the raid and possible prison sentence sinks in and her cool facade crumbles into frantic panic.

Caddick vanished after that evening and has not been seen or heard from since, with authorities assuming she had 'done a runner' with some stashed away cash.

Her husband didn't report her missing until two days later saying her son heard her 'go out for a run' and he figured she was out trying to sort through her legal woes.

It wasn't until a severed foot washed up on a NSW South Coast beach months later, which testing confirmed as Caddick's, did police then conclude she had jumped into the ocean from cliffs at The Gap near her house.

While her movements the day after the raid are speculation, this is where the show plows on, showing Caddick leaving her house before Josh and Anthony wake and going on her normal jogging route.

At one point she pauses at a lookout on The Gap cliffs which is where authorities say Caddick, in a state of shock, committed suicide with a leap into the ocean.

But this is where the dramatised version really takes a creative leap, showing Caddick stepping back from the edge before exploring some of the more bizarre theories surrounding her disappearance.

The official theory is that Caddick jumped off cliffs near her Sydney house but the show (pictured) take a look at some other scenarios

Viewers on Twitter were less than impressed by the storyline (pictured)

The yacht theory:

Caddick did not have a passport in another name and all five of her known passports were handed over by her husband in the days after she disappeared.

This would make leaving the country via plane highly unlikely.

But one theory the show puts forward is that Caddick had given a mysterious yacht captain a payment to ferry her out of the country as her 'plan B'.

In the show this falls apart when her husband holds a press conference and she becomes the most high profile missing person in the country.

There has been no suggestion of any such yacht in the official investigation.

The characters of George and his bodyguard (pictured) as gangsters Caddick owed money to were completely made up

A scene in which Caddick sizes up chopping her foot off to throw off police (pictured) was abandoned in the mini-series as quickly as it was introduced

George the underworld figure:

Caddick having a safe house on the NSW South Coast where she is found by one of her former clients George who turns out to be a gangster is entirely made up.

The shows writers invented the character to spice up the story. George also serves as a plot device to allow for dialogue in the scene where Caddick is in hiding.

There has also been no evidence turned up of an off-shore Cayman Islands account holding millions of dollars.

The show also explores the theory Caddick escaped on a yacht (pictured) but there has been no evidence to suggest this

Viewers were divided over whether the show was a worthwhile dramatisation

That Caddick severed her own foot:

Another theory the show explores is that Caddick cut off her own foot to throw off detectives while she went into hiding or skipped the country.

In the story she implores George and her bodyguard, already established as fictitious, to do the dirty work.

Aside from questions about whether Caddick could have survived such a procedure alone and without proper medical attention, a woman even slightly matching Caddick's description with one foot would have surely caught attention but no sightings have ever been reported.

Caddick (pictured with Anthony Koletti) stole more than $30million in an elaborate Ponzi scheme and fraudulent investments

The show had mixed reviews (Pictured: Kate Atkinson playing Melissa Caddick)many ripping into the 'pointless' and 'rushed' plot veering into different theories only to have them scrapped as a fantasy

While the mysterious case continues to grip the public, the show itself was largely panned on Twitter.

The general reaction was less then impressed with the majority of viewer comments ripping into the 'pointless' and 'rushed' plot veering into different theories only to have them scrapped as a fantasy.

'So this is what? A guess at what happened. This is poorly done, yikes,' one fuming viewer wrote.
The search for two British nationals whose light plane crashed in the English Channel has been called off  as it emerged the aircraft went down in a snowstorm.

France's Maritime Prefecture today said there was 'no trace of survivors or wreckage' despite a two-day search that started when the single-engine Piper PA-28 went off radars on Saturday morning.

It contained an unidentified British pilot and passenger who were in a group of six aircraft heading to the Pas de Calais resort of Le Touquet from Wellesbourne Mountford Airfield, near Stratford-upon-Avon.

All were linked to the South Warwickshire Flying School, which had organised the 'Fly-out' to northern France.

The Piper PA-28 was in a group of aircraft which was heading to the northern France resort of Le Touquet on Saturday morning (file image, Piper PA-28)

A Prefecture spokesman said: 'An emergency operation did not uncover any sign of the crash on Saturday, and on Sunday a helicopter flew across the search area but found nothing.

'The direct search has been called off, but anyone discovering debris is asked to contact the maritime authorities.'

An early investigation has pointed to an April snowstorm in the middle of the Channel on Saturday morning.

One source in France said: 'All of the planes from England were confronted with a very large cloud of snow in freezing cold weather.

'It caused some of the planes to turn around, while others zig zagged in the hope of getting round it.

'The Piper went straight in, and this may well have caused the crash. If the survivors had managed to get out of the sunken plane, survival time in the water below would have been very short.'

The stricken plane, registration number G-EGVA, was owned by part time Flying Instructor Guy Wakeley, 51, who is also a well-known financial services boss.

Mr Wakeley, non-executive director at City of London equity investment company HgCapital Trust plc, was not involved in the trip to Le Touquet.

Guy Wakeley is Chief Executive of Equinity plc. He owns the 46-year-old Piper PA-28R-200 Cherokee Arrow II that came down in the English Channel on Saturday morning

The investigating source said: 'The owner rents his plane out through Wellesbourne, but is not made aware of who is using it at any one time.

'He was not aboard the plane on Saturday'. Pilots and passengers on the other planes were on Monday still assisting the authorities with enquiries.

The Flying School had publicised Saturday's trip to France as a 'Club Fly-Out to Le Touquet'.

Ray Stock, head of training at the Flying School, on Sunday refused to discuss who was on board the plane at the time of the crash.

British Coastguard originally launched an operation supported by French aircraft and boats including the Abeille-Languedoc (Languedoc Bee) tug, which was chartered by the French Navy.

Flight records show the Piper PA-28R-200 Cherokee Arrow II  which was built in 1976  had left Wellesbourne at 7.56am on Saturday and went off radar over the Channel at 09.02am.

The Piper has been in production since 1960 and various models have been involved in a number of high-profile accidents in that time.

In August 1972, Prince William of Gloucester, the Queen's cousin, was killed along with his co-pilot in a Piper Cherokee Arrow after crashing on take-off from Halfpenny Green, near Wolverhampton, during an air race.
Ukraine must be sent more heavy weapons to help kick Russian soldiers out of the country, Liz Truss said today amid a row between allies over whether to supply tanks.

The Foreign Secretary used a Warsaw press conference alongside her Ukrainian counterpart to say Kyiv should be given even more weapons of the type' demanded by President Volodymyr Zelensky.

He has made no secret of his desire for Nato nations and others to supply heavy armour in the wake of civilian massacres in places like Bucha.

Boris Johnson and others are understood to be discussing whether tanks can be supplied to Ukraine by countries using the same hardware.

But western officials today suggested the Biden administration in Washington is acting as a throttle on the plan, over fears that the war machines could breach rules allowing only defensive weapons to be supplied.

One said that the US was 'not minded' to support the supply of T-72 tanks of the type used by Ukraine from sympathetic neighbours, adding: 'They have this offensive dimension, they are not purely defensive. They would not be particularly relevant to the military activities the Ukrainians need to undertake.'

However Ms Truss used her press conference tonight to say: 'We also need even more weapons of the type the Ukrainians are asking for.

'The fact is that being tough is the only approach that will work. Putin has escalated this war and this approach is vital to ensuring he loses in Ukraine and that we see a full withdrawal of Russian troops and Ukraine's hand is strengthened at the negotiating table.'

The Foreign Secretary used a Warsaw press conference alongside her Ukrainian counterpart to say Kyiv should be given even more weapons of the type' demanded by President Volodymyr Zelensky .

Zelensky has made no secret of his desire for Nato nations and others to supply heavy armour in the wake of civilian massacres in places like Bucha, which he visited today

The Prime Minister today said Britain 'will never waver from supporting our friends' in a sign of an increased commitment to defend Ukraine that could include armour and anti-ship missiles.

While the UK is not expected to deliver any of its own tanks it could act as a facilitator for other allied nations to supply them to Kyiv. Pictured in a Ukrainian T-72

While the UK is not expected to deliver any of its own tanks it could act as a facilitator for other allied nations to supply them to Kyiv.

Downing Street has also refused to rule out supplying anti-ship missiles to prevent amphibious landings in Odessa.

Mr Johnson highlighted the Nlaw and Javelin anti-tank systems and Starstreak anti-air missiles which the UK has already supplied to Ukraine, as well as protective helmets and body armour.

But in his talks with Mr Zelensky on Saturday he indicated there will be further help on offer.

The Ukrainian president last night hailed Boris Johnson's 'historic leadership' in marshalling military help for his embattled country - as the UK vowed to deliver more defensive aid to kick out the Russian invaders.

The Prime Minister today said Britain 'will never waver from supporting our friends' in a sign of an increased commitment to defend Ukraine that could include armour and anti-ship missiles.

Mr Zelensky said there will be a 'new package' of 'very, very tangible support', while No 10 said the Prime Minister 'committed to continue to step up defensive support'.

In a video address last night the Ukrainian president said: 'Thank you Boris for the leadership! Historical leadership. I'm sure of it.'

Ms Truss argues that weakening Russia's economy will help strengthen Ukraine's hand in peace negotiations with Moscow.

She will hold talks with Polish counterpart Zbigniew Rau on Tuesday and has also pledged a 10 million civil society fund for Ukraine, including support for organisations dealing with sexual violence following reports of Russian forces using rape as a way to terrorise the civilian population.

There has also been widespread international outrage about other atrocities, including possible mass executions carried out by Russian forces as areas around the capital, Kyiv, returned to Ukrainian control.

Mr Johnson, who spoke to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky over the weekend, used a video posted on social media to show his support for the country's efforts to resist the Russian invasion.

He said: 'All the tanks and guns in Vladimir Putin's arsenal will never break the spirit of Ukraine's people or conquer their homeland.'

No 10 would not be drawn on exactly what could be provided but the Prime Minister's official spokesman said scenes over the weekend were 'barbaric'.

He said: 'These are despicable attacks against innocent civilians and they are yet more evidence that Putin and his army are committing what appear to be war crimes in Ukraine and certainly leave us in no doubt that it's entirely right to continue to go further on sanctions, on defensive military aid, and all other measures to put pressure on Putin and his regime to turn back and stop this war.'

He added: 'We will continue to speak with our allies about how we can move further and as much as possible in lockstep to continue to ratchet up the pressure.'

The spokesman also urged countries to cut off reliance on Russian gas and oil.

'We know that different countries are exposed to relying on Russian oil and gas more than others and so that presents different challenges,' he said.

'But they should all - and we should all - be moving at maximum speed to cutting out oil and gas because it is simply the money that we are providing, that these countries provide, to Russia that is funding the Russian war machine and we should be in no doubt about where that money is going.'

The Russian focus in Ukraine appears to have shifted from attempts to besiege Kyiv to efforts around the south and east of the country.

British defence intelligence analysts said that includes the deployment of mercenaries from the Wagner Group - seen as Mr Putin's private army - in the Donbas area.

Meanwhile, a pair of yachts thought to belong to Russian billionaires were seized in Italy and Spain today and on Friday in the latest move to freeze the assets of oligarchs associated with Putin.

Spanish police today impounded a superyacht belonging to Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg, they said, in what is believed to be the first such action in Europe at the request of U.S. authorities.

Valued at more than 90 million euros ($99 million), the 78-metre-long 'Tango' (255 ft) was seized in a shipyard on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca, the Guardia Civil police said in a statement.

A number of documents and data storage devices were seized on board, it said, adding it had also uncovered 'a complex financial and partnership scheme' designed to hide Vekselberg's ownership of the vessel.

Civil Guards accompany U.S. FBI agents and a U.S.Homeland Security agent from the yacht called Tango in Palma de Mallorca, Spain, Monday April 4, 2022

Civil Guards officers search the yatch 'Tango', which belongs to Renova Group head Viktor Vekselberg, in the port of Palma de Mallorca, Spain, 04 April 2022. The yacht was seized by authorities in concordance with sanctions imposed against Russian oligarchs and their assets being frozen in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine

Valued at more than 90 million euros ($99 million), the 78-metre-long 'Tango' (255 ft) was seized in Spain at the behest of U.S. authorities

Three days earlier, Italian authorities seized the 33-metre-long 'New Vogue' yacht moored at Porto Maurizio, in the north-western Italian region of Liguria, on Friday night

Customs Office and Port Authority seized the 3.3 million euro Russian yacht 'New Vogue' in Imperia, Italy

A spokesperson for billionaire Vekselberg, who heads aluminium-to-energy conglomerate Renova, had no immediate comment.

The oligarch is not on the list of individuals subject to European Union sanctions against Russia, but was placed under U.S. sanctions over alleged Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and then included on a list of members of the inner circle of President Vladimir Putin targeted in retaliation for Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

The Guardia Civil said it had acted in a joint operation involving itself, the FBI and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).

Three days earlier, Italian authorities seized the 33-metre-long 'New Vogue' yacht moored at Porto Maurizio, in the north-western Italian region of Liguria, on Friday night.

The seizure was ordered by the Imperia Public Prosecutor's Office, following an investigation by the judicial police, which began in early March.

Over the course of the investigation, Customs Office and Port Authority officials arranged discreet surveillance of the vessel to ensure it did not leave the port.

The yacht is reportedly traceable to Russian oligarchs, though no names were given in local media reports.
A British father and son have died after their family got caught in a landslide in Australia - with mother and a second son left in critical condition.

The man, aged 49, and his nine-year-old son were pronounced dead at the scene of the landslip in the Blue Mountains, a popular tourist area to the west of Sydney, around 1.30pm on Monday.

The mother, aged 50, and her second son, 14, were airlifted to hospital in critical condition having suffered severe head and abdominal injuries. They had to be sedated and hooked up to breathing devices before being moved.

A 15-year-old girl, the couple's daughter, miraculously escaped unhurt but was taken to hospital for shock - with rescuers saying she is 'extremely distressed'.

Police said all five were members of the same British family, who were on holiday in Australia when tragedy struck.

Paramedics were winched from a rescue helicopter down the cliff face as they searched for anyone who had been taken by moving debris

The accident took place at Wentworth Falls, an area of the Blue Mountains that is popular with hikers and families. A picnic area is located close by.

Sydney and the surrounding areas have recently been hit by torrential rains that left areas including the falls severely flooded.

But conditions on Monday were good for walking an all trails had been open at the time of the accident.

Police are now investigating exactly how the slip took place, including whether the family were walking under an area of rock that collapsed on them or along a trail that fell into a gorge.

It is unclear whether a member of the family or a passerby alerted emergency crews to the accident.

NSW Police Detective Acting Superintendent John Nelson described the incident as 'a tragic scene'.

NSW Ambulance Acting Chief Superintendent Stewart Clarke said the two critical patients had 'significant head and abdominal injuries' and had to be sedated before they could be moved.

They were winched out via helicopter around 6pm, more than four hours after the initial accident took place.

Mr Clarke said the scene that greeted rescuers was 'exceptionally confronting and heartbreaking'.

He added that crews had struggled to access the patients due to the remote location and treacherous terrain, with weeks of torrential rain across the region creating slippery conditions.

Superintendent Clarke described the scene as an 'extremely dangerous, unstable environment'.

A rescue operation (pictured) is underway to air lift the critical patients out of the area for further medical treatment

Rescue efforts have been hampered by the treacherous terrain, which has been 'unstable' due to recent rainfall

'This was a really complex and delicate rescue operation for our crews who were working to access patients in rugged bushland and were navigating unstable ground,' he said.

Despite recent downpours, it is understood the part of the walking track where the tragedy occurred was open to the public.

Superintendent Clarke said the situation was devastating for everyone involved.

'This is absolutely heartbreaking for all involved and a truly tragic ending to what I'm sure was meant to be a pleasant day out,' he said.

'It is terribly sad to have lost two lives here today and my heart goes out to the families and the survivors of this horrific ordeal who have witnessed what is certainly a traumatic event.'

Seven paramedic road crews including special operations paramedics and two rescue helicopters with a critical care doctor and a critical care paramedic on board were dispatched to the scene.

The rescue operation also involved local police, Police Rescue, Fire and Rescue NSW, National Parks & Wildlife Services, Blue Mountains detectives, PolAir and rescue helicopters,

Wentworth Pass Loop is a 5km bushwalking track through the Blue Mountains National Park.

According to the NSW National Park Service website, the 'challenging' walk has a grade 4 difficulty, indicating it is very steep and bushwalking experience is recommended.
The ex-boyfriend of a missing Florida mother, whose body was found buried in a shallow grave in Alabama over the weekend, allegedly sent text messages to the woman's family members after her disappearance a week ago, claiming that she had asked him to 'drop her off in the middle of nowhere.'

Law enforcement officers recovered the remains of 37-year-old Cassie Carli on Saturday night in a barn in Springville, Alabama, located some 300 miles away from Navarre Beach, Florida, where she was last seen alive.

Marcus Spanevelo, 34, Carli's ex-boyfriend and the father of her four-year-old daughter, Saylor, was arrested in Tennessee on Sunday on charges of evidence tampering and giving false information.

According to text message and Facebook messenger exchanges between Spanevelo and Carli's family members prior to the discovery of her body, the man claimed that Carli had been 'acting crazy' and asked him to drop her off somewhere in Destin, Florida, where her friend lived.

Raeann Carli, Cassie's younger sister, reached out to Spanevelo on Facebook last Tuesday, asking about her niece, reported Fox 13.

'Is Saylor with you?' she wrote. 'Please marcus [sic]...this is NOT like my sister! She has been doing great & was supposed to star a new job! I hope you will at least cooperate with the police/let them know you have Saylor. She is now a missing person.'

In a text message exchange between Marcus Spanevelo, the ex-boyfriend of Cassie Carli, who was found dead in Alabama on Saturday, and her sister, Raeann, the male suspect claimed that Cassie had asked to be dropped off 'in the middle of nowhere' the night she vanished

Cassie Carli was last seen alive on March 27, when she left her home in Florida to pick up her daughter, Saylor, from her ex-boyfriend, Spanevelo

Spanevelo has been arrested in connection to his ex's death, with upgraded charges expected within days

Spanevelo replied, telling the sister that the child was with him.

'[Cassie] wanted to be dropped off in the middle of nowhere in Destin with saylor [sic]..I told her I wouldn't let saylor go like that.'

Spanevelo added that police had already reached out to him, asking questions.

This exchange was similar to the one Spanevelo reportedly had with Carli's father Andrew the day before.

Spanevelo allegedly told the father that Cassie had asked him to 'drop her off in the middle of nowhere in Destin' so that she could stay with a friend.

Andrew replied that the woman he was referring to, 'moved to Alabama a while ago. Cassie would never have you drop her off anywhere.'

Spanevelo told Andrew that he had left with Saylor.

Cassie Carli's remains were found buried in a shallow grave inside a barn on US 11 in Springville, Alabama, on Saturday night, Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob Johnson said.

Sheriff Johnson told a press conference Sunday that Carli, 37, had been identified thanks to a tattoo on her remains, Fox13 reported.

The grim discovery came hours after Spanevelo was arrested in connection with the March 27 disappearance from a restaurant parking lot in Navarre, Florida, close to where Carli lived.

Carli had traveled there to pick up the couple's daughter, who was found safe in Alabama on Wednesday

It remains unclear how Carli died, with an autopsy scheduled for Monday.

Johnson told journalists: 'Cassie Carli whos been missing now for about a week, we discovered her body while executing a search warrant out in Alabama.

'It was in a barn, in a shallow grave, so its not the ending that we wanted, obviously. But we're hoping to provide a little closure for the family.'

Carli's bodies was discovered in a shallow grave inside this bar in Springville, Alabama, on Saturday night

Authorities positively identified Carli's body by a tattoo that was found on the remains that were recovered in the barn

Johnson said Spanevelo had 'absolutely not' been cooperative following his arrest over Carli's disappearance Saturday.

He tore into the suspect, with Johnson saying he hopes Spanevelo is executed for the crime. The cop said: 'He was totally uncooperative with us and that goes a long way.

'Its your babys mother whos missing and youre not going to cooperate with authorities, its kind of telltale.

'We hated that Cassie has passed away, but its good to get closure for the family. Johnson said. Its good to keep this dirtbag in jail, where he belongs.

'I think we have a great case and I think hes either going to spend the rest of his life in jail or get the needle. Hopefully the needle.'

The sheriff refused to say how they'd learned where Carli had been buried, but added that the barn had a peripheral connection to Spanevelo.

Spanevelo was arrested in Tennessee, and is currently being held there on charges of evidence tampering and giving false information pending an extradition hearing.

Sheriff Johnson says he expects those charges to be upgraded following Monday's autopsy.

Concerned family members raised the alarm after they could not get in touch with Carli last week, with cops further disturbed on discovering Carli's car in the restaurant lot, with her purse still inside. Saylor was found safe and well with her dad in Birmingham, Alabama, on Wednesday.

Spanevelo, 34, was arrested in Lebanon, Tennessee, around 10 a.m. on Saturday and has been charged with tampering with evidence, giving false information concerning a missing person investigation and destruction of evidence.

'Spanevelo was arrested based on a Santa Rosa County Sheriffs Office Major Crimes warrant which was signed by a judge,' the Santa Rosa County Sheriff's Office wrote in a press release. 'We are cautious as to the information being released due to the sensitivity of this case.'

Carli's sister Raeann posted a video on Facebook reacting to the arrest, saying: 'We are a little relieved to know that Marcus is in custody, and we're hoping that can bring us some more answers and closer to finding Cassie.

'Like I said, now that he's in custody, hopefully we can get a few more answers on her disappearance. We're going to bring Cassie home.'

Carli's sister Raeann posted a video on Facebook reacting to the arrest, saying: 'We are a little relieved to know that Marcus is in custody, and we're hoping that can bring us some more answers and closer to finding Cassie'

We are so thankful for Sgt. Aloy & all of the law enforcement involved in helping get justice for Cassie. The search continues tomorrow!!! 10am on Navarre Beach under the water tower!! Will make a post after this with more detailed info! Lets BEING CASSIE HOME!!   Posted by Raeann Carli on Saturday, April 2, 2022

She also said the 'search is on tomorrow' as the family continues to look for the mother-of-one.

Detectives from Santa Rosa County traveled to Birmingham, Alabama, on Wednesday and located Marcus Spanevelo and his daughter, Saylor, four, three days after the girl's mother, Cassie Carli, vanished in Navarre, Florida, located more than 260 miles away.

The Maury County Sheriff's Office in Tennessee said the father has been booked into jail.

The community has shown up on the beach every day to help search for Carli

Spanevelo, the ex-boyfriend of missing Florida mother Cassie Carli, was located in Birmingham, Alabama, on Wednesday, with his four-year-old daughter Saylor, but he has not been arrested or charged

Carli's car was located on Tuesday in Navarre with her purse inside, raising concerns for her well-being, Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob Johnson said during a press conference on Thursday, adding that there has been no activity on the missing woman's phone or credit card since Sunday.

Carli had arranged to meet up with Spanevelo to exchange custody of their daughter at around 7 p.m. in the parking lot of Juanita's Grill at Navarre Beach.

Every day the family and community members have met in the parking lot of Juanita's Grill at Navarre Beach - where her car was found - to search for her, according to WEAR-TV.

Her father, Andrew Carli, told DailyMail.com that before going, she told him, '"I'll be right back." She never came back.'

He was booked into jail, according to the Maury County Sheriff's Office in Tennessee

Andrew said Spanevelo, whom he described as a 'narcissist,' had a turbulent relationship with his daughter after their split. He claimed that prior to her disappearance, Carli had obtained a court order compelling her ex-boyfriend to pay her $6,000 in child support.

Carli's dad also said that Spanevelo would not take his calls or answer his text messaging asking about Carli.

Carli's young sister Raeann told Fox News her sister felt 'extremely unsafe' around Spanevelo and had warned her family about him.

'Just in general, with her relationship with him, it has always been, she has had some fear of him,' her sister said. 'Hes always controlling, and tried to be manipulative, and she had some fear of him in the past. And what hes capable of, or planning maliciously towards her.'

Raeann, who lives in North Carolina, told NBC's Dateline that Cassie and her ex typically met at a Walmart located in Destin, halfway between Navarre and Panama City, where Spanevelo lives.

Andrew Carli, Cassie's dad, texted his daughter the night she went missing and received replies from her phone, claiming she was having trouble with her car and phone

The custody exchange was set to take place at this parking lot at Navarre Beach

Carli never returned home and was reported missing by her father on Monday evening

But for an unknown reason, they decided at the last minute to change their meeting place Sunday.

Nearly four hours after Carli went out to pick up Saylor, her father, with whom she lives in Navarre, received text messages from his daughter's phone, telling him that she was having problems with her phone and her car.

'I'm sorry, car was acting up, and I broke my phone,' one of the the texts sent from Cassie's phone stated. 'Marcus is working on it. I will stay at his place tonight. He is paying me money to do some stuff around the house.'

Speaking to DailyMail.com on Thursday, Andrew Carli said he does not believe Cassie sent those texts.

Carli never made it home that night, and she was still missing the following day when her father came home from work and discovered that his daughter has not returned.

That evening, nearly 24 hours after her last sighting, Carli's father contacted the authorities and reported her missing.

Santa Rosa Sheriff's deputies located Carli's vehicle on Tuesday morning at Navarre Beach, but she was nowhere to be found. Her purse was discovered inside.

Saylor has been found safe with her dad, but her mother never made it home, sparking a massive search involving law enforcement officials and volunteers

Sheriff's deputies located Carli's car at the Navarre Beach parking lot on Tuesday

Carli's friend Sam Graves, who organized a search party in Navarre on Tuesday, told WEAR-TV that Saylor's father, whom she identified as Spanevelo, falsely claimed that he had brought Cassie to Graves' house after she 'freaked out' on Sunday.

Andrew Carli, Cassie's dad, called those claims 'bulls***,' arguing that Spanevelo never even met Graves.

Graves said that Spenevelo is a Brazilian national and that he previously threatened to take Saylor out of the country. She also alleged that the man was an 'abuser,' although Spenevelo has not been charged with any crime related to Carli.

Graves grimly remarked said that all indicators are pointing to a 'worst-scenario ending,' with that prediction since sadly coming to pass.

Carli had just started a new job at the nearby Eglin Air Force base the day before. Her sister said Carli told her that her first shift went well.
The U.S. is asking the United Nations General Assembly to kick Russia off the Human Rights Council, with growing evidence that Vladimir Putin's forces are slaughtering civilians in the streets of Ukraine.

A two-thirds majority vote from the 193-member assembly in New York could excommunicate Russia for gross violations of human rights.

'Russia's participation on the Human Rights Council is a farce.' U.S. Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said in Bucharest on Monday. 'And it is wrong, which is why we believe it is time the UN General Assembly vote to remove them.'

The UN General Assembly has already adopted two resolutions with at least 140 yes votes denouncing the invasion of Ukraine.

'My message to those 140 countries who have courageously stood together is: the images out of Bucha and devastation across Ukraine require us to now match our words with action,' Thomas-Greenfield said as she was visiting Romania to survey the refugee situation there.

Russia is in the second year of its three year term on the 47-member body based out of Geneva.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that President Biden thinks it is 'ludicrous' that Russia still has a seat on the Human Rights Council. She declined to say whether China should be kicked off the council too.

'Russia's participation on the Human Rights Council is a farce.' U.S. Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said in Bucharest on Monday. 'And it is wrong, which is why we believe it is time the UN General Assembly vote to remove them'

The U.S. is asking the United Nations General Assembly to kick Russia off the Human Rights Council, with growing evidence that Vladimir Putin's forces are slaughtering civilians in the streets of Ukraine.

The last nation to be suspended from the rights council was Libya in 2011 due to violence against protesters by forces loyal to then leader Muammar Gaddafi.

Last month, the Human Rights Council set up an investigation into alleged rights violations, including potential war crimes, by Russia. Thirty-two members voted in favor, while Russia and Eritrea voted against. Thirteen other members, including China, abstained.

Mass graves containing the bodies of civilians have recently been uncovered in Bucha, Ukraine. A 45-foot pit containing the bodies of at least 57 civilians was uncovered in Bucha - a city on the outskirts of Kyiv where hundreds of civilians have been found dead.

Serhii Kaplychnyi, head of the local rescue services, said at least 57 innocent people were buried in the grave, other officials placed the total at near 300.

A U.S. defense official said Monday they aren't in a position to confirm reports from Bucha - but have nothing to contradict Ukrainian claims of atrocities.

Biden called the Bucha killings 'outrageous' and said he will step up the U.S. posture.

'This guy is brutal, and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous, and everyone's seen it ... I think it is a war crime ... I'm seeking more sanctions.'

Satellite images taken on March 31, while Russian troops were still in control of the area, clearly show the existence of the grave - giving proof to the lie peddled by Moscow that it was dug by Ukrainian forces. Satellite firm Maxar said images taken as far back as March 10 show what appear to be preparations to construct the pit.

The deputy mayor of Bucha said that around 50 of the bodies found after Kremlin forces withdrew were the result of extrajudicial killings by Russian forces. Russia vehemently denied killing civilians.

Another mass grave was uncovered in woodland near the town of Motyzhyn, around 20 miles west of the city of Bucha, and contained at least 20 bodies.

The bodies of local mayor Olga Sukhenko and her family were found in the grave. A resident of Motyzhyn said Russian soldiers killed any Ukrainian officials who refused to collaborate.

The mayor and her family had been reported by others as kidnapped by Russians on March 23 and taken in an unknown direction.

Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine's foreign minister, said Russian troops had instigated a 'deliberate massacre' in Bucha and branded them 'worse than ISIS'. Photos from the ground showed bodies left to rot alongside roads, some of them with their hands tied, others piled on top of car tires as if to be burned. Witnesses gave horrifying accounts of torture and rape by Putin's men.

Footage released by the Ukrainian military showed what appeared to be a 'torture chamber' in a building used as a barracks by Russian troops in Bucha. The bodies of civilians were lined up against a wall in the basement, kneeling, having been killed. At least one had been shot through the knee before being killed, the military said.

Civilian survivors said some bodies left on the streets had been run over by Russian tanks and 'squashed like animal skin rugs'. Others reported seeing soldiers shoot dead elderly civilians in front of their relatives.

Bodies of civilians are seen in a mass grave in the town of Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, after the Ukrainian army secured the area following the withdrawal of the Russian army from the Kyiv region on previous days, Bucha, Ukraine on April 03

A view shows buildings damaged in the course of Ukraine-Russia conflict in the southern port city of Mariupol, Ukraine April 3

Prime Minister Boris Johnson led world leaders in condemning the violence at the weekend, pledging to send funding and specialist investigators to the International Criminal Court at The Hague to compile evidence for a war crimes tribunal.

'We will not rest until justice is served,' he vowed, before a spokesman for the PM added: 'It's clear that Putin crossed the threshold of barbarism some time ago.'

'It's certainly evidence that Putin's army is committing war crimes,' the spokesman said, adding that the Government now wants 'to look beyond what we have already provided' in terms of fresh arms shipments to Ukraine.

A mass grave was discovered in the grounds of the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, containing the bodies of dozens of civilians

Another view of the mass grave discovered close to a church in Bucha, which was uncovered by Ukrainian forces as Russian troops withdrew from the area around the capital

Dead bodies litter the streets near Bucha, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, after Russian forces withdrew from the region - leaving evidence of 'war crimes' in their wake

Russian forces, which had occupied areas to the west of Kyiv since the early days of the war, withdrew from the region at the weekend - leaving behind evidence of atrocities

'Whatever equipment we send will obviously allow Ukraine to defend itself. We are aware of the requests from the Ukrainians for equipment to defend themselves from ships and we are looking into what we can do,' he said.

Putin's invasion has suffered another devastating blow after his force's death toll rose to 18,300, according to Kyiv's estimates today.

Russia has only admitted 1,351 of its troops have died fighting in Ukraine since Putin invaded on February 24, a fraction of the figure estimated by Ukraine's armed forces.

In a further blow to Putin's war, Ukrainian forces have also retaken some towns in the northern Chernihiv region, whilst Russian forces no longer occupied any areas in the Sumy region, in Ukraine's northeast.

Ukrainian soldiers also blitzed a Russian military convoy in an effort to disrupt deliveries of fuel and supplies to Putin's troops on the frontline, with video showing a military tanker being hit by what appears to be a rocket before bursting into flames.

But Russian attacks on civilian areas have continued, with eight people killed and 34 wounded after shelling hit the southern Ukrainian cities of Mykolaiv and Ochakiv on Sunday, prosecutors in Kyiv said.
More than four tons of cocaine has been intercepted on ships smuggling narcotics in the Caribbean during a 45-day sting operation led by the US Coast Guard, officials said.

The 8,500 pounds of cocaine, with a value of $245 million, was offloaded from a Coast Guard vessel at a Florida port following a series of interdictions, the U.S. Coast Guard said Saturday.

At least 13 suspected drug smugglers from Colombia and the Dominican Republic were arrested in 11 incidents involving the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Dauntless and the HNLMS Friedland of the Royal Netherlands Navy.

At least 8,500 pounds of cocaine worth about $245 million were offloaded at a port in Miami on Friday, the United States Coast Guard revealed

The 8,500 pounds of cocaine were seized during 11 interdictions carried out by the United States Coast Guard and the Netherlands Navy

Coast Guard crew removes some of the 8,500 pounds that were intercepted in the Caribbean Sea

'The Coast Guards strong international partnerships, counter threats in the maritime domain, protect each of our countries from transnational organized crime, and work to stabilize and promote good governance in the region,' said District Seven duty enforcement officer, Lt. Paul Puddington.

The Coast Guard was unable to say where the cocaine was being smuggled to and from after it offloaded the drugs at a Miami port.

The arrests come six weeks after the Coast Guard cutter James dropped off 30 tons of cocaine and marijuana worth over $1 billion at Port Everglades in Florida.

The U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Dauntless offloaded $245 million worth of cocaine Friday in Miami

The 54,500 pounds of cocaine and 15,800 pounds of marijuana offloaded February 17 followed months of interdictions of drug smuggling boats in the Caribbean Sea and Eastern Pacific Ocean.

Coca cultivation in Colombia in 2020 soared to 245,000 hectares (945 square miles), enough to produce 1,010 tons of cocaine, according to the White Houses latest report on harvesting trends in the Andean region.

As recently as 2014, potential production was less than half that amount. Production in Peru and Bolivia has also steadily risen.
The FBI and Spanish authorities seized mega yacht Monday owned by oligarch and Putin friend Viktor Vekselberg  amid calls for even tighter sanctions on Russia following new discoveries of atrocities outside Kyiv.

The 254-foot vessel was docked in Palma de Mallorca, the capital of Spains Balearic Islands and a playground and tax haven for the wealthy.

The seizure was a joint operation including FBI and Homeland Security Investigations as well as Spain's Civil Guard carried out at the request of U.S. authorities.

The seizure was the the first in the U.S. government's sanctions initiative to 'seize and freeze' giant vessels and other pricey assets of Russian elites in an effort to turn up pressure on Putin in response to the invasion.

It came hours after new horrors emerged from the suburb of Bucha outside Kyiv, Ukrainian forces who pushed back Russian invaders discovered bodies of Ukrainian citizens shot dead in the street, some with their hands tied behind their backs.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called it 'genocide,' and there was a new push within the Biden administration for tougher sanctions.

'I'm going to continue to add more sanctions,' President Joe Biden said Monday as he arrived from his home in Delaware to Washington. He repeated his assessment that Putin had committed 'war crimes,' but stopped short of saying Russia had committed genocide.

The FBI and Spanish authorities seized a mega yacht belonging to oligarch Viktor Vekselberg on Monday, amid calls to further tighten sanctions on Russia

The U.S. is also pushing to suspend Russia from the UN Human Rights Council  the panel charged with exposing abuses like the kind being uncovered amid Russia's war on Ukraine. The move would require a two-thirds vote of the UN General Assembly.

A Civil Guard source said the immobilized yacht is Tango, a vessel flagged in the Cook Islands that Superyachtfan.com, a specialized website that tracks the worlds largest and most exclusive recreational boats, values at $120 million.

The Justice Department put the value lower, at $90 million, in its official release.

The yacht is among the assets linked to Viktor Vekselberg, a billionaire and close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin who heads the Moscow-based Renova Group, a conglomerate encompassing metals, mining, tech and other assets, according to U.S. Treasury Department documents.

All of Vekselbergs assets in the U.S. are frozen and U.S. companies are forbidden from doing business with him and his entities.

While Vekselberg has not been sanctioned by the European Union, he is under investigation in the U.S. for possible tax fraud, money laundering and falsifying documents precisely to hide the ownership of the Tango yacht, the Civil Guard said in a statement.

According to the Superyachtfan web site, the ship has 7 cabins and can sleep up to 14 guests, with a crew of 22. There are no available interior photos  although it has four 1,730 hp diesel engines and can make 22 knots.

According to the Justice Department, a warrant for the seizure alleged 'that the Tango was subject to forfeiture based on violation of U.S. bank fraud, money laundering, and sanction statutes. Separately, seizure warrants obtained in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia target approximately $625,000 associated with sanctioned parties held at nine U.S. financial institutions.'

Documents filed in the case allege that Vekselberg 'used shell companies to obfuscate his interest in the Tango to avoid bank oversight into U.S. dollar transactions.'

He was sanctioned by the Treasury Department in 2018, but 'continued to make U.S. dollar payments through U.S. banks for the support and maintenance of the Tango and its owners, including a payment for a December 2020 stay at a luxury water villa resort in the Maldives and mooring fees for the yacht.'

'Todays action makes clear that corrupt Russian oligarchs cannot evade sanctions to live a life of luxury as innocent Ukrainians are suffering,' said Deputy Attorney General Lisa O. Monaco. She said DOJ was delivering 'on our commitment to hold accountable those whose criminal activity strengthens the Russian government as it continues to wage its unjust war in Ukraine. That commitment is one we are not finished honoring.'

Viktor Vekselberg, chairman of the Board of Directors of Renova Group, is friends with Russian President Vladimir Putin

A U.S. federal agent and two Civil Guards board the yacht called Tango in Palma de Mallorca, Spain, Monday April 4, 2022. U.S. federal agents and Spain's Civil Guard are searching the yacht owned by oligarch Viktor Vekselberg

The seized yatch 'Tango', which belongs to Renova Group head Viktor Vekselberg, moors in the port of Palma de Mallorca, a tax haven and playground for global elites

Vekselberg, who made his fortune in aluminum and oil, featured in the Mueller probe

She seizure follows discoveries of atrocities against civilians in Bucha, outside Kyiv

Here the Tango is seen moored in Malaga. Vekselberg bought it in 2011, according to the Justice Department

Interior photos are not available, although it can accommodate 14 guests

The move is the first time the U.S. government has seized an oligarchs yacht since Attorney General Merrick Garland and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen assembled a task force known as REPO - short for Russian Elites, Proxies and Oligarchs - as an effort to enforce sanctions after Russia invaded Ukraine in late February.

Vekselberg has long had ties to the U.S. including a green card he once held and homes in New York and Connecticut. The Ukrainian-born businessman built his fortune by investing in the aluminum and oil industries in the post-Soviet era.

Vekselberg was also questioned in special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and has worked closely with his American cousin, Andrew Intrater, who heads the New York investment management firm Columbus Nova.

Vekselberg and Intrater were thrust into the spotlight in the Mueller probe after porn star Stormy Daniels released a memo that claimed $500,000 in hush money was routed through Columbus Nova to a shell company set up by Donald Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen. Columbus Nova denied that Vekselberg played any role in its payments to Cohen.

Vekselberg and Intrater met with Cohen at Trump Tower, one of several meetings between members of Trump's inner circle and high-level Russians during the 2016 campaign and transition.

The 64-year-old mogul founded Renova Group more than three decades ago. The group holds the largest stake in United Co. Rusal, Russias biggest aluminum producer, among other investments.

Vekselberg was first sanctioned by the U.S. in 2018, and again in March of this year, shortly after the invasion of Ukraine began. Vekselberg has also been sanctioned by authorities in the United Kingdom.

The yacht sails under Cook Islands flag and is owned by a company registered in the British Virgin Islands administered by different societies in Panama, the Civil Guard said, 'following a complicated financial and societal web to conceal its truthful ownership.'

Agents confiscated documents and computers inside the yacht that will be analyzed to confirm he real identity of the owner, it said.

The U.S. Justice Department has also launched a sanctions enforcement task force known as KleptoCapture, which also aims to enforce financial restrictions in the U.S. imposed on Russia and its billionaires, working with the FBI, Treasury and other federal agencies. That task force will also target financial institutions and entities that have helped oligarchs move money to dodge sanctions.

The White House has said that many allied countries, including German, the U.K, France, Italy and others are involved in trying to collect and share information against Russians targeted for sanctions. In his State of the Union address, President Joe Biden warned oligarch that the U.S. and European allies would 'find and seize your yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets.'

'We are coming for your ill-begotten gains,' he said.

Monday's capture is not the first time Spanish authorities have been involved in the seizure of a Russian oligarchs superyacht. Officials there said they had seized a vessel valued at over $140 million owned by the CEO of a state-owned defense conglomerate and a close Putin ally.

French authorities have also seized superyachts, including one believed to belong to Igor Sechin, a Putin ally who runs Russian oil giant Rosneft, which has been on the U.S. sanctions list since Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.

Italy has also seized several yachts and other assets.

Italian financial police moved quickly seizing the superyacht 'Lena' belonging to Gennady Timchenko, an oligarch close to Putin, in the port of San Remo; the 65-meter (215-foot) 'Lady M' owned by Alexei Mordashov in nearby Imperia, featuring six suites and estimated to be worth 65 million euros; as well as villas in Tuscany and Como, according to government officials.
A teenager has been awarded 1.1 million in damages by a hospital after suffering a severe upper body injury during birth when staff failed to explain the risks of a natural birth or offer a Caesarean section to his mother.

The boy suffered a 'significant' injury which limits his activities and work prospects, the High Court heard today.

Deputy High Court judge Clare Padley ruled that the teenager cannot be identified for legal reasons, but said Guys and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust, which had responsibility for the care of the boy and his mother, can be identified.

The judge concluded the agreement was in the best interests of the teenager after a relative took legal action against hospital bosses on his behalf.

Barrister Julian Matthews, representing the family, earlier told the court that the boy's mother had experienced difficulties during previous births.

But he said hospital staff had not explained the risks of a natural birth, nor offered her a Caesarean section.

Signs outside St Thomas' Hospital in Lambeth, south London, where the teenager suffered a serious upper body injury during birth

The boy, who has not been identified for legal reasons, suffered a 'significant' injury which limits his activities and work prospects, the High Court (pictured) heard today

The barrister added that an agreement on a damages figure had been reached after discussions with lawyers representing the hospital trust.

Guys and St Thomas apologised for 'failings' in its care through its lawyer at the hearing.

It comes after another judge last week approved a similar settlement, involving a different hospital trust, after hearing that a teenage girl had suffered a severe injury at birth.

In July 2020, the NHS had to make a 37million payout to the parents of a baby boy who was left severely brain-damaged after mistakes by staff on a maternity ward at the hospital.

The amount was thought to be one of the largest payouts in the history of the health service.

In the maternity negligence case at the High Court the NHS trust conceded that mistakes with the boys care left him severely disabled and needing round-the-clock care for the rest of his life.
Donald Trump's struggling social media venture hit more trouble on Monday when it emerged that two tech entrepreneurs had quit Truth Social and that the platform is only now advertising for an engineer to help build an Android app - depriving millions of Trump supporters from the chance to sign up.

Last week, download data revealed that Truth Social's launch had fizzled quickly.

And now Josh Adams and Billy Boozer have left their jobs as chiefs of technology and product development less than a year after joining.

Their departures - reported by Reuters - follow a difficult launch of the company's iPhone app on Feb. 20.

Weeks later, many users are still on a waiting list, unable to access the platform.

Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) Chief Executive Devin Nunes, a former Republican congressman, said publicly that the company aimed to make the app fully operational within the United States by the end of March.

Industry analysts estimate the app has been downloaded 1.2 million times in all - putting it well behind other apps that target conservative users such as Parler with 11.3 million and GETTR at 6.8 million installations.

Its reliance on iPhone users and the absence of an Android app could be putting it at a particular disadvantage.

Android phones comprise about 40 percent of the U.S. market, but skews much higher among Trump supporters.

At the time of the last election, the Trump campaign found that almost two thirds of his base were using Android phones - in part because of distrust of Apple and in part because of the expense of iPhones.

Tech entrepreneur Billy Boozer has left Trump Social, Reuters reported on Monday, along with another senior figure Josh Adams in the latest blow to Donald Trump's social media app

Truth Social is Trump's highest profile business venture since leaving office, and is part of his fightback against social media platforms that banned him last year

The app launched in February but its download numbers stalled in recent weeks, according to research by Sensor Tower, which said they had plunged by more than 90 percent

The shaky rollout has reportedly infuriated Trump himself, who sees the app as a chance to stand up for free speech and strike a blow against platforms that banned him after the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol last year.

Trump has been heard on the phone 'swearing gratuitously' and asking 'what the f*** is going on' with the app, according to the Daily Beast.

And things could be getting worse.

The exit of two executives critical to the app-launch efforts could imperil the company's progress as it tries to prove it can compete with mainstream platforms such as Twitter, two people familiar with the company told Reuters.

'If Josh has left, all bets are off,' a source said of tech chief Adams, calling him the 'brains' behind the platform's technology.

Another source familiar with the venture said Boozer also had a major leadership role as product chief, running management across technology infrastructure, design and development teams.

Boozer declined to comment and Adams did not respond to a request. Representatives for TMTG and Trump did not respond to requests for comment.

It is the latest bad news for Trump and his highest-profile business venture since leaving the White House.

Last week an industry analyst said Truth Social was installed only 60,000 per week during the past month.

'This is down 93% from its launch week, when it saw 872,000 installs during the week of Feb. 21,' an expert at Sensor Tower told TheWrap based on early data.

To date the former president has only posted on the app once -- the day it launched

Other platforms are trying to stay one step ahead.

On Monday, GETTR - launched by former Trump adviser Jason Miller - unveiled a new feature with closed caption live subtitling of livestreams in 12 languages

'GETTR continues to innovate and bring amazing new features to our global free speech community,' said Miller in a statement.

'Our new translation technology will allow people to communicate better than ever before, without the threat of Big Tech censorship. Were just getting started.'

Meanwhile Trump himself has not made much use of his new platform

'Get Ready! Your favorite President will see you soon!' the ex-president wrote on February 21. He has not posted anything since.

The ex-president had hoped Truth Social would be an aggressive competitor to tech giants like Twitter and Facebook.

But since debuting at the top of the Apple's free app list for most downloads, Truth Social has tumbled more than 199 spots. It's no longer on that list, which only goes to 200, as of Wednesday. It's not available for Android users yet.
Eco-warriors have scrawled graffiti on a magistrates' court building after they appeared in connection with a series of disruptive protests on the M25.

The demonstrators spray painted 'Insulate Britain' in blue letters on the wall outside Crawley Magistrates Court after they faced charges of causing a public nuisance in connection with M25 protests.

The group, which included Catherine Eastburn, 54, the wife of a former Transport for London director, posed for photos with a banner under the message.

One woman was spoken to by three uniformed officers from Sussex Police before being led off for questioning.

The latest vandalism came after the alleged protesters appeared in court accused of causing a public nuisance by obstructing a public highway.



Insulate Britain activists scrawled graffiti on a magistrates' court building after they appeared in connection with a series of disruptive protests on the M25

The demonstrators spray painted 'Insulate Britain' in blue letters on the wall outside Crawley Magistrates Court after they faced charges of causing a public nuisance in connection with M25 protests

Cathy Eastburn, 54, of London, was among the group of people who were charged with the offence.

Her husband is public transport boss Benedict Plowden, 58, who left TfL and his 170,000-a-year job at the end of October.

She appeared before the court where she pleaded not guilty to causing a public nuisance on the M25.

The alleged protesters were arrested by police on September 13 last year after staging a protest at junction 3 of the M25.

One by one they rose from the public gallery and appeared in the dock to resounding applause from supporters in court.

Some had already served jail sentences for previous offences committed during protests on the M25.

Several defendants made a speech claiming the environment was being damaged by a lack of action by the Government to crack down on carbon emissions.

Mrs Eastburn implored the court to listen to what the defendants were saying about the environment.

One defendant, Oliver Rock, 41, said: 'I've already been to prison for two months and I've got 5,00 of court fees. Other prisoners said: "You shouldn't be here." They couldn't understand why peaceful protesters were there.

'The Government are failing to address this crisis. Who is responsible for this? I'm being responsible for this by taking these actions.'

One woman was spoken to by three uniformed officers from Sussex Police before being led off for questioning

Insulate Britain, an offshoot of Extinction Rebellion, wants the Government to insulate all UK homes by 2030 to cut carbon emissions.

It repeatedly blocked major roads between September and November, causing long traffic jams.

Activists often glued their hands to roads or each other to make it harder to remove them.

Retired biologist, Judith Bruce, 83, Ana Heyatawin, 58, Tessa Marie Burns, 33 - pleaded guilty to a different charge of wilfully obstructing a highway.

The court heard protesters from Insulate Britain went onto the M25 at Junction 13, at Stanwell in Surrey at around 8.43am on September 13 with police arriving at around 9.00am.

By 11.43am the motorway had been cleared but not before disruption estimated to cost in excess of 62,000 had been caused.

Addressing the court, Bruce said: 'I was there and I did sit in the road and I obstructed traffic for about two hours and to this charge I am guilty.

'But I feel myself guilty of far more than that and more damaging than that. I and all of us are complicit by contributing to years of damage to the world by participating in the way we live - the consume and throw away society we have created.

'We are destroying in 200 years our living surroundings that we call Mother Nature. All our inventions are destructive: bombs, machines, corporations. The M25 is an example of this. It is a constant stream of tin cans rushing ever more to feed this incessant need for growth.

'We know this is happening and we know the future is destroyed. I'm a very ordinary person with no previous incidents of protest. We have a right to do something.'

The graffiti was left scrawled on the building after the protesters appeared at court charged with causing a public nuisance

The 83-year-old, from Swansea, was fined 200 and ordered to pay 85 costs and 34 surcharge.

Heyatawin also pleaded guilty to obstructing the highway but was not fined after the court heard she had already served a three month sentence and had additional fines to pay.

Burns, who also pleaded guilty, was handed a 200 fine with 85 costs and 34 surcharge.

The other defendants all pleaded not guilty to causing a public nuisance on the highway.

They are: Venitia Carter, 57, of Brighton, Jessica Causby, 25, of London, Priyadaka Conway, 60, of Cambridge, Catherine Eastburn, 54, of London, Cameron Ford, 31, of Cambridge, Gregory Frey, 25 of Cambridge, Susan Hagley, 66 of Ipswich, Oliver Rock, 41, of London, Alexander Rodger of Brighton, 31, Joseph Shepherd, 21 of Horsham and Michael Wiley, 75.

Their cases were adjourned with all defendants being given bail to appear before Lewes Crown Court on May 9.
An estranged husband has admitted being responsible for the death of his 'mutilated' wife whose body was found dumped under a pile of clothes in a room sealed shut with a dressing gown cord.

Russell Marsh, 29, denies murdering his ex-wife Jade Ward as well as an alternative count of manslaughter as his trial got underway at Mold Crown Court.

Moments before Ms Ward's lifeless body was discovered, her alleged murderer was filmed by officers at a police station telling them he had 'done something horrible'.

He rocked back and forth in his chair and repeatedly apologised as officers found the mother-of-four's body at her home in Shotton, Flintshire, on August 26 last year.

After a jury was sworn in, Prosecutor Michael Jones QC described how Marsh was working an overnight shift for his employer Bio Energy in Ellesmere Port on the night 27-year-old Ms Ward was killed.

Russell Marsh, 29, denies murdering his estranged wife Jade, 27, at their home in Shotton, North Wales, last year

Jade Ward, 27, had ended her relationship with her 'controlling' husband the week before her death and had been spotted with another man at a party

He said the defendant had told his supervisor that he had to leave several hours into his shift and claimed his brother had taken an overdose and needed to go to hospital.

The prosecutor said this was 'completely untrue' and instead Marsh was tracked by CCTV, ANPR cameras, and phone masts heading into north Wales and arriving at the former family home in Shotton.

Mr Jones said the couple had separated on three occasions but they had split in the summer of 2021. He said close friends and family members heard Ms Ward saying that this time the separation was 'for good'.

Ms Ward had allegedly shared a kiss with another man at a party and was 'moving on' with her life.

This information made its way back to Marsh who was described in court as being 'controlling' over his former partner.

Flowers and tributes were left in memory of Jade Ward outside her home on Chevrons Road, Shotton

Marsh is alleged to have attacked Co-op worker Ms Ward with a knife before strangling her and then handing himself into police the next day. Marsh told officers they'd find his wife upstairs and dead in her bed.

Police forced entry to the property and found Ms Ward in the location he indicated but covered with a pile of clothing.

The door was also 'secured with a dressing gown cord,' the trial heard. Ms Ward, who was in blood-stained pyjamas, was pronounced dead at the scene.

A pathology report detailed how she suffered multiple wounds 'across her body', including her face and arms, while grip marks left her bruised and there was evidence of 'defensive' wounds sustained around the hands showing she had 'made efforts to fight off' her attacker.

Floral tributes, balloons, photographs, written messages, candles and teddies were left on the pavement yards from the home where Jade Ward, 27, was found dead last August

Prosecutor Mr Jones said the pathology expert determined Ms Ward's 'horrific' cause of death was concluded as asphyxiation that could only be carried out by another person. Mr Jones said her body had been 'mutilated'.

On Monday, April 4, Marsh went into the witness box and gave evidence. While being questioned by his barrister Christopher Terhani QC the defendant accepted he killed Ms Ward by way of asphyxiation and had no lawful reason for doing so.

However he denied having any intent to kill or cause Ms Ward serious harm.

Father-of-five Marsh, who left school at 16 with two GCSEs in science and religious studies, confirmed there was a seven-month period in 2017 when he was signed off from work - at a different company - due to ill mental health caused by 'pressure and anxiety'. He was medicated during this period.

The scene outside the Chevrons Road home where Jade Ward was found dead with multiple stab wounds

Police officers at the scene last August. Officers were told by Marsh they would find his wife in the bedroom, court hears

The defendant also told the court he was roughly 30,000 in debt in 2019 following house renovations and paying for the wedding between himself and Ms Ward. The couple were together on and off for just over nine years in all.

Marsh said they had 'rocky times' throughout - more so towards the tail end of the relationship. He said the pair were 'tired' and 'drained' and claimed they had 'next to nothing' when it came to a physical relationship.

In summer 2019, not long after their wedding, the couple had split up for 'a variety of reasons', the court heard, but they later reconciled within days.

At the time of the split Marsh was accused of bruising Ms Ward's wrists. He said he had 'never been violent' with Ms Ward.

Marsh denies murder and an alternative count of manslaughter. The case, being heard by Judge Rhys Rowlands and expected to last two weeks, continues.
A Texas man who shot dead his girlfriend's ex-husband as the men argued over child custody will not face criminal charges because the shooting was in self-defense, the Texas Attorney General has announced.

William 'Kyle' Carruth, 39, opened fire on Chad Read, 54, after the two squared up to each other and wrestled over a gun in Lubbock on November 5.

A special grand jury found Carruth will not be charged because the argument was on his property and the shooting was in self-defense, Attorney General Ken Paxton said on Thursday.

Carruth, who is the ex-husband of 72nd District Court Judge Ann-Marie Carruth, was never arrested for the shooting, which his lawyer had argued was a 'justifiable homicide'.

Judge Carruth, who lost her bid for re-election in March and will be in office until December, divorced him shortly after the shooting.

The argument leading up to the shooting centered on a custody dispute over the children of Chad Read and his ex-wife Christina, who was dating Carruth.

Read's new wife, Jennifer, filmed the moment her husband was shot and killed by Carruth and released the footage.

The disturbing video shows Read can be heard demanding to see his nine-year-old son outside Carruth's house before he's shot dead.

Pictured: Kyle Carruth (left in a black top and holding a rifle) and Chad Read (right wearing a teal top) are seen in a grab from mobile phone footage squaring off outside a home that reportedly belongs to Carruth

William 'Kyle' Carruth opened fire on Chad Read after the two squared up against each other and wrestled over a gun in Lubbock, Texas, on November 5.

Carruth will not face criminal charges for shooting dead his girlfriend's ex-husband during a child custody argument because the argument unfolded on his property and was carried out in self-defense, a Texas grand jury found

Jennifer Read (left), the widow of Chad Read (right) released footage showing the moment her husband was shot and killed by Carruth

TIMELINE OF CHAD READ'S DEATH AND INVESTIGATION November 5, 2021 - Kyle Carruth opens fire on Chase Read after a confrontation about the whereabouts of his nine year old son November 16, 2021 - Kyle Carruth's marriage to Judge Ann-Marie Carruth prompts Lubbock County's District Attorney's Office to recuse from the investigation into the shooting and turn findings over to the Texas AG'S office. November 19, 2021 - Judge Carruth and Kyle Carruth's divorce is finalized. Court filings are sealed. November 24, 2021 - Jennifer Read releases footage of the shooting and seeks custody of Chad Read's children. January 2022 - A judge dismisses Jennifer Read's petition to have custody of the children. March 30 - A special grand jury decides not to indict Kyle Carruth for Chad Read's death. March 31 - Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton issues a statement saying Kyle Ruth will not be criminally charged. April 1 - Jennifer Read condemns the grand jury's decision and her attorneys say she'll move on with a civil lawsuit seeking $50million from Kyle Ruth over wrongful death claims. Advertisement

Jennifer Read will launch a $50million wrongful death lawsuit in a civil court now the criminal investigation has finished.

'Apparently in Texas it's okay to bring a gun out to a verbal altercation and murder the ex. The 'special' grand jury was just for show,' she wrote on Facebook.

'I don't know of one other person who testified for Chad, besides me and his mom. They didn't like being inundated with calls and did this to say they did it, but I guarantee they weren't there for Chad Read.'

Lubbock County District Attorney's Office had excused itself from the investigation because of Carruth's relationship with the judge, according to the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal.

Investigators turned their findings over to the Texas Attorney General's Office, which handled all prosecutions related to the case.

'The presentation of the case included several eyewitnesses, family of Chad Read, and additional evidence that was not previously released to the public,' Paxton announced.

'After several days of thorough inspection of the evidence, the Special Grand Jury concluded their investigation into the matter and deliberated on whether the evidence supported the filing of criminal charges against Kyle Carruth.

'The Special Grand Jury voted today to not indict for any criminal charges against Kyle Carruth.'

After the killing, Judge Carruth, made an affidavit in their divorce case saying she been 'notified that my husband...is under investigation for the shooting and killing of his girlfriend's children's father after he attempted to pick up his children.'

A lawyer for Jennifer Read issued a statement after the jury's finding saying the criminal justice system had 'utterly failed' her

'We believe there was no legitimate reason for Kyle Carruth to bring a deadly weapon to an argument that he wasn't even a part of. Chad Read died unarmed, shot and killed while simply trying to determine the whereabouts of his son,' Jennifer's lawyer, Tony Buzbee, told Law&Crime.

On Thursday, Attorney General Ken Paxton said that a special grand jury had determined Carruth will not face

Jennifeer Read took to Facebook on Friday to condemn the AG's office's response to her husband's killing

Kyle Carruth is the ex-husband of Ann-Marie Carruth, who After Chad Read's death, Lubbock County District Attorney's Office recused from the investigation. The DA did not allow her office to take on the case and cited Judge Carruth, Kyle Carruth's ex-wife, as her reasoning

'The civil matter has been on hold awaiting the outcome of the criminal proceedings. We will now aggressively pursue Jennifer Read's claims in civil court.'

Jennifer Read had also been seeking custody of Chad Read's nine and 14-year-old children.

'They're aware that Kyle Carruth shot and killed their father in front of their mother, step-brother, and myself,' she argued last year in court filings.

A judge denied her petition for custody in January. Her lawyer said she will not be able to sue again as the prior lawsuit had been filed by Chad Read and dismissed after his death.

'Under Texas law, one of the blood-relatives of the children would need to file suit in order to obtain custody of the children, and it pains Mrs. Read that no family member has yet stepped up to protect these children,' her attorney said.

Judge Carruth, who lost her bid for re-election in March and will be in office until December, divorced Kyle shortly after the shooting. Pictured above with their children in 2019

Chad Read (left) was married to Jennifer Read (right) when he was shot dead

Chad's last moments were captured by Jennifer from a car parked on the street outside Kyle Carruth's South Lubbock home, showing Chad arguing with his ex-wife and Carruth.

From the mobile phone video, it appeared that Chad Read and Kyle Carruth were arguing on the porch of the house, with Christina Read standing to the right.

Kyle Carruth was heard telling Read to 'get off of my property'. Chad Read gesticulated with his arms as Carruth turned around to go inside the house.

Read turned around and continued talking to his ex-wife, telling her that he wanted his son, who he was supposed to have custody of from 3.15pm that day, according to Jennifer in an affidavit filed after the incident.

'I get him at 3.15. If you want to see him you can see him up until 3.15. You keep trying to keep my son from me, I'm going to drag you, and Ann-Marie, and everybody else into court,' he said.

Carruth then re-emerged from the house holding a gun and shouted 'leave' at Read.

Now face-to-face, Carruth fired one shot into the floor at the pair's feet, which did not appear to deter Read, who continued to push against Carruth.

Carruth then jumped back away from the porch, raised the rifle and fired two shots at Chad, who slumped to the floor.

After the shooting, Jennifer Read accused Christina Read and Kyle Carruth of conspiring to kill her slain husband, claiming that Chad Read had evidence of the couple's affair and threatened to make it public.

'Christina Read and Kyle Carruth have been engaged in an ongoing affair, despite Kyle Carruth being married,' she stated in an affidavit last year.

The affidavit added: 'On October 30, 2021, Chad Read informed Christina Read that he had evidence of her affair with Kyle Carruth and that he was going to go public with it.'

Jennifer also suggested that Carruth and Christina Read plotted to Chad Read, pointing out moments from the video that she says suggests it was deliberate.

Citing the Castle Doctrine, a Texas law that allows someone 'to defend himself, others or his property,' Carruth's lawyer said last year that the shooting was justified.

On Thursday, a special grand jury agreed not to indict him with any charges.
She most recently worked as an editorial director for Gates Ventures, where she wrote speeches for Bill Gates

At the same time, Harris is hiring a new head speech writer after her last one departed in February - Meghan Groob

Vice President Kamala Harris's deputy chief of staff Michael Fuchs is set to leave the administration in May, the 11th staffer to leave in as many months

Vice President Kamala Harris's deputy chief of staff Michael Fuchs is set to leave the administration in May, the 11th staffer to leave in as many months.

Fuchs has advised Harris on domestic and international issues, helped manage staff and accompanied her on foreign trips. He worked as a foreign policy advisor for President Bill Clinton and in the State Department under President Barack Obama.

Fuchs will stay in his current role until early May to 'ensure a smooth transition,' according to a memo sent around to staff. He has not yet announced where he is heading.

At the same time, Harris is hiring a new head speech writer after her last one departed in February - Meghan Groob will shape the VP's public remarks. She most recently worked as an editorial director for Gates Ventures, where she wrote speeches for Bill Gates. She was also a senior speechwriter in the Obama administration.

Groob will fill the vacancy left by Kate Childs Graham.

Meanwhile, Kirsten Allen will be Vice President Kamala Harris' new press secretary, moving over from the Department of Health and Human services (HHS) after three high-profile departures in the VP's press shop.

'Exciting day! Honored and elated to work for @VP and continue serving this historic Administration,' Allen wrote on Twitter.

Harris is hiring a new head speech writer after her last one departed in February - Meghan Groob will shape the VP's public remarks

The 11 staffers who have left or are leaving Harris' office since June Michael Fuchs, deputy chief of staff Nancy McEldowney, National Security Adviser Sabrina Singh, deputy press secretary Kate Childs Graham, head speechwriter Symone Sanders, senior adviser and chief spokesperson Ashley Etienne, communications director Peter Velz, director of press operations Vince Evans, senior aide Karly Satkowiak, director of advance Gabrielle DeFranceschi, deputy director of advance Rajan Kaur, director of digital strategies Advertisement

Allen currently serves as national press secretary for the Covid-19 response at HHS. Allen previously worked for Harris as deputy national press secretary and African American media director during Harris' presidential campaign in 2019. She's also served in communications roles for the House subcommittee on coronavirus and for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Allen's hire comes as the press secretary role has remained vacant for months. Her deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh announced she was leaving for the Defense Department last week. Chief spokesperson and senior adviser Symone Sanders departed in December, shortly after communications director Ashley Etienne left.

Singh was Harris' longest serving press staffer she worked with the vice president for over two years, joining the then-senator's team in March 2020 during the presidential campaign to run communications after working on the campaigns of Michael Bloomberg and Corey Booker.

Staffers in the vice president's office have been jumping ship after a year full of messaging blunders and a barrage of personal attacks on the VP, combined with viral rumors of toxicity within the office and tensions between Harris's and President Biden's offices.

The announcement of Allen's hiring came just after juicy details of tension and chaos in the VP's office have trickled out in leaked excerpts of 'This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America's Future,' by New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns.

Harris has lost 11 staffers since June, with deputy chief of staff Michael Fuchs being the most recent to leave

Kirsten Allen will be Vice President Kamala Harris' new press secretary, moving over from the Department of Health and Human services (HHS) after three high-profile departures in the VP's press shop

Allen previously worked for Harris as deputy national press secretary and African American media director during Harris' presidential campaign in 2019. She's also served in communications roles for the House subcommittee on coronavirus and for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee

Harris' office kicked up a fuss over a Vogue cover that pictured the vice president in sneakers before being told to back down by President Biden's office who said concerns over the cover were 'first world problems,' according to the book.

Harris reportedly sent out her chief of staff to scold Biden's staffers for not standing up when she entered the room, the way they do for the president, and her some in her office complained about Biden's 'all-white inner circle.'

They complained about Harris being assigned to work on immigration with Northern Triangle countries, and the VP herself hissed at Biden for calling her 'border czar,' insisting she was focused on the 'root causes,' according to the book.

Harris has lost 10 staffers since June. The vice president's office could employ up to around 50 staffers at any given time.

Of the four-person senior press shop that began with Harris, only one remains - Herbie Ziskend. Ziskend will be promoted to senior advisor for communications, according to an email sent to an internal email shared with DailyMail.com.

The shakeup of the vice president's press team comes under the direction of new communications director Jamal Simmons. The reset came as both the president and vice president sought to step up public engagement to battle low poll numbers.

After Singh, Harris lost her national security advisor, Nancy McEldowney.

McEldowney will be succeeded by her deputy Philip Gordon, according to an announcement by the Vice President's office. He currently serves as special assistant to the president and deputy national security adviser to the vice president.

Both McEldowney and Gordon have been with the White House since the start of the Biden administration and advised both Harris and President Biden on affairs such as Afghanistan, Iran, Ukraine and cybersecurity issues.

McEldowney said that she is stepping down to 'focus on some pressing personal matters' but will remain an impassioned supporter of the Biden Harris administration.

Deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh, above, announced she was leaving for the Defense Department last week

Spokesperson Symone Sanders and Communications Director Ashley Etienne both left last year. In all, ten officials have left since Harris visited Central America last June

'This was a difficult decision because I am so deeply committed to the work we do and the crucial national interest we serve. But after more than a year, this is the right decision for my family,' she said.

McEldowney did not say what her last day would be but said she is 'not rushing out the door.'

McEldowney is a 31-year veteran of Foreign Service, having served as ambassador to Bulgaria, and deputy chief of mission in both Azerbaijan and Turkey.

The adviser's departure comes on the heels of Harris's high-stakes NATO trip to Poland and Romania, and after a turbulent first year marked by a number of public messaging failures.

In Warsaw, Harris attracted controversy after laughing off questions about the refugee crisis resulting from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The vice president's nervous laugh came up yet again as she took questions from reporters alongside Polish President Andrzej Duda about accepting Ukrainian refugees to take the burden off Poland.

Harris and Duda both looked at each other to see which one wanted to answer. 'OK,' Harris said with a laugh.

'A friend in need is a friend indeed,' she said before chuckling at her own line. Duda then took the question.
Keir Starmer today backed a shadow minister who suggested he would be 'quite happy' if Russian hackers knocked out Britain's nuclear deterrent.

The Labour leader insisted he has 'confidence' in Fabian Hamilton despite footage showing him making remarks that were branded 'treasonous' by Tories.

In the video uncovered by the Mail on Sunday, the MP told a 2019 political rally that 'Russian hackers can already hack into the software' controlling Trident

He said, 'I'd be quite happy about that,' before adding: 'As long as we could do the same to theirs.'

Mr Hamilton has rejected the 'ludicrous' criticism, and asked about the claims by broadcasters today Sir Keir said: 'Look, he made some comments a number of years ago. I have confidence in him but the Labour Party position is absolutely clear.

'I went to Brussels myself to see the secretary general to talk about Ukraine and to make clear our unshakeable commitment to Nato and of course to the deterrent that comes with being part of Nato.'

Sir Keir had said: 'I have been very clear in relation to my position and the Labour Party position in favour of deterrence as a strong ally of Nato. We were there when the treaty was first signed and Nato was set up.

'Our support for Nato is absolutely unshaken. I don't think I could have been clearer in the last few weeks about the Labour Party position on either Trident or Nato.'

Fabian Hamilton made the incendiary comments during the 2019 Labour party conference in Brighton

Mr Hamilton has rejected the 'ludicrous' criticism, and asked about the claims by broadcasters today Sir Keir said: 'Look, he made some comments a number of years ago.'

Trident missiles (pictured in a 1999 launch) make up the UK's independent nuclear deterrent

Defence Secretary Ben Wallace condemned Mr Hamilton yesterday for 'siding with' Russian President Vladimir Putin, who put his nuclear forces on 'special combat readiness' shortly after invading Ukraine in February.

Mr Wallace said Sir Keir should sack Mr Hamilton, adding: 'It is one thing to disagree with the UK's possession of nuclear weapons, but to take the side of a man who has deployed chemical weapons and who is responsible for bombing civilians in Ukraine is treasonous'.

He added that it was a test of leadership for Sir Keir, who faced criticism last year for failing to sack Angela Rayner when she called Tory voters 'scum'.

'Starmer took no action when his deputy leader called Tory voters scum,' Mr Wallace said.

'Will he do nothing when one of his own Shadow Ministers backs Britain's enemies?'

A spokesman for Mr Hamilton described Mr Wallace's demands as 'ludicrous', adding: 'Labour's historic commitment to our nuclear deterrent is steadfast.

'Vladimir Putin's illegal and unprovoked war in Ukraine cannot be allowed to turn nuclear.'

Mr Hamilton, who made his remarks at a CND rally in September 2019 when he was both a Shadow Defence Minister and Shadow Foreign Office Minister under Jeremy Corbyn's leadership, was quoting a 'former senior Labour colleague who was in Tony Blair's Cabinet', who had said nuclear weapons were 'utterly useless' because 'Russian hackers can already hack into the software systems that control these weapons'.

'Now, I don't know enough about this to know whether that's true or not,' Mr Hamilton said.

'But imagine for a minute that it is true. Not that they could actually set the weapons off, but that they could render them entirely useless.

'Well, I'd be quite happy about that,' he said, before being careful to add: 'As long as we could do the same to theirs.'

Mr Wallace said: 'He is bordering on encouraging criminal activity  a dangerous man who is putting ideology above our public safety and playing with fire. Starmer should sack him.'

Mr Hamilton has also been criticised for hosting an antisemitic Jordanian MP in Parliament

In his speech, Mr Hamilton also argued that there was 'never a better time' for Britain to give up its nuclear weapons.

On the day Russia invaded Ukraine Putin gave a warning which was widely interpreted as a threat to use nuclear weapons.

He said: 'No matter who tries to stand in our way or all the more so create threats for our country and our people, they must know that Russia will respond immediately, and the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history.'

Mr Hamilton's appointment in 2016 was ridiculed by the Tories, with one MP saying: 'It's a complete absurdity to appoint a Minister for Peace.

'What are they going to do, go around and be nice to people?

'That is not the way the world works. We face a pretty unprecedented time of international tension. It's simply peacenik Corbyn posturing and putting the nation's defence at risk.'

The Trident leak is not the first time Mr Hamilton has been involved in controversy.

In 2019, he welcomed Yahya Al-Saud into the Palace of Westminster. Al-Saud is a Jordanian MP who has made virulently antisemitic comments and was notorious for praising terrorism in Palestine.
Russia's Foreign Minister has said his country will hold a press conference later to prove that claims Vladimir Putin's troops have been committing war crimes in Ukraine are false.

Sergei Lavrov warned western leaders to examine their own consciences before accusing the Russian president.

He said Moscow would demonstrate that Western accusations that its soldiers killed civilians in Northern Ukraine were false.

His comments come after a Russian state TV talk show star claimed the killings carried out in war-torn Bucha were part of a 'provocation plotted by Britain' as horrifying images emerged from the devastated Ukrainian town.

US President Joe Biden on Monday accused Putin of war crimes and called for a trial, adding to the global outcry over civilian killings in the Ukrainian town of Bucha as more graphic images of their deaths emerged.

The Kremlin categorically denied any accusations related to the murder of civilians, including in Bucha, where it said the graves and corpses had been staged by Ukraine to tarnish Russia.

Asked at a news conference about Biden's comments, Lavrov said the West should first consider its own actions in Iraq and Libya.

'Not all is well with the conscience... of American politicians,' he said.

Lavrov said Russia's mission to the United Nations would later on Monday hold a press conference in New York with 'the most detailed material to show the true nature of incidents in Bucha'.

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said his country will hold a press conference later to prove that claims Vladimir Putin's troops have been committing war crimes in Ukraine are false

Speaking in a broadcast, Vladimir Solviev (pictured) a prominent pro-Putin personality, added: 'It's obvious people will try to blame us as a people behind genocide'

Speaking in a broadcast last night, Vladimir Soloviev, a prominent pro-Putin personality who supports the invasion, added: 'The war against Russia entered a new phase today. Very soon we will be blamed of genocide.'

He alleged the plot was masterminded by Britain as he praised the 'true patriots' in Donbas as other sources have accused Kyiv of staging the horrifying scenes in Bucha.

Soloviev also brought up allegations of Russian troops raping young women in front of their families, at one point saying he 'doesn't even want to comment' on the topic.

It comes as the Russian defence ministry rejected the allegations and claimed that 'not a single civilian suffered from violence when the town was controlled by the Russian Armed Forces'.

Russian ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov said: 'I would like to point out that Russian troops left Bucha on March 30.

'The Ukrainian authorities remained silent all these days, and now they have suddenly posted sensational footage in order to tarnish Russia's image and make Russia defend itself.

An elderly woman collects firewood to heat her house in the devastated Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, on April 2

Lavrov said Russia's mission to the United Nations would later on Monday hold a press conference in New York with 'the most detailed material to show the true nature of incidents in Bucha'

'I would like to emphasise with full responsibility that not a single civilian suffered from violence when the town was controlled by the Russian Armed Forces.

'On the contrary, our troops delivered 452 tonnes of humanitarian aid for civilians.

'Meanwhile, the fact that the Ukrainian Armed Forces shelled the town of Bucha right after Russian troops had left was deliberately ignored in the US.

'This is what could have caused civilian casualties. That said, the Kyiv regime is clearly trying to blame its atrocities on Russia.'

Konstantin Kosachev, deputy speaker of the Russian upper house of parliament, said: 'There are no doubts that it is a staging organised by Kyiv authorities.

'And the fact that the West has picked it up and is hyping it makes it an accomplice of this cynical and immoral crime.'

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova claimed Kyiv colluded with the West in seeking to blame Russia.

'I think that the very fact that these statements were made minutes after these materials were released leaves no doubts as for who has contracted this story,' she told state-run Rossiya-1 television channel.

She claimed the West decided immediately Russia was to blame 'based on the videos, seconds-long videos and several photos. And they are ready to pour accusations.

A satellite photo show a probable grave site (circled) near the Church of Saint Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, Ukraine

'No expert work done, no information from the other side throwing light on what is going on...'

She also alleged the massacres were 'a provocation staged by the Ukrainian military and radical nationalists' to disrupt peace talks.

Meanwhile the Telegram channel War on Fakes, which has been accused of spreading misinformation about the invasion, shared posts discrediting the atrocities pictured and filmed in Bucha and said it was part of a 'planned media campaign'.

One post said: 'Fake: The Russian military left Bucha, having previously left huge casualties among the civilian population.

'Truth: Notes about Bucha appeared in several foreign publications at once - it looks like a planned media campaign.

'Given that the troops left the city on March 30, where were these footage for 4 days? Their absence only confirms the fake.

'The video with the bodies is puzzling: here, at 12 seconds, the "corpse" on the right moves its hand.

'At 30 seconds in the rearview mirror, the "corpse" sits down. The bodies in the video seem to have been deliberately laid out in order to create a more dramatic picture.'

'This is clearly seen if you play video at a speed of 0.25 of normal.'

This was shared by the Russian Ministry of Defence Telegram channel.

Meanwhile the Kremlin today said that it categorically denied any accusations related to the murder of civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, adding that Ukrainian allegations on the matter should be treated with doubt.

Yesterday Ukrainian authorities said they were investigating possible crimes by Russian forces after finding hundreds of bodies strewn around towns outside Kyiv following Russian withdrawal from the area.

Larisa Savenko 72, stands outside her damaged home with Andriy Leshbon in war-torn Bucha, Ukraine yesterday

Soldiers walk amid destroyed Russian tanks in Bucha, in the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine on Sunday

'This information must be seriously questioned,' Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call.

'From what we have seen, our experts have identified signs of video falsification and other fakes.'

Peskov said that the facts and chronology of the events in Bucha did not support Ukraine's version of events and urged international leaders not to rush to judgment.

'We categorically deny any accusations,' said Peskov.

'The situation is undoubtedly serious and we would ask that many international leaders not rush with their statements, not rush with their baseless accusations, request information from different sources, and at least listen to our explanations.'
President Joe Biden on Monday thanked the nation's truckers for keeping the economy going as he touted his efforts to strengthen the supply chain amid shortages.

Speaking in front of three 18-wheelers parked on the South Lawn of the White House, the president said he wished he could drive one of these 'suckers' and recounted meeting his first female trucker - Big Momma.

He told the crowd of truck drivers, union representatives and labor leaders that he wanted to 'thank you all to keep what you're doing to keep America moving because that's literally what you're doing.'

'You all quit everything comes to a halt,' he said of truck drivers.

The president, who calls himself a 'car guy,' spoke wistfully of the trucks behind him.

'I thought I was gonna get to drive one of these suckers today,' he said.

He did stop and climb up on the stair of one of the trucks to peek inside the 18-wheeler's cab.

President Joe Biden climbs onto a semi truck parked on South Lawn of White House

President Biden thanked the nation's truckers for keeping the economy going at an event on South Lawn of White House with big trucks parked behind him

The president was touting his administration's plan to boost the numbers of truck drivers. Ahead of the event, which was also attended by Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, the administration noted that since they launched their effort in 2021, hiring has swelled with more commercial driver licenses available in the first two months of this year versus last year's corresponding period.

Truckers move 72% of the US economy's goods, per industry estimates, but the Covid-19 pandemic saw a spike in labor shortages for the industry.

The White House said since Jan. 2021, states have issued more than 876,000 of those special licenses, and trucking employment now exceeds pre-pandemic levels by 35,000 jobs.

The plan is part of a joint effort by the Department of Transportation and Department of Labor and stems from the infrastructure legislation that Congress passed and Biden signed into law last year.

Biden has focused on rebuilding the supply chains after shortages that rose during the covid pandemic.

Prices for food, gas and necessities are reaching their highest levels in 40 years, hitting Americans in the pocketbook ahead of the midterm election and causing Biden's poll numbers to plummet.

President Biden said he wished he could drive one of these 'suckers'

Biden is trying to improve the supply chain as Americans show frustration with the high prices

An NBC poll out last week showed only 33% of voters approval of Biden's handling of the economy.

But tough working conditions for long-haul truck drivers make hard to retain drivers, who often leave for other companies or quit the industry altogether.

The average annualized turnover rate of long-haul drivers at larger companies was 96% during the third quarter of last year, according to the American Trucking Associations, a trade group. At smaller carriers, the turnover rate was 73%.

The job typically consists of multiday trips during which the driver spends nights away from home and sleeps in the cab of the truck. The median pay is $47,130 per year, which is higher than the median for all occupations, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
President Joe Biden on Monday called for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin and said more sanctions were in the works following the report of atrocities in Bucha, Ukraine.

'He is a war criminal,' Biden told reporters of Putin. 'But we have to gather the information. We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue to fight and we have to get all the detail so this could be  actual have a war crimes trial. This guy is brutal and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous and everyone's seen it.'

He added he is 'seeking more sanctions' but declined to detail what those would be. The U.S. has implemented harsh financial penalities on Russian officials, banks and businesses after its invasion of the Ukraine.

'He should be held accountable,' Biden said of Putin.

The president also said he didn't think what happened in Bucha, Ukraine, was genocide but called it a 'war crime.'

He has previously called Putin a war criminal but this was the first time he has called for the Russian president to face legal consequences. His comments echo those of European leaders, who are calling for harsher sanctions against Russia after mass graves were found in the town near Kyiv, after Russian soldiers departed the area.

But Biden didn't go as far in his remarks as Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, who called the Russian actions 'genocide' after visiting Bucha.

'This is genocide. The elimination of the whole nation and the people,' Zelensky said. He has also called for tougher sanctions.

President Joe Biden called for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin for actions of Russian soldiers in Bucha, Ukraine

A satellite image taken on March 31 shows the mass grave - a 45ft-long pit - dug behind the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, during the time that Russian forces were in control of the region

Ukraine's prosecutor-general said the bodies of 410 civilians, many with bound hands and close-range gunshot wounds, have been recovered from towns surrounding Kyiv after last week's withdrawal of Russian troops.

A mass grave containing the bodies of at least 20 civilians including a mayor and her family has been uncovered near the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv in just the latest evidence of Russian war crimes.

The pit was uncovered in woodland near the town of Motyzhyn, around 20 miles west of the city of Bucha where another mass grave has been found, and contains the bodies of local mayor Olga Sukhenko who was buried along with her husband and son, according to Ukraine's former ambassador to Austria Olexander Scherba.

European Commission Presient Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, tweeted Monday that he European Union will send investigators to Ukraine to help the local prosecutor general 'document war crimes.

The UK, France and Germany, along with the NATO Secretary General, on Sunday night called for an international probe to be opened into allegations of Russian 'war crimes'. Meanwhile, Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas declared: 'It's not a battlefield, it's a crime scene' in reference to the horrific images.

And the United States and its allies will seek to suspend Russia from the U.N. Human Rights Council, according to Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

'The images out of Bucha and devastation across Ukraine require us now to match our words with action,' she said.

The U.S. and more than 40 other countries are working to nvestigate possible violations and abuses, after the passage of a resolution by the United Nations Human Rights Council to establish a commission of inquiry.

Zelensky, meanwhile, appeared overwhelmed at seeing the carnage in the town, admitting he finds 'it very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here'.

On the streets of Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, the bodies of civilians have been found scattered, many with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture, after Russian forces retreated from the area.

Ukraine and Western leaders have accused Russia of carrying out the massacre of civilians and dumping their bodies in mass graves.

Zelensky today said it had become harder for Ukraine to negotiate with Russia since Kyiv became aware of the scale of alleged atrocities carried out by Russian troops in Ukraine.

'These are war crimes and will be recognised by the world as genocide,' Zelensky said, wearing body armour and surrounded by military personnel.

'It's very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here,' he said. 'The longer the Russian Federation drags out the meeting process, the worse it is for them and for this situation and for this war.'

'We know of thousands of people killed and tortured, with severed limbs, raped women and murdered children,' he said, adding that in Bucha and other towns in the Kyiv region 'dead people have been found in barrels, basements, strangled, tortured.

WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES

A visibly emotional Volodymyr Zelensky today stood motionless as he surveyed the scene of utter devastation he encountered in the town of Bucha, with dozens of bodies shot at close range laying on the empty streets

The Ukrainian President appeared overwhelmed at seeing the carnage in the town, admitting he finds 'it very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here'

A Ukrainian policeman walks by a pit in the village of Motyzhyn, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022 where the bodies of the mayor of the village, Olga Sukhenko, her husband and son and that of a man believed to be a Ukrainian serviceman, who was not yet identified, lie

Dead bodies litter the streets near Bucha, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, after Russian forces withdrew from the region - leaving evidence of 'war crimes' in their wake

A mass grave was discovered in the grounds of the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, containing the bodies of dozens of civilians

President Biden again called Russian President Vladimir Putin (above left) a war criminal

Footage released by the Ukrainian military showed what appeared to be a 'torture chamber' in a building used as a barracks by Russian troops in Bucha. The bodies of civilians were lined up against a wall in the basement, kneeling, having been killed. At least one had been shot through the knee before being killed, the military said.

Civilian survivors said some bodies left on the streets had been run over by Russian tanks and 'squashed like animal skin rugs'. Others reported seeing soldiers shoot dead elderly civilians in front of their relatives.

Additionally, Putin's invasion has suffered another devastating blow after his force's death toll rose to 18,300, according to Kyiv's estimates today.

Russia has only admitted 1,351 of its troops have died fighting in Ukraine since Putin invaded on February 24, a fraction of the figure estimated by Ukraine's armed forces.

In a further blow to Putin's war, Ukrainian forces have also retaken some towns in the northern Chernihiv region, whilst Russian forces no longer occupied any areas in the Sumy region, in Ukraine's northeast.

Ukrainian soldiers also blitzed a Russian military convoy in an effort to disrupt deliveries of fuel and supplies to Putin's troops on the frontline, with video showing a military tanker being hit by what appears to be a rocket before bursting into flames.

But Russian attacks on civilian areas have continued, with eight people killed and 34 wounded after shelling hit the southern Ukrainian cities of Mykolaiv and Ochakiv on Sunday, prosecutors in Kyiv said.

And Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov rejected the allegations of Russian troops killing civilians in Bucha, describing the scenes outside Kyiv as a 'stage-managed anti-Russian provocation.'

Meanwhile British Prime Minister Boris Johnson led world leaders in condemning the violence at the weekend, pledging to send funding and specialist investigators to the International Criminal Court at The Hague to compile evidence for a war crimes tribunal.

'We will not rest until justice is served,' he vowed, before a spokesman for the PM added: 'It's clear that Putin crossed the threshold of barbarism some time ago.'

'It's certainly evidence that Putin's army is committing war crimes,' the spokesman said, adding that the Government now wants 'to look beyond what we have already provided' in terms of fresh arms shipments to Ukraine.

'Whatever equipment we send will obviously allow Ukraine to defend itself. We are aware of the requests from the Ukrainians for equipment to defend themselves from ships and we are looking into what we can do,' he said.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki called Russia's actions 'genocide.'

Morawiecki said the allegations 'must be properly documented and judged,' and he called 'to establish an international commission composed of specialists.'

French President Emmanuel Macron said Monday that there is 'clear evidence of war crimes' in Bucha that demand new measures. 'I'm in favour of a new round of sanctions and in particular on coal and petrol. We need to act,' he said on France-Inter radio.
A British man aged 36 was found dead face down in a swamp in Bali after a suspected motorbike crash.

The UK citizen texted his fiancee at 1am on Saturday morning to say he'd be home shortly, but never returned.

Stunned locals spotted his body in a swamp next to a landfill in Denpasar City on Sunday morning.

The British tourist, 36, was recovered by emergency workers after locals spotted him

The British man was sadly dead when police arrived at the scene early on Sunday morning

Cops said they'll continue to investigate the circumstances surrounding the death

South Denpasar police chief Kompol Gede Sudyatmaja said: 'At around 1:00 am, the victim sent a WhatsApp message to his girlfriend and said he was on his way home.

'However, after waiting until the morning, the victim did not come home and was contacted by his cellphone, but it was not active.

'It is suspected that the victim was involved in an accident and fell into the swamp.'

Police said: 'It is suspected that the victim was involved in an accident and fell into a swamp.'

The engaged tourist in Bali was expected to get home on Saturday morning, but died en route

Poppies Lane, Kuta in Bali, 2020. Motorbikes are a common mode of transport on the island

Cops are investigating the circumstances of the death but do not suspect foul play.

A post-mortem revealed the man's injuries were caused by his grey Honda Scoopy motorbike falling into the water.

Police found a driver's license, a credit card, Rp 607,000 in cash, a room key and a Covid vaccine pass on his person.

Local media reported 18-year-old Putu Kurniawan as discovering the body while working in the area.

He said: '[I] was working and saw there was a corpse floating there.

'He was found wearing black shorts, a black t-shirt [with] a tattoo on his right arm, it was suspected that he had drifted from where he had the accident.'

The Brit was reportedly partying at one of the AMV bars in the Legian area, South Kuta, Badun.

He lived with his fiancee at Kertha Lestari, Southernland Regency Housing, Sidakarya in South Denpasar.

Police chief Sudyatmaja added that the British Consulate in Bali had been informed of the death.

He said: 'Investigating officers are checking cameras in the area to try and establish the cause of death of the foreign man.

'The initial assessment is that we don't believe that foul play was involved.

'The victim's embassy has been informed and they will contact relatives in his home country.'

The Foreign Office told MailOnline: 'We are providing consular support to the family of a British national who died in Bali and are in contact with the local authorities.'
Shoppers have been evacuated from outlets on Oxford Street following reports of a gas leak sparking an emergency shut down of the area.

Police officers and the London Fire Brigade were called to near Poland Street in Soho, Westminster at 13.05pm to reports of a gas leak.

Around 400 people from nearby buildings were evacuated as a precaution and the area was cordoned off by police.

Authorities also shut down Berwick Street, Oxford Street, Noel Street, Wardour Street and Great Marlborough Street, but they have since been reopened.

Shoppers have been evacuated from outlets on Oxford Street following reports of a gas leak sparking an emergency shut down of the area

Police officers and the London Fire Brigade were called near Poland Street in Westminster at 13.05pm to reports of a gas leak

The Metropolitan Police confirmed there have been no injuries and the area is now safe, according to Westminster councillor Timothy Barnes.

He tweeted: 'Thanks to Soho and Westminster police, alongside Westminster council for managing Poland Street, Soho this afternoon following a gas leak.

'Site now safe. Small evacuation area nearby with Cadent gas offering hot water and a warm place for anyone cut off. DM me for details if requested.'

The force tweeted: 'Please can we make you aware of a gas leak that has been identified at Poland St W1F. LFB and Police are in attendance.

The Metropolitan Police confirmed there have been no injuries and the area is now safe, according to Westminster councillor Timothy Barnes

The force tweeted: 'Please can we make you aware of a gas leak that has been identified at Poland St W1F. LFB and Police are in attendance'

'Nearby Buildings are currently being evacuated, road closures and cordons have been put in place as a safety precaution.

'Following our tweet earlier regarding the gas leak is Poland Street, Please note than Berwick St, Oxford Street and Noel Street are now open. Poland Street remains closed whilst engineers work on the Gas Leak. Officers remain on scene.'

A Metropolitan Police spokesperson told MailOnline: 'Police are assisting following a gas leak. Officers were called at 13:05hrs on Monday, 4 April in the Poland Street area, in Westminster to a report of a gas leak.

'Officers, London Ambulance Service and London Fire Brigade have attended the scene. We are not aware of reports of any injuries.

'Local road closures are in place and some buildings have been evacuated while emergency services deal.'
A Connecticut woman wanted for dozens of car break-ins has been accused of crashing into eight police cruisers and injuring seven officers during a wild chase on Sunday that ended with her smashing her white Hummer into a pole and being taken into custody.

Hannah Casperson, 25, was suspected of helping her boyfriend, 31-year-old Thomas Crawford, vandalize and ransack 41 parked vehicles in and around Waterbury last week.

Casperson, from Brookfield, was out on probation during the incidents.

Crawford was spotted at a grocery store shopping for meat on Thursday night and placed under arrest, but his girlfriend managed to get away.

Hannah Casperson, 25 (left), is accused of crashing her Hummer into eight police cruisers after allegedly helping her boyfriend, Thomas Crawford, 31 (right), burglarize 41 cars

A bystander's cellphone video shows an armed police officer confronting Casperson driving her white Hummer H2 in Waterbury, Connecticut, on Sunday

Casperson is seen in the footage crashing into a marked police cruiser

The Hummer clips a utility pole at Rutledge and East Main streets before driving off

Waterbury police said city officers tracked down Casperson on Sunday, after receiving information about her location and approached the white 2006 Hummer H2 she was in shortly after 8.30am.

When cops with guns drawn tried to talk to Casperson in the area of Rutledge and East Main streets, the woman struck a cruiser and clipped a utility pole before driving off.

Police then attempted to corner Casperson again at Brass Mill Drive and East Main Street, but she hit a cruiser before entering onto Interstate 84 westbound.

Casperson reportedly struck six more cruisers before losing control and wrapping her Hummer ultimately around a utility pole about 25 miles away in the area of Monroe Turnpike and Wheeler Road in Monroe, reported News 12.

Police say Casperson struck seven more cruisers between Waterbury and Monroe

Seven police officers were injured, with six of them requiring hospitalization

Casperson eventually slammed her Hummer into a utility police in Monroe, causing massive damage to the vehicle

Casperson was taken to a hospital in a stable condition to be treated for non-life-threatening injuries. She faces dozens of charges

She was taken to St Vincent's Hospital in Bridgeport and was listed in stable condition with non-life threatening injuries.

Six officers were taken to a hospital and later discharged, police said. Another injured officer did not need hospital treatment, officials said.

Police said Casperson was expected to face charges related to Sunday's chase after being discharged from the hospital. They said there were multiple warrants pending for her arrest on other charges.

Court records show she pleaded guilty in November to criminal mischief and failure to appear in court and was sentenced to 18 months of probation. She also has a pending case in which she is charged with interfering with police and has pleaded not guilty.

Crawford was charged with 41 counts each of burglary, conspiracy at burglary and larceny, and criminal mischief. He is being held at the Wolcott Police Department on $75,000 bond.
Texas officers found a tractor-trailer carrying 77 migrants during a traffic stop in another human smuggling attempt across the border.

Police arrested the the driver, an undocumented Honduran man, after stopping the truck near Carrizo Springs last Thursday, the Texas Department of Public Safety revealed.

A police body camera video showed the group of mostly men crammed in the open air freight container, which was covered with a blue tarp.

One of the migrants confirmed they were from Mexico when asked by a cop.

The driver, whose name was not released, was taken into custody for human smuggling and was found to be in possession of methamphetamine.

The Texas Department of Public Safety added that he had a history of 'drug and weapons charges.'

Texas Department of Public Safety agents discovered 76 migrants hidden inside a tract trailer during a traffic stop near Carrizo Springs last Thursday. The driver of the vehicle, a Honduran undocumented migrant, was taken into custody

An undocumented migrant from Honduras (pictured) was apprehended last Thursday in near Carrizo Springs, Texas, after he was stopped driving a tractor trailer with 76 migrants hidden in the back

The migrants were turned over to the U.S. Border Patrol Del Rio Sector for processing.

'This failed mass smuggling load is a good example of the dangerous tactics used by criminals just to make (money),' the Del Rio Sector said.

Thursday's shocking find occurred before the border agency's sector agents came across three larger groups of migrants who were stopped near the border town community of Normandy that sits across the Rio Grande River.

The 77 migrants, including the driver, were placed in custody of U.S. Border Patrol

U.S. Border Patrol's Del Rio Sector said the' mass smuggling load is a good example of the dangerous tactics used by criminals just to make (money)'

Around 1:45 am Monday, Del Rio Station agents encountered 126 migrants, including 36 from Nicaragua.

Eagle Pass Station border officers took into custody 140 individuals, including 64 from Colombia just after 3 am Sunday.

On Saturday, at approximately 5 a.m., a group of 146 migrants, including 65 people from Colombia, was apprehended by Eagle Pass Station agents.

The U.S. Border Patrol has registered 838,685 encounters with migrants along the southwestern border since October 2021, the start fiscal year 2022

A total of 77 migrants, including the driver, were not apprehended by the Texas Department of Public Safety last Thursday

The U.S. Border Patrol, which has reported 838,685 encounters with migrants along the southwestern border since October 2021, the start of fiscal year 2022, said it is expecting a significant rush of asylum seekers at the land border as a result of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announcement last Friday that it will be terminating the Title 42 public health measure.

The policy was institute in March 2020 by the administration of former President Donald Trump and granted the border agency the authority to expel migrants stopped for unlawful border crossing on the basis that they were deemed a danger to the U.S. due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

'There are a significant number of individuals who were unable to access the asylum system for the past two years, and who may decide that now is the time to come,' U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Chris Mangus said Monday.

'We are doing everything we can to prepare for this increase, ensure we continue to process people humanely, and impose consequences on those who break the law,' Mangus said. 'At the same time, we will continue to use all available resources to secure our borders.'
A police constable who had a sexual relationship with a vulnerable rape victim and later used his influence to avert a police warrant at her home was today jailed for three years.

Simon Rose, 48, was a respected officer who had served Greater Manchester Police for five years when he struck up the inappropriate relationship with the woman while investigating her case in May 2012.

Their relationship endured for seven years until October 2019 when her name came under the spotlight over a search warrant at her home, prosecutor Vanessa Thomson told Liverpool Crown Court.

After telling colleagues to ignore any evidence found at the flat, they abandoned the warrant but the woman was interviewed, which brought the affair to light.

Rose, of Parbold, Lancashire, was convicted of misconduct in public office and attempting to pervert the course of justice after a nine day trial in January.

Sentencing him today, Judge David Swannerton said: 'You took advantage of vulnerable victim by forming a sexual relationship with her.

Former police constable Simon Rose, 48, of Parbold, Lancashire, was today jailed for three years for misconduct in public office after having a relationship with a rape victim

PC Simon Rose met the victim while investigating her case in 2012 and they went on to have a sexual relationship. He later used his influence to thwart a police search at her home

'You have breached not only the trust of your immediate colleagues, people who saw you as a friend, but the trust the public expect and are entitled to have in police officers.

'Police officers behaving like you did damage trust in the whole police service and it is to the detriment of every single police officer and society as a whole,' he added.

The court heard that Rose had been attached to the Salford division of GMP and was 'a highly respected, outgoing police officer' according to Miss Thomson.

He met the woman in his role as a specially trained officer involved in dealing with rape and sexual assault allegations. She alleged she had been raped at knifepoint after being taken away in a vehicle by two men although the case did not proceed.

Miss Thomson said that by 2019 Rose was based at Swinton Police Station and his role included executing search warrants. One of the addresses involved the woman's home, although there was no suggestion she was involved in criminality.

Rose was based at Swinton Police Station in Greater Manchester in October 2019 when news of the affair came to light

On October 3, 2019, he went with two colleagues to execute the warrant and en route admitted he was on friendly terms with the woman.

As they got nearer, he said he was worried that something would be recovered from her home which would get him sacked.

He became increasingly anxious and asked his colleagues to overlook any evidence they found and they consequently abandoned executing the warrant that day.

Although Rose insisted he genuinely didn't believe there was a firearm at the property, Judge Swinnerton said he accepted that his real motivation was to cover up his 'own shameful secret'.

Rose later admitted in cross-examination that forming a sexual or emotional relationship with such a victim was entirely wrong.

'But knowing it, that is precisely the sort of relationship you entered into,' said the judge, who pointed out that Rose had carried out the clandestine relationship behind his partner and his colleagues' backs.

After his behaviour came to light and the woman was interviewed she told how their relationship became sexual a few months after their first meeting and they had sex on three or four occasions.

Rose appeared at Liverpool Crown Court today where he was jailed for three years for misconduct in public office

Rose later admitted in cross-examination that forming a sexual or emotional relationship with such a victim was entirely wrong

She said that they had had exchanged sexual messages and spoken about their sexual fantasies and she sent him explicit photographs of herself. He repeatedly told her to delete their messages and keep their relationship quiet.

The woman told how she had had strong feelings for Rose and that he had discussed them being together even though he had a partner.

When she met someone else, her relationship with Rose turned to close friendship which lasted for a number of years.

In an impact statement today, the victim described how they had a close emotional relationship after their initial sexual encounters and when he suddenly ended all contact she felt used and upset.

She said the lies he had told during the trial 'were horrible. I knew they were wrong.'

Sarah Barlow, defending, said that the couple's relationship had been 'a genuine friendship' but she did not dispute the victim's distress.

In relation to the search warrant he did not believe that there were any firearms.

'He was acting very much in panic trying to save his own skin, thinking of his own job,' said Ms Barlow.

The court heard that he has lost his relationship with his partner as well as his job.
Sen. Lindsey Graham described Ketanji Brown Jackson as an 'activist' as he explained why he would not back her nomination for the Supreme Court, despite having voted in favor of her for an appeals court role just last year.

He said she would be in a position to make law on the Supreme Court, unlike on lower courts.

And he said her radical stances meant she would never even have made it in front of the Senate if Republicans held the balance of power.

'If we get back the Senate, and we're in charge of this body, and there's judicial openings, we will talk our colleagues on the other side, but if we're in charge she would not have met before this committee,' he said.

'You would have had somebody more moderate than this.

'So I want you to know right now the process you started to go to a simple majority vote is going to rear its head here pretty soon. where we're in charge then we'll talk about judges differently.'

Democrats described his comments about the first black woman nominated to the Supreme Court as 'shameful.

Sen. Lindsey Graham set out his opposition to the nomination of Kentaji Brown Jackson, as the Senate Judiciary Committee began its debate on Monday

Democrats believe they will secure the confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson by the end of the week, making her the first African American woman to sit on the Supreme Court

They hope to have Jackson confirmed by the end of the week, after the Senate Judiciary Committee began debating her merits on Monday.

Graham said he had been happy to support Jackson at the circuit court level even if he did not agree with her stances.

'If you you win, I expect you to pick somebody I wouldn't support on the court - that just sort of comes with winning,' he said.

'So I didn't think twice about not voting for her.

'But now that you're talking about the Supreme Court, you're making policy not just bound by it.

'And a lot of my friends on the other side have done this, voted for a person at the district court level ... only to vote no at Supreme Court level.'

President Biden called on senators to confirm Jackson in a Monday morning tweet

Biden, he said, could have picked from a range of highly qualified people in order to fulfill his campaign promise to nominate the first African-American woman for the Supreme Court.

'It didn't bother me that much,' he said. 'It was trying to make the court look more like like America.'

But he said her appearance before the committee underscored that she came from the more radical wing of the left.

'So there are people that President Biden could have picked that would have been in the liberal camp in terms of voting on the Supreme Court,' he said.

'And they could have gotten 60 to 65 votes.

'The White House didn't go down that road because it feels that they must pick somebody that's more appealing to the hard left.'

Her nomination must first pass the committee before then being voted on by the full Senate.

It needs only a simple majority vote to go through, and Democrats believe they have the necessary votes.

It means she would become only the third black justice and the sixth woman in the court's 200-year history.

Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee spokesperson Nora Keefe condemned Graham's comments.

'Republicans' shameful and relentless attacks on a nominee as qualified as Judge Jackson reinforce the stakes of this years election and will remind voters why we must defend and expand our Democratic Senate majority with the power to confirm Supreme Court justices,' she said.

President Joe Biden sent a tweet in support of Jackson as senators began their meeting.

'Judge Jackson will bring extraordinary qualifications, deep experience and intellect, and a rigorous judicial record to the Supreme Court,' he said.

'She deserves to be confirmed as the next justice.'
The Palm Springs Unified School District (PSUSD) is suing Juul, joining hundreds of other California schools in accusing the popular e-cigarette maker of creating 'false and deceptive statements' that have led to a 'youth nicotine epidemic of historic proportions.'

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on Tuesday, names Juul, as well as tobacco company Phillip Morris and its parent company Altria as defendants.

Palm Springs Unified School District, which has a population of 21,7075 students and 1,125 staff members, is demanding unspecified compensation for damages related to business expenses that involve the confiscation of e-cigarettes in schools.

Attorneys for the district also said that member schools have lost a great deal of instruction time and that a drop in school enrollment related to health and behavioral issues stemmed from vaping has become a trend.

'Students in Plaintiff's schools have openly charged e-cigarette devices in classrooms, causing disruption and diverting staff resources away from classroom instruction,' reads the lawsuit.

'Other students, addicted to nicotine, have demonstrated anxious, distracted and acting out behaviors, causing disruption and diverting staff resources away from classroom instruction and requiring additional time and attention for addicted students,' it added.

Students using e-cigarettes have led the Palm Springs Unified School District to sue Juul, as well as tobacco company Phillip Morris and its parent company Altria as defendants

The Palm Springs Unified School District is the latest school system in California to sue Juul, a popular e-cigarette maker in the U.S., as more than 100 hundreds school districts in the state have also sued the company

The legal age to buy vaping devices in California is 21. However, the prevalence of Juuls and other e-cigarettes have forced the school district 'to close some bathrooms and Plaintiff's staff has had to devote staff time and resources to monitoring the bathrooms, including regularly walking through them both during class and between classes,' according to the lawsuit.

'Because many students who do not engage in e-cigarette activities do not wish to use the school restrooms, even to wash their hands, Plaintiff has had to go so far as to rent multiple portable hand-washing stations that have been placed outside of restrooms in an effort to maintain student hygiene and prevent the spread of disease,' the complaint further states.

The district's complaint is now the latest lawsuit that Juul has to deal with after statewide and nationwide class-action lawsuits were filed against the e-cigarette giant and 120 other co-defendants since 2019. However, Palm Spring Unified has filed its complaint separately from other districts.

More than 100 school districts across California are suing Juul for misconduct and for negatively affecting the lives of their students, according to William Shinoff, an attorney representing an estimated 700 other school districts across the country with similar accusations against the e-cigarette company.

'We believe it's a multi-multi-billion-dollar lawsuit against Juul and others,' James Frantz, who also is representing PSUSD from the same firm - Frantz Law Group - told The Desert Sun.

The school district has confirmed the lawsuit's filing to DailyMail.com but declined to comment due to the complaint's ongoing status. Juul did not respond to request for comment.

Juul, the maker of the popular e-cigarette brand that has recently come under fire from health officials over its popularity with young adults, has not only been sued by school districts from all around the country, but also by several states, including California and North Carolina

The San Francisco Unified School District, one of the largest in the state, set a precedent by suing Juul in 2019 and a verdict could be made as early as November.

Juul, which once made $2 billion in revenue in 2018, had its headquarters in San Francisco before relocating to Washington D.C. in 2020. Later that same year, the company cut its workforce by about 40 percent and halted global expansion. This year, Juul has an estimated number of 1,492 employees and serves Canada, Russia and South Korea amongst others in Southeast Asia and in Europe.

The ruling in regards to the San Francisco Unified School District's case could set a precedent and be 'instructive for all the school districts as to what could happen,' according to Frantz and Shinoff.

Complaints made by Palm Springs Unified echo similar ones raised by other schools districts across the country, stating that many employees and students have been 'hit hard by the youth e-cigarette epidemic.'

One of the schools districts biggest concern is the doubling number of senior students that have reportedly consumed nicotine between 2017 and 2018.

In 2018, one of Juul's most successful years thanks to a $2 billion made in profits, more than one in four high school students across the U.S. had reported consuming a tobacco product.

'Consistent with this national trend, youth e-cigarette consumption rates in Palm Springs Unified School District continue to climb,' the lawsuit states. ''Defendants' conduct has created a public health crisis in Plaintiff's schools and Plaintiff spent significant and unexpected levels of time and resources on addressing the pervasiveness of youth e-cigarette use.'

The school district also put forward a proposal to make Juul pay for vape detectors' installments, worth $5,000, in every single classroom in its high schools and middle schools. Funding for educational campaigns on the harmful effects of nicotine and additional resources to ban the use of e-cigarettes on school campuses have also been stated in the lawsuit, according to Palm Springs Unified's attorneys.

They have also alleged that the use of e-cigarette products is detrimental to the local environment, creating a growing hazardous waste problem at schools enrolled in the district's system.

'Defendants' e-cigarette products contain chemicals that can be toxic or fatal if ingested in their concentrated forms, as well as lithium-ion batteries, which cannot be safely disposed of in the normal stream of trash,' the complaint reads.

'The e-cigarette epidemic has led to significant levels of hazardous waste from these e-cigarette products throughout Plaintiff's schools, either from youth improperly disposing of them by littering or throwing them in the trash or toilets, or because teachers and school staff must confiscate and store them,' the lawsuit adds.

School districts are not the only public establishments to take action against Juul. Several states, including California and North Carolina have also sued the company, with the latter being the first state to successfully hold Juul accountable by winning a $40 million settlement.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) on Monday congratulated Hungary's authoritarian leader, Prime Minister Viktor Orban, on his landslide victory in the country's Sunday election.

She also shared praise for Hungary's referendum to ban 'sexually-explicit media' from public schools' sex education classes, urging the US to follow suit.

'Congratulations to Viktor Orban on winning a victory well deserved! Hes leading Hungary the right way and we need this in America,' the Republican firebrand wrote on Twitter.

'America should also ban sexually explicit media in sex-ed and all gender change information for minors under 18 intentionally confusing children.'

Along with her post she shared a European news outlet's report on the results of a referendum on educating kids about 'sexual orientation' and showing them 'sex-change media content,' as well as asking if Hungarians 'support the promotion of sex reassignment therapy for underage children.'

More than 90 percent of voters who answered said they disapproved of all the measures, according to Visegrad 24.

Greene shared praise for Orban's victory and said the US should be led the same way the authoritarian leader is leading Hungary

However, the referendum ultimately failed to pass. It required more than 50 percent of voters who cast ballots to weigh in on all four questions -- which did not happen.

Orban's nationalist Fidesz party won 53 percent of the vote in Hungary's parliamentary elections, a sweeping victory that looked briefly uncertain after Orban's close relationship with Vladimir Putin was put under scrutiny over Russia's brutal invasion of Ukraine.

It's Orban's fourth consecutive victory.

During his victory speech, Orban labeled Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky one of the 'opponents' he had to overcome to win.

The right-wing leader had hampered the European Union's ability to unanimously condemn Putin's unprovoked attack.

The Republican firebrand and Prime Minister Orban have similarly resisted praising Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine while also not shying away from criticizing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

His government, which relies heavily on Russian energy imports, has resisted criticizing Moscow even as a majority of European voices did so.

It echoes a small but vocal group of US Republican lawmakers, including Greene, who have not endorsed Putin's invasion but have also been critical of Zelensky, despite international praise for his leadership through the conflict.

A pinned post on Greene's official Congressional Twitter page shares condemnation for 'Putin & his murderous war in Ukraine' and 'Zelensky & Nazi militias in his corrupt country.'

She's also previously shared possible Russian disinformation videos that Greene claimed depicted Ukrainian soldiers harming civilians in their country, writing: 'The US must demand Zelensky stop his military from torturing his own people.'

The account she shared it from has since been suspended.

The claim that Ukraine is run by Nazis as well as allegations that Kyiv's forces are killing their own people are both known to be pro-Kremlin talking points that Putin has used to justify his bloody attack.
Last May, June Brown replied to a loyal viewer of EastEnders called Alfie, just as she had done for decades throughout her magnificent career as soap's GOAT.

But this fan letter was different.

The then 94-year-old's reply was cloaked in the wistful regret and frustration she felt deeply with the once-great BBC soap, with which she had a tragic fallout, quitting after 35 years without the send-off Dot Cotton deserved.

June wrote: 'Dear Alfie, I couldn't agree with you more about the current EastEnders episodes and I'm very glad you chose to watch the drama channel.

'The reason I left was because I no longer recognised the character they were writing for me so I'm afraid you won't see me again.

'They are already mentioning my character in the current episodes so what rubbish they will write about me is anyone's guess.

'Yours, June Brown 'Dot' x.'

How devastating.

DAN WOOTON: Eastenders' bosses should feel ashamed at how they made June Brown feel when she was coming towards the end of her life and career. Pictured: Dan with June

une Brown did create Dot Cotton in 1985, which is why the soap should have been open to listening to her ideas about how she wanted the character to end her very special run

EastEnders bosses should feel ashamed this is how they allowed the woman who had created their greatest ever character  a British icon  to feel coming towards the end of a long career and life.

Now, I get how it happened but there's no excuse.

Having covered soaps for many years in the early stages of my career, soap executives and writers believe they are all powerful  often making decisions that upset actors and loyal fans 'for the good of the show'  until they're sacked after a few years and a new regime is ushered in for another reinvention.

They like to hammer home the attitude that no actor is bigger than the soap.

But if there's one actor who could be trusted impeccably to know what's right for her character then surely, surely that person was June Brown.

What soap boss could truly claim they understood Dot Cotton better than her?

And while today is absolutely about celebrating the legend that is June, a woman whose energy, outrageous sense of fun and vigour I fed off during our every meeting, the end of her relationship with EastEnders is a bitter pill.

After all, those in charge should have been acutely aware that there wasn't long to resolve the situation, given June's age and deteriorating health for some time.

June enjoyed 35 years on the show, joining in 1985 and filming her final scenes in 2020 (far right)

June's final scene on January, 21 2020 will always be a major missed opportunity. Above: Dot in 1999

That made EastEnders' tribute released this afternoon feel a little bit empty.

It read in part: 'There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humour will never be forgotten.

'June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2884 episodes, June's remarkable performances created some of EastEnders finest moments.'

Indeed, June Brown did create Dot Cotton in 1985, which is why the soap should have been open to listening to her ideas about how she wanted the character to end her very special run.

Last year, explaining her decision to walk on a podcast with her former co-star Rani Singh, June unleashed her trademark brand of cutting humour.

She said: 'I don't want a retainer for EastEnders, I've left, I've left for good.

'I've sent her off to Ireland where she'll stay. I've left EastEnders. I did make up a limerick. It's a bit dirty.

'I went back to do a good story. Alas and alack, when I got back it had gone up in smoke. I got a small part, a very small part.

'And that ended up as a big wet fart. Alas and alack, I will never go back.'

But she admitted the decision had left her feeling 'bereaved', which makes me feel so sad.

The actor John Altman, who played Dot's son Nick Cotton and remained close to June, has become an ardent critic of EastEnders bosses, who he believes have put woke ideology ahead of what's right for their characters and viewers in recent years.

In September, during an interview on my GB News show, he told me he was written out of the show after he told bosses he objected to a plan to make his character gay.

John had revealed last year that June had got to a similar point with the increasingly woke management, explaining: 'She just wasn't happy anymore so she had to decide to leave, which is a shame.'

'She's very much a die hard professional in the business and she wasn't getting quite what she was she wasn't very impressed by some of the writing she was getting.'

Likewise, loyal June was unhappy that the actress who played her granddaughter Dotty Cotton, Molly Conlin, had been cruelly replaced by Milly Zero when bosses decided to bring the character back.

John explained: 'It was a great shame that Molly Conlin wasn't brought back as Dotty as well. I don't think she was very happy about that.

'And nor was I actually, I didn't understand why, when they had the original actress who'd grown up, they hadn't brought her back, but that's up to the BBC.'

We felt like Dot Cotton was a member of our extended circle and she became so familiar that she was very much part of the fabric of British culture  and that's all down to the genius of June Brown

And that's another reason why June Brown was a true original who should be celebrated  she put her money where her mouth was.

So many soap stars continue to take easy pay cheques and ignore bosses running a show into the ground, as is currently the case on EastEnders, but June was never going to be that sort of actor.

It's not that she wanted to retire, either.

She had been battling on for many years, even though she was increasingly losing both her sight and hearing.

But she remained a stickler to the end, criticising the new breed of Enders stars' 'lazy speech', which was 'much more The Only Way Is Essex' than Cockney.

That's why June's final scene on January, 21 2020 will always be a major missed opportunity.

As Dot was convinced to go to Ireland by Sonia (Natalie Cassidy), she left her a simple voicemail message saying: 'I shall miss you and I shall always love you, as I know you love me. So goodbye my dearest girl. Your loving grandma, Dot.'

It's no surprise to me that in the months since Dot's exit, EastEnders has plummeted to record low ratings, with just 1.7 million tuning in on some nights.

Alongside the late, equally great Queen of Albert Square Barbara Windsor and Corrie legends like William Roache, Helen Worth and the dearly departed Liz Dawn and Betty Driver, June Brown will form British soap royalty  representing a golden age of the genre when the nation would stop to watch their nightly performances.

We felt like Dot Cotton was a member of our extended circle and she became so familiar that she was very much part of the fabric of British culture  and that's all down to the genius of June Brown.

While I celebrate her genius, her humanity and her wicked sense of humour today, I can't shake the feeling of deep regret that EastEnders missed the opportunity to give both her and Dot Cotton, the character she expertly created, the send-off they had earned.
Advertisement

Britain's daily Covid cases plunged by a third over the weekend as testing dropped to the lowest level in a year in the first official figures since England ditched its free swabbing regime.

UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) statistics show another 143,382 positive Covid tests were logged on Saturday, Sunday and Monday, compared to the 215,001 recorded over the same three-day spell last week.

Meanwhile, Covid deaths today fell by three per cent week-on-week, while daily hospital admissions increased by four per cent. Both measures tend to lag two to three weeks behind the trend in cases.

Today's drop in daily confirmed cases coincides with plummeting testing rates, sparked by No10's decision to axe free tests forever.

The Government's daily case numbers are solely based on people swabbing themselves and registering the results with the system. Separate Covid-tracking estimates, which show infections have hit pandemic highs and are yet to slow down, are based on tens of thousands of random tests.

Downing Street today insisted the universal free testing programme will not be coming back in England, claiming the 2billion-a-month lateral flow spending was 'simply unsustainable'. Only health and care workers, the elderly and the vulnerable are still eligible for free swabs.

Scotland will end its offer next month while Wales is to stop handing out the swabs this summer.

Meanwhile, it was revealed today that the NHS quietly expanded its symptom-list to include body aches, a runny nose and diarrhoea.

Since the start of the pandemic, officials have only accepted three symptoms: a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell, despite other countries and health bodies including up to 14.

UK Health Security Agency data shows another 143,382 positive Covid tests were logged over the weekend, down by a third in a week. But the drop in cases comes as the number of tests taken in the UK plummeted to its lowest level in a year (shown in graph)

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) estimated more than 4.1million people had the virus on any given day over the week to March 26, equivalent to one in 13 being infected. The figure is the highest ever recorded in England, topping the previous peak of 3.7m at the height of the Omicron wave in January. It is also 18 per cent higher than last week

The UKHSA figures show 143,382 positive tests were logged over the last 72 hours, down by 33.3 per cent on the 215,001 reported last Monday. An average of 65,133 infections have been reported on average over the last seven days.

But the drop in cases comes as the number of tests taken in the UK plummeted to its lowest level in a year.

Just 428,278 swabs were logged on Saturday and 497,415 on Sunday, down 22.5 per cent and 21.4 per cent week-on-week.

The Prime Minister's official spokesman today insisted the virus tests would not be coming back. They said: 'I think we need to look at where we are in the course of this pandemic.

'We know there is relatively high prevalence of Covid at the moment but because of vaccines, because of therapeutics and other approaches, we are not seeing it have the knock-on impact when it comes to requiring the most intensive hospital treatment.

'At the same time, the provision of free tests was costing taxpayers 2billion a month and that is simply unsustainable.'

Meanwhile, daily data today showed a further 210 deaths within 28 days of a positive test were recorded. Latest estimates from the ONS suggest a third of these fatalities is not primarily due to the virus.

And 2,480 infected patients were admitted to hospitals across the UK on Tuesday, up 4.2 per cent in a week. NHS England data suggests around half of these patients were not admitted because they were unwell from Covid.

Meanwhile, 91.9 per cent of Britons aged 12 and over have now had at least one vaccine dose, while 86 per cent are double-jabbed and 67.6 per cent are boosted.

WHAT IS THE FULL LIST OF COVID SYMPTOMS? According to the NHS updated list, symptoms of Covid in adults can include: a high temperature or shivering (chills)  a high temperature means you feel hot to touch on your chest or back (you do not need to measure your temperature)

a new, continuous cough  this means coughing a lot for more than an hour, or 3 or more coughing episodes in 24 hours

a loss or change to your sense of smell or taste

shortness of breath

feeling tired or exhausted

an aching body

a headache

a sore throat

a blocked or runny nose

loss of appetite

diarrhoea

feeling sick or being sick Advertisement

The vaccination scheme opened to five to 11-year-olds in England today. This age group was already eligible for jabs in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The youngsters are offered two jabs, 12 weeks apart, of a low-dose jab.

It comes as the NHS quietly expanded its official Covid symptom-list to include body aches, a runny nose and diarrhoea. Nine new official symptoms also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache.

No10's spokesperson said ministers expect the public to use their 'good judgment' on whether to go out if they have symptoms.

He said: 'I think anyone, even pre-Covid, would recognise if they have symptoms of an infectious disease, something like flu, they should stay home and not infect their loved ones or colleagues, and it is that sort of good judgment that we expect to see going forward.'

The NHS notes on its website that the symptoms are 'very similar to symptoms of other illnesses, such as colds and flu'.

People experiencing these symptoms should 'try to stay at home and avoid contact with other people', as well as taking 'extra care' to avoid contact with anyone at higher risk from the virus.

Professor Tim Spector, lead scientist of the Zoe Covid symptom tracker app, wrote on Twitter that the change comes after two years of urging health chiefs to expand the list.

He said: 'NHS official main symptoms of coronavirus (COVID-19) have finally changed after two years of lobbying and Zoe app user input  hurrah!

'Pity they have the order wrong  but it's a start and could help reduce infections.'

It is understood that the Government's chief medical officer would have needed to sign off on the expanded list of symptoms.

In March, Professor Spector was highly critical of the Government for not recognising a broader list of virus symptoms.

He said at the time: 'The Government's refusal to recognise the wide array of symptoms and to drop isolation advice and testing is likely driving the incredible number of cases we see today.

'Many people are no longer isolating when they have symptoms, either because they feel they don't have to anymore or because they or their employers still don't recognise symptoms like runny nose or sore throat as Covid.'

The World Health Organization lists 13 symptoms of the virus, including four not listed by the NHS: a rash or discolouration of the fingers or toes, red or irritated eyes, loss of speech or mobility and chest pain.

Meanwhile, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention symptom list is the same as the NHS website, although it does not include a loss of appetite.

And the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control lists 12 symptoms, while Germany acknowledges 14.

Professor Spector told MailOnline adding more symptoms to the NHS list 'is definitely a step in the right direction and it could help reduce infections as we go forward'.

Since the start of the pandemic, the NHS has only listed three Covid symptoms: a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell. But it has now quietly expanded its list of all the tell-tale signs of the virus to also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache. Shortness of breath, feeling tired, an aching body, a sore throat, a blocked or runny nose and diarrhoea were also added to the list

The health service on Friday expanded its list of the tell-tale signs of the virus to also include a loss of appetite, feeling or being sick and a headache. Since the start of the pandemic, health chiefs have pointed to a high temperature, a cough and a loss or change to taste or smell as the only three symptoms of the virus

'However, whilst this is good news, I'd like to see the order of the symptoms changed, as the NHS list puts far too much emphasis on symptoms like fever, and anosmia, which we know are much less common since the Omicron variant emerged,' he said.

Professor Spector added: 'According to the ZOE COVID Study, the top five symptoms being reported by contributors with a positive Covid test are; runny nose (83 per cent), fatigue (71 per cent), sore throat (69 per cent), headache (69 per cent) and sneezing (68 per cent).'

'It seems this decision has been made in light of the changes to testing.

'We were always told that the barrier to expanding the list was that adding more symptoms could overwhelm the testing capacity, so it makes sense that since free testing has now stopped, the list has been updated.'

The move for the UK to recognise more symptoms comes as Covid tests are now only available for certain groups.

Most people will now have to purchase the swabs from high street stores, where they are available for about 2 each.

England has ended its offer of free swabs under its plans to 'live with' the virus and following pressure from the Treasury over the bill  which ministers claimed cost 2billion in January at the height of the Omicron wave.

Scotland will end its offer next month, while Wales is to stop handing out the swabs this summer.

Experts argued the timing of the end of free testing 'couldn't really be worse', and that the country would now have to rely on the public 'doing the right thing' and getting tested when unwell.

But ministers have insisted it is the 'right' moment to scrap the mass-testing regime, which cost No10 up to 2bn-a-month. Only the most vulnerable and health care workers are still able to get free swabs.
Liz Truss heaped pressure on EU and other Western leaders to cut Russian oil and gas out of their economies today, accusing them of funding Vladimir Putin's criminal army in Ukraine.

She used a Warsaw press conference alongside her Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba to promise more weapons for Kyiv and a fresh wave of economic sanctions.

It came amid global revulsion at war crimes committed by Russian troops in the city of Bucha that were revealed at the weekend after they were forced out.

Some countries including Germany have shown a reluctance to wean themselves off Putin's power, with Berlin's finance minister Christian Lindner today rejecting a European Union embargo on gas imports.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz's governing coalition appears at odds over a ban on Russian energy imports and pressure is mounting on European leaders to impose more punitive sanctions on President Vladimir Putin's government in the face of mounting evidence of atrocities against Ukrainian civilians by the Russian army.

She said: 'It is the responsibility of the UK and our allies, and that's what Dmytro and I have discussed today, to step up our support for our brave Ukrainian friends.

'That means more weapons and more sanctions. Putin must lose in Ukraine. Later this week the G7 foreign ministers and the Nato foreign ministers will meet. We need to announce a tough new wave of sanctions.

'The reality is that money is still flowing from the West into Putin's war machine - and that has to stop.'

Mr Kuleba warned there were worse horrors committed by Russian forces than those witnessed in Bucha, adding: 'Half measures are not enough anymore.'

She used a Warsaw press conference alongside her Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba to promise more weapons for Kyiv and a fresh wave of economic sanctions.

A Ukrainian policeman walks by a pit in the village of Motyzhyn, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022 where the bodies of the mayor of the village, Olga Sukhenko, her husband and son and that of a man believed to be a Ukrainian serviceman, who was not yet identified, lie

President Zelensky appears shattered after visiting Bucha to see the bodies of the dead, describing what has happened in the region as 'genocide' and a 'war crime'

Some countries including Germany have shown a reluctance to wean themselves off Putin's power, with Berlin's finance minister Christian Lindner today rejecting a European Union embargo on gas imports.

He called for the 'most severe' sanctions to be applied by the West 'this week' on Moscow after the atrocities discovered.

'This is not the request of Ukraine's foreign minister. This is the plea of the victims of rape, torture and killings, their relatives and the entire Ukrainian nation,' he added.

'I have heard thousands of arguments about why this or that sanction cannot be imposed against Russia.

'It is time to put all hesitation, reluctance, business-wise arguments aside and think about human suffering and the need to stop the Russian war machine until it kills and destroys more on its way.

'I invite foreign representatives, my colleagues, foreign ministers, those who have doubts about whether to disconnect Russian banks from Swift or to continue buying Russian gas, oil and coal, or to receive Russian vessels in ports and process products, either sold to Russia or bought from Russia.

'I invite all of them to visit Bucha, without any delay - to visit a small village and stand in front of the mass grave, to see the bodies of dead Ukrainian women who had been raped before being killed and who the Russians tried to set on fire to hide the traces of their crimes.'

Kyiv officials say the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been uncovered so far, including 57 from a mass grave in the centre of the city of Bucha - the scene of heavy fighting with Ukrainian forces. The bodies had been rolled into a 45ft pit dug in the grounds of a grand Orthodox church.

President Volodymyr Zelensky has described what happened in Bucha, to the west of Kyiv, as 'genocide' of the Ukrainian people. He was joined by Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez who also described the killings as 'genocide' and called for those responsible to be held accountable.

Boris Johnson was among other world leaders denouncing 'war crimes' committed in Ukraine, while vowing to send funding and investigators to help lead a probe into the atrocities at The Hague. Joe Biden, speaking today, called the scenes in Bucha 'outrageous', branded Putin a 'war criminal' and said he must face trial.

Ms Truss said she would be working with allies to go further banning Russian ships from western ports, cracking down on Russian banks, going after new industries 'filling Putin's war chest, like gold' and to agree 'a clear timetable to eliminate our imports of Russian oil, gas and gold'.

She also called for further weapons to be supplied to Ukraine to combat Vladimir Putin's invasion.

Ms Truss said: 'We also need even more weapons of the type the Ukrainians are asking for.

'The fact is that being tough is the only approach that will work. Putin has escalated this war and this approach is vital to ensuring he loses in Ukraine and that we see a full withdrawal of Russian troops and Ukraine's hand is strengthened at the negotiating table.'

Lindner suggested that instead of a general ban on all energy imports from Russia, the EU could look separately at oil, coal and gas, as alternative suppliers for each of the fossil fuels could be found at varying speeds.

It came amid global revulsion at war crimes committed by Russian troops in the city of Bucha that were revealed at the weekend after they were forced out.

'We are dealing with a criminal war,' Lindner said before talks with his EU colleagues in Brussels. 'It is clear we must end as quickly as possible all economic ties to Russia. We must plan tough sanctions, but gas cannot be substituted in the short term. We would inflict more damage on ourselves than on them.

After years of prospering from Russian energy imports, Germany is convulsed by a debate over how to unwind a business relationship that critics say is financing Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Russia supplies 40 per cent of Europe's gas needs.

Germany has tightened sanctions on Russian executives, politicians, technical goods and financial flows, but has stopped short of blocking oil, gas and coal, saying that would hurt Germany more than the Kremlin.

Economic analysts have said Germany will face a steep recession if it stops importing Russian energy.

Defence Minister Christine Lambrecht said on Sunday that the European Union must discuss banning the import of Russian gas after Ukrainian and European officials accused Russian forces of committing atrocities near Kyiv, raising hopes that Germany was rethinking it opposition to a ban.

But Economy Minister Robert Habeck said he opposes an immediate ban on Russian fossil fuel imports.

'We are working every day to create the preconditions and the steps toward an embargo,' Habeck said during a news conference on Monday, adding that this approach 'harms Putin daily'.

Markus Soeder, the conservative premier of the wealthy state of Bavaria, criticised the government for what he said was an ideological focus on switching only to wind and solar while pushing ahead with plans to shut down the last nuclear power plants this year.

'We need five nuclear power stations for another five years and a pipeline from southern Europe to southern Germany,' he said. 'We need to look into fracking.'
Larry Ray, 62, is accused of running a sex cult out of his daughter Talia's dorm at the elite liberal arts college in Bronxville, New York

Both parties have rested in the Sarah Lawrence College 'sex cult' case with alleged cult leader Larry Ray declining to take the stand in his own defense.

Ray made the decision after intense discussions with his legal team over the weekend. He informed Judge Lewis Liman of it Monday morning ahead of the jury entering court and before the defense stepped up to present its case.

After three weeks of often harrowing and graphic testimony and a plethora of witnesses from the prosecution  including four former 'cult members'  the defense case lasted barely two hours and took in just two witnesses.

The first, forensic cell site analyst John B. Minor, attempted to cast doubt on the credibility of government maps that tracked cell phone activity and appeared to incriminate Ray and his co-conspirator Isabella Pollok by putting them in the same place as Claudia Drury at key times.

Across several days of testimony Drury told the court that she had been forced into a life of prostitution and handed over more than a million dollars to Ray by way of 'reparations' for wrongs of which he coerced her into believed herself guilty.

On Monday, jurors heard that the data was unreliable but under cross examination from Lindsay Keenan the quality of Minor's own conclusions was undermined leaving it unclear what if any gains his testimony had made.

Both parties have rested in the Sarah Lawrence College 'sex cult' case. Attorney Glenn Ripa is seen in the sketch

Forensic cell site analyst John B. Minor (pictured in a sketch) attempted to cast doubt on the credibility of government maps that tracked cell phone activity and appeared to incriminate Ray and his co-conspirator Isabella Pollok by putting them in the same place as Claudia Drury at key times

Next came attorney Glenn Ripa, the subject of a hearing late Friday.

The defense had initially hoped to introduce an 'advice of counsel' defense with Ripa's testimony, arguing that Ray acted in good faith collecting 'reparations' from students including Drury and not paying taxes on them having been told that those actions were legal by Ripa.

Judge Lewis did not allow this, finding that Ripa's testimony  which he described as 'all over the place'  fell far short of reaching that bar.

Instead, Ripa could only testify that he told Ray that reparations for personal damages were not considered taxable income and that he understood Drury to have confessed to having poisoned Ray.

Again, Keenan stood to cross-examine and damaged the little testimony Ripa had given. She established that the attorney had made no records regarding this 'advice,' and made no mention of it to the defense before March 30 this year.

Under intense questioning Ripa went on to admit that he had no idea Ray was already taking money from Drury when he allegedly advised him and that he had no clue that the sums of money involved ran to more than two million rather than the couple of hundred that Ripa had in mind.

The government closed its case Friday with testimony from Maritza Rosario, the mother of three siblings who each testified as alleged cult members and victims

Yalitza Rosario, Felicia Rosario and Santos Rosario. Felicia, 39, told the court how she regarded herself as Ray's 'wife' only recently realizing their relationship was a sham. Yalitza, 32, testified that her relationship with Ray 'tore her world apart' and led to her mental breakdown. Santos, 30, told of violent physical abuse, coercion and extortion to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars.

Larry Ray's sex trafficking trial was halted after the accused sex cult leader suffered another medical emergency in court

Felicia Rosario (pictured arriving court earlier this week) told jurors how she came to realize her 'romance' with alleged sex cult leader Larry Ray was a sham

Felicia, 39, told the court how she regarded herself as Ray's 'wife' only recently realizing their relationship was a sham

Assistant US Attorney Mollie Bracewell stood to deliver more than two hours of closing statements from the government Monday afternoon.

Speaking in clear, level tones Bracewell sought to strip back a case that has been often dumbfounding in detail and refocus the jury on what, she maintained, was at the heart of it.

Ray, she told the court, had presided over a criminal organization that existed entirely for his benefit. He used trust to assume power and mounted a campaign of terror, sustained over close to ten years, to induce confessions and turn the students of Sarah Lawrence into piggy banks.

She replayed some of the most disturbing audio and video: Santos Rosario, 30, being beaten with a hammer by Ray whose blows rained down again and again; Daniel Levin being tortured with pliers, clamped to his tongue and a hammer thrust beneath his chin or into his torso.

And she reminded the jury of the night when Ray and Pollok allegedly subjected Claudia Drury to hours of torture in her room at Manhattans Gregory Hotel.

On that night Ray allegedly stripped Drury naked, tied her to a chair and repeatedly suffocated her with a plastic bag, choked her with a leash, poured water over her while sitting her in the frigid blast of an AC unit and cut her hair with souvenir scissors that had been a gift from a client and she had kept because she thought them pretty.

They did it because, by then a prostitute, Drury had become too close to that client, Bracewell said, and had to be brought to heel.

Jurors heard audio of this sustained attack during Drurys testimony. At one point Ray can be heard asking Pollok to pass him the plastic bag  an instrument of torture, Bracewell said  at another Drury can be heard choking. You can listen to it again, Bracewell told the jury Monday afternoon and added, If you are able.

The night, she said, was a snapshot that told them almost everything they needed to know about Ray and his crimes.

Alleged cult victims Claudia Drury and Dan Levin

Sarah Lawrence College is an elite liberal arts college in Bronxville, just north of New York City

The effect was powerful and immediate. Jurors sat riveted, some took notes.

Ray, Bracewell told them, was at the head of a criminal structure that had a hierarchy, a group of followers and an anointed few  his lieutenant Isabella Pollok and his daughter Talia Ray. Both, she argued, were complicit in his crimes.

This was all about the control that Ray ruthlessly and relentlessly pursued over Drury, Levin and the Rosario siblings.

Anticipating the biggest stumbling block of all  the how? of the whole affair  Bracewell reminded jurors of the testimony of psychologist Dr Dawn Hughes, given four weeks ago.

Hughes had outlined the ways in which coercive control is gained and the tactics used. She listed ten: Establishing Trust, Physical Violence, Sexual Abuse, Isolation, Indoctrination and Gaslighting, Emotional Abuse, Deprivation, Economic Abuse and Collateral.

Ray may not have written this playbook, Bracewell suggested, but he studied it and he followed it verbatim.

The evidence, she told the jury, is overwhelming. She said This man reigned over his criminal family and enterprise so he could profit and gain power.

He did so with fear, violence, manipulation, lies and schemes and he did so for years.

This was, she said, nothing but a long con,  a means to the millions Ray and Pollok used to prop up a lifestyle of designer clothes, luxury hotels and expensive dinners and funneled into a domain name portfolio worth, Ray boasted to his father, more than $34million.

She concluded, He told his victims his acts of cruelty were attempts to hold them accountable for made up acts against him.

It is time to hold him accountable for his litany of crimes. We are asking you to bring Lawrence Ray to justice.

Federal Defender Marne Lenox was next to address the court  beginning the defense summation which she will conclude Tuesday.

The way Lenox cast it this was all about storytelling and storytellers who lost track of the difference between truth and fiction.

They all, she said, believed  Ray included. Ray believed he was the victim of a massive conspiracy, that he had been poisoned and was due reparations.

The students turned his villains into their own and spun tall tales that they themselves came to believe.

Lenox took a long deep breath, steadying her nerves before she began. Some people she admitted thought Lawrence Ray was crazy. But others did not. Others believed in the world in which, she maintained, Ray and the students lived.

She said, That world may not be one that you or I can ever hope to understand but for the defendant and others, through the looking glass, this world was real.
A long-term business associate of Prince Andrew is the director of a tax avoidance company which has been fined by HM Revenue and Customs for not complying with an investigation.

Arthur Lancaster, a chartered accountant who has worked with the Duke of York for many years, was named in court proceedings as the director of AML Tax (UK) Limited.

Tribunal judges ruling on a case brought by HMRC slammed Mr Lancaster as 'evasive' and said his evidence was 'lacking in candour, in some respects incorrect and littered with inconsistencies'.

The firm is part of the Isle of Man based Knox Group, a collection of companies established by Doug Barrowman - the Scottish billionaire businessman who is married to Baroness Mone.

AML Tax was accused by HMRC of 'aggressively promoting tax avoidance schemes in the UK for years'.

The company allowed about 50,000 workers to avoid paying tax on their earnings by having their salaries paid in loans, instead of the usual way, and claiming this was compliant with legislation.

Arthur Lancaster (left), a long time associate of Prince Andrew (right), has been criticised by judges for being 'evasive' during an investigation and subsequent tribunal into his company

The workers were left facing steep bills from HMRC, according to the Times.

HMRC took the company to a tribunal after it failed to comply with parts of their tax investigation and was subsequently fined 150,000.

The company was ordered last month to hand over the required records to enable HMRC to calculate the tax owed which is currently estimated to be more than 3million.

HMRC Counter Avoidance Director Mary Aiston said AML Tax 'used a series of tactics to try and frustrate HMRC's efforts that was legally due, in a sustained campaign of non-compliance'.

Speaking after the ruling last month, she added: 'I'm delighted their obstructive conduct has been penalised.

'HMRC is determined to drive promoters of tax avoidance out of business.'

AML Tax (UK) Ltd is part of the Knox Group. Pictured: Knox House on the Isle of Man

The tribunal judges singled out Mr Lancaster for criticism and highlighted his role in the scheme.

The ruling stated: 'Overall, we were left with the impression that Mr Lancaster was evasive, providing as little evidence as possible and that he did not wish to volunteer anything more than he considered necessary.

'As a result, it seems to us that the evidence Mr Lancaster gave in his witness statements and orally was confused, lacking in candour, in some respects incorrect and littered with inconsistencies.'

HMRC said the 150,000 fine is in addition to penalties already issued totalling around 9,000.

The government body said it will now carefully examine AML's financial records to assess their Corporation Tax bill for 2014 and 2015.

Despite the ruling, Prince Andrew reportedly has no plans to cut ties with Mr Lancaster.

A spokesman for the duke told the Times: 'The recent tribunal findings in relation to an HMRC investigation in no way relate to, or affect, any of the work undertaken by Arthur Lancaster on behalf of the duke.'
New York City Mayor Eric Adams held up the sneakers of a 12-year-old boy shot dead last week and promised his mother that the city would use every resource to find his killers.

'Just think about this for a moment. What the family said while we spoke just really resonated with me - Whose child is next? Whose child is next? This could have been your [children's] sneakers - My son's. Whose child is next? This story just strikes at the heart of the trauma in our city and out country,' Adams told reporters outside the grieving mom's home in Brooklyn.

But the comments by the besieged city's 'wartime general' seemed to ring hollow as violent crime has skyrocketed during Adams' first three months in office.

There were 107 shootings in March, with 27 people having been shot in the last week of the month. That comes on top of a nearly 60 percent spike in crime in February compared to the same time last year.

The most recent tragedy involved Kade Lewin, who was fatally shot in the head and chest while inside a car with his 20-year-old cousin Jenna Ellis - who was also shot but is recovering - and another eight-year-old relative who was not injured.

Ellis had treated the children to Boston Market and pulled over on East 56th Street and Linden Boulevard in East Flatbush at around 7.45 pm Thursday before the tragic drive-by shooting took place.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams held up the sneakers of a 12-year-old boy shot dead last week and vowed that the city would use every resource to find his killers

On Monday, Kade's anguished mother, Suzette Lewin, clutched a picture of her son, asking city officials for justice and begging the killers to come forward.

'All I'm asking, please come forward,' Suzette Lewis pleaded with the public on Monday. 'Please, please, somebody say something. I'm asking for justice for Kade. Please. Please, I'm asking for justice, please.'

Adams apologized to Kade's and Jenna's families and pledged yet again to put an end to the overwhelming spike in violence in the city.

With a somber demeanor, Adams addressed the public in one of his well-known speeches, which are often criticized for being filled with promises to tackle crime that are not delivered.

'When you understand the realness of this, you understand the urgency of this. And so when I move with the urgency and people are telling me to slow down; What the hell is wrong with you?' he added.

Quite opposite to his remarks, desperate New Yorkers have pleaded with the mayor and city officials to be harsher on crime and get rid of lax bail reforms that allow criminals back on the streets to terrorize residents.

Adams had previously said that the Big Apple has become 'a laughingstock' in need of a 'wartime general' to tackle the rampant lawlessness.

On Monday, Kade Lewin's grieving mother, Suzette Lewin, clutched a picture of her son, asking city officials for justice and begging the killers to come forward

Kade was fatally shot in the head and chest while inside a car with his 20-year-old cousin Jena Ellis, who was also shot but is recovering, and another eight-year-old relative who was not injured

New York City is reeling from a February crime wave that saw a nearly 60 percent spike in incidents since the same time last year. There were 107 shootings just in the past month and 27 people have been shot in the week to date

'[It's] overwhelming. We can replace the name of Kade with so many other names. Promising young people snatched away from us,' Adams said on Monday.

Kade was pronounced dead at the scene after a shooter fired 11 bullets into the Toyota Corolla he was inside.

Jenna Ellis, who was sitting in the driver's seat, was hit in the upper leg and right cheek.

She was rushed to Kings County Hospital where she is recovering. Jenna had recently gotten her license and was driving Lewin's mother's car. Lewin and Ellis were reportedly very close and saw each other frequently.

A younger female relative, eight, was sitting in the back seat and was uninjured. She said she was eating and looking at her phone when the violence began.

Investigators believe the family was not targeted. A source told the New York Daily News that the gunman was aiming for someone who drives a similar make and model car.

Immediately after the shooting, two black sedans were reported to have fled the scene at high speeds.

The NY Post reported a witness as saying: 'I heard eight shots and I would say within 20 seconds of the shots, I saw a car on the corner facing East New York Avenue and they almost got into an accident with oncoming traffic.'

Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell also said she will use 'every possible resource' to find the shooter.

The mayor said he will personally contribute to helping with the family's funeral costs and medical bills.

'We're so sorry. Those who took their lives will be found,' Adams said.

'We're putting out a call to help this family during this time. The mounting cost of burying Kade. The medical costs of young Jenna that's still in the hospital with six bullets.

'I will personally contribute. We want contributions to go to lisadozierfuneralservice.com to raise money that's needed. This family has been hit with this real crisis,' he added.

'Just think about this for a moment. What the family said while we spoke just really resonated with me - Whose child is next? Whose child is next? This could have been your [children's] sneakers - My son's,' the mayor said on Monday

Kade was pronounced dead at the scene after a shooter fired 11 bullets into the Toyota Corolla he was inside

Investigators believe the family was not targeted. A source told the New York Daily News that the gunman was targeting someone who drives a similar make and model car

Kade's cousin, Jenna Ellis, who was sitting in the driver's seat, was hit in the upper leg and right cheek. She is recovering

Photographs of Kade Lewin during a press conference outside of his home in Brooklyn

Adams, a former cop, has pledged to reduce violence in the city with a crime-fighting plan that includes removing homeless people from the subways.

He has also faced backlash since he first hinted he'd bring back a similar version of the controversial plainclothes anti-gun unit.

More than 200 cops from the NYPD's Neighborhood Safety Team have been sent to patrol 30 key areas where shootings have risen alarmingly.

Previous iterations of the unit were disbanded in 2020 by then-Mayor Bill de Blasio amid anger at policing sparked by the murder of George Floyd and concerns they accounted for a disproportionate number of shootings and complaints.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams visits the home of Kade Lewin

Adam has faced incessant backlash since he first hinted he'd bring back a similar version of the controversial plainclothes anti-gun unit. Above, Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell, Chief of Department Kenneth Corey and NYPD executives join Mayor Eric Adams as they brief the media regarding the rollout of the Neighborhood Safety Teams on March 16

Adams has also said he wants to see changes in bail reform laws and other criminal justice measures, claiming they will bring down crime rates in the city and reduce gun violence.

In February, Adams proposed his plan to revamp city bail laws that often allow suspects to roam the streets - sometimes within hours of an arrest.

'Let's remove the cash bail system, because one should not be able to get out of jail just because you can pay bail. Let's take that away. Judges should look at the case in front of them and say, 'This person has two gun arrests, and he's continually saying to the people of the city that I don't care about the safety of you,' the mayor said.

'That judge should have the right to make the discretion that this person just be held.'

What offenses are 'bail-eligible' in NYC? In 2020, a new law took effect that limited the kinds of crimes judges could set bail for. The law was meant to stop people from languishing in jail just because they couldn't pay, but some have criticized it for allowing criminals to run loose. Offenses that are still eligible for bail include: - Any violent felony - Robbery aided by another person - Burglary where property is defined as a 'dwelling' - Witness intimidation or tampering - Any felony sex crime or offense and some misdemeanor sex offenses - First and second degree money laundering - Child sex crimes The law was amended that same year to include misdemeanors involving harm to a person or property and felonies committed while on probation or supervised release. Sources: new-york-lawyers.org; NY State Advertisement

However, Adams can't do much to amend the current bail laws since they have to be changed by the state Legislature.

Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul, who faces an election in November after taking over for her disgraced predecessor Andrew Cuomo, has received stiff resistance from progressive members in her party about changing the controversial bail laws.

Meanwhile, Hundreds of New York City prosecutors have left their jobs because of low pay and high workloads in recent years, putting more stress on an already overburdened justice system as crime continues to skyrocket in the Big Apple.

Assistant district attorneys are burned out because of two laws that took effect in January 2020, right as the pandemic was about to send crime soaring.

The laws require prosecutors to quickly share evidence with defense attorneys in order to ensure a speedy trial.

But the high volumes of paperwork - sometimes hundreds of pages per case - combined with a load of up to 100 cases at once and low starting pay have sent prosecutors fleeing for the private sector, the New York Times reports.

So far this year, 36 prosecutors in Brooklyn have quit, along with 44 in Manhattan, at least 28 in the Bronx and nine on Staten Island.

The low morale and dwindling workforce adds to the soft-on-crime approach of Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, who has vowed that armed robbery would be treated as a misdemeanor if the firearm didn't 'create a genuine risk of physical harm.'

Meanwhile, a 2020 law that ended cash bail for most misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies has returned more criminals to the street.

The law, meant to stop people from languishing in jails just because they can't make bail, is now meeting pushback from high-level city officials, including Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell and Gov. Kathy Hochul.

According to Hochul's plan, perpetrators of gun crimes, as well as subway and transit crimes, would become eligible to be detained and held for bail if the plan is enacted.

The laws would allow cops and judges to bypass Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, who has been widely criticized for his soft-on-crime stance, which involves only applying cash bonds in the most serious cases.

Meanwhile, crime continues to go up in a trend that began during the worst days of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

On Friday, a 72-year-old tourist was tripped after she left a lunch with her daughters in Manhattan.

Cyndi Gradwell of Ocean City, Maryland, arrived in NYC with her two daughters on Friday.

Cyndi Gradwell, 72, of Ocean City, Maryland, was left with a black eye, a chipped tooth, and bruises after criminal Kelvin Winfield intentionally tripped her as she and her daughters walked down Ninth Avenue in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen district

Her daughters gifted her a trip to New York City as a Christmas present and the ladies were walking down the street with their suitcases after enjoying a nice lunch together when Winfield started yelling at Gradwell's daughters before cutting her off and tripping her

As the trio was walking down Ninth Avenue between 35th and 36th streets in Hell's Kitchen with their suitcases after enjoying a nice lunch, Kelvin Winfield started yelling at Gradwell's daughters.

Surveillance footage, obtained by the New York Post, shows Gradwell trying to move to go around him when he sticks his foot out and trips her, causing her to fall flat on her face, hitting her teeth.

Gradwell suffered a black eye and bruises, and said she had several of her teeth 'knocked [loose],' causing her to only to be able to eat mashed potatoes, eggs, and 'spaghetti strands one at a time.'

Another tourist was shot multiple times in the leg and groin on March 18.

French-born Pierrick Jamaux, who is visiting from Hong Kong , was getting out of an Uber with his Australian model wife, Sarah Watts, 26, and another person at their hotel in Midtown when a man approached them and demanded Jamaux hand over his Richard Mille watch, the New York Post reported.

Jamaux, 33, is a French-born cryptocurrency expert visiting from Hong Kong with his wife, Watts, an Australian born model

Pierrick Jamaux, 33, (pictured inside the ambulance) was shot multiple times in the legs and groin during an attempted robbery outside his hotel in NYC

The attacked occurred on March 18 as the couple and another woman got out of an Uber outside the Fifty Hotel and Suites in Manhattan

Jamaux told police the man then opened fire before he could react, striking his legs and groin and causing him to fall to the ground as the man tried to rob him.

Police said the other person with the couple, a 25-year-old woman, jumped on the gunman's back to try and stop him before the shooter pushed her off and fled.

New York Police Department officials said five shell casing were recovered from the scene and that Jamaux had multiple entry and exit wounds on both legs. He was taken to the nearby Bellevue Hospital where he was reported in stable condition.
A 23-year-old woman has died after eating cannabis sweets after having them delivered via a messaging app on her phone.

The woman and her friend, 21, purchased what she thought were cannabis 'gummies', called 'Trrlli Peachie O's', on 29 March, which were delivered to her home address in South Park Drive, Ilford.

Both she and her friend felt immediately unwell after eating just one sweet. Police and ambulance crews were sent to the address at 11.30pm on Tuesday last week.

Both women were taken to an east London hospital, but sadly, the 23-year-old died four days later on Saturday 2 April.

The woman's identity is not being released at the moment and a post-mortem examination is to be arranged.

Her friend has been discharged from hospital following treatment.

Leon Brown, 37, of Albert Road, South Norwood, south London, has been charged in connection with the death.

He appeared in custody at Barkingside Magistrates Court on Monday 4 April.

He was subsequently charged with possession with intent to supply Class B synthetic cannabinoid, being concerned in the supply of a synthetic cannabinoid, and possession with intent to supply a psychoactive substance.

Officers are currently awaiting tests on a number of sweets which have been recovered by police the Ilford home.

It has not yet been confirmed where the 'Trrlli Peachie O's' were being manufactured, but police are warning the public against illegal substances packaged in the form of cannabis sweets as they pose a risk of accidental consumption due to the child-friendly packaging.

A 23-year-old woman has died after eating cannabis sweets after having them delivered via a messaging app on her phone. She and her friend, 21, purchased 'Trrlli Peachie O's', on 29 March, which were delivered to her home address in South Park Drive, Ilford. Both she and her friend felt immediately unwell after eating just one sweet. Police and ambulance crews were sent to the address at 11.30pm on Tuesday last week (file picture)

Chief Superintendent Stuart Bell of the Met's East Area BCU said: 'I must warn the public against taking any illegal substances, including those packaged in the form of cannabis sweets.

'Please do not buy or consume these products. They are illegal and, because of the child-friendly packaging, they can pose a risk of accidental consumption.

'The particular batch of sweets were contained in packaging featuring "Trrlli Peachie O's" branding. It has not been confirmed at this stage where the sweets were manufactured.

'Drug dealers harm communities and risk the safety of individuals. We will take positive action to target those engaged in this activity as well as those found in possession of these substances.

'Anyone with information about people selling illegal products such as these is asked to speak with local officers, call police on 101 or, to remain anonymous, contact Crimestoppers.'

Urgent enquiries are under way to establish the full circumstances and to look into other cases where people have become seriously unwell after eating cannabis sweets, gummies and similar products.

Officers are aware of one potentially linked case in which a woman was taken unwell earlier in March after eating a cannabis sweet in Tower Hamlets.

She was taken to hospital and later discharged - but investigations are ongoing to see whether this sweet was part of the batch of sweets associated with last week's Ilford death.
The world has reacted in growing horror and rage to the shocking revelations of massacres around Kyiv as Russian forces have withdrawn, with the notable exception of China.

In the town of Bucha, just to the north-east or Kyiv, mass graves have been discovered, along with bodies in the street - hands sometimes bound - with close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke of 'hundreds of people tortured and killed' in a video address.

The Japanese foreign minister, Yoshimasa Hayashi, wrote on Twitter that Japan is 'deeply shocked' by the 'large number of civiliians in Ukraine who have been killed as a result of the acts of the Russian forces'

Communal workers carry body bags in the town of Bucha, not far from the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Sunday

Ira Gavriluk holds her cat as she walks next to the corpses of her husband and her brother, who were killed in Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, on Monday

Another view of the mass grave discovered close to a church in Bucha, which was uncovered by Ukrainian forces as Russian troops withdrew from the area around the capital

A mass grave was discovered in the grounds of the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, containing the bodies of dozens of civilians

A visibly emotional Volodymyr Zelensky today stood motionless as he surveyed the scene of utter devastation he encountered in the town of Bucha, with dozens of bodies shot at close range laying on the empty streets

The Japanese foreign minister, Yoshimasa Hayashi, said he was 'shocked' at 'brutal acts of violence on civilians', adding: 'Murdering innocent civilians is a violation of international humanitarian law and it's absolutely unacceptable.'

But Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov rejected the allegations of Russian troops killing civilians in Bucha, describing the scenes outside Kyiv as a 'stage-managed anti-Russian provocation.'

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez called upon those behind the massacres to appear before the International Criminal Court, to 'answer these alleged cases of crimes against humanity, war crimes and, why not say it, of genocide, too.'

US President Joe Biden doubled down on his labeling of Vladimir Putin as a 'war criminal' after seeing the reports out of Bucha.

'We have to gather all the detail, so this can be an actual, have a war crimes trial. This guy is brutal. And what's happening in Bucha is outrageous.'

He also pledged to provide Ukraine with the weapons they needed to continue the fight.

UK Foreign Minister Liz Truss, speaking alongside Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba during a trip to Warsaw, assured that the perpetrators would be brought to justice.

She also decried any efforts to relax sanctions on Russia while their troops are still on Ukrainian territory and called for even tougher sanctions.

'The reality is that money is still flowing from the West into Putin's war machine - and that has to stop,' she said.

French President Emmanuel Macron echoed the calls for a new round of sanctions and 'very clear measures', offering to help the Ukrainians in the investigation of war crimes.

European Union Parliament President Roberta Metsola said: 'The atrocities committed by the Russian army in Ukraine are horrific, they are disgraceful and they are shameful.'

He added: 'They underlined the level of threat facing Ukraine and the global rules-based world order.'

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawieck called the Russian actions 'war crimes' and said: 'When we look at the terrible crimes against women, children and entire families, our scream should be even louder.'

Secretary General of the United Nations said he was 'deeply shocked' and called for an 'independent investigation'.
A company boss has spent 100,000 on a house for a family fleeing Ukraine to live in for free.

Jamie Hughes, 50, wanted to show his support for families affected by the Russian invasion.

So he decided to buy a three-bedroom home in Wrexham, North Wales, to offer to refugees.

Jamie, who started his telecoms company at 21, is now set to welcome a mother-of-three to the home.

Jamie Hughes, 50, pictured, wanted to show his support for families affected by the Russian invasion

He said: 'I wanted to help because it was absolutely devastating watching millions of people fleeing - the bombs going off'.

Jamie first thought about converting an annex in his own home but realised it would take too long.

He added: 'It would have taken about two years, been too cramped and lacking in privacy.

'I went to look at some empty properties and I made an offer and bought one'.

The home is now set to house mum-of-three Maria and her boys, aged 10, 12 and 14.

He decided to buy a three-bedroom home in Wrexham, North Wales, to offer to refugees

Maria, who worked in anaesthetics at a Ukrainian hospital, is still in western Ukraine but is making her way to a refugee camp in Poland.

She is hoping to move to the UK in the coming week if their visas are confirmed on time.

Family friend Julie Simkins has been helping to get the house ready through a Facebook group called Wrexham and Ukraine United.

She said the community had been 'absolutely incredible' following donations of sofas, beds and washing machines.

She added: 'They've been rallying round to help with donations and are ready to embrace her and the boys.'
The father of Harmony Montgomery, who vanished in New Hampshire in 2019 at age 5, is facing eight new charges related to firearms theft that are not connected to the girl's disappearance.

Adam Montgomery, 32, is accused of stealing a rifle and a shotgun between September 29 and October, 3, 2019, just months before Harmony's last known sighting.

The father also faces charges of receiving stolen property for retaining the weapons, being a felon in possessing the weapons and being 'an armed career criminal' after having been convicted of at least three felonies,' according to the New Hampshire Attorney General's Office.

The eight new charges against Montgomery carry sentences totaling up to 154 years in prison.

Montgomery, of Manchester, has a criminal record that goes back at least to 2007. He has been in jail since January in connection with a second-degree assault charge involving his daughter.

Adam Montgomery, 32, the father of missing 7-year-old Harmony Montgomery, has been accused of stealing a rifle and a shotgun, receiving stolen property, being a felon in possession of weapons and being an armed career criminal

Harmony was last seen in New Hampshire in November or December of 2019, but she was only reported missing in the fall of 2021

Harmony still has not been located. Police in Manchester, New Hampshire, have received hundreds of tips, and photos of Harmony have appeared on billboards and social media sites. A $150,000 reward is being offered for information leading to the missing girl.

In late March, Montgomery was indicted by a grand jury on a charge of second-degree assault, a felony, alleging that he struck Harmony in the face in July 2019.

Montgomery pleaded not guilty to the assault charge and to misdemeanor charges of interference with custody and endangering the welfare of a child.

He is scheduled to be arraigned on the new gun charges on Tuesday.

'There is no evidence of any connection between the stolen firearms and the disappearance of Harmony Montgomery,' Attorney General John Formella said in a news release.

Montgomery had custody of Harmony, who vanished sometime in late November or early December in 2019. But authorities did not know she was missing until last fall.

Montgomery's estranged wife, Kayla Montgomery, 31 (right), has been was indicted on a felony charge of theft by deception

Montgomery told police Harmony was living with her mother in Massachusetts, but the mother said she hadnt seen the child since a video call around Easter 2019.

According to a police affidavit, two relatives, including Adam's brother and his uncle, claimed that the father had given Harmony a black eye in July 2019.

But according to a review of the case released by New Hampshire Gov Chris Sununu's office last month, a child protective services worker who visited the Montgomery family's home months before Harmony's disappearance concluded that the allegation about Harmony's black eye was unfounded.

Adam Montgomery also has been arrested on misdemeanor charges of interference with custody and endangering the welfare of a child.

The same grand jury indicted Montgomery's estranged wife, Kayla Montgomery, 31, on a felony charge of theft by deception, alleging that she told state Health Department workers that Harmony was a member of her household from November 2019 to June 2, 2021, and that she received food stamp benefits for Harmony.

Both have pleaded not guilty, and have told police that the child was living with her biological mother, Crystal Sorey, in Massachusetts. But Sorey said she last saw her daughter during a phone video conversation around Easter 2019.

News of the back-to-back indictments come a day after it emerged that Adam's current girlfriend, Kelsey Smalls, 27, was found dead in a Manchester hotel room on March 13.

An arrest affidavit obtained by DailyMail.com alleges that Adam Montgomery, who has a history of criminal offenses in two states and drug abuse, punched Harmony in the face and gave her a black eye in July 2021 - just six months after New Hampshire's child protective services gave him custody of his daughter.

Montgomery's uncle, Kevin Montgomery, quoted Adam Montgomery saying: 'I bashed her around this house,' according to the filing.

According to the uncle, Montgomery explained that he had left Harmony, then age 5, in charge of her infant brother while he was in the bathroom.

When the baby started crying, Montgomery said he came out of the bathroom to find Harmony with her hand clamped over her brother's mouth to stop him from crying.

'Adam told Kevin that he responded by striking [Harmony] in the face and causing the black eye,' according to the affidavit.

Adam also would allegedly spank his daughter on her buttocks, force her to stand in a corner for hours and make her scrub the toilet with her own toothbrush.

Kevin Montgomery told police he reported the 2019 assault to the Department of Children of Children Youth and Their Families (DCYF).

A caseworker visited Montgomery's home in July 2019 and found the claim Harmony had a black eye unfounded. However, the family were 'identified as high risk of repeat child welfare system involvement' and were given referrals for housing supports, the review stated.

During a second visit that August, the worker noticed a red mark in Harmonys eye and faded bruising under her eyelid. The worker was told by Harmony and her father that the mark was caused by 'horseplay with another sibling when a toy light saber struck Harmony Montgomery near her eye.'

In late March, Montgomery was indicted on a second-degree assault charge for allegedly hitting daughter Harmony in the face in July 2019

Two other visits that year showed 'the children appeared happy and healthy,' the review said. The last visit was on October 1, 2019.

The division didnt have contact with Adam Montgomery again until January 2020. When asked about Harmony, he said the child was living with her mother, Sorey, in Massachusetts.

A child protective services worker left a voicemail for Sorey, but the call wasnt returned and there is no evidence of any additional attempts to contact her, the review said.

Adam Montgomery made similar comments about Harmony when a case worker visited the house twice in 2021, the review said.

In September, a 'close contact' of Harmonys mother contacted the division and 'raised concerns' that Sorey hadnt seen her daughter since 2019 and hadnt been able to contact Adam Montgomery, the review said. The division confirmed that Harmony had never been registered for school in the public school system.

The division attempted to find the Montgomery family and speak with Sorey, who later told police she hadnt seen her daughter since a Facetime call around Easter 2019.
A former leader of the notorious MS-13 street gang will be spending the rest of his life in jail, the U.S. Department of Justice announced.

Miguel Angel Corea Diaz, 41, was sentenced last Friday to life in prison by a Maryland court for conspiring to commit murder in aid of racketeering and murder in aid of racketeering.

Corea Diaz, an El Salvador native, was also found guilty of conspiring to possess with the intent to distribute marijuana, cocaine and heroin, and possession with intent to distribute heroin.

He was arrested in April 2018 in New Jersey and convicted by a federal jury in November 2021.

Known as the 'Reaper,' Corea Diaz was one of the top leaders of the MS-13 along the East Coast. From 2015 to 2019, he was in charge of a cell known as the Sailors Locos Salvatruchos Westside Clique that operated out of Langley Park, Maryland.

In March 2017, Corea Diaz and co-defendant Junior Noe Alvarado-Requen, 24, put together an MS-13 hit squad after a gang member wanted for arrest had an argument over marijuana with Raymond Wood, a Lynchburg, Virginia, high school student.

Several gang members showed up at Wood's home and kidnapped him from the front lawn.

Wood was driven from Lynchburg to Bedford County where the gang members strangled him, stabbed him and cut off his right hand.

Prosecutors said Corea Diaz and Alvarado-Requen helped hide the killers from law enforcement.

Miguel Angel Corea Diaz, a former leader of the MS-13 gang, was sentenced to life in prison by a federal Maryland court on Monday. The El Salvador native was convicted in November 2021 for conspiring to commit murder in aid of racketeering and murder in aid of racketeering. He was also found guilty of conspiring to possess with the intent to distribute marijuana, cocaine and heroin, and possession with intent to distribute heroin

Miguel Angel Corea Diaz (center) put together an MS-13 squad of assassins that in March 2017 kidnapped and murdered Raymond Wood, a 17-year-old high school student

At least 20 law enforcement agencies worked together to dismantle the gang's operations throughout the region.

Nassau County District Attorney Anne T. Donnelly said that her office and the Drug Enforcement Administration were looking into drug trafficking activities in Long Island, New York, in 2017 and learned of Corea Diaz's presence in the area.

'Miguel Angel Corea Diaz, also known as Reaper, reported directly to the gang's top leadership in El Salvador and was responsible for implementing MS-13's program of violence and intimidation on the East Coast,' Donnelly said.

Prosecutors found that under Corea Diaz, the gang extorted local migrant-run businesses in and near Langley Park and charged them 'rent' for operating in MS-13 controlled turfs.

The gang also trafficked narcotics, including marijuana and cocaine.

'A large share of the proceeds of the Sailors Clique's illegal activities were sent to gang leadership in El Salvador to further promote the goals of the gang, using structured transactions and intermediaries to avoid law enforcement scrutiny,' the Justice Department said.

Raymond Wood, a 17-year-old high school student from Lynchburg, Virginia, was murdered by MS-13 in March 2017

'As members of MS-13, Corea Diaz and his co-conspirators were ruthless and showed no regard for human life by extorting innocent people, tampering with witnesses, and ordering a murder over a drug dispute,' said Steven M. D'Antuono, Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI Washington Field Office.

According to the Department of Justice, other MS-13 branches continue to operate throughout the Maryland, including Frederick County, Anne Arundel County, Prince George's County, and Montgomery County.

'Any time we can get a notorious gang member off the streets, it is a victory for both law enforcement and law-abiding citizens,' said James R. Mancuso, the Special Agent in Charge for Homeland Security Investigations' office in Baltimore.
The Polish Prime Minister has slammed Emmanuel Macron for negotiating with Putin in several phone calls since the outbreak of the war five weeks ago.

Mateusz Morawiecki berated the French President at a press conference today over his phone calls with Russian leader Vladimir Putin amid an international outcry over the slaughter of civilians during the invasion.

It comes as France confirmed on Monday it has decided to expel Russian diplomatic staff, echoing a similar action taken by Germany, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Monday.

Ukraine accused Russian forces of carrying out a 'massacre' in Bucha and Western leaders reacted with outrage to images of bodies strewn across the streets of the town.

Poland has on many occasions called for harsher sanctions on Russia and supply more arms to Ukraine.

It has also called for an international tribunal to investigate killings of civilians in Ukraine

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki attends a press conference (pictured) at which he berated French President Emmanuel Macron for holding phone calls with Vladimir Putin

Polish Prime Minister Mr Morawiecki said: 'Mr. President Macron, how many times have you negotiated with Putin, what have you achieved? Have you stopped any of the actions that have taken place?'

'One should not negotiate with criminals, one should fight them...Nobody negotiated with Hitler. Would you negotiate with Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot?' he added.

Macron's office hit back at the comment and said it is important for President Putin to understand the demands of Western countries and the cost for Russia of disregarding them.

'From the onset, the president has used all available means to make Putin stop the war: massive sanctions, support to Ukraine, demands made directly to President Putin during their calls,' a French presidential official said.

Macron has spared no effort to mediate between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

He travelled to Moscow and Kyiv in early February and spoke to Putin 16 times since the start of the year, in telephone conversations the Elysee says have been confrontational but offered an opportunity to keep a communication channel open and gauge Putin's state of mind.

Officials for Macron (pictured) said the phone calls, of which there have been 16 since January, provided an important way of communicating demands directly to the Russian President

Elysee officials have in the past offered scathing readouts of the calls, saying Putin has appeared 'paranoid', has lied to the French leader and that Macron told him he made a serious mistake in invading Ukraine on February 24.

Russia sent its forces into Ukraine on what Putin called a 'special military operation' to demilitarise and 'denazify' the country. Ukraine and the West say Putin launched an unprovoked war of aggression.

Meanwhile, France confirmed it will join Germany in expelling Russian diplomats in response to the atrocities seen in Ukraine.

A ministry source, who asked not to be named, said 35 Russian diplomats would be expelled.

'This action is part of a European approach,' the foreign ministry statement added.

'Our first responsibility is always to ensure the safety of French people and Europeans,' it said.

Germany on Monday expelled a 'significant number' of Russian diplomats in what Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called a response to the 'unbelievable brutality' the Kremlin had unleashed in Ukraine.

Berlin's move involves 40 Russians while Lithuania on Monday said it was expelling Russia's ambassador over Putin's aggression in Ukraine.

There has been outrage across Europe over killings in the town of Bucha near the capital where dozens of bodies were found in mass graves or littering the streets near Kyiv over the weekend.

The Kremlin has rejected Western accusations that Russian forces were responsible.
Lawmakers have reached a bipartisan deal to offer $10 billion in additional Covid-19 funding.

The number is less than half of what the White House originally requested, but some Republicans were prepared to offer nothing as they claimed previous Covid funding had been squandered or still had yet to be spent.

While past Covid-19 relief bills, such as the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, have been saddled with funding for struggling families and businesses, the new deal would be narrowly tailored to public health efforts to fight the virus.

The package would enable the federal government to purchase more therapeutics, tests, vaccines and other supplies, but would not allow for international aid, according to the Washington Post.

Senate Republicans including Mitt Romney, Utah, Richard Burr, N.C. and Roy Blunt, Mo., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., were working with Democrats after the pandemic funding was pulled from the 2022 budget bill. Lead negotiators on the Democratic side were Sens. Chris Coons, Del., Chuck Schumer, N.Y., and Patty Murray, Wash. The new deal could clear the upper chamber as soon as this week.

President Biden had originally asked Congress for another $22.5 billion in funding to fight Covid-19, warning that the government would soon run out of its stockpile of therapeutics and would not have the capacity to offer a second booster dose of the vaccine to everyone.

The White House originally asked Congress to include $22.5 billion in funding to fight the ongoing pandemic, but that number was slashed to $15.6 billion after negotiations between Republicans and Democrats

Senate Republicans including Mitt Romney, Utah, Richard Burr, N.C. and Roy Blunt, Mo., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., were working with Democrats after the pandemic funding was pulled from the 2022 budget bill

Lawmakers included $15.6 billion in the fiscal year 2022 budget legislation, but it was yanked at the last second after progressives protested the pay-fors of the funding - repurposing about $7 billion in leftover state and local Covid relief. The original Covid relief included about $10 billion for fighting the pandemic at home and $5 billion for abroad.

Moderate Republicans who could be swayed to vote for further aid insisted it was paid for, and demanded a full accounting of where other aid money has gone so far.

The new deal set to be announced Monday is paid for by repurposing aid from previous Covid-19 bills, but does not dig into state assistance.

Biden officials have warned that offering money to fight the pandemic abroad is essential for preventing the development and spread of new variants. The U.S. Agency for International Development (AID) was running a program to administer vaccines abroad, but warned that it will be forced to pause the initiative without further funding.

Coons had pushed negotiators to include money for the global response, and Romney had said earlier that the bill would include about $1 billion in global aid. The international funding was cut after negotiators could not find agreement on how to pay for it.

Both chambers only have less than a week to send the bill to Biden's desk before a two-week recess on April 9, but some Democrats in the House have threatened to vote against it without the global aid.

'I don't understand why we as a country would make this mistake. My constituents do not want another variant to shut down their lives,' Rep. Tom Malinowski, told the Washington Post. 'My constituents are already suffering higher prices because of covid-related economic disruptions, half a world away, in countries that are not adequately vaccinated.'

Coronavirus cases are on the rise throughout some of Europe, Hong Kong and China and Biden officials are preparing for a potential surge here at home this spring. In the U.S., cases and deaths remain lower than they've been since last summer. An average of 27,088 are testing positive for the virus each day and an average of 649 are dying.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg revealed at the White House Monday that it marked the first day he and husband Chasten dropped their twins off at daycare.

Buttigieg was the first speaker at a trucking industry event on the White House's South Lawn - applauding the essential workers for bringing him baby supplies.

'I have to share - this is a big day in my own household because it was our first time taking our kids to daycare,' the new dad said.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg (right) revealed at a White House event Monday on the trucking industry that it marked the first day he and husband Chasten dropped their twins off at daycare

Pete Buttigieg (right) and husband Chasten (left) announced the birth of their twins Joseph 'Gus' August and Penelope Rose in August

Chasten Buttigieg shared his husband Pete Buttigieg's comments about dropping the kids at daycare and noted how they're now 'sitting and scooting and babbling precious monologues'

He and Chasten adopted twins - Joseph 'Gus' August and Penelope Rose - in August.

'If anyone saw me walking around Target looking a little confused and sad earlier today now you know,' Chasten Buttigieg later tweeted, sharing the video clip of his husband talking about taking the twins to daycare.

'When our kids were born early they were just four pounds. I could rest both of them on my chest while cradling them with one hand. Now they're sitting and scooting and babbling precious monologues on the way to daycare. Slow down!' Chasten Buttigieg added.

In October, Pete Buttigieg had to defend his decision to take paternity leave amid a supply chain crisis after being mocked by Fox News Channel host Tucker Carlson.

'When somebody welcomes a new child into their family and goes on leave to take care of that child, that's not a vacation. It's work. It's joyful, wonderful, fulfilling work, but it is work,' Buttigieg said on Meet the Press.

Carlson suggested that Buttigieg was at home 'trying to figure out how to breastfeed' - a comment widely condemned as homophobic.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg (center right) stands alongside President Joe Biden (center left) at a trucking industry event Monday on the South Lawn of the White House

At Monday's event, Buttigieg quickly segued to trucking after mentioning the kids.

'And as I was getting ready for that,' he said of taking the kids to daycare. 'I kept looking around at all of the physical items that surrounded us and thought about how they got here.'

'The bottles, the little jars of baby food, the spoons we were using to feed them, the high chairs that they were sitting in, even the family minivan itself - got to us because truck drivers brought them where they needed to be,' the Transportation secretary continued.

'And that's true for everything we count on - groceries, books, livestock, medicine,' Buttigieg added. 'If you enjoyed the food you ate for breakfast, the clothes you're wearing right now, or the device you might be using to watch this event - you can thank a truck driver for getting that to you.'

Three large rigs were parked on the driveway of the White House's South Lawn - giving the event a similar feel to ones former President Donald Trump hosted.
The butler did it.

An Ohio man affectionately known in his Akron neighborhood by the nickname Lurch confessed to shooting a 16-year-old boy three times after the teen broke into his home, police said.

The teen apparently stumbled as he broke into the 74-year-old's home at around 7:30 a.m. last Tuesday on the 700 block of Johnston Street in Akron, according to a local police report.

Lurch, whose real name was not revealed by police, said he was half asleep while watching TV when the the intruder broke into his home by breaking the glass out of his front door - a day after his birthday.

'So I didn't actually see him come in, but I did when I hit the corner, but it took me a second to get my blanket,' said Lurch, revealing that he shot the intruder with his 380 Luger as soon as he set foot into his home.

He then remembers the wounded teen going into the hallway and opening a door leading to the home's basement.

'And he rolled on the steps and started moving that way and I shot him again. And he lived,' said Lurch, who apparently got his nickname from the gaunt butler in the classic Addams Family television show played by the 6-foot-9 actor Ted Cassidy.

Lurch said that the teen grabbed a shovel from his cleaning supplies that were hung on the wall of the stairs leading to the basement before he shot him again.

He then monitored the teen's every move until officers from the Akron Police Department arrived on the scene.

* SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO

Lurch said he opened fire when the teen came crashing through his front glass door before going into into the hallway, leading to the basement. Pictured: The hallway of Lurch's home

Known as 'Lurch,' this 74-year-old homeowner from Akron, Ohio, was asleep during the early hours of last Tuesday morning when a 16-year-old intruder broke into his home

Lurch fired his 380 Luger (pictured), which he regularly keeps near him in case he needs to protect himself from danger

The teen was taken to Akron Children's Hospital and is in stable condition, according to police.

'As far as I know, I hit him three times,' Lurch recalled.

Police said the investigation remains ongoing and that events leading to the incident 'will be further evaluated to determine if or when charges might be applied,' WKYC, a local channel, reported.

'Most would agree that within reason, someone has a right to defend themselves, so if that someone broke into his house, in that he's confronted with an unknown person with an unknown motive, all those things will be taken into consideration,' Lt. Michael Miller, Public Information Officer for Akron Police, told news outlets.

Asked about his chances of possibly being charged, Lurch said: 'I better not, I am in my own home and he breaks into it,' referring to the teen robber.

Akron Police told DailyMail.com that it has 'not released the juvenile's name and he has not been formerly charged. Charges are pending though.'

Lurch said he opened fire when the teen came crashing through his front glass door (pictured)

The wounded teen then rolled down the steps to the basement, where he allegedly grabbed a shovel hanging on the wall next to the stairs

Speaking to Fox News after the incident, Lurch believes the teen may have picked to rob his home due to the lack of cars in his driveway, saying his truck was at the repair shop when the incident unfolded.

'Fooled him, didn't I?' Lurch chuckled. 'He can't be from around here. I've lived here 74 years, so even the people who moved in close by, talk to the neighbor or something and they'd say 'don't go over there.''

Lurch said that the incident wasn't the first time someone had tried to break into his home, and that he would be ready for another similar situation.

'Nobody else better break in, it'll be a bigger gun this time,' Lurch said.

Anyone with information regarding the incident should call the Akron Police Department Detective Bureau at 330-375-2490 or 330-375-2Tip.
A Cambridge college accepted funding from a Chinese university with close links to the Chinese military to do research into China's premier tool of global influence.

Jesus College, Cambridge, accepted 20,000 from Tsinghua University in Beijing for 'background research' on foreign business involvement in China's Belt and Road Initiative in 2019, The Times has reported.

The funding controversy comes at a time when British universities are being accused of helping to 'launder' and make more acceptable the reputation of China, a highly controlling, authoritarian state that censors its media.

The Belt and Road Initiative is a sprawling influence venture in which Chinese firms build ambitious infrastructure projects in countries around the globe.

Those countries are then heavily indebted and many forfeit their own assets to China when they cannot make payments.

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a think tank based in Canberra, rates Tsinghua University, the alma mater of President Xi, as very high risk for security purposes owing to its close links to Chinese military forces.

Chinese President Xi Jinping giving at a speech in Beijing. President Xi's old university, Tsinghua University, granted a Cambridge college 20,000 to fund research

File photo of Jesus College, Cambridge from 23 March 2022. Jesus College has accepted funding from a Beijing university rated as very high risk for security purposes owing to its close links to Chinese military forces

It is not thought that the research done by Jesus College was sensitive to security issues, but such an association raises a question at a time when China is credibly accused of multiple human rights violations and even genocide.

NGOs Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have accused China of crimes against humanity by holding Muslim minority Uighurs in concentration camps in Xinjiang.

In the south, China has stamped out the democratic rights and freedoms of former British colony Hong Kong with a national security law in 2020 that gave it broad new powers to punish critics and silence dissenters.

Beijing in the winter sunshine. China has credibly been accused of gross human rights violations in Xinjiang and Hong Kong, calling into question its funding of British universities, which many consider to be 'reputation laundering'

And China is increasingly more belligerent towards democratic Taiwan as its military power grows, with some fearing that the communist state will launch a military operation to bring it back under Beijing's control this decade.

Jesus College has form for accepting questionable money from Chinese sources.

In 2019 it received 155,000 from Huawei to cover a two-year research co-operation programme, producing a 'white paper' on global communications reforms.

The following year the government banned Huawei from building the 5G network amid concerns over its links to the Chinese Communist Party.

In a sign of some of the compromises that come with accepting Chinese money, Peter Nolan, a member of the Jesus College China Centre, warned colleagues in November 2020 against holding debates on China's human rights abuses.

Robert Clark, research fellow at the Civitas think tank, said: 'That Jesus College allows itself to be sponsored by a major Chinese state institution despite what is going on in Xinjiang, for example, is highly questionable.'

Alicia Kearns, the Tory MP and co-chairwoman of the China research group, said: 'We need a mandatory register of foreign partnerships, funding and gifts in kind so we understand who is trying to influence our universities.'

A Jesus College official said: 'This work was undertaken in January to March 2018, with the support of the UK Government. It was completed 18 months prior to the Australian Strategic Policy Institutes risk register, which was published in November 2019. It was agreed in advance that the Global Issues Dialogue Centre would maintain complete academic freedom.'
The White House is instructing federal immigration prosecutors to consider dismissing older cases of immigrants who are not public safety threats as the administration braces for massive influx of migrations at the southern border once the pandemic-era Title 42 ends next month.

An internal memo issued on Monday to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) prosecutors was obtained by BuzzFeed News, and details the latest effort from President Joe Biden's administration to reshape the immigration system.

The guidance was written by chief ICE attorney Kerry Doyle, a Biden appointee, was sent to prosecutors on Monday and represents another attempt by the agency to emphasize the discretion prosecutors have in court and lower the backlog of cases in immigration court.

'Prosecutorial discretion is an indispensable feature of any functioning legal system,' reads the new guidance, written by Biden appointed chief ICE attorney Kerry Doyle.

'The exercise of prosecutorial discretion, where appropriate, can preserve limited government resources, achieve just and fair outcomes in individual cases, and advance DHS's mission of administering and enforcing the immigration laws of the United States in a smart and sensible way that promotes public confidence,' Doyle wrote.

An ICE spokesperson reiterated, according to BuzzFeed, that the new memorandum allows for ICE attorneys to exercise prosecutorial discretion authority and claims it will help 'build public confidence in our immigration system.'

'Consistent with the enforcement guidance issued by Secretary Mayorkas, ICE focuses its civil immigration enforcement priorities on the apprehension and removal of non-citizens who pose a threat to our national security, public safety, and border security, consistent with all legal requirements and applicable court orders,' the ICE spokesperson said.

The memo explains various ways to prosecutors that they can exercise discretion, noting specifically that removing non-priority cases from the docket is ICE's preference.

The Biden administration sent a memo Monday to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) prosecutors instructing them to consider dismissing older cases of immigrants who are not public safety threats. Pictured: Migrants expelled from the U.S. under Title 42 walk toward Mexico at the Paso del Norte International border bridge on April 1, 2022

Since Biden took office in January 2021, CBP has encountered more than 2.2 million migrants and the border  and that number could as much as triple with the end of Title 42

In the fall, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas released new rules deprioritizing deportation of nonresident criminals that the administration feels are not a threat to public safety.

Former President Donald Trump's administration had a hard-line illegal immigration policy and treated every undocumented immigrant as a priority for arrest and deportation. Biden, on the other hand, wants to target immigrants he believes are 'public safety' threats, according to the memo to ICE.

Conservatives claim that Biden's new rules are preventing ICE agents and lawyers from doing their job to enforce immigration laws within the U.S.

The new guidance comes after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced on Friday that it is ending on May 23 the pandemic-era Title 42. This policy allowed for the instant deportation of migrants arriving at the border without hearing their asylum claims in the midst of the coronavirus health emergency.

Immigration advocacy groups and more progressive Democratic lawmakers have pressured the Biden administration to drop Title 42, claiming it is an inhumane practice that is no longer needed as COVID-era restrictions continue to loosen.

Experts have warned that once Title 42 is no longer in play, migration, which is already at record-breaking levels, could triple.

Some reports show that at least 170,000 migrants are waiting on the Mexico side of the border to immediately migrate and claim asylum at U.S. ports of entry by May 23.

Since Title 42 was put in place, more than a million migrants apprehended at the border have been rapidly expelled to Mexico or other countries, often within hours of being caught.

Since Biden took office in late January 2021, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has encountered more than 2.2 million migrants illegally crossing or claiming asylum at the southern border.

Migrants expelled from the U.S. and sent back to Mexico under the pandemic-era Title 42 policy, walk towards Mexico at the Paso del Norte International border bridge on April 1, 2022

From February 2021  the first full month of Biden's presidency  to the end of last Fiscal Year on the last day of September 2021, at least 1.44 million migrants were apprehended or encountered.

So far in Fiscal Year 2022, which started on October 1, 2021, encounters have reached 838,635.

The new ICE memo on Monday could possibly be a way to cut the growing court backlog, which has only been exacerbated over the last few years.

There are more than a million cases pending in immigration court, which officials claim is unsustainable as many take years to even be heard.

'[ICE] attorneys must be particularly mindful of the resource constraints under which we operate at a time when immigration courts docket toal (sic) over 1.5 million cases nationwide,' Doyle wrote in the memo, according to BuzzFeed. 'Sound prioritization of our litigation efforts through the appropriate use of prosecutorial discretion can preserve limited government resources.'
Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal appeared to endorse a poll shared to the platform by Elon Musk asking if the company should finally implement an edit button - a statement that comes just hours after the Tesla leader acquired a 9.2% stake in the social media giant.

'The consequences of this poll will be important,' Agrawal tweeted. 'Please vote carefully.'

Musk's original tweet asked 'Do you want an edit button?' It's a project that eagle-eyed users noted was already in the works by the social media giant.

Agrawal's post even mirrored the language of another tweet Musk posted days after acquiring his large stake in the company - but before news of the purchase had been made public.

Twitter did not respond to a request for comment from DailyMail.com about Agrawal's statement.

The March 14 acquisition, disclosed Monday in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing, makes Musk Twitter's largest shareholder - but it's unclear how much power the minority stake will give the Tesla CEO over Twitter's day-to-day decision making.

He has criticized the platform in the past for stifling free speech - and been admonished for his own Twitter posts by regulators.

Minority stake or not, some experts expect Musk to use his block of shares to influence the company towards a open model with fewer content moderation measures.

"Specifically, Musk could seek to influence the openness of the platform and how it controls content or push to invest in the subscription model more aggressively," Ali Mogharabi, an analyst for financial services firm Morningstar, said in an investors note on Monday.

Elon Musk's decision to snap up the large stake in his favorite social media platform is already paying off after Twitter's share price soared more than 27% on the news Monday - making the already ultra-wealthy Musk an additional 1.2 billion, according to Bloomberg.

Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal appeared to endorse a poll shared to the platform by Elon Musk asking if the company should finally implement an edit button

Agrawal's post even mirrored the language of another tweet Musk posted days after acquiring his large stake in the company - but before news of the purchase had been made public

Twitter shares soared 27% Monday after it was disclosed Tesla CEO Elon Musk purchased a 9.2% stake in the company

Republican lawmakers are already praising Musk for for protecting 'free speech' following the news.

Rep. Lance Gooden (R-Texas), who co-founded the Freedom From Big Tech Caucus, lauded Musk but said his purchase was a warning about the social media giant's 'power.'

'The fact that the worlds richest man chose to outright buy Twitter rather than develop a new platform shows Twitters monopoly power,' Gooden told DailyMail.com.

'Im glad Elon Musk is stepping up to protect free speech, but Congress must act to put the rest of big tech in their place.'

Numerous GOP lawmakers have accused Twitter of 'censorship' including 'shadow banning,' which supposedly restricts a user's reach without their knowledge or appearing to do so.

Republican Study Committee Chair Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) posted on Monday, 'If [Elon Musk] can clean up Twitter and stop online censorship, Im all for him taking over the whole damn thing.'

Republican Study Committee Chair Rep. Jim Banks was among the first elected officials to praise Musk's purchase

Pro-Trump Rep. Lauren Boebert demanded that Musk use his money invested in the company to push for a reversal of Donald Trump's permanent suspension

Another Trump ally, former Treasury Department official Monica Crowley, also sounded off

Anger at the platform spilled over when it permanently suspended Donald Trump's account early last year following the January 6 attack on the US Capitol. Some Republicans now hope Musk will have enough sway to get the ex-president back on.

'Now that [Elon Musk] is Twitters largest shareholder, its time to lift the political censorship. Oh and BRING BACK TRUMP!' outspoken pro-Trump Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) wrote on the site.

Former Trump Treasury Department official Monica Crowley said, 'He should demand the end of political censorship, company-wide reform, and the reinstatement of President Trump.'

Musk, who has described himself as a political moderate, has butted heads with the Biden administration in the past and has not shied away from criticizing -- and even mocking -- President Joe Biden.

Rep. Lance Gooden (left) told DailyMail.com: 'Im glad Elon Musk is stepping up to protect free speech, but Congress must act to put the rest of big tech in their place'

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki was asked during her Monday press briefing if the billionaire's history with Biden would force the administration to recalibrate its digital strategy, which has so far relied heavily on Twitter.

'I expect we will continue to use Twitter, as you all will as well, I would expect,' Psaki answered while declining to comment on Musk's ownership specifically.

The world's richest man worth an estimated $273billion bought nearly 73.5 million shares, a document filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission shows.

It means the Tesla co-founder has more than quadruple the shares of Twitter's founder Jack Dorsey, who owns 2.25 percent.

His passive stake in the company is valued at up to $2.9billion based on the stock's Friday close, and the estimated cost of the deal was $2.4billion, according to the stock price on March 14 when he bought the shares.

The news prompted Twitter's stock to soar by more than 26 percent in pre-market trade before Wall Street opened on Monday, meaning his shares are now worth around $3.6billion, earning him an interested $1.2billion in three weeks.

Elon Musk has become Twitter's largest shareholder, with a 9.2 per cent stake in the social media company

The news prompted Twitter's stock to soar by more than 26 per cent in pre-market trade before Wall Street opened on Monday

The world's richest man bought nearly 73.5 million shares, a document filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission shows

Shares of other social media firms, including Meta Platforms and Snapchat owner Snap Inc, were also trading higher.

Musk's stake in Twitter is considered a passive investment, which means he is a long-term investor that's looking to minimize his buying and selling of the shares.

'We would expect this passive stake as just the start of broader conversations with the Twitter board/management that could ultimately lead to an active stake and a potential more aggressive ownership role of Twitter,' Dan Ives of WedBush Securities wrote in a client note early Monday.

Twitter's share price has rocketed since Musk's investment on March 14

Passive investment is a strategy for slowly building wealth by long-term ownership of stocks rather than engaging in frequent trading, which is often accompanies by additional fees and can be more volatile.

Ives also told CNBC: 'Musk could try to take a more aggressive stance here on Twitter.

'This eventually could lead to some sort of buyout.

'This makes sense given what Musk has at least been talking about, at least from a social media perspective.'

The shares are held by the Elon Musk Revocable Trust, of which he is the sole trustee.

On the same day as the filing of the SEC document, Musk challenged Vladimir Putin to a fight on Twitter and posted a meme about supporting current trends.

The mogul has been raising questions about the ability to communicate freely on Twitter, tweeting last month about free speech and the social media platform.

On the same day as the filing of the SEC document, Musk challenged Vladimir Putin to a fight on Twitter

The mogul has been raising questions about the ability to communicate freely on Twitter, and on March 26 he asked what should be done about Twitter's free speech principles and if a new platform is needed

A day earlier, he made a poll asking whether Twitter adheres to the principle of free speech, warning the results will be 'important'

'Free speech is essential to a functioning democracy. Do you believe Twitter rigorously adheres to this principle?' he tweeted.

He accompanied it with a poll on March 25, with 70 per cent of two million users responding that the platform does not adhere to free speech.

Musk said: 'The consequences of this poll will be important. Please vote carefully.'

In a separate tweet, Musk said that he was 'giving serious thought' to creating a new social media platform.

Musk was responding to a Twitter user's question on whether he would consider building a social media platform consisting of an open source algorithm and one that would prioritize free speech and where propaganda was minimal.

Also last month, Musk asked a federal judge to nullify a subpoena from securities regulators and throw out a 2018 court agreement in which Musk had to have someone pre-approve his posts on Twitter.

US securities regulators said they had legal authority to subpoena Tesla and Musk about his tweets, and that Musk's move to throw out a 2018 court agreement that his tweets be pre-approved is not valid.

The entrepreneur is a frequent user of Twitter although his posts have occasionally landed him in hot water.

He has over 80 million followers on the site since joining in 2009 and has used the platform to make several announcements, including teasing a go-private deal for Tesla that landed him in regulatory scrutiny.

It means the Tesla co-founder has more than quadruple the shares of Twitter's founder Jack Dorsey (pictured), who owns 2.25 per cent

In 2018, the tech CEO was slammed after calling a British diver who helped rescue a group of Thai boys stuck in a cave a 'pedo'.

His Twitter posting has also led to accusations of stock manipulation, regularly sharing polls and information about his companies online.

In August 2018, he wrote that he was 'considering taking Tesla private at $420. Funding secured,' a nod to Musk's well-known interest in marijuana.

The issue was, he didn't actually have funding secured - but the stock price soared at the time, and it was later revealed that Musk apparently wrote the tweet because he 'thought his girlfriend would "find it funny."'

He later tweeted how 'high' the stock had gone later in 2019 when it did, in fact, hit $420 a share.

Musk's revelation about his stake in Twitter shares comes two days after Tesla Inc. posted lackluster first-quarter production numbers.

While the company delivered 310,000 vehicles in the period, the figure was slightly below expectations.

Musk has been selling his stake in Tesla since November, when he said he would offload 10 per cent of his holding in the electric-car maker. He has already sold $16.4 billion worth of shares since then.

Twitter was the target of activist investor Elliott Management Corp in 2020, when the hedge fund argued its then-boss and co-founder, Jack Dorsey, was paying too little attention to Twitter while also running Square.

Musk and Dorsey have had some common ground in terms of dismissing the so-called Web3, a vague term for a utopian version of the internet that is decentralized.

Musk is also the founder and CEO of SpaceX, and leads brain-chip startup Neuralink and infrastructure firm The Boring Company.

Dorsey resigned as Twitter CEO in November after 15 years at the helm.

He remains remains the CEO of Square Inc, the hugely successful financial payments company that he co-founded in 2010, and is the sixth largest shareholder in Twitter.
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.

(2) When you give it to us INDIRECTLY

Your information will also be provided to us when you follow us or otherwise interact with on or via Twitter, when you like and/or join our page on Facebook or interact with us in other ways on or via Facebook.

(3) When you give permission to OTHER ORGANISATIONS to share it or it is AVAILABLE PUBLICLY

We may combine information you provide to us with information available from external publicly available sources. Depending on your privacy settings for social media services, we may also access information from those accounts or services. We use this information to gain a better understanding of you and to improve our communications and fundraising activities.

(4) When you visit our WEBSITE

We use cookies to identify you when you visit our website. Please refer to our Cookies Policy for details on the way our use of cookies affects your personal data.

What information do we collect?

We may collect, store and use the following kinds of personal data:

(1) We will typically hold your name and contact details, including telephone number, location, and e-mail address. However, we may request other information where it is appropriate and relevant, for example:

Your bank details or debit/credit card details (if making a donation).

(2) any communication preferences you give;

(3) information about your computer and about your visits to and use of this website including your IP address, geographical location, browser type, referral source, length of visit and number of page views; and/or

(4) any other information shared with us as per clause 1.

Do we process sensitive personal information?

Applicable law recognises certain categories of personal information as sensitive and therefore requiring more protection, including political opinions and trade union membership. In limited cases, we may collect sensitive personal data about you. We would only collect sensitive personal data if there is a clear reason for doing so; and will only do so with your explicit consent.

How and why will we use your personal data?

Personal data, however provided to us, will be used for the purposes specified in this Policy or in relevant parts of the website.

We may use your personal information to:

(1) Enable you to subscribe to our hard copy publications;

(2) Send you information about our work, campaigns, organisations and any other information, products or services that we provide (this will not be done without your consent);

(3) Provide you with the services, products or information you have requested;

(4) If you request, put you in touch with other supporters in your area (who have also provided such consent);

(5) Handle the administration of any donation or other payment you make via credit/debit card, cheque, standing order or BACS transfer;

(6) Collect payments from you and send statements and/or receipts to you;

(7) Conduct research into the impact of our activity / campaigns;

(8) Deal with enquiries and complaints made by you relating to the website or us in general;

(9) Make petition submissions to third parties, where you have signed a petition and the third party is a target of the campaign to which the petition relates; and/or

(10) Audit and/or administer our accounts.

Supporter Analysis

Google Analytics

We may use some of your personal information to analyse our digital performance, for example to see how our website can be improved to help us achieve the purposes set out in section 9 below, to record how you are using our website or to assess the popularity of different articles / campaigns.

For more information on how we use your personal information in relation to Google Analytics, please view our cookie policy by clicking this link cookies policy



You can opt-out of the collection of information for such purposes here: http://www.aboutads.info/choices

Communications, updates, fundraising

Where you have provided appropriate consent, we will contact you by telephone and e-mail, with targeted communications to let you know about our events and/or activities that we consider may be of particular interest; about the work of In Defence of Marxism; and to ask for donations or other support.

Donations and other payments

All financial transactions carried out on our website are handled through either:

PayPal (Europe) S.a r.l. (PayPal), a third party payment services provider. We recommend that you read PayPals privacy policy (available at https://www.paypal.com/uk/webapps/mpp/ua/privacy-full?locale.x=en_GB ) prior to effecting any transactions with us through PayPal; or

GoCardless Ltd (GoCardless), a third party payment services provider. We recommend that you read GoCardlesss privacy policy (available at https://www.gocardless.com/legal/privacy) prior to effecting any transactions with us through GoCardless.

We will provide your personal data to PayPal / GoCardless only to the extent necessary for the purposes of processing payments for transactions you enter into with us. We do not store your financial details.

Childrens data

We do not knowingly process data of any person under the age of 16. If we come to discover, or have reason to believe, that you are 15 and under and we are holding your personal information, we will delete that information within a reasonable period and withhold our services accordingly.

Security of and access to your personal data

We endeavour to ensure that there are appropriate and proportionate technical and organisational measures to prevent the loss, destruction, misuse, alteration, unauthorised disclosure or of access to your personal information.

Your information is only accessible by appropriately trained staff and volunteers.

We may also use agencies and/or suppliers to process data on our behalf. We may also merge or partner with other organisations and in so doing transfer and/or acquire personal data.

Please note that some countries outside of the EEA have a lower standard of protection for personal data, including lower security requirements and fewer rights for individuals. We may transfer and/or store personal data collected from you to and/or at a destination outside the European Economic Area (EEA). Such personal data may be processed by agencies and/or suppliers operating outside the EEA. If we transfer and/or store your personal data outside the EEA we will take reasonable steps to ensure that the recipient implements appropriate measures to protect your personal data.

Otherwise than as set out in this Privacy Policy, we will only ever share your data with your informed consent.

Your rights

Where we rely on your consent to use your personal information, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time. This includes the right to ask us to stop using your personal information for direct marketing purposes or to be unsubscribed from our email list at any time. You also have the following rights:

(1) Right to be informed  you have the right to be told how your personal information will be used. This Policy and any other policies and statements used on our website and in our communications are intended to provide you with a clear and transparent description of how your personal information may be used.

(2) Right of access  you can write to us to ask for confirmation of what information we hold on you and to request a copy of that information. Provided we are satisfied that you are entitled to see the information requested and we have successfully confirmed your identity, we have 30 days to comply.

(3) Right of erasure  as from 25 May 2018, you can ask us for your personal information to be deleted from our records.

(4) Right of rectification  if you believe our records of your personal information are inaccurate, you have the right to ask for those records to be updated.

(5) Right to restrict processing  you have the right to ask for processing of your personal data to be restricted if there is disagreement about its accuracy or legitimate usage.

(6) Right to data portability  to the extent required by the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) where we are processing your personal information (i) under your consent, (ii) because such processing is necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are party or to take steps at your request prior to entering into a contact or (iii) by automated means, you may ask us to provide it to you  or another service provider  in a machine-readable format.

To exercise these rights, please send a description of the personal information in question using the contact details in section 15 below. You can also unsubscribe from our email list by sending a blank email to news-unsubscribe@marxist.com

Where we consider that the information with which you have provided us does not enable us to identify the personal information in question, we reserve the right to ask for (i) personal identification and/or (ii) further information.

Lawful processing

We are required to have one or more lawful grounds to process your personal information. Only 4 of these are relevant to us:

Personal information is processed on the basis of a persons consent Personal information is processed on the basis of a contractual relationship Personal information is processed on the basis of legal obligations Personal information is processed on the basis of legitimate interests

(1) Consent

We will ask for your consent to use your information to send you electronic communications such as newsletters and and fundraising emails, and if you ever share sensitive personal information with us.

(2) Contractual relationships

Most of our interactions with supporters are voluntary and not contractual. However, sometimes it will be necessary to process personal information so that we can enter contractual relationships with people. For example, if you subscribe to one of our publications, or purchase merchandise online.

(3) Legal obligations

Sometimes we will be obliged to process your personal information due to legal obligations which are binding on us. We will only ever do so when strictly necessary.

(4) Legitimate interests

Applicable law allows personal information to be collected and used if it is reasonably necessary for our legitimate activities (as long as its use is fair, balanced and does not unduly impact individuals rights).

We will rely on this ground to process your personal data when it is not practical or appropriate to ask for consent.

Achieving our purposes

These include (but are not limited to) promoting socialist policies

Governance

Internal and external audit for financial or regulatory compliance purposes

Statutory reporting

Publicity and income generation

Conventional direct marketing and other forms of marketing, publicity or advertisement

Unsolicited messages, including campaigns, newsletters, and fundraising appeals

Analysis, targeting and segmentation to develop and promote or strategy and improve communication efficiency

Personalisation used to tailor and enhance your experience of our communications

Operational Management

Maintenance of suppression files

Processing for historical, scientific or statistical purpose

Purely administrative purposes

Responding to enquiries

Delivery of requested products or information

Communications designed to administer existing services including subscriptions, administration of petitions and financial transactions

Thank you communications and receipts

Maintaining a supporter database and suppression lists

Financial Management and control

Processing financial transactions and maintaining financial controls

Prevention of fraud, misuse of services, or money laundering

Enforcement of legal claims

Reporting criminal acts and compliance with law enforcement agencies

When we use your personal information, we will consider if it is fair and balanced to do so and if it is within your reasonable expectations. We will balance your rights and our legitimate interests to ensure that we use your personal information in ways that are not unduly intrusive or unfair in other ways.

Data retention

The length of time each category of data will be retained will vary depending on how long we need to process it for, the reason it was collected, and in line with any statutory requirements. After this point the data will either be deleted, or we may retain a secure anonymised record for research and analytical purposes.

In the event that you ask us to stop sending you direct marketing/fundraising/other electronic communications, we will keep your name on our internal suppression list to ensure that you are not contacted again.

Policy amendments

We keep this Privacy Policy under regular review and reserve the right to update from time-to-time by posting an updated version on our website, not least because of changes in applicable law. We recommend that you check this Privacy Policy occasionally to ensure you remain happy with it. We may also notify you of changes to our privacy policy by email.

Third party websites

We link our website directly to other sites. This Privacy Policy does not cover external websites and we are not responsible for the privacy practices or content of those sites. We encourage you to read the privacy policies of any external websites you visit via links on our website.

Updating information

You can check the personal data we hold about you, and ask us to update it where necessary, by emailing us at webmaster@marxist.com

Contact

We are not required by law to have a Data Protection Officer  however we have a Data Protection Manager.

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
MSNBC host Tiffany Cross said on her show this weekend that it was 'utterly ridiculous to center' the discussion of the Oscars slap incident around 'opinions of white folks' and held a panel explaining to viewers why white people should 'sit this one out.'

The host kept the conversation going Sunday, a week after Will Smith infamously slapped comedian Chris Rock onstage at the Oscars. Smith has since apologized and resigned from the Academy in the face of possibly suspension.

Cross kicked off the topic on the slap by saying that 'everybody has an opinion and I'm sure you all are tired of talking about it, but we have to weigh in on it.'

'I think it is utterly ridiculous to center this conversation in the opinions of white folks,' she added. 'This is just about what happened there.

'The jumping off point should not be what might the white people think about it. It is just this moment between those two men. I thought it was uncalled for,' Cross said.

Cross brought on her panel, which included TheGrio columnist Michael Harriot and actress Yvette Nicole Brown, for a conversation that centered around the idea that white people don't understand the full context of Sunday's incident.

Harriot was first to speak, explaining that that the incident was 'about how black people relate to each other.'

MSNBC host Tiffany Cross (center) and her her panel, actress Yvette Nicole Brown (left) and TheGrio columnist Michael Harriot (right) discussed the ongoing Oscars slap and why they believe white people should 'sit this one out'

TheGrio columnist Michael Harriot explaining that the the Oscars slap was 'about how black people relate to each other'

Theres a level of disrespect that every person can handle. Some people use their words, some people use their hands. It is what it is. In the black community we understand that. @YNB on The Slap #CrossConnection pic.twitter.com/S00SVUMZFw  The Cross Connection with Tiffany Cross (@CrossConnection) April 2, 2022

'It's hard to explain to a white person what's the difference is between an open-handed slap and a punch is, because they consider it all violent,' he said on the show.

'It's hard to explain that everyone, really, has a certain threshold for which they will react in a certain way  whether it is say something to their mother, their sister.'

Brown offered her opinion to the conversation, saying what happened at the Oscars was a private matter among black people that came out publicly, adding that she's possibly seen harder slaps at family's Spades tournaments.

'On Twitter, a lot of us were like, "Y'all sit this out for your protection," because when we need to have a conversation, we're gonna have it,' she said. 'If you put your nose in something that black people need to discuss amongst ourselves, it happens.'

She stressed that 'violence is not the answer. But added there's a 'level of disrespect that every person can handle. Some people use their words, some people use their hands. It is what it is. In the black community, we understand that.'

'I am not saying violence is the answer,' she said and all three people on the panel agreed, condemning Smith for the incident.

'Everyone has apologized, ' she added. 'We're trying to move forward as a family.'

MSNBC host Tiffany Cross said it 'utterly ridiculous to center' the discussion of the Oscars slap incident around 'opinions of white folks'

Brown said that 'Some people use their words, some people use their hands. It is what it is. In the black community, we understand that' - but added, 'I'm not saying violence is the answer'

The show's host took over the conversation and said she would 'try to put this in context for our white fellow countrymen as best I can.'

'In really, truly black America, there's a commonality amongst us all,' she said. 'If we went to a white person's home, and it was their family dinner, and we were sitting at the table, and the mother hauled off and slapped the father and everybody at the table has an opinion.'

'If I weigh in as the guest in this home and say, "Yeah, you guys are terrible," everybody's like "I'm sorry. When did you get an opinion? This is our family table",' she said.

'That's what this moment felt like for many of us. There's a nuance to what happened.'

Cross added that she wanted to be clear that 'while we talk about family talk, I think it is utterly ridiculous to center this conversation in the opinions of white folks. This is just about what happened there.

'The jumping off point should not be what might the white people think about it. It is just this moment between those two men. I thought it was uncalled for,' Cross said.

Cross ended the panel discussion by saying she hoped both Smith and Rock get the help that they need.

Smith resigned from the Academy on Friday in the face of possible expulsion from the organization.

Smith marched onto the Oscars stage on Sunday and hit Rock, after the comedian told a joke about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Rock's wisecrack was targeted at Pinkett Smith's buzzcut, a style she has embraced in wake of her alopecia diagnosis

Smith, in a statement first obtained by Variety on Friday, called his actions during the ceremony 'shocking, painful and inexcusable,' adding that he would accept any additional consequences issued by the Academy's Board of Governors.

'The list of those I have hurt is long and includes Chris, his family, many of my dear friends and loved ones, all those in attendance, and global audiences at home,' Smith said. 'I betrayed the trust of the Academy. I deprived other nominees and winners of their opportunity to celebrate and be celebrated for their extraordinary work. I am heartbroken.'

The actor also acknowledged that slapping Rock during the ceremony caused other award winners to be overshadowed.

'I want to put the focus back on those who deserve attention for their achievements and allow the Academy to get back to the incredible work it does to support creativity and artistry in film,' Smith, 53, said.

He also shared how 'change takes time' and he is now 'committed to doing the work to ensure that I never again allow violence to overtake reason.'

The Academy said it has accepted Smith's 'immediate resignation' and will 'continue to move forward' with its disciplinary proceedings against him for violations of the group's standards of conduct. Smith's resignation came two days after the organization met to initiate the disciplinary hearings.

As evidenced by her unamused expression, Pinkett Smith did not appreciate the joke

The Best Actor winner is set for a 'D-Day' hearing with the Academy on April 18 where he will find out 'if he still has an Oscar - and a career', an insider said.

Rock has not made any public comment about the slap, saying he is 'still processing' the incident.

He told a Boston crowd during a stand-up gig: 'So, how was your weekend?'

Rock continued: 'I don't have a bunch of s*** to say about that, so if you came here for that...

'I'm still processing what happened, so at some point I'll talk about that s***. It'll be serious. It'll be funny, but right now I'm going to tell some jokes.'

Smith was presented with his first Academy Award after the onstage attack

This week, Smith's biopic was 'thrown into chaos' as Netflix and Apple+ removed their bids on the film based on his autobiography.

A source told The Sun: 'Netflix and Apple+ have quietly removed their bids for a Will Smith biopic and will instead relocate the funds and develop original ideas from new black actors.'

The source added that working with the rapper has now become 'risky business' as he faces his upcoming movie projects being put on hold in the wake of the scandal.

Meanwhile, work on the fourth instalment of the Bad Boys film franchise has been halted by Sony following the Oscars scandal, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Industry sources say studios want to assess how tarnished Smith's reputation has become after he stormed on stage to slap Rock for making a joke at the expense of his wife Jada, before sinking millions of dollars into further projects.
A nightclub has sparked outrage after hosting a 'funeral' featuring what appeared to be the embalmed corpse of an up-and-coming rapper who was shot dead during a robbery two weeks ago.

Fans of rapper Goonew were aghast when cellphone recordings emerged from the event, dubbed The Final Show, which was held at club Bliss in Washington DC on Sunday night.

The 24-year-old rapper, whose real name was Markelle Morrow, was shot dead on March 18 in the 3400 block of Walters Lane in the District Heights neighborhood.

His mother, Patrice Parker Morrow, said her son was shot in the back during a robbery and a large bejeweled pendant he always wore was stolen, reported NBC4.

A funeral for Washington DC-based rapper Markelle Morrow, 24, who performed under the stage name Goonew, took place at Bliss nightclub, where his embalmed body was apparently put on public display

Viral videos and photos from the raucous funeral show the deceased dressed in designer clothes and sporting a crown

Mourners were said to have paid $40 cover charge to enter the club. Videos show people in the crowded venue dancing and singing around the dead rapper's body

Morrow was shot and killed in Washington DC on March 18 during a robbery, according to his family

On Sunday, a large crowd of mourners gathered to say goodbye to the up-and-coming rapper at Bliss, which bills itself as 'the perfect place for a sophisticated night of lounging and dancing.'

The celebrity news site The Shade Room reported guests paid a $40 to attend the home-going for Morrow.

Videos recorded during the event show what appears to be Morrow's body, with his eye open, propped up on a stage sporting a designer Amiri hooded sweatshirt, ripped jeans decorated with flames and sneakers, accessorized with a watch and a gold crown.

The crowd are seen dancing and singing while multi-colored strobe lights illuminate the packed venue. At one point, fireworks are set off right next to Morrow.

Many commenters on Instagram were appalled by the macabre display, describing it as 'weird,' 'disturbing' and 'disrespectful'.

Others, however, defended having Morrow's body up on stage, saying it was what his family wanted.

The management of Bliss nightclub released a statement on Instagram page on Monday seeking to distance itself from the growing controversy about the send off.

'Bliss was contacted by a local funeral home to rent out our venue for Goonew's home-going celebration,' the message read. 'Bliss was never made aware of what would transpire. We sincerely apologize to all those who may be upset or offended.

'Please keep Goonew's family and friends in your prayers at this difficult time.'

Bliss club's management on Monday sought to distance itself from the controversy surrounding the unusual funeral, stating that the club 'was never made away of what would transpire'

Police are offering a $25,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction of Morrow's killers

While it is unclear from the videos and photos taken during the funeral that the figure on the stage was Morrow's actual body, rapper Black Fortune, who performed at the event, insisted that it was the dead rapper's real corpse.

Black Fortune wrote on his Instagram Stories: 'No this ain't no wax figure... my Brodie went out gansta.'

Calls and emails to Bliss seeking comment were not returned on Monday.

No arrests have been made in the shooting of Morrow, and police in Prince George's County are offering a $25,000 reward for information leading to a conviction.
Controversial Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.) had a bizarre message for Democrats in a speech on the House floor on Monday, asserting that real women had 'XX chromosomes' and 'no tallywacker.'

He delivered the remarks as members of his own party still appear to be furious that the freshman lawmaker boasted about getting invited to cocaine-fueled orgies in Washington.

Cawthorn told Democrats they will 'never amend biology,' taking a shot at left-wing outrage over red states passing laws curbing discussion on sexual orientation and gender identity in the classroom and limiting transgender students' participation in school sports.

'The left has ripped away the pen of truth from the author of life,' the odd tangent began.

'They've exchanged natural science for a party platform, and declared war on biology. Your left-wing movement is forcing children to endure radical expressions of sexuality and yet you can't even define what a woman is.'

The comment is likely in reference to Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's Supreme Court confirmation hearing, where the Biden nominee said she is 'not a biologist' during a grilling by GOP Senator Marsha Blackburn on the 'definition' of the word 'woman.'

Cawthorn continued, 'You might amend a bill, but you'll never amend biology. Science is not Burger King. You can't just have it your way.'

Rep. Madison Cawthorn took to the House floor on Monday where he scolded Democrats: 'The left has ripped away the pen of truth from the author of life'

The fast food giant actually scrapped its 'Have it your way' slogan in 2014 in favor of the more personal, inclusive 'Be your way.'

'I am the youngest member of the House of Representatives,' the 26-year-old Congressman said. 'And I never imagined that one of my sacred duties in this hallowed chamber would be explaining to the House Speaker the difference between a man and a woman.'

'Take notes Madame Speaker, I'm about to define what a woman is for you: XX chromosomes, no tallywacker. It's so simple.

'And yet today this proclamation of fundamental scientific fact will cause the woke liberals of Silicon Valley to strip you of your voice and ban you until you bow at their alter of falsehoods.'

He added: 'You and your party are living a lie.'

Cawthorn ignited a firestorm of criticism from Republicans in North Carolina and in Washington late last month when he made comments on a podcast describing 'sexual perversion' from members of Congress.

Cawthorn's tirade comes after House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy said he spoke with the freshman lawmaker about comments he made claiming he was invited to an orgy in DC. McCarthy said Cawthorn's behavior was not up to par and that he 'lost my trust'

He claimed to have been invited to an orgy and alleged he saw at least one lawmaker do cocaine.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Cawthorn 'lost' his 'trust' after meeting with the young Congressman last week, claiming his behavior was 'not becoming' of his national office.

The Republican leader warned Cawthorn could face consequences if he did not course correct.

Current and former GOP lawmakers demanded that Cawthorn either name names or admit to lying.

The North Carolina Republican, who has not retracted his comments, released a statement blaming Democrats and the media for his controversy.

'My comments on a recent podcast appearance calling out corruption have been used by the left and the media to disparage my Republican colleagues and falsely insinuate their involvement in illicit activities,' he said without going into specifics about those comments.

Cawthorn's GOP primary opponents have also pounced on how he's spent his fledgling term in Congress.

North Carolina state Senator Chuck Edwards, who hopes to be the Republican nominee for Cawthorn's seat in November, released a new political ad insinuating that the incumbent is more interested in being a 'celebrity' than working for his district.

'Here in the mountains, we dont seek the limelight. We put our heads down and get to work,' Edwards says in the short clip. 'If you want a celebrity, go watch the Kardashians.'

Edwards captured the endorsement of North Carolina Senator Tom Tillis last week.

Tillis said Cawthorn had 'fallen well short of the most basic standard western North Carolina expects from their representatives.'
Two people have been killed in a helicopter crash in southern NSW, the second fatal crash within days.

Emergency services found the wreckage 200m east of the Snowy Mountains Highway at Kiandra Flats shortly before midnight Monday.

A 64-year-old woman and a 75-year-old man travelling from Sydney's north died in the crash.

A crime scene was set up as police launched an investigation into the circumstances of the crash.

Two people were killed in a helicopter crash in the Snowy Mountains (pictured) on Monday

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau has also launched a separate investigation.

It's understood the privately-owned aircraft was travelling in a group of helicopters prior to the the crash.

'[However] exactly where they were leaving from and where they were going we're yet to determine,' ATSB chief commissioner Angus Mitchell told reporters.

'We are certainly reaching out to the other parties in the company to try to build a [better] picture.'

The latest tragedy is the second fatal helicopter crash in Australia in less than a week.

A pilot and four passengers died last Thursday when their helicopter came down at Mt Disappointment north of Melbourne.

The crash claimed the lives of pilot Dean Neal, Radford's Abattoir chairman Paul Troja, AXIchain finance consultant Ian Perry and CEO Linda Woodford, along with First AG Capital and Sydney father-of- three Nicholas Vasudeva.

Nine fatal aircraft incidents across Australia have claimed 17 lives in recent months, according to the ATSB.

It's also the second helicopter crash in the Snowy Mountains within weeks.

Five people including four National Park and Wildlife Service staff survived when their helicopter crashed near Guthega in Kosciuszko National Park on March 11.

Two survivors had to be winched to safety.
Advertisement

Satellite images which show dead bodies lining the streets of Bucha weeks ago appear to have debunked Russian claims that they were placed there after their troops left the Ukrainian commuter town.

Authorities in Ukraine said the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in areas outside of Kyiv - specifically in the town of Bucha - after last week's withdrawal of Russian troops.

Horrific images show many civilians with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture. A growing number of world leaders have voiced outrage and called for tougher sanctions against Moscow.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov dismissed the accusations that Russian troops committed the atrocities as a 'staged provocation' but has yet to provide the 'empirical evidence' he says proves they are not responsible.

Meanwhile, the Russian Ministry of Defence issued a lengthy statement which said no civilians had suffered violence at the hands of Russian troops and that the images were staged.

However, analysis of satellite images by the New York Times and of moving and still images by fact-checkers at the BBC contradict Russia's denial.

The NYT has retrieved archived satellite images they have then matched up with photos taken by members of the media on the ground in Bucha which they say proves the bodies were there before Russian troops withdrew on March 30.

The newspaper matched up to 11 bodies on the streets in a video shot by a local resident on April 2 with a satellite image from March 11 - when Russia was occupying the town - which suggests the bodies had been there for weeks. Subsequent images obtained by MailOnline from March 19 correlate with the same video.

WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES

 Slide me  Images taken on February 28 (left) and March 19 (right) shows that bodies lined the streets - before Russia says troops left

Pictured: Bodies of civilians lay in a mass grave in Bucha which was recaptured by the Ukrainian army last week

Images show civilians with bound hands. Pictured: Ira Gavriluk walks next to the corpses of her husband and her brother

A second video depicted three more bodies which satellite images show appeared there between March 20 and 21, according to the Times, again - before Russia said they left the town.

Meanwhile, other Russian claims include that one body appears to move in a video taken from a moving car but this was later debunked by fact-checkers and proved to be a mark on the windshield in higher quality footage.

Russia's defence ministry added: 'It is of particular worry that all the bodies of the people whose images have been published by the Kiev regime are not stiffened after at least four days.'

But a forensic pathologist who has worked on war crime investigations told the BBC that after four days, the process of stiffening - known as rigor mortis - has usually subsided.

The pathologist also told the BBC that the appearance of victims of violence varies dramatically depending on the weapon used and other circumstances.

They said that there is not always visible pools of blood, especially if victims are dressed for cold weather.

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov (pictured) said his country will hold a press conference to prove that claims Vladimir Putin's troops have been committing war crimes in Ukraine are false however the Kremlin has yet to present their evidence

Broken: A visibly emotional President Volodymyr Zelensky yesterday stood motionless as he surveyed the scene of utter devastation he encountered in the town of Bucha, with dozens of bodies shot at close range laying on the empty streets

The Russian statement also claims that news of the atrocities didn't emerge until four days after they say troops withdrew on March 30, but there is evidence of corpses in the streets being shared online as early as April 1.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the start of his talks with UN Under-Secretary-General Martin Griffiths that Moscow sees the claim of a massacre of civilians on the outskirts of Kyiv as 'a provocation that posed a direct threat to global peace and security'.

Lavrov noted that Russia called for an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council but the UK that currently chairs it refused to convene. He vowed to press the demand for holding the meeting.

Earlier today, Lavrov vowed that Russia would hold a press conference in New York where they would present 'the most detailed material to show the true nature of incidents in Bucha'.

But at a press conference held this evening, Russia's envoy to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya, did not present any evidence that they were not responsible for the atrocities or that the images had been staged.

Instead, Nebenzya said Russia will present the alleged proof to the UN Security Council at the earliest opportunity.

'We have empirical evidence to support this,' Nebenzya told journalists at the press conference.

'We intend to submit them to the Security Council as soon as possible so that the international community is not misled by the false plot of Kyiv and its Western sponsors.'

Pictured: Russia's envoy to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya said Russia will present 'empirical evidence' to the UN Security Council

Vassily Nebenzia speaks to the media about charges of a massacre in the Ukrainian town of Bucha at UN headquarters in NYC

Britain's UN ambassador says a previously planned UN Security Council meeting Tuesday is certain to focus 'front and center' on the killing of large numbers of civilians in Ukraine.

Some of the dead were found with their hands tied behind their backs after Russian troops left the Ukrainian town of Bucha on the outskirts of the capital Kyiv.

The UK holds the council presidency in April, and Ambassador Barbara Woodward said Britain didn't grant Russia's request for a meeting on the situation in Bucha on Monday because 'we didn't see a good reason to have two meetings back to back on Ukraine.'

She told reporters that the Security Council will be briefed Tuesday by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths and UN political chief Rosemary DiCarlo.

Woodward said that 'the images that we saw coming out of Bucha over the weekend were harrowing, appalling, probable evidence of war crimes and possibly a genocide.'

Meanwhile, a Russian law enforcement agency has said it has launched its own investigation into allegations that Ukrainian civilians were massacred, focusing on what it calls 'false information' about Russian forces.

Pictured: Bags containing bodies of civilians, who according to residents was killed by Russian soldiers in Bucha, Ukraine

Volunteers unload bags containing bodies of civilians, who according to residents were killed by Russian army soldiers

The Investigative Committee claims Ukrainian authorities made the allegations 'with the aim of discrediting Russian troops' and that those involved should be investigated over possible breaches of a new Russian law banning what the government deems to be false information about its forces.

Russian law enforcement has launched several investigations since Russian troops entered Ukraine, typically into incidents such as the shelling of areas held by Russia-backed separatists.

Moscow faced global revulsion and accusations of war crimes Monday after the Russian pullout from the outskirts of Kyiv revealed streets strewn with corpses of what appeared to be civilians, some of whom had seemingly been killed at close range.

The grisly images of battered bodies left out in the open or hastily buried led to calls for tougher sanctions against the Kremlin, namely a cutoff of fuel imports from Russia.

Germany and France reacted by expelling dozens of Russian diplomats, suggesting they were spies, and US President Joe Biden said Russian leader Vladimir Putin should be tried for war crimes.

On Monday, Biden called for a trial, adding to the global outcry over civilian killings in the Ukrainian town of Bucha as more graphic images of their deaths emerged.

'Obviously responsible': Pentagon spokesman John Kirby (pictured) speaks during a media briefing at the Pentagon, April 4

Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told the media it was 'pretty obvious' Russia was responsible for the Bucha atrocities

Meanwhile, the Pentagon said Russian forces are obviously responsible for the atrocities in Bucha, even as it acknowledged it was not yet sure precisely which units were operating in the area.

'I think it's fairly obvious, not just to us but to the world, that Russian forces are responsible for the atrocities in Bucha,' Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told a news briefing.

'Now exactly who - what units, whether they're contractors or Chechens - I don't think we're able to say right now. But we're certainly not refuting that these atrocities occurred and occurred at the hands of Russians.'

The Kremlin categorically denied any accusations relating to the murder of civilians, including in Bucha, where it said the graves and corpses had been staged by Ukraine to tarnish Russia.

Asked at a news conference about Biden's comments, Lavrov said the West should first consider its own actions in Iraq and Libya.

Solviev (above), who is a pro-Putin personality, saidd: 'It's obvious people will try to blame us as a people behind genocide'

'Not all is well with the conscience... of American politicians,' he said.

Speaking in a broadcast last night, Vladimir Soloviev, a prominent pro-Putin personality who supports the invasion, added: 'The war against Russia entered a new phase today. Very soon we will be blamed of genocide.'

He alleged the plot was masterminded by Britain as he praised the 'true patriots' in Donbas as other sources have accused Kyiv of staging the horrifying scenes in Bucha.

Soloviev also brought up allegations of Russian troops raping young women in front of their families, at one point saying he 'doesn't even want to comment' on the topic.

It comes as the Russian defence ministry rejected the allegations and claimed that 'not a single civilian suffered from violence when the town was controlled by the Russian Armed Forces'.

Russian ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov said: 'I would like to point out that Russian troops left Bucha on March 30.

'The Ukrainian authorities remained silent all these days, and now they have suddenly posted sensational footage in order to tarnish Russia's image and make Russia defend itself.

'I would like to emphasise with full responsibility that not a single civilian suffered from violence when the town was controlled by the Russian Armed Forces.

An elderly woman collects firewood to heat her house in the devastated commuter town of Bucha, northwest of Kyiv

Lavrov (above) said Russia's mission to the UN would later on Monday hold a press conference in New York with 'the most detailed material to show the true nature of incidents in Bucha'. However, there has been no evidence presented at this stage

'On the contrary, our troops delivered 452 tonnes of humanitarian aid for civilians.

'Meanwhile, the fact that the Ukrainian Armed Forces shelled the town of Bucha right after Russian troops had left was deliberately ignored in the US.

'This is what could have caused civilian casualties. That said, the Kyiv regime is clearly trying to blame its atrocities on Russia.'

Konstantin Kosachev, deputy speaker of the Russian upper house of parliament, said: 'There are no doubts that it is a staging organised by Kyiv authorities.

'And the fact that the West has picked it up and is hyping it makes it an accomplice of this cynical and immoral crime.'

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova claimed Kyiv colluded with the West in seeking to blame Russia.

'I think that the very fact that these statements were made minutes after these materials were released leaves no doubts as for who has contracted this story,' she told state-run Rossiya-1 television channel.

She claimed the West decided immediately Russia was to blame 'based on the videos, seconds-long videos and several photos. And they are ready to pour accusations.

A satellite photo show a probable grave site (circled) near the Church of Saint Andrew in Bucha

'No expert work done, no information from the other side throwing light on what is going on...'

She also alleged the massacres were 'a provocation staged by the Ukrainian military and radical nationalists' to disrupt peace talks.

Meanwhile the Telegram channel War on Fakes, which has been accused of spreading misinformation about the invasion, shared posts discrediting the atrocities pictured and filmed in Bucha and said it was part of a 'planned media campaign'.

One post said: 'Fake: The Russian military left Bucha, having previously left huge casualties among the civilian population.

'Truth: Notes about Bucha appeared in several foreign publications at once - it looks like a planned media campaign.

'Given that the troops left the city on March 30, where were these footage for 4 days? Their absence only confirms the fake.

'The video with the bodies is puzzling: here, at 12 seconds, the 'corpse' on the right moves its hand.

'At 30 seconds in the rearview mirror, the 'corpse' sits down. The bodies in the video seem to have been deliberately laid out in order to create a more dramatic picture.'

Larisa Savenko 72, stands outside her damaged home with Andriy Leshbon in Bucha, Ukraine

Soldiers walk amid destroyed Russian tanks in Bucha, in the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday

'This is clearly seen if you play video at a speed of 0.25 of normal.'

This was shared by the Russian Ministry of Defence Telegram channel.

Meanwhile the Kremlin today said that it categorically denied any accusations related to the murder of civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, adding that Ukrainian allegations on the matter should be treated with doubt.

Yesterday Ukrainian authorities said they were investigating possible crimes by Russian forces after finding hundreds of bodies strewn around towns outside Kyiv following Russian withdrawal from the area.

'This information must be seriously questioned,' Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call.

'From what we have seen, our experts have identified signs of video falsification and other fakes.'

Peskov said that the facts and chronology of the events in Bucha did not support Ukraine's version of events and urged international leaders not to rush to judgment.

'We categorically deny any accusations,' said Peskov.

'The situation is undoubtedly serious and we would ask that many international leaders not rush with their statements, not rush with their baseless accusations, request information from different sources, and at least listen to our explanations.'
President Joe Biden's national security adviser warned on Monday that Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine would be 'protracted' but he stopped short of calling atrocities in Bucha a genocide.

Jake Sullivan warned that Russia was 'revising its war games' as its invasion of the Ukraine continued to stall. He said the United States predicted that the Russian forces would move to Eastern Ukraine to focus on Donbass and Bucha.

'The next stage of this conflict may very well be protracted, we should be under no illusions that Russia will adjust its tactics, which have included and will likely continue to include wanted and brazen attacks on civilian targets,' he warned.

'What I'm saying when I say protracted is that it may not be just a matter of a few more weeks before all is said and done,' he noted.

Sullivan also said the Biden administration is 'working around the clock' to get assistance to the Ukraine, including laser guided rocket systems, Puma unmanned aerial systems, armored high mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicles, and more.

He also echoed earlier comments from President Joe Biden and refused to call the atrocities in Bucha, Ukraine, a 'genocide.'

'It's not just that we sit around and debate terms and ultimately decide to apply a turn based against static circumstances,' he said when asked how the administration made such a determination.

'We watch as things unfold we gather evidence, we continue to develop facts. And as we gathered evidence, and as we got the facts together, we ultimately came to the conclusion that war crimes were committed,' he added.

President Joe Biden's national security adviser Jake Sullivan warned that Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine would be 'protracted'

Meanwhile, Biden on Monday called for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin and said more sanctions were in the works following the report of atrocities in Bucha, Ukraine.

'He is a war criminal,' Biden told reporters of Putin. 'But we have to gather the information. We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue to fight and we have to get all the detail so this could be  actual have a war crimes trial. This guy is brutal and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous and everyone's seen it.'

He added he is 'seeking more sanctions' but declined to detail what those would be. The U.S. has implemented harsh financial penalities on Russian officials, banks and businesses after its invasion of the Ukraine.

'He should be held accountable,' Biden said of Putin.

The president also said he didn't think what happened in Bucha, Ukraine, was genocide but called it a 'war crime.'

He has previously called Putin a war criminal but this was the first time he has called for the Russian president to face legal consequences. His comments echo those of European leaders, who are calling for harsher sanctions against Russia after mass graves were found in the town near Kyiv, after Russian soldiers departed the area.

But Biden didn't go as far in his remarks as Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, who called the Russian actions 'genocide' after visiting Bucha.

'This is genocide. The elimination of the whole nation and the people,' Zelensky said. He has also called for tougher sanctions.

President Joe Biden called for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin for actions of Russian soldiers in Bucha, Ukraine

A satellite image taken on March 31 shows the mass grave - a 45ft-long pit - dug behind the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, during the time that Russian forces were in control of the region

Ukraine's prosecutor-general said the bodies of 410 civilians, many with bound hands and close-range gunshot wounds, have been recovered from towns surrounding Kyiv after last week's withdrawal of Russian troops.

A mass grave containing the bodies of at least 20 civilians including a mayor and her family has been uncovered near the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv in just the latest evidence of Russian war crimes.

The pit was uncovered in woodland near the town of Motyzhyn, around 20 miles west of the city of Bucha where another mass grave has been found, and contains the bodies of local mayor Olga Sukhenko who was buried along with her husband and son, according to Ukraine's former ambassador to Austria Olexander Scherba.

European Commission Presient Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, tweeted Monday that he European Union will send investigators to Ukraine to help the local prosecutor general 'document war crimes.

The UK, France and Germany, along with the NATO Secretary General, on Sunday night called for an international probe to be opened into allegations of Russian 'war crimes'. Meanwhile, Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas declared: 'It's not a battlefield, it's a crime scene' in reference to the horrific images.

And the United States and its allies will seek to suspend Russia from the U.N. Human Rights Council, according to Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

'The images out of Bucha and devastation across Ukraine require us now to match our words with action,' she said.

The U.S. and more than 40 other countries are working to nvestigate possible violations and abuses, after the passage of a resolution by the United Nations Human Rights Council to establish a commission of inquiry.

Zelensky, meanwhile, appeared overwhelmed at seeing the carnage in the town, admitting he finds 'it very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here'.

On the streets of Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, the bodies of civilians have been found scattered, many with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture, after Russian forces retreated from the area.

Ukraine and Western leaders have accused Russia of carrying out the massacre of civilians and dumping their bodies in mass graves.

Zelensky today said it had become harder for Ukraine to negotiate with Russia since Kyiv became aware of the scale of alleged atrocities carried out by Russian troops in Ukraine.

'These are war crimes and will be recognised by the world as genocide,' Zelensky said, wearing body armour and surrounded by military personnel.

'It's very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here,' he said. 'The longer the Russian Federation drags out the meeting process, the worse it is for them and for this situation and for this war.'

'We know of thousands of people killed and tortured, with severed limbs, raped women and murdered children,' he said, adding that in Bucha and other towns in the Kyiv region 'dead people have been found in barrels, basements, strangled, tortured.

WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES

A visibly emotional Volodymyr Zelensky today stood motionless as he surveyed the scene of utter devastation he encountered in the town of Bucha, with dozens of bodies shot at close range laying on the empty streets

The Ukrainian President appeared overwhelmed at seeing the carnage in the town, admitting he finds 'it very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here'

A Ukrainian policeman walks by a pit in the village of Motyzhyn, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022 where the bodies of the mayor of the village, Olga Sukhenko, her husband and son and that of a man believed to be a Ukrainian serviceman, who was not yet identified, lie

Dead bodies litter the streets near Bucha, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, after Russian forces withdrew from the region - leaving evidence of 'war crimes' in their wake

A mass grave was discovered in the grounds of the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, containing the bodies of dozens of civilians

President Biden again called Russian President Vladimir Putin (above left) a war criminal

Footage released by the Ukrainian military showed what appeared to be a 'torture chamber' in a building used as a barracks by Russian troops in Bucha. The bodies of civilians were lined up against a wall in the basement, kneeling, having been killed. At least one had been shot through the knee before being killed, the military said.

Civilian survivors said some bodies left on the streets had been run over by Russian tanks and 'squashed like animal skin rugs'. Others reported seeing soldiers shoot dead elderly civilians in front of their relatives.

Additionally, Putin's invasion has suffered another devastating blow after his force's death toll rose to 18,300, according to Kyiv's estimates today.

Russia has only admitted 1,351 of its troops have died fighting in Ukraine since Putin invaded on February 24, a fraction of the figure estimated by Ukraine's armed forces.

In a further blow to Putin's war, Ukrainian forces have also retaken some towns in the northern Chernihiv region, whilst Russian forces no longer occupied any areas in the Sumy region, in Ukraine's northeast.

Ukrainian soldiers also blitzed a Russian military convoy in an effort to disrupt deliveries of fuel and supplies to Putin's troops on the frontline, with video showing a military tanker being hit by what appears to be a rocket before bursting into flames.

But Russian attacks on civilian areas have continued, with eight people killed and 34 wounded after shelling hit the southern Ukrainian cities of Mykolaiv and Ochakiv on Sunday, prosecutors in Kyiv said.

And Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov rejected the allegations of Russian troops killing civilians in Bucha, describing the scenes outside Kyiv as a 'stage-managed anti-Russian provocation.'

Meanwhile British Prime Minister Boris Johnson led world leaders in condemning the violence at the weekend, pledging to send funding and specialist investigators to the International Criminal Court at The Hague to compile evidence for a war crimes tribunal.

'We will not rest until justice is served,' he vowed, before a spokesman for the PM added: 'It's clear that Putin crossed the threshold of barbarism some time ago.'

'It's certainly evidence that Putin's army is committing war crimes,' the spokesman said, adding that the Government now wants 'to look beyond what we have already provided' in terms of fresh arms shipments to Ukraine.

'Whatever equipment we send will obviously allow Ukraine to defend itself. We are aware of the requests from the Ukrainians for equipment to defend themselves from ships and we are looking into what we can do,' he said.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki called Russia's actions 'genocide.'

Morawiecki said the allegations 'must be properly documented and judged,' and he called 'to establish an international commission composed of specialists.'

French President Emmanuel Macron said Monday that there is 'clear evidence of war crimes' in Bucha that demand new measures. 'I'm in favour of a new round of sanctions and in particular on coal and petrol. We need to act,' he said on France-Inter radio.
An Indiana man has been sentenced to 650 years in prison for 30-year-old sex crimes which he was convicted of after investigators matched his DNA from a licked envelope to samples found at some of the crime scenes.

Steven Ray Hessler was found guilty of 19 felony charges for crimes against 10 victims between 1982 and 1985, on March 3.

The charges included counts of rape, unlawful deviate conduct, criminal deviate conduct and robbery.

In all of the cases, he broke into the victims' homes and attacked them then fled. For decades, his crimes went undetected.

Steven Ray Hessler was found guilty of 10 sex crimes on March 3

He avoided punishment for years, even though police had his DNA on file from other crimes.

Prosecutors used an advanced genealogy testing technique on a sample found from one of his crimes.

It led them to him or his brother. Hessler was eventually charged after police intercepted a utility bill in 2020, after he licked the envelope.

Victims testified how he would enter their homes with a balaclava or ski mask on, beat them and rob them in a string of incidents between 1983 and 1985.

He targeted men and women - sexually assaulting any female victims and beating the male victims.

Prosecutors celebrated the sentence this week.

Shelby County Prosecutor Brad Landwerlen said: 'Steven Ray Hessler is one of the most evil, dangerous, sadistic predators that Ive had the pleasure of prosecuting in my 30+ year career.

'He derived great pleasure from his unnecessarily brutal methods of terrorizing and sexually torturing his victims.'

Hesesler targeted men and women - sexually assaulting any female victim and beating the male victims - in a string of attacks in the 1980s

He added: I promised the victims early-on that my goal would be that he go to prison the rest of his life, and all involved are very happy that we have achieved that goal.

'The victims suffered for so long, and they wondered if someone looked at them in the store, if a car drove by slow, if a car drove by and honked, anything out of the norm.

'"Is this him? Is he coming to get me? Is he going to follow through with his threats?"

'They wondered about that.'

Hessler, pictured on Friday, 'derived great pleasure from his unnecessarily brutal methods of terrorizing and sexually torturing his victims', prosecutors said

Hessler denied the crimes and his attorney says he plans to file an appeal despite the DNA evidence.

Attorney Bryan L. Cook said in a statement to WRTV: 'This was one of the most unusual cases probably any defense attorney on the planet could ever encounter for a laundry list of reasons. The facts involved seem more like something out of a movie than real life.

'It involved 80-100 suspects ranging from Hesslers cousin (previously indicted for 4 of the attacks), police officers, doctors, pharmacists, and even Michael Kenyon who was the inspiration for Frank Zappas song, The Illinois Enema Bandit.

'Several potentially viable suspects were ruled out by DNA although 8 of 10 victims were not DNA cases  which was a central issue in the case. Many physical descriptions by victims of the attacker did not match Hesslers age, build, weight, eye color, or education.'

Cook added: 'Several psychics were involved, one parading through a crime scene before police even processed the scene. Potentially critical evidence from some scenes was lost or destroyed over the years.'
The State Department on Monday said it was concerned for the health of Trevor Reed, a former U.S. Marine jailed in Russia, following local reports that he was being treated in prison hospital after ending a hunger strike.

The 30-year-old Texan was sentenced to a nine-year prison term after being convicted of endangering the lives of two police officers while drunk during a visit to Moscow in 2019.

He pleaded not guilty and the United States described his trial a 'theater of the absurd.'

State Department spokesman Ned Price said the U.S. was worried he was not getting proper medical care.

'We are concerned by reports that Trevor Reed's health is deteriorating,' he said.

'We continue to call on Russian officials to provide adequate medical care immediately or otherwise to release him to the United States to receive the care that he needs.'

Reed's parents met with Joe Biden last week to keep up pressure to bring him home at time when relations between Moscow and Washington have deteriorated because of the war in Ukraine.

Former U.S. Marine Trevor Reed was detained in Russia in 2019. On Monday, the State Department said it was concerned at reports his health was deteriorating after a hunger strike

State Department spokesman Ned Price called on Russian officials to ensure that Reed got the urgent medical care he needed or to release him to the U.S.

Reed, 30, has languished in a Russian prison since 2019 after he was accused of drunkenly grabbing an officer's arm as he was being arrested, causing him to swerve. The US has disputed the account and called his trial a 'theatre of the absurd'

And they revealed that their son had launched a hunger strike in protest at being kept in solitary confinement and not receiving care for tuberculosis-like symptoms.

On Monday, local media reported that Reed had been taken to a medical facility

'On Friday, April 1, the convict Reed ended his hunger strike and began to receive food,' the Federal Penitentiary Service said, according to Interfax and RIA.

'On the same day, at his request, he was sent to the medical facility.'

His parents say he came into close contact with a prisoner who had TB in December and was not given preventative treatment.

'Trevor has been transferred back to a prison 'hospital' at the IK-21 gulag in Mordovia. Our son continues to experience symptoms consistent with active tuberculosis,' they said in a statement on Monday.

'As a result of his hunger strike, Trevor lost seven pounds in five days, his health continues to deteriorate by the day and we remain terrified that Trevor will become the next Otto Warmbier if the administration doesn't act urgently to bring him home.'

Joey and Paula Reed met with President Joe Biden on Wednesday evening to discuss securing their son's release from a Russian prison

The Reeds, above as they demonstrate in Lafayette Park near the White House earlier on Wednesday, have been protesting in DC and trying to get a meeting with the president

Warmbier was an American student detained in North Korea for more than a year. He was in a coma when released home and died soon after.

The Reeds took their message to the White House last week and said they wanted to to remind Biden of their son's service to the country during their 30-minute meeting.

'He listened intently to everything we had to say until we were through talking. We couldn't have asked for more,' Joey Reed told CNN.

Paula Reed added: 'We got to get it off our chest, all the things that we've been wanting to say to him, and it's done. We got to say what we wanted to say. He listened intently, and we're grateful for that.'

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Biden 'reiterated his commitment to continue to work to secure the release of Trevor, Paul Whelan, and other Americans wrongfully held in Russia and elsewhere, and to provide all possible assistance until they and others are free and returned home to their families who are advocating so passionately for their release.'

The Reeds have called for the US to engage in a prisoner swap in exchange for their son, but US officials had not been very responsive to the desperate parents' repeated pleas until now.

Reed's parents say their son is continuously punished for small things like not making his bed properly, according to ABC News.

'During the day, because the room has no real heating and there's cracks in the windows, you see your breath all day long. He coils up on the floor next to a hot water pipe to stay warm and then he's given violations for laying on the floor during the daytime,' father Joey Reed told reporters.

They've also expressed concerns that their son is being used as a 'bargaining chip' during rising tensions between the US and Russia as the latter continues its invasion of Ukraine.
A personal trainer was killed by a train hours after he absconded from a Priory hospital, an inquest heard yesterday.

Matthew Caseby, 23, had been admitted as an NHS patient two days earlier under the Mental Health Act after police responded to a report of a trespasser on the railway.

The graduates father Richard, 61, told the court how the family were only fully told about the detention after his son vanished. The court heard that sensitive, gentle and intelligent Mr Caseby had been having counselling since 2018. He had his last session in June 2020, three months before his death outside University Station in Birmingham, near where he had graduated with a first class history degree in 2018.

Matthew Caseby swimming in the sea off Brighton beach. He was described as sensitive, gentle and intelligent and had graduated with a first class history degree in 2018

His father said the hospital authorities had a basic legal duty... to keep our son safe and secure. He told the jury: They did not. They did not. There have been catastrophic consequences for Matthew, for me, for my wife and our two daughters.

His son was detained on September 3, after a member of the public reported concerns. Mr Caseby was taken to a psychiatric hospital and sectioned the next day.

He told doctors he had been hearing voices and receiving messages and was moved to the Priory in Birmingham on the Saturday. His father said he and his wife Jo, 60, rang the Priory about seven times that weekend, seeking and offering information on their son, but none of this [information] was recorded by the hospital.

They next heard from the hospital on the Monday after Mr Caseby had scaled a fence, having been left unattended. The family hurriedly printed missing posters and headed to Birmingham from London.

While searching near the hospital, Mr Casebys father flagged down three police cars and discovered none of the crews was looking for his son or was aware he was missing. Mr Caseby was only upgraded to a high-risk missing person after a shift change at 7am  but by then 14 hours had been lost, his father said.

Before that Richard Caseby said he had spoken to a Priory worker who told him people abscond all the time to get drink or drugs or see friends... they usually come back. He said that comment remained burned on my mind.

His son was hit by a train at 8.46am. His father was 200 yards away, exploring a hunch that his son may have sought refuge near his old hall of residence. He found out what had happened after a 9am meeting with the Priorys medical director who assured me to my face that Matthew was a low suicide risk. The inquest in Birmingham continues.

 For confidential support call the Samaritans on 116 123 or visit www.samaritans.org
Germany was accused of 'fuelling Putin's war machine' yesterday  after Berlin held out against a ban on importing Russian energy.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz attracted criticism from senior figures in both Ukraine and the UK after his administration rejected calls for the measure.

French President Emmanuel Macron also put pressure on Germany, saying Russian atrocities in the town of Bucha 'require a new set of sanctions and very clear measures'. He added: 'I'm in favour of having a sanctions package, especially on coal and oil, which we know are particularly painful. I want us to be able to act.'

But Germany, which relies heavily on Russia for energy, continued to oppose wider sanctions. German finance minister Christian Lindner yesterday rejected an EU embargo on imports of Russian gas despite global revulsion at the massacre of Ukrainian civilians by Vladimir Putin's forces.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz attracted criticism from senior figures in both Ukraine and the UK after his administration rejected calls for the measure

French President Emmanuel Macron also put pressure on Germany, saying Russian atrocities in the town of Bucha 'require a new set of sanctions and very clear measures'

Speaking ahead of EU talks in Brussels, Mr Lindner said: 'We are dealing with a criminal war. It is clear we must end as quickly as possible all economic ties to Russia... but gas cannot be substituted in the short term. We would inflict more damage on ourselves than on them.'

German economy minister Robert Habeck also spoke out against an immediate ban. He told reporters that Berlin was 'working every day to create the preconditions and the steps toward an embargo'  and insisted that German action 'harms Putin daily'.

The lack of action prompted an angry response from Ukraine's foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba, who called for a ban on Russian energy supplies and for Moscow to be totally ejected from the Swift payment system, which dominates international trade.

The lack of action prompted an angry response from Ukraine's foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba, who called for a ban on Russian energy supplies and for Moscow to be totally ejected from the Swift payment system, which dominates international trade

At a press conference in Poland, Mr Kuleba did not name Germany, but said: 'The West continues to fuel the Russian war machine with payments for fossil fuels... with financial transactions conducted through Russian banks that have not been disconnected from Swift yet.'

Addressing foreign ministers who will attend Nato, EU, and G7 meetings this week, he added: 'If you have doubts, reluctance, or arguments about the need to keep doing business with Russia, go to Bucha first and then talk to me.'

Boris Johnson will challenge Mr Scholz over sanctions during talks in London this week.

A Government source last night voiced frustration over German intransigence, which is blamed for holding up an EU-wide deal on sanctions.

Publicly, No 10 continued to stress the importance of Western unity, saying Britain would impose further sanctions 'as much as possible in lockstep' with allies.
Russian gas still flowing despite rouble deadline

(China Daily) 15:20, April 04, 2022

Russian gas continued to flow into Germany this weekend despite Berlin's refusal to adhere to President Vladimir Putin's demand for gas contracts to be paid in roubles.

"Gas is flowing to Germany. Deliveries are incoming. Supply security is still guaranteed," a German government spokesperson said on Saturday.

The German government is "in close contact" with its European partners and will "monitor the situation closely," the spokesperson added.

German transmission system operator Gascade, which manages the German section of the Yamal-Europe pipeline, said on Saturday that it couldn't confirm any cutting off of gas supplies to Germany.

Putin delivered an ultimatum on Thursday to "unfriendly" nations to pay for their energy in roubles starting Friday, or risk being cut off from vital supplies. However, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz insisted that German companies will continue to make payments for Russian gas in euros.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that Russia would not turn off gas supplies to Europe immediately as payments on deliveries due after April 1 are due in the second half of this month and May.

European buyers and governments are working on ways to potentially pay for gas in roubles. With weeks left before bills are due, governments in Europe, which relies on Russia for more than a third of its gas supplies, are talking to energy companies about Russia's demand.

The European Commission said on Friday that those with contracts requiring payment in euros or dollars should stick to the stipulated currency.

Russia's gas giant Gazprom announced on Friday that it will quit its business operations in Germany without giving any details or explanation of its decision.

Meanwhile, Ukraine said on Saturday its forces had seized back all areas around Kyiv, claiming complete control of the capital region for the first time since Russia launched the "special military operation" on Feb 24.

There was no immediate Russian comment on the claim, but its Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov stressed Russia's combat effectiveness, saying aviation forces had struck 51 Ukrainian military facilities during the night.

Some US officials familiar with the latest US intelligence assessments said Russia has revised its strategy to focus on taking control of the Donbass and regions in eastern Ukraine with a target date of early May.

On Sunday morning, the southern port city of Odesa was hit by a Russian airstrike, Serhii Bratchuk, spokesman of the operational staff of Odesa regional military administration, said on national television. Several explosions were heard in the city before sunrise.

Konashenkov confirmed high-precision sea and air-launched missiles destroyed an oil refinery and three storage facilities near Odessa, which had supplied fuel to Ukrainian troops.

An article published by RT said the Russian Defense Ministry had identified US officials involved in developing biological weapons in Ukraine.

These officials were "the heads of divisions and employees of the US Department of Defense, as well as its main contractors," said the report, citing Konashenkov.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
The Senate passed a procedural motion Monday night to proceed with Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's confirmation - voting 53-47 to discharge her Supreme Court nomination from the Judiciary committee and bring up her name for a vote before the full chamber.

Moderate Republican Senators Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah all joined Democrats after an 11-11 vote earlier on Monday left her Supreme Court nomination in a dead-lock.

Democrats want to vote on her confirmation by April 8, when Congress breaks for a two week spring recess. With a 50-50 split Senate, and the backing of at least three Republicans, Brown will all but assuredly be confirmed in the coming days.

Brown will be the first black woman ever to serve on the Supreme Court bench.

Ahead of the vote Monday, many Republicans said they remained in opposition to Judge Jackson's confirmation, citing her weak sentencing of a child incest rapist.

A tie vote in the Judiciary Committee earlier in the day forced Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to file a discharge motion so Jackson's confirmation could move to the upper chamber's floor for a vote.

Even if a 50-50 vote were to happen in the Senate, Vice President Kamala Harris has the power to break ties.

Republicans on the Judiciary panel, however, used their time speaking Monday to reiterate their opposition to Jackson. Many brought up the fact that she handed down half the recommended sentence for a man who raped his 13-year-old niece and later allegedly sexually assaulted his sister-in-law.

The Senate voted 53-47 on Monday evening to discharge Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's nomination from the Judiciary Committee to the upper chamber for a full floor vote on her nomination to the Supreme Court

The three Republicans who voted with Democrats to move Jackson's nomination to the Senate floor were Susan Collins of Maine (left), Mitt Romney of Utah (center) and Lisa Murkowski of Alasak (right)

During Senator Mike Lee's closing remarks Monday, the Utah Republican said: 'Just three days ago and over a week after the hearings were concluded, we received the sentencing transcripts from a case where Judge Jackson gave yet another light sentence  to a violent child rapist who failed to give truthful information to the court and falsified his address for purposes of requiring a sex offender registry participation.'

In 2010 Leo Weekes, who raped his 13-year-old niece, was given a 16 month sentence with four years of probation. Weekes was required to register as a sex offender for 10 years as a result of his 2010 conviction, but he gave false information, according to the New York Post.

In February 2014, prosecutors asked Judge Jackson to put Weeks back in prison for 24 months as punishment for the registration violation.

Jackson will be the first ever black woman to ever serve on the Supreme Court bench

'I do believe that criminal history is having a disproportionate impact on the sentence that the guidelines prescribe in this particular case in light of what you actually did here,' Jackson said at the time, before sentencing Weekes to 12 months along with credit for time served, which was half the time requested by federal prosecutors.

This lighter-than-recommended sentencing allowed Weekes to allegedly sexually assault another relative  his sister-in-law  when he otherwise would have been in prison.

Details of this case were not shared with the Judiciary Committee with information provided on Jackson's sentencing record ahead of the four days of confirmation hearings last month.

Instead the full story of Jackson's role in Weekes' case emerged just before the Monday vote.

'We just last week, after the hearing, got information on another case  of an individual who raped his 13-year old-niece. Jackson sentenced him to half what the prosecutor wanted because he failed to register on a sex registry and went to work at a daycare,' Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who is on the Judiciary panel, said of the case.

'Because he was released early, because of Judge Jackson's sentence, he committed another sexual assault  a rape. Again she had him before her, and again she sentenced him to half of what the prosecutor sought. This is a pattern.'

Republican Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas also slammed Jackson for her sentencing.

Republicans are now opposing Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's nomination to the Supreme Court for giving convicted incest rapist Leo Weekes (pictured) half the recommended sentencing period after raping his 13-year-old niece. Since he was free, Weekes was able to carry out another alleged sexual assault of his sister-in-law

'The government asked for him to go to prison for two years,' he said. 'Judge Jackson gave him just one year. During that second year when he should have been in prison, yes, he went on to try to rape again and then bribe the victim with $2,500 to recant her testimony.'

Outside of this case, Republicans railed Jackson every since her nomination regarding her sentencing record for child pornography offenders.

'Judge Jackson will be a rubber stamp for the radical left,' Republican Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn tweeted on Monday.

'A Supreme Court justice's primary commitment should always be to the Constitution  not to woke progressivism,' she went on, adding: 'Judge Jackson's record has made it clear that she will interpret the Constitution through the lens of progressive ideology.'

'I cannot in good conscience vote in favor of her nomination to the Supreme Court.'

Details of Jackson's role in the sentencing came out Monday morning, as the Judiciary Committee met to vote on her nomination. Pictured: The Supreme Court nominee sits down with Democratic Senator Jacky Rosen on Monday

Cruz also posted to Twitter on Monday: 'Judge Jackson's sentencing record for criminals is outside of the mainstream. It's extreme.'

Senator Josh Hawley, who was one of the most harsh on Jackson's child pornography sentencing record during the hearings two weeks back, explained from his panel seat Monday why he would not support Jackson.

'Child pornography is not fiction or a 'conspiracy.' There are 85 million images of child pornography on the internet,' the Missouri Republican tweeted as a rebuke of criticism over his line of questioning of the nominee.

Senator Lindsey Graham described Jackson as an 'activist' in explaining why he would not back her nomination for the Supreme Court, despite having voted in favor of her for an appeals court role just last year.

He said she would be in a position to make law on the Supreme Court, unlike on lower courts.

And he said her radical stances meant she would never even have made it in front of the Senate if Republicans held the balance of power.

'If we get back the Senate, and we're in charge of this body, and there's judicial openings, we will talk our colleagues on the other side, but if we're in charge she would not have met before this committee,' he said.

'You would have had somebody more moderate than this.

'So I want you to know right now the process you started to go to a simple majority vote is going to rear its head here pretty soon. where we're in charge then we'll talk about judges differently.'

Democrats described his comments about the first black woman nominated to the Supreme Court as 'shameful.

Sen. Lindsey Graham set out his opposition to the nomination of Kentaji Brown Jackson, as the Senate Judiciary Committee began its debate on Monday

Democrats believe they will secure the confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson by the end of the week, making her the first African American woman to sit on the Supreme Court

Graham said he had been happy to support Jackson at the circuit court level even if he did not agree with her stances.

'If you win, I expect you to pick somebody I wouldn't support on the court - that just sort of comes with winning,' he said.

'So I didn't think twice about not voting for her.

'But now that you're talking about the Supreme Court, you're making policy not just bound by it.

'And a lot of my friends on the other side have done this, voted for a person at the district court level ... only to vote no at Supreme Court level.'

President Biden called on senators to confirm Jackson in a Monday morning tweet

Biden, he said, could have picked from a range of highly qualified people in order to fulfill his campaign promise to nominate the first African-American woman for the Supreme Court.

'It didn't bother me that much,' he said. 'It was trying to make the court look more like like America.'

But he said her appearance before the committee underscored that she came from the more radical wing of the left.

'So there are people that President Biden could have picked that would have been in the liberal camp in terms of voting on the Supreme Court,' he said.

'And they could have gotten 60 to 65 votes.

'The White House didn't go down that road because it feels that they must pick somebody that's more appealing to the hard left.'

Her nomination must first pass the committee before then being voted on by the full Senate.

It needs only a simple majority vote to go through, and Democrats believe they have the necessary votes.

It means she would become only the third black justice and the sixth woman in the court's 200-year history.

Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee spokesperson Nora Keefe condemned Graham's comments.

'Republicans' shameful and relentless attacks on a nominee as qualified as Judge Jackson reinforce the stakes of this year's election and will remind voters why we must defend and expand our Democratic Senate majority with the power to confirm Supreme Court justices,' she said.

President Biden sent a tweet in support of Jackson as senators began their meeting.

'Judge Jackson will bring extraordinary qualifications, deep experience and intellect, and a rigorous judicial record to the Supreme Court,' he said.

'She deserves to be confirmed as the next justice.'
The first transgender MP said he is 'bitterly disappointed' that trans people will be excluded from a plan to ban conversion therapy.

Conservative MP for Bridgend Jamie Wallis, 37, came out as trans last week in a highly personal statement.

He took to social media today to rally against ministers' plans to limit a ban on conversion therapy to gay people.

He said it was 'wrong to exclude protections for a whole group of people from a practice described as "abhorrent."'

Conservative MP for Bridgend Jamie Wallis, 37, came out as trans last week in a highly personal statement. He took to social media today to rally against ministers' plans to limit a ban on conversion therapy to gay people

He said it was 'wrong to exclude protections for a whole group of people from a practice described as "abhorrent"'

The backbencher argued that it would be a 'broken promise' to allow conversion therapy to be banned, but for it not to apply to trans people.

The outcome of a double U-turn by the Prime Minister last week, in which he appeared to flip-flop on whether to legislate against conversion therapy, has reportedly seen No 10 settle on outlawing 'only gay conversion therapy, not trans'.

When announcing the initial consultation into the conversion therapy ban, the UK Government said: 'The proposed protections are universal: an attempt to change a person from being attracted to the same-sex to being attracted to the opposite-sex, or from not being transgender to being transgender, will be treated in the same way as the reverse scenario.

Jamie Wallis, 37, has been praised for his bravery by Prime Minister Boris Johnson after revealing he is 'not OK' and being open about having gender dysphoria

Jamie Wallis said he was 'bitterly disappointed' at the Government's decision to exclude trans people from the plans to ban conversion therapy

'They therefore protect everyone.'

LGBT and religious leaders, including former archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams, have put pressure on Boris Johnson to include trans people in a ban on conversion therapy.

In a series of tweets, Mr Wallis said: 'I'm bitterly disappointed at the Government's decision not to include gender identity in the ban on conversion therapy.

Last month Wallis, 37, was fined 270 and given three points on his licence after crashing into a lamppost. He says he has PTSD after being raped last year

Boris Johnson praised the courage of his MP's statement - hours after his gag at a dinner: 'Good evening, ladies and gentleman, or as (Labour leader Sir) Keir Starmer would put it, people who are assigned female or male at birth'

Tory MPs have been supporting their colleague on Twitter. Johnny Mercer sent a series of flexed biceps emojis to represent strength while others including party chairman Oliver Dowden praised his bravery. However, the Government has not included trans people in legislation aiming to ban conversion therapy

'Many have asked what my thoughts are. I've always believed that this debate attracts unnecessary hysteria and toxicity, and meaningful results can only come from meaningful debate.

'Understandably, concerns need to be looked at and debated, but it is wrong to exclude protections for a whole group of people from a practice described as 'abhorrent'.

'I hope the announcement that a separate piece of work will now be done on this issue will be done at speed.

'If the CT (conversion therapy) ban passes through Parliament without any protections for the transgender community, it cannot be described as anything other than a broken promise.'

The Government has said trans people should be 'treated with the maximum possible generosity and respect' but that the 'complexity of issues requires separate work to further consider transgender conversion therapy'.
Boris Johnson is 'set to announce plans to send migrants to Rwanda' to be processed under a 'secretive deal worth millions' to the African nation, according to reports.

A government source said the Prime Minister has been told the plans are not quite ready after he intended to announce them last week following a surge in the number of migrants crossing the Channel.

Ministers are waiting for Priti Patel's Nationality and Borders Bill, which would enable asylum seekers to be processed abroad, to make its way through the House of Lords and be given royal assent before the terms of the deal with Rwanda can be finalised, the Times reported.

The plan would see the government fly asylum seekers out to Rwanda for processing while the UK pays the African country millions of pounds.

On Monday evening, the House of Lords voted against the bill, extending the Parliamentary battle over the flagship bill.

It comes as the number of migrants to have crossed the Channel so far this year passed 4,500 - a number which was not reached until June in 2021. That year, a total of 28,526 people crossed the Channel, but this year is expected to break that record.

Boris Johnson is 'set to announce plans to send migrants to Rwanda' to be processed under a secretive deal 'worth millions to the African nation', according to reports

The deal has been described as 'secretive' with ministers only allowed to refer to 'country X' during meetings.

There have been similar attempts to offshore migrants in Ghana and Albania, but these plans have fallen through.

As well as opposition in the House of Lords, the bill has met resistance in the Commons where Tory MP David Davis has tabled an amendment to scrap the measures.

The unelected House of Lords inflicted a mauling on the bill on Monday, maintaining its stand-off despite the House of Commons reinstating the contentious reforms which were previously rejected by the the upper chamber.

The peers asked for significant changes to be made which included removing a broad provision to make it a criminal offence to knowingly arrive in the UK without permission, and ensuring any move to offshore asylum claims is subject to approval of both Houses of Parliament, along with a cost breakdown.

The upper chamber also backed measures to safeguard against prosecution of people who carried out at-sea rescues, by providing a 'reasonable excuse' defence, while taking steps to prevent asylum seekers being treated differently based on how they entered the UK.

In addition, peers renewed their demand that asylum seekers be allowed to work if no decision had been taken on their claim after six months, as well as enable unaccompanied child asylum seekers in Europe to join family in the UK.

The latest defeats mean a continuation of the legislative tussle between the two Houses over the Bill, known as parliamentary ping-pong.

The clock is also now ticking for the legislation with the end of the parliamentary session in sight.

Speaking during the debate, the Bishop of Durham, the Rt Rev Paul Butler, was deeply critical of a move enabling the offshoring of asylum seekers to overseas processing centres, similar to those used by Australia.

He said: 'When people arrive on our shores seeking protection we have a responsibility to treat them as we would wish to be treated if we indeed had to flee for our lives.

'If we move them to other countries for the process of their asylum claims I very much fear a blind eye will be turned to their treatment.

'The inhumanity of this part of the Bill is my primary concern. There are however significant practical and financial concerns.'

The number of migrants to have crossed the Channel so far this year passed 4,500 - a number which was not reached until June in 2021. That year, a total of 28,526 people crossed the Channel, but this year is expected to break that record

Labour frontbencher Lord Rosser said: 'Campaigners claim it will cost less to put asylum seekers in the Ritz than run an offshoring policy.

'But experience elsewhere and not least for Australia suggests that the cost of such a scheme would be considerable per person, not cost effective.'

But Home Office minister Baroness Williams of Trafford said: 'Asylum processing overseas is one part of a system-wide reform designed to break the business model of people smugglers and disincentivise unwanted behaviours.'

Meanwhile, Conservative peer Baroness Stroud pressed her call to allow asylum seekers to work if their claim was delayed.

She said: 'There is a danger that in our current system we are penalising these people by not allowing them to work and putting significant stumbling blocks in the way of their integration unnecessarily.'

And refugee campaigner Lord Dubs renewed his demand for unaccompanied child asylum seekers in Europe to be allowed to join family in the UK.

The Labour peer, who fled the Nazis as a child on the Kindertransport scheme, said: 'I believe that this would lessen the dangerous journeys that young people make to join their families. It might eliminate them altogether.

'If we believe that traffickers should not have opportunities, then providing a safe and legal route is surely the right thing to do.

'Family reunion is surely fundamental to what a civilised society should support.'
NYC Mayor Eric Adams' administration has fired a city lawyer after she posed as a reporter to grill him about why kids are still being masked.

Daniela Jampel, 38, was ousted from her role as an attorney at the Department of Law on Monday, hours after berating Adams about his continued rule that under fives must wear masks at a press conference that was intended to discuss LGBT rights.

Jampel, a 38 year-old mother of three from Washington Heights, was filmed confronting Adams at a press conference Monday about why he'd postponed plans to lift the rule on under-5's wearing masks from April 4.

'Three weeks ago, you told parents to trust you that you would unmask our toddlers,' she said.

'You stood right here, and you said that the masks would come off April 4. That has not happened.

'Not only did you renege on your promise, you had your lawyers race to court on Friday night arguing that there would be irreparable harm if children under 5 are allowed to take off their masks today along with their older siblings in school.

'So my questions are, what is the irreparable harm to children aged 2 to 4 take off their masks, just as they do in Long Island, just as they do in Westchester? When will you and will you unmask our toddlers?'

Adams answered by saying that the mask mandate had been maintained over an uptick in cases, because under 5's aren't eligible to receive the shot. Just hours later, it was revealed Jampel had been fired from her role as an attorney, with a city official condemning her behavior at the press conference.

After her firing Jampel tweeted unrepentantly, saying: 'Je ne regrette rien' (I regret nothing), before adding: 'The fight continues.'

Jampel told DailyMail.com: 'I can't really talk about it, until I have a lawyer.'

Daniela Jampel, pictured here with her family, confronted NYC Mayor Eric Adams about his decision to delay ending the under 5's mask mandate at a press conference Monday

She is currently on maternity leave.

Jampel in December wrote an op ed for DailyMail.com, asking: 'Where is the outrage on behalf of our children, who have been forced to endure these restrictions going on 2 years?

'Why don't we insist on the same quality of life -- that we demand for ourselves -- for our own kids?'

A Law Department spokesman says the decision to fire Jampel was made prior to Monday's confrontation with Adams - but condemned her latest behavior too.

The spokesman told the New York Daily News the dismissal came as a result of 'troubling claims about her work for the city Law Department' but didn't elaborate further.

He added: 'Todays events, however, which include her decision to lie to City Hall staff and state she was a journalist at todays press conference, demonstrate a disturbing lack of judgment and integrity.'

'As of today, she is no longer an employee of the Law Department.'

Jampel issued a statement on Twitter in the wake of her dismissal suggesting that she wouldn't comment further on her firing.

She wrote: 'My statement is that I am retaining counsel and will not litigate in the press.

Washington Heights lawyer Daniela Jampel, pictured, issued her latest salvo against NYC Mayor Eric Adams at an unrelated press conference on Monday and was fired hours later

Jampel issued these tweets after her dismissal from NYC's Law Department, saying she regretted nothing and that 'the fight continues'

Children are NOT at serious risk from Covid, multiple studies show Multiple studies have shown young children are not at serious risk from Covid-19. Data from from American Academy of Pediatrics shows children accounted for about 19 percent of all COVID cases, but less than 0.26% of cases resulted in death. A study from October found that around half of pediatric Covid cases are asymptomatic, and that was before the more mild Omicron variant became dominant in the U.S. Hospitalizations of pediatric COVID patients are also rare. A study in February, found the Pfizer vaccine was only 12% effective at preventing Omicron in five- to 11- year-olds. The main argument in favor of vaccinating children is to prevent them from spreading the virus but researchers from University of Berlin found, on average, children release less Covid particles into the air. Experts believe people who release lower amounts of aerosol particles when speaking have smaller viral loads, which also means they do not spread the virus at the same level. Advertisement

'Also, the NY Post used the most unflattering picture of me ever taken. Next time I will dress up for my big day.'

Jampel went on to attack NY Daily News reporter Michael Elsen Rooney as 'a petty, petty man' and thanked her supporters.

Adams realized Jampel was a gatecrasher halfway through her statement.

His staff could be seen trying to hustle her out, but he told them to let her continue, then ordered Jampel to conclude her question and record his answer on her phone.

Adams proceeded to answer Jampel's question by saying that his plan was always to move in tandem with the number of cases.

The city is now averaging 3,600 new cases a day, up from around 1,600-a-day a month ago.

Adams continued: 'I made the announcement that we were looking to announce today, which is Monday, to take the masks off children 2 and 4 years old. But I also stated, if we see an uptick, we will come back and make the announcement of what were going to do.

'We're going to pivot and shift as COVID is pivoting and shifting. There is a new variant. The numbers are increasing. We're going to move at the right pace, and thats the role I must do.

'That's what I stated. I'm living up to my promises.'

Adams promised to end the under 4 mask mandate on March 22, but went back on his decision April 1. A Staten Island judge struck the mandate down on Friday, but Adams' office appealed the decision, keeping the order in place, the New York Post reports.

Adams explained that the city's COVID positivity rate rose to 2.67 percent last week, up from the rolling monthly average of 2.33 percent.

He added that medical professionals have called for the mandate to remain in place because there's no vaccine available for toddlers.

Jampel subsequently identified herself on Twitter, where she pushes for the ending of mask mandates for young children in NYC.

She made her case at an event taking aim at Florida's so-called Don't Say Gay bill, which bans the teaching of lessons on gender identity and sexual orientation for kids in kindergarten up until third grade.

Eric Adams appeared momentarily confused by Jampel's presence, but answered her question, and said he'd kept the kids' mask mandate because of an uptick in COVID cases

Jampel has three daughters aged eight, four and six months and is angered by the seemingly never-ending child mask mandate

Adams was keen to position the Big Apple as a liberal antidote to the conservative new law, and invited Floridians who feel unhappy with the bill to move to the Empire State instead.

But critics say the mask rule for under 5s displays an unpleasant draconian streak from a mayor who's happy to rub shoulders unmasked with celebrities most nights of the week

Adams was also confronted by parents furious at his decision to extend the mask mandate for under-5s as he hit the town for a Broadway show Sunday.

The new mayor, who has quickly become known for mingle with famous faces, was met with angry chants of 'Unmask our kids!' as he attended the Paradise Square Broadway Musical at Ethel Barrymore Theater on Sunday night.

Parents demanding that the mask mandate be lifted confronted Adams on Sunday

Adams has come under fire for his busy social life, which last week included a party with supermodel Cara Delevingne (left) and the opening night of Sarah Jessica Parker's new play (right) on a single evening

A handful of women held up signs as Adams entered the building wearing a gray KN95 mask.

The latest twist in New York City's masking saga for under-5's began Friday, when Adams said he was delaying plans to lift the rule from April 4.

A state judge struck down the indefinite mask rule for under5-s the same day.

That lawmaker called it 'arbitrary, capricious, and unreasonable' and therefore 'void and unenforceable.'

But Adams successfully requested a stay to pursue an appeal just hours later.

He has angered parents with a whirl of social events, including a party with Cara Delevingne at the new One Vanderbilt skyscraper last week, as well as a trip to see Sarah Jessica Parker and her husband Matthew Broderick appear in Broadway play Plaza Suite.

Adams also attended the white tie Gridiron Dinner on Saturday in Washington D.C. with a long list of politicians and journalists.
An outspoken Liberal MP has slammed Scott Morrison claiming he has 'ruined' the Liberal party and that there is 'ruthless bullying' in the party's ranks.

Catherine Cusack, a member of the New South Wales Upper House who lives in the flood-devastated Northern Rivers region, has joined the recent pile-on against Mr Morrison in an scorching opinion piece in The Guardian.

Ms Cusack, 58, claimed Mr Morrison had 'trashed' Liberal party values of 'freedom and fairness' and ruined the party that she loved and has served for 40 years.

Ms Cusack laid into Mr Morrison over his Government initially only provided flood support for the Federal seat of Page, which backs the Coalition, rather than other towns such as Ballina, Byron and Tweed, which sit in the Labor seat of Richmond.

Catherine Cusack, a Liberal MP who lives in the flood-devastated Northern Rivers region, agreed with Concetta Fierravanti-Wells' views on Mr Morrison - and upped the ante in a scorching opinion piece (Pictured are submerged in water in Ballina)

Ms Cusack, 58, claimed Mr Morrison had 'trashed' Liberal party values of 'freedom and fairness' and ruined the party that she loved and has served for 40 years

Ms Cusack (right) claimed Morrison has 'ruined' the Liberal party and had acted like flood victims are 'pawns in his awful Game of Thrones'

Ms Cusack, who was among several local MPs to express outrage, announced she was quitting soon after, even though flood support funding was eventually opened up to those towns.

In her article on Tuesday, Ms Cusack claimed Morrison has 'ruined' the Liberal party and had acted like flood victims are 'pawns in his awful Game of Thrones'.

Ms Cusack, who recently announced she would quit Parliament, said her 'bulls**t tolerance levels are at zero'.

She claimed 'self-serving ruthless bullying' under Morrison was now affecting 'the poorest most vulnerable Australians who lost everything in the floods'.

'Scott Morrison's brazen attempt to fund flood victims in a Nationals seat and exclude flood victims in a Labor seat that I happen to live in was just too much.'

In early March, Morrison announced funding for residents of Lismore, Richmond Valley and Clarence Valley - which all sit in the seat of Page, which is held by the Nationals.

Ms Cusack has clashed with her party previously over education, climate change and koala protection and her attack is the latest episode of friendly fire in parliamentary ranks.

NSW Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells laid into Mr Morrison during a late night appearance on the Senate floor last week, hours after the Federal Budget was handed down.

Speaking under the protection of parliamentary privilege, Ms Fierravanti-Wells said: 'He (the Prime Minister) is adept at running with the foxes and hunting with the hounds, lacking a moral compass and having no conscience.

'In my public life, I have met ruthless people. Morrison tops the list... [he] is not fit to be Prime Minister.'

Northern Rivers flood victims wait for assistance from their rooftop

Geoff Provest, NSW Nationals MP for Tweed, told ABC radio he was 'disgusted with the prime minister'.

In reaction to the outrage, federal minister for emergency management, Bridget McKenzie, announced in mid-March that Ballina, Byron and Tweed residents would be eligible for the two $1,000 payments per adult.

Ms Cusack with her family at Lennox head

He said the treatment of people from Ballina especially was 'deplorable' and that federal government ministers should 'hang their heads in shame'.

Labor MP Justine Elliot lambasted Mr Morrison for ruling out areas in her electorate of Richmond, which includes Ballina, Byron and the Tweed Shire, from receiving payments.
North Carolina state Sen. Chuck Edwards released a political ad Monday suggesting incumbent Rep. Madison Cawthorn is more interested in being a 'celebrity' than working for his district.

'Here in the mountains, we dont seek the limelight. We put our heads down and get to work,' Edwards says in the short clip. 'If you want a celebrity, go watch the Kardashians.'

Cawthorn rattled his GOP House colleagues by suggesting orgies and cocaine use are rampant in Washington, D.C. - and that they take part.

He damaged himself enough politically for North Carolina Sen. Tom Tillis to endorse Edwards.

Tillis said Cawthorn had 'fallen well short of the most basic standard western North Carolina expects from their representatives.'

North Carolina state Sen. Chuck Edwards released a political ad Monday suggesting incumbent Rep. Madison Cawthorn is more interested in being a 'celebrity' than working for his district

Earlier Monday, Rep. Madison Cawthorn tried to change the subject by giving a floor speech in opposition of trans women. He's been under fire for days over his cocaine and orgy comments

Earlier Monday, Cawthorn tried to change the subject by giving a floor speech in opposition of trans women.

Cawthorn told Democrats that real women had 'XX chromosomes' and 'no tallywacker.'

Cawthorn told Democrats they will 'never amend biology,' taking a shot at left-wing outrage over red states passing laws curbing discussion on sexual orientation and gender identity in the classroom and limiting transgender students' participation in school sports.

'The left has ripped away the pen of truth from the author of life,' the odd tangent began.

'They've exchanged natural science for a party platform, and declared war on biology. Your left-wing movement is forcing children to endure radical expressions of sexuality and yet you can't even define what a woman is.'

The comment is likely in reference to Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's Supreme Court confirmation hearing, where the Biden nominee said she is 'not a biologist' during a grilling by GOP Senator Marsha Blackburn on the 'definition' of the word 'woman.'

Cawthorn continued, 'You might amend a bill, but you'll never amend biology. Science is not Burger King. You can't just have it your way.'

The fast food giant actually scrapped its 'Have it your way' slogan in 2014 in favor of the more personal, inclusive 'Be your way.'

'I am the youngest member of the House of Representatives,' the 26-year-old Congressman said. 'And I never imagined that one of my sacred duties in this hallowed chamber would be explaining to the House Speaker the difference between a man and a woman.'

'Take notes Madame Speaker, I'm about to define what a woman is for you: XX chromosomes, no tallywacker. It's so simple.

'And yet today this proclamation of fundamental scientific fact will cause the woke liberals of Silicon Valley to strip you of your voice and ban you until you bow at their alter of falsehoods.'

Cawthorn's tirade comes after House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy said he spoke with the freshman lawmaker about comments he made claiming he was invited to an orgy in DC. McCarthy said Cawthorn's behavior was not up to par and that he 'lost my trust'

He added: 'You and your party are living a lie.'

Cawthorn ignited a firestorm of criticism from Republicans in North Carolina and in Washington late last month when he made comments on a podcast describing 'sexual perversion' from members of Congress.

He claimed to have been invited to an orgy and alleged he saw at least one lawmaker do cocaine.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Cawthorn 'lost' his 'trust' after meeting with the young Congressman last week, claiming his behavior was 'not becoming' of his national office.

The Republican leader warned Cawthorn could face consequences if he did not course correct.

Current and former GOP lawmakers demanded that Cawthorn either name names or admit to lying.

The North Carolina Republican, who has not retracted his comments, released a statement blaming Democrats and the media for his controversy.

'My comments on a recent podcast appearance calling out corruption have been used by the left and the media to disparage my Republican colleagues and falsely insinuate their involvement in illicit activities,' he said without going into specifics about those comments.
Australian fighter jets and navy vessels will be armed with new long-range strike missiles years ahead of schedule under a new $3.5billion military cash splash to deter the rising threat of China.

Defence Minister Peter Dutton said the time table for the country's Super Hornet fighter jets to be fitted out with US-made Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles needs to be sped up, so Australia doesn't 'get bullied'.

The emergency package will also see Australia's Hobart-class Destroyers and Anzac Frigates decked out with Norwegian-made Naval Strike Missiles as Beijing's growing presence in the South Pacific sparks concerns in Canberra.

'The acquisitions of these missiles gives us the ability to deter an act of aggression,' Mr Dutton told Sunrise on Tuesday ahead of the government's official announcement later today.

'We are spending more money on defence than we ever have, and we have to because the Indo-Pacific has changed and we need to be realistic about the fact that China is arming herself with more nuclear weapons.'

The military cash splash will see Australia's Hobart-class Destroyers (pictured) and Anzac Frigates decked out with Norwegian-made Naval Strike Missiles as Beijing's growing presence in the South Pacific poses concerns for Canberra

Defence Minister Peter Dutton said the time table for the country's Super Hornet fighter jets to be fitted out with US-made Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles (pictured) needed to be sped up, so Australia doesn't 'get bullied'

He said part of reason for expediting Australia's defence capabilities was due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the threat authoritarian regimes pose to liberal democracies across the globe.

'The world has been shocked with what we've seen in Europe and in Ukraine and we hope and pray that doesn't spread to other countries,' Mr Dutton said.

'But we're also very worried about what's happening in the Indo-Pacific and this is about Australia being prepared and making sure that we can stare down any act of bullying against our country.'

The missiles will be able to strike targets up to 900km away and will be manufactured by US defence companies Raytheon and Lockheed Martin.

The weapons will arrive three years ahead of schedule for the Air Force and up to five years ahead early for the Navy.

Hi-tech sea mines will are also set to arrive as part of the package.

China's growing presence in the region has them attempting to base themselves on Australia's doorstep

Australian fighter jets and navy vessels will be armed with new long-range strike missiles years ahead of schedule under a new $3.5 billion fast-tracked package to deter the rising threat of China. Pictured: Xi Jinping

The missiles to deter China (People's Liberation Army, pictured) will be able to strike targets up to 900km away and will be manufactured by US defence companies Raytheon and Lockheed Martin

Mr Dutton said Australia is working towards its own sovereign manufacturing capabilities in the medium term but the quickest way to acquire the missiles in the short term is through US partners.

'We're trying to establish the industry here and we're going to do that very quickly and accelerate that as well because we need to, we must,' he said.

The defence minister also flagged nuclear-powered submarines arriving in Australia much sooner than expected, with the first boat anticipated to be in the water at the end of the 2030s.

'I think we can condense the timeline of delivery,' he said, adding that the US and UK under the trilateral AUKUS alliance 'understand the situation in the Indo-Pacific'.

'But we'll release all of that detail at the appropriate time.'

A major announcement on when the subs might be ready will be made later this year.

Shocking disparities between Australia and China's military power shows we would struggle in a war
Actress Jodi Gordon is accused of assaulting her investment banker boyfriend with a bottle of wine in court documents.

NSW Police were called to a bed and breakfast in Kurrajong Heights, north-west of Sydney, on Sunday morning following reports of an altercation between the former Neighbours and Home and Away star and her partner Sebastian Blackler.

Mr Blackler was arrested, but was later released without charge.

Court documents reportedly said investigators asked the 31-year-old why he had bruising and swelling to his left eye, before he alleged his 37-year-old girlfriend 'hit him with a wine bottle'.

However, he declined to make a formal statement.

Court documents allege that investigators found Gordon (pictured) with bruising to her left eye and bottom lip, and with three lumps on her forehead

The 37-year-old Home and Away and Neighbours alumni has been in a 'tumultuous on-off relationship' with 31-year-old banker Sebastian Blackler since November 2020

The AVO documents, obtained by The Australian newspaper, also allege that investigators found Gordon with bruising to her left eye and bottom lip, and with three lumps on her forehead - but her injuries appeared to be days old.

Gordon was 'well affected by intoxicating liquor' and told police she 'fell against the counter', the documents alleged.

Documents tendered to the court also alleged that police 'fear domestic assaults are occurring between the parties with Gordon's consumption of intoxicating liquor exacerbating the violence'.

'There is clearly domestic violence occurring between the parties [but they] are reluctant to disclose how the injuries have been sustained,' they said.

Officers took out a restraining order against Gordon on Sunday morning on behalf of Mr Blackler.

Mr Blackler, a portfolio manager at a wealth management firm in Sydney, was also issued with an AVO over the same alleged incident.

Police would not provide a statement when contacted by Daily Mail Australia.

Australian actress Jodi Gordon (pictured) and her ex-boyfriend Sebastian Blackler have each been reportedly issued with AVOs against each other

The former couple broke up in May 2021, but are understood to have rekindled their relationship in February.

The court orders state the pair must not must not assault or threaten stalk, harass or intimidate each other.

They are also prohibited from intentionally or recklessly destroy or damage any property or harm an animal the other person owns.

Ms Gordon's order also bars her from being in Mr Blackler's company for at least 12 hours after drinking alcohol or taking illicit drugs.

Ms Gordon, 37, and Mr Blackler, 31, will both face Windsor Local Court on April 21. Daily Mail Australia has contacted Ms Gordon and Mr Blackler for comment.

Jodi Gordon (left) split with Mr Blackler (right) in May last year, but the pair reportedly rekindled their relationship in February

It is not the first time police have taken out an AVO against Mr Blackler on Ms Gordon's behalf.

Police were called to Ms Gordon's Double Bay apartment, in Sydney's eastern suburbs, on November 27, 2020, over reports of an alleged domestic violence incident.

Officers subsequently took out an interim AVO to prevent Mr Blackler from assaulting, threatening, stalking, harassing or intimidating Ms Gordon

The following month, a court order was issued banning Mr Blackler from assaulting or threatening, stalking, harassing or intimidating Ms Gordon.

The order expired at the end of 2021.

Ms Gordon, who played Martha MacKenzie on Home and Away from 2005 to 2010, shares daughter Aleeia with her ex-husband, former NRL star Braith Anasta.

The former couple married in 2012, welcomed their daughter in 2014, and separated a year later.
The Australian Grand Prix is being sued for $8.7 million after Robbie Williams was unable to perform at the 2020 race when it was cancelled at the last minute.

A day before Williams was due to take the stage, punters were told over megaphone the entire event would be cancelled due to Covid-19 concerns.

The British rock star, Miley Cyrus and The Veronica's were booked to perform at the 2020 Formula One, due to be held over four days in Melbourne in March.

The multi-million dollar event is held each year at Melbourne's Albert Park drawing in massive crowds but was cancelled two years in a row, in 2020 and 2021.

British pop star Robbie Williams is pictured with Aussie driver Daniel Ricciardo hours before his 2020 performance was cancelled and the race scrapped

A day before Williams (pictured on March 12, 2020) was due to take the stage, punters were told over megaphone the entire event would be cancelled due to Covid-19 concerns

World Tour Melbourne claims the snap cancellation was in breach of the Australian Grand Prix Corporation's obligations.

According to a writ filed in the Supreme Court last week, the touring agency demands $7.594 million for costs incurred and $1.128 million in lost profits.

Williams was paid $1.94 million to headline the first World Tour Melbourne concert event on March 14, but his show was cancelled as fans queued to enter on March 13.

Costs include the talent fee for Williams' performance. No fee is listed for Cyrus or support acts including Pete Murray and Seb Fontaine, but The Veronicas - who were due to perform as a support act on March 13 - received $3,125.

In the writ, the agency lists the cost of venue hire, sound and lighting, publicity, legal fees, and backstage catering amounting to $32,500.

World Tour Melbourne said it was only told the gig would be cancelled during a teleconference with the Australian Grand Prix and local touring partner Dainty just after midday on March 13.

The agency claims the notification came just a day before the event was due to begin and Williams was scheduled to take the stage.

Williams (pictured with his wife Ayda Williams in 2019) was paid $1.94 million to headline the first World Tour Melbourne concert event on March 14, 2020

According to a writ filed in the Supreme Court last week, the touring agency demands $7.594 million for costs incurred and $1.128 million in lost profits (pictured, fans gather outside the gates just hours before the event was cancelled)

According to the writ, it said the corporation was responsible for 'undertaking and facilitating the organisation, conduct, management and promotion of annual Formula One events at Albert Park'.

WTM is part owned by controversial Oscar winner Will Smith, who last week slapped host Chris Rock at the Oscars event in Los Angeles after the comedian made a remark about Smith's wife Jada Pinkett Smith's shaved head.

Pinkett Smith, who was diagnosed with alopecia in 2019, is also a part-owner.

Australian Grand Prix Corporation general manager of corporate affairs and communications Haydn Lane said as the matter was before the courts he would not be commenting.

Disappointed fans were refunded the $99 they paid for tickets to see the pop star.

The 2021 Formula One event was also cancelled due to ongoing logistical issues caused by the pandemic, after the race was pushed back from March to November.

F1 officials asked the Victorian Government if drivers and team members could be put into a strict quarantine bubble instead of having to complete the mandatory two-week stint in hotels due to racing schedules.

The multi-million dollar event is held each year at Melbourne's Albert Park drawing in massive crowds but was cancelled two years in a row, in 2020 and 2021 (pictured is the 2020 event)

Pictured is a press conference from Chase Carey, Andrew Westacott, Michael Masi and Paul Little is held at Albert Park after the 2020 Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix was cancelled

AGPC chairman Paul Little said at the time of the cancellation last July: 'We're deeply disappointed that for a second consecutive year, both MotoGP and Formula One fans won't be able to see the world's best riders and drivers compete at the wonderful Phillip Island and Albert Park Grand Prix Circuits.'

'We appreciate the challenge Australia faces with current international travel restrictions and the importance of vaccinations.'

The 2023 Formula One event will begin in Melbourne on Thursday with punters to be treated to performances from four Australian artists.

Tickets for the highly anticipated event, the first in two years since the pandemic hit, sold out 18 weeks before the race.

About 130,000 racegoers are expected to watch the action on Saturday and Sunday.
Dozens of gay and trans rights groups have pulled out of an LGBT conference hosted by the Government.

It follows anger at the exclusion of transgender people from plans to ban conversion therapy.

Last week the Government announced that it would go ahead with banning the cruel practice of attempting to turn gay people straight just hours after saying the move had been dropped. But ministers said the proposal would not ban attempts to change someones gender identity.

Sources said this was due to concerns that parents and teachers could find themselves in court for questioning a childs desire to change gender.

More than 80 groups have now withdrawn their support from the international conference, saying they will only participate if Boris Johnson reverts to his promise to include trans people in the ban.

The former Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams has written to the Prime Minister urging him to include trans people in the ban on conversion therapies

Terrence Higgins Trust issued a statement on behalf of 23 HIV groups, saying they will not support or attend the Safe To Be Me conference, scheduled for June and July.

It came as religious leaders, including former Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams, wrote to the Prime Minister urging him to include trans people in the ban.

LGBTQ+ rights charity Stonewall said the communitys trust in the Government was shattered and it was appalling that the PM would so casually walk away from four years of promises to the LGBTQ+ community.

The charity said: It is apparent that trans people have once again been sacrificed for political gain.

'Commissioning a separate body of work to unpick something that has already been resolved many times the world over can only be read as an attempt to kick the issue of protecting trans people into the long grass.

'This is callous and unacceptable.

Boris Johnson's government announced last week it would go ahead with banning the cruel practice of attempting to turn gay people straight just hours after saying the move had been dropped

The statement was shared by the LGBT+ Consortium, which has more than 500 members, and over 80 groups added their names to it.

A No10 spokesman said: The Prime Minister is committed to bringing forward legislation to ban conversion therapy. Recognising the complexity of issues and need for further careful thought, we will carry out separate work to consider the issue of transgender conversion therapy further.

This is a legally complex area and we have a responsibility to ensure unintended consequences are not written into legislation, particularly in the case of under-18s. Last night a Government source said the conference was likely to be cancelled.
Australia's corporate regulator has accused Macquarie Bank of failing to properly manage transactions made by a jailed conman who stole almost $3million.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has launched legal action in the Federal Court alleging Macquarie had failed to adequately monitor and control transactions by third parties, such as financial advisers, on their cash management accounts.

Macquarie Bank is accused of failing to manually check money movements via its bulk transaction system, after Australians with self-managed super funds were fleeced by a conman from Sydney's wealthy Upper North Shore.

ASIC alleged this oversight was exploited by Killara-based financial adviser Ross Andrew Hopkins, the director of QWL who was last year sentenced to six year's jail for making $2.9million in unauthorised withdrawals.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has launched legal action in the Federal Court alleging Macquarie had failed to adequately monitor and control transactions by third parties such as financial advisers on their cash management accounts (pictured is the foyer of its Sydney headquarters)

ASIC alleged this oversight was exploited by Killara-based financial adviser Ross Andrew Hopkins (pictured), the director of QWL who was last year sentenced to six year's jail for making $2.9million in unauthorised withdrawals

The corporate regulator's case relates to 13 clients of an independent financial adviser between 2016 and 2019 who pleaded guilty to fraud.

Macquarie in December agreed to reimbursed those clients $3.5million.

Macquarie released a statement on Tuesday pointing out it had co-operated with ASIC's investigation into its Cash Management Account third party fee authority.

'Macquarie treats the security of its clients' accounts with the utmost seriousness, and has continued to introduce new controls and processes to respond to the evolving external fraud environment,' it said.

ASIC deputy chair Sarah Court said Macquarie's failings had enabled Hopkins to use his fee authority to steal from his clients.

'Macquarie failed to properly detect and prevent these unauthorised fee transactions, many of which were over $10,000 each,' she said.

'Mr Hopkins' conduct is an example of what can go wrong when banks do not properly monitor their systems and implement appropriate processes.'

Macquarie Group's chief executive Shemara Wikramanayake in 2019 was Australia's highest paid corporate leader with an $18million remuneration package.

With a market capitalisation of $79billion, Macquarie Group is bigger than ANZ making it Australia's third bigger financial giant behind the Commonwealth Bank, NAB and Westpac.
The King of Swaziland has been accused of 'showing the middle finger' to his country's impoverished population after allegedly spending 13million on a fleet of luxury cars for his 14 wives.

King Mswati III has imported 19 Rolls-Royces and as many as 120 BMWs, according to reports, some of which were seen being delivered earlier this month.

Witnesses spotted BMW X3 and 5-Series models, which can cost more than 30,000 each, under wraps on the back of a truck as they were shipped from South Africa.

The average salary in Swaziland is estimated to be only 10,000 a year - meaning a typical worker would have to toil for 70 years to afford a Rolls-Royce - and the lavish spending has sparked outrage in the country.

Delivery: One of the fleet of Rolls-Royce cars which Swaziland's King Mswati III has reportedly bought for his 14 wives is seen on its way for delivery to the royal family

Wrapped up: A picture which circulated online showed cars being shipped from South Africa last week, apparently on their way to be delivered to the royal family

Absolute monarch: King Mswati III (pictured in Russia last month) renamed the country Eswatini in 2018 to mark his 50th birthday

Opposition politician Wandile Dludlu accused the King of continuing to 'spoil himself and his family,' according to TimesLive.

'To say this is a blatant display of arrogance and total disregard of the poor people of Swaziland's feelings by the monarch would be an understatement,' he said.

'He is basically showing them a middle finger and proving to all and sundry that he is a law unto himself.'

Investigative journalist Mzilikazi wa Afrika called it 'heartbreaking news' as he shared one of the pictures.

'Amidst all the economic challenges Eswatini, King Mswati III yesterday decided to bless his wives with very expensive wheels,' he said.

The King was accused of 'spoiling' his own family while the rest of the population 'continue starving', according to one Twitter user who said the monarch 'doesn't care much'.

Mswati III, who was educated for a time at Sherborne School in Dorset, renamed the country Eswatini in 2018 to mark his 50th birthday and the 50th anniversary of independence from Britain.

The monarch has 14 wives (after one reportedly died of skin cancer), more than 25 children and a reputation for lavish spending.

With unrestricted political power over his 1.3 million people, he is the only absolute monarch on the continent and one of the few remaining in the world.

Arrival: A red and white car is delivered to Swaziland where the King has been accused of 'showing the middle finger' to his country's impoverished population

One of the cars which King Mswati allegedly bought for the royal family - sparking outrage in the country

On the throne since 1986, Mswati has previously attracted controversy over his purchase of a 200million luxury jet.

According to one estimate, the average salary in the country is only 10,000 a year - meaning the King's typical subject would have to work for around 70 years and spend nothing else to be able to afford one of the Rolls-Royces he bought.

The World Food Programme estimates that 63 per cent of the country's population lives below the poverty line.

In addition, more than a quarter of people aged 15 to 49 are believed to be living with HIV.

According to NGOs, 10 percent of the population is responsible for around half of the nation's consumption.

The UK provided around 300,000 of foreign aid to the country last year, according to government figures.

In 2017, Minister of State for International Development, Alistair Burt, revealed Britain had provided 6.8million in aid to Swaziland since 1997.

Anger: The King was accused of 'spoiling' his own family while the rest of the population 'continue starving', according to one Twitter user who said the monarch 'doesn't care much'

Under cover: Witnesses spotted BMW X3 and 5-Series models, which cost more than 30,000 each, under wraps on the back of a truck as they were shipped from South Africa

Earlier this year, public service workers took to the streets of the capital Mbabane to demand higher pay.

Opposition leader Dludlu claimed that civil servants have not received a promised pay rise in three years while the country's health system is said to be on the verge of collapse.

'Notwithstanding the outrage of Swazis over the purchase of the Rolls Royce vehicles, the King Mswati-led government continued to rub salt into the gaping wound suffered by people by purchasing a further 120 BMWs and 30 motorbikes,' he said.

'We strongly condemn in the strongest possible terms this brazen looting of the oppressed people of Swaziland's hard earned taxes.'

Dludlu called on residents to 'stand up and face up to this evil regime that continues to keep us in bondage'.

He added: 'Under no circumstances can we allow one family to continuously condemn us to poverty. It is about time that we fight back and reclaim what rightfully belongs to us.'
A doting mum of three had mysteriously stashed a large bundle of cash in her handbag when she supposedly decided to take her own life.

Samantha Fraser's estranged husband Adrian Basham claims she was alive after he assaulted her on July 23, 2018 inside her Phillip Island home.

He has pleaded not guilty in the Supreme Court of Victoria to her murder.

On Monday, the jury was taken through traumatic evidence describing how police came to find the psychologist hanging from rails attached to the garage door of her parents' home.

Samantha Fraser told her new boyfriend in a text message the night before her death that she had been looking forward to her future

Adrian Basham has pleaded not guilty to murdering his estranged wife

Detective Sergeant Andrew Spooner told the court he found Ms Fraser bloody and bruised with a rope tied around her neck.

When he searched a car parked inside the garage he located a purse within a handbag containing $9,500. No explanation was offered as to why Ms Fraser had the money on the day she would die.

Sergeant Spooner had attended after local police expressed concerns about the crime scene.

Blood had been found splattered on the garage floor just below where Ms Fraser had been found hanging - her feet touching the ground.

Beside her was an overturned stepladder.

Dressed in a black singlet top, black pants and without shoes, Ms Fraser showed signs of a savage assault.

'I observed there was a rope tied around her neck with a large knot to the rear... her right cheek, eye area appeared to be swollen,' Sergeant Spooner said.

'Her hair appeared to be wet and some had fallen forward across her face. I observed a reddish purple mark running across her head from above her right eye.'

The detective noted dry blood around both Ms Fraser's nose and mouth.

In what would be deemed 'unusual' for a suicide, Sergeant Spooner spotted what he believed to be blood above and below the knot and smeared up the rope from which Ms Fraser was hanging.

Adrian Basham is accused of killing Samantha Fraser (pictured) inside her Phillip Island home in 2018

The Cowes home where Samantha Fraser was allegedly murdered in 2018

Samantha Fraser had been expected to pick-up her children from school, but never arrived

Forensic experts claim DNA profiles of three contributors were found on the surface of the knot of the noose used to hang Ms Fraser.

The DNA is said to be 100 billion times more likely to be Basham's than a person chosen randomly from the Caucasian population, the jury has heard.

More of Basham's alleged DNA was found under his ex-wife's fingernails.

Police had noted Basham had sustained a recent scratch on his nose when they had questioned him following the discovery of Ms Fraser's body.

Basham's barrister Ashley Halphen has told the jury his client did indeed assault Ms Fraser on the day she died, but he denied killing her.

'Mr Basham admits to causing those injuries. The issue, members of the jury, is then whether or not Mr Basham's actions went further and beyond causing those injuries,' he said.

'Did Samantha Fraser suicide? You will need to consider whether you can exclude suicide as a possibility. If you cannot, then you must return a verdict of not guilty.'

Basham, 45, had been captured on CCTV from a neighbour's home lurking about his ex-wife's home on the day she was allegedly murdered.

Crown prosecutors claim Basham assaulted his ex-wife before hanging her from the garage door in an attempt to make the alleged crime look like a suicide.

Her head injuries had been so severe that she had suffered a brain injury before she supposedly climbed a stepladder and took her own life.

There was no suicide note.

Samantha Fraser had been happy and relaxed the very day before she supposedly hanged herself from a garage door

Adrian Basham is accused of bashing and murdering his wife before attempting to make it look like a suicide

Ms Fraser had only a day earlier celebrated her 38th birthday with friends.

She had separated from Basham in 2017, with Ms Fraser taking out intervention orders against him as the relationship continued to sour.

Ms Fraser's friends had baked her a cake and later told police she had looked relaxed, happy and was looking ahead to the future.

Rebecca McFarlane told the jury her friend was 'content with where she was.'

The following day Ms Fraser took her children to school and stopped to enjoy a coffee with friends.

Alarm bells were raised that afternoon after her kids were left waiting at the school gate.

When police forced their way into her home, their worst fears were realised.

The jury has heard Basham had been hellbent on financially crippling Ms Fraser.

Peter Matthews had been friends with the couple up until their bitter separation.

Basham had taken-up a fly-in-fly-out position on a mining project on Barrow Island off the Western Australian coast for several years while still together with Ms Fraser.

'He talked about that he would cripple her financially and take the house and the savings and anything that was of value , which I felt really confronted and really alarmed by,' Mr Matthews told the court.

'He also talked and alluded to, oh, making her "pay in other ways", were his exact words.'

The trial continues.

1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732)

Lifeline 13 11 14
NASA is set to launch its first-ever space tourism mission to the International Space Station later this week.

The mission will see three amateur astronauts travel to the orbital observatory aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, which will lift off from Florida's Kennedy Space Center at 12:05 ET (17:05 BST) on Wednesday, April 6.

Canadian investor and philanthropist Mark Pathy, US entrepreneur Larry Connor, and ex-Israeli Air Force pilot Eytan Stibbe have reportedly paid a whopping $55 million (41 million) each for the trip.

The trio will spend eight days at the space station, where they will conduct 'scientific research, outreach, and commercial activities', according to the US space agency.

Former NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria will serve as commander on the Axiom Mission 1 (Ax-1), which will see the crew devote roughly a tenth of their time (100 hours) to science, medical and tech investigations.

NASA is set to launch its first-ever space tourism mission to the International Space Station later this week. Canadian investor Mark Pathy (middle, right), US entrepreneur Larry Connor (left), and ex-Israeli Air Force pilot Eytan Stibbe (right) have reportedly paid $55 million each

Former NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria (pictured second from the left) will serve as commander on the Axiom Mission 1 (Ax-1), which will see the crew devote roughly a tenth of their time (100 hours) to science, medical and tech investigations

EXAMPLES OF AX-1 MISSION RESEARCH Larry Connor, Ax-1 mission pilot, entrepreneur, and non-profit activist investor, has a number of projects in collaboration with the Mayo Clinic. Connors experiments on behalf of Mayo Clinic would provide data on space travels impact on senescent cells and heart health. Connor is expected to be in charge of maintaining senescent cells  cells that have stopped dividing  at the ISS. These cells are linked to multiple age-related diseases, and understanding them can help protect astronauts on long-haul trips to Mars. Mark Pathy, Ax-1 mission specialist, is working on behalf of The Montreal Childrens Hospital, Canadian Research Universities and The Royal Canadian Geographical Society. He is working with six Canadian universities, as well as two startups on 'proof of concept' ideas. This includes the worlds first in-space demonstration of two-way holoportation  a mixed reality app for special lenses that receives two-way 3D projections as a hologram to communicate between users remotely. In addition to human research, Pathy plans to lead Earth observation activities which will contribute to further analysis of the impact of climate change, urbanization, and other factors on the ecology and human habitation of North America. Eytan Stibbe, Ax-1 mission specialist, social impact investor, and Israeli philanthropist, is working on behalf of the Ramon Foundation. His mission is named "Rakia," after the dome (atmosphere) created by God on the second day after the firmament, which protects life on Earth. During his mission, he will facilitate scientific experiments and will conduct educational and artistic activities to connect the younger generation in Israel and around the globe on the values of peace, innovation, and social responsibility. For the first time, an astronaut will represent Israelis on the International Space Station in Hebrew. Advertisement

The trip, carried out in partnership with the commercial spaceflight company Axiom Space, will be the first all-private mission to the International Space Station (ISS).

So far, Russia has sent seven self-funded tourists to space in partnership with the US-based company Space Adventures.

Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa along with his assistant Yozo Hirano became the latest to do so when they had a 12-day stay on the ISS at the end of last year.

Their trip came at the end of a groundbreaking year for space tourism which saw Elon Musk's SpaceX take the first ever all-civilian crew in a three-day journey orbiting the earth, while competitor Blue Origin  owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos  also completed two missions beyond the Earth's atmosphere.

Pathy, Connor and Stibbe have taken part in hundreds of hours of training ahead of their upcoming launch on a Falcon 9 rocket, including test driving the Dragon spacecraft.

Connor will serve as pilot, with Pathy and Stibbe working as mission specialists during the day-long trip to the station.

Axiom Space has aspirations to build a commercial space station in low-Earth orbit once NASA retires the ISS in 2031.

The Houston-based company wants to launch a private module to the ISS in 2024 to start building on that goal.

'For us, it [Ax-1] really is the first of a series of flights precursor missions before our station comes to orbit,' said Michael Suffredini, Axiom's president and CEO and NASA's former International Space Station program manager from 2005 to 2015.

'The first module will come into orbit in the latter part of 2024, and so this really is paving a way for a new era where there are more and more opportunities for individuals and nations around the world to live and work in the microgravity environment.'

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos also has a vision for a business park in space, which would see his Blue Origin company build the Orbital Reef station in partnership with several other companies, including Boeing and Sierra Space.

The Ax-1 crew have been training at the NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, and other NASA facilities, since August 2021.

This training has allowed them to become familiar with the ISS systems, scientific facilities on board and emergency procedures.

As well as training with NASA, the four have been working with the European Space Agency (ESA) and SpaceX at its Hawthorne, California facility.

The SpaceX training has allowed them to become familiar with the operation of the Crew Dragon capsule, which will take them to the station and back.

NASA started working with the Axiom mission operations team on simulations in December to get a feel for how the first all civilian crew on the ISS would operate.

This work allowed ground control for NASA and Axiom to familiarise themselves 'with the dynamic phases of the private astronauts' flight to and from the space station.'

The US space agency confirmed that it would continue these joint simulations through the next few months, in preparation for launch.

'This represents another significant milestone in our efforts to create a low-Earth orbit economy,' said Phil McAlister, director of commercial spaceflight at NASA.

'I wish these Axiom crew members safe travels, and I hope they find their time in space productive and enjoyable.'

Expedition 1 was the first launch of astronauts to the space station on November 2, 2000. The ISS has been continuously occupied since then.

Lopez-Alegria (left) will serve as the commander of the mission and Connor (right) as pilot

Stibbe (left) and Pathy (right) will work as mission specialists during the day-long trip to the ISS

Axiom Space, the private space company developing its own module for the ISS, will operate the trip, sending the four to the station on a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule

PREVIOUS SPACE TOURISM FLIGHTS Canadian investor Mark Pathy, US entrepreneur Larry Connor, and ex-Israeli Air Force pilot Eytan Stibbe are the first would-be spaceflight crew comprised entirely of private citizens in a mission to the International Space Station. So far, Russia has sent seven self-funded tourists to space in partnership with the US-based company Space Adventures. Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa along with his assistant Yozo Hirano became the latest to do so when they had a 12-day stay on the International Space Station at the end of last year. Their trip came at the end of a groundbreaking year for space tourism which saw Elon Musk's SpaceX take the first ever all-civilian crew in a three-day journey orbiting the earth, while competitor Blue Origin  owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos  also completed two missions beyond the Earth's atmosphere. Advertisement

That first crew of three included NASA commander William Shepherd, alongside cosmonauts Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei K. Krikalev.

Axiom has also revealed that the astronauts will be taking technology built by Israeli company, Aleph Farms, to the station.

This technology involves turning cells taken from a cow into raw meat by growing the cells and turning them into muscle, fat and other components.

'Aleph's general goal is to be able to provide nutritious, tasty, sustainable food anywhere, anytime,' said Zvika Tamari, the head of space research, adding that ' stretching that to its limit is the ability to also provide nutrition in space.'

In terms of outreach, an ancient coin minted by Jewish rebels revolting against the Romans 1,900 years ago will accompany former Israeli pilot Stibbe to the ISS.

The coin comes from the Bar Kokhba revolt, which took place from 132 to 136 AD and was the final of three Jewish-Roman wars that first began when Romans took control of Jerusalem in 63 AD.

It bears etchings of a palm tree on one side and a vine leaf with the inscription 'Year Two of the liberty of Israel' on the other.'

NASA recently announced the ISS had just nine years of operational life left, with plans to sink it in the South Pacific Ocean in January 2031.

On the run up to that happening, the space agency plans to support commercial operators in launching privately funded and run space stations, starting with an Axiom Space module attached to the ISS.

Stibbe (left) will be joined by Larry Connor (right) and Mark Pathy (second right), and led by retired NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria (second left), who has travelled to space four times and is now the vice president of Aximo Space

This launch is a precursor to that module, which is expected to dock with the station by the middle of this decade, part of NASA's efforts to built a robust low-Earth orbit economy  driven by the private sector, rather than national players.

Axiom recently completed the preliminary design review of two modules that will be attached to the ISS this decade, then separate into its own free-flying station.

For more than 21 years, NASA has supported a continuous US human presence in low-Earth orbit aboard the space station.

'The agency's goal is to enable a strong, commercial marketplace in low-Earth orbit with private industry where NASA is one of many customers,' a spokesperson said.

'This strategy will provide services the government needs at a lower cost, enabling the agency to focus on its Artemis missions to the Moon in preparation for Mars while continuing to use low-Earth orbit as a training and proving ground for those deep space missions.'
Advertisement

The idea of getting stranded in extreme Arctic conditions is enough to fill even the bravest adventurers with dread.

But a new emergency shelter could make surviving in sub-zero temperatures much easier.

A team of students from the Royal Danish Academy have developed a pop-up igloo inspired by polar bears, with an origami 'skin' to trap snow and use it as a natural insulator.

'Inspired by local flora, fauna, snow caves, and the traditional Inuit igloos, snow is considered a building material rather than a burden,' the team explained.

During tests in Alaska, the designers showed that with up to 15 inches (400mm) of snow, the emergency shelter could maintain an average of 37C (66.6F) difference between inside and outside, compared to a conventional winter tent which offered a 13C (23.4F) difference.

A team of students from the Royal Danish Academy has developed a pop-up igloo inspired by polar bears, with an origami 'skin' to trap snow and use it as a natural insulator

During tests in Alaska, the designers showed that with up to 15 inches (400mm) of snow, the emergency shelter could maintain an average of 37C (66.6F) difference between inside and outside, compared to a conventional winter tent which offered a 13C (23.4F) difference

Inspired by polar bears The team took inspiration from polar bears, who retain body heat within their fur coat with hollow fibre hairs. In the same way, the mylar material incorporated on the inside of the origami skin reflects the heat back into the space, keeping anyone inside the tent warm. While you might worry that the tent would struggle to remain intact during blizzard-like conditions, the researchers reassure that it can withstand the weight of 154lbs (70kg) human standing on top. 'The internal fiberglass lattice structure is connected and deploys simultaneously with the origami outer shell,' the said. 'The lightweight and structural optimized lattice has been put to the test  withstanding the weight of a 70kg human standing on top.' Advertisement

The pop-up igloo was recently awarded Winner Of The Year at the Design Educates Awards in the Product Design category.

In the description, the team, led by Henry Glogau and Samuel Barratt, explained the inspiration behind their design.

'What would you do if you found yourself in extreme arctic conditions?' they said.

'Lost with little visibility, no cell phone coverage and sub-zero temperatures. Hypothermia is a serious threat, and help could be hours away.

'Cold extreme environments are hostile, with conditions often unpredictable and uncontrollable.

'This project proposes an alternative shelter design, which looks to harness extreme conditions to its advantage, rather than fight against them.'

The tent is made from a mylar material, and features an origami-like design, which helps to anchor the tent and to keep the inside warm.

'In strong winds the aerodynamic water droplet form naturally anchors the shelter to the ground while dispersing wind forces,' the team explained.

'At micro scale, local level turbulence is created within the origami pockets, encouraging snow to naturally build up in blizzard like situations, thereby creating a natural insulation and protection layer.'

The team took inspiration from polar bears, who retain body heat within their fur coat with hollow fibre hairs.

In the future, the emergency shelters could be positioned along checkpoints and hiking routes, where they could be deployed in seconds when needed

The team took inspiration from polar bears, who retain body heat within their fur coat with hollow fibre hairs. In the same way, the mylar material incorporated on the inside of the origami skin reflects the heat back into the space, keeping anyone inside the tent warm

In the same way, the mylar material incorporated on the inside of the origami skin reflects the heat back into the space, keeping anyone inside the tent warm.

While you might worry that the tent would struggle to remain intact during blizzard-like conditions, the researchers reassure that it can withstand the weight of a 154lb (70kg) human standing on top.

'The internal fiberglass lattice structure is connected and deploys simultaneously with the origami outer shell,' the said.

While you might worry that the tent would struggle to remain intact during blizzard-like conditions, the researchers reassure that it can withstand the weight of 154lbs (70kg) human standing on top

'The lightweight and structural optimized lattice has been put to the test  withstanding the weight of a 70kg human standing on top.'

To test the tent - the price of which remains unclear - the team put it through rigorous testing over a one-month period in Alaska.

The results indicated that with 11.8 to 15 inches (300 to 400mm) of snow cover, an average of 37C (66.6F) difference between inside and outside could be maintained.

For comparison, conventional winter tents offer a 13C (23.4F) difference, according to the team.

In the future, the emergency shelters could be positioned along checkpoints and hiking routes, where they could be deployed in seconds when needed.
Advertisement

A spectacular aurora borealis triggered by giant 'cannibal' solar eruption that hurtled towards Earth at 1.8 million miles an hour has thrilled stargazers in Scotland and North America.

New photos from the public show the natural light display in green and pink hues over Loch Lomond in Scotland, rural Canada and North Dakota.

According to the Met Office, a coronal mass ejection (CME)  a massive expulsion of plasma from the Sun's outermost layer  was responsible for the display last week, from March 30 to April 1.

But this was no ordinary coronal mass ejection  this was a 'cannibal' coronal mass ejection, which is described as 'the most violent form of interaction between CMEs' by NASA.

When a slow CME is expelled before a fast one from the same general region on the Sun, the fast CME simply 'gobbles up' the slow one, resulting in one big ejection from the sun.

One photographer, David Gilliver, from Gartcosh, North Lanarkshire, captured the aurora over Loch Lomond near Glasgow as a flash of brilliant fluorescent green over the loch's surrounding highlands on March 30.

Mr Gilliver said: 'The lights were barely visible to the naked eye when I arrived at Duck Bay Marina next to Loch Lomond  I could just make out a vague green hue in the sky.

'I set my camera rolling straight away and was so excited when I started to see the northern lights appearing in the resulting exposures.

Scroll down for video

A stunning long exposure photographs show the Northern Lights shining behind mountains and illuminating a Scottish loch on March 30

Another long exposure shot taken by Mr Gilliver. Long exposures keep the shutter open for a longer period of time, creating a blurring effect to indicate motion

AURORA: A STUNNING NATURAL DISPLAY The Northern and Southern Lights are natural light spectacles triggered in our atmosphere that are also known as the 'auroras'. There are two types of aurora: aurora Borealis, which means 'dawn of the north', and aurora australis, 'dawn of the south.' The displays light up when electrically charged particles from the sun enter the Earth's atmosphere. Usually the particles, sometimes referred to as a solar storm, are deflected by Earth's magnetic field. But during stronger storms they enter the atmosphere and collide with gas particles, including hydrogen and helium. These collisions emit light. Auroral displays appear in many colours although pale green and pink are common. Advertisement

Mr Gilliver went out after dark to capture the phenomenon around 11:30pm with his Canon 5D Mark III and Canon 24mm prime lens.

He stayed outside for two hours to witness the aurora and take his photo with a 25-second exposure, which helps emphasise movement of an object in a still photograph.

'I have only witnessed them twice before and didn't have my camera gear with me on one of those occasions, and so I was really excited to discover that the northern lights were going to be pretty active this week,' he said.

'It is one of the most exciting moments I have experienced as a photographer!'

Time-lapse footage and photos also show the aurora borealis over a rural cabin in central Saskatchewan, Canada, as captured on March 30 by photographer Jenny Hagan.

'Just south of the small village of Laporte ... I set up by an old 1950s abandoned farm house,' Hagan told Space.com.

'Sights like these are plentiful here in rural Saskatchewan, the land of the living sky, and the relics of the past offer up great foreground for the wide open views of our sky.'

Another time-lapse video also shows a view of the aurora as captured by Kelsey Byre in Grafton, North Dakota.

Mrs Byre captured the green lights over the horizon near her home on April 1 and posted the five-hour time-lapse to Instagram.

In the US, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration had issued a G3 warning for March 31, referring to a 'strong' geomagnetic storm, but said there would be 'continuing, but weakening, CME influences' up to April 1.

The Met Office said the coronal mass ejections (CMEs) were launched from the Sun on March 28, and that solar activity had been 'at high levels over the past 24 hours'.

The aurora borealis pictured here over a rural cabin in central Saskatchewan, Canada, taken on March 30 by photographer Jenny Hagan

Auroras happen when electrically charged particles from the sun enter the Earth's atmosphere. Usually the particles are deflected by Earth's magnetic field. But during stronger storms they enter the atmosphere and collide with gas particles, including hydrogen and helium. These collisions emit light. Auroral displays appear in many colours although pale green and pink are common

WHAT IS A 'CANNIBAL' SOLAR ERUPTION? Sunspots are areas on the sun's surface where powerful magnetic fields, created by the flow of electrical charges, become tangled and eventually release a huge explosion of energy that results in a solar flare. Cannibal coronal mass ejections (CMEs) happen when fast-moving solar eruptions overtake earlier eruptions in the same region of space, forming a huge wavefront that triggers a powerful geomagnetic storm. CMEs usually take around 15 to 18 hours to reach Earth. Advertisement

In the Earth's north, the Northern Lights are officially known as the aurora borealis and in the south it is called the aurora australis.

The light display is created by disturbances in Earth's magnetosphere caused by solar events, usually concentrated around the Earth's magnetic poles.

As well as CMEs, such solar events include solar flares  explosions on the Sun that happens when energy stored in 'twisted' magnetic fields is released.

NASA explains: 'There are many kinds of eruptions on the sun. Solar flares and coronal mass ejections both involve gigantic explosions of energy, but are otherwise quite different.

'The two phenomena do sometimes occur at the same time  indeed the strongest flares are almost always correlated with coronal mass ejections  but they emit different things, they look and travel differently, and they have different effects near planets.'

Particles from the solar events can travel millions of miles, and some may eventually collide with the Earth.

According to Royal Museums Greenwich, most of the particles are deflected, but some become captured in the Earth's magnetic field.

They're accelerated down towards the north and south poles into the atmosphere  which is why an aurora best seen when nearer the magnetic poles.

The stunning display of lights we see in the night sky, both in the northern and southern hemispheres, are caused by wild activity on the surface of the Sun

SOLAR FLARES AND CMEs A solar flare is a tremendous explosion on the Sun that happens when energy stored in 'twisted' magnetic fields (usually above sunspots) is suddenly released. In a matter of just a few minutes they heat material to many millions of degrees and produce a burst of radiation across the electromagnetic spectrum, including from radio waves to x-rays and gamma rays. Solar flares are different to 'coronal mass ejections' (CMEs), which were once thought to be initiated by solar flares. CMEs are huge bubbles of gas threaded with magnetic field lines that are ejected from the Sun over the course of several hours. Advertisement

'These particles then slam into atoms and molecules in the Earth's atmosphere and essentially heat them up,' said Royal Observatory astronomer Tom Kerss.

'We call this physical process "excitation", but it's very much like heating a gas and making it glow.'

The aurora has fascinated Earthlings for centuries, but the science behind it has not always been understood.

Earth has an invisible forcefield, the magnetosphere, that protects us from dangerous charged particles from the Sun.

The magnetosphere is the area around Earth controlled by the planet's magnetic field.

Science expert Marty Jopson explains: 'Whilst it shelters us, it also creates one of the most impressive phenomena on Earth  the Northern Lights.'

'When the deadly solar winds meet Earth's magnetosphere, some of the charged particles get trapped, and are propelled down the Earth's magnetic field lines straight towards the poles.

'And when they reach Earth, they strike atoms and molecules in our atmosphere, releasing energy in the form of light.'

The problem is disruption to our magnetic field creates solar storms that can affect satellites in orbit, navigation systems, terrestrial power grids and data and communication networks.

'Harmful space weather has affected Earth before, but as we become increasingly reliant on systems and technologies vulnerable to the Sun's outbursts, future solar impacts could be even more disruptive,' says the European Space Agency (ESA).
When it comes to mesmerising images of space, we're more accustomed to those taken by astronauts, probes or iconic telescopes such as Hubble.

But a fascinating new picture, which was actually taken by a photographer back on Earth, has captured astronauts performing a spacewalk outside the International Space Station (ISS).

The photo, taken by award-winning German photographer Sebastian Voltmer, is believed to be the first ground-based image of two ISS astronauts spacewalking.

Fascinating: A new picture, which was actually taken by a photographer back on Earth, has captured astronauts performing a spacewalk outside the International Space Station

The photo, taken by award-winning German photographer Sebastian Voltmer, is believed to be the first ground-based image of two ISS astronauts spacewalking

He captured American astronaut Raja Chari and German Matthias Maurer while they were carrying out a six-hour spacewalk to install a camera and conduct maintenance and upgrades.

What made it even more fitting was that it was taken from Maurer's hometown of Sankt Wendel in Germany.

Voltmer, whose astrophotography has been featured in exhibitions at the Smithsonian in Washington, DC and the Carl Zeiss Planetarium in Stuttgart, called the picture a 'once in a lifetime image'.

Sharing the photo on Twitter last month, he wrote: 'Yesterday I witnessed the #spacewalk shortly after sunset. Here comes a first photo.

'#ESA #astronaut Matthias Maurer was just "climbing" at this moment. The rod-shaped structure (Canadarm2) is the robot arm. Greetings from Matthias Maurer's hometown  it was very exciting. #iss.'

Voltmer said that when he took the photo, he quickly showed German media how it had captured Maurer, and it went viral.

Voltmer captured American astronaut Raja Chari and German Matthias Maurer while they were carrying out a six-hour spacewalk to install a camera and conduct maintenance and upgrades

What made it even more fitting was that the image was taken from Maurer's hometown of Sankt Wendel in Germany

Although Voltmer's image is believed to be the first ground-based picture of two ISS astronauts spacewalking, in 2011 amateur photographer Ralph Vandebergh did also capture images of American astronaut Steve Bowen during a spacewalk (pictured)

'This image of the ISS pass was taken on 23 March 2022, under good seeing conditions through my C11 EdgeHD telescope from the hometown of ESA astronaut Dr Matthias Maurer,' Voltmer told Spaceweather.com.

'I feel like I just made a once in a lifetime image.

'It's probably the first ground-based picture showing two spacewalkers on the ISS at the same time.'

Although Voltmer's image is believed to be the first ground-based picture of two ISS astronauts spacewalking, in 2011 amateur photographer Ralph Vandebergh did also capture images of American astronaut Steve Bowen during a spacewalk.

Vandebergh was on the Canadarm 2 robotic arm in that image.

Voltmer initially only spotted Maurer in his photo but after taking a bit more time to analyse it, with the help of another well-known photographer Phillip Smith, he saw that Chari was visible too, perched on the Canadarm 2.

Voltmer used a Celestron 11-inch EdgeHD telescope on a GM2000 HPS mount and an ASI290 planetary camera to get the shot.

More of his images can be seen on his Instagram account here.
NASA will reattempt the 'wet dress rehearsal' of its 365ft moon megarocket today, having been forced to call off yesterday's test amid technical glitches and stormy conditions.

The enormous Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, which is at Pad 39B of NASA's Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, was initially given the go-ahead at 06:45 EDT (11:45am BST) yesterday morning.

However, the test was called off at 12:06 EDT (17:06 BST) following a technical glitch, which meant the mobile launcher couldn't be pressurised.

'The fans are needed to provide positive pressure to the enclosed areas within the mobile launcher and keep out hazardous gases,' NASA explained.

'Technicians are unable to safely proceed with loading the propellants into the rocket's core stage and interim cryogenic propulsion stage without this capability.'

Meanwhile, four lightning strikes were detected near the launch pad, including one that was particularly strong. Thankfully, none of them struck the SLS rocket.

There's not long to wait to see SLS in action again, with a new test targeted for 14:40 EDT (19:40 BST) today.

Yesterday's test was called off at 12:06 EDT (17:06 BST) following a technical glitch, which meant the mobile launcher couldn't be pressurised

Nasa's Space Launch System: The largest rocket ever made Space Launch System, or SLS, is a launch vehicle that NASA hopes will take its astronauts back to the moon and beyond. The rocket will have an initial lift configuration, set to launch in the early-2020's, followed by an upgraded 'evolved lift capability' that can carry heavier payloads. Space Launch System Initial Lift Capability - Maiden flight: Mid-2020's - Height: 311 feet (98 metres) - Lift: 70 metric tons - Weight: 2.5 million kilograms (5.5 million lbs) Space Launch System Evolved Lift Capability - Maiden flight: Unknown - Height: 384 feet (117 metres) - Lift: 130 metric tons - Weight: 2.9 million kilograms (6.5 million lbs) Advertisement

During a teleconference last night, Mike Sarafin, Artemis I mission manager and Charlie Blackwell-Thompson, Artemis launch director said that teams are continuing to troubleshoot the issue with the fans.

An update is expected later this morning on whether the 14:40 EDT (19:40 BST) test is still on track.

'The Space Launch System (SLS) core stage, interim cryogenic propulsion stage, and Orion spacecraft will remain powered up overnight,' NASA explained in a blog last night.

'The SLS boosters will be powered down, and then powered up again Sunday morning. Teams will work through the night and into the morning to complete necessary preparations ahead of loading propellants into the rocket.'

The test will be the first full 'wet dress rehearsal,' where NASA will conduct a series of final prelaunch tests, including loading the SLS propellant tanks and conducting a launch countdown under similar circumstances to the real launch later in the year.

It provides engineers and officials with a host of information on how the rocket performs, how procedures play out, and informs the decision on when to launch.

The name, wet dress rehearsal, comes from the fact the tests are primarily designed to show that the rocket can be loaded with super-cold liquid propellants.

'The wet dress rehearsal will be the final major test for the Artemis I mission and will ensure the rocket, spacecraft, ground equipment and launch team are "go" for launch,' NASA explained.

Atop the massive Space Launch System rocket is the Orion capsule, which will take the first woman and first person of colour to the moon some time after 2025.

NASA expects the official Artemis I launch, the first involving SLS and Orion, to happen anytime from the end of May to mid-July - depending on the rehearsal.

Space Launch System, or SLS, is a launch vehicle that NASA hopes will take its astronauts back to the moon and beyond

'We continue to evaluate the May window, but we're also recognising that there's a lot of work in front of us,' said Tom Whitmeyer, NASA Deputy Associate Administrator, with responsibility for exploration systems development.

That work includes analysing the data from the wet dress rehearsal.

'During the test at the launch pad, engineers will be on duty in the Launch Control Center and in other stations where they will work during the Artemis I launch,' NASA explained in a blog post about the wet dress rehearsal.

Atop the massive Space Launch System rocket is the Orion capsule, which will take the first woman and first person of colour to the moon some time after 2025

NASA expects the official Artemis I launch, the first involving SLS and Orion, to happen anytime from the end of May to mid-July - depending on the rehearsal

'They will capture as much data as possible on the performance of all the systems that are part of SLS and the Orion spacecraft as well as the Kennedy ground systems.'

After the wet dress rehearsal, the combination of Orion and SLS will stay on Pad 39B for about a month, before rolling back into the hanger for more analysis.

While it is the first mission for the massive Space Launch System rocket engine, it will be the second for the Orion capsule, which was involved in a test flight in December 2014, going to space on a ULA Delta IV Heavy.

When it launches, Orion won't have any crew on board, despite being able to hold up to four astronauts. Instead, it will carry dummies to the moon and back.

These are designed to replicate human weight and give scientists and engineers and insight into flight performance, without putting humans at risk.

The Artemis I mission will see the Orion spacecraft, the SLS and the ground systems at Kennedy combine to launch the Orion 280,000 miles past Earth around the moon over the course of a three-week mission.

If Artemis I is a success, then NASA will send Artemis II on a trip around the moon, this time with a human crew on board.

The Artemis II mission plans to send four astronauts in the first crewed Orion capsule into a lunar flyby for a maximum of 21 days.
A large piece of space debris that crashed down in rural India over the weekend may be from a Chinese rocket that was launched last year, experts believe.

The metal ring  reportedly 6.5-10 feet (2 to 3 metres) in diameter and weighing over 90lb (40kg)  was discovered in a village field in Maharashtra state late on Saturday.

There were no reports of injuries or structural damage.

'We were preparing a community feast, when the sky blazed with the red disc which fell with a bang on an open plot in the village,' an unnamed woman in Maharashtra's Chandrapur district told The Times of India.

'People ran to their home fearing (an) explosion and remained inside for nearly half an hour.'

Another object  a large, metal ball around half a metre (1.5 feet) in diameter  fell in another village in the district, district collector Ajay Gulhane told the Press Trust of India.

A large piece of space debris (pictured) that crashed down in rural India over the weekend may be from a Chinese rocket that was launched last year, experts believe

The metal ring  reportedly 6.5-10 feet (2 to 3 metres) in diameter and weighing over 90lb (40kg)  was discovered in a village field in Maharashtra state late on Saturday

He added: 'It has been collected for examination. We had sent (junior officials) to every village in the district to find if more parts of objects, if any, are lying scattered.'

An Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) official told the Times that the timing of the objects' arrival was the 'closest match' to the re-entry times on Saturday for debris from a Chinese rocket launched in February 2021.

'When rocket bodies survive atmospheric re-entry, the rocket parts such as nozzles, rings and tanks can impact on Earth,' another ISRO official said.

Astronomer Jonathan McDowell, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, tweeted that the ring was consistent with a piece of China's Long March 3B rocket.

Objects generate immense amounts of heat and friction when they enter the atmosphere, which can cause them to burn up and disintegrate, but larger ones may not be destroyed entirely.

Their wreckage can land on the surface of the planet and may cause damage and casualties, though that risk is low.

Astronomer Jonathan McDowell, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, tweeted that the ring was consistent with a piece of China's Long March 3B rocket (pictured)

McDowell said the ring was 'consistent with being part of the CZ-3B third stage tankage'

In 2020, debris from another Chinese Long March rocket fell on villages in the Ivory Coast, causing structural damage but no injuries or deaths.

The latest incident comes a month after a discarded rocket that was believed to belong to China crashed into the moon's far side.

The three-tonne piece of space junk is believed to have left a massive crater in the lunar surface on March 4.

Astronomers first thought the rocket part had been launched by Elon Musk's SpaceX in 2015, before changing their mind and saying it was Chinese, something Beijing denied.

It was the first time that a piece of space junk had accidentally struck the lunar surface.
Some species of birds living in a protected rainforest in Panama have declined by 90 per cent in more than 40 years, a shock new study reveals.

Researchers have studied long-term bird population numbers at Parque Nacional Soberania, a 55,000-acre national park about 15 miles from Panama City.

Data was taken from annual bird surveys at the national park by University of Illinois researchers between 1977 and 2020.

Out of 57 bird species, they found 35 have seen numbers decline by half or more, while nine species have declined by 90 per cent or more.

The researchers can't definitively point to causes for the declines, but they've called it 'a concerning trend'.

Possible explanations  such as changing amounts of rainfall, food availability and reproductive rates  may be tied to climate change, they say.

Over a 44-year study, University of Illinois researchers observed significant declines in common tropical bird species, including the Ocellated antbird (Phaenostictus mcleannani, pictured), in a protected area in Panama's Parque Nacional Soberania

Panama's Parque Nacional Soberania is around 15 miles from the country's capital, Panama City

KEY FINDINGS Over 44 years, researchers gathered sufficient data to track 57 bird species. The researchers noted declines in 40 species, or 70 per cent. Out of the 57 species, 35 (61 per cent) have numbers that have fallen by half or more. Nine species (15 per cent) declined by 90 per cent or more. Only two species (3.5 per cent) increased over the 44-year period. Advertisement

'It was very surprising,' said study author Henry Pollock at the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences (NRES) of the University of Illinois.

'Many of these are species you would expect to be doing fine in a 22,000-hectare national park that has experienced no major land use change for at least 50 years.'

Co-author Jeff Brawn, who has investigated birds at Parque Nacional Soberania for more than 30 years, called the findings 'concerning'.

'This is one of the longest, if not the longest, study of its kind in the Neotropics,' Brawn said.

'Of course, it's only one park. We can't necessarily generalise to the whole region and say the sky is falling, but it's quite concerning.'

The team say that the decline is most pronounced for 'edge species'  those that specialise in transition zones between open and closed-canopy forest.

Birds that migrate to high elevations require some degree of forest connectivity to be successful, but forest in Panama  like most places  became increasingly fragmented in the last several decades.

About 40 years ago, a paved access road cut through the site, which created the ideal habitat for edge species that like openings in the forest canopy.

But over time, the road stopped being maintained and has since turned into a small gravel road and the forest canopy filled in overhead.

Overall, edge species were hardest hit, most declining by 90 per cent or more.

Parque Nacional Soberania (pictured) is located around 15 miles from downtown Panama City

Silhouetted Panama City at dawn from across the rainforest of Soberania national park, Panama

It was back in 1977 that a University of Illinois faculty member initiated the twice-yearly bird sampling effort.

Since then, researchers have gone to park every year to set up mist nets in the rainy and dry seasons to capture birds.

Mist nets gently entangle birds, allowing the team to carefully pluck them out, identify, measure and band them, and then release them unharmed.

Over 44 years and more than 84,000 sampling hours, the researchers captured more than 15,000 unique birds representing nearly 150 species.

They gathered sufficient data to track 57 of those species.

After studying the 44 years of data, the researchers noted declines in 40 species (70 per cent), while 35 species lost at least half of their initial numbers.

Only two species  a hummingbird and a puffbird  increased.

Recently, even just capturing birds in the park has become more of a challenge, the team claim.

The white-flanked antwren (Myrmotherula axillaris), a species found throughout the entire Amazon Basin

The long-billed hermit (Phaethornis longirostris), which visits a variety of flowering plants for nectar

'At the beginning of the study in 1977, we'd catch 10 or 15 of many species,' said Pollock. 'And then by 2020, for a lot of species, that would be down to five or six individuals.'

The researchers are reluctant to generalise their results beyond Parque Nacional Soberania to the rest of the South American region.

'Right now, this is really the only window we have into what's going on in tropical bird populations,' Pollock said.

'Our results beg the question of whether this is happening across the region, but unfortunately we can't answer that.

'Instead, our study highlights the lack of data in the tropics and how important these long-term studies are.'

The plain xenops (Xenops minutus). This species is often difficult to see as it forages for insects, including the larvae of wood-boring beetles, on bark, rotting stumps or bare twigs

The spotted antbird (Hylophylax naevioides), found in Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama

Loss of birds from any habitat can threaten the integrity of the entire ecosystem, according to the researchers.

In the South American region, these birds are key seed dispersers, pollinators and insect consumers.

Fewer birds could threaten tree reproduction and regeneration, impacting the entire structure of the forest, a pattern shown elsewhere after major bird declines, according to a 2017 study.

'Almost half the world's birds are in the Neotropics, but we really don't have a good handle on the trajectories of their populations,' said Brawn.

'So, I think it's very important more ecological studies be done where we can establish trends and mechanisms of decline in these populations. And we need to do it damn quick.'

Researchers haven't looked at the impacts or the underlying causes of the declines yet, although this could be the focus of future studies.

The new paper has been published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Africa Women Innovation and Entrepreneurship Forum (AWIEF) in partnership with USAID Southern Africa Trade and Investment Hub (USAID TradeHub) is proud to launch a new program which will increase the investor, export readiness and competitiveness of 100 SMEs in Southern Africa.

The USAID funded Enhanced Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs) Investment and Export Readiness Through a Digital Platform program is aimed at SMEs in Angola, Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, and Zambia who are either already exporting or interested in exporting products to South Africa and/or to the United States.

The program aims to leverage the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), a United States Trade Act that significantly enhances market access to the US for qualifying Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries, and valid until 2025, to drive export trade for the SMEs.

The objectives of this new AWIEF program are to: (a) increase exports from the Southern African countries to South Africa; (b) increase exports from all the nine targeted Southern African countries to the US, leveraging AGOA; and (c) support firms seeking specific trade-related technology transfer (e.g. labelling, branding, laboratories).

The comprehensive 8-week program will help strengthen participants governance, regulatory compliance, and risk management capabilities and will be implemented as an online training course through the AWIEF digital platform  the AWIEF Community.

AWIEF Founder and CEO, Irene Ochem says: We are very excited to have won this project funding from USAID and to be partnering with USAID TradeHub. SMEs are the power engines of Africa economies and represent the bulk of all businesses in Africa. This program is about supporting Southern African entrepreneurs to expand their businesses by accessing new markets and trading beyond their borders. It is also important for SMEs to leverage the huge opportunities offered by AGOA to enter into international trade with the US.

Call for applications

Applications are invited from all SMEs that are registered in the above-mentioned Southern African countries. Priority industry sectors include: Agriculture, Agro-processing, Textiles and Apparel.

To submit your application, please follow this link: https://bit.ly/374UYyg

The deadline for submission is Monday, April 11, 2022 at 11:59pm Central African Time (CAT). Applications will only be accepted through the link above.

Program Timeline

Applications open: Thursday, March 31, 2022.

Applications close: Monday, April 11, 2022 at 11:59pm CAT.

Recruitment: Tuesday, April 12 to Friday, April 22, 2022.

Program starts: Tuesday, 3 May 2022.

Partager et informez vous aussi......

0 shares Share

Tweet

LinkedIn

Articles similaires
Apprentice winner Harpreet Kaur reveals her sister will remain a shareholder in their dessert parlour business  but says Lord Sugar is still yet to meet her sibling.

Harpreet, 30, who won Lord Sugar's 250,000 investment, told MailOnline her sister Gurvinder, 33, not only remains a director but still owns her stake in the company.

In an exclusive interview, Harpreet insisted that Apprentice boss Lord Sugar had 'no problem' with her business of five years being jointly run by a member of her family and BBC producers built up the tension as 'a bit of fun TV editing.'

'She's going to stay': Apprentice winner Harpreet Kaur reveals her sister will remain a shareholder in their dessert business  but says Lord Sugar is still yet to meet her sibling

Harpreet said: 'My sister is going to remain as a director in the business. They made a big deal of it on the show but it's not that big of a deal.

'Lord Sugar is getting two for the price of one and is looking forward to meeting my sister but if it stopped him from investing then she was going to step down.

'During the interviews there was nothing they said about the business plan, they had no issue with it. I was so confident because I thought if the only problem is the company structure, not the business itself, then I'm onto a winner.

'They had no problems with the costs, expenses, figures, so if it was just a case of my sister being a shareholder then we were happy to change it but she's going to stay.

'We didn't have to argue or anything  it was a bit of fun TV editing but Lord Sugar doesn't have a problem.'

'I'm onto a winner': Harpreet, who won Lord Sugar's 250,000 investment, told MailOnline her sister Gurvinder (pictured), not only remains a director but still owns her stake in the company

'It's not a big deal': Harpreet insisted that Lord Sugar had 'no problem' with her business being jointly run by a member of her family and producers built up tension as 'a bit of fun TV editing'

Harpeet's sister became the joke of Internet memes during the show's final after viewers believed she would be sacked from the company and replaced as a shareholder by Lord Sugar.

She added: 'I tease her with the memes though and say "right  you're sacked!" Lord Sugar says "you're out sis, goodbye!"'

The entrepreneur, whose business started as a Leeds shopping centre kiosk when she was 24, revealed she's single but too busy to find love, especially now she has Lord Sugar to impress.

She said: 'It would be lovely to settle down one day but right now if someone asked me on a date, I'd say yes, the 15th December 2023  I am too busy.

'Unfortunately, any potential dates are going to have to wait. The man of my dreams could walk past me, and I wouldn't bat an eyelid.

'We all go through different life journeys and experiences. It is hard to get the perfect balance  right now I am happy running my business and doing my own thing.'

'I tease her': Harpeet's sister became the joke of Internet memes during the show's final after viewers believed she would be sacked from the company and replaced by Lord Sugar

'It's hard to get the perfect balance': Harpreet revealed she's single but 'too busy' to find love, especially now she has Lord Sugar to impress

After watching The Apprentice since its launch in 2005 and winning Lord Sugar's investment, there's little Harpreet doesn't know about the show.

She claims Gordon Ramsay's new TV programme Future Food Stars, which sees the chef task restaurant owners with challenges in a bid to win his financial backing, is a 'copycat' of The Apprentice  and predicts Lord Sugar won't be happy.

She said: 'He has copied The Apprentice hasn't he? I felt like it wasn't the usual Gordon Ramsay that we're used to seeing. He was really chilled and I wanted him to let rip. I can't imagine Lord Sugar will be too pleased.'

Harpreet says Future Food Stars has nothing on The Apprentice's 'gruelling' process, which led her fellow candidate Shama Amin to quit this year on medical grounds.

She said: 'It is so tough and no one gets it unless you're in the process otherwise you just think it's a bunch of people on TV looking silly. It is so much more than that. It is such a crazy experience. I won and I still had a traumatic experience.

'Whenever I have watched the show in the past and someone's quit I've thought "why she's quit?" but now I get it. It is so gruelling and it drains you emotionally, physically, and mentally.'

'I gave him an offer he couldn't refuse': Harpeet beat fellow finalist Kathryn Louise Burn, who runs an online pyjama business, to Lord Sugar's investment with her dessert brand Oh So Yum

'I will do it, I promise': Harpreet has vowed to open a new store within the first six months of winning Lord Sugar's investment  after already launching her nationwide delivery service

Harpeet beat fellow finalist Kathryn Louise Burn, who runs an online pyjama business, to Lord Sugar's investment with her dessert brand Oh So Yum.

She still runs her kiosk, as well as managing a dessert parlour in Yorkshire, and since winning the show has already hit her first target in launching a delivery wide service, so customers up and down the country can enjoy her sweet treats.

The businesswoman vowed: 'My next aim is to open another store within the next six months. I'm going to make sure I do that. I will do it, I promise.

'I would like to open another store in Yorkshire because it's a good link and there's plenty of custom around here and then further from that I want to continue exploring the rest of the UK.

'I know I have a lot of people down south that want my fresh waffles and fresh crepes so I will stick to Yorkshire for the next few months but then I want to continue growing from there.'
She became a mother for the second time after welcoming daughter Isabella in February with actor Jason Staham, 54.

And Rosie Huntington-Whiteley shared a glimpse of her newborn daughters face as she posted a slew of snaps on Thursday.

The former Victoria's Secret Angel also looked incredible in a pregnancy throwback as she shared a collage of Instagram stories.

Cute: Rosie Huntington-Whiteley shared another glimpse of her newborn daughter on Sunday along with stunning pregnancy throwback snaps

Wow: The Former Victoria's Secret Angel looked incredible in a pregnancy throwback snap

The blonde beauty looked flawless in a camel lounge slip dress by Kim Kardashian's SKIMS clothing line.

Rosie was glowing as she snapped the mirror selfie in a typical supermodel pose.

The actress worked her voluminous curls as she achieved the perfect big hair look to accompany her throwback image.

The English star went on to give her 14.9 million followers a glimpse of her daughters face.

However, the notoriously private businesswoman refrained from posting a full portrait of her two month old baby daughter.

Little feet: The runway icon who is known for her love of designer went on to share a stunning pair of beige Chanel baby shoes to her carousel of images

Chic: Rosie also posed in a midi dress by Ukrainian designer Bevza. The stunning ensemble was decorated with the wings on the shoulders

The toddler looked adorable in a cream baby grow while she lay in her cot.

The runway icon who is known for her love of designer went on to share a stunning pair of beige Chanel baby shoes to her carousel of images.

Rosie also posed in a midi dress by Ukrainian designer Bevza. The stunning ensemble was decorated with the wings on the shoulders, inspired by a traditional cloak worn by Olga of Kyiv.

The father of Rosie's children is her fiance, actor Jason. They began dating in 2010 and got engaged in 2016 and also have a four-year-old son Jack.

They welcomed their son a year after getting engaged. Of their decision to not rush into marriage she had told ET in 2018 that it wasn't a 'huge priority.'

She said: 'We're looking forward to that time. It's also not a huge priority for us; we're so happy. I think it will be fun to do it when the baby's grown up a bit and he can be involved in the wedding.'
Two-time Survivor contestant Zeke Smith proposed to his longtime partner Nico Santos at the 2022 GLAAD Awards in Los Angeles on Saturday night.

The Superstore actor, 42, quickly accepted his fiance's proposal, which occurred in front of a lively audience that cheered as Smith popped the question on stage.

The lovebirds first met at the annual ceremony in 2018, and the organization honors various branches of the media for their outstanding representations of the LGBT community and the issues that affect their lives.

Congratulations: Survivor's Zeke Smith proposed to his longtime partner Nico Santos at the 2022 GLAAD Awards in Los Angeles on Saturday

'I said yes. You have my heart forever,' Santos captioned a photo of Smith on one knee asking for his hand in marriage.

In the image, Smith can be seen presenting an engagement ring to his love, who wore a burgundy Paul Smith suit and pair of black glasses.

Meanwhile Smith wore a black tuxedo, from Bonobos, and a classic white dress shirt.

He said yes! The Superstore actor, 42, quickly accepted his fiance's proposal, which occurred in front of a lively audience that cheered as Smith kneeled on the stage to pop the question

How special: The lovebirds first met at the annual ceremony in 2018, and the organization honors various branches of the media for their outstanding representations of the LGBT community and the issues that affect their lives

Smith met Santos one year after announcing to the world he is transgender, following a shocking Survivor episode where he was outed by one of his fellow Millennials vs Gen X contestants.

At the time, Smith opened up to People about his history and why he didn't reveal being trans on the show.

'I'm not ashamed of being trans, but I didn't want that to be my story,' he tells the magazine. 'I just wanted to go out on an adventure and play a great game.'

'I said yes. You have my heart forever,' Santos captioned a photo of Smith on one knee asking for his hand in marriage

Handsome: In the image, Smith can be seen presenting an engagement ring to his love, who wore a burgundy Paul Smith suit and pair of black glasses

He also said he was open about being transgender with the show's producers in his audition, but opted not to discuss it while filming.

'When you tell people you're trans, you get two reactions: Either they look at you funny and pull back, or they go, "Aww, that must be so hard,"' he said. 'I'm a goofy, fun-loving guy, so neither of those reactions work well for me.'

During the series, one of his competitors tried to paint Zeke as 'deceitful' for not being forthcoming about being transgender.

Four years together: Smith met Santos one year after announcing to the world he is transgender after getting outed by one of his fellow Millennials vs Gen X contestants

In his introduction video on season 33 of Survivor: Millennials vs Gen X, Smith stated he came out as gay at the age of 15.

Smith reportedly began transitioning while he studied religion at Harvard University.

He previously told People, he felt depressed during his transition and decided to set his sights on competing in Survivor in the hope of becoming 'the man I wanted to be.'

Santos is best known for starring on six seasons of from 2015 to 2021 as well as his roles as Oliver T'sien in the 2018 hit romantic comedy Crazy Rich Asians.
Steve Coogan has defended the BBC's controversial new drama The Reckoning in which he plays the shamed sexual predator Jimmy Savile.

The actor, 56, appeared on Sunday Brunch to talk about the upcoming miniseries and said we need to look at individuals like Savile 'to prevent it happening again'.

Coogan, who famously portrays fictional comedic character Alan Partridge, added that he spoke to actors playing the victims to put them at ease.

Coming soon: Steve Coogan has defended the BBC's controversial new drama The Reckoning in which he plays the shamed sexual predator Jimmy Savile

'I think thats because Jimmy Savile played a trick on the entire nation so theres a real feeling of antagonism about it,' Steve told hosts Tim Lovejoy and Simon Rimmer.

He added: 'But you need to look at someone like that to understand how theyre able to operate and to prevent it happening again.

'If you sweep it under the carpet and just dont talk about it anymore, then those people are destined to come back.'

Predator: The actor, 56, appeared on Sunday Brunch to talk about the upcoming miniseries and said we need to look at individuals like Savile 'to prevent it happening again' (Jimmy Savile presenting Top Of The Pops in 1973)

Changes: Changes: Coogan previously explained in a statement the decision to play Savile was not one 'I took lightly' (pictured left in character, Savile is seen right in the 60s)

Steve continued: 'Id go and talk to them as myself and go, "Hi, Im Steve, Im not Jimmy Savile, thats who Im going to play today".

'And youre playing a role and were going to do it professionally, and it was so that they knew that I was someone else. So it was a tightrope, but I think we did it properly.'

The Reckoning will trace the disgraced former star's upbringing, his early career and prolific child sex offences.

TV drama: Coogan, who famously portrays fictional comedic character Alan Partridge, added that he spoke to actors playing the victims to put them at ease

The decision to chronicle Savile's life has come under fire from many, however BBC has stated that they worked with his victims and will portray a story 'with sensitivity and respect'.

Coogan previously explained in a statement the decision to play Savile was not one 'I took lightly'.

He added: 'Neil McKay has written an intelligent script tackling sensitively a horrific story which, however harrowing, needs to be told.'

Controversy: The Reckoning will trace the disgraced former star's upbringing, his early career and prolific child sex offences (Savile pictured in 1984)

Piers Wenger Controller, of BBC Drama, added: 'The story of Jimmy Savile is one of the most emotive and troubling of our times.

'We do not intend to sensationalise these crimes but to give voice to his victims.

'We will work with survivors to ensure their stories are told with sensitivity and respect and to examine the institutions which Jimmy Savile was associated with and the circumstances in which these crimes took place.

'Drama has the ability to tackle sensitive real life subjects and consider the impact of a crime on its survivors and what lessons can be learnt to stop this ever happening again.'

For confidential support for adults who suffered any type of abuse in childhood call NAPAC on 0808 801 0331, free from landlines and mobiles, or click here for details
Rufus Du Sol have won their first Grammy Award.

The Sydney dance trio, comprising members Tyrone Lindqvist, Jon George and James Hunt, won the award for Best Dance/Electronic Recording for their song Alive.

Speaking at the ceremony in Las Vegas on Sunday, the band said it had 'been a beautiful journey' getting to where they are today.

'Beautiful journey': Aussie dance trio Rufus Du Sol won their first Grammy Award for Best Dance/Electronic Recording on Sunday. (Pictured from left to right: Tyrone Lindqvist, Jon George and James Hunt with producer Jason Evigan and mixer Cassian Stewart-Kasimba)

'Being in there and hearing our name was very surreal. It feels so good... I want to cry, but I'm laughing,' Tyrone said.

They beat the likes of James Blake and David Guetta, who were also nominated in the same category.

Rufus Du Sol already have four ARIAs under their belt, last year winning two awards for Best Group and Best Dance Release for Alive.

Success story: Speaking at the ceremony in Las Vegas on Sunday, the band said it had 'been a beautiful journey' getting to where they are today

Winners: Rufus Du Sol beat the likes of James Blake and David Guetta, who were also nominated in the same category

However this win was even more significant because it was their first Grammy Award after three nominations.

They were nominated twice at the 2020 Grammys.

Jon previously told Billboard they were determined to win this time around.

Driven: The dance group was nominated twice at the 2020 Grammys

'I want to win pretty badly. I think it's fair to have that hunger,' he said.

'It's not the reason we make music, to get accolades, but it is nice to have recognition and have people identify with the work. It's validating, to be perfectly honest, and something we've dreamed.'

The group, known for hits including You Were Right and Treat You Better, formed in Sydney, Australia, in 2010.
A trailer for the English-language remake of hit French comedy series Call My Agent! has been unveiled and sees a feisty Helena Bonham Carter lock horns with other actors and agents.

The Amazon Prime series, titled Ten Percent, follows the fictional London talent agency Nightingale Hart as it struggles to adapt with agents desperately trying to keep their celebrity clients happy.

When tragedy strikes, the company and the agents' personal and professional lives are thrown into mayhem as they try to continue to help their celebrity clients with their marital problems, careers and stage fright.

It's here! A trailer for the English-language remake of hit French comedy series Call My Agent! has been unveiled and sees Emma Corrin making a guest appearance

The trailer sees the likes of Helena Bonham Carter, Dominic West and Bridgerton's Phoebe Dynevor all make cameo appearances as exaggerated versions of themselves, while other stars play the fictional agents.

In the first look trailer, fans are given a glimpse at the humorous storylines set to unfold as Kelly Macdonald pours a smoothie over the head of her agent Dan (Prasanna Puwanarajah).

The agency find themselves in an array of chaotic scenarios as Helena Bonham Carter and Olivia Williams lock horns as they are awkwardly offered the same part and David Oyelowo tries to hide from his real-life wife Jessica.

But the biggest reveal of the jam-packed clip is when experienced agent Jonathan, played by Jack Davenport, reveals the agency is 'f**ked' and must sell to an American company.

Hilarious: The trailer sees the likes of Helena Bonham Carter, Dominic West and Bridgerton's Phoebe Dynevor all make cameo appearances as exaggerated versions of themselves

The agency is sent into more turmoil when the American representatives arrive to shake things up, with the agents desperately attempting to keep their clients onboard.

The British show, which will be released on April 28, is based off the French comedy series Dix pour cent, known in the UK and US as Call My Agent!.

The adaptation retains the essence of the French series, where a Parisian talent agency's employees must scramble to keep their star clients happy and their business afloat after the sudden death of their founder.

Tensions: The Amazon Prime series, titled Ten Percent, follows the fictional London talent agency Nightingale Hart as it struggles to adapt

The UK adaptation will feature a star-studded cast including The Duke's Jim Broadbent, The Crown's Emma Corrin, Red Election's Lydia Leonard and Don't Look Up's Himesh Patel.

Other series regulars will include Maggie Steed, Prasanna Puwanarajah, Hiftu Quasem, Fola Evans-Akingbola, The Crown's Rebecca Humphries, Harry Trevaldwyn, Notting Hill star Tim McInnerny, Natasha Little, Edward Bluemel and Eleonore Arnaud.

Writer John Morton, the man behind W1A and Twenty Twelve, is in charge of creative duties on the eight-part series.

It is expected that Pirates Of The Caribbean actor Jack Davenport is playing a suave, ruthless agent based on Mathias Barneville, played by Thibault de Montalembert in Dix Pour Cent.

Crisis: The biggest reveal of the trailer is when experienced agent Jonathan, played by Jack Davenport, reveals the agency is 'f**ked' and must sell to an American company

While it is believed that stage star Lydia Leonard will star as an agent bearing similarities to the French show's linchpin, the firecracker Andrea Martel, played by break-out star Camille Cottin.

But there will be slight differences between the characters in the English version and the French cult, created by writer Fanny Herrero.

Herrero told The Sunday Times earlier this year that there are 'fundamental differences' in what French and British audiences find funny.

Drama: The agency is sent into turmoil when the American representatives arrive to shake things up, with the agents desperately attempting to keep their clients onboard

Role: It is believed that Lydia Leonard (left) will star as an agent bearing similarities to the French show's linchpin, the firecracker Andrea Martel, played by break-out star Camille Cottin (right) in Dix pour cent

Christian Baute, the new show's executive producer, believes the same type of 'exuberant' humour used by some characters wouldn't 'quite work culturally' for a UK audience.

'Camille is very exuberant. In a workplace, you wouldn't necessarily find that exuberance in the UK', she told the publication. 'They are not the same.'

'They wouldn't be as candid in their judgment. It would be more polite. You wouldn't say things in the same way as the French character. Andrea, if she doesn't like something, she would just say she doesn't like it.'

Herrero, the writer and creator of the original series, added British humour tends to be more self-depreciating than French comedy.

Characters: It is expected that Pirates Of The Caribbean actor Jack (left) is playing a suave, ruthless agent based on Mathias Barneville, played by Thibault de Montalembert (right) in Dix pour cent

However, the remake will incorporate writer/director John Morton's unique British sensibility and introduce some new storylines.

John told Daily Mail: 'I'm thrilled, startled and daunted to be given the chance to re-create such a wonderful show as 'Call My Agent!' for an English language audience.'

In a statement, John also added: 'It's great to be working with Amazon Prime Video who support creativity and gives us the freedom to put our own distinctively British stamp on the series.

'It's a privilege to be working with an extraordinary cast, along with some star-studded cameos, who together represent the best of Britain's talent.'
Married At First Sight viewers rallied behind Domenica Calarco after she was cruelly outed as an OnlyFans model by rival bride Olivia Frazer.

But the 29-year-old's supporters are now turning their backs on her after she hosted an anti-Olivia 'hate party' at her parents' farm on the outskirts of Sydney on Sunday.

Guests at the MAFS finale screening, which was attended by several of Domenica's co-stars, were greeted with custom-made signs bearing nasty slogans about the teaching student, including one poster saying 'We don't serve any Olivia's'.

Taking it too far: MAFS viewers have turned on 'immature' Domenica Calarco (pictured) after she hosted a 'hate party' for Olivia Frazer at her parents' farm outside Sydney on Sunday

Domenica wore a red T-shirt emblazoned with the words 'My body, my choice, b***h!'

The slogan 'my body, my choice' has long been associated with abortion rights, but Dom appears to be using it to promote her OnlyFans account.

The makeup artist was supported at the event by her ex-'husband' Jack Millar and their co-stars Ella Ding, Brent Vitiello and Al Perkins, who all wore the bold shirts.

'It was just a big "I hate Olivia" party. Everyone rallied around Domenica and they enjoyed watching the glass-smashing video,' one guest told Daily Mail Australia.

'Immature': Guests at the MAFS finale screening were greeted with custom-made signs bearing nasty slogans about Olivia, including one poster saying 'We don't serve any Olivia's'

Unpleasant: 'It was just a big "I hate Olivia" party. Everyone rallied around Domenica and they enjoyed watching the glass-smashing video,' one guest told Daily Mail Australia

'Domenica was booing the screen every time Olivia came on and everyone was just sticking their middle fingers up. It was outright bullying,' they added.

'There was no respect for anyone or what they've been through. It was honestly just a big anti-Olivia and Tamara [Djordjevic] event.'

One fan on social media labelled Domenica a 'bully' while another said the anti-Olivia posters were 'immature'.

Pals: Domenica (left) was supported at the event by her ex-'husband' Jack Millar and their co-stars Ella Ding (right), Brent Vitiello and Al Perkins, who all wore the bold shirts

Questionable: Domenica and her friends wore T-shirts with the slogan 'My body, my choice, b***h!' This phrase has long been associated with abortion rights, but Dom appears to be using it to promote her OnlyFans career

'For someone who claimed she can't stand bullying and was bullied her whole childhood, you're doing a fabulous job [of] showing otherwise,' one critic wrote.

'It's bad enough Olivia has to deal with the backlash from the show, but to have a poster of this sort shows the immaturity on your end.'

A second agreed, writing: '[Domenica] is as bad as Olivia. Both d**kheads... I personally think editing made Dom look a lot nicer than she actually is.'

Backlash: One fan labelled Domenica as a 'bully' while another said the anti-Olivia posters were 'immature'

One viewer commented on Instagram: 'Taking it too far. You don't fix bullying with bullying. Wrong message being sent.'

'Guess who lives rent free in Domenica's head,' another fan wrote.

Domenica spared no expense for the party, setting up a marquee with a large projector for the guests to watch Sunday's MAFS reunion dinner party.

Uncalled for: 'Domenica was booing the screen every time Olivia came on and everyone was just sticking their middle fingers up. It was outright bullying,' a guest told Daily Mail Australia

You can't take him anywhere! Al Perkins attempted to drink a shoey from someone's flip-flops

Elsewhere at the event, Brent and Ella were seen looking rather cosy with each other as they posed for snaps in a photo booth.

They had earlier been seen leaving Brent's Bondi pad, before picking up Al in North Bondi then hopping in a limo which took them to Domenica's parents' farm.

At one stage, Ella was seen holding a heart sign with the words 'good vibes only', which was rather ironic given the nature of the party.

Married At First Sight continues Monday at 7:30pm on Channel Nine and 9Now

Hmm! At one stage, Ella was seen holding a heart sign with the words 'good vibes only', which was rather ironic given the nature of the party

Pals: Brent and Ella were seen looking rather cosy with each other as they posed for snaps in a photo booth
She is never shy showing off her phenomenal figure on social media.

And Molly-Mae Hague was at it again on Sunday as she flaunted her sensational bikini body in a throwback snap from her work trip to Mexico last month.

The influencer set pulses racing in the skimpy beige two piece which featured a beaded waist belt in the beachy snap.

Wow: Molly-Mae Hague flaunted her sensational bikini body in a throwback snap from work trip to Mexico last month

Molly-Mae showed off her slim silhouette as she oozed confidence on the Tulum sands.

The Love Island star layered the look with a white cotton shirt which she casually wore off her shoulders.

She completed the look with a stylish straw hat while her signature blonde locks were left to loosely cascade over her shoulders.

Toned: She also showed off her slim silhouette as she posed for a snap in a window, bikini-clad on the Tulum sands (pictured last month)

The Influencer and Creative Director jetted off to the Caribbean coastline for a work trip as she shot a campaign for Filter By Molly-Mae last month.

She revealed that she was 'filming something very special' to her fans through her Instagram account.

During her trip, she has also been sharing snaps of the beautiful Mexican scenery, alongside her bikini-clad content.

It comes after Molly-Mae, speaking of her struggle with endometriosis, admitted she thought she would die and has nearly called an ambulance multiple times during her periods.

Speaking in her latest YouTube vlog, the former Love Islander explained how she found nights particularly difficult, and was fearful she 'wouldn't wake up' due to the excruciating pain.

Taking to her popular channel on the video-sharing site, Molly-Mae answered fans' queries surrounding her experience with the condition - which causes tissue similar to the lining of the womb to grow in other places, such as the ovaries.

Shocking! It comes after Molly-Mae, speaking of her struggle with endometriosis, admitted she thought she would die and has nearly called an ambulance multiple times during her periods

Speaking to her 1.64million subscribers during the the 'Q&A Girl Talk', the reality star confessed of her symptoms: 'Mine have definitely worsened over the years, I cannot explain the levels of pain I have experienced.

'I have actually nearly called myself an ambulance on multiple occasions because of the level of pain that I was in.

'It got so bad, I would be rolling in bed and I would actually be fearful for my life, thinking for my body to be in this much agonising pain, what is it going through?

Tough: 'I have actually nearly called myself an ambulance on multiple occasions because of the level of pain that I was in' revealed the star

'I literally used to lie there and think, "Am I going to see tomorrow morning?" I genuinely used to be in that much pain that I was fearful I wouldnt wake up in the morning. It was so so horrendous.'

'Tommy didn't even used to know what to do with me, he would be looking at me like, "I don't know what to do".'

The former Love Islander first spoke of her diagnosis last year and has bravely shown scars from operations she's undergone to ease her symptoms.
Peaky Blinders

Rating:

Not a bullet, not a bomb, not a knife can kill Tommy Shelby...just as Aunt Polly always predicted.

Tommy himself (Cillian Murphy) couldnt do it at the climax of Peaky Blinders (BBC1).

Loading his gun with a bullet that bore his own name carved into it, he raised the muzzle to his head  and had a sudden vision of his dead daughter Ruby.

Long story short, Ruby told him he wasnt dying from a brain tumour after all, and suicide was unnecessary.

His fatal diagnosis was a lie fed to him by the Fascist leader Oswald Mosley.

The finale of Peaky Blinders (BBC1) was as ambiguous as the famous cut-to-black ending of The Sopranos

There is another, darker way to read that enigmatic final scene

The decisive answer might come when the long-promised Peaky Blinders movie is made

She even, helpfully, pointed him to a newspaper that exposed the whole deception.

Except, of course, it didnt.

The charred news cutting, with a photo of the doctor with Mosley (Sam Claflin) and his duplicitous, over-sexed wife Diana (Amber Anderson), didnt explain why Tommy has been suffering hallucinations and violent epileptic fits.

And even in a drama as soaked in the supernatural as this, isnt it a tiny bit too convenient to have the hero saved by a vision from beyond the grave?

There is another, darker way to read that enigmatic final scene.

Tommy stands in the doorway of his gypsy caravan, surrounded by photos of everyone he has lost  not just Polly and Ruby, but his wife Grace and brother John too.

He raises the gun, his dead child materialises.

In the final moments, we saw the caravan ablaze (an echo of the traditional Romany funeral) and Tommy, framed by the flames, riding away on a white horse.

In a story so rich with enigmas and double meanings, it seems very plausible that Tommy is indeed dead by his own hand.

The brief interlude with the newspaper and the doctor was a hallucination, and that was his departing spirit we glimpsed on horseback.

There hasnt been a more ambiguous conclusion to a TV serial since the screen went black at the end of The Sopranos.

The decisive answer might come when the long-promised Peaky Blinders movie is made.

Perhaps it will bring the continuing adventures of T. Shelby, in which case he definitely wont be dead.

Or perhaps it will centre on his youngest brother Finn (Harry Kirton) and Duke Shelby (Conrad Khan), Tommys illegitimate son, who has his fathers psychopathic streak as well as his cut-glass looks.

Duke kicked Finn out of the clan, after shooting the treacherous and cowardly Billy (Emmett J Scanlan) between the eyes. Poor Billy had it coming: hes been one nervous squeak away from death in every scene hes ever featured in, since the first series.

The feud between Finn and Duke could supply the next chapter. Only creator Steven Knight knows. The rest of us, as usual, are left guessing by Peaky Blinders.

Neither was there any satisfactory answer to the riddle of that name.

The show has heavily implied that it referred to the gangs penchant for sewing razor blades into the brims of their cloth caps. Swung in the fist, the cap became a slashing weapon.

A documentary last month about the Birmingham mobsters who inspired the series pointed out how unlikely this was. Safety razors had not been invented, and cut-throat razors were the wrong shape.

The haircuts will be missed and so will the stylised art deco sets, the outrageous games with history (did Diana Mosley really proposition MPs for sex on the benches of the House of Commons?) and the shamelessly sentimental dialogue

More likely, one historian suggested, that the thugs got their nickname by wearing their hats pulled low over one eye.

In fact, the mystery is solved by a 1929 court report in the Daily Mail archives.

This states the hoodlums wore caps with heavy iron plates in the brims  and used them to blind their victims with head-butts.

The Mails reporter noted that the gangs notoriety was so fearsome that Birmingham was known as the City of Dreadful Night.

That name was apt for the Wild West shoot-out between Arthur Shelby (Paul Anderson) and the IRA, outside the Garrison pub.

It began as a gunfight and ended like a World War I battlefield, with machine guns and mustard gas.

Arthur was winged, hit in the arm, but his luxuriant banner of hair was fortunately untouched. If any harm had come to that, the barbers of Britain would be plunged into mourning.

In a story so rich with enigmas and double meanings, it seems very plausible that Tommy is indeed dead by his own hand

No one sported a short-back-and-sides better than Arthur. His hair has inspired a million young men and women too, all adopting extravagant topknots on shaven skulls. A haircut that signified conformity and the lingering influence of National Service, half a century ago, has become high fashion... entirely because of Peaky Blinders.

Arthurs soup-strainer moustache never did catch on, chiefly because it made him look like his mouth was under attack from a drug-crazed hairbrush.

The haircuts will be missed and so will the stylised art deco sets, the outrageous games with history (did Diana Mosley really proposition MPs for sex on the benches of the House of Commons?) and the shamelessly sentimental dialogue.

To family, said Tommy, raising a glass to the surviving Shelbys. Sometimes it is shelter from the storm, sometimes it is the storm itself.
Married At First Sight lovebirds Olivia Frazer and Jackson Lonie have revealed they plan to start a family together.

The controversial couple told New Idea this week they are already thinking about marriage and kids after shacking up together on the NSW Central Coast.

'Babies are definitely on the brain,' Olivia told the magazine.

'Babies are definitely on the brain': Married At First Sight lovebirds Olivia Frazer and Jackson Lonie (pictured during their final vows) have revealed they plan to start a family together

However, she said they will go travelling and legally tie the knot before having kids.

'We want to travel, buy a house, and make our marriage legal before we're ready for a bub,' she explained.

Jackson said he already has 'dad jokes' at the ready.

Success story: The controversial couple told New Idea this week they are already thinking about marriage and kids after shacking up together on the NSW Central Coast

'Any kids of ours would be welcomed into very wild and loving families, with amazing grandparents, aunties, and uncles,' he added.

The pair announced at Sunday's reunion dinner party they had moved into a 'beach shack' on the Central Coast.

'We've got some pretty big news. We've moved in together. Official as of yesterday,' plumber Jackson told his MAFS co-stars.

He's keen! Jackson said he already has 'dad jokes' at the ready

Olivia, 28, said she was thrilled when Jackson, 30, agreed to leave his home in Melbourne so they could start a new life together on the coast.

But despite this big move, she revealed Jackson had not yet 'dropped the L-bomb'.

However, she said she did not want to scare him off by pressing the issue.

Love shack: Olivia, 28, said she was thrilled when Jackson, 30, agreed to leave his home in Melbourne so they could start a new life together on the coast

During their final vows last month, an emotional Jackson said he was committed to Olivia but came short of saying 'I love you'.

'Liv, I came into this experience hoping to find someone I could spend the rest of my life with,' he began.

'When I turned around and saw your beautiful smile, I definitely felt like we had an instant connection, to the point we were up all night, chatting each other's ear off.'

Making progress: During their final vows last month, an emotional Jackson said he was committed to Olivia but came short of saying 'I love you'

'Since then, we have gone through so much together, both completely out of our comfort zones, and at the same time, dedicated to give this our all and to have each other's back.'

'But through all the good times we have shared, there have been some moments that really made me think about us moving forward,' he added.

Jackson said that while he didn't approve of some of the snarky comments Olivia had made throughout the experiment, he was willing to look past them.

Olivia gushed: 'Never in my wildest dreams did I ever dare hope for a partner who is as beautiful, kind, compassionate and even-tempered as you are,' Olivia said to Jackson

'I'm so grateful that I met you. You are amazing to me. I want to make you feel special every day, just like you deserve,' he said.

After confessing his feelings, Olivia told Jackson: 'From the second I met you, I knew that you were something special, and it felt as if I'd known you forever.

'Even as I was walking down the aisle to marry a stranger, I felt so much at ease.'

Married At First Sight continues Monday at 7:30pm on Channel Nine and 9Now
Lisa Armstrong's fans were left gushing over how 'happy' she looked on Saturday night as she attended her friend's 30th birthday party.

The make-up artist, 45, took to her Instagram account to share a series of photos from the evening as she celebrated her pal Lydia's big bash.

The Strictly Come Dancing crew member looked the picture of happiness as she could be seen smiling in a slew of snaps with her friends - including her beau James Green who she brought along as her date.

Beaming: Lisa Armstrong's fans were left gushing over how 'happy' she looked on her Instagram on Saturday night as she attended her friend's 30th birthday

Lisa looked radiant as she uploaded a colourful collage of images for her 146,000 followers.

The blonde beauty stunned in a pair of white trousers and low-cut top, while she teamed her outfit with a gold Gucci belt and a silver necklace.

The star - who was once married to TV host Ant McPartlin - oozed confidence as she smouldered in the snaps, with her pretty features highlighted by a glam palette of make-up while her tresses were worn in a messy bun.

Party time: The Strictly Come Dancing crew member looked the picture of happiness as she could be seen smiling in a slew of snaps with her beau James Green

She captioned the post: 'Fun night celebrating my girl's @lydiabarnesmakeup 30th. Happy birthday lovely.'

Lisa's fans flocked to her page to inform her how well she was looking.

'Good to see you happy Lisa, miss you,' one said.

Another follower wrote: 'You looks so fresh and your skin amazing Lisa' while another chimed in: 'Looking so well and happy x'.

Friends: Lisa looked radiant as she uploaded a collage of images for her 146,000 followers

One fan appeared to make a dig at her ex as they penned: 'You look better and better the longer youre away from your ex husband. Just saying.'

While another devotee chimed in: 'Love how you man is always by your side'.

It comes days after Lisa revealed she was feeling loved-up with her new man.

They couple just before the first national lockdown in 2020, and despite Covid-19 restrictions, their relationship continued to blossom.

Disco: The blonde beauty stunned in a pair of white trousers and low-cut top, while she teamed her outfit with a gold Gucci belt and a silver necklace

Happy: She captioned the post: 'Fun night celebrating my girl's 30th,' Lisa captioned the snap, as fans headed to the comments to gush over her latest look

Fans: Lisa's fans flocked to her page to inform her how well she was looking

The outing comes as Lisa appeared to make a thinly-veiled dig at her ex during an episode of Steph's Packed Lunch last month.

Sharing her thoughts on 'what makes a happy relationship', award-winning make-up artist firmly said on Channel 4: 'Trust, loyalty, laughter.'

Lisa - who just returned from a loved-up trip abroad with boyfriend James - split from Ant in 2018 following a 12-year marriage.

Ant was divorced by Lisa on the grounds of adultery with now wife, Anne-Marie Corbett but it was reported this was committed was only after they were separated'.

Exes: Lisa - who just returned from a loved-up trip abroad with boyfriend James - split from Ant in 2018 following a 12-year marriage (pictured in 2015)

She said in full: 'You need to have your own independence within the relationship, so you're able to go off, be with your mates, be with your boys and then come back and enjoy listening to each other's stories.'

Giving an example, she added: 'And what have you done with your day? How was your job?'

Lisa went on: 'And be their own independent person but then you come together and you realise that you are better as a couple and there's trust, loyalty and laughter.'

Romance: Lisa is believed to have started dating James Green at the beginning of 2020 and went public with their relationship last August - they have just returned from a holiday

Last month Lisa revealed she and beau James, her first serious relationship since splitting from husband Ant McPartlin, had got matching tattoos, showing off their identical inkings in an Instagram post.

In January Lisa and James marked their second Christmas together as a couple.

Lisa is believed to have started dating James at the beginning of 2020 and went public with their relationship last August, shortly after he separated from his wife Kirsty.

She and ex-husband Ant confirmed their split in 2018, following his stint in rehab the previous year where he sought help for alcohol and painkiller addiction.

Following rehab, Ant took a year out from TV and he and Lisa parted ways, with their divorce being finalised in April 2020.

The Saturday Night Takeaway presenter was reported to have handed over 31 million to Lisa, including their 5million home in West London, after an 'eight-hour negotiation'.
Married at First Sight took out the top spot in Sunday night's television ratings, delivering its highest numbers all season.

The Channel Nine reality show drew 1.14 million metro viewers for its penultimate episode, reports TV Blackbox.

Crime drama Underbelly: Vanishing Act also proved to be a winner for the network, pulling in 719,000 viewers in the five capital cities.

Ratings winner: Married At First Sight (cast members pictured) took out the top spot in Sunday night's television ratings, delivering its highest numbers all season

Sunday's finale of Dancing with the Stars, which saw Grant Denyer win for a second time, pulled in 564,000 metro viewers for Channel Seven.

Underbelly: Vanishing Act was the highest-rating new Australian drama release since SeaChange in 2019, Nine announced on Monday.

And MAFS was the most-livestreamed program across all broadcasters.

Big numbers: The Nine reality show drew 1.14 million metro viewers for its penultimate episode, reports TV Blackbox. Pictured: MAFS couple Domenica Calarco and Jack Millar

Fan favourite: Crime drama Underbelly: Vanishing Act (promo image seen here) also proved to be a winner for the network, pulling in 719,000 viewers in the five capital cities

In addition to pulling in its highest ratings all season, Sunday's episode of MAFS also recorded its highest-ever BVOD audience with 292,000 viewers.

The strong ratings helped Nine win across all key demos and network rankings.

The latest episode of MAFS saw all of the brides and grooms come together for a drama-filled reunion dinner party.

Winning streak: Sunday's finale of Dancing with the Stars, which saw Grant Denyer (left, with Lily Cornish) win for a second time, pulled in 564,000 metro viewers for Channel Seven

Ella Ding and Mitch Eynaud revealed they were back together, despite going their separate ways at their final vows.

And it was revealed fan favourites Domenica Calarco and Jack Millar had broken up.

'It kind of fizzled. I don't know what happened and I'm left very confused,' admitted a blindsided Domenica, 28.

Married At First Sight continues Monday at 7:30pm on Channel Nine and 9Now
Married at First Sight's Olivia Frazer was forced to call the police on Saturday night after a terrifying incident at her Central Coast home.

Several people tracked down her home address and yelled abuse from the street, calling the teaching assistant a 'c**t' and saying she 'needs to die in a hole'.

Olivia, who is now fearing for her life, filmed her reaction to the ordeal on her iPhone.

'They screamed that I should die in a hole': Married At First Sight's Olivia Frazer was forced to call the police after a terrifying incident at her Central Coast home on Saturday night

'Some lunatics have just pulled up outside my home,' the 28-year-old said in footage obtained by Daily Mail Australia.

'I don't know how they got my address... [They] screamed that I'm a c**t, I'm a rat and I should die in a hole,' she added.

'I can barely go out in public, and now I can't even chill at home. What the f**k do people want from me?'

A distressed-looking Olivia said she was home alone when the abuse started.

She phoned the police, before calling Channel Nine's security team, her boyfriend Jackson Lonie and her mother Sandy Frazer.

Fearing for her life: Several people tracked down her home address and yelled abuse from the street, calling the teaching assistant a 'c**t' and saying she 'needs to die in a hole'

Nine arranged for security to patrol Olivia's home overnight following the incident.

'Nine and Endemol Shine takes its obligations in respect to the health and wellbeing of the participants of this program extremely seriously,' a network spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia on Monday.

'All participants have access to the show psychologist during filming, during broadcast and once the program has ended.

Intervention: Channel Nine arranged for security to patrol Olivia's home following the incident

'Nine also have an additional service for participants should they like or need further individual and confidential psychological support.

'This service gives participants access to clinicians who have been specifically engaged to support those involved in the program in relation to their experiences.

'This service is available to all participants for as long as they need it; it does not end.

'All participants have access to a security hotline operated 24 hours a day, seven days a week, by a specialist security company.'

Not sorry: It comes after Olivia (left, with Jackson Lonie) refused to apologise to Domenica Calarco for outing her as an OnlyFans model during Sunday night's reunion dinner party

It comes after Olivia refused to apologise to rival bride Domenica Calarco for outing her as an OnlyFans model during Sunday night's reunion dinner party.

'What you did to Dom, sourcing a photo and showing it to everyone, was really unkind,' cinema manager Holly Greenstein said.

'Liv, why is it that you won't apologise to Dom for the photo?' she then asked.

Question: 'Liv, why is it that you won't apologise to Dom for the photo?' asked Holly Greenstein

'Because I'm not sorry,' said Olivia, drawing gasps from the dinner table.

She then explained she had no regrets about sharing the photo with her co-stars because Domenica had posted the image on her public Twitter account.

Married At First Sight continues Tuesday at 7:30pm on Channel Nine and 9Now
Cardi B deactivated her Twitter account on Sunday after lashing out at her 'slow dumba**' fan base over skipping the 64th Annual Grammy Awards in Las Vegas.

'I'm deleting my Twitter but [oh] God I hate this f***ing dumba** fan base,' the Bronx-born 29-year-old wrote before deleting the social media platform.

'[You've] got the slow dumba**es dragging my kids all cause y'all [thought] I was going to the Grammys and I didn't the f***? When the f*** [did] I hint I was going? Just f***ing stupid. I can't. I [need] to protect myself.'

'I'm deleting my Twitter!' Cardi B deactivated her Twitter account on Sunday after lashing out at her 'slow dumba**' fan base over skipping the 64th Annual Grammy Awards in Las Vegas (pictured Sunday)

Even if Cardi (born Belcalis Almanzar) had gone to the awards ceremony, she would have lost the best rap performance trophy to Baby Keem for his track Family Ties featuring Kendrick Lamar.

The Up hitmaker - who won a Grammy in 2019 - still has 198.1M followers remaining over her Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, and SoundCloud accounts.

Cardi - who previously deactivated her Twitter in March 2021 and October 2020 - told her demanding fans she only attends awards shows if she has a new song to perform: 'You gotta chill the f*** out.'

The Bronx-born 29-year-old wrote: 'God I hate this f***ing dumba** fan base. [You've] got the slow dumba**es dragging my kids all cause y'all [thought] I was going to the Grammys and I didn't the f***? When the f*** [did] I hint I was going? Just f***ing stupid. I can't. I [need] to protect myself'

Champ: Even if Cardi had gone to the awards ceremony, she would have lost the best rap performance trophy to Baby Keem (pictured) for his track Family Ties featuring Kendrick Lamar

Not silenced: The Up hitmaker - who won a Grammy in 2019 - still has 198.1M followers remaining over her Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, and SoundCloud accounts

'You gotta chill the f*** out!' Cardi - who previously deactivated her Twitter in March 2021 and October 2020 - told her demanding fans she only attends awards shows if she has a new song to perform

The half-Dominican, half-Trinidadian star later went to RICHBICH Clinic in Midtown Manhattan to undergo a $250 'BrightBich' intimate bleaching procedure and laser hair removal.

'I'm at RICHBICH Clinic getting my porn star p***y on. I'm talking about getting it lasered, getting it bleached, Peloton ready, you know?' Cardi explained.

'You've gotta laser. You've gotta wax. You've gotta do a little bleaching. It's like chef's kiss p***y. Let's go! I'm ready to take the pain. F**k that.'

'Getting my porn star p***y on!' The half-Dominican, half-Trinidadian star later went to RICHBICH Clinic in Midtown Manhattan to undergo a $250 'BrightBich' intimate bleaching procedure and laser hair removal

Cardi explained: 'I'm talking about getting it lasered, getting it bleached, Peloton ready, you know? You've gotta laser. You've gotta wax. You've gotta do a little bleaching. It's like chef's kiss p***y. Let's go! I'm ready to take the pain. F**k that'

'One thing I always gotta have with her is a d**n charger': RICHBICH Clinic owner Jennifer Nemeth wrote that treating the Cardi Tries producer-star 'was the funniest experience of my life'

RICHBICH Clinic owner Jennifer Nemeth wrote that treating the Cardi Tries producer-star 'was the funniest experience of my life.'

'One thing I always gotta have with her is a d**n charger,' the New York State-licensed esthetician captioned her Instastory.

Cardi also spent quality time with her three-year-old daughter Kulture Kiari Cephus, who baked her a cake on Sunday.

'So Kulture made this cake': Cardi also spent quality time with her three-year-old daughter Kulture Kiari Cephus, who baked her a cake on Sunday

Cooing in the background: The F9 actress also Instastoried a rare glimpse of her seven-month-old son, whose name has not been released

Four years strong! Cardi is also stepmother to husband Offset's (L, pictured March 2) three other children - son Jordan, 12; daughter Kody, 6; and daughter Kalea, 6 - from his relationships with Justine Watson, Oriel Jamie, and Shya L'amour

The F9 actress also Instastoried a rare glimpse of her cooing seven-month-old son, whose name has not been released.

Cardi is also stepmother to husband Offset's three other children - son Jordan, 12; daughter Kody, 6; and daughter Kalea, 6 - from his relationships with Justine Watson, Oriel Jamie, and Shya L'amour.

The former stripper, the 30-year-old Migos rapper, and little Kulture will all voice characters in the April 15th episode of Nickelodeon animated series Baby Shark titled 'The Seaweed Sway.'
Martha Stewart regretfully announced that her beloved cat Princess Peony had died tragically over the weekend in a post shared to Instagram on Sunday.

The star, 80, revealed that four of her dogs had 'mistook' the cat 'for an interloper and killed her defenseless little self.' She did not share which dogs were involved in the fatal attack.

Martha included an image of three men helping her dig a hole on her property, where the deceased feline would be laid to rest.

So sad: Martha Stewart regretfully announced that her beloved cat Princess Peony had died tragically over the weekend in a post shared to Instagram on Sunday; Martha pictured in 2018

'burying the beautiful and unusual Princess Peony,' she stated, before noting that she 'will miss her very badly.

'RIP beauty,' concluded the Martha Bakes host, who was soon flooded with sympathetic comments from fans and friends, alike.

Kris Jenner commented a trio of crying emojis, while famed photographer Douglas Friedman wrote, 'Martha....im so sorry to hear this.'

'That is horrible. I am so sorry,' penned designer Adam Lippes.

RIP: The star, 80, revealed that her four dogs had 'mistook' the cat 'for an interloper and killed her defenseless little self'

Burial: She included an image of three men helping her dig a hole on her property, where the deceased feline would be laid to rest

Martha also posted a tribute to Princess Peony on her Instagram Story, which featured a photo of the beautiful cat.

'RIP beauty cat Princess Peony,' she wrote.

As revealed on Martha's official website, Princess Peony was born on May 11, 2009 and was four-months-old when she was adopted.

Sympathy: 'RIP beauty,' concluded the Martha Bakes host, who was soon flooded with sympathetic comments from fans and friends, alike

Tribute: Martha also posted a tribute to Princess Peony on her Instagram Story, which featured a photo of the beautiful cat

Her sister Empress Tang was born in the same litter and also adopted by Martha.

They're of the calico Persian cat breed, which are characterized by their long-haired coats, round faces and short muzzles.

Martha has long made it known that she is an animal lover, even admitting in an article featured on her website that she owned 'at least 20 cats, 25 dogs, 10 chinchillas, scores of canaries and parakeets, two ponies, three donkeys, 10 horses, many sheep and goats, hundreds of chickens, geese, turkeys, guinea fowl, quail, peacocks, and homing pigeons.'

She famously hosts Animal Planet's annual Puppy Bowl, which airs during the year's Super Bowl, with her friend and rapper Snoop Dogg.

Siblings: As revealed on Martha's official website, Princess Peony was born on May 11, 2009 and was four-months-old when she was adopted. Her sister Empress Tang (pictured) was born in the same litter and also adopted by Martha

Breed: They're of the calico Persian cat breed, which are characterized by their long-haired coats, round faces and short muzzles

In an interview with TODAY in 2021, the star revealed that she leaned on her plethora or pets for comfort amid the global coronavirus pandemic.

Encouraging others to add a furry friend to their family, she gushed that 'house pets are a great comfort, a great addition to the household.'

'They are wonderful for your children to have a responsibility of taking some taking care of something else. All of that is to me just endemic in this pandemic,' she continued, before adding that an uptick in pet adoptions at the time was a 'wonderful thing.'

At one point during the interview, Martha spoke directly about Princess Peony and her sister Empress Tang, who she described as 'gorgeous, 'very special' and 'players.'

Animal lover: Martha has long made it known that she is an animal lover, even admitting in an article featured on her website that she owned 'at least 20 cats, 25 dogs, 10 chinchillas, scores of canaries and parakeets, two ponies, three donkeys, 10 horses, many sheep and goats, hundreds of chickens, geese, turkeys, guinea fowl, quail, peacocks, and homing pigeons'; it is unknown if dogs pictured were involved in Princess Peony's death
Real Housewives of New Jersey star Jennifer Aydin has revealed that her husband Bill's red Ferrari was stolen from their garage in Paramus, New Jersey on Sunday night.

While speaking about the scary incident on her Instagram Story, the 44-year-old reality star told her urged her more than 442,000 followers that the robbery occurred just before 11 p.m.

'Bill and I just got a home call that Bill's Ferrari was stolen from our garage. The kids are home. My family is home. My mother is home,' she began in one recording. 'They somehow got in the garage and stole the Ferrari within the last hour.'

Scary: Real Housewives of New Jersey star Jennifer Aydin reveals her husband Bill's red Ferrari was stolen from their garage in Paramus on Sunday night

She then urged anyone in the Paramus area of New Jersey to message her with any information to shed light on what happened.

'It's crazy,' she stated, before sharing a screenshot of a text message from someone claiming they saw the vehicle in the city of Elizabeth, New Jersey.

The screenshot: 'Ferrari is in Elizabeth. My bf is a cop here and they attempted to pull it over, but it took off.'

Hot wheels: Jennifer's husband Bill pictured in the red Ferrari during an episode of RHONJ

'Bill and I just got a home call that Bill's Ferrari was stolen from our garage. The kids are home. My family is home. My mother is home,' she began in one recording. 'They somehow got in the garage and stole the Ferrari within the last hour'

Unbelievable: She then urged anyone in the Paramus area of New Jersey to message her with any information to shed light on what happened

In addition to reiterating that her family and children were all home in another post, she revealed her 17-year-old son Justin 'pulled up right as they were leaving' their property.

'Thank God he wasnt there 30 seconds earlier to cross their path while in the act. Thank you God and Jesus and all my guardian angels,' she captioned security footage of the robbery.

She concluded: 'My family is safe. Scared, but safe. Mommy and Daddy will be home tomorrow.'

'It's crazy,' she stated, before sharing a screenshot of a text message from someone claiming they saw the vehicle in the city of Elizabeth, New Jersey

Close call: In addition to reiterating that her family and children were all home in another post, she revealed her 17-year-old son Justin 'pulled up right as they were leaving' their property

Aydin has recently posted a number of photos from her trip to Miami while staying at the Fontainebleau in Miami, Florida.

Just hours before Bill's car got stolen, she was enjoying martinis at Joe's Stone Crab.

Her fans were quick to flood her with support in the comment section as they remarked they were glad her 'family is safe' but appalled by the 'disgusting crime.'

Scene of the crime: Jennifer's home is pictured above as featured on the Bravo reality series, the Real Housewives of New Jersey

It has been a dramatic year for the couple after Jennifer revealed that she confronted her husband Bill about an affair the day before she gave birth to their fourth child on an episode of The Real Housewives Of New Jersey in January.

She told Teresa Giudice and Dolores Catania that Bill's affair happened 10 years ago and that she was now at peace with it.

In a confessional, Jennifer said she was nine-months pregnant, a stay-at-home mom with no income of her own at the time, and it was 10 days before she was about to give birth.
Simon Cowell kept comfortable in blue loungewear as he arrived to auditions for the upcoming season of his talent show America's Got Talent on Saturday at the audition space in Pasadena.

The 62-year-old was sporting a black and grey wrist cast, which is a result of breaking his arm in a horrifying bike crash just two months ago.

While the judge was masked, he seemed in high spirits as he arrived at the space - flashing the camera's a thumbs up.

Audition time: Simon Cowell, 62, kept comfortable in loungewear as he arrived to the America's Got Talent auditions on Saturday while still sporting his wrist brace

Simon shielded his eyes with a pair of black aviator sunglasses, donning a dusty blue pyjama-style loungewear set.

He typically kept his look casual in a pair of black lace-up trainers on his way into the auditions.

The music mogul previously told MailOnline he was a 'bit of a nutter' after narrowly avoiding serious injury during the accident , in which he wasn't wearing a helmet.

Ouch! The music mogul was still sporting a wrist brace after his frightening bike crash two months ago

Raring to go: While the judge was masked, he seemed in high spirits as he arrived at the space - flashing the cameras a thumbs up

The e-bike crash took place in London, with Simon assuring he is to wear a helmet in future.

America's got talent is set to return for its 17th season, after Simon began the show in 2006.

His fellow judges Sofia Vergara and Heidi Klum also looked eager to see what this years batch of contestants had to offer, cutting a glamorous figure as they rocked up.

Casual: Simon shielded his eyes with a pair of black aviator sunglasses, donning a dusty blue pyjama-style loungewear set

On the mend! Simon previously joked he's been 'a bit of a nutter' when he emerged with his broken arm in a cast for the first time since being rushed to hospital in February

Better safe than sorry: Simon (pictured riding his bike in January) has since promised to stay away from bikes for good after the 'horror' crash

Concerns: In August 2020, Cowell crashed while riding a different bike - the Swind EB-01 bike, which can reach up to 60mph and is banned on public roads in the UK (stock image)

Heidi sported a metallic ensemble with blue jeans and silver court heels, paired with an oversized silver jacket.

While Sofia went bold with an animal print jumpsuit, with tiger face prints decorated over it.

Final judge Howie stepped out of an SUV for the auditions, giving onlookers a wave as he donned a low-key look.

The auditions follow on from the Britain's Got Talent auditions which took place earlier this year, with the show set to air on ITV in April.

Glamorous: His fellow judges Heidi Klum and Sofia Vergara also looked eager to see what this years batch of contestants had to offer, cutting a glamorous figure as they rocked up

Present! Last but not least, Howie Mandel was dropped off just steps away from the filming location by a black SUV
They have been dating for five years.

And Leonardo DiCaprio and his girlfriend Camila Morrone have treated themselves to an opulent getaway as they were spotted touching down at the private airport in Los Cabos, Mexico, over the weekend.

The leading man, 47, considered his safety by sporting a face covering and kept his travelling attire laid-back in a hoodie and navy cap.

Trip: Leonardo DiCaprio and his girlfriend Camila Morrone touched down at the private airport in Los Cabos, Mexico over the weekend to embark on a romantic getaway

In contrast, Camila, who boasts an impressive 3 million followers on Instagram, ensured her look was nothing short of spectacular as she wore a classic white sundress complemented by a chic sunhat.

The Bukowski actress toted a Rive Gauche Saint Laurent bag and rounded off her gorgeous look with large black shades.

After landing, the famous couple were whisked off in a limo to their final destination.

Getaway: Camila, 24, ensured her look was nothing short of spectacular as she wore a classic white sundress complemented by a chic sunhat

Designer: The Bukowski actress toted a Rive Gauche Saint Laurent bag and rounded off her gorgeous look with large black shades

The couple reportedly started dating in the latter part of 2017 after meeting at an event in South Beach, Florida.

It wasn't until the 2020 Oscars that they made their public debut in front of the sea of photographers.

The Los Angeles based duo share a home together and even adopted a few Huskies during 2020's lockdown.

Romance: The couple reportedly started dating in the latter part of 2017 after meeting at an event in South Beach, Florida (Camila pictured March 2022)

Last November it was reported that despite keeping their relationship largely out of the spotlight, the couple is 'closer than ever.'

'They are really solid and everything is great with Leo and Cami,' a source told E! News. 'It's all status quo.'

Though they only became romantic in 2017, Camila's step-dad Al Pacino had actually introduced them years prior.

And though they've attended many high profile events, the two always make a point to walk the red carpet separately.
Jade Tuncdoruk has revealed some of the things she 'learnt last week' following a series of headline-making scandals.

The influencer, 26, told her Instagram followers in a Story post on Monday, that 'it's not my fault if people don't like me, and it's not in my best interest to try to change their minds'.

Jade previously drew criticism for demanding a small business refund her $2,000 honeymoon deposit after ignoring the terms and conditions, and also became a target after a racially insensitive Uber Eats rant of hers went viral.

In a reflective mood: Jade Tuncdoruk (pictured), 26, revealed the things she 'learnt last week' in an Instagram Story post on Monday, after facing backlash over her travel refund scandal and racially insensitive Uber Eats rant

The socialite also shared her other revelations, which include: 'Most people are feeling the same anxiousness and self-doubt as me.'

She also told her fans: 'People aren't just sitting in a room judging me the whole time I'm there.'

Jade sparked backlash in January after it emerged she'd demanded a small business refund her $2,000 honeymoon deposit after ignoring the terms and conditions.

Peace of mind: 'It's not my fault if people don't like me, and it's not in my best interest to try to change their minds,' was one of the influencer's revelations she shared with her followers

Candid: Jade also shared her other revelations, which include: 'Most people are feeling the same anxiousness and self-doubt as me'

She raised eyebrows by complaining to her online fans about the financial woes of cancelling her lavish Hunter Valley honeymoon with fiance Lachie Brycki due to Covid.

In her now-deleted post, Jade, who is frequently gifted with luxury designer handbags and clothing, explained that she'd booked her stay with premium holiday rental company Weekenda last year, putting down a $2,000 deposit.

She however decided to cancel her booking with the company Weekenda in August, after postponing her wedding due to Covid.

Cash: The model was slammed in January for 'demanding' that a small business give her a refund for a deposit on her honeymoon - after she ignored the company's terms and conditions

'Incredibly poor form': Jade said she'd booked her stay with premium holiday rental company Weekenda last year, putting down a $2,000 deposit. After cancelling the booking due to Covid, she demanded that the company refund her deposit. Weekenda denied their request

Jade demanded that the company refund her deposit - even though Weekenda's terms and conditions clearly states that customers aren't entitled to a refund of their deposit if they cancel.

'We requested a refund due to the pandemic, but they said the best they could do was put it back up on line to be booked by someone else,' Jade explained.

'Six weeks out of [sic] the booking and we've asked again for a refund which they've denied. They've had months to refund us for a booking that we don't need. They're taking our money just because they can,' she raged.

In black and white: Weekenda's terms and conditions (pictured) clearly states that customers aren't entitled to a refund of their deposit if they cancel

She added: 'It's just incredibly poor form and so disappointing that businesses are taking advantage of people in the middle of a pandemic.'

Jade included a link to Weekenda's Instagram page, and it didn't take long for her supporters to lash out at the company.

She later claimed she was surprised that her followers had begun contacting the company directly and demanding they refund her money.

Success: Not long after, Jade shared another post announcing that Weekenda had agreed to refund her deposit

'Not y'all following them,' she wrote, rolling her eyes.

Not long after, Jade shared another post announcing that Weekenda had agreed to refund her deposit.

Things went from bad to worse when Jade was forced to apologise for a racially insensitive Uber Eats Facebook post from 2017 which went viral.

The brunette copped huge backlash in early January when a Facebook post showing her complaining to Uber Eats about their 'annoying non-English speaking delivery drivers' resurfaced.

More backlash: Things went from bad to worse when Jade was forced to apologise for a racially insensitive Uber Eats Facebook post from 2017 which went viral

Jade apologised for her 'hurtful comments' after her Facebook post was uploaded by the Celeb Spellcheck Instagram page.

The resurfaced post read: 'I order off you guys all the time and I'm starting to find it really annoying that you have so many non English speaking delivery people who can't follow basic delivery instructions.

'I got a notification today saying my food was arriving and it took the person a further 20 mins to get to my door because he didn't read my delivery instructions properly and when I called him to explain he didn't understand a word I was saying.'

She continued: 'Your GPS is consistently sending drivers to the wrong address which I've explained in my instructions which most people read and have no problem with but when foreigners are delivering it takes twice as long for me to receive my then cold food. Sort it out.'

Post: In the resurfaced post, Jade' wrote: 'I order off you guys all the time and I'm starting to find it really annoying that you have so many non English speaking delivery people who can't follow basic delivery instructions'

Jade subsequently issued a grovelling apology to fans that month, writing on Instagram: 'Hey everyone. I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for the way I've conducted myself recently.'

'I'm aware that my actions were poorly thought out and lack integrity. I want everyone to know that I hold myself to a higher standard than this. I've made it my priority to reevaluate the aspects of my life that have lead to the disconnect between my soul and my actions.'

To conclude, Jade wrote: 'I am sorry to anyone I've let down, including myself.'
Simon Gregson was filmed dancing shirtless on furniture before reportedly being kicked out of his Coronation Street co-star's leaving party.

Video shows the actor, 47, with his shirt off before launching an expletive-filled rant at on-screen daughter Alexandra Mardell's leaving party in Manchester's Deansgate district in February.

Onlookers revealed Simon stripped off after becoming 'a bit merry' with his co-stars.

Wild: Simon Gregson was filmed dancing shirtless on furniture before reportedly being kicked out of his Coronation Street co-star's leaving party

Simon allegedly directed his fury towards the security staff with an expletive-filled rant, who attempted to kick him out of the venue.

An onlooker told The Sun: 'He was the life and soul of the party but took it a bit far and it annoyed the bar staff and bouncers in the end.'

A lip-reading expert told the publication Simon appeared to be saying 'f**k' and 'f**k you' to the two members of staff before assuring, 'I will get down.'

The star - who plays character Steve McDonald in the soap - had been partying with Corrie's Katie McGlynn at the showbiz bash.

Life and soul: Video shows the actor, 47, with his shirt off before launching an expletive-filled rant at on-screen daughter Alexandra Mardell's leaving party in Manchester in February

Dancing king: Onlookers at the Manchester party revealed Simon stripped off after becoming 'a bit merry' with his co-stars

Asked to leave? Simon allegedly directed his fury towards the security staff with an expletive-filled rant, who attempted to kick him out of the venue

She allegedly stepped in-between her pal and the bouncer in a bid to cool down the situation, later posting a beaming photo of herself in an unmissable yellow dress alongside Alexandra, who plays Emma Booker in the ITV favourite.

The source continued: 'Simon was acting pretty wildly  but more in the sense that he was in high spirits and getting carried away.

'The crowd were laughing and cheering, with a lot of people egging him on, and most people there saw the funny side. But some clubbers were shouting abuse at him as well, which was unnecessary.'

Alexandra's photos from the night saw her party with Millie Gibson (Kelly Neelan), Colson Smith (Craig Tinker), Georgia Taylor (Toyah Battersby), Elle Mulvaney (Amy Barlow) and Mollie Gallagher (Nina Lucas).

Simon's representatives have been contacted for comment by MailOnline.

Get down: A member of security was seen reaching up to Simon and attempting to get him down

All good: The actor was seen climbing down from the furniture after a spot of dancing

Hilarious: An onlooker said: 'He was the life and soul of the party but took it a bit far and it annoyed the bar staff and bouncers in the end' (pictured, centre, with Alexandra and her boyfriend Joe Parker, far left)

It comes after Alexandra revealed that her character is set to leave the cobbles in dramatic fashion as she teased the Rovers barmaid could be sent to prison.

Appearing on Friday's episode of This Morning, the actress also detailed her reasons for leaving the soap, explaining that she fancied trying something new.

Following a fatal car crash on the show, Emma has been racked with guilt.

Although Faye Windass (Ellie Leach) was behind the wheel at the time of the accident, leaving a pensioner dead, Emma was supposed to be teaching her how to drive but she was still intoxicated from the night before.

Teasing that this could mean her character is jailed, Alexandra revealed to hosts Alison Hammond and Dermot O'Leary that her kindhearted alter ego cannot lie.

Gorgeous: Katie McGlynn (left) later posted a beaming photo of herself in an unmissable yellow dress alongside Alexandra (right), who plays Emma Booker in the ITV favourite

Cast night out! Alexandra with her co-stars (L-R) Mikey North, Jordan Ford Silver, Tanisha Gorey, Joe Duttine, Charlie de Melo, Harriet Bibby, Alexandra and Georgia Taylor

Gang: Elle Mulvaney (far left) Steve (centre-left), Emma (centre) and Tanisha Gorey (centre-right) appeared to be in high spirits during the star-studded party

Looking good: The star posed for another snap with Colson Smith and Julia Goulding

'Is she off to prison? What's gonna happen? I dont know how she would get on with that.'

Alexandra - who cut a stylish figure for the appearance in a chic fuchsia suit - also revealed that she had originally told show bosses that she wanted to leave a year ago.

'There wasnt a particular reason, I just thought it was my time,' she explained. 'Its a relief they're not killing me off, the door is open which is lovely.'

Having watched the show since she was a child Alexandra went on to say how she understands why actors stay for 60 years or more.

Co-star William Roach has played the role of Ken Barlow since the show's inception in 1960.

'It goes so fast I feel new myself still, it was massive to leave, it's like being at school, I was there for quite a long time,' she said. 'It's right for Emma, I'm happy with it.'

Pals: Emma and her co-star Rob Mallard (who plays Daniel Barlow) put on a friendly display

Stunning! The beauty beamed as she posed with Charlotte Jordan known for her role as Daisy Midgeley and Sair Khan who plays Alya Nazir

She added: 'I've loved every storyline - finding out Steve McDonald is your dad and working with Simon Gregson! He's such a laugh to work with, I miss him so much.

'I grew up with Corrie so it was always in my head as a dream. I auditioned for another role and didnt get it but I always told my mum I would be David Platts (Jack P. Shepherd) girlfriend on the show'.

The star who is has been appearing in a play since she left the soap also revealed that she took a few mementos from the set.

She admitted: 'A mug that said boss girl, I also took the pink furry coats, because why not.'
Love Island's Dr Alex George has been praised by fans after revealing he's bought four holiday cottages in Pembrokeshire and plans to house a Ukrainian family in one.

The 31-year-old took to social media on Sunday to explain he plans on renovating the homes but wants to help out a family in need.

The star shared the exciting news with his 2million Instagram followers as he beamed in front of one of the doors.

Heartfelt: Dr Alex George, 31, announced on Instagram on Sunday that he has bought four holiday cottages in Pembrokeshire and hopes to home a Ukrainian family in one

Generous: The former Love Island star beamed as he took to social media on Sunday to share his exciting new purchase with fans

He penned: 'Todays the day! Im so excited to announce that Ive bought 4 holiday cottages in beautiful Pembrokeshire, in Wales.

'I initially bought these for my passion for property and renovation, as well as wanting to create relaxing spaces for families to holiday and enjoy the Welsh countryside in!'

He continued: 'With all of the current devastation in Ukraine, I have decided I would love one of the cottages to be home to a Ukrainian family for as long as they need.

Tour: Dr Alex took fans around the properties in his latest YouTube video detailing everything he is going to change

Wow: The 31-year-old bought the cottages initially for his 'passion for property' but with all of the devastation in Ukraine he decided one should be home to a Ukrainian family

'My plan is to start the renovations and get the properties into a good state to house a family as soon as possible.'

Dr Alex took fans around the properties in his latest YouTube video detailing everything he is going to change.

The influencer explained how the 'cottages are not in a fit state at the minute' and hopes to renovate them as quickly as possible to help the refugees.

The reality star said: 'We have all been moved by the things we have seen in Ukraine and I have felt quite powerless in the last few weeks and months.

'What I would like to do is put a Ukrainian refugee family in to stay there as long as they need to.

'I'm going to renovate these cottages as quickly as possible to a high standard and when one is done we can put a family in.

Exciting: Dr Alex beamed as he and his friend showcased the cottages on YouTube

So sweet: The star has created a new Instagram account allowing fans to follow along the journey

'The buildings are incredibly old and use to be farm buildings but have so much character and are nice and quirky.'

Dr Alex has created a new Instagram account @dralexrenovates for fans to follow along the journey which has already raked up 74.7 thousand followers in less than 24 hours.

Fans couldn't contain their excitement for the heartfelt announcement.

They wrote: 'You are amazing.'

'Honestly a true influencer!'

Thrilled: Fans couldn't contain their excitement for the 'incredible' purchase

Volodymyr Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, recorded a video message for the Grammys on Sunday, encouraging people to speak up against the war. 'Anything but silence', he declared

A satellite image taken on March 31 shows the mass grave - a 45ft-long pit - dug behind the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in Bucha, during the time that Russian forces were in control of the region

'What a man, so admirable!!'

'What an incredible thing to do!!'

Dr Alex's kind gesture comes after reports showed mass graves filled with the bodies of dozens of civilians have been uncovered in cities near Kyiv on Monday.

From satellite images taken a week ago a slit trench dug into the grounds of a church is visible.

Officials now say the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in total, with many strewn through the streets.
Mark Wales was unanimously crowned the winner of Australian Survivor: Blood V Water on Monday night.

The ex-SAS commander, 42, took home the $500,000 cash prize after heading into the finale with Josh Millgate, Chrissy Zaremba and Shayelle Lajoie.

It was a gruelling final immunity challenge that saw the remaining four go head-to-head.

Sole Survivor: Ex-SAS commander Mark Wales (pictured), 42, was unanimously crowned the WINNER of Australian Survivor: Blood V Water on Monday's episode - pocketing $500,000

They were required to stand on a wooden platform, stationed above a waterfall, and grab hold of lower rungs at regular intervals.

Chrissy was the first to be defeated, followed by Josh, Mark and Shayelle.

In the ultimate betrayal, Chrissy sent Josh to the jury where he was voted out.

Support system: Mark celebrated his win with his 'soulmate' and wife Sam Gash (left), who he met on the 2017 season of the show

Former contestants reunited to vote for who should be crowned Sole Survivor.

Mark was unanimously crowned the winner, and his proud wife Sam Gash was there to celebrate.

In an Instagram post on Monday, Mark detailed the physical and emotional strength that's required to star on the show.

Remaining contestants: Mark headed into the finale with Josh Millgate, Chrissy Zaremba (left with her family) and Shayelle Lajoie (centre with her family)

Sent packing: In the ultimate betrayal, Chrissy sent Josh (pictured) to the jury where he was voted out after their final immunity challenge

'Playing Survivor is hard, I'm meant to be conditioned for this type of work but I could feel it breaking me down,' he wrote.

'The physical is endurable, it's the dilemmas, the attachments, the losses, the fear, the grief and the emotional toll of that makes it so, so hard - AND, therefore - such a great story, an unreal game and the best show in the world.

'Whatever happened out there, I always reminded myself that the night is always darkest before the dawn - there's always hope.'

Mark went on to praise his 'soulmate' Sam, who he met on the 2017 season of the show, and said he's 'lucky to have played Survivor twice'.
She quit Married at First Sight following a very messy break-up with her on-screen 'husband' Anthony Cincotta.

But Selin Mengu looked like she didn't have a care in the world as she was spotted leaving her Coogee hotel in her pyjamas the morning after filming Monday's finale.

The executive assistant, 33, risked a wardrobe malfunction as she rushed out to run errands around the eastern suburbs on January 14.

Big night? Selin Mengu looked like she didn't have a care in the world as she was spotted leaving her Coogee hotel in her pyjamas the morning after filming Monday's MAFS finale

At one stage, Selin was seen covering her chest and adjusting her shirt, which was only buttoned from halfway down.

She teamed a $140 Peter Alexander sleepwear set with thongs as she visited a nearby store to buy a pencil sharpener for her Charlotte Tilbury lipliner.

Monday's reunion saw the mother of one come face to face with her ex-'husband' Anthony for the first time since going their separate ways.

Whoops! The executive assistant, 33, risked a wardrobe malfunction as she rushed out to run errands around the eastern suburbs on January 14

Sleepy chic: She teamed a $140 Peter Alexander sleepwear set with thongs as she visited a nearby store to buy a pencil sharpener for her Charlotte Tilbury lipliner

Both Selin and Anthony chose to write 'leave' during a commitment ceremony that aired on February 24.

'The time was up for Anthony and I in the experiment. We both decided it was the best thing we could do to end it and are civil,' she said of the experience.

Selin explained the highlight of the experiment was being able to put herself out there and learning it wasn't selfish to want to find love.

Reunited: Monday's reunion saw the mother of one come face to face with her ex-'husband' Anthony Cincotta for the first time since going their separate ways

Married At First Sight was a ratings smash for Channel Nine this season, regularly drawing one million metro viewers per episode.

It routinely doubled the audience of Channel 10's Australian Survivor and had about triple the viewership of Seven's struggling SAS Australia.

With BVOD catch-up numbers and regional figures taken into consideration, MAFS often drew more than two million viewers per night.
Katie Price is taking another step away from her abruptly cancelled engagement by getting a recent tattoo of ex Carl Woods' face removed from her arm.

Both Katie and Carl did what most tattoo artists strongly advice couples not to do by getting portraits of one another's faces inked onto their forearms.

But the former glamour model, who has carried Carl's face on her arm for the last two years, is keen to have it removed after he broke off their engagement in March.

Moving on: Katie Price and Carl Woods are taking another step away from their cancelled engagement by getting matching tattoos of each other's faces removed from her arm

Ex-Love Island contestant Carl dumped Katie over allegations of infidelity, and he too is hoping to have the tattoo he obtained while on holiday in Turkey last year lasered off.

A source told The Sun: 'Katie and Carl are both looking at options to cover up their inkings - it's not ideal to be looking at your exes' face all the time after a split.

'Katie can be impulsive and would be happy with anything to cover up her tattoo of Carl but he's keen to get something that looks good. It's basically a race to see who can do it first.'

Bad move: Both Katie and Carl did what most tattoo artists strongly advice couples not to do by getting portraits of one another's faces inked onto their forearms

The beleaguered ex-model has previous when it comes to getting tattoos inspired by her relationships.

As well as Carl's face, Kate also has ex-husband Peter Andre's name tattooed on het wrist and former boyfriend Leandro Penna's name and the date they met inked onto her ankle.

Carl proposed to Katie in April 2021, only ten months after they initially started dating, marking the seventh engagement for the former glamour model.

There it is: Katie is now hoping to get the tattoo of Carl's face removed from her forearm

Not the best idea: Carl opted to get Katie's face inked onto his arm during a trip to Turkey

However the coupe separated in March, with the luxe car dealer accusing Katie of messaging 'another man' on WhatsApp.

A source told The Sun: 'Carl was furious and was accusing Katie of all kinds of things. He was ranting about loyalty and saying hed found out exactly how she was hiding the messages from him.

'Carl believes Katie went behind his back with another man. He lashed out in a series of texts and accused her of lying to him and using her pals to hide the phone number of the man he thinks shes been seeing.

'He branded her a cheat and a player and told her he has had enough.'
Sophie Guidolin has called out trolls who criticised her for posing in a skimpy bikini with her teenage son Kai.

On Sunday, the Gold Coast influencer, 32, shared a photo of herself in a green bikini smiling alongside her son Kai as he celebrated his 15th birthday.

'Happy 15th Kai,' she captioned the post.

Speaking out: Gold Coast influencer Sophie Guidolin has hit back at trolls who criticised her for taking a 'sexualised' photo in a bikini with her teenage son

But Sophie was forced to defend her Instagram post after several fans criticised her for posing in a bikini next to her teenage son.

'WE LIVE IN THE GOLD COAST, Australia. Where wearing a bikini to the beach is so beyond normal, that I didn't even consider having to place a disclaimer on this photo,' she began the post.

'When Kai woke up, I was in the pool and yes- in a bikini (as I am most days). I wanted a photo straight away as he wanted to ride his bike and go out riding all day immediately.'

'WE LIVE IN THE GOLD COAST, Australia. Where wearing a bikini to the beach is so beyond normal, that I didn't even consider having to place a disclaimer on this photo,' she said

'When Kai woke up, I was in the pool and yes- in a bikini (as I am most days). I wanted a photo straight away as he wanted to ride his bike and go out riding all day immediately' she added

'Do I have a problem wearing a bikini in front of my sons? NO WAY. Why? Because I'm not sexualised to him, nor have I ever been,' she continued

'Do I have a problem wearing a bikini in front of my sons? NO WAY. Why? Because I'm not sexualised to him, nor have I ever been,' she continued.

'If you have an issue, maybe you should look into why you feel you have to sexualise a woman's body instead of it simply being a mum and her son at the pool!'

Many fans also rushed to Sophie's defence, with one writing: 'I can't believe you even had to explain that! What a nanny state we live in now.'

Many fans also rushed to Sophie's defence, with one writing: 'I can't believe you even had to explain that! What a nanny state we live in now'

'You shouldn't have to edit this, nothing more than a beautiful mum and son photo,' another agreed.

'Omg!! I cannot believe you are having to defend yourself about this,' one more said.

Sophie shares her two sons and two daughters with her ex-husband Nathan Wallace.
Ella Ding and Brent Vitiello and have addressed rumours that they coupled up after splitting with their partners on Married at First Sight.

The pair sparked gossip when they only had eyes for each other as they hit Maroubra Beach in Sydney on the most romantic day of the year, Valentine's Day.

The sighting raised eyebrows given that Brent was paired with Tamara Djordjevic on MAFS, and Ella is coupled up with Mitch Eynaud.

What's happening? Ella Ding (pictured) and Brent Vitiello and have addressed rumours that they coupled up after splitting with their partners on Married at First Sight. Asked if they were now a couple on Monday, Ella told Yahoo that she and Brent are 'just chilling'

Asked if they were now a couple on Monday, Ella told Yahoo that she and Brent are 'just chilling'.

She then revealed their cute 'couple nickname', 'Brella' - which was given to them by fans.

'Aren't they saying 'Team Brella'?' Ella asked the publication, while Brent, 33, added, 'We're just doing a bit of Brella s**t and that's it'.

'We all know there's an attraction between Ella and Brent but neither of them wants to rush into something,' an alleged source told Yahoo.

Cute! She then revealed their cute 'couple nickname', 'Brella' - which was given to them by fans. 'Aren't they saying 'Team Brella'?' Ella asked the publication, while Brent (pictured) added, 'We're just doing a bit of Brella s**t and that's it'.

Apart: The pair sparked gossip when they only had eyes for each other as they hit Maroubra Beach in Sydney on the most romantic day of the year, Valentine's Day. Brent was at the time paired with Tamara Djordjevic (left) on the show

'She's planning on moving to Sydney soon and then they'll see where they're both at once the whirlwind of the show has died down and they don't have to hang out in secret' they added.

Brent earlier told radio hosts Fitzy & Wippa that there was 'nothing' romantic between the pair.

Ella meanwhile got back together with 'husband' Mitch before the reunion episodes, which were filmed in January, after Mitch had dumped her at the final vows.

Back on: Ella meanwhile got back together with 'husband' Mitch (right) before the reunion episodes, which were filmed in January, after Mitch had dumped her at the final vows

Sad: The beautician, 28, burst into tears on the show last week when financial planner Mitch, 27, told her he couldn't make a decision about their future

The beautician, 28, burst into tears on the show last week when financial planner Mitch, 27, told her he couldn't make a decision about their future.

But the pair surprised everyone at Sunday's reunion dinner party when they arrived together and announced they had reconciled.

Ella explained they'd decided to meet up on the Gold Coast, where Mitch lives, after filming their final vows in early December, and this ended up being a game changer.
Former Married At First Sight star Cyrell Paule had fans thinking she's engaged to her Love Island star beau Eden Dally on Monday.

The 32-year-old shared photos of a lavish proposal set-up in front of Sydney Harbour to her Instagram page, from a friend's engagement.

After fans flocked to the comments section to reveal their first thoughts, Cyrell joked that 'all dreams of getting married died out' after her 'first fake marriage' to Nic Jovanovic back in 2019.

Setting the Internet abuzz: Former Married At First Sight star Cyrell Paule had fans thinking she's ENGAGED to Eden Dally (both pictured), after she posted a photo of a proposal set-up to her Instagram page on Monday

The proposal photos saw a wooden table adorned with candles, roses and chic tableware.

A neon sign with the text 'Will you marry me?' was stationed towards the right hand side of the table, and was surrounded by a stunning white floral arrangement.

There was also a bottle of Champagne ready on ice, as well as chocolates.

Gorgeous: Cyrell, 32, shared photos of a lavish proposal set-up in front of Sydney Harbour to her Instagram page, from a friend's engagement

Online chatter: Fans of Cyrell were quick to comment, with one writing: 'I so thought this was a post for you and Eden!' Another wrote: Oh my God got excited for a second thinking this was for you!!!!!'

Fans of Cyrell were quick to comment, with one writing: 'I so thought this was a post for you and Eden!'

Another wrote: Oh my God got excited for a second thinking this was for you!!!!!'

One also posted: 'Totally thought this was your engagement!'

Not engaged: Cyrell was quick to address the confusion, writing: 'No it's not us that got engaged!!! All dreams of getting married died out, since my first fake marriage,' alongside a series of laughing face emojis

Very happy: She also took to her Instagram Stories to reveal that she and Eden are 'very happy'

Cyrell was quick to address the confusion, writing: 'No it's not us that got engaged!!! All dreams of getting married died out, since my first fake marriage,' alongside a series of laughing face emojis.

She also took to her Instagram Stories to reveal that she and Eden are 'very happy'.

Cyrell and Eden welcomed their first child, son Boston, in February 2020.

Reality TV debut: Cyrell and Eden met in March 2019 after Cyrell's 'marriage' to Nic Jovanovic (pictured) on MAFS ended when they decided they were better off as just friends

Timeline: Cyrell and Eden began dating officially within a matter of weeks, and she later moved into his Sydney home. They announced they were expecting in August 2019

The couple met in March 2019 after Cyrell's 'marriage' to Nic Jovanovic on Married At First Sight ended when they decided they were better off as friends.

Cyrell and Eden began dating officially within a matter of weeks, and she later moved into his Sydney home.

They announced they were expecting their first child together in August 2019.
Advertisement

EastEnders star June Brown led a life that was as dramatic and tragic off-screen as her on-screen character Dot Cotton, as the actress' death was announced by the BBC on Monday at the age of 95.

Known for playing the chain-smoking, gossiping EastEnder, the actress died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side after playing the iconic character for 21 years.

While June became one of the most iconic figures in soap, her journey to fame wasn't easy, and after overcoming childhood tragedy that included the loss of two of her siblings, the star battled hardship raising her large family before rising to prominence with her famous role.

Sad: EastEnders star June Brown led a life that was as dramatic and tragic off-screen as her on-screen character Dot Cotton, as the actress' death was announced by the BBC on Monday at the age of 95

Born in Needham Market, Suffolk in 1927 as one of five children, June's father Henry was a wealthy businessman before he went bust during the Second World War investing in German banks.

The star's mother Louise was a milliner, and the star previously confessed that she felt her mother viewed in much lower regard than her siblings, describing herself as the 'mongrel' of the family.

June's childhood was also tinged with tragedy, after her younger brother, John, died of pneumonia in 1932 when he was just 15 days old, and her sister Marise died of meningitis two years later when she was just eight years old.

RIP: Known for playing the chain-smoking, gossiping EastEnder, the actress died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side after playing the iconic character for 21 years

Stunning: Born as one of five children, June eventually landed a spot at the prestigious Old Vic Theatre School, and spent years performing with the Royal Shakespeare Company before making her first television appearance in 1959

The star previously admitted that the loss 'shaped the way she behaved for a long time', writing in her autobiography: 'In particular, it influenced my expectations of men. Too dependent, I found it impossible to be happy alone. I was constantly in and out of love, always looking for the kind of caring she had given me.'

She added: 'Micie was the only person to know the real me. The result was that I've spent my life looking for a companion who could show me the same sort of love. And I've never found anyone to match her.'

June excelled in her studies and evenutually landed a scholarship at Ipswich High School in the hope of becoming a biologist, but her father insisted she would only 'go off and get married.'

Having served in the Women's Royal Naval Service at the end of the war, June first discovered her love of acting during her time in the RNS, and once the war was over she got a job as a cinema operator.

Ordeal: She met and married her first husband John Garley in 1950 when she was just 23. However John struggled with depression and died by suicide just seven years later after gassing himself

June eventually won a place at the coveted London's Old Vic Theatre School, where she met and married her first husband John Garley in 1950 when she was just 23.

However John struggled with depression and died by suicide just seven years later after gassing himself, and June previously detailed her regrets at abandoning her husband at his lowest moments.

She told The Mirror in 2013: I should never have left him. But I was tired. I couldn't stand any more,' after both she and Johnny had been unfaithful to one another.

Tough times: She married her second husband Robert Arnold in 1958, and the pair went onto have six children. June openly detailed the hardships her family faced while she and Robert worked as jobbing actors

Sad: Despite confessing to several affairs, June was married to Robert for 45 years, until he passed away in 2003 after battling Lewy-body dementia

June also spoke of her guilt at leaving him at home by himself and the horror of discovering his body in their flat. She said it was only in the latter stages of his life that she had any inkling that he was having suicidal thoughts.

Before landing her iconic soap role, June performed with the Royal Shakespeare Company, for many years, appearing alongside stage icons such as Alec Guinness, John Gielgud and Peggy Ashcroft.

She made her first television appearance as Chica, a native, in The Rough and Ready in 1959, and alongside an array of TV bit parts, even starred in Coronation Street as the mother of Tony Parsons

In 1958 she married her second husband, actor Robert Arnold, and the pair went onto have six children in seven years, although their second child, daughter Chloe died after just 16 days after being born prematurely.

Despite confessing to several affairs, June was married to Robert for 45 years, until he passed away in 2003 after battling Lewy-body dementia.

June openly detailed the hardship she faced as a jobbing actor raising her large family, and was no stranger to bringing her children along to the set when she was unable to find childcare.

Blast from the past: She made her first television appearance as Chica, a native, in The Rough and Ready in 1959, and alongside an array of TV bit parts, even starred in Coronation Street as the mother of Tony Parsons

She also previously discussed how close to the poverty line she and husband Robert were when she landed the role of Dot Cotton.

She said: 'I'd been offered no work, was trapped in a hole and couldn't see my way out. I earned just 3,000 a year, not enough to support my husband, who was always in and out of work all the time, and our five teenage kids.

'There was just no hope for the future  it was a choice between money for the electricity bill or saving the family from starvation.'

While June originally joined the EastEnders cast, she was already in her late fifties, and was originally booked for just a three-month stint as villain Nick Cotton's long-suffering mother Dot.

Known for her devotion to her religion and heavy chain-smoking, she quickly became a hit with viewers, and went onto star in 2,884 episodes of the soap over 21 years.

Dot temporarily left the soap between 1993 and 1997 before she returned to the square. June also took six months off in 2012 to write her autobiography.

Iconic: Despite originally joining the EastEnders cast for three months, June won an army of fans with her role as chain-smoking gossip Dot, who was forever tormented by her villainous son Nick

For the ages: Hard-nosed Dot's relationship with Jim Branning warmed viewers' hearts throughout her time on the soap, until Jim was sadly written out in 2011 after actor John Bardon suffered a strok

Dot Cotton's Biggest Storylines History: Dot has been involved in a number of dramatic storylines throughout her years in Walford Dot's debut - 1985: Dot Cotton made her debut in EastEnders in July of that year as the mother of notorious criminal Nick Cotton and the best friend of Ethel Skinner. Despite Nick stealing from his mother and attempting to poison her, Dot believes he can be redeemed. Dot temporarily leaves Albert Square - 1993: Nick's girlfriend Zoe Newton arrives in Walford and introduces Dot to their nine-year-old son, Ashley Cotton. Dot becomes close with her grandson and Zoe asks her to move to Gravesend with them. Nick is thrown behind bars when Dot returns - 1997: Dot moves back to the square after Nigel Bates tracks her down. Nick has been arrested for drug possession and she is shocked when he returns unexpectedly. He begins stealing from her again and falsely claims to have AIDS. Dot discovers the lie and reports him to the police. Dot helps her friend Ethel to die - 2000: Ethel begs Dot to help end her life after she comes terminally ill. Torn between her deeply held Christian beliefs against euthanasia and her friend's wishes, Dot ultimately helps Ethel to die with pills, but later thinks she should be jailed for murder. Feeling she should be punished, Dot ends up in court for shoplifting. She is jailed for 14 days for contempt of court following an outburst in the courtroom. Dot ties the knot for a second time - 2002: Dot starts a relationship with neighbour Jim Branning. When he proposes, she is overwhelmed and leaves Walford. Jim perseveres and proposes to Dot a second time when they visit the London Eye on Christmas Eve. They decide to have a platonic marital relationship. Dot appears in EastEnders' first ever single-handed episode - 2008: In an emotional episode, Dot recorded a message for her husband Jim after he suffered a stroke. The episode featured only her character and June was praised by viewers for her emotional performance. Dot watches on as Nick dies - 2015: After years of forgiving him for his crimes, Dot accepts Nick's inability to change. After he asks her to buy him heroin, she agrees and gives it to him. Nick confesses he murdered Reg Cox as he lays dying and Dot decides not to call an ambulance to save him. Sonia steals from Dot - 2019: Sonia resorts to stealing from her step-grandmother after a blackmail threat from Martin's hit-and-run victim. She covers her tracks by claiming hackers are to blame after trying to steal thousands from Dot's bank account. Advertisement

Dot's enduring popularity with viewers turned June into a cultural icon, adored by the soap's legions of fans.

Although she loved portraying the character, the actress admitted her fame was sometimes difficult for her family to deal with.

She said: 'They got fed up with it. If we went shopping and people would stop for an autograph, nowadays it's a selfie, you're always being stopped.

'I would always stop. They put you where you are don't they? Your fans. You should appreciate your fans.'

In 2008 June also earned critical acclaim when she appeared in EastEnders' first single-handed episode, when Dot recorded a message for her husband Jim Branning, who had suffered a stroke.

Her performance in the scene earned unanimous praise from viewers, and she became one of very few soap actresses to earn a BAFTA nomination.

One of Dot's biggest storylines in recent years was for the show's 30th anniversary when she gave her son Nick a fatal dose of heroin and let him die.

Sensational: Despite a decades-long history in the acting world, one of June's more iconic moments came when she formed an unlikely friendship with pop superstar Lady Gaga in 2013

The character began to appear less frequently from February 2015 due to June gradually losing her eyesight and having difficulty reading the scripts.

This was later written into the character the following year, with June making sporadic appearances on EastEnders since 2017, with Dot becoming a millionaire in 2019 after learning her longtime friend Dr Legg had left his entire estate.

In 2020, June then announced that she had left EastEnders for good after growing disatisfied with recent storylines, telling the Distinct Nostalgia podcast, June said: 'It's almost as if I've been bereaved. I don't want a retainer for EastEnders, I've left. I've left for good.

'I've sent her off to Ireland where she'll stay. I've left EastEnders. I did make up a limerick. It's a bit dirty.

Outspoken: An avid supporter of the Conservative party, June was no stranger to sharing her cutting opinions on social media, and even joked she was hoping to be 'buried at sea' following her death (pictured in 2013)

June then recited the limerick: 'I went back to do a good story. Alas and alack, when I got back it had gone up in smoke. I got a small part, a very small part. And that ended up as a big wet fart. Alas and alack, I will never go back.'

Alongside her iconic soap role, June also appeared on Strictly Come Dancing's Christmas Special in 2010, taking to the dancefloor with pro Vincent Simone, and like her on-screen persona, smoked heavily from the age of 16.

An avid supporter of the Conservative party, June was no stranger to sharing her cutting opinions on social media, and even joked she was hoping to be 'buried at sea' following her death.

Despite a decades-long history in the acting world, one of June's more iconic moments came when she formed an unlikely friendship with pop superstar Lady Gaga in 2013.

In a clip from the star's appearance on The Graham Norton Show, the pop superstar can be seen beaming with excitement as she and June embraced.

Asked whether she knew of June ahead of the interview, Gaga said: 'I am a very big fan of yours, I just don't watch a lot of television. You are so fabulously dressed and I'm honoured to be seated next to you.'

In 2019 June also revealed that Gaga even invited her on a night out, telling the Loose Women panel: 'She invited me to a private thing, unfortunately I was doing Piers Morgan the next day.

'I'm not showing off, I'm telling the truth and I had to be in early and you're in all day long. I can't go clubbing if I've got to be alert the next day.'

Gone! In 2020, June then announced that she had left EastEnders for good after growing disatisfied with recent storylines (pictured in 2019), with her character relocating to Ireland after longtime friend Dr Legg left her his estate

June's death was announced in a statement from the BBC on Monday, revealing she died peacefully on Monday while the BBC urged fans to raise a glass of sweet sherry in her memory.

An EastEnders spokesman said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved June Brown, OBE, MBE, sadly passed away last night.

'There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humour will never be forgotten.

'June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2,884 episodes, June's remarkable performances created some of EastEnders' finest moments.

'We send all our love and deepest sympathies to June's family and friends. A very bright light has gone out at EastEnders today but we shall all be raising a sweet sherry in June's memory. Rest in peace, our dearest June. You will never be forgotten.'

A statement from her family said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce our beloved mother, June, passed away very peacefully at her home in Surrey on Sunday evening, with her family by her side.

'We would kindly ask that our privacy is respected at this very difficult time.'

'We'll be raising a sweet sherry in her memory': Heartbreak as EastEnders icon June Brown dies aged 95 after playing chain-smoking launderette manager Dot Cotton in 2,884 episodes of BBC soap opera over 35 years

By Martin Robinson, Chief Reporter for MailOnline

The actress died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side, the BBC revealed today

One of Britain's greatest soap stars was on EastEnders for 35 years, leaving the show in 2020 at the age of 93,

Brown, who began her career on Coronation Street married first husband, John Garley, in 1950, but he died

June married actor Robert Arnold in 1958. He died in 2003 after 45 years of marriage and six children

EastEnders legend June Brown, best known for her role as Albert Square busybody Dot Cotton, has died at the age of 95, the BBC has announced.

The actress, a mother-of-six born in rural Suffolk in 1927, died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side, two years after her final appearance on the soap and 35 years after her debut.

Fellow stars including Adam Woodyatt, who played Ian Beale until last year, Gillian Taylforth, who plays Kathy Beale in the show and Letitia Dean, best known as Sharon Watts, hailed their friend and colleague as 'an amazing woman and a truly wonderful actress'.

BBC director general Tim Davie said: 'June Brown was a brilliantly talented actor who was loved by millions' who had 'delivered some of the most memorable moments in soap history'.

Actor and writer Stephen Fry said June Brown will be remembered 'as a tireless and fearless LGBT ally'. He tweeted: 'June Brown, amongst all her other wonderful human qualities and achievements, will be remembered as a tireless and fearless LGBT ally - especially during the darkest days of HIV/AIDS and Section 28... it was a privilege to know her.'

For decades she was one of the most famous faces on British TV, playing the devout Christian famed on Albert Square for her chain smoking, gossiping and mothering of those in need while working in the launderette.

Incredibly she began her career on Coronation Street and it was at the age of 58 that she landed the role that would turn her into a household name. Actor Leslie Grantham, who famously played Dirty Den in the soap, put June forward for the part after seeing her in the comedy drama Minder. She became so popular on the soap that she remained there for the next 30 years, except for a four-year break between 1993 and 1997.

Her relationship with her tearaway son Nasty Nick Cotton, played by John Altman, would captivate millions who watched in horror and sympathy as she forgave and forgave him for his crimes. But in 2015 Dot finally gave up on him after he cut the brakes on Roxy's car and he died after consuming a bad batch of heroin bought for him by his very own mother.

Dot's loving relationship with Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, saw the on-screen couple win a host of awards and left heartbroken fans in tears as she said goodbye to him following a stroke.

Ms Brown's family revealed she died peacefully last night while the BBC urged fans to raise a glass of sweet sherry in her memory. The star still loved a tipple and a cigarette well into her 90s.

Tragedy: EastEnders star June Brown, pictured in 2020 aged 93, who was best known for her role as Dot Cotton, has died at the age of 95

Sad: June enjoyed 35 years on the show, joining in 1985 and filming her final scenes in 2020 (far right)

Emotional: Her most memorable moments included helping her best friend Ethel end her life in 2000, which proved highly controversial

They're friends? June Brown shares a cuddle with Lady Gaga, who she became close to after bonding backstage at the Graham Norton Show

Legendary: June Brown and John Bardon are pictured in their roles as Dot and Jim Branning in EastEnders. They became one of the show's most beloved couples

Viewers were captivated by her relationship with her tearaway son Nick, played by John Altman, who would die from a heroin overdose bought for him by Dot (pictured right)

June Brown is pictured at her book signing at Easons store in Dublin, Ireland.She is joined by two of her daughters Sophie and Naomi in 2013

An EastEnders spokesman said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved June Brown, OBE, MBE, sadly passed away last night.

'There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humour will never be forgotten.

'June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2,884 episodes, June's remarkable performances created some of EastEnders' finest moments.

'We send all our love and deepest sympathies to June's family and friends. A very bright light has gone out at EastEnders today but we shall all be raising a sweet sherry in June's memory.

'Rest in peace, our dearest June. You will never be forgotten.'

A statement from Brown's family said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce our beloved mother, June, passed away very peacefully at her home in Surrey on Sunday evening, with her family by her side.

'We would kindly ask that our privacy is respected at this very difficult time.'

Members of the EastEnders cast have paid tribute to June Brown. Gillian Taylforth, who plays Kathy Beale in the show, hailed Brown as 'an amazing woman and a truly wonderful actress'.

She said: 'I'm truly heartbroken by this news. June Brown OBE, MBE, was an amazing woman and a truly wonderful actress.

'I shared many scenes with her over the years and she was always someone I looked up to and learnt from.

'There will never be another June Brown and I'm sending all my love to her family.'

Adam Woodyatt, who plays Taylforth's on-screen son Ian Beale, also paid tribute to the actress, who died at her home in Surrey on Sunday with her family by her side.

He said: 'I'm lost for words, something June never was.

'So many memories, so much fun. Just purely and simply an incredible woman who had the most incredible life and career, I was fortunate to have shared a small part of it.

'They never made you a Dame (we did try), but to me you will always be Dame Brown.'

Letitia Dean, best known as Sharon Watts, said: 'My beloved June, I truly loved you. Not just a phenomenal actress but a very dear friend.

'Oh the fun we have had over the years! I will never stop loving you, THANK YOU for your kindness and your generosity and for loving me the way you did.

'Sending all my dearest love to June's family at this devastating time. God bless you June.'

Milly Zero, who plays Brown's on-screen granddaughter Dotty Cotton, also expressed her love and respect for Brown, describing her as a 'national treasure'.

Zero, 22, tweeted: 'Rest in perfect peace 'Grandma Dot'. I have never met anyone who cared about their craft so deeply.

'An artist, a national treasure, an icon & an inspiration to us all. You will always live on in the hearts of everybody you touched. There will never be anyone quite like June.'

Dot would always be taken advantage of by her son Nick, and he would always be forgiven by his Christian mother

Eastenders cast with the award for TV Soap of the year during the 2017 Television and Radio Industries Club Awards, three years before she left the show

Dot would find love with Jim, who proposed on the London Eye overlooking the Houses of Parliament

The actress's 35-year run as the Albert Square mainstay began in 1985. before she left the show in 2020.

Brown was perhaps EastEnders' best-known star and larger-than-life Dot was known for her devout Christian faith and hypochondria, as well as her endless cigarette addiction.

The veteran actress, who had a long career in television and theatre, arrived on Albert Square shortly after the soap began in 1985, and aside from a break between 1993 and 1997, was a regular for more than three decades.

On January 31 2008 she single-handedly starred in an episode called Pretty Baby, in which she spoke to a cassette recorder about her life so that her husband could listen to it as he lay in hospital following a stroke.

Brown served in the Women's Royal Naval Service at the end of the Second World War, and then left to train at London's Old Vic Theatre School in Lambeth.

After joining Albert Square she also starred in comedy Ain't Misbehavin in 1997, and played Nanny Slagg in the BBC's production of Gormenghast in 2000.

She announced the bombshell news of her exit from EastEnders in 2020 with little fanfare, revealing her decision on a podcast with a former co-star.

Dot had not featured in the soap for a month, when she left a voicemail for Sonia Fowler saying she had moved to Ireland.

At the time an EastEnders' spokesman said the door remained open for a comeback, appearing to leave the decision in Brown's hands.

Some of Dot's biggest storylines explored controversial issues such as euthanasia, cancer and homophobia.

Her marriage to Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, was popular among fans - while she was also mother to the notorious criminal Nick Cotton, played by John Altman.

Brown won several awards for her portrayal of Dot, including a lifetime achievement honour at the 2005 British Soap Awards.

In 2009, she was nominated for the best actress prize at the TV Baftas for her standalone episode of the soap.

In December 2021 Brown was made an OBE in the New Year Honours, as she was recognised for services to drama and to charity.

She was previously made an MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours in 2008 for services to drama and charity.

Brown married her first husband, John Garley, in 1950.

After his death she married actor Robert Arnold in 1958 and had six children with him.

Helping her best friend die, losing faith in her son and THAT single-hander... a look back at Dot Cotton's greatest moments

Dot's debut in Albert Square (1985)

Dot Cotton made her debut in EastEnders just months after the soap first arrived on screens in the mid 1980s.

She arrived on the Square as the mother of criminal gangster 'Nasty Nick' Cotton and the close friend of Ethel Skinner.

Dot quickly made an impact on the soap as the resident gossip who is never without a cigarette in her hand, and becomes known for her signature hairstyle, launderette's uniform and the signature catchphrase 'oh I say!'

Her early months on the Square were plagued with woes thanks to her criminal husband Charlie - who is killed in a lorry accident - and Nick - who even tries to poison his beloved mum.

Despite Nick's criminal antics, Dot seemed to constantly defend her son, even vowing that he could change.

Legendary: She made her debut on Albert Square in 1985, and from the beginning she had no shortage of woes thanks to the criminal antics of her husband Charlie and son Nick

Dot leaves Albert Square (1993)

Dot made a temporary exit from Walford in the early 1990s when she learned that Nick Cotton had fathered son Ashley with his girlfriend Zoe Newton, and she grew close to the young schoolboy.

The soap veteran made the surprise decision to depart Walford for a new life in Gravesend with her son and grandson but she returned four years later after Nick was arrested for drugs possession.

Sadly Ashley was tragically killed off in 2001 after his motorbike crashed into the launderette after Nick tampered with the brakes.

The death left Dot and her son even more estranged, especially after she learned that Nick was responsible for Ashley's death.

Dramatic: In a rare comedic moment, Dot accidentally drank a suspicious herbal tea that was laced with cannabis

Dot accidentally takes cannabis (1997)

Despite some dark moments, Dot is also known for some comedic moments, and one of her finest came after she temporarily moved in with OAP Lilly Mattock.

Drinking some suspicious herbal tea, Dot put on an extremely giddy display as it was revealed that the so-called 'alternative remedy' was laced with cannabis.

The hilarious scenes saw a wide-eyed Dot offer some of the 'herbs' to her guests in front of a policeman, before abruptly refusing to throw the drugs away.

Touching: In 2000 Dot's lifelong Christian faith was put to the test when her close friend Ethel Skinner asked her to help end her life

Dot helps her closest friend Ethel Skinner Die (2000)

Amongst other traits, Dot is also well-known for her no-nonsense Christianity, which has sparked a debate on several occasion.

Her faith was put to the test in 2000 when cancer-stricken friend Ethel asked her to help her die before the illness prevents her from moving or speaking.

In emotional scenes, Dot refused to help Ethel with her dying wish as they celebrated her 85th birthday, but after struggling to see her friend in so much pain, she agreed.

After helping Ethel to blow out her candles, Dot assisted her friend with taking a fatal overdose of pills, and she later died peacefully in her sleep.

Mr and Mrs: In a rare moment of happiness for Dot, she tied the knot with Jim Branning in 2002 after his hilarious proposal at the top of the London Eye

Dot Marries Jim Branning (2002)

In happier scenes, Dot finally found happiness with Jim years after the death of her husband Charlie, but the soap battleaxe still proved tough to win over.

Jim pursued Dot for months before finally stealing a kiss in the Queen Vic, and when he proposed to her, she fled the Square.

Eventually Jim got down on one knee and yet again asked Dot to marry him as they rode the London Eye on Christmas Eve, and in a now-iconic moment, she nonchalantly replied: 'Yeah I will.'

The couple then tied the knot in a simple church ceremony with the entire Square in attendance, but on their wedding night agreed that they would keep their marriage platonic.

Their marriage was one for the soap ages until Jim suffered a stroke in 2008, and his character was eventually written out of the soap in 2011 under the ruse that he would be taken to a nursing home.

Tragic: In 2004 Dot was diagnosed with kidney cancer, and originally refused to undergo treatment, determined to keep the news a secret from her friends and family

Dot is diagnosed with kidney cancer (2004)

After being diagnosed with kidney cancer, Dot was determined to keep her illness a secret from her friends, family and even her husband Jim.

Despite confiding in her pal Dennis Rickman, Dot refused to undergo chemotherapy and simply decided to quietly pass away.

But eventually Dot was convinced to undergo treatment and went onto make a full recovery.

Iconic: In 2008 Dot made soap history in EastEnders' first ever single-handed episode, which earned her a BAFTA nomination for Best Actress

Dot makes history with soap's first ever single-handed episode (2008)

In a television first, Dot took centre stage in an episode which saw her come to terms with the news that her husband Jim had suffered a stroke.

The episode simple saw Dot record a message for Jim in her home, and in the episode she openly talks about her Christian faith, her childhood, but in a sombre moment reflected on that fact that everybody who was ever close to her had since passed away.

It was the first time a soap ever released an episode that featured just one character, and was even named after the Tony Jackson song Pretty Baby, which Dot said her guardian Will used to sing to her as a little girl after she was evacuated to Wales during the Second World War.

June's performance in the episode earned unanimous praise from viewers and critics, and even received only the second BAFTA nomination for a performance in a soap.

At the end of her tether: In 2015 Dot finally realised that her son Nick was beyond redemption, and watched him die after overdosing on heroin

Tragic: The dark scenes saw Dot ignore her son's suffering as he confessed to Reg Cox's murder, and she was eventually jailed for the crime

Dot watches her son Nick die after he overdoses on heroin (2015)

Dot's son returned to Albert Square several times over the years, and he breathed his last during the soap's 30th Anniversary specials after becoming addicted to heroin.

On the run from the police, Nick hid a derelict house after surprising Dot who believed that he was dead.

Unable to control his addiction, Nick begged Dot to get him some more drugs, and finally convinced that her son was beyond redemption, she agreed.

Sat at his side with a cigarette, Dot watched her beloved son overdose as he confessed to murdering Reg Cox, and rather than call an ambulance, she simply watched his life slip away.

Dot later confessed to the police that she is responsible for Nick's death, and is eventually found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to 14 months in prison.

Upsetting: In one of Dot's final story lines in 2019, she was devastated to see her beloved friend Dr Legg pass away from pancreatic cancer

Dot becomes a millionaire after Dr Legg dies (2019)

In one of Dot's final story lines, she was reunited with longtime friend Dr Legg, who returned to Walford in 2018, 34 years after his first appearance.

Dr Legg broke the news that he is dying of pancreatic cancer, and asked her to help plan his funeral, and in his final moments he reminisced about meeting his late wife Judith before slipping away.

Dot is then stunned to learn that Dr Legg has left her his entire estate in his will, leading her lodger Stuart Highway to declare 'She's a millionaire!'

But Dot refused to keep all of the money and instead decided to share it with her family and buy her house from the council.
Georgia Love and Lee Elliott deleted all of their Instagram photos from their recent trip to Saudi Arabia after backlash from fans.

And on Monday, the pair were again on holiday, this time somewhere far less controversial and far safer for social promotion - Tasmania.

The former Bachelorette stars shared a series of photos to Instagram documenting their visit to Hobart.

Safe! Georgia Love (right) and Lee Elliott (left) deleted their Instagram photos from their recent trip to Saudi Arabia after backlash from fans. On Monday, the pair were again on holiday, this time somewhere far less controversial and far safer for social promotion - Tasmania

In the images, they visit various picturesque sites, as well as showing off their ritzy accommodation.

Georgia wrote in a caption on one image: 'My love affair with Tassie continues. The best place on earth'.

It comes after the couple were reportedly asked to delete their posts by Saudi tourism officials.

Home and away: The former Bachelorette stars shared a series of photos to Instagram documenting their visit to Hobart

Lovely: In the images, they visited various picturesque sites

The 33-year-old reporter and her husband of a year were recently given an all-expenses paid trip by Visit Saudi to help promote tourism in the nation.

Georgia and Lee, 40, were asked to share photos from their holiday on their respective social media pages in exchange for the free trip.

One photo showed the couple arriving at the airport in Saudi Arabia, while another saw them sipping beverages out of coconuts.

Pretty out there: Georgia, who is from Tasmania originally, was beaming in her tourist selfies

Nice drop: The pair were also happily showing off their ritzy accommodation

Their holiday attracted plenty of controversy, with many fans flagging the Middle Eastern country's horrific human rights record.

Shortly afterwards, both Georgia and Lee removed all of their social media posts, supposedly at the direction of Saudi tourism officials.

'She was told by the Saudi tourism people to remove all of the posts, they were fantastic with her,' Georgia's manager confirmed.

Deleted: It comes after the couple were reportedly asked to delete their posts by Saudi tourism officials. The 33-year-old reporter and her husband of a year were recently given an all-expenses paid trip by Visit Saudi to help promote tourism in the nation

Here they are: One photo showed the couple arriving at the airport in Saudi Arabia

'They were quite upset that she was getting a lot of negative reaction and they said, "We don't want this to impede on your trip so please remove all those posts and don't do any more posting."

'They were very sympathetic to her situation and said, "Remove the posts, we don't require you to do any more posting for us."'

Lee later addressed the backlash in a post on Instagram, explaining that he understood the anger their holiday had garnered.

Working holiday: Another saw them sipping beverages out of coconuts

Controversy: Their holiday attracted plenty of controversy, with many fans flagging the Middle Eastern country's horrific human rights record

'We thought long and hard about coming and we decided to come as the world is changing for the better and Saudi along with it,' he wrote.

'We strongly believe by Saudi opening up to the rest of the world and by tourists being here it has to be more accountable and hope this is a change for the better.

'Trust me, we looked into it before coming and believe many things have changed for the better in more recent times and hope they continue to do so.'
TOWIE star Chloe Brockett will reportedly be quizzed by police after she was embroiled in an 'ugly nightclub catfight' on Saturday, which left a reveller with blood streaming down her face.

The reality star, 21, allegedly threw an ice bucket at her co-star Ella Rae Wise during a row while on a night out, but missed and hit the cousin of fellow cast member Rem Larue in the face.

Friends of the victim have claimed that she wants 'justice' for the injury, with police and ITVBe bosses stepping in to speak with Chloe about her actions.

Shocking: TOWIE's Chloe Brockett 'to be quizzed by police after ugly nightclub catfight that left reveller with blood streaming down her face - while show bosses 'launch investigation'

Nasty: A woman was seen with blood streaming down her face after the ugly incident

A source told The Sun: 'The police have been called by the young woman caught up in the incident. She was left badly shaken up and needed stitches to a wound on her head afterwards.

'They want answers from Chloe and hope that Towie takes the issue seriously.'

Another insider claimed that Chloe's future on TOWIE could also be in jeopardy, with reports that the star will be 'pulled in to explain herself.'

They said: 'The show has a strict policy of no violence and it will be hard to ignore such a public outburst from Chloe. It simply won't be condoned and she'll be pulled in to explain herself.'

MailOnline has contacted representatives for Chloe and TOWIE for comment.

Fight night? The reality star, 21, allegedly threw an ice bucket at her TOWIE co-star Ella Rae Wise during a row while on a night out. Chloe was pinned down on the floor by security, her white boots visible in the crowd (pictured)

It came as Chloe broke her social media silence in the wake of the scandal on Monday, taking to Instagram Stories to share a glimpse of renovations at her home.

Posting a snap of a freshly-painted room with a stepladder in it, she captioned the post: 'A work in progress @abstract_venetianplasterin.'

The star later shared a video of the walls in her room which had been decorated with funky gold wallpaper.

Speaking out: It came as Chloe broke her social media silence in the wake of the scandal on Monday, taking to Instagram Stories to share a glimpse of renovations at her home

Transformation: The star later shared a video of the walls in her room which had been decorated with funky gold wallpaper

Chloe was celebrating a friend's birthday with pals at the W London Hotel when she launched a Grey Goose cooler at Ella during an argument.

The vessel is said to have hit Rem's family member, leaving her bleeding, with the reportedly injured and angry woman needing to be held back by other partygoers including The Only Way Is Essex cast members Roman Hackett and Rem.

In a video obtained by The Sun, Chloe is seen furiously flailing around as she is pinned to the ground by security, her white boots visible amongst the crowd.

The incident happened in the early hours of Saturday morning in The Perception Bar at the hotel.

A witness told the publication: 'Chloe and Ella were rowing and it turned nasty.

Pals: Chloe (right) wore a khaki dress and white boots on her night out to celebrate her friend's birthday

Agitated: The vessel is said to have hit Rem Larue's family member, leaving her bleeding, with the reportedly injured and angry woman needing to be held back by other partygoers

Looking on: The incident happened in the early hours of Saturday morning in The Perception Bar at the hotel

'We saw Chloe throw an ice bucket at Ella but it missed and hit another woman. She was seriously bleeding.

Security were holding and restraining Chloe to the floor during the commotion while she kicked her legs to try and get them off of her.'It was a truly awful display and completely unprovoked.

'The woman tried to confront Chloe but she wasn't able to get close to her because she was being held down by security.

'It was really shocking to see these women off the TV behaving in this way. And for Chloe to then lob an ice bucket and seriously hurt someone.'

MailOnline has contacted representatives for Chloe and Ella for comment.

Earlier in the evening, Chloe dined out with her pals, eating sushi at Sexy Fish in Mayfair.

She was seen wearing a khaki dress as she sipped on a cocktail, writing on Instagram: 'Celebrating my besties birthday, drinking cocktails and eating sushi.'

Chloe and Ella, who were once good friends, have been at loggerheads ever since they joined the ITV2 reality show.

They have become embroiled in numerous war of words on TOWIE, including during the May 2021 season finale.

Family affair: It is claimed the woman who was hit by the ice bucket is the cousin of fellow TOWIE cast member Rem (pictured)

The pair got caught in a slanging match at James 'Diags' Bennewith's 30th birthday barbeque, with Kelsey Stratford getting stuck in the middle.

In the showdown, Chloe accused Ella of being fake as she wished Joey Turner good luck before he left for university.

After Ella wished him 'all the best', Chloe raged: 'I've just got to say I don't know what language you're speaking because it honestly sounds like fluent bulls**t. You've not been around him in literally a year.'

But Ella was quick to hit back, saying that she was still allowed to pass on her good wishes to him, to which Chloe responded that she was 'not his friend'.

After Ella asked Chloe what her 'problem' was, Chloe fumed: 'I don't like you, you don't like me, we don't like each other.'

Rows: Chloe (right) and Ella have become embroiled in numerous war of words on TOWIE, including during the May 2021 season finale

Before Ella said: 'But I don't have to talk about you, if you don't like me, you shouldn't care what I'm doing in my life.'

Ella accused Chloe of being 'embarrassing' and being 'obsessed' with her before Chloe dragged their mutual friend Kelsey into the row, saying she 'tolerates' Ella.

Ella asked Chloe 'why the f***k do you care' as Chloe accused Ella of being insincere before storming off.

The two former friends previously fell out after Ella accused Chloe of spending all her time with Kelsey, with Chloe accusing Ella of making up stories as the row escalated.

After the argument, Chloe unfollowed Ella on social media before the pair said they would try to get their friendship back on track and re-followed each other - but they have had a number of explosive rows since.
She has swapped London for South Africa for a little break away.

And Georgia Toffolo took to Instagram on Monday to reveal she will soon be heading back to swanky Chelsea after her 'epic adventure'.

In the snap the 27-year-old looked gorgeous in a knitted keyhole bra top which she wore with a matching skirt.

'Not sure I'll be wearing this in London': Georgia Toffolo wore a very skimpy knitted keyhole bra top and skirt on the last day of her South African holiday on Instagram on Monday

Posing for the camera, her hip dropped to one side, the blonde beauty showed off her fantastically toned midriff.

The strapless top clung to the Made In Chelsea stars enviable assets, with a racy cut out at the centre.

Her long blonde locks fell down past her shoulders in a relaxed curl, framing her beautiful face.

The reality star is soon to be leaving her holiday and said: 'Sad to be leaving South Africa, but looking forward to seeing my pup after a epic adventure. I cant wait to show you on @thismorning' (Pictured in Kenya in March)

Wow: Fans and famous friends rushed to complement Georgia on her fabulous look with Vicky Pattinson writing: 'Wow'

Looking fresh faced with very little make-up the TV personality accessorised her sexy look with a simple gold chain around her and teal rings on her fingers.

Captioning the snap: 'Not sure Ill be wearing this in London! Sad to be leaving South Africa, but looking forward to seeing my pup after a epic adventure. I cant wait to show you on @thismorning'

Fans and famous friends rushed to complement Georgia on her fabulous look with Vicky Pattinson writing: 'Wow'.

While Love Island's Georgia Steel added: 'Gorgeous gee' as Lottie Moss agreed by sharing fire emojis.

Pals: While Love Island's Georgia Steel added: 'Gorgeous gee' as Lottie Moss agreed by sharing fire emojis

Blonde beauty: The former I'm a Celebrity contestant, visited Kenya on another glamorous trip last month (pictured in March)

The former I'm a Celebrity contestant, visited Kenya on another glamorous trip last month.

The reality TV regular went on to shared photos of her adventures, in one picture she posed with a pair of elephants at an orphanage.

Writing: 'Up early to go to the elephant orphanage just outside of Nairobi, It is the most successful orphan elephant rescue and rehabilitation program in the world!'.

The star also shared videos of her holiday, one of which was filmed by her friend and The Island With Bear Grylls star Barnes Thomas - who joined her on the trip.

The pals enjoyed a boating adventure on the ocean, where they swam and spotted dolphins.

However Georgia also posted that the group were covered in "guts" after they attempted to catch fish.
Kim Kardashian and Pete Davidson have reportedly taken another big step in their relationship.

According to TMZ, the reality star, 41, and the actor, 28, visited his grandparents' home in Staten Island while Davidson was shooting a movie in New York.

The pair stopped by the residence, which was close to where Davidson happened to be shooting, after filming wrapped for the day.

Getting closer to the family: Kim Kardashian and Pete Davidson have reportedly taken another big step in their relationship, according to TMZ

Kim has already met his mother Amy last year.

Kardashian and Davidson started dating back in October after working together on an episode of Saturday Night Live.

The King of Staten Island actor has reportedly already met quite a bit of Kim's family including her mother Kris who he was photographed with alongside Kardashian and rapped Flavor.

Despite the pair growing closer and spending time with more members of their family, there a still a few very important people in Kim's life Pete hasn't met yet  her kids.

Grandma and grandpa: The reality star, 41, and the actor, 28, visited his grandparents' home in Staten Island while Davidson was shooting a movie in New York

Television romance: Kardashian and Davidson started dating back in October after working together on an episode of Saturday Night Live

Kardashian shares four children with her ex-husband Kanye West: eight-year-old North, six-year-old Saint, four-year-old Chicago and two-year-old Psalm.

The stars have had a drama-filled relationship with Kanye West launching multiple social media attacks against his ex and her new man for several months.

Recently, reports came out that Kanye promised he would 'go away somewhere' after a number of personal tirades against Kim and Pete.

An insider in the Kardashian family's camp claimed: 'For the sake of the kids, Kanye has told Kim he's not making any public appearances or inflammatory social media statements, and he will go away somewhere to get better.'

He may be getting help: A Page Six source claimed that Kanye told Kim that 'he's going away to get help'; the couple are pictured in 2020

Not so fast: Kanye's (left) new head of media and partnerships Jason Lee (right) has denied the new claim being made about the controversial rap star

However, West's new head of media and partnerships Jason Lee has denied the claim being made about the controversial rap star.

Jason, who hosts Hollywood Unlocked, told Yahoo that the claim Kanye had such a talk with Kim is 'simply untrue.'

'Ye monitors all headlines pertaining to him and his family daily. Most all are being fed to media by "sources close to the Kardashians," which have been creating a false narrative that not only is untrue but further compromises his goal of creating a healthy environment for the beautiful children he shares with Kim,' Jason claimed.

'He's been focused on taking care of himself, being a present and loving father and a creative genius well before all the false headlines we've seen as recent.'

Jason declared: 'If you don't hear it from his mouth, read it from his social media, or get it from a press release he approved it's simply false.'

Ready to open up: Kim is ready to talk about Kanye on her new Hulu series The Kardashians which debuts April 14

Taking the W out? Kim seems to have moved on with her business links with West. Last summer she said she was rebranding her makeup line KKW Beauty. And on Friday she said she was rebranding her scent line KKW Fragrances

West's social media attacks on Davidson and Kardashian got so bad that he was dropped from performing at the Grammys that took place on Sunday.

Kim is ready to talk about Kanye on her new Hulu series The Kardashians which debuts April 14.

When plugging the show with co-anchor Robin Roberts, she admitted things have been quite surreal. In a teaser trailer for the ABC primetime special, which airs on April 6, Robin joked to Kim: 'You can not make this stuff up!'

She replied: 'You couldn't write this stuff if it was a sitcom!'

Robin also asked the 41-year-old beauty: 'How have you leaned on your family through your divorce with Kanye?'

Her answer wasn't shown, but at another point in the trailer, the Kardashians star noted: 'It's hard to live your life on a reality show and then say I want certain things to be private.'

Kim seems to have moved on with her business links with West. Last summer she said she was rebranding her makeup line KKW Beauty. And on Friday she said she was rebranding her scent line KKW Fragrances.
Charithra Chandran has opened up about the pressure she feels to represent the South Asian community.

The 25-year-old Bridgerton star - who portrays Edwina Sharma in the period drama's second series - candidly spoke about the beauty of having other South Asian women alongside her on set.

The second instalment of the Regency dram returned to Netflix last week. Speaking to Bustle about her experience, Charithra said: 'When you're a woman of colour on set, you don't expect to have other women of colour on set with you.

Speaking out: Charithra Chandran has opened up about the pressure she feels to represent the South Asian community

Charithra went on to speak about her on-screen sister Simone Ashley, 27, who plays Kate Sharma. She said: 'I had a scene partner who is not only another woman of colour, but who's also from the same part of India as me.

'There's a negligible chance of that happening, but it did, so it's super exciting.'

She added: 'I do feel the pressure of representing my community, and for the show being a success. But no one is putting that on me. It's entirely self-inflicted.

Talented: The Bridgerton star - who portrays Edwina Sharma in the period drama's second series - candidly spoke about the beauty of having other South Asian women alongside her on set

The Oxford native went on to discuss her 'instant chemistry' with co-star Jonathan Bailey, 33, who plays Anthony Bridgerton.

'Jonny is so generous. He sent me a 'good luck' message on Instagram before my chemistry read with him. He didn't need to do that, but he knew how daunting it can be, and he just wanted to assure me that everyone was rooting for me.

She continued: 'I knew from that moment that we would get along Not to be a pretentious ar*ehole, but acting is reacting, and Jonny gives you a lot to react to.'

Charithra said: 'I do feel the pressure of representing my community, and for the show being a success. But no one is putting that on me. It's entirely self-inflicted'

'A lot of the directors would say, "Where's my diamond?" I enjoyed that. It made me feel special: it's quite the ego boost.'

Charithra had a career in law before diving into acting and admitted she knows her current lifestyle isn't 'reality'.

The Alex Rider star said: 'I'm aware my lifestyle is not reality at the moment. And I don't want to start thinking it is. My support network actually do live real lives. So it is important for me to maintain those friendships, away from the industry.'

'You have to be a bit of a d*ckhead to believe you're going to be famous. I just don't believe people will recognise me.'

Charithra said: 'When you're a woman of colour on set, you don't expect to have other women of colour on set with you'

Adapted from The Viscount Who Loved Me, the new season focuses on Anthony Bridgerton (Jonathan Bailey) and his search to find a wife.

But in true Bridgerton fashion, 'a considerable scandal' is promised to ensue when he gets caught up in a love triangle with two sisters.

And the second season of the show seems to be as racy as the last, with scenes of a naked Anthony covering his modesty in his bedroom and in wet clothing after falling in the river as the result of some flirtatious behaviour.

The Sharma family make their debut in London in season two and will turn Anthony's world upside down.

Kate Sharma is Edwina's strong older sister. Shelley Conn plays their mother, Mary Sharma and together, they make up the Sharmas. The family of women are traveling from India to participate in the social season.

Bridgerton quickly gained the title of Netflix's most-watched series to date, garnering over 82 million views worldwide.
June Brown's fans have remembered the iconic moment she met with another showbiz heavyweight, Lady Gaga, after her death aged 95 on Sunday.

The EastEnders star, whose passing was announced on Monday, made an appearance on The Graham Norton show in 2013 alongside the pop star, and the pair quickly formed an unlikely friendship.

Re-sharing a clip of their meeting on social media, many fans recalled the moment as 'TV gold,' while others paid tribute to soap star June after her death.

'TV gold': June Brown's fans have remembered the iconic moment she met with another showbiz heavyweight, Lady Gaga, after her death aged 95 on Sunday

Gracing the stage in a dramatic fur coat with a cigarette, June left Gaga in awe when she appeared on Graham Norton, with the host asking the Born This Way hitmaker whether she'd heard of the star.

'I am a really big fan of yours. You are so fabulously dressed. I am honoured to be sitting next to you,' Gaga said, before picking up June's glass of wine.

She added: 'I want to drink from your cup to see what those genes are.'

Sensational: The EastEnders star made an appearance on The Graham Norton show in 2013 alongside the pop star, and the pair quickly formed an unlikely friendship.

Beloved: Gracing the stage in a dramatic fur coat with a cigarette, June left Gaga in awe when she appeared on Graham Norton

June later revealed in 2019 that Gaga's kindness continued off-screen, telling The Daily Star: 'She was so funny, intelligent and down to earth, but when she went in front of the press, you could see her put the Gaga persona on.'

The actress also revealed the star even invited her on a night out, adding: 'She saw me sitting on my own and came back, dropped the whole Gaga thing and invited me to a nightclub.

'Sadly I couldn't make it, but I thought what a charming and talented girl.'

The heartwarming encounter resurfaced on social media following June's death, with many fans lauding the moment as 'TV gold.'

Drink up! 'I am a really big fan of yours. You are so fabulously dressed. I am honoured to be sitting next to you,' Gaga said

Reflecting: The heartwarming encounter resurfaced on social media following June's death, with many fans lauding the moment as 'TV gold'

One posted: 'Terribly sad news about the legendary June Brown. I want to remember this pure moment she met Lady Gaga and ended up totally stealing the show and making a friend for life. A true legend of soap land!'

Another wrote: 'This will forever be TV gold!' while a third tweeted: 'June Brown meeting Lady Gaga remains a top-tier television moment. What a light we've lost.'

'A completely glorious moment; JB was an awesome woman,' one fan posted.

'@ladygaga heartbreaking news June Brown has passed away. Iconic interview on @grahnort with the both of you. So sad,' a fan also posted.

Best pals: June revealed in 2019 that Gaga even invited her on a night out

For decades Brown was one of the most famous faces on British TV, playing the devout Christian famed on Albert Square for her chain smoking, gossiping and mothering of those in need.

Her relationship with her tearaway son Nasty Nick Cotton, John Altman, who she forgave and forgave for his crimes until she gave up on him and he died after consuming a bad batch of heroin bought for him by his very own mother.

Her loving relationship with Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, would captivate millions, leaving fans in tears as she said goodbye to him following a stroke.

Brown's family revealed she died peacefully on Sunday while the BBC urged fans to raise a glass of sweet sherry in her memory. The star still loved a tipple and a cigarette well into her 90s.

Farewell: Brown's family revealed she died peacefully on Sunday while the BBC urged fans to raise a glass of sweet sherry in her memory (pictured in 2020)

An EastEnders spokesman said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved June Brown, OBE, MBE, sadly passed away last night.

'There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humour will never be forgotten.

'June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2,884 episodes, June's remarkable performances created some of EastEnders' finest moments.

'We send all our love and deepest sympathies to June's family and friends. A very bright light has gone out at EastEnders today but we shall all be raising a sweet sherry in June's memory. Rest in peace, our dearest June. You will never be forgotten.'

A statement from her family said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce our beloved mother, June, passed away very peacefully at her home in Surrey on Sunday evening, with her family by her side.

'We would kindly ask that our privacy is respected at this very difficult time.'
They've reportedly been an item since last year, but have slowly been sharing more of their relationship as they ease into their romance.

And Kaia Gerber looked right at home with Austin Butler as they held hands while picking up a few things from her local Malibu Farmers' Market.

The 20-year-old supermodel flashed a hint of her abs wearing a cropped black long-sleeved top with structured slacks while Austin, 30, opted for an all-black outfit at the outdoor shops in the affluent community where Kaia grew up.

Lovers in LA: Kaia Gerber looked right at home with Austin Butler as they held hands while picking up a few things from her local Malibu Farmers' Market

Kaia's cozy black sweater featured a deep swoop neck and was hemmed straight across her torso.

She stuck with the '90s vibes wearing a pair of chocolate brown pleated trousers which were cut above the ankles to show off her black leather flats.

Gerber, who is the daughter of Cindy Crawford and Rande Gerber, carried a lavender purse with a gold chain across her arm and a few reusable brown bags from the celebrity favorite grocery store, Erewhon.

Her dark brown hair looked freshly blown out and caught the wind as she walked through the market wearing a pair of dark sunglasses.

So happy together: The 20-year-old supermodel flashed a hint of her abs wearing a cropped black long-sleeved top with structured slacks while Austin, 30, opted for an all-black outfit at the outdoor shops in the affluent community where Kaia grew up

Austin stayed warm underneath a thick black Carhartt utility jacket and a matching T-shirt with dark denim.

He laced up a pair of brown leather shoes and kept one hand in his pocket while walking her pet pooch on a leash.

The couple reportedly began dating before December 2021 after she split from Jacob Elordi, 24. Kaia and Jacob were together for one year.

Supermodel: She stuck with the '90s vibes wearing a pair of chocolate brown pleated trousers which were cut above the ankles to show off her black leather flats

'Austin and Kaia are in fact dating. All of her friends think they are so adorable and it's a total step up from her last relationship and she knows it too,' sources told E! News at the time.

'She seems really happy. All of her friends think he's really cute.'

Austin, who is set to star in the highly-anticipated Elvis biopic which debuts June 24, was previously in an eight-year relationship with Vanessa Hudgens before the pair broke up in early 2020.
She's never been afraid to show off her phenomenal figure.

And Hofit Golan took the opportunity to flaunt her incredible figure once again, as she modelled a vast array of swimwear while holidaying in St Barts on Instagram.

The 36-year-old socialite spent some time relaxing on the sun-drenched island with her friend and influencer Khloe Terae and her boyfriend Alvaro Nunez.

Stunning: Hofit Golan took the opportunity to flaunt her incredible physique once again, as she modelled a vast array of swimwear while holidaying in St Barts on Instagram

Hofit modelled a plunging burgundy bikini that showed off her ample assets and toned stomach as she tucked into a lavish meal.

The star then posed up a storm in a red swimsuit emblazoned with the words 'Sugar Daddy', before getting a piggyback off her boyfriend, 28, in another stylish two piece.

She also put on a busty display in cut out swimsuit, as she lounged on the sand next to a shirtless Alvaro, who flaunted his chiselled abs.

Flawless: The model spent some time relaxing on the sun-drenched island with her friend and influencer Khloe Terae and her boyfriend Alvaro Nunez

Hofit loves the jet set life and recently returned from a trip to Mexico.

She took to Instagram earlier this month to document the trip and wowed in a plunging swimsuit as she frolicked on the beach with her boyfriend.

The pair put on a PDA packed display as they celebrated their 1st anniversary in Mexico.

Having a blast: Hofit modelled a plunging burgundy bikini that showed off her ample assets and toned stomach as she tucked into a lavish meal

Red hot: The star then posed up a storm in a red swimsuit emblazoned with the words 'Sugar Daddy'

Hofit and her entrepreneur beau enjoyed a lavish getaway to Tulum where they shared a kiss on the beach after sampling the resort's culinary delights.

The founder of Super Luxury Group, Alvaro, flashed his abs in a pair of black swimming shorts as he laughed with his love.

Hofit and Alvaro enjoyed their anniversary celebrations as they dressed up to attend dinner at the various hotels.

The couple stayed villa at Aldea Canzul beach resort before they travelled onto Azulik and finished up their trip at the Papaya Playa Project.

The fashionista has been travelling the world with her businessman beau by her side, and confirmed their romance when they made their red carpet debut in July.

Hofit, who comes from Israel, has been a regular on the showbiz party circuit for several years.

Piggyback: Before getting a piggyback off her boyfriend, 28, in another stylish two piece.

In 2015, the jetsetter spoke to Femail about her experiences of premieres and film festivals, saying it can be exhausting.

She explained: 'After Cannes and Fashion Week, I can't wear earrings and my feet won't fit into a single pair of heels.

'My body rejects glamour. I don't brush my hair for ten days and I go on a beauty strike.'

Toned: She also put on a busty display in cut out swimsuit, as she lounged on the sand next to a shirtless Alvaro, who flaunted his chiselled abs

The Israeli socialite boasts many A-list friends, whom she spoke to MailOnline about in 2015.

She said: 'Kelly Brook was in Cannes with me and she's just a ball of laughs and fun. She's so easy going and low maintenance.

'Even Lindsay Lohan is such a different person to the way she is projected, she actually likes her privacy and time to herself and is a nice regular person.

'Then there's Michelle Rodriguez, who is like hanging out with your best friend from high school - she's smart, funny, down to earth and doesn't have an inch of ego.'
Advertisement

Villanelle brutally attacked Helene as Eve looks on while slightly aroused in episode six of series four of Killing Eve, released on Sunday.

In the latest instalment, titled Oh Goodie, I'm the Winner, the plot moves on from the shock ending of episode four when Villanelle (Jodie Comer) was shot in the back with an arrow on the orders of Helene (Camille Cottin).

However, after new assassin Pam (Anjana Vasan) removes the the arrow and casually calls Villanelle's injury a 'flesh wound', psychopath Villanelle bounces back to her best and sets out to seek revenge against Helene.

Shocker: Villanelle, played by Jodie Comer (pictured), brutally attacks Helene in episode six of series four of Killing Eve, released on Sunday

Villanelle learns of Helene's location after being sent a secret message by fellow assassin Gunn (Marie-Sophie Ferdane).

The murderous character heads to Helene's hotel room and waits under the bed for the perfect moment to pounce with a knife.

However, Eve (Sandra Oh) turns up at the hotel and is totally unaware that Eve is hiding under the bed.

Open-mouthed: Eve looks in shock on while slightly aroused in the episode after Eve seeks revenge against Helene in her hotel room

As Eve enters Helene's hotel room, Helene begins to flirt with Eve and attempts to get her to take a seat on the bed, prompting Villanelle to painfully slice the skin on the back of Helene's feet in a horrific attack.

Helene stands up and stumbles around the room much to the shock of Eve while Villanelle climbs out from under the bed.

As Villanelle brings the knife up to to slit Helene's throat, Helene grabs a vase in a bid to save herself.

Gruesome: Murderous character Villanelle heads to Helene's hotel room and waits under the bed for the perfect moment to pounce with a knife

Fighting back: Helene stands up and stumbles around the room much to the shock of Eve while Villanelle climbs out from under the bed

However, she doesn't have the strength and Villanelle beats her to the ground before drawing the knife across her neck, with Eve looking on slightly aroused.

Villanelle later travels to a remote Scottish island and seeks refuge after reuniting with Gunn.

However, the violence does not end there - Eve tracks down Carolyn (Fiona Shaw) and Lars (Ingvar Eggert Sigursson) at his cabin and, after a hushed conversation, shoots him in the head.

Gripping: However, the violence does not end there - Eve (Sandra Oh) tracks down Carolyn (Fiona Shaw) and Lars (Ingvar Eggert Sigursson) at his cabin where more shocking scenes unfold

Out of luck: Once at the cabin, after a hushed conversation, Eve shoots him in the head, marking the end of the road for the character

It comes after Killing Eve viewers watched a terrifying scene unfold in a recent episode in which Villanelle chopped off a man's finger and stuck it up his nose.

The brutal assassin, was seen using a cheese wire to wrap around The Twelve torture victim Rustem's (Sebastian Abineri) arm and chop off his fingers, with his toes already having been detached.

In the episode, Helene (Camille Cottin) visited Villanelle in jail after she was previously locked up by the authorities.

Horrific: Killing Eve viewers were in for a bumpy ride as they watched a horrific scene unfold in a recent episode in which psychopath Villanelle chopped off a man's finger

Villanelle informed Helene she had a desire to make a lot of money, prompting Helene to free Villanelle from her prison cell.

Helene then handed Villanelle a sealed envelope containing the name of her next target, which led her to Rustem.

After pressing Rustem for information, the unsympathetic executioner chopped off his thumb using the cheese wire.

Shocking: The brutal assassin was seen using a cheese wire to chop off a torture victim's fingers, before sticking on up his nose

Excruciating: After pressing Rustem for information, the unsympathetic executioner chopped off his thumb using the cheese wire

Taking things a step further, she stuck the digit up his nostril.

Meanwhile, fans were left hot under the collar after catching a glimpse of Eve and Helene taking a bath together in a steamy scene.

In the intimate moment, Eve was seen surrounded by bubbles as she sat at the opposite end of the tub from Helene.

Overstepping the mark? Taking things a step further, Villanelle stuck the digit up his nostril in a moment of madness

Eve and Helene played a game of cat and mouse after Eve tracked down the sadistic French handler in her native country.

After a number of flirtatious exchanges between the pair, things culminated as they stripped off before making their way into the bathroom.

Taking to Twitter, one person wrote: 'Always wanted to see Sandra Oh and Camille Cottin kiss and share a bath so yaay #KillingEve.'

The next episode of Killing Eve arrives on BBC iPlayer on Monday April11 and airs on BBC One at 9pm on Saturday.

Intimate: Killing Eve fans were left hot under the collar after catching a glimpse of the show's Eve Polastri and Helene taking a bath together in a recent steamy scene

Locking eyes: In the moment, Eve was seen surrounded by bubbles as she sat at the opposite end of the tub from Helene (Camille Cottin, pictured)
Sean Penn and his ex-wife Leila George were in good spirits together as they enjoyed an afternoon out in Tribeca nearly two weeks after finalizing their divorce following one year of marriage.

The 61-year-old actor and his former wife went out for a round of miniature golf in New York City after recently returning from another trop to Ukraine as part of his CORE nonprofit foundation to aid in refugee relief for the Ukrainian people.

Penn and George dated for four years before getting married during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic on July 30, 2020, and separated nearly one year later on September 28, 2021.

Staying friendly: Sean Penn and his ex-wife Leila George were in good spirits together as they enjoyed an afternoon out in Tribeca nearly two weeks after finalizing their divorce following one year of marriage

In divorce documents obtained by The Blast, Penn submitted a 'settlement package to the L.A. County Courts' on March 17, just five months after she filed for dissolution of marriage in October.

It's unclear who received what in the split, but Sean and Leila reportedly had an 'iron-clad prenuptial agreement' with specific financial details planned in the event the union didn't work out.

'The only specific terms in the legal filing are that the court will terminate its ability to award spousal support (due to the prenup) and Penn should be responsible to pay for both attorneys fees,' according to the site.

Penn sported a dark blue sweater and jeans while hitting a few balls around a mini golf course with his ex.

Stepping out: The 61-year-old actor and his former wife went out for a round of miniature golf in New York City after recently returning from another trop to Ukraine as part of his CORE nonprofit foundation to aid in refugee relief for the Ukrainian people

Split: Penn and George dated for four years before getting married during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic on July 30, 2020, and separated nearly one year later on September 28, 2021

Relaxed: Penn sported a dark blue sweater and jeans while hitting a few balls around a mini golf course with his ex

Friendly exes: In divorce documents obtained by The Blast , Penn submitted a 'settlement package to the L.A. County Courts' on March 17, just five months after she filed for dissolution of marriage in October

Making it work: The former married duo laughed while Leila whipped out a score card to mark down swings in the friendly battle

The former married duo laughed while Leila whipped out a score card to mark down swings in the friendly battle.

Sean and Leila were spotted picking up a few supplies earlier in the day after returning from a second trip to Ukraine on a refugee relief mission for their CORE organization.

The 61-year-old actor wore a dark green jacket with a patch from his nonprofit and jeans while unloading a host of bags from the back of his black SUV upon arriving to the states once again.

Leila, 30, sported a long tan trench coat with denim slacks and sneakers, and wore dark circular sunglasses over her eyes post shopping excursion.

Not a bad way to spend the day: They took turns making putts at the course in Lower Manhattan

Staying close: She used his shoulder to write out the score from their mini golf match

Take a walk: Leila and Sean may have legally split, but they have clearly stayed friendly

Out and about: Sean Penn and estranged wife Leila George were spotted picking up a few supplies in New York on Sunday afternoon after returning from a second trip to Ukraine on a refugee relief mission for their CORE organization

Warm: Leila, 30, sported a long tan trench coat with denim slacks and sneakers, and wore dark circular sunglasses over her eyes post shopping excursion

They recently traveled overseas together with his CORE nonprofit to help Ukrainian refugees who have fled the country following the Russian invasion.

CORE (Community Organized Relief Effort) is a nonprofit organization founded by the actor, initially established in response to the devastating 2010 earthquake in Haiti.

Hundreds of thousands of people were killed from the quake on Jan. 12, 2010, which registered at a 7.0 magnitude, and was followed by at least 50 after shocks. The earthquake completely knocked out resources to the community, with more than three million people affected.

Penn stepped up to help the country and formed CORE to bring immediate aid and relief services to the Haitian people.

After visiting the Ukraine at the beginning of the Russian invasion while working on a VICE documentary about the rising tensions between Russia and Ukraine, Sean later returned to Poland to set up a center in the country for his CORE charity to distribute supplies to refugees.

Comfortable: The 61-year-old actor wore a dark green jacket with a patch from his nonprofit and jeans while unloading a host of bags from the back of his black SUV upon arriving to the states once again

Weekend: They walked around the city together after unwinding at miniature golf

Sean, Leila and their CORE team visited the Krakow Glowny (Cracow Main) railway station in March, where one of the reception centers for Ukrainian refugees operates.

Penn and George arrived in Krakow to sign on behalf of CORE an agreement with the city's authorities regarding cooperation with the aid efforts dedicated to people displaced due to the Russian attack on Ukraine.

The charity has agreed on a deal with Mayor of Krakow Jacek Majchrowski to supply aid to Ukrainian refugees as they continue to escape the war-torn country.

Both Sean and Leila shared small details of the mission to their Instagram accounts as they traveled through parts of the country and back into Poland.

Doing his part: Sean shared a short clip to Instagram while driving through Lviv, Ukraine on a recent mission with his CORE nonprofit

Hard work: Leila also shared small details of the mission to her Instagram account as they traveled through parts of the country and back into Poland

CORE will open a center in the city which will provide support for refugee care. Local staff will be employed and they will be given full training in how to help people in need as they cross the border from their homeland roughly 500 miles to the east.

CORE will also fund the renovation of buildings designated to house up to 50 refugees in Krakow. Poland and Romania have taken the majority of refugees since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in February this year.

Sean previously revealed he walked miles to the Polish border earlier this year as he filmed a VICE documentary on Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

The star said both he and his film crew decided to abandon their car and pursue on foot after seeing the thousands of Ukrainian residents fleeing for safety, with queues stretching for miles.
Actor Brennan Elliott took to social media Sunday to share the sad news that his 'fearless' wife Camilla is battling stomach cancer.

The Hallmark mainstay asked fans and followers for prayers as Cami embarks on 'one of the most aggressive types of chemotherapy and immunotherapy' to treat her illness, which is stage IV.

Brennan and Cami have been married back since 2011 and they share two young children together, a boy and girl.

Tragic: Actor Brennan Elliott took to social media Sunday to share the sad news that his 'fearless' wife Camilla is battling stomach cancer

'Those closest to me know that my Wife Cami has had several bouts with cancer in the past but now she embarks on a new journey as a Stage IV metastatic gastric cancer patient,' Brennan penned in a heart wrenching caption.

The couple typically stays out of the limelight and Cami is rarely if ever shown on Elliott's social media accounts.

However, for this post, The Perfect Pairing actor, posted two snapshots of his beloved wife.

In one, Cami appears in selfie wearing a fur trimmed jacket with short hair. In the second, she is in the midst of treatment in a cozy sweater and protective face mask with her IV port bandaged.

Send prayers: The Hallmark mainstay asked fans and followers for prayers as Cami embarks on 'one of the most aggressive types of chemotherapy and immunotherapy' to treat her illness, which is stage IV

'There is no one I consider braver, stronger, more Fearless even when you're Faced with a sinister opponent who never plays fair,' Brennen wrote.

'Even after countless surgeries and chemotherapy rounds, She forges ahead into spring taking on the one of the most aggressive types of chemotherapy and immunotherapy.

'As you all know me to be a very private person, this feels scary and exposing but If there is any hope that her story can help Even one person, then her cancer Experience Was Not Done in vain. Please keep @Camilla_row in your prayers,' he continued.

Several of his Hallmark co-stars took to the comments to offer their love and support, including Mean Girls star Lacey Chabert.

Her story: In an image of Cami shared by Brennan, the mom of two is in the midst of treatment wearing a cozy sweater and protective face mask with her IV port bandaged

'We love you guys and are holding you close in our hearts. Cami is stronger than anyone I know. We are praying for you and sending all our love,' she wrote.

Chabert and Elliott are longtime co-stars together in projects like The Crossword Mysteries series, the All of My Heart franchise and the holiday flick A Christmas Melody.

Both actors recently solidified their working relationship with the feel-good network and signed lucrative deals with Hallmark, according to Just Jared.

Elliott has been working with Hallmark for well over a decade: 'It's been a dream to have worked with the wonderfully creative and supportive team at Hallmark over the years.

'I'm thrilled to continue this relationship that's meant so much to me and have the opportunity to bring to life new characters and tell stories that will make people smile.'
Harry Johnson and Cam Holmes have claimed that their Too Hot To Handle co-star Holly Scarfone's relationship with Scott Disick is fake.

The Netflix stars spoke out about the new couple in an interview with Slingo, as they claimed Holly would 'milk dry' an opportunity to further her fame.

Holly, 23, has been the centre of attention in recent weeks after since striking up a relationship with the Keeping Up With the Kardashians star, 38.

'No way on God's planet does she like him': Holly Scarfone's Too Hot To Handle co-stars have insisted her relationship with Scott Disick is FAKE and she will 'milk it dry'

Harry, who appeared alongside Holly on season three of the saucy reality show, said: 'For me, Holly is just about it, if that makes sense.'

Cam - who appeared on season two of the series - chimed in to say: 'Yeah, she loves it... She knows what shes doing and shell do it to get where she needs to be.'

Harry added: 'Holly loves it. Imagine a cow, Holly would milk it dry - in the nicest way possible.'

When asked directly if they felt she genuinely likes Scott, Harry replied: 'Nah, no way on gods planet does she like Scott. Hollys smart. I like her, but shes smart.'

MailOnline has contacted Holly's representatives for comment.

Cosy: Holly, 23, has been the centre of attention in recent weeks after since striking up a relationship with the Keeping Up With the Kardashians star, 38 (pictured in March)

Having their say: Harry Johnson (left) starred alongside Holly on season three of Too Hot To Handle, while Cam Holmes (right) appeared on season two and both doubt Holly's intentions

Holly and Scott were first spotted together at Nobu Malibu last month, and they travelled to Paris together not long afterwards.

Since they started dating, some fans have pointed out that Holly bears a resemblance to Kylie Jenner.

Scott was previously in a relationship with Kylie's older sister, Kourtney Kardashian, from 2005 to 2015. The pair share three children: Mason, 12, Penelope, nine, and Reign, seven.

Seeing double: The social media influencer (left) notably bares a striking resemblance to Scott's ex-girlfriend Kourtney Kardashian's little sister Kylie Jenner (right)

Longtime girlfriend: Scott was previously in a relationship with Kylie's older sister, Kourtney Kardashian, from 2005 to 2015 (pictured in 2015)

Kourtney has long since moved on from Scott and is now engaged to Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker.

Holly isn't Scott's first girlfriend since Kourtney either. He dated 20-year-old Amelia Gray Hamlin from February to December of last year and before her, he was linked to Sofia Richie, 23.

Holly first gained fame after appearing on the latest season of the reality show Too Hot To Handle.

Previous relationship: Holly isn't Scott's first girlfriend since Kourtney either. He dated 20-year-old Amelia Gray Hamlin from February to December of last year

The show follows contestants vying for a cut of the grand prize, but in order to get a share, they must abstain from any sexual contact for four weeks.

During her time on the show, Holly was romantically linked to contestant Nathan Soan.

She was born in Canada, but now lives in Colorado. She graduated with a psychology degree from the University of Colorado.
EastEnders viewers were left 'heartbroken' as the BBC soap paid a 'beautiful' tribute to June Brown after Monday's episode. She had passed away aged 95 on Sunday.

The programme concluded with a photo of the actress, who had starred on the show on-and-off between 1985 and 2020, spanning 2,281 episodes.

Following the message, which read: 'In loving memory of June Brown OBE, MBE. 1927 - 2022,' adoring fans rushed to Twitter to share their praise for the late star.

'I have tears in my eyes': EastEnders viewers were left 'heartbroken' after the BBC soap paid a 'beautiful' tribute to June Brown after her death aged 95 on Monday (pictured in 2008)

They wrote: 'With tears in my eyes I say farewell June Brown, our beloved Dot Branning (nee Cotton). R.I.P. June, you will be greatly missed.'

A beautiful heartwarming tribute to you Watching June Brown a walford legend on bbc one now beautiful and legendary June Brown we are missing you sweetheart thank you for all the memories in shows and movies rip angel #EastEnders #DotCotton #JuneBrown #JuneBrownRIP.'

'@bbceastenders lovely to see a tribute to the lovely #JuneBrown on tonights show #DotCotton #EastEnders thinking of all her friends and family at this sad time. Fly high June x.'

'Beautiful tribute to the legendary June Brown R.I.P sleep tight you beautiful angel #Eastenders.'

Emotional: The programme concluded with a photo of the actress, who had starred on the show on-and-off between 1985 and 2020, spanning 2,281 episodes

'So sad to see this today! #JuneBrown was an amazing actress and always seemed like she had real charm and character. What a huge loss! #eastenders.

'What a nice tribute to June brown at the end of tonights #EastEnders in loving memory [sad emoji] [broken heart].'

'Tuned into #Eastenders just in time to see the tribute to June Brown.'

'RIP to #JuneBrown. You were the heart of Eastenders & with #Babs the pair of you made the program. You were iconic. Rest in Peace wonderful lady.'

Upset: Following the message, which read: 'In loving memory of June Brown OBE, MBE. 1927 - 2022,' adoring fans rushed to Twitter to share their praise for the late star

'Heartbroken to hear about the supreme June Brown. She created a true soap icon in Dot Cotton, and I have such wonderful and fun memories of her which I'll always cherish... including her singing an Ancient Greek prayer to me to explain where my name originated. Rest well, legend!'

For decades Brown was one of the most famous faces on British TV, playing the devout Christian famed on Albert Square for her chain smoking, gossiping and mothering of those in need.

Her relationship with her tearaway son Nasty Nick Cotton, John Altman, who she forgave and forgave for his crimes until she gave up on him and he died after consuming a bad batch of heroin bought for him by his very own mother.

Her loving relationship with Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, would captivate millions, leaving fans in tears as she said goodbye to him following a stroke.

Sad: June led a life that was as dramatic and tragic off-screen as her on-screen character Dot Cotton, as the actress' death was announced by the BBC on Monday (pictured in 1997)

Brown's family revealed she died peacefully on Sunday while the BBC urged fans to raise a glass of sweet sherry in her memory. The star still loved a tipple and a cigarette well into her 90s.

An EastEnders spokesman said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved June Brown, OBE, MBE, sadly passed away last night.

'There are not enough words to describe how much June was loved and adored by everyone at EastEnders, her loving warmth, wit and great humour will never be forgotten.

Stunning: An EastEnders spokesman said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved June Brown, OBE, MBE, sadly passed away last night' (pictured in her youth)

'June created one of the most iconic characters in Dot Cotton, not just in soap but in British television, and having appeared in 2,884 episodes, June's remarkable performances created some of EastEnders' finest moments.

'We send all our love and deepest sympathies to June's family and friends. A very bright light has gone out at EastEnders today but we shall all be raising a sweet sherry in June's memory. Rest in peace, our dearest June. You will never be forgotten.'

A statement from her family said: 'We are deeply saddened to announce our beloved mother, June, passed away very peacefully at her home in Surrey on Sunday evening, with her family by her side.

'We would kindly ask that our privacy is respected at this very difficult time.'
Kumail Nanjiani took a step back into the past when he filmed a scene for his upcoming series Immigrant on Monday.

The actor, 44, donned a light brown tweed jacket over an orange button-down shirt as he transformed into real-life character Somen 'Steve' Banerjee.

Banerjee created the famous Chippendale's chain of male strip clubs that popped up all over the United States in the 1980s.

Time machine: Kumail Nanjiani took a step back into the past when he filmed a scene for his upcoming series Immigrant on Monday

He was arrested and pled guilty to attempted arson, racketeering and murder for hire in the early 1990s.

However, on the morning Banerjee was due to be sentenced he was found hanging in his prison cell.

Meanwhile, getting into character, Kumail's black hair was combed over to the right, and he added a pair of thick-rimmed glasses.

Interesting color palette: The actor, 44, donned a light brown tweed jacket over an orange button-down shirt

He walked around the parking lot putting flyers on era-appropriate cars like a station wagon with wood paneling.

The flyers read, 'A Male Exotic Dance Night, For Ladies Only.'

In one shot, a woman wearing blue jeans and a black and white striped t-shirt with very short sleeves had a flyer in hand and appeared to be reading it with interest.

New customer? In one shot, a woman wearing blue jeans and a black and white striped t-shirt with very short sleeves had a flyer in hand and appeared to be reading it with interest

Entrepreneur: Immigrant centers around Somen 'Steve' Banerjee who created the famous Chippendale's chain of male strip clubs

Fans can watch him soon: On top of Immigrant, fans will soon get to see Nanjiani in the highly-anticipated Star Wars series Obi-Wan Kenobi (pictured 2021)

On top of Immigrant, fans will soon get to see Nanjiani in the highly-anticipated Star Wars series Obi-Wan Kenobi.

He will play a currently unknown character alongside Ewan McGregor's Obi-Wan, Hayden Christensen's Darth Vader and Joel Edgerton's Owen Lars.

McGregor recently revealed that the series premiere will be pushed back two days to May 27 when the first two episodes will both air.
Abbie Chatfield and Konrad Bien-Stephen are living the high life in Venice, Italy.

And the reality TV couple continued their holiday in style on Sunday as they took a break from designer shopping to visit a trendy bar for an afternoon drink.

The pair looked stylish as they strolled around the waterlogged city, with Abbie, 26, picking up several items from Italian fashion house Versace.

La dolce vita! Abbie Chatfield and Konrad Bien-Stephen continued their Venetian holiday in style on Sunday as they took a break from shopping to visit a trendy bar for an afternoon drink

The Hit Network radio presenter cut an effortlessly chic figure in a dark green coat, which she paired with black pants and colourful sneakers.

She wore light makeup and styled her blonde hair loosely, and completed her outfit with white cat-eye sunglasses.

Konrad opted for a more sporty ensemble, teaming a vintage-inspired white jumper with navy sweatpants and orange trainers.

When in Venice: The couple ordered Aperol Spritz cocktails for their afternoon refreshment

Splashing the cash! The pair looked stylish as they strolled around the waterlogged city, with Abbie, 26, picking up several items from Italian fashion house Versace

You've made it, baby! Abbie looked like she didn't have a care in the world as she necked her orange cocktail

That's amore! The pair laughed and chatted over a few Aperol Spritzes, before going for a walk around Venice

They laughed and chatted over a few Aperol Spritzes, before going for a walk around the city.

The pair are exploring Europe together after attending a friend's wedding in Scotland last weekend.

Just days ago, Abbie was left stunned by a 'sexist' dining experience in Venice, after she was handed a menu that was seemingly intended for women only.

Holiday: The pair are exploring Europe together after attending a friend's wedding in Scotland

Not happy: Just days ago, Abbie was left stunned by a 'sexist' dining experience in Venice, after she was handed a menu that was seemingly intended for women only

Odd: She noticed her menu didn't have any prices, but the one given to her boyfriend had all the prices listed

Unimpressed: The different menus implied only men should pay the bill at this particular restaurant, which Abbie found ridiculous because she is the 'breadwinner' in her relationship

She noticed her menu didn't have any prices, but the one given to her boyfriend had all the prices listed.

The different menus implied only men should pay the bill at this particular restaurant, which Abbie found ridiculous because she is the 'breadwinner' in her relationship.

Abbie, who is on her way to becoming a millionaire thanks to her glittering post-Bachelor media career, said in a TikTok video: 'So we're at the boujee restaurant, and my menu didn't have prices on it?'

Success: Abbie is on her way to becoming a millionaire thanks to her glittering media career

Fuming: 'He got a menu with prices on it, and I didn't. B***h, I'm the breadwinner! The f**k? Patriarchy strikes again,' Abbie said

Chivalry: Konrad bent down to help Abbie tie her shoelace while roaming the streets of Venice

What's going on? At one stage, the carpenter showed his girlfriend something on his iPhone

'Konrad was like, "Yeah it's expensive." I was like, "How do you know that?" Obviously look where it is, obviously it's expensive,' she added, showing her luxurious surroundings.

'[But] he got a menu with prices on it, and I didn't. B***h, I'm the breadwinner! The f**k? Patriarchy strikes again.'

She captioned the video: 'Only men get a menu with prices? PATRIACRHY.'

Abbie, who recently dropped $1.45million on a two-bedroom cottage in Byron Bay, has been in an open relationship with Konrad since November.

The carpenter previously starred on Brooke Blurton's season of The Bachelorette.

Modern romance: Abbie, who recently dropped $1.45million on a two-bedroom cottage in Byron Bay, has been in an open relationship with Konrad since November
EastEnders viewers were left bereft at heartbreaking scenes this week that saw Mick Carter break down in tears at his sister Tina's heartbreaking funeral.

But the soap is set the take a shocking turn as Linda Carter and Janine Butcher come to blows in the pub following the service.

Entangled in an ongoing love triangle, the dramatic scene - which will air on Tuesday - sees Linda (Kellie Bright) confront Janine (Charlie Brooks) as the pair fight in front of Mick (Danny Dyer).

Drama! Linda Carter is set to go head-to-head in a brawl with Janine Butcher after she comforted Mick at Tina's heartbreaking funeral on Tuesday

In photos from the scene, the two women can be seen pushing each other as Mick tries to split up the brawl, whilst their daughter Nancy (Maddy Hill) looks on.

Linda returned to Albert Square for the funeral but was previously rejected by Nancy and even argued with Mick before the service.

Earlier this week, fans saw Mick break down in tears and become overwhelmed with grief as he took to the stand to speak.

Oh no! In photos from the scene, the two women can be seen pushing each other as Mick tries to split up the brawl, whilst Linda's daughter Nancy looks on in shock

Love triangle: It comes as Janine jumped to Mick's aid to comfort him at the funeral leaving his ex-wife Linda furious as she stormed out embarrassed

Janine jumped to Mick's aid to comfort him leaving his ex-wife Linda furious as she stormed out embarrassed.

The family was left devastated by Tina's tragic death, and had come together to bid farewell.

Tina, portrayed by Luisa Bradshaw-White, was brutally murdered over a year ago on the show by Gray (Toby-Alexander Smith).

Bad day: Linda returned to Albert Square for the funeral but was previously rejected by Nancy and argued with Mick before the service

Phil Mitchell discovered Tina's body under the Argee Bhajee restaurant prompting prompting Gray to finally come clean to the police.

In the wake of the killers arrest, Mick turned to devious Janine as he grappled with his doubts over whether he did enough to help Tina in her time of need.

The ripples of his arrest spread all across Walford, with Mick struggling to deal with Tina's death.

Tissues at the ready: Mick turned to devious Janine as he grappled with his doubts over whether he did enough to help Tina in her time of need

With Shirley seemingly missing, the patriarch of the Carter clan turned to Janine, who he felt was the only one to truly understood him.

Fans saw Janine embracing Mick and even laying a kiss on top of his head as she plotted her next move.

Mick has no idea that Janine is responsible for ruining his marriage by conspiring against both him and Linda over the holiday period.

EastEnders will air on Tuesday at 7.30pm on BBC One.
Dillon Passage, the estranged husband of Tiger King personality Joe Exotic, has denied that he sought to divorce the imprisoned zookeeper via unlawful means.

Passage, 25, put out a statement through his lawyers, Chris Kirker and Holly Davis of Kirker Davis LLP, in response to previous claims made by Exotic, 59, whose real name is Joseph Maldonado-Passage, that Passage 'failed to serve his husband and did not follow through with obtaining a divorce through the legal system.'

Exotic's legal team said in a statement obtained by People that multiple attempts to speak with Passage over the split were met with no response.

The latest: Dillon Passage, 25, the estranged husband of Tiger King personality Joe Exotic, 59, has denied that he sought to divorce the imprisoned zookeeper via unlawful means

In response, lawyers for Passage said that Exotic has been 'well known for stretching the truth for personal gain, so we are unsurprised to find him doing the same in his divorce case against our client.'

Passage's legal team said that they officially reached out to Exotic's lawyers with 'a full and comprehensive settlement agreement ... on September 3, 2021.

'On September 8, 2021, at 4:59 p.m. CST, our office received an email from Joe that said, "It will be a cold day in hell before I sign these papers" and "Your out of your f***in mind (sic)."'

Passage's lawyers said that Exotic publicly revealed 'that he was fighting cancer' in the wake of the exchange, and that Passage ceased 'pursuing litigation out of respect for Joe's health crisis.

Passage, seen last month in an Instagram shot, said through his lawyers that he went through the proper legal channels in his effort to divorce Exotic

Since his split with Exotic, Passage has been romantically involved with a man named John

'Our firm always urges clients to take the high road, and we applauded his compassionate decision. But Dillon now feels compelled to counter the untrue statements that Joe is making publicly. Dillon is eager to efficiently finalize the divorce agreement he proposed in September of 2021.'

A lawyer for Exotic told the outlet in response that their side has 'heard nothing from his lawyers or Mr. Passage' but are happy 'he's ready to move forward.'

Exotic filed for divorce from Passage last Thursday in Santa Rosa County, Florida, saying in legal docs that the union is 'irretrievably broken' and that he hopes 'they can both move on with their lives and divorce quickly and amicably.'

An attorney for Exotic, Autumn Beck Blackledge, said to the outlet in a statement that 'Joe is nearing the end of his cancer treatment and has fallen in love.

'He has no ill will toward Dillon, but has been trying for a while to reach him to get a divorce settlement. My understanding is that both Joe and Dillion have moved on romantically and they should both have the freedom to love again free from the bonds of marriage.'

Passage's manager Jeff Duncan had previously issued a statement to the outlet stating that Passage was 'pleased to get some finality to the divorce,' and that twice before, his legal team 'drafted the necessary paperwork on two separate occasions which were not signed by and then ignored by Joe.'

Passage and Exotic wed December 11, 2017, months after Exotic's previous spouse Travis Maldonado died after accidentally shooting himself October 6, 2017

Exotic was sentenced in January 2020 in Oklahoma to 22 years in custody in connection with a 2017 murder-for-hire plot of his business rival Carole Baskin, as well as numerous wildlife law violations in the deaths of five tigers, and infractions of the Endangered Species Act

Passage was 'happy to get some closure and welcomes progress toward his request for divorce to Joseph Maldonado,' Duncan said.

Exotic's lawyer Blackledge said in response that Exotic was seeking to divorce Passage 'because he desires to marry his new love interest Mr. John Graham whom he met in prison.'

Passage and Exotic initially tied the knot December 11, 2017, months after Exotic's previous spouse Travis Maldonado died after accidentally shooting himself October 6, 2017.

Exotic was sentenced in January 2020 in his native Oklahoma to 22 years in custody in connection with a 2017 murder-for-hire plot of his business rival Carole Baskin, as well as numerous wildlife law violations in the deaths of five tigers, and infractions of the Endangered Species Act. Earlier this year, his sentence was reduced to 21 years after appealing his sentence, citing court errors.

Passage last year revealed in an Instagram post that he and Exotic had been 'seeking a divorce' amid the situation.

'This wasn't an easy decision to make but Joe and I both understand that this situation isn't fair to either of us,' Passage said in March of 2021. 'It's something that neither of us were expecting but we are going to take it day by day. We are on good terms still and I hope it can stay that way. I will continue to have Joe in my life and do my best to support him while he undergoes further legal battles to better his situation.'

Passage last July revealed on the social media site that he was moving on in his love life with a man named John.
The Taliban swears by Islamic law. Under the sharia, consuming non-medicinal drugs for pleasure is considered haram. So now, going by that law, the Taliban, rulers of Afghanistan, have banned poppy cultivation and opium harvest.

The announcement comes just when farmers had begun the harvest season. Farmers have been warned that if they proceed with the harvest, they could be jailed.

Taliban has banned opium cultivation in Afghanistan. Illustration: Geetanjali/DailyO

Taliban said that farms that defy the rules will be burned and destroyed. As for the offenders, they will be punished under sharia law. The details of the punishment are not clear; but offenders can face jail, public flogging or even be executed. Moreover, transporting the drug is also banned.

But the story of Afghanistan and opium, and Talibans relationship with the drug is far more complex than a ban.

Heres what you need to know about Afghanistan, opium and the Talibans relationship with the drug:

1. Opium in Afghanistan: Afghanistan supplies nearly 80% of the worlds illicit opium trade. It has been the land of opium for decades. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Afghanistan is the worlds largest opium producer.

The Taliban's supreme leader banned the cultivation of narcotics in Afghanistan, the world's biggest opium producer, as they seek international recognition in a bid to wind back sanctions pic.twitter.com/WBqQ6JrOab  Reuters (@Reuters) April 3, 2022

2. The bread and butter: When opium is such a large part of Afghanistan, it is a given that its the bread and butter for many. The opium harvest season employed nearly 1,20,000 people in 2019, according to the UNODC Afghanistan opium survey. Afghan farmers say growing opium is just more profitable than growing anything else. For a country whose economy is in a free fall, where there are no jobs to provide food; jobs without money; where people are being forced to sell their children and organs, growing opium seems like a better deal for life.

So if opium puts food on the table, why does the Taliban want to ban it?

via GIPHY

3. Talibans relationship with opium can only be described as that of a love-hate one. You see, Taliban wasnt always so opposed to lucrative farming.

1998-2000: This was Taliban 1.0s stint as rulers in Afghanistan. During this period, opium cultivation went from 41,000 hectares to more than 64,000 hectares under the Taliban rule.

2001: Taliban 1.0 banned opium cultivation in Afghanistan in July 2000. Just like they are doing now, back then too, the Taliban implemented the rule stringently. And by May 2001, a UN report said that the Talibans strategy worked with opium cultivation significantly reduced in the Taliban-controlled areas.

2001-02: The impact of the Taliban ban was seen around the world as seizures of opium or opium drugs became minimal.

But post 2002, opium cultivation once again soared in Afghanistan and especially in the Taliban-controlled areas under US invasion.

Opium cultivation in hectares in Afghanistan through the years. Chart: UNODC

The majority of opium was cultivated in Afghanistans Helmand province, the Talibans stronghold, till as recently as 2020.

Opium was one of the Talibans major sources of income during the insurgency. Though they deny involvement in the drug trade, a 2018 Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction (Sigar) report, said that illicit income made up 60% of Talibans income with annual earnings of about $100million - $400 million.

In fact, the fighting season in Afghanistan during the period of US involvement also came after the poppy cultivation season. The fighting season involves various militant groups, especially the Taliban, escalating violence across the country in coordinated attacks.

However, after coming to power in 2021, the Talibs have not taken too kindly to domestic drug addicts; beating and rounding them up forcefully in treatment centres. Taliban believes drug addiction in Afghans can be cured only by beating it out of them.

4. Market: Several drugs used for medical purposes like morphine (to alleviate pain), codeine (used in cough syrups) and more are derived from opium. But in its deadly and illegal form, it is heroin that is also extracted. Afghanistan provides 95% of the heroin in the European market.

via GIPHY

5. Opium in India: India is not a major market for heroin; rather low-cost synthetic drugs such as methamphetamines are more prevalent in the Indian addict market. These illegal drugs come from Bangladesh, Myanmar and the North East. But if you scratch your head a little, youll remember the staggering 23,200 kg of opium that was seized from the Mundra Port in Gujarat last year. The cost  about $2.9 billion or a more conservative estimate would be $60-90 million. It is reported that the illicit drug came from nowhere but Afghanistan, at the height of the Taliban takeover. It wasnt meant for the Indian market, but it was meant to be routed to other markets in Australia and Europe.

Taliban banning opium cultivation is likely part of its strategy to be recognised internationally. If Talibans ban is serious, then it is likely they will have the same success like they did in early 2000s. But whether nipping the worlds addiction at the root will cost the lives of hungry Afghans or not needs to be seen.
Police conducted raids at Pudding and Mink Pub at Radisson Hotel in Banjara Hills during which family members of celebrities and political leaders were caught (Photo by arrangement)

HYDERABAD: Demanding to form a special investigation team (SIT) comprising Narcotic Control Bureau (NCB) officials to investigate into drug peddling in the state, Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) working president B. Mahesh Kumar Goud alleged that a number of pubs were being run with direction of IT minister K. T. Rama Rao.

Following the police raids on Pudding and Mink Pub at Radisson Hotel in Road No.6, Banjara Hills during which family members of celebrities and political leaders were caught, Mahesh Kumar on Sunday alleged that after the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) came to power, drugs and liquor supply had been increased in the state and hundreds of youngsters were addicted to drugs.

"By placing the local inspector under suspension and serving a memo to the assistant commissioner of police, Banjara Hills, senior police officials have washed their hands and let off culprits in the drug peddling case. The government must form an SIT and investigate the drug peddling case," Mahesh Kumar Goud demanded.
People detained during the raid at the Banjara Hills police station in Hyderabad on Sunday. (Photo by arrangement)

Hyderabad: Many of those found partying at Radisson Blus pub during the weekend are alleging that they were manhandled and treated rudely by the police who, they alleged, detained them without any reason.

Many of them are likely to file a human rights violation case against the police highhandedness.

Meanwhile, some customers confirmed the presence of actor Naga Babus daughter Niharika Konidela and Big Boss-Telugu winner Rahul Sipliguni.

According to eye-witnesses, who narrated the events to Deccan Chronicle whole, requesting anonymity, about 60 cops barged into the pub around 3 am and raided the place for drugs. Those detained claimed that the cops took their numbers and Aadhaar card details and let them off.

We were in a rude shock. Why should we be pulled up and kept for questioning in toilets without any rhyme or reason? We were held till about 6:30 am. We were told to leave after they collected our Aadhar details and phone numbers, said a woman IT employee.

While some cops mentioned a drug-related raid, others mentioned that it was raided for being open beyond the permissible hours, said a businessman, adding We are on the verge of filing a human rights violation case against the police.

I was out with two of my friends after a long time as the Covid cases have reduced and the mask compulsion was removed. I saw many girls being pushed around by women constables, shared a resident of Marredpally.

I have been partying on weekends for a long time and never came across issues like this. Shouldnt the cops deal with the manager or the owner for keeping the place open? I saw Niharika Konidela and Sipligunj, among others. They were at different tables partying. I definitely did not notice anything illegal happening, said a techie.
HYDERABAD: Though the health department has advised the public not to venture out between 2 pm and 4 pm as the temperature is rising at an alarming speed, the police personnel who control the traffic under the blazing sun have no escape from the scorching heat.

During the eight-hour duty, especially in the morning, traffic police personnel have been encountering numerous issues apart from clearing traffic. Though junctions have outposts for them, they provide limited cover and most of their duties are out on the streets, especially during peak traffic hours and VIP movements.

Maximum temperatures in the city have already crossed 40 Celsuis. SR Nagar traffic police inspector N. Shreya, working with a team at Maitrivanam Junction at Ameerpet, admitted that the job was not easy during summers. She said police worked in two shifts  the first one from 8 am to 2 pm, and the second from 2 pm to 10 pm.

Every junction has an outpost with a roof for traffic personnel to sit. But we are required to be on the street, especially during peak traffic hours or during VIP movement or catching offenders.

A traffic constable from the Panjagutta traffic police station, posted at Greenlands Junction at Begumpet, said the amount of time a cop needed to spend on the street depended on which junction it was.

At some junctions, they have to spend almost the entire time on the street. For example, at the Panjagutta Junction, where right turns for vehicles coming from two directions are not allowed, if a cop is not regulating traffic, it may lead to accidents, he said. The policemen are shifted to a different junction every month.

The constable added that even the existing outposts provided only limited shade from the sun. Shreya said the GHMC was setting up outposts, modelled on the lines of those in Bengaluru, which provided better shade than the existing ones, and also had a fan within them. However, she said, there was no clarity on when they would be completed.

Traffic police personnel had been provided water and glucose at police stations since March 15, which was a practice followed every summer, said Shreya.
Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray on Saturday demanded that loudspeakers of mosques be shut down. (Pixabay Image)

Bengaluru/Dharwad (KTK): After the anti-halal meat drive, right wing outfits led by Bajrang Dal and Sriram Sena have now called for a ban on loudspeakers in mosques.

Backing the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray, they warned that they will play Bhajans at 5 AM as a protest against azaan from loudspeakers at mosques.

Raj Thackeray on Saturday demanded that loudspeakers of mosques be shut down.

"Why are loudspeakers in mosques played at such high volume? If this is not stopped, there will be speakers outside mosques playing Hanuman Chalisa at higher volume," he had warned while addressing a Gudi Padwa rally at Shivaji Park in Mumbai.

In a video message, Sriram Sena convener Pramod Muthalik said the Hindu outfits have been demanding that the loudspeakers on mosques should be banned and the Supreme Court's order on noise pollution implemented.

In this regard, the Sriram Sena had petitioned the authorities concerned but no one paid heed, he alleged.

The government has to instruct the mosque managements not to use loudspeakers, Muthalik said. He also said that the Supreme Court prohibited usage of loudspeakers from 10 PM to 6 AM every day.

"The order also says that loudspeakers should not be used in the silent zones such as schools and hospitals but that order is being violated by the mosque managements. We will play Bhajan every morning if the loudspeakers from mosques are not removed," Muthalik warned.
Minister for municipal administration Botsa Satyanarayana said that as of now, there is no reorganization of ZPs. (Facebook)

VIJAYAWADA: The thirteen Zilla Parishads in AP would continue despite an increase in the number of districts to a total 26 from Monday. The AP government will take a decision on this after studying about the divisions of ZPs.

Initially, the state government wanted to have 26 Zilla Parishad governing bodies. However, once the elections were over for the ZPs, they will remain in power for five years as per Panchayatraj law. ZP elections were held in September 2021 and the new governing bodies were formed the next month, which will remain for another four and half years.

The ZP chairmen and the vice chairmen along with the governing body members will remain in power for five years.

Minister for municipal administration Botsa Satyanarayana on Sunday told the media that as of now, there is no reorganization of ZPs. The 13 ZPs will continue as usual and there will be no impact on councils with the reorganization of districts.

The minister said that the modalities on the division of ZPs will be announced after the study on ZPs.
Hyderabad: Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao on Sunday evening left for New Delhi aboard a special flight, accompanied by his wife Shobha Rao, and daughter and MLC K. Kavitha, among others. While the Chief Ministers Office did not release any information on his visit to the national capital because it was a private visit, it is learnt that the primary reason for the visit is related to some health check-ups.

Though the Chief Minister and his family were to visit New Delhi a few days ago, that trip was put off. During the current visit, the Chief Minister is expected to hold a meeting with TRS MPs and give them directions on how to go about highlighting various issues on which the TRS government has been contesting with the Centre including paddy procurement and caste wise census among other things.

The TRS leadership has already called for protests in the national capital on April 11 on the paddy procurement and other issues. It is learnt that during his Delhi visit, the Chief Minister is not expected to meet Union minister for food and public distribution Piyush Goyal with whom the TRS MPs and party leaders here in the state have been running battle of words of paddy procurement.

However, sources said an appointment had been sought with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and it remained to be seen if the request would be approved by the Prime Ministers Office. There is speculation that Chandrashekar Rao could meet Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav during this trip and discuss unity among non-BJP parties as part of the efforts to dethrone the BJP from power in the country.

The CMO, meanwhile, also did not reveal any information on the likely duration of Chandrashekar Raos visit to Delhi.
Hyderabad: The TRS MPs on Monday served notice on Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla to move a privilege motion against Union food minister Piyush Goyal for deliberately misleading the Parliament over the issue of export of boiled rice to other countries.

The notice was served by TRS MPs Kotha Prabhakar Reddy, Venkatesh Netha, Manne Srinivas Reddy, Nama Nageswara Rao, BB Patil and Kavitha Malothu. They said that, while answering a question on paddy procurement raised in Rajya Sabha on April 1, Piyush Goyal had said that India cannot export boiled rice under WTO restrictions and state governments must bear this in mind.

The MPs informed the speaker that Goyal's response was to a plea from them that the three lakh tonnes of parboiled rice lying with the states be exported to help the farmers.

In his reply, Piyush Goyal made a wrong and misleading statement that the central government cannot export this under WTO regime, the TRS MPs said.

"But, India was exporting millions of tonnes of parboiled rice to other countries as shown on the governments website. This was tantamount to misleading the nation and hence we are raising the issue of privilege of the Parliament," the MPs said in the notice.
Islamabad: Pakistan's former chief justice Gulzar Ahmed was on Monday nominated for the office of the caretaker prime minister by incumbent Imran Khan, amid ongoing political crisis in the country.

Former information minister and senior leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party Fawad Chaudhry said that the premier made the decision after approval from the party's core committee.

The announcement comes after President Arif Alvi sent letters to Prime Minister Khan and Leader of the Opposition Shehbaz Sharif on Monday seeking suggestions for the appointment of a caretaker prime minister.

"In response to the President's letter, after consultation and approval by the PTI Core Committee, Prime Minister Imran Khan has nominated Pakistan's former chief justice Gulzar Ahmed for the post of caretaker Prime Minister," Chaudhry said.

In his letter, President Alvi told them in case they do not agree on the appointment within three days of the dissolution of the Parliament, they shall forward two nominees each to a committee to be constituted by the Speaker, comprising eight members of the outgoing assembly, or the Senate, or both, having equal representation from the treasury and the opposition.

The Constitution has empowered the president to appoint a caretaker prime minister in consultation with the prime minister and the leader of the Opposition in the outgoing National Assembly, the President's Secretariat said in a statement.

Under Article 224-A(1) of the constitution of Pakistan, a caretaker government is set up to organize elections in the country.

Khan will continue as the prime minister till the appointment of a caretaker prime minister.

So far Shehbaz Sharif has refused to take part in the process, terming it illegal.

Born in 1957, Justice Ahmed served as chief justice from December, 2019 until his retirement in February 2022.

He was part of a five-judge bench that disqualified former premier Nawaz Sharif in the Panama Papers case. He made headlines multiple times due to his strong verdicts and comments against governments and bureaucrats.

Justice Ahmed had also ordered authorities to reconstruct a temple vandalised by a mob in northwest Pakistan and instructed them to recover the money for the restoration work from the attackers whose act had caused "international embarrassment" to Pakistan.

He had also attended a grand function at the rebuilt temple to celebrate Diwali festival last year and to express solidarity with the members of the Hindu community.
Islamabad: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Sunday named senior US diplomat Donald Lu as the person who was allegedly involved in the "foreign conspiracy" to topple his government through a no-confidence vote tabled by the Opposition.

Addressing a meeting of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leaders here after the National Assembly Deputy Speaker rejected the no-trust motion, citing national security, said that during the National Security Committee's meeting, the country's highest security body, it was also noted that a foreign interference was made into the internal politics of the country through a no-confidence motion.

He then claimed that Lu, the top American official dealing with South Asia in the US State Department, was involved in the foreign conspiracy' to topple his government.

Pakistan's Opposition leaders have ridiculed Khan's allegation, and the US has dismissed it.

Khan claimed that Lu warned the Pakistani envoy to the US, Asad Majeed, that there would be "implications" if the Pakistan Prime Minister survived the no-trust vote in the National Assembly.

He said minutes of the communique regarding a meeting between the ambassador of Pakistan in the US and the US officials were shared in the NSC's meeting.

A plan was perpetrated outside Pakistan to interfere into internal politics of the country, adding when the highest national security body confirmed it, it became irrelevant as to how many numbers the opposition had in the assembly, the official APP news agency quoted Khan as saying.

The embassy officials of the said country were also in contact with the PTI members who had defected, he claimed.

Khan said that the no-confidence motion against him was a foreign conspiracy and he thanked Allah that it failed.

The prime minister referring to his announcement early in the day, said that the Opposition was in a state of shock and they did not know what had happened to them.

On Saturday, Prime Minister Khan openly held the US responsible for the foreign conspiracy to overthrow his government.

Ok I'm taking the name of US, the conspiracy has been hatched with the help of America to remove me, PM Imran had said while addressing the participants of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf parliamentary party in Islamabad.

Earlier, National Assembly Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri termed the no-confidence motion against the premier unconstitutional, saying that it was backed by foreign powers.

Khan claims the US is leading a conspiracy to remove him because of his criticism of US policy and other foreign policy decisions he has taken.

Khan visited Moscow to meet President Vladimir Putin as Russia was launching the invasion of Ukraine. He has previously criticised America's "War on Terror".

Pakistan's ties with Russia have moved past the bitter Cold War hostilities in recent years and the chill in the relations between Pakistan and the US has further pushed the country towards Russia and China.

US President Joe Biden is yet to make a customary call to Prime Minister Khan since he assumed office in January 2021.
Ukrainian authorities were investigating possible war crimes by Russia after finding hundreds of bodies, some bound and shot at close range, strewn around towns near Kyiv after Kremlin forces withdrew to refocus their attacks in other parts of the country. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia on Sunday of committing genocide in his country, as Western leaders condemned images emerging of dead Ukrainian civilians in a town abandoned by Russian forces outside the capital, Kyiv.
Veteran Nepal diplomat Shankar Sharma, the former Ambassador to the US, has been appointed as the new Ambassador to India.

President Bidhya Devi Bhandari on Sunday appointed Sharma to the key post and he will take up his assignment soon.

The post in New Delhi was vacant after Sher Bahadur Deuba government recalled as many as 12 ambassadors including from India. Former minister Nilamber Acharya was the Ambassador until the time of recall.

Sharma brings extensive experience in government, international institutions, and economic research.

Before joining the National Planning Commission as a member in 1997, he worked as a Senior Economic Advisor, in the Ministry of Finance, as a Senior Economist in the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore, and a Fellow in the East-West Center, Hawaii.

He also served as a Professor of Economics in the Centre for Economic Development and Administration, Tribhuvan University.

As a high level development planner in Nepal, Sharma provided leadership for national planning, policy guidance, program development and monitoring as Vice Chairman. He worked as policy advisor for many national and international organisations like the World Energy Council Committee, the Millenium Development Goal Assessment of the Asia Pacific Region, UNESCAP, Bangkok, the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, and the United Nations Development Programme.

Watch the latest DH Videos here:
As the final week of the Budget Session gets under way, the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022, was discussed in the Lower House. Home Minister Amit Shah responded to Opposition's critiques, saying that the bill only aimed to strengthen India's internal security and not with any other intention. Rajya Sabha was adjourned for the day after continued opposition ruckus over not being heard.
The Russia-Ukraine conflict, now in its sixth week, has impacted the geopolitical order  or the global disorder, as some would say  as never before in the last many decades. Analysts the world over are divided in their prognosis of the causes and effects of this devastating war that has brought death, destruction and disruption in the lives of thousands of innocent Ukrainians. Millions of them have fled their nation to escape the massive onslaught from the invading Russian army, which is equipped with overwhelmingly superior firepower. The Ukrainian army, not as well-equipped but strengthened by many of its citizen-volunteers has taken on the Russians displaying rare grit and matchless valour to defend their motherland. Many border towns in Ukraine, such as Mariupol, Chernihiv, Sumy and Kharkiv, and the Luhansk and Donbass regions have been razed to the ground. But that the Russians have not exactly had a cakewalk into Ukraine and that they have suffered so many casualties to their manpower, superior weaponry and equipment has surprised not only them but military analysts the world over.

Governments, professional militaries and strategic analysts do analyse the lessons and shortcomings emerging out of such conflicts to effect course corrections and prepare for the future. Wars, which in todays world can cause unimaginable havoc and humongous casualties on both sides, are launched with a clear-cut strategic objective in mind. What was in Russian President Vladimir Putins mind when he did so does baffle many analysts. Did he go to war to prevent Ukraine from formally joining NATO, thus discouraging NATO deployments and other influences close to Russian borders? Or, was his larger, unstated ambition to resurrect the erstwhile Soviet Union, which collapsed in December 1991, and which he described as the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century? Was Ukraine about to develop a nuclear capability in the near future that would have threatened Russian security? Did the Russians, after capturing Crimea in 2014, now desire to annex Ukraines Mariupol to obtain unhindered access into the Sea of Azov? Was his motive to effect regime change in Ukraine and install a pro-Russian government in Kyiv?

The jury is out on the question, with differing opinions on Putins end objective  some have also proffered the opinion that Putin has perhaps fallen into the US trap of getting himself into this needless military confrontation!

Thus, the first lesson for any nation and its leaders is to have a clear-cut and achievable politico-military aim before it launches itself into any armed conflict  the costs of which can be staggering to all sides, with severe economic repercussions for a nations well-being in the future. The economic sanctions imposed by the West now will surely impact Russia and its people over a long period.

The second lesson that clearly emerges is that a nation must be fully prepared to ensure its security on its own. Notwithstanding any alliances or any other friendly grouping, no nation will put its boots on the ground to assist its allies. It may give financial or military assistance to a friendly or allied nation, but nothing more than that. The Ukrainian plight is a good example of a nations imperative to be prepared to singly fight for its security. Thus, for India, as its strengthens the Quad or any South-East Asian grouping, it will be appropriate to remember that in humanitarian operations or in distress situations, these alliances may come in handy, but they will most likely not in a war.

In the event of a conflict, nations supplying arms and equipment may resort to imposing sanctions and thus a nation can be in jeopardy as regards its war-fighting capabilities if the supply or import of critical ammunition/spares is denied for whatever reason. Thus, self-reliance in essential military requirements must be ensured in peacetime by both the public and private defence industry of the nation. Ordinarily, it takes inordinately long to reach satisfactory levels of self-reliance in indigenisation of equipment. To overcome this, the Indian government must push for self-reliance programmes on a war footing.

The Indian military is heavily dependent on Russia for the supply and sustenance of over 65% of its weapons and weapon platforms like aircraft, ships, tanks, artillery, air defence weaponry, missiles, etc. Thus, it will only be prudent for India to diversify its sources for these in the immediate term while vigorously striving for indigenous development and production of these.

Importantly, the performance of critical Russian equipment, which the Indian military possesses in its arsenals  such as the T-90 tanks, BMP 2/3 mechanised infantry combat vehicles, Su-30 and MiG-29 fighters, the S-400 air defence systems being bought now, the GRAD and SMERCH rocket batteries, various types of drones and helicopters should be carefully evaluated, keeping in view their performance in the current conflict.

Restoration of the military supply chains with both Russia and Ukraine will have to be adequately streamlined. In addition, the lessons emerging from this conflict at the strategic, and operational art and tactics levels must be studied as relevant to the Indian context and our own geographical terrain. Prima facie, the Russians appear to have faltered in their deployments and actions at all these levels.

This conflict has once again highlighted the significance of hybrid warfare. Information warfare appears, unexpectedly, to have been the weakness of the Russians in this conflict and Putin personally has been successfully painted as a war criminal, the Hitler of the present day, etc., to global audiences. Nevertheless, he could also have avoided causing far too much collateral damage on innocent Ukranians. As the current sole superpower in the world, the Americans too have to take their share of the blame for not being able to prevent this conflict. India, of course, in keeping with its national interests, has been walking a diplomatic tight rope between Russia and the West.

Even six weeks into Putins invasion, it remains difficult to predict how this conflict will end. But the hard lessons that emerge from this conflict must be sought and analysed, and suitable measures taken for Indias benefit and overall security.

(The writer was the first chief of the

Defence Intelligence Agency and Deputy Chief of the Integrated Defence Staff)
Rural Development & Panchayat Raj Minister K S Eshwarappa on Sunday alleged that a few forces plotted halal and jhatka meat controversies to divide society.

"A few persons and forces masterminded halal and jhatka meat controversies. Let people following certain practices be allowed to continue the same," he said after inaugurating a comprehensive solid waste management unit at Nitte in Karkala taluk in the district.

"It is not good to appease Muslims. The BJP favours Hindutva but is not opposed to Muslims. We respect patriotic Muslims, but won't leave those raising slogans in favour of Pakistan," he said.

Check out latest DH videos here
Seats under the Right to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) - which seemed to have lost relevance in the last three years, is back in demand this year.

The department of public instruction (DPI) has received more than 20,000 applications for admissions to various grades under RTE.

It has received 20,414 applications so far, for the 18,555 seats available for the academic year 2022-23.

Officials attributed the sudden rise in demand to the economic crisis caused by the pandemic.

According to sources, the highest number of applications seeking admissions in schools under the RTE quota is from Bengaluru South.

A total of 3,989 applications were received for 1,276 seats in schools there.

This is followed by Mysuru district, with 2,600 applications for 928 seats.

Officials told DH that a majority of the parents who have applied for seats under the RTE quota for their children are those hit severely during the pandemic.

Not all parents are capable of paying fees demanded by private unaided schools. This year, a few parents who were earlier sending their wards to private schools are now trying their luck under RTE, said an official.

A parent who has applied under RTE for a school in Bengaluru North said, Our elder daughter is studying in a private school and the fee is around Rs 80,000. Now, we need to admit our younger one as well. Keeping in mind the high costs, we have applied under RTE.

In 2021-22, the number of available seats was 14,036. For these, 11,531 applications were received and 3,070 seats were filled. In 2020-21, the number of seats available was 17,453 and 11,026 applications were received. But only 3,070 seats were filled.

The DPI will conduct the first round of lottery for seat allotment on April 4.

The demand for RTE seats dropped considerably, after amendments brought by the department, giving priority to seats in government schools, followed by aided schools.

If there is no government or aided school nearby, seats will be allotted in a private school.

Watch the latest DH Videos here:
Please allow ads as they help fund our trusted local news content.

Kindly add us to your ad blocker whitelist.

If you want further access to Ireland's best local journalism, consider contributing and/or subscribing to our free daily Newsletter .

Support our mission and join our community now.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has ordered that every telecom service provider (TSP) offering at least one Plan Voucher, one Special Tariff Voucher (STV), and one Combo Voucher renewable on the same date of every month.

The regulator noted that if the date of such renewal is not available in a month, the renewal shall be the last date of that month.

After due consideration, the Authority has decided to issue the Telecom Tariff (67th Amendment) Order, 2022 (02 of 2022), after 60 days from the date of commencement of this Order.

Following industry representations, TRAI clarified that in case the same date for such renewal is not available in a month, the date of renewal will be the last date of that month.

The regulator added the clause: "Every telecom service provider shall offer at least one plan voucher, one special tariff voucher, and one combo voucher which shall be renewable on the same date of every month, and if the date of such renewal is not available in a month, the date of renewal shall be the last date of that month."

For example, if the date of renewal is January 31, the next date of recharge will be February 28 or 29 (depending on whether or not it is a leap year), and the subsequent dates will be March 31, April 30, and so on.

Currently, TSPs such as Airtel and Vodafone Idea, provide recharge packages with validities of 24 days, 28 days, 56 days, and 84 days, among others. As of now, there is no recharge that can cover the whole month of 30 days or 31 days.

Customers have been complaining that with the monthly validity of 28 days, they have to do 13 recharges in 12 months. To sort out this issue, Trai came out with a directive in January. TRAI then mandated that every telecom company must include at least one PV, one STV, and one CV with 30 days validity among its tariff offers. Now, there was confusion in the case where recharge is done on the 31st of a month and the same date is not available in the next month. Providing clarity on this, Trai revised the order now.

The telecom regulator has provided another 60 days to comply with the fresh directive.

Indias largest telecom operator Reliance Jio launched INR 259 (USD 3.42) plan with a calendar month validity earlier this week, to help prepaid users remember just one recharge date every month.
The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) has sent a Statement of Issues (SOI) to Celcom and Digi flagging the potential adverse impact of their proposed merger.

Celcom and Digi have been asked to provide feedback, details and proposed resolutions for the issues laid out in the SOI within the next 30 days. The merger of the units was agreed by their respective parent firms Axiata Group and Telenor Group in June 2021.

The SOI is part of an audit process commenced by MCMC in November 2021 to determine the impact of the merger on competition in the market. The process is not final and is aimed at granting the operators time to address concerns, but given the extent of the issues identified the completion of the merger is now likely to be delayed beyond the originally expected Q2 window.

As reported by TeleGeography, the regulator has called on the operators to address its concerns around the national retail market for mobile and low-speed fixed broadband and data services, as well as mobile voice and P2P messaging services. MCMC also raised issues around the national wholesale market for voice, messaging and mobile broadband, including network sharing arrangements.
The government of Papua New Guinea has passed an act imposing a tax liability on Digicel, an operator that is a major player in the Pacific and Australia.

It has been suggested that the tax, equal to about $100 million with a further penalty of $14 million for non-payment, may affect plans for Australias Telstra to buy the Pacific operations of Digicel, a company headquartered in Jamaica.

These plans were reported in October last year after Telstra partnered with the Australian government for a US$1.6 billion acquisition of Digicel Pacific. This has been seen as part of a wider strategy to limit Chinas influence in the region.

Digicel boasts a total of 13.2 million customers in 32 countries including 2.5 million mobile phone subscribers across its operations in Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Vanuatu, Tonga, Samoa and Nauru.

Now, however, Digicel Group has said it is considering legal options after Papua New Guinea imposed the $100 million tax on the operator on 25 March. It has said the tax has potential implications for the Australian buyout as well as suggesting that the countrys credit rating may suffer.

According to Reuters, Digicel's founder Denis O'Brien met with the Papua New Guinea prime minister James Marape last week to try to resolve what has been described as a "new arbitrary, company-specific tax".

Telstra has largely reserved comment so far, suggesting that the tax is a matter for the current owner of Digicel Pacific and awaiting Papua New Guinea regulatory approvals for the proposed acquisition.

Plans for the tax were first outlined last November in the countrys 2022 budget measures. The tax applies only to companies that control more than 40% of Papua New Guineas market for telecommunications and banking. Parliament was told that Digicel holds 90% of the retail mobile voice and internet market.

Reuters reports that Bank of South Pacific, the only other company affected, has told the Australian Stock Exchange that the tax must be paid annually in September.
Digital infrastructure company Equinix has announced plans to build a brand-new data centre in the city of Salalah on the south coast of Oman.

The data centre is being built in cooperation with Omantel, a leading regional wholesale carrier, and will be commercially and operationally managed in full by Equinix as a carrier-neutral and open access Equinix International Business Exchange data centre.

The new site, called SN1, will be the second carrier-neutral data centre to be built in Oman after MC1 in Muscat, and will be Equinixs fifth data centre in the region alongside sites in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Once open, Equinix says, SN1 will become a key interconnectivity point for traffic flows between Asia, Europe, and Africa.

By shortening the length and route of many highly strategic and important cables in the region, Equinix says the new SN1 site in Salalah will change the landscape of global traffic flows by creating a much more cost-effective route to connect businesses to the Middle East.

The new site will also offer direct fibre links to MC1, and enable carriers, content providers and cloud providers to co-locate critical IT infrastructure in the region.

With access to several new and existing submarine cables, the SN1 facility is the latest in a string of strategic subsea-related investments for Equinix.

In December 2021, the company announced it had been selected by submarine cable infrastructure development specialist SUB.CO for the hosting of the 9,800-kilometre Oman-Australia Cable (OAC) into its International Business Exchange data centres in Perth and Muscat.

Additionally, during 2021, Equinix opened similar cable hosting sites in Genoa and Bordeaux as well as announcing the opening of significant subsea connections with EllaLink in Portugal and Brazil.
Telecom Egypt, Egypts first integrated telecom operator and one of the largest subsea cable operators in the region, has announced that EG-IX, the first open access internet exchange in Egypt, is live and available for customers.

The new internet exchange, powered by AMS-IX, (Amsterdam Internet Exchange, a neutral member-based association that operates multiple interconnection platforms around the world), is intended to enhance the digital experience of internet users in Egypt, Africa and the Middle East.

EG-IX is hosted inside Telecom Egypts largest certified tier III data centre which is located in Smart Village in West Cairo and named Regional Data Hub (RDH). RDH is connected with advanced fully meshed network securing access to 14 submarine cable systems. This number will increase to 18 cable systems by 2025, says Telecom Egypt.

EG-IX is based on the IX-as-a-Service (IXaaS) solution offered by AMS-IX, the leading interconnection platform service provider, and will act as an open access internet exchange platform for large content delivery network, application and cloud providers and telecom carriers who are looking to enhance the digital experience of end customers in MEA region.

IXaaS solution supports Telecom Egypt's setting up and running of a state-of-the-art internet exchange point in Egypt, capitalizing on more than 25 years of AMS-IXs experience in such fields.

The EG-IX platform will support Telecom Egypt in its efforts to improve the quality of internet services in Egypt. Moreover, this exchange point will strengthen Egypts position as an international connectivity hub, further highlighting the potential of the growing digital sector in the region.
Infobip has acquired a Service without Network (National) licence to operate in Zambia, which will help the firm expand in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region.

Becoming a licensed operator in Zambia will help Infobip bring local support to customers and also means the firm can strike partnerships in Zambia or the surrounding countries, thanks to the licences compliance with local laws and regulations.

Zambia is an exciting market for Infobip, allowing us to service neighbouring countries such as Zimbabwe and Botswana too, where the way of doing business is very similar. Many multinationals are opening offices in these countries, which shows what an important region it is in terms of growing our business footprint, says Douglas Van Wyk, Regional Manager for Southern Africa at Infobip.

Erica Lengwe, Managing Director at Infobip Zambia, says the move creates many opportunities for Infobip, especially given that the Zambian government is increasingly moving into the digital transformation space.

This creates many opportunities for businesses looking to enter the digital space and consider of digital communications can help improve the customer experience, which is Infobips bread and butter. Weve seen for a long time how Zambia is embracing the wave of digital transformation, so its important for us to play our part in pioneering a more digital future, said Lengwe.
Minister Coveney to meet Vice President and Foreign Minister of Colombia, H.E. Marta Lucia Ramirez

Press release

Minister for Foreign Affairs, Simon Coveney T.D., will meet the Vice-President and Foreign Minister of Colombia, H.E. Marta Lucia Ramirez on Tuesday 5 April. The Vice-President is currently visiting Ireland to attend the Global Diaspora Summit and undertake an official programme of engagements.

I am delighted to be able to welcome Vice-President and Foreign Minister Ramirez to Iveagh House and I very much look forward to holding a wide-ranging discussion on topics which are of great importance to both Ireland and Colombia.

Colombia is a key partner for Ireland in the Latin America and Caribbean region and is a country with which we share excellent bilateral relations. This relationship has been strengthened in recent years with the opening of our respective Embassies in 2018 and 2019, and most recently by the launch of Irelands-first ever Strategy for Latin America and the Caribbean

In addition to bilateral relations and the recently launched strategy, Minister Coveney and Vice-President Ramirez will discuss global issues including the situation in Ukraine and Venezuela; our longstanding cooperation and lesson sharing on peacebuilding; as well as the significant trade and investment opportunities that exist between our two countries.

The Vice-Presidents visit comes only a short time after the Tanaistes successful visit to Colombia as part of this years Saint Patricks Day programme.

ENDS

Press Office

4 April

..

 Previous Item | Next Item 
China's textile sector notches steady growth in first two months

Xinhua) 15:36, April 04, 2022

BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- China's textile industry posted robust growth in the first two months of this year, data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) showed.

In the period, the added value of textile firms with an annual operating revenue of at least 20 million yuan (about 3.15 million U.S. dollars) climbed 6.7 percent year on year, according to the MIIT.

The operating revenue of the aforementioned firms totaled 706.9 billion yuan, increasing by 13.5 percent from the same period a year ago.

Profits of these companies came in at 24.8 billion yuan, down 1.8 percent year on year.

MIIT data also showed China's textile exports from January to February rose 11.9 percent year on year to 24.7 billion U.S. dollars.

(Web editor: Xue Yanyan, Bianji)
Google may address the size limitations associated with the inclusion of a physical SIM or a dual eSIM support with this software feature.

Google released Android 13 Developer Preview 2 (DP2) last month, but even weeks later, new features of Android 13 are being spotted. One such feature (found by Mishaal Rahman of Esper.io) is the support for Multiple Enabled Profiles (MEP) which lets a single eSIM simultaneously connect to two different carrier connections. This would open up possibilities for eSIM-only or even portless phones in the future.

But, what are Multiple Enabled Profiles, and how does it work?

How two connections on one eSIM would work

Even with their size changes from full to mini to micro to nano, SIM card slots still take up space in our phones which the manufacturers may want to use for other applications. After all the size and number of different smartphone components have been increasing with each passing year. So, the eventual solution might seem like eSIMs but at present dual eSIM phones are also not that prevalent or ideally solving the aforementioned size constraints. What to do then?

Well, Google has a solution, it seems.

Its called Multiple Enabled Profiles (MEP) wherein a single physical interface is involved between a SIM profile and a modem but with multiple logical (software) interfaces. All of these separate logical interfaces will have their own independent communication channel between the said SIM profile and modem.

The modem will identify the logical interfaces like physical ones only and multiple logical interfaces would be treated as multiple carrier connections.

In his blog, Mr. Rahman says, "Google is proposing the creation of logical interfaces that are multiplexed on a single physical interface. Each logical interface can then provide an independent communication channel between a SIM profile and a modem, so thered only need to be a single actual physical connection to the modem. No rewiring is needed, so existing devices with a single eSIM chip wired to a modem can theoretically support MEP.

It will be backward compatible and even existing devices with a single eSIM chip connected to a modem should be able to support MEP. It will be platform agnostic as well which means this concept of MEP and two carrier connections on a single SIM is something that could work on iOS, macOS, and Windows too. That said, we will have to see how Google decides to license its patented tech.

In the past, the company has been reportedly spotted testing MEP support on certain Pixel hardware. Now we will see if it decides to implement this feature, and how it pans out.

Meanwhile, for other news, reviews, feature stories, buying guides, and everything else tech-related, keep reading Digit.in.
Samsung Galaxy A33 5G starts at 28,499 and Galaxy A73 5G begins at 41,999 in India.

Update: We have made changes to the article to include the Galaxy A33 5G pricing details.

Samsung surreptitiously disclosed the pricing details of the Galaxy A73 5G and Galaxy A33 5G in India. If you recall, the phones had launched in India at the end of March. Days later, we finally have the specifics of how much both of these Galaxy phones would cost. So, lets have a look at them along with the pricing of all the Galaxy A series phones.

Samsung Galaxy A73 5G Pricing in India and Pre-booking Offers

In India, Samsung Galaxy A73 5G prices are as follows:

41,999 for the 8+128GB model and

44,999 for the 8+256GB variant

You can avail an introductory discount of up to 3000 with ICICI debit/credit cards, SBI credit cards, or Samsung Finance+.

Additionally, if you pre-reserve the A73 5G, the company is offering a pair of Galaxy Buds Live (originally worth 6,990) for 499.

Samsung has priced the Galaxy A33 5G as follows:

28,499 for the 6+128GB variant

29,999 for the 8+128GB unit

The introductory offers include a 1500 discount with SBI Credit Cards, EMI transactions, as well as ICICI bank cards. The phone is available through Samsung.com.

And, here are the rest of the phones from the Galaxy A lineup:

Galaxy A53 5G would cost you 34499 for the 6GB+128GB model and 35,999 for the 8GB+128GB unit.

The Galaxy A23 price is set at 19,499 for the 6GB+128GB model and 20,999 for the 8GB+128GB variant.

Finally, the Galaxy A13 comes at 14999 for the 4GB+64GB memory variant, 15,999 for the 4GB+128GB unit, and 17,499 for the 6GB+64GB model.

As for other news, reviews, feature stories, buying guides, and everything else tech-related, keep reading Digit.in.
Subscriber content preview

SEATTLE  An industrial building at 6250 Stanley Ave. S. sold for almost $3.8 million, according to King County records.

The seller was Stanley LLC, which acquired the property in 2014 for about $1.6 million.





. . .
: WangLimin (), : NewYork

 : Psychiatric Li Li on Her Intentional PSYCHOPATHIC DISPLAY

: PSYCHIATRY,Li Li,Psychopath,AMERICAN EVIL SYSTEM,HUMANSCUMS

: BBS  (Mon Apr 4 11:26:52 2022, )



Psychiatric Li Li on Her Intentional PSYCHOPATHIC DISPLAY Again

April 04, 2022

by Limin Wang



Li Li, the cheater Chinese woman, is by the "legal" sense my "wife". The

HUMANSCUMS OF THE AMERICAN-CHINESE HYBRID EVIL SYSTEM have turned that

prostitute Li Li into a PSYCHIATRIC tool while she was aided and abetted by

ACHES' HUMANSCUMS for TWICE DESERTIONS in year 2014. The ACHES HUMANSCUMS,

including NYC Police, claimed they could NOT find Li Li while Li Li was

never put on a missing list. Since the PROSTITUTE LI LI was still acting as

a "mother" and thus contacting the young daughters then, I was suddenly

fired off the slavery "job" and then was having the time to find Li Li and

persuade Li Li home. But, Li Li started to show off this kind of SPONTANEOUS

PSYCHIATRIC OR PSYCHOPATHIC RANTING ON HER OWN ALMOST EVERYDAY, AND

SOMETIMES MULTIPLE TIMES A DAY. Also, Li Li started to show many SICKENING

behaviors such as using the bathroom in DARKNESS AND with SLAMMED TIGHT

BATHROOM

DOOR at home, DRESSING in the DARKNESS at home, REJECTING SEX RELATIONSHIP

WITH ME THE HUSBAND, EVEN ANY NORMAL COMMUNICATION ON ANY PRACTICAL LIFE

MATTER WITH ANY OTHER MEMBER OF THIS FAMILY, ETC.



I do not understand why Li Li started her today's psychiatric episode. She

got up earlier than me, and then she stayed in a closet room for SO LONG,

apparently NOT for any complex dressing. When she refused to prepare the

simple breakfast, I did the fruit breakfast. When I was checking how the

garbage on the curbside and in the garbage corner was now, Li Li, acting as

a SPY WITHIN since her accompany trip to Long Island Jewish Medical Center

while the daughter Alexandria Wang was seduced and abducted by HUMANSCUMS,

PARTICULARLY, THE TWO NYC COPS, OF THE AMERICAN EVIL SYSTEM to there on the

night of Sept. 24-25, 2021. The AES HUMANSCUMS, including the NYC POLICE,

including the TWO COPS on that 09/24-25/21 night, WOULD NOT RECOGNIZE THE

PSYCHIATRIC ISSUES OF THE HUMANSCUM LI LI. On contrast, the AES HUMANSCUMS

want to paint Li Li as a "victim" of "domestic violence" at home from me,

the "husband". The AES would not remove such a malignant tumor Li Li from

this family, but it tried many ways, including numerous attempted-murders on

me via slavery workplace "accidents" and then DENIED AND DISTORTED by that

front's AES HUMANSCUMS, via "MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS" of their bogus diagnoses

/treatments but real professional murdering, and NYC POLICE PREMEDIATED

DIRECT MURDER-ATTEMPTS, and it has KEPT my young daughter ALEXANDRIA WANG

under their EVIL "foster care" and CORECED the slightly-older daughter

Rosila Wang not to come back even for visits as well as not to COMMUNICATE

as before!



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdUyGIholQI

https://www.facebook.com/limin.wang.94651/videos/396592148562796







AMERICAN EVIL SYSTEM MUST DIE, AND THE HUMANSCUMS OF THE AMERICAN EVIL

SYSTEM MUST GO, FOR HUMAN BEINGS TO LIVE.



--

WangLimin People's Voice

http://blog.mitbbs.com/WangLimin

http://www.mitbbs.com/pc/index/WangLimin

 :WangLimin  Apr 4 11:59:13 2022 [FROM: 2603:7000:101:87]

 :WWW  mitbbs.com [FROM: 2603:7000:101:8]


I dont know if theyre having the same discussions at documenta, but I dont think so. The ultimate meaning of this Biennale lies in its topicality: the idea that there is a man who can decide to invade a democracy in the country next to his own, and that he can do so out of his own hubris, is exactly what the Exhibition is trying to oppose. However, there is no room for cancel culture: I live and work in the United States, where that kind of censorship knows no half measures, so I prefer to be very cautious on the subject. I can make three considerations: first, we are right in the thick of things and it is very difficult to make decisions; second, cancelling people and stories does not heal anything, least of all the present; third, once a distance has been created, a shadowy zone where Dostoevskij gets ignored, it will be very difficult to pick up the threads again in the future. In this way, cancel culture does no good to anyone.
Hamburg has long relied on a system of levees, but these were breached in February 1962, sweeping the north coast of Germany: the levee failed in 63 places, submerging almost a fifth of the municipality. As a result, much of Hamburgs city center and suburbs are now surrounded by a new dam  25 kilometers of sea wall and 78 of green wall. But the engineered system cannot be used to protect HafenCity, a semi-artificial island on the banks of the Elbe River in the German port city, from rising tides. It is a once-abandoned port district, now home to major architectural works, including the Elbphilharmonie concert hall by Herzog & de Meuron. The massive development area will have around 15,000 residents and 45,000 workers when the district is completed.
Dundalk Chamber will hold their annual cross border tourism conference online on Wednesday 6th April.

There is no fee for attendance.

The conference will focus on the opportunities that the region offers and listen to best practices from other areas.

Brexit is sure to be a major topic, and the Chamber say that they are concerned about its economic impact on the local tourism trade.

In advance of the conference Dundalk Chamber released a statement expressing concern regarding the British governments position on visa requirements.

There is a great concern that Brexit related issues will seriously curtail the potential of this area, both North and South.

The Nationality and Borders Bill will shortly become law requiring any non-Irish or UK citizen to apply for a visa should they wish to travel North.

This means that an EU citizen, e.g., French on holiday in the South will not be able to travel to the Mournes unless they complete a visa.

This reduces the number of attractions available to a tourist visiting the island unless they apply and obtain a visa.

It also means that a sailing boat cannot travel from Carlingford/ Greenore to Warrenpoint if there is a Dutch person on board unless a paper application form is posted and delivered before departure.

There is no facility to complete an online application in this case.

We have been told that there will be no checks or scrutiny on the Border.

Therefore, this is a piece of legislation which will not be enforced!

This will not be understood by a German thinking of visiting Dublin and Belfast.

If it is not going to be enforced, then do not pass the legislation.

"Laws should be introduced only with the expectancy that they will be enforced.

At this stage, the UK Government has said no to the obvious solution of a derogation for the island on the visa requirements, giving a win-win for both parts of the island.

Will the British ever consider any part of Ireland when they legislate?

We all know Brexit was a bad idea, but Brexit consistently creates barriers and dismantles all the good work on Strand 2 of the relationships on these islands, that between North and South.

The Protocol is working on the ground, as businesses North and South will testify, but that fact is being ignored.

There are also emerging problems, which the Chamber raised 5 years ago, on the taxation of people working and living in the different jurisdictions.

The Belfast Agreement did address this in part, but Brexit has complicated the matter.

Attendees can register at: https://www.dundalk.ie/event/tourism-conference
Irish whiskey continues its march to the highest levels of desirability among private collectors, with two rare bottles of Midleton Very Rare selling at auction for a combined 94,000.

The auction took place at IrishWhiskeyAuctions.com, Irelands premier whiskey auction website, founded in 2018 by Dundalk couple Anthony & Katie Sheehy. Holding a monthly online auction lasting nine days, the business has gone from strength to strength and now employs five people in addition to the company founders.

The history-making whiskeys  put up for sale by private collectors  were sold separately at auction on Sunday 21st March, with both lots coming from the ultra-prestigious Midleton Very Rare Silent Distillery Collection, which has received worldwide acclaim since its first releases in 2020 and 2021.

The first  a 2020 bottling of Midleton Very Rare Silent Distillery Collection Chapter One, a 45-year-old Irish single malt from the Old Midleton Distillery which operated for 150 years from 1825-1975  fetched a record hammer price of 48,000 (50,952 including fees). It is the highest price paid for an Irish whiskey at public auction. One of just 48 bottles unveiled two years ago for sale in Ireland, UK, France and US, Chapter One commanded a selling price at launch of 35,000 per bottle (750ml).

The second  a bottle of the 2021-released Chapter Two, an exceptional 46-year-old single pot still Irish whiskey distilled in 1973 in the signature style of Old Midleton  sold for 46,000 (48,829 including fees). At launch, 70 bottles were made available for sale in Ireland, UK, Global Travel Retail, US, and France at a price per bottle (750ml) of 40,000.

It is not the first time that Irish whiskey auction site IrishWhiskeyAuctions.com has made history with Midleton Very Rare. In March 2020, it sold a bottle of Chapter One for 42,000 (44,583 including fees), at the time making it the worlds most expensive Irish Whiskey ever sold.

Irish Whiskey now has bottles that are comparable to the bottles of Scotch and Japanese whiskies that command ultra- premium prices on the world stage, explains Anthony Sheehy, Founder & Owner of IrishWhiskeyAuctions.com. It is something that we should be shouting from the roof tops to show the fantastic growth and interest that exists for Premium Irish Whiskey.

The new record sales come as the third chapter of Midleton Very Rare Silent Distillery Collection is expected to be released, in what will eventually be a six-chapter Collection that is ushering in a new era for ultra-rare luxury Irish whiskey. The whiskey maker has previously revealed there will be one release each year from 2020 until 2025, ranging in age from 45 to 50 years old, all from the legendary Old Midleton Distillery. The Collection will culminate in 2025 with the oldest ever release to celebrate the 200th Anniversary of the Old Midleton Distillery.

Every month Irish Whiskey Auctions have charity lots which are donated by members of the whiskey community of Ireland to help raise much needed funds for local and national charities. Their first charity item on the site was in 2018 to raise money for The Zoe Murphy Appeal, a local charity in Dundalk which raised 2,222. This kind gesture inspired the couple to try and have a charity item each auction going forward.

This idea was so well received by the whiskey community that on many occasions some auctions had more than one charity item. To date they have helped raise in excess of 50,000 for various charities. Adding to the excitement of the March auction, Irish Distillers donated Bottle Number 1 from its recent Midleton Very Rare 2022 vintage release for a special charity lot, raising 11,220 for The Capuchin Day Centre, Bow Street, Dublin. Bottle Number 1 from the annual vintage release has never been available to the public in the whole 38 years of production.
Shorter showers and less car journeys are just some of the measures expected to be promoted under a new Government plan to help people reduce energy costs.

A "variety of measures" could help people become more energy efficient during the current cost of living crisis, according to Environment Minister Eamon Ryan.

Speaking on Morning Ireland on RTE Radio 1 on Monday morning, Minister Ryan repeated his previous comment that the Government "needs to do a lot more" to battle the current crisis.

"Some of those measures will take time," he admitted. However, Minister Ryan noted the "need to focus on energy efficiency" and called on the public to play its part.

He said a number of measures will be considered to lessen the burden on people.

"The scale of them will depend on the unfolding crisis [in Ukraine] in the next few weeks," he said.

The Environment Minister acknowledged that the Irish public is currently doing all it can to adapt to the rising cost of living.

The Minister said he will look at further supports for more vulnerable households in the coming weeks.

He previously stated that any additional measure in addition to the electricity bill rebate and reduced cost of public transport charges will have to be very targeted measures to ensure they help those most in need.

It is believed that the Public Service Obligation levy, which is applied to all energy consumers and costs about 57 a year, will be axed from this October
Elizabeth Maruma Mrema, executive secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, addresses the closing ceremony of the first part of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, or COP15, in Kunming, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Oct. 15, 2021. (Xinhua/Li Xin)

"That is clearly China's commitment, not just to the process, but to ensure the effective implementation of the framework when it is adopted. Of course, now we are seeing China playing the leadership role as the President of the COP in the preparations for the COP in Kunming," Elizabeth Maruma Mrema, executive secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, said.

by Martina Fuchs and Guo Shuang

LONDON/GENEVA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Crucial UN biodiversity meetings in Geneva on a global deal to better protect nature that is due for approval later this year in China's Kunming are moving in the right direction, said the executive secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) recently.

After negotiations wrapped up, Elizabeth Maruma Mrema told Xinhua via video link that she is optimistic the post-2020 global biodiversity framework will be ratified at the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the CBD in Kunming, capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province, after several delays due to COVID-19.

As people, countries, all stakeholders want to see a "transformative, ambitious, universal and action-oriented post-2020 global biodiversity framework," she said, "the general agreement is there."

"Clearly, the world is waiting for a global biodiversity framework," Mrema said, voicing hope that these negotiations are going to "continue in the lead up to Kunming."

Visitors take photos at the Kunming Dianchi International Convention & Exhibition Center, a venue of the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15), in Kunming, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Oct. 18, 2021. (Photo by Liang Zhiqiang/Xinhua)

The physical meeting of the resumed sessions of the CBD's scientific and implementation bodies, and the working group tasked with developing the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, took place in Geneva on March 14-29.

The talks, originally scheduled to take place on Jan. 12-28, were postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

They will now set the stage for the COP15 biodiversity summit in Kunming, which, according to Mrema, are envisaged between the end of August to the beginning of September.

Mrema also stressed that an intersessional meeting will take place in Nairobi at the end of June to further progress on the development of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework.

Aerial photo taken on Feb. 2, 2022 shows the scenery of Haihong Wetland Park in Kunming, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Feb. 2, 2022. (Xinhua/Chen Xinbo)

CHINA'S ROLE

The Kunming Declaration was adopted last October and commits to ensuring the development, adoption and implementation of an effective post-2020 global biodiversity framework to reverse the current loss of biodiversity.

It also aims to ensure that biodiversity is put on a path to recovery by 2030 at the latest, towards the full realization of the 2050 Vision of "Living in Harmony with Nature."

In February, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that 9 percent of all the world's species will likely be "at high risk" of extinction even if warming is capped at the ambitious Paris target of 1.5 degrees Celsius.

During last year's COP15 meetings in Kunming, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced China will take the lead by investing 1.5 billion yuan (233 million U.S. dollars) to establish the Kunming Biodiversity Fund.

A gull flies to eat the food people threw at the Haigeng Dam in Kunming, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Dec. 18, 2019. (Xinhua/Hu Chao)

The fund will be used to support developing countries in biodiversity protection, he said.

"That is clearly China's commitment, not just to the process, but to ensure the effective implementation of the framework when it is adopted. Of course, now we are seeing China playing the leadership role as the President of the COP in the preparations for the COP in Kunming," Mrema said. 
Access to financing and expertise will be immediately suspended

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development is moving ahead with its plans to exclude the Russian Federation and Belarus from receiving funding for projects. The EBRD Board of Governors have approved taking firm action against the Russian Federation and Belarus following the invasion of Ukraine.

Access by the Russian Federation and Belarus to the resources of the Bank is to be formally suspended with immediate effect. This means that there can be no new financing of projects or technical cooperation activities in either country. Furthermore, the Bank avails itself of all rights to suspend or cancel further disbursements of funding on existing projects.

The EBRD has announced already that it is in the process of closing its Resident Offices in both Moscow and Minsk.

The EBRD President, Odile Renaud-Basso, said: It is sad that we have come to this point after so many years of cooperation and activity in both countries. However, the Russian-led war on Ukraine has left us no choice but to show our condemnation with more than just words. Actions are required, too, so that the two countries are in no doubt that we believe they have undermined the values which are important to us as an institution and to the international community.

The EBRD is now focusing on delivering a 2 billion Resilience and Livelihoods Support Package for Ukraine and for other countries in the region directly impacted by the refugee crisis. The measures are designed to help companies and communities. Funding is being made available rapidly to enable Ukrainian firms to receive liquidity support, deferral of loans and trade finance. Where possible, businesses will be helped to relocate so that their operations can continue. Once conditions allow, the Bank has also pledged to take part in a reconstruction programme for Ukraine.

The EBRD is also ready to support all its countries of operations to deal with the consequences of the war and its economic impact.

 
THE Cork woman who died tragically while on a mountain hike on Saturday has been described as a doting mother full of fun, life and energy.

Cora O'Grady, who was in her early 50s and from Mitchelstown, fell ill while climbing the Galtee mountains in Tipperary with her son and daughter. Attempts were made to save her after she collapsed at 1pm last Saturday. However, she was tragically pronounced dead just one hour later.

Cora and her children had taken part in the climb to support former RTE broadcaster and Motor Neurone disease sufferer Charlie Bird who was climbing Croagh Patrick in Mayo for charity.

Ms OGradys body had been transported to University Hospital Waterford ahead of a postmortem to establish the cause of death.

Fianna Fail councillor Deirdre O'Brien said she had known Cora both socially and as a constituent.

"This was something that was very unexpected and came as a huge shock to so many," she said.

"(Cora) can only be described as a doting mother who loved her family. It's such a tragedy to see two children left behind.

"She was a very bubbly person who was outgoing and full of fun. The fact that this happened while she was doing something to help someone else makes it even more tragic. Our thoughts and prayers are with the family."

Fellow councillor, Fine Gael's Noel McCarthy, described the palpable shock in the community.

"Even before hearing the name people were shocked. I've spoken to others who described Cora as a terribly nice woman. This was a terrible tragedy and everyone is so shocked.

"The whole community is devastated that this was a person who was out doing (something for) a good cause only for this to happen. It must also be devastating for emergency services and for everyone that day who made every effort to save her life."

He said their thoughts are with Cora's family and friends and added: "You hear of people suffering breaks and falls on that mountain but this is a rare tragedy. All we can say is that the community is 100% there for the family and will do anything they can to ease their pain."
A string of small

earthquakes were reported the town of Blackpool just days after fracking operations restarted in England after a seven year hiatus, raising concerns that the controversial drilling process could eventually trigger bigger temblors.

The British Geological Survey (BGS)

detected five quakes since Thursday near the contentious Preston New Road site operated by UK shale gas firm Cuadrilla Resources.

Most of the earthquakes were at negative levels, meaning they were unnoticeable by residents. However, a 0.3-magnitude earthquake recorded on Friday hit amber on the governments monitoring scale, meaning Cuadrilla has to proceed at caution,

Friends of the Earth Campaigner Rose Dickinson told Metro.co.uk.



British Geological Survey

Incidentally, fracking was halted at the Blackpool site in 2011 because of earthquakes. The largest had a magnitude of 2.3 and was felt locally.

Since hydraulic fracturing operations started at Preston New Road, near Blackpool, we have detected some small earthquakes close to the area of operations, BGS said, as quoted by the Guardian. This is not unexpected since hydraulic fracturing is generally accompanied by micro-seismicity. The Oil and Gas Authority (OGA) has strict controls in place to ensure that operators manage the risk of induced seismicity.

The government has a traffic-light system that immediately halts operations if seismic activity exceeds 0.5 on the Richter scale.

All of the earthquakes detected at Preston New Road so far are below the threshold required to cease hydraulic fracturing, BGS added.

Cuadrilla has shrugged off the minor seismic activity. It

retweeted a post from seismologist Stephen Hicks, who commented that Fridays 0.3-magnitude earthquake could set a new world record for one of the worlds smallest earthquakes that has been reported on by multiple media outlets.



Twitter

The micro seismic events which have been recorded through the detailed monitoring Cuadrilla and the BGS are carrying out are successfully detecting events even at these very low levels, the company said, per the Guardian. This is not an amber incident under the traffic light system operated by the OGA as we were not pumping fracturing fluid as part of our hydraulic fracturing operations at the time and the seismic events remain under 0.5 local magnitude.

However, opponents said that the earthquakes are proof that fracking poses too many risks.

Recent research by Stanford University shows that these tiny tremors can be indicators of bigger quakes to followlike canaries in a coal-mine, David Smythe, emeritus professor of geophysics at the University of Glasgow, told Metro.co.uk.

The problem for Cuadrilla is that if it carries on regardless, bigger earthquakes may well be triggered, Smythe continued. To quote Cole Porter, There may be trouble ahead. Cuadrillas only safe option is to cease fracking.

With drilling underway, documents obtained by

Greenpeaces Unearthed show that ministers are looking to weaken earthquake standards at fracking sites.

In a letter sent to Conservative MP Kevin Hollinrake in July, UK energy minister Claire Perry said the traffic-light system is set at an explicitly cautious level but, as we gain experience in applying these measures, the trigger levels can be adjusted upwards without compromising the effectiveness of the controls.

https://twitter.com/UE/statuses/1053626060313714694 caption= photo_credit_src=https://twitter.com/UE/status/1053626060313714694 photo_credit=

Earlier this month, a high court judge allowed drilling to restart in England despite years of anti-fracking protests and last-ditch legal bids.

Environmentalists warn that increased gas extraction not only jeopardizes the countrys emissions reduction targets, it also skirts warnings from the UNs

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report that says we must reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent below 2010 levels by 2030 in order to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures.
Heres a quick overview of New Jersey electricity rates:

Current average retail rate of electricity: 16.32 cents/kilowatt-hour

16.32 cents/kilowatt-hour Current range of electricity prices in New Jersey: 13.59 to 20.36 cents/kWh

13.59 to 20.36 cents/kWh Average monthly electric bill: $109.54

$109.54 Average energy usage: 683 kWh/month

Jump To: New Jersey Energy Rates | Price Comparison | How to Find the Best Rates | Types of Electricity Plans | Best Electricity Companies | What to Look For When Choosing a Provider | FAQ

Whether youre moving to the area and looking for power connection or simply shopping for the best electricity rates in New Jersey, EcoWatch is here to help. Weve narrowed down the top clean-energy providers in the city, and by using this tool or clicking the links below, you can compare prices and find the right plan for you.

New Jersey has a deregulated energy market, which separates the supply rate of your electric bill from the delivery cost. This means that New Jersey residents can shop for their own energy supplier, while the delivery of the energy will be based on your local utility company.

While the idea of choosing your own energy supplier seems simple enough, deregulated energy can be a confusing industry to understand, and many consumers wind up paying way too much. Lets compare electric rates in New Jersey so you dont overpay for energy.

New Jersey Energy Rates

The state of New Jersey passed a bill in 1999 to deregulate electricity and gas, giving residents the freedom to choose their own energy suppliers.1 With deregulation, customers can shop from dozens of suppliers to find the best rates and plans that match their needs.

The citys retail electricity providers (REPs) offer plans that vary in price, contract terms, quality and environmental impact. On top of paying your REP, your rate will include an additional charge from your TDU to cover the cost of delivering electricity, meter reading, wiring from the power lines and more. Those charges are regulated by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (BPU).

Unlike with REPs, you cannot choose your utility company, as it depends on where you live. The majority (70%) of New Jersey residents are serviced by Public Service Energy & Gas (PSE&G), while the others are split among Jersey Central Power & Light (JCP&L), Atlantic City Electric and Rockland Electric Company.2

Comparison of Electricity Prices in New Jersey

Here at EcoWatch, we strive for a healthier planet and encourage our readers to live more sustainably when feasible. As such, weve chosen to highlight some of the best electric companies in New Jersey that offer 100% renewable energy.

On average, a renewable plan might cost 1 to 2 cents more per kWh than a non-renewable plan. If you use 1,000 kWh per month, that will be about a $10 to $20 difference. The electricity prices below may not be exact, as rates can fluctuate daily and may vary depending on your ZIP code and your local utility.

Plan Term (months) Rate (/kWh)* AEP Renewable Fixed Price Offer 12 15.39 Alphas 100% Green-e certified Fixed 24-month 24 13.89 Astral Energy Ultimate Power Plan 1 15.2 CleanChoice Energy 100% Wind and Solar 12 18.2 Clearview Energy GreenGuarantee12Plus 12 15.19 Clearview Energy ClearGreenGuarantee12 12 16.09 Clearview Energy GreenGuarantee6Plus 6 13.59 Clearview Energy ClearGreenGuarantee6 6 14.29 Green Mountain Energy SolarSPARC 12 12 17.5 Green Mountain Energy Pollution Free Reliable Rate 12 16.5 Inspire Clean Energy Fixed 12 12 $139.99 / month M Power 100% Renewable Energy Price Protected 12 13.9 NAP 16 month Fixed Plan 16 13.24 Sunwave Gas & Power 100% Green 7 7 15.3 Sunwave Gas & Power 100% Green 12 12 15.9 Sunwave Gas & Power 100% Green 24 24 15.2 Verde Energy Green Choice 6 12 15.79 Verde Energy Get It Fixed 12 12 15.79 YEP Energy Renewable Fixed Price Plan 6 20.36 YEP Energy Renewable Fixed Price Plan 12 18.23 YEP Energy Renewable Fixed Price Plan 18 18.34 YEP Energy Renewable Fixed Price Plan 24 18.13

*Rates will vary based on your public utility; youll see the rates above if your utility is PSE&G. Rates are subject to change.

How to Find the Best Electricity Rates in New Jersey

When searching for the best electricity prices in New Jersey, remember that rates can fluctuate based on location, seasonality, energy demand and more. EcoWatch can help you lock in a great rate using this tool, but here are a few things to keep in mind when signing up for a new electric plan:

Your Energy Usage

Most REPs offer tiered plans based on your households average energy usage. Tiered-rate energy plans are often called V-shaped plans because the rates are more expensive for people who use the least and most amounts of energy and are lowest for those in the middle.

For example, in a typical tiered plan, customers who use around 500 kWh or 1,500 kWh per month will pay more than those who use around 1,000 kWh per month. According to the EIA, the average New Jersey home uses 683 kWh per month.3

Contract Length

Typically, the longer you commit to one provider, the better deal youll get. Well discuss the different types of electricity plans in the next section.

A word of caution: Read the fine print and ask questions before you sign up for a new plan. Many contracts come with startup fees as well as cancellation fees for early termination. And while some New Jersey electricity providers will advertise a $10 cancellation fee, the fine print may read that its really $10 per month left on the contract.

Electricity Facts Label

When looking for a new supplier, always look for an Electricity Facts Label (EFL). Similar to a nutrition label you see on packaged foods, an EFL will give you a snapshot of a companys electricity prices, contract lengths and terms, sources of generation, emission levels, and more.

To find the best electricity rates in New Jersey, we recommend comparing prices from a few companies. As a trusted energy information source, EcoWatch is often able to secure discounted rates for our readers. You can use this tool to be connected with local energy providers near you.

Types of Electricity Plans in New Jersey

There are a lot of terms that pop up around energy deregulation that many homeowners dont fully understand  including the nuances of the different types of electric plans offered in New Jersey. Heres an overview of each option, including major advantages and disadvantages.

Fixed-Rate Plans

Just as it sounds, a fixed-rate plan allows you to secure a rate that will stay the same throughout the entire duration of your contract. Note that fixed rate does not mean that your electric bill will be exactly the same every month. Instead, it means the rate you pay per kilowatt-hour of electricity wont change. So, your bills will still be higher during months you use more electricity.

Pros of a Fixed-Rate Energy Plan in New Jersey Cons of a Fixed-Rate Energy Plan in New Jersey Youll have a better idea of what to expect when it comes to budgeting. If you cancel early, you could be subject to an early termination fee (ETF), unless youre moving to a new address outside of the providers service area. Your rates remain locked in even if local energy costs rise. Some fixed-rate plans will turn into variable-rate plans upon contract expiration. Be sure to read the fine print and ask your energy provider specific questions about length and price.

With a fixed-rate plan, youll pay the same amount month over month for each kilowatt-hour of energy you use. This ensures your rates will stay the same even when the market rate of electricity fluctuates. Some months, youll pay less than the market rate, and others, youll pay more.

Variable-Rate Plans

If youre wary of being locked into a length-based contract, you may consider a variable-rate electric plan. With these plans, the price you pay is based on variables in the energy market. The price per kWh will increase or decrease depending on supply and demand. This means that the rate you pay for electricity can fluctuate by the month or even the hour.

Pros of a Variable-Rate Energy Plan in New Jersey Cons of a Variable-Rate Energy Plan in New Jersey If the price of energy drops, there may be some months where a variable-rate electric customer will be paying less per kWh than someone on a fixed-rate plan. Variable rates can be very risky if extreme weather or other factors suddenly  and drastically  increase the price of electricity. Most variable-rate contracts do not have early termination fees.

With a variable-rate plan, prices change based on the market rate of electricity. Some months, youll pay less than homes with fixed-rate plans, and others, youll pay more. You may also see surprisingly high bills during extreme fluctuations.

No-Deposit and Prepaid Energy Plans

Many power plans require a deposit upon signing a contract to protect the REP from losses should a customer be unable to pay their energy bill. However, certain companies will offer a no-deposit electricity plan option so long as the customer passes a credit check. If a customer doesnt have a high enough credit score for a no-deposit plan, they can still avoid paying a deposit by opting for a prepaid, or pay-as-you-go, electricity plan.

With a prepaid plan, the customer pays in advance for a set amount of electricity. The good news is that the customer can track their electricity usage online and can reload the account when it runs low. However, rates are not fixed in a prepaid plan, so it can be harder to plan out expenses.

Pros of a Prepaid Energy Plan in New Jersey Cons of a Prepaid Energy Plan in New Jersey The obvious  no deposit. Youll have to pay for your electricity upfront and remember when to top up your meter. You have total control over how much you spend on your electricity. Your power will be automatically shut off if you hit the threshold of electricity you paid for (this can be avoided by actively monitoring your usage or enrolling in an auto-pay plan). You dont have to sign a contract that may come with cancellation fees. Youll pay a higher rate per kWh compared to other plans (in most cases).

Green Energy Plans

Green energy plans are those that supply electricity from renewable energy sources. Thats going to be primarily wind or solar energy in New Jersey.4

New Jersey is currently one of the top states for solar and has an ambitious Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) goal of requiring 35% of energy sold in the state to come from renewables by 2025.5 As such, most energy providers offer 100% green energy plans. Some REPs may even have Green-e Verification or a similar certification to ensure that the electricity is responsibly generated, transmitted and distributed.

Most green energy REPs will still offer variable- and fixed-rate plan options; the main difference is where the energy comes from.

Pros of a Green Energy Plan in New Jersey Cons of a Green Energy Plan in New Jersey You can feel good about where your electricity is coming from. On average, renewable plans cost around 1 to 2 cents per kWh more than non-renewable plans. (If you use 1,000 kWh per month, that will be about a $10 to $20 difference.) You can support clean energy without the high initial cost of solar or wind. Theyre not offered by all energy companies, so youll have more limited options when choosing a provider.

Business Energy Plans

Not all REPs will provide energy to commercial customers. If you need a supplier for your business, youll have to look for a provider that offers business energy rates. Business energy plans may also apply to industrial sectors, as well as schools, government buildings and churches.

Most business energy plans will offer variable or fixed-rate options.

Electricity Companies and Providers in New Jersey

There are over 100 New Jersey natural gas and electric suppliers. Here are some of the best energy choices according to our review standards:

Green Mountain Energy

100% renewable options

Green-e certified plans

Fixed-rate plans available

Variety of term options

20+ years of experience

Low complaint rate

A+ Better Business Bureau (BBB) accredited business6

Clearview Energy

Exclusively offers 100% renewable-energy plans

Fixed-rate plans available

15+ years of experience

Low rates

Committed to educating customers

Variety of plans to choose from

Partners with community initiatives and climate research organizations7

Inspire Clean Energy

Certified B Corp

A+ BBB rating

Exclusively offers 100% renewable-energy plans

No signup or termination fees

Rather per-kWh rates, Inspire charges a flat monthly subscription price.8

Verde Energy

Iffy track record, but trying to right the ship

Variety of plans with 100% renewables

Fixed rates

No termination fees or deposits

Competitive rates9

What to Look For When Choosing an Electricity Provider

Whether youve just moved to New Jersey or youre looking to save money by switching companies, here are five things you should look out for when choosing an electricity provider:

Types of plans offered: Not every REP will offer fixed-rate, variable and no-deposit energy plans. Where the energy is coming from: We recommend companies that offer 100% renewable plans from solar or wind energy. If the company does not specify where its electricity comes from, its likely natural gas. Electricity rates  and the fine print: Many customers shopping for a new energy provider will be looking for the cheapest electricity rates in New Jersey, but if the prices look too good to be true, be sure to read the fine print. Some companies will offer low rates for short-term contracts with a fine-print clause that eventually turns the plan into a variable-rate or higher-priced option. Be wary of this, as companies with misleading advertising may not have your best interests in mind. Company history: In most cases, youll want to choose an energy supplier with a proven track record of quality service in your area. You also may want to do some research to find out if theres a parent company. Some companies that offer renewable energy plans are backed by oil companies like Shell. Customer reviews: No one enjoys having to pay for an electric supply, but an excessive number of negative customer reviews is probably a warning sign to steer clear of a company. On the other hand, tons of positive reviews are telling that a company is likely honest and accommodating.

FAQ: New Jersey Electricity Plans

The EcoWatch team frequently gets energy questions from readers in New Jersey regarding electricity plans. Here are the most common questions we see, along with our answers.

Which provider has the cheapest energy in New Jersey?

Based on our market research, Clearview Energy offers the cheapest electricity rate in New Jersey through their GreenGuarantee6Plus plan, with rates starting at 13.59 cents per kWh.

What is the best New Jersey energy provider?

Weve found that the best energy providers in New Jersey include Green Mountain Energy, Clearview Energy and Inspire Energy. However, the provider thats best for you will depend on your households specific energy needs.

What is the average electric bill in New Jersey?

The average monthly bill for electricity is roughly $111.70 for New Jersey homeowners as of January 2022. We calculated this number based on the most recent data from the EIA that shows New Jerseys average price for electricity is 16.32 cents per kWh and the average monthly consumption is 683 kWh.10,11

While New Jersey has some of the highest electricity rates, its low consumption keeps utility bills reasonable. For comparison, the national average electric bill is $117.46 and the average price of electricity just below $0.14/kWh.12

How can I lower my electricity bill in New Jersey?

Because of deregulation, the best way to lower your electricity bill in New Jersey is to compare rates from multiple providers and choose the one thats going to offer you the best deal over time.

You can also work to lower your overall electricity use by making more conscious decisions to turn off lights, better insulate your home, mind the thermostat and use more power strips. Follow these tips for more ways to save energy at home.

What is the best energy plan in New Jersey?

Its hard to single out the best energy plan in Texas because whats best for one customer may not be the best for another. We recommend looking at the plans offered by Green Mountain, Clearview and Inspire Energy and finding one that works best for your household. Or, use this link to get connected to the best energy providers in your area.

Related Topics
Greta Thunberg, the Swedish environmental activist who has been challenging the world to take immediate action to help mitigate the climate crisis since she was 15, has a new book coming out this fall  The Climate Book  featuring more than 100 contributors, from novelist Margaret Atwood to scientist Katharine Hayhoe and social activist and author Naomi Klein.

The purpose of The Climate Book is to give readers a global overview of how the planets many crises connect, reported The Guardian.

All the facts and stories in this book are unnerving enough individually. But they too, are closely joined together- just like all of us. And once you start to connect them, understanding them as a part of a web of interlinked events, they quickly gain another, far more alarming meaning, Thunberg said in a video post on her Twitter account, as The Hill reported.

In The Climate Book, Thunberg considers what her own experiences as a climate activist have taught her, reported The Guardian. She also discusses greenwashing, which she feels is one of humanitys biggest obstacles, but  once we know the full extent of its implications  also an opportunity for hope because we can do something.

I have decided to use my platform to create a book based on the current best available science  a book that covers the climate, ecological and sustainability crises holistically, said Thunberg, as The Independent reported. Because the climate crisis is, of course, only a symptom of a much larger sustainability crisis.

Thunberg began her public work as a climate activist in 2018 when she staged a protest outside the Swedish Parliament with a sign that read Skolstrejk for klimatet (school strike for climate). This led to an international movement of students skipping Friday classes to participate in demonstrations demanding action from leaders concerning the climate crisis.

Thunberg has already been nominated three times for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Right now, we are in desperate need of hope. But hope is not about pretending that everything will be fine, said Thunberg, as reported by The Guardian. To me, hope is not something that is given to you, it is something you have to earn, to create. It cannot be gained passively, through standing by and waiting for someone else to do something. Hope is taking action. It is stepping outside your comfort zone.

Of the three books Thunberg has already published, Scenes from the Heart and Our House Is on Fire were co-authored by Thunbergs parents and sister. A book of Thunbergs collected speeches concerning planetary warming and the climate crisis, No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference, was published in 2019.

The Climate Book will be published in the UK in October of this year and will be released in the U.S. early next year.

This is the biggest story in the world, and it must be spoken as far and wide as our voices can carry, and much further still, said Thunberg, as The Independent reported.
To tackle the global challenge of climate change, it is essential for Europe to cooperate with China on the economics of climate change, Germany's leading expert Ottmar Edenhofer has said.

Due to its sheer size and vast potential for innovation, China's involvement is crucial for the world to solve the climate problem, Edenhofer, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), told Xinhua in a recent exclusive interview.

China's goals to achieve carbon peaking by 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2060 are in alignment with the European Union's (EU) plan to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, said Edenhofer.

Edenhofer's institute has been working closely with its Chinese counterparts at the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and has published a series of papers jointly with Chinese scientists, particularly on carbon peaking.

"We are very pleased to be working with Chinese scientists," he said.





Produced by Xinhua Global Service
If only half of the land stewarded by Indigenous people and local communities in Peru were logged or destroyed, the country would need to eliminate all cars from its roads in order to meet its 2030 climate goals.

Thats one of the findings from a new report that shows just how important Indigenous territories are to preventing the worst impacts of the climate crisis, especially in four countries that store about 28 percent of the carbon currently sequestered in Indigenous lands.

The key takeaway from our report is that governments in four countries we looked at  in Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Peru  are not going to be able to beat their 2030 climate mitigation targets without better protecting and conserving Indigenous and community lands, report co-author and Climate Focus policy expert Darragh Conway said in a press conference.

Silent Saviors

The report, titled Sink or swim: How Indigenous and community lands could make or break nationally determined contributions was authored by World Resources Institute and Climate Focus and published by the Forest Declaration Assessment, a civil-society initiative to track global progress towards the goal of halting and reversing deforestation by 2030. It was published on Thursday ahead of the expected Monday release of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Working Group III report on mitigation, and emphasizes how protecting Indigenous territories can help prevent the worst impacts of the climate crisis.

Both reports come at a crucial moment for climate action. Scientists have stated unequivocally that we must limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels in order to avoid the worst impacts of the climate crisis, yet the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) pledged by world leaders at the last COP26 climate conference in November of 2021 would heat the globe by a full 2.4 degrees Celsius, according to one analysis.

One mitigation strategy is to better protect Indigeous communities rights to manage their own lands. A growing body of research reveals that Indigenous peoples are the best protectors of the nature they still control. Indigenous people currently manage only around five percent of all global land, but that land contains 80 percent of the Earths remaining biodiversity. Further, land managed by Indigenous peoples and local communities (IPLCs) accounts for 28 percent of all of the above-ground carbon stored in forests worldwide.

The report authors decided to zero in on the four critical forest countries in particular that together are home to more than 300 Indigenous groups. They looked at something called carbon fluxes  the amount of carbon absorbed by or emitted from a forested area  in the four countries between 2001 and 2020, comparing IPLC and non-IPLC lands. What they found was that 92 percent of the IPLC lands in the four countries were net carbon sinks, storing an average of 30 tonnes (approximately 33 U.S. tons) of carbon dioxide per hectare each year. This was more than twice the carbon stored in lands managed by other groups. Further, the IPLC lands stored an amount of carbon dioxide equal to, on average, 30 percent of the four countries 2030 emissions-reduction targets under the Paris agreement.

Without these carbon sinks, Brazil and Colombia would have to get rid of 80 percent of their vehicle fleets to meet their commitments and Mexico would need to jettison 35 percent. Peru, as already mentioned, would have to go entirely car-free if it lost just half of these vital lands.

Since these lands are already drawing down carbon without any extra effort on the part of policy makers, one would think the countries would be eager to claim them as part of their plan to fight climate change. Yet none of the four countries NDCs take note of the work that IPLCs are doing to sequester carbon. Neither do they make protecting IPLCs a cornerstone of their climate mitigation or forest protection strategies.

And this is despite the absolutely fundamental role that these lands are already playing in putting the brakes on climate change and helping those countries to meet their existing climate change targets, Conway told reporters. What were seeing here is the indigenous and local communities really are acting as kind of silent saviors.

The Other Way Around

It isnt simply that the four countries dont take these lands into consideration when drafting their climate strategies. They are all actively working against their protection.

Existing governance frameworks in the four countries fall far short of what is needed to realize the mitigation potential offered by IPLC lands, the study authors wrote. In all four countries, these lands are under constant threat from ranching, mining, and logging, much of which is illegal and linked to corruption and collusion between governments and illegal actors.

One notable example is Brazil, which has rolled back the clock on protections for Indigenous lands under the leadership of rightwing President Jair Bolsonaro.

Unfortunately for us in Brazil, it shows how Brazil is going the other way around, Adriana Ramos, a coordinator of the policy and law program at Brazilian NGO Instituto Socioambiental, told the press.

In the last three years, deforestation in Indigenous territories has increased 138 percent. Overall, Amazon deforestation in the country is three times higher than it should be to meet the countrys climate goals. The government has encouraged these changes both by changing policies and by encouraging illegal land invasions by gold miners, loggers and others. While the country vowed in its NDC to reduce illegal deforestation, this is based on draft bills in Congress that would reclassify several methods that are currently considered illegal as legal.

Ultimately, Ramos said that the country needed to reverse course on Indigenous rights in order to effectively fight the climate crisis.

I think that for us in Brazil, the recognition of Indigenous territories should be one of the main strategies to deal with climate change and to avoid deforestation, she said.

Best Protectors

Brazils Indigenous communities and their allies are fighting back. Ramos said that protesters were gathering in Brasilia this week to put pressure on the government to protect land rights. The report authors, too, were not content to merely diagnose a problem. They also set out a series of recommendations the four governments could follow to give IPLC lands the respect they deserve:

Legally recognize all IPLC lands. Make sure land rights are broad and any exceptions are very specifically delineated. Make sure these communities have the right to free, prior and informed consent. Enforce these rights in practice by actively combating illegal land grabs and combatting corruption. Empower IPLCs by supporting these communities own plans for their lands. Use data to analyze the costs and benefits of protecting IPLCs.

Further, they argued that the countries should work with these communities when crafting their climate plans.

When strengthening their NDC targets ahead of COP27, countries should work with IPLCs to define the contribution that IPLC lands can make to enhancing national ambition and to develop the national initiatives needed to realize that contribution, report co-author Mario Finch, Research Manager of Climate Ambition and Implementation at World Resources Institute, said in a press release shared with EcoWatch.

While the study focused on just four countries in particular, Conway said that other forest countries with large Indigenous populations would likely benefit by reviewing its findings. For concerned governments and citizens in countries that do not have large Indigenous populations, they can make sure that any funding they provide to forest protection actually goes to Indigenous communities themselves and that any laws banning the import of goods gained via deforestation also emphasize the rights of Indigenous peoples.

Ultimately these communities are best placed to protect the forest because they live there, they manage the forest, theyve been doing it effectively for thousands of years, he said.
The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is out, and it offers an urgent call to act immediately on the climate crisis.

The new report, released Monday, found that the climate is already changing in ways that are unprecedented in thousands to hundreds of thousands of years and that some effects, such as a certain amount of sea level rise, are already irreversible. It also warned that temperatures will likely spike beyond 1.5 to two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels this century unless greenhouse gas emissions are widely and rapidly reduced.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called the report a code red for humanity, in a UN press release.

The alarm bells are deafening, and the evidence is irrefutable: greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel burning and deforestation are choking our planet and putting billions of people at immediate risk, Guterres said.

The report is officially titled IPCC Working Group I report, Climate Change 2021: the Physical Science Basis. It is the first part of the IPCCs Sixth Assessment Report, which is due in full in 2022. This initial publication comes less than three months before the next UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, as NBC News pointed out. The report will likely inform debate as world leaders are expected to arrive with ambitious pledges to reduce emissions by 2030.

The IPCC was first formed in the late 1980s and gathers thousands of scientists from 195 countries who review the latest scientific findings on climate change. Their reports are generally considered a scientific consensus on the issue. This latest report is the work of 230 authors and confirms that the climate crisis is largely human caused, is getting worse and will only be stopped with dramatic action.

The report concluded that the burning of fossil fuels was responsible for 1.1 degrees Celsius of warming since 1850-1900. Further, since 1970, global temperatures have risen faster than in any other 50-year period over the last 2,000 years, according to BBC News.

It is a statement of fact, we cannot be any more certain; it is unequivocal and indisputable that humans are warming the planet, report author professor Ed Hawkins, from the University of Reading, told BBC News.

This warming is already causing impacts such as more frequent and intense heat waves and more rainfall and flooding across the world, as evidenced by extreme weather events this summer such as heat-fueled wildfires in the U.S. West and deadly floods in Belgium and Germany.

Climate change is already affecting every region on Earth, in multiple ways. The changes we experience will increase with additional warming, IPCC Working Group I Co-Chair Panmao Zhai said in the press release.

All of this is set to accelerate in the future. The report authors found that the world would hit 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming by 2040 in all emissions scenarios run by the authors, and this could happen even earlier if emissions are not reduced, according to BBC News.

However, the report authors said that they thought the temperature rise could be paused and reversed if emissions are halved by 2030 and reach net-zero by 2050. They also said that it was still possible to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, but this is likely the last report that will be released while this is still the case.

This report shows the closer we can keep to 1.5C, the more desirable the climate we will be living in, and it shows we can stay within 1.5C but only just  only if we cut emissions in the next decade, director of research at the Grantham Institute, Imperial College London and IPCC lead author Joeri Rogelj told The Guardian. If we dont, by the time of the next IPCC report at the end of this decade, 1.5C will be out the window.
By John R. Platt

As I sat in a pharmacy chair for the required 15 minutes after my first vaccine dose, my mind turned to animals.

There werent any animals nearby, of course  the buzzing fluorescent lighting of the run-down drugstore wasnt anyones natural habitat, including mine. And that very absence of visible sky and wildlife  a change from the past 15 months, much of which Id spent watching the world go by through my home-office window  served to remind me how easily we can lose sight of it.

I returned home, rushed to the back window and the birdfeeders beyond, and randomly pulled a new book out of a pile of review copies. Sure enough, its subject was animals.

And it wasnt alone. In recent months publishers have released a bevy of new books about birds, bears, koalas and other creatures. These hefty tomes do more than just celebrate our furry, feathery or chitinous friends; they also examine our relationships with them, for better or worse.

Here are publishers descriptions of 10 of the best new wildlife-related books of 2021 so far. The books come from a long list of celebrated authors, scientists and journalists and cover species from several continents. Theyll help give you a dose of the wild  and a window into other parts of the world  that will hold you over until its safe to travel again to see loved ones. Human and otherwise.

1. Animals Best Friends: Putting Compassion to Work for Animals in Captivity and in the Wild by Barbara J. King

An uplifting new book from the author of How Animals Grieve.

As people come to understand more about animals inner lives  the intricacies of their thoughts and the emotions that are expressed every day by whales and cows, octopus and mice, even bees  we feel a growing compassion, a desire to better their lives. But how do we translate this compassion into helping other creatures, both those that are and are not our pets?

2. The Bedside Book of Birds: An Avian Miscellany by Graeme Gibson

Margaret Atwood provides the foreword to this new edition of her late partners classic book.

In this stunning assemblage of words and images, novelist and avid birdwatcher Graeme Gibson offers an extraordinary tribute to the venerable relationship between humans and birds.

4. Flames of Extinction: The Race to Save Australias Threatened Wildlife by John Pickrell

Signs of hope amidst and after apocalyptic wildfires.

In the early months of 2020, the worlds attention was riveted on Australia, where the nations iconic wildlife fought for survival in the face of unprecedented wildfires. Images of koalas drinking from firefighters water bottles went viral and became the global face of a catastrophe that would kill as many as three billion animals. Known as the Black Summer, the fire season was responsible for more wildlife deaths and near-extinctions than any other single event in Australian history. Flames of Extinction, written by a journalist at the heart of this news coverage, is the first book to tell the stories of Australias record-setting fires, focusing on the wild animals and plants that will be forever changed. (Read an exclusive excerpt.)

5. How to Talk to a Tiger  And Other Animals: How Critters Communicate in the Wild by Jason Bittel; illustrated by Kelsey Buzzell

A kids book thats about a lot more than growling.

Ever wanted to talk to a tiger? Or chatter with a cheetah? Or yak with a yak? This book brings together a babble of more than 100 beasties and explores the amazing ways they talk to each other. From fish that fart to alligators that dunk to fire worms that flash, youll discover that wildlife have the strangest ways of sending a message

6. The Glitter in the Green: In Search of Hummingbirds by Jon Dunn

A worldwide travelogue examining some of the worlds most charismatic and mysterious migrators.

Hummingbirds are a glittering, sparkling collective of over 300 wildly variable species. For centuries, they have been revered by Indigenous Americans, coveted by European collectors, and admired worldwide for their unsurpassed metallic plumage and immense character. Yet they exist on a knife-edge, fighting for survival in boreal woodlands, dripping cloud forests and subpolar islands. They are, perhaps, the ultimate embodiment of evolutions power to carve a niche for a delicate creature in even the harshest of places.

7. The Grizzly in the Driveway: The Return of Bears to a Crowded American West by Rob Chaney

Can we relearn how to live with returning megafauna?

Montana journalist Robert Chaney chronicles the resurgence of this charismatic species against the backdrop of the countrys long history with the bear. Chaney captures the clash between groups with radically different visions: ranchers frustrated at losing livestock, environmental advocates, hunters, and conservation and historic preservation officers of tribal nations. Underneath, he probes the balance between our demands on nature and our tolerance for risk.

8. Beloved Beasts: Fighting for Life in an Age of Extinction by Michelle Nijhuis

An illuminating history of the conservation movement.

In the late nineteenth century, as humans came to realize that our rapidly industrializing and globalizing societies were driving other animal species to extinction, a movement to protect and conserve them was born. In Beloved Beasts, acclaimed science journalist Michelle Nijhuis traces the movements history: from early battles to save charismatic species such as the American bison and bald eagle to todays global effort to defend life on a larger scale.

9. Florida Scrub-Jay: Field Notes on a Vanishing Bird by Mark Jerome Walters

A portrait of the last-ditch efforts to save the final few dozen birds of a critically endangered species.

The only bird species that lives exclusively in Florida, the Florida scrub-jay was once common across the peninsula. But as development over the last 100 years reduced the habitat on which the bird depends from 39 counties to three, the species became endangered. With a writers eye and an explorers spirit, Mark Walters travels the state to report on the natural history and current predicament of Floridas flagship bird.

10. Empire of Ants: The Hidden Worlds and Extraordinary Lives of Earths Tiny Conquerors by Susanne Foitzik and Olaf Fritsche

An intimate portrait accompanied by amazing photographs.

Inside an anthill, youll find high drama worthy of a royal court; and between colonies, high-stakes geopolitical intrigue is afoot. Just like us, ants grow crops, raise livestock, tend their young and infirm, and make vaccines. And, just like us, ants have a dark side: They wage war, despoil environments, and enslave rivals  but also rebel against their oppressors.

11. Gone: A Search for What Remains of the Worlds Extinct Creatures by Michael Blencowe

Examining the scars left behind on an emptying Earth.

Inspired by his childhood obsession with extinct species, Blencowe takes us around the globe  from the forests of New Zealand to the ferries of Finland, from the urban sprawl of San Francisco to an inflatable crocodile on Brightons Widewater Lagoon. Spanning five centuries, from the last sighting of New Zealands upland moa to the 2012 death of the Pinta Island giant tortoise, Lonesome George, his memoir is peppered with the accounts of the hunters and naturalists of the past as well as revealing conversations with the custodians of these totemic animals today.

Visit the Revelator Reads archives for hundreds of additional book recommendations.

John R. Platt is the editor of The Revelator. An award-winning environmental journalist, his work has appeared in Scientific American, Audubon, Motherboard, and numerous other magazines and publications. His Extinction Countdown column has run continuously since 2004 and has covered news and science related to more than 1,000 endangered species. He is a member of the Society of Environmental Journalists and the National Association of Science Writers. John lives on the outskirts of Portland, Ore., where he finds himself surrounded by animals and cartoonists.

Reposted with permission from The Revelator.
Oxytocin, the powerful hormone that helps individuals bond with each other, can apparently turn a massive, roaring lion into a cuddly kitten, scientists have found. Sometimes called the love hormone, oxytocin reinforces the attachment bonds between mothers and children, romantic partners and friends, and even people and their pets.

In a study published recently, lions who had oxytocin sprayed up their noses became much more cordial with their neighbors and roared less often at lions they didnt know, Phys.org reported. The study, Oxytocin promotes social proximity and decreases vigilance in groups of African lions, appeared in the journal iScience.

According to the study, administering oxytocin could have crucial benefits for conservation and the management of populations of lions in the wild, since it softens the interactions between those that are unfamiliar with each other.

Our study provides evidence that oxytocin administration may increase prosocial behavior between unfamiliar individuals, suggesting that oxytocin could potentially serve as a management tool to aid in introductions of lions both in captivity and in the wild, the researchers wrote.

Increasingly, lion prides are being pushed into private reserves due to urban expansion, where they are in closer proximity to each other, reported Phys.org. Unlike cheetahs and leopards, lions are social animals, but can also be violent and protective of their territory. Those that are rescued from circuses, breeding facilities and other unhealthy circumstances are kept away from other individuals if they cant be socialized successfully.

In situations like these, the bonding influences of oxytocin could be helpful.

If you think about male lions, for example they will leave the pride when theyre a couple of years old and they will meet up with other male lions they dont know and theyre not related to, and they will form lifelong bonds, said University of Minnesota neuroscientist Jessica Burkhart, who was the lead author of the study, as Phys.org reported.

In 2018 and 2019, the researchers sprayed oxytocin up the noses of 23 lions on a wildlife reserve in South Africa. When the lions were given the hormone, they were more accepting of other lions getting closer to a toy they had been given.

After the lions were treated with oxytocin, and we gave them their favorite pumpkin toy to play with, we saw the average distance between them drop from about seven meters with no treatment to about 3.5 meters after oxytocin was administered, Burkhart said, as reported by Phys.org.

According to Burkhart, the effects of oxytocin seem to kick in pretty quickly.

If I spray an aggressive lion, by the seventh squirt their demeanor completely changes. They are chilling out. They are blinking a lot which lions do when they are chilling, said Burkhart, as Smithsonian Magazine reported. We always wait 45 minutes just to make sure its taking effect, but in my opinion it seems to kick in within a few minutes.

In contrast with lions who werent treated with oxytocin, the lions who were didnt respond in kind when they heard recordings of the roars of strangers, which Burkhart said was an especially good sign, reported Phys.org. In humans, oxytocin can have the effect of causing competitiveness with those who are not part of a group.

Currently were working on introductions of animals who have been rescued from circuses or overseas or war zones that now live in sanctuaries, said Burkhart, as Earth.com reported. The hope is that this will translate to animals being relocated in the wild, helping them to become more inclined to their new social environment so theyre more curious and less fearful, leading to more successful bonding.
When the UK government imposed a moratorium on fracking in 2019, climate campaigners breathed a sigh of relief.

Now, however, there are concerns that the practice might be resurrected in response to Russias invasion of Ukraine. The government said on Thursday that fracking-company Cuadrilla did not yet have to seal and shutter two wells at its Lancashire fracking site, The Guardian reported. However, environmental advocates still warn that fracking is not the way to solve the energy crisis.

Trying to restart fracking now would only mean wasting more time when we have little, a Greenpeace spokesperson said, as BBC News reported. It will take many years to develop and if it ever gets produced, it will be sold to the highest bidder on the international market, with no impact on our energy bills.

Cuadrilla has had a difficult history with its Lancashire wells. Fracking at the site was halted in 2011 because of earthquakes, and then restarted seven years later. However, earthquakes also resumed with operations, and eventually the risk of seismic activity prompted the government to announce a 2019 moratorium on the controversial practice, as Sky News reported.

Cuadrilla was supposed to permanently seal its wells by the end of June of this year, but the company appealed this decision on Monday, arguing that the two wells could boost the UKs gas production amidst high energy prices and a push to diminish reliance on Russian fossil fuels.

UK oil-and-gas regulator the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA) approved the appeal.

The North Sea Transition Authority has looked carefully at this application, alongside recent developments, and agreed to withdraw the requirement to decommission the wells by the end of June, the regulator said, as BBC News reported. Cuadrilla now have until the end of June next year to evaluate options for the Preston New Road and Elswick sites. If no credible re-use plans are in place by then, the North Sea Transition Authority expects to reimpose decommissioning requirements.

Cuadrilla CEO Francis Egan celebrated the news.

I would like to thank the prime minister and the business secretary for seeing the light and realising  just in time  how absurd it would have been to force us to pour concrete down Britains only two viable shale gas wells in the middle of an energy crisis, Egan said in a statement reported by Sky News.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has also been under pressure to lift the fracking ban by some Conservative members of parliament, according to BBC News. However, climate advocates maintain that fracking is not the solution.

Greenpeace said the best way to achieve energy independence would be to promote renewable energy, improve home insulation and install heat pumps.

Friends of the Earth energy campaigner Danny Gross agreed.

Fracking would do little to nothing for energy prices or energy security, he said, as The Guardian reported. What we need are real solutions that can help lower peoples energy bills, and fracking just isnt part of that mix.
In a stunning and upsetting decision, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child refused to hear the case of 16 youth from around the world who are threatened by the climate crisis.

The international human rights body is tasked with protecting childrens rights. As such, a joint petition from youth including Greta Thunberg argued that five G20 countries  Argentina, Brazil, France, Germany, and Turkey  are violating their rights to life, health, and culture under the Convention on the Rights of the Child by failing to curb greenhouse gas emissions to levels that would keep global temperature increases below 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.

The petition called out five countries that have ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child but that continue to pollute and use fossil fuels. By doing so, they are not taking action to fulfill their obligations under the Convention to provide for the health and well-being of children as the climate crisis intensifies, Earthjustice reported.

In their petition, the youth requested action, not money. They implored the UN body to make specific recommendations to the five nations about how they can meet their treaty obligations. These included changing their laws in response to climate change and applying more diplomatic pressure on big polluters like the U.S. and China. Every country except the U.S. has ratified the Convention.

The 1.5C target was set by climate scientists in the historic Paris Agreement. According to the IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5C, successful limiting of temperature increases will mean our world will suffer less negative impacts on intensity and frequency of extreme events, on resources, ecosystems, biodiversity, food security, cities, tourism and carbon removal.

The young petitioners, the self-dubbed Children vs. the Climate Crisis, hail from 12 different nations ranging from the tiny, almost-sea-level-height Marshall Islands to the behemoth fossil fuel-guzzling U.S. They all reiterate that they, children, should not be taking up this fight. Instead, they should be enjoying their teenage years and not wondering what the next decades could bring, French climate activist Iris Duquesne, 18, told EcoWatch. Despite their diverse origin stories and unique reasons for protesting, their message is unified: to save the future, severe and swift action is needed now.

The truth is that Im doing this because I feel like I havent been left a choice and this is the only way for me to not feel guilty, Duquesne told EcoWatch. The shame of having the possibility to do something and not doing it is too big. This is the main motivation for all youth climate activists, this and anger. Anger to feel left behind, not listened to and simply left alone.

The youth are represented by human rights and environmental lawyers from Hausfeld and Earthjustice. The Committees decision, delivered Oct. 11, delivered a rebuke to young people around the world who are demanding immediate action on the climate crisis, a statement by Hausfeld said. In dismissing the case, the Committee told children that climate change is a dire global emergency, but the UNs doors are closed to them.

The Committee has instructed the youth to each file claims in the five countries, only returning to the UN after theyve lost in national courts. Their attorneys warn that this process would create years of procedural delays and that it sends this message to the children: Youre on your own.

I feel angry, Duquesne told EcoWatch. Governments and officials say they care, but nothing is ever being done to secure a safer future for us. Our livelihoods and integrity are directly impacted, yet nobody listens to us. It is very very scary.

For petitioner Litokne Kabua (18) and other children from the Marshall Islands in the south Pacific, there is simply no time to file a climate change case in every state in the world that is fueling global warming: if emissions are not immediately reduced, the Marshall Islands will likely be submerged in the ocean within the childrens lifetime, the Hausfeld statement said. This makes fighting climate change not just an environmental issue, but also a social justice issue.

Despite the disappointing outcome, the youth did win on some of the most challenging legal issues dealing with climate litigation. The Committee accepted their arguments that states are legally responsible for the harmful effects of emissions originating in their territory on children outside their borders. Moreover, the fact that all states are causing climate change, the Committee held, does not absolve states of individual responsibility to reduce their own share of emissions. The Committee also found that the youth are victims of foreseeable threats to their rights to life, health, and culture. These findings could prove important in future climate litigation.

Despite this legal victory, the procedural loss requiring them to bring their cases first in national courts is a big blow. Their attorneys claim there are tomes of case law and expert evidence showing that none of those cases would succeed. In effect, their attorneys argue, the Committee instructed the youth to squander years waiting for inevitable dismissal, and time is running out.

I have no doubt this judgment will haunt the Committee in the future, said petitioner Alexandria Villasenor, 16. When the climate disasters are even more severe than they are now, the Committee will severely regret not doing the right thing when they had the chance. Children are increasingly on the frontlines of the climate crisis, accounting for over 80% of climate-related deaths. Yet again, the adults have failed to protect us.

Tiffany Duong is a writer, explorer and motivational speaker. She holds degrees from UCLA and the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. As a contributing reporter at EcoWatch, she gives voice to whats happening in the natural world. Her mission is to inspire meaningful action and lasting change. Follow her on Twitter/Instagram @tiffmakeswaves.




France facing worst bird flu outbreak in history

France is managing its worst bird flu outbreak in history as the country detects a rebound in outbreaks in its major poultry producing regions, Reuters reported.

France has culled more than 12 million birds since the first outbreak was confirmed on November 26, 2021, the worst bird flu crisis ever in the country. 1,112 outbreaks have been reported.

The government and the country's poultry industry are concerned that the outbreaks will result in more birds killed, restrictions, and a possibility of human transmission.

25 out of 27 European Union countries (except Malta and Cyprus) are facing bird flu outbreaks with Italy suffering the most severe damage. Word Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) data showed that outbreaks have ended in all countries by end of March, except for France.

The highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu virus has spread rapidly in the key Pays de la Loire region and affected Brittany mid-March. Both regions are the country's biggest poultry producers.

The outbreaks come as farmers are expecting rising livestock feed prices because of Russia's invasion into Ukraine, both key grain exporters, as well as issues with the supply chain.

France's LDC, the EU's largest poultry producer, said this could result in reduced slaughtering activity or a temporary closure of some locations.

Gilles Huttepain, former LDC chairman and vice-chairman of French poultry lobby Anvol, said LDC will virtually close four slaughterhouses for up to eight weeks. These slaughterhouses produce 1.1 million poultry weekly.

Huttepain said other companies will compensate some of the lost volume by increasing production, adding that supplies won't be wiped out.

- Reuters




Buenos Aires grains exchange warns of early frosts affecting soy and corn crops

The Buenos Aires grains exchange said early frosts in Argentina's farming belt could result in soybeans and corn losses for the 2021/22 season, another possible blow to output already affected by drought earlier this year, Reuters reported.

The exchange slashed its soybean harvest projections by 2 million tonnes and by 7 million tonnes for corn. Argentina is the biggest exporter of soy oil and soymeal in the world, and second biggest corn exporter.

The Buenos Aires grains exchange current forecast for soybean production is at 42 million tonnes and corn output at 49 million tonnes.

The exchange's weekly weather report said the frost may incur additional losses to the harvest, with the southeast of Buenos Aires province the most affected.

Soy harvest is 19% complete, according to the exchange. As for corn, the exchange said the frosts are only affecting yields of late-planted corn still in development. Corn harvest is currently at 14.4% complete.

Last week, the Buenos Aires grains exchange slashed its corn projections by 2 million tonnes because of the drought, following a bigger cut earlier this year.

- Reuters




Dismal Q1 for Australian beef exports



Australia's beef exports have recorded a disastrous start to the year, with first quarter (January to March) shipments falling to a record low.

Total shipments to all export markets for Q1 reached just 177, 223 tonnes  the lowest in at least the last decade, and 27% below the past ten-year average of 241,000 tonnes.

As Beef Central has reported earlier, it's been a bad start for the Australian red meat processing industry in 2022, caused principally by:

- Flooding and logistics issues across large areas of Eastern Australia surrounding record rain during late February and early March;

- Associated congestion problems with the Port of Brisbane  the nation's major gateway for beef exports  shut for a week, and continuing to operate on a reduced scale through March. Some processors were forced to reduce throughput as chilled and frozen storage started to fill-up as container vessel services were delayed;

- Impacts from flooding and logistics on road and rail delivery of packaging materials, pallets and other consumables used in the plants themselves;

- Underlying shipping container access issues and port service difficulties in the United States and some other importing destinations;

- An upswell in COVID-19-related sickness among processing staff in January also saw production off to a very slow start in the 2022 season.

Underlining all these issues, slaughter cattle supply remains very tight across most of Australia, as the herd recovery process continues to evolve, after the devastating 2019 drought. Indeed some regions did not start to emerge from drought until the second half of 2020.

Monthly export figures released by DAF show March beef exports to all markets reached just 74,348 tonnes, about 9000 tonnes or 11% below the same month last year.

Most large markets were impacted with the exception of Japan, which took 20,083 tonnes of Australian beef for the month  virtually the same as last year.

Calendar year-to-date trade with Japan has reached 46,529 tonnes, down 8% on the same three months last year.

With the start of Japan's new financial year from April 1, Australia's tariff rate for chilled beef into the country this year is 27%, continuing the long-term decline from 38.5% that applied prior to the Japan-Australia Free Trade Agreement in 2015. The JAEPA tariff will continue to decline gradually to 23.5% in 2028. March trade is often compromised into Japan as traders anticipate the friendlier tariff that applies after the annual adjustment.

Flat levels of trade with other customers saw China elevated to second largest export beef customer again in March, accounting for 13,483 tonnes, mostly frozen. That was up about 15% on February statistics, but back 10% on March last year.

First-quarter volume reached 33794 tonnes, down 7% on last year.

South Korea last month imported 13,187 tonnes of Australian beef  a sharp 28% rise from February, but down 16% on last year. First quarter volume reached 33,039 tonnes, down 8%.

The United States continues to absorb historically low levels of Australian beef, as it liquidates large numbers of its own breeding cows used for manufacturing beef due to drought.

Trade into all East and west coast US ports last month reached a little over 11,000t, down 12% year-on-year. The January-March quarter saw volume reach just 26,925 tonnes, down 9% on last year.

Australia's smaller and secondary export markets also struggled last month and through the first quarter.

Indonesia took 3,105 tonnes last month and 6,518 tonnes for the quarter  back 36% and 45%, respectively.

The 11 destinations making up the Middle East took 2,641 tonnes last month, down 6%, while quarterly trade reached 5,419 tonnes, down 32%. Price remains a key issue in the Middle East, where cheaper South American beef is establishing a strong market presence.

The EU and UK markets remain in a holding pattern, until free trade agreements are ratified (in the case of the United Kingdom) or negotiated (in the case of the European Union).

Trade to the UK last month reached just 73 tonnes, and the EU at 398 tonnes, about two-thirds of trade seen a year earlier.

For the quarter ended March 31, the UK took just 203 tonnes of Australian beef, and the EU, 1,662 tonnes, back about 20pc on corresponding 2021 figures.



- Beef Central
BERLIN, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Germany's exports to China rose by 6.4 percent month-on-month to 9.5 billion euros (10.5 billion U.S. dollars) in February, according to provisional data published by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) on Monday.

Including imported goods worth 13.8 billion euros in February, China remained Germany's biggest foreign trade partner, according to Destatis.

At the same time, Germany's total exports rose by 6.4 percent month-on-month to 124.7 billion euros, according to Destatis. Imports increased by 4.5 percent to 113.1 billion euros.

The United States remained Germany's largest customer country. Goods worth 11.2 billion euros were exported to the U.S. in February, slightly up from January, according to Destatis.

Imports from other countries of the European Union (EU) grew 10.4 percent on the previous month to 67.8 billion euros in February.

Already before the start of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Germany's foreign trade with Russia started declining as exports and imports to Russia fell by 6.3 percent and 7.3 percent, respectively, according to Destatis.

The conflict would have a "massive impact" on German foreign trade, warned Dirk Jandura, president of the German Wholesale, Foreign Trade and Services Association (BGA). "The medium- to long-term effects are hardly foreseeable so far." (1 euro = 1.10 U.S. dollars) 
This content is made possible by our sponsor; it is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Engadget's editorial staff.

If youre seeking a better job right now, youve likely found numerous openings. According to Harvard Business Review , factors such as burnout and wage growth have prompted todays workforce to rethink their current roles. The era has been dubbed the Great Resignation due to the significant turnaround, and career-switchers are in a great spot as employers are more likely to sweeten the deal to fill empty positions.

But still, businesses want to hire professionals who best fit their needs. Optimizing your resume and writing a compelling cover letter is crucial in increasing your chances of securing interviews and landing a new role. The Freesumes Ultimate Job Search Asset Bundle may help you stay ahead of competitors. Available now for less than $30 , youll get templates and tips on acing interviews and improving your LinkedIn profile .

As seen on Dice, HubSpot, Lifehack, Skillcrush and TemplateMonster, this collection may be valuable for job seekers, no matter what stage you are in your career. It contains three premium, professional resume templates for Microsoft Word, which could help you grab recruiters and hiring managers attention, each with its own matching cover letter blueprint. The bundle also includes a tracking document to help you stay organized during your search.

Of course, landing a new gig goes beyond whats on a piece of paper. Youll find a Job Search FAQs Guide written by Debi Douma-Herren, SPHR, SHRM-SCP, which answers the 12 most common questions job seekers ask during their hunt. This includes tips on how to get on a recruiters radar and helpful queries to raise during interviews.

Lastly, potential employers may search for you on social media, so refreshing your LinkedIn page could make you look like a strong candidate. This bundles Guide to Optimizing Your LinkedIn Profile includes actionable steps to choosing a good picture, crafting an enticing headline and listing the ideal number of skills for higher discoverability.

Todays job market is ripe with opportunities, and with expert guidance, you might find yourself speaking with a hiring manager quite soon. The Freesumes Ultimate Job Search Asset Bundle usually retails for $225, but you can get it for now for $29 or 87 percent off.

Prices subject to change.
The Department of State has cut the ribbon on the Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy (CDP), which is now in operation. The move makes cybersecurity a more formal area of focus for US foreign policy following a swathe of attacks linked to Russia and China.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced the CDP in October. The bureau comprises three policy units: International Cyberspace Security, International Information and Communications Policy and Digital Freedom.

The office will eventually be led by an Ambassador-at-Large, who will require Senate confirmation. Jennifer Bachus, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, is running the bureau on an acting basis as senior official and principal deputy assistant secretary.

The bureau could help the US address cybersecurity threats both by itself and through partnerships with allies. A spate of major hacks have been attributed to state-linked actors from Russia and China over the last several years, including several Microsoft Exchange cyberattacks (for which the Biden administration pinned the blame on China). Others include the SolarWinds attack , over which the US has sanctioned multiple Russian companies, individuals and entities.

In February, FBI Director Christopher Wray said the agency had more than 2,000 active investigations related to thefts of US tech or information that were allegedly carried out by China. He claimed the country had a "massive, sophisticated hacking program that is bigger than those of every other major nation combined. Shortly before Russia invaded the country in February, Ukraine's government blamed it for a cyberattack against its websites.
A freight train left Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region on Saturday for Laos' Vientiane, marking the opening of Guangxi's first international freight train that runs via the China-Laos Railway.

Loaded with 165 tonnes of industrial products produced by companies in Guangxi, the train will arrive in Vientiane in three days, according to the China Railway Nanning Group Co., Ltd.

Compared with sea shipping and other traditional methods, the freight train can cut the transportation time by more than 10 days, which helps save companies' costs, said Qian Feng, general manager of the Sinotrans Limited Guangxi branch, a participant in the cross-border transportation.

"The operation of the China-Laos Railway has created convenient and efficient traffic conditions for Guangxi's products to enter the Laos market, and a number of companies interested in developing business in Laos have consulted us," said Qian.

The China-Laos Railway, which kicked off operation on Dec. 3, 2021, stretches over 1,000 km, linking Kunming, the capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province, with the Laotian capital Vientiane.

Produced by Xinhua Global Service
The Pound Canadian Dollar (GBP/CAD) exchange rate fluctuated drastically throughout last weeks session, peaking at CA$1.6462 on Monday, before falling to CA$1.6334 on Wednesday.

Pound (GBP) Exchange Rates Fluctuated Following Dovish Speech from BoE Governor

The Pound (GBP) began the weeks session on the back foot as Bank of England (BoE) governor, Andrew Bailey struck a dovish tone in a speech on Monday.

Bailey echoed his previous cautious outlook, stating it will take time before we really come to a proper assessment of how the joint experience of COVID and the Ukraine invasion [may] cause the world economy to emerge into new steady state.

This continued to dampen Sterlings appeal during the first part of Tuesday, however progress in Russian-Ukrainian peace talks boosted GBP in the afternoon.

Later in the week, many Western leaders became dubious of the negotiations, concerned Russian military was regrouping rather than withdrawing, in spite of Kremlin agreeing to peace calls.

Moreover, the UKs final GDP growth rate revealed the British economy grew by 1.3% during the last three months of 2021.

This exceeded expectations of a 1% expansion and beat the third quarters downwardly revised 0.9% lending some support to Sterling.

However, fresh geopolitical uncertainty alongside a disappointing manufacturing PMI then weakened the Pound again at the end of the session.

Canadian Dollar (CAD) Exchange Rates Mixed as Oil Prices Decline

The commodity-linked Canadian Dollar (CAD) suffered from falling oil prices throughout the first half of the weeks session.

This was largely due to fears of a drop in global demand as high levels of coronavirus caused Shanghai to go into lockdown.

In the middle of the week, the Loonie fluctuated in correlation to the markets volatility due to an absence of Canadian economic data.

At the end of the week, CAD was buoyed by Canadas latest GDP reading: the figures printed in line with market forecasts, confirming a 0.2% expansion of growth in January.

However, declining oil prices limited the Loonies gains in the latter half of the week.

GBP/CAD Exchange Rate Forecast: Will Peace Talks Bolster GBP?

Looking ahead, the Ukraine crisis is likely to remain the key driving force behind the Pound Canadian Dollar exchange rate for the foreseeable future.

Should peace talks continue to make some progress, it may buoy the risk-sensitive Sterling.

Furthermore, a number of speeches are scheduled from BoE Governor Bailey as well as policymakers, Catherine Mann and Jon Cunliffe.

Should these speeches underpin the BoEs dovish outlook, it may weigh on GBP.

On the other hand, the final UK services PMI is expected to marginally increase from 60.5 to 61: if market forecasts are reached, it may provide Sterling with some support.

Meanwhile, CAD is likely to remain susceptible to oil prices.

On the data front, the Loonie may be influenced by trade data.

The Canadian trade balance for February is predicted to slip marginally from CA$2.62 billion to CA$2.4 billion. Meanwhile, import and export trade are both expected to stumble from CA$54 billion to CA$53 billion, and CA$56.62 billion to CA$55.4 billion, respectively.

At the end of the week, the Canadian Dollar may be impacted by employment figures.

The unemployment rate is forecast to hold steady at 5.5% in March, but could another decline help to bolster the Loonie?
The Pound Sterling Canadian Dollar (GBP/CAD) exchange rate slipped this morning as the UKs income squeeze intensifies following Bleak Friday.

However, the Canadian Dollar (CAD) may find its gains capped as the recent downtrend in oil prices continues.

Pound (GBP) Exchange Rates Slip on Cost-of-Living Fears

The Pound (GBP) fell this morning as the UKs cost-of-living crisis continues to rattle GBP investors.

Last Friday  dubbed Bleak Friday by some  the squeeze on living standards really began to bite. The UKs energy price cap rose by 54%  the largest increase in gas and electricity prices in living memory  fuelling concerns that millions of people could be plunged into fuel poverty.

On the same day, scheduled rises to taxes and households services also came into effect, such as water bills and council tax.

Bank of England (BoE) Governor Andrew Bailey warned last Monday that UK households face a historic shock to real incomes that could severely impact the countrys economic growth.

While the headwinds from Bleak Friday would likely have continued to buffet Sterling today regardless, GBP investors were given a fresh reminder of the cost-of-living crisis following new UK consumer confidence data.

The income squeeze has triggered a significant and sustained drop-off in consumer sentiment, contributing to the largest one-year drop in confidence since the 2008 global financial crisis, according to new data from PwC.

The PwC consumer confidence index dropped to -20 this month, down from +10 last summer. Thats the lowest level since confidence hit -26 at the beginning of the pandemic, two years ago.

Lisa Hooker, Leader of Industry for Consumer Markets at PwC UK, commented: This shift in sentiment is both significant and sudden, with consumer spending expectations moving towards more essential areas at the expense of discretionary items. Businesses that help customers by offering them the options to trade down are more likely to keep their loyalty for when things get better.

Canadian Dollar (CAD) Exchange Rates Capped by Softer Oil Prices

Meanwhile, the Canadian Dollars gains may be limited today as oil prices continue to decline, thereby putting downward pressure on the oil-sensitive Loonie.

Crude prices have been falling in recent days after US President Joe Biden announced the largest-ever release of US oil reserves. The US will now release 180 million barrels of oil  about 1 million barrels a day  over six months in an attempt to cool the overheating energy market.

The downside in oil also came amid a UN-brokered truce between the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the Iran-aligned Houthi group on the Saudi-Yemeni border. Recent conflict between the two sides has disrupted oil supply and production, causing spikes in crude prices, so the peace has seen oil dip.

At the time of writing, WTI crude  the oil benchmark for North America  is trading below $99, down on the day and 4.71% down over the last five days. This, in turn, is weighing on the commodity-linked Loonie.

GBP/CAD Exchange Rate Forecast: BoC Business Outlook Survey in Focus

Looking ahead, the Bank of Canadas (BoC) latest business outlook survey could cause some movement this afternoon. If the survey give a generally positive view of the current business conditions and expectations for the coming quarter then CAD could consolidate its gains.

As for the Pound, the UKs cost-of-living crisis could continue to weigh on Sterling throughout the week.

Meanwhile, any updates from Russias invasion of Ukraine may also have an effect on GBP exchange rates. After last weeks positive start, with apparent progress being made in peace talks, the mood has started to sour again.

Recently, Ukrainian forces retook the town of Bucha where they have found evidence of a massacre of unarmed civilians, many with bound hands and signs of torture.

Russia has dismissed the claims as disinformation.

Some analysts are worried that the latest developments threaten to derail peace talks. If Russia-Ukraine relations continue to sour over the course of the week, GBP/CAD could face selling pressure.
Commentary From Crisis Management Expert Edward Segal, Bestselling Author of the Award- Winning Book "Crisis Ahead: 101 Ways to Prepare for and Bounce Back from Disasters, Scandals, and Other Emergencies " (Nicholas Brealey)

Each new generation brings with it its own challenges, preferences and priorities that help shape the workplace and can create management issues for business leaders.

A new report from ThoughtExchange, an anti-bias management discussion platform, profiles the latest and youngest generation to join the workforce those born between 1997 and the early 2000sknown as Gen Z.

Gen Z At Work

According to the ThoughtExchange's Gen Z At Work report that was released last week, " it's no surprise that members of Generation Z are at the helm of workplace transformation, redefining the 9 to 5 and setting new standards for employee expectations...with The Great Resignation underway, it's imperative that employers take note.

"In fact, as the most populous generation, with over 60 million members in the United States alone, Gen Z is well on their way to becoming the most influential group in the workplace.''

The report found that:

96% of respondents said it's important they feel valued, included, and empowered at work.

80% of respondents prefer a job that allows them to explore and grow various skillsets, rather than a job that is focused on a particular set of skills.

79% of respondents value having a manager that cares about their personal development as much as their professional development.

Warning

Dave MacLeod, ThoughtExchange's CEO and founder, said, "Leaders: Get going on purpose and inclusion. With 85% of respondents conveying they want to work for a company with a mission and 89% saying they will leave a company that doesn't include them, the future is clear.

"Leaders who fail to rapidly shift their organizations into a force for good or include their people in figuring out just how to do that will end up becoming the Blockbusters of the business world," he warned.

Challenges

Some have found it challenging, if not difficult, to manage members of Gen Z. In an informal survey, several business executives shared their experiences and perspectives.

Work Ethic

Max Benz, the founder and CEO at BankingGeek, noted that "One of the biggest challenges I've faced in managing Gen Z employees is helping them to develop a work ethic. Many of them are used to being rewarded for things like participation and effort, rather than results.

"I've found that it's important to set clear expectations and goals for them, and then hold them accountable to meeting those expectations. Additionally, I try to motivate them by focusing on their strengths and emphasizing how their contributions are helping us achieve our goals," he said.

Discipline

Andrei Vasilescu is a serial entrepreneur, digital marketing expert and co-founder of DontPayFull.com. He observed that "Gen Z can be exhausting because they lack discipline, they like to challenge you. They grew up online in an environment that amplified their voices, so they were never raised like us, where kids had no say in things. When I was their age, you had to 'earn' the right to open your mouth and challenge adults and people with more experience. Well, they feel entitled to do it because they've always been allowed to do it.

"They think they're better than you, smarter than you, more capable than you, and they will tell you to your face. I've butted heads more than once with a Gen Z employee, because since our company is online-based, they think they know everything about the digital world and that they can teach me," according to Vasilescu.

Staying Motivated

Scott Spivack, marketing director at United Medical Credit, said that "As a business leader, I do manage a fair share of Gen Z employees. [They] demand more freedom and personal space when it comes to working. They're not really inclined to work with managers that micro-manage, because it kills their much-needed breathing space.

"Plus, each of them has a varied set of motivations, so it's hard to figure out what exactly drives them. For some, it's the idea of growth, while for others, it's a good pay package. So, dealing with Gen Z employees is a constant learning process and you need to adapt to lead them better," he concluded.

Impatience

Teri Shern, the cofounder of Conex Boxes, noted that "One of the biggest challenges that I've faced with managing Gen Z employees is they can be very impatient when it comes to learning certain things. It seems that Gen Z doesn't want to waste time with learning something that they don't think is necessary to them.

"While this can be excellent in terms of cutting down on learning time and focusing only on what they need to focus on, it can also be a challenge when they don't realize what the bigger picture is," she concluded.

Instant Gratification

Jonathan Ben Zvi is the CEO of All Forward, a technology platform that allows freight forwarders to request and receive quotes from around the world in real-time. He pointed out that, "... Gen Z is used to instant gratification and may become easily frustrated if they don't see results immediately."

Advice For Business Leaders

Find Ways To Connect

Isaac Tebbs, head of growth at the Millions Visa debit card, noted that "Managing members of this generation can be difficult, but it is definitely worth it if you can find a way to connect with them and keep them engaged. Some tips for others include being understanding of their need for flexibility, keeping communication open and positive, and offering opportunities for growth and development."

'Embrace Their Inherent Skills'

Quynh Mai, CEO and founder of digital marketing agency Moving Image & Content, observed that "Some Gen X and Millennial leaders find Gen Z staff members terrifying. They live and shop their values. They don't hesitate on calling you out when you are wrong or culturally tone-deaf. They think they know more than you doand in this new digital-first world, they do.

"The fact is, that in today's world, they are smarter, faster, and better equipped to cope than we are, so we need to embrace their inherent skills and learn from them," she commented.

Provide Feedback

Burak Ozdemir, the founder of Alarm Journal, said that" Managing employees of any generation can be challenging, but there are a few things to keep in mind when it comes to Gen Z. First and foremost, they crave feedback. Make sure you give them regular performance updates so they know how they're doing and where they need to improve.

Lay Out Expectations

"They also appreciate clear communication and structure, so laying out expectations from the start is key. Additionally, being open to new ideas and flexible with work schedules is importantremember that this generation is used to having constant access to information and technology, so they're often more comfortable working on their own terms," Ozdemir counseled.

###
Mike Sutter /Staff



Whataburger plans to expand into the Atlanta area this year, bursting into one of the few regions of the Sun Belt where it does not already have a presence.

The San Antonio burger chain announced it would open restaurants this year in Kennesaw and Woodstock, Georgia two towns that are about 30 miles northwest of Atlanta. Next year, it plans to open six locations in other towns outside of Atlanta, including two in Athens, which is home to the main campus of the University of Georgia.
Jeremy Daniel /Rockefeller Productions

Its a big week for Fiesta fans, with the Texas Cavalier River Parade, NIOSA and more. Find out all about that here. Thats not all thats going on this week. Heres a look:

Attraction: Pixar Putt, a pop-up outdoor mini golf course features 18 holes inspired by Pixars beloved movies, including Toy Story, Coco, and Finding Nemo. The event will also have after dark nights exclusively for attendees 18 and older. Opens today. 4-10 p.m. Mondays-Thursdays, 3-11 p.m. Fridays, 9 a.m.-11 p.m. Saturdays and 9 a.m.-11 p.m. Sundays (after 7 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays 18+), through May 15, 125 N. Flores St.. $31-$99, tobincenter.org.
Sam Owens /San Antonio Express-News

Southwest Airlines launched its new nonstop service from San Antonio International Airport to Oklahoma City on Sunday. The airline first announced the service in December.

Airport officials said in a news release that nonstop flights will operate six times a week, with flights departing daily except Saturday. The airport now has nonstop flights to 37 destinations.
Monte Bach/San Antonio Express-News

North East Independent School District and San Antonio police are investigating a report alleging inappropriate behavior in the showers at the boys locker room at Churchill High School, the schools principal said in a letter to parents.

Students reported the incident last week, the letter by Principal Todd Bloomer said. It was sent to parents Friday.
COLOMBO, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Only less than 50 percent of scheduled trains operated in Sri Lanka on Monday, leaving many passengers stranded, General Manager of Sri Lanka Railways Gamini Seneviratne said.

He told reporters that a large number of railway employees were not able to reach their duty stations due to the curfew lifted on 6 a.m. local time on Monday, which also affected a large number of commuters in the morning.

Seneviratne said things are expected to return to normal by Tuesday.

Sri Lanka Railways operates around 396 trains including 67 long-distance and 16 intercity trains, and transport about 3.72 million passengers per day.

The South Asian country has for days seen protests urging the government to take measures immediately to solve hours-long power cut and fuel shortage.

A 36-hour curfew came into force on Saturday evening and was lifted early Monday in a bid to ensure law and order in the country. 
If construction goes as planned, the Museo del Westside will open in May 2023 as a participatory museum that will grow its collections essentially from scratch.

One molcajete and memento at a time. Photo by photo. One oral history after another. An old protest poster or ad here, a historic business sign there.

Its parent organization, the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center, has been mounting exhibitions in its name for years.

The most accessible, En Aquellos Tiempos: Fotohistorias del Westside, is a collection of archival photos derived from residents and enlarged onto fotobanners that can be viewed while driving by.

They reflect the history and heritage of an area that began developing after that of the citys downtown core and that the museo will celebrate and elevate.

Spanish for museum, the museo will focus on the late 1880s through the 1970s. Its first show, Historias de Westside, will survey and showcase photos, artifacts and oral histories in that timeline.

Other shows will drill down deeper, as did a small exhibit it mounted about the nearby Alazan Apache Courts, one of the nations oldest public housing projects.

The museum will shine a light on Mexican Americans who frequented Spanish-language movie houses on the West Side and saw entertainers perform under carpas, or tents.

Its subjects will include those who danced under the stars on the rooftop of the now demolished La Gloria building, where women wore flapper dresses in the 1920s, as recovered photos show.

The museo will celebrate artists, activists and political leaders born on the West Side who rose to state and national prominence; educators and small business owners; and so many who joined the U.S. military, starting in World War I.

Last Tuesday, officials broke ground for the museum, which will sit on an existing Esperanza complex called Rinconcito de Esperanza. That translates into a little corner of hope.

Its at the corner of Guadalupe and Colorado Streets, but for the Esperanza its really the corner of history and social justice.

Graciela Sanchez, longtime executive director of the Esperanza Peace & Justice Center, said the pivotal moment in the museos creation was April 1, 2002, when the iconic dance hall La Gloria was demolished.

It galvanized preservation forces who saw little interest in the area from the citys larger preservation world.

The museo will be housed in whats known as Rubens Icehouse, which was stabilized and got a metal roof 10 years ago. It includes the wooden and concrete structures that made up the icehouse, which also served as M&E Grocery Store.

Theyll be rehabilitated and connected with a new 600-square-foot structure made of compressed earth adobe. In total, the museo will become a 2,300-square-foot space.

Rinconcito already includes Esperanzas Casa de Cuentos, its popular clay studio Mujerartes and a series of tiny houses that will be refurbished in the future.

The museo is being funded by $1.5 million from the citys Westside Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone, which will provide $500,000 every year for three years; $100,000 from the San Antonio Area Foundation; and $75,000 from Impact San Antonio, among other donations, Sanchez said.

The museo will cost about $1 million to complete. A director and cultural historian will be hired this year.

In so many ways, the project is an extension of the study of the borderlands of South Texas, where Mexican Americans continue to wage struggles for recognition, economic justice and equality.

Sanchez uses a 1920s flyer the museo has acquired as an example of an important find that helps tell a story of a people yet to be fully told.

The event at Casiano Park featured a long list of speakers at a Diez y Seis celebration, including civil rights attorney Alonso Perales, whose incredible life is the subject of a comprehensive new book, Pioneer of Mexican-American Civil Rights: Alonso S. Perales, by historian Cynthia E. Orozco of Eastern New Mexico University.

Similar documents and artifacts may exist in personal archives and collections everywhere, but especially on the West Side, where the Esperanza hopes to find them.

Theyll help tell a story thats more positive, too, she said. All we have heard is negative.

In the future, as in the past, the Esperanza wont charge admission.

It has lots of esperanzas that someday busloads of students will come visit and that theyll learn a more complete history of themselves in U.S. history.

eayala@express-news.net
Josh Brodesky, editorial page editor of the San Antonio Express-News, has won a first-place prize for opinion writing in the Best of the West journalism contest.

Brodesky won in general interest column writing for a selection of his 2021 columns. Nancy M. Preyor-Johnson, the papers associate editorial page editor, took third place in the same category. The results were announced Sunday.

Brodeskys winning entry of five columns dealt with topics ranging from pervasive food insecurity in San Antonio to his own struggles with depression, which he likened to low-hanging clouds.

On ExpressNews.com: Express-News coverage of Texas freeze wins first-place in Best of the West

It is a powerful collection of columns, wrote Randy Essex, former executive editor of the Omaha World-Herald, who judged the category.

Rare authority

Preyor-Johnsons entry included columns on Texas restrictive new abortion law; her aunts difficult life and death; and efforts by the Texas legislature and Gov. Greg Abbott to limit classroom conversations about racism, discrimination and current events.

Preyor-Johnson writes with rare authority born of thoughtful understanding, Essex wrote. It is an outstanding body of work.

This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate 2 1 of 2 Billy Calzada /San Antonio Express-News Show More Show Less 2 of 2 Courtesy / Show More Show Less



The second-place award went to Jean Guerrero of the Los Angeles Times, for columns exploring how Latinos fit into American politics.

On Saturday, Best of the West announced that the Express-News had won the first-place prize in project reporting for stories exposing official errors and oversights that worsened the effects of Winter Storm Uri, which left millions of Texans without power, heat and water for days in February 2021.

The papers spot news coverage of the storm won second place in breaking news, and a searchable database of family violence fatalities in Bexar County won second place for informational graphics. Other categories in Best of the West are still being judged.

The contest was founded in 1987 to recognize journalistic excellence in 14 Western states, including Texas. Entry fees are used to fund hotlines that offer free or low-cost legal advice to journalists seeking access to public records and government meetings.
Whenever someone was in need in Texas or Louisiana, it seemed like Pastor Warren Beemer always was there  in spirit, if not in person.

Beemer, 52, a former youth pastor at Cornerstone Church and pastor since 2013 at Healing Place Church San Antonio, near Boerne, was killed in a traffic accident Friday evening in Louisiana while on his way to visit relatives in Baton Rouge. He and his wife, Faith, were lead pastors at Healing Place.

We want to be a healing place for a hurting world, Faith Beemer says in a video inviting people to church on their website.

Its a good day, guys. Come join us, her husband adds as an invitation.

Warren Beemer, a resident of Fair Oaks Ranch, was traveling east on Interstate 10 when he struck the rear of a tractor-trailer in West Baton Rouge Parish, according to Louisiana state police. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Many of Beemers followers and leaders in the faith community expressed shock and sadness on social media over the void left by the loss of the gregarious, energetic faith leader. He had three children and is also survived by his mother, two brothers and other family members.

To our family and friends our hearts are broken for the Beemer family, the church said in a statement. On behalf of Healing Place Churchs faith body, thank you for the prayers and support; they are felt. This has impacted our house and we will be taking this time to grieve the passing of our pastor, Pastor Warren Beemer.

A celebration of life will be held at 11 a.m. Thursday at Healing Place Church in Baton Rouge, and a memorial service is planned in San Antonio, according to the Boerne church.

Rod Pruitt, an ordained Christian minister and friend for more than 25 years, said Beemer made connections with everyone, including people living on the streets.

GLORIA FERNIZ / san antonio express-news

There was no one who after they spent some time with him didnt come to a place where they were comfortable with him, said Pruitt, founder and president of Through the Storm Ministries.

Pruitt, who had a daughter at Cornerstone when Beemer was the youth pastor, said its hard to deal with the loss of a leader who was that full of life, so totally given to loving and caring about people. He had planned to call Beemer this week to schedule a time to meet for coffee and conversation.

Beemer was well known but remained humble and would often drop everything he was doing to help marginalized souls in need, he said.

The communitys devastated over the loss of him, Pruitt said. There were some areas that I think Warren outshone anybody as a Christian.

Mark Roye, president of Blood N Fire Ministries and friends with Beemer for nearly 20 years, accompanied him last year on a mission trip to disaster-riddled towns in the Midwest. He said Beemer was always a man of faith and action and was a devoted husband, father and friend.

There have been thousands whose lives have been impacted by the life of Pastor Warren Beemer. His legacy will continue, Roye wrote on Facebook.

Pastor Donte Banks of GodChasers Community Church wrote, my heart is shaken but my faith is secure. Thank you Pastor. He said Beemers sphere of influence was so great that he could reach and rescue those who stand on the periphery of his ministries.

Beemer, who was from Baton Rouge, had been a youth pastor at Family Worship Center there in the early to mid-1990s before moving to San Antonio.

In a highly publicized case in 2004, Beemer helped rescue seven Texas children, ages 8 to 17, found abandoned in a Nigerian orphanage during a mission to deliver supplies to the needy. With help from U.S. lawmakers from Texas, the children were returned to their hometown of Houston and given medical checkups and treatment. Beemer and another pastor who spearheaded the rescue were later reunited with the children on The Oprah Winfrey Show.

Beemer also provided support to then-Mayor Ivy Taylor, and his church founded the social service-focused Dream Center on San Antonios East Side. In December, he provided humanitarian relief to communities in Kentucky that were ravaged by tornadoes.

In his last Facebook post on March 28, a jovial, laughing Beemer posted a video with parishioners making breakfast tacos from food donations for firefighters and first responders working to combat wildfires in Texas.

Were thanking God just for the opportunity to love people, serve people right where they are, he said.

On Facebook early Wednesday, Faith Beemer published a picture of her husband as he slept.

Ive never seen someone work so hard so people can know the true tangible love of Jesus Christ, the caption reads.

Whether its people in our church or people on the streets his heart is for them. He makes me more proud to be married to him with every passing day, she wrote.

shuddleston@express-news.net
The small city of Hays, located along the quickly growing Interstate 35 corridor south of Austin, is among the smallest incorporated cities in the state, with a population at last count of 257 souls.

Its so small that it doesnt have a grocery store, gas station or any source of commercial tax revenue within its city limits.

But because of the citys proximity to Austin and San Antonio, an Austin-based developer is looking to build a 271-home subdivision, commercial retail center and trail system in Hays extraterritorial jurisdiction.

It would transform the small town, and the citys leaders and residents are divided over what that will mean for its future.

MileStone Community Builders, an Austin homebuilding company, is looking to take over an existing development agreement that the city signed in 2013 with another developer, Walters Southwest. That agreement called for residential homes and a big-box retail development just outside the city limits at Texas 45 and FM 1626.

Hill Country Headlines: Get top stories from the region sent to your inbox

The new deal  should the city agree to begin negotiations with MileStone  would be slightly smaller but still significant. Preliminary plans for Hays Commons, as the development would be called, propose 271 homes  184 on quarter-acre lots, 65 on third-acre lots and 22 on 1-acre lots.

The plans also call for an urban grocery store, a midsized retail space and a nature trail system.

Garrett Martin, CEO of MileStone, says the newest iteration of Hays Commons is a big shift away from the 4 million square feet of impervious cover that was proposed for the original development.

We think that with the park system were going to put in there, the compatibility of uses is far better for the city of Hays, Martin said. Its really been a win-win conversation with the leadership.

Hays Mayor Larry Odom has been a champion of working with MileStone and said Hays Commons is in the citys best interest because the city plans to annex the commercial parts of the development, which finally will give the city commercial tax revenue.

I think its necessary for the city of Hays financial survival, he said.

Hays is like Mayberry

But the proposed Hays Commons, in both its original form and the current plan, is exposing fractures in the citys leadership and its residents, who say the development is simply too big for their small town and will forever change the fabric of the city.

Hays is a small, pastoral community nestled along the bustling I-35 corridor, with residents who pride themselves on their country way of living.

Lydia Bryan-Valdez, mayor pro tem, said most houses in the city are surrounded by trees and described Hays as a honey pot.

Its like what used to be Mayberry, she said, referring to The Andy Griffith Show. Its so close-knit.

Bryan-Valdez opposes Hays Commons, at least in its current form. She wants to see all the homes on full-acre lots, and she thinks the mayor and others are trying to rush the development agreement through official city channels.

Hays Commons will not only change our quality of life because of increased traffic and effects on wildlife, she said, but it also risks contamination of Little Bear Creek and the groundwater that sustains us.

On ExpressNews.com: Waters under fire amid Hill Country development boom

Theres going to be a 150-year-old family farm that this development is going to wrap around, she said. Its going to wrap around our tiny city.

Bryan-Valdez said the mayor is very pro-commercialization and the city doesnt need commercial tax revenue to survive. For its operating revenue, the city relies on property taxes and water sales.

Carol Pennington lives in the extraterritorial jurisdiction just outside Hays city limits, in a neighborhood called Chaparral Park that would be affected should Hays Commons be built.

She goes to all City Council meetings to protest the development and encourage MileStone to reconsider putting all the homes on full-acre lots.

She said the city doesnt need any retail space  the little gas station on the outskirts of the city is enough.

Were close enough to Austin and Buda that we dont need any commercial right here, she said. We want to stay this way.

But Martin insisted that MileStones conversations thus far with Hays leadership have gone really well, and he said he wasnt aware of anybody who was opposed to the new plan. He also said MileStones version of the development is low-density when compared with the original Walters Southwest agreement and that a midlevel retail space is more in line with the citys objectives than a big-box space.

He said the only questions and concerns hes heard about the project are from people who live outside the city, in greater Hays County.

On ExpressNews.com: 2,500-home project pits Austin developer against city of Buda

Ultimately, he said, more than 160 people on average are moving to the Austin area on a daily basis, and they all need a place to live. Hays location just 20 minutes south of downtown Austin makes it a prime spot for homebuilding, allowing people to have a Hill Country living experience while being close to the big city.

People oftentimes struggle with change, especially in a time like were in right now where growth is happening at a record pace, he said. But honestly, that hasnt been the case here, and I think thats because its an improvement over what is already entitled on the property.

Martin said MileStone plans to enact a municipal utilities district, which essentially would levy a tax on homeowners in the development to pay for infrastructure improvements.

The City Council at its March 14 meeting did not agree to accept the latest development agreement, which would allow the city to begin more formalized discussions with MileStone and move the project forward. Instead, the council opted to review the current plan further and have time to examine the new Hays Commons parameters.

The story of Hays is one thats playing out across the I-35 corridor and the Hill Country in general as more and more people move to the region. MileStone is the same company behind a controversial 2,500-home housing development in Buda, also in Hays County, that has received very little support from city leadership because of its expected effects on infrastructure.

But development companies as far away as Dallas are looking to take advantage of little state regulatory oversight in unincorporated areas of Central Texas, as well as the explosive demand for Central Texas housing thats more affordable than what buyers can find within city limits.

The Hill Country is expected to grow in population by more than 50 percent over the next 20 years

Annie Blanks writes for the Express-News through Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms. ReportforAmerica.org. annie.blanks@express-news.net.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

It felt like an international summit in a meeting room at the Auburn Creek Apartments.

Burmese, Congolese, Iraqis, Somalians and Sudanese parents packed the North Side clubhouse for details about Head Start classes for their children.

The clash of languages overwhelmed Pamela Allen, a parent advocate with the Family Services Association. There wasnt a plan for the scenario in her program for refugee families. Then, an Iraqi man registering his 1-year-old son, Bahaulldin, introduced himself.

Let me help you, maam, Abdul Abdallah said in English.

A former interpreter with the U.S. Army in Iraq, he spoke Arabic, understood by many of the 40 parents. He translated Allens directions and a calm settled over the room.

Jerry Lara /Staff photographer

He rescued me in more ways than one that day, Allen, 58, said. He helped me navigate different cultures with honor and respect for their beliefs.

On ExpressNews.com: When you make an entrance, everyone has to see you: Dressmaker, 91, makes San Antonio sparkle, shine

Thirteen years ago, Abdallahs goodwill gesture was the start of a lasting friendship with Allen, and it landed him a role as one of San Antonios interpreters. Recently, Allen and her husband, Tim, dined with the Abdallah family in their Northwest Side home as he reflected on his familys journey from Iraq to America.

It began in 2003. Abdallah wanted to use the English he studied at Baghdad University to help protect his people. His chance came at a gas station while listening to an Iraqi man translate a conversation with an American soldier. Abdallah told the soldier the man wasnt translating very well and relayed the full message.

It felt so good that I could help fix the situation, Abdallah said.

He went to the mosque and asked the Imam for permission to apply for a job as an interpreter. The cleric gave his approval, but cautioned Abdallah that he had to accept the consequences of his choice.

Jerry Lara /Staff photographer

From 2003 to 2009, he worked with the U.S. Army, one of an estimated 50,000 interpreters who faced retaliation from militant groups for their actions. According to the List Project to Resettle Iraqi Allies, more than an estimated 1,000 Iraqi interpreters were killed during the campaign because of their affiliation with U.S. forces.

Abdallah worked as a liaison at the National Iraqi Assistance center in the Green Zone, a heavily barricaded base at Baghdads center. Iraqis, who waited in the hot sun for hours, asked Abdallah for help to find missing family members in detention centers and prisons.

Just pray for me, he replied when people asked how they could repay him.

Two people knew Abdallah was an interpreter  one of his older brothers and Athraa, his future wife, whom hed known all his life and married in 2005.

Athraa kept his secret, always worried about her husbands safety. Abdallah lived in a militia-controlled neighborhood where he survived several close calls with militants thanks to luck, wits and mercy from above.

By 2007, Iraq had become dangerous and volatile, and he feared for his familys safety. Athraa was pregnant with their second son when Abdallah sought help from Army Col. Richard Welch, a supervisor and friend he worked with in the Green Zone. The colonel helped Abdallah process paperwork for a special immigrant visa interview with the American Embassy in Baghdad.

I will never forget what he did for me, Abdallah said.

Jerry Lara /Staff photographer

On ExpressNews.com: Texas braid artist celebrates decades of twisting African American hairstyles, advocating for culture

After two months of waiting, he received an email from the embassy  he had an interview in seven days. It was the longest week of his life. After the family received passports, they began their long trip from Iraq. There were stops in Jordan, Germany, Chicago, Houston and, finally, San Antonio. It took two years to pay back the government for the airline tickets.

A Catholic Charities caseworker welcomed them when they arrived on Aug. 6, 2009. Not long after, he met Allen. After weeks of volunteering to help her, Family Services hired him as one of their caseworkers.

When Allah loves you so much, he always puts great people in front of you, Abdallah said.

About the author A 22-year veteran of the Air Force, Vincent T. Davis embarked on a second career as a journalist and found his calling. Observing and listening across San Antonio, he finds intriguing tales to tell about everyday people. He shares his stories with Express-News subscribers every Monday morning. See More Collapse

The duo offered help in the resettlement community, where immigrants from 16 countries spoke 11 languages. They became fixtures in four apartment complexes near Wurzbach Road, where their students lived. Their bond strengthened as their caseload overflowed to nights and weekends.

Abdallah was Allens ally, informing and educating as he once did in Iraq. Allen was the nurturer, quick to look out for youngsters and their parents rights.

She worked through their hearts before she went into their homes, Abdallah said.

They received calls at all times of the day for a range of issues. They helped girls wear hair coverings in school, residents pay utility bills and families grapple with untimely deaths.

For the past 10 years, Abdallah has worked at University Hospital. Hes a surgical tech in the pediatrics unit. He said working with his co-workers and seeing the kids smiles make his day. Athraa also works at the hospital in the food service area.

In 2014, he became an American citizen, and Athraa took the oath a year later. Their teenage sons, Bahaulldin (Boo-Boo), 16, and Dheyaa (Za-Za), 13, now look Abdallah in the eye, bridging Iraqi and American cultures. Their daughter, Ola, born in San Antonio, follows the customs of her ancestors while at ease with western culture. His children, who embrace him after work and affectionately call him dude, are his heart.

On ExpressNews.com: Pep talk to my past pregnant self: Texas woman uses TikTok to share life as special needs mom

For Abdallah, living in America offers freedom and countless opportunities for his children that he didnt have growing up. The third child of five, Abdallah grew up in a simple family. He recalled winters fishing in a rowboat on Annah Lake for nine hours until he lost feeling in his legs. Then he walked miles to town to sell his catch, each step feeling as if pin needles were stabbing each leg.

Its a story familiar to Pam and Tim Allen, who the Abdallahs call family. If anything were to happen to the couple, theyve named the Allens as their childrens godparents. Their daughter once asked, If shes our godmother, why isnt she Muslim?

Its not about belief, Abdallah said. Its about being human.

He reminds his children of sacrifices others have made for their family and to always have hope. And whatever role they take on, do it in honor of the Abdallah name.

Becoming American citizens was the first step for my family to go forward, Abdallah said. Now they have the option to continue what I started. I tell my kids be grateful for what they have and never forget what we have in this country. It will be a legacy even after you die.

vtdavis@express-news.net
San Antonio Metropolitan Health District released a five-year plan Monday to arm the citys health department with more resources and eliminate health disparities in the community.

Its priorities are violence prevention, mental health, health equity and social justice, food insecurity and nutrition, data and technology and access to care.

Pandemic aside, the health profile of our city needs to improve, said City Manager Erik Walsh. Metro Health is like the fire department after 9/11.

When COVID-19 hit, it affected nearly every aspect of public health in San Antonio. People who lost their jobs struggled to afford healthy food. Many needed assistance to remain housed. Those most vulnerable to severe cases of COVID-19 often had pre-existing health conditions.

Now city officials want to take a more direct approach to address residents health. That means letting the public know Metro Health handles more than just restaurant inspections.

Its about an intentional focus on disparities, said Claude Jacob, Metro Health director. Marginalized communities have been feeling the brunt.

The plan, dubbed SA Forward, expands existing Metro Health services. That includes Project Worth, a teen ambassador program, and the citys Healthy Corner Store initiative. It replaces a prior strategic plan and incorporates both lessons learned during the pandemic and feedback from before COVID-19 brought public health to the forefront.

To bulk up the citys health programs, Metro Health will become more active in policymaking than it ever has before, said Dr. Junda Woo.

San Antonios existing budget includes $16.3 million for Metro Health  for now.

Walsh expects the SA Forward plan to come with an increased ask from the citys annual budget. City Council will begin its budget talks next week and likely will discuss putting more money toward Metro Health.

The city health department also operates with the help of grants, some from the state and federal governments.

District 7 Councilwoman Ana Sandoval, who has a masters in public health from Harvard and often speaks on the topic, said she supports further city investment. Some state grants limit Metro Healths ability to respond to public health issues unique to San Antonio, she said.

In order for us to chart our own future in public health locally, we also have to put (forward) our local dollars, Sandoval said.

Metro Health touches everything San Antonio does, from police and fire to parks and transportation. The SA Forward plan ensures public health is ingrained in other city operations.

Like many health departments, one challenge Metro Health often has faced is communicating with the public about its goals and accomplishments. It already offers a variety of services. The department touches on diabetes prevention and control, nutrition education, maternal services for moms, asthma control for kids, testing for sexually transmitted diseases and more.

Public health is critical to each of us, and yet is often invisible to most of our community, Walsh said.

While some of the objectives in the plan are concrete  like the creation of a new Metro Health office focused on policy and civic engagement  others are less tangible, such as understanding how COVID-19 changed access to health care.

Sandoval said the return on investment for taxpayers should be a reduction or even eradication of health disparities  something thats hard to show residents immediately but can be measured over time.

As part of SA Forward, Metro Health released a new dashboard to share the citys progress toward its goals. Its a new tool intended to let the public hold San Antonio officials accountable.

The city timed the release of SA Forward to the beginning of National Public Health Week, which kicked off Monday. Across the country, the pandemic brought heightened attention to the role of local public health departments in responding to emergencies.

As a result, officials everywhere have shown increased interest in bolstering public health. Bexar County last month announced it will put $60 million of its federal pandemic aid toward the creation of a public health division under the University Health system to reach more residents outside city limits.

While Metro Healths new plan builds off greater public awareness of health initiatives, it also symbolizes a path forward for how cities can address issues that have long existed.

Regardless of the roller coaster or where we are (in the pandemic), we must address these other conditions that have been worsened because of COVID, Jacob said. So were in for the ride. Were in for the long haul.
While slightly more than half of Texans identify as female, less than one-third of seats in municipal governments are represented by women, according to new data released by the Center for American Women and Politics.

Women make up just 28.9 percent of elected local government officials, making the state one of the lowest in the country for female representation in municipal government, according to the data. Women also only make up only 27 percent of elected officials in Texas House of Representatives and Senate.

On ExpressNews.com: Waters under fire in Texas Hill Country as development, population boom

To conduct the study, the Center for American Women and Politics  a unit of the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey  reviewed all incorporated cities and towns with populations of over 10,000. The center looked at the people who make up city councils, boards of aldermen, city commissions, mayors and officials who perform mayoral functions.

Jerry Lara/San Antonio Express-News

Women make up half of San Antonios City Council, representing districts across the Alamo City. Former Mayor Ivy R. Taylor, who served from 2014 to 2017, was the citys last female mayor.

The only other woman to hold that office was Mayor Lila Cockrell in 1981.

Across municipalities within Bexar County, women make up the majority of elected members on the Olmos Park, Hollywood Park, Converse and Fair Oaks Ranch city councils. Lynda Billa Burke is the only woman who serves on the Alamo Heights City Council.

Tom Reel/Staff photographer

There are also only a handful of female mayors in the 19 municipalities within Bexar County. They include Balcones Heights Mayor Suzanne de Leon and Leon Valley Mayor Chris Riley.

On ExpressNews.com: Best Fiesta Ever: Here's your San Antonio guide

Rebeca Clay-Flores and Marialyn Barnard are the only women on the Bexar County Commissioners Court. Trish Deberry, who resigned from her Commissioners Court seat, is vying for Bexar County Judge.

Women make up the minority in most Hill Country municipalities, including Boerne and Fredericksburg. There are no women on the New Braunfels City Council.

Across the country, Hawaii was the only state where women made up half of those in municipal offices. Mississippi is last at 19.7 percent.

timothy.fanning@express-news.net
A self-proclaimed weedaholic from San Antonio has pleaded guilty to a federal misdemeanor for his role in the Capitol riot.

Chance Uptmore, 25, pleaded to illegally parading, demonstrating or picketing in the Capitol, one of four charges he had faced in Washington, D.C., in connection to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

Prosecutors agreed to dismiss the other three as part of the plea agreement. He faces no more than six months in jail, and could get probation.

Uptmore still faces trial next week in Texas over pot, psychedelic mushrooms and a gun that were found at his San Antonio home during a raid in which FBI agents investigated him and his father for the Capitol case.

According to his plea documents, Uptmore went on a birthday trip in January 2021 with his father to the East Coast, attended then-President Donald Trump's Stop the Steal rally in Washington, D.C., and then joined the mob that breached the Capitol.

His plea documents said Uptmore filmed several videos outside the building of the mob breaching the police line on the northwest side of the Capitol, videos of Trump supporters assaulting officers and scaling walls.

Uptmore and his father entered the building, walked around and Uptmore recorded more videos of rioters confronting police, the plea documents said.

In other court documents, Chance Uptmore told FBI agents that he entered the Capitol building because he was caught up in the crowd, and because it was a once-in-a-lifetime event. The documents also said his father followed him into the building after advising him not to enter.

After identifying the Uptmores from news and social media videos, FBI agents searched their San Antonio home and found several drug-related items that included 16 pounds of marijuana and various THC products, one-third of a pound of psilocybin mushrooms and a loaded, .38 caliber revolver in Chance Uptmores bedroom, according to a pleading filed by Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Roomberg.

Chance Uptmore was charged with being an unlawful user of a controlled substance in possession of a firearm.

Uptmore told agents he smokes a ton of marijuana, and then uses the mushrooms for micro-dosing . . . it helps you get into a flow state, Roombergs pleading states.

In a second interview when Uptmore and his father went to the FBI office in San Antonio, Uptmore said that he uses micro doses of mushrooms to be productive, focus and counter depression; uses THC edibles to knock out; and weedanytime.

The Defendant further stated that he smokes hash rosin, also known as dab, in the morning because it does not leave a strong taste in the mouth, but it is too expensive to use all the time, the pleading said. The Defendant characterized himself as mainly a blunt smoker who smokes 5 to 10 blunts a day, sometimes more.

Uptmore also estimated that he spends approximately $1,000 per month on drug use and describes himself as a weedaholic, the prosecution pleading states.

His lawyer, John Convery, tried to get the San Antonio indictment dismissed, but U.S. District Judge Fred Biery turned down the request.

Convery told Biery during a hearing last week that Uptmore has offered to take a conditional plea - plead guilty as long as he can later appeal. San Antonio prosecutors, however, do not want that kind of plea deal and the case is scheduled for trial next week.

Uptmores father, James Herman Sonny Uptmore, is awaiting trial in the Capitol case only on four misdemeanor charges.
I am one of the 40 Black ABA Law School deans who support the historic nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court.

I support her confirmation to the Supreme Court for several reasons. First, Jackson is an exceptional choice with stellar academic credentials and legal experience rivaling that of her future Supreme Court peers. Jackson graduated magna cum laude from Harvard-Radcliffe College and graduated cum laude from Harvard Law School, where she served as a supervising editor of the Harvard Law Review.

She served as a law clerk for three federal judges at every level of review: the District Court of Massachusetts, the First Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court. After practicing as a lawyer in the corporate and public sector, she also served as a judge on the federal district court and the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals; both appointments require U.S. Senate confirmation. Jackson has written about 600 district court opinions and has been reversed fewer than 12 times, which means that her opinions were affirmed almost 98 percent of the time.

Second, she has widespread ideological support. Retired D.C. Circuit Judge Thomas Griffith noted that he was nominated by a Republican president, yet he enthusiastically endorses Jackson, who was nominated by a Democratic president. Jackson is endorsed by an ideologically diverse group of former Supreme Court law clerks who worked for other judges contemporaneously with Jackson.

Third, Jackson provides needed additional diversity to the U.S. Supreme Court. With her appointment, the Supreme Court will have four women serving contemporaneously  Jackson, Amy Coney Barrett, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor  the most serving at the same time in the courts history. It will also have three judges  Jackson, Sonia Sotomayor, and Clarence Thomas  from racially and ethnically diverse backgrounds, also the most serving at the same time.

In the Courts 233-year history, there has never been a Black woman who served on the Court. In fact, the first Black justice did not serve until Thurgood Marshall was confirmed by the Senate in 1967, and the first woman not until 1981 when Sandra Day OConnor was confirmed. Other Black women have been shortlisted, but none were selected.

Of the 115 Supreme Court justices, only five women have ever served, with three currently serving. There have only been two African American men who have ever served: Marshall and Thomas.

Of the 3,843 people who have ever served as federal judges in the U.S., only 70, constituting less than 2 percent, have been Black women. Her appointment will serve as a corrective to past practices of overlooking the capabilities and talents of Black women and will inspire generations of Black girls and young women to aim for the top.

Jackson provides additional diversity to the Supreme Court. She will be the only Protestant serving on the court and the first appointed since 1990. She is part of an interracial nuclear family, and her family of origin is economically diverse, which includes law enforcement officials, lawyers, teachers and the formally incarcerated.

Fourth, after three days of hearings, Jackson has demonstrated her judicial demeanor and temperament. In enduring more than 20 hours of questioning by members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, she demonstrated incredible grace under pressure. In answering the senators questions, Jackson thoughtfully and thoroughly analyzed and explained the law. Jackson explained her judicial philosophy on sentencing, and the arguments against that record, especially on child pornography offenders, have been discredited. In fact, her sentencing record has been described to be in the mainstream.

For all these reasons, Jackson is the complete package and is a superb choice to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Leonard M. Baynes is the dean of the University of Houston Law Center.
City leaders gathered Friday to remind San Antonians to give driving their full attention.

Amen. Put the phones down. Hold off on those texts and social media posts. But we hope this effort goes beyond a news conference and banners during Distracted Driving Awareness month.

In our rearview mirrors are the days when the biggest driving distractions were the radio, eating and, yes, grooming. Its now common to see drivers texting, emailing and scrolling, hindering their visual, manual and cognitive abilities; weaving in their lanes, sitting like Zombies at a light that turned green, oh, 5 seconds ago and counting.

A search of TxDOT crash records revealed 113,841 distracted-driving crashes in Texas last year, including 19,462.

In 2020, when there was less traffic due to the pandemic, distracted driving caused nearly 1 in 5 crashes on Texas roads. These accidents led to 367 deaths and 2,205 injuries, according to TxDOT.

Views & Voices: Editorials, columns and commentary, delivered to your inbox

What will it take for drivers to change? Enforcement of existing laws.

A 2014 City of San Antonio ordinance made it illegal to use a handheld communication device for any reason while operating a motor vehicle, even at a stop sign or stop light. And in 2017, Texas lawmakers included traffic ticket penalties for texting and driving.

In San Antonio in 2021, there were 72 citations for using a wireless communication device in a school zone, 1,525 for use of handheld device and 63 for using a wireless communication device for electronic messaging, according to the San Antonio Police Department.

But enforcement can be complicated; although SAPD has a traffic unit dedicated to infractions, officers must observe the distracted driving violation.

Its not a cliche to say this is life or death for drivers. Last year, more than 4,480 people were killed on Texas roads, and distracted driving plays a part in that. The text messages, social media updates and emails are not worth driving distraction.

San Antonio Municipal Court Presiding Judge Carla Obledo, who mostly handles traffic violations, told us she sees distracted driving in her car and the courtroom every day. She offers sound advice: Plan ahead. Set your music and your navigation. As much as possible, dont use your phone.

Lets put our phones down and drive.
The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) has been contributing to the country's economic development while promoting regional connectivity and prosperity, Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said on Saturday.

"We envision Pakistan emerging as the gateway to China's western regions, Afghanistan and Central Asia" through CPEC, Qureshi said at the two-day Islamabad Security Dialogue.

Pakistan is endeavoring to reap peace dividends in Afghanistan in the form of enhanced connectivity and trade, he added.

Stressing Pakistan's policy of shifting from geo-politics to geo-economics, Qureshi said the country is advocating peaceful co-existence and win-win cooperation, adding that its location makes it a natural hub for economic confluence for different states.

"We are positioning Pakistan as an economic hub, a melting pot for positive global interests focusing on enhancing connectivity, development partnerships, and peace within our borders and beyond."

Qureshi said Pakistan will continue to support an equitable and inclusive global order where no one is left behind, adding that zero-sum perspectives must be shed.

"We need to focus on cooperation, rather than confrontation and must strive for a world of peace, progress and prosperity in which benefits of development are shared by all."





Produced by Xinhua Global Service
A capital campaign is, by definition, a community endeavor.

Any institution embarking on one does so with the hope that its work has earned the trust and respect of institutions and individuals in the community. Its the community that is investing in the institutions future and demonstrating belief in its goals.

To that end, St. Marys Universitys Defining Moment Comprehensive Campaign, which raised $165 million, generously affirmed the Marianist institutions impact on San Antonio and beyond. The campaign began in 2017 with the goal of raising $130 million. When that was surpassed, two years later, the goal was pushed to $150 million.

Views & Voices: Editorials, columns and commentary, delivered to your inbox

St. Marys is the oldest university in San Antonio. The campaign focused on the goals of promoting a culture of excellence in teaching, research and service; deepening St. Marys Catholic and Marianist identity; and preparing students to not only have successful careers but to also live meaningful lives.

The university asked, and the community responded. Just under 12,000 donors contributed to the record-breaking fundraising total, ranging from 39 who gave $1 million or more to 4,900 who gave $100 or less.

Because of their generosity, 94 endowed scholarships will be created for students; 14 newly endowed teaching positions will be added; $13.2 million will go for classroom and lab renovations; and $5.2 million will fund the Center for Catholic Studies.

St. Marys has been an essential part of San Antonio for 170 years. The bulk of those years, its been anchored on the citys historically neglected West Side as a beacon of possibility and opportunity.

We applaud St. Marys administration, faculty, alumni and students for their historically successful capital campaign. Its a testament to the communitys faith and expectations that St. Marys will continue to do what its done so well over the years  educating leaders for the common good.
Texas Republican Dan Crenshaw is in elite company when it comes to fundraising in Congress. The two-term incumbent is raising money on par with some of the top leaders in both parties in the U.S. House. Here are the top 10 fundraisers in the U.S. House and where they are from.

The current Republican Leader in the U.S. House is the favorite to be speaker of the House if Republicans retake the majority this year.

2. Nancy Pelosi, D-CA: $12,312,904.07

The current Speaker of the House, in her 18th term in Congress, fights to keep Democrats in the majority.

3. Dan Crenshaw, R-Houston: $10,974,085.34

The two-term incumbent and retired Navy SEAL is seeking re-election in a district that has become more secure for Republicans because of redistricting.

IN-DEPTH: Raising $11M since 2021, Dan Crenshaw has become one of the biggest fundraisers on Capitol Hill

4. Steve Scalise, R-LA: $10,195,027.93

Scalise is the Minority Whip, making him the 2nd highest-ranking Republican in the U.S. House.

5. Katherine Porter, D-CA: $10,192,331.69

The Orange County Democrat gained notoriety for winning a district that had long been held by Republicans and has become a leading voice in the progressive caucus.

6. Adam Schiff, D-CA: $9,294,705.04

Schiff is chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and was the lead investigator for Democrats during the first impeachment of President Donald Trump.

7. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY: $7,900,003.36

Two-term Congresswoman has become one of the leading voices in the House for progressive issues.

8. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-GA: $7,491,511.12

The freshman Republican from Georgia ran as an ardent supporter of Trump and has backed his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

9. Liz Cheney, R-WY: $7,179,163.25

The three-term congresswoman who voted for Trumps impeachment after the attack on the U.S. Capitol, Cheney is engaged in one of the most competitive Republican primaries for Congress with the former president backing her opponent.

10. Jim Jordan, R-OH: $6,867,844.78

In Congress since winning his first election in 2006, the Ohio Republican is a founding member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus.

jeremy.wallace@chron.com
Support for the Conservatives in UK rural areas is falling, with the party now almost neck and neck with Labour, a new survey says.

A major shift in the political allegiances of rural voters has been highlighted, with data showing the Conservative lead on Labour slashed since 2019.

The British countryside provides a key economic and voting bloc - 12 million voters live in rural areas, representing a major proportion (16%) of the UK economy.

The survey, commissioned by the Country Land & Business Association (CLA), polled 1,000 people across five of the UKs most rural counties: Cornwall, Cumbria, North Yorkshire, Norfolk and Gwynedd.

Results show that most respondents voted Conservative (46%) in the 2019 general election, while 29% voted Labour, and 13% Liberal Democrats.

Barely two and a half years on and over a third of the same voters now intend to vote Labour (36%) at the upcoming election. While only 38% intend to vote Conservative, a 7.5-point swing.

Mark Tufnell, president of the CLA, said the poll's results showed that no party should take rural voters for granted.

2019 showed us that the old tribal loyalties of politics are dissipating. Any party that comes up with a genuinely ambitious plan to grow the economy in rural areas would, I suspect, win a great deal of support.

Large gains were also seen for the Green Party, whose percentage share of the rural vote grew from 3% to 8%, while the Liberal Democrats lost 3% points, moving from 13% to 10%.

Further responses show that almost three-quarters of countryside voters (71%) believe opportunities for young people in rural areas have either decreased or remained stagnant in the last 5 years.

And almost half (42%) stated that there had been an economic decline in their community over the last 5 years, while the majority (79%) blamed the lack of affordable housing in rural areas for driving young people out of the countryside.

Mr Tufnell said the government was missing out on the economic potential of rural areas: "The rural economy is 18% less productive than the national economy but closing that gap would generate 43bn of activity.

"We have so many businesses that could expand, that could grow and create good new jobs, but government too often gets in the way."

He added that the planning regime, as an example, was "almost designed to hold back the economy, treating the countryside as a sort of museum."

"Sensible small-scale housing developments are often rejected out-of-hand and applications to convert disused farm buildings into office or workshop space can often take years.

"As a result, fewer jobs get created and housing becomes less affordable, so young people just move away," Mr Tufnell said.
Only subscribers with PAID Print or E-Edition subscriptions please enter here to gain access. If you are not already a Paid subscriber do not go through this portal. Please return to the subscription page to purchase one of our offers. Thank you!
BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- China's textile industry posted robust growth in the first two months of this year, data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) showed.

In the period, the added value of textile firms with an annual operating revenue of at least 20 million yuan (about 3.15 million U.S. dollars) climbed 6.7 percent year on year, according to the MIIT.

The operating revenue of the aforementioned firms totaled 706.9 billion yuan, increasing by 13.5 percent from the same period a year ago.

Profits of these companies came in at 24.8 billion yuan, down 1.8 percent year on year.

MIIT data also showed China's textile exports from January to February rose 11.9 percent year on year to 24.7 billion U.S. dollars. 
Category Select Category Apparel/Garments Textiles Fashion Technical Textiles Information Technology E-commerce Retail Corporate Association Press Release

SubCategory Select Sub-Category
Amitabh Bachchan has hinted at resuming his weekly meetings with fans at the gate of his Mumbai home, Jalsa, on Sundays. Amitabh wrote on his blog that if the meets are arranged, it will be done with caution. He also referred to the relaxation of several Covid-19 protocols in Mumbai as a blessing.

Amitabh announced the completion of his filming in Rishikesh, "Travel over .. leaving the devbhoomi with an immense feel of exhilaration to have been in this divine environ .. the work the atmosphere of work .. the crew and the colleagues .. all .. and the need to get back again .. to them .. and in the divinity of the surroundings ..



Later in the blog, the veteran actor discussed how the Covid-19 restrictions in Mumbai have been lifted, and how he plans to resume his weekly meetings with fans as a result. Alright .. the news about the city of Mumbai is that no more masks and protocol of CoviD .. which comes as a blessing .. and the restrictions of flights in the International to be given operations as normal ..So hopefully travel from far off lands shall be in permission .. and perhaps the Sunday meets at the Jalsa gate on the Sunday to be revived, albeit with given precautions .. Such a desire to look forward to when I am back, he penned.

Amitabh had shared a tweet in March 2020 informing fans that the meet had been cancelled due to an increase in Covid-19 cases in India. Sharing a selfie he posted on Twitter, T 3470 - To all Ef and well wishers an earnest request !PLEASE DO NOT COME TO JALSA GATE TODAY .. SUNDAY MEET am not going to come ! Take PRECAUTIONS .. be safe ."

Meanwhile, Amitabh is working on Sooraj Barjatya's Uunchai. He also has Vikas Bahl's Goodbye, Runway 34, in which he co-stars with Ajay Devgn and Rakul Preet Singh, and Brahmastra.
With rumours of a wedding in April, Ranbir Kapoor and Alia Bhatt have been the talk of B-town. The news portals and paparazzi are on a high alert on the lookout for any information they can gather about the rumoured wedding of Ranbir and Alia. However, it is not just them who are facing the heat, but also their families.

Recently Neetu Kapoor was questioned about the impending marriage, but she remained tight-lipped. Ranbirs aunt Rima Jain was also questioned, but she too chose not to disclose any information. The questions are now being directed toward Ranbirs uncle, Randhir Kapoor. Randhir who is known for his characteristic outspokenness told a news portal, I dont know why people take such liberties with Alia and Ranbir. They are to get married in the RK house? I have heard no such thing. Not that I am aware of.

It is clear that the families will not be acknowledging or dismissing any speculative reports. In their individual interviews, both Ranbir and Alia have made it clear that they are in fact, very keen on getting married. However, we do not have an answer to when this might happen.





In the meantime, Ranbir and Alia will be co-stars in Ayan Mukherjees next movie Brahmastra. While the actors are currently caught up with their individual projects, they will soon come together to promote Brahmastra, which is releasing on 9 September this year.
Ricky Kej, an Indian composer, won his second Grammy at the 64th Grammy Awards, which were held at Las Vegas' MGM Grand Marquee Ballroom. Ricky Kej greeted the audience with a Namaste as he accepted the award alongside rock legend Stewart Copeland. For Divine Tides, he and The Police drummer Steward Copeland won the Grammy for Best New Age Album. He also posted on social media. Rocky Kej wrote on Instagram: "So grateful to have won the Grammy Award for our album Divine Tides. Absolutely love this living-legend standing next to me - Stewart Copeland. Love all of you too! This is my 2nd Grammy Award and Stewart's 6th."



Ricky Kej was born in the United States but now resides and works in Bengaluru. Ricky Kej posted a picture of himself from the dressing room before the Grammys, captioning it, "Almost ready for the Grammys." Ricky Kej wrote a few days ago about being nominated for a Grammy, "With just over 10 days to go for the upcoming GRAMMY awards, a huge shout out to all my fellow artists and collaborators from around the world for being a part of this special journey with #DivineTides."





He received his first Grammy Award in 2015 for his album Winds of Samsara. He has been recognized by the United Nations as a Global Humanitarian Artist and is an active environmentalist. Stewart Copeland is the founder and drummer of The Police, a British rock band. Meanwhile, the music company Lahari Music released Divine Tides, which includes 9 songs and 8 music videos shot all over the world, from the Indian Himalayas to the forests of Spain.
In his previous release, Looop Lapeta, also starring Tapsee Pannu, Tahir Raj Bhasin was seen playing a lead role. Shortly after, Tahir worked in the crime and thriller genre web series Yeh Kaali Kaali Aankhein. He then worked in the web series set in 70s Bollywood, Ranjish Hi Sahi. With three highly rated projects, Tahir has earned laurels in the digital space. With the hat-trick in his bag, he is only moving onward and upward.





Tahir is currently shooting for a big secret project in Gujarat. As this is his first time shooting in Gujarat, the actor said, Its fascinating to be shooting in Gujarat for the first time for a secret project that Im currently filming. I have always loved the fact that as an actor I get to travel the world and experience different cultures. So, I just shot at the Salt beds at Kutch and now, I will be shooting across Gujarat in cities like Gondal, and Rajkot.

Talking about his upcoming project, he said, Im fortunate that after a hat-trick of hits, producers want to mount my projects at a certain scale now and this ones definitely one of those projects that put me front and centre to deliver a solid performance. I like such challenges.





The actor continues by saying, I play a very different kind of lead in this one but I cant say anything more because the project will be announced soon. As I explore genres and characters, I want to be as diverse as possible and this ones straight up my alley.
Miami, Florida--(Newsfile Corp. - April 3, 2022) - Bitcoin 2022 in Miami, Florida this year, will host Industry Day on the first of four days that will make up the BTC 2022 experience. Industry Day is made up of several unique events geared towards companies and individuals working within the Bitcoin industry, but will include a crypto networking meet and greet as well as an investor match-up and meet and greet, both of which will bring together companies and investors to interact and potentially work together to scale already-implemented Bitcoin-based working ideas and business models in many cases.





Industry day networking event at the Bitcoin 2022

To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit:

https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/8342/119093_4da4820584893b06_001full.jpg

The initial meet and greet on Industry Day will be held at the top of the day on April 6, before Pitch Day gets officially underway. Pitch Day is a big part of the Industry Day events, and more or less the center of events planned around it for Wednesday the 6th. The initial meet and greet will simply bring together all of the Industry participants and many of the panelists and speakers such as Kevin O'Leary from ABC's Shark Tank, and Tyler Evans of Bitcoin Inc and UXTO Management to name two of over a dozen experienced and heavily referenced judges.

Investors Meet and Greet on Bitcoin 2022 Industry Day

In the middle of the exciting list of events scheduled for the first day of the Bitcoin 2022 experience, investors and companies will get the opportunity to meet and speak directly. This highly coveted event is known to be one of the breeding grounds for many of the deals and partnerships that come out of the Bitcoin conference each year.

Individuals with Bitcoin Whale Passes to BTC 2022 will be in a specially designed meet and greet catered to the group specifically, but Industry Day participants will also get the opportunity to mix in similar style also. Anticipation for the entire group to meet and greet and speak about business models and potential alliances is also expected to happen a bit earlier on the same day. Specifically in the late morning at the Tech and Entrepreneurs meetup for one. General admission ticket holders won't show up to the Bitcoin party until the following day - April 7th, when the first day of main conference events begins. All before meet and greets between individuals working more directly in the Bitcoin industry will have their time to connect and share with each other.

Other elements of Bitcoin 2022 Pitch Day

Pitch Day is the centerpiece around which most elements of Industry Day are situated. The initial meet and greet and investors meet up will be accompanied with other events that interest BTC industry insiders and businesses. Pitch Day itself will feature selected applicants currently in the Bitcoin industry who submitted their businesses into the pool of qualified contestants, all looking to pitch their ideas and/or active businesses for a chance at investor backing.

Pitch day specifics will be broken into three parts through the entirety of the day with the meet and greets, Tech and Entrepreneurs Meetup, mining events and a Bitcoin 101 Q&A highlighting several events scheduled for the first day of Bitcoin 2022. BTC Media founder David Bailey will kick-off Bitcoin 2022 with a welcome address to the several thousand attendees anticipated on Industry Day.

Additional points and mentionables about Bitcoin 2022

Globally recognized entrepreneur Kevin O'Leary will also deliver a keynote address to the Bitcoin 2022 attendees scheduled to go forth at the top of the second half of the Pitch Day agenda. A good part of the initial afternoon features events around BTC mining and the future adoption of Bitcoin into more industry and global markets. All things industry will be the focus on that first day of Bitcoin 2022.

The Bitcoin Renaissance is an art exhibit which will highlight the first years of Bitcoin up until now. Over 60 artists will have sculptures, paintings and digital art creations on display for attendees throughout the entire 4 day experience. The final day of BTC 2022 will feature a star-studded multi-stage extended music concert with headliners pop and hip-hop star CL, hip-hop and rap star Logic, music legend and electronic platinum artist DeadMau5, world-renowned Dutch DJ and artist San Holo, world-renowned club DJ Steve Aoki and famed east coast US headlining hip-hop duo Run The Jewels. BTC tickets can be purchased for the entire four days or for any individual parts of the experience, such as Industry Day for the meet and greets and industry meetups which will occur only on that day. Tickets purchased with BTC are discounted, with all prices set to go up once more prior to the BTC 2022 launch.

Visit us at https://b.tc/conference/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheBitcoinConf

Media Contact:

Brendan Brown

info@coinpresso.io

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119093
Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi holds talks with Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Zhou Mu)

HEFEI, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi held talks on Sunday with visiting Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province.

Wang said China always takes the Philippines as a priority in its neighborhood diplomacy, and China's good-neighborly and friendly policy toward the Philippines has maintained continuity and stability.

The two sides should remove disturbances, calmly and properly manage differences and not let them affect the overall situation of China-Philippines relations, Wang said.

China is ready to speed up the construction of key infrastructure projects with the Philippines, and continue to provide COVID-19 vaccine assistance and enhance public health cooperation according to the need of the Philippines, Wang said.

Locsin said Philippine-China relations have become increasingly mature and bilateral practical cooperation has achieved historic results, bringing lasting benefits to both sides.

As a responsible major country, China is committed to independence and peaceful development, setting a new example in a turbulent world, Locsin said, adding that China has long promoted the development of other countries in the region through its own development and played an irreplaceable role in global economic growth.

The two sides exchanged views on the South China Sea issue and held that maritime issues should be placed in an appropriate position in bilateral relations.

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi holds talks with Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, east China's Anhui Province, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Zhou Mu)
BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping met via video link with European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

Experts and scholars applauded Xi's remarks on China-European Union (EU) relations and the Ukraine crisis, saying that the meeting has provided strategic guidance for sustained and sound development of the China-EU relationship, while adding stability and positive energy to a turbulent world.

During the meeting, Xi stressed that China and the EU should act as two major forces upholding world peace, and offset uncertainties in the international landscape with the stability of China-EU relations.

The two sides need to take the lead in defending 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, and jointly reject the resurrection of rival-bloc mentality and oppose attempts at a new Cold War, with a view to maintaining world peace and stability, Xi said.

Leon Laulusa, executive vice president of the Paris-based ESCP Business School, said China and the EU are "two key players" on the international stage, and that their roles "are therefore essential to ensure world peace and security."

China and the EU have cooperated for many years, especially in the areas of peace, security, prosperity, sustainable development and people-to-people exchanges, said Laulusa.

Frederic Baldan, CEO of Belgian consulting company CEBiz, said Xi's proposal on the development of China-EU relations "meets the interests of the European people" and would benefit the world.

Xi also said that China and the EU should act as two big markets promoting shared development, and deepen economic globalization through open cooperation. China will stay committed to deepening reform and further opening up. China welcomes European business investment and expects the EU to provide a fair, transparent and nondiscriminatory environment for Chinese business investment and development in Europe.

He added that the two sides need to seek greater synergy between their development strategies and explore more complementarity between China's new development philosophy and paradigm and the EU's trade policy for open strategic autonomy.

Bernard Accoyer, former president of the French National Assembly, called himself "a defender of friendship" between the EU and China, noting that the "friendship is essential for progress in any field" regarding China-EU cooperation.

Horst Loechel, a professor at the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management, said the EU and China, being each other's important trading partners, should develop their trade ties further "in the benefit of the people and the companies."

"A closer relationship between the EU and China will maintain and perhaps even leverage the economic benefits for Europe and China as well ... it will make a significant contribution to global political and economic stability in difficult times," said Loechel.

During the meeting, the Chinese president underscored that China and the EU should act as two great civilizations promoting human progress, and meet global challenges through solidarity and collaboration.

The two sides need to follow true multilateralism, advocate a vision of global governance featuring the principle of extensive consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits, continue to spearhead international cooperation on climate change and biodiversity, and work together to defeat COVID-19, he said.

Timo Vuori, director of International Trade and Trade Policy, the Confederation of Finnish Industries, said the virtual meeting "is just one but important milestone in our dialogue which must continue in the future at all levels," adding that the two sides can overcome various challenges they face via "open dialogue and committed common action."

Uros Lipuscek, a Slovenian political scientist, said that "neither the EU nor China as two leading economic partners can progress without increased cooperation on all levels," adding that China and the EU "need a new pragmatic approach" to promote cooperation.

Xi also expounded China's position on the Ukraine issue during the meeting. He said China's position is consistent and clear-cut. China always stands on the side of peace and draws its conclusion independently based on the merits of each matter.

China calls for upholding international law and universally recognized norms governing international relations, acts in accordance with the purposes and principles of the UN Charter, and advocates the vision of common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security, Xi added.

Xulio Rios, director of the Observatory of Chinese Politics in Spain, said both Europe and China hope the Ukraine crisis can "cease as soon as possible," and they should work together with other members of the international community for a diplomatic solution to the crisis and lay the foundation for a European security architecture. 
Results published in the Journal of Neurosurgery show that clazosentan significantly reduced the combined incidence of vasospasm-related morbidity and all-cause mortality post-aSAH with no unexpected safety findings.

The pivotal studies in Japanese patients supported the approval of Pivlaz (clazosentan) in Japan in January 2022, Pivlaz is expected to be available in April 2022.

Allschwil, Switzerland - April4, 2022

Idorsia Ltd (SIX: IDIA) and Idorsia Pharmaceuticals Japan today announce the publication of "Effects of clazosentan on cerebral vasospasm (https://thejns.org/view/journals/j-neurosurg/aop/article-10.3171-2022.2.JNS212914/article-10.3171-2022.2.JNS212914.xml)- (https://thejns.org/view/journals/j-neurosurg/aop/article-10.3171-2022.2.JNS212914/article-10.3171-2022.2.JNS212914.xml)related morbidity and all-cause mortality after aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage: two randomized phase 3 trials in Japanese patients (https://thejns.org/view/journals/j-neurosurg/aop/article-10.3171-2022.2.JNS212914/article-10.3171-2022.2.JNS212914.xml)" in the Journal of Neurosurgery1. Clazosentan, a selective endothelin A (ET A ) receptor antagonist, significantly reduced the combined incidence of vasospasm-related morbidity and all-cause mortality post-aSAH with no unexpected safety findings1.

Aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage (aSAH) is a sudden, life-threatening bleeding occurring in the subarachnoid space, caused by the rupture of an aneurysm.2,3 An urgent intervention involving endovascular coil embolization or microscopic clipping is required to prevent rerupture.2 Clot hemolysis and the release of vasoconstricting agents can contribute to cerebral vasospasm, which typically begins approximately 3 days after aSAH onset, peaks in severity at days 8-11, and resolves by day 21.4 If untreated, cerebral vasospasm can be a key factor of morbidity and mortality in patients with aSAH.2 Cerebral vasospasm may lead to delayed ischemic neurological deficit (DIND) in up to 40% of aSAH cases, and half of the patients with vasospasm develop cerebral infarction.3 With an occurrence of 22.5 per 100,000 person-years, aSAH is 2-3 times more frequent in Japan than in the rest of the world5 and is therefore a significant problem in this country.

Two prospective, multicenter, double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled, pivotal Phase 3 studies assessing the efficacy and safety of clazosentan in reducing vasospasm-related morbidity and all-cause mortality events in adult Japanese patients post-aSAH, were conducted in parallel in 57 neuro surgical centers in Japan. Patients were randomized 1:1 to receive continuous infusion of either 10 mg/hr of clazosentan or placebo within 48 hours of the onset of aSAH for up to a cumulative maximum of 15 days after aSAH. Protocols were identical, each study enrolling 221 patients, except for the securing intervention, which was either endovascular coiling (JapicCTI-163369; the "coiling study") or surgical clipping (JapicCTI-163368; the "clipping study").

Both studies showed that clazosentan, compared to placebo, reduced the occurrence of cerebral vasospasm-related morbidity and all-cause mortality events by >50% within 6 weeks post-aSAH with statistical significance (p<0.01 for both studies). The composite endpoint, adjudicated blindly by an independent committee, was defined by at least one of the following: Delayed ischemic neurologic deficit (DIND) due to cerebral vasospasm / New cerebral infarction due to cerebral vasospasm / All-cause death. The effect of clazosentan on all-cause morbidity and mortality events within 6 weeks of aSAH was also significant (p<0.05) in a pre-planned pooled analysis of both studies whereas a numerical trend was observed in each study on this endpoint. The pooled analysis of secondary endpoints indicated that clazosentan decreased the event rates for individual components of the primary composite endpoints. In this analysis, vasospasm-related DIND was reduced by 60% (p = 0.0004) and vasospasm-related new cerebral infarcts were reduced by 55% (p<0.0001).

The studies confirmed the well-documented safety profile of clazosentan which has now been studied in more than 2000 patients around the world. In these two registration studies there were no unexpected safety findings. Treatment-emergent adverse events occurring in >5% of the clazosentan group (with a difference of >2% compared to placebo) were vomiting and signs of hemodilution or fluid retention (i.e., hyponatremia, hypoalbuminemia, anemia, pleural effusion, brain edema and pulmonary edema).

Teiji Tominaga, M.D., Ph.D., Professor & Chairman, Department of Neurosurgery, Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine commented:

"The studies we publish in the Journal of Neurosurgery confirm that treatment with clazosentan significantly reduces the consequences that, as neurosurgeons, we all dread after successfully repairing a ruptured brain aneurysm. The results with clazosentan versus placebo were very impressive with a reduction in the risk of vasospasm-related DIND by almost two thirds, a clear reduction in the risk of vasospasm-related new cerebral infarcts by more than half, and - consistent with this effect - the need for rescue therapy, such as balloon angioplasty to open spastic vessels, was reduced by 57%."

Professor Tominaga, concluded:

"Clazosentan is the only innovation in more than 20 years for the prevention of cerebral vasospasm after SAH treatment and the associated new cerebral infarctions and ischemic symptoms. I believe we can change the lives of many patients suffering from this unpredictable and devastating condition."

About PIVLAZ (clazosentan) 150 mg

PIVLAZ (clazosentan) is a potent, selective endothelin A (ET A ) receptor antagonist which targets the root cause of cerebral vasospasm. PIVLAZ was designed to inhibit ET-1-mediated cerebral vasospasm by blocking the interaction between ET-1 and the ETA receptor.7,8

In January 2022, the Japanese health authorities approved PIVLAZ (clazosentan) 150 mg, for the prevention of cerebral vasospasm, vasospasm-related cerebral infarction and cerebral ischemic symptoms after aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage (aSAH) securing. Idorsia Japan is on track to make PIVLAZ available to physicians to start treating patients in April 2022.

Notes to the editor

About REACT - the global registration program for clazosentan

REACT is a Phase 3 study to investigate the efficacy and safety of clazosentan for the prevention of clinical deterioration due to vasospasm-related delayed cerebral ischemia (DCI) in adult patients following aSAH. The Phase 3 study incorporates the learnings from the clazosentan program9,10,11 to identify patients at high risk of vasospasm and delayed cerebral ischemia, the optimal dose, the best measure to demonstrate efficacy, and an optimized set of patient management guidelines to ensure patient safety. The study aims to randomize approximately 400 patients - treated either with microsurgical clipping or endovascular coiling - at around 95 sites across 15 countries and is expected to conclude around the end of 2022. Patients are randomized to receive continuous infusion of either clazosentan (15 mg/hr) or placebo prophylactically, on top of local standard-of-care, for a period of up to 14 days. Clazosentan has been granted orphan drug designation in Europe (2003) and the US (2006), providing an exclusivity period of 10 and 7 years, respectively, after approval.

References

Endo H, Hagihara Y, Kimura N, Takizawa K, Niizuma K, Togo O, Tominaga T. Effects of clazosentan on cerebral vasospasm-related morbidity and all-cause mortality after aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage: two randomized phase 3 trials in Japanese patients. J Neurosurg. Published online April 01, 2022; DOI: 10.3171/2022.2.JNS212914 Daou BJ, et al. Clinical and experimental aspects of aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage. CNS Neurosci Ther. 2019; 25(10):1096-1112. de Oliveira JG, et al. Comparison between clipping and coiling on the incidence of cerebral vasospasm after aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Neurosurg Rev. 2007; 30(1): 22-31. Dorsch NW, King MT. A review of cerebral vasospasm in aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage part I: incidence and effects. J Clin Neurosci. 1994; 1(1): 19-26. Etminan N, et al. Worldwide incidence of aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage according to region, time period, blood pressure, and smoking prevalence in the population: a systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Neurol. 2019; 76(5): 588-597. Fujimura M, et al. Preventive Effect of Clazosentan against Cerebral Vasospasm after Clipping Surgery for Aneurysmal Subarachnoid Hemorrhage in Japanese and Korean Patients. Cerebrovasc Dis. 2017;44(1-2):59-67. Vajkoczy P, et al. Clazosentan (AXV-034343), a selective endothelin A receptor antagonist, in the prevention of cerebral vasospasm following severe aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage: results of a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, multicenter Phase IIa study. J Neurosurg. 2005;103(1):9-17. Roux S, et al. Ro 61-1790, a new hydrosoluble endothelin antagonist: general pharmacology and effects on experimental cerebral vasospasm. J Pharmacol Exp Ther. 1997;283(3):1110-1118. Macdonald R L, et al. Randomized trial of clazosentan in patients with aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage undergoing endovascular coiling. Stroke. 2012; 43(6):1463-9. Macdonald R L, et al. Clazosentan, an endothelin receptor antagonist, in patients with aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage undergoing surgical clipping: a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase 3 trial (CONSCIOUS-2). The Lancet Neurology, 2011; 10(7):618-625. Macdonald R L, et al. Clazosentan to Overcome Neurological Ischemia and Infarction Occurring After Subarachnoid Hemorrhage (CONSCIOUS-1). Stroke 2008; 39:3015-3021.





About Idorsia Pharmaceuticals Japan

Idorsia Pharmaceuticals Japan was established, under the leadership of Dr Satoshi Tanaka, in 2018 to conduct clinical development and prepare the commercialization of Idorsia's innovative and promising compounds for patients in Japan.

About Idorsia

Idorsia Ltd is reaching out for more - We have more ideas, we see more opportunities and we want to help more patients. In order to achieve this, we will develop Idorsia into a leading biopharmaceutical company, with a strong scientific core.

Headquartered near Basel, Switzerland - a European biotech-hub - Idorsia is specialized in the discovery, development and commercialization of small molecules to transform the horizon of therapeutic options. Idorsia has a broad portfolio of innovative drugs in the pipeline, an experienced team of professionals covering all disciplines from bench to bedside, state-of-the-art facilities, and a strong balance sheet - the ideal constellation to translate R&D efforts into business success.

Idorsia was listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange (ticker symbol: IDIA) in June 2017 and has over 1200 highly qualified specialists dedicated to realizing our ambitious targets.

For further information, please contact

Andrew C. Weiss

Senior Vice President, Head of Investor Relations & Corporate Communications

Idorsia Pharmaceuticals Ltd, Hegenheimermattweg 91, CH-4123 Allschwil

+41 58 844 10 10

investor.relations@idorsia.com (mailto:investor.relations@idorsia.com) - media.relations@idorsia.com (mailto:media.relations@idorsia.com) - www.idorsia.com (http://www.idorsia.com)

The above information contains certain "forward-looking statements", relating to the company's business, which can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "estimates", "believes", "expects", "may", "are expected to", "will", "will continue", "should", "would be", "seeks", "pending" or "anticipates" or similar expressions, or by discussions of strategy, plans or intentions. Such statements include descriptions of the company's investment and research and development programs and anticipated expenditures in connection therewith, descriptions of new products expected to be introduced by the company and anticipated customer demand for such products and products in the company's existing portfolio. Such statements reflect the current views of the company with respect to future events and are subject to certain risks, uncertainties and assumptions. Many factors could cause the actual results, performance or achievements of the company to be materially different from any future results, performances or achievements that may be expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described herein as anticipated, believed, estimated or expected.

Anhang
Terry O'Regan brings over 20 years of senior management experience pioneering market, product, and business development.

VANCOUVER, BC and UNITED KINGDOM, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Terry O'Regan's strong track record in product launches, portfolio innovation, policy reform and business development has shown him to be an experienced leader in the pharma and biotech sectors. Taking on his next big venture, Terry O'Regan has joined the Brains Bioceutical team as President.

As President of Brains Bioceutical, a global manufacturer of naturally sourced active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), O'Regan provides strategic direction and oversight of the company's business development. O'Regan will assist in positioning Brains Bioceutical as a leader in the research and development of phyto-cannabinoid health solutions.

"The team at Brains Bio has been at the forefront of innovation within the global cannabinoid industry. Our unique suite of licenses, certifications and approvals will strategically allow us to build on the company's success," says Terry O'Regan, President of Brains Bioceutical. "Brains Bio is positioned to become a leading research house and commercial leader within one of the fastest growing categories in the pharmaceutical industry. We are on the edge of unlocking a new frontier of research and drug development to provide novel treatments for disease areas of high unmet need. Brains is one of the few companies that can effectively operate within this sector, successfully navigating the supply of API, together with nutraceuticals and pharmaceuticals."

O'Regan has an esteemed track record of high performance in the pharma and biotech sectors. Previously as Senior Vice President of the MS Franchise with Biogen, O'Regan returned the franchise back to growth in a highly competitive market. O'Regan also served as the company's Managing Director of UK and Ireland, where he achieved the highest MS market share in Biogen. He developed a comprehensive portfolio strategy that maximized the potential of Biogen's MS brands, ensuring the company had the top three most prescribed MS drugs in the United Kingdom.

O'Regan was elected as Chairman of the American Pharmaceutical Industry Group, where he worked tirelessly to position the Life Sciences as a significant contributor to the UK economy, provider of employment and a world leader in drug discovery. He led his team to obtain approval and reimbursement of the first rare disease treatment for SMA, for its full license indication by the National Health Service (NHS), England's publicly funded healthcare system. Now making the jump to cannabinoid pharmaceuticals, O'Regan is a key fixture in the success of Brains Bioceutical. His industry knowledge and respected authority in pharmaceuticals will take the company to new heights.

"Throughout my career I have always searched for new opportunities that will benefit patients and the healthcare industry in a new way. Brains Bioceutical is one of those opportunities," says Terry O'Regan, President of Brains Bioceutical. "This new frontier in the health and wellness space will have an immense impact on the lives of patients and consumers around the world, providing evidence for novel treatment options and products to enhance life. I'm excited to be a part of it."

This relevant experience will allow Brains to grow its expanding specials medicines offering, as demand for medical cannabinoid products continues to grow across the UK. O'Regan's experience will expertly pioneer much needed research and product development in this sector.

"One of the keys to our success at Brains Bio is the high level of expertise and proven industry success of our executive team," says Ricky Brar, CEO of Brains Bioceutical. "Terry is just that - a proven industry leader that will help innovate and elevate this company."

O'Regan is eager to provide evidence-based health solutions for patients and consumers using phyto-cannabinoids. Brains Bioceutical is at the forefront of a radical shift in the health and wellness industries. O'Regan is proud to be working with the Brains Bioceutical team, using research and empirical data to solidify the company's leadership and expertise in the use of phyto-cannabinoids to treat major diseases and improve patient outcomes.

For more information on Brains Bio, please visit www.brainsbioceutical.com.

ABOUT BRAINS BIOCEUTICAL CORP

Brains Bio is the leader in evidence-based cannabinoid and phytochemical active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) to enhance life and treatment options for consumers and patients. Headquartered in Vancouver, Canada with operations in the United Kingdom, Brains Bio is one of the only producers of natural hemp-based cannabinoid APIs in the world. Combined with the company's unparalleled expertise and institutional knowledge in biotechnology, pharmaceuticals and cannabinoid-based product development, Brains Bio is strategically positioned to be a trailblazer in healthcare innovation across the world.

CAUTIONARY STATEMENT:

This news release contains forward looking statements or forward-looking information ("forward-looking statements") within the meaning of securities laws. Often, but not always, forward looking statements can be identified by the use of words such as "plans", "expects" or "does not expect", "is expected", "estimates", "intends", "anticipates" or "does not anticipate", or "believes", or variations of such words and phrases or state that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will" be taken, occur or be achieved. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, in this news release are forward-looking statements and are based on expectations, estimates and projections as at the date of this news release. Any statement that involves discussions with respect to predictions, expectations, beliefs, plans, projections, objectives, assumptions, future events or performance are not statements of historical fact and may be forward-looking statements. Risks, uncertainties and other factors involved with forward-looking statements could cause actual events, results, performance, prospects and opportunities to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Although the Company believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing the forward-looking statements in this news release are reasonable, there can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Readers should not place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements and information contained in this news release. The forward-looking statements included in this news release are made as of the date of this news release and the Company does not undertake an obligation to publicly update such forward-looking statements to reflect new information, subsequent events or otherwise unless required by applicable securities laws.

For media inquiries please contact: Telephone: 1-888-321-8003, Email: media@brainsbio.com; For investor relations please contact: Email: ir@brainsbio.com; Website: www.brainsbio.com

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779426/Brains_Bioceutical_Corp__BRAINS_BIOCEUTICAL_APPOINTS_FORMER_MANA.jpg
4 April 2022

THIS ANNOUNCEMENT CONTAINS INSIDE INFORMATION

Pensana Plc

("Pensana" or the "Company")

Update on the results from the Coola exploration programme

Pensana Plc is pleased to announce the following update on the results from the exploration programme undertaken on the Coola licence, located 16 kilometres north of the Company's state-of-the-art Longonjo rare earth project in Angola.

Having identified highly anomalous technology metals including rare earths, scandium and fluorite in soils surrounding the 7 500km2 Coola project in 2020, field exploration activities resumed in Q3 2021, and a range of very encouraging results has been reported from the Coola carbonatite and the recently identified Sulima West.

Highlights

Twenty-two samples from a 4.2 km diameter ring structure at Sulima West, located 50 km from the Coola carbonatite, were all mineralised and returned values of between 0.6% and 10.6% TREO, averaging 4.2% TREO (NdPr average = 0.86%). The iron content in these rocks averaged 28% Fe and the Manganese averaged 5.6% Mn.

Sulima West has been intersected by ten large exploration trenches up to 90 metres in length, coinciding with a large radiometric anomaly. The trenches are understood to have been excavated during 1960-61 but have not been followed up with modern exploration methods.

Rock chip sampling of the 0.9 km diameter Coola carbonatite ring dyke returned values of between 0.6% and 4.9% TREO (average 2.6%). Soil geochemistry over the covered carbonatite returned values of between 0.37% and 13.18% TREO (average 3.21%).

Mineralogical studies of the Coola carbonatite identified the rare earth mineral to be bastnasite, which occurs as discrete veins, veinlets, and segregations within the carbonatite.

Soil geochemistry over the fluorite-rich zone at Coola identified an area of 13 000 m 2 with average fluorite values of 17% (Calcium Flouride) CaF2.

Exploration Manager, Grant Hayward, commented:

"We are extremely encouraged by the initial results from both Coola and Sulima West and are eager for the field season to commence to follow up on these exciting targets. Whilst it is early stage, these are very large structures reporting grades which are in some cases higher than those for Longonjo.

There are several radiometric anomalies and ring structures still to be evaluated, and we very much look forward to further exploration in 2022 with the easing of Covid related travel restrictions."

Exploration results include significant total rare earth oxide (TREO) values from the rock chip and soil sampling programmes completed in 2021 on Pensana's Coola prospecting license (No. 059/02/01/T) in Huambo Province, central Angola.

Field activities in Q3 2021 focused primarily on the Coola carbonatite, which showed encouraging rare earth element (REE) scandium (Sc) and fluorite mineralisation, following the initial 2020 sampling programme. Subsequent follow-up work thereon included detailed geological mapping, soil and rock chip sampling, and augering of the central soil covered diatreme.

During this period, a visit was conducted at the Sulima West target, a radiometric anomaly located approximately 50km northwest of Coola, where a series of historic trenches and pits had been identified. Initial sampling of some of these trenches was completed during this visit.

Analytical results from these programmes have been received and the results of the work completed to date is summarised below:

Main findings at the Coola Carbonatite include:

Geological mapping of the 0.9 km diameter Coola intrusive centre identified three main lithologies, namely a carbonatite ring dyke, fenite breccias with carbonate matrix, and a strongly oxidised and hydrated barite-rich rock.

Rock chip sampling of the 20- 50 m wide portions of the carbonatite ring dyke returned values of between 0.6% and 4.9% TREO (average 2.6%). Soil geochemistry over areas of soil covered carbonatite returned values of between 0.37% and 13.18% TREO (average 3.21%).

wide portions of the carbonatite ring dyke returned values of between 0.6% and 4.9% TREO (average 2.6%). Soil geochemistry over areas of soil covered carbonatite returned values of between 0.37% and 13.18% TREO (average 3.21%). Rock chip sampling of the breccia and oxidised barite-rich rock generally showed TREO grades of <1.0% TREO. Soil geochemistry over areas of soil covered breccia returned values of between 0.44% and 3.93% TREO (average 1.37%). Soil geochemistry over areas of soil covered oxidised and hydrated barite-rich rock returned values of between 0.28% and 8.26% TREO (average 1.84%).

Mineralogical studies of the carbonatite identified the REE mineral to be bastnasite, which occurs as discrete veins, veinlets, and segregations within the carbonatite.

Scandium values of rock chip samples from all lithologies showed highest values of 67 ppm Sc. Scandium values in soil samples were highest in the breccia and oxidised and hydrated barite rich rock ranging from 30 - 220 ppm and averaging 92 ppm Sc. The scandium in the carbonatite averaged 25 ppm Sc.

Soil geochemistry over the fluorite-rich zone at Coola identified an area of 13 000 m 2 with average fluorite values of 17% CaF 2 .

with average fluorite values of 17% CaF . Augering of the regolith within the central diatreme generally showed low TREO grades of 0.3-1% TREO. Geochemistry indicated that the area is underlain by oxidised and hydrated fenite lithologies.

Main findings at the Sulima West target include:

Sulima West is a 4.2 km diameter ring structure with a corresponding radiometric anomaly. Inspection of the satellite imagery of this ring structure identified 10 large trenches of about 90m length located in the western segment of the structure. These trenches correspond with the highest radiometric response.

length located in the western segment of the structure. These trenches correspond with the highest radiometric response. Little information on these trenches was available from the Geological Institute of Angola , however local anecdotal information reports that the trenches were excavated between 1960 and 1961 by the Companhia Minerais do Lubito and a further pitting programme was completed in 1972 by unknown parties.

, however local anecdotal information reports that the trenches were excavated between 1960 and 1961 by the and a further pitting programme was completed in 1972 by unknown parties. The trenches extend over an area of 40 000m 2 , are up to 90 metres in length and up to 3 metres deep. Four pits were located with depths of up to 10 metres.

, are up to 90 metres in length and up to 3 metres deep. Four pits were located with depths of up to 10 metres. The trenches and pits are excavated in an iron/manganese-rich laterite of unknown thickness. The precursor lithology of the laterite is unknown but may represent a deeply weathered carbonatite.

Twenty-two samples of the Fe/Mn rich material within the trenches returned values of between 0.6% and 10.6% TREO (NdPr range = 0.11-3.07%) and averaged 4.2% TREO (NdPr average = 0.86%). Fe content in these rocks average 28% and Mn averages 5.6%.

The REE distribution is LREE enriched and is suspected to be monazite as the highest TREO values correspond to the most anomalous phosphorous values.

The information contained within this announcement is considered by the Company to constitute inside information as stipulated under the Market Abuse Regulations (EU) No.596/2014. Upon the publication of this announcement via a Regulatory Information Service, this inside information will be considered to be in the public domain. The person responsible for arranging for the release of this announcement on behalf of the Company is Paul Atherley, Chairman.

ENDS

For further information, please contact:

Shareholder/analyst enquiries:

Pensana Plc

Paul Atherley, Chairman IR@pensana.co.uk

Tim George, Chief Executive Officer

Rob Kaplan, Finance Director

Virginia Skroski, Head of Investor Relations & Communications

Media enquiries:

Finsbury Glover Hering:

Gordon Simpson / Richard Crowley Pensana-LON@finsbury.com

The information contained within this announcement is considered by the Company to constitute inside information as stipulated under the Market Abuse Regulations (EU) No.596/2014. Upon the publication of this announcement via a Regulatory Information Service, this inside information will be considered to be in the public domain. The person responsible for arranging for the release of this announcement on behalf of the Company is Paul Atherley (Chairman).

About Pensana plc

The electrification of motive power is the most important part of the energy transition and one of the biggest energy transitions in history. Magnet metals are central to the transition and critical to high value manufacturing applications such as electric vehicles and offshore wind turbines.

Pensana plans to establish Saltend as an independent, sustainable supplier of the key magnet metal oxides to a market which is currently dominated by China. The US$194 million Saltend facility is being designed to produce circa 12,500 tonnes per annum of rare earth oxides, of which 4,500 tonnes will be neodymium and praseodymium (NdPr), representing circa 5% of the world market in 2025.

The Saltend facility is located within the world class Saltend Chemicals Park, a cluster of leading chemicals and renewable energy businesses at the heart of the UK's energy estuary, and host to a range of companies including BP Petrochemicals technology, INEOS, Air Products, Triton Power, Nippon Gohsei and Tricoya.

Pensana's plug and play facility will create over 500 jobs during construction and over 125 direct jobs once in production. It will be the first major separation facility to be established in over a decade and will become one of only three major producers located outside China.

Initial feedstock will be shipped as a clean, high purity mixed rare earth sulphate (MRES) from the Company's Longonjo low impact operations in Angola. A state-of-the-art concentrator and MRES processing plant are being designed by Wood to the highest international standards. They will be powered by minimal carbon hydro-electric power and connected to the Port of Lobito by the recently upgraded Benguela railway line.

Pensana is of the view that provenance of critical rare earth materials supply, life cycle analysis and GHG Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions will all become significant factors in supply chains for major customers. The Company intends to offer customers an independently and sustainably sourced supply of the metal oxides and carbonates of increasing importance to a range of applications central to the energy transition, industrial, medical, military and communications sectors.

For many miners around the world who are looking to access the European and US supply chains, it is becoming increasingly clear that the proposed EU and possible UK carbon border taxation would mean that it is no longer acceptable for manufacturers to source material extracted or processed unsustainably.

Pensana is aiming to establish Saltend as an attractive alternative to mining houses who may otherwise be limited to selling their products to China, having designed the facility to be easily adapted to cater for a range of rare earth feedstocks.

www.pensana.co.uk
4April 2022, 08:00 CET



ArcelorMittal (the 'Company') announces the publication of the convening notice for its Annual General Meeting and Extraordinary General Meeting of shareholders (the 'General Meetings'), which will be held on Wednesday 4 May 2022 at 15.00 CET.

In view of the Covid-19 outbreak, ArcelorMittal is taking precautionary measures to limit exposure for its employees, shareholders and other stakeholders. The Company's Board of Directors has therefore decided to hold this year's General Meetings without a physical presence, as permitted under Luxembourg law. Arrangements have therefore been made to provide shareholders with the opportunity to vote electronically and by proxy voting.

The ArcelorMittal shareholders entitled to vote at the General Meetings will be those who are shareholders on the record date of 20 April 2022 at midnight (24:00 hours CET) (the 'Record Date').

The Company will also provide the opportunity for a virtual questions and answers ('Q&A') session for shareholders subject to prior registration. This virtual Q&A session will take place at 14.00 CET on 4 May 2022. All details to register and participate can be found in the convening notice.

The convening notice, the Annual Report 2021, the Form 20F 2021, the voting forms and all other meeting documentation will be available on ArcelorMittal's website www.arcelormittal.comunder Investors - Equity investors - Shareholders events - AGM - General Meetings of shareholders, 4 May 2022. Shareholders may obtain, free of charge, a copy of the Annual Report 2021.

ENDS

About ArcelorMittal

ArcelorMittal is the world's leading steel and mining company, with a presence in 60 countries and primary steelmaking facilities in 16 countries. In 2021, ArcelorMittal had revenues of $76.6 billion and crude steel production of 69.1 million metric tonnes, while iron ore production reached 50.9 million metric tonnes.

Our goal is to help build a better world with smarter steels. Steels made using innovative processes which use less energy, emit significantly less carbon and reduce costs. Steels that are cleaner, stronger and reusable. Steels for electric vehicles and renewable energy infrastructure that will support societies as they transform through this century. With steel at our core, our inventive people and an entrepreneurial culture at heart, we will support the world in making that change. This is what we believe it takes to be the steel company of the future.

ArcelorMittal is listed on the stock exchanges of New York (MT), Amsterdam (MT), Paris (MT), Luxembourg (MT) and on the Spanish stock exchanges of Barcelona, Bilbao, Madrid and Valencia (MTS).

For more information about ArcelorMittal please visit: http://corporate.arcelormittal.com/
1.5 million loan will further support clinical manufacture of mocravimodfor the adjunctive treatment of Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML)

DUBLIN and SAINT-LOUIS, France, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Priothera, a late-clinical stage biotechnology company pioneering the development of its S1P receptor modulator drug, mocravimod, today announces that it has entered a 1.5 million Loan Agreement with the regional Bpifrance in Strasbourg (Grand Est Bpifrance), via Priothera SAS, its French affiliate.

This R&D innovation loan will be used to further support the clinical manufacture of mocravimod for a European, US and Asian registration-enabling clinical trial with mocravimod in Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) patients undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT).

Brice Suire, Co-Founder and Chief Financial Officer of Priothera, said: "This non-dilutive financing, alongside the funding from the European Investment Bank that we announced recently, will play an important role in financing the development of mocravimod. It will allow us to strengthen our local French team and accelerate delivery of the clinical supply of mocravimod needed for our upcoming registration-enabling global clinical trial.We are very pleased with the confidence shown by Grand Est Bpifrance in supporting the Company in its development program."

Alban Stamm, Innovation Manager at Bpifrance Alsace commented: "We believe that Priothera, with its drug candidatemocravimod, has the potential to enable a major breakthrough in preventing transplant rejection which would provide a tremendous benefit to AML patients undergoing a stem cell transplant. The Bpifrance loan will support Priothera's key objective of establishing human proof of concept and generating registrational data, allowing the company to create significant socio-economic value in France and beyond that for patients globally."

Mocravimod, a sphingosine 1 phosphate (S1P) receptor modulator which has been previously tested in multiple autoimmune indications, is being developed to enhance the curative potential of HSCT in patients with AML. Moreover, it has shown clinically relevant benefits in an early clinical study in patients with hematologic malignancies undergoing HSCT.

About Priothera

Priothera is leading the way in developing orally applied sphingosine 1 phosphate (S1P) receptor modulators for the treatment of hematological malignancies. S1P receptor modulators are known to largely reduce egress of T cells from lymphatic tissues and not being immunosuppressants, thereby allowing for inhibition of graft-versus-host-disease (GvHD) while maintaining graft-versus-leukemia benefits in patients receiving HSCT.

Priothera which was founded in 2020 by an experienced team of drug development experts is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. The Company is backed by international founding investors Fountain Healthcare Partners (Dublin, Ireland), funds managed by Tekla Capital Management, LLC (Boston, Massachusetts), HealthCap (Stockholm, Sweden) and EarlyBird Venture Capital (Berlin, Germany).

For more information please visit: www.priothera.com

About Bpifrance

Bpifrance is the one stop shop for entrepreneurs with a vastly comprehensive toolbox offered in the field to customers through 50 local branches. Our mission is simple: we believe in serving the future, by being entrepreneur-centric and heavily decentralized.

www.bpifrance.fr

Contacts

Priothera

Florent Gros, CEO

E: info@priothera.com

MEDiSTRAVA Consulting

Sylvie Berrebi, David Dible, Sandi Greenwood, Frazer Hall

E: priothera@medistrava.com

T: +44 (0)203 928 6900
Winners include Liberty Hospital, four Ardent Health Services hospitals, University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics and Novant Health

LONDON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, Clarivate Healthcare Business InsightsTM , a part of Clarivate Plc (NYSE: CLVT), a global leader in providing trusted information and insights to accelerate the pace of innovation, announced the 2021 winners of its annual Revenue Cycle Awards. In its 10th year, the Revenue Cycle Awards recognizes healthcare organizations for achieving outstanding performance on revenue cycle KPIs, based on data from their most recent and preceding full fiscal years. The 2021 Revenue Cycle Awards recipients include Liberty Hospital- MO; four Ardent Health Services hospitals -ID, NJ and TX; University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics - IA and Novant Health - NC.

Launched in 2012, the Clarivate Healthcare Business Insights Revenue Cycle Awards were established to recognize hospitals and health systems demonstrating strong performance on revenue cycle KPIs that indicate the fiscal health of an organization. Participants can opt to enter a full health system, a flagship hospital or a subgroup of facilities within a system. This year's recipients faced challenges, including the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, disrupted cash flow, rising patient out-of-pocket costs and revenue cycle staff turnover. Through their renewed commitment to process efficiency, forward-thinking initiatives, staff engagement and the patient experience, this year's winners reinforced the foundation for revenue cycle operations - achieving high-performing revenue cycles and demonstrating top-decile performance in multiple studied metrics.

Winners were selected based on many KPIs, and the studied metrics were adapted in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. In past years, metrics have been heavily focused on financial outcomes. For the 2021 Awards, alternative metrics were included to assess the effectiveness of revenue cycle operations, such as the percentages of initial denials attributed to varying root cause categories, which provides insight into the efficiency and accuracy of staff workflows. Evaluation also included narratives provided by awards entrants describing recent revenue cycle initiatives, efforts made to improve the patient experience, strategies for staff retention and more.

Beth Reed, Principal Analyst, Clarivate Healthcare Business Insights: "This year's winners demonstrated skill in adapting to the challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic. Each participant emphasized staff engagement to prevent turnover and support efficient day-to-day operations while also investing in the patient experience. Balancing the needs of staff and patients in the coming years will be crucial for revenue cycle success."

While all winners have high-performing revenue cycles in common, they represent varied segments of the healthcare landscape as defined by annual net revenue.

Healthcare Business Insights 2021 Revenue Cycle Awards Winners

Liberty Hospital - 2021 REVENUE CYCLE AWARD WINNER - $250 MILLION OR LESS NET REVENUE

Based in Liberty, Missouri, Liberty Hospital (https://www.libertyhospital.org/) has 204 beds and has generated approximately $191 million annual net revenue. Liberty Hospital is a repeat winner, having won a 2019 Revenue Cycle Award.

Key achievements:

Top decile year-over-year improvement on balance-after-insurance collection rate: 29.86% improvement

Top decile year-over-year improvement on pure self-pay (uninsured) collection rate: 81.69% improvement

Liberty Hospital leaders invested in digital self-service tools, such as online medical record release, and automation, such as for scheduling and coding, to improve the patient experience; leaders supported remote revenue cycle through virtual events and team recognition, which resulted in near-perfect staff engagement scores among Clinical Coding and HIM staff

Select Ardent Health Services facilities - 2021 REVENUE CYCLE AWARD WINNER - $250 MILLION TO $1 BILLION NET REVENUE

Based in Nashville, TN, Ardent (https://ardenthealth.com/) is a leading provider of healthcare in communities across the country. Four of its 30 hospitals were recognized as first-time Revenue Cycle Award winners: Hackensack Meridian Health Mountainside Medical Center, Hackensack Meridian Health Pascack Valley Medical Center, Portneuf Medical Center and Seton Medical Center Harker Heights, which total 763 beds. Ensemble Health Partners manages revenue cycle operations for these facilities.

Key achievements:

Top decile performance on upfront collections as a percentage of net revenue in most recent fiscal year: 1.53%

Top decile year-over-year improvement on percentage of dollars initially denied by payers due to billing errors: 99.22% improvement

Leaders in professional development by implementing a "hire from anywhere" program for the revenue cycle, maintaining remote work options and soliciting staff feedback, all of which prevented turnover and improved productivity in 2022.

University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics - 2021 REVENUE CYCLE AWARD WINNER - $1 BILLION TO $2 BILLION NET REVENUE

Based in Iowa City, Iowa, University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics (https://uihc.org/) is an academic health system featuring an 860-bed hospital and more than 200 clinics. The system has generated approximately $1.7 billion net revenue. University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics is a repeat winner, having won a 2020 Revenue Cycle Award.

Key achievements:

Top decile performance on cost to collect in most recent fiscal year: 2.22%

Top decile performance on percentage of patient payments made online in most recent fiscal year: 57.59%

University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics leaders improved the patient experience by enhancing online financial services, such as bill pay and estimation, and plan further investments in financial assistance processes for 2022; leaders supported revenue cycle teams by launching a staff satisfaction task force that planned camaraderie events and prompted the development of the Outstanding Employee monthly award

Novant Health - 2021 REVENUE CYCLE AWARD WINNER - $2 BILLION+ NET REVENUE

Based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Novant Health (https://www.novanthealth.org/) includes 15 hospitals and 750 clinics across North Carolina. The system features 2,649 beds and has generated approximately $3.2 billion net revenue. Novant Health is a repeat winner, having won a 2019 Revenue Cycle Award.

Key achievements:

Top decile performance on combined patient and payer credit balances as a percentage of net A/R in most recent fiscal year: 2.10%

Top decile performance on percentage of dollars initially denied by payers due to patient access errors in most recent fiscal year: 20.69%

Novant Health leaders invested in the patient experience by creating combined hospital and professional charge estimates for surgeries, which they plan to expand to additional service lines in 2022; leaders improved revenue cycle workflows through strategic automation, such as for late charges and billing

Clarivate Healthcare Business Insights is a proud partner of over 2,000 hospitals and health systems in the United States. Clarivate Healthcare Business Insights supports healthcare leaders by optimizing performance, engaging and retaining employees, and providing insights to help navigate the evolving market - all while putting the patient first. As part of the Revenue Cycle Awards program, throughout 2022, Clarivate Healthcare Business Insights will highlight the work behind the numbers with exclusive content, connecting leaders from the winning organizations with the HBI community. Submissions for the 2022 Clarivate Healthcare Business Insights Revenue Cycle Awards will open later this year.

To learn more about Clarivate Healthcare Business Insights, visit www.clarivate.com/products/healthcare-business-insights/.

Follow the latest news from Clarivate, request commentary and interviews with our experts via our Newsroom.

About Clarivate

Clarivate is a global leader in providing solutions to accelerate the pace of innovation. Our bold mission is to help customers solve some of the world's most complex problems by providing actionable information and insights that reduce the time from new ideas to life-changing inventions in the areas of Academia & Government, Life Sciences & Healthcare, Professional Services and Consumer Goods, Manufacturing & Technology. We help customers discover, protect and commercialize their inventions using our trusted subscription and technology-based solutions coupled with deep domain expertise. For more information, please visit clarivate.com.

Media Contact?

Catherine Daniel

Director, External Communications, Life Sciences & Healthcare

media.enquiries@clarivate.com

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1159266/Clarivate_Logo.jpg
BEIJING (dpa-AFX) - Yuanqing Yang, Chairman and CEO of technology products major Lenovo (LNVGY) on Monday announced the vision for the company for the new financial year, building on the recent commitment to double investment in R&D as well as setting up a vision to achieve net-zero by 2050. The CEO said the Group would be hiring 12,000 R&D professionals around the world over the next three years, in addition to around 5,000 brought into the company during fiscal 2021-22, to support research across the new IT architecture of 'Client-Edge-Cloud-Network-Intelligence'. The company is aiming to optimize between technology with quick market returns and foundational research, and between continuous improvement and breakthrough innovation. The CEO said the company is aspiring to become one of the world's leading ICT companies. The R&D efforts would be focused around incubating technologies from edge computing to technology which would help businesses capitalize on the metaverse, and emerging and disruptive innovation like next-generation AI and heterogeneous computing. Alongside its R&D commitments, Lenovo outlined its vision to become net-zero by 2050. The company said it was working with the Science Based Target Initiative to establish goals that support this vision. In 2020, Lenovo exceeded its 2020 emission reduction goals a year ahead of schedule and has already established science-based targets for 2030. Shares of Lenovo closed Friday's trading at $22.07, up $0.70 or 3.26 percent from previous close. Copyright(c) 2022 RTTNews.com. All Rights Reserved Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann.
BERLIN (dpa-AFX) - German exports rebounded at a stronger-than-expected pace in February, data from Destatis showed on Monday. Exports grew 6.4 percent on a monthly basis, reversing a 3.0 percent fall in January. Shipments were forecast to climb 1.5 percent. Likewise, imports advanced 4.5 percent in February, in contrast to the 4.0 percent fall a month ago. Economists had expected a monthly growth of 1.4 percent. As a result, the trade surplus rose to a seasonally adjusted EUR 11.5 billion from EUR 8.9 billion in January. This was also well above the economists' forecast of EUR 9.6 billion. On a yearly basis, exports grew 14.4 percent after rising 11.1 percent in the previous month. At the same time, growth in imports moderated to 24.5 percent from 25.9 percent. The unadjusted trade surplus totaled EUR 11.4 billion versus a EUR 17.9 billion surplus in the same period last year. In trade with the Russian Federation, exports decreased 6.3 percent and imports dropped 7.3 percent in February compared to January. Trade with Russia was not restricted until late February but sanctions imposed against Russia will impact the trade in March, Destatis said. Exports to the member states to the EU grew 10.4 percent month-on-month and imports from those nations rose only 5.2 percent. Similarly, shipments to the euro area countries moved up 9.2 percent and imports from currency bloc gained 4.4 percent. Most German exports went to the United States in February, with goods exports up 2.7 percent. Meanwhile, imports from the U.S. were down 2.5 percent. At the same time, exports to China increased 6.4 percent and imports from China moved up 4.8 percent. Copyright(c) 2022 RTTNews.com. All Rights Reserved Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann.
Cape Town, South Africa--(Newsfile Corp. - April 4, 2022) - NeoNomad Finance offers an all-in-one DeFi ecosystem that bridges the CeFi/DeFi gap and makes financial services accessible to all. Development has progressed rapidly, and the team continues to release new features. NeoNomad will hold their $NNI (NeoNomad Investment Token) IDO launch on the following launchpads on 6 April 2022:

- XT.com

- NomadPad (NeoNomad's own launchpad)

Whitelisting on NomadPad is open until 5 April 2022. Find out how to get whitelisted here.

On the threshold of the NeoNomad Initial DEX Offering (IDO), the team shares its vision for building an inclusive DeFi system for everyone.

100 Years of Finance [video] https://youtu.be/zZz3BSRT6vc

NeoNomad Finance announces ecosystem, IDO launch

The gap between centralized finance (CeFi) and decentralized finance (DeFi) makes it complicated to manage several fiat and crypto investments. Because of this gap, it is also difficult to spend crypto holdings in a fiat world. This gap also makes investing less accessible and more difficult for the underbanked or unbanked global population. Additionally, there is a lack of opportunity to invest crypto holdings in other asset classes, such as agriculture and precious metals.

NeoNomad Finance bridges the gap between CeFi and DeFi by providing an all-in-one dashboard showing fiat, crypto and asset-backed non-fungible token (NFT) investments in one place. Through NomadPay, an integrated payments service, users can spend crypto gains straight from their wallets with a debit card. NeoNomad also provides asset-backed NFTs such as gold, silver, livestock, blueberries and nut trees. This makes investing in asset classes such as precious metals or agriculture easier and more accessible.

Once NeoNomad launches, the NNI token will list on several exchanges, including its own NeoNomad decentralized exchange (DEX) and XT.com. Afterward, it will launch swaps, yield farming, liquidity pools and staking. There are huge DeFi benefits for those who get involved in the NeoNomad ecosystem early. NeoNomad's liquidity pools enable liquidity providers (LPs) to earn LP tokens from swap fees, which can be staked in NeoNomad farms to multiply the rewards. With NeoNomad's yield farming, LPs can also earn rewards in the form of NNI tokens or stake their LP tokens to earn more NNI. The first pair that NeoNomad will be launching for liquidity pools and yield farming is NNI-USD Coin (USDC). Additionally, NomadPad will go live, giving the community the opportunity to invest in innovative new projects as they launch.

About NeoNomad

The NeoNomad Finance team has a ridiculously ambitious vision and a diverse group of people in the team to achieve it. The team is composed of individuals with experience in hedge fund investments and trading, blockchain development, business intelligence and agricultural investments.

NeoNomad's goal is to provide a more inclusive DeFi ecosystem to facilitate financial stability and allow the sustainable growth of wealth for all.

Website - https://www.neonomad.finance/

Twitter - https://twitter.com/NeoNomadFinance

Telegram chat - https://t.me/neonomadfinance

Telegram announcements - https://t.me/neonomadannouncements

Reddit - https://www.reddit.com/r/NeoNomadFinance/

Medium - https://medium.com/@NeoNomadFinance

Discord - https://discord.com/invite/Fj77EYcTNH

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/neonomad-finance

Source code - https://github.com/neonomadfinance

Documentation - https://docs.neonomad.finance/neonomad-documentation/

Tokenomics - https://docs.neonomad.finance/neonomad-documentation/tokenomics-fundamentals/nni-tokenomics

Youtube - https://youtu.be/zZz3BSRT6vc

Media Contact:

Company: NeoNomad Xchange

Email: info@neonomad.exchange

City and country: Cape Town, South Africa

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119126
VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / March 4, 2022 / Hannan Metals Limited ("Hannan" or the "Company") (TSXV:HAN) (OTC PINK:HANNF) is pleased to provide an update on exploration programs at the Belen project area at the 100%-owned Valiente copper-gold porphyry project in central Peru (Figures 1 and 2).

Highlights:

Follow-up reconnaissance ridge-top soil sampling program at Belen has identified two large coherent copper and gold soil anomalies that extend along a 10-km trend that remains open in multiple directions. Soil geochemistry shows a transition from a larger copper-gold-molybdenum porphyry-style signature associated with Miocene-age intrusions to a peripheral gold+antimony+tellurium epithermal signature typically found in a shallow level epithermal system above a porphyry intrusion;

All copper and gold soil anomalies remain open to multiple directions and further sampling is ongoing to delineate the anomalies. Hannan will expand the current ridge-top soil program to cover the entire 10-km trend. Further results are expected shortly.

Michael Hudson, CEO, states "The Belen copper-gold porphyry target is developing strongly with analytical results continuing to demonstrate robust soil geochemistry over large areas, suggesting association with a zoned porphyry and epithermal mineral system. Due to the dense jungle vegetation and thin soil veneer, outcrops are rare. The low impact surface exploration by the Company has proven very successful in outlining prospective mineralized areas in a highly leached environment. Field and social teams are actively engaged in the area with the target shaping up rapidly to allow drill permitting to commence shortly."

A total of 149 soil samples taken to date show a transition from a copper-gold-molybdenum porphyry-style geochemical signature. The anomaly up to 1,461 ppm copper (Figures 3 and 5) extends over 1.6 km by 0.8 km and is associated with a Miocene-age cluster of monzonitic to dioritic intrusions. One outcrop channel sample assayed 1m @ 0.31 g/t gold and 380 ppm copper, hosted within a hornblende bearing feldspar porphyry with milky quartz-iron oxide veinlets. An outcropping intrusion in the vicinity was dated at 15.4Ma. Sub-crops in soil sample pits are strongly oxidized and leached (Figure 3 and 4) with associated silver, zinc, potassium and vanadium.

A peripheral gold-antimony-tellurium soil anomaly up to 85 ppb gold extends 2 km by 0.4 km (Figures 3 and 5) around the porphyry-style geochemical signature. This gold-antimony-tellurium association could be representative of a shallow level epithermal system above a porphyry intrusion. There are also indications of gold-copper-zinc anomalous areas that may reflect skarn-style mineralization also common in porphyry environments. Artisanal gold workings have been located downstream from the anomalous soil sampling area and Hannan geologists have panned gold from stream sediment samples.

Hannan will expand the current ridge-top soil program to cover the entire 10-km intrusive trend with a systematic grid sampling program followed by trench sampling. Stream sediment samples will also be collected from creeks to rapidly determine the prospectivity of different areas. Hannan also plans to survey an extensive airborne magnetic survey over the Valiente project area. Field and social teams are actively engaged in the area, with Hannan's policy to undertake exploration activities only within areas where full support from local stakeholders exists.

Technical Background

All mineralized samples were collected by Hannan geologists. Samples were transported to ALS in Lima via third party services using traceable parcels. At the laboratory, rock samples were prepared and analyzed by standard methods. The sample preparation involved crushing 70% to less than 2mm, riffle split off 250g, pulverize split to better than 85% passing 75 microns. The crushers and pulverizes were cleaned with barren material after every sample. Samples were analyzed by method ME-MS61, a four acid digest preformed on 0.25g of the sample to quantitatively dissolve most geological materials. Analysis is via ICP-MS. Channel samples are considered representative of the in-situ mineralization samples and sample widths quoted approximate the true width of mineralization, while grab samples are selective by nature and are unlikely to represent average grades on the property.

All soil samples were collected by Hannan geologists using an in-house protocol for soil sampling in jungle areas. The samples were subsequently analyzed with a portable XRF deploying a protocol developed by Hannan for the San Martin project. The method is designed to minimize risk of contamination and ground disturbance. In most cases the sample media is the "B-horizon" of the soil profile. Only 100g of sample material is collected from each site. From the soil sample a pellet is being produced which is dried and analyzed by a portable XRF (pXRF). Certified reference material, blanks and field duplicates are routinely added to monitor the quality of the pXRF data. Gold was analyzed by ALS in Lima using a standard sample preparation and 50g fire assay sample charge.

About Hannan Metals Limited (TSXV:HAN) (OTCPK: HANNF)

Hannan Metals Limited is a natural resources and exploration company developing sustainable resources of metal needed to meet the transition to a low carbon economy. Over the last decade, the team behind Hannan has forged a long and successful record of discovering, financing, and advancing mineral projects in Europe and Peru. Hannan is a top ten in-country explorer by area in Peru.

Mr. Michael Hudson FAusIMM, Hannan's Chairman and CEO, a Qualified Person as defined in National Instrument 43-101, has reviewed and approved the technical disclosure contained in this news release.

On behalf of the Board, "Michael Hudson"

Michael Hudson, Chairman & CEO Further Information

www.hannanmetals.com

1305 - 1090 West Georgia St., Vancouver, BC, V6E 3V7

Mariana Bermudez, Corporate Secretary,

+1 (604) 685 9316, info@hannanmetals.com

Forward Looking Statements. Certain disclosure contained in this news release may constitute forward-looking information or forward-looking statements, within the meaning of Canadian securities laws. These statements may relate to this news release and other matters identified in the Company's public filings. In making the forward-looking statements the Company has applied certain factors and assumptions that are based on the Company's current beliefs as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to the Company. These statements address future events and conditions and, as such, involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the statements. These risks and uncertainties include but are not limited to: the political environment in which the Company operates continuing to support the development and operation of mining projects; the threat associated with outbreaks of viruses and infectious diseases, including the novel COVID-19 virus; risks related to negative publicity with respect to the Company or the mining industry in general; planned work programs; permitting; and community relations. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The Company does not intend, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation to, update or revise any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this news.

SOURCE: Hannan Metals Ltd.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/695804/Hannan-Copper-Gold-Soil-Sampling-Defines-Porphyry-Target-at-Belen-Peru
BANGKOK, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The latest transportation of Thai fruits through the China-Laos Railway, after the first shipment of Thai rice to China in February, is fueling hope that the rail route would facilitate and boost exports of Thai agricultural products to their major market.

The batch of Thai fruits, 40 tons of durians and 20 tons of coconuts, was loaded on the train at the Vientiane South Station of the China-Laos Railway and reached the Nateuy Station in Luang Namtha Province on Friday, which borders southwest China's Yunnan Province. The fruits were then transited to trucks at the Nateuy Station and entered China by road.

The shipment came after Thailand used the rail route to transport 500 tons of rice to southwest China's Chongqing Municipality in February.

Yan Jianchao, the Thai chief representative of the Shanghai Minsheng Shipping Co., the logistics company responsible for the shipment of the Thai rice, said extra efforts were spent on communication and coordination because it was the first time, but it went well thanks to the support of relevant departments from China, Thailand and Laos.

The China-Laos Railway has opened a new gate for expanding trade cooperation between China's southwestern regions and Southeast Asian countries, Yan said.

China has remained Thailand's largest trading partner for nine consecutive years, and has been a major export market for Thailand's agricultural products. Bilateral trade volume surged 33 percent year on year to 131.18 billion U.S. dollars in 2021, according to data from China's General Administration of Customs.

Thailand expects to see the transportation of more export products to China through the China-Laos Railway, with fruits, vegetables and other products being the prioritized items, Thai Deputy Prime Minister and Commerce Minister Jurin Laksanavisit said in a recent interview with Xinhua.

The China-Laos Railway, which stretches over 1,000 km and links Kunming, capital of China's Yunnan Province, with Vientiane, has boosted regional connectivity and economic cooperation since it started operation four months ago.

"This rail route will become the new channel to transport goods from Thailand to China, especially agricultural products, which saves more time on transportation that can retain the freshness of agricultural products such as fruit and vegetable," Auramon Supthaweethum, director-general of the Department of Trade Negotiations under Thailand's Ministry of Commerce, told Xinhua in an interview.

As it is anticipated to reduce transportation time with reasonable cost, the China-Laos Railway would be considered as a new option for Thai exporters, Auramon said, adding that it would advantage not only agricultural products but also all other exporting products such as synthetic rubber, cassava and cassava starch.

Thailand is ready to ship more goods through this route after the construction of sanitary and phytosanitary facility at the Mohan railway checkpoint, which is scheduled to be ready by mid-year, Auramon said.

Given the majority of China-ASEAN trade has relied mainly on maritime routes rather than overland transportation, it is foreseeable that with the China-Laos Railway, there could be a significant shift from maritime trade to road and rail in the coming years, she said.

Auramon noted that the railway also helps open the possibilities of extending export routes to other countries such as in Europe with an approximately 15-18 days delivery, which is faster and lower cost compared to marine transportation. 
Development of Yellowtail receives government approval

Yellowtail expected to produce ~250,000 gross barrels of oil per day starting in 2025

This fourth oil development is the largest to date on the Stabroek Block

Hess Corporation (NYSE: HES) today announced it has made a final investment decision to proceed with development of Yellowtail offshore Guyana after receiving government and regulatory approvals. Yellowtail, the fourth oil development and the largest on the Stabroek Block, is expected to produce approximately 250,000 gross barrels of oil per day starting in 2025.

Yellowtail will utilize the ONE GUYANA floating production, storage and offloading vessel (FPSO), which will develop an estimated resource base of approximately 925 million barrels of oil. Six drill centers are planned with up to 26 production wells and 25 injection wells.

Hess' net share of development costs, excluding pre-sanction costs and FPSO purchase cost, is forecast to be approximately US$2.3 billion, of which approximately US$210 million is expected in 2022, US$430 million in 2023, US$585 million in 2024, US$390 million in 2025 and US$295 million in 2026.

"We are excited to sanction our fourth oil development and the largest FPSO to date on the Stabroek Block," CEO John Hess said. "We look forward to continuing to work with the Government of Guyana and our partners to realize the remarkable potential of this world class resource for the benefit of all stakeholders. The world will need these low cost oil resources to meet future energy demand and help ensure an affordable, just and secure energy transition."

The Liza Phase 1 development, utilizing the Liza Destiny FPSO, began production in December 2019; its production capacity is expected to increase to more than 140,000 gross barrels of oil per day following production optimization work currently under way. The Liza Phase 2 development, utilizing the Liza Unity FPSO, began production in February 2022 and is expected to reach its production capacity of 220,000 gross barrels of oil per day later this year as operations are safely brought online. The third development on the block at Payara is on track for production startup in 2024, utilizing the Prosperity FPSO with a production capacity of approximately 220,000 gross barrels of oil per day.

At least six FPSOs with a production capacity of more than 1 million gross barrels of oil per day are expected to be online on the Stabroek Block in 2027, with the potential for up to 10 FPSOs to develop gross discovered recoverable resources of more than 10 billion barrels of oil equivalent.

The Stabroek Block is 6.6 million acres. ExxonMobil affiliate Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited is operator and holds 45% interest in the Stabroek Block. Hess Guyana Exploration Ltd. holds 30% interest and CNOOC Petroleum Guyana Limited holds 25% interest.

Hess Corporation is a leading global independent energy company engaged in the exploration and production of crude oil and natural gas. More information on is available at www.hess.com.

Cautionary Statements

This news release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. Words such as "anticipate," "estimate," "expect," "forecast," "guidance," "could," "may," "should," "would," "believe," "intend," "project," "plan," "predict," "will," "target" and similar expressions identify forward-looking statements, which are not historical in nature. Our forward-looking statements may include, without limitation, the expected number, timing and completion of our development projects and estimates of capital and operating costs for these projects; estimates of our crude oil and natural gas resources and levels of production; and our future financial and operational results. Forward-looking statements are based on our current understanding, assessments, estimates and projections of relevant factors and reasonable assumptions about the future. Forward-looking statements are subject to certain known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from our historical experience and our current projections or expectations of future results expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. The following important factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those in our forward-looking statements: fluctuations in market prices or demand for crude oil, NGLs and natural gas, including due to COVID-19, competing or alternative energy products and political conditions and events; potential failures or delays in increasing oil and gas reserves, including as a result of unsuccessful exploration activity, drilling risks and unforeseen reservoir conditions, and in achieving expected production levels; changes in laws, regulations and governmental actions applicable to our business, including legislative and regulatory initiatives regarding environmental concerns, such as measures to limit greenhouse gas emissions and flaring, fracking bans as well as restrictions on oil and gas leases; the ability of our contractual counterparties to satisfy their obligations to us, including the operation of joint ventures which we may not control and exposure to decommissioning liabilities for divested assets in the event the current or future owners are unable to perform; unexpected changes in technical requirements for constructing, modifying or operating exploration and production facilities and/or the inability to timely obtain or maintain necessary permits; potential disruption or interruption of our operations due to catastrophic events, including COVID-19 or climate change; and other factors described in Item 1A-Risk Factors in our Annual Report on Form 10-K and any additional risks described in our other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. As and when made, we believe that our forward-looking statements are reasonable. However, given these risks and uncertainties, caution should be taken not to place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements since such statements speak only as of the date when made and there can be no assurance that such forward-looking statements will occur and actual results may differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statement we make. Except as required by law, we undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether because of new information, future events or otherwise.

We use certain terms in this release relating to resources other than proved reserves, such as unproved reserves or resources. Investors are urged to consider closely the oil and gas disclosures in Hess Corporation's Form 10-K, File No. 1-1204, available from Hess Corporation, 1185 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10036 c/o Corporate Secretary and on our website at www.hess.com. You can also obtain this form from the SEC on the EDGAR system.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220401005508/en/

Contacts:

Investor Contact:

Jay Wilson

(212) 536-8940

jrwilson@hess.com

Media Contact:

Lorrie Hecker

(212) 536-8250

lhecker@hess.com
ROLLING MEADOWS, Ill., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. today announced that its risk management services subsidiary, Gallagher Bassett International Ltd (GB), has acquired Hadleigh, Essex-based third-party claims administrator Claims Settlement Agencies Ltd (CSA). Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Founded in 1990, CSA specializes in handling claims arising from corporate and personal travel, Accident & Health and Personal Accident insurance, and also offers medical screening and policy fulfilment services. CSA works primarily with UK-based London market underwriters and insurers, dealing with claims arising from incidents occurring in nearly every global travel destination. Scott Beesley and his team will remain in their current location under the direction of GB-UK head Simon Pemberton.

"CSA immediately increases the range of services and expertise GB can offer its new and existing clients, and provides GB opportunities to cross-sell other products and services to underwriters and insurers they haven't previously worked with," said J. Patrick Gallagher, Jr., Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. Chairman, President and CEO. "We are delighted to welcome Scott and his team to our growing global company."

Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. (NYSE:AJG), a global insurance brokerage, risk management and consulting services firm, is headquartered in Rolling Meadows, Illinois. The company has operations in 68 countries and offers client service capabilities in more than 150 countries around the world through a network of correspondent brokers and consultants.

Investors: Ray Iardella Media: Linda J. Collins VP - Investor Relations VP- Corporate Communications 630-285-3661/ ray_iardella@ajg.com 630-285-4009/ linda_collins@ajg.com

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/597229/Arthur_J_Gallagher_Logo.jpg
BURLINGAME, Calif., April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Accumulus Synergy, a nonprofit corporation working to develop an information and data exchange platform aimed at transforming how drug innovators and health authorities worldwide interact, today announced the appointment of three executive members of the company's leadership team.



"As we are making excellent progress on priority programs and executing on our strategic plan, we are putting in place a highly experienced management team. Looking ahead, we will be hiring additional key staff to deliver on near-term and long-term product roadmap and objectives in consultation with health authorities, sponsors, and other stakeholders," said Frank Nogueira, CEO of Accumulus Synergy. "Jillian Wein Riley, Dominique Lagrave, and Jack Quigley are proven professionals in their fields and will be critical to our vision of safe and effective medicines reaching patients faster and more efficiently."

Jillian Wein Riley joins Accumulus Synergy as General Counsel and Head of Legal Affairs from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) where she most recently served as Associate Counsel. At UPMC, a $24 billion world-renowned health care provider and insurer, Jillian advised on various academic medicine functions with a focus on FDA-regulated issues, products, and industries. She will be responsible for further developing Accumulus Synergy's legal capability in support of the company's platform development efforts. This will include all elements of legal and regulatory compliance and risk mitigation along with coordinating strategic partnerships.

Prior to her role at UPMC, Jillian served in various legal functions, including as a Law Clerk to the Honorable Cathy Bissoon in the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania, an attorney in GlaxoSmithKline's Consumer Healthcare Division, Reed Smith LLP, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Office of the Chief Counsel.

Jillian received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Barnard College at Columbia University, a Master's in Public Health from the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health and a Juris Doctor from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.

Dominique Lagrave joins Accumulus Synergy as Vice President of Regulatory Innovation and brings more than two decades of global regulatory operations leadership experience. In his new role, Dominique will be responsible for the business development, release, adoption, and democratization of the Accumulus Synergy platform in accordance with the company's vision and mission.

Most recently, Dominique was the Head of Global Regulatory Operations at Amgen and was leading the company's key regulatory technology programs. Besides his work at Amgen, he has been actively involved in developing the Accumulus Synergy technology platform for the past 18 months. Prior to Amgen, Dominique served as a key member of the global regulatory teams at Galderma, Novo Nordisk, Liquent-Parexel and Dendreon.

Dominique is a Board Member of IRISS Forum since 2021 and holds a Pharm D and a master's degree in International Regulatory Affairs from the University of Paris.

Jack Quigley joins Accumulus Synergy as Head of Business Operations. In this role, Jack will be responsible for corporate strategy, change management, communications, quality, and the cross-functional integration of high priority activities.

Prior to joining Accumulus Synergy, Jack spent several years as a Strategy and Operations consultant in Deloitte's Life Sciences and Health Care practice, with a particular emphasis on solving challenges in the R&D and Regulatory spaces. At Deloitte, he led teams across a variety of disciplines, including process improvement, supply chain transformation, systems implementation, operating model redesign, and M&A diligence and integration, earning a reputation as a trusted strategic adviser to his clients.

Jack holds three degrees from Northwestern University: an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management, a master's degree in Public Policy, and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science.

About Accumulus Synergy

Funded by leading biopharma companies, the nonprofit Accumulus Synergy, Inc. was formed in 2020 to create a cloud-based platform to transform data sharing between the biopharma industry and global health authorities. The common-platform approach aims to improve efficiencies in the regulatory process by leveraging advanced technology, including data science and AI, as well as tools for secure data exchange to improve patient safety, help reduce the cost of innovation, and ultimately bring patients safe and effective medicines faster. It will work with partner companies, key stakeholders, and global health authorities to build and sustain a platform that meets regulatory, cybersecurity, and privacy requirements spanning clinical, safety, chemistry and manufacturing, and regulatory exchanges and submissions. For more information, please visit www.accumulus.org.

Media contact:

Paul Laland

paul.laland@accumulus.org

415.519.6610




Provides First Quarter Recap

VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / April 4, 2022 / Blue Lagoon Resources Inc. (the "Company") (CSE:BLLG)(FSE:7BL)(OTCQB:BLAGF) is pleased to provide shareholders its first update and recap of the first quarter of 2022. The Company's numerous accomplishments in the first quarter included the following.

FINANCING WITH STRATEGIC INVESTORS BOOSTS HEALTHY TREASURY WITH NO DEBT

On March 22, 2022, the Company announced the closing of a flow through financing of $5,746,983.84, thereby boosting its treasury to nearly $9 million. In addition, the Company has over $4 million in-the-money warrants that are exercisable at $0.50 and expire on Aug 12, 2022.

"We are continuing with our aggressive strategy of advancing the Dome Mountain gold project at a rapid pace, having accomplished numerous important goals since acquiring this project only two years ago this past week," said Rana Vig, President and CEO of Blue Lagoon Resources. "Our entire team continues to wholeheartedly believe that we have an exceptional project at Dome Mountain. This belief was further bolstered last month by sophisticated investors like Crescat Capital and its strategic technical advisor, world renowned geologist, Dr. Quinton Hennigh, when they made a second investment in our company, which provided for more than 18% of the $5.7 million capital raise," he added.

PRESIDENT & CEO ACCUMULATES MORE SHARES

The Company's President and CEO, Rana Vig, bought 100,000 shares (figure 1) in the open market during March 2022, thereby bolstering his personal share position to over 3.4 million.

Figure 1

NEW ZONES IDENTIFIED FOR PRIORITY FOLLOW UP IN 2022

In January 2022 the Company announced the results of its 2021 soil sampling program that resulted in identification of strong anomalous gold, zinc, and copper-in-soils zones in a number of new zones which warrant follow-up during the Company's 2022 exploration program.

In a news release dated January 20, 2022, Blue Lagoon Resources chief geologist, Bill Cronk said, "the soil sampling program was remarkably successful in that we identified multiple gold-in-soils anomalies as well as strong multi-element associations with the gold. The more anomalous elements (Zn, Cu, As, Mo, Pb etc.) that we see associated with gold, the higher degree of confidence we have of an underlying mineralized system thus, allowing us to immediately prioritize our follow-up program. A highly anomalous zinc zone to the northwest of Freegold is especially of interest as values here are very high and dwarf the zinc values seen in soils associated with the known Boulder Vein system where gold in the current resource has a very close correlation with elevated zinc values in core."

A total of 4216 soils have been collected on the Dome Mountain property since 2020, of which 3167 samples were collected in 2021.

20,000 METER DRILL PROGRAM KICKED OFF

In 2021, the Company announced a 20,000-meter drill program (news release January 11, 2021) and ended the year with drilling 22,691 meters. Based on that success, on January 26, 2022, the Company announced another 20,000-meter drill program for 2022. The first phase of that drill program is now complete, and drilling is now paused for a short time to allow for assays to return from the lab and allow for the snow to melt and the yearly spring break-up to complete.

Due to an exceptionally slow turnaround time from assay labs, an industry wide problem, more than 28 assays remain pending.

NEWLY DISCOVERED CHANCE ZONE

On February 7, 2022 the Company news released the results from Hole DM-21-224 which encountered new, high-grade vein intercepts. This hole was drilled from the most southern pad in the newly discovered Chance Structural Corridor (see news release Dec 7, 2021) and drilled at an Azimuth of 167 Degrees. The target here was the continuation of mineralization seen in the corridor where the structural trend intersected the proposed eastern continuation of the Boulder Vein. The hole encountered a new, high-grade vein running 14.8 g/t Au and 38.3 g/t Ag over 7.3m. (see more details on this hole in the Company's news release Feb 7, 2022).

Upon receiving further results from the newly discovered Chance zone, in the Company's March 17, 2022 news release, Blue Lagoon President and CEO, Rana Vig commented, "during our 2021 Phase 2 drill program, the Chance Structural Zone was drilled with 29 holes from five different pads over a northwest to southeast strike length of 500 meters. From our most northwest pad, the Chance Structural Zone extends at least another one kilometer to the northwest. Every single pad drilled along this structural corridor in 2021 hit significant sulfide mineralization and we are very pleased to get such promising results back supporting our 2022 Chance Structural Zone exploration program, which is just one of several zones we are working on. This year will be very busy and exciting for us as we aggressively follow up on these results and more," he added.

UPDATED RESOURCE

Another significant accomplishment during the first quarter of 2022 was the filing of a new technical report on the Company's Dome Mountain Gold Project entitled "Mineral Resource Estimate for the Dome Mountain Gold Project, Smithers, British Columbia, Canada" (News Release Feb 3, 2022). The Technical Report was authored by Dr. Gilles Arseneau, P.Geo., of Arseneau Consulting Services Inc.

"The significance of this new resource at Dome Mountain cannot be understated as our goal was to demonstrate that a limited amount of in-fill drilling would move ounces to a higher category, which was a complete success," said Bill Cronk, Chief Geologist for Blue Lagoon Resources. "While the new resource increases the contained gold ounces by 30% and silver ounces by 46%, more importantly, limited amount of new drilling since Blue Lagoon acquired the project in 2020 allowed us to increase the indicated resource by 102,582 gold ounces - amounting to an increase of 145%. In addition, 45,000 gold ounces have been upgraded to the Measured category, a first for this project," he added. (Feb 3, 2022).

The resource model is limited to the mineralization around the Boulder Vein, which is defined by 42,869 metres of drilling from 355 drill holes drilled from 1985 to 2016 and 26 infill holes from 8 drill pads totalling 3,786 metres drilled in 2020 and 13 infill holes totalling 3,005 metres drilled in 2021. Further information on the mineral resource estimate can be found in the Technical Report available at www.sedar.com and on the Company's website.

The following table provides a summary of the updated mineral resource:

Class Tonnes Au cap (g/t) Ag Cap (g/t) Au Oz Ag Oz Measured 136,000 10.32 57.31 45,000 250,000 Indicated 662,000 8.15 41.19 173,000 876,000 Inferred 85,000 6.02 26.13 16,000 71,000

SALE OF GOLD AND SILVER CONCENTRATE

During the first quarter, the Company's toll mill partner shipped the fourth shipment of concentrate made from the mineralized material from the Dome Mountain underground mine (news released February 14, 2022). The shipment of 103 dry tonnes of gold and silver concentrate grading approximately 90 g/t Au and 477 g/t Ag was sent to Ocean Partners UK Limited, a leading European based commodities trading company with offices in six countries around the world. All concentrate assays were completed at Base Met Labs, an accredited metallurgical testing facility located in Kamloops, BC.

A total of three shipments totalling 223 dry metric tonnes of concentrate were shipped in 2021 and had a value to the Company of more than CDN $1 million. This forth shipment, the largest to date, has a value to the Company of more than CDN $700,000.

Bags full of gold and silver concentrate made from Dome Mountain mineralized material that were shipped from Nicola's milling facility in Merritt, B.C.

The Company has not made a decision to proceed to production at this time and will evaluate its production decision once all permit requirements are in place. Any production decision in advance of obtaining a feasibility study of mineral reserves demonstrating economic and technical viability of the project is associated with increased uncertainty and risk of failure.

MINE PERMIT AMENDMENTS

The Company is continuing to advance its amendment work on its 75,000 tonnes per year mining permit and believes that it's now in the final stages of the approval process. The Company has submitted its draft application, which is being reviewed by the Ministry of Mines, and upon receipt of comments, will submit its final application seeking approval to commence mining operations at the Dome Mountain mine. Weekly meetings are being held with ministry staff that are greatly assisting in the approval process.

MARKETING AGREEMENT

The Company also announces that it has retained Gold Standard Media (GSM) to conduct marketing services for the company and raise its public awareness. GSM is headed by Kenneth Ameduri, who manages a marketing team headquartered in Austin, Texas. The engagement is for a term of twelve months at a total cost of USD $250,000.

The scientific and technical data contained in this news release was approved by William Cronk, P.Geo., a qualified person as defined in NI 43-101 and a consultant to the Company.

For further information, please contact:

Rana Vig

President and Chief Executive Officer

Telephone: 604-218-4766

Email: rana@ranavig.com

The CSE has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. The securities referenced in this news release have not and will not be registered under the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended and may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an applicable exemption from registration requirements. This news release does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of any offer to buy nor will there be any sale of these securities in any province, state or jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such province, state or jurisdiction.

This release includes certain statements that may be deemed "forward-looking statements". All statements in this release, other than statements of historical facts, that address events or developments that Blue Lagoon Resources Inc. (the "Company") expects to occur, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements that are not historical facts and are generally, but not always, identified by the words "expects", "plans", "anticipates", "believes", "intends", "estimates", "projects", "potential" and similar expressions, or that events or conditions "will", "would", "may", "could" or "should" occur. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause the actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking statements include use of proceeds from the Private Placement and acceptance of the stock options by the CSE. Investors are cautioned that any such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on the beliefs, estimates and opinions of the Company's management on the date the statements are made. Except as required by applicable securities laws, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements in the event that management's beliefs, estimates or opinions, or other factors, should change.

SOURCE: Blue Lagoon Resources Inc.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/695811/Blue-Lagoon-Continues-to-Make-Significant-Strides-During-First-Quarter-of-2022
VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / April 4, 2022 / GREAT ATLANTIC RESOURCES CORP. (TSXV:GR) (the "Company" or "Great Atlantic") is pleased to announce it has begun a prospecting and rock geochemical sampling program at its Mascarene Property, located in southern New Brunswick. Rock sampling is currently being conducted in the area of the Wheal Louisiana copper - nickel - cobalt occurrence. Previous Great Atlantic rock sampling in this area also confirmed gold mineralization.

Two shafts were sunk at the Wheal Louisiana occurrence in the 1850s. Other historic pits exist in this area. Limited sampling by Great Atlantic during 2020 confirmed copper and gold mineralization in rubble adjacent to a shaft and a near-by pit in this target area. A rubble sample of mafic rock returned 6.19% copper, 0.404 grams/tonne (g/t) gold and an anomalous value of 107 ppm cobalt. Two quartz vein rubble samples returned anomalous values for copper (up to 0.86% Cu) and gold (up to 0.19 g/t gold).

A small inactive quarry also exists in the area of the Wheal Louisiana occurrence with sulfide (including chalcopyrite) bearing quartz veins in bedrock and quartz vein rubble. Great Atlantic is conducting additional rock sampling in this area. Prospecting and rock geochemical sampling are also planned during 2022 at other target areas within the Mascarene Property including areas where the Company has confirmed gold, copper and zinc mineralization in rubble adjacent to historic workings (please see the Company's website for results of previous rock sampling at the Mascarene Property).

Quarry rubble with copper sulfide (chalcopyrite) in quartz veins

Great Atlantic recently completed a five-hole diamond drilling program in the area of the Wheal Louisiana occurrence with chalcopyrite bearing veins being intersected (Company news release of March 16, 2022). The drill core from that program is currently being logged and sampled.

A broad northeast trending zone of magnetic high anomalies (identified during a 2001 government airborne magnetic survey) transects the entire Mascarene Property. Great Atlantic's management speculate this magnetic high trend to be associated with a buried mafic intrusion(s) and a possible target for mafic intrusive hosted copper-nickel-cobalt deposits. The current prospecting and rock sampling is and will be conducted within and adjacent to this magnetic high trend.

The prospecting and rock sampling is being supervised by a Qualified Person. Rock samples will be submitted to a certified laboratory independent of Great Atlantic for gold assay and multi-element analysis (including copper, nickel, cobalt and zinc).

The Mascarene Property covers an area of approximately 2,080 hectares. The property is located approximately 6 kilometers southwest of the town of Saint George. Access is excellent with paved provincial roads transecting the property and within close proximity of the property.

David Martin, P.Geo. (New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador), a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101 and VP Exploration for Great Atlantic, is responsible for the technical information contained in this News Release.

On Behalf of the board of directors

"Christopher R Anderson"

Mr. Christopher R. Anderson

President CEO Director

604-488-3900 - Office

Investor Relations:

Andrew Job

1-416-628-1560

IR@GreatAtlanticResources.com

About Great Atlantic Resources Corp.: Great Atlantic Resources Corp. is a Canadian exploration company focused on the discovery and development of mineral assets in the resource-rich and sovereign risk-free realm of Atlantic Canada, one of the number one mining regions of the world. Great Atlantic is currently surging forward building the company utilizing a Project Generation model, with a special focus on the most critical elements on the planet that are prominent in Atlantic Canada, Gold, Copper, Zinc, Nickel, Cobalt, Antimony and Tungsten.

This press release includes certain statements that may be deemed "forward-looking statements". All statements in this release, other than statements of historical facts, that address future exploration drilling, exploration activities and events or developments that the Company expects, are forward looking statements. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those in forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking statements include exploitation and exploration successes, continued availability of financing, and general economic, market or business conditions.

Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Great Atlantic Resource Corp.

888 Dunsmuir Street - Suite 888, Vancouver, B.C., V6C 3K4

SOURCE: Great Atlantic Resources Corp.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/695824/Great-Atlantic-Begins-2022-Prospecting--Rock-Geochemical-Sampling-at-its-Gold-Copper-Nickel-Cobalt-Zinc-Mascarene-Property-Southern-New-Brunswick
VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / April 4, 2022 / Silver Elephant Mining Corp. ("Silver Elephant") (TSX:ELEF)(OTCQX:SILEF)(Frankfurt:1P2N) and Battery Metals Royalties Corp. ("Battery") announce that they have entered into a binding letter of intent (the "LOI") pursuant to which Battery proposes to acquire a 45% equity interest of Silver Elephant's wholly owned Mega Thermal Coal Corp. (formerly Asia Mining Inc.) ("Mega Coal"), which owns and operates the Ulaan Ovoo and Chandgana thermal coal mines in Mongolia through Mega Coal's wholly-owned Mongolian subsidiaries.

The proposed transaction ("Transaction") is a positive step to transform Silver Elephant to a pure silver mining and exploration company by monetizing non-core assets; and includes the following key terms:

(a) Silver Elephant shall transfer a 45% equity interest in Mega Coal to Battery;

(b) Mega Coal and Battery will revise the terms of a net smelter royalty agreement dated August 25, 2021, as amended, between Mega Coal and Battery from US$2 per tonne of coal to 3% of gross coal sales with a minimum royalty of US$3 per tonne of coal;

(c) Silver Elephant and Battery will revise the terms of a net smelter royalty agreement dated August 25, 2021, as amended, between Silver Elephant's Bolivian subsidiaries and Battery to remove the threshold price as a condition for royalty payments; and

(d) Silver Elephant will transfer to Mega Coal: (i) 9,000,000 Battery Shares; and (ii) 1,000,000 common shares of Flying Nickel Mining Corp. ("Flying Nickel Shares"), currently held by Silver Elephant, immediately prior to completion of the Transaction.

in exchange Battery will:

(a) issue 15,000,000 common shares of Battery ("Battery Shares") to Silver Elephant;

(b) transfer 3,000,000 Flying Nickel Shares currently held by Battery to Silver Elephant; and

(c) under certain circumstances, pay Silver Elephant an additional Penalty (as defined below).

The total consideration is $6.3 million based on a deemed value of $0.30 per Battery Share and $0.60 per Flying Nickel Share;

In connection with the Transaction, it is expected that:

a) Silver Elephant will distribute the remaining 55% equity interest in Mega Coal to Silver Elephant shareholders;

b) Battery will change its name to Oracle Commodity Holdings Corp. and complete an equity private placement offering ("Financing") of up to 7,000,000 units of Battery ("Units") at a price per Unit of $0.30 for aggregate gross proceeds of up to $2,100,000. Each Unit will consist of one Battery Share and one Battery Share purchase warrant (a "Warrant"). Each Warrant shall entitle the holder thereof to purchase one additional Battery Share at a price of $0.35 at any time on or before the 36 months anniversary of the date of issuance of the Warrants; and

c) Battery will subsequently seek to complete a listing of the Battery Shares on either the TSX Venture Exchange or the Canadian Securities Exchange (the "Listing"). In the event the Listing is not completed prior to July 15, 2022, Battery agrees that it shall issue to Silver Elephant an additional 1,000,000 Battery Shares in connection with closing of the Transaction ("Closing") (the "Penalty"). For avoidance of doubt, the Penalty is only applicable subject to Closing and shall result in an aggregate of 16,000,000 Battery issued to Silver Elephant.

Silver Elephant and Battery believe the Transaction, among other things, will:

add current assets of Flying Nickel Shares and Battery Shares to Silver Elephant, and enable Silver Elephant to further participate in the upside from Battery's nickel, vanadium, and coal royalty and equity holdings; expand Battery's equity portfolio, and enhance Battery's investment appeal to facilitate its Financing and Listing; provide Silver Elephant shareholders direct participation in thermal coal by receiving Mega Coal shares; and provide Mega Coal with additional current assets and a broadened shareholder base to prepare for a potential Canadian public listing and fundraising to ramp up its coal production, given current Newcastle thermal coal benchmark price is $255/tonne.

Pursuant to the LOI, the parties shall use commercially reasonable best efforts to enter into a Definitive Agreement in respect of the Transaction on or before April 22, 2022. The expected Closing is July 15, 2022, subject to the satisfaction of all closing conditions. The LOI also includes a termination fee of $1,500,000, payable by the terminating party in certain conditions. After careful consideration, the independent directors of each of Silver Elephant and Battery have determined the Transaction to be in the best interests of their respective company.

It is currently contemplated that the Transaction will be completed by way of a statutory plan of arrangement pursuant to the Business Corporations Act (British Columbia) (the "BCBCA"), which will require the approval of the Supreme Court of British Columbia. The final structure of the Transaction will be subject to the receipt of tax, corporate, securities and other advice from the parties' advisors.

Currently, Silver Elephant owns 31,730,110 common shares of Battery, representing 39.7% of the issued and outstanding common shares of Battery. Upon Closing, Silver Elephant is expected to hold approximately 37,730,110 Battery Shares if no Penalty is applied or 38,730,110 if the Penalty is applied, which is expected to represent approximately 39.7% of the issued and outstanding Battery Shares if no Penalty is applied or approximately 40.3% of the issued and outstanding Battery Shares if the Penalty is applied, in each case without accounting for any additional Battery Shares that may be issued following the date hereof in connection with the Financing, the Listing or otherwise. In addition, upon Closing, Mega Coal is expected to hold 9,000,000 Battery Shares representing 9.5% of the issued and outstanding Battery Shares if no Penalty is applied or 9.4% of the issued and outstanding Battery Shares if the Penalty is applied, in each case without accounting for any additional Battery Shares that may be issued following the date hereof in connection with the Financing, the Listing or otherwise.

The Transaction is a 'related party' transaction in accordance with Multilateral Instrument 61-101 - Protection of Minority Security Holders in Special Transactions ("MI 61-101"). For Silver Elephant, the Transaction is exempt from the valuation requirements by application of section 5.5(a) of MI 61-101. Further information regarding minority shareholder approval requirements and other disclosure requirements under MI 61-101 will be provided in a subsequent news release.

Closing of the Transaction will be subject to such corporate and/or regulatory approvals as may be required, including the approval of the Toronto Stock Exchange (the "TSX"), and such other requirements as may be applicable under applicable laws and the policies of the TSX, including, if applicable, approval of the shareholders of Silver Elephant and/or Battery.

Qualified Person

The technical contents of this news release have been prepared under the supervision of Danniel Oosterman, VP Exploration. Mr. Oosterman is not independent of the company in that he is employed by it. Mr. Oosterman is a qualified person as defined by the guidelines in NI 43-101.

About Mega Thermal Coal

Mega Thermal Coal owns and operates the following Mongolia projects:

Ulaan Ovoo: contains a measured 174.5 million tonnes and indicated 34.3 million tonnes of thermal coal with an average GCV of over 5,000 kcal/kg (as cited in Technical Report by Wardrop Engineering, December 13, 2010, available on SEDAR). Ulaan Ovoo has seen limited production between 2019 to 2022.

Chandgana Khavtgai: contains a measured and indicated 1.05 billion tonnes of thermal coal with an average GCV of 3,636 kcal/kg (as reported by Kravits Geological Services LLC, September 28, 2010, available on SEDAR).

Chandgana Tal: contains a measured 124.4 million tonnes of thermal coal with an average GCV of 3,306 kcal/kg (as reported by John T. Boyd Company, February 2014, available on SEDAR).

About Silver Elephant

Silver Elephant Mining Corp. is a premier silver mining and exploration company which also owns 39% of Battery Metals Royalties Corp. Silver Elephant's flagship Pulacayo project received over 94,000 meters of drilling since the late 1990's with an indicated mineral resource of 106.7 million oz of silver, 1,385 million pounds of zinc, and 694 million pounds of lead, and an inferred mineral resource of 13.1 million oz of silver, 123 million pounds of zinc and 62 million pounds of lead (prepared by Mercator Geological Services Ltd, details provided in the Company's news release dated October 13, 2020).

To find out more about Silver Elephant, visit www.silverelef.com.

About Battery Metals

Battery Metals Royalties Corp. is an investment company, spun-out from Silver Elephant Mining Corp. Battery's core assets include: (1) Certain royalties on silver, nickel, vanadium, and coal projects; and (2) 22,953,991 common shares (37% ownership) of Flying Nickel Mining Corp. (TSX: FLYN) and 22,953,991 common shares (46% ownership) of Nevada Vanadium Mining Corp.

To find out more about Battery Metals, visit www.royalbatt.com.

SILVER ELEPHANT MINING CORP.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD

Greg Hall

Director

For more information about Silver Elephant, please contact Investor Relations:

+1.604.569.3661 ext. 101

info@silverelef.com

BATTERY METALS ROYALTIES CORP.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD

Anthony Garson

Director

For more information about Battery, please contact Investor Relations:

+1.604.569.3661 ext. 101

info@royalbatt.com

Neither the Toronto Stock Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the Toronto Stock Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements and Reader Advisory

Certain statements contained in this news release, including, but not limited to, statements with respect to the Transaction, the completion of the Transaction, the receipt of all necessary regulatory, shareholder and other approvals as may be required pursuant to applicable laws and stock exchange policies, the satisfaction of all closing conditions to the Transaction, the terms and conditions of the Transaction, among other things, and statements which may contain words such as "expects", "anticipates", "intends", "plans", "believes", "estimates", or similar expressions, and statements related to matters which are not historical facts, are forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws. Such forward-looking statements, which reflect management's expectations regarding the Transaction, future growth of Battery and Mega Coal, results of operations, performance, business prospects and opportunities, are based on certain factors and assumptions and involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties which may cause the actual results, performance, or achievements to be materially different from future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements.

These factors should be considered carefully, and readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Each of Silver Elephant and Battery believes that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements contained in this news release and the documents incorporated by reference herein are reasonable based on information available to it, but no assurance can be given that these expectations will prove to be correct. In addition, although each of Silver Elephant and Battery has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual actions, events or results to differ materially from those described in forward looking statements, there may be other factors that cause actions, events or results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. None of Mega Coal, Battery or Silver Elephant undertakes any obligation to release publicly any future revisions to forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this news or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events, except as expressly required by law.

Not for dissemination in the United States or for distribution to U.S. newswire services. The securities offered have not been registered under the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities Act"), or any applicable state securities laws and may not be offered or sold in the United States or to, or for the account or benefit of, a person in the United States or a U.S. person (as defined in Regulation S under the U.S. Securities Act) absent registration under the U.S. Securities Act and any applicable state securities laws, or compliance with an exemption therefrom. This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy nor shall there be any sale of the securities in any state in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful.

Investors are cautioned that, none of the securities of Mega Coal or Battery are currently traded on any stock exchange or market and there is no guarantee that the securities of Mega Coal or Battery will ever be listed for trading, and accordingly, securityholders may not be able to sell their securities through the facilities of any stock exchange or market at any time. This means that the securities of Mega Coal and Battery may be difficult to trade or sell. Even if any listing is achieved, trading in the securities of Mega Coal and Battery should be considered highly speculative and investors should only invest if they are ready to lose all of their investment.

There is no guarantee that the Transaction will be completed or even if any completed, will be on the terms currently contemplated herein. The parties to the LOI may amend the terms of the Transaction at any time.

SOURCE: Silver Elephant Mining Corp.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/695845/Battery-Metals-Royalties-to-Acquire-45-Interest-in-Mongolian-Coal-Assets-from-Silver-Elephant-Mining-For-63-Million
Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - April 4, 2022) - Loon Energy Corporation (TSXV: LNE) (the "Company" or "Loon") and Optimind Pharma Inc. ("Optimind") have entered into a second amending agreement to the definitive acquisition agreement announced on November 30, 2021 and December 23, 2021, with respect to the reverse takeover transaction between Loon and Optimind (the "Transaction"). The amending agreement provides for an extension to the completion of the Transaction to be on or before June 30, 2022. Optimind also agreed to pay certain costs of the Company under the amendment agreement.

Optimind has also advised that it has completed the minimum concurrent financing of $500,000 and is nearing completion of its audited financial statements needed for completion of the Transaction and listing on the CSE.

Completion of the Transaction is subject to a number of conditions, including but not limited to, acceptance of the CSE and TSXV. There can be no assurance that the Transaction will be completed as proposed or at all. The TSXV has in no way passed upon the merits of the proposed Transaction and has neither approved nor disapproved the contents of this press release.

This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any of the securities in the United States. The securities have not been and will not be registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities Act") or any state securities laws and may not be offered or sold within the United States or to or for the account or benefit of U.S. Persons unless registered under the U.S. Securities Act and applicable state securities laws or an exemption from such registration is available.

About Optimind Pharma

Optimind pharma is a Canadian pharmaceutical company in the psychedelics space with two key business verticals 1) Clinic Model: Optimind has developed a clinic based business model for psychedelic assisted psychotherapy for the treatment of depression, anxiety, and PTSD. 2) Partnership with First Nations: Optimind has set up a joint venture with Manitari Pharma, an Indigenous owned pharmaceutical company, to help bring awareness to the benefits of psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy and advocate for federal approvals to treat depression and anxiety which remains a disproportionately large issue for the indigenous community. Manitari Pharma corporation operates under the guidance of the Navigator Program which ensures the fair treatment of Indigenous business relations. The company has a 1,300 square foot facility and bonded excise warehouse on six acres of land in Kanesatake by the Ottawa River and as part of the joint venture, has applied for psilocybin dealer's license with Health Canada.

For further information, please contact:

Loon Energy Corporation

Harvey McKenzie, Chief Financial Officer

Email: hhmckenzie@outlook.com

Telephone: 416-400-8003

Optimind Pharma Inc.

For more information, visit: www.optimindpharma.com

Contact information: Tomas Sipos, CEO of Optimind Pharma - tdsipos@gmail.com

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements and forward-looking information (collectively, "forward-looking statements") within the meaning of applicable securities laws. Any statements that are contained in this press release that are not statements of historical fact may be deemed to be forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are often identified by terms such as "may", "should", "anticipate", "will", "estimates", "believes", "intends" "expects" and similar expressions which are intended to identify forward-looking statements. More particularly and without limitation, this press release contains forward looking statements concerning the Transaction, the consolidation, the Concurrent Financing, the expected composition of the board of directors of the Company upon completion of the Transaction, the completion and timing of the application to the CSE in respect of the Transaction, the ability of the Company and Optimind to meet the conditions of the Transaction in the required timeframes, and obtaining the necessary exemptions and approvals from the TSXV and CSE or other regulatory bodies. The Company cautions that all forward-looking statements are inherently uncertain, and that actual performance may be affected by a number of material factors, assumptions and expectations, many of which are beyond the control of the Company and Optimind, including expectations and assumptions concerning the Company, Optimind, the Transaction, the timely receipt of all required shareholder and regulatory approvals (as applicable), including the acceptance of the TSXV and the CSE, the satisfaction of other closing conditions in accordance with the terms of the Definitive Agreement. The reader is cautioned that assumptions used in the preparation of any forward-looking statements may prove to be incorrect. Events or circumstances may cause actual results to differ materially from those predicted as a result of numerous known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, many of which are beyond the control of the Company. The reader is cautioned not to place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements. Such information, although considered reasonable by management at the time of preparation, may prove to be incorrect and actual results may differ materially from those anticipated. Forward-looking statements contained in this press release are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are made as of the date of this press release, and the Company does not undertake any obligation to update publicly or to revise any of the included forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as expressly required by securities law.

Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

THIS NEWS RELEASE IS NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO U.S. NEWSWIRE SERVICES FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119146
Studio 189 is an artisan-produced fashion lifestyle brand and social enterprise based between New York (USA) and Accra (Ghana). The bag was designed and produced in the Studio189 Product Development Center in Accra and with the NGO ASIGE in the Northern region of Ghana, in support of women in rural communities

AMSTERDAM, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Amsterdam-based fashion brand Scotch & Soda announces the launch of 100 limited-edition raffia "Born to Love" bags in collaboration with Studio 189, a fashion lifestyle brand and social enterprise co-founded in 2013 by actress Rosario Dawson and luxury executive Abrima Erwiah. Based in New York City and Accra, Studio 189 is a platform that helps to promote and curate African and African-inspired fashion by supporting community-led projects, primarily in West Africa. The Scotch & Soda bag is designed and developed by Studio189 in the product development center in Accra and handcrafted in Bolgatanga by a community of weavers led by ASIGE (Advocacy for Social Inclusion and Girls Education), a non-governmental organization focused on the empowerment of women through work and education.

Studio 189's mission is to use fashion as an agent for social change, aiming to create well-designed products as sustainably as possible, whilst focusing on job creation, education, and training for women in particular. The brand collaborates with various communities across Ghana that specialize in traditional artisanal techniques that are open to upskilling and to continuously improving their work.

Launched as part of the latest Scotch & Soda 'Born To Love' capsule collection for Summer 2022, the bag joyfully celebrates unity and togetherness, as shown by the word 'LOVE' woven into the design across the front.

The bag design is rooted in the concept of love and is made with love by women working together in community using materials and colors found in nature. The color palette is inspired by the flowers, plants and herbs in Ghana. Created using traditional basket weaving techniques unique to the upper East area of Bolgatanga, the bags were woven in a horizontal pattern featuring both colorful and neutral stripes giving it an abstract rainbow-like appearance. The bags were made from locally sourced Palmyra leaf fibers, commonly known as raffia, which is naturally dyed using vegetal pigments extracted such as from hibiscus, millet husk and plant leaves, The artisanal process requires three to four weeks for the preparation of the materials, prior to the actual weaving stage. It then takes one week for an experienced weaver to make a basket bag. This product is made using no-waste manufacturing and sustainable materials.

For the collaboration with Scotch & Soda, Studio 189 chose to have the basket bags woven by ASIGE. Founded in 2016 by Dorcas Apoore, ASIGE invests in social programs and vocational training. The weaving of the bags is part of a larger initiative that provides work for local communities, made up primarily of women of all ages (from 18 years old and up), including widowers, young mothers, and grandmothers. The weaving work is a source of much needed income to support their basic living expenses and is adapted to their personal lives and schedules. ASIGE works with several communities in Bolgatanga that include both experienced and inexperienced weavers. Lead by Elizabeth Adongo and Nboo Avea, the community chosen to weave the Scotch & Soda bags is composed of 76 people, from which 41 women and one man were selected based on their higher weaving skills. The group was trained by Raymond Adongo, Elizabeth's husband. An additional staff of 45 people from Studio189 in Ghana, primarily women, worked on this project between the factory, the studio, photography and video. The production of the bag activates an entire supply chain from design/development to raw materials to manufacturing to marketing to education.

The limited-edition love bag will retail for 149,95 euros (179 USD) and will be available on the Scotch & Soda website, as well as in a selection of the brand's stores. All proceeds from the sale of the bags will be donated to Scotch & Soda's partner, The Hunger Project, to support the organization's initiatives in countries like Ghana.

Dorcas Apoore, Founder and CEO of ASIGE, declared: "Investing in women and girls is one of the surest ways to reach our sustainable development goals. When women are equipped with technical skills, they can rise above the poverty line in Ghana and in Africa as a whole." Apoore added: "We are very happy to be working with Scotch & Soda. Since they came into our lives, we've seen the impact on our people. We look forward to a positive development with Studio 189, Scotch & Soda, and our community."

Abrima Erwiah, Co-founder and President of Studio 189, said: "Through our collaboration with Scotch & Soda, we have been able to bring to life the "Born to Love Bag", made in Ghana by women artisans by hand using locally sourced materials, in harmony with the planet. We are grateful to Scotch and Soda for entrusting us to translate their vision into reality and to use their platform to help amplify our message. It's about dignity and about working together, honoring everyone's work and contributions and delivering a project that is well designed, filled with Community, Joy and Heart."

Stephane Jaspar, CMO of Scotch & Soda, commented: "I have been following Abrima's project for years now and we are thrilled that we were able to partner together on this project as part of our 'Born To Love" collections. It is a great opportunity to bring more awareness on her amazing mission and on the artisanal craftsmanship of rural communities in Africa, whilst supporting The Hunger Project's initiatives in countries like Ghana."

About Studio 189 (Studio One Eighty Nine)

Co-founded by Rosario Dawson and Abrima Erwiah, Studio 189 is an artisan produced fashion lifestyle brand and social enterprise that is as a recipient of the prestigious CFDA/VOGUE fashion fund and has also won the prestigious CFDA Lexus Fashion Initiative for Sustainability. The brand is made in Africa and produces African and African-inspired content and clothing.

The brand currently operates a store in Accra (Ghana), an ecommerce site, a manufacturing facility in Accra, and supports various community led projects in Africa and in the USA. Studio 189 works with artisanal communities that specialize in various traditional craftsmanship techniques including natural plant-based dye indigo, hand-batik, kente weaving and more.

Studio 189 focuses on empowerment, creating jobs and supporting education and skills training and partners with organizations such as the United Nations ITC Ethical Fashion Initiative, Warby Parker, Cosabella, and more.

The first collection launched on February 14th 2013 in honor of One Billion Rising. The mission took shape following a trip with Eve Ensler's V-Day and Dr. Mukwege's Panzi Hospital in February 2011, through Kenya, Burundi and Rwanda to Bukavu in the Democratic Republic of Congo for the opening of the City of Joy

For more information, please visit: www.studiooneeightynine.com

About ASIGE

Established in 2016, ASIGE (Advocacy for Social Inclusion and Girls Education) is a non-governmental, non-profit organization based in Bolgatanga, in the Upper East Region of Ghana. ASIGE works with rural communities to design colorful and customized baskets and bags for local and international markets. The non-profit organization focuses on areas such as women empowerment, girls' education, disability Inclusion, gender equality and poverty reduction.

Ran by Dorcas Apoore (founder and CEO) and her husband Simon Adongo Ayimbire (Administrator), ASIGE provides training in basket weaving to women in rural communities in the Bolgatanga area, creating a market for their products. Additionally, the social enterprise enrols girls into vocational training, provides sensitization on sexual and reproductive health rights and supplies sanitary pads to schools.

Dorcas Apoore holds a bachelor's degree in Development Planning and is graduated from the University for Development Studies in Ghana. Apoore was selected as one 16 young leaders from around the globe to participate in the 2018 EDD (European Development Days), held in Brussels. She is an advisory board member at the World Bank's global program S4YE (Solutions for Youth Employment), and a business member at CAMFED (Campaign for Female Education) in Ghana. Simon Adongo Ayimbire, holds a bachelor's degree in Accounting Education and is a chartered accountant with a vast work experience.

Instagram: @asigeghana

About The Hunger Project

Founded in 1977, The Hunger Project is a global, non-profit, strategic organization committed to the sustainable end of world hunger. The organization runs programs in 22 countries throughout Africa, South Asia and Latin America and reaches more than 15,8 million men and women, empowering them to end their own hunger, lead lives of self-reliance, meet their own basic needs and build better futures for their children.

The Hunger Project pioneers sustainable, grassroots, women-centered strategies and advocates for their widespread adoption. Through the organization's programs, 500,000 trained local leaders in 14,500 rural villages work to lead their own community out of hunger and poverty.

Scotch & Soda has been a partner of The Hunger Projects since 2020. For more information, For more information, please visit: www.thp.org

About Scotch & Soda

Born in Amsterdam, Scotch & Soda celebrates the free spirit of its birth city. Endlessly optimistic, the brand champions individuality, authenticity and the power of self-expression to create the unique - an attitude reflected in its designs. The Scotch & Soda collections include menswear, womenswear, kidswear, denim, eyewear, fragrances, and accessories, occupying a unique space in today's global fashion landscape.

Collections can currently be found globally in 252 freestanding stores across Europe, North America, Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Australia, as well as in 7,000 doors in some of the world's biggest cities, including New York, London and Paris. The brand's online operations also ship to over 70 countries.

For more information, please visit: www.scotch-soda.com

Visual Assets

Please click on the links below to download:

1) Images of the Scotch & Soda x Studio 189 project

(Photo credit: "Courtesy of Studio 189 - Photos by Daniel Kons")

2) Still life image of the Scotch & Soda x Studio 189 limited-edition bag

(Photo credit: "Courtesy of Scotch & Soda")

Media enquiries

Daniel Urrutia | Communications Director | urrutia.daniel@scotch-soda.com

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779571/Scotch_Soda_x_Studio_189.jpg

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779572/Scotch_Soda_x_Studio_189.jpg

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1525212/Scotch_and_Soda_Logo.jpg

Download full press release here:

PDF English - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779574/Scotch_Soda_EN.pdf

PDF German - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779573/Scotch_Soda_DE.pdf

PDF French - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779575/Scotch_Soda_FR.pdf

PDF Dutch - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779576/Scotch_Soda_NL.pdf
Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - April 4, 2022) - Avalon Advanced Materials Inc. (TSX: AVL) (OTCQB: AVLNF) ("Avalon" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that it has signed a binding letter of intent with RenJoules International Ltd., an Essar Group Company ("Essar"), to become a strategic partner and co-developer in support of Avalon's plans to establish a regional lithium battery materials supply chain to serve the needs of future electric vehicle and battery manufacturers in Ontario and elsewhere.

This agreement involves providing initial financial and development support for building a lithium refinery in Thunder Bay, Ontario that will be designed to accept lithium minerals concentrates, not only from Avalon's Separation Rapids Lithium Project north of Kenora, ON, but also from other aspiring new producers from the many lithium pegmatite resources that occur in northwestern Ontario. It will operate as a separate private business, called Avalon Lithium Inc., a newly established Avalon subsidiary in which Essar will become a co-owner.

With the agreement announced today, the partners will immediately begin the key next steps including; finalizing initial commercial terms and completion of final feasibility studies for both the refinery operations and lithium mineral concentrate production at the Separation Rapids site that will provide the initial feed for the refinery until other new producers also get started. This will also include finalizing the exact location for the refinery in Thunder Bay and proceeding with initial site preparation work both at Separation Rapids and the Thunder Bay site.

Present indications on demand for lithium battery materials produced in Ontario are supporting an initial production capacity for the refinery of 20,000 tonnes per annum of lithium hydroxide and/or lithium carbonate. This will require a capital investment in the order of C$500 million, which Essar and Avalon would jointly fund, with funding also anticipated from applicable Government programs and other private investors including Indigenous businesses in Northern Ontario. With construction planned to begin this year, it could be in operation by 2025. This will also create new economic development opportunities for First Nations to take advantage of lithium resources in their traditional territories to produce lithium mineral concentrates for purchase by Avalon Lithium Inc.

Demand for lithium hydroxide and lithium carbonate continues to grow in North America as new electric vehicle and battery manufacturing capacity is established both in the U.S. and in Canada. Ontario is now well positioned to take advantage of the rapid growth with the recent announcement of Ontario's first-ever Critical Minerals Strategy, which Premier Doug Ford described as "the government's blueprint to connect industries, resources and workers in our province's north to the future of manufacturing in the south as we build up home-grown supply chains." Avalon Lithium Inc. will deliver on a key priority of the government's plan: "growing domestic processing and creating resilient local supply chains" and help the province become a global leader in the sector. Ontario's rich endowment in critical minerals in the North uniquely positions Ontario to create the full supply chains and take advantage of the demand for critical minerals in the emerging new advanced manufacturing sector of the economy.

Speaking on the partnership, Kush Singh, CEO, Essar Power Limited said, "We truly believe that green energy is "the future". This initiative of setting up a lithium refinery is a core part of Essar's global strategy of investments in the energy transition towards decarbonisation with a prime focus on Green Hydrogen and Storage. Lithium is a foundational critical mineral for the battery supply chain and with the Ontario government's stellar vision through its Critical Mineral Strategy, we are confident that this is the right location and time for our strategic partnership with Avalon and other stakeholders."

Avalon President Don Bubar commented, "While EV manufacturing and lithium battery materials production can be the initial catalyst for starting critical minerals supply chains in the North, it is just the beginning where innovation of new products and new efficient processing technologies for other critical minerals such as tantalum, cesium, and rare earths, can inspire future growth into other areas of advanced manufacturing including aerospace technology."

The agreement builds on growing Canada-India bilateral economic ties and supports clean energy and foreign direct investment objectives. The Company wishes to thank the Ontario division of Invest-in-Canada for introducing Avalon to Essar last year.

About the Essar Group

The Essar Group is a diversified business enterprise based in Mumbai, India that controls a number of subsidiary companies including Renjoules International Limited involved in the core sectors of Energy (Exploration & Production, Refining & Marketing, Power, Hydrogen), Infrastructure & Logistics (Ports, Storage Terminals), Metals & Mining, Technology & Retail (Shipping, Oilfield Services, Projects, Technology solutions etc.) Essar Global Fund Limited (EGFL), set up in 2005, invests in building and nurturing Essar Group assets, and creating value in these core sectors.

With Assets Under Management (AUM) of US$8.2 billion, as on 31 March 2021, and a net asset value of US$4.4 billion, the current investment portfolio of EGFL is future centric and value accretive. EGFL is now poised to transition its existing assets towards a greener economy and invest in businesses which will transform sector landscapes from carbon to a clean energy ecosystem. The returns from the transition will not only outperform benchmark returns but also contribute to a sustainable society within the framework of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) and transform sectors for a post carbon economy.

About Avalon Advanced Materials Inc.

Avalon Advanced Materials Inc. is a Canadian mineral development company specializing in sustainably-produced materials for clean technology. The Company now has four advanced stage projects, providing investors with exposure to lithium, tin and indium, as well as rare earth elements, tantalum, cesium and zirconium. Avalon is currently focusing on developing its Separation Rapids Lithium Project near Kenora, Ontario while continuing to advance other projects, including its 100%-owned Lilypad Cesium-Tantalum-Lithium Project located near Fort Hope, Ontario. Social responsibility and environmental stewardship are corporate cornerstones.

For questions and feedback, please e-mail the Company at ir@AvalonAM.com, or phone Don Bubar, President & CEO, directly at 416-364-4938 ext. 222.

This news release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to statements that Essar intends to become a strategic partner and co-developer in support of Avalon's plans to establish a regional lithium battery materials supply chain to serve the needs of future electric vehicle and battery manufacturers in Ontario and elsewhere, that this agreement involves providing initial financial and development support for building a lithium refinery in Thunder Bay, Ontario that will be designed to accept lithium minerals concentrates, not only from Avalon's Separation Rapids Lithium Project north of Kenora, ON, but also from other aspiring new producers, that it will operate as a separate private business in which Essar will become a co-owner, that the partners will immediately begin the key next steps including finalizing initial commercial terms and completion of final feasibility studies for both the refinery operations and lithium mineral concentrate production at the Separation Rapids site, that this will also include finalizing the exact location for the refinery in Thunder Bay and proceeding with initial site preparation work both at Separation Rapids and the Thunder Bay site, that present indications on demand for lithium battery materials produced in Ontario are supporting an initial production capacity for the refinery of 20,000 tonnes per annum of lithium hydroxide and/or lithium carbonate, that this will require a capital investment in the order of C$500 million, which Essar and Avalon would jointly fund, with funding also anticipated from applicable Government programs and other private investors including Indigenous businesses in Northern Ontario, that construction is planned to begin this year, that it could be in operation by 2025, that this will also create new economic development opportunities for First Nations to take advantage of lithium resources in their traditional territories to produce, that Avalon Lithium Inc. will deliver on a key priority of the government's plan and help the province become a global leader in the sector. Generally, these forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "potential", "scheduled", "anticipates", "continues", "expects" or "does not expect", "is expected", "scheduled", "targeted", "planned", or "believes", or variations of such words and phrases or state that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will be" or "will not be" taken, reached or result, "will occur" or "be achieved". Forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements of Avalon to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on assumptions management believes to be reasonable at the time such statements are made. Although Avalon has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. Factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from expected results described in forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to market conditions, and the possibility of cost overruns or unanticipated costs and expenses as well as those risk factors set out in the Company's current Annual Information Form, Management's Discussion and Analysis and other disclosure documents available under the Company's profile at www.SEDAR.com. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Such forward-looking statements have been provided for the purpose of assisting investors in understanding the Company's plans and objectives and may not be appropriate for other purposes. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Avalon does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements that are contained herein, except in accordance with applicable securities laws.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119161
Sandro Piancone, CEO, and Jorge Olson, CMO, will host the April 5 investor call to go over questions and updates, including GGII's new subsidiaries, and business model

San Diego, California--(Newsfile Corp. - April 4, 2022) - Green Globe International Inc. (OTC Pink: GGII) ("GGII") announces an investor update conference call on Tuesday, April 5, 2022, at 11 AM PST, 2 PM EST. Everyone can register for the conference call at www.GGIIgroup.com. Interested attendees can join the call via telephone or video conference on their phone or computer. Investors and attendees can submit their questions ahead of the call using the following link: https://www.GGIIgroup.com

Topics to be discussed in the call:

Year-end overview Financial disclosures Hempacco's S1 registration GGII business model New Subsidiaries Hemp Hop Update Cheech and Chong Update New product catalog

Forward-Looking and Cautionary Statements

This news release may include forward-looking statements including opinions, assumptions, estimates, the Company's assessment of future plans and operations, including but not limited to information concerning a potential combination with Hempacco and the timing thereof. When used in this document, the words "will," "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "expect," "intent," "may," "project," "should," and similar expressions are intended to be among the statements that identify forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements are founded based on expectations and assumptions made by the Company. Forward-looking statements are subject to a wide range of risks and uncertainties. Although the Company believes that the expectations represented by such forward-looking statements are reasonable, there can be no assurance that such expectations will be realized. Any number of important factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements including, but not limited to regulatory and third party approvals not being obtained in the manner or timing anticipated; the ability to implement corporate strategies; the state of domestic capital markets; the ability to obtain financing; changes in general market conditions; industry conditions and events; and other factors more fully described from time to time in the reports and filings made by the Company with OTC Markets Group, Inc. or the securities regulatory authorities. Except as required by applicable laws, the Company does not undertake any obligation to publicly update or revise forward-looking statements. We intend that all forward-looking statements be subject to the safe-harbor provisions of relevant securities laws and considered forward-looking information within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended.

# # #

About Green Globe International, Inc. (GGII):

Green Globe is a Fast-Moving Consumer Goods incubator and holding company of intellectual property, products, and companies that better people's lives by helping them feel and look better inside and out.

Green Globe (GGII) owns or has interests in several brands and companies including; Green Star Labs, Inc., changing how people feel about themselves inside and out with nutritional supplements, CBD, and beauty products, and hemp CBD cigarette and rolling paper manufacturer Hempacco Co. Inc., Disrupting Tobacco's $1 Trillion tobacco industry, with its subsidiaries and joint ventures including HempBox Vending, Inc. vending and advertising company, Cali Vibes, Inc. Cannabinoid cigarettes, HempHop Smokables, Inc., partnering with music producer and rapper Rick Ross, Cheech and Chong Smokables, Inc. delivers cannabinoid Hemp CBD cigarettes to consumers with Cheech and Chong as partners. The Real Stuff Smokables, Inc.

Green Globe is publicly traded under the ticker symbol GGII, and continues to look for best-in-class companies, products, and patents to create Fast Moving Consumer Goods and channels for selling them, including retail automation and advertising platforms.

Add Your Name to the GGII Investor Email List

To be added to GGII's investor email list and be kept apprised of all upcoming IR activities, please subscribe using this link: https://newsroom.newsfilecorp.com/lists/8020/490

Company Contact:

Sandro Piancone, CEO, or Investor Relations IR@ggiigroup.com

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119176
MOGADISHU, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations on Monday reaffirmed its support for freeing Somalia from explosive hazards and highlighted the impact that the scourge has on the citizens.

James Swan, the UN secretary-general's special representative for Somalia, said the world body is determined to bolster national capabilities to counter threats posed by explosive devices in a sustainable manner.

"The continued use of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) poses a serious threat to the country and its population," Swan said in a statement issued in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, to mark the International Day for Mine Awareness and Assistance in Mine Action.

The theme for this year is "Safe Ground, Safe Steps, Safe Home."

The UN envoy said the contamination by and from explosive remnants of war and landmines resulting from years of conflict in Somalia continues to have detrimental effects on safety and human security and hampers development efforts.

About 500 civilians were killed or injured in Somalia in 2020 due to IEDs and explosive remnants of war; casualties totalled 669 in 2021, he said.

"The United Nations in Somalia remains committed to working with the Somali authorities and partners on mine action, which enables peacebuilding, humanitarian, and socio-economic development efforts while protecting civilians," Swan said.

The UN in Somalia works closely with national and international mine action specialists in responding to explosive threats faced by communities while enhancing the capacity of Somalis to lead and coordinate mine action responses, he said.

According to Swan, the support includes the provision of explosive ordnance risk reduction, the delivery of survey and clearance activities, victim assistance, stockpile destruction, and advocacy for adherence to the international legal instruments. 
Regulatory News:

Gecina (Paris:GFC) is delighted to welcome the teams of a major real estate group to 157 avenue Charles de Gaulle in Neuilly-sur-Seine, signing a nine-year lease for 1,650 sq.m. The premises will be made available from June 1, with the tenant scheduled to arrive in September 2022.

This transaction, secured at rental values exceeding the Group's initial expectations, has set a new benchmark for prime buildings in Neuilly-sur-Seine, reflecting the appetite among businesses for high-quality offices in the most central sectors of Paris City and Neuilly-sur-Seine.

Positioned on the major corridor linking Paris' Central Business District and La Defense, 157 Charles de Gaulle offers 11,400 sq.m of offices and services.

This transaction takes the building's letting rate up to 15%, just a few weeks after it was delivered during the first quarter of 2022. It represents a first concrete illustration of the strong interest among several potential tenants that Gecina is currently in talks with.

About Gecina

As a specialist for centrality and uses, Gecina operates innovative and sustainable living spaces. The Group owns, manages and develops Europe's leading office portfolio, with over 97% located in the Paris Region, and a portfolio of residential assets and student residences, with over 9,000 apartments. These portfolios are valued at 20.1 billion euros at end-2021.

Gecina has firmly established its focus on innovation and its human approach at the heart of its strategy to create value and deliver on its purpose: "Empowering shared human experiences at the heart of our sustainable spaces". For our 100,000 clients, this ambition is supported by our client-centric brand YouFirst. It is also positioned at the heart of UtilesEnsemble, our program setting out our solidarity-based commitments to the environment, to people and to the quality of life in cities.

Gecina is a French real estate investment trust (SIIC) listed on Euronext Paris, and is part of the SBF 120, CAC Next 20, CAC Large 60 and Euronext 100 indices. Gecina is also recognized as one of the top-performing companies in its industry by leading sustainability benchmarks and rankings (GRESB, Sustainalytics, MSCI, ISS ESG and CDP).

gecina.fr

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005753/en/

Contacts:

GECINA CONTACTS

Financial communications

Samuel Henry-Diesbach

Tel: +33 (0)1 40 40 52 22

samuelhenry-diesbach@gecina.fr

Virginie Sterling

Tel: +33 (0)1 40 40 62 48

virginiesterling@gecina.fr

Press relations

Julien Landfried

Tel: +33 (0)1 40 40 65 74

julienlandfried@gecina.fr

Armelle Miclo

Tel: +33 (0)1 40 40 51 98

armellemiclo@gecina.fr
Article L. 238-8-II of the French commercial Code and article 223-16 of the AMF (French Financial Markets Authority) general regulation

Regulatory News:

Corporate name of the issuer: Veolia Environnement (Paris:VIE) 21 rue La Boetie 75008 PARIS FRANCE (ISIN code: FR0000124141-VIE)

Information closing date Total number of shares

forming the share capital Total number of voting rights March 31, 2022 699,725,266 Total number of theoretical voting rights (1): 739,018,245 Total number of voting rights that may be exercised (2): 726,533,635

Inclusion in the Veolia Environnement Articles of Association of a clause requiring a reporting obligation of the declaration of crossing a shareholding threshold, complementary to the one relating to the thresholds provided by the French law and the regulations in force (article 8).

(1) Number of theoretical voting rights after taking into account the number of shares with double voting rights as of March 31, 2022 (39,292,979 shares) and the number of treasury shares held as of March 31, 2022 (12,484,610 shares).

(2) Number of voting rights that may be exercised number of theoretical voting rights (or total number of voting rights attached to shares) shares without voting rights (number of treasury shares held as of March 31, 2022).

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005842/en/

Contacts:

Veolia Environnement
WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Crude oil futures moved higher on Monday, rebounding from recent losses, as Western nations called for new sanctions against Russia after Ukraine said Russian troops carried out a 'massacre' in the town of Bucha, killing hundreds of civilians. Western nations have called for a ban on imports of Russian oil and gas. U.S. President Joe Biden has called for war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin and said he would seek more sanctions after reported atrocities in Ukraine. Saudi Aramco's decision to raise its official selling price for crude in May contributed as well to the sharp uptick in oil prices. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for May ended higher by $4.01 or about 4% at $103.28 a barrel. Brent crude futures moved up $2.20 or about 2.1% to $106.59 a barrel. Both WTI Crude futures and Brent Crude futures shed about 13% last week, weighed down by the U.S. decision to release oil from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), and concerns about outlook for energy demand due to the imposition of lockdown measures in Shanghai. U.S. President Joe Biden announced last week that up to 1 million barrels per day will be released from U.S.' Strategic Petroleum Reserve for six months beginning May. Copyright(c) 2022 RTTNews.com. All Rights Reserved Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann.
Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - April 4, 2022) - Canuc Resources Corporation (TSXV: CDA) (OTCQB: CNUCF) ("Canuc" or the "Company") is pleased to announce the closing of non-brokered Private Placement for gross proceeds of $450,000 CAD. The closing of this Private Placement results in issuance of 3,000,000 Units. Each Unit consists of one common share ("Common Share") priced at $0.15 per share, and one half of one common share purchase warrant ("Warrant"). Each whole Warrant entitles the holder to purchase one additional Common Share at $0.35 for a period of two years from the closing of the Private Placement.

Each whole Warrant has an early exercise provision that allows the Company to trigger exercise of the Warrant when the 10-day average price of Common Shares traded on the TSX Venture Exchange exceeds $0.50 per share. 30 days after the trigger date, any unexercised Warrants will be deemed to be null and void. All securities issued under this Private Placement will be subject to a hold period expiring four months and one day from the date of closing.

Proceeds will be used for exploration on the Company's San Javier Silver-Gold Project.

Final closing is subject to acceptance and approval by the TSX Venture Exchange.

About Canuc

Canuc is a junior resource company focusing on its San Javier Silver-Gold Project in Sonora State, Mexico. The Company also generates cash flow from natural gas production at its MidTex Energy Project in Central West Texas, USA where Canuc has an interest in eight (8) producing natural gas wells and has rights for further in field developments.

For further information please contact:

Canuc Resources Corporation.

416) 525 - 6869

cberlet@canucresources.ca

Forward Looking Information

This news release contains forward-looking information. All information, other than information of historical fact, constitute "forward-looking statements" and includes any information that addresses activities, events or developments that the Corporation believes, expects or anticipates will or may occur in the future including the Corporation's strategy, plans or future financial or operating performance.

When used in this news release, the words "estimate", "project", "anticipate", "expect", "intend", "believe", "hope", "may" and similar expressions, as well as "will", "shall" and other indications of future tense, are intended to identify forward-looking information. The forward-looking information is based on current expectations and applies only as of the date on which they were made. The factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated in such forward-looking information include, but are not limited to, the ability of the Corporation to fund the exploration expenditures required under the Agreement. Other factors such as uncertainties regarding government regulations could also affect the results. Other risks may be set out in the Corporation's annual financial statements, MD&A and other publicly filed documents.

The Corporation cautions that there can be no assurance that forward-looking information will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such information. Accordingly, investors should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information. Except as required by law, the Corporation does not assume any obligation to release publicly any revisions to forward-looking information contained in this press release to reflect events or circumstances after the date hereof.

Neither the TSXV nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSXV) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this news release.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119229
Singapore, Singapore--(Newsfile Corp. - April 4, 2022) - Raffles Financial Group Limited (CSE: RICH) (FSE: 4VO) (OTCQX: RAFFF) ("RFG" or the "Company") We wish to give our shareholders an update on the latest development in performance of the Joint Venture Agreement ("JVA") between the Company and Stamatis Capital Pte Ltd ("SC") on 2nd February 2022.

Pursuant to the JVA, both Parties incorporated a joint venture company in Singapore named "Raffles Financial Americas Pte Ltd" in which the Company and SC held 51% and 49% respectively. Raffles Financial Americas Pte. Ltd. ("RFA", or the "JV") had also entered into a joint venture agreement with the Joseph Sassoon Group ("JSG"), a privately owned investment management firms, to form Sassoon Raffles Financial ("SRF") which was each held 50% by RFA and JSG.

On 31st March 2022, SC served a notice of termination from the JVA to the Board of the Company taking consideration into the Cease Trade Order being issued by the Ontario and British Columbia Securities Commission to the Company on 6 January 2022. SC represented to the Board of the Company that SC had major concerns and issues on such Order that would produce an unfavorable effect on the ordinary business of both RFA and SC.

After going through detailed assessment on the options available to the Company, the merits as well as financial impact of accepting the notice of termination, the Board of the Company agreed with SC to withdraw from the JVA and immediately dispose of the 51% interest in the outstanding share capital of RFA to SC at SGD1.00. Both parties agreed that the Company shall be released from all of its obligations to RFA following to such disposal.

In addition, following to the disposal of RFA, the Company no longer has any interest in the joint venture agreement between RFA and the Joseph Sassoon Group that was announced on 4th March 2022. RFA and its joint venture had yet to commence any business and generated any income up to the date of the disposal. Both parties had also not contributed any funding to RFA.

The Board of the Company is of the view that the above action does not produce material financial impact to the Company.

We will keep shareholders duly informed on the progress of our business and the audit matter and will work closely with auditors to clear this matter as soon as possible.

About Raffles Financial Group Limited (CSE: RICH) (FSE: 4VO) (OTCQX:RAFFF)

Raffles Financial Group is listed on the Canadian Securities Exchange Purchasable under the stock symbol (CSE: RICH), the Frankfurt Stock Exchange Purchasable under the stock symbol (FSE: 4VO) and the OTC Markets under the stock symbol (OTCQX: RAFF).

On behalf of the RFG Board of Directors

Monita Faris

Corporate Secretary

Phone: + 604-283-6110

Email: monita@rafflesfinancial.co

Website: www.RafflesFinancial.co

The CSE has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the accuracy or adequacy of this release.

Neither the Canadian Securities Purchase nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the Canadian Securities Purchase) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Certain statements contained in this release may constitute "forward-looking statements" or "forward-looking information" (collectively "forward-looking information") as those terms are used in Canadian securities laws. These statements relate to future events or future performance. The use of any of the words "could", "intend", "expect", "believe", "will", "projected", "estimated", "anticipates" and similar expressions and statements relating to matters that are not historical facts are intended to identify forward-looking information and are based on the Company's current belief or assumptions as to the outcome and timing of such future events.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119230
MIAMI, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Carnival Cruise Line said today that the one-week period of March 28-April 3 was its busiest booking week in the company's history, showing a double-digit increase from the previous record 7-day booking total.

With 22 of its 23 ships back in guest operations across all its year-round U.S. homeports, Carnival has led the industry in terms of restart and customer demand. Its final ship, Carnival Splendor, will return to service from Seattle on May 2, and then Carnival will welcome its newest ship, Carnival Celebration, to PortMiami in November. By year-end 2022, Carnival will have more capacity sailing (as measured by ALBDs - available lower berth days) than it was sailing in 2019. And then in 2023, Carnival will put into service another new Excel-class ship, Carnival Jubilee from Galveston.

"The excitement of the industry's restart, our successful return of our entire fleet, the guest reaction to Mardi Gras, our loyal guest response to our 50th birthday this year, the support of our travel advisor partners - and of course, the amazing work of our Carnival team - have all contributed to the strong demand we are seeing, and this record-breaking booking week," said Christine Duffy, president of Carnival Cruise Line.

Duffy added that all sales channels, including Carnival.com, travel advisors, the Carnival guest contact center and personal vacation planners all contributed to the record-breaking results. With the restart of cruising in Australia now set, Carnival is finalizing plans for its return in Australia and will be announcing those details soon.

ABOUT CARNIVAL CRUISE LINE

Carnival Cruise Line, part of Carnival Corporation & plc (NYSE/LSE: CCL; NYSE: CUK), is proud to be known as America's Cruise Line with a total of 23 ships, sailing from 14 U.S. homeports and employing more than 40,000 team members from 120 nationalities. Carnival's newest ship, Mardi Gras, featuring the first roller coaster at sea and the first cruise ship in the Americas powered by eco-friendly Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), sailed from Port Canaveral, Fla., July 31, 2021. As part of its 50th Birthday festivities, Carnival Celebration, sister ship to Mardi Gras, is scheduled to debut in late 2022 from PortMiami, as well as Carnival Jubilee from Galveston in 2023.

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1780058/Carnival_Cruise_Line_Mardi_Gras.jpg
Calian is the leading provider of military training and exercise support to NATO

A one-year contract with four option years, NATO 360 has a full potential value of CAD$15M

OTTAWA, ON / ACCESSWIRE / April 4, 2022 / Calian Group Ltd. (TSX:CGY), a diverse products and services company providing innovative healthcare, communications, learning and cybersecurity solutions, has been named the primary recipient of the NATO 360 contract, with work beginning this month. With this award, Calian will continue to play a leading role in NATO exercise support as a Mission Partner for the Joint Warfare Centre (JWC). JWC, located in Stavanger, Norway, is a hub for collective training at both the operational and strategic levels of warfare and supports NATO readiness.

This contract represents an expansion of the military training and exercise support Calian provides to NATO. Calian training solutions have prepared NATO high readiness forces at strategic, operational and tactical levels. In the past 13 years, Calian has supported the design and delivery of over 70 NATO exercises, with exercise planning, computer-assisted technologies, role-playing, mentoring and advising. Calian played key roles in delivering pre-deployment exercise and training events for NATO International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), NATO Mission Iraq and NATO Mission Georgia deployments. Additionally, in September 2021, Calian was awarded a military training contract with the NATO Security Force Assistance Centre of Excellence, a multinational entity with Italy, Albania and Slovenia as sponsoring Nations.

"Calian is pleased to be a trusted partner to NATO. With this NATO 360 win, we can continue to deliver innovative training solutions to NATO training audiences in support of the JWC," said Donald Whitty, President, Learning, Calian. "Calian offers a wealth of multi-national expertise and the ability to respond to NATO mission-critical operational and training requirements."

In times of international crisis, Calian has responded to short-notice requirements by providing surge capabilities in support of NATO high readiness forces. The understanding of NATO requirements and the ability to provide innovative solutions and multi-national experts have been key to the success of NATO, JWC and Calian.

"Customer retention and innovation are key pillars of the Calian growth strategy, and the NATO 360 win demonstrates both," said Kevin Ford, Calian CEO. "We're looking forward to growing our relationship in support of NATO during a time of increased need. I'm particularly proud that Calian was selected by NATO due to our innovative training delivery."

NATO 360 is a one-year contract with four option years and has a full potential value of CAD$15M.

About Calian

www.calian.com

We keep the world moving forward. Calian helps people communicate, innovate, learn, stay safe and lead healthy lives with confidence. Every day, our employees live our values of customer-centricity, integrity, innovation and teamwork to engineer reliable solutions that solve complex problems. That's Confidence. Engineered. A stable and growing company for 40 years, we are headquartered in Ottawa with offices and projects spanning North American and international markets. Visit calian.com to learn about innovative healthcare, communications, learning and cybersecurity solutions.

Product or service names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Media inquiries:

pr@calian.com

613-599-8600 x 2298

Investor Relations inquiries:

ir@calian.com

DISCLAIMER

Certain information included in this press release is forward-looking and is subject to important risks and uncertainties. The results or events predicted in these statements may differ materially from actual results or events. Such statements are generally accompanied by words such as "intend", "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "expect" or similar statements. Factors which could cause results or events to differ from current expectations include, among other things: the impact of price competition; scarce number of qualified professionals; the impact of rapid technological and market change; loss of business or credit risk with major customers; technical risks on fixed price projects; general industry and market conditions and growth rates; international growth and global economic conditions, and including currency exchange rate fluctuations; and the impact of consolidations in the business services industry. For additional information with respect to certain of these and other factors, please see the Company's most recent annual report and other reports filed by Calian with the Ontario Securities Commission. Calian disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. No assurance can be given that actual results, performance or achievement expressed in, or implied by, forward-looking statements within this disclosure will occur, or if they do, that any benefits may be derived from them.

Calian  Head Office  770 Palladium Drive  Ottawa  Ontario  Canada  K2V 1C8

Tel: 613.599.8600  Fax: 613-592-3664  General info email: info@calian.com

SOURCE: Calian Group Ltd.

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/696004/Calian-Awarded-NATO-360-Collaborative-Production-Environment-Development-and-Delivery-Support-Contract
Closed-end funds are traded on the secondary market through one of the stock exchanges. The Fund's investment return and principal value will fluctuate so that an investor's shares may be worth more or less than the original cost. Shares of closed-end funds may trade above (a premium) or below (a discount) the net asset value (NAV) of the fund's portfolio. There is no assurance that the Fund will achieve its investment objective. Past performance does not guarantee future results.

Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann.
The Dallas-Based ActivePure Brand Heads to Orlando for Water Quality Association Exposition - Booth #401

DALLAS, TX / ACCESSWIRE / April 4, 2022 / Aerus, the worldwide leader in healthy home environmental solutions, will attend the 2022 Water Quality Association Convention and Exposition April 6- 8 in Orlando, Florida. The event will provide the opportunity for attendees to gain the proper knowledge and information on Aerus and its water purification products. Aerus is amongst roughly 160 other companies attending that specialize in water, air and surface purification. The Water Quality Association (WQA) will have multiple booths open for attendees to explore as well as necessary amenities.

"We will be showcasing our solutions for drinking water, including our industry-leading Alkaline water products, the Elevate PH Max and Elevate RO 600," said Domenico Brunetti, management consultant at Aerus. "In addition, we will be sharing our 'Double Your Business' strategy with our Aerus air and surface purification line and Laundry Pro that combines the power of ActivePure Technology and oxygen-based oxidizers to clean laundry without the use of detergent."

Aerus will present in booth #401 just to the left of the entrance at the Orange County Convention Center. Aerus Director of Water Products, Scott Buss, will be in attendance to address Aerus' whole home water solutions.

"Aerus is proud to be showcasing our entire water product line at the 2022 Water Quality Association Convention and Exhibition to share how our products can provide a solution for all types of water issues," said Buss. "I hope attendees will stop by to learn how they can improve water quality in addition to the other solutions that ActivePure provides for those concerned with water, air and surface purification."

Aerus strives to meet the highest standard in environmental standards for air, water and surface purification. Aerus Whole Home Water Solutions provide peace of mind that water is clean and healthy for consumption and designed to treat water at its source. Aerus Water products that will be on display include:

Aerus Whole House Water Conditioners - designed to help reduce water contaminants, scale buildup, and electricity use.

Aerus Whole House Water Filtration - treats water directly at the source, so recipients are able to enjoy the benefits of cleaner, fresher water from every faucet.

Aerus Problem Water Filtration - solutions to remove arsenic, high levels of acidity, iron, hydrogen sulfide, manganese and tannins from drinking water using a combination of water filtration and water conditioners.

Water Refiner

Ultraviolet Disinfection - disinfection with UV technology is not only user-friendly but recognized as one of the most effective means by North American Health authorities.

Drinking Water Solutions

Laundry Systems

Attendees and those interested in the WQA Convention and Exposition can register online at https://www.wqa.org/convention/Attend/Register-Now as well as view the event's full itinerary and schedule. Registration fees vary based on daily attendance, memberships and customer status. Information on frequently asked questions, gain approval, additional resources and sponsorship and leadership awards are also made available on the WQA Convention website.

For more information about Aerus and its solutions for water, please visit BeyondByAerus.com, or call 1-800-243-9078. For more information on Aerus Water, please visit www.BeyondByAerus.com.

###

ABOUT AERUS:

Since 1924, Aerus (formerly Electrolux Corp. USA) has been committed to providing cutting-edge technologies and unparalleled service to businesses and homes across North America and over 30 global markets. During that time, Aerus products have helped protect over 50 million businesses and homes and have been honored in the Smithsonian. Aerus now has over 350 franchise and distributor locations in North America and has been recognized as one of the top 100 direct selling companies by Direct Selling News. The Aerus product line includes floorcare, air purification and water filtration products for residential and commercial applications. Aerus is a proud reseller of ActivePure Technology, which has been proven in laboratory testing to reduce over 99.9% of many pathogens, including RNA and DNA viruses, bacteria and molds, by up to 99.9% in the air and on surfaces.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Jo Trizila, TrizCom Public Relations on behalf of Aerus

Email: Jo@Trizcom.com

Office: 972-247-1369

Cell/Text: 214-232-0078

OR?

Kyra Castillo, TrizCom Public Relations on behalf of Aerus

Email: Kyra@trizcom.com

Office: 972-247-1369

Cell/Text: 214-695-7080

SOURCE: ActivePure Technology

View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/696017/Aerus-Water-Presents-New-Product-Features-at-2022-WQA-Convention
CardioRenal, a Grenoble, France-based company that specializes in improving treatment at home for patients with severe chronic kidney disease (CKD), raised 3.3M in seed funding.

The backers included French entrepreneurs and longstanding company shareholders (the management).

The company intends to use the funds to pursue its plan to achieve clinical and regulatory approval in preparation for the CE marking of its integrated tool, which is expected in 2023.



Led by Maurice Berenger, CEO, CardioRenal specializes in improving treatment at home for patients with severe chronic kidney disease (CKD). Its platform that enables doctors to optimize patient treatment through remote monitoring of key blood biomarkers.

CardioRenal completed a clinical trial on the technology in October 2021. The results of this trial will be presented at the European Renal Association congress in Paris, France, in May.



FinSMEs

04/04/2022
China has witnessed green and low-carbon tomb-sweeping activities in this year's Qingming Festival holiday.

The Qingming Festival, or Tomb-Sweeping Day, which falls on Tuesday this year, is a traditional Chinese holiday for people to pay tribute to the dead and worship ancestors.

Agencies in charge of funeral services have provided online tribute-paying services by creating mourning websites and other commemorative platforms on the internet.

According to data from the Ministry of Civil Affairs, on Sunday, the first day of the three-day Qingming Festival holiday, 6.95 million Chinese attended virtual memorial ceremonies on 2,304 online platforms, growing by 275.7 percent from a year earlier.





Produced by Xinhua Global Service
Neuron23, a South San Francisco, CA-based biotechnology company, raised $100M in Series C funding.

The round, which brought total financing raised to date to $213.5m, was led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, with participation from Westlake Village BioPartners, Kleiner Perkins, Redmile Group, Cowen Healthcare Investments, Acorn Bioventures, HBM Partners, Perceptive Advisors, and Surveyor Capital.

Led by CEO Nancy Stagliano, Neuron23 is an early stage biotechnology company focused on developing precision medicines for genetically defined neurological and immunological diseases. Neuron23 leverages recent advances in human genetics, combined with their artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled drug discovery and biomarker platforms, to advance therapeutics for devastating diseases.

Proceeds from the Series C financing will be invested in the companys lead programs against leucine-rich repeat kinase 2 (LRRK2), a gene associated with Parkinsons disease and systemic inflammatory diseases, and tyrosine kinase 2 (TYK2), a JAK family protein that plays a role in pathological immune signaling. The funds will also be used to build Neuron23s clinical development team, precision neuroimmunology platform, and data sciences capabilities.

LRRK2 is a complex, multidomain protein found in neurons and many other tissues and cell types throughout the body. Variants in the LRRK2 gene are the most common mutations found in inherited Parkinsons disease, and there is also emerging evidence that LRRK2 activity may play some role in a subset of the larger population of patients with non-familial Parkinsons. Neuron23 has numerous LRRK2 candidates in its pipeline, including a subset indicated for the treatment of systemic inflammation.

Valentin (Vali) Barsan, M.D., an investor for SoftBank Investment Advisers and attending pediatric oncology physician at Stanford University School of Medicine, will join the Neuron23 board of directors. At Stanford, Dr. Barsan is focused on developing and translating genomic technologies in oncology to implement personalized therapy and study mechanisms of effective cancer immunity. In addition to the appointment of Dr. Barsan, Jim Scopa, a longtime investor in innovative life sciences companies, also joins the board of directors. Mr. Scopa serves as a board member of several life sciences and venture capital companies, including Dice Molecules, Adverum Biotechnologies, One Ventures, and Blade Therapeutics. From 2005 to 2017, he was managing director of MPM Capital, where he led investments in biopharmaceuticals, medical devices, and diagnostics.

FinSMEs

04/04/2022
BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- China and Hungary on Monday pledged to continue to enhance bilateral cooperation in various fields to build a stronger comprehensive strategic partnership.

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter Szijjarto made the remarks in a phone conversation.

Wang conveyed congratulations of the Chinese leaders over the Fidesz party's re-winning parliamentary elections under the leadership of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

The election result shows that the independent policy pursued by the Hungarian side is in line with the country's national conditions and the common interests of its people, and is firmly and broadly supported by the people, Wang said. He wished that the Hungarian side will achieve greater progress under the leadership of Prime Minister Orban.

Wang said as the world finds itself in a new period of turbulence and changes, it is particularly valuable and important not only for Hungary, but also for other countries in Europe and the rest of the world to stay independent.

Underlining the comprehensive strategic partnership between China and Hungary, Wang said that both sides should deepen cooperation, consolidate the political foundation, enhance their capacity to jointly resist risks and challenges, and safeguard each other's sovereignty, security and development interests.

Noting that a resilient Hungary is firm in overcoming difficulties, Wang said China will continue to staunchly support Hungary in preserving its independent choice of development path.

For his part, Szijjarto conveyed appreciations of Prime Minister Orban for the Chinese leaders.

Szijjarto said he is glad to have the first phone conversation after the election with the Chinese foreign minister, which demonstrates the mutual trust and friendship between Hungary and China and the high level of their ties.

The Fidesz party's victory indicates the Hungarian people's trust in the party's domestic and foreign policies, he said.

Hungary will continue to firmly safeguard its legitimate interests, and is ready to deepen cooperation with China in various fields and promote their comprehensive strategic partnership to higher levels, Szijjarto said.

The two sides also exchanged views on relations between China and the European Union (EU).

Wang said the Chinese side will follow the important views elaborated by President Xi Jinping during the meeting with EU leaders via video link, work with the EU to tackle global challenges and implement the consensus reached by Chinese and EU leaders, so as to promote the healthy and stable development of China-EU relations.

Szijjarto said Hungary firmly supports EU-China friendship and will continue to play a constructive role in the development of EU-China relations with respect and a down-to-earth attitude. 
The FBI has released its Internet Crime Complaint Center 2021 Internet Crime Report, so I wanted to take the opportunity to discover which internet scams are on the rise, so we can all try our best to prepare and be aware.

In this edition of the Mid-Valley Scam Alert, Ill be breaking down the FBIs report and highlighting what to look out for this year. This column may be a bit longer than usual, but I hope youll find it interesting and informative.

It should come as no surprise that phishing and smishing are on the rise.

If you recall from previous columns, phishing occurs when scammers attempt to lure victims using fraudulent messages, often with links. The term is usually associated with email scams.

But now theres also smishing, which is a combination of SMS (short message service) and phishing. This means con artists use text messages with fake links to try to get you to reveal personal information.

The FBI report indicates that there were 323,972 victims of phishing and other related scams in 2021. That's up from 2020, when there were 241,342 victims. With these types of frauds becoming so prevalent, its as important as ever to stay vigilant and never click on a link that seems fishy.

Quick facts

Lets start with some key stats from the report.

The report includes information from 847,376 complaints of suspected internet crime. This is a 7% increase from 2020. Victims reported losses around $6.9 billion.

Top three cybercrimes reported by victims in 2021:

Phishing (323,972 victims) Nonpayment/nondelivery scams (82,478 victims) Personal data breach (51,829 victims)

Top three scams with highest reported victim losses

Business email compromise scams (about $2.4 billion) Investment fraud (about $1.5 billion) Romance/confidence schemes (about $956 million)

Victims younger than of 20 made up 14,919 of the complaints and accounted for $101.4 million in losses. Those 20-29 years old filed 69,390 complaints and reported $431.1 million in losses. The 30-39 age group represented 88,448 complaints and $937.3 million in losses.

Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Albany Democrat-Herald.

Those between the ages of 40 and 49 were responsible for 89,184 complaints and $1.19 billion in losses. The 50-59 age group made up 74,460 complaints and accounted for $1.26 billion in losses. Finally those 60 years old and older made up 92,371 of the complaints and reported $1.68 billion in losses.

Featured frauds

Although I dont have the ability to break down every type of fraud or scam accounted for in the report, I want to shed some light on a few that are growing in popularity.

Business email compromise scams resulted in the highest amount of total losses in 2021. So what exactly does this fraud look like?

This type of scheme targets businesses and individuals who perform transfers of funds. The shady character will get a subject to compromise legitimate business email accounts so the transfer can go directly to the scam artist.

In the past, the fraud involved hacking or spoofing business email accounts. Now, it can involve schemers using virtual meeting platforms to hack emails and pretend to be business leaders and initiate the wire transfers.

Another scam thats becoming more frequent is nonpayment/nondelivery.

Nonpayment scams refer to good and services being shipped but payment never rendered. In this case, the victim is a seller and they ship a good without being properly compensated for it. Nondelivery fraud, on the other hand, involves a victim buying a good but never receiving it.

One more scam I want to highlight is tech support fraud. As the name suggests, this scheme involves a criminal posing as a customer service or technical support representative. During such a scam, bad actors will try to get you to reveal sensitive information so that they can help resolve a fake problem like being locked out of your bank account.

Oregon numbers

The FBI also published individual state reports. Here are a few highlights from the Oregon data, which differ slightly from national trends:

Nonpayment/nondelivery accounted for the highest number of victims (1,083)

The fraud with the highest total amount of losses was business email compromise scams (around $23.4 million)

Those 60 years old and older accounted for the highest number of victims (1,513)

Those aged 40-49 reported the highest total number of losses (nearly $21 million)

This column just scratches the surface of the FBI data, so I encourage you to check out the full report if you want to see which other scams are on the rise. As always, knowing what to look out for can make all the difference. Lets try to bring the number of scam victims down in 2022.

Maddie Pfeifer covers public safety for Mid-Valley Media. She can be contacted at 541-812-6091 or Madison.Pfeifer@lee.net. Follow her on Twitter via @maddiepfeifer_

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Welcome to my genealogy blog. Genea-Musings features genealogy research tips and techniques, genealogy news items and commentary, genealogy humor, San Diego genealogy society news, family history research and some family history stories from the keyboard of Randy Seaver (of Chula Vista CA), who thinks that Genealogy Research Is really FUN! Copyright (c) Randall J. Seaver, 2006-2021.




ISLAMABAD, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Pakistan's Minister for Human Rights Shireen Mazari said on Saturday that the United States attempted to topple the Pakistani government by sending threatening words and is now making false denial.



"Has the U.S. government ever spoken the truth? It has always been telling lies to the world. It even lied to the UN about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but later the lies were exposed, showing that the U.S. spoke blatant lies to very prestigious senior officials of the UN," Mazari said in a video message.

The official said that the Pakistani nation should know that all denials coming from the United States are a pack of lies.

"The U.S. threatened regime change in Pakistan, targeted Prime Minister Imran Khan, and said that the United States will forgive Pakistan if it removed Khan as prime minister," the minister added.

The minister said that the Pakistani prime minister was targeted because he took a stand against the United States and tried to make decisions on his own.

Earlier on Friday, Khan said while addressing an event that the United States showed displeasure when he visited Russia, adding that as a sovereign country, Pakistan has the right to have an independent foreign policy without influence from anyone.

The prime minister also mentioned that an official demarche has been made through official channels to the U.S. embassy in Pakistan.





Produced by Xinhua Global Service
New algorithm could be quantum leap in search for gravitational waves

A new method of identifying gravitational wave signals using quantum computing could provide a valuable new tool for future astrophysicists.



A team from the University of Glasgows School of Physics & Astronomy have developed a quantum algorithm to drastically cut down the time it takes to match gravitational wave signals against a vast databank of templates.



This process, known as matched filtering, is part of the methodology that underpins some of the gravitational wave signal discoveries from detectors like the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Observatory (LIGO) in America and Virgo in Italy.



Those detectors, the most sensitive sensors ever created, pick up the faint ripples in spacetime caused by massive astronomical events like the collision and merger of black holes.



Matched filtering allows computers to pick gravitational wave signals out of the noise of the data collected by the detector. It works by sifting through the data, searching for a signal which matches one out of potentially hundreds of trillions of templates  pieces of pre-created data which are likely to correlate with a genuine gravitational wave signal.



While the process has enabled numerous gravitational wave detections since LIGO picked up its first signal in September 2015, it is time-consuming and resource-intensive.



In a new paper published in the journal Physical Review Research, the team describe how the process could be greatly accelerated by a quantum computing technique called Grovers algorithm.



Grovers algorithm, developed by computer scientist Lov Grover in 1996, harnesses the unusual capabilities and applications of quantum theory to make the process of searching through databases much faster.



While quantum computers capable of processing data using Grovers algorithm are still a developing technology, conventional computers are capable of modelling their behaviour, allowing researchers to develop techniques which can be adopted when the technology has matured and quantum computers are readily available.



The Glasgow team are the first to adapt Grovers algorithm for the purposes of gravitational wave search. In the paper, they demonstrate how they have applied it to gravitational wave searches through software they developed using the Python programming language and Qiskit, a tool for simulating quantum computing processes.



The system the team developed is capable of a speed-up in the number of operations proportional to the square-root of the number of templates. Current quantum processors are much slower at performing basic operations than classical computers, but as the technology develops, their performance is expected to improve. This reduction in the number of calculations would translate into a speed up in time. In the best case that means that, for example, if a search using classical computing would take a year, the same search could take as little as a week with their quantum algorithm.



Dr Scarlett Gao, from the Universitys School of Physics & Astronomy, is one of the lead authors of the paper. Dr Gao said: Matched filtering is a problem that Grovers algorithm seems well-placed to help solve, and weve been able to develop a system which shows that quantum computing could have valuable applications in gravitational wave astronomy.



My co-author and I were PhD students when we began this work, and were lucky to have had access to the support of some of the UKs leading quantum computing and gravitational wave researchers during the process of developing this software.



While weve concentrated on one type of search in this paper, its possible that it could also be adapted for other processes which, like this one, dont require the database to be loaded into quantum random access memory.



Fergus Hayes, a PhD student in the School of Physics & Astronomy, is co-lead author of the paper. He added: Researchers here in Glasgow have been working on gravitational wave physics for more than 50 years, and work in our Institute for Gravitational Research helped to underpin the development and data analysis sides of LIGO.



The cross-disciplinary work that Dr Gao and I led has demonstrated the potential of quantum computing in matched filtering. As quantum computers develop in the coming years, its possible that processes like these could be used in future gravitational wave detectors. Its an exciting prospect, and were looking forward to developing this initial proof of concept in the future.



The paper was co-written by Dr Sarah Croke, Dr Christopher Messenger and Dr John Veitch, all from the University of Glasgows School of Physics & Astronomy.



The teams paper, titled A quantum algorithm for gravitational wave matched filtering, is published in Physical Review Research. The research was supported by funding from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) and the Leverhulme Trust.






Paris, Amsterdam, April 4, 2022

Press release

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield to sell Gera Arcaden in Germany for 116 Mn

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield (URW) today announces an agreement with an institutional investor for the sale of Gera Arcaden, in Germany, for an agreed Total Acquisition Cost of 116 Mn (at 100%, URW share 51%), which represents a premium to the last appraised value.

The transaction is expected to complete in Q2-2022, subject to standard closing conditions.

Gera Arcaden is an 38,300 sqm shopping centre, including offices, located in the city centre of Gera.

URW also entered into a management contract and will continue the asset and property management of the centre through its German third-party asset management business.

For further information, please contact :

Investor Relations

Maarten Otte

+33 7 63 86 88 78

Maarten.Otte@urw.com

Media Relations

Cornelia Schnepf  Finelk

+44 7387 108 998

Cornelia.Schnepf@finelk.eu

About Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield is the premier global developer and operator of Flagship Destinations, with a portfolio valued at 54.5 Bn as at December 31, 2021, of which 86% in retail, 6% in offices, 5% in convention & exhibition venues and 2% in services. Currently, the Group owns and operates 85 shopping centres, including 53 Flagships in the most dynamic cities in Europe and the United States. Present on two continents and in 12 countries, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield provides a unique platform for retailers and brand events and offers an exceptional and constantly renewed experience for customers.

With the support of its 2,800 professionals and an unparalleled track-record and know-how, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield is ideally positioned to generate superior value and develop world-class projects.

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield distinguishes itself by its Better Places 2030 agenda, that sets its ambition to create better places that respect the highest environmental standards and contribute to better cities.

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield stapled shares are listed on Euronext Amsterdam and Euronext Paris (Euronext ticker: URW), with a secondary listing in Australia through Chess Depositary Interests. The Group benefits from a BBB+ rating from Standard & Poors and from a Baa2 rating from Moodys.

For more information, please visit www.urw.com

Visit our Media Library at https://mediacentre.urw.com

Follow the Group updates on Twitter @urw_group, Linkedin @Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield and Instagram





Attachment
English French

PRESS RELEASE

Paris, April 4, 2022

Acquisition of 100% of Generix Group Portugal





Generix Group, Industrial, Logistics and Retail Ecosystems provider with leading Collaborative SaaS Solutions, announces that it has acquired 100% of its subsidiary Generix Group Portugal.

On March 31, 2022, Generix Group acquired the 50% stake in its subsidiary Generix Group Portugal that was previously held mainly by the founding manager, thus increasing the company's stake in this subsidiary to 100%.

The outgoing manager will accompany this long-planned move as part of a transition period that will ensure optimal operating continuity.

Commenting on this acquisition, Jean-Charles Deconninck, Chairman of the Board, said: "Generix Group Portugal has been growing its business for the past 15 years thanks to its strong reputation in the B2B Integration markets (EDI, electronic invoicing) and to its development in recent years in the Supply Chain Execution market. This operation, in line with the Group's international development strategy, anchors it in a key territory where it has also set up a European Shared Services Center since 2018."

About Generix Group





Generix Group is a Collaborative Supply Chain expert present in 60 countries, thanks to its subsidiaries and network of partners. More than 6,000 companies around the world use its SaaS solutions. The groups 800 employees provide daily support for such customers as Carrefour, Danone, FM Logistic, Fnac-Darty, Essilor and Ferrero in the digital transformation of their Supply Chain.

Its collaborative platform, Generix Supply Chain Hub, helps companies to keep the promises they make to their customers. It combines the capabilities to execute physical flows, digitalize information flows, manage collaborative processes and connect companies to all their partners, in real time.

Generix Supply Chain Hub is aimed at all players in the Supply Chain: manufacturers, third- and fourth-party logistics providers (3PL/4PL) and retailers. Founded in France in 1990, the company is listed on the Eurolist market of Euronext Paris, compartment B (ISIN: FR0010501692). To learn more: www.generixgroup.com

Attachment
Brazil and Colombia and Mexico and Peru, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Boyden, a premier leadership and talent advisory firm with more than 75 offices in over 45 countries, shares regional analysis of leadership and talent trends in Latin America, revealing the highest global level of confidence in growth, the lowest level of confidence in board skills and operations leadership as the top priority for hiring.

The global study, Talent-led transformation in a post-pandemic world: how can global business leaders deliver on ambitions of growth and reinvention? explores the business outlook among CEOs, boards and other senior leaders, and talent trends, priorities and investment in the wake of the pandemic through 2022. In the Regional Analysis: Latin America, survey data across five core talent and strategy themes alongside Boyden expert insights form a nuanced picture of the Latin American leadership landscape.

Demands on leaders today are both broad and complex, comments Luis Lezama Cohen, Managing Partner, Mexico and LatAm Regional Practice Leader, Financial Services. With the pandemic, and now events in Ukraine, companies are accelerating solutions and requiring more out of their executives.

Study findings show that 88 percent of respondents in Latin America are extremely confident or confident in their organizations growth potential, compared with the global average of 77 percent. This contrasts with 67 percent in the region who are extremely confident or confident in having the right talent to align to strategy.

Lack of alignment goes up to board level. Respondents in Latin America are the most concerned globally about board composition, with 61 percent saying a different mix of skills is needed on the board, compared with the global average of 52 percent. The pandemic highlighted competitive differences among companies with well-structured processes and governance, and those without, comments Aurea Imai, Managing Partner, Brazil. Therefore, a number of companies are reinventing their boards to refresh their strategies and gain agility in a dynamic economic environment. There is strong competition between traditional companies, start-ups and VC-backed businesses, with boards pressed to deliver diversity and innovation.

Expansion into new markets and the development of new products are strategic priorities and a means to attract the best talent. Operational leadership is therefore the top priority in hiring, with an additional focus on operational capabilities at board level. Directors need a refined understanding of regional economies and cultural awareness to drive the development of new products and markets. Next generation managers are equipped with better training, wider business perspectives, a fluency in globalization, multicultural approach, language skills and international exposure, comments Antonio Sanchez, Managing Partner, Colombia.

Talent attraction data signals 62 percent are considering new approaches to measuring performance in Latin America, compared with 51 percent globally; the top driver is to tie culture and behaviours to business objectives. Retention challenges are a significant concern, with 63% expecting these, compared with 50% globally. Challenges in talent recruitment are expected by 52% of respondents compared with 49% globally.

Despite the regions enormous potential, the effects of the pandemic and current-state political situation constrain the resolution of existing structural economic and social deficiencies. Business leaders have a significant role to play in pursuing public private collaboration to achieve economic recovery, concludes Carla Woolcott, Managing Partner, Peru.

About Boyden

Boyden is a premier leadership and talent advisory firm with more than 75 offices in over 45 countries. Our global reach enables us to serve client needs anywhere they conduct business. We connect great companies with great leaders through executive search, interim management and leadership consulting solutions. Boyden is ranked amongst the top companies on Forbes Americas Best Executive Recruiting Firms for 2021. For further information, visit www.boyden.com.

Attachment
HOUSTON, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- 547 Energy International LLC (547 Energy), the global clean energy investment platform of Quantum Energy Partners (Quantum), today announced that it has committed $250 million of equity funding to Aer Soleir, an onshore wind, solar and energy storage company headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. Aer Soleirs strategy is to support Europes ambition to become the worlds first climate-neutral continent by 2050 by developing, constructing, owning and operating renewable energy projects throughout Europe.



Aer Soleir is comprised of 20 employees who are actively sourcing development-stage projects across the European Union. The company is led by its two Founding Partners, Andy Kinsella, as Chief Executive Officer, and Manus ODonnell as Chief Financial Officer. Both Andy and Manus will also support Aer Soleirs growth as Board Directors. Andy Kinsella brings over 35 years of experience in the international energy sector to the business. He has held leadership positions at companies including Irelands Electricity Supply Board (ESB), ESB International, GE, Siemens and most recently Mainstream Renewable Power where he served as CEO. Manus ODonnell was most recently Chief Investment Officer of NTR plc, a Dublin-based investor in, and asset manager of, renewable energy projects with a focus on wind, solar and storage projects in Europe and the U.S. He previously held senior financial leadership positions in Mainstream Renewable Power and Airtricity.

Andy Kinsella, Founding Partner and Chief Executive Officer of Aer Soleir, remarked, We have built a world-class team that is fostering early-stage development and guiding projects successfully through licensing, financing, engineering, construction and operation. As we grow, we are guided by our mission to develop and build best-in-class, large-scale renewable energy transition projects that will provide material, long-lasting economic benefits to communities across Europe.

Manus ODonnell, Founding Partner and Chief Financial Officer of Aer Soleir, said, The timing could not be better to launch Aer Soleir, a European-focused renewable energy platform. We are pleased to have the expertise and the capital that 547 Energy provides, and we look forward to growing our partnerships with emerging developers across Europe.

Gabriel Alonso, Chief Executive Officer of 547 Energy, said, Andy and Manus have assembled a deeply experienced and talented team that will support Europes near-term renewable energy targets and ambition to transition to a clean energy economy. We are confident in Andy, Manus and the teams ability to grow Aer Soleir into a leading European pure-play renewable energy developer, as the team works to develop the projects needed to transition to a clean energy economy.

The demand for renewable energy projects to accomplish Europes energy transition is staggering said Sean ODonnell, Partner and Head of Energy Transition at Quantum. We are pleased to back Andy, Manus and the Aer Soleir team as they work to identify, invest in and guide major renewable energy assets to operation.

About Aer Soleir

Aer Soleir is a values-driven company with a clear sense of vision and mission. As a focused European renewable energy company, we invest in sustainable infrastructure projects from early-stage development and beyond. Leveraging our deep experience in renewable energy and strategic investment, we form alliances with local partners to support and accelerate new opportunities to develop, construct, own, and operate utility scale, onshore wind, solar and energy storage projects throughout Europe.

For more information on Aer Soleir, please visit https://www.aersoleir.com

email info@aersoleir.com

About 547 Energy

547 Energy aims to maximize value for its investors by partnering with leading entrepreneurs who are driving growth in the clean energy economy. To date, 547 Energy has invested in ConnectGen, BlueFloat Energy, Aer Soleir, certain affiliates of ENORA S.A., and NetOn. 547 Energy was founded and is led by industry veteran Gabriel Alonso and is backed by Quantum Energy Partners, a leading provider of capital to the global energy industry. For more information on 547 Energy, please visit www.547energy.com, email info@547energy.com or contact Jeff Muir at jmuir@547energy.com.

Why the name 547 Energy?

The human eye sees color over wavelengths ranging approximately from 400 nanometers (violet) to 700 nanometers (red), with the green sitting at roughly 490 to 575 nanometers. A wavelength of 547 nanometers is visible as electric green, a color which represents the overarching aim of 547 Energy  to advance towards a sustainable energy future.

About Quantum Energy Partners

Founded in 1998, Quantum Energy Partners is a leading global provider of private equity capital to the responsibly sourced energy and energy transition & decarbonization sectors, having managed together with its affiliates more than $18 billion in equity commitments since inception. For more information on Quantum, please visit www.quantumep.com or contact Michael Dalton at +1-713-452-2110.

Media Contact

Ally Copple

Ally@InnovantPR.com

713.201.8800
Dublin, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Airport Retailing Market: Global Industry Trends, Share, Size, Growth, Opportunity and Forecast 2022-2027" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.



The global airport retailing market reached a value of US$ 20.1 Billion in 2021. Looking forward, the publisher expects the market to reach US$ 41.6 Billion by 2027, exhibiting at a CAGR of 10.06% during 2022-2027. Keeping in mind the uncertainties of COVID-19, we are continuously tracking and evaluating the direct as well as the indirect influence of the pandemic. These insights are included in the report as a major market contributor.



Airport retailing includes services like hotels, nursing homes, car rental outlets, exchange offices, banks, and drugstores. It also comprises books and magazines, gifts and crafts, jewelry, clothing and accessories, optics, and souvenirs stores. Besides this, it assists in providing convenience to people traveling by delivering a variety of merchandise. As it also aids in generating brand awareness, airport retailing is finding extensive application in airports across the globe.



Airport Retailing Market Trends:

The flourishing travel and tourism industry on account of rising bleisure travel represents one of the key factors strengthening the growth of the market. Apart from this, a significant increase in the time spent by passengers at airports due to early check-in times for security and operational concerns has positively influenced the demand for airport retailing worldwide. This can also be attributed to the surging disposable incomes and changing lifestyles of individuals around the world.

Furthermore, as retail stores at airports are duty-free, which is exempted payment of local or national taxes, they allow travelers to purchase available products at a relatively cheaper rate. This, in confluence with numerous initiates undertaken by brands to customize their offering and improve the overall shopping experience of travelers, is creating a favorable market outlook.

Moreover, brands are engaging in extensive research activities to collect data related to location, flight schedules, and the number of passengers in the flight. These activities assist brands in keeping check of warehouses, adopting price skimming strategies, and conducting promotional activities to meet the preferences of the customer base. Additionally, the market is projected to impel on account of the rising trend of bringing souvenirs while traveling.



Key Market Segmentation:

The publisher provides an analysis of the key trends in each sub-segment of the global airport retailing market, along with forecasts at the global, regional and country level from 2022-2027. Our report has categorized the market based on product, airport size and distribution channel.



Breakup by Product:

Liquor and Tobacco

Perfumes and Cosmetics

Fashion and Accessories

Food and Beverages

Others

Breakup by Airport Size:

Large Airport

Medium Airport

Small Airport

Breakup by Distribution Channel:

Direct Retailers

Convenience Stores

Specialty Retailers

Departmental Stores

Breakup by Region:

North America

United States

Canada

Asia-Pacific

China

Japan

India

South Korea

Australia

Indonesia

Others

Europe

Germany

France

United Kingdom

Italy

Spain

Russia

Others

Latin America

Brazil

Mexico

Others

Middle East and Africa

Competitive Landscape:

The competitive landscape of the industry has also been examined along with the profiles of the key players being Airport Retail Group LLC, Autogrill S.p.A., China Duty Free Group Co. Ltd. (China International Travel Service Co. Ltd.), DFS Group Ltd. (LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton), Dubai Duty Free, Dufry AG, Duty Free Americas Inc., Flemingo International Ltd., Gebr. Heinemann SE & Co. KG, Japan Airport Terminal Co. Ltd., KING POWER International and Lagardere Travel Retail (Lagardere Group).



Key Questions Answered in This Report:

How has the global airport retailing market performed so far and how will it perform in the coming years?

What has been the impact of COVID-19 on the global airport retailing market?

What are the key regional markets?

What is the breakup of the market based on the product?

What is the breakup of the market based on the airport size?

What is the breakup of the market based on the distribution channel?

What are the various stages in the value chain of the industry?

What are the key driving factors and challenges in the industry?

What is the structure of the global airport retailing market and who are the key players?

What is the degree of competition in the industry?

Key Topics Covered:



1 Preface



2 Scope and Methodology

3 Executive Summary



4 Introduction

4.1 Overview

4.2 Key Industry Trends



5 Global Airport Retailing Market

5.1 Market Overview

5.2 Market Performance

5.3 Impact of COVID-19

5.4 Market Forecast



6 Market Breakup by Product

6.1 Liquor and Tobacco

6.1.1 Market Trends

6.1.2 Market Forecast

6.2 Perfumes and Cosmetics

6.2.1 Market Trends

6.2.2 Market Forecast

6.3 Fashion and Accessories

6.3.1 Market Trends

6.3.2 Market Forecast

6.4 Food and Beverages

6.4.1 Market Trends

6.4.2 Market Forecast

6.5 Others

6.5.1 Market Trends

6.5.2 Market Forecast



7 Market Breakup by Airport Size

7.1 Large Airport

7.1.1 Market Trends

7.1.2 Market Forecast

7.2 Medium Airport

7.2.1 Market Trends

7.2.2 Market Forecast

7.3 Small Airport

7.3.1 Market Trends

7.3.2 Market Forecast



8 Market Breakup by Distribution Channel

8.1 Direct Retailers

8.1.1 Market Trends

8.1.2 Market Forecast

8.2 Convenience Stores

8.2.1 Market Trends

8.2.2 Market Forecast

8.3 Specialty Retailers

8.3.1 Market Trends

8.3.2 Market Forecast

8.4 Departmental Stores

8.4.1 Market Trends

8.4.2 Market Forecast



9 Market Breakup by Region



10 SWOT Analysis



11 Value Chain Analysis



12 Porters Five Forces Analysis



13 Price Analysis



14 Competitive Landscape

14.1 Market Structure

14.2 Key Players

14.3 Profiles of Key Players

14.3.1 Airport Retail Group LLC

14.3.1.1 Company Overview

14.3.1.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.2 Autogrill S.p.A.

14.3.2.1 Company Overview

14.3.2.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.2.3 Financials

14.3.2.4 SWOT Analysis

14.3.3 China Duty Free Group Co. Ltd. (China International Travel Service Co. Ltd.)

14.3.3.1 Company Overview

14.3.3.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.4 DFS Group Ltd. (LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton)

14.3.4.1 Company Overview

14.3.4.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.5 Dubai Duty Free

14.3.5.1 Company Overview

14.3.5.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.6 Dufry AG

14.3.6.1 Company Overview

14.3.6.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.6.3 Financials

14.3.6.4 SWOT Analysis

14.3.7 Duty Free Americas Inc.

14.3.7.1 Company Overview

14.3.7.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.8 Flemingo International Ltd.

14.3.8.1 Company Overview

14.3.8.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.9 Gebr. Heinemann SE & Co. KG

14.3.9.1 Company Overview

14.3.9.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.10 Japan Airport Terminal Co. Ltd.

14.3.10.1 Company Overview

14.3.10.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.10.3 Financials

14.3.11 KING POWER International

14.3.11.1 Company Overview

14.3.11.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.12 Lagardere Travel Retail (Lagardere Group)

14.3.12.1 Company Overview

14.3.12.2 Product Portfolio

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/bx688u

Attachment
YERINGTON, Nev., April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Nevada Copper Corp. (TSX: NCU) (OTC: NEVDF) (FSE: ZYTA) (Nevada Copper or the Company) today announced positive operations advances at its Pumpkin Hollow Project (the Project), including record monthly production and continued expectation of up to 5kptd achieved in Q3 as planned, and previously guided.

We are pleased with the progress continuing to show at Pumpkin Hollow at the underground mine, open pit project, and exploration initiatives, stated Randy Buffington, CEO and President of Nevada Copper. The team has done a remarkable job of continuing to safely advance the ramp-up in the key areas of development, stoping, and processing. We look forward to continuing this progress towards steady state production on schedule for later this year.

March Operations Highlights

Underground Mine

Record Copper Production. In March, as the company continues to improve stoping rates, record copper production was achieved. 1,300dmt of copper concentrates were produced during the last 30 days from multiple stopes, including the high-grade Sugar Cube zone. The commissioning of the paste plant line, planned to be completed in April 2022, along with other operational improvements, is projected to facilitate quicker stope turnover leading to further increases in hoisting and production rates.





In March, as the company continues to improve stoping rates, record copper production was achieved. 1,300dmt of copper concentrates were produced during the last 30 days from multiple stopes, including the high-grade Sugar Cube zone. The commissioning of the paste plant line, planned to be completed in April 2022, along with other operational improvements, is projected to facilitate quicker stope turnover leading to further increases in hoisting and production rates. 3ktpd Hoisting Achieved in March. Peak 7-day continuous hoisting rates reached 2,600 tpd in March, including achieving hoisting of 3ktpd earlier than anticipated which represents a significant production ramp-up progress milestone. Operational focus is on sustaining and increasing the 3ktpd rate in Q2, and the plan remains to reach a capacity of 4.5k to 5ktpd during Q3 2022 as previously announced.





Peak 7-day continuous hoisting rates reached 2,600 tpd in March, including achieving hoisting of 3ktpd earlier than anticipated which represents a significant production ramp-up progress milestone. Operational focus is on sustaining and increasing the 3ktpd rate in Q2, and the plan remains to reach a capacity of 4.5k to 5ktpd during Q3 2022 as previously announced. Ramp-up Continues Positive Momentum. Q1 2022 development rates are a 32% quarter-on-quarter increase over Q4 2021. Q1 2022 hoisted ore tons are a 73% quarter-on quarter increase over Q4 2021. Stope ore tons hoisted are a 17% quarter-on-quarter increase over Q4 2021, continuing the trajectory of month-on-month increases over the past 6 months. Enhanced contractor management procedures and key performance indicators are in place to further increase productivity going forward and allow greater access to additional stopes.





Q1 2022 development rates are a 32% quarter-on-quarter increase over Q4 2021. Q1 2022 hoisted ore tons are a 73% quarter-on quarter increase over Q4 2021. Stope ore tons hoisted are a 17% quarter-on-quarter increase over Q4 2021, continuing the trajectory of month-on-month increases over the past 6 months. Enhanced contractor management procedures and key performance indicators are in place to further increase productivity going forward and allow greater access to additional stopes. Ventilation Infrastructure on site. All surface ventilation infrastructure arrived as planned in Q1 2022. The commissioning of the surface ventilation fans has been optimized to allow for the prioritization of ore development and is planned to be completed in Q2 in line with increased production.





All surface ventilation infrastructure arrived as planned in Q1 2022. The commissioning of the surface ventilation fans has been optimized to allow for the prioritization of ore development and is planned to be completed in Q2 in line with increased production. Q2 Milestones to increase ore hoisting rates.



Completion of paste plant commissioning, enabling significantly faster stope cycles Mining of additional high-grade ore zones Construction of a third ore pass advanced, which when completed, enables a further increase in ore handling rates towards nameplate capacity Sequentially higher month-on-month hoisted volumes and concentrate production Completion of current dike heading to access further higher grade stopes



Previous Constraints Addressed. Most constraints encountered in Q4 2021 and early Q1 2022 have been resolved during Q1. The bolting fleet was refurbished, resulting in demonstrated increases in equipment availability; a damaged remote loader has been scheduled to be replaced shortly; lower contractor delivery was resolved and new KPIs agreed. While these items, plus higher property taxes, increased the cost of ramp-up execution beyond plan, the Company expects to obtain sufficient funds to address these additional costs, including the $15m accordion to its existing Credit Facility.



Open Pit Project

Drill Program has commenced. Drill rigs are scheduled to arrive to site in the coming weeks and drilling to commence this month. The initial focus of the program will be in-fill and extension drilling of the open pit, to follow up on the last drilling program which identified significant additional mineralization and indicated the orebody which remains open in multiple directions, extends beyond the original pit boundary. The drilling program will also provide updated geological information for advancing the fully permitted Open Pit Project into feasibility evaluation reflecting opportunities for increased scale, larger resource and other optimization workstreams. An updated prefeasibility study is expected in Q3 2022 to incorporate the higher copper price environment.





Drill rigs are scheduled to arrive to site in the coming weeks and drilling to commence this month. The initial focus of the program will be in-fill and extension drilling of the open pit, to follow up on the last drilling program which identified significant additional mineralization and indicated the orebody which remains open in multiple directions, extends beyond the original pit boundary. The drilling program will also provide updated geological information for advancing the fully permitted Open Pit Project into feasibility evaluation reflecting opportunities for increased scale, larger resource and other optimization workstreams. An updated prefeasibility study is expected in Q3 2022 to incorporate the higher copper price environment. Solar Project Progress. The Company has continued to progress the planned feasibility studies for a potential solar project, with renewables consulting group Warm Springs Consulting.



Exploration

The Company continues to review and evaluate its extensive mineral landholdings at and around Pumpkin Hollow. This ongoing review of the detailed aeromagnetic surveys and continued surface reconnaissance will provide a broader understanding of the geologic model and targeting across Nevada Coppers land package.





The review will help direct exploration activities in 2022 on newly acquired lands and targets around the existing deposits. The work on the new ground will include surface mapping, sampling, trenching and follow up drilling. The areas of work include the Porphyry, Tedeboy, Mountain View and Black Mountain targets. Geophysical and structural targets around the existing deposits are expected to be followed up with drilling projected to begin in Q3 2022.



Corporate

On March 31, 2022 the Company filed its audited consolidated annual financial statements, the related managements discussion and analysis and Annual Information Form for the year ended December 31, 2021 on SEDAR.



Qualified Persons

The technical information and data in this news release was reviewed by Greg French, C.P.G., VP Exploration of Nevada Copper, Steven Newman, VP Technical Services of Nevada Copper, and Neil Schunke, P.Eng., a consultant to Nevada Copper, who are non-independent Qualified Persons within the meaning of NI 43-101.

About Nevada Copper

Nevada Copper (TSX: NCU) is a copper producer and owner of the Pumpkin Hollow copper project. Located in Nevada, USA, Pumpkin Hollow has substantial reserves and resources including copper, gold and silver. Its two fully permitted projects include the high-grade underground mine and processing facility, which is now in the production stage, and a large-scale open pit project, which is advancing towards feasibility status.

NEVADA COPPER CORP.

www.nevadacopper.com

Randy Buffington, President and CEO

For further information contact:

Rich Matthews, Investor Relations

Integrous Communications

rmatthews@integcom.us

+1 604 757 7179

Cautionary Language

This news release includes certain statements and information that constitute forward-looking information and forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities laws. All statements in this news release, other than statements of historical facts are forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements and forward-looking information specifically include, but are not limited to, statements that relate to underground mine development, production and ramp-up expectations and objectives, future hoisting and production rates, equipment installation, expectations regarding obtaining additional funding and the other plans of the Company with respect to exploration and development of the Pumpkin Hollow project.

Forward-looking statements and information include statements regarding the expectations and beliefs of management. Often, but not always, forward-looking statements and forward-looking information can be identified by the use of words such as plans, expects, potential, is expected, anticipated, is targeted, budget, scheduled, estimates, forecasts, intends, anticipates, or believes or the negatives thereof or variations of such words and phrases or statements that certain actions, events or results may, could, would, might or will be taken, occur or be achieved. Forward-looking statements or information should not be read as guarantees of future performance and results. They are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results and events to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements or information.

Such risks and uncertainties include, without limitation, those relating to: the ability of the Company to complete the ramp-up of the underground mine within the expected cost estimates and timeframe; requirements for additional capital and no assurance can be given regarding the availability thereof; the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the business and operations of the Company; the state of financial markets; history of losses; dilution; adverse events relating to milling operations, construction, development and ramp-up, including the ability of the Company to address underground development and process plant issues; ground conditions; cost overruns relating to development, construction and ramp-up of the underground mine; loss of material properties; interest rates increase; global economy; limited history of production; future metals price fluctuations; speculative nature of exploration activities; periodic interruptions to exploration, development and mining activities; environmental hazards and liability; industrial accidents; failure of processing and mining equipment to perform as expected; labor disputes; supply problems; uncertainty of production and cost estimates; the interpretation of drill results and the estimation of mineral resources and reserves; changes in project parameters as plans continue to be refined; possible variations in ore reserves, grade of mineralization or recovery rates from managements expectations and the difference may be material; legal and regulatory proceedings and community actions; accidents; title matters; regulatory approvals and restrictions; increased costs and physical risks relating to climate change, including extreme weather events, and new or revised regulations relating to climate change; permitting and licensing; dependence on management information systems and cyber security risks; volatility of the market price of the Companys securities; insurance; competition; hedging activities; currency fluctuations; loss of key employees; other risks of the mining industry as well as those risks discussed in the Companys Managements Discussion and Analysis in respect of the year ended December 31, 2021 and in the section entitled Risk Factors in the Companys Annual Information Form dated March 31, 2022. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described in forward-looking statements or information. The forward-looking statements and information contained in this press release are based upon assumptions management believes to be reasonable, including, without limitation: no adverse development in respect of the property or operations at the Project; no material changes to applicable laws; the ramp-up of operations at the underground mine in accordance with managements plans and expectations; no worsening of the current COVID-19 related work restrictions; reduced impacts of COVID-19 going forward; the Company will be able to obtain sufficient additional funding to complete the ramp-up, no material adverse change to the price of copper from current levels; and the absence of any other factors that could cause actions, events or results to differ from those anticipated, estimated or intended.

The forward-looking information or statements are stated as of the date hereof. Nevada Copper disclaims any intent or obligation to update forward-looking statements or information except as required by law. Readers are referred to the additional information regarding Nevada Coppers business contained in Nevada Coppers reports filed with the securities regulatory authorities in Canada. Although the Company has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual actions, events, or results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that could cause actions, events or results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. For more information on Nevada Copper and the risks and challenges of its business, investors should review Nevada Coppers filings that are available at www.sedar.com.

Nevada Copper provides no assurance that forward-looking statements and information will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements or information. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements or information.
New York, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Global Flexible Solar Panels Market Size, Share & Industry Trends Analysis Report By Type, By Application, By Regional Outlook and Forecast, 2021 - 2027" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06249493/?utm_source=GNW

This method produces a substantially thinner product than standard polycrystalline or monocrystalline solar panels. In comparison to traditional solar panels, they are more flexible and lighter, which means that the roof simply needs to support a relatively lighter infrastructure that does not necessitate racks. This lowers the cost of production and installation.



As the unit of measurement to confirm the growth of civilization and a comfortable living environment for people, energy plays a major part in the development of numerous industries. The rapid advancement of technology and the conversion of most fuel-powered equipment to electrical power has raised the demand for clean energy resources.



For instance, the European Union launched a "green deal" scheme in order to access the massive solar roof potential of the European region in order to meet its carbon emission targets by 2050. A data center in Mumbai features one of the biggest buildings integrated with vertical solar PV systems in the world, with a capacity of over 1MW and a facade area of over 5000 square feet.



Photovoltaic (PV) devices turn sunlight directly into electricity. Photovoltaic cells of various sorts are essential components of a PV power system, also called solar cells. These components are integrated and encapsulated to produce a photovoltaic module, which is a mounting structure for grid-connected and off-grid solar panels. Solar energy is also renewable, which aids countries in achieving their policy objectives for reliable, secure, and inexpensive energy, as well as providing power access with less price volatility and promoting social and economic growth.



COVID-19 Impact



The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has substantially devastated economies across the world. Due to the pandemic, various businesses, irrespective of their sizes, were severely demolished. In addition, various governments across the world were forced to impose lockdown in their countries in order to regulate the spread of the COVID-19 infection. Moreover, various countries enforced travel restrictions as well as trade limitations, due to which, the worldwide supply chain was considerably disrupted. The COVID-19 pandemic also had a negative impact on the flexible solar panels market. It had a significant impact on energy systems across the world, as a major reduction in investments was observed. Moreover, production facilities of flexible solar panels were shut, which substantially halted the production of these solar panels.



Market Growth Factors:



Increasing applications of flexible solar panels in various verticals



Flexible solar panels have a number of advantages over traditional solar panels. They can be mounted on low-load supporting roofs that would. The lack of structural elements such as ballasts, or roof penetrations makes installation easier and lowers labor costs. Flexible Thin-Film Applications that are popular due to their toughness and versatility, certain flexible solar panel technologies are particularly well suited to marine applications, such as aboard boats and yachts, where traditional solar panels can not be installed. In addition, there is also a type of ultra-thin film solar panel that can be bent as much as a thin sheet of plastic.



Increased demand for flexible solar panels in remote areas



Flexible thin-film solar panels are prevailing in the market for a long duration. Amorphous silicon, a non-crystalline type of silicon, was used to create the first generation of flexible thin-film photovoltaic (PV) modules. While early generation a-Si thin-film modules were lightweight and flexible, they had a poor power output, with a power efficiency of only 5 to 6%, implying that only 5 to 6% of the suns energy was turned into electricity. As a result, the power density was low, necessitating a huge surface to produce a power output comparable to crystalline silicon modules.



More than 73 million households in remote areas across the world get electricity from solar lanterns, solar home systems, and local solar-based micro-grids, instead of a conventional power grid. Off-grid systems and devices provide advanced and enhanced services to those who live in areas without access to centralized electrical grids, as well as helping to spread the usage of renewable energy.



Market Restraining Factors:



Less effective and more fragile in comparison to rigid solar panels



Flexible solar panels are less efficient when compared to rigid panels. While rigid crystalline panels possess increased efficiency, ranging from 16% to 23%, flexible solar panels have efficiencies ranging from 10% to 17%. This is due to the fact that flexible panels thin semiconductor films have less material to interact with sunlight. In addition, when compared to crystalline silicon in rigid panels, the semiconductor material utilized in flexible panels displays reduced efficiency.



Flexible solar panels can be easily bent and flexed to an extent. However, excessive bending and flexing might lead the solar cells to shatter. In addition, a solar cell can be cracked with just one bad strike, and cracked cells have a decreased efficiency. Rigid panels feature a glass overlay that can protect them from various elements.



Type Outlook



Based on Type, the market is segmented into Copper Indium Gallium Selenide, Cadmium Telluride, Amorphous Silicon and Others. In 2020, the cadmium telluride segment registered a substantial revenue share of the flexible solar panel market. Thin solar panels are made of different photovoltaic materials than crystalline silicon solar panels. Cadmium telluride is an example of a thin-film solar panel. Thin-film solar panels are extremely thin because the photovoltaic material is printed onto a plastic surface rather than covered between a top and bottom protective layer like many other types of solar panels.



Application Outlook



Based on Application, the market is segmented into Industrial, Residential, Aerospace, Automobile, and Others. In 2020, the industrial segment garnered the largest revenue share of the flexible solar panel market. Low-wattage equipment used in industries, such as lights, cameras, and others, are powered by flexible solar panels integrated into the building. The growing need for flexible solar panels is due to the rising demand for green energy to meet with the surge in the use of electricity-driven heavy-duty machinery and automation in the manufacturing industries.



Regional Outlook



Based on Regions, the market is segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Latin America, Middle East & Africa. In 2020, Asia-Pacific witnessed the largest revenue share of the flexible solar panel market. The increasing growth of this segment is owing to the increasing consumption of solar panels across the region. Moreover, the regional market is flourishing due to the increasing number of developments across countries like India and China.



The market research report covers the analysis of key stake holders of the market. Key companies profiled in the report include Hanergy Holding Group Ltd., Enecom Srl, Flisom AG, PowerFilm Solar, Inc., SoloPower Systems, Inc., Solbian Energie Alternative Srl, Sun Harmonics co. ltd., Jinko Solar Holding Co., Ltd., Trina Solar Co., Ltd., and JA Solar Holdings Co., Ltd.



Strategies deployed in Flexible Solar Panels Market



Dec-2021: Jinko Solar came into a partnership with Aldo Solar, the leading supplier of solar energy solutions in Brazil. Through this partnership, the company aimed to grab growth opportunities in Brazil.



Jan-2021: Hanergy Thin Film Power Group signed an agreement with Forest Group, Japanese construction, and solar power conglomerate. Together, the companies focused on optimization in Japans photovoltaic market by combining their expertise and rich sectorial experience.



Apr-2020: Flisom expanded its global footprint by establishing its first high-capacity Solar Panel facility, the HUF12.5bn plant in Kecskemet. Through this expansion, the company aimed to support the Hungarian government by leveraging the expertise of Hungarian engineers and skilled workers.



Jun-2019: MiaSole Hi-Tech, a subsidiary of Hanergy Holding Group introduced an update in the worlds strongest production thin-film solar module, the FLEX-03W solar module. The enhanced flexible ultra-light solar solution version is stronger and delivers up to 540W in only 5.6kg as well as enables solar power generation wherever the sun shines and empowers the next generation of flexible solar technology.



Apr-2019: Alta Devices, a subsidiary of Hanergy Holding Group introduced a new solar solution. The launch aimed to satisfy the specified requirements of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) which can perform as platforms for cellular and IoT connectivity. Moreover, this solution would provide best-in-class features to increase power, reduce weight and offer sufficient safety from the strident environment commonly found in the Earths stratosphere.



Mar-2019: Global Solar Energy, a subsidiary of Hanergy Holding Group rolled out an FG-M1 55-watt panel, the latest form factor of its flexible PowerFLEX+ solar panel. The launch aimed to fit more applications like marine, mobile, off-grid, and RV installations. Moreover, the product provides higher performance and efficiency when partly shaded and at lesser than ideal angles to the sun.



Jan-2018: PowerFilm Solar introduced its US-assembled custom crystalline solar solutions under the brand name Soltronix. The launch aimed to offer a small window at US-based assembly companies for the import of tariff-free cells.



May-2017: Flisom AG came into a partnership with Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (Empa). The partnership aimed to make sure that the companys products carry on the cutting edge of solar thin-film offerings.



Scope of the Study



Market Segments covered in the Report:



By Type



 Copper Indium Gallium Selenide



 Cadmium Telluride



 Amorphous Silicon



 Others



By Application



 Industrial



 Residential



 Aerospace



 Automobile



 Others



By Geography



 North America



o US



o Canada



o Mexico



o Rest of North America



 Europe



o Germany



o UK



o France



o Russia



o Spain



o Italy



o Rest of Europe



 Asia Pacific



o China



o Japan



o India



o South Korea



o Singapore



o Malaysia



o Rest of Asia Pacific



 LAMEA



o Brazil



o Argentina



o UAE



o Saudi Arabia



o South Africa



o Nigeria



o Rest of LAMEA



Companies Profiled



 Hanergy Holding Group Ltd.



 Enecom Srl



 Flisom AG



 PowerFilm Solar, Inc.



 SoloPower Systems, Inc.



 Solbian Energie Alternative Srl



 Sun Harmonics co. ltd.



 Jinko Solar Holding Co., Ltd.



 Trina Solar Co., Ltd.



 JA Solar Holdings Co., Ltd.



Unique Offerings



 Exhaustive coverage



 Highest number of market tables and figures



 Subscription based model available



 Guaranteed best price



 Assured post sales research support with 10% customization free

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06249493/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



__________________________
Dublin, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Malaysia Construction Market Size, Trends and Forecasts by Sector - Commercial, Industrial, Infrastructure, Energy and Utilities, Institutional and Residential Market Analysis, 2020-2025" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.



The Malaysian construction industry grew by an estimated 1.5% in real terms in 2021, following an annual decline of 19.4% in 2020

The industry's output in 2021 was supported by an improvement in wider economic activity and more favorable external demand. Despite remaining stable in the first half of last year, construction activities plummeted in the third quarter of 2021, due to weakness in civil engineering, residential and non-residential building construction activity.

As a result, the Malaysian construction industry contracted by 2.6% year on year (YoY) in the first three quarters of 2021, according to the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM). The industry is expected to have registered positive growth in the final quarter of 2021, supported by a fall in Coronavirus (COVID-19) infections and the subsequent relaxation of restrictions. However, severe flooding towards the end of Q4 2021 may slow growth in early Q1 2022.



GlobalData expects the Malaysian construction industry to expand by 16.5% this year, supported by further improving economic conditions, the government's focus on completing large infrastructure projects, and increased investment on industrial and energy projects.

In December 2021, the Malaysian parliament passed the government's budget for 2022, approving an expenditure of MYR332.1 billion ($81.8 billion). The budget includes an allocation of MYR75.6 billion ($18.6 billion) for development expenditure, as well as a number of incentives to improve employment rates and support businesses.



The construction industry is expected to register an annual average growth of 6.2% between 2023 and 2026, driven by investment in large-scale transport and energy projects. In September 2021, the government announced its plan to establish the Public Private Partnership (PPP) 3.0 model, a specialized mechanism to fund infrastructure projects in the 12th Malaysia (12MP) plan between 2021 and 2025.

In June 2021, the government unveiled its energy transition plans until 2040, aiming to increase the proportion of renewable energy in the total energy mix from 2% in 2019, to 31% by 2025 and 40% by 2035. As part of the 12MP, the government announced its goal of developing 120 cities to achieve sustainable city status by 2025, by providing additional support to private sector projects implementing strategic development programmes. The government also intends to construct 500,000 affordable houses by 2025.

Scope

Historical (2017-2021) and forecast (2022-2026) valuations of the construction industry in Malaysia, featuring details of key growth drivers.

Segmentation by sector (commercial, industrial, infrastructure, energy and utilities, institutional and residential) and by sub-sector

Analysis of the mega-project pipeline, including breakdowns by development stage across all sectors, and projected spending on projects in the existing pipeline.

Listings of major projects, in addition to details of leading contractors and consultants

Key Topics Covered:



1 Executive Summary



2 Construction Industry: At-A-Glance



3 Context

3.1 Economic Performance

3.2 Political Environment and Policy

3.3 Demographics

3.4 Covid-19 Status

3.5 Risk Profile



4 Construction Outlook

4.1 All Construction

Outlook

Latest News and Developments

Construction Projects Momentum Index

4.2 Commercial Construction

Outlook

Project AnalyticsLa

test News and Developments

4.3 Industrial Construction

Outlook

Project Analytics

Latest News and Developments

4.4 Infrastructure Construction

Outlook

Project Analytics

Latest News and Developments

4.5 Energy and Utilities Construction

Outlook

Project Analytics

Latest News and Developments

4.6 Institutional Construction

Outlook

Project Analytics

Latest News and Developments

4.7 Residential Construction

Outlook

Project Analytics

Latest News and Developments

5 Key Industry Participants

5.1 Contractors

5.2 Consultants



6 Construction Market Data



7 Appendix



For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/5a80qe
New York, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Global Emergency Lighting Market Size, Share & Industry Trends Analysis Report By Offering, By Power System, By Lighting Type, By Application, By Regional Outlook and Forecast, 2021 - 2027" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06249486/?utm_source=GNW

In addition, in case of a fire emergency, a power outage, or the breakdown of typical lighting supplies can all cause the primary power source to fail. Emergency lights are widely being employed in various newly constructed offices and dwellings. It can also be used in a variety of settings, including residential, commercial, and industrial.



One of the most crucial technological developments in emergency lighting has been the incorporation of LEDs in green or red exit signs. Several exit signs in the emergency lighting sector now utilize emergency lighting technology because it is more cost-effective, long-lasting, and energy-efficient than other traditional illumination sources. This emergency lighting is also necessary in public venues such as schools, industrial infrastructure, hospitals, and other public places so that people can safely be rescued in the case of an emergency.



One of the most significant benefits of the emergency light is its substantial energy density of lithium-based batteries, combined with their long life, which is double that of Ni-Cd (nickel-cadmium) batteries and NiMH (nickel-metal hydride). Additionally, the increased adoption of LEDs and the combination of emergency lighting and aesthetic lighting are key factors that are allowing manufacturers to bring more developments to their products.



It prevents the user from becoming trapped in a tough circumstance due to a sudden blackout and allows the user to quickly create an emergency light. This circuit replaces incandescent lamps with light-emitting diodes, resulting in a circuit that is both energy-efficient and brighter with its illuminance. Additionally, the circuit employs a novel theory to improve the economic performance of the unit.



COVID-19 Impact



The COVID-19 outbreak had a severe impact on society and the economy around the world. The pandemics impact on the supply chain has been increasing day by day. This has caused stock market uncertainty, as well as lowered corporate confidence, hindered supply chains, and increased consumer concerns. Due to the suspension of manufacturing services across the world, various countries under lockdown experienced major losses of businesses and money. The emergence of COVID-19 also had a significant impact on production and manufacturing operations, resulting in a decline in the growth of the emergency lighting market.



COVID-19s continued spread has become one of the worlds most serious economic risks, bringing widespread concern and economic suffering for consumers, businesses, and communities around the world.



Market Growth Factors



Increasing number of government initiatives



Various governments are planning to build world-class infrastructure across their countries in order to attract key investors from all over the world. In addition, many governments have announced the development and construction of numerous smart city projects. The goal of these projects is to incorporate automatic and comprehensive emergency lighting systems.



Moreover, NFPA 70 - National Electric Code, International Fire Code, Advanced Occupational Safety and Health Administration Code of Federal Regulations, Advanced, Latest Standard Fire Prevention Code 1999, NFPA 101 - Life Safety Code, and NFPA 1997 5-9.3 are a few of the primary regulations for primary testing, maintaining, and regulating advanced emergency lighting systems all over the world.



Reducing LED Prices



Emergency lighting is typically characterized as basic lighting with the ability to turn on automatically when there is no specific source of continuous power supply or if any normal lighting malfunctions on a regular basis. Most modern structures now include an emergency light that can be installed during the construction process. In the industrial context, LEDs can save up to 70% of energy. Moreover, the incorporation of LEDs into the security sector is likely to have a substantial advantage on the emergency lighting industry because of their great controllability.



The fundamental, as well as one of the most important factors that are increasing the popularity of emergency lighting systems, is the steady drop in average selling prices of light-emitting diodes. Because of their low energy efficiency and long-life cycle, LEDs are widely being employed in the emergency lighting industry, due to which, the overall cost of the emergency lighting systems are being reduced.



Market Restraining Factors



High initial investment and maintenance cost



The initial investment that is required for the deployment of efficient emergency lighting systems, such as capital investment and operational cost, is very high. Architects, electrical experts, and lighting designers have numerous issues when it comes to providing sufficient emergency lighting. The required information about the premises must be collected either through blueprints, site surveys, or the building in-charge at the commencement of any emergency lighting design. the inadequate information of all these factors may result in poor and inefficient design and installation of the emergency lighting systems.



The high capital investment can result in the incorporation of low-quality components in the emergency lighting systems. While emergency lighting goods are required by law and are an important construction component, badly designed lighting products are likely to suffer from a lower aesthetic appeal.



Offering Outlook



Based on Offering, the market is segmented into Hardware, Software, and Services. In 2020, the Hardware segment acquired the largest revenue share of the emergency lighting market. LED lights, incandescent lights, fluorescent lights, test buttons, led drivers, battery, emergency light module, charge indication, housing, and a variety of additional hardware components are used to operate an emergency lighting system. In addition, batteries and modules are the major hardware components of the emergency lighting system.



Power System Outlook



Based on Power System, the market is segmented into Self-Contained Power System, Central Power System, and Hybrid Power System. In 2020, the Central power segment recorded a substantial revenue share of the emergency lighting market. Emergency lighting based on central power systems is less complicated to maintain and survive longer than emergency lights with self-contained or hybrid power systems. This attribute makes the central power system easier to install and operate. Hence, the growth of this segment is being driven by this factor.



Lighting Type Outlook



Based on Lighting Type, the market is segmented into LED, Fluorescent Lighting, Incandescent, and Others. In 2020, the LED segment procured the largest revenue share of the emergency lighting market. LEDs are energy-efficient, and their cost has been steadily decreasing in recent years. As a result, theyre commonly being employed in emergency lighting systems. In addition, LEDs are becoming more popular due to government measures such as the ban on incandescent lighting. Moreover, these lights are very controllable as the integrity of these lights can vary on the basis of requirements when coupled with a driver.



Application Outlook



Based on Application, the market is segmented into Industrial, Commercial, and Residential. In 2020, the Commercial segment accounted for a substantial revenue share of the emergency lighting market. The rising growth of this segment is owing to the increasing utilization of emergency lighting systems in the corporate sector. A sudden power cut can pose a major challenge for the output of an organization and can significant losses. For instance, the emergency lighting solution prevents an organizations server from going down in case of a power cut. Hence, the utilization of energy lighting systems in the commercial sector is constantly increasing.



Regional Outlook



Based on Regions, the market is segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Latin America, Middle East & Africa. In 2020, Europe held a substantial revenue share of the emergency lighting market. The rise in the demand for emergency lights across the region is being driven by the development of smart cities in Germany, France, Italy, and the UK, as well as increased safety awareness in these countries. Moreover, governments in this country are encouraging the utilization of energy-efficient lighting, which is driving the adoption of LEDs. Therefore, the regional market is flourishing.



The market research report covers the analysis of key stake holders of the market. Key companies profiled in the report include Zumtobel Group AG, Acuity Brands Lighting, Inc., Emerson Electric Co., Legrand S.A., Signify N.V. (Cooper Lighting, LLC), Koninklijke Philips N.V., AMS AG (OSRAM Licth AG), Schneider Electric SE, Beghelli S.p.A., and Daisalux, S.A.



Strategies Deployed in Emergency Lighting Market



Oct-2021: SCHNEIDER ELECTRIC merged with SESCO Lighting, the most successful lighting manufacturers representative company to form one company. This merger aimed to expand its reach into South Carolina.



Aug-2021: Zumtobel teamed up a joint-product development with NICHIA, the worlds largest LED manufacturer and inventor of the high-brightness blue and white LEDs. The collaboration aimed to develop a new offering to the consumers. Moreover, Zumtobel and NICHIA launched ZUMTOBEL Spectrum, a lighting solution developed for its luminaires that harness proprietary technologies.



Jun-2021: Acuity Brands signed an agreement to acquire ams OSRAMs North American Digital Systems, which develops and manufactures lighting components including LED drivers, LED light engines, electronic ballasts, and certain connected components. Under this acquisition, the company would bring strategic fit and perspective to consumers and associates to grow strategy for their business along with that, the company would expand its advanced LED driver portfolio, which currently includes the IOTA emergency driver and eldoLED driver.



Oct-2020: Schneider Electric formed a technological and commercial partnership with SolarEdge Technologies, a provider of power optimizers, solar inverters, and monitoring systems for photovoltaic arrays. Under this partnership, the companies aimed to provide homeowners with seamless energy management to boost up the urban solar market with the help of Schneider Electrics expertise in energy distribution and automation solutions and SolarEdges Solar, Backup, and smart energy management solutions. Additionally to serve, the need for solar for the new home construction in California, as part of California Energy Commission updates to Title 24 Building Energy Efficiency Standards.



Dec-2019: Acuity Brands launched Renna luminaires from Peerless, an innovation in rectilinear lighting combining superior technology. The product delivers indirect, direct, or bidirectional illumination of space without the concentrated light distribution familiar to small LED luminaires. Furthermore, the product light scatters uniformly over the surface, which decreases the number of fixtures required for installations.



Dec-2018: Legrand took over Kenall, a manufacturer of innovative, energy-efficient, and sustainable specification-grade lighting and control solutions. The acquisition aimed to compete in additional market segments, with the product demand as well as pitching to the lighting specification community.



May-2018: Acuity Brands acquired IOTA Engineering, a Tucson, AZ-based manufacturer of highly engineered emergency lighting products. Following the acquisition, the company aimed to support the expansive smart building and lighting solutions strategy of Acuity Brands.



May-2018: Philips Lighting took over Shenzhen LiteMagic Technologies, a Chinese manufacturer and seller of lighting luminaires and control systems for urban and facade lighting. Following the acquisition, the company aimed to expand its high-end offering of facade lighting with luminaires and control systems offering to capture growth in the mid-segment of the urban market. Moreover, it would help the company to grow in the large and fast-growing market for urban lighting in China.



Scope of the Study



Market Segments covered in the Report:



By Offering



 Hardware



 Software



 Services



By Power System



 Self-Contained Power System



 Central Power System



 Hybrid Power System



By Lighting Type



 LED



 Fluorescent Lighting



 Incandescent



 Others



By Application



 Industrial



 Commercial



 Residential



By Geography



 North America



o US



o Canada



o Mexico



o Rest of North America



 Europe



o Germany



o UK



o France



o Russia



o Spain



o Italy



o Rest of Europe



 Asia Pacific



o China



o Japan



o India



o South Korea



o Singapore



o Malaysia



o Rest of Asia Pacific



 LAMEA



o Brazil



o Argentina



o UAE



o Saudi Arabia



o South Africa



o Nigeria



o Rest of LAMEA



Companies Profiled



 Zumtobel Group AG



 Acuity Brands Lighting, Inc.



 Emerson Electric Co.



 Legrand S.A.



 Signify N.V. (Cooper Lighting, LLC)



 Koninklijke Philips N.V.



 AMS AG (OSRAM Licth AG)



 Schneider Electric SE



 Beghelli S.p.A.



 Daisalux, S.A.



Unique Offerings



 Exhaustive coverage



 Highest number of market tables and figures



 Subscription based model available



 Guaranteed best price



 Assured post sales research support with 10% customization free

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06249486/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



__________________________
A Fuxing bullet train enters Nyingchi Railway Station on the Lhasa-Nyingchi railway in Nyingchi, southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, March 31, 2022. (Xinhua/Han Xile)

LHASA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- On a sunny spring day, a green Fuxing bullet train ran through the mountains along the Yarlung Zangbo River, heading for Nyingchi, a city known for its peach blossoms in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region.

Liu Lili didn't want to miss the peach blossom season. Working in a clothing store in the city of Xigaze, she bought a C893 train ticket from Xigaze to Nyingchi, planning to visit her sister there and enjoy the peach blossoms together with her.

"When the train passed through the Lhasa station, I thought most passengers on the carriage would get off. To my surprise, they also headed to Nyingchi to see the flowers like me," said Liu, 25.

This was the first spring since the Lhasa-Nyingchi Railway opened for operation on June 25, 2021. The first electrified railway in Tibet, with a designed train speed of 160 kph, has cut the travel time from some five hours by bus to three and a half hours.

On the platform of the Lhasa railway station, 36-year-old station worker Tashi Dondrup watched passengers board the C893 train.

Tashi Dondrup, a native of the regional capital Lhasa, had to take a plane in 2002 when he headed to school in Wuhan, capital of central China's Hubei Province, because there were no trains in Tibet. After he started working in 2006, he witnessed the development of rail transport in the plateau region.

In July 2006, the Qinghai-Tibet Railway linking Lhasa and Xining, capital of Qinghai Province, went operational, ending the pre-railways period in Tibet. In August 2014, the Lhasa-Xigaze Railway opened for operation as the first extension line of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway. In June 2021, when the Lhasa-Nyingchi Railway was put into operation, Fuxing bullet trains ran in the plateau region for the first time.

The Lhasa railway station has witnessed explosive growth in passenger flow, surging from 2.24 million in 2007 to more than 4 million in 2021.

"The original four waiting halls can no longer meet the demand. We are now renovating the station to provide another two rooms for passengers to wait for trains," Tashi Dondrup said.

Now, bullet trains have connected Lhasa, Nyingchi, Shannan and Xigaze, whose combined GDP accounts for more than 70 percent of the region's total. Railway transportation has further driven the economic growth of the cities.

Sonam Tobgye, a farmer from Changzhug Township, Nedong District in the city of Shannan, often takes the train to Lhasa to visit his daughter. His home is located at the foot of Yumbulagang, Tibet's first palace, dating back more than 2,000 years, which is a popular tourist attraction in Shannan.

The 67-year-old said the new railway not only makes travel easier, but also brings more tourists, as well as tourism revenue, to his hometown.

"Some of my fellow villagers sell souvenirs, some run tea houses and some provide horse-riding services for tourists. Their wallets have become much fatter," he said.

Near the Nyingchi railway station, Nyima Chodron operates a Tibetan restaurant with her husband. The farmer from a nearby village said their restaurant has received more customers since the operation of the Lhasa-Nyingchi Railway, with the profit reaching 100,000 yuan (about 15,746 U.S. dollars) last year.

"I believe more guests will come when the epidemic ends," she said.

Government figures show that the per capita disposable income of urban and rural residents in the city of Nyingchi reached 41,346 yuan and 21,767 yuan, respectively, in 2021, up 13.3 percent and 15.8 percent over the previous year. The number of tourists in the city exceeded 10 million, and the tourism income reached a record high of 8.3 billion yuan.

Railway figures show that the Lhasa-Nyingchi Railway has transported 977,100 passengers since its opening. Up to 40,000 tonnes of cargo has arrived in Nyingchi by train.

Local villager Penpa, 38, used to transport materials for the construction of the railway. After the railway opened, he started a logistics company, with four trucks delivering cargo, such as daily necessities, feedstuff and construction materials, from the railway station to elsewhere in the city.

"The railway freight charge is at least one-third lower than road transportation. I believe I will have more business in the future," he said. 

Local villager Penpa works at the Nyingchi railway station in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, March 29, 2022. (Xinhua/Lodro Gyatso)

Nyima Chodron arranges beverages at the Tibetan restaurant run by her family near the Nyingchi railway station in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, March 28, 2022. (Xinhua/Han Xile)

Aerial photo taken on March 28, 2022 shows peach blossoms at a village in Nyingchi, southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region. (Xinhua/Lodro Gyatso)
Dublin, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Pet Furniture Market: Global Industry Trends, Share, Size, Growth, Opportunity and Forecast 2022-2027" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.



The global pet furniture market reached a value of US$ 3.3 Billion in 2021. Looking forward, the publisher expects the market to reach US$ 4.5 Billion by 2027, exhibiting at a CAGR of 5.33% during 2022-2027. Keeping in mind the uncertainties of COVID-19, we are continuously tracking and evaluating the direct as well as the indirect influence of the pandemic. These insights are included in the report as a major market contributor.



Pet furniture, also known as animal-friendly furniture, is designed to meet the needs of different pets, including dogs, cats, rabbits, hamsters, and fish. It is made using safe and durable materials to suit the natural needs and behavior of pets. Some of the commonly used pet furniture includes beds, hammocks, doghouses, dog coolers, cat trees, parrot tents, and play equipment. At present, it is widely available in numerous shapes, sizes and colors among pet specialty stores and other markets.



Pet Furniture Market Trends:

The increasing adoption of pets, especially among the millennial population, across the globe represents one of the key factors bolstering the growth of the market. Apart from this, as domestic animals are treated like family members, there is an increase in spending on toys, travel accessories, beds, clothing items, collars, leashes, medicine, gift, bowls and grooming and veterinary services.

This, in confluence with the rising availability of pet insurance, is contributing to market growth. Moreover, there is a significant rise in the demand for innovative and fashionable pet accessories, such as furniture. As a result, leading market players are focusing on multi-functional and stylish product innovation to meet consumer preferences.

They are also following a design-centric approach to compliment the home decor of the pet owners and consequently employing designer prints and premium fabrics, faux furs, and wickers for the product manufacturing. Besides this, they are utilizing natural and environment-friendly raw materials, such as jute and banana leaves. In addition, a rise in the trend of bringing and keeping pets in offices is positively influencing the demand for multi-functional pet furniture, which is acting as another growth-inducing factor.



Key Market Segmentation:

The publisher provides an analysis of the key trends in each sub-segment of the global pet furniture market, along with forecasts at the global, regional and country level from 2022-2027. Our report has categorized the market based on product, application and distribution channel.



Breakup by Product:

Beds and Sofas

Houses

Trees and Condos

Others

Breakup by Application:

Cats

Dogs

Others

Breakup by Distribution Channel:

Specialty Stores

Supermarkets and Hypermarkets

Online Stores

Others

Breakup by Region:

North America

United States

Canada

Asia-Pacific

China

Japan

India

South Korea

Australia

Indonesia

Others

Europe

Germany

France

United Kingdom

Italy

Spain

Russia

Others

Latin America

Brazil

Mexico

Others

Middle East and Africa

Competitive Landscape:

The competitive landscape of the industry has also been examined along with the profiles of the key players being Custom Quality Pet Furniture LLC, Furhaven Pet Products, Go Pet Club LLC, Inter IKEA Holding B.V., Luxury Pet Furniture Ltd, MidWest Homes For Pets, North American Pet, Pet Gear Inc, PetPals Group Inc, Prevue Pet Products Inc., Shanghai Senful Pet Products Co.Ltd. and Ware Pet Products.



Key Questions Answered in This Report:

How has the global pet furniture market performed so far and how will it perform in the coming years?

What has been the impact of COVID-19 on the global pet furniture market?

What are the key regional markets?

What is the breakup of the market based on the product?

What is the breakup of the market based on the application?

What is the breakup of the market based on the distribution channel?

What are the various stages in the value chain of the industry?

What are the key driving factors and challenges in the industry?

What is the structure of the global pet furniture market and who are the key players?

What is the degree of competition in the industry?

Key Topics Covered:



1 Preface



2 Scope and Methodology



3 Executive Summary



4 Introduction

4.1 Overview

4.2 Key Industry Trends



5 Global Pet Furniture Market

5.1 Market Overview

5.2 Market Performance

5.3 Impact of COVID-19

5.4 Market Forecast



6 Market Breakup by Product

6.1 Beds and Sofas

6.1.1 Market Trends

6.1.2 Market Forecast

6.2 Houses

6.2.1 Market Trends

6.2.2 Market Forecast

6.3 Trees and Condos

6.3.1 Market Trends

6.3.2 Market Forecast

6.4 Others

6.4.1 Market Trends

6.4.2 Market Forecast



7 Market Breakup by Application

7.1 Cats

7.1.1 Market Trends

7.1.2 Market Forecast

7.2 Dogs

7.2.1 Market Trends

7.2.2 Market Forecast

7.3 Others

7.3.1 Market Trends

7.3.2 Market Forecast



8 Market Breakup by Distribution Channel

8.1 Specialty Stores

8.1.1 Market Trends

8.1.2 Market Forecast

8.2 Supermarkets and Hypermarkets

8.2.1 Market Trends

8.2.2 Market Forecast

8.3 Online Stores

8.3.1 Market Trends

8.3.2 Market Forecast

8.4 Others

8.4.1 Market Trends

8.4.2 Market Forecast



9 Market Breakup by Region



10 SWOT Analysis



11 Value Chain Analysis



12 Porters Five Forces Analysis



13 Price Analysis



14 Competitive Landscape

14.1 Market Structure

14.2 Key Players

14.3 Profiles of Key Players

14.3.1 Custom Quality Pet Furniture LLC

14.3.1.1 Company Overview

14.3.1.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.2 Furhaven Pet Products

14.3.2.1 Company Overview

14.3.2.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.3 Go Pet Club LLC

14.3.3.1 Company Overview

14.3.3.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.4 Inter IKEA Holding B.V.

14.3.4.1 Company Overview

14.3.4.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.5 Luxury Pet Furniture Ltd

14.3.5.1 Company Overview

14.3.5.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.6 MidWest Homes For Pets

14.3.6.1 Company Overview

14.3.6.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.7 North American Pet

14.3.7.1 Company Overview

14.3.7.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.8 Pet Gear Inc

14.3.8.1 Company Overview

14.3.8.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.9 PetPals Group Inc

14.3.9.1 Company Overview

14.3.9.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.10 Prevue Pet Products Inc.

14.3.10.1 Company Overview

14.3.10.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.11 Shanghai Senful Pet Products Co.Ltd.

14.3.11.1 Company Overview

14.3.11.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.12 Ware Pet Products

14.3.12.1 Company Overview

14.3.12.2 Product Portfolio

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/lh8jm0

Attachment
Dublin, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Food Safety Testing Market: Global Industry Trends, Share, Size, Growth, Opportunity and Forecast 2022-2027" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.



The global food safety testing market reached a value of US$ 19.2 Billion in 2021. Looking forward, the publisher expects the market to reach US$ 33.4 Billion by 2027, exhibiting at a CAGR of 9.97% during 2022-2027. Keeping in mind the uncertainties of COVID-19, we are continuously tracking and evaluating the direct as well as the indirect influence of the pandemic. These insights are included in the report as a major market contributor.



Poor hygiene during food preparation and processing can lead to contamination and serious diseases, such as diarrhea and cancer. As a result, governing agencies of various countries are implementing stringent food safety guidelines to ensure that food products undergo vigorous testing procedures before being sold in the market. Food safety testing focuses on detecting the presence of potential toxicants, such as harmful organisms, pathogens, preservatives, and chemicals, among different food products. It also assists in identifying adverse effects, maintaining food hygiene, and preventing and controlling foodborne illnesses.



Food Safety Testing Market Trends:

Rising instances of food adulteration and contamination are among the major risk factors for the spread of foodborne diseases that contribute significantly to healthcare costs. This represents one of the key factors catalyzing the need for food safety testing across the globe. It ensures in maintain the quality of food products, which avoids potential health hazards to consumers. Moreover, the growing consumption of packaged food products on account of rapid urbanization, busy lifestyles, and improving income levels is bolstering the market growth. The growing awareness among individuals about food hygiene and safety is also driving the market.

Apart from this, automation, versatility, and the speed of analysis, along with stringent regulatory frameworks on food safety, are encouraging food processors to adopt immunoassays (IAs) in food testing. Furthermore, leading market players are introducing polymerase chain reaction (PCR) kits, standard and chromogenic media, and immune sera for the fast and qualitative detection of pathogens in real-time. They are also focusing on developing methods that help minimize the time and cost of food testing while ensuring accurate results. This is anticipated to positively influence the adoption of food safety testing worldwide.



Key Market Segmentation:

The publisher provides an analysis of the key trends in each sub-segment of the global food safety testing market, along with forecasts at the global, regional and country level from 2022-2027. Our report has categorized the market based on type, food tested and technology.



Breakup by Type:

Pathogen

Genetically Modified Organism

Chemical and Toxin

Others

Breakup by Food Tested:

Meat and Meat Products

Dairy and Dairy Products

Cereals, Grains and Pulses

Processed Food

Others

Breakup by Technology:

Agar Culturing

PCR-based Assay

Immunoassay-based

Others

Breakup by Region:

North America

United States

Canada

Asia-Pacific

China

Japan

India

South Korea

Australia

Indonesia

Others

Europe

Germany

France

United Kingdom

Italy

Spain

Russia

Others

Latin America

Brazil

Mexico

Others

Middle East and Africa

Competitive Landscape:

The competitive landscape of the industry has also been examined along with the profiles of the key players being ADPEN Laboratories Inc., ALS Limited, AsureQuality Limited, Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc., Bureau Veritas, DNV AS (Stiftelsen Det Norske Veritas), Eurofins Scientific, Intertek Group plc, Merieux NutriSciences, NEOGEN Corporation, NSF International, SGS SA and TUV SUD.



Key Questions Answered in This Report:

How has the global food safety testing market performed so far and how will it perform in the coming years?

What has been the impact of COVID-19 on the global food safety testing market?

What are the key regional markets?

What is the breakup of the market based on the type?

What is the breakup of the market based on the food tested?

What is the breakup of the market based on the technology?

What are the various stages in the value chain of the industry?

What are the key driving factors and challenges in the industry?

What is the structure of the global food safety testing market and who are the key players?

What is the degree of competition in the industry?

Key Topics Covered:



1 Preface



2 Scope and Methodology



3 Executive Summary



4 Introduction

4.1 Overview

4.2 Key Industry Trends



5 Global Food Safety Testing Market

5.1 Market Overview

5.2 Market Performance

5.3 Impact of COVID-19

5.4 Market Forecast



6 Market Breakup by Type

6.1 Pathogen

6.1.1 Market Trends

6.1.2 Market Forecast

6.2 Genetically Modified Organism

6.2.1 Market Trends

6.2.2 Market Forecast

6.3 Chemical and Toxin

6.3.1 Market Trends

6.3.2 Market Forecast

6.4 Others

6.4.1 Market Trends

6.4.2 Market Forecast



7 Market Breakup by Food Tested

7.1 Meat and Meat Products

7.1.1 Market Trends

7.1.2 Market Forecast

7.2 Dairy and Dairy Products

7.2.1 Market Trends

7.2.2 Market Forecast

7.3 Cereals, Grains and Pulses

7.3.1 Market Trends

7.3.2 Market Forecast

7.4 Processed Food

7.4.1 Market Trends

7.4.2 Market Forecast

7.5 Others

7.5.1 Market Trends

7.5.2 Market Forecast



8 Market Breakup by Technology

8.1 Agar Culturing

8.1.1 Market Trends

8.1.2 Market Forecast

8.2 PCR-based Assay

8.2.1 Market Trends

8.2.2 Market Forecast

8.3 Immunoassay-based

8.3.1 Market Trends

8.3.2 Market Forecast

8.4 Others

8.4.1 Market Trends

8.4.2 Market Forecast



9 Market Breakup by Region



10 SWOT Analysis



11 Value Chain Analysis



12 Porters Five Forces Analysis



13 Price Analysis



14 Competitive Landscape

14.1 Market Structure

14.2 Key Players

14.3 Profiles of Key Players

14.3.1 ADPEN Laboratories Inc.

14.3.1.1 Company Overview

14.3.1.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.2 ALS Limited

14.3.2.1 Company Overview

14.3.2.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.2.3 Financials

14.3.2.4 SWOT Analysis

14.3.3 AsureQuality Limited

14.3.3.1 Company Overview

14.3.3.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.4 Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc.

14.3.4.1 Company Overview

14.3.4.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.4.3 Financials

14.3.4.4 SWOT Analysis

14.3.5 Bureau Veritas

14.3.5.1 Company Overview

14.3.5.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.5.3 Financials

14.3.5.4 SWOT Analysis

14.3.6 DNV AS (Stiftelsen Det Norske Veritas)

14.3.6.1 Company Overview

14.3.6.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.6.3 SWOT Analysis

14.3.7 Eurofins Scientific

14.3.7.1 Company Overview

14.3.7.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.7.3 Financials

14.3.7.4 SWOT Analysis

14.3.8 Intertek Group plc

14.3.8.1 Company Overview

14.3.8.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.8.3 Financials

14.3.8.4 SWOT Analysis

14.3.9 Merieux NutriSciences

14.3.9.1 Company Overview

14.3.9.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.10 NEOGEN Corporation

14.3.10.1 Company Overview

14.3.10.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.10.3 Financials

14.3.10.4 SWOT Analysis

14.3.11 NSF International

14.3.11.1 Company Overview

14.3.11.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.12 SGS SA

14.3.12.1 Company Overview

14.3.12.2 Product Portfolio

14.3.12.3 Financials

14.3.13 TUV SUD

14.3.13.1 Company Overview

14.3.13.2 Product Portfolio

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/rum36s

Attachment
RADNOR, Pa., April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The law firm of Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP (www.ktmc.com) informs investors that a securities class action lawsuit has been filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York against New Oriental Education & Technology Group Inc. (New Oriental) (NYSE: EDU). The action charges New Oriental with violations of the federal securities laws, including omissions and fraudulent misrepresentations relating to the companys business, operations, and prospects. As a result of New Orientals materially misleading statements to the public, New Oriental investors have suffered significant losses.



Kessler Topaz is one of the worlds foremost advocates in protecting the public against corporate fraud and other wrongdoing. Our securities fraud litigators are regularly recognized as leaders in the field individually and our firm is both feared and respected among the defense bar and the insurance bar. We are proud to have recovered billions of dollars for our clients and the classes of shareholders we represent.

CANNOT VIEW THIS VIDEO? PLEASE CLICK HERE

CLICK HERE TO SUBMIT YOUR NEW ORIENTAL LOSSES. YOU CAN ALSO CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING LINK OR COPY AND PASTE IN YOUR BROWSER: https://www.ktmc.com/edu-class-action-lawsuit?utm_source=PR&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=edu

LEAD PLAINTIFF DEADLINE: April 5, 2022

CLASS PERIOD: April 24, 2018 through July 22, 2021

CONTACT AN ATTORNEY TO DISCUSS YOUR RIGHTS:

James Maro, Esq. (484) 270-1453 or Email at info@ktmc.com

NEW ORIENTALS ALLEGED MISCONDUCT

New Oriental provides educational programs, services and products to students across the Peoples Republic of China (China) and delivers online courses through its online learning platforms.

On June 1, 2021, Chinese regulators announced they had fined 15 off-campus training institutions, including New Oriental, for illegal activities such as false advertising and fraud. Among the violations were reportedly fabricating teacher qualifications, exaggerating the effects of training, and fabricating user reviews. Following this news, the price of New Oriental American Depository Shares (ADSs) dropped from $11.09 on June 1, 2021, to $9.32 on June 3, 2021, a 16% decline over the two-day period.

Then, on July 23, 2021, China unveiled a sweeping overhaul of its education sector, banning companies that teach the school curriculum from making profits, raising capital or going public. This drastic measure effectively ended any potential growth in the for-profit tutoring sector in China. Following this news, the price of New Oriental ADSs fell from $6.40 on July 22, 2021 to just $1.94 by market close on July 26, 2021, a nearly 70% decline.

WHAT CAN I DO?

New Oriental investors may, no later than April 5, 2022 seek to be appointed as a lead plaintiff representative of the class through Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP or other counsel, or may choose to do nothing and remain an absent class member. Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP encourages New Oriental investors who have suffered significant losses to contact the firm directly to acquire more information.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR THE CASE

WHO CAN BE A LEAD PLAINTIFF?

A lead plaintiff is a representative party who acts on behalf of all class members in directing the litigation. The lead plaintiff is usually the investor or small group of investors who have the largest financial interest and who are also adequate and typical of the proposed class of investors. The lead plaintiff selects counsel to represent the lead plaintiff and the class and these attorneys, if approved by the court, are lead or class counsel. Your ability to share in any recovery is not affected by the decision of whether or not to serve as a lead plaintiff.

ABOUT KESSLER TOPAZ MELTZER & CHECK, LLP

Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP prosecutes class actions in state and federal courts throughout the country and around the world. The firm has developed a global reputation for excellence and has recovered billions of dollars for victims of fraud and other corporate misconduct. All of our work is driven by a common goal: to protect investors, consumers, employees and others from fraud, abuse, misconduct and negligence by businesses and fiduciaries. At the end of the day, we have succeeded if the bad guys pay up, and if you recover your assets. The complaint in this action was not filed by Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP. For more information about Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP please visit www.ktmc.com.

CONTACT:

Kessler Topaz Meltzer & Check, LLP

James Maro, Jr., Esq.

280 King of Prussia Road

Radnor, PA 19087

(484) 270-1453

info@ktmc.com

A video accompanying this announcement is available at: https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/ab02eb5b-12da-400c-939e-60d0386b1018
KELOWNA, British Columbia, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Allied Corp . ("Allied" or the Company) (OTCQB: ALID) is pleased to commend the Colombian Government for the final approval of Regulation 227 (the "Regulation") which describes the technical guidelines regarding the export of cannabis flower from Colombia.



On July 23, 2021, the President of Colombia, President Ivan Duque, signed Decree 811 lifting the prohibition on exportation of dried cannabis flower from Colombia.

In October 2021, Allied was asked to provide first comment on the Regulation and then in November 2021, second comment. On February 20, 2022, Regulation 227 was officially announced by the President of Colombia introducing the practical regulations and implementation plan for the export of cannabis flower.

On April 01, 2022, the Colombian Government has released final approval of the technical guidelines necessary for the export of cannabis flower. This, among other important advances, will enable Allied to begin exporting dried cannabis flower internationally to countries where it is legal to do so. Of note, the United States still has a legal limit of 0.3% THC.

While only a few Colombian companies have been able to successfully export cannabis derivatives such as CBD distillate and isolate, up until now, the export of dried flower from Colombia has been prohibited. Allied has successfully shipped to several international markets and will now be submitting for multiple export requests for dried cannabis flower destined for international markets.

Dried cannabis flower is the fastest growing product segment of the multi-billion dollar global cannabis industry (Source: Fortune Business Insights). Unlike processed products such as isolate, high quality cannabis flower must come to market with the aesthetics and terpene/cannabinoid profile that the customer wants. This is where Allied excels. We are excited to immediately take action with our first shipments of cannabis flower from Colombia to international markets, said Mr. Calum Hughes, CEO and Chairman of Allied Corp.

About Allied Corp.  CLICK HERE

Click here for Allied Inside business model website: CLICK HERE

Allied Corp. is an international cannabis company with its main production center in Colombia and is one of the few companies that has exported from Colombia internationally. In preparation for the possible legalization of cannabis by the US Federal Government, Allied also has the option to purchase a US cannabis license in the US (Nevada) exercisable if such were to happen. In addition to this, Allied has three CBD-brands to market with products selling in the United States. Lastly, Allied has both Cannabinoid and psilocybin products in the pharmaceutical development track seeking pharma drug indications for depression, anxiety and PTSD.

Investor Relations:

ir@allied.health

1-877-255-4337

Forward-Looking Statements:

This press release contains forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws in Canada or the United States ( forward-looking information). Forward-looking information may relate to the Companys future outlook and anticipated events, plans or results, and may include information regarding the Companys objectives, goals, strategies, future revenue or performance and capital expenditures, and other information that is not historical information. Forward-looking information can often be identified by the use of terminology such as believe, anticipate, plan, expect, pending, in process, intend, estimate, project, may, will, should, would, could, can, the negatives thereof, variations thereon and similar expressions. The forward-looking information contained in this press release is based on the Companys opinions, estimates and assumptions in light of managements experience and perception of historical trends, current conditions and expected future developments, as well as other factors that management currently believes are appropriate and reasonable in the circumstances. Forward looking statements in this press release include the following: that Allied is leveraging the conditions in its Colombia grow operation and future Kelowna location to support its Research and Development efforts; that Allied is making important strides forward to position itself as a leader in the medical cannabis space, that Allied intends to make a series of proposed trademark and other intellectual property protection filings, as part of the Companys Intellectual Property and Pharma Development (IP&PD) Strategy, statements respecting the joint development, manufacturing, and the introduction of TACTICAL RELIEF branded products.

There can be no assurance that the underlying opinions, estimates and assumptions will prove to be correct. Risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from forward-looking information in this release include: the Companys exposure to legal and regulatory risk; the effect of the legalization of adult-use cannabis in Canada and Colombia on the medical cannabis industry is unknown and may significantly and negatively affect the Companys medical cannabis business; that the medical benefits, viability, safety, efficacy, dosing and social acceptance of cannabis are not as currently expected; that adverse changes or developments affecting the Companys main or planned facilities may have an adverse effect on the Company; that the medical cannabis industry and market may not continue to exist or develop as anticipated or the Company may not be able to succeed in this market; risks related to completion of the greenhouse construction in Colombia, risks related to market competition; risks related to the proposed adult-use cannabis industry and market in Canada and Colombia including the Companys ability to enter into or compete in such markets; that the Company has a limited operating history and a history of net losses and that it may not achieve or maintain profitability in the future; risks related to the Companys current or proposed international operations; risks related to future third party strategic alliances or the expansion of currently existing relationships with third parties; that the Company may not be able to successfully identify and execute future acquisitions or dispositions or successfully manage the impacts of such transactions on its operations; risks inherent to the operation of an agricultural business; that the Company may be unable to attract, develop and retain key personnel; risks resulting from significant interruptions to the Companys access to certain key inputs such as raw materials, electricity, water and other utilities; that the Company may be unable to transport its cannabis products to patients in a safe and efficient manner; risks related to recalls of the Companys cannabis products or product liability or regulatory claims or actions involving the Companys cannabis products; risks related to the Companys reliance on pharmaceutical distributors; that the Company, or the cannabis industry more generally, may receive unfavorable publicity or become subject to negative consumer or investor perception; that certain events or developments in the cannabis industry more generally may impact the Companys reputation or its relationships with customers or suppliers; that the Company may not be able to obtain adequate insurance coverage in respect of the risks that it faces, that the premiums for such insurance may not continue to be commercially justifiable or that there may be coverage limitations and other exclusions which may result in such insurance not being sufficient; that the Company may become subject to liability arising from fraudulent or illegal activity by its employees, contractors, consultants and others; that the Company may experience breaches of security at its facilities or losses as a result of the theft of its products; risks related to the Companys information technology systems; that the Company may be unable to sustain its revenue growth and development; that the Company may be unable to expand its operations quickly enough to meet demand or manage its operations beyond their current scale; that the Company may be unable to secure adequate or reliable sources of necessary funding; risks related to, or associated with, the Companys exposure to reporting requirements; risks related to conflicts of interest; risks related to fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates; risks related to the Companys potential exposure to greater-than-anticipated tax liabilities; risks related to the protection and enforcement of the Companys intellectual property rights, or the intellectual property that it licenses from others; that the Company may become subject to allegations that it or its licensors are in violation of the intellectual property rights of third parties; that the Company may not realize the full benefit of the clinical trials or studies that it participates in; that the Company may not realize the full benefit of its licenses if the licensed material has less market appeal than expected and the licenses may not be profitable; as well as any other risks that may be further described in and the risk factors discussed in the Company's continuous disclosure including its Management's Discussion and Analysis sections in its Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Annual Reports on Form 10-K and Current Reports on Form 8-K filed under the Company's profile at www.sec.gov.

Although management has attempted to identify important risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking information in this presentation, there may be other risk factors not presently known to the Company or that the Company presently believes are not material that could also cause actual results or future events to differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking information in this presentation. 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 information. Accordingly, readers and viewers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information, which speaks only as of the date made. The forward-looking information contained in this release represents the Companys expectations as of the date of this release or the date indicated, regardless of the time of delivery of the presentation. The Company disclaims any intention, obligation or undertaking to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required under applicable securities laws.
LONDON and NEW YORK, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- For over 4,000 U.K. insurance professionals, finding program and portfolio capacity will soon be a whole lot easier with the new bespoke platform from InsurerCore and Stere. Responding to customer demand for an all-in-one marketplace that would facilitate both networking and capacity placement, U.K.-based InsurerCore, a professional risk appetite network exclusively for insurance professionals, and U.S.-based Stere, a capacity placement marketplace for capacity seekers and providers, have launched a unique capacity/business search engine that fuses professional networking with program and portfolio level matchmaking capabilities.



We are thrilled by the competitive advantages this Stere platform will bring to our customers, said InsurerCore Founder and Managing Director Peter Clarke. In the current insurance market, who you know is key and by combining the strength and scope of the InsurerCore and Stere networks, we will give our customers access to capacity placement opportunities and efficiency gains found nowhere else.

The partnership brings benefits to both sides of the Atlantic. Since the launch of InsurerCores Beta in 2020, the company has become the largest network of its type in Europe with over 2,000 insurers, MGAs, and brokers spanning 560 products from across the U.K. and abroad. The new joint platform means that Stere MGA and program administrator clients gain access to this key London market network while InsurerCore members have access to Steres superior selection engine and program placement digital ecosystem, which improve program owner placement success rate and tackle speed-to-market, capacity sourcing, and other challenges facing the industry.

On average, carriers and reinsurers only work with about 1% of the programs they review, said Stere CEO Dogan Kaleli. In teaming up with InsurerCore to create a game-changing capacity and networking ecosystem we aim to vastly increase the universe of capacity opportunities for portfolios, facilities and schemes across the London market. Whether you are a carrier, reinsurer, reinsurance broker, or program administrator, our digitized processes eliminate manual capacity placement pain points and inefficient post-placement steps, making it easier and faster to place business.

About InsurerCore

InsurerCore is a Professional Network, exclusively for insurance professionals, that enables efficient and informed communication around risk and risk appetite. Detailed product listings, a bespoke insurance search engine, advanced analytics and a scrolling news feed are just some of the features that support this. Visit www.insurercore.com for more information.

About Stere

Stere is a digital ecosystem for insurance programs. With Stere, program leaders source capacity and access digital tools to launch sooner and grow faster and smarter. Stere clients are capacity seekers such as MGAs, program administrators, and embedded insurance programs, along with their ecosystem partners such as carriers, fronting carriers, reinsurers, brokers, program consultants, and technology providers. Visit www.stere.io or email hello@stere.io for a demo.
BURLINGTON, Vt., April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Leading household products company and green pioneer Seventh Generation has unveiled a significant brand evolution  the biggest in its 34-year history  that celebrates its beliefs about the rights and the health of the next seven generations while communicating the performance of its products. The new logo and packaging visual identity will roll out across the companys full product portfolio nationwide throughout April 2022.



For more than 30 years the power of plant science has been at the core of our brand and is now reflected in how we show up for consumers on shelf and in their homes, said Seventh Generation CEO Alison Whritenour. As the sustainability say-do gap continues to widen, we saw an opportunity to use a new visual design to better reflect the plant-based formulas within each product on our packaging to provide consumers with the information to make healthy and sustainable choices for their homes and families.

Seventh Generation has a long history of providing household products that help people to clean and care with purpose, and its product packaging has always been a vehicle to educate and empower consumers to make the best decisions for the environment and family, with voluntary ingredient disclosure on the pack. Since its inception, the company has studied the power of plants and has led the industry in sustainable sourcing  it was one of the first companies to launch recycled paper products and was the first to eliminate phosphates from auto-dish liquids. A founding B Corp, Seventh Generation has helped set the standard for corporate responsibility, and in the tradition of transparency, the company also releases annual Corporate Consciousness Reports.

The cleaning category has evolved and grown with us since Seventh Generation first disrupted it more than three decades ago, said John Moorhead, Chief Marketing Officer of Seventh Generation. While we know that our mission is what brings people into the brand, we also recognized the opportunity to modernize our visual identity and more consistently communicate the efficacy of our products.

A recent study from GlobeScan found that while nearly half of consumers want to change their lifestyle to be more environmentally friendly, only 22 percent of consumers have made those changes in the past year. There is still much work to be done to close this gap, and Seventh Generations new brand look builds on its mission to do so, by supporting future generations, formulating products with renewable, plant-based ingredients, and driving climate action.

At a time when immediate and meaningful climate action is needed, with the latest IPCC report emphasizing the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that are dangerously heating the planet, we know the time is now to protect the health of future generations, continued CEO Whritenour. We remain focused on supporting a shift toward a more equitable future that places deep value on human and planetary health, driven by our commitment toward climate justice and equity.

The new logo incorporates seven overlapping leaves, inspired by the next seven generations for which the brand advocates. In addition, graphic elements on the logo and packaging amplify the companys commitment to natural ingredients  particularly highlighting the molecular, plant-based components driving the efficacy of its products.

Modern molecular-inspired visuals set on a clean, white canvas communicate both the plant and cleaning power of Seventh Generations products, revealing the ingredients inner workings. The leaf design  a primary building block of the new brand  represents both Seventh Generations outstanding eco-credentials and the brands purpose to transform the world into a healthy, sustainable and equitable place.

While business and consumer action are important, Seventh Generation recognizes it must also drive systemic change through strategic advocacy. Knowing a better world for future generations will not come from creating better products alone, Seventh Generation advocates for climate justice and equity, and seeks out systemic change for a more sustainable and equitable world for all.

Seventh Generations in-house creative team worked with the London office of agency Design Bridge to create its new visual identity.

About Seventh Generation

For more than 30 years, its been Seventh Generations mission to help you protect your world with our environmentally conscious and effective household products. Our products are solutions for the air, surfaces, fabrics, pets and people within your home -- and for the community and environment outside of it. Seventh Generation offers a full line of laundry, dish and household cleaners, baby products including Free & Clear diapers, training pants and baby wipes, plus recycled paper products and recycled plastic trash bags, personal care products such as deodorant and body wash and period care products including Organic certified tampons. The company derives its name from the Great Law of the Iroquois Confederacy that states, "In our every deliberation, we must consider the impact of our decisions on the next seven generations." For information on Seventh Generation cleaning, paper, baby and feminine personal care products, to find store locations, and explore the company's website visit www.seventhgeneration.com.

Contact:

Brandi Thomas

seventhgen@allisonpr.com
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The global Immersion Cooling Market is projected to reach US$ 2.1 Bn by 2032 from US$ 300.3 Mn by 2022. The expected growth rate during the forecast period is 21.5%.



Immersion cooling is likely to be driven by increasing server rack density and chip density, new use cases such as hazardous edge computing settings, and demand to reduce energy consumption during data center cooling.

Attributes Details Immersion Cooling Market CAGR (2022-2032) 21.5% Immersion Cooling Market Size (2022) US$ 0.3 Bn Immersion Cooling Market Size (2032) US$ 2.1 Bn

Request a report sample to gain comprehensive insights at

https://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/sample/rep-gb-14459

Over the projection period, the demand for immersion cooling is likely to be driven by data centers' increasing desire for cost- and energy-efficient cooling solutions. Because of the proliferation of the Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence (AI), businesses are dealing with massive amounts of data that require higher density IT gear to perform at an enterprise level.

Existing data centers are unable to adapt to new types of workloads, which has fueled demand for immersion cooling data centers, which consume less power and take up less space. Data centers in the United States are increasingly migrating to public and private cloud platforms, which is expected to positively impact the immersion cooling market adoption trends.

Moving to the cloud has various advantages, including increased scalability and elasticity, lower total operational expenses, and lower capital expenditure. Furthermore, the increasing volume of data transmission and the rise of big data has heightened the significance of safe data centers and immersion cooling.

As a result of such activities, the usage of IoT devices is predicted to increase, which is projected to increase the demand for immersion cooling systems. Data centers have traditionally relied on air cooling technologies.

Energy consumption rises when data center facilities install more technology to meet expanding needs, resulting in higher operational expenses. Rising energy consumption improves power usage effectiveness, which is a key component in determining data center energy efficiency.

For any Queries Related with the Report, Ask an Analyst @ https://www.futuremarketinsights.com/ask-question/rep-gb-14459

Scope of the Report

Attributes Immersion Cooling Market Immersion Heater Market Data Center Immersion Cooling Market CAGR (2022 - 2032) 21.5% 5.5% 15.27% Market Value (2026) US$ 700 Bn US$ 6.8 Bn US$ 0.703 Bn Growth Factor Sales remain high as it is non-hazardous and can handle heat loads. Higher sales as it is a cost effective and ecological solution. Energy-efficient cooling solutions driving the demand for immersion cooling systems. Opportunity Provides solutions which reduce data center power consumption. Replacements of conventional heaters with immersion heaters create a lucrative market. Artificial intelligence, blockchain, and other developing technologies are reshaping the market. Key Trends Organizations are capitalizing on the immersion cooling technologies. End-user preference is growing, as is the creation of eco-friendly beneficial projects. Data centers cooling immersion solutions are contributing to reducing cooling energy consumption

As computers are meant to perform demanding computations become more powerful, air-based cooling solutions struggle to keep up with the heat created by these chips. Immersion cooling systems are a viable alternative since they require less hardware, lowering operating costs and lowering energy use.

As per the global immersion cooling market study by Future Market Insights, the lack of rules and regulatory requirements for immersion cooling is a significant barrier to its widespread adoption.

Standardization is recommended in non-homogeneous computational environments because standardized products are interchangeable. Because proprietary systems that are incompatible constitute a market barrier, specifications and standards must be developed to enable the global deployment of immersion cooling for data center equipment.

Key Takeaways

In the immersion cooling market, the cryptocurrency mining application is predicted to develop at the fastest rate. This industry is very competitive because of the tremendous potential for growth in nations such as the United States, Japan, India, and Germany.

The US immersion cooling market size is expected to reach US$ 1.8 Bn by 2032.

During the forecast period, the single-phase immersion cooling type segment is predicted to lead the market and grow at the fastest CAGR. Because it is less expensive to set up and more energy-efficient, demand for single-phase immersion cooling is expected to continue to grow.

Because of the high concentration of hyper-scale data centers in these nations, the United States and Canada are key revenue contributors to the North American immersion cooling market. The United States is home to 40 per cent of the world's total hyperscale facilities.

We Offer tailor-made Solutions to fit Your Requirements, Request Customization @ https://www.futuremarketinsights.com/customization-available/rep-gb-14459

Competitive Landscape

Owing to the firms in the industry are constantly developing new cooling solutions with the ability to cool very dense storage components, the market is fairly concentrated. They're also spending money on research and development to come up with new solutions that are projected to help the sales of immersion cooling grow even more.

In terms of the data center industry, there is a slew of merger and acquisition activities going on around the world, which is predicted to improve various players' ability to invest in modern cooling infrastructure. Fujitsu Limited, Green Revolution Cooling, Submer Technologies, and others are key players.

Recent Developments

Wiwynn Corporation and Microsoft teamed up in April 2021 to create a two-phase immersion cooling system for data centres. The partnership's technology advancements will be evaluated at a Microsoft-owned data centre in Quincy, Washington.

Iceotope Technologies Ltd. announced the release of a highly scalable, GPU-rich, and liquid-cooled solution for the deployment of HPC and AI workloads in colocation using Lenovo ThinkSystem SR670 servers in January 2021. The Ku:l Data Centre solution is able to withstand the increased heat loads brought on by processor roadmaps.

Explore FMIs Extensive ongoing Coverage on Oil and Gas Domain

Turbine Inlet Cooling System Market

Increasing demand for power and energy across the globe has led to an increase in number of new gas turbines globally. This increasing installation rate is expected to directly impact the demand for turbine inlet cooling systems.

Green Cooling Technologies Market

The thriving population and increasing energy consumption is initiating a strong demand for technologies methods, and equipment aiding in the reduction of greenhouse gas emission and are helping to save significant amount of energy.

Ring Main Unit Market

Ring main unit is a set of switchgear commonly used ring-type electrical power distribution networks, and it plays an important role in secondary distribution substations. A wide range of industrial applications of ring main units include transportation, infrastructure, and construction, and recent industrial developments across the globe are expected to provide a fillip to growth of the ring main unit market.

No.2 Diesel Fuel Market

After the advent of the internal combustion engine in the late eighteen century, diesel, as a fuel, witnessed momentum in demand as it was the most suitable alternative for the traditional fuel i.e. coal dust.

Floating Power Plant Market

The existence of floating power started by the introduction of general electric transportable large power barges during the World War II. Floating power plant is also known as power barges, it is a specially designed ship in which an actual power plant is installed for supplying the power to the required areas in marine sector.

Electrolytic Capacitor Market

An electrolytic capacitor, also referred as an aluminum electrolytic capacitor is a polarized capacitor and operates on electrolyte to achieve better capacitance than other capacitors. Its anode consist of aluminum foil and covered with insulation aluminum oxide, due to this thin oxide layer these capacitors have high CV (capacitance voltage product).

Distribution Transformers Market

According to recent study, the distribution transformers market is expected to experience substantial growth, expanding CAGR of over 6% from 2021 to 2031.

Photovoltaic Mounting System Market

According to a research study, Photovoltaic Mounting System market is set to witness robust growth during 2021-2031 with a CAGR of 10% to 11%.

Portable Power Station Market

According to research estimates, Portable Power Station Market is predicted to witness robust growth in the next decade i.e. 2021-2031.

Portable Fuel Cells Market

According to latest research estimates, portable fuel cells market is projected to witness lucrative growth over the coming decade.

About Future Market Insights (FMI)

Future Market Insights (FMI) is a leading provider of market intelligence and consulting services, serving clients in over 150 countries. FMI is headquartered in Dubai, and has delivery centers in the UK, U.S. and India. FMI's latest market research reports and industry analysis help businesses navigate challenges and make critical decisions with confidence and clarity amidst breakneck competition. Our customized and syndicated market research reports deliver actionable insights that drive sustainable growth. A team of expert-led analysts at FMI continuously tracks emerging trends and events in a broad range of industries to ensure that our clients prepare for the evolving needs of their consumers.

Contact:

Future Market Insights,

1602-6 Jumeirah Bay X2 Tower,

Plot No: JLT-PH2-X2A,

Jumeirah Lakes Towers, Dubai,

United Arab Emirates

For Sales Enquiries: sales@futuremarketinsights.com

Website: https://www.futuremarketinsights.com/

Report:https://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/immersion-cooling-market
BONITA SPRINGS, Fla., April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Discovery Senior Living ("Discovery") and National Health Investors ("NHI") have announced a new, joint venture, the provisions for which include the acquisition and rebranding of nine (9) former Holiday Retirement communities. Management functions for the communities, which are located in Arkansas (2), Georgia (2), Ohio (1), Oklahoma (1), New Jersey (1) and South Carolina (2), have been transferred to Discovery Senior Living and its subsidiary management companies, effective immediately. Additionally, Discovery will be assuming operations of an assisted living community in Vero Beach, Florida, through Discovery and NHI's existing joint venture.

The acquisition represents a breakthrough JV for NHI, which will share ownership of the new, nine-community, Independent Living portfolio with affiliates of the Discovery organization. Of the newly rebranded communities, seven were allocated across Discovery's new, Morada and TerraBella Regional Management Companies, with the remaining three split up between the provider's Rittenhouse Village, Seaton Senior Living and flagship Discovery Village portfolios.

The move is the latest in a trio of large-scale acquisitions that have seen the Discovery enterprise and its capital partners add 39 communities since November 2. The joint venture with NHI helps establish a debut presence in Arkansas, New Jersey and Ohio, which become the 17th, 18th and 19th states in which the senior living provider now owns and/or operates communities.

"We are very enthusiastic to grow our relationship even more closely with NHI and see tremendous opportunities to leverage our unique operating management structure to position these communities for further success. The leadership team at NHI has been a tremendous partner before, during and after the pandemic and we are both humbled and excited to be part of their continued forward evolution while executing our proprietary growth plans," said Richard J. Hutchinson, CEO of Discovery Senior Living.

"We are excited to expand our relationship with Discovery through this new joint venture which is a transformative operating model for NHI. Our decision to pivot from the traditional triple-net lease model to an operating partnership is a milestone moment for the company and one we would only contemplate with a trusted and experienced partner like Discovery. This creates another avenue of long-term growth for NHI and we are confident that Discovery will be a key partner in delivering that growth," said Eric Mendelsohn, President and CEO of NHI.

Including the latest acquisitions, Discovery Senior Living now operates a portfolio of 110 communities together encompassing more than 15,000 units.

About Discovery Senior Living

Discovery Senior Living is a family of companies that includes Discovery Management Group, Morada Senior Living, TerraBella Senior Living, Discovery Development Group, Discovery Design Concepts, Discovery Marketing Group, and Discovery At Home, a Medicare-certified home healthcare company. With almost three decades of experience, the award-winning management group has been developing, building, marketing, and operating upscale senior-living communities across the United States. By leveraging its innovative "Experiential Living" operating philosophy across a growing portfolio of more than 15,000 existing homes or homes under development, Discovery Senior Living is a recognized industry leader for lifestyle customization and today ranks among the 10 largest U.S. senior living operators and providers.

About National Health Investors

Incorporated in 1991, National Health Investors, Inc. (NYSE: NHI) is a real estate investment trust specializing in sale-leaseback, joint-venture, mortgage and mezzanine financing of need-driven and discretionary senior housing and medical investments. NHI's portfolio consists of independent, assisted and memory care communities, entrance-fee communities, skilled nursing facilities, medical office buildings and specialty hospitals.

Media Inquiries:

Heidi LaVanway, Vice President of Marketing

HLaVanway@DiscoveryMGT.com | 239.301.5330

Related Images











Image 1: Discovery Senior Living





Discovery Senior Living and NHI have announced the acquisition and rebranding of 10 former Holiday Retirement communities.









This content was issued through the press release distribution service at Newswire.com.

Attachment
English French

PRESS RELEASE

Arcueil, April 4, 2022

Changes in the management team of Clicars,

Spanish entity of Aramis Group

Appointment of Jose Carlos del Valle as Managing Director in Spain

Aramis Group today announces the evolution of the management team of its Spanish entity, Clicars.

The latter has experienced exponential revenues growth since its acquisition by Aramis Group in 2017 and illustrates the success of sharing best practices within the Group.

Carlos Rivera and Pablo Fernandez, the historical co-founders of Clicars, have been involved for several months in putting together a renewed management team, which combines continuity and a fresh look.

For their part, they retain a strategic role.

Jose Carlos del Valle, 38, becomes the new Managing Director of Clicars. Jose Carlos joined the company in 2020 as Sales Director to support its hypergrowth. He was in particular able to help implementing best practices in e-commerce, while immersing himself in the Group's culture that always puts the customer's interest at the centre of its actions. Jose Carlos is a telecommunications engineer with a degree from the Universidad Politecnica de Madrid and an MBA from Harvard Business School. He spent more than six years at Amazon as Head of Delivery Experience, where he gained valuable skills in logistics and customer satisfaction. He previously worked at Samsung and Telefonica.

He will be supported in his new role by a management team made up of both long-standing Clicars employees and new profiles. Julien Divay, Clicars' Chief Financial Officer for the past 4 years, replaces Jose Carlos as Sales Director. He is in turn replaced by Maria Ares as Chief Financial Officer, who joins the company with 12 years of experience in financial positions at PwC and Ironhack in particular. A new director, Susana Diez, has also recently been recruited for the Villaverde refurbishing centre, near Madrid.

The key functions of Marketing and Technology see their respective directors, Alba Manzanero and Ivan Velasco, Clicars employees since its inception in 2016, renewed. Likewise, Javier Rodriguez remains Purchasing Director and Mila Cano Human Resources Director.

Carlos Rivera and Pablo Fernandez commented: "After a year and a half at Clicars, where he has contributed to the excellent performance of the company, we are confident that Jose Carlos del Valle, together with the great team of professionals that make up our new management team, will continue to successfully pursue the ambitious goals that the company has set for the future. Clicars' ambition remains to guarantee its customers very high-quality reconditioned vehicles at competitive prices, and to continue to be a benchmark for innovation, local job creation and commitment to the circular economy."

Nicolas Chartier and Guillaume Paoli, co-founders1 of Aramis Group, said for their part: "We are delighted with these developments within our Spanish entity. Jose Carlos knows Clicars very well and his work as Sales Director has contributed to the development of the brand and its excellent performance in 2021. He will be able to rely on Maria, Chief Financial Officer, whom we are delighted to welcome in the Group and whose career and experience, both in large groups and in agile and innovative structures, will be an asset for our success in Spain. The priorities set for Clicars, as for all the other entities of Aramis Group, remain unchanged: to serve our customers in the best possible way, in order to fuel the strong growth of our revenues, by capitalising on the commitment of our employees and our technological and industrial know-how, with a view to sustainable development. Jose Carlos' expertise in the sector and in e-commerce, coupled with his human and management qualities, make him the ideal leader to accompany Clicars in the pursuit of its strong growth trajectory, while respecting these principles.

***

About Aramis Group

Aramis Group is a leading European B2C platform to acquire a used car online and brings together four brands: Aramisauto, Cardoen, Clicars and CarSupermarket, in France, Belgium, Spain and the UK respectively.

The Group is transforming the used car market and is putting digital technology at the service of customer satisfaction with a fully vertically integrated business model. For the full 2021 fiscal year, Aramis Group generated revenues of 1.36 billion, sold more than 80,000 B2C vehicles, and recorded more than 73 million visits to its websites. At the end of September 2021, the Group had more than 1,800 employees, a network of

60 agencies and three industrial refurbishing sites. Aramis Group is listed on compartment A of the Euronext Paris stock exchange (Ticker: ARAMI  ISIN: FR0014003U94). For more information, visit www.aramis.group.

Investor contact

Alexandre Leroy

Head of investor relations

alexandre.leroy@aramis.group

+33 (0)6 58 80 50 24

Press contacts

Brunswick

aramisgroup@brunswickgroup.com

Hugues Boeton +33 (0)6 79 99 27 15

Alexia Gachet +33 (0)6 33 06 55 93

1 Since the IPO of the company in June 2021, Nicolas Chartier is Chairman and CEO of the company, and Guillaume Paoli is Deputy CEO, on a rotation basis every 2 years

Attachment
Philadelphia, PA, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Remote learning may have been a temporary education measure during the pandemic, but for many students it has had a permanent impact  affecting their readiness for post-secondary education and career plans, future workplace outlooks, and choice of where to live.

Those are some of the findings of a survey of 16- to 18-year-olds in the U.S. and U.K. conducted in March by Philadelphia-based Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM). The survey gathered responses from 1,000 11th and 12th grade students from across the U.S. and sixth form students in England and Wales, as well as some of their teachers, to determine the impact the last two years have had on their future plans. The students were participants in this years MathWorks Math Modeling (M3) Challenge, an annual internet-based, intensive math modeling contest organized by SIAM.

Its clear that most high school students see both positives and negatives to remote options as they pave their future education and career paths, with a significant percentage altering plans to be positioned for what they predict will be a hybrid workplace combining remote and in-person working, said Michelle Montgomery, M3 Challenge Program Director at SIAM.

The majority (58%) of students surveyed said they envision a combination of remote and in-person work for their future careers, with nearly one in five (19%) stating that the ability to work remotely is a factor in their decision about what to study or what jobs they might pursue.

In addition, more than a third (37%) said that if they could work remotely, they would move to a different part of the country for the lifestyle or experience, regardless of where their work is headquartered.

Now in its 17th year, M3 Challenge involves high school juniors and seniors and sixth form students working in small teams for up to 14 consecutive hours on a designated weekend in February, using mathematical modeling to quantify the issues and devise a solution to a real-world problem. Of the hundreds of participating teams, eight finalists were selected from across the U.S., England, and Wales, after having their submissions rigorously judged by an international panel of 150 Ph.D.-level mathematicians. Finalist teams will receive an all-expenses-paid trip to New York City to participate in the competitions final judging event, which will take place on April 25.

Sponsored by MathWorks, the leading developer of mathematical computing software, M3 Challenge spotlights applied mathematics and technical computing as powerful problem-solving tools and viable, exciting professions. This years competition  which will award more than US$100,000 (75,000) in scholarship prizes  asked students to use math modeling to predict the future of remote work, from analyzing the percent of jobs that are remote-ready and whether workers in those jobs will be willing or able to work remotely, to determining the percentage of workers who will go remote in a given city or metro area. It drew the participation of nearly 2,700 students from 612 teams.

Remote working pros and cons

According to the survey, given the events of the last two years, 59% of students are concerned about the mental health impacts (loneliness, anxiety, stress, etc.) that the increasingly remote workforce of the future may bring. The same percentage of respondents expressed that decreased human interaction, even in a hybrid environment, may make it more difficult to feel part of a team at work.

Other concerns include the possibility that merging home and work life could result in spending longer work hours online (40%), that being mentored and promoted would be more difficult (26%), and that the job market would be more competitive due to employers being unrestricted by employees locations when hiring (21%).

What did respondents say were the benefits of an increasingly remote workplace? Almost half (47%) point to more flexible work hours, which may boost job satisfaction, while 46% cite a better work-life balance due to people spending less time commuting. About 40% said the ability to work remotely expands the pool of career opportunities, as employees are no longer limited to applying for local jobs, and that remote/hybrid working will lower the worlds carbon footprint since fewer people will be commuting.

Higher education preparedness post-pandemic

When it comes to the pandemics effect on the students readiness for college or university, 55% said that remote and hybrid learning affected how prepared they feel. Of those, the majority (63%) attribute their lack of preparedness to the difficulty they had staying focused when learning online, while more than half (57%) said it was hard to maintain good study habits. Others found it harder to network with teachers and students who may have otherwise mentored them (39%) and worried that they are unprepared for a university workload due to the remote instruction experiences they have had since 2020 (32%).

"While less than a third of students surveyed expressed concern over lenient grading, more than half (55%) of high school teachers admitted to grading more leniently due to the pandemic, since it was difficult to maintain previous standards in the COVID-19 learning environment, Montgomery said. These disparities led 64% of teachers to agree that their graduating students are less prepared for university compared to pre-pandemic graduates.

Theres no question that for many students about to begin their post-secondary education, the pandemic and the challenges it presented may have some lasting effects, she continued. The good news? An overwhelming majority of students (76%) say there has been no impact on their math or computer-science-related grades, 45% say the pandemic had no effect on how prepared they feel for university, and 82% say it had no effect on their university plans, career path, or choice of university.

More information about M3 Challenge and the 2022 challenge problem can be found at https://m3challenge.siam.org.

To see the full list of schools with winning teams, visit https://m3challenge.siam.org/node/567.

About Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics

Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is an international society of more than 14,000 individual, academic and corporate members from 90+ countries. SIAM helps build cooperation between mathematics and the worlds of science and technology to solve real-world problems through publications, conferences, and communities like chapters, sections and activity groups. Learn more at siam.org.

Attachment
Pakistan's Minister for Human Rights Shireen Mazari said on Saturday that the United States attempted to topple the Pakistani government by sending threatening words and is now making false denial.



"Has the U.S. government ever spoken the truth? It has always been telling lies to the world. It even lied to the UN about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but later the lies were exposed, showing that the U.S. spoke blatant lies to very prestigious senior officials of the UN," Mazari said in a video message.

The official said that the Pakistani nation should know that all denials coming from the United States are a pack of lies.

"The U.S. threatened regime change in Pakistan, targeted Prime Minister Imran Khan, and said that the United States will forgive Pakistan if it removed Khan as prime minister," the minister added.

The minister said that the Pakistani prime minister was targeted because he took a stand against the United States and tried to make decisions on his own.

Earlier on Friday, Khan said while addressing an event that the United States showed displeasure when he visited Russia, adding that as a sovereign country, Pakistan has the right to have an independent foreign policy without influence from anyone.

The prime minister also mentioned that an official demarche has been made through official channels to the U.S. embassy in Pakistan.





Produced by Xinhua Global Service
Trondheim, 4 April 2022: Petors AS, a company owned by CEO and primary insider of NORBIT ASA, Per Jrgen Weisethaunet, has on 4 April 2022 purchased 6 000 shares in NORBIT at an average price of NOK 27.49 per share.



Following the transaction, Petors AS owns 6 971 695 shares in NORBIT. In addition, related parties of Weisethaunet own 7 893 shares, so that the total number of shares controlled by Weisethaunet and related parties amount to 6 979 588 shares, representing 11.94 per cent of the outstanding shares in NORBIT.

For further queries, please contact:

Per Kristian Reppe, CFO, +47 900 33 203

About NORBIT ASA

NORBIT is a global provider of tailored technology to selected niches, solving challenges and promoting sustainability through innovative solutions, in line with its mission to Explore More. The company is structured in three business segments to address its key markets; Oceans, Connectivity and Product Innovation & Realization (PIR). The Oceans segment delivers tailored technology solutions to global maritime markets. The Connectivity segment providing wireless solutions for identification, monitoring and tracking. The PIR segment offers R&D services, proprietary products and contract manufacturing to key customers. NORBIT is headquartered in Trondheim with manufacturing in Norway, has around 400 employees and a worldwide sales and distribution platform. For more information: www.norbit.com

This information is subject to the disclosure requirements in the Norwegian Securities Trading Act  5-12.

Attachment
Austin, Texas, United States, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Zero backlog in data-intensive applications



Austin, US, and Helsinki, Finland (March 30, 2022) GoalProfit (www.goalprofit.com), a platform designed to empower retailers to build customized intelligence applications, announced the closing of a $655k pre-seed round. Founded by ex-IBM executives Maxim Morozov and Oleg Sidorkin, GoalProfit is on a mission to make big data solutions accessible to all retailers and help them to transform in the new post-COVID reality.

GoalProfits offering is based on a proprietary data engine that allows enterprises to process billions of data points at blazingly fast speed and arrive at more profitable, intelligent decisions. With GoalProfit, we help retailers craft and data-drive their merchandising decisions: price, promo, markdowns, inventories, demand, customer analytics, and many others.

This pre-seed round is led by Business Angels - Ali Omar, Henry Nilert, Pekka Ylitalo, Stas Baranov - and YellowRockets VC (San Fransisco, US) early-stage venture fund that focuses on robotics and automation. Since GoalProfits inception in early 2021, the company has released its platform and signed up several customers.

"We are on a mission to show that advanced big data solutions are accessible to all businesses," said Oleg Sidorkin, co-founder and CTO of GoalProfit. "Our solution is designed to bring the benefits of customized tools previously only available to large corporations. It gives any retailer the toolkit to explore their competitive advantage without the need for an expensive internal IT team."

Retail bankruptcies in 2020 hit the highest levels in more than a decade, and experts say there are more to come. There were dozens of retail bankruptcies in 2020, and experts say the pain isn't over yet. S&P Global Market Intelligence tallied 49 bankruptcies in the retail space as of mid-November.

Pricing is by far the most powerful tool for earnings improvement. The first implementation of GoalProfit shows that data-driven pricing could improve gross margin by at least 4% while maintaining in-store traffic.

GoalProfit now offers a suite of intelligence applications for the retail industry. Price & Markdown optimization solutions are based on a fast data platform with low-code interfaces which could be customized for specific customer needs. API data integration can be established in days, and users are onboard with almost no learning curve thanks to the familiar XLS style interface.

"The $25 billion data and analytics software industry is an ideal starting point for GoalProfit. I've watched retailers spend incredible amounts of money with no return on their investment because of the slow and complex implementations," says Maxim Morozov, who previously worked in IBM and Nielsen in Customer Success."

I was amazed how fast and how flexible, enterprise-grade software the team has built in such a short time. The stars were aligned: the team has vast experience in the field, they have deep domain expertise, they understand the pain point of retailers, and above all, the technology is very powerful and easily customizable.  says Ali Omar, GoalProfit lead investor in this pre-seed funding round.

AI/ML technologies penetration rate in retail shows double-digit growth rates. We expect the same positive outlook for the next five years. The GoalProfit Platform is a high-performance analytical system for dynamic analysis and commodity price forecasting. Such solutions are becoming a key competitive factor for medium and large market players today. The distinctive feature of GoalProfit is the low code solution, easy installation and configuration, quick implementation, and unlimited performance.  says Valerie Bertele, YellowRockets.VC Partner.

The company has offices in Austin, US, and Helsinki, Finland, and will use the investment to grow its engineering and sales teams in Europe and the US.

About GoalProfit

GoalProfit is a global SaaS provider of a low-code retail optimization platform empowering retailers to build customized intelligence applications. GoalProfit is on a mission to make big data solutions accessible for all retailers and help them survive in a new post-COVID reality. Created by retail industry experts, GoalProfits SaaS solutions deliver a significant return on investment with a truly tailored user experience.

Better Prices. Higher Profits.



Attachment
TORONTO, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The voice of the Canadas foodservice and hospitality industry, Restaurants Canada has partnered with Nextech AR Solutions (OTCQB: NEXCF) (NEO: NTAR) to develop the first metaverse marketplace for Canadas foodservice industry. A major step forward for the foodservice and hospitality industry, the 365 Marketplace will be the global destination for food and restaurant professionals looking to connect and do business virtually. In addition to, and complimenting the 365 Marketplace, Restaurants Canada has also announced an exciting content partnership with Trend Hunter, the #1 trend research platform, which will give access to valuable insights, and research for the industry.

Launching at RC Show 2022Canadas leading foodservice and hospitality event, taking place May 9-11, 2022the 365 Marketplace offers a unique opportunity to connect Canadian foodservice and hospitality organizations, and professionals with local and international sellers. With the industry ramping back up post-pandemic, the launch of the 365 Marketplace will help to fuel the economy by enabling buyers and sellers to seamlessly interact in real-time and globally like never before.

The 365 Marketplace offers a one-stop-resource for international communities to connect with the Canadian foodservice market, and vice-versa, says Roy Little, Interim President and CEO, Restaurants Canada. Our partnership with Nextech AR Solutions offers industry professionals the tools they need to help better serve the Canadian market and establish global connections. We look forward to bringing the virtual 365 Marketplace platform to the industry to break down barriers and encourage business across borders as the global foodservice industry revives post-pandemic.

Designed by Nextech AR Solutions, the platform creates a hybrid blend of virtual event space and international marketplace, with up to 5,000 virtual vendor profiles serving 30,000+ members. 365 Marketplace aims to be a thriving centre for ecommerce, using unique 3D augmented reality technology to showcase products in their truest form, allowing members to interact at a higher level.

The 365 Marketplace brings the restaurant industry into the metaverse, providing a completely digital marketplace where 3D models and AR experiences, including holograms, can be utilized to connect Buyers and Sellers and provide a much more interactive experience than a traditional online marketplace, says Paul Duffy, President & Chairman of Nextech AR Solutions Corp. By partnering with Nextech, and employing Nextechs ground-breaking technology, Restaurants Canada is showing they are pioneers in the Restaurant Industry and are setting the stage for how business will be conducted going forward and in the future. These are truly exciting times for the Canadian Food and Beverage Industry, and I am excited to see it all unfold.

Buyers and sellers will benefit from increased engagement and exposure through the platform, with access to a consolidated directory of goods and service providers, unique marketing and advertising opportunities, the ability to host events and more. Companies can connect globally using the platforms messaging and virtual meeting features, as well as take advantage of live-streaming capabilities, launch new and exclusive products and encourage information sharing and education through on-demand video courses and materials.



The Innovator Exchange

In partnering with Trend Hunter, the platform will also host the first Innovator Exchange, a program that brings together a select group of industry thought leaders within a think tank led by Trend Hunter. The program will tackle the biggest issues impacting foodservice in Canada, highlight global trends, and provide tangible takeaways that will enable these leaders to create a positive and lasting impact on the restaurant industry.

The international launch is supported by a contribution from Global Affairs Canada and includes a strategic partnership with Trend Hunter. Restaurants Canada will provide its members and 365 Digital Marketplace users with a Taste of the Future including insights, international trends and data analytics all shared to help foodservice professionals innovate and predict what the industry may face in the coming years. With unique virtual events and experiences through both 365 Marketplace and RC Show 2022, the food and restaurant industry will be well-equipped to thrive post-pandemic.

We are excited about the Restaurants Canada partnership as they fulfill the spirit of the Revival campaign in an industry that the pandemic hit the hardest. We look forward to providing a "Taste of the Future" by bringing our years of trend research expertise to inspire ideas and use our Innovator Exchange program as a forum to unlock new ways the industry can create value together, says Suresh Parmachand, CMO and Futurist at Trend Hunter.

The Marketplace will officially launch at RC Show 2022 with over 700+ vendor supplier members and will provide access to operators in Canada and beyond. The Trend Hunter partnership will bring leading experts and brands together with a series of events being planned in connection to the RC Show and throughout the year that will innovate and inspire the future of our industry.

For more information, visit www.restaurantscanada.org.

-30-

About the RC Show  since 1944

Canadas leading foodservice and hospitality event showcasing cutting-edge products, pioneering people and transformative ideas. Attendees can shop, taste, learn, connect and grow their business with multiple days of business-building action, including featured areas, competitions, workshops and RC Hospitality Week events tailored to educate, motivate and lead the industry. RC Show includes the latest trends, a dynamic selection of innovative products, and influential speakers assembled from around the globe, designed to help operators grow their businesses. An annual event not to be missed. Learn more at www.rcshow.com

About Restaurants Canada

Restaurants Canada is a national, not-for-profit association advancing the potential of Canadas diverse and dynamic foodservice industry through member programs, research, advocacy, resources and events. Before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Canadas foodservice sector was a $95 billion industry, directly employing 1.2 million people, providing Canadas number one source of first jobs and serving 22 million customers across the country every day. The industry has since lost hundreds of thousands of jobs and billions in sales due to the impacts of COVID-19.

www.restaurantscanada.org



About Nextech AR

Nextech AR Solutions is a Metaverse company that develops and operates augmented reality (AR) platforms, transporting three-dimensional (3D) product visualizations, human holograms and 360 portals to its audiences altering e-commerce, digital advertising, hybrid virtual events (events held in a digital format blended with in-person attendance) and learning and training experiences.

www.nextechar.com

About Trend Hunter

Trend Hunter is a Toronto-based global market research agency, event organization, and innovation consultancy. They create strategies, tactics, and experiences for B2C and B2B organizations across industries to unlock the hidden growth potential in their brands. Founded in 2005 by Jeremy Gutsche, NY Times bestselling author and innovation maven, Trend Hunter has evolved from a global media hub to an innovation agency, backed by the world's most comprehensive trend research platform. They continue to experience exponential growth as they expand their presence and offerings in the market research and innovation spaces. They promise to be your best choice for inspiration-to-innovation strategies to help you Create the Future.

www.trendhunter.com
NEW AUCKLAND, Australia, April 05, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- According to the leading digital marketing agency in Auckland, Zib Digital, combining both SEO and paid advertising efforts will give any business a serious boost. Individually, these strategies can produce highly effective results, but integrating both can help a business achieve both short-term and long-term marketing goals.

Zib Digital explains that Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising can provide fast results due to its immediate and highly targeted nature. PPC offers strong ability for tailoring ads by platform, purchase behaviour and specific search terms, with real-time analytics available that can aid in providing data on consumer behaviours.

On the other hand, Zib Digital says SEO provides the advantage of driving strong organic traffic to a website and is an effective long-term strategy. It is not uncommon for results to take six months to be achieved.

When both SEO and PPC are implemented as part of a combined strategy, Zib Digital says businesses can achieve an effective balance of long-term and short-term benefits. By using both together, businesses can uncover more customer insights including new target keywords and search trends, which can aid in developing new marketing campaigns or improve existing ones.

Additionally, the experts in digital marketing in Auckland explain that combining SEO and PPC strategies can maximise viewability to consumers by claiming prime real estate on search engine results pages (SERPs). As Google Ads are shown above organic search results, an effective strategy will ensure high visibility.

Zib Digital says it's important to remember that both SEO and PPC strategies require continuous maintenance to ensure positive marketing results. SEO best practices continually change and it is a fiercely competitive space, so continuous management to optimise a website's SEO performance is crucial. Similarly, PPC campaigns need to be continuously optimised to ensure the best possible performance and ad spend is not wasted.

As the leaders in SEO Auckland, Zib Digital has a proven track record of delivering strong results and has built and marketed websites and digital campaigns for more than 1,000 brands in a wide variety of industries.

To learn more, contact the top PPC and SEO company in Auckland today.

Contact us - https://zibdigital.co.nz/

Katie McAleese + 64 272 757 059

Related Images











Image 1: Zib Digital NZ









This content was issued through the press release distribution service at Newswire.com.

Attachment
Prague, Czech Republic, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Students For Liberty, the largest pro-liberty student organization, announced it will be hosting its annual event  LibertyCon Europe on April 23-24, 2022, in the Cubex Centre and Radlicka Kulturni Sportovna in Prague, the Czech Republic.

For the first time after the pandemic European Students For Liberty is bringing together some of the most respectable and well-known speakers and activists in the liberty movement from around the globe to discuss the philosophy of liberty and host an open discussion with students across the ideological spectrum.

Announced speakers of the event are Leszek Balcerowicz - former Deputy Prime Minister of Poland, David Friedman, Tom Palmer, Lawrence Reed, Stephen Davies, George Selgin, Stephan Livera, Dominik Stroukal, Tatsiana Khomich, Li Schoolland, and many more.

On April 23, guests of the conference can expect sessions covering the role of the government, free society, technologies, Eastern Europe and Russia, Bitcoin, lockdowns & mandates, and other challenges Europe is facing right now.

On April 24, the conference will transform into a festival at the Radlicka Kulturni Sportovna, where guests will have a chance to enjoy live music, movie screenings, and some of the most thought-provoking discussions from activists around Europe.



"With Eastern Europe in crisis and liberty under the gravest threat in decades, LibertyCon in Prague promises to be a memorable event for young people. Do not miss it. You will learn how the principles of liberty apply to current events and why the understanding of libertys ethical foundations is indispensable to future success. See you there!" said Lawrence W. Reed, President Emeritus, Foundation for Economic Education.

LibertyCon is an excellent place for students and professionals to find networking opportunities, reconnect with fellow liberty enthusiasts, and meet the next generation of liberty activists.

LibertyCon Europe is an exceptional opportunity for students from all over Europe to gather together, make connections, exchange ideas, and build a freer, more prosperous future for Europe, said Tamar Tarsaidze, LibertyCon Europe Conference Director.

Tickets are available for the price of 20 and include attendance at all keynote and breakout sessions, swag, meals, and attendance at social parties. VIP tickets are sold out.

Register now here: https://studentsforliberty.ticketspice.com/libertycon-2022



European Students For Liberty prides itself on taking a big tent approach to promote liberty. Not only are pro-liberty people of all types and backgrounds welcome to join, but theres no requirement to have prior knowledge of libertarian thought, economics, or any particular approach to liberty.

Learn more about the LibertyCon at https://libertycon.net/

About Students For Liberty:

Students For Liberty is the largest pro-liberty, student-driven organization in the world. Students For Libertys mission is to educate, develop, and empower the next generation of leaders for liberty. For more information, visit: https://studentsforliberty.org/

Attachment
Chief spokesman of Afghanistan's caretaker government Zabihullah Mujahid speaks at a press conference in Kabul, Afghanistan, on April 3, 2022. (Photo by Saifurahman Safi/Xinhua)

Afghanistan's Taliban supreme leader bans cultivation of poppy and trade of opium in the country. "Enforcement of this decree is mandatory. The violator will be prosecuted and punished by the judiciary," the Taliban-led caretaker government says in a statement.

KABUL, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The Taliban supreme leader Haibatullah Akhundzada on Sunday banned in a decree the cultivation of opium poppy and trade of opium in Afghanistan, the Taliban-led caretaker government confirmed.Afghanistan's Taliban supreme leader bans cultivation of poppy and trade of opium in the country. "Enforcement of this decree is mandatory. The violator will be prosecuted and punished by the judiciary," the Taliban-led caretaker government says in a statement.



"As per the decree of the supreme leader of Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA), all Afghans are informed that from now on, cultivation of poppy has been strictly prohibited across the country," the caretaker government said in a statement.

The statement added that if anyone violates the decree, the crop will be destroyed immediately and the violator will be punished.

"In addition, use, transport, trade, export and import of all types of narcotics such as alcohol, heroin, K tablet (a drug with stimulant effects often sold in Afghanistan), hashish and etc., including drug manufacturing factories in Afghanistan are strictly banned," the statement said.

"Enforcement of this decree is mandatory. The violator will be prosecuted and punished by the judiciary," according to the statement.

Much of the world's opium poppy is cultivated in the militancy-hit Asian country. In 2020, some 6,300 tons of opium were produced in the country, according to official data. 
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban (C, Front) speaks to supporters at a rally in Budapest, Hungary, on April 3, 2022. (Photo by Attila Volgyi/Xinhua)

BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Monday sent a message of congratulation to his Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orban on his Fidesz party's re-winning parliamentary elections.

In the message, Li stressed that as China and Hungary enjoy profound traditional friendship, their bilateral relations have maintained high-level development in recent years.

He said China is ready to work with Hungary to maintain the momentum of high-level exchanges, further enhance mutual strategic trust, and deepen practical cooperation in all areas, so as to lift the China-Hungary comprehensive strategic partnership to higher levels. 


The White House is seen the morning after US President Joe Biden returned from a trip to Brussels and Poland to meet with NATO leaders in Washington, March 27, 2022. [Photo/Agencies]

It is interesting to watch the White House going hectic for days trying to undo what its master said that Russian President Vladimir Putin "cannot remain in power". It so happened that not long ago, Hunter Biden, son of US President Joe Biden, was revealed to be involved in Ukrainian biological laboratories.

One day before President Biden expressed what he later called "my outrage" in letting personal emotions overtake his presidency in Warsaw, London's Daily Mail reported on March 25 that "Hunter Biden DID help secure millions in funding for a US contractor in Ukraine specializing in deadly pathogen research". It was later confirmed by the New York Post with Hunter's e-mails obtained from a computer he had "forgotten" about having left it at a repair shop in Delaware.

By way of background, it has been fairly well documented that the United States has some 400 bacteriological laboratories around the world, including about two dozens in Ukraine. Although not all were "owned" by the Americans they were partially financed by the US Department of Defence (DoD).

The US DoD said that its biological threat reduction program was working with partner countries to combat the threat of outbreaks (intentional, accidental, or natural) of the most dangerous infectious diseases in the world, including Ukraine. The functioning of the so-called "American" biolaboratories in Ukraine started during the presidency of Viktor Yushchenko in 2005. In 2013 Ukraine abandoned its cooperation with the US but one year later it was restarted during the presidency of Petro Poroshenko.

The involvement of the Biden family in the Ukrainian biolabs surfaced on March 24 during the Russian military operation in Ukraine. Russian State Duma speaker Vyacheslav Volodin revealed on State media that an investment fund run by Hunter Biden financed research and the implementation of the US military biological program.

American intelligence officials had earlier dismissed Russia's claims of US military bio-program, explaining that Ukraine's network of biological labs was "researching pathogens" for which they had publicly received funding from Washington. However, the White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki claimed on March 9 that reports of biolabs in Ukraine were fake news propagated by Russia.

It is no surprise that they did not mention Hunter Biden's involvement in raising funds for the biolabs.

In 2009 Hunter Biden started a company  Rosemont Seneca Technology Partners  with Christopher Heinz, stepson of former Secretary of State John Kerry. The company invested $500,000 in Metabiota, a pathogen-research company headquartered in San Francisco.

Then in a separate story on March 17 into a federal tax investigation into Hunter's business dealings, the New York Times confirmed that the e-mails on Hunter's computer were authentic.

The e-mails revealed Hunter Biden introduced Metabiota to officials at Burisma, the Ukrainian gas company where he was a highly paid board member, for a "science project" involving biolabs in Ukraine.

"I don't think I made a mistake in taking a spot on that board. I think I made a mistake in terms of underestimating the way it would be used against me," he said of the US$50,000-a-month gig that raised eyebrows and ignited a political firestorm because his father was serving as vice president in the Obama administration at the time.

Metabiota has worked in Ukraine for Black & Veatch (B&V), an American defense contractor with ties to military intelligence agencies, which built secure labs in Ukraine, according to the Daily Mail.

According to the e-mails, Metabiota's then vice-president Mary Guttieri wrote to Hunter Biden about geopolitical issues involving the company's research in the former Soviet republic, two months after Russia annexed the Crimea region.

"As promised, I've prepared the attached memo, which provides an overview of Metabiota, our engagement in Ukraine, and how we can potentially leverage our team, networks, and concepts to assert Ukraine's cultural and economic independence from Russia and continued integration into Western society," her memo read.

B&V had been commissioned in 2010 by the US DoD's Threat Reduction Agency to build a lab in Odessa, Ukraine, to "enhance the government's existing surveillance systems to detect, report and respond to bioterrorism attacks, epidemics and potential pandemics", the company's website said.

The US Embassy in Ukraine posted on its website that its International Counterproliferation Program provides hands-on training for the National Police, the Security Service of Ukraine, and the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine.

"Training efforts focus primarily on Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) and dual-use item identification and interdiction. Courses include subject matter experts covering bio-terror investigations, dual-use item investigations, general WMD awareness, and WMD investigations. Workshops are tailored to focus on chemical, biological, or other WMD-related investigations. Trainings are conducted with an interagency focus, as opening lines of communication and guiding interagency networking and relationship-building is one of the cornerstones of building a successful and sustainable WMD capability in Ukraine," said the Embassy website.

Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland admitted during testimony before a US Senate committee on March 8 to the existence of biological research labs in Ukraine. "The US is working with Ukraine to prevent biological research facilities from falling into the hands of Russians," she said.

A 2012 report by the US National Academy of Sciences said that some Ukrainian labs have been upgraded to the level needed to handle some of the more dangerous pathogens such as anthrax and cholera. And Russia claimed that evidence they seized in Ukraine showed some pathogens were transported to the US.

Later the World Health Organization advised Ukraine to destroy high-threat pathogens stored in the country's labs to prevent "any potential spills".

This time, Psaki and other White House staff may find it hard to walk back. But Hunter Biden and those responsible at the US DoD owed the world a clarified account for the biolab pathogen programs they funded.

Hopefully the Russian-Ukraine conflict will soon be over, but the world will still be inquiring about the pathogen research programs aided by young Biden and Pentagon.

The author is a former Chief Information Officer of the Hong Kong Government, a PR & Media Consultant and veteran journalist.
Medical workers from east China's Shandong Province take part in a departure ceremony in Jinan, before leaving for Shanghai, on April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Xu Suhui)

SHANGHAI, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Around 10,000 medics nationwide have rushed to China's business hub Shanghai to aid the megacity to fight against the resurging COVID-19.

On Sunday, thousands of medics arrived in Shanghai with a population of 25 million by high-speed trains departing from provincial-level regions such as Tianjin, Hubei, Shandong and Jiangxi.

"Some of our 90-strong team had been to Wuhan, Hubei Province, or designated hospitals for COVID-19 control in Tianjin. They are also experienced," said Wang Zengguang, head of a medical team from Tianjin Medical University General Hospital. "We are determined to secure a victory in completing our task."

Earlier medical teams coming from the nearby provinces of Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Anhui have already arrived in Shanghai to join in the fight, according to the Shanghai Municipal Health Commission.

On Saturday, Shanghai reported 438 confirmed locally transmitted COVID-19 cases and 7,788 asymptomatic carriers.

RESOLUTE MOVES

Chinese Vice Premier Sun Chunlan on Saturday urged resolute and swift moves to stem the spread of COVID-19 in Shanghai in the shortest time possible, issuing her call during an inspection visit to the city.

Sun, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, stressed unswerving adherence to the dynamic zero-COVID approach and mobilizing COVID-19 testing capacity, medical personnel, and COVID-19 prevention supplies to support Shanghai in the fight against the epidemic.

The vice premier called for stepping up efforts to ensure that all those in need are tested, isolated, hospitalized or treated.

She also stressed strict closed-loop management for key industries and institutions to ensure the normal operation of core functions and the stability of supply and industrial chains.

Shanghai will conduct citywide nucleic acid testing on Monday after citywide antigen testing on Sunday.

A medical worker takes a swab sample from a woman for nucleic acid test in Changning District of east China's Shanghai, April 1, 2022. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

The measures were aimed at completely eliminating potential risks, cutting off the chain of transmission, curbing the spread of the virus, and achieving dynamic zero-COVID as soon as possible, Wu Qianyu, an official with the Shanghai Municipal Health Commission, told a press conference on Sunday.

RACING TO SECURE SUPPLIES

Authorities and suppliers in Shanghai have been racing to secure daily supplies for residents under closed-off management.

Shanghai has been working to increase sources of supplies and coordinate with suppliers to expand procurement channels to boost market supply, local authorities told a press conference.

Temporary vegetable warehouses have been set up for extra storage in the city and existing warehouses are boosting their capacity to deliver goods.

Staff members work at a vegetable warehouse in Songjiang District, east China's Shanghai, April 1, 2022. (Xinhua/Ding Ting)

In Pudong District, a warehouse with the capacity to store up to 1,500 tonnes was set up, with around 200 tonnes of vegetables from across China entering the warehouse every day.

In grocery delivery platform Dingdong's Chenta Warehouse, employees have been working around the clock since March to meet the surging customer needs.

With an area of over 23,000 square meters, the warehouse is one of the largest sorting centers of fruit and vegetables in the Puxi area. Over 1 million fruit and vegetable items are sent to more than 100 distribution warehouses across western Shanghai.

Xu Huacheng, who is in charge of the warehouse, said that the warehouse has almost doubled its employees from around 300 to nearly 600 since March.

"Our supplies are overall stable, and the company has arranged more storage space for handling the surging needs," Xu said.

SHANGHAI PORT

The Shanghai Port is still operating normally and there is no congestion of container ships, the Shanghai International Port Group Co., Ltd. said in a statement on Sunday.

A total of 52 ships are waiting for handling at the port, including nine container ships, while four of the nine are waiting for berthing, according to the statement.

Faced with the impacts of the epidemic, Shanghai Port has rolled out a series of measures to protect the safety of the port, ensure its normal operation and guarantee the stability of the industrial chain and supply chain in the Yangtze River Delta and the globe, the statement said. 
A medical worker from east China's Zhejiang Province takes a swab sample from a child for nucleic acid test at a community in Songjiang District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Zhang Jiansong)

Residents wait to take nucleic acid tests at a community in Pudong New Area of east China's Shanghai, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Ding Ting)

Medical workers from east China's Zhejiang Province take swab samples from residents for nucleic acid tests at a community in Songjiang District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Liu Ying)

A medical worker from east China's Jiangsu Province takes a swab sample from a resident for nucleic acid test at a community in Xuhui District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Gao Feng)

A medical worker from east China's Zhejiang Province takes a swab sample from a child for nucleic acid test at a community in Songjiang District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Liu Ying)

A medical worker from east China's Anhui Province takes a swab sample from a resident for nucleic acid test at a community in Huangpu District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

Residents prepare to take nucleic acid tests at a community in Putuo District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Chen Fei)

Medical workers from east China's Zhejiang Province prepare to conduct nucleic acid testing for residents at a community in Songjiang District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Liu Ying)

Aerial photo taken on April 4, 2022 shows residents waiting to take nucleic acid tests at a community in Huangpu District of Shanghai, east China. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

Volunteers help a resident register for nucleic acid test at a community in Songjiang District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Zhang Jiansong)

A medical worker from east China's Anhui Province takes a swab sample from a volunteer for nucleic acid test at a community in Minhang District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Fang Zhe)

A medical worker from east China's Jiangsu Province takes a swab sample from a resident for nucleic acid test at a community in Pudong New Area of east China's Shanghai, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Ding Ting)

Residents wait to take nucleic acid tests at a community in Xuhui District, east China's Shanghai, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Gao Feng)

Medical workers from east China's Zhejiang Province take swab samples from residents for nucleic acid tests at a community in Putuo District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua/Chen Fei)

A medical worker takes a swab sample from a man for nucleic acid test in Fengxian District of Shanghai, east China, April 4, 2022. Amid rising numbers of COVID-19 infections in its latest resurgence, Shanghai on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign covering the city's more than 24 million residents. (Xinhua)
A study by three French institutesIfremer, the University of Bordeaux and the IRD (a public research institution)has found that the surface water of the Atlantic Ocean is twice as polluted by cellulose fibers as it is by microplastics. This study, based on measurements taken from an offshore race boat, also shows that the North Atlantic is more affected by plastic pollution than the South Atlantic and questions the dynamics of the subtropical gyre (area with a high concentration of microplastics) since the pollution levels measured there are lower than expected.

During the last Vendee Globe, a singlehanded round-the-world yacht race, French skipper Fabrice Amedeo collected 53 samples using the microplastics sensor fitted aboard his Nexans  Art & Fenetres sailboat. The microplastic sensor continuously pumps and filters seawater; every 24 hours, Fabrice Amedeo changes the 300, 100 and 50 m mesh filters and stores them aboard his monohull.





The various teams led by Catherine Dreanno, a researcher at Ifremer Brest, LDCM lab, Jerome Cachot, professor at the University of Bordeaux, EPOC lab; Sophie Lecomte, Director of Research at CNRS, CBMN lab; and Christophe Maes, Head of IRD research, LOPS lab, have just completed the analysis of 300 m mesh filters.

The first observation focuses on the concentration and the wide variety of shapes, sizes, colors and kinds of particles and fibers (ranging between 0.3 and 5 mm) in the samples taken, which contained twice as many cellulose fibers as microplastics (MP).





Cellulose fibers are present in virtually all the samples collected (92.5% of samples), in contrast to microplastics, where solely 64% of samples contain at least one piece of microplastic. These results support the theory that there is widespread contamination of the seawater offshore by anthropogenic particles created from the breaking up of plastics or washing clothes. Catherine Dreanno

Through spectroscopic analysis it is possible to work out that the fragments of microplastics studied are predominantly (45%) polyethylene (PE), particularly that used in plastic bags and food wrap, as well as polyethylene terephthalate (PET), notably that used in plastic bottles.

Its important to note that in the case of microplastics, like that of cellulose fibers, which colonize our oceans, there is an acute problem with the additives used by manufacturers to modify the properties of these materials: coloring them, making them more hard-wearing, rigid or, on the contrary, more flexible.

As the material ages, these additives end up coming away from the medium which, in this case, is cellulose fiber or a particle of microplastic, and dissolving in the ocean or being released into organisms digestive tracts if these particles are ingested Sophie Lecomte

The most surprising element in the researchers findings is that this initial study of offshore surface waters reveals a real difference between the South Atlantic and the North Atlantic. A certain number of samples collected in the south do not contain microplastics and generally they contain less than in the north.

However, we should have found some as Fabrice Amedeo navigated the subtropical South Atlantic Gyre, an area renowned for its massive concentration of this material. This unique set of data casts doubt then over the internal dynamics of the gyre. Well have to wait and see how the smallest fragments, those collected using 100 and 30 m filters, are divided up and distributed in the water column. Christophe Maes

The samples in the 100 m and 30 m filters are in the process of being analyzed, along with those from the last Transat Jacques Vabre between Le Havre and Brazil, which will enable the mapping of microplastic pollution in the North Atlantic, together with a more in-depth study into the difference in concentration between the South and North.

Upcoming sea passages will enable an even deeper understanding of the Atlantic Ocean. Fabrice Amedeo will this year participate in the Vendee - Arctique - Les Sables (a race between France and Iceland) and the Route du Rhum (Saint-Malo  Pointe-a-Pitre): during these sea passages, the microplastics sensor, which is funded with the support of the Onet Group, will be in operation 24/7.

The project offers the opportunity to collect and analyze microplastics of different size grades, which are present in the surface waters of the oceanan area that currently has little data available about it.
IVECO signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Enel X, the Enel Group company dedicated to developing and selling innovative energy services and solutions for the electrification of consumptions and mobility.

Under the terms of the non-binding MoU, IVECO and Enel X plan to explore a possible collaboration that will unlock the potential of e-mobility for commercial vehicles in Europe, with a focus on light commercial vehicles, heavy-duty vehicles and buses.

The two companies will assess how IVECO electric trucks can support the transition of Enels fleet to zero emission vehicles, while examining new joint opportunities in other transport segments.

The collaboration also aims to develop a joint offer addressing the e-mobility of commercial fleets, including but not limited to recharging infrastructure for light and heavy commercial vehicles.

IVECO and Enel X will leverage their R&D and technical expertise to evaluate the interoperability of the Enel X charging infrastructure with IVECO e-vehicles, and the potential joint development of advanced services (e.g., smart charging and V2G, Vehicle-to-Grid).
DERBY  The dog found shot twice in Derby last week continues to recover after he had to have his front leg amputated from the damage caused by the shooting, according to those involved with his care.

Shelton resident Renee Warner organized a GoFundMe campaign to help cover costs of the dogs surgery and recovery. The fundraiser was established on behalf of the Shelton Animal Shelter, which is overseeing the dogs care at this time.

In an update to the fundraiser on Saturday, Warner said the dog underwent surgery Friday and had to have his leg and shoulder blade amputated because of what she described as extensive damage caused by gunshots. Despite losing the leg, Warner said vet staff had him up and walking briefly on Saturday.

He is on his journey to recovery, Warner said.

As of Monday afternoon, nearly 300 people had donated over $13,000 to help cover the dogs medical costs.

The dog was found by officers in Derby on Friday after a 911 call around 2 a.m. reporting an injured German shepherd at Coon Hollow Park.

The 911 caller, later identified as 28-year-old Stranja Perrin, and 27-year-old Anthony Singletary were found in her car with Perrins two minor children at the park, Lt. Justin Stanko said. Perrin and Singletary were determined to be the owners of the dog, despite them both denying owning a dog, according to Stanko.

Investigators found nearby video surveillance that showed Perrins vehicle pull in to the park an hour before her call to police. Officers found 10 shell casings in the area, which were consistent with ammunition Perrin had with two 9mm handguns she was legally licensed to carry, Stanko said.

Stanko said multiple people told investigators Perrin and Singletary were recently experiencing homelessness and had been living in the vehicle they were found in at the park.

Perrin was charged with conspiracy to commit unlawful discharge of a firearm, conspiracy to commit cruelty to animals, conspiracy to commit first-degree reckless endangerment and two counts of risk of injury to a child.

Singletary, identified by police as a convicted felon, was charged with criminal possession of a firearm, conspiracy to commit unlawful discharge of a firearm, conspiracy to commit cruelty to animals, conspiracy to commit first-degree reckless endangerment and two counts of risk of injury to a child.

Stanko said neither of them has prior animal cruelty charges. He said Perrins children were placed with family members.

Singletary and Perrin were arraigned Monday at Superior Court in Derby, where Judge H. Gordon Hall ordered them held on bonds of $125,000 and $75,000, respectively.

At the request of a prosecutor, the judge also ruled that if they are able to post bond, they not have any pets or domestic animals while the charges are pending.

This is a very, very serious incident, Senior Assistant States Attorney Kimberley Northrop said, noting allegations of inflicting harm on a defenseless animal.

The prosecutor identified Singletary as the alleged shooter and said Perrins children were very shaken up and traumatized by the event, which at least one of them witnessed.

Assistant Public Defender Carla Droniak asked the judge to set a lower bond, noting that Perrin is pregnant and due to deliver in November.

These are just allegations at this point, she said.

In setting the bond, Hall said: The allegations are just that, but the allegations reflect a recklessness that is of great concern to the court, not to mention a degree of cruelty.
BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- A recent industry report has highlighted China's impressive advances in computing power, ranking the country as one of the best among major economies in the field.

The report, jointly released by the Tsinghua University, the International Data Corporation and Chinese IT firm Inspur Information, comprehensively assesses the computing power, efficiency, application and infrastructure of 15 major economies.

Noting that computing power has become the driving force in promoting the digital economy, the report said increasing investment in this sector will have an amplified and long-term effect on economic growth.

In the context of the booming cloud computing, artificial intelligence, 5G, among other emerging technologies, analysts believe that computing power has become an important infrastructure that will shape China's future technological landscape.

OPTIMIZED INFRASTRUCTURE

According to a recent policy announcement, China has started work on a mega project to build an integrated national big data system to improve overall computing power and resource efficiency.

The project involves establishing eight national computing hubs in the country's economic powerhouses and less developed yet resource-rich regions, plus 10 national data center clusters, according to the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).

The move comes amid a surge of demand for computing capacity as the country rides the digitalization wave, but shortages of energy and land resources have limited the expansion of data centers in the more developed regions.

"Computing power has already become an important infrastructure for the national economic development," the NDRC stated on its website, estimating China's demand for computing power to surge by over 20 percent annually in upcoming years.

By creating a national computing power network, the project will support the less developed regions with abundant renewable energy resources to store and process data transmitted from the economically advanced areas to address the soaring demand and the regional capacity imbalance.

"Innovation activities of enterprises need to be backed by computing power," said Peng Zhen, CEO of Inspur Information, adding that the future featuring massive data and high efficiency calls for a smarter computing power framework to support more enterprises.

EMPOWERED FUTURE

"How to improve computing power to utilize the massive data and benefit economic development is a question that we have to address," said Li Donghong, a researcher at Tsinghua University.

Statistics have shown that the scale of China's cloud computing market, which offers a glimpse of the country's overall computing power, exceeded 300 billion yuan (about 47.24 billion U.S. dollars) in 2021, according to the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT).

"In the next few years, China's cloud computing market is expected to maintain an average annual growth rate of 30 to 40 percent, with the market size reaching 1 trillion yuan by 2025," said He Baohong, a researcher with the CAICT.

Looking ahead, analysts expect the cloud computing industry to grasp the development opportunities brought by the country's accelerated digitalization drive.

According to a five-year plan released earlier this year, China aims to raise the proportion of the added value of core digital economy industries in its GDP to 10 percent in 2025, up from 7.8 percent in 2020.

By 2025, China will see the digital transformation of industries reach a new level, digital public services will become more inclusive, and the digital economy governance system will improve noticeably, per the plan.

China will strengthen its support of 6G research and development, enhance innovation in strategic fields such as integrated circuits and artificial intelligence, and facilitate the development of new business modes, according to the plan. 
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

GREENWICH  Greenwich Public Schools is establishing two new programs at Cos Cob School for its elementary-aged special-education students to give them more educational options.

One program would put a special education teacher in class with a non-special education teacher; the other would create an alternative classroom that would teach math and reading along with life skills and communication.

Every student is unique, and we want to make sure that we focus on individual students needs, Stacey Heiligenthaler, chief officer of special education and student supports, told Greenwich Time. By having different options for students, were able to provide them the support and the special education services that they need.

Heiligenthaler crafted a special-education action plan after an independent consultants critical review of the special education department was presented in June 2021. The district had 1,184 students in special education programming last school year.

The district appointed Heiligenthaler to her position in February after she served in an interim capacity. During the March 24 Board of Education meeting, she gave an update on the action plan and answered questions, in particular those around the co-teaching classrooms that will launch next school year.

Greenwich special education has long been a sore spot with families; data show students with autism in Greenwich Public Schools spent less time with their nondisabled peers in the 2020-21 school year than in the previous four school years, according to Connecticut Department of Education data.

On average, the districts 58 students with autism spent 47.2 percent  less than half  of their time with their general-education peers, slightly better than the statewide average. Statewide, students with autism have 45.8 percent of their education with nondisabled classmates, according to the same data.

Other students in special education, such as those with learning disabilities, had more time with nondisabled peers and have seen progress in their general-education time throughout the past five years, the data show.

The new programs should help expand the connection between students with a disability and their nondisabled peers, official said.

As for the specific programs that will be in place for the 2022-23 school year, the district will only have co-teaching in Cos Cob School, and it will be limited to kindergarten and first grades, officials said.

Co-teaching brings a special-education teacher into the classroom to help all of the students, so the class will have two instructors for at least part of the day.

Heiligenthaler said co-teaching is very common; some GPS middle-school classrooms use co-teaching. Co-teaching can allow some students more time in the classroom who would otherwise be instructed in the resource room, she said.

Board member Lauren Kostin asked whether that it was a fair distribution of resources to establish co-teaching in just one location.

My issue is that a child at Cos Cob who does have significant needs would benefit from this program but then somebody else from another school would have to leave their home school to have those services, she said. I mean, thats hard when co-teaching is certainly one of the best practices.

In the interest of equity, if were doing it at one school, we should do it at all of them, she said.

Heiligenthaler said she would love that but advocated for the district to start small and grow the program. Co-teaching will expand to more grade levels each year, she said.

Although the program will only be offered at Cos Cob, K-1 students throughout the district with individualized education programs that recommend co-teaching may transfer to Cos Cob if their families choose. Heiligenthaler said transportation would be provided for these students.

She said Cos Cob was chosen for its central location, accessibility and open space.

Eventually we can look at doing it at other schools, but that would be something that would be down the road and based on the needs of the students that are in the district, she said.

Cos Cob will also house the unique learner program, a classroom for grades 3-5 with an alternative set of requirements from the state. Students work on reading and math but also learn life skills and hone communication.

The program will allow the district to accommodate more students and reduce the number of costly out-of-district placements, Heiligenthaler said.

As of March 7, GPS had spent nearly $5.4 million on out-of-district placements for the current school year. But beyond saving the district money, Heiligenthaler says the unique learner program will help students succeed.

I think that being in their home community is so important and having access to general education peers and being able to do specials and lunch and recess and field trips, she said. These are the students that theyre going to be with through elementary school and into middle school and high school. Having that ability to develop those relationships is so important for any child but especially students who that is a challenge for them.

She said families will be notified in coming weeks of opportunities to enroll students in the co-teaching environment or unique learner program.

Editors note: This story has been updated to correct the number of Greenwich students in special education programming last school year.

annelise.hanshaw@hearstmediact.com
Port Chester Police / Contributed

PORT CHESTER, N.Y.  The mayor of the village of Port Chester was credited with helping find a missing 4-year-old boy over the weekend, according to police.

At about 7 p.m. Sunday, authorities in Port Chester  just over the border in New York from Greenwich  received a frantic 911 call from a family on Iriving Avenue, reporting their 4-year-old son was missing.
Lt. Gov. Josh Tenorio recently met with Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Readiness, Rep. John Garamendi, D-Calif., to discuss the Port Authority of Guam.
A U.S. Marine from 9th Engineer Support Battalion, 3d Marine Logistics Group guides Landing Craft Air Cushion 29 ashore at Aparri, Philippines during Balikatan 22, March 28, 2022. Balikatan is an annual exercise between the Armed Forces of the Philippines and U.S. military designed to strengthen bilateral interoperability, capabilities, trust, and cooperation built over decades shared experiences. Balikatan, Tagalog for shoulder-to-shoulder, is a longstanding bilateral exercise between the Philippines and the United States highlighting the deep-rooted partnership between both countries. Balikatan 22 is the 37th iteration of the exercise and coincides with the 75th anniversary of the U.S.-Philippine security cooperation.
People pose for photos on the skywalk of Senayan Park in Jakarta, Indonesia, Jan. 23, 2022. (Xinhua/Xu Qin)

Stretching 256,142 hectares of land on the second-largest island of Kalimantan, the Indonesian new capital Nusantara is becoming a new destination for local government to attract new capital and investments to boost the economy.

by Hayati Nupus

JAKARTA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The Indonesian government is looking for investors to finance a huge project for its new capital, Nusantara, with an area covering 256,142 hectares of land on the second-largest island of Kalimantan, bordering Brunei and Malaysia.

The first phase of the project development will be carried out until 2024, Coordinating Minister for Maritime and Investment Affairs Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan said, adding that the project is scheduled to be fully completed on the 100th anniversary of the country's independence in 2045.

Indonesia is exploring a variety of sources of funds to finance the massive project, including using state funds, offering investment to overseas partners, and mobilizing people to crowdfund.

Investors from various countries are offered to build business centers, and government offices would be built using state funds, Pandjaitan said.

According to the National Development Planning Agency, this project requires funds of at least 501.56 trillion rupiahs (about 35 billion U.S. dollars).

"We are open to anyone who wants to come (to invest)," Pandjaitan said on Wednesday.

Photo taken on Jan. 23, 2022 shows the cityscape in Jakarta, Indonesia. (Xinhua/Xu Qin)

Investors from the United Arab Emirates are ready to invest their capitals through a sovereign wealth fund, the minister noted.

"Abu Dhabi has confirmed that they will invest 20 billion U.S. dollars," he said. "We will see how much investment will be."

Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has expressed his interest in investing in Nusantara when Pandjaitan visited Riyadh in early March, and this Middle Eastern investor is also keen to invest his money in the supply of crude oil, mangroves and coral reefs in Indonesia.

A follow-up meeting is expected to be held in the near future to see potentials and technicalities of each project, Pandjaitan added.

Previously, Softbank had expressed its intention to fund the new capital city project, but the Japanese investor canceled it.

"Softbank has resigned since its shares dropped," said Pandjaitan.

Another commitment has come from the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The Manila-based institution said in a statement that it would help Indonesia design its new capital city as an inclusive and carbon-neutral city, assess its potential environmental and social impacts, and raise funds from the government and private sources.

The funding opportunity may come from anywhere, including from Indonesians who are enthusiastic about crowdfunding to build public or social facilities, said Chairman of the Nusantara National Capital Authority Bambang Susantono.

Susantono gave an example of how an Indonesian diaspora group proposed the construction of a Diaspora House in the new capital.

"Because the construction of the house will not be financed by the state, they took the initiative to do crowdfunding to build the Diaspora House," he said. 




Haiti - Justice : 21% of Haitian detainees in the Dominican Republic are murderers





In the Dominican Republic, 1,464 Haitians are currently behind bars, mainly in La Victoria prison (363 inmates), El Seibo (110), Anamuya de Higuey (101) and La Vega (100).



306 (20.9%) of the 1,464 Haitian detainees are in prison for homicides; 285 (19.4%) for robberies; 194 (13.2%) for drugs; 175 (11.9%) for domestic violence; 108 (7.3%) for assault and battery and 396 (27.0%) for various other criminal code offences, according to statistics from the General Directorate of Penitentiary and Correctional Services.



Of all Haitian detainees, 376 have been sentenced by the courts, while 1,088 (74.3%) are in preventive detention awaiting trial.



Haitians represent 80.08% of the 1,828 foreign prisoners in the Dominican Republic (2022)



In 2021, in addition to Haitians, there were 214 North Americans and 104 Europeans in Dominican prisons.



However, all Haitian prisoners represent only 4.99% of the 29,289 detainees in the 41 prison centers of the country (2022 estimate). It should be noted that these centers are overcrowded, the average occupancy rate being 183%



La Victoria is the most populated prison in the Dominican Republic where there is the highest level of overcrowding with more than 7,000 inmates



Image thumbnail : Partial view of the courtyard of La Victoria prison



S/ HaitiLibre






















Haiti - Diaspora Covid-19 : Daily Bulletin #745





GLOBAL SITUATION 2019-2022:

Epidemiological situation:

Sunday, April 3, 2022 the number of people infected worldwide with the Covid-19 coronavirus and its variants since the start of the pandemic (March 11, 2020) amounts to 491,829,572 cases (+706,301 in 24 hours ), the day before (+970.401)



Number of infected countries: 225



*Healings: 426,790,612 people have been cured of Covid-19 worldwide (+896,339), the day before (+1,048,218)

*Deaths: 6,176,246 people have died of Covid-19 worldwide since the start of the pandemic (+1,427 in 24 hours), the day before (+2,973)

*Active cases (minus deaths and recoveries) in the world is currently 58,862,714 cases (-191,465 in 24 hours), the day before (+80,790)



Average cure rate in the world: 86.77% (+)



Average mortality rate in the world: 1.25% (=)



World: Number of daily confirmed cases





(Day-1)



Vaccination: 11.39 billion doses of vaccine injected (+20 million doses injected in 24 hours. Update April 3, 2022 (latest data available).



HAITI:

Warning: The Ministry of Public Health and Population (MSPP) did not make available after March 26, 2022 daily data on the Covid-19 situation in Haiti. Accordingly, the data below on the situation in Haiti are the latest available.



According to the Ministry of Public Health, +16 new cases of Covid-19 and its variants have been confirmed in Haiti as of March 26, 2022 (latest partial data available ) for a total of 30,545 confirmed cases throughout the national territory (48.7% women and 51.3% men), since the first case (March 19, 2020 https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-30319-haiti-health-origin-of-the-first-2-cases-of-covid-19-in-haiti.html ). Previous update (+7 cases as of March 24, 2022).



Healings: 28,431 (+162)



Cure rate: 93.07% (+)



Deaths: 833 deaths (+0) ()



Death rate: 2.72% (=)



5th Wave (Omicron Dominant):

Total of the 5th wave (starting December 27, 2021) 4,551 confirmed cases and 67 deaths



Screening since the start of the pandemic: 188,012 tests (+690 in 2 days) since March 19, 2020, latest data available. Note that the very small number of people screened every day at the national level out of a population estimated at 11.6 million citizens, does not statistically allow us to make a representative estimate of the situation in Haiti, which translates into a < B>number of daily confirmed cases largely underestimated.



TOP 5 of the most affected municipalities in the West (2022):

Delmas: 740 (+1); Petion-ville 624 (+3); Port-au-Prince 406 (+0); Tabarre 287 (+0); Cross-Bouquets 239 (+1)



Confirmed cases by department (2022 / 2021 / 2020):

West: 2022: 2,552 cases; (2021: 9.890); (2020: 6,945 cases)

North: 2022: 267 cases; (2021: 664); (2020: 677 cases)

Center: 2022: 226 cases; (2021: 1.001); (2020: 508 cases)

Artibonitis: 2022: 184 cases; (2021: 855); (2020: 593 cases)

Northeast: 2022: 148 cases; (2021: 404); (2020: 314 cases)

Southeast: 2022: 262 cases; (2021: 768); (2020: 274 cases)

South: 2022: 214 cases; (2021: 891); (2020: 262 cases)

North West: 2022: 255 cases; (2021: 383); (2020: 229 cases)

Grand'Anse: 2022: 173 cases; (2021: 861); (2020: 176 cases)

Nippes: 2022: 39 cases; (2021: 249) (2020: 149 cases)



Cumulative deaths by department (2022-2021):

West: 295 deaths (2020: 104 deaths)

North: 54 deaths (2020: 34 deaths)

Center: 79 deaths (2020: 13 deaths)

Artibonite: 42 deaths (2020: 39 deaths)

North East: 7 deaths (2020: 6 deaths)

South: 51 deaths (2020: 6 deaths)

Southeast: 15 deaths (2020: 9 deaths)

North West: 15 deaths (2020: 12 deaths)

Grand'Anse: 7 deaths (2020: 13 deaths)

Nippes: 27 deaths (2020: 5 deaths)



Distribution of deaths by age (since the start of the epidemic):

0-9 years: 15 deaths

10-19 years: 10 deaths

20-29 years: 31 deaths

30-39 years: 56 deaths

40-49 years: 80 deaths

50-59 years: 134 deaths

60-69 years: 187 deaths

70-79 years: 183 deaths

80 years and over: 137 deaths



Vaccination:

163,369 Haitians (1.4% of the population) +2,205 in 6 days have received a 1st dose of vaccine since July 16, 2021, date of the first injection through 149 open vaccination centers and 111,914 Haitians are fully vaccinated (2 doses, 0.96% of the population) +1.585 in 6 days. Update March 22, 2022 latest information available (source MSPP).



List of the 149 Vaccination Centers open in Haiti (and hours) by department:

(updated October 20, 2021, latest information available)

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-35051-haiti-covid-19-list-of-149-vaccination-centers-open-in-the-country.html



DIASPORA:

Epidemiological situation :



USA:

*Cases since the first case (February 29, 2020): 81,832,612 cases (+6,241 in 24 hours), the day before (+12,856)

*Healings: 65,676,514 healings (+150,540), the day before (+142,983)

National Cure Rate: 80.25% (+)

*Deaths: 1,008,198 deaths (+39), the day before (+170)

National death rate: 1.23% (=)

*Active cases (minus deaths and recoveries): 15,147,900 (-144,338), yesterday (-130,297)



USA: Number of daily confirmed cases:





(Day-1)



Vaccination: 561.34 million doses of vaccine injected since December 14, 2020, the date of the first injection in the United States (+130,000 doses in 24 hours). Update April 2 (latest data available).



DOMINICAN REPUBLIC:

Confirmed cases since March 1, 2020: 578,179 cases (+49 in 24 hours) the day before (+92 in 24 hours). First case (March 1, 2020)

Healings: 573,600 healings (+10 in 24h), the day before (+66)

National Cure Rate: 99.20% (-)

Deaths: 4,375 deaths (+0), previous (+0)

Death rate: 0.75% (=)

Positivity rate over 4 epidemiological weeks: 0.90% (+)

Active cases: (excluding deaths and recoveries) 204 cases (+39 in 24 hours) the day before (+26)



Dominican Republic: Trend of active cases: (minus recoveries and deaths)





(Day-1)



TOP 5 Provinces with the most new cases in the last 24 hours:

Maria Trinidad Sanchez: +14 new cases ()

Santo Domingo: +12 new cases in 24 hours (+)

Distrito Nacional: +11 new cases in 24 hours (+)

Puerto Plata: +9 new cases in 24 hours ()

Santiago: +1 new cases in 24 hours (-)



Vaccination: 15.52 million doses of vaccine injected since February 16

2021, date of the first injection in the Dominican Republic (+10,000 doses injected in 24 hours). Update April 2, 2022 (latest data available).



QUEBEC:

Warning: Quebec health authorities no longer update data on the Covid situation on weekends. The figures below are therefore the latest available.



Confirmed cases since the first case (February 27, 2020): 970,951 (+3,182 in 24 hours), previous (+3,319)

Healings: 931,800 people (+2,084 in 24 hours) previous (+1,206)

Cure rate: 95.96% (-)

Deaths: 14,382 (+17 in 24h) previous (+12)

Death rate: 1.48% (=)

Active cases: (excluding death and recovery) 24,769 cases (+1,081 in 24 hours), previous (+2,101)



Quebec: Trend of daily confirmed cases





(average weekly trend)



Vaccination: 18,669,587 doses of vaccine injected since December 14, 2020, date of the first injection (+20,898 doses in 24 hours), latest data available - MSSS as of March 31, 2022)



FRANCE:

*Confirmed cases since the first case (January 24, 2020): 25,997,852 cases (+102,266 cases in 24 hours), previous (+132,114)

*Healings: 23,390,491 healings (+18,822), previous (+60,354)

National Cure Rate: 89.97% (-)

Deaths: 142,506 (+31 in 24h), previous (+68)

Death rate: 0.54% (=)

Active Cases: 2,464,855 (+83,413), previous (+71,692)



France: Number of daily confirmed cases





(Day-1)



Vaccination: 141.91 million doses of vaccine injected since December 27, 2020, date of the first injection in France (+40,000 doses injected in 24 hours. Update April 3, 2022 (latest data available)



Previous bulletin : https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-36337-haiti-diaspora-covid-19-daily-bulletin-744.html



See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-30319-haiti-health-origin-of-the-first-2-cases-of-covid-19-in-haiti.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-30165-haiti-flash-first-case-of-covid-19-in-the-dominican-republic.html



HL/ HaitiLibre






















Haiti - News : Zapping...





Jean Dominique, 22 years that the investigation continues...

On April 3rd, 2000, Jean Dominique, journalist and director of Radio Haiti Inter, and Jean-Claude Louissaint, receptionist, were murdered in front of the radio station. The investigation has been going on for 22 years... parents, friends and society are still waiting for the justice response to the assassination of Jean Dominique and Jean-Claude Louissaint. 22 years of justice silence, 22 years of victory for impunity



DR : Seizure of 11,920 packs of cigarettes from Haiti

Saturday, in the sector of El Abanico (Province of Dajabon), the Specialized Body for Land Border Security (CESFRONT) seized 11,920 packets of smuggled CAPITAL brand cigarettes from Haiti.



Arrest of a suspected individual

Friday, April 1st, the police in the city of Hinche arrested Joseph Jaccerne, in "Agwaedyond" (3rd communal section, right river, locality of Samana). Originally from the city of Papaye Joseph Jaccerne was in possession of a 9mm caliber pistol at the time of his arrest.



Insecurity and elections in Haiti discussed in New York

This Wednesday, March 30, 2022, CARICOM member Consuls were invited to a lunch organized by the Consulate General of Barbados in New York. Lauture Jacques the Consul of Haiti in New York, took the opportunity to talk to his counterparts about the efforts of the Haitian Government to fight against the insecurity that is eating away at the Capital of Haiti and which is taking the necessary steps to proceed with the realization elections in the coming months.



Handicap International Delegation in Haiti

Thursday, March 24, Genard Joseph, Secretary of State for Persons with Disabilities received a delegation from "Handicap International", an important partner for the Office of the Secretary of State. This meeting is part of a series of consultations and exchanges around a strategic plan that aims to empower people with disabilities through synchronization of the actions of all partners working in the field.



28th National Charismatic Congress Announced

The National Committee of the Association of Charismatic Faithful of Haiti announces that the 28th National Congress will be held from April 22 to 24, 2022 in Saint Louis de Gonzague (Delmas 33) around the theme "Trust, Haiti : I make you the light of nations.



HL/ HaitiLibre


















By William Schwartz | Published on 2022/04/03

On April 2nd the turn-of-the-century era romance drama "Twenty Five Twenty One" aired its fifteenth episode, to ratings of 9.592%. But the episode drew significant controversy for a depiction of September 11th that many considered to be tasteless. In the show's internal continuity, the male lead, played by Nam Joo-hyuk, is in the United States working as a reporter. When 9/11 hits, he has to report on the terrorist attack on the spot for South Korean audiences.

Advertisement

The controversy arises less from the reporting itself as the reaction from the female lead played by Kim Tae-ri. As this is a huge opportunity for her longtime friend, she has a huge, beaming smile in response to this event. The juxtaposition of a real world tragedy with a big career boost for her friend was, perhaps, intended to be ironic. But commenters in South Korea attacked the scene for being in very poor taste, and were surprised that Netflix would air such a scene on its worldwide platform.

Interestingly, the controversy appears to be almost entirely localized within the South Korean zeitgeist. At the time of this writing the only English language publications to report on the controversy are ones devoted exclusively to coverage of South Korean cultural content. "Twenty Five Twenty One" finished its sixteen episode run on April 3rd with ratings of 12.636%.

Written by William Schwartz

___________

"Twenty Five Twenty One" is directed by Jung Ji-hyun, Kim Seung-ho-III, written by Kwon Do-eun, and features Kim Tae-ri, Nam Joo-hyuk, Bona, Choi Hyun-wook, Lee Joo-myung, Seo Jae-hee. Broadcasting information in Korea: 2022/02/12~2022/04/03, Sat, Sun 21:10 on tvN.
Photo taken on March 7, 2022 shows a view of the third round of talks between Russian and Ukrainian delegations at the Belovezhskaya Pushcha. (Belta news agency via Xinhua)

On the Ukraine issue, China does not seek geopolitical interests, nor will it watch the event from a safe distance while sitting idle, or add fuel to the fire, Wang Yi said, stressing that the only thing that China wants is peace in Ukraine.

BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- China hopes Russia and Ukraine would stick to peace talks until a ceasefire agreement is reached and the only thing that China wants is peace in Ukraine, State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Monday.

Wang made the remarks during a phone conversation with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba.

Kuleba briefed Wang on the Russia-Ukraine situation. China is a great country which advocates the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and plays a key and active role in safeguarding peace, he said.

He added that Ukraine wishes to maintain communication with China and hopes that China would continue to play an important role in achieving a ceasefire in his country.

Wang expressed appreciation for the efforts of the Ukrainian government and all sectors of society in assisting the safe evacuation of Chinese citizens from Ukraine, stressing that Chinese leaders and the Chinese government highly value the safety of every overseas Chinese citizen.

He said he hopes Ukraine would continue to take active and effective measures to ensure the safety of Chinese citizens remaining in the country. Kuleba, in response, pledged his country's utmost efforts in this regard.

People rest at a temporary settlement site near Mariupol, Ukraine, March 17, 2022. (Photo by Victor/Xinhua)

Noting China's stance on the Ukraine issue as promoting dialogue and peace talks, Wang said Chinese President Xi Jinping has comprehensively expounded China's position on multiple occasions, which serves as an important guidance to address the current challenges.

It is China's historical and cultural tradition as well as its consistent foreign policy to safeguard peace and oppose war, Wang said.

On the Ukraine issue, China does not seek geopolitical interests, nor will it watch the event from a safe distance while sitting idle, or add fuel to the fire, Wang said, stressing that the only thing that China wants is peace in Ukraine.

China welcomes peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, Wang said, adding that no matter how difficult the talks would be and what differences they would have, the general direction of peace talks should be held until a ceasefire and eventual peace are achieved.

Wang said the conflict will eventually come to an end, and what is important is to think over the past misery and preserve sustainable security in Europe.

Local residents receive humanitarian aid in the village of Anadol in Donetsk, on March 10, 2022. (Photo by Victor/Xinhua)

China believes that the principle of indivisible security should be adhered to, and a balanced, effective and sustainable European security architecture should be built upon dialogue on an equal footing, Wang said, adding that based on its objective and impartial position, China is willing to continue to play a constructive role in its own way.

Wang said he believes that Ukraine is capable of making choices that are in the fundamental interest of the people of the country.

Kuleba said he agrees with China's views and expressed appreciation for China's humanitarian assistance.

He said Ukraine is dedicating to peace talks with Russia to find a lasting solution, and the country is willing to become the gate of Europe.

Wang said he hopes this gate will lead to peace in Europe, development in Ukraine and cooperation between China and Europe. 
Yemeni people walk past the site of airstrikes in Sanaa, Yemen, March 26, 2022. (Photo by Mohammed Mohammed/Xinhua)

The council members called on all parties to seize the opportunity provided by the truce and work with the UN special envoy to make progress toward a comprehensive ceasefire and an inclusive political settlement.

UNITED NATIONS, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The UN Security Council on Monday issued a statement, welcoming the April 1 call by UN special envoy Hans Grundberg for a two-month truce announcement on Yemen and the positive response from the parties.

The council members underscored the opportunity a truce affords to alleviate the humanitarian suffering of Yemenis and improve regional stability, according to the statement issued by council president Barbara Woodward.

They urged the building of confidence through measures such as, but not limited to, the re-opening of Taiz road, and the regular flow of fuel deliveries, goods and flights, in accordance with the agreed truce, it said.

The council members called on all parties to seize the opportunity provided by the truce and work with the UN special envoy to make progress toward a comprehensive ceasefire and an inclusive political settlement.

They expressed full support for the envoy's political consultation efforts, reiterated the urgency of an inclusive Yemeni-led, Yemeni-owned process, under UN auspices, and underscored the importance of a minimum 30 percent participation in them by women, in line with the Outcomes of the National Dialogue Conference as recalled by resolution 2624 (2022).

They welcomed the Gulf Cooperation Council initiative for Yemeni-Yemeni dialogue which launched last week, in support of the UN's own efforts. They expressed deep concern about Yemen's humanitarian crisis and underlined the urgent need to fund the humanitarian response, according to the statement. 
Iran hostage rescue veteran to speak in Brevard

Phillip Hanson, U.S. Army Special Forces sergeant major (ret.), is pictured here while serving as a Green Beret in Thailand in 1971.

Phillip Hanson, a retired U.S. Army Special Forces sergeant major who has served in military special ops and national security roles for nearly 50 years, will present the free program Operation Eagle Claw: Iran Hostage Rescue Attempt next week in Brevard.

Hanson, who lives in Flat Rock, will speak at 2 p.m. Thursday at the Transylvania County Election Center, 150 South Gaston St., Brevard.

Hansons program on April 14 will review the background of the Iran hostage crisis, which began in November 1979 and Phillip Hanson, a retiree who lives in Flat Rock, will speak on the operation and lessons of Operation Eagle Claw.culminated in the release of the hostages in January 1981. Hanson will explain the planning, preparation and execution of Operation Eagle Claw, which was intended to rescue the hostages in early 1980, as well as the factors that resulted in that operation being aborted midstream, with eight service member fatalities. Analyzing the positive outcomes from the failed undertaking, Hanson will also discuss the many operational changes following Operation Eagle Claw that greatly enhanced the capability of all the U.S. service branches to respond effectively to hostage rescue situations.

Hansons special operations career has spanned more than 50 years, including experience as both an operator and a trainer in the U.S. and in overseas assignments in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Latin America, and the Caribbean. In 1980 he served as a member of the Operation Eagle Claw Task Force assigned to rescue the American hostages being held captive by the Islamic government in Tehran, Iran.

Born and raised in the Pacific Northwest, Hanson began a military career of 20 years in 1969 when he enlisted in the U.S. Army, with Special Forces designation. As an operator and a trainer he assisted Special Forces operations in the Vietnam War and Panama as well as serving as an explosives specialist at Fort Bragg, N.C.

In 1978 Hanson was selected as one of the early members of Delta Force and participated in Operation Eagle Claw, security for the Los Angeles Olympics, the invasion of Grenada, personal protection for U.S. generals in the Middle East, and, at times, attachment to Navy SEAL Team 6.

For 28 years following his retirement from the Army, Hanson headed an international security services firm based on his special operations expertise. Concurrently, for a period of nine years, he assisted the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, attached to the U.S. Coast Guard Special Missions Training Center while creating instructional programs for advanced interdiction forces and counterterrorism operations.

In 2021 Hanson received the Saint Philip Neri Silver Award from the Special Forces Association, recognizing the highest standards of integrity, moral character, and professional competence while serving in the United States Army Special Forces. Hanson is currently the Vice President of Region 4, Chapter XVII of the Special Forces Association.

The program next week will live-stream on Facebook at 2:10 p.m. here. and will be available later on YouTube here.
A MAN from Henley is delivering donations to Ukraine.

Piers Burnell set off for the border with Poland on Monday in his Land Rover Discovery carrying 25 boxes of donations, including food and sterilised water, nappies and medication.

He was due to meet two separate contacts on Wednesday, who will take his donations on to Ukraine, and is due back in the UK tomorrow evening.

Mr Burnell, a theatre producer and radio presenter, who lives in Market Place, said: The plan started as a conversation with a friend saying Maybe we should just load the car up and go to Poland. The more I thought about it, the more I thought, Actually, why not?

I found news reports of local people who were helping to organise donations and then just worked backwards and found contacts on Facebook.

Among the donations are teddy bears for children with messages such as, please be my friend written on them. Town councillor David Eggleton said: Ive been helping out with donations, which Ive been collecting from all over the place.

Weve been overwhelmed by all the support. It has been incredible.
Tourists visit the Casa Mila, a renowned building designed by architect Antoni Gaudi, in Barcelona, Spain, June 27, 2021. (Xinhua/Zhang Cheng)

She expected the number of tourists to continue to increase in April, reaching about 80 percent of pre-pandemic figure.

MADRID, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Spain welcomed 3.15 million tourists in February of this year as the tourist industry continues to recover from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, said the Spanish Statistical Office (INE) on Monday.

The number of foreigners visiting Spain increased by 1,007.8 percent when compared with February 2021, when many travel restrictions were still in place due to the pandemic.

Spending also rose strongly, with visitors spending a total of 3,757 million euros in the month, which was 1,060.2 percent up from the figure in last year's same period.

Visitors take photos at an observation deck on the top of a hill in San Sebastian, Spain, Aug. 24, 2019. (Xinhua/Guo Qiuda)

Although the signs of recovery continue, INE points out that the number of foreign visitors to Spain accounted for only 71 percent of pre-pandemic figure.

The lifting of restrictions has seen a large increase in the number of tourists from other European countries, especially from the United Kindom, France and Germany, according to the INE.

Reyes Maroto, Minister of Industry, Commerce and Tourism, said that travelers view Spain as "a safe destination," considering there is "a growth of more than 670,000 travelers in February compared to the previous month."

Photo taken on Sept. 22, 2020 shows the city view of Toledo, Spain. (Xinhua/Meng Dingbo)

She expected the number of tourists to continue to increase in April, reaching about 80 percent of pre-pandemic figure. 
Photo taken on Nov. 25, 2021 shows a construction site where Israel plans to build a massive Jewish settlement on the site of an abandoned airport in east Jerusalem. (Photo by Muammar Awad/Xinhua)

RAMALLAH, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The Palestinian presidential spokesman warned on Monday that the Israeli escalation against the Palestinians would lead to more tension in the entire region.

Condemning Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid's visit to Damascus Gate in the Old City of East Jerusalem on Sunday, Nabil Abu Rudeineh said in a statement that this visit is "irresponsible."

"The ongoing behavior of the Israeli army and police and the actions of the Israeli settlers are provocative," Abu Rudeineh added.



The continued Israeli escalation in East Jerusalem and the Israeli settlers' assaults on Al-Aqsa Mosque are "a clear and blatant violation that proves Israel's lack of commitment to the understandings and the signed agreements," the spokesman noted.

On Sunday night, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said in a statement that 19 Palestinians were injured by Israeli police during clashes outside Damascus Gate in East Jerusalem following Lapid's visit.

In the 1967 Middle East war, Israel occupied the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, which are all claimed by the Palestinians, and has controlled or besieged them ever since.

Since then, the Palestinians have been seeking self-determination in a bid to establish an independent state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. 
BELGRADE, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Serbia's current President Aleksandar Vucic convincingly won presidential elections, while Vucic's ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) won the most votes in parliamentary elections, according to preliminary results published by the Serbian Republic Electoral Commission (RIK) Monday evening.

According to RIK's report, after counting 8,030 out of 8,255 polling stations, Vucic won 58.59 percent of the votes in the presidential elections, which enabled him to claim victory in the first round, ahead of the second-ranked candidate, former chief of the Serbian General Staff Zdravko Ponos (18.32 percent).

Moreover, SNS won 42.97 percent of votes for the parliament, which translates to 119 out of 250 MP seats, and enables Serbia's ruling party to form the new government together with smaller coalition partners.

SNS's ruling coalition partner Serbian Socialist Party (SPS) won 11.5 percent of the votes (32 MP seats) and will likely partake in the new parliament majority together with the Alliance of Hungarians of Vojvodina (6 MP seats).

The opposition coalition "United for the Victory of Serbia" won the second most votes in parliamentary elections with 13.57 percent of votes (38 MPs).

Serbia held regular presidential and local elections on Sunday, along with extraordinary parliamentary elections

Vucic on Sunday already declared victory for himself and his party, promising peace and stability, good neighbor relations, the continuation of EU integration, and strengthening of the country's traditional partnerships, such as those with China and Russia.

RIK is obliged to announce the final results 96 hours after the closing of polling stations. 
Las Vegas, NV  BirchStreet Systems had the pleasure of participating as a sponsor for the 2022 Americas Finance Conference (AFC) at Hilton Orlando Lake Buena Vista from March 21-24.

The AFC brought hotel and corporate finance teams together for the first time since 2018 to reconnect through networking opportunities and reenergize team dynamics through engaging and educational content.

Chief Executive Officer Brendan Reidy, Chief Commercial Officer Paul Rantilla, and Senior Vice President of Solutions Consulting Kim Huff attended the various events, observing Hiltons deep passion for its culture and clients. They spent valuable time learning about Hiltons strategy coming out of the pandemic and overcoming the latest set of challenges facing the hospitality industry.

We participated in Lab events, and heard from Property Finance teams who shared how they plan to embrace more technology this next year to streamline and automate their Procurement, Invoice, Inventory, and Recipe Management processes said Kim Huff.

Paul Rantilla commented, Hilton is coming back from the impact of the global pandemic. As evidence of their growth, they are opening more than one property per day. We heard a lot about leveraging technology and finding ways to become more efficient which ties in well with our value proposition.

Brendan Reidy encapsulated the experience saying, For 20-years BirchStreet Systems has been a valued partner of Hilton, providing them with the automation required to help them maximize their business performance goals and drive to a very successful and even brighter future ahead.

About BirchStreet Systems

BirchStreet Systems powers hospitality and food and beverage enterprises with a comprehensive procure-to-pay business solution. As the global leading provider of spend management solutions in the hospitality industry, 16,000 enterprises in over 130 countries subscribe to BirchStreet to connect with a network of more than 450,000 suppliers.

Established in 2002, BirchStreet is privately held and is headquartered in Las Vegas, NV with offices in California, China, Singapore, India and the UK. For more information, please visit www.birchstreetsystems.com.

Contact: BirchStreet Sales: [email protected] /949-567-7000

BirchStreet Sales
NAIROBI, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Kenya and the Netherlands on Monday signed an agreement to facilitate export of horticulture through the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR).

James Macharia, cabinet secretary in the Ministry of Transport, Infrastructure, Housing, Urban Development and Public Works told journalists in Nairobi that the deal involves the development of a cool logistics corridor on the railway system for transportation of fresh produce to the port of Mombasa for onward export to Europe.

"To make the railway system ready for transporting refrigerated fresh produce, Kenya Railways Corporation has embarked on re-modification work to install reefer plug-in points for the containers," Macharia said.

According to the ministry of transport, Kenya's key gateway the port of Mombasa as well as the SGR stations will be equipped to support freight of frozen horticultural products in order to enhance international trade.

"The SGR network has the capacity and speed required to transport frozen fresh produce to the port of Mombasa from any consolidation center along the rail line," Macharia said.

Liesje Schreinemacher, Netherlands Minister of Foreign Trade and Development, said that her country is committed to creating a sustainable sea freight solution for fresh produce that will reinforce Kenya as a regional hub for handling perishable goods.

Horticulture is a major source of foreign exchange for Kenya alongside tea, tourism and remittances. According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics, Kenya's earnings from exports of cut flowers, fruits and vegetables rose 5% in 2021 from the previous year.

Kenya's horticulture earnings rose to 158.1 billion Kenyan shillings (1.39 billion U.S. dollars) in 2021 from 150.2 billion shillings a year earlier. 
The hotel development and financing world is buzzing with the news that the EB-5 program has been renewed, creating new opportunities for upcoming projects. My partner David Sudeck and I have written the short update below to help get you up to speed.

In case you havent heard, EB-5 is back! On March 15, President Biden signed the Omnibus Spending Bill, which included the EB-5 Reform and Integrity Act of 2022, sponsored by Senators Pat Leahy (D-VT) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA). This bipartisan bill restores viability to EB-5 by reauthorizing the lapsed Regional Center Program, a component essential to the success of EB-5.

Whats different about EB-5 this time around?

While the basics of the program remain the sameforeign investors provide a specified amount of capital to development projects that create American jobs, and are put on a fast track to green cards for themselves and their familiessome aspects of the Regional Center Program have changed. The Regional Center Program, which was authorized until June 2021, allows investors to pool their resources to finance new projects and enterprises. Regional centers also have different requirements for the types of jobs created by a development project.

The new bill raises the minimum investment in qualified projects to $1,050,000, except in Targeted Employment Areas (TEAs) where the investment minimum will be $800,000. TEAs are areas that the program prioritizes for job creation, usually rural or areas with high unemploymentwhere the investment minimum remains $800,000. The new minimum investment requirement will hold for the next five years, and then will be subject to reevaluation. The bill also puts a premium on investment in rural areas by expediting visa applications for investors involved in those projects; ten percent of EB-5 visas are set aside for these investors. Infrastructure projects are also subject to lower minimum investment requirements, but do not qualify for expedited visa processing.

Regional centers are now the only way for investors to pool their resources, and existing centers will need to refile to comply with new requirements. They cannot be owned by non-US citizens, and will be subject to additional regulatory filings, multiple certifications, audits, inspections, filing fees and compliance. Experts expect that these changes will greatly reduce the number of regional centers to those who truly intend to be active in the program.

Why should developers be paying attention?

The renewed EB-5 program revitalizes a source of hard-to-find financing for new construction and development projects. We expect high-quality projects, like hotel and other real estate projects, to continue to be favored by foreign investors. The funds obtained through this program are relatively low-cost, in the six- to seven- percent rangemuch cheaper than typical mezzanine financing.

Theres a lot of new energy and excitement following these developments in the EB-5 program, and we see that attitude reflected in two big conferences scheduled for early April: The EB-5 & Global Immigration Expo in Miami on April 7-8 and the IIUSA Conference in Orlando on April 11-13. We hope to see you there!

More than ever, the key to successfully financing a project with EB-5 funds will hinge on finding a reliable source of financing to raise capital, and knowledgeable advisors who can help developers avoid costly misadventures. Our Global Hospitality Group has closed $1.5 billion in EB-5 financing, and has a 100% successful track record on deals with signed term sheets.

We will be publishing further articles exploring the impact of the revitalized EB-5 program over the next several weeksplease reach out if you have questions you would like to see answered.

Get help evaluating and executing on EB-5 financing

We have a lot of practical experience in helping our developer clients raise EB-5 funding. If you would like some help to evaluate what strategy might be best for you, please contact us. There is no cost for an initial discussion.

Jim Butler, +1-310-201-3526 or [email protected]

David Sudeck, +1-310-201-3518 or [email protected]

For more information about EB-5 financing, including the latest updates, check the EB-5 Financing section of our Hotel Law Blog.

For more on the background of the EB-5 program, some best practices weve observed through our work with clients, and other EB-5 information, you can start with these popular articles:

The Hotel Developers EB-5 Handbook

FAQs: Essentials of EB-5 construction financing for developers

EB-5 construction financing term sheet for top developers

More than $1.5 billion of EB-5 construction financing closed for JMBM clients

Are hotels still the darling of EB-5 financing?

The 5 questions every developer is asking about EB-5 financing

Tips to avoid the 6 most common mistakes developers make with EB-5

Why you do NOT want to form your own regional center

What does JMBM do to help with EB-5 construction financing?

See how JMBMs Global Hospitality Group can help you.

Click here for the latest articles on EB-5 Financing, and here for C-PACE Financing.

Jim Butler

+1 310 201 3526

JMBM

View source
Hospitality Net understands that visitors to our website (the Website) and potential customers/members of Hospitality Net care about how their information is collected, used, processed, transferred, stored, and shared. This Global Privacy Policy describes Hospitality Nets commitment to protecting your privacy and forms a part of our Website Terms & Conditions. This Global Privacy Policy is reviewed annually and is updated as often as necessary. Updates are available publicly on the Website.

This Global Privacy Policy provides information on how Hospitality Net handles data as a data controller, meaning all data we process for our own purposes. Where Hospitality Net is a processor or a sub-processor of data, that activity is generally governed by a Data Processing Agreement.

WHAT WE COLLECT AND HOW WE USE IT

Website

When you visit the Website, you are not required to actively provide any information, but we may collect some of your Personal Data and Navigation Information, as set out in Section 1.3 below. We collect some Personal Data, and we may collect some Navigation Information, when you contact us via the Website contact form, chat function, sign up for webinars or sign up to receive information about our Products. Some information is collected via the Website using cookies.

Hospitality Net uses cookies and comparable techniques to ensure that we provide you with the optimal experience when using the Website, and to learn from our visitors and Users to improve the Website and Products, as well as tailoring our communications with you:

Functional cookies  These cookies make sure you can use our Website in a secure environment and can save your login data and preferences, so you will not have to keep entering this every time you use the Website.

 These cookies make sure you can use our Website in a secure environment and can save your login data and preferences, so you will not have to keep entering this every time you use the Website. Analytical cookies  These cookies are used to gain insight into the use of the Website and allow us to improve the Website in terms of quality and effectiveness and help us to understand how visitors interact with our website by collecting and analyzing information anonymously.

 These cookies are used to gain insight into the use of the Website and allow us to improve the Website in terms of quality and effectiveness and help us to understand how visitors interact with our website by collecting and analyzing information anonymously. Marketing cookies  These cookies are used by us to be able to improve your browsing experience and to learn your preferences, so that we can improve our marketing strategy and provide you with tailored offers. Marketing cookies are also needed to make use of registration and contact forms.

Collected Data

Personal Data refers to any information that can be used to identify you personally. For our purposes, this may include your User ID, first and last name, email address, company name, company type, phone number and information about you that is publicly available online via sites like LinkedIn, Google and Facebook, data you write in a contact or registration forms, your preferences and your account settings.

Navigation Information refers to information about your visits to the Website, computer and device. For our purposes, this includes which website you visited prior to visiting us or which link or campaign you clicked on to reach our website, your IP address, geographical location (city and/or country), referral source, length of visits, pages viewed, heat mapping, browser type and version, and ISP information. In some cases Navigation Information may also be Personal Data.

Generally, we may use your Personal Data and Navigation Information for the following purposes:

Personalizing My HN on the Website. We retain Personal Data processed for this purpose until we receive an actionable request to delete a Users Personal Data;

Understanding User preferences for the legitimate purpose of improving our Website. We may retain Personal Data processed for this purpose until you withdraw your consent;

Managing your Hospitality Net account. We retain Personal Data processed for this purpose until we receive an actionable request to delete a Users Personal Data;

Contacting you for direct marketing purposes. We may retain Personal Data processed for this purpose until you withdraw your consent.

Supporting Suppliers

The Website integrates services provided by third parties. We may share some of your information with these suppliers so they can provide their services, including newsletter subscriptions, payment processing, analyzing data, marketing support, User profiling, business development, and customer service.

To ensure that your Personal Data is collected, processed, used, stored, and transferred securely and in accordance with applicable law, Hospitality Net uses third parties that provide sufficient guarantees to implement appropriate technical and organizational measures to protect your information. For such third parties that may transfer Personal Data outside the European Economic Area, Hospitality Net confirms that it implements appropriate safeguards for such transfers.

Please note, the terms and privacy policies of such third parties may apply to you as well, in particular: Cloudflare, Cloudflare Stream, Google Analytics, Google Ads, Google Tag Manager, Google Recaptcha, Hotjar, Stripe, Salesforce and Salesforce Pardot. Your acceptance of applicable third party terms is required to access the Website and Products.

This overview of suppliers provides a current view. Hospitality Net strives to keep this list as up to date as reasonably possible.

Third-Party Websites

The Website may contain links to third party websites. Such links do not amount to an endorsement of such other websites. Hospitality Net is not responsible for other websites.

Third-Party Sign in

If you create an account or log into the Website through a third-party platform (such as LinkedIn, Google or Facebook), we will have access to certain information from that platform, such as your name, email address, and profile picture, in accordance with the authorization procedures determined by such platform.

Third-Party Embeds

On our Website we use third-party services for embedding videos and maps. When you interact with an Embed, it can send information about your interaction to the hosting third party just as if you were visiting the third partys site directly. For example, when you load a page with a YouTube video Embed and watch the video, YouTube receives information about your activity, such as your IP address and how much of the video you watch. We do not control what information third parties collect through Embeds or what they do with the information. This Privacy Policy does not apply to information collected through Embeds. The privacy policy belonging to the third party hosting the Embed applies to any information the Embed collects, and we recommend you review that policy before interacting with the Embed.

Information of Children

The Website and Products are for business use and are not intended for or targeted toward children under 16 (Children). We do not knowingly collect any information about Children. We encourage parents and legal guardians to monitor the internet usage of their Children and ensure they do not provide personal information to Hospitality Net. If you believe that we have collected information about Children, please contact us at [email protected] so that we can delete the information.

We Do Not Sell Personal Data

We do not sell your Personal Data.

PERSONAL DATA RETENTION AND SECURITY

Retention of Personal Data

We retain Personal Data for as long as we reasonably consider it to be necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, after which time we will delete the information. You can request deletion of your Personal Data as described below.

Security of Personal Data

Data security is a matter of critical importance. Hospitality Net uses a wide range of security measures to safeguard your data against unauthorized access and disclosure and we continually evaluate our security program to ensure its effectiveness.

Transfer of Personal Data

As an international company with customers and Users worldwide, we may transfer and access Personal Data around the world, including to and from the United States. To comply with applicable law, we maintain strong data protection and privacy controls to protect your Personal Data during cross-border and international transfers, as well as during periods of storage in foreign countries (e.g. EU Standard Contractual Clauses, and binding corporate rules).

We believe that your essential privacy rights are not contingent on your nationality or residency. While applicable law always governs data privacy matters, we intend for this Global Privacy Policy to apply generally to Users and their Personal Data around the world. Nevertheless, privacy law is a constantly changing landscape so we reserve the right to deviate from this Global Privacy Policy where applicable law provides for a different approach.

Required Disclosure of Your Personal Data

We may use or disclose your Personal Data if we reasonably determine that such use or disclosure is necessary to (a) protect our rights, operations, or Users; (b) comply with applicable laws, a valid court order, or other legal process; or (c) otherwise perform our contractual obligations with our customers.

We may transfer the data we control, including Personal Data, in the event of a company reorganization, merger, or sale.

Your Data and Your Rights

As a general matter, depending on local data protection laws, you have rights that may include:

Clear information on our processing of your Personal Data;

Access your Personal Data that we hold, together with the right to have inaccuracies corrected;

To have your Personal Data delivered to you in a standard electronic format;

To object to our processing of your Personal Data, and to prevent solely automated decision making or profiling; and

To restrict our processing of your Personal Data, or have your Personal Data deleted.

Exercising Your Rights

If you wish to exercise your rights with respect to your Personal Data, you can email your request to privacy@hospitalitynet.org or send postal mail to:

Hospitality Net

Boschcour 54

6221 JR Maastricht

The Netherlands

We will generally respond to your request within 30 days.

If you wish to unsubscribe from an email list, please click the unsubscribe link found at the bottom of our emails or visit your account.

If you want to raise a complaint about the way we process your Personal Data or the way we have handled a request, please contact us. You may file a complaint with the data protection authority of any country where you live or work or where Hospitality Net operates.

California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) Supplement

The CCPA is effective January 1, 2020. If you are a resident of California, this supplement to the Global Privacy Policy sets out additional rights and information for you.

Many obligations under the CCPA are addressed in other provisions of the Global Privacy Policy. This Supplement is meant to fill in the gaps for California residents and the terms used in this Supplement are either defined in the Global Privacy Policy or in the text of the CCPA. Consumer Rights:

The right to access, and to know both the categories of personal information and the specific personal information we collect;

The right to have your personal information deleted, subject to some legal limitations;

The right to request disclosure of the personal information collected; and

The right to disclosure of information disclosed for valuable consideration.

Submitting Requests under CCPA

California residents may submit requests for information under the CCPA to Hospitality Net by email to privacy@hospitalitynet.org .

Please be as specific as possible when you exercise your rights under CCPA and submit a request regarding your personal information. Under the CCPA, we are obligated to verify your identity before we process your request.

No Discrimination

Hospitality Net will not discriminate against you in pricing, user experience, or any other way for exercising any of your rights under the CCPA.

This Global Privacy Policy was last updated and reviewed on 4 April 2022.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has taken a 9.2% stake in Twitter to become its largest shareholder after raising questions about the social media platforms dedication to free speech.

The goal of Musk's 73.5 million share purchase worth $2.9 billion, based on the closing price Friday, is not clear. Yet in recent weeks Musk has raised questions about free speech on Twitter and if failing to adhere to its basic principles undermines democracy.

The regulatory filing Monday describes Musk as a long-term investor looking to minimize his buying and selling of the shares.

GIGAFACTORY TEXAS: New details on Elon Musk's invite-only party for opening of Tesla's Austin manufacturing facility

He has also pondered starting a rival social media network, and industry analysts are skeptical about whether the mercurial CEO would remain on the sidelines for long.

We would expect this passive stake as just the start of broader conversations with the Twitter board/management that could ultimately lead to an active stake and a potential more aggressive ownership role of Twitter," Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities said in a client note early Monday.

Twitter's stock surged 20% before the opening bell Monday.

Musk told his more than 80 million followers on Twitter that he was  giving serious thought " to creating his own social media platform and has clashed repeatedly with financial regulators about his use of Twitter.

His Twitter stock purchase comes as Musk is locked into a bitter dispute with U.S. securities regulators over his ability to post on Twitter. Musks lawyer has contended in court motions that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is infringing on the Tesla CEOs First Amendment rights.

SPACEPORT: Abbott grants $10 million to spaceports in Houston and South Texas  where Elon Musk develops rockets

In October of 2018, Musk and Tesla agreed to pay $40 million in civil fines and for Musk to have his tweets approved by a corporate lawyer after he tweeted about having the money to take Tesla private at $420 per share.

The funding was far from secured and the electric vehicle company remains public, but Teslas stock price jumped. The settlement specified governance changes, including Musks ouster as board chairman, as well as pre-approval of his tweets. The SEC brought a securities fraud charge, alleging that Musk was manipulating the stock price with his posts.

Musks lawyer is now asking a U.S. District Court judge in Manhattan to throw out the settlement, contending that the SEC is harassing him and infringing on his First Amendment rights.

Early in March, Musk asked Judge Alison Nathan to nullify an SEC subpoena and throw out the settlement agreement. His lawyer, Alex Spiro, said the SEC has used the court agreement to trample on Mr. Musks First Amendment rights and to impose prior restraints on his speech.

The SEC responded in a court motion, saying it has legal authority to subpoena Tesla and Musk about his tweets, and that Musks move to throw out the settlement is not valid.

LIFE IN STARBASE: Elon Musk brings exploding rockets and real estate to South Texas. Not everyone is happy.

The SEC disclosed that it is investigating Musks Nov. 6, 2021 tweets that asked followers whether he should sell 10% of his Tesla stake. The commission confirmed that it issued administrative subpoenas while investigating whether Musk and Tesla are complying with disclosure controls in the 2018 agreement.

The commission also is investigating whether Tesla described accurately in public filings with the agency whether it complied with the controls.

The commission maintains that the subpoenas were lawful, and that Musk isnt following proper legal procedure to challenge them. SEC attorney Melissa Armstrong called Musks challenge frivolous, and pointed out that Musk and Tesla agreed to have his tweets pre-approved by other company officials.

Courts have long recognized that congress has vested the SEC with broad authority to conduct investigations into possible violations of federal securities laws and to demand production of evidence relevant to such investigations, Armstrong wrote.

TESLA HQ MOVES: Tesla plans to move its headquarters to Austin

The subpoenas, issued under seal, come from a formal order by the commission authorizing the investigation. They seek all written communications concerning the Nov. 6 tweets and whether they were shown to Tesla lawyers for pre-approval.

Musk attorney Spiro has asked for verbal arguments in the case.

Musk's revelation about his stake in Twitter shares comes two days after Tesla Inc. posted first-quarter delivery numbers. While the company delivered 310,000 vehicles in the period, the figure was slightly below expectations.

Krisher reported from Detroit.
Karen Warren, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

Gasoline prices in Houston and across the nation fell for the third consecutive week as crude continued its retreat from 14-year highs.

The average price of gasoline in Houston slid by 4 cents to $3.83 a gallon, according to the fuel-price tracking website GasBuddy, down from the recent peak of $3.95 a gallon on March 14. Prices, however, are still 34 cents a gallon higher than a month ago and $1.27 higher from a year ago.
If the first rule of politics is that a public official, elected or appointed, will not voluntarily accept a restriction of the scope of authority of the office, then the president of Mexico will never allow Petroleos Mexicanos (aka, Pemex) to become a real oil company.

Instead, Pemex will continue to be an agency of the federal executive, that is, an entity that is subordinate to presidential and ministerial appointments, dismissals and allocations of human resources and capital.

In Mexico, its not that X (the State) owns Y (Pemex). Its X = Y. The employees of Pemex are civil servants. There is no arms-length relationship: The president appoints the corporate executives and members of the board, all Mexican.

Mexicos president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, has involved himself in the strategic decisions of Pemex to a much greater degree than any prior president. The subordination of Pemex professionals and business leaders to the will of political actors has never been greater.

The public knows that Lopez Obrador has suspended the auctions of oil and gas leases, ordered the construction of a new refinery, and intimidated regulators into shutting down the legally permitted operations of foreign investors in both the oil and electricity sectors.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Mexicos Pemex takes ownership of Deer Park refinery

In the Houston energy community, such decisions have been condemned; in Mexico, they have been criticized for injuring the interests of investors, violating the law and regulations, and jeopardizing energy supply. In addition, the attempt at the regulatory repossession of the 2017 Zama oil discovery by a consortium led by Houstons Talos Energy has cost the state billions of dollars in oil royalties.

Zama is expected to produce 160,000 daily barrels of light oil. Since 2020 and at $80 a barrel and 50 percent net royalty, the state has forfeited upward of $4 billion in royalties and taxes by refusing to allow Talos to bring the reservoir into production  all for a dreamy and fiscally irresponsible ideological posture.

Meanwhile, the business and policy elites in Mexico criticize the decisions of this president regarding energy policy. What those elites do not do, however, is to assert in public that the president of Mexico should have no role in the administration of the states oil and power utilities.

Fish in water

In Mexico there is a conflation of Cardenismo and nationalism. The former is the narrative that since 1938, Mexico has had oil as its national vocation. The president of Mexico is responsible for protecting the nation against predatory international oil companies.

In Mexico, the harm to the national interest from a legal framework that allows for presidential interference in the management of the state energy companies goes simply unnoticed. Its like one fish asking another, Have you noticed the water? wrote Xochitl Herrera, head of Mexico Coverage for REDD Intelligence, a news, data and research provider focused on emerging markets, on WhatsApp.

Mexicans would like the president to make better decisions regarding energy, but they do not question if the president should have the legal right to make the decisions hes made.

The president thinks first of votes, poll numbers and symbolism. The proof is the purchase of the refinery in Deer Park. Although the refinery had not reported a profit since 2018, it was nonetheless valuable on the presidents pet scale of energy sovereignty.

On HoustonChronicle.com: How Houston's Talos Energy is getting squeezed out of its oil discovery

Why spend $1.5 billion for a money-losing operation in Houston when at home Pemex operates uner the weight of $110 billion in debt? Symbols for him count more than profits.

Norwegian model

It is therefore sadly unlikely that the president of Mexico, or members of his party in Congress, will anytime soon urge the reforms needed to take the president out of Pemexs hair. The principal reform needed is a second national oil company organized along the lines of Norways Equinor with an international board that would choose the director-general.

Mexico and investors would be better served with the president out of the way.

George Baker is the publisher of Mexico Energy Intelligence, a Houston oil industry newsletter. @Energia.com
WASHINGTON - What if there were no more long distance natural gas pipelines built in the United States?

What might sound like an unlikely scenario is the subject of a new study by the Department of Energy, which studied what would happen to natural gas demand if no more interstate pipelines were built.

In such a scenario, they predict gas demand would be 4 percent less than under normal conditions and prices would be 11 percent higher.

"Restricting U.S. interstate pipeline builds in our projection results in 7.4 billion cubic feet per day less interregional capacity in 2050," the report reads. "For example, (that restriction) limits the amount of natural gas that can flow from the Appalachia production region to demand areas such as the Midwest."

RELATED: How long will Biden's new alliance with LNG last?

The study comes as the Biden administration has expressed skepticism about the future of natural gas in the United States, promoting policies to get the United States off electricity generated from fossil fuels as quickly as possible in favor of wind and solar energy.

In February the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ordered pipeline developers to provide detail on the greenhouse gas emissions their projects will generate - though later adjusted the order as a draft policy and said it would not apply to projects already under review at FERC.

Litigation from environmental groups has already made new pipeline construction a hard sell, with a number of companies canceling projects over the past year, citing rising legal costs.

Complicating Biden's clean energy plans are rising energy prices driven by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and booming economic activity as Covid-19 seemingly wanes. Last month Biden committed to expanding U.S. LNG exports to Europe, to aid allies there.

But the administration remains committed to getting the nation on the path to net zero emissions by mid century, in lines with other global powers.

Hardest hit by an end to interstate pipeline construction would be the electricity sector. The Energy Department forecasts that 11 percent less gas-fired power plants than under normal conditions.

That would help renewables to become the largest source of generation, with 4 percent more wind and solar than would be built otherwise. Also, coal generation would be 9 percent higher and nuclear generation 5 percent higher, according to the Energy department.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

It was an epic week for Houston barbecue.

Still basking in the smoked meat glow of Bravos Top Chef episode Thursday that featured a barbecue brisket challenge attended by some of the citys top pitmasters, Houston was treated Sunday to even more barbecue fandom at the 2022 Houston Barbecue Festival.

About 2,000 event-goers packed the grounds at the Humble Civic Center to sample creative bites from more than two dozen of the areas best barbecue joints. It was a reason to rejoice: because it marked the return of the areas biggest and best barbecue event after a two-year pandemic absence; because the event underscored Houstons prominence in Texas barbecue; and because the citys barbecue fans were still on a smoked meat high thanks to Top Chef.

Dave Rossman/Contributor Dave Rossman/Contributor Dave Rossman/Contributor Dave Rossman/Contributor About 2,000 event-goers packed the grounds at the Humble Civic Center to sample creative bites from more than two dozen of the areas best barbecue joints.

BAYOU CITY BARBECUE: Why Houston is Texas' new 'cue capital

Pitmaster Greg Gatlin of Gatlins BBQ called returning to Sundays festival therapeutic  a welcome reconnection with the barbecue community that hasnt been able to gather en masse since the pandemic hit the city in March 2020.

Its been a while since Ive seen some of these guys. Its great, said Gatlin, who was a telegenic judge on Thursdays Top Chef barbecue episode, filmed at J-Bar-M Barbecue in EaDo. Ive missed them.

Like many of the other pitmasters at the festival, Gatlin was ready to impress barbecue fans whose admission tickets allowed them unlimited samples from all participants. The Gatlins BBQ team served up smoked jerk chicken, frogs legs, and curried rib tips.

Energy was high throughout the festival, and the food wowed: Memphis-style chopped pork nachos from Pinkertons Barbecue; smoked dirty rice topped with pulled pork from Daddy Duncans BBQ in Katy; fire crackers with pimento cheese and a chunk of brisket from J-Bar-M; a cracklins-studded chopped pork sandwich from Truth BBQ; Iberico pork steak and fajita tacos from The Pit Room; Australian A9 wagyu pastrami on toasted rye crostini and boudin on a spicy cracker from Tin Room BBQ in Atascocita; pepper jack brisket boudin from Brothertons Black Iron BBQ in Pflugerville; deep-fried pork riblet from Blood Bros. BBQ in Bellaire which also made a lemongrass-stuffed pork belly lechon; and roasted garlic cheddar beef sausage and smoked beef confit and stock-braised mushrooms in red wine reduction from Bretts BBQ Shop in Katy.

Dave Rossman/Contributor Dave Rossman/Contributor Dave Rossman/Contributor Dave Rossman/Contributor About 2,000 event-goers packed the grounds at the Humble Civic Center to sample creative bites from more than two dozen of the areas best barbecue joints.

Other barbecue joints participating included 1701 Barbecue in Beaumont, Burns Original BBQ, CorkScrew BBQ in Spring, Doziers BBQ in Fulshear, Burro & Bull in Cypress, Harlem Road Texas BBQ in Richmond, JQs Tex Mex BBQ, Lenox Bar-B-Q, Nomad BBQ, Pizzitolas Bar-B-Cue, Southern Q, Spring Creek Barbecue, Tejas Chocolate & BBQ in Tomball, and The Brisket House.

Were the OG here, said Ronnie Killen of Killens Barbecue in Pearland and The Woodlands. Weve been at this a long time.

Killens had a long line of fans patiently waiting for his smash burgers served with piping hot crinkle-cut fries. He also served his famed pork belly burnt ends.

For Russell Roegels of Roegels Barbecue Co., it was all about restoring the joy within Greater Houstons barbecue family.

We havent done this in a few years so its great to be outside cooking, said the pitmaster whose team served brisket boudin and jalapeno cheese sausage. Were seeing old customers and maybe making new ones.

Greg Morago writes about food for the Houston Chronicle. Follow him on Facebook or Twitter. Send him news tips at greg.morago@chron.com. Hear him on our BBQ State of Mind podcast to learn about Houston and Texas barbecue culture.
Democrat Beto ORourke doesnt talk much about his former rival and current U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz on the campaign trail these days as he runs for governor.

But asked about his 2018 race against Cruz during a campaign stop Port Arthur on Monday, ORourke explained he knew part of his job back then was to warn of the consequences of another term in office for Cruz.

I dont know if I could have even imagined the stuff that he has done since he won the election. When you were freezing in your homes and hes at the Ritz Carlton in Cancun, ORourke said. When the Congress was trying to count the electoral college votes to ensure the peaceful transfer of power  240 years in this experiment  hes part of the insurrection and sedition.

ORourke, the 49-year-old former Congressman from El Paso, was referencing Cruzs decision to go on vacation during the 2021 winter storms that knocked out power to millions of Texans, and to Cruzs role in trying to delay the certification of the 2020 presidential election as Trump supporters began to storm the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Cruz has criticized those who use the term insurrection for the Jan. 6 riot, calling it a Democratic ploy to slander every Trump voter in America.

In 2018, Cruz defeated ORourke by 2.6 percent of the vote  the closest a Democrat has come to winning a statewide office in Texas since the 1990s.

ORourke said this time as he campaigns for statewide office, hes determined to make sure we prosecute the case against giving Gov. Greg Abbott another term.

Abbott, 64, is seeking a third 4-year term as governor. If he wins, hell match former Gov. Rick Perry as the only Texas governors to be elected to three 4-year terms in office.

jeremy.wallace@chron.com
Once little more than a pipe dream, the national movement to legalize marijuana keeps inching closer to reality.

On Friday the U.S. House muscled through legislation decriminalizing cannabis for the second time in two years, even picking up three Republican votes to lend it some bipartisan credibility. The bill would remove marijuana from the federal Controlled Substances Act, impose an 8 percent tax on cannabis products, and make Small Business Administration loans and services available to cannabis businesses. The bill also undoes some of the damage wrought by the decades-long War on Drugs by allowing some convictions on cannabis charges to be expunged and for others to be reviewed.

The White House said Friday President Biden opposes the bill in its current form. Thats disappointing given his strong campaigning for aspects of it  including making medical marijuana legal nationally and support for states that chose to legalize recreational use. Now that hes president, he should help draft a version more to his liking. If he cant produce a better bill, he should support this one, and urge its passage in the Senate.

The bill takes aim at the inexplicably rigid dichotomy on cannabis policy between most states and the federal government. Already, 38 states have legalized medical marijuana and 18 of them made recreational use legal, too. If states are still considered laboratories for democracy, then these successful experiments  which range from full legalization to subtler forms of decriminalization, including the county-by-county approach to enforcement found in Texas  should make clear federal prohibition should end. Cannabis sales are flourishing, hitting $20 billion in 2020 and projected to more than double by 2025. Some states, such as Illinois, have deftly woven in social justice aspects into the legalization effort, pardoning thousands of people convicted of low-level marijuana offenses.

Legalization has graduated from its status as a fringe issue of the far left and libertarians. In fact, its now wildly popular nationally, with a recent Pew Research Center poll showing that 60 percent of Americans support making pot legal for recreational use and another 31 percent say medical uses should be permitted. Wide majorities of Republicans of all age groups favor legalizing marijuana medically. Even deep-red states such as Oklahoma, which legalized medical marijuana three years ago, recognize its lucrative potential: the state now has more retail cannabis stores than Colorado, Oregon and Washington combined. Thats despite the fact that Oklahoma has yet to legalize recreational use of the drug. Roughly 1 out of 10 of adult residents have been approved to buy and smoke marijuana for medical reasons.

Texas should get off the sidelines and update its outdated pot prohibitions. Its medical program for people with select maladies is far too limited, and keeping possession of even small amounts of pot a crime is a recipe for over-policing of the worst kind, despite the efforts in counties such as Harris, Dallas, Bexar and Travis to dial in doses of leniency. Gov. Greg Abbott has said that nobody should go to jail for smoking or possessing pot, but he hasnt joined his opponent, Beto ORourke, in making legalization a pillar of his campaign.

Whatever happens in the next session of the Texas Legislature, there is opportunity right now for Biden to help his party move this issue forward in the Senate.

He should do so not because marijuana is the miracle drug some of its most ardent champions claim it is. And not because its widespread use is free of health or societal concerns. He should back the House bill because treating marijuana like its heroin is absurd.

The House bill would also address what has become a patchwork system of disparate state and local laws. And it would make it possible for federally-insured banks to begin working with marijuana grow operations and dispensaries. Without that step, too many cannabis firms working in cash  a dangerous and expensive way to do business. Besides, as long as pot remains illegal at the federal level, these businesses know that a change in administration or even just a new attorney general with an anti-pot agenda can cause their investments to go up in smoke.

Those businesses, as well as their investors, employees and customers, deserve stability and access to the banking system. This bill will help provide both things.

Half a century after the war on drugs launched in 1971, surely know now that federal prohibition of pot is overkill. Lets treat it like alcohol. The U.S. government should get out of the way of states working out ways to allow its use while mitigating its risks.
China does not seek selfish geopolitical interests over Ukraine, nor does the country hold an indifferent attitude to the conflict, not to mention adding fuel to the fire, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Monday.

Wang made the remarks in a phone conversation with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba. It was their second phone call since the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, following their call on March 1.

China has only one sincere expectation for the Ukraine situation, which is peace, Wang stressed. China welcomes peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, he said, calling on the two sides to stay committed to negotiations regardless of the difficulties they face and the differences between them.

Wang stressed the importance of learning lessons from the crisis and finding a way to maintain lasting security in Europe. He called on relevant parties to conduct equal-footed dialogue and set up a balanced, effective and sustainable European security framework based on the principle of indivisible security.

China will maintain an objective and fair position and continue to play a constructive role in its own way, he said. China believes the Ukrainian side has enough wisdom to make choices in accordance with its people's fundamental interests, he added.

He also thanked the Ukrainian government and other sectors of the country for their efforts in helping with Chinese citizens' safe evacuation from Ukraine.

Kuleba said China is a great country, calling it a positive force in safeguarding peace. Ukraine is willing to maintain communication with China and hopes that China will continue to play an important role in ending the conflict, he said.

Kuleba said he agrees with China's views on the Ukraine issue and thanked China for its humanitarian assistance to his country.

Ukraine remains committed to conducting peace talks with Russia and finding sustainable solutions, he said, adding that Ukraine hopes to become a gate of Europe.

Wang said he hopes that the gate will lead to peace in Europe, development of Ukraine and cooperation between China and Europe.
BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The Russia-Ukraine conflict continued on Monday as relevant parties are holding a new round of peace talks via video to discuss draft agreements between the two countries. Following are the latest developments of the situation:

The Russian military struck an oil processing plant and a fuel depot in Ukraine's southern Black Sea port of Odessa, Maksym Marchenko, head of the military administration of Odessa region, said Sunday in a video message posted on the official Telegram channel of the Odessa City Council.

There were no casualties in the airstrike, Marchenko said, without giving further details.

Earlier on Sunday, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said during a briefing that the Russian Armed Forces have destroyed an oil refinery and three storage facilities for fuel and lubricants near Ukraine's Odessa with high-precision sea- and air-based missiles.

- - - -

Russia's state space corporation Roscosmos would not cooperate with countries supplying weapons to Ukraine, Director General of Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin said Sunday via his social media channel.

He said Roscosmos stopped joint projects with Western countries for moral and ethical reasons, and would not have any cooperation with countries that provide weapons and political support to Ukraine.

Earlier, Rogozin said that Roscosmos would soon submit proposals to Russia's leadership on ending cooperation on the International Space Station with the United States, Canada, European countries and Japan.

- - - -

The Russian Defense Ministry on Sunday refuted Kiev's accusation of alleged killing of civilians in the settlement of Bucha in Ukraine's Kiev region.

"All photographs and video materials published by the Kiev regime, allegedly evidencing some kind of 'crimes' committed by Russian military personnel in the city of Bucha, Kiev region, are another provocation," the ministry said in a statement.

It said that during the time the settlement was under control of the Russian forces, not a single local resident suffered from any violent actions, adding that "all Russian units completely withdrew from Bucha on March 30."

- - - -

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Sunday that Germany and its allies will in the next few days decide on further measures to sanction Russia.

Also on Sunday, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called for tightened sanctions against Russia.

During a TV interview, German Minister of Defense Christine Lambrecht noted that the European Union should talk about putting an end to gas supplies from Russia.

- - - -

Algerian Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra will pay a visit to Moscow accompanied by his counterparts from Jordan, Sudan, Iraq and Egypt and the Secretary General of the Arab League to discuss with Russian officials the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the Algerian Foreign Ministry said Sunday in a statement.

The delegation will later meet with the Ukrainian side in Warsaw, the statement added. 
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

What Gabriela Tornero witnessed in the classroom, after spending nearly a decade as a teacher, inspired her to change careers.

I saw a lot of need for mental health care, she said.

Tornero became a counselor for Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston.

For four years she has been a clinician embedded in Catholic schools around Houston. Each counselor covers two campuses, providing free services to children and their families.

Since COVID began, Tornero has noticed a marked increase in demand.

We are in a mental health crisis due to the pandemic, she said.

Many Houstonians are grappling with grief, social isolation, unemployment, food insecurity, home loss and bankruptcy associated with COVID, all added to pressures that already existed, said Natalie Wood, senior vice president of programs for Catholic Charities.

Its like an Instant Pot for trauma, Wood said. All the issues people were struggling with prior to the pandemic were exacerbated.

Need help? Catholic Charities has an online form and a call line, 713-791-2496, for families in need of counseling See More Collapse

Tornero said the pandemic has resulted in children acting out, expressing emotional hardships and struggling in school as they return from remote learning.

She is currently at client capacity. Whenever an individual reaches out for help, she has to make a referral to another agency. Often, that organization will have a years wait.

Its heart-wrenching to hear that, Tornero said.

The parents are also facing a myriad of challenges  and that stress is carried by the students as well.

Its like being in a pressure cooker, said Wood.

And anxiety continues to be high, even two years later.

All coping strategies are down, Wood said. It just escalates under pressure. Were seeing more calls for people who are struggling with family conflict.

SPECIAL REPORT: In CrisisTexas schools dont have enough mental health providers

Catholic Charities offers a number of programs to help, including individual, group and family counseling. In addition, grant-funded programs provide free services to victims of crime, as well as veterans and their families.

Funding is also available to expecting parents and those with young children, as well as counseling for unaccompanied refugee minors.

Srimaya Gurung runs the Catholic Charities counseling program, headquartered in the Counseling and Behavioral Health Clinic, located in Midtown.

She oversees a staff of 23, mostly bilingual. During the pandemic, all services pivoted to a virtual format.

Its been taken very well, Gurung said. Most of our patients became big believers in virtual care. They didnt have to drive.

IN RENEW: Olympian Simone Biles ignited a conversation about mental health

In fact, moving online made it possible for Catholic Charities to expand mental health care services.

For instance, veterans in rural areas, who had difficulty coming into Houston for services, can now simply dial in by phone or make a Zoom appointment.

We can reach outside of our normal service areas, Gurung said.

While most counseling has remained virtual or by phone, services, such as the school counseling program and refugee support groups, have resumed in-person sessions.

Having a mix of both, I think will help more people, Gurung said.

Like Tornero, she has also noticed increased need, including calls about domestic violence, substance abuse and a loss of housing.

Because Catholic Charities offers a range of services to help individuals out of poverty, Gurung said, counseling clients can be connected with assistance in other areas of the nonprofit.

This is a comprehensive program, Gurung said.

For instance, a family who comes in for mental health services might be pointed to resources for housing or immigration lawyers.

As the pandemic continued, Gurung said, it became apparent that staff members also needed help. They too were experiencing loss and grief related to COVID.

As helpers, its hard, Gurung said. You have to hear the stories and also provide care. Thats been really challenging.

Providing support and care to caregivers on their team became a top priority.

My role, with my leadership team, is to make sure staff have the support they need to continue making an impact on our clients lives, she said.

All staff members are trained in trauma-informed care. Cost is on a sliding scale.

We do not believe anyone should be turned away, because they cannot pay, Wood said. We have a sliding scale but if people cannot meet the end of the scale, which is $30, we will work with them.

Having the option to obtain affordable mental health care is a game changer, said client Jodie Gonzales, who lives close to downtown.

Throughout my process, regardless of my financial situation, there has always been an option for me at Catholic Charities, she said. Ive never had to sacrifice my needs.

Gonzales said that having a virtual option made her sessions more convenient.

If Im at the office, I can do this on my lunch break and go back to work, she said. Im so grateful. This remained a constant for me, even when the world stopped.

Counseling through Catholic Charities is open to people of all faiths, Wood said. The nonprofit considers the work a ministry, she added.

We believe all people are made in the image and likeness of Christ, Wood said. Because of that, all deserve dignity. All people should be met with help on their journey to heal, regardless of race, religion, socioeconomic status or age.

All should have access to the best care possible, she added.

We feel strongly called to do this, she said. Its soul work, thats really what it is.

Peyton is a Houston-based freelance writer.
A police chase turned deadly when the vehicle being pursued crashed into a ditch in south Houston, authorities said Monday.

Houston police were pursuing a man they described as a known narcotics suspect about 5:30 p.m. Friday near 2901 Lockcrest Street, near the South Freeway and Almeda Genoa.

THE LATEST: Galveston business owners say the city marshal is bullying them and point to a viral video as proof

The pursuit was approaching Furman Street when the man's gray Mercedes GLC300 left the road, struck a ditch and came to a stop on its side against a telephone pole, authorities said.

The Mercedes created a large cloud of dirt as it left the road, which obscured the officers' vision, police said. The officer's vehicle also struck the ditch and landed on its side.

The officers were not injured, police said Monday. They pulled the driver from the Mercedes then administered medical assistance until Houston Fire Department paramedics arrived.

The driver was taken to Ben Taub Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Officers recovered cash and narcotics from the Mercedes, authorities said.

The investigation into the crash continues.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

Of the four defendants accused in the deaths of two Harris County law enforcement officials in unrelated incidents, only one appeared in court Monday amid logistical issues ranging from too few defense attorneys to a non-working elevator for inmates.

Joshua Stewart, 23, appeared in the 177th District Court on a capital murder charge in the shooting death Thursday of Deputy Darren Almendarez.

Investigators said they believe Stewart and alleged accomplices Fredarius Clark, 19, and Frederick Tardy, 17, are responsible for killing the deputy as he interrupted the theft of a catalytic converter from his truck.

Clark purportedly acted as a lookout as Stewart and Tardy crawled under Almendarezs vehicle in a grocery store parking lot with cordless power tools, according to court records revealed on Monday. The deputy, who was off-duty at the time, sent his wife away and confronted the three.

Clark allegedly opened fire on Almendarez, who attempted to wrangle the weapon out of his hands, records show. The gunfire continued and Almendarez retreated to the front of the vehicle. The deputy was fatally shot as Clark and the two others drove away.

On Monday, Harris County deputies saluted and people hugged as Almendarez body was transported by hearse from the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences to a funeral home. A funeral is slated for Almendarez on Friday in Humble. He is survived by his wife, Flor Zarzoza, and a teenage daughter.

Judge Robert Johnson urged the prosecutors in court to state whether the death penalty will be sought against Stewart, who appeared in a yellow jumpsuit, in order to request a later hearing aimed at holding him without bail.

The state will be seeking the death penalty at this time, prosecutor Caroline Dozier told the judge.

Stewart, for now, will be held without bail until that review in May.

Another prosecutor, Keith Houston, declined to comment on whether the death penalty would be sought for Clark or Tardy  the youngest of the defendants.

Tardy, though led up to the courthouses 19th floor, did not appear because a defense attorney qualified for capital cases could not be found.

When its a small pool, its hard to get someone on short notice, Houston said.

The judge attempted to divide court-appointed attorneys Philip and Robert Scardino between Tardy and Clark but the siblings protested  citing a conflict of interest. The brothers instead opted to defend Clark, whom they said is accused of being the triggerman in the case.

Clark was absent and is still hospitalized for gunshot wounds sustained during the incident. Both defendants are expected back in court Tuesday.

David Cuevas, head of the Harris County Deputies Organization, said that he believed all three defendants should be held without bail.

More than 15 sheriffs deputies filled the courtroom ahead of Stewarts appearance as a show of support for the slain law enforcement official. Several deputies stayed for more than three hours not knowing if Clark or Tardy would appear amid the frequent delays.

Johnson repeatedly stated that an elevator used to transport inmates in the courthouse was not working.

Logistics prevented a fourth defendant, charged with intoxication manslaughter in the death of a Precinct 7 constables deputy, from appearing in the same courtroom.

Adolfo Serrano, 36, was arrested Saturday following what authorities said was a drunken-driving wreck that killed Jennifer Chavis, a Precinct 7 deputy with the Harris County Constables Office. During a probable cause hearing, a magistrate earlier on Monday morning ordered that he be held on $750,000 bail.

Authorities said Chavis died when Serrano, who may have been fleeing an earlier crash, slammed into the back of her patrol vehicle  which then erupted into flames. Chavis, who was poised to pull Serrano over, never emerged from the vehicle, officials said.

Chavis, an Army veteran, and her husband were raising a 4-year-old son and 11-year-old nephew together.

nicole.hensley@chron.com
Garcia, Michela / Harris County Sheriff's Office

The Harris County Sheriff's office will host a public procession Monday in honor of an off-duty deputy killed while disrupting an attempted catalytic converter theft last week.

Deputy investigator Darren Almendarezs remains will travel from the Institute of Forensic Sciences, where he was taken for autopsy, to a funeral home in northeast Harris County.
Its possible that when Clarence Thomas joins his wife Ginni for breakfast every morning, hes wearing a smile and earmuffs, maybe AirPods. Perhaps the venerable Supreme Court justice is happily oblivious to the wild conspiracy theories she embraces, and as recent text messages reveal, helped promote within the highest levels of the U.S. government. Or that she apparently believes some fellow Americans  that is, Democrats  not only intend to destroy the nation, they are evil incarnate. Its possible he makes a supreme effort not to hear her when she inveighs against the enemy. Possible, but not probable.

Ordinarily, maybe it wouldnt matter so much that the spouse of a Supreme Court justice holds views that many would call extremist. For decades, in fact, critics have objected to Virginia Ginni Thomas active, committed participation in ultraconservative causes. She is entitled to her beliefs and Justice Thomas should be judged on his conduct as a member of the court, not by his wifes political associations.

But what weve learned in recent weeks about Ginni Thomas deep involvement in the White Houses response to the 2020 presidential election, and in particular her exchanges with then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows between Election Day and four days after the attack on the U.S. Capitol, is anything but ordinary. We now know that she may have played a role in the insidious attempt to undermine the results of the 2020 election, which culminated in the January 6 insurrection.

If thats true, the revelation will strike many Americans as repugnant. But his wifes views and her conduct after the election arent themselves grounds for censuring Thomas. But they are more than sufficient to demand that the justice recuse himself from any cases arising from the Trump administrations desperate efforts to cling to power that should make it to the high court. These cases pose weighty questions of the constitutional balance of powers and other bedrock principles of American law, and a justice whose wife appears to have helped in an effort to undermine those principles cannot offer the impartial ruling Americans deserve, whether or not the couple avoided discussing her activities over breakfast.

Ginni Thomas bizarre notions about the 2020 election and her possible involvement in a foiled insurrection were revealed in dozens of text messages she and Meadows exchanged before and after she attended the so-called Stop the Steal rally where Trump urged his supporters to head to the Capitol. The messages were first reported by Bob Woodward of the Washington Post and Robert Costa of CBS.

If Justice Thomas really doesnt discuss his wifes political activities, as hes asserted over the years, here are a few things revealed by her text messages that might surprise him about her response to the 2020 election, in addition to the fact that she pressed Meadows more than once to have the results overturned:

Thomas told Meadows she was intrigued by the rumor that President Donald Trump had put in place a sting operation that involved dispensing millions of secretly watermarked ballots that would snare Democrats intent on stealing the election. The wholly false theory was widely promulgated among QAnon conspiracists.

Thomas insisted that attorney Sidney Powell should be the lead and the face of Trumps effort to challenge the election in court. Powell is the woman  eventually too extreme even for Trump and his cronies  who blamed Venezuela, the Clinton Foundation, Cuba and George Soros for stealing the election. Powell also popularized the ridiculous Release the Kraken call to arms and defended herself in court by conceding that reasonable people would not accept such statements as fact. (Ginni Thomas apparently did.)

Thomas told Meadows shed heard that the Biden crime family & ballot fraud co-conspirators were being arrested and detained for ballot fraud and then were being shipped to Guantanamo Bay to face justice before military tribunals. I hope thats true, she added.

Of course, Ginni Thomas has every right to believe whatever nonsense she wants to believe, no matter how bizarre. She has every right to pursue a career of her own, as spouses of Supreme Court justices have always done.

But how can Americans be confident that Justice Thomas is free of bias, or even outright conflict of interest, when he rules on questions stemming from the election? Simple answer: They cant.

His wife doesnt just hold controversial views, and the problem isnt that shes vocal about them. The conflict stems from the fact that shes taken such an active role in urging the Trump White House to further the conduct that is now at the heart of the cases likely to be heard at the Supreme Court. Her involvement could either influence her husband or create the perception that it does. A Supreme Court already beset by serious questions of credibility and the stench of partisanship  to borrow Justice Sonia Sotomayors term  doesnt need even the appearance of unseemly influence. Americans have every right to expect Thomas and his colleagues to appear fair and unbiased.

Is it fair to suggest that what weve learned about Ginni Thomas actions could influence her husbands rulings? Thats easy to answer. How reasonable is it, knowing what we know now, to wonder why Justice Thomas was the sole dissenter when the court rejected in January Donald Trumps efforts to keep White House records away from congressional investigators?

Perfectly reasonable. After all, was Justice Thomas concerned about what those records might reveal about his wifes White House contacts?

We cant know. We can only wonder.

The point is, we shouldnt have to wonder.

The law already requires other federal judges to step aside from cases where their impartiality could be questioned. The standard is one of perception, not guilt. But the Supreme Court is different. Members of the most powerful judicial body in the country are essentially self-policing. While justices often do recuse themselves from cases where their impartiality might reasonably be questioned they are not required to.

Thomas did not recuse himself from the case in January, when few Americans had any idea of how deep his wifes involvement in efforts to keep Trump in power was. He should have. But now we have a better idea, even if an as-yet incomplete one. Without question, Thomas should have recused himself last time and should do so in any case in the future concerning the January 6 insurrection, the work of the House committee or the 2020 election.

If he doesnt, his own reputation will suffer, and so will that of the court where he is now the longest-serving member. If that happens, the nation itself, all of us and the rule of law, will pay the highest price.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

With Harris County well inside its own code yellow phase of the COVID pandemic, Precinct 4 Commissioner Jack Cagle wants to the take a red pen to the county judges emergency powers.

The proposal, on the commissioner courts Tuesday agenda, would strip County Judge Lina Hidalgo of authority she was granted March 16, 2020, to have emergency powers as long as Gov. Greg Abbott had them under the states disaster declaration related to the pandemic.

CONTRACT CONTROVERSY: Lawyers for Hidalgo, aides say records undercut allegations in vaccine contract probe

They are under a different set of rules, Cagle said March 22 when he asked about the parameters of the emergency powers, noting the Legislature is out of session and will not return until January. We are here every two weeks and we can be here in 72 hours.

For more than two years, Hidalgo and other leaders around the state have had extraordinary ability because of the public health risks of the pandemic to close and open public places, approve contracts and establish emergency shelters, testing sites and vaccine distribution locations.

The disaster declaration has allowed Harris County to quickly stand up vital, life-saving initiatives throughout the pandemic, including in just the past several months, with the arrival of both rapid tests for schools and nurses for overstretched hospitals, said Melissa Arredondo, a spokeswoman for Hidalgo.

One of those health-related contracts, for an outreach program to encourage vaccine use in hard-to-reach communities, is the focus of a criminal investigation that Republican critics argue is a stain on Hidalgos office and defenders say reeks of political retribution.

The contract with Elevate Strategies, which Hidalgo could have approved under her emergency authority, was approved 4-1 by commissioners court, with Cagle the lone dissenter.

Cagle, who has been critical of Hidalgos broad authority and the contract under investigation by the Texas Rangers, said last month when he asked to discuss the extent of the emergency powers, that there are clear differences between Abbotts need to respond quickly and the countys ability to handle a crisis.

LINA HIDALGO: 8 things to know about Lina Hidalgo, after the recent raid on Harris County offices

The governor having emergency powers makes more sense than for us and an emergency meeting can be convened within 72 hours notice, Cagle said. Abbott cannot call the legislature back as quickly, he added.

The stated reason for following the governors term is no longer applicable for transparency and public engagement principles, Cagles office said in the summary of the item on the court agenda.

Rescinding her emergency powers, however, may not be something county officials can do. Numerous elected officials continue to have authority under the disaster declaration, including Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner and all county judges across Texas. Under the states disaster declaration procedures, county judges in an affected area  in this case all of Texas  have emergency authority. Absent Abbott removing Harris County from the states disaster declaration, it is unclear whether Hidalgo would retain that authority with or without the support of local officials.

County judges typically need commissioners court approval, but their powers expand greatly as the head of county emergency management. Much of that comes from a 1975 state law that gave special responsibility to mayors, county judges and county health officials.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Lina Hidalgo refused vendor contributions  and still raised $1.8 million

Exercising the powers, however, is different than having them, some officials said.

We used common sense, but as the emergency has dragged on I think we have used that authority less and less because we didnt need to, said Jason Millsaps, chief of staff to Montgomery County Judge Mark Keough.

Still, Millsaps said Keough maintains the authority.

At the March meeting, Hidalgo and the two other Democrats on commissioners court, Rodney Ellis of Precinct One and Adrian Garcia of Precinct Two, were not eager to scale back the emergency powers.

If something goes on, I dont want to have to track somebody down that is minding the ship, so to speak, Ellis said.

Hidalgo also said her ability to convene a meeting in 72 hours may not be fast enough, and the authority should stay.

We can rehash this every time, we talk about it every court, and why sometimes we dont have 72 hours, she said.

Arredondo said being nimble to COVID remains vital.

The pandemic is not necessarily over, she said. It is encouraging that cases are lower right now, but it is too soon to say exactly what will happen next.

dug.begley@chron.com
Houstons Dan Crenshaw has become one of the biggest fundraisers on Capitol Hill, deepening his influence in the halls of Congress and making him a formidable statewide candidate if he ever chose to run for higher office in Texas.

Crenshaw has raised nearly $11 million for his re-election campaign since the start of 2021  the 3rd highest total of the 435 members of the U.S. House. Only House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy have raised more, according to Federal Election Commission records.

No other member of the U.S. House from Texas ranks within the top 40 fundraisers, and more is coming for Crenshaw.

He continues to blast fundraising appeals to his supporters, pledging to help elect more Republicans to Congress to take control from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats.

This is the most important midterm election of our lifetimes  and Dan Crenshaw will not let your contributions go to waste, one recent letter says.

TOP 10 FUNDRAISERS IN THE U.S. HOUSE Since the start of 2021, these are the candidates for the U.S. House who have raised the most money. Source Federal Election Commission. 1. KEVIN MCCARTHY, R-CA: $13,179,963.43 2. NANCY PELOSI, D-CA: $12,312,904.07 3. DAN CRENSHAW, R-HOUSTON: $10,974,085.34 4. STEVE SCALISE, R-LA: $10,195,027.93 5. KATHERINE PORTER, D-CA: $10,192,331.69 6. ADAM SCHIFF, D-CA: $9,294,705.04 7. ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ, D-NY: $7,900,003.36 8. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE, R-GA: $7,491,511.12 9. LIZ CHENEY, R-WY: $7,179,163.25 10. JIM JORDAN, R-OH: $6,867,844.78 See More Collapse

Crenshaw, a 38-year-old retired Navy SEAL, has built a national fundraising platform starting shortly after he was elected in 2018, when he was lampooned on Saturday Night Live by comic Pete Davidson, who made fun of his eye patch. Crenshaw lost use of his right eye in a 2012 bomb blast in Afghanistan that nearly killed him.

IN-DEPTH: Crenshaw aims to build his GOP brand independent of Trump

The resulting media coverage  and a Crenshaw appearance on SNL after Davidson apologized  helped build the then-freshmans national profile. Nearly $1 million of his donations since 2021 have come from California, New York or Florida, according to FEC records.

Thanks to partisan redistricting Crenshaw, who is seeking a third term in the House this year, doesnt really need the money for his own re-election.

Top leadership fund contributor

After a closer than expected 2020 re-election victory, the Texas Legislature redrew his district, removing tens of thousands of voters just west of downtown Houston and replaced with 380,000 Montgomery County residents to make it a rock-solid GOP stronghold.

Crenshaw does have opposition in November. Democratic activist Robin Fulford of The Woodlands, is trying to unseat Crenshaw. She has raised just over $60,000 for the race so far.

That has freed Crenshaw to send hundreds of thousands of dollars to other campaigns, local Republican groups and political causes. Crenshaw, who runs a political action committee called America Reloaded, has doled out more than $200,000 to 42 candidates in 17 states. That has included helping U.S. Senate and House candidates, Texas House candidates, county judge candidates and school board members.

While some members of Congress sit on their fundraising haul to project political power, Crenshaw says he is constantly spending as part of a mission he said to try to grow the party, not just in Congress, but beyond.

I try not to be selfish with the money I raise, Crenshaw said. I spend my time and resources helping quality Republicans keep their seats or flip Democrat seats across the country.

The splashiest example of that is a series of movie-trailer-like videos hes released over the last few years where he plays the part of a military leader recruiting a band of GOP soldiers to get into Congress. In 2020, that brought publicity and dollars to candidates including U.S. Reps. Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio, and Beth Van Duyne, R-Irving. A spinoff ad in Georgia helped two incumbent U.S. Senate candidates who would go on to lose their runoff elections, solidifying the Democrats majority in Congress.

This year, hes revived the reloaded theme, with new videos that have helped Republicans Wesley Hunt and Morgan Luttrell win their congressional primaries in Harris and Montgomery counties.

But its not just Texas. Crenshaw is sending the maximum allowable $5,000 donation into races in places like California, Illinois and Minnesota, plus has poured $100,000 into the Congressional Leadership Fund, which targets dozens of seats to grow the GOP ranks in Congress. No member of Congress has given more to the Congressional Leadership Fund than Crenshaw.

Crenshaw has also spent more than $400,000 to put on an annual Youth Summit in Houston aimed at building connections with younger GOP voters.

Best way to move up

There is more to what Crenshaw is doing than just being charitable, said Brandon Rottinghaus, a University of Houston political science professor.

By involving himself in other races, hes building good will with other future members and alliances on Capitol Hill that can help him pass legislation, secure committee positions and grow his role in leadership in the House.

The best way to move up in leadership in Congress is to be a hub for political funds, Rottinghaus said.

The only Republican doing more than Crenshaw on that front is McCarthy, who has raised $13 million since the start of 2021 and is trying to line up support to be the Speaker of the House next year if Republicans regain control of the House. McCarthy has been the top fundraiser among U.S. House members. Pelosi has raised just over $12 million.

Rottinghaus said Crenshaws spending and ability to raise millions of dollars, even when he doesnt have a competitive re-election, is only fueling his options to run for higher office someday. Raising $11 million in just over a year already would make him a serious contender to run for the U.S. Senate if a seat opens up. Some have talked about Crenshaw as a presidential contender.

At his youth summit in September, a member of the audience asked him about running for president or governor someday.

I dont know, you know, but to answer that honestly, always will keep options open, Crenshaw said.

jeremy.wallace@chron.com
KIEV, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has signed a decree to approve the composition of a Ukrainian delegation for the talks with Russia over security guarantees, the Ukrainian president's press service said Monday.

The delegation will be led by David Arakhamia, head of the Ukrainian delegation to the peace negotiations with Russia, according to the decree.

Ukraine's Justice Minister Denys Malyuska, Adviser to the Head of the Presidential Office Mykhailo Podoliak, Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov, and six other Ukrainian officials will be members of the delegation, the decree said.

On Saturday, Arakhamia said that the draft agreements that had been discussed during the Ukraine-Russia meeting in Istanbul were ready for discussion by the presidents of Ukraine and Russia.

At the face-to-face negotiations in Istanbul, Kiev proposed to sign a new international treaty on security guarantees, which enshrines obligations for the guarantor countries to provide Ukraine with military assistance in the event of an attack. 
DALLAS (AP)  The Texas bar association is investigating whether state Attorney General Ken Paxton's failed efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election based on bogus claims of fraud amounted to professional misconduct.

The State Bar of Texas initially declined to take up a Democratic Party activist's complaint that Paxton's petitioning of the U.S. Supreme Court to block Joe Bidens victory was frivolous and unethical. But a tribunal that oversees grievances against lawyers overturned that decision late last month and ordered the bar to look into the accusations against the Republican official.

The investigation is yet another liability for the embattled attorney general, who is facing a years-old criminal case, a separate, newer FBI investigation, and a Republican primary opponent who is seeking to make electoral hay of the various controversies. It also makes Paxton one of the highest profile lawyers to face professional blowback over their roles in Donald Trump's effort to delegitimize his defeat.

A spokesman for the attorney general's office did not respond to requests for comment. Paxton's defense lawyer, Philip Hilder, declined to comment.

On HoustonChronicle.com: George P. Bush announces bid to unseat embattled Texas AG Ken Paxton

Kevin Moran, the 71-year-old president of the Galveston Island Democrats, shared his complaint with The Associated Press along with letters from the State Bar of Texas and the Board of Disciplinary Appeals that confirm the investigation. He said Paxton's efforts to dismiss other states' election results was a wasteful embarrassment for which the attorney general should lose his law license.

He wanted to disenfranchise the voters in four other states, said Moran. It's just crazy.

Texas' top appeals lawyer, who would usually argue the state's cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, notably did not join Paxton in bringing the election suit. The high court threw it out.

Paxton has less than a month to reply to Moran's claim that the lawsuit to overturn the results in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin was misleading and brought in bad faith, according to a June 3 letter from the bar. All four of the battleground states voted for Biden in November.

From there, bar staff will take up the case in a proceeding that resembles the grand jury stage of a criminal investigation. Bar investigators are empowered to question witnesses, hold hearings and issue subpoenas to determine whether a lawyer likely committed misconduct. That finding then launches a disciplinary process that could ultimately result in disbarment, suspension or a lesser punishments. A lawyer also could be found to have done nothing wrong.

The bar dismisses thousands of grievances each year and the Board of Disciplinary Appeals, 12 independent lawyers appointed by the Texas Supreme Court, overwhelmingly uphold those decisions. Reversals like that of Moran's complaint happened less than 7% of the time last year, according to the bar's annual report.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Texas AG Ken Paxton sues Biden administration over billions in rescinded Medicaid funding

Claire Reynolds, a spokeswoman and lawyer for the bar, said state law prohibits the agency from commenting on complaints unless they result is public sanctions or a court action.

The bar's investigation is confidential and likely to take months. But it draws renewed attention to Paxton's divisive defense of Trump as he and Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush vie for the former presidents endorsement in the Republican primary to run for attorney general in 2022.

On the Democratic side, Joe Jaworski, the former mayor of Galveston, has said he'll run. Moran said Jaworski is a friend but that he played no role in the complaint against Paxton.

Paxton's election challenge was filled with claims that failed to withstand basic scrutiny. A succession of other judges and state elections officials have refuted claims of widespread voter fraud, and Trump's own Justice Department found no evidence of fraud that could have changed the election's outcome.

Nonetheless, Paxton's lawsuit won him political and financial support from Trump loyalists at a time when fresh allegations of criminal wrongdoing led many in the state GOP to keep their distance from the attorney general.

Last fall, eight of Paxton's top deputies mounted an extraordinary revolt in which they accused him of abusing his office in the service of a wealthy donor. The FBI is investigating their claims.

Paxton has denied wrongdoing and separately pleaded not guilty in a state securities fraud case that's languished since 2015. He has also used his office in ways that have benefited allies and other donors.

The new criminal allegations prompted an exodus of the top lawyers from Paxton's office. But Solicitor General Kyle Hawkins was still serving as Texas' top appellate lawyer at the time of the election lawsuit.

Although the solicitor general usually handles cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, it was a private Washington D.C.-based lawyer who brought election challenge with Paxton. Hawkins has since moved to private practice. A spokesman for his firm said we cant help you" with questions about why he didn't handle the suit.
The 2022 3i SHOW was held March 17 to 19 at Western State Bank Expo Center, Dodge City, Kansas.

The 3i SHOW is a salute to Industry, Implements and Irrigation. Organized and managed by Western Kansas Manufacturers Association, this invitational show provides an opportunity for exhibitors from all over the world to showcase their agribusiness products.

From a traveling exhibit in 1950, the Western Kansas Karavan with members loading their products on trucks and making one-night displays in various Kansas towns, has come the 3i SHOW. Exhibitors each year feature the latest equipment, technology and services.

(Photos by Diana Derstein.)

Close
As an existing print subscriber it is easy to get FREE access to all our online content.

When you click get started below it will walk you through creating an online account to attach your print subscription number to.

After your account is created it will ask you to either add a subscription for online access or click on the print subscriber button. Click the print subscriber button header and it will open a dropdown, now click on get started. The page will reload and you will be prompted to enter an account number and a zip code.

IT IS VERY IMPORTANT TO USE THE NUMBER OFF OF THE MOST RECENT ISSUE OR ANYTHING AFTER JANUARY 28, 2019 TO GAIN ACCESS!

OLD ACCOUNT NUMBERS WILL NOT WORK

The account number and zip code are easily available on your most recent issue of the High Plains Journal or Midwest Ag Journal in the address fields as is shown here. Sometimes the account number has extra zero's in front of it, just ignore those.
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.
Hudson, NY (12534)

Today

Showers early, then cloudy overnight. Low 47F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Showers early, then cloudy overnight. Low 47F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%.
How the Neil Young vs. Joe Rogan Spotify dispute affected artists everywhere

The ultimatum posed to the streaming service became a call to action for artists everywhere.

A guest post by Vincent Williams of Berklee College of Music: Music Business Journal.

On January 24, Neil Young penned a letter to his label and manager regarding the spread of misinformation regarding Covid-19 perpetuated by Americas number one podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience on Spotify. They can have Rogan or Young. Not both.1 The ultimatum posed to the streaming service became a call to action for artists everywhere. In the days that followed, many other artists, including Joni Mitchell, Nils Lofgren, and India.Arie, followed Youngs lead and planned to remove their catalogs from the platform. With each artist making statements about issues they take with the company, what started as a fight against misinformation quickly became a much larger expose of Spotifys ethics and dominance over the streaming industry.

Factors in Spotifys Stance

The Joe Rogan Experience has been on Spotify since September of 2020, with over 11 seasons worth of content. In its first month alone, the show accounted for 4.5% of all Spotify podcast listening or 14.9 million hours. Not to mention Spotify and Rogans $100 million deal to have all of his episodes exclusively streamed on their platform.2 On the other hand, Neil Young regularly accumulated around six million monthly listeners, not even breaking into the most significant 500 artists on their service. From the numbers alone, Spotify clearly would have suffered a much more significant financial loss if they sided with Young, considering podcast ads becoming an essential source of revenue.

Money aside, Spotify also has the numbers to reason that the rising concern over the infodemic Rogan perpetuates has never deterred users from the site. With no negative impact on their bottom line so far, Spotify seemingly has no reason to re-evaluate its stance on Rogans podcast. In their 2021 Q4 report, Spotify boasted an 18% increase in Active Monthly Users (AMU), with Premium Subscribers increasing by 16%. Apart from an increase in users, Spotify cites that their Ad-Supported Revenue reached a record 15% of total revenues, marking the first time that ad-revenue has exceeded one billion dollars in a single year for the company. This increase has been credited to the fact that podcast revenue benefited from strong growth across existing Spotify studios and our exclusive licensing deals.3 Following Spotifys recent podcast acquisitions, the company raised their Cost Per Thousand Listeners (CPM) to advertise on Spotify-exclusive shows to upwards of $60.4. With approximately 11 million listeners per episode and three to five episodes per week, The Joe Rogan Experience is likely the exclusive licensing deal Spotify credits their significant ad revenue too.

With millions of dollars on the line and a contract to uphold, Spotify has to be extremely careful with handling Rogans content. Their deal entails that Rogan maintains creative liberty over his show, but that is not to say that Spotify cannot disapprove of it. After the retaliation by artists on the platform, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek spoke with Rogan. The two agreed, resulting in the removal of 113 episodes from the platform.5 All but one of the now-deleted episodes were recorded prior to the Covid-19 pandemic and therefore remain unrelated to the issue of misinformation that sparked this controversy. However, it does present a step in the right direction of Spotify siding with artists by removing inappropriate and offensive language from the platform, something many cited as a primary reason for leaving.

Artists Follow Youngs Example

After Spotify doubled down on their defense of Rogan, Youngs actions have been followed by other prominent artists. Joni Mitchell was one of the first to take action, and writing Irresponsible people are spreading lies that are costing people their lives in her official statement.6 India.Arie posted a video to her Instagram announcing her departure by creating a compilation of times Joe Rogan has used slurs and other hateful languages on his show. She also went on to say that artists are underpaid and Joe Rogan gets paid all this money, and its hard for me to, these days, just sit back and go, Oh, well, thats how it goes.7

Spotify is no stranger to widespread backlash from the music community. For years, countless industry professionals have criticized the companys pitifully low royalty payments. The collective criticism of Joe Rogan cuts deeper, with many arguments rooted in the frustration that he should be paid millions more than the musicians whom Spotify was made for. For many, removing music from the platform stems from feelings of being wronged by the company, which regularly dishes out hundreds of millions of dollars to sign exclusive deals with podcasters while actively fighting to pay artists less.

#CancelSpotify

With many of their favorite artists leaving the platform, consumers also faced the dilemma of potentially moving to other streaming platforms, following the virtual location of their favorite artists music. On January 27th, 2022, Spotify was forced to restrict access to its online and phone support systems due to an influx of cancellation requests and complaints, which caused an overload in its system.8 It is unclear how many subscriptions have been lost to date due to this controversy. However, the inability to handle the volume of the requests and the removal of specific episodes of the podcast could suggest that it was a significant loss.

For now, Spotify remains the largest platform for music streaming, holding 31% of the market share, compared to Apple Musics 15%, in second place.9 As for podcast streaming, Spotify has gradually been cutting into Apple Musics lead. Although Spotify did not report listener numbers, their AMU growth rate during Q3 2021 suggested they were on the verge of taking over the number one spot. As the largest site for music streaming, Spotify is also the most important place for artists to upload their music. With such a firm hold on the market, Spotify offers the best chance for independent musicians to connect to their target audience. The streaming giant is invaluable to the high-profile artists for this reason, and to take down Spotify would undoubtedly have negative repercussions for up-and-coming artists everywhere: a perspective that the eminent artists who are leaving the platform might not realize.

Not All Artists are Multi-Millionaires

Waging a battle against Spotifys allowance of misinformation is a privilege that only certain well-established, considerably wealthy artists have. Neil Young accumulated a net worth of over $200 million through his decades of live performance, as well as the sale of physical records and merchandise. It is the same case for the other prominent names that have followed suit: Joni Mitchell, $100 million; Nils Lofgren, $20 million; India.Arie, $6 million. Independent artists do not have the same privilege as these stars to remove their songs from a platform for moral reasoning.

The majority of independent artists do not have lucrative enough careers to justify doing music full-time. Therefore, alternate revenue streams are a must for indie musicians, more often than not in the form of working a job outside of their artistry, something the current Spotify deserters do not have to worry about. A survey by MIDiA Research in combination with Amuse found that About three-quarters of independent artists earned less than $10,000 a year from music.10 Until small artists can be discovered, build a fanbase, and have support to tour and manufacture merchandise, streaming will most likely be their primary source of music-related income. Since Spotify doubles the size of its closest competitor, to cancel Spotify would be to take away the greatest (albeit, poor paying) opportunity these artists have to share their songs with the largest possible audience.

Furthermore, if an artist is signed, the decision to remove songs is at the discretion of their label. Most artist-label contracts maintain the right of the label to distribute songs where they see fit, meaning the most profitable spaces. Therefore, it is not surprising that high-profile artists, such as Young, convinced their labels to remove their catalogs from Spotify. Smaller artists who bring in less revenue will not have as big a voice within their label, meaning less control over where their music goes. The primary mission of the record label and artist management is to see their clients grow. As demonstrated above, Spotify is the dominant force of the streaming industry. Removing works from Spotify by unestablished artists would severely limit their future growth capabilities, therefore disincentivizing these labels from taking action.

Conclusion

A conclusion has yet to be realized in this case, making it difficult to tell where Spotify will land. Even as more artists join the cause, it is hard to imagine that Spotify will take serious actions to appease its user base. The company has repeatedly demonstrated that they are entirely market-driven, and their financial reports may very well indicate that they are too big to fail. Of course, there is always a chance that enough users grow tired of Spotifys constant mistreatment of artists and questionable morals and abandon the platform. However, if history should be any indicator, Spotify could just as well shake off this controversy just like any other and, in a matter of weeks, go back to their fight to under-pay musicians out of the spotlight once again.

Share on:
Pittsfield Conservation Commission to Meet Virtually Through May

PITTSFIELD, Mass.  The Conservation Commission has decided to continue meeting virtually through the end of May, pointing to the often rapidly changing trends in COVID-19.

"If you look to how things were in the beginning of December things were not too bad, [the delta variant] was fading, and then we had [the omicron variant] and I guess what I'm saying is it could change real quickly," Commissioner Jonathan Lothrop said at the panel's meeting on Thursday.



"I mean, six weeks ago, we were at the highest we've ever been and it's so hard to know what the future is and I think the challenge is if we set a meeting for four weeks from now and it gets posted, everything else, and then all sudden they get whacked with the newest sub-variant or whatever where does that leave us? So I guess in all honesty, I prefer to keep virtual for at least a little bit longer."

This will give time to make a plan before the extension of Massachusett's remote meeting provision of the Open Meeting Law  originally enacted on March 12, 2020  ends on July 15.



The commission began meeting virtually again in February after the virus peaked in mid-January.



Pittsfield has since recovered from the surge, dropping down to a 2.5 percent positivity rate from a 17.8 percent positivity rate in mid-January and entering the yellow incidence rate category from the "red zone."



Though, there has been a slight uptick in cases, as the city went from a 1.8 percent positivity rate on March 26 to a 2.5 percent positivity rate on Wednesday.



In other news, a continued application from LSG Investments LLC with principal Scott Graves, owner of the Rusty Anchor at 1451 North St., was continued again at this meeting.



Graves applied for a dock reconfiguration that includes accommodations for the Williams College sailing team. The commission had concerns with the design in terms of size and orientation.



The property has 20 to 25 boat moorings that were formerly installed by the Berkshire Sailing Club that the team is looking to use. The moorings expired in 2021 under the previous order of conditions that were assigned to it.


COMEDIENNE and musician, Mai TT, on Saturday revealed that Tinashe sent her daughter US$1 000, to help boost her business, even before the two had become a romantic pair. COMEDIENNE and musician, Mai TT, on Saturday revealed that Tinashe sent her daughter US$1 000, to help boost her business, even before the two had become a romantic pair.

Mai TTs wedding is expected this Saturday in Harare.

She engaged prominent female church leaders ahead of her bridal shower and wedding.

Born Felistas Murata, Mai TT, received prayers from church leaders  Prophetess Memory Matimbire, Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Service chaplain Mai Phiri, Mai Gwatidzo and her mother Pastor Esther Murata.

Pastor Gwatidzo and Chaplain Phiri shared messages on how women should handle their marriages and chronicled Mai TTs Christian background, describing her as a prayer warrior.

Mai TT then stunned guests by opening up about how Tinashe Maphosa connected with her in her Instagram inbox.

It was on my daughters birthday when Tinashe sent a greeting into my Instagram inbox, said Mai TT.

I ignored his message since I am someone who is always busy. At first, it was Hi and I did not respond and a month later it was hey.

Tinashe pretended to be someone who just wanted to send a birthday present to my daughter and that drew my attention.

As time went by, he followed my live videos, he praised the way I looked after my children and I just said thanks.

He went on to narrate that my attitude towards my children, and the consistency in supporting them, reminded him of his late mother and he sent US$1000 to support my daughters business.

He promised to support my daughters cosmetics business and asked if I could give him my contact details.

He went on to admire my beauty. I told him about my relationships sezvo ndiri munhu anongopinda achibuda saka ndakamuudza kuti ndichangobuda and I am fresh.

Ndakabva ndamuudza ipapo kuti my number is 077.. and the next day I was the first to say hie.

Tinashe went on to invite me to the US and I agreed and visited him. The rest can be summarised by why we are here today, said Mai TT.

She urged other women not to ignore some of the messages sent to their inboxes. H Metro
HIGH Court judge Justice Gladys Mhuri yesterday dismissed an application by activist Namatai Kwekweza, who sought to challenge the legality of the extension of Chief Justice Luke Malabas term of office by five years.

On May 16 last year, President Emmerson Mnangagwa extended Malabas term of office saying he was medically fit to continue as the countrys top judge despite being 70 and was supposed to go on retirement in terms of the provisions of the 2013 Constitution.

To effect the extension of office, the President signed Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No. 2) Act into law on May 7, 2021.

Several human rights organisations, including Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum executive director Musa Kika, contested the decision without success.

On May 20 last year, Kwekweza wrote to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) through her lawyers Scanlen and Holderness requesting information relating to how the JSC had arrived at the decision to recommend the extension of Malabas term of office beyond retirement age.

How did the JSC come to a decision on the appropriate recommendation to make to the President under section 186(1) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe relating to  Malabas bid to continue as CJ for another five years? In particular, was a meeting held by the commissioners for this purpose? Was a resolution passed to make the appropriate recommendation? If so, may we have a copy of the resolution? If a resolution was passed  which commissioners of JSC voted in favour of recommending that  Malabas tenure be extended for another five years and which commissioners voted against? Kwekweza submitted in her letter.

The JSC responded through its legal practitioners Kantor and Immerman dismissing Kwekwedzas request saying that it infringed on the individuals rights.

Kindly note that our client avers that the information request you have made is not in accordance with the applicable law. Any such request is subject to the rights of the individuals and institutions concerned. Theres no automatic right to the information, the JSC lawyers wrote back.

Kwekweza was, however, not satisfied with the response and she filed a High Court application.

In her ruling, Justice Mhuri said: The Constitutional Court declined to confirm the orders and set them aside. In essence, the case confirmed the CJs position to remain in office for the next five years as accepted by the President. It sealed and brought to finality any challenge to the CJs extension of tenure and all the processes that led to it.

That issue, therefore, is no longer live and is moot. This notwithstanding is there any benefit to the applicant or the public at large at this stage to order that the respondent answers yes or no as submitted by applicant when the issue is no longer live, or as submitted by the respondent when the horse has bolted. Newsday
Name: Hena Jalil

Company: BT Global

Job title: Chief Information Officer

Date started current role: September 2021

Location: London, England

Hena Jalil is currently the CIO for BT Global, a division of United Kingdom telecommunications company BT Group that provides global security, cloud and networking services to multinational companies worldwide, with operations in 180 countries and with a yearly revenue of four billion. Before this she was the IT, Digital and Data Director at Openreach. Openreach is a BT subsidiary that connects nearly all homes and businesses in the United Kingdom to the national broadband and telephone network. Jalil is a transformational technical leader/engineer who has built an exceptional track record of delivering customer and business outcomes. In the various CIO roles, she has consistently solved business challenges with commercial astuteness whilst boldly introducing and embedding innovation.

What was your first job? While I was still in university, I taught IT to people who were older and had no prior experience with computers. It was just a summer job, but it was a great learning experience. I had to make sure I was challenging people enough and keeping them engaged as an instructor, which was very insightful for my early career in IT.

Did you always want to work in IT? Ive always wanted to work in technology. Ever since I was a child, Ive loved breaking things apart, fixing them, trying to understand how they work and how I could make them work better. Technology excites me as it solves a lot of real-world challenges and I always wanted to be a part of something with a capability to have such a fantastic impact on the world.

What was your education? Do you hold any certifications? What are they? I graduated from Birla Institute of Technology, Ranchi with a bachelors degree in engineering and later got my MBA from the University of Warwick. I hold a lot of professional certifications along the way as well, e.g. Microsoft, Oracle, SAFe etc.

Explain your career path. Did you take any detours? If so, discuss. I think its pretty rare that anyone has a completely linear career path. I was a hands-on coder, and eventually switched to a more strategic path. I also started out in a consultancy, and working on customer projects was a vastly different experience from working for a company that has ownership over its technology. That was the biggest transition for me  taking that leap landed me in a role where I had a lot more ownership and control.

What business or technology initiatives will be most significant in driving IT investments in your organisation in the coming year? For BT Global, digital transformation is hugely significant. Were moving more towards a platform-based view where were focusing on building platforms rather than products, which is a big transition for BT Global. We need to execute at pace to deliver the best customer solutions, digitise sales and optimise services to provide a world class experience for our customers. From a security perspective, Im working in partnership with Kevin Brown to build security platforms and ideate solutions. From our epidemiological AI tool to our investment in Safe Security, cyber was a huge focus for BT Global in 2021 and continuing into 2022.

What are the CEO's top priorities for you in the coming year? How do you plan to support the business with IT? Our biggest priority this year is to ensure were delivering a best-in-class product portfolio thats lucrative and attractive to our customers while becoming more efficient on delivering those solutions. Our goal over the next few years is to double our productivity and create a flawless customer experience as we zero in on a modern and strategic approach to delivering the IT solutions our customers need.

Does the conventional CIO role include responsibilities it should not hold? Should the role have additional responsibilities it does not currently include? CIOs have historically been pretty set in their ways in terms of how they approach technology. I think its time for CIOs to pivot from a solely technological focus to a stronger business and commercial acumen. In reality, technology touches every single part of almost every job in the world. Its up to CIOs to steer that ship both internally (i.e. ensure employees are equipped with the tools and software they need) and externally by helping customers understand the product suite that is best going to serve their interests.

Are you leading a digital transformation? If so, does it emphasise customer experience and revenue growth or operational efficiency? If both, how do you balance the two? Digital transformation is the central part of my role as CIO. BT Global has historically served large customers, but our portfolio has been very network-centric and more about base connectivity. Looking towards the future, we want to transfer to more over-the-top endeavours, which is a massive undertaking. Our customers are well along their way into cloud migration and now theyre focused on how to change their posture from reactive to proactive. One way were helping move that forward is through strategic digital programs where we aim to build platforms rather than just products. In these projects, there absolutely needs to be a balance between customer experience and operational efficiency  you should always be driving an excellent customer experience and strong value propositions for your customer. If you solely focus on cost efficiency alone without keeping a larger goal in mind, you will lose focus of the end-goal youre trying to achieve.

Describe the maturity of your digital business. For example, do you have KPIs to quantify the value of IT? In many ways, BT Global has been a ground-breaking force in bringing a digital-first mindset to our products, customers and more. Today, whether were talking about cybersecurity or networking or cloud services, as a truly global organisation that provides products and services to around 180 countries, and with our extensive global presence, we support international and multi-national organisations and provide local availability of businesses, technology, service and support professionals around the world.

Every conversation at BT starts with a discussion on KPIs, and that stands true for proving out the value of IT. KPIs are central to every single project and task, and were always monitoring data and results to ensure our actions are actually turning the dial - its about executing, not just talking.

What does good culture fit look like in your organisation? How do you cultivate it? Im part of a new team led by Harmeen Mehta, our Chief Digital and Innovation Officer, who are dedicated to gaining insight and understanding of where BT stands as an organisation and how we can use that to adapt our culture to attract a new generation of tech talent. Theres a cultural shift happening, and as you can see with the Great Resignation, people have different expectations, goals, and motivations. Were working on resetting our culture accordingly and weve recently launched a new manifesto called The Digital Way which introduces principles on culture and behaviour that we want to embed within the company.

What roles or skills are you finding (or anticipate to be) the most difficult to fill? BT is doing a complete reset of its digital agenda and we are looking for people with a variety of experience for e.g. startups and not just corporates, hands on technical experts as well as strong leaders etc. and we do not want to compromise on our expectations as it is critical to our success. Specialist technical skills for e.g. SRE, DevOps, Security are also a lot more difficult to find as people are reassessing their options post the pandemic.

What's the best career advice you ever received? One of my previous CEOs once said to me  Always run to the fire and I have repeatedly seen the value of that. What sets people on a path of success is their drive for value and the difference they can make. A moment of crisis helps differentiates you from others and demonstrates your resilience, tenacity and creativity in doing the best for the business. Ultimately, you need a clear idea of the value you can bring to a business and how you can execute on it. People also shouldnt shy away from learning throughout their entire careers  I went back to school for my MBA after starting my career as an engineer because I wanted to learn more about strategic and financial challenges, and even now I spend my weekends catching up on new technology.

Do you have a succession plan? If so, discuss the importance of and challenges with training up high-performing staff. Its an interesting question as Ive only just started my position in the fall of 2021. Right now, Im focused on working with our newly established team  we have a deep bench of talent that I both want to nurture and learn from. There are definitely some good contenders who are already proving their worth.

What advice would you give to aspiring IT leaders? For those who are just starting out their career in technology or exploring the option, my best advice is to never presume that you know everything. Learning is a continual process, especially in technology. Act like a sponge: soak up every single article or academic research you can find, get coffee with your superiors and quiz them on their vision for the future and always be humble. I still do that today.

One other thing I would say is that it is paramount IT leaders empower the next generation to go into the tech field. STEM education is especially important for young girls, and we really owe this to the next generation but also it is great for the IT industry.

What has been your greatest career achievement? Driving the IT transformation required to enable the FTTP build for UK (Fibre to the premise) with an ambition to complete 25M premises by 2026. Also supporting and scaling broadband during the Covid lockdowns to enable the businesses, education, healthcare etc. to carry on in spite of the demand spikes.

Looking back with 20:20 hindsight, what would you have done differently? I would have been more fearless. That additional bit on top of boldness gives an edge to get to results faster.
PRESIDENT Emmerson Mnangagwas spokesperson George Charamba has exposed that MDC Alliance leader Douglas Mwonzora for being the ruling Zanu PF partys project to destroy the opposition led by Nelson Chamisa.

Mwonzora and Thokozani Khupe, who heads a rival MDC faction, have long been accused of being in a marriage of convenience with Mnangagwas Zanu PF.

In his latest weekly column published by the State media under the pen name Jamwanda 2, Charamba described Mwonzora and his erstwhile ally Khupe as rival suitors fighting for the right to mate with Zanu PF.

He exposed how Khupe was used to endorse the Political Actors Dialogue (Polad), a platform described by critics as Mnangagwas strategy to get endorsement from opposition political parties.

Viewed that way, Zanu PF, with its well sequenced dalliance with Thokozani Khupe and Douglas Mwonzora, is the foremost winner, followed by the two it mated with, Charamba wrote.

It used both to nudge the recalcitrant Chamisa into the desired corner where he has little choices but to jaw-jaw, and on Zanu PF terms With Mwonzora at the helm of MDC whether T, Alliance or both  Polad got its myth, which became a mouth for Chamisa and all those who bankrolled him.

The Mwonzora-led MDC-T enjoyed the backing of State institutions, including the police and army in the fight against Chamisas then MDC Alliance party which won parliamentary and local authority seats in 2018 general elections. Mwonzora wrested MDC Alliance headquarters, the Morgan Richard Tsvangirai House with the aid of armed soldiers and police. He also received funding under the Political Parties (Finance) Act based on seats won by Chamisas MDC Alliance while the courts granted him carte blanche to recall his rivals MPs.

Chamisa has since formed a new political outfit, the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) party.

Having created Polad, Zanu PF needed an ideologue, who would run with and elaborate on, the concept, through sheer logic and cogency of argument, Charamba further stated.

Zanu PFs goal is to insert a new mores in our politics where elections are followed by a de-escalation, all to allow national consensus, national focus and national effort towards betterment of Zimbabweans. That goal needed validation and echo from its opposite number, something well beyond Khupe conceptually. It needed the agile mind of Mwonzora, who swiftly outgunned Chamisa into an outcast, the black sheep of the Zimbabwe political family.

Repeated efforts to get a comment from Mwonzora were in vain yesterday as his number was not reachable. His spokesperson Witness Dube was not picking up calls. Newsday
Ukrainian photojournalist Maks Levin who went missing since 13 March while documenting the Russian invasion of Ukraine near the capital, Kyiv, has been found dead on 1 April. The International and European Federations of Journalists (IFJ-EFJ) join their Ukrainian affiliates, NUJU and IMTUU, in condemning the deliberate attacks on journalists in Ukraine.

The photojournalist, Maks Levin, 40, was a prominent freelancer. His body was found in the Huta-Mezhyhirska village on Friday, according to the news website LB.ua, one media outlet where Maks Levin worked.

On Saturday, the Vyshhorod district prosecutors office said in a statement that based on preliminary information, Mr. Levin was shot by Russian armed forces with small arms fire, and that a criminal investigation into his death was underway. The colleague Mr. Levin had been traveling with, Oleksiy Chernyshov, has not been found.

IFJ General Secretary, Anthony Bellanger, said: "This war is being incredibly tough to cover for media workers on the front line, who are suffering targeted attacks daily. Targeted attacks on journalists covering the war constitute war crimes that cannot go unpunished".

Evidence of war crimes committed by the Russian occupiers is mounting, said EFJ General Secretary Ricardo Gutierrez. There is no longer any doubt that journalists are being deliberately targeted. On the ground, journalists are now operating without distinctive signs so as not to be targeted. We once again call on the international community to set up a special tribunal to investigate these war crimes and prosecute the perpetrators.

At least six other journalists have been killed since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in late February:

Yevheniy Sakun , an Ukrainian cameraman for LIVE TV killed on 1 March during a rockets attack on the TV tower in Kyiv;

, an Ukrainian cameraman for LIVE TV killed on 1 March during a rockets attack on the TV tower in Kyiv; Ukrainian journalist Viktor Dedov died on 11 March in Mariupol after his flat was bombed;

died on 11 March in Mariupol after his flat was bombed; Brent Renaud , a US journalist shot dead in Irpin, on 13 March;

, a US journalist shot dead in Irpin, on 13 March; Pierre Zakrzewski , Fox News camera operator, and Ukrainian journalist Oleksandra Sasha Kuvshynova , killed on 14 March while reporting from Horenka.

, Fox News camera operator, and Ukrainian journalist , killed on 14 March while reporting from Horenka. Russian journalist Oksana Baulina, killed after coming under Russian shelling with another civilian while she filmed destruction at a shopping centre in Podil district in Kyiv, on 23 March.

Donate to the IFJ/EFJ Safety Fund for journalists in Ukraine
After two years of mostly remote work and months of changing plans about when to bring people back to the office, Google's hybrid work arrangement begins today. That means that most employees will be expected to be in the office three days each week, with the rest of the time spent working remotely.

Google has spent a considerable amount of time and energy reconfiguring office spaces to accommodate a hybrid work arrangement and to give employees peace of mind about returning even though we haven't put Covid-19 behind us. The company has added spaces designed to accommodate a mix of employees working in collaboration, regardless of whether they were in the office or working remotely.

At the time, a Google executive told the New York Times that the pandemic had simply accelerated the future of work that most people thought was "10 years out," and "brought us to that future now." On the other hand, Google's former head of HR, Lazlo Bock, told Bloomberg that it won't last. At least, hybrid work won't.

According to Bock, there are two reasons things are more likely to return to the way they were pre-pandemic. First, employees who work remotely will be at a disadvantage when it comes to promotions or pay increases, compared with their in-office peers.

That certainly isn't fair, but it's not surprising. It's harder to evaluate performance when someone isn't physically there all the time. Even if that's not true, there will certainly be a perception that it is. If your colleagues are working in the office full time and you're only there part of the time, it's hard not to wonder what you might be missing. The fear of missing out is real, and Bock suggests it will drive people back to the office eventually.

The other reason is far simpler, though just as problematic: Bosses want employees back in the office. "We'll get everyone back into the office eventually. I just don't want to pick that fight now," Bock says one Google executive told him.

It's no surprise that many managers would prefer to have their team together in person if given a choice. Managing a remote team is hard and introduces different challenges compared with having everyone sitting at desks where you can see them and keep track of what they're working on. Then again, if your primary concern is being able to see your team and what they're working on, you're probably doing it wrong.

Of course, there certainly are benefits to having people who work with each other in close proximity. It's hard to argue that the last two years haven't had a cost. Connecting with a team via Zoom isn't the same as sitting around a table. There are intangible benefits to being together with the people you collaborate with that simply don't exist virtually.

That doesn't mean that working in the office is the only way to be productive. If anything, the last two years have shown that many jobs and roles can be done remotely. The problem is that many of the people who make decisions about how employees work have assumed that remote work was a temporary solution to a temporary problem. Once the pandemic is over, everything will get back to "normal."
Prevent Unauthorized Transactions in your demat / trading account Update your Mobile Number/ email Id with your stock broker / Depository Participant. Receive information of your transactions directly from Exchanges on your mobile / email at the end of day and alerts on your registered mobile for all debits and other important transactions in your demat account directly from NSDL/ CDSL on the same day." - Issued in the interest of investors.

KYC is one time exercise while dealing in securities markets - once KYC is done through a SEBI registered intermediary (broker, DP, Mutual Fund etc.), you need not undergo the same process again when you approach another intermediary.

No need to issue cheques by investors while subscribing to IPO. Just write the bank account number and sign in the application form to authorise your bank to make payment in case of allotment. No worries for refund as the money remains in investor's account."

www.indiainfoline.com is part of the IIFL Group, a leading financial services player and a diversified NBFC. The site provides comprehensive and real time information on Indian corporates, sectors, financial markets and economy. On the site we feature industry and political leaders, entrepreneurs, and trend setters. The research, personal finance and market tutorial sections are widely followed by students, academia, corporates and investors among others.
TVS Motor Company: Subsidiary TVS Motor (Singapore) Pte. Limited has acquired a 70% stake in United Kingdom-based EBCO, for GBP 1,163,070. EBCO provides smart connected mobility solutions through a pipeline of e-bikes across the city and mountain biking segments. The company has tie ups with most major dealers across the United Kingdom and is the exclusive distributor of Corratec e-bikes in the UK. In addition, TVS Motor registers sales of 3.07 lakh units in March 2022, which fell compared to 3.22 lakh units sold in same month last year.



Hero MotoCorp: The company sold 4.50 lakh units of motorcycles and scooters in March 2022, declined sharply compared to 5.76 lakh units sold in corresponding month last year. In the financial year (FY22), sales dropped to 49.44 lakh units, compared to 57.91 lakh units sold in previous year.



GOCL Corporation: The company has received a notice of demand of Rs45.72 crore from the Income Tax Department. This notice is in connection with Joint Development Agreement for the land at Kukatpally, Hyderabad, pertaining to assessment year 2013-14. But as per the company, aforesaid notice is not tenable in law.



Karnataka Bank: The bank clocked a 6.27% growth in core deposits at Rs80,385 crore for the year ended March 2022 compared to previous financial year, and gross advances during the same period grew by 9.5% to Rs57,726 crore. The share of CASA to total deposits stands increased at 32.97% at March 2022, against 31.5% at the end of March 2021. The private sector lender expects 12 percent growth in deposits and about 17% in gross advances for FY23.



JSW Energy: Subsidiary JSW Neo Energy (JSWNEL) has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding with the Government of Chhattisgarh for setting up 1,000 MW capacity of hydro pumped storage project (Hasdev Bango Pumped Storage Project) in Chhattisgarh.



Alkem Laboratories: ISP Chile (Public Health Institute of Chile) had conducted an inspection at the company's manufacturing facility at Daman, India during March 28 to April 1, 2022. At the end of the inspection, no observations critical to good manufacturing practices were detected.



Lupin: The company has signed a Definitive Agreement with Anglo-French Drugs & Industries for acquiring a portfolio of brands. This will strengthen the company's presence in vitamins, minerals & supplements and CNS segments.



Dr Reddy's Laboratories: The company has entered into an agreement with Novartis AG to acquire the cardiovascular brand Cidmus in India. The acquisition cost is $61 million. The Cidmus is indicated for heart failure patients with reduced ejection fraction.
RECALLED Harare mayor Jacob Mafume and fellow Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) councillors Simon Chabuka (Mutare) and Anorld Batirai Dube (Bulawayo) have approached the High Court challenging their dismissal by Local Government minister July Moyo.

They want their recalls to be declared null and void, saying their constitutional rights were violated.

Moyo last week announced that the three positions were vacant after they were recalled by PDP in a letter dated March 28, 2022.

In terms of section 278(i) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe, as read with section (l)(k), the wards the three represented were now vacant because the three had joined Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC), Moyo said.

But Mafume and the two councillors argue that they belonged to the PDP led by Tendai Biti.

They cited Moyo, the town clerks of Harare, Bulawayo, Mutare and the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission as respondents.

Mafume won the 2018 local authority elections in ward 17 in Harare under the MDC Alliance.

Other PDP members who were recalled included Kucaca Phulu, Settlement Chikwinya, Dube, Chabuka, Willias Madzimure, Regai Tsunga, Biti and Chelesile Mahlangu who had won National Assembly seats under the MDC Alliance.

On April 14, 2021, the High Court ruled that only authorised representatives of the PDP led by Biti, in particular under Chikwinya as the secretary-general had the power to act on behalf of the PDP.

In this regard, Moyo and those who communicated with him are violating our choice by seeking to ascribe us membership of a political party that is alien to us and is certainly not the PDP led by Biti and Chikwinya that we have always been members since 2017, Mafume submitted.

They asked the town clerks to disregard Moyos letter. The matter is yet to be heard. Newsday
MipTV: Docubay to double content offering via content partnerships The longest-running global TV market MipTV kicked off on Monday. Major international production companies, distributors and buyers showcased their 'wares' at the industry event that includes programming such as drama, documentary, kids, and factual formats. .......Read More...

Cineline India returns to film exhibition with nine properties across Maharashtra Kanakia Group's Cineline India has re-entered the film exhibition industry with the launch of nine properties at prime locations across Maharashtra. The nine locations of MovieMax Cinemas include Sion, Andheri, Goregaon, Kandivali, Mira Road in Mumbai; Eternity Mall and Wonder Mall in Thane; The Zone (Nashik), and Eternity Mall (Nagpur)........ Read More...
Remember Sean Penn had threatened to smelt his Oscar awards if Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is not invited to speak at the Academy?

What Oscars couldn't do, the Grammys did. At the awards ceremony, they played a pre-recorded message from President Volodymyr Zelensky that he recorded in a bunker two days ago and bounced around to several points in order to ensure that no one could trace the origins of the clip.

Zelensky oughta win a Grammy pic.twitter.com/0m5lyawZs1  Michael (@michael_rf) April 4, 2022

President Volodymyr Zelensky's Grammys Speech

In his powerful message, Zelensky said, "The war. Whats more opposite to music? The silence of ruined cities and killed people".

Reflecting at the plight of Ukrainians, he added, "Our children draw swooping rockets, not shooting stars. Our 400 children have been injured and 153 children died. Our parents are happy to wake up in the morning in bomb shelters, but alive. Our loved ones dont know if we will be together again. The war doesnt let us choose who survives and who stays in eternal silence."

"Our musicians wear body armor instead of tuxedos. They sing to the wounded in hospitals -- even to those who can't hear them. But the music will break through anyway."

"We defend our freedom to live, to love, to sound"

Here is Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's pre-taped speech at the #Grammys, introducing a performance for Ukraine from John Legend: "Our musicians wear body armor instead of tuxedos. They sing to the wounded in hospitals." https://t.co/rjX2S54hkr pic.twitter.com/43fcZTrjQK  Variety (@Variety) April 4, 2022

"On our land, we are fighting Russia, which brings horrible silence with its bombs. The dead silence. Fill the silence with your music, fill it today to tell our story."

He also appealed for help and support as he added, "Tell the truth about the war on your social networks, on TV. Support us in any way you can -- any, but not silence. And then peace will come."

"To all our cities the war is destroying -- Chernihiv, Kharkiv, Volnovakha, Mariupol and others: They are legends already, but I have dream of them living, and free. Free like you on the Grammy stage."

Twitter

After Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's powerful speech, John Legend took the stage and paid a tribute to the war-torn country . He performed with Ukrainian artists. Take a look at his performance below.

A night before the Grammys, John Legend said, "Im proud to celebrate and honor and cultivate our music. Black music is and has been the rhythm, the root, the inspiration, the innovation behind so much of the worlds popular music. It doesnt exist without us."

"Our art and music can help movements find their footing and voice. Our art and music can help activists, the people closest to injustice and lead the way forward to equality and opportunity," he said.

(For more news and updates from the world of celebrities from Bollywood and Hollywood, keep reading Indiatimes Entertainment, and let us know your thoughts on this story in the comments below.)


American President Joe Biden signed the omnibus spending bill on March 15 and it included the EB-5 Reform. What does it stand for exactly? The EB-5 Reform and Integrity Act is a bipartisan legislation introduced in 2019 and again in 2021 in Congress with the view of reforming the EB-5 Immigrant Investor federal program, which provides green cards to certain foreign investors. How is it going to work now in the context of Indian investors?



Immigration law expert and Founder & Principal Attorney, Gehis Immigration & International Legal Services, Mr. Naresh M Gehi explains, "The employment based EB-5 investor visa plan was first created in 1990 with a specification of a set standard amount of Rs $1 million for an investment whereas it was standardized at $500,000 for TEA- targeted employment area."



BCCL/Representational image

Categorically speaking, he says, the EB-5 investor visa is characterized by two distinct programmes : The Stand Alone programme which does not have an expiration duration. The Regional Center programme which has an expiration limit and requires regular reauthorization. The latter holds more popularity amongst the EB-5 investors because the Regional Center programme takes into account, the full time jobs by the enterprises as well as the investments and indirect job creation done by the applicants.



However, since 2021, says Naresh M Gehi, several visas of those who had invested under the Regional Center programme lapsed due to the refusal of US citizenship and immigration services (USCIS) to process them. This was due to a lawsuit that claimed statutory authorisation was not a mandatory requirement for the adjudication of visas and citizenship green cards.



Unsplash/Representational image

Post the conflict regarding the legislations related to the Investor Visa programme, it has been declared that the programmes that expired more than eight months ago will be funding the federal government for the remaining year as part of the spending package. He adds, " As for the lapse of the reauthorization of the Regional Center programme concerning the investments made, the green cards will further be determined under the US citizenship and immigration services - Homeland security. Additionally, while the investment amount will rise up to $800,000 for high employment investments and rural areas, it will be up to $1,050,000 for other ventures."



He informs that two new fees will be created to cover the costs of a new integrity enforcement fund created under the new legislation. The fund will cover the costs of audits and site visits and to ensure that participants comply with immigration laws. The annual fee is around $20,000 (to be covered by each regional center) and there will be an additional $1,000 investor filing fee.



About the estimated processing time for EB-5 applications, he says, "The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has to determine how to achieve processing time goals of under six months for I-526 petitions and under one year for I-829 petitions. The DHS and USCIS are expected to attend to this important issue and to work hard to resolve it."



Naresh M Gehi is often asked how the adjustments of the visa status can be done after filing for the EB-5 program?



Unsplash/Representational image

He answers, "The adjustment of status under the EB-5 program will be done concurrently, which means that the investor petition and the I-485 adjustment of status application will be filed together. This will help the investor to continue to stay in the United States with their spouse and children under the age of 21, until the investor application is approved. He/she can apply for a work permit, get a social security number, a driver's licence and obtain a travel document to travel outside the United States until a decision is made on the application. This is a big advantage of the new law especially because in the past, the I -526 investor visa petition had to be approved before the investor was allowed to apply for an adjustment of status. The biggest disadvantage of the old law was that the USCIS was taking several years to adjudicate the investor visa petition which made life very difficult for investors who generally had short term visas to stay in the United States."



The new legislation, he says, aims to provide greater protections to investors and prohibits the denial applications based on the expiration of the Regional Center program and directs USCIS to continue to allocate green cards to applications filed before September 30, 2026. The Act also allows the investors to complete the permanent residence process despite termination or debarment of an EB-5 entity or Regional Centre programme."

Naresh M. Gehi is an Indo-US Lawyer and the Director of Gehis Immigration and International Legal Services based in Mumbai, and is an expert in complex Immigration strategies, foreign investments, optimization of tax benefits, cross-border investment and tax issues. All views/ opinions expressed in the article are of the author.


Controversial Hindu priest Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati, of the Dasna Devi temple, has been booked by the Delhi Police over inflammatory comments he made during a Hindu Mahapanchayat in the national capital on Sunday.

Narsinghanand Saraswati, Suresh Chauhanke, the Chief Editor of Sudarshan News and Preet Singh, president, Save India Foundation were among those booked by the Delhi Police for promoting disharmony, feelings of enmity, hatred or ill will between two communities.

BCCL

Unauthorised event

The event, dubbed Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha was held in North-West Delhi's Burari Ground on Sunday, despite the Police not granting permission to the organizers.

The same group that had earlier held a similar controversial event at Jantar Mantar in the national capital, where anti-Muslim slogans were raised.

What Narsinghanand said

According to the Delhi Police, around 700-800 people had participated in the gathering in which Narsinghanand exhorted Hindus to take up arms to fight for their existence.

He also said that "50 per cent of Hindus will convert" in 20 years if a Muslim becomes the prime minister of India.

"Only in 2029 or in 2034 or in 2039, a Muslim will become the prime minister. Once a Muslim becomes the prime minister, 50 per cent Hindus will convert, 40 per cent will be killed and the remaining 10 per cent will either live in refugee camps or in other countries in the next 20 years.

BCCL

"This will be the future of the Hindus. If you want to avoid this future, then become a man and take up arms," Narsinghanand is heard saying in a video clip of the mahapanchayat.

Narsinghanand went on to assert that Hindus should stop "begging" for their rights.

"For long I have seen Hindus begging for their demands to be fulfilled. But I have not seen even a single demand of any Hindu being met. We got Ram Janmabhoomi not by begging but through the court's intervention, so stop being a beggar," he said.

Three FIRs registered

A case was registered in Mukherjee Nagar after which the investigation was initiated.

The police also received complaints from journalists who alleged mishandling and assault at the event during reporting.

"A complaint was received in PS Mukharjee Nagar from two journalists of a News Portal who had come to Burari Ground for reporting the event of Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha. In their complaint, they had alleged that on April 3, at around 1.30 pm, when they were rushing towards the exit, they were manhandled and assaulted by a group of people who also tried to snatch the mobile phones and I-Card of journalists," the police said.

"Another complaint was also received from an independent/ freelance journalist who had also come to Burari Ground for reporting the event of Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha. He had alleged that on April 3, at around 1 pm, when he along with two other journalists were interviewing one person, then some persons manhandled and assaulted him. A case was registered," the police further added in its statement.

Screengrab

Narsinghanand, no stranger to controversies

Narsinghanand was earlier arrested on January 15, in a similar case, by Uttrakhand Police and sent to 14-day judicial custody. He was later released on bail. Narsinghanand was one of the organisers of the three-day Dharam Sansad in Haridwar where hate speeches were allegedly made against the minority community.





For more on news, sports and current affairs from around the world, please visit Indiatimes News.
The average thief isnt on the streets or in train stations anymore; but is online. A recent report by ACI Worldwide found that attempts of digital fraud have been on the rise. The report stated that the share of suspected fraudulent digital transaction attempts originating from India increased by 28.32 per cent over the 12 months ending March 2021 compared with the previous 12 months. Most recently, a woman from Madhya Pradesh lost close to 40,000 as a hacker gained access to her digital wallet.

Also Read: Guy Explains Why You Should Avoid Crypto Mining Pool Scams On Twitter

Even though the method of each fraud is unique, the idea of social engineering fraud remains the same. These are carried out by attackers that directly interact with their victims, calling them and posing as an executive. Eventually, they are misled into giving sensitive information, which can allow access to their digital wallet or even their bank account. More often than not, bank accounts are linked to digital wallets, potentially compromising both. Hackers use various techniques like vishing, shimming and phishing when conducting such attacks.

The most common frauds taking place today are:

1) Know Your Customer (KYC) fraud

AFP/Representational image

Fraudsters pose as company officials to dupe the victim into revealing sensitive information with the pretext of completing their Know Your Customer (KYC) policies. Fraudsters are known for gaining access by convincing victims to give them remote access to their devices to assist them in completing this KYC process. Unfortunately, once remote access has been granted, it's already too late!



2) SIM-Port fraud

Unsplash/Representational image

Also Read: Explained: Types Of E-Commerce Fraud And How To Shop Online Safely

Is a dangerous scam where gullible victims share their 10-digit unique SIM card number with cybercriminals posing as telecommunications executives. The scammers use this unique SIM card number to initiate a porting request, after which the SIM is shut down for 24 hours. Within 24 hours, the scammers issue a new SIM on the same number and then use it to login and reset the victims mobile wallets, net banking, UPI, and other log-in details.



3) QR Code fraud

Unsplash/Representational image

Online marketplaces are a playground for hackers to conduct such scams. Upon seeing a classified ad, they target individuals posing as potential buyers. Once the deal is finalised, the fraudster shares a QR code with the victim, asking them to scan it to receive the payment. This is where victims are compromised.



4) Counterfeit Customer Care fraud

Unsplash/Reprentational image

Attackers create phony customer care numbers on Google, Twitter, and Facebook, to dupe customers into calling them instead of the company they want to register a complaint with. Once again, the scammers pose as a company executive to attain vital financial information from its victim.



5) Cryptocurrency fraud

Unsplash/Representational image

Also Read: 'Dark Herring' Fraud Subscription Stole 105 Million Android Users' Money: Here's How

In January, multiple Internet celebrities had their social media handles compromised. Once hackers gained access to their grips, a video was posted to advertise a token asking for deposits of specific cryptocurrency in a particular wallet address. There are numerous cases where Ponzi cryptocurrencies have been hyped, and investors lose all their money to con artists who disappear from the face of the Earth.



How to prevent such attacks on your digital wallets:

1) Check Your Financial Statements

This is the most essential step to avoid any digital payments fraud. Once you get into vetting your statements, spotting irregularities will become second nature.

2) No Company Exec Will Ask for Remote Access

Customer service representatives will never ask you to give them remote access to your device. The most common remote access tool used in such attacks is Anydesk. Individuals should never share their unique Anydesk code with anyone and remember that company executives will never ask for your Debit or Credit Card details over the phone. Ask for the main switch/reception number and their extension to challenge and verify who they are.

3) Never Scan Unknown QR Codes

To prevent the most common QR code fraud in India, one must remember the fundamental principle of Unified Payment Interface (UPI) individuals never have to scan a QR code or click on a link received through an SMS or email, to receive payment.

4) Enable Two-Factor Authentication

Utilize the SMS-based two-factor authentication to safeguard your accounts from being taken over. For example, even if your password gets leaked, only you get prompted with an OTP via SMS required to access a digital payment site or app.

5) Only Download Digital Wallet Apps from Official Websites

Unsplash/Representational image

If you ever receive a link via SMS or email to install a new wallet, there are high chances that it may be rigged. So always download digital wallet apps from its official website.

6) Look for SSL encryption and PCI DSS-Compliance

While making any payments via a browser, a simple but effective measure every individual can take is to ensure the payment page is HTTPS-based. Always look for the sacred s at the beginning of a URL or a lock icon. If you are using a digital payment app, make sure the app is PCI DSS compliant. Always check what security measures your digital payments app has undertaken.

7) Cross-check every new cryptocurrency

Individuals must avoid getting swayed by the fear of missing out (FOMO). So, if you spot a celebrity or social media influencer endorsing a new cryptocurrency, wait. Dont blindly follow whats instructed.

8) Stop password reuse

Unsplash/Representational image

Never reuse the same password on multiple websites. All it takes is an attacker to compromise one site, and they can use those same credentials on various other sites by trying their luck. Use a password manager, the password is stored in the browser of the operating system.



Bottom line is that young Indian netizens cannot let their guard down in today's digital powered reality and need to be aware of all digital payments protocols. Individuals need to be careful of who they follow and not get easily influenced by digital personas. It is also imperative to not be impulsive- in most cases of digital wallet fraud, the victim at some point makes a hasty decision allowing the attacker to find loopholes and steal confidential data. Stephane Nappo aptly puts it, The five most efficient cyber defenders are Anticipation, Education, Detection, Reaction and Resilience.

About the author: Sean Duca is the Vice President and Regional Chief Security Officer for Asia Pacific & Japan at Palo Alto Networks. He's based in Australia. Views expressed here are author's alone.

For more technology news and science updates, keep reading Indiatimes.com.
A man in Canada's Alberta had gone out Kayaking and fishing but what he found in the river was not expected at all.

Braeden Rouse hooked an 8 feet 6 inches long sturgeon, dubbed living dinosaur, that weighed about 159 kilograms.

According to CTV News Calgary, the man had no gigs over the weekend so he decided to try his luck at the river and ended up with his biggest haul. He even pulled the massive Triassic-era fish to the shore.

Facebook

Roofing closes down in Alberta for the winter because of the cold weather, so we came out here so we could work during the cold weather," Rouse told the news channel. "We had the weekend off, so we decided to go try our luck.

He and his girlfriend Sidney Kozelenko hit the road for a three-hour drive to a fishing spot on the Fraser River. He had not expected to catch a monster sturgeon. However, getting the beast close to the shore was quite a difficult task that took about half an hour and a hand from Sidney and his kayak.

Facebook

I knew it was big, he said. You can tell its big because when you go to pull, it wont move like, it wont budge, and itll actually start running. As soon as it started running, Im like, Okay, I need to hop in my kayak, he explained.



This is when Sidney understood that the catch is quite big and started taking a video. Rouse said he was being pulled all around the river by the sturgeon and it began to go downstream.

I battled him for about 25 minutes on river, and then we finally tired the fish out. the roofer said, adding that the sturgeon also took him upstream.

After catching the fish, Rouse and Sidney reportedly released the sturgeon back into the water after taking it to the shore.



For the latest from trending, click here.
If you think your father is the greatest, you should hear about this Vietnamese man. This man spent hundreds of hours and lakhs of rupees building a wooden tank for his son.

Truong Van Dao from Bac Ninh province, east of the capital Hanoi once had a 16-seat minibus. He and his colleagues took three months to convert that into a French EBR105 model, complete with its 2.8-meter-long (9.1-foot-long) replica canon, according to the AFP news agency.

Gilf News

According to Dao, he took out most of the vans parts but retained its main engine and the minibus floor, while rearranging the inside to fit all the gears needed for the wooden tank. The total makeover reportedly cost him $11,000.

Gulf News

According to him, the difficult part about the entire thing was not the ornate wood but ensuring all the wheels moved simultaneously. As a result, the finished product can only reach a speed of 25 kilometres (16 miles) per hour, as any faster than that would result in problems with the cables connecting the wheels.

The man and son now take the wooden tank around the neighbourhood for a spin and enjoy their bond.

This Vietnamese father builds a wooden replica of a French EBR105 tank for his 3-year-old son  pic.twitter.com/cAT1y4YYmk  Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) March 30, 2022

"My son and me find it more fun riding the tank, which has nothing to do with weapons nor war," Dao told AFP. "I only considered it as a normal car, renovated it into a tank to make it more interesting," the 31-year-old carpenter added.



Well, if there's no harm then it should be fun.

For the latest from trending, click here.


MONROVIA.  The story of what happened to Liberian Emmanuel Tuloe has the quality of a modern fable.

The 19-year-old, dressed in a school uniform of sky blue shirt and navy shorts, looks incongruous in a class full of pupils at least six years younger than him.

But the one-time primary school dropout is happy.

Last year, he was struggling to earn a living as a motorbike taxi driver when he found US$50,000 (40,000) in a mix of US and Liberian notes, wrapped in a plastic bag by the side of the road.

He could have easily pocketed this life-changing amount. But he gave it to his aunt to look after and when the rightful owner appealed on national radio for help in finding the cash, Emmanuel came forward.

Mocked by some for his honesty  people laughed at him saying he would die poor  his act earned him generous rewards including a place at Ricks Institute, one of Liberias most prestigious schools.

President George Weah handed him US$10,000 and a local media owner also gave him cash, some of which was raised from viewers and listeners. And the owner of the money that was found donated US$1,500-worth of goods.

On top of those and perhaps most significantly, a college in the US reacted by offering him a full scholarship once he had completed his secondary education.

Enjoying the academic discipline

And that is what he is focused on at Ricks, a boarding school set up 135 years ago for the elite of Liberian society descended from the freed slaves who founded the country. Its two-storey buildings sit on a beautiful, lush campus 6km (3.5 miles) from the Atlantic coast.

I am enjoying the school, not because Ricks has a big name but because of the academic and moral disciplines, Emmanuel said, chuckling and playing with the collar of his shirt as he talked.

Like many Liberian children from a poor rural background are forced to do, he dropped out of school at the age of nine in order to earn some money to help his family out. This was shortly after his father had died in a drowning accident and he went to live with his aunt.

He became a motorbike taxi driver just a couple of years later.

After such a long time out of education, he needs a lot of extra support at school.

When Emmanuel first joined the sixth-grade class he was feeling a bit inferior; he could not voice himself in the classroom, but day-by-day we worked on him, his main class teacher Tamba Bangbeor explained to the BBC.

Academically, he came with a low foundation, so we tried to put him in the enrichment programme. That has been helping him.

He now has six years of secondary school ahead of him and will be 25 when he graduates. But he does not mind the age gap with his classmates and describes them as friendly.

Emmanuel also enjoys boarding, saying that dormitory life is good because this is a way of learning to live on your own someday.

Looking at the future, he wants to study accounting at university to prepare myself to help guide the use of the countrys money.

His prudence and honesty were seen as examples to follow in a country where allegations of corruption are rife and where officials are often accused of stealing state resources.

Reflecting on the way that some people made fun of him for returning the money, he acknowledges that he could have used the funds to improve his material situation but it was never going to get me the opportunity I now have.

Emmanuel thanked God for giving him the rewards and he was also grateful to my parents for teaching me to be honest.

And my message to all young people is: Its good to be honest; dont take what does not belong to you.  BBC.
When Hong Kong was hit by its fifth and deadliest wave at the start of this year 2022, Hong Kong authorities had implemented a tightly-enforced two-person gathering limit, dining curfews, bar and gym closures, and a return to remote learning at schools.

The Chinese territorys dynamic zero COVID strategy, which has been implemented to align with mainland China, has reportedly battered the citys cosmopolitan image as Asias World City and set in motion an exodus of foreign businesses and talent, as per a report in Aljazeera.



AFP

Also Read: Newborns Dying & Millions Starving As Humanitarian Crisis Deepens In Afghanistan

And these measures came on top of the already present strict travel restrictions since March 2020, including flight bans for at risk countries and up to 21 days of mandatory hotel quarantine for incoming arrivals.



Gradually, these strict policies seemed to have suffocated the residents in more ways than one.

Outflow Of 1,57,000 Residents In 2022

Hong Kong has seen a net outflow of almost 157,000 residents since the beginning of this year, according to immigration data. In March 2022, the Hong Kong Chamber of Commerce warned that the city was facing an exodus of educated workers on a scale not seen since the run-up to the citys transfer from British to Chinese sovereignty, as per Aljazeera.

When a Hongkong employee Francis Lee returned to the UK with his wife last week after a two-year stint at a top investment bank in Hong Kong, his sadness was far outweighed by his sense of relief. He reportedly said I felt like I just didnt want to lose another six, nine, 12 months more of having to think about quarantine, washouts, policy flip-flopping and being sent to government quarantine and what not.



In the face of growing restlessness from the business community, Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam had last month announced a relaxation of some measures from April 1, including lifting a ban on flights from nine countries and reducing quarantine for arrivals from abroad to seven days. Still, the citys pandemic policies remain out of step with the global trend towards reopening and are reportedly far stricter than peers such as New York, London and Singapore.

The executive admitted for the first time last week that the strict COVID policies were affecting the citys competitiveness.

She said, Its an unarguable fact that we have a brain drain and some senior management of some corporates have left Hong Kong.

bloomberg

Also Read: Lifelong Money Lessons That COVID Lockdown Taught Us

Need To Open Up Hongkong

Hong Kong nightlife tycoon Allan Zeman, who has been long known as a supporter of the government, reportedly said Weve got to open up Hong Kong. Its great to worry about health, which is very, very important. But on the other hand, we also need an economic life as we are an international financial centre, and theres many companies in Hong Kong.. He added that Obviously, every person you lose is a brain gone. No one is comfortable with having people leave.

Also Read: How Sri Lanka's Economic Crisis Has Led To Used Cars Costing More Than A Luxury Flat

For more of the latest economic and financial news, keep reading Worth. Click here.


Anyone with "machine learning" in their job title, or even in their sphere of knowledge, is in a good career place these days. People with skills and experience in machine learning are in high demand, and that definitely includes machine learning engineers.

According to the research firm Markets and Markets, the demand for machine learning tools and systems is expected to grow from $1.03 billion in 2016 to $8.81 billion this year, at a compound annual growth rate of 44 percent. Organizations worldwide are adopting machine learning to enhance customer experience and gain a competitive edge in business operations.

IDG Nicholas Kridler is a data scientist and machine learning engineer at the online styling service provider Dia & Co.

The growth of data is contributing to the drive for more machine learning solutions and skills, the study says. Examples of applications in key verticals include fraud, risk management, customer segmentation, and investment prediction in financial services; image analytics, drug discovery and manufacturing, and personalized treatment in healthcare; inventory planning and cross-channel marketing in retail; predictive maintenance and demand forecasting in manufacturing; and power usage analytics and smart grid management in energy and utilities.

I think people focus on the hype of AI without understanding the overall benefit you get from cobbling together lots of little algorithms."

These are just a few of the use cases for machine learning, and engineers are essential to many of these efforts. So, what does a machine learning engineer do?

Machine learning in software development

In machine learning, individuals design and develop artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms that are capable of learning and making predictions. Machine learning engineers are typically part of a data science team and work closely with data scientists, data analysts, data architects, and others outside of their teams.

According to Study.com, an online education platform, machine learning engineers are advanced programmers who develop machines that can learn and apply knowledge independently. Sophisticated machine learning programs can take action without being directed to perform a given task.

Machine learning engineers need to be skilled in areas such as math, computer programming, and data analytics and data mining. They should be knowledgeable about cloud services and applications. They also must be good communicators and collaborators.

The professional social networking site LinkedIn, as part of its 2022 LinkedIn Jobs on the Rise research, listed "machine learning engineer" as the fourth fastest-growing job title in the United States over the past five years.

[ Also on InfoWorld: AI, machine learning, and deep learning: Everything you need to know. ]

Becoming a machine learning engineer

To find out whats involved in becoming a machine learning engineer, we spoke with Nicholas Kridler, a data scientist and machine learning engineer at the online styling service provider Dia & Co.

Kridler earned a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and a Master of Science degree in applied mathematics from the University of Colorado, Boulder.

In graduate school, my focus was computational mathematics and scientific computing, Kridler says. I think a career in a tech-related field was my only choice, because I chose to have such a narrow focus in school.

Early work experiences

When Kridler left graduate school in 2005, he didn't have a lot of software development experience, so his options were limited. His first job was as an analyst for a small defense contractor called Metron, which produces simulation software.

In October 2006, Kridler joined another defense contractor, Arete Associates, as a research scientist. Arete specializes in developing remote sensing algorithms. I learned a lot at Arete, including machine learning, software development, and general problem solving with data, he says.

Kridler left that position at the end of 2012, when data science was beginning to take off, and joined the healthcare technology provider Accretive Health (now R1 RCM) as a senior data scientist. Accretive was ambitious about incorporating data science, but the tools available at the time made it difficult to make progress, he says.

Winning the Kaggle competition

While Kridler was employed at Accretive, his boss let him work on a Kaggle competition with a friend from Arete. The competition involved classifying whale calls from audio data, and felt similar to things I had worked on at Arete, he says. We won by a hair, and beat out the deep learning algorithms which were still in their infancy at the time.

Winning a competition will always be the most memorable moment, because it opened so many doors for me."

Kridlers participation and success in Kaggle competitions helped him land a job as a data scientist with the online clothing provider Stitch Fix, in 2014. Data science was still fairly new, and I felt that a lot of companies were like Accretive in that they were very aspirational about data science but didn't necessarily have the environment where a team could be successful, he says.

Stitch Fix seemed much closer to the environment at Arete, where algorithms were core to the business and not just a nice-to-have, Kridler says. He worked as a data scientist at Stitch Fix from 2014 to 2018.

I was really lucky to have worked there as the company scaled, because I got the opportunity to learn from talented data scientists and data platform engineers, Kridler says. I worked closely with the merchandising team developing inventory algorithms. But I also built analytics tools because it helped build a great relationship with the team.

One of Kridlers biggest accomplishments at Stitch Fix was developing the Vendor Dash, which allowed brands to access their sales and feedback data. It provided a lot of value to our brands and was mentioned in the company's S-1 filing, he says.

A solid foundation in programming

Kridler left Stitch Fix in 2018 to move to San Diego. In August 2018, he joined Dia & Co., a styling service provider similar to Stitch Fix. As a machine learning engineer, he worked on styling recommendations and led the effort to rebuild a recommendation infrastructure.

At Dia, I was able to apply the machine learning infrastructure knowledge I developed at Stitch Fix and further develop my skills as an engineer, Kridler says. Unfortunately, Dia had to cut back, and he spent the next two years working as a data scientist at two companies, before returning to Dia as a lead machine learning engineer.

A combination of school, early work experience, and timing led Kridler to his current role. There are so many powerful tools that simply didn't exist when I was in school and when I was starting my career. When I started, I had to work at a much lower level than is required today, and I think that helps me pick up new skills very quickly.

For example, he learned to program in C and Fortran and didn't touch scripting languages like Python until I already had a solid foundation in programming, Kridler says. I worked on machine learning algorithms before they were so prevalent, which gave me a bit of a head start.

A day in the life of a machine learning engineer

The typical workday or workweek varies quite a bit by company, Kridler says. At Stitch Fix, he worked closely with business stakeholders and was responsible for developing a shared roadmap. This meant frequent meetings to share the current status of initiatives and to plan upcoming tasks, he says. Slightly more than half his time was spent in meetings or preparing for meetings. The other half was spent on development, whether the deliverable was an algorithm implementation or an analysis. At Dia & Co., his role primarily supports the companys platforms, which requires fewer stakeholder interactions. Our stakeholders submit requests that get turned into tickets and we operate much more like a software development team, he says. Around 90% of my time is spent writing code or developing algorithms.

Most memorable career moments

"Winning a competition will always be the most memorable moment, because it opened so many doors for me, Kridler says. Hiring for data science has always been difficult, and I felt that I had an advantage because I was able to point to something that clearly showed what I was capable of doing. Another memorable moment was when Stitch Fix went public, and he was able to see his work mentioned in the company's S-1 filing. I feel really fortunate to have been a part of a company that took such a distinct stance on algorithms and data science.

Skills, certifications, and side projects

I've never had to return to school or earn certificates, but I've also been fortunate that I've been able to learn on the job, Kridler says. When I transitioned into data science, I spent a lot of time learning through Kaggle competitions. I have an easier time learning new things if I have a project that lets me apply that knowledge. I've written in so many programming languages that it's not really difficult for me to learn a new language. I don't pursue any sort of formal training, and rely on publications and documentation to pick up a new skill. I've often relied on side projects for expanding my skill set.

Career goals: Keep building things

Kridler enjoys building things whether, it's a new algorithm or a company. I want to be in a position where I get to continue to build things, he says. In my current position, it means building upon the infrastructure and expanding the application of the algorithms we have built. In the future, I would like to build upon what Stitch Fix tried to do and show that algorithms are meant to augment, not replace. Whether it's helping someone make a better decision or removing the need to do the tedious work, I think people focus on the hype of AI without understanding the overall benefit you get from cobbling together lots of little algorithms.

Inspirations and advice for aspiring engineers

One of Kridler's inspirations is Katrina Lake, the founder of Stitch Fix, because she actually wanted to build something different and she did it, he says. Christa Stelzmuller, the CTO at Dia & Co., has great ideas about how to use data, and has a great understanding of what does and doesn't work.

For developers seeking a similar path to his own, Kridler's advice is to follow your passion. I've gotten this advice from many people in my career, and you will always have a better time if you are working on something you are passionate about. It's also a good idea to go out and build a lot of things," he says. Just like the best way to becoming a good software developer is to write a lot of code, it really helps to have seen a lot of different problems.
Ah, the halcyon days of developers as kingmakers, of developers calling all the shots, of developers turning to open source and cloud to route around barriers to productivity (like Legal! Purchasing! Security! Operations!).

Of course, those days never existed. Not perfectly, anywayand thank goodness. It turns out that in a world increasingly composed of software, developers matter. A lot. Theyre not the only thing that matters, but enabling developer productivity has become a key vector in every organizations success. Which is why, perhaps ironically, the best way to set your developers free may actually be to fetter their freedom.

There and back again

When RedMonk analyst Steven OGrady first published The New Kingmakers in 2013, he partly captured the zeitgeist of the age that developers matter, but mostly he promoted a new way of thinking. New to enterprises, anyway. By then, developers had already embraced the empowerment afforded them by open source and, increasingly, cloud. Still, the idea hadnt quite caught on that developer productivity wasnt merely a nice-to-have feature but a must-have.

In late 2017, OGrady could happily report that his ideas had caught on in a big way, but with unintended consequences. The more developers mattered, the more everyone wanted to cater to their needs with new software tools, new open source projects, new cloud services, etc. This meant lots of new developer choice and associated freedom, but that wasnt necessarily an unalloyed good. As he noted, The good news is that this developer-driven fragmentation has yielded an incredible array of open source software. The bad news is that, even for developers, managing this fragmentation is challenging.

Can one have too much choice? Yep.

Its long been known in consumer retail, for example, that when there is too much choice, consumers are less likely to buy anything at all, and if they do buy, they are less satisfied with their selection. Turns out this isnt just a matter of breakfast cereals or clothing. It also applies to developers building enterprise software. InfoWorlds Scott Carey writes that complexity is killing software developers. Hes right. But what can be done?

Less is more

In a conversation with Weaveworks CEO Alexis Richardson, he related how self-service development platforms are reemerging to help developers make sense of all that open source and cloud choice. By giving developers a standard, pre-approved environment in which the effort to create an app from an idea is minimal, he explained, it allows them to focus on innovation not plumbing.

Pre-approved environment? That sounds like control. Werent open source and cloud, in part, meant to overcome control?

Thats one way to look at it, but, done right, a little bit of constraint goes a long way. Just ask Netflix, which has embraced this idea and run with itover nicely paved roadsas explained by Netflix engineers Ed Bukoski, Brian Moyles, and Mike McGarr:

The Netflix culture of freedom and responsibility empowers engineers to craft solutions using whatever tools they feel are best suited to the task. In our experience, for a tool to be widely accepted, it must be compelling, add tremendous value, and reduce the overall cognitive load for the majority of Netflix engineers. Teams have the freedom to implement alternative solutions, but they also take on additional responsibility for maintaining these solutions. Tools offered by centralized teams at Netflix are considered to be part of a paved road. Our focus today is solely on the paved road supported by Engineering Tools.

Its clear why an enterprise would want to centralize some control over the choices its developers make. Enterprises want fast but safe, suggests Richardson, and safe includes making sure that compliance and security are in place,  containers are scanned, supply chain is verified in the GitOps pipeline, and so on. Its also the case that constraining choice is better for enterprises than using raw AWS [or another cloud], according to Richardson, because if a bank lets 1,000 app teams loose on [a particular cloud], then they will create 1,000 stacks, all of which need secops to verify.

Clearly, that would be a mess. Whats perhaps less obvious at first is how enterprise interests in exerting some control can pair perfectly with their developers interests.

Enterprises want their app devs to become super productive so that the time from idea to dopamine is minimal, Richardson says. Yes, thats right. Its in an enterprises interest to ensure maximum developer productivity. Just as its the developers desire to be maximally productive. Interests are aligned.

This brings us to self-service development platforms or PaaS (platform as a service), as we once called them.

A PaaS by any other name

Some enterprise IT leaders cringe at the notion of developer self-service, admits Gartner analyst Lydia Leong, because they worry that self-service would open formerly well-defended gates  and allow a horde of unwashed orcs to overrun the concrete landscape in a veritable explosion of Lego structures, dot-matrix printouts, Snickers wrappers, and lost whiteboard marker caps. They dont trust their developers, in other words. Or maybe they dont trust the guardrails self-service platforms can erect. Whatever the concern, she continues, self-service isnt an all-or-nothing proposition. Responsibility can be divided across the application life cycle so that you can get benefits from you build it, you run it without necessarily parachuting your developers into an untamed and unknown wilderness.

In other words, enterprises that want to give their developers the freedom the cloud affords can couple it with just enough constraint to make that freedom useful.

How to do this effectively? Netflix has provided plenty of advice, but so have others, such as financial services company Finextra , which knows a thing or two about balancing developer freedom with security assurances, given its conservative financial services customers. Or you could set up time to talk with Leong or RedMonks OGrady to ensure you get the balance right between freedom and control.

However you approach it, the point is to stop thinking about freedom and control as impossibly opposed. Smart enterprises are figuring out ways to enable their developers using self-service platforms. Maybe you should, too.
A STANDOFF between markers and the Zimbabwe Schools Examination Council (Zimsec) has resulted in the examination board failing to release the 2021 Ordinary and Advanced Level results in time.

In previous years, Zimsec would release results in February, giving prospective A Level pupils time to enrol and learn for at least a month.

However, the first term ends on Thursday, with both O and A Level results for 2021 yet to be released, affecting for high schools and universities plans.

Scores of markers boycotted marking of examinations midway after Zimsec failed to pay agreed allowances.

The delay in releasing the results has resulted in O Level pupils failing to enrol for Form 5 classes for the first term.

It has also seen some pupils awaiting A Level results failing to enrol with tertiary institutions such as the Zimbabwe Open University during the March intake window, while others like the Midlands State University have been forced to defer their intakes.

Zimsec spokesperson Nicholette Dlamini yesterday blamed the COVID-19 pandemic for causing a shift in the normal calendar of the marking and release of the examination results.

She said the board would release the results soon, but failed to provide the exact date.

The year 2019 was the last year we had the normal school year. This is 2022 that we are now having a normal school year. If you look at 2021, the first term started in March and last year, the results came on April 23 and we havent reached the date, Dlamini said.

Our examinations were written last year. They started in December and they finished on January 31, so according to the cycle and the timeline, we have not yet reached that. The results will be released soon.

But teacher unions said Zimsecs explanation was not convincing, adding that this added to the chaos bedevilling the education sector.

Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ) president Takavafira Zhou said the disruption of the marking process after examiners went on strike in a dispute over allowances in February compromised the credibility of the final results.

Zimsec markers downed tools accusing the examinations body of failing to honour its pledge to pay them US$25 per day for those staying out of residence and US$12 per day for those in residence.

Markers went on strike amid the marking process and it took longer for the few remaining makers to complete the process. And time was moving, Zhou said.

Another thing, Zimsec lost a number of experienced markers who did not turn up because they were incapacitated. This did not only contribute to the delay of the results, but will also compromise the quality of the results to be released.

Zimbabwe Teachers Association secretary-general Goodwill Taderera said the introduction of a new curriculum, in particular the continuous assessment learning activities (Cala), had contributed to the delay in the release of the results.

The introduction of the Cala is a challenge to both learners and teachers and is also affecting the whole process of how the examinations are marked and how they are released because they are a new aspect, Taderera said.

In a latest review of the curriculum, PTUZ showed that the syllabus was facing a number of challenges in implementation because of inadequate funding and lack of understanding by both teachers and learners.

The curriculum, which was introduced in 2017, has projects and tasks to be completed by students in some subjects and has been blamed for creating avenues for corruption in the education sector, with teachers often demanding payment to help pupils with their work.

Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe president Obert Masaraure said Zimsec was reeling under mismanagement and underfunding.

The institution has not been spared of the rot that has seized all State institutions. The disruption of marking because of a serious labour dispute delayed the process. The morale among personnel at Zimsec is at an all-time low and they are working at a slower pace than expected, he said.

Zimbabwe National Students Union president Lennox Machoko added: Given the circumstances where the government has reverted to the normal calendar, it means that the universities and colleges will not have ample time to do the whole application selection process since the results have been delayed.

Primary and Secondary Education ministry spokesperson Taungana Ndoro said the ministry had a robust catch-up strategy when contacted for comment.

As soon as they are enrolled, they will hit the ground running, he said. Newsday
Recently I was reading an article from the University of Pennsylvania Law Review entitled, The Illusory Coverage Doctrine: A Critical Review. According to the article, the Illusory Coverage Doctrine is a doctrine of insurance contract enforceability, as opposed to interpretation, that serves to protect policyholders from procedurally unconscionable exclusions that almost completely wipe out the coverage purportedly available under their policies.

In other words, if a commercial lines insured is sold a policy that doesnt cover a business activity that resulted in a claim, the coverage under the policy might be considered illusory, depending on the scope and degree of the exclusion. If the exclusion is broad and deep, a court might find the insurance contract to be unenforceable.

I first spoke about this in seminars I did in the 90s and wrote about it in my book, When Words Collide: Resolving Insurance Coverage and Claims Disputes. The problem is, many courts have found that coverage is not illusory if there is any coverage at all for which a premium was paid.

In my book, I give a personal example of when my residence was hit by a tornado in 2013. In addition to about $40,000 in damage to property, we lost 19 trees that had to be cut down and removed from the premises. These were largely 40- to 80-foot cedar trees in various states of damage. We received at least four quotes from tree service companies vying for the job. Of course, I asked for documentation of insurance coverage.

One of the companies had only been in business for a few months. Im sure getting coverage was difficult for them, as attested by the fact that the owner proudly presented me with a portfolio of insurance documents that included a certificate of insurance, a CGL policy declarations page, and assorted policy forms.

The CGL policy was the 2004 ISO edition and attached to it were 42 endorsements, many of them exclusionary in nature. One in particular excluded ongoing operations and your work, the latter term effectively meaning completed operations. In other words, this business owner, tasked with bringing down very large trees, some immediately adjacent to a neighbors home, essentially had what was referred to in the old days as an OL&T policy  Owners, Landlords and Tenants. That is, his policy covered him on his premises but not on a job site.

Was his CGL coverage illusory given the nature of his business? I would argue that it absolutely was. However, many courts would opine otherwise. The law review article above cited an Indiana Supreme Court decision that reiterated an established rule that Coverage under an insurance policy is not illusory unless the policy would not pay benefits under any reasonably expected set of circumstances.

As stated earlier, many courts have found that coverage is not illusory if there is any coverage at all for which a premium was paid. Translated, this means that, if your insurance premium deal was too good to be true, there is likely little coverage to be found. In the case of this tree service company, I suspected as much when I saw on the declarations page that the CGL coverage was priced at $707, a ridiculously low premium for such a hazardous business.

Obviously, the reason the premium was so low was that it was essentially a premises-only policy. Therefore, the premium being commensurate with a premises exposure, the coverage might not be considered illusory. You get what you pay for. Again, guessing that this new tree service business had a very difficult time procuring coverage, you would think that the owner would question what he was buying at such a discounted price after likely being turned down by other insurers or offered coverage at an outrageous price.

The problem is, most consumers and small business owners dont understand this. After all, especially from the standpoint of home and auto insurance, industry marketing is dominated by price-focused advertising. The implication is that insurance, by and large, is a commodity differentiated only by price. A homeowners policy is a homeowners policy. An auto policy is an auto policy. A CGL policy is a CGL policy. The law review article addresses this by invoking the reasonable expectations doctrine, something I also address in my book.

Im sure there are business owners who would be suspicious of the extent of coverage, but if it helps them get work, ignorance is bliss. Unfortunately, that doesnt protect the public who could be harmed by someone who is effectively uninsured. The law review article addresses this by questioning whether coverage should be granted as a matter of public policy, another concept I explore in my book.

So, can a policy provide illusory coverage? Legally, it probably can as some courts have found, but realistically, making a case for illusory coverage can be very difficult. But thats not the point.

March is recognized as Ethics Awareness Month in the insurance and risk management industry. From that perspective, lets forget about the legality of an insurance policy like the CGL package discussed in this article. Is it ethical to sell such a policy, KNOWING how limited the coverage is relative to business operations?

I dont believe it is. It might possibly violate fraud or unfair trade practices laws, but even that is debatable given how most state laws are written.

Is it an ethical practice? I dont believe it is and I said that to the tree service business owner, explained his coverage deficiencies, and gave him my business card if he wanted to present it to his insurance representatives. I never heard any more about this, so my guess is that the business owner pretended our conversation never happened. We have enough people in the industry who unknowingly sell deficient coverage  we dont need people knowingly doing that.

What do you think? Is knowingly selling an insurance package that is grossly deficient in providing coverage for a businesss usual and customary operations unethical? Feel free to respond in the Comments section of this article, if reading online, or send me an email.

This article is republished from Insurance Journal magazine.
The first time I can recall asking this question was in 2010 and it involved a claim denial under personal auto uninsured motorists and medical payments coverages for someone who was hit by a car while sitting on a snowmobile on the side of a street.

Medical payments coverage was identical to that under the ISO Personal Auto Policy (PAP) and applied to the named insured(s) and resident family members while occupying or as a pedestrian when struck by a motor vehicle designed for use on public roads or a trailer of any type.

The state-specific underinsured motorist coverage, unlike the countrywide ISO coverage, also required that the insured be a pedestrian if not occupying a motor vehicle at the time of the accident.

So, in order to recover medical or, in some states, uninsured motorist or no-fault payments, what constitutes being a pedestrian, a term not defined in the ISO PAP or most other auto forms.

Pedestrian Definition

There are statutes that define pedestrian within the governance of said statutes. For example, federal Title 23 U.S.C. 217, which deals with the accommodation of bicycle and pedestrian traffic for transportation projects, defines pedestrian to mean any person traveling by foot and any mobility-impaired person using a wheelchair.' The term wheelchair means a mobility aid, usable indoors, and designed for and used by individuals with mobility impairments, whether operated manually or motorized.

Massachusetts Annotated Laws Title XIV, Chapter 90, 34A, which also governs transportation issues, defines pedestrian to include personal operating bicycles, tricycles and similar vehicles and persons upon horseback or in vehicles drawn by horses or other draft animals.

One of the reasons often cited for a lack of a definition of pedestrian in auto policies is the variety of state and federal laws that define this term. However, few of these statutes appear to directly govern how the term may be defined in an auto insurance contract. So why not define the term?

Why, you say? A Nevada insured was struck by an auto while skateboarding, incurring medical expenses of $24,000. The claim was denied on the basis that he was not a pedestrian. The insurer interpreted pedestrian to require that the claimant literally be on foot.

A bicyclist in Ohio was hit by an auto and taken to a local hospital. The agent turned in a medical payment claim which was denied because the claimant was not on foot.

According to these carrier interpretations, a pedestrian would not include someone sitting down or on a skateboard, bicycle, roller skates, snow skis, horseback, and the list goes on.

What about a scooter, Segway, e-bike, etc.? If, for example, the e-bike is deemed to be a motor vehicle designed for use on public roads and the claimant is occupying it, then there would appear to be coverage under many, if not most, auto policies. But not for a regular bicycle? One could argue that this makes no logical sense.

As for the courts, decisions are all over the place.

For example, in State Farm Mut. Auto Ins. Co. v. Stein, 940 P.2d 383 (Colo. 1987) and in Cole v. Auto-Owners, 272 Mich. App. 50, 723 N.W.2d 922 (2006), the courts opined that a bicyclist was not a pedestrian as required to trigger uninsured motorist coverage.

On the other hand, in Tucker v. Firemans Fund, 308 Md. 69, 517 A.2d 730 (1986), the court ruled that someone who was sitting on a stool was a pedestrian and that the undefined term pedestrian could be ambiguously applied to different sets of facts and circumstances.

That being said, courts often reference dictionaries to determine the common meaning of terms and, if you examine most dictionaries, youll find that they define pedestrian to mean a person on foot. The Cambridge Dictionary defines pedestrian to mean a person who is walking and gives an example of its use in a sentence: Bicyclists and pedestrians use the path. Clearly, this dictionary is distinguishing pedestrians from bicyclists.

No doubt there are dozens, if not hundreds, more judicial examples of how the undefined term pedestrian may be interpreted. It is usually a good thing to remove ambiguity from an insurance contract. A good example is the Washington state Supreme Court case of McLaughlin v. Travelers Commercial Ins. Co. In this case, the court considered dictionary definitions, as well as at least two state statutes.

For example, motor vehicle statute RCW 46.04.400 stated that Pedestrian means any person who is afoot or who is using a wheelchair, a power wheelchair, or a means of conveyance propelled by human power other than a bicycle. On the other hand, casualty insurance statute RCW 48.22.005(11) stated that Pedestrian means a natural person not occupying a motor vehicle as defined in RCW 46.04.320.

The court found that this variance in definitions created an ambiguity with regard to the meaning and intent of the word pedestrian and, therefore, found in favor of the insured claimant.

Regardless of ambiguity, one would think that an insurance-specific definition should prevail anyway over a motor vehicle definition.

Another issue is, if an insurer interprets pedestrian to include someone on foot but not in a wheelchair, is that potentially discriminatory under insurance or Americans with Disability Act-like laws? Not being an attorney, I cant answer that, but as a matter of fairness and equity, it doesnt seem right. Even if legal, is it ethical?

Equity and Consistency

My personal opinion, as a matter of equity and consistency, is that auto medical payments coverage should apply in the same way that un(der)insured motorist coverage under the ISO Personal Auto Policy applies  to named insureds and resident family members when struck by a vehicle designed for use on public roads without regard to whether the insured is on foot or occupying a vehicle of any type.

What do you think? Feel free to engage in a conversation about your experience with these types of claims or your opinions on coverage by expressing your thoughts either in the comments section on www.insurancejournal.com or via email.

And, with kids hopefully headed off to college this fall, check out next months column about insuring college students so you can address these issues on your upcoming home and auto renewals.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine may result in cyberattacks causing widespread and severe losses in Ukraine and beyond.

Even before the current invasion, some Russian cyberattacks aimed at Ukraine spread to other nations. The most prominent of these was the NotPetya attack in 2017.

NotPetya was the name given to a strain of one of the most destructive types of malware, known as Wiper malware, which is designed to functionally destroy computers by wiping their contents completely. It was designed to spread to other computer networks, and did. It caused an estimated $10 billion in losses throughout the world. (NotPetya will be discussed in greater detail later in this article.)

The current threat matrix is multidimensional. Russia may intentionally target companies in the United States, Europe, Australia, Japan and elsewhere, in response to support given to Ukraine, and in retaliation for the economic sanctions that have been imposed.

If the war drags on or escalates, Russia may seek tactical or strategic benefit by increasing the overall level of distress in other nations.

After the conflict ends, however it ends, Russia will be the object of extreme resentment and suspicion. It may launch cyberattacks to increase disorder, believing that an environment of disorder would best serve its position as a significant power.

In addition to the nations in conflict, cyberattacks could be launched by groups affiliated with them, as well as independent groups sympathetic to one of them.

Cybersecurity analytics firms estimate that approximately 10 hacking groups are currently assisting Russia. And Ukraine has publicly called for an international IT army of volunteer hacker groups. It is estimated there are at least 22 such groups currently assisting Ukraine.

The threat is enhanced by the increased availability of zero click vulnerabilities. These are cyberattacks that can enter networks without the victims doing anything, such as clicking on a link, or without using compromised credentials. They include vulnerabilities such as Solarwinds, Log4j and Pegasus. Compounding this threat, researchers have discovered a Russian cyberweapon called HermeticWizard, which is a new strain of software designed to autonomously spread another strain, HermeticWipe, to other computers in a network. That is, it has capacities similar to the NotPetya malware.

Even without intentional design, malware can break into the wild, infecting other networks and causing the kind of collateral damage to innocent parties that is a feature of traditional warfare.

Property/casualty insurers face potential exposure to losses from cyberattacks that directly target or indirectly reach their insureds in the United States and elsewhere in the world. This article addresses the extent to which War Exclusions may mitigate that exposure.

Modern War Exclusions

The term War Exclusion is a misnomer. Over the years, War Exclusions have come to apply to much more than traditional war between sovereign nations. There are countless variations in title, language and the scope of coverage in provisions used by different insurers, and in different lines of business. Several exclusions are used broadly. Others are bespoke. Yet with this understanding, for ease of reference, when referring to these provisions in general or collectively, this article will use the term War Exclusions.

Any analysis of the issues addressed must focus on the specific War Exclusion at issue.

Some of the frequently used terms and phrases used in War Exclusions of potential relevance here include the following: war; hostilities; warlike operations (whether declared or not); military operations; military or usurped power; damage to property by or under the order of any government; acts of foreign enemies; any action taken to hinder or defend against these events, [or alternatively]; and action in hindering or defending against an actual or expected attack by any government, sovereign or other authority using military personnel or other agents.

There is one commonly used form of special interest, because it appears in many all-risk property policies that might be implicated in cyber losses. It is at issue in the two prominent pending litigations described below. It provides in relevant part as follows.

Hostile/Warlike Action Exclusion

Loss or damage caused by hostile or warlike action in time of peace or war, including action in hindering, combatting, or defending against an actual, impending, or expected attack:

by any government or sovereign power (de jure or de facto) or by any authority maintaining or using military, naval or air forces; or by military, naval, or air forces; or by an agent of such government, power, authority or forces. This policy does not insure against loss or damage caused by or resulting from [the perils in the Exclusion above] regardless of any other cause or event contributing concurrently or in any other sequence to the loss.

Current Prominent Litigation

Both of the prominent cases currently in litigation address the application of the Hostile/Warlike Action Exclusion to cyberattacks. Both arose out of the NotPetya cyberattack in 2017.

In the NotPetya cyberattack, Russia sent malware to at least several dozen Ukrainian companies. It was disguised as ransomware, similar at first view to an earlier ransomware attack called Petya.

But the new strain was really wiperware. That is, it automatically encrypted the victims data, permanently and inalterably. Essentially, it obliterated the data in the victims systems. It was designed to spread to other networks automatically, rapidly and indiscriminately, and it spread throughout the world. It was so indiscriminate that it infected the network of the Russian state oil company, Rosneft.

It is estimated that NotPetya caused approximately $10 billion in losses, including more than $1 billion in losses to three separate organizations in the United States.

The first prominent litigation is Mondelez Intl, Inc. v. Zurich Am Ins, Co., in which an American confectionary, food and beverage company asserts it suffered over $100 million in damages because of the loss of 1,700 servers and 24,000 laptops. Its insurer denied coverage because the policy contained the Hostile/Warlike Action Exclusion. The case is pending in state court in Illinois and no decisions have yet been rendered.

The second prominent litigation is Merck & Co., Inc. v. ACE Am. Ins. Co., et al. The pharmaceutical giant Merck suffered a widespread systemic failure caused by NotPetya. Operations were halted for two weeks, and Merck asserts it suffered more than $1.4 billion in damages. It had nearly three dozen insurers on all-risk property policies providing coverage for loss or damage resulting from the destruction or corruption of computer data and software. The insurers rejected Mercks claims based on the Hostile/Warlike Action Exclusion.

On Jan. 13, 2022, the lowest-level state court in New Jersey rendered its decision. It said it was interpreting the words of the Hostile/Warlike Actions Exclusion by their ordinary meaning. It said that the term warlike could only be interpreted as like war. This is consistent with the definition in the Oxford English Dictionary, which also defines hostile as of, pertaining to, or characteristic of an enemy, pertaining to or engaged in actual hostilities. Merck argued this meant that the exclusion only applied when armed forces engaged in traditional warfare.

The court agreed. It cited a few old cases and said that no court has applied a war (or hostile acts) exclusion to anything remotely close to the facts herein. Based on this logic, it held Merck had every right to anticipate that the exclusion only applied to traditional forms of warfare. Thus, it held the exclusion did not apply.

This decision is subject to robust criticism. It is true that the exclusion had never been applied to a cyberattack  but no court had ever been presented with the issue. Further, the court did not analyze the term hostilities, which is inherent in the definition of hostile. There are numerous sources of authority in various contexts that broaden the term far beyond conventional war by armed forces.

Moreover, contemporary military doctrine in the U.S. and several other advanced nations recognizes cyberspace as a domain of warfare and conflict. Finally, there is general consensus that cyber activities are subject to the international Law of Armed Conflict, which is the proper term for what is generally called War Law. For these reasons, this case should not be considered authoritative. It may not withstand appeal. Even if it does, courts in other states have no obligation to follow it.

In addition, the case could clearly be distinguished based on the facts of the current conflict. Russia and Ukraine are involved in an actual war, with bullets and bombs. If they were also to deploy destructive cyber weapons against each other, War Exclusions would clearly apply. And if outside groups were to deploy destructive cyber weapons in support of one of the nations, with extensive collateral damage outside the physical theatre of conflict, there is a substantial argument that they too should fall within War Exclusions.

Analytical Framework

As of the time this is being written, Merck is the only known decision construing War Exclusions in the context of a cyberattack by any nation, under any type of policy. There are countless variations in the types of cyberattacks and the applicable language of War Exclusions. Thus, the question is wide open, requiring detailed analysis on a case-by-case basis.

There are four central areas of analytical inquiry. First, is a given cyberattack covered at all by the particular property/casualty policy at issue? Next, what is the nature of effect of the cyberattack? Third, what is the nature of the threat actor launching the cyberattack? And fourth, what is the nature of the victim?

Often, the answers to these questions will not be clear. But the best answers available must be examined under the case law of a given U.S. state. The case law on War Exclusions is sparse and not especially illuminating, and general insurance coverage law varies across states. Thus, determining whether to enforce a War Exclusion is much more art than science, and judgments are required.

Is the Cyberattack Covered at All?

The essential first step is to determine whether the loss caused by the cyberattack falls within covered risks contemplated by the policy. This is a function of:

How cyber risks are treated in the policy. What grants, extensions and exclusions might apply?

In the absence of policy provisions, is there silent cyber or non-affirmative cyber coverage?

Property/casualty policies treat cyber risks in various ways. In current policies, it is very rare to have no language addressing cyber risks at all. Instead, most have express coverage grants, extensions or exclusions. Many of these are ISO forms or ISO-derived forms. Merely by way of example, these include, among other forms:

an Extension for Interruption of Computer Operations Due to Destruction or Corruption of Electronic Data;

an Extension for Replacement or Restoration of Electronic Data;

a definition of Business Income and Extra Expense coverage which includes Interruption of Computer Operations; and

Inland Marine policies with an Electronic Data Processing Coverage Form.

In addition, Exclusions for Access or Disclosure of Confidential or Personal Information and Data-Related Liability are fairly common.

Apart from forms such as these, in theory, policies could be found to afford silent or non-affirmative coverage for a range of cyber risks. These include commonly understood risks such as First-Party Cyber Property Loss and Network Disruption (including Business Interruption and Contingent or Dependent Business Interruption) and Ransomware and Cyber Extortion.

In theory, policies could also be found to cover less commonly understood or addressed cyber risks. These include the following:

Third-Party Cyber Physical Events , which are cyber-related events resulting in damage or injury to third parties. This could include damage to data, software, hardware, and computer systems, and also other types of property damage and bodily injury.

, which are cyber-related events resulting in damage or injury to third parties. This could include damage to data, software, hardware, and computer systems, and also other types of property damage and bodily injury. IoT Risks , which refers to devices connected to the Internet that fail or malfunction. They can cause first- or third-party property damage or bodily injury.

, which refers to devices connected to the Internet that fail or malfunction. They can cause first- or third-party property damage or bodily injury. Industrial Cyber Risks, which are related to but different from IoT Risks. They arise from electronic interference, Internet-based or otherwise, with an Industrial Control System (ICS) or a Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) System. These are systems used to monitor and control plants or equipment. They present special challenges of interpretation and causation. If these systems are compromised, they can be used to destroy production equipment. For example, they might cause a generator or turbine to rotate too quickly and damage or destroy property. The equipment itself could be destroyed. The loss could cascade because equipment around it could be damaged as it breaks apart. So the damage is not merely to the equipment, but from the damaged equipment, causing further damage to other equipment or property. And the loss could be aggravated by third-party property damage and bodily injury.

Upon making the determination that there might be coverage under the policy, the analysis proceeds to the next questions.

What is the Nature and Effect of the Cyberattack?

The key questions are:

Is it hostile or warlike as commonly understood?

Is the effect kinetic, are there physical effects similar to those produced by bullets and bombs?

If the effects are not kinetic, do they cause widespread or severe economic damage, impair critical infrastructure, impair the governments ability to provide essential services, or have similar gravity?

Modern policies do not focus on whether a war has been declared, or whether there has been an act of war. Instead, they focus on the nature and source of the attack, and its effect.

Since at least 2012, the position of the U.S. government has been that cyber activities that proximately result in death, injury or significant destruction would likely be viewed as a use of force. Use of force is understood to refer to the prohibition in Article 2(4) of the United Nations Charter, which prohibits the use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.

Thus, it is highly likely that a cyberattack would be construed as hostilities, war or warlike operations when it has kinetic effects, i.e., it has the same effects as bullets and bombs, hurting people and breaking things.

Beyond that, without specific policy language, the courts will be faced with unresolved questions of first impression.

Some of the other circumstances in which War Exclusions are most likely to apply are when the effects of the cyberattack are widespread and severe, and when it results in significant disruption of the availability or integrity of essential services, such as: computer networks and information systems; the internet; financial institutions and financial market infrastructure, especially if there are significant economic losses; health services; utilities; and other components of critical infrastructure and essential services.

War Exclusions could also be applied to a cyberattack causing loss or damage resulting from an impairment of functioning of the government, including the nations security or defense.

It is reasonable to assume these effects could trigger War Exclusions even in the absence of specific language. But insurers would be well-advised to add express language addressing them.

What is the Nature of the Threat Actor?

Is the threat actor:

Russia or Ukraine?

A group officially or in reality connected to, controlled by, or acting at the request of Russia or Ukraine?

An independent group voluntarily aligning with Russia or Ukraine?

One of the challenging technical issues in cybersecurity has been accurately identifying the source of a cyberattack. This is called Attribution. While challenging, it is not impossible. For example, the NotPetya attack was attributed to the Sandworm group working within Russias military intelligence organization, the GRU, by each of the Five-Eyes Intelligence Alliance  the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and New Zealand  as well as by Denmark, Finland, Latvia and Sweden. In the context of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, there is a substantial possibility that governments would again make attributions.

Even without government attributions, many of the same resources used by governments to make attributions are equally available to private companies. An example is the cybersecurity forensic firm CrowdStrike, and others of similar caliber. In fact, they are at times relied on by governments themselves.

It is extremely likely that Russia would be the nation launching a direct cyberattack on the West, either targeting a specific entity, or using malware designed to spread. For cyberattacks from Ukraine, there would be some risk of inadvertently sending an exploit into the wild. But in either case, virtually every government, cybersecurity forensic firm, and hacker collective will be joining the effort to identify the source, so reliable attributions are likely to be possible.

Additional threats come from groups of non-state actors who are de jure or de facto agents of one of the nations in conflict. Much is known about the threat signatures and characteristics of many of these groups, so again reliable attributions may be possible. Indeed, some groups have declared their allegiance openly.

Where the attacker is a nation or an affiliated non-state entity, most cyberattacks would likely fall within War Exclusions. For non-state entities, of course, it would help if the exclusion expressly contained language such as by a state  or those acting on its behalf, or those acting at its direction, or by an agent of, or similar terms. But a substantial argument could be made that those words are not required.

Once again, there is no case law directly on point in the cyber context, so this is a question of first impression.

An additional area of inquiry is whether the non-state actor is a Russian ransomware gang or other entity that was made subject to sanctions by the U.S. Treasury Departments Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC), either before or as a consequence of the invasion. This would have two effects.

First, even if an insurer wanted to pay a ransomware demand, it would be illegal to do so. Second, it would strengthen the position that the cyber attacker was sufficiently close to the Russian government that War Exclusions should be enforced.

There is another gray area. What if a non-affiliated hacker group such as Anonymous launches an attack against Russia that inadvertently spreads to other countries? Novel and complex questions would arise about whether it had the type of relationship with one of the combatants that is necessary under most current War Exclusions, or whether it could be characterized as a unprivileged belligerent in a war.

What Is the Nature of the Victim?

Is the victim:

An insured that was directly targeted?

An insured hit by a cyberattack deliberately designed to spread to other networks?

An insured that was collateral damage in a cyberattack that went into the wild?

Finally, the nature of the victim will be a factor in whether War Exclusions apply to a given cyberattack. If the victim is directly targeted by the cyber attacker, there should be little doubt about the applicability of War Exclusions. It is possible that some would raise questions if the victims were not physically located in Russia or Ukraine. But as noted, advanced countries recognize cyberspace as a military domain. That domain has no physical boundaries, and a thoughtful court should recognize that.

The most likely entities to be directly targeted are banks, IT and internet

service companies, utilities, shipping companies and mobile phone network operators.

If the victim was struck by an attack deliberately intended to spread, a strong case for enforcing War Exclusions could also be made, because the loss would likely be considered to result from a direct cyberattack.

But one scenario may raise additional issues. What if the cyberattack goes into the wild and inadvertently spreads to an insureds system, so that the loss is more remote than those from the original attack? There is no clear authority here, and most policies have not addressed this.

One of the new LMA War, Cyber War and Cyber Operation Exclusions (which are discussed below) does address it, by providing an exception to the exclusion for the direct or indirect effect of a cyber operation on a bystander cyber asset. That term is defined as a computer system used by an insured or its third party service providers that is not physically located in an impacted state but is affected by a cyber operation. An impacted state is defined as any state where a cyber operation has had a major detrimental impact on the functioning of that state and/or security or defense of that state. Under this language, at least some losses from collateral damage are not excluded  those suffered by an entity in a state that was not heavily affected by the cyberattack.

Updated War Exclusions

Given the many potential open issues described above, insurers may wish to review the treatment of cyberattacks under War Exclusions for all their lines of business.

Standalone cyber insurers have been working on this problem for years, trying to address it fairly, while avoiding the danger of catastrophic aggregation.

They have started to put forth proposals. In a significant effort, in late 2021 the Lloyds Market Association released four War, Cyber War and Cyber Operation Exclusions. (LMA Exclusions) They were designed for use in standalone cyber policies, and attempt to address and thus provide clarity on several of the most vexing issues.

Although the LMA Exclusions were designed for standalone cyber insurance policies, several of their concepts and elements merit consideration when reviewing and updating War Exclusions in policies for other lines of business.

Conclusion

The application of War Exclusions is not an exercise involving certainty derived from immutable facts. Rather the determination is a judgment based on an evaluation of often incomplete facts in an uncertain legal context, made by people  claims executives, their legal advisors, and ultimately judges. The coming weeks, months, and years may require many such judgments.

Topics Cyber Russia Property Casualty Ukraine
As if spiraling gas prices werent enough, motorists across Arizona and the nation are paying more for auto insurance as repair costs and more crowded roads push premium rates higher.

After giving customers premium credits and refunds in 2020 as insurance claims plummeted due to the pandemic, auto insurers are raising rates to help cover higher claims costs driven by increased driving and other factors.

Several large insurers including implemented auto-premium rate increases since mid-2021, filings with the Arizona Department of Insurance and Financial Institutions show.

Geico Casualty Co. posted an 8% rate increase in November. State Farm Mutual filed an 0.4% rate increase for its Arizona private-passenger auto customers. Progressive Advanced Insurance Co. and sister Progressive Preferred posted Arizona auto-policy rate increases ranging from 2.5% to 6.9% since mid-2021, while Farmers of Arizona filed for increases totaling more than 8%. Allstate Fire & Casualty filed a 7% increase effective this month.

Arizona does not require auto insurers to get state approval before changing rates. Insurers say they need higher premiums to offset higher claims losses since the height of the pandemic, citing factors including increased driving and higher repair costs driven by supply-chain issues and labor shortages.

Insurers moved to provide premium discounts and other relief to policyholders starting in March 2020, when it was apparent insurance claims were plummeting as shutdowns kept many people off the roads.

No question that at the beginning of the pandemic, miles driven and claims fell off a cliff and during that unique period of time insurers did a lot of things to try to provide some relief to their policyholders, said Robert Passmore, vice president of auto and claims policy at the American Property Casualty Insurance Association.

Passmore said people are back to normal driving levels, citing data from the National Highway Transportation Administration showing miles traveled reached near-pandemic levels and fatalities increased in 2021.

At the same time, Passmore noted, the severity of accidents including fatalities have risen and repair costs have increased

State Farm provided over $4 billion in dividends and rate cuts to its auto-insurance customers at the onset of COVID-19 in early 2020. The company pared back a special premium discount in February 2021 with a 3% rate increase in Arizona.

Our approach is to make incremental adjustments based on driving behaviors to help minimize the impact to customers, said company spokesman Sevag Sarkissian. Auto claim costs are increasing in part due to a rise in the cost of labor, materials and supply chain-related issues. Although miles driven, claim volume and severity have increased, State Farm auto rates remain below pre-COVID-19 levels.

A report issued by the APCIA in February said higher claims costs are being driven by increased driving and worse driving behavior, higher medical costs, increased injury-claim settlements, increased injury severity in auto crashes and skyrocketing auto repair and replacement costs.

While Arizona has no power to preapprove auto insurance rates, the state insurance department reviews rate filings to make sure they are not unfairly discriminatory and meet other legal requirements, said Erin Klug, assistant director of product filing and compliance division at the Arizona Department of Insurance and Financial Institutions.

The department cant find a rate excessive as long as there is ample competition, Klug said.

While California was the only state to require insurers to give auto policyholders a break on premiums amid COVID-19 shutdowns, Arizona was among many states that encouraged insurers to offer premium relief, Klug said.

Industrywide, insurers refunded or discounted about $14 billion in response to falling claims, according to the insurance association.

But some consumer advocates say the industry should have given policyholders a much bigger break and ended up pocketing much of that savings from the steep decline in auto losses in 2020.

Insurers should have returned about $30 billion more to policyholders, based on lower losses, including $648 million in Arizona, says a report last August by the Consumer Federation of America and the Center for Economic Justice.

Since the pandemic, driving has mostly rebounded, but we strongly believe that Arizona consumers and consumers in every state were overcharged by insurers, said Michael DeLong, research and advocacy associate for the Consumer Federation.

The APCIs Passmore disputed the consumer advocates report and said premium relief is no longer warranted amid rapidly rising claims costs.

Theyre still talking about a period of time that existed basically two years ago, he said. Were in a very different time now.

Passmore said regulators and insurers must ensure that rates are not unfairly discriminatory and that theres sufficient rates to ensure the solvency of the carriers.

In the face of rising auto insurance costs, consumers can save money by shopping around for lower premiums, Klug and DeLong said.

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Trends COVID-19 Auto Pricing Trends Arizona
For insurance leaders tasked with managing their organizations human capital, the COVID-19 pandemic presented myriad challenges around employee safety and wellness, and transformed their workplace responsibilities in ways they never anticipated.

From navigating the shift to fully remote work, to return-to-office uncertainty, to mask and vaccine mandates, and employee burnout, as well as maintaining company culture, theres been a lot for top talent leaders to handle over the last two years.

The experience also helped underscore the importance of the HR position and why HR leaders must be considered a true business partner in leading an organization, particularly as it relates to employee health and safety, executives in these positions told Carrier Management, sister publication to Insurance Journal.

The pandemic has truly changed how we do business and the relationship employers have with their employees, and so much of it sits in the HR function, said Laura Rock, chief human resources officer for Zurich North America. Its such an exciting time to be in this seat.

Its really enlarged our role  for everybody on the HR team  to help manage the pandemic, everyone from benefits to employee relations, said Caryn Angelson, chief legal officer and chief human resources officer of Tokio Marine North America and general manager of Global Talent Management Group for Tokio Marine Holdings.

Theres an adage comparing HR leaders to the elementary school principal. Now weve also become the school nurse, Angelson said.

In many ways, workplace safety was taken for granted prior to the pandemic, said Tracey Schweitzer, chief people officer for Wisconsin-based American Family Insurance, but these days its on the forefront of everyones minds.

Still, she noted, I certainly never joined HR thinking that a good percentage of my time over a two-year period would be spent on things like vaccines or testing or masking or extended office closures.

Through it all, Schweitzer said HR leaders like herself never wavered from prioritizing the needs of their people.

We really needed to make sure that we led with our values, and first and foremost kept our employees safe, she said.

There was never a question. We take care of our customers; we take care of our employees.

The talent leaders from American Family, Tokio Marine and Zurich North America, as well as Florida-based American Integrity Insurance, Nationwide Insurance, Westfield, and startup homeowners insurtech Slide, shared how they guided their organizations through a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic and their priorities moving forward.

A Flexible Approach

The pandemic transformed the workplace in a short period of time, and companies had to adapt quickly, said Tokio Marines Angelson.

Staying flexible and in constant communication with employees and company leadership has been key, especially given the everchanging threat of the virus, as evidenced by the recent Delta and Omicron variants. Companies have had to alter, or completely scrap, their plans for employees to return to the office full time, and many employees now prefer to have the option to work from home at least a few days a week.

Where we ultimately land when the pandemic becomes more endemic is likely a hybrid workplace where some days youre in the office and some days youre at home, said Angelson, who has been with Tokio Marine since 2001.

Jennifer Palmieri, chief people officer for Westfield, said the company is not taking a one-size-fits-all approach to bringing employees back into the office. The leaders value having people work in person, she said, but know that things can be accomplished remotely as well.

The company is checking in and surveying employees regularly and making decisions based on that feedback, she said. We realize that different employees will have different needs and expectations, wants and desires as they return to work, and were going to work with them to try to accommodate as much as possible, Palmieri said.

About 25% of American Familys workforce was working remotely when the pandemic hit, said Schweitzer. So, the company was already leveraging technology to connect with its employees. However, the situation has accelerated the remote work trend, she said.

The company is now developing and testing different options and precautions so people can work safely. As long as we continue to meet business, customer and employee needs, we feel were going to be able to continue to test and iterate what we learned, she said.

Slide, started last year by Bruce Lucas, the former chief executive officer and founder of homeowners insurer Heritage Insurance, opened a physical office in Tampa when it launched last fall, according to Chief People Officer Shannon Gougis. Though employees have the option to be remote or in person, most are coming into the office regularly.

Everyone appreciates the ability to be in person and collaborate because we are building something from scratch. So, its really beneficial to be able to have that face time, she said.

The Great Resignation, Diversity and the Talent War

The Great Resignation is something HR and talent leaders across all industries are intimately familiar with as the pandemic prompted people to re-evaluate their current careers and pursue new job opportunities.

The pandemic certainly has been a time where everyone just paused; there was a lot of time to reflect and rethink what was important to them and their families. Theyve developed more of a sense of purpose and passion, and they want their work to be meaningful to them, not just a job, said Angela Bretz, senior vice president, and chief diversity and talent acquisition officer for Nationwide.

Workplace flexibility, for example, is no longer considered a perk but the number one job requirement by potential candidates, Bretz said. Organizations must adjust and be open to new ways of doing things if they want to attract and retain talent, she said.

Nationwide sees the current employment movement as The Great Attraction, Bretz said, and has had to rethink and reimagine its talent strategy. How we are recruiting and retaining folks looks and feels different today than how it did a couple years ago because whats important to them has shifted, she said.

The Great Resignation opened the door for a new company like Slide to attract top talent, according to Gougis, who became the companys second employee in September and has 25 years of experience in HR. If you take a step back and look at it, it really is just about employees wanting a good workplace environment thats optimal for them, as well as fair pay and recognition, she said. Its left this space for Slide to come in and kind of be the hero, or the winner, because its allowed us to really have those conversations about [Slides] culture, and then they see it in action.

Gougis said the company currently has about 20 employees and plans to hire at least 13 more. The company is looking for a diverse group of people who are willing to step outside their comfort zone in order to help push us forward, she said.

Attracting those kinds of employees hasnt been a problem so far because people want to be part of something innovative and exciting. The insurtech is being flexible in how it builds its team by allowing company leaders to craft their staffing strategy, rather than focusing on hiring for specific job titles.

We cant approach the talent portion of the business in old, archaic ways and never change. A more modern approach is necessary for both the business and employees to be successful, she said.

Recruiting diverse talent remains a key focus for HR and talent leaders, the executives said, as companies realize the necessity  and benefits  of employing people of different backgrounds.

To that end, Nationwide combined its HR and diversity, equity and inclusion organizations early last year. Bretz, who has worked for Nationwide for 36 years and has led its DEI efforts since 2019, joined the companys human resources team as head of talent acquisition at that time.

She said Nationwide is very intentional in looking at the current makeup of its teams and hiring for what is missing, whether it be a certain personality, race or gender. What we understand and we get wholeheartedly is that diversity, equity and inclusion begins with recruiting, she said.

Palmieri joined Westfield as chief people officer in July 2020 and has focused on reorganizing the carriers HR functions to include DEI and its HR technology group since then. She said the goal of integrating these teams into the HR function was to make the organization less transactional and more strategically focused on achieving Westfields business goals and anticipating its future needs.

Her teams efforts to bring in new and strong talent are intrinsically linked to Westfields DEI strategy, she said.

Westfield is working with organizations like historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) to introduce young people of color to the insurance industry to align with that strategy.

We want to help educate and inform them about the industry and the great work that we do and how you can have a really meaningful career, she said.

Talent and DEI are built into American Familys strategic plan, Schweitzer said, because of the companys belief that having diverse teams and inclusive environments produce better business results. The company views The Great Resignation as an opportunity to be more intentional in its DEI recruitment efforts, and in how it develops current talent within the organization.

It isnt like we talk about business and then talent and DEI is on the side. Those things are integrated together, which makes my role even more exciting because everybody cares about talent and its part of our strategic leadership perspective, she said.

Tokio Marines Angelson said work flexibility is easing talent attraction and retention efforts, but she is consciously aware of not overlooking remote workers when it comes to new opportunities and assignments. This is especially true for women, who are opting to do remote work with increasing frequency and are already underrepresented in the senior ranks of the insurance industry.

We all, as management, have to be much more deliberate in terms of ensuring that equal opportunities for advancement are given to everyone irrespective of where their office may be, she said.

Maintaining, Rebuilding a Companys Secret Sauce

One of the most important elements of attracting and retaining employees is company culture, the HR leaders said, which has been hard to maintain with the shift to remote work.

Tokio Marines Angelson said the ongoing hybrid work environment may also impact the engagement of new talent. Culture is the secret sauce, and making sure that people really understand the culture if theyre new to the organization is going to be a challenge for all organizations, she said.

The executives stepped up their efforts to keep people engaged and connected to each other and their organizations throughout the pandemic.

Angela Quinn, senior vice president and chief human resources officer for Florida homeowners insurer American Integrity, said her team organized a variety of fun activities to bring people together safely, including virtual coffee breaks, field trips and games.

It takes more effort to keep a relationship or develop a relationship when youre not in person, so we were very creative, said Quinn, who has led HR for American Integrity for 10 years.

While there was a paradigm shift in terms of how people formed relationships during the pandemic, particularly newer employees, Quinn believes the relationships at her company are stronger than before. There was an intentionality about getting to know our employees and each other, she said.

Schweitzer said its been a challenge to create connections with new employees of American Family, which once housed thousands of people at its main campus in Wisconsin. A good chunk of our workforce has never set foot in one of our buildings because they were hired during the pandemic, she said. Their relationships were built over Zoom.

Improving the onboarding experience for new employees so they can build those relationships if they continue to work remotely is a big priority for her team, she said.

They are also working on how to bring people together safely. For example, rather than have people leave for meals or have them delivered, the company now offers fully subsidized breakfast and lunch. This also offers the opportunity for what she called accidental collisions among employees.

Food always brings people together, she said.

Post-Pandemic Priorities

The human resources leaders know theres a strong feeling of burnout among employees two years into the pandemic, so communication and employee well-being are top priorities moving forward.

Theyve instituted several initiatives for employees to express their concerns or ask for support, including regular check-ins, wellness surveys, access to outside resources and job flexibility.

We are very intentional about having those conversations and setting expectations, [communicating] that while we know this is a difficult time,  we expect them to walk away, take breaks and pause because their mental health and just overall wellness is priority No. 1, Nationwides Bretz said.

The pandemic has changed the dynamic between employees and managers over the last two years, said Zurichs Rock. HR leaders now look to managers to connect with their employees at a much more basic level in terms of their safety, health and family situation.

Its been very rewarding for her team to be able to support that work, she said.

Its a huge priority for us to make sure that our people feel at their best working with us, Rock said.

Palmieri said managers and leaders should be having frequent check-ins with their employees to see how they are feeling. Not only does it help the employee and the HR organization but also the overall business.

Its really important for leaders to have open lines of communication with their employees and to share with us any findings that they have, she said.

American Familys Schweitzer said the core function of HR is taking care of people, but she knows her team of 450 must take care of themselves as well during this demanding time.

Her team is working on prioritizing what needs to get done right away and what can wait.

One of the ways that were helping really all employees, but I would say HR employees especially, is to be really intentional about when we engage and not creating fires, Schweitzer said. Fire drills are always going to exist, but not creating fires when they dont need to be.

As the immediate pandemic challenges shift, Rock said her team is ready for whatever happens next and shes grateful for the partnership and support of company leaders.

My department feels appreciated by our employees, appreciated by the company, and feels like weve really been able to deliver and make a difference, she said.

Topics COVID-19 Talent Training Development
New Hampshire landowners who make their properties available to the public for recreation at no charge do not enjoy complete immunity under the states recreational use statute. Landowners have immunity from negligence only where the victim of negligence is actually using their property.

In an opinion issued last Friday, New Hampshires Supreme Court overturned a lower court that granted immunity to the landownerin this case, the state  in a case where a woman standing on federal land was injured by the collapse of a wall of an adjacent fort that was owned and maintained by the state.

The justices said the statute granting immunity should be interpreted strictly. The laws plain language states that immunity from liability from personal injury is limited to injuries incurred by those who use land for recreational purposes free of charge.

According to the facts relayed by the court, in June 2018, the plaintiff, Janet Bisceglia, and her family visited a historic lighthouse situated on land in New Castle, which is owned by the federal government. That federal land is adjacent to Fort Constitution, which is owned and operated by the state. While the plaintiff was standing on the federal land next to the outer wall of Fort Constitution, a portion of the wall fell on top of her, causing her substantial injuries.

Bisceglia sued the state for negligence.

The trial court granted summary judgment for the state. The court determined that, because the state held Fort Constitution out to the public at no charge and the wall was maintained as part of the historic site for the use and enjoyment of the public, the law shields the state from liability, regardless of whether the plaintiff was physically on the states property at the time of the injury.

On appeal, the plaintiff argued that the trial court erred in ruling that the statute bars her suit when it is undisputed that she never entered upon or used the states property in any way.

The state argued that recreational use immunity does not turn on whether a particular individual was using the subject property for recreational purposes at the time he or she was injured, but, rather, the operative question is whether the landowner has permitted members of the general public to use the land for recreational purposes

But the high court rejected the states argument.

The recreational use statute at issue (RSA 508:14, I) provides: An owner, occupant, or lessee of land, including the state or any political subdivision, who without charge permits any person to use land for recreational purposes or as a spectator of recreational activity, shall not be liable for personal injury or property damage in the absence of intentionally caused injury or damage.

The high court noted that the purpose of the law is to encourage owners of land to make land and water areas available to the public for recreational purposes by limiting their liability towards persons entering thereon for such purposes.

The statute limits the liability of landowners who make their land available for public recreational uses on the theory that it is not reasonable to expect such owners to undergo the risks of liability for injury to persons and property attendant upon the use of their land by strangers from whom the accommodating owner receives no compensation or other favor in return, according to the court.

However, citing legislative intent and previous court rulings, the high court found that the language of the statute limits its applicability to on-premises injuries and does not eliminate all common law duties of landowners toward all entrants on land.

To interpret the statute in the manner suggested by the State would require that we add language that the legislature did not see fit to include, the judges wrote.

Because it is undisputed that the plaintiff did not use the states land, the trial court erred in granting the states motion for summary judgment based on the recreational use statute, the stats high court concluded.

Topics New Hampshire
A federal appeals court has granted a request from a northern Virginia school system to continue using a challenged admissions policy at a highly selective high school while it appeals a ruling that found the policy discriminates against Asian American students.

A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said in a ruling Thursday that Fairfax County Public Schools can continue to use its new admissions policy at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology.

U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton rejected the new policy in a February ruling, saying that impermissible racial balancing was at its core. Commonly known as TJ, the prestigious school near the nations capital is often ranked as one of the best public high schools in the country.

Earlier this month, Hilton also rejected a request from the school system to delay the implementation of his ruling. But the 4th Circuit, in a 3-2 ruling, said the school board had met the legal requirements for a suspension of Hiltons order while its appeal is pending.

The 4th Circuit panel agreed with school officials who argued that because the selection process for the incoming freshman class is well underway, implementing Hiltons ruling now would throw the process into chaos.

Judge Toby Heytens wrote that he has grave doubts about Hiltons conclusions regarding both disparate impact and discriminatory purpose of the new admissions policy.

In my view, appellant Fairfax County School Board is likely to succeed in its appeal, Heytens wrote.

In a dissenting opinion, Judge Allison Jones Rushing said putting Hiltons ruling on hold while the school board appeals his decision is not in the public interest. Jones said any logistical difficulties or inconvenience associated with changing the admissions policy at this late date simply do not outweigh the infringement of constitutional rights.

And everyone _ even temporarily frustrated applicants and their families _ ultimately benefits from a public-school admissions process not tainted by unconstitutional discrimination, Rushing wrote.

The case has been closely watched as courts continue to evaluate the role that racial considerations can play when deciding who should be admitted to a particular school. Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a similar case alleging that Harvard University discriminates against Asian Americans in its admissions process.

Fairfield County Public Schools said the order from the 4th Circuit allows the school board to continue with the current application process to select the Class of 2026 this spring.

For the 2,500+ students in this application pool, this means the race blind process set out by the School Board in October 2020 will remain in place as an appeal challenging the February court decision plays out, the board said in a news release.

The parents group Coalition for TJ, which filed the lawsuit, said the 4th Circuit judges have made a grave error in allowing the school system to continue to use its new admissions process.

If the judges decision stands, we would see Fairfax County Public Schools usher in a second class of students to Americas No. 1 public high school through an unconstitutional race-based admissions process, the coalition said in a statement.

For decades, Black and Hispanic students have been woefully underrepresented in the student body. After criticism over its lack of diversity, the school board scrapped a standardized test that had been at the heart of the admissions process and opted instead for a process that sets aside slots at each of the countys middle schools. It also includes experience factors like socioeconomic background.

The parents group argued in its lawsuit that Asian Americans, who constituted more than 70% of the student body, were unfairly targeted in the new policy.

The schools current freshman class, which was admitted under the new policy, saw a significantly different racial makeup. Black students increased from 1% to 7%; Hispanic representation increased from 3% to 11%. Asian American representation decreased from 73% to 54%.

The school system has insisted that its new policies are race neutral, and the panel evaluating applicants is not even aware of applicants race as it conducts its reviews.

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics K-12 Virginia
Maryland lawmakers voted Friday to let voters decide whether to legalize recreational marijuana in November.

The Maryland House voted 94-39 for a constitutional amendment already approved by the Senate. The House also voted 89-41 for a separate measure that takes steps to implement recreational marijuana, if voters approve, but it leaves matters of licensing and taxes for lawmakers to decide next year.

The constitutional amendment does not require approval from Republican Gov. Larry Hogan. The General Assembly, which is controlled by Democrats, sent the implementation bill to Hogan in time to override a veto, if the governor rejects the measure, before lawmakers adjourn April 11. The House and Senate both passed the bill with enough votes to override a veto.

The constitutional amendment defines that recreational marijuana would not be legal until July 2023 for people 21 and over. The legislation includes provisions spelling out a transitional period between Jan. 1 and July 1 that would include a fine for possession of marijuana of under an ounce and a half.

If voters approve, the companion bill would legalize possession of up to 1.5 ounces. It also would remove criminal penalties of up to 2.5 ounces and create a civil citation. Existing laws on marijuana possession would apply to possession of more than 2.5 ounces.

It would make changes in criminal law and create automatic expungements of past marijuana possession convictions. It also would automatically expunge the conviction of anyone previously found guilty of simple possession of marijuana, if it was the only charge in the case. In addition, it allows for resentencing of those convicted of marijuana charges.

Now, the possession of up to 10 grams of marijuana is a civil violation in Maryland, with a fine of up to $100 for a first offense.

Currently, 18 states, along with the District of Columbia, have fully legalized marijuana. There also are 37 states, including Maryland, that have legalized medical marijuana. Maryland currently has about 150,000 registered cannabis patients.

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Cannabis Maryland
Marine fuel sellers have stopped serving vessels flying the Russian flag at major European hubs including Spain and Malta in another blow to Moscows exports, five industry sources with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

Losing access to refueling points in the Mediterranean Sea poses major logistical problems for Russian oil tankers going from Baltic ports to Asia and also creates safety concerns over potentially being stuck at sea with flammable cargoes, shipping sources say.

Russia is reeling from a wave of severe economic sanctions on its banks and oligarchs and foreign companies are cutting ties after Moscows invasion of Ukraine, which Russian President Vladimir Putin calls a special military operation.

Multiple factors have prompted the halt in refueling services, including what sources have described as self sanctioning where companies try to stay ahead of the next wave of measures by refusing to enter into contracts with Russian entities.

Payment problems due to banking restrictions have also added to complications with deals for marine fuel, which is typically priced and paid for in U.S. dollars.

One source said Russian-flagged ships couldnt secure marine fuel in Malta, the British overseas territory of Gibraltar or neighboring Algeciras in Spain  all major bunkering, or refueling, zones in the Mediterranean.

Several tankers had to take a longer journey in order to bunker in other countries after European ports refused to provide fuel, said another source who was familiar with one of the tankers movements.

A government official in Malta said the country was not allowing any Russian-flagged ships to come to its ports.

A transport ministry spokesperson with Spains Merchant Marine said it was possible that certain providers are adopting these measures independently.

A Gibraltar government spokesperson said port authorities would reject calling requests by all ships either owned or operated by anyone connected to the country, not even for bunkering, in accordance to UK rules.

The spokesperson said that as in Britain, foreign ships with Russian cargoes would be not be affected.

Not Doing Business

Russias maritime sector is already grappling with the winding down of other services including ship certification by leading foreign providers  vital for accessing ports and securing insurance  shipping companies pulling out and ship engine makers suspending training on their equipment.

Shipping industry sources say given the complexities of the worlds seaborne trade it was unclear how Russian companies would be able to operate with multiple services being withdrawn.

Danish marine fuels supplier and ship owner Monjasa said it had suspended trading and supplies with Russian-flagged vessels, Russian registered companies and companies and individuals with ties or affiliation to Russian ownership with effect from Feb. 25, a day after Russias invasion started.

Denmarks Bunker Holding said it had stopped all deliveries into Russian harbors since the start of March, adding that the group and subsidiaries including Dan-Bunkering had also ceased to enter into new obligations with Russian counterparties.

We are aware of the challenges this decision to stop trade with Russian counterparties imposes on clients and counterparties in the rest of the world, but with the terrible situation in Ukraine we need to act swiftly and decisively against Russia, Bunker Holding said in a statement.

Gibraltar bunker supplier Peninsula, which is active elsewhere in the Mediterranean and other locations, said in a LinkedIn post it was not doing business with Russian vessels, ports, companies  owned or majority owned  suppliers and financial institutions.

Earlier this month, Britain announced sanctions on Russias biggest shipping company Sovcomflot.

While a ban on Russian vessels from EU ports is still under discussion, Russias oil and products exporters have already faced problems concluding charters for ships and insurance, shipping sources say.

(Additional reporting by Inti Landauro and Isla Binnie in Madrid, Chris Scicluna in Valletta and Rowena Edwards in London; editing by Veronica Brown and David Clarke)

Photograph: A Russian flagged cargo ship docks in the port of Boulogne-sur-Mer, northern France, Saturday, Feb. 26, 2022 . French officials say marines patrolling the English Channel area have intercepted the ship sailing under the Russian flag and escorted it to the port of Boulogne-Sur-Mer for an investigation. The interception of the ship, carrying cars, was triggered by financial sanctions levied days ago against Russia for its invasion of the Ukraine. Photo credit: AP Photo/Michel Spingler, File.

Topics Russia
The Jensten Group, the UK independent insurance broking group, has embarked upon a transformation program across the business which will see it simplify its corporate structure, systems, and brands.

The restructure will see the business rationalize over a period of time into five key trading divisions with the introduction of four new brands over the next few months: Jensten Insurance Brokers, Jensten London Markets, Jensten Underwriting and Jensten Brokers Europe, and the retention of the Coversure brand for franchise activities.

The first to go live is Jensten Insurance Brokers, launched today (April 4), which will sit alongside the Coversure Franchise business, making up Jenstens retail operations. The wholesale division brand changes will follow later in 2022.

The move sees Tasker Insurance Brokers, which was acquired by Jensten in September 2021, rebranded as Jensten Insurance Brokers. On May 23, two wholly owned Coversure branches (Huntingdon and Ilkeston) will be brought into Jensten Insurance Brokers, followed by HTC Associates in September  all eventually trading under the Jensten brand.

While operating in the newly named Jensten Insurance Brokers trading division, Advance Insurance Agencies, Jenstens niche personal lines broking business in the South West, and Packetts, Jenstens regional office in Yorkshire, will retain their current brands.

Other sub-brands, including Travel Risk Professionals, Enhance Insurance Services and Numark Insurance Services will also retain their separate branding, recognizing their value in the specific niches and markets in which they operate.

The move will see Robin Thomson, former managing director of Tasker Insurance Brokers becoming managing director of the larger Jensten Insurance Brokers. Matt Jones will continue to lead Advance, Marshall Sugden will lead Packetts and Rob Palmer the Coversure franchise business  all reporting to Robert Organ, managing director Retail, Jensten Group.

The Jensten Group is committed to expansion through a mixture of organic growth and acquisition and presently controls in excess of 320 million gross written premium. Last year, we completed the acquisitions of Tasker Insurance Group, Advance and Packetts as part of our Buy and Build strategy. The investment in the Jensten brand, whilst retaining other meaningful brands within the business, reflects our determination to focus on what is valued by our clients, commented Alistair Hardie, group CEO, of Huntingdon, England-based Jensten Group.

Source: Jensten Group

Topics Agencies
Howden, the London-based international insurance broker, further strengthens its presence in Italy with two new acquisitions: Nord Est Insurance Broker and ASI Insurance Brokers.

Financial details of the acquisitions were not disclosed.

Since establishing its operations in Italy a year ago, to further its expansion in this key market, Howden has already made five acquisitions, including the largest independent insurance broker in Italy, Assiteca, and the specialist brokers Andrea Scagliarini S.p.A. and Tower S.p.A.

Nord Est was founded in 1989 and is a well-established independent insurance broker with long-standing relationships among local mid-upper market clients.

We are excited to become part of a Group that shares the same entrepreneurial mind-set which has allowed us to establish strong and lasting market relationships over the years, where our people are truly valued and will continue to have the freedom to deliver what is best for our clients, Ugo Furlan and Mario Gava, co-founders of Nord Est, said.

ASI was established in 2008 and is a specialized broker for sureties and freelance professionals.

I have been looking for a partner who could give us international breadth for years and Howden is the perfect fit for our growing business. It is our forever home that will support our continued growth, guided by common principles including People First and the unwavering commitment to really deliver the best solutions for our clients, all of whom we know personally, according to Roberto Brunetta, founder of ASI Insurance Brokers.

Luigi Sturani, regional CEO, Howden, Europe, commented: Nord Est and ASI are two highly regarded brokers, with very talented teams, and we are excited to welcome them to Howden. Both of these acquisitions are essential to expand our product specialty portfolio in Italy and to establish a local territorial distribution. Our long-term strategy is to position ourselves among the top players in Italy and bring choice to clients and talent in this key European market.

About Howden Broking

Established in 1994, Howden today comprises owned businesses across Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America, the Pacific and the Middle East, employing more than 9,000 people worldwide. Together with network partners aligned to its specialty-led proposition, Howden operates in more than 90 territories.

Source: Howden Broking

Topics Mergers & Acquisitions Agencies
Companies linked to insolvent British financier Lex Greensill obtained insurance fraudulently, insurer Tokio Marine said on Monday, adding it did not plan to pay out on the policies and would vigorously defend itself against any legal claims.

Greensills supply chain finance firm collapsed last year, leading to the failure of $10 billion in supply-chain finance funds run by Credit Suisse.

Credit Suisse Warns Greensill Litigation Against Insurers, Debtors May Take 5 Years Credit Suisse Knew Frozen Greensill Funds Insurance Cover Relied on One Insurer: Report

Greensill administrators Grant Thornton declined to comment on Monday.

Credit Suisse said in a statement that the insurance policies were valid, and that it would also vigorously defend its position to preserve the rights of the supply chain finance funds and their investors.

Supply chain finance aims to lower financing costs by allowing suppliers to receive early payment of their invoices.

Credit Suisse bought debt that was issued by Greensill and backed by loans the supply chain finance firm made to companies.

To manage its risk, Greensill took out credit insurance with a subsidiary of Insurance Australia Group (IAG). Tokio Marine took on the policies in 2019 when it bought the unit.

Tokio Marine carried out investigations in 2020 into Greensill-related policies written at its Australian subsidiary BCC Trade Credit, it said in a statement.

While these investigations remain ongoing, Tokio Marine has found that since at least September 2018, matters material to the underwriting of the policies were fraudulently misrepresented to BCC by Greensill, Tokio Marine said.

There was also a fraudulent failure to disclose material matters to BCC prior to the purported inception of numerous policies, renewals and endorsements, the statement said.

Tokio Marine had told counterparties to the insurance on Monday that their policies were void and said it would vigorously defend any legal claims against it.

Credit Suisse is seeking compensation from insuranceto restore assets to the investors in the supply chain finance funds.

It said earlier on Monday that litigation related to Greensill supply chain finance funds could take around five years and warned that some investors would not be able to recover their money.

The bank joined creditors of Greensill Capital by filing lawsuits in Australia seeking compensation from IAG, court filings showed last month.

(Reporting by Carolyn Cohn; editing by Barbara Lewis)

Related:

Topics Carriers Fraud
An overnight fire heavily damaged a century-old hardware store and lumber yard that abuts a southern Indiana citys historic downtown square, authorities said.

Firefighters arrived at the scene in Scottsburg after 11 p.m. on March 30 to find heavy flames coming from the roof of the Vail True Value Lumber Co. building.

Once crews realized they couldnt do much to save the building they shifted their focus to containing the blaze and protecting the citys historic square, said Scottsburg Fire Chief James Richey.

Once its through the roof, youre chasing your tail at that point, Richey told WAVE-TV, adding that our main focus was to try to save the historic square which is less than 10 feet away.

Richey said with the help from several other fire departments, crews were able to extinguish the flames without any additional fire damage to neighboring buildings. No injuries were reported.

Vail True Value Lumber Co. announced in March 2020 that the business was celebrating its 100th anniversary. In a March 31 post on its Facebook page that included photos of the ruined building, the company thanked firefighters and said we lost our home of 102 years.

Scottsburg, a city of about 6,700 people, is located about 30 miles (50 kilometers) north of Louisville, Kentucky.

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Indiana
Iowa Insurance Commissioner Doug Ommen recently issued an enforcement order against Gary D. Marcum formerly of Clive, Iowa, and now a resident of Kodak, Tennessee. The enforcement order permanently revokes Marcums resident insurance producer license and orders Marcum to pay $30,000 in civil penalties for violating a previous enforcement order from October 8, 2019.

In a March 24 letter, Ommen wrote that Marcum violated a cease and desist order related to 2019 charges. Marcum is prohibited from selling, soliciting, negotiating insurance, transacting any business of insurance in Iowa, and from providing business assistance to or facilitating the insurance business of any other person transacting any business of insurance in the state.

Marcum is alleged to have engaged in various unsuitable recommendations with at least six Iowa customers.

Marcus has been licensed in Iowa as a resident insurance producer since 2000.



Assisting Iowans with their insurance and retirement needs is an important duty and is a privilege. Despite having his insurance producer license suspended, Mr. Marcum violated the previous order on numerous occasions by continuing to transact in the business of insurance, Ommen said. Mr. Marcums actions wont be tolerated and his insurance producer license is now permanently revoked and he will be paying a $30,000 fine for his actions.





Source: Iowa Insurance Division

Topics Agencies Iowa
U.S. self-driving truck companies have a golden opportunity in the form of a nationwide driver shortage, but their robot drivers still are not ready and neither are their biggest potential customers.

The uncertainties surrounding autonomous trucking come at a critical time for the U.S. trucking industry, which faces a record shortage of 80,000 drivers as demand for online shopping and rapid delivery times is straining supply chains.

Private investors, who have so far poured nearly $9 billion into U.S. AV trucking companies according to data from Pitchbook, are hoping that self-driving trucks eventually catch on. Among the companies developing the technology are TuSimple Holdings Inc, Aurora Innovation Inc, Embark Technology Inc, and Alphabet Incs Waymo.

But large logistics companies, who represent the tech startups coveted future customers, are in no rush to sign big contracts. They continue to test the technology of multiple providers in limited partnerships.

Everybody is at a point where theyre hedging their bets, said Eric Fuller, the Chief Executive of US Xpress Enterprises Inc, a carrier and trucking brokerage that manages 6,000 of its own tractors.

The company has announced partnerships with TuSimple and Aurora. Fuller, who also sits on TuSimples advisory board, said US Xpress was working with all the other AV companies, but had yet to announce more partnerships.

The companies say they have developed technology that can safely pilot a 33,000 pound (15,000 kg) truck down a busy highway and are pushing toward commercial launches.

They provide the sensors and software, and some have partnered with truck manufacturers to incorporate their technology at the assembly line, but all rely on large logistics companies to pay for their offering.

The U.S. Southwest, primarily Texas and Arizona, where weather and regulations are favorable, has emerged as the testing ground for heavy-duty autonomous vehicle (AV) companies.

Large logistics groups such as DHL, United Parcel Service Inc and Ryder System Inc have launched pilot programs with several autonomous trucking companies.

But logistics giants also say they are still in the early stages of exploring the technology and are waiting to see which startups have the team, capital and network to survive and prove self-driving to be feasible on a large scale.

SHAKING THINGS OUT

While much attention has been focused on self-driving taxis, industry experts increasingly bet on driverless trucks to be the first autonomous vehicles to generate meaningful revenue due to the less complex driving environment in which they operate.

Making a meaningful dent in the U.S. market of 2.3 million trucks will take time, however, and industry experts project no more than a few hundred-thousand autonomous trucks over the next decade.

Logistics companies hope robo-trucks will one day take over monotonous long-haul tours, but not replace existing jobs.

Human drivers will prefer to spend more time on shorter, complex routes near their homes  routes that are still too difficult for self-driving technology.

Pitchbook analysts expect the global AV trucking market to balloon from around $530 million in 2023 to $167 billion in 2035.

Theres still opportunity for more players. Were not at a point where were shaking things out, Jim Monkmeyer, president for transportation at DHL Supply Chain, said during a February visit to TuSimples testing facility in Tucson, Arizona.

DHL Supply Chain, which operates some 1,500 trucks and manages around $3 billion of annual North American freight spend, has so far partnered with TuSimple and Embark and put in reservations for future trucks with both companies. Those orders are slated to be fulfilled in 2024.

Monkmeyer said DHL had contracted with multiple providers to reduce its risks, but added that placing truck reservations early was crucial in order to be among the first to explore the new technology.

Monkmeyer and his logistics colleagues say self-driving trucks offer the potential to increase freight capacity and reduce cost, with robots, unlike humans, not subject to a mandatory 11-hour daily driving limit.

LOWER COSTS

But the economics pan out only once the driver is out of the cabin.

So far, only TuSimple has removed its safety drivers in a handful of night-time trial runs along an 80-mile (130 km) stretch of highway between Tucson and Phoenix, Arizona.

The company is planning to present per-mile cost calculations in the next few months, Cheng Lu, TuSimples former CEO, said in late February, just days before the company replaced him in a surprise move.

Your cost has to either be lower than what todays costs are, or there is a clear line of sight to be lower, said Lu, who now serves as an adviser to the new CEO.

Drivers account for more than 40% of per-mile costs, according to data by the American Transportation Research Institute.

Graphic on current per-mile trucking costs: https://tmsnrt.rs/3ulCdyo

Autonomous driving could halve driver costs, with the companies planning to charge between 35 and 45 cents in per-mile subscription fees, according to two industry experts.

But the companies, three of them publicly listed, are far from generating meaningful revenue, let alone profit. Embark recorded a 2021 net loss of $124 million, TuSimple had a loss of $411 million and Aurora lost $755 million.

For the logistics partners, access to sufficient capital is crucial when determining whom to partner with, DHLs Monkmeyer and US Xpress Fuller said.

TuSimple said it ended 2021 with some $1.3 billion left in cash, Aurora with $1.6 billion.

But the companies also confront other real-world hurdles as they try to release their technology on a larger scale.

Ryder, which operates nearly 240,000 trucks and around 800 U.S. maintenance locations, has partnered with TuSimple, Waymo and Embark to explore how self-driving trucks would fit into its network.

The logistics company wants to understand how to service the host of lidar, radar and camera sensors and whether trucks operating around the clock require different maintenance schedules.

In the long run, the tech companies also had to tackle more challenging driving conditions, such as snow, said Ryders head of new product development, Karen Jones.

I cant just run an autonomous business in the Southwest and Southeast, you have to figure out how to get to the Northeast, she said.

(Reporting by Tina Bellon in Tucson, Ariz. Editing by Matthew Lewis)

Topics USA Auto Personal Auto Trucking Autonomous Vehicles
A Texas city has settled a lawsuit with the parents of a 3-year-old boy who died last September after being infected with a rare brain-eating amoeba that was found at a splash pad hed visited.

The Arlington City Council approved a $250,000 settlement last week with the parents of Bakari Williams. He died Sept. 11 after being hospitalized with primary amebic meningoencephalitis, a rare and typically fatal infection caused by the naegleria fowleri amoeba.

The city said that as part of the settlement, it will invest in health and safety improvements, including technology to automatically shut off splash pads where water readings arent in acceptable ranges. Also, QR codes will allow visitors to see current information about water quality.

After Bakaris death, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found the amoeba in water samples collected from the city splash pad Bakari visited.

City officials have said records from two of its four splash pads, including the one Bakari visited, showed employees didnt consistently record, or in some cases didnt conduct, the water quality testing required prior to the facilities opening each day.

The lawsuit said city employees failed to adequately monitor and chlorinate the citys splash pad water, making the splash pad unreasonably dangerous.

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Lawsuits Texas
An Alexandria, Louisiana physician pleaded guilty to having conspired to violate three different federal statutes in connection with a scheme to defraud both federal and private workers compensation insurers.

U.S. District Judge Timothy L. Brooks presided over the plea hearing, in which Robert Clay Smith,60, waived indictment by a grand jury and pleaded guilty to a criminal information charging him with conspiracy to commit health care fraud, wire fraud, and illegal remunerations (taking kickbacks).

Court documents allege that the basic premise of the scheme, which ran from 2013 until 2017, was that individuals associated with a Rogers-based medical supply and billing company recruited Smith to dispense pain creams and patches to his workers compensation patients by offering him a split of the profits. The Rogers company acted as the billing agent for Smith, handling all the paperwork and submitting the allegedly fraudulent claims to both the U.S. Department of Labor, Office of Workers Compensation Programs, which covers all federal employees, and to private insurers as well. In exchange, Smith admitted, the company paid him 50 to 55 percent of the profits collected from successfully billing insurers, at markups of 15 to 20 times what the medications actually cost.

According to court documents, Smith , a Louisiana physician, made more than $650,000 from the scheme. Smith admitted that in addition to receiving illegal kickbacks, he knew he did not have a license to dispense medications from his clinic, required under Louisiana law, and nonetheless bought topical medications from the Rogers company and dispensed them to his workers compensation patients from his clinic.

Smithis the second physician to plead guilty in connection with the federal investigation. In July 2021, Dr. Robert Dale Bernauer Sr., another Louisiana doctor, pleaded guilty to conspiring with the same individuals, in a scheme similar to the one for which Smith has accepted responsibility. Additionally, in October 2021, the companys former billing director, Amanda Dawn Rains, pleaded guilty to participating in criminal conspiracies with the two doctors, and others.

As a result of his guilty plea, Smith may be sentenced to up to five years in prison. The court will determine his sentence at a later date, after reviewing a pre-sentence investigation report prepared by the U.S. Probation Office and considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

Source: U.S. Attorneys Office for the Western District of Arkansas

Topics Louisiana Fraud Workers' Compensation
The Louisiana Department of Insurance (LDI) recently issued cease-and-desist orders and license suspensions against two insurance producers for violations of the Louisiana Insurance Code.

On March 11, the LDI issued a cease-and-desist order and license suspension to Kim Marie Holmes for alleged insurance fraud. Holmes was issued an arrest warrant in Ascension Parish on March 3 and charged with insurance fraud for attempting to defraud an insurance company for over $15,900.

An investigation by Louisiana State Police found Holmes made material misrepresentations on her renters insurance policy following Hurricane Ida by greatly inflating the price of items claimed as damaged or never purchasing items claimed as damaged from the places reported in the claim. State Police also noted that Holmes apartment complex never received any reported damages to the building in which she lived.

On March 21, the LDI issued a cease-and-desist order and license suspension to Andrea R. Ceballos for alleged theft of property. Ceballos was arrested in Arkansas and charged with the theft of approximately $13,000 from the insurance agency where she worked as a producer. Although she is a resident and producer in Arkansas, Ceballos held a non-resident license in Louisiana.

The producers listed above have 30 days from the time of service to request an administrative appeal or the actions will become final.

Source: Louisiana Department of Insurance

Topics Agencies Louisiana
West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice has signed into law a bill that creates a mutual insurance company dedicated to coal mine reclamation costs. Critics have called it an ill-fated coal industry bailout, but supporters said it would protect taxpayers against rising reclamation costs.

The governor, himself a coal company owner, signed the bill last week, setting up a private, nonstock mining mutual insurance company, using $50 million in state funds. Senate Bill 1, backed by Senate President Craig Blair, would help the state avoid what Blair has called a financial tsunami from the reclamation of vast areas that have been spoiled by years of mining.

A recent state audit found that West Virginia could be liable for hundreds of millions of dollars in mine reclamation costs if companies that hold bonds become insolvent, according to news reports.

West Virginia for years has had a Special Reclamation Fund, funded through a tax on coal, but the concern is that it could be overwhelmed in coming years. The state also allows mining companies to post bonds of as much as $5,000 per acre, but a state environmental agency has said that would cover only a fraction of the reclamation costs, and a number of coal companies have gone bankrupt in recent years, news outlets have reported.

Federal law requires states to keep enough funding available to reclaim areas where permit holders have defaulted, and a recent study projected that costs could reach almost $500 million over the next 20 years. The Sierra Club environmental group last year filed a lawsuit aimed at pressuring the federal government to intervene in the cost of the mine cleanup.

Studies have shown that, as reclamation costs have increased, reclamation bonds may cover as little as 10% of the costs, and most of the bonds are held by one firm, Indemnity National Insurance Co, the Charleston Gazette-Mail reported.

Supporters of the West Virginia bill acknowledged that the full liabilities of such a mutual insurance company are not yet known, but the bill calls for an initial investment of $50 million from the state. That would come from the state Department of Environmental Protection but would be repaid, without interest, to the department once the reclamation work is finished, the bill explains.

The bill also would authorize the mutual company to issue performance bonds to mine operators.

Topics Mining
West Virginia is set to go to trial this week against Johnson & Johnson JNJ.N, Teva Pharmaceuticals Industries and AbbVie Inc. over claims that the companies fueled an opioid epidemic in the state.

West Virginia accused the drug manufacturers of creating a public nuisance by deceiving prescribers about the risks and benefits of opioid painkillers and of violating the states Consumer Credit and Protection Act.

The companies marketing efforts caused opioids to become a common treatment for chronic pain in West Virginia, which led to an increase in substance abuse and overdose deaths, according to West Virginias complaint.

The companies have denied the allegations.

Pharmaceutical company Endo International Plc ENDP.O, which was a co-defendant in the case, reached a $26 million settlement with West Virginia on March 30.

West Virginia has been hard hit by the epidemic.

In 2020, the state had a per capita opioid mortality rate of 81.4 overdose deaths per 100,000 people, nearly three times the national average of 28.3, according to data from the National Center for Health Statistics.

There have been a wave of recent settlements over companies responsibility for the opioid crisis, which has led to more than 500,000 deaths from overdoses in the past two decades, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

More than 3,300 lawsuits have been filed against drugmakers, distributors and pharmacies over the crisis.

Last month, Rhode Island and Florida struck settlements to resolve opioid litigation on the eve of trials. Rhode Island reached a deal valued at $107 million with Teva and Allergen and Florida settled with Teva, CVS, Allergan and Endo for a combined $878 million.

J&J and the three largest U.S. drug distributors  AmerisourceBergen Corp ABC.N, Cardinal Health Inc CAH.N and McKesson Corp MCK.N  reached nationwide settlements worth $26 billion to resolve state and local government opioid claims. West Virginia was one of five states that did not sign on to the J&J portion of that settlement.

Topics Virginia Drugs
How did the main players fare during the finale?

Tommy Shelby

After being blindsided by a terminal diagnosis, Tommy (Cillian Murphy) spends most of the finale tying up loose ends: settling his affairs, blowing up his home to make way for social housing, arranging a new home for his wife and son, travelling to Canada to claim $5 million owed to him, and finally having his showdown with Michael. Essentially, Tommy is preparing for his inevitable death, but at the last moment, a spiritual visit from his late daughter Ruby as he holds his gun to his head saves his life. He realises his doctor is involved with fascist Oswald Mosely and lied about Tommys illness in the hope that the Peaky Blinder would choose to end his life on his own terms: after all, only Tommy Shelby could kill Tommy Shelby. He leaves his burning gypsy caravan behind, presumably to reclaim his life, and the series ends as it began, with Tommy cutting a striking figure on horseback.

Michael Gray

After stewing in prison, Michael arranges to meet Tommy in Canada where he intends to rid himself of his cousin for good. In cahoots with the Boston Irish, he arranges to have a bomb placed in the car he is to share with Tommy to collect the $5 million owed to Shelby. However, he is thwarted by Johnny Dogs, who switches the bomb and places it in the other car, killing his co-conspirators. Tommy ends their feud with one shot from his gun, right through Michaels eye, fulfilling Polly's prophecy that one of them would die at the hands of the other.

Arthur Shelby

Tommys older brother had a redemptive narrative for the finale, transforming from a cumbersome addict to an essential part of the Shelby plan against their fascist enemies. When he is targeted by IRA members at the Garrison pub, Arthur is prepared for battle and soon settles the score, killing their leader Captain Swing/Laura McKee (played by Charlene McKenna) in revenge for the death of his beloved aunt, Polly (the late Helen McCrory). He is the only person Tommy entrusts with his terminal diagnosis and during Tommys goodbyes, his brother off-screen, by the river, as he finds farewells difficult.

Duke Shelby

While Michael was fighting to become the new king of the family across the pond, Erasmus Shelby laid claim to the title of Duke in his absence and surely set up another compelling family feud for a future movie or spin-off series. After he put a bullet through the eye of traitor Billy Grade and expelled his uncle Finn from the family (by order of the Peaky f*cking Blinders, of course), Finn vowed revenge on his newly-discovered nephew.

Ada Thorne

Tommys fierce sister Ada is not present for much of the final episode, appearing towards the end during an outdoor dinner where Tommy says his goodbyes. He encourages her to run for office, as she was always better suited to political life, and she senses he is keeping something from her and the rest of the family about his planned time away and how long he will be gone.

Did it satisfy long-time viewers?

Cillian Murphy in Peaky Blinders

Oh yes. It was a well-rounded conclusion, with enough violence and emotion to satisfy any fan as well as impressive acting and cinematography. There were twists and turns aplenty, especially surrounding Tommy and Michaels struggle for power over the family as well as Tommys health storyline. Plus there was a welcome return of fan-favourite Alfie Solomon, played by the excellent Tom Hardy, and viewers were delighted by Johnny Dogs sleight of hand with the Canadian car bomb, though his line that he was off to look at the fog while Tommy dealt with Michael will surely become an iconic line  its already getting the meme treatment on Twitter.

Is there a movie on the way?

Our favourite Birmingham gangsters are expected to return in a film. In January last year, showrunner Steven Knight said the show would "continue in another form" after the sixth and final season. In an interview with Empire magazine in January, Knight said: "I think of this sixth series as the end of the beginning."

The movie is expected to take place during World War II and will probably continue the story of Tommys connection with Oswald Mosely (Sam Claflin) and the rise of Nazis in the 1930s. While no casting has been announced yet, we can only hope that Cork star Cillian Murphy will reprise his role as the leader of the Peaky Blinders.

What should we watch next?

Peaky Blinders leaves an opening for another period drama to take its place and who better to provide its replacement than the creator of the show, Steven Knight. Knight has penned World War II drama SAS: Rogue Heroes, which is set in 1941 and tells the true story of how the SAS was formed in North Africa. A trailer was released yesterday and features Game of Thrones star Alfie Allen, Sex Education star Connor Swindells, and The Affair actor Dominic West. it will air on BBC One later this year.
Home tutors, who provide tuition to children that are unable to attend school, must be treated as employees of the Department of Education and not sub-contractors as they are now.

Thats according to Cork TD Colm Burke (Fine Gael), who is calling for home tutors to be officially designated as employees of the Department of Education.

There are approximately 1,425 home tutors who work with children who are not in school due to mental health difficulties, illness, or who are without an offer of a school place.

Currently, home tutors are classed as self-employed and are subject to PSRI Class S, which means they do not have the right to sick leave, holiday pay, maternity benefit, or pension entitlements.

Tutors can complete 42 hours of tuition each week. While they are engaged with the families of the children receiving the tuition, they are not contracted directly by the Department of Education like school-based teachers. However, the Department does act as their payroll agent.

Discrepancy

If a company in the private sector applied a similar approach, it would be criticized, Mr Burke said.

Likewise, in this case, the Department of Education is paying these people. They are making the deductions from their pay in relation to PRSI and PAYE but then they are still deemed not to be employees of the department.

I think this needs to be regularized. There are quite a number of people in Cork alone who are providing this service. As I understand it, there is a huge demand for this service and there are some people who are having difficulty in tutors being provided.

Colm Burke TD wants home tutors to be officially employed by the Department of Education. Picture: Howard Crowdy

A spokesperson for the Department of Education said the home tuition grant scheme is "intended to be a short term intervention."

"The Department of Education Home Tuition Grant Schemes provide funding towards the provision of a compensatory educational service for children who, for a number of specific reasons, are unable to attend school. By its nature, it is intended to be a short term intervention," they said.

"Under the Home Tuition Schemes, home tutors are engaged by the parents/guardian of the child who is to receive tuition. Home tutors do not have a contractual relationship with the Department of Education.

"In accordance with instructions from the Revenue Commissioners, payments under the Home Tuition Grant Scheme are subject to statutory deductions at source. In order to facilitate and support parents, as an administrative solution my Department acts solely as payroll agents on behalf of the parents/guardian.

"The Department of Social Protection has determined that home tutors are engaged under a contract for service and are therefore self-employed and subject to PRSI Class S. Any further queries in relation to PRSI Class should be directed to the Department of Social Protection."

Previous figures provided by the Department of Education show that 172 students last term were in receipt of the home tuition grant on mental health grounds. The tuition is provided in these "cases to students with diagnoses of school phobia, also known as school refusal or school avoidance, and/or associated depression or anxiety that is causing major disruption to their attendance.
A Kerryman has been remanded in custody after pleading guilty to sexually exploiting two girls at a house in Limerick.

The man, who cannot be named, also admitted possessing sexual material involving children.

The man appeared before Limerick Circuit Criminal Court and was arraigned on three charges which are contrary to the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act 1988.

He is being represented by Padraig J OConnell solicitors, Killarney. He wore a face mask in court and spoke only to confirm a guilty plea to all three charges.

The man pleaded guilty to one count of sexual exploitation of a child, a named girl at a house in Limerick, on April 21, 2016.

He also admitted to a charge that he sexually exploited a child, a second named girl, at the same address, on April 22, 2016.

The man also pleaded guilty to a single count of possession of child pornography.

Prosecuting senior counsel John OSullivan told the court there are two victims in this case and he requested the man be placed on a national register for sex offenders.

The court ordered the man be registered on this list, and that a psychological assessment be carried out.

The court extended free legal aid to cover the cost of a psychological report.

Judge Tom ODonnell, presiding, ordered that neither the man nor his victims be publicly identified.

No evidence was disclosed, and the man was remanded in custody for sentencing before Limerick Circuit Court on April 28th.
An agitated man with a knife in his pocket was refused service when he tried to buy alcohol at his local shop but when he was told he could come back later he responded by shaking the managers hand and kissing him.

Defence solicitor, Kevin Hegarty, described his client  46-year-old Bernard Ameyaw  as very animated, even without drink.

However, Judge Olann Kelleher referred to an earlier incident just before the accused went to the shop and said: Having a knife over his head at 6.30pm in the evening is a serious matter.

Sergeant Gearoid Davis outlined the evidence against Bernard Ameyaw in relation to the unlawful possession of a knife on the two occasions on May 26, 2019.

A witness on Church Street, off Shandon Street, said she went to lock her own gate when she saw the defendant, who is her neighbour, arguing with two males. He then went back into his own house at Church Street and came out brandishing a knife over his head at the two males.

Five minutes, later the manager at Centra on Shandon Street saw the defendant, who was agitated. He told him he had a knife for his own protection. He showed him the knife.

He said he wanted to buy alcohol. He was refused and was asked to leave and he did, Sgt Davis said.

The defendants only other conviction was under the Road Traffic Act.

Mr Hegarty quoted from the statement given by the manager of Centra, in which he stated in relation to the accused: I did not believe he was going to do anything. He asked me could he come back afterwards. [When told that he could] he shook my hand, kissed me and walked away.

Judge Kelleher asked: What is the underlying problem?

Mr Hegarty said, He is very animated, even without drink.

Judge Kelleher directed the preparation of a probation report in advance of sentencing on June 13, on the charges of possessing the knife on each occasion.
Sinn Fein remains on course to emerge from the Stormont election as Northern Irelands biggest party, a new opinion poll indicates.

The partys popularity has risen to 27%, extending its lead over the DUP to almost seven points, according to the survey of voter intentions.

The findings of the Institute of Irish Studies-University of Liverpool/Irish News poll are broadly in line with other surveys over recent weeks and months, all of which have put Sinn Fein in front and with a significant gap between it and the second-placed DUP.

The last University of Liverpool poll of decided voters in February had Sinn Fein on 23.2% of first preference votes and the DUP on 19.4%.

DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson faces a battle to retain the partys pre-eminent position at Stormont (Liam McBurney/PA)

While the DUP has made a slight gain seven weeks on, rising to 20.2%, Sinn Fein has surged ahead with a 3.8 point increase on its February standing.

If polling data is borne out at the May 5 Assembly election, Sinn Fein would displace the DUP as the regions largest party  a position it has occupied for almost 20 years  and it would be entitled to take the role of first minister, with Michelle ONeill the partys likely choice for the job.

However, there is uncertainty whether a functioning executive will be formed post-election.

The Executive collapsed in February when DUP first minister Paul Givan quit in protest over Brexits Northern Ireland Protocol and the barriers it has created on the movement of goods between Britain and the region.

The DUP has made clear it will not be returning to an executive before major changes are secured to the contentious Irish Sea trading arrangements.

The opinion poll also indicates that unionist concern about the protocol is rising.

In February, 11.7% of unionists ranked it as their biggest concern. That figure is now up to 20.9%, though it remains lower down the priority list for unionist voters than the economy (29.8%) and health (25.5%).

Of nationalist voters surveyed in the latest poll, only 2.1% ranked the protocol as their main concern  well behind health (31%) and the economy (30.2%).

Powersharing rules mean a properly functioning administration can only be formed if the largest unionist and largest nationalist parties agree to enter the joint office of the first and deputy first ministers.

Aside from the protocol, both the DUP and UUP have repeatedly refused to confirm whether they would take the post of deputy first minister alongside a Sinn Fein first minister.

Unionist concern over the Northern Ireland Protocol is rising, according to the opinion poll (Peter Morrison/PA)

The roles of first and deputy first minister are equal in law and one has no more power or authority than the other. While Sinn Fein has held the deputy first minister role for much of the last 15 years, it has yet to be in a position to take the first ministers job.

Of the other parties, the cross-community Alliance Party looks set to build on recent strong electoral showings.

Despite a one-point drop from February, the poll still places it as the third most popular party at 14.6%.

The Assembly election uses the single transferable vote system of proportional representation, which gives voters the opportunity to rank other parties in order of preference after selecting their first choice.

The opinion poll places Alliance out in front when it comes to the most popular party for transfer votes  something that could prove crucial in close-run battles in the regions 18 five-seat constituencies.

According to the survey, the UUP comes in fourth in the popular vote, on 13.5%  down a half-point from February.

The SDLP, in fifth, is up slightly on its standing seven weeks ago, rising from 9.9% to 10.3%.

Of the smaller parties, support for the Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) party has slipped back one point to 5.4%.

The Green Party NI has also fallen back, dropping two points in seven weeks to come in at 4.3%.

Support for People Before Profit has fallen as well, down slightly from the 2.3% it recorded in the last survey to 2.1%.

The opinion poll also found that 17.2% of voters have still to decide who they will give their first preference to.

Institute of Irish Studies director Professor Peter Shirlow told the Irish News that while support for the DUP had lifted slightly, it still looked like Sinn Fein was on course to displace it as the largest party.

The DUP may be aided by the decline in support for the TUV and the significant share of unionists yet to decide, he said.

The SDLP and UUP are pretty much where they were in 2017, while Alliance seems to be holding the 2017-19 electoral surge  these three parties need to transfer between each other to ensure seats are gained or at least not lost.

The poll of 1,000 voters was conducted between March 11 and 26 by Social Market Research Belfast and has a margin of error of 3.1+/-.
The Government is pushing for tougher international sanctions against Russia, as the Taoiseach condemned in the strongest possible terms the atrocities and civilian deaths in Ukraine.

Micheal Martin said that nothing can be ruled out in its response to the appalling and barbaric crimes committed by Russian troops in Ukraine.

He said that every conceivable pressure has to be put on Russia to stop the war and the attack on humanity.

I would rule nothing out in terms of how we respond, and I think Europe is repulsed by this, Mr Martin said in Dublin on Monday.

We have seen this before, we didnt think we would see it again.

There is no justification for this war and without question, from my perspective, the Russian Federation and Putin has put himself beyond the pale.

There has been international condemnation of other atrocities, including possible mass executions carried out by Russian forces as areas around the capital, Kyiv, returned to Ukrainian control.

We would support further sanctions given the appalling and barbaric crimes committed by Russian Federation troops in Ukraine, particularly in Kyiv and Bucha and other towns, where we see innocent civilians murdered, with their hands tied behind their backs, Mr Martin added.

We cant be blind in the first instance to the appalling human trauma and death that is being visited on the people of Ukraine and every conceivable pressure that we can has to be put on Russia, to stop this war and stop this attack on humanity.

Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney said he spoke to his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba about the atrocities uncovered in recent days.

Mr Coveney said he believes a war crime has been committed in Bucha and called for the incident to be investigated by the International Criminal Court.

(Mr Kuleba) was quite graphic in terms of his description of what hed seen and witnessed in Bucha, which is a town on the outskirts of Kyiv, where civilians have been slaughtered, tortured, and in some cases, raped before being killed.

It was a very sobering conversation, with pretty shocking accounts of brutality and what I think can only be described as war crimes.

He said that the Ukrainian minister has called on the European Union to increase its sanctions against Russia.

I said I would support him in that, Mr Coveney added.

Ireland has been one of the countries that has been pushing for strong sanctions, a fifth package of sanctions and I hope well see that this week, which will include the targeting of energy goods, and also increasing the number of Russian individuals that are on sanctions list, as well as targeting further Russian banks in terms of removing them from the Swift money transfer system.

I think we can also look at issues around access to ports and so on. So these are the kind of real and practical next steps that can be taken by the EU, of course theres a price to that.

The alternative to that is to add somewhat to the sanctions that are already in place, but not to do the kind of fundamental changes that I think Ukraine is now asking for in response to the gruesome discoveries.

He said the current sanctions were not stopping Russias war in Ukraine.

It has also emerged that the Russian ambassador to Ireland, Yuriy Filatov, has been invited to attend Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyys address to the joint Houses of the Oireachtas this week.

Mr Coveney said it is for Mr Filatov to decide whether to attend, adding it is important to keep communication lines open with Moscow.
SYDNEY, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Researchers from Australia's University of Sydney have discovered an underground, water-storing basin that stretches across the country's eastern seaboard which could store water for times of drought.

The research, published in Nature's Scientific Reports and released to the public on Monday, simulated the flow of water in three connected underground basins that stretch over 800 km between the cities of Brisbane in Australia's north, and Canberra to the south.

Lead author on the study, Dr. Ben Mather from the University of Sydney's School of Geosciences, told Xinhua the vast basins could capture up to 20 percent of the runoff water from Australia's recent floods.

"The groundwater superhighway is essentially a whole bunch of rock layers that are built from Permian to Triassic sediments, which are 50 to 300-million-year-old sediments. And they transport vast amounts of water over long distances."

Not only do the large water basins act as storage for water, absorbing water during times of intense rainfall which can be tapped into during times of drought, they also help spread water geographically.

"Surface and groundwater sources are connected. Groundwater acts as a buffer during flood and drought, by either soaking up or providing water supplies as the situation demands."

"We found that the Sydney (water) basin ... can transport water up to three meters per day, which is record-breaking on the global stage."

However, Mather noted that over the last two decades, groundwater levels, or the water table, had dropped by as much as 17 meters in agricultural regions, indicating that more would need to be understood to sustainably tap into this hidden supply of water.

"As groundwater levels drop and stop naturally replenishing rivers, water evaporation leaves salt behind, with negative implications for rural and urban water users."

Mather and his team's research has received funding from the government of the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW). They hope this initial research would form the basis for using groundwater in a sustainable and mutually beneficial way.

"Now that we have this model, we can start to refine down from there, and really help farmers and other users of the groundwater to determine which of the most productive aquifers are within their local region." 
Warning: some graphic details below

Europe must consider stepping up penalties for Moscow by boycotting its gas exports, Germanys defence minister has said, as foreign outrage mounts over evidence of possible executions and other atrocities by Russian forces in Ukraine.

Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida said on Monday that we strongly condemn attacks on civilians, following reports of bodies found with signs of torture in areas abandoned by Russian forces.

New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern called reports of rape and other atrocities by Russian soldiers beyond reprehensible.

Meanwhile, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy appealed in a video shown Sunday during the Grammy Awards in Las Vegas for musicians and other artists to help tell the story of Russias invasion.

A mass grave in Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv (Rodrigo Abd/AP)

Support us in any way you can, Mr Zelenskyy said.

Ukrainian officials said the bodies of 410 civilians were found in towns around the capital, Kyiv, that were recaptured from Russian forces. Mr Zelenskyy called the killings evidence of genocide.

In Bucha, northwest of the capital, Associated Press journalists saw 21 bodies.

One group of nine, all in civilian clothes, were scattered around a site that residents said Russian troops used as a base.

They appeared to have been shot at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs.

Destroyed homes in Bucha (Rodrigo Abd/AP)

Ukrainian officials blamed Russian soldiers, but Russias defence ministry said photos and videos of dead bodies have been stage managed by the Kyiv regime for the western media.

The ministry said not a single civilian in Bucha faced any violent military action and the mayor did not mention any abuses a day after Russian troops left.

Russian president Vladimir Putins February 24 invasion has killed thousands of people and forced more than four million Ukrainians to flee their country.

Mr Putin has said the attack is aimed at eliminating a security threat after Ukraines government pursued membership in the US-European Nato military alliance.

The head of Ukraines delegation in talks with Russia said Moscows negotiators informally agreed to most of a draft proposal discussed during talks in Turkey, but no written confirmation has been provided.

A rocket is buried in the ground in Bucha (Rodrigo Abd/AP)

Russian demands include Ukraine declaring itself neutral and renouncing membership of military alliances.

Russian forces retreated from some areas around Kyiv after Moscow said it was focusing its offensive on the countrys east, where two regions are controlled by Russian-backed separatists.

Russian troops had rolled into Bucha in the early days of the invasion and stayed until March 30.

The reports of atrocities are severe enough that European officials would have to talk about halting gas supplies from Russia, German defence minister Christine Lambrecht said on public broadcaster ARD.

Such crimes must not go unanswered.

Ukrainian soldiers celebrate at a checkpoint in Bucha (Rodrigo Abd/AP)

Europe gets 40% of its gas and 25% of its oil from Russia, while such sales are the Kremlins main source of export revenue.

Governments have been scrambling to find ways to reduce that reliance.

Estimates of the impact of a gas boycott on European countries vary but most involve a substantial loss of economic output.

For its part, Russia is temporarily enjoying a windfall as global prices surge due to anxiety over possible supply disruptions.

Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko called on countries to end Russian gas imports. He said they were funding the killings.

On Saturday, Lithuania announced it had stopped imports of Russian gas and urged other European governments to do the same.

It is time to do everything possible to make the war crimes of the Russian military the last manifestation of such evil on earth

If we can do it, the rest of Europe can do it too, president Gitanas Nauseda said on Twitter, referring to Russia as the aggressor.

Some European leaders said the killings in the Kyiv area amounted to war crimes.

US secretary of state Antony Blinken called images of what happened near Kyiv a punch to the gut. on CNNs State of the Union programme. The US has previously said that it believes Russia committed war crimes.

It is a brutality against civilians we havent seen in Europe for decades, Nato secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said on the same broadcast.

Russia asked for a meeting on Monday of the UN Security Council to discuss events in the city.

One resident of Bucha, who refused to give his name out of fear for his safety, said Russian troops went from building to building and took people out of the basements where they were hiding.

From this month on - no more Russian gas in Lithuania .



Years ago my country made decisions that today allow us with no pain to break energy ties with the agressor.



If we can do it, the rest of Europe  can do it too!  Gitanas Nauseda (@GitanasNauseda) April 2, 2022

He said soldiers checked their phones for evidence of anti-Russian activity and took them away or shot them.

The AP also saw two bodies, that of a man and a woman, wrapped in plastic that residents said they had covered and placed in a shaft until a proper funeral could be arranged.

He put his hands up, and they shot him, said the resident who refused to be identified.

Oleksiy Arestovych, an adviser to Mr Zelenskyy, claimed some of the women had been raped before being killed and the Russians then burned the bodies.

On Monday, the Ukrainian military said its forces had retaken some towns in the Chernihiv region and humanitarian aid was being delivered.

The road between Chernihiv and Kyiv was to reopen to some traffic later in the morning, according to the news agency RBK Ukraina.

The mayor of Chernihiv, which has been cut off from food and other supplies for weeks, said Russian shelling has destroyed 70% of the northern city.

Zoya, the wife of 44 year old, Hennadiy Merchynskyi looks identifying along with police at the body of her husband, killed by Russian forces and dumped in a well in the village of Motyzhyn, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022. Picture:AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda

The regional governor in Kharkiv in the northeast said Russian artillery and tanks launched more than 20 strikes on Ukraines second-largest city and its outskirts over the past day.

In a video address posted online Sunday, Mr Zelenskyy said Russian soldiers who killed and tortured civilians were responsible for concentrated evil.

It is time to do everything possible to make the war crimes of the Russian military the last manifestation of such evil on earth, he said in remarks translated by his office.

The president directed some of his remarks at the mothers of Russian soldiers.

Even if you raised looters, how did they also become butchers? he said. You couldnt overlook that they are deprived of everything human. No soul. No heart. They killed deliberately and with pleasure.

In Motyzhyn, some 30 miles west of Kyiv, residents told AP that Russian troops killed the towns mayor, her husband and her son and threw their bodies into a pit in a pine forest behind houses where Russian forces had slept.

Inside the pit, AP journalists saw four bodies of people who appeared to have been shot at close range.

The mayors husband had his hands behind his back, with a piece of rope nearby, and a piece of plastic wrapped around his eyes like a blindfold.

Ukrainian deputy prime minister Iryna Vereshchuk confirmed the mayor was killed while being held by Russian forces.
A serving London Metropolitan Police officer has been charged with sexually assaulting a colleague while on duty.

PC Joseph Demir, attached to the North West Basic Command Unit, was charged with sexual assault by post on March 9, the force said in a statement.

The incident is alleged to have occurred on March 10, 2020, when Mr Demir was a student officer at Hendon Training School. The offence was reported on July 1, 2020.

Mr Demir, who has been placed on restricted duties, was charged following an investigation by the Mets Directorate of Professional Standards.

He is due to appear at Willesden Magistrates Court on Tuesday.
People from Bucha have told of the happy life, different plans and dreams for the future they have lost as a result of the consistent attacks on the city.

Bodies with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds and signs of torture lay scattered across the city, which lies on the outskirts of Kyiv, after Russian soldiers withdrew from the area.

Nadia Melnychuk, 27, owns a cottage in Bucha with her husband, Roman, and said knowing neighbours have been killed in their little, beautiful city is like a horror story.

We didnt want to see this life, we didnt want to have war, Ms Melnychuk, a PR manager, told the PA news agency.

In February and January we had a simple, happy life there We had a happy life, different plans and dreams for our future, and after that we lost everything we had.

Nadia Melnychuk and her husband, Roman, in Bucha (Nadia Melnychuk)

We couldnt even know  our house, is it still here? We have no information about it.

Ms Melnychuk and her husband moved from Kyiv to Bucha during one of Ukraines Covid lockdowns last year.

When Hostomel Airport was struck by Russian air forces just outside the city on the first day of the invasion, they could see it from the windows of their cottage.

They left Bucha for western Ukraine as soon as they could.

Its like a horror story, Ms Melnychuk said.

We know that our neighbours, who live not far from our cottage house, some of them are killed.

We couldnt even come into contact with our relatives who stayed in Bucha for the first two weeks because they were under their houses.

They tried to be in a safe place because there were rockets everywhere and soldiers killed everyone they see on the streets.

A photo taken in Bucha Municipal Park (Nadia Melnychuk)

She confirmed her relatives, including her mother-in-law, have now left the city, but described what some of them had seen in Bucha.

There were stories from our relatives who told us that they tried to go to houses of people, and if someone didnt open their door to the Russian soldiers, didnt give them food or something  because Ukrainians dont want to be in contact with them, they are occupiers  they killed Ukrainians, she said.

People were frightened and they couldnt even bury these bodies of killed people, because these killed people were on on the streets.

Ms Melnychuk likened Bucha to other European settlements, saying its a little, beautiful city.

I couldnt even imagine that it could happen with us.

Its really horrible that our neighbour country, Russia, wanted to take everything we had and tried to make such big and awful things with our people.

She added she had heard via Ukrainian territorial defence forces that the scenes in Bucha were worse than what they saw in Donetsk in 2014.

Ms Melnychuk said the territorial defence forces reported to her relatives in the city that there were dead and naked women in the streets who they thought must have been raped.

Olha, who is also from Bucha and did not want to share her last name, left the city on February 24 just as Ms Melnychuk did.

The 21-year-old and her family left Bucha when they first felt shaking from the explosions at Hostomel airport.

Others she knows have also left the city, while she described how it felt to leave before many of her friends did.

The messages were quite short, like: Im alive, in Kyiv, will text you if I need help,' she said.

I cant even imagine how much pain and terror my friends went through.
Burma Chinese Foreign Minister Reiterates Support for Junta in Talks With Myanmar Counterpart

Myanmar junta's Foreign Minister Wunna Maung Lwin (left) and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on Friday. / MOFA

Stepping up Beijings support for the Myanmar military junta, which staged a coup last year, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his visiting Myanmar counterpart that China was ready to work with his country to deepen exchanges and cooperation in all areas.

Junta-appointed Myanmar Foreign Minister Wunna Maung Lwin was in China from March 31 to April 2 at the invitation of Wang Yi.

During the meeting in Tunxi, Anhui Province on Friday, Wang said Beijing has always placed Myanmar in an important position in its neighborly diplomacy while expressing Beijings desire that the two sides should advance the construction of the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor; strengthen cooperation on industrial parks, cross-border power grids and connectivity; and implement landmark projects.

China is one of the top investors in Myanmar and has strategic infrastructure projects in the country, including energy pipelines and a proposed port that would give Beijing a critical link to the Indian Ocean.

It was also condemned for taking a soft approach towards the junta by saying its priorities are stability and not interfering in the internal affairs of its neighbor. The coup has so far killed more than 1,700 people and caused social and political instability, with many observers fearing that the country is now on the verge of being a failed state.

A Chinese government press release said Wunna Maung Lwin expressed deep concerns over Myanmars economic difficulties, which were aggravated by the drastic changes in the current international situation.

In return, Wang said, China is ready to strengthen coordination with Myanmar to help overcome difficulties.

During the meeting with Wunna Maung Lwin, according to the Chinese press release, the two sides had an in-depth discussion on regional cooperation and exchanged views on issues including the South China Sea and the Ukraine crisis. The US and EU have warned China not to support Russia.

Wang stressed that joint efforts should be made to cope with the negative spillover effects of the Ukraine crisis, oppose unilateral sanctions and long-arm jurisdiction, and safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of developing countries.

Since the coup, regime leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing has made diplomatic overtures toward Russia and visited there. The Myanmar regime has purchased military hardware from Russia, and Moscow has backed the regimes coup. The regime has sent several high-ranking delegations to Russia since the coup.

When Russia invaded Ukraine, Myanmars spokesman expressed support for Russia.

After its failure to condemn the coup, sustained anti-China demonstrations erupted in Myanmar and factories owned and run by Chinese companies have been attacked.

However, during the first week of June, Chinese Ambassador to Myanmar Chen Hai met Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing in Naypyitaw, becoming the first ambassador to do so.

In the same month, a Chinese governments fundamental assessment of Myanmar showed that the country was moving into another prolonged period of military rule, according to the Financial Times.

Yun Sun, an expert on Myanmar-China relations at the Stimson Center, a US think-tank, said to the Times that, I think the Chinese can see that this military coup is successful and is here to stay.

During the Friday meeting, China said it supported regional group ASEAN, which includes Myanmar, for playing a mediating role in Myanmars crisis.

Wang urged regional countries to work with Myanmar to constructively implement ASEANs five-point consensus based on the principle of non-interference in the blocs internal affairs.

The consensus is the blocs peace plan for Myanmar, including an immediate cessation of violence in the country. Last year, ASEAN didnt allow the junta chief to attend the blocs summit after his failure to honor the agreement.

You may also like these stories:

Regime Forces Kill Motorbike Rider in Central Myanmar

Myanmar Regime Backs Russias Invasion of Ukraine

Myanmar Junta Threatens to Disband Two Major Parties After They Refuse to Submit Financial Records
Burma Military-Linked Myanmar Beers Sales Tumble Amid Boycott

Myanmar Beer at a restaurant in Yangon in March 2022 / AFP

When Japanese brewing giant Kirin called time on its Myanmar operations last month, the news made little difference to Kyaw Gyilike many drinkers, he had long boycotted the beer it produced with a military conglomerate.

For years, Myanmar Beer dominated bars and supermarket shelves, its Japanese backing a sign of the economic liberalization washing into the Southeast Asian country after the military relaxed its iron grip on power in 2011.

But after the generals ousted Daw Aung San Suu Kyis civilian government in February last year, many turned their backs on the brew, along with a host of other goods made by companies linked to the armed forces, from soap to coffee.

We know other beer brands are paying tax to the military, but we dont want all of our money going to them, said sailor Kyaw Gyi, sitting outside a bar on Yangons 19th Street, a popular drinking haunt.

We avoid it. If there is only Myanmar Beer in the restaurant, then we dont drink beer, he said, using a pseudonym.

Farther along the street in Yangons bustling downtown, restaurant manager Zaw Naing said his establishment hadnt sold the light, 5 percent brew since April last year.

It was not just the beer orders they had canceled, he added  they also asked the brand to take back all the chairs, tables and umbrellas that bore its red, white and gold emblem.

If people see the Myanmar Beer logo with our restaurant name, they wont come, he said, also asking to use a pseudonym.

Demand down

As anger seethes at the militarys crackdown on dissentwhich a local monitoring group says has killed more than 1,700 peopleestablishments still serving the beer have faced more serious consequences.

In early March, bombs were set off outside two Yangon bars and a restaurant in second city Mandalay that were still selling the beer, according to local media.

Drivers transporting the beer in the rural central plains have also been stopped by local anti-coup groups and their cargoes trashed, according to local media reports.

Myanmar Brewerythe firm run by Kirin and military conglomerate Myanma Economic Holdingsenjoyed a market share of nearly 80 percent, according to figures published by Kirin in 2018.

Following months of Covid- and coup-related disruption in 2021, its year-end operating profit was just 6.6 billion yen (US$54 million)compared with 13.8 billion yen the previous year.

In February, after months of trying to dissolve its partnership with the military-backed firm, and as pressure from rights groups escalated, the Japanese giant announced it would leave Myanmar.

The boycott and its upcoming exit is leaving rivals Heineken, Carlsberg and Thailands Chang eyeing the market gap.

The three breweries have picked up market share from Myanmar Beer, particularly in the cities, said a Yangon-based market observer who did not want to be named.

AFP has contacted Carlsberg for comment.

A representative for Heineken who requested anonymity said it was too early to assess and comment on consumer purchasing habits.

We keep drinking

But back on 19th Street, Aung Myo said customers had long switched to beers untainted by connections to military-backed firms, like Chang, Tigerowned by Heinekenand Carlsbergs Tuborg.

People dont want to drink Myanmar Beer even though it tastes good, he told AFP.

The demand is definitely down.

In Myanmars complex political landscape, there are still some areas where punters can enjoy a Myanmar Beer in peace.

Crowded bars in the military-built capital Naypyitaw were still serving it on a recent Saturday night, and the brew is reportedly still available in further-flung rural areas that have seen little coup-related violence.

The boycott has also been rebuffed in Rakhine in the west, where a truce between the junta and Arakan Army (AA) rebels fighting for greater autonomy has insulated the state from the turmoil gripping much of the rest of Myanmar.

We dont see any boycott movement here, said government employee Htun Htun, 28, at a bar in state capital Sittwe, where billboards for the beer still lined the streets.

So, we keep drinking it The alcohol rate is not too high and the taste is good.

Analysts say the AA is taking advantage of the calm to expand its presence in the state, setting up its own courts and administration while the junta battles anti-coup dissidents elsewhere.

Clashes between the AA and the military in 2019 displaced more than 200,000 people across the state, one of Myanmars poorest.

While the current peace lasts, Nyi Nyi, 27, said he would not be looking to change.

If theres no problem with the military, we will still choose our usual Myanmar Beer, he said.
Burma One Killed, Five Injured as Myanmar Junta Quells Prison Protest

Monywa Prison in Sagaing Region. / Monywa People Strike Committee

Myanmars junta has killed at least one inmate and injured five others in the notorious Monywa Prison, Sagaing Region, after a protest broke out.

Political prisoners and other detainees in Monywa on Sunday evening staged a loud protest against human rights violations and torture at the prison which holds nearly 1,000 inmates, most of whom are political detainees. Prominent protest leader Wai Moe Naing and ousted regional chief minister Dr. Myint Naing are both held at Monywa.

Anti-regime slogans, like We are united, our people, could be heard, residents told The Irrawaddy.

Military vehicles entered the compound and around 30 shots were heard, sources said.

Anti-regime activist Ko Than Kyaw Oo of the Monywa Peoples Strike Committee confirmed an inmates death and five injuries with gunshots.

He said junta troops removed prison staff and took control of the jail, interrogating detainees about the protest through the night.

Junta forces tortured detainees. I am worried for my comrades and other political prisoners as we have heard nothing, the activist told The Irrawaddy.

Ko Than Kyaw Oo said the protest, despite the threat of harsh punishments, stresses how badly political prisoners are being treated.

They refused to accept injustice despite knowing they are inside the juntas hell. I respect their courage and urge people outside the jail to get involved in the revolution, the activist said.

Monywa detainees have joined the general strike by defying the junta inside Monywa, he said.

Protests have been held at other prisons and detention centers and the junta has responded with beatings, shootings, denial of medical treatment and enforced isolation.

On March 15, seven Kale prison inmates in Sagaing Region, including Van Dam, a Chin National Defense Force member, were killed and more injured. The regime said they were shot when Van Dam led around 50 prisoners in a prison break, taking three prison officers hostage.

The junta claimed prison guards only shot at the prisoners legs but the regimes photos showed some victims were shot in the head and chest.

The junta has not mentioned Sundays incident in Monywa.

Since last years coup, the junta has killed at least 1,723 people and detained more than 13,000, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.

You may also like these stories:



Funding Revolution Important for the Victory: Prominent Myanmar Activist

Regime Artillery Strikes Kill Children and Senior Citizens in Upper Myanmar

Yangon Suffers Water Shortages Amid Rolling Blackouts in Myanmar
Burma Resistance in Myanmars Demoso Claims It Killed 350 Junta Troops in Jan-March

Demoso-PDF fighters

More than 300 junta troops were reportedly killed during a series of intense firefights with the Peoples Defense Force in Kayah States Demoso in the first three months of this year.

Demoso is one of the major towns in Kayah State after its capital Loikaw.

Demoso-Peoples Defense Force (PDF) said in a statement on Sunday that from Jan. 1 to March 31, 350 soldiers were killed in 67 firefights.

Fourteen resistance fighters also lost their lives during the fighting and some were severely injured, it added. The Irrawaddy couldnt independently verify the fatalities.

Kayah State has been one of the most active resistance areas against the regime in Myanmar. Heavy fighting between the local PDFs and junta soldiers has raged in towns since last year.

The junta responded to the heavy losses by escalating military operations and its violence against civilians, including indiscriminate artillery shelling and airstrikes on civilian targets, killings of civilians and torching of houses.

Intense fighting broke out between the local PDF and regime soldiers in Demoso and surrounding areas last month.

According to the Demoso-PDF, 495 civilian houses were set on fire by the juntas forces and 94 other civilian houses were destroyed by the juntas artillery shells in the past three months. Junta forces also killed at least eight innocent civilians in Demoso Township, the group said.

State-based resistance groups said villagers who remain in their homes are being tortured, killed and used as human shields.

When regime forces pass, they burn villages and conduct aerial and artillery strikes against villages and displacement camps, residents say.

The junta has also blocked the main supply routes into the area in an apparent attempt to isolate Demoso.

In the two weeks since the regime forces blocked the supply lines, making it difficult for refugees to carry food, the fighting has eased somewhat.

They blocked all three main roads into Demoso so refugees are finding it difficult to carry food, a spokesperson for the Demoso-PDF said.

A majority of Kayah States population of 200,000 have been displaced by fighting, with clashes taking place almost daily.

You may also like these stories:



Junta Forces Massacre 14 People in Upper Myanmar

Myanmar Junta Sentences Veteran Activist on his Birthday

Junta Court Charges Myanmar Journalist With Incitement
Burma Shan Armed Group Refuses Myanmar Junta Request to Withdraw Troops

SSPP troops. / SSPP / SSA Info

The Shan State Progress Party (SSPP) has rejected a request from Myanmars military regime to withdraw troops from southern Shan State.

It is not like we arrived in southern Shan State yesterday. Our Wan Hai headquarters are in southern Shan State, said SSPP secretary Colonel Sai Hsu.

They have been making demands. We only live in southern Shan State. Where are supposed to withdraw to?

Lieutenant General Yar Pyae, chairman of the regimes National Solidarity and Peace Negotiation Committee, and SSPP leaders met in Naypyitaw on March 31 and the armed group was told to withdraw its troops.

The meeting was attended by SSPP vice-chairman Sao Khin Hsai, Col Sai Hsu and some central executive committee members.

Junta media reported that the regime discussed de-escalation of the conflict in Shan State and urged the SSPP to cooperate in development work and ahead of a general election, which junta leader Min Aung Hlaing has promised to hold next year.

Col. Sai Hsu said the SSPP had not responded to the election request.

We accepted their invitation. We made no comment about the election. They just talked about their plans, he said.

The SSPP went to the capital to avoid fighting with the regime, said Col. Sai Hsu.

Mainly we discussed how to avoid fighting. It is not our responsibility if fighting breaks out, he said.

Tensions are growing as junta forces tail SSPP troop movements, said Col. Sai Hsu, who called on both sides to exercise restraint.

The SSPP and its rival Shan armed group, the Restoration Council of Shan State (RCSS), have been engaged in intense fighting over territory.

Both were formed to seek greater autonomy in Shan State with the RCSS based in the south and the SSPP in the north of the sprawling state.

In June last year, the SSPP, with the support of its Taang National Liberation Army and United Wa State Army allies, attacked the RCSS, which was expanding into northern Shan State.

As defeated RCSS troops withdrew south, the SSPP followed them to Lawksawk in February, prompting the regime to ask the SSPP to withdraw back north.

The RCSS signed the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement with President Thein Seins quasi-civilian government in 2015.
Burma Ten Alleged Yangon Activists Jailed Over Bomb Attacks on Myanmar Junta

The detained Yangon suspects jailed last week by the regime.

Ten alleged Yangon activists, who were detained in April last year and charged with involvement in bombings, were sentenced to seven years in prison with labor, according to their lawyers.

A court in Insein Prison on March 31 handed down the maximum sentences for illegal weapons possession and their detention period will be deducted from the sentence. The 10 still face charges Article 436 of the Penal Code which could extend their terms by 20 years.

The arson trial under Article 436 is ongoing. The maximum penalty under 436 is 20 years, said a lawyer.

They were detained in night raids on April 17 last year following three blasts that killed at least one soldier and wounded several others at the General Administration Office in Yankin Township, where troops were based.

The following day, the regimes Myawaddy TV announced suspects had been arrested in the township with bomb-making equipment after a tipoff. The accused showed signs of severe torture in the juntas pictures.

The face of Ma Khin Nyein Thu, 31, was visibly swollen and she was reportedly sexually harassed during the interrogation.

A family member said Ma Khin Nyein Thus is now in good health.

Since the coup, many activists have been given lengthy jail terms or death sentences for alleged attacks and for having ties to the civilian National Unity Government or its armed peoples defense forces (PDFs). Recently several individuals were given 10-year sentences for allegedly donating cash to PDFs.

Those who are tried by court-martial are given harsher penalties and denied citizenship and human and legal rights, including the right to counsel, said lawyers.

U Khin Maung Myint, a lawyer, said: There are two separate types of court, one for courts-martial in townships where direct military rule is imposed. Lawyers are not allowed to represent the accused in those courts. No one tried at those courts has been released and they are all given maximum sentences.

No detainees tried at prison courts have been released, he added.

More than 10,007 people remain under detention since the February 2021 coup, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners. Around 905 detainees have been given prison sentences, including 59 death sentences. Two children have received death sentences. At least 41 other suspects in hiding have been given death sentences in absentia.

You may also like these stories:

Serbia Sold Arms to Myanmar Junta After Coup

Regime Forces Kill Motorbike Rider in Central Myanmar

Myanmar Regime Backs Russias Invasion of Ukraine
Burma UN Envoy on Myanmar Calls on ASEAN to Engage All Voices

Noleen Heyzer, the UN Special Envoy for Myanmar (left) and Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen during the meeting on Friday.

A UN special envoy who attracted Myanmar peoples fury by suggesting they seek negotiation with the countrys military junta has urged the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to pay attention to all parties involved in its approach to solving the crisis in Myanmar.

The envoy, Noleen Heyzer, met with Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen and the countrys ASEAN Special Envoy for Myanmar, Prak Sokhonn, last week. Myanmar is an ASEAN member and Cambodia holds the 10-member blocs rotating chair for this year.

During the meeting the envoy stressed it was paramount for ASEAN to listen carefully to all voices on the ground in supporting durable peace and national reconciliation, according to a statement by the UN.

The Special Envoy emphasized that indicators and results on the ground were urgently needed, adding any goodwill towards protecting the people of Myanmar and their livelihoods needed to be demonstrated in concrete terms, the release said.

Myanmar has been in social and political turmoil since last years military coup, which has reversed all of the democratic reforms that the Southeast Asian country enjoyed for the preceding 10 years. The majority of the countrys population has rejected the coup by all means, including armed resistance, and the juntas brutal response has killed more than 1,700 people so far. It has also launched airstrikes and torched villages accused of harboring resistance groups. International observers say the country is on the verge of being a failed state.

In February, Heyzer made Myanmar people furious with her comment that those defying the military must negotiate a power-sharing arrangement as a solution. Having witnessed how brutal the Myanmar regime is, the majority of Myanmar people now take it for granted that any attempt to negotiate or share power with the junta is nothing more than a direct insult to the people killed by the regime. Furthermore, as the majority are rejecting military rule in the country by any means at this moment, while also demanding justice, Myanmar people unsurprisingly took the UN envoys power sharing recommendation as a slap in the face.

The press release about the meeting in Cambodia said the special envoy continued to stress the urgent need for a coherent international backing for a unified regional approach supportive of a Myanmar-led process reflective of the will of the people.

She will also continue to engage with all key stakeholders, focusing on helping articulate the bottom-lines and conditions needed for momentum towards any talks about talks in the greater interest of peace, stability and democracy, it added.

The UN envoys meeting in Cambodia came after the ASEAN envoy visited Myanmar last month to visit with regime boss Min Aung Hlaing, prompting criticism that the tour would legitimize the regime. Upon his return from the trip, Prak Sokhonn admitted that the Myanmar issue was complicated and would take a long time to solve, as the stakeholders were not ready to cooperate and still insist on fighting and eliminating one another.

Prior to his visit, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen visited Myanmar and met the junta chief, becoming the first outside figure to see the regime head, who has been targeted for international sanctions and condemnation for his bloody post-coup attacks on his opponents. Hun Sens visit was seriously condemned by Myanmar people, too.

Neither Hun Sen nor Prak Sokhonn met Myanmars detained democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi or any members of the countrys shadow National Unity Government, which many in Myanmar take as their legitimate government.

During her meeting with Hun Sen, Noleen Heyzer urged the prime minister to leverage his influence on Myanmars regime chief to de-escalate violence and serve the greater interests of the people.

However, a few days before the UN envoy encouraged Hun Sen to coax concessions from Min Aung Hlaing, the junta chief vowed to crush all resistance in the country.

Currently, the regimes troops are raiding and torching villages in Upper Myanmar under the name of clearance operations.

You may also like these stories:

Serbia Sold Arms to Myanmar Junta After Coup

Regime Forces Kill Motorbike Rider in Central Myanmar

Myanmar Regime Backs Russias Invasion of Ukraine
The Australian Government has directed the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) to conduct a public inquiry into access to regional mobile towers and into the feasibility of providing mobile roaming during natural disasters or other emergencies.

Minister for Communications Urban Infrastructure Cities and the Arts Paul Fletcher said the Government has had a longstanding policy of improving mobile coverage and competition in regional, rural, remote and peri-urban Australia. He said the 2021 Regional Telecommunications Review had noted strong progress but highlighted issues that need to be further addressed.

In that context, we want to make sure that the current settings for providing access to mobile towers are fit-for-purpose, Fletcher said.

The ACCC will call for submissions from a range of parties, including the organisations that provide towers and associated infrastructure, and the organisations that use the towers to provide services to Australians.

A factor that increases the need for this review is that in the last year both Telstra and Optus have sold part ownership of their tower networks to third parties. It is important to consider the impact of this change in ownership on the incentives of the tower ownership businesses when it comes to providing access to their towers and the charges levied for that access.

The inquiry will look at the costs of providing towers and associated infrastructure, including land access, and how these translate into the fee structures for firms interested in accessing towers to provide mobile and other wireless services. It will also look at the factors that are important for industry in deciding whether to invest in towers and provide better mobile coverage.

Minister for Regionalisation Regional Communications and Regional Education Bridget McKenzie said the 2021 Regional Telecommunications Review had recommended that the Government examine the feasibility of providing mobile roaming during natural disasters and other emergencies.

The inquiry will be specifically about whether roaming can be activated in an area where there is a disaster or other emergencies, regardless of which telco people may be using during the time of the crisis.

This could help our regional communities stay safe, stay connected to business and to loved ones during natural disasters and other emergencies.

The ACCC will consider the technical feasibility of providing roaming during these circumstances, as well as the business systems and processes that would be required, and the time and cost involved, McKenzie said.

The ACCC is to commence the inquiry by 1 July 2022 and must report within 12 months. The ACCC will publish a draft report and seek submissions on that report before providing its final report to the Minister.

The direction and explanatory statement can be found here.

To view the report of the 2021 Regional Telecommunications Review and the Governments full response, go here.

The sale of mobile sites to another party generally incentivises better access to the site by competitors. The general model for these site asset sales and lease back, is that the buyer makes a break-even or modest return on the lease back to the original owner then maximises the return by engaging other tenants on the asset.

The first time this type of asset sale and lease-back occurred with mobile sites in Australia was in 2000 when Cable & Wireless Optus sold it's mobile tower sites to Crown Castle Australia for $200 million. Crown Castle was in a break-even position on the original deal with C&W Optus but was then able to leverage the assets with leases to the other mobile operators.

Regional and rural sites are more costly to establish than urban. In most cases a road and power transmission will need to be constructed to the site, resulting in establishment costs regularly in excess of $1 million. The mobile traffic generated by these sites is usually not enough to provide any return on investment, hence the mobile black-spot funding provided by Government. Minimising the losses on these sites has become the objective of the mobile operators, as returns sometimes will not cover operating costs, as demonstrated by the recent deal between Telstra and TPG Telecom, driving better asset utilisation.

Australia's wide geography area with low population density provides a unique economic problem that can't be solved by applying standard competition models. It will be interesting to see the findings that come out of this enquiry.
Commpete, an alliance of Australian challenger telecommunication companies, has welcomed the announcement of an ACCC inquiry into telecommunications competition issues as part of the Governments response to the 2021 Regional Telecommunications Independent Committee Report.

Commpete says the announcement follows repeated calls from it for the ACCC to conduct an urgent and wide-ranging review of the mobile market, with a particular focus on the actions required to produce a dynamic and competitive market for wholesale mobile services.

Today the Government heeded these calls by instructing the ACCC to formally look into these issues, particularly in relation to mobile tower access fees and making network roaming available in emergency circumstances.

Commpete chair Michelle Lim said, Commpete strongly welcomes this announcement, as the inquiry focuses on an important area impacting competition. However, the ACCC should now go further and use this inquiry to examine how mobile competition is being affected by recent and proposed changes to the structure of the industry.

Because MVNOs rely on unregulated access to MNOs infrastructure, MNOs are in an unduly strong bargaining position and are largely able to dictate the terms of service agreements.

With the proposed Telstra/TPG network sharing deal, despite what is being said before it formally proceeds, there is logical and genuine risk it will become even more difficult for MVNOs and smaller competitive infrastructure players to negotiate reasonable terms that enable them to compete effectively in the market. The reality is the future of mobile access for end users is beholden on terms which ultimately are within the four corners of a bi-lateral commercial 10-year agreement.

In other words, the agreement between two parties has long-term effects on the structure of the whole industry. This is a profound risk to both competition and the long-term interests of the Australian public.

Lim continued that the recent TowerCo sales, which included towers funded under Government Blackspot programs, with others dating back to Postmaster General, demonstrated that the ACCC inquiry in seeking to prevent bottleneck pricing for co-location should not be underestimated.

This should also be considered given recent developments where TPGs access to sharing network capabilities was conditional on TPG decommissioning parts of its physical network tenanted with TowerCo businesses, she said.

With the development of new technologies such as 5G, there are unparalleled opportunities for innovation and diversity in the mobile sector, which will benefit all in the economy. But outcomes will be sub-optimal if left to the incumbent MNO club, and MVNOs are not given the opportunity to actively participate and challenge the cosy status quo, driving change through innovation.

This is the same dynamic that has undermined the effectiveness of Government funded mobile infrastructure and the prompted the new emphasis on active neutral host networks.

The major MNOs have pocketed government subsidies to build out or upgrade their own networks, and doing so has frustrated the achievement of open access. Commpete believes that any telecoms infrastructure constructed or upgraded using government grants or subsidies should require active network sharing with MVNOs as well as MNOs, in order to drive choice and competition in the sector.

Lim continued that to this end, Commpete welcomes the Governments announcement that the new CRA program will provide funding for neutral host models and the development of 8,000 kilometres of mobile coverage under an open access arrangement. The requirements of the new open access regime need careful policy and planning consideration to set out a permanent and effective arrangement for future use of all Australians living, working and travelling to these regions.

Doing this will deliver flexibility, value and choice and is in the long-term best interests of end users as open access creates a more timely, dynamic and competitive market for both retail and wholesale, she said.

Commpete members include Circles.Life, Field Solutions Group, Macquarie Telecom Group, MyRepublic, Southern Phone, Superloop, Symbio Holdings and TasmaNet. When combined, Commpete members represent 1,575 Australian staff, approximately $1 billion in annual turnover and more than $250 million combined investments in FY 20/21, the organisation claimed.

One of Commpete's recent members, Field Solution Group, operates a mobile network in regional areas and in July last year announced a trial of a neutral host radio access network. This was on the back of multiple from mobile black spot program awards. While FSG has had some success with Optus participating in this arrangement, it is unknown as to whether the other two MNOs have joined FSG's program.

Field Solutions Group also acquired another listed Commpete member TasmaNet in November last year.
By deploying the Field Service Management software, Konica Minolta will transition to a predictive maintenance model that will allow the company to plan the deployment of field service staff across ten national operating companies (NOCs) across Europe.

IFS Cloud will also ensure maximum equipment uptime, reduce engineer call outs, and achieve a heightened customer experience.

As part of Konica Minoltas Next Generation Field Service Management objective, which will be completed by the end of 2023, the IFS solution will allow employees to align schedules and optimise and deploy resources in real-time to automatically allocate work orders.

The evaluation of IoT generated data by production printers and systems for medical image diagnosis, is another application the IFS solution supports. This application enables technicians to predict whether defects are imminent or unscheduled maintenance is due.

IFS Clouds Field Service Management capabilities provide the same user experience on iOS, Android or Windows, which means employees can check the availability of spare parts on a smartphone or tablet and create invoices and quotations on site at the customer.

IFS Cloud will replace Konica Minoltas ClickSoftware installation.

Konica Minolta uses SAP software in parts of their business, which will have a bidirectional integration with the IFS solution.

"We are proud that a renowned company like Konica Minolta wants to future-proof its field service management with IFS Cloud. Our solution supports the company with services related to the installation of systems and equipment, says IFS president North and Central Europe Glenn Arnesen.

"With the IFS solution, we can realise our vision of Next Gen Field Service Management. The first pilot project in Belgium and the Netherlands with around 130 employees is going very promisingly. In the next step, we will make the new solution available to around 1,000 field service technicians in ten national operating companies across Europe, says Konica Minolta senior consultant Ged Cranny.
Telecommunications provider Digicel says it is looking at its legal options to get a tax imposed on it by Papua New Guinea removed, warning that this could delay the sale of its Pacific assets to Telstra.

The Additional Company Tax was approved by the PNG parliament on 29 March and imposes a one-time 350 million kina tax (about A$132 million) on Digicel, according to a statement released by Digicel Pacific on Monday.

An additional 50 million kina (A$18.9 million) would have to be paid if the tax was not paid on time.

Telstra announced on 25 October last year that it had acquired Digicel's assets in the South Pacific region for US$1.6 billion, with the Federal Government contributing US$1.33 billion of this sum.

Reports in November last year had put the tax at a lower figure of 190 million kina (A$76 million) per year for major banks and 90 million kina (A$36 million) for telecommunications firms.

In its Monday statement, Digicel said the introduction of the "new arbitrary, company-specific tax" on 25 March without consultation was perplexing both for Digicel and PNG, given the reputational and credit rating implications of "this sudden, bizarre and unprecedented tax".

It also pointed that under the ACT the disputed tax was payable on 30 March.

The telco said its owner, Denis O'Brien, had been assured, by PNG Prime Minister James Marape and two of his regional governors that the tax would not be imposed.

"This matter requires urgent resolution given its implications for the sale of Digicel's Pacific operations to Telstra, but also given the knock-on consequences for all foreign direct investment exiting Papua New Guinea and the wider reputational and credit rating implications for Papua New Guinea internationally," the Digicel statement said.

"In parallel with these discussions Digicel is also considering its legal options in the event that this discriminatory tax is not removed.

"These matters will affect the timing of the previously announced sale of Digicel Group Holdings Limited's wholly owned subsidiary Digicel Pacific Limited to a wholly owned subsidiary of Telstra Corporation Limited.

"Prior to the introduction of the ACT, all but one of the required regulatory approvals to complete the transaction had been obtained."

Telstra has not made any public statement about this development. However, the Australian telco told Reuters that the tax was a matter for the owner of Digicel Pacific.

"The acquisition of Digicel Pacific by Telstra in partnership with the Australian Government has not yet received all of its regulatory approvals and has not (been) completed yet," it said.
ICT company Acer has promoted Gaba Cheng, general manager of product management and supply chain, to the role of managing director for the Oceanic region.

Cheng will take over from Darren Simmons to head the Acer Oceanic region later this month.

A 15-year veteran of the local company, Cheng joined Acer in 2007 as National Product Manager, and then stepped into Head of Consumer Client Products before rising to the role of General Manager in 2014.

Acer says that as head of product management for the Oceanic region, Cheng has been instrumental in the go-to-market product strategy for its leading consumer, gaming and commercial product lines.

Prior to working with Acer, Cheng worked at BenQ as national distribution manager.

Speaking about his appointment, Cheng said: On behalf of myself and the Acer team here in Australia and New Zealand, I would like to thank Darren for the significant impact he has made in the region during his tenure as managing director. I look forward to working with the team to build on the platform that Darren has built and put in place over the past eight years.

Acer says that during his eight years as managing director and over 21 years of service, Simmons enjoyed a highly successful stint in the company as sales director before taking on the reigns and being appointed the first ever local MD in February 2014.

Under Mr Simmons leadership the business has successfully stabilised and more than doubled its revenues across the ANZ region cementing Acer as a market leading brand in the commercial,consumer and gaming markets, noted Acer.

Acer Pan Asia Pacific regional operations president Andrew Hou says, We are delighted to announce Gaba Cheng as the new Managing Director Oceanic Region. Over the past 15 years, he has held various senior roles within the Acer Oceanic team, with increasing scale and complexity. He has worked closely with Darren during this time to successfully launch a number of innovative products

to the local market.

Under Darrens leadership, the Acer Oceanic region has seen consistent top line growth, profit growth and market share growth across commercial, consumer and gaming. These are tremendous achievements, and we thank Darren for his contribution to the success of the business and wish him the best of luck in his next endeavour.

Acer says Gaba Cheng is currently working through a transition and handover with Simmons to move into the role and lead the region effective from 19 April.
India based data-driven business transformation specialist BluePi Consulting has appointed Gaurav Sharma to the role of CEO for Australia and New Zealand, following the opening of the company's first international operations in Sydney.

"Gaurav Sharma has an incredible track record driving growth within enterprise technology companies, and were excited to have him as a co-founder, leading the business in our first international market that has emerged strongly from the pandemic and shows incredible potential across a diverse range of industry sectors from banking and financial services to retail, public sector, telecommunications, construction and logistics," said BluePi founders Pronam Chatterjee and Kaushik Khanna.

Gaurav Sharma has more than 20 years of consulting and sales experience in the IT Industry.

He joins the company from Cognizant, where he worked as ANZ vice president and head of industries business.

Sharma previously worked for HCL (most recently as vice president for Australia and head of sales for various industry sectors), and for Tech Mahindra (most recently as APAC head of airlines business).

It was his first role with Tech Mahindra  principal relationship manager for Qantas  that in 2006 brought Sharma to Australia from Germany, where he was working as a senior consultant at Siemens Information Systems.

Sharma holds bachelor's and master's degrees in computer science, both from Banaras Hindu University (India).

"The innovations that BluePi has pioneered will completely transform enterprise digital business models and Im thrilled with the opportunity to bring our skills, knowledge and experience to enable customers and partners in Australia and New Zealand to leverage new-age technologies," said Sharma.

BluePi expects its presence in Sydney will accelerate its growth in the ANZ region.

The company offers consulting and strategic solutions across cloud, data, AI driven supply chain and app modernisation, and has particular expertise in the retail, BFSI, and logistics industries.

BluePi is an AWS premier consulting partner, and also has relationships with Snowflake, Databricks, GCP and Cloudera.
Ukraine on Sunday accused the Russian army of having committed a massacre in Bucha, a town northwest of Kyiv recently retaken by Ukrainian troops, where the bodies of civilians were found in the streets.

This is what we know at this stage about what happened in Bucha.

 A destroyed town 

Bucha, a commuter town of around 37,000 outside Kyiv, as well as the nearby town of Irpin, saw fierce fighting since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24.

Bucha was occupied by the Russian army on the third day of the war, on February 26, and remained inaccessible for more than a month.

Shelling stopped on Thursday and Ukrainian forces were only able to fully enter the town a few days ago.

AFP journalists on Saturday saw massive holes left by shells in apartment blocks, numerous wrecked cars and streets littered with debris or downed power lines.

Those who stayed in Bucha, trapped by the incessant fighting, were deprived of water and electricity and lived in very cold temperatures.

Witnesses told AFP that they saw Chechen fighters amid the Russian forces.

 Around 20 bodies in the street 

AFP on Saturday saw the bodies of at least 22 people in civilian clothes on a single street in Bucha.

One of them was on the pavement near a bicycle, others had bags of provisions near them.

On body had his hands tied behind his back and most the bodies were scattered over several hundred metres (yards) on one street.

Another corpse was found near the station, under a blanket.

The cause of death of these people could not be immediately determined, but at least two of them had large head wounds.

The skin on the faces of the corpses looked waxy, suggesting that they had been there for at least several days.

According to the mayor of Bucha, Anatoliy Fedoruk, the victims were killed by Russian forces with a bullet in the back of the neck.

 Mass graves 

The corpses of 57 people were found in a mass grave, the chief of local rescue efforts Serhiy Kaplychniy, said as he showed AFP the trench where the bodies lay.

The mass grave is behind a church in the towns centre. Some of the bodies were either unburied or partially buried. They were all dressed in civilian clothes.

On Sunday Mayor Fedoruk said 280 people were buried in mass graves because they could not have be buried in cemeteries that were within firing range.

We found mass graves. We found people with their hands and legs tied up with bullet holes in the back of their heads, presidential spokesman Sergiy Nikiforov told the BBC Sunday.

 How many victims? 

The mayor of Kyiv who went to Bucha on Sunday, Vitaly Klitschko, told AFP that the exact number of victims was not yet known.

We believe that more than 300 civilians died, he said.

This is not a war, it is a genocide, a genocide of the Ukrainian population.

 International outcry 

The images from Bucha have led to a global outcry.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Sunday that the sight of multiple civilian bodies in Bucha was a punch to the gut.

The UK said the appalling acts must be investigated as war crimes.

French President Emmanuel Macron said the images were unbearable and that Russian authorities must answer for these crimes.

Germany has said the civilian deaths in Bucha are a terrible war crime that cannot go unanswered and called for fresh sanctions on Moscow.
Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelensky called Russian troops murderers, torturers, rapists, looters on Monday after dozens of bodies were found near Kyiv, triggering global outrage and vows of tough new sanctions on Moscow.

Local authorities said they had been forced to dig communal graves to bury the dead accumulating in the streets, including some found with their hands bound behind their backs, in scenes that sent shockwaves through international capitals more than a month into Russias invasion.

Despite Russian denials of responsibility, condemnation was swift, with Western leaders, NATO and the UN all voicing horror at reports of civilian murders in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, and elsewhere.

Zelensky was unsparing in his nightly video message, warning concentrated evil has come to our land.

He described Russian troops as murderers, torturers, rapists, looters, who call themselves the army and who deserve only death after what they did, speaking in Ukrainian.

Switching to Russian, he continued: I want every mother of every Russian soldier to see the bodies of the killed people in Bucha, in Irpin, in Hostomel.

I want all the leaders of the Russian Federation to see how their orders are being fulfilled.

Zelensky said he had created a special body to investigate killings in areas from which Russian troops have withdrawn around the capital, as Moscow refocuses its energies on southeastern Ukraine.

The scale of the killings is still being pieced together, but Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered so far.

And Buchas mayor Anatoly Fedoruk told AFP that 280 bodies were placed in mass graves because it was impossible to bury them in cemeteries within firing range.

Satellite imagery firm Maxar released pictures it said showed a mass grave located in the grounds of a church in the town.

Municipal worker Serhii Kaplychnyi told AFP that Russian troops initially refused to allow residents to bury the dead in Bucha.

They said while it was cold to let them lie there.

Eventually, they were able to retrieve the bodies, he said. We dug a mass grave with a tractor and buried everyone.

AFP reporters in the town saw at least 20 bodies, all in civilian clothing, strewn across a single street.

The UN said it was highly concerned by images emerging from the region, though it said it could not rule out that some of the dead were fighters or had died of natural causes.

 Clear indications of war crimes 

Ukraines Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba accused Russia of a deliberate massacre, while Zelenskys spokesman, Sergiy Nikiforov, said the killings in Bucha looks exactly like war crimes.

Russias defence ministry pushed back, saying not a single local resident in Bucha suffered violence.

It accused Kyiv of falsifying images of corpses in another production for Western media.

Moscows deputy ambassador to the UN said Russia had requested a UN Security Council meeting on Monday in light of heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha  but a senior Washington official said the move was designed to feign outrage.

The deaths have heightened calls for new measures against Russia.

On Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron said he was in favour of fresh sanctions.

There are very clear indications of war crimes. It was the Russian army that was in Bucha, Macron told the France Inter broadcaster.

He said new measures could target the oil and coal industries.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said new sanctions would be decided in the coming days, with his defence minister raising the possibility of an end to gas imports.

(Russian) President (Vladimir) Putin and his supporters will feel the consequences, Scholz said.

Other European officials, including Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney, said the EU must respond strongly with tougher sanctions, while Zelensky said there will definitely be a new package of sanctions against Russia.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki on Monday called for an international investigation into what he termed a genocide.

And Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said Spain will do everything to deal with these alleged cases of (crimes against) humanity, war crimes and why not say it too, genocide.

 Something terrible is coming 

The Ukrainian leader warned that the worst could be yet to come as Moscow refocuses its attention on the south and east of the country, in a bid to create a land link between occupied Crimea and the Russian-backed separatist statelets of Donetsk and Lugansk.

Russian troops still control the occupied areas of other regions, and after the expulsion of the occupiers, even worse things could be found there, even more deaths and tortures, he said.

He also appeared in a taped message at the Grammys, urging people to tell the truth about this war support us in any way you can, any, but not silence.

Europes worst conflict in decades, sparked by Russias invasion on February 24, has already killed 20,000 people, according to Ukrainian estimates.

Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainians have fled the country, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighbouring countries in the last 24 hours alone, the UN refugee agency said.

In the eastern city of Kramatorsk, women, children and elderly people were boarding trains to flee the Donbas region.

The rumour is that something terrible is coming, said Svetlana, a volunteer organising the crowd on the station platform.

Russia has redoubled its efforts in Ukraines south and east, including carrying out several strikes Sunday on the strategic Black Sea port of Odessa, which Moscow said targeted an oil refinery and fuel depots.

We were woken up by the first explosion, then we saw a flash in the sky, then another, then another. I lost count, resident Mykola, 22, told AFP.

Britains defence ministry said recent Russian air activity had been focused on southeastern Ukraine, adding that heavy fighting was continuing in the devastated and besieged southern city of Mariupol.

The city continues to be subject to intense, indiscriminate strikes, the ministry said in an update on Twitter.

The UNs top humanitarian envoy Martin Griffiths is expected in Kyiv soon after arriving in Moscow on Sunday in an attempt to halt the fighting.

And peace talks are scheduled to resume by video on Monday, though Russias chief negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said it was too early for a top-level meeting between Zelensky and Putin.

He said Kyiv had become more realistic in its approach to issues related to the neutral and non-nuclear status of Ukraine, but a draft agreement for submission to a summit meeting was not ready.

Ukraine has proposed abandoning its aspirations to join NATO and declaring official neutrality, if it obtains security guarantees from Western countries.

It has proposed temporarily shelving the question of Crimea, annexed by Russia in 2014, and two breakaway territories in the Donbas that Russia has recognised as independent.

Medinsky said Russias position on Crimea and the Donbas remains unchanged.

burs-sah/reb/ssy
French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday he was in favour of new sanctions against Moscow after claims that Russian forces committed atrocities against Ukrainian civilians in Bucha, a town outside Kyiv.

There are very clear indications of war crimes. It was the Russian army that was in Bucha, Macron told the France Inter broadcaster after the discovery of mass graves and hundreds of dead people northwest of Kyiv.

The scenes are unbearable. International justice must work. Those who were behind these crimes must respond, he said.

Local authorities said they had been forced to dig communal graves to bury the dead accumulating in the streets, including some found with their hands bound behind their backs, in scenes that sent shockwaves through international capitals more than a month into Russias invasion.

Macron called for progress on further moves towards sanctions at the European Union level which he said could target the Russian oil and coal industries.

What happened in Bucha makes a new round of sanctions, and very clear measures, necessary, Macron said.

France would coordinate such steps with its EU partners, especially Germany, in the coming days, he said.

Macron said that targeting the oil and coal industries would be particularly painful for Russia.

The EU could also impose further sanctions against Russian individuals, Macron added.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said Monday he saw signs of a possible genocide in Ukraine after claims that Russian forces committed atrocities against Ukrainian civilians in Bucha, a town outside Kyiv.

We will do everything to ensure that those who have perpetrated these war crimes do not go unpunished, and therefore appear before the courts to deal with these alleged cases of (crimes against) humanity, war crimes and why not say it too, genocide, he said.

Putins unjustified aggression has brought war back to the gates of the European Union, he told an economic forum in Madrid.

Sanchez is one of the first European Union leaders to label Russias actions in Ukraine a genocide.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki on Monday also called for an international investigation into what he termed a genocide carried out by Russian troops in Ukraine.

Ukraine and Western leaders have erupted in outrage over the discovery of mass graves and hundreds of dead people in Bucha, a small town northwest of Kyiv.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky directly blamed Moscow for the killings of civilians.

This is genocide. The elimination of the whole nation and the people, Zelensky told the CBS programme Face the Nation, according to a transcript provided by the network on Sunday.

Russia denied the accusations and said Kyiv had staged footage of the corpses.

Spains public prosecutor last month opened an inquiry into serious violations of international humanitarian law by Russian troops in Ukraine.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki on Monday called for an international investigation into what he termed a genocide carried out by Russian troops in Ukraine, including in the town of Bucha.

These bloody massacres committed by Russians, by Russian soldiers, deserve to be called what they are. This is genocide and it must be judged, Morawiecki told reporters.

This is why we are proposing an international commission to investigate this crime of genocide.

Such a commission is essential if we want to find out the truth on the extent of Russian fascist crimes.

Morawiecki also called for new Western sanctions against Russia and compared to Russian President Vladimir Putin to dictators from the past.

Clear and determined sanctions are necessary. These sanctions are not working, Morawiecki said.

He also addressed French President Emmanuel Macron saying: How many times have you negotiated with Putin and what have you achieved? We do not discuss, we do not negotiate with criminals. Criminals have to be fought against.

Nobody negotiated with Hitler. Would you negotiate with Hitler, with Stalin, with Pol Pot?

Addressing German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Morawiecki said: It is not the voices of German business leaders, of German billionaires who are probably stopping you from taking action, that should be listened to in Berlin today but the voices of innocent women and children.

Dozens of bodies were found in mass graves or littering the streets of towns previously occupied by Russian forces near the capital Kyiv over the weekend.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Russia of committing genocide
EU officials said Monday they were weighing new sanctions targeting Moscow in response to alleged atrocities against Ukrainian civilians by Russian forces that sparked a wave of international outrage.

Despite Russian denials of responsibility, condemnation was swift, with Western leaders, NATO and the UN all voicing horror at images of dead bodies in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, and elsewhere.

Local authorities said they had been forced to dig communal graves to bury the dead accumulating in the streets, including one in Bucha found with his hands bound behind his back.

Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelensky called Russian troops murderers, torturers, rapists, looters and warned in his nightly video message that concentrated evil has come to our land.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the bloc was urgently discussing a new round of sanctions as it condemned atrocities reported in Ukrainian towns that have been occupied by troops sent in by Russian President Vladimir Putin five weeks ago.

The proposals, which French President Emmanuel Macron said could target Russias oil and coal sectors, could be discussed by foreign ministers on the sidelines of a NATO meeting on Wednesday and Thursday, or at their regular meeting early next week, an EU official told AFP.

Borrell also offered EU assistance in documenting evidence of the alleged atrocities, and Zelensky said he had created a special body to investigate.

The scale of the killings is still being pieced together, but Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered so far.

And Buchas mayor Anatoly Fedoruk told AFP that 280 bodies were placed in mass graves because it was impossible to bury them in cemeteries still within firing range of Russian forces.

Satellite imagery firm Maxar released pictures it said showed a mass grave located in the grounds of a church in the town.

Municipal worker Serhii Kaplychnyi told AFP that Russian troops initially refused to allow residents to bury the dead in Bucha.

They said while it was cold to let them lie there.

Eventually, they were able to retrieve the bodies, he said. We dug a mass grave with a tractor and buried everyone.

AFP reporters in the town saw at least 20 bodies, all in civilian clothing, strewn across a single street.

 Clear indications of war crimes 

Zelenskys spokesman, Sergiy Nikiforov, said the scene in Bucha looks exactly like war crimes.

Moscow rejected the accusations and suggested the images of corpses were fakes while calling for a UN Security Council meeting on what its deputy ambassador to the body called a heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha.

We categorically reject all allegations, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists.

But Macron said he was in favour of fresh sanctions since there are very clear indications of war crimes. It was the Russian army that was in Bucha, he told France Inter radio.

In Germany, Chancellor Olaf Scholzs defence minister raised the possibility of an end to gas imports.

President Putin and his supporters will feel the consequences, Scholz said.

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki of Poland, whose country has welcomed millions of Ukrainians fleeing the violence, called for an international investigation into what he termed a genocide.

 Even worse things 

Zelensky warned that the worst could be yet to come as Moscow refocuses its attention on the south and east of the country, in a bid to create a land link between occupied Crimea and the Russian-backed separatist statelets of Donetsk and Lugansk.

Russian troops still control the occupied areas of other regions, and after the expulsion of the occupiers, even worse things could be found there, even more deaths and tortures, he said.

Eight people were killed and 34 wounded in Russian attacks on two towns in southern Ukraine on Sunday, prosecutors in Kyiv said.

Europes worst conflict in decades, sparked by Russias invasion on February 24, has already killed 20,000 people, according to Ukrainian estimates.

Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainians have fled the country, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighbouring countries in the last 24 hours alone, the UN refugee agency said.

In the eastern city of Kramatorsk, women, children and elderly people were boarding trains to flee the Donbas region.

The rumour is that something terrible is coming, said Svetlana, a volunteer organising the crowd on the station platform.

Russia has redoubled its efforts in Ukraines south and east, including carrying out several strikes Sunday on the strategic Black Sea port of Odessa, which Moscow said targeted an oil refinery and fuel depots.

We were woken up by the first explosion, then we saw a flash in the sky, then another, then another. I lost count, a 22-year-old resident, Mykola, told AFP.

Britains defence ministry said recent Russian air activity had been focused on southeastern Ukraine, adding that heavy fighting was continuing in the devastated and besieged southern city of Mariupol.

The city continues to be subject to intense, indiscriminate strikes, the ministry said in an update on Twitter.

The UNs top humanitarian envoy Martin Griffiths is expected in Kyiv soon after arriving in Moscow on Sunday in an attempt to halt the fighting.

And peace talks are scheduled to resume by video on Monday, though Russias chief negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said it was too early for a top-level meeting between Zelensky and Putin.

He said Kyiv had become more realistic in its approach to issues related to the neutral and non-nuclear status of Ukraine, but a draft agreement for submission to a summit meeting was not ready.

burs/js/jh/lc
Everybody is in agreement including the prosecution and court that his case has dragged on for too long, Thomas Kwoyelos lead counsel Dalton Opwonya told Justice Info on March 28. There is no one who has stayed on remand for over thirteen years like Kwoyelo since the time he was put in custody. That is a long time, yet the trial is just starting.

The International Crimes Division of the High Court sitting in Kampala has planned to have a six month non-stop trial, but government does not have money nor even the time, Opwonya added, so it has been decided we do two weeks trial every three months, meaning eight weeks a year. The next session of trial will be early May this year.

One of Kwoyelos relatives who visited him in the high security prison in Kampala recently and preferred not to be named said the former rebel commander complained of high blood pressure and paralysis on the right hand side, a health condition one of his other lawyers, Caleb Alaka, confirmed. He has serious medical conditions, and he has told the court that he needs to be granted bail to seek treatment outside the prison. But court insists he will receive the treatment in prison, Alaka told Justice Info.

More hope now than before

Justice has to be seen to be done and there is no any other way in this, Alaka said of the sluggish trial. For the state lead counsel in the trial, William Byansi, the good thing is that all parties in the case have prepared and now the trial has resumed. He added that the public has to be aware of the complexities of this case.

According to Ugandan judiciary spokesman Jameson Karemani, the judiciary has tried its best so far; it provided the Justices to preside over the case and the resources and logistics to facilitate the process. There is more hope now than before, he noted. When asked about the cost of trial, Karemani referred us to the court Registrar, but attempts to get the figures were yet to bear fruit by the time of filing this report.

Kwoyelo was taken into custody in 2009. He was arrested after sustaining injuries in battle, an episode that ended his 16-year participation in rebel activity. In 2011, the international crimes division of the high court charged him with 93 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including rape, murder and recruitment of child soldiers.

During the hearings in March, Kwoyelo pointed out to court that his LRA colleague Dominic Ongwen, who surrendered to US authorities in 2015 and was subsequently transferred to the International Criminal Court in The Hague, already knows his verdict, whereas he (Kwoyelo) is yet to start the trial phase. The ICC sentenced Ongwen in May 2021 to 25 years in prison, which he has appealed.

If this court cannot give me a speedy trial, let me be taken to the ICC in The Hague, he told the International Crimes Division of Uganda recently, according to his lawyer Opwonya. But the court said it was only competent to deliver justice to him and the parties in the case.

On March 1st, the International Crimes Division of the High Court sitting in Kampala (Uganda) has rejected the plea by the Lord Resistance Army former leader Thomas Kwoyelo to be tried by the Hague based International Criminal Court.

According to his lawyers, Kwoyelo is also unhappy that the trial is taking place in the capital Kampala, instead of Gulu in northern Uganda, where his relatives could attend. But we have ensured relatives including his two wives attend court sessions and visit him in prison, Opwonya said.

Not on governments priority list

But Martin Aliker, a veteran researcher and analyst working on peace building programmes in Gulu, says Kwoyelos case is not on the governments priority list. Kwoyelos case has been taken by events. Governments priority is rebuilding northern Uganda and issues that affect the ordinary lives of the people and there is no urgency for call to justice, he said.

Government has to put its resources to the urgent needs of the people, he continued. The LRA issue is fizzling out, yet this makes it unfair to Kwoyelo. On Kwoyelos demand to go to the Hague for trial, Aliker thinks that when Kwoyelo asks to be taken to ICC, it is not that Kwoyelo believes in his innocence, but that he believes in the voice and opportunities offered by ICC.

After focusing on the length of the proceedings, a dozen prosecution witnesses were presented during the March hearings, out of more than 90 that the state has listed to testify. And as the trial limps on, observers and human rights groups are turning their attention to the merits and demerits of the case.

Kwoyelo was a child at the time he was abducted by Joseph Konys LRA, and was conscripted against his will in the rebel group. Questions still arise as to why of all the senior LRA commanders, some more senior than Kwoyelo, he would be the only one tried and not given amnesty although he applied for it, says human rights advocate Moses Sserwanga. Wouldnt that be a possible case of double standards? Since 2000 when the domestic amnesty law was put in place, over 12,900 former LRA combatants have been granted amnesty. There are no others under trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

No witness protection program

In a report last year, Human Rights Watch expressed concern at the lack of a witness protection programme. With no witness protection programme in place, witnesses may be exposed, their safety compromised and some traumatised for life, it says. It also says there is no professional interpretation system that can be used during the trial, whereas some local dialects are used. With court relying on various individuals, court staff and even guards, there is a risk of having varying interpretations of what the accused and witnesses say in court, the report stressed.

As Kwoyelo waited years for his trial, public expectations of the case have died down, as have expectations of the countrys international crimes division. This institution was established in 2008 to offer an alternative domestic remedy while the ICC launched investigations to establish the highest responsibilities on both sides of the conflict between the Ugandan state and the LRA.

With the first two weeks of daily trial sessions ended, the next session is expected in May.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday described as genocide the killings of civilians in the town of Bucha outside the capital Kyiv reclaimed from Russian forces.

These are war crimes and it will be recognised by the world as genocide, Zelensky said during a visit to Bucha, where bodies were discovered strewn throughout the town after it was reclaimed by Kyivs army.

You stand here today and see what happened. We know that thousands of people have been killed and tortured with extremities cut off, women raped, children killed, he told reporters wearing a bullet-proof vest and accompanied by military personnel.

Its genocide, he added.

Ukraine and Western nations have accused Russian troops of war crimes after the discovery of mass graves and apparently executed civilians at Bucha, prompting vows of action at the International Criminal Court.

Russias defence ministry denied its troops had killed civilians in the town recently retaken by Ukrainian soldiers.

Britain, France, Germany, the United States and NATO all voiced horror at the images from Bucha, where some of the bodies lying in public appeared to have been bound by their hands and feet before being shot.
Lithuania on Monday said it was expelling Russias ambassador over Russian aggression in Ukraine, including the horrific massacre in the town of Bucha near the capital.

Dozens of bodies were found in mass graves or littering the streets near Kyiv over the weekend. The Kremlin has rejected Western accusations that Russian forces were responsible.

In response to Russias military aggression against sovereign Ukraine and the atrocities committed by the Russian armed forces in various occupied Ukrainian cities, including the horrific massacre in Bucha, the Lithuanian government has decided to downgrade the diplomatic representation, Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis told reporters.

The ambassador of the Russian Federation will have to leave Lithuania, he said, adding that the Baltic state would also withdraw its ambassador from Moscow.

The move drew an immediate response from Moscow.

It wont take long for retaliatory measures to follow, Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told AFP.

Landsbergis also said Lithuania will close Moscows consulate in the port city of Klaipeda, where 20 percent of residents are ethnic Russians.

He described the Bucha killings as a war crime.

What the world sees in Bucha, unfortunately, may be only the beginning. As other cities are liberated, we may see more horrific instances of war crimes, he said.

Last month, Lithuania already expelled four Russian diplomats, prompting a tit-for-tat response from Moscow.
Ukraines president on Monday urged the world to acknowledge genocide at the hands of Russian troops after bodies were discovered in a town outside Kyiv, sparking global outrage.

US President Joe Biden called for a war crimes trial over the alleged atrocities in Bucha and said he would seek more sanctions against Moscow, as EU momentum built for a tougher response on top of already unprecedented sanctions against Russia over the war.

European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said the European Union was ready to send a team of investigators to gather evidence of possible war crimes.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accuses Russian troops of being behind the killings, but the Kremlin has denied any responsibility and suggested images of corpses were fakes.

These are war crimes and it will be recognised by the world as genocide, Zelensky said Monday as he visited the town, where the corpses, some with their hands bound behind their backs, were discovered over the weekend near Kyiv.

You stand here today and see what happened. We know that thousands of people have been killed and tortured with extremities cut off, women raped, children killed, he told reporters, wearing a bullet-proof vest for a rare visit outside the Ukrainian capital.

Moscow has called for a UN Security Council meeting on what its deputy ambassador to the body called a heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha.

Whats happening to Bucha is outrageous and everyones seen it, Biden said Monday, calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a war criminal.

 We dug a mass grave 

We have to gather all the details to be able to have a trial, the US president added.

The United States also said it would seek to suspend Russia from the UN Human Rights Council and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said urgent discussions were underway on tougher sanctions against Russia.

The scale of the killings is still being pieced together. On Sunday, Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered in the wider Kyiv region after Russian troops pulled back.

In Bucha, the local mayor said 280 people were buried in mass graves because they could not be buried in cemeteries that were within firing range.

AFP on Saturday saw the bodies of at least 22 people in civilian clothes on a single street in Bucha.

Satellite imagery firm Maxar released pictures it said showed a mass grave located in the grounds of a church in Bucha.

Before leaving the city, Russian forces refused to let residents bury the dead, municipal worker Serhii Kaplychnyi told AFP.

Eventually, they were able to retrieve the bodies, he said. We dug a mass grave with a tractor and buried everyone.

 Mariupol 90 percent destroyed 

Russia has redoubled its efforts in Ukraines south and east, including strikes Sunday on the strategic Black Sea port of Odessa, which Moscow said targeted an oil refinery and fuel depots.

The mayor of the south-eastern port city of Mariupol said Monday 90 percent of the city had been destroyed since being besieged by Russian forces, trapping some 130,000 residents who have not yet fled.

We are planning to evacuate the remaining residents, but we cannot do it today because of incessant bombings, Vadym Boichenko told journalists.

Britains defence ministry also said recent Russian air activity had focused on south-eastern Ukraine. Mariupol continues to be subject to intense, indiscriminate strikes, it said.

Attacks on two other towns in southern Ukraine on Sunday killed eight people and wounded 34, prosecutors in Kyiv said.

One EU official told AFP that a new sanctions package on Russia could be discussed by foreign ministers, either on the sidelines of a NATO meeting on Wednesday and Thursday, or at early next week.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who spoke about very clear indications of war crimes, told France Inter radio that they could target Russias oil and coal sectors.

But Germany warned that cutting off the supply of Russian gas to Europe was not yet possible, despite calls in several EU countries that the measure was necessary to face down Russia.

 Something terrible is coming 

We have to cut all economic relationship to Russia, but at the moment, its not possible to cut the gas supplies. We need some time, German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said as he arrived for talks with his eurozone counterparts in Luxembourg.

Europes worst conflict in decades, sparked by Russias invasion on February 24, has already killed 20,000 people, according to Ukrainian estimates.

Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainians have fled the country, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighbouring countries in the last 24 hours alone, the UN refugee agency said.

In the eastern city of Kramatorsk, women, children and the elderly boarded trains to flee the Donbas region and out of the path of the Russian advance.

The rumour is that something terrible is coming, said Svetlana, a volunteer organising the crowd on the station platform.

The UNs top humanitarian envoy Martin Griffiths is expected in Kyiv after arriving in Moscow on Sunday in an attempt to halt the fighting.

And talks were scheduled to resume by video on Monday, though Russias chief negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said it was too early for a top-level meeting between Zelensky and Putin.

He said Kyiv had become more realistic in its approach to issues related to the neutral and non-nuclear status of Ukraine, but a draft agreement for submission to a summit meeting was not ready.

burs/js/jh/jm
The bodies of five men tortured and killed by Russian troops were found in the basement of a childrens health facility, the Ukrainian Prosecutor Generals office said on Monday.

In the basement of one of the childrens sanatoriums, police found the bodies of five men with their hands tied, a statement on Telegram said.

The unarmed civilians were beaten before being killed by soldiers of the armed forces of the Russian Federation, it said.

Photos showing the bodies accompanied the statement.

An investigation into the circumstances of their deaths has been opened, prosecutor Iryna Venediktovas office added.

The West on Monday called for an investigation into war crimes blamed on Russian troops in the Kyiv region, which Moscow denies, but Ukraine calls genocide.

Dozens of corpses in civilian clothes were discovered at the weekend in Bucha, on the northwestern gates of the Ukrainian capital, in the streets or in mass graves, following the Russian withdrawal.
Canadas foreign minister accused Russia of war crimes Monday after dead bodies were found scattered on the streets of Bucha, outside Kyiv, and warned of imminent new sanctions.

The shocking discovery of bodies in civilian clothing has sparked a chorus of international outrage, with US President Joe Biden calling for a war crimes trial.

What happened over the weekend is completely egregious, completely unjustifiable and shocking, Melanie Joly told a press conference while on a trip to Finland.

These are clearly war crimes. These are clearly crimes against humanity, she said.

In a subsequent tweet, Joly took explicit aim at the atrocities committed by the Russian forces against innocent civilians in Bucha, as Canada joined Western allies in calling for those responsible to be brought to justice by the International Criminal Court.

We will continue to impose severe costs on the Russian regime, she vowed.

The scale of the killings in Bucha is still being pieced together. On Sunday, Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered in the wider Kyiv region after Russian troops pulled back.

The Kremlin has denied any responsibility and suggested images of corpses were fakes.

Joly told the press conference Canada would very soon be announcing more sanctions against Russian and Belarusian individuals and entities, while urging the G7 to do more.

A Canadian government statement said the measures would target nine Russians and nine Belarusians who are known to be close associates of their countries governments.

The European Union was urgently discussing a new round of sanctions against Russia on Monday, while Biden also said he would seek more sanctions.
The mayor of Kyiv Vitali Klitschko on Monday called on the residents of the Ukrainian capital who fled the conflict in the city not to return for at least another week.

First, there is a round-the-clock curfew in several districts of Kyiv region. Also in the cities near the capital, where the fighting continued, a large number of explosive devices were found  which can pose a great threat, he said.

We do not rule out the possibility of rocket fire. Yes, our air defence forces are working perfectly. But, anything can happen. So I ask people to wait a bit and not to come back, he added.

Ukraine and Western powers have cast doubt on Russias pledge to reduce military activity around Chernigiv and the capital Kyiv, made during face-to-face talks in Istanbul on Tuesday.

Ukraines military has also warned the withdrawal of Russian troops around Kyiv and Chernigiv is probably a rotation of individual units and aims to mislead.

Global outrage at accusations of Russian war crimes in Ukraine has mounted with the discovery of mass graves and corpses in streets near Kyiv, as President Volodymyr Zelensky directly blamed leaders in Moscow for the torture and killings of civilians.
Canadas foreign minister accused Russia of war crimes Monday after dead bodies were found scattered on the streets of Bucha, outside Kyiv, and warned of imminent new sanctions.

The discovery of bodies in civilian clothing has sparked a chorus of international outrage, with US President Joe Biden calling for a war crimes trial.

What happened over the weekend is completely egregious, completely unjustifiable and shocking, Melanie Joly told a press conference while on a trip to Finland.

These are clearly war crimes. These are clearly crimes against humanity, she said.

In a subsequent tweet, Joly took explicit aim at the atrocities committed by the Russian forces against innocent civilians in Bucha, as Canada joined Western allies in calling for those responsible to be brought to justice by the International Criminal Court.

We will continue to impose severe costs on the Russian regime, she vowed.

On Monday afternoon, Canadas House of Commons adopted a motion condemning Russias crimes against humanity and war crimes committed in Ukraine.

The scale of the killings in Bucha is still being pieced together. On Sunday, Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered in the wider Kyiv region after Russian troops pulled back.

The Kremlin has denied any responsibility and suggested images of corpses were fakes.

Joly said Canada would very soon be announcing more sanctions, while urging the G7 to do more.

A Canadian government statement said the measures would target nine Russians and nine Belarusians who are known to be close associates of their countries governments.

The European Union was urgently discussing a new round of sanctions against Russia on Monday, while Biden also said he would seek more sanctions.
The highly rated rom-com coming-of-age drama "Twenty Five, Twenty One" finally closes its curtains.

"Twenty Five, Twenty One" episode 16 delivers a bittersweet ending to Nam Joo Hyuk, Kim Tae Ri, WJSN Bona, Choi Hyun Wook and Lee Joo Myung's stories. Read to know more!

'Twenty Five, Twenty One' Episode 16: Na Hee Do and Baek Yi Jin Say Goodbye To Each Other

While Baek Yi Jin (Nam Joo Hyuk) stays in New York to cover the massive destruction of the 911 attack, Na Hee Do (Kim Tae Ri) focuses on her training as a fencer.

Although they were still together, they couldn't feel each other's support and comfort as the absence made their hearts waver.

On the other hand, Go Yu Rim (WJSN Bona) and Moon Ji Woong's (Choi Hyun Wook) relationship stands strong despite being away from each other for so long. Ji Seung Wan (Lee Joo Myung) thrives as a college student.

Baek Yi Jin Ends Things With Na Hee Do

Yi Jin applied for a correspondent position in New York. Before that, he comes back to South Korea to wrap things up.

He meets Hee Do, and they go over what went down in their relationship. Although hurt, the two bared their souls to one another.

Hee Do honestly said how disappointed she was in Yi Jin, who was perpetually sorry after constantly breaking his promise.

On the other hand, Yi Jin told Hee Do how he felt while he was in New York, which was a living hell where being in love while people are dying was a luxury.

However, Hee Do was willing to share his burdens had Yi Jin told her everything about it. But Yi Jin didn't want Hee Do to suffer with him. With that said, the two called it off bitterly.

Tae Yang Squad in 2009

Before Hee Do's Grand Prix competition, she runs after Yi Jin who was also looking for her at the time.

Because their conversation the last time didn't end on a good note, the two apologized about how rash they were during their breakup.

Yi Jin and Hee Do wished each other happiness, and all the best things in the world, and once again said goodbye to one another.

After seven eventful years, Yi Jin was promoted as Hee Do's mother's successor in UBS. From being a local news reporter, he is now the news anchor who delivers hot news to his nation.

He also fulfilled his promise in reuniting his family with a small, homey new shelter, after the IMF crisis broke them up.

Seung Wan does amazing as an assistant director for a variety show. Ji Woong is now CEO of a fashion company, after selling clothes and posting photos of trendy outfits online.

Gold medalist Yu Rim retired from fencing and now manages a huge fencing school that hones young talents. She also said yes to Ji Woong's marriage proposal and is now engaged.

Meanwhile, Hee Do bags another gold from her San Francisco competition before her retirement.

Yi Jin, Hee Do, Yu Rim, Ji Woong and Seung Wan-who were once full of life and dreams and owned the summer-are now thriving and owning lives, wiser and even better.

KDramaStars owns this article.

Written by Elijah Mully.
Lee Jung Eun talks about her upcoming K-drama "Our Blues" and her experience working with the Oscar-winning director Bong Joon Ho.

The actress gears up for the premiere of her newest series under JTBC. The 52-year-old South Korean actress spills more secrets regarding her working relationship with co-star Cha Seung Won and screenwriter Noh Hee Kyung.

Lee Jung Eun Overwhelmed to Work Alongside Screenwriter Noh Hee Kyung

"Our Blues" screenwriter Noh Hee Kyung has produced tons of remarkable K-dramas that fans have loved throughout the years.

He is the person behind the success of "Padam Padam," Jo In Sung and Song Hye Kyo-led series "That Winter, The Wind Blows," and the smash-hit rom-com "It's Okay, That's Love."

In a report cited by Newsis, Lee Jung Eun praised the screenwriter for creating such a beautiful masterpiece, referring to the healing K-drama "Our Blues."

The award-winning actress also spoke about meeting him for the first time and being overwhelmed by his charisma.

Lee Jung Eun Teases Fans with Her Kiss Scene With Cha Seung Won

During the interview obtained by the local outlet, she also shared her experience working alongside the equally-talented Cha Seung Won.

In "Our Blues," Lee Jung Eun portrays a local fish shop owner Jung Eun Hee and her unexpected reunion with former crush Choi Han Soo, played by the 51-year-old actor.

They accidentally cross paths on Jeju Island when Han Soo returns to his hometown after realizing that city life is not for him.

Dishing out what the viewers should look forward to towards her loveline with her on-screen partner, Lee Jung Eun revealed that she and Cha Seung Won will deliver heart-fluttering romance. She specifically cited her kiss scene with the actor.

However, the actress jokingly apologized and said that the scene would be magical if Cha Seung Won was paired with a beautiful actress but added, "I have a lot of money" pertaining to her K-drama character.

'Our Blues' Cast, Release Date, and Everything We Know So Far

K-drama fans are looking forward to the star-studded healing K-drama "Our Blues."

The cast, which includes Lee Jung Eun, Cha Seung Won, Lee Byung Hun, Shin Min Ah, Kim Woo Bin, Han Ji Min and more, are set to deliver various yet interesting stories of people living on Jeju Island.

The omnibus style K-drama is helmed by director "That Winter, The Wind Blows," and "Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo" Kim Kyu Tae alongside screenwriter Noh Hee Kyung.

"Our Blues" release date is scheduled to hit the small screens on April 9 via tvN and Netflix

Lee Jung Eun recalled her working experience with Oscar-Winning director Bong Joon Ho as the interview continued.

To recall, the actress appeared in his award-winning film "Parasite" where she took on the role of the wealthy family's helper, Guk Mun Gwang.

Interestingly, this is not her first time starring in a Bong Joon Ho-directed project.

Lee Jung Eun expressed her gratitude to the 52-year-old director for casting her in the 2009 movie "Mother" alongside Korea's biggest names in the industry.

KDramastars owns this article

Written by Geca Wills
We're always interested in hearing about news in our community. Let us know what's going on!

Go to form
How do you allocate places on a 100 Best Restaurants list? "It's not easy," says Ireland's most widely read food and hospitality critic, Lucinda OSullivan.

"I dont judge restaurants merely by the artwork on a plate, or whether or not theyve won a rubber tyre award," the critic notes.

"Im not particularly into sitting in overly precious, hushed rooms in silent worship, cooing over foraged fiddlehead ferns.

"For me, it has to be more than that, its the whole package  atmosphere, attitude, good food, service, and how they serve their customers and community through thick and thin  that warrants them a place on my 100 Best Restaurants list."

KILKENNY QUALITY RECOGNISED

So how did the black and amber eateries fare?

Making the Top 30 from Kilkenny were The Lady Helen (#2), Rinuccini (#15) and Campagne (#16), whilst Fennelly's of Callan made the Top 30-100 list.

Read the author's thoughts below:

The Lady Helen (#2)

The exquisitely refined 1-Star Lady Helen room at the Mount Juliet Estate in Thomastown, Co. Kilkenny, is a joy. Ive stayed at Mount Juliet many times down the years and remember occasions when Tiger Woods was quietly fishing from the River Nore, or the visit of the late Albert Roux to cook a special dinner featuring the Queen Mothers favourite souffle as the grand flourish. However, the cuisine nowadays is at a different level with, on my visit last month, John Kellys Tasting Menus delivering on tantalizing, ethereally elegant, contemporary dishes. Foie Gras had Franco Japanese influences with dashi, walnut, pear and treacle brioche; Turbot was with celeriac, lovage, pickled gooseberries and chicken jus; while Tipperary organic veal had asparagus, morels and wild garlic.

Rinuccini (#15)

In a wonderful Georgian house in the shadows of Kilkenny Castle, for over thirty years the Cavaliere family have been delivering exquisite high-end Italian food in an atmosphere that almost has you believing youve discovered somewhere special in Rome. Chef Antonios ravioli is as fine as silk, his fresh Kilmore Quay Black Sole on the bone grilled to that nano second of perfection and finished with white wine, lemon, garlic, extra virgin olive oil and fresh parsley.

Campagne (#16)

Foie gras creme caramel with fig chutney, caramelized walnuts and golden raisins is just one of the stalwarts of Garrett Byrnes French-inspired Kilkenny kitchen that will leave you drooling. The atmosphere is sophisticated, professional and welcoming, and Byrne has never been pretentious about his Michelin star. Worth the detour as they say. Do ask to see the Speedos.

Fennellys Of Callan (Top 31- 100)

What sisters Etain and Aoife Holohan did here was absolutely inspirational. They turned an old former pub into one of the hippest spots in the country, with not only great food but with an amazing rustic yard where they hold fantastic courtyard musical gigs and other artistic events. Think of Buddha bowls; Cajun pork belly stew; spinach & moong dal curry; porky sandwiches; burnt Basque cheesecake; almond bakewells; tarte au chocolat with vanilla and black pepper ice-cream.

You can read the full article from Lucinda O'Sullivan HERE.
Al-Otabi told Al-Maalouma news agency, "The logical explanation for the presence of Turkish forces in large parts of northern Iraq is that they are an occupying country," stressing that "the repeated bombing of villages is a violation of national sovereignty."

He added, "Despite the danger of the Turkish incursion and its repercussions on the lives of thousands of families, we are surprised, regardless of some political forces, as if the matter did not pose a threat to Iraqi national security," noting that "what Turkey is doing is an occupation in broad daylight and all the pretexts it presents unacceptable arguments.

He pointed out that "the Turkish incursion contributed to the displacement of thousands of families in the past years and the destruction of large villages and towns," noting that "the failure to shed light on what is happening is also a big question mark."

The Turkish occupation army has established nearly 40 military headquarters, in addition to violating the sovereignty of Iraqi lands, but the central government and the Kurdistan Region are still silent.

A

Source: Roj News
The HSE/South East Community Healthcare has welcomed a funding announcement by Creative Ireland, whereby older persons, mental health and disabilities residential care centres in its region will continue to be visited by The Mobile Music Machine throughout 2022.

Over the last two years of Pandemic and backed by Creative Ireland, the Mobile Music Machine have been familiar visitors to such facilities across counties Carlow, Kilkenny, South Tipperary, Waterford and Wexford to deliver their live arts project known as 'Covid Care' concerts.

To date, the Mobile Music Machine have performed over 1,000 such concerts in care settings across 18 counties in Ireland.

A classical music quartet founded and led by cello soloist, chamber and orchestral musician Gerald Peregrine, The Mobile Music Machine also play with special guests.

Creative Ireland, as a state body working through partnerships with local, national and other government and public agencies, cultural and enterprise agencies and local enterprise, shapes opportunities for people and communities to unlock their creative potential.

The 2020 and 2021 recitals in the South East, as a therapeutic intervention arranged in accordance with restrictions applicable at each healthcare facility, were also delivered with the support of the Blackwater Valley Opera Festival, Creative Ireland, Rethink Ireland, Wexford County Council, the Wexford Mental Health Association and HSE National Lottery grant funding.

As part of its programme to enhance the health and wellbeing of Irelands older people as they emerge from the pandemic, Creative Ireland has now awarded funding to the Mobile Music Machine to perform 400 concerts in residential care homes (including those publicly, trust and privately run) in 2022.

Welcoming the funding announcement, Dr. Denise Rogers (Senior Clinical Psychologist with HSE/South East Community Healthcare and co-ordinator of previous visits by The Mobile Music Machine) says:

This is excellent news. Staff, service users and their families have faced enormous challenges over the last two years. The COVID Care concerts developed as a project to bring classical music into the lives of vulnerable members of society and those most affected by the impact of the pandemic. Wherever they occurred, they made people smile. The Mobile Music Machine bring great joy and we look forward to further opportunities for such therapeutic activity!

The Chief Officer of HSE/South East Community Healthcare Kate Killeen White, in also welcoming the news, said:

In the context of the many restrictions and other effects on everyday lives that the pandemic brought, we were delighted that Creative Irelands programme of activities for older people  in the shape of our hosting of The Mobile Music Machine across various locations  did much to relieve loneliness and isolation. The COVID Care Concerts, as a project, brought beautiful music and song into the lives of vulnerable members of society and those often most affected by the impact of the pandemic.
An Irish migrant and refugee support group has expressed concern about "increasingly visible and alarming gaps" in Ireland's effort to support Ukrainian refugees.

The Limerick-based group, Doras, has raised the issue as an increasing number of Ukrainians are contacting their information and support centre to seek additional and more specialised support.

Almost 20,000 Ukrainian people have come to Ireland over the past several weeks following Russia's invasion of the country, with tens of thousands more expected to arrive.

CEO John Lannon says that while there is a lot to commend about the response from both Irish government and civil society, there are a growing number of issues that need to be addressed.

He acknowledged Ireland had responded "fairly well" to the crisis.

He said, "However, what were seeing on the ground is causing us increasing cause for concern and its vital we tackle some of the issues before things deteriorate.

We have large numbers of Ukrainians calling into our information and support centre and contacting us by phone and email. Were seeing an increasing volume of people that require additional and more specialised support, which is not surprising when you consider the gravity of the situation.

"These are people who have made a long and harrowing journey to flee a brutal war. Many have been separated from husbands, family and friends at home, and some have lost people to the war or are living in fear that they will do so. What adults and children have witnessed is hard to comprehend and the level of trauma and distress is often evident. The needs and supports they require are likely to increase over time."

According to Mr Lannon, a coordinated response is needed from the government, with proper resources allocated at the local level.

He said, "What we need now is a more coordinated response from the government, with proper resources allocated at the local level. This is especially true if we are to welcome 100,000 refugees as per government forecasts. Most Ukrainian refugees are sharing houses within the Eastern European communities, or are in emergency accommodation, or are being hosted by Irish families.

"While people are grateful for a short-term roof over their heads, the support they require goes beyond food and accommodation and includes mental and physical health supports, translation and language skills, and training and employment supports. Host families and supportive communities also need support, especially when you consider the complexity of trauma and PTSD and those with additional needs such as pregnant women, new mothers, and people with disabilities.

"We need to ensure people are not left in situations where they are placed at even greater risk and unable to cope. Sourcing suitable accommodation is essential. Some of the accommodation being provided at present is very poor and unfortunately, this has been the case for international protection applicants over many decades."

Mr Lannon believes the State cannot rely on the goodwill of the Irish people without providing proper resources.

He said, "We see this with our work. Our workload was already under huge pressure, and this has now increased massively, putting a huge strain on our ability to cope. We simply cant deliver the services we need without adequate staffing and resources."

The consistency of Ireland's approach to refugees is also under question, with Mr Lannon comparing the treatment of applicants from war zones in Afghanistan to refugees from Ukraine.

He said, "Theres also a strong feeling out there that international protection applicants from war zones in Afghanistan and elsewhere are being pushed to the back of the queue. The difference in how their requests for asylum and support are being treated is staggering and quite rightly raises important questions.

"We see it in how many people in direct provision cant access appointments for Temporary Residence Certificates or PPS numbers. There are now people in direct provision for several months without access to basic supports, including children who cannot go to school. We understand the systems are under pressure, but thats simply not acceptable.

"Its time now for proper systems and supports in every county so that peoples rights are respected, including those fleeing wars and persecution in places other than Ukraine."
The Irish Government is pushing for tougher international sanctions against Russia, as the Irish premier condemned in the strongest possible terms the atrocities and civilian deaths in Ukraine.

Micheal Martin said that nothing can be ruled out in its response to the appalling and barbaric crimes committed by Russian troops in Ukraine.

He said that every conceivable pressure has to be put on Russia to stop the war and the attack on humanity.

I would rule nothing out in terms of how we respond, and I think Europe is repulsed by this, Mr Martin said in Dublin on Monday.

We have seen this before, we didnt think we would see it again.

There is no justification for this war and without question, from my perspective, the Russian Federation and Putin has put himself beyond the pale.

There has been international condemnation about other atrocities, including possible mass executions carried out by Russian forces as areas around the capital, Kyiv, returned to Ukrainian control.

We would support further sanctions given the appalling and barbaric crimes committed by Russian Federation troops in Ukraine, particularly in Kyiv and Bucha and other towns, where we see innocent civilians murdered, with their hands tired behind their backs, Mr Martin added.

We cant be blind in the first instance to the appalling human trauma and death that is being visited on the people of Ukraine and every conceivable pressure that we can has to be put on Russia, to stop this war and stop this attack on humanity.

Irish foreign affairs minister Simon Coveney said he spoke to his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba about the atrocities uncovered in recent days.

Mr Coveney said he believes a war crime has been committed in Bucha and called for the incident to be investigated by the International Criminal Court.

(Mr Kuleba) was quite graphic in terms of his description of what hed seen and witnessed in Bucha, which is a town on the outskirts of Kyiv, where civilians have have been slaughtered, tortured, and in some cases, raped before being killed.

It was a very sobering conversation, with pretty shocking accounts of brutality and what I think can only be described as war crimes.

He said that the Ukrainian minister has called on the European Union to increase its sanctions against Russia.

I said I would support him in that, Mr Coveney added.

Ireland has been one of the countries that has been pushing for strong sanctions, a fifth package of sanctions and I hope well see that this week, which will include the targeting of energy goods, and also increasing the number of Russian individuals that are on sanctions list, as well as targeting further Russian banks in terms of removing them from the Swift money transfer system.

I think we can also look at issues around access to ports and so on. So these are the kind of real and practical next steps that can be taken by the EU, of course theres a price to that.

The alternative to that is to add somewhat to the sanctions that are already in place, but not to do the kind of fundamental changes that I think Ukraine is now asking for in response to the gruesome discoveries.

He said the current sanctions were not stopping Russias war in Ukraine.

It has also emerged that the Russian ambassador to Ireland, Yuriy Filatov, has been invited to attend Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskys address to the joint Houses of the Oireachtas this week.

Mr Coveney said it is for Mr Filatov to decide whether to attend, adding it is important to keep communication lines open with Moscow.
Voters approved an ordinance to ban roll carts in 2016, but a petition with more than 3,000 signatures calls for the city to repeal it.




More than 12,000 migrant workers will enter Korea in the first half of this year to relieve labor shortage in farming and fishing areas, the justice ministry said Monday.







Of the total of 12,330 migrant workers invited to the country, 100 from the Philippines first arrived here on Monday, with 200 more expected to come by Wednesday.







The 300 Filipino workers have been invited by the Yanggu county government in the eastern Gangwon Province ahead of the busy farming season.







Last week, the justice ministry also decided to grant stay extensions to over 130,000 migrant workers and 950 foreign fishing ship crewmen in the country.







The ministry said it plans to help local industries expected to suffer manpower shortages, such as fish processors, in the second half of this year to employ migrant workers. (Yonhap)






Gov. Eric Holcomb is optimistic his recently concluded trade mission to Eastern Europe and Israel will pay off for Indiana with new jobs and business investment in the years ahead.

The Republican chief executive, Commerce Secretary Brad Chambers and Adjutant General R. Dale Lyles participated in numerous meetings last week with government and corporate leaders in Slovakia and Israel identifying opportunities available in Indiana and renewing ties with enterprises already doing business in the Hoosier State.

"This trip was extremely productive in creating opportunities for future Hoosier investment across Slovakia and Israel in a variety of industries," Holcomb said.

"Throughout the week, Sec. Chambers, Maj. Gen. Lyles and I were warmly greeted with open hospitality which led to productive discussions, opportunities for academic exchanges, mutual investment and cross partnerships."

Among the highlights of the trip was a Wednesday reception in Tel Aviv, Israel, with Doral Energy leaders to discuss innovative technology, clean energy and the economy of the future.

Doral last year broke ground in Starke and Pulaski counties, just south of LaPorte County, on a three-phase solar farm project that's expected to deliver a $1.5 billion investment in the companys Indiana operations over the next five years.

Holcomb and Chambers also met in Israel with representatives from Start-Up Nation Central to strengthen Hoosier partnerships with innovative Israel businesses and GrowingIL to discuss future sustainability, university partnerships and innovative product development, and toured Equinom's new research and development center to see how the company's next generation of non-GMO seeds might be incorporated into its existing Indianapolis business operations.

In addition, the Hoosier officials discussed Indiana-Israel relations with Minister of Foreign Affairs Yair Lapid and strategic economic partnerships with Minister of Energy Karine Elharrart. They also spoke with U.S. Ambassador to Israel Thomas R. Nides.

The delegation concluded its trip in Jerusalem's ancient City of David on Friday, learning the history of the 3,000-year-old site and sharing a spiritual experience at the Western Wall.

Earlier in the week, the delegation met with Ukrainian refugees in Slovakia and visited the Gate of Freedom monument in Bratislava, the capital, where Holcomb emphasized Indianas solidarity with Ukraine and commitment to providing support in any way possible.

The trade mission was Holcomb's 10th international economic development trip since becoming governor in 2017.
Former IZ*ONE Sakura will finally re-debut as a K-pop idol under HYBE's new girl group LE SSERAFIM. On April 4, the star's profile photos were revealed, making fans gush over her gorgeous visuals. However, her new look also drew comparisons to her visuals when she was still in IZ*ONE.

What's the difference?

LE SSERAFIM Teaser: Sakura Revealed as First Member of New Girl Group

At midnight on April 4, HYBE revealed photo sets of LE SSERAFIM's first member, Sakura, through its official SNS.

In her photos, the female idol flaunted her visuals. The Japanese-born star showcased various concepts, reminiscent of magazine pictorials.

Sakura particularly digested broad concepts and versatility, ranging from her innocent image to her chic and elegant beauty.

A teaser video was also uploaded, where Sakura proudly walks forward against the backdrop of an electronic display with "LE SSERAFIM" written, and smiles leisurely while riding on a bike.

Sakura's confident walking and haughty eyes, combined with intense beats, overwhelm the eyes of K-pop fans.

Starting with Sakura, the group plans to unveil a new member every day.

How is LE SSERAFIM Sakura Different When She Was in IZ*ONE?

As soon as the photos were revealed, Sakura drew various reactions. Some were delighted, while others couldn't help but praise her stunning beauty.

People were also surprised by how she changed in a span of a year since IZ*ONE disbanded in 2021.

In most of her pictures, Sakura looks seductive, showing her chic and confident side that has never been shown before by the idol. Her mature appearance is completely different from when she was still promoting under IZ*ONE. Back then, she went by cute and lovely image.

Now, people think she's more beautiful, oozing with confidence and fearlessness.

While others seemed disappointed that Sakura's new look makes her almost unrecognizable, many still reacted positively to her beauty.

Not only her makeup changed but also her hairstyle. Known for her bangs and short 'do, Sakura completely erased her image in IZ*ONE with her new long locks sans bangs, enhanced by purple highlights.

On the other hand, LE SSERAFIM is the first girl group to be launched in collaboration with HYBE and its subsidiary label Source Music.

LE SSERAFIM, which is an anagram of "I'M FEARLESS," implies self-confidence and strong will without fearing anything will be the concept of the new group.

Sakura, along with her former co-IZ*ONE Chaewon, will finally re-debut in May 2022.

What are your thoughts on Sakura's upgraded visual?

For more K-Pop news and updates, keep your tabs open here at KpopStarz.

KpopStarz owns this article.

Written by Eunice Dawson
The debut song of the group MCND's ICE AGE in Europe is on the rise.

Hundreds of teams participate in MCND EUROPE DANCE CONTEST 2022 held on a large scale ahead of MCND's first European Tour [1ST] MCND EUROPE TOUR 2022 to realize MCND's popularity. In particular, not only in Europe but also in other regions in Asia and the Americas. Fans' participation continues through YouTube and TikTok, adding to the heat.

READ ALSO: MCND to Hold First Fan Meeting, Online and Offline Simultaneously

The competition among participants was fierce as MCND's own selection of the contest had a special pledge of inviting backstage and performing stage opportunities. Quality videos reinterpreting the style and music video concept of "ICE AGE" as well as high-quality dance skills attracted attention.

MCND has been doubling expectations with the title of the first K-pop idol's European tour since the pandemic. They have been raising interest in the performance in a special way, such as releasing one song from the setlist every day through TikTok Live since the 30th.

Meanwhile, MCND will visit Amsterdam, Netherlands from the 9th to the 17th, London, Hungary, Budapest, Cologne, Germany, Paris and Toulon, France, and Lausanne, Switzerland, to meet European fans.

About MCND

An acronym for "Music Creates New Dream," MCND is a five-member boy group under TOP Media. The group, composed of members Castle J, Bic, Minjae, Huijun, and Win, made their debut last February 27, 2020 with the mini-album "Into the Ice Age," led by its title track "Ice Age." The group immediately broke into the Top Ten of the South Korean Gaon Album Chart, peaking at the eighth spot.

"Into the Ice Age" was followed by two more EPs, "Earth Age" last August 2020 and "MCND Age" last January 2021. They reached the 3rd and 4th spot on the South Korean Gao Album Chart, respectively.

RELATED ARTICLE: MCND Comeback 2021: Boy Group Holds Online Showcase in Line with the Release of New Mini-Album
Residents in the Symphony Bay subdivision may have another place to visit to go for a swim, meet with friends, study in a library or workout in a fitness center within the next year.

Representatives from Fairwyn Ltd., developers of the Symphony Bay subdivision, plan to construct a two-story, 10,000 square-foot clubhouse at 301 Harmony Drive in the subdivision, which is located near the corner of Townline Road and North Edwards Boulevard in Lake Geneva.

Members of the Lake Geneva City Council unanimously approved a precise implementation plan for the clubhouse, March 28. The plan commission unanimously recommended the plan, March 21.

Richard Zirk, representative for Fairwyn Ltd., highlighted some of the features of the clubhouse during the plan commission meeting.

Zirk said the clubhouse will be similar in design to a clubhouse that already has been constructed in the subdivision near South Lake Shore Drive, south of The Boat House Bar & Grill.

However, he said the new clubhouse will be about four times the size of the current clubhouse facility.

That is the same design, same style, same materials, Zirk said. This is designed to have the same look and appearance.

The clubhouse is set to feature a lounge area and a club room with a prep kitchen that can be used for large parties.

If folks want to have a wedding anniversary or birthday party there, they can prep their food, Zirk said of the club room. There is no cooking onsite. We dont provide for that type of food prep. Its simply reheating. There will be microwaves and those type of things.

The facility is set to include an indoor fitness center, locker rooms, dance studio, storage areas, office space, art room and a library, which also can be used as a multi-purpose room.

We have a lot of crafters in our area. We have card clubs. A card club might be using the library on a Thursday afternoon. Its designed for multi-purpose, Zirk said. Theres a lot of different clubs and things that happen. We want to make this space as flexible as we can.

The clubhouse also is set to include a mail room where residents can pick up and drop off their mail or packages.

This is a way to help make life for our residents a whole lot easier, to be able to go inside, pick up their mail, and talk to their friends and make this a gather point for people to just be able to socialize more easily, Zirk said.

The outside area of the clubhouse is set to feature pickleball courts, bocce ball courts and swimming pool.

A bicycle/pedestrian trail will be located east of the clubhouse, which will connect to other trails in the area.

Those paths interconnect with pathways that the community has going through Veterans Park and pathways that get you to the high school, through our estate park and winding up at the Buttons Bay facility without having to drive if you didnt want to, Zirk said.

Jackie Mich, senior associate planner for Vandewalle & Associates, Inc. of Madison, city planning firm for Lake Geneva, said she is pleased with the design of the clubhouse.

All in all, it looks great, Mich said. I think it will be a great amenity for the residents.

Construction of the clubhouse is scheduled to begin this summer and be completed in spring 2023.

We start this summer and finish up in the spring, Zirk said.

The Symphony Bay subdivision, which was approved by the Lake Geneva City Council in 2017, is being constructed in several phases. Once the subdivision is completed, it is set to feature about 427 residential units.

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.
On Friday April 1 at approximately 12:33 p.m. the Walworth County Sheriffs Office Communication Center received a 911 call reporting a boat explosion on Lauderdale Lake in the Town of LaGrange, according to a release from the Sheriffs Office.

Emergency responders were immediately dispatched to the area and deputies located a pontoon type barge on the shoreline off of Stewart Drive with significant damage.

Three male victims were located and medical first aid was administered by both deputies and fire/rescue personnel.

One male victim was transported to a local trauma center with severe injuries, another male was treated and released and the third male was pronounced deceased at the scene by the Walworth County Medical Examiners Office. The man has been identified online as Jesse Perry.

Following the accident, a gofundme account was set up for Perrys family to try to cover expenses related to his unexpected death.

Perry leaves behind a wife, two young children, Jesse Jr. (6) and Bella (8) and two stepchildren, Hannah (12) and Ryan (16), according to the gofundme post.

To contribute to the gofundme account go to gofundme.com and search Jesse Perrys funeral and family.

The Walworth County Hazardous Materials Unit assisted with fuel spillage.

The three males worked for a local pier service and were in the process of installing a pier when the explosion occurred. The cause of the explosion is under investigation by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the Walworth County Sheriffs Office, the Walworth County Medical Examiners Office, and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

Assisting agencies included the Lauderdale LaGrange Fire and Rescue Department, Elkhorn Area Fire Department EMS Division, Walworth County Hazardous Materials Unit, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the Walworth County Medical Examiners Office, and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

No additional information about the cause of the incident has been released.

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.
The interim chancellor of UW-Whitewater resigned Monday in a move that other university leaders said was unexpected.

Jim Henderson, who took over as leader of the 11,500-student university last July, said in a statement that one of his goals as interim chancellor was to help hire the best chancellor for the long-term success of UW-Whitewater.

Over the past few days it has become clear to me that I cannot make progress on that goal, he said.

But a search hasnt yet begun and just this fall, University of Wisconsin System President Tommy Thompson said at a UW Board of Regents meeting that Henderson had agreed to extend his service for a second year.

The System named Provost John Chenoweth as the next interim chancellor effective Tuesday. He has worked at UW-Whitewater since 2002, including a stint as dean of the College of Business and Economics. He has served as the universitys deputy leader since last summer.

This is an unexpected situation, but I am confident that Provost Chenoweth will maintain continuity at UW-Whitewater, interim System President Michael Falbo said in a statement. I thank Jim for his service.

Henderson was the Systems vice president for academic and student affairs from 2016 through 2018 and also served as interim UW-Madison provost in the summer of 2019. He did not immediately respond to an interview request made through a university spokesperson.

Regents President Ed Manydeeds is expected to provide an update on a search for a new permanent chancellor at a Thursday meeting on the UW-Stevens Point campus.

Hendersons resignation is the latest in a string of leadership shake-ups at UW-Whitewater.

The previous chancellor, Dwight Watson, resigned last year because of a cancer diagnosis. The year prior, the System investigated him after a former student at a previous job accused him of sexual misconduct. Investigators found the accusations to be without merit.

Watsons predecessor, Beverly Kopper, resigned after a System investigation found her husband had sexually harassed students and university employees, leading one of them to sue the university last fall for allegedly failing to protect women. Koppers husband denied the allegations.

In a Monday message to the campus community signed by half of Hendersons cabinet  Chenoweth; Artanya Wesley, vice chancellor for student affairs; Jeff Arnold, interim vice chancellor for administrative affairs; and Katie Kuznacic, interim vice chancellor for university relations  the group acknowledged the leadership whiplash of the last few years. They said they had no details about Hendersons departure and highlighted UW-Whitewaters collective accomplishments, such as the largest freshman class in four years and a much stronger financial position.

During a time of unprecedented challenges, our university family has shown strong resilience and achieved important successes, the vice chancellors said. We deeply appreciate you.

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], April 4 (ANI/BusinessWire India): The PCI Security Standards Council (PCI SSC), a global payment security forum, published version 4.0 of the PCI Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).

PCI DSS is a global standard that provides a baseline of technical and operational requirements designed to protect account data. PCI DSS v4.0 replaces version 3.2.1 to address emerging threats and technologies and enable innovative methods to combat new threats. The updated standard and Summary of Changes document are available now on the PCI SSC website.

Also Read | Sri Lanka Unrest: President Gotabaya Rajapaksa Sacks Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa; Invites Opposition to Join Unity Cabinet.

To provide organizations time to understand the changes in version 4.0 and implement any updates needed, the current version of PCI DSS, v3.2.1, will remain active for two years until it is retired on 31 March 2024. Once assessors have completed training in PCI DSS v4.0, organizations may assess to either PCI DSS v4.0 or PCI DSS v3.2.1. The standard also provides additional time for organizations to implement many of the new requirements. More information on the implementation timeline can be found on the PCI Perspectives Blog.

Feedback from the global payments industry drove changes to the standard. Over the course of three years, more than 200 organizations provided over 6,000 items of feedback to ensure the standard continues to meet the complex, ever-changing landscape of payment security.

Also Read | Sri Lanka Unrest: 4 Ministers Sworn Into New Sri Lankan Cabinet.

"The industry has had unprecedented visibility into, and impact on the development of PCI DSS v4.0," says Lance Johnson, Executive Director of PCI SSC. "Our stakeholders provided substantial, insightful, and diverse input that helped the Council effectively advance the development of this version of the PCI Data Security Standard."

Updates to the standard focus on meeting the evolving security needs of the payments industry, promoting security as a continuous process, increasing flexibility for organizations using different methods to achieve security objectives, and enhancing validation methods and procedures. Details about the updates can be found in the PCI DSS v4.0 Summary of Changes document on the PCI SSC website.

Examples of the changes in PCI DSS v4.0 include:

Updated firewall terminology to network security controls to support a broader range of technologies used to meet the security objectives traditionally met by firewalls.

Expansion of Requirement 8 to implement multi-factor authentication (MFA) for all access into the cardholder data environment.

Increased flexibility for organizations to demonstrate how they are using different methods to achieve security objectives.

Addition of targeted risk analyses to allow entities the flexibility to define how frequently they perform certain activities, as best suited for their business needs and risk exposure.

WATCH: "First Look at PCI DSS v4.0" a video featuring Council representatives discussing key changes to the standard.

"With India being a highly targeted country by cyber hackers, securing payment data with data security standards in an evolving payment ecosystem is critical to build robust payments infrastructure keeping security at the centre of everything," says Nitin Bhatnagar, Associate Regional Director - India, PCI Security Standards Council. "PCI DSS v4.0 is a unique example of how the Council is evolving security standards and validation programs to support a range of environments, technologies, and methodologies for achieving security. PCI DSS has always been technology-neutral and requirements are intended to apply to all types of environments."

LISTEN: Coffee with The Council: A Preview of the PCI DSS v4.0 and Transition Training a podcast featuring Council representatives discussing what to expect with PCI DSS v4.0 and assessor training information.

In addition to the updated standard, supporting documents published in the PCI SSC Document Library include the Summary of Changes from PCI DSS v3.2.1 to v4.0, the v4.0 Report on Compliance (ROC) Template, ROC Attestations of Compliance (AOC), and ROC Frequently Asked Questions. Self-Assessment Questionnaires (SAQs) will be published in the coming weeks.

To support global adoption of PCI DSS, the standard and Summary of Changes will be translated into several languages. These translations will be published over the next few months, between March and June 2022.

The Council will provide additional information throughout the year to help the community understand the changes made to the standard. This includes the PCI DSS Symposium, an online education event available 21 June 2022 for PCI SSC community members. Training for assessors will be available in June. For a schedule of assessor training sessions consult the PCI SSC training resource page.

VIEW: "PCI DSS v4.0 At a Glance" an overview document on the changes to PCI DSS v4.0.

Subscribe to the PCI Perspectives Blog for additional resources including podcasts, videos, and blog posts designed to help organizations navigate the transition to PCI DSS v4.0.

This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Raipur, Apr 4 (PTI) Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel on Monday said his government will chalk out an action plan to rehabilitate those people who migrated to neighbouring states during the Salwa Judum movement around 15 years ago.

Also Read | Punjab FM Harpal Singh Cheema Sets Up Task Force to Increasing Sugarcane Farmer's Income.

A delegation of such displaced people from the state, who are currently living in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, met Baghel on Monday at his official residence seeking proper rehabilitation, an official said.

Also Read | Kerala Shocker: Newly-Wed Man Drowns in Kozhikode Lake While Clicking Selfies.

"During discussion, Baghel said those who migrated to Telangana and Andhra Pradesh from Chhattisgarh after being displaced from Bastar, Sukma, Bijapur, Dantewada (Bastar region) during the Salwa Judum movement, will be wholeheartedly welcomed by his government, if they are willing to come back," an official statement said.

The state government will chalk out an action plan to create a conducive environment for their rehabilitation, and they will be provided all basic facilities, including ration cards, school, employment, along with land, the release added.

State Industry Minister Kawasi Lakhma, who hails from Sukma, and senior officials were also present during this meeting.

Salwa Judum, an anti-Naxal operation powered by vigilante groups, was kicked off in 2005-06 in Bastar during then BJP government, before it was disbanded in 2011 by the Supreme Court over allegations of human right violations.

The violence rising from the movement forced several tribals to flee and settle in neighbouring states, while many shifted to government-aided relief camps in Bastar.

Shubhranshu Choudhary, convener of New Peace Process, an initiative for peace in Naxal-hit Bastar region, who accompanied the displaced tribals here, said the Union government should initiate a conversation with the concerned states to discuss a wider rehabilitation plan.

"Announcing (initiative for) rehabilitation by Chhattisgarh is a very good sign but not everyone will be keen to shift next to police camps. The Centre must initiate a conversation with concerned states to discuss wider rehabilitation plans, he said.

The Salwa Judum movement resulted in the mass displacement of an estimated 55,000 tribals from 644 villages of Bastar region to neighbouring states, particularly erstwhile Andhra Pardesh, Chaudhary said.

"The situation of the displaced tribals has worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic. Andhra Pradesh and Telangana governments have carried out plantation on half the land on which they used to cultivate crops for the past 15 years. During the last three months, plantation work has been taking place in the other half as well, forcing them to settle on roads," he claimed.

The displaced tribals have requested the Chhattisgarh CM to discuss the issue with the Telangana and Andhra Pradesh governments and get this displacement stopped, he said.

The rehabilitation scheme of the Union Home Ministry for Bru tribals displaced from Mizoram to Tripura due to internal violence can be used, he suggested, adding that the displaced tribals will hold a protest on April 6 at Jantar Mantar in Delhi.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
New Delhi, April 4: Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar are scheduled to visit Tokyo in mid-April to hold the next edition of the '2+2" dialogue with their Japanese counterparts, covering a range of key issues including possible implications of the Ukraine crisis for the Indo-Pacific, people familiar with the development said on Monday. Jaishankar and Singh are set to travel to Tokyo after concluding a visit to the US.

Both the ministers are visiting the US to hold the '2+2' foreign and defence ministerial talks with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin on April 11 in Washington, the people said.

Both Japan and the US are India's partners in the Quadrilateral coalition and the implications of the Ukraine crisis for the Indo-Pacific are likely to figure in the talks in both Washington and Tokyo. Singh is likely to be in the US from April 10-13, the people said.

The planned visit by Singh and Jaishankar to Tokyo comes less than a month after Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida visited India for the annual India-Japan summit. PM Narendra Modi to Visit J&K on April 24: BJP Leader.

At the summit in New Delhi, Kishida announced an investment target of five trillion Yen (Rs 3,20,000 crore) in India over the next five years. In the 2+2 dialogue, the two sides are expected to deliberate on ways to further expand bilateral cooperation in the areas of defence and security besides taking stock of the developments in the Indo-Pacific, the people cited above said.

The Japanese delegation will be headed by Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi and Defence Minister Nobuo Kishi. The '2+2' dialogue with Japan was initiated in 2019 to further deepen bilateral security and defence cooperation and bring greater depth to the special strategic and global partnership between the two countries. India has the '2+2' ministerial format of dialogue with very few countries including the US, Japan, Australia and Russia.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI): Lok Sabha will discuss the issue of the Ukraine crisis on Tuesday under Rule 193.

Earlier in the Business Advisory Committee of the Lok Sabha, Speaker Om Birla had agreed to allow a discussion for a short term on the same after demand from several political parties.

Also Read | Mumbai Shocker: Cops Book Two House Helps After 45-Year-Old Woman Complains of Theft and Sexual Harassment.

Notices for Rule 193 have been given by RSP Lok Sabha MP N.K. Premachandran and Congress MP Manish Tewari.

Discussion is likely to happen for two hours following which a reply will be given by Minister of External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar.

Also Read | Naseeruddin Shah Supports Niece Saira Shah Halim Ahead of Ballygunge By-Elections.

The government is also mulling the option of asking Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia to intervene in the debate. Scindia as Civil Aviation Minister played a key role in coordinating efforts of various airlines including private airlines to fly aircraft to bring Indians back.

While members of Parliament want to understand how the situation currently is in Ukraine and what is India's stand vis-a-vis Ukraine and Russia and also what the Indian government plans to do to accommodate the students who were brought back under Operation Ganga from war-hit Ukraine via special flights.

Operation Ganga, under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership was launched on February 26. The first evacuation flight from Bucharest reached New Delhi with 249 nationals on 27 February. Op Ganga went on till March 11.

Members also want to understand the government of India's stand with regards to Russia and Ukraine and also how it impacts geopolitical space. Fuel prices impacted because of the crisis is what members are likely to seek response on from the govt.

Many students who were in their later years of college for medical education and see their future in a limbo with the college infrastructure completely destroyed in Ukraine.

More than 22,000 Indians, majorly students were brought back on more than 80 flights. India also rescued several others including citizens from Bangladesh & Nepal.

Four Union Ministers Kiren Rijiju, Hardeep Puri, Jyotiraditya Scindia and General VK Singh were dispatched to neighbouring countries to help coordinate evacuation efforts. (ANI)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
New Delhi, Apr 4 (PTI) The contentious bill providing for legal sanction to police to obtain physical and biological samples of convicts and detainees for investigation in criminal matters was passed by Lok Sabha on Monday, with Home Minister Amit Shah asserting it will act as a defender of human rights of law-abiding citizens.

He also sought to allay the concerns voiced by MPs about invasion of privacy, insisting all data collected under the proposed law will be protected.

Also Read | Mumbai Shocker: Cops Book Two House Helps After 45-Year-Old Woman Complains of Theft and Sexual Harassment.

The bill, which seeks to replace the Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920, was passed by a voice vote after Shah assuaged the concerns raised by the Opposition, which claimed the draft law was "draconian" and could convert India into a "police state".

Responding to the Opposition charge, Shah, citing a provision in the bill, said people arrested for an offence, except for those committed against women and children, or for which the punishment is not less than seven years in jail, may not be obliged to allow collection of their biological samples.

Also Read | Naseeruddin Shah Supports Niece Saira Shah Halim Ahead of Ballygunge By-Elections.

Hitting back at the Opposition for alleging misuse of Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, Shah said UAPA is not for any particular caste or religion, but "your (Opposition) advocacy is only for one caste-religion".

"I still say today that Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) was a law in the interest of this country, it was repealed for appeasement, I have no hesitation in saying this. We do not play vote bank politics. We have come to secure the country, take the country to the greatest heights in the world," Shah said.

"Those who are talking human rights (of offenders), it is my request to them that you must think about those who are harassed by criminals. You are concerned about those involved in robbing, rape... I have brought this bill for defending the human rights of crores of law abiding citizens of this country, no one should try to paint it otherwise," he said.

Shah said the Modi government does not believe in investigation with the help of "third degree methods" but through modern technology, data base and information.

"There is a need to have a balance in the country. Along with individual rights, we will have to think about society's rights as well, and ensure a balance between the two," he said.

Urging the Opposition not to cast aspersions against the government over the bill, Shah said the Modi dispensation has taken a number of measures to ensure the police and investigators remain two steps ahead of criminals, including setting up specialised universities for forensic training.

During a discussion on the bill, members voiced concern over the broad provisions in the draft legislation that empowers a head constable of a police station or a head warden of a jail to take measurements of convicts as well as those in preventive detention.

Initiating the discussion on the Bill, Congress member Manish Tewari said the draft legislation was "draconian and against civil liberties".

Trinamool member Mahua Moitra said the Bill sought to replace the Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920, but the proposed law had fewer safeguards than the law enacted by British colonisers.

Moitra contended in the absence of a data protection law, the proposed measure lacked safeguards to ensure that the information collected was protected well, and could lead to violation of the privacy of an individual who has not been convicted.

BSP member Danish Ali apprehended the Bill could convert India into a police state and could be used to settle political scores.

Ali, Moitra as well some other Opposition members also demanded that the bill be referred to a parliamentary standing committee.

After several Opposition members voiced concern over protection of the data collected under the proposed law, Shah assured it will be protected, appropriate rules framed and the best of forensic science experts engaged to limit its use.

Shah said data will be stored in a protected hardware and those "who send samples (for matching) will get back the results and data will not be shared" through network.

He also asserted that National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) will be the sole custodian of the data and that no party or private player be involved in the process.

Don't raise apprehensions without any ground, he told the opposition members.

Shah said a database has been in use for two-and-a-half years to solve crimes, including automobile thefts.

"There is no complaint from anywhere. Now, if any NGO raises a false complaint after listening you, then God knows," Shah said, adding next-generation crimes cannot be tackled with old techniques.

"We have to try to take criminal justice system to the next era," Shah said.

This bill has been brought with the sole intent to increase the rate of conviction, to contain the number of crimes and send a tough message in society to get those committing a crime punished.

Earlier, moving the bill for consideration and passage in the Lok Sabha, Shah said that besides the bill, the government is also preparing a model prison manual that will be sent to states.

"A lot of the concerns will be addressed with the sending of that prison manual. It has various provisions relating to subjects such as rehabilitation of prisoners, making them part of the mainstream again, limiting the rights of jail officials, maintaining discipline, security of jails, separate jails for women and open jails," Shah said.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Kolkata (West Bengal)/New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI): Referring to the economic crisis in Sri Lanka, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday said India's economic condition is even worse than the neighbouring island nation.

Attacking the Centre over the fuel price hike, Banerjee said the central government should discuss the "economic crisis" in the country with all political parties instead of using the central agencies against the States.

Also Read | Mumbai Shocker: Cops Book Two House Helps After 45-Year-Old Woman Complains of Theft and Sexual Harassment.

Briefing mediapersons, the Chief Minister said, "Sri Lanka's economic condition is bad but India's condition is worse than Sri Lanka's. Fuel prices have been hiked here. The Central government should call all political parties to discuss the economic crisis in our country rather than using Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Enforcement Directorate (against States)."

"People should wake up. They took the votes in Uttar Pradesh and after seven days increased the prices of everything as return gifts. The country's economy is getting ruined. They are hatching a conspiracy against the States. All states must see and the Opposition must be together against these things," she added.

Also Read | Naseeruddin Shah Supports Niece Saira Shah Halim Ahead of Ballygunge By-Elections.

Meanwhile, Ram Gopal Yadav, Samajwadi Party MP said that Sri Lanka-like situation can happen in India as well. "They (Centre) won't have enough money to even roll out salaries to government employees. They have a Rs 4.27 lakh crore FCI subsidy due in 2 yrs. They don't have any money; this government has gone bankrupt," he said.

Sri Lanka is currently battling a deep economic crisis. On Sunday, 26 Sri Lankan Cabinet Ministers resigned en masse from their positions amid rising public anger against the government over the economic crisis. All 26 of them signed a general letter, consenting to resign paving the way for a new Cabinet to be formed.

Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa will continue to be in the office and all other members of the Cabinet have tendered their resignations to the PM.

The country's government on Saturday blocked access to social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp and YouTube, but lifted the ban on Sunday afternoon after the PM's son Namal Rajapaksa spoke against it. (ANI)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Gorakhpur (UP), Apr 4 (PTI) A man attacked two PAC constables with a sharp-edged weapon at the south gate of Gorakhnath temple here and tried to enter the temple premises, police said.

The accused has been identified as Murtaza and has been arrested, they said.

Also Read | Rajya Sabha MP Joginpally Santosh Kumar Receives Vriksha Mitra Award.

According to police, the accused tried to forcibly enter the temple premises on Sunday after raising the religious slogan of Allahu Akbar.

"Two of our Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) constables were injured after the accused tried to enter the temple with a sharp-edged weapon. He went to a PAC post near the gate and tried to attack the police, ADG, Gorakhpur zone, Akhil Kumar said.

Also Read | Manipur: Class 4 Student Attends Classes While Babysitting 2-Year-Old Sister in Lap.

The accused, who was also injured in the attack, was held by the constables, he said.

The officer said the injured constables -- Gopal Kumar Gaur and Anil Paswan -- were given first aid at Guru Gorakhnath hospital and are undergoing treatment at BRD Medical College.

"The accused is also undergoing treatment at the district hospital. Initial investigation revealed that his name is Murtaza and is a resident of Gorakhpur," Kumar said.

He also said that the angle of terror cannot be ruled out as Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath often visits the region.

Strict action will be taken after probing the incident from all angles, the ADG added.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI): Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday recalled the 'Nation First' spirit of freedom fighter Prahlad Patel on his birth anniversary and appealed to the universities to research and publish the unknown aspects of the life of freedom fighters.

"Patel's father passed away when he was incarcerated but Prahlad Patel did not accept the conditions of apology that were put forward by the colonial rulers for allowing him to perform the last rites," said PM Modi narrating an incident from the life of freedom fighter which symbolizes 'Nation First' approach.

Also Read | Mumbai Shocker: Cops Book Two House Helps After 45-Year-Old Woman Complains of Theft and Sexual Harassment.

PM Modi shared that even though Prahlad Patel helped Sardar Patel in merging the princely states in India after independence, yet, many such great freedom fighters don't find mention in the history books.

While addressing the event on the 115th birth anniversary of Prahlad Patel via video conferencing, PM Modi appealed to all the universities to research and publish the unknown aspects of the freedom fighters.

Also Read | Naseeruddin Shah Supports Niece Saira Shah Halim Ahead of Ballygunge By-Elections.

"We should remember freedom fighters like Shri Prahladji Patel in the enterprise of building New India," he said.

An event was organized in the Becharaji district of Gujarat to mark the 115th birth anniversary of freedom fighter Prahladji Patel. Chief Minister Bhupendrabhai Patel was also present at the event. (ANI)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Kolkata, Apr 4 (PTI) Stating that her government took action against the former TMCP student leader who heckled the vice-chancellor of state-run Aliah University, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday sought to know what steps were initiated against the VC of Visva-Bharati, a central university.

Giasuddin Mondal, a former leader of the TMC's student wing, was seen in a purported video threatening and verbally abusing Aliah University VC Mohammad Ali, following which he was arrested.

Also Read | Karauli Violence: Councillor Matloom Ahmed Booked, Curfew Extended Till April 7.

"Police have already made an arrest in the Aliah University incident. What is happening in Visva-Bharati and Bolpur? How many people have been arrested there? Has the VC of Visva-Bharati been arrested?" she told reporters at the state secretariat.

"A section (community) studies in Aliah University. All are good. There can be discontentment among the students of Aliah University. The one who hurled abuses has been arrested by police. Here police take action," she added.

Also Read | India, Japan 2+2 Dialogue Set to Take Place in Mid-April in Tokyo.

Banerjee's comments came in the backdrop of ceaseless student protests at the Visva-Bharati in Bolpur's Santiniketan over a host of issues.

"Is there any action taken in Visva-Bharati against what this 'bhadralok' (gentleman) is doing there," she said, in an apparent dig.

Incidentally, Visva-Bharati praised the police and said that similar steps should be taken against those students who had gheraoed senior varsity functionaries last month and used abusive words.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
New Delhi, Apr 4 (PTI) India's top oil firm IOC, engineering and construction giant Larsen & Toubro and renewable energy company ReNew Power on Monday came together to form a joint venture to develop green hydrogen business.

Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and L&T have additionally signed a pact to form a joint venture with equity participation to manufacture and sell electrolyzers used in the production of green hydrogen.

Also Read | ESIC Recruitment 2022: Apply for 93 Vacancies at esic.nic.in; Check Details Here.

"The tripartite venture is a synergistic alliance that brings together the strong credentials of L&T in designing, executing, and delivering EPC projects, IOC's established expertise in petroleum refining along with its presence across the energy spectrum, and the expertise of ReNew in offering and developing utility-scale renewable energy solutions," the firms said in a statement.

The joint ventures will look to manufacture zero-carbon emitting hydrogen, which is used from refineries to steel plants to even running automobiles, via electrolysis powered by renewable energy.

Also Read | Android 13 OS Likely To Allow Two Carrier Connections on One eSIM: Report.

The government in February, notified a green hydrogen policy aimed at boosting the production of green hydrogen and green ammonia to help the nation become a global hub for the environmentally friendly version of the element.

For countries like India, with its ever-increasing oil and gas import bill, green hydrogen can also help provide crucial energy security by reducing the overall dependence on imported fossil fuels.

While nearly all hydrogen produced in India today is grey, it is estimated that demand for hydrogen will be 12 million tonnes by 2030 and around 40 per cent of the element produced in the country (around 5 million tonnes) will be green, as per the draft National Hydrogen Mission guidelines.

By 2050, nearly 80 per cent of India's hydrogen is projected to be 'green' - produced by renewable electricity and electrolysis. Green hydrogen may become the most competitive route for hydrogen production by around 2030. This may be driven by potential cost declines in key production technologies and in clean energy technologies such as solar PV and wind turbines.

"Today, hydrogen is mainly used in the refining, steel and fertilizer sectors, which will be the focus of the JVs' initial efforts," the statement said, adding "the country's refining sector consumes approx. 2 million tonnes of grey hydrogen every year, with IOC owning one of the largest shares of its refining output."

To help decarbonize the Indian industry, the new green hydrogen policy provides for the waiver of inter-state transmission charges for a period of 25 years and a banking provision of up to 30 days, which will help reduce the cost of green hydrogen significantly. This will, therefore, push the replacement of grey hydrogen with green.

Speaking about the joint venture, SN Subrahmanyan, CEO & MD, L&T, said, "the IOC-L&T-ReNew JV will focus on developing green hydrogen projects in a time-bound manner to supply green hydrogen at an industrial scale."

While L&T will bring its strong EPC credentials to the table, IOC being India's premier oil refiner with extensive capabilities in chemical processes and refining has established deep R&D capabilities in many aspects of the green hydrogen value chain, and ReNew Power has in a short time established itself as a leading renewable energy supplier and has built itself a very strong reputation.

"We consider this partnership as a significant step in India's quest for alternative energy," he said. "Addressing another gap in the Green Hydrogen manufacturing chain, IOC-L&T JV will focus on production and sale of Electrolyzer."

Commenting on the occasion, Shrikant Madhav Vaidya, Chairman, IOC said, "to start with, this partnership will focus on green hydrogen projects at our Mathura and Panipat refineries. Alongside, other green hydrogen projects in India will also be evaluated."

While the usage of hydrogen in the mobility sector will take its due time, however, the refineries will be the pivot around which India's green hydrogen revolution will materialize in a substantial way, he said. "The partnership forged today will thus catalyse the greening of India's energy basket."

Sumant Sinha, Chairman and CEO of ReNew Power said, In alignment with the government's broader strategic climate goals for 2030 and 2070 set by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, ReNew looks forward to working with L&T and IOC to build the green hydrogen business in India. ReNew, as a leader in intelligent energy solutions and with advanced capability across renewable energy technologies, is well poised to complement the capabilities of our partners."

"The timing for these proposed JVs is excellent as they will help support the government of India's recently announced green hydrogen policy to boost India Inc's decarbonization journey."

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Brussels [Belgium], April 4 (ANI): The European Union on Monday condemned in the strongest possible terms the reported atrocities committed by the Russian armed forces in a number of occupied Ukrainian towns that have now been liberated.

High Representative Josep Borrell in a declaration on behalf of the EU on Russian atrocities committed in Ukrainian towns, said that haunting images of large numbers of civilian deaths and casualties, as well as the destruction of civilian infrastructure show the true face of the brutal war of aggression Russia is waging against Ukraine and its people.

Also Read | Climate Change May Be Causing Many Birds to Nest, Lay Eggs Earlier: Study.

"The massacres in the town of Bucha and other Ukrainian towns will be inscribed in the list of atrocities committed on European soil," read the statement.

According to the statement, the Russian authorities are responsible for these atrocities, committed while they had effective control of the area. They are subject to the international law of occupation.

Also Read | Imran Khan Nominates Pakistans Former Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed as Caretaker Prime Minister.

The perpetrators of war crimes and other serious violations as well as the responsible government officials and military leaders will be held accountable, said the statement.

The European Union supports all measures to ensure accountability for human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law in Ukraine by Russian Armed forces.

"In particular, we fully support the investigation launched by the ICC Prosecutor into war crimes and crimes against humanity as well as the work of the OHCHR Commission of Inquiry. The EU is assisting the Ukrainian Prosecutor General and Civil Society focused on collection and preservation of the evidences of war crimes," read the statement.

"We stand in full solidarity with Ukraine and the Ukrainian people in these sombre hours for the whole world. The EU will continue to firmly support Ukraine and will advance, as a matter of urgency, work on further sanctions against Russia."

Russian President Vladimir Putin "must stop this war" immediately and unconditionally.

Russian forces launched military operations in Ukraine on February 24, three days after Moscow recognized Ukraine's breakaway regions - Donetsk and Luhansk - as independent entities.

Several countries including the UK, the US, Canada, and the European Union have condemned Russia's military operations in Ukraine and imposed sanctions on Moscow. These countries have also promised to help Ukraine with military aid to fight Russia. (ANI)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Islamabad [Pakistan], April 4 (ANI): Amid the ongoing political turmoil in Pakistan, Prime Minister Imran Khan has summoned a meeting of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Parliamentary Board on Tuesday to discuss ticket distribution in the next election, reported local media citing sources.

The meeting, which will be chaired by Khan, comes after President Arif Alvi dissolved the National Assembly on Sunday, reported ARY News.

Also Read | Sri Lanka Unrest: President Gotabaya Rajapaksa Sacks Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa; Invites Opposition to Join Unity Cabinet.

Notably, while the federal cabinet stands dissolved, Imran Khan will continue to perform his duties as the prime minister, said Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry on Twitter.

The development comes as National Assembly Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri, who was chairing Sunday's session, dismissed the no-confidence motion against the Imran Khan-led government, terming it a contradiction of Article 5 of the Constitution.

Also Read | Sri Lanka Unrest: 4 Ministers Sworn Into New Sri Lankan Cabinet.

Following this, Imran Khan in his address to the nation called the no-trust motion against him a 'foreign agenda'.

"It was a foreign agenda, I want to tell the people don't get disturbed the God is looking over the nation," the media outlet quoted him as saying.

"The Speaker has decided to use his authority. I have sent advice to the President for dissolution of the assemblies," he added.

In line with Khan's proposal, President Alvi also dissolved the National Assembly on Sunday with the elections likely to be held in the next 90 days. (ANI)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Tehran [Iran], April 4 (ANI/Xinhua): Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said on Sunday that the United States has by no means any compassion toward Muslim nations in the region, according to the president's official website.

Making the remarks in a phone conversation with his Iraqi counterpart Barham Salih, Raisi said it has become evident that the external power only seeks its own interests and hegemonic goals.

Also Read | Pakistan Political Crisis: 'Opposition Is Still Unable To Understand What Happened Today', Says Imran Khan.

Raisi said Iran supports Iraq in promoting its unity, independence, security and regional and international position, noting any insecurity in Iraq will be detrimental to the entire region.

The scope of "brotherly and friendly" relations between Iran and Iraq goes beyond that of merely two neighbours, the Iranian president told Salih.

Also Read | Russia-Ukraine War: Ready to Pay for Russian Gas Supplies in Rubles, Says Slovak Economy Minister Richard Sulik.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi president emphasized the need for enhancing bilateral cooperation with Iran to overcome regional challenges, according to high priority to stability and security in the region.

Regional crises can be resolved solely by the countries of the region and without external interference, Salih said. (ANI/Xinhua)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Lahore, Apr 4 (PTI) A Pakistani court on Monday dismissed a petition of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to cancel the pre-arrest bail of the join Opposition's nominee for the slot of prime minister Shehbaz Sharif in a PKR 14 billion money laundering case.

The court, however, said that he and other suspects will be indicted on April 11.

Also Read | Ganesh Temple Street: Street in New York Named After Prominent Hindu Temple.

The court's verdict has come as a blow for Prime Minister Imran Khan who was keen to see Shehbaz behind bars in the ongoing constitutional crisis triggered by dissolution of the National Assembly.

Shehbaz, the PML-N president and Leader of the Opposition in National Assembly, did not appear before the special court of the FIA in Lahore as he had sought exemption to appear before the Supreme Court on the petitions of the opposition parties challenging the dismissal of no-confidence motion against Prime Minister Khan by the deputy speaker that plunged the country into constitutional crisis.

Also Read | Climate Change May Be Causing Many Birds to Nest, Lay Eggs Earlier: Study.

His son Hamza, however, appeared before the court.

Shehbaz's counsel Advocate Amjad Pervez told the court that the FIA challenged the bail of the opposition leader only to please "one individual" (prime minister Khan).

An FIA official pleaded before the court to withdraw its bail order as Shehbaz had been "misusing the concession of bail".

After hearing the arguments from both sides, Judge Ijaz Hassan Awan dismissed FIA's petition and extended the bail of Shehbaz and his son Hamza till April 11. The judge also announced indicting the suspects in the case on next hearing on April 11.

The FIA had registered FIR against Shehbaz and his sons - Hamza and Suleman - under sections 419, 420, 468, 471, 34 and 109 (financial fraud, impersonation and forgery) of the Pakistan Penal Code and sections 5(2) and 5(3) (criminal misconduct) of the Prevention of Corruption Act and read with Section 3/4 of the Anti-Money laundering Act.

Shehbaz has termed the case 'politically motivated' based on Khan's vengeance.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Colombo [Sri Lanka], April 4 (ANI): Amid the ongoing unrest in Sri Lanka following the economic crisis, the anti-government protests continue to take place in the island nation, demanding solutions to the current economic crisis.

The protest continues across the island even after the entire cabinet of ministers resigned on Sunday and the beleaguered President Gotabaya Rajapaksa invited all political parties to join him to find solutions to the crisis, Colombo Page reported.

Also Read | Moeed Yusuf, Pakistans National Security Advisor, Resigns From His Position Amid Political Turmoil.

Masses held protests in front of the houses of several former ministers today.

A group of protesters in Kalutara also came in front of the Kalutara Public Meeting Office of former Minister Rohitha Abeygunawardena. The police used tear gas to disperse them, according to Colombo Page.

Also Read | Ganesh Temple Street: Street in New York Named After Prominent Hindu Temple.

It further reported that police also launched tear gas to disperse the protest in front of the Prime Minister's residence Carlton House in Tangalle.

According to Colombo Page, police also used tear gas to disperse a large group of people demonstrating in front of former Energy Minister Gamini Lokuge's house. The rioters had set fire to a large advertisement in front of Lokuge's house and later pelted stones at the house. At that moment, tear gas was used to disperse the crowd.

A protest was also held today in front of the house of former Minister Chamal Rajapaksa in Debarawewa. Another group staged a protest in front of former Minister Janaka Bandara Tennakoon's house in Dambulla demanding a solution to the crisis facing the country, Colombo page reported.

People had organized a number of protests in Colombo at Independence Square, Lipton Roundabout, and other areas.

The island nation is facing an unprecedented economic crisis. Sri Lanka's economy has been in a free fall since the COVID-19 pandemic due to the crash of the tourism sector.

Sri Lanka is presently facing a foreign exchange shortage which has led to a food, fuel, power and gas shortage and has sought the assistance of friendly countries for economic assistance.

Sri Lanka is witnessing at least 13-hour daily power cuts. Sri Lanka's currency has been also devalued by almost SLR 90 against the US dollar since March 8. (ANI)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Kabul [Afghanistan], April 4 (ANI): The US special envoy for Afghanistan, Thomas West spoke with former president Hamid Karzai and discussed the Afghan people's desire to see girls return to secondary school soonest.

"A pleasure to speak yesterday with @KarzaiH. We exchanged views re: the Afghan people's desire to see girls return to secondary school soonest, and the need for a national consultative process to determine country's future," West tweeted.

Also Read | Sri Lanka Unrest: President Gotabaya Rajapaksa Sacks Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa; Invites Opposition to Join Unity Cabinet.

Earlier, West said he was hopeful that the Taliban will reverse their decision over banning teenage girls from going to schools and allowing them to get an education.

He also accused the Taliban of breaching the promises they had made to the Afghan people, as per Khaama Press.

Also Read | Sri Lanka Unrest: 4 Ministers Sworn Into New Sri Lankan Cabinet.

The Taliban regime issued a decree banning female students above grade six from attending classes. The girls were further told to stay home until the Islamic Emirate announces its next decision.

The decision by the Islamic Emirate has drawn severe backlash across the world with the Foreign Ministers of Canada, France, Italy, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America condemning the Taliban's decision to deny so many Afghan girls the opportunity to finally go back to school. (ANI)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)
Srinagar, April 4: The Indian Army has initiated Court Martial against a Captain involved in an alleged encounter where three civilians mistaken to be terrorists were killed in Amshipura village of Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district in July 2020.

The Army says a Court of inquiry and the summary of evidence indicated the need for "disciplinary proceedings". The Court Martial proceedings has been then initiated against Army Captain Bhoopendra Singh.

The three people from Rajouri district of Jammu region -- Imtiyaz Ahmed, Abrar Ahmed and Mohammed Ibrar -- were killed in Shopian district on July 18, 2020, and called as "terrorists".

But as the protest started and doubts were raised over the alleged killings, the Army promptly constituted a Court of inquiry which found prima facie evidence that the troops had "exceeded" powers vested under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act.

After the news about the fake encounter spread, the Jammu and Kashmir Police had constituted a special investigation team which filed a chargesheet against three people, including Captain Singh, for "staging a fake encounter" in Shopian district and killing three men. Over 2,000 Paramilitary Troopers Died on Duty in Last 3 Years: Ministry of Home Affairs.

It had alleged that Captain Singh had provided wrong information to his superiors and the police about the recovery made during the encounter. The other two named by the police in its chargesheet are Tabish Nazir and Bilal Ahmed Lone, both civilians. The Court of inquiry was followed by the summary of evidence, which was completed in the last week of December 2020.

In October 2020, Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha visited the three families and assured them that justice will be done.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Apr 04, 2022 08:54 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).
The driver of the HRTC bus was killed and 34 passengers were injured after a Himachal Road Transport Corporation bus met with an accident on Chandigarh-Manali highway NH 3, in Mandi on Monday. "The driver suddenly lost control of the bus. The bus was en route Shimla from Manali. Injured people shifted to a local hospital," said Mandi SP Shalini Agnihotri.

Check Tweet:

Himachal Pradesh| A person (driver) died &34 injured after an HRTC bus met with an accident on Chandigarh-Manali NH 3, in Mandi, after the driver suddenly lost control. The bus was en route Shimla from Manali. Injured people shifted to a local hospital: Mandi SP Shalini Agnihotri pic.twitter.com/2Yskzl6QfH  ANI (@ANI) April 4, 2022

(SocialLY brings you all the latest breaking news, viral trends and information from social media world, including Twitter, Instagram and Youtube. The above post is embeded directly from the user's social media account and LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body. The views and facts appearing in the social media post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY, also LatestLY does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.)
PM Narendra Modi spoke with Israel PM Naftali Bennett & confirmed "he is recovering well (from COVID). We discussed recent global events, and also reviewed India-Israel cooperation in various areas. I look forward to welcoming him in India very soon to continue our discussions." pic.twitter.com/GlKsTJqyoC ANI (@ANI) April 4, 2022

(SocialLY brings you all the latest breaking news, viral trends and information from social media world, including Twitter, Instagram and Youtube. The above post is embeded directly from the user's social media account and LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body. The views and facts appearing in the social media post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY, also LatestLY does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.)
President Joe Biden is "confident" that his son Hunter Biden did not break any laws even as a federal probe into his youngest son's foreign business dealings continues, the White House chief of staff said Sunday.

Ron Klain appeared on ABC's "This Week" two days after it was reported that a federal grand jury was hearing testimony in recent months about Hunter's cash flow while serving on the board of Burisma, a Ukraine energy company, according to Daily Mail.

Klain vehemently denied that the White House reached out to the Justice Department about the probe against Hunter. The investigation is being conducted out of the president's home state of Delaware.

The White House chief of staff noted that the president was "confident that his son didn't break the law." However, he also recognized that it was a matter to be decided by the Justice Department, adding that no one in the White House had any involvement in the matter.

Klain was also asked about a recent report revealing entities controlled by Hunter Biden and uncle James Biden were paid around $5 million over the course of 14 months by a Chinese energy firm.

READ NEXT: Hunter Biden's Wife: Who Is Melissa Cohen? Getting to Know the Second Wife of President Joe Biden's Son

Federal Investigation on Hunter Biden

According to Fox News, Hunter Biden is under federal investigation for possible violations of tax, money laundering, and foreign lobbying laws through his business relationships abroad.

Hunter's business ties with Burisma have raised questions. He joined the Ukrainian gas company's board when his father was vice president of the United States.

It caused concerns about a possible conflict of interest with Joe Biden being deeply involved in U.S. policy toward Ukraine during the Obama administration. Hunter also had "multimillion-dollar" financial ties to CEFC China Energy.

Meanwhile, Attorney General Merrick Garland has not shed any light publicly on the investigation.

Last Wednesday, Elie Honig, a top legal analyst at CNN, said it was possible that Hunter Biden could be indicted over his foreign business dealings, The Hill reported.

Honig described the probe as a "very real, very substantial" investigation of potentially serious federal crimes.

Hunter Biden's Laptop

Hunter Biden left behind a laptop at a computer repair shop in Delaware in April 2019, which contained a hard drive with a trove of emails detailing Joe Biden's youngest son's foreign business deals.

According to New York Post, multiple news outlets had confirmed the existence and authenticity of the laptop, including The Washington Post and The New York Times.

Fifty-one former U.S. intelligence officials earlier warned that the information on the hard drive might be misinformation from the Russians, planning to influence the 2020 election.

However, it was reported that financial documents were found on the laptop that matched records and other documents obtained in a probe by Republican senators Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson.

Johnson accused the mainstream media of hiding Hunter's business dealings to protect his father before the presidential election.

In an interview with Fox News' "Sunday Morning Features," Johnson said the media "covered it up," resulting in Biden being elected the president.

READ MORE: Pres. Joe Biden, a 'Direct Beneficiary' of His Son Hunter Biden's Foreign Deals, Says Head of Government Accountability Institute

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written by: Mary Webber

WATCH: Federal Investigation Into Hunter Biden's Tax Affairs l WNT - From ABC News






At least 16 were recorded dead, while three were still missing as of Sunday after landslide and flash floods triggered by a storm in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

According to France 24, emergency workers have pulled two more bodies under the rubble of a landslide in a Monsuaba neighborhood of Angra dos Reis. The outlet noted that the landslide in Angra dos Reis killed four children and four adults.

Another landslide occurred in Brazil's town of Paraty, specifically in the Ponta Negra neighborhood, NDTV reported.

According to officials, the landslide in this neighborhood killed a mother and six of her children. The children were reportedly two, five, eight, 10, 15, and 17 years old.

The mayor's office noted that a seventh child was rescued by the authorities and is currently in stable conditions, per France 24.

Al Jazeera reported that seven houses were also swept away by the tragedy in Ponta Negra and four people sustained injury.

Landslides were not the only cause of death for people in the state of Rio de Janeiro.

According to reports, a 38-year-old man died after he was electrocuted while trying to help another individual to escape the flash floods. The place where the man was electrocuted was unclear.

Meanwhile, Emergency workers are still searching for the reported missing in the Monsuaba neighborhood.

As of Saturday, officials pointed out that 71 families in Ponta Negra were forced to evacuate their homes following the tragedy.

READ NEXT: Brazil: Vicious Piranhas Eat Footballer's Flesh Down to Bone After Jumping in Lake to Flee From Police

Storm Prompts Landslide and Flash Flood in Rio de Janeiro

NDTV noted that storms on Friday triggered flash floods and landslides across the state of Rio de Janeiro, including the state's capital, Rio.

The outlet also mentioned that a photo of several areas, including Belford Roxo and Nova Iguacu, were gravely affected by the flood.

The pictures reportedly showed small alligators swimming through the flooded streets in the suburbs of Belford Roxo. Meanwhile, another photo showed a hospital in Nova Iguacu had a flooded corridor in its Intensive Care Units.

According to experts, rainy season downpours in Brazil were enhanced by La Nina, a phenomenon which was cyclical cooling of the Pacific ocean. Experts also noted that climate change is also a factor in the tragedies in the state.

Officials from Angra revealed that the city received 26 inches of rain in two days, which is a level of rain that was not registered in the past.

Brazil Pres. Jair Bolsonaro on Rio de Janeiro Tragedy

On Sunday, Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro announced on Twitter that his administration is acting on the effects of the landslides and flash floods in Rio de Janeiro.

- Neste momento, tecnico da Defesa Civil Nacional ja esta no RJ ajudando nas acoes de resposta e no socorro as vitimas. Como parte do apoio federal, tambem foram acionadas aeronaves do @DefesaGovBr para transportar os militares do @cbmerjoficial para as regioes mais afetadas.  Jair M. Bolsonaro (@jairbolsonaro) April 2, 2022

Bolsonaro noted that a technician from the National Civil Defense is already in the state to help the victims of the tragedy.

Bolsonaro also pointed out that an aircraft from the Minister of Defense was also dispatched to transfer the military to the most affected areas of Rio de Janeiro.

Bolsonaro also underscored that Minister Daniel Ferreira also ordered the visit of National Secretary for Civil Defense and Protection, Colonel Alexandre Lucas. The Brazilian president noted that the office had already talked with Governor Claudio Castro and one of the municipalities gravely affected by the landslide and flash floods.

READ NEXT: Grammy Awards 2022: Vicente Fernandez Wins Posthumous Grammy for 'A Mis 80's'

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written By: Joshua Summers

WATCH: Rio de Janiero Flood & Landslide Heavy Rain hits Brazil, April 1st 2022 - From chave weather - daily videos
President Joe Biden on Sunday pushed for his gun controls agenda following the shooting incident in Sacramento the same day that killed at least six individuals.

Speaking about Sunday's tragedy in Sacramento, Biden seized the opportunity to promote his program that aims to curb the rising gun violence statistics in the country, per Fox News.

"We must do more than mourn; we must act," Biden said in a statement on Sunday night.

Biden also pointed out that the tragedy in Sacramento was the reason his administration has taken "historic executive action" in implementing his comprehensive gun crime reduction strategy.

The president also noted that the administration established gun trafficking strike forces in U.S. cities to intervene with community violence and hire more police officers from community policing.

Pres. Joe Biden then called on Congress to act on the gun violence that is taking place across the country.

The president urged Congress to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, and repeal gun manufacturers' immunity from liability.

Biden also called on Congress to pass his budget proposal to give cities across the country additional funding to fund the police and crime prevention intervention strategies.

"These are just a few of the steps Congress urgently needs to take to save lives," Pres. Joe Biden underscored.

READ NEXT: Sacramento Mass Shooting: 6 Dead, 12 Injured in 'Senseless Tragedy'

Pres. Joe Biden's Strategy in Curbing Gun Violence

President Joe Biden highlighted a comprehensive strategy for reducing gun violence during his State of The Union address in February.

A statement from the White House noted that $350 billion in the American Rescue Plan was made available for the cities, counties, and states, for them to use and invest in proven strategies of community violence intervention.

The said strategy mentioned by President Biden includes stemming the flow of firearms and giving support to local law enforcement by providing federal tools and resources to put more cops who will focus on the issue.

In addition, the strategy also involves investing in evidence-based community violence intervention, and even expanding summer programs, employment opportunities, and other services to make teenagers and young adults stay away from crime, per the White House statement.

However, not all officials are in favor of Pres. Joe Biden's plans.

Last week, lawmakers from Alabama moved to advance legislation that would prohibit their local officials from participating in the president's enforcement of gun control, Associated Press noted per U.S. News and World Report.

"The Second Amendment says the right to bear arms shall not be infringed upon, and this bill is about safeguarding our God-given rights to protect our families and homes," Senator Gerald Allen from Tuscaloosa said.

Biden Addresses Sacramento Shooting

On Sunday, President Joe Biden also commented on the shooting in Sacramento saying that that tragedy forever changed the families of the dead victims.

"Today, America once again mourns for another community devastated by gun violence... In a single act in Sacramento, six individuals were left dead and at least a dozen more injured," Biden said, per Fox News.

The president also thanked the first responders in Sacramento following the shooting.

Biden then noted that the victims of the Sacramento were not the only victim of gun violence in the country, adding that the government equally mourns for the victims and families who were not able to make it to the national headlines.

Six people were fatally shot and another 12 were reportedly injured in downtown Sacramento on Sunday morning. Fox News noted that no suspect was taken into custody in connection to the shooting.

READ NEXT: Brazil: Rio de Janeiro Landslides and Flash Floods' Death Toll Rises to 16; 3 Still Missing

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written By: Joshua Summers

WATCH: President Biden Tackles Gun Violence - From ABC News
U.S. Border Patrol has been using the encrypted messaging app Wickr to communicate, which has raised alarm to the National Archives.

The National Archives sent a letter to U.S. Homeland Security officials expressing concern about the use of the encrypted messaging app by Customs and Border Protection, according to an Insider report.

Laurence Brewer, the chief records officer of the National Archives and Records Administration, was sent to Eric Hysen, the chief information officer of the Department of Homeland Security, in October 2021.

Brewer has expressed his concern about how the agency was using the Amazon-owned Wickr app, which can automatically delete messages.

The U.S. Border Patrol has also been reported to be using another encrypted messaging service WhatsApp.

Brewer wrote in the letter that he wanted to ensure that records management regulations are being adhered to, as well as ensure that U.S. Customs and Border Patrol is regulating the use of the said messaging apps.

The chief records officer also said that he wanted to make sure all employees were aware that they must keep all messages for federal records.

READ NEXT: Border Patrol 'Robot Dogs' Soon to Be Deployed Along U.S.-Mexico Border

Amazon-Owned Encrypted Messaging App Wickr

Wickr was bought by Amazon's cloud-computing division last June and has contracts with a number of government agencies, according to an NBC News report.

The app has been popular among the military, government agencies, journalists, and politicians.

Little is known about how the agency has deployed the app. Its auto-deletion feature has made the platform a cause of concern for external watchdogs, aside from government record keepers.

Nikhel Sus, senior counsel for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), said that CBP, like ICE and other agencies that DHS oversees, has an "abysmal track record" when it comes to following record-keeping laws. CREW is a nonprofit watchdog group.

Sus said that the practice has real consequences for accountability by impending investigations and oversight of the agency's activities. He added that the CBP's use of Wickr "certainly raises red flags."

Sus' nonprofit organization filed a lawsuit against CBP last month after it failed to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request that the watchdog group filed.

CREW is asking CBP to "fully and promptly process CREW's FOIA request and produce all non-exempt documents immediately."

Tammy T. Melvin, a spokesperson for CBP, noted that the agency could not comment on pending litigation. Melvin said that the distribution/use of Wickr is currently under review.

Wickr RAM, another product of Wickr, is intended for the military. It is not clear how its features and capabilities differ from the version of the app used by CBP.

CBP reportedly paid Wickr $700,000 for product licenses, with the new contract currently worth around $900,000, according to a Vice report.

The description of the contract noted that it is "to renew and procure additional Wickr software licenses and professional support" to use a secure instant messaging platform.

The contract was dated September 16, according to the records.

READ MORE: Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas Gets Grilled by Border Patrol Agents During Heated Meeting

This article is owned by Latin Post

Written by: Mary Webber

WATCH: Smugglers busted using look-alike Border Patrol vehicle from 12 News






Missing Florida mom Cassie Carli's body was discovered in a shallow grave in Alabama on Saturday.

Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob Johnson said that the body was identified by the detectives based on a tattoo, adding that it was discovered in a barn in Alabama, according to Fox 13 News report.

Carli was last seen on Sunday evening while meeting her ex-boyfriend Marcus Spanevelo, who is her daughter's father.

The two had met in the parking lot of a beachside restaurant not far from her home in Navarre, Florida.

Investigators later recovered Carli's vehicle, with her purse inside. They also confirmed that Carli's four-year-old daughter was safe.

Johnson said that Carli's family was crushed when they learned that her body had been located. He added that they "hated" that the Florida mom had passed away.

However, the sheriff also said that it is good "to get closure for the family."

READ NEXT: Missouri Teen Dies After Falling From Florida Amusement Park Ride That's Taller Than Statue of Liberty

Cassie Carli's Ex-Boyfriend During the Investigation

Spanevelo was arrested and charged with tampering with evidence, as well as giving false information in a missing person investigation.

Johnson noted that Spanevelo has been "totally uncooperative" during the whole investigation of the case, according to a Crime Online News report.

Johnson added that since authorities have been dealing with Carli's ex-boyfriend, Spanevelo has been "acting like a dirtbag," noting that he does not see that changing.

The sheriff said that information gathered in the course of their investigation has caused them to go to the property in Alabama, where they served a search warrant on Saturday evening.

Johnson said that Spanevelo has a connection with the property. However, he declined to comment to say what that was.

The sheriff noted that the information did not come from Spanevelo. He added that all Spanevelo said was "lawyer."

Both Spanevelo and their daughter Saylor were found the next day in Birmingham, Alabama. The four-year-old was returned to her mother's family, according to a WKRG News report.

Carli's family said that the missing mother was concerned about Spanevelo as they were working through custody problems.

Her brother, Anthony Carli, said that Cassie has been telling him for the last two years that Spanevelo has been threatening his sister.

Anthony added that his sister told him that if anything happens to her, "it's him."

Deputies noted that an autopsy is scheduled to take place on Monday in Huntsville, Alabama where Carli's cause of death will be determined.

The State Attorney's Office noted that additional charges will be filed against Spanevelo, pending autopsy results.

Johnson noted that once the autopsy is done and the charges were filed, people will understand.

The sheriff said that he thinks Spanevelo will be spending the rest of his life in prison or "he's going to get the needle."

Johnson said that hopefully, Spanevelo will get the needle.

Spanevelo had not been officially identified by investigators before his arrest as he had not been charged with a crime or named a person of interest.

READ MORE: Denver Shooting Kills Five Including Suspect; Police Identifies Gunman

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written by: Mary Webber

WATCH: Missing Florida mom Cassie Carli found dead in shallow grave, deputies say - from WFLA News Channel 8






A community initiative taken to respond to Covid-19 in Laois and other counties is being restarted to respond to ensure services are co-ordinated to respond to the needs of Ukrainian refugees.

The Government has announced that Community Response Forums are being established in every local authority area to coordinate local responses to the Ukraine crisis.

There had already been an informal meeting under the auspices of Laois County Council of local agencies who would be at the coalface of organising response. While the local authority and agencies have been active in providing response, no definitive model had been outlined from Goverment.

Now, the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage Darragh OBrien and the Minister for Rural and Community Development, Heather Humphreys have written to local authorities setting out a template for arrangements to be in place in each area.

A statement from the Department of Rural and Community Development said that building on structures and relationships during the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Community Response Fora will enable all those involved to work together under the stewardship of the local authority.

It added that supplementing the supports and services being provided by government agencies at a local level, the purpose of the fora will be to ensure effective communication and information sharing in the coordination of local community and voluntary actions in providing community supports to the new Ukrainian communities.

Laois County Councillor Thomasina Connell had called for a response team to be set up.

"It is clear that Local Authorities are best placed to do this as they are familiar with the wide range of services in their local area and can deliver this information quickly and effectively.

"We as a Council need to streamline these essential services where possible, being the provision of accommodation, medical care and education and deal with these issues expeditiously. Similarly, Laois County Council must immediately offer support for Ukrainians with English language support. They are permitted to work straight away and a co-ordinated approach with the Chamber of Commerce and Intreo would be beneficial.

"We need a structured approach to this as we anticipate the number of Ukrainians arriving to increase, possibly dramatically increase in the coming months.

"Re-establishing a modified grouping of our previous Covid Response Forum at this stage would centralise our response to this crisis and support and prioritise those who have now arrived in Co. Laois. The Council needs to urgently dedicate resources to deal with this crisis and ringfence these for a period of upwards of six months," she said.

The Ministers welcomed welcomed the establishment of Fora.

These local forums worked very well during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic response and are best placed to put arrangements in place to help the new arrivals from Ukraine access services, said Minister Humphreys.

Right across Government, we are doing all we can to assist Ukrainian nationals who have fled this devastating war. This approach at local level is a key part of our overall efforts and will be so important in the weeks and months to come, she added.

Minister OBrien said local authorities are stepping up once again to lead the local response to what is a very complex and rapidly evolving situation.

"They will coordinate local efforts very effectively and ensure that every effort is made to welcome new arrivals from Ukraine into our communities, he said.

Minister of State for Communities and Charities, Joe OBrien TD elaborated further.

Each Forum will work to harness the goodwill and assistance available within our communities, including the resources of the community and voluntary sector to manage offers of assistance to ensure that the often complex needs of those arriving are met, he said..

Minister of State with responsibility for Local Government and Planning, Peter Burke TD added that the Forum will bring together all of the public, community and voluntary organisations active locally, as well as the Cathaoirleach or Mayor of each local authority. It will also be of central importance that members of the local Ukrainian community are fully involved, he said.

The Department of Rural and Community Development Intensive added that work has been underway across Government over the past number of weeks preparing a humanitarian response to the needs of the thousands of Ukranian people who are expected to arrive in Ireland over the coming weeks.

It says the focus to date has been primarily on the key issues of accommodation, welfare supports and health care services.

It added that there is also a clear need to co-ordinate the community and voluntary sector response and to start focussing on the integration supports and social supports which will be needed for this population in the medium and longer term.
Laois Gardai have issued an urgent appeal to the public to help them identifying a driver suspected of being behind the wheel of a car which has left a motorcyclist in a serious condition in hospital.

Gardai renewed an appeal for dashcam footage and other information regarding a crash on the Sleaty Road near Knockbeg College at the weekend after discovering a vehicle in Athy.

Laois gardai are working on the basis that the black coloured Passat Volkswagen car was involved in the collision at around 4.30 pm on Sunday, April 3.

However, they have yet to identify the driver of the vehicle. While they urged the individual to contact them to help them with their enquiries, they also appealed to the public to get in touch.

Gardai say they particularly want to hear from anybody who may have seen the VW Passat in the Carlow town, Graiguecullen, Athy areas between 4pm and 5pm on Sunday. They say they car may have been driven erratically.

Anybody with dashcam footage is also asked to make contact with gardai in Portlaoise.

It's understood that the motorcyclist, who is aged in his 60s, remains in a serious condition in a Dublin hospital to which he was airlifted on Sunday afternoon from the crash scene at the gates of Knockbeg College which is located in Laois near the Carlow and Kildare borders.

The victim is understood to have been living in Carlow but was a native of the area of Laois where the accident happened.

The Sleaty Road is a busy link route between Carlow and Athy.
Dublin Airport is under fire for advising people to arrive for flights at peak times three and a half hours before departure, and four if parking a car.

It comes following days of delays at the airport including long wait times in security queues.

In a tweet posted from their official Twitter account earlier today (Monday April 4), Dublin Airport stated, "If you are flying from Dublin Airport soon, please be aware that it might be very busy at peak periods, so allow yourself plenty of time. At peak times, this can mean up to 3 and a half hours before your departure time. If parking a car, allow a further 30 minutes."

Customers took to the comments section to voice frustrations, with one user stating, "Simply not good enough in terms of basic level of service provision. Expecting people to turn up 4 hours in advance for mostly short haul flights is absurd."

The advice reportedly applies to both Terminal 1 and Terminal 2.

If you are flying from Dublin Airport soon, please be aware that it might be very busy at peak periods, so allow yourself plenty of time. At peak times, this can mean up to 3 and a half hours before your departure time. If parking a car, allow a further 30 minutes.  Dublin Airport (@DublinAirport) April 4, 2022

One frustrated traveller commented: "So itll take longer to get from the airport carpark to the plane than it does to get to most destinations in the EU? Have I got that right? Jokeshop!"

Dozens of Twitter users have asked for clarification on what the airport means by 'peak times', however no answer to this question has been given at time of publication.

Dublin Airport's website also does not contain information on what times are considered 'peak'.

However, a spokesperson from the airport has confirmed that 4am up until 11am and 12pm are considered peak times at Terminal 2, and 3am to 8am at Terminal 1, with a further peak at around 4 and 5pm.
A home carer from Newbridge was honoured at a special awards ceremony on Friday, April 1.

Derek Mayne's was the Comfort Keepers Carer of the Year 2021 award at the Comfort Keepers' office in Kildare.

Comfort Keepers, the nationwide quality provider of award-winning home care services, was established in 2005 and employs 50 people at its Kildare office.

Following the judges' selection based on set criteria and including online voting, Derek was chosen as one of twelve finalists in the running for the prestigious accolade of Comfort Keepers Carer of the Year 2021.

Derek has been a carer for almost two years, working all throughout the pandemic to make a difference to his clients lives.

On initially being nominated for this years award, Derek said: "I am delighted to have been nominated: I love my job.

"Its hugely rewarding to have the privilege of looking after my clients in their own homes and making a difference to their lives. Joining Comfort Keepers over two years ago has been the best decision I have ever made.

Louise Carrick (Comfort Keepers Kildare Client Care Manager), Derek Mayne (Comfort Keepers Carer of the Year nominee), Audeen McMahon (Comfort Keepers Kildare Client Care Coordinator), and Julie Robert (Comfort Keepers Director of Quality & Care)

"In that time I have been awarded Carer of the Month twice and this is a great honour to be recognised for something I love," he added.

According to the nominations from co-workers and clients, Derek is described as being 'an amazing carer with a huge personality; he loves what he does, is a very considerate and diligent carer, and is a pleasure to work with'.

"He goes above and beyond for everyone and clients love him; he has a huge heart and is funny too (exactly what clients want)," they added.

In addition, fellow carer/home support worker, Eileen Heffernan, and client care manager, Louise Carrick, both received recognition awards for their 10 years of service.

Collette Gleeson, Managing Director at Comfort Keepers Ireland said about the nominees and winners: "Our carers are amazing individuals and a vital resource providing outstanding, personal and relationship-based care and support to the most vulnerable in our society and their families all across Kildare."

"Their hard work and passion have been particularly valued since the onset of the global pandemic, with people wanting to stay safe and happy at home for as long as possible."

Speaking about Derek, she said: "He has done fantastic work in the community across the last year and throughout recent years, making a positive impact on his clients daily lives. He is committed, respectful, professional and hardworking."

"His patients look forward to his visits, as do their families... Derek is a great representative for Comfort Keepers and our quality care."

Comfort Keepers is owned by the global company Sodexo, and has over 1,500 employees nationwide.

The company is currently recruiting and has around 40 available roles in Kildare and around 650 roles nationwide, such as home support worker, office administration, clinical management and supervisory roles.

Visit www.ckjobs.ie for more information.
A man is due to appear at Naas District Court on Monday, April 4, in connection with the seizure of a sawn-off shotgun in Kildare on Saturday.

Gardai seized the firearm and charged the man following an operation targeting organised criminal activity.

As part of ongoing investigations into such activity in the north Kildare and Dublin areas, an intelligence led operation was conducted by Eastern Regional Garda Units, Dublin Regional Garda Units and the Leixlip Detective Unit on Saturday, April 2.

In the course of the operation a car was stopped and searched in the Kilcock area. A double barrel sawn-off shotgun was recovered from the car. The sole occupant of the car, a man in his 20s, was arrested and detained at Leixlip Garda Station under section 30 of the Offences against the State Act, 1939, for questioning.

The man was later charged and is expected to appear before a sitting of Naas District Court on Monday, April 4, in connection with this investigation.

The firearm has been sent for ballistic and forensic examination and investigations are ongoing.
The Governments priority will be to help people at most risk of fuel poverty, through a set of specific measures to ease the rising cost of living, Minister for the Environment Eamon Ryan has said.

Mr Ryan said there will be further universal measures brought in and advice will be published to help people reduce their energy bills.

Among the measures will be the reduction of the public service obligation (PSO) on electric bills to zero, as part of Octobers budget.

Mr Ryan said the Government cannot fix the cost-of-living crisis because of international issues and the ongoing war in Ukraine.

While the Government is working on the cost-of-living package, it is not expected to include any further financial support.

The Government says it has already allocated 2 billion since Octobers budget to alleviate cost-of-living pressures.

Measures have included a cut in fuel excise duty, the reduction of public transport costs and rebates on household energy bills.

Mr Ryan told RTE Morning Ireland: We need to target particularly those in fuel poverty.

Some of those measures will take time, some of them will be better placed for the budget, where we really need to look at how the social welfare system can kick in, and it will take time to get that right to work.

We need to focus on energy efficiency. All the (international) advice there is that the next phase really has to be about energy efficiency, helping people to save money with some practical measures to cut the bill.

So well bring to government in the next two weeks, some of those measures, some of them are in planning systems, some are in regulatory, and there will be a campaign to help explain to the public what are the simple ways in which bills can be cut.

Mr Ryan said he will not rule out incentives either.

The Green Party leader said they will look at how the country can accelerate the switch to local power supplies, and cut back Irelands dependency on importing fossil fuels.

He said this would include switching to wind, solar and hydro and biomass and other power supplies in Ireland.

Ive asked the department and all the relevant energy agencies to come forward with the measures that could help accelerate and help both households and small businesses save money by making the switch we know we need to make in any case, he added.
A group of defence lawyers gathered across Ireland this morning for the second time in as many months to protest low rates of pay for legal aid in criminal cases.

Both junior and senior lawyers stood outside courthouses, including the Criminal Courts of Justice in Dublin, to demand action on what many have called "pitiful" payment rates in the District Court.

One of the organisers of the protest, Darren Lalor BL, said "There is a real danger that good people are put off doing criminal defence work because they do not have their own independent resources to fund them through years of earning next to nothing.

"It is not in the public interest that good lawyers are effectively pushed out of criminal defence work due to low rates of pay."

Organisers wrote to the Presidents of all Courts earlier to explain that many lawyers would be unavailable for twenty minutes from 10.30am today (Monday April 4) due to the protest.

The letter, which was co-signed by former Chairman of the Bar Council, Micheal P. O'Higgins SC, described the rates of pay in the District Court as "uneconomic and unsustainable".

Reportedly, defence lawyers are receiving rates far below that of their peers in Northern Ireland.

Luigi Rea BL, stated that according to a report of the Department of Justice in 2018, the Irish State's funding of legal aid per capita of the population is 18.40. This is far below the rates available in England and Wales (38.14) and Northern Ireland (73.53).

He said, "Fees at all levels of the criminal legal aid system have been anchored at the 2002 rates. Very substantial cuts in rates of payment have not been reversed despite the economic recovery."

Ms. Eileen OLeary SC, a senior barrister who practices in the higher courts said, "Everyone in our society benefits from a properly funded criminal defence service. A properly functioning criminal legal aid system vindicates the rights of victims, and treats the accused fairly. Damaging the administration of justice is bad for victims and the whole of society."
GARDAI are warning people to be vigilant after being alerted to a text scam that is doing the rounds.

It follows a recent incident during which a woman, living in Limerick, received a suspicious message which gardai believe was an attempt to defraud her.

A lady in Woodview rang me to say that she received a text that stated: Im a widow, Im very ill and going to die in the next few days, please text me, explained divisional crime prevention officer Sergeant Ber Leetch.

She told me she had deleted the text which is perfect. The scammers wanted her to feel sorry for the widow and then there was a sense of urgency  as in the widow was going to die soon.

If the lady had sent a text back she would definitely have been asked for money, said Sgt Leetch.

After being made aware of the incident, gardai advised the woman to block the number on her phone.

Separately, gardai are warning that scammers are emailing individuals claiming to be collecting monies for the children of

Ukraine.

"This shows how low the scammers will go to get money so make sure that you know exactly to whom you are sending your money," said Sgt Leetch.
A MART operator has been ordered to pay 10,000 in damages to a Limerick farmer who was injured when a one-ton bull escaped from a pen at Ennis Mart.

At Ennis Circuit Court, Judge Colin Daly ordered Clare Co-Operative Marts to pay Rose Keating (28) 10,000 arising from an incident, on May 25, 2017, that left three other people injured by the Charolais bull.

Judge Daly stated that the appropriate general damages in the case was 20,000. However, he halved the pay-out to 10,000 after finding that Ms Keating was 50% responsible for the injuries she suffered.

Judge Daly made this finding after concluding that on the balance of probabilities Ms Keating opened the latch to the pen that allowed the bull escape.

In evidence, Ms Keating had denied opening the gate that allowed the bull escape.

The judge made the award after he was informed that Ms Keating had earlier rejected a settlement offer from the defendant company.

The settlement offer was made after Judge Daly told Sandra Barnwell BL, prior to lunch, that her client should consider its position after hearing an outline of the case against Clare Co-operative Marts.

The court was told an internal report by Clare Co-Operative Marts recorded that a major accident took place on the morning of May 25, 2017 where three people were injured by a bull including two who were badly injured.

Counsel for Ms Keating, Emmet OBrien BL, told the court that she has an extensive land-holding at Manister, Croom, County Limerick and qualified as a solicitor in January.

Ms Keating told the court that she is a full-time farmer and has 50 dairy cows and 100 dry cattle.

In evidence, she recalled that she was in the process of opening the gate to the pen when the bull burst out and came out on top of me.

Ms Keating said that she got the full force of the gate and the bull continued on up on the ramp where he injured three others. The plaintiff said that she was very thrown back - I was in shock.

Ms Keating said that she didnt report her own injuries to the mart and didnt go her own GP for six months concerning her injuries after saying that she is quite pain resistant.

In his judgement, Judge Daly stated that the bull charged and caused the gate to strike Ms Keating and slammed her against the wall.

He added: It was the marts custom and practice at that time not to have any drovers or personnel working in this area. As a consequence of this incident, others were injured - some seriously.

Ms Keating told the court that she suffered injuries to her back and wrist from the bull escaping.

Judge Daly said that he had to take into account the fact that Ms Keating did not attend her GP for six months after the accident and also subsequent to receiving legal correspondence from the mart.

Judge Daly stated that in response to the legal letter from Clare Co-Operative Marts that alleged that Ms Keating may have been responsible for the bull escaping, Ms Keating did put Clare Marts on notice that on the day she did suffer injuries and was reserving her position in relation to the proceedings.

He added that he was satisfied that Ms Keating and her late father were not supervised when unloading their animals into what the Mart General Manager agrees 'was a dangerous situation.

Judge Daly stated that the dangerous situation is the mixing of animals from different farms in the holding pen. He said he was also satisfied to find Ms Keating was not supervised when she attempted to remove her animals.

"I am also satisfied to find that it was easily foreseeable that an accident of this type could occur and that there were insufficient measures in place by the mart to prevent this from happening.

Judge Daly stated that his conclusion is supported by the mart erecting signs in the area and procedural changes implemented within 12 months of the accident.

The back and wrist injuries sustained by Ms Keating were described as are soft tissue injuries which, the judge said, were at the lower end of the scale.

In evidence, Clare Co-Operative Marts General Manager, Martin McNamara said the first time he was made aware that Ms Keating suffered an injury was almost two years later through correspondence from the Personal Injury Assessment Board (PIAB).

He confirmed to the court that another man, who was also injured on the day, had also sued the mart and that case has been resolved.

Judge Daly awarded costs against Clare Co-Operative Marts.
A MOTHER-OF-TWO who died on a Limerick Climb for Charlie event has been described as "very community-minded".

Cora O'Grady, aged 51, from Mitchelstown, set off like so many on Saturday morning but tragically didn't come home.

She left Kings Yard in Kilbehenny for the top of Galtymore but fell ill on her journey. Despite the best efforts of emergency services to resuscitate the casualty, she passed away.

Pat English, the Limerick Leader notes correspondent for Kilbehenny, is related to Ms O'Grady.

"Her grandfather and my grandfather were brothers. Her mother - the late Chrissie O'Grady (nee English) - is from Kilbehenny.

"Fifty-one is no age at all. She was outgoing and very community-minded. I'm sure that's why she supported the Climb for Charlie walk up Galtymore. She was great at helping out at different events. Its terribly sad and especially for her two children," said Pat.

Ms O'Grady's children are aged 11 and 8-years-old.

One of the organisers of the event was treasurer of Kilbehenny Community Centre, Moss Fitzgerald. He was the one who got the phone call about Ms O'Grady's death.

"It had been a wonderful day but that phone call put a complete dampner on proceedings. On behalf of Kilbehenny Community Centre, we'd like to offer our condolences to the O'Grady Family at this sad time," said Mr Fitzgerald, who praised all the emergency services - Irish Community Air Ambulance, An Garda Siochana, National Ambulance Service and South Eastern Mountain Rescue Association.

Until that phone call bearing bad news everything had been going according to plan

"Carmel OGorman was the main organsISer and we the community in Kilbehenny helped out. Everybody registered at 8.30am at the community centre and we had them leaving Kings Yard at 9.15am. We had some very good guides out. We had spoken to Maureen OBrien, of South Eastern Mountain Rescue Association, for advice on safety and precautions.

"John O'Gorman sang the Galtee Mountain Boy at the top of Galtee mountain. It was all set up in the community centre with refreshments for people coming back and people signing in when they came back. Everybody was helping out and we were overwhelmed with the amount of money raised. Then I got that terrible phone call," said Moss.

In a Facebook post, Ms O'Gorman wrote, "To think someone out to do a climb for a charity event passed away so suddenly is heartbreaking. Sending all our love and support to Cora's two children and extended family. Rest in peace".

The man who inspired men, women and children to go walking on Saturday, Charlie Bird has also paid tribute to Ms O'Grady.

I want to offer my condolences this morning to the family and friends of Cora O Grady from Mitchelstown in County Cork.

Cora who was climbing in the Galty mountains took ill and passed away. Her family and friends are in my thoughts and prayers.  Charlie Bird (@charliebird49) April 4, 2022

Her body was removed to University Hospital Waterford and a file will be prepared for the local coroner.
TWO LIMERICK communities came together last weekend to raise money for charity and celebrate new social connections.

Locals from Lough Gur and Bruff held a Climb with Charlie event on Saturday, April 2 to coincide with the hundreds of climbs taking place across the country.

The events were organised by former journalist Charlie Bird to raise money for Pieta House and Irish Motor Neurone Disease Association.

Over 60 locals took part in the 15km walk which took three hours to complete, with stops along the way for people to enjoy a break and a chat.

The route started at Beechinors store at Holycross before heading to the new link footpath and to the start of the Sli na Slainte.

After a brief stop in Bruff, walkers returned back along the route to Lough Gur enjoying a catch up along the way.

On the day, Councillor Brigid Teefy was there to support the walkers and commented: "The communities of Lough Gur, Holycross and Bruff are to be commended for organising this event to raise funds for two very worthy causes.

"Many of the walkers that I have met here today have said that junction upgrade works here have allowed them to enjoy regular walks from Bruff to Holycross."

Mrs Teefy continued: "It is a great example of communities, local landowners and Council working together. Limerick City and County Council took on board and listened to what the communities and landowners asked for here and by all accounts everyone is very pleased with the outcome so far.

"We look forward to further improvement works at this junction before the project is fully completed in May.

"The new upgrade works along the Sli na Slainte have already commenced and will provide an improved surface for all walkers."

The walkers raised a total of 1,250 for the two charities.
WORK TO preserve one of Limericks top tourist attractions is under way.

Engineers have moved in to Clancys Strand to begin the operation to restore the pedestal under the Treaty Stone, which has been weather damaged.

In a project set to take up to eight weeks, all growth and vegetation on the monument is to be removed.

Natural hydraulic lime mortar is to be used to rake out and repoint the structure, stone indentation will also take place. Resin injections will see the cracked stone repaired, while the bronze inset of the historic construction will be cleaned.

Bricks will be cleaned, while brick paving will be raked out and re-pointed, a council spokesperson said.

The last piece of the job  which is dependent on clement weather  will be a final clean down of the area when scaffolding is removed from the site.

Nolan Group is the main contractor on the project, while the conservation consultant Carrig Conservation International has specified the works which need to take place.

Outgoing City North councillor John Costelloe is delighted the work is under way.

I've been chasing this for a number of years. It's invaluable to Limerick. I welcome the fact work has commenced. It's the jewel in Limerick's crown and I'm so glad it's being restored, he said.

The Treaty Stone is the rock which the Treaty of Limerick was signed in 1691, heralding an end to the Williamite War.


(Image Jose Carlos Fajardo via AP)

"There's just too many damn guns," community activist Stevante Clark told The Sacramento Bee Sunday in response to a "mass casualty shooting" near the State Capitol site that has, at this writing, resulted in six dead and twelve wounded.

Clark's feelings are no doubt colored by the deaths of two brothers from years earlier, one killed by police in 2018, and the other, a 16-year-old who shot himself in the abdomen with a shotgun in 2006. Those have taken their toll on him. That said, a subjective analysis of decisions and choices leading up to both shows that blaming guns will not provide solutions.

So naturally, that's what California's political leadership is doing.

"The scourge of gun violence continues to be a crisis in our country, and we must resolve to bring an end to this carnage," Governor Gavin Newsom asserted. "Rising gun violence is the scourge of our city, state, and nation, and I support all actions to reduce it," Mayor Darrell Steinberg echoed.

It's no coincidence that both career politicians used "scourge." A word search shows they are parroting established violence monopoly lobby talking points. Get the sound bite out there, repeat it enough times, and that's what most people are going to remember.

Keeping attention focused on a narrative means it won't be focused elsewhere, such as the fact that Sacramento is a Bloomberg Mayors city, and Giffords gives California an "A" rating:

"California has the strongest gun laws in the United States and has been a trailblazer for gun safety for the past 30 years."

The message here: the laws are still not enough. Every state will have to follow suit. And they still won't be enough. That's because, simply put, "gun control" doesn't work. .....
UP TO 75 Ukrainian women, men and children fleeing the war-torn nation are being given refuge in a former primary school on Limerick's northside.

As part of a joint operation between St Munchin's Community Enterprise Centre, Limerick City and County Council, the HSE, the Red Cross, the Civil Defence, the LCETB, gardai and government, the old St Lelia's School in Kileely is to serve as an emergency shelter for refugees arriving safely in Ireland.

So far, 22 people arrived at the former school - whose classrooms have been converted into dormitories - on Saturday night, with more to follow in the coming days amid an operation co-ordinated by the gardai, Civil Defence and council.

Donations have been flooding into Linda Ledger, the manager of St Munchin's centre, which is providing the accommodation, as it runs the old St Lelia's Primary School, which up to now was an age-friendly campus.

"It really is emergency accommodation in the truest sense of the word," Linda told the Limerick Leader, "These people are sleeping in dormitories with people they do not know. They are sleeping on cot beds. I am getting a shower facility in today, but up to now, they've been going up to the Redemptorists, and into my house to shower."

It's been acknowledged the cot beds in place are uncomfortable, and the centre's manager has said that locals are providing fold-up camper beds, alongside vouchers for Penneys so new clothes can be bought.

"These people are heartbroken, but so brave. They are so afraid, so shellshocked. Some of them have very little or no English at all. This is not the best or most ideal situation. But it's the best we can do, and our wraparound supports are brilliant. These people have nothing. I've seen kids wearing men's size slippers. What these people need is clothes that fit them. What I'm saying is good for people to donate is a Snuggie. That will cover them if it's cold. If it's hot they can take it off. It's better than a morning gown," Linda explained.

In a bid to try and provide more facilities for the refugees, two new modular buildings have been ordered, and will arrive on site tomorrow.

These will provide space for more beds, plus a cold kitchen, toilet and shower facilities for Limerick's newest residents.

Along with the 22 refugees, Linda said "three cats, a dog and a bird" were also among the convoy.

An information stand has been set up by the Department of Social Protection, while volunteers connected with St Munchin's Community Enterprise Centre took the refugees into the city's post office to get Irish mobile Sim cards.

As is natural, there was a lot of nervousness and upset when the displaced Ukrainians first arrived - but since then, they have began to settle in.

"The difference from Saturday to yesterday is they are opening up more, they are feeling a bit safer. There is one man, who is 84, who wanted to go out and dig. So I sent him up to our allotment. He's come back and he's wrecked," Linda laughed.

"I'm very lucky because at St Munchin's, people are very good, they rally around. Today when people were down, they asked what they needed. I told them I needed two irons and an ironing board. I want to give them the tools so they can help themselves. They all want to learn English too," she added.

Learning the meal patterns of the new community has also been an education for centre volunteers.

"From what I've seen, they eat very little four times a day. It's Ramadan at the minute, so one person is fasting," Linda explained.

One of those people providing support is local Fine Gael councillor Olivia O'Sullivan, who is on the board of management at St Munchin's Community Centre.

She said: "The team at St Munchins, led by Linda Ledger, are to be commended for the way they all got stuck in to get the former school ready to be a temporary home for our European neighbours in desperate need. Seven weeks ago these people were living lives very similar to our own and their lives changed forever with the order from Putin to invade their country."

Cllr O'Sullivan said she knows the team at St Munchin's will "rise to the challenge", as will the local community, who will "open their hearts too in support, as they have been doing already."

St Munchin's Community Centre is accepting donations of a number of items including sanitary products, socks, deodrants, shampoo, hairbrushes, coats, slippers and shoes, underwear and toothpaste.

For more information, and to donate, please telephone 061-458651, drop into the centre, or visit https://www.facebook.com/StMunchinsCommunityCentre/
Ukrainian refugees are to be offered employment and training help at an iconic Dublin cafe  which is also putting Red Cross Buns on its menu to aid the humanitarian effort.

Bewleys Cafe on Grafton Street will be selling the pastries in place of its usual hot cross variety until Easter, with all proceeds going to the Irish Red Cross.

Coupled with the fundraising drive, the cafe is bringing in interpreters to provide a practical welcome and employment advice and training service to new arrivals fleeing the war in their homeland, in support of the Irish Red Cross.

We want the cafe to be a place where people can start their Irish journey, in the same way as so many before them, said General Manager, Donna OLeary.

There is a real need for interpreters in the current crisis, and we have established a team of two Ukrainian speakers at the cafe to help to guide people who need an introduction to services or help with employment.

This is not just about Bewleys  we also want to help to connect people with other potential employers and services.

We want to work with people to help them get into suitable employment, utilising our vast network as a leader in the coffee industry.

Within Bewleys we have available roles in our bakery and head office, from entry-level positions to skills such as baristas, sales and engineering and we offer internationally recognised training.

Interpreters Oksana Karbiwska and her daughter Kamilia are Ukrainian nationals settled in Ireland  and eager to help their compatriots.

We are here to help, to reassure people, and to be a friendly face in a new country, said Oksana, 42, who is from Lviv and left Ukraine when she was 19.

We are delighted to do something practical as it has been difficult being in Ireland and feeling helpless while our fellow Ukrainians suffered.

The Bewley family came to Ireland as refugees and the business, founded on Quaker principles, has been helping Irelands new arrivals since 1840.

We are following in the tradition of Victor Bewley who, in 1956, reached out and employed and trained people who had fled Hungary on foot following the uprising  some of whom designed and baked the Cafes most iconic offerings, said Ms OLeary.

We will always continue to reach out the hand of friendship and be a home for new arrivals from all over the world.

The Irish Red Cross has been working with Bewleys to establish practical needs on the ground.

This is a good response to the current situation  part fundraising and part practical. There is a real need for displaced people to feel welcomed in their own tongue and to gain access to advice and employment opportunities, said Liam ODwyer, Secretary General of the Irish Red Cross.

Bewleys Red Cross Buns will retail for 4 each, or 20 for a box of six, with all proceeds going to the aid agency.
State Bank of India (SBI) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Border Security Force to offer special benefits to the serving and retired BSF personnel and family pensioners through the Central Armed Police Salary Package (CAPSP) Scheme.

On this significant occasion, Dinesh Khara, Chairman, SBI stated that At SBI, we endeavour to do our best to support the undying efforts extended by the BSF personnel for the safety of our nation and citizens. We are humbled to partner with the Border Security Force and provide solutions that aim to benefit and ensure financial security for the BSF personnel and their families. It is an honour and a matter of pride for us to be associated with this force and offer a host of curated benefits through our Central Armed Police Salary Package (CAPSP), which ensures ease of access to banking facilities for them and their families."

The MoU will ensure extensive benefits to the security forces including complimentary Personal and Air Accidental Insurance (Death) cover, additional cover in case of on-duty death, and Permanent Total Disability / Partial Disability cover. The MoU will support child education and the marriage of girl children of deceased BSF personnel. The retired personnel will be eligible for complimentary Personal Accidental (Death) Insurance, irrespective of age, whereas family pensioners will be eligible for a bouquet of benefits.

Considering the selfless services rendered by BSF personnel, Bank will offer zero-balance savings bank accounts with a host of complimentary benefits and waiver of service charges to recognize their contribution toward nation-building. Bank will also provide attractive interest rates and concession on processing charges for serving personnel on Home, Car, Education, and Xpress Credit Personal loans.

Subscribe to Mint Newsletters * Enter a valid email * Thank you for subscribing to our newsletter.
At least six people died and at least nine were injured in an early-morning shooting in Sacramento, California, the city's police department said on Twitter.

Police said several blocks of a commercial stretch of the downtown area were closed while they investigate. Videos posted online showed people shouting and running in the street.

Reuters could not independently verify the footage.

The incident comes a little more than a month after a man shot and killed his three children and a fourth person before taking his own life in the same city.
BARDUFOSS : The sound of gunfire echoed around the Norwegian fjords as a row of Swedish and Finnish soldiers, positioned prone behind banks of snow, trained rifles and missile launchers on nearby hills ready for an enemy attack.

The drill, in March, was the first time forces from Finland and Sweden have formed a combined brigade in a scheduled NATO exercise in Arctic Norway known as "Cold Response." Neither country is a member of the NATO alliance. The exercise was long planned, but Russia's invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24 added intensity to the war game.

"We would be rather naive not to recognise that there is a threat," Swedish Major Stefan Nordstrom told Reuters. "The security situation in the whole of Europe has changed and we have to accept that, and we have to adapt."

That sense of threat means President Vladimir Putin, who embarked on what he calls a "special operation" in Ukraine partly to counter the expansion of the NATO alliance, may soon have a new NATO neighbour.

Finland has a 1,300 km (810 mile) border with Russia. In a March 28 phone call, the country's President Sauli Niinisto asked NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg for details on principles and steps for accepting new members, he wrote on Facebook. Finland's leaders have discussed possible membership with "almost all" NATO's 30 members, and will submit a review to parliament by mid-April, Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto told Reuters.

Sweden  home of the founder of the Nobel Peace Prize and a country which has not fought in a war since 1814  is more hesitant. But a recent opinion poll for a major Swedish TV station found 59% of Swedes wanted to join NATO, if Finland does.

For some in the alliance, the two countries sandwiched between Russia and NATO-member Norway are already partners. U.S. General David Berger, who is the commandant of the U.S. Marines Corps, told reporters at the drill that  putting the politics of membership aside  they were brothers-in-arms during training.

"For marines, at the tactical level ... there's no difference," Berger said. "I just have to know that the unit over there, they have my back. They've got me covered."

Stoltenberg announced in early March that NATO was now sharing all information on the war in Ukraine with Sweden and Finland. Both countries regularly attend NATO meetings. At the exercises in Norway, Stoltenberg said "no other countries in the world" are closer partners.

But he noted an important difference: "The absolute security guarantees that we provide for NATO allies, are only for NATO allies."

As non-members, Finland and Sweden's combined population of 16 million don't have the protection of NATO's guarantee that an attack on one ally is an attack on all.

Moscow did not respond to a request for comment for this story. It has repeatedly warned both countries against joining NATO. On March 12, the Russian foreign ministry said "there will be serious military and political consequences" if they do, according to Russian news agency Interfax.

Stoltenberg has said it would be possible to allow Finland and Sweden in "quite quickly." NATO has not commented on what a fast-track process would be; a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Defense said any decision would be taken by the countries themselves but their accession would need to be agreed by all 30 allies.

"President Putin wants less NATO on Russia's borders," Stoltenberg said in January, also referring to more allied troops in southeastern Europe, Poland and the Baltics. "But he is getting more NATO."

Memories of war

More than 1,000 km to the southeast of the NATO drill, 80-year-old Markku Kuusela knows real war. The pensioner, who lives in Imatra, a town on Finland's border with Russia, was evacuated to Sweden with his brother as an infant after his father was killed fighting a Russian invasion.

They returned to Finland only after the war was over.

"It is always in the back of my mind," said Kuusela, visiting the cemetery where his father is buried. Tears welled in his eyes. "How it would have been to have a father."

Some 96,000 Finns, or 2.5% of the population, died fighting the Russian invasion, in two wars between 1939 and 1944. A total of 55,000 children lost fathers and over 400,000 people lost homes as territory was conceded.

But the Finns, fighting under cover of dense forest, repelled the Russians and ever since, Finland has had a clear goal: strong defence and friendly relations with Russia.

The country built a conscript army  it has about 900,000 men and women in reserves  and according to the International Institute for Strategic Studies, one of the largest artilleries in Europe.

For years, Finns and Russians have interacted extensively. This year, Imatra was planning to celebrate a 250-year history of Finnish tourism since a visit by Catherine the Great, the Russian empress, in 1772.

Now the Imatra border station is deserted, its stalls unused. Finland's security service, known as Supo, says Russia's military resources are currently focused on Ukraine and its own domestic operations, but warns the situation may change quickly.

The Ukraine invasion triggered almost 3,000 applications from Finns to join local associations of reservists as well as almost 1,000 to women's emergency preparedness groups, the groups said.

One applicant was Pia Lumme, a 48-year-old coordinator for the Finnish National Agency for Education who lives near Imatra. She recalled her grandmother's war memories.

"I think we Finns all share ... the will to uphold this country," Lumme said.

Finland is one of few European countries to maintain a national emergency supply of fuel, food and medicine. Building emergency shelters beneath every major building has been mandatory since World War Two. The country says its 54,000 shelters have room for 4.4 million of the 5.5 million population.

Finns' backing for joining NATO has risen to record numbers over the past month, with the latest poll by public broadcaster Yle showing 62% of respondents in favour and only 16% against.

Supo, the security service, said on March 29 Finland must guard against potential Russian retaliation to Helsinki's discussions on joining NATO, or interference in the public debate.

"We don't need to make any quick decisions on our own defence, but certainly a possible membership application could lead to making us a target of interference or hybrid actions," Haavisto told Reuters in an interview. "Finland needs to prepare for that and also listen to how NATO countries would react."

CRISIS KITS

Sweden, which has argued that non-alignment has served its people well, has been slower to see Russia as a threat  for example, it allowed defence spending to slip and emergency shelters to fall into disrepair after the Cold War. But the mood there is also changing.

After Russia invaded Crimea in 2014, the government speeded up rearmament and boosted military strength on the island of Gotland, near the headquarters of Russia's Baltic Fleet. It also reintroduced limited conscription that year.

Stockholm said earlier this month it would almost double defence spending to around 2% of GDP and is refurbishing a network of emergency bunkers, to shelter up to seven million people. It says there are currently around 65,000 shelters, mostly in private homes.

Around 71% of Swedes are worried about an increased military threat from Russia  up from 46% in January  according to a survey by pollsters Demoskop for daily Aftonbladet on March 2.

Three retail chains told Reuters sales of products to prepare for emergencies had accelerated again after picking up at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Sales of crisis kits, wind-up radios, water filters and water containers - pretty much everything - have increased," said Fredrik Stockhaus, founder of Criseq, a Swedish online store. Sweden's statistics office does not measure sales at this level of detail.

If either country does go for NATO membership, Finland looks set to move first, diplomats and politicians say. Foreign Minister Haavisto said he is in "almost daily" talks with his Swedish counterpart on the topic.

"It wouldn't be ideal for Finland to go alone, because then all the risks in the application process would be on Finland," said Matti Pesu, a foreign policy analyst at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs.

In Sweden, the government and opposition are conducting an analysis of security policy which is expected in May. Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson stressed on national TV on March 30 it was important to wait and see what conclusions that reaches. The ruling Social Democrats oppose joining, but four opposition parties support it.

Even so, Sweden's non-aligned status is increasingly blurred, said Anna Wieslander, Northern Europe Director at the Atlantic Council think-tank.

"If you look at it, we are preparing to meet the adversary together and I think there is no doubt in which camp we are," she said. "You can see the warnings Russia has given so there is no doubt on their side as well."
So much for Prime Minister Imran Khans New Pakistan." Faced with growing discontent among his own lawmakers and allies, Khan told the president to dissolve parliament and called for fresh elections after a hotly anticipated no confidence vote against him was abruptly canceled Sunday.

Prepare for elections," Khan said in a televised speech to the nation. No corrupt forces will decide what the future of the country will be," he said, repeating the allegation that the U.S. is working with his rivals to overthrow the government.

Drawing outrage from the opposition, which says it has the numbers to force him from office and take power, his move is now expected to be tested in Supreme Court. Opposition leader Shehbaz Sharif warned that Khan would be charged with treason for violating the constitution. Its a well trodden path in Pakistan, where high treason  and the death penalty that comes with it  has been used against former military leader and president Pervez Musharraf (he lives in Dubai and has managed to escape the verdict handed down in 2019 that sentenced him to death.)

Indeed, no Pakistani leader has served a full term in office, due to assassinations, martial law, votes of no confidence and arbitrary dismissals. Khans term, which began on in August 2018, isnt due to end until August 2023. Had the trust vote gone ahead, he would have taken his place in that long list of failed prime ministers and presidents. Its likely he still will.

One of the most telling moments in the weeks of turmoil that lead up to the canceled vote happened Saturday, when the countrys powerful military chief openly criticized Russia for its war in Ukraine. General Qamar Javed Bajwa said Moscows actions had resulted in a great tragedy" that had killed thousands and made millions refugees, in a significant departure from Khans more neutral tone. Khan visited President Vladimir Putin in Moscow the day Russia invaded its neighbor as part of a long-planned overseas mission.

Bajwas statements also appeared to be an attempt to reposition Pakistan back toward the U.S.  again, in obvious opposition to Khan. Pakistan seeks to broaden and expand relations with both China and the U.S., Bajwa said, without impacting our relations with either."

A former cricket great, Imran Khan has gone from being seen as too close to the military, which has ruled Pakistan for nearly half its 75-year history, to now falling out with the organization widely viewed as the real power in the South Asian nation. Last week he blamed a foreign funded conspiracy" for trying to remove him from power, tapping into a deep well of anti-U.S. sentiment that emerged in response to American foreign policy post-9/11. U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said there was no truth" to the allegations.

Khans Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (Justice) party has 155 seats. With the help of coalition partners, hes retained a slim majority of little more than 172. The joint opposition of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharifs Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and the Pakistan Peoples Party run by Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, the son of assassinated former leader Benazir Bhutto, has more than 160 seats. They needed 172 votes in Pakistans 342-seat parliament to unseat the prime minister. If successful, it would have meant the return to the dynastic politics that Pakistanis have grown so weary of.

This continuing political instability will only worsen Pakistans precarious economic position. There is significant pressure on both its foreign reserves and its currency (although not as severe as Sri Lankas, its enough to force its default risk to soar). Inflation, meanwhile, is running above 12%  way beyond the central banks target range of 5%-7%. Khan put a $6 billion International Monetary Fund bailout in jeopardy last month when he cut fuel and electricity prices after previously agreeing to increase taxes as part of the IMF program. Khans promises to overhaul corrupt institutions, fund affordable housing and create an Islamic welfare state are now all but abandoned.

His government has also been grappling with a deteriorating security situation since the Taliban returned to power in neighboring Afghanistan last August. Thats provoked a resurgence of militancy in Pakistan  including the bombing of a Shiite mosque in Peshawar last month claimed by the local chapter of Islamic State that killed as many as 60 people and wounded almost 200.

Pakistans constitution calls for the establishment of an interim government to take the country to the elections, which must be held within 90 days. Khan may have dodged the vote of no confidence for now, but a Gallup Pakistan poll taken in February showed his approval rating had fallen to 36% from 40% in 2018, while Nawaz Sharifs had more than doubled to 55%. As many as two dozen of his own lawmakers have turned against him, as has the army. Khan is in trouble, no matter which way you cut it.

The question now is how much unrest he and his opponents will incite before another poll can be held or the Supreme Court can sit. Tens of thousands of Khans supporters gathered in the capital Islamabad on March 26, which followed a major anti-government rally weeks earlier. Expect more of this, and all the danger it brings. Pakistans 220 million citizens deserve better.

Ruth Pollard is a columnist and editor with Bloomberg Opinion.
"Thunder is impressive," Mark Twain wrote, "but it is lightning that does the work." Anyone who's watched a lightning storm will understand what he meant: Lightning is one of nature's most awe-inspiring phenomena, illuminating the skies with its fearsome forks.

According to the U.K. Met Office, lightning strikes the planet up to 1.4 billion times a year , or an estimated 44 times every second. And it's more than just a light show: Lightning plays a critical role in keeping Earth's electrical balance in check ; aids in fixing nitrogen , thereby helping plants grow; and potentially even helps to clear the atmosphere of pollutants .

But some lightning strikes work harder than others. While most lightning flashes measure 2 to 3 miles (3.2 to 4.8 kilometers) in length, some truly colossal bolts occasionally crackle above our heads, forking their way across hundreds of miles of sky. But how big can lightning actually get? And should we be worried about these gigantic bolts?

Related: Can diamonds burn?

How lightning is made

Lightning arises in storm clouds when strong positive charge develops in one region of the cloud and strong negative charge develops in another, creating electrical forces between them.

"A lightning flash is initiated in a region where the electrical forces are extremely strong," said Don MacGorman, a physicist and senior researcher at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Severe Storms Laboratory in Oklahoma. "They become strong enough that the air can't withstand the electrical force anymore and breaks down."

That means that, as the electric force grows, it breaks down the air's insulating power, which usually keeps areas of different charge separated from each other. Researchers think this occurs because the buildup of the excessive electrical force starts to accelerate "free" electrons  those not attached to an atom or a molecule  in the air, in turn knocking other electrons loose from their atoms and molecules, MacGorman said. This process continues, accelerating more and more electrons. "Scientists call this process an electron avalanche, and it's what we mean when we say the air breaks down," MacGorman told Live Science.

This eventually creates a very hot channel in the air that acts like a wire, whose ends grow outward toward the positive and negative charges that caused the breakdown. The growing channel eventually connects the positive and negative charges, and when it does, it triggers the immense electric current we know as a lightning flash.

"Think of it as a giant spark that has grown through the cloud," MacGorman said.

Sometimes, the lower region of a cloud, which usually contains positive charge, does not have enough charge on its own to stop the channel. So the lightning bolt continues growing, stretching downward toward the ground. As it does so, it draws an upward spark from the ground to meet it, triggering a lightning flash with huge electric currents that transport some of the storm's charge to the ground. These cloud-to-ground channels are what most of us commonly picture when we think of lightning  those vivid forks that strike Earth .

The cloud's the limit

But what factors limit the size of these massive bolts? Researchers have been trying to answer this question for decades. Vertically, the extent of a flash is limited by the height of a storm cloud, or the distance from the ground to its pinnacle, which is about 12 miles (20 km) at its highest.

But horizontally, an extensive cloud system provides much more room to play with. This is where the heavyweights work their magic.

Related: Why do deserts get so cold at night?

Back in 1956, Myron Ligda, a meteorologist in Texas, used radar to detect a flash spanning more than 100 miles (160 km). At the time, it was recognised as the longest lightning flash ever recorded. Since then, advancements in technology have allowed researchers to measure much larger flashes, and more of them.

In 2007, researchers identified a bolt over Oklahoma that measured 200 miles (322 km) long. But only a decade later, that record was obliterated: In October 2017, clouds above the Midwest released a flash of lightning so huge that it illuminated the skies above Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. Spanning more than 310 miles (500 km) across the three states, the jolt was so unprecedented that a group of researchers published a study about it in the journal Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society , describing it as a "megaflash." It was one of the largest lightning flashes ever recorded.

But even that flash has been surpassed. Auspiciously, on Halloween 2018, a lightning bolt over Brazil was later revealed to have spanned more than 440 miles (709 km). Keeping meteorologists on their toes, the skies broke that record by releasing another behemoth on April 29, 2020  a megaflash that stretched from Texas to Mississippi, covering 477 miles (768 km).

While lightning has traditionally been observed from ground-based systems such as antennae and radar, many of these record-breaking flashes are now recorded using satellites. One of these, called the Geostationary Lightning Mapper , made up of sensors on two satellites orbiting Earth, helped reveal the enormous extent of the lightning flash in October 2017, said MacGorman, who is an author of a study about this former record-breaking flash. "That system responds to the light emitted from a cloud top, so we see the light from the lightning flashes and can then map it, pretty much all over this hemisphere," MacGorman said.

The making of giants

But even with these exciting visual insights, researchers still aren't sure about the precise mechanics that underpin such lengthy electrical illuminations. Cloud size is almost certainly a factor; also required, MacGorman said, are certain "mesoscale processes  large scale wind flows that enable that system to be tied together to persist for a long time."

With the stage set by these monster clouds, what's actually happening within them? "These megaflashes appear to be like a continuous sequence of discharges in very close succession," said Christopher Emersic, a research fellow who studies thunderstorm electrification at the University of Manchester in the U.K.

Related: What's the coldest place in the universe?

He hypothesizes that if a cloud system is highly charged across a large area, a series of discharges can propagate through it like a line of falling dominoes. "If dominoes are all set up without too big a gap, one triggers another in a large series of topples," Emersic told Live Science. "Otherwise, it 'fails,' and in this case, you'll get only a smaller spatial lightning event rather than a megaflash."

The larger the parent cloud, the more opportunity there is for the discharge to continue propagating  "hence why megaflashes could, in principle, be as large as the parent cloud, should the charge structure be conducive," Emersic said.

That also means there are likely much bigger flashes out there than we've already seen. "Storms can get larger than [the ones we've measured from]," MacGorman said.

Paired with more sophisticated detection tools, this makes it likely that lightning hunters will go on to find even larger bolts that break current records and increase our awareness of these immense natural feats.

Lightning bolts over a city (Image credit: Shutterstock)

Cause for concern?

Despite the apocalyptic picture they paint, megaflashes aren't necessarily more dangerous than regular lightning. "A spatially extensive flash doesn't necessarily mean it carries more energy," Emersic said.

Because the cloud systems from which they originate are so vast, however, megaflash strikes can be difficult to predict. "Such events can often lead to ground strikes far away from the main lightning activity in the convective core," Emersic said. "Someone on the ground could think the storm has passed but be caught by surprise by one of these spatially extensive discharges seemingly from nowhere."

It's also possible that in a warming world, there might be an uptick in the types of storms that give rise to megaflashes, Emersic said. "And so, indirectly, that can make the conditions more likely, thereby increasing their frequency."

For now, though, megaflashes aren't that common; MacGorman estimates that they make up only about 1% of lightning flashes overall. Nevertheless, researchers like him will go on hunting  and, no doubt, discovering  even bigger behemoths for us to marvel at.

Originally published on Live Science on Dec. 14, 2019, and updated on April 4, 2022.
Click here to read the full article.

For Alexander Skarsgard, being one of the sexiest actors in Hollywood hasnt always been a blessing. The Emmy winner recently told The Sunday Times that all the focus on his physical appearance during the early parts of his careers had a negative impact on the choices of roles he was being offered.

I dont really know if that was the reason I wasnt getting roles, Skarsgard said. Starting out in Sweden, there was stuff about being tall and blond. But most people here are tall and blond. Still, after my first job, I was on a stupid sexy hunky hot list and then people didnt take me seriously.

Skarsgard added, If you want characters with depth, but have been labeled a dude who takes his shirt off, youre not going to get those offers.

Although Skarsgard had been acting in Swedish films for over a decade and appeared in Hollywood movies such as Ben Stillers 2001 comedy Zoolander, it wasnt until his series regular role on HBOs vampire drama True Blood that Skarsgard starting becoming a household name in the U.S. The actor often appeared shirtless as the vampire Eric Northman, a character he played for 76 episodes.

Skarsgard will be shirtless on screen again for his upcoming role as a Viking prince in Robert Eggers 10th century epic The Northman. Eggers revealed earlier this year, The amount of discipline that Alex put into this role is crazy. He transformed his body more wildly than he did in Tarzan.'

The Northman co-star Ralph Ineson told NME last year of Skarsgard, Hes made himself look like some kind of monster for the part, the dedications incredible  hes got his shirt off  and you think: My god, thats not a bodybuilder doing a scene, thats like a proper serious actor!'

The Northman opens in theaters on April 22 from Focus Features.

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Click here to read the full article.

Bowing in Canneseries official selection, six-episode miniseries Infiniti isnt just for sci-fi aficionados, Empreinte Digitale producer Eric Laroche told Variety.

Co-produced between France and Belgium, the latest Canal Plus offering  created by Stephane Pannetier and Julien Vanlerenberghe  interweaves multiple storylines, moving from the International Space Station (ISS) that suddenly goes silent to an investigation in Kazakhstan, where a beheaded, wax-covered body is found by a local cop.

Discouraged by his superiors, Isaak (Daniyar Alshinov) decides to solve the mystery, while French astronaut Anna Zarathi (Celine Sallette) pursues her dream of space travel.

Having more than one genre, especially in a TV series, is very interesting. But one of them still needs to form the skeleton of the show. In our case, its the murder mystery, says Laroche.

I am not a big traveler, but I live for cinema and for series. The first time I went to New York, I went: Oh my God, I am in a movie. When I went to Japan, I kept saying Im in a Miyazaki film, in a Koreeda film. When I went to Kazakhstan, I said: I dont know where I am. I have never been on a journey like that.

While Paris-based Empreinte Digitale continues to blend genres with Disney Plus fantasy Parallels and upcoming Netflix show The 7 Lives of Lea, which will include time travel and body swapping, it has already nabbed the Critics Jury Award at MipDrama in 2017 for sci-fi series Missions.

There is a connection, especially in terms of production. We already know how to create something with many visual effects. We learnt it with Missions and we confirmed it with Infiniti, says Laroche. But the ambitious scope of the series initially scared off potential broadcasters.

Many of them said it wasnt the kind of story they normally make. Others went: Its great, but its never going to happen. We asked the writers to complete the first episode, thinking that if no one wants the series in France, maybe we can look for another partner abroad. And then come back, saying: See? The Brits think its possible after all.

With Canal Plus on board, the producers decided to shoot mostly in English despite their international cast, featuring the likes of The Whistlers star Vlad Ivanov or Ukrainian-born Anatolii Panchenko. There were six languages spoken on set, which was both frightening and exciting, adds Laroche.

Infiniti star Celine Sallette appreciated the poetic, mythical and metaphorical take of the writers, as well as the complexity of the characters, each dealing with their respective traumas.

The beautiful thing about Anna is that you take this dream of space and look at it from an intimate point of view. This dream is not coming true for her  she has had this seizure. It was a failure, but she will regain herself once again, step by step. It was really beautiful to explore, she says.

Laroche adds: This is the number one rule with series  you can create the most amazing set up, send the audience somewhere they have never been, but if the characters arent interesting, they wont come back. I used to say that we all loved Six Feet Under, but not because of the funeral home. It was because of that family.

While for the moment there are no plans for the second season, everything is possible, says Laroche.

Since the beginning, we said: This is a miniseries. When the writers pitched us the story, they told us how it would end. Thats the reason why its so well-written  you need to know where you are going.

Infiniti was shot in France, Kazakhstan and Ukraine, and current events proved difficult for the entire team.

The viewers wont know that we shot there  its not a part of the story. Which is why we decided its our duty to talk about Ukraine during the interviews, says Laroche. On Monday, when the series will be released on Canal Plus, there will be a special introduction before the first episode.

We spent two and a half months in Ukraine: when you work on something so difficult, a connection is formed. When the war started, we contacted everyone and tried to help them out. We sent money, first necessity items. This is very important to us.

We see Ukrainians filling sandbags on the beach, building defenses, but also playing drums, filling that place with loud music, beer and strength. They are escaping mental terror, adds Sallette, wearing the colors of the Ukrainian flag.

Now, when I text Ilya, who led our amazing stunt crew, he says: We are fine. We are working towards our victory. They are the real heroes today, because they are not allowing themselves to be intimidated by fear. Or by this man.

Heroism is not about being successful in everything you do or being strong all the time. It has something to do with failure  the kind of failure you need to overcome. You get through it and emerge victorious. You conquer your monsters, she says.

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Click here to read the full article.

The union representing film and TV directors in British Columbia called for a strike authorization vote on Monday, after negotiations with the studios broke down.

The Directors Guild of Canada represents about 1,700 workers in British Columbia, including directors, second unit directors, location managers and production assistants. The union has been in talks for the last year on a new contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and the Canadian Media Producers Association.

On Monday, the union said that the talks are at an impasse, after the producers rejected a proposal from a government mediator.

The union called on its members to vote for a strike mandate, which would give the unions leaders the power to call a strike. A strike could paralyze the industry in British Columbia, which has become a significant hub for TV series production in recent years.

The vote is set to begin at 9 a.m. Wednesday and conclude at 5 p.m. on Thursday afternoon. The strike vote is the first in the history of the DGCs B.C. District Council.

In a statement, the union said the key issues include minimum wages, payment terms for COVID testing, and retroactivity of wage increases to the expiration of the last contract.

Last fall, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees called for an unprecedented strike authorization vote affecting 60,000 members in the U.S., after negotiations stalled. The authorization passed with 98.7% support. The union reached an agreement with the AMPTP on the eve of a strike deadline.

The DGC BC contract expired in 2021, and negotiators have been working on an agreement since then.

We have bargained in good faith for a full year, but the Employers bargaining team has been unwilling to engage on our most important issues and has kept demanding more and more clawbacks throughout the process, said Allan Harmon, chair of the DGC BC, in a statement. Despite our willingness to compromise on significant issues, they kept moving the goalposts, making it impossible to get a fair deal for our people.

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Click here to read the full article.

Quebecois auteur Florence Longpre has scored a triple, landing her newest series Aubreys Back in the main competition at Canneseries after enjoying selections at both the Berlinale Series Market and Series Mania with her tragic comedy Last Summer of the Raspberries. Written during the COVID-19 lockdowns, the new series follows Audrey, played by Longpre, a young woman emerging from a decades long coma following a traumatic brain injury.

The series was co-authored by Guillaume Lambert (Adulthood) and their collaboration carries the story forward in this heartfelt journey of rediscovery.

The first Canadian series selected in long form competition at Canneseries, Audreys Back is produced by Pixcoms Nicola Merola, Charles Lafortune, and Marie-Eve Pelletier. Former collaborator Guillaume Lonergan (Emilie, Can You Hear Me) directs the series, having also directed Lamberts series Adulthood, which was nominated for the International Emmys. Original score is by Alexandra Streliski. Beta Film will handle international distribution for the series, as well as one other series in competition: Spains El Inmortal  Gangs of Madrid.

Variety spoke to Longpre and Lambert ahead of the series premiere at Canneseries.

How did this series come to life? And what was the writing dynamic like?

Florence Longpre: The work with Guillaume was amazing. But it was difficult because there was no leader. Often there is a lead writer who makes more of the final decision, but for this project we decided that it would be both of us. So that was very difficult. But I think the result is there, because there was a lot of talking, understanding, and compromise. Thats why the result is so beautiful, I think.

Guillaume Lambert: Yeah. It was difficult for both of us to defend each scene. Florence and I are really close friends. So we can say easily that it was difficult because we love each other so much. Were both actors. Were both screenwriters. We really wanted to collaborate. So it was like lets make it work. Its going to be difficult, but lets make it work.

How do you approach the difference between comedy and tragedy, on the page and on the screen, especially when you are both the writer and lead actor?

Florence Longpre: For me its the type of thing, for comedy and tragedy, its the same note for me. Its a note of sincerity and fragility. And if you want too much to make it funny, for me, it doesnt work. You have to be in the situation, in the sincerity of this situation. Well, personally for me, thats what makes me laugh. When I can recognize myself, or the line is so well done and well said. Yeah, it comes from the situation and the feeling of the situation, like in real life. Sometimes in real life, you have a quick response to the dialogue. So its the same in this area.

Guillaume Lambert: I think the comedy is really close to the tragedy for the same reasons, for the same emotions. You can laugh, but you can cry, and as a writer I dont want to, you know, put the comedy in a box and the drama in a separate box. I like to mix them both. And I think that Florence has the same way of working. I love when people say I was bursting in tears and then I had a laugh. And then I laughed again and then I cried again! I think this is, this is life.

Music seems to play a central role in many of your projects. What is your inspiration for placing songs and score in such a prominent way?

Florence Longpre: The music is so important. When we write the script, and I think we are the only ones in Quebec who do this, but we put the song in the script. Because we want it, and they have to begin the process. Its a long process to have the song in the series. Sometimes it can take months, years even. With Enya, it was very complicated. But it was super easy with Arcade Fire. You never know.

The series begins with Audrey waking up from a coma following a traumatic brain injury. Florence, how did you approach playing this character?

Florence Longpre: First of all, I was very afraid about that because, uh, that was very difficult to play. Its weird because I dont say anything, but it was very, very difficult to not be there. To not be there was something I had to practice a lot. Before I was an actress, I worked a lot with quadriplegic people. Its not exactly the same, but I was aware of some of the difficulty when you cannot move, when you cannot talk, and the way it can affect your emotions. So there was a real desire to be truthful and serious about this subject because theres something so profound about waking up and being alive. When you lose the ability to talk and move, you realize how precious it is. So it was all of that that I wanted to put in this character.

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Click here to read the full article.

Harrison Ford has signed on to star opposite Jason Segel in the Apple comedy series Shrinking, Variety has learned.

The show was first announced in October 2021. Segel will write the series alongside Ted Lasso co-creator Bill Lawrence and Ted Lasso star, writer, and co-executive producer Brett Goldstein.

Shrinking follows Jimmy (Segel), a grieving therapist who starts to break the rules and tell his clients exactly what he thinks. Ignoring his training and ethics, he finds himself making huge, tumultuous changes to peoples lives, including his own.

Ford will play Dr. Phil Rhodes, described as a down-to earth, sharp as a tack blue collar shrink, blunt but with an ever present twinkle. Phil is a pioneer in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy who has built a successful practice over the years that he shares with his two young proteges, Jimmy and Gaby. Fiercely independent, Phil has recently been diagnosed with Parkinsons, which forces him out of his comfort zone as he grapples with intrusive friends, his estranged family and his legacy.

The role will mark Fords first ever television starring role. The iconic actor is best known for starring in film franchises like Star Wars, Blade Runner, and Indiana Jones, the last of which is currently prepping its fifth film with Ford returning as the titular globe-trotting archaeologist. He is known for starring in films like The Fugitive, Witness (which earned him an Oscar nomination), Patriot Games, Sabrina, and Working Girl as well. Ford also starred in the film The Mosquito Coast, which was recently adapted into an Apple drama series starring Justin Theroux.

Ford is repped by UTA and Ziffren Brittenham.

Segel, Lawrence, and Goldstein all serve as executive producers on Shrinking in addition to writing. Lawrence executive produces via Doozer Productions, with Doozers Jeff Ingold and Liza Katzer also executive producing alongside Neil Goldman. Warner Bros. Television, where Doozer is under an overall deal, is the studio.

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Click here to read the full article.

Lithuanian film director and academic Mantas Kvedaravicius, who captured the escalating conflict in Ukraine in several powerful works, has been reported dead in Mariupol, the Ukrainian city that was the subject of his doc Mariupolis that premiered in Berlin.

While (he was) trying to leave Mariupol, Russian occupiers killed Lithuanian director Mantas Kvedaravicius, the Ukrainian Defence Ministry tweeted on Saturday. Kvedaravicius was 45.

A Lithuanian news agency called 15min reported that Kvedaravicius was rushed to a hospital but could not be saved.

News that Kvedaravicius has been killed by the Russian military  which could not be verified with family members  has prompted an outpour of statements and social media posts mourning the directors death.

We lost a creator well known in Lithuania and in the whole world, who, until the very last moment, in spite of danger, worked in Russia-occupied Ukraine, Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said in a statement.

Best known for Mariupolis, which portrays Ukrainian citizens going on with their lives while besieged in the Southern port city by Russian-backed fighters in 2014, Kvedaravicius was previously in Berlin with his 2011 doc Barzakh, shot in the Russian region of Chechnya as it recovers from the war with Russia, laying bare the reality of life there. The film was given a prize by Amnesty International at the Berlinale that year.

In 2019 Kvedaravicius attended Venice where Parthenon, his third film  and first incursion into fiction narrative, albeit mixed with documentary techniques  premiered in the Venice Critics Week section. Kvedaravicius feature film debut was based on three years of anthropological research among marginal communities in Odessa, Istanbul, and Athens.

Mantas Kvedaravicius was a unique human being. Maddeningly stubborn; a one-of-a-kind artist, said Locarno Film Festival director Giona A. Nazzaro, who at that time headed the Venice Critics Week, in a Facebook post in which he also praised the pic for its hauntingly powerful images.

He conjured a painful beauty. Ferocious poetry. Mantas was like a seer. He knew what was coming and decided he wanted to see it up close, Nazzaro added.

We will miss you, Mantas. You sure taught us a hard lesson.

The Vilnius International Film Festival paid tribute to Kvedaravicius with a minute of silence during its closing ceremony on Sunday.

We lost a director who did a heroic job documenting the atrocities of the war, said the fests director Algirdas Ramaska, who noted that Mantas himself did not like to talk.

Mantas dedicated his work to the areas of conflict, the reality of war and the humanity that shines in that darkness. His cinema was and will be very important not only today.

Information on Kvedaravicius survivors was not immediately available.

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Click here to read the full article.

Over cigarettes in a Tokyo nightclub, a newbie crime reporter eager to make a mark is speaking to his source. Jake Adelstein (Ansel Elgort), an American whos become fluent in Japanese to work as a journalist far from home, uses the language to ask his source Jin Miyamoto (Hideaki Ito) whether the city of Tokyo has officially recorded murder cases at all. Miyamoto, a corrupt cop, is briefly caught up in all the flashes of distraction the nightclub has to offer  bright lights, music, liquor on order and young women ambiently available  before explaining the situation to this outsider. He spells it out, in emphatic English, to make his point to the American: There. Is. No. Murder. In. Japan.

In other words, the Tokyo police of the late 1990s, when our story takes place, will use any excuse to look away from whats happening. Thats in order to, among other goals, ensure equilibrium among the crime organizations doing business across the streets of the city. This gives a spark of motivation to Jake, who has left Missouri in search of action, excitement and the opportunity to do reporting that has real impact. In this adaptation of the real-life Adelsteins memoir, Jakes muscular self-belief runs headlong into a rigorously held silence. And this conflict, rippling across an environment whose language Jake speaks easily but whose codes he cannot crack, helps Tokyo Vice assert itself as a significant new entry in the crime-drama canon.

Executive producer Michael Mann, who directed the pilot, is putting himself out there in a striking way: Comparisons are, perhaps, inevitable to Miami Vice, the stylish 1980s serial he produced, as well as to the 2006 feature film of the same title he helmed. Manns sense for the visual language of temptation  conveying vice both as a scourge to be eliminated and as a decadent pleasure  enriches Tokyo Vice. So, too, does his understanding of hierarchies, within both the criminal and legitimate worlds: Much of the pilot is taken up with Jakes trying to prove himself at the newspaper for which he works, one where cub reporters are expected simply to transcribe and print the polices side of the story. Rinko Kikuchi is excellent as Jakes editor, attempting to balance her advocacy for her writer with a confused sense that he cant go on being intransigent forever.

And say this much for Elgort, a controversial figure off screen after allegations of sexual assault surfaced in 2020: On screen, hes able to avoid many of the pitfalls into which an actor who looks like him on a Japan-set series might have fallen. The show is aware of whats potentially uncomfortable about Jake as savior figure, and undercuts the narrative, and its protagonist, accordingly, starting with the performance. A natural slickness or seeming insincerity that has held Elgort back at other moments in his screen career here helps build a character who knows a fair amount and, as a result, thinks himself a genius. Speaking both English and Japanese, Elgort is absolutely credible as a thrill seeker who sees Tokyo as the staging ground for a story in which he can play hero. That means that what looks to him like crusading for the truth in the face of obstacles can appear to those around him like a white American delusionally disrupting an ecosystem he cannot hope to meaningfully comprehend. You are an American, so you think youre more talented than you actually are, a colleague teases him; the joke hangs in the air even as Elgort contorts his face into sneering agreement.

But thered be no show were Jake not talented enough to make headway  even if its often by luck or through the assistance of sympathetic Tokyo denizens, crucially Ken Watanabes detective Hiroto Katagiri. Watanabe is reliably terrific, and lends weariness and heft to Elgorts bright-eyed gumshoe act. Elsewhere across the series, Rachel Keller is terrific as a young woman working her way through the nightclub scene (a milieu that will be familiar to anyone whos read the true-crime classic People Who Eat Darkness). Her Samantha reluctantly helps Jake toward a more granular understanding of what hes up against. And Kellers performance as a woman whose journey to independence has ironically ended up with her living as a hostage to her patrons is excellent. Moments of her storyline that fall into cliche, like a perhaps-inevitable flashback to Samanthas arrival in Japan, pulse with life despite the scripts shortcuts.

Thats true of much of Tokyo Vice, a beautifully shot and elegantly acted series that can seem at times to power past its writing. The pilot so effectively conjures the disorientation and novelty of a new place that the fish-out-of-water storyline feels somewhat new. Yet a backstory involving Jakes family back home  though nicely performed by Jessica Hecht as forlorn mother and Elgort as wayward son  seems out of place. And if the script, like the shows title, can lend an occasional sense of its setting as unusually rife with corruption, the core Watanabe-Elgort relationship makes clear the truth of the series: Tokyo, like all places, is impenetrable to those who dont take the time to learn its ways on their own terms. In a rewardingly chewy complication that elevates Tokyo Vice, Jakes journey toward that truth is one in which his Americanness  his eager outspokenness  is as often hindrance as help.

Tokyo Vice premieres Thursday, April 7, on HBO Max, with three episodes, followed by two episodes each Thursday up to the finale Thursday, April 28.

HBO Max. Eight episodes (five screened for review).

Production

Executive producers: Michael Mann, Jake Adelstein, Ansel Elgort, John Lesher, Alan Poul, J.T. Rogers, Emily Gerson Saines, Ken Watanabe, Kayo Washio, Destin Daniel Cretton.

With

Ansel Elgort, Ken Watanabe, Rachel Keller

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
The extent to which digital currency has grown is significant in recent years. It is something many people are using between each other as well as investing, and some businesses are already accepting forms of cryptocurrency for payment.

Now one bank in local operation plans to offer digital currency as part of their employees savings plan.

Laredos Vantage Bank is planning to offer a new way for their employees to have a savings plan with the company, as they plan to step away from traditional savings plans  if the employee wishes to do so  in exchange for a digital currency savings plan. The new savings plans work with the most well-known cryptocurrency, Bitcoin.

The idea for the Bitcoin Savings Plan was something presented to us by one of our partners, Vantage Bank Chief Human Resources Officer Eric Thompson, EVP said. It is a program they launched and asked if we would be interested in participating.

The new program, NYDIG's Bitcoin Savings Plan, is a simple and secure way for people to invest in Bitcoin.

According to Thompson, the Bitcoin Savings Plan lets employees automatically convert a portion of each paycheck to Bitcoin. The Bitcoin is then held on NYDIG's institutional-grade custody platform, which meets the highest security and regulatory standards.

The implementation of the employee program makes the bank one of the first, if not the first bank in the state of Texas, to have such a savings plan program for employees. In a time when many people are looking for the best employer with top benefits, the human resources officer thinks this is a good way to go.

We are excited to be part of a number of organizations across the country offering this program, Thompson said. During this Great Resignation,' attracting and retaining top talent has been especially challenging. Focusing on our employees and the benefits we offer help make Vantage Bank Texas an employer of choice for current and potential employees.

The CEO of the company has also praised the new program for expanding on its benefits which helps retain local talent as well.

Part of offering our team members the most comprehensive benefits package possible is making sure we evolve with new financial technologies, said Jeff Sinnott, president and CEO of Vantage Bank Texas. As part of that, we are also providing associates with education about Bitcoin, sharing the risks and considerations that should be evaluated before directing their post-tax dollars to a Bitcoin Savings Plan.

According to the bank, the implementation of the new savings program reinforces the financial evolution of cryptocurrency and how employers are adapting to offer competitive benefits packages for employees.

Thompson says that although the new savings plan will be offered, the bank continues to offer the traditional saving plans they have always done throughout the years.

The Bitcoin Savings Plan is just one of the many savings programs we provide our employees, Thompson said. All employees have the opportunity to participate in a 401K plan where the bank matches a portion of their contribution as well as an Employee Stock Ownership Plan.

Vantage Bank Chief Business Architect - Shared Services Shawn Main, EVP says the bank does not currently allow customers to directly buy, sell or trade cryptocurrency. However, the company executive does say they will offer educational tools for their employees to understand the new technology better.

Vantage Bank Texas is focused on educating our employees, researching the technology and learning how the blockchain will best support our customers and their financial needs, Shawn said. We are also actively engaged with the Texas Blockchain Council to better understand the technology and its future potential within our monetary system. Our partnership with NYDIG is just one example of how we are working to educate our employees on this transformative technology.

The bank does say this technology is mostly popular among younger people as well.

Data by the bank shows that the NYDIGs 2022 survey showed more than one-third of workers between the ages of 18-29 are interested in earning some of their salary in Bitcoin. This was echoed in Vantage Banks experience, as more employees were requesting the Bitcoin Savings Plan option, the bank stated in a press release.

Shawn says when it comes to the employees choosing whether to invest in digital currency or simply investing regularly for their savings plans they should consult with their personal financial planners to determine which option is best for them."

Also, just like any other savings plan, Thompson says employees can withdraw funds at any time just as they would with any savings account already in existence.

Vantage Bank Texas has two locations in Laredo. One is located at 7219 McPherson Rd. and the other is located at 4819 San Dario Ave.
If you do not have a current print subscription to the Lodi News-Sentinel, but want to view unlimited articles for the month, please choose this option.
Longford is enjoying the economic dividend of visits to the Royal Canal Greenway.

New research from Waterways Ireland has found that more than 640,000 trips have been taken on the Royal Canal Greenway since it opened in March 2021.

The 130km amenity crosses Kildare, Meath, Westmeath and Longford and is a joint initiative between Waterways Ireland and the local authorities in those areas.

It is the longest greenway in Ireland, running from Maynooth, Co Kildare to Clondra, Co Longford. It cost 12m to deliver.

Chief Executive of Longford County Council, Paddy Mahon said: Since its opening, the Royal Canal Greenway has proved itself to be a great addition to our countys tourism offering. It has helped to bring new people to our towns and villages, with new businesses opening up along its route.

"It has also been great for local people. It helped people find enjoyment in their locality in times of lockdown. Now, with restrictions eased, we all continue to enjoy such a great amenity on our doorstep.

A former towpath for barges, the Royal Canal Greenway features 90 bridges, 33 locks, 17 harbours and four aqueducts.

Greenway users can choose to complete the entire 130km flat, off-road trail in one visit or to explore the shorter designated routes between the 14 connecting access points and towns. These range from 6km to 15km.

Waterways Ireland appointed Tracsis in 2021 to undertake a validation exercise on the data from physical counters in place along the Greenway and to undertake a consumer survey.

The research found that the amenity has returned a dividend of 17.2million to the business community in its first year of operation, returning the investment in the project in eight months. The economic dividend was based on a weighted average visitor spend of 27.

The research also found that across the four counties involved, 17 new businesses have opened and 13 businesses have confirmed that they have pivoted or expanded their business to provide for Greenway customers.

Chief executive of Waterways Ireland, John McDonagh said: We are delighted that the Royal Canal Greenway has been an outstanding success in its first year.

We acknowledge the commitment of our partners in Longford, Kildare, Meath and Westmeath county councils in delivering this greenway and that of local communities and businesses, which have helped to make it a success by creating new tourist and recreational opportunities.

We look forward to welcoming more domestic and international visitors in the coming years.
The Minister for Higher and Further Education has officially opened Ireland's newest university today in what he is calling "a landmark day" for the North-West.

Speaking at the launch event, Minister Simon Harris called the creation of the new Atlantic Technological University (ATU) "a massive achievement" and said it was "on the back of ten years of hard work".

ATU comprises institutes of technology including Galway-Mayo (GMIT), Sligo (IT Sligo) and Letterkenny (LYIT) campuses and will serve over 20,000 students across eight campuses.

The minister said, "I cannot tell you how happy I am to be with you today and with you in person. You are now the youngest technological university in our country."

He praised the name of the new institution and compared the educational journey at ATU to the journey of emigrants.

Minister @SimonHarrisTD officially launches the Atlantic Technological University! 'We have created a powerhouse for the West and North-West; a powerhouse of education".

Watch live here: https://t.co/KyUkYvndZs#AtlanticTU #ATU #HereisATU pic.twitter.com/92RZx9gadP  Atlantic Technological University (@atu_ie) April 4, 2022

He said, "When you think of the Atlantic Ocean, you think of all the people who left Ireland for prosperity, for wellbeing, for employment. Atlantic Technological University will provide the prosperity, the wellbeing, the employment on our shores on our island."

Minister Harris acknowledged there may be mixed moments due to the dissolution of LYIT, GMIT and IT Sligo, and thanked educators at the former institutions for their service and belief.

He said, "You believed the North and the North-West deserved access to higher education like everybody else. Today is a testament to your dedication, to your leadership, and to the passion you have."
Local News

By Chris Boyle Published: April 04 2022

Access to care for Long Island veterans cannot be eroded in any way, shape or form, Zeldin said.

Congressman Lee Zeldin (R, NY-1), a United States Army veteran, issued the following statement regarding a new U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs report, which recommends cuts and relocation of certain services offered at the Northport VA Medical Center (VAMC):

Veterans across Long Island rely on the Northport VA and its array of healthcare services to survive and thrive," Zeldin said. "Cutting off essential services, without convenient and reliable replacements, would be devastating to the people who have been willing to sacrifice everything on behalf of our nation. I will do everything in my power to prevent this from happening, and I will work in conjunction with our large veterans community on Long Island to determine the best path forward. Access to care for Long Island veterans cannot be eroded in any way, shape or form.

Some of the reports main recommendations pertaining to Northport VA can be found below:
Community, Charity & Cause

By Ls Cohen Published: April 04 2022

Just a few of the local efforts to help the Ukrainian people.

Long Islanders have stepped up to help out the people of Ukraine. Major corporations and regional law enforcement have been shipping items as diverse as bullet-proof vests and medical supplies to the war-torn nation. Local organizations have also been doing their part, raising funds and supplies for the civilians caught up in the conflict. Below we list just a few of the places you can donate to help right now.

Babylon Town Launches Effort to Aid Ukrainian Refugees

The Town of Babylon has launched a drive to collect monetary donations that will go toward supporting Ukrainian refugees who are fleeing the Russian invasion. The drive is being coordinated through the Industrial Development Agency with the goal of raising $25,000.

The Town of Babylon is home to one of the largest Ukrainian populations on Long Island, and we will do everything we can to stand with the people of Ukraine, and with our friends and neighbors here at home who still have family and friends over there, said Town Supervisor Rich Schaffer.

All proceeds collected through the drive will be donated to the Holy Family Ukrainian Catholic Church in Lindenhurst, which will work to disseminate through charitable organizations in countries where refugees are resettling.

DONATE HERE!

Town of Islip Joins Saints Peter & Paul Ukrainian Orthodox Church in West Islip to Help Ukraine

The Town of Islip has partnered with Saints Peter & Paul Ukrainian Orthodox Church in West Islip to collect donations that will directly assist the Ukrainian people. All who are interested in donating are encouraged to provide First Aid Kits, Bleed Stop, and Tourniquets: items that will directly meet the supply needs of the Ukrainian people caught in the ongoing crisis. There are 2 drop off locations, one located at Islip Town Hall, 655 Main St., the other in the Higbie Lane Community Center at 90 Higbie Lane in West Islip. Monetary donations will also be accepted and can be made payable directly to Saints Peter & Paul Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE DETAILS

Long Island Man Starts DOnation Drive For Ukrainians

On Facebook, Tom Birkhoff - a Long islander who was born in Ukraine - has been running a huge effort to gather donations and supplies for the Ukrainian people. He constantly updates on progress, thanking those who are helping him make a difference.

DONATE HERE!
(Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers on AIM in London on Monday.

----------

AIM - WINNERS

----------

i3 Energy PLC, up 13% at 23.35 pence, 12-month range 7.39p-24.73p. The oil and gas producer posts "record production" in its first quarter. In the first quarter, the weekly average production of barrels of oil equivalent per day more than doubles to about 20,312 from 8,856 a year ago, the Hampshire, England-based firm says. The production increase resulted "from the company's low decline profile and strong drilling performance," Ryan Heath, president of i3 Energy Canada Ltd, explains.

----------

Directa Plus PLC, up 7.4% at 130.00p, 12-month range 97.55p-178.00p. The graphene nanoplatelets supplier says it has received authorisation from the US Environmental Protection Agency for its Grafysorber technology. The authorisation allows the potential to export the patented technology, it says.

----------

CareTech Holdings PLC, up 4.9% at 746.00p, 12-month range 522.00p-748.57p. DBAY Advisors Ltd submits an indicative proposal for a possible all cash offer for the social care services provider of 750.00p per share. DBAY says the offer represents a 28% premium to Caretech's closing share price on March 4. DBAY notes the potential offer also includes a partial non-voting share alternative to enable shareholders to roll-over some of their investment and retain an interest in CareTech's future should they decide to do so. CareTech says discussions with DBAY are at an early stage.

----------

AIM - LOSERS

----------

XLMedia PLC, down 9.7% at 36.33p, 12-month range 24.30p-69.50p. The digital performance publisher says Chief Executive Officer Stuart Simms is resigning from his role in the following months. "He will remain with the business for the next few months to support the executive team and board, and to facilitate an orderly handover," the company explains. Stuart Simms has been CEO of the company since October 2019. The board is starting a formal executive search process to find a new CEO, it adds.

----------

By Arvind Bhunjun; arvindbhunjun@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2022 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
(Alliance News) - i3 Energy PLC on Monday posted "record production" in its first quarter, sending shares higher.

In the first quarter, the weekly average production of barrels of oil equivalent per day more than doubled to about 20,312 from 8,856 a year ago, the Hampshire, England-based firm reported.

The production increase resulted "from the company's low decline profile and strong drilling performance," Ryan Heath, president of i3 Energy Canada Ltd, explained.

i3 added that current production continues to exceed expectations.

The oil and gas producer in the UK and Canada amended its full-year net operating income forecast to USD192 million, 28% over its December forecast, it said.

"We have a portfolio ideally suited to deliver a consistent and progressive dividend and value growth," commented Chief Executive Officer Majid Shafiq.

i3 Energy shares surged 11% to 22.95 pence each in London on Monday morning.

By Tom Budszus; tombudszus@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2022 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
(Alliance News) - Oilex Ltd shares fell on Monday after the firm said that a licensing issue is preventing the restart of production at its Cambay field in India.

Shares were down 14% at 0.22 pence each on Monday morning in London.

The Perth-based developer of natural gas assets said that the Gujarat Pollution Control Board is questing whether a new Environmental Clearance Certificate issued by India's Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change authorises the use of the early gas production facility on the Cambay C-73 wellsite.

The GPCB is raising the issue "since the EGPF is not specifically referenced". Oilex, however, insists that the facility is mentioned and authorised under clause 17 of the certificate.

The company said that it has enlisted the support of the Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change and the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons to resolve the issue.

"We look forward to an early resolution of this issue which is currently preventing the re-start of production on the Cambay field," Chief Executive Officer Roland Wessel said.

By Abby Amoakuh; abbyamoakuh@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2022 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
(Alliance News) - The following is a round-up of updates by London-listed companies, issued on Monday and not separately reported by Alliance News:

----------

Greencoat Renewables PLC - Dublin-based investor in euro-denominated renewable energy infrastructure assets - Agrees to buy 50% of the Borkum Riffgrund 1 offshore wind farm in Germany from Kirkbi AS - who held a 31.5% stake - and William Demant Invest AS - who held a 18.5% stake - for a total cash consideration of about EUR350 million. The wind farm was developed and constructed by Orsted, which remains a 50% shareholder. Borkumm Riffgrund 1 is located in Germany's exclusive economic zone in the North Sea and consists of 78 SGRE 4.0 megawatt turbines that have been operational since 2015. The deal is expected to close in the second quarter.

----------

Standard Life Private Equity Trust PLC - investor in private equity funds focused on Europe - Changes names to abrdn Private Equity Opportunities Trust PLC.

----------

JPEL Private Equity Ltd - investment company - Plans to return total of USD18 million to USD equity shareholders, from existing cash on balance sheet. The redemption price for the 9.7 million USD equity shares will be USD1.85. Still has 40.0 million USD equity shares still in issue.

----------

Asimilar Group PLC - London-based investment firm - Starts trading on AQSE Growth Market. Retains AIM listing. "The board believes in the opportunities offered by the AQSE Growth Market to improve liquidity in nascent companies and in the investment companies that invest in them," company says. Adds: "It also provides greater optionality to the board going forward, should the company decide to cancel the admission of its shares to trading on AIM, in terms of reducing operating costs and taking advantage of a market regime which may be more fitting to an investment company - reducing the risk that investment opportunities are missed and shareholders' interests thereby affected."

----------

H&T Group PLC - Surrey, England-based pawnbroker - Following an internal review at the request of UK Financial Conduct Authority, says about 9,800 loans issued by company's unsecured high-cost short term loans business to about 8,000 customers should not have been granted between April 2014 and October 2019. Notes this represents 12% of HCST loans and 13% of HCST customers during the period. Redress will be paid in respect of these loans - which will be GBP2.1 million, covering GBP1.6 million paid directly to customers and GBP500,000 to cover the balance of current outstanding loans. On average, eligible customers will receive redress amounting to GBP264. Notes a provision of GBP2.1m was raised in the company's financial statements for 2021, to cover the cost of this redress.

----------

Beeks Financial Cloud Group PLC - Glasgow-based provider of connectivity for financial markets - Intends to raise about GBP15 million through placing to new and existing institutional investors. The price of the placing shares and the number of new shares to be issued will be determined at the close of the bookbuild. Canaccord Genuity Ltd is acting as nominated adviser and sole bookrunner for the placing. Notes, in event of oversubscription, Chief Executive Gordon McArthur intends to sell up to GBP2.8 million of existing stake. He owns about 47% of current issues share capital of company.

----------

Sanderson Design Group PLC - Buckinghamshire, England-based interior furnishings company - Bedlinen and homewares company Bedec, a core licencee, renews licensing agreement with company for a further three years, as expected. Notes about GBP1.4 million of accelerated income will be recognised in the current financial year in connection with the renewal. Will also receive sales-based royalty payments. Bedeck currently has exclusive rights to sell a wide range of bedlinen and towelling for the Morris & Co, Sanderson, Harlequin and Scion brands throughout the UK, Europe and Middle East.

----------

Gulf Keystone Petroleum Ltd - Bermuda-based oil and gas exploration company operating in Iraq - Receives gross payment of USD40.9 million from Kurdistan Regional Government for Shaikan crude oil sales during December 2021 and gross USD6.6 million in relation to the arrears from the outstanding January 2020 to February 2020 invoices.

----------

Arrow Exploration Corp - Calgary, Canada-based oil and gas company - Spuds Rio Cravo Este-2 well on the Tapir block in the Llanos Basin of Colombia. Well is targeting a large, three-way fault-bounded structure with multiple high-quality reservoir objectives. The well is expected to be drilled to a total depth of 8,146 feet. Drilling and casing of the RCE-2 well is expected to take about three weeks, followed by completion, and then testing. Company has a 50% stake in the Tapir block. On track to hit 3,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day within 18 months of its AIM listing, which was October 2021.

----------

Mineral & Financial Investments Ltd - Cayman Islands-based investment company - Completes 3,520 metres of 18,000 metres infill and exploration drilling programme as part of the ongoing programme to deliver a feasibility study at the Venda Nova deposit at its Lagoa Salgada project in Portugal. The study is expected to be completed by the end of 2022. Chief Executive Jacques Vaillancourt says: "We remain confident these programs will deliver a robust development plan for an initial mine at the Venda Nova property. Over time, we expect ongoing exploration efforts to continue to expand the overall resources at Lagoa Salgada to expand the operations well beyond this initial development plan."

----------

By Paul McGowan; paulmcgowan@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2022 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
(Alliance News) - The following is a round-up of updates by London-listed companies, issued on Monday and not separately reported by Alliance News:

----------

Conroy Gold & Natural Resources PLC - Dublin-based gold exploration and development company focused on Ireland and Finland - Wins three new prospecting licences in Ireland covering an area of 100 square kilometres. An application for these licences to be transferred to Conroy Gold Longford-Down Ltd, one of the company's joint ventures with Demir Export, is intended, the company adds.

----------

Pensana PLC - London-based rare earth metal miner - Notes new results from its exploration programme on the Coola licence at the Longonjo rare earth project in Angola. Twenty-two samples from a 4.2 kilometre diameter ring structure at Sulima West, located 50 kilometres from the Coola carbonatite, were all mineralised and returned values of between 0.6% and 10.6% total rare earth oxide, Pensana explains. Exploration Manager Grant Hayward says: "We are extremely encouraged by the initial results from both Coola and Sulima West and are eager for the field season to commence to follow up on these exciting targets. Whilst it is early stage, these are very large structures reporting grades which are in some cases higher than those for Longonjo."

----------

Bushveld Minerals Ltd - Guernsey-based vanadium producer with assets in South Africa - Updates its mineral resources and ore reserves for the Vametco vanadium mine near Brits in South Africa. The ore reserve as at December 31 is 262,000 tonnes vanadium in magnetite at a grade of 2.02%, down from 267,200 tonnes as at the same time the previous year. The combined inferred and indicated mineral resource is reported at 182.7 million tonnes at an average grade of 1.98% vanadium in magnetite at December 31, with an average magnetite content of 35.0% for 703.9 thousand tonnes of contained vanadium compared to 709.8 thousand tonnes at the same time the previous year.

----------

GreenRoc Mining PLC - London-based company focused on the development of mineral projects in Greenland - Appoints BioApp Greenland and Niras AS to carry out an Environmental Impact Assessment and a Social Impact Assessment, respectively, at its Thule Black Sands Ilmenite project in north-west Greenland.

----------

Nexus Infrastructure PLC - Essex, England-based infrastructure services provider - Completes sale and leaseback of its head office building, Nexus Park. The proceeds of GBP13.5 million will be used to clear its existing bank debt totalling GBP10.8 million, with the remaining GBP2.7 million being used to enhance its cash reserves, the company explains. Nexus also enters into a 20-year lease for Nexus park.

----------

Induction Healthcare Group PLC - London-based virtual care platform - Says four national health service trusts in London have partnered partner with Induction to support long-term outpatient care transformation through its Induction Zesty platform. The combined contracts have terms ranging between 2 and 9 years and will result in total revenue GBP3.6 million. Induction describes Zesty as a "digital front door for hospitals" that allows patients to "take control" of their appointments, correspondence and consultations.

----------

Empyrean Energy PLC - Subiaco, Australia-based oil and gas development company with interests in China, Indonesia and the US - Provides an update on drill preparations of the 100% owned Jade prospect, offshore China. Says two onshore bases have been setup for helicopter to rig transfers. Says various drilling services, including drilling fluid, cement, log tools, shipping vessels, are now ready. Company expects rig mobilisation and operations to anchor the rig to commence on April 6.

----------

Oxford Nanopore Technologies PLC - Oxford-based company developing and selling nanopore sequencing products - Expands use of nanopore sequencing in cancer. Says its Oxford nanopore technology will be used by Genomics England to investigate and validate the benefits of sequencing for improving patient care and advancing research to develop new treatments. Following this, the next phase will focus in more depth and at larger scale on haemato-oncology, sarcoma and brain tumours.

----------

Infrastructure India PLC - Isle of Man-based closed-ended investment company focused on assets in India - Extends the long stop date in relation to the sale of the assets of its wholly-owned subsidiary, Indian Energy Mauritius Ltd. The assets are two special purpose vehicles, Teni and Gadag. The long stop dates for the sales of Theni and Gadag were March 15 but they have now been extended to April 4 and May 15, respectively.

----------

Schroder UK Public Private Trust PLC - London-based investment company focused on UK companies - Completes the sale of its holding in investment management firm Seedrs Ltd for GBP12 million.

----------

Clean Power Hydrogen PLC - Doncaster, England-based developer and manufacturer of green hydrogen technologies - Wins order from AFCryo, a New Zealand-based manufacturer of composite cryostats and cryogenic cooling systems, for the sale of a 1MW MFE220 electrolyser unit. The unit is expected to be delivered in early 2023. This is the second 1MW electrolyser unit that AFCryo has purchased within 18 months, Clean Power Hydrogen explains. Both of these electrolysers will be used as part of the decarbonisation of New Zealand's heavy transport fleet, the company adds.

----------

Saietta Group PLC - Bicester, England-based engineering company specialising in electric vehicles - Establishes an electric vehicle motor production facility in Sunderland, England through its agreements with ZF Automotive UK Ltd. Saietta intends to use the factory to manufacture its heavy commercial vehicle drivetrains. Company says the facility will have the capacity to produce 100,000 units a year. Additionally, Saietta buys four motor production lines and an electronic circuit board production line for a total of GBP1.1 million.

----------

National Milk Records PLC - Chippenham, England-based agricultural technology information services provider - Wins new contract with Genus PLC, an animal breeding and biotechnology company based in Hampshire, England. National Milk will act as the partner for Genus's multi-panel genomic testing and evaluations for its bovine female genomic testing requirements for the UK market.

----------

Future Metals NL - Perth-based platinum exploration company - Provides further assay results from resource definition drilling at its Panton PGM project in Western Australia. The three definition holes all confirm that mineralisation extends to widths over 50 metres along the 3.5 kilometre strike. Drill hole PS402 returned an unconstrained bulk intersection of 150.8 metres at 1.18 grams per tonne of palladium equivalent from 8 metres down hole. Says an updated mineral resource estimate remains on track for the second quarter of 2022.

----------

CleanTech Lithium PLC - Jersey-based lithium exploration and development company focused on Chile - Says resource drilling at its two project, Laguna Verde and Francisco Basin, are progressing well. Drilling confirms presence of sub-surface brine aquifers at both projects. Resource estimates for both are expected in the second quarter of 2022, the company adds.

----------

Ebiquity PLC - London-based media and marketing consultancy - Completes acquisition of media audit specialist Media Management LLC. On March 30, Ebiquity proposed the acquisition for a price of GBP6.1 million with a deferred consideration payable in 2025.

----------

Velocys PLC - Oxford-based sustainable fuel technology company - Says it is moving into 2022 with a "clear focus" on executing its commercial strategy. Expects to complete interim engineering work at its biorefinery project in Mississippi during the first quarter of the year. Full completion is expected in summer. Company anticipating US and UK government policy support for long-term revenue stability for biorefineries. Announces potential sale of its undeveloped Ashtabula site in Ohio, US.

----------

Power Metal Resources PLC - London-based metals exploration company focused in North America, Africa and Australia - Announces results from its first drilling programme at the Tati project in Botswana. Says the drill programme was completed safely and on-budget. Intersects near surface gold mineralisation, including shallow depth reserve circulation drilling results of up to 5.17 grams per tonne of gold over 3 metres from 9 metres downhole.

----------

Eckoh PLC - Hertfordshire, England-based secure payment provider - Expects full year results to be in line with expectations of GBP32.1 million in revenue and GBP4.9 million in adjusted operating profit. Adds that the integration of Syntec, the payment solutions provider acquired in December, is progressing well. Syntec's contribution to revenue and profit in the three months since acquisition are expected to be consistent with previous projections.

----------

Distribution Finance Capital Holdings PLC- Manchester-based bank providing personal savings products and working capital to dealers and manufacturers - Notes "significant" momentum in new lending in the first quarter of 2022. Says the pace and strength of dealer sales seen the previous year has continued into 2022, with average stock turn running at 105 days against a historical average of 150 days. Adds loan book has grown 20% since year-end. Delivery dates for some assets, particularly across the transportation sector, have continued to drift, the company explains, and outbreaks of Covid-19 in China and the conflict in Ukraine are expected to delay product deliveries to dealers until later in the year. As a result, company expects loan book growth to slow. For 2022, Distribution expects between a loss of GBP2 million and breakeven.

----------

Likewise Group PLC - Solihull, England-based floor coverings distributor - Says trading in the first three months of 2022 is ahead of internal budgets. Consequently, Likewise says it is "confident" in meeting market expectations for 2022. Company continuing to develop its logistics infrastructure.

----------

Yamana Gold Inc - Toronto-based mine operator focused on Canada, Chile, Brazil and Argentina - Notes positive initial drill results at its El Penon mine in Chile. Says the results have opened up a "significant" new near-mine area for exploration with the potential for adding primary and secondary veins. At the Odyssey in Canada, infill drill holes at East Gouldie further demonstrate the continuity and "robustness" of the known mineralization, Yamana adds. At Wasamac, also in Canada, infill drill results demonstrate a "wide, robust" mineralized zone, with exploration continuing to support the company's plan for an annual production of 200,000 ounces and a mine life of at least fifteen years.

----------

HydrogenOne Capital Growth PLC - London-based hydrogen investment fund managed by HydrogenOne Capital LLP - Announces a placing of an unspecified amount of shares at a price of 100 pence per share. Company says this represents a premium to its net asset value per share at March 31. The placing is being conducted by an accelerated bookbuilding process.

----------

Burford Capital Ltd - London-based asset management firm - Says its management team, including its chief executive officer, chief investment officer and chief financial officer, have invested USD3 million in Burdford's stock since March 31. All five executives used their cash compensation to make the investments, which occurred through the Burford employee deferred compensation plan. With this investment, CEO Bogart and CIO Molot control almost 9% of Burford shares.

Separately, Burford announces a private offering of USD350 million senior notes due 2030 by its wholly-owned subsidiary Burdford Capital Global Finance LLC.

----------

Zoo Digital Group PLC - Sheffield, England-based cloud software-based subtitling, dubbing and meida localisation services provider - Launches Zoo Denmark as the latest step in the company's global growth initiative. Company says the new Copenhagen-based facility will become a hub for localisation services and dubbing.

----------

By Heather Rydings; heatherrydings@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2022 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
The Manistee Downtown Discharge Authority joined the Manistee City Council in formally opposing the relocation of Packaging Corporation of America discharge Wednesday. The 7 million gallons of wastewater discharged daily contains PCA wastewater, Tondu Corporation effluent, leachate from Harlands landfill, cooling water storm runoff. Complaints about discoloration of the water near Magoon Creek Natural prompted the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality to revise the draft permit.

60 YEARS AGO

Udell forest dedication

Manistee area residents are invited to attend the dedication of the Udell Experimental Forest located near Wellston on May 2 at 3 p.m. The dedication ceremony will be held at the Manistee Ski Area ski lodge on the Udell Experimental Forest.

Now playing

Now playing at the Vogue Theatre is Sergeants 3 starring Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop. Showtimes are at 8:05 p.m. this week.

80 YEARS AGO

Warmer weather expected

This mornings sunshine and moderate temperatures were but a prelude of the fair weather which Easter churchgoers may expect to enjoy tomorrow. The official weather bureau forecast from Detroit promised warmer weather today, tonight and tomorrow morning with moderate winds.

Forest fire tower closed

As a wartime measure, all lookout towers on the Manistee National Forest will be closed to the public until further notice, it was announced today. The action is in cooperation with the state conservation department.
In just two months Ousmane Dembele has changed the opinion of himself at Barcelona, with the Frenchman's performances turning him from an onlooking figure to a star performer, and club president Joan Laporta has listened to the wishes of fans by setting up a meeting with the player's agent in Morocco.

Barcelona had been adamant that Dembele had to make the first move after he rejected all contract extension offers in January, but the form the Frenchman has shown has made him an altogether more valued asset.

Los Cules are believed to have thought over the situation and have decided to reach out to Dembele's agent one more time, with CEO Mateu Alemany set to represent the Catalan club in the Morocco talks.

The Camp Nou fans gave the 24-year-old a standing ovation when he was substituted off against Sevilla, which is a rare occurrence in the five years he has been at Barcelona.

The supporters want Dembele to stay at the club and Laporta has listened to them, whilst Xavi Hernandez has also been incredibly impressed by the work ethic he has shown in recent months.

"He looks very happy and very involved," Xavi declared in his post-match press conference.

"For the way I want to play, he is good."

Dembele's future to be decided in Morocco

"If he adapts to our terms, he could stay with us," explained Alemany as he arrived in Morocco.

Barcelona don't plan to move from their strict economic parameters for any player, yet the board have made the decision to at least try to persuade Dembele to stay amidst pressure from fans.

What is most important is whether or not the player truly wants to stay at Barcelona, and if he does then he must reduce his economic demands.

Alemany knows that Dembele's future will be decided in the Morocco summit, and he expects a gesture of concession from the player's agent.
Marquinhos hugs Sergio Ramos as the Spaniard comes on during PSG's win against Lorient.

Marquinhos hugs Sergio Ramos as the Spaniard comes on during PSG's win against Lorient.

The Paris Saint-Germain supporters are still frustrated about Mauricio Pochettino's side crashing out of the Coupe de France and the Champions League, with the big-name players coming in for a lot of criticism, and Sergio Ramos felt their wrath as he came on as a substitute against Lorient on Sunday night.

After two months out with an injury, Ramos replaced Marquinhos in the 72nd minute but was met by a mixture of boos and whistles by the crowd at the Parc des Princes.

The Spanish centre-back was not only whistled and booed when he came on, though, as he was also whistled every time he touched the ball. A clear message from the PSG fans towards Ramos.

This was just Ramos' sixth appearance for PSG since joining as a free agent from Real Madrid last summer, with injuries having ruined his debut season in the French capital.

In fact, his last match for PSG came back on January 23, with the supporters pointing the finger at the club's management for signing the 36-year-old.
At today's 64th Grammy Awards, Kanye West won the award for Best Melodic Rap Performance for his song "Hurricane". He was nominated for 4 other categories, including two Best Rap Album nominations for Donda, and the other for Lil' Nas X's Montero; Album of the Year for Donda, Best Rap Song for "Jail".

Kanye West officially ties JAY-Z for the same number of GRAMMYs received among hip-hop artists

The two of them were partners in the 'Watch the Throne' project, they both have 22 awards individually. In 2019 Kanye West released "Jesus Is King", with this album Ye won Best Contemporary Christian Music Album. Since then, there have been seventeen times that the musician has been nominated, counted with mentions for Album of the Year or Producer of the Year.

The first time West was nominated for a Grammy was in 2005, he won Best Rap Album for his debut album "College Dropout"

He also won Best Rap Song for the great song "Jesus Walks", and also Best R&B Song "You don't know my name".

The following year he also won Best Rap Album for "Late registration", Best Rap Song for "Diamonds of Sierra Leone", and Best Rap Solo Performance for "Gold Digger".

West released Donda a few months ago, which was in honor and tribute to his late mother, the album was scheduled to be released last year but due to the pandemic, it stalled. Kanye West rented the entire Mercedes Benz Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia to work on this album in private and made constant recordings of his production process where he was in a "jail cell" type of space to later make several closed-door performances with a limited amount of audience.

The album became instantly viral because of its particularity in performance antics, attire, and song list
A new bill in Georgia means that taxpayers in that state will soon receive a bonus refund. This comes after Governor Brian Kemp signed House Bill 1302, providing a very welcome one-time tax credit for those who filed income tax returns for both the 2020 and 2021 tax years.

"When government takes in more than it needs, I believe those dollars should be returned to the taxpayer, because that is your money and not the government's," Kemp explained.

How much is the Georgia Tax Rebate Check?

The state government in Georgia has outlined that the tax credits will be worth 250 dollars for those who are single or who are married but filing separately. Then, for those who are head of household it will be 375 dollars. For those who are married and filing jointly, the check will be for 500 dollars.

When are the Georgia Tax Rebate Checks being sent out?

This money will be paid back to the eligible taxpayers once they complete their form for the 2021 tax year. The deadline for doing that is April 18, so in the next few weeks all residents in Georgia should have sent off their tax form and should then collect their bonus refund shortly afterwards.

If you're set up for direct deposit then you'll get a bank transfer more quickly, while everyone else will be sent a paper check and this might take a little longer.

Who is eligible for the Georgia Tax Rebate Checks?

As for who is eligible, the Georgia state government makes it quite clear on their website.

"Any Georgian who was a full-year resident in 2020 and 2021 and who also filed a Georgia individual income tax return for 2020 and 2021 is eligible for the refund," they say. "Part-year filers who file individual tax returns for both years (2020 and 2021) will be eligible for a proportional refund equal to the maximum amounts based on filing status multiplied by the share of their income taxable in Georgia."
Even though the federal government in the USA is no longer giving out stimulus checks to all low-income and medium-income households, there are still various benefits programs being introduced across the country to help put more cash in your pocket.

In our live blog this Monday April 4th, we'll outline details on several of these schemes. So, stay tuned for the most up-to-date information on how to save money!

Elon Musk is now the highest stockholder of Twitter

After the purchase of 92.% of Twitter?s stock, the richest man in the world made the company?s worth increase.

On Friday his stake was worth $2.9 billion, by Monday morning it was worth $3.5 billion. It is probable that Elon?s investment motivated others to do the same.

You could claim Child and Dependent Care Credit

If the cost of childcare or dependent care is taking a significant chunk out of your employment income, you should check to see if you might be eligible for child and dependent care credit.

This is a tax credit for those who, in order to look for work, pay someone to provide care for a child under the age of 13 or a dependent. If you're not already claiming this, it's something to look into.

You can read more here about the Child and Dependent Care Credit and how it works.

How to claim $250 Tax Rebate Checks in Georgia

Governor Brian Kemp of Georgia has signed a new bill into law that will give all taxpayers in the state a Tax Refund Check, so long as they paid taxes in the past two years.

For single filers, the check is worth $250, while for those who are head of household it will be $375 dollars and for those who are married and filing jointly the check will be for $500.

You can read more here about the Tax Rebate Checks in Georgia.

How to claim Workers' Compensation benefits

Many people across the USA have suffered an accident at work, one which entitles them to Workers' Compensation benefits.

This is a scheme that most US companies should have in place and it can help cover wages and medical costs in the event of a workplace accident.

You can read more here about how to claim Workers' Compensation benefits.

The $500 Stimulus Checks for Essential Workers

Many state governments are running programs through which they continue to give out stimulus checks, but only to those who are essential workers.

It is a type of thank you program and there is one currently running in Massachusetts, where the amount can reach $500.

You can read more here about the $500 Stimulus Checks for Essential Workers and how to claim one.

Claiming both SSDI and SSI

Two of the main benefits programs in the USA are called Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI). They are different programs, but it is possible to claim money through both.

Not all Americans are aware of this fact, so this tip is one way that people can potentially claim a little more money than they were previously.

You can read more here about claiming both Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI).
Continuing our season of drinks created by spirits maestro Alexandre Gabriel, we have a very special spiced rum that combines the finest Jamaica rum with coconuts, ginger and vanilla. Its Canerock Spiced Rum and its a Master of Malt exclusive.

Its fair to say that many rum aficionados rather turn their noses up at spiced rum. In the past, the category was awash with cheap unaged rums, artificially flavoured, packed full of sugar and coloured to make them look aged. Fine for drowning in Coca-Cola, but not drinks that get lovers of authentic Caribbean spirits excited.

The changing face of spiced rum

But the market is changing rapidly. There are all kinds of great flavoured products available which start with high quality rum and then add natural flavours like honey, spice or even smoke. There are also so-called botanical rums like Spirit Union Lemon & Leaf or Mad City which ape the clean flavours of London Dry Gin. The spiced rum category is now hugely diverse.

For his first foray into spiced rum, called Canerock, we knew that Alexandre Gabriel from Maison Ferrand, long time friend of this blog, would do things a bit differently. Hes the man behind Citadelle Gin, Ferrand Cognac (both covered recently in the New Arrival slot) and the wonders of the Plantation rum range.

Just listen to the production process of his pineapple rum, Plantation Pineapple Stiggins Fancy. It involves infusing the rinds of Queen Victoria pineapples in white rum for a week. They then distil it, and infuse the fruit of the pineapples in dark rum for three months. These are married together and left to age in casks for three months. The recipe is based on 19th century flavoured rums and was created in conjunction with drinks historian David Wondrich. A bit different to most pineapple-flavoured spirits.

Take some of Jamaicas finest rums

The production process for Canerock is no less elaborate. It took Gabriel and the team more than three years and 90 experiments to perfect the recipe. The base consists of pot and column still rums from two of Jamaicas greatest distilleries: Clarendon and Long Pond. Both produce classic high ester rums laden with flavours of pineapple and green banana. The blend also includes some long-aged flavouring rums. These are often so highly-flavoured that they are practically impossible to drink neat but in tiny amounts add complexity to blends.

Gabriel has access to these in-demand distilleries because he owns them. Well, sort of. Maison Ferrand owns Barbadoss West Indies Distillery, and it has a third share in National Rums of Jamaica which owns Long Pond and Clarendon.

And add natural ingredients

To this high quality Jamaican base, Gabriel and the team add Madagascan vanilla pods, Caribbean coconut, Jamaican ginger, and other spices. Only natural ingredients are used. No artificial flavours here. The flavoured rum is then aged in American oak barrels and then 10-16% of the blend is finished in PX sherry casks adding a layer of sweet dried fruit character. As with all of Ferrands products, Gabriel is totally open about sweetening. Canerock has a dosage, addition of sugar solution, of 25 grams per litre.

The result is a taste sensation  a highly-flavoured spiced rum thats good for all kinds of cocktails or just sipping neat with ice and a slice of lime. Maison Ferrand recommends drinking it slowly in a Highball made with fresh coconut water and ice. Its the next best thing to a trip to Jamaica.

Canerock Spiced Rum is available only from Master of Malt. Click here to buy.

Tasting note for Canerock Spiced Rum

Nose: Rich and complex with pastry notes of vanilla, coffee beans, dark chocolate and coconut.

Palate: Opening with sweet caramel, soft spices and raisins, then allspice and delicate oak tannins developing with each sip.

Finish: Hot and sweet at the same time with poppy seed pie, dark cherry, prune, coconut and fresh notes of mint, ginger and cloves.
Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - The Libyan parliament's reluctance to accept the mediation initiative of the UN Secretary General's Special Advisor on Libya, Stephanie Williams, has served as an impediment to progress towards a rapid resolution of the Libyan crisis which is in a total deadlock
AHMEDABAD, India

April 4, 2022

Middle East

Saudi Arabia

Jordan

Iraq

Lebanon

India

USD 2.2 bn

Middle East

Africa

Jordan

Saudi Arabia

Jeddah

Amman Jordan

www.axantia.com

/PRNewswire/ -- Intas Pharmaceuticals Ltd. (Intas) has signed an exclusive license and supply agreement with Axantia Holding (Axantia), a leading pharmaceutical company in theoperating through its pharmaceutical subsidiaries; Pharma International Pharmaceutical & Chemical Manufacturing Co. Ltd and Med City Pharmaceutical Industries for Ranibizumab (biosimilar of Lucentis). Under the terms of this agreement, Axantia will register, hold the marketing authorization and commercialize Ranibizumab in certain territories includingand GCC countries.Intas has developed a biosimilar of Lucentis, which is currently under Phase III global trial for submission in major countries including EMA & the US.Ranibizumab is a recombinant humanized IgG1 monoclonal antibody fragment that binds to and inhibits vascular endothelial growth factor A (VEGF-A). Ranibizumab is indicated for the treatment of patients with Neovascular (Wet) Age-Related Macular Degeneration (AMD), Macular Edema Following Retinal Vein Occlusion (RVO), Diabetic Macular Edema (DME), Diabetic Retinopathy (DR) and Myopic Choroidal Neovascularization (mCNV).Intas Pharmaceuticals Ltd. is a leading vertically integrated pharmaceutical company based in Ahmedabad,, having end-to-end capabilities of formulation development, manufacturing and marketing along with backward integration of APIs. The organisation has more than 18,000 employees and 14 manufacturing sites worldwide and sells products in more than 85 countries. The Intas Group's revenue amounted toin FY 2020-21 and the compounded annual growth rate of revenue has been 19% in the past 5 years.For more information, please visit www.intaspharma.comAxantia is a leading pharmaceutical company, established in 2014 as a joint venture between Abu Al Haj Family and Al Faisaliah Group. Axantia develops, manufactures, markets and distributes high-quality branded generic pharmaceuticals and under-licensed products in 20 countries across the, and the CIS. Axantia was established to deliver high-quality and affordable medicines, exploit scale, and foresee and respond to new opportunities and risks.Axantia's subsidiaries  Pharma International Company inand Med City Pharmaceutical Industries inare supported by functional organizations with different manufacturing lines to deliver a broad portfolio covering all major therapeutic areas. Axantia has a general formulations plant inand has renovated 3 plants in; GF plant, Cepha plant and Injectable Cepha plant. Axantia is wellplaced to be the partner of choice for companies looking to establish business in the MENA region.Please visitfor more information.
South stars Naga Chaitanya and Samantha Ruth Prabhu have been making headlines for one or another reason ever since they got separated in October last year. The ex-couple exchanged wedding vows in 2012 and ended their relationship after four years of togetherness.

While the estranged couple has moved on in their lives, the latest buzz suggests that both of them are not interested in working together and director Nandini Reddy is having a tough time due to their divorce.

According to reports, Samantha has worked with Nandini in Jabardasth (2013) and Oh! Baby (2019) and they were slated to team up for another project. Interestingly, Chay was in talks to play the lead role opposite Sam in it. However, their separation has now changed the director's initial plans.

As per a report by Tollywood.net, Naga Chaitanya is still a part of Nandini's upcoming directorial venture while she is hunting for Samanthas replacement. Yes, you read that right!

Reportedly, the filmmaker had narrated the script to Naga and Samantha when they were together, however, ever since their separation, they 'are not ready to act together in a movie'.

Talking about the same, sources informed the portal, "Nandini Reddy has decided to stick with Naga Chaitanya and she is now in search of an actress who can replace Samantha Ruth Prabhu in the film".

However, the trio is yet to react to the ongoing speculations and an official announcement is still awaited.

Interestingly, amidst the rumours of reconciliation, The Family Man 2 actress recently unfollowed her ex-husband on social media and made it clear that they aren't coming back together.

Last year, post their separation announcement, Samantha was trolled badly by her fans who were disappointed with her decision. Later, in an interview, she slammed the trolls and talked about the tough phase after parting ways with Chay. The actress stated that back then, she thought she was weaker and would "crumble and die".

Later, Chaitanya also talked about ending relationship with the Oo Antava star and stated that divorce was the best decision as both of them are happy now.
Hollywood star Will Smith shocked everyone when he slapped Chris Rock at the recently-held 94th Academy Awards. Chris joked about Smith's wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, appearing like 'GI Jane 2' before presenting an award at the Oscars 2022.

The Gemini Star became upset and stormed the stage, slapping Chris and warning him not to use his wife's name in public.

The incident is still the most talked-about and will remain in the public consciousness for a long time. Meanwhile, actor-comedian Vir Das has slammed a troll who said he 'deserves to be' slapped like Chris Rock. While Chris had not reacted against Will, Vir stated that if someone attempted to retaliate against him like that, he would return the slap.

The two had a Twitter exchange, on Sunday, after Vir posted a photo of his messy hair with the caption, "There's mutiny in the hair".

Theres mutiny the the hair. pic.twitter.com/2qt8pjRPlS  Vir Das (@thevirdas) April 3, 2022

Reacting to the photo, a Twitter user commented, "Someone needs to do a Will Smith on this one. He would totally deserve it too".

Someone needs to do a will Smith on this one. He would totally deserve it too  Baron Harkonnen (@baron_uncle) April 3, 2022

Vir responded to the troll's post by inviting him to his next show. He tweeted, "Youre welcome to buy a front row ticket and try at my next show. Just know I slap back. Also once youve spent that front row money, your wife will probably slap you for ruining her evening. Cheers".

Youre welcome to buy a front row ticket and try at my next show. Just know I slap back. Also once youve spent that front row money, your wife will probably slap you for ruining her evening. Cheers. https://t.co/bZWhXlbRYu  Vir Das (@thevirdas) April 3, 2022

What do you think about Vir Das' savage response? Tell us in the comments section below.

On the film front, he is a part of Judd Apatow's recent Netflix release The Bubble. Besides that, the comedian is also treating his fans across the country with laughs with his latest tour.
News and commentary on organized crime, street crime, white collar crime, cyber crime, sex crime, crime fiction, crime prevention, espionage and terrorism.
India-based martech company, Niswey is now an Elite HubSpot Solutions Partner, the highest tier in the HubSpot partner ecosystem. This makes Niswey the first agency headquartered in Asia to be awarded the Elite status. HubSpot is a leading customer relationship management (CRM) platform for scaling companies and provides software and support to help companies grow better.

The Elite tiering is an invite-only tier of HubSpot awarded to the best partners in the world, with the capabilities to not just bring new customers on board, but also enable them to grow better via a range of services, such as migrations, onboarding, integrations, web development and optimization, and inbound marketing.

Brian Garvey, VP of the Solutions Partner Program at HubSpot said, HubSpots partner community is essential to our goal of helping millions of organizations grow better. Niswey has played a significant role in helping our APAC customers get the most out of HubSpot, with their highly skilled and empathetic team. On behalf of everyone at HubSpot, Im thrilled to congratulate Niswey on becoming a HubSpot Elite partner.

As of now, there are a total of 42 Elite partners in the Solutions Directory out of thousands of partners in the HubSpot ecosystem. Niswey is now one of them.

Thrilled at the achievement, Suma E P, CEO, Niswey said, "This is a proud moment for all of us at Niswey. Back in 2016, it was very hard for us to imagine we would hit the highest partner tiering in HubSpot. But we have always believed in this platform that creates tremendous value for businesses. With a lot of support from the HubSpot team, and our team's continuous expertise building, we are now the first partner headquartered in Asia to reach the Elite status. And this strengthens our resolve to continue to help HubSpot customers grow better."

Niswey is also the proud recipient of the HubSpot Customer First Award for APAC, for 2021. The firm also represents Southeast Asia in the HubSpot Partner Advisory Council (PAC), and has hosted several events for the HubSpot Users Group (HUG) community since 2019.

About Niswey

Niswey is a martech company based in New Delhi. The company has SaaS products for the HubSpot ecosystem as well as delivers inbound marketing and account based marketing services. Niswey is a HubSpot Elite Solutions Partner, and is rated by Clutch as one of the Top 15 HubSpot partners in the world. The company provides HubSpot onboarding, implementation, development, management and integration services to its mid-size and enterprise clients. Among its clients are DHI, ResMed, Lixil India, MakeMyTrip, Increff and Gojek. For more information, please visit https://www.niswey.com/
MIDDLETOWN  The city of Middletown raised the transgender flag at City Hall March 31 in honor of the International Transgender Day of Visibility, to show its support for, and raise visibility of, its transgender and gender nonconforming residents.

TDOV was founded in 2009 by U.S.-based transgender activist Rachel Crandall, a licensed psychotherapist and executive director of Transgender Michigan, and TDOV is honored every year on March 31, according to a press release.

TDOV also provides a platform to raise awareness of the work that is still very much needed to achieve trans equality, and to combat discrimination and violence that is still all too common, especially for transgender women of color, Mayor Ben Florsheim said in a prepared statement.

Anything we can do as individuals, and collectively as a community, to be inclusive and promote equity for all people is important. History has shown us all too graphically how damaging silence against oppression can be, the mayor said.

At a time when transphobia is rampant across the country, it is important that we celebrate, uplift, and honor the transgender community here in Middletown, Assistant General Counsel Christopher Forte, creator of Middletown Pride, said in the statement.

As part of the observance, the city is highlighting three LGBTQIA+ Committee members: Laura Timmons, Cayes Jarda and Christine Rebstock.

Transgender Day of Visibility means that I am free to live my best life in a community that loves and accepts me as my authentic self. I have lived with chronic anxiety and depression for 40 years of my adult life, and being closeted was a big contributor to that. Once I came out as transgender female, I truly am living my best life, Timmons said.

As an educator, its important to me to be a visible beacon in my community for the students, families and staff. I knew at the early age of 5 who I was and no one believed me or understood. I had nobody to turn to, not even a book. I hid for a long time and that chipped away at that happy 5-year-old who was ready for the world. I came out on national television, and it was the best thing I ever did, Jarda said.

After hiding who I really was for over 50 years, today and everyday, I am out as my true self. I live, work, and do the everyday things of life without hiding who I am, even simple things like getting gas and grocery shopping. I want to show people that we conduct normal lives as our true selves not only here in Middletown or in Connecticut, but throughout the world, Rebstock said.

The transgender flag will be flying at City Hall through Friday. For information visit hrc.org.
For more than 30 years, Maureen Fontaine has run a licensed child care business out of her home in Fairfield. She came close to retiring in 2020 after losing both her parents to COVID that May, but she decided to stay open.

It was so stressful, Fontaine said through tears as she recalled all the unknowns and changing protocols during the early months of the pandemic.

Several of the parents in her program were essential workers  a nurse, a teacher  who were suddenly forced to balance their jobs with child care responsibilities. By staying open, Fontaine said, It enabled them to work, because Im sure some of them would have stopped working.

Connecticuts labor force  the portion of the adult population employed or looking for work  contracted sharply at the beginning of the pandemic and has failed to recover to its pre-COVID scale. While many of the 289,400 jobs lost in March and April of 2020 have been recovered, the states workforce in February 2022 remained 4.2 percent smaller than it was the same month in 2020.

Economists have attributed much of the persistent workforce deficit to a child care shortage.

The biggest economic problem the U.S. currently faces is low labor force participation, University of Michigan economist Betsey Stevenson told the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis last month. To solve that problem requires investing more in our youngest citizens and supporting their families with a more reliable, affordable and a higher quality child care sector.

The need for investment has only grown more acute over the last two years. About one in four working households in Connecticut have children under the age of 6, and the state was already short 50,000 infant and toddler care slots before the pandemic.

That deficiency has since gotten worse.

While Fontaine kept her doors open, many providers in Connecticut could not. Dozens of in-home providers and child care centers have shuttered, leading to a capacity decline of several thousand spaces since the beginning of 2020, according to data compiled by 211 Child Care and United Way CT. Among the larger centers that remained open, many currently have empty classrooms.

Nationwide, the number of child care programs has declined by about 10 percent, according to Child Care Aware of America. The sector has recovered only 87.6 percent of jobs compared to February 2020, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Analysts with Wells Fargo estimated nearly half a million families around the country are still struggling to arrange child care.

Providers were always teetering, said Eva Bermudez Zimmerman, a labor organizer with CSEA SEIU Local 2001, which represents more than 2,000 in-home caregivers.

Running a child care business is a delicate balance, she said. Mandated child-to-teacher ratios limit capacity, and the complex patchwork of state and federal subsidies only goes so far in covering tuition and keeping the lights on. If one or two parents pull out of a small child care program, the entire business is at risk of going under.

Youre always going to be on the brink of shutting down, which is what happened during COVID, Bermudez Zimmerman said. With so many parents out of work or sheltering at home for the first few months, many child care businesses were forced to downsize or close altogether, and When you shut it down, its really hard to start back up, she said.

The industry that supports all industries

Over the last two years, child care providers have scrambled to support working parents in more ways than just watching their kids. Bermudez Zimmerman said she knows of half a dozen caregivers who have loaned a parent their car when they needed to get to work.

Mini Santosh, director at Action Early Learning Center in Danbury, said she has helped many parents fill out paperwork for tuition assistance. Most of the 150 children at the center come from households considered working poor, and many parents went through periods of unemployment during the pandemic. Santosh said she encouraged them to continue bringing their children to the center, even if they couldnt pay, and to use the time the kids were being looked after to seek out work.

Our industry pretty much supports all industries, Santosh said.

Action ELC also served as a hub for distributing meals to families and supplying cleaning products, masks and gloves to child care providers in the surrounding area. Santosh said nearly every one of her employees came down with COVID at one point, but they adapted  quarantining for periods of time and sending the children home with iPads for virtual care programs.

We made sure there was learning happening, making sure those connections are made, checking on those families if they need any help other than child care  we did all of that, Santosh said. Because they were in crisis, and we were all in crisis.

Child care centers around the state say theyre losing teachers and staff turnover is high. They attribute those challenges to the tight labor market and the lack of funding to pay a competitive salary to early care teachers, who hold higher education degrees and often additional credentials. Average earnings for teachers in the sector are close to poverty level, according to Connecticut Voices for Children.

We've reached a point now where individual teachers are saying, Enough! said Joanne Kelleher, director of the Early Childhood Collaborative of Southington. They can go work for McDonald's or Target for $18 or $20 an hour and, as someone said to me, I don't have to touch bodily fluids and poopy diapers all day long.

That places further strain on the sector.

Melody Davis, a teacher at a center in Waterbury, cares for four babies in her classroom. In the past, she had assistant teachers to back her up, but lately she finds herself more often on her own. When you dont have that extra staff thats in there every day just to help you out, it can be so overwhelming, she said. You cant get that helping hand if you dont have the money to pay for it.

Davis has a 3-year-old daughter who attends the child care center where she works. She said she used to work a second job to make ends meet, but she didnt want to be away from her daughter, McKenzie, in the evenings and on weekends. Her income now should qualify her for state child care subsidies, but Davis said she has run into complications getting approved.

Despite those frustrations, Davis is passionate about her work.

Weve been doing Mother Goose and rhyming and things like that, she said. If we get a child who likes dinosaurs or something, we'll do a theme on dinosaurs. Or if they like cars, well do something on cars. Just to keep them engaged and learning.

Fixing the crisis

After two years enduring the pandemics ups and downs, taking on additional responsibilities and supporting working parents even if it meant losing money, child care businesses were taken aback when Gov. Ned Lamonts latest budget didnt include an infusion of funding to shore up the industry.

We should not be in this situation right now. Because when the governor needed us, and he called us out in a pandemic, we responded, Georgia Goldurn, director of Hope for New Haven child care center, told a recent rally of child care providers. After months of warning this governor that child care is on the brink of collapse, he devoted $0 out of a $2 billion surplus to fix the crisis in the child care industry, Goldburn said.

Max Reiss, a spokesman for Lamont, said child care funding increased in last year's state budget and that level of support was maintained for the current year. We've provided significant funding over the last several years, both through the general fund and through federally supported programs, he said.

Over the last two years, federal COVID-related funding bolstered Connecticut's child care sector with more than $200 million, which went toward stabilizing child care businesses and providing tuition vouchers to parents.

But that was a short-term fix.

In response to the faults in the child care sector laid bare by the pandemic, lawmakers have proposed several pieces of legislation this session that could offer a lifeline to the industry. Senate Bill 2 includes provisions that would increase state funding for child care and school readiness programs by several thousand dollars per child. Senate Bill 408 seeks to fund grants and loans for startup child care centers or those seeking to expand. Senate Bill 487 would establish funding and support for infant and toddler care providers, potentially in the hundreds of millions of dollars over the next several years. House Bill 5465 would provide early childhood educators and care providers with salary enhancements and student loan forgiveness grants.

Several of Connecticuts top companies have expressed public support for child care funding proposed in S.B. 2. The Connecticut Business and Industry Association has testified in favor of S.B. 2, S.B. 408 and H.B 5465.

Office of Early Childhood Commissioner Beth Bye told members of the Children and Public Health committees that the Lamont administration supports expanding early childhood education for all, but she added, We continue to believe that federal legislation and funding is imminent and want to be sure that any steps Connecticut takes align with these federal funds and accompanying rules.

That federal proposal would restrict child care cost to 7 percent of family income and it would provide universal preschool.

If the federal government were to pass a law like that, it would kind of turn some economics at the state level on its head, Reiss said.

In a report last year, researchers with think-tank Connecticut Voices for Children wrote that the child care industry faces an untenable economic model. Tuition rates are set based on a percentage of the market rate. Thats a problem because the market rate is suppressed, they wrote, based on limits to what families are able to afford, rather than the actual cost of high quality programming. As a result, staff are undervalued, funding for quality improvements is minimal, and low-income families are effectively excluded from many programs, the report found.

The Center for American Progress has estimated that infant and toddler care in Connecticut costs more than $20,000 a year to provide. The annual market rates in Connecticut are roughly $4,000 below that. Most parents in Connecticut cant afford to pay what child care costs, and unlike K-12 education early childhood programs are not free and universally accessible.

Everyone's in agreement that there are issues that need to be addressed in the structure and infrastructure of child care, Reiss said. Leadership at the federal level would absolutely provide clarity at the local level.

The future economy

Universal access to child care would strengthen the workforce. But its also an investment in the states economic future, experts say. Leaders in the child care industry often point out that early education is critical to child development.

They are the youngest students in the community, and we are their first educators, Action ELCs Santosh said.

Janet Currie, an economist at Princeton University, said, What we do for children can be viewed as an investment and will have an impact on how the economy functions in the future.

By contrast, Currie continued, If we don't invest in children, we end up with children who are sick, disabled, not well educated, not able to take the jobs that we need to have staffed in the knowledge economy.

Companies and lawmakers are already contemplating what those jobs will look like. Last week, Lamont made a $75 million deal with defense contractor Lockheed Martin that would keep its Sikorsky operation headquartered in the state until 2042, supporting a workforce of 7,000.

By then, today's infants and toddlers would be in their 20s, beginning their careers.

Failing to support early child care and education would mean not meeting the full potential of society, Currie said. It's bad for individuals, but it's also bad for everybody.

Fontaine said she believes it's important for all families to have access to affordable, high-quality child care programs where children feel safe and are able to grow to their full potential. Those strong bonds and consistent care has been especially vital for her students over the past two years, she said.

Fontaine has made a point of talking to the children in her program about their feelings during the pandemic. And one day, during lunch, one young student posed an idea: Wouldn't it be great if we could make a coronavirus machine? he said.

For the next few weeks, Fontaine had the children imagine their coronavirus machines and draw pictures. She got boxes and the children attached wheels and decorations. And inside the boxes they pasted their plans for how they would get rid of the coronavirus.
MONROE  A woman wanted for a string of car robberies hit multiple police cars in Waterbury before crashing into a pole at Route 111 in Monroe Sunday morning, closing the road, police said.

Waterbury Police said they received information around 8:45 a.m. Sunday that a vehicle and a female suspect wanted in connection with recent criminal activity were in the area of Rutledge Street in Waterbury.

When police approached the vehicle  a white Hummer with a woman identified as Hannah Casperson in the drivers seat  Casperson accelerated and collided with the police cruiser before fleeing the area, police said.

She then struck another police cruiser at Brass Mill Drive and East Main Street before entering Interstate 84, traveling west, police said.

Casperson lost control of her vehicle in Monroe and struck a telephone pole near the Monroe Turnpike and Wheeler Road just before 10 a.m., causing a section of the road to be closed so police could investigate, police said. It was expected to reopen around 3 p.m.

Waterbury police took Casperson into custody. She is currently being treated for non-life-threatening injuries in St. Vincents Hospital in Bridgeport, according to police.

Police said Casperson, of Brookfield, faces additional pending charges as well as multiple outstanding warrants.

On Friday, Wolcott Police said Casperson is wanted in connection with dozens of thefts from cars that occurred in an elderly living complex on Wolfs Hill Road in Wolcott overnight Thursday. Thefts from vehicles were also reported on Munson and Brooks Hill roads area.

More than 40 vehicles were entered through unlocked doors or smashed windows, with numerous items taken, police said.

Wolcott Police said Waterbury Police notified the department around 11:30 a.m. on Friday that the white Hummer police said was connected to the car breaks had been seen heading into Wolcott. Officers spotted the car in a grocery store parking lot, but the driver, later identified as Casperson, saw them and fled south.

Officers arrested a second suspect in the thefts in the grocery store. Thomas Crawford, 32 of Naugatuck, is charged with 41 counts each of third-degree burglary, sixth-degree larceny, conspiracy to comitt both and second-degree criminal mischief.

Crawford is being held on a $75,000 bond, Wolcott police said.
PORTLAND  The State Bond Commission on Thursday approved a $500,736 allocation of funds for a much-needed replacement of the track on the middle and high school campus.

The bond commission is responsible for granting approval to requests from the governors office for funding projects around the state.

Superintendent of Schools Charles Britton said he and the rest of the Portland schools community were thrilled to hear the news that the replacement was one of the approved projects. We are over-the-moon excited, he said.

He said the track has cracks running through it, which means it will need to be completely replaced. You could walk on it, but youd have to be very careful jogging on it, Britton said.

For the past few years, Portland High School has not been able to host home track and field meets because of the condition of the track.

Ive been getting lots of excited emails all morning from track parents and students, Britton said. Theyve wanted this for a long time.

Britton thanked local and state officials, including state Rep. Christie Carpino, R-Cromwell; and state Sen. Norm Needleman, D-Essex; for their help in making this happen.

Carpino said on Friday she was glad to see the project receive approval. This is a project that will benefit the entire community, she said.

For the past two years, Carpino and Needleman have been advocating for this in a display of bipartisan support.

This was a joint effort between myself and Senator Needleman, she said. Good things happen when people work together.

Replacing the track at Portland Secondary School will allow students to continue training and racing on a safer, higher-quality surface, also reinforcing our commitment to the full development and support of all of our students, Needleman said in a statement.

Britton said that if the project was not approved for state bond funding, it likely would have been added to the towns capital projects budget, which would have delayed the undertaking, and taken away funds from other needed projects in town.

The ball is already rolling on the project. On Friday morning, the superintendent met with the facilities director and other school officials to discuss the plan.

The next step, he said, will be to seek out an engineering firm to do the preliminary inspection work, which should happen in the coming months.

His hope, he said, is that by this time next year, construction will have begun.

Im very grateful, and I know I speak for all the staff, students and especially the track team, Britton said.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

KILLINGWORTH  The developer who had the high bid to buy the Deer Lake Boy Scout camp said she has no problem with the Scouts extending their deadline to May 1 to consider a better offer. In fact, she hopes a higher offer does come in.

Margaret Streicker, CEO of Fortitude Capital LLC, urged the state or a third party to step in and beat her $4.6 million offer to buy the 255-acre camp on Paper Mill Road.

We mutually agreed that could be extended, Streicker said.

Streicker is taking it slow regarding her plans for the property, she said, and currently is talking with groups concerned for the site. She noted she recently met with Killingworth First Selectman Nancy Gorski.

Deer Lake is a very special place to lot of people and, as such, it deserves the time and consideration, and having the opportunity to hear from all of the various stakeholders in the community, Streicker said Thursday.

So were certainly not rushing anything, she said. We intend to be slow and deliberate and make sure we do something that future generations will enjoy, she said.

I have had the opportunity to speak with the first selectwoman of Killingworth two days ago and we had a wonderful conversation. And I have spoken to a number of other constituents in the community, Streicker said.

To dispel concerns of parents of day campers, she said, Ive already agreed to lease the summer camp to Pathfinders for the next three summers.

Streicker, who also sits on the board of directors of the Connecticut Yankee Council, said she had recused herself from all council meetings and any discussions about the matter, in order to avoid any conflict of interest.

Conservationists, residents, local and state and federal officials have opposed the sale of the camp to a private developer, wanting to keep it as priceless green space.

Streicker said the property appeals to her because Deer Lake is a wonderful opportunity to acquire a very large parcel of land, its picturesque, its bucolic, theres so many wonderful things about it.

The bidding on the property has turned into a lengthy process with deadlines moved at the last minute in the past few months.

The Boy Scouts have had three offers; the most recent bid was submitted hours before the March 31 deadline. A local Scouting organization, Pathfinders, made an offer of an undisclosed amount March 30.

The Boy Scouts accepted Streickers bid in February and rejected the bid of $2.4 million from the Trust for Public Land. The council then extended the deadline to March 31 to accept a superior offer.

With just hours left until the that deadline, state Attorney General William Tong interceded and the Boy Scouts of America agreed to postpone consideration of proposals until May 1, according to Tongs office.

The attorney generals office is reviewing legal questions raised regarding the sale of the camp, according to the office.

Streicker said she had no problems with the attorney generals announcement of the deadline extension.

However, she added, I encourage the attorney general, Sen. (Richard) Blumenthal and Gov. (Ned) Lamont to put their money where their mouth is and actually raise the offer to the Boy Scouts, regarding their public statements on the sale of Deer Lake.

I have no problems, but there is a commercial transaction here and they have been suggesting to the press that the Boy Scouts owe it to the community to sell it for far less than it is value  and thats simply not so, Streicker said.

Were entering a transaction and that is what it is, she said.

And should the state come in and choose to buy the land within the time frame [of] the Boy Scouts  again this has nothing to do with me, I dont control their time line  should they come in and make a superior offer. Alls fair in love and war. By all means, please do, she said.

And I would celebrate that, Streicker said. I look forward to that fantastic opportunity which in theory is a win for the Boy Scouts and a win for future generations  from one perspective. There are many perspectives.

Right now she is gathering information.

Im in my fact-finding phase, she said. As someone who appreciates the difficult politics here  as someone whos run for Connecticuts U.S. congressional seat, I can say that I am trying to understand what all the various positions are and trying to come up with a plan that is beneficial to all if possible. Understanding that theres still financial obligations.

... And I also recognize that other people werent stepping up in the right way, she said. Again, I look forward to Sen. Blumenthal putting his money where this mouth is  to all of these various politicians who have stepped themselves into this conversation.

Streicker advocates the state buy the parcel.

The state, should they so choose, has the resources so they can spend it to make an appropriate investment in the future of land conservancy, said Streicker.

Blumenthal, D-Conn., disagreed with Streicker comments regarding the sale.

Politics have nothing to do with it  its a matter of whats right or what people of Connecticut, particularly generations of young people who will have their own children and should have an opportunity to repeat those wonderful memories of camping, hiking, fishing  all of the great stuff the Boy Scouts have championed, he said.

Blumenthal said he would fight to unlock federal funds that will help preserve this land, this preserve, this unique, precious resource for generations of outdoors lovers to come.

We have a profoundly significant opportunity to sustain this pristine resource for the community with the value that goes beyond its commercial price, Blumenthal said.

... So we will fight as long and hard as possible to make available federal funds from the department of Interior if were given the chance to do it, Blumenthal said.

Streicker, a Republican, ran for the 3rd District U.S. House seat held by Democrat U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro in the last election did not rule out running for public office in Connecticut again.

Streicker has residences in New York, and Milford.

When asked whether she would consider running for the 3rd District seat again, she said anythings possible.

When asked whether she would run for any other public office in Connecticut, she answered again that anything is possible.

The Boy Scouts is selling Deer Like because of declining enrollment, Scout officials have said. The Boy Scouts of America declared bankruptcy in 2021 and in March this year have offered $2.7 billion to settle a claim with tens of thousands of sex abuse survivors, according to Reuters.

The Connecticut Yankee Council paid a portion with a combination of land and cash from its endowment to fulfill its share of the national organizations settlement, according to Scouting officials.
Self-service smart lockers -- similar to the Amazon Hub Lockers that have been popping up around the country -- are now available for airmen at Robins Air Force Base in Georgia, the first base to install the secure package delivery system at its barracks.

Robins unveiled the new equipment during a March 30 ceremony, with senior installation leadership and the airman who initially came up with the idea in attendance. Seven other Air Force bases have scheduled the intelligent lockers to be installed at their facilities; they will eventually be available across the Air Force, according to a service press release.

Previously, troops at Robins had to wait two to three days for the base's post office to manually sort a package, notify the recipient that it is available for pickup and then hand it out, according to Senior Airman Ricardo "Noah" Morales, who pitched the locker concept to Air Force leadership. Now, technology is quickly replacing or reshaping service jobs typically carried out by human beings.

Read Next: Judge Blocks Air Force Discipline over Vaccine Objections

"This will improve life for Airmen because they can now retrieve their packages 24/7. Shift workers will now be able to get off their shift and retrieve their package at any time of the day without having to work around the base post office's limited hours," Morales said during the ribbon-cutting event.

The Robins post office operates from 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Monday through Friday; it is closed during the weekend, giving service members a limited window to access their mail, according to Roland Leach, a base spokesperson.

With the new secure package system, service members will likely be sent an individual code when a parcel is delivered, allowing them to immediately retrieve it from a locker.

Morales secured the funding for Robins when he won first place and $235,000 to implement the smart locker venture in a 2021 Air Force innovation contest. The next competition, to be held in August, will give Air Force members another chance to win a share of $1 million for their inventive ideas.

Secure delivery lockers are growing in popularity across the U.S. and are now available everywhere from apartment buildings to grocery stores. The industry is expected to grow exponentially from a market of roughly $677 million last year to more than $1.6 billion by 2028, according to a report published by ResearchAndMarkets.com.

But as new technology expands, it also threatens to replace conventional service jobs. A recent report by research company Forrester projects 11 million U.S. jobs will be lost to automation by 2032.

Even the United States Postal Service has entered the parcel locker industry, testing its technology in limited locations across the country. With development of the secure locker system at Air Force bases still ongoing, individuals sending mail domestically or internationally to an APO, FPO or DPO should continue to keep in mind the specific guidelines set by the USPS.

-- Jonathan Lehrfeld is a fellow at Military.com. Follow him on Twitter @lehrfeld_media.

Related: 'Like He Came Back to Me': WWII Mail Received 76 Years Later
Welcome Guest! You Are Here:
Mercury was found last month in a sink at an Oahu elementary school, not far from another elementary school where elevated levels of beryllium were detected during widespread testing of the Navy's water system in Honolulu.

The service announced Friday that a sample taken March 16 at Pearl Harbor Kai Elementary School contained mercury levels nearly twice the limit set by the Safe Drinking Water Act.

The sample was taken from an indoor sink located in an administrative building "not regularly used by students," according to the Navy, and was isolated to the sink.

Read Next: Judge Blocks Air Force Discipline over Vaccine Objections

News of the mercury finding was followed Saturday by an announcement from the Navy that "no more than" 30 gallons of fuel and water had spilled at the Red Hill Fuel complex. The accidental release occurred while workers were removing water from the fuel tanks, a process known as "dewatering."

Navy personnel halted the process, and the Hawaii Department of Health was called in to monitor the cleanup, according to a service press release.

Both incidents come amid extensive water testing around the Navy's Red Hill facility after a spill contaminated a water well last November, displacing more than 4,000 military personnel and family members and sickening roughly 6,000.

The Navy shut down the Red Hill facility and spent months flushing and testing the water system, sampling about 5% of the homes in affected neighborhoods. The service has said it will test about 10% of the homes every six months for the next two years.

The discovery of mercury in the school sink is likely related to a contaminated faucet, since no other water samples collected at the school or nearby buildings contained mercury. The faucet has since been replaced with new water safety results pending, according to the Navy.

In addition to the mercury, test results have yielded high levels of other contaminants including:

Beryllium in an outdoor sink at Pearl Harbor Elementary School, at a level one-fourth higher than the Hawaii Department of Health's accepted limit. The metal is used frequently in the aviation industry to create alloys and make gears, cogs, springs, aircraft, satellites and more.

Lead levels three times the legal limit in a laundry sink -- also not used by children -- at the Pier Side Child Development Center.

Levels of an organic compound known as DEHP seven times the allowable amount were detected in a vacant home on base. The same chemical, which is often added to plastics to make them flexible, was found at significantly higher rates in nonresidential buildings in three areas, including Catlin Park and Radford Terrace neighborhoods and the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard.

Petroleum contamination in a home in the Halsey Terrace neighborhood that tested at levels of 460 parts per billion, double the accepted level set by the health department of 211 parts per billion.

While there have been few studies on the health outcomes of long-term exposure to petroleum products in humans, mercury exposure, either chronic or acute, can damage the nervous system, causing tremors, mood swings or irritability; cognitive impairment; insomnia,; headaches; and more.

Lead poisoning, particularly in children, can impair development of the brain and other organs, causing developmental and intellectual delays and impairment, including reduced intellectual capacity and behavioral problems.

The Hawaii Department of Health announced March 18 that the tap water in all residential neighborhoods served by the Navy's water system at Pearl Harbor was safe to use and consume, after the service's extensive flushing work.

"On behalf of Secretary [Lloyd] Austin, we are incredibly proud of the diligent work done by the Interagency Drinking Water System Team to restore safe drinking water as well as by the hundreds of volunteers and the many people of Hawaii who helped our displaced families during this unfortunate situation," Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro said in a press release after the announcement.

Families remain leery, however, with some paying for third-party testing or asking the Navy to test all individual homes to guarantee that the water is safe.

Navy wife Lauren Wright returned to her home in the Radford Terrace neighborhood last month to find her hot water heater destroyed by the contamination and the water showing a visible sheen.

Even after the second system flush in mid-March, the smell was "going back and forth," as was the sheen, she told Military.com

As of late March, the family was still using a camping shower with water from outside sources and were filtering all their water.

"We just want options and the truth," Wright said. "I told my son, 'Take a quick shower, it's safe,' and he said, 'But I don't want my skin falling off.'"

In the aftermath of the original fuel spill, the Navy created a crisis response team available 24 hours a day through the Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam Emergency Operations Center, according to the service.

In his statement in March, Del Toro encouraged families to reach out immediately with any concerns or issues regarding their water.

"We all recognize this has been a hardship for those families and want to thank them again for their patience and resilience," Del Toro said. "Our priority will continue to be their safety and returning them to a new, better normal."

-- Patricia Kime can be reached at Patricia.Kime@Military.com. Follow her on Twitter @patriciakime.

Related: 'We Have Put You in an Unsafe Condition': Top Navy Officials Apologize for Tainted Water at Pearl Harbor
Officers and leaders in the maritime services say that they are paying close attention to the Russian invasion of Ukraine but not because of the threat the former Cold War foe poses. They say the conflict will provide key advice about how to deter China.

"The conflict in Ukraine, for me, validates the last couple [national defense strategies]," Gen. David Berger, commandant of the Marine Corps, told an auditorium full of people Monday at the Sea-Air-Space Exposition outside of Washington, D.C.

Berger explained that the conflict in Europe showed him "that you need a really strong land force to deter Russia in Europe." Conversely, in the largely aquatic Indo-Pacific region, the top Marine said that "you need a very strong Navy-Marine Corps team."

Read Next: Judge Blocks Air Force Discipline over Vaccine Objections

Adm. Mike Gilday, the military head of the Navy, cautioned the audience, largely made up of military officers and industry representatives, that "given everything that's going on right now in Europe, I think the three of us in this group say, 'Keep your eye on China.'"

Gilday was referring to himself, Berger and Adm. Karl Schultz, the commandant of the Coast Guard, who all made up the panel.

The Navy's top officer noted that one of his key takeaways from the conflict was a reinforcement of his service's choice of the "divest to invest" strategy that calls for the shedding of some aging and ineffective ships in order to save money that is then invested in new technologies.

The strategy is controversial and has been sharply critiqued by lawmakers as recently as last week.

"Let's keep it real with respect to what we're going to field out there," Gilday said. "We can only have so many ready ships that are manned properly, they've been trained properly, that [have] ammunition in their magazines, that have the proper maintenance."

Gilday cautioned the audience not to focus solely on the Navy's total ship count. "It's more than just a numbers game -- it's a capabilities and a numbers game," he argued.

"Take a look at the 125 [battalion tactical groups] that Vladimir Putin has positioned around Ukraine. That's not the force that any of us want," Gilday said.

Meanwhile, in a different panel discussion, the Pentagon's Dr. Ely Ratner, the department's assistant secretary for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs, said that "Ukraine is a prime example of what happens when" the respect for "international rules-based order" breaks down.

"We understand that [China] is pursuing an alternative regional international order -- one that would not be defined by the kind of principles and rules that we believe that undergirded the kind of stability and prosperity that we've seen for some time," Ratner added.

To counter that, Gilday argued that the Navy has to keep sailing ships in the Asia-Pacific region to keep an eye on China.

"Think about how important [forward presence] was for the United States, and the world really, to restricting Russia's activity in Ukraine," Gilday said. "We pulled the rug out from under Vladimir Putin with respect to his ability to use false flag operations as a pretext to cross the border and invade."

-- Konstantin Toropin can be reached at konstantin.toropin@military.com. Follow him on Twitter @ktoropin.

Related: Top Marine General Praises Ukrainian Forces as 'Very Well Trained, Very Well Led'
WASHINGTON  An Algerian man imprisoned at the Guantanamo Bay detention center for nearly 20 years has been released and sent back to his homeland.

The Department of Defense announced Saturday that Sufyian Barhoumi was repatriated with assurances from the Algerian government that he would be treated humanely there and that security measures would be imposed to reduce the risk that he could pose a threat in the future.

The Pentagon did not provide details about those security measures, which could include restrictions on travel.

Barhoumi was captured in Pakistan and taken to the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in 2002. The United States eventually determined he was involved with various extremist groups but was not a member of al-Qaida or the Taliban, according to a report by a review board at the prison that approved him for release in 2016.

U.S. authorities attempted to prosecute Barhoumi in 2008 but the effort was dropped amid legal challenges to the initial version of the military commission system set up under President George W. Bush.

In the final days of Barack Obama's presidency in January 2017, a federal judge in Washington declined to intervene in the Pentagon's decision not to repatriate Barhoumi, whose lawyer said he had expected his client to be released and that the prisoners family had begun making preparations for his return, including by buying him a car and a small restaurant for him to run.

The Justice Department said then-Defense Secretary Ash Carter rejected the release of Barhoumi on Jan. 12, 2017, based on a variety of substantive concerns, shared by multiple agencies, without going into detail.

Barhoumi, who lost four fingers in a land mine explosion in Afghanistan, offered to plead guilty to any charges in 2012 in hopes he could receive a fixed sentence and return to his elderly mother, according to his attorney, Shayana Kadidal of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Our government owes Sufyian and his mother years of their lives back, Kadidal said. Im overjoyed that he will be home with his family, but I will dearly miss his constant good humor and empathy for the suffering of others in the utterly depressing environment of Guantanamo.

The effort to resettle prisoners languished under President Donald Trump. The Biden administration is attempting again to reduce the number of men held at Guantanamo as part of a broader effort to close the facility.

Barhoumi's release brings the total held at the U.S. base in Cuba to 37 men, including 18 who have been deemed eligible for repatriation or resettlement in a third country.
April is designated as the Month of the Military Child. Throughout the month, "military brats" are recognized for the sacrifices they make because they have a parent in the military. In honor of the Month of the Military Child, here are 9 military discounts for kids and their families.

1. Disney

Disney World is the happiest place on earth! It's even better because of Disney's Armed Forces Salute program. Military personnel can get discounted tickets to Disney theme parks, as well as discounts off select rooms at Disney Resort hotels. These deals are good for military spouses of eligible service members even without the member being present.

2. Amusement parks

Disney isn't the only amusement park that offers military discounts. Other fun parks like LEGOLAND and Universal Studios help military families out with deals as well. If you have an amusement park in your area, call ahead, check the parks website, or visit your local ITT office on base to ask what kinds of military discounts they offer and what you need to do to take advantage of them.

3. Crafts

Whether art supplies are needed for fun craft projects or for school assignments and supplies, military families can stock up using military discounts at Jo-Ann Fabric, and Michaels.

4. Zoos and Aquariums

Many zoos throughout the country, like the San Diego Zoo in California and Zoo Atlanta in Georgia, offer military discounts on admission prices. You can also find deals for military families at aquariums like the New York Aquarium and the National Aquarium in Baltimore, Maryland.

5. National Parks

Most national parks don't have an entrance fee, but for those that do, fees are waived on designated free entrance days. Service members and their families are also eligible for the America the Beautiful National Parks and Federal Recreation Lands Pass for free, a pass that's normally $80. The pass allows free admission for a year at sites that charge entrance or standard amenity fees.

6. Academic Help

Military families are eligible for free access to the Department of Defense online tutoring program with Tutor.com. Students needing a little extra help with homework and studying can ask a professional tutor anytime they need it.

For those older military brats getting ready to take the SAT or ACT, eKnowledge offers highly discounted rates on standard, premium and super courses.

7. Clothing and Shoes

Tastes and fashion change, and of course, kids grow. So new clothes and shoes are always necessities. To help keep wardrobes up-to-date, use military discounts at a variety of stores, including Old Navy, L.L.Bean, Wrangler, Under Armour, Zappos, Nike and Reebok.

8. Movies

Movie theaters like Regal and Cinemark offer discounted tickets for the military. Keep in mind the discount may vary by location and time of day. For instance, some theaters may not offer a discount on matinees, but do offer one at an evening showing.

9. Blue Star Theatres

Blue Star Theatres is a collaboration between Theatre Communications Group and Blue Star Families. Through this initiative, more than 170 theatres and playhouses around the country offer free or discounted admission to the military, their families, and veterans.

Stay Up-to-Date With Military Discounts

Want the scoop on military discounts? From travel to phones and everything in between, troops, military families and veterans can stay on top of military discounts. Become a Military.com subscriber and get full access through our newsletter.
Key

In the early 1880s there was a bustling of activity on the headwaters of the Colorado River below Specimen Mountain as miners searched for gold and silver lodes and dreamed of striking the big one.



How it all began is not perfectly clear, but the evidence indicates that J. E. Shipler prospected the area as early as 1873 and by 1880 he, or so he said, had located seventeen lodes in the Lead Mountain Mining District between Michigan and Jack Creeks. In 1878 or 1879 Benjamin Burnett of Fort Collins heard of a silver strike Shipler had made in the vicinity of what became Lulu City, and dispatched an old prospector friend, John Rigdon, to look the area over for precious metals. Rigdon found a good vein, and when he had the ore assayed, Burnett decided he would visit the site and look it over. Burnett was pleased with what he saw, and, according to his son who was with him at the time, began to lay out a town that he named Lulu City.



Lulu in 1880 was booming. In addition to the construction activity, a road was opened to Lulu about the middle of August. The news of the strikes on the headwaters of the Colorado River drew miners from North Park and by July a reported 200 miners were busily staking out claims in the hills around Lulu City.



During the first winter, that of 1879-80, only ten or twelve miners remained at Lulu to carry on their activities, and these men had their problems, not the least of which was running out of food in February and having to snowshoe over the mountain to Estes Park. The following winter men remained behind, but this time roads had been laid out and the miners made arrangements to have food sledded into Lulu.



The new season opened in the spring of 1881 with high hopes and the smell of riches in the air. Prospectors roamed the hills around Lulu and dug holes in the mountain sides. They gave their mines such names as Wild Rose, Rustic, Friday Night, Reindeer, Tiger, Bonanza, and Pioneer. One of the most promising was the Southern Cross owned by Ben Dunshe. It received considerable publicity from the local reporter of the Colorado Miner, and the Rocky Mountain News carried a story that a new type of ore was found at that mine. A miner, the story went, held an ore-bearing rock over a campfire and the silver melted out.



During the main working season of 1881 and the following winter many miners spent their time developing those mines that looked promising. By May of 1882 the Carbonate mine had a 400-foot drift, the Southern Cross had one of 125 feet, the Triumph of 115 feet, and the Greensboro 85 feet.



The gold and silver deposits were only in pockets, and the ore for the most part was low grade. Although there was talk off and on about bringing a smelter into the area, one never was set up, and the miners had no way of extracting the metal from the ore. In the absence of a smelter the only alternative the mine owner has is to transport the ore to the nearest smelter, but there were no railroads near the Lead Mining District, and wagon transportation was not economically feasible for such low grade ore.

Commodity List This is a list of exploitable or exploited mineral commodities recorded from this region.

 Gold  Silver





List of minerals for each chemical element

References

Sort by Year (asc) Year (desc) Author (A-Z) Author (Z-A) In-text Citation No.

Holland, F. R. Jr. (1971), Rocky Mountain National Park, Historical Background Data: 62-74. Baldwin, S.B. (1980) Historic resource study : Dutchtown and Lulu City, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado; 132 p.

Localities in this Region
Products

What are the Main Properties and Uses of Inconel718

The biggest immediate challenge for the EU will be replenishing its depleted gas inventories. While the EU could still increase LNG imports from countries such as the US, such purchases would be more expensive.

Refilling natural gas storage space to historical average levels this year could cost 70 billion euros, a sevenfold increase, compared to 10 billion euros in previous years. "

A complete replacement for Russian gas is not only very expensive, but it also may not be possible.

In the next 12 months, there is little way to meet the demand for a "normal" year in the absence of Gazprom, which also includes Alloy Inconel718.





What is Nickel-based Super Alloy Inconel718:

Inconel 718 or In718 is a nickel-chromium-molybdenum alloy. It is an oxidation-resistant and corrosion-resistant material ideal for use in extreme environments under pressure and heat. In718 was invented in the early 1960s in INCO Huntington Alloys (now Special Metals Co.) and used in turbine parts manufacturing. Since then, In718 has become the most widely used nickel-based superalloy in the history of aero-engines. The unique alloy composition of In718 enables it to have good comprehensive properties, namely high strength, creep resistance, etc. Especially under 650, it has good stability in terms of mechanical properties. Many parts of modern aero-engines, such as turbine discs, blades, brakes, shafts, stators, seals, supports, pipes, fasteners, are made of In718.





Properties of Nickel-based Super Alloy Inconel718:

When heated, a thick and stable passivating oxide layer is formed on the surface of the alloy, protecting the surface from further erosion. It exhibits high yield, tensile, and creep fracture properties at high temperatures. Inconel718s high-temperature strength is developed by solid solution strengthening or precipitation hardening. Inconel718 has good comprehensive properties in the temperature range of -253 ~ 700 (1290F). Its yield strength below 650 ranks first among the deformation superalloys. It has good fatigue resistance, radiation resistance, oxidation resistance, corrosion resistance, and good machining and welding performance. Various complex-shaped parts can be produced with Inconel718, and thus Inconel718 is widely used in aerospace, nuclear energy, petroleum industry, and extrusion die in the above temperature range.





Applications of Nickel-based Super Alloy Inconel718:

Chemical processing;Gas turbine blades, seals, and combustors;High-temperature fasteners;Pressure vessels;Aerospace industry, for constructing heat resistant turbines;Low-temperature storage tanks;Nuclear energy industry;Petroleum industry.





About KMPASS

KMPASS is a trusted global chemical material supplier & manufacturer with over 12 years experience in providing super high-quality chemicals and Nanomaterials. The company export to many countries, such as USA, Canada, Europe, UAE, South Africa, Tanzania,Kenya,Egypt,Nigeria,Cameroon,Uganda,Turkey,Mexico,Azerbaijan,Belgium,Cyprus,Czech Republic,Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Dubai, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia,Germany, France, Italy, Portugal etc. As a leading nanotechnology development manufacturer, KMPASS dominates the market. Our professional work team provides perfect solutions to help improve the efficiency of various industries, create value, and easily cope with various challenges. If you are looking for Inconel718 powder, please send an email to: sales2@nanotrun.com or contact us.





For Germany, the largest economy in Europe, the impact of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict on the natural gas market is the most obvious. This also exposed the serious dependence of some German industrial enterprises on Russian natural gas. Some analysts pointed out that the instability of natural gas supply has had a big impact on the German economy and threatened its market competitiveness because alternative energy supplies will not be cheap and difficult to come quickly. Increased uncertainty over natural gas supplies is putting enormous pressure on German manufacturers in sectors ranging from steelmaking to chemical production, especially Germany's large number of small and medium-sized companies.



There will be no shortage of Alloy Inconel718s for the time being, but the market demand for Alloy Inconel718s in the future will also change with the influence of various external factors. If you need Alloy Inconel718s, please feel free to contact us.



Inquery us
Products

What problems should we pay attention to in the development of graphite technology?

Russian president demanded that exports of Russian gas to "unfriendly" countries be settled in rubles. The demand has raised concerns in Germany about possible supply disruptions and the impact on industry and households if utilities do not pay in robles. Europe gets about 40% of its gas from Russia. Last year, Europe imported about 155 billion cubic meters. Germany, Europe's largest economy, depends heavily on Russian gas.

The chief executive of Germany's E.ON said the German economy would face "significant damage, which should be avoided if possible" without Russian supplies. He also said it would take Germany three years to wean itself off Russian gas.

In the event of a supply disruption, Germany's gas network regulator would prioritize home heating over industrial use, so energy-hungry manufacturers such as steelmakers would be the first to suffer, he said.

The volatile international situations will continue to affect the markets and prices of many commodities like the natural graphite.

According to the above analysis and discussion, the author believes that when using natural graphite as raw material to develop artificial graphite, the following issues need to be paid attention to in terms of technology:

Surface modification of natural graphite. Compared with carbonaceous materials such as petroleum coke and pitch coke, natural graphite has fewer oxygen-containing functional groups on the surface, lower activity, and poorer binding force than coal tar pitch.

Therefore, with natural graphite, especially natural flake graphite as the main raw material, the carbon graphite products prepared according to the artificial graphite production process inevitably have the problem of poor mechanical properties. Appropriate surface treatment of natural graphite is required to increase the content of oxygen-containing functional groups on its surface.

Purification of natural graphite. The purity of carbonaceous raw materials such as petroleum coke and pitch coke is relatively high, and the ash content is usually less than 0.5%, while the purity of natural graphite treated by flotation is relatively low, and the carbon content is usually below 90%.

Therefore, carbon graphite products prepared from natural graphite are often limited in their application fields due to their low purity and poor comprehensive performance. High purification treatment of natural graphite is one of the ways to solve this problem.

The cost of chemical purification is low, but the water consumption in the washing process is large and the pollution is large, while high-temperature purification has the problem of high cost. Some people also think that block graphite can be prepared according to the production process of artificial graphite, and then subjected to high-temperature heat treatment above 2500 .

While the "carbon" phase is graphitized, the impurities in the natural graphite phase are removed, but firstly, the production cost is increased, and secondly, the defects formed after the gasification of impurities often cause the performance of the product to decline.

The particle size of natural graphite. To improve process performance and product performance, in addition to fine-structure carbon-graphite products, most carbon-graphite products need to use different grades of carbonaceous raw materials in the batching process. For some large-sized products, the particle size of carbonaceous raw materials even reaches The flotation-treated natural graphite is often in the form of a fine powder, and the particle size is only tens to hundreds of microns. Therefore, the use of natural graphite as a raw material is limited to the preparation of fine-structure carbon graphite products.

Although natural microcrystalline graphite with different particle sizes can be obtained, due to its low purity and high cost of high-temperature purification, there is no report on the preparation of coarse-structure carbon graphite products using natural microcrystalline graphite as raw material. To solve the problem of the lack of large particles of natural graphite, it is recommended to use the "secondary coke" process in the treatment of carbon black raw materials in the artificial graphite industry.

Volume shrinkage during preparation. In the preparation process of artificial graphite, especially in the graphitization process, since the arrangement of carbon atoms gradually changes to a regular graphite structure, the volume shrinkage of the product is relatively large.

The advantage of this volume shrinkage is that it can increase the density of the product, but when the shrinkage is uneven, it is easy to cause the product to crack. When natural graphite is used as raw material, the density and mechanical properties of the product are lower due to the smaller volume shrinkage during carbonization and graphitization.

In addition, when developing artificial graphite with natural graphite as raw material, it is also necessary to consider the issue of comprehensive production cost.

Since the price of flotation natural graphite is similar to that of calcined petroleum coke and pitch coke, and then purified to a carbon content of 98%, the price of natural graphite is nearly twice that of calcined petroleum coke and pitch coke. In addition to the above-mentioned several carbon graphite products that have formed a large industry, the proposal of most technical routes and technical measures will greatly increase the production cost.

High quality graphite manufacturer

Luoyang Moon & Star New Energy Technology Co., LTD, founded on October 17, 2008, is a high-tech enterprise committed to the research and development, production, processing, sales and technical services of lithium ion battery anode materials. After more than 10 years of development, the company has gradually developed into a diversified product structure with natural graphite, artificial graphite, composite graphite, intermediate phase and other negative materials (silicon carbon materials, etc.). The products are widely used in high-end lithium ion digital, power and energy storage batteries.

If you are looking for graphite or lithium battery anode material, click on the needed products and send us an inquirysales@graphite-corp.com









At a regular press conference held by the Ministry of Commerce on March 31, a media question was raised: The COVID-19 outbreak has led to the shutdown of production in many parts of China. What impact will it have on China's foreign trade enterprises as a whole and micro, small and medium-sized foreign trade enterprises?

In this regard, the Spokesperson of the Ministry of Commerce said that the Ministry is closely following the impact of the epidemic on foreign trade enterprises, especially small, medium and micro foreign trade enterprises. As far as we can see, some foreign trade enterprises are affected by the epidemic and are faced with periodic problems in production and operation, logistics and transportation. At the same time, problems such as rising raw material costs, slow cross-border shipping and supply chain bottlenecks have yet to be fundamentally alleviated, and foreign trade enterprises, micro, small and medium-sized enterprises in particular, still face considerable operating pressure. The price of natural graphite operated by foreign trade enterprises will also fluctuate with the changes of the epidemic. Contact us for the latest quotation on natural graphite.

Inquery us
04.04.2022 LISTEN

Chairman of the Ghana Association of Songwriters, Emmanuel Barnes, popularly known as Mr. Logic has accused Ghanas first President Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah as the root cause of Ghanas economic hardship.

According to Mr. Logic, the independence fighter made a big mistake when he said Ghana was capable of managing its own affairs which ended up in the premature fight for independence.

He was reacting to the just-passed controversial E-Levy, and the reaction of citizens in the face of economic hardship.

Whether it is a capital tax, general tax or whichever tax you are paying. Lets learn how to abide by these things. Once we have accepted that Ghana is a developing country, we must not blame the government for our problems. We shouldnt blame NDC or NPP.

"It is Kwame Nkrumah that needs to be blamed. Look at South Africa, they had white people in their country yet they allowed them to build the country and gradually took over. Now they both live together there. But as for Kwame Nkrumah he said we can be able to handle our own affairs. Have we been able to handle our affairs? He quizzed.

Mr. Logic urge Ghanaians to stop complaining as he thinks it impedes the development of the country.

Lets start being very responsible. We always like to complain and thats why we dont develop as a country. Complaining left and right. Fuel this fuel that. E Levy this and E Levy that and so on. Poverty is a choice. You decide to be poor and so if youre poor dont make certain statements and drag people along with you, he stated.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

Except you are under the rock, you will have heard the news. The two major Nigerian representations at this year's Grammy awards lost nevertheless, one is more louder than the other.

Wizkid's Made in Lagos Deluxe edition lost the Best Global award category to Angelique Kidjo's Mother Nature album. He also lost the Best Global performance category to the Pakistan Arooj Aftab.

As expected, the loss has generated mixed reactions from the fans, music critics, and industry lovers. In 2021, Essence, a standout song off Made in Lagos was unofficially tagged the song of the summerin retrospect, it was. The album broke into the Billboard Hot 100, soundtrack a lot of parties, and was on the list of major music magazines' end-of-the-year songs list.

Grammy award voting members know better as they have settled for Angelique Kidjo's climate change pivoted album Mother Nature. The deed has been done, where does Wizkid go from here, what does he need to do if he wants to cart home the plaque?

Bar the creation of the Afrobeats category.

Some Over Sabi fans said Wizkid doesn't need a Grammy or any awards. Artists want awards, they crave for it, it has always been a form of validation for them. They bask in the euphoria of their victory. The Grammy is the biggest award in the world. Wizkid needs it, if the feelers from his camp should be taken into consideration, they all anticipated his victory.

With months or weeks to the release of More Love, Less Ego , Wizkid and his management need to go back to the drawing board. There has to be a narrathatwhthatrives the album. In 2020, when Burna Boy lost the Grammy to

Angelique Kidjo, he went back to the drawing board to draft an Afrocentric conscious album; met with the woman who helped him in crafting an album. Burna Boy co-opted Grammy winner and music mogul P. Diddy as executive producer. The narrative being peddled by his publicists was very simple; here is a very conscious man, his grandfather managed Fela, he is set to bring Africans/African American Americans back consciousness, his music also walked the talk. He was that conscious.

The voting members of the Best Global category are still not aware of modern African music works, they still believe the continent lives on one dollar per daystill on point, they are ravaged by poverty, war, corruption, and famine. These are some of Africa's country realities. They don't believe in the posh cars, women, etc. While Burna Boy gives a small amount of this trope on Twice As Tall, he was more focused on issues Africans battle with.

2022 is another chance for Wizkid to go for the Grammy, the lapses of 2020/2021 must be avoided. His sparse interview should be brushed up. It should be more deliberate and more narrative-driven and please, he should get a songwriter and expand his themes.

Grammy has always been political, Burna Boy understood this, I think with the right tweak, reorientation, Wizkid might one day bring home the award.

Emmanuel Daraloye is a music critic.
Asante Akim South Constituency First Vice Chairman hopeful, Nana Kwadwo Agyei Yeboah (Nana Kay), has called on those who wants to contest for various positions in the party to run a clean campaign devoid of insults and personal attacks.

"All hands ought to be on deck devoid of factionalism, backbiting and personal attack to enable the party fulfilled its Breaking the Eight agenda.

"The forthcoming contest is a family contest without political enemies unlike General Elections, so we must come together to achieve our common goal of winning the 2024 General Elections," he told Accra-based Kingdom FM 107.7

Nana Kay who is aspiring to contest for the Asante Akim South Constituency Vice Chairmanship position therefore called for peace to prevail in the Constituency adding that with one accord NPP will be able to maintain its parliamentary seat.

Addressing some polling station executives at different locations in the Constituency, the NPP Vice Chairman hopeful encouraged them to showcase the achievements of the NPP government.

"The main tool we are going to use to 'break the eight' is to trumpet the brilliant performance of His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo led NPP government.

"We must rekindle our communication skills by trumpeting the NPP Government's unprecedented infrastructure development across the country.

"We should all these have been done in the wake of the covid-19 pandemic. It is an opened secret that Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo has performed creditably than any President in the Fourth Republic. We should therefore take advantage to sell the good news and be proud as being members of the NPP," he stressed.

He noted that the NPP has become more attractive to Ghanaians because of its brilliant performance over the past five years adding that Ghanaians have hopes that NPP can break the eight-year political cycle.

"Most of Government's programmes and policies are fully being implemented in the areas of education, health, agriculture and provision of social amenities. If we have such high profile personalities in Asante Akim South, have no excuses if we fail to deliver. It therefore behoves on us to work harder towards the 2024 Elections to make history," he stated.

Nana Kwadwo Agyei Yeboah (Nana Kay) encouraged polling station executives as well as the foot soldiers at the grassroot level to have confidence in the leadership of NPP at the national, regional and constituency levels.
Member of Parliament for Ellembelle, Emmanuel Armarh Kofi- Buah, has called on the President, the Police and the Commission of Human Rights and Administrative Justice, CHRAJ, to investigate Adamus Resources Limited Mine's incessant use of security personnel to brutalize the people of Teleku-Bokazo and Ahwia.

Armarh Kofi- Buah, while condemning the invading of the Essiama District Divisional Police Command following the shooting to death of a resident by a security officer at Nkroful on April 1st, said they people have no problem with the Police but Adamus.

I apologize on behalf of the people of Teleku-Bokazo especially the young people who went to the Police station to vandalize the station and caused damage. However, we have serious problems in this area but we don't have a fight with the police.

In fact, this is about the fourth death of a young person in connection with Adamus Resources mining operations and the persons who shot these young people on those two occasions are not police officers but the military attached to the Adamus Mines. So the thought that young people will go and attack police stations is regrettable, he said.

The MP, speaking to Citi News after visiting the deceaseds family and the Chief of Teleku-Bokazo, as well as interacting with the youth, said the bigger problem in the area is the misuse of security personnel by Adamus Resources Mines which has so far resulted in about four deaths.

He said these incidents must be investigated by the CHRAJ and the Police.

Let me be very clear, the people of Teleku-Bokazo and Ahwia and its environs have lived here for over 300 years as farmers on their lands in peace. Since all of a sudden Adamus Resources came saying it has been given all those lands, we have not had any peace. Even when Adamus is done by mining in parts of the concession after 10 years, it refuses to allow even the community to engage in legal mining activity for their daily survival after destroying their farms. Is this fair?

And then we will have State soldiers to protect Mining companies who end up shooting citizens. That is the anger. I'm therefore calling on President Akufo-Addo, the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice, CHRAJ and the Police Service to investigate the real issue with the treatment of the people over here by Adamus Resources Limited Mines. We have to have a just and fair investigations into their activities, he added.

Meanwhile, the traumatized wife and brother of 33 year old Andrew Donkor who was allegedly shot dead on Friday by security personnel at the forecourt of the Nkroful Magistrate Court during the prosecution of some illegal miners arrested by Adamus Resources Mines, are demanding justice from the Police.

What I demand now is justice because there is clear evidence according to witnesses that my brother was not even at where the crowd was but sitting somewhere making a phone call. So I'm beginning to think this was out of malice or deliberate. Why should there should be shooting when the crowd were not rioting but were just there to support their people. If you want to give a warning shot, you don't rather shoot an innocent person. Even his friends took out two bullets from him before sending him to hospital.

Four more bullets have been retrieved from his body by doctors at the hospital which means it was deliberate, so we demand justice. We want o know the military person that fired the shot and explain why he fired at somebody who was not armed, the victim's brother, Thomas Donkor said.

He is the only person who provides for me and my children. I want to soldier to be dealt with and dismissed from the service. My husband only told me he was going to the district assembly and I later heard he has been shot dead. I commit the person who shot my husband into the hands of God. I plead with the government to punish the soldier for me, said the victim's Wife, Doris Donkor.

The Chief of Teleku-Bokazu, Nana Afful kwaw II, speaking to Citi News after the MP's visit said the killing of residents in relation to operations of Adamus Resources Limited is becoming one two many.

The MP for Ellembelle, Emmanuel Armarh Kofi-Buah, has called for calm among the youth of Teleku-Bokazu as he dialogues with all stakeholders in resolving the matter.

Even though officials of Adamus Resources Limited in the December 2021 burning of one Budu on its concession admitted it was done by its security personnel, they are yet to speak on this recent arrest and prosecution of illegal miners from its concession resulting in this fatality.

citinewsroom
President Akufo-Addo has sent his fraternal greetings to Muslims in Ghana and around the World as they begin their 30 days fasting today.

Muslims started their annual Ramadan fast on Sunday April 3.

Mr Akufo-Addo in his message said the Ramadan is a month of intense devotion and commitment to the principles of love sacrifice and dedication to duty.

I urge Muslims to strive to live by these values and cloak the Month of Ramadan in sanctity and Holiness, he wrote on his Facebook page.
French President Emmanuel Macron has condemned the "unbearable" images of murdered civilians in the Ukrainian commuter town of Bucha, near Kyiv, and said Russian authorities "must answer for these crimes".

Since Russian soldiers pulled out of Kyiv and the surrounding area, local Ukrainian officials say they have recovered 410 civilian bodies.

Bucha mayor Anatoly Fedoruk told AFP on Saturday that 280 bodies were found buried in mass graves.

Reporters have confirmed dozens of corpses were left lying on the streets following the Russian withdrawal.

AFP reporters in Bucha counted at least 20 bodies, all in civilian clothing, strewn across a single street.

One man had his hands tied behind his back with a white cloth, and his Ukrainian passport left open beside his body.

"On the streets, hundreds of civilians cowardly murdered," Macron wrote on Twitter on Sunday, in reference to Bucha.

Possible war crimes

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian condemned "in the strongest possible terms" the actions of the Russian army which "could be, if confirmed, war crimes".

"I have received information indicating massive abuses by Russian forces in Ukrainian towns that they have been occupying these last few weeks, in particular in the area of Bucha," he said in a statement.

France will work with Ukrainian authorities and the International Criminal Court (ICC) to put on trial those responsible, Le Drian said.

Ukrainian authorities published graphic images of alleged Russian atrocities on Twitter.

Moscow has retorted that the pictures are a Ukrainian "fabrication".

The Kremlin has repeatedly denied Ukrainian claims that it has targeted civilians and has rejected allegations of war crimes.

Sanctions

France's reaction echoed that of EU chief Charles Michel who on Sunday also condemned "atrocities" carried out by Russian forces and pledged further sanctions on Moscow.

"EU is assisting Ukraine & NGOs in gathering of necessary evidence for pursuit in international courts," he said, adding that "further EU sanctions & support are on their way."

Ursula Von der Leyen, head of the European Commission, also expressed outrage over the "unspeakable horrors".

The EU has imposed several waves of punishing sanctions on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine.

But the 27-nation bloc has stopped short of imposing an embargo on the Kremlin's oil and gas exports as some member states still rely heavily on Russian fossil fuels.

Weapons deliveries

France could come under greater pressure to accelerate weapons deliveries to Ukraine in the wake of the apparent execution of civilians and discovery of mass graves in Bucha.

Macron has spoken repeatedly with Russian leader Vladimir Putin since the February 24 invasion of Ukraine and has been wary of provoking the Kremlin, calling deliveries of tanks or aircraft to Ukraine "red lines".

Poland's deputy prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski accused France and Germany of being too close to Russia in an interview published Sunday.

(with newswires)
Minister for Trade and Industry, Hon. Alan Kyerematen has disclosed that five out of the Worlds six leading Automobile Companies are currently producing vehicles in Ghana.

Hon Alan Kyerematen made this remark at the inuagration of Nissan Vehicle Assembly Plant at the Tema Industrial Area on Thursday, March 31, 2022.

In attendance at the inauguration were President Akufo-Addo, Japanese Ambassador to Ghana, Mr. Hisanobu Mochizuki, Ministers of State, Chairman and Managing Director of Japan Motors Trading Company Limited, members of the diplomatic corps among other dignitaries present.

According to the Mr Kyerematen, Ghanas Automotive Development Policy has become a masterpiece of the automotive industry presenting itself as a template for other sub-Saharan African countries to adopt. Currently present in Ghana are Volkswagen (VW), Toyota, Nissan and others with Kantanka Automobile Company being the main local vehicle manufacturer.

The minister also noted that the investor community is expecting the full implementation of the policy. He added that the Ministry is engaging with the Automotive Assemblers Association of Ghana (AAAG), second-hand dealers, the Ministry of Finance and Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) to develop a roadmap for the smooth implementation of the outstanding issues, "and I wish to commend our private sector partners for their continuous support."

He stated, "This move is to position Ghana to take advantage of the increasing demand for vehicles in Africa and boost local production of vehicles that will go a long way to enhance the export of vehicles to neighbouring countries within ECOWAS and across the continent.

Africa is looking forward to doubling its current production of close to 1.5 million vehicles annually by 2030 and Ghana is looking forward to participating fully in this market. This cannot happen by chance; it would require deliberate efforts to build our capacities in the area of Components and Parts development to feed into the value chain of the automotive industry."

Mr. Kyerematen further noted that his outfit is embarking on a comprehensive supplier development programme to develop the entire automotive ecosystem through technological development, human capital and supply chains development. The programme will outline an incentive framework and regulatory regime to support the optimisation of the automotive value chain within Ghana.

The minister who is expectant of full participation of all relevant stakeholders in kick-starting the establishment of integrated automotive industry in Ghana, relying on local resources which would serve as raw materials for component manufacturing.

He hinted that a group of global vehicle components and parts manufacturing companies from South Africa, Germany, and Egypt will next month, undertake a study tour in Ghana to assess existing local capacity and initiate plans to establish strategic alliances with local private sector operators in the industry.

The new plant is expected to assemble Peugeot branded vehicles for Ghana and other West African markets.

Mr. Kyerematen pledged his sectors commitment to addressing the teething challenges while working together with all relevant stakeholders to create an enabling environment for a successful automotive industry in Ghana.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

Two persons have been picked up in connection with a shooting incident that led to the death of one person, while eight others sustained gunshot wounds on April 1, 2022, at Asunafo in the Kwabeng District of the Eastern Region.

Preliminary investigation established that the shooting incident occurred during a community clash between two factions over a mining activity in the town.

In the course of the incident, nine persons sustained gunshot wounds and were rushed to the Enyirensi Government Hospital, where one person died on arrival.

DSP Ebenezer Tetteh, Eastern Regional Police PRO, who confirmed the arrest of the two suspects on Sunday, urged the public to volunteer reliable information to assist the police arrest other culprits on the run.

We want to assure those persons that will be giving us such information that it is going to be treated with the utmost confidentiality, he said.

We are also going to ensure that persons who are linked to these disturbances are taken through the due process of the law and the law is made to punish them, so it will serve as a deterrent to other people who will try to take the law into their own hands, DSP Ebenezer Tetteh added.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

The Chiir Royal Family has accused the Police of besieging the Nandom Naa's Palace and conducting an unwarranted search after holding members of the family hostage.

In a press release from the Chiir Royal Family dated April 3, 2022, it says members of the family who even wanted to attend to natures call were prevented from doing so.

We (members of the Chiir Royal Family) woke up this dawn to see a heavy joint Military and Police Team that besieged the Palace and held us hostage and forcefully entered our rooms to mount an unprovoked, unwarranted, unnecessary and utterly disgusting "unsuccessful search for weapons" without providing any warrant to that effect.

It is evident that this search was only shamefully conducted in the Chir Royal Palace to our dismay. Some family members who even wanted to attend to nature's call were prevented and told by security officers that "no one is supposed to go out today'. This could only mean that there was an authorized curfew on the Chiir Royal family, parts of the release signed by Mr. Peter Aabenyaa Deri who is the head of Chiir Royal Family reads.

According to the family, the invasion by the Police has come on the back of the gazetting of the CEO of Rabito Clinic, Prof. Edmund Delle as the new Nandom Naa even though he has not been enskinned by the appropriate kingmakers and outdoored as custom and tradition demands and also in flagrant disregard of a High Court injunction.

The release explains that though the Chiir Royal Family petitioned the Upper West Regional House of Chiefs and wrote to the President of the National House of Chiefs to inform the House of the pending petition against the Rabito Clinco CEO, they decided to set aside all the rules and procedures guiding the Chieftaincy institution by gazetting Prof. Edmund Delle.

We are by this statement appealing to all relevant stakeholders of Nandom who really want peace to prevail in Nandom to call the Regional House of Chiefs to order by allowing the case to travel through the Judicial Committee of the Regional House of Chiefs for the right person to be determined and gazetted or in failure continue to station Military and Police officers in Nandom for the rest of the coming years, the Chiir Royal Family press release concludes.

Read the release below:
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky called Russian troops "murderers, torturers, rapists, looters" on Monday after dozens of bodies were found near the embattled capital, Kyiv, triggering global outrage and vows of tough new sanctions on Moscow.

Local authorities said they had been obliged to dig communal graves to bury the dead accumulating in the streets. Some bodies were found with their hands bound behind their backs, in scenes that sent shockwaves through international capitals.

Despite Russian denials of responsibility, condemnation was swift, with Western leaders, NATO and the UN all voicing horror at reports of civilian murders in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, and elsewhere.

President Zelensky was unsparing in his nightly video message, warning "concentrated evil has come to our land".

He described Russian troops as "murderers, torturers, rapists, looters, who call themselves the army and who deserve only death after what they did.

"I want every mother of every Russian soldier to see the bodies of the killed people in Bucha, in Irpin, in Hostomel," the president continued.

"I want all the leaders of the Russian Federation to see how their orders are being fulfilled."

Scale of killings still unclear

Zelensky said he had created a special body to investigate killings in areas from which Russian troops have withdrawn around the capital, as Moscow refocuses its energies on southeastern Ukraine.

The scale of the killings is still being investigated, but Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered so far.

Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba accused Russia of a "deliberate massacre", while Zelensky's spokesman, Sergiy Nikiforov, said the killings in Bucha "looks exactly like war crimes".

Russia's defence ministry pushed back, saying "not a single local resident" in Bucha suffered violence.

It accused Kyiv of bombarding its southern suburbs and falsifying images of corpses in "another production" for Western media.

Moscow's deputy ambassador to the UN said Russia had requested a UN Security Council meeting on Monday "in light of heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha".

AFP reporters in the town saw at least 20 bodies, all in civilian clothing, strewn across a single street.

Calls for harsher sanctions

Images of the dead have sparked global shock and calls for new measures against Russia.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the killings "a punch to the gut", while NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said the violence -- unseen in Europe for decades -- was "horrific" and "absolutely unacceptable".

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said new sanctions would be decided "in the coming days.

"President Putin and his supporters will feel the consequences," he said, as his defence minister raised the possibility of an end to gas imports.

'Something terrible is coming'

Europe's worst conflict in decades, sparked by Russia's invasion on 24 February, has already killed 20,000 people, according to Ukrainian estimates.

Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainians have fled the country, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighbouring countries in the last 24 hours alone, the UN refugee agency said.

In the eastern city of Kramatorsk, women, children and elderly people were boarding trains to flee the Donbas region.

"The rumour is that something terrible is coming," said Svetlana, a volunteer organising the crowd on the station platform.

Russia has redoubled its efforts in Ukraine's south and east, including carrying out several strikes Sunday on the strategic Black Sea port of Odessa, which Moscow said targeted an oil refinery and fuel depots.

Peace talks are scheduled to resume by video on Monday, though Russia's chief negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said it was too early for a top-level meeting between Zelensky and Putin.
The Member of Parliament (MP) for North Tongu Constituency, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has through another statement sought to expose H.E President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for his preference for extravagant travels.

According to the MP, the Presidents latest travel to the United States of America and the United Kingdom is costing the taxpayer over GHS3.5 million despite the president preaching the need to cut expenditure in the midst of the economic hardships.

President Akufo-Addo left Accra for Washington on Thursday 31st March 2022 at 11:52pm aboard a United Airlines Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner with call sign UAL997.

In his expose, Okudzeto Ablakwa explains that on arrival in Washington, the President already had the luxurious US$18,000 an hour LX-DIO airplane waiting for him.

Calculating the use of the plane by the president for various trips, Okudzeto says, It is imperative to note that so far, the Ghanaian taxpayer must cough up an astronomical US$465,000 in luxury rental charges. At current exchange, that is a scary GHS3,505,515.49.

He explains, Before the President landed at 6:40am at the Dulles International Airport in Washington on the 1st of April, the ubiquitous luxury LX-DIO had landed at same airport the previous day at 12:27pm waiting for President Akufo-Addo.

President Akufo-Addo couldnt wait to fly his favourite US$18,000 an hour LX-DIO from Washington where he departed at 10:13am and arrived at the Charlotte Douglas International Airport in North Carolina at 11:22am  a flight time of 01:09. It is important to acknowledge that there were more than a dozen available commercial flights with business class tickets not exceeding $700 in value.

Find more in the statement below:

Good evening, folks.

I know many of you have been waiting keenly for our consistently unimpeachable and authoritative flight tracking details of President Akufo-Addos latest travel to the United States of America and the United Kingdom.

As always, we appreciate your high interest, generous encouragement and most importantly your patriotic partnership in ensuring that there is greater transparency and accountability in the governance of our dear and only country.

Unfortunately, I do not have good news for you. Our crusade to get the President to keep his promise of protecting the public purse and our resolve to end naked profligacy still requires more work.

With the pretentious notion that the obnoxious E-Levy has been secured to rake in more revenue to finance his lavish indulgences, and after hurriedly granting a presidential assent of dubious validity, as President Akufo-Addo knows very well that 136 NPP MPs cannot purport to constitute a decision-making quorum; President Akufo-Addo is back to his old ways of Russian Oligarchic travels.

After a momentary glimmer of hope when he was compelled to fly commercial to Dubai last month, many had thought his penchant for egregious betrayal of the Ghanaian people by his obstinate dissipation of scarce taxes on his sybaritic lifestyle despite a hitherto loud promise to protect the public purse now belongs to the past. More so, considering his government's public posture of massive expenditure cuts as a direct response to the current economic crisis.

Apparently, we were merely deceived; President Akufo-Addo has for the umpteenth time ignored the precarious state of the Ghanaian economy and abandoned Ghana's US$36million Presidential Jet in favour of his most cherished ultra-luxury toy  the LX-DIO which now rents for US18,000 an hour.

It is clearly a helpless costly addiction which sadly, the Ghanaian taxpayer must pay for.

The President's latest misconduct appears to be the most deceptive thus far.

His new meet-me-there-strategy is a well hatched one to create the impression to Ghanaians back home that hes indeed repented and now committed to flying commercial only to catch up with his chartered aircraft in transit for the rest of his travels.

So, President Akufo-Addo left Accra for Washington on Thursday 31st March, 2022 at 11:52pm aboard a United Airlines Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner with call sign UAL997.

Before the President landed at 6:40am at the Dulles International Airport in Washington on the 1st of April, the ubiquitous luxury LX-DIO had landed at same airport the previous day at 12:27pm waiting for President Akufo-Addo.

President Akufo-Addo couldnt wait to fly his favourite US$18,000 an hour LX-DIO from Washington where he departed at 10:13am and arrived at the Charlotte Douglas International Airport in North Carolina at 11:22am  a flight time of 01:09. It is important to acknowledge that there were more than a dozen available commercial flights with business class tickets not exceeding $700 in value.

The President kept the LX-DIO with him as he addressed Bishop T.D. Jakes summit and then flew aboard the same extravagant jet yesterday the 2nd of April, 2022 at 9:28am US time and arriving at the London Stansted Airport at 9:40pm UK time. A flight time of some 7hours 54minutes.

At this point, it is unclear if the President will return to Ghana with the LX-DIO on Wednesday or if he would stick to the new deceptive strategy of being seen in the Ghanaian jurisdiction aboard commercial flights while hiding his elaborate chartered arrangements from the prying Ghanaian public.

It is imperative to note that so far, the Ghanaian taxpayer must cough up an astronomical US$465,000 in luxury rental charges. At current exchange, that is a scary GHS3,505,515.49.

This will mean that since May last year, the Ghanaian taxpayer has spent at least GHS28.5million on President Akufo-Addos ostentatious travels.

How duplicitous is that for a government that claims to be cutting expenditure drastically in the wake of widespread excruciating hardships and economic mismanagement, and yet our President has the conscience to spend a whopping 3.5million Ghana Cedis attending a church service and a fanciful tourism event in London.

With this terrible example from the President by attending events at great cost to the taxpayer that cannot be classified as priority, one wonders how the presidency can enforce its recent ban on ministerial international travels.

Be assured, this latest meet-me-there-strategy shall be vigorously exposed and defeated.

Our tracking continues; we shall keep you updated.

For God and Country.
North Tongu MP Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa

04.04.2022 LISTEN

North Tongu Member of Parliament (MP), Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has accused the President, H.E Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo of "sybaritic lifestyle."

He said the President has returned to his old ways of Russian Oligarchic travels immediately after assenting to the controversial Electronic Transaction Levy (E-Levy).

This is contained in a Facebook post detailing the cost of the Presidents latest travel to the United States of America and the United Kingdom.

President Akufo-Addo left Accra for Washington on Thursday 31st March 2022 at 11:52pm aboard a United Airlines Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner with call sign UAL997.

In his expose, Okudzeto Ablakwa explains that on arrival in Washington, the President already had the luxurious US$18,000 an hour LX-DIO airplane waiting for him.

Calculating the charges for various trips, Okudzeto says, It is imperative to note that so far, the Ghanaian taxpayer must cough up an astronomical US$465,000 in luxury rental charges. At current exchange, that is a scary GHS3,505,515.49.

The North Tongu MP says it is now clear government announced expenditure-cutting measures was just to push for the passage of the E-Levy.

With the pretentious notion that the obnoxious E-Levy has been secured to rake in more revenue to finance his lavish indulgences, and after hurriedly granting a presidential assent of dubious validity, as President Akufo-Addo knows very well that 136 NPP MPs cannot purport to constitute a decision-making quorum; President Akufo-Addo is back to his old ways of Russian Oligarchic travels.

After a momentary glimmer of hope when he was compelled to fly commercial to Dubai last month, many had thought his penchant for egregious betrayal of the Ghanaian people by his obstinate dissipation of scarce taxes on his sybaritic lifestyle despite a hitherto loud promise to protect the public purse now belongs to the past. More so, considering his government's public posture of massive expenditure cuts as a direct response to the current economic crisis.

Apparently, we were merely deceived; President Akufo-Addo has for the umpteenth time ignored the precarious state of the Ghanaian economy and abandoned Ghana's US$36million Presidential Jet in favour of his most cherished ultra-luxury toy  the LX-DIO which now rents for US18,000 an hour, Okudzeto Ablakwa explains in a post on his Facebook page.

He concludes, With this terrible example from the President by attending events at great cost to the taxpayer that cannot be classified as priority, one wonders how the presidency can enforce its recent ban on ministerial international travels.

Read the full statement from Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa in the attachment below:
04.04.2022 LISTEN

The Member of Parliament for North Tongu Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has once again accused President Akufo-Addo of chartering luxurious jets for his recent trips outside the country.

According to Mr. Ablakwa, the President in his trip to the United States and the United Kingdom boarded the LX-DIO which now rents $18,000 an hour.

In a Facebook post on April 3, the Member of Parliament for North Tongu stated that the President had deceived Ghanaians after he was applauded for going commercial during his Dubai trip.

He indicated that "apparently we we're merely deceived. President Akufo-Addo has for the umpteenth time ignored the precarious state of the Ghanaian economy and abandoned Ghana's US$36 million presidential jet in favour is his most cherished ultra-luxury toy- the LX-DIO, which now rents for US$18,000 an hour."

On March 8,2022, Modern Ghana News reported that, the President had boarded a commercial flight to Dubai.

He was commended by Okudzeto Ablakwa for finally listening to Ghanaians.

Read article here: https://www.modernghana.com/news/1143614/akufo-addo-goes-commercial-after-favorite-jet.html

It was understood the President heeded to critics to cut down his expenditure on foreign trips following the economic crisis.

Government further announced expenditure cut measures to restore the economy.
Member of Parliament (MP) for Tamale North, Alhassan Suhuyini has charged the Ghana Police Service (GSP) to focus on reforming its recruitment processes and ensure it is done right.

The process of recruiting officers in the service has become a matter of concern especially after some officers were implicated in the series of bullion van robberies in the country.

In the past weekend, a man alleged to be a Police officer was arrested after brandishing and threatening motorists with a gun.

In reaction, Alhassan Suhuyini has proposed the Ghana Police Service takes a critical look at reforming the recruitment processes.

We have to first of all tackle the issue of recruitment, get the recruitment right. The second thing is in-service training. After the recruitment, what is the nature of training given to them to remind them of the code? And then we can now talk about issue of motivation, the Tamale North Member of Parliament said in an interview with TV3.

Hon. Alhassan Suhuyini continued, We need to revisit the way we recruit people into the security. In the past, it wasnt easy for people to go into the Army or Police like people do now.
The Rwanda-Uganda border was reopened on 31st January 2022, following the closure of the border for about two years. The move to reopen the Katuna border, which has been among the critical issues at the centre of relations between the two countries, is a significant relief to the business community that has endured two years of trade disruption. The Katuna border reopening is great news for the Private Sector and Trade, opening up a chance to export Ugandan products. The Ugandan trade fraternity should resolve pending issues between Rwanda and Uganda to speedy normalize relations between the two countries.

There have been complaints about delays in crossing at the Katuna border, spotlighting that even with the reopening, more needs to be addressed. After three years of closure, there has been a general breakdown in bilateral trade. The morale among exporters is particularly low, and infrastructure is in disrepair. But with the opening of the border, trade volume is expected between the two countries. The major concern is now for both countries to rethink their prevalent trade policies and practices to flourish free trade.

For Uganda, improving infrastructure at the side of the border would go a long way to increase trade volume between the countries. There is a need to rehabilitate cracked parts of the Kabale-Katuna Highway that leads to the border. The potholes and mud have blocked heavy trucks, thereby hindering adequate transportation. Infrastructure enhances connectivity and encourages the number of exports. Boosting infrastructure would ensure that Uganda performs better in inter-state trade.

Uganda should focus on increasing security in the Katuna area. Ensuring adequate border security and management is essential for preventing and countering the flow of suspected insurgents. Border security and management are imperative to curb the illicit cross-border movement. Both countries have a flourishing tourism industry, and activities like gorilla trekking cut across the borders. Therefore, it is essential to warrant security for crossing tourists. Giving Border Patrol sensor technology and having more security personnel available to search vehicles can improve safety.

The unionisation of Ugandan exporters would boost the lagging trade at the border. Upon reopening, business at the border has been slow. To increase the volume of trade to Rwanda, the Uganda government should incentivize exporters to unionise. The formation of trade unions would bring about collective bargaining and increase bargaining power on the market. Ultimately, unionising would increase the price of Ugandan products in the Rwandan market, thereby boosting morale and productivity among traders.

The opening of the Katuna border is an opportunity to strengthen bilateral ties between the two states. The renewed free movement of goods and services would accelerate economic development. However, Uganda must revise its trade policies for free trade to blossom.

Preta Peace Namasaba is a writing fellow at the African Liberty
The Minister of National Security , Albert Kan-Dapaah has said Ghana has not experienced any terrorist attack.

This, he said, does not mean that the country is relaxing on its security measures.

He said these while answering questions on the security situation in Ghana, in Parliament on Monday April 4.

Mr Kan-Dapaah said [We] remain on high alert to avert terrorist infiltration with proactive measures, counter-terrorism operations along the borders in the country. Safeguarding the country is a key priority for all state security agencies, we will remain vigilante.

In recent years, apart from Burkina Faso, Mali, there have been a couple of terrorist attacks in Cote DIvoire, about seven attacks in Benin, recently one in Togo.

Ghana has so far not been attacked but we believe that we have to hold ourselves at all times to ensure that if there is attack we will be able to handle it, it does not mean the terrorist are not planning, we believe they may be planning but we believe we have to do what is necessary to ensure we overcome them.

He added that At the beginning of 2022, we were all optimistic that we will be able to salvage the global economy from the ring of covid pandemic[but] the Russia-Ukraine conflict further plunged the global economy into abyss of economic catastrophe.

The situation has been made worse by coups in [some West African countries] including Mali, Burkina Faso.

I want to state that Ghana is relatively stable despite a number of threats, both external and internal, that can undermine security and stability.

These threats have been prominent by crime, land an chieftaincy disputes, piracy and activity of secessionists, he said, adding that a number of measures have been introduced to deal with threats, Mr Kan-Dapaah said.

These measures include enhancement of highway patrols and night patrols, introduction of horse patrol operations.

3news.com
A 21-year-old man, Moses Appiah, has allegedly killed his grandparents at Akyem Hemang in the Eastern Region.

The Police Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the Eastern Regional Police Command , DSP Ebenezer Tetteh, confirmed the incident and said the victims were aged 75 and 80.

He said preliminary investigations revealed the suspect attacked the grandparents with a fufu pounding pestle and a metal hammer on Saturday, April 2.

Deep cuts were inflicted on the victims left eye and chest.

The victims were taken to the Hawa Memorial Hospital at Oseim and declared dead by the medical doctor in charge.

The bodies of the two aged victims would be processed to the Police Hospital in Accra for autopsy, the police said.

The suspect, Appiah Moses, has been arrested by community members and handed over to the police by the Akyem Hemang chief

He is in police custody awaiting investigation and appropriate charge before he is arraigned for court processes.

Neighbours said the suspect had early on attacked his grandparents before the second attempt, resulting in their death.

3news.com
Minister for National Security, Albert Kan-Dapaah has stated the countrys security machinery is on high alert for fresh secessionist attacks in the country from the West African sub-region.

The Government has picked irrelevant information secessionists are gathering momentum for fresh secessionist attacks on the country, the security Minister said.

He minces no words to say the national security apparatus is on high alert to curtail any of such eventualities in the country.

The sector Minister made this revelation highlighting some areas of security concerns on the floor of Parliament today Monday, April 4, 2022.

According to the Minister, crimes such as disputes over lands and chieftaincy disputes are among the major areas of concern in the country.

Kan-Dapaah was answering some urgent questions on national security in Parliament.

Again the Minister highlighted some of the difficulties in handling the security situation in Bawku.

He also raised concerns about the situation of terrorism in Ghana's neighbouring countries adding that the government has instituted some measures to prevent such occurrence in the country.

Source: Classfmonline.com
Dr. Sulemana Alhassan Anamzoya

04.04.2022 LISTEN

Dr. Sulemana Alhassan Anamzoya, former Chief Executive Officer for the Northern Development Authority (NDA) has extended felicitation to Ghanaian Muslims especially those in the Tolon constituency of the Northern Region as the 2022 Ramadan begins.

In a brief Ramadan message, he called on Muslims to take advantage of the holy month to pray for mother Ghana to continue to flourish.

"I felicitate all Ghanaian Muslims especially Muslims in the Tolon constituency of the Northern Region as the Holy Month of Ramadan begins," he stated.

He revealed that Ramadan remains a period of spiritual reflection, faith building, abstinence, sacrifice and supplications to Almighty Allah.

According to him, the Akufo-Addo government is doing everything possible to salvage situations for a prosperous and stable economy.

Read the full message below:

I felicitate all Ghanaian Muslim particularly Muslims in the Tolon Constituency, of the Northern Region as the Holy Month of Ramadan begins.

Ramadan is the month when Muslims globally observe one of the five pillars of their faith, share with their brothers and sisters and show love to all people around them.

Ramadan remains a period of spiritual reflection, faith building, abstinence, sacrifice and supplications to the Almighty Allah.

The importance of the period is even more crucial for us as we seek Allahs intervention and divine guidance in addressing some challenges that we face as a people.

It is evident that the government of the day is doing everything possible to salvage situations for a prosperous, peaceful and loving nation.

For our Muslim compatriots in the New Patriotic Party in the Northern Region, let us use the opportunity of the Ramadan to pray for sound leadership, peace and growth of our party knowing that Allah answers the prayers of the faithful.

I wish you all a happy Ramadan.
The John A. Kufour Foundation (JAKF) has launched the maiden edition of the Youth in Agribusiness festival to establish the Youth in Agribusiness Information hub in Ghana.

The festival, which will be celebrated on the theme: Youth in Agribusiness in Ghana: the story so far and the way forward in July, 2022 at the Jubilee Park and the Prempeh Assembly Hall in Kumasi, will be one-stop-shop where all the necessary information needed for the development and sustainability of agribusiness could be accessed by the young individuals in Ghana.

The festival is designed to showcase the outstanding development of young people within the agribusiness sector. It seeks to celebrate distinguished young agribusiness practitioners by providing the platform for them to share their success stories.

"It is therefore important to provide the platform to share the experiences, learn lessons and network along the value chain which will serve as an inspiration to generate interest for both employed and unemployed youths, more especially for those who do not see agribusiness as an attractive business venture will be exposed to the achievement of youth in Agribusiness The Chief Executive Officer of JAK Foundation Prof. Baffour Agyemang Duah said.

He explained that a month before the main festival, there will be a pre-engagement on agribusiness educational programmes for students from selected universities such as the University of Development Studies, University of Ghana, University of Cape Coast, University of Health and Allied Sciences, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science & Technology, University of Winneba, Kumasi Technical University, some agriculture colleges and selected youth groups.

The festival is to provide facilities for young entrepreneurs in the agric sector to network and also share their results with the public.

"The initiative was born out of the former President John Kufuors own personal commitment to improving agriculture and agri-related businesses in the country, particularly those that are led by young people he added.

The Convener of the Youth in Agribusiness Festival, Mr. Jeffrey Agyemang-Duah, said the festival is envisaged to bring together major stakeholders in agribusiness on one platform to share their experiences, lessons learnt, and to network along the agricultural value-chain.

He added that the festival will serve as an inspiration to generate interest in agribusiness for both employed and unemployed youth, stressing that those who do not find agribusiness as an attractive business venture will be exposed to the achievements of the youth in agribusiness and will therefore have evidence of the prospects and the life-changing experiences in agribusiness.

Mr. Duah further explained that the festival was inspired by the need to motivate the youth to accept agriculture and its related activities as a commercial business venture.

The Youth in Agribusiness Festival is targeting people aged between 18 to 35 who are involved in farming, technology service provision, agri-input dealership, agri advisory and financial service provision, processing and value addition, packaging, branding, digital or online marketing, transportation and distribution and agri-tourism, among others he explained.

By getting more young people into agribusiness through this festival, we believe, it will contribute to the reduction of youth unemployment in Ghana which unfortunately, shot from 8.72 percent in 2019 to 9.46 percent in 2020 according to International Labor Organization.

"We hope to create linkages and networking space among young agribusiness entrepreneurs with industry leaders and investors; an electronic form has been designed for organisations and individuals who wish to exhibit their products and services to visit the John A. Kufuor Foundations website for more details, he added.

The Chief Executive Officer of the National Entrepreneurship and Innovation Programme Ghana, Mr. Kofi Ofosu Nkansah stated that they are excited to be a part of the festival.

As a government programme responsible for the youth enterprise, we are to support the youth enterprises like the agribusiness, therefore, we see this festival as a good platform for partnership in the attainment of the programme objectives, he said.

The Head of the Agri-Biz programme, GIZ, Dr. Elke Stumpf in a brief remark said GIZ has not relented on its efforts in the job creation process, adding that GIZ has been working to promote job creation, particularly for the youth and women.

Trading is an important and crucial aspect of any business or entrepreneur for reaching international markets, she added.

The Chief Executive Officer, Chamber of Agribusiness Ghana, Mr. Anthony Morrison, launching the festival explained that Agriculture in Ghana requires restructuring to give the youth the opportunities to contribute to food security and good health.

I strongly believe that Ghana has what it takes both comparatively and competitively to change the agriculture transformation, and as stakeholders, we should all contribute to this transformation, he added.

The Head of Marketing and Communication at Agricultural Development Bank (ADB), Mr. Solomon Adu Atefoe explained that ADB is associated with youth in agribusiness festival.

We are happy to partner with the John Agyekum Kufour Foundation for this project and hope to see a successful end, he added.

Present at the launch were the Ghana Investment Promotion, National Entrepreneurship, and Innovation Programme, National Youth Authority, GIZ-Agribiz Project, Chamber of Agribusiness Ghana, Oak Foundation, Kent Investment, Ghana Agriculture & Rural Development Journalist Association and Agribusiness Student Association of Ghana.
Daily 8am (translated by RAWA), April 4, 2022

The Taliban Ministry of Higher Education has written to all public and private universities that female professors are no longer allowed to attend men's scientific conferences.

The letter states that female professors, students and graduates are not allowed to participate in men's programs.

The letter also instructs all public and private universities to set up programs for men and women separately, and no man has the right to participate in women's programs.

The letter states that the graduation ceremony of female students should be held in accordance with the Islamic hijab, and no female student has the right to post a photo or video of the ceremony on social media.

The letter instructs private universities that students have no right to celebrate their graduation ceremony without the coordination of the relevant university.

The Taliban Ministry of Higher Education had previously banned professors and students from talking to the media.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

Panwways Ghana, a subsidiary of Panways Group srl, an industrial consultancy firm has implored mining firms in Ghana to adopt eco-friendly ways to control dust without wasting water.

While commending organizers and partners of the Ghana Mining week celebration and the Gold expo, the company noted that the government of Ghana was committed to the various water and sanitation conventions which Ghana had subscribed.

Panways wish to state that its wide interest in soil stabilization and dust control wish to advice all and sundry to adopt our technologically advanced green dust control. This technology is ecologically friendly and is being applied in Western and Eastern Europe, particularly Albania, Italy and Crimea with host of other countries.

This was contained in a statement issued and signed by Mr. Patrick Kwesie, Managing Partner of Panways and copied to the media.

The statement said the mining week and the Gold Expo has helped shape the mining industry standards and its management effort to create enough sustainability in their various host Communities.

We are proud because the ordinary miner must be noticed and live luxury as he or she toils. Indeed, this initiative is an eye-opener, it said.

The statement recommended to the organizers of the event and government to concentrate on other vital minerals such as Silica sand, Kaolin, Bauxite, Manganese, Granite and limestone which were abundant in the Jomoro municipality.

It further pleaded with the various stakeholders in government to assist Panways and Unikat Handles Gmbh to assess the Jomoro municipality for national development.

The statement finally commended the government and the various mining companies as well as their related support services firm for the prompt support they rendered to the victims of the Appiatse disaster that threw the whole country into a state of mourning.

We wish to thank the Western Regional minister for putting the region in the utmost and prestigious state for investors, it added.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

The Deputy Majority Leader, Hon Alexander Kwamena Afenyo-Markin has said the Minority's suit at the Supreme Court was just to give false hope to sympathizers of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) who were very angry.

He explained that James Gyekye Quayson, the embattled Assin North MP though was in his office, but was legally barred from entering the chamber considering the fact that, his election had been annulled by the Court.

The Effutu lawmaker added that there was no process of appeal before any Court of Appeal to warrant a stay of the High Court judgement.

He however indicated that the Majority MPs were set in their numbers.

Hon Afenyo-Markin was speaking on News File, a political and social affairs program on Joys news TV channel last Saturday, April 2nd, 2022.

"The fact of the matter, on that fateful day the E-levy was passed, we had 274 members because of the annulment of the Assin North elections, and the Minority leadership ensured that he didn't come to the chamber. so why can't they be truthful to their sympathizers and stop leading them astray," he noted.

He argued that the Minority had 136 members at that time with the absence of Assin North MP.

According to him, assuming all of the Minority members were even present, the quorum for taking such decisions ought to be half of the House. "Half of the House would, therefore, will be 137, not 138," Afenyo-Markin said.

He added, "Though Hon Sarah Adwoa Safo wasnt around at the time of proceedings, the Majority still had the 137 required to pass the bill without the Minority, that must also be well noted.

"The Minority cannot argue on the basis that Parliament required 138 to make such a decision since the number of MPs by law at the time were 274 and not 275."
From the street with the hustle life to the project life, Ghanaian sensational musician, Joseph Luminary Adzrago, known in music circles as Luminary DMR on the first day of April 2022, donated to residents of his hometown, Adidome in the Volta Region.

Lumi-DMR, known for his philanthropic routines, embarked on a charity project dubbed Donate and Support for Brilliant Students aimed at supporting the much less privileged in the small town of Tswala Adidome in the North Volta of Ghana where he hails from.

The artiste/songwriter, philanthropist and CEO of Development Means Reform Records (DMR Records) seemed to have a resounding success in rapidly improving the music system and championing youth empowerment as he was recently honoured with an award by the ECOWAS Youth Council as an ECOWAS Youth Ambassador for his philanthropic gestures in May 2020 during the COVID-19 lockdown in Ghana.

One of which was when he partnered with media houses to donate relief items including food to the hardest-hit and vulnerable through his Lumi-DMR Foundation.

The skilled entrepreneur and musician is known for his hit songs, AGYEIWAA, CANABIS, BOBOBO and a lot more. His latest song titled 'I DEY BUY ALL' features young legendary Afrobeat musician, Tic, which is equally enjoying massive rotation on both radio and television following his five years distribution deal with Universal Music Group.
The C K Tedam University of Technology and Applied Science (C K UTAS), at Navrongo in the Upper East Region, has launched a nationwide awareness of Transthyretin Amyloidosis (ATTR) project, led by a nine-member team of scientist.

The project is aimed at raising awareness to support the early detection and diagnosis of Transthyretin Amyloidosis in Ghana, from a Public and Health Professional Trainers and Trainees' Perspective. In an interview with our Modern Ghana News during the launch in Navrongo, a senior lecturer of C K UTAS, Department of Applied Biology, School of Environment and Life Sciences Dr. Kweku Appiah said, the course of the disease has to do with the normal protein referred to us thyretin protein, but non-communicable disease.

He stated that, depending on the circumstances, if it has to do with old age, most likely there is a high tendency that Transthyretin protein might miss-fold. Proteins Dr. Appiah indicated are generally found in the human system, and when proteins miss-fold, they end up in our organs such as the brain, heart, kidney liver, and a host of other organs in the body and also in our tissues.

He added that another dimension of it is the genetic factor where we inherit a mutant gin of the protein. When that happened, he stated that the adverse effect that comes along with the miss folding of the protein will start at age 20 to about 30 years.

Meanwhile, Dr. Appiah indicated that research into Transthyretin Amyloidosis is however limited to Africa and West Africa alone.

The Vice-Chancellor of C K UTAS Professor Eric Magnus Wilmot who launched the project explained the historical antecedent of the disease saying research has shown that the disease produced from TTR is pronounced among African-Americans.Once the African-Americans trace their root from Africa as a result of the slave trade, it is of the belief that it will equally be prevalent in Africa, and truly, has it been detected in Ghana, Serra Leone, the Gambia, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, and Nigeria.

Prof Wilmot stated that, unfortunately, the countrys health care system has not been programmed in a way how to detect these things early and help find the solution to them. Prof Wilmot disclosed that the research is the first of its kind in our Sub-Region and CK UTAS is privileged to launch it.

It will help train the public on its early detection and once it is diagnosed solution follows. He said the launch forms the first phase of the study and when successful, he believes the University through the project, will lead the efforts at bringing the diagnoses to the doorsteps of Ghanaians and all the necessary things that are needed in combating the disease.

GBCNEWS/EA/GA
Reverend ASP Francis K. Amenuvor, the Chaplain of the Volta Regional Police Command, on Sunday said corruption, wickedness and other social vices were on the rise because Christians had failed to make the needed change in society.

He said if Christians, who made up 70 per cent of the Ghanaian population, could exude true Christian values, the ills of society would be nibbed in the bud.

Rev. ASP. Amenuvor was preaching a sermon on the theme: "Building a new nation in Christ" at the Edem congregation of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church at Adaklu Kodzobi in the Adaklu District.

He said a new nation was a country made up of people with new hearts, new spirits, new thinking and a new way of life in Christ.

Rev. ASP. Amenuvor said corruption which used to be a taboo word was now glorified by all, including Christians.

He said, "though we are unfaithful to God, His love for us is still unwavering and He is calling us to turn back to Him."

Rev. ASP. Amenuvor said the world was going through a lot of challenges because "we have turned our back to God and are following our hearts' desires."

He appealed to Christians to be the vessels that God should use to build a new nation.

The Regional Chaplain noted that the new nation God desired for man was devoid of corruption, wickedness, backbiting, mudslinging and a place where there would be equal opportunities for all.

He encouraged Christians to remain steadfast even in times of challenges and to trust and remain faithful and committed to Christ Jesus.

GNA
Rwanda's Court of Appeal on Monday upheld a 25-year prison term against ailing "Hotel Rwanda" hero Paul Rusesabagina on terrorism charges, rejecting a prosecution appeal to increase the penalty to life.

The fiercely outspoken critic of President Paul Kagame, who has been in custody for almost 600 days, was convicted last year after a trial his family and supporters branded a sham that was plagued with irregularities.

"Since he is a first-time offender, the court finds that his sentence should not be increased, because the 25 years he was given is in accordance with the weight of his crimes, and the court maintains his sentence," said judge Francois Regis Rukundakuvuga.

State prosecutors had appealed the original sentence, saying the punishment against the former Kigali hotel manager was too lenient and should be increased to life.

The court was also ruling Monday on appeals against sentences meted out to Rusesabagina's 20 co-defendants, who were originally jailed for between three and 20 years.

All the accused were convicted in September 2021 of backing an armed rebel group blamed for a spate of deadly attacks in Rwanda in 2018 and 2019.

The 67-year-old Rusesabagina has boycotted almost all proceedings in the case against him, and he was not in court for Monday's ruling.

Rusesabagina is credited with saving more than 1,200 lives during the 1994 genocide, in which 800,000 mostly Tutsis, but also moderate Hutus, were slaughtered.

But, in the years after Hollywood made him an international celebrity, a more complex image emerged of a staunch government critic whose tirades against Kagame led him to be treated as an enemy of the state.

Rusesabagina 'abducted'

'Hotel Rwanda' hero Paul Rusesabagina was arrested in August 2020. By Simon Wohlfahrt AFPFile

Last month, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention concluded that Rusesabagina had been "abducted" when he was arrested in August 2020 and that his detention was "arbitrary", calling for his immediate unconditional release.

Rusesabagina's family -- who have already warned he could die behind bars -- in early March said his health was at a "crisis" point and that he needed treatment immediately.

"(He) appears to have suffered partial facial paralysis which is impairing his speech, following his complaints of ongoing weakness and severe pain in his arm and jaw," the family said in a statement.

"There is no doubt that the mental and physical harm inflicted on Rusesabagina, which includes four days of physical torture and starvation in August 2020, and 250 days of solitary confinement in Rwanda's Mageragere Prison, will now have a permanent impact on his state of health and remaining quality of life."

Rusesabagina, who is also a Belgian national, became the most famous Rwandan globally after American actor Don Cheadle dramatised his deeds during the genocide in the 2004 Hollywood film "Hotel Rwanda".

He later used his celebrity to denounce rebel-leader-turned-president Kagame, who has been in power since 1994 and is accused by critics of crushing opponents and ruling through fear.

Rusesabagina left Rwanda in 1996, living in Belgium and then the United States, where he has permanent residency.

He was arrested in August 2020 when a plane he believed was bound for Burundi landed instead in Kigali after what his family has described as a kidnapping.

Both the United States and Belgium have voiced concern that Rusesabagina had been denied a fair trial, and his family insist their ailing father has been mistreated in prison and denied proper legal services.

Ahead of the original verdict, Kagame dismissed criticism of the case, saying Rusesabagina was in the dock not because of his fame but over the lives lost "because of his actions".
The United Nations through its United Nations Partnership on Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNPRPD) has organized a 5-day workshop for stakeholders within its community.

The training is expected to improve the all-round perception of persons with disability.

Speaking at the event today, April 4, 2022, the Resident Coordinator of the United Nations, Charles Abani stated that the inclusion of persons with disabilities in all facets of life was necessary if the targets of the Sustainable Development Goals (SCGs) are to be achieved.

In delivering his speech, he stated, disability inclusion is an essential condition for upholding human rights, sustainable development, peace and security. It is also central to the promised of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development to leave no one behind.

He added that, it was of great importance that persons with disabilities are put at the center and not left behind. He noted that, the mantra of nothing about us without us needs to be brought to life.

He encouraged stakeholders to not just seek to bring about the change, but to approach the situation as a society to ensure that all persons with disabilities realize their rights and take up positions at the political and economic space.

In an interview with Modern Ghana News, President of the National Federation of Disability Organizations, Mawunyo Yakar-Dagbah stated that the aim of the workshop, although made up majority of abled persons, was to equip the disabled persons on ways they can be included in the grand scheme of affairs in order not to be left behind.

She bemoaned the lack of attention on the Disability Act which was passed in 2006. According to her, the inability of government to properly implement the act is hindering the ability of the federation in executing its duties as well as cementing the rights and safety of persons with disabilities.

She indicated that, the disability Act that was passed in 2006, Act 715 and then in 2007 government also ratified the UN convention on the rights of persons with disabilities. Actually signed in 2007 and then ratified in 2012. It requires that you amend your domestic laws if there was a need and clearly there is a need.

"Even with our act there is no mention of women with disabilities, children with disabilities and women face double discriminations as a result of being women and being disabled. There was nothing on situation of humanitarian crises and the Act itself did not come with a legislative instrument. There are several provisions in there which are not well explained as to how it should be implemented.

She indicated that the act created the National Council of Persons with Disabilities, but the council is not well resourced and as such making the goal of equipping all disabled persons quite challenging and slow.

The workshop will last till April 8, 2022.
The Ghana Police Service has announced that it arrested some 28 suspected armed robbers through various operations in the country at the end of March 2022.

In a press release issued on Monday, April 4, 2022, the Police confirm that two armed robbers were shot dead during that intelligence-led operations.

As a result of sustained, intelligence-led operations conducted across the country in the month of March 2022, the Police arrested twenty-eight robbery suspects and two other suspects were shot dead in the course of the operations, parts of the Police statement reads.

While the suspects are being prosecuted in various courts, the Ghana Police Service has extended appreciation to the communities that assisted in these anti-armed robbery operations.

The Police in the statement have assured the public that it shall continue with the fight against robbery and all other crimes to ensure a safer and secure environment for all.

Below is the full Police statement issued today:

Twenty Eight (28) Armed Robbery Suspects arrested and two shot dead in March

As a result of sustained, intelligence-led operations conducted across the country in the month of March, 2022, the Police arrested twenty eight robbery suspects and two other suspects were shot dead in the course of the operations.

The suspects who are being prosecuted in various courts include: Zakaria Gomna, Ayenduo Sule, Ahmed Abubaku, Emmanuel Frimpong @ Attah Panin, Seth Frimpong, Stephen Arthur, Awudu Yusifu, Selasi Agorsor, Musah Inusah, Kofi Aszilevi Atta Essau and Kassim Mohammed. The others are Kwaku Okyere, Collins Atobia , Prince Tei Larbi, Prosper Beesi, Francis Mensah, Salifu Illiasu, Yahaya Zakaria, Omar Abubakar, Amadu Osmanu, Aliu Mohamadu, Evans Akolgo, Abotitogum Agonga Joseph, Sophia Johnson, Umaru Garage and Abuchy Abu.

We would like to commend all the Police commands and the special anti-robbery task forces that participated in the operations.

We would also like to express our gratitude to the communities that assisted the police in these anti-armed robbery operations.

We would like to assure the good people of Ghana that we shall continue with the fight against robbery and all other crimes to ensure a safer and secure environment for all.

We therefore seek your continued help and support in this fight, for we are very much aware that we achieve more when we work together.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

Students of Wulugu Senior High School in the North East Region, who were involved in the riot that led to the destruction of school property, have been surcharged GH76 each.

In March 2022, the students protested over the quality of food served to them among other concerns and vandalised school property in the process.

The school was subsequently shut down by the Regional Security Council to allow investigations into the incident.

Subsequently, the five-member committee has submitted its report to the school board.

They have made some far-reaching recommendations that will help deal with the situation.

The NEC considered the recommendations and also passed some resolutions on the recommendations that have been made, North East Regional Minister, Yidana Zakaria, said to Citi News.

He also noted that five of the students believed to be the leaders of the riot have been expelled from the boarding house of the school.

Because they are the ring leaders, they will pay a little more than their colleagues would, he noted further. Overall, all the students have been billed to pay some amount of money that will be used to repair the damage they have caused, Mr. Zakaria said.

The Minister further indicated that all students are to report to school tomorrow, Tuesday, April 5, 2022, after almost a month of closure.

---citinewsroom
04.04.2022 LISTEN

Former Member of Parliament for Salaga South of the Savannah Region, Hon. Adam Salifu Braimah on Sunday donated 200 bags of sugar to the Muslim community in the constituency to support them observe this year's Ramadan.

The bags of sugar is expected to be distributed to Mosques, Imams, women and the youth within the area as part of his contribution to help ensure a successful Ramadan.

According to him, the items were his contribution to supporting Muslims in the constituency undergoing spiritual cleansing this period considered as a major pillar in the Islamic calendar.

The former regional minister for Savannah Region commended his Muslim brothers and sisters for their resilience and enormous support given him over the years.

He prayed for Allah's guidance to enable them endure the challenges they will encounter in the remaining days of the fasting.

He implored them to endeavor to pray for President Akufo-Addo and the government to lead Ghana to prosperity and progress.

He also pledged his continuous support to them and wished them a fruitful fasting period.
Posted by Liam on at 08:46 AM CST



George Lucas had been attempting to use the name Utapau in Star Wars projects for years, but always ended up changing it to another name. Utapaus first appearance was in an early rough draft of a planet that would become Tatooine.







projects for years, but always ended up changing it to another name. Utapaus first appearance was in an early rough draft of a planet that would become Tatooine. Ralph McQuarrie began developing a design for a sinkhole planet during the early work on A New Hope in 1976. Lucas would reference these designs when making Revenge of the Sith.







in 1976. Lucas would reference these designs when making Utapau first appears in an issue of the Star Wars: Clone Wars tie-in comic. The 2004 short story Reversal of Fortune stars Barris Offee, Aayla Secura, Shaak Ti, and Stass Allie.







tie-in comic. The 2004 short story Reversal of Fortune stars Barris Offee, Aayla Secura, Shaak Ti, and Stass Allie. There is some discrepancy on Commander Codys fate as a result of the LEGO Star Wars video game, which shows him being killed by Grievous prior to Obi-Wans duel.







video game, which shows him being killed by Grievous prior to Obi-Wans duel. The MagnaGuards arent given many distinguishing factors, but the video game The Clone Wars: Lightsaber Duels introduced the villainous EG-5, who wields two red lightsabers.







introduced the villainous EG-5, who wields two red lightsabers. Tion Medon is played by Australian actor Bruce Spence, who is best known for his roles in other geek franchises like The Matrix, The Lord of the Rings , and Mad Max .







, and . The Crisis on Utapau story arc reel had to find creative means of making sure that Anakin and Grievous never meet. Based on their early interaction during the Chancellors rescue, the two have apparently never met.







Within the Seperatist Council is the Quarren leader Tikkes, who surprisingly became a fan favorite. A fan campaign pushed very hard for Filoni to incorporate Tikkes in The Clone Wars . Filoni planned to use him in the seventh season, but the episodes were not completed.







. Filoni planned to use him in the seventh season, but the episodes were not completed. Steven Spielberg stepped in to direct moments of the chase with Grievous. Spielberg released two films the same year as Revenge of the Sith with the remake of War of the Worlds and Munich . The original War of the Worlds was one of Lucass inspirations, and Spielbergs version features significant use of Lucass Industrial Lights and Magic in one of their largest productions.







with the remake of and . The original was one of Lucass inspirations, and Spielbergs version features significant use of Lucass Industrial Lights and Magic in one of their largest productions. The Commando Cody adventure Radar Men From The Moon inspired the feature film Lost Planet Airmen, but that movies hero was only referred to as Rocket Man and not Cody.

Hey there,fans! This week on the site were sinking into the underlevels of Utapau with an exploration of the pivotal moment inwhere Obi-Wan duels General Grievous and suffers through Order 66. Check out our  Expand Your Mind  article to learn about the sequences relevance to the overallcanon, but stay tuned throughout the week for more articles, insights, videos, and merchandising content.was the most action-packedfilm to date, and Utapau is the site of some of the films most memorable moments. Not only do you get a major battle, an exciting lightsaber duel, and a non-traditional chase sequence, but this was where the turning point of the entire Clone War took place. The first moments of Order 66 occur when Commander Cody fires on Boga and attempts to track down Obi-Wan.Its an underrated planet for sure, so read more about Utapau with our Force Facts.What do you think,fans? Would you like to see Utapau explored more in the new continuity? What do you think of Grievous's death? Let us know in the forums , and as always, may the Force be with you!Check out Rebelscum.com merch!Be sure to follow us on all of our social media platforms:
A judge in Kigali has ruled that Paul Rusesabagina, the hotel manager credited with giving hundreds of people shelter during the 1994 Rwandan genocide, will only serve a 25-year sentence for terrorism, not a life sentence as the prosecution has demanded.

"Since he is a first time offender, the court finds that his sentence should not be increased, because the 25 years he was given is in accordance with the weight of his crimes, and the court maintains his sentence," said judge Francois Regis Rukundakuvuga on Monday.

Rusesabagina, 67, was convicted in September of eight terrorism changes after the court said he supported activities against President Paul Kagame's rule.

Although convicted on these charges, he refused to take part in the original trial, calling the process a sham and politically motivated. His supporters and a number of diplomats in the international community have come to his defense.

He came to trial in Rwanda after he said he was abducted, which is against international law. The United Nations has formally requested the Rwandan government address the allegations that he has been abducted and arbitrarily detained.

The former hotel manager was not in court on Monday during the prosecution's appeal against the 'lenient' sentence.

"Given the significance of the charges of which Rusesabagina was convicted and the impact of those crimes on people and their assets, he should not be given a lenient sentence. He should be given life imprisonment," said public prosecutor Jean Pierre Habarurema earlier in the day.

While Rusesabagina admits having a leadership role in the Rwanda Movement for Democratic Change (MRCD), he denies responsibility for attacks carried out by its armed wing, the National Liberation Front (FLN).

During the trial, judges said the two groups were indistinguishable.

The 2004 movie portraying Rusesabagina was an international success, and he later used his fame to denounce actions by the Kagame government.

Kagame has ruled Rwanda since 1994. Human rights groups say that Rusesabagina's case is an example of his continual intimidation of all members of the opposition.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

2023 is just around the corner and very soon Nigerians will be trooping to the polling stations to cast their votes to elect a new President. Itll be a defining election that will determine whether the country will remain as one or whether the chaos, anarchy and hardship will continue.

Their options, unfortunately, will be very limited.

All the major presidential candidates are over the age of seventy suffering from incontinence problems, dementia and other old-age ailments and have at one time or another been in government or involved in it. A majority of them dont have clean slates and their past achievements are subject to debate.

Agbaya is a Yoruba word that describes an older person  mostly men  who dont act their age, thinking they are perpetual Man-Childs and not knowing when to quit  even after theyve got the T-shirt!

To move the country, forward the nation needs a new young vibrant leader: all over the world, with the exception of a few, young leaders in their forties are being elected to take their countries forward into the 21st century.

In Nigeria the constitution needs to be amended: nobody over the age of 65 should be allowed to contest; a presidential candidate needs to be in touch with the modern world around him. And that means being physically and mentally fit and how to be part of it. Theres no point in electing an old Baba who cant even operate a smartphone, let alone know what a gym is!

Second on the list should be education: a slew of previous leaders havent had the educational qualifications to string a sentence together let alone a paragraph or an entire speech. Minimum qualifications for a person wishing to be President should be at least a Masters degree (- preferably not in Theatre Arts or Religious Studies!). In addition to educational qualifications the candidate should be made to do an I.Q Test  no room for dullards!

Previous criminal convictions or indictments will have to be third on my list. Im a great believer in forgiveness and believe if youve done your time for your crime you should be given a second chance. This, however, in my books, does not extend to Treasury looters. If youve been convicted for corruption or at one-time or another been a guest of the EFCC chances are if elected to high office again the looting will continue especially when all of them believe in the maxim of an ex-President who doesnt believe corruption is a crime. So, if you have a conviction or the EFCC has paid you a visit you shouldnt be allowed to stand for office.

So, if my conditions are followed 95% of the Presidential candidates will have to step aside  and finally retire!

With all the Babas (- aka agbayas) gone itll pave the way for a new generation of young leaders to emerge who wont keep on reminiscing about how great they were during the civil war and will get to grips with the task of nation re-building.

Follow me on Twitter: @Archangel641 or visit http://www.archangel641.blogspot.co.uk
04.04.2022 LISTEN

When health emergencies occur it is the doctors and other healthcare providers who are on the frontlines in responding to the humanitarian and public health crises. But they along with those impacted are not just part of the problem but also key to effective solutions. Along with most affected people, it is the frontline healthcare providers who should be shaping responses to the pandemics and health emergencies.

Associations of different medical specialities must join forces to give input to the government to help improve responses to pandemics like COVID-19 and other health emergencies. Same holds true for networks of other healthcare providers and key actors who have a critical role to play in such crises. Failing on organized medicine will only defeat us on the goals that public health and sustainable development initiatives are trying to achieve. Also let us remember that it was healthcare workers who were on the frontlines in the severest phases of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 13th national conference of AIDS Society of India (13th ASICON) in Hyderabad, India, opened with an important session hosted by Organized Medicine Academic Guild (OMAG) of India  a network of over 15 professional medical associations in the country including Association of Surgeons of India (ASI), Indian Academy of Paediatricians (IAP), AIDS Society of India, Indian Associations of Opthalmologists, Orthapaedicians, Anaesthesiologists, INDUSEM, NCDC, among others. This OMAG session at the 13thASICON was chaired by noted HIV leaders Dr Basavraj Sajjan and Dr Prakash Bora.

Dr Suneela Garg, President of OMAG and Professor of Excellence (Community Medicine) at Delhis Maulana Azad Medical College (MAMC) said that Organized Medicine Academic Guild of India was founded in 2018 mandated to support the UN Sustainable Development Goals agenda of the Indian government. It is our collective vision that will help accelerate progress towards achieving health of our societies, said Dr Garg. Global health security is one of the biggest challenges for a highly diverse and populous nation like India. That is why OMAG is already unifying different medical experts associations to improve responses to antimicrobial resistance, TB, trauma, non-communicable diseases (NCDs), infectious diseases, health emergencies and pandemics. These health emergencies and pandemics need clinical and public health solutions emphasized Dr Suneela Garg.

Dr Suneela Garg reiterated the commitment made for global health security six years ago (2016) when Indian Prime Minister and then USA President had jointly endorsed the global health security agenda. Need of the hour is to bring peoples health centrestage with measurable impacts at national level said Dr Suneela Garg.

One world one health

Ensuring quality healthcare services for everyone worldwide is so vital. Dr Garg highlighted the commitment for expanding the universal healthcare coverage to one billion, protecting another one billion people from health emergencies, and ensuring one billion are enjoying better health and wellbeing worldwide. These are interim goals towards health for all worldwide. One World One health agenda must be the unifying force reinforced Dr Garg. Global Work Plan of The World Health Organization (WHO) also echoes the priorities listed by OMAG leaders.

Prof Sagar Galwankar, Director for Research and Development, Florida State University; Scientific Chair of OMAG; and former Director of American College of Academic International Medicine, said although past infectious disease outbreaks like ZIKA and EBOLA had crossed geographic boundaries giving the first taste of fast infection-spread and raising global health security concerns when organisms and infections spread. Infections like COVID-19 had hampered the security of a nation. Infections are among the greatest risk to health security, said Prof Galwankar.

Prof Sagar Galwankar echoed Dr Gargs commitment to work on antimicrobial resistance and multidrug resistant organisms. Lack of public health convergence in terms of education, research and care is a challenge. Deeply entrenched disparities and inequalities are another major challenge when it comes to ensuring health for all. He also said that emergency medicine, family medicine, infectious diseases, toxicology, or other such disciplines are in infancy currently. If we do not develop them quickly enough then it will severely limit our response.

Coordinated response is key. Connecting care, competencies and culture is a challenge, he said.

Dr Ishwar Gilada, Secretary General of OMAG and President of 13th ASICON said that OMAG responded during COVID-19 and continues to do so for ensuring our response is backed by science and evidence, and takes into account important recommendations emerging from OMAG member associations of different medical specialities. In a country with over 1.4 billion population, we have 8944 serious and critical COVID-19 cases as of this week, though even one case is a case too many.

We need to stick to reason, science and evidence. Instead of comparing number of cases or deaths in a country, we should stick to number of cases or deaths per million population for comparative analysis and emerging disease trends. India stands at 2nd position worldwide in number of cases, or no.3 in total COVID-19 deaths globally. But if we look at number of cases per million, then India stands at 149th position worldwide and number 135th position if we look at deaths per million population.

With 97% of eligible population having received the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine and 85% of these fully vaccinated, and almost similar part of the population having been exposed to the virus, immunity against COVID-19 is reasonably high in India, thereby risk of another catastrophic wave is perhaps minimal  though we need to be vigilant against emerging variants, said Dr Gilada.

Dr Gilada said that we should expect infectious disease like COVID-19 to be with us for few years, but hopefully as an endemic and we better learn to live with it. Disaster management and preparedness plans and those addressing global health security must also include organised medicine.

Bobby Ramakant  CNS (Citizen News Service)

(Bobby Ramakant is part of CNS Editorial and recipient of World Health Organization (WHO) Director Generals WNTD Award 2008. Follow him on Twitter @BobbyRamakant)
Nanahemaa Akosua Fremponmaa Sarpong Kumankuma, Chairperson of the Convention Peoples Party (CPP) has dared women to enter into professional fields purportedly reserved for men and challenge the status quo, break the barriers, and make an impact in whatever field of endeavour.

Nanahemaa Fremponmaa who made admonishment encouraged women to acquire professional skills through formal academic pursuit or informal apprenticeship, We must not be satisfied with any position, we must dare to climb upwards.

The CPP Chairperson stated at the eleventh monthly stakeholder engagement seminar organized by the Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Office which is a platform rolled out for state and non-state actors to address national issues. It was also attended by representatives from the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR), Ghana Ports and Harbour Authority (GPHA), and SIC Insurance Company PLC.

The eleventh stakeholder engagement was also used to climax the GNA Tema Regional Offices month-long activities to mark the 2022 International Womens Day celebration and also mark the first anniversary of the stakeholder engagement.

Speaking on the topic: The path of women entrepreneurs: Challenges and Prospects, Nanahemaa Fremponmaa urged women to organize things properly as they acquire skills in the various fields and move into the technology field.

Nanahemaa Fremponmaa noted that even though the voices for women's equality, advancement, and advocacy continue to gain momentum, they are not making the required impact, therefore, women must catalyze the change through impactful engagement at the top level.

She said, we cannot simply continue an outdated conversation for women's equality, the rate of change is not fast enough for the heightened expectations around equality.

She said data in Ghana continue to show that women are not moving toward equality, despite, the best intentions of gender advocates, structures continue to emerge to fight against the interest of women.

Nanahemaa Fremponmaa noted that from the political, economic, governance, social, religious, and other fields, the national and grassroots movements have only created dialogue and sparked conversation around gender parity, we have not yet fuelled enough fire to evolve thinking, or pushed through to see substantive change.

If we are to challenge the status quo and impact change, we must consider how our biases, conscious or unconscious, are affecting our daily conversations and practices, she said.

The CPP Chairperson noted that these biases could include the tendency to associate with people who remind us of ourselves or searching for information in a way that confirms our own perceptions and firmly held beliefs.

These actions maintain the status quo within the organization and do not challenge the established norms that may be excluding underrepresented people in the organization.

We need to dig deeper to explore our differences and challenge the status quo. This logic can transcend the more practical applications, such as recruiting strategies, hiring practices, or promotion criteria, and ask us all to self-reflect, she said.

Mr. Francis Ameyibor, Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Manager in his remarks revealed that technology has virtually balanced the workspace, works that in the past demanded physical manpower have changed as machines are now being used to manage these, this makes it flexible for the female to also operate it.

Mrs. Sika Ramatu Lawson, a Project Electrical Engineer at the Department of Electrical Engineer at TOR who spoke on Prospects of women in the oil refinery sector: Womens contribution to the success story of the Tema Oil Refinery, said the refinery which was a purely engineering-oriented field of work, was predominantly male-dominated as fewer women study and work in that area.

Mrs. Cynthia Kwarteng Tufuor, SIC Area Manager for Tema Region speaking on Prospects of women in the insurance industry: Womens contribution to the SIC Mission, said women form about 60 per cent of the workforce of SIC Insurance but occupy 35 per cent of leadership positions.

Mrs. Florence Essel, GPHA Assistant General Manager in Charge of Administration, speaking on the topic: Prospects of women in the blue economy: Womens contribution to the GPHAs 60 years of operation, said that some of the machines and other operational mechanisms made it virtually impossible for a female to enter those fields in the past but now the situation is changing.

Mrs. Essel said 16 per cent of the entire staff at the GPHA are females adding that their Transit Area is also headed by a female while some females work at the Management Departments.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

Mr Clement Ofosuhemeng, Patient Coordinator of Operation Smile Ghana, said the international non-government organization has reaffirmed the teams resolve to help reconstruct the cleft lips and palates while providing counselling to the parents to be able to care for the children irrespective of peoples opinions.

He said the team is aware of the stigma associated with the defect as society, family and friends saw such children as outcasts and spirit children, therefore, we are creating an enabling environment for parents to access health care without any hindrance.

Mr Ofosuhene said as part of the measures the team ensured that everything including transportation, food and medical bills that could prevent parents from having surgery for their cleft babies were taken care of by the team.

He, therefore, called on parents, and caregivers to contact the organization on +233502407860 and +233241917137 to help correct the defects in their babies and put a smile back on their faces instead of hiding them.

Some parents of children with cleft lips and palates have encouraged other parents, and caregivers with children with such birth defects to seek medical care for their kids instead of hiding them for fear of stigma.

The Cleft lip and cleft palate are openings or split in either the upper lip or the roof of the mouth (palate) respectively or both, which occurs when facial structures that are developing in an unborn baby do not close completely.

Some of the parents in an interview said it was upsetting and heart-breaking to give birth to a child with a cleft, adding however that seeking early medical care could help correct it for the child to have a normal life.

Mr Kofi Wayo, a father of a 16 months old baby girl with a cleft defect said he was not too worried when she was born with the cleft lip and palate even though the mother who is now deceased was.

Mr Wayo said that irrespective of the stigmatization from people, he encouraged the wife not to hide the girl while they sought medical care for her which resulted in the cleft lips being corrected at the Komfo Anokye Hospital at Kumasi.

He said since her defect also affected the palate they had started the process to get that one too corrected for the girl to have a normal life as she grows.

Ms Mercy Takyi, a mother of 17 months old baby boy who has had his defect corrected for free courtesy of Operation Smile Ghana, said the birth of her fourth born made her scared since none of her earlier three children had any form of defect.

Ms Takyi said to avoid stigma, she stopped her trading job so she would not have to take the baby to town unless to visit the child care centre (weighing), adding that whenever they even reached the centre to avoid others from staring at him, the nurses attended to them early so they could leave.

She said because of the defect, the baby could not breastfeed and therefore had to rely on formula food which was given to him through a syringe.

For her, being introduced to the benevolent of Operation Smile by health workers two days after delivery, made a difference in their lives as the corrective surgery was done for the boy when he was three months and weeks old.

She said there were a lot of babies with such defects but parents often hid them making it look like it was rare, reiterating the importance of not hiding the children as doing so could lead them to the right source of help.

Ms Ajara Mumuni, whos 16 months old baby had already gone through the first surgery to correct the cleft lip and awaiting a second for the palate, on her part advised parents, especially mothers close their ears to what people say upon seeing their babies with defects.

Ms Mumuni said for her, that was what saw her through the trying moments and pushed her to seek medical care, she said to give hope and encouragement to other parents, she visited the Agogo Hospital where the boy was born to show him to other parents after the successful first surgery as evidence that it could be corrected.

For Ms Doris Agbetuormyo, it was a double agony as the father of the eight-month-old baby boy abandoned them the moment he visited them at the clinic at Dansoman and saw the baby with the defect.

Ms Agbetourmyo said that luckily for her the anaesthetist who worked on her during the caesarean session encouraged her and connected her with the Operation Smile team who took her through the necessary process and the surgery was done in February 2022.

God knows best, so pray and look for help from the hospitals instead of hiding them, it can be corrected and I can testify to that, she emphasized.
Mrs. Matilda Adane Okrah, Maintenance Planner at Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) has revealed that women remain underrepresented in the oil and gas industries across most levels, but especially in senior management levels.

She said women are underrepresented in the oil and gas industry in general and Ghana is no exception, stressing that industry players have made several attempts to create a more inclusive work environment but the numbers have not increased as fast as in other industries.

Mrs. Okrah stated this at the eleventh monthly stakeholder engagement seminar organized by the Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Office which is a platform rolled out for state and non-state actors to address national issues.

The eleventh stakeholder engagement was also used to climax the GNA Tema Regional Offices month-long activities to mark the 2022 International Womens Day celebration and also mark the first anniversary of the stakeholder engagement.

Speaking on the topic: Prospects of women in the oil refinery sector: Womens contribution to the success story of the Tema Oil Refinery, Mrs. Okrah said despite these there is great potential to draw upon the increasing numbers of women with the requisite qualifications as more women are graduating with engineering and other technical degrees.

Ms. Phillipa Joy Essien, TOR Learning and Development Officer urged the media to provide women operating in technical fields the platform to talk about their exploits.

She said the lack of exposure to the accomplishment of women operating in the technical and some male-dominated fields most girls are not encouraged to learn toward joining the male-dominated fields as they felt they would be the only ones pursuing such dreams.

Ms. Essien said Media houses should give the platform to more women to talk about their operations and the technical things they are doing to serve as an encouragement.

She agreed with other panelists that there was the need for women in technical positions to mentor the younger girls by encouraging more of them to move toward such fields as they have the needed ability to excel in such areas.

Mrs. Sika Ramatu Lawson, a Project Electrical/Instrumentation Engineer at the Department of Electrical Engineer at TOR, on her part said throughout her academic journey as an electrical engineer, females had always been less than one per cent of the total class population.

I wouldnt say it was easy through school, from secondary to tertiary we the females were few for example we were two out of 45 or five out of 50 in class, we were the focus of both our teachers and male counterparts, she revealed.

Mrs Lawson recounted that her interest in engineering started at the early stages of life; as a young lady, I loved drawing, fixing, and repairing old gadgets, as well as loved mathematics which motivated me to pursue the technical courses from secondary to tertiary.

She said women engineers like herself had broken the boundary and proved themselves in the oil refinery sector even though it was a predominated male-oriented field of work.

According to her, the female population ratio of TOR in the past compared to the current was very encouraging, revealing that at a point in time there was only one female engineer amongst the host of men.

She said it was worthy to mention that at the moment TOR has several gallant ladies who were applying modern technology in various positions as technicians and engineers, chemists, and laboratory technicians, among others for the successful running of the only refinery in Ghana.

We the ladies in Tema Oil Refinery especially those of us in engineering as well as the other departments continue to strive to prove to the world that women can do it in such male dominating environment and TORs success story wouldnt have been complete without women professionals, Mrs. Lawson stated.
About 3,000 people from Lolonya, Agblabanya, Anyamam, Azizanya, Kpoji and Otlorkpe both in the Ada East and West Districts have been rendered homeless by the tidal waves which hit the communities.

It also destroyed more than 400 homes in the two districts Mr. Jerry Narh, Deputy Director of the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) for Ada West has revealed.

What we have gathered so far indicates that we are having 300 to 350 houses affected so far in Ada West. Then those who are displaced, most importantly, they are about 3,000 plus, and that is quite a huge number. So the devastation for us is quite serious and we are giving it all the serious attention that is needed," he said.

Mr. Narh noted that NADMO team was assessing the damage to the homes to ascertain which ones can be salvaged or temporarily restored to serve as shelters for the residents.

He, however, added that some residents have been given temporary shelter and safe havens at churches.

Mr. Christian Corletyey Otuteye, the Member of Parliament for the Sege Constituency reacting to the incident cautioned that if action is not taken at the earliest possible time, the effects of the waves will exceed what residents are currently experiencing.

I visited the places upon receiving the news about the tidal waves ravaging the communities in my constituency, and I could say that this is a bad incident that has ever happened to the communities in terms of the wave, he lamented.

Mr. Otuteye said, he would raise the issue on the floor of Parliament for the Minister responsible for Housing to answer questions about the status of the sea defence wall.

Mr. Abel Apaflo, a resident of Foah in the Ada East District said that although the situation was worse other communities including Kpoji and the Otlorkper would also be hit.

Mr. Dan Martey Teye, a resident of Akplabanya said the area was largely affected to the extent that residents have nothing to salvage adding that, properties running into thousands of Ghana cedis have been destroyed.

He said this years waves have affected many households and individuals, displacing many residents and destroying fishing tools, livestock, and other indispensable valuables.

He indicated that even though the ravages of tidal waves were not new to the Ada coastal belts, the damage this year has been enormous, disrupting major economic activities, and affecting women, children, and other vulnerable people in these communities.

Mr. Philip Tetteh Sai, the Assembly Member for Anyamam Electoral Area said thousands of the residents have been displaced and would remain outside for some days considering the distance the seawater has traveled in the two communities.

He noted that most buildings have collapsed which rendered most of the victims homeless hence what they could do to help the victims was to let them move to occupy the church buildings in the towns as an immediate solution awaiting intervention from donors or the government.

Mr. Sai who is also the Presiding Member for the Ada West District Assembly said, this has happened for close to 25 years and called on the authorities to do something about it".
The State is to file the witness statement of its last witness in the case involving Alhaji Collins Dauda, a former Minister of Works and Housing and four others.

The prosecution delayed the filing of the witness statement because the witness was out of the jurisdiction.

The case has been adjourned to May 11, 2022.

Alhaji Dauda accused in the US$200 million Saglemi Housing Project scandal, has been admitted to self-recognizance bail by Criminal Court Four (High Court Division) in Accra.

The court presided over by Justice Mrs. Comfort Tasiame then ordered Alhaji Dauda to deposit his passport with the Court's registry.

Four other accused persons standing trial with Alhaji Dauda have also been admitted to bail in a total sum of US$322 million or its Ghana Cedi equivalent.

Mr Kwaku Agyeman-Mensah also a former Minister of Works and Housing and Alhaji Ziblim Yakubu, a former Chief Director of the Ministry, were admitted to bail in the sum of US$65 million each with three sureties each.

The Court further directed the two to also deposit their passports with the Court registrar.

Mr Andrew Clocanas, Executive Director of Contructora OAS Ghana Limited, was also admitted to US$179 million bail with three sureties each. One of the sureties must be a public or civil servant and he is also ordered to deposit his passport with the court registrar.

Mr Nouvi Tetteh Angelo was admitted to bail in the sum of $13 million with three sureties. The sureties are to provide two landed properties situated in Accra.

This was after all five accused persons have pleaded not guilty to charges of willfully causing financial to the State.

Dauda, Member of Parliament for Asutifi North, has been additionally charged for intentionally misapplying public property.

Dauda, together with Kwaku Agyeman-Mensah, Alhaji Ziblim Yakubu, Andrew Clocanas and Nouvi Tetteh Angelo, are also facing the charge of issuing a false certificate.

Clocanas and Tetteh have been additionally and jointly charged for dishonestly causing financial loss to the State.

The facts of the case as read out by the Attorney General, Mr Dame, Dauda, a Member of Parliament, was a Minister of the Ministry of Water Resources, Works, and Housing (MWRWH) from February 2013 to March 2015, whilst Agyeman-Mensah was also a Minister of the MWRWH from April 2015 to January 2017.

Yakubu was the Chief Director of MWRWH from July 2009 to April 2017, with Clocanas being the Executive Chairman of Construtora OAS Ghana Limited and Tetteh, a director and majority shareholder of Ridge Management Solutions DWC-LLC as well as director of VHM Ghana Limited.

In August 2012, former President John Dramani Mahama, granted executive approval to the Ministry for the construction of 5,000 affordable housing units (the Saglemi Affordable Housing Project) for sale to workers through mortgage arrangements provided by Ghana Home Loans to be implemented by Construtora OAS Limited.

The project was to be funded by a Buyer's Credit of US$200million provided by Messrs Credit Suisse International (Credit Suisse).

On 31st October 2012, Parliament granted approval for the government to secure a facility of US$200 million from Credit Suisse for the project, following a joint memorandum to Parliament by the then Minister for MWRWH, Mr Enoch Teye Mensah and the then Minister for Finance and Economic Planning, Dr. Kwabena Duffour.

On January 4, 2013, a Facility Agreement was signed between the Ministry of Finance, as borrower, and Credit Suisse, as creditor, for a facility of $200 million for the project and same day, MWRWH through the then Minister, Mr E.T Mensah, signed an Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) Agreement with Construtora OAS Ghana Ltd represented by 4th accused for the construction of affordable housing units at Saglemi in the Greater-Accra Region.

The project, which was to be executed in four phases on 2,172 acres of land was at a contract price of US$200million, including consultancy services, an Escrow Management Agreement, a condition precedent to the release of the facility to the borrower, was also signed pursuant to the Facility Agreement and the EPC Agreement, between the Ministry of Finance (Borrower), the MWRWH (Account holder), the Bank of Ghana (Account holding bank) and Construtora OAS (Contractor).

The purpose of the agreement was to ensure that the $200 million facility would be properly applied towards the development of the 5,000 housing units.

The agreement, therefore, required payments under the contract to be effected only when specific works had been duly executed, verified, and certified by the consultants of the project, the Architectural and Engineering Services Limited (AESL).

The EPC Agreement provided for an advance payment of 40 percent of the contract price to the contractor within five working days of the receipt of the facility in the Escrow Account, where the advance payment was to be applied towards specific works set out in the contract.

The remaining amount of the contract price was to be paid to the contractor based on the fulfilment of specific project milestones and the contractor was required under the agreement to set out the details of the achieved project milestones, which had to be verified and certified by the consultants before payment was done.

On January 9, 2013, Credit Suisse disbursed an amount of US$198,450,000, representing the US$200 million less fees and transaction expenses into the Escrow Account and on February 27, 2013, an amount of US$80 million representing 40 percent of the contract sum was transferred to Construtora OAS as advanced payment.

However, the contractor allegedly failed to apply the amount towards the purpose for, which the payment was made, thus, on February 27, 2014, Dauda who had assumed office as the new Minister, without any parliamentary approval, allegedly reviewed the original EPC and signed the first and restated agreement with Construtora

OAS, represented by its Executive Chairman, the 4th accused, and in the process, changed the scope of works and the application of the US$200million approved by Parliament for the construction of 5000 housing units.

The new agreement required the contractor to execute the project in three phases over a site of 1,272 acres whilst the $200million was now to be applied towards the execution of only the first phase of the project comprising just about 1,502 housing units, contrary to the executive and parliamentary approvals as well as the Facility and Escrow Management Agreements.

As a result, on April 15, 2013, the AESL signed a contract with Vito Hugo-Coordenaca Gestao De Projectos (VHM) subcontracting its consultancy services under the EPC agreement to the company for US$500,000,000 over a period of 24 months.

This was the amount provided under the EPC Agreement for consultancy services for the 5000 housing units.

Under the agreement between AESL and VHM, a maximum amount of US$2,000,000. was to be paid to AESL and not more than US$2,987,750 was to be paid to VHM for their services.

This contract also provided for 40 percent advanced payment.

In April 2015, when AESL and the VHM were still providing consultancy services under the contract, the MWRWH, allegedly entered another contract for consultancy services with Ridge Management Solutions DWC-LLC (RMS), represented by its director and majority shareholder, Tettey, for three months at a contract sum of US$5.6million.

This was at a time RMS allegedly was not registered in Ghana as a company.

Once again, the MWRWH was required to make an advance payment of 40 percent of the contract sum.

This contract was said to be completely outside the EPC Agreement.

Investigations revealed that Tettey, the majority shareholder of RMS, is also a Director of VHM Ghana Limited, allegedly.

In August 2016, Agyeman-Mensah entered into yet another consultancy agreement with RMS, this time, for what was referred to as marketing implementation services for a sum of US$2,502,198 and again, the Ministry was required to make an advanced payment of 40 percent of the contract sum, when all that while, AESL and VHM were purportedly performing the same consultancy services for the project, their consultancy agreements having been extended at various times by Mensah and Yakubu.

On December 21, 2016, Yakubu without recourse to Parliament allegedly reviewed the First and Restated Agreement and signed the Second and Restated Agreement, which led to a further reduction in the scope of works to 1,412 housing units at a revised contract price of US$181,018,000 and extended the completion period of the contract to July 31, 2017, without any basis.

Between March 2014 and January 2015, an amount of $46,131,153.41 was paid to the contractor, Construtora OAS, whilst a total of $3,386,916.08 was paid to AESL and VHM when no works had been duly executed by the contractor, with the payments allegedly authorised and approved by Dauda and Yakubu without any evidence of specific project milestones achieved by the contractor as required under the EPC Agreement.

It is also argued that there was no justification for the advanced payment of $80 million earlier made, but between June 2015 and January 2017, a further amount of $54,066,768.16 was paid to the contractor of the project when no work had been duly executed.

Again, though there were no milestone reports supporting the payments, Mensah and Yakubu allegedly ordered for further payments to be made to the three consultants; AESL, VHM and RMS, far more than the $5,000,000 stated as consultancy fees in the original EPC Agreement without any evidence of work.

There were no verification and certification of actual work done by the contractor as required under the EPC Agreement though a total amount of $196,428,891.66 had been spent on the Saglemi Affordable Housing Project, with the contractor having been paid $179,904,757.78, allegedly.

Investigations revealed that the cost of works executed on the site, including consultancy services, is about $64,982,900.77.

Only 651.75 acres of land out of the 2,172 acres of land made available by the MWRWH to the contractor for the project has been developed.

Investigations further revealed that only 668 housing units were completed by the contractor.

The houses are, however, not habitable so not a single house under the project has been sold and the facility remains unpaid, resulting in huge financial loss to the Republic of Ghana.

GNA
Professor Vera Adobea Essuman, an Eye Specialist at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, is advocating the prompt referral of abnormal eye conditions to help reduce the mortality rate of retinoblastoma in Ghana.

She said early detection of the disease could save the lives of children who die needlessly because their parents failed to send them to the hospital early enough for treatment.

Retinoblastoma is the commonest eye cancer in children for the first five years, which arises from the retina, causing blindness and leading to death if not treated early.

Prof. Essuman said the survival rate of children with the condition was low because most parents sought medical attention at later stages when nothing could be done to save the eye.

She said this at a training programme for some community health nurses and midwives in Kumasi on early detection of retinoblastoma and other eye conditions in children as part of a project aimed at preventing, protecting and treating eye cancer in children.

Dubbed: National Eye Screening Project, it seeks to equip the nurses and midwives at the community level to detect and refer eye conditions for early treatment with the overall goal of preventing cancer of the eye in children.

As part of the project, all beneficiary nurses and midwives would be provided with a device known as arclight to examine the eyes of children at their health centres and refer those with abnormal conditions to the appropriate facilities.

Funded by Rotary International through the Rotary Club of Detmold-Blomberg and Rotary Club of Accra - La East, the Project is targeting about 500 nurses and midwives across the country.

It is a collaboration between the Ghana Health Service. University of Ghana Medical School, World Health Organisation, and World Child Cancer.

Prof. Essuman said eye cancer in children, apart from causing blindness, could also kill the child if not detected early.

She said in developed countries hardly would three out of 100 children with retinoblastoma die, but in the case of developing countries, the survival rate was very low.

She said a recent national survey to look at the situation in Ghana revealed that 60 cases on averagely among newborns across the country were detected annually.

Most cases, she noted, were often presented late such that by the time they got to the hospital, the eyes were in a state that could not be saved.

Sometimes it goes beyond the eyes to the extent that you cannot save the lives of the children.

Prof. Essuman entreated parents to send children to the hospital as soon as they detected any abnormality in the eyes, especially those below five years, to ensure early treatment.

GNA
The vital Matebe hydroelectric power plant in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo powers Goma -- a city with more than one million inhabitants -- and part of the nearby Rutshuru territory.

But the key infrastructure is caught up in fighting between the army and the M23 rebel group, one of many in Congo's restive east, which launched an offensive against villages and army positions in Rutshuru on March 28 and 29.

"We evacuated all the staff. Only a 'skeleton team' remains to protect the installations and ensure the plant does not stop," said Emmanuel de Merode, director of the UNESCO-listed Virunga National Park.

Formed from the remnants of a Congolese Tutsi rebellion, the M23 had been defeated by the army in 2013 after it captured Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, in 2012.

M23 militiamen have established bases on Mount Sabyinyo, which demarcates the border between Congo, Uganda and Rwanda. By ALEXIS HUGUET AFP

But the movement resurged late last year, claiming the Congolese government did not respect a 2013 peace deal on allowing demobilised rebels to return as a step towards reintegration into civilian life.

De Merode flew from Goma on Friday to inspect the plant, which has a power of 14 megawatts and was constructed by the Virunga National Park, and raise the morale of the remaining guards and technicians.

The Belgian toured Matebe and the newly started construction site of another power plant in Rwanguba, which will double Goma's energy supply in three years' time.

"By your presence and by your commitment, you are defending vital installations for the population of North Kivu," he told park guards in a solemn address, before returning to his headquarters in Rumangabo.

Belgian conservationist Emmanuel de Merode inspected the plant and met the remaining guards and technicians. By ALEXIS HUGUET AFP

"We were caught in the crossfire between the M23 and the army," said Ali Masudi Bwana, a security official at the Matebe plant, of the March attacks.

The rebels "shot machine gun fire in our direction", he added, pointing to a small wooded hill overlooking the village of Rwanguba and the Rutshuru river that powers the plant.

Gorillas in danger

Despite the risks, teams from the Virunga National Park in March resumed their monitoring of mountain gorillas. By ALEXIS HUGUET AFP

M23 militiamen have taken control of around 10 settlements without facing much resistance and established bases on Mount Sabyinyo, which demarcates the border between Congo, Uganda and Rwanda.

After losing dozens of soldiers in M23 attacks, Congo's army in late February launched artillery fire into the Virunga National Park's gorilla sector to dislodge the rebels.

Despite the risks, teams from the Virunga National Park in March resumed their monitoring of mountain gorillas, an endangered species that -- like the M23 -- straddles the frontier between Congo, Rwanda and Uganda.
A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.
04.04.2022 LISTEN

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has expressed confidence in the governments recent strategies aimed at reviving the struggling economy.

Speaking to the BBCs Peter Okowche, President Nana Addo said the governments strategies will offer the country the chance to recover from the adverse effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.

In Ghana, the recovery programme we have is very credible and that is what is going to give us the opportunity to come out of this period a stronger economy, and it is that future we are looking at. The digital economy is emerging as the biggest economy in the country and for a long period, it has not had any tax at all, so it is important that it also comes into the net. 

The President assented to the E-levy Bill on Thursday, despite a challenge at the Supreme Court by the Minority in Parliament against its passage.

The government had hoped the levy will widen the tax net and raise an extra GH6.9 billion in 2022 when it was first announced in the budget.

However, that did not happen, as the bill was laid in Parliament for consideration in March.

President Akufo-Addo believes criticisms against the passage of the controversial tax are unfounded, as countries affected by the pandemic equally resorted to unpopular measures to revive the economy.

The world is going through very difficult times. Ghana is no exception, Nigeria is no exception. There is no country in the world that has escaped the ravages of COVID-19 What you need to look at is the elements being put on the ground that looks beyond the Russia Ukraine war.

The economy has gone through very difficult times. I can quote statistics of the US and UK economies, but they will not serve a purpose. It is a phenomenon that is going on which has made life difficult, Akufo-Addo explained.

---citinewsroom
April 04, 2022

Parliament Moves, Elections Let Empire Losses Accumulate

Yesterday saw three important political events, each with an outcome that is unsatisfactory for the U.S. and its European sidekicks.

In Pakistan the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) party had left the government coalition. Additionally some members of prime minister Imran Khan's PTI party had change sides. The opposition in the parliament was preparing a no-confidence vote against him. At the same time a report by the Pakistani ambassador to the U.S. said that U.S. officials had warned that Pakistan would stay on their enemy list as long as Imran Khan was left in his position.

This was understood to be a call for regime change with rumored bribes pushing the swing votes against Khan.

Yesterday the deputy speaker of the parliament did not allow the no-confidence vote to take place. Imran Khan then asked the president of Pakistan to dissolve the parliament and announced new elections within 90 days.

The case is now in the hands of the supreme court of Pakistan which, after a session today, will continue to hear the case tomorrow.

It seems likely that the supreme court will make a 'wise' decision, blame everyone and agree to new elections.

It will then be the voters who will have to decide mainly on an issue of Pakistan's foreign policy. Should it be independent and friendly with China and Russia or should it change back to the U.S. side?

I haven't found any recent polls from Pakistan but a few days ago Khan's party had won the local elections in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The people may well be impressed with his position and give him their vote.

As usual in Pakistan the military, who's leadership tends to be pro-U.S., may intervene though I doubt that it will have sufficient public support for it.

In Hungary Prime Minister Viktor Orban has won his fourth election with his party again gaining a two-thirds majority. Hungary is in the EU and in NATO but Orban has his own ways and is friendly with Russia's president Vladimir Putin:

While Orban had earlier campaigned on divisive social and cultural issues, he dramatically shifted the tone of his campaign after Russias invasion of Ukraine in February, and has portrayed the election since then as a choice between peace and stability or war and chaos. While the opposition called for Hungary to support its embattled neighbor and act in lockstep with its EU and NATO partners, Orban, a longtime ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has insisted that Hungary remain neutral and maintain its close economic ties with Moscow, including continuing to import Russian gas and oil on favorable terms. At his final campaign rally Friday, Orban claimed that supplying Ukraine with weapons  something that Hungary, alone among Ukraines EU neighbors, has refused to do  would make the country a military target, and that sanctioning Russian energy imports would cripple Hungarys own economy. This isnt our war, we have to stay out of it, Orban said.

Orban's win makes further EU and NATO moves against Russia more difficult.

The third event that yesterday went counter to U.S. interests was the re-election of Serbia's president Aleksandar Vucic:

The IPSOS and CESID pollsters, which have proven reliable in previous Serbian ballots, predicted Vucic would end up with nearly 60 percent of the votes. If confirmed in the official tally, Vucic would win outright a second five-year term as president and a runoff vote would not be needed. The pollsters projected that Vucics Serbian Progressive Party would win the most votes in the parliamentary ballot, with around 43 percent, followed by the United for Victory of Serbia opposition group with around 13 percent.

...

Vucic, a former ultranationalist who has boasted of his close ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin, has sought to portray himself as a guarantor of stability amid the turmoil raging in Europe due to Russias invasion of Ukraine. Speaking after voting in Belgrade, Vucic said he expected Serbia to continue on the path of stability, tranquility and peace.

...

In a country that went through a series of wars in the 1990s and a NATO bombing in 1999, fears of a conflict spilling over have played into Vucics hands. Although Serbia is formally seeking entry into the 27-nation European Union, Vucic has fostered close ties with Russia and China, counting on the Serbs resentment of the West over the 1999 NATO air war. Serbia has supported a U.N. resolution that condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but Belgrade has not joined Western sanctions against Moscow, a historic Slavic ally.

Another potential loss could occur in the elections in France next Sunday. President Emmanuel Macron is leading the polls but his advantage over the right-wing Marine Le Pen is narrowing. Current polls have Macron at 27% and Le Pen at 20% with socialist Jean-Luc Melenchon following at 15%. A runoff vote, two weeks after the first round, between Macron and Le Pen could have surprising results as the people on the left will probably not vote for the neo-liberal Macron for the sole purpose of keeping Le Pen out of the Elysee.

France is a big player in the EU and NATO. Any upset in France would have major consequences.

Posted by b on April 4, 2022 at 15:52 UTC | Permalink

Comments

next page 
The children of Sugar Grove Elementary School were sent to school in green attire on St Patrick's Day last month, which was poorly planned to be the same day as school picture day.

So while their kids were ready for a 'green party', they were not prepared for the 'green background' that they were inevitably photoshopped against.

Parents couldn't help but laugh when the digital proofs of their children's school photos saw their children's heads floating above grass fields and white fences.



Amanda Snow, who sent her six-year-old son Oliver to the school, said her son was covered head to toe in green, including a green mohawk which completely disappeared in the photo.

"It was kind of hard to explain to him what was happening, because he's 6, said his mother.

But as soon as he saw all the different options, he was just laughing because it looks like he's a fence, or it looks like he's a field. So, he thought it was really funny.

The photo company involved said the digital proofs were processed quickly and had not gone through post-production before parents were notified. They assured the "final product" will be fixed before photos could be printed.

"I might reach out to the company and see if I can get the unedited ones, because honestly, they've brought me so much joy and laughter over the last day, said Amanda.

Source
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

HOUSTON (AP)  During hours of relentless questioning, Melissa Lucio more than 100 times had denied fatally beating her 2-year-old daughter.

But worn down from a lifetime of abuse and the grief of losing her daughter Mariah, her lawyers say, the Texas woman finally acquiesced to investigators. I guess I did it, Lucio responded when asked if she was responsible for some of Mariah's injuries.

Her lawyers say that statement was wrongly interpreted by prosecutors as a murder confession  tainting the rest of the investigation into Mariahs 2007 death, with evidence gathered only to prove that conclusion, and helping lead to her capital murder conviction. They contend Mariah died from injuries from a fall down the 14 steps of a steep staircase outside the familys apartment in the South Texas city of Harlingen.

As her April 27 execution date nears, Lucios lawyers are hopeful that new evidence, along with growing public support  including from jurors who now doubt the conviction and from more than half the Texas House of Representatives  will persuade the states Board of Pardons and Paroles and Gov. Greg Abbott to grant an execution reprieve or commute her sentence.

Mariahs death was a tragedy not a murder. ... It would be an absolutely devastating message for this execution to go forward. It would send a message that innocence doesnt matter, said Vanessa Potkin, one of Lucios attorneys who is with the Innocence Project.

Lucio's lawyers say jurors never heard forensic evidence that would have explained that Mariah's various injuries were actually caused by a fall days earlier. They also say Lucio wasn't allowed to present evidence questioning the validity of her confession.

The Texas Attorney Generals Office maintains evidence shows Mariah suffered the absolute worst case of child abuse her emergency room doctor had seen in 30 years.

Lucio still advances no evidence that is reliable and supportive of her acquittal, the office wrote in court documents last month.

The Cameron County District Attorneys Office, which prosecuted Lucio, declined to comment.

Lucio, 53, would be the first Latina executed by Texas and the first woman since 2014. Only 17 women have been executed in the U.S. since the Supreme Court lifted its ban on the death penalty in 1976, most recently in January 2021.

In their clemency petition, Lucios lawyers say that while she had used drugs, leading her to temporarily lose custody of her children, she was a loving mother who worked to remain drug-free and provide for her family. Lucio has 14 children and was pregnant with the youngest two when Mariah died.

Lucio and her children struggled through poverty. At times, they were homeless and relied on food banks for meals, according to the petition. Child Protective Services was present in the familys life, but there was never an accusation of abuse by any of her children, Potkin said.

Lucio had been sexually assaulted multiple times, starting at age 6, and had been physically and emotionally abused by two husbands. Her lawyers say this lifelong trauma made her susceptible to giving a false confession.

In the 2020 documentary The State of Texas vs. Melissa, Lucio said investigators kept pushing her to say she had hurt Mariah.

I was not gonna admit to causing her death because I wasnt responsible, Lucio said.

Her lawyers say Lucio's sentence was disproportionate to what her husband and Mariah's father, Robert Alvarez, received. He got a four-year sentence for causing injury to a child by omission even though he also was responsible for Mariah's care, Lucio's lawyers argue.

In 2019, a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned Lucios conviction, ruling she was deprived of her constitutional right to present a meaningful defense. However, the full court in 2021 said the conviction had to be upheld for procedural reasons, despite the difficult issue of the exclusion of testimony that might have cast doubt on the credibility of Lucios confession.

Three jurors and one alternate in Lucios trial have signed affidavits expressing doubts about her conviction.

She was not evil. She was just struggling. ... If we had heard passionately from the defense defending her in some way, we might have reached a different decision, juror Johnny Galvan wrote in an affidavit.

In a letter last month to the Board of Pardons and Paroles and to Abbott, 83 Texas House members said executing Lucio would be a miscarriage of justice.

As a conservative Republican myself, who has long been a supporter of the death penalty in the most heinous cases ... I have never seen a more troubling case than the case of Melissa Lucio, said state Rep. Jeff Leach, who signed the letter.

Abbott can grant a one-time, 30-day reprieve. He can grant clemency if a majority of the paroles board recommends it.

The board plans to vote on Lucios clemency petition two days before the scheduled execution, Rachel Alderete, the boards director of support operations, said in an email. A spokeswoman for Abbotts office did not return an email seeking comment.

Abbott has granted clemency to only one death row inmate, Thomas Whitaker, since taking office in 2015. Whitaker was convicted of masterminding the fatal shootings of his mother and brother. His father, who survived, led the effort to save Whitaker, saying he would be victimized again if his son was executed.

Lucios supporters have said her clemency request is similar in that her family would be retraumatized if shes executed.

Please allow us to reconcile with Mariahs death and remember her without fresh pain, anguish and grief. Please spare the life of our mother, Lucios children wrote in a letter to Abbott and the board.

___

Follow Juan A. Lozano on Twitter: https://twitter.com/juanlozano70
Muhlenberg Hosts 2022 Pennsylvania U.S. Senate Democratic Debate

The first debate for the Pennsylvania Democratic candidates was broadcast and held on campus in front of a live audience on April 3.

By: Kristine Yahna Todaro Thursday, April 7, 2022 02:50 PM

From left: Candidates Pennsylvania State Representative Malcolm Kenyatta and United States Representative Conor Lamb on the debate stage with moderators Ari Mittleman, Jenny DeHuff and Christopher Borick. Images: Marco Calderon/Muhlenberg College

An enthusiastic crowd filled the Seegers Union Event Space on the afternoon of Sunday, April 3, for the first 2022 Pennsylvanian U.S. Senate Democratic debate.

Democratic candidates State Representative Malcolm Kenyatta and U.S. Representative Conor Lamb addressed a variety of issues, answering questions about the challenges of political polarization, their support of unions, the rising costs facing the state's farmers, the impact of opioids, their stance on climate and energy issues as well as the economic and foreign policies they support.

The debate organizers were informed on March 31, without explanation, that Pennsylvania Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman would not be attending the debate.

AJ Henley '24, president of the Muhlenberg College Democrats, opened the debate.

Pennsylvanians will go to the polls on Tuesday, May 17, to choose their nominee for the open Senate seat vacated by retiring Republican Senator Pat Toomey.

The debate was held in front of a live audience and broadcast by PCN. The broadcast is available to view without a paywall on PCN's Election 2022 webpage, under 'Democratic Race for U.S. Senate.'

The debate was co-sponsored by City & State PA, Pennsylvania Kitchen Table Politics and the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion as well as by the student organizations Muhlenberg College Democrats and The Muhlenberg Weekly.

AJ Henley '24, president of the College Democrats, opened the debate by reminding the audience that the war in Ukraine is a powerful reminder that democracy and the ability to cast an educated vote should never be taken for granted.

"The opportunity to gather here todayas candidates face questions and address voters without preconditionsis a fundamental aspect of freedom of expression and a hallmark of our democracy," they added.

U.S. Representative Conor Lamb greets students following the debate.

A dozen Muhlenberg students volunteered for the debate, acting as guides for the candidates and members of the press, checking tickets and welcoming audience members.

The debate was moderated by Christopher Borick, Professor of Political Science and director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion; Jenny DeHuff, City & State PA editor-in-chief; and Ari Mittleman, founder and host of PA Political Podcast: Pennsylvania Kitchen Table Politics.

Pennsylvania State Representative Malcolm Kenyatta with students after the debate.

Reporters from two dozen national and local media outlets attended the live debate, in some cases live tweeting throughout the event. To date, news about the debate has appeared in nearly 90 articles and videos, including The Philadelphia Inquirer, Bloomberg News, National Journal, POLITICO and The Washington Post.

Jenny Lee '24 (left) and Eitan Gitlin '25 check audience members' tickets.

About Muhlenberg College

Founded in 1848, Muhlenberg is a highly selective, private, four-year residential, liberal arts college offering baccalaureate and graduate programs. With an enrollment of approximately 2,200 students, Muhlenberg College is dedicated to shaping creative, compassionate, collaborative leaders through rigorous academic programs in the arts, humanities, natural sciences and social sciences; selected preprofessional programs, including accounting, business, education and public health; and progressive workforce-focused post-baccalaureate certificates and masters degrees. Located in Allentown, Pennsylvania, approximately 90 miles west of New York City, Muhlenberg is a member of the Centennial Conference, competing in 22 varsity sports. Muhlenberg is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
A fully budded marijuana plant is seen during the Cannadelic Miami expo in Miami, Florida on Feb. 5, 2022.
An endemic Guam kingfisher rests in its housing cell at the Department of Agricultures captive breeding facility in Mangilao on March 30, 2022.
Herry Wirawan, a former teacher and founder of an Islamic boarding school, who is accused of raping 13 school girls between 2016 and 2021, sits during his verdict trial at the district court in Bandung, West Java province, Indonesia on Feb. 15, 2022.
Veteran Bollywood actor Naseeruddin Shah come out in support for his niece Saira Shah Halim, who is the CPI(M) candidate bypolls for West Bengal's Ballygunge Assembly constituency slated to take place on April 12.

In a video message on Monday, the actor said: "I am not a member of any political party. I am seeking votes individually. Whether you will elect any person who shifts political ideology frequently or any person who stands by the people? So in the Ballygunge by-polls I am seeking support for Saira Shah Halim.

"I have known her since her childhood. However, keeping aside my family relationship, I have always considered her as an honest and sensible person. She and husband are running a hospital for the sake of common people. They have compassionate minds."

Without directly naming him, the legendary actor also ridiculed the Trinamool Congress candidate.

"Would you like your representative to be a caring, compassionate, and committed person who will work for you, or would you prefer a turncoat opportunist who is also a serial hate-monger?"

Saira Shah Halim's husband is senior CPI(M) leader, Fuad Halim, whose father is the late Hasim Abdul Halim, former Speaker of the West Bengal Assembly from 1982 to 2011.

By-elections for the Ballygunge Assembly constituency was necessitated because of the sudden demise of Trinamool Congress legislator Subrata Mukherjee on November 4, 2021.

The BJP has fielded former journalist Keya Ghosh.

Recently, Naseeruddin Shah's wife, Ratna Pathak Shah, also a veteran Bollywood actress, had released a similar video message seeking support for Saira Shah Halim.
Handout | Coca Cola

After releasing the Starlight "space" flavored Coke last month, Coca-Cola on Monday announced another new flavor, Zero Sugar Byte, which will drop May 2 and is supposed to taste like pixels, the company stated in a press release.

Coca-Cola said it will continue releasing new flavors throughout the year, with Byte first appearing on a new island created in Fortnite. Until the May 2 drop date for Zero Sugar Byte, the flavor will "live in the metaverse," Coca-Cola stated.
The Illinois State Board of Education announced a $17 million grant to create the nation's first state-funded Freedom Schools network last month, which aims to supplement learning in school with a research-based, multicultural curriculum taking place over the summer and/or the school year.

The Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant, created by Public Act 101-654, is funded with federal Coronavirus Urgent Remediation Emergency dollars and aims to improve the outcomes for low-income students and address the opportunity gap and learning loss caused by the pandemic, which had a disproportionate impact on low-income students, the Illinois School Board of Education wrote in a press release.

Low-income students last year experienced rates of chronic absenteeism 50% higher than the state average, ISBE stated. The number of students meeting or exceeding standards in math or English language arts also fell by twice as much as the state average. Freedom Schools aim to offer students culturally relevant learning opportunities with academic and social supports, including "quality teaching, challenging and engaging curricula, wrap-around supports, a positive school climate and strong ties to family and community," ISBE wrote.

"Freedom Schools have a profound impact on the communities they serve, and this funding will expand their reach, bringing the benefits of a research-backed education grounded in the civil rights movement to more Illinois learners this summer and next school year," Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker said in a statement.

"This is just one aspect of our multi-faceted approach to renewing our students' learning experience and getting them back on track after the pandemic's disruptions," Pritzker continued. "I'm also proud that we're doing so with a keen eye for our low-income communities, which have been hit the hardest by the learning loss of these past two years."

Illinois' Freedom Schools network will be the first in the nation to receive state funding, ISBE stated. Freedom Schools began in the 1960s with the goal of providing quality education for all students, motivating civic engagement, and empowering disenfranchised communities.

The renowned curriculum of Freedom Schools allows students of all ages to experience a new and liberating form of education that directly relates to the imperatives of their lives and communities, ISBE wrote. Freedom Schools around the country continue to demonstrate the intergenerational effects and proven benefits of civic engagement by providing students with instruction that fosters confidence, critical thinking, and social-emotional development.

The Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools initiative will also aim to empower educators and strengthen the teacher pipeline, as teachers in Freedom Schools must be from the local community.

"As an educator, I'm thrilled that students will have the opportunity to extend and deepen their learning," State Superintendent of Education Dr. Carmen I. Ayala said in a statement. "As a Latina, I am intimately aware of the intrinsic value of an educational environment that honors and respects your ethnic heritage. I'm excited that these special programs will reach the children who have been hardest hit by the pandemic and provide a safe and empowering learning experience for them."

The initiative is named after African American leader, educator, and public servant Phillip Jackson. Jackson founded and led the Black Star Project, which celebrated its 25th-anniversary last year. The organization closes achievement gaps, ISBE wrote, and supports economic empowerment for African American and Hispanic youth and families through community-based support programs like tutoring, mentoring, parent advocacy and development, and college preparation.

The Phillip Jackson Freedom Schools Grant application is open to public schools, public universities, community colleges and not-for-profit, community-based organizations. Priority will be given to joint applications between a community-based or not-for-profit organization and another eligible entity, the ISBE wrote.

"Freedom Schools have a proud history and a profound significance for African Americans," Illinois Senate Majority Leader Kimberly A. Lightford, one of the sponsors of the legislation that created the Freedom Schools initiative, said in a statement.

"These schools represent a long tradition of engaged citizenship, personal empowerment, and academic excellence. I know this experience will have a positive impact on students, their families, and the whole community," Lightford continued.

The programs are being offered through the Children's Defense Fund, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit. Additionally, the Springfield Urban League has partnered with the organization to offer Freedom Schools for more than 10 years, hosting several sites across the state. This is the first time the programs are being funded entirely by the state, however.

The state plans to issue 45 grant awards in the amount of $350,000 each, officials told the Chicago Tribune, with ISBE officials aiming for students who opt into the pre- and post-assessments to have a 2.5% increase in proficiency in literacy or other objectives by the end of the program. Officials anticipate parent and community engagement rates to be higher for student participants, as the program aims to provide support for the entire family.

Interested groups can find the application on the ISBE website or email asosina@isbe.net. Applications are due by 4:30 p.m. on April 29.
Illinois College Online will begin offering a Master of Science degree in nursing in May.

It will meet a pressing community need ... (to) prepare MSN degree-seeking nurses for multiple leadership roles in their communities," Provost Catharine OConnell said.

The masters program is flexible and designed for working nurses looking to expand their impact in health care.

Since Illinois College announced a traditional bachelor's degree in nursing in 2020, the on-campus program has grown to more than 100 nursing majors and pre-nursing students.
GOLDEN  Illinois Route 94 south of Golden in Adams County will close for several days starting Tuesday.

Traffic will be detoured to U.S. 24, County Highway 11 and County Highway 17 while a railroad bridge is replaced, according to the Illinois Department of Transportation.



Traffic will not be allowed on Illinois 94 between County Road N. 2300 and N. 2200 Avenue.
About $55 million is sitting unclaimed by Illinois residents.

All that's lacking is a tax return.

The IRS said the money is owed to 55,767 Illinois taxpayers who did not file a federal income tax return for 2018. Most of them are for $840 or more, according to the agency.

Refunds not claimed by April 18 will be lost. Taxpayers have three years to claim a refund.

If no return is filed to claim a refund, the money becomes property of the U.S. Treasury," according to IRS spokesman Michael Devine.

Some may not have filed because their income was less than what is required to file a tax return, he said.

More than $1.5 billion remains unclaimed for 2018 by 1.5 million people who did not file a federal income tax return, according to the IRS.
The proceedings of the Rajya Sabha were adjourned again, this time till 2 p.m. on Monday, amid Opposition uproar over "unabated" hikes in petroleum prices.

Soon after the House re-assembled at 12 p.m. after the first adjournment, the panel deputy chairman Sasmit Patra initiated the Question Hour and asked the Members to raise the supplementary questions from the Petroleum Ministry.

Meanwhile, the Opposition Members started raising slogans against the continuous price hike and rushed to Well of the House.

Some of the Opposition Members gave notices under Rule 267 to discuss the matter which was rejected by Chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu.

Deputy chairman Patra tried to dissuade the Opposition Members and requested them to return to their seats and allow the House run but they refused to give in.

Patra proceeded with the Question Hour despite the ruckus but when the Opposition continued sloganeering and protesting in the well, the Chair adjourned the proceedings till 2 p.m.

Earlier in the day, when the House assembled at 11 a.m., Chairman Naidu informed the House that he has rejected the Opposition Members' notices under rule 267 to discuss the price hike matter as they enough opportunities to take it up it during the discussion of Appropriation Bill 2022 and Finance Bill 2022.
Brian Ganz feels the Big Brothers-Big Sisters program is a significant presence in Jacksonville.

Its one of the most important ways that the community can help the future of the town, Ganz said. Im very passionate about it. I just couldnt imagine Jacksonville without the program, because I know how important it is to the community.

Ganz, 48, is program director for Big Brothers-Big Sisters in Jacksonville. Ganz has a long on-and-off history with the organization, starting when he interned for Big Brothers-Big Sisters while attending MacMurray College.

Ganz worked for Pathway Services for a year after college graduation, then joined Big Brothers-Big Sisters as an employee and worked there until 2008, when he decided to leave the human services field to sell insurance.

But when the Big Brothers-Big Sisters Jacksonville office closed in June 2019, Ganz felt the need to return.

I reached out to a friend of mine who still ran the Big Brothers-Big Sisters agency in Decatur and said, Hey, what can we do to get things started back in Jacksonville? Ganz said. As a result, Ganz was able to reopen the Jacksonville office in fall 2019 and has been in charge ever since. He reports to the main Big Brothers-Big Sisters of Central Illinois office in Decatur.

We started from scratch, because we didnt have access to any of the old information. It has been challenging, Ganz said. When I started with Big Brothers-Big Sisters the first time, we had 70 matches and a healthy waiting list. We have 15 kids who are ready to be matched right now and, in my mind, that is a low number for the need that we know is out there.

Ganz organized a Bowl for Kids Sake fundraiser in early 2020 and was on track to getting the reopened local office fully operational before everyones world was upended.

I was scheduled to interview nine kids at Washington (Elementary) School that week for our school-based program, Ganz said. I interviewed two on Monday, was going to interview two more on Thursday, and then COVID hit. We actually had gained some pretty good momentum but, once COVID hit, it pretty much shot us in the foot.

Now Ganz is trying again.

We are just trying to get our feet back under us after coming out of COVID, he said. We are now back to making matches. I know our numbers are going to continue to grow. There are still people today that I talk to that dont realize that Big Brothers-Big Sisters is back in service.

Big Brothers-Big Sisters uses volunteer adult mentors and puts them into the lives of children. Most of the children are from single-parent families, and many are from limited-income homes.

One of the things I like to remind volunteers is, you dont have to do anything different than you normally do, just bring a child along with you, Ganz said. Shopping at the grocery store sounds mundane, but youd be surprised by the number of kids that enjoy going grocery shopping. Its something they normally dont get to do.

Big Brothers-Big Sisters has two mentor programs. The school-based program involves meeting with a child at school once a week for 30 minutes, something that a volunteer could do during a lunch hour. The community-based program involves taking a child, what Big Brothers-Big Sisters calls your little, to visit places or do things in the community.

Without a mentor in their lives, somebody they meet with on a regular basis, someone thats going to be consistent for them to help them reach their full potential, a lot of kids in our program dont necessarily think much beyond what they are doing today or tomorrow, Ganz said. They dont think much in advance about what their future could be like. Most kids arent thinking of goals, period.

A Big Brother or a Big Sister can come in and say, What do you want to do with your life? If you could do anything, what would you want to do? Ganz said. We get them thinking outside of the box. Having somebody besides Mom or Dad to help them realize their potential is immeasurable.

Ganz was not a little in the Big Brothers-Big Sisters program but he remembers his Uncle Pat as an adult mentor who filled a role for the young Ganz when he needed it. Ganz said most successful people in the world have had someone besides a parent in their corner.

We dont want a volunteer to come in and save the world. But what they can do, just by having fun with a child, they will change that childs world, Ganz said. Social media is full of people up in arms about social issues, but if you help one child youll be surprised at what a difference it will make.

Ganz is a native of the Clinton County community of Germantown but has been a Jacksonville area resident since college graduation. Because hes stuck around, Ganz has been able to see the difference that Big Brothers-Big Sisters has made in the lives of those who now are adults.

When I started with the agency right out of college, I often thought to myself, these kids are having fun now, but what kind of long-term impact is it going to have? Ganzsaid. Now Im a lot older and those kids I was serving 25 years ago are now adults. I still see them at the grocery store or Walmart and theyll talk to me and tell me what their big is up to now.



They have stayed in touch. We have had some matches that have been in each others weddings and have remained really good friends to this day, Ganz said. A lot of our matches create lifetime friendships.

The Big Brothers-Big Sisters Jacksonville office is funded by Prairieland United Way, an Office of Juvenile Justice grant, and fundraisers including Bowl for Kids Sake and a new raffle, Cash for Kids Sake.

Most volunteers get involved because they want to help a child. But what they end up telling me is they get just as much out of it as the child does, Ganz said. For a lot of people who are busy being adults, to be able to regularly see the world through a childs eyes is refreshing.
A lot of questions are looming for President Joe Biden as the COVID-19 pandemic finally appears to be slowing down.

What about inflation? Why can't gas prices be more reasonable? But another has Americans sitting on the edge of their seats in suspense as a deadline nears next month  student loan payments.

At the start of the pandemic in 2020, President Donald Trump ceased all federal student loan repayment plans and froze them interest-free several times during the worst illness spread in just over 100 years.

Many borrowers haven't had to pay on their student loans for more than three years now, and while Biden has extended the freeze once before it has often been said that May 31 payments would have to restart  yet it is a campaign promise, pressure from fellow Democrats and a rally in the nation's capital by supporters Monday just may be playing a role in the commander in chief's decision process.

Supporters of canceling student loan debt are gathering at the President Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial in Washington, D.C. at 11 a.m. CDT/12 p.m. EDT to encourage Biden to do away with the trillions of dollars debt borrowers have. #CancelStudentDebt is trending on social media.

The White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain on the "Pod Save America" podcast said, "The president is going to look at what we should do on student debt before the pause expires, or hell extend the pause."

It's well documented that Biden made a campaign promise when he went toe-to-toe with Trump and said he would forgive up to $10,000 of student loan debt. That has yet to happen, and prominent lawmakers have publicly voiced the 46th President needs to act.

Former Democratic presidential candidate and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren took to social media to show her support for student debt cancelation while sharing her own educational experience.

Former Ohio State Senator and current congressional candidate in the Buckeye State's 11th congressional district, Nina Turner also lent her perspective.
Telangana Congress leaders are scheduled to meet Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Monday to discuss strategies to counter the BJP and TRS in the state.

Congress has to take on both the BJP and TRS in the state to keep itself relevant in the state. In the recent Hyderabad municipal polls, while the Congress lost badly, the BJP emerged more powerful.

In the 119-membered Telangana Assembly, the Congress has just 6 MLAs, while the MIM are more in number.

The ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are engaged in a war of words, blaming each other for the delay in hiking the quota for STs and paddy procurement.

The issue of ST quota hit the headlines after Union minister of State for Tribal Affairs Bishweswar Tudu told the Lok Sabha on March 21 that his ministry has not received any proposal from the Telangana government seeking an increase in reservations for STs to 12 per cent.

He was responding to a question by Congress MP from Telangana, N. Uttam Kumar Reddy.

The TRS was quick to demand removal of the minister from the post for his "blatant lies" in Parliament. It also gave a notice for moving a privilege motion against him for "misleading" the Lok Sabha.

The TRS maintained that the state government not only made a proposal but the state Assembly passed a Bill for increasing the reservations to STs from 6.8 per cent to 10 per cent and sent it to the ministry of tribal affairs.
MERIDEN  While Miguel Cardona spends most of his week in Washington D.C. as the U.S. Secretary of Education, on Sundays you might see him worshiping at a local church or attending a family event.

Last month marked a year since Cardona was sworn in to his current job and despite his busy work schedule, he makes time for his family and local community.

His first day on the job, March 3, 2021, Cardona traveled to Meriden with First Lady Jill Biden and interacted with local students.

During his first year, his department has been busy helping the education system recover from the pandemic. In a recent interview, he noted that when he started as Secretary of Education, less than half of the schools were open for in-person learning and now 100% are open full time for in-person learning.

His department has been working on making sure American Rescue Plan Act funds are in the hands of educators, Cardona said, and helping Puerto Rico recover from the pandemic and the natural disasters that have affected the island.

Staying close to his roots

Cardona said he often thinks of Meriden and Connecticut when he makes decisions. He recalled when he was an assistant superintendent in Meriden he had a conversation with the parent of a middle school student. The parent said he wasnt thinking about sending the student to college because of the cost.

I was dismayed by the fact that as a middle schooler, already his parents are thinking that theyre not going to be able to send him to college, Cardona said. So as Im making decisions here, I remember those conversations.

He said he is now working to make sure all people, regardless of financial status, have access to quality higher education and to ensure all students feel welcome in school. Cardona mentioned the job is better than he expected and that he is fortunate to have the opportunity to influence the education of so many students.

For Cardona, whats most rewarding is hearing students are improving. He said that at the end of the day his goal is to help children.

The main challenge right now is making sure that schools become better than they were before the pandemic.

They have to be better, Cardona said, adding children now have more needs.

When he was asked about how he handles work-life balance, he said Im dad, first.

Im dad, Im a husband and I have to keep that balance, he continued. Theyve been excellent, very supportive and for me its really important that I make my way back to Meriden regularly to stay connected with my family, with my community.

For Miguels father, Hector Cardona, the anniversary means a lot.

Hector Cardona explained that although his son is very dedicated to his career, he did not know he would influence education at the national level. He mentioned that it was a big deal when Miguel Cardona became State Commissioner of Education and then soon after became U.S. Secretary of Education. Hector Cardona said those are very big accomplishments and stressed how proud he and his wife are of their son.

The new job has made family life a bit different, but Cardona makes time to visit his parents on the weekends and even in the middle of the week. Hector Cardona said that on a typical Sunday, his son goes to church with his family and then takes part in a family gathering with his parents. The Sunday afternoon conversations are always exciting as Miguel Cardona tells the family about the places he visits and the prominent people he meets.

Hector Cardona said that his sons success not only has to do with his knowledge and preparation but also with the fact that he really enjoys what he does.

Mark Benigni, Meriden superintendent of schools, said he is thrilled for Cardona. Benigni described Cardona as a leader and stressed the whole city takes pride in the work he is doing. He said that although he misses working with Cardona, he knows he is doing important work at the national level. Benigni also mentioned that Cardona has done a great job advocating for in-person learning.

Cardona has worked on making sure students are challenged academically, but provided with the emotional support they need, Benigni said.

ksantos@record-journal.com203-317-2364Twitter: @KarlaSantosNews
WALLINGFORD  Living in a country where the official language is not your primary language can create many obstacles.

We have heard from a few Wallingford parents who mentioned they feel their children are not receiving enough help learning English. One of them is Magdali Cordova, who came from Ecuador and has two children attending Wallingford Public Schools in seventh and third grade. Her younger child did not know any English when he arrived in the United States.

He has problems because aside from him not having any knowledge of English, when he came here he was not assigned [an English] teacher either, Cordova said. She realized her son had an English teacher that knew no Spanish. Communication was a challenge between them, Cordova said.

In November 2021, she decided to speak with the school principal and explain her sons needs. A teacher was assigned to teach him English last month.

Cordova feels the public schools should better prioritize help for English learners.

I think that for Wallingford Public Schools, the main priority for children that come from a foreign country should be to take into consideration this topic but mainly so children dont become traumatized, she said.

Wallingford Public Schools

School Superintendent Danielle Bellizzi said the proposed 2022-23 budget includes one additional teacher for English learners. The position is based on an expected increase in English learners.

The district currently has 10 English learner teachers and five certified bilingual teachers assigned to different schools based on need, she said.

During the January Board of Education meeting, Carrie LaTorre, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, said the district provides before or after school services to English learners.

The services are offered through a grant for immigrant students and are focused on numeracy and literacy skills with a strong focus on speaking English.

According to Bellizzi, eight of the 12 Wallingford schools are running the program and 75 students are participating.

In the classroom setting, the classroom teacher provides grade-level instruction as well as small group instruction based on the individual student's needs, Bellizzi said.

English learners also receive instruction from the English learner teacher as well as other certified staff, she said.

Like every Wallingford Public Schools student, if there are difficulties with the acquisition of curriculum, parents are informed through phone calls, emails and parent conferences, Bellizzi said.

She explained Title III is a federal grant that helps to ensure English learners attain English language proficiency and meet academic standards.

According to a budget document, in the 2021-22 school year the district was awarded $44,338 from Title III.

We always advocate to make sure that students and our fellow teachers have the resources that they need to be successful in all of our programs, especially our specialized ones, said Anne Varrone-Lederle, president of the Wallingford Education Association. Teachers for our English language learners would definitely be a part of this. she said.

Teachers get moved around based on need and enrollment and her team keeps track of these movements to ensure students and teachers have the needed resources, she added.

For more information about Wallingford Public Schools, visit https://www.wallingford.k12.ct.us/.

ksantos@record-journal.com203-317-2364Twitter: @KarlaSantosNews
Click here to read the full article.

Netflix has slowed development on its upcoming action-thriller Fast and Loose, which Will Smith has been attached to star in. The project has been moved to the streamers back burner in the days following the 2022 Oscars ceremony, during which Smith walked onstage and slapped Chris Rock after the comedian made a joke about the appearance of Smiths wife, Jada Pinkett Smith.

In the week before the Oscars ceremony, director David Leitch reportedly also pulled away from the project, electing to move to the Ryan Gosling vehicle Fall Guy for Universal. After beginning to search for a new director, Netflix has now halted Fast and Loose in the days following the Oscars.

It remains uncertain whether Netflix will return to developing Fast and Loose and, if so, whether the streamer would seek a new star for the project. Variety has reached out to Netflix for comment.

The story of Fast and Loose would follow a criminal who loses his memory after an attack. After mysteriously waking up in Tijuana, the character is forced to discover the clues of his past, leading him to learn that he has led two identities  one as a wealthy crime lord, the other as an undercover CIA agent.

Along with Fast and Loose, it remains to be seen how many dominoes could fall in the wake of Smiths outburst at the Oscars. Smiths Apple TV Plus drama Emancipation is currently in post-production and was seen by some as a potential awards contender for the coming year. The thriller stars Smith as an escaped slave in Louisiana who joins the Union Army. The film is scheduled to release in 2022, but Apple has not yet issued an official date.

The news of Fast and Loose comes on the heels of Smith resigning from the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences on Friday.

The Hollywood Reporter was first to report the news.

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
The Mumbai Police are questioning Bharatiya Janata Party's Leader of Opposition (Council) Pravin Darekar in connection with the alleged irregularities during his tenure at the Mumbai District Central Cooperative Bank (MDCCB) Ltd, here on Monday.

Following summons on Sunday, Darekar reported to the MRA Marg Police Station, which lodged the FIR on March 14 based on a complaint by Aam Aadmi Party state general secretary Dhananjay Shinde.

Hundreds of BJP activists from the city staged vociferous protests outside the police station as Darekar stepped inside for the probe, alleging he was being targeted by the state government's vendetta politics.

Among other things, Shinde has alleged that Darekar cheated the government and the MDCCB by impersonating as a labourer to contest the bank's elections as a Director in the workmen's category.

He further said that Darekar served the MDCCB Director and two terms as the Chairman, after which a probe was ordered by the Maharashtra Cooperative Department and he was disqualified in January 2022.

Shinde stated that it was during Darekar's tenure that an alleged misappropriation of MDCCB's funds to the tune of Rs 2,000 crore took place and sought his resignation as Leader of Opposition.

Besides AAP, Shiv Sena leader Kishore Tiwari had earlier filed a complaint against Darekar in September 2021 with Ghatkopar Police Station, claiming he had mis-declared his professional credentials in his election affidavits and hence was liable for action.

Darekar -- who continues on the MDCCB board for the current term (2021-2026) -- has consistently denied all the allegations hurled against him in the matter by Shinde and Tiwari, with the latter urging Union Minister for Cooperation Amit Shah to clarify the party's stand in the matter.
Sadie Layher/Graphic

A new statewide poll shows how Texans are almost evenly split on their decision for Texas governor. Beto O'Rourke sits only two points behind Gov. Greg Abbott at 40% to 42% respectively in the latest poll.

The Texas Lyceum Poll released its findings on Friday, April 1 after asking 926 registered voters whom they would support if the gubernatorial election were held at this moment. While it's an almost even split, 18% said they would be supporting someone else, hadn't thought enough about it, or didn't know.
My Nashville Post role has evolved since 2000 when I joined the now-defunct The City Paper. TCP became a Post sister publication in 2008 (when I began doing some Post work) and folded in 2013. I have been managing editor of the Post since late 2011.

Follow William Williams Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Save Manage followed notifications Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today
(Natural News) The economic fallout from Russias invasion of Ukraine is continuing to reverberate throughout Europe, though it is hitting some countries far worse than others.

That is especially true of Germany, which was reliant on Moscow for the lions share of its annual natural gas supply.

The U.S. and other Western nations have imposed sanctions on the purchase of Russian oil and gas, but not all European nations are keen to do that so quickly without being assured they can obtain supplies elsewhere. And with the Biden regime so quick to dismantle the U.S. oil and gas industry, thanks to demands by lunatic leftists within the Democrat Party, Berlin cant really depend on a steady supply from America. And there isnt any other viable alternative readily available.

That said, the Germans are increasingly skittish about simply dropping Russian gas, and with good reason: Without it, the countrys economy is liable to collapse completely, according to the CEO of Germanys multinational BASF SE, which is the worlds largest producer of chemicals.

Company CEO Martin Brudermuller warned that either limiting or cutting off energy imports from Russia would likely put in doubt the viability of small and medium-sized energy firms to continue operating in the country while also spinning Germany off into the most catastrophic economic crisis since the end of World War II, when the country lay in ruins following an Allied invasion.

Brudermuller, who made his remarks to the Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper right before German officials, in the middle of last week, provided an early warning to industries as well as the German population that there could potentially be shortages of natural gas, as the Kremlin appears committed to President Vladimir Putins demand that unfriendly countries settle their energy payments in rubles, the Russian currency, following Western sanctions.

While he suggested that Germany could be independent of Russia gas in four to five years, for now, he conceded, LNG imports cannot be increased quickly enough to replace all Russian gas flows in the short term.

In the meantime, Brudermuller said its not enough that we all turn down the heating by two degrees now, since Russia covers 55 percent of German natural gas consumption. He explained forcefully that if Moscows gas flows disappeared overnight, many things would collapse here since we would have high levels of unemployment, and many companies would go bankrupt. This would lead to irreversible damage.

To put it bluntly: This could bring the German economy into its worst crisis since the end of the Second World War and destroy our prosperity, Brudermuller continued. For many small and medium-sized companies, in particular, it could mean the end. We cant risk that!

Here is the question posed by the newspaper, along with the BASF CEOs response:

And what if, for example, Putins demand for payment in rubles leads to an immediate stop in gas supplies?

A delivery stop for a short time would perhaps open the eyes of many  on both sides. It would make clear the magnitude of the consequences. But if we dont get any more Russian gas for a long time, then we really have a problem here in Germany, he noted.

At BASF, we would have to scale back or completely shut down production at our largest site in Ludwigshafen if the supply fell significantly and permanently below 50 percent of our maximum natural gas requirement. Minister Habeck has already activated the early warning level of the gas emergency plan, he continued.

Russias Putin played his hand brilliantly, whether we want to admit that or not, in calculating what he could and couldnt get away with in terms of dealing with Ukraine. Sanctions on his country will sting, but he seems far more prepared to weather the economic storm than those countries trying to sanction him.

Sources include:

FAZ.net

ZeroHedge.com
(Natural News) Once again, the foreign policy amateurs working for the Biden regime are doing more to drive away American allies and friends than Donald Trump ever did, though he is frequently blamed for harming international relationships.

The latest disaster from the Biden team: Threatening India economically if New Delhi continues to buy Russian oil amid U.S. sanctions that are doing much to create a bipolar global economic system to the detriment of the U.S. dollar.

According to Business Standard, a senior U.S. official has said that a substantial increase in Russian oil imports by India could put the latter at great risk as the Biden regime increases enforcement of its sanctions against Moscow over the invasion of Ukraine.

Even though the current U.S. sanctions regimen doesnt actually prevent other nations from purchasing Russian oil, the warning increases the likelihood that the regime will at least attempt to restrict the purchases to normal levels.

The warning, such as it was, came ahead of a visit to New Delhi by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who plans to spend two days there amid an ongoing visit to India by U.S. Deputy National Security Adviser for Economics, Daleep Singh.

Oil refiners in India, the worlds third-largest importer and consumer of the commodity, have been rapidly buying up Russian oil via spot tenders on global markets since the invasion started on Feb. 24, likely anticipating the Wests sanctions regimen. Since then, India has bought at least 13 million barrels of Russian crude compared to roughly 16 million barrels throughout 2021.

U.S. has no objection to India buying Russian oil provided it buys it at discount, without significantly increasing from previous years, said the U.S. source who spoke on condition of anonymity. Some increase is allowed, the source added without providing details.

Meanwhile, Business Standard noted further that the U.S. State Dept. is aware of ongoing talks between India and Russia regarding oil purchases, citing the source.

We continue to engage our partners in India and around the world on the importance of a strong collective action, including strong sanctions, to press the Kremlin to end its devastating war of choice against Ukraine as soon as possible, the source added.

The report added:

U.S. sanctions are reducing the ability of Russia, which normally produces about 1 in every 10 barrels of global oil, to get crude to market. The Paris-based International Energy Agency has estimated that sanctions and buyer reluctance could remove 3 million barrels per day from global markets of Russian crude and refined products from April.

The source said Washington has no problems if India settles trade with Russia in rupees or continues to pay in dollars, provided the transactions are sanctions-compliant and with permitted entities.

But India is looking out for its own best interests, which is what our country did when Donald Trump was in office. And Russia is offering to help.

First and foremost, the Indians are working on a trading method with Russia to purchase goods, including use of the countrys currency, the rupee.

Also, Russia has offered the use of a messaging system that the countrys central bank developed as a means of enabling bilateral payments since New Delhi is not currently an active participant in the U.S.-led sanctions effort against Moscow, according to AntiWar.com.

Sources told Bloomberg that the plan involves using Russias messaging system, known as SPFS, for rupee-ruble-denominated payments. The proposal is expected to be discussed when Lavrov arrives in the Indian capital this week, the outlet said.

The move comes after the U.S. and the West cut Russia out of SWIFT, the primary messaging system used for international financial transactions.

In the end, whats going to happen is that the U.S. moves, which are stupid on their face, will lead to the creation of a whole new global financial structure that cuts out the U.S. and the West and is self-contained among nations that, unlike the Biden regime, wont steal hundreds of billions in currency reserves.

There is no stopping the Western financial collapse thats coming.

Sources include:

AntiWar.com

Business-Standard.com
(Natural News) Dr. Peter McCullough, a respected internist and cardiologist, told lawmakers at a March 4 hearing hosted by Pennsylvania Republican state Sen. Doug Mastriano that at least 95 percent of Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) deaths in the U.S. could have been prevented with early treatment.

McCullough, who has often warned against mass vaccination against COVID-19, testified as an expert witness in the hearing. Dr. Bryan Ardis, a chiropractor and medical researcher; philanthropist Steve Kirsch and Attorney Thomas Renz also testified.

Medical experts and lawmakers discussed at the hearing the four pillars of pandemic response, the brokenness in medicine today and how to unite Pennsylvania under the banner of Medical Freedom.

According to McCullough, transmission only occurs from someone who is acutely ill to a susceptible person. He said lockdowns, social distancing and other preventive measures dont need to be enforced for individuals who are perfectly healthy.

McCullough also discussed the importance of early treatment drugs like fluvoxamine, hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin since various studies have proven that multi-drug therapy for COVID-19 significantly reduced the risk of hospitalization and death by as much as 95 percent. He said that these early treatment drugs shouldnt be controversial, especially if they could have been used to prevent coronavirus in many patients.

Renowned for being the most published person in his field and an editor of two major medical journals, McCullough warned against vaccine mandates calling for the inoculation of children with experimental COVID-19 vaccines.

Risks of vaccinating children far outweigh potential benefits

McCullough said that based on publications of representative data, it is obvious that the risks of vaccinating children far outweigh the potential benefits. He added that there have been multiple reports of teenagers experiencing fatal negative side effects of the COVID-19 vaccines in the past several weeks.

The cardiologist was referring to a pre-print study released on February 14, which was conducted to study the autopsy microscopic cardiac findings in adolescent deaths that occurred shortly after receiving the second Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 dose.

In Connecticut, two teen-aged boys died on days three and four after taking the Pfizer vaccine. The parents of both boys were shocked to find the children dead at home.

The autopsies performed on the teenagers revealed that the vaccines caused the deaths with massive heart inflammation and evidence of superimposed catecholamine injury on the heart.

McCullough warned that despite evidence to the contrary, both the authorities and Big Pharma insist that these dangerous COVID-19 vaccines are pushed, encouraged and mandated. (Related: Altered DNA? Dr. Peter McCullough discusses dangerous long-term effects of COVID-19 vaccines.)

As a physician and as a public citizen, McCullough said that all vaccine mandates should be dropped immediately and that all current vaccines should be pulled from the market and undergo a very intensive review on safety and efficacy to determine where the vaccine program has gone wrong.

As of March 18, almost 1.2 million adverse events linked to the coronavirus vaccines have been reported to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS). To date, the reported cases also include 26,059 deaths, 143,554 hospitalizations and 37,133 cases of heart inflammation or myocarditis.

Visit Vaccines.news to read more articles about the side effects of COVID-19 vaccines.

Watch the video below as panelists from the documentary Vaxxed II: The Peoples Truth talk about whether or not its safe to take the coronavirus vaccine.

This video is from the Marine1063 channel on Brighteon.com.

More related stories:

Dr. Peter McCullough: One COVID vaccine death is too many.

The Big Logic: Lack of COVID-19 treatment protocol is reckless, says Dr. Peter McCullough.

Dr. Peter McCullough discusses omicron variant with Ann Vandersteel  Brighteon.TV.

Sources include:

LifeSiteNews.com

SenatorMastriano.com

PubMed.NCBI.NLM.NIH.gov

Brighteon.com
(Natural News) CNN has ceased all operations in Russia following an announcement by President Putin that mainstream media outlets who publish fake news will be punished.

(Article by Sean Adl-Tabatabai republished from NewsPunch.com)

CNN will stop broadcasting in Russia while we continue to evaluate the situation and our next steps moving forward, a CNN spokesperson admitted to The Hollywood Reporter.

Vyacheslav Volodin, who serves as speaker for the lower house of Russian parliament, declared that Putins reform will force those who lied and made statements discrediting our armed forces to bear very grave punishment.

I want everyone to understand, and for society to understand, that we are doing this to protect our soldiers and officers, and to protect the truth, he said.

Bigleaguepolitics.com reports:The law will impose prison sentences of up to three years and fine individuals who spread false and defamatory statements about the military. For cases that are deemed to lead to severe consequences to the Russian military efforts, there could be up to 15 years in prison for offenders.

The usual actors are claiming that this is a blatant crackdown by Putin on the free press, and while they certainly have a point, there is no doubt that Western media outlets, such as CNN, have propagandized the masses shamelessly and mercilessly about the nature of the Russia/Ukraine conflict.

Big League Politics has reported on the information war conducted on the West against freedom of speech and expression:

Russia Today (RT), a Kremlin-funded news network, has been banned from spreading its message on Telegram, the popular and growing encrypted messaging application that is ostensibly meant to protect freedom of speech.

Telegram caved after receiving pressure from the European Union to censor their content, which the globalist body claims is a haven for conspiracy theories undermining Ukrainian support in their current conflict with Russia.

The rules are clear. There cannot be any circumvention, said V?ra Jourova, the European Commissions vice president for values and transparency, to POLITICO.

All actors should take their responsibilities. First, because it is the law in the EU. Second, everyone has understood what is at stake by now, Jourova added, making the case for ubiquitous censorship of all non-globalist operations.

We will not rest until everyone  including messenger services  take their responsibility in countering the Kremlins war propaganda, Thierry Breton, the EUs internal markets Commissioner, said in a statement of demands sent to Telegram.

While Telegram embraces censorship, an alt tech video platform  Rumble  is continuing to stream RT as they demonstrate their stalwart commitment to freedom of speech.

Putins decision to expel CNN and other fake news sources is certainly controversial but may ultimately be effective. The fake news, after all, is the enemy of mankind.

Read more at: NewsPunch.com
(Natural News) They say justice delayed is justice denied and that is true, but they also say better late than never, and both of them apply in this case.

More than five years ago, Hillary Clinton colluded with the Democratic National Committee, which she had all but officially taken over as a vessel to fund her campaign against Donald Trump on a plot to entrap the GOP nominee in a lie that would go on to dog him until this day.

Specifically, Clintons campaign and the DNC funded the bogus Russia dossier that the FBI would later use as justification to launch a counterintelligence investigation into a major party presidential campaign, something that was unprecedented in the history of the bureau. But both the campaign and the DNC lied about it and said they neither knew anything about the origins of the dossier or how it was initiated.

Finally, more than a half-decade later, both the Clinton campaign and the DNC are paying some sort of price for their chicanery, as reported by the Washington Examiner:

The Federal Election Commission has fined the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clintons 2016 campaign for lying about the funding of the infamous, and discredited, Russian dossier used in a smear attempt against Donald Trump weeks before he shocked the world with his 2016 presidential victory.

The election agency said that Clinton and the DNC violated strict rules on describing expenditures of payments funneled to the opposition research firm Fusion GPS through their law firm.

Combined, the two entities paid $1,024,407.97 to the law firm Perkins Coie for the information gathered by Fusion GPS, while both hid the reason and claimed that the money was for legal services instead of opposition research.

Instead, the DNCs $849,407.97 and the Clinton campaigns $175,000 covered Fusion GPSs opposition research on the dossier, a basis for the so-called Russia hoax that dogged Trumps first term, the Washington Examiner reported.

According to a memo seen by the Examiner, the Clinton campaign and the DNC claimed that they correctly described the expenditures as being for legal advice and services because the Perkins Coie firm hired Fusion GPS. But the attempt at establishing plausible deniability did not work; the FEC noted that the law on the matter is clear and it was indeed violated.

The memo also said that neither the party nor Clintons people conceded to lying to the agency but are not planning to contest the finding (because that would bring the entire sordid episode back into the news cycle at a time when Hillary is said to be considering yet another White House bid because Biden is too old and Kamala Harris is too dumb to be president).

Solely for the purpose of settling this matter expeditiously and to avoid further legal costs, respondent[s] does not concede, but will not further contest the commissions finding of probable cause to proceed with the probe, the federal agency noted.

The FEC, in a memo to the Coolidge Reagan Foundation, which filed its complaint over three years ago, said it fined Clintons treasurer $8,000 and the DNCs treasurer $105,000, the Examiner reported.

The thing is, Clinton and the DNC are not the only guilty ones here; the corporate media, which knew from the outset that the dossier was BS, reported on it as though it was real and that Trump actually was a dupe for Vladimir Putin.

Axios, one of the leading D.C.-based corporate media outlets, has admitted that reporting surrounding the now infamous Trump-Steele dossier was one of the most egregious journalistic errors in modern history, in an article slamming news-media colleagues for the years of fake news reporting, the National Pulse reported in November.

In addition, Axios noted, outlandish, outsized coverage of the dossier, which was not even vetted at the time, as Trumps presidency began helped drive the narrative of collusion between Trump and Russia.

Our institutions  our politics and our media  no longer function as our founders established and envisioned.

Sources include:

WashingtonExaminer.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) When influenza vaccines were first introduced in 1980, the claim was that they would put an end to the flu. It has been more than 40 years since, however, and rates of infection and death are about the same as they were back in 1960.

The following image shows flu shot uptake between 1980 and today, as provided by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC):

The next image shows monthly influenza mortality counts between 1959 and 2016:

Notice anything wrong with what you see? Despite a massive rise in flu shot uptake over the past 40 years, the same number of people are dying every month from the flu, almost as if the shots are doing absolutely nothing to stop the virus.

We went from 12 million flu shots in 1980 to almost 200 million in 2020, writes Alex Berenson on his Substack, adding that nothing has changed as far as flu deaths during that time.

There is absolutely no relationship between the number of flu vaccines we give and deaths from influenza.

Vaccine hesitancy research from 2010 was used to trick more people into taking covid injections 11 years later

It gets worse, though. What is not shown on the second chart are the number of flu deaths in 2017 and 2018. It turns out more people died from the flu during that season than perhaps ever, including during the 1968 Hong Kong flu outbreak.

The New York Times reported that 80,000 Americans of flu died during the winter of 2017-18, which it said was the highest toll in years.

Among the dead were 180 babies, children and teenagers, more than in any year since the CDC began tracking pediatric deaths.

What this all proves, of course, is that flu shots are just as useless as Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccines at saving lives. Both injections are also dangerous and come with the risk of serious side effects, though covid injections seem to be far worse.

Instead of asking if the reason people didnt want to get jabbed was that the shots manifestly DID NOT WORK, the authorities simply looked for ways to encourage or force people to take them, Berenson further explains.

By 2010, research on vaccine hesitancy and compliance began to accelerate  This is what happens when process  taxpayer-funded process  gets separated from outcome, when too many people have too much money and careers at stake for anyone to ask the question: Does any of this make sense?

The results of all that research were used to carefully craft and hone the plandemic and how to deal with resisters who refuse to get injected with experimental gene therapy chemicals, also known as mRNA (messenger RNA) vaccines.

 when Covid came the vaccinators knew EXACTLY what to do, Berenson contends. Except this time the money made the funding for flu shots look like a rounding error. Getting out of this ditch is going to be very, very difficult.

These and other revelations are really starting to make waves in the court of public opinion. People who were once convinced that vaccines are safe and effective are now starting to question everything about the official narrative.

COVID has helped me re-evaluate the entire vaccine narrative, and for the first time in years, I did not get a flu shot this winter, wrote someone who reads Berensons work, adding that she did not get the covid injections either.

Now I feel guilty for past discussions with some of my children and a sibling about how they needed to get the flu shot. I believe that Robert Malone, in one of his interviews, stated that the flu shot is a lot more controversial among vaccine experts than anyone would ever know.

More related news about flu shots can be found at ChemicalViolence.com.

Sources for this article include:

AlexBerenson.substack.com

NaturalNews.com
A Bangaldeshi police constable harassing a woman for wearing a bindi has drawn widespread criticism, with some demanding harsh punishment for the accused.

On April 2, Lata Samaddar, a lecturer of theatre and media studies at Dhaka's Tejgaon College, filed a complaint alleging that she was harassed in broad daylight by the policeman in the capital city's Sher-e-Bangla Nagar area.

"When I was walking towards the college, a middle-aged long bearded man hurled abuse at me saying 'Why are you wearing a tip (bindi)?' I turned around and found the man sitting on a motorcycle, wearing police uniform," she said in her complaint.

News of the incident spread quickly on social media, drawing heavy criticism.

Actress and MP Suborna Mustafa discussed the incident in Parliament on Sunday, demanding that action be taken against the harasser.

Human rights activist Nurjahan Khan told IANS on Monday that the incident was a form of the ongoing communalism being carried out by a section of police administration.

She also demanded exemplary punishment for the accused.

Advocate Rana Dasgupta said: "The identity of the police officer should be exposed, he should be punished. If we don't get rid of this situation, the future of Bangladesh is definitely dark."

Leaders of the Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Oikya Parishad demanded the arrest of the police constable.

AT Ahmedul Huq Chowdhury, a veteran freedom fighter, told IANS that most of the police officials need long term counselling to behave in a proper term.

Bikram Kishore Tripura, the secretary and former Additional Inspector General of Police, said: "For the sake of the service the delinquent police officer should be identified and departmentally proceeded immediately."

Activist and poet Imtiaz Mahmood protested by posting a photo on social media of him wearing a bindi on his forehead.
(Natural News) Former 60 Minutes correspondent and award-winning investigative reporter Lara Logan, who appears to have been shunned by Fox News after she compared Dr. Anthony Fauci to Nazi regime terrorist Dr. Josef Mengele, dropped truth bombs about whats really going on with Russias invasion of Ukraine.

In an interview with Stew Peters last week, Logan began by noting that she has never in her life seen such universal acceptance of war by Americans, most of whom have embraced Ukraine because theyve been lied to constantly about Russia and its current leader, President Vladimir Putin.

Its what you call the theater of the absolute ridiculous, she said, noting that all across L.A. there are Ukrainian flags flying. When in our lifetimes did anybody ever see the cheering that is going on with any kind of war? That really gets my BS meter just going absolutely off the charts.

What you have here is whether you like Putin or dont like him, whether hes a good guy or hes a bad guy, Putin is not willing to be part of whatever global government structure that is coming our way, she said. Hes one man who is standing between us and the people who want to see a new world order.

And you dont have to dig very deep to find out that Ukraine has a very dark history, Logan continued. And its directly involved in much of what is going on in the United States. You talk about all the lies, well Ukraine has been at the center of many of the most damaging lies.

She went on to note Putin has been calculating and careful ahead of his invasion of Ukraine, adding that the Russian leader has said for 15 years he would not tolerate NATO expansion.

He has also made it very clear he is not part of whatever theyve got right now in the bioweapons labs that Hunter Bidens  partners and firms are connected to, she went on. They want to say that were conspiracy theoristsbut at the World Economic Forum, they can talk about a new world order, and likewise for other globalist constructs like a world minimum wage, a global vaccine passport, and so on.

Im just tired of it, Logan added. You know, those people who want to read The New York Times and read the Washington Post and believe the nonsense, I just, I dont have time for that anymore. Im talking to the people who are listening and want to hear whats true and whats not true.

Later, Logan spoke about what the Wests leaders have ignored since Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy came to power, such as mass graves in the countrys east, in places like Odessa and in the Donbas region, where the Ukrainian military and militias have allegedly carried out killings when people there voted to secede and either became independent or moved closer to Russia.

That was never a narrative the West was ever, you know, we werent gonna tell that story, we were just going to ignore it, she said in comments that were backed up by a source from Ukraine who spoke to Natural News on background for this story.

Were going to parrot out what Zelenskyy and the West want us to say about Ukraine, she added.

Logan went on to note the irony behind the first impeachment of then-President Donald Trump for allegedly withholding aid to Ukraine for a moment, though that money was going to fund Ukrainian military units that are literally neo-Nazis. And yet, she said, the leftist deep state in the U.S. accused any American who supported Trump of being neo-Nazis.

Last week, Logan was invited onto Americas Voice and asked about reports from the Daily Mail that the Russian army was running out of bullets.' Peters noted earlier in his monologue, In response, Lara revealed the truth: That the story was completely ridiculous, and that the war in Ukraine has arguably prompted more lies, on a larger scale, than any news event in recent history. It may have caused more lies even than COVID.

WATCH:

Sources include:

StewPeters.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) Former President Donald Trumps Truth Social wants to make itself cancel-proof against leftist demands that Big Tech preemptively deplatform it.

(Article by Jordan Boyd republished from TheFederalist.com)

So far, the increasingly popular free speech platform has already survived attacks from the corporate media hellbent on smearing anything associated with Trump. Now, leftists are wielding Jan. 6 as an excuse to demand Big Tech companies such as Apple thwart Truth Social before it even becomes fully operational at the end of the month.

In Big Tech Could Save Us From Truth Social, author Samuel OBrient, who has a history of demanding censorship because he believes Limiting Free Speech is Essential to Democracy, argues that Big Tech companies should preemptively nuke the anti-political censorship platform simply because it is associated with the former president.

Trump clearly wants to use Truth Social to rally his troops again and fire them up for another run at the White House. Theres almost no way that such a mission wont include inciting violence in some form, OBrient wrote this week. If Truth Social becomes a venue for hate-spewing and further insurrection-plotting, these big tech giants can buy themselves a lot of goodwill by honoring their credos and standing up to protect American democracy.

While corporate media are still largely focused on downplaying the number of people abandoning propaganda sites run by the political actors in Big Tech, leaders at Truth Social know that a war on their attempt to offer a family-friendly social media site is coming and they are prepared to stop it in its tracks.

The campaign by the left and the mainstream media to censor and suppress other viewpoints is a shocking threat to democracy, Devin Nunes, CEO of Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) in charge of launching Truth Social, told The Federalist. The fact that theres even a need and a demand for Truth Social  a social media platform that wont censor content based on viewpoints  is unsettling in itself. Once you begin censoring, the suppressions develop a momentum of their own. This naturally leads to demands for preemptive censorship, which until recently was a concept you only found in dystopian science fiction novels.

Despite the difficulties presented by a market largely controlled by Big Tech monopolies, Truth Social built most of its platform from the ground up. Parler previously tried a similar strategy but was eventually nuked by dozens of companies who wanted the platform gone for political reasons. Unlike in Parlers case, Apple is really the only Big Tech company that has the power to remove Truth Social from its app store and the new social media platform is already working to keep the illegal activity that censors use to justify suppression off of the platform.

While some are calling for Truth Social to be wiped off of the web, the leaders of the social media company are confident that their lack of reliance on corrupt, political actors for web services will guard them against sudden deplatforming.

Were building as much of our own infrastructure as possible from scratch. We wont be relying on Big Tech firms to keep our website on the internet, and were partnering with companies that are fundamentally committed to free speech, such as Rumble, Nunes said.

Big Tech is filled with political entities that have used their influence and authority to suppress narratives about Covid-19, biological sex, and political stances they dislike. During the 2020 election alone, social media oligarchs did their best to alter the election outcome in favor of now-President Joe Biden. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was caught red-handed funneling money into poor election practices that benefit Democrats and Twitter, aided by the corrupt corporate media, deliberately blacked out any coverage of the Hunter Biden laptop story. After the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Facebook, Twitter, and others justified wiping Trump off of their platforms for inciting violence but have let actual warmongers like Russias Vladimir Putin stay on.

Users are hungry for a social media platform that doesnt threaten them when they think or speak differently than the regime desires and Nunes said they will find it with Truth Social.

The Big Tech companies generally did not begin as leftwing propaganda projects. In fact, the founders of a lot of these companies were idealistic proponents of free speech. But over time, they got corrupted and transformed their platforms into appendages of the Democratic Party and the left, Nunes said. Truth Social wont do that, no matter the pressure from the media, the government, the left, or anywhere else. President Trump, myself, and others here have spent years fighting back against the lefts ridiculous attempts to silence us.

Nunes is all too familiar with political censorship that is strategically used to justify false narratives circulated by the corrupt corporate media. When he served as the Chair of the House Intelligence Committee, Nunes was quick to call out the fraudulent stories about Trump colluding with Russia which were repeatedly promoted by the dishonest press. Nunes also helped expose Twitter for shadowbanning conservatives like him.

You cant eliminate one side from the public debate and expect to keep a healthy democracy. Everyone is entitled to have their say, and were not going to hire a bunch of Big Tech-style political enforcers and ideological goons to force-feed you the viewpoints we decide you should be reading. Thats condescending and unfair, and we wont do it, Nunes said.

Read more at: TheFederalist.com
(Natural News) In case you havent noticed, a line is being drawn in the sand: you either stand with Ukraine and unquestioningly parrot the establishment narrative  or you are an agent of the Kremlin. The war propaganda is palpable and we havent seen anything like this since the immediate aftermath of 9/11.

(Article by Matt Agorist republished from TheFreeThoughtProject.com)

While the media and your leaders are demanding that you take a side, it is important to remember that it is entirely possible to stand against the Russian invasion in Ukraine as well as the folks who helped to instigate it.

There is no question that NATO policy over the last 8 years has pushed Vladimir Putin into a corner, creating a direct threat to the national security of Russia. And, as Chris Hedges points out, Russia has every right to feel threatened, betrayed, and angry.

However, he adds, But to understand is not to condone. The invasion of Ukraine, under post-Nuremberg laws, is a criminal war of aggression.

It is also important to point out that those standing with the Ukraine now, are largely responsible for the quagmire currently unfolding in the region. As we listen to political voices talk about standing up for freedom and democracy in Ukraine, their words ring hollow to those who have been paying attention.

For starters, Ukraine is not a democracy as democracies dont take down three TV stations for being critical of the president. Democracies dont kidnap and cage their political opposition, who happened to come in second in the election process. And, democracies dont bomb innocent civilians within their own countries for not being loyal to the party.

Undoubtedly, the people of Ukraine desire freedom and democracy  but their leaders have made it clear that this is not their end game.

Whats more, those claiming to stand for freedom and democracy out here in the West, are not who they claim to be either. Just a few short weeks ago, they were carrying out incredible acts of tyranny against their own people.

Today, as President Putin attempts to illegally and unjustifiably seize Ukraines territory, Canada continues to be inspired by Ukraine and its people, who remain strong, resilient, and determined as they defend their countrys sovereignty, Canadas Prime Minster Justin Trudeau said in a statement on Ukraine last week. In these dark hours, Canadas message to the people of Ukraine is this: You are not alone. We are standing with you. Our support for Ukraine, for democracy, and for human rights remains unwavering.

Exactly how he said this through a straight face is anyones guess, as Trudeau has risen through the ranks of historys tyrants rather quickly over the last two years.

Only weeks before claiming he stands for freedom and human rights, Trudeau began freezing the bank accounts of protesters who stood against tyrannical mandates. Citizens were beaten and arrested for protesting peacefully in front of the capitol. Not only did they go after the protesters, but the government went after the bank accounts of those who provided monetary support in the form of donations as well.

For practicing their free speech, Canadians were persecuted and driven into financial ruin by the government who claims to stand with the Ukraine. This was all carried out with zero due process and without any democratic input at all  completely voiding the statement that Trudeau stands for democracy.

When the American political class  who also claims to stand for democracy in Ukraine  watched as the Canadian government began financially persecuting individuals for their freedom of speech, they not only remained silent but facilitated it. This was one of the most tyrannical moves in recent Western history and instead of standing against it, the establishment actually supported it.

In fact, a poll by Trafalger Group for Convention of the States recently found that a super-majority of Democrats, 65%, actually thought Trudeaus authoritarian move to arrest people and confiscate their life savings  for practicing their freedom of speech  was a good thing.

In a similar speech, like the one from Trudeau above, Biden talked out of the side of his mouth as well as he claimed America stands up to bullies. We stand up for freedom. This is who we are.

Again, these words ring hollow given the fact that only months before he said this, he was removing peoples freedom  forcing them to take a vaccine or face financial ruin.

Instead of calling out the establishment for these unconstitutional and illegal mandates, ABC, CBS, NBC, WaPo, AP, MSNBC, and CNN, chose to support the unilateral decision to force Americans to undergo a medical procedure against their will and vehemently defended it  claiming those that opposed it were the problem.

It is no surprise that these were the same media who have been marching us into a conflict with Russia over Ukraine  only this time, instead of stupid lies about horse paste, their disinformation has potentially catastrophic consequences.

We cannot have such short memories. The same folks who lied to us for two years over covid are again manipulating us into a devastating conflict with Russia because they stand to reap massive profits from war.

As Chris Hedges so accurately reminds us:

Only the autocrats and politicians who dream of empire and global hegemony, of the god-like power that comes with wielding armies, warplanes, and fleets, along with the merchants of death, whose business floods countries with weapons, profit from war. The expansion of NATO into Eastern Europe has earned Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, General Dynamics, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Analytic Services, Huntington Ingalls, Humana, BAE Systems, and L3Harris billions in profits. The stoking of conflict in Ukraine will earn them billions more.

We must not let the purveyors of propaganda lead us into another Afghanistan or Iraq. We simply cannot afford it, and this time, the enemy is a far greater threat than an insurgency in caves.

Read more at: TheFreeThoughtProject.com
(Natural News) There is now talk about Russia demanding payment in rubles for other things besides just energy.

Just as President Vladimir Putin was set to give his announcement about Russia only accepting natural gas payments in rubles beginning on April 1, Vyacheslav Volodin, the speaker of the lower house of the Russian parliament, issued his own battle cry to Europe and the West:

European politicians need to stop the talk, stop trying to find some justification about why they cannot pay in rubles. If you want gas, find rubles.

A BBC News report added that Russia is also on the verge of demanding payment in rubles for other commodities such as fertilizer and grain, which are now in short supply, as well as for metals and timber.

It sounds as though anything Russia exports will need to be paid for in rubles, which violates the sanctions imposed against the country in retaliation for its invasion of Ukraine.

Will Europe survive Putins ultimatums?

The following is a breakdown of various European countries and how they rely on Russia for its exports:

 France reportedly gets 20 percent of its gas from Russia, according to the head of the countrys CRE regulatory body, though it does not expect any supply issues

 Bulgaria takes in a whopping 90 percent of its gas from the Russian company Gazprom, though its natural gas grid operator has reportedly opened a tender for underground drilling as part of domestic plans to double the countrys gas storage capacity and prepare for any potential supply disruptions

 Poland relies on Russia for about 50 percent of its gas use, but it says it has no plans currently in place to limit gas use

 Greece receives about 40 percent of its gas from Russia via a pipeline that bypasses Ukraine, and its government is currently assessing to see how it will fare if Russia shuts off the tap.

 Italy also relies on Russia for 40 percent of its gas and is monitoring the situation to see how it might be impacted. Before any further decisions are made, Italy is planning to just wait for any contract amendments from Gazprom

 The Netherlands relies on Russia for about 15-20 percent of its gas supply, and the Dutch government is already asking people to use less of it, though the countrys gas crisis plan has not yet been activated

 Great Britain only takes in about 3 percent of its gas from Russia and says it has a range of contingency options in place to ensure supply no matter what happens with the situation

Germany, on the other hand, will be hit much harder and could have to force-ration gas. Households and emergency services such as hospitals would get first priority, and other industries would be last in line.

This would hit manufacturers that rely on gas for production particularly hard, pushing up prices and possibly leading to job losses, warns Damien McGuinness, BBCs Berlin correspondent.

This early warning stage aims to help businesses plan for any future shortfalls: a crisis group of representatives from the government will meet daily, he adds.

German Economy Minister Robert Habeck says he hopes for support from the public to make this all go smoothly, adding that every kilowatt helps in keeping things functioning as smoothly as possible.

Germany gets half of its gas and a third of its oil from Russia, reports indicate, while its neighbor Austria gets 80 percent of its gas from Russia. Should anything go haywire in the coming weeks or days, Austria could be in a lot of trouble.

More related news can be found at Collapse.news.

Sources include:

BBC.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) There is another lockdown happening in Shanghai to battle the latest strain of the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19). And area residents are starving because of it.

According to reports, the citys aggressive lockdown and quarantine requirements are making it difficult for many to obtain basic necessities such as food and medication.

Wan Wenying, a 56-year-old from Shanghais Baoshan district, told the independent media on March 29 that she barely has enough food to survive. And local officials, she says, are refusing to help her.

Our building was sealed off yesterday, but our residential compound has been sealed off for four days, Wan said, adding that residents in her building are being forced to take nucleic acid tests for the Fauci Flu.

There is more than enough money, manpower and initiative to get these tests into the building, but not enough to provide food and medicine. This is how Shanghai is saving lives.

The government doesnt care if its people are alive or dead, Wan added, noting that one local official told her to just order prepared food and have it delivered to her house, which she cannot afford because she has no income and receives a small pittance from social benefits.

I dont have any money and Im stuck at home.

Covid testing companies are still raking in a fortune from all the fascism

Chinas state-run media reported that authorities placed Baoshan under seal-off management from March 26 to March 28 due to an alleged outbreak of the Omicron (Moronic) variant of the Chinese Virus.

On March 28, the city of Shanghai reported 4,477 new cases of Moronic, along with 5,982 more cases the following day. Because China has now implemented a zero covid policy, strict measures are being enforced such as mass testing, regardless of the economic or psychological costs involved.

On March 30, authorities in Shanghai announced that they had conducted an astounding 9.1 million nucleic acid tests just since the start of the official lockdown on March 28. Shanghai has about 26 million total residents.

For at least the next week, residents in the wrong parts of town  meaning those where the strictest measures are being enforced  will no longer be allowed to leave their compounds.

We will resume normal life soon, but in the next period of time, we ask everyone to adhere closely to pandemic control measures, do not gather, and reduce movements, reads one housing committee notice seen by Reuters.

Conveniently, the lockdowns are once again impacting the global economy. U.S. automaker Tesla, Irish automotive supplier Aptiv, and German auto component maker Thyssenkrupp have all been forced to shut down their manufacturing plants. Japanese apparel giant Uniqlo also closed many of its stores throughout the city.

Shanghai residents who are sick and require care are out of luck. Many of them will probably die while the Chinese governments saves more lives by keeping everyone locked inside their homes.

Last week, my kidney stone disease acted up again, says Lin Mei (pseudonym), a local resident of Shanghais Pudong district.

I wanted to go see urologists at major hospitals, but their services were suspended. I went to a small clinic, but the doctors prescription drugs werent powerful enough to subdue my pain. So the pain persisted, and I ended up with a fever.

The only thing Lin can do now is drink as much water as possible and hope for the best.

Meanwhile, local food prices are skyrocketing, as they were already due to global economic conditions. Basic food items such as eggs, meat and vegetables have become prohibitively expensive, and items such as instant noodles are no longer even available.

The latest news about the never-ending plandemic can be found at Pandemic.news.

Sources for this article include:

TheEpochTimes.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) As Yogi Berra might say: Its deja vu all over again.

(Article by Carey Gillam republished from CareyGillam.Substack.com)

Five years ago, the once seemingly invincible Monsanto Co. was dealt its first searing courtroom loss over allegations that its glyphosate weed killer causes cancer and Monsanto worked to hide the risks.

That loss was followed by another, and another and the global recognition of damning internal Monsanto documents that ultimately led Monsanto owner Bayer AG to agree to pony up more than $11 billion to settle thousands of cancer claims.

The litigation still lingers as Bayer wrestles with angry investors and plans to remove glyphosate-based products, such as the widely used Roundup herbicide, from the U.S. consumer market.

Now its Syngentas turn.

The mass tort machine that took down Monsanto has set its sights on the Chinese-owned, Switzerland-based agrochemical giant and its peddling of a weedkiller called paraquat.

Numerous research studies have linked paraquat to the development of Parkinsons disease, and plaintiffs attorneys representing people from around the U.S. allege Syngenta has known of these risks for decades but failed to warn users.

A case management conference in the litigation is set in federal court for today, March 4.

That comes after several of Syngentas top executives have been forced in recent weeks to sit down for hours of questioning under oath by plaintiffs attorneys.

The topics of questioning include:

What, if any, efforts Syngenta has taken to identify safety concerns with paraquat.

Syngentas knowledge of certain paraquat studies.

Syngentas policies and procedures relating to complaints or health effects reported by users.

Safety procedures used in the manufacturing process.

Syngentas knowledge of alternative chemicals.

Syngentas marketing efforts around paraquat.

The group of executives being deposed includes:

Philip Botham, principal science advisor for Syngentas Product Safety Group.

Montague Dixon, U.S. regulatory portfolio lead, Herbicides Regulatory and Stewardship North America.

Clark Ouzts, product marketing lead.

Clive Campbell, Syngentas chief medical officer.

On the plaintiffs side are many of the same lawyers who helped lead the Roundup litigation, including lawyers from The Miller Firm, which brought the very first Roundup trial to a $289 million verdict against Monsanto.

As happened in the Roundup litigation, there are so many plaintiffs filing lawsuits against Syngenta that the litigation has been corralled into what is known as multidistrict litigation, or an MDL.

According to court records, more than 600 lawsuits are pending now in the paraquat MDL under the direction of Chief U.S. District Judge Nancy Rosenstengel in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois.

A separate but similar group of paraquat lawsuits are being handled through Judicial Council Coordination Proceedings (JCCP) in Contra Costa County Superior Court.

Among those suing are people who developed Parkinsons after working on farms and ranches, at schools or in jobs for municipalities where they say they were exposed to paraquat.

An incurable disease

Parkinsons is an incurable progressive nervous system disorder that can cause tremors and loss of balance and leave victims severely debilitated until death.

Paraquat is commonly used in agriculture and is known as a particularly effective, though hazardous, herbicide. Regulators and the companies selling it warn users that ingesting even small amounts can kill a person quickly.

Because of the poisonous quality to paraquat, its use is restricted in the U.S. to trained applicators.

But while the toxic nature of the chemical is well established, allegations that it causes Parkinsons disease remains hotly debated.

Dutch neurologist Bastiaan Bloem recently authored a book about Parkinsons, blaming widespread exposure to herbicides such as paraquat, along with other toxic chemicals used in agriculture and manufacturing, for the spread of the disease.

Syngenta and co-defendant and former paraquat distributor Chevron USA assert there is no link between the chemical and the disease, and they argue that newer and more robust research has actually discounted a tie between paraquat and Parkinsons.

Looking for the bellwether

While the litigation focus currently is on discovery and other evidence gathering, a key question still to be determined is which of the many plaintiffs bringing claims will be the first to go to trial.

Lawyers for Chevron have recently questioned the validity of some of the plaintiffs specific exposure claims, calling them dubious, and pointing out that some plaintiffs seeking trial dates have said they were using paraquat and/or were otherwise exposed to the chemical at times and in places where paraquat was not allowed.

One plaintiff, Chevron pointed out in a court filing, alleged exposure in 1940, fully two decades before the chemical was introduced to the market.

In the MDL, Rosenstengel has set a first trial date for November of this year, though that date is expected to change. In the JCCP, the first trial is not expected until May of next year.

Stay tuned.

Read more at: CareyGillam.Substack.com
(Natural News) Ukrainian officials have requested that the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) revoke domains issued in Russia and shut down primary Domain Name System (DNS) servers in the country.

(Article by Sebastian Moss republished from DataCenterDynamics.com)

Mykhailo Fedorov, First Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine, asked Goran Marby, CEO of ICANN, to impose sanctions on Russia. He argued that Putin was using the Internet to promote war propaganda.

Representatives for ICANN verified the emails authenticity, but declined to comment.

A California-based nonprofit responsible for protecting the operational stability of the Internet, ICANN manages the global DNS root zone. The body was previously controlled by the US government, but was privatized in 2016.

All of these measures will help users seek for reliable information in alternative domain zones, preventing propaganda and disinformation, Fedorov said in his email.

Leaders, governments and organizations all over the world are in favor of introducing sanctions towards the Russian Federation since they aim at putting the aggression towards Ukraine and other countries to an end. I ask you kindly to seriously consider such measures and implement them as quickly as possible. Help to save the lives of people in our country.

Removing the domains .ru, .?? and .su from the root zone, would make it difficult for people inside and outside Russia to access Russian websites, email, and other services.

There are about five million domains on the global Internet that would be impacted by such a move.

Shutting down DNS root servers within Russia would affect users in the country.

The message was also posted to an ICANN mailing list by Ukrainian Oksana Prykhodko.

There, Erich Schweighofer, a professor at the University of Vienna and ICANN community participant, replied: Removing Russia from the Internet does not help supporting the civil society in this country for a democratic change. ICANN is a neutral platform, not taking a position in this conflict but allowing States to act accordingly, e.g. blocking all traffic from a particular state.

The RIPE Network Coordination Center, the Regional Internet Registry (RIR) for Europe, the Middle East, and some of Central Asia, this week rejected a similar request by Fedorov to disconnect Russia.

It is crucial that the RIPE NCC remains neutral and does not take positions with regard to domestic political disputes, international conflicts or war, Christian Kaufmann, chairman of the RIPE NCC executive board, said.

Read more at: DataCenterDynamics.com
When apples and other fruits are prepared for travel, they are frequently treated with a fungicide to prevent spoiling and improve shelf life.

The method retains freshness, but it may be a double-edged sword: it may aid in the selection and spread of pathogenic yeasts that are multi-drug resistant.

New research published this week in mBio, an open-access publication of the American Society for Microbiology, adds to that theory.

Human pathogen caused by fungicide

Earlier research has concerned with the human pathogen Aspergillus fumigatus, according to mycologist Anuradha Chowdhary, M.D., Ph.D., at the University of Delhi, but the new study focuses on drug-resistant cell lines of Candida Auris, a pathogenic yeast secluded from the environment that spreads quickly in hospitals, as per ScienceDaily.

Fungicides used in agriculture may accidentally select drug-resistant fungi, according to Chowdhary.

She and her colleagues looked for pathogenic C. auris and other yeasts on the surfaces of 84 fruits from nine distinct tree fruit species.

The fruits were obtained in northern India in 2020 and 2021 and contained 62 apples (20 harvested in orchards and 42 purchased from a store in Delhi). At least one form of yeast was found in each fruit species.

Many medications are resistant to C auris. It was initially discovered in Japan in 2009, and it has since spread to all inhabited continents.

Researchers have been looking at how the disease develops and spreads.

"We still don't fully grasp the mechanisms that cause the simultaneous formation of numerous separate C auris genetic clusters," Xu added.

Chowdhary and Xu's work, published last year in mBio, was the first to isolate C auris from a natural setting, the marshes and sandy beaches of an Andaman Islands coastal ecosystem in India.

According to the latest results, apples may act as a selection force for the disease and aid in its spread.

Even though the study only looked at fruits from northern India, Xu pointed out that the spread of C. Auris is not a uniquely Indian phenomena.

It's a worldwide threat: the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention designated C. auris as one of five diseases that represent an immediate danger to public health across the world.

To determine how to respond to the pathogen's threat to people, researchers must first understand how it moves through other natural systems.

Read more: Common Agricultural Fungicide Linked to Poor Immunity in Honey bees: USDA Study

Effects of agricultural fungicides to people

Modern fungicides sprayed on fruits and vegetables have come under renewed attention after scientists discovered that they triggered comparable genetic abnormalities in mouse neurons to those seen in autism and Alzheimer's disease, as per The Guardian.

Researchers subjected dishes of brain cells to over 300 different pesticides and fungicides and discovered that one family of fungicides, strobilurins, caused patterns of genetic modifications similar to those seen in human situations.

Scientists at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill thought that the experiment would offer light on the types of environmental chemicals that contribute to autism cases.

Surprisingly, they discovered substances that produced several genetic markers for autism as well as neurodegenerative disorders at the same time.

The strobilurins have just been licensed for usage in the last 20 years, more than half a century after the first person diagnosed with autism was revealed in the medical literature.

Since their introduction to the market, fungicides have been applied in greater quantities to preserve crops such as cabbages, spinach, lettuce, kale, tomatoes, apples, pears, and grapes.

While the fungicides generated autism- and Alzheimer's-like fingerprints in the way genes are expressed in mouse brains, the significance of the alterations is unclear: the researchers have no proof that the chemicals contribute to either disorder.

Related article: Pesticide Linked to Three Generations of Disease
The spectacle of lightning forking from the skies to the earth is enough to make anyone nervous. But what if you turn that around?

That's the ideal combination for some horror film that deserves to go viral.

On Tuesday night, video evidence from Wichita, Kansas, captured what homeowner Taylor Vonfeldt described as "the most incredible strike of lightning I've ever seen on tape."

Chris Vagasky of Vaisala, a lightning specialist, told AccuWeather that he agreed with Vonfeldt's reaction.

Upside down lightning?!

It was a pretty remarkable show of what scientists termed as upward lightning, Vagasky said, adding later, "To witness one like this was a little surprise."

He said that these begin at the top of an item, most commonly a man-made skyscraper or communications tower.

While they constitute a small percentage of lightning strikes, they can be spectacular and occur well after the storm, away from heavy rain, allowing common people to catch them with clarity.

The sparks recorded in Vonfeldt's film were amazing.

The video began with his camera in slow motion, fixed on the skies over his neighborhood.

Vagasky stated that this was not the first time he had witnessed such a spectacle and, like Ferrell, felt that adjacent man-made buildings contributed to the remarkable occurrence.

Vagasky saw it for the first time in person in Oklahoma City.

There, all of the local TV stations had their transmitter antennas at a nearby TV tower farm, offering the ideal setting for rising stars to put on a spectacular display.

Read more: Jupiter Lightning Storms Are More Similar To Earth's Than Previously Thought

What is upside-down lightning?

Vertical lightning strikes start on the ground and go upward.

These discharges, which often originate at the top of tall and thin buildings, represent a major threat to wind turbines, as per Phys.org.

An EPFL research investigated the mechanisms underlying these little-understood phenomena.

Is lightning the result of an enraged sky? Not very often. It can even be initiated from the ground in rare cases.

The inverted branches of the lightning that point to the clouds rather than the earth readily identify upward-moving discharges from downward-moving discharges.

Upward strikes are poorly understood phenomena that mostly occur where tall and thin constructions are located on high land.

A researcher from EPFL's Electromagnetic Compatibility Laboratory (EMC) became interested in this issue, investigated it, and eventually wrote his thesis on it.

His findings were published in a recent edition of the Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics.

Ground-to-cloud lightning strikes have been detected since the 1930s, but it is only recently, with the increasing usage of wind turbines, that it has become a significant problem, according to Aleksandr Smorgonskii, a doctorate student at the EMC Lab.

Considering their strength, these discharges pose no danger to communication antennae or buildings.

These iron constructions, outfitted with lightning rods, transmit energy from the bottom to the top, where they escapes unharmed.

Wind turbines, on the other hand, are not the same.

Among the most intriguing data uncovered by the study is the fact that these lofty buildings can record up to 100 more upward hits than downward strikes in a single year.

Furthermore, it appeared that the majority of ground-to-cloud hits occur in the absence of current thunderstorm activity.

Smorgonskii used the Euclid lightning-detection system to identify whether a downward strike had occurred within a 50-kilometer radius less than one second before such a specific upward strike.

Only 15% of the time was this true, that is, more than 80% of ground-to-cloud attacks are begun independently.

Related article: Just What is Lightning? Fatal Phenomena Explored
Forecasters have claimed that the worst of the winter weather has passed by Britain as it moves towards Spring, but rising stress will result in storms monitoring Europe moving into the UK instead.

According to charts and maps, the UK will be drenched in rain this week, clearing by the weekend.

A blob of rain is expected to move northwards from Europe towards the south of England and Wales on Tuesday, with 2mm in London and 3mm in Cornwall expected by 9pm.

Situations that are delicate, with showers of rain

Rain has moved northwards into the UK by 6 a.m. on Wednesday, settling in the midlands and Wales, while continuing to fall over the south, with 1 mm per hour expected in most places, as per Virginia News Today.

About the same time, a belt of Atlantic rain moving east approaches Eire and Britain, with Eire arriving Wednesday night and the west coast of Britain arriving at 6 p.m. on Thursday.

This band, which brings snow to Scotland and up to 3mm of rain per hour to the rest of the UK, moves over the country from Thursday into Friday night, clearing by Saturday midday.

Through the week, Bournemouth and Bristol are expected to receive 45mm of rain, or about 2 inches, whilst Belfast and Carlisle are expected to receive 35mm and 42mm, respectively.

London received 15mm of rain from Tuesday to Saturday midday, whilst Scarborough is mainly spared from the wet weather forecast for the next week.

The brunt of the rain remained over the east coast of Scotland around midnight on Wednesday, with some spreading south onto England and Wales' shoreline, as per Express.

While most of the rain has passed throughout the UK by 9 p.m., snowfall rates of up to 3cm per hour have been reported in certain parts of Scotland.

Areas like Lochcarron had 45mm of rain in the 24 hours leading up to midnight on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the majority of the UK will have a rainy finish to the week, but it will be considerably lighter, with WXCharts predicting that all regions except Newcastle will get at least 1mm of rain throughout the course of the day.

According to British Weather Services meteorologist Jim Dale, the cold will return on Wednesday.

In comparison to the end of last week, we will lose the very chilly effect on Sunday and Monday, and Tuesday will seem warmer.

However, when this cold front passes through on Wednesday and Thursday, we'll be back in the deep freeze.

In the days running up to Wednesday, average temperatures vary from 7 to 11 degrees Celsius, with lows of 3 degrees Celsius as far south as Cardiff, according to WXCharts.

Also Read: Study Explains why North Receives more Tropical Rainfall than the South

Other areas that will affected by the rainfall

The "meteorological winter" is finished, according to Jo Farrow, a Netweather.tv forecaster, but some showers are still expected.

Excessive tension is currently building over the UK, with a waving climate entry lurking over the English Channel, according to her.

The rain can be seen on the backside of the Radar image above, which covers SE Britain to begin the day.

By lunchtime, the patchy rain across East Anglia, London, and the House Counties has faded, but the comfortable and cozy entry progressively moves northwards, bringing rain.

To Cornwall, South Devon, and Dorset, then to Cardiff and along the M4 and M3 in the evening rush hour.

Related article: Heavy Rainfall Persist in Southeastern US, Increasing Risks of Flash Flood
World leaders on Sunday condemned the killing of civilians in a suburb of the Ukrainian capital, calling for new sanctions and ions of alleged war crimes as outrage grew.

Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed Russian forces as murderers, torturers and rapists after hundreds of bodies of Ukrainian civilians were found on the streets of towns surrounding Kyiv. He also vowed to investigate and prosecute all Russian crimes in Ukraine, saying he had created a special mechanism to do so.

Ukraines prosecutor-general said the bodies of 410 civilians have been recovered from Kyiv-area towns. Residents of the Ukrainian town of Bucha near Kyiv have given harrowing accounts of how Russian troops shot and killed civilians without any apparent reason, news agency Reuters reported.

According to civilian accounts, Russian soldiers would go from building to building, take people out of the basements where they were hiding, check their phones for evidence of anti-Russian activity and take them away or shoot them.
Extreme rainfall over recent days resulted in severe flooding and colossal landslides in two regions in the State of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on Saturday, April 2.

A total of at least 16 people, including seven children, have been reportedly killed after being swept by raging flash floods and being buried by the rockfall.

Landslides and Flooding

Residents of the Baixada Fluminense and Costa Verde regions of the Brazilian state experienced the weekend's catastrophic events after record-breaking rainfall of more than 800 millimeters, as per the natural disaster monitoring site Floodlist.com.

More than 200 families in 22 neighborhoods have been affected by the events, which also caused the displacement of some residents and their transfer to temporary settlements.

On Saturday, local authorities declared a State of Public Calamity to allow the prioritization of relief and recovery efforts.

Also Read: Landslides Due to Heavy Rains Kill Almost 100 People in Brazilian Mountain City of Petropolis

Affected Areas

In the town of Paraty, seven children, aged between two and 17, were with their father when the mudslide lethally struck them, according to local authorities, as per CNN.

More than four people were injured and over 70 families were displaced in the town.

Travel in Paraty has also been affected as mudslides blocked some streets and isolated several parts of the town, according to Paraty Mayor Luciano Vidal, as cited by Reuters.

The displaced families were also given shelters and rented hostels.

In the municipality of Mesquita, torrential rain killed a 38-year-old man after being electrocuted to death.

The event transpired when the man was reportedly in floodwaters attempting to save another person. Municipal authorities have launched a probe into the incident.

In the city of Angra dos Reis, civil defense and fire officials stated that although five people were rescued, a girl and a teenager were killed, and nine people went missing following the flash floods, as per the US media agency's affiliate CNN Brazil.

Previous Natural Disasters

Some communities in Brazil are still recovering from the security and natural hazards caused by landslides and floods triggered by intense torrential rain over recent months.

In February, inclement weather caused several days of rainfall in the Petropolis area of the state, killing a total of more than 230 people due to mudslides and flash floods.

In March, a memorial for the said victims of the natural disasters was destroyed by the same phenomenon.

Deforestation

In recent years, Brazil has been plagued by the decreasing population of its trees, especially in the Amazon Rainforest; as trees are known to greatly absorb water, notably during times of flooding.

Indigenous communities in the country have also gathered to raise their voice against the government.

In a January report, a record-breaking 430 square kilometers (166 square miles) area of trees was cut down in the Brazilian Amazon.

The data significantly exceeded the deforestation, making it five times greater than January 2021, as per the government satellite data, as cited by the BBC.

Environmentalists have accused Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro of allegedly tolerating the acceleration of deforestation in the Amazon.

During the 26tg annual United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland, in 2021, Brazil is one of the many countries that pledged to impose efforts against deforestation and protection of forests, as per the College of Natural Resources News of North Carolina State University.

Related Article: Dozens Killed, Hundreds of Thousands Displaced After Torrential Rain Hit Sao Paulo
Even though certain governments seek to protect human rights, Ecuador has decided that natural creatures have specific constitutional protections, such as the right to live.

First Country to Hold Wild Animals with Legal Rights

According to ScienceAlert, on February, a 7-2 jury verdict marked a watershed moment in the nation's rights of nature procedural safeguards, elevating the juridical standing of wild creatures.

As noted by Ecuadorian environmentalist lawyer Hugo Echeverra, although natural liberties were incorporated in the charter of rights and freedoms, it was unclear previous to this ruling if animals in the wild may enjoy from natural rights and even be deemed legal owners as a member of ecosystem.

The particular instance depended on empirical proof of woolly monkey psychological and behavioural richness to assert Estrellita must be at a least quality the entitlement to somatic freedom.

Moreover, the environmental jurisdiction ought to have guarded Estrellita's privileges by assessing her particular situations prior to actually setting her in the wildlife park, as per The Guardian.

The court also acknowledged in its decision that selective breeding as well as adaptation of feral creatures are occurrences that have a significant influence on the conservation of habitats and the equilibrium of environment, as they entail the steady reduction of wildlife communities.

Customarily, ecological legislation has not been preoccupied with creatures that are not deemed significant creatures, including threatened animals protected by the US Endangered Species Act.

The judgement states very clearly that such privileges to live, develop, and grow are subject to natural systems, that encompass biocompatibility among animals such as hunting.

The verdict comes on the heels of a historic judgment in Ecuador last year that determined quarrying in a preserved tropical rainforest breaches nature's sovereignty. The jury has ruled that creatures have privileges, which are recognized by natural rights.

Also read: Scientists Finally Map an Entire Human Genome with Roughly Three Billion Letters in Human DNA





Ecuador Court Ruled Legal Rights For Nonhuman Creatures

Back in 2008, Ecuador became the first nation on the planet to acknowledge the interests of nature on a legitimate basis.

According to Inside Climate News, Kristen Stilt, a wildlife legal specialist, informed that in United states, the privileges of wildlife seem like a radical notion, yet individuals do n't know how common it is throughout the planet.

This implies that poaching, angling, collecting, and logging will still be permitted as far as they are done in compliance with various pre-existing regulations - for instance, not in violation of threatened species statutes - and in terms of mitigating distress. Such rules are now proven to be a vital legislative instrument for protecting wildlife, particularly wildlife.

Nations such as New Zealand even Canada, as well as neighboring territories and several US towns, incorporate agreements, clauses, or municipal legislation that provide comparable safeguards for feral creatures.

Thus, in a society where ecological damage affects all of us directly, adopting rules might ultimately guide us all as people and society to make wiser decisions that enrich all of us. The judge recommended that appropriate regulations be written in the hereafter to further protect these interests.

Nevertheless, governments have yet to entrench such privileges in their constitutions, and measures to conserve environment persist life-threatening in countless locations throughout the globe.

Related article: Wild Dolphin 'Kylie' Seen 'Talking' With Harbor Porpoises




Nearly 130 native Australian reptiles that foreign wildlife traffickers have targeted will be added to a worldwide convention, which the Morrison government and conservationists believe will end the "cruel and repugnant" trade.

Protecting Reptiles

Sussan Ley, the environment minister, has designated the spiny-tailed gecko, shingleback lizard, and various blue-tongue lizard species for inclusion under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (Cites).

"Unfortunately, our reptiles have become a major international target. While exporting these animals without specialized permits is already illegal under Australian law, this listing will secure additional international support for their protection," Ley said.

Also Read: Over 80,000 Plant Species at Risk of Extinction Because "Humans Don't Find Them Useful"

Criminal Act

The Department of Agriculture, Water, and the Environment's environmental crime section has convicted 11 persons on wildlife trafficking charges in the previous two years, with a total sentence of nearly 27 years in jail, according to Ley. Government authorities, she claimed, are still pursuing networks involved in "cruel and repulsive" trafficking.

Cites had informed the government that 127 species would be added to an official list by the middle of this year. It was one of the most extensive lists of any signatory to the treaty since it went into effect in 1975, according to Ley.

Australian reptiles are prized for their distinctive traits and colors, making them a target for wildlife traffickers worldwide.

Cites is the same treaty that prohibits the import of exotic wildlife and animal goods such as ivory.

Humane Society International (HSI) conservationists advocated listing the reptiles in 2020.

According to HSI, the reptiles were commonly marketed on pet trade websites and Facebook groups in Europe, although their export was banned.

According to Alexia Wellbelove, a senior campaign manager at HSI, the illicit traffic in reptiles is frequently harsh, with live creatures wrapped with tape and placed into socks or tiny containers before being smuggled overseas with no food or water.

Many do not make it through the voyage. This listing adds to their arsenal of weapons against unlawful international traffic in live reptiles.

The reptiles will be listed in Appendix 3 of the agreement, which means that nations will be required to register imported creatures for Australia to keep track of the trade.

Wellbelove said HSI was hopeful that the reptiles would be given more protection in the future under the convention's appendix one, which would entail a legal prohibition on international commerce.

The Cites prohibited list includes 1,082 species and 36 subspecies of plants and animals. The convention's first signatory was Australia.

Wildlife Smuggling

Wildlife smuggling is a lucrative industry. Like illegal narcotics and weaponry, wildlife and animal parts are trafficked by deadly transnational networks. It is nearly hard to collect solid numbers for the value of the illicit wildlife trade due to its very nature. The wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC estimates that it is worth billions of dollars.

Harms

Two well-known examples of illicit wildlife commerce are poaching elephants for ivory and tigers for their skins and bones. Many other species, from sea turtles to wood trees, are equally overexploited. Wildlife trading isn't always illegal. Thousands of species of wild plants and animals are trapped or harvested in the wild and then legally marketed as food, pets, decorative plants, leather, tourist souvenirs, and medicine. When a growing amount of wildlife commerce is illegal and unsustainable, it becomes a crisis, posing a direct threat to the existence of many wild species.

Related Article: Urban Expansion May Spell Extinction to More than 850 Species

For similar news, don't forget to follow Nature World News!
Chile's new left-wing President Gabriel Boric has signed on to the United Nations Escazu Agreement, reversing the previous Chilean government's position of refusing to accept the environmental deal.

Chile, the world's largest copper producer, initially supported the pact, which focuses on access to information and environmental protection in Latin America and the Caribbean, but eventually declined to join it, citing legal concerns.

Boric on Escazu treaty

The Chilean Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated on Friday that President Gabriel Boric has signed the UN Escazu Agreement, reversing the government of former President Sebastian Piera.

The convention was negotiated at the 2012 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil ("Rio 2012 Conference"), and it is the first in the world to incorporate provisions for environmental defenders' rights.

The pact was signed on March 4, 2018, and will enter into force on April 22, 2021. Chile is now the treaty's 25th signatory, the UN Economic Commission for Latin America, and the Caribbean's 12th ratifying member, as per Jurist.

Boric, who took over for center-right former President Sebastian Pinera last week, has committed to taking a firm stance on climate change and environmental legislation.

This deal marks a watershed moment in the state's connection with its citizens in environmental problems, according to Boric, who spoke during a signing ceremony on Friday.

Boric, a 36-year-old former student activist, took office on March 11. He was elected as Chile's youngest president on a platform of addressing the country's significant inequalities and improving access to healthcare, education, and pensions.

Boric tweeted on Friday, "Environmental warriors, you have taught us to endure, and we are here for you." Just as we pushed the signing of Escazu today, we will continue to fight for adequate pensions, great health care, and the abolition of gender violence in educational institutions tomorrow, as per Aljazeera.

Read more: New UN High-Seas Treaty Must Close Gaps In Biodiversity Governance

Escazu Environmental Treaty

EHRDs are defined by the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders as individuals and groups who, in their personal or professional capacity and in a peaceful manner, try to protect and support civil rights related to the environment, including water, air, land, flora, and fauna.

They are typically local individuals or indigenous people dealing with a growing local population, the implementation of construction projects, or activities associated with extractive sector.

EHRDs, who frequently live near environmentally important locations, play an essential role in safeguarding these areas and hence contribute significantly to achieving global climate and sustainable development goals, as per Universal Rights Group.

The Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation, and Justice in Environmental Matters, often known as the Escazu Agreement, is the first broader environmental civil liberties pact in Latin America and the Caribbean.

It was drafted and adopted in Escazu, Costa Rica, in 2018, with civil society, individual rights, and environmental specialists engaging in the process and thereby playing an important role in the treaty's approval.

The Escazu accord provides the right to receive environmental information and participate in environmental judgment, therefore increasing environmental information and access to justice.

While theEscazuz Agreement recognizes the right to a healthy environment, it also compels states to prevent and investigate assaults on persons who safeguard and defend environmental rights.

The agreement recognizes the importance of EHRDs' work and requires states to provide recommendations on suitable and effective measures to protect their safety.

Related article: Tribe Treaty to Restore Wild Bison up North
Machu Picchu, one of the most recognized archaeological sites in the world, is located high (2,430 m above sea level) above the Urubamba River on a narrow saddle between two mountain peaks. The larger peak, called Machu Picchu (3,082 m), stands to the south, while the smaller peak, Huayna Picchu (2,720 m), is located to the north. A new paper by Ministry of Culture of Peru historian Donato Amado Gonzales and University of Illinois Chicago archaeologist Brian Bauer suggests that the Inca city was originally called Picchu, or more likely Huayna Picchu, and that the name Machu Picchu became associated with the ruins starting in 1911.

Machu Picchu is an ancient Incan citadel located about 80 km (50 miles) from Cusco, Peru.

When the American explorer Hiram Bingham III first visited the settlements ruins in 1911 and then brought them to the worlds attention, they were little known  even among those who lived in the Cusco region.

More than 110 years after Binghams first visit to the site, Dr. Gonzales and Professor Bauer reviewed independent data sources, for information concerning the original name of Machu Picchu.

They examined Binghams notes and other materials related to his work at the site, early maps and atlases descriptions of the region, and 17th century land documents held in the Archivo Regional del Cusco.

We began with the uncertainty of the name of the ruins when Bingham first visited them and then reviewed several maps and atlases printed before Binghams visit to the ruins, Professor Bauer said.

There is significant data which suggest that the Inca city actually was called Picchu or more likely, Huayna Picchu.

The researchers found that the ruins of an Inca town called Huayna Picchu is mentioned in a 1904 atlas that was published seven years before Bingham arrived in Peru.

Additionally, they detail that Bingham was told in 1911 of ruins called Huayna Picchu along the Urubamba River before he left Cusco to search for the remains.

A landowners son later told Bingham in 1912 that the ruins were called Huayna Picchu.

The most definitive connections to the original name of the Inca city are preserved within accounts written by Spaniards relatively soon after the region came under their control in the late 16th century, Professor Bauer said.

We end with a stunning, late 16th-century account when the indigenous people of the region were considering returning to reoccupy the site which they called Huayna Picchu.

The teams paper was published in the Nawpa Pacha: Journal of the Institute of Andean Studies.

_____

Donato Amado Gonzales & Brian S. Bauer. 2022. The Ancient Inca Town Named Huayna Picchu. Nawpa Pacha: Journal of the Institute of Andean Studies 42 (1); doi: 10.1080/00776297.2021.1949833
The hair transplant Turkey price varies. It's important to understand that there is no set price for such procedures. Since the cost depends on several factors, it's hard to estimate what you might pay. The costs of hair transplant surgeries are based on the number of grafts needed to cover the area where you're experiencing thinning or baldness.

How much does a hair transplant cost in Turkey?

The total cost of a hair transplant Turkey depends on the stage of your hair loss and the number of grafts needed to achieve the results you want. For example, if you're looking to fill in some gaps left behind by receding hairlines, a small FUE procedure could be all that's required. However, if you're experiencing more advanced hair loss and are looking for a dramatic change, a full FUE procedure may be necessary.

At hair transplant clinics in Turkey, the average cost of an all-inclusive hair transplant package is 2,300 , and the minimum price is 1,100 . The maximum cost is 6,000 , which makes it one of the most affordable destinations in Europe for hair transplants. In Germany, a hair transplant package costs 5,700  on average. It costs 6,500  in the UK and 5,950  in Spain.

What are the different hair transplantation procedures?

Two of the most popular hair transplantation methods are Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE hair transplant) and Follicular Unit Transplantation (FUT hair transplant). Both methods are highly effective but may be appropriate for different patients based on their specific situations. At the Cosmedica hair transplant clinic in Turkey, however, only the newer FUE technique, as well as the DHI technique are used.

FUE Hair Transplantation Procedure

Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE procedure) allows the surgeon to harvest hair from the donor area with little noticeable thinning of the area, since follicles are removed randomly.

Three types of FUE hair transplants are offered at Cosmedica Clinic:

Manual FUE

Robotic FUE

Sapphire FUE

Manual FUE

A manual FUE hair transplant is performed by the experienced doctor who uses a handheld device to extract the individual hair follicles and insert them in their new positions.

FUE Sapphire

Using blades made from a precious gemstone called sapphire, very precise incisions are made at the transplant site before the graft is inserted into the skin. This results in better and faster healing outcomes for the patient. There is also an option to use an even finer Micro Sapphire blade.

Robotic FUE

A robotic FUE procedure uses a hair transplant device that is guided by the physician. As one of the most advanced devices on the market, the physician selects the amount of hair desired for harvesting and maps out the desired donor area. Using this device allows for multiple incisions, accurate follicular extraction, and faster processing times.

FUT Technique

Follicular Unit Transplantation uses a strip of tissue from the back of the scalp. Each one of these units is then dissected into smaller individual hair grafts, which are inserted into the balding areas of the scalp during surgery.

Which Hair Transplant Method Is Best?

Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE) and Direct Hair Implant (DHI) are the two hair transplant procedures available at Cosmedica. FUT, or the traditional method of hair transplantation, is still used on many patients worldwide, but not in Turkey. At Cosmedica, only the newer methods are used. Your surgeon will help you choose which method is best for you during your consultation.

During your free consultation with Cosmedica's top hair transplant surgeon Dr. Levent Acar, you should focus on the number of follicular units that will be transplanted, as well as your post-surgery goals. You and your doctor should discuss the method of hair restoration which would yield the best results. Some patients prefer a surgical method of treatment, while others prefer to have their hair restored through non-surgical techniques.

Recovery Period After Hair Transplantation

The healing process after hair implantations varies depending on the individual patient and their circumstances. Hair transplant surgery recovery time can take up to around 2 weeks depending on the individual.

After hair transplant surgery, patients are advised to refrain from strenuous activity for about two weeks. During this period, patients should also avoid sweating, raising their blood pressure, and consuming alcohol or tobacco.

It is important to remember that, because it can take about a full year for hair to regrow, patients will not be able to evaluate their results for the first 12 months.

How much do 3000 hair grafts cost in Turkey?

As you can see from the Cosmedica hair transplant Turkey price list 3000 hair graft costs no more than 4000 which is relatively cheap compared to other countries. All the offered packages include a consultation and hair analysis, accommodation, transfer from the airport and hotel to the clinic and back, an aftercare package and regular post op check-ups.

Are 3000 hair grafts a lot?

Not exactly. 3000 hair grafts are not a lot considering the hair transplantation procedures needed to perform a surgical operation on the baldness of the front hair.

Why are hair transplants so cheap in Turkey?

There are several reasons for the lower price of hair transplantation in Turkey. The main cost saver for the average client is the rent and material prices in Turkey, which are a fraction of the price of those in other regions. Additionally, the cost of goods is lower due to Turkey having a lower exchange rate than most countries. As a result, hair restoration clinics can offer lower-cost procedures of equal and higher quality.

Are hair transplants in Turkey safe?

It is very safe to get a hair transplant in Turkey. There are many reasons why clinics in Turkey and medical tourism have become so popular, but it is down to the advanced machines used, the best surgeons, and the innovative techniques they use. This industry could not be more highly developed than in Turkey, where new technologies are being launched regularly. As a result of this rapid technological development, people all around the world are heading to Turkey for hair transplants.

Turkey's pricing policies meet the general health policy. At the same time, plastic surgery and hair transplantation can be offered at suitable prices. In Turkey, clinics that have been accredited by the Joint Commission International (JCI) are provided with government incentives. This program has enabled JCI-accredited hospitals to keep costs down, which in turn gives patients access to affordable healthcare services.

A great deal of information has been shared regarding the safety and effectiveness of the procedure, which is unusual in a developing country. Trained medical professionals have completed thousands of operations, cementing their reputation for excellence.

In Turkey, patients are treated with the utmost care, and their hair transplant operation is performed by the most qualified team of doctors. The doctors who perform hair transplant procedures in Turkey have years of experience and training on their side and will provide patients with the most natural-looking results possible.

Hair restoration in Turkey is vastly popular for several reasons, such as the high success rates, affordable prices, and the cost of medical services offered by clinics. To provide top-notch surgical skills and equipment to patients, Turkey has aggressively invested in improving its healthcare infrastructure.
Following the Final Investment Decision in November 2021 to cease oil refining at Marsden Point, convert to import terminal operations and relaunch the company as Channel Infrastructure NZ Limited, the Channel Infrastructure board has been reviewing the composition of the Board to ensure a balance of skills, knowledge and experience across the Board that supports the new strategic direction of the company into the future.

The Board is now delighted to announce the appointment of Anna Molloy and Andrew Holmes to the Board, effective from 4 April 2022.

Anna is a director (and Audit and Risk Committee chair) of Winton Land Limited, a director of ANZ New Zealand Investments Limited, and has previously been a Future Director on the board of NZX Limited. She has previously been the Business Development Manager at SPCA Auckland and held analyst roles with Masfen Securities and ABN Amro. Anna has degrees in Commerce and Chemical Engineering, and is a Chartered Financial Analyst.

Andrew Holmes retired from bp in 2019 after a 34-year career, having been CEO Asia Pacific Fuels & Air BP and President BP Australia, as well as CEO of bps Global Aviation Fuels Division. In those roles, Andy led bps business in Australia and Asia for seven years, including its terminal operations in Australia, as well as its global aviation fuels business. Andy has also previously been the Chairman of the Australian Institute of Petroleum, and on the board of the Business Council for Australia. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering and an MBA.

The Board has determined that both Anna Molloy and Andrew Holmes are Independent Directors for the purposes of the NZX Listing Rules. As directors appointed by the Board, Ms Molloy and Mr Holmes will be subject to re-election at the next Annual Shareholders Meeting to be held on 10 May 2022.

Chairman, Simon Allen, said: We are delighted to announce two outstanding appointments to the Board as Refining NZ relaunches as Channel Infrastructure, New Zealands leading fuel infrastructure business.

With her background in chemical engineering and investment analytics, Anna brings a combined skillset that is well suited for Channel Infrastructure, and Anna will sit on our Audit, Risk and Finance Committee reflecting her governance experience on audit and risk matters. Andy brings vast experience as a global and regional CEO from his previous career with bp. His deep understanding of terminal businesses, regional fuel supply chains, and the aviation fuel sector will be particularly valuable as the company delivers safe and reliable service to its customers as the owner and operator of nationally strategic infrastructure at Marsden Point with aspirations for growth, including in future fuels.

Channel Infrastructure also announces that director John Bourke has informed the Board that he does not intend to stand for election at the forthcoming Annual Shareholders Meeting, and accordingly will step down off the board at that meeting. Chairman Simon Allen said: On behalf of the Board I thank John for the insights and experience he brought to the Refining NZ Board as the company shutdown refining operations and converted to an import terminal. His specialist expertise in refinery operations and first-hand experience with planning and executing a refinery closure for Mobil has been invaluable since his appointment to the board in September 2021. With the refinery now closed, John considers it a natural time for him to stand down to make way for a different specialist skill set on the Board.

Chairman Simon Allen added: The Channel Infrastructure Board recognises the importance of fit-for-purpose corporate governance practices and processes, including board composition, to provide accountability to shareholders for the companys actions and performance, to strengthen our business culture and to strive to continuously improve our performance and deliver returns for shareholders. With the business and future plans of the company changing, it is appropriate that the Board is continuing to review current corporate governance structures to ensure that they are both consistent with best practice and appropriate for Channel Infrastructure moving forward. This includes continuing to build diversity across the company, and it is pleasing to note the Board changes we are announcing today increase the gender diversity on the Board, along with further aligning the Boards overall skillset with the companys business and operations. I look forward to providing shareholders with a further update on the Boards review of these matters at the upcoming ASM.

- ENDS -

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:

CHI - Indicative Interest Margin for Bond Offer

ARG - FY22 Annual Result Announcement Date and webcast

Marsden Maritime Holdings commences due diligence

MCK appoints Stuart Harrison as Managing Director

CDI appoints Jason Adams as Managing Director

6th May 2022 Morning Report

KPG FY22 annual results announcement date

BGP - 1st Quarter Sales to 1 May 2022

Air NZ completes shortfall bookbuild

GEO - March 2022 Quarter Operating Update


Reporter

Debra Pressey is a reporter covering health care at The News-Gazette. Her email is dpressey@news-gazette.com, and you can follow her on Twitter (@DLPressey).
Any scientist with something worthwhile to share with the scientific community wants to publish. However, any published article in a creditable journal has to run the gauntlet of the peer-review process.

Image Credit: Shutterstock.com/PolyPloiid

Introduction

Peer review refers to the process of evaluating the quality of a submitted manuscript prior to publication by other scientists in the same field. It is said to have been mentioned first by Syrian physician Ishaq bin Ali al-Rahwi, in his work titled Ethics of the Physician. He referred to the need to make notes of the condition of the patient at each visit and to submit such notes to review by a local medical body to decide if the care given was appropriate by the standards for physicians at the time. This work was from a man living between 854-931 CE.

Once the printing press came into being, publications proliferated with amazing rapidity. This made the regulation of published matters a necessity, and it was done mostly by peers. The English journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society was the first to detail the peer review process back in 1665 formally. At this time, the main aim was to select papers for publication.

Soon afterward, the aim switched to ensuring that the study was accurate and worthy of publication. The Royal Society of Edinburgh described their peer review process in 1731, Memoirs sent by correspondence are distributed according to the subject matter to those members who are most versed in these matters. And the Royal Society of London set up their Committee on Papers to examine manuscripts submitted for their Philosophical Transactions.

In todays world, peer review has become a systematic and standardized aspect of journal publication. The review is carried out by scientists who are doing research in the same or related areas but working independently of the authors of the index study.

Presubmission

Peer review follows an initial assessment of whether the submitted manuscript fulfills the criteria for the journal involved. The subject dealt with by the manuscript must fit the aim of the journal and the platform of the editors. Many manuscripts are rejected at this stage.

Once the editor determines that the journal criteria have been met, expert peer reviewers are chosen depending on their ability to do a fair, effective, and timely review. The editor must rule out conflicts of interest.

The Process

The peer reviewers, or referees, are asked to scrutinize the manuscript and decide if it meets the high standards of their field of research. The aspects that come under assessment include the originality of the research, the soundness of the experimental approach, and the ethicality and appropriateness of the techniques used.

In addition, the validity and significance of the paper are evaluated  will the paper move the field forward in some way? Other aspects noted by the reviewers may include missing or inaccurate references.

Image Credit: Biomedcentral.com/Peer review process

Title

The process begins with the title. The title must be clear, concisely describing the concept, the variable altered, and the systems used in the study. Most readers skim titles when looking for papers relevant to their needs, indicating their importance.

Abstract

The abstract is equally relevant for the peer reviewer, as it states the purpose, methods, the most important results, and conclusions of the study. The introduction, describing the papers scope and purpose in detail, with brief notes on the methods used, is scanned for its informativeness. The hypothesis and predictions are determined to be clear or otherwise.

Methods

The methods section of the study must be vetted for adequate detail as to what experiment was performed and when along with the equipment used. These should be appropriate to the study. The peer reviewer will otherwise suggest details that need to be added.

Results

The results section describes the experimental outcomes and data trends fairly and accurately. The reviewers will check the raw data to make sure the conclusions match the data, scan that all supporting tables and figures are relevant and necessary, and are captioned properly.

Discussion

The final discussion section provides the interpretation and links it to past studies. The reviewers look at whether the meaning of the results is properly deciphered in terms of the original research question, whether the discussion is focused, and whether the study limitations and strengths are clearly mentioned. This should also include the future applications and theoretical importance of the experimental work.

If a manuscript offers data that can be used for research outside the original area, it is still very useful even though the starting hypothesis may not have been answered specifically. The novelty of the idea, the validity of the conclusions, and the accuracy of the data may be more important in these cases.

The references list all sources of information used by the authors in any part of their work. The reviewer ensures that all citations are correct, appropriate, and properly formatted and suggests missing or relevant citations.

Keeping all this in mind, the paper is judged to be worthy of publication or not. If the reviewers think that in terms of content, writing, and logical appeal, the manuscript is among the top quarter of papers in the same field, they will recommend its publication.

Guidelines for Reviews

There are guidelines for peer reviewers to write their reviews, such as those published by the American Physiological Society. These are intended to make sure that they are easily read and understood.

The review structure typically starts with an overview of the suggestions provided by the reviewer.

It may then progress through the structure of the paper, the data sources, the methods of investigation, the flow of the reasoning, and the validity of the conclusions. Finally, the review may address problems of style and language.

Reviewers are expected to do this task from the standpoint of both the editor and the authors to ensure a timely, professional, constructive, and reasoned review. Good reviews can help students and other researchers to learn how to peer review themselves. Manuscripts must be kept strictly confidential, even if the reviewer thinks a colleague could add value to the review.

However, permission may be obtained for such contributions, and the colleague must be credited as required. Confidentiality is key for all who participate in the process throughout and extends to destroying the document after the review is complete, without saving any document electronically.

Overall, the reviewers comment on whether the paper should be accepted, rejected, or revised before publication. The editor regulates the process, making sure that the reviewers make reasonable requests for revision, deciding on the relative importance of various review comments, and setting aside those requirements that are not necessary within the area of the study.

Journals typically have a large number of reviewers on their panel so that reviewers are not overloaded and can return the paper in a timely fashion and allow editors to pick the most suitable reviewer for a given manuscript. Typically, reviewers take about six hours to review one paper, and most reviewers say they are happy to review papers occasionally.

How does peer review make research more trustworthy? Play

Motivation of Peer Reviewers

Many peer reviewers review papers in order to keep themselves abreast of current work and in recognition of the fact that others review their work as well. In addition, reviewers are often the friends of the editor who requests their review. Keeping track of new experiments can spark new ideas for the reviewers themselves.

Related Stories Malaria: An Interview with the World Health Organization

Some eminent reviewers may later become part of the journal for which they review, or may use their reviewing as part of their resume or to accelerate their careers. Peer reviewing may demonstrate a deep familiarity with the subject and a dedication to advancing in the field, which is often useful when trying for promotions.

Types of Peer Review

There are four types of peer review: single-blind, double-blind, open peer, and transparent peer review. These differ in the degree to which the author and reviewers reveal their identity.

Single-Blind and Double-Blind

In single-blind peer review, the authors do not know who reviewed their manuscript unless the reviewers sign their reports, but the reviewers do know whose paper they are assessing. In the double-blind type, neither authors nor reviewers know each others identities. This can be useful when the paper is from an unknown author or another country, for instance, since it avoids possible bias.

However, distinctive variations in the style, subject matter, and citations often make it easy to tell the country and even the researcher in many cases. The value of concealing author identity is thus controversial.

Open and Transparent

With open peer review, both authors and reviewers are known, and the reviewers reports are published along with the accepted manuscript, as are the authors responses. With transparent review, the authors do not know who reviewed their manuscript unless the reviewers sign their report. Still, as above, both the reports and the authors responses are published with the manuscript if accepted.

Open and transparent peer review processes prevent reviewers from inserting harmful or careless comments and encourage timely reviews. In addition, plagiarism is discouraged. An open review process can also discourage honesty, however.

Transparent review is most advantageous in that it allows reviewers to offer frank criticism, especially when the author is someone already established in the field, without fear of it impacting their relationship with the author.

A major drawback with concealing the identity of the reviewer is that the manuscript may be delayed deliberately to allow reviewers to publish their work first if it competes with the work under review.

Common Errors to be Spotted

Some mistakes that often occur in scientific papers include illogical or contradictory statements, hasty conclusions, falsely attributing causality, overlooking confounding factors, leaving out key experimental details, and using inadequately defined terms.

What Happens Next?

Once the manuscript is assessed, the journal editor evaluates the comments made by the reviewers and suggests changes be made in accordance with them. Following these revisions made by the authors, the manuscript may be accepted for publication. The editorial team will then carry out formatting and typographical editing before it is published in the journal.

Alternatively, the reviewers reports may lead to the manuscript being rejected or transferred to another journal.

Image Credit: topvector/Shutterstock.com

The Need for Peer Review

Peer review is considered to validate the manuscript since the reviewers are experts in the same field. Gaps in explanation or experimental work, clumsy writing or a lack of clarity, and the general relevance of the paper, may all be pointed out by the reviewers in an attempt to make it more useful to others.

When the authors know their work will need to be vetted by others skilled in the same field, the manuscript will be of a higher standard. Moreover, there is a kind of censorship applied at this point to make sure that the ideas expressed in the manuscript are sufficiently backed by science before being released to the world at large.

That is, the reviewers examine the relevance of the research question, as well as the quality and accuracy of the experimental data and the conclusions drawn from it. Thirdly, they determine that the authors conclusions are not subject to personal bias or interpretations.

Finally, reviewers can help authors improve their work by avoiding ruthless attacks and pointing out correctable deficiencies instead. The guidance should not be primarily about the writing style or typos but instead about the quality and accuracy of the research or the validity of the conclusions.

The reviewed manuscript can become sounder, easier on the reader, and more complete and relevant for the reader.

Since editors will usually not insist on making changes that would necessitate a complete redoing of the whole experiment, even if suggested by the researchers, the authors should use this guidance to improve their work via revision before resubmitting their work to the same or another journal.

The Drawbacks of Peer Review

Even though most journals have accepted peer review as a necessity, this process has faced extensive criticism on a number of grounds. For one, it is extremely slow, with the manuscript being in the hands of the chosen peer reviewers for weeks or months, during which the findings may lose their relevance.

Secondly, the process leaves every new manuscript extremely vulnerable to the personal opinions and biases of the journal editors as well as reviewers, especially since scientists are often as or more resistant to challenges to their strongly held convictions as other people are. For example, conservative scientists may suppress new ways of experimental verification.

Peer reviewers often fail to detect plagiarism.

Even more serious is the verified fact that peer review is rarely thorough enough to rule out the publication of errors. Several researchers have proved this to be the case, with over a hundred nonsense papers churned out by a single computer program accepted by prestigious journals and institutes.

The number of qualified reviewers is simply far short of that required to review the million or more papers that are published each year. This means that many papers have not been reviewed adequately, and scientists are being exposed to bad science as a result.

Peer review is a flawed process, full of easily identified defects with little evidence that it works. Nevertheless, it is likely to remain central to science and journals because there is no obvious alternative, and scientists and editors have a continuing belief in peer review. How odd that science should be rooted in belief.

Many researchers in this area have suggested or designed potentially better systems for peer review, which could lead to shorter turnarounds but improved results, with less time being invested in repeated rounds of peer review and more into actual scientific research. At present, post-publication peer review is being tried out, as well as dynamic peer review. This allows a broader base of discussion and evaluation, avoids plagiarism, speeds up publishing time, and allows the public to see the paper and the comments.

Other newer approaches include the transferable peer review, with journals dealing with the same branch transferring reviewed manuscripts between themselves, thus avoiding further review and the need to reformat the paper, and collaborative reviews, with different people using their varying specialized skills to review the same work. Many scientists also support results-masked peer review to avoid publication bias, leaving the results, impact, and relevance of the paper to be evaluated after publication.

References
So what is the latest thing to hit the Lower Mainland? If you said rain, you are completely right, but let's focus on eats. Just like how the poke trend descended on the city about 5 years ago, we are witnessing a new trend - KFC. No, not Kentucky Fried Chicken... Rather Korean Fried Chicken! There seems to be one in every neighbourhood now and it really is a great takeaway treat. Think of it, fried chicken in either bone-in or bite sized pieces sauced with delicious flavours that can be shared with a group of people (or eaten by yourself too...). We were recently invited to try out Mr. Chicken in Langley which boasts flavours from around the world.

One thing that struck me right away was the pricing - it ranged from around $17.00 to $20.00 for a full order. That is considerably less expensive than most other KFC joints in town.

To get a taste of the menu, we had the whole thing including the Korean flavour that was sweet & spicy with a thick glaze. All of our orders were 9 pieces of bone-in chicken. They ranged from drumsticks to cut-up thighs as well as wing portions. I found the deep hue of the glaze to be appetizing and indeed it was delicious. There was a rich sweetness that was accented by enough saltiness to keep it from tasting too sugary. At the very end, I found a bit of heat.

One of the most interesting flavours was the Mexican where it looked to be oversauced while emitting a very strong smell. One bite into the chicken and it turned out to be one of the best of the bunch where we really got some of the Mexican spices as well as a good amount of heat. So while I thought there might've been too much sauce to begin with, it was actually a good thing as it was necessary to get the desired impact. Furthermore, the sauce didn't seem to impact the crunchiness of the batter very much as it wasn't soggy.

Staying with something more familiar, we tried the Japanese with the classic sweet soy marinade. With a little less sauce or glaze on this one, the batter was noticeably more crunchy. The flavours here were a bit more subtle than the previous 2, but still had enough for impact. I found this one to be less sweet than other versions I've had and that is a good thing since some can get pretty syrupy. The chicken itself was juicy and since it was on the bone, there was more natural chicken flavour as well.

One of the most surprising flavours was the English with house-made cheddar cheese powder. I guess this was classified as English due to our love of mac n' cheese in North America? Whatever the case, this has to be the best cheese-flavoured KFC I've had in town. The difference is that instead of using store-bought cheese powder (that has all kinds of non-cheese ingredients), this one looked and tasted like cheddar. No strange aftertaste and not overly sweet powder. I recommend that you try this one for sure.

I would say the French flavour was definitely the most subtle tasting of them all. Well, it certainly was not very discernible from the regular fried chicken (Canadian Flavour) due to its plain appearance. However, it did ultimately taste good though. The honey butter did not hit me in the face like the spice of the Mexican or the sweet glaze of the Korean. Yet, the aromatic nuttiness of the butter and the natural sweetness of honey made for a very pleasant taste. This would be perfect for those who were wanting something less powerful. Also, it meant the batter was crunchier too.

Another interesting flavour was the Italian where the spices adhered to the batter after the toss. So this had a distinctive aroma of the usual oregano, basil and thyme where it stood out from the others. I would say it was trending towards the other KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) territory where we were dealing with herbs and spices on the batter. Now that would not be very interesting, so their twist was to make it into a vinaigrette. So yes, we had the Italian herbs in there, but also some background acidity for good measure.

So the award for "most out-there" KFC was the Thai flavour. So one would think that tossing the fried chicken in Thai sweet chili would be the thing to do here right? Well only for a place being lazy and not creative... The chef decided to take the Canadian (just regular fried chicken on the menu) and add a side of coconut chili dip on the side. I enjoyed the creamy and lightly spicy dip so much, I started dipping the other flavoured chicken into it as well.

We also tried all of their sides including Crackling, Milk Balls and Wedges. The fried chicken skin was crunchy and the fat had mostly been rendered. It came with a ranch dipping sauce. With a crunchy breading, the thickened milk balls were quite good, reminded me of the Chinese version. Rarely seen, the breaded wedges ensured that the outside was crispy while the inside was soft and potatoey. Even though it was merely a Cabbage Slaw, I really enjoyed it because it was fresh and completely dressed. Good compliment to the rest of the fried menu items. Lastly, we tried the Mr. Tiramisu which was their version that didn't included mascarpone and any coffee. Hence, it was mostly creamy with soft sponge and chocolate. I have to say this was the most interesting KFC joints in the Lower Mainland. Not only are their prices super reasonable, the flavours are uniquely different. Definitely one of the better options.

*All food and beverages were complimentary*





The Good:

- Resonable pricing

- Unique flavours

- Well-executed





The Bad:

- Parking in the area is challenging
Patients who had leakage to the left atrial appendage due to incomplete device sealing after left atrial appendage occlusion (LAAO) experienced more clotting and bleeding events within a year following their procedure compared with patients who had no leaking, according to a study presented at the American College of Cardiology's 71st Annual Scientific Session.

The study, which included data from more than 50,000 patients, is by far the largest to date to assess how leaking after LAAO affects the likelihood of adverse health outcomes. The results suggest that even small leaks are associated with a 10%-15% higher risk of adverse events.

Our study shows that any leak matters, and we should find ways to optimize the procedure to minimize the proportion of patients who end up with leaks. Because this is a preventative procedure, it is important to find ways to master this and prevent leaks from happening. Fortunately, there are indications that leaking might be less common with newer devices and improved techniques." Mohamad Alkhouli, MD, professor of medicine at Mayo Clinic and study's lead author

Stroke is a major concern in patients with atrial fibrillation (AFib), the most common heart rhythm disorder. Blood thinners are the primary medical option for reducing the risk of strokes, which are caused when a blood clot blocks an artery in the brain; however, blood thinners are not suitable for many patients due to drug interactions, bleeding complications, cost, frequent blood checks with warfarin or other reasons. The WATCHMAN device, approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2015, is designed to help prevent strokes by sealing off the heart's left atrial appendage where blood can pool and clot. It is now widely used to reduce the risk of stroke in patients with AFib who cannot tolerate long-term use of blood thinners.

For the study, researchers analyzed data from 51,333 patients who underwent LAAO procedures with the WATCHMAN device between 2016-2019 as recorded in the ACC's LAAO Registry, a database that includes nearly all LAAO procedures conducted in the U.S. and is part of the College's NCDR registries. Echocardiograms were used to classify the size of any leaks around the device an average of 45 days after a LAAO procedure, a standard part of the clinical follow-up for this procedure. Registry data also included information about subsequent adverse health events occurring in the years after the procedure.

Overall, researchers found that 73.4% of patients had no leaks, 25.8% had small leaks (greater than zero but less than 5 millimeters across) and 0.7% had large leaks (greater than 5 millimeters)proportions similar to those reported in previous registry studies and clinical trials.

While relatively few patientsroughly 2%-3%experienced adverse events in the year following their LAAO procedure, the researchers found that the relative risk of these events varied significantly between patients with and without leaks. Compared to patients who had no leaking, those with small leaks had a 10% higher relative risk of suffering any major adverse events, an 11% higher relative risk of major bleeding complications, and a 15% higher relative risk of clotting-related events, including stroke, systemic embolization and transient ischemic attacks.

The study revealed no significant differences in the rate of adverse events between patients with large leaks and those with small or no leaks, which Alkhouli said is likely due to the use of anticoagulants in these patients. Instructions for the WATCHMAN device indicate that patients who have residual leaks greater than 5 millimeters across should be considered to have a failed procedure, and they are generally treated with anticoagulants.

Alkhouli said leaking is relatively common with LAAO procedures because the size and shape of the left atrial appendage varies widely from person to person, which can make it difficult for operators to position the device in a way that completely seals off the appendage. He noted that the shape of the appendage portion where the leaked blood flows into could affect the associated risks. More recent technologies, such as the use of CT scans to image the appendage and software that allows users to practice the procedure virtually before operating on a patient, could help operators place the WATCHMAN device in a more optimal position. Alkhouli said newer generation WATCHMAN device designs, which were introduced in 2021, could also help to reduce the risk in some patients.

The study was based on registry data reflecting real-world practices, meaning variations in the measurement of leaks could exist and may impact the results of the study, Alkhouli said. He added that future studies could help clarify whether using blood thinners in some patients with leaks smaller than 5 millimeters would be helpful in reducing stroke risk.

This study was simultaneously published online in the JACC: Clinical Electrophysiology at the time of presentation. The study was funded by Boston Scientific, maker of the WATCHMAN device.

Alkhouli will present the study, "Residual Leaks Post Left Atrial Appendage Occlusion," on Sunday, April 3, at 12:15 p.m. ET / 16:15 UTC in the Main Tent, Hall D.
Cardamonin -; a natural compound found in the spice cardamom and other plants -; could have therapeutic potential for triple-negative breast cancer, according to a new study using human cancer cells. The findings also show that the compound targets a gene that helps cancer cells elude the immune system.

About 10-15% of breast cancers are triple-negative, which means they don't have receptors for estrogen or progesterone and don't make excess amounts of a protein called HER2. These tumors are difficult to treat because they don't respond to the hormone-based therapies used for other types of breast cancer. They also tend to be more aggressive and have a higher mortality rate than other breast cancers.

It has been challenging to develop a targeted therapy for triple-negative breast cancer that is safe and effective at the same time. Because of this, there is a critical need to investigate medicinal plants as a new way to combat this cancer." Patricia Mendonca, PhD, assistant professor and research analyst at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee

Mendonca will present the new research at the American Society for Investigative Pathology annual meeting during the Experimental Biology (EB) 2022 meeting, to be held April 25 in Philadelphia.

"The fact that cardamonin has been used for centuries as a spice and, more recently, as a supplement shows that its intake is safe and may bring health benefits," said Mendonca. "Our research shows that cardamonin holds potential for improving cancer therapy without as many side effects as other chemotherapeutic agents."

For the new study, the researchers investigated how cardamonin affected the expression of the programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD-L1) gene, which is found in tumor cells. PD-L1 is overexpressed during breast cancer progression and plays a critical role in helping breast cancer cells evade the body's immune system.

The researchers used two genetically different triple-negative breast cancer cell lines -; one derived from women with African American ancestry and the other from women of European origin (Caucasian). They found that cardamonin treatment caused a dose-dependent decrease in cell viability in both cell lines. It also reduced PD-L1 expression in the Caucasian cell line but not the African American cell line, indicating that cells from different races may respond differently to cardamonin because of genetic variations among races.

"This is the first study to describe cardamonin's inhibitory effect on the expression of PD-L1, which is relevant for the treatment of triple-negative breast cancer," said Mendonca. "These findings add support to other research that has shown differences in the tumor microenvironment between African and non-African Americans."

The researchers caution that this research is still in progress. They plan to perform more studies in both cells and animals to confirm the efficacy of this compound before it is tested in people. They also want to explore other mechanisms that may be involved in cardamonin's anti-cancer properties.
A new drug shows promise in providing relief to cardiomyopathy patients experiencing shortness of breath, according to late-breaking research presented today at the American College of Cardiology (ACC) Scientific Session in Washington, D.C.

Florian Rader, MD, MSc, associate professor of Cardiology and medical director of the Hypertension Center in the Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai, presented results of an international clinical trial that shows the drug, mavacamten, alleviated the shortness of breath in patients with obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.

The genetic condition causes thickening of the heart muscle, and as a result, heart muscle cells enlarge and scarring often develops between cells. Patients with the condition typically experience shortness of breath, chest pressure, irregular heartbeat, and, although rare, sudden cardiac arrest.

"Until now, existing treatments for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy have been suboptimal, leaving most patients symptomatic and often, in need of invasive or even open-heart surgery," said Rader, who served as site principal investigator of the clinical trial at Cedars-Sinai and lead author of the ACC late-breaking abstract. "Follow-up data from this extended clinical trial shows success in lessening the obstruction to blood flow out of the heart in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Along with this relief of obstruction came substantial improvements in symptoms and an important heart failure blood biomarker."

As Rader, also co-director of the Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy Clinic at Cedars-Sinai, explained in the late-breaking presentation, mavacamten showed preliminary success in relieving symptoms associated with the condition-;specifically shortness of breath, which can be debilitating for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy patients.

Key data from the clinical trial-;shared by Rader at ACC22-;includes:

The average age of the 231 clinical trial participants was 60 years old, and 39% of those on the trial were female. The median follow-up was 62 weeks.

69% of trial participants had improved shortness of breath after 48 weeks of treatment.

Treatment with mavacamten was generally well tolerated, and no new safety concerns were raised during longer-term follow-up.

Since the condition was first described some 60 years ago, Rader says no disease-specific targeted treatment options have been developed.

While the prevalence of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is roughly 1 in every 200 patients, Rader says the condition is thought to be widely underdiagnosed.

A lot of patients have the condition-;and often feel short of breath or palpitations-;but their doctor doesn't recognize these symptoms as stemming from hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Instead, patients may be told by their physician they are out of shape, need to lose weight or are suffering from an anxiety condition." Florian Rader, MD, MSc, associate professor of Cardiology and medical director of the Hypertension Center, Smidt Heart Institute, Cedars-Sinai

The correct approach, Rader says, is to first pay close attention to the patient's symptoms. If shortness of breath is a main concern, then a doctor should listen to the patient's heart for a murmur, then follow up with an electrocardiogram, and, ultimately, an echocardiogram, which most often will lead to the correct diagnosis.

Christine M. Albert, MD, MPH, professor, chair of the Department of Cardiology and the Lee and Harold Kapelovitz Distinguished Chair in Cardiology, says this treatment option is specifically designed for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy-;a welcome change for patients who have suffered for years.

"This is the largest and longest report of mavacamten in patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy," said Albert, who is also participating at ACC. "We are encouraged to learn that it once again proved safe and effective. We are excited to be at the forefront of bringing this investigational treatment to patients."

The drug was developed by Bristol Myers Squibb and is under consideration for approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
A reduced diffusion capacity in the pulmonary function of patients who have experienced severe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has been widely reported, which has contributed to some of the severe symptoms associated with COVID-19. Furthermore, the majority of hospitalized patients with COVID-19 have suffered from restrictive lung function impairment.

Study: Lung function before and after COVID-19 in young adults: a population-based study. Image Credit: KZenon / Shutterstock.com

Background

Scientists have expressed difficulty in assessing the impact of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection on lung function with spirometry as a result of the great variability in lung function that exists between individuals.

Several studies have indicated that people with higher than average lung function showed significant decline post-COVID-19. Importantly, these studies have reported that pulmonary abnormalities that occurred during severe COVID-19 improved after virus clearance.

Recently, many studies have reported post-COVID symptoms, irrespective of disease severity. However, not much evidence is available regarding the degree of impairment of lung function in young adults who were not severely infected by SARS-CoV-2.

Although non-severe asthma patients are not at risk of contracting severe COVID-19 or hospitalization, it is important to determine whether pre-existing asthma influences lung function changes related to mild or moderate SARS-CoV-2 infection.

About the study

In a new Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology: Global study, researchers evaluate whether SARS-CoV-2 infection has a negative impact on lung function in young adults who experienced mild to moderate COVID-19. In this study, the researchers further analyzed if pre-existing conditions, such as asthma and allergic sensitization, or the use of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS), affected the pulmonary function of the study cohort.

In this study, candidates from the population-based cohort Barn, Allergi, Miljo, Stockholm, Epidemiologi (BAMSE) were evaluated before (2016-2019) and after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2021). The researchers obtained seropositivity data based on serum levels of SARS-CoV-2 receptor-binding domain-specific immunoglobulin (Ig) G, IgM, and/or IgA.

The mean change in the lung function was recorded in percent of predicted (pp) from before to after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The serological data obtained before and after the onset of the pandemic were compared. Changes in the lung function in seropositive candidates were also analyzed in accordance with allergic sensitization and self-reported ICS use.

Study findings

The authors did not observe any evidence of COVID-19-associated lung function impairments in young adults with or without asthma. In addition, no connection between allergic sensitization or ICS-use and lung function change was observed in COVID-19 seropositive patients.

A small number of participants with asthma possessing IgM antibodies exhibited a possible spirometric worsening as compared to the seronegative group with asthma, which might be due to an exacerbation of asthma in proximity to the infection.

Previous studies have shown that viral respiratory infections are common triggers of asthma exacerbations. These studies have also revealed that children infected with SARS-CoV-2 did not suffer any damage to their lung function.

A small number of adults with COVID-19 experienced asthma exacerbations; however, allergic sensitization did not affect lung function in the seropositive group. The use of ICS also did not affect COVID-19 outcomes in the study cohort.

Strengths and limitations

A key strength of the current study is the availability and utilization of lung function measures that were recorded before and after the COVID-19 pandemic. This data possesses the potential to detect minor changes in lung function among individuals with confirmed COVID-19 and compare the result with seronegative individuals. In the study cohort, the majority of the participants had mild disease, which reflected the disease manifestation in young children infected with SARS-CoV-2.

One of the key limitations of this study is the lack of information about the total lung capacity of the participants. Although previous studies related to normal spirometry suggested restrictive impairment to be unlikely, the lack of data in the current study did not permit the authors to make a strong conclusion about restrictive lung function impairment.

Another limitation of the study is the inclusion of seropositivity as a marker for previous COVID-19, as individuals with low or absent antibody responses were not considered. There is a high possibility of reduced antibody levels among individuals who were infected early in the pandemic. The authors also indicated the possibility of misclassification of some participants with previous COVID-19, which presents the possibility of biased results.

Conclusions

The current study revealed that young adults with mild to moderate COVID-19 do not suffer from impaired spirometric lung function. Additionally, no evidence was found to suggest that participants with asthma suffered long-term lung function damage. Furthermore, the current study revealed that allergic sensitization or recent ICS use had no significant impact on the lung function of seropositive participants.
In a recent study published in the journal Nature, researchers developed and evaluated an approach that used machine-learning algorithms to analyze mobile phone and satellite data to estimate poverty. They aimed to optimize the Novissi flagship emergency social assistance program in Togo, West Africa, providing subsistence cash relief to those most affected by COVID-19.

Study: Machine learning and phone data can improve targeting of humanitarian aid. Image Credit: rarrarorro / Shutterstock

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had devastating consequences in low- and lower-middle-income countries (LMICs). The living standards of the most economically vulnerable individuals have further worsened with a transition toward extreme poverty. Governments and humanitarian organizations worldwide have been trying to provide social assistance to the needy.

In high-income nations, governments have used the recent income data of individuals to assess their socioeconomic status and disbursed funds accordingly. However, in low-income countries, such data is either unavailable or obsolete. Thus, it has been challenging to identify individuals who require the greatest humanitarian aid.

About the study

In the present study, researchers developed a machine-learning-based approach to estimate poverty and target the poorest Togolese population for social assistance. This approach was termed a phone-based approach by the authors of the present study.

The Togolese government had launched the Novissi program in April 2020 to provide monetary aid to informal workers. The authors aimed to expand this program to the poorest Togolese residents, who were agricultural workers. Their phone-based approach was a two-step process.



In the first step, satellite and mobile phone data were obtained and analyzed by machine-learning algorithms. For the analysis, Togo was divided into several grid cells. Next, the algorithms estimated the relative wealth of people residing within every grid cell that represented the 2.4-km regions of the country. Subsequently, a population-weighted average of these grids was calculated for estimating the average wealth of every canton, Togos smallest administrative unit.

In the second step, mobile phone data provided by two Togolese mobile phone operators and obtained on an extensive survey were matched and analyzed by the machine-learning algorithms to determine the average daily consumption of every mobile phone subscriber.

a) Regional targeting. Satellite imagery of Togo is used to construct micro-estimates of poverty (middle)16, which are overlayed with population data to produce canton-level estimates of wealth. Individuals registered in the 100 poorest cantons (right) are eligible for benefits. Inset images  2019 Google. b) Individual targeting. A machine-learning algorithm is trained using representative survey data to predict consumption from features of phone use (Methods,  Machine-learning methods). The algorithm constructs poverty scores that are correlated with ground-truth measures of consumption (left). Subscribers who register for the program in targeted cantons with estimated consumption of less than USD $1.25/day are eligible for benefits (right). The red distribution shows the predicted wealth distribution of the entire population of Togo; the blue distribution shows the predicted wealth distribution in the 100 poorest cantons, and the green section indicates the predicted wealth distribution of Novissi beneficiaries.

The phone-based targeting approach was compared to three other feasible targeting approaches, geographic targeting [selecting individuals in the poorest cantons (Togos admin-3 level) or poorest prefectures (Togos admin-2 level], occupation-based targeting (selecting informal workers), and phone expenditure-based method that used estimated poverty based on an individuals mobile phone usage expenditure (calling and texting). In addition, the authors used optimal targeting, that selected agricultural workers as the poorest population.

The comparative effectiveness of the targeting approaches was considered for two scenarios. The first scenario targeted the rural Togolese population and evaluated the existing policy situation faced by the Togolese government during September 2020. The data used for analysis was based on a survey conducted by the authors during the same period. The proxy means test (PMT) was used as a ground-truth estimate of true poverty.

The second scenario targeted nationwide Togolese residents and evaluated a generalized hypothetical scenario. Data from national households were obtained in person by the government between 2018 and 2019 and used for this scenario. Consumption was used as the ground truth estimate of poverty in the second scenario. The outcomes assessed for each targeting approach were social well-being, exclusion errors, and fairness measures.

Precise targeting would enhance social welfare. For the welfare outcome, the constant relative risk aversion (CRRA) utility function was used to calculate welfare aggregates. A budget was defined for equal wealth distribution among the beneficiaries that met the targeting thresholds. The budget used by the authors was similar to that of the Novissi program (US$ 4 million). The social aid to be provided may be incorrectly estimated by the targeting approaches. Hence, fairness outcomes were assessed.

The fairness of each targeting mechanism was assessed by evaluating each mechanisms demographical parity, viz., the extent to which each mechanism over or under-targets the vulnerable groups compared to the true rate of poverty in that group. The exclusion errors were calculated by assessing the extent to which truly poor individuals were excluded from the analysis by mistake.

Results

In the first scenario, the phone-based targeting approach [area under the curve (AUC) 0.7] outperformed the other targeting approaches (geographic blanket targeting AUC 0.6). Additionally, the exclusion errors were lower in the phone-based approach (53%) than in other approaches (59%78%).

Likewise, in the second scenario, the phone-based targeting approach (AUC 0.7) most effectively prioritized the poor compared to the other approaches, with lesser exclusion errors (50%) than the other approaches (52%76%).

Notably, the occupation-targeting approach could not attain national-level scalability and had higher exclusion (76%) compared to the teams optimal targeting approach with lower exclusion errors (48%). Taken together, the phone-based approach demonstrated higher efficacy in the first scenario.

Interestingly, the phone expenditure-based approach performed significantly worse (AUC 0.57 and 0.63 for the first and second scenarios, respectively) than the phone-based targeting approaches (AUC 0.70 for and 0.73 for the first and second scenarios, respectively).

To summarize, the study findings demonstrated that the phone-based targeting approach that analyzed mobile phone and satellite data by machine learning could improve humanitarian assistance targeting. However, since poverty can change over time and data may become obsolete, constantly updating the data is necessary to enable the accurate disbursement of social aid to the poorest individuals.
Against the background of the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, with high vaccine coverage in several regions coupled with increasing rates of new infections in some hotspots, a new Swedish study examines the protective effect of immunity engendered by natural infection in contrast to hybrid immunity.

Introduction

There has been much controversy over whether individuals who have a history of prior COVID-19 need to be vaccinated against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Such individuals generally show an immune response to the administration of a COVID-19 vaccine, indicating that vaccination continues to be beneficial.

However, pending hard evidence, the task of persuading those with prior infection to take a primary series of the vaccine, plus boosters, is made more difficult. With vaccine passports becoming a requirement in some places, considerable differences have been revealed in the approach to issuing such passports. Should those with prior infection be recognized as immune or only those with hybrid immunity?

The current study, which appears in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, aimed to shed light on this issue.

What did the study show?

The study used Swedish national registers maintained by three different entities to form three cohorts. The first comprised unvaccinated people with natural immunity, and unvaccinated infection-naive individuals, of the same sex and age. The second and third cohorts included those who had taken one or two doses of the vaccine after a prior infection, again matched by age and sex to those with prior infection but unvaccinated.

The investigators looked for evidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection and hospitalization for COVID-19 over a period from March 20th, 2020, until October 4th, 2021, and September 5th, 2021, respectively. However, follow-up was shorter in cohorts 2 and 3, which were enrolled later, and during a period of lower infections.

Over the follow-up period of 164 days, non-immune individuals had over 99,000 documented infections, with approximately 2,000 hospitalizations. Conversely, those with natural immunity developed 34,000 infections, with approximately 3,200 hospitalizations. The risk of infection after natural infection was 95% lower. In comparison, the risk of hospitalization in this group was initially higher for the first three months but was reduced by 87% over the next 20 months.

The risk was higher among the older age groups and those born out of Sweden as well as those with higher education.

During a follow-up of 52 days, after a single dose of vaccine, following prior infection, the risk was reduced by 58% for reinfection, compared to those with natural immunity alone, in cohort 2. The effect weakened thereafter. It was also weaker in older people and those who had other illnesses.

There were eight hospitalizations in the one-dose hybrid immunity group, vs. 110 in the natural immunity group, for a reduction of 44%.

After two doses in previously infected individuals, there were just over 400 reinfections, with six hospitalizations, compared to 800 cases and 40 hospitalizations in those with natural immunity alone.

Two-dose hybrid immunity reduced reinfection risk by 56% compared to natural immunity, lasting at least nine months. The number of people with natural immunity who need to take two doses of vaccine in order to prevent one reinfection is 767.

What are the implications?

Overall, in those with prior infection, both one and two doses of vaccine were associated with a reduced risk of either reinfection or hospitalization than natural immunity alone. In the natural immunity cohort, the risk of reinfection was low for the next 20 months or more but reduced further with vaccination for the next nine months.

It is important to note that the difference in the number of cases and of hospitalizations in the natural immunity and hybrid immunity cohort is small, especially in the latter. Thus, there remains little evidence to promote the need for vaccination in those previously infected, especially with the long duration of immunity in this study, for 20 months or more.

Natural immunity seems to be of longer duration than vaccine-induced immunity, corroborating an Israeli study that recently published early findings and an earlier study by the same authors who showed waning vaccine effectiveness in Sweden within a few months. Nonetheless, hybrid immunity showed better protection against hospitalization than natural immunity, but the small numbers in this scenario call for further studies.

These findings suggest that if passports are used for societal restrictions, they should acknowledge either a previous infection or vaccination as proof of immunity, as opposed to vaccination only.

This is of special relevance in regions that have been poorly covered by vaccination, especially since the current Omicron variant possesses impressive vaccine-antibody escape characteristics.
Findings from a new animal study suggest that cannabidiol (CBD) and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) might be safe for use with opioid pain relievers. Although more studies are needed, the results suggest that these compounds might be a low-risk way to reduce the dose of opioids needed to relieve pain.

There is intense interest in using medical marijuana in patients with chronic pain because compounds in marijuana like CBD and THC may produce pain relief themselves or enhance the pain-relieving effects of opioids. This means people could potentially use lower doses of opioids and still get relief from pain. Taking less pain medication could also lead to a lowered risk of addiction or physical dependence to opioids." Lawrence Carey, PhD, postdoctoral fellow, University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio

The researchers found that CBD and THC do not enhance the rewarding effects of opioids. This means that these compounds may not increase the risk for addiction when used in conjunction with opioids.

Carey will present the new research at the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics annual meeting during the Experimental Biology (EB) 2022 meeting, to be held April 25 in Philadelphia.

In the new study, the researchers gave rhesus monkeys the opportunity to choose a food reward or an injection of the opioid fentanyl. They then tested whether CBD, THC or mixtures containing both compounds affected the number of times monkeys selected fentanyl over food. They found that a wide range of doses of CBD or THC both alone or in a mixture did not increase or decrease the number of times they selected fentanyl.

"Giving the animals the opportunity to choose between a drug injection and a food reward helped us to somewhat replicate choices a human drug user may face, such as whether to spend money on drugs or food," said Carey. "Having the option of responding for food is also useful for studying drugs like THC that produce sedative effects. It helps demonstrate the animal is reallocating behavior from drug to food choice instead of simply shutting down response for a drug due to sedation."

The researchers are now conducting other studies to assess whether CBD and THC can decrease signs of opioid withdrawal and relapse.

"A big reason why people continue to take opioids after they become addicted is the appearance of withdrawal symptoms," said Carey. "We are using what we learned from this study to determine whether these doses -; which didn't alter choice for food or drug rewards -; may help relieve opioid withdrawal or decrease relapse and drug seeking behavior following periods of abstinence."

The researchers caution that opioid use disorder is a complex disease and there are many factors to consider when developing a drug to treat it. Although this study indicates that THC and CBD do not increase the rewarding effects of opioids, they say that before applying these findings to people, it will be necessary to determine whether these treatments alter other pathological processes involved with opioid use and to better understand any risks that may be associated with their use.

Lawrence Carey will present this research from 10 a.m.12 p.m., Monday, April 4, in Exhibit/Poster Hall A-B, Pennsylvania Convention Center (Poster Board Number B12) (abstract) and 1:431:56 p.m., April 4 in Room 113 A (abstract). Contact the media team for more information or to obtain a free press pass to attend the meeting.
Clinicians and nurses in neonatal intensive care units (NICU) across Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust (MFT) are the worlds first to deploy genedrives MT-RNR1 ID Kit, a new rapid genetic point of care test (POCT) to screen babies for the genetic variant m.1555A>G when admitted with suspected sepsis. Neonates with bacterial infections such as sepsis are routinely prescribed gentamicin, an aminoglycoside antibiotic , however, for babies with an inherited m.1555A>G genetic variant, a single dose of this antibiotic can result in permanent hearing loss.

New clinical trial results demonstrate that genedrives test can detect the presence of the genetic variant in less than half an hour, compared to traditional lab-based testing, which can take days or weeks to deliver results. This historical slow turn- around time meant that this vital patient safety issue could not be determined in an emergency care setting. The rapid result enables clinicians to prescribe alternative antibiotic treatments to neonates carrying the variant, enabling patients to begin life-saving treatments as soon as possible without risk of hearing loss.

The rollout follows the results of a successful performance trial of the technology in the NICU at Saint Marys Hospital in Manchester, part of MFT. Using genedrives test, the Pharmacogenetics to Avoid the Loss of Hearing (PALOH) study  which was part-funded by NIHR Manchester Biomedical Research Centre (BRC)  screened 751 neonates admitted to the NICU for the MT-RNR1 genetic variant known as m.1555A>G, which can provide results to clinicians in 26 minutes. This information was used to guide prescribing decisions, with babies at risk of antibiotic-induced hearing loss prescribed an alternative antibiotic.

Prior to using the genedrive test, clinicians had no way of knowing if their newborn had the m.1555A>G variant before prescribing life-saving antibiotics, as existing genotyping technology involves time-consuming lab testing. In cases of early-onset neonatal infection, National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines state that antibiotic therapy should be started within one hour of the decision to treat with antibiotics, and any delays could be lethal. As such, clinicians have until now been forced to make prescribing decisions without this genetic information. Genedrives test and instrument has enabled this, providing clinicians with genetic information in a clinically relevant timeframe. This has the potential to spare over 14,000 neonates from permanent hearing loss around the world every year.

Despite the risk of hearing loss for patients with m.1555A>G genetic variant, gentamicin is the preferred and recommended antibiotic treatment for neonatal sepsis. This is due to the fact that alternative broad-spectrum antibiotics such as cephalosporins risk the development of antibiotic resistant organisms. Approximately 1 in 500 babies have the m.1555A>G genetic variant.

In non-acute clinical cases, guidance from the Clinical Pharmacogenetics Implementation Consortium (CPIC) and from the UK Medicines and Healthcare Regulatory Agency (MHRA) already recommends that genetic testing is carried out and that individuals with the m.1555A>G variant do not receive aminoglycoside antibiotics, unless the risk of permanent hearing loss is outweighed by the severity of the infection. With genedrives technology, this informed decision making is now also available to clinicians working in acute NICU settings.

Weve known about the link between m.1555A>G and profound hearing loss for some time, but there has been no way of doing a genetic test at a patients bedside in less than an hour. Time is of the essence for clinicians treating neonates presenting with sepsis  they do not have the luxury of waiting days or weeks for the results of a genetic test. Wed seen the valuable work genedrive was doing testing for other genetic variants, and we were keen to explore how its technology could help our NICU nurses and consultants." Professor Bill Newman, Consultant in Genomic Medicine, MFT

Professor Newman, who is also Genomic Solutions Associate Lead for Manchester BRCs Hearing Health theme, added; During the trial, genedrives rapid point of care test provided our clinicians with vital information when they needed it. They no longer had to make prescribing decisions in the dark, and they no longer had the conundrum of knowing that some of their patients could develop profound hearing loss after treatment with routine antibiotics. Crucially, genedrive delivers results in less than 30 minutes, which means treatment can begin within the hour  this is critical in these cases.

MFT is now rolling out the genedrive antibiotic induced hearing loss test across three of its NICUs to start, with more rollouts planned. The first sites in the trust to implement the technology include Saint Marys Hospital and Wythenshawe Hospital. The genedrive MT- RNR1 assay (test) uses cells collected from a swab from the inside of the patients cheek. In pre-clinical validation, the genedrive platform demonstrated an assay sensitivity of 100% and a specificity of 100%. During the PALOH trial, the platform demonstrated real-world analytical sensitivity of 100%, a specificity of 99.2%, and an accuracy of 99.2%.
Overweight patients with atrial fibrillation are more likely to experience a return of the heart rhythm disorder after a corrective procedure than those of normal weight, according to research presented at EHRA 2022, a scientific congress of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC).

The risk of recurrent atrial fibrillation after ablation rose incrementally as body mass index (BMI) increased. Our study suggests that overweight patients should be advised to lose weight before the intervention to improve the likelihood of being free of the arrhythmia afterwards." Dr. Jacob Toennesen, Lead Author, Gentofte University Hospital, Denmark

Atrial fibrillation is the most common heart rhythm disorder worldwide. It is estimated that one in three Europeans will develop the condition. Atrial fibrillation is associated with elevated risks of stroke, heart failure and premature death, while more than 60% of patients have impaired quality of life. Dr. Toennesen said: "The potential for deleterious outcomes means that obtaining a normal heart rhythm is a crucial goal of treatment."

Treatment options include drugs and ablation, which involves burning or freezing a small portion of the heart to create a scar and prevent the spread of abnormal electrical impulses. While previous research has shown that obesity is associated with the development of atrial fibrillation, this study examined the link between BMI and a return of the heart rhythm disorder after ablation.

The study was conducted using Danish nationwide registries. It included a total of 9,229 adults who underwent a first-time atrial fibrillation from 2010 through 2018. Patients were divided into five groups according to BMI in kg/m2: underweight (below 18.5), normal weight (18.5 to 24), overweight (25 to 29), obese (30 to 34) and morbidly obese (over 34). The median age decreased from 64 years in the normal weight group to 60 years in the morbidly obese group.

Patients were deemed to have experienced atrial fibrillation during follow-up if they claimed prescriptions of anti-arrhythmic drugs, were hospitalised due to atrial fibrillation, underwent re-ablation, or had an electrical cardioversion which transmits electric shocks to the heart through electrodes on the chest to restore normal heart rhythm.

The authors analyzed the relative risk of recurrent atrial fibrillation according to BMI after adjusting for sex, age, procedure year, heart failure, ischaemic heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), chronic kidney disease, hypertension and diabetes. At one year, compared to the normal weight group, the overweight, obese and morbidly obese groups had a 19%, 22% and 32% higher likelihood of atrial fibrillation, respectively. The same pattern was observed after five years, with 15%, 18% and 26% higher risks of the abnormal heart rhythm in the overweight, obese and morbidly obese groups, respectively, compared with the normal weight group. The relative risk in underweight patients did not significantly differ from those with normal weight at either time point.

Dr. Toennesen said: "The study shows that recurrence rates of atrial fibrillation increased incrementally with rising BMI at short- and long-term follow-up. For instance, after one year 61% of normal weight patients were still free of the heart rhythm disorder compared to just 52% of morbidly obese patients. We also observed that both procedure duration and X-ray dose increased with rising BMI."

He concluded: "The strength of association between high BMI and repeat atrial fibrillation after ablation was comparable to the influence of well-known factors like heart failure, COPD and hypertension which are typically treated in these patients. The findings indicate that aggressive weight management prior to ablation could potentially lead to better outcomes."
A simple blood test for women of all ages and risk levels could one day be possible thanks to a new set of protein biomarkers that researchers identified using breast milk.

Although mammograms are a useful tool for catching breast cancer early, they aren't typically recommended for low-risk women under 40. Because the biomarkers we found in breast milk are also detectable in blood serum, screening could potentially be done in women of any age using blood or breast milk." Danielle Whitham, doctoral candidate, Clarkson University, New York

The newly identified biomarkers are for a specific type of cancer called invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC), one of the most common types of breast cancers. However, the researchers say that their approach could be used to identify biomarkers for other types of breast cancer.

"If our future studies are successful, it could change how women are monitored for breast cancer and aid in earlier diagnosis," said Whitham. "This could even lead to a higher survival rate in women."

Whitham will present the research at the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology annual meeting during the Experimental Biology (EB) 2022 meeting, to be held April 25 in Philadelphia.

"We used breast milk because it contains proteins, epithelial cells and immune cells, all of which provide a great deal of information about what is happening in a woman's body during a crucial time in breast development," said Whitham.

For the study, breast milk samples were obtained from three women diagnosed with breast cancer and three women without cancer. Using liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry, the researchers compared the relative levels of certain proteins between the two groups to identify differences in the women with cancer. The analysis revealed 23 proteins that were dysregulated. All the proteins that showed differences were previously shown to play a role in cancer or tumor development.

Now that the researchers have identified a biomarker set, they plan to confirm it with a larger group of women. Then, they will test the protein biomarkers' applicability in blood serum. If those tests are successful, a blood test could be developed to be used on women of any age to monitor protein changes for detection of breast cancer.

Research collaborators on this team include Costel Darie and Sumona Mondal of Clarkson University, Kathleen Arcaro and Brian Pentecost of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and David Fenyo of New York University School of Medicine.

Women interested in helping with this research by donating breast milk samples can visit http://breastmilkresearch.org.

Danielle Whitham will present this research from 12:301:45 p.m. Monday, April 4, in Exhibit/Poster Hall A-B, Pennsylvania Convention Center (Poster Board Number A248) (abstract). Contact the media team for more information or to obtain a free press pass to attend the meeting.

This study was supported by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health under award number R15CA260126.
Page Content

The Honorable Minister of Justice Anna E. Richardson recently returned from a four-day working visit to Aruba, from March 28 until March 31. The working visit was filled with meetings and site visits with the purpose of exchanging information with key agencies and stakeholders on Justice and Immigration matters to reinforce cooperation ties and friendship between the two countries. The visit has resulted in future collaboration between Aruba and St. Maarten on different aspects within the Justice sector.





On March 28, the first day of the visit, Minister Richardson was given an introduction and guided tour of KIA prison Aruba (Korrectie Instituut Aruba) by the Prison Director, Mr. Gino Winklaar. St. Maarten and Arubas prison systems share similar challenges, some of which include the fact that they are over 30 years old and both are exposed to sea blast causing structural damage over time. At both prisons, more than half of the respective prison populations are also foreign nationals who have committed serious crimes.





On March 29, Minister Richardson visited the Aruba Courthouse and met with representatives of the Aruba monuments foundation with regard to the historical restoration and upgrade of the Aruba Courthouse as a monument. The intent of the visit was to gather information on how this project was handled, how funds were sourced and how this information can be of benefit to St. Maartens Courthouse building.





The second day ended with a visit to Arubas Marine Base where Minister Richardson was eager to receive an in-depth presentation on the Formacion Social Program (SVT). The program has been ongoing in Aruba for a number of years and was designed to give a last chance to dropouts and troubled young adults from the ages of 18 to 24. The SVT program can accommodate two groups of 25 trainees each per year. The first female group started the program just recently. The project consists of two phases of which the first phase is the military-style training of four months and the second phase is focused on general education and includes an eight-month internship. At the end of the program the cadets receive a certificate of recognition which they can use to enter the job market, and in some cases, the Aruba Military.





The St. Maarten Youth Brigade assists with the development of youth on St. Maarten through mental, physical and social sessions. However, for quite some time, Minister Richardson has been exploring possibilities to strengthen the goal of such institutions with the establishment of a Military Academy on St. Maarten. In 2021, the Ministry of Justice in collaboration with the Department of Interior and Kingdom Relations hosted the first National Youth Delinquency Symposium with the objective to harness and connect key stakeholders within the youth delinquency network, identify challenges and seek solutions such as the establishment of a Military Academy.





Minister Richardson stated, Considering that St. Maarten is located in a hurricane belt, we usually seek military assistance during natural disasters which led to the establishment of the military detachment in 2012, currently consisting of 24 marines. As such, the establishment of a Military Academy allows us to locally train and strengthen our current military capacity.





On March 30, Minister Richardson visited the Aruba Interpol office as they play a vital role within the countrys Ministry of Justice. Head of NCTVI/Interpol Aruba, Mr. Adolphus Richardson and one of his team members, gave an introduction to the organization and a presentation elaborating on an Aruba-based crime and border management system.





During the very extensive work visit, Minister Richardson also sought the time to meet with St. Maarteners living abroad in Aruba. She updated them on St. Maartens latest developments and used the opportunity for shared ideas and opinions on how the St. Maarten community abroad can continue to support and contribute to the efforts back home. Minister Richardson was also very keen on actively listening and receiving feedback and suggestions during the meet and greet. The evening culminated with individuals having the opportunity for a one-on-one dialog with Minister Richardson.





On March 31, the last day of the working visit, Minister Richardson met with Minister of Justice of Aruba, Honorable Rocco Tjon where they were able to discuss the importance of prevention and the willingness to collaborate on different aspects within the Justice sector. In the spirit of collaboration, I continue to echo the words forward together' as we continue to learn and share information from our sister countries within the Dutch Kingdom. This work visit has allowed St. Maarten to forge new work relationships as well as learn about the different justice agencies in Aruba. Id like to thank Minister Tjon, the agencies and stakeholders that welcomed my team and me, as we continue in our vision to maintain a safe and strong St. Maarten, concluded Minister Richardson.
A recent study posted to the medRxiv* preprint server presented the rapid spike in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) seroprevalence during the emergence of the Omicron variant in Finland.

Background

The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Omicron variant of concern (VOC) emerged at the end of 2021. It altered the epidemiology of the ongoing SARS-CoV-2 pandemic with a swift increase in COVID-19 cases worldwide. On November 29th, 2021, the first case of the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant was detected in Finland. Nevertheless, data on the prevalence and exposure of Omicron in the initial months of Omicron emergence in Finland is not well established.

About the study

In the present research, the scientists assessed alterations in prevalence and exposure of COVID-19 during the initial period of the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron VOC emergence in the Greater Helsinki area, Finland. The team conducted a prospective seroepidemiological evaluation of COVID-19 on 1,600 routine serum specimens delivered to Helsinki University Hospital Laboratory (HUSLAB) for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) serology. This analysis was performed between November 15th, 2021, and March 6th, 2022.

The present study was initiated in 46 calendar weeks in 2021 and ended in nine calendar weeks in 2022. A total of 100 serum samples were chosen at random and tested for SARS-CoV-2 immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies against the viral receptor-binding domain (RBD) of the spike 1 (S1) and nucleocapsid (N) proteins. Further, the S1 and N proteins were assessed using SARS-CoV-2 IgG II Quant (S protein) and Abbott SARS-CoV-2 IgG (N protein) analyses, respectively, for each calendar week of the study.

The samples for each calendar week were selected by choosing a random initiation point and selecting specimens systematically till 100 specimens, and five extra samples were obtained. Subsequently, the 100 selected specimens were evaluated for COVID-19 antibodies. If the specimen volume was insufficient or the assay failed, the sample was substituted with one of the extra samples corresponding to that calendar week.

The authors estimated the percentage of the subgroups identified based on the serostatus for each calendar week. The statistical analysis of the study was conducted using IBM statistical package for the social sciences (SPSS) software.

Results

The study results demonstrated that the subgroups derived from the serostatus evaluation of the samples were 1) anti-S1 negative/anti-N negative, 2) anti-S1 positive/anti-N negative, 3) anti-S1 positive/anti-N positive, and 4) anti-S1 negative/anti-N positive. These four subgroups respectively indicate 1) no serological proof for previous SARS-CoV-2 infection or vaccine immunization; 2) no proof for recent COVID-19 but seroresponse to vaccination was present, 3) consistent with vaccination status prior infection status unknown, and 4) no proof for vaccination but possible recent infection.

The mean age of the study participants was 33 years, and more than 55% population included in this research were females. During the initial five weeks of the study, the baseline prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 N antibodies was 5.2%, whereas in the last five weeks, it rose to 28.2%. At the same timestamps, the percentages of SARS-CoV-2 seronegative samples dropped from 11.6% to 3.8%, and anti-S1 positive/anti-N negative samples declined from 84.2% to 68.2%.

In people aged less than 30 years, a dramatic increase in N antibody seroprevalence was detected during the research period. The seroprevalence of N antibodies was continuously beneath 10% by the end of 2021, but it demonstrated a quick increase by week 1 of 2022 and exceeded 20% by week 3 of 2022.

Anti-N positive/anti-S1 negative samples started to appear from week 2 in 2022 and accounted for 0.9% of all studied samples, which might indicate a delayed or diminished seroresponse towards S1 in Omicron infections. The declining percentage of seronegative samples from group 1 towards the study's conclusion depicted the elevation in anti-N positive samples in groups 3 and 4.

Omicron became the dominant SARS-CoV-2 variant in the Greater Helsinki area by the middle of December 2021. The findings demonstrated a rapid incline in the individual-level SARS-CoV-2 exposure, suggesting high COVID-19 transmission. This observation corresponded to prior investigations on the topic. Nearly 4% of the participants were SARS-CoV-2 S and N seronegative at the end of the research. Around 78% of study volunteers exhibited SARS-CoV-2 S antibodies/without N antibodies, reflecting viral immunization from COVID-19 vaccination/without recent infection.

Conclusions

The study findings depicted that the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 N antibodies rapidly elevated from 5.2% between 46 and 50 weeks in 2021 to 28.2% between five and nine weeks in 2022 during the research period. This data indicates that around 23% of the subjects were SARS-CoV-2-infected during the study period. However, the percentage of seronegative and anti-S1 positive/anti-N negative samples dropped. Anti-N positive samples that were negative for anti-S1 antibodies started to appear by week 2 in 2022.

Overall, the study depicts a significant hike in the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 N antibody during the initial period of Omicron emergence in Finland, reflecting a high COVID-19 transmission rate. Additionally, the results showed that during the emergence of the Omicron VOC in the Greater Helsinki Area, Finland, a significant number of COVID-19 patients remained undiagnosed. The authors suggested subclinical SARS-CoV-2 infections and reduced reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) tests as reasons for this observation.

*Important notice

medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.
In a new study posted to the medRxiv* preprint server, researchers discussed the stability of spike antibody titers mounted against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection, and their ability to protect from infection with other antigenically similar SARS-CoV-2 variants.

Background

According to the World health organization (WHO) statistics, over 486 million people have been infected with SARS-CoV-2, the organism that caused the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

Infection with SARS-CoV-2 leads to the development of adaptive immune responses, which in some patients remain active for a longer time, while in some fade quickly. These immune responses include either induction of SARS-CoV-2 spike-binding antibodies or neutralizing antibodies.

Usually, in any infection, the antibodies mounted are at a strong peak during the infection, followed by declining levels and then stabilization. This pattern of antibody level durability and protection in SARS-CoV-2 was investigated in the current study.

About the study

In the present research, two PARIS (Protection Associated with Rapid Immunity to SARS-CoV-2) cohort studies involving a total of 501 healthcare workers with and without prior infection of SARS-CoV-2, enrolled between April 2020 and August 2021, were performed. The studies involved frequent and longitudinal sampling from two to six months up to 400 days post-infection.

For the protection dataset, 400 participants, including 273 females, 126 males, and one unknown gender, without any co-morbidities were identified. These unvaccinated participants were either monitored for four weeks of follow-up, or two study visits were performed. During the enrolment, 150 were seropositive, while 250 were seronegative for SARS-CoV-2 spike antibodies. A total of 2,106 study visits were carried out to determine the risk of infection and seroreversion in 400 participants.

For determining the antibody durability, 137 seropositive participants from 400 participants with known dates of COVID-19 positive tests or symptoms onset were selected, and a total of 813 distinct visits were conducted.

Eleven participants were detected with new SARS-CoV-2 infections, of which ten were naive participants, and one was previously infected without detectable antibodies. Infection was confirmed for one individual by nucleic acid amplification test (NAAT) conducted by the study group, nine infections were confirmed outside the Mount Sinai Health System, while one infection was confirmed by seroconversion.

Antibody titers against the SARS-CoV-2 spike proteins were measured by a two-step enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Firstly, the sera were screened for IgG at 11:50 dilution, and antibodies were detected against a full-length spike protein.

Further, the durability of antibodies and changes in their titers with time were determined using an additive mixed model mgcv package (version 1.8-36) for R (version 4.1.1). Participants with low levels of detectable antibodies (less than 1:80) were removed from the analysis, whereas those with detectable antibodies of 1:80-1:6,400 were used. In this analysis, sex, age, and baseline titers were included as covariates.

The frequency of seroreversion was determined by calculating the probability of survival via the Kaplan-Meier estimator. Seroreversion was defined by patients who were seropositive initially, however, subsequently, the titers went undetectable or below the detection limit on two consecutive visits.

The researchers further studied whether the antibody titers were able to protect against re-infection with a genetically similar SARS-CoV-2 variant. Participants with detectable antibodies were compared to those with undetectable antibodies by a Fishers exact test.

Study findings

The results demonstrated that spike binding IgG antibody titers were highly variable amongst the COVID-19 survivors, with titers ranging between 1:80 and 1:6,400. Around 59.1% of participants displayed antibody titers above 1:800 at the baseline visit.

It was found that after the infection, the antibody titers decreased over the first three months, after which the levels of antibodies were stabilized for a year. Moreover, participants with higher antibodies showed a higher initial decline than those with lower antibody levels.

The researchers also investigated whether age or sex has any effect on antibody durability. Participants of age 40 or over showed 1.62-fold higher antibody levels. Sex-wise, female participants displayed 1.40-fold higher antibody titers than male participants.

It was also observed that eight participants out of 137 who were initially seropositive (below 1:800) for the antibodies tested negative during follow-up study, confirming seroreversion.

Interestingly, the antibodies mounted upon infection were detectable after re-infection, demonstrating significant protection from the antigenically similar variants.

Conclusions

Overall, this current study reported the pattern of SARS-CoV-2 antibody durability over time, with an initial decline and then stabilization after three months. Seroreversion was found to be lower, and participants with ages over 40, as well as females, showed higher antibody levels. Moreover, the antibodies mounted in the infection showed protection towards re-infection with other variants.

However, this study had a few limitations. The enrolment done in the first wave relied on clinical symptoms and not on molecular tests. Moreover, a smaller sample size due to increased numbers of vaccinated healthcare workers may have led to bias in the study.

*Important notice

medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.
I'm being held captive in England by the U.S. government.

On the day my wife and I were to fly home from London after a brief visit, we took a covid-19 test, as required by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to travel to the U.S. The United States will not allow anyone to fly into the country who has tested positive for covid, and it is up to the airlines to enforce that.

My wife's test was negative.

My test was positive.

She flew out.

I stayed put.

I stayed put and tried to figure out what to do next. And as anyone who considers traveling overseas should realize, the hard part isn't getting there. It might not even be avoiding covid, though that's getting tougher. It's getting back to the United States.

I am not allowed to fly for 10 days. After that, if I have a negative test, I'm free to go.

But while in Britain, I dont have to quarantine. The British government says I'm free to do whatever I want. I can ride the stifling Underground, visit beautiful museums, or stand in line for a crowded indoor concert. I could go full Typhoid Mary, if I wanted, and wander into quaint pubs, all without a mask. Hardly anyone in England seems to bother to wear one.

What I can't do is ride an airplane, with air recirculated every three minutes, among people required to wear masks the whole time. Had I caught covid while in the U.S., I could freely fly from Washington, D.C., to San Francisco  masked, of course  without a problem. But not over the Atlantic.

So I was looking at 10 days of hotels, which are not cheap in London. It's not as if I can call a friend here and say, "Hey, I got covid. Can I crash on your living room sofa?"

But a colleague who travels often to London made a suggestion: Go to Brighton, the classic beach town on the English Channel. Hotels cost a third less there. Brilliant. (It's seedy and charming and historical. Worth a trip.)

I rode the train down, and what had only been a scratchy throat did develop into a dry cough, some sneezing, a loss of appetite, and maybe even a slight fever. I wore a mask whenever I went out.

Meanwhile, covid cases were rising rapidly in Britain. Hospitalizations, too.

The British government estimated that nearly 3.5 million people in England tested positive last week, about 6% of the population. British doctors on Twitter are warning again of stressed hospitals. Drugstores had masks, lots of sturdy masks, but not a single covid test. All Boots stores, the British equivalent of CVS or Walgreens, had printed signs that said they were all out and to try again tomorrow. Those signs were never taken down during my stay, and I hit several stores every day. While masked.

My symptoms quickly went away, and after four days I felt fine again. I continued to wear an N95 mask. My Johnson & Johnson vaccine and the half-dose Moderna booster recommended by the CDC apparently did the trick.

But, now, how do I get back? Here's the problem. There is a chance that some little piece of the virus remains in my body. So if I take another test and it's positive, I'm stuck here again  with no symptoms except a bleeding wallet. I didn't want to take that risk.

Fortunately, a Facebook friend happened to post something about her husband, who was caught in a similar circumstance. His solution was to pay a private doctor to attest that 10 days after his first symptoms, he no longer was contagious. For $185 he got a legitimate "certificate of recovery" that deemed him "fit to fly." And he got home.

I'm going to try that. Wish me luck  because if there's one thing I've learned about traveling to another country during covid, it's this: You may not get horribly sick, but your personal finances will feel the pain.
(Newser)  Update: The family of a Black man fatally shot by a Georgia state trooper in 2020 will receive a $4.8 million settlement from the state. A lawyer for Julian Lewis' family says the settlement was reached last month before a lawsuit was filed, the New York Times reports. The white trooper who fired the shot was charged following Lewis' death, but the prosecution stalled after a grand jury declined to indict him last June. A family lawyer says the settlement is just one step, and that Lewis' family wants to "continue to push for the criminal responsibility." They are also pushing the district attorney to release police video of the incident. "Taxpayers should know why the state settled this case for nearly $5 million," the attorney says. Our original story from Aug. 15, 2020, follows:

A Georgia state trooper was fired and charged with murder Friday a week after he shot a 60-year-old man who tried to flee a rural traffic stop, authorities said. The president of Georgia's NAACP chapter called the slaying of Julian Edward Roosevelt Lewis another chilling example of a Black man being killed unlawfully by a white law enforcement officer, the AP reports. An attorney for Lewis' family said the trooper initiated the traffic stop over a burned-out tail light and Lewis was shot almost immediately after the trooper forced his car into a ditch. "Mr. Lewis never got out of the vehicle and the investigation will show that, mere seconds after the crash, he was shot to death, shot in the face and killed," attorney Francys Johnson said.

Johnson said that information was given to the family by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, which arrested 27-year-old Jacob Gordon Thompson on charges of felony murder and aggravated assault Friday. The agency did not include those details in its own statement on Thompson's arrest. The GBI said Lewis was fatally shot Aug. 7 after a chase in rural Screven County, about 60 miles northwest of Savannah. The Georgia Department of Public Safety said it fired Thompson after he was charged Friday. He had been a trooper for the Georgia State Patrol since 2013. Thompson's attorney, Keith Barber, declined to comment on specifics of the case, but said he believes the former trooper "has an excellent character" and "will be exonerated in this case."

(Read more police shooting stories.)
Press Release

April 3, 2022 Drilon sounds alarm, disappointment over 27-M unused, nearly-expired vaccines Senate Minority Leader Franklin M. Drilon expressed strong disappointment as approximately 27 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines remain unused and are in danger of expiring. Drilon took to task once again the Department of Health (DOH) and the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) on COVID-19 for what he called "a callous disregard for the taxpayers" as he underscored that each centavo that was used for the purchase of the anti-coronavirus vaccines come from the taxpayers. "More than two years into the pandemic, the IATF still manages to mismanage the government's response to the pandemic. It is unconscionable that the vaccines that were purchased through loans could end up in the garbage," Drilon said. "It is criminal neglect if they let that happen. I'd like to remind the DOH and the IATF that it is Juan dela Cruz who will pay for these vaccines," he added. He underscored that the purchase of millions of COVID-19 vaccines raised the country's debt stock from P9 trillion pre-pandemic to P12 trillion as of February 2022. At P500 per dose, the government is throwing away P13.5 billion if the 27 million doses are not administered within the next three months, according to Drilon. Drilon said that these P13.5 billion could have been used instead to augment the ayuda for PUV drivers and operators affected by the astronomical increase in the prices of fuel. The minority leader said that the government should not allow the doses to expire, as he pointed out that still a considerable number of Filipinos have not yet received their booster shots. "I hope we are not resting on our laurels. The coronavirus is still within our midst. We must ramp up our vaccination efforts. We have 27 million doses of vaccines that are close to their expiration dates. The DOH and IATF should distribute in the most efficient manner," Drilon stressed. "Huwag naman nating ipamana sa susunod na administrasyon ang expired na bakuna," Drilon said.
(Newser)  "Backward mobility" is one term economists use to describe the descent of many middle-class families into "the bottom 50% of Americans who collectively have a negative net worth." That financial trend is the background for Eli Saslow's piece for the Washington Post on the "death spiral of an American family." The story begins by recounting how a son, Dave Ramsey Jr., struggled to raise cash to cremate his father, Dave Sr., a former police officer, Mason, and Little League ump who died of a heart attack in bed beside a collections notice. Divorce, Detroit-area real estate that lost much of its value during the Great Recession, and medical bills put the elder Ramsey among "the record 23% of Americans in the past 5 years who have died with a negative net worth," passing only financial woes to the next generation.

Dave Jr.'s own work history began with a job injury followed by an opioid addiction, and he was barely making ends meet as a landscape contractor. Among the family's debts: $681 to Verizon and more than $12,000 to the doctor who signed Dave Sr.'s death certificate. As the article makes clear, Dave Jr. is not the only one to carry the burden. His 17-year-old daughter, Brionna, dropped out of high school to work full-time and help the family. She also hoped to save money for a car that would get her from Michigan to California, where she dreams of opening a tea shop. But the Ramseys don't have a car, and Brionna spends up to a third of her income on rideshares; the rest goes to basic expenses and bills. (Read the full story here, which recounts Brionna's struggle to scrape together $5 to get home from work on an 8-degree night.)
(Newser)  Updated: For the second time this week, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un berated South Korea for touting its supposed preemptive strike capabilities against the North, saying her countrys nuclear forces would annihilate the Souths conventional forces if provoked, the AP reports. In a statement carried Tuesday by North Koreas state media, Kim Yo Jong called South Korea Defense Minister Suh Wooks recent comments about preemptive strikes a fantastic daydream and the hysteria of a lunatic. She stressed that North Korea doesnt want another war on the Korean Peninsula but warned it would retaliate with its nuclear forces if the South opts for preemptive strikes or other attacks, which would leave the Souths military little short of total destruction and ruin. Our original story from Monday follows:

The influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called the South Korean defense minister a "scum-like guy" for talking about preemptive strikes on the North, warning Sunday that the South may face "a serious threat." Kim Yo Jong's statement came amid heightened tensions between the rival Koreas over the North's spate of weapons tests this year, including its first intercontinental ballistic missile launch in more than four years, per the AP. Some experts say her statement could signal that North Korea will conduct more significant weapons tests soon and take a hardline stance on South Korea.

During a visit to the country's strategic missile command on Friday, South Korean Defense Minister Suh Wook said that South Korea has the ability and readiness to launch precision strikes on North Korea if it detects the North intends to fire missiles at South Korea. Seoul has long maintained such a preemptive attack strategy to cope with North Korea's growing missile and nuclear threats, but it was highly unusual for a senior Seoul official under the Moon administration to publicly discuss it. On Sunday, Kim's sistera senior official in the Norths ruling Workers' Party, who is in charge of relations with Seoul and Washington, and is thought to be the No. 2 official behind her brotherissued blistering rhetoric directed at Suh and threats toward Seoul.

"The senseless and scum-like guy dare mention a 'preemptive strike' at a nuclear weapons state," Kim Yo Jong said in a statement carried by state media. "South Korea may face a serious threat owing to the reckless remarks made by its defense minister." "South Korea should discipline itself if it wants to stave off disaster," she said. Pak Jong Chon, a secretary in the Workers' Party's central committee, separately warned that "any slight misjudgment and ill statement rattling the other party under the present situation" may trigger "a dangerous conflict and a full-blown war." Pak added North Korea will "mercilessly direct military force into destroying major targets in Seoul and the South Korean army" if South Korea preemptively attacks North Korea. (Read more North Korea stories.)
(Newser)  The Taliban was in the restricting mood Sunday, banning opium poppywhich accounts for 80% of the world's supply of opiumalong with wine, heroin, and other drugs. The Taliban has had an interesting relationship with opium, having repeatedly tried to ban the narcotic before using the crop to fund its 20-year insurgency, the New York Times reports. Upon claiming power in August, leaders signaled their tolerance would end, thereby satisfying a "major demand of the international community" on the path to reducing sanctions, per CNN.

But soon after, leaders said there were no immediate plans to intervene. Eying a window, many farmers took to growing the long-lasting crop as an investment amid harsh drought and economic crisis; with less supply, they figured, prices would climb. They were right: Prices have reportedly doubled in recent weeks, per CNN. That's excellent news in Kandahar province, home to a large part of the Taliban's supporter base, where "almost every farmer seems to have dedicated a portion of their plots to the crop," the Times reports. The expected announcement came, strategically, as the harvest was already begun.

"No one can try to cultivate the plant," Mawlawi Abdul Salam Hanafi, the prime minister's administrative deputy, read from the official decree issued by the Taliban's leader, Haibatullah Akhundzada, during a press conference at the Ministry of Interior. "If someone violates this, his cultivation will be destroyed and the violator will be dealt with according to Islamic Law." As the Los Angeles Times reported in August, "the absence of Afghan opium and heroin, which mostly reaches users in Europe, Africa and Canada rather than the United States, could create a wider opening for highly potent synthetic opioids like fentanyl from China and India." (Read more Afghanistan stories.)
(Newser)  The discovery of the bodies of apparently executed civilians left behind in a Ukrainian town by withdrawing Russian troops was met with international condemnation on Sunday, even as residents assess the horrific toll. One street in Bucha contained the bodies of at least 20 men, CNN reports. "Their hands are tied behind their backs with white 'civilian' rags, they were shot in the back of their heads," Mayor Anatoliy Fedoruk told Reuters. He said about 270 town residents had been buried in two graves, per the Washington Post. President Volodymyr Zelensky said the Russian forces are committing genocide.

The Russia Defense Ministry said "not a single civilian has faced any violent action by the Russian military" in Bucha or other Kyiv suburbs, per NBC News. But Fedoruk puts the civilian deaths in his town at more than 300, and photos and video show bodies among the destroyed military vehicles on the streets. Residents said Russian soldiers went building to building, pulling people from the basements where they'd sought safety. The troops checked their phones for signs of opposition to the invasion, then took them away or shot them on the spot, townspeople said.

US officials are discussing imposing more sanctions against Russia. The EU has rejected pressure from Zelensky and President Biden to slap sanctions on Russian oil and gas, but that could change now. Germany's defense minister said Sunday the EU should consider it, per the New York Times. Ukraine asked the International Criminal Court to come see the mass graves in Bucha as part of a war crimes investigation, per the Post. "The most important thing is we cant become numb to this," said US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the scenes in Bucha demonstrate a "brutality against civilians we havent seen in Europe for decades." (Read more Russia-Ukraine conflict stories.)
(Newser)  President Biden calls it a "war crime," while Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky uses the term "genocide." Both are referring to reports and images emerging from areas around Kyiv after Russian soldiers pulled back. Ukraine authorities say they have so far counted the bodies of more than 400 civilians in towns near the capital, particularly Bucha, reports the AP: "The images of battered corpses lying in the streets or hastily dug graves unleashed a wave of outrage that could signal a turning point in the nearly 6-week-old war," the outlet adds. Coverage:

The scene: In the New York Times, Carlotta Gall and Andrew E. Kramer interview people in Bucha who recount stories of citizens being killed indiscriminately. "They shot everyone they saw," says one woman, Svitlana Munich, whose friend was shot outside her home. The coroner in Bucha, Serhiy Kaplishny, shows images of men who were killed with their hands bound behind their backs. Kaplishny says he arranged to have a mass grave dug near a church to accommodate all the bodies, which may or may not be the purported mass grave seen in this satellite photo via Reuters.

In the New York Times, Carlotta Gall and Andrew E. Kramer interview people in Bucha who recount stories of citizens being killed indiscriminately. "They shot everyone they saw," says one woman, Svitlana Munich, whose friend was shot outside her home. The coroner in Bucha, Serhiy Kaplishny, shows images of men who were killed with their hands bound behind their backs. Kaplishny says he arranged to have a mass grave dug near a church to accommodate all the bodies, which may or may not be the purported mass grave seen in this satellite photo via Reuters. Mayor, family: The BBC reports that in the village of Motyzhyn, the bodies of four people who had been shot were found in a shallow grave. Among them were the head of the village, Olha Sukhenkothe mayor, essentiallyher husband, and her son. "Our reporters have also seen the bodies of five men in a basement in Bucha who had their hands bound," per the outlet. Such accounts are repeated again and again in coverage.

The BBC reports that in the village of Motyzhyn, the bodies of four people who had been shot were found in a shallow grave. Among them were the head of the village, Olha Sukhenkothe mayor, essentiallyher husband, and her son. "Our reporters have also seen the bodies of five men in a basement in Bucha who had their hands bound," per the outlet. Such accounts are repeated again and again in coverage. Similar tale: Human Rights Watch said in a statement it had documented several cases of Russian military forces committing laws-of-war violations against civilians in occupied areas of the Chernihiv, Kharkiv, and Kyiv regions of Ukraine." Officials in Ukraine have asked representatives of the International Criminal Court to visit multiple mass graves in Bucha, per the Washington Post. NATO's secretary-general spoke of a brutality against civilians we havent seen in Europe for decades." Russia adamantly denies its troops are responsible for any atrocities against civilians.

Human Rights Watch said in a statement it had documented several cases of Russian military forces committing laws-of-war violations against civilians in occupied areas of the Chernihiv, Kharkiv, and Kyiv regions of Ukraine." Officials in Ukraine have asked representatives of the International Criminal Court to visit multiple mass graves in Bucha, per the Washington Post. NATO's secretary-general spoke of a brutality against civilians we havent seen in Europe for decades." Russia adamantly denies its troops are responsible for any atrocities against civilians. Harrowing images: Freelance photographer Heidi Levine, who is on assignment with the Washington Post, has a series of images from inside Bucha. Warning: Some include graphic content.

(Read more Russia-Ukraine conflict stories.)
(Newser)  Who knows how things would've worked out for Craig Butfoy, and the passengers on the planes he piloted, if he simply hadn't pressed a wrong button one day at work. That button press, as it turns out, led to questions being asked, and then a startling revelation: The now-former British Airways pilot had lied about his experience to get the job, per Insider. Butfoy, said to be in his late 40s, was sentenced on March 28 to one year behind bars after admitting to fraud charges and violating an order on air safety standards.

According to court documents seen by the Times of London, Butfoy made up training certifications and falsely noted he had more than 1,600 hours of flying time as a captain when applying for a pilot's job at BA CityFlyer, a British Airways affiliate. He got the job, and between April 2016 and March 2018, Butfoy flew the friendly skies, first for a year for BA CityFlyer, then for Stobart Air, a now-defunct Irish regional airline under the Aer Lingus umbrella. Things fell apart for Butfoy, however, when, while his plane was on the tarmac in Switzerland, he apparently pressed a button "no qualified pilot would," sources tell the Times.

Officials started looking more closely into his background and discovered he'd tweaked his flight hours log before coming to work for British Airways. Per the Independent, some of those flying hours he claimed had apparently taken place in a flight simulator. He also said he'd had a private pilot's license since 1998, which wasn't true, per court documents. Still, a British Airways representative tells Insider that Butfoy was indeed fully qualified and certifiedthey noted only that Butfoy gave incorrect info as part of his references during the job application processand that "at no point was there any risk to customers or colleagues." (Read more British Airways stories.)
(Newser)  Jury selection in the deadliest US mass shooting ever to go to trial begins Monday, with the panel chosen to determine whether Nikolas Cruz will be put to death for murdering 17 students and staff members at a high school in Parkland, Fla. Court officials say 1,500 candidates or more could be brought before Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer, prosecutors, and Cruz's public defenders for initial screening over the next several weeks, per the AP. The final panel will comprise 12 jurors plus eight alternates. Cruz, 23, pleaded guilty in October to the Feb. 14, 2018, massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, meaning the jury will only decide if he receives a death sentence or life without parole.

Seven other US killers who fatally shot at least 17 people died during or immediately after their attacks, either by suicide or at the hands of police. The suspect in the 2019 massacre of 23 at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, is still awaiting trial. Death penalty trials in Florida and much of the country often take two years to start because of their complexity, but Cruz's was further delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic and extensive legal wrangling. On Mondays through Wednesdays for most of the next several weeks, prospective jurors will be brought into the courtroom in groups of 60.

They will be asked if they can put aside any animosity toward Cruz and judge the case fairly. They will then be asked if they're available from June through September. Out of each group, Scherer is hoping five remain. Candidates who pass those hurdles will be taken into another room, where they'll fill out a questionnaire on their backgrounds and beliefs for the lawyers to later review. They'll be brought back in several weeks for individual questioning. To qualify for the jury, they must say they can vote for the death penalty if the evidence supports that verdict, but also that they don't believe it should be mandatory for murder.

(Read more Parkland school shooting stories.)
(Newser)  President Biden is again escalating his public condemnation of Vladimir Putin. As evidence emerges of mass atrocities against civilians in areas around Kyiv, Biden on Monday doubled down on his branding of Putin as a "war criminal" and said the US is gathering information about alleged war crimes, reports the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post. "We have to get all the detail so this can be an actual war-crime trial," he told reporters. "This guy is brutal, and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous and everyone has seen it." He added, per CNBC: "I think it is a war crime. ... He should be held accountable." Biden spoke after Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky visited Bucha himself and labeled the actions of Russia a "genocide," per CNN.

"It's very difficult to negotiate when you see what they have done here," said Zelensky, adding that Russian soldiers "treat people worse than animals." Ukraine officials say the bodies of more than 400 civilians have been recovered from towns around Kyiv, some with their hands bound behind their backs, and journalists from the AP counted at least 21 bodies around Bucha itself. On Monday, the European Union announced it would launch a joint investigation with Ukraine into possible war crimes. Russia has denied that its military is responsible for any atrocities against civilians.

(Read more Russia-Ukraine conflict stories.)
(Newser)  At least 168 people are unaccounted for after a deadly attack on a train in northwest Nigeria, authorities say. The Nigerian Railway Corporation said Sunday that cell phones of more than 140 passengers from the Abuja-Kaduna train have been switched off or are ringing without being answered since the attack a week ago, reports Reuters. Authorities say the attackers blew up a section of track before opening fire on the night train, killing at least eight people. The 18 police officers on the train were outgunned. Relatives of some of the missing people say they have been contacted by bandits demanding ransom

It's not clear whether all 168 missing people were abducted or if some went home without contacting authorities, the BBC reports. The governor of Kaduna state has accused kidnapping gangs of being in league with the Islamic militant group Boko Haram. With many travelers avoiding roads in the region because of kidnap gangs, the train had been a popular alternative, but this was the second attack along the same stretch of track in the space of six months, reports the AP. "Nigerians are finally convinced nowhere is safe," journalist Chris Paul Otaigbe tells the BBC. "Many would now prefer staying at home or within their neighborhoods." (Read more Nigeria stories.)
(Newser)  The Senate Judiciary Committee debated Ketanji Brown Jackson's nomination for Supreme Court justice on Monday with Democrats aiming to confirm her by the end of the week as the first Black woman on the high court. The panel recessed at midday after one of the Democrats, California Sen. Alex Padilla, was delayed on a flight. The committee is expected to vote later in the day and deadlock on the nomination, 11-11, the AP reports. All of the Republicans on the panel are opposing Jackson, and the full Senate is evenly split 50-50 between Democrats and Republicans.

If the committee deadlocks, Democrats are expected to immediately move to the Senate floor to "discharge" Jackson's nomination. While that won't delay the process for long, it is still another blow for Democrats who had hoped to confirm Jackson with bipartisan support. The committee hasnt deadlocked since 1991, when Biden was chairman of the panel and a motion to send the nomination of current Justice Clarence Thomas to the floor with a "favorable" recommendation failed on a 7-7 vote. The discharge vote, expected late Monday, would be the first of several procedural steps on the Senate floor with a goal of a final confirmation vote by Friday.

With the support of at least one Republican, Maine Sen. Susan Collins, Jackson is on a glidepath toward confirmation to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer. The chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin, said as he opened Monday's meeting that Jackson has "the highest level of skill, integrity, civility, and grace." "This committees action today in nothing less than making history," Durbin said. The committee's top Republican, Sen. Chuck Grassley, said he was opposing Jackson's nomination because "she and I have fundamental, different views on the role of judges and the role that they should play in our system of government."

(Read more Ketanji Brown Jackson stories.)
(Newser)  Police in Sacramento say a "related suspect" has been arrested in connection with the deadliest mass shooting in the California city's history. Police said Monday that Dandre Martin, 26, was arrested and faces charges of assault with a deadly weapon and illegal firearms possession, the Sacramento Bee reports. Six peoplethree women and three menwere killed and 12 others injured in the shooting early Sunday in a crowded downtown district packed with bars and restaurants.

Police said Sunday that the shooting, which followed a large fight around 2am, involved at least two shooters. It's not clear how many suspects are still at large. "As the investigation progressed, Sacramento Police Department SWAT and detectives served search warrants at three residences in the area," police said in a statement Monday. During the execution of the search warrants, at least one handgun was recovered. Police say at least 100 shots were fired during the incident.

"The scale of violence that just happened in our city is unprecedented during my 27 years here, Police Chief Kathy Lester said during a news conference, per the AP. "We are shocked and heartbroken by this tragedy." KTLA reports that the Sacramento County coroner identified the three slain women as Johntaya Alexander, 21; Melinda Davis, 57; and Yamile Martinez-Andrade, 21. The three male victims were named as Sergio Harris, 38; Joshua Hoye-Lucchesi, 32; and Devazia Turner, 29. (Read more Sacramento stories.)
TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the Supreme Commander, has extended his Holy Month of Ramadan greetings to all brave Bahraini servicemen in the Kingdom and abroad.

He prayed to Allah the Almighty to bless the martyrs of the nation and rest their souls in eternal paradise. This came as HM the King exchanged congratulations and good wishes as he hosted yesterday an Iftar banquet at Al Safriya Palace marking the advent of the Holy Month.

The Supreme Commander hailed the affiliates of the Bahrain Defence Force (BDF), National Guard, Interior Minister and National Intelligence Agency for their dedicated efforts to protect national unity, enforce the law and defend the achievements of the homeland.

He commended the coordination and cooperation between the BDF, National Guard and all other security agencies, affirming that Bahrain would remain united and resolve to further development and maintain security.

Present in the occasion were BDF Commander in Chief Field Marshall Shaikh Khalifa bin Ahmed Al Khalifa, National Guard Chief General His Highness Shaikh Mohammed bin Isa Al Khalifa, National Security Advisor, Royal Guard Commander, HH Shaikh Nasser bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Royal Guard Special Force Commander Lieutenant-Colonel HH Shaikh Khalid bin Hamad Al Khalifa and Interior Minister General Shaikh Rashid bin Abdulla Al Khalifa.

The banquet was also attended by the Defence Affairs Minister, National Intelligence Agency Chief, BDF Chief of Staff, National Guard Director of Staff, Strategic Security Chief and senior officers from the BDF, National Guard, Interior Ministry and the National Intelligence Agency.

They congratulated HM the King on the advent of the Holy Month and wished him good health, happiness and long life and the Kingdom and its loyal people further security, stability, progress and prosperity under his wise leadership.
TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa has welcomed ambassadors and exchanged greetings with them on the Holy Month of Ramadan, lauding strong historic relations binding Bahrain with their countries.

HM the King received yesterday at Al Safriya Palace  in the presence of His Royal Highness Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the Crown Prince and Prime Minister  heads of diplomatic missions accredited to Bahrain.

They hailed HM the Kings effort to further strengthen Bahrains relations and expand cooperation and fruitful work with their countries. The diplomatic mission heads also conveyed to HM the King greetings from their countries leaders on the advent of the Holy Month.

They wished His Majesty and the Kingdom and its loyal people many happy returns and further progress and prosperity. HM King Hamad commended the ambassadors efforts to further bolster cooperation between Bahrain and the countries in light of mutual keenness on achieving common goals and aspirations.

He said that Ramadan reinforces the values of brotherhood, solidarity and cohesion among all people, and emphasises the tolerant principles and teachings of the true Islamic religion.
TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

The High Appeals Court acquitted a Bahraini man and his son of money embezzlement charges, citing a lack of evidence. The two had previously been found innocent by the Court of First Instance, but the plaintiff challenged the ruling.

According to court files, the plaintiff gave the Bahraini man BD100,000 to invest through his companies, with a 10% profit agreement. However, after the specified time limit had expired, the defendant continued to stall.

As a result, he filed a complaint against him. A thorough investigation was launched against the defendant who transferred the ownership of his companies to his son.

He also emptied the accounts of his family to conceal the source of the money and legalise his income. Meanwhile, the defendant acknowledged receiving the money from the plaintiff, claiming it was a loan.

The defendant also presented proof that he paid a portion of the money he got. According to the High Appeals Court, because the defendant did not conceal the source of the money he received, he was acquitted of money embezzlement.
TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

Staff Reporter

The Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism yesterday said that it is closely monitoring the prices of all food products in the local markets to ensure there is no price rise during the Holy Month of Ramadan.

The prices of all basic food products including fruits and vegetables are being monitored, the ministry said yesterday. On tomato price rise, the ministry said the reasons are many including high price in the countries of origin, weather fluctuation and lack of adequate imports.

The ministry attributed the cucumber price rise to the impact of weather conditions on the cultivation and production in cucumber exporting countries apart from logistical issues related to shipping.

The ministry reassured all citizens and residents that tomato prices will be stabilised in the coming weeks and prices will be back to normal. The ministry has been carrying out many periodic inspection campaigns to ensure that traders are not stocking excess fruits and vegetables with an aim to increase their prices after heavy demand during the Holy Month.

Action was taken against many traders who would stock surplus quantities of fruits and vegetables. Legal measures were taken against the violators on the basis of Law No 35 of 2012.

During the beginning of the New Year, 27 commercial stores were shut down by the ministry inspectors after finding them guilty of manipulating prices of food items in the name of increase in Value Added Tax.

The action was taken upon receiving numerous complaints from consumers about the unjustified hike in food prices, a statement issued by the ministry said.

The ministry will not hesitate to take legal action against anyone taking advantage of the situation. Calls have come from different quarters including the parliamentarians asking the government and the ministry to intensify inspections at food markets to ensure prices of food remain stable during the Holy Month.

It is learnt that over 200 food traders have agreed to keep prices of essential food items under control during the Holy Month.
TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

The Cabinet has directed the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism to provide an abundance of goods for Bahrains citizens and residents in accordance with market needs.

It also instructed the ministry to continuously monitor commodity prices during this Holy Month of Ramadan. This came as HRH Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the Crown Prince and Prime Minister, yesterday chaired the weekly Cabinet meeting at Gudaibiya Palace.

The Cabinet highlighted developments in the Bahrain Defence Forces combat readiness and defense capabilities, noting the recent visit of His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the Supreme Commander, to the Royal Bahrain Naval Force to inaugurate a number of warships.

To mark the International Day of Conscience, adopted by the United Nations in response to the initiative of the late His Royal Highness Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa, which falls annually on 5 April, the Cabinet affirmed that the Kingdom of Bahrain continues to adopt initiatives that strengthen compassion and global peace.

The Cabinet thanked Kingdoms medical and health professionals for their honourable efforts and sacrifices in the service of the country to mark World Health Day. It noted that the medical workforce are appreciated for their continued efforts and sacrifices to provide the best healthcare in spite of various circumstances and challenges.

The Cabinet welcomed the decision of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabias Cabinet in its recent session chaired by the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, to authorise its Minister of Energy, or his respective representative, to discuss with their Bahraini counterpart a draft cooperation agreement between the government of both countries in the field of energy.

The Cabinet welcomed the announcement by the United Nations Special Envoy to Yemen, Hans Grundberg, that a two-month armistice had been reached. It expressed their appreciation for the response of the leadership of the Coalition to Restore Legitimacy in Yemen and the Yemeni parties to the efforts of the UN envoy.

The armistice came as part of the initiative announced by Saudi Arabia in March 2021, to end the Yemeni crisis and reach a comprehensive political solution that guarantees the return of security and stability to the country
The Japan Air Self-Defense Force has repositioned a mobile radar unit on its southern island chain to strengthen defenses due to increased Chinese activity in the region.

Approximately 20 members of the 53rd Guard Team accompanied a TPS-102 radar unit to Yonaguni Island on Friday, according to a Self-Defense Force spokesman. The island, about 70 miles off Taiwans eastern coast, is Japans westernmost territory.

The troops relocated from Miyako Island, about 140 miles to the east, the spokesman said Monday.

The move will strengthen the defense of our country at a time when neighboring countries are increasing their activities around our country, the spokesman said, referring to China, whose coast guard frequently enters waters claimed by Japan around the Senkaku Islands, about 125 miles north of Yonaguni.
Amateur radio friends reconstruct original Falklands invasion contact

2nd April 2022 marked the 40th anniversary of the Argentine invasion of the Falkland Islands.

On that day in 1982, Bob McLeod VP8LP, living at Goose Green, was hearing on a local VHF net that invading troops could be seen in the streets of the capital Port Stanley about 50 miles from him but was surprised to find that the BBC was making no mention of it in news broadcasts.

Bob took to his shortwave amateur radio equipment and started calling out. In London, Laurie Margolis G3UML had been listening carefully for several hours, sitting in the BBC Ariel Radio Group radio room G3AYC on the roof of The Langham building next to Broadcasting House.

G3UML had some expectation that VP8LP would try to call, and they were able to copy each other. Laurie was then able to pass on Bobs vital information to the authorities. Bob and Laurie have remained in touch ever since and Laurie is still a member of the BBCs Amateur Radio Group to this day.

On 2nd April this year the two friends met up again on the air to relive their contact of 40 years previous, this time using the BBC centenary callsign GB100BBC. Both stations were good signals with each other, firstly on 10m and then 15m, despite the recent geomagnetic storms. Their chat was recorded for the archives and a feature about the original 1982 link-up was broadcast on Radio 4 the following morning as a feature in the Broadcasting House programme.

You can listen back to this via BBC Sounds. Laurie is also the guest presenter of Tuesday 4th Aprils RSGB webinar Tonight@8  he talks about his historic contact with VP8LP as well the recent reconstruction. There are some video clips from the event as part of the presentation. You can watch the Tonight@8 presentation at rsgb.org/webinars
The lowering of the legal age of adulthood in Japan on Friday has sparked concerns that it may be more difficult to support women under 20 who have been coerced into appearing in pornographic videos.

Last year, nonprofit group Paps held 81 consultations about forced appearances in porn, with 20 of them involving people under the age of 20, the former age of adulthood in the country.

Lawyer Kazuko Ito, secretary general of nongovernmental organization Human Rights Now, warned that porn talent agencies may be scouting people in junior high and high schools to make them debut as porn actors as soon as they turn 18.

Victims are often solicited by talent agencies to become television personalities or models, and forced to sign delegation contracts, according to the international human rights group. In many cases, victims realize that they will be in a porn video only after being sent to a shooting location, and are told that they will have to pay a penalty if they refuse the work.

They could be forced to give up their portrait rights under contracts with video production firms. Videos, if released on the internet, could stay online virtually forever.

Previously, the sales of videos featuring 18-and 19-year-olds could be halted by exercising the right to annul contracts signed by minors without the guardians consent.

But the revised Civil Code, which sets the new age of adulthood at 18, prevents such victims from cancelling their contracts through this route. ...continue reading
Cincinnati, OH (45221)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 51F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 51F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%.
NORWALK  After Tracey Magnets principal was suddenly reassigned last week, some parents are calling for more stability at the school, which will install its fourth principal in the past year in June.

Marie Allen temporarily transferred from Brien McMahon High School last week to serve as Traceys principal through the end of the school year. Allen replaced Barbara Brush, who has moved to the districts Central Office after seven months leading Tracey.

A district spokesperson has not responded to questions about Brushs move to Central Office and why the transfer was made last week.

In a statement to Hearst Connecticut Media, the Board of Education acknowledged that these types of personnel changes are usually made at the end of the school year, but there are times and circumstances when mid-year shifts become necessary. The board said it is not involved in the day-to-day school operations and decisions, since those responsibilities fall to Superintendent Alexandra Estrella and her team.

At all times, Dr. Estrella does an excellent job at keeping the board aware and informed as needed, and in notifying families about any changes as soon as possible, the board stated.

Lynne Moore will become Traceys permanent principal  and fourth person to lead the school in the past year  when she transfers from Norwalk High School on June 20.

The series of changes has been unsettling for some Tracey parents.

My daughter is in second grade. She will have had four principals by the time she enters third grade, Michelle Tiani, the vice president of the Tracey Magnet School PTA, said in an email. A student should have a total of three in their entire cycle in the Norwalk Public Schools system by the time they graduate. Its very unsettling.

My other daughter will enter kindergarten next year. We need a consistent, capable and confident individual who can uphold the school's principles and mission, she added.

Norwalk Public Schools hired Brush in August. She replaced Theresa Rangel, who left the school last June after six years to join Naugatuck Public Schools as its director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. Under her leadership, Tracey was named a National School of Character and a Blue Ribbon School by the U.S. Department of Education in 2019.

Any principal was going to have big shoes to fill after the fantastic leadership of Theresa Rangel, said Courtney Brooks, who has two children at Tracey.

Brooks said the school has suffered recently without a strong person at the helm. She said a lack of communication and vision has left parents and students feeling adrift.

Hopefully, the school will bounce back with a new leader, Brooks said.

Allen and Moore bring decades of experience to Tracey. Allen came to Norwalk in 2008 after working in the Houston Independent School District in Texas. Allen, who had been an assistant principal at Brien McMahon, previously served as an assistant principal at Ponus Ridge Middle School and principal of Norwalk Pathways Academy at Briggs.

Allen will work with Tracey Magnets Curriculum and Instruction Site Director Lindsay Esposito and the entire school staff to ensure a positive finish to the school year for all students, Estrella said in her email to parents last week.

Allen will then work with Moore over the summer to prepare for the 2022-23 school year.

Moore joined Norwalk Public Schools in 1998 as principal of West Rocks Middle School. In 2018, she was reassigned to Norwalk High School as an assistant principal. Before moving to Connecticut, she was an elementary reading teacher for more than 15 years in Wisconsin and Missouri. She also served in various leadership roles across the Midwest and New York state.

With the appointments of Dr. Allen and Dr. Moore, the Board of Education is confident that Tracey Magnet School has experienced and effective leadership in place, the Board of Education said in its statement.

emily.morgan@hearstmediact.com
After trying to get Sri Lankan and Bhutans support to accomplish strategic objectives, India is now working tirelessly for Maldives strategic support.

by Asad Ali

The regional stability is at stake with Indias increasing military might in the region. India has been trying to strength its military muscles in order to contain China and Pakistan. After trying to get Sri Lankan and Bhutans support to accomplish strategic objectives, India is now working tirelessly for Maldives strategic support. The tiny island nation Maldives is strategically very important for both China and India as it possesses some strategically routes. In lieu of the growing strategic competition in the region, India has decided to land its ground forces in Nepal. Interestingly, incumbent pro-India government of Maldivesunder PM Sher Bahadur Deuba, has given green signal to Indian proposal. If this Indian proposal materializes, this will create arms race and strategic competition in the region. It will also have severe implications for regional peace.

In greater context, deployment of ground forces in another sovereign country is clear cut violation of international treaties, conventions and territorial laws. Unfortunately, India is doing so openly for strategic competition, which is putting regional peace in jeopardy. Only few people in Maldives government are supporting this move. On the other hand, majority of the lawmakers and people have announced to protest against Indian move. Even former Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli of Maldiveshas recently announced to protest against the Bhutan governments decision to give free hand to Indian Army. In addition, former Nepali President Abdullah Yameen has also announced his political come back and resentment against threats emanating from Indian side. He is working with other political parties to reduce growing Indian influence in the country.

The activism of two former top politicians in domestic politics and statements against Indian offensive posture has also created chaos within hawkish Indian establishment circles. The announcement of Maldives politicians to resist Indian move has caused a stir in Indian policy circles, which are already struggling to find new opportunities in the Indian Ocean to compete with China. The trio of Modi-Shah-Doval is exploring other notorious options as well to accomplish its strategic objectives.

Likewise, it should be noted that despite decades of close ties, the former Maldivian President Abdullah Yameenis in favor of scrapping all defense agreements with India. He has alleged that India has greatly increased its military infrastructure in his island nation, which the current government denies.The demands of the former president, who was ousted on corruption charges and remained in custody, have been well received by Maldivian people. The large number of people re attending his Progressive Party meetings is strengthening his rhetoric. People are urging his party to take aggressive stance against possible Indian occupation.

It is pertinent to mention here that India's growing military presence has not only posed a serious threat to its national security but has also hampered the development of Maldives. Therefore, it is imperative that Indian Army be withdrawn from here by the end of this year.The presence of Indian Army in Maldives will encourage other powers to increase their influence in the region.

Similarly, Maldives is of great importance to India in achieving its strategic goals in the Indian Ocean. Rising anti-India sentiments, which have now gained a strong political voice, are becoming a major obstacle to its goals.If former President gets political success in next general elections, it will be huge setback for Indian policymakers. They are now investing heavily in Maldives pro-India politicians to get favorable policies and its strategic objectives.

By reaching out to its neighbors such as Nepal, Bhutan and Sri Lanka, India actions seems similar to Chinas so-called string of pearls strategy to increase its strategic pivot in the region. But, the intentions of India are heinous. The fact is that India cannot invade or deploy its military in any other independent/ sovereign country. As far as Chinse String of Pearls strategy is concerned, Beijing has been helping smaller nations to develop their economic model and state infrastructure. It helped them in achieving economic growth and provided them economic assistance. Recently, China helped Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Maldives and Nepal. Likewise, it is seeking greater regional cooperation by through China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Both China and Pakistan have offered regional as well as extra-regional powers to become part of CPEC for the economic uplift of the region. It is also pertinent to mention here that the sole purpose of CPEC is greater economic integration and regional cooperation.

In Indian case, things are different and contrary to Chinese model. India is not looking for economic uplift of smaller nations. It is looking for strategic depth and opportunities in the region which are purely regarding containment of its strategic rival China and Pakistan. So, hawkish Indian intentions are threat to entire regional peace and need international attention.

If US and West are viewing Russia through occupational prism, they must also denounce Indian offensive strategic designs condemn them. The blatant Indian acts are direct threat to Nepals sovereignty as well. International community must come forward this time around and stop India from using sovereign country to accomplish its strategic objectives, which aims at destabilizing regional peace.

The writer is a strategic expert on South Asian Affairs in Islamabad




The pace is quickening as the Danbury Charter School Planning Team works toward opening its school for 110 sixth-grade students in the fall of 2023. DCS is a public charter school open to all Danbury students without tuition, featuring the acclaimed International Baccalaureate program. When fully developed, the school will serve a total of 770 students in grades 6-12.

The Planning Team has engaged John Taylors Elevate Charter Schools to serve as the schools management partner, subject to the approval of the State Board of Education. Taylor began his career in public education as a classroom teacher. Since 2014, he has served as the executive director of Booker T. Washington Academy in New Haven. The Academy has been recognized as a high-quality School of Distinction by the Connecticut State Department of Education. Prior to his arrival in New Haven, Mr. Taylor served as the founding principal at Green Tech High Charter School in Albany, where students outperformed state averages on the New York State Regents examinations, 100 percent of his graduates earned Regents Diplomas and each of them was accepted to college.
PETERBOROUGH, ON, April 3, 2022 /CNW/ - Every Canadian deserves a safe and affordable place to call home. The COVID-19 pandemic has made it clear that affordable housing is key to Canada's recovery, as people in Canadian communities, including Peterborough.

Today, Ryan Turnbull, Member of Parliament for Whitby, on behalf of the Honourable Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion, Julia Deans, President and CEO for Habitat for Humanity Canada and Susan Zambonin, CEO for Habitat for Humanity Peterborough & Kawartha Region came together to announce $4.1 M in federal funding that supported the construction of homes at 33 Leahy's Lane in Peterborough to help 41 families realize their dreams of homeownership.

This investment by the Government of Canada was made possible the National Housing Strategy's (NHS) National Housing Co-investment Fund (NHCF).

The National Housing Strategy's NHCF gives priority to projects that help those in greatest need, including women and children fleeing family violence, seniors, Indigenous Peoples, people with disabilities, those dealing with mental health and addictions, veterans and young adults.

Last year, Vancity Community Investment Bank (VCIB) worked with Habitat for Humanity Canada to arrange a $30 million credit facility to support the construction of 414 affordable housing units across the country. Habitat for Humanity Peterborough & Kawartha Region was the first local Habitat to access these funds to support a new project. VCIB has a long track record supporting the development of affordable housing, and their credit facility provided essential financing for the Leahy's Lane project.

The Habitat for Humanity model of affordable homeownership bridges a gap for people who face barriers to homeownership and would not otherwise qualify for a traditional mortgage. Local Habitat for Humanity organizations in every province and territory across Canada help build and rehabilitate decent and affordable homes, from single-family houses to multi-unit developments. With the help of volunteers and donors, Habitat helps families build their own homes and pay an affordable mortgage geared to their income. Safe, decent and affordable homeownership plays a critical role in helping families build a foundation for a life with better choices and more opportunities.

Quotes:

"Every Canadian deserves a safe and affordable place to call home. Our Government is dedicated to helping those in need which is why we partner with organizations such as Habitat for Humanity to make a real difference in the lives of families. Today, 41 families are realizing their dreams of homeownership here in Peterborough. Our government will continue to support housing needs for Canadians coast to coast to coast."  The Honourable Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion

"Our government believes that every Canadian deserves a safe place to call home. Across the country, we are working with Habitat to build the safe, appropriate, affordable housing necessary for healthy and sustainable communities. Here In Peterborough, the investments in these new homes will make a real difference in the lives of 41 hard-working families, a place they can proudly call their own."  Ryan Turnbull, Member of Parliament for Whitby

"Thanks to the support of CMHC and our partnership with Vancity, as well as the innovative vision of Habitat for Humanity Peterborough & Kawartha Region, 41 families now have decent and affordable housing and access to the social and economic benefits that come with affordable homeownership."  Julia Deans, President and CEO, Habitat for Humanity Canada

"At a time when housing prices are skyrocketing locally, this innovative development will help 41 local families including seniors, singles, and couples to pay an affordable mortgage geared to their income. Because of the generosity of our many partners, these 41 families will have an opportunity to save more, invest in education, and have more financial stability."  Susan Zambonin, CEO, Habitat for Humanity Peterborough & Kawartha Region

"As a purpose-driven lender, VCIB has a long history of financing affordable housing. Habitat shares our values and we're proud to be working together to increase Canada's affordable housing stock and to promote affordable homeownership."  Trish Nixon, Managing Director, Commercial Impact Banking, Vancity Community Investment Bank.

Quick facts:

With a budget of $13.2 billion , the NHCF gives priority to projects that help people who need it most, including women and children fleeing family violence, seniors, Indigenous people, people with disabilities, those with mental health or addiction issues, veterans, and young adults.

, the NHCF gives priority to projects that help people who need it most, including women and children fleeing family violence, seniors, Indigenous people, people with disabilities, those with mental health or addiction issues, veterans, and young adults. Through the NHCF, the Government of Canada will work with partners to build up to 60,000 new affordable homes and repair up to 240,000 existing affordable and community homes.

will work with partners to build up to 60,000 new affordable homes and repair up to 240,000 existing affordable and community homes. Under the NHCF, investments are also planned to create or repair at least 4,000 shelter spaces for victims of family violence, as well as create at least 7,000 new affordable housing units for seniors and 2,400 new affordable housing units for people with developmental disabilities.

To help Canadians find affordable housing, Budget 2021 provides an additional $2 .5 billion over seven years in new funding and to reallocate $1 .3 billion in previously announced funding to speed up the construction, repair, and support over 35,000 additional housing units.

.5 billion over seven years in new funding and to reallocate .3 billion in previously announced funding to speed up the construction, repair, and support over 35,000 additional housing units. In Budget 2021, $750 million in existing funding under NHCF has been advanced to 2021-22 and 2022-23. This will accelerate the creation of 3,400 new units and the repair of 13,700 units. $250 million in existing funding will also be allocated to support the construction, repair, and operating costs of an estimated 560 units of transitional housing and shelter spaces for women and children fleeing violence. This funding will help the Government address gender-based violence.

Canada's National Housing Strategy (NHS) is a 10-year, $72+ billion plan that will give more Canadians a place to call home.

Related links:

As Canada's authority on housing, CMHC contributes to the stability of the housing market and financial system, provides support for Canadians in housing need, and offers unbiased housing research and advice to all levels of Canadian government, consumers and the housing industry. CMHC's aim is that by 2030, everyone in Canada has a home they can afford and that meets their needs. For more information, please visit cmhc.ca or follow us on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn and Facebook.

authority on housing, CMHC contributes to the stability of the housing market and financial system, provides support for Canadians in housing need, and offers unbiased housing research and advice to all levels of Canadian government, consumers and the housing industry. CMHC's aim is that by 2030, everyone in has a home they can afford and that meets their needs. For more information, please visit cmhc.ca or follow us on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn and Facebook. To find out more about the National Housing Strategy, please visit www.placetocallhome.ca.

About Habitat for Humanity Canada

Founded in 1985, Habitat for Humanity Canada is a national charitable organization working towards a world where everyone has a decent and affordable place to call home. Habitat Canada brings communities together to help families build strength, stability and independence through affordable homeownership. With the help of volunteers, Habitat homeowners and 49 local Habitats working in every province and territory, we provide a solid foundation for better, healthier lives in Canada and around the world. Habitat for Humanity Canada is a member of Habitat for Humanity International, which was established in 1976 and has grown to become a leading global nonprofit working in more than 70 countries. For more information, please visit www.habitat.ca.

About VCIB

VCIB is an Ontario-based, Schedule I federally chartered bank and a subsidiary of Vancity credit union. As Canada's first values-driven bank, VCIB provides specialized financing solutions for impactful projects like social purpose real estate and clean energy projects. For purpose-driven businesses and organizations, VCIB offers banking, investing, and financing solutions tailor-made to increase their growth and impact. VCIB is a Certified B Corporation and a member of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values. For more information, visit vcib.ca, tweet us at @BankVancity, and connect with us on LinkedIn.

SOURCE Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation

For further information: Arevig Afarian, Office of the Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion, [email protected]; Media Relations, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, [email protected]
$20 a month high-speed Internet will help connect hundreds of thousands of low-income families and seniors

OTTAWA, ON, April 4, 2022 /CNW/ - Canadians need access to high-quality Internet services at affordable prices. Through the Connecting Families initiative, the Government of Canada, in partnership with 14 Internet service providers (ISP), is supporting affordable high-speed Internet for those who need it most.

Today, the Honourable Francois-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, the Honourable Kamal Khera, Minister of Seniors, and the Honourable Gudie Hutchings, Minister of Rural Economic Development, announced the launch of the second phase of the Connecting Families initiative.

In partnership with 14 participating ISPs across the country that are voluntarily contributing to the initiative by offering $20 a month high-speed Internet services, the Government of Canada will help connect hundreds of thousands of low-income families and seniors to affordable high-speed Internet.

In line with Canada's Connectivity Strategy, which aims to provide all Canadians with access to Internet speeds of at least 50 megabits per second (Mbps) download and 10 Mbps upload, Connecting Families 2.0 introduces significantly faster speeds and increased data usage. For $20 a month, Internet speeds will be five and ten times faster respectively than previously offered. As well, the data allotment is doubling, from 100 GB to 200 GB of usage per month. This new phase will also broaden eligibility from families receiving the maximum Canada Child Benefit (CCB) to include seniors receiving the maximum Guaranteed Income Supplement (GIS). Access Communications, Bell Canada, CCAP, Cogeco, Hay Communications, Mornington, Novus, Rogers, SaskTel, Shaw, Tbaytel, TELUS, Videotron and Westman Communications are participating in Connecting Families.

Today's announcement builds on the Government of Canada's progress toward ensuring that 98% of Canadians have access to high-speed Internet by 2026, and 100% by 2030. As we work to rebuild from the COVID-19 pandemic and grow the economy, the Government of Canada will continue to help build strong communities and a more competitive and resilient Canada for everyone.

Quotes

"Being connected is important to maintain professional, social, economic and cultural networks within the digital economy. However, many low-income Canadians are still facing barriers that prevent their full participation in the economy. By working closely with Internet service providers across the country, we are increasing accessibility and providing all Canadians with affordable and reliable Internet."

 The Honourable Francois-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry

"Seniors depend on the Internet to stay in touch with loved ones and access vital services. Providing low-income seniors with affordable access to high-speed Internet service will make a tremendous difference in their everyday lives. We're grateful to leading Internet service providers for their partnership in making the Internet more accessible to all Canadians."

 The Honourable Kamal Khera, Minister of Seniors

"Being connected to the Internet in this day and age is no longer a luxury. Simply put, it's a necessity. That's why this initiative is so important: it's helping Canadians get connected to high-speed Internet for $20 a month. This will not only help families and seniors stay connected to their loved ones but also allow for so much more, like access to online learning and health care services, which has been especially challenging in rural communities. Our government will continue to support initiatives like this for the betterment of rural Canada."

 The Honourable Gudie Hutchings, Minister of Rural Economic Development

Quick facts

Participating Internet service providers (ISP) to date include Access Communications, Bell Canada , CCAP, Cogeco, Hay Communications, Mornington, Novus, Rogers, SaskTel, Shaw, Tbaytel, TELUS, Videotron and Westman Communications.

, CCAP, Cogeco, Hay Communications, Mornington, Novus, Rogers, SaskTel, Shaw, Tbaytel, TELUS, Videotron and Westman Communications. With Connecting Families 2.0, eligible participants will have an added Internet offering: 50 Mbps download speeds (or if less than 50 Mbps, the fastest speed available to households in that region) and 200 GB of data usage each month at the discounted rate. No equipment or installation fees will be applied. The existing $10 Internet plan offering under Connecting Families 1.0 also remains available.

Internet plan offering under Connecting Families 1.0 also remains available. Eligible households will receive a letter from the Government of Canada. This letter will contain an access code that is needed to sign up for Connecting Families through a secure online portal. The access code will be valid for the entire duration of the initiative, provided the household continues to be eligible; however, access to the discounted Internet offering will depend on availability.

ISPs participating in Connecting Families have provided significant contributions, representing millions of dollars in support, to help bridge the digital divide for low-income Canadians.

Computers for Success Canada (CFSC) will continue to maintain and operate the secure online portal for use by eligible households that have received a letter from the Government of Canada.

(CFSC) will continue to maintain and operate the secure online portal for use by eligible households that have received a letter from the Government of Canada. Today's announcement builds on several other steps the government has taken to improve telecom services for Canadians, including the historic ENCQOR 5G partnership for next-generation technology, the Connect to Innovate program, the $2.75 billion Universal Broadband Fund and the CRTC's $750 million Broadband Fund.

Associated links

Stay connected

Follow Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada on social media.

Twitter: @ISED_CA, Facebook: Canadian Innovation, Instagram: @cdninnovation and LinkedIn

SOURCE Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada

For further information: Laurie Bouchard, Senior Manager, Communications, Office of the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, [email protected]; Luka Vujic, Press Secretary, Office of the Minister of Rural Economic Development, [email protected]; Media Relations, Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada, 343-291-1777, [email protected]
OTTAWA, ON, April 4, 2022 /CNW Telbec/ - Canada's response to the COVID-19 pandemic is continually guided by the latest science, evidence and research. To that end, the Government of Canada is actively working with a community of national and international experts to gather evidence on the health impacts of the pandemic, as well as potential long-term effects of the virus.

To do this, the Government of Canada is launching a second cycle of the Canadian COVID-19 Antibody and Health Survey (CCAHS). This national survey, led by Statistics Canada, the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) and the COVID-19 Immunity Task Force (CITF), aims to better understand the impacts of the pandemic on the health and well-being of Canadians, including the prevalence of chronic symptoms and conditions and the challenges that Canadians may have faced in accessing healthcare.

The development of this survey will estimate the prevalence of post COVID-19 condition (commonly known as long COVID) in Canada, and will provide information on the risk factors, symptoms and impacts of this condition on daily functioning.

Across all ten provinces, 100,000 randomly selected Canadians aged 18 years and older will have received invitations from Statistics Canada to participate in the survey. Over the course of the first week of April, the first 33,000 selected Canadians will receive a kit in the mail. Among the items inside is a link to the online survey with questions related to their general health, any chronic symptoms and conditions, their COVID-19 history and related symptoms, vaccination status, interactions with the healthcare system and medication use.

In addition to the invitations to complete the online survey, respondents will be provided with dried blood spot (DBS) test kits, with step-by-step instructions, to test for COVID-19 antibodies. These DBS tests will be used to estimate the number of Canadian adults who have infection-acquired and/or vaccine-induced antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19). Respondents who choose to conduct the DBS test component will receive a personalized report of their results.

Canadians aged 18 years and over will be randomly selected from Canadian households to create a representative sample and ensure that the results are generalizable to the Canadian adult population. Individuals who do not receive an invitation to participate in the survey cannot volunteer for the study.

Quotes

"We appreciate the participation of Canadians who have been invited to take part in this survey. Increasing our understanding of COVID-19, including its longer-term effects, is key to addressing and recovering from the pandemic. Your involvement is essential to better understand the extent of COVID-19 across Canada to help us support you and all affected."

The Honourable Jean-Yves Duclos

Minister of Health

"The availability of high-quality information on post COVID-19 condition, also known as long COVID, is limited at this time. We are working closely with the provinces and territories as well as Statistics Canada and the CITF to advance the evidence base on post COVID-19 condition to support those Canadians who are experiencing longer term effects."

Dr. Theresa Tam

Chief Public Health Officer of Canada

"The Omicron variant spread quickly and Canada's SARS-CoV-2 monitoring capacities have been undermined by the steep decline in PCR testing for active infection. With many vaccinated Canadians having light or no symptoms, hospitalization rates are not giving us the full picture of COVID-19 in Canada either. This study is therefore poised to give us a good estimate of the number of Canadians who have previously had a SARS-CoV-2 infection or who have acute infection, by vaccination status. This will provide governments with further evidence as they continue to make important and tailored decisions regarding public health strategies and measures."

Catherine Hankins

COVID-19 Immunity Task Force Co-Chair

"As COVID-19 health measures continue to ease, researchers and policy-makers still require key information to better understand the virus itself, and its social, economic and health impacts  including chronic, long-term health effects. The data collected by Statistics Canada in the Canadian COVID-19 Antibody and Health Survey will be used by our partners, the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) and Canada's COVID-19 Immunity Task Force (CITF), to protect the health and well-being of Canadians and to guide Canada's COVID-19 recovery. Guarding Canadians privacy is at the heart of everything we do; your data will be kept private, safe and confidential. Statistics Canada employees are proud to provide world-class expertise to support Canada's recovery efforts. I want to thank Canadians for their willingness to take part in this survey."

Anil Arora

Chief Statistician, Statistics Canada

Quick facts

The Public Health Agency of Canada , Statistics Canada and the COVID-19 Immunity Task Force are conducting a second cycle of the Canadian COVID-19 Antibody and Health Survey.

, Statistics Canada and the COVID-19 Immunity Task Force are conducting a second cycle of the Canadian COVID-19 Antibody and Health Survey. The first cycle started in 2020 and found that few Canadians had antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 in early 2021.

The second cycle of the study involves sending surveys and test kits to 100,000 Canadians across the ten provinces.

Canadians aged 18 years and older will be randomly selected to create a representative sample and ensure that the results are generalizable to the Canadian adult population. Individuals who do not receive an invitation to participate in the survey cannot volunteer for the study.

DBS testing is an innovative technology commonly used by scientists at PHAC to screen for transmissible diseases in Canada . It has a variety of uses such as testing for sexually transmitted, blood-borne infections (STBBIs) and testing for antibodies from previous infections such as COVID-19. Learn more about how DBS testing is used by PHAC scientist in this blog.

The survey invitations and test kits will be administered during three waves, with wave 1 launched in early April, wave 2 in May, and wave 3 in June.

Associated links

Canadian COVID-19 Antibody and Health Survey (CCAHS)

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19): Canada's response

Post COVID-19 condition

Scientists use dried blood spot testing to study spread of COVID-19 in Canada

Canada's COVID-19 Immunization Task Force

SOURCE Public Health Agency of Canada

For further information: Media Contacts: Public Health Agency of Canada: Media Relations, 613-957-2983, [email protected]; Statistics Canada: Media Relations, 613-951-4636, [email protected]; COVID-19 Immunity Task Force: Rebecca Burns, 438-871-8763, [email protected]
Gadkari rejected any political intent behind the meeting with Thackeray. He said that the meeting was of a personal nature and called it a "family meeting."

Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Sunday visited the residence of Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray. Speaking to the press after the meeting, Gadkari rejected any political intent behind the meeting with Thackeray. He said that the meeting was of a personal nature and called it a family meeting. The Union Minister cited his old familial relationship with the Thackeray family.

He further informed the reporters that the meeting was a result of an invitation by Raj Thackeray. He stated, This was not a political meeting. I have got a good relationship with Raj Thackeray and his family members for 30 years. I had come to see his new house and to know his mothers well being. It was a family visit and not political.

It is noteworthy that the meeting comes a day after Raj Thackeray warned the Maharashtra government of putting loudspeakers in front of mosques and playing Hanuman Chalisa if the administration does not take action against Mosque loudspeakers.

Raj Thackeray had stated while addressing his party workers, I am not against prayers, you can pray at your home, but the government should take a decision on removing mosque loudspeakers. I am warning now Remove loudspeakers or else will put loudspeakers in front of the mosque and play Hanuman Chalisa.

Despite Nitin Gadkaris statements, it is being speculated that the meeting signals a possible BJP-MNS alliance for the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) elections scheduled for this year.
Among the 46 arrested individuals, 13 have been arrested in connection with the actual incident, whereas, 33 people have been arrested for violating curfew order issued by the administration.

Rajasthan Police today arrested 46 individuals and detained another seven for questioning following the communal clashes that ensued after stones were allegedly pelted on a Hindu religious procession by members of the Muslim community. Among the 46 arrested individuals, 13 have been arrested in connection with the actual incident, whereas, 33 people have been arrested for violating curfew order issued by the administration to maintain peace and order in the area. Internet services have also been shut down in the area in view of the violence.

Informing about the arrests in the case, Inspector-General (IG) of Police, Bharatpur Range, Prasanna Kumar Khamesra said, After stone pelting took place during the procession in Futa Kot area Main Bazaar Karauli on Saturday, the police acted promptly and arrested 46 people and detained seven people for interrogation. He further stated, 13 accused have been arrested in connection with the incident in the case registered at Police Station Karauli and 33 people have been arrested for violating curfew order. 07 people have been detained for questioning. A total of 21 two-wheelers and four-wheelers were also seized by the police.

Earlier, during a press conference, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot affirmed that perpetrators of the clashes will be punished irrespective of their religion. He stated, I have talked to the Director-General of Police about the incident. I have urged him to take strict action against the perpetrators of the clashes irrespective of their community so that a message goes to all that only rule of law will prevail in Rajasthan.
Siddaramaiah on Sunday accused the Janata Dal-Secular (JDS) of supporting the anti-conversion and cow slaughter bills brought in by the Basavaraj BJP-led Karnataka government.

Former Karnataka Chief Minister and the current Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the state assembly Siddaramaiah on Sunday accused the Janata Dal-Secular (JDS) of supporting the anti-conversion and cow slaughter bills brought in by the BJP-led Karnataka government. He further said that the Congress party does not support the BJP government as alleged by the JDS.

Speaking at a Press conference in Bengaluru, the senior Congress leader said, We are committed to secularism and constitution. It is the JDS leaders who support the anti-conversion and cow slaughter bills and we dont. He further added, They (JDS) support the BJP and its governments bills.

This rebuttal by Siddaramaiah comes after ex-Karnataka Chief Minister and JDS chief HD Kaumaraswamy questioned Congress stand on hijab and halal meat controversies.




India is reported to have agreed to Sri Lankas request to increase the $500 million credit facility to $750 million for import of diesel from India.

by Col R Hariharan

President Gotabaya Rajapaksas political survival has become a huge question mark, as the country neared bankruptcy towards the end of the month. The month saw 10-hour power shutdowns almost every day, at petrol pumps endless ques waited for hours for petrol, surgical operations were halted due to lack of medical supplies, daily newspapers facing newsprint shortage went on line mode and cancellation of public exams in schools for want of paper. Adding to the woes, hydropower generation dipped as water sources dried up and annual agriculture production farm fell by 40 percent due to ill-timed ban on import of chemical fertilizers and pesticides.

To handle the fiscal crisis, the Central bank floated Sri Lanka rupee during the first week of March. It resulted in the devaluation of the rupee by 36 percent, pushing up the prices of daily necessities. In a bid to save foreign exchange, authorities expanded the list of banned imports to include fruits, vegetables and milk powder. The essential items ran out of stock in stores adding to the agony of the public.

These events have become symbolic of the failure of the national leadership to manage the worst ever economic crisis Sri Lanka faces since independence in 1948. They also demonstrated the national leaderships inability to evolve a coherent strategy and get its act together to handle the national crisis. It was reflected in the administrations failure to monitor and coordinate its response system when supplies were running out of stock.

A typical example of such failure is the case of import of urgently required diesel shipments. The Daily Mirror quoted sources within the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation to say that the diesel shipments received at the port could not be cleared as the treasury did not have funds to pay for the demurrage. According to the report, the vessel carrying the shipment refused to enter Sri Lankan waters unless payment was made upfront. President Gotabaya Rajapaksa had given a guarantee that funds would be released for the shipment, but the captain has refused to accept this guarantee, the report added. It said the government was expected to pay a sum of $52 million to clear the diesel shipment.

India is reported to have agreed to Sri Lankas request to increase the $500 million credit facility to $750 million for import of diesel from India. Accordingly, another two consignments of 40,000 tonnes of diesel each are expected to be delivered to Sri Lanka on April 5 and 14. But the moot question is, has the administration got its drill taped up to receive and dispatch the shipments to reach the consumer in time?

Public anger at the governments apathy has snowballed into massive protests. There were huge public rallies organised by the opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) and the JVP led National peoples Party (NPP), where there were loud slogans raised against the Rajapaksas. In the coming days, we can expect it to erode Gotabayas loyalist Sinhala nationalists who had overwhelmingly voted him as President. Leaders of disgruntled coalition partners of the ruling Sri Lanka Podujana Party (SLPP) are also lining up to bring down finance minister Basil Rajapaksa. Udaya Gammanpila, leader of the Piyithuru Hela Urumaya (PHU) party proposes to present a draft of the 22 Amendment to the Constitution next month in parliament. It is aimed at making it illegal for a dual citizenship holder like Basil Rajapaksa, who is an American citizen, to take up any work related to governing the country.

An all-party conference convened by President Rajapaksa on March 23 to seek other parties' support to overcome the present economic crisis was attended by almost all parties, barring the main opposition SJB and the NPP. Party leaders and representatives presented their proposals and statements at the conference. They promised their maximum commitment for the benefit of the country.

The beleaguered government has decided to eat the humble pie and overcome its reluctance to approach the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to overcome the financial crisis. Similarly, it has approached Bangladesh for an additional $250 million line of credit in addition to the $250 million LoC already sanctioned. India has already extended$2.5 billion plus assistance in various forms. It is also considering Sri Lankas request for an additional $ one billion LoC, which could materialize in April. China is considering offering a $1.5 billion credit facility to Sri Lanka and a decision is expected soon. According to a top Chinese official, Sri Lanka was offered a loan of $500 million from the China Development Bank on March 19. But Sri Lanka will have to strategize its approach to managing its economy as it has to repay about $4 billion worth of debt this year, including an international sovereign bond of $1 billion maturing in July.

Unfortunately, on top of the continuing Covid-19 pandemic threat, the Ukraine war and the slapping of stringent sanctions against Russia have made Sri Lankas economic recovery more difficult. Russians and Ukrainians form around 15 percent of international tourist travellers to Sri Lanka. Sri Lankas direct flights to Moscow had to be cancelled in the face of the sanctions and the war has added to uncertainties over their arrival.

India, usually dubbed as Big Brother from the small but highly vocal anti-India lobby in the country, has stepped in to meet urgent needs of Sri Lanka. Minister for external affairs S Jaishankar flew in from Maldives on a two-day visit to Sri Lanka. The Minister, an old Sri Lanka hand as a diplomat in Colombo during the crucial days of Indian Peace Keeping Forces operations (1987-90), had a packed schedule on March 28. He called upon President Rajapaksa on March 28 and assured him of Indias continued support in Sri Lankas economic recovery process. The President thanked the Indian government for the economic assistance to the tune of $2.5 billion. They agreed to deepen economic and commercial linkages with special emphasis on Indian investments. Their discussions also covered defence and energy cooperation as well as Sri Lanka governments talks with Tamil National Alliance (TNA), indicating Indias sustained interest in the Tamil devolution issue.

The Indian minister joined PM Mahinda Rajapaks at a special event in Temple Trees to virtually inaugurate the Jaffna Cultural Centre, built with Indian funds. He also met with his counterpart Prof GL Peiris and FM Basil Rajapaksa to discuss foreign policy and economic issues. They witnessed the signing of six memorandums of understanding. The MoUs included implementation of Sri Lanka Unique Digital Identity (SL-UDI) programme with Indias grant assistance, providing Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre, implementation of hybrid power projects in three islands off Jaffna which was earlier given to a Chinese organisation, cooperation on development of fisheries harbours in Sri Lanka and the establishment of modern computer labs and smart boards with customized curriculum software in 200 schools in Galle district.

Sri Lanka ministry of defence has announced it had signed maritime security pacts with India on March 16. It underlined the pacts will not result in hindrance or threat to national security . It said the pacts included the receipt of a floating dock facility and Dornier reconnaissance aircraft free of charge from India.

The Indian EAMs visit culminated with participation in the 18th ministerial meeting in hybrid mode of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical & Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) held on March 29, hosted by Sri Lanka, the current chairman. It was held ahead of the 5th summit meeting of BIMSTEC to be held later. The forum provided an opportunity for Sri Lanka to renew its linkages with other members  Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal and Thailand.

In conclusion, three things are clear: (1) President Rajapaksa will have to clean up his act if he is to survive; (2) India seems to be investing in Rajapaksas, particularly when Sri Lanka is losing the lure of China. (3) India-Sri Lanka strategic relations are poised to grow, considering the strategic reset in the Indian Ocean region in the wake of the war in Ukraine.

The coming months are going to be crucial for not only Rajapaksas but Sri Lanka as a whole as it faces an unprecedented economic crunch. It is hoped that it would retain Indias goodwill and support. [Written on March 31, 2022]

[Col R Hariharan, a retired MI specialist on South Asia and terrorism, served as the head of intelligence of the Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka 1987-90. He is associated with the Chennai Centre for China Studies. Email: haridirect@gmail.com Website: https://col.hariharan.info]
.The apex court took suo moto cognizance of the dissolution of the National Assembly after the Speaker rejected the no-trust vote on Sunday on "constitutional" grounds.

The Supreme Court f Pakistan will today resume the hearing on the dismissal of the no-confidence motion against the Imran Khan government by the National Assembly Speaker Asad Qaisar. The apex court took suo moto cognizance of the dissolution of the National Assembly after the Speaker rejected the no-trust vote on Sunday on constitutional grounds. Chief Justice of Pakistan Umar Ata Bandial observed that the judiciary can interfere to some extent in the proceedings of the National Assembly after arguments on the separation of powers between the judiciary and the legislature were advanced.

The top court refused to stay the ruling of the Speaker on Sunday. Notices were issued to the Prime Minister, the National Assembly Speaker Asad Qaisar , and Deputy Speaker Sadiq Sanjrani.

As per an ARY News report, the Attorney General of Pakistan Khalid Jawed Khan, members of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), and members of the opposition were among those who reached the court on the matter.

The matter is being heard by a five-member bench of the Supreme Court headed by Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial.
Russia has claimed that the killings have been staged by the Ukrainian side. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has termed the killings as a "genocide."

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called for an independent probe in the reported killing of around 300 civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha allegedly by Russian forces. Guterres said in a tweet, I am deeply shocked by the images of civilians killed in Bucha, Ukraine. It is essential that an independent investigation leads to effective accountability. This comes after footages and photos allegedly showing dead bodies on the streets of Bucha emerged in the media.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has termed the killings as a genocide. During a CBS News segment, on being asked about the killings, Zelenksy was quoted as saying, Indeed. This is genocide.

Meanwhile, Russia has claimed that the killings have been staged by the Ukrainian side. The Russian Defense Ministry said that all photos and footage allegedly evidencing the Russian troops crimes in Bucha represent another provocation as all Russian units completely withdrew from the town as early as March 30.

Russian First Deputy Envoy to UN Dmitry Polyansky said on Sunday that Moscow has urged the UN Security Council (UNSC) to hold a meeting in view of the provocation of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha. As per a Sputnik report, Polyansky was quoted as saying, In light of the blatant provocation by Ukrainian radicals in Bucha, Russia has demanded a UN Security Council meeting be convened on Monday afternoon, April 4. Moscow will expose the Ukrainian instigators and their Western patrons, he added.
Amid the worst economic crisis faced by Sri Lanka, the nation's Leader of Opposition Sajith Premadasa gave out a message to the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to "help Sri Lanka to the maximum possible extent".

Amid the worst economic crisis faced by Sri Lanka, the nations Leader of Opposition Sajith Premadasa gave out a message to the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to help Sri Lanka to the maximum possible extent.

When asked if the country is ready for elections, the LoP stated, I can tell you, I myself and we all have been ready ever since we entered social service and political service. We are ready for any eventuality.

Sri Lanka is in the midst of a severe economic crisis, with food and fuel shortages impacting a substantial portion of the population. Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the economy has been in free collapse, resulting in a tourism industry crash.

On Sunday, 26 Sri Lankan cabinet ministers resigned en masse amid mounting public outrage over the governments handling of the countrys economic crisis.

According to the English language publication Daily Mirror, all 26 of them signed a general letter agreeing to quit, opening the path for a new Cabinet to be created.

All political parties in Sri Lanka have been encouraged to take ministerial positions and work together to find a solution to the countrys problem, according to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

The President said in a letter that the current issue is the result of various economic and global problems, and that a solution must be found within the countrys democratic process. The letter claimed that together we must work together in the national interest for the benefit of citizens and future generations, adding that as one of Asias leading democracies, it must be addressed within the framework of democracy itself.

On Sunday, 26 Sri Lankan cabinet ministers resigned en masse amid mounting public outrage over the governments handling of the countrys economic crisis.

According to the English language publication Daily Mirror, all 26 of them signed a general letter agreeing to quit, opening the path for a new Cabinet to be created.

According to News Wire, Mahinda Rajapaksa will remain in office, and all other members of the Cabinet have submitted their resignations to the Prime Minister.

Meanwhile, a 36-hour curfew imposed on Sri Lanka on Saturday evening at 6 p.m. was lifted at 6 a.m. on Monday, but the nation remains in a state of emergency.
Cabraal's declaration comes seven months after assuming the job in the midst of Sri Lanka's greatest economic and political crisis in decades. Cabraal announced his decision to resign from the position today on Twitter.

Ajith Nivard Cabraal, the Governor of Sri Lankas Central Bank, announced his resignation to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Monday, as the country faced its worst economic crisis since independence.

Cabraals declaration comes seven months after assuming the job in the midst of Sri Lankas greatest economic and political crisis in decades. Cabraal announced his decision to resign from the position today on Twitter.

In the context of all Cabinet Ministers resigning, I have today submitted my resignation as Governor, Central Bank, Sri Lanka to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, tweeted Cabraal today.

Cabraal, a veteran policymaker who took over as governor of Sri Lankas Central Bank in September amid a worsening foreign exchange crisis, advocated for lowering reliance on foreign debt, particularly from the Washington-based International Monetary Fund.
Avant-Garde Chairman and an influential figure in the government Nissanka Senadhipathi and his family members have left for the Maldives secretly through the Katunayake Airport this morning, reliable sources confirmed.

By the time he arrived at the airport, the camera system with all the security cameras covering the airports exit terminal was reportedly down. He had left the Katunayake Airport departure terminal and boarded flight UL102 at 8.20 this morning.

Airport sources said that the airport security forces have also started an investigation into the malfunction of the security camera system at the airport.








Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC has confirmed that the popular Instagram celebrity, Pascal Okechukwu popularly known as Cub...

Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC has confirmed that the popular Instagram celebrity, Pascal Okechukwu popularly known as Cubana Chief Priest, is currently in their custody.

Reports emerged at the weekend that the commission arrested Pascal at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in the nations capital while he was traveling to Owerri, the Imo State capital.

Pascal, who is currently being quizzed by the anti-graft agency, was arrested over alleged tax fraud and money laundering.

When contacted, the spokesman of EFCC, Wilson Uwujaren confirmed the development on Sunday night.

Uwujaren, however, failed to reveal details of the arrest, saying I can only confirm the arrest to you, no details for now.

According to reports, the commission had decided to keep mum on the arrest

Many of his fans who were unaware of the arrest had expressed concerns on social media over his whereabouts due to his days-long silence on Instagram.
The United Nations says 789 persons have been killed by explosives in the ongoing insurgency in the North East. Speaking during the Internat...





The United Nations says 789 persons have been killed by explosives in the ongoing insurgency in the North East.





Speaking during the International Day for Mine Awareness and Assistance in Mine Action event in Nigeria, the United Nations Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Nigeria, Matthias Schmale said for Borno, Adamawa, Yobe (BAY) States, the United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS) collated 1,532 incidents involving explosive hazards from January 2016 to January 2022 involving more than 10,000 causalities out of which 1,356 civilians were injured and 789 killed.





He said: In Northeast Nigeria, explosive ordnance in their different forms continue to represent an immediate, grave and additional threat to already suffering populations. The use of indiscriminating improvised mines kills, maims and constitutes an obstacle to the basic right of safe freedom of movement.





These devices are also an obstacle to early recovery and development effort for the BAY states.





He said, Mines and other explosives are an everyday threat to civilian populations. We particularly condemn the use of improvised mines which kill and maim without discrimination. It is important to remind that such devices go against international humanitarian law. Restriction of safe freedom of movement, endangered everyday life, killing and maiming indiscriminately, purposely targeting civilians, and causing unnecessary suffering is not acceptable. Populations shall be protected against such threats.





He revealed that With donors support, and under the coordination of the United Nations, especially through UNMAS, action is already taken by humanitarian partners such as the Youth Awakens Foundation, Danish Refugee Council and Mine Advisory Group to mitigate the effects of this threat through risk education and mapping of contaminated lands.





He said: I am pleased to stress that since January 2019, Mine Action organisations have provided critical life-saving information to mitigate the risk by Explosive Ordnance Risk Education (EORE) for more than 1.2 million (including almost 60% girls and boys) conflict-affected communities, IDPs in camps, host communities, refugees and returnees.





Also, life-saving assistance was provided to 999 humanitarian workers of more than 1032 UN agencies, International and National NGOs and Civil Society Organisations as well as stakeholders (government officials, service providers and caregivers) through explosive ordnance awareness to protect them during their travel and work.





A lot has been accomplished. However, these efforts must be sustained. The 2022 Humanitarian Needs Overview process has identified 1.2 million people immediately at risk and in need for life-saving assistance in Borno, Adamawa and Yobe.





Again with donor support, the Humanitarian Response Plan will target 407,000 individuals from all genders and ages to facilitate a decisive lifesaving risk education, mapping and marking of hazardous areas, identification of survivors and affected communities across BAY States.





He, however, noted that full integration of Mine Action within humanitarian, early recovery and development strategies and plans is essential to effectively and efficiently protect communities.





He said, Be reassured that as the Resident Coordinator and Humanitarian Coordinator, I pay the utmost attention to this necessary coordination and thank UNMAS for their action. I also praise all endeavours to ensure that our actions are developed and coordinated in close cooperation with Nigerian authorities and institutions.





The humanitarian and development community appreciates the relentless actions borne by the Nigerian security forces to clear the roads from improvised mines and to dispose of Explosive Remnants of War.





He revealed that the UN was ready to collaborate with the federal government to extend the demining to the North West with a record of a growing crisis in the region.





Schmale said, The United Nations, especially through UNMAS, are more than willing to provide technical advice and coordination support for the Government of Nigeria to fulfil this objective.
Sheikh Nuru Khalid has been sacked as the chief imam of the Apo legislative quarters Jumaat mosque in Abuja. The Islamic cleric was...

Sheikh Nuru Khalid has been sacked as the chief imam of the Apo legislative quarters Jumaat mosque in Abuja.

The Islamic cleric was initially suspended for his anti-government sermon during the Jummat service on Friday.

He criticised the government for its inadequacy in dealing with rising insecurity in the country.

In his sermon, the cleric asked citizens not to vote for any politician who cannot guarantee the safety of lives and properties of Nigerians.

The condition of the Nigerian masses is one. Stop killing us. We will not go to the polls, since you have nothing to do but vote, Khalid had said.

Saidu Muhammed Dansadau, chairman of the mosque committee, said the clerics teachings of political apathy are un-Islamic.

Consequently, he was suspended from his position.

Advertisement

Reacting to his suspension, Khalid said only God can give or take power from anyone.

In a letter addressed to the Imam on Monday, the mosque committee said he had shown no remorse despite his suspension.

The committee said his reaction did not show any form of regret following his sermon.

Unfortunately, your media reaction to the suspension creates the impression that you are not remorseful, the letter reads in part.

Advertisement

Leadership demands a great sense of responsibility.

An official of the mosque who spoke to TheCable via telephone also confirmed his dismissal.

Its true, he was sacked, the official said.
The cost of President Putins war are vast and incalculable, especially in Ukraine. But in Russia they amount to more than just asting of heavy Western sanctions. This cost as stated above includes not only talent, but other unspoken matters.

by Victor Cherubim

With more than 5 weeks into a war sending over 4 million Ukrainians as refugees and displacing millions more from their homes, little of the war has changed in Ukraine, but much has unnoticeably happened in Russia.

Young workers in Russia many weaned on a well-planned Western strategy of hamburgers and Coco Cola and holidays abroad, since the end of the USSR in 25 December 1991,some 30 odd years ago, are now becoming not used to restrictions at home.

Young workers are fleeing their country, particularly to salubrious parts of the CIS, to avoid conscription. Meanwhile, tech firms with international customers are relocating to avoid sanctions and the stigma of conducting Russian related business. This brain drain is not necessarily surprising given the global hunger for anything technological related, which Russia is well known to produce with almost as much vigour, as it does natural gas, oil and vodka.

In just five weeks, according to Associated Press, some 70,000 computer specialists have emigrated from Russia. Another 100,000 tech workers as estimated, may leave soon for safer shores. To prevent any further outflow, President Putin has this week signed legislation eliminating all income taxes until 2024 for Russian IT company employees,

As people walk past Red Square in Moscow with St.Basils on left and Spasskaya Tower second on the right, according to reports, the sudden mood in the business centre of the City, is frosty, not only due to the weather, but due to the business and political climate.

An elite crowd of IT employees of boff companies, some with visas to the EU, whilst many without, are wanting to relocate to Russian Federation countries. The latter are more than eager to take on this talent, which has been in short supply over decades.

The cost of war

The cost of President Putins war are vast and incalculable, especially in Ukraine. But in Russia they amount to more than just asting of heavy Western sanctions. This cost as stated above includes not only talent, but other unspoken matters.

Whilst this war rages on in Ukraine, we gather other frozen conflicts with Russia, are thawing.

Last weekend, Azerbaijani forces were accused of advancing into the provinces demilitarised zone in Nagona-Karabak.

For Russian soldiers high up in the Zangezurmountains of Armenia, the war in Ukraine must seem very far away. While their comrades fight and die in Eastern Europe, just across the border, lies the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, formally inside Azerbaijan but held by Armenian separatists since the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990, and run as a de-facto part of Armenia.

The timing couldnt be worse for Moscow now being forced to commit personnel and equipment to maintain the status quo between Yerevan (Armenia) and Baku (Azerbaijan). Moscow is obliged to protect Armenia, as a member of its Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) pact.

Whilst this war rages on in Ukraine, we now are informed that one reason for the de-escalation is to re-group Russian forces, perhaps, due to its dependency on Ukrainian technical spare parts for its war machine.?

Whilst this war rages in Ukraine, there is Big Power play in Turkey.

President RecepTayyip Erdogan has chosen his timing to be not only a mediator between Russia and Ukraine, but also exert his influence, in the entrance to the Black Sea, a seaway used by the contending forces.

Whilst this war rages in Ukraine, there is India wanting to play an even bigger role in this war?

Should we know why Britain sent Foreign Secretary, Liz Truss, to New Delhi, whilst Russia also sent Sergei Lavrov, its Foreign Minister to India at the same time, while some days earlier Chinese Foreign Minister, Wang Yi paid an overdue visit to his counterpart, Minister Jaishankar?

One Correspondent compared Lavrov smiling at Narendra Modi, like a Cheshire cat, while

Liz Truss was straight jacket in her tonewanting India to play by the Sanctions Rule book.Foreign Minister Wang Yi was diplomatically subdued.

The timing of the war could not be worse for Russian oligarchs?

Russian oligarchs are fleeing their second homes in Europe to avoid sanctions, like birds before a total eclipse. They are flying in all directions to escape sanctions. Banks all over the world are having to sequestrate their asset base to enforce sanctions. They are under duty to report frozen assets and suspected breaches.

Indicators of sanctions evasion risk are as follows:

1. Russian clients communicating changes to the beneficial ownership of their non-Russian or dual nationality family members.

2. Requests to transfer assets between Russian national / dual national family.

3. Use of Trust arrangements, with circumstances of transfers calling into question indirect control or otherwise could retain a benefit from the assets transferred.

4. Assets transferred have usually been shares in companies in UK and or controlling stakes in these businesses.

5. Payments from venture capital and private equity vehicles.

6. Clients seeking to move all their assets to other financial institutions.

7. Clients domiciled in Russia asking whether they can make transfers.

8. Attempts to purchase sanctioned Russian securities.

9. Increased volume of transaction monitoring alerts results from Russian and others receiving larger transfers than is typical.

10. Payments received by UK Businesses, often innovative areas.

These and many more sanctions evasion risks are coming into force.

It seems a field day for British and other legal houses in the UK and abroad, to help in the litigation that, perhaps, is pending.

The Brits are adept in using every means possible to use one calamity in one part of the world, to benefit another part of their State coffers, which may be well known to the Oligarchs.

I will not be surprised, if they use the Ukrainian war for the purpose of tracking money laundering worldwide.
Watertown, NY (13601)

Today

Partly cloudy. High 64F. Winds NE at 10 to 20 mph..

Tonight

Considerable clouds this evening. Some decrease in clouds late. Low 38F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph.
Amid the ongoing impacts of the pandemic, school counselors said they are seeing more students consider alternatives to college. Students are considering trade schools or gap years, and there is generally more uncertainty about what they want to do beyond high school graduation.

I have noticed more students who are unsure about what their path should be after graduation, Sarah Wilkins, a counselor at Portage High School, said.

Lauren Dado, career and technical education director for the Hammond Area Career Center, said she has seen more students consider CTE or contemplate different pathways outside of college.

It was time for the narrative to change, Dado said. She said that when she was growing up, a lot of students felt there was no option other than college.

She said that especially in the Region, there is money to be earned without taking on a lot of student loans. Wilkins said a lot of students are considering going into a trade, as they can make higher wages right away and have little to no debt after high school.

Its another way to make money and sustain gainful employment, Dado said.

Wilkins said she tries to encourage students to look at career assessments and see what aligns with their interests and skills. Portage will also be adding a Jobs for Americas Graduates course next year, which will help students who are still unsure.

Karen Moffett, counseling department chair at Chesterton High School, said there is a lot of focus while students are freshmen and sophomores to try to help them determine their interests. She said a lot of students take classes at Porter County Career and Technical Education Center. Moffett said students also have the opportunities to participate in internships while in high school.

She said nearly 20% of the senior class does an internship in fields such as physical therapy and other unique careers.

I wouldn't say students are choosing gap years per se, but there has been a huge switch from traditional four-year college/universities to trade schools, apprenticeships, etc., Wilkins said.

Moffett said that Duneland School Corp. has been steady in how students have reacted but that during early COVID-19, a lot more students took a year off.

They did not want to pay money for college and do it all online anyway, Moffett said. She said that once schools started opening back up, she saw more students transition back to considering college as their postgraduate plan.

She said that in March, 70% of Chesterton seniors had applied to a two- or four-year institution.

Wilkins said she thinks the pandemic has changed the view of society as a whole on careers. She said students may have seen their parents switch careers, get laid off or work fully from home.

"I think the pandemic may have forced students to look at various career options with ... 'will this career survive through a pandemic or allow me flexibility with at-home working options should something like this ever happen again.'" she said.

She also said she thinks the pandemic put a huge spotlight on the service industry and medical field, which may have sparked interest in some students.

Dado said a lot of these industries are in high need, especially health sciences. At the Hammond Area Career Center, students can train to become emergency medical technicians or certified nursing assistants, both careers that are desired right now.

She said that the career center always has all of the health sciences classes filled completely.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
SAUK VILLAGE  Police arrested a Crete man for aggravated assault and criminal damage to a school bus.

Troopers from the Illinois State Police Chicago District investigated a report of criminal damage to a school bus when no children were present at 3:34 p.m. on March 18 on Interstate 57 northbound at 127th Street in Cook County. Officers identified the vehicle and offender after responding to the scene.

Sauk Village police arrested Shawn R. Whirl on unrelated criminal charges Friday, identifying Whirl as the suspect in the March 18 incident. They detained his vehicle.

"Illinois State Police Division of Criminal Investigation Agents charged Shawn R. Whirl, a 52-year-old male from Crete, IL with aggravated assault (Class A Misdemeanor) and criminal damage to property (Class A Misdemeanor) in reference to an incident on March 18, 2022 on Interstate 57 northbound at 127th Street in Cook County, IL," Illinois State Police said in a press release. "ISP DCI Zone 1 Agents responded to Sauk Village PD and charged Whirl with aggravated assault and criminal damage to property."

Whirl remains in the custody of the Sauk Village police on unrelated charges.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Hoosiers needing emergency assistance can now text 911 in their native language and have their plea for help immediately translated for a police, fire or ambulance dispatcher.

The Indiana Statewide 911 Board recently announced it has partnered with INdigital to translate text-to-911 messages into English from 108 different languages.

"We've already seen the benefits of texting to 911. It allows people in sensitive situations to communicate with law enforcement, and now we are removing the language barriers to those services," said State Treasurer Kelly Mitchell, chairwoman of the Statewide 911 Board.

Indiana in 2014 was one of the first states to launch text-to-911 services. All 92 counties were connected to the system by 2016.

Altogether, Indiana 911 telecommunicators have processed more than 1.3 million inbound and outbound text messages. Though there occasionally have been communication struggles with text messages sent in languages other than English.

"With technology constantly evolving, this upgrade shows why Indiana is on the forefront in providing 911 services to our non-English speaking citizens," said Ed Reuter, executive director of the Statewide 911 Board.

"This new translation upgrade will help bridge the communication gap and speed up sending emergency services when every second counts."

Calling 911 for emergency assistance still is recommended over texting. Since 2019, dispatchers at Indiana 911 centers have had access to "Language Line" services for immediate voice translation of up to 250 different languages, with Spanish accounting for 91% of translation calls.

Mitchell, a Valparaiso University graduate, said extending translation services to text-to-911 will ensure that an alternative way of reaching a 911 dispatcher is available to everyone in the Hoosier State.

"Text-to-911 enables direct access to emergency services for those who are deaf or speaking-impaired, having a medical emergency that prevents them from being able to speak or in a situation where making a voice call would put them in danger," Mitchell said.

Mark Grady, CEO of INdigital, said his company works to improve 911 service every day. He said strong state programs like Indiana's, with good legislation and targeted funding, help them build better systems.

"Our goal is for everyone to have access to 911 when they need it most. Bridging language barriers and providing more ways to communicate are essential in todays world," Grady said.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
MICHIGAN CITY  A pedestrian was killed Monday after being hit by a vehicle on U.S. 12, which then fled the scene, Michigan City police said.

Police officers responded to the scene at approximately 6:30 a.m. and saw the pedestrian lying in the roadway. They then succumbed to their injuries and died.

Investigators were the on scene processing evidence and speaking with witnesses. Additional information will not be released at this time.

Other responding agencies included the Michigan City Fire Department and LaPorte County Emergency Medical Services.

The Michigan City Police Department is asking anyone who has additional information to email Cpl. Brian Wright at bwright@emichigancity.com or call at 219-874-3221, extension 1005.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
VALPARAISO  Jury selection begins Monday morning in a Valparaiso murder case where the accused is not the one blamed with directly causing the fatal wound.

Rather, John Williams, 29, of Valparaiso, is accused of beating another man, who while attempting to stop Williams, struck a third man with a knife, police said.

The man stabbed was Travis Thompson, 36, of Valparaiso, and it was later determined he died as a result of blood loss caused by a stab wound on his upper left leg that severed the femoral artery.

Williams is charged with murder, two counts of robbery resulting in serious bodily injury, two counts of robbery resulting in bodily injury, aggravated battery when assault poses a substantial risk of death, two counts of robbery and one count of battery resulting in serious bodily injury, court records show.

Williams is being represented this week by defense attorney Mark Chargualaf in the trial before Porter Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Clymer.

An alleged victim in the case testified during a bond hearing last month that when Williams showed up at his Valparaiso apartment on Jan. 29, 2020, to purchase marijuana, Williams punched him in the face.

Williams then forced the man into a bedroom and continued to repeatedly punch him in the face, according to the testimony. During the attack, the man said he was able to get ahold of a knife, but in an attempt to stop Williams, he stabbed Thompson, whom he did not know.

When Thompson said aloud he had been stabbed, Williams responded, "Oh hell no," the alleged victim said.

Williams is accused of beating the alleged victim while his friend, Thompson, searched the apartment for marijuana and THC wax, police said.

After making a failed attempt to get Thompson into his vehicle, Williams and a woman drove away, leaving Thompson behind bleeding profusely in the 700 block of Elm Street, police said. Police and paramedics were later unable to revive Thompson.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Press Release

April 3, 2022 'Luntiang Kinabukasan', a story book about Kiko Pangilinan, launched

'GIVING UP ON FIGHTING FOR THE COUNTRY IS LIKE GIVING UP ON MY KIDS' VICE-PRESIDENTIAL aspirant Francis "Kiko" Pangilinan on Sunday led the launching of the book that detailed his childhood and how his experiences as a child shaped his resolve in building a better future for everyone. Entitled "Luntiang Kinabukasan" (A Green Tomorrow), the book contains anecdotes about Pangilinan's adventures as a man wearing so many hats and how these helped him become who he is now. "Ako bilang kandidato, bilang senador, bilang ama, at bilang asawa, iisa lang ako. Hindi ako naniniwala na iba ang set of standards bilang politician, iba din ang set of standards bilang ama," Pangilinan said. "I may wear so many hats, whether as a father, as a son, as a husband, or as a senator, the values are all the same. Hindi pwedeng double standards. That's why very important sa akin ang pamilya," he added. During the book launch, Pangilinan shared the importance of storytelling, saying all his children -- KC, Kakie, Miel, and Miguel -- loved hearing bedtime stories back when they were kids. This storytelling activity further strengthened his relationship with his kids, Pangilinan added, hoping that the launching of his book will also become an anchor for other families to have bonding time. For Pangilinan, the family plays an important role in paving the way for a strong community. "Ako'y naniniwala na mas malakas ang komunidad, mas malakas ang lipunan kapag matibay ang pundasyon ng pamilya," he said. "It's a reminder that what we do to our children and how we raise them, it has a great bearing on how they will be parents to their own children in the future. Therefore, the strong tradition of family bonding, care, respect will continue after we're all gone," he added. The agriculture advocate also shared the reason why the cover of the book showed him wearing long socks, attributing this to his skin asthma condition while he was growing up. The long socks, Pangilinan shared, have two purposes. First is to hide the scars as a result of his skin allergy. Second is to prevent flies from perching on his wounds. Despite his childhood condition, Pangilinan did not lose his confidence. Instead, this further strengthened his desire to whatever problems that come his way. He always goes back to this part of his childhood whenever he feels giving up as a senator as a result of character assassinations against him. "We're doing this because mahal natin ang ating mga anak, mahal natin ang ating bansa. Alam natin na kailangan nating gawin ito para matiyak na pagdating ng panahon ay mas maganda na ang ating bansa para sa ating mga anak," he said. "There were times that I wanted to give up in the last five and a half years, it was very lonely. We continue to remain outspoken, and we continued to speak up despite insults, the bashing on social media, death threats. And why did we do this? Because if I gave up, it's like I was giving up to KC, Kakie, Miel, Miguel and a better future for them," he said. The book launch also gave opportunity for Pangilinan's young supporters to ask him questions regarding his bid for vice-presidency. Among the questions raised include the duties of a vice-president, how he and Vice-President Leni Robredo became a tandem, the country's problem on rice importation, and the oil price hike. Pangilinan expressed gratitude to the Batch 81 of his fraternity, Upsilon Sigma Phi, for making the book launch possible. The book, "Luntiang Kinabukasan: Ang Kwento ni Kiko Pangilinan/ A Green Tomorrow: The Story of Kiko Pangilinan," is authored by Eugene Evasco, translated by Yvette Fernandez, and illustrated by Ara Villena. ### Photos and transcript attached below. Link of Kwentuhan Tayo with Kiko Pangilinan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QD-4vc8wvng
Former LaPorte Mayor Blair Milo is taking the fight for Northwest Indiana's Republican U.S. House nomination to a new battlefield: television.

The U.S. Navy veteran on Monday unveiled the first television ad by any of the seven GOP candidates competing in the May 3 primary election for Indiana's 1st Congressional District of Lake, Porter and northwest LaPorte counties.

The 30-second commercial highlights Milo's military service and condemns Democratic President Joe Biden and U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., "for threatening all we hold dear" through "open borders, skyrocketing prices, threats to law enforcement and our kids' futures."

"That all stops now," Milo proclaims in the ad. "I've taken on threats my whole life, to serve you and this nation, and I'm ready to do it again."

The Milo campaign said it's spending about $45,000 to air the ad on cable television stations in all three counties in the district as part of the "first phase" of her TV buy.

"Indiana's 1st District is a highly competitive seat that has trended Republican for years and is now primed to elect a conservative to help put an end to the Biden/Pelosi disaster in Washington," Milo said.

Milo is not the first Republican congressional candidate for Northwest Indiana to put out a campaign video this year, however.

Jennifer-Ruth Green, of Crown Point, released a 90-second video on her campaign website in January that details her experience as an Air Force combat veteran and her goal to "leave this country better than we found it."

"Like you, I'm disappointed in all the divisive rhetoric and the clear leadership crisis," Green says in the video. "We need accountable leaders of character. My training has taught me that leaders lead from the front, and that's what I'll do in Congress."

Both Green and Milo are supplementing their video messages with mailers going out to likely Republican voters just as early voting begins Tuesday.

They've also personally visited with Republican activists and voters at local party meetings and church services across Northwest Indiana over the past few months.

"I talk to families every single day who are struggling to make ends meet in our uncertain economy," Green said. "The only solution is to vote the Democrats out of power."

There's been no publicly released polling in the race. Though Milo's mayoral experience and Green's planeload of endorsements almost certainly make them among the favorites, along with Mark Leyva, of Highland, the Republican nominee in eight congressional elections since 2002.

Also running are Martin Lucas, of Schererville; Nicholas Pappas, of Portage; Ben Ruiz, of East Chicago; and Aaron Storer, of Schererville.

The winner of the Republican primary will face the winner of the Democratic primary, likely U.S. Rep. Frank J. Mrvan, D-Highland, in the Nov. 8 general election for a two-year term representing Northwest Indiana in the U.S. House.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
OAK FOREST  A Calumet City woman was fatally shot by Oak Forest police in a gunfight, Illinois State Police said.

The Illinois State Police Public Integrity Task Force is investigating after an Oak Forest Police Department officer fatally shot the woman, who has not been identified.

The fatal shooting occurred during a gunfight that took place around 11:50 a.m. Sunday on the 5500 block of 159th Street in Oak Forest, according to police.

"Preliminary information indicates the OFPD arrived on scene and attempted to transport the female to the hospital for a mental health evaluation, the female subject fled the scene," Illinois State Police said in a press release. "OFPD Officers followed the subject and attempted to negotiate with her. The female produced a handgun during the incident and officers continued to negotiate with her. The female entered a local business where OFPD officers and the female exchanged gunfire."

At least one other person, a police officer, was shot in the gunfight.

"An OFPD officer suffered a non-life-threatening injury during the exchange and was transported to a local area hospital for treatment," Illinois State Police said in a press release. "The female was transported to a local area hospital where she was pronounced deceased."

Authorities are not releasing any further details about the fatal shooting yet.

"This is an active and ongoing investigation, and no additional information will be released at this time," Illinois State Police said.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
LAPORTE  A new regional advertising strategy will use billboards all along the Indiana Toll Road to promote the best the northern part of the state has to offer visitors.

LaPorte County is the first of the seven counties along the Toll Road to invest in the strategy.

The LaPorte County Council has approved $50,000 this year and in 2023 to help pay for the billboards.

The signs will highlight attractions such as beaches along Lake Michigan, the Indiana Dunes National Park and Amish country along with promoting major events and festivals.

Dan Bearss, executive director of the Northern Indiana Tourism Development Commission, said the key is changing the image of this part of the state into more of a positive one by giving the millions of Toll Road travelers more exposure to whats good about the area.

He said a recent study revealed more than 60% of people from outside Indiana have a negative perception about the northern part of the state.

We think we can do something about that. We need to do something about that, he said.

Bearss said the goal is to mirror the success of the Pure Michigan campaign that includes a lot of billboards on major highways about events and attractions to draw interest in the state from travelers.

What we have to do is a better job of marketing ourselves and telling our story, he said.

Bearss said the campaign is also a very cost-effective way of reaching a large number of Chicago area residents, many of whom use the Toll Road.

With the Toll Road when people are driving the road, theyre going to see the billboards, Bearss said.

He said the billboard campaign reflects Indianas Cool North, a brand developed in 2016 to help with tourism and attracting new residents and talent.

LaPorte County Convention and Visitors Bureau executive director Jack Arnett, whos also president of the NITDC, said the plan is to approach the rest of the Toll Road counties for a similar amount of funding toward the effort.

He said the counties are being asked to use strictly a portion of their federal American Rescue Plan Act funds Congress approved to help municipalities recover from COVID-19.

Arnett said the plan is for tourism officials in each county to develop their own messaging and destinations to promote on the billboards.

Attractions and special events are advertised already in things like pamphlets in all plazas along the Toll Road. But Arnett said only about 2% of the travelers stop in the plazas.

Hes not sure when the effort will start being reflected on billboards because there is still some research to be done.

"We want to build the image of LaPorte County and the 'Cool North,' and we want that to stick with people when theyre driving through, Arnett said.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
VALPARAISO  Candidates got a lesson in using Porter Countys new online campaign finance software as well as how to fill out forms the old-school way.

Weve never had this many people at a campaign finance training before, Porter County Clerk Jessica Bailey.

The Porter County election board has begun to levy fines as it enforces campaign finance rules. Even filing one minute late can bring a $50 fine, said Kenard Taylor, who led Saturdays training.

Taylor, of KLT Consulting LLC, was the countys test pilot for the software and brought about numerous tweaks, he said. Over the years, he has filed some 300 reports and is currently treasurer for 17 campaigns, he said.

Dont kid yourself; people are looking at these reports, he told the attendees.

Taylor has testified in two federal trials involving campaign finance and spoke with FBI agents on a third, he said.

His first advice for candidates is to not be treasurer of their own campaign committee. The candidates job is to get elected, and if youre spending your time on campaign finance reports, youre not spending enough time on your campaign, Taylor said.

Another no-no is to use your personal bank account for campaign donations. That can bring IRS scrutiny of your finances because all deposits in your personal account count toward your personal income. Instead, get an employer identification number from the IRS and set up a separate account for your campaign.

Taylor advised not opening an interest-bearing account. Earning interest automatically triggers the need to file an income tax return for the campaign. Most local banks dont charge interest, but some bigger national banks do, he said.

Keeping meticulous records is vital. For example, being sloppy on whether the donation is from an individual or a company can force the donor to go before the county election board to answer charges of violating a campaign finance law. Guess how long that donor is going to be your donor if he or she must get a lawyer to sort it all out, Taylor said.

Contributions need to be recorded carefully.

The best thing you can accept is checks because that gives you all the information you need, Taylor said. He advised photocopying checks before depositing them and using cash receipt books that give the campaign a duplicate copy.

In-kind donations have to be reported as both an income and an expense. It would be best if he gave you a letter saying what that fair market value is, he said.

Taylor walked candidates and campaign workers through a 70-slide PowerPoint presentation to explain the intricacies of filling out the reports.

Over the last 10 years, Ive faced a lot of questions, he said, including what to do if the candidate dies before the campaign committee is dissolved. If that happens, its up to the executor to determine whether to give the balance to charity or to another candidate.

Taylor praised Baileys work in administering the countys elections. One of the greatest things she did was get this countys easy campaign finance thing going, he said.

Some of you may want to do the old way. I feel sorry for you, but thats your choice, he said.

The online reporting system allows the campaign treasurer to enter information frequently throughout the campaign to ease the burden of spending a lot of time just before the deadline to fill out reports.

This year is also the first that Porter County will be using vote centers. Voters will be able to cast a ballot at any polling place, not just the one for their assigned precinct, as was the case in the past.

Early voting begins Monday. Hours will be 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Hours on April 23 and April 30, the last two Saturdays before the election, will be 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.

Early voting locations are Porter County Administration Building, 155 Indiana Ave., Room 102A, in downtown Valparaiso; Chesterton Town Hall, 790 Broadway; Hebron Community Center, 611 N. Main St.; North County Government Complex, 3560 Willowcreek Road, Portage; Union Township Fire Station 2, 267 N. 600 West; the Valparaiso Fire Department training building, 355 Evans Ave.; and USW Local 6787, 1100 N. Max Mochal Hwy., Chesterton.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
PORTAGE  The 19th Annual Portage Community and Business Night, described as the biggest networking event in Portage, is April 21.

It's hosted by the Greater Portage Chamber of Commerce and sponsored by Samuelson Insurance Agency. The event gives businesses the opportunity to showcase their services and/or products to residents in the community.

It's from 4 to 7 p.m. at Woodland Park in Portage and is free to the public. Donations of nonperishable foods are welcomed.

Tocayos will be selling Mexican food. The Portage chamber is selling 50/50 raffle tickets for $10. Maximum 300 tickets sold. Tickets may be purchased at the chamber office.

Vendors are encouraged to have a Minute to Win It game at their booth for participants. The most creative game will win a free booth for 2023.

Questions regarding the event can be answered by calling the chamber office at 219-762-3300, or by emailing nsimpson@portageinchamber.com. Register online at portageinchamber.com.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
A majority of Indiana manufacturers continues to grapple with supply chain shortages and higher costs, a new survey found.

Katz, Sapper & Miller's 2022 Indiana Manufacturing Survey: Back to Work" found four out of five Indiana manufacturers are suffering from supply chain shortages that have become prevalent worldwide since the inception of the coronavirus pandemic. All of the nearly 100 companies surveyed reported higher materials and input costs as labor shortages have made many goods harder to come by, especially as back orders have mounted.

The annual survey by the Indianapolis-based advisory, tax and audit firm found the Hoosier State's manufacturers are focused on procuring supplies, managing costs, recruiting labor and implementing more automation at their factories.

The companies surveyed spanned a number of sectors, including automotive, aerospace, health care, furniture, food, chemicals, paper products and metal fabrication. They had as many as 10,500 workers with an average size of about 478 employees.

For more than a decade, respondents to our survey have said the state of Indiana does a good job supporting manufacturers, and this year is no different. Its exemplified in companies abilities to weather the challenges COVID-19 brought and remain afloat, said Jason Patch, partner-in-charge of KSMs Manufacturing & Distribution Services Group. Because of state and federal support, the industry was able to adjust and see profits increase over the past couple years. Now, they can apply that flexibility they learned during the pandemic to issues facing them today.

A majority  53% of those surveyed  said COVID-19 is not a serious threat to their business or that they expected to survive the pandemic, the survey found. Most reported being able to maintain or improve profit margins, by an average of 9%, two years into the global pandemic.

About 45% said they experienced more demand from customers, 81% supply chain shortages and 100% greater cost of materials. It's the first time there was ever a unanimous response in the history of the survey.

About 93% said they have raised pay, with an average increase of 17% in labor costs, according to the Katz, Sapper & Miller survey. About 73% said they are pursuing more automation in response to a lack of available workers.

Companies are at quite a crossroads. They see the need to protect their businesses by layering automation into production, yet they dont want to discourage workers from applying for the jobs that need to be filled as soon as possible, said Mark Frohlich, associate professor of operations management at the Kelley School of Business at IUPUI. While much of this years data reveals numerous challenges, manufacturers are learning they have many tools at their disposal to be more capable and competitive in the coming years.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
The Grammy Awards took an extended moment to honor Taylor Hawkins, the Foo Fighters drummer who died just over a week ago while on tour with the band in Colombia.

The show featured a compilation of photos and video footage from Hawkinss career as a charismatic drummer known for his wide smile. Hawkins, who joined Foo Fighters in the 90s, died at age 50. The band was scheduled to perform at the awards ceremony but pulled out after Hawkinss death.

Earlier in the night, Billie Eilish paid tribute to Hawkins when she performed in a T-shirt with the drummers image on it while singing her song Happier Than Ever.

After the tribute to Hawkins, a quartet of musical-theater performers honored other musical luminaries who have died over the past year, including Stephen Sondheim, the iconic Broadway composer and lyricist who died in November. Singing a compilation of Sondheim songs, including Send In the Clowns and Somewhere were Ben Platt, Cynthia Erivo, Leslie Odom Jr. and Rachel Zegler, who played Maria in the recent Steven Spielberg-directed film adaptation of West Side Story.
Exploring the personal experiences of Sara Mardini and Sean Binder, two volunteers who were arrested in February 2018 after helping migrants cross safely into Lesbos, Greece, the journalist Alex W. Palmer outlines the complex situation aid workers in Europe find themselves in: increasingly demonized by local authorities while also facing pressure from different ends of the international political spectrum.

Palmer traces the origins of the problem, explaining how, in the early days of the migrant crisis, the grass-roots response embodied the broadly held values of E.U. citizens: to be a place of refuge and compassion, to create a new future from the ashes of two world wars and to set an example based on morality rather than power.

But, as Palmer discovers, this idea was never unanimous, and it was only a matter of time before this compassion and idealism was eclipsed by anger and resentment. Many rejected the idea of newcomers entirely. Terrorist attacks and acts of criminality committed by asylum seekers further worsened collective sentiments and heightened public unease about the challenges of integration. The topic became a pawn for far-right media outlets and politicians, who helped stoke the growing anti-immigrant temper, portraying Europe as on the brink of being overrun by foreign hordes  and aid workers as part of the problem.

A highly politicized issue, the debate surrounding the migrant crisis continues to rage. As volunteers are targeted, whats next for migrant aid in Europe?
Everything in Paradise Square is true. Nothing in Paradise Square is true.

Yes, history shows that in 1863, after Abraham Lincoln extended the Civil War draft to include all white men between the ages of 25 and 45  Black men being excepted because they were not considered citizens  mobs of disgruntled Irish Americans rose up against Black people in New York, burning buildings and killing many in their path.

And its true that in the impoverished, piano-shaped district of downtown Manhattan called Five Points, some Black and Irish neighbors who had been living together in relative harmony joined forces to resist the mobs.

But in hammering these large-scale events into individual stories, and in manipulating them so performers have reason to sing at top volume and dance nearly nonstop, the uplifting, star-making, overwrought new musical, which opened on Sunday at the Ethel Barrymore Theater, turns history on its head. Racism becomes an individual character flaw instead of a systemic evil; resistance, the solitary moral genius of a hero.
The state of Georgia will pay a $4.8 million settlement to the family of a 60-year-old Black man who was fatally shot by a state trooper in 2020 during a traffic stop over a broken taillight, officials said.

Julian Edward Roosevelt Lewis, 60, was killed on Aug. 7, 2020, after the trooper, Jacob Thompson, spotted him driving at night with a broken taillight, according to a report from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

Mr. Thompson, who is white, followed Mr. Lewis and tried to get him to pull over near Sylvania, Ga., which is about 60 miles northwest of Savannah. Eventually, Mr. Thompson used his patrol vehicle to force Mr. Lewiss car to turn sideways into a ditch.

As he got out of his patrol vehicle, the trooper drew his gun and fired at Mr. Lewis after it appeared that Mr. Lewis was trying to maneuver his car toward Mr. Thompson, the report said, citing the troopers account. Mr. Lewis was struck once and pronounced dead at the scene.
An aid convoy that has been trying to reach Mariupol since Friday still has not made it to the besieged southern port city, the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Sunday.

Mariupol has sustained devastating attacks by Russian forces for weeks. Thousands of civilians remain trapped there with limited access to food, water and electricity.

Russia late Thursday had announced a cease-fire to start the following day to allow for evacuations out of Mariupol. Humanitarian efforts to reach the city for a large-scale evacuation have stalled repeatedly.

The Red Cross said that its team had set out for Mariupol from Zaporizhzhia, about 140 miles northwest, on Friday, but had to turn back after arrangements and conditions made it impossible to proceed.
As Shanghai struggles to contain an Omicron outbreak, a top Chinese official vowed to adhere to a zero Covid policy to stamp out the virus in the shortest time possible.

During a visit to Shanghai on Saturday that analysts said indicated the central governments high level of concern about the situation there, a Chinese vice premier, Sun Chunlan, urged improvement in the citys coronavirus testing capacities and the expansion of makeshift hospitals and isolation centers to quarantine those infected with the virus, according to Chinese state media on Sunday.

Over the past month, Shanghai, Chinas largest city, has faced one of the countrys largest coronavirus outbreaks since the pandemic began two years ago. After weeks of targeted restrictions, like neighborhood shutdowns, Shanghai officials last week pivoted to a more sweeping lockdown that closed off the metropolitan area in two stages  the eastern part of the city, followed by the western portion  for mass testing.

But mismanagement of lockdowns and other restrictions have led to growing discontent and confusion across the city. Social media posts expressing anger, desperation and frustration have flooded the Chinese internet. Residents have been unable to get help for life-threatening situations through official channels. Patients could not secure their regular medical assistance. Infected parents have been separated from their toddlers. And residents locked indoors scrambled to find essential supplies.
To paraphrase Ian Fleming: To read one good book is happenstance; two is coincidence; three is wild good fortune. That a columnist should enjoy novels in her purview is not particularly noteworthy  but to read three excellent books in sequence, all for the same column, is unusual, a critics jackpot. These are stories of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances, and the less you know about their plots going in, the better.

Image

Sarah Tolmies ALL THE HORSES OF ICELAND (Tordotcom, 111 pp., paper, $15.99) is a slim and beautiful chronicle that reminded me of Naomi Mitchisons Travel Light; a medieval Christian scholar named Jor relates the marvelous history of a nameless white mare from whom all of Icelands horses are descended, and the no-nonsense Icelander, Eyvind of Eyri, who traveled to Mongolia to find her.

Eyvind is far from home, intending to sail from Scandinavia to Greece on a merchant vessel and seek his fortune. But when the captain makes Christian conversion a condition of the venture, Eyvind refuses, and instead joins the party of a Jewish Khazar named David, bound far inland to the steppes of Central Asia to trade with a Khan. Once there, Eyvind learns that the Khans encampment is plagued by a ghost  and it has been prophesied that someone fitting Eyvinds description will banish it. While Eyvind protests that he is no magician, only he seems able to see and hear the mysterious white mare, and to acknowledge that she has some connection to the ghost.
10. And finally, a photographer captures the transfixing beauty of starling murmurations.

Each spring and autumn, the skies in southern Denmark come to life with swirling displays of hundreds of thousands of European starlings, an event known locally as sort sol, or black sun. As the birds pass through on their seasonal migrations, they cast shadows across the skies.

There is no definitive explanation for why starlings murmurate, though most scientists theorize that the behavior helps protect the birds from predators. The patterns captured the eye of Sren Solkr, a photographer who grew up in Denmark and spent years following the birds around Europe and capturing images of their movements.

Have a breathtaking night.

Sarah Hughes compiled photos for this briefing.

Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern.

Want to catch up on past briefings? You can browse them here.

What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes.com.

Here are todays Mini Crossword, Spelling Bee and Wordle. If youre in the mood to play more, find all our games here.
BEIJING  China Eastern Airlines Flight 5735 was at 29,100 feet in clear afternoon skies over the hills of southern China, seemingly ready for a smooth landing in Guangzhou. The plane, a Boeing 737-800 NG, was only seven years old. One of Chinas most experienced aviators was among the three pilots in the cockpit.

But then, at 2:20 p.m. on March 21, the aircraft plummeted.

Air traffic controllers made frantic calls that went unanswered. The pilots sent no Mayday messages. The plane fell more than 20,000 feet in less than a minute, to 7,400 feet. Then it gained 1,200 feet of altitude in about 15 seconds, before a final plunge into a hillside covered in bamboo groves and banana trees. The plane was almost exactly vertical and approaching the speed of sound as it tore into the soft earth, with pieces of the aircraft driving as deep as 60 feet into the mud. Two pieces of a wingtip landed seven miles away.

Investigators, including a seven-member team from the United States that arrived Saturday, are scrambling to understand what happened in the final minutes before the plane plunged headlong, killing all 132 people onboard.
Just months ago, Germanys plans to build a terminal for receiving shiploads of liquefied natural gas were in disarray. Would-be developers were not convinced customers would make enough use of a facility that can cost billions of dollars. And concerns about climate change undermined the future of a fossil fuel like natural gas.

Perceptions have changed. After Russias invasion of Ukraine and the Kremlins threats to sever fuel supplies, the government in Berlin has decided it needs these massive facilities  as many as four of them  to wean the country off Russian gas and act as a lifeline in case Moscow turns off the taps. The cost to the taxpayer now seems to be a secondary consideration.

Most of the gas that Europe buys from Russia to power its electrical utilities is delivered through pipelines, over land or under the sea. Liquefied natural gas provides another way to move gas great distances when pipelines are not an option. Natural gas is chilled to a liquid and loaded on special tankers. It can then be transported to any port with equipment to turn it back into a gas and pump it into the power grid.

We are aiming to build L.N.G. terminals in Germany, Robert Habeck, the countrys economy minister, recently said before talks with potential gas suppliers. Mr. Habeck is a politician from the environmentalist Greens but is finding, somewhat to his dismay, that Germany needs the fossil fuel.
As Starbucks faces a rising wave of employee unrest, its new chief executive is abruptly shifting how the coffee chain splits its profits between workers and shareholders.

In a letter on Monday to employees, customers, investors and others titled, On the Future of Starbucks, Howard Schultz announced that the company would suspend stock buybacks immediately. It was his first act on his first day back in the top job, which he held twice before.

Mr. Schultz said stopping buybacks would allow Starbucks to invest more profit into our people and our stores  the only way to create long-term value for all stakeholders. When a company uses its funds to repurchase and retire its own stock, the share price often rises, rewarding investors and executives who typically hold large amounts of stock.

During Mr. Schultzs last stint as chief executive, between 2008 and 2016, Starbucks spent more than $6 billion on buybacks. Last month, Starbucks announced that he would return as chief executive on an interim basis, replacing Kevin Johnson, who took over from him in 2017. Mr. Schultz helped turn the Seattle company into a global powerhouse.
Citigroup has its 65,000 U.S. employees in the office two days a week and has held workshops for managers and employees on remote collaboration. Globally, most roles will move to a minimum of three days a week when it is safe to do so, the company said. Wells Fargo started bringing back most of its 249,000-person work force in mid-March with what it calls a hybrid flexible model  for many corporate employees, that entails a minimum of three days a week in the office, while groups that cater to the banks technology needs will be able to come in less often.

BNY Mellon, which has nearly 50,000 employees, is allowing teams to determine their own mix of in-person and remote work. And it introduced a two-week work from anywhere policy for people in certain roles and locations. The energy around the office has been palpable as employees eagerly map out their plans, said Garrett Marquis, a BNY Mellon spokesman.

Moelis & Company, a boutique investment bank, has strongly encouraged its almost 1,000 staff members to come to the office Monday through Thursday, but with added intraday flexibility over their hours, said Elizabeth Crain, the companys chief operating officer. That might mean dropping children off at school in the morning, or taking the train during daylight hours for safety reasons, she said. The new approach fosters teamwork and enables employees to learn from one another in person, while also giving them more control over their schedules.

Ms. Crain said everyone was much more flexible. We all know we can deliver, she said.

Ms. Crain, who has worked in the financial industry for more than three decades, recently committed to something that would have been unthinkable before the pandemic: a weekly 9 a.m. session with a personal trainer near her office. She said she hoped that breaking out of the confines of the traditional workday sent a message to employees that they were trusted to get the job done while making time for their personal priorities.
I respect this level of control, but I cannot appreciate a pizza this way. Besides, the best pizza places, regardless of style, are less like museums and more like eccentric workshops. Take the work of the Japanese chef Susumu Kakinuma, who runs the Tokyo restaurant Seirinkan.

Though Seirinkan is now endorsed by the Associazione, decades ago, when Mr. Kakinuma traveled to Naples and fell in love with the local pizza style, restaurants were so skeptical of a Japanese cook trying to make Italian pizza that it was impossible for him to apprentice himself locally.

Instead, Mr. Kakinuma ate a lot of pizza. And each time he ate, he observed the hands of the pizzaiolos, the textures of the dough and the timing of the ovens. Then he baked, teaching himself as he went.

Mr. Kakinuma modeled the pizzas he made back in Tokyo on Neapolitan pizzas, but not too strictly  he used Italian tomatoes and cheeses, but Japanese flour. He sauced lightly. He took the tradition of throwing salt into the oven farther, making it part of his seasoning process, and he shaped the dough differently, wrinkling it so it puffed into soft, starlike tips.

In short, he helped to form, through his own compulsive pizza-making, a new school  Tokyo neo-Neapolitan  which now includes several serious pizzerias in Tokyo, some of which use swirls of mayonnaise, shaved tuna, smoked eel and all kinds of ingredients that might make the Associazione shudder.
Deaths at American nursing home residents from Covid appear to be at their lowest levels since the coronavirus first swept the United States more than two years ago, according to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Some 67 residents died during the week ending March 27. While that number could be adjusted in the coming weeks, it mirrors the lows last reached during June 2021 before facilities were hit with the Delta and Omicron variants. Although cases among residents climbed much more sharply in the fall and winter, deaths still reached roughly 1,500 in January before steadily dropping.

But experts say there is little reason for complacency. Nursing home residents remain highly vulnerable to the virus because of their age and underlying medical conditions. While booster shots proved to be protective against severe illness during the latest surge, federal regulators already authorized second booster shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna coronavirus vaccines last week. There is also growing concern over a highly contagious subvariant of Omicron, known as BA.2.

Getting the second booster shot to nursing home residents is a real policy priority, said David Grabowski, a health policy researcher at Harvard Medical School who studies nursing homes. We know this is protective.
The family of a 12-year-old boy who was fatally shot last week in Brooklyn pleaded for answers at a news conference with Mayor Eric Adams on Monday, describing deep pain and frustration that innocent victims continue to be caught up in gunfire.

The child, Kade Lewin, was in the passenger seat of a parked car in East Flatbush on Thursday evening, sharing a meal with relatives, when a barrage of bullets ripped through the vehicle. He was struck in the head and pronounced dead at the scene.

The boy was not believed to be the intended target; police said the person who pulled the trigger likely sought someone else and fired into the wrong car after riding around the block several times, blasting out its windows and killing Kade. No arrests have been made.

All Im asking: Please come forward, Kades mother, Suzette Lewin, said in brief remarks Monday as she held a framed portrait of her son smiling brightly.
The interaction  in which officers de-escalated a situation and then deferred to trained outreach workers  offers a model for the future that New York officials say they envision as they try to address the large numbers of unsheltered people in the subway system in part by boosting the role of social workers and health professionals.

But it also illustrates the challenges for transit agencies like New Yorks as they seek to address a seemingly intractable crisis that sits well outside the bounds of their missions. Though the members of the BART team appeared to have used a relatively humane touch to steer the woman out of the transit system, they were still limited in their ability to guide her to stable, affordable housing.

As Mayor Eric Adams looks to accelerate New York Citys continued recovery from the pandemic and address perceptions that it has grown unsafe, he has been particularly focused on street homelessness. His efforts have centered on clearing street encampments and the subways, then trying to point those who dwell there toward city shelters, although the majority of people have continued to decline placement offers because they view shelters as unsafe.

Americas transit systems  public spaces with long operating hours and enclosed spaces offering more safety than the streets  have long been de facto shelters for the nations homeless population. For much of that time, transit agencies have turned to the police to address complaints by penalizing and ejecting those taking refuge on trains, subways and buses.
In the short term, the stay means that the maps approved by the Democrat-led Legislature in February, as well as the states June primary calendar, will remain in effect. But it remains to be seen whether the maps will survive the appeals process.

Analysts generally believe the Appellate Division is more likely to defer to the Legislatures prerogative to draw the maps and less likely to intercede in a way that would blow up this years elections calendar than was the lower court judge, Patrick F. McAllister, a State Supreme Court justice in rural Steuben County and a Republican.

The outcome in New York has attracted intense national interest, with partisan control of three to four seats in the House of Representatives hanging in the balance at a time when the two parties are vying for the majority from coast to coast. The New York lines as currently construed promise to boost House Democrats while also safeguarding the partys State Senate majority, prompting national Republicans to spend richly on the legal challenge.

Inside New York, the tangled legal machinations have had a more immediate effect on candidates for office from both parties, who are watching the proceedings carefully.

Before it was stayed, Justice McAllisters decision had set campaigns racing to determine what districts  if any  they were actually running in. Candidates who had already spent a month gathering petitions to run in the newly drawn congressional, State Senate and Assembly districts faced the prospect that the lines would be erased, their costly work temporarily nullified and Junes primary elections postponed just days before the petitioning process was scheduled to end.
Gail: Impressed by your long-range thinking. If for some reason Trump doesnt run again  which I cant really imagine  DeSantis certainly has positioned himself to be next in line. By being as loathsome as possible. I find him completely appalling, but youre mainly opposed to him as a Trump backer, right? How would you rate him as governor?

Bret: Im no fan of the Dont Say Gay bill. But Democrats underestimate DeSantis at their peril. Florida is hopping, Miami feels like the hottest destination in the country, and barring some scandal or mishandled crisis, DeSantis is going to crush his most likely Democratic opponent, Charlie Crist, in his race for re-election this fall. DeSantis also has a genius for baiting liberals and the media, and hes figured out a way to triangulate between the evangelical, business and Trumpian wings of the Republican Party.

Long and short of it: If Joe Biden doesnt dramatically turn his presidency around to boost the Democratic brand and Trump doesnt torpedo DeSantiss candidacy out of spite  two big ifs, Ill admit  DeSantis is going to be awfully hard to defeat in a general election. How would you propose to beat him?

Gail: As far as his current re-election race in Florida goes, this is one of those contests where the impartial experts, asked to comment on the oppositions chances, say things like, Theres always hope. Dont think Im going to invest any energy in dreaming of a DeSantis defeat this year. But definitely going to keep watching him warily on the national level. Im kinda fascinated that right now hes at war with Disney over the Magic Kingdoms defense of gay rights. Whod have thought?

Bret: Strange to say this, but one of the few things Trump did to the G.O.P. that I liked was try to push it to embrace gay rights. So much for that.

The larger question here is how far private companies like Disney should go to take politically divisive positions, especially when corporate executives are dealing with a more politically active work force. My general sense is that its a bad idea for them to do so  but an even worse idea for politicians to punish them for essentially making business decisions. If people are offended by Disneys stances, theyre free to skip Disney World.

Gail: Florida aside, its gonna be a heck of an election year. One of my own fascination points is Ohio, my old home state, where there seem to be more Republicans running for the Senate than squirrels in Central Park. Recently one of them tweeted that when it comes to Ukraine, Weve got our own problems.
Elon Musk has offered to buy Twitter, follow our live coverage of the news.

When Elon Musk mulled taking Tesla private in 2018, he posted on Twitter to tell the world about it. When he got stuck in traffic in 2016, he tweeted the idea of an underground tunnel system to alleviate soul destroying congestion. And when he challenged President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to one-on-one combat last month, he broadcast it on Twitter.

Now Mr. Musk is putting his money where he mouths off.

On Monday, a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission revealed that Mr. Musk, the billionaire chief executive of Tesla and SpaceX and the worlds wealthiest person, had bought a 9.2 percent stake in Twitter, the social media platform where he has over 80 million followers. The purchase appears to make Mr. Musk Twitters largest shareholder, ahead of the 8.8 percent stake owned by the mutual-fund company Vanguard and dwarfing the 2.3 percent stake of Jack Dorsey, Twitters former chief executive.

Mr. Musks Twitter investment, which he has been accumulating since at least last month, was worth about $2.89 billion based on the closing price of the companys stock on Friday. But by the end of Monday, after news of his buy-in sent Twitters share price soaring more than 27 percent, it was worth about $3.7 billion. The shares are a fraction of Mr. Musks reported $270 billion-plus net worth.

Despite his penchant for sharing everything on Twitter  from business ideas, insults and memes to, this past weekend, his experience at a famed Berlin nightclub  Mr. Musk was uncharacteristically mum on the purchase of the companys shares, at least initially.
It was a late February evening in 2020, and I was standing in the marshlands of Friesland, a northern province in the Netherlands. Above my head, hundreds of thousands of starlings were swirling, swooping and diving in a dramatic fashion, blackening the sky.

The sound of their wings reverberated through the air, creating wind patterns on the surface of the still water.

The transfixing scene was the climax of three years Id spent following European starlings along their migration routes across the continent.
The city is embarrassed and instead of figuring out how to honor Fanny Williams, they want to erase her, said Maryline Blackburn, a leader of the Coalition to Save Aunt Fannys Cabin, a group of Black and white residents that worked to preserve the building. Those images of the boys with the menus are atrocious. However, that is a part of history. You cant change it. You cant take it away, sweep it under a rug to make yourself feel better about it.

The argument over Aunt Fannys comes at a time when scores of Confederate statues and other symbols of the Old South have been removed or relocated. But the fate of the Smyrna restaurant has been divisive and personal in a different way, as Black residents recall their own experiences working at Aunt Fannys and seek to learn more about the woman at the center of the debate.

Aunt Fannys Cabin, which was segregated in its early years, operated from 1941 to 1992, serving fried chicken, macaroni and cheese, gen-u-wine Smithfield ham and other regional specialties. Black people worked as cooks, hosts, servers and busboys. Waiters were made to sing for white patrons. The uniforms for female employees included pinafore dresses and head wraps that evoked the era of slavery. It was, for a time, among the best-known restaurants in the Atlanta area and inspired other local restaurants that romanticized the regions plantation history.

Jackie Gleason ate at Aunt Fannys. So did Clark Gable.

Some former employees recall the institution with nothing but disgust.
Cornell, for instance, has reported that 97 percent of its students are fully vaccinated and 92 percent have also received a booster dose. The university credited its extensive surveillance testing program, which included testing vaccinated students weekly, with uncovering the rapid spread of Omicron among students in December.

Two months later, university officials said they were confident that frequent and regular testing of nonsymptomatic, vaccinated-and-boosted individuals is no longer necessary to adequately monitor our community. In mid-March the school also eased its on-campus mask mandate.

By the end of the month, Cornell experienced a rise in coronavirus cases that appeared to be second in intensity only to its initial Omicron wave in December, which resulted in final exams moving online and the cancellation of all university-sponsored events.

Cases are increasing beyond our predictions, officials said on March 23.

Getting an accurate count of active cases on campus is now more difficult. A majority of positive test results are now being recorded through tests of people who already have symptoms, the university said, meaning that asymptomatic cases  the kind that may only be spotted through surveillance testing  have gone undetected. People who have enough coronavirus in their bodies to test positive but are not feeling any symptoms are still able to spread the virus to others, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Even so, some public health experts say that advances in wastewater surveillance, widespread access to rapid tests and the protection offered by vaccines and previous infections mean that shifting a universitys strategy to targeted testing could work  barring a drastic shift in the virus, like the possible emergence of more vaccine-evasive variants that scientists have warned about.
The College of the Holy Cross is renaming the science buildings on its campus in Worcester, Mass., in honor of one of its most famous graduates, Dr. Anthony S. Fauci.

The college announced on Monday that its science complex will be formally known as the Anthony S. Fauci Integrated Science Complex starting on June 11, a date that coincides with Dr. Faucis 60th class reunion weekend.

Holy Cross confirmed on Monday that Dr. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and President Bidens top medical adviser on the coronavirus pandemic, will be on campus for the reunion. The National Institutes of Health did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
On Monday, less than a dozen family members sat quietly in the courtroom, watching the proceedings intently. The gunman, dressed in an olive green sweater over a collared shirt, sat with his lawyers up front.

Judge Scherer asked prospective jurors about scheduling conflicts or other obstacles that could prevent them from serving for the duration of the trial. Those who did not have any were asked to fill out questionnaires that asked about their backgrounds and their ability to handle graphic evidence. The remaining jury pool will be asked to return in a few weeks for courtroom interviews to gauge whether they can be impartial.

Please do not discuss this case with anyone, the judge urged.

A murmur arose from the first group of prospective jurors when Judge Scherer told them that the trial could last through September. Many rattled off reasons that serving on the jury would represent an extreme inconvenience, a sign of the long selection process ahead. One man said he operated a restaurant. Another said his employer would not pay him if he were selected. A woman said she was the caregiver for her grandchildren. Another said she was about to start a new job as a nurse.

Im a server at the Cheesecake Factory  if I dont work, they dont compensate me, one man said. If the restaurant were to, the man added, it would pay him only $8 an hour. And Im not going into debt, he said.

Of the first group of 60 prospective jurors, 18 were asked to fill out questionnaires and return in May.

That the gunman faces a court penalty at all is unusual for mass shootings, in which perpetrators often die, either by suicide or by being killed by the police.

The gunmans guilt was never in doubt: Police officers captured him in the hours after the shooting, and his lawyers offered a guilty plea in exchange for a life sentence. (He was 19 at the time and is now 23.) But the Broward County state attorney, Michael J. Satz, turned down that plea, saying he was obliged to seek capital punishment for such a heinous crime.
WASHINGTON  The Biden administration is seeking to clear potentially hundreds of thousands of deportation and asylum cases pending before immigration courts, an unprecedented move that could significantly reduce the current backlog of 1.7 million cases.

In a memo dated Sunday, Immigration and Customs Enforcement directed its lawyers to review cases and try to clear those considered low priority under enforcement guidelines that the administration established last year. The American Immigration Lawyers Association estimates that there are at least 700,000 such cases  about 40 percent of the court backlog.

The agency would not provide an estimate of how many cases would be cleared under the directive or how long it would take. Previous administrations have moved cases off the court docket but not on such a broad scale. During the eight years of the Obama administration, more than 166,000 immigration cases were administratively closed, according to court data.

The court backlog has ballooned to the largest ever, causing yearslong delays for immigrants seeking asylum and other forms of relief. One reason is that the coronavirus pandemic has delayed proceedings. A significant number of cases were added during the Trump administration, especially after a surge in undocumented migrants crossing the border in 2019. That administration also reopened tens of thousands of cases that had been removed from the court docket.
WASHINGTON  A nearly unified wall of G.O.P. opposition to Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson cracked slightly on Monday as two more Senate Republicans said they would side with Democrats in supporting her, paving the way for her confirmation as the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.

Senators Mitt Romney of Utah and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska joined a third Republican, Susan Collins of Maine, in lending their support to Judge Jackson, defying deep resistance in their party to the nominee. The G.O.P. opposition was underscored anew on Monday when all 11 Republicans on the Judiciary Committee voted against the nomination.

That prompted Democrats to use an unusual procedure to force the nomination out of the deadlocked panel with a vote of the full Senate, which agreed to the move by a vote of 53 to 47.

The three Republicans gave President Biden at least a modicum of the bipartisan backing he had hoped for ahead of a confirmation vote now expected as early as Thursday. And it was a counterpoint to the bitterly partisan debate over Judge Jackson, in which Republicans on the judiciary panel attacked her as a liberal partisan with a questionable record, glossing over her qualifications and experience in hearings that featured the airing of conservative grievances, accusations of leniency toward child sexual abusers and divisive questions, including how she would define the word woman.
Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland on Monday signed into law a new congressional map drawn by Democrats, a little more than a week after a judge called their previous effort an extreme gerrymander and threw it out.

Mr. Hogan, a Republican, agreed to approve the maps after Democrats dropped their appeal of the judges ruling. He described the deal as a tremendous victory for democracy and for free and fair elections in Maryland and said the new map was a huge improvement over the original one.

The new map will most likely result in a congressional delegation that will look a lot like the current one.

Democrats are favored to win six districts under the new map, and Republicans to win one, with an eighth district considered competitive, according to Douglass Mayer, a former aide to Mr. Hogan and the spokesman of Fair Maps Maryland, an anti-gerrymandering organization. The state is currently represented by seven Democrats and one Republican.
To hear more audio stories from publications like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.

WASHINGTON  Supreme Court justices, like most people, like to appear to be consistent. No one wants to be thought to be a flip-flopper, an opportunist or a hypocrite.

That means justices try not to disavow earlier legal views, even ones that appeared in dissents, in opinions they wrote as appeals court judges, in academic work, at their confirmation hearings and elsewhere.

This impulse, which a provocative new article calls personal precedent, can be at odds with respect for precedent in the conventional sense.
WASHINGTON  The Supreme Court ruled on Monday in favor of a Brooklyn man who said he had been falsely accused by police officers of resisting arrest, saying he could sue for malicious prosecution under a federal civil rights law.

The vote was 6 to 3, with the majority deciding only the narrow question of what the man, Larry Thompson, had to show to meet a requirement that there was a favorable termination of the prosecution against him. Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, writing for the majority, said it was enough that prosecutors had dropped the charges, rejecting the view that Mr. Thompson had to demonstrate that there had been some affirmative indication of his innocence.

The case started in 2014, as Mr. Thompson, a Navy veteran and longtime postal worker, was living with his fiancee, their newborn baby girl and Mr. Thompsons sister-in-law who, Justice Kavanaugh wrote, apparently suffered from a mental illness.

When the baby was a week old, the sister-in-law called 911 and accused Mr. Thompson of sexually abusing the infant, citing a red rash on her buttocks that turned out to be diaper rash. When four police officers arrived, Mr. Thompson refused to let them in without a warrant.
Six people were killed and at least a dozen wounded in downtown Sacramento on Sunday in what the authorities say is the largest mass shooting in the citys history.

This tragedy comes just about a month after another shooting in the Sacramento area in which a man gunned down his three children outside a church. Its an explosion of violence that mirrors a nationwide trend.

What happened last night is the biggest and most recent example of what we all know: Gun violence is truly a crisis in our community  and has increased not only here in Sacramento, but across the nation, Kathy Lester, the Sacramento chief of police, said at a news briefing Sunday afternoon.

Across the country in 2022, there have been five mass murders  defined as the killing of four or more people, according to the Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit organization that collects data on shootings. Three of them were in California.
This $10 billion Covid package will give the federal government  and our citizens  the tools we need to continue our economic recovery, keep schools open and keep American families safe, Mr. Schumer said in a statement. While this emergency injection of additional funding is absolutely necessary, it is well short of what is truly needed to keep us safe from the Covid-19 virus over the long-term.

He added that he planned for additional bipartisan negotiations over another emergency aid package that could include both aid for the global vaccination effort and additional assistance for Ukraine as it battles a Russian invasion.

Every dollar we requested is essential, and we will continue to work with Congress to get all of the funding we need, but time is of the essence, Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said in a statement. We urge Congress to move promptly on this $10 billion package because it can begin to fund the most immediate needs, as we currently run the risk of not having some critical tools like treatments and tests starting in May and June.

The domestic spending is paid for largely by repurposing unspent money that was approved in March 2021 in the $1.9 trillion pandemic law that Democrats pushed through without any Republican votes, as well as some funds from the $2.2 trillion law approved under the Trump administration, a key Republican demand.

Among the programs and agencies affected are a grant program for shuttered venues, the Economic Injury Disaster loan program, the Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund, as well as agriculture and transportation funding, according to summaries provided by the two offices.
DAKAR, Senegal  French, American and European officials have expressed serious concerns about allegations that hundreds of people were killed last week in a town in the West African nation of Mali by Malian soldiers accompanied by Russian mercenaries on a campaign to fight insurgents.

Although the accounts are still unclear, human rights organizations, security analysts and Malian civil society groups said that between 200 and 400 people had been killed in the town, Moura  and that government troops and Russian fighters might have been responsible.

Human Rights Watch described it as the worst atrocity in Malis decade-long armed conflict. Hundreds more were reportedly killed last month by Islamist insurgents, according to the group.

Malis armed forces have battled Islamist extremists and other violent groups for the past decade in the Sahel region, an arid strip of land just south of the Sahara, where hundreds of civilians have been killed and hundreds of thousands more have been displaced.
NAIROBI, Kenya  A court in Rwanda on Monday turned away an attempt by prosecutors to extend the 25-year sentence for Paul Rusesabagina, the hotelier turned dissident whose story was portrayed in the Oscar-nominated movie Hotel Rwanda, to life in prison.

Mr. Rusesabagina was convicted in September on charges including murder, kidnapping and belonging to a terrorist group in a legal case that has been widely condemned by human-rights groups.

He had refused to participate in the appeal trial, denouncing it as fraudulent, after prosecutors said the sentences he and 20 others had received were too lenient. But in the end, the court ruled against the prosecution, finding that the current sentence was in accordance with the weight of his crimes as a first-time offender.

Kate Gibson, Mr. Rusesabaginas legal counsel, said the decision was of a little solace. What we are seeing is just the end of a long process of a sham trial so the number itself isnt really of significance, she said.
Image A health care worker administering Covid vaccines to students in Chitungwiza, Zimbabwe, last week. Credit... Aaron Ufumeli/EPA, via Shutterstock

Senators announced a deal on a $10 billion coronavirus aid package on Monday to provide additional aid for domestic testing, vaccination and treatment efforts, after dropping a push to include billions for the global vaccination effort.

The agreement requires at least $5 billion to be set aside for therapeutics and $750 million for research and clinical trials to prepare for future variants. The remaining funds will be used for vaccines and testing.

It does not include $5 billion in funding for the global vaccination effort that had previously been proposed, after senators spent the weekend haggling over a Republican demand to claw back money Congress previously approved.

The package was announced by Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority leader, and Mitt Romney, Republican of Utah. Both have led negotiations in recent days. In a statement, Mr. Schumer said that President Biden supported the agreement, even though it was less than half of the White Houses original $22.5 billion request.

This $10 billion Covid package will give the federal government  and our citizens  the tools we need to continue our economic recovery, keep schools open and keep American families safe, Mr. Schumer said in a statement. While this emergency injection of additional funding is absolutely necessary, it is well short of what is truly needed to keep us safe from the Covid-19 virus over the long-term.

He added that he planned for additional bipartisan negotiations over another emergency aid package that could include both aid for the global vaccination effort and additional assistance for Ukraine as it battles a Russian invasion.

Every dollar we requested is essential, and we will continue to work with Congress to get all of the funding we need, but time is of the essence, Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said in a statement. We urge Congress to move promptly on this $10 billion package because it can begin to fund the most immediate needs, as we currently run the risk of not having some critical tools like treatments and tests starting in May and June.

The domestic spending is paid for largely by repurposing unspent money that was approved in March 2021 in the $1.9 trillion pandemic law that Democrats pushed through without any Republican votes, as well as some funds from the $2.2 trillion law approved under the Trump administration, a key Republican demand.

Among the programs and agencies affected are a grant program for shuttered venues, the Economic Injury Disaster loan program, the Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund, as well as agriculture and transportation funding, according to summaries provided by the two offices.

In a separate statement, Mr. Romney called for the legislation to receive broad bipartisan support and added that he was willing to explore a fiscally responsible solution to support global efforts in the weeks ahead.

Lawmakers are pushing to move the aid package through before the end of the week, when both chambers are scheduled to leave for a two-week recess. It is unclear if there will be enough support for such a swift timeline, given that Senate Democrats aim to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court this week and all 100 lawmakers would have to agree to waive procedural hurdles to speed up the process.

Multiple House Democrats have also expressed frustration with the omission of the global vaccination aid, which is central to Mr. Bidens strategy of reducing vaccine inequality and limiting the impact of the next coronavirus variant.

Without global vaccination funding, we are simply not tackling the problem of COVID, Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington, the chairwoman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said on Twitter.

Several Democrats, however, said the urgent need to provide domestic aid was enough to warrant their support.

I understand that domestic public health spending is also urgently needed, and so I intend to vote for this bill, Senator Chris Coons, a Democrat from Delaware and one of the negotiators, said in a statement. However, this is only a partial step, and I will push my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to pass a robust international funding bill in the coming weeks to address pandemic-related needs and the growing global hunger and food security crisis.

Recent efforts to pass an initial $15.6 billion Covid package collapsed last month when House Democrats balked at clawing back money that had been set aside for state governments in last years law.

Those funds remained untouched in the current plan. But the measure also includes a bipartisan bill, led by Senators John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, and Alex Padilla, Democrat of California, that will give state, local and tribal governments more flexibility in how coronavirus aid is spent.

While access to vaccines has gradually expanded around the world, administering the shots remains a challenge. In many low-income countries, only about 15 percent of the population has received at least one vaccine dose, compared with about 80 percent of the population in many middle- and high-income countries, according to the Our World in Data project at the University of Oxford.
The systematic destruction produces little military gain, but is part of a broader strategy to seize the countrys east, analysts and U.S. military officials say.

With the Russian economy showing some signs of resilience after the initial shock of the wide-ranging Western sanctions put in place after Mr. Putins invasion in February, the Kremlin appeared to be girding for a continuation of the war, despite talk in European capitals of now possibly banning Russian coal, oil or, less likely, gas.

They are not going to stop, Oleksiy Danilov, the secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, said in a statement on Monday. Putins order given to his soldiers to destroy our state has not disappeared.

In a visit to Bucha on Monday, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine left the door open to a negotiated peace, despite the horrific scenes uncovered over the weekend. In a camouflage bulletproof vest, surrounded by soldiers and journalists, Mr. Zelensky accused Russia of genocide, but said he was still hoping to meet with Mr. Putin to try to stop the war.

Ukraine must have peace, Mr. Zelensky said. We are in Europe in the 21st century. We will continue efforts diplomatically and militarily.

Mr. Biden, speaking to reporters in Washington after returning from Delaware, said that information needed to be gathered for a trial of Mr. Putin, calling the Russian leader a war criminal. Mr. Biden said he would at some point be announcing more sanctions against Russia, without specifying what they would be.

In Europe, the growing evidence of Russian atrocities also appeared to be paving the way for more sanctions, even as divisions remained among E.U. members of whether to impose a broad ban on Russian energy imports.
Update: New video shows Russian soldiers opening fire on a cyclist in Bucha.

An analysis of satellite images by The New York Times rebuts claims by Russia that the killing of civilians in Bucha, a suburb of Kyiv, occurred after its soldiers had left the town.

When images emerged over the weekend of the bodies of dead civilians lying on the streets of Bucha  some with their hands bound, some with gunshot wounds to the head  Russias Ministry of Defense denied responsibility. In a Telegram post on Sunday, the ministry suggested that the bodies had been recently placed on the streets after all Russian units withdrew completely from Bucha around March 30.

Russia claimed that the images were another hoax and called for an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting on what it called provocations of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha.

But a review of videos and satellite imagery by The Times shows that many of the civilians were killed more than three weeks ago, when Russias military was in control of the town.
With a colorless prime minister in Jean Castex  Mr. Macron has tended to be wary of anyone who might impinge on his aura  there have been few other compelling political figures able to carry the presidents campaign in his absence. His centrist political party, La Republique en Marche, has gained no traction in municipal and regional politics. It is widely viewed as a mere vessel for Mr. Macrons agenda.

His governments wide use of consulting firms, including McKinsey  involving spending of more than $1.1 billion, some of it on the best ways to confront Covid-19  has also led to a wave of criticism of Mr. Macron in recent days. A former banker, Mr. Macron has often been attacked as the president of the rich in a country with deeply ambivalent feelings about wealth and capitalism.

Still, Mr. Macron has proved adept at occupying the entire central spectrum of French politics through his insistence that freeing up the economy is compatible with maintaining, and even increasing, the French states role in social protection. Prominent figures of the center-left and center-right attended his rally on Saturday.

Over the course of the past five years, he has shown both faces of his politics, first simplifying the labyrinthine labor code and spurring a start-up business culture, then adopting a policy of whatever it costs to save peoples livelihoods during the coronavirus pandemic. His handling of that crisis, after a slow start, is widely viewed as successful.

He absolutely proved up to the task, Mr. Tenzer said.
But its hopes that Mr. Orban, who went from being an anti-Kremlin liberal firebrand in 1989 to Mr. Putins closest partner in Europe, might again change direction after the election seems to have been diminished by the scale of his partys victory. It won more than two-thirds of the seats in Parliament while an openly pro-Putin, far-right party, Our Homeland Movement, secured enough votes to enter Parliament for the first time.

Putin is right. Ukraine is getting what it deserves, Janos Horvath, a supporter of the far-right party, said after casting his vote. Ukraine, he said, echoing a favorite Kremlin talking point, mistreats its ethnic minorities, including Russians and Hungarians, and must be stopped.

The crushing defeat of Mr. Orbans opponents, who campaigned on pledges to show more solidarity with Ukraine and Hungarys allies, makes it unlikely that Hungary will now join NATO and the European Union in condemning Mr. Putin over his military onslaught or in supplying weapons to help Ukraine defend itself. Hungary, unlike Poland, has steadfastly refused to let weapons pass through its territory to Ukraine.

While increasingly isolated from his foreign allies, Mr. Orban won strong domestic support for his neutral stance on the war, turning what had initially threatened to become an electoral liability into a vote-getter. He did this through relentless misrepresentation of his opponents position, deploying a vast apparatus of loyal media outlets to convince voters that his rivals wanted to send Hungarian troops to Ukraine to fight against Russia, something that nobody has suggested doing.
Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlins spokesman, told reporters that he had no information about when the talks, which were last held last week, would resume, and whether the events in Bucha would affect their progress.

The situation is serious, there is no doubt, Mr. Peskov said.

Andrei Kortunov, director general of the Russian International Affairs Council, a research organization close to the Russian government, said that the events in Bucha will certainly make progress even more difficult.

It is hard to sit at a table and shake hands when such things happen, he said.

While the talks are important, Mr. Kortunov said, they primarily depend on the military situation on the ground, where both sides are still waiting for more favorable conditions to emerge for them to press harder from the position of strength.

As of today, there isnt much hope, he said.

The situation is further complicated by the fact that, while Mr. Putin alone can dictate Russian policy, in Ukraine, Mr. Zelensky is dependent on public opinion and a multitude of political actors in the country.

The events in Bucha would make him even more constrained, Mr. Kortunov said, referring to Mr. Zelensky.
BRUSSELS  President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine lambasted the former leaders of Germany and France, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy, in a video address released late on Sunday, seemingly blaming them for the deaths of Ukrainian civilians.

I invite Ms. Merkel and Mr. Sarkozy to visit Bucha, to see what the policy of 14 years of concessions to Russia has led to, Mr. Zelensky said, referring to the Kyiv suburb where images surfaced over the weekend of bodies lying in the streets after Russian forces withdrew. See with your own eyes the tortured and slain Ukrainians.

Mr. Zelensky was speaking, he said, on the 14th anniversary of the 2008 NATO summit in Bucharest, Romania, where, after a major internal debate, NATO promised membership in the alliance to Georgia and Ukraine but without specifying when.

He blamed NATO country politicians for harboring an absurd fear of Russia, adding: They thought that by refusing Ukraine, they could appease Russia, to convince it to respect Ukraine and live normally alongside us.
Ukraine has accused Russian forces of carrying out a massacre in the town of Bucha, while Western nations reacted to images of dead bodies there with calls for new sanctions against Moscow.
 2008-2022 One News Page Ltd.

All rights reserved.

One News is a registered trademark

of One News Page Ltd.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz says the West will impose new sanctions on Russia in the next few days. The discovery of hundreds of bodies in a town outside of Kyiv drew horror around the world.
Pilgrims gather for the Stations of the Cross at the Colosseum in Rome on Good Friday, April 3, 2015. / Vatican..

CNA 15 Apr 2022
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky surprised quite a few Grammys viewers when he made an appearance for a message on Sunday night.
Jon Batiste won album of the year, Silk Sonic song and record of the year and Olivia Rodrigo best new artist at a ceremony where President Zelensky of Ukraine made an appeal for help.
Mounting evidence of Russias attacks on Ukrainian civilians in towns near Kyiv has prompted outrage and calls for those responsible to be held to account.
Ukrainian authorities accused Putin's forces of committing war crimes and leaving behind a scene from a horror movie as they withdrew from the town near Kyiv.
After uncovering new leads in the 30-year-old cold case, prosecutors say the suspect was inspired by racist violence. He killed one man and injured two others in an arson attack on a refugee home.
Russian soldiers have been accused of carrying out "genocide" in the Ukrainian town of Bucha amid harrowing evidence of mass graves, torture and bodies lying in the streets as Kremlin forces pull back from Kyiv.
The German government has declared 40 Russian diplomats unwelcome and taken temporary control of Gazprom's German subsidiary. This comes as the world digests images of civilian deaths in a Kyiv suburb. DW has the latest.
New Zealand will impose more sanctions on Russia tonight after reports of Ukrainian civilians being abused, murdered and buried in mass graves."Russia must answer to the world for what they've done," Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern...
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made a surprise appearance at the Grammys 2022 in a pre-recorded speech. The leader addressed the current situation of the Russia-Ukraine war and urged the world to tell the truth about the invasion and to send help to his country's people.
Boris Johnson says mass graves being found was "sickening" and those responsible must be held to account.
Hungarian authoritarian leader, Prime Minister Viktor Orban, made his victory speech on Sunday, signaling his support of Russia and calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky an "opponent." The situation comes as the country's elections have not yet ended but showed an overwhelming lead held by Orban's party.
Newsy 05 Apr 2022

Watch VideoIn towns like Bucha, cut off from the world for nearly six weeks, the shocking images of civilian deaths are now out in..
In early March 16 African countries including South Africa abstained from voting on a resolution in the UN General Assembly calling on Russia to end its military operations in Ukraine. Olayinka Ajala examines five reasons why African countries have chosen to stay neutral on the crisis.
Oneindia 04 Apr 2022

Ukrainian authorities found hundreds of bodies, some bound and shot at close range, scattered across towns near Kyiv after Kremlin..
A Ukrainian mother in a bombed-out village on the outskirts of Kyiv has relived the heartbreaking moment she was forced to bury her son after a brutal Russian offensive.In video footage shot by the BBC, the grieving mother showed...
Ukraine has launched an investigation into war crimes officials believe have been committed by Russian forces during the course of the invasion.
Laxman Pai, Opalesque Asia:

About one-fifth of special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) initial public offerings (IPOs) is not in favor of completing the de-SPAC transaction with any entity that had principal business operations in China (including Hong Kong and Macau), said a study.

According to GlobalData, China's tougher offshore IPO listing rules and the US SPACs decision to exclude Chinese entities from de-SPAC transactions could leave capital-hungry startups dry. Smaller startups may consider getting merged with blank check firms to accelerate their expansion as SPAC is a quicker and more economical way for a company to go public.

The data and analytics company revealed in a report that concerns about Chinese entities failing to secure local governments' permission to follow the guidelines of the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act (HFCAA) could be one of the factors influencing the initial business combination decision of SPACs.

Besides, Beijing's crackdown on big technology firms in recent times is also a factor for the blank check companies' decision to remove Chinese firms from their areas of interest, it said.

HFCAA, brought into effect by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in December 2020, mandates all companies listed on US exchanges to provide evidence of their auditing inspections and furnish documents to prove that the registrants are not owned or controlled by a governmental entity in a foreign jurisdiction.

Keshav K......................

To view our full article Click here
Montreal, QC - When the lights go out, and the electricity stops, Montreal residents and businesses are in good hands as SOS Electricien Montreal is one of the best teams to to get them switched back on in no time at all. SOS Electricien Montreal has more than 15 years of experience. Its qualified technicians can carry out emergency services and electrical installations in all kinds of buildings: institutional, industrial, 
Michigans ample supply of freshwater may be its most valuable natural resource, but for decades, the states waterways have been marred by pollutants.

That is according to a report by the Environmental Integrity Project, which is painting a dire picture of Michigans waterways.

The nonprofit looked at waterways and bodies of water in all 50 states by surveying the most recent available state Integrated Water Reports filed with the Environmental Protection Agency.

Rivers and streams

The report, The Clean Water Act at 50: Promises Half Kept at the Half Century Mark, found that 95% of rivers and streams and 43% of lakes and reservoirs are impaired for swimming and recreation in Michigan.

It defines impaired waters as those that are too polluted to meet safety standards for swimming and recreation, aquatic life, fish consumption, or for use as drinking water.

That means more than 54,000 miles of rivers and streams in the state are polluted with things like nitrates, bacteria or other contaminants which could make them unsafe for swimmers.

Indiana tops the list of states with the dirtiest waterways. Indiana has 24,395 total miles of rivers and streams listed as impaired for swimming and recreation.

Oregon has the most overall miles of rivers and streams categorized as impaired for any use at 122,800 miles, followed by California with 83,361 impaired miles. Michigan is third with 54,687 impaired miles.

About 96% of Michigans rivers and streams are deemed impaired for fish consumption, and 15,776 miles were listed as impaired for aquatic life, according to the report.

The report assessed 1,426,619 miles of rivers, streams and creeks across the U.S. and found that over half were impaired for any use.

Lakes and reservoirs

More than half of assessed lake acres nationally have been designated as impaired for at least one use, according to the report.

The study assessed a total of 814,808 lake acres in Michigan, and found that 91% of inland lakes and reservoirs were impaired for water contact recreation, and fish consumption.

However, only 3,318 acres were assessed for water recreation impairments. For comparison, Houghton Lake, the largest inland lake in Michigan, has a surface area encompassing 20,044 acres.

Over 378,000 acres were assessed in Michigan for fish consumption.

The study also found that 3% of assessed lake acres were impaired for aquatic life.

Nationwide, the states classified 11.2 million acres of lakes, ponds and reservoirs as impaired, which was about 55% of assessed lake acreage.

Great Lakes

Michigan assesses both the open water of the Great Lakes and the health of their shorelines.

For its portion of the Great Lakes, Michigan reported in a 2020 Integrated Water Report, that 100% of assessed open water was impaired for fish consumption, under EPA quality standards.

But the state either had insufficient information or did not sample enough to determine the impairment status of other uses of open water, such as to support aquatic life, reads part of the Environmental Integrity Project study.

Michigan has more than 3,000 miles of Great Lakes shorelines, but it only assessed 240 of these miles for water recreation. The state concluded that only 2% of these  or 5.8 miles  were impaired for swimming and recreation.

EPA categorizes the Great Lakes differently than other inland lakes. Some parts of the Great Lakes are international waters, shared with Canada, making the responsibility for assessing them more complex. The states bordering the Great Lakes also use different methods for evaluating and classifying these water bodies.

Of those that provided recent assessments, both Ohio and Illinois found 100% of their assessed waters were impaired for fish consumption.

Michigan-based data for the report came from a 2020 Integrated Water Report to the EPA.

Conclusions

The U.S. Congress passed the federal Clean Water Act in a series of votes from March to October of 1972. The law promised fishable and swimmable waters no later than 1983, and the elimination of all discharges of pollutants into navigable waters by 1985. But this report concludes that the Clean Water Act has fallen far short of achieving these ambitious goals.

The causes vary, and include things like agricultural runoff and drought, according to the report.

To address these problems, Environmental Integrity Project researchers recommend the EPA update its regulations, enforce those already on the books and allocate more resources and staff to do so.

The Clean Water Act should be celebrated on its 50th birthday for making Americas waterways significantly cleaner, stated Eric Schaeffer, Executive Director of the Environmental Integrity Project and former Director of Civil Enforcement at EPA in a press release. However, we need more funding, stronger enforcement and better control of farm runoff to clean up waters that are still polluted after half a century. Lets give EPA and states the tools they need to finish the job  we owe that much to our children and to future generations.

The authors note that this data does not provide a complete picture of the nations water pollution woes because of differences in how states monitor their waterways.

"It is important to keep in mind that in some cases, states reporting higher levels of impairment may actually be doing a better job of monitoring waterways or are using more stringent criteria to assess water quality," reads part of an Environmental Integrity Project press release. "Although the most recent available state water quality reports to EPA make clear that about half of assessed river and stream miles and lake acres are impaired, the true extent of the nations water pollution is unknown because few states monitor all their waterways as required."

For more information on the Environmental Integrity Project, visit environmentalintegrity.org.
Metro Creative Graphics

A Huron County man will serve time in prison following his eighth conviction on charges of operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated.

Duane Edward Langely, 52, of Bad Axe, was sentenced to 18 months to five years in prison on a charge of operating while intoxicated, third offense, as well as a probation violation on Monday in Huron County District Court. He received 180 days in jail for the probation violation charge.
Midland County Board of Commissioners will consider submitting a resolution to Lansing to encourage a reform of the Michigan Auto Insurance Reform Act.

Commissioners will discuss passing a resolution on the new no-fault insurance reform law, among other items on its agenda, during its regular board meeting at 9 a.m. April 19 in the County Services building.

The resolution would support health care providers and patients in need of lifelong medical care across Michigan calling on the state to take action.

The Michigan Auto Insurance Reform Act, which took effect last July, has become a topic of concern for the board after crash survivors have shared negative effects of the legislation with commissioners. The Midland County resolution further describes the wide impact of the act, estimating more than 18,000 Michigan residents would have to find other means for care and support without action.

"There are many Midland County residents, and their families, who are currently benefiting, or would in the future, from services pertaining to their care, recovery and rehabilitation from catastrophic injuries but are already directly affected if the current law is not

changed," the resolution reads.

While a majority of the state legislation was widely praised, several unintended impacts have been raised by both health care providers and patients across Michigan.

One example of the challenges includes a reimbursement reduced by almost half. Reimbursement for post-acute services (services that support an individual's continued recovery) that do not have a Medicare code were reduced by 45%. Affected services include adult foster home care, attendant care in homes and transportation.

In addition, Michigan does not have a fee schedule for care covered by auto insurers, unlike several other no-fault insurance states. They pay much more for the same services than is paid by employer plans or government insurance such as Medicare or Medicaid.

Under the new fee schedule, services that Medicare covers will have a 200% reimbursement rate, while more specialized services such as home health care without a Medicare code will be reimbursed 55% of whatever they were charging for services at the start of 2019.

"This is a humanitarian crisis born from a government-mandated price fix, that only the legislature can undo," it continues.

If the resolution is passed, Midland County Clerk Ann Manary would share the resolution with the following Michigan leaders: governor's office, state senate, state house, and members of the Midland County delegation to the Michigan legislature.

Photo Provided County of Midland

Photo Provided County of Midland

Several regional residents spoke on behalf of those impacted by the legislation during recent board meetings in Midland County. For more information, visit here.

This article was updated

Related content

Some Midland Co. residents feel unintended impact of auto insurance reform
Mark Birdsall/Huron Daily Tribune

The Food Bank of Eastern Michigan will help bring a free drive-thru food distribution to the Upper Thumb on Wednesday, April 6, the only food giveaway scheduled in the coming week.

Wednesdays drive-thru popup pantry will take place at Moravian Church, 2711 Cass St., in Unionville. The free food giveaway begins at 10:30 a.m.
BIG RAPIDS  Archery is a fun pastime for people of all ages, and the Big Rapids Salvation Army recently held a training session for adults interested in taking part in the archery courses for kids that the organization is set to hold this year.

The course consisted of participants getting familiar with the equipment and ensuring their understanding of the proper techniques and care for the bow and arrows.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

Three weeks ahead of the Michigan Republican nominating convention, Trump criticized Michigans 2020 election as rigged and encouraged supporters to ask each state candidate at the April 23 nominating convention if they will support the Trump ticket.

If they wont give you that assurance, dont give them your vote, he said to a crowd of more than 5,000 people at the Michigan Stars Sport Center in Washington Township. Thousands of other attendees stood outside, mirroring the crowds Trump attracted at that location while president in 2018 and 2020.

Candidates and officials reinforced Trumps message, boosting his permanence in the Republican Party and repeating unproven claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

Donald Trump is still the leader of this party, said Matt DePerno, Trumps pick for attorney general. And Donald Trump has come here today and said to every one of you delegates, support Matt DePerno. Support Kristina Karamo.

"This right here is the continuation of the MAGA movement.

Current precinct delegates were peppered throughout the crowd as Trump pushed them to support his candidates of choice and attacked those running against his candidates, calling former House Speaker and attorney general hopeful Tom Leonard a RINO.

Hes a RINO, Trump said of Leonard. Hes not going to do a damn thing.

Trump also took aim at Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and state Attorney General Dana Nessel, all Democrats, on issues that included state-order shutdown during the pandemic, the threatened closure of Line 5 and decisions Benson made ahead of the election.

He pinged Benson for her mailing of unsolicited ballot applications to Michigan voters, signature verification guidance that was overturned by a judge post-election, and the acceptance of third party donations toward election operations.

Republicans must get tough and smart and not let them get away with the crime of the century, Trump said.

More than 200 audits by local clerks, several court rulings and a Senate investigation into the 2020 election have upheld the results in Michigan, where President Joe Biden pulled ahead of Trump by about 154,000. Additionally, while a judge did overturn Bensons signature verification guidance on administrative grounds, other courts upheld Bensons mailing of ballot applications and the acceptance of third party donations.

Later in his speech, he promised if Republicans retook the U.S. House and Senate that they would "immediately" end "every single COVID mandate."

Trump reminded the crowd that Whitmer's husband tried to use his position to get a boat in the water in May 2020 during the early depths of the COVID-19 pandemic. The owner of a Northern Michigan dock company said Marc Mallory placed the boat in the water before the Memorial Day weekend as Whitmer urged residents not to rush to the region. Trump accused Biden and Whitmer of imposing rules on everyday citizens "that they did not abide by themselves."

"They totally failed on the pandemic, and now they are trying to walk away from COVID like nothing happened," the former president said.

The Whitmer administration has pointed at studies estimating that thousands of lives were saved by her early stay home orders. But since the Michigan Supreme Court ruled Whitmer's emergency powers unconstitutional in October 2020, the Democratic incumbent has gradually shifted away from public epidemic health orders.

An early focus on his prepared speech hit his trademark issue of immigration. Michigan officials said in September that up to 1,300 Afghan allies and nationals are expected to be resettled in the state.

Let there be no doubt the Biden administration is resetting this humongous wave of illegal aliens in communities like yours all across America, Trump said of the Afghanistan refugees.

He claimed without evidence that "thousands of unvetted, unscreened Afghan refugees" are being resettled all over Michigan.

The Biden administration has a screening process that critics have blamed for keeping some Afghan refugees overseas. A group of 69 Afghan refugees with connections to Michigan State University arrived in the United States from Albania after they narrowly escaped the Taliban last August when President Biden withdrew remaining U.S. forces from Afghanistan.

"If any part of our country is going to be turned into a migrant camp, it should not be the communities of hardworking Americans," Trump said. "It should be the neighborhoods of the radical left politicians.

What ever happened to the American Dream? he added.

Trump swung around to his endorsements about 40 minutes into his speech, bringing his endorsed secretary of state hopeful Kristina Karamo on stage. He repeated his accusation that Michigan's election was stolen from him.

Biden won Michigan 51%-48%, or by more than 154,000 votes, a result that was confirmed by dozens of audits, a series of court decisions and a Republican-led Senate Oversight Committee report. But Trump attacked Benson for a "corrupt election."

The former president criticized Benson for mailing out 7.7 million unsolicited absentee ballot applications to registered voters, "including people that were dead, and those who no longer live in the state. Other than that it was wonderful.

"You're guaranteed to have a corrupt election, with your radical Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, Trump said. He later called Benson a socialist and Nessel lawless.

Kristina is running for secretary of state to clean up Michigan's election for us to deliver citizenship confirmation, residency, confirmation, little things like that, Trump said, calling Karamo back to the podium.

I am so excited to be your next secretary of state, to make sure that no matter who you vote for what you believe your vote counts and your vote is not nullified by an illegal ballot, Karamo said.

Trump argued that Republican voters prefer to vote on election day, and called for a return to that system. Michigan has had no-reason absentee voting after a 2018 vote of the people.

Trump then introduced DePerno, whom he described as hated by politicians  the weak ones, the RINOs.

Trump called Leonard, who lost to Nessel by less than 3 percentage points in 2018, a "RINO" or Republican in name only, though he admitted he didnt know him.

DePerno called Trump the greatest president in the history of this country.

In the spring of 2020 Gov. Whitmer shut down our state, and some of us stood up and fought against it and never submitted to tyranny, DePerno said. If elected as Attorney General we will change this in this state we will restore this state, back to what it once was, a constitutional republic. I will return the office back to the law firm for the people.

Saturdays visit came three weeks ahead of the Michigan Republican nominating convention in Grand Rapids, where precinct delegates will choose which GOP candidates for secretary of state and attorney general will advance to the November elections. They also will select two nominees for the State Board of Education, the Michigan Supreme Court, as well as the Michigan State, Wayne State and University of Michigan boards.

Saturday night's speech marked the first time the former president has visited Michigan since his election eve November 2020 campaign visit to the state.
Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - The Vice President of Libya's Presidential Council, Abdallah Al-Lafi, has hailed efforts of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Libya, in the challenging humanitarian issues, stressing the importance of the work it is doing, and the successes achieved in contributing to the success of the national reconciliation project launched by the Presidential Council
Photo: (Photo : Getty images )

A Chinese woman completes a quadruplet birth after the first two babies were born a few days ago. The first baby was born on March 22 after 25 weeks and six days in the womb. The second baby was born four days after. On April 2, the mom successfully gave birth to two more babies. According to The South China Morning Post, the first two babies were initially kept in incubators, while the two premature babies were held in the womb as doctors feared they might have complications if born too soon.

Babies born too soon

The father, Mr. Chu, said that doctors initially told his 22-year-old wife that she carried triplets. It turned out that the fourth fetus was obscured during check-ups. The couple later found out that they were having quadruplets, and it was too late to reduce the number of fetuses. On March 22, their first baby was born at Qilu Hospital of Shandong University in Jinan, Shandong province, eastern China, at 25 weeks and six days. Four days later, the second son was born.

According to w.dzwww.com, in the early morning of April 2, the quadruplet mother successfully gave birth to two little boys. The four babies have already been reunited.

According to Ma Yuyan, a doctor from the hospital, they kept the two infants in incubators as doctors tried to postpone the delivery of the two babies as premature babies tend to have complications. She said that the first two babies had "extremely early births," and having four babies born too soon would have many difficulties, making it risky for all of them to survive, the doctor said.

The doctor said that the pregnant woman sought medical treatment for a cervical problem when she was 22-week pregnant. Eventually, the woman underwent an emergency procedure to reinforce her cervix. Her first son was born three weeks later, weighing 700 grams. An emergency procedure was done. The second boy was also born four days later, weighing 800 grams.

Read Also: Mermaid Birth: Spanish Twins Born in 1 in 80,000 Rare Phenomenon

Preterm Labor and Risks of multiple births

The doctor said that they do not suggest women carrying so many fetuses as they are vulnerable to preterm labor and premature rupture of fetal membranes. Pregnant women carrying multiple pregnancies also have higher chances of gestational hypertension and diabetes.

According to Beaumont.org, more than 60 percent of twins are born prematurely. The higher the number of fetuses in pregnancy, the greater the risks for early births. Premature babies are often tiny, with low birth rates, and most would require help in breathing, eating, fighting infection, and staying warm. Babies born before 28 weeks are especially vulnerable as most of their organs are not yet ready for life outside the uterus.

Father appeals for help on medical bills

The father, Mr. Chu, is appealing for help to settle the hospital bills. The family is from the rural area of Jining in Shandong. The medical cost of 10,000 yuan (US$1,573) per baby per day in the incubator has placed a heavy financial burden on the family. Mr. Chu, who works for a logistics company, has a household income of 5,000 yuan (US$786) per month, and their savings are not enough to cover the cost. He said they borrowed the expenses of hospitalization from relatives and friends. Adding two more babies makes the price astronomical for the family. The father posted a call for help on the online platform, hoping to get more help to cover the hospital bills.

Related Article: Group B Strep: Silent Disease that Kills One Baby Per Week in the U.K.
Photo: (Photo : Getty images )

A reporter in the Washington DC area called his family to warn them of a looming tornado headed toward their home in the middle of his broadcast.

On Thursday night, NBC Washington Chief Meteorologist Doug Kammerer was on air at about 8:45 PM doing a weather report. When the National Weather Service (NWS) issued the storm warning, he realized that the tornado's path was right over his house.

Calling his family

As per NBC News, Kammerer was reporting about a storm on-air. When he saw the video on track of the storm, he said it was going straight to his house. He then started dialing a cellphone to call his son.

He asked his son if he was at home. He then calmly asked his son to go to the basement as they had a tornado warning. He asked his son and sibling to get down to the basement as soon as possible.

Kenton can be heard on-air responding to his dad, "Right now?"

Kammerer responded that he should get down to the basement right now. He then told him to get down in the basement bedroom and wait for 10 to 15 minutes.

Kammerer resumed his broadcast after hanging up the phone.

He then told the audience he needed to warn his kids because they might be online gaming now and not listening to the news.

A few minutes after he returned to the air, the NWS canceled the tornado warning.

Read Also: DNA-Gel for Skin Treatment of "Butterfly Children" Pending FDA Approval After Promising Trial Results

No damage from the storm

James Morrow, a meteorologist working for NWS headquarters in Silver Spring, watched Kammerer on air.

According to him, the decision to cut in during broadcast and for the meteorologist to ask permission to call while on air is not easy for stations. As a viewer and a scientist who understands the risk of tornadic storms, he said it was heartening to see this type of coverage, NPR reports.

NBC Washington shared the clip Friday morning on its Instagram Page, and viewers had good things to say about Kammerer.

Someone commented that he was so calm. Another person praised him for being a good parent.

Kammerer was glad that no one was hurt in the tornado. He told Today that he noticed that his house was right in the tornado's path when he was zooming on the radar. He said he became concerned as his kids were home alone, and he knew they would not be paying attention to the warning.

AS he was live on air, he was "debating" in his head if he should call them while on TV. He then realized he had to make the call, thinking he had to protect his kids.

He was grateful that no one was injured due to the tornado and that his family was safe.

Related Article: U.K.'s Most Premature Twins Finally Comes Home After 5 Months in the Hospital and Given 0 chance of survival.
Photo: (Photo : Getty images )

Skippy Foods, LLC recalled more than 9,353 cases of Skippy Peanut Butter across 18 states. The company cited concerns during manufacturing that caused steel fragments to end up in peanut butter jars.

Loyal Skippy peanut butter fans are asked to take their time in checking their pantry. The company announced the recall of its peanut butter product on March 30, and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) also posted the announcement on its website on the same day.

According to the FDA, the recall applies to Skippy Reduced Fat Creamy Peanut Butter Spread, Skippy Reduced Fat Chunky Peanut Butter Spread, and Skippy Creamy Peanut Butter Blended With Plant Protein.

Recalled products

Hormel Foods, the owner of the Skippy, said that they are doing the recall as an "abundance of caution" and are issuing the recall to ensure that consumers are aware of the issue at hand. The concern was identified by the manufacturing facility's internal detection system.

The recall involves around 161,692 pounds of Skippy Peanut Butter.

According to the recall notice, the products were shipped to 18 states: Wisconsin, Oklahoma, New York, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Nebraska, North Carolina, Missouri, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Kansas, Indiana, Illinois, Hawaii, Florida, Delaware, Connecticut, and California.

CNN noted the following recalled Skippy products and their details:

SKIPPY Reduced Fat Creamy Peanut Butter, 40oz with "best if used by" dates of MAY 0423 and MAY 0523

SKIPPY Reduced Fat Creamy Peanut Butter - Club, 2/40oz with "best if used by" date of MAY 0523

SKIPPY Reduced Fat Chunky Peanut Butter, 16.3oz with "best if used by" dates of MAY 0623 and MAY 0723

SKIPPY Creamy Peanut Butter Blended with Plant Protein, 14oz with a "best if used by" date of MAY 1023

Read Also: Food Safety Authority Ireland: Rice Milk Should Not Be Given to Kids Below 4.5 Years

According to the FDA, the peanut butter product retailers have been notified. So far, no consumer complaints have been reported, as per WTOP News. No other sizes or varieties of its peanut butter or peanut butter spreads are included in the recall.

The FDA also said that the products being recalled may "contain a small fragment of stainless steel from a piece of manufacturing equipment." However, the recall is categorized as Class II, meaning the "probability of serious adverse health consequences is remote."

What to do if your Skippy product is affected by the recall

Skippy recommends returning to the retailer in exchange for products affected by the recall.

Consumers can also contact Skippy Foods Consumer Engagement at 1-866-475-4779 or visit their website at www.peanutbutter.com for instructions and information. The Consumer Engagement is available from Monday-Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Central Time.

In a statement published on NBC New York, Skippy expressed its apologies to fans for the inconvenience. The company also said that they are committed to product quality, and it will continue to invest in processes to ensure the quality and wholesomeness of the products.

Related Article: Massive Milk Formula Recall Empties Store Shelves in Utah, Mothers Panicking
Photo: (Photo : Manuel Velasquez/Getty Images)

At least two types of Disney-branded hand sanitizers have been ordered for recall by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) after detecting carcinogenic chemicals like benzene and methanol.

FDA tested the products which have specific photos of Baby Yoda from "The Mandalorian" and Mickey Mouse. According to CNN, the company distributing the product was informed of the test results in late February 2022.

The affected lots of Disney-branded sanitizers include 20D21 and 20E21, with an expiration date of June 20 and Sept. 30, 2022. These were manufactured from April to May 2020. The products, which supposedly contain 68 percent ethyl alcohol, are sold in 2.11 fl oz bottles in blue, green, and black.

Read Also: Crib Bumpers Could Soon Become Illegal; Senate Approves Measure to Ban Sleep Product

Benzene and Methanol's Risks

Per the FDA, Best Brands did not manufacture these products but imported them from a third-party producer. Upon learning the items tested for carcinogenic chemicals, the company conducted further investigations to determine which lot had been impacted.

Best Brands confirmed that some of the lots were already pulled out of store shelves as early as April 2021 due to other reasons unrelated to the test results. To date, the company has not had any reports of untoward incidents regarding the use of sanitizers. Nonetheless, they are abiding by the recall and are advising customers to discard the products.

Hand sanitizers help kill microorganisms that may carry risks of illness. During this pandemic, doctors said that hand sanitizers are good for hygiene measures if there is no soap or water readily available.

However, the FDA said that products containing benzene are considered carcinogenic as exposure to this chemical via oral or skin contact and inhalation may lead to risks of developing leukemia or other life-threatening blood disorders. The dangers of benzene in humans have been known to scientists for more than a century.

On the other hand, exposure to methanol has been linked to symptoms like nausea, vomiting, blurred vision, headache, and damage to the central nervous system. Young kids are most at risk of methanol poisoning.

Consumers who may have questions about these Disney-branded hand sanitizers recall may email Quality@BestBrandsintl.com. Best Brands advises the public to visit their healthcare provider if they have experienced medical issues or adverse reactions related to the product. Consumers are also advised to report to the hotline 1- 800-332-1088.

Tennessee Technical Coatings Corp. Hand Sanitizers Also Recalled

In March 2022, Tennessee Technical Coatings Corp. has also voluntarily recalled its Hand Sanitizer Isopropyl Alcohol Antiseptic 75% products from store shelves due to the presence of methanol. The company sells these products in one-gallon containers at various supermarkets and wholesale stores in Tennessee.

Batches of these products included the lots 00422001, 00421002, 00429001, 00622003, 00806001, and 00521001 and were manufactured from April to August 2020, per Local Memphis. The company has also not received any report of adverse reactions but has recalled the items to ensure the safety of consumers.

Related Article: New Jersey Issues Camden Milk Contamination Recall After 40 Preschool Kids Drank Sanitizer
Photo: (Photo : Annice Lyn/Getty Images)

A Las Vegas mother has been sent to jail for child abuse and attempted murder after trying to suffocate her "evil baby" just hours after the home birth.

Ashley Hollingsworth, 23, had her daughter in a relative's home bathroom and appeared not to want the child as she left her on the toilet. However, an aunt and uncle intervened and managed to take the mom and child to the hospital.

However, Hollingsworth tried to suffocate the newborn at least two times on the way to the hospital because she thought her daughter was an "evil baby." Hollingsworth said that her baby reeked of an abnormal scent and sounded like she was grunting at her, per the Daily Mail.

Read Also: Baby Eleanor Easey Case: Dad Who Fed Custard to 14-Week-Old Baby Guilty of Manslaughter

Las Vegas Mom Has Medical Condition

The newborn is Hollingsworth's third child. Her other children are said to be with their father in California. Police records indicated that MountainView Hospital called for assistance after the mother tried to flee.

Two hours later, the police found Hollingsworth, but she was bleeding profusely. While the police determined that these were self-inflicted injuries, Hollingsworth said that someone beat her up with a rock, according to the New York Post.

A Primm woman was arrested Wednesday after authorities accused her of trying to suffocate her newborn.

Ashley Hollingsworth, 23, was booked on one count of child abuse and one count of attempted murder pic.twitter.com/HLEf9BboVL  Truecrimewiththelmaandlouise (@Truecrimewitht2) April 2, 2022

On the other hand, the hospital personnel told the police that Hollingsworth was babbling about the prophecies and "other religious ideations" before she escaped. She also told the cops that "something evil" was inside her stomach, so she had to kill it.

The police then booked the Las Vegas mom for child abuse and attempted murder. Her mugshot showed her with large black eyes and some blood on her head.

The baby's father, and Hollingsworth's current partner, was with the mom and child during the transport to the hospital. He said that she refused to go to the hospital; thus, the baby was born at home. Doctors who examined the baby determined that she suffered some injuries.

Hollingsworth was diagnosed with a medical condition and had an arrest record in 2018. She told the police that she had not taken her medication during her pregnancy. The mother is expected to appear in court in the coming weeks and is in jail without bail.

Las Vegas Dad Whips Son Over TV Row

Meanwhile, a Las Vegas dad has been charged with killing his 5-year-old son because they fought about the TV. Gerald Oglesby, 33, apparently whipped General Sema'j Oglesby with a cellphone charger's electric cord. The father then gave his boy a shower but continued to beat him up with a final blow to his abdomen.

Gerald told the cops that he knew he struck his son too hard with the punch to the stomach after he vomited and then stopped breathing. The police said that the father tried to resuscitate his child and did not call 911 right away. He confessed that he feared getting help because he did not want to lose custody of his son, per The Sun.

The Las Vegas dad said that he had spanked General in the past for answering back to him. Gerald has previous police records of domestic battery.

Related Article: Florida Parents Facing Child Abuse Charges for Locking Adopted Son in Box
Photo: (Photo : EVA MARIE UZCATEGUI/AFP via Getty Images)

Deputies from the Santa Rosa County Sheriff's Office announced on Sunday, April 3, that missing Florida mom Cassie Carli was found dead and buried in a shallow grave in Alabama. They located her body in a barn on Saturday evening, one week after Carli went missing, according to CNN.

Authorities told reporters during the press conference that when the police searched the said barn for Carli, they found signs of a body buried under a patch of dirt that was disrupted. The St. Clair County coroner said that investigators were called in to uncover the Florida mom's body, where they initially identified Carli via a tattoo on her right foot.

The sheriff said police were not yet revealing what led them to the specific location, but they did say that the property was linked to her ex-boyfriend Marcus Spanevelo "in a roundabout way."

Carli last seen on March 27 in Navarre, Florida

Carli was last seen in the parking lot of Juana's Pagodas in Navarre, Florida, on March 27, when she was supposed to pick up her daughter Saylor from Spanevelo during a scheduled custody exchange.

Authorities discovered Carli's vehicle in that same parking lot, but she was still missing with her purse left behind in the car. Sheriff Bob Johnson issued a statement during a press conference earlier in the week, saying that there were things in Carli's purse that they didn't think she would just up and leave.

Johnson added that the police are concerned because people don't usually go four days without anyone hearing from them or not using their credit cards or cell phones. Both Saylor and Spanevelo were found the following day in Birmingham, Alabama, with the young child returned to her mother's family.

Spanevelo was arrested several days later in Tennessee on charges of giving false information concerning a missing person investigation, destruction of evidence, and tampering with evidence.

The family of Carli told WFLA Now's JB Biunno in an interview on Friday that she was concerned about her former partner as they worked through custody problems. Cassie's brother, Anthony Carli, said that she has been telling him that Spanevelo has been threatening her for the last two years. Anthony added that Cassie always said that if anything happens to her, it's him.

Read Also: Covid-19 Pandemic Worsens Mental Health Crisis For High School Students in the United States

Autopsy of Carli's body to take place on Monday

Deputies announced during the press conference that an autopsy of Carli's body is scheduled to take place in Huntsville, Alabama, on Monday, where her cause of death is expected to be determined. Depending on the finding of the autopsy, Spanevelo could face additional charges.

Penn Live reported that Johnson wants Spanevelo to pay for what he has done, saying, "Once the autopsy is done and you see the charges filed you'll understand. I think [Spanevelo] is going to spend the rest of his life in prison or he's going to get the needle. Hopefully the needle."

Related Article: CDC Data Shows Kids Ages 5 to 11 Are The Least Vaccinated Against COVID-19 in The United States
Photo: (Photo : Getty images )

Consumer groups are warning parents and families of the dangers of Pop It toys following an incident wherein a tiny piece of the toy was embedded in the gum of a toddler.

The incident was posted on Facebook by CPR Kids, a group of pediatric registered nurses that provides information, classes, and sessions on child safety. CPR Kids posted a warning about the dangers of the poorly made toy; after a mother and a toddler's aunt contacted them about it. The bubbles easily pop out of the toy and can be easily mistaken for candy. It could embed in kids' gums when eaten, making it a choking hazard.

Choking Hazard

According to Honey9, a woman named Kendall posted that she noticed a bit of pink in her nephew's mouth while holding him. Upon further investigation, she found out it was a gumball. Her sister, the child's mother, realized it was rubber, so she pulled at it. The toy somehow broke off and got stuck in the boy's top gums.

She added it was fortunate the toy got suctioned in his teeth and did not choke his nephew. She warned others that the toy had a faulty part as a piece must have broken off and fallen on the floor, and her nephew must have gotten it. She clarified that her nephew is not allowed to play with it.

She warned those who also have the same toy in their house to check and ensure that it is of good quality. They brought the toy made of very flimsy rubber from a mall kiosk.

The tiny bubbles resemble a candy-like gumball or a Smartie, and a toddler could have easily mistaken it for food. Kendall's sister urged everyone to share their story to prevent any untoward incident.

Read Also: Parental Warning: Skippy Foods Recalls 9,000 Cases of Skippy Peanut Butter

Pop It Toy

Pop It toys are popular "fidget toys" designed to help those with sensory conditions such as autism and ADHD. The toy is popular with children as it features bubbles of silicon that can be popped in and out. The expensive version is found online in toy shops, but the cheaper versions have flooded the market.

According to a report in Chicago Times, consumer advocates were concerned about the mass production of Pop It toys by counterfeiters, especially during the Christmas season.

While the original toy is silicone and features proper label warnings and age recommendations, the counterfeit versions are of poorer quality and have none of the said warnings.

According to Abe Scarr, the Public Interest Research Group in Illinois, as counterfeiters have replicated the product, it can be confusing for consumers to know which are sold by reputable sellers whose products have undergone safety testing.

Scarr also reported that in reviews of products sold at Amazon, there were reports of bubbles breaking within the first day of children playing with it, making it a choking hazard for kids.

Related Article: Meteorologist Dad Calls His Family on Air to Warn About Looming Tornado
Photo: (Photo : ABDULAZIZ KETAZ/AFP via Getty Images)

An Oklahoma County District Attorney's Office has declined to file charges of child neglect against the family of J.J. Rodriguez, the toddler mauled by their neighbors' dogs in the city of Spencer.

According to the Oklahoma County Sheriff's Office, J.J. was reportedly playing with his sisters in their front yard when he walked into the unfenced backyard of their neighbor's home. The Sheriff's Office added that the neighbor opened the door, and the Pitbulls escaped.

Jose Rodriguez, J.J.'s father, disputed those claims, telling KFOR in a message that he watched his son being dragged off their lawn with his own two eyes. Rodriguez is adamant that his neighbor's dogs dragged J.J. into their property.

J.J. Rodriguez suffers significant injuries after dog mauling

J.J.'s parents claimed more than one dog attacked their son, a mauling which left the young boy in critical condition. The violent attack left J.J. with significant injuries, including his eyes being dislocated, his jaws broken into several different places, and his nose bitten off.

Jose still cannot forget the hardships his son faced because of his neighbor's dogs, saying, "I'm the one that went out there and fought the dogs off of them. I'm trying to protect him and just the feeling of, you know, lifting my son's body off the ground and then trying to keep him alive. I have nightmares all the time."

With J.J. fighting for his life in the hospital, the family got another unexpected problem when the sheriff's office launched an investigation regarding claims they left the young boy unattended and could face child neglect charges.

After hearing Sheriff Tommie Johnson's announcement that they could face charges, J.J. Rodriguez's family fired back through their attorney. Their lawyer told KOCO that J.J.'s recovery is where their focus needs to be right now.

Fortunately for the Rodriguez family, Oklahoma County DA David Prater decided not to file any charges against J.J.'s mom and dad. Jose still regrets the whole incident, saying he wished he could have gone out there a little quicker to save his son.

Read Also: Baby Eleanor Easey Case: Dad Who Fed Custard to 14-Week-Old Baby Guilty of Manslaughter

J.J., now known as the indestructible baby

The concerned father said that it was literally just seconds, but all that damage was done in those seconds and that his son is never going to know what normal is as a result. J.J. is now affectionately called the indestructible baby for how he survived the dog mauling.

Jose said J.J. is proving that he is more than resilient. Cassandra Rodriguez echoed that sentiment, saying, "I taught him how to crawl and walk before, I could do it again. That's just what I'll do. He's my strength."

There is good news regarding J.J.'s condition, with the latest medical update stating that he had his stitches removed from his face and could now see out of one of his eyes. A GoFundMe page has been set up for J.J. to help the Rodriguez family with their medical bills.

Related Article: Chinese Man Arrested After Being Caught Using Identity of 7-year-old in Fake Philippine Passport
A humanitarian hub has been set up at London Luton Airport in the UK to provide practical support for air passengers arriving from Ukraine.

At the hub, the arrivals are given a range of contact numbers for local and national agencies. Alongside this, refreshments are provided while advisors give guidance for onward travel within the UK. The Ukrainian flag is on display in the hubs reception area, along with artwork designed by Lutons Surrey Street Primary, Cardinal Newman Catholic and Queen Elizabeth schools.

') } else { console.log ('nompuad'); document.write(' ') } // --> ') } else if (width >= 425) { console.log ('largescreen'); document.write('') } else { console.log ('nompuad'); document.write('') } // -->

Arrivals are greeted by volunteers from the Bedfordshire and Luton Emergency Volunteers Executive Committee, the British Red Cross and the Airport Chaplaincy. Paramedics from the Hearts First Ambulance Service provide mental and physical health support information.

The hub has been organized by statutory body Bedfordshires Local Resilience Forum, which brings together partners such as local authorities, NHS clinical commissioning groups, emergency services, the charity and voluntary sector and the airport. It is intended to provide a warm welcome to those uprooted from their homeland.

Amanda Carcary, senior emergency response officer for the British Red Cross in Bedfordshire, said, Kindness is so vital when people arrive in the UK after an experience like this, which is why our teams are trained to give emotional support as well as help people with practical things. We know that people are leaving family behind in Ukraine and enduring long, cold journeys to get to safety, so we are here to offer them a warm welcome. We have Ukrainian-language welcome packs with key information about life in the UK.

Councilor Aslam Khan, deputy leader of Luton Council, said, In a short space of time, many different organizations have come together and been working around the clock to provide a warm welcome and practical support to those whose lives have been violently disrupted by the Russian invasion of their country. As it did when establishing a testing site during the Covid pandemic, London Luton Airport has underlined its role as our community airport by hosting this vital point of refuge.

Alberto Martin, CEO of London Luton Airport, said, As an international airport, we help to connect cultures, places and people, so it has been heartbreaking to witness events unfold in Ukraine. We are proud of the support we provide to our communities and are glad we can play a small part in ensuring a warm welcome to Ukrainian families as they arrive in the UK.
If youre looking for a high refresh rate monitor, today is your lucky day. Amazon is selling the Samsung Odyssey G5 27-inch 1440p high refresh rate monitor for $250. The usual price fluctuates between $100 to $200 more than todays sale price.

This monitor features a 165Hz refresh rate. Its also packing FreeSync, which reduces stutter and helps keep those frames buttery smooth. To get the maximum refresh rate with FreeSync, you need to use the DisplayPort, as HDMI tops out at 144Hz.

Samsung also says this monitor has HDR10. However, for true high dynamic range, which allows for a greater range of colors on a display, you need at least 1,000 nits of brightness. The Odyssey taps out at 350. Its also an ultra-wide monitor, which means the aspect ratio is 21:9 and not the usual 16:9. This may take some getting used to, but it should provide a more immersive experience.

This a nice little monitor well worth considering.

[Todays deal: 27-inch Samsung Odyssey G5 monitor for $250 at Amazon.]
Filipinos cannot endure 6 more years of impunity: Pangilinan

VICE-PRESIDENTIAL aspirant Francis "Kiko" Pangilinan on Monday said that Filipinos cannot endure six more years of a Duterte-like administration, which is marked by corruption, abuse of power, and impunity.

Speaking via zoom during the Solid Leni-Kiko Global townhall meeting, Pangilinan said he set aside his own senatorial re-election plans and teamed up with Vice President Leni Robredo "because our country cannot afford another six years of this kind of administration, of corruption, of abuse, of impunity, (and) of non-accountability."

"We cannot afford Pharmally-like corruption scandals," he added.

Both Pangilinan and Robredo are not members of political dynasties or political families.

"We are doing this for our children. We are fighting for a better future for them," he said.

Describing the last five years and one-half of being the prime targets of President Duterte's baseless tirades, Pangilinan said "it has been a very difficult, lonely battle."

"Lalo na sa amin sa opposition, walang katapusan ang paninira, pang-iinsulto, death threats ... Talagang lahat na ng kahayupan ay tinanggap namin," Pangilinan said.

He said even his family members were targets of vile attacks. "Pati si Frankie and Sharon ay tino-troll. May rape threats, may death threats," he said.

Pangilinan, in describing the political track record of Robredo, said "I felt the most qualified really from Day One is Vice President Leni after she showed her record of service as vice president."

"Talagang sterling, spotless, sincere, and really dedicated. Lalo na noong Covid19 (response)," he said.

Pangilinan said Robredo is "the most deserving, the most qualified, and she is the candidate that the country needs. And the president that the country needs."

Recalling his experiences while campaigning in different parts of the country, Pangilinan said "ang akala namin ni Vice President Leni kapag nagpasya kaming tumakbo ay malungkot pa rin. Mahirap pa rin. Iilan lang kami."

"But kabaligtaran ang nangyari. Na-sorpresa nga kami. Hindi namin inaasahan iyong dagsa ng supporta. Nakakainspire talaga," he said.
     60%         
Absa Group today announced the appointment of Arrie Rautenbach as Chief Executive Officer (CEO), effective immediately.



The appointment follows a thorough recruitment and selection process completed by the Board.



Arrie, who is currently Chief Executive of the Groups retail and business banking (RBB) unit, is the first internally appointed CEO since 2006. He has more than 25 years banking experience, which includes serving as the Groups Chief Risk Officer, simultaneously providing executive leadership for the Group Separation Programme and Group Strategy Office. His extensive experience in the banking sector, his in-depth knowledge of Absa through several executive roles over the years, and his experience and strengths in strategy development and execution for the group, positions him ideally to lead the Group at this time.



Previous Absa roles include Chief Executive of Retail Banking, Managing Executive of Absa Card Division and Managing Executive of Distribution. He began his career with Absa Group at Bankfin in the late 1990s.



Interim CEO Jason Quinn will resume his position as Group Financial Director with immediate effect.



Wendy Lucas-Bull, outgoing Absa Group Chairman, said: On behalf of the Board, I am delighted to announce the appointment of Arrie as our Group CEO. I am confident that his leadership will provide the continuity and stability necessary to consolidate our purpose and strategy. I know that the Group is in good hands under Arries executive leadership as I hand over the reins of the Board Chairmanship to Sello, who takes over on 1 April 2022. I would like to thank Jason and Punki for their significant contributions as Interim Group CEO and Interim Financial Director, respectively, during which time the Groups positive operational momentum was maintained. I am pleased to be handing over the Chairmanship to Sello, with the Group in very good shape, having delivered record results for 2021 and with strong capital and liquidity ratios.



Sello Moloko, Absa Group Chairman Designate, said: "Arries appointment will anchor our performance and growth, as we consolidate our position as a leading financial services provider on the continent. Arrie is aligned with the Board on our organisational imperatives, including talent management and transformation. The Board looks forward to working with Arrie and the executive to ensure a Pan-African financial services Group that creates sustainable value for all its stakeholders. Furthermore, I look forward to continuing to work with Jason and Punki and thank them and the Exco for such strong delivery over the last year, which has placed the Group on a solid footing for the future.



Arrie Rautenbach, Absa Group CEO, said: "I am humbled and honoured to lead Absa during challenging conditions locally and internationally. I am excited at the prospect of working with a talented and diverse team, leading an outstanding business that is positioned to seize the many opportunities that lie ahead. I look forward to working with the Board and the Executive in consolidating our strategy and performance, driving organisational and cultural transformation, and delivering financial and social value for all our stakeholders, and sustainable future growth and returns for Absa and its shareholders."



Punki Modise will step down as Interim FD of Absa Group and Absa Bank and as an executive director of the Boards, with immediate effect. She will take the position of Interim Chief Executive: RBB and remains on the Group Executive Committee (Exco).

Source: Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
The Ghana Education Service (GES) has cautioned the general public, particularly parents, guardians and their school children, to beware of the tricks of persons exploiting the Computerized School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS).



Speaking in an interview with Kwami Sefa Kayi on Peace FM's 'Kokrokoo' programme Monday morning, the GES Director-General, Prof. Kwasi Opoku Amankwa noted that some unscrupulous persons have developed websites which they are using to dupe students into thinking they are going to be placed in their schools of choice.



He added that there are others who are giving the parents and their children false hope and taking monies from them.



According to the GES Director-General, all these are fraudulent schemes used by some persons to woo innocent people.



He emphatically stated that, "we have made it clear that no one has to pay before it's done'' and admonished the public to report any person or entity that demands money or uses any website aside the recommended website indicating they are going to place their wards in a Senior High School(SHS)/Senior High Technical Schools (SHTS) to the Police for their immediate arrest.





Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
Muslims across the country have commenced this years Ramadan today April 3, 2022.



The National Chief Imam, Sheikh Osmanu Nuhu Sharubutu made the announcement on the recommendation by the Muslim Hilal Conference.



The Muslim Hilal Conference is responsible for advising the National Chief Imam and for that matter Muslims in Ghana on Ramadan moon issues.



The Conference advises when Muslims across the country must start and end Ramadan, with the National Chief Imam as the Leader of the Conference.



Hilal Conference is made up of all the Regional Chief Imams, Zongo Chiefs, and representatives from all the Muslim sectors.



Having waited for information to trickle from all the 16 regions of the country, no information in respect to the sighting of the moon has been received. The Chief Imam now uses his position, and in accordance with our jurisprudence recommends to all Muslims in the country to complete the days of Shaban in 30 days and begin Ramadan on Sunday.



What it means is that Sunday, the 3rd of April becomes the first day of Ramadan 2022, the National Chief Imams spokesperson, Sheikh Armiyawo Shaibu disclosed.



The elderly, people who are travelling, pregnant women, people who are suffering from some form of chronic illness as well as children are exempted from fasting but in place of fasting they are required to feed the hungry.

Source: Ghanaweb.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
Lawyer, Martin Kpebu, has stated that the unexplained wealth of public officials immediately they assume power must be probed.



He calls for the implementation of a law that requires that they account for properties or wealth they acquire when they come into office.



The lawyer wants the automatic implementation of Article 286 (4) of the 1992 Constitution to help check corruption in the country.



That is the heart of the matter that is the one we need to implement, unexplained wealth. Somebody comes into office and then overnight hes building properties left, right, centre, by the time hes leaving hes amassed so much wealth.



That is what we need to implement; that there will be a law to implement the 286, Clause 4 that, at the time youre leaving office, you appear before CHRAJ automatically and explain all your wealth, he said.



Continuing he stated that, the implementation of Article 286 (4) in a manner that it is activated automatically at the end of a public officers term of office, would be most beneficial to the anti-graft campaign.



Martin Kpebu said, when this law was implemented under President Kwame Nkrumah, it resulted in the accountability of public officials and Ministers thus should be adopted again.



And then were saying that in our history when the Jiagge Commission sat, and history shows that people used to send evidence to the Commission in the night, theyll go and push it under the doors, so the next morning by the time the commissioners and staff came, they would find envelopes that contain evidence that Mr. X upon becoming Minister built this house, bought this fresh car Bugatti, Lamborghini, you name them, and so investigate, he said.



He however adds that, for the law to be highly effective Ghanaians should be able to boldly report corrupt officials and activities.



You remember that the last time CDD, the last time I read something about this corruption fight, they said at least 8 out of 10 Ghanaians are scared of reporting corruption and other malfeasances against public officers.



Most of our population are scared of reporting, so the only method or the more viable way of fighting corruption is that have a standing committee then people can send evidence surreptitiously, he said.

Source: Ghanaweb.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
Old Mutual Ghana, led by the Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Tavona Biza, has paid a courtesy call on the South African High Commissioner to Ghana, Her Excellency Grace Jeanet Mason.



Mr. Biza, who was accompanied by the Head of Marketing and Customer Experience at Old Mutual Ghana, Rita Adu Boateng, said the meeting served as an opportunity to discuss ways to deepen collaborations and investment opportunities between businesses in Ghana and South Africa.



"We have been operating in Ghana for over nine years, but as a business birthed in South Africa about 176 years ago, it is always important for us to meet and collaborate with the high commissioners office and also seek their perspective on where they are seeing growth opportunities and how we can tap into these opportunities.



This meeting is, therefore, for us to work more and a bit closer together. Also, as a responsible business doing great things within the Ghanaian market, we both have the intention of adding value to Ghana, "he added.

Mr. Biza touched on some major investments made by Old Mutual, such as the Onix Accra 1.



He explained this investment as proof of the companys commitment to Africa. Old Mutual, together with Onix, acquired Ghanas Tier IV facility as the first and only tier 4 collocation carrier-neutral data center in West Africa. It is also expected to be the largest operational data center in Ghana, providing physical space, power, cooling, connectivity, and security to customers.



On her part, the South African High Commissioner, Her Excellency Grace Jeanet Mason, stressed that the purpose of the meeting was to look at further collaborations and also offer assistance to South African institutions and businesses in Ghana through investor aftercare, as well as ensure economic recovery post-COVID-19 recovery of the two economies.



"This is part of the ongoing collaboration we have with our South African partners to ensure more investment comes into Ghana and also for the mutual benefit of both countries and their economies," she said. She also stressed that her High Commission supports South African investors through post-investment support to ensure that investment projects are sustainable and profitable.



She commended Old Mutual for its consistent hard work in ensuring that people are always living in confidence through their numerous insurance policies. "Insurance companies are critical to any economys growth and development. The fact that Old Mutual Ghana has been in existence for over a century is great proof of the many opportunities the company provides in insurance and pensions. "



Her Excellency Mason, touching on the companys acquired asset, the Onix Data Center in Accra, gave the assurance that this was part of Old Mutuals $25 million investment in Ghana and would be officially unveiled before the end of the second quarter of 2022. The Data Center is partly powered by solar energy, which helps to reduce its carbon footprint in its immediate locality as well as contribute to the exponential growth of Africas digital economy.

Source: Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has inaugurated twelve (12) joint venture production companies under the Defence Industries Holding Company Limited (DIHOC) of the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF), with a call on the business community to venture more into such collaborations with the armed forces.



Interesting, and it is very important, these are all joint venture entities formed between private companies and the Ghana Armed Forces. Therefore, this development presents a beautiful synergy between the efficiencies availed by the private sector and the institutional discipline and diligence availed by the armed forces in driving the industrialisation strategy of the government, he stressed.



According to him, such collaborations between the private sector and the army will help to develop a diversity of production value-chain that will mutually benefit both the civilians and the military.



The event also witnessed the commissioning of several construction equipments provided by the Jospong Group of Companies (JGC) as its role in the joint venture company.



The construction equipment will enable the various field engineers of the GAF to undertake various construction works. These include roads and buildings and to also manage and maintain the fleet of JGC.



Dr. Bawumia made the call while speaking at the inauguration of 12 new joint venture companies under DIHOC, and the commissioning of construction ceremony on Monday, April 4, 2022, at the Burma, Accra.



Among the 12 entities are DIHOC Footwear Division, DIHOC Primesec Ghana Ltd., Defence Electronic Technology Limited, DIHOC Blackswan International Ltd., DIHOC MacDan Logistics Solutions Ltd., 360 Defence Builders Ghana Ltd., DIHOC Energy West Ghana Limited, DIHOC Denzel Ghana Limited and others.



He noted that though the GAF have had DIHOC, this entity has not been leveraged significantly to catalyst the industrlisation of our country until now.



This state of affairs in the GAF, he indicated, were among the reasons the Akufo-Addo administration instituted the flagship programme One District One Factory in the clarion call for a Ghana Beyond Aid.



He said the creation of such an industrial complex has the potential of creating 1,5000 direct jobs, hence described as amazing the over a billion dollars investment portfolio being provided by the private sector under the partnership.



The vice president hinted that there were ongoing arrangements to increase the number of companies under the industrial complex including the development of a 20,000-acre land into a cattle ranch and other agro-businesses, among other businesses.



He, therefore, assured the companies of the governments support to ensure that they thrive to become the bedrock of a defence industrial complex that will not only serve the security and defence needs of Ghana and Africa but also countries across the world.



While applauding the GAF for their continuous efforts to preserve Ghanas territorial integrity and the general peace across, Dr. Bawumia pointed out that the current system of armaments acquisition through purchase agreements have been best with several challenges



The Ghana Armed Forces and all other security establishments in the country have depended mainly on the import of security hardware and equipment for their operations. Armaments such as armoured vehicles, weapons, ammunition, and communication systems are all procured from external entities, mostly through sale and purchase agreements. This structure of armaments acquisition through purchase agreements raises several challenges that continue to undermine the efficiency of the GAF, he said.



Additionally, he indicated that most of the foreign suppliers do not have a local logistics support in Ghana to help maintain these very expensive and sophiscated armaments.

Consequently, the maintenance and support required for these defence and security assets effectiveness are not readily available.



Consequently, Dr. Bawumia said the maintenance and logistical support for these assets usually come with huge costs to the government even in cases where these ammunitions are donations from other countries.



Again, he said these challenges also shorten the life spans of these assets and reduce optimum functioning during use in some instances.



Also there is little skill transfer and no technology transfer in such sales and purchase arrangements with foreign suppliers, the vice president bemoaned.



Dr. Bawumia used the occasion to commission several construction equipments provided by the Jospong Group of Companies (JGC). He also performed a sod-cutting ceremony for the construction of a medical facility for the GAF.



The Director of Legal, GAF, General Benjamin Amoah Boakye, said the GAF have had a very good relationship the JGC for the past years.



He said the fleet on construction equipment provided by JGC will enable the 48 and 49 Field Engineers of the GAF to embark on various construction works



The event was attended by the Chief of Staff, Honourable Akosua Frema Osei Opare, Deputy Minister of Defence, Hon. Kofi Amankwa Manu, military chiefs, and captains of industry.

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 has been called upon to revisit its partnership agreement under the Education Ordinance of 1852 to support the missions with grants to run their educational institutions.



Reverend Monica A. Achana, the Upper West Regional Manager of the Methodist Education Unit, who made the call in Wa, observed that though there were mission schools, the Government was not providing any support for their effective operation.



It is a fact that religious bodies cannot be sidelined if we want quality education delivery in the country, she said during the Methodist Education Week celebration in Wa at the weekend.



Rev. Achana called for effective teamwork and cooperation among stakeholders in the education sector if the desired results were to be achieved.



The Methodist Education Week is an annual event of the Methodist Church of Ghana to create awareness on its active role in quality education delivery for the people of Ghana.



It was also to appreciate the support of parents, teachers and other stakeholders of the Church in providing holistic education with high moral standards for children in the country.



Quiz competitions and games among the students as well as clean-up exercises at the Wa Naas Palace were some of the activities that marked the week-long celebration.



Rev. Achana explained that apart from the preaching of the gospel of salvation, the Church also deemed it necessary to provide formal education to the people, hence the establishment of educational institutions in the country.



She indicated that the poor collaboration between the Directors of Education and the Mission Education Unit Managers had made the work of the managers very difficult, leading to poor performances of the school children.



The work done by directors is not the same as that of the unit managers. We call on the Government to strengthen the partnership so that we can boast of our education as it used to be, she said.









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
Staff and students of the Ningo Senior High School (SHS) are bearing the brunt of a 45-minute rainstorm that hit the Ningo-Prampram area in the Greater Accra Region, ripping some of the roofs of the school building.



The Schools Computer Laboratory and the Staff Common Room were among the structures affected by the storm on Friday.



Rainwater, as a result, entered the desktop computers and the internet rack, as well as soaked the exercise books and files of students.



The Ghana News Agency, during a visit to the School's premises, gathered that even though the school was in session at the time of the rainstorm, which occurred around 1300 hours, no injuries or casualties were recorded.



Mr Michael Tetteh Eku, the Ningo-Prampram District Director, National Disaster Management Organisation, told the GNA that a team had visited the school to assess the extent of the damage.



He said he would review a report from the team to decide on the best interventions for the school.



In a piece of advice to residents, he said people living in structures with signs of weakness should endeavour to reinforce them to ensure their safety during the rainy season.



Meanwhile, some concerned residents have blamed the effect of the rainstorm on the school on the cutting of a big Mahogany tree in front of the three-storey building, which housed the Computer Lab and Head Teachers Office, serving as a windbreak.







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
TrueCare Ghana a non-Government Organization (NGO) has presented a cheque of Twenty Seven Thousand Six Hundred Cedis (GH 27,608.00) to Focus Orthopedic Hospital to enable a 3-year-old boy Master Adom Jedia who is suffering from a tight hamstring to undergo surgery.



Adom Jedia has been incapacitated by the sickness for the past three years and needed the aforementioned amount to enable him to undergo the surgery.



Madam Rachael Ofori, the mother of Adom Jedia as a single mother said all efforts to raise funds for her son's surgery have proved futile.



She stated that her son's health keeps getting worse for a lack of financial assistance to save his life.



Barely two months now, I was introduced to TrueCare Ghana to seek their support to help address the plight of my son and to my surprise, they have not disappointed me. And to my greatest surprise, they have been able to raise the required fund needed for the surgery.



"All I can say now is that may God richly bless them for their intervention," she exclaimed, her face beaming.



Delivering the cheque to the hospital, the Executive Director of TrueCare Ghana, Saint Ofosu Koranteng disclosed that over the years the NGO has taken an active interest in facilitating funds to assist patients who cannot afford their surgical bills.



When you take a closer look at the National Health Insurance Scheme, there are many restrictions and limitations to the beneficiaries such that, certain areas are not being covered especially when it comes to surgeries.



"In this regard, we are stepping in as an NGO to complement the governments effort to help address the plight of the vulnerable in the country."



Stressing that, TrueCareGhana is currently focused on addressing issues related to health, community development, and disaster relief.



Adding that, the foundation will continue to support the government in diverse ways in order to help address the plight of the vulnerable in society.



The Administrator at Focus Orthopedic Hospital Mrs. Vivian Quashie-Kumasa who received the cheque on behalf of the hospital applauded TrueCare Ghana for their swift intervention.



She also used the occasion to appeal to other corporate organizations, philanthropists, and well-meaning individuals in the country to emulate the gesture and come to the aid of individuals facing similar challenges.















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
Parliament on Friday continued with the debate on President Akufo-Addos message on the State of the Nation Address (SONA) he presented to the House on March 30, 2022.



While contributions from the Majority Caucus lauded the President and his government for the strong and bold leadership in transforming the economy, the Minority side accused the government of failing to protect Ghanaians from the current economic hardships.



Mr Moses Anim, Deputy Minister for Fisheries and Aquaculture who took his turn on the floor praised President Akufo-Addo for his transformational leadership which salvaged the economy from its doldrums when assuming office in 2017.



He said despite the huge economic challenges that the President inherited he did not resign himself to complaining but worked to fix the economic difficulties.



Mr Speaker at the end of 2019 we all knew the status of the economy that the President had brought from the worst situation at end of 2016 to the end of 2019, he said.



Mr Anim also stated that as a result of the pragmatic measures taken by government the economy at the end of 2019 grew on average by seven percent, reducing the fiscal deficit to 4.5 percent and the banks which were in difficulty saw some appreciable growth.



He said the government was able to roll out its Free Senior School (SHS) policy in addition to providing teacher trainee and nursing allowance among others because the economy was effectively managed by the government and resilient to accommodate the new programmes.



Mr Speaker before the COVID struck, we were being touted by the IMF and the World Bank and that where Ghana is now is about to leapfrog he added.



However, Mr Kwabina Mintah Akandor, Ranking Member on Health in his contribution accused the President of providing wrong figures in terms of the COVID expenditures to the House.



He said President informed the House that GH17.7 billion has been spent to contain the pandemic up till 2022 but disputed the claim saying records from the 2021 and 2022 budgets show that GH20.7 was spent on COVID.



He said, Mr Speaker, with all these expenditures we could not even install simple equipment at the Kotoka International Airport to do antigen testas I speak to you now, there are frontline health workers that we are still owing in this country.



Mr Akandor also alleged that for the past two months the service providers of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) have threatened to withdraw their services if monies owed them are not paid.



He said citizens are complaining that anytime they go to these facilities they are made to pay money and buy their own drugs even though they are carrying the NHIS card.



Mr Speaker, the NHIS is the main health finance scheme in the country and the President did not touch on it, I now understand why he did not touch on it he added.

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
A member of the legal team of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Abraham Amaliba has said that the signing of the e-levy bill into law by President Nana Addo Danklwa Akufo-Addo does not affect the case against the approval in court.



Mr Amaliba said on the Key Points on TV3 Saturday, April 2 with host Dzifa Bampoh that the signing of the bill does not affect the case at the Supreme Court, he said.



The issue is still on the front burner.



Mr Amaliba earlier accused Mr Akufo-Addo of engaging in recklessness following the signing of the e-levy bill.



He said Mr Akufo-Addo was fully aware of the suit filed against the approval of the e-levy by the Minority yet, he went ahead to sign the bill, a situation Mr Amaliba said is putting undue pressure on the Supreme Court.



Speaking on the New Day show on TV3 on Friday April 1, he said The action of the President has put undue pressure on the justices of the Supreme Court. He was reckless in doing that because he was aware there is a case in the Supreme Court. His act is not illegal but his action, is it desirable?



He is going to put undue pressure on the judges.



For his part, the Governments Spokesperson on Governance and Security, Palgrave Boakye Danquah, said the signing of the e-levy bill was not appropriate because there was no injunction on it.



President Akufo-Addo on Thursday, March 31 assented to the Electronic Transaction Levy (e-levy) bill into law on Thursday, March 31.



The policy was approved by a one-sided Parliament on Tuesday, March 29 after the minority staged a walkout.



Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta revealed on Wednesday, March 30 that deductions will start in May this year.



He said that is the assurance he has been given by the Controller and Accountant General (CAGD) and the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), who will be the revenue collectors.



We had some meetings with Controller and Accountant Generals Department (CAGD) and the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) and they have said right at the beginning of May they should be able to put their system together, he told TV3s Roland Walker in Parliament after President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo delivered the State of the Nation Address.



The signing comes at a time the Minority has sued the Attorney General at the Supreme Court over the approval of the bill by the House.



Speaking on the New Day show Mr Boakye Danquah said [the signing] is not a rush. Once parliament has approved a bill the final stage is for the president to assent to the bill.



He added Persons who have a contrary view in terms of the interpretation of the law will go to the supreme court. The Minoritys case has just been filed, there is no injunction.



He further indicated that Parliament had the required number of lawmakers present in the House when the bill was approved on Tuesday, March 29.



We had the quorum, if we didnt have the quorum, two-thirds, there is no way the Speaker of Parliament Alban Bagbin would have allowed that to happen, he said.

Source: 3news









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
Veteran lawyer and politician, Alhaji Mohammed Mumuni, has recounted how former President Jerry John Rawlings played a role in him switching camp from the Convention Peoples Party (CPP) to the National Democratic Congress (NDC).



According to him, he has always been an Nkrumahist and believed in the ideologies of Ghanas first President, Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah.



I have always been an Nkrumahist and I believe in Kwame Nkrumahs ideals. At the very beginning, they tried to get me into the NDC but I resisted because I had my elders back home, I cannot come to Accra and pick a party and go home. I told them I had to go home and listen to my elders. When I came home and listened to my people; the likes of Lawyer Ibrahim Mahama and others they say no we are CPP and we are not going to go with any other party, he revealed in an interview with Motion TV monitored by MyNewsGh.com.



The former Foreign Affairs Minister disclosed that he later became the parliamentary candidate for the Peoples Heritage Party (PHP) for the Kumbungu Constituency.



Alongside the opposition NPP, we boycotted the parliamentary elections after the presidential elections. So I remained in the opposition and I became the Chairman of the Convention Peoples Party (CPP). That time it was not Convention Peoples Party because that time they actually refused we should not use the name Convention Peoples Party so we made it the Peoples Convention Party (PCP) so I was the Regional Chairman. In course of time, I was enticed, I believe I was motivated to join the NDC, he revealed.



Asked who led the motivation he said Some of my friends talked to me and said look you are a good material and wasting your time elsewhere why dont you come to join us but resisted. Finally, Jerry John Rawlings came to Tamale and sent for me at the Airforce Base in Tamale so I went to him and he said, young man what are you doing? He said we need youcant you see we have a development agenda? We are concerned about development

Source: Ghanaweb.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 Member of Parliament(MP) for Banda constituency, Ahmed Ibrahim, has disclosed what the Minority had to do just to shore up their numbers to stop the passage of the Electronic Transfer Levy Bill.



According to him, their action was necessary because both sides of the House had to rally their numbers to ensure that they push forward their interests.



He was debunking claims that the Minority's opposition and subsequent walk-out during the passage of the bill was a ruse. There were reports that behind the scenes, the Minority had come to an agreement with the Majority.



However, speaking in an interview on Neat FM's "Me Man Nti" programme, the Banda MP, who is also the Deputy Minority Chief Whip, disclosed that they even had to bring in an NDC MP who was indisposed.



"To be able to mobilise people in this Parliament within 14 hours is not simple. The honourable Member for Akatsi South, Bernard Ahiafor was in Amsterdam, we airlifted him. The honourable member for Jomoro, Dorcas Toffey was in Takoradi, we brought her. The honourable Sukparu (Mohammed Adams Sukparu) who was indisposed, we wheeled him in."



He further disclosed that the Ketu North MP, James Klutse Avedzi was "to go to South Africa we stopped him. The honourable Haruna Iddrisu was to deliver a lecture at the Dubai expo 2022; invited by the Dubai government, he forfeited it."



According to him, "we did all of this because we didnt know if they wanted to bring it (e-levy) or they wont, and so to accuse us of being in bed with the Majority after all these sacrifices, I think we are beyond that."



President Nana Akufo-Addo, has meanwhile, signed into law the E-levy Act; two days after the bill was passed by parliament amidst Minority walkout.







In a related development, the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu, and his colleagues Mahama Ayariga and Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, have dragged the Attorney-General to the Supreme Court over the approval of the Electronic Transactions Levy (E-Levy).They contend that Parliament did not have the required number of at least half of its members present, when the controversial tax policy was approved.Last Tuesday, the House approved the policy without the participation of National Democratic Congress (NDC) MPs.The Tamale South MP and his colleagues want the Supreme Court to declare that the said approval was contrary to law.They are seeking the following reliefs;a. A declaration that on the authority of the Supreme Court case of Justice Abdulai v. Attorney-General, Writ No. J1/07/2022 dated 9th March, 2022, the constitutional quorum number for decision-making and voting within the meaning of Article 104(1) of the 1992 Constitution is 138 Members of Parliament out of the 275 Members of Parliament and not 137 Members of Parliament.b. A declaration that on a true and proper interpretation of articles 2(1)(b) and 104(1) of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana, there was no quorum to enable the 137 Members of Parliament of the Majority Caucus present in Parliament on 29th March, 2022 to pass the Electronic Transactions Levy (E-Levy).c. A declaration that on a true and proper interpretation of Article 104(1) of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana, the passing of the Electronic Transactions Levy (E-Levy) by the 137 Members of Parliament of the Majority Caucus present in Parliament on the 29th March 2022 without the requisite quorum number of 138 Members of Parliament present in Parliament, is null and void and of no legal effect.d. An order of the Honourable Court setting aside the passing of the Electronic Transactions Levy (E-Levy) by the 137 Members of Parliament of the Majority Caucus present in Parliament on the 29th March, 2022 as a nullity.e. Any other order(s) the Honourable Court may deem fit.

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
Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has disclosed that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has returned to renting his favourite luxury private jet after the passage of E-levy.



According to him, the president now rents the luxurious private jet more cunningly to hide it from the prying eyes of the Ghanaian public.



In a post on his social media handle, the Ranking Member of Parliaments Foreign Affairs Committee explained that President Akufo-Addo travels onboard a commercial flight from the country while the rented luxurious private jet awaits him at his destination airport.



President Akufo-Addo has for the umpteenth time ignored the precarious state of the Ghanaian economy and abandoned Ghana's US$36million Presidential Jet in favour of his most cherished ultra-luxury toy  the LX-DIO which now rents for US18,000 an hour.



It is clearly a helpless costly addiction which sadly, the Ghanaian taxpayer must pay for. The President's latest misconduct appears to be the most deceptive thus far.



His new meet-me-there-strategy is a well-hatched one to create the impression to Ghanaians back home that hes indeed repented and now committed to flying commercial only to catch up with his chartered aircraft in transit for the rest of his travels, parts of Mr. Ablakwas post read.



The legislator indicated that the luxurious LX-DIO private jet now rents at US$18,000 per hour adding that it is imperative to note that so far, the Ghanaian taxpayer must cough up an astronomical US$465,000 in luxury rental charges.



At the current exchange, that is a scary GHS3,505,515.49. This will mean that since May last year, the Ghanaian taxpayer has spent at least GHS28.5million on President Akufo-Addos ostentatious travels he continued.



President Akufo-Addo travelled via a commercial flight to the Dubai Expo held on Monday, March 7.



This drew praise from Mr. Ablakwa who had been on the heels of the president imploring him to use the Presidential jet which he says is in pristine condition.



President Akufo-Addo, who has defiantly flown on ultra-luxurious chartered executive jets for all his trips outside Africa since May last year, deserves some credit for finally listening to an outraged public and surrendering to legitimate patriotic pressure from struggling Ghanaians reeling under an economy in tatters.



I sincerely applaud President Akufo-Addo for flying commercial to the Dubai Expo as he left Ghana yesterday [Monday, March 7], he added in a Facebook post.





Read Below The Full Post of Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa



Good evening, folks.



I know many of you have been waiting keenly for our consistently unimpeachable and authoritative flight tracking details of President Akufo-Addos latest travel to the United States of America and the United Kingdom.



As always, we appreciate your high interest, generous encouragement and most importantly your patriotic partnership in ensuring that there is greater transparency and accountability in the governance of our dear and only country.

Unfortunately, I do not have good news for you. Our crusade to get the President to keep his promise of protecting the public purse and our resolve to end naked profligacy still requires more work.



With the pretentious notion that the obnoxious E-Levy has been secured to rake in more revenue to finance his lavish indulgences, and after hurriedly granting a presidential assent of dubious validity, as President Akufo-Addo knows very well that 136 NPP MPs cannot purport to constitute a decision-making quorum; President Akufo-Addo is back to his old ways of Russian Oligarchic travels.



After a momentary glimmer of hope when he was compelled to fly commercial to Dubai last month, many had thought his penchant for egregious betrayal of the Ghanaian people by his obstinate dissipation of scarce taxes on his sybaritic lifestyle despite a hitherto loud promise to protect the public purse now belongs to the past.



More so, considering his government's public posture of massive expenditure cuts as a direct response to the current economic crisis.



Apparently, we were merely deceived; President Akufo-Addo has for the umpteenth time ignored the precarious state of the Ghanaian economy and abandoned Ghana's US$36million Presidential Jet in favour of his most cherished ultra-luxury toy  the LX-DIO which now rents for US18,000 an hour.



It is clearly a helpless costly addiction which sadly, the Ghanaian taxpayer must pay for.



The President's latest misconduct appears to be the most deceptive thus far.

His new meet-me-there-strategy is a well hatched one to create the impression to Ghanaians back home that hes indeed repented and now committed to flying commercial only to catch up with his chartered aircraft in transit for the rest of his travels.



So, President Akufo-Addo left Accra for Washington on Thursday 31st March, 2022 at 11:52pm aboard a United Airlines Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner with call sign UAL997.



Before the President landed at 6:40am at the Dulles International Airport in Washington on the 1st of April, the ubiquitous luxury LX-DIO had landed at same airport the previous day at 12:27pm waiting for President Akufo-Addo.



President Akufo-Addo couldnt wait to fly his favourite US$18,000 an hour LX-DIO from Washington where he departed at 10:13am and arrived at the Charlotte Douglas International Airport in North Carolina at 11:22am  a flight time of 01:09. It is important to acknowledge that there were more than a dozen available commercial flights with business class tickets not exceeding $700 in value.



The President kept the LX-DIO with him as he addressed Bishop T.D. Jakes summit and then flew aboard the same extravagant jet yesterday the 2nd of April, 2022 at 9:28am US time and arriving at the London Stansted Airport at 9:40pm UK time. A flight time of some 7hours 54minutes.



At this point, it is unclear if the President will return to Ghana with the LX-DIO on Wednesday or if he would stick to the new deceptive strategy of being seen in the Ghanaian jurisdiction aboard commercial flights while hiding his elaborate chartered arrangements from the prying Ghanaian public.



It is imperative to note that so far, the Ghanaian taxpayer must cough up an astronomical US$465,000 in luxury rental charges. At current exchange, that is a scary GHS3,505,515.49.



This will mean that since May last year, the Ghanaian taxpayer has spent at least GHS28.5million on President Akufo-Addos ostentatious travels.



How duplicitous is that for a government that claims to be cutting expenditure drastically in the wake of widespread excruciating hardships and economic mismanagement, and yet our President has the conscience to spend a whopping 3.5million Ghana Cedis attending a church service and a fanciful tourism event in London.



With this terrible example from the President by attending events at great cost to the taxpayer that cannot be classified as priority, one wonders how the presidency can enforce its recent ban on ministerial international travels.



Be assured, this latest meet-me-there-strategy shall be vigorously exposed and defeated.



Our tracking continues; we shall keep you updated.



For God and Country ???????? ????????

Source: Ghanaweb.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
Outgoing President of the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS), Emmanuel Boakye Yiadom says he sees nothing wrong if political parties show interest to sponsor students during an election.



It is been done elsewhere in Africa, so what is wrong if done in Ghana? he questioned.



According to him, students have the freedom to decide on which political party they want to join  hence, disagrees with the argument that political parties must not interfere in student politics.



Speaking on NEAT FMs morning show, 'Ghana Montie', Mr Boakye Yiadom claimed the NUGS election is non-partisan  but, could not prove that with facts.



I served as NUGS president without associating myself with any political party. I cant say the same for others. I dont know what they do. I contested the position in my name and my institution, he told host Kwesi Aboagye.



His comment follows the election of a new NUGS president which was marred with violence.



The union elected Dennis Appiah Larbi-Ampofo as President despite agitations over the credibility of the exercise.



Mr Appiah Larbi-Ampofo won the election by garnering 78.1 per cent of the total votes cast.



Some aggrieved students said they doubt the credibility of the elections. They subsequently declared another aspirant as winner.



Others also cited political interference during the election.



It took police personnel on the grounds to calm tempers when some aggrieved members expressed dissatisfaction over the electoral process.









Source: King Edward Ambrose Washman Addo/peacefmonline.com/ghana









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

Featured Video
Vic Ukrainetz, known as King of the Fiddle, is one of the performers booked for a special benefit show this coming Saturday in Summerland.
MANZINI - The publics focus has shifted from witnesses to the Coroner, Senior Magistrate Nonhlanhla Dlamini, as they are expecting a report about the findings of the inquest into the death of Thabani Nkomonye.

It is no doubt that while the coroner is analysing the submissions, some emaSwati, including the family of the late Thabani Nkomonye, are discussing some of the crucial evidence, which was submitted by witnesses during the inquest. Nkomonye is the 25 year old man who went missing on the night of Saturday May 8, 2021 after his vehicle was allegedly involved in a road traffic accident at Nhlambeni, along the Mhlaleni/Nhlangano Public Road. His body was not located, despite several searches by police and members of the public. It was eventually discovered five days later, on May 13, 2021 and it was about 20 metres from where the car was found.

The delay in the discovery of the body raised questions among many, leading to the start of the #JusticeForThabani movement, whereupon the members of the public demanded answers from the police. Thereafter, then Acting Prime Minister (PM), Themba Masuku, appointed a coroner to lead an inquest into the death of Nkomonye. The inquest into the death of Nkomonye started on June 1, 2021 and ended on March 15, 2022. During the inquest, a total of 43 witnesses were paraded by both the prosecution and the legal team of the Nkomonye family. The legal team included Advocate Mduduzi Tsotsi Mabila, Human Rights Lawyer Thulani Maseko, Lawyer Gigi Reid and Lawyer Mangaliso Nkomondze, who is a brother to the deceased. This publication also picked some of the evidence which was submitted by some of the witnesses.



Siphiwe Mkhabela (ThabaniS mother): Thabani had no eyes



On June 1, 2021, when the inquest started, she said when she was asked to identify his late sons body at the Raleigh Fitkin Memorial Hospital, it had a hole on his right shoulder, injuries on his right hip and stomach and an open wound on the head. Mkhabela submitted that before signing the post-mortem statement, she told the police officer that she had seen all the parts on his sons body, except for the eyes. She alleged that she demanded that this should be captured in the statement but the police told her that she might have not seen the eyes because the body was swollen. On Wednesday, May 19, 2021, she submitted that she went to Dups Funeral Home for purposes of cutting Nkomonyes dreadlocks. She told the coroner that she was shocked to find out that the body did not have eyes. When she asked the mortuary attendant about the missing eyes, she told the coroner that his response was that: Bamuletse anjena (They brought him like this).



Police Pathologist Dr Komma Reddys post-mortem report



The ante mortem (before death) injuries present proved that the body of Thabani had about 94 injuries;

* Contusions of 13x5 cm, 5x3 cm and 5x4 cm present on the top of the head.

* Contusions of 11x7 cm and 5x2 cm present on the back side of the head.

* Abraded contusions of 3x1 cm (2), 1x1 cm (2) and 2x1/2 cm on the forehead.

* Abraded contusions of 5x3 cm and 2x1cm, 4x1/8 cm, 3x1/8 cm (3) and 1x1/8 cm (3) cm present on the left cheek.

* Abraded contusions of 8x3 cm present on the right cheek.

* Contusion of 6x2 cm present on the upper lip.

* Abrasion of 5x1 cm present on the lower lip.

* Abraded contusions of 8x5 cm, 3x1 cm, 2x2 cm and 1x1 cm present on the left shoulder and contusions of 7x5 cm present on the top of the right shoulder.

* Braded contusions of 3x2 cm (2), 2x1 cm (3) present on the front and right side of the chest.

* Contusions of 3x2 cm, 2x1 cm and 1x1 cm (8) on the right side of the lower abdomen.

* Abraded contusions of 24x11 cm, 5x 1/6 cm (2), 3x2 cm (3), 2x1/8 cm (4) and 1x1 cm (15) present on the back.

* Contusions of 1x  cm (3) present on the front of the right thigh.

* Contusions of 1x  cm ((2) and  x  cm (2) present on the front portion of the left thigh.

* Lacerated wounds of 7x2 cm, 5x2 cm and 2x1 cm present on the palm of the left hand and lacerated wound of 4x2 cm present on dorsal surface of the left hand.

* Abraded contusions present at the tips of the right hand fingers.

* Contusions of 3x1 cm and 1x1 cm present on the front portion of the left knee.

* Abraded contusion of 15x  cm present on the front and middle portion of the left leg.

* Contusions of 2x1 cm and 1x2 cm (2) present in the left ear.

* Abraded contusions of 2x  cm (3) and 1x  com (4) present on the back side of the left leg.

* Abraded contusions of 2x  cm (2) and 1x1 cm (3) present on the lateral side of the right ankle.



Some of the questions and answers about the post-mortem report.



Thabani Nkomonye did not sustain any injuries while inside the Mazda Demio sedan, which he was driving on the day of his disappearance  Dr Komma Reddy. Advocate Mduduzi Tsotsi Mabila and Dr Komma Reddy agreed that there were no blood stains in the car, including the airbags. Thereafter, Advocate Mabila wanted to establish from the pathologist if one could conclude that the bleeding of Nkomonye did not begin while he was in the car. The pathologist claimed that maybe there was no external bleeding when the deceased was in the car, because if there was (external bleeding) while inside the vehicle, there would have been blood stains within it.

Advocate Mabila asked Dr Reddy if he could rule out that the injuries on Nkomonyes mouth were caused by blunt force, which could be a punch. Dr Reddy said; Yes, it (punch) can cause it (the injuries on the mouth). The advocate asked the pathologist, that from the injuries they had talked about (12 broken ribs, bleeding mouth and abraded contusions on the back), could he rule out that the deceased was allegedly punched on the face and fell down and then supposedly kicked on the body, before being purportedly dragged. The pathologist submitted that they did come across such injuries even if the person was assaulted. He agreed with the advocates statement and submitted that this was because the injuries in the pictures were consistent with hard impact, thus it could be caused by anything.



Prosecutor Fikile Dlamini and Dr Komma Reddys questions and answers



The prosecutor told the doctor that there was evidence that suggested that after the post-mortem; he told the deceaseds mother that the injuries on the back might be a result of being dragged down. Dr Reddy submitted that the deceaseds relatives asked him what could have caused the injuries and he told them that he might have been injured when he got out of the car, supposedly through a window or if he crawled with his back or someone dragged him. He submitted that he told them it could be either of the above. Again, the prosecutor told the pathologist that there was evidence that he informed the deceaseds mother that the injuries to his head might be a result of him being supposedly ejected by the car and landed with his head on the ground. However, the doctor responded by saying he told the deceaseds relatives that using his experience, there were slim chances that he could have been ejected by the car because he was heavy (a giant) and the way the windscreen was shuttered does not suggest that the deceased was thrown out of the car. He added that he suggested that maybe he came out through the window or someone assisted him out of the car.



Thabanis mother Siphiwe Mkhabela - body found within two minutes



She told the coroner that upon arrival at the scene on Thursday March 13, 2021, the police waited in small groups along the main road, while they proceeded to the accident scene, which she said it was about 20 metres from the road. She submitted that they searched in different directions from where the car was found and within two minutes, she heard the deceaseds uncle shouting; Nangu umntfwanami (here is my son) and she rushed there and saw him under a tree. She claimed that the Timberland boot he was wearing on the day he disappeared was allegedly visible above a tree and someone could see it from a distance. She added that in their view, it appeared that the deceaseds body was placed there. She added that they were convinced that the police had a hand in their death of their son, considering that they claimed to have searched the area on the night of the accident and in the following morning  during broad daylight. Again, another witness, Mathokoza Makhanya conducted another search during the day on Monday March 10, 2021.



Lawyer Gigi Reids questions to Dr Komma Reddy



Conclusion reached by Lawyer Reid; the injuries which were sustained by the deceased are not consistent with wounds from a car accident. The lawyer submitted that the post-mortem report said the deceased had 12 broken bones (seven on the left and five on the right). Her concern was how the doctor found out that the bones were broken. In fact, she asked if he took him to X-ray. Dr Reddy responded to the negative. He submitted that he used his naked eyes to see the ribs were broken. The lawyer asked what the doctor thinks could have caused such injuries on the ribs.

In response, Dr Reddy claimed that it could be the steering wheel or something hard. However, the lawyer wondered if the airbags of the car could break the ribs and the police pathologists asked not to answer the question. The lawyer then put it to the doctor that if the airbags came out from the steering wheel, it could not injure the driver so much that his ribs could be broken. She also asked if a person who was so badly injured could be able to crawl. Dr Reddy submitted that according to his imagination, it was possible. However, the lawyer put it to him that he was allegedly terribly lying and that this made her to be worrisome.



Investigator Constable Bhoncozi Kunene - how police searched scene



His summary was that they (about 15 people, including three police officers) searched for the occupants of the car for about two-hours, but in vain at the accident scene on the same night.

Constable Kunene attended to the accident together with two other officers Msibi and Thusi. The Prosecutor Fikile Dlamini asked him what could be the cause of the accident, according to his analysis. In response, he said sleeping on the steering wheel and speeding are suspected to be the cause of the accident.



Scenes of crimes Constable Sanele Malindzisa  he confirmed there were no bloodstains in the car



The scenes of crime officer, confirmed with pictures that there were no blood stains in the car which was driven by the late Thabani Nkomonye. Constable Malindzisa also agreed with Advocate Mduduzi Tsotsi Mabila that someone who dives to a thicket would be expected to be found above it. This was after the advocate asked the witness if he was correct that at the scene he showed them where the deceaseds body was found and further informed them that it was underneath a thicket. As such, the legal practitioner said the witness told them that they (police) had to cut the thicket in order to retrieve the body where it was lying. In response, the police officer confirmed that the body was found under the thicket and that they had to cut the tree branches in order to take it. The advocate wondered if the witness would agree with him that if someone dives into a thicket, he would expect to person or body (dead or alive) above it. The witness responded to the positive.



Sihle Gama submitted that he witnessed A police car chasing a black Mazda Demio at high speed



Gama, a witness paraded by the legal team of the Nkomonye family told the coroner that the police refused to record his statement in which he was to narrate that on May 8, 2021, he saw a police car chasing the vehicle similar to the one which was supposedly driven by the deceased, at high speed. He also informed the police that people, who can tell anyone who needs answers about what happened to the black Mazda Demio sedan, were the police.
Hungary's Andras Nemeth defeated fellow Hungarian Laszlo Bujtas in heads-up play to outlast 82 runners and win Event #1: $50,000 6-Handed NLH in the Triton Poker Special Edition Series at Merit Crystal Cove Resort and Casino in North Cyprus. Nemeth took home $1,082,000 from a total prize pool of $3,936,000 for the victory.

Laszlo and Bujtas were joined by Dong Hyun Kim, Phil Ivey, and Jason Koon in the top five. Other notables that cashed include Michael Addamo in 11th and Sam Greenwood in eighth.

Triton Poker Special Edition Series Event #1: $50,000 NLH 6-Handed Final Results

Place Player Country Prize (USD) 1 Andras Nemeth Hungary $1,082,000 2 Laszlo Bujtas Hungary $770,000 3 Dong Hyun Kim South Korea $503,800 4 Phil Ivey USA $387,100 5 Jason Koon USA $307,000 6 Elton Tsang Hong Kong $240,100 7 Stephen Chidwick United Kingdom $188,000 8 Sam Greenwood Canada $147,000 9 Michael Soyza Malaysia $113,000 10 Eng Siang Ewe Malaysia $99,000 11 Michael Addamo Australia $99,000

Winners Reaction

Nemeths win is the latest in his hot run on the high roller scene that started with two victories at EPT Prague in March. The European Tour regular made the trip to North Cyprus to compete in the Triton Poker series, and he was pleased with his result.

Its so surreal, Nemeth said in his post-win interview. To play for the first time and actually win.

I want to pinch myself, he continued.

Nemeth has an opportunity to join the $100,000 event with late registration extended until the first round of Day 2, but he may have his sights set on Wednesdays Short Deck tournament.

Its expensive, and I know a few guys who know how to play, and it seems very complicated, he said when asked about his plans for the rest of the series.

Winning this tournament helps. So maybe. Well see.

Final Table Action

The unofficial table got started with seven players, and Stephen Chidwick was the first to go when he made a set of deuces but ran into Elton Tsang's flush.

Six-handed play went on for nearly two hours until Day 1 chip leader Tsang bowed out in sixth place when he couldnt improve against a charging Nemeth. The elimination of Tsang brought Nemeth near 10 million in chips and the rest of the table trying to outrun the ever-growing blinds.

Day 1 Chip Leader and Sixth-Place Finisher Elton Tsang

Day 1 Chip Leader and Sixth-Place Finisher Elton Tsang

Shortly after, Koon was next to go in fifth place when his king-queen ran into the pocket queens of Bujtas. On the very next hand it was Ivey who hit the rail when he got his money in with ace-jack but watched Bujtas catch up with a suited seven-five to eliminated him in fourth place.

The eliminations continued in rapid succession as players were in a position to either shove or fold, due to the escalating blinds. Kim was the eliminated in third when he got it in good with pocket sevens, but Nemeth called with pocket fours and made a straight on the river.

Heads-up play was an All-Hungarian matchup, but it didnt last long. While six-handed play went on for nearly two hours, the final five eliminations occurred over just 35 minutes, and the big moment came when Nemeth made a pair of aces to beat the king-queen of Bujtas.

Congratulations to Andras Nemeth on winning Event #1: $50,000 6-Handed NLH at the Triton Poker Special Edition Series!

PokerNews will return on Monday at 1 p.m. EEST with live reports from the Day 2 finale of Event #2: $100,000 8-Handed NLH. Be sure to join us for coverage of every event from the Triton Poker Special Edition Series at Royal Crystal Cove Resort and Casino in North Cyprus.
Charleston, SC (29403)

Today

Scattered thunderstorms. High near 85F. Winds SSW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 66F. Winds WSW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
MBABANE  Four bush knife-wielding robbers, including a 14-year-old, broke into Minister of Economic Planning and Development Dr Tambo Ginas home on Saturday night and made away with valuables.

The incident happened at around10pm, while the minister was away, attending the Buganu ceremony at Hlane Royal Residence in the Lubombo Region. The homestead is situated at Highlands View, on the outskirts of Mbabane, a few kilometers from the city centre. When the robbers arrived at the ministers homestead, according to a source, one of them entered into the house and the others remained outside. The robber who was inside the house is said to have ordered a male occupant to lie on the floor and gave him a T-shirt to cover his face while threatening him with the bush knife.

The other robber reportedly joined him and they are said to have demanded to enter the ministers bedroom. The source said the robbers told the male occupant that they had information to the effect that there was a lot of money in Dr Ginas bedroom. There were two occupants in the house and the other one was in his bedroom when the robbers attacked.

Cellphones

The occupant refused to allow the robbers into the ministers bedroom and that was when they began taking valuable items, such as laptops and cellphones, which they put in a bag before they took off. The house occupants are said to have pursued the robbers, who ran all the way to Mountain Inn. The source said while the occupants were chasing them, they raised the alarm. Security guards at Mountain Inn and the Ministry of Public Works and Transport Depot, according to the source, joined the chase and the 14-year-old was apprehended. He was caught by the security guards and they handed him over to the police while the others escaped. All the stolen items, said the source, were recovered. The robber, who is said to have been carrying the bag containing the stolen goods, dropped it during the chase. The caught teenager was arrested. When questioned about the robbery, he is said to have disclosed that they had been sent by a certain man to commit the offence, who reportedly told them that there was some money in the house.

Son

Reached for comment, the minister confirmed to have received the report of the incident. He said when it all happened, he was away, attending the Buganu ceremony and had left behind his two sons. The minister said this was a common robbery and the people involved probably went to the same school as his son and they knew where they stayed. Common robbery is the unlawful and intentional forceful removal and appropriation. Chief Police Information and Communications Officer Superintendent Phindile Vilakati confirmed the arrest of a 14-year-old boy in connection with the robbery. She said the security personnel around the area did a tremendous job and the police were still looking for the other suspects. The area where the ministers homestead is situated, especially places around Mountain Inn, once had many reports of housebreaking and in most instances the suspects were arrested by the police.
COLUMBIA  A bill that would reinstate a dedicated funding source for the South Carolina Conservation Bank has stalled at the Statehouse and will likely not see any more progress this session.

The House version of the S.C. Conservation Enhancement Act was introduced in February and would require a portion of the deed recording fee to go to the bank's trust fund. It would also add the commissioner of agriculture, secretary of commerce and secretary of transportation, or their designees, as nonvoting members of the bank's board.

The bill would likely produce between $20 million and $25 million a year for the Conservation Bank to continue its work of protecting and sustaining lands in the state.

But Rep. Murrell Smith, R-Sumter, said members have raised some questions regarding the bill that they won't have time to work through this session. Smith filed the House version of the bill earlier this year and said he thought the Senate would take the lead on it. But there hasn't been much movement in that chamber, either.

"We're going to work out whatever issues (there) are in the interim while we're adjourned," Smith said at a Ways and Means Committee meeting on March 31. "This will be on the first of the legislative agenda when we come back in January."

He said he remains committed to the bill.

Sen. Chip Campsen, R-Isle of Palms, filed the Senate version of the S.C. Conservation Enhancement Act in February, and it currently resides in the Senate Finance Committee.

Unlike the House bill, the Senate version would also dedicate a portion of the sales tax revenue from sporting goods to capital improvements on public lands owned by the S.C. Department of Natural Resources, the Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism, and the Forestry Commission.

"We decided that the House version, because it was moving quicker and earlier, would be the vehicle," Campsen said. "It's certainly too late to pass the Senate bill this year."

He said the House's bill was amended in subcommittee to make it effective next year because the chamber sent $30 million to the Conservation Bank from the general fund for the upcoming fiscal year. And if the bill was passed and made effective this year, it would have added about another $27 million on top of that.

"The bank is funded very well this coming fiscal year," Campsen said. "So we'll deal with passing that bill with a dedicated funding source next year."

Rebecca Haynes, deputy director of the Conservation Voters of South Carolina, said there has already been a lot of support expressed for the bill in the Ways and Means Committee, and since it didn't pass this year, that allows "more time for education and conversations about how to make it the best piece of legislation it can be."

The organization is part of a diverse coalition of environmental and conservation groups to support the legislation.

"It's really in the interest of the state to find ways to support conservation efforts," Haynes said. "And that's what's so beautiful about the conservation bank, as a state agency, an effort to leverage those dollars well."

Campsen said there is a correlation between an increase in real estate transactions and the need to do more conservation. If the bill passes as is, 25 cents of each $1.30 paid in deed recording fees would support the Conservation Bank Trust fund.

The more money paid in real estate transfer fees, the more funding will be provided to the bank.
If youre the designated weeknight cook, youll want a repertoire of time-saving techniques. There are any number of ways to employ what is known as sheet-pan cooking  roasting food on a baking sheet instead of standing over the stove.

Christopher Kimball illustrates this with the charred broccoli in his new cookbook Milk Street Vegetables, as seen below. Kimballs Greek Peas with Potatoes and Herbs demonstrates a second time-saver: The one-pot meal. Either could be vegetarian mains, or add a bit of meat or cheese and some seasonal fruit and supper is set.

Oven-charred broccoli with peanuts, soy and scallions

Broccoli, when deeply charred, develops nutty, bittersweet flavors while crisping the florets. Charred broccoli is great on its own  maybe with some freshly squeezed lemon for brightness  but tossing with a few high-impact ingredients immediately after it comes out of the oven takes the flavors to another level (see the recipe below).

Other combinations Kimball suggests are oven-charred broccoli with pistachios and parmesan, dates and toasted almonds; or lime, shallots and fish sauce.

Start to finish: 35 minutes. Serves 4.

Ingredients

2 pounds broccoli, florets cut into 2-inch pieces, stems peeled and sliced about  inch thick

2 tablespoons grapeseed or other neutral oil

Kosher salt and ground black pepper

Instructions

Heat the oven to 500F with a rack in the lowest position. Set a heavyweight rimmed baking sheet on the rack. Make sure the baking sheet is heavyweight so it doesnt warp and can withstand a 500F oven.

In a large bowl, toss the broccoli with the oil,  teaspoon salt and  teaspoon pepper.

Carefully remove the hot baking sheet from the oven and distribute the broccoli in an even layer. Roast without stirring until deeply charred and tender-crisp, 20 to 25 minutes. Transfer to a serving dish.

While the broccoli is roasting, in the same bowl used to toss the broccoli with oil and seasonings, whisk together 3 tablespoons grapeseed or other neutral oil, 3 tablespoons seasoned rice vinegar, 3 tablespoons soy sauce,  cup roasted peanuts (finely chopped), 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes and two scallions (thinly sliced on the diagonal).

As soon as the broccoli is done, scrape it into the bowl and toss to combine. Taste and season with kosher salt and black pepper. Transfer to a serving dish and sprinkle with another two scallions (thinly sliced on the diagonal) and toasted sesame seeds (optional).

Greek peas with potatoes and herbs (Arakas Kokkinistos)

Weve included a generous amount of potatoes and some carrots to give the stew-like dish enough substance and heft that it can be served as a vegetarian main. Lemon zest and juice added at the end, along with a generous dose of fresh herbs, brightens the flavors.

Start to finish: 35 minutes. Serves 4.

Dont allow the onion and garlic to brown. Cook only until the onion has softened so the flavors remain light and without any caramelized notes. Dont thaw the peas before use; they can be added frozen to the pot.

Ingredients

6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided, plus more to serve

1 medium red onion, finely chopped

4 medium garlic cloves, minced

2 tablespoons tomato paste

2 medium carrots, peeled, halved lengthwise and cut into -inch pieces

1 pounds Yukon Gold potatoes, unpeeled, cut into -inch pieces

Kosher salt and ground black pepper

2 cups (12 ounces) frozen peas

1 tablespoon finely grated lemon zest, plus 1 tablespoon lemon juice

 cup chopped fresh dill

 cup chopped fresh mint

3 ounces feta cheese, crumbled ( cup)

Instructions

In a large Dutch oven over medium-high, heat 3 tablespoons of the oil until shimmering. Add the onion and garlic, then cook, stirring occasionally, until the onion begins to turn translucent, about 3 minutes. Add the tomato paste and cook, stirring constantly, until the onion is well coated and the tomato paste is fragrant, 1 to 2 minutes. Add the carrots, potatoes, 2 cups water, 1 teaspoons salt and  teaspoon pepper, then bring to a simmer. Cover, reduce to medium and cook until a knife inserted into a potato meets no resistance, 15 to 18 minutes.

Off heat, stir in the peas. Cover and let stand until the peas are warmed through, about 2 minutes. Stir in the remaining 3 tablespoons of olive oil and the lemon zest and juice. Taste and season with salt and pepper. Stir in  of the dill and mint. Transfer to a serving bowl, sprinkle with the remaining herbs and feta, then drizzle with additional olive oil.

Excerpted from MILK STREET: VEGETABLES by Christopher Kimball. Copyright  2021 by CPK Media, LLC. Photography by Connie Miller of CB Creative. Used with permission of Voracious, an imprint of Little, Brown and Company. New York, NY. All rights reserved.
Georgetown, SC (29440)

Today

Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds SW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms this evening, then skies turning partly cloudy after midnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds SW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
GREENVILLE  Tanglewood Middle School students returned to classes April 4 in the wake of the deadly shooting of Jamari Jackson last week.

The 12-year-old Jackson was killed by a fellow student March 31 on school grounds.

The alleged shooter, who is also 12, was arrested by Greenville County sheriff's deputies the same day. He was charged with murder, possession of a weapon during a violent crime, possession of a firearm on school property and unlawful possession of a weapon by a person under 18.

His name has not been released because he is a minor.

Students' first full day back after the shooting wasn't a normal one, district spokesman Tim Waller said. The regular schedule was followed, but academic lessons were set aside so students and teachers could talk with one another.

There was also heightened security.

On the sign at the school's entrance, the marquee was changed to read "Tanglewood Together." In a message to parents, Principal Graysen Walles said he knows families are still reeling from what happened.

Walles said that absences will be excused early in the week but encouraged students to attend. Resuming as much of a normal routine as possible is helpful, he said.

"Please note that our goal is not to resume academics fully on Monday, but rather to get students back into a routine, and to make sure they know that school is a place full of people that care about them and a place where they can get supports that they may need," he said.

The school had two mental health specialists assigned to each first-period classroom to talk with students, Walles said.

James Nelson said he spent most of the day expecting his daughter Colleen, an eighth grader, to text and ask him to pick her up early. Colleen didn't know Jamari or hear the shooting, but the aftermath had left her deeply unsettled, her dad said. She hadn't wanted to come back.

Colleen said that when she got to school Monday morning, she was so anxious that she felt like throwing up.

"I didn't want to be here," she said.

But she stayed and never ended up texting her dad. At the end of the day climbing into his car, Colleen said she was glad she stuck it out. In her first period, her teacher and classmates just sat and talked about how they felt. The counselors told students it was OK to feel sad and upset and reminded them there were lots of people they could talk to about what happened if they wanted.

Each of her other classes had similar chats. It felt good to talk with her friends and joke with them like normal, she said.

"I'm glad I stayed the entire day because tomorrow it'll be easier," Colleen said.

Walles told parents he would send them updates every day this week letting them know how the day went.

"I know that we are all hurting, and we will get through this together," he said.

The Tanglewood shooting took place at a time when school shootings are increasing as children return to in-person learning as the COVID-19 pandemic numbers decline.

In 2021, South Carolina recorded its most shootings in K-12 schools in 47 years, according to a Post and Courier analysis of Center for Homeland Security and Defense data.

School safety and mental health experts believe the increase can be attributed to the rise of mental health problems that students are experiencing after learning remotely.

In October, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and Childrens Hospital Association all declared a national emergency in childrens health.
NORTH CHARLESTON  The killing of Walter Scott seven years ago April 4 was a high-profile case that helped spark a national reckoning over police violence against African Americans.

But when Anthony Scott listens to discussions around police brutality, and media pundits list off the victims of law enforcement violence, his brother's name is often left out.

Sometimes it's upsetting, Scott said. But we know that he was chosen. ... He was chosen for the time to bring about change. So now, that's what we're going to see: change.

The perceivable lack of nationwide recognition of Walter Scott mirrors local challenges faced by Scott's brother to keep his memory alive.

Walter Scott was fatally shot on April 4, 2015, by Michael Slager, a White North Charleston police officer, after he fled on foot following a traffic stop over a busted brake light.

Slager was charged federally and in state court in the killing after a cellphone video of the shooting was released to the public. In May 2017, Slager pleaded guilty in federal court to civil rights violations and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Slager is serving his sentence at a low-security federal prison in Colorado.

Seven years after Scotts death, Anthony Scott and other local activists feel not enough has been done locally to honor the memory of Walter Scott. The place where he was killed still lacks any sort of memorial.

Anthony Scott wanted to keep his brothers story alive. He's attempted to do that by seeking cultural and systemic change within the North Charleston Police Department.

A seat at the table

Anthony Scott told Police Chief Reggie Burgess about his desire to bring about change in 2019.

Burgess replied: Anthony, could you come to speak to the officers and talk to them about how it feels to be the brother to Walter Scott?

The monthly sessions usually begin with the new officers watching the footage of Scott being shot by Michael Slager. The cellphone video shows Scott running from Slager as the former law enforcement officer fires eight .45-caliber rounds at the 50-year-old Black man. Five of those shots struck Scott, three of them in the back, killing him.

Anthony Scott enters the room after the video plays, introducing himself as the brother of the man the recruits just witnessed being gunned down. Scott begins with a personal touch, telling the officers how the incident traumatized his family. He also attempts to engage in broader discussions around race, asking the officers whether they understand that all people, Black and White, have prejudices.

Scott, who said most of the recruits are age 25 and under, said he tries to help them understand that law enforcement officers are held to a higher standard and called to protect and serve the community.

That calling often requires police to set aside personal feelings about a particular person they're dealing with  something Slager failed to do, Scott said. Slager's history of using excessive force served as indication of his hot-headed temperament, Scott said. Walter Scott's fleeing probably took an already aggravated Slager over the edge, Scott said.

Burgess said Scott has also told the recruits about the communitys relationship with police  what it is like for people to see patrol cars in their neighborhood or flashing lights in a rearview mirror. The recruits can also ask Scott questions.

Theyll ask him questions about how close was he and Walter, Burgess said. They ask: How do you deal with it every night? How do you come here and work with us?

Some people may think Anthony Scotts relationship with the department is unconventional, Burgess said, but he felt it was essential.

Anywhere we can learn, were going to those people, or go to that place to get that information, so we can be better, he said.

Scott said you can only bring about change if you're in the room where decisions are being made.

"If you have no place at the table, how will you be able to make a difference as far as getting the changes that are needed?"

The site of death

Part of the challenge around remembering Scott has to do with where he was killed, an empty stretch of land off Craig Road.

Following the shooting, a makeshift memorial was created on the lot with cards and flowers from well-wishers who empathized with the family. Those materials were removed, but Anthony Scott said he has no idea who removed the items or where they were placed.

Also, discussions began after the tragedy about potentially creating a permanent memorial on the site, Scott said.

Jerry Waldrop owns the lot where Scott was killed, along with the pawnshop that abuts the site. Waldrop said no one from the Scott family, nor the city of North Charleston, has ever asked him about using the property to permanently remember the 2015 shooting.

Waldrop said he is opposed to the idea because he wants to eventually develop the land, which he has owned for more than 20 years. He said he sees Scott's killing as a tragedy, along with the host of nationwide acts of police violence against African Americans. But a memorial would be more appropriate if it were located at City Hall, which houses the city's Police Department, Waldrop said.

"Right in front of city hall  a big ol' statue," Waldrop said. "That's the police station. They should put it right there for all the police to see every time they go to work."

The city of North Charleston did not respond to questions about the 2015 killing of Walter Scott or discussions about creating a memorial at the Craig Road site.

Fighting for change

Among those who feel Scott's killing hasn't gotten the attention it deserves is the man who filmed it.

Feidin Santana recorded the shooting April 4, 2015, on his cellphone while on his way to work. Santana thinks one reason Scott's case isn't as widely discussed as other police brutality incidents is because the North Charleston event was a rare occasion in which the police officer ended up being sentenced for the death of an unarmed Black man.

Still, that's no reason for the Scott case to be brushed aside, Santana said.

"I think Walter Scott should be a name in every conversation when it comes to justice and police brutality," he said. "He cannot be forgotten. And if we forget our history, we're doomed to repeat."

In 2021, Santana opened Change Up Cuts, a barbershop off Rivers Avenue that Santana feels is also an ode to the tragedy. The shop is more than a business, but also a place for the community to assemble and discuss the problems impacting local neighborhoods.

Much of the shop's work has been focused around efforts like school drives and vaccine clinics. The space has also welcomed political candidates to chat with community members. Its civic engagement mainly includes regular community meetings, where residents can air concerns and discuss ways to better help Black and Hispanic populations.

"The values we stand for in this business is in memory of what happened in 2015," Santana said.

Santana admits he was immediately hesitant after the 2015 shooting to work with NCPD on criminal justice reform. It's hard to work alongside the same agency whose officer wrongfully killed a man, he said.

He's since had several interactions with police officers who helped him understand not all cops are bad people. He's open to working with NCPD on reform. Santana feels more Spanish-speaking officers would be beneficial, though he also believes over-policing in minority communities, even with officers of color, is problematic.

Never Forget

There have been struggles nationally to bring about police reform in the name of Walter Scott.

U.S. Sen Tim Scott's 2020 Justice Act had originally included Walter Scott's name attached to a section in the bill that would withhold federal money from states that didn't keep data on police shootings. But Anthony Scott told the senator in a phone conversation he wanted Walter's name removed because the Scott family felt the legislation wasn't aggressive enough, as it lacked a ban on chokeholds and no-knock warrants, as well as changes to the legal doctrine of qualified immunity.

The Justice Act wasn't passed.

One legislative gain took shape in South Carolina shortly after Scott's killing. In 2016, then-Gov. Nikki Haley signed a bill into law to help police get body cameras. While a worthy step forward, the bill falls short of requiring police officers to release body camera footage upon the community's request, Anthony Scott said.

"If they don't share, we don't know," Scott said. "Being transparent with the community is the most important thing."

Locally, the fight over police reform has centered on the racial bias audit. The city had for years brushed aside demands by a local interfaith group and the Scott family for an audit of the department. In 2020, the city finally awarded a contract to Virginia-based CNA to conduct a review of the law enforcement agency.

The report, completed in 2021, found racial disparities in a number of policing practices. But both city councilmembers and local activists said the report wasn't comprehensive enough.

Jerod Frazier with the Charleston Area Justice Ministry said the audit didn't expose where traffic stops are happening in the city. Also, some of the community listening sessions were held in neighborhoods not largely impacted by heavy police presence, he said.

"It didn't go far enough," Frazier said.

The city recently formed a Police and Community Committee, tasked with working alongside law enforcement to implement the audit's recommendations. Anthony Scott is part of the group. An area that needs improvement is the city's disciplinary approach, Scott said.

Excessive force should get more than just "a slap on the wrist," he said. Officers who commit multiple violations should be fired, and their records should prevent them from being hired by other agencies, Scott said.

Anthony Scott feels addressing the policies and the culture in NCPD is the best way to honor Walter Scott. Even if there is no memorial, and national attention around Walter Scott's killing continues to wane, good police may prevent a future tragedy committed by a cop sworn to serve and protect.
NORTH CHARLESTON  Police and emergency responders scrambled on a recent Saturday night to treat and transport victims after the rat-a-tat of gunfire erupted three times within five hours throughout the city.

Detectives were still cataloging evidence at a crime scene Feb. 26 in the Dorchester Terrace neighborhood, where a 15-year-old boy was critically injured in a spray of gunfire that injured three others, when calls came in for shootings outside apartment buildings off McMillan Avenue and Hanahan Road.

Capt. Al Kuechler said investigators were put on standby after the McMillan Avenue shooting. Within minutes, officers were rushing to the reports of gunfire on Hanahan Road.

Hey, its no longer standby. We need all yall to come out here, he told the team.

The toll was grim when the sun rose that Sunday: Two people were dead, including the teenager, and four others injured. It was a shock of violence in an already dangerous year. Seven homicides and 17 shootings would be reported by the end of the month.

Gun violence concerns often center around North Charleston, and for good reason.

The beleaguered city has struggled for years to contain gun violence, as internecine gang warfare and drug trafficking routinely drives the citys homicide rate to levels unmatched in nearby communities.

And the problem has steadily gotten worse in recent years, crime data shows.

The citys Police department tallied 36 homicides in 2021, the highest death toll in years. Thirty-four of those killings involved guns.

Shootings and aggravated assaults involving firearms have steadily increased in the past five years, according to the data.

Ninety-seven people were shot in 2017, compared with 120 victims last year, a 24 percent increase in shootings. Meanwhile, the number of aggravated assaults involving firearms rose 82 percent, from 247 reported offenses in 2017 to 451 offenses last year.

Not all aggravated assaults involving firearms result in shots fired. The offense is an aggregation of multiple gun-related crimes, including pistol-whipping, threats made with firearms, and shots fired into residences or vehicles that miss their target.

Gun crimes are rising in the Holy City.

Sixteen homicides were reported in Charleston in each of the past two years, a sharp increase for a city where killings usually hover around 10. Again, guns caused almost all of those deaths.

The number of aggravated assaults involving firearms more than doubled in Charleston during the past five years  76 reported offenses in 2017 and 178 offenses in 2021. Shots were fired in 48-62 percent of those cases in recent years, the Police Department found.

Numbers for the Charleston County Sheriff's Office actually showed a decline in the number of aggravated assaults involving firearms, while homicides have remained steady after a spike in 2019. But the number of reported shootings has risen over the past five years.

Gun violence is rising in Americas urban areas, a trend experts say is contributing to a spike in homicides.

In 2020, South Carolinas homicide rate reached levels unseen since the early 1990s, when the crack-cocaine epidemic ravaged cities and drove the homicide rate to record highs.

The nations homicide rate remains significantly lower than in South Carolina, but it has been on the rise in recent years after more than two decades of decline, including significant spikes in 2015 and 2020. The FBI has not yet released crime data for 2021.

Some public officials have claimed the spikes in killings are the result of de-policing.

The public outcry and civil unrest that followed the controversial police killings of Black residents around the country in recent years, including the August 2014 shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., made law enforcement officers more hesitant to actively investigate crimes and make arrests, they say. In 2015, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said police had gone fetal due to fears that a mistake could end their careers or create headlines.

Richard Rosenfeld, a professor at the University of Missouri in St. Louis, has studied crime for 50 years.

Rosenfeld looked at the de-policing theory in 2015 and found it suspect. While big-city police departments made fewer arrests for low-level offenses in 2015, arrest rates were already declining well before Browns death, according to his 2019 study. There was not a sharp drop in arrest rates in 2015, which would suggest police departments had retrenched.

So what has caused the homicide spikes?

Rosenfeld said one leading theory is that increased mistrust of police, particularly in communities of color, means residents are less willing to report crimes or assist with investigations.

Rosenfeld said a Gallup poll showed a big decline in public confidence in police after Ferguson, and again after George Floyds shooting in Minneapolis in May 2020, particularly among African Americans. But its harder to measure community mistrust than, say, the impact of arrests on homicides, he said.

While homicides are rising, the overall violent crime rate in America has remained steady and property crimes continue to fall.

Clearly, something is singling out homicides and, to a lesser degree, non-fatal violent crime, Rosenfeld said. And the answer there is guns.

The criminologist said he was speculating a little, but there has been emerging evidence to support the theory that more firearms on city streets is leading to more homicides.

Gun sales skyrocketed at the start of the pandemic, and again during the civil unrest that followed Floyds killing in Minneapolis, research shows.

A 2021 study from the University of Chicago Crime Lab found that Chicago police officers were recovering more illegally possessed guns during the pandemic, even while performing fewer street stops.

Researcher Jens Ludwig wrote in an April 2021 article for The Chicago Tribune announcing the labs findings that when illegal gun carrying increases, gun violence rises shortly thereafter.

Our gun violence problem is, in part, an illegal gun carrying problem, he said.

The COVID-19 pandemic and its destabilizing effect on communities and police departments has almost certainly had an effect on homicides, but the impact is complex, Rosenfeld said.

Fewer people out in the community should mean there are fewer opportunities for homicides to occur, Rosenfeld said, but joblessness and community disengagement do generally lead to higher homicide rates.

In a way, the pandemic has caused de-policing in communities, the criminologist said, but not because officer frustration led to less policing. Particularly at the pandemics start, waves of cops were forced into quarantine because of virus exposures, and social-distancing requirements meant police were less active on the street, Rosenfeld said.

North Charleston police officials pointed to several factors they believed were contributing to the citys homicide spike, including the pandemic.

Social distancing isnt really an option for detectives, Kuechler said. Detectives are in close contact with people constantly, and frequently find themselves at hospitals or in cramped interrogation rooms.

Detectives would interview someone at the hospital, only to learn afterward from a nurse the person was positive for COVID, Kuechler said. Lt. Tireka Wright said they saw the same thing in patrol  an officer would book a person at the jail and get a call an hour later saying the suspect tested positive.

Whole patrol teams would be impacted, the lieutenant said. That officer went into quarantine, and other officers were forced to pick up the slack.

Local law enforcement officials have emphasized the importance of community policing, including town halls and community events, as a way to reestablish trust with residents. But Wright said those efforts were severely curtailed during the pandemic.

The pandemic also had an outsized effect on already poor and disadvantaged communities. Charleston County Sheriff Kristin Graziano said the gun violence problem cannot be solved without addressing the myriad social factors that drive crime  joblessness, affordable housing and transportation, and community resources for the mentally ill.

As big of a city as we are, we have horrible infrastructure, Graziano said.

The pandemic made police work harder, but North Charleston police officials said other factors have played a role, including more violence tied to drug trafficking, in particular marijuana, and cheap gun modifications that make pistols spray bullets like machine guns.

Ken Hagge, deputy chief of investigations for North Charleston, said the legalization of marijuana in other states has led to an influx of potent pot in South Carolina that sells for more money. Higher prices mean more competition among gangs and more bloodshed, Hagge said. It also leads to more rips, or drug robberies, and disputes over bad products.

Officials said gun switch modifications also are being found more often on pistols. The illegal modifications turn pistols into less accurate, but more deadly, automatic weapons. A modified pistol combined with an extended magazine can fire off dozens of rounds in seconds, Hagge said.

Social media has also led to more deadly feuds among young people, officials said.

Graziano said people were letting their fingers do the talking.

We've lost this piece of humanity that is really necessary to resolve a lot of disputes, she said.

A big question for experts and law enforcement officials is whether homicides will continue to escalate, remain steady or fall again.

Rosenfeld said he is not sure anyone can say yet whether this is an anomaly or the new normal, but his inclination is that the recent homicide spikes are caused by unpredictable and extraordinary events  like the pandemic and civil unrest, that will eventually subside.

The crack-cocaine epidemic of the 1980s and early 1990s was an extraordinary event that caused crime rates to skyrocket, but then crime levels fell for almost 25 years afterward as the economy improved and racial segregation lessened, at least to some degree, Rosenfeld said.

North Charleston police officials said they believed there was a light at the end of the tunnel.

The community held peace walks in Dorchester Terrace and on McMillan Avenue to condemn the Feb. 26 shootings. At a March 18 town hall, local pastor and activist Thomas Dixon announced the launch of S.A.V.E., or Stand Against Violence Everywhere, a community organization dedicated to addressing gun violence.

North Charleston residents are sick of the violence, Kuechler said.

I mean, who wants to live in a neighborhood, and you've been there for 20 years, and you can't sit on your front porch and drink coffee in the morning without worrying about shots being fired or someone getting shot? the lieutenant said.
MANZINI  The budget for the merging of parastatals will be sourced from the Public Enterprise Unit (PEU) Loan Guarantee Fund (LGF), where E500 million is currently available.

This follows that government has approved the engagement of Eswatini Economic Policy Analysis and Research Centre (ESEPARC) for the implementation process of their study. The Communications Officer in the Ministry of Finance, Setsabile Dlamini said the implementation of the recommendations by ESERPARC had been given a go ahead. Dlamini said during the implementation process, ESERPARC shall get approval for all actions taken. The communications officer was responding to a questionnaire which sought to establish if government had approved the implementation of the study by ESERPAC and if yes, how much was set aside for this process.

She said: There is no precise amount and it will be dependent on the actions being taken. We can confirm that there is some money from the LGF Fund that will be used to this exercise.

This publication has it in authority from impeccable sources that the PEU LGF currently has around E500m in it and Cabinet agreed to use this fund to pay for the reformed process.

Like Dlamini, the impeccable sources clarified that at this point, it was difficult to know exactly how much would be needed for the implementation process as government sought to minimise the State-owned-enterprises (SOEs) from 49 to about 30.

The reduction of the SOEs, according to the Minister of Finance, Neal Rijkenberg, could result in savings amounting to E1 billion. He said this during the post-budget seminar hosted by the Central Bank of Eswatini in collaboration with the Economics Association of Eswatini (ECAS) last month. He said the objective of the exercise was to improve the parastatals performance as it had been reported that in recent years, a majority of them drained government, given that they survived on subventions. According to the ESERPAC report, Eswatinis SOEs, were now huge burden on the economy and on the fiscus, with transfers to Category A parastatals approaching the E3billion mark (E2.4 billion) in 2020/21.

Given the escalating expenditure on the SOEs, Dlamini was sought for comment on the breakdown of how the money to be sourced from the PEU LGF would bring changes in terms of the number of employees under SOEs. She was asked how much would be used for offering voluntary retirement packages to the employees, Dlamini said: The budget will be determined by the establishment of the framework of the implementation process. The communications officer was also sought to establish how many employees would be absorbed in the new structure. To this, she said, it was pretty much early to pre-empt a process that had not started. Dlamini further said once the implementation began, then it would have indications of employees to be absorbed.

It is worth noting that the recommendations of the ESERPARC study included the strengthening of the PEU and remodelling it into a fully-fledged and fully capacitated agency managing and monitoring the performance of SOEs in the country. It also suggested that a system of clear and effective incentives be designed and implemented to reward the managersand employees for improvements in efficiency, productivity, and consumer satisfaction. However, it highlighted that a one-size-fits-all approach would not be effective and sustainable, particularly for the purposes of monitoring performance and tracking progression towards realisation of key performance indicators. It was also stated that it was important to enhance SOEs capacity in data collection, reporting and knowledge management, including making use of their often obsolete and outdated websites and digital media platforms.

High staff turnover and incapacity to attract skilled labour emerged in the review, with poor conditions of service and the issues of inadequate skills and limited capacity to retain highly qualified personnel (due to low remuneration and incentives)had a bearing on performance and delivery on set mandates among many of the SOEs, reads in part the report. The review further encouraged the scope for reform to be considered in its broadest sense to go beyond privatisation and look into the wide spectrum which may include rationalisation. The report stated that the current number of SOEs showed that the governments privatisation agenda had been slow. It was said although there were delays in the implementation of policies;some reforms had led to the privatisation of local public enterprises.

Some of the reforms were highlighted the conversion of Eswatini Electricity Board (SEB) in December 2007 to the Eswatini Electricity Company (EEC), a private entity. Also, other enterprises noted were the Royal Eswatini National Airways (which formed a jointventure with South African Airways to form Swaziland Airlink) and the commercial arm of the Eswatini Dairy Board  are partially privatised. However, it was noted that the number of SOEs in Eswatini were huge and this raised concerns about their sustainability.
Charleston, SC (29403)

Today

Mostly cloudy. A stray afternoon thunderstorm is possible. High 86F. Winds SSW at 15 to 25 mph..

Tonight

Thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. Low 66F. Winds SW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
There have been contradictions about our local government's strategy on COVID-19 testing and limitations for those who have come in close cont Read more
The polls have closed over in Hungary, where parliamentary elections will determine whether Viktor Orban and his Fidesz Party will remain in power, or be displaced by a conservative coalition that promises to continue many of Orbans policies (such as, unfortunately, heavy dependence on Russia for energy supplies). Significant that Orbans opposition calculates that it can only succeed by running a candidate who is nearly as socially conservative as Orban.

No exit polls are being conducted, so well have to await an old-fashioned vote count. All of the pre-election polls showed Fidesz ahead, but by narrow margins. Henry Olsen says the earliest returns from around Budapest look very good for Fidesz:

Meanwhile, I have noted before that the European and American deep states are doing everything they can to assure Orbans defeat, including setting up the narrative that the election is rigged. (Irony alert.) Lets go through and offer commentary about some of the news story about the election from todays Wall Street Journal news division:

But in a counterpoint to Europes rush to help Ukraine, Mr. Orban has promised to resist all of those measures, centering his re-election bid on a promise to keep Hungary out of the frayand powered by affordable Russian gas. His campaign ads, social-media accounts, and talk shows on state radio and public television warn that a defeat for Mr. Orban will drag the country into the war.

Of course, American natural gas is cheaper than Russian gas, but as the Biden Administration and the climatistas oppose expanding our export capacity, it is hard to call out Hungary for doing what most other European nations are doingcontinuing to take Russian gas, because they have few other options.

Mr. Marki-Zay [the opposition candidate] argues he would be a more constructive member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, yet would also oppose any sanctions on Russian gas. But he has struggled to get airtime for that message in a country where nearly all largest TV and radio stations have been bought up by Mr. Orbans political allies.

So Orban controls Hungarys major media? Sort of like the Democratic Party here, no?

Mr. Orban, who has governed Hungary for half of its postcommunist history, has used his majority in parliament to rewrite election laws, gerrymander voting districts, and permit mail-in ballots without identity verification from communities that favor him.

Just like the Democratic Party here, no? (Is there an echo here?)

This concentration of power is now so strong that the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, an intergovernmental security group, has taken the rare step of sending a full team of up to 200 election monitors.

Memo to OSCE: Will you send election monitors to Philadelphia, Milwaukee, and Atlanta for our next national election? I didnt think so.

It is said that Orban is corrupt, and favors cronies. I suspect the real problem Western elites have with Orban is that he wont put Hunter Biden on the board of Hungarian companies.

It is said that Orban is too close to, or sympathetic to, Putin. I must have missed where Orban presented Putin with a reset button for closer relations, or told Russias foreign minister that hed have more flexibility after the election.

Meanwhile, a former student of mine, Bradley Devlin, is covering the scene for The American Conservative magazine, and has up today a terrific article on Preempting Claims of a Rigged Election in Hungary.

Today, Hungarians will head to the polls to determine if Viktor Orbans Fidesz party will retain control of the Hungarian government. While the polls are close, it appears likely Fidesz will have a majority yet again, and Orban will enter his fourth consecutive term as Prime Minister. Sensing this is the case, the united opposition has taken pages from Stacey Abrams playbook to delegitimize the electioneven before the votes have begun being counted.

Read the whole thing, and stay tuned for updates later.

UPDATE 1: At 4 pm eastern time (US), it is looking like a Fidesz landslide taking shape:

UPDATE 2 (from Henry):

FINAL UPDATE:

And another classic example of leftist thought: turnout in Hungary was high (about 67%), and the margin wasnt close, but for the left, democracy depends always on the right people winning. And the wrong people won today in Hungary. So:
Several readers kindly directed me to the YouTube video of Professor Steven Koonins presentation on the state of climate science sponsored by Berkeleys Nuclear Engineering Department this past Friday. The video is posted here. The event featuring Koonins presentation paired Professor Koonin with Berkeleys own Professor David Romps.

The Nuclear Engineering Department promoted the event and profiled the participants here. Steve Hayward called attention to the event here. The event was geared to Professor Koonins book Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesnt, and Why It Matters, reviewed here by Steve in the current issue of the Claremont Review of Books.

In his response to Koonins remarks at the event Romps romps in a manner I found shocking. He argues that Koonin is engaged in a style of argument he calls pooh-poohism. While the label is innocuous, in substance pooh-poohism is an offense against intellectual honesty. Romps all but calls Koonin a liar and worse. That is certainly the upshot of his remarks. Romps ramps it up in a big way. Watching the video, I thought to myself Will Smith, call your office. Koonin, however, took it in stride and shook hands with Romps at the conclusion of the event.

Professor Koonin gave the 2021 annual Global Warming Policy Foundation lecture (below). Here one can take in Koonin free of Romps, which I think it the way to go. The GWPF has posted the text of Koonins lecture here. Professor Koonins five-minute PragerU is posted here.

With a little help from my friendly algorithms I also came across Professor Richard Lindzens 2018 GWPF lecture (Global Warming for the Two Cultures). I thought some readers might find it of interest.
I referred to the Black Lives Matter organization as a scam in a post yesterday. Those who dont follow the news closely may not have understood that characterization. This New York Magazine piece is a good place to start.

It focuses mainly on a $6 million house in California that Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, the BLM umbrella organization, bought with donated funds in October 2020. BLM has plenty of money to spare, having taken in, by its own account, $90 million in donations in 2020, of which it still had $60 million on hand as of February 2021. The groups founders love real estate; the New York Post revealed in April 2021 that Patrice Cullors, a BLM executive, had just spent $3 million to buy herself four homes. You wont read about that on Facebook, however:

Its currently not possible to share the Posts article on Cullorss home purchases on Facebook because the sites parent company, Meta, has labeled the content abusive.

In other words, inconvenient for the powers that be.

The author of the linked story got access to emails and other documents in which BLM leaders discussed how to spin their $6 million real estate purchase:

On March 30, I asked the organization questions about the house, which is known internally as Campus. Afterward, leaders circulated an internal strategy memo with possible responses, ranging from Can we kill the story? to Our angle  needs to be to deflate ownership of the property.

BLM also hired a private detective:

At other points, Bowers and his associates direct a private investigator to look into BLMGNF detractors and journalists, including me.

It is widely known that BLMs finances are a mess. It doesnt appear that the organization has ever carried out the most basic filings required of nonprofits:

BLMGNF was awarded tax-exempt status from the IRS in December 2020, two months after the houses purchase. The distinction meant the group would have to disclose information about donors and expenditures in an annual filing known as a 990. But BLMGNF has not submitted those forms for 2020 or 2021. It also has problems at the state level: The Washington Examiner reported in February 2022 that Californias attorney general told the group it was considered delinquent. BLMGNF has since retained the high-profile Democratic lawyer Marc Elias and maneuvered to get more time to formally submit data from 2020 by switching from calendar-year to fiscal-year tracking.

Fundraising for BLMGNF seems to have come to an end, at least for now:

In the meantime, contributions to the group have been essentially shut down. AmazonSmile suspended the organization from its platform in February 2022, and BLMGNF has removed donation links from its own website.

Still, I suppose that $90 million could last for quite a while. And that figure likely understates the amount that panicked corporations poured into BLMs coffers as protection money in 2020. This is a sordid story that seems to be drawing to a close. It is unlikely that any outsider will ever find out where most of the money went. It is equally unlikely that any federal or state law enforcement entity will go after BLMGNF for fraud, as would happen with a non-politically favored nonprofit.

UPDATE: Quite a few of the companies that paid extortion money to BLM in 2020 are publicly traded. Activist shareholders in those companies should demand accountability: How much did we contribute? To what entity or entities? How was our money used? Do we actually have any idea? Where is the accounting, in writing? Who is accountable for this expense? Why do we think it did our company any good? These are just some of the questions that left-leaning management should be required to answer.
Irans ruling mullahs are intent on inflicting maximum humiliation on President Biden as he seeks to bless, fund, and facilitate their nuclear program. They will not meet with our diplomats face to face. They relegate the administration to interlocutors including the friends of Vladimir Putin in Vienna. Twilight Zone has nothing on the Biden administration.

In the latest development out of Vienna, AFP reports: Iran says it will return to Vienna only to finalize nuclear deal, not to negotiate. Subhead: Foreign Ministry spokesman Khatibzadeh says Tehran is waiting for Washington to settle outstanding issues. I take it that the outstanding issues involve sanctions relief for designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations including the Irans Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The mullahs demand our blessing on their terrorism as well as on their nuclear program.

Quotable quote: Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov later said Moscow had received the necessary guarantees from Washington on trade with Iran.
Controversial Nollywood actress, Tonto Dikeh, has resumed fighting on social media with her ex-lover, Prince Kpokpogri.

In 2021, the duo were involved in several messy fights both on social media and in real-time, which led to the arrest and detention of Kpokpogri in Abuja.

For a couple of months, they both seemed to have ceased fire, while concentrating on their individual lives.

Not until Sunday evening when the controversial actress posted a twerking video of Kpokpogri, which has kick-started yet another war of words on social media between the ex-lovers.

Fresh allegations

The 36-year-old actress recently described her ex-boyfriend as a public dick; she also claimed that Kpokpogri had an affair with his married sister.

The mother-of-one sparked fresh controversies on Saturday when she posted a twerking video of her ex-lover, which got many thinking they were back together.

The actress had called the politician a community penis. In their previous fights, she had claimed that the Delta born- publisher was involved in various escapades with various female socialites in Delta state.

The actress took to her Instagram on Sunday evening inciting fresh controversies while reacting to reports that they were back together.

Reacting to the comments in an Instagram post on Saturday, Kpokpogri admitted that he was a community penis and urged Tonto Dikeh to go and make peace with God for all the dirty life she had lived and free herself from apparent depression.

According to him, Tonto had slept with peoples husbands and snatched other peoples boyfriends.

He wrote: In as much as I dont like trouble, I dont shy away when I see one. community penis you said fine? but for every husband you have slept with, every boyfriend you have snatched and the dirty life you have lived you need to make peace with God and free yourself from obvious depression Ashewo.

Firing back at her ex, Tonto dared him to post proof of her affairs with married men.

She wrote: Oga Kpo Kpo, from morning till night, Abeg between me and you who is the Prostitute? Name the names of the husbands I have snatched or boyfriends, and name a place, any blog that joined me together with anyones husband Oo I call you a COMMUNITY PUBLIC DICK BECAUSE THATS WHO YOU!! Plus your mother is the A. From A mother to a motherWith love, you obviously cant take half the shit you have done to me. So dont cry when I feel the need to start two can play this Game BINGO..

Inviting her fans to a new series of heavily worded allegations she wrote on her Insta-story,  Grab your coke and popcorn its about to go down.

She further said:  Clown ass nigga, look at a man sleeping with his married sister ( TINA) and you dear call me names.

Tonto also called on Kpokpogri to return her diamonds and other of her accessories the police couldnt retrieve from this possession.

Shortly after, Tonto also revealed that Kpokpogri has locked his comment, which was later verified by PREMIUM TIMES. It seems the politician cum activist has chosen not to engage in any further social media fights at the time.

Background

Before June 27, 2021, Prince Kpokpogri, was just a regular guy; little or nothing was known about the Delta publisher and aspiring politician, not until his ex-lover unveiled him on the occasion of his birthday.

While their love affair began to bloom , in many ways than one, the duo kept their fans up to date with their love journey as they showered each other with loved-up pictures and gifts on social media.

However, three months later, the eventful love affair was cut short when an anonymous blogger Gistlover claimed that the activist was cheating with the actress with several other women and also bad-mouthed her at different fora.

To buttress their claims, GistLover released the audio of an alleged conversation between Prince Kpokpogri and another lady.

This led to several clashes. Tonto also claimed that her ex-boyfriend also had an affair with a popular dancer, Jane Mena, and that she was in possession of their sex video.

Also, in a petition against Prince Kpokpogri dated September 6 and addressed to the Commissioner of Police, FCT Command, Tonto, through her counsels in Festus Keyamo Chambers, Okechukwu Uju-Azorji, and Arinze Egbo, said Kpokpogri carefully planned his entry into her life and started to court her with a proposal to marry her

Advertisements





In October, Kpokpogri hit back at his ex-lover accusing her of infidelity and drug addiction. The Nigerian gossip mill went into overdrive with reports that the DSS had arrested Kpokpogri but he would later debunk the report and in a matter of days, filed a petition against Tonto, requesting N10 billion compensation.

Through the intervention of the Nigerian police, Kpokpogri and Tonto were able to settle their differences or so we thought, not until recently.
MANZINI  A second senior member of government and prince suffered an arson attack last night.

The senior member of government is the Principal Secretary (PS) in the Ministry of Defence, Prince Sicalo. A house, which was still under construction, belonging to the PS at Mbekelweni, was petrol-bombed in the wee hours of yesterday. The house, which is a rondavel, had its roofing collapsing after unknown arsonists supposedly threw a petrol bomb inside it. According to impeccable sources, the petrol bomb was thrown inside the house just after midnight. The sources disclosed that a loud thud was heard by neighbouring homesteads before the blaze engulfed the house. It was reported that the unknown arsonists gained entry by cutting through the fencing of the homestead, before setting the house alight.

Guarded

When this publications reporter arrived at the compound, it was gathered that there was an individual who guarded the yard. The guard was said to have been at the far end of the compound. It is worth noting that within the residence, there is an incomplete guard house, the main house and a shack constructed from corrugated iron sheets. When the individual responsible for manning security at the compound was sought for comment, he said: The elders are not here. Please wait for them. When this reporter requested to assess the damage, he politely requested that the proprietors of the homestead should be the ones to give the authority to do so.

On the other hand, it was established from neighbours that police officers had already visited the homestead to carry out an investigation. Also, while this publications reporter was at the compound, senior members of the community arrived to assess the damage. Thereafter, a vehicle which is frequently driven by the PS, arrived at the compound. It had three occupants, which among them was a member of the Umbutfo Eswatini Defence Force (UEDF). The UEDF member, who was identified by his last name, Dlamini, was approached by this publications reporter. Subsequent to pleasantries, he was informed that means had been made to establish communication with the Prince; however, at the time they had not been successful. This was at around 8:40am.

Dlamini said given the circumstances which had brought the reporter to the compound, it would be hard for him to comment or allow pictures to be captured. He said the arson attack was a sensitive matter, which required the elders to engage the media. Dlamini further cast doubt that the PS would arrive at his homestead yesterday, as there was the annual Buganu Ceremony at Hlane Royal Residence; hence he was committed. In vernacular, he further said: Tindzaba takaNgwane atikhulumeki tidzinga banikati.

Issues

Worth noting is that kaNgwane is often used to refer to the royal family and in this context, the verbatim of the UEDF member loosely means Issues involving the royal family, can best be addressed by them (royal family). Thereafter, the compound was left at about 9:15am. Meanwhile, the first senior government official to have his house petrol-bombed was the Minister of Tinkhundla Administration and Development, David Cruiser Ngcamphalala. He had his house at Sigwe petrol-bombed on December 21, 2021. Also, Madlangempisi Member of Parliament (MP) Sibusiso Scorpion Nxumalo had his three-bedroom house, including the sitting room, kitchen and the three bathrooms, petrol-bombed by three unknown men who were armed with guns (pistols). The incident, which left everything inside the house reduced to ashes, took place around 10pm last Wednesday. This publication last Friday reported that the MP said his children, who were in the house, informed him through a phone call that there were armed men who were looking for him at his home, and that they had set the house alight. This arson attack follows others that have happened in recent months.
The Director-General, Yahaya Bello Presidential Campaign Organisation, Hafsat Abiola, says she is leading the campaign efforts for Governor Yahaya Bello because she sees the qualities needed to take Nigeria to its right destination in him.

Hafsat Abiola, daughter of late M.K.O Abiola, acclaimed winner of the 1993 presidential elections, said on Sunday in Lagos that one of the similarities between her late philanthropist father and the Kogi governor was that they both refused to have political godfathers.

This, she said, was responsible for the persecution the governor had faced by different interests and the controversies around his administration.

The DG expressed the confidence that Mr Bello would clinch the ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC) irrespective of the zone of the national chairman.

Nigerians must be given the free hand to choose their leaders. That is the meaning of democracy. My father did not contest to represent zoning interest. His interest was Nigeria and Nigeria alone, she said.

She added that another similarity was that the late MKO believed in a United Nigeria, just like Mr Bello, noting that he also treated everyone around him with respect regardless of their social standing.

These are the same qualities I have seen in the Kogi governor. He dared to contest, not minding that he was from a minority tribe in Kogi and won, and he has come out again. My father did the same when it was believed that a Yoruba man could not be President.

Yahaya Bello is the best man for the job. And you know me, Im not driven by pecuniary considerations. I do what I believe in. In the next seven weeks, we will be working hard, and when we emerge, we will deliver a Nigeria of our dreams, she said.

She said her father would have been happy to see that a young, courageous man like Mr Bello had done everything to bring back his Hope 93 in Hope 23, with the same person that did the manifesto on board  Jonathan Zwingina.

Thousands of Nigerians from all walks of life had stormed Eagle Square at the nations capital on Saturday to witness the official acceptance of Mr Bello to vie for the 2023 Presidency.

While declaring his intention to run, Mr Bello reiterated that he had demonstrated the capacity to lead Nigeria in his present assignment as the governor of Kogi, noting that, for him, all that mattered was Nigeria and the wellbeing of its citizens.

The DG pointed out that the presidential aspirant had the right marks where the votes were  women and youths  adding that her being the first female Director-General of a presidential campaign organisation was an attestation to Mr Bellos unrivalled record in women inclusion.

(NAN)
Suspected armed bandits, Sunday night, invaded Tsafe town, the council headquarters of Tsafe Local Government Area of Zamfara State, killing many people.

Residents said one of the victims is the son of the states commissioner for security affairs, Mamman Tsafe. Neither the commissioner nor the state government has confirmed the killing. The states commissioner for information, Ibrahim Dosara, did not respond to calls and a text message by PREMIUM TIMES.

Residents said the gunmen who invaded the town went on a shooting spree immediately after night prayer. The gunmen killed at least three people in the attack.

PREMIUM TIMES learned that the incident occurred in the Hayin Tumbi area, which is close to the commissioners residence, while many people were still in mosques observing their night prayers,

Following the attack, many residents have fled the town.

The state police spokesperson, Muhammad Shehu, did not respond to calls for comment about the attack when contacted on Sunday night.

However, a police source confirmed the attack and the killing of the commissioners son. The source said the police would release an official statement on the incident Monday morning.

Sunday nights attack is the latest in Zamfara by gunmen who have terrorised the state and neighbouring states since 2018.

The gunmen have killed thousands of people and kidnapped thousands of others in Zamfara and other North-west states.

The attacks have continued despite repeated pledges by President Muhammadu Buhari to end them and despite the heavy deployment of security operatives to the areas.

Apart from Zamfara, other states affected by the attacks include Kebbi, Sokoto, Kaduna and Niger.
The rural banditry and terrorism ravaging Nigerias northwestern states are products of a poor criminal justice system, ethnic profiling and criminality propelled by poverty, a body of security experts said in a report.

The Centre of Democracy and Development for West Africa, CDD, identified the key actors and drivers of the violent crime that has killed over 12,000 and displaced over one million persons in the region.

The raging violence in the Northwest, which extends to Niger State in the Northcentral, has taken a war-grade dimension with terrorists delivering audacious attacks on military installations and rail lines in addition to crumbling rural communities and attacking travellers on highways.

Although there have been heated debates over the motivations and agenda of the terrorists, locally referred to as bandits, CDD dispels reports that the violent entrepreneurs are sponsored by the northeasts Boko Haram insurgents, aggrieved politicians, the Fulani ultranationalist, or foreign powers.

The conflict in the northwest cannot be reduced to a factor or an actor, the body said in its report, titled: Northwest Nigerias Bandit Problem: Explaining the Conflicts Drivers. Rather, the crisis is rooted in several overlapping economic, political and social problems.

Poor Criminal Justice System

The poor administration of justice, CDD said, has contributed to the uprising of violent criminals in the northwest. Corruption and ineptitude among the police and judicial officials were identified as reasons for taking up arms by the bandits. The report also identified the highhandedness of security operatives as a factor contributing to the violent crime, leading to an endemic killing spree and bloodshed.

One former bandit narrated to the experts in the report that his father spent seven years chasing justice for his rustled cattle, detailing how justice was not achieved until the man died. We became impoverished by judicial cases hence the decision to take up arms, the repentant bandit was quoted to have said.

Ethnic cleansing

The Hausa self-defence security outfit, code-named Yan Sakai, has deployed excessive use of force and violence against the Fulanis in Zamfara and Sokoto on suspicion of being bandits sympathisers, the CDD said.

The volunteer guards who emerged in the northwest communities in the 2000s have on several occasions killed innocent Fulani kinsmen extrajudicially, fuelling the existing violent crime. The Fulani militants revolting against being targets of ethnic cleansing orchestrated attacks against their Hausa counterparts.

Security forces, more so the Yan Sakai, began harassing, robbing, and killing ordinary herders on suspicion of them being bandits, the report revealed. As herders left the northwest for other communities or countries, they began to spread among their fellows that Fulanis were being prosecuted in Zamfara in particular.

Criminality Propelled by Poverty

Violent crimes influenced by overwhelming poverty in the northwestern states were also identified as a driver and one of the root causes of banditry in the region. The social-economic development provides fertile ground for conflict and criminal violence, said the report.

As of 2019, each northwestern state has a higher rate of poverty than the national average of 40.1 per cent with Sokoto having the highest rate in the country: 87.73 per cent of the states population live in poverty, the report stated. Conflict is exacerbating this low-level education and development as one million Nigerian children are out of school due to insecurity in the northwest.

One other factor driving banditry and terrorism in the region, according to the Abuja-based think-thank, is the land use disputes between farmers and herders, leading to intercommunal clashes between the two parties. Many farmers in the northwest are said to be Hausa while herders are predominantly Fulani.

Some Fulanis have taken to farming and urban livelihood, the report highlighted in parts. There are strong divisions between pastoralists and the urban Fulani.

Bandits on the Prowl

About a hundred groups of bandits with over 30,000 militants are operating in the northwest, killing, maiming, and kidnapping innocent citizens and residents of the region, the CDD has said.

The bandits, predominantly Fulani, include Hausa, Kanuri, and other tribes in the region. They depend largely on information gathering about their targets from informants who work in cahoots with them.

Some bandits command more than 1000 fighters, though such groups tend to be loosely organised, granting significant autonomy to their commanders, colloquially known as lieutenants, the report said. One former bandit noted that in many groups, a lieutenant may even seek commanders permission to form a group once they have weapons and fighters.

Political Will Is the Way forward

The CDD recommends that any efforts to end terrorism and banditry in the northwest region will require greater political will and unity among concerned leaders of the affected states.

The report noted that it is not enough to kill bandits or jail them, adding that the government has to be patient and have the willingness to make tough compromises and a holistic view of security.

Experts in the report also suggested that the killing of the late bandit kingpin, Buharin Daji, led his bandit group to fracture into nearly thirty groups thus increasing insecurity rather than reducing it.

Any solution to end banditry will be contingent on security sector reform and improving trust between security agencies and local communities, the report noted.

Despite repeated assurances, the Buhari administration has not been able to stop the violent criminals, a measure of assessing the Presidents national security promise.
A committee of the mosque at Apo Legislative Quarters, Abuja, on Monday, has sacked its Chief Imam, Nuhu Khalid, over a sermon he delivered last Friday criticising Nigerian leaders including President Muhammadu Buhari over insecurity in the country.

In his sermon, the cleric, who was lamenting the security situation and disregard for human lives, said the high level of insecurity in the country is because of the collective failure of the countrys leaders, especially President Muhammadu Buhari.

The cleric blamed Nigerian politicians for being only concerned about securing the votes of the people.

He also blasted them for paying lip service to securing the lives and property of Nigerians.

He particularly called out Mr Buhari for failing to keep his campaign promises of securing the lives of Nigerians.

We have your video telling Nigerians that the military is capable. It has all the requirements to tackle this insurgency and if you are voted into power, you are going to make sure that happens in a short time.

You have been given four years and an addition, yet people are dying like fowls, killing is becoming the norm in Nigeria under your watch Mr President.

If there is no Nigerian to tell you, I will take the responsibility of telling you and I will take the responsibility of telling you and I will take the responsibility for the consequences because the lives and properties of Nigerians are above all.

Let me tell you, Mr President, under your watch, bandits are demanding, are taxing Nigerians  is that the provision of the constitution of Nigeria. Under the constitution of Nigeria, no one has the right to tax any Nigerian except being authorised by the federal government.

The cleric, who is popularly called Digital Imam, was speaking days after gunmen attacked a Kaduna-bound train killing eight people. Several passengers on the train sustained bullet wounds and the gunmen abducted an unknown number of people.

The cleric was also talking about rising insecurity across the country. In the North-west, for instance, bandits have killed thousands of people and have kidnapped several residents and travellers in the area.

Apo Legislative Quarters is the official residence of politicians, especially federal lawmakers.

Cleric doubled down

In an interview after he was suspended, the cleric refused to recant his criticism of the countrys leaders and Mr Buhari, saying he was ready to bear the consequences that will follow.

If I cannot voice out, what is the essence of living, then? I have made my mind to sacrifice for that. No going back. I didnt say any word under duress. I intentionally said it and I meant what I said, and I am ready to bear the consequences.

Letter of dismissal

The Mosque Committee, in a letter sacking him from the mosque dated April 4, 2022, said it sacked the cleric for showing no remorse after his suspension.

Imam, you know better than me by the teaching of Islam, the essence of administering punishment is to correct behaviour. Unfortunately, your media reaction to the suspension creates the impression that you are not remorseful, not to talk humble reflecting on the consequences of your utterance.

Leadership demands a great sense of responsibility. If our words do more harm than good to the larger interest of the country or the public. We have a responsibility to maximum restrained for the good of the public. It is obvious, however, that you dont seem keen to modify our Friday sermon to be reflective of the vitality of the security situation in the country.

You are an influencer; your words carry a lot of weight, and your words can make or mar our situation. Your words can be taken advantage of by mischief-makers, those responsible for these security challenges or enemies of the country for their devilish agendas. As leaders of the mosque, we have a sacred responsibility to avoid utterances that are capable of making a bad situation worse. This is our fear and concern.

Our decision is informed by our obsession to promote peace in the country. We are not oblivion of the implication of our action in view of the penchant of many Nigerians for a critique of the Government of the day. We however believe, no sacrifice is too much for the committee members to disengage you as part of our contribution to ensure peace prevails in our motherland no matter the gravity of the consequences because we are convinced that you have no intention to change the mode of your sermon in the course of Friday prayers, the leader of the mosque committee, Saidu Dansadau said.

PREMIUM TIMES could not immediately reach Mr Khalid for comment.
The coroner presiding over the inquest into the death of Jumoke Oyeleke on Monday fixed April 25 to visit the scene where the police allegedly murdered her.

Mukaila Fadeyi, the coroner, said at the Magistrate Court in Ogba, Lagos, that they would visit the location and return to court for the hearing.

A bullet hit Ms Oyeleke, 25, after police fired shots to disperse the Yoruba nation protesters during the July 3, 2021, rally.

But the police denied responsibility for her death, saying its officers never fired a single live bullet.

However, the post-mortem report of the deceased revealed that she died of hemopericardium, disruption to the heart and lungs and missile injury to the chest.

Hearing

Sunday Soyemi, a pathologist with the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH), was absent for cross-examination on Monday.

The deceaseds family lawyer, Taiwo Olawanle, said there may not be a need to cross-examine Mr Soyemi because he had in his testimony indicated the police.

Mr Olawanle also suggested that the pathologist accompany the court on the visit.

The lawyer told the court that a police officer, Onyeisi Nwaolai, attached to the State Criminal Investigative Department (SCID) in Yaba refused to appear in court for cross-examination despite five adjournments.

The police officer, in his testimony deposed to the court on September 20, 2021, said a yet-to-be-identified person fired the bullet that hit Ms Oyeleke.

Some of the protesters were later arrested with arms and charged to court, he said.

That arms recovered from the protesters have also been sent to the ballistic department for a thorough examination.
A former President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, said all Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential hopefuls from the North were working for a consensus candidate to foster desired unity in the country.

Mr Saraki disclosed this in Asaba on Monday when he led other aspirants, including Governor Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto State, Bala Mohammed of Bauchi and a former Managing Director of FSB International Bank Plc, Mohammad Hayatu-Deen, on a consultative visit to Governor Ifeanyi Okowa at Government House, Asaba.

He said Nigeria was in dire need of competent leaders to reverse the countrys slide into poverty, insecurity and anarchy.

He stated that Nigeria was the largest economy in Africa under the PDP, but regretted that the country was now the poverty and kidnapping capital of the world under the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led Federal Government.

He called members and leaders of the party to support a consensus arrangement to ensure the PDP remained united and able to rescue the country from maladministration.

According to Mr Saraki, We are here, the four of us, to discuss with Governor Ifeanyi Okowa on how to build consensus for our party ahead of the presidential election.

We had a very useful discussion with the governor; we have decided to come as four of us who are aspiring to be president on the PDP platform.

Your Excellency, you know your reputation in the PDP and the country is always first in your mind and ever since, when there is an assignment that has to do with ensuring unity of the party, you have always been called upon.

Thats why we are here to meet with you and share with you what we have been trying to do.

The four of us have been meeting and we came up with this idea that in the interest of the party, that we should come together and look at a consensus arrangement.

This is important because we believe that the country needs unity. We are all eminently qualified to lead this country but we believe that only one person will lead and that person needs everybody to make Nigeria better and to fix this country, he said.

Mr Saraki, also a former governor of Kwara, stated that the interest of the aspirants was second to that of the country, adding that as somebody who has always shown that as well, we have come here today as our first visit to the southern part of the country.

This also goes to show that this consensus arrangement is not just about the issue of the North but about Nigeria and to carry you along on what we intend to do.

We have shared our thoughts with you and you have also shared your ideas with us on what we need to do and we can assure you that we are committed to this consensus process.

This consensus is needed so that at the end of the day, PDP will be united to provide leadership for this country because the way the country is today, we need to fix it, we need to tackle the issue of insecurity and unemployment.

Responding, Governor Okowa thanked the visitors for coming to intimate him of their plans, saying consensus candidacy is indeed in the best interest of the unity of the party and the country.

He underscored the importance of building consensus to solve the current challenges bedevilling the nation.

I truly want to welcome you to Delta state. I have listened to you and the fact that you have started to meet together to think of the best way possible for us to get out of the very difficult situation we have found ourselves as a country is very heart-warming.

I thank you for putting yourselves together to educate the rest of us from across various states on the need for us to build a consensus.

I believe that it will reduce acrimony and help to position us as a party in order to help to compete favourably and win the 2023 elections.

Theres no doubt that God has favoured us and placed us in a good position to be able to win the elections but we need to also take some human actions that will enable us to give strength to ourselves.

This action that four of you have taken today is actually a step in the right direction. It will strengthen us and pull us together.

It is my prayer that God will help you achieve this consensus that you seek to build because, in that consensus, we will be united as a party, which will give a lot of hope to Nigerians, that truly, PDP is working the talk.

Advertisements





So I truly want to appreciate you for this visit and urge that you work hard towards the building of this consensus and that of the party too.

I think that this is the kind of thing that we need at the moment and as you take this step forward, may God give you the strength to be able to engage the rest of our brothers across this nation.

We hope that at the end, we would be in a place to say yes, we have really strengthened the PDP and that we are in a better position than other political parties to compete, Okowa stated

SOURCE: Delta Government House Press Unit.
The Kano State High Court in Kano has convicted two civil servants, Helen Odey and Zainab Musa, for fraudulently securing employment through impersonation and forgery.

The Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC) disclosed in a statement on Monday that the court convicted the two defendants on three charges of conspiracy, impersonation and making false statements to a public officer.

The judge, Dije Aboki, sentenced Ms Odey to two years imprisonment, and Ms Musa to six months jail term, according to the statement by ICPCs spokesperson, Azuka Ogugwa.

The commission accused them of impersonating Hussienat Ahmed to secure employment with the Kano State Universal Basic Education Board.

They allegedly used a statement of the result of the Federal College of Education belonging to Ms Ahmed to perpetuate the fraud.

The commission had charged the convicts for conspiring among themselves to impersonate one Hussienat Ahmed to secure employment with the Kano State Universal Basic Education Board by using a Federal College of Education Kano statement of result, belonging to the said Hussienat Ahmed, the statement said.

It added that their offences were contrary to section 96(1) (a) of the penal Code Law, Cap 105 Laws of Kano State and punishable under section 197 of the same law.

They had both pleaded not guilty to all the charges preferred against them and that set the stage for trial.

Having found ICPC to have proved its case beyond a reasonable doubt, the trial judge convicted and jailed the two defendants to six months imprisonment with N200,000 fine, each.

On count 2, Mr Aboki found the first defendant (Ms Odey) guilty and sentenced her to two years imprisonment and N500,000 fine.

Also, on count 3, the judge sentenced Ms Ody to one years imprisonment.

All the sentences are to run concurrently.
A week before Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, Africa and Europe agreed on a joint vision spanning economic growth, security and climate change. War in Ukraine may not directly influence continental relations but could damage bilateral ties. The agreements could also be affected by the global economic impact of the crisis.

The African Union (AU) may face a tough task in ensuring that international partners stick to their commitments, including those made at other summits such as the November 2021 Forum on China-Africa Cooperation in Dakar.

At the AUEuropean Union (EU) summit in Brussels on 16 and 17 February, the two organisations committed to equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines, ensuring Africas economic recovery and combating illicit financial flows. They also agreed on the mitigation of climate change and cooperation on matters of peace and security.

The first in five years, the summit included promises of a 150 billion investment for Africa against the background of fierce global competition for economic influence on the continent.

Then on March 11, United States (US) Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with AU Commission Chairperson Moussa Mahamat and various AU commissioners. The US vowed to work closely with the AU, signalling growing cooperation and recognition of the AUs role as Africas voice in the world.

On the day of Russias invasion, Mr Mahamat and AU Chairperson Macky Sall called on Russian and any other regional or international actor to imperatively respect international law, and the territorial integrity and national sovereignty of Ukraine. They expressed extreme concern over the very serious and dangerous situation created in Ukraine.

But when it came to the March 2 vote on the United Nations General Assemblys Ukraine resolution, almost half of AU member states abstained or did not cast their ballot. This development could influence relations between individual countries and Europe. The resolution deplores in the strongest terms Russian aggression against Ukraine and calls on Russia to immediately, completely and unconditionally withdraw all of its military forces from the territory of Ukraine within its internationally recognised borders.

Following the meeting with Mr Blinken, US ambassador to the AU Jessica Lapenn told the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) that the U.S. welcomed Messrs Mahamat and Salls statement on Ukraine. It also lauded Kenya, Ghana and Gabon  Africas non-permanent UN Security Council members  for supporting the General Assembly resolution. Ms Lapenn said that despite the circumstances, the meeting between Mr Blinken and Mr Faki focused on Africa. Climate change, trade and investment, health and peace, and security were discussed.

But the March 2 vote revealed an Africa deeply divided. Twenty-eight AU member states voted in favour, 17 abstained, eight did not vote, and Eritrea voted against. The lack of consensus was again apparent on March 24, when only 22 African countries supported South Africas alternative resolution on humanitarian assistance to Ukraine. The draft was criticised for not mentioning Russia. South Africa explained that it was trying to find a solution that would have buy-in from all parties, including Russia.

It is worth noting that the AUs role in representing Africas positions is quite different to that of the EU. The AU is an intergovernmental organisation that cannot always forge a common stance, even though it has tried to do so on migration and climate change issues. The EU has supranational status and can speak on behalf of the bloc.

In condemning the attack on Ukraine, Messrs Mahamat and Sall were sticking to AU values and norms on sovereignty. Mr Sall, as AU chairperson, expressed grave concern about the situation. But then his country, Senegal, abstained on the March 2 resolution, which sharply criticised Russia. Senegals position also shows that countries abstained due to national interests.

While relations between the AU and its partners, the EU and US, are unlikely to be directly affected, the stance of certain African countries could hamper future diplomatic relations and development aid.

Some EU diplomats in Africa were surprised, even angered, that countries such as South Africa refused to support the March 2 resolution. Abstention was seen as rejecting efforts to uphold sovereignty and international law. A total of 141 UN member states voted for and only four against.

The EU ambassador in South Africa, Riina Kionka, tweeted: Were puzzled because South Africa sees itself and is seen by the world as a country championing human rights, international law and the rule of law.

South Africa countered that the March 2 resolution did not foreground the call for meaningful engagement. President Cyril Ramaphosa said South Africa was committed to peacefully resolving conflicts based on its history of having attained democracy through a negotiated settlement. Abstaining, he added, did not mean the country did not uphold human rights or was unconcerned about the impact of the conflict on civilians.

A Pretoria-based European diplomat told the ISS that EU relations with South Africa were unlikely to be affected since the organisation did not punish countries that way. However, others say aid and development assistance to states or organisations that openly support Russia could be impacted.

The war in Ukraine threatens to severely affect food security in Africa, as some countries rely heavily on Russian and Ukrainian imports of wheat, says African Development Banks Akinwumi Adesina. East Africa, for example, depends on it for a third of its supplies, with Egypt and Sudan particularly heavily affected by the crisis. Other major consumers of the commodity are Nigeria, Morocco, Senegal and Tunisia.

Ironically, the AUs theme for 2022 is Building resilience in nutrition on the African continent: Accelerate human capital, social and economic development. In this complex context, the organisation will struggle to raise its voice and secure a lasting solution to the food crisis.

The AU will also have to consider whether its commitments to the EU will be negatively impacted if divisions among African states over Russias Ukraine invasion persist. In the meantime, it can focus on ensuring that the situation does not completely stymie recent pledges by the EU and the U.S.

Liesl Louw-Vaudran, Senior Researcher and Project Leader, Southern Africa, Institute for Security Studies (ISS)

(This article was first published by ISS Today, a Premium Times syndication partner. We have their permission to republish).
A former Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Michael Aondoakaa, has approached the Federal High Court in Abuja for a review of an earlier judgement which barred him from occupying public office in Nigeria.

Mr Aondoakaa, who was the AGF between 2007 and February 2010 during the late Umar YarAdua administration, argued in his fresh suit that the judgement barring him from public office was fraudulently obtained.

The Calabar division of the court in Cross River State, had in 2010, declared Mr Aondoakaa, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), unfit to hold public office on account of his abuse of powers while he was the AGF.

The Court of Appeal affirmed the decision in September 2015, and lately by the Supreme Court in December 2021.

Mr Aondokaas fresh legal action came after the judgement he seeks to upturn has been affirmed by the Supreme Court.

The court decision was a fallout of a suit filed in 2009 by a politician, Emmanuel Obot, accusing Mr Aondoakaa of using his office to frustrate the legal process and enforcement of a court judgement given in his favour.

According to Mr Obot, the Court of Appeal restored his mandate to represent the Uyo Federal Constituency of Akwa Ibom State in the House of Representatives in the aftermath of the April 2007 general elections.

He said Mr Aondoakaa, however, deployed his office as the AGF to frustrate the enforcement of the judgement by writing letters to relevant authorities preventing him from being sworn into the House Representatives as ordered by the Court of Appeal.

He said Mr Aondoakaas actions were informed by his shared pecuniary interest with Bassey Etim, from whom the Court of Appeals judgement retrieved the House of Representatives seat.

Delivering judgement on Mr Obots suit on June 1, 2010, the judge, Adeniyi Ademola (now retired), ruled that Mr Aondoakaa was not a competent, fit and proper person to hold office with regards to the oaths of allegiance and office. He also awarded N50 million damages against him in favour of Mr Obot.

Judgement fraudulently obtained, says Aondoakaa

But Mr Aondoakaa filed a fresh suit on December 14, 2,021 seeking a review of the Federal High Court judgement.

He filed the fresh suit at the Federal High Court in Abuja a few days after the Supreme Court affirmed the verdict on December 10, 2021.

The former minister based his request for a review of the verdict because he said Mr Obot obtained it by fraud and misrepresentation of facts.

He said Mr Obot fraudulently obtained the judgement based on a dishonest claim that he had a joint interest with Bassey Etim in the over N700m interest in the judgement sum of N415m in the Utan Brama Victims case in suit number FHC/CA/8/95.

He also said Mr Obot fraudulently procured a letter dated April 17, 2,008 written in the name of M.K. Aondoakaa & Co to All Stakeholders, Utan Brama Fire Disaster, Mbo Local Government, Akwa Ibom State.

He denied authorising the letter and maintained that he never had such letterhead on which it was written. He said: the letterhead procured and used by Mr Obot purporting to emanate from him was fraud and deceit.

Mr Aondoakaa also said his administration as the AGF was not responsible for the payment of judgement debt to the Utan Brama fire disaster victims.

He pointed out that the full and final payment to the victims was before his appointment as the AGF during the administration of his predecessor, Bayo Ojo.

He added that contrary to the fraudulent misrepresentation of facts by Mr Obot, he had no personal or private involvement in the payment of N415million payment in the Utan Brama victims case.

He denied having the N700million interest in the judgement sum as he was never a counsel to any of the parties and at no time was ever involved at Utan Brama fire disaster case in a private and official capacity at the same time.

Faulting the Federal High Courts decision barring him from holding public office, Mr Aondoakaa said the court in furtherance of the said conscious, deliberate, dishonest and fraudulent allegations, believed same to be true, entered judgement in favour of the 1st defendant (Mr Obot)based on the purported conflict of interest and/ or that the plaintiff (Mr Aondoakaa) compromised his official position, with his private position in the 1st defendants suit.

In the suit which named Mr Obot and the AGF as defendants, Mr Aondoakaa prayed the court for an order setting aside the judgement of the Federal High Court in suit no: FHC/CA/CS/50/2009 between Emmanuel Obot versus the Attorney-General of the Federation and Michael Aondoakaa, delivered on June 1, 20,10 on the grounds of fraud.

Background

Mr Obot had in 2006 emerged as the winner of the primary election of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) ahead of the 2007 election for the Uyo Federal Constituency of Akwa Ibom State.

Advertisements





He said his name was presented to INEC, but only to be later substituted unlawfully with another name.

On December 12, 2007, the Court of Appeal, Calabar division, delivered a verdict, ordering the President of the Court of Appeal to empanel a new tribunal to hear and determine Mr Obots petition in Uyo.

But Mr Aondoakaa, in his capacity as the AGF, wrote the President of the Court of Appeal not to give effect to the decision of the Court of Appeal.

The then President of the Court of Appeal, Ayo Salami (now retired), however, ignored Mr Aondoakaas letter and went ahead to set up a new panel of judges for the tribunal.

On April 18, 2008, the new election tribunal panel gave its judgment ordering that Mr Obis be sworn into the House of Representatives to represent Uyo Federal Constituency.

Affirming the tribunals judgement on December 2, 2009, the Court of Appeal ordered INEC to issue a certificate of return to Mr Obot.

By Section 246(2) of the Nigerian Constitution, the decision of the Court of Appeal on legislative elections is final.

But Mr Aondoakaa, again, wrote the then INEC chairman, Maurice Iwu, to disregard the judgment of the Court of Appeal, which he described in the letter as an obvious desecration of the institution of the judiciary.

Not done, Mr Aondoakaa wrote Dimeji Bankole,then-Speaker of the House of Representatives, to disregard the judgement but to allow the status quo ante to remain until the last word is heard from the Supreme Court.

With his letters to INEC and the House of Representatives, Mr Aondoakaa prevented Mr Obot from being sworn in.

Offended by Mr Aondoakaas actions, Mr Obot, on May 9, 2009, filed a suit seeking the Federal High Court, Calabar Division, to declare him unfit to hold public office.

Mr Aondoakaa, who was still in office at the time, was sued both in his personal and official capacity.

The Federal High Court in its judgment on June 1, 2,010 granted Mr Obots prayers. As of that time, Mr Aondokaa had left office.

Court of Appeals decision

Mr Aondoakaa appealed to the Court of Appeal in Calabar.

On September 3, 2015, the court dismissed his appeal and affirmed the Federal High Court judgement.

The Court of Appeal, in its own decision, affirming the verdict, said Mr Aondoakaa undermined and subverted the rule of law, the due administration of justice and the independence, authority and integrity of the judiciary, the court had ruled.

Joseph Oyewole, a member of the three-man panel of the Court of Appeal, noted that the facts of the case said: It is unthinkable that the occupier of the exalted office of Attorney General would subvert the ends of justice, as was crudely done in this case by the appellant, he said.

He said a person occupying the AGF office should epitomise all that is good and noble in the legal profession.

That office should never again be occupied by individuals of such poor quality as the appellant, he added.

Drawing a contrast between what was said to be Mr Aondoakaas desecration of the judiciary and his filing of the appeal to seek justice from the same institution, Mr Oyewole said: It is ironic that the appellant should approach the same time he so brazenly desecrated for succour against the consequences of his appalling conduct.

Supreme Courts decision

Mr Aondoakaa had also further appealed to the Supreme Court.

But in its unanimous decision delivered on December 10, 2021, a five-man panel of the Supreme Court led by Mary Peter-Odili dismissed the appeal and affirmed the lower courts judgement.

Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, who delivered the lead judgement, held that The appellant (Aondoakaa), as the Chief Law Officer of the Federation and a Senior Advocate of Nigeria was reckless and acted in a manner most unbecoming of the occupant of such an exalted office.
For the umpteenth time, the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and Nigerias National Information and Technology Development Agency (NITDA) have renewed their conflicts over the University Transparency and Accountability Solutions (UTAS) designed by the former to replace the governments Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) that is currently in use for the payment of salaries and emoluments.

NITDA had recently issued a statement, saying UTAS failed to pass certain quality assurance tests conducted by the agency.

But the president of ASUU, Emmanuel Osodeke, a professor, said NITDAs rush to the press was to misinform the public and politicise the process.

According to him, NITDA is yet to report to the minister of labour and employment, Chris Ngige, who is the chief conciliator.

NITDAs statement

NITDA wrote in the statement that; A detailed Functionality/User Acceptance Test on the platform was carried out by our team. A total of 687 test cases were generated in which 529 passed, 156 failed and two cautionary warnings. As some of the failed cases are critical to the overall functionality of the solution, the agency could not recommend for the solution to be deployed in a production environment.

It added: However, one Medium Risk, three Low Risks and 44 Informational Risks were identified.

Meanwhile, citing a report issued by NITDA, the PUNCH reported that UTAS passed by 99.3 per cent.

ASUU reacts

Speaking to PREMIUM TIMES, Mr Osodeke accused NITDA of deliberately delaying and frustrating the process of the adoption of UTAS.

He said the union and NITDA agreed to meet on Monday March 28, but NITDA released its statement on Saturday when we have not even finished the process.

We have not even finished the process. We have not finished for Monday, you have gone to the press. You have not reported back to the body that requested the testing, he said in a telephone conversation.

Mr Osodeke added that the union declined to sign the document because NITDA refused to include some of the recommendations as mere recommendations, instead of tagging them as major in its report.

He said the testing conducted on UTAS by NITDA could be done in three days, but the government agency told ASUU they could only conduct the testing for three hours a day. That too, excluding weekends.

When we got there we were told they can only meet with us from 2 oclock in the afternoon. They said 2p.m to 4p.m or 2p.m to 5p.m, which is just three hours a day, he said.

He added: We raised the issue that if you know this thing is important, why cant you spend two days and finish it? We didnt know they had ulterior motives.

If you look at the press release by them, they said it took two weeks, just to create the impression in public that it was done for long.

No scorecard

Mr Osodeke said at the beginning of the process, ASUU requested a template used in the testing and how NITDA determines when UTAS pass or failed a test, but NITDA told them there was no any.

Mr Osodeke likened the situation to examin(ing) a student and adjudging any score I like as pass or fail.

Does it make sense? You should set a standard. They say they dont have a standard, he said

He added: For the first two days, we asked them to give us the template for testing so that we know at what level do you say this thing has passed and at what level do you say it failed?. What do we score to tell us that you have met the minimum, that we can move on to the next stage, but they say they dont have it. Tell us the indices of critical importance. They say they dont have any.

According to Mr Osodeke, NITDA does not understand the peculiarities of the universities as one of the items it asked ASUU to remove from UTAS was its universality, which he noted makes it easier to include names of people with characters.

He said: In creating the UTAS, we made it flexible such that if someone comes from China, his name can be captured, if someone comes from Israel, his name can be captured, when the person is Yoruba when you have small-small dots all over the name, it can be captured. But they said because of those ones it did not pass.

We spent a long time arguing that a university is not a nigerian-based organisation only. It is universal, it has to be flexible. But they insisted that we should remove it and we should make it English alone. We told them to put it in writing that they are the one directing us to put it in English alone so that in future when we cannot capture somebody we will hold you responsible.

NITDA responds

When PREMIUM TIMES sought NITDAS reaction, the head of corporate affairs and external relations at the agency, Hadiza Umar, said: we have made our stand in the press release issued last week.

Advertisements





According to the said statement released on March 28, NITDAS interaction with ASUU has positively impacted the functionality of UTAS.

There is no doubt that the exercise has positively impacted on the functionality and robustness of the UTAS platform. Furthermore, we believe that the interaction availed ASUU the opportunity to understand and appreciate NITDAs commitment and level of professionalism exhibited in carrying out its responsibilities, the statement reads in part.

It added: Considering the challenge encountered, the assessment methodology had to be reviewed to facilitate daily remediation of critical issues as they occur. This, although not in NITDAs Standard Operating Procedure for exercises such as this, was adopted. Consideration was made to the national importance attached to the exercise as well as the need to complete it in a reasonably shorter period of time.

The attention of stakeholders and the general public is drawn to the need for the UTAS platform to be sufficiently robust with key functionalities implemented before being deployed to the production environment.

However, the assessment revealed that the Solution, as it is currently implemented, is limited.

There are critical functionalities that have to be implemented, tested and passed before the Solution can be considered to meet NITDAs due diligence requirements.

These areas of improvement have been fully documented and shared with the ASUU team for necessary action. It is expected that ASUU will improve on the areas identified, work on the security issues flagged and resubmit the Solution for further assessment.

No work, No pay

Reacting to the threat of invoking the No work-No pay clause by the government, the ASUU president said the implication of such a threat is that the best hands would continue to leave the country.

Mr Osodeke gave an instance of the influx of Nigerian doctors to other countries, which he said was a result of a similar threat by the government.

He said: He (Mr Ngige) declared that with doctors when they were on strike. What happened? They left. We are now paying for that mouthing by Ngige. That thing he said, Nigeria is paying heavigly for it as the doctors are leaving.

If he continues with what he is saying, at the end of the day, the good hands, the good professors will leave the country, then we will pay the price.

Its just so unfortunate we dont appoint people that have capacity to reason, to think of the future, to head very critical sectors of the Nigerian state.

Backstory

The adoption of UTAS to replace IPPIS for the payment of staff salaries in the university system is one of the demands by ASUU that must be addressed before it could call off its ongoing three months strike that began on February 14.

Other demands include the renegotiation of the 2009 federal government-ASUU agreement on the working conditions of Nigerian academics, the payment of earned academic allowances, revitalisation fund for universities, and distortions in the payment of salaries, funding of state universities, and the release of white papers on the visitation panels sent to the universities.

While the minister of education has released the names of the teams to draft the white papers from the reports of the visitation panels, the government is yet to inaugurate them to commence work.

Qosim Suleiman is a reporter at Premium Times in partnership with Report for the World, which matches local newsrooms with talented emerging journalists to report on under-covered issues around the globe.
Not just do we now owe more. We owe it to the wrong set of people. Unlike with the Obasanjo governments counterparty, we will have to pay this set of creditors back. Unfortunately, we cannot point to what we used the money for. And what is there to point at cannot pay for itself, not to talk of helping to pay down parts of this humongous debt.

17 years ago, the Obasanjo administration reached an agreement with the Paris Club on a comprehensive treatment of Nigerias debt. Although it was a multi-stage, multi-covenant agreement, local newspaper headlines focused on the bit where, in order to obtain a debt cancellation estimated at US$18 billion (including moratorium interest) representing an overall cancellation of about 60% of its debt to the Paris Club of around US$30 billion, the Obasanjo government agreed to pay its Paris Club creditors US$12.4 billion, representing regularisation of arrears of US$6.3 billion, plus a balance of US$6.1 billion to complete the exit strategy.

Much was made then of the possibility that the Obasanjo government could have deployed the US$12.4 billion paid to the Paris Club more usefully: Building more and better schools, hospitals, bridges, new roads, etc. Today, this argument undergirds much of the justification by the Buhari government of its extensive borrowing. Given how serious the nations infrastructure deficit is, isnt there a trade-off to be had between more debt and investment in trains, bridges, and roads? Without doubt, yes. Especially if such investments boost domestic productivity, and by extension the countrys ability to meet its diverse obligations on an ongoing basis.

But there were far more serious other considerations in 2005. Not many Nigerians commentating on the decision by the Obasanjo government to reach that agreement with the Paris Club so many years back remember that it was only in 2006 that the country received its first sovereign credit rating. According to FitchRatings, its decision (published on Monday, January 30, 2006) to assign the Federal Republic of Nigeria Long-term foreign and local currency Issuer Default Ratings of BB- (BB minus), both with Stable outlook was underpinned by a clutch of reforms undertaken by the government, all of which enabled the Nigerian government to reach agreement on resolution of outstanding debt obligations with the Paris Club (PC) of official creditors on 20 October 2005.

 it is easy to presume that the burden the economy faced in the first few years of this century was a sovereign one. Nothing could be further from the truth, though. Big corporate organisations found access to credit lines bunged up because of the countrys poor debt position. Banks had problems setting up credit lines with correspondent banks for the same reason.

In other words, before the agreement reached by the Obasanjo administration with its official creditors, Nigeria was in a bad fiscal place. Fitch estimated, then, that because of the debt agreement, the governments public debt burden will be equivalent to just 17% of GDP by end-2006 compared with 66% in 2004. It also believed that with public foreign debt of just US$5.1 billion, (including US$2.9 billion of mostly concessional debt owed to multilateral institutions), compared with US$42 billion of international reserves forecast for end-2006, Nigeria will be a net public external creditor while the public external debt service ratio will fall to just 1% of exports of goods and services in 2007.

Against this background, it is easy to presume that the burden the economy faced in the first few years of this century was a sovereign one. Nothing could be further from the truth, though. Big corporate organisations found access to credit lines bunged up because of the countrys poor debt position. Banks had problems setting up credit lines with correspondent banks for the same reason. And the agreement with the Paris Club simply lifted a chokehold on the nations finances and economy. Essentially, the agreement was completed in two phases, in keeping with the provisions of a Policy Support Instrument (PSI) that the Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund agreed for the country in October 2005. Under phase one of the agreement with the Paris Club, Nigeria was to obtain cancellation of 33 per cent of eligible debts after paying all the arrears due on all categories of debts. Phase two involved Nigeria paying amounts due under post-cut off date debt, and the Paris Club granting an additional 34 per cent cancellation of all eligible debt, after which Nigeria bought back the remaining eligible debt.

Remember that in naira terms, the countrys public debt moved from N12.60 trillion in 2015 to N39.56 trillion last year. Worse still, poised to take advantage of softer external financing conditions which prevailed until this year, we had moved the ratio of our external debt to domestic debt from 17:83 in 2015 to 40:60 last year.

If a public debt of US$46.2 billion threatened to throttle the economy so many years ago, what are we to make of the US$95.78 billion that the country owed at the end of last year? Remember that in naira terms, the countrys public debt moved from N12.60 trillion in 2015 to N39.56 trillion last year. Worse still, poised to take advantage of softer external financing conditions which prevailed until this year, we had moved the ratio of our external debt to domestic debt from 17:83 in 2015 to 40:60 last year. It gets worse. Even as the external component of government debt rose from US$11.41 billion in 2016 to US$38.39 billion last year, the commercial part of this (Eurobonds and Diaspora bonds) rose from US$1.5 billion to US$14.69 billion.

Not just do we now owe more. We owe it to the wrong set of people. Unlike with the Obasanjo governments counterparty, we will have to pay this set of creditors back. Unfortunately, we cannot point to what we used the money for. And what is there to point at cannot pay for itself, not to talk of helping to pay down parts of this humongous debt.

Uddin Ifeanyi, journalist manque and retired civil servant, can be reached @IfeanyiUddin.
On Thursday, April 7, in Abuja, there will be an official launch of a foundation in honour of Innocent Chukwuma, the Innocent Chukwuemeka Chukwuma Empowerment Foundation (ICCEF). This will be followed by the official launch of an academic chair and fellowship, the Innocent Chukwuma Social Impact Chair and Fellowship (ICSICF) on Friday, May 13, the day he was interred a year ago. The chair and fellowship are being hosted by the Lagos Business School with support from Ford Foundation.

It has been a year since the passage of Innocent Chukwuma, my friend, brother, and Comrade. It looks like yesterday when I got that devastating response from Professor Chidi Odinkalu saying, We may have lost Innocent. I had called in response to a barrage of WhatsApp messages from Chidi, which started with, Good evening, sir. How are you doing? Family? Have you heard about Innocent?

Innocent Chukwuma, or Innoma, as I called him, was 55, and the immediate past Regional Director (West Africa) of Ford Foundation. He was full of life and ideas. His death was devastating in many ways. It depleted the ranks of civil society and human rights activists in Nigeria, which has suffered severe blows in the last two decades from the death of the inveterate organiser and leading democracy activists, Chima Ubani, in 2005, to the consummate scribe and Principal Private Secretary to former Edo State Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, Olaitan Oyerinde, in 2012, to lawyer and human rights activist, Bamidele Aturu, in 2014, to former President of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) and Executive Director of Alliance for Credible Elections (ACE), Emma Ezeazu, in 2015, to radical communication scholar and activist, Dr Yima Sen, in 2020, to the political activist and national publicity secretary of Afenifere, the Pan-Yoruba socio-cultural group, Yinka Odumakin, on April 3, 2021, and many others.

Innocent Chukwuma died on Saturday, April 3, 2021, 24 hours after he was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia (AML), three days before he was due to travel to the University of Oxford to commence writing his autobiography after eight years in charge of Ford Foundation, West Africa.

Innocent and I had life-long friendship, which started in the late 1980s as student activists  he at University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and I at the University of Calabar. We both served in the same orientation camp in Maiduguri, Borno State, for our NYSC and would later connect in Lagos after service. As young men trying to find our feet in our different endeavours  he worked at Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO), Nigerias foremost human rights organisation, while I was a reporter at the TheNews  his flat which he shared with two of his Mbaise kinsmen, Okey Nwaguma, the Executive Director of Rule of Law and Accountability Advocacy Centre (RULAAC) and Dr Geoffrey Anyanwu, was a weekend getaway for me.

In my friendship and collaboration with Innocent Chukwuma, which spanned more than three decades, what has remained with me, beyond the banters and social engagements, are the conversations we had about the future of Nigeria. These conversations started from what Innocent and I have in common: 1966, the year of our birth.

As with everything about him, it started as a joke. He had teased me about the fact that he was two months older than I. I ignored him. Then he got serious, reminding me that 1966, the year of our birth, was a pivotal moment in the history and political evolution of the country. Of course, I knew that, but it wasnt something I had thought about deeply in terms of how historical coincidence could trigger an attempt to confront the Nigerian malaise. Innocent had suggested the formation of a group, the Class of 66, to undertake that task.

On January 15, 1966, barely six years after independence, the country witnessed a military coup, which truncated the First Republic with the assassination of the countrys first Prime Minister, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Belewa, the Premier of Western Nigeria, Chief Ladoke Akintola, and the Premier of Northern Nigeria, Sir Ahmadu Bello, among other high-profile casualties. On July 29, 1966, there was another coup, which overthrew the government of General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi, Nigerias first military head of state. He and his host at Ibadan, the first military governor of the Western Region, Lt. Colonel Francis Adekunle Fajuyi, among others, were assassinated. The ugly consequences of these two events would spill over leading to a civil war, which lasted from July 1967 to January 1970.

Fifty-two years after, the country has yet to make any meaningful effort at national redemption. It is no surprise, therefore, that the leadership is rudderless and the country remains comatose. Innocent would be shocked at what the country has become in the last one year, a veritable killing field awash with the blood of compatriots spilled daily courtesy of ruthless kidnappers, bandits and terrorists who have capitalized on unexampled poor governance to share coercive powers with the state and carve out territories of their own in the forests and highways.

Innocent Chukwuma, indeed, was many things to different people. One of his legacies is the Oluaka Institute in Imo State, a technology incubation village, which he set up to bridge the technology gap and tackle youth unemployment.

As part of the first-year remembrance, Josephine Effah-Chukwuma, Innocents widow, and CLEEN Foundation, the organisation he founded in 1998 and led for many years before joining Ford Foundation, have lined up several activities befitting a man who was at home with creative ideas and solutions. Impact and Legacy. Those are the two words that best define Innocents life on earth, notes Josephine Effah-Chukwuma. Anyone who knew Innocent or even met him for a few hours would agree.

On Thursday, April 7, in Abuja, there will be an official launch of a foundation in honour of Innocent Chukwuma, the Innocent Chukwuemeka Chukwuma Empowerment Foundation (ICCEF). This will be followed by the official launch of an academic chair and fellowship, the Innocent Chukwuma Social Impact Chair and Fellowship (ICSICF) on Friday, May 13, the day he was interred a year ago. The chair and fellowship are being hosted by the Lagos Business School with support from Ford Foundation. On that day, there will be a reading of excerpts of Innocents biography being written by Dr Nduka Otiono, Associate Professor and Graduate Program Coordinator at the Institute of African Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. This is being done with support from Ford Foundation.

It is heartwarming that Josephine Effah-Chukwuma and her children, Chidinma, Amarachi, and Nkechi, as well as CLEEN Foundation, Ford Foundation, friends, and associates, have come together to remember and celebrate Innocent Chukwuemeka Chukwuma. He would be proud.

Truly, #InnocentChukwumaLives!

Chido Onumah, co-host of @90MinutesAfrica, can be reached via @conumah
The police in Zamfara State on Monday have provided more details about how bandits attacked Tsafe town and killed three people, including the son of the states commissioner for security affairs, Mamman Tsafe.

PREMIUM TIMES earlier reported how the bandits, Sunday night, invaded Tsafe town, the council headquarters of Tsafe Local Government Area of Zamfara State.

The incident occurred in the Hayin Tumbi area, which is close to the commissioners residence, while many people were still in mosques observing their night prayers,

The state police spokesperson, Muhammad Shehu, on Monday, said the gunmen invaded the town at around 8:30 p.m.on motorcycles from the Eastern outskirts of the town and started shooting sporadically.

Mr Shehu said police personnel and other security operatives mobilised to the scene and engaged the assailants in a serious gunfight that forced them to retreat into the bush.

Unfortunately, three persons, including the son of Commissioner for Security and Home Affairs, Rtd DIG Mamman Ibrahim Tsafe were shot dead by the bandits while scampering for their lives, and three other people sustained gunshot wounds, Mr Shehu said.

The attack came hours after a police tactical team repelled another attack by bandits on the Western outskirt of Tsafe. A police officer was injured in the confrontation.

Mr Shehu said Zamfara State police commissioner, Ayuba Elkanah, has visited the injured police officer and the families of those killed by the bandits to commiserate with them.

The commissioner also to assess the existing security emplacement of the area to deploy additional re-enforcement that would forestall future attack in Tsafe and its environ.

While at Tsafe, Mr Elkanah condoled with the Commissioner, Mr Tsafe, and families of other victims that lost their sons in the attack.

The Commissioner of Police assures that the deployment of additional joint tactical teams would go a long way in improving the security and safety of Tsafe and its environment. Calling on the residents to improve their synergy with the security operatives, by giving credible and timely information on activities of criminal elements.

The Commissioner of Police further directed the State CID to conduct a discreet investigation to unravel the circumstances of the attacks.

PREMIUM TIMES gathered that the attack on the town is believed to be a reprisal of the killing of a Fulani by a Hausa vigilante group in Tsafe on Saturday.

Reprisal attacks between vigilante groups and armed bandits have triggered several violent incidents in Zamfara and other neighbouring states.

Zamfara State and other North-western states have been consumed by an orgy of violence since 2018. Armed groups, locally referred to as bandits, have killed thousands of people. They have also injured and abducted several other people.

These insurgents impose protection taxes on helpless rural communities, rustle their cattle and kidnap residents and travellers for ransom.
LONDON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- BetterCommerce, an API first headless and composable ecommerce platform, today announced a strategic partnership with LAB Group, a leading digital agency with multi-disciplinary expertise across technology, marketing, data-led human insights, communications, and creativity. The partnership will support BetterCommerce customers by working with a leading agency whose expertise is in large scale digital transformation across multiple disciplines. LAB's expertise ranges from UI/UX to Digital Marketing and everything in between.

LAB will also work closely with the team at BetterCommerce as a SI partner who will deliver unique and seamless customer experiences across all sales touchpoints for ecommerce brands. With the suite of modules already offered by BetterCommerce, this partnership will help retailers and brands to build unique propositions for their end customers both online and offline. LAB has previously worked with customers like J.P.Morgan, Coca-Cola and Superdry.

In partnering with BetterCommerce, LAB Group gains access to a comprehensive suite of headless and composable PBCs (Packaged business capabilities) that powers some of the top UK brands today. With BetterCommerce's composable approach, LAB customers will be able to re-platform or optimize their business use cases at the speed they choose. BetterCommerce brings flexibility, agility and speed to businesses who want to innovate their brand's image with a modern, headless commerce solution.

One the major benefits of this partnership will be to create bespoke solutions for large enterprises who want to invest in technology but refrain from hiring a huge IT team or do not want to work with multiple vendors to create fragmented solution. LAB Group and BetterCommerce with the combination of technology and services is determined to address the core issues faced by mid-market to enterprise retailers and brands.

"We are very excited about this new partnership with BetterCommerce, they are the perfect commerce partner for LAB Group. Headless and composable commerce is the direction we advocate for with our clients and their ability to offer flexibility as a strategy is incredibly suited to our approach to web builds. Our partnership will combine a best in breed MACH approach through the combination of BetterCommerce's platform and LAB Group's specialisms." says Gareth Simms, Digital Experience Consultant.

"We're committed to impact mid-market to enterprise retailers. Scaling up from 10M to 100M is difficult and it not only requires advanced and sophisticated technology, but it also requires a team who can use these technologies and build for the future.", said Vipul Aggarwal, CRO at BetterCommerce. "I can't think of any better partner who understands digital transformation, technology, and creative customer experiences better than LAB."

About BetterCommerce:

BetterCommerce is designed to offer a suite of composable PBCs and headless commerce API's allowing retailers to create unique shopping experiences and manage bespoke business requirements.

About LAB Group:

Lab Group is a group of agencies that unites multi-disciplinary expertise across technology, marketing, data-led human insights, communication, and creativity.

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1673077/BetterCommerce_Logo.jpg

Media Contact:

Simon Glazer

Elate Communications

simon.glazer@elatecommunications.com

07767 382 946

SOURCE BetterCommerce
MUNICH, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- 2021 was another very successful year for Catella Real Estate AG (CREAG), both operationally and financially. CREAG kicks off 2022 in January with its 15th anniversary and a new spokesperson at the helm. Andreas Wesner joins the Management Board of CREAG as of April 1, where he will continue to drive the growth strategies of the "Catella Property Investment Management" business unit.

With a transaction volume of around EUR 1.3 billion, the EUR 1 billion mark was clearly exceeded in 2021. The equity placed by the investment management company in 2021 will be just under the billion mark at more than EUR 950 million. With 19 open-ended, regulated real estate funds developed with a variety of investment strategies in terms of risk/return ratios, property type and property location, investors gain access to various European markets and professional portfolio and asset management through CREAG. CREAG currently offers four Article-8 products for sale, consciously and actively fulfilling its responsibility to the environment, the economy and society. In October last year, together with Bank J. Safra Sarasin, CREAG received the prestigious Scope Award in the category Best Asset Manager "ESG Commercial Real Estate" for its commitment to sustainability.

Furthermore, in order to fulfill this responsibility, CREAG has set itself 18 transparent and concrete sustainability targets up to the year 2025 in its newly published "CREAG Sustainability Strategy 2025". CREAG uses these to manage its sustainability activities, pursuing a clear vision of making a positive contribution to the sustainable development of the environment, the economy and society.

Since its founding in 2007, the company has developed into one of the leading investment managers in Germany, with assets under management of currently just under EUR 7 billion and around 100 employees.

At the beginning of the second quarter of 2022, Andreas Wesner will take over the function as Managing Director of CREAG. Mr. Wesner has many years of extensive experience in the German and European real estate market as well as in the regulated fund business. He joins Catella after holding the position of Head of Transactions - Northern Continental Europe at LaSalle Investment Management. Prior to LaSalle, Mr. Wesner worked for AXA Investment Managers and The Carlyle Group in investment management and acquisitions.

"I am looking forward to the new challenges and the opportunity to join CREAG and its talented team. My past 20 years in real estate investment in Germany and Europe are a very good basis to further develop CREAG's path to become a leading pan-European investment manager," says Andreas Wesner.

Timo Nurminen, Head of Property Investment Management at Catella welcomes Andreas Wesner to the team: "We are delighted to welcome Andreas Wesner to the CREAG team. CREAG plays a key role in the growth strategy of the business unit "Catella Property Investment Management". Mr. Wesner's broad expertise and experience will support the implementation of CREAG's future growth and expansion," says Timo Nurminen.

CONTACT:

For more information, please contact:

Julia Stubler

Marketing & PR Manager Catella Real Estate AG

+89 189 16 65 275

julia.stuebler@catella-investment.com

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

The following files are available for download:

SOURCE Catella - Property Investment Management
Technological advancements in cosmetic implants and rise in number of product approvals by the U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for cosmetic implant products drive the growth of the cosmetic implants market.

PORTLAND, Ore., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Allied Market Research published a report, titled, "Cosmetic Implants Market by Product (Dental Implants, Breast Implants, Facial Implants, Other Implants), by Biomaterial (Polymers, Metals, Ceramics, Biomaterials): Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2020-2030." According to the report, the global cosmetic implants industry was estimated at $9.24 billion in 2020, and is anticipated to hit $20.54 billion by 2030, registering a CAGR of 8.2% from 2020 to 2030.

For Right Perspective, Download Sample PDF at: https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/request-sample/1463

Drivers, restraints, and opportunities-

Increase in prevalence of congenital facial deformities including cleft lip and cleft palate, technological advancements in cosmetic implants, and rise in number of product approvals by the U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for cosmetic implant products drive the growth of the cosmetic implants market. On the other hand, high costs involved in the procedures impede the growth to some extent. However, new product launches in the global market are expected to create lucrative opportunities in the industry.

Covid-19 scenario-

Temporary closure of cosmetic hospitals and dental clinics in the majority of countries, especially, during the initial phase of the pandemic, impacted the global cosmetic implants market negatively.

Most of the scheduled cosmetic surgeries were either cancelled or postponed during the period. However, the market has already started recovering and is projected to get back on track soon.

The dental implants segment to maintain the lion's share-

By product, the dental implants segment accounted for the highest market share in 2020, generating more than half of the global cosmetic implants market. The same segment is also anticipated to cite the fastest CAGR of 8.8% from 2020 to 2030. This is attributed to rise in prevalence of dental deformities and increase in number of dental procedures among individuals across the world.

Do You Have Any Query Or Specific Requirement? Ask to Our Industry Expert: https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/purchase-enquiry/1463

The metals segment to lead the trail-

By biomaterial, the metals segment generated the highest share in 2020, holding more than one-third of the global cosmetic implants market. Increase in number of dental clinics and dental surgeries drive the segment growth. The biomaterials segment, on the other hand, is expected to cite the fastest CAGR of 9.3% from 2020 to 2030, due to rise in number of cosmetic surgeries across the globe.

North America to dominate by 2030-

By region, North America contributed to the major market share in terms of revenue 2020, holding more than one-third of the global cosmetic implants market, owing to rise in number of road accidents, increase in presence of key players for development of cosmetic implants, and upsurge in well-established infrastructure across North America. The Asia-Pacific region, simultaneously, is projected to cite the fastest CAGR of 9.6% from 2020 to 2030. Increase in number of dental hospitals, rise in prevalence of congenital deformities, and surge in population base boost the market growth in the region.

Prominent market players-

3M

Danaher Corporation

POLYTECH Health and Aesthetics GmbH

Dentsply Sirona Inc.

GC Aesthetics PLC.

Institut Straumann AG.

AbbVie, Inc.

Sientra Inc.

Zimmer Holdings Inc

Avenue Basic Plan | Library Access | 1 Year Subscription |

Sign up for Avenue subscription to access more than 12,000+ company profiles and 2,000+ niche industry market research reports at $699 per month, per seat. For a year, the client needs to purchase minimum 2 seat plan.

Request for 14 days free trial: https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/avenue/trial/starter





"We have also published few syndicated market studies in the similar area that might be of your interest. Below are the report title for your reference, considering Impact of Covid-19 Over This Market which will help you to assess aftereffects of pandemic on short-term and long-term growth trends of this market."

Trending Reports in Healthcare Industry (Book Now with 10% Discount):

Fluoroscopy Equipment Market - Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 20202028

Monoclonal Antibodies Market - Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2020-2028

Healthcare IT Market - Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2020-2028

Dermatology Devices Market - Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 20202028

Orthopedic Digit Implants Market - Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 20202028

Gene Sequencing Market - Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 20202028

About Us

Allied Market Research (AMR) is a full-service market research and business-consulting wing of Allied Analytics LLP based in Portland, Oregon. Allied Market Research provides global enterprises as well as medium and small businesses with unmatched quality of "Market Research Reports" and "Business Intelligence Solutions." AMR has a targeted view to provide business insights and consulting to assist its clients to make strategic business decisions and achieve sustainable growth in their respective market domain.

Pawan Kumar, the CEO of Allied Market Research, is leading the organization toward providing high-quality data and insights. We are in professional corporate relations with various companies and this helps us in digging out market data that helps us generate accurate research data tables and confirms utmost accuracy in our market forecasting. Each and every data presented in the reports published by us is extracted through primary interviews with top officials from leading companies of domain concerned. Our secondary data procurement methodology includes deep online and offline research and discussion with knowledgeable professionals and analysts in the industry.

Contact:

David Correa

5933 NE Win Sivers Drive

#205, Portland, OR 97220

United States

USA/Canada (Toll Free): +1-800-792-5285, +1-503-894-6022

UK: +44-845-528-1300

Hong Kong: +852-301-84916

India (Pune): +91-20-66346060

Fax: +1(855)550-5975

help@alliedmarketresearch.com

Web: https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/reports-store/life-sciences

Follow Us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/life-sciences-industry-research/

Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/636519/Allied_Market_Research_Logo.jpg

SOURCE Allied Market Research
STOCKHOLM, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Elisa Polystar has acquired FRINX s.r.o, a Slovak telecom network automation software supplier. FRINX products and software will complement Elisa Polystar's zero-touch automation and analytics offering, which helps communications service providers (CSPs) automate their network management processes in a multivendor telecom network environment. The acquisition is consistent with Elisa's strategy to grow digital services internationally and accelerate development of its telecom software business under Elisa Polystar. With this transaction, Elisa Polystar is taking another step on its strategic journey to make self-driving networks happen.

FRINX is a privately owned software provider founded in Bratislava, Slovakia, in 2016. FRINX helps CSPs automate their network configuration management. Its products  proven by installations among leading CSP customers  are cloud-native, microservices-based and network vendor-independent. Today, the company has around 40 experts working in its projects. Following the acquisition, development of their product offering will continue as part of Elisa Polystar's automation business.

Elisa Polystar is a world-leading network automation and analytics solutions provider, serving over 120 CSPs globally. With its background as an international business of Finland's largest CSP, Elisa Polystar's solutions are proven and tested in live networks.

Network automation is a must for CSPs in order to cope with the massive rise in the amounts of data, adoption of new technologies and the overall increased complexity of telecommunication networks. It is about both reducing costs and enhancing the customer experience at the same time. As a result of this acquisition, the combined portfolio will be a good match for existing customer demand. Furthermore, the combined resources will allow Elisa Polystar to provide an accelerated path for their customers in the future.

Gerhard Wieser, CEO and co-founder of FRINX: "We are excited about the possibilities for us and our customers that arise from joining Elisa Polystar. Elisa Polystar is a true pioneer in network automation and operates globally. By joining them, we get access to a global sales channel as well as increased machine learning capabilities and resources. For our own people, it means a chance to join an extended global network of software professionals with more opportunities for personal growth and broader career opportunities."

Kirsi Valtari, EVP for Automation at Elisa Polystar: "I am happy to welcome the very skilled FRINX experts to join our Automation team. FRINX products and software are a fantastic complement to our own suite of automation solutions, and we're excited about the possibilities for collaboration going forward. Together, we will be able to create new and even better ways to enhance the operations of customers of both Elisa Polystar and FRINX."

About FRINX:

FRINX builds software that enables customers to create automated, repeatable, digital processes to build, grow and operate their digital infrastructure. Communication service providers are choosing FRINX products and solutions to automate cloud assets, data centres, branch offices, core, edge and access networks.

The goal of automation is to provide programmatic interfaces to save time and resources in deploying infrastructure changes and to provide a cost-effective basis for adding new functionality and services. FRINX provides software that enables low-code workflow design and operation, analytics to support machine learning and intent-based infrastructure control to integrate devices and services from many networking vendors.

FRINX has offices in Bratislava, Slovakia and New York, NY. The company is now part of Elisa Polystar. www.frinx.io

About Elisa Polystar:

Elisa Polystar, part of Elisa Group, is an innovative provider of cloud-native automation and analytics solutions. Our products help CSPs to reduce both OPEX and CAPEX costs, while enhancing customer experiences.

Our portfolio  proven with hundreds of CSPs globally  integrates AI-driven analytics with automation. It unlocks the benefits of closed-loop network operations and optimisation, delivering self-driving networks. Our solutions are compatible with any network, as well as any service, including IoT and 5G network slicing.

With our background as an international business of Finland's largest CSP, Elisa Polystar's solutions are tested in live networks, and with the unique needs of operators in mind: by an operator, for operators. www.elisapolystar.com

MEDIA CONTACTS

Elisa Polystar

Inna Ott

Director of Marketing

Phone: +46 8 50 600 600

Email: inna.ott@polystar.com

Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1778047/Elisa_Polystar_Logo.jpg

SOURCE Elisa Polystar
YAOUNDE, Cameroon, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- IHS Cameroon, a subsidiary of IHS Towers, one of the largest independent owners, operators and developers of shared communications infrastructure in the world, has recently been certified as a Best Employer for 2022. The "Best Places to Work" certification is awarded to the highest performing companies in terms of working conditions and recognizes the trust employees place in their management. The certification is based on evaluations by employees and the company's management team.

"We are honoured to be certified as a Best Place to Work. This award confirms our commitment to building a fulfilling work culture and future with our employees. We are proud that our employees have a consistently positive experience with their colleagues and managers and find personal satisfaction in their work." Vanina Ambassa Doumbe, Human Resources Director, IHS Cameroon.

82% of employees recommend IHS Cameroon as a place to work. These results reflect the various actions undertaken by IHS Cameroon, notably to attract, retain and develop the loyalty of employees and support them in their professional development. In addition to ensuring the continuous improvement of processes within the organization.

About the Best Places to Work program

Best Places to Work is an international certification program that recognises the best employers in different countries. The assessment is based on an analysis of a company's attractiveness through a two-step process focusing on 8 dimensions around company culture, management leadership, learning opportunities and HR practices. Join our community on LinkedIn , Twitter and Facebook .

For more information, visit www.bestplacestoworkfor.org

SOURCE Best Places to Work
FN Media Group Presents USA News Group News Commentary

VANCOUVER, BC, April 1, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- In 2021, shares of more eco-friendly companies known to appease ESG investors were outperformed by oil and gas stocks over the course of the year. Despite this apparent divergence, there's been a movement towards making O&G stocks more ESG friendly, such as the push to reincorporate Civitas Resources, Inc. (NYSE:CIVI) into ESG funds. Less phased by ESG peer pressure, billionaire investor Warren Buffett and his Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE:BRK-A) (NYSE: BRK-B) stacked up an investment worth ~$7.7 billion into Occidental Petroleum Corporation (NYSE:OXY) in March 2022, with speculation he could pay the remaining $50 billion to acquire the whole thing. Buffett's latest investment put Occidental in with Chevron Corporation (NYSE:CVX) as the only two O&G stocks in Berkshire's top 10 largest common stock holdings. Meanwhile, other ESG-friendly O&G deals are taking place, including the takeover of Petroteq Energy, Inc. (OTCPK: PQEFF) by Viston United Swiss AG.

In the case of Petroteq Energy, Inc. (OTC Pink:PQEFF), cleaner technologies for sustainable oil production drew significant attention from ESG-focused equity firm Viston United Swiss AG, which was created to invest in renewable energies and clean technologies, as well as in the environmental protection industry.

Petroteq's development of proprietary oil extraction and remediation technologies made it stand out as part of an overall ESG strategy for Viston United Swiss AG.

Their technology's ability to enable a company to produce oil without water, waste tailings ponds and emissions, led to Viston's premium price valuation of Petroteq stock, at a price point of approximately 279% over the closing price of the Common Shares on the TSX Venture Exchange on August 6, 2021, and a 1,032% premium to the 52-week volume weighted average trading price on the TSX-V prior to the offer originally made in April 2021.

"We are particularly pleased with the recognition this shows of our technology which we have taken from inception to commercial viability as a one of its kind in oil sands eco-friendly, green extraction," said former Petroteq Chairman and CEO, Dr. Gerald Bailey, who retired in January. "We had always forecast a great future. However, we respect the value of this offer to shareholders and if it can be achieved it will reward our many dedicated supporters."

Last September, Petroteq proved it could produce from oil sands ore using its Clean Oil Recovery Technology (CORT) process.

After the release of the pilot program's test results, Vladimir Podlipskiy, PhD, Interim CEO and Director of Petroteq, commented, "Confirmation that heavy oil extracted from Utah oil sands using our CORT process is suitable for production of MSAR and bioMSAR fuels could allow for the production of fuel and biofuel with significant environmental benefits, while creating a higher value product stream for Petroteq's future commercial production."

In addition to sustainable oil production, Petroteq's technology cleans oil sands of all hydrocarbons, creating a purified sand as part of an overall ESG strategy.

The Viston offer has been favorably across the Petroteq team. Its Board Members have shared their unanimous intention to tender their shares through the offer. Now the company's Founder, Former Chairman and CEO Alex Blyumkin has announced his support for the takeover bid.

"After thorough consideration of all aspects of the Viston Offer, the advice provided by Haywood and consulting with its other advisors, the Board has unanimously determined to recommend that Shareholders accept the Viston Offer and tender their Common Shares," said the Board in their official statement.

The offer itself is valued at a considerable premium over the market price, with a 100% all-cash consideration of C$0.74 per common share.

Meanwhile, through its US shares on the OTC under the PQEFF symbol, shares of Petroteq are trading around US$0.375 (C$0.474) on March 30, 2022. At that price point, the C$0.74 still represents a potential 56% premium over the more current trading price.

At a time when the US government is urging increased oil and gas production to offset some of the deficit created, talk is ramping up on how to increase domestic production again.

According to Ben Dell, co-founder and Managing Partner of the private equity firm Kimmeridge Energy Management, it's possible to produce traditional energy sources with reduced carbon emissions.

Kimmeridge is currently the largest shareholder in Civitas Resources, Inc. (NYSE:CIVI), which produces oil and natural gas in the Rocky Mountain region of Colorado, and is billed as "Colorado's first carbon-neutral oil and gas producer."

"My real ambition is to see oil and gas companies like Civitas added back to ESG funds," said Dell, stating he hopes ESG funds would go on to "understand that the company is already reducing its emission footprint and has offset its footprint and is delivering a net zero product."

After closing a large $346 million acquisition of Denver-Julesburg Basin operator Bison Oil & Gas II, Dell who was already serving as Chairman of the company, officially took over as interim CEO of Civitas.

Last year at the Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE:BRK-A, BRK-B) annual shareholder meeting, Warren Buffett shared his own unconventional views on ESG investing. When it comes to reporting for the sake of it, Buffett believes excess ESG reporting should be avoided, as he doesn't believe these reports are always fully read before additional questions come about.

Berkshire Hathaway is comfortable with investing in both Chevron Corporation (NYSE:CVX) and Occidental Petroleum Corporation (NYSE:OXY).

But just because Berkshire's methods of acknowledging ESG intentions aren't as transparent as other firms might be, that doesn't mean its O&G interests ignore the market's demand for ESG efforts.

For example, Occidental Petroleum Corporation (NYSE:OXY) has announced plans for 70 plants to capture carbon from the air by 2035. Construction on the first direct air capture plant that's planned is expected to start in H2 2022, with startup scheduled for late 2024, with the cost per plant expected to cost $1 billion.

"Corporations and CEOs are realizing that for us to mitigate climate change in the world, it's absolutely necessary that we take steps now," said Vicki Hollub CEO of Occidental. "This is a sure opportunity and a way that we can definitively store and keep captured CO2 either underground or through products for forever, and it's a path for others to make their path sustainable too."

Hollub's company is also investing $100 million this year to develop three carbon sequestration hubs by 2025. Occidental has said it's on track to secure more than 100,000 net acres this year for these sequestration hubs, including for multiple sequestration sites on the Gulf Coast.

Another Berkshire interest, Chevron Corporation (NYSE:CVX), earlier this year made its biggest bet so far in company history into alternative fuels, through a $3.15 billion acquisition of biodiesel maker Renewable Energy. While biodiesel and renewable diesel use similar feedstocks, renewable diesel undergoes a separate refining process to make it chemically identical to ultra-low-sulfur diesel.

"Most people see (biodiesel) as growing in the U.S. and Southeast Asia ... and view it as a blendstock to get optimum margin because it's less expensive than renewable diesel," said Mark Nelson, Executive VP of Downstream and Chemicals for Chevron, in an interview with Reuters.

Much like the PetroTeq and Viston takeover offer, Chevron's offer for Renewable Energy came with a premium of more than 40% prior to the company's closing price the Friday before the Monday announcement took place.

The investment fits into Chevron's long-term plans to cut operational emissions to net zero by 2050 and in September pledged to invest $10 billion to reduce its carbon emissions through 2028, with about $3 billion earmarked for renewable fuels.

More recently, Chevron agreed to collaborate with Restore the Earth Foundation on a carbon offsets reforestation project in Louisiana, which includes planting an expected 1.7 million native bald cypress seedlings as part of the project.

"Chevron New Energies is proud to collaborate with Restore the Earth on our inaugural carbon offsets project  bringing lower carbon solutions to Chevron as well as our customers," said Barbara Harrison, vice president of Offsets & Emerging of Chevron New Energies. "In addition to helping remove carbon, the seedling replanting is anticipated to contribute to local forest and wetland ecosystem restoration."

For more information go to: https://usanewsgroup.com/2022/03/25/this-quick-turnaround-takeover-is-the-kind-of-play-smart-investors-snap-up-in-a-heartbeat/

Article Source:

USA News Group

http://USAnewsgroup.com

info@usanewsgroup.com

DISCLAIMER:

Nothing in this publication should be considered as personalized financial advice. We are not licensed under securities laws to address your particular financial situation. No communication by our employees to you should be deemed as personalized financial advice. Please consult a licensed financial advisor before making any investment decision. This is a paid advertisement and is neither an offer nor recommendation to buy or sell any security. We hold no investment licenses and are thus neither licensed nor qualified to provide investment advice. The content in this report or email is not provided to any individual with a view toward their individual circumstances. USA News Group is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Market IQ Media Group, Inc. ("MIQ"). MIQ has been paid a fee for PetroTeq Energy Inc. advertising and digital media from Maynard Communication Limited. There may be 3rd parties who may have shares of PetroTeq Energy Inc., and may liquidate their shares which could have a negative effect on the price of the stock. This compensation constitutes a conflict of interest as to our ability to remain objective in our communication regarding the profiled company. Because of this conflict, individuals are strongly encouraged to not use this publication as the basis for any investment decision. The owner/operator of MIQ DOES NOT own any shares of PetroTeq Energy Inc. MIQ reserves the right to buy and sell, and will buy and sell shares of PetroTeq Energy Inc. at any time thereafter without any further notice. We also expect further compensation as an ongoing digital media effort to increase visibility for the company, no further notice will be given, but let this disclaimer serve as notice that all material disseminated by MIQ on/about PetroTeq Energy Inc. has been reviewed and approved by the principals at PetroTeq Energy Inc.; this is a paid advertisement, and while we do not currently own shares of PetroTeq Energy Inc., we plan on buying and selling shares of PetroTeq Energy Inc. in the open market. While all information is believed to be reliable, it is not guaranteed by us to be accurate. Individuals should assume that all information contained in our newsletter is not trustworthy unless verified by their own independent research. Also, because events and circumstances frequently do not occur as expected, there will likely be differences between the any predictions and actual results. Always consult a licensed investment professional before making any investment decision. Be extremely careful, investing in securities carries a high degree of risk; you may likely lose some or all of the investment.

USA News Group is Source of all content listed above. FN Media Group, LLC (FNM), is a third party publisher and news dissemination service provider, which disseminates electronic information through multiple online media channels. FNM is NOT affiliated in any manner with USA News Group or any company mentioned herein. The commentary, views and opinions expressed in this release by USA News Group are solely those of USA News Group and are not shared by and do not reflect in any manner the views or opinions of FNM. FNM is not liable for any investment decisions by its readers or subscribers. FNM and its affiliated companies are a news dissemination and financial marketing solutions provider and are NOT a registered broker/dealer/analyst/adviser, holds no investment licenses and may NOT sell, offer to sell or offer to buy any security. FNM was not compensated by any public company mentioned herein to disseminate this press release.

This release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended and such forward-looking statements are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. "Forward-looking statements" describe future expectations, plans, results, or strategies and are generally preceded by words such as "may", "future", "plan" or "planned", "will" or "should", "expected," "anticipates", "draft", "eventually" or "projected". You are cautioned that such statements are subject to a multitude of risks and uncertainties that could cause future circumstances, events, or results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements, including the risks that actual results may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements as a result of various factors, and other risks identified in a company's annual report on Form 10-K or 10-KSB and other filings made by such company with the Securities and Exchange Commission. You should consider these factors in evaluating the forward-looking statements included herein, and not place undue reliance on such statements. The forward-looking statements in this release are made as of the date hereof and FNM undertakes no obligation to update such statements.

Media Contact Information:

FN Media Group, LLC

Media Contact e-mail:

editor@financialnewsmedia.com

U.S. Phone: +1(954)345-0611

SOURCE USA News Group
Bahrains Labour Fund (Tamkeen) signed new strategic partnership agreements with six banks to provide a comprehensive range of financing solutions for private sector enterprises.



The banks include Bahrain Islamic Bank, Khaleeji Commercial Bank, Al Baraka Islamic Bank, Kuwait Finance House, Ithmaar Bank, and Al Salam Bank. The signings are an addition to previously announced strategic partnership agreements with Bahrain Development Bank and Ahli United Bank.



These partnerships provide enterprises with the necessary capital to fuel their development and growth locally and internationally. Tamkeens 2021-2025 strategy aims to deliver higher impact for the economy in alignment with national economic priorities and market needs.



Husain Mohamed Rajab, Chief Executive of Tamkeen welcomed this collaboration with financial institutions, emphasizing the role Tamkeen plays by incentivizing investment, employment and training across all sectors with a special emphasis on high potential sectors, all of which create a positive ripple effect across the national economy.



He said: We highly value these strategic partnerships with key players in Bahrains financial services sector to facilitate opportunities for growth and development for enterprises in the Kingdom. These financing schemes help companies achieve their business objectives, therefore empowering their success and increasing their contribution to our national economy.



Empowering enterprises is one of Tamkeens core mandates and as such, Tamkeen has supported over 65,000 enterprises in Bahrain through various programs and initiatives, providing specific support when required, including through the business continuity program which supported over 22,000 enterprises during the global pandemic.



Furthermore, Tamkeen enabled over 19,000 entrepreneurs to launch new businesses, fostering a thriving startup ecosystem in Bahrain. Tamkeens partnership with financial institutions to offer financing schemes stretches over 13 years where more than 7,000 micro and small businesses have been supported.



This initiative builds on years of impact delivered for local enterprises, bringing them more financing options to leverage their success. The support will be offered through some of Tamkeens recently announced programs, including Start Your Business, Business Growth, Go Digital, and others.



Tamkeen recently launched 16 support programs as part of its strategic transformation initiative that focuses on creating greater impact for the national economy. These programs serve Tamkeens main objectives of making the private sector the engine of economic growth and Bahrainis the employee of choice locally and internationally, empowering their contribution to sustainable economic development in the Kingdom.  TradeArabia News Service
Boviet Solar brands its solar PV modules, and announces three research projects designed to advance solar technologies. Tweet this

Boviet Solar's monofacial PV modules are now called the Gamma Series and the bifacial PV modules are now called the Vega Series. Previously, the product lines used a series of letters and numbers to identify each module, such as BVM6610M-XXXS-H-HC. The company continues to keep the product code names for internal purposes in addition to the new product brand names.

These names were chosen because Vega is the brightest star in the Lyra Solar System and Gamma is the second brightest. Vega is also the second-brightest star in the northern hemisphere and the fifth brightest star of all.

"We think Vega and Gamma are the perfect images for our highly efficient mono- monofacial and bifacial PV modules with their industry leading power output. Furthermore, star names make sense because our own Sun is of course a star a star that makes solar energy possible here on Earth," said Sienna Cen, President of Boviet Solar USA.

All future Boviet Solar product lines will also be named after stars.

Research & Development



Boviet Solar also announced today three new research and development (R&D) initiatives.

The company's internal and external R&D activities encompass product power, efficiency, and reliability, as well as advanced PV product technologies such as PERC, half-cut, multi-busbar, and large cell design. Boviet Solar collaborates with USTH University, VNU university and HUST University in Vietnam, and Nanchang University in China, on its R&D activities.

"Adapting and improving upon best-in-class PV technology has been a key driver behind Boviet Solar's success and is central to our future. Technology is moving from P-type cell to N-type cell, new power classes of modules are now 600+W, and module technologies are moving to N-type Topcon and HJT. We intend to remain at the forefront of researching and developing these technologies to remain a leader in the industry," said Hui Huang, Director of R&D.

The three initiatives are focused on:

N-Topcon battery technology: This technology has significantly higher efficiency, stability and yield rate potential. In addition, the existing PERC production line is compatible with the N-Topcon solar cells production line, so that the cost reduction of N-Topcon and PERC solar cells tends to be the same. This is also considered to be a major advantage of N-Topcon compared to other N-type technologies. Currently, the average efficiency of N-Topcon batteries in industrial production is 24.5% .The ultimate efficiency of N-Topcon cells is about 28.7%, much higher than PERC's 25% ,which is very close to the theoretical limit efficiency of monocrystalline silicon, 29.43%.

600+W PV Module product development: Using N-TOPCON high-efficiency battery and advanced packaging technology to develop high-power, low-light attenuation, and low-light response N-type 600W modules. In terms of power generation, TOPCon has a stronger single-watt power generation capacity. Due to the advantages of low temperature coefficient, low attenuation, and higher double-sided ratio, TOPCon solar modules of the same power have higher power generation gain.

HJT heterojunction high-efficiency battery technology: This technology is still in the research stage. Boviet Solar will conduct testing on the production line in the future. The HJT solar cell production process is the simplest with the least steps, offering considerable room for localization to reduce costs. It is expected to become the next-generation mainstream technology with its efficiency limit of 27.5%.

About Boviet Solar



Founded in 2013 in Vietnam, Boviet Solar is part of Boway Alloy and a global Tier 1 solar technology company that specializes in the manufacturing of Monocrystalline PERC cells, Monofacial and Bifacial PV modules, as well as solar project development. The company works with IPPs, EPCs, project developers, solar installers, and contractors to deliver top-performing PV modules for utility-scale, commercial, industrial, and residential solar projects. With a proven track record of success working with many of the industry's leading players, Boviet Solar has maintained its position as a BloombergNEF Tier 1 solar module manufacturer and supplier since 2017. The company offers financial stability, technology know-how, manufacturing excellence and supply chain transparency. Its PV Modules are known for their power, performance and quality and have been rated as top performers on the PVEL/DNV-GL module reliability scorecard since 2019. Boviet Solar's USA headquarters are in San Jose, California and its global headquarters are located in Vietnam. For more information, please visit www.bovietsolar.com.

Manufacturing & Sales Capacity



Boviet Solar has 1.5 GW PERC PV Cell manufacturing capacity and 1.5 GW Monocrystalline Monofacial and Bifacial PV Module capacity. Since its inception, the company has delivered 3.122 GW of modules worldwide. In addition to Vietnam and the U.S., Boviet Solar has offices in Germany and China.

Technology Driven



Adapting best-of-class technology has been a key driver behind Boviet Solar's success and is central to its future. Through internal product development and collaboration with industry partners, Boviet Solar has assembled a suite of solar energy products that give customers flexibility, enabling them to choose the best product for their needs. The company specializes in advanced Monocrystalline technology combined with PERC cell, monofacial and bifacial PV modules. Boviet Solar is developing high-efficiency N-Topcon battery technology, high-power PV modules of 600+ W, and HJT heterojunction high-efficiency technology.

Top Performing PV Modules



Boviet Solar's PV modules have been ranked Top Performers by PV Evolution Labs (PVEL) since 2019. The brand is synonymous with quality. Every year PVEL publishes the PV Module Reliability Scorecard, which provides independent, long-term reliability and performance data that developers, investors, and asset owners refer to when choosing modules for their projects.

That ranking, and the strength of the Boviet Solar brand, is maintained through stringent supplier and manufacturing processes and tailoring products to customers' needs. The company's production equipment is sourced from internationally recognized manufacturers; combined with high-quality silicon and other materials, Boviet Solar's products are built to last. All production processes are accredited with the ISO 9001 Quality Management Standard, and dozens of control experts conduct tests at every step of the production process, ensuring that products meet or exceed performance requirements.

In addition to its internal product tests, independent global testing and evaluation laboratories validate that Boviet Solar products meet stringent requirements for safety, quality and performance. This quality has resulted in the award of certifications and approvals from international agencies including IEC, CE, TUV, and Intertek. Boviet Solar modules undergo tests in areas including salt mist corrosion, ammonia corrosion, sand/dust resistance, PID resistance, LID-LeTID resistance, wind load, and snow load tests. For a full list of product certificates, please visit the company website.

PV Module Portfolio



PERC, half-cut, multi-busbar, large cell design, robust product design and components enable our PV modules to pack more power per module, capture more photons, produce more energy, and provide reliable, dependable system performance under different installation requirements, difficult weather, or environmental conditions. To learn more about Boviet Solar's top performing PV modules, visit https://bovietsolar.com/products.

"Whether you are an EPC, installer, contractor, or project developer, we have the right PV module for your residential, commercial, industrial, and utility scale projects. As a result, you can mitigate your project risk, lower your balance of system (BOS) cost, lower the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), and receive great return on investment (ROI) and long-term reliable energy generation and savings." said Cen.

Safe Harbor Statement

This press release has been prepared by Boviet Solar (the "Company") solely to facilitate the understanding of the Company's business model and growth strategy. The information contained in this press release has not been independently verified. No representation, warranty or undertaking, express or implied, is made as to, and no reliance should be placed on, the fairness, accuracy, completeness or correctness of the information or the opinions contained herein. None of the Company or any of its affiliates, advisers or representatives will be liable (in negligence or otherwise) for any loss howsoever arising from any use of this press release or its contents or otherwise arising in connection with the press release, and you are advised to conduct an independent analysis with respect to any matters contained herein. This press release contains forward-looking statements and management may make additional forward-looking statements in response to your questions. These forward-looking statements include descriptions regarding the intent, belief or current expectations of the Company or its officers with respect to its future performance, consolidated results of operations and financial condition. These statements can be identified using words such as "expects," "plans," "will," "estimates," "projects," or words of similar meaning. Such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from expectations implied by these forward-looking statements because of various factors and assumptions. Although we believe our expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are reasonable, we cannot assure you that they will be realized. In addition, these forward-looking statements are made as of the current date, and the Company does not undertake to update forward-looking statements to reflect future events or circumstances, unless otherwise required by law.

SOURCE Boviet Solar
DUBLIN, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Chinese Battery Swap Growth Opportunities" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

This study assesses the battery swap market in China, including the passenger vehicle and the commercial vehicle segments. It provides a market overview of 2020 in terms of overall public charging and battery swap service solutions.

The research service includes snapshots of EV sales and ownership and summarizes information such as total battery swap stations, total battery swap EVs, and total battery swap services. It also comprises current and future market trends, key government regulations, comparative cost analysis between traditional charging solutions and battery swap services, and important battery swap service operator profiles.

Battery swap services are emerging solutions in China and the world. They provide quick battery replacement in 3-10 minutes. In addition, in comparison to traditional charging solutions, they offer significant time savings. Charging solutions in the Chinese electric vehicle (EV) market are being revolutionized. The government encourages the use of battery swap services as they provide rapid battery replacement and increased time savings; therefore, fleets such as public taxis are gradually adopting these solutions.



Furthermore, the launch of the Battery-as-a-Service (BaaS) monthly subscription and the reduction in the cost of EVs (battery separation) have increased the sales attractiveness of battery swap EVs among individual EV buyers. However, the Chinese battery swap market presents an oligopoly scenario. In 2020, only 3 operators participated in the market; nevertheless, this was an increase from 2 in 2019.



In 2020, China developed and operated 555 battery swap stations, and the annual frequency of battery swaps reached 27.3 million. Moreover, 3% of operating EVs in the country adopted battery swap solutions in 2020. Passenger vehicles accounted for the largest share (60%) of battery swap EVs. However, the monthly frequency of passenger vehicles' battery swaps was about 4-6 times. In comparison, public taxis and commercial vehicles contributed to a higher frequency of battery swaps.



In future, a growing number of government regulations will be introduced in the Chinese battery swap market. In addition, an increasing number of EV models for battery swaps will be launched, and a growing number of potential stakeholders will enter the market, leading to increased market fragmentation. Nevertheless, traditional charging and battery swap solutions will coexist on compatible EVs, and the market will continue to grow in 2025.

Key Topics Covered:



The Strategic Imperative

Why Is It Increasingly Difficult to Grow?

The Strategic Imperative

Impact of the Top 3 Strategic Imperatives on the Chinese Battery Swap Industry

Growth Opportunities Fuel the Growth Pipeline Engine

Growth Environment, Global COVID-19 Impact

The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Global GDP Growth

Global Growth Scenario Analysis - Assumptions

Global GDP Growth under Differing Scenarios

Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Key Regions

Growth Opportunity Analysis

Chinese Battery Swap Market Overview

EV Charging and Battery Swap Market Segmentation

Key Growth Metrics

Key Highlights - China's EV and Charging Infrastructure in Operation

EV and Charging Infrastructure in Operation Growth Drivers

Growth Restraints

Key Findings

Current Market Trends

Key Government Regulations

Chinese EV Market Snapshot, 2020

Chinese EV Charging Infrastructure Snapshot, 2020

Chinese Battery Swap Service Market Snapshot, 2020

Chinese Battery Swap Station Breakdown by Location, 2020

Chinese Battery Swap Station Breakdown by Operator, 2020

Chinese Battery Swap Station Market Share Analysis

Battery Swap Station Forecast

Forecast Discussion

Future Market Trends

SWOT Analysis

Chinese Battery Swap Station System Layout

Chinese Battery Swap Value Chain Analysis

Chinese Battery Swap Station Investment Cost

Case Study - Comparative Cost Analysis of China's Public Charging and Battery Swap Stations

Public Charging and Battery Swap Stations Case Study - Key Battery Swap EV Models in China

Case Study - Comparative Cost Analysis of Battery Swap EVs and Fuel Vehicles

Battery Swap Service Operator - Aulton

Battery Swap Service Operator - Aulton's Business Model

Battery Swap Service Operator - Nio

Battery Swap Service Operator - Nio's Business Model

Battery Swap Service Operator - Botan

Battery Swap Service Operator - Botan's Business Model

Case Study - Better Place

Case Study - Comparative Analysis of Battery Swap Service Business Models in China

Growth Opportunities

Growth Opportunity 1 - Construction of Battery Swap Stations for EVs

Growth Opportunity 2 - Battery Asset Management and Station Operation for Battery Swap Services

Growth Opportunity 3 - New Business Model Battery-as-a-Service Subscription for Battery Swap Services

Companies Mentioned

Aulton

Nio

Botan

Better Place

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/gwm9b0

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]

For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900

U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets
Apogem Capital is positioned to unlock value for investors in the private markets

NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- New York Life Investments today announced Apogem Capital as the new brand for its dedicated private markets alternatives boutique, bringing together the capabilities and investment teams of GoldPoint Partners, Madison Capital Funding and PA Capital. Apogem Capital has approximately $37 billion in assets under management1 making it a leading provider of a broad range of private capital solutions tailored to middle market companies.

Leveraging its combined expertise and strong market presence, Apogem Capital is well positioned to offer sponsors and their portfolio companies access to a streamlined suite of capital solutions. These include direct lending, junior debt, primary and secondary private equity fund investments as well as equity-co-investments, GP stakes, real assets and long/short equity. In moving forward, Apogem Capital seeks to deliver powerfully comprehensive thinking to spark ideas, new strategies and new possibilities across the alternatives landscape. At the same time, it retains a deep commitment to its proven investment processes, experienced investment teams, and deep sourcing relationships across the entirety of the middle market.

"With the largest alternative investors seeking to allocate more capital with fewer firms, we recognized that there is a significant opportunity to bring together the collective strengths of New York Life Investments' alternatives boutiques for the benefit of Apogem's investors and private equity sponsors alike," added Christopher Taylor, CEO of Apogem Capital. "At Apogem Capital, our entire team is excited about the opportunities ahead to leverage our middle market expertise to unlock meaningful value across the private equity ecosystem."

"Through our boutiques, New York Life Investments has been at the forefront of investing in the private markets for more than two decades," said Yie-Hsin Hung, CEO of New York Life Investment Management and Chairman of the Board at Apogem Capital. "We believe that Apogem Capital will not only be able to generate attractive investment opportunities in the private markets but will also build upon its strength in private equity and debt to create even more value for our investors, clients, sponsors and partners."

"As a company rooted in partnership and collaboration, we now have the combined scale, expertise and capabilities to better compete in the global marketplace and achieve our strategic growth aspirations," concluded Chris Taylor. "We believe Apogem Capital is uniquely positioned to take alternative investing to new heights."

As a result of the combination, the New York Life Investments Alternatives brand will be retired in favor of Apogem Capital, which launches with a new brand identity, logo and website to reflect the unified brand of the boutiques and forward-looking strategy.

About New York Life Investments

With over $700 billion in assets under management2 as of December 31, 2021, New York Life Investments3 (www.newyorklifeinvestments.com) is comprised of the affiliated global asset management businesses of its parent company, New York Life Insurance Company (New York Life), and offers clients access to specialized, independent investment teams through its family of affiliated boutiques. New York Life Investments remains committed to clients through a combination of the diverse perspectives of its boutiques and a long-lasting focus on sustainable relationships.

New York Life Insurance Company (www.newyorklife.com), a Fortune 100 company founded in 1845, is the largest4 mutual life insurance company in the United States and one of the largest life insurers in the world. Headquartered in New York City, New York Life's family of companies offers life insurance, retirement income, investments, and long-term care insurance. New York Life has the highest financial strength ratings currently awarded to any U.S. life insurer from all four of the major credit rating agencies5.

Media Contacts

Allison Scott

[email protected]

Kate Sylvester

[email protected]

____________________ 1 AUM is estimated and unaudited as of December 2021. AUM includes non-discretionary and co-advised assets, as well as assets managed for New York Life and certain of its subsidiaries. All other data as of December 31, 2021 unless otherwise noted. 2 AUM includes Assets under Administration. 3 "New York Life Investments" is both a service mark, and the common trade name, of certain investment advisors affiliated with New York Life Insurance Company. 4 Based on revenue as reported by "Fortune 500 ranked within Industries, Insurance: Life, Health (Mutual)," Fortune magazine, 6/2/2021. For methodology, please see http://fortune.com/fortune500/. 5 Individual independent rating agency commentary as of 9/30/2021: A.M. Best (A++), Fitch (AAA), Moody's Investors Service (Aaa), Standard & Poor's (AA+).

SOURCE New York Life Investments
ORLANDO, Fla., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Red Lobster CEO Kelli Valade has announced her resignation as Chief Executive Officer, effective April 15. Red Lobster will immediately begin a search for a successor who can lead the company in achieving its vision of being "Where the world goes for seafood, now and for generations."

Valade joined Red Lobster in August 2021. Under her leadership, she has created a new strategic framework and go-forward plan with a focus on the core guest and the need for value, as well as built out the executive team, adding the newly-created roles of Chief Marketing Officer and Chief Information Officer and recruiting a new Chief Financial Officer.

"Red Lobster is a beloved, iconic brand with a loyal guest following and incredibly smart and talented employees," said Valade. "My job as the brand's leader has been to inspire and develop our people, while also leveraging the brand's strengths and finding ways to build on them for even greater success. We've accomplished a lot in a short period of time, including building a great leadership team that alongside the board will carry the business forward to achieve our vision. I have truly loved my time here at Red Lobster. This was an incredibly difficult, but necessary, decision."

"On behalf of the Board, we thank Kelli for her service and accomplishments during her tenure as CEO, including navigating through the most recent wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. She has helped us assemble a talented and highly capable leadership team to lead us forward. We wish Kelli the very best in the future," said Rittirong Boonmechote, Chairman of the Red Lobster Board of Directors.

Following Valade's departure, Red Lobster's executive team will work closely with the Board of Directors to continue to drive the brand forward and ensure business continuity during the search for a permanent replacement. Paul Kenny, who is a member of Red Lobster's Board, will serve as the liaison between Red Lobster's leadership and the Board during this time of transition.

About Red Lobster Seafood Co.

Red Lobster is the world's largest and most-loved seafood restaurant company, headquartered in Orlando, Fla. With a proud heritage and an even brighter future, Red Lobster is focused on serving the highest quality, freshly prepared seafood that is traceable, sustainable and responsibly-sourced. To learn more about Red Lobster's sourcing standards and where the seafood we serve comes from, please visit www.redlobster.com/seafoodwithstandards. Red Lobster is also proud to be an employer of choice, including in 2022, for the second consecutive year, being named to Forbes magazine's list of America's Best Large Employers. To learn more about Red Lobster, including locations and menu options, please visit http://www.redlobster.com or find us on Facebook , Twitter , Instagram or TikTok.

Contact: Nicole Bott, [email protected]

SOURCE Red Lobster Seafood Co.
NEW YORK, April 3, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of DiDi Global Inc. ("DiDi" or the "Company") (NYSE: DIDI). Such investors are advised to contact Robert S. Willoughby at [email protected] or 888-476-6529, ext. 7980.

The investigation concerns whether DiDi and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices.

[Click here for information about joining the class action]

On March 11, 2022, media outlets reported that DiDi suspended preparation for its planned Hong Kong listing, following notice from the Cyberspace Administration of China that DiDi's proposals to prevent security and data leaks had fallen short of requirements.

On this news, DiDi's American Depositary Receipt ("ADR") price fell $1.49 per ADR, or more than 44%, to close at $1.89 per share on March 11, 2022.

Pomerantz LLP, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Paris, and Tel Aviv, is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, Pomerantz pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 85 years later, Pomerantz continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomlaw.com

CONTACT:

Robert S. Willoughby

Pomerantz LLP

[email protected]

888-476-6529 ext. 7980

SOURCE Pomerantz LLP
NEW YORK, April 3, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of Gatos Silver, Inc. ("Gatos" or the "Company") (NYSE: GATO). Such investors are advised to contact Robert S. Willoughby at [email protected] or 888-476-6529, ext. 7980.

The investigation concerns whether Gatos and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices.

[Click here for information about joining the class action]

On January 25, 2022, post-market, Gatos issued a press release disclosing that "[d]uring the Company's resource and reserve update process for the Los Gatos Joint Venture ("LGJV") . . . the Company concluded that there were errors in the technical report entitled 'Los Gatos Project, Chihuahua, Mexico' with an effective date of July 1, 2020 (the '2020 Technical Report'), as well as indications that there is an overestimation in the existing resource model." Accordingly, "[o]n a preliminary basis, the Company estimates a potential reduction of the metal content of CLG's mineral reserve ranging from 30% to 50% of the metal content remaining after depletion" and advised that "the mineral resource and reserve estimates in the 2020 Technical Report should not be relied upon."

On this news, Gatos' stock price fell $7.02 per share, or 68.89% percent to close at $3.17 per share on January 26, 2022.

Pomerantz LLP, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Paris, and Tel Aviv, is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, Pomerantz pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 85 years later, Pomerantz continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomlaw.com.

CONTACT:

Robert S. Willoughby

Pomerantz LLP

[email protected]

888-476-6529 ext. 7980

SOURCE Pomerantz LLP
NEW YORK, April 3, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of TAL Education Group ("TAL" or the "Company") (NYSE: TAL). Such investors are advised to contact Robert S. Willoughby at [email protected] or 888-476-6529, ext. 7980.

The investigation concerns whether TAL and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices.

[Click here for information about joining the class action]

On April 25, 2021, media reports revealed that the City of Beijing had fined four online education agencies, including TAL, the maximum fine of 500,000 yuan (approximately $80,000) each for misleading customers with false advertising regarding course pricing. On May 12, 2021, news reports revealed that an impending crackdown by the Chinese government on the private tutoring sector would be further reaching and more drastic than previously publicly known, including that regulators had already taken adverse actions against TAL and other for-profit tutoring companies.

On this news, TAL's American Depository Share ("ADS") price fell $6.89 per ADS, or 13%, over the following two trading sessions to close at $46.25 per ADS on May 13, 2021.

On June 1, 2021, Chinese regulators announced that they had fined 15 off-campus training institutions, including TAL, for illegal activities such as false advertising and fraud. On this news, TAL's ADS price fell $7.24 per ADS, or nearly 18%, over the following two trading sessions to close at $33.27 per ADS on June 3, 2021. Finally, on July 23, 2021, China unveiled a sweeping overhaul of its education sector, banning companies that teach the school curriculum from making profits, raising capital or going public, effectively ending any potential growth in the for-profit tutoring sector in China.

On this news, TAL's ADS price fell $16.12 per ADS, or 78.56%, over the following two trading sessions to close at $4.40 per ADS on July 26, 2021.

Pomerantz LLP, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Paris, and Tel Aviv, is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, Pomerantz pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 85 years later, Pomerantz continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomlaw.com.

Media Contact:

Robert S. Willoughby

Pomerantz LLP

[email protected]

SOURCE Pomerantz LLP
Russell has over ten years' experience as a Chair and NED, with high profile roles in industries including banking, Fintech and Edtech. He has held senior positions across various committees including audit, risk, credit, investments, and remuneration/nominations. Russell is a qualified accountant  who spent over 25 years at KPMG  with 13 years as a Partner. During this time, he oversaw sectors such as Global Banking, Public Sector, and was Practice Lead for emerging markets. In 2006, he was seconded from KPMG to HM Treasury as Director of Financial Management and shortly after retiring from KPMG, he was appointed by the United Kingdom (UK) Government to lead the Learning and Skills Council, the largest non-departmental public body in the UK at the time.

David Skillen, Chairperson UK, The Bank of London: "Geoff has an impressive domestic and international background, having undertaken assignments in over 80 countries. The complexity of roles he has succeeded in during his long career, as well as the trust put in him by HM Government is a clear indicator that he is an outcome focussed leader, and will add tremendous value to our growing firm as both a board member and BAC Chair".

Geoff Russell says, "I'm excited to be joining The Bank of London at this transformative stage of its journey. I'm delighted I can help drive the firm's long-term financial performance whilst ensuring a robust and agile control framework. I have full confidence that we will differentiate ourselves using our innovative and patented technologies, to drive transparency, reduce complexity and make banking better for all".

NOTES TO EDITORS

About The Bank of London

The Bank of London is a leading-edge technology company and the world's first purpose-built global clearing, agency, and transaction bank.

Launched in November 2021 as the sixth principal clearing bank of the United Kingdom, and only the second in 250 years. With a $1.1 billion valuation, it is the first bank in history to attain 'unicorn' status upon debut.

With headquarters in London and offices in New York, The Bank of London has been established to serve banks, clearing houses, digital & traditional asset firms, governments, financial services companies from local fintechs to global institutions, payment networks and non-financial brands seeking to launch fully compliant financial products and services in-country and across-borders.

For more information visit: thebankoflondon.com, or on Twitter and Instagram at: @thebankoflondon.

SOURCE The Bank of London
Financial advisor Aaron Hoffman joins rapidly growing Christian-focused registered investment advisor, Inspire Advisors, seeking greater vocational fulfillment by aligning his Christian beliefs with his professional life.

BOISE, Idaho, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- "Many advisors are aware of the hypocrisy of the woke culture that permeates their current firms, and they are actively looking for new platforms to practice." That's how Aaron Hoffmanthe newest financial advisor to join Christian advisory firm, Inspire Advisorsdefined the current state of the investment community.

Hoffman manages $20M of client assets and is a native Texan and Louisiana transplant, currently residing near the city of Ruston, LA with his wife Sunni and their three daughters. "My experience working for one of the larger investment firms was good at the onset, but the longer I continued, the more I felt upper management was out of touch and sold out to ideals I disagree with. I finally realized that I couldn't continue at a firm in constant contradiction with my values."

Working in an environment that contradicts your beliefs is a condition often referred to as "cognitive dissonance." This mental conflict occurs when your beliefs don't align with your actions. In an article medically reviewed by Randy Bressler, PsyD, author Jennifer Tzeses writes, "Cognitive dissonance can cause discomfort, stress, and anxiety. And the degree of these effects often depends on how much disparity there is between the conflicting beliefs, how much the beliefs mean to that person, as well as with how well the person copes with self-contradiction."

Inspire Advisors' CEO, Robert Netzly shared his thoughts about the transition. "The conflict Christian financial advisors face having their deeply-held beliefs and convictions constantly contradicted by the firms they work for can be cause for intense mental and spiritual turmoil." Netzly continued, "That was my experience. When I learned about biblically responsible investing, I lost the ability to function in my practice at a major bank because I didn't know how I could continue investing in companies that profited off atrocities like abortion, let alone continue at a firm that advocated for these issues and provided no alternative solutions. It's the exact reason we started Inspire Advisors, to allow Christian advisors to bring their whole selves to work and live in harmony with their religious beliefs and actions."

Mark 3:25 says, "A house divided against itself cannot stand." Firms that repeatedly take political or social stances on divisive issues that ostracize their Christian advisors and clients, and heap burdens of cognitive dissonance on their staff, will find themselves struggling to retain quality talent as advisors move to platforms like Inspire Advisors that enable them to align their work with their beliefs.

Hoffman shared his experience since making his transition, "It's liberating to move into a firm that offers greater flexibility in how I run my practice and more freedom to align investments with conservative biblical values."

About Inspire Advisors

Inspire Advisors is the wealth management division of the Inspire Investing family of companies, an enterprise with $1.9 billion in assets under management (as of 3/25/22), ranked as the third fastest growing investment firm in the nation in the Financial Advisor Magazine annual report and top-quartile member of the Inc. 5000 list of fastest growing private companies in the United States.

The Inspire Advisors platform is purpose-built from the ground up to support Christian financial advisors who want to run their practices with diligent biblically responsible investing (BRI) alignment, a growing conviction among financial advisors and their clients.

Christian financial advisors interested in exploring a relationship with Inspire Advisors can email [email protected] or visit www.inspireadvisors.com to learn more.

*Disclaimer: Investment advisory services offered through Inspire Advisors, LLC and Inspire Investing, LLC, both being Registered Investment Advisors with the SEC. Inspire Investing, LLC and Inspire Advisors, LLC are affiliates.

SOURCE Inspire Investing
AUSTIN, Texas, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- By acquiring HIPAA Exams , 360training adds improved HIPAA courses to its massive library of online lessons. In the coming months, 360training will be launching a new "Healthcare" vertical on its website, complete with a catalog of 29 new online healthcare training courses. Essential courses to be released include:

HIPAA for Health Care Workers

HIPAA Exams designed this 90-minute online HIPAA training course to educate Health Care Workers on the complete HIPAA law, including HIPAA Privacy, HIPAA Security, Enforcement of HIPAA violations, and 2022 Updates.

HIPAA for Medical Office Staff

HIPAA for Medical Office Staff is specific for Medical Office Staff personnel who do not directly provide medical treatment to patients.

HIPAA for Dental Offices

HIPAA for Dental Offices comprehensively looks at HIPAA legislation and addresses its application within a dental office setting.

HIPAA for Business Associates

HIPAA for Business Associates provides a comprehensive look at HIPAA legislation as it applies to a Business Associate.

Bloodborne Pathogens Training

This IACET accredited online Bloodborne Pathogens course is for anyone working in a setting where bloodborne pathogens (BBP) or anything potentially contagious could infect them.

Why Choose HIPAA Exams?

HIPAA Exams has been the most trusted source in HIPAA compliance since 2008. Tom Anderson, CEO of 360training, explains what drew him to the company:

"We are excited to announce the addition of HIPAA Exams to the growing 360training family of businesses. With over 13 years of experience, HIPAA Exams is our first major expansion into the immense and burgeoning healthcare sector. This represents our fifth acquisition in the last year. As we expand, we are eager to grow the HIPAA Exams brand and integrate these dynamic courses as the most trusted source of online medical compliance training."

HIPAA Exams is also one of the few IACET accredited providers. In addition, all HIPAA Exams courses:

Are 100% online and can be accessed anywhere, anytime

Include continuing education credits

Have bulk pricing available

Are low cost and highly accredited

About HIPAA Exams

HIPAA Exams , a division of Engaging Training Solutions Inc, is an IACET accredited business. They specialize in professional and management development training with primary focuses on health care, workplace safety, and legislative compliance. HIPAA Exams began in 2008 as an online learning system for hospitals. The company soon expanded when Massachusetts General, Scripps, and the U.S. Air Force asked HIPAA Exams to develop content for Registered Nurses specific to Joint Commission (JC) compliance.

About 360training

Since 1997, 360training.com, Inc. has provided individuals and businesses with online regulatory-approved training, facilitating a safe, healthy environment for the communities they serve. The company has delivered over four million training plans across multiple brands, including Meditec , AgentCampus , VanEd , OSHAcampus , OSHA.com , GetTIPS , and Learn2Serve . Please visit www.360training.com or their social media accounts on Facebook , Twitter , and LinkedIn to learn more.

SOURCE 360training.com
Bank Nizwa, Omans trusted Islamic Bank, has signed a deal with the Ministry of Labour to back the beneficiaries of the Sahim programme with a set of sharia compliant banking services specially designed for this category.

The Ministry of Labours Sahim programme targets job seekers and fresh graduates by providing them with a temporary work contract in different segments; both government and private sector.

This programme comes in line with Oman 2040 Vision to empower the national cadres to fulfil the requirements of the labour market by spreading the culture of temporary work and flexible working hours and consolidating this culture of work in the community.

Overall economic growth

The Sahim programme will not only provide job opportunities for Omanis graduates, but it also supports overall economic growth of the sultanate and improve living standards of individuals across the country.

As per the agreement, Bank Nizwa will provide timely and relevant Islamic finance options including financing facilities and services, savings and mudaraba investment accounts, credit cards, and many other banking products, for job seekers and fresh graduates making their entry into the competitive employment market.

The agreement was recently signed at Bank Nizwa headquarters by Khalid Al Kayed, CEO of Bank Nizwa, and Al Sayid Salem bin Muslim Al Busaidi, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Labour for Human Resources.

Empowering the workforce

Al Kayed said: Our aim is to empower Omans workforce with financial assistance to help them take confident strides in their careers. Youth are the fulcrum of our society; they are the leaders of tomorrow. As new employees, they require financial support to boldly carve their niche in the market, and, through this agreement, we want to assure them of our continuous support to help them grow and build their careers. As pioneers in the Islamic banking sector, we have, time and again, demonstrated our dedicated support for local communities through innovative products and services that help us march towards the inspiring Oman Vision 2040. We will continue to invest in the welfare of the community and meet the expectations of our government.

One of the objectives of Oman Vision 2040 is to foster a favourable environment to attract talented youth into the labour market. While the National Employment Programme, which stems from the guidelines prescribed under the Vision, is aiding the government in filling the labour market with qualified and skilled national workforce, Labour Ministry, with the support of private organisations, continues to introduce specific initiatives to meet the set target of employing 85% job seekers by 2022.

-- TradeArabia News Service
Medtronic adds to its robust clinical program with long-term data demonstrating the continued blood pressure lowering effect of the Symplicity renal denervation procedure

Medtronic also completes enrollment in the SPYRAL HTN-ON MED trial

DUBLIN and WASHINGTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Medtronic plc (NYSE:MDT), a global leader in healthcare technology, today announced long-term data from the first 80 patients in the SPYRAL HTN-ON MED trial, which were presented today at the American College of Cardiology's 71st Annual Scientific Session (ACC.22) late-breaking featured clinical research sessions. The data were also simultaneously published in The Lancet.1

In the first 80 patients of the SPYRAL HTN-ON MED trial, the data demonstrated that patients who were prescribed anti-hypertensive medications and treated with the Medtronic Symplicity Spyral Renal Denervation (RDN) System continued to show durable, clinically significant blood pressure reductions through three years. At three years:

18.7 mmHg reduction in RDN patients versus 8.6 mmHg in sham for 24-hour systolic ambulatory blood pressure (ABPM)

20.9 mmHg reduction in RDN patients versus 12.5 mmHg in the sham arm for office systolic blood pressure (OSBP)

"Across the latest trials, consistent blood pressure reductions have been observed in patients with uncontrolled hypertension treated with the Medtronic Symplicity Spyral RDN system," said Felix Mahfoud, M.D., cardiologist at Saarland University Hospital in Homburg, Germany, and member of the SPYRAL HTN executive committee. "For the first time, we now have randomized data that demonstrates that in a typical patient population  hypertension patients who are on anti-hypertensive medications and treated with RDN  we are seeing the continued, long-term blood pressure lowering effect. Lowering blood pressure can have meaningful clinical results for patients, including a decrease in the risk of cardiovascular events."

The trial also demonstrated procedural and long-term safety with the Symplicity Spyral renal denervation catheter, with zero major device or procedural safety events through three years.1

"With the ON MED randomized data presented and published today, Medtronic has now demonstrated the long-term benefit of renal denervation against a backdrop of an anti-hypertensive medication, with continued demonstration of a safe procedure," said Jeffrey Popma, M.D., chief medical officer for the Coronary & Renal Denervation business and the Structural Heart & Aortic business, which are part of the Cardiovascular Portfolio at Medtronic. "This highlights the importance of additional treatment options such as renal denervation."

Approved for commercial use in more than 60 countries around the world, the Symplicity Spyral renal denervation system is limited to investigational use in the United States, Japan, and Canada.

SPYRAL HTN-ON MED is a global, randomized, sham-controlled trial investigating the blood pressure lowering effect and safety of RDN with the radiofrequency-based Medtronic Symplicity Spyral system in hypertensive patients prescribed one to three anti-hypertensive medications. The long-term ON MED data presented at ACC.22 studied the same cohort of patients as the six-month primary endpoint analysis that was previously published in The Lancet in 2018.2

Medtronic completes randomization in the full cohort of its SPYRAL HTN-ON MED Trial

Medtronic also announced it recently completed randomization for the full cohort of its SPYRAL HTN-ON MED trial and closed enrollment. The full analysis cohort targets up to 340 randomized patients. Medtronic expects the six-month post procedure follow-up for the full cohort will be complete in the second half of calendar year 2022.

"The data presented at ACC underscores Medtronic's confidence in RDN as a solution for the millions of people who suffer from uncontrolled high blood pressure. These new data will be important to regulatory officials, clinicians and payers as we look to bring a new treatment option to market for patients with uncontrolled hypertension," said Jason Weidman, senior vice president and president of the Coronary & Renal Denervation business unit, which is part of the Cardiovascular Portfolio at Medtronic. "Looking ahead, we remain focused on the anticipated six-month follow up for the full cohort of the ON MED trial in the second half of this calendar year."

The SPYRAL HTN-ON MED trial is part of the SPYRAL HTN Global Clinical Program, adding to the safety and efficacy data for RDN. Along with the real-world data from the Global Symplicity Registry, when combined with commercial experience, there have been more than 20,000 procedures performed with Medtronic RDN technology. The clinical program is backed by the most rigorous and extensive patient experience studied in the presence2 and absence3 of medication and in patients with high baseline cardiovascular risk.4

About the Medtronic Symplicity Spyral Renal Denervation System

The Medtronic RDN procedure uses a minimally invasive procedure that delivers radiofrequency energy to specific nerves near the kidneys that can become overactive and cause high blood pressure.

About Medtronic

Bold thinking. Bolder actions. We are Medtronic. Medtronic plc, headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, is the leading global healthcare technology company that boldly attacks the most challenging health problems facing humanity by searching out and finding solutions. Our Mission  to alleviate pain, restore health, and extend life  unites a global team of 90,000+ passionate people across 150 countries. Our technologies and therapies treat 70 health conditions and include cardiac devices, surgical robotics, insulin pumps, surgical tools, patient monitoring systems, and more. Powered by our diverse knowledge, insatiable curiosity, and desire to help all those who need it, we deliver innovative technologies that transform the lives of two people every second, every hour, every day. Expect more from us as we empower insight-driven care, experiences that put people first, and better outcomes for our world. In everything we do, we are engineering the extraordinary. For more information on Medtronic (NYSE:MDT), visit www.Medtronic.com and follow @Medtronic on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Any forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties such as those described in Medtronic's periodic reports on file with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Actual results may differ materially from anticipated results.

1 Mahfoud F, Kandzari D, Kario K, et al. Long-term efficacy and safety of renal denervation in the presence of antihypertensive drugs (SPYRAL HTN-ON MED): a randomised, sham-controlled trial. Lancet. 2022; https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(22)00455-X/fulltext

2 Kandzari D, Bhm M, Mahfoud F, et al. Effect of renal denervation on blood pressure in the presence of antihypertensive drugs: 6-month efficacy and safety results from the SPYRAL HTN-ON MED proof-of-concept randomised trial. Lancet 2018 ; 391: 2346-55.

3 Bhm M, Kario K, Kandzari D et al. Efficacy of catheter-based renal denervation in the absence of antihypertensive medications (SPYRAL HTN-OFF MED Pivotal): a multicentre, randomised, sham-controlled trial. Lancet 2020; 395:144451.

4 Mahfoud F, Mancia G, Schmieder R, et al. Renal denervation in high-risk patients with hypertension. J Am Coll Cardiol 2020; 75: 2879-88.

Contacts:

Krystin Hayward Leong Ryan Weispfenning Public Relations Investor Relations +1-508-298-8246 +1-763-505-4626

SOURCE Medtronic plc
MILWAUKEE, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Ademi LLP is investigating possible securities fraud claims against First High-School Education (NYSE: FHS). The investigation results from inaccurate statements First High-School Education may have made regarding its business operations and prospects.

Click here to learn more about the investigation: https://www.ademilaw.com/case/first-high-school-education-group-co-ltd or call Guri Ademi toll-free at 866-264-3995. There is no cost or obligation to you.

The investigation focuses on whether First High-School Education properly disclosed the impact of government regulations on its kindergarten through grade nine tutoring business.

If you wish to obtain additional information or have information about this investigation, please contact Guri Ademi either at [email protected] or toll-free: 866-264-3995, https://www.ademilaw.com/case/first-high-school-education-group-co-ltd.

We specialize in securities fraud and shareholder litigation. For more information, please feel free to call us. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.

Contact:

Ademi LLP

Guri Ademi

3620 East Layton Ave.

Cudahy, WI 53110

Toll Free: (866) 264-3995

Fax: (414) 482-8001

www.ademilaw.com

SOURCE Ademi LLP
Global delegates gather to focus on educating the sustainability leaders of the future at one of the first U.S. colleges to reach carbon neutrality

MEADVILLE, Pa., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Allegheny College, one of the nation's oldest and most innovative four-year colleges where multidisciplinary learning breaks the conventional mold, will host the Fifth World Symposium on Sustainable Development at Universities (WSSD-U-2022), June 1617, 2022. This year's symposium focuses on "Educating the Sustainability Leaders of the Future" and will contribute to development of this fast-growing field. Researchers, educators and delegates from colleges and universities around the world will gather to display and present their works relating to teaching sustainable development while fostering an exchange of information, ideas and experiences.

Allegheny College's Associate Professor Beth Choate , Ph.D., chair of the Environmental Science and Sustainability department, and Professor Eric Pallant , Ph.D., Christine Scott Nelson Endowed Professor of Environmental Science and Sustainability, are chairpersons of WSSD-U-2022 along with Professor Walter Leal , Ph.D., director of the Research and Transfer Centre "Sustainability and Climate Change Management" (FTZ-NK) of the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences in Germany. Also collaborating are representatives of the European School of Sustainability Science and Research in Hamburg, the World Sustainable Development Research and Transfer Centre, the Inter-University Sustainable Development Research Programme and the United Nations University initiative, "Regional Centres of Expertise on Education for Sustainable Development."

Previous WSSD-U conferences held in Rio de Janeiro and Manchester, UK, and at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Universiti Sains Malaysia have demonstrated a need for a continuation of the dialogue among sustainability academics and practitioners. WSSD-U-2022 will be hybrid, so delegates worldwide may attend either on the Allegheny College campus or virtually.

"Allegheny College is proud to be hosting the Fifth World Symposium on Sustainable Development at Universities," said Professor Choate. "Members of the ESS department have presented at all of the previous conferences, and each year delegates are impressed by the work that we are accomplishing at a small, liberal arts college with undergraduate students. Hosting this conference after all the others have been held at large research institutions around the globe demonstrates that we are a significant player in sustainability education."

The focus of the Fifth World Symposium is on how to educate the sustainability leaders of the future. Delegates participating at WSSD-U-2022 include sustainability officers and directors, teaching and research faculty, university administrators, campus facilities and operations staff, consultants, student leaders and others interested in the field. The wide range of participants will help to develop integrated approaches towards sustainable development and contribute to the implementation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals , a group of 17 initiatives agreed to by all United Nations Member States in 2015 that recognize that tackling climate change and protecting the environment must go hand-in-hand with strategies that end poverty, improve health and education, reduce inequality, and spur economic growth.

The wealth of experiences and accepted papers at WSSD-U-2022 will establish how higher education institutions are collaborating and partnering with their local communities, organizations, industry and other groups to accelerate climate action by tackling intertwined issues of climate, economic inequality and public health. The goal of the symposium is to document such experiences and make them available to a global audience.

Six papers will be presented and published by teams of Allegheny College faculty and students covering topics including:

College-Community Environmental Collaborations: Guidance for Successful Community-based Projects and Research

Student Knowledge and Perceptions of a Green Campus

Growing a Resilient Campus Forest: Opportunities, Barriers, Solutions

Academic and Non-profit Environmental Organization Collaboration: A Case Study on Forest Conservation with Allegheny College and the Foundation for Sustainable Forests

Embodying the Ethics of Sustainable Development: An SDG-Themed Community Engaged Learning Cohort for Future Leaders

The Pennsylvania Environmental Resource Consortium: A State-Wide Collaborative Network for Sustainable Outreach, Education, and Action

Allegheny College was one of the first eight institutions of higher education in the United States to achieve carbon neutrality, doing so in 10 years without a substantial endowment, a large staff or a big budget. For the last five years, the College's Environmental Science and Sustainability program has been listed among the top five in the U.S. for its interdisciplinary, experiential approach, acknowledging and understanding the mutually dependent relationship between the environment, economy and justice. Allegheny College students and faculty tackle real-world problems, actively working to create a regenerative community economy with equitable access to healthy food, renewable energy, clean air and water, good jobs and healthy living environments.

"As countries of the world strive to implement the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, Allegheny College is dedicated to taking a leadership role on the global stage to produce multidisciplinary approaches, methods and projects that may be replicated elsewhere," concluded Allegheny College President Hilary L. Link, Ph.D., a member of Second Nature 's Climate Leadership Steering Committee. President Link will deliver the welcome address for the delegates.

All presentations, posters and papers at WSSD-U-2022 will be documented and disseminated in a book, "Educating the Sustainability Leaders of the Future," as part of the award-winning "World Sustainability Series" published by Springer, one of the worlds top five scientific publishers.

About Allegheny College

Allegheny College, founded in 1815, is one of the nation's oldest and most innovative four-year colleges where multidisciplinary learning breaks the conventional mold. It is one of the few colleges in the United States with a unique requirement to choose both a major and minor for graduation, to provide students with a cross-disciplinary path in the sciences and humanities for educational depth and intellectual growth. Located in Meadville, Pennsylvania, Allegheny College is one of 40 colleges featured in Loren Pope's "Colleges That Change Lives." In its 2021 rankings, U.S. News & World Report recognized Allegheny College in its Top 20 Best in Undergraduate Teaching and Top 30 Most Innovative National Liberal Arts Colleges.

Media Contact

Ivy Cohen

Ivy Cohen Corporate Communications

212-399-0026

[email protected]

SOURCE Allegheny College
During the Moguls in the Making competition, which will take place Sept. 15-18, students will be grouped into teams of four from 15 HBCUs and asked to develop and pitch business ideas that promote economic mobility in Charlotte. The teams will pitch their ideas to a panel of judges from the business community with each member of the top three winning teams earning scholarships for $20,000, $10,000 and $5,000 respectively as well as guaranteed paid internship offers from Ally, a laptop and other prizes. All students from each of the 12 other teams will earn $1,000 scholarships for their participation in the rigorous challenge.

Moguls in the Making (MITM) was developed in 2019 to provide HBCU students with career-launching business experience, networking access to executives and internships and scholarships, while also giving Ally a new path for reaching diverse talent. Since MITM launched three years ago, Ally has hired 36 of the participants as interns and 12 as full-time employees, working on teams across the company, from IT and marketing to product design and development. The digital financial services company has awarded $356,000 in scholarships through the program since 2019.

"We're looking forward to another year of dynamic energy and creativity from the HBCU students who give their all to develop innovative and viable business ideas that can have incredible impact on communities," said Natalie Brown, director of Corporate Citizenship at Ally. "Moguls in the Making attracts students who are eager to grow and want to be future corporate leaders and top entrepreneurs."

Last year's winning idea from the North Carolina A&T team focused on a new way to generate power locally to lower electric bills for residents in low income neighborhoods. Other winning ideas involved using technology to improve high school graduation rates, help people get jobs in skilled trades and provide health care for the uninsured.

TMCF is a natural fit for Ally's initiatives, given to its history of success in supporting nearly 300,000 students who attend HBCUs and Predominantly Black Institutions (PBIs). Since its founding in 1987, TMCF has awarded over $300 million in scholarships and boasts a 90% graduation rate for students in its programs.

"We are proud of our relationship with Ally and fully support the next generation of leaders from HBCUs, institutions that play a critical role in ensuring young people of color are not left behind," said TMCF Chief Programs Officer Eric D. Hart, Ed.D. "Moguls in the Making provides additional opportunities for students of color which will ultimately lead to a more diverse workforce, both at Ally and beyond."

For the last two years, the program has been virtual because of the pandemic, but organizers are planning to hold the competition in person this fall. Travel expenses to Charlotte will be covered for all students selected for the program.

Leading up to the competition weekend, students will participate in a series of learning sessions to prepare them for the program and help them bond with other students from their teams.

To help students better understand the program, Ally and TMCF will hold three virtual sessions via the Handshake college recruiting platform on March 31, April 21 and May 12. Each 90-minute session will start at 6 p.m. ET. Former Moguls participants will be on hand to answer questions.

To participate in the Moguls program, students must be current, full-time rising sophomores, juniors or seniors in good standing at an HBCU or PBI and must have a minimum cumulative 3.0 GPA. (Applicants with a cumulative GPA of 2.75 or better must be recommended by department chair or Dean.) Applications will be accepted through May 15. To apply or get more details, go to https://www.ally.com/go/moguls/ or https://www.tmcf.org/students-alumni/entrepreneurship/moguls-in-the-making/.

The Moguls competition was cited by Fast Company as a reason Ally was named 6th on its 2021 list of Best Workplaces for Innovators, which recognizes companies that foster creative cultures.

About the Thurgood Marshall College Fund (TMCF)

Established in 1987, the Thurgood Marshall College Fund (TMCF) is the nation's largest organization exclusively representing the Black College Community. TMCF member-schools include the publicly-supported Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Predominantly Black Institutions, enrolling nearly 80% of all students attending black colleges and universities. Through scholarships, capacity building and research initiatives, innovative programs, and strategic partnerships, TMCF is a vital resource in the PK-12 and higher education space. The organization is also the source of top employers seeking top talent for competitive internships and good jobs.

TMCF is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt, charitable organization. For more information about TMCF, visit: www.tmcf.org .

About Ally Financial

Ally Financial Inc. (NYSE: ALLY) is a digital financial services company committed to its promise to "Do It Right" for its consumer, commercial and corporate customers. Ally is composed of an industry-leading independent auto finance and insurance operation, an award-winning digital direct bank (Ally Bank, Member FDIC and Equal Housing Lender, which offers mortgage lending, point-of-sale personal lending, and a variety of deposit and other banking products), a consumer credit card business, a corporate finance business for equity sponsors and middle-market companies, and securities brokerage and investment advisory services. Our brand conviction is that we are all better off with an ally, and our focus is on helping our customers achieve their strongest financial well-being, a notion personalized to what is important to them. For more information, please visit www.ally.com and follow @allyfinancial.

For more information and disclosures about Ally, visit https://www.ally.com/#disclosures.

For further images and news on Ally, please visit http://media.ally.com.

Contact:

Brenda Rios

[email protected]

SOURCE Ally Financial
Receives Mary Lanning Public Service Award from Insurance Federation of New York

MELVILLE, N.Y., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- William H. Frazier, co-founder of American Veterans Group, has been recognized for exceptional public service for his advocacy on behalf of America's post-9/11 military veterans.

Frazier, who co-founded American Veterans Group (AVG) in 2018, has received the Mary Lanning Public Service Award from the Insurance Federation of New York, Inc. He received the honor during the organization's annual luncheon in New York on Thursday, March 31.

American Veterans Group, PBC, is a social impact investment bank and Wall Street's first and only public benefit corporation. The firm is a service-disabled, veteran-owned broker-dealer that dedicates 25% of its earnings to support job-training, internships and apprenticeship programs for veterans transitioning from military to civilian life.

Since its founding, AVG has directly supported more than 1,700 veterans nationwide. The firm has donated $337,785 to 27 non-profit organizations in 33 U.S. cities, directing its philanthropy to communities where it and its clients do business.

Frazier co-founded AVG with the firm's chief executive officer, Ben Biles, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and veteran who served six years, including deployment to Afghanistan. Frazier's 45 years of leadership experience in the finance and non-profit sectors has helped to establish and grow AVG. Prior to co-founding AVG, Frazier served 20 years at Oppenheimer & Company where he was Co-Head of Global Fixed Income. He also was managing partner at Gates Capital Corporation immediately prior to founding AVG and led municipal trading for JP Morgan earlier in his career.

Giving back to the community, Frazier serves on the Board of Trustees for the Northwell Health System and formerly was chairman of the board for Northwell's Huntington Hospital. He has served in numerous roles at Northwell Heath, including investment committee board member, past chairman of the board of trustees for Huntington Hospital, chairman of the finance and investment committee, and as a past member of the executive committee. Mr. Frazier graduated from Hofstra University with a bachelor's degree in finance in 1971.

About American Veterans Group

American Veterans Group, PBC, is a military veteran-owned, social impact-focused broker dealer that delivers value to institutional clients while providing meaningful philanthropic support to the military veteran community. The company reinvests 25% of its earnings in national and local military veteran non-profit organizations that provide worthy services and support to one of America's most vulnerable, at-risk populations. As Wall Street's only public benefit corporation, American Veterans Group empowers institutional clients to partner in its social mission while enabling them to remain focused on key business objectives and goals. To learn more about American Veterans Group, visit their website at www.americanvetsgroup.com.

About Insurance Federation of New York, Inc.

The Insurance Federation of New York, Inc., since 1913, has been a force for communicating ideas among all sectors of the insurance industry, bringing public and private interests together for the benefit of all. The Insurance Federation of New York's prestigious Free Enterprise Awardpresented to some of history's legendary entrepreneurscontinues to salute risk takers and leaders whose creativity and initiative has enabled the expansion of business throughout New York, across the country and around the world.

Media Contacts:

For American Veterans Group

Mark Kroeger

The Boldsquare Group

(513) 236-3109

[email protected]

For Insurance Federation of New York

Rebecca McLean

(212) 808-5500, ext. 113

[email protected]

SOURCE American Veterans Group
"Capital Group is excited for our highly rated 1 target date series to be leveraged to create a more personalized target date service for investors saving for retirement. Target Date Plus will enable retirement plans to deliver the personalized asset allocation that participants, plan sponsors and advisors are increasingly seeking, and importantly with administrative ease," said Brendan Mahoney, Head of Institutional Retirement Strategic Growth, Capital Group. "With this service, we expect our target date series, which thoughtfully balances both building and preserving wealth, to expand its stewardship beyond the nearly eight million 2 participants we serve today."

Target Date Plus underscores Capital Group's efforts to provide more flexibility in how it distributes its investment services and is a natural evolution of the firm's target date series. The service offers additional personalization by incorporating an individual's age, salary, assets, savings rate, and company match rate. Morningstar Investment Management analyzes this information and provides the investor with a customized asset allocation and investment portfolio. Morningstar Investment Management can also inform the individual if and when they may benefit from allocating part of their savings to a guaranteed income3 annuity.

"There is growing demand from retirement savers for investment strategies that better reflect their goals and aspirations. Using our strong network of data integrations with recordkeepers, user experiences, and advice engines, we can power a new generation of personalized advice services that we believe can position retirement savers for better outcomes," said Brock Johnson, president of Global Retirement and Workplace Solutions at Morningstar Investment Management.

Through its data network and integrations, Morningstar Investment Management obtains the necessary data points from recordkeepers to furnish and build out a personalized asset allocation and fund-level portfolio for each investor. That network also enables the service to return the investment recommendation to the recordkeeper to process and implement. Morningstar Investment Management has designed a user interface for the service based on its learnings from serving 1.7 million managed accounts users to enable investors to interact with the service and modify the required data points.

About Morningstar Investment Management LLC's Workplace Solutions group

Our parent company, Morningstar, Inc., was founded on the simple idea that when people have good investment information, they can make better choices that help them achieve their financial goals. In the Workplace Solutions group at Morningstar Investment Management LLC, a subsidiary of Morningstar, Inc. and a registered investment adviser, our advocacy for the individual investor extends to the workplace retirement market where the responsibility for investing and saving now rests with employees. Our products and serviceswhich range from a managed accounts service to target-date products to custom models and fiduciary servicesare not only designed to help people save for the retirement they want, but to help them make their money last once they get there.

About Morningstar, Inc.

Morningstar, Inc. is a leading provider of independent investment research in North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. The Company offers an extensive line of products and services for individual investors, financial advisors, asset managers and owners, retirement plan providers and sponsors, and institutional investors in the debt and private capital markets. Morningstar provides data and research insights on a wide range of investment offerings, including managed investment products, publicly listed companies, private capital markets, debt securities, and real-time global market data. Morningstar also offers investment management services through its investment advisory subsidiaries, with approximately $265 billion in assets under advisement and management as of Dec. 31, 2021. The Company has operations in 29 countries. For more information, visit www.morningstar.com/company. Follow Morningstar on Twitter @MorningstarInc.

About Capital Group

Capital Group, home of American Funds, has been singularly focused on delivering superior results for long-term investors using high-conviction portfolios, rigorous research and individual accountability since 1931.

As of December 31, 2021, Capital Group manages more than $2.7 trillion in equity and fixed income assets for millions of individuals and institutional investors around the world. Capital Group manages equity assets through three investment groups. These groups make investment and proxy voting decisions independently. Fixed income investment professionals provide fixed income research and investment management across the Capital organization; however, for securities with equity characteristics, they act solely on behalf of one of the three equity investment groups.

For more information, visit capitalgroup.com.

1 Source: Morningstar, Inc. as of January 25, 2022. Morningstar Analyst RatingTM of Gold is given to the low-cost share classes of the American Funds Target Date Retirement Series (F-2, F-3, R-5 and R-6).

2 Based on Capital Group's internal analysis as of December 31, 2021.

3 Guarantees are based on the claims-paying ability of the issuing insurance company.

Media contacts:

Erin Parro, Morningstar

[email protected]

Tel: (312) 244-9999

Natalie Marin, Capital Group

[email protected]

Tel: (213) 615-4508

Investments are not FDIC-insured, nor are they deposits of or guaranteed by a bank or any other entity, so they may lose value.



Investors should carefully consider investment objectives, risks, charges and expenses. This and other important information is contained in the fund prospectuses and summary prospectuses which can be obtained from a financial professional, Capital or your relationship manager, and should be read carefully before investing.

Although the target date portfolios are managed for investors on a projected retirement date time frame, the allocation strategy does not guarantee that investors' retirement goals will be met. Investment professionals manage the portfolio, moving it from a more growth-oriented strategy to a more income-oriented focus as the target date gets closer. The target date is the year that corresponds roughly to the year in which an investor is assumed to retire and begin taking withdrawals. Investment professionals continue to manage each portfolio for approximately 30 years after it reaches its target date.

The Morningstar Analyst RatingTM is not a credit or risk rating. It is a subjective evaluation performed by Morningstar's manager research group, which consists of various Morningstar, Inc. subsidiaries ("Manager Research Group"). In the United States, that subsidiary is Morningstar Research Services LLC, which is registered with and governed by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The Manager Research Group evaluates funds based on five key pillars, which are process, performance, people, parent, and price. The Manager Research Group uses this five-pillar evaluation to determine how they believe funds are likely to perform relative to a benchmark over the long term on a risk adjusted basis. They consider quantitative and qualitative factors in their research. For actively managed strategies, people and process each receive a 45% weighting in their analysis, while parent receives a 10% weighting. For passive strategies, process receives an 80% weighting, while people and parent each receive a 10% weighting. For both active and passive strategies, performance has no explicit weight as it is incorporated into the analysis of people and process; price at the share-class level (where applicable) is directly subtracted from an expected gross alpha estimate derived from the analysis of the other pillars. The impact of the weighted pillar scores for people, process and parent on the final Analyst Rating is further modified by a measure of the dispersion of historical alphas among relevant peers. For certain peer groups where standard benchmarking is not applicable, primarily peer groups of funds using alternative investment strategies, the modification by alpha dispersion is not used.

The Analyst Rating scale is Gold, Silver, Bronze, Neutral, and Negative. For active funds, a Morningstar Analyst Rating of Gold, Silver, or Bronze reflects the Manager Research Group's expectation that an active fund will be able to deliver positive alpha net of fees relative to the standard benchmark index assigned to the Morningstar category. The level of the rating relates to the level of expected positive net alpha relative to Morningstar category peers for active funds. For passive funds, a Morningstar Analyst Rating of Gold, Silver, or Bronze reflects the Manager Research Group's expectation that a fund will be able to deliver a higher alpha net of fees than the lesser of the relevant Morningstar category median or 0. The level of the rating relates to the level of expected net alpha relative to Morningstar category peers for passive funds. For certain peer groups where standard benchmarking is not applicable, primarily peer groups of funds using alternative investment strategies, a Morningstar Analyst Rating of Gold, Silver, or Bronze reflects the Manager Research Group's expectation that a fund will deliver a weighted pillar score above a predetermined threshold within its peer group. Analyst Ratings ultimately reflect the Manager Research Group's overall assessment, are overseen by an Analyst Rating Committee, and are continuously monitored and reevaluated at least every 14 months.

For more detailed information about Morningstar's Analyst Rating, including its methodology, please go to https://shareholders.morningstar.com/investor-relations/governance/Compliance--Disclosure/default.aspx.

The Morningstar Analyst Rating (i) should not be used as the sole basis in evaluating a fund, (ii) involves unknown risks and uncertainties which may cause the Manager Research Group's expectations not to occur or to differ significantly from what they expected, and (iii) should not be considered an offer or solicitation to buy or sell the fund.

 2022 Morningstar, Inc. All rights reserved. The information contained herein: (1) is proprietary to Morningstar and/or its content providers; (2) may not be copied or distributed; and (3) is not warranted to be accurate, complete or timely. Neither Morningstar nor its content providers are responsible for any damages or losses arising from this information. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.





All Capital Group trademarks referenced are registered trademarks owned by The Capital Group Companies, Inc. or an affiliated company. All other company and product names mentioned are the trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

This content, developed by Capital Group, home of American Funds, should not be used as a primary basis for investment decisions and is not intended to serve as impartial investment or fiduciary advice.

Statements attributed to an individual represent the opinions of that individual as of the date published and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Capital Group or its affiliates. This information is intended to highlight issues and should not be considered advice, an endorsement or a recommendation.

American Funds Distributors, Inc., member FINRA.

 2022 Capital Group. All rights reserved.

SOURCE Capital Group; Morningstar
Guided by Arup's mission to shape a more sustainable world through high quality work and innovative solutions, the firm also announced a new regional leadership, organized to deliver exceptional service to clients and communities.

Four regional leaders will drive Arup's local operations to ensure the highest quality client service: Sean Meadows (Canada), Federico Torres Jimenez (South), Brian Swett (East), and Scott Russell (West).

Further, in order to drive focus and influence in our key markets, Arup named eight new leaders for our priority businesses and services: Bill Scrantom (Property, Science, Industry, and Technology  and Social Infrastructure, including Healthcare), Jenny Buckley (Aviation, Highways, Rail), Brian Raine (Energy, Water, and Resources), Tim Treharne (Advisory Services), Chris Pollock (Technical Services), Gideon D'Arcangelo (Digital Services), Paul Moore (Cities, Planning, and Design), and Robert Kay (Climate Services and Sustainability).

Fiona Cousins, Chair

Fiona Cousins is Arup's Americas Region Chair, an Arup Fellow, and member of the Arup Group Board. Having joined Arup in 1985, Fiona most recently led the climate services and sustainability teams for Arup in the Americas, along with serving as a key leader in building engineering and digital strategies for the firm. She is a mechanical engineer by profession and, as a renowned sustainability and resilience consultant, has worked on a wide range of projects to establish clear and decisive direction for sustainable and resilient outcomes. In 2019, she was appointed by Mayor Bill de Blasio and Speaker Corey Johnson to the New York City Advisory Board for Local Law 97.

"At Arup, we're always looking to expand our capabilities and pursue mission-driven, positive work within the AEC industry. As markets change, we will continue to push for more sustainable outcomes on all our work by incorporating and relying on digital solutions. We will also take an intentional approach to our clients' objectives to drive the firm's growth," said Cousins.

Under Fiona's leadership, the regional, business and service leaders will be instrumental in helping Arup realize its vision of shaping a more sustainable and equitable built environment that puts client services at the forefront.

Nigel Nicholls, Chief Operating Officer

Nigel Nicholls is Chief Operating Officer for Arup in the Americas. Nigel joined the firm in London in 1989 and has spent the last 10 years as Managing Director of Arup's New York office, the firm's largest in the Americas Region. He is a mechanical engineer by profession and has spent time living and working in many parts of the world including the UK, Zimbabwe and Botswana before moving to the USA 20 years ago.

"I am excited by Arup's commitment to raising the profile of our local leadership and generating new opportunities for sustainable growth. Especially following our recent commitment to achieve net zero emissions across the firm's entire operations by 2030, we intend to approach all projects through a sustainable design lens and continue working on positive-impact projects with our clients," said Nicholls.

Sean Meadows, Canada Leader

Sean Meadows has over 20 years of experience in the consulting industry, supporting public sector clients to deliver diverse and challenging infrastructure projects that have expanded sustainable transit options and equitable transit access. Arup's Canada offices are in Toronto and Montreal.

Federico Torres Jimenez, Americas South Leader

Federico Torres Jimenez has led projects in several businesses and services working with the public and private sectors, including key managerial and consultancy positions in the United Kingdom and Latin America. Federico previously led the opening of Arup's Bogota office, and established Arup as an active player in the Colombian infrastructure market. The South region includes the firm's offices in Houston, Dallas and Bogota.

Brian Swett, Americas East Leader

Brian Swett is an internationally recognized leader in climate change and sustainability, with more than 20 years of experience working with municipal governments, private sector real estate development, federal governments, and nonprofits. Brian previously served as Arup's Director of Sustainable Cities and Real Estate and Boston Group Leader. The East region includes the firm's offices in New York, New Jersey, Boston, Washington DC and Chicago.

Scott Russell, Americas West Leader

Scott Russell brings a renewed focus to client care, community service, and member development to his work, drawing on his previous experiences as Arup's Los Angeles Group Leader, the Director of Marketing and Communications for the Americas Region, and an urban planner. The West region includes the firm's offices in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland and Seattle.

Bill Scrantom, Americas Property, SIT (Science, Industry, and Technology), and Social Infrastructure Leader

Bill Scrantom is a recognized leader in healthcare planning and is a known expert in the design of sustainable healthcare environments with more than 35 years of experience, bringing a client-centric focus to designing significant facilities for academic medical centers, community hospitals, ambulatory facilities and medical research facilities.

Jenny Buckley, Americas Transport Leader

Jenny Buckley is a leader of large multidisciplinary teams for complex transportation projects. With over 20 years of industry experience, she is known for delivering strategic solutions and maintaining strong client relationships. She serves on the Americas Region Board and has over 20 years of experience in structural engineering.

Brian Raine, Americas Energy, Water, and Resources Leader

Brian Raine is a leader in Utility Scale Renewable energy work, aligned with the UN sustainable development goals that include clean energy and resilient infrastructure solutions. He established Arup's Texas offices in 2001.

Tim Treharne, Americas Advisory Services Leader

Tim Treharne has 40 years of experience in banking finance and investment, principally in the structuring, procuring and financing of major capital projects. Having worked on projects and programs across a range of sectors and geographies, Tim brings a depth of experience and market knowledge from multiple perspectives in developing alternative delivery models for public and private clients alike to advance climate and social initiatives.

Chris Pollock, Americas Technical Services Leader

Chris Pollock has over 20 years of experience and has led and successfully delivered acoustics and audiovisuals through strategic design input and planning. Chris is a champion for wellbeing and sustainability and leads the delivery of innovative technical services for a team of specialist designers and consultants.

Gideon D'Arcangelo, Americas Digital Services Leader

Gideon D'Arcangelo has over 30 years of experience as an expert in user-centric design practices and is an accomplished leader who has overseen countless projects for corporate and cultural clients from concept, installation and operations. He is a leading designer for interactive and immersive experiences in the built environment, and a champion of equitable design.

Paul Moore, Americas Cities, Planning, and Design Leader

Paul Moore has over 30 years of experience in oversight and management of major urban design, land use and transportation planning, and engineering projects. He has extensive experience developing major transportation and transit planning projects, small area planning and redevelopment studies, traffic engineering and design manuals and studies, and livable transportation solutions.

Robert Kay, Americas Climate and Sustainability Services Leader

Robert Kay joins Arup with 32 years of experience in climate change and coastal zone management. Prior to working at Arup, Robert served as the Deputy Director and Senior Fellow of ICF's Climate Center, helping clients embrace the climate transition.

About Arup

Dedicated to sustainable development, Arup is a built environment consulting firm of 16,000 designers, advisors and experts working across 140 countries. Founded to strive for humanity and excellence in everything that we do, we collaborate with our clients and partners, using imagination, technology and rigor to shape a better world.

CONTACT: Jackie Wei-Green, [email protected], (310) 578-4437

SOURCE Arup
RIVERSIDE, Calif., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Attorney Zulu Ali, founder and principal of the Law Offices of Zulu Ali & Associates, LLP (zulualilaw.com), the largest Black-owned law firm in California's Inland Empire, has been renamed Criminal Defense Litigator of the Year for 2022 by the American Institute of Trial Lawyers.

Attorney Zulu Ali

The American Institute of Trial Lawyers is an invitation only professional organization composed of premier trial attorneys from each state. These attorneys exemplify the very best qualities and qualifications of an attorney. Each attorney must meet stringent qualifications as a civil or criminal attorney. These attorneys' practice in a variety of fields to help and promote the ethical and elite practice of law. Selection is based on a thorough multi-phase process which includes peer nominations and third-party research.

Lawyers are selected based upon their exemplary work in the legal field, and positive reviews from their peers. Less than .03% of all lawyers will be selected to become a member of the American Institute of Trial Lawyers.

A former police officer and U.S. Marine Corps veteran, he earned a juris doctorate in law (J.D.) from Trinity International University; a masters in administration of justice (M.S.) and business (M.B.A.) from University of Phoenix; a degree with a focus on African studies from Regents College through a consortium with Tennessee State University; and is a doctoral scholar researching pan-African business and trade at California Southern University.

In 2007, inspired by the legacy of civil rights attorneys Charles Hamilton Houston, Thurgood Marshall, and Avon Williams, Jr., who used the law and courts as a vehicle to make change and protect all people against injustice, Attorney Zulu Ali opened the Law Offices of Zulu Ali & Associates, LLP with a focus on representing persons accused of crimes, immigrants, and persons seeking civil justice in state and federal courts. Ali is on the list of counsel at the African Court of Justice and Human Rights in Tanzania (Africa) and the International Criminal Court at The Hague (Netherlands).

Attorney Ali served as Director of the American Committee for United Nations Oversight, an advocacy group that lobbied the United Nations for police reform in 2015. He is the Director of the Stop and Frisk Youth Leadership Academy, which mentors and trains at-risk youth to deal with police encounters; Director of the Southern California Veterans Legal Clinic, a legal clinic offering no cost and low cost legal services to military veterans; Board Member of the Islamic Development Center of Moreno Valley Shurah Board; and a member of Iota Phi Theta Fraternity, Inc. serving on the international governing body (Grand Council) as General Legal Counsel.

Attorney Zulu Ali, a distinguished biographee of Marquis Who's Who and a recipient of the Albert Neilson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021, and received the Marquis Who's Who Humanitarian Award for 2022. In 2017, Attorney Ali was recognized as one of the most influential African American Leaders in Los Angeles by the National Action Network founded by Reverend Al Sharpton.

Attorney Ali has been Honored as one of the Top 100 Lawyers in his area by the National Black Lawyers and National Trial Lawyers; a Top 10 Lawyer by the American Academy of Trial Attorneys, American Institute of Legal Counsel, American Jurist Institute, and Attorney & Practice Magazine; and Rue Ratings Best Lawyer in America.

He is the founder and CEO of 10 Nubian Queens & 5 Kings Media (http://10nubianmedia.com), a mass media production company focusing on black family and social justice content in film, radio, theater, music, and book publishing.

Additionally, Zulu Ali is host of the nationally syndicated radio talk show Justice Watch with Attorney Zulu Ali (justicewatchradio.com) which broadcasts from NBC Radio studio in Redlands, California; and he is a member of the National Black Radio Hall of Fame (Chicago chapter).

A devoted family man, Ali has been married to his wife (Charito) since 1986, has four adult children (Christine, Whitney, Ashley, and Lynda), four grandchildren (Amayah, Tye, Izem, and Amina), and resides in Southern California with his family.

Press Contact:

Rosa Nunez, Producer

Justice Watch Radio

951-782-8722

[email protected]

SOURCE Law Office of Zulu Ali & Associates, LLP
Automotive Steering Column Market: Driver

Growing demand for electric power steering driving advanced steering column adoption to drive growth

The key factor driving the global automotive steering column market growth is the growing demand for electric power steering, which is driving advanced steering column adoption. Technology advances have helped steering systems in evolving from manual to EPS and steer-by-wire systems. The EPS system incorporates various components in the vehicle's steering column. For instance, Nexteer Automotive Corporations Column Assist EPS integrates various electronics such as motors, sensors, and the steering-assist mechanism with the steering column. In addition, as EPS makes vehicles highly fuel-efficient, thus, its adoption is increasing in passenger cars. The Tata Nano Twist manufactured by India-based Tata was one of the most affordable cars, from 2014 until 2018. When the company discontinued its production in 2018, the vehicle was fitted with EPS. Thus, the increasing adoption of EPS will drive market growth during the forecast period.

Automotive Steering Column Market: Challenges

Increasing penetration of steer-by-wire technology to hamper the growth of the automotive steering column market

The key challenge to the global automotive steering column market growth is the increasing penetration of steer-by-wire technology. The benefit of steer-by-wire technology includes better handling and safety. The steer-by-wire system also provides improved performance, reliability, and safety with reduced manufacturing and operating costs and better fuel economy. Japan-based INFINITI automaker offers SBW systems in Q-series vehicles, with Q50 being the most prominent one. SBW systems bring enhanced safety with reduced crash impact owing to fewer mechanical linkages and components as needed in the case of conventional steering systems. The elimination of mechanical linkages makes it easier for automakers to design and manufacture vehicles with left-hand and right-hand drives. This leads to simpler design in terms of reduced mechanical parts. Such factors will limit the market growth during the forecast period.

To know about more drivers, challenges along with upcoming trends - Request Free Sample Research Report

Automotive Steering Column Market: Segmentation Analysis

Technavio market research report segments the automotive steering column market by Application (Passenger cars and commercial vehicles) and Geographic (APAC, Europe, North America, South America, and the Middle East and Africa).

The automotive steering column market share growth in the passenger cars segment will be significant for revenue generation. The significant increase in the demand for passenger cars from emerging economies owing to factors such as the rise in disposable income will facilitate the market growth through this segment in the coming years.

To gain further insights on the market contribution of various segments - Download a Free sample report

Related Reports:

The automotive grille market share is expected to increase by USD 15.37 billion from 2021 to 2026, and the market's growth momentum will accelerate at a CAGR of 4.87%. Download a free sample now!

share is expected to increase by USD 15.37 billion from 2021 to 2026, and the market's growth momentum will accelerate at a CAGR of 4.87%. The automotive vacuumless braking market share is expected to increase by USD 2.54 billion from 2021 to 2026, and the market's growth momentum will accelerate at a CAGR of 7.57%. Download a free sample now!

Automotive Steering Column Market Scope Report Coverage Details Page number 120 Base year 2021 Forecast period 2022-2026 Growth momentum & CAGR Accelerate at a CAGR of 5.61% Market growth 2022-2026 USD 3.52 billion Market structure Fragmented YoY growth (%) 5.45 Performing market contribution APAC at 68% Competitive landscape Leading companies, competitive strategies, consumer engagement scope Companies profiled BorgWarner Inc., Coram Europe Srl, Fuji Autotech AB, Huhei Henglong Auto System Group, JTEKT Corp., Leopold Kostal GmbH & Co. KG, Mando Corp., Nexteer Automotive Group Ltd., NSK Ltd., Pailton Engineering Ltd., Robert Bosch GmbH, thyssenkrupp AG, Yamada Manufacturing Co. Ltd., ZF Friedrichshafen AG, and Continental AG 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 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.

Table of Content

1 Executive Summary

1.1 Market overview

Exhibit 01: Executive Summary  Chart on Market Overview



Exhibit 02: Executive Summary  Data Table on Market Overview



Exhibit 03: Executive Summary  Chart on Global Market Characteristics



Exhibit 04: Executive Summary  Chart on Market by Geography



Exhibit 05: Executive Summary  Chart on Market Segmentation by Application



Exhibit 06: Executive Summary  Chart on Incremental Growth



Exhibit 07: Executive Summary  Data Table on Incremental Growth



Exhibit 08: Executive Summary  Chart on Vendor Market Positioning

2 Market Landscape

2.1 Market ecosystem

Exhibit 09: Parent market



Exhibit 10: Market Characteristics

3 Market Sizing

3.1 Market definition

Exhibit 11: Offerings of vendors included in the market definition

3.2 Market segment analysis

Exhibit 12: Market segments

3.3 Market size 2021

3.4 Market outlook: Forecast for 2021-2026

Exhibit 13: Chart on Global - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 14: Data Table on Global - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 15: Chart on Global Market: Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 16: Data Table on Global Market: Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

4 Five Forces Analysis

4.1 Five forces summary

Exhibit 17: Five forces analysis - Comparison between 2021 and 2026

4.2 Bargaining power of buyers

Exhibit 18: Bargaining power of buyers  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.3 Bargaining power of suppliers

Exhibit 19: Bargaining power of suppliers  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.4 Threat of new entrants

Exhibit 20: Threat of new entrants  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.5 Threat of substitutes

Exhibit 21: Threat of substitutes  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.6 Threat of rivalry

Exhibit 22: Threat of rivalry  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.7 Market condition

Exhibit 23: Chart on Market condition - Five forces 2021 and 2026

5 Market Segmentation by Application

5.1 Market segments

Exhibit 24: Chart on Application - Market share 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 25: Data Table on Application - Market share 2021-2026 (%)

5.2 Comparison by Application

Exhibit 26: Chart on Comparison by Application



Exhibit 27: Data Table on Comparison by Application

5.3 Passenger car - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 28: Chart on Passenger car - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 29: Data Table on Passenger car - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 30: Chart on Passenger car - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 31: Data Table on Passenger car - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

5.4 Commercial vehicle - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 32: Chart on Commercial vehicle - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 33: Data Table on Commercial vehicle - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 34: Chart on Commercial vehicle - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 35: Data Table on Commercial vehicle - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

5.5 Market opportunity by Application

Exhibit 36: Market opportunity by Application ($ million)

6 Customer Landscape

6.1 Customer landscape overview

Exhibit 37: Analysis of price sensitivity, lifecycle, customer purchase basket, adoption rates, and purchase criteria

7 Geographic Landscape

7.1 Geographic segmentation

Exhibit 38: Chart on Market share by geography 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 39: Data Table on Market share by geography 2021-2026 (%)

7.2 Geographic comparison

Exhibit 40: Chart on Geographic comparison



Exhibit 41: Data Table on Geographic comparison

7.3 APAC - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 42: Chart on APAC - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 43: Data Table on APAC - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 44: Chart on APAC - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 45: Data Table on APAC - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.4 Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 46: Chart on Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 47: Data Table on Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 48: Chart on Europe - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 49: Data Table on Europe - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.5 North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 50: Chart on North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 51: Data Table on North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 52: Chart on North America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 53: Data Table on North America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.6 South America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 54: Chart on South America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 55: Data Table on South America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 56: Chart on South America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 57: Data Table on South America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.7 Middle East and Africa - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

and - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 58: Chart on Middle East and Africa - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

and - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 59: Data Table on Middle East and Africa - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

and - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 60: Chart on Middle East and Africa - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

and - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 61: Data Table on Middle East and Africa - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.8 China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 62: Chart on China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 63: Data Table on China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 64: Chart on China - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 65: Data Table on China - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.9 US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 66: Chart on US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 67: Data Table on US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 68: Chart on US - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 69: Data Table on US - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.10 Japan - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 70: Chart on Japan - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 71: Data Table on Japan - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 72: Chart on Japan - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 73: Data Table on Japan - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.11 India - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 74: Chart on India - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 75: Data Table on India - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 76: Chart on India - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 77: Data Table on India - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.12 Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 78: Chart on Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 79: Data Table on Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 80: Chart on Germany - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 81: Data Table on Germany - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.13 Market opportunity by geography

Exhibit 82: Market opportunity by geography ($ million)

8 Drivers, Challenges, and Trends

8.1 Market drivers

8.2 Market challenges

8.3 Impact of drivers and challenges

Exhibit 83: Impact of drivers and challenges in 2021 and 2026

8.4 Market trends

9 Vendor Landscape

9.1 Overview

9.2 Vendor landscape

Exhibit 84: Overview on Criticality of inputs and Factors of differentiation

9.3 Landscape disruption

Exhibit 85: Overview on factors of disruption

9.4 Industry risks

Exhibit 86: Impact of key risks on business

10 Vendor Analysis

10.1 Vendors covered

Exhibit 87: Vendors covered

10.2 Market positioning of vendors

Exhibit 88: Matrix on vendor position and classification

10.3 Coram Europe Srl

Exhibit 89: Coram Europe Srl - Overview



Exhibit 90: Coram Europe Srl - Product / Service



Exhibit 91: Coram Europe Srl - Key offerings

10.4 Fuji Autotech AB

Exhibit 92: Fuji Autotech AB - Overview



Exhibit 93: Fuji Autotech AB - Product / Service



Exhibit 94: Fuji Autotech AB - Key offerings

10.5 JTEKT Corp.

Exhibit 95: JTEKT Corp. - Overview



Exhibit 96: JTEKT Corp. - Business segments



Exhibit 97: JTEKT Corp. - Key news



Exhibit 98: JTEKT Corp. - Key offerings



Exhibit 99: JTEKT Corp. - Segment focus

10.6 Leopold Kostal GmbH Co. KG

Exhibit 100: Leopold Kostal GmbH Co. KG - Overview



Exhibit 101: Leopold Kostal GmbH Co. KG - Product / Service



Exhibit 102: Leopold Kostal GmbH Co. KG - Key offerings

10.7 Nexteer Automotive Group Ltd.

Exhibit 103: Nexteer Automotive Group Ltd. - Overview



Exhibit 104: Nexteer Automotive Group Ltd. - Business segments



Exhibit 105: Nexteer Automotive Group Ltd. - Key news



Exhibit 106: Nexteer Automotive Group Ltd. - Key offerings



Exhibit 107: Nexteer Automotive Group Ltd. - Segment focus

10.8 NSK Ltd.

Exhibit 108: NSK Ltd. - Overview



Exhibit 109: NSK Ltd. - Business segments



Exhibit 110: NSK Ltd. - Key offerings



Exhibit 111: NSK Ltd. - Segment focus

10.9 Pailton Engineering Ltd.

Exhibit 112: Pailton Engineering Ltd. - Overview



Exhibit 113: Pailton Engineering Ltd. - Product / Service



Exhibit 114: Pailton Engineering Ltd. - Key offerings

10.10 Robert Bosch GmbH

Exhibit 115: Robert Bosch GmbH - Overview



Exhibit 116: Robert Bosch GmbH - Business segments



Exhibit 117: Robert Bosch GmbH - Key news



Exhibit 118: Robert Bosch GmbH - Key offerings



Exhibit 119: Robert Bosch GmbH - Segment focus

10.11 thyssenkrupp AG

Exhibit 120: thyssenkrupp AG - Overview



Exhibit 121: thyssenkrupp AG - Business segments



Exhibit 122: thyssenkrupp AG - Key news



Exhibit 123: thyssenkrupp AG - Key offerings



Exhibit 124: thyssenkrupp AG - Segment focus

10.12 ZF Friedrichshafen AG

Exhibit 125: ZF Friedrichshafen AG - Overview



Exhibit 126: ZF Friedrichshafen AG - Business segments



Exhibit 127: ZF Friedrichshafen AG - Key news



Exhibit 128: ZF Friedrichshafen AG - Key offerings



Exhibit 129: ZF Friedrichshafen AG - Segment focus

11 Appendix

11.1 Scope of the report

11.2 Inclusions and exclusions checklist

Exhibit 130: Inclusions checklist



Exhibit 131: Exclusions checklist

11.3 Currency conversion rates for US$

Exhibit 132: Currency conversion rates for US$

11.4 Research methodology

Exhibit 133: Research methodology



Exhibit 134: Validation techniques employed for market sizing



Exhibit 135: Information sources

11.5 List of abbreviations

Exhibit 136: List of abbreviations

About Technavio

Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focuses on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions.

With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios.

Contacts

Technavio Research

Jesse Maida

Media & Marketing Executive

US: +1 844 364 1100

UK: +44 203 893 3200

Email: [email protected]

Website: www.technavio.com

SOURCE Technavio
Blood Viscometer Market 2022-2026: Scope

Our blood viscometer market report covers the following areas:

Blood Viscometer Market 2022-2026: Drivers & Challenges

The increasing vascular diseases is one of the key drivers supporting the blood viscometer market growth. A blood viscometer plays a major role in evaluating blood viscosity, which will further provide valuable information regarding the risk of vascular disorders. The blood viscosity test determines the blood flow conditions throughout the vasculature and analyzes the risk of vascular symptoms, depending on the blood viscosity rates in the organ. Moreover, the increasing prevalence of vascular diseases is likely to positively impact the growth of the global blood viscometer market during the forecast period. As per the CDC, in 2021, for every 40 seconds, someone in the US had a heart attack. Also, every year, 805,000 people in the US have a heart attack, of which one in five heart attacks is silent. Such an increase in the prevalence of vascular diseases is likely to propel the demand for blood viscometers during the forecast period.

However, the high cost of blood viscometers is one of the factors hindering the blood viscometer market growth. The cost of a blood viscometer ranges between $2,500 and $3,500, which makes it difficult to purchase for establishments that have smaller footprints. Furthermore, advances in blood viscometer have increased the prices of these systems, thereby hindering the growth of the market. Additionally, the cost includes the maintenance, calibration, and installation charges. Few vendors like Anton Paar offer an extended three-year warranty program for their blood viscometer, with free installation and operational qualification documentation. However, it may not be the same with all the available vendors in the market. Hence, buyers incur additional costs in terms of repair services, sensor damage issues, and installation charges. Thus, the high cost of the blood viscometer and associated costs are likely to hinder the growth of the market.

To know about more drivers & challenges - Download a free sample now!

Blood Viscometer Market 2022-2026: Segmentation Analysis

End-user

Hospitals



Diagnostics



Others

Geography

North America



Europe



Asia



Rest Of World (ROW)

Blood Viscometer Market 2022-2026: Revenue Generating Segment & Regional Analysis

The blood viscometer market share growth by the hospital's segment will be significant during the forecast period. Blood viscometers are used extensively in hospitals to determine the viscosity of the blood, which helps identify the risk factors for vascular diseases. Many hospitals are working under government sponsorship or through private entities. These multi-specialty hospitals have a capacity of 500 beds and engage closely with many suppliers to procure therapeutic devices and diagnostic products such as blood viscometers. Many reimbursement authorities and government organizations tie up with hospitals to provide patient treatment and favorable reimbursements. Such factors will drive the segment growth during the forecast period.

will be significant during the forecast period. Blood viscometers are used extensively in hospitals to determine the viscosity of the blood, which helps identify the risk factors for vascular diseases. Many hospitals are working under government sponsorship or through private entities. These multi-specialty hospitals have a capacity of 500 beds and engage closely with many suppliers to procure therapeutic devices and diagnostic products such as blood viscometers. Many reimbursement authorities and government organizations tie up with hospitals to provide patient treatment and favorable reimbursements. Such factors will drive the segment growth during the forecast period. 41% of the market's growth will originate from North America during the forecast period. The US is the key market for the blood viscometers market in North America . Market growth in this region will be slower than the growth of the market in Asia. The increasing demand for testing blood viscosity to identify vascular diseases will facilitate the blood viscometer market growth in North America over the forecast period.

To know more about the market segmentation - Download a free sample now!

Blood Viscometer Market 2022-2026: Key Highlights

CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2022-2026

Detailed information on factors that will assist blood viscometer market growth during the next five years

Estimation of the blood viscometer market size and its contribution to the parent market

Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior

The growth of the blood viscometer market

Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors

Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of blood viscometer market vendors

Related Reports:

The portable oxygen concentrators market share is expected to increase by USD 1.51 billion from 2021 to 2026, and the market's growth momentum will accelerate at a CAGR of 12.52%. Download a free sample now!

share is expected to increase by USD 1.51 billion from 2021 to 2026, and the market's growth momentum will accelerate at a CAGR of 12.52%. The gastrointestinal bleeding treatment market share is expected to increase by USD 188.19 million from 2021 to 2026, and the market's growth momentum will accelerate at a CAGR of 4.63%. Download a free sample now!

Blood Viscometer Market Scope Report Coverage Details Page number 120 Base year 2021 Forecast period 2022-2026 Growth momentum & CAGR Accelerate at a CAGR of 6.75% Market growth 2022-2026 USD 11420.5 thousand units Market structure Fragmented YoY growth (%) 5.85 Performing market contribution North America at 41% Competitive landscape Leading companies, competitive strategies, consumer engagement scope Companies profiled A and D Co Ltd., Analytical Technology and Control Ltd., Anton Paar GmbH, ATAGO Co. Ltd., BARTEC Top Holding GmbH, Benson Viscometers Ltd, BioFluid Technology Inc., Cambridge Viscosity Inc., Cannon Instrument Co., China BeiJing Steellex Scientific Instrument Co., Fann Instrument Co., KYOTO ELECTRONICS MANUFACTURING CO. LTD., Labtron Equipment Ltd., PCE Holding GmbH, Rheonics GmbH, RheoSense Inc., Paul N. Gardner Co. Inc., Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., TOKI SANGYO Co. Ltd., WATERS CORP, and Xylem Inc. 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.

Table Of Contents :

1 Executive Summary

1.1 Market overview

Exhibit 01: Executive Summary  Chart on Market Overview



Exhibit 02: Executive Summary  Data Table on Market Overview



Exhibit 03: Executive Summary  Chart on Global Market Characteristics



Exhibit 04: Executive Summary  Chart on Market by Geography



Exhibit 05: Executive Summary  Chart on Market Segmentation by End-user



Exhibit 06: Executive Summary  Chart on Incremental Growth



Exhibit 07: Executive Summary  Data Table on Incremental Growth



Exhibit 08: Executive Summary  Chart on Vendor Market Positioning

2 Market Landscape

2.1 Market ecosystem

Exhibit 09: Parent market



Exhibit 10: Market Characteristics

3 Market Sizing

3.1 Market definition

Exhibit 11: Offerings of vendors included in the market definition

3.2 Market segment analysis

Exhibit 12: Market segments

3.3 Market size 2021

3.4 Market outlook: Forecast for 2021-2026

Exhibit 13: Chart on Global - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 14: Data Table on Global - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 15: Chart on Global Market: Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 16: Data Table on Global Market: Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

4 Five Forces Analysis

4.1 Five forces summary

Exhibit 17: Five forces analysis - Comparison between 2021 and 2026

4.2 Bargaining power of buyers

Exhibit 18: Bargaining power of buyers  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.3 Bargaining power of suppliers

Exhibit 19: Bargaining power of suppliers  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.4 Threat of new entrants

Exhibit 20: Threat of new entrants  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.5 Threat of substitutes

Exhibit 21: Threat of substitutes  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.6 Threat of rivalry

Exhibit 22: Threat of rivalry  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.7 Market condition

Exhibit 23: Chart on Market condition - Five forces 2021 and 2026

5 Market Segmentation by End-user

5.1 Market segments

Exhibit 24: Chart on End-user - Market share 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 25: Data Table on End-user - Market share 2021-2026 (%)

5.2 Comparison by End-user

Exhibit 26: Chart on Comparison by End-user



Exhibit 27: Data Table on Comparison by End-user

5.3 Hospitals - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 28: Chart on Hospitals - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 29: Data Table on Hospitals - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 30: Chart on Hospitals - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 31: Data Table on Hospitals - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

5.4 Diagnostics - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 32: Chart on Diagnostics - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 33: Data Table on Diagnostics - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 34: Chart on Diagnostics - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 35: Data Table on Diagnostics - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

5.5 Others - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 36: Chart on Others - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 37: Data Table on Others - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 38: Chart on Others - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 39: Data Table on Others - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

5.6 Market opportunity by End-user

Exhibit 40: Market opportunity by End-user ($ thousand)

6 Customer Landscape

6.1 Customer landscape overview

Exhibit 41: Analysis of price sensitivity, lifecycle, customer purchase basket, adoption rates, and purchase criteria

7 Geographic Landscape

7.1 Geographic segmentation

Exhibit 42: Chart on Market share by geography 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 43: Data Table on Market share by geography 2021-2026 (%)

7.2 Geographic comparison

Exhibit 44: Chart on Geographic comparison



Exhibit 45: Data Table on Geographic comparison

7.3 North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 46: Chart on North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 47: Data Table on North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 48: Chart on North America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 49: Data Table on North America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.4 Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 50: Chart on Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 51: Data Table on Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 52: Chart on Europe - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 53: Data Table on Europe - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.5 Asia - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 54: Chart on Asia - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 55: Data Table on Asia - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 56: Chart on Asia - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 57: Data Table on Asia - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.6 Rest of World (ROW) - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 58: Chart on Rest of World (ROW) - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 59: Data Table on Rest of World (ROW) - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 60: Chart on Rest of World (ROW) - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 61: Data Table on Rest of World (ROW) - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.7 US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 62: Chart on US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 63: Data Table on US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 64: Chart on US - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 65: Data Table on US - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.8 Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 66: Chart on Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 67: Data Table on Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 68: Chart on Germany - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 69: Data Table on Germany - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.9 UK - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 70: Chart on UK - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 71: Data Table on UK - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)



Exhibit 72: Chart on UK - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 73: Data Table on UK - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.10 China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 74: Chart on China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 75: Data Table on China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 76: Chart on China - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 77: Data Table on China - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.11 France - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 78: Chart on France - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 79: Data Table on France - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ thousand)

Exhibit 80: Chart on France - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 81: Data Table on France - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.12 Market opportunity by geography

Exhibit 82: Market opportunity by geography ($ thousand)

8 Drivers, Challenges, and Trends

8.1 Market drivers

8.2 Market challenges

8.3 Impact of drivers and challenges

Exhibit 83: Impact of drivers and challenges in 2021 and 2026

8.4 Market trends

9 Vendor Landscape

9.1 Overview

9.2 Vendor landscape

Exhibit 84: Overview on Criticality of inputs and Factors of differentiation

9.3 Landscape disruption

Exhibit 85: Overview on factors of disruption

9.4 Industry risks

Exhibit 86: Impact of key risks on business

10 Vendor Analysis

10.1 Vendors covered

Exhibit 87: Vendors covered

10.2 Market positioning of vendors

Exhibit 88: Matrix on vendor position and classification

10.3 Anton Paar GmbH

Exhibit 89: Anton Paar GmbH - Overview



Exhibit 90: Anton Paar GmbH - Product / Service



Exhibit 91: Anton Paar GmbH - Key offerings

10.4 Benson Viscometers Ltd

Exhibit 92: Benson Viscometers Ltd - Overview



Exhibit 93: Benson Viscometers Ltd - Product / Service



Exhibit 94: Benson Viscometers Ltd - Key offerings

10.5 BioFluid Technology Inc.

Exhibit 95: BioFluid Technology Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 96: BioFluid Technology Inc. - Product / Service



Exhibit 97: BioFluid Technology Inc. - Key offerings

10.6 Cambridge Viscosity Inc.

Exhibit 98: Cambridge Viscosity Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 99: Cambridge Viscosity Inc. - Product / Service



Exhibit 100: Cambridge Viscosity Inc. - Key offerings

10.7 China BeiJing Steellex Scientific Instrument Co.

Exhibit 101: China BeiJing Steellex Scientific Instrument Co. - Overview



Exhibit 102: China BeiJing Steellex Scientific Instrument Co. - Product / Service



Exhibit 103: China BeiJing Steellex Scientific Instrument Co. - Key offerings

10.8 Labtron Equipment Ltd.

Exhibit 104: Labtron Equipment Ltd. - Overview



Exhibit 105: Labtron Equipment Ltd. - Product / Service



Exhibit 106: Labtron Equipment Ltd. - Key offerings

10.9 PCE Holding GmbH

Exhibit 107: PCE Holding GmbH - Overview



Exhibit 108: PCE Holding GmbH - Product / Service



Exhibit 109: PCE Holding GmbH - Key offerings

10.10 RheoSense Inc.

Exhibit 110: RheoSense Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 111: RheoSense Inc. - Product / Service



Exhibit 112: RheoSense Inc. - Key offerings

10.11 Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc.

Exhibit 113: Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 114: Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. - Business segments



Exhibit 115: Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. - Key news



Exhibit 116: Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. - Key offerings



Exhibit 117: Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. - Segment focus

10.12 Xylem Inc.

Exhibit 118: Xylem Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 119: Xylem Inc. - Business segments



Exhibit 120: Xylem Inc. - Key offerings



Exhibit 121: Xylem Inc. - Segment focus

11 Appendix

11.1 Scope of the report

11.2 Inclusions and exclusions checklist

Exhibit 122: Inclusions checklist



Exhibit 123: Exclusions checklist

11.3 Currency conversion rates for US$

Exhibit 124: Currency conversion rates for US$

11.4 Research methodology

Exhibit 125: Research methodology



Exhibit 126: Validation techniques employed for market sizing



Exhibit 127: Information sources

11.5 List of abbreviations

Exhibit 128: List of abbreviations

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: [email protected]

Website: www.technavio.com/

SOURCE Technavio
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) has been ranked 9th globally in the Technical Education and Vocational Training Index of the Global Knowledge Index 2021.

Issued by the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Knowledge Foundation in cooperation with the United Nations Development Programme, the index aims to measure global cognitive development as a comprehensive concept that is closely related to sustainable development and the various aspects of modern human life, building knowledge societies and economies, and setting development policies to anticipate future.

The Global Knowledge Index measures the cognitive development in 154 countries worldwide, based on seven composite sub-indices that highlight the performance of six vital sectors: Pre-university education, technical education and vocational training, higher education, R&D, ICT, innovation, and economics, as well as a sub-index for the enabling environment to assess the social, political, economic, health and environmental context incubating these sectors.

KSA excels in sub-axes

The technical education and vocational training indicator has several sub-axes where KSA excelled in, to emerge number one globally in the proportion of students enrolled in non-university post-secondary education in vocational and technical programmes.

It also ranked 2nd in the world in quality and qualifications in technical education and vocational training, 4th in the technical education and vocational training components and 4th globally in terms of the average income of technical education and vocational training professions that require intermediate skills.

Besides, the country was 6th in the world in percentage of weak employment.

The Global Knowledge Index 2021, which was widely reviewed during the Knowledge Summit 2022 held recently at Expo 2020 Dubai, highlighted KSAs strong performance in the area of cognitive infrastructure.

Five major strengths

The Index pointed out that the country has five major strengths such as the volume of cultural exports share in total exports, mobile broadband internet usage per subscription, households with internet access, individuals with standard ICT skills, and median income for intermediate skill TVET occupations.

The fifth edition of the Global Knowledge Index 2021 included 155 variables that were selected from more than 40 international sources and databases, including that of Unesco, the World Bank, the International Telecommunication Union, the International Monetary Fund, the Organisation Economic Cooperation and Development, the International Labour Organisation among others.

Switzerland was ranked 1st globally for the fifth year in a row, followed by Sweden, USA, Finland and the Netherlands.-- TradeArabia News Service
The Innovative Campaign Created by Award-Winning Creative Agency, Camp + King, Announces the Cloud-Based Ask Joe Virtual Assistant to Educate Wine Lovers Across the Nation

NAPA, Calif., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Joe Wagner, fifth-generation winemaker and owner of Boen Wines launches the innovative Boen Ask Joe Virtual Wine Assistant. Wagner unveils the cloud-based virtual assistance program that puts the Boen winemaker right in consumers' pockets to answer all of their questions or lead them through a one-on-one wine tasting, just by scanning the QR code located on all 2020 Boen Wines. This innovative platform connects wine lovers from around the world, giving them more wine knowledge, or aiding in their everyday enjoyment of wine.

The Ask Joe Virtual Wine Assistant aims to bring consumers closer to the wine in their glass by tapping into Joe's knowledge, humor, and experience. Ask Joe creates a two-way dialogue between the winemaker and the wine lover. Tapping into the platform is as easy as scanning the QR code located on the bottleneck of all Boen 2020 vintage bottles or in your favorite retailer and wine shop and simply start talking to Virtual Joe. If you don't have a bottle of Boen in front of you, the program can also be accessed by going to AskJoeWagner.com.

"Today's modern wine enthusiast is interested in learning about more than just what's printed on the bottle label. We created the Ask Joe Virtual Assistant to provide consumers with an easy opportunity to dive into the behind the scenes of the wine in front of them as well as to share quick tips and facts," says Joe Wagner. "I can't wait for our Boen aficionados, both new and existing, to go through the Ask Joe experience and learn something new."

Camp + King (C+K), the award-winning creative agency, designed the campaign to begin with a film launching Boen Terroir Gum, a fictional product, on April Fool's Day as a misdirect. The second campaign film built on the innovation fail of terroir-infused gum to herald the actual product, Boen Ask Joe Virtual Wine Assistant. Honest and simple, with a hint of deadpan humor, the film introduces wine enthusiasts to Joe Wagner amidst the vines of his family's vineyard as he introduces the truly innovative Ask Joe Virtual Wine Assistant. The campaign films are a production of Camp + King's in-house production entity the Content Lab, fully produced from concept through production, post, and finishing.

"Working with Joe Wagner and Boen Wines for the launch of the Ask Joe Virtual Wine Assistant provided the opportunity for our team to reimagine the way in which the wine industry speaks to its enthusiasts," says Jamie King, Founder and CEO of C+K. "The resulting campaign was as great a delight to our team as it is to the viewers."

In addition to answering a wide variety of questions including those that are conveniently suggested on the homepage for the user, the Ask Joe Virtual Assistant also offers an interactive wine tasting experience with Virtual Joe. If the user has one of Boen's three wines available, they can crack open a bottle, pour themselves a glass, and let Joe take them through an exclusive one-on-one wine experience that covers the aroma, palate, and food pairings.

AI smart speaker devices and consumer adoption has exploded in the past decade. According to a study by Voicebot.ai in 2020, 61.2% of smartphone owners use voice assistant.

Always ahead of the curve, Joe Wagner learned the ropes at a young age from his father. In the vineyard, Wagner garnered a love for cultivating the land, tending to the grapevines, the strengths of a good work ethic and leading by example. He established Belle Glos with the inaugural vintage of 2001 focusing on vineyard-designated Pinot Noirs. Since starting his blossoming company, Copper Cane Wines & Provisions, in 2014, Wagner has launched numerous new wines, each with a distinct slant towards his personal style. In 2019, Wagner returned his attention to an accessible version of his signature robust style of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay with Boen. Today the Boen portfolio showcases three wines including a Chardonnay and Pinot Noirs from Sonoma County, Monterey County, and Santa Barbara County in California.

For more information on the Ask Joe Virtual Assistant, visit AskJoeWagner.com, and stay up to date on social by following @BoenWines.

About Boen

Boen is a translation of 'The Farm,' a reminder to fifth-generation winemaker and farmer Joe Wagner that the wine he makes is indivisible from the land it comes from. Born and raised in California's wine country, Joe has devoted his life to the vineyard. No stranger to the soil, he takes a hands-on approach to surveying his vineyards and cultivating his land. It is this intimacy with the earth and craft that create a distinctly personal and defining wine. With its ripe fruit flavors, bright acidity, and hints of toasty oak, Boen is the purest expression of Joe's signature style. Boen showcases the land and the art of winemaking and is an earnest representation of cool coastal mornings and sunny California days. Boen's portfolio of wines includes Chardonnay and Pinot Noirs from Sonoma County, Monterey County, and Santa Barbara County in California. For more information visit Boenwines.com and follow on Instagram @boenwines.

About Camp + King:

Is a four-time AdAge Small Agency of the Year and a 2021 AdAge A-List agency. The 60-person shop has offices in San Francisco and Chicago. Their clients include brands such as Energizer, RE/MAX, and Papa John's, among others. Camp + King is dedicated to making brands Conversationworthy.

Media Contacts:

SOURCE Copper Cane Wines & Provisions
OSLO, NORWAY, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Borr Drilling Limited (the "Company") (NYSE and OSE: "BORR") is pleased to announce it has been awarded new contracts and extensions for 5 of its premium jack-up drilling rigs. These awards increase the company's backlog by approximately 2,530 days, excluding optional periods.

The premium jack-up drilling rig "Gunnlod" has secured a contract with an undisclosed operator in Southeast Asia. This contract is expected to commence in direct continuation of its current contract. The work will cover 11 wells with an anticipated duration of 186 days plus options.

The premium jack-up drilling rig "Mist" had options exercised by PTTEP for a total duration of approximately 3.5 months and it is now expected to remain contracted with the customer until Q4 2022.

The premium jack-up drilling rig "Saga" has secured a contract with an undisclosed operator in Southeast Asia. This contract will commence in direct continuation of its current contract and the work will cover a 1-well program with an anticipated duration of 45 days.

Additionally, the Company has secured long-term contracts in the Middle East with an undisclosed operator for 2 of its premium jack-up drilling rigs. The contracts have a firm duration of 3 years plus options each and are expected to commence in the second half of 2022.

These awards increase the company's contracted fleet to 20 rigs out of a total of 23 delivered rigs.

Borr Drilling remains in constructive discussions with its lenders in relation to the deferral or refinancing of its debt maturing in 2023 and expects such discussions to be successfully concluded on or before June 30th, 2022.

Hamilton, Bermuda

4 April 2022

Forward looking statements

This press release includes forward looking statements, which do not reflect historical facts and may be identified by words such as "expect", "will" and similar expressions and include statements relating to rig contracting and extensions and exercises of options including the duration of such contracts and extensions and backlog, statements relating to its discussions with creditors and goal to successfully conclude such discussions by June 30, 2022, and other non-historical statements. Such forward-looking statements are subject to risks, uncertainties, contingencies and other factors could cause actual events to differ materially from the expectations expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements included herein, including risks related to actual performance under drilling contracts, the risk that backlog may not be realized, the number of rigs that will be in operation and rates that are achieved, and risks relating to discussions with creditors including the risk that a refinancing is not agreed on terms or if a refinancing is agreed, the terms of such refinancing, the risk that the conditions for extensions of maturity and new rig delivery dates agreed with yard creditors are not met, including the condition that by June 30, 2022 Borr refinance the maturities of its other secured debt and convertible bonds until at least 2025, risks relating to covenants in debt facilities and liquidity and the risk that Borr may not be able to refinance its debt maturities beyond 2023 and other risks and uncertainties described in the section entitled "Risk Factors" in our most recent annual report on Form 20-F and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Such risks, uncertainties, contingencies and other factors could cause actual events to differ materially from the expectations expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements included herein. These forward-looking statements are made only as of the date of this release. We do not undertake to update or revise the forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

CONTACT:

Questions should be directed to: Magnus Vaaler, CFO, +44 1224 289208

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/borr-drilling-limited/r/borr-drilling-limited---announcement-of-new-contracts-and-extensions-for-jack-up-drilling-rigs,c3539503

SOURCE Borr Drilling Limited
HOUSTON and TUPELO Miss., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Cadence Bank (NYSE: CADE) will release its first-quarter 2022 earnings on Monday, April 25, 2022, after the close of the financial markets. It will also hold its earnings webcast on Tuesday, April 26, 2022, at 10:00 a.m. CT.



The webcast is live coverage of management's conference call with analysts and can be found by visiting: https://ir.cadencebank.com/events . This will be an interactive session between management and analysts; others may listen to the live broadcast as it happens. The conference call will also be available in archived format at the same address.



Cadence Bank (NYSE: CADE) is a leading regional banking franchise with approximately $50 billion in assets and more than 400 branch locations across the South, Midwest and Texas. Cadence provides consumers, businesses and corporations with a full range of innovative banking and financial solutions. Services and products include consumer banking, consumer loans, mortgages, home equity lines and loans, credit cards, commercial and business banking, treasury management, specialized lending, asset-based lending, commercial real estate, equipment financing, correspondent banking, SBA lending, foreign exchange, wealth management, investment and trust services, financial planning, retirement plan management, and personal and business insurance. Cadence is committed to a culture of respect, diversity and inclusion in both its workplace and communities. Cadence Bank, Member FDIC. Equal Housing Lender.

SOURCE Cadence Bank
LONDON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The Silicon Photonics Market Value is expected to record a valuation of USD 7253.6 Million by 2028, Registering to Accelerate at a 25.8% CAGR, According to the most recent study by Brandessence Market Research & Consulting Pvt ltd.

The Global Silicon Photonics Market size was Valued at USD 1454.8 Million in 2021. Silicon Photonics Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report By Product (Transceivers, Variable Optical Attenuators, Switches, Cables, Sensors) By Component (Lasers, Modulators, Photo Detectors) By Waveguide (400-1,500 NM, 1,310-1,550 NM, 900-7000 NM) By Applications (Data Centers And High-Performance Computing, Telecommunication, Military, Defense And Aerospace, Medical, And Life Science, Other Applications) Based On Region, And Segment Forecasts, 2022 - 2028

The global silicon photonics market has been expected to grow at a good rate in the coming decade. The silicon photonics market CAGR will be really high considering the demand that is increasing for the data transfer capabilities and higher bandwidth. The COVID outbreak has made work from home and school from home a norm and that has created the need to transfer information at a faster rate. This has opened doors to multiple application opportunities for the global silicon photonics market.

Get Sample of [email protected] https://brandessenceresearch.com/requestSample/PostId/1919

Silicon Photonics Market Drivers

The need for silicon photonics arises because it is difficult for the conventional copper cables to cater to the high-speed transfer demand of the current times. This issue of spectral range being limited is eliminated by the usage of optical interconnects along with silicon photonic transceivers. Further, the components like the transceivers, switches and interconnects which are used in the communication networks consume a lot less power and over a cost benefit and offer a more environment-friendly option.

Lasers are needed for the optical data transmission at a higher speed since they make pure light in frequency as well as color terms. The silicon photonics have an option of using either the off-chip or the on-chip light sources. The on-chip source has the ability to achieve a higher density of integration as it has a compact size and also offers better performance in energy proportionality and energy-efficiency terms. It is however a complex process. Further, the different sources of light increase the complexity levels as they hinder the growth of the global silicon photonics market.

Short-reach communication can link the optical interconnects and that creates a huge scope for the global silicon photonics market in developing the communication market. The technology has the ability to optimize the performance of short reach communication system. Data can be transferred at a faster speed due to this. The silicon photonics market leaders have been making their efforts to increase the speed of transmission and do it over a bigger distance. A critical task for the global market is the implanting of various different types of integrated circuits. It is a big challenge because of the thermal effect. Great difficulties are faced in embedding components in a nanometer scale. These silicon photonic devices have higher sensitivity towards the waveguide dimensions. Therefore, they require a non-meter scale control and need to have a decent amount of variation in the silicon-refractive index. This is a major challenge as it can be controlled only by increasing the power consumption.

Silicon Photonics Market report covers prominent players like

The major silicon photonics companies are focused on investing in technology development and research through which they can further reduce power consumption. The major companies which are operating in the market are engaged in exchange of information too and mergers and acquisition.

Cisco Systems

Intel

MACOM Technology

GlobalFoundries

NeoPhotonics

InPhi

II-VI

IBM

STMicroelectronics

Rockley Photonics

Mellanox Technologies

Sicoya

Lumentum Operations

RANOVUS

Broadcom

Hamamatsu Photonics

Molex

Fujitsu

Chiral Photonics

EFFECT Photonics

AIO Core

NKTPhotonics

IPG Photonics

DAS Photonics

TDK Corporations

Get Methodology @ https://brandessenceresearch.com/requestMethodology/PostId/1919

Silicon Photonics Market: Segmentation analysis

In terms of application, the transceivers are expected to be used in multiple applications and therefore it is expected that they will grow the fastest. This is where they are used for data center, high-performance computing and the telecommunication. The top silicon photonics companies look to enable data at 100 Gbps. The sales saw a bit of a dip during the covid pandemic but as the covid pandemic is heading towards its end, we can expect the sales to jump quickly and make up for all the losses and deficits that have been incurred recently.

The hybrid silicon lasers is also going to grow as it is used for the mass production issues of production of silicon lasers. This hybrid approach uses the benefits of the light emitting properties and combines it with the process of silicon maturity for fabricating electrically driven lasers. These lasers are fabricated on a silicon wafer which maybe integrated into the other silicon photonic devices.

Recent Development:

Researchers Built a Silicon Photonic Neural Network that Overcomes Limitations of Fiber Transmission: On January 16th, 2022; Researchers at Princeton Lightwave Lab and NEC Laboratory America have built a real-time neural network on an integrated photonic chip, enabled by silicon photonics. The technology could be useful for a trans-pacific transmission link of upto 10,000 km and could help to overcome the adverse effects of fiber nonlinearity. This is an excellent case of how photonics outperforms electronics in AI applications. In addition, the silicon neural network created by the researchers is programmable and based on the so-called broadcast-and-weight protocol.

Tower Semiconductor in Israel is Offering the World's First Open-Silicon Photonics with Monolithic III-V Lasers: On December 22nd, 2021; Tower Semiconductor in Israel is offering the world's first open silicon photonics (SiPho) foundry-ready process with integrated III-V lasers, amplifiers, modulators and detectors. The platform was developed with networking giant Juniper Networks for optical connectivity in datacentres and telecom networks, as well as new emerging applications in artificial intelligence (AI), LiDAR and other sensors for driverless cars. The platform co-integrates III-V lasers, semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOA), electro-absorption modulators (EAM) and photodetectors with silicon photonics devices, all monolithically on a single chip. This enables smaller, higher-channel count and more power-efficient optical architectures and solutions. Foundry availability will enable a broad array of product developers to create highly integrated photonic integrated circuits (PICs) for diverse markets.

Buy now of this repot: https://brandessenceresearch.com/Checkout?report_id=1919

MACOM Technology Solution Collaborated with GlobalFoundries to Scale Silicon Photonics for Data Centers and 5G: On December 8th, 2021; MACOM Technology Solutions and GlobalFoundries (GF) collaborated to ramp the innovative Laser Photonic Integrated Circuit (L-PIC) platform from MACOM using GF's current-generation 300mm-wafer silicon photonics offering, 90WG. Production scale of 300mm wafers is expected to enable exponential port growth in cloud data centers and 5G networks. The collaboration was leveraged GF's 300mm silicon manufacturing process to deliver requisite cost, scale and capacity that is expected to enable mainstream L-PIC deployment for hyper scale data center interconnect and 5G network deployments at 100G, 400G and beyond.

Cisco acquired Silicon Photonics Company Luxtera for $660 Million: On December 18th, 2018; Cisco incorporated Luxtera's technology across its intent-based networking portfolio, which spans data center and service provider markets. Cisco specifically cited integration of Luxtera's technology into its 100GbE and 400GbE portfolios. As system port capacity increases to 400GbE and beyond, optics plays an increasingly important role in addressing density and power requirements. In late October Cisco announced 400G switches that target hyperscale cloud providers, large enterprise data centers, and telecommunications providers moving to 5G. The company was actually a bit late to the 400G party.

Silicon photonics market: Market Trends

The global silicon photonics market forecast is extremely positive in the modern world as the pandemic has disrupted value chains all over the world and manufacturing sector has also been affected leading to a slowdown in consumer spending and demand. The pandemic however has been fruitful for the internet usage as there has been a spike in employees working from home when the lockdowns were imposed in order to curb the spread of coronavirus. This pandemic also brought a higher inclination of the consumer towards watching television and learning through the internet.

The surge though has also seen people laid off and their expenditures cut down. This has been impacting the sales of networking components directly like the silicon photonic devices to a large extent. Data centers and high-performance computing is touted to be among the fastest growing applications of these solutions. The world has seen the first phase of 5G network deployment begin but the pandemic has halted the progress. This is going to affect the growth of the global market. The recent silicon photonics market trends though suggest that as the pandemic heads towards its final stages, the market will keep growing.

Reginal Analysis:

The region of Asia Pacific is expected to register the maximum growth in the coming few years as the global silicon photonic market sees application in the telecommunication sector and data center along with the higher performance applications in computing among others. The market in the Asia Pacific region has further been driven by the population being high. The two most populated countries, China and India, are in the region and are seeing a wave of technology outreach. The high-speed networks and mobile devices are being used increasingly and the infrastructure therefore is growing rapidly for this market. Both the countries saw a massive COVID pandemic period where people adapted to the work from home norms and that has driven the market significantly.

On Special Requirement Silicon Photonics Market Report is also available for below region:

North America

U.S, Canada

Europe

Germany , France,U.K., Italy , Spain , Sweden , Netherland, Turkey , Switzerland , Belgium , Rest of Europe

Asia-Pacific

South_Korea , Japan , China , India , Australia , Philippines , Singapore , Malaysia , Thailand , Indonesia , Rest Of APAC

Latin America

Mexico , Colombia , Brazil , Argentina , Peru , Rest of Latin America

Middle East and Africa

Saudi Arabia , UAE, Egypt , South Africa , Rest Of MEA

Get Full Access of all Report: https://brandessenceresearch.com/chemical-and-materials/silicon-photonics-market-size

Related Reports:

Brandessence Market Research & Consulting Pvt ltd.

Brandessence market research publishes market research reports & business insights produced by highly qualified and experienced industry analysts. Our research reports are available in a wide range of industry verticals including aviation, food & beverage, healthcare, ICT, Construction, Chemicals and lot more. Brand Essence Market Research report will be best fit for senior executives, business development managers, marketing managers, consultants, CEOs, CIOs, COOs, and Directors, governments, agencies, organizations and Ph.D. Students. We have a delivery center in Pune, India and our sales office is in London.

Website: https://brandessenceresearch.com

Blog: Nanotechnology Companies https://brandessenceresearch.com/blog/top-5-automotive-aftermarket-companies-in-global-market-2021

Follow Us: Linkedin

Mr. Vishal Sawant

Email: [email protected]

Email: [email protected]

Corporate Sales: +44-2038074155

Asia Office: +917447409162

SOURCE Brandessence Market Research And Consulting Private Limited
With 22 of its 23 ships back in guest operations across all its year-round U.S. homeports, Carnival has led the industry in terms of restart and customer demand. Its final ship, Carnival Splendor, will return to service from Seattle on May 2, and then Carnival will welcome its newest ship, Carnival Celebration, to PortMiami in November. By year-end 2022, Carnival will have more capacity sailing (as measured by ALBDs  available lower berth days) than it was sailing in 2019. And then in 2023, Carnival will put into service another new Excel-class ship, Carnival Jubilee from Galveston.

"The excitement of the industry's restart, our successful return of our entire fleet, the guest reaction to Mardi Gras, our loyal guest response to our 50th birthday this year, the support of our travel advisor partners  and of course, the amazing work of our Carnival team  have all contributed to the strong demand we are seeing, and this record-breaking booking week," said Christine Duffy, president of Carnival Cruise Line.

Duffy added that all sales channels, including Carnival.com, travel advisors, the Carnival guest contact center and personal vacation planners all contributed to the record-breaking results. With the restart of cruising in Australia now set, Carnival is finalizing plans for its return in Australia and will be announcing those details soon.

ABOUT CARNIVAL CRUISE LINE

Carnival Cruise Line, part of Carnival Corporation & plc (NYSE/LSE: CCL;NYSE: CUK), is proud to be known as America's Cruise Line with a total of 23 ships, sailing from 14 U.S. homeports and employing more than 40,000 team members from 120 nationalities. Carnival's newest ship, Mardi Gras, featuring the first roller coaster at sea and the first cruise ship in the Americas powered by eco-friendly Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), sailed from Port Canaveral, Fla., July 31, 2021. As part of its 50th Birthday festivities, Carnival Celebration, sister ship to Mardi Gras, is scheduled to debut in late 2022 from PortMiami, as well as Carnival Jubilee from Galveston in 2023.

SOURCE Carnival Cruise Line
Company Reaffirms First Quarter and Annual 2022 Outlook

CHICAGO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Cars.com Inc. (NYSE: CARS) ("CARS" or the "Company"), the leading automotive marketplace platform that provides a robust set of digital solutions, today announced the resignation of Sonia Jain, Chief Financial Officer, effective April 15, 2022. Jain will be leaving the Company to pursue a new opportunity with a pre-IPO, venture capital-backed company.

"On behalf of the CARS team, I want to thank Sonia for her contributions to the Company and wish her well in her new endeavor. She leaves behind a strong Finance organization and a deep bench of talented Finance executives," said Alex Vetter, Chief Executive Officer of CARS.

The Company has appointed Jandy Tomy, Vice President and Treasurer, to serve as interim CFO. Tomy has been at CARS since March 2017 and has more than 20 years of public company experience in various financial and accounting roles. She previously served as CARS CFO from Jan. 2020 through June 2020. A nationally-recognized search firm has been retained to fill the permanent CFO position.

"I look forward to collaborating with Jandy in her CFO role once again and leveraging her many years of CARS financial leadership as the Company's strategy continues to deliver sustainable growth," continued Vetter. "The Board and I are fortunate that Jandy is able to seamlessly step in and lead our talented Finance team during the search for a permanent CFO."

CARS reaffirms the previously communicated first quarter and annual 2022 outlook made Feb. 24, 2022. Additionally, for the first quarter of 2022, the Company reports year-over-year and sequential quarterly growth in Dealer Customers.

ABOUT CARS.COM INC.

CARS is the leading automotive marketplace platform that provides a robust set of digital solutions that connect car shoppers with sellers. Launched in 1998 with the flagship marketplace Cars.com and headquartered in Chicago, the Company empowers shoppers with the data, resources and digital tools needed to make informed buying decisions and seamlessly connect with automotive retailers. In a rapidly changing market, CARS enables dealerships and OEMs with innovative technical solutions and data-driven intelligence to better reach and influence ready-to-buy shoppers, increase inventory turn and gain market share.

In addition to Cars.com, CARS brands include Dealer Inspire, a technology provider building solutions that future-proof dealerships with more efficient operations and connected digital experiences; FUEL, which gives dealers and OEMs the opportunity to harness the untapped power of digital video by leveraging Cars.com's pure audience of in-market car shoppers, DealerRater, a leading car dealer review and reputation management platform, automotive fintech platform CreditIQ, and Accu-Trade, a leading provider of vehicle acquisition technology and valuation data.

The full suite of CARS properties includes Cars.com, Dealer Inspire, FUEL, DealerRater, CreditIQ, Accu-Trade, Auto.com, PickupTrucks.com and NewCars.com. For more information, visit www.Cars.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the federal securities laws. All statements other than statements of historical facts are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements include information concerning the Company's industry, Dealer Customers, results of operations, business strategies, plans and objectives, market potential, outlook, trends, future financial performance, planned operational and product improvements, potential strategic transactions, including the proposed acquisition of Accu-Trade, recent acquisitions, such as CreditIQ, liquidity, including draws from the Company's revolving credit facility, expense management and other matters and involve known and unknown risks that are difficult to predict. As a result, the Company's actual financial results, performance, achievements, strategic actions or prospects may differ materially from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. These statements often include words such as "believe," "expect," "project," "anticipate," "outlook," "intend," "strategy," "plan," "estimate," "target," "seek," "will," "may," "would," "should," "could," "forecasts," "mission," "strive," "more," "goal" or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements are based on the Company's current expectations, beliefs, strategies, estimates, projections and assumptions, based on its experience in the industry as well as the Company's perceptions of historical trends, current conditions, expected future developments, current developments regarding the COVID-19 pandemic and other factors the Company thinks are appropriate. Such forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable by the Company and its management based on their knowledge and understanding of the business and industry, are inherently uncertain. These statements are expressed in good faith and the Company believes these judgments are reasonable. However, you should understand that these statements are not guarantees of strategic action, performance or results. The Company's actual results and strategic actions could differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking statements. Given these uncertainties, forward-looking statements should not be relied on in making investment decisions. Comparisons of results between current and prior periods are not intended to express any future trends, or indications of future performance, unless expressed as such, and should only be viewed as historical data. Whether or not any such forward-looking statement is in fact achieved will depend on future events, some of which are beyond the Company's control.

Forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks, uncertainties and other important factors, many of which are beyond the Company's control, that could cause its actual results and strategic actions to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking statements contained in this press release. For a detailed discussion of many of these and other risks and uncertainties, see the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K, its Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, its Current Reports on Form 8-K and its other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, available on the Company's website at investor.cars.com or via EDGAR at www.sec.gov . All forward-looking statements contained in this press release are qualified by these cautionary statements. You should evaluate all forward-looking statements made in this press release in the context of these risks and uncertainties. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are based only on information currently available to the Company and speak only as of the date of this press release. The Company undertakes no obligation, other than as may be required by law, to update or revise any forward-looking or cautionary statements to reflect changes in assumptions, the occurrence of events, unanticipated or otherwise, or changes in future operating results over time or otherwise.

The forward-looking statements in this report are intended to be subject to the safe harbor protection provided by the federal securities laws.

SOURCE Cars.com Inc.
Funds will enable the Discovery Center to upgrade interactive Earth and space science exhibits.

MANCHESTER, N.H. , April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Central Rivers Power, the owner and operator of eight New Hampshire-based hydroelectric power plants recently announced a commitment of $10,000 to the McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center. Funding will be directed to these partners to support the upgrades to the interactive Earth and space science exhibits in the Center's science galleries and replace some of the well-used seats in its planetarium theater.

"We are honored and delighted that Central Rivers Power has joined as a founding corporate member of the McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center," said Discovery Center Executive Director Jeanne Gerulskis. "To have as a partner a company dedicated to providing reliable, low-carbon energy to the national power grid is wonderful. We share with Central Rivers Power a desire to inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers to lead in fields like hydropower and other renewable energies, which are so critical to our future."

Dedicated to New Hampshire space pioneers Alan Shepard and Christa McAuliffe, the McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center is a 45,000-square foot air and space museum with an all-digital, full-dome planetarium (the largest in Northern New England), two floors of interactive science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) exhibits, an observatory with professional telescopes, and a full spectrum of live and virtual STEM outreach programs for learners of all ages.

"We are thrilled to support the McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center as it continues its mission to bring the STEM learning to the community," said Central Rivers Power Chief Executive Todd Wynn. "One of our commitments as a company is using technology to create a sustainable, greener future. The Center's devotion to educating all of us on the wonders of our worldand beyonddovetails nicely with our concern for the preservation of this planet."

About Central Rivers Power

Central Rivers Power owns and operates 45 hydroelectric power plants with a combined installed capacity of 340 megawatts across the United States including eight hydroelectric plants located in New Hampshire, which provide reliable, carbon-free energy to the local power grid supporting the communities in which they operate. In total, Central Rivers Power produces about 1.25 million megawatt-hours of clean energy annually, offsetting greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to the emissions of over 190,000 passenger vehicles. Central Rivers Power is an affiliate of Hull Street Energy. For more information visit www.centralriverspower.com.

Media Contact:

Andy Kiss

[email protected]

SOURCE Central Rivers Power
Streem brand, platform, and local service continue in Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) market

and (ANZ) market Management team retained with long-term growth mandate

Streem joins PR Newswire, Brandwatch, and Falcon.io brands to activate full-service offering for Cision across ANZ

SYDNEY and CHICAGO, April 3, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Global communications intelligence company Cision announced today that it has completed the acquisition of realtime media monitoring company Streem.

Since announcing the deal in December 2021, Streem has continued its high-growth trajectory, winning major new customers, including Amazon, HSBC, Crown Resorts, and several government departments.

Cision's Chief Revenue Officer Stephen Boyes noted, "Streem has established itself as the customer-preferred media intelligence platform in the ANZ market. We are excited that they are now part of the Cision family and that our ANZ customers can benefit from a full suite of monitoring, distribution, insights, and social media solutions."

Streem customers will benefit from the global reach of Cision, while continuing to receive the same local support and expertise they have relied on since the company's launch in 2017. Streem's customers will also continue to access the company's existing media monitoring and insights platform, supported by its local product and engineering teams.

"The closing of this deal gives us the opportunity to create the ANZ region's leading media intelligence offering. Streem is best positioned to deliver on every customer's need through a single platform and local team," Elgar Welch, CEO of Streem said.

The completion of the acquisition follows approval by Australia's Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB) and the United States' Department of Justice (DoJ), and results in a sale of 100% of Streem shares to Cision. Streem will continue to operate as an independent brand, with operations and people, including key management and founders Elgar Welch (CEO) and Antoine Sabourin (CTO), to remain in place.

Cision is a portfolio company of Platinum Equity, which acquired the business in 2020. The Streem transaction marks the second add-on acquisition Cision has completed this year.

"We are delivering on our promise to invest in Cision's growth, expand its product offering and extend its geographic reach," said Platinum Equity Partner Jacob Kotzubei and Platinum Equity Managing Director Matthew Louie in a joint statement. "We will continue working with the team to pursue more opportunities to drive growth organically and through acquisitions."

About Streem

Streem is one of the ANZ market's fastest growing media intelligence companies, delivering comprehensive and realtime Print, Online, TV, Radio, & Social media monitoring, insights, and reporting to leading corporate and government organisations including Telstra, Amazon, Qantas, Commonwealth Bank, and the Department of Prime Minister & Cabinet. Through Desktop, Tablet and Mobile, Streem's customers can see, stream and analyse millions of news items in realtime, helping PR and Corporate Affairs teams to do their jobs.

About Cision

As a global leader in PR, IR, marketing and social media management technology and intelligence, Cision helps brands and organisations to identify, connect and engage with customers and stakeholders to drive business results. Through a suite of IR services, PR Newswire helps companies meet their communications and disclosure needs. A network of over 1.1 billion influencers, in-depth monitoring, analytics and its Brandwatch and Falcon.io social media platforms headline a premier suite of solutions. Cision has offices in 24 countries throughout the Americas, EMEA and APAC. For more information about Cision's award-winning solutions, including its next-gen Cision Communications Cloud, visit www.cision.com and follow @Cision on Twitter.

Media Contacts:

Streem

Jack McLintock

Media Relations Manager

Streem

[email protected]

Cision

[email protected]

SOURCE Cision Ltd.
When programs are manually uninstalled, there are often hidden residual files that are not removed. These unremoved files take up space on your Mac's hard drive. SpyHunter for Mac's App Uninstaller has a built-in scan engine designed to detect leftover files and delete them, making sure the selected program(s) and all their data are completely removed from your computer. SpyHunter for Mac also includes a Startup Manager feature that allows users to configure and fine-tune their Mac startup settings to optimize and potentially speed up the startup process.

To download SpyHunter for Mac Free Trial and try its App Uninstaller for Free plus its anti-malware features, go to https://www.enigmasoftware.com/products/spyhunter/#mac.

How Can SpyHunter for Mac's Free App Uninstaller Benefit You?

SpyHunter for Mac's App Uninstaller:

Removes residual files & unwanted apps to free up disk space

Enhances personal privacy and security

Uninstalls unwanted software that persistently reappears with "Forced Uninstall"

Provides a detailed snapshot of all installed apps

Identifies apps that consume system memory and other resources

Utilizes SpyHunter for Mac's features to remove malware & PUPs

To learn more about SpyHunter for Mac's FREE App Uninstaller, please visit https://www.enigmasoftware.com/products/spyhunter/#mac. Access to and use of SpyHunter for Mac's App Uninstaller for free is part of and subject to the terms of use of SpyHunter for Mac.

About EnigmaSoft Limited

EnigmaSoft Limited is a privately held Irish company with offices and global headquarters in Dublin, Ireland. EnigmaSoft is best known for developing and distributing SpyHunter 5 and SpyHunter for Mac, advanced anti-malware apps. SpyHunter detects and removes malware, enhances Internet privacy, and eliminates security threats  addressing issues such as malware, ransomware, and other malicious security threats affecting millions of PC and Mac computer users on the web. SpyHunter 5 has scored top grades in comparative testing by independent third-party testing labs such as AV-TEST. SpyHunter 5 has also been certified by AppEsteem, Checkmark Certified and TRUSTe.

Connect with EnigmaSoft: Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn | YouTube

SOURCE EnigmaSoft Limited
Since Cora launched in 2016, the natural period care category has grown significantly with an abundance of product choices. But, even with so many options, shopping for period care remains an after-thought with most consumers trained to dash in-and-out of the aisle as quickly as possible. With its brand refresh, Cora has unveiled a bold new look inspired by the beauty category that addresses comfort and self-care while imagining a more engaging shopping experience with a modernized color palette and approachable language. Cora also is doubling-down on showing the realness of periods through relatable imagery.

Cora's entire portfolio has been renamed, making the period care items stand out with accessible language that emphasizes the type of comfort each product provides. New product names include: The Comfort Fit TamponTM; ; The Peace-of-Mind PadTM; The Got-You-Covered LinerTM; and The Perfect Fit DiscTM.

"We heard from consumers that being comfortable is a top priority when on their period, yet more than half of people never feel that way[1]," said Dana Cohen, chief marketing officer, Cora. "With our new brand look, Cora is going all-in on comfort, empathy, and belonging, because we believe consumers deserve to be comfortable on their periods."

Cora's broad portfolio of period care products have driven significant growth for the brand. The brand's reusable products are growing 75% year-over-year at retail and are now driving a quarter of the brand's growth[2]. Last year, Cora introduced a reusable menstrual disc, which sold out three times at launch and is now the fastest growing reusable disc in the category[3]. Adding to its period care and wellness line-up, Cora has introduced three new products, available at cora.life and select retailers nationwide:

The Restorative Vulva Balm : a hydrating moisturizer made with non-irritating natural ingredients that relieves vulva dryness and irritation.

: a hydrating moisturizer made with non-irritating natural ingredients that relieves vulva dryness and irritation. The Stay Well Period Patch : a discreet, easy-to-wear herbal body patch with chasteberry extract and black cohosh that provides comfort before and during your period.

: a discreet, easy-to-wear herbal body patch with chasteberry extract and black cohosh that provides comfort before and during your period. The Balancing Boric Acid Suppository : a vaginal suppository that combines boric acid with naturally occurring lactic acid and vitamin C to promote pH balance and protect against irregular odors.

"The future of period care goes beyond tampons and pads," said Molly Hayward, co-founder and chief brand officer. "When Cora was founded, we were one of the first brands to bring a fresh, modern look and clean ingredients to period care basics like tampons and pads. Consumers deserve more choices in the period care aisle. At Cora, we're committed to bringing innovative products to manage all types of cycles, comfortably."

About Cora

Cora is a leading provider of clean period, bladder, and body care products that provide comfort through the uncomfortable. The brand's portfolio includes tampons, pads, and liners made with organic cotton as well as cycle support and reusable options such as cups, disc, and period underwear. With every Cora purchase, the company provides period products and body literacy resources to people who might otherwise go without. Cora has given over 17 million period products to individuals in need around the world, including in the United States, Kenya, India, and Europe. Cora's products are available at Cora.life and at national retailers such as Target, CVS, Kroger, Safeway, Albertsons and Amazon. For more information, visit www.cora.life.

[1] OnePoll random double-opt-in survey of 2,000 U.S. women ages 18+ commissioned by Cora between March 4 and March 9, 2022

[2] SPINS MULO L52 w/e 12/26/21

[3] SPINS MULO 52 w/e 2/20/22

SOURCE Cora
Your browser does not support the video tag.
Saudi Arabias ICT sector, which expanded 8% between 2019 and 2021 to reach a value of $32.1 billion, is expected to witness a year-on-year growth of 2.3% for 2022, with ICT spending set to top $32.9 billion (SR123.4 billion), said IDC.



According to data presented by the CITC, Saudi Arabia has added 37,000 telecommunication towers since 2017, covering about 99% of the Kingdom's area. Moreover, the value of the Saudi ICT and postal markets exceeded SR140 billion in 2021.



The data was presented during the recently held 8th edition of the ICT Indicators Forum, which revealed that Saudi Arabia is now home to one of the world's fastest growing ICT markets.



The forum, hosted jointly by the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) and International Data Corporation (IDC), featured a series of enlightening presentations and panel discussions that provided valuable insights into the current ICT market and the Kingdom's digital transformation journey. The sessions also highlighted the impact of government initiatives on enabling digital transformation across sectors in the Kingdom.



Speaking at the event, Hamza Naqshbandi, IDC's associate vice president for Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, described the Saudi ICT sector as one of the most rapidly growing markets in the region.



"The Kingdom's response to the pandemic was one of the strongest and most robust that any economy had to the pandemic," said Naqshbandi. "IDC research shows that the Kingdom was way ahead of the curve in terms of its preparedness and response to the pandemic, and the pioneering Vision 2030 initiative has been a key facilitator of that success."



"The growth we have forecast for Saudi Arabia's ICT sector in 2022 is particularly significant when viewed in a regional context," continued Naqshbandi. "And this is feeding into a broader global trend, with IDC forecasting that worldwide ICT spending will increase from $3.86 trillion (SR14.48 trillion) in 2021 to $5.34 trillion (SR20.03 trillion) in 2025."



Another noted speaker at the event was Steven Frantzen, IDC's senior vice president and managing director for the EMEA region, who urged businesses to prepare for the future, the role they will play in it, and the impact they want to achieve.



"Digital is now a permanent, yet dynamic fixture in our world," said Frantzen. "Entire industries want to intelligently leverage data to their advantage and can do so because they have faster access to digital technologies. But 'digital first' isn't about picking/prioritizing a particular technology or business model  it's an organizational aspiration and a desired business cultural characteristic that should apply across customer engagement, hybrid work, unified security, remote operations, and shared business value."



Frantzen also moderated a VIP panel discussion, titled 'The Building Blocks of Saudi Arabia's Digital Economy  What to Expect in the Hyper-Connected Digital-First Kingdom'. The session showcased valuable insights and perspectives from a number of Saudi Arabia's most respected ICT leaders, including Salman Faqeeh, managing director of Cisco Saudi Arabia; Rasheed A Al-Odah, country managing director at Trend Micro; Ziad Mortaja, CEO of MIS; and Majid Alotaibi, chief business officer at Mobily.  TradeArabia News Service
ATLANTA, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Cousins Properties (NYSE:CUZ) announced today that it will release its first quarter 2022 earnings after the market closes on Thursday, April 28, 2022. Cousins will hold its first quarter 2022 earnings conference call on Friday, April 29, 2022 at 10:00 a.m. (Eastern Time). The number for this call is (877) 247-1056. The live webcast of this call can be accessed on the Company's website, www.cousins.com, through the "Cousins Properties First Quarter Conference Call" link on the Investor Relations page.

A playback will be available shortly after the call on Friday, April 29, 2022 and run through Friday, May 6, 2022. The number for the playback is (877) 344-7529, passcode 1847512. The playback can also be accessed on the Company's website through the "Cousins Properties First Quarter Conference Call" link on the Investor Relations page.

Financial information will be placed on the Company's website promptly after the earnings release announcement. This information will be available in the "Featured Reports" section on the Investor Relations page. This information will also be available through the "SEC Filings" and "Supplemental Information" links on the Investor Relations page.

About Cousins Properties

Cousins Properties is a fully integrated, self-administered and self-managed real estate investment trust (REIT). The Company, based in Atlanta, GA and acting through its operating partnership, Cousins Properties LP, primarily invests in Class A office buildings located in high-growth Sun Belt markets. Founded in 1958, Cousins creates shareholder value through its extensive expertise in the development, acquisition, leasing and management of high-quality real estate assets. The Company has a comprehensive strategy in place based on a simple platform, trophy assets and opportunistic investments. For more information, please visit www.cousins.com.

CONTACT:

Roni Imbeaux

Vice President, Finance and Investor Relations

404-407-1104

[email protected]

SOURCE Cousins Properties
Winning or being shortlisted for the Davos Communications Awards will bring highly valuable publicity through online global media outlets, 2,000 WCFA newsletter subscribers, and social media . The recognition can increase one's brand credibility internationally, help to improve and achieve professional growth, benchmark the company, expand its business, attract new clients and partners, strengthen and motivate teamwork, and encourage recruitment.

The Awards are organized by the World Communications Forum Association and celebrate exceptional professional work done by businesses, governments, and academia in public relations, marketing, branding, social media, and leadership. The judges will recognize projects demonstrating innovation, creative thinking, engagement, and success in pioneering strategic marketing tools.

Participants who enter the Awards with three or more submissions get rewarded with 1-year Membership at WCFA, enjoying a full list of benefits.

The Davos Communications Awards 2022 are open for submission on www.davosawards.com

Entries are accepted in 26 categories:

Best Public Relations Campaign

Best Marketing Communications Campaign

Best Digital or Social Media Campaign

Best Global Communications Campaign

Best Inclusive Marketing Campaign

Best Engage for Change Campaign

Best Internal Communications Campaign

Best Small-Budget Campaign

Best Influencer Marketing Campaign

Best Content Marketing Campaign

Best Use of Brand

Best Corporate Affairs

Best CSR or ESG

Excellence in Communications Response to Covid-19

Special Event

PR Consultancy of the Year

Marketing Agency of the Year

Digital Agency of the Year

In-house Team of the Year

Outstanding Freelancer of the Year

Rising Star  for practitioners under the age of 30

Silver Star  for practitioners over the age of 50

Best Leader in Public Relations and Communications

Best Crisis Communications Leader

Best Student in Public Relations or Communications

Best Woman in Public Relations

All categories are judged by an influential and respected international Jury of experts from the United Kingdom, Brazil, Lithuania, Nigeria, Romania, United States, Ghana, Singapore, Iran, Turkey, Australia, South Africa, Hungary, and the Netherlands.

Among them are the Jury Chair Amanda Coleman, Director and Founder at Amanda Coleman Communication Ltd., Alasdair Townsend, Managing Partner at Sherlock Communications, Antanas Zabulis, Board member at Baltic Management Institute, Catalin Hosu, Communication Manager at COMM360, Claudine Moore, Corporate Communications and Business Development Strategist at C. Moore Media International Public Relations, John Ehiguese, Founder and CEO of Mediacraft Associates, Kobi Hemaa Osisiadan-Bekoe, Head of Corporate Communications at Ghana Post, Lisa O'Sullivan, Growth Lead of Global Health PORTER NOVELLI, Marie Alexander, Founder and Executive Director of Alexander PR Group, Mina Nazari, PR and Communications expert at Tabriz Electric Power Distribution company, Pelin Kocaalp, General Manager at Hill+Knowlton Strategies, Sjaak Koole, Alumni Chapter Lead at the European University, Sukruti Narayanan, Director Business Growth & Public Relations at MeTV, Thabisile Phumo, Senior Vice President and Head of Stakeholder Relations at Sibanye-Stillwater, Zsofia Lakatos, Managing Director at Emerald PR, and more.



Partners of the Awards are PR Newswire  a part of Cision Group Ltd. and DHL.



The winners and finalists of the Davos Communications Awards for 2021 can be seen here.

For more information about the Awards, visit www.davosawards.com or contact Maxim Behar, WCFA President, at [email protected] or +359 888 50 31 13.

About Davos Communications Awards:

The Davos Communications Awards, launched by the World Communications Forum Association in 2021, are global prestigious awards that recognize exceptional professional work done by businesses, governments, and academia in public relations, marketing, branding, social media, CSR, and leadership. Entries are open to agencies, in-house teams, and individuals from any sector to help celebrate and showcase professional excellence in the industry. Winning a Davos Communications Award is an opportunity for professionals and businesses to pitch themselves as the best, to stand out from the competition, increase their credibility, and motivate their teams.

About World Communications Forum Association:

The World Communications Forum was founded in 2010 in Davos, Switzerland, where the Association was registered in 2014. The WCFA is an organization committed to active global discussions and exchanges focused on the development of the communications expertise of its members and being an active voice in its key role in business, society, and politics. Every year the forum gathers prominent representatives of the communication and public relations sector from around the world, who, through dialogue and discussion, exchange experiences and ideas to shape the art of global communications. In 2021, the WCFA organized its 'Global Communications Summit' on Zoom, bringing together more than 450 top communications experts globally.

SOURCE World Communications Forum Association
SAN FRANCISCO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Dechert LLP announced today that Nicole Macarchuk will join the firm's corporate and securities group in San Francisco; she will serve as a key addition to the firm's private equity M&A and private credit teams. Ms. Macarchuk will be the sixth partner to join Dechert's San Francisco office in the past year as part of the firm's strategic plan to bolster its interdisciplinary corporate, litigation, and financial services capabilities in California.

Ms. Macarchuk brings immense knowledge of the alternative asset management industry, with wide ranging experience in private equity and private credit transactions. Most recently, Ms. Macarchuk was the General Counsel and Chief Operating Officer of Angel Island Capital in San Francisco, a multi-strategy credit boutique and portfolio company of Golden Gate Capital.

She began her legal career in private practice and became co-general counsel at alternative asset management firm Sculptor Capital Management, formerly Och-Ziff Capital Management, in 2004. She then joined global investment firm KKR in 2010 as a managing director and General Counsel of public markets until 2018, when she joined Angel Island Capital. She earned a B.A. in economics from Fordham University and a J.D. cum laude, from Fordham University School of Law. She is a member of the Board of Directors of Heluna Health. Ms. Macarchuk is admitted in New York.

Henry Nassau, Dechert's Chief Executive Officer, commented, "Nicole's exceptional client-side experience and business sense, and her deep expertise in private equity and credit investing across multiple industries and geographies, are unique and invaluable additions to our practice, especially as alternative asset managers are launching new products and strategies at a record pace. She also shares our commercial, collaborative approach to solving our clients' most critical business challenges and our dedication to mentoring our talent."

"I am thrilled to join Dechert and work side by side with attorneys I came to know and respect during my time at KKR and Angel Island. These relationships, along with the firm's ability to provide high quality legal, regulatory, and industry counsel on a global scale, is what drew me to Dechert," said Ms. Macarchuk. "I also look forward to being part of the growing San Francisco office and contributing to the firm's West Coast expansion strategy."

Ms. Macarchuk's arrival follows the additions of private fund formation partner Sonia Gioseffi, former federal prosecutor Hartley West, corporate governance litigator Rick Horvath, and relocated litigation partner Joshua Hess and private equity M&A partner Jonathan Stott to Dechert's San Francisco team. In 2020, Dechert also welcomed a product liability trial team led by Kimberly Branscome and Jay Bhimani to its Los Angeles office, and IP litigator Jennifer Swan to Silicon Valley. Other recent senior hires in California at counsel level include private equity specialist Maryam Naghavi (San Francisco), global finance lawyer Andrew Taggart (San Francisco) and product liability litigator Benjamin Sadun (Los Angeles), who was subsequently elected to Dechert's partnership.

Recognized as an international powerhouse, Dechert's private equity practice has been on a fast-track growth trajectory, advising more than 300 private equity and other private investment clients worldwide. The firm's global team of more than 250 lawyers represents all types of private equity sponsors and other private investment firms, including sovereign wealth funds and family offices, and their portfolio companies, as well as institutional and corporate investors looking to invest in private equity funds. Recognized among the top law firms for private equity deals by Mergermarket's "Global & Regional League Tables 2021  Legal Advisors," the firm was ranked #5 for U.S. Buyouts and #10 for Global Buyouts by deal value.

About Dechert

Dechert is a leading global law firm with 22 offices around the world. The firm advises on matters and transactions of the greatest complexity, bringing energy, creativity, and efficient management of legal issues to deliver commercial and practical advice for clients.

SOURCE Dechert LLP
Market Trend

The introduction of LED candles is one of the trends in the market. These candles are an electronic alternative to traditional candles. Moreover, some candles offer additional features such as remote control. The launch of such products is expected to further support the market growth in the coming years.

Vendor Insights

The decorative candles retail market is fragmented, and the vendors are deploying growth strategies such as investment in building brand and brand equity to differentiate themselves from their competitors and to compete in the market. The report analyzes the market's competitive landscape and offers information on several market vendors, including:

Aldi Stores Ltd.

Amazon.com Inc.

Bed Bath and Beyond Inc.

Costco Wholesale Corp.

Dollar General Corp.

GALA GROUP GMBH

Harlem Candle Co.

Inter IKEA Holding BV

JD and Kate Industries

Kohls Corp.

Kroger Co.

Ocado Retail Ltd.

Target Corp.

Temple and Webster Group

Tesco Plc

The Home Depot Inc.

Voluspa

Walmart Inc.

Wayfair Inc.

Williams-Sonoma Inc.

Find additional highlights on the growth strategies adopted by vendors and their product

offerings, Read Free Sample Report .

Geographical Market Analysis

North America will provide maximum growth opportunities in decorative candles retail market during the forecast period. According to our research, the region will contribute 37% of the global market growth during the forecast period. The US and Canada are the two major markets in North America.

Know more about this market's geographical distribution along with a detailed analysis

of the top regions. View Our Report Snapshot

Key Segment Analysis

The decorative candles retail market share growth by the offline segment will be significant during the forecast period. The growth has been attributed to the introduction of new businesses, wider assortments, pricing, and retail strategies by retailers to attract customers and remain competitive in the market.

View FREE Sample: to know additional highlights and key points on various market

segments and their impact in coming years.

Key Market Drivers & Challenges:

The diversified product portfolio of key vendors drives the global decorative candles retail market growth. For instance, Amazon provides a wide range of candles made from different materials such as glass, metal, plastic, wood, fabric, and many more. In addition, popular brands such as Louis Vuitton from LVMH have entered the market and offer ceramic candles with leather handles.

The emission of toxic fumes is challenging the global decorative candles retail market growth. Exposure to harmful fuels and gases results in serious health hazards. Paraffin wax, which is a major source of raw material to make candles, is harmful to health when burnt. In addition, candles equipped with a lead-core wick release heavy metals such as lead and can lead to serious health issues such as hormone disruption, behavioral problems, and learning disabilities.

Download free sample for highlights on market Drivers and Challenges impacting the

decorative candles retail 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!

Related Reports:

Scented Candles Market by Distribution Channel and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025

Candle Market by Product and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025

Decorative Candles Retail Market Scope Report Coverage Details Page number 120 Base year 2021 Forecast period 2022-2026 Growth momentum & CAGR Decelerate at a CAGR of 6.5% Market growth 2022-2026 USD 1.94 billion Market structure Fragmented YoY growth (%) 7.4 Regional analysis North America, Europe, APAC, South America, and Middle East and Africa Performing market contribution North America at 37% Key consumer countries US, Canada, China, Germany, and UK Competitive landscape Leading companies, Competitive strategies, Consumer engagement scope Key companies profiled Aldi Stores Ltd., Amazon.com Inc., Bed Bath and Beyond Inc., Costco Wholesale Corp., Dollar General Corp., GALA GROUP GMBH, Harlem Candle Co., Inter IKEA Holding BV, JD and Kate Industries, Kohls Corp., Kroger Co., Ocado Retail Ltd., Target Corp., Temple and Webster Group, Tesco Plc, The Home Depot Inc., Voluspa, Walmart Inc., Wayfair Inc., and Williams-Sonoma Inc. Market dynamics Parent market analysis, Market growth inducers and obstacles, Fast-growing and slow-growing segment analysis, COVID 19 impact and recovery analysis and future consumer dynamics, Market condition analysis for 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.

Table of Contents

1 Executive Summary

1.1 Market overview

Exhibit 01: Executive Summary  Chart on Market Overview



Exhibit 02: Executive Summary  Data Table on Market Overview



Exhibit 03: Executive Summary  Chart on Global Market Characteristics



Exhibit 04: Executive Summary  Chart on Market by Geography



Exhibit 05: Executive Summary  Chart on Market Segmentation by Distribution Channel



Exhibit 06: Executive Summary  Chart on Incremental Growth



Exhibit 07: Executive Summary  Data Table on Incremental Growth



Exhibit 08: Executive Summary  Chart on Vendor Market Positioning

2 Market Landscape

2.1 Market ecosystem

Exhibit 09: Parent market



Exhibit 10: Market Characteristics

3 Market Sizing

3.1 Market definition

Exhibit 11: Offerings of vendors included in the market definition

3.2 Market segment analysis

Exhibit 12: Market segments

3.3 Market size 2021

3.4 Market outlook: Forecast for 2021-2026

Exhibit 13: Chart on Global - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 14: Data Table on Global - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 15: Chart on Global Market: Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 16: Data Table on Global Market: Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

4 Five Forces Analysis

4.1 Five forces summary

Exhibit 17: Five forces analysis - Comparison between 2021 and 2026

4.2 Bargaining power of buyers

Exhibit 18: Bargaining power of buyers  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.3 Bargaining power of suppliers

Exhibit 19: Bargaining power of suppliers  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.4 Threat of new entrants

Exhibit 20: Threat of new entrants  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.5 Threat of substitutes

Exhibit 21: Threat of substitutes  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.6 Threat of rivalry

Exhibit 22: Threat of rivalry  Impact of key factors in 2021 and 2026

4.7 Market condition

Exhibit 23: Chart on Market condition - Five forces 2021 and 2026

5 Market Segmentation by Distribution Channel

5.1 Market segments

Exhibit 24: Chart on Distribution Channel - Market share 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 25: Data Table on Distribution Channel - Market share 2021-2026 (%)

5.2 Comparison by Distribution Channel

Exhibit 26: Chart on Comparison by Distribution Channel



Exhibit 27: Data Table on Comparison by Distribution Channel

5.3 Offline - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 28: Chart on Offline - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 29: Data Table on Offline - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 30: Chart on Offline - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 31: Data Table on Offline - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

5.4 Online - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 32: Chart on Online - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 33: Data Table on Online - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 34: Chart on Online - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 35: Data Table on Online - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

5.5 Market opportunity by Distribution Channel

Exhibit 36: Market opportunity by Distribution Channel ($ million)

6 Customer Landscape

6.1 Customer landscape overview

Exhibit 37: Analysis of price sensitivity, lifecycle, customer purchase basket, adoption rates, and purchase criteria

7 Geographic Landscape

7.1 Geographic segmentation

Exhibit 38: Chart on Market share by geography 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 39: Data Table on Market share by geography 2021-2026 (%)

7.2 Geographic comparison

Exhibit 40: Chart on Geographic comparison



Exhibit 41: Data Table on Geographic comparison

7.3 North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 42: Chart on North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 43: Data Table on North America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 44: Chart on North America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 45: Data Table on North America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.4 Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 46: Chart on Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 47: Data Table on Europe - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 48: Chart on Europe - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 49: Data Table on Europe - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.5 APAC - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 50: Chart on APAC - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 51: Data Table on APAC - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 52: Chart on APAC - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 53: Data Table on APAC - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.6 South America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 54: Chart on South America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 55: Data Table on South America - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 56: Chart on South America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 57: Data Table on South America - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.7 Middle East and Africa - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

and - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 58: Chart on Middle East and Africa - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

and - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 59: Data Table on Middle East and Africa - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

and - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 60: Chart on Middle East and Africa - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

and - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 61: Data Table on Middle East and Africa - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.8 US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 62: Chart on US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 63: Data Table on US - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 64: Chart on US - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 65: Data Table on US - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.9 China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 66: Chart on China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 67: Data Table on China - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 68: Chart on China - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 69: Data Table on China - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.10 Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 70: Chart on Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 71: Data Table on Germany - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 72: Chart on Germany - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 73: Data Table on Germany - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.11 UK - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

Exhibit 74: Chart on UK - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 75: Data Table on UK - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)



Exhibit 76: Chart on UK - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)



Exhibit 77: Data Table on UK - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.12 Canada - Market size and forecast 2021-2026

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 Exhibit 78: Chart on Canada - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 79: Data Table on Canada - Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

- Market size and forecast 2021-2026 ($ million)

Exhibit 80: Chart on Canada - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

- Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

Exhibit 81: Data Table on Canada - Year-over-year growth 2021-2026 (%)

7.13 Market opportunity by geography

Exhibit 82: Market opportunity by geography ($ million)

8 Drivers, Challenges, and Trends

8.1 Market drivers

8.2 Market challenges

8.3 Impact of drivers and challenges

Exhibit 83: Impact of drivers and challenges in 2021 and 2026

8.4 Market trends

9 Vendor Landscape

9.1 Overview

9.2 Vendor landscape

Exhibit 84: Overview on Criticality of inputs and Factors of differentiation

9.3 Landscape disruption

Exhibit 85: Overview on factors of disruption

9.4 Industry risks

Exhibit 86: Impact of key risks on business

10 Vendor Analysis

10.1 Vendors covered

Exhibit 87: Vendors covered

10.2 Market positioning of vendors

Exhibit 88: Matrix on vendor position and classification

10.3 Amazon.com Inc.

Exhibit 89: Amazon.com Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 90: Amazon.com Inc. - Business segments



Exhibit 91: Amazon.com Inc. - Key news



Exhibit 92: Amazon.com Inc. - Key offerings



Exhibit 93: Amazon.com Inc. - Segment focus

10.4 Inter IKEA Holding BV

Exhibit 94: Inter IKEA Holding BV - Overview



Exhibit 95: Inter IKEA Holding BV - Product / Service



Exhibit 96: Inter IKEA Holding BV - Key offerings

10.5 Kohls Corp.

Exhibit 97: Kohls Corp. - Overview



Exhibit 98: Kohls Corp. - Business segments



Exhibit 99: Kohls Corp. - Key offerings



Exhibit 100: Kohls Corp. - Segment focus

10.6 Kroger Co.

Exhibit 101: Kroger Co. - Overview



Exhibit 102: Kroger Co. - Product / Service



Exhibit 103: Kroger Co. - Key news



Exhibit 104: Kroger Co. - Key offerings

10.7 Target Corp.

Exhibit 105: Target Corp. - Overview



Exhibit 106: Target Corp. - Product / Service



Exhibit 107: Target Corp. - Key news



Exhibit 108: Target Corp. - Key offerings

10.8 Temple and Webster Group

Exhibit 109: Temple and Webster Group - Overview



Exhibit 110: Temple and Webster Group - Product / Service



Exhibit 111: Temple and Webster Group - Key offerings

10.9 The Home Depot Inc.

Exhibit 112: The Home Depot Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 113: The Home Depot Inc. - Product / Service



Exhibit 114: The Home Depot Inc. - Key offerings

10.10 Walmart Inc.

Exhibit 115: Walmart Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 116: Walmart Inc. - Business segments



Exhibit 117: Walmart Inc. - Key news



Exhibit 118: Walmart Inc. - Key offerings



Exhibit 119: Walmart Inc. - Segment focus

10.11 Wayfair Inc.

Exhibit 120: Wayfair Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 121: Wayfair Inc. - Business segments



Exhibit 122: Wayfair Inc. - Key news



Exhibit 123: Wayfair Inc. - Key offerings



Exhibit 124: Wayfair Inc. - Segment focus

10.12 Williams-Sonoma Inc.

Exhibit 125: Williams-Sonoma Inc. - Overview



Exhibit 126: Williams-Sonoma Inc. - Business segments



Exhibit 127: Williams-Sonoma Inc. - Key offerings



Exhibit 128: Williams-Sonoma Inc. - Segment focus

11 Appendix

11.1 Scope of the report

11.2 Inclusions and exclusions checklist

Exhibit 129: Inclusions checklist



Exhibit 130: Exclusions checklist

11.3 Currency conversion rates for US$

Exhibit 131: Currency conversion rates for US$

11.4 Research methodology

Exhibit 132: Research methodology



Exhibit 133: Validation techniques employed for market sizing



Exhibit 134: Information sources

11.5 List of abbreviations

Exhibit 135: List of abbreviations

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: [email protected]

Website: www.technavio.com/

SOURCE Technavio
Clinical Dermatology CRO Sales to Top US$ 3.5 Bn by 2032

Fact.MR's market study on the global dermatology CRO market delves deep into analyzing prevailing trends affecting sales of dermatology CRO for drug discovery, clinical, and preclinical applications. The report also covers opportunities, challenges, and other factors creating prolific growth opportunities across various segments within the market including type, service and regions.

NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The overall sales in the dermatology CRO market are expected to reach US$ 4.3 Bn by 2032, growing at a CAGR of 9.1% from 2022 to 2032.

Use of topical dermatological medications such as cleansers, anti-inflammatory, local anesthetics, anti-infective, and emollients to treat acne is increasing. According to the American Academy of Dermatology Association, there are nearly 50 million people suffering from acne each year in the U.S. This is anticipated to create high prospects for sales within the dermatology CRO market.

Pharmaceutical companies are improving their research services due to the growing prevalence of skin ailments such as cancer, eczema, psoriasis, and other diseases. Hence, the demand for dermatology CRO is expected to augment in the coming years.

For more insights into the Market, Request a Sample of this Report

https://www.factmr.com/connectus/sample?flag=S&rep_id=7178

The rising integration of artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and advanced trial programs is observed as research and development initiatives gain momentum in the dermatology CRO.

Likewise, the surging focus on virtual clinical trials, adoption of various advanced software or technological solutions, and measures undertaken by governments to streamline supply-chain within healthcare will drive the dermatology CRO market.

Rising demand for biologics, regenerative medicines, and orphan drugs to treat the skin allergies and diseases will further augment the sales in the market.

Improvements in the regulatory environment are projected to help increase the adoption of dermatology CRO services in the near future. For instance, the Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) published new guidelines in February 2018 that are focused on reducing the time taken for approval from almost 30 to 60 days. Such developments will steer growth in the forthcoming years.

Report Attributes Details Base Year Value (2021A) US$ 4 Bn Projected Year Value (2032F) US$ 4.3 Bn Estimated Year-on-Year Growth (2022E) 8.6% Global Growth Rate (2022-2032) CAGR 9.1%

Key Takeaways:

Based on type, the clinical segment is expected to exhibit growth at a CAGR of 10% between 2022 and 2032.

North America is expected to exhibit10.4% CAGR due to increasing awareness about skin problems in the region.

is expected to exhibit10.4% CAGR due to increasing awareness about skin problems in the region. In terms of service, the clinical monitoring segment is estimated to lead the market owing to growing focus on dermatological treatments and medications.

Dermatology CRO market size is anticipated to grow 2.4X from 2022 to 2032, accounting nearly US$ 4.3 Bn in 2032.

Growth Drivers:

Growing incidence of skin cancer and other skin ailments are driving the need for dermatological medications. This is likely to bolster the growth in the market.

Surging demand for vaccines and the exclusion of unfavorable regulations are projected to boost the growth in the market.

Restraints:

The inability of small and medium enterprises or new players to invest in and conduct outsourced research services is likely to restrain the growth in the market.

Request Methodology & Get a Glimpse of Our Expertise

https://www.factmr.com/connectus/sample?flag=RC&rep_id=7178

Competitive Landscape:

Leading manufacturers operating in the global dermatology CRO market are concentrating on advancing their production capabilities to expand their consumer base in the coming years. Furthermore, they are updating their product line by making technological advancements.

Apart from this, organizations are adopting new business strategies such collaborations, joint ventures, acquisitions, and others to extend their global presence.

For instance,

February 2021 : Icon plc. Entered into a definitive agreement with PRA Health Sciences for the purchase of the latter for nearly US$ 12 Bn. This merger will aid customers due to various advantages and developments offered in geographic, functional, and therapeutic scale.

: Icon plc. Entered into a definitive agreement with PRA Health Sciences for the purchase of the latter for nearly US$ 12 Bn. This merger will aid customers due to various advantages and developments offered in geographic, functional, and therapeutic scale. October 2019 : For safeguarding the welfare of clinical research sites, Parexel developed closer links with the Society for Clinical Research Sites (SCRS). This stronger relationship is aiding the company execute significant initiatives as a Site Engagement Partner to improve the experience of patient in clinical trials.

Key Companies Profiled by Fact.MR

IQVIA HOLDINGS INC.

Pharmaceutical Product Development, LLC (PPD)

Syneos Health

Parexel International Corporation

Covance Inc.

CTI Clinical Trial & Consulting

Charles River Laboratories International, Inc.

Icon, Plc

PRA Health Sciences

Medidata Solutions, Inc.

Pharmaron

TFS

MEDPACE HOLDINGS, INC.

Wuxi AppTec

Bioskin

Proinnovera

GVK Biosciences Private Limited

Biorasi

Javara

More Valuable Insights on Dermatology CRO Market

In the latest report, Fact.MR provides a comprehensive market study on the global dermatology CRO market by covering unbiased analysis for the forecast period of 2022 to 2032. This survey also highlights the factors influencing the growth in the dermatology CRO market with detailed segmentation as follows:

By Type:

Drug Discovery

Target Validation



Lead Identification



Lead Optimization

Clinical

Phase I



Phase II



Phase III



Phase IV

Preclinical

By Service:

Project Management/Clinical Supply Management

Data Management

Regulatory/Medical Affairs

Medical Writing

Clinical Monitoring

Quality Management/Assurance

Bio-statistics

Investigator Payments

Laboratory

Patient and Site Recruitment

Technology

Other Services

By Region:

North America

Latin America

Europe

APAC

MEA

Key Questions Covered in the Dermatology CRO Market Report

Who are the prominent dermatology CRO manufacturers?

Which region is estimated to account for a maximum share in the global dermatology CRO market during 2022-2032?

What is the anticipated market value of dermatology CRO market in 2022?

Which are the challenges encountered in the global dermatology CRO market?

What is the estimated market size of global dermatology CRO market during the forecast period (2022-2032)?

What is the expected growth rate of the global dermatology CRO market until 2032?

Explore Fact.MR's Coverage on the Healthcare Domain

Dermatology Diagnostic Devices Market: Rising demand for anti-aging products in geriatrics-dominated emerging economies, such as the U.S and the U.K, is projected spur the demand for dermatology diagnostic devices. Furthermore, the growing prevalence of various skin allergies and diseases, such as acne and eczema, is likely to create lucrative opportunities for the market.

Dermatology Devices Market: Demand for dermatology devices is estimated to spur due to the prevalence of skin disorders and skin cancers. In addition to this, the rising use of dermatology devices to reduce stretch marks and for hair removal is projected to create prolific growth opportunities for the market.

Skincare Devices Market: The use of skincare devices is surging in the hospital sector, thereby propelling the growth in the market. Besides this, the increasing prevalence of skin diseases such as skin cancer, eczema, and others are likely to spur the sales of skincare devices.

About Fact.MR

Fact.MR is a market research and consulting agency with deep expertise in emerging market intelligence. Spanning a wide range  from automotive & industry 4.0 to healthcare, chemical, and materials, to even the most niche categories. 80% of Fortune 1000's trusts us in critical decision making.

Contact:

Mahendra Singh

US Sales Office

11140 Rockville Pike

Suite 400

Rockville, MD 20852

United States

Tel: +1 (628) 251-1583

E: [email protected]

SOURCE Fact.MR
New essential resources ensure that patients will benefit without delay following regulatory acceptance of digital endpoints

BOSTON , April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, the Digital Medicine Society (DiMe) , in partnership with Anthem, Biogen, Eli Lilly, Evidation, Janssen, Merck, Pfizer, and Savvy Co-op, announced the public launch of the 3Ps of Digital Endpoint Value (3Ps), a toolkit of resources created to facilitate the inclusion of digital endpoints as evidence for payers in reimbursement decisions for new drugs. A public meeting for industry leaders will detail the recommendations and resources on April 7, 2022.

DiMe maintains an open access library of digital endpoints being used in industry sponsored trials of new medical products. Since the library's launch in October 2019, the number of unique digital endpoints being used to answer questions about new therapies has grown by 790%. Today, 91 different sponsor organizations are relying on these measures to answer questions about new medical products.

As digital endpoints are used more frequently in the evaluation of new medical products, the field has focused extensively on regulatory acceptance in support of drug approval. In March 2022, the FDA issued a draft guidance providing its recommendations on the use of digital health data acquisition in clinical investigations, furthering the widespread speculation that regulatory acceptance is not far ahead.

"By launching these new recommendations and resources, we are the first to recognize and address the need to ensure that evidence from digital endpoints is developed in a way that is acceptable to payers as well as regulators," says Jennifer Goldsack, CEO of DiMe. "We applaud the forward-looking vision of our partners in this project and are proud to make these resources available in advance of any delays in making effective new treatments available to the patients who need them."

The open-access 3Ps toolkit recognizes that pharma and payers must work together to define the evidence needed to support the value of new, digitally generated data to patients' lives. The 3Ps resources were developed following a series of workshops convening global regulators, health technology assessment (HTA) bodies, public and private payers, industry sponsors, health economists, and clinical and patient experts.

"Following a series of discussions with payers from the U.S. and Europe, it is clear that pharmaceutical organizations using digital endpoints in drug development must pursue integrated evidence plans that generate data to inform regulatory, reimbursement, and pricing decisions," says Katrine Christensen, global value and access strategy lead at Biogen Digital Health. "The 3Ps toolkit will advance the dialogue between manufacturers, patients, payers, and regulators on what patient-centric evidence should look like. Hopefully this will help further broaden acceptance of the new improved endpoints."

"Great progress has been made on patient-centric digital evidence for registration of new medicines," says Mariah Leach, patient expert and member of Savvy Co-op. "The 3Ps toolkit of resources defines the path for multiple stakeholders to cooperate and continue that momentum to ensure that new drugs that address the most important symptoms to patients make it quickly to market following regulatory approval."

"We know that digital endpoints can provide a more complete picture of a patient's lived experience, helping researchers and clinicians better measure and manage changes in symptoms, improve early detection of disease, and lower the burden of assessment through permissioned, passive data collection," says Bray Patrick-Lake, senior director of strategic partnerships at Evidation. "The 3Ps are a crucial step in developing evidence for payers to incorporate digital endpoints in reimbursement and pricing decisions for new drugs."

To learn more, click here or attend the public meeting on April 7, 2022 which will detail the resources and accompanying materials.

About the Digital Medicine Society: The Digital Medicine Society (DiMe) is the professional society serving the digital medicine community, driving scientific progress and broad acceptance of digital medicine to enhance public health. At DiMe, our commitment to fully integrating experts from all of the disciplines comprising digital medicine is unwavering. From regulators to white-hat hackers, ethicists to engineers, and clinicians to citizen scientists, we are proud to welcome all experts committed to ensuring that digital medicine realizes its full potential to improve human health. Join us !

Media Contact: Jamie Gray, [email protected] , 310.699.3163

SOURCE Digital Medicine Society (DiMe)
"Our ongoing expansion in the Hampton Roads market continues to strengthen our presence in the region, allowing us to better service our customers, create additional jobs, and provide additional resources and support to the local communities," said Jim McQuade, President and CEO of Dollar Bank.

The new office reflects Dollar Bank's "branch of the future" concept, allowing transactions to be accomplished with a banker or using Personal Teller Machines (PTMs). PTMs feature real Dollar Bank tellers that communicate via video with customers at the machine either in-branch or at the drive-thru. The PTMs also function as ATMs to dispense cash or accept a simple deposit 24/7.

All offices have lobby office hours Monday through Thursday, 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM, Friday, 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM and Saturday, 9:00 AM to 1:00 PM. Drive-thrus utilizing PTMs offer extended hours with a live teller Monday through Saturday, 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM.

About Dollar Bank

Dollar Bank has assets of more than $11.5 billion. Today, Dollar Bank operates more than 90 locations throughout Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Virginia and has over 1,400 employees. For more than 166 years, Dollar Bank has grown to become the largest mutual bank in the United States, committed to providing the highest quality of banking services to individuals and businesses. Dedicated to aiding the communities it serves, Dollar Bank supports quality of life initiatives, financial literacy programs, and organizations devoted to helping individuals and families in need. Dollar Bank (www.dollar.bank) is headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

SOURCE Dollar Bank
The new location provides dog waste removal services to residents and communities of all sizes

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- DoodyCalls, a nationwide leader in pet waste removal services, is growing its footprint in the pooper scooper industry with the opening of an office in Overland Park, Kansas. DoodyCalls currently cleans up in over 57 territories across 23 states and has been named the number-one pet waste removal franchise in the United States by Entrepreneur Magazine's annual Franchise 500 list.

Amidst an eclectic career that includes time spent as Chief-of-Staff to the Global Brand President at Ralph Lauren and as a lead project manager in the recruitment of private equity energy C-suite executives and board members, Aaron Griffith was looking for a new opportunity. After spending over a decade on the East Coast, Griffith returned to his roots in the Kansas City metro area to care for his aging grandparents and to be closer to family. A big believer in the bond between pets and their humans with a knack for business, Griffith decided to scoop the poop with DoodyCalls.

"I am honored to begin this new venture with DoodyCalls and leverage my passion for dogs into business success in my hometown that is so dear to me," said Aaron Griffith, owner and operator of DoodyCalls of Overland Park. "I am so excited for this unique opportunity to serve our community and pursue my business passions."

Inspired by his late grandfather's battle with Parkinson's disease and dementia and fueled by his lifelong love of dogs, Griffith was drawn to the DoodyCalls business model and how it provided him an opportunity to serve his community as a whole. A strong believer in supporting his neighbors, Griffith also plans to give back to the community with charitable initiatives and hopes to expand his business in the near future.

"We are excited to further expand our footprint into the Sunflower State and our Overland Park leader Aaron has the right amount of drive and determination to create success in the market," said Jacob D'Aniello, COO and founder of DoodyCalls. "We know his passion for business and love of dogs will help him flourish in the community."

The Johnson County DoodyCalls franchise will service the following areas: Leawood, Lenexa, Olathe, Overland Park, and Stillwell.

The scoop on what DoodyCalls offers:

For residential dog owners, DoodyCalls provides dog waste pickup, brown spot treatment and deodorizing services.

DoodyCalls provides dog waste pickup, brown spot treatment and deodorizing services. For communities and parks, DoodyCalls designs, sells, installs, services and maintains common areas, pet waste stations, equipment and supplies.

To learn more about the Overland Park franchise location, please visit https://www.doodycalls.com/overlandpark. DoodyCalls is currently seeking poop scoop franchise operators who align with the brand's values of humility, ethical leadership, integrity, respect, and providing the best service experience possible. To learn more about franchise opportunities or to find a local service technician, visit https://www.doodycalls.com/locations/.

About Doody Calls

DoodyCalls was founded in 2000 by Jacob and Susan D'Aniello in the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington DC. In 2004, the company began franchising its pet waste removal business nationwide and established corporate headquarters in Charlottesville, VA. DoodyCalls provides service to 23 states and the District of Columbia with dog waste pickup with consumer and industrial services. For more information about Doody Calls, visit www.doodycalls.com.

MEDIA CONTACT:



Sarah O'Connor-Guffey

Fish Consulting

815-630-9557 | [email protected]

SOURCE DoodyCalls
Fry has been an ACC member for almost 30 years, during which time he's been involved in leadership roles on both the national level and at the Indiana state level. He most recently served as vice-president of the ACC and previously served as president and governor of ACC's Indiana Chapter, on the ACC Board of Trustees and MedAxiom's Board of Managers. He has held positions on several ACC committees, councils, and task forces, including the Nominating Committee, Interventional Section Leadership Council, and Board of Trustees Task Force on Clinician Well-Being.

Fry is an interventional and general cardiologist at Ascension Indiana St. Vincent Heart Center in Indianapolis and chair of the Ascension National Cardiovascular Service Line. He helped launch Navion Healthcare Solutions, a data quality management software company owned by Ascension, where he previously served as board chair.

Originally from Ireland, Fry moved to Downers Grove, Illinois, when he was almost 7 years old. After completing his undergraduate degree at Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa, Fry moved to St. Louis to attend medical school at Washington University School of Medicine.

He completed his residency in internal medicine and fellowship in general cardiology at Washington University/Barnes-Jewish Hospital as well as completing a two-year cardiovascular research fellowship focused on pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics of native and genetically modified plasminogen activators. After fellowship, he remained at Washington University as assistant professor and medical director of the cardiac transplant program before moving to Indianapolis in 1991 to complete an interventional cardiology fellowship at Ascension St. Vincent Hospital  Indianapolis.

Other new ACC officers for 2022-2023 are Vice President B. Hadley Wilson, MD, FACC; Board of Trustees members Pamela Bowe Morris, MD, FACC, and Ed W. Childs, MD, FACS; Membership Committee Chair Joseph Edward Marine, MD, MBA, FACC; Board of Governors Chair Malissa Wood, MD, FACC, and Board of Governors Chair-Elect Nicole Lohr, MD, PhD, FACC.

The American College of Cardiology envisions a world where innovation and knowledge optimize cardiovascular care and outcomes. As the professional home for the entire cardiovascular care team, the mission of the College and its 54,000 members is to transform cardiovascular care and to improve heart health. The ACC bestows credentials upon cardiovascular professionals who meet stringent qualifications and leads in the formation of health policy, performance standards and practice guidelines. The College also provides professional medical education, disseminates cardiovascular research through its world-renowned JACC Journals, operates national clinical data registries to measure and improve care, and offers cardiovascular accreditation to hospitals and institutions. For more, visit acc.org.

SOURCE American College of Cardiology
NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- National bridge lender Emerald Creek Capital (ECC) reports funding over $133 million in commercial mortgages during the first quarter of 2022, on pace to lend over half a billion for the year.

Notable among the Q1 closings is a $43.3 million acquisition loan provided on the south shore of Staten Island, NY. The loan is secured by a five-building, 51-unit commercial complex with 161,210 square feet of net rentable area. Verizon Wireless, Dunkin Donuts, and Panera Bread are among the long-term tenants in place. The property also features a Tesla charging station. The loan was funded in just three weeks.

Additionally, in Q1, Emerald Creek provided a $14.1 million acquisition loan to a long- standing repeat borrower in the city of Rochester, NY. The property consists of a 111,741- square-foot warehouse and distribution facility net leased to FedEx. The building is located within the Rochester Technology Park, home to global tenants including Pepsi, McKesson, Kodak, and L3 Harris Technologies.

Emerald Creek Capital recently surpassed $2.3 billion in capital deployed since inception and has closed 450 bridge loans in 25 states nationwide. Speed, flexibility, and certainty of execution continue to be the driving forces behind the company's significant growth.

"We've seen a large increase in demand from sponsors for a financing partner that can move quickly on more complex transactions," says Managing Partner Mark Bahiri. "Emerald Creek's level of execution is unmatched in the industry, and this is reflected in our firm's recent performance and positive trajectory in the first quarter of 2022."

About Emerald Creek Capital:

With offices in Manhattan, Boston, Pennsylvania and South Florida, Emerald Creek Capital has built a reputation as an industry leader in the alternative finance space. The firm provides bridge loans secured by commercial real estate in primary markets through both its domestic and offshore investment vehicles. To date, the firm has provided $2.3 billion in first mortgage loans across 450 loan transactions.

For more information, visit www.emeraldcreekcapital.com.

SOURCE Emerald Creek Capital
The Arab Parliament as well as GCC leaders have welcomed the statement issued by the United Nations Special Envoy to Yemen, Hans Grundberg, which includes the announcement of a two-month humanitarian truce starting from today (April 3), stressing that it is a real opportunity to resume the political process and alleviate the suffering of the Yemeni people, reported SPA.

In a statement on Friday, Parliament considered the positive atmosphere of the Yemeni-Yemeni consultations hosted in the capital, Riyadh, and under the auspices of the GCC, as a great opportunity for Yemenis to restore the state, praising at the same time the efforts of Saudi Arabia to restore stability in Yemen and end the suffering of the Yemeni people.

The Arab Parliament called on the Houthi militias to comply with and respect the armistice, and to deal with the ongoing discussions regarding proposals for the next steps.

The truce announcement was made by the UN special envoy Hans Grundberg on Friday, on the second day of peace talks in Riyadh.

"The parties accepted to halt all offensive military air, ground and maritime operations inside Yemen and across its borders," his statement said.

Fuel ships will be allowed passage into the rebel-held port of al-Hudaydah on the Red Sea, and commercial flights will be able to operate from the airport in the rebel-held capital Sanaa. Roads into the besieged south-western city of Taiz would also be opened, added the UN envoy.

In Riyadh, the GCC Secretary-General for Arab States Dr Naif Falah Mubarak Al Hajraf welcomed the Yemeni truce that puts an halt to all forms of military operations inside Yemen and on the Saudi borders - in accordance with the detailed and announced arrangements by the Special Envoy and under the auspices of the United Nations to provide the appropriate environment and ground to reduce the escalation, reach a political settlement of the conflict between the Yemeni parties, and achieve comprehensive peace.

The GCC Secretary-General affirmed that the issuance of this declaration comes as an affirmation of the importance the international community attaches to the Yemeni crisis, praising the efforts of the Special UN Envoy in declaring the truce, which comes in the context of the KSA's initiative to end the Yemeni crisis to reach a comprehensive political solution, announced in March 2021, too.
"I was drawn to Callan for its singular focus on investment consulting, its reputation for building long-term partnerships with clients, and the caliber and accessibility of its people," said Hylton. "The firm has also created an inclusive, welcoming environment for clients and colleagues, which is genuinely refreshing. I am thrilled to be a part of the team."

Most recently, Ms. Hylton was an associate partner at AON Investments USA where she consulted to DB and DC plans with more than $45 billion in assets under advisement collectively. She also gained investment consulting experience with Towers Watson Investment Services (now WTW) and Hewitt Investment Group (now part of AON). Additionally, she worked at investment management firms BNP Paribas Investment Partners, Cratos Capital Partners, and Wachovia Securities. Ms. Hylton earned her MBA in finance from the University of North Carolina Kenan-Flagler Business School and a BS in finance from Wake Forest University. She is a holder of the right to use the Chartered Financial Analyst designation.



"I am excited to have Emily join our team," said Hood. "Her deep knowledge and breadth of investment experience will strengthen our team and add value for our clients. Her focus on putting clients first directly aligns with our core values, and her investment knowledge and approach aligns with our long-term investment philosophy."

About Callan

Callan was founded as an employee-owned investment consulting firm in 1973. Ever since, we have empowered institutional clients with creative, customized investment solutions backed by proprietary research, exclusive data, and ongoing education. Today, Callan advises on more than $3 trillion in total fund sponsor assets, which makes it among the largest independently owned investment consulting firms in the U.S. Callan uses a client-focused consulting model to serve pension and defined contribution plan sponsors, endowments, foundations, independent investment advisers, investment managers, and other asset owners. Callan has six offices throughout the U.S. Learn more at callan.com.

Media Contact:

Elizabeth Anathan

[email protected]

415-274-3020

SOURCE Callan LLC
BIRMINGHAM, Ala., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Encompass Health Corp. (NYSE: EHC) will hold its annual meeting of stockholders at 11:00 a.m. CDT, on Thursday, May 5, 2022. The meeting will be held at the Company's Home Office located at 9001 Liberty Parkway in Birmingham, Alabama.

Stockholders planning to attend the meeting will be asked to present valid picture identification, such as a driver's license or passport, and proof of stock ownership. Reporters planning to attend are requested to pre-register with Erin Wendel-Ritter by calling 205 970-5912 or emailing [email protected]shealth.com no later than Friday, April 29, 2022.

For Encompass Health stockholders not able to attend the meeting and other interested parties, a live audio webcast can be accessed at https://investor.encompasshealth.com. Those interested may replay the audio webcast through an archived link on the same website following the meeting.

About Encompass Health

As a national leader in integrated healthcare services, Encompass Health (NYSE: EHC) offers both facilitybased and homebased patient care through its network of inpatient rehabilitation hospitals, home health agencies and hospice agencies. With a national footprint that includes 147 hospitals, 251 home health locations, and 96 hospice locations in 42 states and Puerto Rico, the Company provides highquality, cost-effective integrated healthcare. Encompass Health is ranked as one of Fortune's 100 Best Companies to Work For. For more information, visit encompasshealth.com, or follow us on our newsroom, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

Media Contact

Erin Wendel-Ritter | 205 970-5912

[email protected]

Investor Relations Contact

Mark Miller | 205 970-5860

[email protected]

SOURCE Encompass Health Corp.
THE WOODLANDS, Texas, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Excelerate Energy, Inc. ("Excelerate" or the "Company") today announced that it has launched the roadshow for its initial public offering ("IPO") of 16,000,000 shares of its Class A common stock. The initial public offering price is expected to be between $21.00 and $24.00 per share. The Company also intends to grant the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 2,400,000 shares of Class A common stock at the initial public offering price, less underwriting discounts and commissions. Excelerate intends to list its common stock on the New York Stock Exchange ("NYSE"), under the ticker symbol "EE."

Barclays, J.P. Morgan, and Morgan Stanley are serving as joint lead book-running managers for the offering. Wells Fargo Securities is also acting as a book-running manager. Raymond James, Stephens Inc., Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co., SMBC Nikko, and BOK Financial Securities, Inc. are acting as co-managers for the proposed offering.

The proposed offering will be made available only by means of a prospectus. Copies of the preliminary prospectus may be obtained from the following sources:

Barclays Capital Inc., c/o Broadridge Financial Solutions, 1155 Long Island Avenue, Edgewood, NY 11717, by telephone at (888) 603-5847, or by email at [email protected] ;





11717, by telephone at (888) 603-5847, or by email at ; J.P. Morgan Securities LLC, Attention: Broadridge Financial Solutions, 1155 Long Island Avenue, Edgewood, NY 11717, by telephone at (866) 803-9204, or by email at [email protected] ; or





11717, by telephone at (866) 803-9204, or by email at ; or Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC, Attention: Prospectus Department, 180 Varick Street, 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10014, by telephone: (866) 718-1649.

A registration statement relating to these securities has been filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission but has not yet become effective. These securities may not be sold, nor may offers to buy be accepted, prior to the time the registration statement becomes effective. This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy these securities, nor will there be any sale of these securities in any state or jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation, or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such state or jurisdiction.

About Excelerate Energy

Excelerate Energy, Inc. is a US-based LNG company located in The Woodlands, Texas. Founded in 2003 by George B. Kaiser, Excelerate is changing the way the world accesses cleaner forms of energy by providing integrated services along the LNG value chain with an objective of delivering rapid-to-market and reliable LNG solutions to customers. Excelerate offers a full range of flexible regasification services from FSRU to infrastructure development to LNG supply. Excelerate has offices in Abu Dhabi, Antwerp, Boston, Buenos Aires, Chattogram, Dhaka, Doha, Dubai, Manila, Rio de Janeiro, Singapore, and Washington, DC.

SOURCE Excelerate Energy, Inc.
NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Global law firm Ropes & Gray today announced that Faiza Rahman has joined the firm's 500-lawyer New York office as a partner in the capital markets practice. Faiza's arrival expands the firm's bench of partners executing the largest and most complex securities work in the market for corporate issuers, leading private equity firms and major investment banks around the world.

Law360 named Ropes & Gray a "Capital Markets Practice of the Year" in January. In 2021, Ropes & Gray steered clients in nearly 150 public offerings worth an aggregate total of more than $55 billion, and closed on nearly 78 IPOs totaling $30 billion.

"Ropes & Gray's capital markets practice is thriving and growing. It has a reputation for collaboration and bringing together the best team of lawyers to get the best result for clients," said Julie Jones, chair. "Faiza's arrival complements our strong and talented team."

Faiza is ranked in Chambers as a leading lawyer for capital markets. She advises public and private companies, investment banks, and private equity firms in a broad range of capital markets transactions, including IPOs, high yield debt offerings and restructurings, as well as corporate governance, securities law compliance, and general corporate matters.

"Faiza is a perfect fit for Ropes & Gray. Issuers, sponsors and investment banks look to Ropes & Gray's capital markets lawyers to execute their most complex transactions. Faiza's excellent track record handling challenging transactions for clients will deepen our ability to deliver these results for our clients," said managing partner David Djaha.

"Faiza is a multifaceted capital markets partner with significant experience leading a broad range of transactions across industry sectors," said Craig Marcus, co-head of the firm's capital markets practice. "She brings deep client relationships and experience counseling on complex debt and equity transactions."

"Ropes & Gray's award-winning capital markets group is known for having great clients and market-leading deals," Faiza said. "I'm excited to be joining a growing practice with a strong culture of collaboration."

Faiza is one of six partners to join Ropes & Gray in New York in 2022. Already this year, the firm welcomed IP transactions partner Ed Sadtler, M&A partner Suni Sreepada, asset management partner Jennifer Graff, employee benefits and executive compensation partner Richard Kidd and finance partner Christopher Poggi.

About Ropes & Gray

Ropes & Gray is a preeminent global law firm with approximately 1,400 lawyers and legal professionals serving clients in major centers of business, finance, technology, and government. The firm has offices in New York, Boston, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Silicon Valley, London, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Tokyo and Seoul, and has consistently been recognized for its leading practices in many areas, including private equity, M&A, finance, asset management, real estate, tax, antitrust, life sciences, health care, intellectual property, litigation & enforcement, privacy & cybersecurity, and business restructuring.

Website | LinkedIn | Twitter | Videos | Podcasts

To view our privacy policy, please click here.

Media Contact:

Eric Goldman

Senior Public Relations Specialist

Office: +1-212-596-9089

Cell: +1-917-224-9861

[email protected]

SOURCE Ropes & Gray
Lower Financing Costs Offered to Property Owners Who Accept Federal Housing Choice Vouchers in North Carolina and Texas

WASHINGTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Fannie Mae (OTCQB: FNMA) announced today its Expanded Housing Choice initiative, providing a new pricing incentive for Texas and North Carolina multifamily property owners who accept U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Housing Choice Vouchers. Housing Choice Vouchers help provide housing for very low-income families, seniors, historically underserved populations, and people with disabilities.

"As we fulfill our mission, we are working with the housing community to expand access to affordable housing for those who need it most," said Hugh R. Frater, Chief Executive Officer, Fannie Mae. "Housing Choice Vouchers provide assistance to a wide range of individuals and families in need. But many voucher holders  especially people of color  are unable to use their vouchers before they expire or end up living in areas of concentrated poverty. Our Expanded Housing Choice initiative is a way to drive greater acceptance of vouchers in the multifamily market and, with that, greater equity and opportunity."

Expanded Housing Choice aims to make the rental housing market more inclusive and equitable by expanding the availability of multifamily units that accept housing choice vouchers. This 12-month initiative will start in Texas and North Carolina and will incorporate feedback from customers, key stakeholders, and market participants.

"We are constantly working to create innovative solutions for promoting sustainable affordable housing and benefitting renters," said Michele Evans, Executive Vice President and Head of Multifamily, Fannie Mae. "Our Expanded Housing Choice initiative can help expand housing access for people who use vouchers; build strong, vibrant resident communities; and support steady income streams for property owners."

As part of this initiative, Fannie Mae has partnered with Enterprise Community Partners to provide resources that help lenders and borrowers understand and get the most out of HUD's Housing Choice Voucher program. Fannie Mae supports the preservation and creation of affordable housing for underserved communities as part of its ongoing mission to ensure that everyone in the United States has access to a stable place to call home.

Expanded Housing Choice will be executed through Fannie Mae's Multifamily Delegated Underwriting and Servicing (DUS) platform. Fannie Mae's Multifamily business relies on DUS to finance quality, sustainable, and affordable rental housing. DUS leverages private capital, aligns interests through risk-sharing, and supports life-of-loan servicing. The strength of the DUS model is shared risk.

About Fannie Mae

Fannie Mae advances equitable and sustainable access to homeownership and quality, affordable rental housing for millions of people across America. We enable the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage and drive responsible innovation to make homebuying and renting easier, fairer, and more accessible. To learn more, visit:

fanniemae.com | Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn | Instagram | YouTube | Blog

SOURCE Fannie Mae
LONDON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Finastra today announced the appointment of Lynne Biggar, a proven financial services and marketing leader, to its Board of Directors, effective March 2022.

Lynne brings decades of experience and deep financial services insight to the Board. Most recently, she was Executive Vice President and Global Chief Marketing Officer at Visa, where she led the organization's global brand and marketing strategy, including all consumer, B2B, and B2B2C marketing activities that advanced Visa's brand and business goals. She also oversaw management and activation of Visa's world-leading sponsorship assets, while driving impactful business outcomes and award-winning initiatives for one of the most valuable brands in the world.

Prior, Lynne was Executive Vice President/Consumer Marketing + Revenue at Time Inc. Before that, she spent more than 20 years at American Express in a variety of leadership positions across high-profile revenue-generating operating and marketing divisions.

Simon Paris, CEO at Finastra said, "Lynne is a distinguished and highly capable executive with an impressive track record in driving growth and success across leading organizations. I know she will provide valuable guidance as we continue our journey as ecosystem orchestrators for Banking as a Service (BaaS) and the future of financial services software. I'm delighted to welcome Lynne on board."

On her appointment, Lynne commented, "I am excited to join the Finastra Board. I have always been a firm advocate for transformational purpose-led brand strategy, and I see that reflected in Finastra's work. I look forward to making a positive contribution in the coming years."

Lynne has been recognized by Forbes as one of the 'World's Most Influential CMOs' three years in a row (20192021) and by Business Insider as one of the '25 Most Innovative CMOs in the World' (2020). Brand Innovators named her on its 'Top 100' Women in Brand Marketing list for the past five years. She is also an Independent Board Director at Voya.

Lynne was sourced through the independent board program operated by Vista Equity Partners, a global investment firm focused on enterprise software, data and technology-enabled businesses, and a majority investor in Finastra. Launched in 2017, the program leverages Vista's ecosystem and additional resources to identify, train and appoint qualified board candidates for its portfolio companies. The program works to create a diverse pipeline of qualified board candidates through programs and partnerships that advance diversity for all boards and drive impact for the corporate world at large.

For further information, please contact:

Caroline Duff

Global Head of PR

T: +44 (0)7917 613586

E: [email protected]

finastra.com

About Finastra

Finastra is building an open platform that accelerates collaboration and innovation in financial services, creating better experiences for people, businesses and communities. Supported by the broadest and deepest portfolio of financial services software, Finastra delivers this vitally important technology to financial institutions of all sizes across the globe, including 90 of the world's top 100 banks. Our open architecture approach brings together a number of partners and innovators. Together we are leading the way in which applications are written, deployed and consumed in financial services to evolve with the changing needs of customers. Learn more at finastra.com

Corporate headquarters

4 Kingdom Street

Paddington

London W2 6BD

United Kingdom

T: +44 20 3320 5000

SOURCE Finastra
The positive impacts of workforce diversity have resulted in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) becoming a strategic priority for competitive organizations. However, organizations often concentrate their efforts on increasing diversity but miss benefits that cannot be realized without a fully inclusive culture, such as higher rates of innovation and profitability.

Although inclusion is key to the success of a DEI strategy, the complexity of the concept makes it a daunting pursuit. An individual employee has many diversity dimensions that cannot be categorized, meaning narrowly defined inclusion efforts won't be enough. This is further complicated by the fact that creating inclusion is not a one-and-done exercise. Rather, it requires the ongoing commitment of employees at all levels to drive a cultural shift.

According to McLean & Company's 2022 Trends Report, organizations taking action to create an inclusive environment are 2.4 times more likely to be effective at providing a positive employee experience. Furthermore, organizations not focused on creating an inclusive environment experience 1.6 times more voluntary turnover than those who are.

In the newly released blueprint, McLean & Company's framework models a three-step process to eliminate the systemic barriers diverse employees face and provides a guide on implementing inclusive practices throughout an organization's culture through its work practices, values, and behavior. The blueprint is intended for HR leaders to determine the current state of inclusion, frame inclusion for the organization, and mobilize inclusion efforts. This type of approach will allow HR leaders to:

Conduct an assessment to understand the current state of inclusion.

Embed inclusion into organizational values and adapt competencies to promote accountability at the individual level.

Use inclusive design principles to modify organizational work practices to demonstrate a more inclusive culture.

McLean & Company's full Embed Inclusion Into the Organization's Culture research blueprint further outlines the steps HR teams and business leaders can take to drive this shift.

To learn more about McLean & Company and to download all the latest research, visit hr.mcleanco.com and connect via LinkedIn and Twitter.

Media professionals are encouraged to register for McLean & Company's Media Insiders program for more research and insights. This complimentary program provides unrestricted, on-demand access to HR, IT, and software industry content and the ability to speak with subject-matter experts from a group of more than 200 research analysts and thought leaders. To register for access, contact [email protected].

About McLean & Company

Through data-driven insights and proven best-practice methodologies, McLean & Company offers comprehensive resources and full-service assessments, action plans, and training to position organizations to meet today's needs and prepare for the future.

McLean & Company is a division of Info-Tech Research Group.

SOURCE McLean & Company
Former CyrusOne CEO will support Talen's clean energy and digital infrastructure transformation, balance sheet restructuring process and enterprise value growth initiatives

THE WOODLANDS, Texas, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Talen Energy ("Talen" or "the Company") announced today that Gary Wojtaszek, former CEO of CyrusOne, a $15 billion data center technology real estate investment trust (REIT) that serves Fortune 1000 companies worldwide, has joined the Talen Energy Supply ("TES") Board of Directors as an independent director. Mr. Wojtaszek joins Carol Flaton, who was appointed as independent director on the TES Board in November 2021.

"I am pleased to welcome Gary to the TES Board," said Alex Hernandez, Chief Executive Officer, President, and Director of TES. "Our Company is at an important inflection point as we transition from an operational turnaround to strategically re-positioning Talen for long-term value creation. Talen's transformation and liability management initiatives create significant opportunities for growing Talen's enterprise value. We are actively working to address the balance sheet with capital to drive the long-term success of the Talen-Cumulus platform and our people," continued Hernandez. "Gary's leadership capabilities, financial acumen, track record of value creation, and digital infrastructure industry experience will bring a valuable perspective to the Board during this critical time."

"Talen is poised to re-position itself for long-term value creation as a clean energy and digital infrastructure platform. There are many parallels to draw between Talen's current strategy and my 12 years at CyrusOne. We had humble beginnings as a small $500 million enterprise value business that spun out of the legacy Cincinnati Bell telecom utility. Nearly a decade later, we had transformed the business to the 3rd largest data center platform globally, resulting in the eventual sale of CyrusOne for $15 billion this year," said Wojtaszek. "I have followed Talen's progress closely over the last two years and have high confidence in Alex and his team as management executes this next chapter. I also look forward to collaborating with Carol, the Board and the Company's key stakeholders to address the balance sheet and position the Company for the future," Wojtaszek continued.

Mr. Wojtaszek has extensive experience founding, growing, leading, and monetizing private and public companies of scale. From August 2011 to February 2020, he served as President and Chief Executive Officer of CyrusOne, Inc., a real estate investment trust that builds and manages carrier-neutral hyperscale data centers globally. Prior to CONE, Mr. Wojtaszek served as chief financial officer and board member of Cincinnati Bell Inc., where he had responsibility for the data center business and oversaw CyrusOne's successful creation, spin-off, and IPO.

Before joining Cincinnati Bell in July 2008, he was senior vice president, treasurer, and chief accounting officer for the Laureate Education Corporation from 2006 to 2008 helping with the leveraged buyout of the company to KKR. He worked at Agere Systems, the semiconductor and optical electronics communications division of Lucent Technologies, from 2001 to 2008, which was subsequently spun off through an IPO. While at Agere Systems, Mr. Wojtaszek worked in a number of senior finance positions, helping with the restructuring and repositioning of the company following the 2001 financial crisis. Mr. Wojtaszek started his career in the General Motors New York treasury group and joined Delphi Automotive Systems as the regional European treasurer in connection with the initial public offering and spin-off of Delphi Automotive Systems from General Motors.

Mr. Wojtaszek currently serves on the Board of GDS Holdings Ltd., an integrated provider of high-performance data centers based in China and serving the Asia Pacific region. He also is a Board member of Quantum Loophole, developer of master planned data center communities in the U.S, and Poema Global and Infra Tech Partners. Mr. Wojtaszek serves as an industry advisor to global investment firm, The Carlyle Group, Inc. and Actis, a leading global investor in sustainable infrastructure.

Mr. Wojtaszek is the founder and CEO of Recreational Realty, which designs, builds, and operates premium class facilities geared towards the needs of the recreational vehicle enthusiast.

About Talen Energy

Talen, through its subsidiary, TES, is one of the largest competitive power generation and infrastructure companies in North America. TES owns and/or controls approximately 13,000 megawatts of generating capacity in wholesale U.S. power markets, principally in the Mid-Atlantic, Texas and Montana.

Through its subsidiary, Cumulus Growth, Talen is developing a large-scale portfolio of renewable energy, battery storage, and digital infrastructure assets across its expansive footprint. For more information, visit https://www.talenenergy.com/esg-focused-future/

Investor Contact

Olivia Sigo

Managing Director Capital Planning

281-203-5387

[email protected]

Media Contact

Taryne Williams

Director Corporate Communications

610-601-0327

[email protected]

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Information

This press release includes "forward-looking statements." All statements, other than statements of historical fact, included in this press release that address activities, events or developments that TES expects, believes or anticipates will or may occur in the future, as well as aspirational goals, are forward-looking statements. These statements are based on certain assumptions made by TES based on its experience and perception of historical trends, current conditions, expected future developments and other factors it believes are appropriate. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this press release. All forward-looking statements are qualified in their entirety by this cautionary statement. TES undertakes no obligation and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances occurring after the issuance of this press release, except as required by law.

SOURCE Talen Energy
PHILADELPHIA, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Berger Montague is investigating securities fraud allegations on behalf of investors who purchased the securities of Gatos Silver, Inc. ("Gatos" or the "Company") (NYSE: GATO) between October 25, 2020, and January 25, 2022 (the "Class Period"), including on or traceable to the Company's initial public offering on or about October 29, 2020.

If you purchased Gatos securities during the Class Period, would like to discuss Berger Montague's investigation, or have questions concerning your rights or interests, please contact attorneys Andrew Abramowitz at [email protected] or (215) 875-3015, or Michael Dell'Angelo at [email protected] or (215) 875-3080 or visit: https://investigations.bergermontague.com/gatos-silver/

Whistleblowers: Anyone with non-public information regarding Gatos is encouraged to confidentially assist Berger Montague's investigation or take advantage of the SEC Whistleblower program. Under this program, whistleblowers who provide original information may receive rewards totaling up to thirty percent (30%) of recoveries obtained by the SEC. For more information, contact us.

The Lawsuit: A recently filed lawsuit charges Gatos Silver and certain of its executives with failing to disclose material information during the Class Period, including in the Registration Statement and Prospectus issued in conjunction with the Company's initial public offering.

On January 25, 2022, Gatos revealed errors in the technical report regarding the Los Gatos Project in Mexico, dated July 1, 2020, as well as "indications that there is an overestimation in the existing resource model." The Company further disclosed that there was a potential reduction of the metal content in the mineral reserve ranging from 30% to 50%. On this news, Gatos shares fell $7.02 per share  nearly 69%  to close at $3.17 per share on January 26, 2022.

Berger Montague, with offices in Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Washington, D.C., and San Diego, has been a pioneer in securities class action litigation since its founding in 1970. Berger Montague has represented individual and institutional investors for over five decades and serves as lead counsel in courts throughout the United States.

Contacts

Andrew Abramowitz, Senior Counsel

Berger Montague

(215) 875-3015

[email protected]

Michael Dell'Angelo, Executive Shareholder

Berger Montague

(215) 875-3080

[email protected]

SOURCE Berger Montague
CLEVELAND, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- GenomOncology , a leading precision oncology software development company, today announced the appointment of Jeff Shiner, Chief Executive Officer at 1Password , to its Board of Directors. Shiner brings over two decades of experience in leading rapid business growth and innovation, which will be essential to GenomOncology's future.

"We are thrilled that Jeff is joining the GenomOncology Board of Directors. As the industry continues to mature, we are excited about the opportunity to expand the reach of our precision oncology solutions to new and innovative markets," said Brad Wertz, Chief Executive Officer at GenomOncology. "He has a demonstrated history of growing businesses and pushing the boundaries when it comes to innovating in tech, which will be crucial for our future. Jeff has been very involved with GenomOncology for some time and I expect this appointment to increase his involvement and impact moving forward."

Shiner has demonstrated significant experience in software development, security, rapid growth, and innovation during his career. Prior to his role at 1Password, Shiner was the Senior Development Manager of WebSphere Commerce at IBM Canada, and led a 400-person technology division at Rosetta, a customer engagement services company. He then joined 1Password in 2012, motivated by the company's passion for building customer-focused security solutions.

Since joining 1Password, Shiner has grown the organization from 20 people to nearly 700 employees around the globe, and achieved revenue north of $150M. 1Password also recently raised the largest funding round in Canadian history at $620M , at a $6.8B valuation, to support its rapid, global growth and to continue developing and launching more of its human-centric solutions. 1Password's enterprise growth has accelerated by 70% year-over-year, with the company now serving more than 100,000 businesses, including brands like Slack, Shopify, Datadog, Intercom, PGA, Snowflake and Wealthsimple  as well as millions of individual customers.

"Precision medicine is expanding rapidly to ensure patients are provided optimal treatment options, with relatively unlimited potential transformation to the care process. Without the right technology, institutions are limited in how they can deliver this capability and impact," said Jeff Shiner, Chief Executive Officer at 1Password. "I am excited to be part of GenomOncology's next chapter, expanding the reach of its technology globally to ultimately advance and improve the healthcare community's access to actionable insights that improve cancer care for patients worldwide."

About GenomOncology

GenomOncology provides the healthcare community with data-driven insights to improve cancer care. GenomOncology strengthens your precision oncology program by transforming valuable, but unusable data, into actionable oncology treatment options and strategic insights. GenomOncology's Precision Oncology Platform (POP) powers its comprehensive set of end-to-end software solutions that enhance decision support. POP combines both proprietary content and public and licensed data sets with internal patient data to provide the information necessary to improve patient outcomes. Learn more at https://www.genomoncology.com/ .

About 1Password

1Password's human-centric approach to security keeps people safe, at work and at home. It's the only solution built from the ground up to enable anyone  no matter the level of technical proficiency  to navigate the digital world without fear or friction. The company's password management and credentials security platform is trusted by over 100,000 businesses, including IBM, Slack, Snowflake, Shopify, and Under Armour. 1Password protects the most sensitive information of millions of individuals and families across the globe, helping consumers and businesses get more done in less time  with security and privacy as a given. Learn more at 1Password.com .

Media Contact

Alysia Kaplan, Director of Marketing

GenomOncology, LLC

(440) 617-6087

[email protected]

SOURCE GenomOncology
The National Motors Supplies Company has opened its first Jetour showroom at the Jeddah Auto Mall, where it unveiled the car brands flagship automobile, the X70 Plus.

The recently appointed dealer also announced that special offers and discounts are available across its range of vehicles in celebration of Ramadan.

Hassan Al-Shamrani, Group Chief Executive Officer of United Motors Group, said: "We are committed to cement Jetours presence in the kingdom, reflecting its global reputation as one of the worlds fastest growing car brands. Our experience and market studies have shown that Jetour vehicles are remarkably suitable for the kingdom. The cars perform well and are aesthetically designed, in addition to being manufactured to a high-quality, meeting all the requirements of our diverse customer base.

More space

At 4,720 millimetres (mm) in length and 1,900 mm in width, the flagship Jetour Plus X70 provides more space than its competitors, offering a roomy interior and a spacious luggage compartment with a capacity of 1,600/1,595 mm.

The X70 Plus features 20-inch light-weight aluminum rims which are elegantly designed and add to the vehicles aesthetic and visual appeal.

Safety is the highest priority for the X70 Plus and the spacious vehicle is equipped with driver and passenger airbags, as well as a lane departure system, all around blind spot technology and adaptive cruise control with collision avoidance.

Natural light, ventilation and visibility

Featuring an aesthetic ultra-wide panoramic sunroof of 1.1 metres squared, the X70 Plus ensures excellent natural light, ventilation and visibility.

The National Motors Supplies Company signed an agreement to become Jetours new agent in Saudi Arabia starting from early 2022. As a subsidiary of United Motors Group, the National Motors Supplies Company was able to benefit from the automotive experience of its parent company, rapidly preparing the necessary infrastructure to begin receiving interested customers from the start of this year.

Demonstrating its commitment towards customer service excellence, the National Motors Supplies Company launched a dedicated showroom for Jetour at Jeddah Auto Mall. Boasting a retail floor which can display 20 cars at a time, the new showroom is also home to an after-sales team who can assist with spare parts and maintenance, providing customers with a one-stop-shop experience.

The newly appointed dealer for Jetour in Saudi Arabia intends to replicate its one-stop-shop model across the kingdom, with plans to launch additional showrooms and after sales services in Riyadh during Ramadan, followed by Khobar city.-- TradeArabia News Service
DUBLIN, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Motor Driver IC Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Motor Type (Brushed DC Motor, Brushless DC Motor, and Stepper Motor), Semiconductor (Gallium Nitrate (GaN) and Silicon Carbide (SiC)), and Application" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global motor driver IC market is expected to grow from US$ 3,882.57 million in 2021 to US$ 5,589.33 million by 2028; it is estimated to grow at a CAGR of 5.3% from 2021 to 2028.



Electric vehicle adoption is expanding worldwide, and sales of electric and hybrid vehicles will increase significantly during the projected period. This growth can be attributed to the strict emission limits and increase in battery density. ADAS capabilities, which were previously only available in high-end luxury automobiles, are now available in entry-level models.

Furthermore, all newly produced automobiles in the US will be equipped with an automatic braking system, a lane departure warning system, and a parking assistance system starting in 2020. Looking at the future scope of motor driver ICs in the automotive, many industrial manufacturers have jumped into the market. Companies are offering an exclusive range of motor drivers for the automotive industry. For instance, ST offers a wide range of motor control ICs that are well-suited for the harshest automotive environments, covering the needs of brushed DC motors, stepper motors, and brushless DC motors across a wide range of voltage and current ratings. As a result, the motor driver IC market will have plenty of opportunities as the demand for electric and autonomous vehicles grows.



Furthermore, semiconductor firms are lobbying electric vehicle manufacturers to abandon standard silicon chips in favor of materials to improve vehicle efficiency while also easing customer concerns. Choosing the appropriate technology has never been more important than now, as the auto industry faces its most significant shift in almost a century. Manufacturers worldwide are rushing to eliminate internal combustion engines, and even gasoline-powered icons like Ford's Mustang and GMC's Hummer are receiving battery-powered versions. Hence, due to the shift, the automotive industry is likely to be the go-to market for motor driver IC manufacturers.



The COVID-19 pandemic had an influence on the motor driver IC business, leading to the closure of many factories, problems in supply chain, and obstacles in international trade. Several automakers have lowered their manufacturing capacity in early 2020 due to rising semiconductor shortages and reducing market potential for motor driver IC. However, the motor driver IC market gained momentum in Q3 of 2020 due to the ease of lockdown measures across the world, which led the market to witness positive outcomes at the end of 2020.



Toshiba Corporation; Mitsubishi Electric Corporation; Texas Instrument; Allegro Microsystems; Dialog Semiconductor Plc; STMicroelectronics; ON Semiconductor; Rohm Co., Ltd.; Infineon Technologies AG; and Analog Devices are a few key companies operating in the motor driver IC market. The report comprises secondary research work on other companies that hold a significant market share.



Reasons to Buy

Save and reduce time carrying out entry-level research by identifying the growth, size, leading players and segments in the global motor driver IC market.

Highlights key business priorities in order to assist companies to realign their business strategies

The key findings and recommendations highlight crucial progressive industry trends in the global motor driver IC market, thereby allowing players across the value chain to develop effective long-term strategies.

Develop/modify business expansion plans by using substantial growth offering developed and emerging markets.

Scrutinize in-depth global market trends and outlook coupled with the factors driving the market, as well as those hindering it.

Enhance the decision-making process by understanding the strategies that underpin commercial interest with respect to client products, segmentation, pricing and distribution.

Key Topics Covered:



1. Introduction



2. Key Takeaways



3. Research Methodology



4. Motor Driver IC Market Landscape

4.1 Market Overview

4.2 PEST Analysis

4.2.1 North America PEST Analysis

4.2.2 Europe - PEST Analysis

4.2.3 Asia Pacific PEST Analysis

4.2.4 Middle East & Africa PEST Analysis

4.2.5 South America PEST Analysis

4.3 Ecosystem Analysis

4.4 Expert Opinion



5. Motor Driver IC Market - Key Market Dynamics

5.1 Key Market Drivers

5.1.1 Growing Production of Consumer Electronics

5.1.2 Increasing Adoption of Internet of Things (IoT) across Industries

5.2 Key Market Restraints

5.2.1 Accuracy over High Current Range

5.3 Key Market Opportunities

5.3.1 Growing Automotive Industry and Rising Adoption of Electric Vehicles

5.4 Future Trends

5.4.1 Emergence of GaN ICs

5.5 Impact Analysis of Drivers and Restraints



6. Motor Driver IC Market - Global Analysis

6.1 Motor Driver IC Market Global Overview

6.2 Motor Driver IC Market - Global Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)

6.3 Market Positioning - Five Key Players



7. Motor Driver IC Market Analysis - By Motor Type

7.1 Overview

7.2 Motor Driver IC Market, By Motor Type (2020 and 2028)

7.3 Brushed DC Motor

7.3.1 Overview

7.3.2 Brushed DC Motor: Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)

7.4 Brushless DC Motor

7.4.1 Overview

7.4.2 Brushless DC Motor: Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)

7.5 Stepper Motor

7.5.1 Overview

7.5.2 Stepper Motor: Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)



8. Motor Driver IC Market - By Semiconductor

8.1 Overview

8.2 Motor Driver IC Market, by Semiconductor (2020 and 2028)

8.3 Gallium Nitrate (GaN)

8.3.1 Overview

8.3.2 Gallium Nitrate (GaN): Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)

8.4 Silicon Carbide (SiC)

8.4.1 Overview

8.4.2 Silicon Carbide (SiC): Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)



9. Motor Driver IC Market - By Application

9.1 Overview

9.2 Motor Driver IC Market, by Application (2020 and 2028)

9.3 Automotive

9.3.1 Overview

9.3.2 Automotive: Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)

9.4 Aerospace and Defense

9.4.1 Overview

9.4.2 Aerospace and Defense: Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)

9.5 Industrial Automation

9.5.1 Overview

9.5.2 Industrial Automation: Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)

9.6 Consumer Electronics and Home Appliances

9.6.1 Overview

9.6.2 Consumer Electronics and Home Appliances: Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)

9.7 Healthcare

9.7.1 Overview

9.7.2 Healthcare: Motor Driver IC Market - Revenue and Forecast to 2028 (US$ Million)



10. Motor Driver IC Market - Geographic Analysis



11. Motor Driver IC Market- COVID-19 Impact Analysis

11.1 North America

11.2 Europe

11.3 Asia Pacific

11.4 Middle East and Africa

11.5 South America



12. Motor Driver IC Market-Industry Landscape

12.1 Overview

12.2 Market Initiative



13. Company Profiles

13.1 Toshiba Corporation

13.1.1 Key Facts

13.1.2 Business Description

13.1.3 Products and Services

13.1.4 Financial Overview

13.1.5 SWOT Analysis

13.1.6 Key Developments

13.2 Mitsubishi Electric Corporation

13.2.1 Key Facts

13.2.2 Business Description

13.2.3 Products and Services

13.2.4 Financial Overview

13.2.5 SWOT Analysis

13.2.6 Key Developments

13.3 Texas Instruments Incorporated

13.3.1 Key Facts

13.3.2 Business Description

13.3.3 Products and Services

13.3.4 Financial Overview

13.3.5 SWOT Analysis

13.3.6 Key Developments

13.4 Allegro MicroSystems, Inc.

13.4.1 Key Facts

13.4.2 Business Description

13.4.3 Products and Services

13.4.4 Financial Overview

13.4.5 SWOT Analysis

13.4.6 Key Developments

13.5 Renesas Electronics Corporation

13.5.1 Key Facts

13.5.2 Business Description

13.5.3 Products and Services

13.5.4 Financial Overview

13.5.5 SWOT Analysis

13.5.6 Key Developments

13.6 STMicroelectronics N.V.

13.6.1 Key Facts

13.6.2 Business Description

13.6.3 Products and Services

13.6.4 Financial Overview

13.6.5 SWOT Analysis

13.6.6 Key Developments

13.7 ON Semiconductor Corporation

13.7.1 Key Facts

13.7.2 Business Description

13.7.3 Products and Services

13.7.4 Financial Overview

13.7.5 SWOT Analysis

13.7.6 Key Developments

13.8 ROHM CO., LTD.

13.8.1 Key Facts

13.8.2 Business Description

13.8.3 Products and Services

13.8.4 Financial Overview

13.8.5 SWOT Analysis

13.8.6 Key Developments

13.9 INFINEON TECHNOLOGIES AG

13.9.1 Key Facts

13.9.2 Business Description

13.9.3 Products and Services

13.9.4 Financial Overview

13.9.5 SWOT Analysis

13.9.6 Key Developments

13.10 Analog Devices, Inc

13.10.1 Key Facts

13.10.2 Business Description

13.10.3 Products and Services

13.10.4 Financial Overview

13.10.5 SWOT Analysis

13.10.6 Key Developments



14. Appendix

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/9024e4?

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]

For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900

U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets
NEW DELHI, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- According to the study undertaken by Astute Analytica, the Global Smartphones Market is estimated to witness a rise in revenue from US$ 273.9 Bn in 2021 to US$ 520.7 Bn by 2030. The market is registering a growth at a CAGR of 7.6% over the forecast period 2022-2030. In terms of volume, the market is recording a CAGR of 7.4% over the projection period. The rise in popularity of touchscreen smartphones and mobile apps distributed via app stores along with rapidly advancing network, mobile processor, and storage technologies led to a convergence where separate mobile phones, organizers, and portable media players were replaced by a smartphone as the single device most people carried. The market is majorly driven by factors such increasing penetration of IoT and rapid technological advancement.

Request a Sample Report of Global Smartphones Market: https://www.astuteanalytica.com/request-sample/smartphones-market

Internet of Things (IoT) device allows to receive and transmit data via the internet using sensors, software and other technologies. Smartphones are the most popular devices that use IoT data connectivity for various functions such as fitness tracking, GPS based guidance, Wi-Fi (wireless fidelity) and Bluetooth connectivity. Furthermore, rapid technological advancements such as AI enabled smartphones is triggering the market growth of smartphones. Companies such as Apple, Samsung, and Huawei have introduced smartphones with powerful AI chips that are capable of performing up to 5 trillion operations per second and is proven to use significantly lesser power. Moreover, 5G features in smartphones will further drive the market growth by improving network efficiency, faster communications and effective data management. However, the health risks due to prolonged exposure to smartphones is hindering the market growth.

Segmentation Analysis:

Androids holds the highest share in the Global Smartphones Market in 2021

Based on operating system, the smartphones market is segmented into Android, Windows, iOS and others. Among these, Androids holds the highest share in the Global Smartphones Market in 2021 and is further estimated to continue its dominance over the forecast period. Growth of the Android segment is attributed to an increase in demand and supply of reasonably priced Android mobile phones. However, the iOS segment has the highest CAGR over the projection period as it provides better customer support with its dedicated support app & website, better app selection and better data privacy & security as compared to other systems.

4GB-8GB RAM size leads the smartphones market in 2021

By RAM size, the market is categorized into below 2GB, 2GB-4GB, 4GB-8GB and above 8GB. The 4GB-8GB segment has the highest share in the smartphones market as greater RAM provides better performance. Also, this segment is ideal for gaming, multitasking, vlogging and for daily related works. Above 8GB RAM segment has the highest annual growth rate over the forecast period.

4G has the lion's share in the smartphones market in 2021

In terms of generation, the smartphones market is segmented into 3G, 4G and 5G. 4G has the highest share of 82% in the Global Smartphones Market in 2021, as 4G data network has revolutionized the whole industry and became integral part of everyone's life.

Above 5.0" screen size segment has the highest share in the smartphones market

By screen size, the market is segmented into below 4.0", 0"5.0" and above 5.0". Among these, the above 5.0" segment has the highest market share in 2021 and also has the highest growth rate over the forecast period. With bigger screens, video-chatting and face time gets better, users can download an app enabling split screen functionality, play games with better resolution & clarity and can watch videos and photos with better composition.

Offline distribution channel leads the smartphones market in 2021

In terms of distribution channel, the smartphones market is divided into online and offline. The offline segment leads the smartphones market in 2021. The major factors like availability of offers, after support and more personalized services makes offline channel to hold highest market share. Online segment has the highest CAGR over the forecast period due to rise in digital literacy and growth of e-commerce across the globe.

Samsung holds the highest share in the Global Smartphones Market in 2021

Based on brand, the market is segmented into Apple, Samsung, Xiaomi, Oppo, Huawei, VIVO and others. Out of these, Samsung holds the highest share of 31% in the year 2021, whereas VIVO holds the highest CAGR of the projection period owing to major offerings in lower priced segment of the smartphone with rapid technological advancements and new features.

Asia Pacific dominates the Global Smartphones Market

Asia Pacific dominates the Global Smartphones Market in 2021 and is further estimated to continue its dominance over the forecast period. Also, the APAC region registers the highest CAGR during 2022-2030. The growth in APAC smartphones market is attributed to factors such as rising population, rising digitalization, improvement in telecom infrastructure and rising disposable incomes in countries such as India and China.

Directly Purchase a copy of report with TOC @ https://www.astuteanalytica.com/request-sample/smartphones-market

Report Attribute Details Market Size Value in 2021 US$ 273.9 Billion Market Outlook for 2030 US$ 520.7 Billion Expected CAGR Growth 7.6% from 2022  2030 Base Year 2021 Forecast Period 2022-2030 Top Market Players Apple, Samsung, Xiaomi, Huawei, Micromax Informatics Ltd., Panasonic Corp., HTC Corporation, Nokia among others Segments Covered By Operating System, By RAM size, By Generation, By Screen Size, By Price Range, By Distribution, By Brand, By Region Geographies Covered North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East & Africa, South America Customization Options Get your customized report as per your preference. Ask for customization

Competitive Landscape

Huawei technologies Company is a China based company and is engaged in telecommunications. It is a provider of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and smart devices, with integrated solutions across four key domains  telecom networks, IT, smart devices, and cloud services.

based company and is engaged in telecommunications. It is a provider of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and smart devices, with integrated solutions across four key domains  telecom networks, IT, smart devices, and cloud services. Vivo Communication Technology Co. Ltd., is a Chinese technology company headquartered in Dongguan , Guangdong that designs and develops smartphones, smartphone accessories, software and online services. The company develops software for its phones, distributed through its V-Appstore.

, that designs and develops smartphones, smartphone accessories, software and online services. The company develops software for its phones, distributed through its V-Appstore. Apple Inc. is a US based multinational technology company that manufactures consumer electronics, computer software and provides online services. In terms of units sold, Apple is the fourth largest producer of consumer smartphones in the world.

Guangdong Oppo Mobile Telecommunications Corp., Ltd, doing business as OPPO. It is a Chinese consumer electronics and mobile communications company headquartered in Dongguan , Guangdong . Its major product lines include smartphones, smart devices, audio devices, power banks, and other electronic products.

, . Its major product lines include smartphones, smart devices, audio devices, power banks, and other electronic products. Xiaomi Corporation, registered in Asia as Xiaomi Inc., is a Chinese designer and manufacturer of consumer electronics and related software, home appliances, and household items. It is a manufacturer of smartphones, all of which run the MIUI operating system, a fork of Android. In 2020, the company sold 146.3 million smartphones and, as of August 2021 , its MIUI operating system had over 450 million monthly active users.

Segmentation Overview

The following are the different segments of the Global Smartphones Market:

By Operating System segment of the Global Smartphones Market is sub-segmented into:

Android



Windows



iOS



Palm OS



Other (Sailfish, Tizen and Blackberry OS)

By RAM Size segment of the Global Smartphones Market is sub-segmented into:

Below 2GB



2GB-4GB



4GB-8GB



More than 8GB

By Generation segment of the Global Smartphones Market is sub-segmented into:

3G



4G



5G

By Screen Size segment of the Global Smartphones Market is sub-segmented into:

Below 4.0"



0"5.0"



Above 5.0"

By Price Range segment of the Global Smartphones Market is sub-segmented into:

< US$ 100



US$ 101  US$ 200



US$ 201  US$ 500



> US$ 501

By Distribution Channel segment of the Global Smartphones Market is sub-segmented into:

Online



Brand Website





E-marketplaces



Offline



Multi Brand Store





Brand Store

By Brand segment of the Global Smartphones Market is sub-segmented into:

Apple



Samsung



Xiaomi



Oppo



Huawei



VIVO



Others

By Region segment of the Global Smartphones Market is sub-segmented into:

North America



The U.S.





Canada





Mexico



Europe



The UK





Germany





France





Italy





Spain





Poland





Russia



Asia Pacific



China





India





Japan





Australia & New Zealand

&



ASEAN



Middle East & Africa (MEA)



UAE





Saudi Arabia





South Africa



South America



Argentina





Brazil

Enquire more about this report before purchase @ https://www.astuteanalytica.com/request-sample/smartphones-market

For Additional Information OR Media Enquiry, Please Mail Us At: [email protected]

About Astute Analytica

Astute Analytica is a global analytics and advisory company which has built a solid reputation in a short period, thanks to the tangible outcomes we have delivered to our clients. We pride ourselves in generating unparalleled, in depth and uncannily accurate estimates and projections for our very demanding clients spread across different verticals. We have a long list of satisfied and repeat clients from a wide spectrum including technology, healthcare, chemicals, semiconductors, FMCG, and many more. These happy customers come to us from all across the Globe. They are able to make well calibrated decisions and leverage highly lucrative opportunities while surmounting the fierce challenges all because we analyze for them the complex business environment, segment wise existing and emerging possibilities, technology formations, growth estimates, and even the strategic choices available. In short, a complete package. All this is possible because we have a highly qualified, competent, and experienced team of professionals comprising of business analysts, economists, consultants, and technology experts. In our list of priorities, you-our patron-come at the top. You can be sure of best cost-effective, value-added package from us, should you decide to engage with us.

Contact us:



Aamir Beg

BSI Business Park, H-15,Sector-63, Noida- 201301- India

Phone: +1-888 429 6757 (US Toll Free); +91-0120- 4483891 (Rest of the World)

Email: [email protected]

Website: www.astuteanalytica.com

Follow US: LinkedIn | Twitter

SOURCE Astute Analytica
Government of Kyrgyzstan to take on full management and ownership of Kumtor Gold Mine

Centerra to pay US$50 million for the purpose of preserving and protecting natural resources in the Kyrgyz Republic

President Sadyr Japarov announces agreement in live address to the nation

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- President of the Kyrgyz Republic Sadyr Japarov announced today the signing of an agreement between his government and Centerra Gold Inc. resolving their disputes over the ownership and management of the Kumtor Gold Company (KGC).

In a live address to the nation, President Japarov hailed the agreement as "a historic breakthrough" and pledged to use the increased revenue towards achieving the country's sustainable development goals.

The agreement provides for a clean separation and resolution of all disputes between the Government of Kyrgyzstan, Centerra, and Kyrgyzaltyn, the Kyrgyz State-owned gold mining corporation, which is a major shareholder of Centerra. The agreement's provisions include:

The Kyrgyz Republic and Kyrgyzaltyn will assume all responsibility for Kumtor Mine, and will retain income earned from the mine after 15 May 2021 .

and Kyrgyzaltyn will assume all responsibility for Kumtor Mine, and will retain income earned from the mine after . Centerra will make a cash payment of US$50 million for the purpose of preserving and protecting natural resources in the Kyrgyz Republic , which will satisfy its obligation to repay an outstanding loan to KGC.

, which will satisfy its obligation to repay an outstanding loan to KGC. Centerra will make a further cash payment of approximately US$36.6 million to Kyrgyzaltyn, of which approximately US$25.5 million will be remitted to the Canadian tax authorities and the remaining approximately US$11.1 million will be paid to Kyrgyzaltyn.

to Kyrgyzaltyn, of which approximately will be remitted to the Canadian tax authorities and the remaining approximately will be paid to Kyrgyzaltyn. In addition, US$53 million reclamation trust fund will be returned to the Kyrgyz Republic .

reclamation trust fund will be returned to the . Kyrgyzaltyn and Centerra will exchange shares, with Kyrgyzaltyn returning its shares in Centerra, and receiving 100% ownership of KGC.

The Agreement also foresees the full and final release of all claims of the parties, termination of all legal proceedings involving the parties in all jurisdictions with no admissions of liability.

The Agreement has been approved by the Government of Kyrgyzstan, including both parliament and the cabinet. The Government of Kyrgyzstan, Centerra and Kyrgyzaltyn expect the arrangement to close no later than 90 days following the signing of the agreement, but further steps will need to be completed successfully in order for the deal to take full effect.

President Japarov further stated: "It is no exaggeration to say that today is a true turning point in the history of our country. Today our people have taken responsibility for their fate into their own hands. Our national assets are now exactly what they should be  in our own hands. This proves that we are on the path of development and growth."

"Throughout this dispute, we have maintained that this is not about nationalisation. It is not Kyrgyzstan against foreign companies. It was about the specific issues with the management of Kumtor mine. We have always said that Kyrgyzstan is open for business. We will always welcome investment from those who share our respect for the rule of law, our national assets, and our national interest. This agreement proves that."

"I want us to now move forward as one people. In spite of all that has happened, we must take decisive strides forward. This is what we as people free in our own sovereign state must do. Our destiny is in our hands now and it is time to take responsibility for our future. Today's decision on Kumtor mine is just the beginning of many more great accomplishments in the development and growth of our country."

Kumtor Mine has been under interim external management since May 2021. In January, the mine posted successful results for 2021, including US$856 million in revenue  of which US$621 million was generated under the interim management. 2021 also saw the mine reduce its overall extraction costs by US$220 per ounce.

NOTES TO EDITORS:

Kumtor Gold Company is the country's biggest economic asset. It is responsible for 12% of Kyrgyzstan's GDP, and 23% of its industrial output. More than 4,000 people work at the complex, and the majority are Kyrgyzstani citizens. Kumtor is one of largest gold mines in the world, and is located at a very high altitude next to glaciers.

Since the government's takeover of the mine in May 2021 following concerns over breached environmental allegations, the two parties have been engaged in international arbitration and other disputes in Kyrgyzstan and abroad. The Global arrangement agreement is meant to effect a complete and orderly separation with Centerra, and to ensure that, in the future, the economic benefits of the Kumtor mine stay in Kyrgyzstan and that the mine can be operated consistently with all environmental, tax and other legislation of the Kyrgyz Republic.

SOURCE Government of Kyrgyzstan
Mouth Watering Flavors Combine for a Limited Time

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Great Steak (www.TheGreatSteak.com), America's Premier Cheesesteak brand, is introducing two new items to the menu that are sure to ignite the senses. A spin on our newly added menu item, the Classic Chicken Sandwich, Great Steak will feature the Honey Sriracha Chicken Sandwich and Honey Sriracha Chicken Fries for a limited time beginning April 4th.

Featured Menu Items:

Great Steak's New Sweet and Fiery Honey Sriracha Chicken is Making Mouths Water Tweet this Great Steak's New Honey Sriracha Chicken

Honey Sriracha Chicken Sandwich : Crispy chicken breast, tossed in a honey sriracha sauce, topped with mayo all in between a toasted Brioche bun.





: Crispy chicken breast, tossed in a honey sriracha sauce, topped with mayo all in between a toasted Brioche bun. Honey Sriracha Chicken Fries: Great Fries, topped with chunks of crispy chicken breast, honey sriracha sauce and sour cream.

In addition to the new Honey Sriracha Chicken options, Great Steak is also launching its new Catering Menu filled with ready-to-serve items from hearty sandwiches, wraps and salads to a build-your-own baked potato bar.

"We are excited to bring our guests two new sweet and spicy items featuring the mouth-watering combination of honey and Sriracha," said Heather Marini, national marketing manager for Great Steak. "And with our new catering options, guests can bring the fresh, grilled flavors of Great Steak to their homes and offices!"

Celebrating 40 years this year, Great Steak's special anniversary sweepstakes is going strong with chances to win a Limited-Edition Great Steak 40th Anniversary Swag Pack. Two lucky winners are selected each month through the end of the year. For more details on Great Steak's 40th Anniversary sweepstakes, please visit https://www.thegreatsteak.com/40thanniversary.



The Honey Sriracha Chicken Sandwich and Honey Sriracha Chicken Fries will be available in Great Steak locations nationwide until July 31st.

ABOUT GREAT STEAK

Headquartered in Scottsdale, Ariz., Great Steak has been serving fresh, grilled to order cheesesteaks in locations across the United States and abroad. The menu has grown from a single cheesesteak to a complete line of Specialty Sandwiches, Great Fries and Fresh Baked Potatoes. Great Steak maintains its authenticity by serving the finest American ingredients, from specialty cut and marinated beef to our freshly baked bread. Grilled to order, grilled to perfection, Great Steak is genuine homegrown comfort food. Founded in 1983, Great Steak has grown across the U.S. and abroad. In 2004 Great Steak became part of the Kahala Brands family, one of the fastest growing franchising conglomerates in the world with a portfolio of nearly 30 fast-casual and quick-service restaurant brands with close to 3,000 locations in over 25 countries.

SOURCE Great Steak
LOS ANGELES, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Greenspoon Marder is pleased to announce the expansion of the firm's Labor and Employment practice group with the addition of three new California attorneys. Brian E. Koegle and Michael R. Fostakowsky join as partners, and Ransom D. Boynton joins as an associate in the firm's Los Angeles offices.

"The team's strong market reputation in the Los Angeles community will further strengthen the firm's growing presence on the West Coast. They have an excellent track record of helping clients on employment counseling, employment litigation, and general commercial and business litigation and we are thrilled to have them on board," says Gerry Greenspoon, co-managing director at Greenspoon Marder. "We are excited to welcome these elite lawyers to the Greenspoon Marder family. They have established themselves as subject matter experts in California employment law and are well-renowned thought leaders in the industry," says Michael Marder, co-managing director at Greenspoon Marder.

"Michael, Ransom, and I are delighted to be joining a group of attorneys at Greenspoon Marder who share our approach of excellent client service, along with a practical and pragmatic approach to dispute resolution. As we make this transition, our goal is to continue helping California businesses navigate the complicated and confusing world of employment law compliance," says partner Brian Koegle.

Mr. Koegle provides counsel to employers in a large number of industries, including hiring practices, employment contracts, wage and hour issues, compensation, discipline, and termination matters. Mr. Koegle has extensive experience representing employers on various complex matters ranging from mediation, arbitration, litigation, administrative hearings, and defending employment discrimination and fair employment practice cases. He also assists employers in designing, drafting, modifying, and implementing personnel policies, procedures, and employee handbooks and conducts personnel policy audits. Additionally, Mr. Koegle counsels business owners on business and commercial disputes, including protection of trade secrets and proprietary information, and has first-chair trial experience litigating business and employment matters.

Mr. Fostakowsky concentrates his practice on employment and labor litigation in all California state and federal courts. He regularly represents employers in a broad range of matters, including discrimination, harassment, retaliation, wrongful termination, wage and hour issues, as well as various Labor Code violations. As a seasoned employment lawyer in and out of the courtroom, Mr. Fostakowsky has extensive experience litigating matters to verdict and successfully resolving hundreds of cases through mediation or other methods of alternative dispute resolution. He has also represented clients in front of the California Department of Labor Standards Enforcement, the Department of Fair Employment & Housing, as well as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Mr. Boynton focuses his practice on representing employers in all aspects of employment litigation, including wage and hour disputes, employment discrimination, employment contract, discrimination claims, and compliance issues. Mr. Boynton also advises a wide variety of companies and organizations in a multitude of industries on compliance with federal, state, and local labor and employment laws.

About Greenspoon Marder

Greenspoon Marder is a national full-service business law firm with over 200 attorneys and locations across the United States. We are ranked among American Lawyer's Am Law 200, as one of the top law firms in the U.S. since 2015. Since our inception in 1981, our firm has been committed to providing excellent client service through our cross-disciplinary, client-team approach. Our mission is to understand the challenges that our clients face, build collaborative relationships, and craft creative solutions designed and executed with long-term strategic goals in mind. We serve Fortune 500, middle-market public and private companies, start-ups, emerging businesses, individuals and entrepreneurs nationwide. For more information, visit www.gmlaw.com.

MEDIA CONTACT

Cynthia Howard, Chief Marketing Officer

720.370.1182 | [email protected]

SOURCE Greenspoon Marder
Purchase of title insurance underwriter will create more seamless end-to-end residential transactions

CHICAGO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Guaranteed Rate Companies, a leader in mortgage lending and digital financial services, announces today that it has closed on its acquisition of Attorneys' Title Guaranty Fund Inc. (ATG), a Chicago-based title insurance underwriter.

"Adding ATG's team to the Guaranteed Rate team is a total win-win situation, allowing us to further serve consumers in real estate sales and the purchase process," said Guaranteed Rate President and CEO Victor Ciardelli.

Ciardelli added, "I have always appreciated and valued the importance of the lawyer's role in real estate transactions. That is why Guaranteed Rate is committed to the lawyer-agent business model created by ATG. We look forward to building on ATG's success by giving lawyers and consumers the technology, tools and additional support that will enable ATG to flourish in the years to come."

Of the acquisition, ATG President and CEO Peter Birnbaum said, "This is a very exciting opportunity for our law firms, team members and customers. With the support of Guaranteed Rate, ATG will continue to be the single most ardent and effective advocate for lawyers in the conveyancing process. We are excited to be part of such an innovative, tech-forward company that is dedicated to preserving the lawyer-centric service model that has defined ATG's success over the years."

Birnbaum and his team have worked for decades to continue the legacy of the organization's founders: Preserving the lawyer's role in real estate transactions for the benefit of the consumer. "Together, ATG and Guaranteed Rate can continue our mission, long into the future, by demonstrating to the public that lawyers play an essential role in protecting consumers in the largest financial transaction of their lives," Birnbaum said.

During the last ten years, Guaranteed Rate Companies has experienced explosive growth, with a record $116 billion in total loan volume in 2021 alone. This acquisition will enable an even more seamless experience for consumers in new markets, expand the lawyer-centric model and bolster Guaranteed Rate's continued expansion into a broader range of financial services.

About Guaranteed Rate Companies

Guaranteed Rate Companies is a leader in mortgage lending and digital financial services. Headquartered in Chicago, the Guaranteed Rate Companies has more than 10,000 employees in over 850 branches across the U.S., serving all 50 states and Washington, D.C. Since its launch in 2000, Guaranteed Rate Companies has helped more than 1 million homeowners with home purchase loans and refinances, with a total loan volume of more than $116 billion in 2021 alone. The company has cemented itself as an industry leader by introducing innovative technology, offering low rates and delivering unparalleled customer service. Honors and awards include: Top Lender for Online Service for 2018 by U.S. News & World Report; Best Mortgage Lender for Online Loans and Best Mortgage Lender for Refinancing by NerdWallet for 2021; HousingWire's 2020 Tech100 award for the company's industry-leading FlashClose technology; No. 3 ranking in Scotsman Guide's 2021 list of Top Retail Mortgage Lenders; Chicago Agent Magazine's Lender of the Year for six consecutive years; and Chicago Tribune's Top Workplaces list for seven consecutive years. Visit rate.com for more information.

About Attorneys' Title Guaranty Fund Inc.

Through its thousands of member attorneys, ATG has presided over more than three million home closings and provided homebuyers with competitively priced title insurance since 1964. ATG has built a significant customer base by providing excellent service at competitive prices. It has been assigned a Financial Stability Rating (FSR) of A (A Prime), Unsurpassed, by the independent ratings bureau, Demotech, Inc. ATG has been included in the Crain's Chicago Business list of "Chicago's Largest Privately Held Companies," for five consecutive years, including January 2022. In addition, ATG has a Claims-Paying Ability Rating of A- from the Kroll Bond Rating Agency, Financial Institutions: Title Insurance Rating Report. For more information, see atgf.com/aboutATG/about-us. In addition to title insurance, ATG offers other law and housing-related services through its subsidiary companies. For more information, visit atgf.com/aboutATG/atg-subsidiaries.

Piper Sandler & Co. and Conlon and Company served as financial advisors to ATG; David T. Brown and Peter A. Shepard of Much Law P.C., served as legal counsel to ATG.

SOURCE Guaranteed Rate Companies
LAVAL, Quebec, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Bausch Health Companies Inc. (NYSE/TSX: BHC) ("Bausch Health") and its gastroenterology (GI) business, Salix Pharmaceuticals ("Salix"), one of the largest specialty pharmaceutical companies in the world committed to the prevention and treatment of gastrointestinal diseases and disorders, today released the results from the second edition of its Patient Perspectives Survey, an annual survey of U.S adults living with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) or chronic idiopathic constipation (CIC). The current report, Patient Perspectives: Living with IBS Now, offers a current understanding of the behaviors and experiences of the IBS and CIC patient population in the past year (February 2021  February 2022), including insights on diagnosis and symptom management. Most notably, almost half (49%) of respondents found their IBS or CIC symptoms have been more challenging to manage during the last 12 months. The report, which was developed based on a nationwide survey conducted in partnership with the Fairleigh Dickinson University Poll (FDU Poll), also addresses gaps in symptom management and reporting, and barriers to effective treatment. The survey also reveals trends in patient-provider communications.

Experience the interactive Multimedia News Release here: https://www.multivu.com/players/English/9017851-salix-pharmaceuticals-survey-living-with-ibs-now/

"Salix remains committed to delivering impactful resources that inform the entire IBS and CIC community and address the needs of both patients and health care providers," said Robert Spurr, president, Salix. "The findings of this year's report illustrate a need for more meaningful health care provider visits to help improve clinical outcomes. As many as 3.5 million annual health care provider visits for IBS take place in the U.S. each year1, and it is our hope that this research will encourage productive dialogue and a collaborative approach to symptom management and guideline-based treatment options during these visits."

Key findings from the report include:

Overall, 45% of patients acknowledged they began experiencing IBS or CIC symptoms within the last 24 months

More than three out of four patients surveyed report that several of their IBS or CIC symptoms included in the survey have not improved or have worsened over the last 12 months (between 77% and 81% of respondents)

92% of HCP-diagnosed patients surveyed were initially diagnosed with IBS or CIC during an in-person appointment with their health care provider

More than half (61%) of patients chose in-person visits as their preferred method of communication with the health care provider who treats their IBS or CIC

When meeting with their health care provider, 40% of patients shared they only discuss their main IBS or CICrelated symptom, rather than discussing all IBS or CIC-related symptoms

Nearly one-third (29%) of patients were not offered a prescription medicine to treat symptoms upon diagnosis of their IBS or CIC

To view key insights from Salix's Patient Perspectives: Living with IBS Now report, visit here. To view a comprehensive infographic, visit here.

About the Methodology Behind Patient Perspectives: Living with IBS Now

Data is from a non-probability online sample of U.S. residents and was carried out in February 2022 by Fairleigh Dickinson University's FDU Poll. Participants were recruited based on previously reported gastrointestinal issues. The overall sample size of the survey was 728 respondents and was screened to include only those who self-reported having IBS with constipation, chronic idiopathic constipation or IBS with diarrhea. Respondents were drawn from multiple panels of U.S. residents and were compensated for their time (maximum $5.00). Due to the limitations of this survey, results may not be representative of the general IBS or CIC population.

About Fairleigh Dickinson University

Since 2001, Fairleigh Dickinson University's FDU Poll has conducted survey research on issues of public importance. Utilizing best practices in survey methodology, FDU Poll produces authoritative statewide and national public polling. In addition, FDU Poll engages in research for corporate, non-profit and government entities. As a charter member of the American Association for Public Opinion Research's Transparency Initiative, the FDU Poll is devoted to building public confidence in polling by embracing the open science of survey research.

About Salix

Salix Pharmaceuticals is one of the largest specialty pharmaceutical companies in the world committed to the prevention and treatment of gastrointestinal diseases. For more than 30 years, Salix has licensed, developed and marketed innovative products to improve patients' lives and arm health care providers with life-changing solutions for many chronic and debilitating conditions. Salix currently markets its product line to U.S. health care providers through an expanded sales force that focuses on gastroenterology, hepatology, pain specialists and primary care. Salix is headquartered in Bridgewater, New Jersey. For more information about Salix, visit www.Salix.com and connect with us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

About Bausch Health

Bausch Health Companies Inc. (NYSE/TSX: BHC) is a global company whose mission is to improve people's lives with our health care products. We develop, manufacture and market a range of pharmaceutical, medical device and over-the-counter products, primarily in the therapeutic areas of eye health, gastroenterology, and dermatology. We are delivering on our commitments as we build an innovative company dedicated to advancing global health. More information can be found at www.bauschhealth.com.

Forward-looking Statements

This news release may contain forward-looking statements, which may generally be identified by the use of the words "anticipates," "expects," "intends," "plans," "should," "could," "would," "may," "believes," "estimates," "potential," "target," or "continue" and variations or similar expressions. These statements are based upon the current expectations and beliefs of management and are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the risks and uncertainties discussed in the Bausch Health's most recent annual report on Form 10-K and detailed from time to time in Bausch Health's other filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Canadian Securities Administrators, which factors are incorporated herein by reference. They also include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties caused by or relating to the evolving COVID-19 pandemic, and the fear of that pandemic and its potential effects, the severity, duration, and future impact of which are highly uncertain and cannot be predicted, and which may have a material adverse impact on Bausch Health, including but not limited to its project development timelines, and costs (which may increase). Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on any of these forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date hereof. Bausch Health undertakes no obligation to update any of these forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this news release or to reflect actual outcomes, unless required by law.

References

International Foundation for Gastrointestinal Disorders. (n.d.). Statistics. https://aboutibs.org/what-is-ibs/facts-about-ibs/statistics/

SAL.0024.USA.22

2022 Salix Pharmaceuticals or its affiliates.

SOURCE Salix Pharmaceuticals
ESS Announces Third Add-on Acquisition

WASHINGTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Echelon Supply and Service ("ESS"), backed by HCI Equity Partners ("HCI"), announced it acquired Berg-Nelson Company, Inc. ("Berg-Nelson" or the "Company") on March 30, 2022. ESS (f/k/a JGB Enterprises, Inc.) is a leading supply chain management and logistics services distributor of industrial hose, fluid power products, and hose assembly solutions throughout a diverse set of end markets including the U.S. Department of Defense, oil and gas, food and beverage, retail, construction, and industrial OEMs. Berg-Nelson is ESS's third add-on acquisition since HCI's platform investment. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Headquartered in Long Beach, California, Berg-Nelson is a supplier of hose, gaskets, and industrial products throughout Southern California. Founded in 1951, the Company distributes products to a variety of industrial end markets and focuses on quick turnaround and specialty applications. Berg-Nelson further expands ESS's geographic distribution network to the West Coast.

"Berg-Nelson is a long-standing market leader in California, and we welcome the highly experienced team at the Company," said Kevin Kilkelly, President of Echelon Supply and Service. We believe it represents a compelling opportunity for ESS to gain a strong presence on the West coast to provide our customers with an even larger product portfolio."

HCI Managing Partner Doug McCormick commented, "This is the third acquisition for ESS, and we're very pleased with the growth of the ESS platform through strategic acquisitions. Berg-Nelson is a well-respected, founder-owned company, which brings expertise and expanded distribution footprint that will further ESS' growth."

Greenberg Traurig, LLP served as legal counsel to ESS.

About Echelon Supply and Service

Echelon Supply and Service, formally known as JGB Enterprises, Inc., is a leading supply chain management and logistics service provider of industrial hose, fluid power products and hose assembly solutions to industrial and government end markets. ESS is headquartered in Liverpool, NY with additional locations in Buffalo, NY, North Carolina, Missouri, Louisiana, Eastern and Western Canada and Texas. For more information, please visit www.echelonsupply.com.

About HCI Equity Partners

HCI Equity Partners is a lower middle market private equity firm focused on partnering with family and founder-owned distribution, manufacturing and service companies. HCI is headquartered in Washington, DC. For more information, please visit www.hciequity.com.

Contacts:

Kelsey Clute, VP, Director of Communications, HCI

[email protected]

Darby Dame, Lambert

[email protected]

SOURCE HCI Equity Partners
HOUSTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Houston Natural Resources Corp. (OTC: HNRC) ("HNR or the Company") announced today that it expects to report strong results for the first quarter ending March 31, 2022.

The company is projecting $20 million in revenue and $10m in EBITDA for the year ending December 31,2022 with the first quarter projected to be $5 million in revenue and $2.5m in EBITDA. The company has historically been increasing revenues over the last three years. This is been due to increase in revenues from its portfolio companies and acquisitions.

The company's revenues have increased by more than 91% to $18,217.737 over the last year from the previous year and net income increasing by more than 157% to $7,636,830.

The company's net assets have increased 2% to $74,251,027 over the last year. The company's net asset value is $3.46 per share for the period ending December 31, 2021. The company recently announced a letter of intent to acquire Cunningham Energy, which would result in a significant increase in the company's assets for the year ending December 31,2022.

The company is planning on applying for listing on the OTCQB in the second quarter. It has engaged auditors Sadler Gibbs and the first year of Worldwide Diversified Holdings, Inc has been completed and they are working on the second year. The listing requirements include two-year audited statements.

The company sponsored a successful $86 million NYSE listing of an energy focused special purpose acquisition corporation during the first quarter of 2022. This will result in a dividend to its shareholders after the lock up period has expired.

The company is evaluating sponsoring other energy focused special purpose acquisition corporation and expects a second energy focused special purpose to be completed in the second quarter. This would also result in an additional dividend to the shareholders.

About Houston Natural Resources Corp

Houston Natural Resources Corp (www.hnrcholdings.com) (OTC: HNRC). The company is a diversified holding company with business operations and investments. The portfolio companies include investments in energy, information technology and healthcare.

FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS:

This press release may contain "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Statements other than statements of historical facts included in this press release may constitute forward-looking statements and are not guarantees of future performance or results and involve a number of risks and uncertainties.

Contact:

Houston Natural Resources Corp

E-mail: [email protected]

Houston Texas USA.

Phone: (757) 707-4563

SOURCE Houston Natural Resources Corp.
Hyperproof offers its compliance software for free to critical infrastructure sectors for a proactive defense posture Tweet this

To help these vitally important organizations in the U.S. and their counterpart organizations in the EU take a proactive approach to cyber defense during this critical time, Hyperproof has chosen to offer its compliance operations software (including a risk register) to them for free for one year. With Hyperproof's intuitive compliance operations software, an organization will be able to:

Track all risks centrally and gain immediate visibility to their risks and their impact.

Implement security controls based on the golden standard of security guidelines for managing cyber risk  the NIST Cybersecurity Framework

Have a single place to easily manage all critical controls on a continuous basis and validate those controls' effectiveness with automation (both evidence collection and testing), workflow, alerting, and analytics features within Hyperproof

"Here at Hyperproof, we wanted to do what we can to help these critical organizations shore up their cyber defense posture  so they can survive cyber attack attempts and remain operational. Chances are, most organizations can quickly identify a few immediate actions to reduce their attack surface, but may not have a complete picture of their attack surface or the imminent threat that is likely already in their systems," says Matt Lehto, Hyperproof's Chief Growth Officer.

"By providing Hyperproof, we hope that organizations can gain better visibility to their risks and security controls  and have an easier time doing the work needed to validate their security posture."

To learn more about this free offer, please visit: hyperproof.io/cyber-defense-solution/

This offer is exclusively available to organizations in the 16 critical infrastructure sectors in the U.S., as defined by the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency as well as critical infrastructure companies in European Union countries, as defined by Directive 2008/114/EC .

About Hyperproof

Hyperproof is a software company focused on creating revolutionary software that brings trust to life. To date, Hyperproof has delivered an innovative SaaS compliance operations platform that empowers compliance, risk, and security teams to stay on top of all compliance work and manage organizational risks (including vendor risks) on a continuous basis. Hyperproof has disrupted the GRC space by tackling a pressing problem ignored by others: helping compliance pros gain control over and effectively manage their ever-growing workload. Hyperproof is used by market leaders in security tech, enterprise software, fintech, healthcare tech, and data communications. To learn more about Hyperproof, visit https://hyperproof.io

Media Contact: Jingcong Zhao

[email protected]

Senior Director, Product Marketing at Hyperproof

SOURCE Hyperproof
Istanbul has emerged as a leading flight destination in the Mena region even as the global tourism and aviation sectors appear to be making a rapid recovery, according to leading flight-booking website Wingie.



Despite continued concerns over Omicron, international air travel in the Mena region showed major signs of recovery in this years first quarter, Wingie Commercial Director Orkun Ozkan said. Istanbul, meanwhile, topped the list of the most preferred destinations among Mena travellers.



According to first-quarter data compiled by Wingie.ae, most of the flight tickets purchased in Mena were to Istanbul, followed by Khartoum, Manila, Dhaka, Baku, Lucknow, Entebbe and London.



Wingies survey also found that, most flights originating from Mena departed from the Saudi cities of Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam and Abha. During the first several weeks of the year, numerous flights also departed from Dubai, Kuwait City and Cairo.



Throughout the period, travellers from Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan and Oman mostly travelled to Istanbul, Ozkan says. The three most popular air routes were Riyadh-Khartoum, Jeddah-Khartoum and Riyadh-Baku.



Wingies survey found that, following Istanbul, the most popular destinations among the same demographic were Khartoum, Manila, Baku and London. More than 15 million people use Wingie each month to book their flights, so it can provide a very good picture of overall travel trends and consumer preferences, Ozkan said.



According to the survey, the average age of those booking tickets through Wingie is 34, and roughly half of them travelled alone during this years first quarter. Ozkan also points out that Wingie  through its cutting-edge LogiConnect platform  can offer route and transfer options that airlines are generally unable to provide.



Thanks to the platforms sophisticated algorithm, nine out of ten LogiConnect users reached their final destinations by way of a single stopover, and with an average cost advantage of 36%, he explained. Wingie will continue to develop its services with the ultimate aim of shaping the future of air travel  and passing the benefits along to its customers.  TradeArabia News Service
RANCHO CUCAMONGA, Calif., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Inland Empire Health Plan (IEHP), a top 10 largest Medicaid health plan and the largest not-for-profit Medicare-Medicaid plan in the country, today announced that Angelica Baltazar, MSW has been named as president of the newly created IEHP Foundation.

The Foundation is the philanthropic arm of IEHP and is uniquely positioned to increase philanthropy and generosity in the region, helping to fill the void for those most vulnerable and keeping dollars in the community.

Inland Empire Health Plan (IEHP), a top 10 largest Medicaid health plan and the largest not-for-profit Medicare-Medicaid plan in the country, today announced that Angelica Baltazar, MSW has been named as president of the newly created IEHP Foundation.

The Foundation's work is centered around achieving what IEHP calls Vibrant Health for the Inland Empire. Vibrant Health means that IEHP's Members and the residents of the Inland Empire will have access to a better, more joyful life through programs that address the root causes of illness, health equity, and the core needs of the community.

Baltazar has more than 20 years of experience in the public health and human services sectors. She joins IEHP from San Antonio Regional Hospital where she most recently served as the Executive Lead for Health Equity and the Executive Director of the Lewis-San Antonio Healthy Communities Institute.

Baltazar holds a bachelor's in social work from Cal Poly Pomona and master's in policy planning and administration from Loma Linda University. She is a community advisory member for Inland SoCal United Way, and a board member of Partners for Better Health and Promise Scholars.

"Finding the right person to lead the IEHP Foundation was a critical first step in its development," said IEHP Chief Executive Officer Jarrod McNaughton. "Angelica's expertise in this field will support our efforts to improve the health of the IE for decades into the future."

About IEHP

With a mission to heal and inspire the human spirit, Inland Empire Health Plan (IEHP) is one of the top 10 largest Medicaid health plans and the largest not-for-profit Medicare-Medicaid plan in the country. In its 25th year, IEHP is supporting more than 1.5 million residents in Riverside and San Bernardino counties who are enrolled in Medicaid or Cal MediConnect Plans and has a growing network of over 7,800 providers and nearly 2,500 Team Members. Through dynamic partnerships with Providers and Community Organizations, paired with award-winning service and a tradition of quality care, IEHP is fully committed to their vision: We will not rest until our communities enjoy optimal care and vibrant health. For more information, visit iehp.org.

Contact: Inland Empire Health Plan

Chelsea Galvez, Media Relations Strategist

(909) 727-5263, [email protected]

SOURCE Inland Empire Health Plan (IEHP)
PLANO, Texas, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Improving, a modern digital services company with a strong history as a System Integrator (SI) and an indirect Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) in the Microsoft Partner ecosystem, has announced the formation of a new team. To support the tremendous company growth around the Microsoft practice, a new corporate team has been created to focus on the partnership with Microsoft. The Improving Microsoft Services Team will work closely with each Improving enterprise to ensure they are maximizing the value of the Microsoft Partnership and assisting clients to do the same for the investments they are making in Microsoft technologies.

Improving's CEO, Curtis Hite, has appointed former President of Improving Cleveland, Lowell Messner, to lead the newly created team. "As Improving continues to accelerate our Microsoft business, the time was right to create a corporate team who can serve as a resource to each of our enterprises" shares Curtis. "Recently, with our enterprises in Columbus and Cleveland merging to create Improving Ohio it has allowed us to re-position a leader with deep expertise and a passion for the Microsoft Partnership. Lowell's experience and success with Microsoft has always been a value for Improving and is something we are now looking to replicate across North America."
DENVER, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Income Laboratory, Inc. (Income Lab), the investment industry's only provider of software for dynamicnot staticretirement planning, today announced the formation of the Income Lab Research Council, bringing together financial planning professors and researchers to exchange ideas and develop projects that can benefit the planning community, including advisors, investors, researchers, teachers, and students.

The Income Lab Research Council, based in Denver, will meet quarterly and aims to contribute both to the education of the next generation of advisors and planners and to the ongoing education of current practitioners.

The inaugural council consists of:

David Evans , PhD, lecturer and CFP program director, Purdue University

, PhD, lecturer and CFP program director, Justin Fitzpatrick , PhD, CFA, CFP, chief innovation officer and co-founder, Income Lab

, PhD, CFA, CFP, chief innovation officer and co-founder, Income Lab Michael Kothakota , PhD, CFP, professor of practice, Kansas State University , and lecturer, Columbia University

, PhD, CFP, professor of practice, , and lecturer, Derek Lawson , PhD, CFP, assistant professor, Kansas State University

, PhD, CFP, assistant professor, Craig Lemoine , PhD, CFP, financial planning program director and associate teaching professor, University of Illinois , editor, Journal of Personal Finance

, PhD, CFP, financial planning program director and associate teaching professor, , editor, Journal of Personal Finance Johnny Poulsen , CFP, CEO and co-founder, Income Lab

, CFP, CEO and co-founder, Income Lab Brandon Ratzlaff , CFP, instructor, Texas Tech University , and adjunct professor, Southern Methodist University

, CFP, instructor, , and adjunct professor, Derek Tharp , PhD, CFP, assistant professor of finance, University of Southern Maine

"Our newly launched Research Council supports Income Lab's mission of helping people live their best retirement, with financial security," Income Lab's Fitzpatrick said. "The pursuit of academic rigor and ongoing research to advance evidence-based retirement planning solutions are part of our DNA, and we are delighted to be collaborating with this distinguished group of educators."

Financial advisors use Income Lab's advanced technology to build and monitor dynamic retirement income plans to help retirees adjust for evolving economic and market conditions, taxes, and changes in spending. Income Lab's software monitors retirement plans monthly to see whether circumstances have changed sufficiently to warrant modifications and then notifies advisors, who can discuss any adjustments with clients.

"I firmly believe Income Lab is the future of retirement modeling and distribution software. Its tools are innovative and forward thinking and we are thrilled to teach this platform to our financial planning students at the University of Illinois," said Lemoine.

Kothakota added, "I'm excited to help Income Lab serve the retirement planning community and influence the direction of retirement planning research and education in America."

About Income Lab

Income Lab is the only provider of software for dynamicnot staticretirement planning. Financial advisors use Income Lab's advanced technology to build and monitor dynamic retirement income plans that help retirees adjust for evolving economic and market conditions, taxes, and changes in client spending. Income Lab's software monitors retirement plans monthly to see whether circumstances have changed sufficiently to warrant modifications and then notifies advisors, who can discuss any adjustments with clients.

Denver-based Income Lab was co-founded in 2018 by Chief Innovation Officer Justin Fitzpatrick, Ph.D., CFA, CFP, and CEO Johnny Poulsen, CFP, after careers in financial services sales, distribution and management. For more information visit www.incomelaboratory.com.

Media Contacts:

Margaret Kirch Cohen Rich Chimberg Newton Park PR, LLC Newton Park PR, LLC +1 847 507 2229 +1 617 312 4281 [email protected] [email protected]

SOURCE Income Lab
The Minnesota-based consultants bring occupational health, industrial hygiene, and environmental compliance project experience within the commercial, industrial, institutional and governmental market sectors

MINNEAPOLIS, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Braun Intertec, a Minneapolis-based engineering, consulting and testing firm with offices throughout the United States, is pleased to announce Industrial Hygiene Services Corporation (IHSC), a Minnesota-based consulting firm, has joined Braun Intertec. IHSC brings experienced consultants known for their expertise in occupational health, industrial hygiene and environmental compliance.

"Protecting the health and safety of clients and our employee owners is one of our company's core values and we are thrilled IHSC joined Braun Intertec to expand our industrial hygiene, occupational health and safety service capabilities," says Jon Carlson, CEO of Braun Intertec. "The addition of IHSC consultants to our environmental consulting team will be a strategic asset as we continue to deliver quality client service and live our value for safety."

The addition of IHSC consultants to Braun Intertec will expand the company's industrial hygiene service offerings and client service capabilities. IHSC consultants are known across the Upper Midwest for their technical skills, extensive regulatory knowledge and experience, and attention to detail. They also bring project experience on commercial, industrial, institutional and governmental projects.

"The entire IHSC team is thrilled to be joining an employee-owned consulting and testing firm with values that closely reflect ours," says Tim Huber, Owner of Industrial Hygiene Services Corporation. "As a values-driven company, Braun Intertec will continue our tradition of building long-term client relationships and delivering high-quality service."

The deal became effective April 1. For more information about Braun Intertec, visit www.braunintertec.com.

About Braun Intertec

Based in Minneapolis, employee-owned Braun Intertec is a premier engineering, environmental consulting and testing firm with more than 1,000 employees located in Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, South Carolina, Texas and Wisconsin.

SOURCE Braun Intertec
The Company Reported Increased Sales In All Business Segments and a 3% Overall Increase In Revenue For 2021 Compared to 2020

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- International Isotopes Inc. (OTCQB: INIS) (the "Company") announces its financial results for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2021.

Total revenues in 2021 were approximately $9.6 million compared to approximately $9.3 million in 2020, which represents an increase of approximately 3%. Our net loss was $902,347 in 2021, compared to net income about $2.2 million in 2020. Our decrease in net income was largely the result of other income received in 2020 in connection with the settlement of a manufacturing and supply agreement. That agreement had resulted in one time income to the company in 2020 of approximately $2.5 million.

The following is a summary of significant accomplishments of the Company in 2021:

Increased sales in the Radiochemical segment by 5% mainly due to a 9% increase in sales of our FDA approved generic sodium iodide I-131 drug product.







Purchased the remaining 75.5% of RadQual, LLC, making RadQual, LLC and TI Services, LLC wholly-owned subsidiaries of International Isotopes, Inc.







Successfully obtained cobalt-60 from the Department of Energy (DOE) to increase our cobalt source production activities which contributed to an 11% increase in Cobalt Product revenues.







Developed several new products for our Nuclear Medicine products segment and expanded these products into Positron Emission Tomography (PET) imaging standards.

Sales of the Company's radiochemical products accounted for approximately 44% of our total sales revenue in 2021 and 2020. Sales in this segment increased by approximately 5% in 2021 as compared to 2020 primarily as a result of increasing sales of our new generic sodium iodide I-131 drug product.

Sales of nuclear medicine standards accounted for approximately 40% and 39%, of our total sales revenue in 2021 and 2020, respectively. Sales in this segment increased by approximately 5% as compared to 2020. This increase in sales is likely due to some improvements in sales seen as the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic begins to subside.

Cobalt products sales accounted for approximately 14% of our total sales revenue in 2021 and approximately 13% in 2020. Sales in this segment increased by approximately 11% in 2021 as compared to 2020. The increase in revenue within this segment is the result of increased Cobalt Sealed Source Manufacturing supported by increased availability of cobalt from the Department of Energy (DOE) in 2021. Our sealed source manufacturing generates much of our revenue within this segment and sealed source sales depend to a great extent on our ability to procure this cobalt material.

Steve Laflin, Chief Executive Officer of the Company, stated, "We continued to see an improvement in all of our business segments financial performance during the past year. The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has continued to have a negative impact on our business sales in 2021, but in spite of that we still achieved the highest annual revenue for the Company in three years. We believe we will continue to see significant recovery of markets, patient treatment schedules, and our product sales in 2022. We will continue to promote sales of our sodium iodide product, and aggressively launch new products within the nuclear medicine standards business segment. The recent increase in the amount of cobalt available from the Department of Energy (DOE) will continue to facilitate further increases in our cobalt product sales in the coming year. We believe that the combination of improving market conditions, following the decline in COVID-19 cases, coupled with our growth projections for each of our business segments, should lead to excellent financial performance for the Company in 2022 and beyond."



International Isotopes Inc.

Year Ended December 31,































$

%





2021

2020

Change

Change



Sale of Product $ 9,661,942

$ 9,364,896

$ 297,046

3%



Gross Profit $ 5,737,800

$ 5,460,027

$ 277,773

5%



Total Operating Expense $ 6,418,592

$ 5,875,700

$ 542,892

9%



Operating Loss Before Other Exp. $ (680,792)

$ (415,673)

$ (265,119)

64%



Other Income (Expense) $ (108,168)

$ 2,858,381

$ (2,966,549)

-104%























Net Income (Loss) $ (902,347)

$ 2,202,651

$ (3,104,998)

-141%























Net income per common share - basic: $0.00

$0.01































Net income per common share - diluted: $0.00

$0.01































Weighted avg. sh. outstanding - basic 477,723,996

423,091,174































Weighted avg. sh. outstanding - dilluted 477,723,996

431,208,535



















































About International Isotopes Inc. International Isotopes Inc. supplies sodium iodide I-131 as an FDA approved generic drug product and manufactures a full range of nuclear medicine calibration and reference standards. The Company also provides cobalt-60 products for medical and industrial applications.

International Isotopes Inc. Safe Harbor Statement

Certain statements in this press release are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, including statements with respect to revenue expectations for the future within our business segments, our ability to launch new products, and the impact of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) on our business. Information contained in such forward-looking statements is based on current expectations and is subject to change. These statements involve several risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual results, performance or achievements of International Isotopes Inc. to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements of the Company expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Other factors, which could materially affect such forward-looking statements, can be found in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission at www.sec.gov, including its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2021. Investors, potential investors, and other readers are urged to consider these factors carefully in evaluating the forward-looking statements and are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements made herein are only made as of the date of this press release and International Isotopes, Inc. and the Company undertakes no obligation to publicly update such forward-looking statements to reflect subsequent events or circumstances.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT:

David Drewitz

Creative Options Communications

Investor and Public Relations

[email protected]

www.creativeoptionsmarketing.com

Phone: 972-814-5723

SOURCE International Isotopes Inc.
This comes on the heels of the company being named a Late-Stage Vendor in the New Tech: Revenue Operations and Intelligence, Q4 2021 Forrester Research report late last year, a Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Canada company for the third consecutive year, a Deloitte Fast 500 North America company for the second consecutive year, as well as a 2021 Best Workplaces in Technology by Great Place to Work.

The Q1 Forrester Wave report provides revenue and technology leaders with an overview of the primary capabilities and providers within major market segments to help inform their technology strategies. We believe it confirms Introhive's unique functionality and value across multiple industries.

According to the Forrester report, Introhive's "success has been built on proven use cases in professional, financial, and legal services, where sales are complex and relationship influence is high. Reference customers cited the visibility Introhive gave them into previously invisible relationships. Organizations in high-risk, complex selling environments seeking greater buyer insights and related data management should consider Introhive".

"I'm thrilled to see that we've been named a contender in the Wave report," said Jody Glidden, CEO and Founder of Introhive. "I see this as a representation of the unique approach we're taking in comparison to most of the market landscape in terms of who we are serving and the way in which we are serving them. I'm extremely pleased to see that our focus and ability to serve companies in high stakes, complex industries like financial services, professional services and consulting were captured in this report."

To download a complimentary copy of the report, go here.

About Introhive

Introhive is the fastest-growing AI-powered sales and relationship intelligence platform, with the single largest revenue acceleration deployment in the world. Trusted by some of the world's most recognizable brands, including PwC, Clark Nexsen, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Colliers International, and Plante Moran, the company has been recognized with 2019, 2020 and 2021 Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Canada Awards , 2020 and 2021 Deloitte Fast 500 North America Awards , 2020 and 2021 MarTech Breakthrough Awards , and is Great Place to Work certified in Canada. Introhive's AI-powered SaaS platform seeks to enable organizations to realize the full value of their relationships across the business and to leverage untapped data to drive revenues and increase productivity while simultaneously improving the customer experience. Introhive has grown to 350+ employees with 10 global office locations, supporting 250,000+ customers in over 90 different countries around the world.

more at www.introhive.ai

Media Inquiries:

Renee Maler

Philosophy PR + Marketing

510.499.9746

[email protected]

SOURCE Introhive
Last-minute filers can connect online with live tax pros for free within minutes, skipping hours on hold with IRS hotline

SAN FRANCISCO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- JustAnswer, a popular Q&A website that connects people with experts for on-demand professional help, has launched a new online chat feature that puts taxpayers with last minute questions in touch with professional tax experts in three minutes or less.

JustAnswer Tax Chat JustAnswer Tax Chat

For nearly 20 years, JustAnswer has connected people with doctors, lawyers, veterinarians, and tax experts for expert help, but for the first time, people can chat for FREE online with live, credentialed tax specialists for answers to their personal tax questions via a special Tax Chat site (https://www.justanswer.com/taxchat) operating now through the April 18th IRS tax filing deadline. Given that one in three (33%) Americans wait until the first two weeks in April to file their taxes*, the special JustAnswer Tax Chat site provides an eleventh-hour lifeline for people struggling to navigate new tax laws and Pandemic-related issues such as the Advance Child Care Credit, stimulus payments and more.

Unlike other tax assistance services available, JustAnswer Tax Chat is:

Convenient - it connects people in minutes to a live specialist for an interactive, online chat rather than having to endure lengthy hold times to reach an agent on the official IRS hotline

Available to anyone who needs it, not just those using a specific tax software program or working with a professional preparer

Free - no credit card or other payment information is required to speak with a JustAnswer tax pro

"The weeks leading up to the IRS deadline is always one of the busiest times of the year for our finance experts on JustAnswer, with the number of tax questions nearly doubling from about mid-March on. This year, we wanted to provide access to online chat with experts to anyone, free of cost through a special dedicated site," explains JustAnswer Executive Vice President of Operations Pamela Webber. "Now, instead of waiting hours to speak to a live human being, or randomly searching the internet for information, they can be connected to a real person within three minutes for an online chat to get the professional tax expertise they need."

Founded in 2003 and now the world's largest online Q&A site, JustAnswer has hundreds of verified and vetted tax professionals working round-the-clock on its platform to help visitors to itsTax Chat site this year. So far in 2022 alone, the company has already received over 22,000 tax questions and expects to process more than double that by the end of April  primarily related to pandemic-related programs and issues such as the Advance Child Care Act, stimulus payments and home office deductions. Typically, the number of questions increases more than 60% in the final two weeks leading up to the annual filing deadline.

About JustAnswer

JustAnswer is an online platform that connects people with live Doctors, Lawyers, Veterinarians, Mechanics and other verified and vetted Experts for real-time, personalized assistance and answers to just about any question or problem 24/7. With more than 12,000 experts across 700 categories, JustAnswer is the leading destination for accessing affordable professional help on-demand when and from wherever you need it.

Media Contacts:

Andrea Toch for JustAnswer: [email protected]; phone: 602-405-8335

*Source: IPX 2021 Survey: https://www.ipx1031.com/americas-biggest-tax-procrastinators-2021/

SOURCE JustAnswer
WICHITA, Kan., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Kansas College of Osteopathic Medicine at Kansas Health Science Center in downtown Wichita is gearing up for its inaugural class with the addition of four new staff members: Darrell Youngman, DO, professor of internal medicine; Nicholas Palisch, Ph.D., director of student affairs; Francis Fitzpatrick, Ph.D., and Stacy Jones, Ph.D., both faculty in biomedical sciences.

Dr. Youngman currently serves as a staff cardiologist at Newman Regional Health in Emporia, and is a former cardiologist for the U.S. Air Force. In addition to his clinical experience, Dr. Youngman was also chief quality officer and chief medical officer for Via Christi Health System in Wichita. Dr. Youngman went to medical school at the Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine in Fort Worth and had a fellowship in cardiology at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Washington, D.C.

Dr. Palisch has spent the majority of his career in higher education, most recently as director of student and alumni services at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. He received his Ph.D. in education from Capella University in Minneapolis and is a member of several national higher education organizations.

Dr. Fitzpatrick most recently served as professor of pharmacology and discipline chair at the Trinity School of Medicine in St. Vincent and the Grenadines and as a professor in the department of pharmacology at the University of Colorado School of Medicine in Denver. Prior to that, Dr. Fitzpatrick conducted research for institutions around the world from Stockholm, Sweden, to Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Dr. Jones has spent the past 19 years teaching biology at Newman University and recently served as a faculty facilitator for case-based collaborative learning at the University of Kansas School of Medicine-Wichita. Her areas of expertise are physiology, microbiology, immunology, human embryology and developmental biology, and cell and molecular biology.

Kansas College of Osteopathic Medicine is the first osteopathic medical school in the state of Kansas and will welcome its inaugural class in August. The campus recently underwent construction to transform 116,000 square feet of the iconic building at 217 E. Douglas Ave. in the heart of downtown Wichita and features clean, inspirational design; innovative, state-of-the-art technology and learning spaces; an osteopathic skills training center; standardized patient teaching rooms; large lecture halls; small-group study rooms; a virtual anatomy lab; and much more.

Kansas Health Science Center is part of TCS Education System, a nonprofit, integrated system that works collaboratively to advance institutional sustainability, student success, and community impact.

About Kansas Health Science Center:

Kansas Health Science Center is a nonprofit organization committed to developing strong, innovative education programs in emerging areas of health care. By opening the Kansas College of Osteopathic Medicine in 2022, KHSC strives to positively impact the health landscape in Wichita and the state of Kansas through directly addressing the disparity in access to health care. Learn more.

About Kansas College of Osteopathic Medicine:

Kansas College of Osteopathic Medicine's inaugural class will begin in August 2022. Implementing a curriculum that is student focused, patient centered, and community based, the mission of the nonprofit institution is to train the osteopathic physician of the future to provide effective, empathetic, and innovative care to optimize the health of patients and their communities. Located in downtown Wichita, KansasCOM is the first osteopathic medical school in the state of Kansas. Learn more at KansasCOM.org.

SOURCE Kansas Health Science Center
The Ax-1 crew is scheduled to launch April 6

HOUSTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- KBR (NYSE: KBR) announced today the completion of its private astronaut training for the upcoming Axiom Mission 1 (Ax-1); the first private astronaut mission in history planned to visit the International Space Station (ISS).

Crew preparation is critical to the safety and success of every human spaceflight mission, a support service KBR has provided for more than 60 years. KBR is currently serving as prime contractor for the Integrated Mission Operations Contract II (IMOC II) and Human Health and Performance Contract (HHPC) with NASA. In 2019, KBR was granted the opportunity to train private astronauts at NASA facilities, a space-industry first.

"KBR is one of the only companies with the expertise needed in ISS systems and space medical operations to deliver this crucial commercial space training," said Stuart Bradie, KBR President and CEO. "We have pioneered space travel for more than half a century and are proud to leverage this domain expertise for the next phase of exploration and research."

Led by KBR, the Ax-1 crew completed a months-long private astronaut training curriculum focused on health, safety and daily life onboard the ISS.

"The KBR team's expertise was key in the preparation of the Ax-1 crew. They facilitated our readiness with over 100 hours of hands-on instruction for all aspects of the mission, prioritizing the safety and health of the Ax-1 crew as well as of the residents aboard the International Space Station on our mission. My crew mates and I are grateful to the KBR team and our partners at NASA for their focus and dedication to training," said Michael Lopez-Alegria, commander of the Ax-1 mission.

Scheduled to launch on April 6, the Ax-1 mission plans to focus its efforts on microgravity research, conducting more than 25 experiments while onboard the space station.

About KBR

We deliver science, technology and engineering solutions to governments and companies around the world. KBR employs approximately 28,000 people performing diverse, complex and mission critical roles in 34 countries.

KBR is proud to work with its customers across the globe to provide technology, value-added services, and long- term operations and maintenance services to ensure consistent delivery with predictable results. At KBR, We Deliver.

Visit www.kbr.com

Forward Looking Statement

The statements in this press release that are not historical statements, including statements regarding future financial performance, are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws. These statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond the company's control that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results expressed or implied by the statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to: the significant adverse impacts on economic and market conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic and the company's ability to respond to the resulting challenges and business disruption; the recent dislocation of the global energy market; the company's ability to manage its liquidity; the outcome of and the publicity surrounding audits and investigations by domestic and foreign government agencies and legislative bodies; potential adverse proceedings by such agencies and potential adverse results and consequences from such proceedings; changes in capital spending by the company's customers; the company's ability to obtain contracts from existing and new customers and perform under those contracts; structural changes in the industries in which the company operates; escalating costs associated with and the performance of fixed-fee projects and the company's ability to control its cost under its contracts; claims negotiations and contract disputes with the company's customers; changes in the demand for or price of oil and/or natural gas; protection of intellectual property rights; compliance with environmental laws; changes in government regulations and regulatory requirements; compliance with laws related to income taxes; unsettled political conditions, war and the effects of terrorism; foreign operations and foreign exchange rates and controls; the development and installation of financial systems; the possibility of cyber and malware attacks; increased competition for employees; the ability to successfully complete and integrate acquisitions; and operations of joint ventures, including joint ventures that are not controlled by the company.

The company's most recently filed Annual Report on Form 10-K, any subsequent Form 10-Qs and 8-Ks, and other U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings discuss some of the important risk factors that the company has identified that may affect its business, results of operations and financial condition. Except as required by law, the company undertakes no obligation to revise or update publicly any forward-looking statements for any reason.

SOURCE KBR, Inc.
Tek Travels DMCC, a wholly owned subsidiary of TBO Tek Limited (TBO), has acquired 51% stake in BookaBed AG to scale up its businesss services and offerings.

TBO is one of the leading global travel distribution platforms connecting over 100,000 travel buyers across more than 110 countries with millions of travel suppliers, as of October 31, 2021.

Headquartered in Switzerland, BookaBed is a trade only company with a strong focus on consistently delivering high-quality customer service while offering great deals in Europe, US, Asia and Australia. It is also a B2B accommodation provider to the Irish and UK travel industries.

Increasing market share in Ireland, UK

BookaBed intends to increase its market share in Ireland and the UK by leveraging TBOs global API business, and TBO Academy that trains and educates travel agents and travel trade partners.

Gaurav Bhatnagar, Co-Founder and Joint Managing Director of TBO, said: "BookaBed allows TBOs entry into the Irish market and strengthens our UK presence. Both TBO and BookaBed have a significant opportunity to leverage each other's strengths and further expand our presence in current and future markets."

"What really makes this truly promising is our shared core values. There are synergies in our business models and vision, but the core values we share are vital when building for the long term. Under Karls continued leadership, we look forward to strengthening BookaBeds business," he stated.

Karl Tyrrell, CEO of BookaBed, said: As the world returns to travel, we look forward to leveraging TBO's technology and content. This combined with BookaBeds deep distribution reach and market position in Ireland and UK creates an even more compelling value for BookaBed customer partners.

No management change

He added: We will continue to service our customers as we currently do and promote and operate the BookaBed brand that is so well known in these markets. There will be no change to our management, sales or support teams.

TBO has won several accolades over the years and has been consistently winning the prestigious World Travel Awards for being Indias leading B2B travel portal since 2019. Its TBO+ proposition is a comprehensive rewards program designed exclusively for buyers where they can earn reward points for each transaction done through the TBO platform and points can be redeemed for a variety of lifestyle and travel products.

TBO also has a dedicated corporate travel booking platform - Paxes and their first B2C business - Zamzam.com, focused on the booming religious tourism, making TBO a truly simplified travel ecosystem.-TradeArabia News Service
The all-inclusive outsourcing agreement will increase branch and ATM channel efficiency and provide members with modern and convenient self-service banking

HUDSON, Ohio, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Diebold Nixdorf (NYSE: DBD), a global leader in driving connected commerce for the financial and retail industries, today announced it will operate and manage the entire self-service banking channel for Langley Federal Credit Union (FCU). The credit union will implement the full suite of DN AllConnect ServicesSM and replace its entire fleet with DN SeriesTM devices.

Langley FCU, one of the 100 largest credit unions in the United States, continuously looks for ways to improve the value of membership through innovation. Through the ATM as a Service model, the credit union will pay Diebold Nixdorf a monthly fee for the equipment and all services received. Diebold Nixdorf is responsible for all operations, including implementation, maintenance, monitoring and event management, compliance, security, cash management and transaction management. This approach will increase branch and ATM channel efficiency and continuously maximize convenience for credit union members. Deployment of the entire solution is expected to be completed by July 2022.

To further optimize each branch, the new DN Series ATMs will be connected to DN AllConnectSM Data Engine. Technical data will be continuously aggregated and analyzed using the latest developments in cloud computing and machine learning, enabling Diebold Nixdorf to generate personalized, actionable insights for each device. This helps decrease the number of incidents and resolution time and significantly improve ATM availability.

Langley Federal Credit Union Vice President of Operations, Jeff Gehris, said: "We chose to transfer management of our self-service fleet to Diebold Nixdorf because the company's innovative nature set them apart from the competition. By replacing our fleet with DN Series ATMs and outsourcing all operations, we can provide our members with a modern and convenient banking experience and bolster revenue-generating opportunities through self-service."

Langley FCU will also implement Transaction Automation, part of the DN Vynamic Branch Transformation suite of software solutions. When an ATM detects an on-us customer, it will process the transaction directly to the credit union's core backend system. This empowers Langley FCU to facilitate transactions in-house whenever possible and enables more advanced and complex transactions.

Diebold Nixdorf senior vice president, North America Banking, Chad Buckland, said: "We are excited to partner with Langley FCU to provide a comprehensive service that enables them to reduce the complexities of their self-service channel, lower their total cost of ownership and increase their security controls removing risks related to non-compliance with regulations, security or obsolescence."

About Langley Federal Credit Union

Langley Federal Credit Union is a federally-chartered credit union, regulated and insured by the National Credit Union Administration. Langley Federal Credit Union serves more than 320,000 members and has $4.2 billion in assets, ranking the financial cooperative as one of the 100 largest credit unions in the country.

Langley is a full-service financial institution where everyone can save, borrow, and spend wisely. Located in Hampton Roads, Langley has 20 branches, over 650 employees and more than 55,000 surcharge-free ATMs throughout the region. For more information, visit www.langleyfcu.org.

About Diebold Nixdorf

Diebold Nixdorf, Incorporated (NYSE: DBD) is a world leader in enabling connected commerce. We automate, digitize and transform the way people bank and shop. As a partner to the majority of the world's top 100 financial institutions and top 25 global retailers, our integrated solutions connect digital and physical channels conveniently, securely and efficiently for millions of consumers each day. The company has a presence in more than 100 countries with approximately 22,000 employees worldwide. Visit www.DieboldNixdorf.com for more information.

Twitter: @DieboldNixdorf

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/diebold

Facebook: www.facebook.com/DieboldNixdorf

YouTube: www.youtube.com/dieboldnixdorf

DN-B

SOURCE Diebold Nixdorf, Incorporated
Frey helps clients navigate white collar and regulatory defense matters, as well as government and internal investigations. He regularly advises major Japanese and other global companies, including leading financial institutions, on sensitive and complex matters involving the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), anti-money laundering laws, and economic sanctions. Frey also routinely provides strategic counseling on compliance issues and crisis management.

Doug Greenburg, Global Chair of the firm's White Collar Defense & Investigations Practice, said: "Chris has robust trial experience and a history of leading large teams in both private practice and within the government. His credentials and substantive skills bolster our white collar offerings, including in securities fraud, financial institution fraud, and FCPA and sanctions matters, and further enhance our team's capabilities in New York, the Bay Area, Asia, and around the world."

"We're excited to have Chris join the firm's world-class white collar team and are looking forward to working with him on the West Coast when he relocates and expands his practice to the Bay Area," added Margaret Tough, Co-Chair of the Bay Area Litigation & Trial Department and partner in the White Collar Defense & Investigations Practice.

Prior to private practice, Frey served as an Assistant US Attorney (AUSA) for the Southern District of New York, where he was a member of the Securities and Commodities Fraud Task Force and the Complex Frauds and Cybercrime Unit, and as Associate Counsel in the White House Counsel's Office under President Barack Obama. As an AUSA, Frey investigated and prosecuted a wide array of white-collar matters, including FCPA violations, insider trading, accounting fraud, market manipulation, investment advisor fraud, money laundering, intellectual property theft and cybercrimes, and criminal tax offenses. In addition, he served as the lead trial lawyer in numerous jury trials and has substantial appellate experience, having briefed and argued more than a dozen appeals before the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Frey is another strong addition to the firm's market-leading White Collar Defense & Investigations Practice following the arrival of former AUSAs Scott Joiner and Alex Wyman in the Bay Area and Los Angeles, respectively.

"Chris is a talented lawyer with significant experience in the US and Japan, and we are thrilled to welcome him to the firm," said Marc Jaffe, New York Office Managing Partner. "His arrival shows our continued commitment to expanding the firm's leading white collar defense capabilities around the globe."

"I've been incredibly impressed by Latham's strong litigation platform, reputation for excellence, and collegial culture," said Frey. "I look forward to further developing my practice here and building on connections between Latham's current offerings and my experience in Japan, while also contributing to the white collar group from New York to California to Asia and beyond."

Frey received his JD from Stanford Law School and his BA from Syracuse University. He joins Latham from Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP where he was a partner resident in Tokyo, Japan.





About Latham & Watkins (lw.com)



Latham & Watkins delivers innovative solutions to complex legal and business challenges around the world. From a global platform, our lawyers advise clients on market-shaping transactions, high-stakes litigation and trials, and sophisticated regulatory matters. Latham is one of the world's largest providers of pro bono services, steadfastly supports initiatives designed to advance diversity within the firm and the legal profession, and is committed to exploring and promoting environmental sustainability.

Notes to Editors



1 Latham & Watkins operates worldwide as a limited liability partnership organized under the laws of the State of Delaware (USA) with affiliated limited liability partnerships conducting the practice in France, Hong Kong, Italy, Singapore, and the United Kingdom and as an affiliated partnership conducting the practice in Japan. Latham & Watkins operates in Israel through a limited liability company. Latham & Watkins operates in South Korea as a Foreign Legal Consultant Office. Latham & Watkins works in cooperation with the Law Office of Salman M. Al-Sudairi in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Contacts



Doug Greenburg, Global Chair, White Collar Defense & Investigations Practice, +1.202.637.1093



Margaret Tough, Co-Chair of the Bay Area Litigation & Trial Department, +1. 415.395.8060



Marc Jaffe, New York Office Managing Partner, +1.212.906.1281

SOURCE Latham & Watkins
Tribute to Iconic Entrepreneur, Corporate Board Pioneer, Activist, and Philanthropist Takes Place on The Campus of His Beloved Alma Mater on The Second Anniversary of His Passing

BALTIMORE, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- A loving, in-person tribute and celebration of the life of Earl G. Graves Sr., the iconic founder of BLACK ENTERPRISE, is set to take place on the campus of his beloved alma mater, Morgan State University in Baltimore, home of the Earl Graves School of Business and Management. Family, friends, leaders, and luminariesas well as current and former employees of BLACK ENTERPRISEwill gather at the Morgan State University Student Center to honor the life and contributions of the visionary entrepreneur, corporate board pioneer, activist, and philanthropist, on Wednesday, April 6, 2022, the second anniversary of his passing in 2020 at 85.

"Anticipation for this celebration of our founder and my father has been building for more than a year, and rightly so," says BLACK ENTERPRISE CEO Earl "Butch" Graves, Jr. "Of course, he was a personal hero to me, my brothers and his eight grandchildren, as well as a devoted husband and partner of our late matriarch, Barbara Graves. However, beyond that, our founder significantly impacted literally millions of others, including generations of Black entrepreneurs, corporate executives, leaders across all professions, and the loyal subscribers of BLACK ENTERPRISE magazine."

Open to the public, the celebration will be immediately followed by a reception at the Graves School of Business and Management. The tribute will also be available for viewing via livestream at BlackEnterprise.com and BLACK ENTERPRISE'S LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter social media channels

Confirmed speakers for the event include Black Enterprise CEO Earl "Butch" Graves, Jr.; Rev. Dr. W. Franklyn Richardson, Senior Pastor, Grace Baptist Church of Mount Vernon (NY); National Action Network Founder Rev. Al Sharpton; Morgan State University President Dr. David K. Wilson; black enterprise Executive VP and Chief Content Officer Derek T. Dingle; Dr. David E. Marion, 41st Grand Basileus, Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc.; U.S. Congressman Kweisi Mfume, Chairman of the Morgan State University Board of Regents; Ray M. Robinson, Chairman of the Board, Citizens Trust Bank; Glenda McNeal, President, Enterprise Strategic Partnerships, American Express; Former Macy's Inc. Executive Chairman Terry Lundgren; RW2 Enterprises CEO and former Aetna Inc. Chairman and CEO Ron Williams; Georgia Power President, Chairman & CEO Chris Womack; and Black Executive CEO Alliance Founder Jerri DeVard. The program will also include performances by the Morgan State University Choir and a presentation of military honors by Lt. General R. Scott Dingle, The Army Surgeon General and Commanding General, USA Medical Command.

More than a year in the planning, due to the moratorium on live gatherings necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the celebration of Graves' life marks a high point of the ongoing recognition of the 50th anniversary of his publishing of the first issue of BLACK ENTERPRISE magazine in August 1970. Among other elements marking the launch of the magazine is a yearlong multimedia content hub, BE: Celebrating 50 Years of Excellence, featuring exclusive video tributes from CEOs, corporate leaders, entrepreneurs, and others from all walks of life who were impacted by Graves. Birthed as a single-magazine publishing company, BLACK ENTERPRISE is now the nation's No. 1 Black digital media brand, with more than 10 million monthly unique visitors, and the leading producer of live and virtual events focused on entrepreneurship and leadership, and professional development.

BLACK ENTERPRISE EXISTS TO INSPIRE, EMBOLDEN, AND EMPOWER The Black COMMUNITY TO EMBARK ON THE LIFETIME JOURNEY FROM AMBITION TO ACHIEVEMENT. BLACK ENTERPRISE is the No.1 Black media brand, with more than 10 million monthly unique visitors. Since 1970, BLACK ENTERPRISE has been the premier business, career, investing, and wealth-building resource for African Americans. BLACK ENTERPRISE produces video and podcast programming, virtual and in-person business and lifestyle events, and other digital media. Visit www.blackenterprise.com for more information.

SOURCE BLACK ENTERPRISE
Upscale, Fast Casual Dining Powerhouse with House-Crafted Menu to Debut in Castle Rock

CASTLE ROCK, Colo., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Capriotti's Sandwich Shop, known for its award-winning, hand-crafted cheesesteaks, turkey subs and more, opened its newest location in Castle Rock at 5715 Atrium Dr. Unit 110 (Next to Xfinity and near Panda Express). Capriotti's brings the Castle Rock community its 45-year tradition of slow-roasting whole, all-natural turkeys in-house and hand-pulling them every morning along with other favorites like the made-from-scratch meatballs using premium, fresh ingredients.

Capriotti's is known for its wide array of sandwiches including The Bobbie, made with fresh oven-roasted turkey, cranberry sauce, stuffing and mayo, the Capastrami, made with hot pastrami, Swiss cheese, Russian dressing and homemade coleslaw and the cheesesteak, made with premium steak, chicken or Impossible plant-based meat and melted cheese plus hot or sweet peppers. The Castle Rock Capriotti's will offer a convenient order-ahead option, in addition to third-party delivery services. The new shop will bring 20 new jobs to the Castle Rock community.

The new location is owned and operated by local entrepreneur, Jaime Beard. Beard first traveled to Utah in hopes of trying out Capriotti's Sandwich Shop, one visit, and she was instantly sold on the idea of owning a shop of her own. After opening her first location in Highlands Ranch last year, Beard thought it was the perfect time to expand her footprint in the community by opening a location in Castle Rock.

"Capriotti's has a unique menu and high-quality products that are difficult to find in this area, and after seeing a stellar response in Highlands Ranch we felt it was the perfect time to expand our network," said Jaime. "We cannot wait to establish ourselves in Castle Rock the same way we did in Highlands Ranch. We want this Capriotti's location to become a key part of the community."

Castle Rock Capriotti's fans can download the CAPAddicts Rewards app on iOS and Android to earn and redeem rewards and score free food. The restaurant will also feature online ordering. Capriotti's in Castle Rock offers catering for any event from corporate events to birthday parties with items such as party trays with cold subs, box lunches or a hot homemade meatball bar.

Capriotti's is open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily. For additional information, visit www.capriottis.com.

About Capriotti's Sandwich Shop

Founded in 1976, Capriotti's Sandwich Shop is an award-winning national franchised restaurant chain that remains true to its 45-year tradition of slow-roasting whole, all-natural turkeys in-house every day. Capriotti's fresh ingredients, homemade subs and unique menu items have won numerous accolades including being named one of the "10 Great Places for a Surprising Sandwich" by USA Today and many "Best of" awards across the country. Capriotti's cold, grilled and vegetarian subs, cheesesteaks and salads are available at more than 100 locations across the U.S. Capriotti's signature sub, The Bobbie, was voted "The Greatest Sandwich in America" by thousands of readers across the country and reported by AOL.com. Capriotti's fans can also download the CAPAddicts Rewards app for iOS and Android, where they can earn and redeem rewards. For more information, visit capriottis.com. Like Capriotti's on Facebook, follow on Twitter or Instagram.

Media Contact: Isabella Caruso, Fishman PR | [email protected] | 847-945-1300

SOURCE Capriotti's Sandwich Shop
LOS ANGELES, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The Harmonist's Sacred Water has been nominated at the prestigious 2022 US Fragrance Foundation Awards under one of its most notable categories, "Universal Luxury".

The Harmonist, a rising star in the fragrance industry, will compete with some of the world's most renowned brands, including Tom Ford, Christian Dior, Gucci, and Chanel.

Founded in 2016 by Lola Tillyaeva (Till), The Harmonist is inspired by the guiding principles of Feng Shui, and all of the brand's fragrances embrace aspects of the Yin and Yang duality and the five elements  wood, fire, earth, water, and metal. Each scent is carefully crafted to help the wearer find balance, harmony, and wellbeing.

Part of The Harmonist's Yang Collection, Sacred Water is a universal perfume with notes of citrus fruit, fresh spice, and minerality. The unique fragrance channels the Yang water energy, invigorating and soothing the wearer like the unfolding expanse of a tranquil sea.

"We are honored to announce that The US Fragrance Foundation has recognized The Harmonist for a second year. We are a young company with an established unique philosophy that inspires and creates harmony for our customers.

"It's a testament to our team's determination, innovation, and passion for fragrances to be nominated amongst some of the most well-known brands. We'd like to assure you that we'll continue to bring passion, love, and quality to the forefront of innovation in the perfume industry," said The Harmonist founder Lola Tillyaeva (Till).

In collaboration with Lola, internationally renowned Givaudan perfumer Guillaume Flavigny developed the fragrance, combining precious ingredients sourced sustainably, including Citron, Mandarin, Fresh Ginger, Magnolia, Orange Blossom, Laminaria Seaweed, Amyris, Grey Amber, and Cedar.

The US Fragrance Foundation will announce the award on June 9, 2022, at their annual awards ceremony in New York City.

Lola Tillyaeva (Lola Till)

Lola Tillyaeva (Till) is a Wellbeing Activist, Entrepreneur, Author, Humanitarian and the visionary behind The Harmonist. An inspiring voice within the wellness and beauty space, Lola published her widely appraised self-care book "Be Your Own Harmonist: Awakening Your Inner Wisdom for Physical, Mental and Emotional Well-being" in September 2020.

Originally from Uzbekistan, Lola created the Paris-based Maison de l'Ouzbekistan, a gallery that showcases the rich cultural heritage of Uzbekistan. Lola is also a devoted philanthropist and founded the "You Are Not Alone Foundation" in 2002 to provide homes and education to severely underprivileged children in Uzbekistan.

SOURCE Office of Lola Tillyaeva (Till)
Positioned for Today's Modern Traveler, the Series Leverages QR Codes to Unlock Additional Planning Content

NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Leading travel media company and most trusted voice in travel guidance, Lonely Planet, is launching an Experience series, a totally new range of guidebooks designed to turn travel on its head.

These innovative guides were designed for a new generation of savvy travelers looking for a more interactive experience, with fresh perspectives from local experts that allow them to "dip in and dip out" at their own pace.

Readers will be able to find curated guidance that allows them to craft their own unique itineraries and offers a more personalized approach to trip planning. Ideally designed for those who want to make the most of their travels, each guidebook contains pull-out city maps, gatefold maps, and QR codes to unlock additional digital content from the Lonely Planet website, and is divided into experiences by themes, a la carte experiences, seasonal planning calendars, and trip builders.

A reflection of a new brand position and promise that Lonely Planet is "For Explorers Everywhere," the Experience series meets the needs of many types of travelers, both those who have been loyal to the brand for decades and those who are just now taking their first trips.

"As we usher in a rebirth of the travel industry in light of the global pandemic, the Experience series puts travelers back in the driver's seat of planning their own itineraries and exploring on their terms," said Sebastian Modak, Editor-at-Large at Lonely Planet. "This new series speaks to a multitude of travelers, from the months ahead planners, to those who go with the flow, and offers a range of tools from additional digital content to physical pocket-approved maps to suit a variety of needs."

Research conducted by Lonely Planet underscored that today's consumers are looking for recommendations from local experts, inspirations from beautiful visuals, and guidebooks that work in tandem with using their digital devices for planning. The Experience series provides all three with Lonely Planet local experts providing in-depth articles and under-the-radar places, complemented by visual guides, best-in-class photography, and illustrative maps.

Available in April 2022

Experience Italy

Experience Portugal

Experience Japan

Experience Iceland

Experience Scotland

Experience Ireland

Available in June 2022

Experience Barcelona

Experience London

Experience New York City

Experience Paris

Experience Rome

Experience Tokyo

Available in September 2022

Experience East Coast Australia

Experience Great Britain

Experience Hawaii

Experience New Zealand

Experience Thailand

Experience Vietnam

Available in November & December 2022

Experience Europe

Experience France

Experience Germany

Experience India

Experience Peru

Experience Scandinavia

The new Experience series books are available in bookstores or online at https://shop.lonelyplanet.com for $24.99 each.

About Lonely Planet

Lonely Planet, a Red Ventures Company, is a digital travel guidance company and the world's number one travel guidebook brand. Providing both inspiring and trustworthy information for every kind of traveler since 1973, Lonely Planet reaches hundreds of millions of travelers each year online, in print and via mobile products and helps them unlock amazing experiences.

Lonely Planet can be found on lonelyplanet.com, mobile, video and in 14 languages, armchair and lifestyle books, ebooks and more. Visit us at lonelyplanet.com and join our community of followers on Facebook (facebook.com/lonelyplanet), Twitter (@lonelyplanet), Instagram (instagram.com/lonelyplanet) , and TikTok (@lonelyplanet)

SOURCE Lonely Planet
With so many parking companies in Los Angeles and Orange County, it can be difficult for businesses to find a reputable parking operator to professionally serve their customers. Whether it be parking attendants, valet parking services, or traffic control operations, Parking Management Services of America (PMSA) will professionally manage your facility and give your business that true peace of mind!

LOS ANGELES, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- For more than 20 years, Parking Management Services of America (PMSA) has provided valet parking services combined with cost-effective parking management solutions throughout greater Los Angeles and Orange County. Today, their parking services demonstrate what to expect from a leader of a professional parking company.



Now with its 5-STAR rating from Trustindex, PMSA continues to demonstrate its ongoing commitment to maintaining successful partnerships with its clients - past, present, and future! The parking consultants at PMSA will strategically prepare efficient and cost-effective parking solutions for your business. And throughout this process, PMSA will continue to work closely with the client to ensure that these uniquely tailored parking solutions are meeting the client's parking goals.



PMSA provides services for the following segments within the parking industry:

Furthermore, as an active member in good standing with the National Parking Association (NPA), clients of PMSA can remain confident knowing that Parking Management Services of America will always abide by the NPA's code of ethics. These ethics extend all the way down to their parking attendants, who are trained to treat patrons with courtesy and always remain professional!



If your business in Los Angeles or Orange County is in search for the very best parking company, look no further and contact PMSA today at 1-800-552-PARK.



Contact:

1-800-552-7275



Photos:

https://www.prlog.org/12911730



Press release distributed by PRLog

SOURCE Parking Management Services of America (PMSA), Inc
NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Lument announced today that Managing Director Brian Sykes, an industry veteran who has originated and closed more than $5 billion in multifamily mortgages over the course of a 30-year career, will head the company's new Boston office. Sykes will lead a Boston team responsible for originating Agency loans and proprietary capital for institutional and private multifamily owners. He will report to Vic Clark, senior managing director and head of conventional multifamily production.

Sykes and his team will work extensively with investors and developers across the country, building on the network he developed over the course of his career.

"Given his exceptional record and breadth of agency, HUD/FHA, and balance sheet experience, there is no one better than Brian to help us continue our expansion," Clark said. "Brian brings a high level of enthusiasm to every deal, whether serving an institutional client or a local owner/operator  he is deeply knowledgeable across the whole spectrum of geographies, property types, and funding options."

Sykes will be joined in the Boston office by Jon Wood, also a managing director. Sykes and Wood worked together for almost 10 years at Capital One and at Deutsche Bank Berkshire Mortgage. Over the last five years, Wood participated in building a customized production platform that closed more than $3 billion of agency loans for multifamily and affordable housing clients.

The Boston office will be rounded out by an equally impressive and client-centric team: Tim Smits, director; Mike McNeill, vice president; Mitchell Goldenberg, assistant vice president; and Christine Mahoney, administrative assistant.

"Lument's emphasis on long-term relationships and its growing range of agency and proprietary products makes the firm an ideal fit for us," Sykes said. "We're now positioned to provide clients with tailored solutions that meet their needs today and to continue serving them as they grow and those needs evolve."

"We are incredibly excited about our Boston team," said James Flynn, Lument's CEO. "We have put a great group in place with the products and financial resources needed to provide new levels of responsive service for our customers."

About Lument

ORIX Real Estate Capital Holdings, LLC, d/b/a Lument, is a subsidiary of ORIX Corporation USA. Lument is a national leader in commercial real estate finance. As the combined organization of legacy industry experts Hunt Real Estate Capital, Lancaster Pollard, and RED Capital Group, Lument delivers a comprehensive set of capital solutions customized for investors in multifamily, affordable housing, and seniors housing and healthcare real estate. Lument is a Fannie Mae DUS, Freddie Mac Optigo, FHA, and USDA lender. In addition, Lument offers a suite of proprietary commercial lending, investment sales, investment banking, and investment management solutions. Securities, investment banking, and advisory services are provided through OREC Securities, LLC, d/b/a Lument Securities, Member FINRA/SIPC. Investment advisory services are provided by OREC Investment Management, LLC, d/b/a Lument Investment Management. OREC Investment Management is registered as an investment adviser with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. For more information, visit www.lument.com .

MEDIA CONTACT

Tyler Howard | Associate Director

513-403-1911 | [email protected]

SOURCE Lument
Increasing application of cloud-based solutions, technological development in artificial intelligence and cognitive computing market, and increase in market for prediction solutions are some of the factors to fuel the MLaaS market growth.

JERSEY CITY, N.J., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Verified Market Research recently published a report, "Machine Learning As A Service Market" By Component (Services, Software Tools), By Application (Analytics And Automated Traffic Management, Fraud Detection, Predictive Maintenance), and By Geography. According to Verified Market Research, the Global Machine Learning As A Service Market size was valued at USD 2.48 Billion in 2020 and is projected to reach USD 38.81 Billion by 2028, growing at a CAGR of 41.2% from 2021 to 2028.

Download PDF Brochure: https://www.verifiedmarketresearch.com/download-sample/?rid=41307

Browse in-depth TOC on "Machine Learning As A Service Market"

202 - Pages

126  Tables

37  Figures

Global Machine Learning As A Service Market Overview

Global Machine Learning As A Service Market is experiencing an increase in development because of technological developments and a rise in the number of Research and innovation activities across the world which leads to growth of the market. Another important factor driving market expansion is the increase in the adoption of cloud-based technologies. Moreover, the growing emphasis on customer-centric behavior is driving overall growth.

The MLaaS model is expected to lead the global, giving customers the option to select from a wide variety of services designed for specific business requirements. Furthermore, the expansion of the adoption rate for MLaaS is anticipated to be propelled by the growing adoption rate for IoT and autonomous systems in businesses. Over a billion devices connected have already been deployed in industrial automation. Smart and connected innovations have augmented the formation of enormous amounts of information, which can then be investigated to produce profitable insights.

Key Developments

In April 2019 , Microsoft initiated a machine teaching framework that utilizes algorithms to address actual problems. This helps break down the issue into smaller bits and provide indications for machine learning models and find immediate assistance.

, Microsoft initiated a machine teaching framework that utilizes algorithms to address actual problems. This helps break down the issue into smaller bits and provide indications for machine learning models and find immediate assistance. In November 2018 , Amazon has released an update of machine learning services in the healthcare sector. It assists in the HIPAA-compliant translation of Amazon which has been interpreted and recorded.

, Amazon has released an update of machine learning services in the healthcare sector. It assists in the HIPAA-compliant translation of Amazon which has been interpreted and recorded. In April 2021 , Microsoft Company stated an open dataset for transportation, general wellbeing, and genome sequencing, employment and economy, population and security, additional support and common datasets, complementary and prevalent datasets, and supplemental and popular sets of data to enhance the precision of machine learning models utilizing a publicly available dataset.

Key Players

The major players in the market are Hewlett Packard Enterprises, AT&T, FICO, IBM Corporation, Microsoft, Google Inc., BigML Inc., Ersatz Labs, Yottamine Analytics, and Amazon Web Services.

Verified Market Research has segmented the Global Machine Learning As A Service Market On the basis of Component, Application, and Geography.

Machine Learning As A Service Market, By Component

Services



Software Tools

Machine Learning As A Service Market, By Application

Analytics And Automated Traffic Management



Fraud Detection



Predictive Maintenance



Risk Analytics



Augmented Reality



Others

Machine Learning As A Service Market by Geography

North America



U.S





Canada





Mexico



Europe



Germany





France





U.K





Rest of Europe



Asia Pacific



China





Japan





India





Rest of Asia Pacific



ROW



Middle East & Africa

&



Latin America

Browse Related Reports:

Natural Language Processing Market By Type (NLP, Rule Based NLP, and Hybrid NLP), By Deployment Mode (Private Cloud, Public Cloud, and Hybrid Cloud), By Application (Information Extraction, Machine Translation, Question Answering, Report Generation), By Vertical (Healthcare, Banking, Financial Services, and Insurance (BFSI)), By Geography, Forecast, 2021-2028

Artificial Intelligence Market By Component Analysis (Hardware, Software and Services), By Technology (Deep Learning, Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing), By End-User Industry (Healthcare, Manufacturing, Agriculture), By Geography, Forecast, 2021-2028

Cognitive Computing Market By Component (Natural Language Processing, Machine Learning, Automated Reasoning), By Deployment Model (On-Premise, Cloud), By Geography, Forecast, 2021-2028

Machine Learning Artificial intelligence Market By Type (Deep Learning, Natural Language Processing), By Application (Automotive & Transportation, Agriculture), By Geography, Forecast, 2021-2028

Top 5 Crowd Analytics accountable for meteoric rise of AI-driven enterprises

Visualize Machine Learning As A Service Market using Verified Market Intelligence:-:

Verified Market Intelligence is our BI Enabled Platform for narrative storytelling of this market. VMI offers in-depth forecasted trends and accurate Insights on over 20,000+ emerging & niche markets, helping you make critical revenue impacting decisions for a brilliant future.

VMI provides a holistic overview and global competitive landscape with respect to Region, Country, and Segment, and Key players of your market. Present your Market Report & findings with an inbuilt presentation feature saving over 70% of your time and resources for Investor, Sales & Marketing, R&D, and Product Development pitches. VMI enables data delivery In Excel and Interactive PDF formats with over 15+ Key Market Indicators for your market.

About Us

Verified Market Research is a leading Global Research and Consulting firm servicing over 5000+ customers. Verified Market Research provides advanced analytical research solutions while offering information enriched research studies. We offer insight into strategic and growth analyses, Data necessary to achieve corporate goals and critical revenue decisions.

Our 250 Analysts and SME's offer a high level of expertise in data collection and governance use industrial techniques to collect and analyze data on more than 15,000 high impact and niche markets. Our analysts are trained to combine modern data collection techniques, superior research methodology, expertise and years of collective experience to produce informative and accurate research.

We study 14+ categories from Semiconductor & Electronics, Chemicals, Advanced Materials, Aerospace & Defense, Energy & Power, Healthcare, Pharmaceuticals, Automotive & Transportation, Information & Communication Technology, Software & Services, Information Security, Mining, Minerals & Metals, Building & construction, Agriculture industry and Medical Devices from over 100 countries.

Contact Us

Mr. Edwyne Fernandes

Verified Market Research

US: +1 (650)-781-4080

UK: +44 (753)-715-0008

APAC: +61 (488)-85-9400

US Toll Free: +1 (800)-782-1768

Email: [email protected]

Web: https://www.verifiedmarketresearch.com/

Follow Us: LinkedIn | Twitter

SOURCE Verified Market Research
Holland joins the high-growth FORM team following a banner year in 2021 where the company more than doubled its revenue, completed four strategic acquisitions, made global R&D investments, and profitably scaled to over 300 global employees with innovation centers in Denver, Boston, London, Kyiv, and Krakow. "FORM is the only company with a complete solution designed for frontline teams. It makes distributed workforces more effective and gives enterprise leaders insight into performance in real-time so they can close execution gaps and meet plan," shares Holland.

FORM's initial offering includes a strategic partner program with a shared go-to-market and revenue model, and an ecosystem program with strategic hardware and software solutions.

Prior to joining FORM, Holland was the Senior Vice President of Client Business Partnerships at Nielsen, and Vice President of Strategic Alliances for Trax Retail, where he introduced the Trax-Nielsen Shelf Intelligence Suitethe first of its kind in the industry. Holland previously led agile product development, sales, implementation, and customer success for Retail Analytics & Category Management at McKinsey & Company. "I'm inspired to hear consistently from FORM customers that we are a company which delivers with excellence and exceeds expectations," says Holland. "In 2022, we will help global organizations solve their biggest business challenges and make digital transformation for frontline teams successful."

Holland's extensive experience in CPG and retail intelligence aligns with the company's growth strategy according to FORM CEO, Ali Moosani. "Matt's industry expertise uniting data and technology to deliver a perfect store for global brands ensures he will deliver what our customers need in a partner program," Moosani says. "He is stellar at identifying value-added technology and services for our customers to complement our platform for field execution and increase their ROI. The fantastic inroads he's building for our solutions will deliver business impact for our customers."

About FORM

FORM powers the world's 2 billion mobile workers as they change companies and industries for good, with mobile technology that improves execution from the frontline. FORM's digital assistant for teams guides daily tasks, boosts communication, and provides leaders with real-time intelligence to drive faster actions and better decisions. FORM activates and connects teams in the field--with leaders, missions, and each other--so they can deliver success in the enterprise. FORM solutions have been deployed by Fortune 500 companies and customers around the world. To learn more, visit www.FORM.com.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Chrissy Reinemund, Senior Content Manager

[email protected]

479-366-8193

SOURCE FORM
Cruise Saudi, launched by the Public Investment Fund (PIF) has welcomed Viking Star on its inaugural visit to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA).

The ship called at the Jeddah Islamic Port where a plaque and key exchange ceremony took place before travelling on to call at Yanbu Port.

The visit from Viking Star marks the fifth ship to sail Saudi waters as part of Cruise Saudis mandate to build a world-class cruise industry in the country, opening up a new gateway for tourism in line with Vision 2030, Saudis transformation blueprint.

Award-winning ship

Viking Star is one of Vikings award-winning ocean ships. Relatively small in size, with a capacity of 930 guests, the ship is able to dock where other larger ships cannot and provide a smooth embarkation and debarkation process.

The interior and facilities on the cruise ship are in line with Vikings Nordic theme  the award-winning spa has been designed with the holistic wellness philosophy of Scandinavia in mind.

The Explorers Lounge and Mamsens gourmet deli are thoughtful spaces located at the bow of the ship and designed to represent the Scandinavian spirit for complete relaxation and for marvelling at sweeping views through double-height windows.

Important milestone

Commenting on the Viking Star visit, Cruise Saudis Chief Executive Officer, Lars Clasen said: Viking Stars visit is an important milestone for Cruise Saudi in welcoming a new cruise line to Saudi. We are proud to have hosted ships from some of the biggest and most renowned international cruise lines including Viking. We are excited to offer tourists a new and exciting opportunity to discover all that Saudi has to offer from pristine islands and beaches of the Red Sea to unique culture and heritage  all underpinned by the quintessential Saudi hospitality.

We aim to be recognised as a world-class one-stop-shop maritime operator and to develop the cruise industry in Saudi as an important economic pillar of tourism in line with Vision 2030. Our ultimate goal is to establish the Red Sea and Saudi as a cruising hub, echoing the history of the region as a maritime hub.

Cruise Saudi has welcomed and has built partnerships with several major international cruise lines including MSC Cruises, Scenic Group, Silversea and Viking, which have completed more than 70 sailings during the summer and winter seasons in 2021 and 2022.-- TradeArabia News Service
The announcement follows news that, nearly four months after tornadoes struck, hundreds of people remain in temporary housing, including travel trailers, hotel rooms, and state parks. At the same time, a month-long call to service has begun.

"On behalf of the Mid-Continent team, I am honored to partner with Habitat for Humanity to give back to our communities and help our fellow Americans in need," said Fernando Villanueva, Mid-Continent's CEO. "We have customers, suppliers, friends, and family that have been touched by natural disasters. It is important to be there for them and help them get back on their feet.

"With Mid-Continent's MAGNUM steel nails and Habitat's manpower, we are helping to rebuild because, together, we are stronger."

Mid-Continent's partnership with Kentucky Habitat for Humanity comes in two parts:

First, the donation of $20,000 by employees to support disaster relief efforts.

by employees to support disaster relief efforts. Second, in-kind pledges of materials by the company to housing blitz projects in Bowling Green and Dawson Springs .

The Bowling Green project includes 10 homes and is expected to break ground in mid-July. The Dawson Springs project includes 14 homes and is expected to break ground next fall. These were the two areas hit hardest by the December tornadoes.

"The Mid-Continent family knows how devastating natural disasters can be, both physically and emotionally, and how long the recovery process can take," said Chris Pratt, Operations General Manager of Mid-Continent. "We're happy to be in a position to help our neighbors and proud to contribute to the building and rebuilding of safe homes for the residents of Bowling Green and Dawson Springs."

Mary Shearer, executive director of Kentucky Habitat for Humanity, said of the partnership with Mid-Continent, "This is just incredible. We cannot thank Mid-Continent Steel and Wire enough for their support, passion, and dedication to not only Habitat for Humanity, but the countless families we will serve with their donations. It is because of companies like Mid-Continent and your employees that Habitat is going to rebuild the lives and communities of those who lost so much!"

This is not the first time Mid-Continent has partnered with a local Habitat for Humanity group to help with disaster relief efforts. In 2019, after a tornado tore through Jefferson City, Missouri., the company donated 1 million nails to River City Habitat for Humanity.

"Mid-Continent has always enjoyed giving back to the community. That's part of the culture here," said Dave Creg, Director of Human Resources for Mid-Continent. "I couldn't be prouder of how everyone came together to help our neighbors in this effort."

Please follow Mid-Continent's Facebook page for updates on our partnership with Kentucky Habitat for Humanity, including details on the two blitz builds.

About Mid-Continent Steel and Wire (MCSW): Mid-Continent Steel and Wire is one of the biggest wire manufactures in North America and with its MAGNUM brand it is the nation's largest nail manufacturer. The company's main locations are in Poplar Bluff, MO; Houston, TX; and Laredo, TX.

MCSW and its dedicated family of brands and employees are committed to providing a comprehensive mix of high-quality products and outstanding service each and every day. We aim to build and secure the future of our communities, employees, customers, suppliers, and shareholders by offering reliable, best-in-class steel solutions at an unbeatable value.

For more information, visit www.mcswusa.com.

Contact Elizabeth Heaton, [email protected], 202-445-9858

SOURCE Mid Continent Steel & Wire, Inc.
"If ever there was inequality, the Ukrainians are indeed the victims. They need all the support they can get," Evans said and continued: "They can't breathe, to breathe you must have air, Ukraine must have air space to breathe.

"Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is Jewish and lost relatives in the Holocaust. The entire globe needs to stand up for the Ukrainian people."

Almost half the children of Ukraine, now over 3 million people, are refugees. Evans and his son, Michael Evans II, just returned from Ukraine. It was the second trip in two weeks to deliver 19 tons of food to feed 45,000 people.

Michael, Mike's son, was in Kyiv, taking the food to the Jewish community with the convoys. Evans has been working in Ukraine for more than a decade, feeding Holocaust survivors and Jewish orphans. He has also built a community center in Jerusalem for Ukrainian Holocaust survivors, and beautiful apartments for them at his Friends of Zion Heritage Center campus. He feeds several thousand Holocaust survivors each week in Israel. In addition, Friends of Zion holds many events for them, including a dance at the Kotel where they are Bar and Bat Mitzvahed.

Evans hosted dozens of children from the "Alumim" children's home in Zhitomir, who managed to leave Ukraine after 11 days and arrive to Israel, and he will be caring for and supporting their needs. Also present at the event were some families of Holocaust survivors who, with the help of the Friends of Zion and Yad Ezer Lahaver organizations, were rescued from Lvov, Mosul, Kyiv and other cities in Ukraine. Eliyahu Gerinkevitch, a soldier who immigrated from Ukraine 7 years ago and serves in the Jerusalem Border Police, told his personal story and thanked the people of Israel and Friends of Zion for being able to rescue his entire family from Kiev, after he had not seen them for three years.

Evans said in the event: "The world must not be silent. Young people can organize marches and fundraisers to show compassion for the suffering people. Millions of them are refugees who have nothing, and those living in Ukraine are suffering unspeakably. They all can't breathe and all their lives matter."

That's why I am launching the Ukraine Can't Breathe campaign. Please go to https://ukrainehope.com/ . Help a refugee family that is stuck with no country, no home, and no husband, and Ukrainians who are in living hell in Ukraine with no electricity, food, or even medicine.

For inquiries, contact Tal Marom Spokesperson for FOZ [email protected]

SOURCE Friends of Zion
"This collaboration benefits patients who are undergoing multiple procedures for breast cancer radiation treatment." Tweet this

"Contouring the tumor bed may seem easy, but it can be the most imprecise thing we perform," said Dr. David Beyer, former President of the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) and Medical Director of Cancer Centers of Northern Arizona Healthcare.

VeraForm is a radiopaque, continuous, three-dimensional, multi-planar tissue marker that is easily identified on conventional planning CT images. As part of this collaboration, MIM Software has created an automated workflow that assists with the identification and segmentation of VeraForm. This will facilitate semi- and auto-contouring of the tumor bed for radiation oncologists.

"This collaboration benefits many patients who are undergoing multiple procedures for breast cancer radiation treatment," said Andrew Nelson, Chief Executive Officer of MIM Software. "We are excited to make this technique available to all of our Radiation Oncology customers as part of their normal service contract."

"MIM Software is a market leader in practical imaging solutions for Radiation Oncology, with thousands of installations across the United States," followed Joe Guido, Chief Executive Officer of Videra Surgical. "This integration enables contouring of the tumor bed, which can have a significant impact on workflow and treatment standardization across healthcare systems for patients who have received a VeraForm marker during breast cancer surgery."

About MIM Software

MIM Software Inc. is committed to enhancing patient care by providing customer-centered and innovative imaging solutions in the fields of Radiation Oncology, Radiology, Nuclear Medicine, Neuroimaging, and Cardiac Imaging.

MIM Software sells its products globally to imaging centers, hospitals, specialty clinics, research organizations, and pharmaceutical companies. The company's products are used in over 3,500 centers worldwide and in 16 of the top 20 hospitals listed in the U.S. News & World Report Hospital Rankings & Ratings.

Visit www.mimsoftware.com to learn more.

About Videra Surgical

Videra Surgical is an oncology surgery company focused on breast cancer treatment. Videra Surgical strongly believes that helping radiation oncologists better identify the tumor bed is essential for the continuum of care for these patients.

Videra Surgical developed and commercialized VeraForm, an adaptable tissue marker comprised of a radiopaque filament that provides a continuous, three-dimensional, multi-planar, and permanent mark of a tumor bed. VeraForm is FDA 510(k) cleared and has been placed in thousands of patients in a rapidly growing number of centers in the United States. Visit www.viderasurgical.com to learn more.

SOURCE MIM Software Inc.
LONDON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Minesoft, a leading global patent search solutions provider, today announced the appointment of Spencer Slaine as President of North America for Minesoft and as a member of the Global Senior Executive Team.

Spencer is an accomplished IP professional and executive who has worked in various roles at several IP service and software organizations over the last seven years. He brings a wealth of IP knowledge and business development expertise to the Minesoft leadership team.

Spencer previously worked for Ipan GmbH, a Warburg Pincus portfolio company, where he supported the launch of the company domestically. He then served as Head of Sales for North America for Ipan/Delegate Group, driving significant growth before their acquisition by CPA Global, where he served as a Vice President of Strategic Accounts. Following CPA Global's acquisition by Clarivate, Spencer was a Director of Product Sales where he worked with industry leading companies to help develop their innovation strategies.

In his new role, Spencer will lead the further expansion of Minesoft's North American footprint working alongside industry veteran, Tim Campbell, Executive Vice President of Minesoft. Spencer will oversee customer success, sales, and marketing, focusing primarily on new business growth and strategy in North America.

"For over 25 years, Minesoft has been successfully providing mission-critical and best-in-class intellectual properly research and analytics solutions to corporations and law firms around the world. I'm extremely excited about the opportunity to work for such a highly regarded and long-standing organization and to support their goals of continued growth and expansion in the U.S. marketplace. Our top priority is and has always been putting the customer first and supporting their innovation workflow and lifecycle," said Spencer Slaine, President, North America, Minesoft.

"Minesoft, backed by Warburg Pincus and MLM 2, is expanding and on the look-out for top IP professionals to help our new phase of expansion and growth. We are thrilled to be joined by Spencer Slaine, whose expertise and commitment is exactly the combination we are looking for to join the senior executive team. We look forward to further strengthening the existing Minesoft team across the world," said Ann Chapman Daniel, Co-Founder, Minesoft.

About Minesoft

Founded in 1996 to develop databases and software solutions for the Information industry, Minesoft specializes in tools and services for retrieving, storing, and distributing patent information throughout the enterprise. Minesoft develops web-based patent search and software solutions offering searchable databases, competitive intelligence tracking, patent analytics and customized corporate knowledge management. Minesoft's clients include Fortune 500/FTSE 100 type companies around the world, national IP Offices, IP Legal and Patent Attorney firms.

Press contact: Caitlin Kavanagh ([email protected])

SOURCE Minesoft
CAMBRIDGE, Mass., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Today MIT Technology Review announced the recomposition of its Board of Directors with the resignation of two long-standing directors, the appointment of three new ones, and the selection of two co-chairs.

The new directors are MIT provost Cynthia Barnhart, the most senior academic officer at the Institute; Lara Boro, chief executive officer of the Economist Group; and Sanjay Sarma, the Fred Fort Flowers and Daniel Fort Flowers Professor of Mechanical Engineering and the vice president for open learning at MIT.

Professor Barnhart replaces Martin A. Schmidt, who is leaving MIT to become president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, while Professor Sarma replaces Institute Professor Jerome I. Friedman, who is retiring from the board.

Professor Barnhart and Alan Spoon, a longtime member of the board and an experienced media business executive, will act as co-chairs.

The appointment of Cynthia Barnhart, MIT's newly named provost, to the board ensures that MIT Technology Review maintains its deep connection to the world-leading knowledge and innovation generated by the scholars and professionals in the MIT community.

Lara Boro is leading the Economist Group, best known for its weekly publication, The Economist, through a business transformation focused on profitable growth, content excellence, and brand strength and integrity. Her expertise connects directly to MIT Technology Review's own goals and aspirations.

Sanjay Sarma brings to MIT Technology Review a unique perspective born of academic scholarship, entrepreneurial expertise, and his ten-year leadership of MIT's Office of Open Learning, through which MIT has become a world leader in the field.

MIT Technology Review CEO Elizabeth Bramson-Boudreau said, "We are honored that Cindy, Lara, and Sanjay will join MIT Technology Review's Board of Directors. Each of them brings unique experience and insight that will help launch us into a new chapter of commercial growth and journalistic impact."

Cynthia Barnhart, Provost, MIT

Cynthia Barnhart is Provost, Professor of Operations Research, and Ford Foundation Professor of Engineering at MIT. Barnhart has served as MIT's Chancellor, as the Associate and Acting Dean for the School of Engineering, and as co-director of the Operations Research Center and the Center for Transportation and Logistics.

Professor Barnhart's teaching and research are in the areas of large-scale optimization and analytics, with a focus on applications in transportation and logistics systems. She has supervised scores of graduate and undergraduate theses across a range of disciplines and has published widely in the flagship journals of her field.

Professor Barnhart is an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and is a fellow of the Institute for Operations Research and Management Science (INFORMS). She has served as the President of INFORMS, the President of the INFORMS Women in Operations Research and Management Science, and the President of the INFORMS Transportation Science and Logistics Society. Professor Barnhart's awards include the INFORMS President's Award, the INFORMS Franz Edelman Prize for Achievement in Operations Research and the Management Sciences, the National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator Award, and honorary doctorates from the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne and the University of Toronto.

Professor Barnhart received her SM in transportation in 1986 and her PhD in 1988 from MIT.

Lara Boro, Chief Executive Officer, The Economist Group

Lara Boro was appointed chief executive of the Economist Group in September 2019.

Prior to her appointment, Ms. Boro served as CEO of Informa Intelligence, a division of FTSE 100 Informa plc, where she originally joined as Group managing director for the Pharma, TMT, and Transportation Intelligence portfolios in 2014. During her time at Informa, she was a key member of the executive team that turned around the Business Intelligence division and successfully returned it to growth in just 18 months.

Ms. Boro was also CEO International at Top Right Group (now Ascential Plc), where she focused on strengthening the group's footprint across the Middle East, Brazil, and China.

Ms. Boro brings a wealth of experience in business-to-consumer and business-to-business information markets, acquired throughout her career including in senior positions held across CPA Global (now Clarivate), the Financial Times, and MasterCard International.

Ms. Boro is the Senior Non-executive Director at RWS Holdings plc. She holds an MBA from INSEAD and a BSc in Economics and Business from UCLA.

Sanjay Sarma, Professor, MIT

Sanjay Sarma is the Fred Fort Flowers (1941) and Daniel Fort Flowers (1941) Professor of Mechanical Engineering at MIT and the Institute's vice president for open learning.

Professor Sarma cofounded the Auto-ID Center at MIT and developed many of the key technologies behind the EPC suite of RFID standards now used worldwide. He has also been at the forefront of technologies now known as the Internet of Things. He was the founder and CTO of OATSystems, which was acquired by Checkpoint Systems (NYSE: CKP) in 2008. He serves on the boards and advisory boards of edX, Hochschild Mining, GS1, EPCglobal, and several startup companies including TraceLink, IoTask, and Top Flight Technologies, and he advises a number of national governments and global companies. As the head of open learning at MIT, Professor Sarma leads a wide-ranging mission to transform teaching and learning through MITx and MicroMasters programs, OpenCourseWare, Bootcamps, xPRO, Horizon, the Abdul Latif Jameel World Education Lab, the MIT Integrated Learning Initiative, the Center for Advanced Virtuality, residential education, and more.

Professor Sarma is coauthor of the award-winning books The Inversion Factor: How to Thrive in the IoT Economy; Grasp: The Science Transforming How We Learn; and Workforce Education: A New Roadmap. He is the author or co-author of more than 200 academic papers in computational geometry, sensing, RFID, automation, CAD, learning engineering, the science of learning and education reform, and is the recipient of numerous awards for teaching and research, including the MacVicar Fellowship, the Business Week eBiz Award, and InformationWeek's Innovators and Influencers Award.

Professor Sarma received his bachelor's from the Indian Institute of Technology, his master's from Carnegie Mellon University, and his PhD from the University of California at Berkeley.

About MIT Technology Review

MIT Technology Review is an independent media company owned by MIT. Established in 1899, it was the first-ever technology magazine; today, MIT Technology Review publishes in multiple digital formats every day, including on our site, in email newsletters, on social channels, and in podcasts. We also produce a multi-award-winning, bi-monthly print magazine and run one of the industry's most highly regarded events brands, EmTech.

Our goal is to become the destination for those seeking to make sense of our technologically driven world.

Media Contact:

MIT Technology Review

[email protected]

SOURCE MIT Technology Review
A key component to the previous campaign was the opportunity for the candidate to work in multiple job specialties of the business, as opposed to a single designated position, and that comprehensive job training will again be highlighted in the current campaign. To apply, candidates must create a short video introducing themselves and explaining what they would bring to Murphy-Goode winery, why they want to work in the wine industry and why Murphy-Goode should hire them. They then upload it to the official campaign website . Finalists will be announced in July, taking their final interviews in Sonoma County the week of August 8th. The final candidate will be selected and announced in August. Once selected, the candidate will begin their year-long adventure with Murphy-Goode, first by shadowing winemaker Dave Ready, Jr., exploring the ins and outs of harvest in Sonoma County. Inspired by their application, Murphy-Goode will then work with the candidate to identify their passion and create the ideal role at the winery for the remainder of the year, and hopefully beyond.

Situated in Geyserville, California, Murphy-Goode winery produces Cabernet Sauvignon, Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay and light-bodied reds from some of California's great growing regions, made with the approachable and inviting attitude of Sonoma County. "A Really Goode Job" has become a revolutionary campaign to provide access and opportunity to those who are passionate about wine and diversify the voices that make up today's wine industry. Removing barriers to entry such as prior experience and proximity to wine country allows Murphy-Goode to reach a diverse pool of job candidates, welcoming those with different qualifications and educational specialties.

Jackson Family Wines, the family-owned wine company that includes Murphy-Goode, has been recognized as one of the best places to work in the northern San Francisco Bay Area seven times consecutively by the North Bay Business Journal . The two candidates that won in 2021, Veronica Hebbard and Lindsay Perry, have been working at Jackson Family Wines since September 2021 as part of their year-long dream job and both will have the opportunity to continue in full-time roles at the company once the year concludes.

"It's been amazing to be able to grow my passion and expand my wine knowledge through hands-on experience with the Murphy-Goode and Jackson Family Wines team," says Hebbard. "I've been able to leverage skills from my previous career as an engineer to help lead innovative sustainability initiatives to forever change the future of wine. Had it not been for this incredible opportunity, I would have never had the courage to follow my heart and pursue a career not only as a woman in STEM but a woman in wine as well."

Perry has also been encouraged by the remarkable opportunity and looks forward to what's ahead. "I'm really passionate about wine and marketing, and one of my priorities with the dream job experience has always been to bring more people of color into the wine world. Murphy-Goode's innovative recruitment approach combined with Jackson Family Wines' belief that the inclusion of more diverse voices and people from different backgrounds create a stronger foundation for the wine industry, helped me accomplish that goal and I feel so proud to be in a position to continue on that path."

To be considered for " A Really Goode Job " with Murphy-Goode, upload your video on the official campaign website  www.murphygoodewinery.com/a-really-goode-job  by June 30, 2022. The role officially starts September 2022 and runs through August 2023. Jackson Family Wines is an equal opportunity employer. Job applicants must be 21 years of age or older, a legal resident of the 50 United States and D.C., and authorized to work in the U.S.

About Murphy-Goode Winery

Welcome to the Goode life. Founded in Sonoma County in 1985 in a spirit of love and friendship by Tim Murphy, Dale Goode and Dave Ready Sr., Sonoma County's own Murphy-Goode Winery crafts some of California's best wines without taking itself too seriously. The story lives on today under the Jackson Family Wines portfolio, continuing a tradition based on a shared appreciation of friendship, hard work, a wicked sense of humor and, of course, a good bottle of wine. Murphy-Goode offers high quality wines from some of California's great growing regions with the approachable and inviting attitude of Sonoma County. Murphy-Goode is never pretentious, is often irreverent and is about having fun. Because of its consistent quality, the brand has become a favorite wine for consumers everywhere. For more information, visit www.MurphyGoodeWinery.com , and follow Murphy-Goode on Facebook , Instagram and Twitter at @MurphyGoodeWine.

SOURCE Murphy-Goode Winery
LOS ANGELES, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- On April 6th, the humble tomato has its day. While tomatoes are not in season in this part of the hemisphere, we can still appreciate all that the terrific tomato has to offer, and enjoy the best quality canned tomatoes from the GREATEST TOMATOES FROM EUROPE!

Preserving fresh tomatoes ensures that their flavor, nutrients and freshness are kept intact so that your dishes reflect the original quality that comes from under the European sun.

Use those exceptional canned tomatoes to celebrate special times such as the upcoming Easter holiday.

Easter Holiday Recipes You Can Try ~

Meat Lasagna - This Italian recipe for lasagna will be the star of your Easter meal. Follow the directions for spectacular results! Get the recipe here: https://greatesttomatoesfromeurope.com/recipes/meat-lasagna/

Fusilli with Ricotta - want a meatless meal for your holiday celebration? Not only is this creamy pasta dish delicious, but it comes together in no time! Get the recipe here: https://greatesttomatoesfromeurope.com/recipes/fusilli-with-ricotta/

Sweet Tomato and Chocolate Cake - although we view tomatoes as a vegetable, it is actually a fruit! So this unique chocolate cake is a great choice for a healthier dessert. Get the recipe here: https://greatesttomatoesfromeurope.com/recipes/sweet-tomato-and-chocolate-cake/

GREATEST TOMATOES FROM EUROPE is not a specific brand, but rather, a campaign by ANICAV -- The Italian Association of Canned Tomato Producers, co-financed by the European Commission -- promoting European preserved (canned) tomatoes. www.greatesttomatoesfromeurope.com

SOURCE Greatest Tomatoes from Europe
Indiana University joins alliance of more than 30 leading academic cancer centers defining and advancing high-quality, high-value, patient-centered cancer care globally.

PLYMOUTH MEETING, Pa., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) announced Indiana University Melvin and Bren Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center will be joining the not-for-profit alliance of leading cancer centers as the 32nd Member Institution. NCCN was founded by 13 original Member Institutions in 1995 and has grown steadily over the years. The 32 Member Institutions serve people with cancer (or risk of cancer) from diverse regions and demographics, always staying at the forefront for research and patient care.

"The IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center is the perfect addition to our growing networkand our only Member Institution in the state of Indiana," said Robert W. Carlson, MD, Chief Executive Officer, NCCN. "The center's Office of Community Outreach and Engagement works with partner organizations around the state to improve the health of all, especially in underrepresented populations. They also have international reach, including work in western Kenya with an underserved population of more than 18 million people, that has been called a model for addressing global cancer disparities and health equity by the National Cancer Institute."

IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center is Indiana's sole NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center and is home to the world's only healthy breast tissue bank serving as a resource to investigators around the world. The center has been involved in ground-breaking work in finding a cure for testicular cancer and pioneering cord blood transplantation. It is responsible for more than 130,000 adult outpatient visits each year; is a site for more than 300 active clinical trials at any time; and provides training for nearly 2,000 students, residents, and fellows every year.

"We are thrilled to become a member of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network," Kelvin Lee, MD, Director of the Indiana University Melvin and Bren Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center, said. "We look forward to sharing our expertise with NCCN and collaborating with many of the nation's leading cancer centers, which will ultimately benefit patients."

By joining NCCN, IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center will have a role in determining the recognized standard for clinical direction and policy in cancer management, by contributing to the NCCN Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology (NCCN Guidelines). The center will appoint expert clinicians to serve on more than 60 interdisciplinary panels responsible for maintaining the most frequently-updated clinical practice guidelines available in any area of medicine. The 83 different subject-specific NCCN Guidelines cover 97% of cancer incidences in the United States, plus additional topics like screening, prevention, genetic/familial risk, supportive care, distress, and survivorship. NCCN Guidelines are available free for non-commercial use at NCCN.org or via the Virtual Library of NCCN Guidelines app. The recommendations are also used to create versions accessible to patients and caregivers in the library of NCCN Guidelines for Patients and adapted for different languages and resource levels via NCCN International Adaptations and Translations and other global resources.

Prior to becoming part of NCCN, IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center joined 75 other centers, associations, and advocacy organizations as part of NCCN's campaign with the American Cancer Society to encourage the safe resumption of cancer screening following a dangerous decline at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Learn more at NCCN.org/resume-screening.

About the National Comprehensive Cancer Network

The National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) is a not-for-profit alliance of leading cancer centers devoted to patient care, research, and education. NCCN is dedicated to improving and facilitating quality, effective, equitable, and accessible cancer care so all patients can live better lives. The NCCN Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology (NCCN Guidelines) provide transparent, evidence-based, expert consensus recommendations for cancer treatment, prevention, and supportive services; they are the recognized standard for clinical direction and policy in cancer management and the most thorough and frequently-updated clinical practice guidelines available in any area of medicine. The NCCN Guidelines for Patients provide expert cancer treatment information to inform and empower patients and caregivers, through support from the NCCN Foundation. NCCN also advances continuing education, global initiatives, policy, and research collaboration and publication in oncology. Visit NCCN.org for more information and follow NCCN on Facebook @NCCNorg, Instagram @NCCNorg, and Twitter @NCCN.

Media Contact:

Rachel Darwin

267-622-6624

[email protected]

SOURCE National Comprehensive Cancer Network
OXFORD, England, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Oxford Science Enterprises, the Science Business Builder and preferred investment partner of the University of Oxford, notes that a report published today  Spotlight on Spinouts by data analyst firm Beauhurst and sponsored by the Royal Academy of Engineering  has ranked Oxford University as the top university in the UK for turning academic research into science-driven spinout companies.

The University created 193 spinouts between 2011-2021  further highlights of the report are below in the press announcement from the University of Oxford, and in the report, which can be downloaded here.

The report also ranks Oxford Science Enterprises as the most active fund focused solely on a single institution in the last decade, having completed 92 investments totalling 891 million since founding in 2015.

Notable investments by Oxford Science Enterprises include Vaccitech in Life Sciences, Ultromics in Health Tech, First Light Fusion in Deep Tech and Mind Foundry in Software and AI.

Alexis Dormandy, CEO of Oxford Science Enterprises, said:

"Oxford University and its partners have established a scientific start-up ecosystem that rivals anywhere in the world. The exciting work being done across life sciences, health tech, deep tech, artificial intelligence, and computing is truly ground-breaking and has the potential to make a positive impact in the real world and improve lives globally. We are extremely proud to be playing a significant part in nurturing this ecosystem, working with brilliant people to transform world-leading science and innovation into world-leading enterprises of the future."

The announcement from the University of Oxford is below:

Oxford University retains top spot for spinout generation in the UK

Oxford University has been ranked first in the UK for turning academic research into spinout companies, according to the new Spotlight on Spinouts report published today by data analyst firm Beauhurst.

The report, sponsored by the Royal Academy of Engineering, has identified 193 spinouts emerging from Oxford University since 2011, ahead of Cambridge University in second place with 137, with Imperial College London and University College London ranked third and fourth, with 106 and 88 spinouts respectively.

Oxford was also found to have the most active cluster for spinouts, with 90 such firms based in the local authority for Oxford alone.

The report comes after several record-breaking years for innovation in Oxford, tracked by the University's commercialisation arm, Oxford University Innovation (OUI). Through OUI, the University created 31 new companies during the 2020/21 academic year.

OUI's own analysis indicates that Oxford's output is one of the highest in the world over the period, second only to ETH Zurich in Switzerland. Investment levels are also at their highest on record, with Oxford companies securing over 1bn in external investment over 2020/21.

Oxford Science Enterprises, the science business builder and preferred investment partner of Oxford University, also performed well in the rankings. The firm has completed the most deals with the highest total value for a fund focused solely on a single institution.

The report also shares insights into spinouts across the UK, including university equity stakes. It demonstrates that Oxford University has taken a mean average of 24.3% in equity across its spinouts since 2011. The University's fact-based approach to equity, which applied until 2021, agreed equity holdings in line with a general trend across all UK universities. In 2021, across all UK universities, the average stake was 20.6% and is in line with the University's new equity position of 20%.

The report shows that there is still much work to be done to increase diversity in UK university innovation, with 86.4% of founding teams and 92.3% of director teams being all-male. There are signs, however, that this all-male trend is starting to reverse  in 2021, 21.9% of UK spinouts had at least one female founder. As part of an ongoing commitment to achieving strong representation and voice of women in decision-making at all levels, the Increasing Diversity in Enterprising Activities (IDEA) initiative was launched last year at Oxford University to better understand and accelerate diversity and inclusion in innovation and entrepreneurship activities, including spinouts.

Report findings also point to a growing trend of investment into UK spinouts, with 2.54bn invested in 2021 compared to 405m in 2012. Average investment size too is growing, reaching 6.7m per round in 2021, up from 2.01m in 2012.

Professor Chas Bountra, Pro Vice-Chancellor for Innovation at Oxford University, said:

"Already moving at pace, our innovation ecosystem is rapidly snowballing into something much larger. We are tracking more students, researchers and faculty getting involved than ever before. The University and its partners are building stronger links with industry and investment communities, attracting more support and larger investment rounds. We are building more space for innovation in the city, such as the redevelopment of the Clarendon Centre at the heart of Oxford into a spinout hub. Through this accelerating momentum, the University and its community of innovators and entrepreneurs are able to respond to the biggest crises of the day and deliver technological advancement which has a meaningful and positive impact on society."

Baroness Nicola Blackwood, Chair of Oxford University Innovation, said:

"This is an exceptional achievement for the University, OUI, and all those across the maturing Oxford cluster. But there is no room for complacency. We are determined to keep listening and striving to do University-based innovation better because that's the only way we will play our full role in solving some of the most challenging problems we face today. This is demonstrated by our recent change in equity policy, which means more equity for academic founders and a sustainable plan for reinvestment in the next generation of innovators from the University stake. And our ongoing work to we create an innovation community that attracts and supports diversity at all levels."

Alexis Dormandy, CEO of Oxford Science Enterprises, said:

"Oxford University and its partners have established a scientific start-up ecosystem that rivals anywhere in the world. The exciting work being done across life sciences, health tech, deep tech, artificial intelligence, and computing is truly ground-breaking and has the potential to make a positive impact in the real world and improve lives globally. We are extremely proud to be playing a significant part in nurturing this ecosystem, working with brilliant people to transform world-leading science and innovation into world-leading enterprises of the future."

Notes to Editors:

Oxford University has been placed number 1 in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings for the sixth year running, and 2 in the QS World Rankings 2022. At the heart of this success is our ground-breaking research and innovation.

Oxford is world-famous for research excellence and home to some of the most talented people from across the globe. Our work helps the lives of millions, solving real-world problems through a huge network of partnerships and collaborations. The breadth and interdisciplinary nature of our research sparks imaginative and inventive insights and solutions.

Through its research commercialisation arm, Oxford University Innovation, Oxford is the highest university patent filer in the UK and is ranked first in the UK for university spinouts, having created more than 200 new companies since 1988. Over a third of these companies have been created in the past three years. The university is a catalyst for prosperity in Oxfordshire and the United Kingdom, contributing 15.7 billion to the UK economy in 2018/19, and supports more than 28,000 full time jobs.

About Oxford Science Enterprises

We are Oxford Science Enterprises, the Science Business Builder. We want to help solve the world's toughest problems for more people, in more places, faster. We do this by transforming world-leading science into world-changing businesses, partnering the best scientists from the world's best university with the best business brains. We grow our companies with care and expertise; in a way that is systematic and scalable. We invest for real-world impact, not only financial returns. And we re-invest proceeds back into the next generation of original research and world-changing businesses.

Our enterprises address problems that affect people in life-changing ways: their health, the availability of food, the survival of the planet. Since 2015, we have received an automatic stake in all Oxford University science spinouts  more than 100 businesses founded by over 200 of Oxford's leading academics. We have taken a leading role in creating and building over 70 of these, adding +55,000 sq ft of lab & start-up space to support them. Today our businesses are worth over 2bn and have created +2,000 jobs.

Follow us: oxfordscienceenterprises.com | Twitter | LinkedIn | Quarterly News

Contacts:

Oxford Science Enterprises

Lisa Bedwell  [email protected]

For media enquiries:

Mark Swallow, Sandi Greenwood, Eleanor Perkin  MEDiSTRAVA Consulting

[email protected]

SOURCE Oxford Science Enterprises
Results demonstrate the importance of vaccinating patients at trusted sites of care

DENVER and WALTHAM, Mass., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- A federal partnership established to help increase access to COVID-19 vaccines for end stage kidney disease (ESKD) patients receiving dialysis was successful in reducing racial disparities in vaccination coverage, new research published today in JAMA Internal Medicine affirms. Compared to white patients, Hispanic, Black and Asian patients were more likely to receive at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine in a dialysis center.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) collaborated with DaVita, Fresenius Medical Care North America and other partners in March 2021 to create the Federal Dialysis Provider COVID-19 Vaccine Partnership. Both providers received allocations of COVID-19 vaccines from the federal government to administer to patients in dialysis centers and distribute to other dialysis providers across the country.

"We were steadfast in our advocacy efforts to support patients with kidney failure by providing access to the vaccine through the pandemic. We're incredibly grateful for the collaboration between the CDC and the kidney care community to leverage our capacity, experience and footprint to bring dialysis patients direct access to COVID-19 vaccines," said Dr. Jeff Giullian, chief medical officer for DaVita and study co-author. "The results of this study affirm that providing vaccines at trusted sites of care is an effective approach to helping to reduce hesitancy and advance equity for patients of color who have been disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic."

"I appreciate all the members of our frontline care teams who worked so hard to efficiently vaccinate our vulnerable patient population," said Dr. Jeffrey Hymes, global head of clinical affairs for Fresenius Medical Care and another study co-author. "This important partnership with the CDC shows how well our dialysis centers can be used to reach often underserved populations and improve equitable access to care, especially for people at highest risk of complications from viruses like COVID-19."

The new study evaluated the impact of dialysis clinics serving as COVID-19 vaccine providers on vaccination coverage and disparities from Dec. 1, 2020, through June 13, 2021. Vaccination coverage was calculated using the number of patients at nearly 5,200 Fresenius and DaVita dialysis centers who received at least one dose of vaccine, regardless of location. Researchers found that:

As of March 28, 2021 , shortly after the federal partnership launched, vaccination coverage among white patients was 52%, exceeding coverage in Black (45.2%) and Hispanic (51.3%) patients. Asian patients had higher vaccination coverage (60%) than white patients.

, shortly after the federal partnership launched, vaccination coverage among white patients was 52%, exceeding coverage in Black (45.2%) and Hispanic (51.3%) patients. Asian patients had higher vaccination coverage (60%) than white patients. By June 13, 2021 , vaccination coverage among Asian (74.1%) and Hispanic (69.5%) patients exceeded that of white patients (65.5%), with vaccination coverage among Black patients slightly lower (63%).

, vaccination coverage among Asian (74.1%) and Hispanic (69.5%) patients exceeded that of white patients (65.5%), with vaccination coverage among Black patients slightly lower (63%). Overall, 50.7% (312,046) of vaccinated patients were vaccinated in a dialysis clinic during the evaluation. Compared to white patients (42.5%), Hispanic (62.2%), Black (55.4%) and Asian (49.5%) patients were more likely to receive the COVID-19 vaccine in a dialysis center.

The researchers recommend that public health agencies and policymakers prioritize dialysis centers for federal vaccine allocations and on-site vaccine administration in the future.

More than 500,000 Americans diagnosed with ESKD receive life-sustaining dialysis care. Due to underlying conditions that may compromise their immune systems, these patients are often at higher risk for COVID-19 infection. ESKD patients are also some of the most racially and ethnically diverse in health care.

Study author affiliations: Fresenius Medical Care, DaVita Inc., Minnesota Department of Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention detailed to Puerto Rico Department of Health, American Society of Nephrology and Yale University School of Medicine, and the American Society of Nephrology and Rogosin Institute.

About DaVita Inc.

DaVita (NYSE: DVA) is a comprehensive kidney care provider focused on transforming care to improve the quality of life for patients globally. The company is one of the largest providers of kidney care services in the U.S. and has been a leader in clinical quality and innovation for more than 20 years. DaVita is working to help increase equitable access to care for patients at every stage and setting along their kidney health journeyfrom slowing progression of kidney disease to streamlining the transplant process, from acute hospital care to dialysis at home. As of December 31, 2021, DaVita served 203,000 patients at 2,815 outpatient dialysis centers in the U.S. The company operated an additional 339 outpatient dialysis centers in ten countries worldwide. DaVita has reduced hospitalizations, improved mortality and worked collaboratively to propel the kidney care community to adopt an equitable, high-quality standard of care for all patients, everywhere. To learn more, visit DaVita.com/About.

About Fresenius Medical Care North America

Fresenius Medical Care North America (FMCNA) is the premier healthcare company focused on providing the highest quality care to people with renal and other chronic conditions. Through its industry-leading network of dialysis facilities and outpatient cardiac and vascular labs, Fresenius Medical Care North America provides coordinated healthcare services at pivotal care points for hundreds of thousands of chronically ill customers throughout the continent. As the world's largest fully integrated renal company, it offers specialty pharmacy and laboratory services, and manufactures and distributes the most comprehensive line of dialysis equipment, disposable products, and renal pharmaceuticals. For more information, visit the FMCNA website at https://fmcna.com/.

Media Contact Information:

DaVita

Halie Peddle

(303) 550-6349

[email protected]

Fresenius Medical Care North America

Brad Puffer

(781) 699-3331

[email protected]



SOURCE DaVita
"Coach Martin" Mussey, BDE Manager for Nexion Travel Group and certified business coach, led the advisors in workshops and exercises to help them establish specific and measurable goals to increase profitability and plan for sustainable growth. Each attendee was also provided exclusive content and materials from Business Success Journeys, Nexion's newly launched coaching program. Other faculty on this Immersive Journey included LaDonna Allen, National Account Manager with Princess Cruises.

Each Immersive Journey is hosted by and exclusive to a supplier, giving Nexion members the chance to not only learn a particular topic, but get to know a supplier's offerings. Immersive Journeys attendees on this trip experienced a cruise with stops at Grand Turks and the Dominican Republic, and Princess's exclusive Medallion Class sailing. Regal Princess's Hotel Director also sat down with attendees to share insights about the unique onboard experience that Princess offers, and how to sell it to their clients.

"Our first Immersive Journey was a smashing success," said Mussey. "Our members loved being able to have the luxury of a few days of time to really learn about achieving business success in a small-group environment. They left with actionable ideas for their businesses and deepened their relationships with an important supplier partner. The Princess team put a lot of time and effort towards helping attendees not only fully understand their product, but also learn about business success from their experts."

Nexion Travel Group President Jackie Friedman concurred: "Immersive Journeys' success depends on a true partnership with our preferred suppliers and I cannot thank Princess enough for hosting our inaugural event. Nexion members have been telling us they want to combine learning about a new skill or tactic with experiencing our suppliers' offerings. Immersive Journeys fits the bill for both, and we cannot wait to host our next Immersive Journeys event with another focus and a new partner."

All travel professionals interested in learning how to succeed as a professional business owner, backed by Nexion Travel Group's many great benefits, are encouraged to call 800-747-6813 or email [email protected].

About Nexion Travel Group

Nexion Travel Group is a fully accredited host agency, offering membership to independent travel professionals since 1995. Nexion Travel Group provides ticketing, operations and fulfillment support to independent travel professionals coupled with best-in-class tools, technology, marketing, education and support. As part of Travel Leaders Group, a division of Internova Travel Group, Nexion Travel Group is the complete host agency for multi-agent agencies, corporate agencies, experienced agents and those new to the industry.

About Internova Travel Group

Internova Travel Group is one of the largest travel services companies in the world with a collection of leading brands delivering high-touch, personal travel expertise to leisure and corporate clients. Internova manages leisure, business and franchise firms through a portfolio of distinctive divisions. Internova represents more than 62,000 travel advisors in over 6,000 company-owned and affiliated locations predominantly in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, with a presence in more than 80 countries.

CONTACT:

Berit Griffin

[email protected]

651-442-5173

SOURCE Nexion Travel Group
SEATTLE, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- West coast publishing house, Flashpoint Books, has announced the April 5, 2022 release of a new book, Wings Over Water: The Vital Magic of North America's Prairie Wetlands. This stunning coffee table book is the printed companion to the soon-to-be-released IMAX movie of the same name, narrated by actor Michael Keaton.

Wings Over Water is a joint venture with The National Audubon Society, the world's oldest non-profit environmental organization dedicated to conservation of birds and their habitat; Ducks Unlimited, the world's largest nonprofit organization dedicated to conserving North America's continually disappearing waterfowl habitats; and the Max McGraw Wildlife Foundation, which works to secure the future of hunting, fishing and land management through programs of science, education, demonstration and communication.

The book features 300 still photographs captured during filming of the latest IMAX film, accompanied by essays from the experts in conservation, bird and wildlife experts.

Just in time for Earth Day 2022, Wings Over Water celebrates and promotes the preservation of the prairie wetlands and the birds that live and breed there. The Prairie Pothole Region is critical breeding and nesting habitat for the birds of North America  over 60 percent of America's ducks are hatched there, as well as hundreds of other shore and song birds. Wings Over Water immerses the reader into one of earth's most important ecosystems, following the breeding and migrations of sandhill cranes, mallards, and yellow warblers from their southern wintering grounds back to the prairie wetlands to nest and raise the next generation of the species.

Wings Over Water: The Vital Magic of North America's Prairie Wetlands will be available everywhere books are sold beginning April 5, 2022 and is available for pre-order here. The film is embarking on a 55-city tour to promote the release of the motion picture.

Learn more about the IMAX film, Wings Over Water at wingsoverwaterfilm.com. Discover Flashpoint at flashpointbooks.com.

ABOUT FLASHPOINT

Flashpoint Books are produced exclusively by Girl Friday Productions , a female-founded and -led book production agency, renowned in the industry since 2006. Past projects include work for CNN, Sesame Street Workshop, The Boeing Company, Modernist Cuisine, National Geographic, Neil Lane, Skydance Productions, and Paw Patrol, among many other major properties.

CONTACT

Georgie Hockett, Girl Friday Productions

206 659 1837

[email protected]

SOURCE Flashpoint
PORTLAND, Ore., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Portland General Electric Company (NYSE: POR) today provided notice of proposed settlement of derivative actions and settlement hearing.

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF OREGON PORTLAND DIVISION

JS HALBERSTAM IRREVOCABLE

GRANTOR TRUST, Derivatively and on

Behalf of PORTLAND GENERAL

ELECTRIC COMPANY, Case No. 3:21-cv-00413-SI

Plaintiff,



JACK E. DAVIS, JOHN W. BALLANTINE,

RODNEY L. BROWN, JR., KIRBY A.

DYESS, MARK B. GANZ, MARIE OH

HUBER, KATHRYN J. JACKSON, PH.D.,

MICHAEL A. LEWIS, MICHAEL H.

MILLEGAN, NEIL J. NELSON, M. LEE

PELTON, PH.D., MARIA M. POPE,

CHARLES W. SHIVERY, JAMES P.

TORGERSON, AND JAMES LOBDELL,



Defendants,



and



PORTLAND GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY,



Nominal Defendant.



SUMMARY NOTICE OF PROPOSED SETTLEMENT OF PORTLAND GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY DERIVATIVE ACTIONS AND SETTLEMENT HEARING

TO: ALL OWNERS OF PORTLAND GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY ("PGE") COMMON STOCK AS OF MARCH 28, 2022.

YOU ARE HEREBY NOTIFIED that the parties to the above-captioned shareholder action pending in the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon (the "Action"), have reached a Settlement to resolve the issues raised in the Action and related shareholder derivative actions captioned Berning v. Pope et al., No. 21-cv-00783-SI, filed in this Court, and Shimberg v. Pope et al., No. 21CV02957, and Ashabraner v. Pope et al., No. 21CV13698, filed in Oregon Circuit Court, Multnomah County (collectively, the "Actions"). The parties to the Actions have entered into a Stipulation dated February 11, 2022, setting forth the terms of the Settlement. The Settlement, if approved by the Court, would fully, finally and forever resolve this Action on the terms set forth in the Stipulation.1

The Stipulation and a detailed Notice of Settlement describing in greater detail the Actions, the proposed Settlement, and the rights of Current PGE Shareholders with regard to the Settlement are available on PGE's website at https://investors.portlandgeneral.com/.

You have the right to participate in a Settlement Hearing to be held on May 9, 2022, at

2:00 p.m. at the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon, Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, Room 15B, 1000 Southwest Third Avenue, Portland, Oregon 97204 to determine:

(i) whether the Court should approve the Settlement as fair, reasonable, adequate and in the best interests of Portland General Electric Company ("PGE" or the "Company") and PGE's shareholders pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure Rule 23.1; (ii) whether to enter a judgment dismissing the Action with prejudice and extinguish and release all Settled Claims; (iii) whether the requirements of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and due process have been satisfied in connection with notice of the Settlement; and (iv) whether the Court should approve Plaintiffs' Fee and Expense Amount, as well as to consider such other matters as may properly come before the Court.

1 Unless otherwise defined, all capitalized terms contained in this Summary Notice shall have the same definitions as set forth in the Stipulation.

The Settlement, reached with the substantial assistance and oversight of an experienced mediator, addresses allegations that certain current and former directors and officers of PGE breached their fiduciary duties by failing to maintain an adequate system of internal controls to oversee PGE's energy trading and purportedly disseminating materially false and misleading statements relating to the Company's energy trading activities. As part of the Settlement, PGE has implemented or, to the extent PGE has not already done so, will implement certain corporate governance reforms specifically set forth in Exhibit A of the Stipulation.

After negotiating the principal terms of the Settlement, Plaintiffs' counsel and PGE separately negotiated at arm's-length with the assistance of the mediator the amount of attorneys' fees and expenses to be paid to Plaintiffs' counsel, agreeing that PGE or its insurance carriers shall, subject to and upon Court approval, pursuant to the timetable provided in the Stipulation, pay or cause to be paid to Plaintiffs' Counsel attorneys' fees and expenses in the total amount of $750,000.

The individual defendants have denied, and continue to deny, all allegations of wrongdoing and that they have any liability on the claims asserted in the Actions. PGE also has denied and continues to deny the claims in the Actions.

If you are a Current PGE Shareholder, your rights to pursue certain derivative claims on behalf of PGE may be affected by the Settlement. Any Current PGE Shareholder wishing to assert an objection to the Settlement or Fee and Expense Amount must, at least fourteen (14) days prior to the Settlement Hearing, (i) file with the Clerk of the Court a written objection to the Settlement and/or Plaintiffs' Fee and Expense Amount setting forth: (a) the nature of the objection; (b) proof of ownership of PGE common stock at the time the Preliminary Approval Order was entered through the date of the Settlement Hearing, including the number of shares of PGE common stock held by the shareholder and the date(s) of purchase; and (c) any documentation in support of such objection; and (ii) if a Current PGE Shareholder intends to appear and requests to be heard at the Settlement Hearing, such shareholder must have, in addition to the requirements of (i) above, filed with the Clerk of Court: (a) a written notice of such shareholder's intention to appear; (b) a statement that indicates the basis for such appearance; and (c) the identities of any witnesses the shareholder intends to call at the Settlement Hearing and a statement as to the subjects of the testimony of each witness. Any Current PGE Shareholder who fails to object in the manner provided above will be deemed to have waived all objections (including the right to appeal) and will be bound by the Order and Final Judgment to be entered and the releases to be given, unless otherwise ordered by the Court.

Any inquiries regarding the Settlement or the Action should be directed to Plaintiffs' Counsel:

David C. Katz Mark D. Smilow WeissLaw LLP

305 Broadway, 7th Floor

New York, NY 10007

Telephone: (212) 682-3025

[email protected]

[email protected]

PLEASE DO NOT TELEPHONE THE COURT OR PGE REGARDING THIS NOTICE

A copy of the Parties' Stipulation and Agreement of Settlement (the "Stipulation") fully executed as of February 11, 2022, is available on PGE's website at https://investors.portlandgeneral.com/.

About Portland General Electric Company:

Portland General Electric (NYSE: POR) is a fully integrated energy company based in Portland, Oregon. The company serves approximately 900,000 customers with a service area population of 2 million Oregonians in 51 cities. PGE owns 16 generation plants across Oregon and other Northwestern states and maintains and operates 14 public parks and recreation areas. For more than 130 years, PGE has powered the advancement of society, delivering safe, affordable, and reliable energy to Oregonians. PGE and its approximately 3,000 employees are working with customers to build a clean energy future. Together with its customers, PGE has the No. 1 voluntary renewable energy program in the U.S. PGE is committed to achieving at least an 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from power served to customers by 2030 and 100% reduction by 2040. In 2021, PGE became the first U.S. utility to join The Climate Pledge. For the eighth year in a row PGE achieved a perfect score on the 2021 Human Rights Campaign Foundation's Corporate Equality Index, a national benchmarking survey and report on corporate policies and practices related to LGBTQ workplace equality. In 2021, PGE, employees, retirees, and the PGE Foundation donated $4.8 million and volunteered 15,760 hours with more than 300 nonprofits across Oregon. For more information visit www.PortlandGeneral.com/news.

SOURCE: Portland General Company

For more information please contact:

Mike Houlihan, PGE, 503-504-9706

SOURCE Portland General Company
Several members of the project team were recognized in front of more than 600 industry professionals at Pier 60 in New York City during ENR's Award of Excellence Gala on March 31. The Best of the Best crystal award was presented the following morning during the Best of the Best Awards Breakfast.

"Expanding healthcare resources for Omaha's veterans community has been a labor of love for the entire design and construction team," said McCarthy Senior Vice President Ryan Sawall. "We're thrilled to be recognized by our industry peers."



Designed and Built for Veterans



Part of the VA Nebraska-Western Iowa Health Care System, the three-level, 157,000 SF outpatient facility is connected to an existing 12-story VA hospital built in 1950. It relieved the hospital of most primary care services for the region's more than 40,000 veterans. It also created an additional entry to the main hospital that expresses honor for its veteran occupants. A kaleidoscope of colored light throughout the main corridor evokes the colors awarded to military service members for acts of valor. That experience was created using a glass curtain wall with colored laminate along the western facade. A 50-by-235-foot curtain wall along the northern facade leads occupants to the main entry, expresses the windblown pattern of an American flag and reduces electric lighting loads on all three levels using healthy, natural daylight.



The facility houses seven primary-care clinics, including one exclusively for women veterans, and a specialty-care clinic. An operating suite includes five operating rooms whose sustainable engineering helped the project achieve energy use 26.2 percent below code.



Shaped by Teamwork



The Omaha VA Ambulatory Care Center was funded through the first-ever public-private partnership (P3) for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Private donors contributed $30 million to make the project a reality after the VA allocated $56 million. Teamwork created an opportunity for a new delivery process that combined elements from traditional public- and private-sector delivery. Unlike previous VA projects, the Construction Manager (McCarthy) joined the project team concurrent to design, which helped achieve $34 million in savings vs. traditional project delivery through early collaboration and co-selection of subcontractors. The schedule was abbreviated from 52 months to 36 months.



Through close coordination between the design and construction teams, the final project cost was within 1 percent of the original $67 million conceptual budget estimate provided during the project's design phase. Lean construction practices enabled the team to meet the contractual completion date, despite experiencing 43 days of weather impacts during the project's structural phase. Team members developed and implemented enhanced safety practices at the start of the pandemic, and the project recorded zero lost-time incidents.



"The community's passion to make this project a reality carried over to our design and construction," said LEO A DALY National Director of Engineering Kim Cowman. "We knew it was something special at the time, and now we keep seeing the project's success as a healthcare resource for veterans, but this award and the level of recognition is humbling."



About LEO A DALY



LEO A DALY is a leader in holistic, high-performance design, specializing in planning, architecture, engineering, interior design and program management. Since 1915, the firm's unyielding focus on design excellence has resulted in exceptional spaces that enhance and enrich the human experience. The firm's award-winning, diverse portfolio includes projects in a wide range of markets in more than 91 countries, all 50 US states and the District of Columbia. For more information, visit www.leoadaly.com.



About McCarthy Building Companies



McCarthy Building Companies, Inc. is the oldest privately held national construction company in the country  with more than 150 years spent collaborating with partners to solve complex building challenges on behalf of its clients. With an unrelenting focus on safety and a comprehensive quality program that span all phases of every project, McCarthy utilizes industry-leading design phase and construction techniques combined with value-add technology to maximize outcomes. Repeatedly honored as a Best Place to Work and Healthiest Employer, McCarthy is ranked the 13th largest domestic builder (Engineering News-Record, May 2021) and is 100 percent employee owned. For more information, visit www.mccarthy.com.



SOURCE LEO A DALY
STOCKHOLM, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- OmboriGrid today announced that the company is integrating the Code barcode scanning SDK (CortexDecoder) into its mobile retail apps. This will help Ombori clients reduce costs by eliminating the need for additional scanning hardware. It will also deliver faster, more accurate barcode reading results, which will enhance the end-user experience.

As OmboriGrid expands its solution into areas such as mobile endless aisle, self-checkout, and order picking in store, fast and reliable mobile scanning is getting increasingly important. It became crucial to replace the existing barcode software with a tried and trusted solution that will deliver better results. The company selected Code Corporation because of its reputation and position as a market leader in this space.

"We are very excited by the increased capabilities that Code barcode scanning brings to our solutions," said Oskar Jakobsson, Chief Product Officer at OmboriGrid. "It will improve our products by increasing both efficiency and accuracy and will enable our clients to save money. Code's unrivaled expertise proves that they're the right partners for us."

"This collaboration with OmboriGrid allows us to support businesses in their digital transformation journey with fast and reliable barcode scanning. We are proud to be partnering with OmboriGrid on solutions that streamline operations and lead to cost savings across industries," says Thomas Rissmann, Director of Software Sales EMEA at Code Corporation.

CONTACT:

Oskar Jacobsson, Chief Product Officer, OmboriGrid AB (publ), +46 (0) 77-586 80 00, [email protected]

Thomas Rissmann, Director Software Sales EMEA, Code Corporation, +49-152-22812955, [email protected]

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/omborigrid-ab/r/omborigrid-announces-partnership-with-code-corporation-to-reduce-cost-of-barcode-scanning,c3538302

SOURCE OmboriGrid AB
"President Biden's actions underscore the need to swiftly and significantly increase domestic production of antimony and other critical minerals essential to securing our clean energy future," said Laurel Sayer, President and CEO of Perpetua Resources. "Prioritizing responsible mineral development is a clear recognition that serious action is needed to address the vulnerabilities associated with energy and mineral dependence. A resilient and diversified energy grid will require the support of a wide variety of battery technologies and associated minerals. Antimony based battery technologies offer an alternative in the market and their inclusion in the mix of energy storage options will help limit overreliance on any one critical mineral."

In 2021, Perpetua entered into a long-term partnership agreement with Ambri, an American company developing an antimony-based liquid metal battery which is designed to provide affordable and reliable grid-scale storage to facilitate the decarbonization of energy grids. Under the agreement, antimony from the Stibnite Gold Project is expected to power over 13 Gigawatt hours of energy storage which is equivalent to over 8 times the total additions to the U.S. energy storage market in 2020 and enough to power approximately 1 million American homes with solar power on a daily basis over the anticipated 20+ year lifespan of the batteries. This partnership highlights the role modern mining can play in addressing some of the world's climate change challenges and directly links the restoration of the historical Stibnite mining district to achieving climate change solutions.

Presidential Determination No 2022-11 comes after weeks of mounting pressure from bipartisan congressional leaders calling for action to end foreign reliance on critical minerals. In a joint letter to the President, Senators Murkowski, Manchin, Risch and Cassidy urged the Administration to use the Defense Production Act to develop domestic critical mineral production to support national security and energy independence.

"Made in America starts with mined in America," said Sayer. "We appreciate the growing urgency and bipartisan recognition that a safe, reliable, and responsible supply chain must begin right here at home and the Stibnite Gold Project is prepared to be part of the solution by providing the only domestically mined source of antimony for both energy storage products and national security platforms."

Citing dependance on foreign sources and an inability to meet the growing demands of a clean energy economy, the Determination orders the Secretary of Defense to "create, maintain, protect, expand or restore sustainable and responsible production" of critical and strategic minerals needed for large-capacity batteries among other products. The Determination also directs the Secretary of Defense to consult with the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of Energy.

The Project is currently progressing into the later stages of the permitting process, and the Company anticipates the circulation of a preliminary Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement ("SDEIS") for cooperating agency review in the second quarter of 2022, with public release shortly thereafter in the third quarter of 2022.

Critical Project for the American Future

The Stibnite Gold Project in central Idaho is designed to restore environmental conditions at a historical mine site while responsibly developing one of the highest-grade, open pit gold resources in the United States and becoming the only domestically mined source of the critical mineral antimony.

With key applications in energy and defense, securing a domestic supply of antimony is more important than ever. Antimony is a key component for grid storage battery technology and Perpetua is uniquely positioned to play a vital role in the decarbonization of the world through its supply agreement with Ambri. Also a vital component in defense applications, antimony was listed by the Department of Defense ("DOD") as a shortfall material in the 100-Day Supply Chain Review Report (June 2021) and in DOD's most recent National Defense Stockpile and Annual Operations and Planning Report (February 2022).

The U.S. Geological Survey recently reported that foreign reliance is growing, with China, Russia and Tajikistan controlling 90% of the world supply of antimony and no domestically mined sources (USGS, 2022 Mineral Commodity Summary).

About Perpetua Resources and the Stibnite Gold Project

Perpetua Resources Corp., through its wholly owned subsidiaries, is focused on the exploration, site restoration and redevelopment of gold-antimony-silver deposits in the Stibnite-Yellow Pine district of central Idaho that are encompassed by the Stibnite Gold Project. The Project is one of the highest-grade, open pit gold deposits in the United States and is designed to apply a modern, responsible mining approach to restore an abandoned mine site and produce both gold and the only mined source of antimony in the United States. Further advancing Perpetua Resources' ESG and sustainable mining goals, the Project will be powered by the lowest carbon emissions grid in the nation and a portion of the antimony produced from the Project will be supplied to Ambri, a US-based company commercializing a low-cost liquid metal battery essential for the low-carbon energy transition. In addition to the company's commitments to transparency, accountability, environmental stewardship, safety and community engagement, Perpetua Resources adopted formal ESG commitments which can be found here.

Forward-Looking Information

Statements contained in this news release that are not historical facts are "forward-looking information" or "forward-looking statements" (collectively, "Forward-Looking Information") within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation and the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-Looking Information includes, but is not limited to, disclosure regarding possible events, next steps and courses of action including actions to be taken by the USFS, the State of Idaho, the U.S. Federal government and other government agencies and regulatory bodies; plans with respect to the Stibnite Gold Project and the success of such project; and our and Ambri, Inc.'s ability to perform under the supply agreement, which agreement is subject to certain conditions, including identification of one or more refiners to transform our antimony concentrate into antimony metal, and mutual agreement on certain material terms, including volume and pricing. In certain cases, Forward-Looking Information can be identified by the use of words and phrases or variations of such words and phrases or statements such as "anticipate", "expect" "plan", "likely", "believe", "intend", "forecast", "project", "estimate", "potential", "could", "may", "will", "would" or "should". In preparing the Forward-Looking Information in this news release, Perpetua Resources has applied several material assumptions, including, but not limited to, assumptions that the current exploration, development, environmental and other objectives concerning the Stibnite Gold Project can be achieved and that its other corporate activities will proceed as expected; that we and Ambri will be able to agree on the terms of the Ambri agreement; that we will find a refinery to transform our antimony concentrate into antimony metal; that Ambri will successfully develop, manufacture and market its proposed batteries; that general business and economic conditions will not change in a materially adverse manner and that permitting and operations costs will not materially increase. Forward-Looking Information involves known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of Perpetua Resources to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the Forward-Looking Information. Such risks and other factors include, among others, changes in laws and regulations and changes in the application of standards pursuant to existing laws and regulations which may result in unforeseen results in the permitting process; uncertainty surrounding input to be received from regulators and community stakeholders; risks related to unforeseen delays in the review process; risks related to opposition to the Project; risks related to increased or unexpected costs in operations or the permitting process; risks that estimates used in budgeting and financial statements may prove to be incorrect; risks related to the outcome of litigation and potential for delay of the Project, as well as those factors discussed in Perpetua Resources' public filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC") and its Canadian disclosure record. Although Perpetua Resources has attempted to identify important factors that could affect Perpetua Resources and may cause actual actions, events or results to differ materially from those described in Forward-Looking Information, there may be other factors that cause actions, events or results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that Forward-Looking 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. For further information on these and other risks and uncertainties that may affect the Company's business, see the "Risk Factors" section of the Company's filings with the SEC, which are available at www.sec.gov and with the Canadian securities regulators, which are available at www.sedar.com. Except as required by law, Perpetua Resources does not assume any obligation to release publicly any revisions to Forward-Looking Information contained in this news release to reflect events or circumstances after the date hereof or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events.

SOURCE Perpetua Resources Corp.
SYRACUSE, N.Y., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Pinnacle Investments, LLC ("Pinnacle"), a 25-year-old investment firm headquartered in Syracuse, expanded their business in Morristown, New Jersey with the procurement of three reps formerly affiliated with The Variable Annuity Life Insurance Company (VALIC). Andrea Coladarci, Adam DeSimone, and Adam Gartside, now doing business as Prime Wealth Group, each left VALIC Friday after 11, 3, and 2 years respectively. Together they were overseeing $200 million in assets.

"We are thrilled to have this team join our growing firm," says Mark Nardella, President of Pinnacle Investments. "Having transitioned from VALIC to Pinnacle myself over two years ago, I can attest to the positive impact that move has been for my business. I'm excited to witness the team unleash their full potential as they are now able to provide their clients with a true open architecture platform of financial products and services. Undoubtedly, their clients will be the ones who benefit most from this move."

Pinnacle incentivizes independent recruits with competitive payouts, which are well above the 45-50% high earners at a wirehouse could earn. They also recruit based on an "ownership" model, offering reps equity in the parent company, Pinnacle Holding Company, LLC, which also owns Pinnacle Employee Services, a professional employer organization; Pinnacle Capital Management, a money management firm; and Confidential Planning, a 403(b) provider.

"Landing such a well-rounded, hardworking, client-focused investment group to our firm is a testament to the exceptional culture Pinnacle Investments is building in the industry," states the CEO of Pinnacle Investments, Ben Quilty. "Our recruitment team has done a tremendous job of getting our unique message to advisors looking to transition their business to a truly independent financial services company, managed by advisors themselves. We encourage any advisor or team of advisors looking to enhance their advisor-client experience to consider Pinnacle as their forever home, just as Prime Wealth Group has done."

About Pinnacle Investments, LLC

Pinnacle Investments, LLC ("Pinnacle") was founded in 1996 by two advisors who sought a better solution for their clients than what was available at a large wirehouse. Pinnacle's success is directly attributable to its ability to provide a personalized approach to investment management and client service while offering the same investment products and protections available at larger financial institutions. Since experienced advisors run the firm, they avoid culture clashes that spoil the experience of advisors and clients. This philosophy has put them on an impressive growth trajectory throughout the U.S. To learn more visit PinnacleInvestments.com.

Investment and advisory services offered through Pinnacle Investments, LLC member FINRA/SIPC.

MEDIA CONTACT

Elizabeth Higman, Marketing Manager

[email protected]

315-295-3832

SOURCE Pinnacle Investments, LLC
1.5 million loan will further support clinical manufacture of mocravimod for the adjunctive treatment of Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML)

DUBLIN and SAINT-LOUIS, France, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Priothera, a late-clinical stage biotechnology company pioneering the development of its S1P receptor modulator drug, mocravimod, today announces that it has entered a 1.5 million Loan Agreement with the regional Bpifrance in Strasbourg (Grand Est Bpifrance), via Priothera SAS, its French affiliate.

This R&D innovation loan will be used to further support the clinical manufacture of mocravimod for a European, US and Asian registration-enabling clinical trial with mocravimod in Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) patients undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT).

Brice Suire, Co-Founder and Chief Financial Officer of Priothera, said: "This non-dilutive financing, alongside the funding from the European Investment Bank that we announced recently, will play an important role in financing the development of mocravimod. It will allow us to strengthen our local French team and accelerate delivery of the clinical supply of mocravimod needed for our upcoming registration-enabling global clinical trial. We are very pleased with the confidence shown by Grand Est Bpifrance in supporting the Company in its development program."

Alban Stamm, Innovation Manager at Bpifrance Alsace commented: "We believe that Priothera, with its drug candidate mocravimod, has the potential to enable a major breakthrough in preventing transplant rejection which would provide a tremendous benefit to AML patients undergoing a stem cell transplant. The Bpifrance loan will support Priothera's key objective of establishing human proof of concept and generating registrational data, allowing the company to create significant socio-economic value in France and beyond that for patients globally."

Mocravimod, a sphingosine 1 phosphate (S1P) receptor modulator which has been previously tested in multiple autoimmune indications, is being developed to enhance the curative potential of HSCT in patients with AML. Moreover, it has shown clinically relevant benefits in an early clinical study in patients with hematologic malignancies undergoing HSCT.

About Priothera

Priothera is leading the way in developing orally applied sphingosine 1 phosphate (S1P) receptor modulators for the treatment of hematological malignancies. S1P receptor modulators are known to largely reduce egress of T cells from lymphatic tissues and not being immunosuppressants, thereby allowing for inhibition of graft-versus-host-disease (GvHD) while maintaining graft-versus-leukemia benefits in patients receiving HSCT.

Priothera which was founded in 2020 by an experienced team of drug development experts is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. The Company is backed by international founding investors Fountain Healthcare Partners (Dublin, Ireland), funds managed by Tekla Capital Management, LLC (Boston, Massachusetts), HealthCap (Stockholm, Sweden) and EarlyBird Venture Capital (Berlin, Germany).

For more information please visit: www.priothera.com

About Bpifrance

Bpifrance is the one stop shop for entrepreneurs with a vastly comprehensive toolbox offered in the field to customers through 50 local branches. Our mission is simple: we believe in serving the future, by being entrepreneur-centric and heavily decentralized.

www.bpifrance.fr

Contacts

Priothera

Florent Gros, CEO

E : [email protected]

MEDiSTRAVA Consulting

Sylvie Berrebi, David Dible, Sandi Greenwood, Frazer Hall

E: [email protected]

T: +44 (0)203 928 6900

SOURCE Priothera
DUBLIN, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Product Lifecycle Management Global Market Report 2021: COVID-19 Growth and Change" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

This report provides strategists, marketers and senior management with the critical information they need to assess the global product lifecycle management market.



This report focuses on product lifecycle management market which is experiencing strong growth. The report gives a guide to the product lifecycle management market which will be shaping and changing our lives over the next ten years and beyond, including the market's response to the challenge of the global pandemic.



Reasons to Purchase

Gain a truly global perspective with the most comprehensive report available on this market covering 12+ geographies.

Understand how the market is being affected by the coronavirus and how it is likely to emerge and grow as the impact of the virus abates.

Create regional and country strategies on the basis of local data and analysis.

Identify growth segments for investment.

Outperform competitors using forecast data and the drivers and trends shaping the market.

Understand customers based on the latest market research findings.

Benchmark performance against key competitors.

Utilize the relationships between key data sets for superior strategizing.

Suitable for supporting your internal and external presentations with reliable high quality data and analysis

Major players in the product lifecycle management market are ANSYS Inc., Accenture, Oracle Corporation, SAP SE, Autodesk Inc., Siemens AG, PTC Inc., Dassault Systemes SE, Aras Corporation, IBM, and Atos.



The global product lifecycle management market is expected to grow from $44.38 billion in 2020 to $49.52 billion in 2021 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.6%. The growth is mainly due to the companies resuming their operations and adapting to the new normal while recovering from the COVID-19 impact, which had earlier led to restrictive containment measures involving social distancing, remote working, and the closure of commercial activities that resulted in operational challenges. The market is expected to reach $70.37 billion in 2025 at a CAGR of 9.2%.



The product lifecycle management (PLM) market consists of sales of product lifecycle management software and services by entities (organizations, sole traders, and partnerships) that are engaged in providing a better strategic process for managing the complete journey of a product from initial ideation, development, service, and disposal. PLM refers to managing every step of the process involved with a product from raw material to finished product. The PLM process is inclusive of the manufacturing and marketing of the goods. From pricing and advertising to expansion or cost-cutting, the concept of product life cycle assists organizations in making smart business decisions.



The main components of the product lifecycle management market include software and services. PLM software enables businesses to strategically collaborate with partners and customers using trusted, up-to-date product information. PLM can be deployed either on-premise or on-cloud. The end-users of PLM include the automotive and transportation industry, industrial machinery, electronics and semiconductors, retail, energy and utilities, aerospace and defense, pharmaceuticals, IT and telecom, and others.



North America was the largest region in the product lifecycle management market in 2020. The regions covered in this report are Asia-Pacific, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, South America, Middle East, and Africa.



Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) are increasing the demand for the product lifecycle management (PLM) market. Major companies operating in the product lifecycle management (PLM) sector are focused on integrating new technology such as augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) to strengthen their position. For instance, in February 2021, Siemens had launched AssistAR 3.0, AssistAR supports assembly, inspection, and maintenance procedures with a new generation of accurate and robust augmented reality (AR) technologies. AssistAR connects to the company's product lifecycle management (PLM) system and uses regular PCs and displays to guide company operators through complex operations without the use of glasses or a headset.



In May 2020, Accenture, an Ireland-based company that specializes in providing consulting and professional services acquired PLM systems for an undisclosed amount. The acquisition of PLM Systems would enable Accenture to advance in the digitization of engineering services; Accenture intends to combine their capabilities, methodology, technology, and solutions for PLM Systems. This acquisition is in line with Accenture's expansion plans towards improving their industrial product development process and providing more efficient and sustainable solutions to their clients. PLM systems is an Italian company that specializes in the design and development of information systems for product lifecycle management.



The growing adoption of product lifecycle management (PLM) from end-use industries is expected to propel market growth in the coming years. PLM has the potential to offer improved supply chain accuracy, enhanced regulatory compliance, lower lead times, and an increase in sales growth. Product lifecycle management (PLM) software is being used by end-use sectors to increase transparency in supply chains & manufacturing processes and speed the development of innovative goods. For instance, in June 2021, Accenture, an Ireland-based company that provided professional services agreed with DI Square, a Japan-based IT company specialized in data analytics software acquired the firm's consulting capabilities for product lifecycle management (PLM) and application lifecycle management (ALM) systems integration. The acquisition of DI Square will increase Accenture's engineering expertise for the automotive and other manufacturing clients in Japan and other markets.



The countries covered in the product lifecycle management market report are Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Russia, South Korea, UK, USA.



Key Topics Covered:



1. Executive Summary



2. Product Lifecycle Management Market Characteristics



3. Product Lifecycle Management Market Trends and Strategies



4. Impact Of COVID-19 On Product Lifecycle Management



5. Product Lifecycle Management Market Size and Growth

5.1. Global Product Lifecycle Management Historic Market, 2015-2020, $ Billion

5.1.1. Drivers Of the Market

5.1.2. Restraints On the Market

5.2. Global Product Lifecycle Management Forecast Market, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

5.2.1. Drivers Of the Market

5.2.2. Restraints On the Market



6. Product Lifecycle Management Market Segmentation

6.1. Global Product Lifecycle Management Market, Segmentation by Component, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

Software

Services

6.2. Global Product Lifecycle Management Market, Segmentation by Deployment, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

On-Premise

On-Cloud

6.3. Global Product Lifecycle Management Market, Segmentation by End-User, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

Automotive and Transportation

Industrial Machinery

Electronics and Semiconductors

Retail

Energy and Utilities

Aerospace and Defense

Pharmaceuticals

IT and Telecomm

Others

7. Product Lifecycle Management Market Regional and Country Analysis

7.1. Global Product Lifecycle Management Market, Split by Region, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

7.2. Global Product Lifecycle Management Market, Split by Country, Historic and Forecast, 2015-2020, 2020-2025F, 2030F, $ Billion

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/oa4o2d

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]

For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900

U.S. Fax: 646-607-1904

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets
ProofPilot is bringing next-generation healthcare to all audiences. Tweet this

ProofPilot is transforming the traditional clinical trial model so more companies can afford to run trials on a wider array of regulated and non-regulated products and services  all without the typically required internal infrastructure. This democratization not only allows small companies to design and execute trials with rigor, but also to massively scale the research capacity of life science companies as well.

As part of this raise, famed technology strategist and healthcare investor Esther Dyson, executive founder of Wellville, joins ProofPilot's Board of Directors. "As a society, we don't know very much about what improves our human health, or even what a 'healthy' person looks like, but with reduced barriers to entry, ProofPilot allows organizations of any size to design unique trials that impact previously underrepresented populations," she says. "The ProofPilot value proposition is a true win-win-winfor companies, researchers, and people alike."

Jeff Kozloff, seasoned healthcare entrepreneur and another new member of ProofPilot's Board of Directors, echoes the value that ProofPilot brings in its transparency. "Trust is at the foundation of all consumer decision-making," says Kozloff. "ProofPilot's innovative platform enables companies to effortlessly conduct evidence-based research to advance science, validate product claims and earn consumer trust."

"Strategically, ProofPilot was a natural fit for Mitsui. This Company makes clinical trials affordable and easy-to-use, allowing many companies to test their next-generation healthcare solutions, and reach a diverse group of participants. With a focus on innovative opportunities in the healthcare and wellness market, we saw how ProofPilot can play an important role in bringing evidence-based changes to the market," said Jin-Ah Lim, General Manager at Mitsui & Co. (U.S.A.), Inc.

About ProofPilot

ProofPilot is an American internet company founded in 2014 by Matthew Amsden, with headquarters in New York City, New York. The software as a service (SaaS) product is created for anyone to design, launch, participate, and engage in research studies. ProofPilot was designed as a solution for Life Science companies with ProofPilot Rx, as well as wellness interventions with its product ProofPilot 365. To learn more, visit https://www.proofpilot.com/.

About Mitsui

With a long history in the United States, Mitsui & Co. (U.S.A.), Inc. ("Mitsui USA") is a wholly owned subsidiary of Mitsui & Co., Ltd., Tokyo, Japan, one of the most diversified and comprehensive trading, investment, and service enterprises in the world. Mitsui & Co. pursues "360 business innovation" that ranges from product sales, worldwide logistics and financing, through to the development of major international infrastructure and other projects. More information on Mitsui USA may be found at www.mitsui.com/us.

About Sopris Capital

Sopris Capital is a venture capital firm that invests growth equity in technology-enabled business services and SaaS companies that are solving critical pain points. Sopris seeks to be a value-added partner to fast-growing companies that have a validated business model, proven product/market fit, and a management team that can capitalize on the opportunity ahead. Learn more at: http://www.sopriscapital.com.

About First Trust Capital Partners

First Trust Capital Partners, LLC ("FTCP") is a private equity and venture capital investor based in Wheaton, Illinois. FTCP is affiliated with First Trust Portfolios L.P. and First Trust Advisors L.P. (collectively "First Trust"). FTCP's portfolio is comprised of over 70 private investments across multiple sectors. Our team is industry-agnostic, but given our background and areas of expertise, we focus on the Financial Services and Health Care Technology and Services sectors. For more information, please visit ftcapitalpartners.com.

About Excelra

Excelra's data and analytics solutions empower innovation in life sciences from molecule to market. The Excelra Edge comes from harmonizing heterogeneous data sets, applying innovative bioinformatics know-how and technologies to accelerate drug discovery & development with reliable and result-oriented insights. For more information, visit www.excelra.com.

Stay up-to-date on ProofPilot news at: https://www.linkedin.com/company/proofpilot

Media Contact

EvolveMKD

[email protected]

SOURCE ProofPilot
UW College of Business to Host Wyoming Collegiate Business Ethics Case Competition April 8

The University of Wyoming College of Business -- in collaboration with the Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative Collegiate Program -- will host the second annual Wyoming Collegiate Business Ethics Case Competition at 9:30 a.m. Friday, April 8.

The competition will feature teams from Casper, Central Wyoming, Eastern Wyoming and Laramie County community colleges. Student presentations will be held in the Peter M. and Paula Green Johnson Student Success Centers Scott and Anne Macdonald CASE Room in the UW College of Business.

The competition is free and open to the public. An awards ceremony will take place at noon in the same room. The top three teams will vie for a trophy and monetary prizes of $300, $200 and $100 per team member for first-, second- and third-place finishes, respectively. Teams will be judged on depth of analysis, ethical considerations and overall performance. Three panelists will judge the competition.

We cannot wait to host our community college partners, says Kent Noble, the UW Bill Daniels Chair of Business Ethics. This years competition will present students with an engaging way to apply the knowledge and expertise they have developed toward a series of business ethics issues.

Teams have been working this semester with faculty advisers from the respective colleges to prepare executive summaries and oral presentations of their case analyses and recommendations. In addition to the competition, teams each will have the opportunity to develop a personal integrity principle through a presentation from Noble Thursday, April 7.

Competing in the competition last year was a growth opportunity for our students, says Tamara Forbis, assistant professor of business at Central Wyoming College. Our team is looking forward to the challenge of battling against other teams from across Wyoming.

For more information, email Josie Voight, UW College of Business project coordinator, at voight@uwyo.edu.
CHICAGO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- According to a new market research report "Public Safety and Security Market by Component, Solution (Critical Communication Network, Biometric & Authentication System, Surveillance System, Emergency & Disaster Management, Cyber Security), Service, Vertical and Region - Global Forecast to 2027", published by MarketsandMarkets, the global Public Safety and Security Market size is expected to grow from USD 433.6 billion in 2022 to USD 707.2 billion by 2027, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 10.3% from 2022 to 2027.

Browse in-depth TOC on "Public Safety and Security Market"

471  Tables

63  Figures

391  Pages

Ask for Report Brochure: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/pdfdownloadNew.asp?id=1024

Factors such as Rising instances of terrorist activities and security, need for security training and awareness, increasing law enforcement requirements for public safety amid COVID-19 to boost the growth of Public Safety and Security Market across the globe during the forecast period. Moreover, Growing trend of IoT in public safety will also help the vendor to boost the Public Safety and Security Market.

The services segment to grow at a higher CAGR during the forecast period

The component segment of the Public Safety and Security Market includes the solutions and services required to safeguard the public and public infrastructure. Service providers offer these components to end users as a combined package of solutions and associated services or individually. The public safety services sector constantly looks for new and better ways to protect cities, infrastructure, businesses, and citizens. The Public Safety and Security Market has been segmented into managed services and professional services based on services. The managed services segment has been further segmented into Managed Security Services (MSS) and managed network services. The professional services segment has been segmented into design and consulting, installation and integration, support and maintenance, and training and education.

Asia Pacific to grow at the highest CAGR during the forecast period

Asia Pacific countries are highly concerned about increasing security spending due to the ever-growing threat landscape. India, Japan, and Singapore have updated or launched new national cybersecurity policies to deal with the increasingly sophisticated threats. Organizations in the Asia Pacific region are expected to spend large amounts of money to deal with cybersecurity breaches. The growing terrorist attacks and cyberattacks in the region have caused huge damage, leading India, China, Australia, Japan, Malaysia, and Singapore to adopt the best-in-class public safety and security systems. The Australian Government has appointed the National Counterterrorism Coordinator to assist the Australian Prime Minister in setting up policies. China has made its security policies stricter and sets up surveillance and perimeter security systems and solutions in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. The Asia Pacific region is witnessing a surge in smart city projects, creating a greater demand for public safety and security technologies such as surveillance systems, scanning and screening systems, and critical communication networks. The Indian Government focuses on infrastructure development and enhancing the security systems at airports, ports, and refineries.

Speak to Analyst: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/speaktoanalystNew.asp?id=1024

Major vendors in the global Public Safety and Security Market include Cisco (US), Honeywell (US), Motorola Solutions (US), IBM (US), NEC (Japan), Siemens (Germany), Thales (France), Ericsson (Sweden), Huawei (China), Tyco (Johnson Control) (Irland), Aros (France), Hexagon AB (Sweden), Idemia (France), General Dynamics (US), ESRI (US), L3HRRIS Technology (US), Alcatel Lucent Enterprise (France), BAE systems (UK), Verint Systems (US), Haystacks (US), Elbit systems (Israel), Teltronic (Spain), AGT International (Germany), Rave Mobile Safety (US), NICE (Israel), Fotokite (Switzerland), Scadafence (US), TVIlight (Netherland), Briefcam (US), Openpath (US), SmartCone Technologies (Canada). 3XLogic (US), Cityshob (Israel), SavYU(Israel), Onsolve (US).

Browse Adjacent Markets: Information Security Market Research Reports & Consulting

Related Reports:

Cybersecurity Market with Covid-19 Impact Analysis by Component (Software, Hardware, and Services), Software (IAM, Encryption, APT, Firewall), Security Type, Deployment Mode, Organization Size, Vertical, and Region - Global Forecast to 2026

Physical Security Market by Component (Systems (PACS, PSIM, PIAM, Video Surveillance, Fire and Life Safety) and Services (ACAAS, VSAAS, Remote Monitoring, Security Systems Integration)), Organization Size, Vertical, and Region - Global Forecast to 2025

About MarketsandMarkets

MarketsandMarkets provides quantified B2B research on 30,000 high growth niche opportunities/threats which will impact 70% to 80% of worldwide companies' revenues. Currently servicing 7500 customers worldwide including 80% of global Fortune 1000 companies as clients. Almost 75,000 top officers across eight industries worldwide approach MarketsandMarkets for their painpoints around revenues decisions.

Our 850 fulltime analyst and SMEs at MarketsandMarkets are tracking global high growth markets following the "Growth Engagement Model  GEM". The GEM aims at proactive collaboration with the clients to identify new opportunities, identify most important customers, write "Attack, avoid and defend" strategies, identify sources of incremental revenues for both the company and its competitors. MarketsandMarkets now coming up with 1,500 MicroQuadrants (Positioning top players across leaders, emerging companies, innovators, strategic players) annually in high growth emerging segments. MarketsandMarkets is determined to benefit more than 10,000 companies this year for their revenue planning and help them take their innovations/disruptions early to the market by providing them research ahead of the curve.

MarketsandMarkets's flagship competitive intelligence and market research platform, "Knowledge Store" connects over 200,000 markets and entire value chains for deeper understanding of the unmet insights along with market sizing and forecasts of niche markets.

Contact:

Mr. Aashish Mehra

MarketsandMarkets INC.

630 Dundee Road

Suite 430

Northbrook, IL 60062

USA: +1-888-600-6441

Email: [email protected]

Research Insight: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/ResearchInsight/public-safety-security-market.asp

Visit Our Website: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com

Content Source: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/PressReleases/public-safety-security.asp

SOURCE MarketsandMarkets
"As we become a key technology partner to the automotive industry, Arriver's Driver Assistance assets will accelerate our efforts to deliver a leading, ADAS solution as part of our Snapdragon  Digital Chassis platform," said Nakul Duggal, senior vice president and GM, automotive, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. "We remain committed to offering advanced solutions for all vehicle tiers and levels and with Arriver's Driver Assistance assets now part of the Snapdragon Ride Platform, we are better positioned to power the future of autonomous driving. We are thrilled to welcome the talented team from Arriver."

As a result of the acquisition, Qualcomm Technologies will incorporate Arriver's Computer Vision, Drive Policy and Driver Assistance assets into its leading Snapdragon Ride Platform portfolio, building on its previous collaboration with Arriver, when owned by Veoneer Inc. Snapdragon Ride Platform, a comprehensive portfolio for high performance central compute and vision system solutions features Snapdragon family of SoCs and accelerator products, addresses the automotive ecosystem's growing needs for a scalable and upgradeable integrated software SoC aimed at providing functional safety. In addition to its ability to scale across a wide range of vehicle types, Snapdragon Ride platform's modularity provides the flexibility to leverage software functionality developed by automakers.

Further financial details on the transaction will be provided at our upcoming earnings call in April 2022.

Veoneer and Qualcomm Technologies will also expand their strategic collaboration. The parties have signed a new agreement that ensures the continuation of service and support for customers and details their future collaboration on roadmap alignment and technology cooperation in the development for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems. Veoneer and Qualcomm Technologies will further engage in joint go-to-market activities including on-the-road demonstrations of combined Qualcomm/Arriver- Veoneer advanced ADAS solutions for L2+ and beyond.

With more than 20 years of automotive industry experience, Qualcomm Technologies is well-positioned to provide advanced solutions that support the ongoing transformation of the automotive industry, resulting in connected vehicles, autonomous driving and electrification. Building on Qualcomm Technologies 'one technology roadmap' of connectivity, low power high compute, camera, graphics, artificial intelligence (AI) technologies and its systems engineering expertise, the Company as of the first quarter of fiscal 2022, secured a more than $13 billion automotive design-win pipeline. Qualcomm Technologies currently works with all leading auto companies, with momentum continuing in the ADAS and AD segments, recently announcing technology collaborations with General Motors, BMW, Ferrari and Renault.

About Qualcomm

Qualcomm is the world's leading wireless technology innovator and the driving force behind the development, launch, and expansion of 5G. When we connected the phone to the internet, the mobile revolution was born. Today, our foundational technologies enable the mobile ecosystem and are found in every 3G, 4G and 5G smartphone. We bring the benefits of mobile to new industries, including automotive, the internet of things, and computing, and are leading the way to a world where everything and everyone can communicate and interact seamlessly.

Qualcomm Incorporated includes our licensing business, QTL, and the vast majority of our patent portfolio. Qualcomm Technologies, Inc., a subsidiary of Qualcomm Incorporated, operates, along with its subsidiaries, substantially all of our engineering, research, and development functions, and substantially all of our products and services businesses, including our QCT semiconductor business.

Snapdragon, Snapdragon Digital Chassis, and Snapdragon Ride are products of Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. and/or its subsidiaries.

Snapdragon, Snapdragon Ride, and Digital Chassis are trademarks or registered trademarks of Qualcomm Incorporated.

Qualcomm:

Pete Lancia

Corporate Communications

+1 (858) 845-5959

[email protected]

Mauricio Lopez-Hodoyan

Investor Relations

+1 (858) 658-4813

[email protected]

SOURCE Qualcomm Incorporated
QualiTru Sampling Systems today announced food industry veteran Ian G. Davis has joined the company as its new CEO. Tweet this

"Ian's extensive experience in leading growth companies and business development will be critical as QualiTru continues transforming, positioning itself for additional growth and market expansion," said Robin Schroeder, QualiTru Sampling Systems' Board Chair.

"I am excited to be joining the team at QualiTru," Ian G. Davis said. "For almost 40 years, the company has been fulfilling its mission of helping food and dairy companies assure the quality and safety of their products. With its great business model, proprietary technologies and talented team of professionals, I believe the company is uniquely positioned to further extend its leadership and capitalize on the rapidly evolving food and dairy production environment. I look forward to working with the team as we navigate the company's expansion through these exciting times."

Davis earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, British Columbia. He lives with his wife and family in Minnesota.

About QualiTru Sampling Systems

Since 1983, QualiTru has been the pioneering leader in the science of aseptic and representative sampling. Known for its expertise and commitment to building awareness of aseptic sampling as a critical means of ensuring consumer health and food safety, QualiTru's innovative sampling technologies are used to help the dairy and liquid food industries produce safe, high quality products in over 30 countries worldwide.

SOURCE QualiTru Sampling System
Company To Provide Strategic Update and Long-Term Financial Targets

HOUSTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- As previously announced, Quanta Services, Inc. (NYSE: PWR) is hosting and webcasting its 2022 Investor Day from New York City on Tues., Apr. 5, 2022. Management intends to present certain information and engage in a question-and-answer discussion focused on the company's strategic initiatives and new long-term financial targets. The management presentation portion of the event is scheduled to begin at approximately 9:00 a.m. Eastern time and the entire event, including the question-and-answer portion, is expected to conclude at approximately 11:30 a.m. Eastern time.

A webcast of the event will be available for live viewing and will also be available for replay following the event on the Company's website under the "News & Events" area of the Investor Relations section (https://investors.quantaservices.com/news-events). The presentation materials utilized by management during Quanta's 2022 Investor Day will also be available on the same area of the Investor Relations website following conclusion of the event. For more information, please contact Kip Rupp at 713-341-7260 or [email protected].

About Quanta Services

Quanta is a leading specialized contracting services company, delivering comprehensive infrastructure solutions for the utility, renewable energy, communications, pipeline and energy industries. Quanta's comprehensive services include designing, installing, repairing and maintaining energy and communications infrastructure. With operations throughout the United States, Canada, Australia and select other international markets, Quanta has the manpower, resources and expertise to safely complete projects that are local, regional, national or international in scope. For more information, visit www.quantaservices.com.

Contact: Kip Rupp, CFA, IRC

Quanta Services, Inc.

(713) 341-7260

SOURCE Quanta Services, Inc.
2.8-acre location in the Edgewater neighborhood is one of the most accessible development sites in the expanding Miami area.

CORAL GABLES, Fla., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- RE/MAX 360 Coral Gables, a boutique full-service real estate, announced their successful representation of Beitel Group in purchasing 3333 Biscayne Boulevard, Miami, Florida. The 2.8-acre location at the northern end of the up-and-coming Edgewater neighborhood is an assemblage of 11 parcels with substantial Biscayne Boulevard frontage. Beitel Group paid $45 million for the property, its first transaction in the Miami market.

Keiti Silva, a sales associate, took the lead in representing the buyer. A specialist in the booming Edgewater and artistic Wynwood neighborhoods, she describes this transaction as indicative of the expanding Miami area and consistent with the Beitel Group's focus. "The purchase of a large-scale site like this one at 3333 Biscayne Boulevard shows the continuing appeal of this vibrant intracoastal waterfront community. The Beitel Group has a history of pursuing value-add properties, and this purchase is consistent with its competencies in multifamily and development projects."

The seller of the property, Miami Sunrise Properties LLC, controlled by Jose Afonso Assumpcao, founder of Brazilian airplane charter and sales company Lider Aviacao is a long-time business acquaintance of Ms. Silva. Realizing the site's zoning and permitted uses, including multifamily housing, she connected seller and buyer.

Recently, Edgewater has experienced significant population growth at 6.54%, driven by an influx of luxury apartment buildings, high-rise condos, and low taxes. The area's access to air, rail, and the I-95 corridor contribute to its favorability.

For more information about investment opportunities in the Miami area, contact RE/MAX 360 Coral Gables at (305) 602-0360.

About RE/MAX 360 Real Estate

As a local full-service brokerage, RE/MAX 360 Coral Gables focuses on making buying and selling a property as simple and as stress-free as possible. The company's knowledge of Miami and its surrounding areas makes it a trusted real estate partner.

SOURCE RE/MAX 360 Real Estate
KNOXVILLE, Tenn., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Inhabit IQ, a software company serving the residential, commercial and vacation rental management industries, announced today that prop-tech veteran Elizabeth Francisco will serve as the company's first Chief Experience Officer, reporting to Inhabit CEO Lisa Stinnett.

In this role, Francisco will be responsible for enhancing the company's brand recognition and further building trust among stakeholders. While remaining focused on ResMan, she will work across the Inhabit portfolio to ensure each step of the customer and employee lifecycles is positive and rewarding. Francisco will represent ResMan and other Inhabit brands when speaking at NMHC, NAA, and other events. In addition, she will collaborate with the vacation vertical through Inhabit's Government Affairs Director Scott Leggat to advocate for clients in the vacation rental sector.

"Over the last 25 years in the multifamily industry, Elizabeth has become a trusted leader and expert in the space," said Stinnett. "From her extensive background as a successful asset manager, to the last ten years in executive leadership with ResMan, she has built a deep understanding of property management needs that is only matched by her drive to create solutions that empower and engage end users."

As a strategic and collaborative leader, Francisco was part of the original founding team at ResMan, where she became an influencer and sought-after speaker in the residential and multifamily property management market. In her new post, she will represent the company and its products and services through various channels to demonstrate Inhabit's unique value proposition in the market. Additionally, Francisco will work to bolster employee understanding of the customers' journey and satisfaction. She will champion both client and employee perspectives for strategic decision-making.

Francisco added, "I am energized to join the Inhabit leadership team on their mission to provide great experiences for customers and employees. The addition of a CXO demonstrates the company's commitment to its people and customer bases. It's a privilege to be entrusted with this responsibility and to use all that I have learned over decades in multifamily. And I'm thrilled that this opportunity allows me to continue working with my ResMan family and customers through this expanded role with Inhabit."

Francisco is the latest addition to Inhabit's executive team, which welcomed Ramon Casillas as Chief Technology Officer in February. Separately, Eric Broughton, who has served as Inhabit's Chief Strategy Officer since 2020, will depart the company to return to his roots as an entrepreneur.

About Inhabit IQ

Inhabit IQ is a software company serving the residential, commercial and vacation property management industries. Its strategic partnerships deliver best-in-class software solutions and services while fostering innovation and collaboration with like-minded entrepreneurs and industry leaders. The company believes that property managers should have the opportunity to choose platforms that best support their business goals and benefit from strategic partnerships across their ecosystem. Inhabit IQ has several private equity partners, including Goldman Sachs Asset Management, Insight Partners, Greater Sum Ventures and PSG, that are committed to helping support the Company's commitment to property management software innovation. To learn more, visit InhabitIQ.com.

Media contact:

Josh Phillips

[email protected]

865-409-5275

SOURCE Inhabit IQ
AdoptAClassroom.org provides teachers and school administrators with an online fundraising platform, plus a private ecommerce marketplace of nearly 30 school supply and school specialty vendors. Through its marketplace, teachers and school administrators can use donations to select exactly what they need for their classrooms.

RHP Properties has adopted Mountain View High School in El Monte, California. The school serves approximately 1,341 children, grades 9-12 and about 200 of the students are residents at nearby RHP Properties manufactured home community Brookside Country Club.

"I am extremely excited because getting a $10,000 donation from RHP Properties is a significant amount of money that goes to support our teachers and students," said Jose Marquez, Principal, Mountain View High School. "I'd also like to take the opportunity to thank Brookside Country Club and AdoptAClassroom.org for this donation. It's very much appreciated and I'm sure our teachers will use it wisely."

"RHP Properties' is proud to continue our partnership with AdoptAClassroom, supporting the organization's outstanding service to our public school system," said Ross Partrich, CEO, RHP Properties.

"We chose Mountain Valley High School to assist all the students who attend the school, many of whom reside at our Brookside Country Club manufactured home community. It is an honor to give back to the community and it is very gratifying to know this donation helps ensure students and teachers have the tools, supplies and resources they need to succeed."

"In 2021, teachers spent on average $750 of their own money on classroom materials. That's more than ever before," said Ann Pifer, executive director of AdoptAClassroom.org. "Teachers continue to face so many challenges, including lost learning due to the pandemic. A lack of the resources they need to teach should not be one of them. Partners such as RHP Properties help equip our teachers and students for success in school."

About RHP Properties



Founded in 1988, RHP Properties is the nation's largest privately held owner and operator of manufactured home communities with managed assets of more than $6B, including 308 manufactured home communities nationwide, totaling about 72,002 homes in 30 states.

Headquartered in Farmington Hills, Michigan, RHP Properties employs more than 1,000 professionals. For more information visit www.rhp.com.

About AdoptAClassroom.org



AdoptAClassroom.org believes every child deserves the tools and materials they need to learn and succeed in school. The national, tech-based nonprofit connects donors and sponsors with PreK-12 teachers and schools to help equip more classrooms and students with school supplies. Since 1998, AdoptAClassroom.org has raised $57 million and supported more than 5.8 million students across the U.S. The 501(c)(3) holds the highest 4-star rating from Charity Navigator and the highest transparency rating offered by GuideStar. For more information, or to make a donation, please visit www.adoptaclassroom.org.

SOURCE RHP Properties
BAY PORT, Mich., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Richmond Brothers Equipment is proud to welcome the start of the Spring 2022 cultivating season alongside farmers and agriculture professionals across the United States. Our farm equipment dealership is proud to announce our online portfolio of cultivator shovels and other types of tilling equipment, available now to help you prepare your soil for planting and after harvest work. It's our mission to provide cost-effective, high-quality, and durable farm tools that decrease operating costs and increase our client's efficiency.

Richmond Brothers Equipment Richmond Brothers Equipment

Cultivator shovels are a critical type of agricultural machinery, designed to dig into and cut up existing soil in order to better prepare it for planting. Richmond Brothers Equipment specializes in selling and manufacturing superior shovels and similar types of equipment to meet the specific needs of each and every farmer across the United States. These reliable tools are ideal for ensuring your crops are given the best chance possible to grow healthily, leading to larger yields come harvest season and increased profits.

In order to ensure profitable results, your cultivating tools must remain sharp and have long lasting parts to ensure the best possible result. Richmond Brothers Equipment can help make your cultivator shovels last even longer by answering all your maintenance questions and helping you find the perfect affordable solution for you.

Our entire collection of deep tillage points, cultivator shovels, and other tools is always available to view and purchase on our website. Our staff is also passionate about helping farmers find the right pieces of equipment to fit their individual needs and budget, lowering their overall cost per acre of land.

To learn more about Richmond Brothers Equipment, and how we can help farmers and agriculture professionals like you find the right equipment, go to richmondbrothersequipment.com for all your needs.

About Richmond Brothers Equipment:

Established in 1991, Richmond Brothers Equipment is a family-owned farm equipment dealership and fabrication shop designed to provide high-quality tools to agricultural professionals as well as expert assistance. Based out of Bay Port, MI, their organization is run on the motto "farmers serving farmers," sharing their extensive knowledge of manufacturing agricultural equipment with the nationwide community. Find out more online at richmondbrothersequipment.com.



Contact:

Jason McCallum

(989) 453-7097

[email protected]

SOURCE Richmond Brothers Equipment
TORONTO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ - The Company's results for the 2022 first quarter will be issued by press release on Tuesday, May 3, 2022 after the close of business at 5:00 p.m. ET.

An Investor Conference Call will be hosted by Martin L. Juravsky, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer and John G. Reid, President and Chief Executive Officer on Wednesday, May 4, 2022 at 9:00 a.m. ET to review the results.

The dial-in telephone numbers for the call are 416-764-8688 (Toronto and International callers) and 1-888-390-0546 (U.S. and Canada). Please dial in 10 minutes prior to the call to ensure that you get a line.

A replay of the call will be available at 416-764-8677 (Toronto and International callers) and 1-888-390-0541 (U.S. and Canada) until midnight, Wednesday, May 18, 2022. You will be required to enter pass code 934317# in order to access the call.

If you would like to unsubscribe from receiving notices of our Investor Quarterly Conference Calls, you may do so by emailing [email protected]; or by calling our Investor Relations Line: 905-816-5178.

If you have any additional questions, please contact our Investor Relations Department at [email protected] or 905-816-5178.

SOURCE Russel Metals Inc.
Studio 189's mission is to use fashion as an agent for social change, aiming to create well-designed products as sustainably as possible, whilst focusing on job creation, education, and training for women in particular. The brand collaborates with various communities across Ghana that specialize in traditional artisanal techniques that are open to upskilling and to continuously improving their work.

Launched as part of the latest Scotch & Soda 'Born To Love' capsule collection for Summer 2022, the bag joyfully celebrates unity and togetherness, as shown by the word 'LOVE' woven into the design across the front.

The bag design is rooted in the concept of love and is made with love by women working together in community using materials and colors found in nature. The color palette is inspired by the flowers, plants and herbs in Ghana. Created using traditional basket weaving techniques unique to the upper East area of Bolgatanga, the bags were woven in a horizontal pattern featuring both colorful and neutral stripes giving it an abstract rainbow-like appearance. The bags were made from locally sourced Palmyra leaf fibers, commonly known as raffia, which is naturally dyed using vegetal pigments extracted such as from hibiscus, millet husk and plant leaves, The artisanal process requires three to four weeks for the preparation of the materials, prior to the actual weaving stage. It then takes one week for an experienced weaver to make a basket bag. This product is made using no-waste manufacturing and sustainable materials.

For the collaboration with Scotch & Soda, Studio 189 chose to have the basket bags woven by ASIGE. Founded in 2016 by Dorcas Apoore, ASIGE invests in social programs and vocational training. The weaving of the bags is part of a larger initiative that provides work for local communities, made up primarily of women of all ages (from 18 years old and up), including widowers, young mothers, and grandmothers. The weaving work is a source of much needed income to support their basic living expenses and is adapted to their personal lives and schedules. ASIGE works with several communities in Bolgatanga that include both experienced and inexperienced weavers. Lead by Elizabeth Adongo and Nboo Avea, the community chosen to weave the Scotch & Soda bags is composed of 76 people, from which 41 women and one man were selected based on their higher weaving skills. The group was trained by Raymond Adongo, Elizabeth's husband. An additional staff of 45 people from Studio189 in Ghana, primarily women, worked on this project between the factory, the studio, photography and video. The production of the bag activates an entire supply chain from design/development to raw materials to manufacturing to marketing to education.

The limited-edition love bag will retail for 149,95 euros (179 USD) and will be available on the Scotch & Soda website, as well as in a selection of the brand's stores. All proceeds from the sale of the bags will be donated to Scotch & Soda's partner, The Hunger Project, to support the organization's initiatives in countries like Ghana.

Dorcas Apoore, Founder and CEO of ASIGE, declared: "Investing in women and girls is one of the surest ways to reach our sustainable development goals. When women are equipped with technical skills, they can rise above the poverty line in Ghana and in Africa as a whole." Apoore added: "We are very happy to be working with Scotch & Soda. Since they came into our lives, we've seen the impact on our people. We look forward to a positive development with Studio 189, Scotch & Soda, and our community."

Abrima Erwiah, Co-founder and President of Studio 189, said: "Through our collaboration with Scotch & Soda, we have been able to bring to life the "Born to Love Bag", made in Ghana by women artisans by hand using locally sourced materials, in harmony with the planet. We are grateful to Scotch and Soda for entrusting us to translate their vision into reality and to use their platform to help amplify our message. It's about dignity and about working together, honoring everyone's work and contributions and delivering a project that is well designed, filled with Community, Joy and Heart."

Stephane Jaspar, CMO of Scotch & Soda, commented: "I have been following Abrima's project for years now and we are thrilled that we were able to partner together on this project as part of our 'Born To Love" collections. It is a great opportunity to bring more awareness on her amazing mission and on the artisanal craftsmanship of rural communities in Africa, whilst supporting The Hunger Project's initiatives in countries like Ghana."

About Studio 189 (Studio One Eighty Nine)

Co-founded by Rosario Dawson and Abrima Erwiah, Studio 189 is an artisan produced fashion lifestyle brand and social enterprise that is as a recipient of the prestigious CFDA/VOGUE fashion fund and has also won the prestigious CFDA Lexus Fashion Initiative for Sustainability. The brand is made in Africa and produces African and African-inspired content and clothing.

The brand currently operates a store in Accra (Ghana), an ecommerce site, a manufacturing facility in Accra, and supports various community led projects in Africa and in the USA. Studio 189 works with artisanal communities that specialize in various traditional craftsmanship techniques including natural plant-based dye indigo, hand-batik, kente weaving and more.

Studio 189 focuses on empowerment, creating jobs and supporting education and skills training and partners with organizations such as the United Nations ITC Ethical Fashion Initiative, Warby Parker, Cosabella, and more.

The first collection launched on February 14th 2013 in honor of One Billion Rising. The mission took shape following a trip with Eve Ensler's V-Day and Dr. Mukwege's Panzi Hospital in February 2011, through Kenya, Burundi and Rwanda to Bukavu in the Democratic Republic of Congo for the opening of the City of Joy

For more information, please visit: www.studiooneeightynine.com

About ASIGE

Established in 2016, ASIGE (Advocacy for Social Inclusion and Girls Education) is a non-governmental, non-profit organization based in Bolgatanga, in the Upper East Region of Ghana. ASIGE works with rural communities to design colorful and customized baskets and bags for local and international markets. The non-profit organization focuses on areas such as women empowerment, girls' education, disability Inclusion, gender equality and poverty reduction.

Ran by Dorcas Apoore (founder and CEO) and her husband Simon Adongo Ayimbire (Administrator), ASIGE provides training in basket weaving to women in rural communities in the Bolgatanga area, creating a market for their products. Additionally, the social enterprise enrols girls into vocational training, provides sensitization on sexual and reproductive health rights and supplies sanitary pads to schools.

Dorcas Apoore holds a bachelor's degree in Development Planning and is graduated from the University for Development Studies in Ghana. Apoore was selected as one 16 young leaders from around the globe to participate in the 2018 EDD (European Development Days), held in Brussels. She is an advisory board member at the World Bank's global program S4YE (Solutions for Youth Employment), and a business member at CAMFED (Campaign for Female Education) in Ghana. Simon Adongo Ayimbire, holds a bachelor's degree in Accounting Education and is a chartered accountant with a vast work experience.

Instagram: @asigeghana

About The Hunger Project

Founded in 1977, The Hunger Project is a global, non-profit, strategic organization committed to the sustainable end of world hunger. The organization runs programs in 22 countries throughout Africa, South Asia and Latin America and reaches more than 15,8 million men and women, empowering them to end their own hunger, lead lives of self-reliance, meet their own basic needs and build better futures for their children.

The Hunger Project pioneers sustainable, grassroots, women-centered strategies and advocates for their widespread adoption. Through the organization's programs, 500,000 trained local leaders in 14,500 rural villages work to lead their own community out of hunger and poverty.

Scotch & Soda has been a partner of The Hunger Projects since 2020. For more information, For more information, please visit: www.thp.org

About Scotch & Soda

Born in Amsterdam, Scotch & Soda celebrates the free spirit of its birth city. Endlessly optimistic, the brand champions individuality, authenticity and the power of self-expression to create the unique  an attitude reflected in its designs. The Scotch & Soda collections include menswear, womenswear, kidswear, denim, eyewear, fragrances, and accessories, occupying a unique space in today's global fashion landscape.

Collections can currently be found globally in 252 freestanding stores across Europe, North America, Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Australia, as well as in 7,000 doors in some of the world's biggest cities, including New York, London and Paris. The brand's online operations also ship to over 70 countries.

For more information, please visit: www.scotch-soda.com

Visual Assets

Please click on the links below to download:

1) Images of the Scotch & Soda x Studio 189 project

(Photo credit: "Courtesy of Studio 189  Photos by Daniel Kons")

2) Still life image of the Scotch & Soda x Studio 189 limited-edition bag

(Photo credit: "Courtesy of Scotch & Soda")

Media enquiries

Daniel Urrutia | Communications Director | [email protected]

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779571/Scotch_Soda_x_Studio_189.jpg

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779572/Scotch_Soda_x_Studio_189.jpg

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1525212/Scotch_and_Soda_Logo.jpg

Download full press release here:

PDF English - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779574/Scotch_Soda_EN.pdf

PDF German - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779573/Scotch_Soda_DE.pdf

PDF French - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779575/Scotch_Soda_FR.pdf

PDF Dutch - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1779576/Scotch_Soda_NL.pdf

SOURCE Scotch & Soda
UW Researcher Part of Study That Reveals Severe Declines of Understory Birds in Panama Neotropical Forest

Corey Tarwater, an assistant professor in the UW Department of Zoology and Physiology, poses with a Rufous motmot at the long-term net lines located on Pipeline Road in Panama, where researchers have been capturing and banding birds for over 40 years. Tarwater is co-author of a paper that was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences April 4. The paper examined the severe decline of understory birds in a protected neotropical forest in Panama. (Anna Chalfoun Photo)

Researchers, including one from the University of Wyoming, report a large decline in bird abundance in a tropical forest in Panama, despite its status as a protected area. The finding potentially points to concerns about how tropical bird populations are faring.

Corey Tarwater, an assistant professor in the UW Department of Zoology and Physiology, says the researchers findings provide novel evidence that tropical bird populations may be undergoing systematic declines even in relatively intact tropical forests.

Even in large, protected tropical forests, the abundance of 70 percent of understory bird species has declined over the last 44 years, Tarwater says. These large tracts of forest should be bastions of biodiversity, where populations of animals are healthy. Instead, we found declines in abundance across species, and these declines were severe for many species. Most of the declining species have lost over half of their initial estimated abundance.

Tarwater is co-author of a paper titled Long-Term Monitoring Reveals Widespread and Severe Declines of Understory Birds in a Protected Neotropical Forest that was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) today (April 4). PNAS is one of the worlds most cited and comprehensive multidisciplinary scientific journals, publishing more than 3,500 research papers annually.

Henry Pollock, a postdoctoral research associate in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, was the papers lead and corresponding author. Other contributors to the paper were from the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada; the Canadian Wildlife Service; and the University of Washington.

The implications of the studys findings are that biodiversity baselines may be shifting over time and large tracts of tropical forest may not be sufficient for maintaining stable bird populations.

The bigger picture is that large tracts of forest may not be sufficient to protect biodiversity now and into the future, Tarwater says. We know that more than two-thirds of the worlds terrestrial species reside in tropical forests. So, it is globally important to understand where these declines are happening and why.

During the study, researchers tracked the presence of bird species in a 22,000-hectare forest in Panama from 1977-2020. Twice each year, the researchers deployed mist nets in multiple study sites, where the species were captured and identified before being released.

Based on identification and counts, the research group modeled populations and estimated changes in abundance of 57 species over the 44-year period. The majority of sampled species declined in abundance, with 35 of the 40 declining species losing more than 50 percent of their initial abundance. The declines extended across different families and were generally independent of ecological traits such as body mass, type of foraging or the species initial abundance. Species with the highest rates of decline were vireos, cardinals, sharpbills, ovenbirds and gnatwrens.

Corey Tarwater walks across a bridge along Pipeline Road, located in central Panama. (Anna Chalfoun Photo)

Only two species -- hummingbirds and puffbirds -- increased in abundance.

Honestly, its a fascinating puzzle that were still studying, Tarwater says. Bottom line: We know so little about most of these species to begin with. That makes it hard to know why puffbirds or hummingbirds are doing better right now compared to others.

Tarwater has been part of the project since 2003, when she first went to Panama. Over the years, she has helped with the capture, banding and measuring of birds at the long-term net lines. Five years ago, she took over the long-term netting project and oversees all aspects of it.

While there have been a number of recent studies that have shown declines in birds in North America and in a few tropical areas, there are few long-term studies in the tropics other than this one, Tarwater says.

This lack of studies makes it difficult to know how widespread these declines may be, she says. We also need much more research to identify the ecological mechanisms underlying these declines.

Given the global importance of tropical forests with respect to carbon storage and biological diversity, conserving tropical ecosystems and mitigating the impacts of land-use change and climate change are increasingly urgent research priorities, according to the study.

Tarwater admits there is not one easy solution. Slowing down the speed of climate change is key because it gives species more time to alter their behaviors in response, she says.

Recent work has found that many species are shifting in response to climate change, but they cant keep up with the pace of climate change, she says. So, the more we can do to slow down climate change, the better.

Preserving habitat connectivity also would help these species track changes in climate. If birds are going to move, because of climate change, to new habitat that better suits them, they have to be able to get to these new habitats, Tarwater says.

But, in many areas throughout the tropics, drastic alterations in land use have separated chunks of intact forest. Species may not be able to get to better habitat if there is little or no forest left to travel across, Tarwater explains. Thus, many species may have a tough choice: either to adapt to climate change in their current habitat or go locally extinct. Were seeing signs of the latter. Thats what we report on in this paper.

The other thing we need is more research on the underlying causes of these declines. That kind of research will help us determine if there are other specific steps we can take to reduce the speed of the declines, she says. I am not sure, at this point, if we can reverse the trends. But we can definitely slow it down to give the birds a better chance of survival.

Besides UWs Biodiversity Institute, research funding was provided by the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute; the National Science Foundation; the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; the U.S. Department of Defense; Earthwatch; the National Geographic Society; the American Philosophical Society; and the U.S. Department of Agricultures National Institute of Food and Agriculture.
The global seaweed extracts market is expected to gain valuation of over US$ 2.7 Bn by 2032

Rising awareness about health benefits of product is helping Europe market to maintain its leading position

Players in the seaweed extracts market developing superior quality products with the help of advanced technologies in their production processes

ALBANY, N.Y., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The global seaweed extracts market is estimated to register growth at a CAGR of 5% during the forecast period of 2022 to 2032, according to a research report by Transparency Market Research (TMR).

Seaweeds are being increasingly utilized for different purposes, owing to their different benefits to human health as well as their antioxidants properties. Many companies operating in the food & beverages industry are utilizing seaweed extracts as natural preservatives and additives in order to cater to rising demand for products with natural ingredients. Moreover, increase in the use of seaweed extracts in the food industry as suspending agents, thickening and emulsifying agents, gelling agents, and stabilizers is leading to profitable prospects in the global seaweed extracts market, note analysts at TMR.

Many cosmetics and personal care products manufacturers around the world are incorporating seaweed extracts in their products, as the popularity of products with natural ingredients has increased in the recent years. Hence, the global seaweed extracts market is observing exceptional demand opportunities from the manufacturers of cosmetics and personal care products. Moreover, the market for seaweed extracts is prognosticated to gain the advantage of improving living standards of major global populace, rising awareness about availability of such products, and rapid urbanization in many parts of the world.

Get PDF Brochure for More Insights  https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=73217

Seaweeds are gaining traction across the European food industry, owing to growing awareness about their health benefits. This factor is fueling the sales growth in the Europe seaweed extracts market.

Seaweed Extracts Market: Key Findings

Major players operating in the global seaweed extracts market are focusing on incorporation of technological advancements in their production activities. Companies are increasing their focus on the implementation of stringent product testing processes in order to ensure that the quality of their products are maintained. These efforts are showing positive impact on the overall growth of the global seaweed extracts market.

Seaweed extracts are being utilized in various end-use industries such as agricultural products, food & beverage, personal care, pharmaceutical, and animal feed additives. This wide range of use explains why the global seaweed extracts market is prognosticated to be valued at more than US$ 2.7 Bn by 2032.

Get Covid 19 Analysis - https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=covid19&rep_id=73217

Seaweed Extracts Market: Growth Boosters

Surge in understanding among people on varied health benefits of consuming seaweeds is favoring the growth of the global seaweed extracts market

Increase in trend of veganism is projected to impact positively on the growth of the seaweed extracts market

Rise in use of skin whitening products by people from across the globe is expected to boost the demand for seaweed extracts in the cosmetic industry

Request a Sample  https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=73217

Seaweed Extracts Market: Competition Landscape

Major companies operating in the global seaweed extracts market are focusing on strengthening their production capabilities in order to cater to the rising product demands

Several enterprises in the market for seaweed extracts are investing heavily in R&Ds in order to develop innovative and high-quality products

Seaweed Extracts Market: Key Players

Some of the key players profiled in the report are:

Annie Chun's Inc

Inc Acadian Seaplants Limited

Arthru Branwell & Co. Ltd.

& Co. Ltd. Algaia

Cargill Incorporated

Biolchim SPA

CP Kelco

Compania Espanola de Algas Marinas S.A.

Extractos Naturales Gelymar S.A.

DuPont Inc.

Groupe Roullier

Fuerst Day Lawson Limited

Kelpak

Humate International Limited

Marinalg International Irish Seaweed

Maine Coast Sea Vegetables

mingyue Seaweed Group

Mara Seaweed

Ocean Rainforest

Ocean Harvest Technology Limited

W Hydrocolloids, Inc.

Valagro

Make an Enquiry Before Buying - https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=EB&rep_id=73217

Seaweed Extracts Market Segmentation

Source

Red Seaweed

Brown Seaweed

Green Seaweed

Form

Liquid

Powder

Flakes

End Use

Food & Beverages

Agricultural Products

Animal Feed Additives

Pharmaceuticals

Others

Region

North America

Latin America

Europe

South Asia & Pacific

& Pacific East Asia

Middle East & Africa

Food & Beverages Industry battles Tangible Impact of Economic and Cultural changes, Explore Transparency Market Research's award-winning coverage of the global Food & Beverages:

Freekeh Market - https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/freekeh-market.html

Processed Vegetable Market - https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/processed-vegetable-market.html

About Transparency Market Research

Transparency Market Research is a global market intelligence company, providing global business information reports and services. Our exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trends analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. Our experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyse information.

Our data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts, so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With a broad research and analysis capability, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques in developing distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.

For More Research Insights on Leading Industries, Visit our YouTube channel - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8e-z-g23-TdDMuODiL8BKQ

Contact

Rohit Bhisey

Transparency Market Research

State Tower,

90 State Street,

Suite 700,

Albany NY - 12207

United States

USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453

Email: [email protected]

Website: http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com

Press Release Source: https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/pressrelease/seaweed-extract-market.htm

SOURCE Transparency Market Research
Sampson is a fourth-generation grocer who brings nearly four decades of experience to The Save Mart Companies in building brands, implementing innovative marketing and merchandising programs, and leading strategic operations. He started his career in a local grocery store as a retail clerk and learned the grocery business from the ground up, which culminated in being named Albertsons Companies' Chief Marketing and Merchandising Officer. He was instrumental in driving Albertsons' merchandising strategy during a period of monumental growth during which he oversaw significant development and innovation of digital and e-commerce strategies, rapidly scaled its private label brands and built customer and associate engagement across 2,300 stores. As a result, he was recognized as Mass Market Retailer's Merchant of the Year in 2017 and received the Retail TouchPoints' 2018 Innovator Award.

Prior to his position as CMMO at Albertsons, Sampson was also President of two separate Albertsons Divisions  Jewel-Osco and Shaws/Star Market. He also held leadership positions at Ahold's Giant of Landover, Walmart's Sam's Club and Schwazze, a Dye Capital portfolio company based in Denver, Colo. Most recently, Sampson held a leadership position at Jacksons Companies based in Meridian, Idaho, and served as a Board Member on their ExtraMile joint venture with Chevron.

"The Save Mart Companies team has built a wonderful operation in the Central Valley of California throughout their 70 years of serving their customers and communities," said Sampson. "The family and leadership team have done a tremendous job in establishing and perpetuating a commitment to innovation and service, and I think there is an exceptional opportunity to invest in and grow The Save Mart Companies' brands. I'm excited to join the company at such a pivotal time for the Save Mart, FoodMaxx, and Lucky California stores. I'm looking forward to leading the team into the next phase of growth and innovation and beyond."

"We are thrilled to have Shane on the team," said Alex Wolf, a Partner of Kingswood. "His retail acumen is unparalleled, and he has driven results across all the companies he's been a part of leading. We're looking forward to leveraging his significant retail experience into The Save Mart Companies' operations."

About The Save Mart Companies

The Save Mart Companies, a Kingswood Capital Management, LP portfolio company and a California- based grocer, operates approximately 200 Save Mart, Lucky California, and FoodMaxx stores in the California Central Valley and Northern Nevada. In addition to its retail operation, the Company also operates SMART Refrigerated Transport and is a partner in Super Store Industries ("SSI"), which owns and operates a distribution center in Lathrop, and the Sunnyside Farms dairy processing plant in Turlock. Proud to be California's largest regional, full-service grocery chain throughout the region, the Company and its 14,000 team members take extra care to help provide customers with the freshest foods for their families at affordable prices.

About Kingswood Capital Management, LP

Kingswood Capital Management, LP is a private investment firm primarily focused on investing in businesses in transition. In addition to access to capital, Kingswood brings relevant industry relationships and a broad network of internal and external operating resources that can strengthen the businesses it partners with and enhance value. Kingswood has extensive experience with complex transactions where it provides tailored solutions that ensure the best outcome for all constituents. For more information, please refer to the Kingswood website at www.kingswood-capital.com.

SOURCE The Save Mart Companies
NEW YORK, April 3, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Pomerantz LLP announces that a class action lawsuit has been filed against C3.ai, Inc. ("C3.ai" or the "Company") (NYSE: AI) and certain of its officers. The class action, filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, and docketed under 22-cv-01413, is on behalf of a class consisting of all persons and entities other than Defendants that purchased or otherwise acquired: (a) C3.ai Class A common stock pursuant and/or traceable to the Offering Documents issued in connection with the Company's initial public offering conducted on or about December 9, 2020 (the "IPO" or "Offering"); and/or (b) C3.ai securities between December 9, 2020 and February 15, 2022, both dates inclusive (the "Class Period"). Plaintiff pursues claims against the Defendants under the Securities Act of 1933 (the "Securities Act") and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (the "Exchange Act").

If you are a shareholder who purchased or otherwise acquired C3.ai Class A common stock pursuant and/or traceable to the IPO; and/or securities during the class period, you have until May 3, 2022 to ask the Court to appoint you as Lead Plaintiff for the class. A copy of the Complaint can be obtained at www.pomerantzlaw.com. To discuss this action, contact Robert S. Willoughby at [email protected] or 888.476.6529 (or 888.4-POMLAW), toll-free, Ext. 7980. Those who inquire by e-mail are encouraged to include their mailing address, telephone number, and the number of shares purchased.

[Click here for information about joining the class action]

C3.ai operates as an enterprise artificial intelligence ("AI") software company. The Company offers a variety of software-as-a-service applications for enterprises and software solutions and integrated turnkey enterprise AI applications for oil and gas, chemicals, utilities, manufacturing, financial services, defense, intelligence, aerospace, healthcare, and telecommunications market segments. The Company also purports to have strategic partnerships with Baker Hughes related to oil and gas markets; FIS related to financial services markets; Raytheon; and AWS, Intel, and Microsoft.

The complaint alleges that the Offering Documents were negligently prepared and, as a result, contained untrue statements of material fact or omitted to state other facts necessary to make the statements made not misleading and were not prepared in accordance with the rules and regulations governing their preparation. Additionally, throughout the Class Period, Defendants made materially false and misleading statements regarding the Company's business, operations, and compliance policies. Specifically, the Offering Documents and Defendants made false and/or misleading statements and/or failed to disclose that: (i) C3.ai's partnership with Baker Hughes was deteriorating; (ii) C3.ai's was employing a flawed accounting methodology to conceal the deterioration of its Baker Hughes partnership; (iii) C3.ai faced challenges in product adoption and significant salesforce turnover; (iv) the Company overstated, inter alia, the extent of its investment in technology, description of its customers, its total addressable market, the pace of its market growth, and the scale of alliances with its major business partners; and (v) as a result, the Company's public statements were materially false and misleading at all relevant times.

On February 16, 2022, during pre-market hours, Spruce Point Capital Management ("Spruce Point") issued a report and strong sell research opinion regarding C3.ai (the "Spruce Point Report"). Specifically, Spruce Point alleged that it had uncovered, inter alia, "[e]vidence of a severely challenged partnership with Baker Hughes, a related-party and C3.ai's largest customer"; "[s]igns of problematic financial reporting and accounting regarding the Baker Hughes joint venture and a revolving door in C3.ai's Chief Financial Officer position"; that "[c]hallenges in product adoption and significant salesforce turnover make it unlikely that C3.ai will meet aggressive analyst estimates"; "[e]vidence of exaggerated or irreconcilable claims made by C3.ai[,]" including "numerous discrepancies" regarding "the value of and cumulative investment made by C3.ai in its technology, description of its customers, its total addressable market, the pace of its market growth and the scale of alliances with companies such as Microsoft, Hewlett Packard Enterprises, Google Cloud, Intel and Amazon Web Services"; and "[w]orrisome corporate governance practices and insider enrichment." As a result, Spruce Point "conservatively estimate[d] 40% - 50% downside risk to C3.ai's share price."

Following publication of the Spruce Point Report, C3.ai's stock price fell $1.01 per share, or 3.93%, to close at $24.70 per share on February 16, 2022.

As of the time this Complaint was filed, the price of C3.ai Class A common stock continues to trade below the $42.00 per share Offering price, damaging investors.

Pomerantz LLP, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Paris, and Tel Aviv, is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, Pomerantz pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 85 years later, Pomerantz continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomlaw.com

CONTACT:

Robert S. Willoughby

Pomerantz LLP

[email protected]

888-476-6529 ext. 7980

SOURCE Pomerantz LLP
NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Purcell & Lefkowitz LLP, a class action law firm dedicated to representing shareholders nationwide, is investigating a potential breach of fiduciary duty claim involving the board of directors of Flowserve Corporation (NYSE: FLS).

If you are a shareholder of Flowserve Corporation and are interested in obtaining additional information regarding this investigation, free of charge, please visit us at:

http://pjlfirm.com/flowserve-corporation/

You may also contact Robert H. Lefkowitz, Esq. either via email at [email protected] or by telephone at 212-725-1000. One of our attorneys will personally speak with you about the case at no cost or obligation.

Purcell & Lefkowitz LLP is a law firm exclusively committed to representing shareholders nationwide who are victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty and other types of corporate misconduct. For more information about the firm and its attorneys, please visit http://pjlfirm.com. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

SOURCE Purcell & Lefkowitz LLP
SkinCeuticals antioxidants provide advanced environmental protection from UV rays, infrared radiation, and pollution by neutralizing free radicals that prematurely age skin across all skin types. The newest research is an additional 12-week study on Phloretin CF an antioxidant with 2% phloretin, 10% L-ascorbic acid, and 0.5% ferulic acid. In partnership with U.S. board-certified Dermatologist, Founder of Skin Wellness Dermatology in Birmingham, AL and skin of color expert, Dr. Corey L. Hartman, the study looked specifically at discoloration attributes across all skin tones within the Fitzpatrick scale.

"Discoloration is a common skin concern I see across patients and vitamin C has been clinically proven time and again to reduce the appearance of discoloration for overall tone improvement," says Dr. Corey L. Hartman, Founder of Skin Wellness Dermatology in Birmingham, AL. "I recommend my patients use SkinCeuticals Phloretin CF and antioxidants within the brand's range regularly to notice brighter, more even skin."

The study demonstrated that this powerful antioxidant formulation delivers brighter, more even skin across all Fitzpatrick types. Phloretin CF is now clinically proven to even skin tone by 20%, increase radiance by 27%, and reduce discoloration by 16% in just 12 weeks.

"In addition to supporting new launches with clinical studies, at SkinCeuticals, we invest continuously in research, even after a product is sold in the marketplace. Continuous academic research is a pillar of Dr. Pinnell's legacy, as well as our brand commitment to medical and aesthetic professionals," says Stephanie Kramer, Global General Manager of SkinCeuticals. "Vitamin C Day gives us a moment to recognize our unique SkinCeuticals approach to antioxidant formulation. Not all vitamin C antioxidants are developed in the same way nor rooted in scientific research. We aim to educate on the power of vitamin C while showcasing relevant new findings from our research, allowing us to continue to provide antioxidants for a wide range of skin concerns."

SkinCeuticals antioxidant serums are clinically proven to improve the appearance of fine lines, wrinkles, and promote a naturally even skin tone. The brand's best-selling C E Ferulic sells at 1 bottle every 30 seconds, with 30+ years of research and 50+ beauty awards behind it. Learn more about why vitamin C is essential for skin health and find the right vitamin C serum for you at a physician near you. Join the celebration by using #vitaminCday on social media.

ABOUT SKINCEUTICALS

Founded in Dallas, TX in 1997, SkinCeuticals discovers, develops, and delivers an advanced line of scientifically backed cosmeceutical treatments. As leaders in antioxidant and sun protection technology, SkinCeuticals products have been shown to dramatically improve skin health by protecting skin from environmental damage and visibly improving skin clarity, tone, and texture to minimize the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. SkinCeuticals is available in over 6,000 doctor offices nationwide, and in the past 5 years has successfully implemented a flagship-doctor partner program with over 100 dermatologists and plastic surgeons who trust in the brand's science and business expertise, exclusively selling SkinCeuticals. For more information, visit the brand on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, or at www.SkinCeuticals.com.

Contact: Laura Cummins at SkinCeuticals, 212-984-4907, [email protected]

SOURCE SkinCeuticals
NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- S&P Global's (NYSE: SPGI) first quarter 2022 results will be issued on Tuesday, May 3, 2022 via news release at approximately 7:15 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time. The news release will be available at www.spglobal.com.

Douglas L. Peterson, President and CEO; Ewout Steenbergen, Executive Vice President and CFO; and Mark Grant, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations, will host a conference call and webcast at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time on May 3, 2022 to discuss the Company's first quarter 2022 financial results. The presentation is open to all interested parties and may include forward-looking information.

Webcast Instructions: Live and Replay

The webcast (audio and slides) will be available live and as an archived replay through the Company's Investor Relations website at http://investor.spglobal.com/Quarterly-Earnings (please copy and paste URL into web browser). The archived replay will be available beginning two hours after the conclusion of the live call and will remain available for one year.

Telephone Access: Live and Replay

The call begins at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time. Please dial in by 8:20 a.m.

For callers in the U.S.: (888) 603-9623

For callers outside the U.S.: +1 (630) 395-0220 (long-distance charges will apply)

The conference passcode is "S&P Global"

The recorded telephone replay will be available beginning two hours after the conclusion of the call and will remain available until June 2, 2022.

For callers in the U.S.: (800) 570-8796

For callers outside the U.S.: +1 (203) 369-3293 (long-distance charges will apply)

Presenters' Slides & Remarks

The presenters' slides will be made available for downloading at the conclusion of the call. The final remarks will be available for downloading the following day. Go to http://investor.spglobal.com/Quarterly-Earnings for these documents and any additional information provided during the presentation.

About S&P Global

S&P Global (NYSE: SPGI) provides essential intelligence. We enable governments, businesses and individuals with the right data, expertise and connected technology so that they can make decisions with conviction. From helping our customers assess new investments to guiding them through ESG and energy transition across supply chains, we unlock new opportunities, solve challenges and accelerate progress for the world.

We are widely sought after by many of the world's leading organizations to provide credit ratings, benchmarks, analytics and workflow solutions in the global capital, commodity and automotive markets. With every one of our offerings, we help the world's leading organizations plan for tomorrow, today. For more information, visit www.spglobal.com.

Investor Relations: http://investor.spglobal.com

Get news direct via RSS: https://investor.spglobal.com/contact-investor-relations/rss-feeds/default.aspx

CONTACTS

Investor Relations:

Mark Grant

Tel: +1 347 640 1521

[email protected]

For questions regarding call access:

Celeste M. Hughes

Senior Manager, Communications and Shareholder Relations

Tel: +1 212 438 2192

[email protected]

Media:

Ola Fadahunsi

Tel: +1 332 210 9935

[email protected]

Christopher Krantz

+44 7976 632 658

[email protected]

SOURCE S&P Global
John Eland Appointed Chief Executive Officer, STACK EMEA

Adam Tamburini Appointed Chief Hyperscale Officer, STACK EMEA

DENVER, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- STACK Infrastructure ("STACK"), the digital infrastructure partner to the world's most innovative companies, today announced that it has appointed two experienced data center industry professionals to its EMEA leadership team. John Eland has joined as Chief Executive Officer, STACK EMEA and Adam Tamburini has joined as Chief Hyperscale Officer, STACK EMEA.

"We're thrilled to welcome John to the STACK team to drive our strategy and operations in the EMEA region," said Phil Koen, Chairman of the Board of STACK. "John is a proven leader who brings over two decades of strategy, development and management experience in the data center industry, including extensive regional expertise that we believe will be highly valuable as we continue to expand STACK's already successful European business."

John joins STACK with over 22 years of experience across the data center, telecom and investment sectors. Most recently, he served as Chief Strategy Officer of the Global Data Centers division at NTT Ltd., a London-based global technology services company. In this role, John led strategy and corporate development in existing and new markets. He also oversaw NTT's ongoing expansion efforts through M&A, joint ventures, strategic partnerships and development.

John commented, "I have been impressed by STACK's accelerating momentum both globally and in Europe, where we have created a strong operating platform and team now operating under the STACK brand. I look forward to driving continued growth across the EMEA region and further strengthening STACK's market position as a trusted global digital infrastructure partner with significant resources, capacity and development expertise."

Mr. Koen added, "We are also excited to welcome Adam, another proven leader in the data center industry. We are confident he will be successful in supporting John and the EMEA leadership team on growing and enhancing relationships with key hyperscalers."

Adam has decades of experience in the data center industry in sales and development and construction. Most recently, he served as SVP Hyperscale Sales at NTT where he was responsible for sales and customer relationships globally with the hyperscale accounts. While at NTT, Adam held various other positions in construction and development in EMEA.

Contacts

STACK Infrastructure

Alyssa Lorenzo / Hayley Cook / Michelle Van Wyk

Sard Verbinnen & Co.

[email protected]

STACK EMEA

Elisabeth Lennhede

Head of Communications

+46703322705

[email protected]

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/stack-infrastructure/r/stack-infrastructure-announces-new-senior-leadership-appointments-for-emea-region,c3538709

The following files are available for download:

https://mb.cision.com/Main/7526/3538709/1558678.pdf STACK Infrastructure Announces New Senior Leadership Appointments for EMEA Region https://news.cision.com/stack-infrastructure/i/john-eland-chief-executive-officer-stack-emea,c3033355 John Eland Chief Executive Officer STACK EMEA https://news.cision.com/stack-infrastructure/i/adam-tamburini-chief-hyperscale-officer-stack-emea,c3033356 Adam Tamburini Chief Hyperscale Officer STACK EMEA

SOURCE STACK Infrastructure
$105 Million Facility Increases Access to Affordable Funding for Thousands of Students Through Outcomes-Driven Underwriting

BOSTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Stride Funding, Inc. (Stride) announced its partnership with Encina Lender Finance (ELF) and other top-tier credit funds to increase financial support for students pursuing high-impact bootcamp and certificate programs across the US. The $105 million senior credit facility will enable Stride to fund thousands more students pursuing alternative education in high-growth technology and trade fields.

Stride is the leading provider of Income Share Agreements (ISAs) for students across higher education and alternative education, and has already partnered with leading schools in the upskill space, including General Assembly and SV Academy. Charging ahead on their student-centric mission to provide flexible, affordable funding to learners of all backgrounds, Stride has pioneered outcomes-driven underwriting and thoroughly vets programs they partner with to ensure quality and a track record of strong career outcomes to support students.

"This partnership is a game-changer. This is the largest facility that's ever been raised in the space. This marks a critical inflection point for the industry as credible, well-known investors enter the market to drive scalable, low cost capital and signal the increasing momentum of outcomes-based funding. These funding products are becoming mainstream and enable students of all backgrounds to get access to pursue meaningful careers," stated Tess Michaels, Stride Funding's Founder and CEO. "Through this partnership, we'll be able to fund thousands of students from virtually any high-quality bootcamp or certificate program across the U.S. while doubling down on our mission to reshape education. Together, we will drive economic mobility for students previously locked out by traditional private loans."

"Encina Lender Finance is thrilled to partner with the team at Stride Funding," said Alex Knowland, Vice President at ELF. "Stride continues to be a leader in the alternative student lending industry and has a demonstrated history of success in the space as an originator and operator. We look forward to supporting them in their core mission of providing flexible financing solutions to students from all backgrounds and fueling economic mobility through not only higher education, but alternative education and upskilling programs."

ELF and other top-tier credit funds join leading impact investors, including Ascendium Education Group, Inc. , Juvo Ventures , and Strada Education Network , in supporting Stride's ISA fund. This fund opens doors and strong career pathways to students who may not otherwise be able to find financing. Unlike the 92% of private loans that require students to find a creditworthy cosigner or co-borrower, Stride does not require current income, a minimum credit score, or a cosigner when determining student eligibility. Additionally, Stride's award-winning platform offers end-to-end supportfrom application, underwriting, and origination, through servicing and personalized career support.

This mission to fund and empower students without cosigners is at the heart of Stride's product design and partnership with schools like General Assembly. Two-thirds of Stride's own engineering team graduated from bootcamp programs.

Lisa Lewin, General Assembly's CEO, added, "Since launching our partnership in 2021, Stride's ISAs have been a pivotal tool in making our immersive programs more accessible for students from diverse backgrounds. This monumental facility will allow even more students across the US to transform their lives and careers through skill development."

Tilda, a software engineer who received a Stride ISA and graduated from General Assembly's Computer Software Engineering Certificate program in 2020, says, "A traditional loan was unattainable to me, especially since I did not have a cosigner. With interest payments and no downside protection, failing to earn enough could put me in a serious debt problem. Thanks to the GA/Stride Catalyst Program, I was able to safely finance the cost of an online certificate course at General Assembly. I paid little-to-nothing upfront, my monthly payments are based on my current income, and I don't pay any interest. My ISA reduced the financial risk of education, so I could focus more on learning and growing."

Students seeking funding from Stride can access the student application portal , where they can receive a quote in less than 30 seconds to determine if a Stride Funding ISA is right for them. Bootcamps and alternative education programs interested in learning how Stride can help support their students can email [email protected] .

About Stride

Stride Funding, Inc. is a mission-driven company that helps students hit their stridewith flexible educational funding. Unlike loans that lock students into rigid repayment structures, Stride offers affordable repayments based on income. The company has been recognized as a visionary leader by FinTech analysts for its innovative funding arrangements and commitment to career support. Stride's executive team includes professionals with experiences across SoFi, JP Morgan Chase, National Foundation for Credit Counseling (NFCC), Sallie Mae, Goldman Sachs, Uber, and Liberty Mutual; Stride's board of advisors is composed of serial entrepreneurs and industry leaders. GSV Ventures , Slow Ventures , Strada Education , Juvo Ventures , Firework Ventures , and Flybridge amongst others have participated in previous funding rounds. Learn more at stridefunding.com .

About Encina Lender Finance

Headquartered in Atlanta, ELF offers revolving lines of credit and term loans ranging in size from $10 to $150 million to specialty finance companies (sponsored and non-sponsored) across a wide range of asset classes including, but not limited to, asset-based lending, factoring, equipment leasing, floorplan financing, commercial real estate bridge lending, tax lien/deed financing, venture debt lending, SMB lending & merchant cash advance, middle-market private credit, charged-off debt buyers, rent-to-own consumer leasing, unsecured consumer lending and specialized student lending. ELF's customers use financing proceeds primarily to fund the origination of new finance contracts and to refinance existing debt, and ELF's loans are secured by portfolios of notes, loans and/or leases. For additional information, please visit ELF's website at https://lenderfinance.encinacapital.com .

Follow Stride

LinkedIn

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

Contact

Morgan Viehman

[email protected]

(214) 775-9960

SOURCE Stride Funding
Fourth Future of Public Health Summit Underscores Power of Partnerships in Improving Community Health

ATLANTA, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Cross-sector partnerships have been used to improve public health over time and present unique opportunities for the U.S. public health system to engage actively with communities and take on future health challenges, achieve health equity and improve the health of communities. That is a central message from the fourth summit in the CDC Foundation's Lights, Camera, Action: Future of Public Health series, which brought together leaders from public health, business, philanthropy, academia, the faith community and community organizations.

As summit speakers and panelists highlighted, creating more vibrant and healthy communities could include local community sectors coming together to address clean water issues, or the global community collaborating to eradicate a disease.

"Most multisector public health partnerships will not have a grand global scale, but that does not make these partnerships any less important or impactful. A community working to address food deserts or access to healthcare could be incredibly transformative for the people living in it," said Judy Monroe, MD, president and CEO of the CDC Foundation.

Strengthening the nation's public health system is essential to creating strong communities. As summit attendees discussed, partnerships can be utilized to build a diverse and effective public health workforce, improve the quality of data used in the public health system and strengthen the laws, governance and financing of public health.

According to CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, MD, MPH, "With partnerships, one plus one can often equal five by amplifying resources, reaching more people, gathering like minds to work for the public good. Partnerships should be developed early, so the foundation is in place long before you might need to rely on each other in an emergency. And we must always remember that partnerships are not a one-way street."

The summit panels explored topics including creating partnerships centered on community voices; harnessing innovation in partnerships to address health challenges; bringing the business and public health sectors together to improve health; and forming collaborations that build trust. The summit presenters highlighted a variety of successful partnerships, including engaging the arts community to address antimicrobial resistance and deploying existing technologies in new ways to solve sanitation and clean water issues in Alaska Native communities.

Building on the topic of establishing trust and sharing power in partnerships, one summit panel highlighted work in Buffalo, NY, that is bringing together the community with the local health system, public health department, university and others to address health inequities.

In describing his approach to partnerships from his community perspective, Pastor George Nicholas of the Buffalo Center for Health Equity noted, "We want to invite you to be in a relationship, in a conversation with us, before we ask you for anything. We want to get to know you, and we want you to get to know us so we can determine if we have a shared vision."

Kelly Wofford, MS, director of health equity at the Erie County Department of Health, discussed the need to show benefit and impact in collaborations. "You have to be able to have conversations about the social determinants of health.  We need to push that upstream, and to do that you need to have conversations."

Summit speakers also emphasized the essential role businesses must play in protecting both employee and community health. According to Stephen Massey, managing director of the Health Action Alliance, "It's become abundantly clear that business is part of public health.  Now is the time for business and public health leaders to work together to strengthen public health.  It's an important moment where we are aligned, and we can proceed from here."

In this discussion, Zoraida Rodriguez Montenegro, senior public policy manager at Uber, described several health programs the company has developed, ranging from free rides for mothers to attend pre- and post-natal doctor's appointments to providing rides to COVID-19 vaccination sites. She also spoke about the need for close dialogue in creating partnerships.

"We need to listen to each other. We have to understand each other and find common ground," said Rodriguez Montenegro. "We have to design solutions that take into account how health care is delivered in communities, in a way that solves barriers to accessing the target population, things like language, access to tech."

An important topic of discussion was the concept of systems change and embracing complexity and interconnectedness in partnerships. Eduardo Sanchez, chief medical officer of the American Heart Association, conveyed that systems change involves an authentic commitment to change, intentionality, doing the things that need to be accomplished, change management and what he termed "anticipatory guidance" to ensure everyone knows what is likely to happen in the process.

In summing up the summit series, the CDC Foundation's Monroe said "Our work is just beginning. Together, what we've been able to do through these four summits is look at learnings from the past to plan for the future. And a central event informing much of our conversation is the COVID-19 pandemic, which provided the latest reminder of the vital importance of public health and need for a future-forward, future-ready public health system."

Full recordings of the fourth summit as well as all previous summits are available on the summit series website at www.futureofpublichealth.org. A podcast that builds on the topic of this summit is available on Contagious Conversations.

The United Health Foundation, the philanthropic foundation of UnitedHealth Group; the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; and The Pew Charitable Trusts are providing initial support for the Lights, Camera, Action Summit Series. This support is aimed at helping to catalyze actions to rebuild confidence, foster health equity and transform our nation's public health system.

The CDC Foundation convened the summit series in collaboration with the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO), the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO), Big Cities Health Coalition (BCHC) and other public health partners. The three previous summits in the series focused on achieving a diverse and robust public health workforce, the need to modernize public health data systems and importance of public health law, governance and finance complementing each other.

About the CDC Foundation: The CDC Foundation helps the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) save and improve lives by unleashing the power of collaboration between CDC, philanthropies, corporations, organizations and individuals to protect the health, safety and security of America and the world. The CDC Foundation is the go-to nonprofit authorized by Congress to mobilize philanthropic partners and private-sector resources to support CDC's critical health protection mission. Since 1995, the CDC Foundation has raised over $1.6 billion and launched more than 1,200 programs impacting a variety of health threats from chronic disease conditions including cardiovascular disease and cancer, to infectious diseases like rotavirus and HIV, to emergency responses, including COVID-19 and Ebola. The CDC Foundation managed hundreds of programs in the United States and in more than 160 countries last year. Learn more at www.cdcfoundation.org and follow the Foundation on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and TikTok.

About ASTHO: ASTHO is the national nonprofit organization representing the public health agencies of the United States, the U.S. territories and Freely Associated States, and Washington, D.C., as well as the more than 100,000 public health professionals these agencies employ. ASTHO members, the chief health officials of these jurisdictions, are dedicated to formulating and influencing sound public health policy and to ensuring excellence in public health practice. For more information, visit https://www.astho.org/.

About BCHC: The Big Cities Health Coalition (BCHC) is a forum for the leaders of America's largest metropolitan health departments to exchange strategies and jointly address issues to promote and protect the health and safety of their residents. Collectively, BCHC member jurisdictions directly impact nearly 62 million people, or one in five Americans. For more information, visit https://www.bigcitieshealth.org.

About NACCHO: The National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) represents the nation's nearly 3,000 local health departments. These city, county, metropolitan, district and tribal departments work every day to protect and promote health and well-being for all people in their communities. For more information about NACCHO, please visit www.naccho.org.

SOURCE CDC Foundation
The food truck will offer an eclectic menu, paying homage to chef, Tony Singh's Scottish Sikh heritage. Born and raised in Leith, Edinburgh, Tony learnt at his mother's knee the cookery skills that have seen him create the unique fusion of Scottish and Asian flavours for which he is so well known. The menu will feature Punjabi Salmon Tacos, Kheer with Islay Whisky Sweet Mango and a refreshing cup of Scotland's most popular soda, Irn Bru.

Tony Singh says:



"I'm looking forward to welcoming New Yorkers to our pop-up Scotland food truck to celebrate Tartan Day. It's a great way to create noise for Scotland and give people a taste of what they can expect from a visit here: good food, a party atmosphere and a warm welcome."

The evening's festivities will be led by Finlay Wilson, the Kilted Yogi, who will bring his famous kilted yoga to the streets of New York. Wilson is an experienced yoga instructor based in the city of Dundee who first wowed the world in 2017 with his viral YouTube video that showcased Scotland's stunning scenery and the beauty of shirtless kilted yoga. Finlay will be celebrating the North American release of his second book, Wild Kilted Yoga, by giving away 50 free signed copies so event-goers can take a little bit of Scotland home with them.

Finlay Wilson says:



"To have the chance to be back in NYC after two years is really such an incredible opportunity. Yoga has given me so much, personally, its tools brought me a lot of relief during the pandemic, and to be able to share my passion and experience for the practice and for the wild Scottish landscape will hopefully inspire (literally) New Yorkers to visit Scotland and try it themselves!"

Attendees will also have the chance to win a trip to Scotland courtesy of G Adventures via a very special Coo-R Code!

The pop-up event is in honour of Tartan Day, a North American celebration of Scottish heritage which is marked every year on 6 April, the date on which the Declaration of Arbroath was signed in 1320. Not only will the event mark the start of celebrations for Tartan Week, but it will also be an opportunity to showcase to the city of New York that Scotland is Calling and ready to welcome visitors once more.

Notes to Editors



This event is being run in partnership between VisitScotland and Matador Network and attendees will have the chance to enter a prize draw to win a trip to Scotland with travel company G Adventures.

Scotland is gradually reopening as restrictions ease and new measures are put in place to ensure everyone's safety. However, we continue to live in uncertain times and so, while we are delighted to be providing our media with a regular update once more, we ask that responsible travel is considered paramount for anyone planning a trip to Scotland.

Certain measures and restrictions remain in places across Scotland , for more details visit https://www.gov.scot/coronavirus-covid-19/

, for more details visit All visitors to Scotland must consult the Scottish Government website at www.gov.scot , VisitScotland's website www.visitscotland.com , the local destination website and contact their accommodation providers, transport providers and any attractions they plan to visit to ensure they are aware of all rules, restrictions and safety procedures relating to Covid-19.

must consult the Scottish Government website at , VisitScotland's website , the local destination website and contact their accommodation providers, transport providers and any attractions they plan to visit to ensure they are aware of all rules, restrictions and safety procedures relating to Covid-19. International travel restrictions have now ended for travellers arriving from abroad in Scotland . However, visitors are still advised to check travel rules for their departure country and each country they are travelling through https://www.gov.scot/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-international-travel-quarantine/

. However, visitors are still advised to check travel rules for their departure country and each country they are travelling through https://www.gov.scot/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-international-travel-quarantine/ It is advised that those planning on travelling to a Scottish island take a coronavirus test in advance of their trip. Further details can be found here .

. When visiting Scotland we urge visitors to enjoy our fabulous country responsibly. VisitScotland encourages visitors to respect local communities and plan ahead with the help of www.visitscotland.com . Helpful guidance can be found in VisitScotland's new Visitor Charter and the Scottish Outdoor Access Code , which offers practical advice for all to #RespectProtectEnjoy Scotland's beautiful countryside.

. Helpful guidance can be found in VisitScotland's new and the , which offers practical advice for all to Scotland's beautiful countryside. Find out more about responsible tourism here .

. Step forward and tread lightly, find a link to the Scotland is calling 'tread lightly' film: https://www.visitscotland.com/campaign/tread-lightly/

Year of Stories

Scotland's Year of Stories 2022 will spotlight, celebrate and promote the wealth of stories inspired by, written, or created in Scotland.

Led by VisitScotland, the Year of Stories 2022 will sustain and build upon the momentum of preceding Themed Years, showcasing a nationwide programme of major events and community celebrations.

From icons of literature to local tales, Scotland's Year of Stories encourages locals and visitors to experience a diversity of voices, take part in events and explore the places, people and cultures connected to all forms of our stories, past and present.

Scotland's Year of Stories will encourage responsible engagement and inclusive participation from the people of Scotland and our visitors.

Join the conversation using #YS2022 and #TalesOfScotland.

Following an industry consultation, Themed Years will take place every second year to enable more time for planning and collaboration. The next Themed Year will take place in 2024.

PLEASE NOTE

This copy was correct at the time of going to press. VisitScotland cannot guarantee the accuracy of the information and accepts no responsibility for any error or misrepresentation. All liability for loss, disappointment, negligence or other damage caused by the reliance on the information contained herewith, or in the event of any company, individual or firm ceasing to trade, is hereby excluded.

SOURCE VisitScotland
UW Seeks Input to Guide General Education Redesign

The University of Wyoming is in the early stages of redesigning its general education program, and the committee charged with leading the effort is seeking public input.

Over the next month, UWs Next Generation General Education Committee invites stakeholders both on and off campus to submit comments.

The first opportunity for members of the UW community is a strategic planning Idea Lab Tuesday, April 5, from 2-4 p.m. The committee invites feedback about what the next iteration of general education should deliver for our students. The session will take place via Zoom. The link can be obtained by emailing Vice Provost for Strategic Planning and Initiatives Anne Alexander at aalex@uwyo.edu.

More information about the committees work, a survey where comments can be submitted and information on other opportunities to provide feedback can be found at www.uwyo.edu/usp/next-gen/index.html. The deadline for this first round of comments is April 29.

The general studies program, called the University Studies Program (USP), consists of coursework required for all students pursuing bachelors degrees at UW. Last updated in 2015, the USP currently consists of a core of 30 required credit hours.

It is customary for universities to review and revise their general education requirements every decade or so. The process is governed by UW Regulation 2-105.

The Next Generation General Education Committee consists of 26 members from units across the university, including individuals familiar with transfer processes with Wyoming community colleges. The committee is co-chaired by Professor Susan Aronstein, of the Department of English; Professor Jacquelyn Bridgeman, head of the School of Culture, Gender and Social Justice; and Department of English Senior Lecturer Rick Fisher, director of UWs Communication across the Curriculum program.
"Amy is a dynamic and proven leader who is the right person to lead The Trust into its next century," said Valerie Peltier, Chair of The New York Community Trust. "Her expertise and relationships, paired with her passion for New York make her uniquely qualified to guide The Trust through its work to improve the quality of life for our entire community."

Freitag has more than two decades of experience in the nonprofit, philanthropic and government sectors. For the past eight years she has led the J.M. Kaplan Fund, a 75-year-old family foundation based in New York City. Freitag previously led the New York Restoration Project and the Tortora Sillcox Family Foundation following her tenure as Deputy Commissioner for New York Parks & Recreation during the Bloomberg administration.

"I am deeply honored to serve as President of The New York Community Trust at a critical moment in our city's history," Freitag said. "The Trust's team is outstanding, and I look forward to working with them and the many New Yorkers who generously support the City's greatest needs."

Freitag succeeds Lorie A. Slutsky, who has served as The Trust's President since 1990. Under Slutsky's leadership, The Trust grew its assets and its influence. "She made an art of refusing to accept business as usual," said Peltier.

"This is an exciting time for The Trust and I am thrilled by the Board's choice," Slutsky said. "Amy's extensive experience in the nonprofit and philanthropic world and her love of New York and its people will be true assets in leading our region's largest community foundation."

About The New York Community Trust

For nearly 100 years, The New York Community Trust has connected past, present, and future generous New Yorkers with vital nonprofits working to make a healthy, equitable, and thriving community for all. It is a public grantmaking foundation dedicated to improving the lives of residents of New York City, Westchester, and Long Island. For more information, visit nycommunitytrust.org .

SOURCE The New York Community Trust
The Brand's First-Ever Digital Issue Features Singular Recipes, In-Depth Reporting and Interviews, Video Guides, Product Reviews, and Powerful Storytelling

NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Dotdash Meredith's Serious Eats today unveils its inaugural digital issue spotlighting the wok with wide-ranging coverage of this ultra-versatile kitchen essential, including exclusive new recipes from celebrated chefs and recipe developers such as Jenny Dorsey, Adam Liaw, Derek Lucci, Lucas Sin, Clarissa Wei, and Kenji Lopez-Alt. "The Wok: A Serious Eats Digital Issue" also features step-by-step video guides to fundamental wok cooking techniques, equipment reviews, in-depth coverage on the science, history, and growing popularity of wok cooking, and so much more. Serious Eats' first digital issue is available here.

The Wok: A Serious Eats Digital Issue Debuts Today. The Brands First-Ever Digital Issue Features Singular Recipes, In-Depth Reporting and Interviews, Video Guides, Product Reviews, and Powerful Storytelling.

"When we sat down to figure out the theme for our first digital issue, we realized it was slated for publication at the same time as the release of The Wok, the second culinary opus from Kenji Lopez-Alt, our former colleague and food-science wunderkind," says Daniel Gritzer, Senior Culinary Director and Tess Koman, Senior Editorial Director of Serious Eats in their Editors' Letter. "One thing we all felt strongly about was that, while Kenji would play a leading role in this digital issue, contributing an introductory essay, two original recipes, and a wok-science excerpt from his book, the Serious Eats Wok Issue is about more than Kenji's amazing new bookthe wok's roots run too deep and its reach is too broad for us to share one person's story alone." Read the complete Editors' Letter here.

Serious Eats' premiere digital issue celebrates China's deep culinary traditions in wok cooking and also showcases the wok's influence across cultures, with Thai, Japanese, and Taiwanese recipes. Additionally, Serious Eats goes on location in China to explore two possible futures for wok production: one, a revival of its ancient hand-hammered roots, and the other, a robotic revolution in the form of "auto-woks."

The issue includes two profiles of impressive women who have made their mark advancing wok cooking: Tane Chan, the pioneering owner of San Francisco's The Wok Shop and cookbook author and "wok therapist" Grace Young. In Grace's interview, she tells of a past fiasco in which years of beautiful seasoning on a cherished wok were stripped away by a well-intentioned but unaware helper: "I always tell that story to show people that when you start cooking with a wokprotect it. Don't let your spouse or partner or best friend wash your wok. Just make it really clear to everyone that you're taking care of your wok. I never leave my wok anywhere overnight when I travel; it will always come back to the hotel room with me."

Highlights from "The Wok: A Serious Eats Digital Issue":

Serious Eats' first digital issue is available here.

ABOUT SERIOUS EATS

Serious Eats is an award-winning food and drink website visited by over 7 million hungry readers every month. Our audience comes to us for rigorously tested recipes, science-driven cooking techniques, robust equipment reviews, and stories that offer cultural and historical context to the foods we love to eat. Since it was founded in 2006, Serious Eats's editorial staff and contributors have included recipe developers, practiced home cooks, professional chefs, scientists, historians, journalists, photographers, novelists, and more. Members of our editorial team come from publications like America's Test Kitchen, Food & Wine, The New York Times, and Saveur; most have also worked in the restaurant industry and/or attended culinary school. Across the board, we're a group of passionate, opinionated food enthusiasts with a drive to dive deep, get things right, and do justice to any topic we take on. Serious Eats is part of the Dotdash Meredith publishing family.

SOURCE Dotdash Meredith
DUBLIN, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Automotive System Simulation Software Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Type, Vehicle Type, and Propulsion Type" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The automotive system simulation software market is projected to reach US$ 2,616.37 million by 2028 from US$ 1,142.52 million in 2021; it is expected to grow at a CAGR of 12.6% from 2021 to 2028.

APAC is at the forefront of the production and sales of automobiles, mainly due to the presence of the world's prominent automotive players, such as Honda, Tata, Toyota, and Geely Auto Group, in the region. Fast-growing economies such as China and India and developed countries such as Japan, Singapore, and Australia are generating huge demands for new vehicles. The current focus of Asian countries on developing a solid manufacturing sector has boosted the prospects of automotive manufacturing in the region.

For example, in August 2021, the Indian government launched The automotive Mission Plan, with a focus on increasing The automotive sector's contribution to national GDP to 12% and creating ~50 million new jobs. Furthermore, an unprecedented need to limit air pollution due to the alarming levels of emissions, especially from passenger vehicles, has encouraged these countries to enact strict regulations on ICE vehicles. Additionally, countries in the region, particularly China and Japan, are prompting the adoption of electric vehicles. According to the ZoZo Go, Electric vehicle makers sold a whopping 3.3 million units in China in 2021, reporting a surge from 1.3 million in 2020 and 1.2 million in 2019. The aforementioned factors are expected to drive The automotive system simulation software market in this region, owing to the ability of these solutions to speed up the production of vehicles and their components, without hampering their reliability.



The automotive system simulation software market constitutes prominent market players such as Ansys, Inc.; Hexagon AB; Siemens AG; and dSPACE GmbH. These companies dominate the market through new product development, acquisition, and expansion strategies. In December 2021, dSPACE GmbH, KPIT Technologies, and Microsoft Corporation collaborated to offer a unique solution for OEMs and Tier-1 companies to achieve homologation for advanced driver assistance systems.



Impact of COVID-19

The COVID-19 crisis had a cascading impact on the global automotive industry since its inception in China, where sales dropped down by 71% in February 2020; and subsequently, by April, sales declined by 47% in the US and crashed by a staggering 80% in Europe. This lowered the market demand as requirement from major automotive manufacturers has declined. However, as the supply chain started regaining some strength from the third quarter of 2020 through the second quarter of 2021, automakers have witnessed a steady rise in the production levels.

Furthermore, the crisis has brought rapid transformation across the mobility value chain and accelerated the digitization process occurring prior to it. Although the pandemic-related restrictions had led to prolonged or periodic shutdowns of production lines, non-manufacturing processes have continued to be attended by employees with secure connections through work-from-home or remote work model. The use of automotive system simulation software market has greatly assisted the production and research of automakers during the crisis since product development process could be continued with limited or no access to laboratories.



Reasons to Buy

Save and reduce time carrying out entry-level research by identifying the growth, size, leading players and segments in the automotive system simulation software market

Highlights key business priorities in order to assist companies to realign their business strategies

The key findings and recommendations highlight crucial progressive industry trends in the automotive system simulation software market thereby allowing players across the value chain to develop effective long-term strategies

Develop/modify business expansion plans by using substantial growth offering developed and emerging markets

Scrutinize in-depth Global market trends and outlook coupled with the factors driving the market, as well as those hindering it

Enhance the decision-making process by understanding the strategies that underpin commercial interest with respect to client products, segmentation, pricing and distribution

Key Topics Covered:



1. Introduction



2. Key Takeaways



3. Research Methodology



4. Automotive System Simulation Software Market Landscape

4.1 Market Overview

4.2 PEST Analysis

4.2.1 North America

4.2.2 Europe

4.2.3 APAC

4.2.4 MEA

4.2.5 SAM

4.3 Ecosystem Analysis

4.4 Expert Opinions



5. Automotive System Simulation Software Market - Key Market Dynamics

5.1 Market Drivers

5.1.1 Upgrading of Vehicle Functions and Increase in Number of E/E Components

5.1.2 Growing Production and Sales of Electric Vehicles

5.2 Market Restraints

5.2.1 Possibility of Invalid Research Outcomes

5.3 Market Opportunities

5.3.1 Booming Automotive Sector in Asia Pacific

5.4 Future Trends

5.4.1 Popularity of Autonomous Vehicles

5.5 Impact Analysis of Drivers and Restraints



6. Automotive System Simulation Software - Global Market Analysis

6.1 Global Automotive System Simulation Software Market Overview

6.2 Global Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue Forecast and Analysis

6.3 Market Positioning - Five Key Players



7. Automotive System Simulation Software Market Analysis - By Type

7.1 Overview

7.2 Automotive System Simulation Software Market, By Type (2020 And 2028)

7.3 Transmission

7.3.1 Overview

7.3.2 Transmission: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)

7.4 Engine

7.4.1 Overview

7.4.2 Engine: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)

7.5 Electric propulsion

7.5.1 Overview

7.5.2 Electric propulsion: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)

7.6 Fuel cell

7.6.1 Overview

7.6.2 Fuel cell: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)

7.7 Driveline

7.7.1 Overview

7.7.2 Driveline: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)

7.8 Chassis

7.8.1 Overview

7.8.2 Chassis: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)

7.9 Others

7.9.1 Overview

7.9.2 Others: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)



8. Global Automotive System Simulation Software Market Analysis - By Vehicle Type

8.1 Overview

8.2 Automotive System Simulation Software Market, By Vehicle Type (2020 and 2028)

8.3 Passenger cars

8.3.1 Overview

8.3.2 Passenger cars: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)

8.4 Commercial vehicles

8.4.1 Overview

8.4.2 Commercial vehicles: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)



9. Global Automotive System Simulation Software Market Analysis - By Propulsion Type

9.1 Overview

9.2 Automotive System Simulation Software Market, By Propulsion Type (2020 And 2028)

9.3 ICE

9.3.1 Overview

9.3.2 ICE: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)

9.4 Electric

9.4.1 Overview

9.4.2 Electric: Automotive System Simulation Software Market Revenue and Forecast To 2028 (US$ Million)



10. Automotive System Simulation Software Market - Geographic Analysis



11. Automotive System Simulation Software Market - Covid-19 Impact Analysis

11.1 Overview

11.2 North America: Impact Assessment of Covid-19 Pandemic

11.3 Europe: Impact Assessment of Covid-19 Pandemic

11.4 Asia Pacific: Impact Assessment of Covid-19 Pandemic

11.5 Middle East & Africa: Impact Assessment of Covid-19 Pandemic

11.6 South America Impact Assessment of Covid-19 Pandemic



12. Automotive System Simulation Software Market-Industry Landscape

12.1 Overview

12.2 Market Initiative



13. COMPANY PROFILES

13.1 Modelon AB

13.1.1 Key Facts

13.1.2 Business Description

13.1.3 Products and Services

13.1.4 Financial Overview

13.1.5 SWOT Analysis

13.1.6 Key Developments

13.2 IPG Automotive GmbH

13.2.1 Key Facts

13.2.2 Business Description

13.2.3 Products and Services

13.2.4 Financial Overview

13.2.5 SWOT Analysis

13.2.6 Key Developments

13.3 ESI Group

13.3.1 Key Facts

13.3.2 Business Description

13.3.3 Products and Services

13.3.4 Financial Overview

13.3.5 SWOT Analysis

13.3.6 Key Developments

13.4 Ansys, Inc.

13.4.1 Key Facts

13.4.2 Business Description

13.4.3 Products and Services

13.4.4 Financial Overview

13.4.5 SWOT Analysis

13.4.6 Key Developments

13.5 Realtime Technologies

13.5.1 Key Facts

13.5.2 Business Description

13.5.3 Products and Services

13.5.4 Financial Overview

13.5.5 SWOT Analysis

13.5.6 Key Developments

13.6 Hexagon AB

13.6.1 Key Facts

13.6.2 Business Description

13.6.3 Products and Services

13.6.4 Financial Overview

13.6.5 SWOT Analysis

13.6.6 Key Developments

13.7 SimScale GmbH

13.7.1 Key Facts

13.7.2 Business Description

13.7.3 Products and Services

13.7.4 Financial Overview

13.7.5 SWOT Analysis

13.7.6 Key Developments

13.8 Gamma Technologies, LLC

13.8.1 Key Facts

13.8.2 Business Description

13.8.3 Products and Services

13.8.4 Financial Overview

13.8.5 SWOT Analysis

13.8.6 Key Developments

13.9 Siemens AG

13.9.1 Key Facts

13.9.2 Business Description

13.9.3 Products and Services

13.9.4 Financial Overview

13.9.5 SWOT Analysis

13.9.6 Key Developments

13.10 dSPACE GmbH

13.10.1 Key Facts

13.10.2 Business Description

13.10.3 Products and Services

13.10.4 Financial Overview

13.10.5 SWOT Analysis

13.10.6 Key Developments



14. Appendix

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/8fvp3n

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]

For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900

U.S. Fax: 646-607-1904

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets
DUBLIN, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Pet Food Market by Pet Type, Food Type and Sales Channel: Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast 2021-2030" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global pet food market was valued at $87,268.2 million in 2020, and is projected to reach $133,430.9 million by 2030, registering a CAGR of 4.6% from 2021 to 2030.



The global pet food market is booming, owing to increased pet ownership across the globe due to rising consumers' disposable income. The consumers are increasingly treating their pets like their own family members, therefore, the demand for organic and nutritional pet food is likely to exhibit the highest CAGR.



Rise in trend of nuclear families, rapid humanization of pets, and increase in awareness about pet health is presently driving the growth of pet food market. Additionally, increase in pet ownership in developing nations and rise in e-commerce sales act as an opportunity for the global pet food market. However, increase concerns toward pet obesity and pet food recalls are likely to restrict the market growth.



Pet food is one of the most strongly regulated food categories in the food & beverage sector. Pet food need to strictly scrutinized in developed countries at every stage. The regulations imposed by government on manufacturing of pet food can limit the growth of the pet food market. Furthermore, in some developing countries, a lack of acceptance of premium and high-priced pet food might hinder the pet food market growth.



The global pet food market is classified on the basis of pet type, food type, sales channel, and region. By pet type, the market is segmented into dogs, cats, and other pets. Based on food type, the pet food market is segregated into dry food, wet food, treats & snacks, and others. By sales channel, the market is categorized into supermarkets & hypermarkets, specialized pet shops, online sales channel, and others. Region wise, the market is segmented into North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and LAMEA. North America contributed the highest revenue in 2020 and is expected to dominate the pet food market during the forecast period.



Dry food was the highest revenue generating food type because it is one of the most convenient types of food, easy to store, requires no refrigeration, and is available at affordable prices as compared to other types of food. Rising trend of nuclear families and their need to keep dogs for companionship and security resulted into highest revenue generation in 2020. North America and Europe would provide lucrative growth opportunities until 2030, owing to considerable increase in pet food production and increasing global pet population.



The impact of COVID-19 on global pet food market had both positive and negative impact. The people during the lockdown were forced to stay at homes. This resulted in growing emergence of adopting pets for companionship, which had a positive outlook on the market.



Competitive intelligence on prominent manufacturers of pet food provides key insights in terms of strategies implemented to gain significant share in the global pet food market. The key players profiled in global pet food market includes Mars Petcare Inc., The Hartz Mountain Corporation, Big Heart Pet Brands, Nestle Purina PetCare, Diamond Pet Foods, Hill's Pet Nutrition, Deuerer, WellPet, Blue Buffalo, and Heristo AG.



Key Benefits

This report provides a quantitative analysis of current trends, estimations, and dynamics of the global pet food market from 2021 to 2030 to identify the prevailing market opportunities.

Porter's five forces analysis highlights the potency of the buyers and suppliers to enable stakeholders to make profit-oriented business decisions and strengthen their supplier-buyer network.

In-depth analysis of the market segmentation assists to determine the prevailing market opportunities.

Major countries in each region are mapped according to their revenue contribution to the global industry. The market player positioning segment facilitates benchmarking while providing a clear understanding of the present position of key market players.

The report includes analyses of the regional as well as global market, key players, market segments, application areas, and growth strategies.

Key Market Segments

By Pet Type

Dogs

Cats

Others

By Food Type

Dry Food

Wet Food

Treats & Snacks

Others

By Sales Channel

Supermarkets & Hypermarkets

Specialized Pet Shops

Online Sales Channel

Others

By Region

North America

U.S.

Canada

Mexico

Europe

UK

France

Netherlands

Germany

Turkey

Rest of Europe

Asia-Pacific

China

Japan

India

South Korea

Australia

Rest of Asia-Pacific

LAMEA

Brazil

South Africa

UAE

Rest of LAMEA

Key Topics Covered:



CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION



CHAPTER 2: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY



CHAPTER 3: MARKET OVERVIEW

3.1. Market definition and scope

3.2. Key findings

3.2.1. Top investment pockets

3.3. Porter's five forces analysis

3.4. Top player positioning, 2020

3.5. Market dynamics

3.5.1. Drivers

3.5.1.1. Rise in trend of nuclear families

3.5.1.2. Rapid humanization of pets

3.5.1.3. Increase in awareness about pet health

3.5.2. Restraints

3.5.2.1. Increase in pet obesity

3.5.2.2. Pet food recalls

3.5.3. Opportunities

3.5.3.1. Increase in pet ownership in developing nations

3.5.3.2. Rise in e-commerce sales

3.6. Impact of COVID-19

3.7. Top impacting factors

3.7.1. Rising trend of nuclear families

3.7.2. Rapid humanization of pets

3.7.3. Increasing awareness about pet health

3.7.4. Increase in obesity

3.7.5. Pet food recalls

3.8. Estimated pet population region-wise

3.9. Supply chain analysis

3.10. Parent-peer market outlook



CHAPTER 4: PET FOOD MARKET, BY PET TYPE

4.1. Overview

4.1.1. Market size and forecast

4.2. Dogs

4.2.1. Overview

4.2.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

4.2.3. Market size and forecast

4.3. Cats

4.3.1. Overview

4.3.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

4.3.3. Market size and forecast

4.4. Others

4.4.1. Overview

4.4.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

4.4.3. Market size and forecast



CHAPTER 5: PET FOOD MARKET, BY FOOD TYPE

5.1. Overview

5.1.1. Market size and forecast

5.2. Dry food

5.2.1. Overview

5.2.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

5.2.3. Market size and forecast

5.3. Wet food

5.3.1. Overview

5.3.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

5.3.3. Market size and forecast

5.4. Treats/snacks

5.4.1. Overview

5.4.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

5.4.3. Market size and forecast

5.5. Others

5.5.1. Overview

5.5.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

5.5.3. Market size and forecast



CHAPTER 6: PET FOOD MARKET, BY SALES CHANNEL

6.1. Overview

6.1.1. Market size and forecast

6.2. Supermarkets/hypermarkets

6.2.1. Overview

6.2.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

6.2.3. Market size and forecast

6.3. Specialized pet shops

6.3.1. Overview

6.3.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

6.3.3. Market size and forecast

6.4. Online sales channel

6.4.1. Overview

6.4.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

6.4.3. Market size and forecast

6.5. Others

6.5.1. Overview

6.5.2. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities

6.5.3. Market size and forecast



CHAPTER 7: PET FOOD MARKET, BY REGION



CHAPTER 8: COMPETITION LANDSCAPE

8.1. Top winning strategies

8.2. Product mapping

8.3. Competitive dashboard

8.4. Competitive heat map

8.5. Key developments

8.5.1. Partnership

8.5.2. Business expansion

8.5.3. Product launch

8.5.4. Investment

8.5.5. Acquisition

8.5.6. Agreement



CHAPTER 9: COMPANY PROFILES

9.1. BLUE BUFFALO CO., LTD. (General Mills, Inc.)

9.1.1. Company overview

9.1.2. Key executives

9.1.3. Company snapshot

9.1.4. Operating business segments

9.1.5. Product portfolio

9.1.6. R&D Expenditure

9.1.7. Business performance

9.1.8. Key strategic moves and developments

9.2. COLGATE-PALMOLIVE COMPANY

9.2.1. Company overview

9.2.2. Key Executives

9.2.3. Company snapshot

9.2.4. Operating business segments

9.2.5. Product portfolio

9.2.6. R&D Expenditure

9.2.7. Business performance

9.2.8. Key strategic moves and developments

9.3. FARMINA PET FOODS

9.3.1. Company overview

9.3.2. Key Executives

9.3.3. Company snapshot

9.3.4. Product portfolio

9.4. HERISTO AG

9.4.1. Company overview

9.4.2. Key Executives

9.4.3. Company snapshot

9.4.4. Operating business segments

9.4.5. Product portfolio

9.4.6. Key strategic moves and developments

9.5. MARS, INCORPORATED

9.5.1. Company overview

9.5.2. Key Executives

9.5.3. Company snapshot

9.5.4. Operating business segments

9.5.5. Product portfolio

9.5.6. Key strategic moves and developments

9.6. NESTLE PURINA PETCARE (Nestle S.A.)

9.6.1. Company overview

9.6.2. Key Executives

9.6.3. Company snapshot

9.6.4. Operating business segments

9.6.5. Product portfolio

9.6.6. R&D Expenditure

9.6.7. Business performance

9.6.8. Key strategic moves and developments

9.7. SCHELL & KAMPETER, INC.

9.7.1. Company overview

9.7.2. Key Executives

9.7.3. Company snapshot

9.7.4. Product portfolio

9.7.5. Key strategic moves and developments

9.8. THE J. M. SMUCKER COMPANY

9.8.1. Company overview

9.8.2. Key Executives

9.8.3. Company snapshot

9.8.4. Operating business segments

9.8.5. Product portfolio

9.8.6. R&D Expenditure

9.8.7. Business performance

9.8.8. Key strategic moves and developments

9.9. TIERNAHRUNG DEUERER GMBH

9.9.1. Company overview

9.9.2. Key Executives

9.9.3. Company snapshot

9.9.4. Product portfolio

9.10. WELLPET LLC

9.10.1. Company overview

9.10.2. Key Executives

9.10.3. Company snapshot

9.10.4. Product portfolio

9.10.5. Key strategic moves and developments

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/wt10tt

About ResearchAndMarkets.com

ResearchAndMarkets.com is the world's leading source for international market research reports and market data. We provide you with the latest data on international and regional markets, key industries, the top companies, new products and the latest trends.

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]







For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630

For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900







U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907

Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716



SOURCE Research and Markets
NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The Insight Partners published latest research study on " Tobacco Products Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Product Type (Cigarettes, Cigars & Cigarillos, Roll-Your-Own, and Others) and Distribution Channel (Supermarkets & Hypermarkets, Convenience Stores, Online Retail, and Others)", the global tobacco products market is projected to reach $907.66 Billion by 2028 from $782.02 Billion in 2021. It is expected to grow at a CAGR of 2.2% from 2021 to 2028.

Get Exclusive Sample Pages of Tobacco Products Market Size - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis with Strategic Insights at https://www.theinsightpartners.com/sample/TIPRE00027854/

Report Coverage Details Market Size Value in US$ 782.02 Billion in 2021 Market Size Value by US$ 907.66 Billion by 2028 Growth rate CAGR of 2.2% from 2021 to 2028 Forecast Period 2021-2028 Base Year 2021 No. of Pages 163 No. Tables 57 No. of Charts & Figures 73 Historical data available Yes Segments covered Product Type, and Distribution Channel Regional scope North America; Europe; Asia Pacific; Latin America; MEA Country scope US, UK, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Australia, Russia, China, Japan, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, Argentina Report coverage Revenue forecast, company ranking, competitive landscape, growth factors, and trends



Tobacco Products Market: Competitive Landscape and Key Developments

Leading players in the tobacco products market include Altria Group, Inc.; British American Tobacco plc; Swedish Match AB; ITC Ltd.; Japan Tobacco International; Imperial Brands; Philip Morris Products S.A.; Vector Group LTD.; Pyxus International, Inc.; and China Tobacco International (HK) Company Limited. These players are focused on developing innovative products to meet the changing requirements of consumers.

Inquiry Before Buying: https://www.theinsightpartners.com/inquiry/TIPRE00027854/

The tobacco products market growth is driven by the rising per capita income, less stringent government regulations, and western culture's influence in developing countries.

The tobacco products market in the Middle East & Africa is projected to grow at the fastest CAGR during the forecast period. The market growth across this region is attributed to the manufacturers' focus on introducing new cigarette flavors and low-nicotine formulations to attract more consumers, especially the women population in the region. Thus, the clientele for tobacco products is rapidly increasing in the region, mainly including adolescents and adults.

Development of Innovative and Premium Products:

Companies frequently use the new product development (NPD) strategy to improve brand performance, retain existing customers, and attract new ones. Moreover, marketing limitations in the tobacco industry have resulted in a more direct relationship between innovation and sales. Recently, tobacco companies have started developing heated tobacco products. Adult smokers face the biggest health risk from burning tobacco and breathing the smoke. It is the most dangerous method to consume nicotine, and it is linked to major illnesses and fatalities. Heated tobacco products are less risky compared to combustibles as they produce aerosols that consist of less harmful chemicals than cigarette smoke. Such products are expected to drive the growth of the tobacco products market during the forecast period. Moreover, manufacturers offer a wide range of flavors in e-cigarettes, which attracts many customers. E-cigarettes are generally costlier than traditional cigarettes and fall under the premium category. The prevalence of e-cigarettes is increasing in the UK.

Speak to Research Analyst: https://www.theinsightpartners.com/speak-to-analyst/TIPRE00027854

Tobacco Products Market: Segmental Overview

Based on products type, the tobacco products market has been segmented into cigarettes, cigar and cigarillos, roll-your-own, and others. The cigarettes segment accounted for the largest market share in 2020. Cigarettes are considered the most popular tobacco products due to various factors, including convenience, enriching user experience, and cost-effectiveness. Increased demand for cigarettes has resulted from rising disposable incomes and hectic lifestylescustomers believe smokes relieve tension and anxiety. Moreover, cigarettes are available in various flavors, from confectionery to alcoholic beverages to herbs and spices. Furthermore, menthol is one of the most widely used and recognizable flavors in tobacco products.

Based on distribution channel, the market has been segmented into supermarkets & hypermarkets, convenience stores, online retail, and others. The supermarkets & hypermarkets segment accounted for the largest share in 2020. Products from various brands are available at reasonable prices in these stores, allowing shoppers to find the right product quickly. Moreover, these stores offer attractive discounts, multiple payment options, and a pleasant customer experience. Due to heavy customer footfall, tobacco product manufacturers usually prefer selling their products through supermarkets and hypermarkets.

Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Tobacco Products Market:

Supply chains were completely disrupted due to nationwide lockdown and border restrictions enacted by various governments during the COVID-19 pandemic, which affected the production and distribution of various products. The pandemic had a short-term impact on the tobacco industry. In countries such as South Africa and India, tobacco product manufacturing sites were nonoperational during the lockdown as tobacco was listed as a non-essential commodity by governments.

Buy Premium Copy of Tobacco Products Market Size, Share, Revenue, Strategic Insights and Forecasts 2021-2028 Research Report at https://www.theinsightpartners.com/buy/TIPRE00027854/

Moreover, there is mounting evidence that smoking is linked to adverse outcomes and increased severity of COVID-19. These factors affected the sales of tobacco to some extent. Furthermore, since COVID-19 is a respiratory disease and creates breathing issues, people avoided smoking in the early phases of the global crisis. This factor affected the sales of tobacco products adversely.

Browse Adjoining Reports:

Tobacco Market Forecast to 2028 - Covid-19 Impact and Global Analysis - by Type (Chewing Tobacco, Dipping Tobacco, Smoking Tobacco, Others); Application (Cigarettes, Cigars and Cigarillos, Others) and Geography

Hot Tobacco Products Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Type (Devices, Capsules, Vaporizers); Distribution Channel (Offline, Online) and Geography

Cigarettes Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Type (Regular, Flavored); Distribution Channel (Supermarkets and Hypermarkets, Convenience Stores, Online Retail, Others) and Geography

Flavored Cigarettes Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Flavor (Fruits, Menthol, Others); Distribution Channel (Supermarkets and Hypermarkets, Convenience Stores, Online Retail, Others) and Geography

Cigars And Cigarillos Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis by Type (Premium, Mass); Category (Cigar, Cigarillo, Little Cigar); Flavor (Fruit/Candy, Mint/Menthol, ChocolateA); Size (7.01 inch or more, 6.01 inch to 7 inch, 5.01 inch to 6 inch, 4.01 inch to 5 inch); Gender (Male, Female) and Geography

Stand-Up Pouches Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Material Type (Plastic, Metal (Foil), Paper); Product Type (Aseptic Stand-Up Pouches, Retort Stand-Up Pouches, Standard Stand-Up Pouches, Hot-Filled Stand-Up Pouches); End Use (Food, Agriculture, Homecare, Personal Care and Cosmetics, Chemicals, Beverages, Tobacco Packaging, Healthcare, Automotive) and Geography

Smokeless tobacco Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Product (Chewing Tobacco, Snuff, Dissoluble tobacco, Others); Distribution Channel (Online, Offline) and Geography

Raw Tobacco Leaves Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Leaf Type (Virginia, Oriental, and Others) and Application (Smoking Tobacco, Moist and Dry Snuff, and Others)

About Us:

The Insight Partners is a one stop industry research provider of actionable intelligence. We help our clients in getting solutions to their research requirements through our syndicated and consulting research services. We specialize in industries such as Semiconductor and Electronics, Aerospace and Defense, Automotive and Transportation, Biotechnology, Healthcare IT, Manufacturing and Construction, Medical Device, Technology, Media and Telecommunications, Chemicals and Materials.

If you have any queries about this report or if you would like further information, please contact us:

Contact Us:

Sameer Joshi

E-mail: [email protected]

Phone: +1-646-491-9876

SOURCE The Insight Partners
Chicago-based not-for-profit delivers humanitarian aid and rides to safety for Ukrainians most in need within the warzone.

CHICAGO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Ukraine TrustChain , a Chicago-based, entirely volunteer-led not-for-profit that funds aid and evacuations for Ukrainian civilians, today announced that it has facilitated the successful evacuation of more than 13,000 Ukrainians since February 25, 2022. These evacuations from war torn areas of Ukraine, which primarily include women, children, the elderly and persons with disabilities, were organized by a U.S. based operations team that funds as many as seven teams on the ground in Ukraine, focused on evacuations and humanitarian needs.

In addition to evacuations, Ukraine TrustChain collects and distributes critical funds to volunteer teams in Ukraine who make urgent deliveries, including medicine, first aid, baby formula, food, clothing and hygiene products to civilians displaced by the conflict. The team also provides meals for approximately 35,000 to 50,000 Ukrainians each week depending on availability of supplies and ground conditions.

Ukraine TrustChain has facilitated the successful evacuation of more than 13,000 Ukrainians since February 25, 2022 Tweet this

"The U.S. team delivers 100% of donated funds directly to the volunteers serving Ukrainian people impacted by the Russian invasion," said Daniil Cherkasskiy, founder of Ukraine TrustChain. "Our teams in Ukraine are bound to our US team by personal relationships and deeply established trust. Teams we fund in Ukraine display an unwavering love for their Ukrainian homeland. They tirelessly deliver aid, at great personal risk, where it is too difficult and too dangerous for international aid organizations to venture."

Ukraine TrustChain was launched in late February 2022 after Cherkasskiy, a Ukraine native who immigrated to Chicago in 1999, received a phone call from a close friend whose preemie twins were trapped in Kyiv and in desperate need of preemie baby formula.

Through a series of connections Cherkasskiy was put in-touch with Natalia Mytsuta, a real estate agent and mother herself, located in Kyiv. Instead of evacuating, Mytsuta risked her life  traveling between bombed pharmacies  attempting to secure formula for a stranger's babies. This act of profound kindness formed the first link in the Ukraine TrustChain; since then, her team alone has grown to nearly 100 individuals.

When not working to provide humanitarian aid to those in crisis, Cherkasskiy's day job is as the Director of Analytics for ShowingTime, a Zillow Group company. His background in technology inspired the idea for Ukraine TrustChain.

"Just as blockchain relies on sequences of hashes to validate a transaction, Ukraine TrustChain relies on chains of deep interpersonal relationships leading to Ukranians in the conflict zone to deliver aid where and when it is needed most," said Cherkasskiy. "In a more literal sense, one of our most effective forms of donations is Bitcoin. Ukraine TrustChain converts Bitcoin to real world currency that is loaded onto locally-issued Ukrainian bank cards; this gives recipients almost instant access to funds without encountering life-threatening obstacles."

In addition to Bitcoin, Ukraine TrustChain accepts donations via Zelle, Chase QuickPay, PayPal and credit card. Operating at zero overhead, 100% of all donations go directly to support volunteer efforts; a donation of as little as $3 can evacuate a person from the war zone while a donation of $15,000 or more can fund an entire team at scale for a week. To donate, please visit: https://www.ukrainetrustchain.org/.

About Ukraine TrustChain

Ukraine TrustChain is a US based volunteer operation funding 100% vetted volunteer teams in Ukraine who make urgent deliveries, including medicine, first aid, baby formula, food, clothing, and hygienic products. Teams evacuate children and seniors from the front lines and provide basic needs to civilians, including the volunteer defense forces: fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters protecting their homeland and loved ones from Russian troops.

Ukraine TrustChain is an Illinois not-for-profit corporation and is in the process of applying to the Internal Revenue Service for tax exemption under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended. Ukraine TrustChain's IRS Taxpayer Identification Number is 88-1192170.

Media Contact:

Meagan Meldrim

FINN Partners on behalf of Ukraine TrustChain

[email protected]

616.970.2177

SOURCE Ukraine TrustChain
CHICAGO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/  United will hold a conference call to discuss first-quarter 2022 financial results on Thursday, April 21 at 9:30 a.m. CT/10:30 a.m. ET.

A live, listen-only webcast of the conference call will be available at ir.united.com. The company will issue its first-quarter 2022 financial results after market close on Wednesday, April 20.

About United

United's shared purpose is "Connecting People. Uniting the World." In 2019, United and United Express carriers operated more than 1.7 million flights carrying more than 162 million customers. United has the most comprehensive route network among North American carriers, including U.S. mainland hubs in Chicago, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, New York/Newark, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. For more about how to join the United team, please visit united.com/careers and more information about the company is at united.com. United Airlines Holdings, Inc. is traded on the Nasdaq under the symbol "UAL".

SOURCE United Airlines
New Award Expands Upon Initial Contract from U.S. Air Force

SAN DIEGO, Calif. , April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Space Micro Inc., powered by Voyager Space, and a provider of digital, electro-optic and communications systems for satellites, deep space exploration and other space equipment, today announced an award from the U.S. Space Force, Space Systems Command for a contract to build a GEO-capable LCT secure laser communications terminal. Under the contract, Space Micro plans to deliver a flight model to Space Force in early 2024.

This new award builds on an initial development contract the U.S. Air Force issued to Space Micro in 2019. This initial contract and subsequent modifications provided funding for Space Micro to update the current LCT design specifically for this mission and to provide communications interoperability to existing systems. Space Micro delivered an engineering model to Space Force in late 2021.The LCT Space Micro will deliver to Space Force under this contract will be a 10 cm system capable of providing full duplex GEO to GEO crosslinks at 40,000 km.

"We are happy to be able to provide Space Force high-precision laser communications terminals tailored for GEO missions, fully developed here in the United States" said David Czajkowski, CEO of Space Micro.

Space Micro offers a range of LCT solutions for civil, commercial and defense applications. The LCT can be used as an OISL (Optical Inter-Satellite Link), a spacecraft to ground link, or a spacecraft to UAV link.

"Space Micro continues to model what successful private and public partnerships can look like, and how impactful they can be not only for our own capabilities, but the broader industry as a whole" said Matthew Kuta, President and COO, Voyager. "We're so proud to see the team's hard work continue to be recognized."

Today's news comes on the heels of an exciting 2021 for Space Micro, as the company recently announced an award from the Space Development Agency for a 24-month development contract for advanced one-to-many optical communications using Managed Optical Communication Array (MOCA) technology to support Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations. Space Micro was also selected by AFWERX, a U.S. Air Force Organization that works with commercial tech firms, to develop an air-to-space laser communications pod that could be deployed on military aircraft or unmanned drones to provide in-flight connectivity.

Captain Charles "Aaron" Bolen, USSF PM, said, "We look forward to this development effort and its potential to increase lasercom capability for future USSF space systems."

About Space Micro Inc.

Space Micro Inc., powered by Voyager Space and based in San Diego, CA, is an engineering-driven supplier of affordable, high-performance, radiation-hardened communications, electro-optics, and digital systems for use in commercial, civil, and military space applications around the world. Space Micro solutions include Telemetry, Tracking and Command (TT&C) transmitters, mission data transmitters, space cameras, star trackers, image processors, Command & Data Handling (C&DH) systems and laser communications systems.

For more information, visit http://www.spacemicro.com or contact Michael Dowd, Vice President of Business Development at (858) 332-0700, extension 122.

About Voyager Space

Voyager Space is a space technology company dedicated to building a better future for humanity in space and on Earth and accelerating the development of a sustainable space economy. With nearly 20 years of spaceflight heritage and over 1500 successful missions as of March 2022, Voyager delivers space station infrastructure and services and technology solutions to commercial customers, civil and national security government agencies, academic and research institutions, and more.

For more information, please visit www.voyagerspace.com

Cautionary Statement Concerning Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains "forward-looking statements." All statements, other than statements of historical fact, including those with respect to Voyager Space, Inc.'s (the "Company's") mission statement and growth strategy, are "forward-looking statements." Although the Company's management believes that such forward-looking statements are reasonable, it cannot guarantee that such expectations are, or will be, correct. These forward-looking statements involve many risks and uncertainties, which could cause the Company's future results to differ materially from those anticipated. Potential risks and uncertainties include, among others, general economic conditions and conditions affecting the industries in which the Company operates; the uncertainty of regulatory requirements and approvals; and the ability to obtain necessary financing on acceptable terms or at all. Readers should not place any undue reliance on forward-looking statements since they involve these known and unknown uncertainties and other factors which are, in some cases, beyond the Company's control and which could, and likely will, materially affect actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements. Any forward-looking statement reflects the Company's current views with respect to future events and is subject to these and other risks, uncertainties and assumptions relating to operations, results of operations, growth strategy and liquidity. The Company assumes no obligation to publicly update or revise these forward-looking statements for any reason, or to update the reasons actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in these forward-looking statements, even if new information becomes available in the future.

SOURCE Voyager Space
Stride strengthens position as a leading fintech as it grows its executive team across credit, servicing, and compliance with four key executive hires

BOSTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Vemo Education (Vemo) co-founder and former Senior Vice President of Originations & Servicing, Renee Mang, has joined Stride Funding, Inc. (Stride) as the company's Vice President of Operations. The award-winning startup, which provides flexible, affordable alternative funding products for students in higher education and alternative education programs, has added four new industry leaders to its executive team with a combined near 100 years of experience across Sallie Mae, National Foundation for Credit Counseling (NFCC), Discover Financial Services, Eastern Bank, OneMain Financial, and more.

Stride, a fast-growing fintech with expertise across credit, servicing, and compliance, is the leading provider of Income Share Agreements (ISAs) , Deferred Tuition Agreements (DTAs), and payment plans for students across higher education and alternative education programs. On a mission to provide flexible, affordable funding to students of all backgrounds, Stride has pioneered outcomes-driven underwriting that doesn't require a cosigner, minimum credit score, or current income when determining student eligibility.

"I'm thrilled to be joining the team at Stride. I've admired their growth, passion, student centricity, and platform from afar and can't wait to bring my 40+ years of experience and passion to accelerate Stride's momentum and operational rigor," said Mang. "I've had the pleasure of growing Vemo and shaping the early days of the ISA industry and supporting some of the top Title IV schools and coding bootcamps. I look forward to growing the best-in-class education funding company driving access and affordability every step of the way."

An early leader in the field, Mang comes with 44 years of experience and held several key positions in her 20 years at Sallie Mae, including managing $30 billion in new loan origination volume annually. She joined Vemo Education as a Co-Founder and Senior Vice President of Originations & Servicing in 2016, overseeing customer service operations, origination, servicing, back-office operations, school relationship management, and student counseling for Vemo's income-based finance products. At Stride, she will lead all customer success, origination, servicing, and income verification teams and instill operational excellence in teams focused on school partners and student customers alike.

Blessing Chimwanda, who oversaw Eastern Bank's consumer lending compliance management program, is Stride's new Chief Compliance Officer. He has spent 20 years in financial services, including as Large Bank Legal and Compliance Bank Examiner at Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, with a deep focus on developing, monitoring, and testing fair lending and ECOA policies.

Pete Klipa joins as Director of Loan Servicing, with 25 years of experience in collections and recoveries in the utility, credit card, and auto finance industries. He previously led Creditor Relations at the National Foundation for Credit Counseling (NFCC), working with the NFCC's largest banks and federal regulators on strategy, oversaw Loss Mitigation at American Credit Acceptance, and managed collection agencies at Discover Financial Services.

Dr. Travis (TJ) Gonzales, Vice President of Credit and Analytics, joins Stride from Purpose Financial, where he most recently served as the Chief Analytics Officer and acting Chief Risk Officer. He previously led analytics and modeling as a Managing Director at OneMain Holdings. He has spent nearly a decade leading teams and leveraging innovative tools and methodologies to support increased access across consumer lending and personal loans.

Tess Michaels, Stride founder and CEO, says, "We founded Stride Funding with the goal of making education more accessible for students across the country, and with this A+ team in place, we're more confident than ever in the impact we will have on reshaping the student loan industry. Renee, Blessing, Pete, and TJ bring with them an incredible amount of leadership, experience, and passion that will drive our scalability, innovation, and differentiation."

To learn more about Stride's executive team and school partnerships, visit stridefunding.com .

About Stride

Stride Funding Inc. is a mission-driven company that helps students hit their stridewith flexible educational funding. Unlike loans that lock students into rigid repayment structures, Stride offers affordable repayments based on income. The company has been recognized as a visionary leader by FinTech analysts for its innovative funding arrangements and commitment to career support. Stride's executive team includes professionals with experiences at JP Morgan Chase, Sallie Mae, National Foundation for Credit Counseling (NFCC), Goldman Sachs, Federal Reserve, and Liberty Mutual; Stride's board of advisors is composed of serial entrepreneurs and industry leaders. GSV Ventures , Slow Ventures , Strada Education , Juvo Ventures , Firework Ventures , and Flybridge amongst others have participated in previous funding rounds. Learn more at stridefunding.com .

Follow Stride

LinkedIn

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

Contact

Morgan Viehman

[email protected]

(214) 775-9960

SOURCE Stride Funding
WEST CHESTER, Pa., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Venerable is pleased to announce the promotions of several leaders within the organization.

Jonathan Summers has been promoted to Senior Vice President, Head of Hedging Strategy and will continue to be responsible for the management of Venerable's hedge strategy and derivatives trading, along with associated risk monitoring and reporting which protects the company's capital and enables it to execute on its growth strategy. Summers has a comprehensive range of experience with variable and fixed annuities, as well as retirement plan business, and previously held roles in hedging, risk reporting, financial reporting, product development, and modeling with Voya Financial, ING Group, and Fidelity and Guaranty Life. He is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries, an Associate of the Casualty Actuarial Society, and a Member of the American Academy of Actuaries. Summers holds a Masters and Bachelor of Arts degree in Mathematics from the University of Rochester.

John Grove, promoted to Vice President, Head of Hedge Reporting, has been with the organization and predecessor companies since 2003, most recently successfully leading the day-to-day hedging operations and robust hedge framework leveraged for critical business decisions. Over the past several years, Grove has held a variety of positions in valuation, hedging, and risk management of fixed and variable annuities with Voya Financial and ING Group. Prior to that, he supported various capital market roles at Capital One Financial. Grove holds a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics degree from The Pennsylvania State University, is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries, earned a Chartered Financial Analyst designation, and has a certificate in Quantitative Finance.

Newly named Vice President, Head of Valuation, Dao Jiang has been with Venerable and its predecessor companies since 2016, most recently leading valuation of reserves for all Venerable blocks as well as the Distributable Cash Flow (DCF) reporting. Jiang worked closely with various functional areas on key strategic initiatives to drive methodology decisions, balancing regulatory requirements with capital optimization. Previously, he served as the GAAP lead of the closed block variable annuity business at Voya Financial, along with model oversight and asset and liability management. He has also held actuarial related positions at MetLife and Legal and General America. Jiang earned a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics degree from George Mason University and is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries.

Dave Wiland, EVP and Chief Financial Officer, shares "I appreciate the contributions John, Dao, and Jonathan make to our organization and the leadership they provide their teams. Their roles are critical to Venerable's growth strategy and organizational success, and it gives me great pleasure to acknowledge their hard work and dedication with these promotions."

Allison Proud, promoted to Vice President, Communications, has been with Venerable and its predecessor companies since 2002. In her role, she has responsibility for the firms internal and external communications and brand, and directly supports the leadership team and functional areas with strategic communications which influence Venerable's culture. Proud previously served in various project management roles, having led, and participated in, strategic projects including the transaction that involved the creation of Venerable. She holds a Master's in Business Administration from Villanova University and a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the University of Delaware.

EVP and Chief Implementation Officer, Lindsey Bollinger, said "Allison's passion for creating an engaging and meaningful experience for our colleagues and external audience is displayed in the thoughtful communications she and her team produce, and the strategic mindset she brings to supporting our leadership team and growth strategy. I value her contributions to our organization."

About Venerable

Venerable is a privately held company with business operations based in West Chester, Pennsylvania and Des Moines, Iowa. Venerable owns and manages legacy variable annuity business acquired from other entities. Created by an investor group led by affiliates of Apollo Global Management, LLC, Crestview Partners, Reverence Capital Partners, and Athene Holdings, Ltd., Venerable is a business with well-established, strategic investors, experienced in successfully building and growing insurance businesses with patient, long-term capital. For more information, please visit www.venerable.com.

Contact:

Allison Proud

Corporate Communications

610-249-9730

SOURCE Venerable
UW in the News

State, national and international media frequently feature the University of Wyoming and members of its community in stories. Here is a summary of some of the recent coverage:

Steve Lupien, director of UWs Center for Blockchain and Digital Innovation, was one of the primary sources for an NBC News report called The Crypto Cowboy State: How Wyoming Became the Center of Cryptocurrency. UW alumna Caitlyn Long also is featured. The detailed report notes that UW is one of the few schools in the country offering a minor in blockchain and cryptocurrency.

UW student Anastasiia Pereverten was among several Ukrainian students who discussed with USA Today how they are trying to keep up with their studies in the U.S. while their home country is at war with Russia. Pereverten plans to apply for temporary protected status after she finishes the spring semester at UW, where she is studying cultural studies.

The Casper Star-Tribune (CS-T) interviewed UW economist Chuck Mason for an article that focused on President Joe Bidens announcement of the largest-ever drawdown of the U.S. strategic petroleum reserve. The Biden administration plans to release about a million barrels of oil per day for up to six months in an effort to bring down still-climbing gasoline prices, which soared after Russia invaded Ukraine.

Rising oil prices could be a boon for Wyomings economy in the short term but, if sustained, they could push consumers away from fossil fuel usage more quickly than previously predicted, according to economists, including UWs Rob Godby, quoted in a Cowboy State Daily article.

The CS-T featured the recent ribbon cutting of UWs new $100 million Science Initiative Building. The 153,000-square-foot, five-floor building houses classrooms, research space, a greenhouse, plant growth areas, the Model Organic Research Facility and the Center for Advanced Scientific Instrumentation.

UW scientists were among researchers noting that climate change is causing plants in the sagebrush ecosystem to flower earlier, according to a CS-T article. Their peer-reviewed study recently was published by the Ecological Society of Americas Ecological Applications journal.

Wyoming Public Radio talked with several educators -- including Kate Welsh, an associate professor in UWs School of Teacher Education -- about the Rural Schools Collaborative, which provided a grant to explore the possibility of establishing a rural teacher corps in Wyoming.

UW economics Professor Todd Cherry and his colleagues are among eight research teams awarded a $10,000 honorarium from the Resources for the Future Solar Geoengineering Research Project to fund research on the benefits/risks of solar geoengineering. The teams project is International Environmental Agreements under the Threat of Solar Geoengineering, according to Science Magazine.

The Leader-Telegram, in Eau Claire, Wis., quoted UW economist Anne Alexander about skyrocketing commodity prices worldwide caused by the effects of Russias invasion of Ukraine. Alexander said higher prices or global shortages of wheat could spark economic and social unrest in global hot spots.

A Laramie Boomerang article -- published by The CS-T -- noted that virtual reality is being used to teach algebra to some Laramie High School students. Andrea Burrows, an associate dean in the UW College of Education, said that using technology such as virtual reality has potential as an education tool that goes beyond teaching algebra.

KGAB Radio noted that 20 Laramie restaurants participated last week in the first International Flavor Festival. The menus were infused with flavors that were inspired by more than 80 international members in the local Laramie community along with UW students from more than 40 different nations.

UW alumni Aaron Kruger, a social studies teacher at Cheyenne Central High School, and Rebecca Junge, a teacher at Caspers Journey Elementary School, each received a $25,000 Milken Educator Award. The award recognizes educators nationwide for making a profound difference for students, colleagues and communities. Wyoming News Now, The Wyoming Tribune Eagle, K2 Radio and The CS-T published the announcement.

Wyoming News Now published a UW release noting that the College of Business recently hosted more than 500 high school students, their teachers and professional business volunteers for the State Leadership Conference of the Wyoming Future Business Leaders of America.

UW Extension will host workshops about invasive grasses and weeds in Gillette, Sheridan and Sundance early next month. Sheridan Media published UWs release on the schedule.

Wyoming News Now published UWs release announcing that the Low Income Taxpayer Clinic opened in the UW College of Business. The clinic will provide representation, education and advocacy for individual taxpayers who are low-income or speak English as a second language.

Four UW Nordic ski team members were among the 361 student-athletes nationwide recently selected to the National Collegiate All-Academic Ski Team. Oil City News published UWs release on the announcement.

The Laramie Boomerang reported that UWs Biodiversity Institute is seeking citizen volunteers to help salamanders safely cross Laramie streets to get to LaBonte Parks lake, where the amphibians lay their eggs. The Boomerang article also noted that Salamander Saturday, an event to celebrate the annual migration, is this weekend at the Berry Biodiversity Conservation Center.
Announces Completion of Sale of Arriver

Signs Strategic Collaboration Agreement with Qualcomm Technologies

SSW Partners to Launch Process to Find Long-term Strategic Buyers

STOCKHOLM and NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Veoneer, Inc., the automotive technology company, today issued the following statement after the closing of SSW Partners acquisition of Veoneer on April 1, 2022, and the subsequent sale of Veoneer's software unit Arriver to Qualcomm Technologies on April 4, 2022:

Following the sale of Arriver to Qualcomm Technologies, Inc., Veoneer remains sharply focused on delivering innovative, best-in-class products and solutions to our customers  with our products being part of more than 125 scheduled vehicle launches for this year.

As a world leader in active safety and restraint control systems, Veoneer is well-positioned to capitalize on the automotive industry's shift to automation and electrification. Veoneer's active safety portfolio is one of the broadest in the industry and includes development, design, manufacturing and integration of vision, radar, lidar, thermal sensing, and central compute units. In restraint control systems, Veoneer is a leading supplier and provides systems to many of the world's largest automotive manufacturers.

Under SSW's ownership, Veoneer will continue to invest heavily in innovation and R&D efforts, enhancing current offerings and bringing to market new cutting-edge technologies to better support and complement OEM activities. Veoneer will execute on its many opportunities to expand into new products and services, as the company builds upon its leading positions.

"I am very excited to have the opportunity to lead Veoneer into the next phase of its development," said Jacob Svanberg, Chief Executive Officer, Veoneer. Veoneer has the right formula for success in the ever-changing automotive industry: best-in-class people, innovative products, leading integration expertise and a high-quality order book", he continued.

Veoneer and Qualcomm Technologies will also expand their strategic collaboration. The parties have signed a new agreement that ensures continuation of service and support for customers and details their future collaboration on roadmap alignment and technology cooperation in the development for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems. Veoneer and Qualcomm Technologies will further engage in joint go-to-market activities including on-the-road demonstrations of combined Qualcomm/Arriver- Veoneer advanced ADAS solutions for L2+ and beyond.

"This new collaboration agreement underscores the strength of our partnership with Veoneer and enables both companies to continue supporting our work together by bringing the latest advancements in driver assistance technologies to the Snapdragon Ride Platform," said Nakul Duggal, Senior Vice President & General Manager, Automotive, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. "The agreement also allows for the continued delivery of high-quality offerings and support for existing customers and opens up new opportunities for Qualcomm Technologies and Veoneer to grow our respective businesses."

As previously announced, Veoneer's new owner, SSW Partners, will lead the process of finding strong, long-term strategic partners for Veoneer's RCS and Active Safety businesses. Together with the Veoneer team, SSW Partners will ensure the smooth continuation of business activities for both customers and employees.

"We are excited to work with Jacob and the team as they build on the Company's long tradition of innovation and customer service," said Antonio Weiss and Josh Steiner of SSW Partners. "We are delighted that Arriver will become part of Qualcomm's thriving, dynamic culture, and look forward to the continuation of the strong partnership between Veoneer and Qualcomm. Over time, we will work to find a long-term home for Veoneer's businesses - where the employees can prosper, the customers can continue to have access to world class products and service, and innovation remains the key strategic priority."

Contacts

For Veoneer:

Thomas Jonsson

EVP Communications & IR

+46 (0)8 527 762 27

[email protected]

For SSW Partners:

Steve Lipin/Christina Stenson

Gladstone Place Partners

1-212-230-5930

About Veoneer

Veoneer, Inc. is a worldwide leader in automotive technology. Our purpose is to create trust in mobility. We design, develop, and manufacture state-of-the-art software, hardware and systems for occupant protection, advanced driving assistance systems, and collaborative and automated driving to OEMs globally. Headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, Veoneer has 7,100 employees in 11 countries. In 2021, sales amounted to $1.66 billion. The Company is building on a heritage of close to 70 years of automotive safety development.

About SSW Partners LP

SSW Partners invests in high-quality businesses and collaborates with partners to create enduring value for all stakeholders. We focus on businesses that consistently invest in their products and people, have built their reputations based on the quality of the goods they produce or services they provide, who have demonstrated the capacity for innovation and constant improvement, and who prioritize the interests of all stakeholders, including employees, customers, owners, and the communities in which the businesses operate.

Snapdragon and Snapdragon Ride are trademarks or registered trademarks of Qualcomm Incorporated. Snapdragon Ride is a product of Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. and/or its subsidiaries.

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/veoneer/r/veoneer-provides-market-update,c3539320

The following files are available for download:

SOURCE Veoneer
Adding More Than 600 New Sales Jobs

RALEIGH, N.C., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Victra's footprint now includes nearly 1,600 locations nationwide. Under the plan, Go Wireless' field staff, store managers and sales associates will become Victra employees and the company's Las Vegas-based back-office support staff will stay on to help support post-acquisition integration.

"Victra has a great reputation as a top industry retailer with years of strong performance," said Victra CEO and Chairman of the Board, Rich Balot. "Similar to Go Wireless, Victra has a focus on delivering a world-class retailer experience with a commitment to growth for our company and our employees, and we look forward to bringing our organizations together."

Victra was founded as a partnership by Richard and David Balot in October 1996 in Wilson, North Carolina, and recently celebrated its 25th anniversary. Victra was incorporated as ABC Phones of North Carolina, Inc. in 1999. Today, Victra is independently owned and operated in Raleigh, North Carolina, with more 230 people in the Store Support Center. In 2020, Victra opened its Victra Contact Center in Winterville, N.C., now employing hundreds of team members who handle calls in support of Victra stores.

Victra believes in inspiring its employees through its unique culture and core values of innovation, collaboration, integrity, performance, and celebration. In addition, the company supports giving back in the communities where our employees live and work. To aid in this goal, the company launched Victra Cares, a program that promotes a culture of giving that inspires employees, helps make positive change within local communities and assists our own employees during times of need.

Through Victra Cares, the company has partnered with many charitable organizations including Building Homes for Heroes, Feeding America and in 2022 a new partnership just launched with the USO. In 2020  2021, Victra made a sizable donation to support Feeding America that provided 1.5 million meals to those in need across the country, with a focus on communities where they have stores.

If you are interested in joining the Victra team, learn more about open roles www.victra.com/careers and apply today.

About Victra, Inc.

Victra, headquartered in Raleigh, N.C., operates as the largest exclusive authorized agent for Verizon Wireless, the nation's best performing wireless network. Victra has approximately 1,600 Verizon-branded retail stores across 49 states, offering a comprehensive mix of wireless devices including smartphones, feature phones, tablets, mobile broadband, and wearables; as well as a broad range of accessories and device insurance coverage. For more information, visit www.victra.com .

CONTACT: [email protected]

SOURCE Victra
VT3989, a Clinical-Stage TEAD Autopalmitoylation Inhibitor, Demonstrates Strong Synergy with Osimertinib in EGFR Mutant Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Models

SAN MATEO, Calif., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Vivace Therapeutics, Inc., a small molecule discovery and development company developing first-in-class therapies targeting the Hippo pathway, today announced that new preclinical data on the company's transcriptional enhanced associate domain (TEAD) autopalmitoylation inhibitor, VT3989, will be presented at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting 2022. Presented findings will highlight results of research evaluating the combination of VT3989 and osimertinib (Tagrisso), an epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) inhibitor, in preclinical EGFR mutant tumor models. Study data demonstrated strong synergistic activity for the treatment combination as compared to osimertinib alone, as evidenced by enhanced efficacy and delayed tumor regrowth. The AACR conference is being held April 8-13, 2022, in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Vivace's proprietary compounds inhibit palmitoylation of members of the TEAD protein family, including both covalent and non-covalent inhibitors. The company's clinical candidate, VT3989, is currently in Phase 1 clinical trials. Pre-clinical research and development activities have demonstrated that the clinical candidate is active as a monotherapy against tumors that rely upon dysfunction of the Hippo pathway, and in combination with other anti-cancer therapies in additional tumor types.

Details of the company's presentation at the AACR conference are as follows:

Poster Presentation #5364:

Title: The TEAD autopalmitoylation inhibitor VT3989 improves efficacy and increases durability of efficacy of osimertinib in preclinical EGFR mutant tumor models

The TEAD autopalmitoylation inhibitor VT3989 improves efficacy and increases durability of efficacy of osimertinib in preclinical mutant tumor models Presenting Author: Tracy Tang , Ph.D., vice president of biology, Vivace Therapeutics

Date/Time: Friday, April 8, 2022 , 12:00  1:00 p.m. Central

, 12:00  Central Location: E-Poster Website

About Vivace Therapeutics, Inc.

Vivace Therapeutics is a small molecule drug discovery and development company focused on targeting the Hippo pathway. The company is pursuing a first-in-class approach to treat human carcinomas of high unmet medical need. Based in San Francisco Bay Area, the company has raised $70 million to date, and is funded by leading biotechnology investors, including Canaan Partners, WuXi Healthcare Ventures, Cenova Capital, Sequoia Capital China, Boxer Capital and RA Capital Mangement. For more information, please visit www.vivacetherapeutics.com.

Tagrisso is a registered trademark of the AstraZeneca group of companies.

Contact information

Sofie Qiao, Ph.D.

President and CEO

[email protected]

650.666.2753

Tim Brons

Vida Strategic Partners (media)

646-319-8981

[email protected]

SOURCE Vivace Therapeutics, Inc.
BOSTON, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Four years ago, childhood friends Nico Estrella and Juan Giraldo put a modern twist on a centuries-old "wellness tea" from Ecuador creating Waku (means "together) a deliciously replenishing herbal tea with prebiotic powers and gut-health benefits. Today, they are proud to announce a brand relaunch that will take place on Tuesday, April 12th and includes new recipe formulations, limited edition flavors and the ability for anyone to become an investor in the company for as little as $100.

(L) Nico Estrella (R) Juan Giraldo

"After getting the feedback from hundreds of customers, we've been working tirelessly for the past year to make Waku even better, focusing on bringing the sugars to 0g while keeping the delicious, all-natural taste," explains Estrella.

Raised with an entrepreneurial spirit passed down from their parents, Estella and Giraldo took notice of the 62 million Americans diagnosed each year with digestive health disorders and wanted to do something about it. Having grown up in Ecuador with some of the world's best natural ingredients, both men immediately thought of the "horchata lojana" recipe they grew up drinking daily for its gut-health benefits and great taste.

Based in Boston, ingredients are responsibly sourced from Ecuadorian farmers in a region of the Andes Mountains that include a powerful botanical blend that have anti-inflammatory properties and digestive benefits. Combined, they help to prevent inflammation and create a balance between a person's gut and overall body wellbeing.

In the past year, the Waku team has worked closely with food scientists and nutritionists to develop a new recipe formulation that reduces the number of added sugars to zero; adds a sweeter taste using natural monk fruit; and maximizes gut-health benefits by adding 6g of prebiotic fiber per bottle. All beverages are caffeine-free, non-GMO, vegan, keto-friendly, and gluten-free with no artificial flavorings or concentrates.

Waku will reintroduce customer favorites while offering limited seasonal flavors throughout 2022. Beverages retail for $39.99 for a 12-bottle case and $29.99 per case for monthly subscriptions which can be purchased at livewaku.com .

Additionally, Waku has partnered with Republic , an investment crowdfunding platform that allows easy access to anyone wanting to invest in private companies. For as little as $100, a person can become an "investor" in Waku through April 30, 2022.

A disruptor in the $7 billion dollar 'ready to drink' tea industry , Waku is one of the first bottled teas to bring gut-health benefits to a category that hasn't seen much innovation in recent years. The brand's revenue traction has grown 9X since year one and they have built a strong fan base with 40% of their online revenue coming from repeat customers.

"We are very excited about our partnership with Republic, since it enables us to welcome Waku fans, customers and anyone wanting to join our mission to replenish the world with the home-grown flavors of Ecuador, as investors," explains Giraldo. "Together, we can now share in the future wins of Waku."

Waku will host a virtual Tea Party on Friday, April 15th at 2:00 pm EST and announce the release of its newest flavor. The public is invited to join via Zoom and win free cases of Waku, t-shirts, hoodies, and hats. Additionally, Estrella and Giraldo will be featured on QVC with Waku on April 27, 2022.

For more information on Waku beverages or investing opportunities, please visit www.livewaku.com .

Contact:

Jennifer Lopez, clover PR

[email protected]

310-864-8633

SOURCE Waku
We're talking Wendy's fluffy, Southern-style biscuit made with real buttermilk, topped with fresh-cracked egg, oven-baked Applewood Smoked bacon (cooked fresh daily!) or savory sausage made with crushed red and black pepper, and sage for the perfect kick, topped with melted American cheese for just. one. dollar. And no, you're not still dreaming  it's the city that never sleeps after all!

WHERE & WHEN:

$1 Sausage, Egg & Cheese or Bacon, Egg & Cheese Biscuits* are available from April 1 through May 1 at participating Wendy's restaurants nationwide during breakfast hours. Now that's something to wake up for!

WHY:

Wendy's delivers a better breakfast with fresh-cracked eggs, saving you from a mediocre folded-egg sandwich offered at the other guys. Not to mention, its perfect Southern-inspired biscuit is made with real buttermilk that's robust enough to hold the delicious ingredients together while still upholding a buttery and flaky bite. The Sausage, Egg & Cheese and Bacon, Egg & Cheese Biscuits are bringing a taste of the south to the big city (and the suburbs)! No plane ticket needed.

HOW:

Wendy's breakfast fans can order online, via the Wendy's mobile app or head to their nearest Wendy's restaurant to seize the day the right way. Don't forget to download Wendy's mobile app so you don't miss out on upcoming deals and earn free Wendy's with Wendy's Rewards.

ABOUT WENDY'S:

Wendy's was founded in 1969 by Dave Thomas in Columbus, Ohio. Dave built his business on the premise, "Quality Is Our Recipe", which remains the guidepost of the Wendy's system. Wendy's is best known for its made-to-order square hamburgers, using fresh, never frozen beef**, freshly-prepared salads, and other signature items like chili, baked potatoes and the Frosty dessert. The Wendy's Company is committed to doing the right thing and making a positive difference in the lives of others. This is most visible through the Company's support of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption and its signature Wendy's Wonderful Kids program, which seeks to find a loving, forever home for every child in the North American foster care system. Today, Wendy's and its franchisees employ hundreds of thousands of people across approximately 7,000 restaurants worldwide with a vision of becoming the world's most thriving and beloved restaurant brand. For details on franchising, connect with us at www.wendys.com/franchising. Visit www.wendys.com and www.squaredealblog.com for more information and connect with us on Twitter and Instagram using @wendys, and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/wendys.

*Limited time only at participating U.S. Wendy's during breakfast hours. Offer only applies to Bacon or Sausage, Egg and Cheese Biscuits. Limit five qualifying items per transaction and per person per day. Not valid in combo. While supplies last. Third-party delivery prices may vary. Check your local Wendy's for breakfast hours.

**Fresh beef available in the contiguous U.S., Alaska, and Canada.

SOURCE The Wendy's Company
EXTON, Pa., April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- West Pharmaceutical Services, Inc. (NYSE: WST), a global leader in innovative solutions for injectable drug administration, today announced that its Scientific Insights Lab team members, Liang Fang and Marissa Rase, received the 2021 Fred Simon Award, and its Chief Scientific Officer, Fran DeGrazio, received the 2021 Edward Smith Packaging Science Award at the 2022 PDA Annual Meeting in Dallas.

The Frederick D. Simon Paper of the Year award is presented for the best paper published in the PDA Journal of Pharmaceutical Science and Technology, named in honor of the late Frederick D. Simon. The award-winning paper entitled, "Physicochemical Excipient-Container Interactions in Prefilled Syringes and Their Impact on Syringe Functionality," studied the chemical interactions between excipients as well as the physical interactions between the excipients and the container and their impact on the functional performance of prefilled syringes. Dr. Liang Fang, Fellow Scientist and Technical Director of West, was the lead author and worked in partnership with Lilly on the published paper. The paper can be found on the PDA website.

The Edward Smith PDA Packaging Science Award was created to recognize outstanding contributions to Pharmaceutical Packaging Science and was awarded to Fran DeGrazio, Chief Scientific Officer of West Pharmaceutical Services. It is presented in honor of Edward Smith and his long-term contributions to pharmaceutical packaging science.

"Here at West, we are so proud to receive these awards and celebrate the accomplishments of our team members as it represents our almost 100-year history of commitment to being a leader in primary packaging and delivery for our healthcare and drug development partners," said Chris Ryan, Senior Vice President, Commercial Products and Emerging Markets at West. "We continue to strive to meet the changing needs of our customers and helping to de-risk their therapies and ultimately, helping patients."

"I am honored to be recognized for this prestigious award from PDA this year," said Fran DeGrazio, Chief Scientific Officer at West. "Contributing and partnering with PDA on packaging science plays an important role in the industry on products delivering medications to patients safely and effectively. This award underscores both the need of focus on quality and innovation and the overall commitment to helping customers across the globe improve patient outcomes."

For more information about West, please visit our website: www.westpharma.com.

For more information about the 2022 PDA Annual Meeting, please visit: https://www.pda.org/global-event-calendar/event-detail/2022-pda-annual-meeting.

About West

West Pharmaceutical Services, Inc. is a leading provider of innovative, high-quality injectable solutions and services. As a trusted partner to established and emerging drug developers, West helps ensure the safe, effective containment and delivery of life-saving and life-enhancing medicines for patients. With approximately 10,000 team members across 50 sites worldwide, West helps support our customers by delivering over 45 billion components and devices each year.

Headquartered in Exton, Pennsylvania, and in business for nearly a century, West in its fiscal year 2021 generated $2.83 billion in net sales. West is traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: WST) and is included on the Standard & Poor's 500 index. For more information, visit www.westpharma.com.

All trademarks and registered trademarks used in this release are the property of West Pharmaceutical Services, Inc. or its subsidiaries, in the United States and other jurisdictions, unless otherwise noted.

SOURCE West Pharmaceutical Services, Inc.
Women account for half of all U.S. medical school graduates. So, it is notable that a recent peer-reviewed paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Internal Medicine ( JAMA, Internal Medicine ), reports that women hold 38 percent of faculty positions in U.S. medical schools, and in academic settings, annually earn about $20,000 less than their male counterparts.

Also, the percentage of female physician partners at Chen, Dedicated and JenCare Senior Medical Centers nationwide is substantively higher than the percentages of female doctors reported by the Association of American Medical Colleges. AAMC's most recent data relevant to primary care shows that just 41.3 percent of active family medicine/general practice physicians and just 38.7 percent active internal medicine physicians are female.

"ChenMed remains an amazing career choice for primary care doctors," notes Gianni Neil, M.D., ChenMed Division Chief Medical Officer. "To transform care of the neediest populations, we recruit and promote mission-focused doctors based upon better health metrics being enjoyed by their patients. Our doctors focus on delivering highly personalized care with VIP service, and not the industry norms of unthinkably high volume of patients, or electronic medical record codes entered for RVUs (billable relative value units)."

ChenMed doctors fulfill their purpose by helping their patients achieve better health, including responding quickly to patient calls or texts to their cell phones and accommodating same-day telehealth or in-person appointments when needed. Plus, ChenMed centers offer services that help reduce barriers to healthy living, from transportation assistance to on-site medications to helping with social services, along with weekly "love calls" to check on patients.

"We empower our primary care physicians and care teams to go above and beyond to help their patients thrive," explains Stephanie Chen, chief legal and culture officer at ChenMed. "And we remain committed to serving our highly diverse staff at every level of our hyper-growth company. Our amazing staff plus shared values of love, accountability, and passion are just a few reasons why we frequently are being recognized as a great place to work. Our teams deserve the credit for everything we are able to achieve."

Notable ChenMed Women's History Month Activities 2022

During Women's History Month (March 2022), ChenMed focused energy on the National Women's History Alliance theme: "Women Providing Healing, Promoting Hope," and ChenMed's chief legal and culture officer was a main-stage presenter at the World Happiness Summit in Miami, March 18-20, 2022, sponsored by WOHASU. ChenMed sponsored the Summit, promoting happiness through a sense of purpose.

The medical practice also partnered with the Women Inspire Network (WIN) Employee Resource Group (ERG) to bring its staff a diverse range of informative activities, programs, and engagement opportunities; and honored ChenMed women for their impact at work, in their communities, or with their families.

About ChenMed:

ChenMed, headquartered in Miami, is a privately owned medical, management and technology company that delivers the high-touch and personalized primary care Medicare-eligible seniors need to enjoy better health. The company operates nearly 100 senior medical centers in 12 states. Named a Fortune 2020 "Change the World" company, a "Most Loved Workplace" by Newsweek Magazine, and a certified Best Place to Work by the Best Place to Work Institute, ChenMed brings concierge-style medicine and better health outcomes to the neediest populations. ChenMed brands include Chen Senior Medical Center, Dedicated Senior Medical Center and JenCare Senior Medical Center.

SOURCE ChenMed
The integration will connect students' future readiness planning with social-emotional health and well-being

TORONTO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ - Xello , the award-winning college, career, and future readiness program, and Intellispark which promotes student success and well-being with technology that improves coordination of student supports, today announced a partnership and integration, which will help school districts provide a more comprehensive level of care for students by linking well-being indicators and college and career readiness information.

From career, personality and skills assessments, to developing a student portfolio and exploring careers and colleges, Xello prepares students for the future by using a discovery-based model that helps students of all pathways build self-knowledge and create meaningful plans for future success; whereas Intellispark empowers educators and families to take action and realize a whole-child vision for student success with integrated communication and collaboration features. These complementary solutions will partner to provide educators with the insights needed to personalize support for every student under a more holistic approach.

"There is not a one-size-fits-all approach to education, so there cannot be a singular approach to supporting students in their current struggles or future opportunities," said Matt McQuillen, Xello Co-Founder and CEO. "The partnership between Xello and Intellispark is a game changer for student success teams who can now connect their students' future goals and plans with present social-emotional health and well-being. This will give educators the insights they need to connect meaningfully with each individual student and the actionable next steps to support their needs."

The need to address social-emotional wellness of students is top of mind for educators, families and communities. In September 2021, after surveying more than 100 educators and 400 parents, Xello released The State of College and Career Readiness in K-12 , which highlighted social-emotional learning competencies as the top indicator of future readiness. During the past two years of the pandemic, educators have made a concerted effort to support students' social and emotional health. The partnership between Xello and Intellispark continues these efforts by linking college, career and future readiness with well-being, while focusing on relationships and providing an evolving whole student perspective.

"At Intellispark, we believe that student success is a team sport," said Stephen M. Smith, Intellispark CEO. "We are thrilled to partner with Xello because they understand the need to develop a personalized path to success for every student. Kids inevitably encounter obstacles as they progress through school that put their future plans at risk. We help kids get the support they need to overcome those challenges so they can thrive. With this partnership, we look forward to helping prepare many more successful, future ready students who feel known, supported and appreciated."

Academically researched and scientifically validated, Xello puts students at the center of their planning experience by equipping them with the knowledge, skills, and insights to make informed decisions and build actionable plans for their future. To learn more about Xello's strategies and implementation options, districts can contact Xello's team of Education Consultants . Existing Xello clients who wish to integrate the Intellispark platform into their subscription should contact their Success Manager.

About Xello

Xello's mission is to help anyone, anywhere in the world create a successful future through self-knowledge, exploration and planning. With more than 20 years in the education software industry, the team at Xello has helped millions of educators and millions of students become future ready with its suite of online platforms. Based in Toronto, Canada, Xello's award-winning future readiness programs are used globally by nearly eight million students and educators. Learn more about Xello at www.xello.world .

About Intellispark

Intellispark was created by Naviance co-founders Stephen Smith and Shaun Fanning to provide a holistic platform to coordinate student support services in PreK-12 schools. With member schools in 43 states and 13 countries, a team with deep education experience, and backing from leading education technology investor GSV Ventures, Intellispark is making student success a team sport with innovative features that connect teachers, administrators, counselors, families, and community resources so every student can thrive. For more information, please visit intellispark.com .

SOURCE Xello Inc.
Circular to Food Delivery Businesses

Her Majestys Government of Gibraltar has said it has become deeply concerned about credible reports of possible breaches of the law and sub-optimal business practices in food delivery services, and is therefore publishing a circular on the obligations and best business practices for takeaway food delivery services.

'This circular is intended as a reminder to all food delivery service providers, but especially takeaway delivery businesses, of important legal requirements, principles and protocols they must abide by.'

Government reminds that every delivery business in Gibraltar must have an appropriate business license to carry out delivery services, however licensed restaurants that deliver their own food are not required to have a separate business licence for deliveries.

'Drivers must be on a full licence, not a learners licence, and must be properly insured. In addition, the requirement to hold the right insurance applies to all drivers, whatever the form of transportation (e.g. motorcycles). Drivers should be covered by the appropriate motor vehicle insurance, and a declaration should be made to the relevant insurers that the vehicle will be used for commercial activity.'

In order to comply with Gibraltar legislation, a motorcycle must be subject to an insurance policy in respect of liability for the death of or bodily injury to a person or damage to property caused by, or arising out of, the use of the vehicle on a road. It is the responsibility of the business as the employer to ensure that the correct insurance policy (or policies) are in place for its drivers.

Drivers must adhere to speed limits and safety protocols and must respect all traffic laws, especially those on speeding and safety. Drivers must also adhere to the Gibraltar Highway Code.

Under the principle of vicarious liability, an employer can be held responsible for the wrongful acts of an employee but can also be held liable for wrongful acts by someone whose role is akin to that of an employee (e.g. a person who is self-employed but is treated as an employee). Takeaway delivery businesses providers must bear in mind that drivers working at the control and direction of the business will not be considered self-employed but as employees of the provider.

All businesses and drivers must abide by food hygiene legislation. This means that all food must be protected from risk of contamination, for example by ensuring that raw food does not contaminate cooked food in motorcycle trunks and boxes. Under applicable legislation, any person who provides a vehicle for the movement of food must ensure that the interior of the vehicle and any surface which the food is liable to come into contact with must be kept in a state of cleanliness to prevent contamination of food.

In addition, food temperature is critical to food safety and quality. If boxes and bags need to keep food hot or cold, then choose appropriate insulated carriers. Where possible, separate hot food from chilled food in the insulated carriers. Hot food should be provided to customers at 63C or above and cold food at 10C or colder. To achieve this, it is recommended to keep distances short and limited to within a 30-minute radius.

Periodic checks should be carried out to ensure the food is maintained at a safe temperature, either hot or cold, and should be recorded in the providers due diligence records. If ice packs are used, these should be cleaned and sanitised as per the insulated box or bag in between every use.

Govt said it is confident that takeaway food delivery businesses want to abide by the law and by best practices. 'It is the business responsibility. However, in order to stop possible abuses, the Government will continue to monitor the huge and rapid growth in this sector.'

'The Government wants to encourage competition in the market, but also to ensure a level playing field for all operators, and that all applicable laws are being respected. Therefore, if necessary, the Government will use its enforcement powers and/or consider legislating to ensure that a level playing is achieved.'

The Minister for Transport, the Hon Paul Balban, said: The food delivery business has seen exponential growth especially during the pandemic. Numerous companies have risen to the challenge and been able to service a community locked down effectively. This circular lays down business requirement and aims to provide this new industry with details of their obligations in respect of employment, traffic and transport, health and safety and business requirements.
Srinagar/New Delhi, April 4 : The Indian Army has initiated Court Martial against a Captain involved in an alleged encounter where three civilians mistaken to be terrorists were killed in Amshipura village of Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district in July 2020.

The Army says a Court of inquiry and the summary of evidence indicated the need for "disciplinary proceedings".

The Court Martial proceedings has been then initiated against Army Captain Bhoopendra Singh.

The three people from Rajouri district of Jammu region -- Imtiyaz Ahmed, Abrar Ahmed and Mohammed Ibrar -- were killed in Shopian district on July 18, 2020, and called as "terrorists".

But as the protest started and doubts were raised over the alleged killings, the Army promptly constituted a Court of inquiry which found prima facie evidence that the troops had "exceeded" powers vested under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act.

After the news about the fake encounter spread, the Jammu and Kashmir Police had constituted a special investigation team which filed a chargesheet against three people, including Captain Singh, for "staging a fake encounter" in Shopian district and killing three men.

It had alleged that Captain Singh had provided wrong information to his superiors and the police about the recovery made during the encounter.

The other two named by the police in its chargesheet are Tabish Nazir and Bilal Ahmed Lone, both civilians.

The Court of inquiry was followed by the summary of evidence, which was completed in the last week of December 2020.

In October 2020, Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha visited the three families and assured them that justice will be done.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Gorakhpur, April 4 : Two Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) constables were allegedly attacked with a sharp-edged weapon by a man at the south gate of Gorakhnath temple in Uttar Pradesh's Gorakhpur district.

The man was trying to forcibly enter the temple.

The incident took place late on Sunday evening and the accused, who has been arrested, has been identified as Murtaza.

According to police, the accused tried to forcibly enter the temple premises after raising the religious slogan of "Allahu Akbar".

"Two of our PAC constables were injured after the accused tried to enter the temple with a sharp-edged weapon. He went to a PAC post near the gate and tried to attack the police," Additional Director General (ADG), Gorakhpur Zone, Akhil Kumar, said.

The accused, who was also injured in the attack, was held by the constables, he added.

The police official said the injured constables -- Gopal Kumar Gaur and Anil Paswan -- were given first aid at Guru Gorakhnath hospital and are undergoing treatment at the BRD Medical college.

"The accused is also undergoing treatment at the district hospital. Initial investigation revealed that his name is Murtaza and is a resident of Gorakhpur," the ADG added.

He said the angle of terror cannot be ruled out as Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath often visits the temple.
Badaun, April 4 : The Yogi Adityanath government has ordered an inquiry into the alleged food poisoning incident that took place in a government residential school for girls in Uttar Pradesh's Badaun district.

Nearly 28 girls had fallen ill after having dinner on Saturday. All the affected students were between 10 to 14-years-old and were admitted at the community health centre.

Their condition is now said to be stable, said a school official.

According to sources, the food is checked for quality by the school in-charge before it is served to the students.

However, on Saturday, a few students had already started eating dinner before it was checked.

Soon after consuming the dinner, a few of the students started vomiting while some complained of a stomach ache and dizziness.

Badaun's Chief Development Officer, Rishi Raj said the samples of the food have been sent to a lab for testing.

"Strict action will be taken against the person found guilty," he added.
Los Angeles, April 4 : K-Pop superband BTS brought the Grammys to the centre stage by performing power-packed number 'Butter'.

Jungkook swooped down from the ceiling in spectacular fashion while other band members sat in the audience alongside stars like Keith Urban. V of the BTS, who was also in the crowd, playfully flirted with Olivia Rodrigo, who performed right before BTS, reports Variety.

In a blink-and-you-miss-it-moment, J-Hope almost slipped while making the transition from one stage to the next but made a smooth (as butter) recovery.

The group then transitioned from super stars to super spies, ducking lights as the James Bond theme played.

It was announced on Tuesday that BTS member Jungkook had tested positive for Covid-19 but recovered in time for the Grammys.

The globally successful K-pop group is nominated for Best pop duo or group performance for 'Butter', their chart-topping single that released in May 2021.

BTS was also nominated in 2021 in the same category for 'Dynamite' but the award went to 'Rain on Me' by Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande.

Following the Grammys ceremony, BTS will be sticking around in Las Vegas for four dates on their 'Permission to Dance on Stage' tour on April 8, 9, 15 and 16 at Allegiant Stadium.

BTS recently made a surprise pre-recorded appearance at the Oscars, celebrating their favourite Disney and Pixar movies, including 'Coco' and 'Aladdin'.

Latest updates on Grammys 2022
New Delhi, April 4 : India is known for its art, literature, and writing. There are many amazing Indian authors to pick from when it comes to Indian literature, thus here is a list of some excellent Indian author books you can read.

CHETAN BHAGAT

Chetan Bhagat is an author, screenwriter, columnist, and TV personality who was named the best-selling English-language novelist in India by The New York Times in 2008. He is best known for his comedy-drama novels about young Indian urban middle-class people. His most well-known works include "Five Point Someone", "Two States", "Half Girlfriend", and "One Indian Girl".

Five Point Someone

The plot revolves around the lives of three students who are unsure of where they want to go in life. Hari, Alok, and Ryan are desperate to gain admission to one of India's engineering schools.

Half Girlfriend

The book tells the story of Madhav and Riya, two people from very different backgrounds who fall in love. Madhav is a local, whereas Riya comes from a wealthy Marwari family. Despite the fact that they are diametrically opposed, there is something that connects them. Madhav wants to be in a relationship with Riya, but Riya only wants them to be friends. They finally arrived at a decision. Riya could be Madhav's half-girlfriend.

AMRITA PRITAM

Amrita Pritam developed an early interest in poetry and literature, which influenced her later career as a poet and novelist. During the pre-partition period, she was a fearless woman who dared to write controversial texts. She experienced difficult times during India's partition, which influenced her to write the Punjabi novel "Pinjar" (skeleton), as well as "Shadows of Words" and "Raseedi Ticket", which are also considered her great works.

Pinjar

Amrita Pritam wrote the novel Pinjar, which translates as Skeleton in Punjabi. Through this story, the author sheds light on the problem that women faced during India's partition.

Raseedi Ticket

Raseedi Ticket is Amrita Pritam's celebrated autobiography, in which she describes how she felt distressed by the influence of hatred; she was traumatised by the horrors of Partition, which inspired her poem 'Vaaris Shah'. According to her autobiography, a writer should not be afraid of criticism, no matter how hostile the world becomes. The time between her intimacy with Sahir and her deep friendship with Imroz is beautifully described. Amrita's story is told in a series of episodes that she considers to be significant in her life.

JHUMPA LAHIRI

Jhumpa Lahiri is a well-known author who has written novels, essays, and short stories. She was a struggling writer whose work was initially rejected by publishers until her breakthrough novel, "The Interpreter of Maladies". Following her success, she went on to write a number of other novels that are well-known throughout the Indian subcontinent and the rest of the world. "The namesake", "Unaccustomed Earth", and "The Lowland" are among the most well-known.

The Namesake

The novel depicts the struggles and hardships of a Bengal couple who immigrate to the United States to start a new life away from everything they know. The story begins when Ashoka and Ashima leave Calcutta and settle in Cambridge, Massachusetts' Central Square. Through a series of mistakes, their son's nickname, Gogol, becomes his official name, an event that will shape many aspects of his life in the years ahead.

The Interpreter of Maladies

The story revolves around the three main characters, with a twist thrown in somewhere by the children. Mr. Kapasi is driving the car towards the Sun Temple when it stops at a tea stall where Mr. and Mrs. Das were arguing about who would take Tina to the bathroom, and Mrs. Das took Tina to the bathroom after losing the argument. Bobby saw a goat and was excited to give her chewing gum on this Mr. Das didn't give any expression actually they were soo immature to be a parent according to Mr. Kapasi.

KHUSHWANT SINGH

Khushwant Singh was a journalist, editor, and novelist who began his career as a lawyer before moving on to become the editor of major journals and magazines. As a writer, he is best known for his novels "Train to Pakistan", "Delhi: A Novel", "The Company of Women", "Truth, Love, and a Little Malice".

Train to Pakistan

This is a story about religious persecution and the consequences of displacement. During India's Partition in 1947, Hindus and Sikhs were forced to relocate to India, while Muslims were forced to relocate to Pakistan, regardless of family history. Some families were uprooted after generations of living in one location or another.

The Company of Women

Mohan Kumar, a millionaire businessman, decides to reinvent his life after separating from his nagging, ill-tempered wife of 13 years. Convinced that 'lust is the true foundation of love', he devises an audacious plan: he will advertise for paid lady companions to share his bed and his life. Thus begins his journey of unbridled sexuality in the company of some extraordinary women.

ARUNDHATI ROY

Arundhati Roy is a writer, essayist, and political activist best known for her novel "The God of Small Things", which won her the Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 1997. Other works by her include "The Algebra of Infinite Justice", "Kashmir: The Case for Freedom", and "Capitalism: A Ghost Story".

Kashmir: The Case for Freedom

Kashmir: The Case for Freedom is a passionate attempt to correct this imbalance and fill a void in our moral imagination. Covering Kashmir's past and present, as well as the causes and consequences of the occupation, the authors make a strong case for the withdrawal of Indian troops and the right of Kashmir to self-determination.

Capitalism: A Ghost Story

In Capitalism: A Ghost Story, best-selling author Arundhati Roy examines the dark side of Indian democracy-a nation of 1.2 billion people in which the top 100 richest people own assets worth one-quarter of India's GDP.

-- Syndicated from IANS
Jaipur, April 4 : The Rajasthan Police have arrested 46 people, detained seven and impounded 21 vehicles even as the curfew continued and Internet remained shut in Rajasthan's Karauli which witnessed riots on April 2.

Bharatpur Range Inspector General of Police Prasanna Kumar Khamesra confirmed the arrests on Monday.

He said that after stone pelting took place during the procession in the Futa Kot area Main Bazaar Karauli on Saturday, the police acted promptly and arrested 46 people and took seven in police custody for interrogation.

"So far 13 accused have been arrested in connection with the incident registered at Police Station Karauli and 33 people were arrested for violating curfew order. Seven people have been taken into police custody for questioning. A total of 21 two-wheelers and four wheelers were also seized by the police during this period," said Khamsera.

He said that in view of the sensitivity of the incident, he along with his team immediately reached Karauli and took stock of the situation along with Superintendent of Police Karauli Shailendra Singh Indolia.

"We called the necessary police force and RAC from other districts of the range and imposed them on the spot for peace and order," he said further.

Many senior officers were sent to Karauli to help in maintaining the law and order and all these officers have been camping at the district headquarter Karauli.

IG Khamesra said that to maintain law and order, the situation is being closely monitored by putting up police patrols in the city. The police force also did a flag march in the city. "Right now the situation is under control but curfew has been imposed in the city as a precaution," added the IG.

Stones were pelted on a procession being taken out on the occasion of Hindu New Year Day on Saturday after which two groups came face to face. Many shops were set ablaze in the incident.

To control the situation, curfew was imposed on Saturday (April 2) and the Internet was also shut down as a precautionary measure.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Chennai, April 4 : Tamil Nadu police are on the lookout for an AIADMK district level functionary alleged to be behind the murder of a DMK leader J. Soundararajan, who ran a juice shop inside the Broadway bus station.

Police suspect that Soundrarajan, who was murdered in broad daylight on Sunday by a four-member gang in two motorbikes, was the victim of political enmity as he had switched to the DMK from AIADMK a few months ago.

The police said that the incident occurred on Sunday when Soundararajan and a few others were involved in setting up a shed near the Broadway bus station in Chennai to distribute water to the passerby during the scorching heat when four men on two bikes approached him. On seeing the assailants, he, along with accomplices, ran but was stabbed by the criminals on his face and neck multiple times with machetes and knives.

The Flower Bazar police reached the spot and took a profusely bleeding Soundararajan to the Rajiv Gandhi memorial hospital but doctors declared him brought dead.

Chennai City Police commissioner Shankar Jiwal while speaking to IANS said: "We are on the lookout for the assailants. Police are also probing into the altercation the deceased had a few days ago with a group of AIADMK men over the construction of the watershed to distribute drinking water to the passers-by. The police are not leaving any stone unturned and the angle of his alleged enmity is also being probed.

Notably, Soundarrajan was a district-level functionary of the AIADMK and his switching sides to the DMK a few months ago was not taken well by the AIADMK local leaders and cadres. Sources in the police said that he had a major fight with another district-level functionary of the AIADMK and the two had a heated argument in public recently.

Soundararajan's friends and family and the DMK local leadership alleged that this AIADMK leader was involved in the attack.

Chennai city police said that two teams of police led by Assistant Commissioners have been constituted to nab the culprits and said that the team will catch the assailants soon.

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, Water Resources minister S. Duraimurugan, Electricity minister, Senthil Balaji expressed grief and condolences over the death.
New Delhi, April 4 : Homegrown audio accessories brand Boult Audio on Monday launched 'AirBass ENCore X' earbuds in the Indian market.

The earbuds will be available for a price of Rs 1,799 on www.boultaudio.com with a standard industry warranty of one year.

The device will also be available on Amazon.in starting April 8.

The ENCore X is armed with the latest Bluetooth 5.1 wireless connectivity and aims to offer a total of 100 minutes of playback time in just 10 minutes of charge without compromising on performance.

"The device is IPX5 Water Resistant and it can comfortably be used outdoors or in the gym.

These earbuds can be used separately as a monopod or else in stereo mode using both the earbuds after successful pairing.

"The AirBass ENCore X has a uniquely built design that's crafted for high ergonomics," the company said in a statement.

It features an angled bud with extra-soft silicone tips for added comfort during long use. The body is built with a high-quality and premium-finish ABS shell which also protects it from water and sweat.

The earbuds are touch-sensitive and can be conveniently used at your fingertips to adjust the volume, change tracks, attend calls or command your voice assistant.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Amaravati, April 4 : In a major administrative overhaul aimed at decentralisation of governance and balanced development, Andhra Pradesh on Monday created 13 new districts taking the total number to 26.

Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy launched the new districts in a virtual mode from his official residence here. Ministers, MPs, MLAs, district collectors and superintendents of police attended the inaugural programmes in their respective districts.

The Chief Minister said a new beginning has been made with the reorganisation of 13 districts to double the number. He said from the state capital to the village, his government was following the policy of decentralisation.

He said the exercise was undertaken to ensure decentralised development of all regions by taking governance closer to the people.

The Chief Minister said while retaining names of 13 old districts, 13 new districts have been carved out for decentralised, accelerated and balanced growth and for administrative convenience.

Jagan Mohan Reddy said the new districts have been formed in accordance with the public opinion. He claimed that while naming the new districts, the government took into consideration various factors, including sentiments of the local people.

The new districts are Parvathipuram Manyam, Alluri Sitharama Raju, Anakapalli, Kakinada, Kona Seema, Eluru, NTR, Bapatla, Palnadu, Nandyal, Sri Satyasai, Annamayyia Aand Tirupati.

In 2019 elections, YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) has promised to create one district in each of the 25 Lok Sabha constituencies.

He pointed out that since the formation of the state 70 years ago, only two districts were created.

The Chief Minister said Andhra Pradesh with a population of 4.96 crore required new districts. "Till yesterday, we had one district for a population of 38.15 lakh but now with creation of 13 new districts, there is one district for a population of 19.07 lakh," he said.

He said his government had been focusing on decentralisation. The first step was taken with the formation of village and ward secretariats.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Jaipur, April 4 : A Special Research Team (SIT) has been constituted to further investigate the Madhya Pradesh-Rajasthan Terror Module, after the ATS teams of the two states worked together to get deep into the details of the criminals in MP, police officials said.

Two additional superintendents of police, along with research officers, have been appointed as co-research officers, the police officials told IANS.

The technical analysis will be handled by an additional superintendent of police and a deputy superintendent of police.

Deputy Inspector General of Police, Anti Terror Sqauds(ATS), Rajasthan will supervise the special research team.

On March 30, 2022, three accused were arrested in Rajasthan with 12 kg RDX while they were travelling from MP to Rajasthan.

Investigations revealed that the suspects associated with terror module reside in Ratlam, Madhya Pradesh and have detailed information about the entire module. So in this regard ATS MP team was informed and alerted, they said.

Three suspects were handpicked with the help of ATS Madhya Pradesh, who were thoroughly interrogated by the officers of ATS Madhya Pradesh and ATS Rajasthan. They were then handed over to ATS Rajasthan.

Based on the research by ATS Rajasthan, the three were arrested on Sunday. They will be presented before a court and a request will be made for their police custody remand, as per the offcials.

On Wednesday, a team of constables and head constables of Sadar Nimbahera police station intercepted a suspicious vehicle on Neemuch Chittorgarh highway and discovered 12 kg RDX and timers from their possession.

Three persons identified as Sarfuddin, Zubair and Altamas from Ratlam were arrested. A major search operation was conducted in Ratlam in which the alleged kingpin of the model Imran Khan and his accomplice Ameen Khan and Ameen Pathan were caught.

After a thorough interrogation, they were handed over to Rajasthan police and further investigation is on in the case, the officials confirmed.
Colombo, April 4 : Following the resignation of the Sri Lankan Cabinet amid anti-government protests, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has invited all political parties, including the opposition, to accept ministerial posts and to help to resolve the ongoing economic crisis.

Issuing a statement, President Rajapaksa invited the parties to come together to find solutions.

"The current crisis is a result of several economic factors and global developments. As one of the leading democratic countries in Asia, solutions should be found to this within a democratic framework," the statement noted.

"Considering this a national need, the time has come to work together for the sake of all the citizens and future generations." As the island-wide protests defying curfew and emergency laws imposed by Rajapaksa took place on Sunday, the government decided to dissolve the cabinet with the plan to have an all-party interim government.

Grappled by a severe economic crisis, the island nation has been going through a crisis where people are suffered without fuel, LPG, electricity and food for months.

Extensive loans and unlimited money printing which exceeded 1.2 trillion LKR ($4 billion) in 2021 along has lead to the current economic crisis.

Meanwhile Governor of the Central Bank Ajith Nivard Cabraal, who was blamed by the opposition parties and activists as responsible for extensive money printing, has resigned.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
New Delhi/ Lucknow, April 4 : The Uttar Pradesh government on Monday told the Supreme Court that Ashish Mishra, son of Union Minister Ajay Mishra Teni, who is accused of running over farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri, is 'not a flight risk'.

The Uttar Pradesh government, represented by Mahesh Jethmalani, was responding to a petition by families of the farmers killed in the October 3, 2021 violence, challenging the bail granted to Mishra by the Allahabad High Court.

Asserting that the offence is 'grave', the state government told the court that 'no words are enough' to condemn it.

It also maintained that it had 'vehemently' opposed the bail in the high court.

However, Ashish Mishra is not a 'flight risk' and security has been provided to the witnesses to ensure there is no tampering, the Uttar Pradesh government added.

The state government's posture on the issue has expectedly angered the farmers who have been accusing the government of shielding Ashish Mishra.

Gursevwak Singh, elder brother of Gurwinder Singh, who was one of the four farmers who died, said, "It is because of this that we have been demanding that the case should be transferred to Delhi. We all know that the proceedings are being influenced here. No action was taken against the union minister despite his video threatening farmers having gone viral. The UP government's attitude is different when it comes to criminals who are from their own party. There is no scope of justice in UP. That is evident from the way an eyewitness was thrashed and his case was closed by the local police." Satnam Singh, the father of 19-year-old Lovepreet Singh, who was killed in the violence, said, "Despite having all the evidence, we sometimes think that we are fighting a lost battle. We all know that the state is trying to save the accused and the proof is now out in the open. The minister is openly giving statements saying he proved his 'innocence' by ensuring BJP's win in Lakhimpur Kheri." Jagdeep Singh, son of Nachattar Singh, who was seen tossed in the air by the speeding SUV, said, "There is no way we can get justice in UP. The main accused was given bail easily despite the SIT submitting evidence in court calling the incident 'premeditated' and 'not an act of negligence'. The state government is now defending his bail. We are now going to approach the apex court to get the case transferred to Delhi or elsewhere to ensure justice for farmers."

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
New Delhi, April 4 : The Supreme Court on Monday reserved the order on a petition seeking cancellation of bail granted to Ashish Mishra, prime accused in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case which claimed eight lives.

A bench headed by Chief Justice N.V. Ramana and comprising Justices Suya Kant and Hima Kohli made strong observations against the February 10 Allahabad High Court granting bail to Mishra. "We don't approve of such irrelevant things...don't want to use word nonsense," said the bench. It further added, "This is not good...what we feel this way going into the merits, injuries (caused by bullet) is not necessary." Senior advocate Mahesh Jethmalani, representing the Uttar Pradesh government, submitted that the alleged offence is very serious and the state government has provided adequate security to all the 98 witnesses in the case, and the police are also in regular touch with them.

The bench noted that the top court appointed Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, a former judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, to monitor the Lakhimpur Kheri violence probe, and had recommended cancellation of bail granted to Mishra.

The Chief Justice told Jethmalani, "Not filing SLP (special leave petition), protection provided to witnesses, these all are not issues...state should have acted on suggestions made by the SIT. We are not forcing you to file an SLP." The Chief Justice further categorically asked Jethmalani, "What is your stand?" Jethmalani replied that Mishra is not a flight risk and to say the offence was intentional or not, is a matter of trial, and reiterated that offence is serious.

During the hearing, the bench observed why did the high court judge go into merits of the case in a bail matter. The bench noted, "Forget about merits, how can the judge go into all this post mortem and all?" Senior advocate Dushyant Dave, representing the family members of the victims', submitted that the high court failed to consider relevant facts, and the order suffered from gross non-application of mind by the high court. After hearing detailed arguments in the matter, the top court reserved the order.

Jethmalani said the state government opposed the bail granted to Mishra in the case.

Mishra was arrested on October 9 last year in the case. On October 3, 2021, eight people, including four farmers, were killed in Lakhimpur Kheri in clashes during a farmers' protest. He was granted bail on February 10.

The family members of the farmers, mowed down by a car belonging to Mishra, in Lakhimpur Kheri had moved the top court challenging bail granted to him. He is the son of Union Minister and BJP MP Ajay Kumar Mishra. The victims' families have claimed that the state has not filed an appeal opposing bail granted to Mishra.

In November last year, the Supreme Court appointed Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, a former judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, to monitor the Lakhimpur Kheri violence probe. The top court also reconstituted the SIT investigating the incident and appointed IPS officer S.B. Shiradkar, as its head.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Lucknow, April 4 : The Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) will probe the incident of an attack on police constables at the Gorakhnath Temple in Gorakhpur.

A team of ATS personnel has reached Gorakhpur.

It may be recalled that on Sunday night, a man forcibly tried to enter the premises of Gorakhnath Temple in Gorakhpur.

Armed with a sharp-edged weapon, he attacked two constables who tried to stop him. He was raising slogans 'Allahu Akbar' during the incident.

The attacker, identified as Ahmad Murtaza Abbasi, dodged security personnel at the temple for around ten minutes before being overpowered.

Chief minister Yogi Adityanath is the head priest (Mahant) of Gorakhnath Temple and has his personal accommodation here.

According to police, the accused tried to forcibly enter the temple premises after raising the religious slogan of 'Allahu Akbar'.

Additional DG, Gorakhpur zone, Akhil Kumar said, "Two of our Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) constables were injured after the accused tried to enter the temple with a sharp-edged weapon. He went to a PAC post near the gate and tried to attack the police." The ADG said that the terror angle in the incident was also being probed.

The accused, who was also injured in the attack, was held by the constables, he said. The injured constables have been identified as Gopal Kumar Gaur and Anil Paswan.
Canberra, April 4 : A new survey on Monday revealed that the incumbent Australian government has made up ground on the Opposition ahead of this year's general elections.

According to the latest edition of Newspoll, the governing Coalition's primary vote has improved a point to 36 per cent compared to 38 per cent for the opposition Labor Party, reports Xinhua news agency.

The two-point margin represents a significant improvement for the government from trailing 41-35 in mid-March.

By comparison, the Coalition received 41.4 per cent of first preference votes in the 2019 federal election and Labor 33.3 per cent.

Newspoll found that Labor leads the Coalition 54-46 on a two-party preferred basis.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison is expected to call the general election for May within days.

The poll was conducted after Treasurer Josh Frydenberg presented the federal budget for the financial year 2022/23, revealing billions of dollars in spending measures to address the rising cost of living.

Labor leader Anthony Albanese's budget reply speech was headlined by a A$2.5 billion pledge to fix a "crisis" in the aged care system.

Morrison's net approval rating rose two points to negative 12 while Labor leader Albanese's fell to the negative one.

Forty-three per cent of voters identified Morrison as their preferred Prime Minister compared to 42 per cent for Albanese, with 15 per cent undecided.
Thiruvananthapuram, April 4 : A large number of Congress leaders and workers are an upset lot as veteran party leader K.V.Thomas appears determined to attend a seminar at the 23rd CPI-M Party Congress which gets underway in Kannur on Wednesday.

On Monday, the chief organiser of the event and also the CPI-M Kannur district secretary M.V.Jayarajan expressed hope that both Shashi Tharoor and Thomas attend the event.

Reacting to it, Thomas said he is waiting to hear from AICC president Sonia Gandhi as he has sought permission for it.

"Let us wait and see and don't jump to conclusions. This is not a state conference of the CPI-M, instead it's the national conference and all its national leaders are there. So let us wait," said Thomas.

Sevety-five-year old Thomas has been a Lok Sabha member from Ernakulam first from 1984 to 1996 and then he had two terms as a legislator and was a cabinet minister in A.K.Antony's ministry (2001-04). Then from 2009 to 2019 again he was in the Lok Sabha.

A peeved Rajmohan Unnithan, Congress Lok Sabha member from Kasargod said this is extremely bad of Thomas to have even considered attending the seminar.

"Fail to understand why Thomas is rearing to go to attend the seminar. He should best understand the sentiments of the Congress cadres in Kerala and behave accordingly. The Congress party has given him lots and he should not forget that," said Unnithan.

Incidentally, the CPI-M is making every attempt to woo Tharoor and Thomas to its seminar as its being held at the home turf of Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and also State Congress president K.Sudhakaran.

Both Vijayan and Sudhakaran have been enaged in a long running feud and if the CPI-M manages to get even Thomas, who presently is upset after he was first denied his sitting Lok Sabha seat in 2019 polls and then again he made an attempt to get a seat to contest in the 2021 April Assembly polls, but that also failed to materialise.

Since then speculations were rife about Thomas crossing over to the CPI-M and the invite to him and if he turns up, would be a slap in the face of Sudhakaran, who has already warned that none should go.

Meanwhile on Monday afternoon, the AICC directed that no body should attend the seminar and that there is no change in the stand taken earlier. Now the ball is in Thomas's court.
Canberra, April 4 : Australia Post on Monday released two postage stamps to mark the platinum jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II, as the nation commemorates her 70th year as Head of the Commonwealth.

The two stamps depict portraits of Queen Elizabeth II from 1952, the year she rose to the throne, and 2019, highlighting her longevity as Head of the Commonwealth, which includes countries such as Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, reports Xinhua news agency.

Australia Post Group Philatelic Manager Michael Zsolt said the latest additions form part of the service's tradition of honoring Queen Elizabeth II.

Queen Elizabeth II is the most featured person on Australian stamps, and the Australia Post was the first postal authority in the Commonwealth to produce a stamp for her birthday each year, Zsolt said.

The Australia Post had previously released stamps to celebrate the golden and diamond jubilees of Queen Elizabeth II, marking 50 and 60 years of her service.

While Queen Elizabeth II has very little involvement in the governance of Australia, she still plays a prominent cultural role.

Her image is also displayed on Australian coins and the A$5 banknote.

The postage stamps and associated collectables are expected to go on sale from Tuesday.
People shop at a local market during the fasting month of Ramadan in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei, April 3, 2022. (Photo by Jeffrey Wong/Xinhua)

BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Muslims in Brunei observed the first day of the fasting month of Ramadan on Sunday as the country has recorded less than 1,000 new COVID-19 cases for 11 consecutive days.

The daily period of fasting starts at the breaking of dawn and ends at the setting of the sun.

Twelve cannon shots were fired at Taman Haji Sir Muda Omar Ali Saifuddien here in the capital, which unveiled the fasting month.

Unlike the practice of closing all Ramadan markets due to the pandemic in 2020, as Brunei has announced entering the COVID-19 endemic period, the country resumed last year's Ramadan markets in several locations across the country, with vendors offering Malay-style cakes, barbecue, drinks and other Muslim delicacies, attracting a large number of people to the markets.

Brunei reported 544 new COVID-19 cases on Sunday, bringing the national tally to 135,974.

As a country of 420,000 people, Brunei has recorded less than 1,000 new cases for 11 straight days since March 24 after the daily increase during the third wave of the pandemic reached its peak on March 3 with 4,885 cases.

As of Saturday, 61.9 percent of Brunei's population have received three doses of COVID-19 vaccines.

In his special speech broadcasted nationwide before welcoming the first day of Ramadan, Haji Hassanal Bolkiah, Brunei's Sultan urged the people to exercise perseverance and patience in the face of challenges during the holy month of Ramadan and the COVID-19 pandemic.

During the month of Ramadan, working hours at government ministries and private industries will be adjusted for earlier off-duty to facilitate fasting for Muslims.

Local eateries are advised not to serve dine-in customers in daylight hours under local law. Offenders will be prosecuted for disrespecting the holy month.

Consuming food, drinking and smoking in public places during daylight hours are also offenses under the law, under which offenders can be prosecuted.

Non-Muslims can buy fast food takeaway in restaurants or eateries. 

People eat in front of the Omar Ali Saifuddien Mosque during the fasting month of Ramadan in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei, April 3, 2022. (Photo by Jeffrey Wong/Xinhua)

A vendor sells fruits at a local market during the fasting month of Ramadan in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei, April 3, 2022.(Photo by Jeffrey Wong/Xinhua)

People buy fruits at a local market during the fasting month of Ramadan in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei, April 3, 2022.(Photo by Jeffrey Wong/Xinhua)
Hyderabad, April 4 : Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) working president K.T. Rama Rao on Monday claimed that fuel prices can be lowered by at least 30 per cent if the Central government does away with cesses.

He remarked that the fuel price hike for 12th time in 14 days outdoes any torture. "Read about Chinese torture only in books. This consecutive 80 paisa fuel price hike, 12th hike in 14 days outdoes any torture & a record of sorts," tweeted Rama Rao.

"Why hesitate to debate in Parliament on crude oil prices, the cesses that we can do away with to reduce prices," he asked Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.

KTR, as the state minister is popularly known, claimed that fuel prices can be lowered by at least 30 per cent if the Central government does away with cesses.

"Any to those who rant about how states can reduce state taxes, in Telangana we have not enhanced VAT in the last 7 years (2015 Jan)," he wrote.

"Our demand is to do away with indiscriminate Cesses imposed by NDA Govt which will lower fuel prices by 30 per cent at least," he added.

Meanwhile, in another tweet, the minister for information technology and industries called for a healthy competition between Hyderabad and Bengaluru. He was responding to a tweet by Karnataka Congress chief D. K. Shivakumar.

"I accept your challenge. By the end of 2023, with Congress back in power in Karnataka, we will restore the glory of Bengaluru as India's best city," Shivakumar tweeted while reacting to KTR's 'pack your bags and move to Hyderabad' suggestion to Khatabook founder Ravish Naresh, who recently flagged bad roads, power cuts, poor quality water supply and other problems in the Karnataka capital.

"I don't know much about politics of Karnataka & who will win but challenge accepted," KTR replied to Congress leader.

"Let Hyderabad & Bengaluru compete healthily on creating jobs for our youngsters & prosperity for our great nation. Let's focus on infra, IT&BT, not on Halal & Hijab," wrote KTR referring to the controversies in the neighbouring state.
Belagavi : , April 4 (IANS) A special KCOCA court on Monday awarded life imprisonment to international gangster and underworld don Bannanje Raja, known as 'threat king', and three other accused persons in connection with the sensational shootout case of BJP leader and industrialist R.N. Nayak.

The accused were pronounced guilty earlier by the special court.

Along with Bannanje Raja, the court has convicted Jagadish Patel, the prime accused in the case from Uttar Pradesh, Abhi Bhandagar from Bengaluru and Ganesh Bhajanthri from Udupi for life imprisonment.

Bannanje Raja is the ninth accused in the case. He is involved in several serious criminal cases in Bengaluru, coastal districts of Karnataka and Maharashtra.

Special Court judge C.M. Joshi had pronounced the order. The court acquitted the sixth accused Rabdin Pichai, 11th accused Mohammad Shabandri, a resident of Bengaluru and 16th accused Anand Ramesh Nayak from Uttara Kannada in the case.

The second accused Jagadish Patel is from Uttar Pradesh, third accused Abhi Bhandagara from Bengaluru, Ganesh Bhajanthri from Udupi, K.M. Ismail from Kerala, Mahesh Achangi from Hassan, M.B. Santhosh from Kerala, Jagadish Chandraraj from Bengaluru, Ankit Kumar Kashyap from Uttar Pradesh.

The shootout had taken place on December 21, 2013 in Ankola of Uttara Kannada district. The police department had lodged the Karnataka Control of Organised Crimes Act (KCOCA) against the accused and this was the first case registered under the Act in the state.

Special Public Prosecutor S.B. Puranik Math and Additional Public Prosecutor Shivaprasad Alva argued against the accused. Shivaprasad Alva had stated that through the judgment the court has sent a good message to the society. The police and prosecution have successfully persuaded the legal action against the anti-social elements.

When asked about whether he faced any threats since the case involved gangster Bannanje Raja, he stated that there was no room for it as he had to deliver the responsibilities given by the government. "This judgment shows that no one is above the law. The law takes its own course. If police and prosecution join hands and pursue the case unitedly, legal action against any criminal element is ensured," he said.

Bannanje Raja had made an extortion call demanding protection money from the deceased Nayak. When he refused to pay the money, the accused got him killed.

Furthermore, Raja had called up media houses from a foreign location and claimed that he had got the murder carried out, severely embarrassing the state and central investigation agencies. Various judges heard the case for over seven years. More than 210 witnesses recorded their statements and prosecutors produced 1,000 pages of documentary proof.

The police had filed a charge sheet in 2013 against 16 accused persons who were associates and sharp shooters working for Bannanje Raja.

Rajendra Shetty a.k.a Bannanje Raja is involved in 44 serious criminal offences, including murder, extortion and kidnapping. Authorities had issued an Interpol Red Corner notice against him. He was nabbed in Casablanca of Morocco and was later extradited to Karnataka.

Raja is an arts graduate and worked as a bus agent in Udupi and Bengaluru. He soon started calling businessmen for ransom and as his crime graph grew he went to Dubai and later settled in Morocco.
Bengaluru, April 4 : Former Karnataka IPS officer Bhaskar Rao on Monday joined the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the presence of the New Delhi Chief Minister and National Convener Arvind Kejriwal.

Rao, a 1990 batch IPS officer known for his people-friendly approach, had applied for voluntary retirement and submitted his resignation in September 2021.

His resignation was accepted after a long gap recently.

He was appointed as the Bengaluru Police Commissioner when the ruling BJP took over from the former Congress-JD (S) coalition government in 2019.

Though, rumours were rife about him joining the BJP, Rao's decision came as a surprise for manu.

When he was serving as Bengaluru Police Commissioner, he faced a tough situation as then Deputy Chief Minister C. Ashwath Narayan objected to his style of functioning.

During his tenure as a Police Commissioner, Rao waged a battle against rampant drug racket in the city.

Continuous raids were conducted and many high profile celebrities were taken into custody. He was the first commissioner who spoke openly about rampant drug trafficking in Bengaluru.

Rao is expected to contest from the Basavanagudi Assembly constituency in Bengaluru, considered as the strong ground of BJP.

His entry will also benefit the party during Civic polls of Bengaluru, which will be held sooner.

AAP state President Prithwi Reddy has also hinted about major personalities and leaders from the state joining the party.
Sydney, April 4 : Volcanic activity beneath the surface of Mars could be responsible for triggering repetitive marsquakes, which are similar to earthquakes, in a specific region of the Red Planet, an international team of researchers suggested.

The team from the Australian National University (ANU) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing discovered 47 previously undetected marsquakes beneath the Martian crust in an area called Cerberus Fossae, a seismically active region on Mars that is less than 20 million years old.

They speculate that magma activity in the Martian mantle, which is the inner layer of Mars sandwiched between the crust and the core, is the cause of these newly detected Marsquakes.

The findings, published in the journal Nature Communications, suggest magma in the Martian mantle is still active and is responsible for the volcanic Marsquakes, contrary to past beliefs held by scientists that these events are caused by Martian tectonic forces.

According to geophysicist Professor Hrvoje Tkalcic, from the ANU Research School of Earth Sciences, the repetitive nature of these quakes and the fact they were all detected in the same area of the planet suggests Mars is more seismically active than scientists previously thought.

"We found that these Marsquakes repeatedly occurred at all times of the Martian day, whereas Marsquakes detected and reported by NASA in the past appeared to have occurred only during the dead of night when the planet is quieter," Tkalcic said.

"Therefore, we can assume that the movement of molten rock in the Martian mantle is the trigger for these 47 newly detected Marsquakes beneath the Cerberus Fossae region." The researchers used data collected from a seismometer attached to NASA's InSight lander, which has been collecting data about marsquakes, Martian weather and the planet's interior since landing on Mars in 2018.

Using a unique algorithm, the researchers were able to apply their techniques to the NASA data to detect the 47 previously undiscovered Marsquakes.

The study authors say while the quakes would have caused some shaking on Mars, the seismic events were relatively small in magnitude and would barely be felt if they had occurred on Earth. The quakes were detected over a period of about 350 sols, a term used to refer to one solar day on Mars, which is equivalent to about 359 days on Earth.

According to Tkalcic, the Marsquake findings could help scientists figure out why the Red Planet no longer has a magnetic field.

"The Marsquakes indirectly help us understand whether convection is occurring inside of the planet's interior, and if this convection is happening, which it looks like it is based off our findings, then there must be another mechanism at play that is preventing a magnetic field from developing on Mars," he said.

"Understanding Mars' magnetic field is crucial for future missions and also if scientists one day hope to establish human life on Mars."
Mumbai, April 4 : Actor Tahir Raj Bhasin is currently shooting a big 'secret project' for which he is filming in Gujarat for the first time in his career.

Tahir says, "It's fascinating to be shooting in Gujarat for the first time for a secret project that I'm currently filming. I have always loved the fact that as an actor I get to travel the world and experience different cultures. So, I just shot at the salt beds at Kutch and now, I will be shooting across Gujarat in cities like Gondal and Rajkot." He says after a hat-trick of hits, producers now want to scale up his projects. He says, "I'm fortunate that after a hat-trick of hits, producers want to mount my projects at a certain scale now and this one's definitely one of those projects that put me front and centre to deliver a solid performance. I like such challenges." Tahir chooses to not disclose much about this project.

He reveals saying, "I play a very different kind of lead in this one but I can't say anything more because the project will be announced soon. As I explore genres and characters, I want to be as diverse as possible and this one's straight up my alley."
New Delhi, April 4 : After opposing the CrPC amendment bill in the Lok Sabha saying that it violates Article 21 and is "beyond the legislative competence of the government", the Congress on Monday demanded to send it to the Standing Committee for further deliberations.

The bill is slated to pass in the Lower House. The meeting of the parliamentary strategy group was chaired by Congress chief Sonia Gandhi.

Earlier, addressing the issue of the violation of Article 21, Congress MP Manish Tewari, said: "The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill 2022, which is a derogation of Article 20 sub Article 3 and Article 21 of the Indian Constitution, highlighted that the bill is beyond the legislative competence of the House and against the fundamental rights of our citizens." He said that an accused cannot be made a witness against himself in the light of the Supreme Court's judgements.

However, the government rejected the objections and the bill was introduced after division of votes in which the opposition was defeated.

Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Ajay Mishra Teni said that the law was made in 1920 and is 102 years old and in the interest of the law enforcing agency, it needs to be amended.
Patna, April 4 : Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Monday categorically denied that he is going to the Rajya Sabha.

While casting his vote for the MLCs election in Patna, Kumar said that he was shocked to read news articles about it.

"They are used to publishing such reports. I am not paying attention to it," he said.

Recently, during an unofficial discussion with a few journalists here, Kumar had expressed his desire of going to the Upper House. In his long political career, he said he has worked in the capacity of a MLA, MLC, MP in the Lok Sabha, cabinet and state minister in the central government and chief minister in Bihar but never served as a Rajya Sabha MP. He denied the statement the next day.

Denying any such plan, one of his cabinet ministers Ashok Chaudhary said that Kumar has no plans of going to the Rajya Sabha. He is the chief minister of Bihar and will complete his five-year tenure.

The state BJP leaders, however, claim that Kumar will go to Delhi and hand over the charge of chief minister to the BJP.

Nitish Kumar expressed confidence that the NDA candidates will bag all 24 seats in the MLC election besides winning the Bochahan bypoll.
Los Angeles, April 4 : Bengaluru-based music composer and environmentalist Ricky Kej won his second Grammy for his New Age album 'Divine Tides' along with Stewart Copeland, founder and drummer of the legendary rock band, The Police.

The qualified dentist-turned-composer, who has also done ad jingles and written the scores of many Kannada films, greeted the audience with a namaste as he stepped on to the stage at the MGM Grand Marquee Ballroom, venue of the 64th Grammy Awards in Las Vegas.

He won his first Grammy in 2015 for his album, 'Winds of Samsara', when none other than the celebrated Hollywood composer Hans Zimmer congratulated him.

Taking to Twitter, Kej wrote ecstatically after the Grammy Awards: "Filled with gratitude and love this living legend standing with me - @copelandmusic. My 2nd Grammy and Stewart's 6th. Thank you to everyone who ever collaborated, hired, or listened to my music. I exist because of you." Accompanying the tweet was a picture of Kej with Copeland.

Born in North Carolina in 1981, Kej, according to his biography, is half-Punjabi, half-Marwari, and has lived in Bengaluru since he was 8. He studied at Bishop Cotton School in Bengaluru before finishing college with a degree in dentistry.

But music was his first love and he started off as a keyboardist with the progressive rock band Angel Dust before becoming a full-time composer of jingles and advocate of green causes.

Latest updates on Grammys 2022
Bengaluru, April 4 : Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai has fixed a two-day New Delhi visit to meet top brass of the party and the union government seeking clearance for the ambitious Mekedatu balancing reservoir project.

CM Bommai's office confirmed that on Tuesday, he would leave for New Delhi for a two-day trip. An appointment has been fixed with Union Jal Shakti Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat to discuss the issue of clearance to the pending Mekedatu project, which is crucial in the wake of upcoming Assembly elections in the state in 2023.

Minister for Water Resources Govind M. Karjol would also accompany CM Bommai to New Delhi. CM Bommai would also hold meetings and discuss other important irrigation projects of the state, including Mahadayi and Upper Krishna project.

CM Bommai's meeting has assumed importance after Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin had recently met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and demanded that neighbouring Karnataka should not be allowed to take up the Mekedatu project.

Opposition Congress has carried out a massive padayatra on the implementation of Mekedatu project by the ruling BJP government. If the ruling BJP fails to commence the work, it will have major consequences on the elections and opposition Congress will gain an upper hand as it is vouching for the implementation.

Considering the seriousness of the issue, Bommai is also likely to meet party President J.P. Nadda and Union Home Minister Amit Shah. CM Bommai is conducting a series of meetings on Monday with the officers of water boards and gathering information on irrigation projects and especially the Mekedatu project.
Kolkata, April 4 : Veteran Bollywood actor Naseeruddin Shah come out in support for his niece Saira Shah Halim, who is the CPI(M) candidate bypolls for West Bengal's Ballygunge Assembly constituency slated to take place on April 12.

Saira Shah Halim is going up against Trinamool Congress' Babul Supriyo.

In a video message on Monday, the actor said: "I am not a member of any political party. I am seeking votes individually. Whether you will elect any person who shifts political ideology frequently or any person who stands by the people? So in the Ballygunge by-polls I am seeking support for Saira Shah Halim.

"I have known her since her childhood. However, keeping aside my family relationship, I have always considered her as an honest and sensible person. She and husband are running a hospital for the sake of common people. They have compassionate minds." Without directly naming him, the legendary actor also ridiculed the Trinamool Congress candidate.

"Would you like your representative to be a caring, compassionate, and committed person who will work for you, or would you prefer a turncoat opportunist who is also a serial hate-monger?" Saira Shah Halim's husband is senior CPI(M) leader, Fuad Halim, whose father is the late Hasim Abdul Halim, former Speaker of the West Bengal Assembly from 1982 to 2011.

By-elections for the Ballygunge Assembly constituency was necessitated because of the sudden demise of Trinamool Congress legislator Subrata Mukherjee on November 4, 2021.

The BJP has fielded former journalist Keya Ghosh.

Recently, Naseeruddin Shah's wife, Ratna Pathak Shah, also a veteran Bollywood actress, had released a similar video message seeking support for Saira Shah Halim.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
KHARTOUM, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Chairman of Sudan's Transitional Sovereign Council Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan on Sunday called on the UN Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan (UNITAMS) to keep the same distance from all parties amid the ongoing political crisis in the country.

His remarks came during a meeting with the head of UNITAMS Volker Perthes in the capital Khartoum, where Al-Burhan questioned the scope of a recent UNITAMS briefing on Sudan to the UN Security Council (UNSC), according to a statement by the sovereign council.

"The briefing did not cover all situations in the country and not include the positive indicators that occurred on the ground," Al-Burhan was quoted as saying.

Perthes, for his part, said his briefing was based on the information and reports prepared by his office in Khartoum, according to the statement.

The UN envoy, however, voiced readiness to review any inaccurate information contained in the report submitted to the UNSC.

The meeting came a day after Al-Burhan warned that if the UN mission goes beyond its mandate or interferes in Sudan's internal affairs, Perthes could be expelled.

In last week's briefing to the UNSC, Perthes cautioned that the deteriorating economic, humanitarian and security situations in Sudan were due to the absence of "a functioning government" since October 2021 and the "violent repression" against the protesters demanding civilian rule.

On Jan. 10, the UNITAMS launched an intra-Sudanese political process to end the country's political crisis. Perthes has since been in consultations with Sudanese political parties and civil forces in the country.

Recently, the African Union joined the UN efforts seeking to reach a political settlement in Sudan.

Sudan has been suffering a political crisis after Al-Burhan, general commander of the Sudanese Armed Forces, declared a state of emergency on Oct. 25, 2021 and dissolved the Sovereign Council and the government.

Since then, Khartoum and other cities have been witnessing continued protests demanding a return to civilian rule. 
New Delhi, April 4 : During FY 2019-20, a total of Rs 921.95 crore was donated by all the corporate/business houses to the five national parties, constituting 91 per cent of the total contribution to political parties from known sources. The maximum donation was to the BJP.

According to an analysis by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), an advocacy body for bringing in transparency in electoral politics, these donations have increased by 143 per cent from the period between 2004-12 to 2019-20.

The analysis was made on the basis of details submitted to the Electiom Commission of India by the parties of the donors who have made donations above Rs 20,000 in a financial year.

The report this time considered the BJP, the Indian National Congress (INC), the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) and the All India Trinamool Congress only but not the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) as Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) did not consider it for analysis in this report as the party declared that it received no voluntary contributions above Rs 20,000 from any donor during this period or the time since 2004.

Out of the five national parties, BJP received the maximum donations of Rs 720.407 crore from 2,025 corporate donors followed by INC which received a total contribution of Rs 133.04 crore from 154 corporate donors, and NCP with Rs 57.086 crore from 36 corporate donors, the ADR said.

During FY 2019-20, the voluntary contributions above Rs 20,000 from corporate/business houses of INC, NCP and BJP formed 96 per cent, 95 per cent and 92 per cent, respectively. CPI declared no income from corporate donations for FY 2019-20.

These national parties have received the maximum corporate donations of Rs 921.95 crore in the FY 2019-20 (during which the 17th Lok Sabha elections were held); followed by Rs 881.26 crore in the FY 2018-19 and Rs 573.18 crore in the FY 2014-15 (during which the 16th Lok Sabha elections were held).

Corporate donations received in FY 2019-20 constituted 24.62 per cent of the total corporate donations received between FY 2012-13 and 2019-20. However, between FY 2012-13 and 2019-20, donations by corporates to national parties increased by 1,024 per cent, with a drop in the percentage of corporate donations in FY 2015-16.

Among the top corporate donors was Prudent Electoral Trust. It donated to two national parties, the BJP and INC, 38 times each, a total of Rs 247.75 crore, of which Rs 216.75 crore went to the BJP in the FY 2019-20.

B.G. Shirke Construction Technology Pvt. Ltd. was the top donor to NCP in FY 2019-20.

The contributions from corporate/business houses have been divided into 15 sectors/categories by ADR and do not form a part of the submission by the parties to ECI. The sectors include trusts and group of companies, manufacturing, power and oil, mining, construction, exports/imports, and real estate, among others.

During FY 2019-20, the BJP, INC, AITC and NCP received the maximum contributions from electoral trusts; the BJP received the highest, Rs 323.32 crore, followed by INC with Rs 71.00 crore, AITC with Rs 2.00 crore and NCP with Rs 1.50 crore, the ADR report said.

A total of 309 donations through which national parties received Rs 10.555 crore, do not have address details in the contribution form; Rs 13.91 crore was received from 144 donations, which do not have PAN details included in the contribution form while Rs 16.19 crore of the Rs 16.215 crore or 99.85 per cent of such donations were without PAN and address details belonged to the BJP.

Among the recommendations was that incomplete contributions' reports must be returned to the parties by the ECI, to deter them from providing incomplete information as this report found out that a total of Rs 16.215 crore was collected by the national parties from 310 corporate donors without obtaining their PAN and address details.

The ADR had brought out similar reports earlier wherein, January 2014 report specified that various sectors of business houses in eight years, between FY 2004-05 and 2011-12, donated a total of Rs 378.89 crore to national parties, constituting 87 per cent of the total contribution from known sources of political parties.

The August 2017 report specified that various sectors of business houses in four years, between FY 2012-13 and 2015-16, donated a total of Rs 956.77 crore to national parties, constituting 89 per cent of the total contribution from known sources of political parties.

ADR's July 2019 report showed that between FY 2016-17 and 2017-18, the various sectors of business houses donated a total of Rs 985.18 crore, constituting 93 per cent of the total contribution to political parties from known sources while the November 2020 report said, the donations from corporate to national parties during FY 2018-19, stood at a total of Rs 881.26 crore (93 per cent).
Chennai, April 4 : The 'Kaaval Uthavi' app of the Tamil Nadu police launched by Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on Wednesday will provide assistance in 60 areas to the general public.

A statement from the Tamil Nadu police said that the app has been launched with 60 features to enable public, especially women, to seek public assistance.

The app contains an emergency help and a dial facility (Dial- 112/100/101) and the Dial- 100 facilities has been integrated with the app.

It also has the facility for filing mobile based complaint and location sharing facility.

Police statement said that the app can be downloaded free of cost from the Google play store.

The other features that are in the app include a Police station locator, Control Room Directory, Cyber Financial Related Complaints, Other emergency helplines, Vehicle Verification, e-payment of fines for traffic violations, Lost Document Report, TN Police Citizen App, 112- India App and other related features.
New Delhi/San Francisco, April 4 : Twitter shares surged nearly 28 per cent on Monday after regulatory filings in the US revealed that Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has a 9.2 per cent passive stake in Parag Agrawal-run platform.

According to a regulatory filing in the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in the US, the world's richest man, with over 80 million followers on Twitter, bought nearly 73.5 million shares in the micro-blogging platform.

Last month, Musk said he is considering building a new social media platform.

"Am giving serious thought to this," he wrote on the micro-blogging site in a reply to a user.

Musk has been a vocal critic of social media platforms, including Twitter. In a Twitter poll, Musk had asked: "do you believe Twitter rigorously adheres to this principle?" and at least "70 per cent" of respondents said "no".

"Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy. What should be done?" Musk wrote in a response to the poll result. He also asked users "is a new platform needed?" Musk's legal skirmish with the US SEC also continues. Musk is currently looking to throw out his 2018 agreement with the SEC, which requires him to get pre-approval for tweets that are of material importance to Tesla.
Mumbai, April 4 : In a shocker, a sociology textbook for nurses has claimed that the oft-reviled system of dowry is actually good for society and even helps parents of "ugly looking girls" to get them married off.

The "gems" of social wisdom are available in "Textbook of Sociology for Nurses", penned by senior author T.K. Indrani, and published by the New Delhi-based Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishers Pvt. Ltd.

Following a furore in Maharashtra academic circles, the publishers informed IANS that they will delete the offensive sections in their future editions of the same textbook.

The idea of dowry, termed as preposterous by many, figures in Chapter 6, Pg. 122, contending the main cause of accepting dowry by the groom's parents is that they have to, in turn, give dowry to their outgoing daughters and sisters.

"Naturally, they look to the (incoming) dowry of their sons to meet their obligations in finding husbands for their daughters," the book seeks to justify.

Contacted for comments, Samina Khan, a spokesperson for the publication house, said that the textbook author will not be revising the title.

"Whenever we go in for revised editions, this portion will be removed from the text," the company told IANS in an email.

Aghast at the developments, retired Mumbai college Prof. Mangal Gogte said the publishers must forthwith withdraw all the copies of the book from the market, remove the chapter giving offence, and then, only be allowed to be available for use.

"How can such trash be permitted by education bodies or the universities, what impression does it create on the young minds and the future generations...The book must be right away yanked off, make the changes before allowing it in the nursing colleges," Gogte urged.

Retired city junior college lecturer R.N. Desai wondered "who are the persons who cleared such nonsense for the students and how it was allowed to reach the students".

"Is there any official scrutiny, quality checks or academic committee under the state or central Education Ministry which whets such material before it cleared for academic purposes? Ideally, all the copies of the textbook must be taken out of the market... The poison must be removed as soon as possible," Desai demanded.

The chapter refers to how young boys earning high salaries or promising professional careers become "scarce commodities" and hence, their parents demand huge amounts of money from the girl's parents to accept her as their daughter-in-law.

The author lists several "merits and advantages of the dowry system", that is officially frowned on, while giving/accepting dowry is banned under the Indian laws.

Dowry helps (the young couple) in establishing their new household as the custom of giving things like cots, mattresses, television, fan, refrigerator, utensils, clothes and even vehicles are given by the girl to her husband in many parts of India, it said.

In the form of dowry, the girl automatically receives her share in the parental property at the time of her marriage, is another contention.

The dowry system helps spread education among girls as due to the burden of dowry, many people have started educating their girls, it also said.

"When the girls are educated or even employed, the demand of dowry will be less. Thus, it is an indirect advantage," says the textbook.

Finally, it claims that "ugly-looking girls can be married off with attractive dowry with well or ugly-looking boys".

Incidentally, around 6 years ago, similar claims on the "goodness of dowry", featuring in HSC textbooks of Maharashtra, had created a huge row.

The latest contentions on dowry have been slammed on social media groups with demands to take action against the author/publishers of using textbooks to spread utter misinformation about a 'societal evil'.

(Quaid Najmi can be contacted at q.najmi@ians.in)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Bengaluru, April 4 : The situation is turning more serious in Karnataka with Hindu organisations planning to broadcast Hindu prayers at the time of azaan in mosques.

Hindu activist Bharath Shetty stated on Monday that the campaign would start in Anjaneya temple of Yelahanka in Bengaluru at 5 a.m., during the time of azaan. The campaign is planned throughout the state, he said.

This being a sensitive issue, more so as Ramzan has just begun, the police is making elaborate security arrangements.

The Hindu organisations are planning to broadcast "Om Namah Shivay", "Jai Shri Ram" slogans and other devotional prayers exactly at the time of azaan in mosques.

The Shri Ram Sena has stated that it had submitted a request to the auhorities for stopping the use of loudspeakers at 5 a.m. The tehsildar and the Pollution Control Board did not take any action on it.

"We will submit a complaint to the District Commissioners as a last resort. The government should ask the Muslim community to follow the guidelines of the Supreme Court. We do not oppose their prayers. But, we oppose the use of loudspeakers because of which lakhs of people are put to inconvenience," Shri Ran Sena founder Pramod Muthalik stated.

Every day at 5 a.m., there will be Ram Bhajans and prayers to Lord Shiva played in temples, he stated.
Bhopal, April 4 : Senior BJP leader Uma Bharti on Monday said that Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, with whom she shared a cordial relationship, has stopped interacting with her directly and replies to her through the media.

She was referring to Chouhan's recent statement that he will close down liquor shops if people stop drinking.

"I have shared a relationship of respect and affection with respected elder brother Shivraj Singh Chouhan ji from 1984 to March 2022. While going to the office or even if I was on a visit to the Himalayas or if he remembered any of my religious songs, Shivraj ji would meet or telephone me. During the past two years, during every meeting, I have discussed liquor prohibition with him. But now that the matter has come out in public, why has my brother stopped talking to me? Why is he speaking through the media?" Bharti tweeted.

The former chief minister has again made a string of suggestions to stop the illegal sale of liquor which includes serving liquor in open spaces adjacent to liquor shops and not opening liquor shops where locals, especially women, oppose them as they are the ones who have voted the BJP to power in the state.

Replying to Chouhan's statement that "If people stop drinking, I will close down liquor shops," Bharti said that stopping the illegal sale of liquor is the responsibility of the police and the administration and an issue of law and order.

Taking a jibe at her, senior Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Digvijaya Singh said: "Very basic differences regarding liquor ban between Uma ji and mamu ji (referring to Shivraj) have come to the fore. BJP central and state leaders should make the policy on the issue clear." Uma Bharti has been advocating for total prohibition in the state for more than a year now. She has repeatedly announced dates for her ground campaign on the issue and then deferred it, saying that both CM Chouhan and state BJP president Vishnu Dutt Sharma were sensitive leaders and agreed with her on the issue.

Uma Bharti posted a series of tweets on April 1, saying that she was ashamed that the state government was earning revenue by playing with the lives and honour of the sons and daughters of the state.
Srinagar, April 4 : One of the two CRPF troopers injured in a militant attack in Srinagar city on Monday has succumbed to critical injuries, officials said.

The two troopers were injured when militants fired at them from close range in Maisuma locality of uptown Srinagar.

Doctors at the S.M.H.S hospital said one of the troopers admitted for treatment with critical injuries has succumbed.

Meanwhile, officials said that the area of the attack was cordoned off for searches.

Militants also fired at and injured two non-local labourers in Lajurah village of Pulwama district on Monday. Searches to nab the assailants have been started there as well.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Amaravati, April 4 : Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy will leave for Delhi on Tuesday to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The Chief Minister is likely to discuss various state-related issues with the Prime Minister.

Release of funds for Polavaram project and the pending installments of the Central assistance for development of backward areas and other issues in Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act are likely to come up during the meeting.

Jagan Mohan Reddy is also likely to brief the Prime Minister on creation of 13 new districts to double the number of districts to 26.

The districts were inaugurated by the Chief Minister on Monday and claimed that the move is aimed at decentralising the governance and bringing administration closer to the people.

Jagan Mohan Reddy is also likely to meet Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
Kolkata, April 4 : The Calcutta High Court on Monday ordered a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe in the murder of the Congress councillor from Jhalda Municipality in Purulia district.

A division bench, headed by Justice Rajasekhar Mantha, passed this order on the prayer of Tapan Kandu's widow, Purnima Kandu, who had been insisting on a CBI enquiry. She had also been alleging that the special investigation team (SIT) of the state police, which had been investigating the case, was trying to shield inspector-in-charge of Jhalda Police station, Sanjib Ghosh.

She also alleged that Ghosh had been putting pressure on her husband for a long time to join the ruling Trinamool Congress.

On the evening of March 13, Kandu and his wife were walking near their residence when three motorcycle-borne youth came and shot him from an extremely close range.

Justice Mantha also directed the SIT to immediately hand over the case-related papers to the CBI, which has been asked to submit a preliminary investigation report within the next 45 days.

The SIT has already arrested four persons in connection with the murder, including Kandu's brother Naren Kandu and the latter's son, Deepak Kandu.

The Calcutta High Court's order on Monday comes as a major embarrassment for the state administration and more specially the Purulia district police. Only on Sunday afternoon, Purulia Superintendent of Police, S. Selvamurugan told media persons that a family feud was the reason behind the killing.

According to him, the two brothers had a bitter relation for quite some time and Naren Kandu was planning the murder of his brother for the last few years.

He also said that an amount of Rs 7,00,000 was fixed for plotting and implementing the murder of Kandu. Selvamurugan also gave a clean chit to Inspector Ghosh.

Immediately after the verdict, Purnima Kandu told media persons she would like to thank the Calcutta High Court for accepting her plea for CBI enquiry. "I want the enquiry to be conducted now and let the real offenders receive harshest punishment," she said.

The opposition parties in the state have welcomed the verdict.

Congress's Purulia district President, Nepal Mahato said that since the beginning there was attempt by the district police authorities to shield the local inspector. "However, we are hopeful that real conspiracy will be unearthed now," he said.

CPI-M Rajya Sabha member and the former mayor of Kolkata Municipal Corporation, Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya said that since the beginning, the SIT was trying to give the colour of family feud. "However, we are happy that CBI will probe the matter now," he said.

BJP state President Sukanta Majumdar said: "Since the beginning, we had been questioning the role of the inspector-in-charge of Jhalda Police station, Sanjib Ghosh in the case. Now the court order has justified that suspicion," he said.

Contacted by IANS, senior Trinamool MP Saugata Roy refused to comment on the matter, saying that he does not have detailed knowledge about the verdict.
Islamabad, April 4 : The core committee of PTI has proposed the name of former Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed as the caretaker Prime Minister of Pakistan, ex-information and law minister Fawad Chaudhry said on Monday, Geo News reported.

The proposal of Gulzar -- who laid down his robes on February 1, 2022 -- came after President Arif Alvi sent letters to Prime Minister Imran Khan and Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif to seek suggestions for the appointment of a caretaker Prime Minister.

In case the two politicians can't reach a consensus over one name within three days, each one of them will send two names to the parliamentarian committee responsible for appointing a caretaker Prime Minister.

The eight-member parliamentary committee, comprising National Assembly and Senate members, with equal representation from the government and Opposition, will be formed by the NA speaker.

PTI Chairman Imran Khan will continue as the Prime Minister despite being de-notified as the premier till the appointment of a caretaker PM, the President's Secretariat said in a release issued after Sunday midnight.

"Imran Khan shall continue as Prime Minister till the appointment of caretaker Prime Minister under Article 224 A (4) of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan," it said.

Khan was de-notified as the Prime Minister of Pakistan on Sunday after the dissolution of the National Assembly.
Afghan security force members search a house in Jalalabad, capital of Nangarhar province, Afghanistan, April 3, 2022. The Afghan security forces have launched a clearance operation in Jalalabad city, capital of Nangarhar province, and the surrounding districts as the latest preventive measures to ensure a high level of security, the local government said Monday. (Photo by Hamidullah/Xinhua)

JALALABAD, Afghanistan, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The Afghan security forces have launched a clearance operation in Jalalabad city, capital of eastern Nangarhar province, and the surrounding districts as the latest preventive measures to ensure a high level of security, the local government said Monday.

The clearance operation was launched Sunday by the security forces of the ministries of interior and defense as well as the national intelligence agency, the government said in a statement.

The operation aimed at arresting and eliminating the thieves, kidnappers and other culprits who had already been listed by the security forces, the statement said.

"During the operation, civilians and private properties would be safe and all cautionary measures had been put in place. Nangarhar residents should not worry about this operation," the statement said.

Dozens of policewomen also take part in the house to house search which is part of the operation, the statement said.

On Sunday, a hostage was freed in Jalalabad. Weapons and ammunition as well as several state-owned vehicles were also found and seized as a result of the ongoing operation, the statement added.

The statement called on citizens to help the security forces during the operation. 
Moscow, April 4 : Ukrainian allegations that Russian troops were involved in war crimes in the city of Bucha near Kiev are not true, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday.

The claims need to be properly investigated and not taken at face value by foreign leaders, he suggested, RT reported.

Information provided by the Ukrainian side "should be subject to serious skepticism", the official said of the allegations levelled by Kiev.

He claimed that Russian military specialists found evidence of video manipulation and other forms of fabrication coming from Bucha.

"The facts and the timeline likewise speak against the veracity of the claims," he added.

Bucha, a small city northwest of Ukraine, had been under the control of Russian troops since late February, when Moscow launched its military campaign against its neighbour. The Russian forces withdrew last week, after progress was made in Russia-Ukraine peace talks.

Days later, Ukrainian officials claimed that Russian troops were guilty of war crimes allegedly committed against civilians living in Bucha.

They claimed some non-combatants were summarily executed before the withdrawal and otherwise deliberately targeted by Russian soldiers in what Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba described as "genocide."

Latest updates on Russia-Ukraine War
Chandigarh, April 4 : Punjab Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema on Monday announced formation of a task force to work out a comprehensive plan, within three months, to increase the income of sugarcane farmers.

Representatives of the Punjab Agricultural University in Ludhiana, the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, the Sugarcane Breeding Institute in Coimbatore, Punjab Sugarfed and other experts will be included in the task force for increasing per acre yield of sugarcane for further boosting farmers' income, he said.

Cheema said the target to increase the sugarcane yield by at least 100 quintals per acre in the next two years has been set, which would further increase the income per acre around Rs 36,000.

Under this scheme, seed of high-breed varieties to be provided, besides imparting the farmers knowledge on modern techniques in sugarcane cultivation and training on mechanisation, an official statement said.

Cheema said the government would draft a plan to modernise the cooperative sugar mills to make them self-reliant for improving performance. A committee will be set-up for this.
New Delhi, April 4 : The Delhi High Court on Monday stayed the summons and other proceedings issued by a lower court against Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy in a defamation case filed by his fellow party man and BJP spokesperson for Delhi Tajinder Pal Singh Bagga.

Issuing notice in the plea, Justice Jasmeet Singh slated it for further hearing on September 6.

As per Bagga, Swamy had allegedly posted a defamatory tweet against him.

Earlier while issuing the summoning order, Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Dharmender Singh had noted that "This court is of the considered view that in the present case there are sufficient grounds for proceedings against the respondent." Challenging the order, Swamy had then moved the High Court.

There was a Twitter war going on between BJP leaders Swamy and Bagga with allegations and counter-allegations flying thick and fast against each other.

Supporters of both the leaders are also eliciting support for their respective leaders and making all kinds of comments on social media.

Subramanian Swamy had tweeted targeting Tajinder Bagga, saying, "Journalists from Delhi told me that before joining BJP, Tajinder Bagga was jailed several times by Mandir Marg police station in New Delhi for petty offences." He also asked a question to the BJP's national president J.P. Nadda in the same tweet, saying that if this is true, then Nadda should know this.

Infuriated by Swamy's direct attack, Bagga hit back at Swamy saying, "Heard you are James Bond's uncle. Instead of tweeting, call Mandir Marg SHO and expose me to details. I'll give you 48 hours after that it's my turn. Your time starts now."
Colombo, April 4 : Sri Lanka President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's attempt to form an all-party cabinet with opposition in place of the one that resigned on Sunday night amidst mounting streets protests, has failed with opposition parties refusing to join.

The two main opposition parties - the United People's Front (UPF) with 54 MPs and the Tamil National Alliance, with 14 MPs representing Northern and Eastern Tamils who have close ties with India, have turned down the President's invitation to join the Cabinet.

TNA MP M.A. Sumanthiran told IANS that President Rajapaksa must listen to the people and leave his post. "People are demanding him to leave not to form a cabinet with the opposition parties," he said.

"He must listen to the people and leave," he added.

The majority opposition party UPF, led by Sajith Premada, too has refused the President's invitation.

"We are not prepared to accept any post in a government which includes the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna, the party lead by Gotabaya Rajapaksa." party's General Secretary Ranjith Madduma Bandara said.

Facing public protests over economic crisis, the members of the cabinet resigned on Sunday night. The President's elder brother and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, however, remained.

On Monday morning, President Rajapaksa invited all political parties including the opposition to accept ministerial posts and to help to resolve the current crisis in the country.

However, on Monday, the President named four Ministers with three reappointments and replacing former Justice Minister Ali Sabry in the post of Finance Minister vacated by his younger brother Basil Rajapaksa.

Amidst mounting public protest against the Rajapaksa family, four other prominent Rajapaksa family members who held cabinet posts have decided not to take up ministerial posts. They included President's younger brother Basil, Elder brother Chamal and his son Shasheendra and Namal Rajapaksa, the son of Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Started from Thursday night when violent protesters blocked the President's house in Colombo suburbs, people have taken to street demanding the President quit.

President Rajapaska imposed rigid emergency law and curfew and blocked all social media platforms to thwart island wide protest on Sunday organised over social media. In defiance of curfew people protested on streets chanting "Gota go home".

From Monday morning, people have been protesting in capital Colombo and around the country and had surrounded the houses of government MPs. They demand Rajapaksas to step down and hand over the government.
New Delhi, April 4 : Attorney General K.K. Venugopal on Monday told the Supreme Court that "tremendous amount of work" has been done by the Central government on creating awareness on fundamental duties to sensitise citizens and students.

The AG submitted before a bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and M M Sundresh that the curriculum of schools contains the entire Article 51A with duties, which are taught to them, and debates have been held throughout the country.

Responding to the PIL filed by advocate Durga Dutt, he contended that the PIL for enacting a law to enforce fundamental duties is not maintainable at all. "I have an objection to this petition. Tremendous amount of work has been done for the purpose of sensitising people," he said.

The bench also noted: "We were also circumspect in issuing the notice and we said that it falls within the domain of political dispensation." Venugopal also added that the President, the Prime Minister, from time to time has addressed this aspect and a one-year awareness drive was also launched.

He said the website of the Ministry of Justice has sufficient content in connection with the matter. The bench added that it wanted to understand the limited point whether any steps have been taken pursuant to the judgment in Ranganath Mishra case (2003).

Venugopal urged the bench to ask the Central government to file an affidavit as he is appearing as the AG in the matter. A counsel separately representing the Central government sought time from the top court to file response in the matter within four weeks.

The top court has scheduled the matter for further hearing in July.

On February 21, the Supreme Court had sought the response from the Centre and state governments on a PIL seeking enforcement of fundamental duties set out in Article 51A of the Constitution.

The plea said: "The Fundamental Duties are an important tool to protect the unity and integrity of several institutions including the judiciary." It contended that every citizen must learn how to respect the institutions of the country and added there have been cases where fundamental duties have been brazenly flouted by the people including the officers of the law.

The plea argued that the need to enforce fundamental duty arises due to a new illegal trend of protest by the protestors in the garb of freedom of speech and expression, by way of blocking of road and rail routes, in order to compel the government to meet their demands.
Kolkata, April 4 : The ruling BJP is resorting to various conspiracies to divert attention from the economic crisis in the country, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said on Monday.

"The price of petrol and diesel have been hiked 11 times during the last 13 days. There has been an exorbitant hike in the price of cooking gas as well. The country is going through an acute economic crisis. The government should hold meetings with all political parties in the country and discuss it. But the ruling party of the country is resorting to conspiracies to divert public attention from this economic crisis," she told media persons here.

Banerjee also said that several fake developments are made viral in the country to instigate people. "Often people are reacting to that without checking the authenticity. There are attempts to malign my image. But I know how to counter that," she said.

She also said that the Union government is silent about the academic future of the Indian students who have returned from Ukraine. "The Union government should take the responsibility so that the students from Ukraine can complete their studies in the country. I have already written to the Union government on this count. However, I am yet to get a reply. But I have decided that the state government should arrange for the same for the students from West Bengal who have returned from Ukraine." On the latest incident about the viral video that showed Giasuddin Mondal, an expelled student of Aliah University and having links with her Trinamool Congress, heckling and abusing the Vice Chancellor, the Chief Minister said that the police has taken prompt action by arresting the offender.

"The students can have some grievances. One of them resorted to abuse for which he has been arrested," she said.

Meanwhile, Vice Chancellor, Mohammad Ali, said after this grave insult, he is no more willing to continue in Aliah University. "I wish to go back to Jadavpur University and I have also written to JU authorities on this count," he said.
New Delhi, April 4: Himachal Pradesh's clear headed plan on industrialisation is set to give the BJP a headstart in the assembly elections slated later this year.

The surge in job generating factories is powering the hill state's increasingly diversifying economy, which was once overwhelmingly dependent on tourism and apples.

Strategic investments in recent years have laid the foundations of deep industrialisation.

For instance, the second ground breaking ceremony for new investments worth Rs 28,197 crores was performed in Mandi in December 2021. And another Rs 2,989 cr investment proposals were cleared last month by a high-level Single window project clearance authority. Besides, the stars are shining bright for a Rs 10,000 cr Bulk Drug Park - one of three proposed by the Government of India (GoI) for the states.

These are just a few examples to indicate how Himachal Pradesh - a small northern hill state, earlier dependent on tourism and horticulture, has broken new ground to spur a silent industrial revolution.

Take the state's Baddi-Brotiwala industrial belt. Bordering Punjab, it is already known as Asia's biggest pharmaceutical hub manufacturing and exporting all kinds of emergency, life-saving drugs and vaccines including Covid-19 Sputnik V vaccine.

Kandrori, a key industrial area, bordering Pathankot (Punjab) was declared as the next pharmaceutical hub, based on the perception that the Baddi-Barotiwala-Nalagarh area has reached a saturation point. The new pharmaceutical fulcrum will have an advantage of good connectivity by road, rail and air. Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur was in Kangra when a MoU was signed by the government with Mefro Organic Limited for an investment of Rs 100 crore to set up a nutraceutical unit at Kandror. Earlier, a MoU was also signed for setting up the Green Field Project of Nutraceuticals with an investment of Rs 70 crore in Kandror.

Beside Paonta Sahib and Kala Amb in Sirmaur is another Industrial belt --Parwanoo attracting expansions of existing units, apart from new investments.

The state's Industries minister Bikram Singh Thakur says the proposed bulk drug park for Una district will be another landmark .

"If approved by the centre since being a project of huge national importance, will itself generate employment for 15,000 people. The centre has offered a grant of Rs 1,000 cr for setting-up park to reduce country's dependence for foreign companies for Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) and other raw materials required by the pharmaceutical companies in India, also Baddi" says Thakur.

The centre has proposed to set-up three such parks and states were asked to submit their competitive bids. Himachal Pradesh has been lobbying hard to get the bulk drug park sanctioned.

Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur and Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Anurag Thakur together have met several union ministers including finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman and minister for chemicals Dr. Mansukh Mandaviya.

In September, the centre had also sanctioned a Rs 5,000 cr medical device park at Nalagarh, which again has helped in boosting the investment drive.

Rajendra Guleria, president of the Baddi-Brotiwala-Nalagarh Industrial Association, admits that Himachal Pradesh has several inherent advantages for the investors. The government, through its initiative on the Global Investors' meet held at Dharamsala in 2019, was able to create an investment climate in the state. The norms were also eased for new investors, apart from creating a land bank.

Though the Covid pandemic impacted the pace of investments, two ground-breaking ceremonies of MoUs signed during the meet (worth Rs 96,000 cr) have been held, one of these on December 27 at Mandi.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi was present at the event and also interacted with investors. He exhorted investors to come to Himachal Pradesh, which has a huge potential to change their fortunes and also help Himachal Pradesh in its development, prosperity and growth.

Director Industries Rakesh Prajapati said the "bulk of the investments, coming to Himachal Pradesh relate to manufacturing, which also include defence industry (to manufacture bullet proof jackets for the army), pharmaceutical formulations, food processing, textile engineering, tourism and hydro-power sector".

In all 287 MoUs were signed at Mandi's ground-breaking ceremony. M/s Nestle in the food sector and Vardhman in the textile group are major investors.

Most of the investments in Himachal Pradesh are in the districts of Solan, where Baddi-Brotiwala-Nalagarh remains a most favoured pharmaceutical belt, beside Una, Sirmaur and Kangra districts, mainly because of location advantage at places like Mehatpur, Amb, Tahliwal, Gagret, Nahan, Kala Amb and Paonta Sahib, apart from Nurpur and Sansarpur Terrace.

Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur says the "state has been rated best in ease of doing business. We tried to create an environment favourable to investors. The projects are cleared through a single window authority under the Chief Minister. Lot of new incentives were also rolled out for the industrial promoters during the past four years." The state has about a 24,000 MW harnessable power potential ,which was about 40 percent of the total potential of the country. Till date, only 10596 MW has been harnessed and the state government has set up a target of harnessing another 10,000 MW in the next ten years, he says.

The state has also written to the Direct Power Grid Corporation to prepare an effective plan for power evacuation from Chenab basin and from Spiti area.

But, Guleria also claims that section 118 of the HP Tenancy and Land Reforms Act still remains a hurdle in getting approvals for land transfers to set-up industrial units.

"We have submitted a representation to the Chief Minister of steps to at least make land transfers a time-bound exercise for the promoters who want to exit ,after running the industry for some years . Ease of doing business also should cover ease to exit and removing multi-layered clearances mechanism" he suggests.

Yet the advantages he claims also include low-cost quality power since Himachal Pradesh is a power surplus state, harmonious industrial relations, no law-and-order issues, clean environment, investor-friendly administration and attractive incentives.

The industrialists are asking the government to come out with a scheme to set up a new township in the industrial belt for the housing facilities. Most of the industrialists either live in Chandigarh or Panchkula as there is no facility. Their mobility to their industrial units remains a big issue, and the worst was during the Covid lockdown.

The opposition Congress contests the BJP government claims on investments.

"These are claims only on paper. Not a MoUs has been translated into action. Let the Chief Minister show a single industrial unit, which has come-up after global investors meet at Dharamsala or his road-show in several metropolitan cities. He even took officers on a foreign junket on pretext of wooing foreign investments. We will bring the real truth before the people before next elections" warns Leader of Opposition Mukesh Agnihotri.

There are also fears being expressed about states facing environmental pollution due to mindless industrialisation. "Some of the water sources at Baddi-Brotiwala and Nalagarh have turned toxic due to effluent discharge in the rivulets and local streams. Air pollution is a serious problem in towns of Paonta Sahib, Amb (Una) and Baddi" alleges Anoop Rattan, a Shimla-based senior lawyer.

(The content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com) --indianarrative
New Delhi, April 4 : Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday spoke with his Israeli counterpart Naftali Bennett over phone and discussed the recent geo-political developments, including the situation in Ukraine.

The Russia-Ukraine war has entered its 40th day. Explosions were heard on Monday in the cities of Kherson and Odesa, in the south, while air raid sirens sounded across the east.

Modi conveyed his best wishes to Bennett for early recovery after his Covid-19 diagnosis. The Prime Minister also expressed his condolences for the loss of lives in the recent terrorist attacks in Israel.

"The leaders had a detailed discussion on recent geo-political developments, including the situation in Ukraine. They also reviewed the ongoing bilateral cooperation initiatives," the Prime Minister's Office said.

Modi also conveyed his eagerness to welcome Bennett in India at an early date.

On the Russia-Ukraine war, India has called for "restraint on all sides" and said that all issues between both the countries can only be resolved through "diplomatic dialogue".

Earlier, Modi had spoken to both Russia President Valdamir Putin and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky in an attempt to resolve the issue through "dialogue".

Modi had also welcomed the ongoing negotiations between Russia and Ukraine and expressed hope that they would lead to a cessation of the conflict.

Similarly, Bennett plays a peacemaker's role in the war and has made numerous calls to both Putin and Zelensky in an attempt to assist the efforts to resolve the conflict,

Latest updates on Russia-Ukraine War
Mumbai, April 4 : Congress' Maharashtra President Nana Patole on Monday accused the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party of allegedly threatening voters with "Enforcement Directorate action" as it faces imminent defeat in the Kolhapur North seat assembly by-elections slated for April 12.

He also slammed state BJP President Chandrakant Patil for his statements that some voters were getting money of Rs 1,000 transferred into their account via some online platforms.

Warning the voters, Patil said that if they took the money, he would write to the ED to probe who has deposited amounts of Rs 1,000 into their bank accounts and initiate a probe into the matter.

Patole said: "Now, Patil is directly threatening voters out of sheer frustration at the BJP's defeat... Will the ED enquire into transactions of Rs 500-Rs 1,000? Will it be probed at the behest of the BJP?" Patil asked the voters not to invite ED action by getting lured with such money transferred to their accounts through an online platform since they know from where the money has come.

The BJP has already been targeting its political opponents using the central investigating agencies, and now it has gone to the level of threatening the ordinary voters and commoners with the name of ED, Patole claimed.

He again slammed the ED for functioning as if it was a branch of the BJP and termed Patil's threats as "arising out of sheer desperation at losing power in the state to Maha Vikas Aghadi in 2019".

Ruling ally and Nationalist Congress Party chief spokesperson Mahesh Tapase dismissed Patil's allegations as baseless and said he was talking such a language as the MVA candidate is romping towards victory in the bypolls.

The by-election - necessitated by the death of Congress legislator Chandrakant Jadhav in December 2021 - is contested by his widow and Congress candidate Jayashree Jadhav against BJP's Satyajit Kadam.

The MVA allies - Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress have targeted the BJP repeatedly for letting loose central probe agencies to scare and silence political opponents not only in Maharashtra but other non-BJP ruled states in the country.
New Delhi, April 4 : The Border Security Force (BSF) said on Monday that it has seized one Pakistani fishing boat from the Harami Nala area near Bhuj in Gujarat.

According to BSF officials, at around 8.20 pm on Sunday, force personnel noticed the movement of two Pakistani fishing boats and four to five Pakistani fishermen near border pillar No. 1160.

After seeing the BSF patrol party approaching them, the Pakistani fishermen took advantage of the marshy terrain and fled to the Pakistani territory. However, the BSF troopers chased them and seized one Pakistani fishing boat, approximately 100 metres inside the Indian territory.

"The seized boat was thoroughly searched but nothing suspicious was recovered from the boat except some fish, fishing nets and fishing equipment. Intensive search of the area is on," an official said.

Earlier on March 17, the BSF had seized two Pakistani boats in the Sir Creek area in Bhuj.

Similarly, on February 10, the BSF had seized at least 11 Pakistani fishing boats from the creek area of Harami Nala in Bhuj.
QUITO, April 3 (Xinhua) -- At least 12 inmates were killed and 10 others injured in a violent riot that occurred early Sunday morning in a prison in southern Ecuador, according to a preliminary report by prison authorities.

The riot took place in the city of Cuenca in a facility known as the Turi prison, one of the largest correctional complexes in the country.

In response to the riot, the government sent more than 800 members of the National Police and the Armed Forces to restore order.

Interior Minister Patricio Carrillo said at a press conference that so far, "12 victims have been identified."

"The motivation (of the riot) is because there is an organization that wants to have absolute power in the center and there are some cells that have rebelled against them," Carrillo said.

Authorities indicated that during the disturbances, 90 prisoners were evacuated, including 10 who had been injured.

"Unfortunately, prisons have for a long time become a permanent threat, but today the will exists and we are going to take the necessary actions," said Carrillo, adding that measures were being taken to prevent potential riots in other prisons in the country.

Violence has become more prevalent in Ecuador's prisons in recent years due to clashes between rival gangs fighting for control, with the deadliest riot occurring in September 2021 when 116 prisoners were killed and 80 others injured. 
Belagavi, : April 4 (IANS) The Karnataka Control of Organised Crimes Act (KCOCA) Special Court awarded life imprisonment to international gangster and fugitive underworld don Bannanje Raja known as the 'threat king' and 7 other accused on Monday in connection with the killing of BJP leader and industrialist of coastal Karnataka, R.N. Nayak. The accused were pronounced guilty earlier by the special court.

The court has also directed the authorities to pay Rs 30 lakh compensation to the wife of deceased industrialist Nayak. The court has asked the Superintendent of Police of Uttara Kannada district and the Police Commissioner of Mysuru City to ensure security to the woman and her son who gave evidence against the accused persons.

K.G. Puranikamatha, the Special Public Prosecutor, stated after the verdict that the accused should have been given the capital punishment and they would go for an appeal demanding the death penalty in the High Court.

Along with Bannanje Raja, the court has sentenced Jagadish Patel, the prime accused in the case from Uttar Pradesh, Abhi Bhandagar from Bengaluru, Ganesh Bhajanthri from Udupi, Mahesh Achangi from Hassan, M.B. Santhosh from Kerala, Jagadish Chandraraj from Bengaluru and Ankit Kumar Kashyap from Uttar Pradesh to life imprisonment.

The fifth accused in the case K.M. Ismail from Kerala has been sentenced to 13 years' imprisonment and the court has imposed a fine of Rs 15,000 on him.

Bannanje Raja is the 9th accused in the case. He was involved in several serious criminal cases in the coastal districts of Karnataka, Bengaluru and Maharashtra like murder, attempt to murder, kidnappings and extortion.

Special Court judge C.M. Joshi pronounced the order. The court had earlier acquitted the 6th accused Rabdin Pichai, 11th accused Mohammad Shabandri, a resident of Bengaluru and 16th accused Anand Ramesh Nayak from Uttara Kannada in the case.

The shootout occurred on December 21, 2013 in Ankola in Uttara Kannada district for refusing to shell out Rs 3 crore as protection money. The police had used the KCOCA Act against the accused persons and this was the first case registered under the KCOCA Act in the state.

Special Public Prosecutor S.B. Puranik Math and Additional Public Prosecutor Shivaprasad Alva had argued against the accused. Alva had stated that through the judgment the court has sent a message to the society. The police and prosecution have successfully pursued the legal action against the anti-social elements.

When asked whether he faced any threats since the case involved gangster Bannanje Raja, he stated that he has to deliver on the responsibilities placed on him by the government. This judgment shows that no one is above the law. The law takes its own course. If the police and prosecution pursue the case unitedly, legal action against any criminal is ensured, he said.

Bannanje Raja had made an extortion call and demanded Rs 3 crore protection money from the deceased Nayak. When he refused to pay, the accused had him killed despite police protection.

Furthermore, he had called up media houses from a foreign location and claimed that he had got Nayak killed, severely embarrassing the state and central investigation agencies.

Various judges had heard the case for over 7 years. More than 210 witnesses recorded their statements and the prosecutors had produced 1,000 pages of documentary proof.

The police had filed a charge sheet in 2013, with charges against 16 persons who were associates and sharp shooters of Bannanje Raja.

Rajendra Shetty a.k.a Bannanje Raja is involved in 44 serious criminal offences including murder, extortion and kidnapping. The authorities had got an Interpol red corner notice issued against Raja and he was nabbed from Casablanca in Morocco. Later, he was extradited to Karnataka.

Raja is an arts graduate and worked as a bus agent in Udupi and Bengaluru. He soon started calling businessmen for ransom and as his crime graph grew he went to Dubai and later settled in Morocco.
New April 4 : Chandigarh could be the new flash point between the BJP, Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) after AAP recently passed a resolution in the Punjab Assembly urging the Centre to "immediately transfer Chandigarh to Punjab".

On Monday, Congress Rajya Sabha MP from Haryana, Depender Singh Hooda, submitted a notice in the Upper House highlighting Haryana's claim over Chandigarh.

Hooda's notice under Rule 267 said, "The claim that Chandigarh was created as capital of Punjab is misleading. It's a violation of the Punjab Reorganisation Act of 1966." Not only the Congress, but the BJP too has opposed the move by AAP.

The BJP-ruled Haryana will convene a day-long special session of the Vidhan Sabha on Tuesday. A cabinet meeting was held on Sunday under the chairmanship of Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, who has condemned AAP moving a resolution in the Assembly to transfer Chandigarh to Punjab.

"Condemnable. They should not have done this. Punjab should first go to the Supreme Court for resolving the Satluj Yamuna Link (SYL) canal issue. The Hindi-speaking areas were not given to Haryana, which delayed the rest of the issues. They should first be ready to hand over the Hindi-speaking areas to Haryana," Khattar said, adding that Chandigarh is and will remain the capital of both Haryana and Punjab.

Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Chandigarh came into existence through the Punjab Reorganisation Act passed in 1966.

Last Friday, the Punjab Assembly unanimously adopted the resolution moved by Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, urging the Centre to transfer Chandigarh to Punjab.

The issue was triggered on March 27 after Union Home Minister Amit Shah announced that the Central Civil Service Rules will be implemented for all employees under the Chandigarh administration, which was opposed by different political parties in Punjab.

If the Central Civil Service Rules are implemented, all employees will get the pay scale under the Central rules.

As per the rules, retirement age will be enhanced from 58 to 60 years, while the maternity leave will be extended to two years from the existing one year.
Kohima, April 4 : "Nagalim", the land of Naga tribals, had been "invaded" by India and Myanmar and the Nagas have neither been a part of either by consent or by conquest, NSCN-IM General Secretary Thuingaleng Muivah has said, the group announced on Monday.

Adressing the General Assembly of Unrepresented Nations and People's Organisations (UNPO) in Washington DC, he said that the Nagas had been living in their own free country till the British forces occupied a part of it in 1832 while the rest called free Naga area remains as free as ever.

"On the eve of the departure of the British, the Nagas of the British-occupied Naga territory declared their independence on August 14, 1947 and joined with their brothers in free Naga area. In 1950, the Indian Constituent Assembly invited the Nagas to join the Union of India, but it was rejected by the Naga people," the Isak-Muivah faction of the National Socialist Council of Nagalim leader said.

He alleged that with a view to legalising its military occupation of "Nagalim", the Indian government "imposed its will" upon the Nagas in the form of the so-called 16-point agreement in 1960. However, it was rejected outrightly by the Naga people.

Muivah reportedly delivered the address at the UNPO, a 44-member organisation, last week, but the speech was released to the media by the NSCN-IM on Monday.

The Naga leader said that realising that seeking a military solution to the political problem is a futile exercise, the Indian government invited the NSCN leadership for political talks leading to a cease-fire agreement between the government and the NSCN signed in August, 1997.

"After 22 years long intensive negotiations with the government involving six Prime Ministers, the historic Framework Agreement was signed on August 3, 2015 in the presence of the Prime Minister (Narendra Modi)." Muivah claimed that the government also recognises the legitimate right of the Nagas to territorial integration of all Naga areas under one political roof.

"Since the unique history of the Nagas and the sovereign right of the Nagas are recognised, it is understood that the Naga flag and constitution are ingredients of their sovereignty," he stated.

However, the former government interlocutor and then Nagaland Governor, R.N.Ravi, currently Tamil Nadu Governor, had, on a number of occasions, rejected the separate Naga flag and constitution.

On this, Muivah said that in spite of all facts, commitments and agreements, the Indian government has started misinterpreting what has been mutually agreed upon and going back on its word.

"In the event of breaking down of the current negotiations, we foresee serious human rights violations again in Nagalim." Muivah also told the UNPO "to look into the fragile situation of the Indo-Naga political talks and take a positive role from your end so that the current peace process is brought to a logical conclusion."
Lviv, April 4 : Women across Ukraine are grappling with the threat of rape as a weapon of war with growing evidence of sexual violence emerging from areas retaken from retreating Russian forces, The Guardian reported.

The world was horrified on Sunday by a picture taken by Mikhail Palinchak on a highway 20 km outside Kiev, in which the bodies of one man and three women were piled under a blanket. The women were naked and their bodies had been partially burnt, the photographer said.

The harrowing image adds to a mounting body of evidence that summary executions, rape and torture have been used against civilians in areas under Russian control since the Kremlin launched the invasion of its neighbour on February 24, The Guardian reported.

Particularly difficult for many to comprehend is the scale of sexual violence. As Russian troops have withdrawn from towns and suburbs around the capital in order to refocus the war effort on Ukraine's east, women and girls have come forward to tell the police, media and human rights organisations of the atrocities they have suffered at the hands of Russian soldiers.

Gang-rapes, assaults taking place at gunpoint, and rapes committed in front of children are among the grim testimonies collected by the investigators, the report said.

And it is not only the Russian soldiers Ukrainian women may have to protect themselves from. In Vinnytsia, a town in the west of the country, a teacher reported to police that a member of the territorial defence services dragged her into the school library and tried to rape her. The man was arrested.

Latest updates on Russia-Ukraine War
New Delhi, April 4 : After coming to know that internal sabotage was the reason for defeat of party candidates in many seats in the recent Uttarakhand elections, the BJP is now planning strict action against those responsible, while seeking to reward leaders who worked hard to ensure victory.

Sources in the Uttarakhand BJP said that a review of some constituencies which the party lost shows that factionalism and internal sabotage were the reasons for losing many seats. The BJP has won 47 out of 70 seats in Uttarakhand polls.

"After reviewing the reasons for the defeat of BJP candidates in a few seats, we found that some leaders worked against the party candidates. Now, we have decided to hold a detailed review of the reasons for the defeat of our candidates in all the 23 seats the party lost," a party insider said.

It is learnt that the BJP has already started identification of people who worked against the party in the election and after completion of the identification process, strict action will be taken against them.

"Identification of leaders and workers involved in anti-party activities is going on from different sources. Some have been already identified and the remaining will be identified soon. The BJP leadership has decided to take strict action against those who worked against the party in the Assembly polls and it will be taken soon," a senior Uttarakhand BJP leader said.

The BJP is also taking feedback from its candidates who lost the election.

"Some candidates had complained about involvement of some leaders in anti-party activities before the declaration of results. We are also taking detailed reports from candidates on the issue," the BJP leader said.

A senior party functionary in Uttarakhand claimed that for smooth functioning of Pushkar Singh Dhami government, the leadership has decided not to tolerate any anti-party activities in the state unit and the first step will be strict action against those who did not follow party line during assembly polls.

Also, a list of hard working leaders is also prepared and they will be appropriately rewarded for their hard work, the party said.
New Delhi, April 4 : The Supreme Court on Monday stayed a Madhya Pradesh High Court order, directing an Arya Samaj organisation that while solemnising marriages, it must comply with the provisions of the Special Marriage Act.

Senior advocate Shyam Divan and lawyer Vanshaja Shukla, representing the Madhya Bharat Arya Pratinidhi Sabha, contended that the high court committed an error by transgressing into the domain of legislature by directing that Arya Samaj marriages conducted by the Arya Samaj temples, under the jurisdiction of the petitioner society in MP, will have to solemnised in consonance of the provisions of the Special Marriage Act.

The petitioner organization said it has jurisdiction over all Arya Samaj temples in Madhya Pradesh.

Counsel argued that the high court wrongly directed that Arya Samaj temples should solemnise the marriages after complying with the provisions of Sections 5, 6, 7 and 8 of the Special Marriage Act, which provide for prerequisite conditions viz, notice of intended marriage, publication of notice, marriage notebook, objection to marriage, and the procedure.

A bench of Justices K.M. Joseph and Hrishikesh Roy, after hearing arguments, stayed the Madhya Pradesh High Court order, which directed the organisation to amend its guidelines in accordance with the Act, and also issued notice to the Madhya Pradesh government.

The matter originated from a plea filed by an inter-caste couple in the high court in 2020, claiming they got married according as per Arya Samaj tradition, and moved the court seeking direction to the state government to provide them protection.

The petitioner organisation denied the couple's claim in the high court and added that the organisation, which helped them marry, was not linked to it. A single bench judge at the high court in December 2020, issued specific directions to the Sabha to amend its guidelines to incorporate sections 5, 6, 7 and 8 of the Special Marriage Act, within a month. This verdict was upheld by a division bench of the high court in December 2021.

The plea contended that the high court's direction that marriage certificates will have to be issued by competent authority as per the Special Marriage Act, takes away power from Arya Samaj temples to issue certificates for marriage. "It is submitted that if Arya Samaj temples are solemnising a marriage of two Hindus, in consonance with Sections 5 and 7 of the Hindu Marriage Act, then there is absolutely no requirement to comply with the provisions of the Special Marriage Act," said the plea.

"It is accordingly submitted that with respect to Arya Samaj marriages, it's the Hindu Marriage Act and that the Arya Marriage Act that holds the field and not the Special Marriage Act."
Bhubaneswar, April 4 : Union minister Dharmendra Pradhan and BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra on Monday expressed their discontent over the vandalisation of over 40 earthen ovens at the Jagannath temple in Puri.

Taking to his Twitter handle, Pradhan said the incident has made him sad and upset.

"Lord Jagannath is the centre of faith and trust for the people of Odisha and of the Hindu community all over the world," he said.

The 'Mahaprasad' has a unique relationship with the 12th century shrine and it is associated with Oriya sentiments. It is unfortunate that the kitchen has been ransacked which has disrupted the preparation of Mahaprasad, he stated.

"The state government and the temple administration should take this matter seriously and take necessary steps so that such an incident does not get repeated in the future," Pradhan said.

BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said in a tweet, "This is very painful... more than 40 earthen stoves of Shri Jagannath Mandir in Puri have been clandestinely damaged due to which age-old traditions have come to an abrupt halt. This is a matter of concern, not only for every Odia but every Hindu as well!" Slamming the Odisha government for the incident, Patra said that security arrangements at the temple are under question today.

The BJP leader also urged the state government and the temple administration to uphold the sanctity of Odia pride, the Jagannath temple.

Speaking to mediapersons, Puri Collector Samarth Verma said, "An internal inquiry is going on and we have also lodged a complaint with the police in connection with the incident. All concerned officials and temple servitors have ensured that there is no disruption in the conduct of temple rituals." The footages of CCTVs installed inside the temple are also being examined, Verma added.

Meanwhile, Puri SP K.V. Singh informed that the police are treating the case as top priority and a five-member team has been formed to probe the matter.

"Anyone involved in this incident will be detained and action will be taken as per the law," Singh said.

According to sources, over 40 out of 240 'chullahs' (earthen ovens) were found damaged when the doors of the 'Roshaghara' (kitchen) was opened on Sunday morning.

The 'Roshaghara' of the Jagannath temple is the largest kitchen in any shrine in the country and entry into it is prohibited for outsiders.

More than 500 'sevayats' are involved in the preparation of 56 types of food which can feed one lakh devotees every day.
Chennai, April 4 : The Communist Party of India-Marxist, which has turned into a minuscule political force in Tamil Nadu, has decided to rework its public strategy, and in its recently-concluded state conference held from March 30 to April 1, decided that the party cadres would henceforth participate in temple programmes.

In the old days, the CPI-M was at the forefront of hefty campaigns against religious beliefs, especially against temples and their rituals, but as times change, its Tamil Nadu unit has decided to actively take part in temple festivals, amid fears of RSS and BJP stamping their presence.

Talking to IANS, CPI-M state Secretary, K. Balakrishnan, said: "The party is involving itseld in the cultural activities attached with the temple festivals and these are events where people attend in large numbers." The CPI-M feels that it has to be proactive in religious programmes or will be left out of mainstream society.

Senior CPI-M leaders of Tamil Nadu are, however, downplaying the decision of the party's state conference and a member of the Tamil Nadu Secretariat told IANS that the party has nothing to lose in embracing religion.

"Party has always been trying to reach out to the masses and there is no point in shying away from religious affairs as the people are actively involved in these programmes. Party state committee has already clarified that we will be participating in cultural programmes," the leader said.

The CPI-M has seen the growth of BJP in southern Tamil Nadu and the saffron party has always been promoting Hindutva politics and has struck a chord in the area, especially Kanniyakumari district.

"There is no ideological shift and the final decision will the be taken at the Party Congress to be held from April 6 to 10 at Kerala's Kannur. You can see party comrades in temple administrations in Kerala and comrades actively participating in Durga Pooja celebrations in West Bengal... there need not be much discussion on the party participating in temple programmes in Tamil Nadu," party leader and Secretariat member, P. Shanmugham told IANS.

He said that 95 per cent of the people of Tamil Nadu are believers but not communal and the party has decided to counter certain forces who are trying to hijack the religious people and convert them into communalists.

The ruling DMK has also climbed down from its earlier stand of verbal attacks against temple-goers and present Chief Minister, M.K. Stalin has already announced a budgetary allocation of Rs 1,000 crore for the renovation of temples.
Mumbai, April 4 : The Mumbai Police on Monday grilled BJP's Leader of Opposition (Council) Pravin Darekar for over four hours in connection with the alleged irregularities during his tenure at the Mumbai District Central Cooperative Bank (MDCCB) Ltd.

Following the summons issued on Sunday, Darekar reported at the MRA Marg police station, which lodged an FIR on March 14 based on a complaint by Aam Aadmi Party state general secretary Dhananjay Shinde.

"I will fully cooperate with the police. If needed, I will join the probe again. Today, I have answered all queries and provided whatever information was sought to the best of my knowledge," Darekar said after stepping out of the police station on Monday evening.

Earlier, several BJP MLAs and hundreds of party workers expressed solidarity with Darekar and staged protests outside the police station as he stepped inside for the probe, alleging that he was being targeted by the state government as part of vendetta politics.

Among other things, Shinde alleged that Darekar cheated the government and the MDCCB by impersonating as a labourer to contest the bank's elections as a Director in the workmen's category.

He further said that Darekar served as the MDCCB Director and two terms as the Chairman, after which a probe was ordered by the Maharashtra Cooperative Department and he was disqualified in January 2022.

Shinde also said that it was during Darekar's tenure that an alleged misappropriation of MDCCB's funds to the tune of Rs 2,000 crore took place and sought his resignation as Leader of Opposition.

Prior to AAP, Shiv Sena leader Kishore Tiwari had filed a complaint against Darekar in September 2021 with the Ghatkopar police station, claiming that he had mis-declared his professional credentials in his election affidavits and hence was liable for action.

Darekar - who continues on the MDCCB board for the current term (2021-2026) - has consistently denied all the allegations hurled against him in the matter by Shinde and Tiwari, with the latter urging Union Minister for Cooperation Amit Shah to clarify the party's stand in the matter.

The BJP leader reiterated that the police are working under tremendous pressure, with the Commissioner of Police (Sanjay Pandey) personally monitoring the investigation.

Monday's development came a few days after the cyber police station recorded the statement of the Leader of Opposition (Assembly), Devendra Fadnavis, in connection with the infamous phone-tapping scam unearthed last year.
New Delhi, April 4 : The Supreme Court was informed on Monday that the first tranche of Rs 150 crore out of the total sum of Rs 1,500 crore, meant for construction of stalled Amrapali housing projects, has been directly paid to the National Buildings Construction Corporation (NBCC).

A consortium of seven banks have granted final approval to infuse Rs 1,500 crore.

Senior advocate and court-appointed receiver R. Venkataramani, in a note, said: "In compliance with the order dated March 28, on March 31 the banks disbursed a sum of Rs 150 crore, though the actual requirement/request by NBCC was for Rs 540 crore. The disbursal of loan was subject to certain pre-condition compliances, as set out in the sanction letter(s) of each bank." Venkataramani added the remaining amount could not be released as banks said that for disbursal of funds, they would require equitable mortgage by deposit of title deeds as a pre-condition.

A bench of Justices U.U. Lalit and Bela M Trivedi was told that one of the reasons is connected with observations made by the top court in its July 2019 judgment, and some clarification was sought.

"The banks have expressed genuine concern that creation of security by way of equitable mortgage by deposit of title deeds, is a precondition. That, as the order mentions that the lease stands cancelled, there is no title document as such which can be deposited with the banks, even though the lease deeds in favour of various Amrapali companies have been shared with the banks," added the note.

The court receiver added that the judgement said all leases in favour of Amrapali Group of companies stand cancelled, which would mean that there would be no title document, which could be deposited with the banks.

It was suggested that the top court could substitute Amrapali Group of companies with the court receiver. The bench pointed out that the expression used in the judgement is "vest in court receiver" or "right of the lessee shall rest in court receiver", and directed the authorities concerned to withdraw the lease deeds of Amrapali projects, in connection with NOIDA and Greater NOIDA, and provide them to the court receiver, for creating equitable mortgage in favour of the consortium.

On March 28, the top court directed the consortium seven banks -- Bank of Baroda (Rs 300 crore), Punjab National Bank (Rs 150 crore), Bank of India (Rs 100 crore), State Bank of India (Rs 250 crore), UCO Bank (Rs 200 crore), Indian Bank (Rs 300 crore), and Punjab & Sindh Bank (Rs 200 crore) -- to begin disbursing the sanctioned funds for the construction of stalled Amrapali housing projects by the next day.

The bench added that the process should begin the next day in order to ensure that NBCC receives it by March 31, for the purpose of construction.

On March 7, the Supreme Court had directed the consortium of banks to follow the footsteps of Bank of Baroda, which has issued a sanction order to grant funding for the stalled Amrapali housing projects, and take a decision on funding the projects within two days.
BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Dong Zhe, a 25-year-old beautician for the deceased at the Babaoshan Funeral Home in the Chinese capital of Beijing, describes her work as "allowing people to bid farewell to the world in a decent way."

Apart from her daily routine of cleaning the bodies and putting on their makeup, Dong now utilizes cutting-edge technologies including 3D printing to help restore the appearance of her special customers.

After a careful check of their appearance, Dong performs her final solemn salute to those resting in peace and calls their family in to start the funeral ceremony.

"The most difficult task for us is to communicate with the family members the deceased left behind, as they are still overwhelmed by great grief, crying nonstop," said Dong, adding that she and her colleagues aim to present the departed in their finest state and to comfort the bereaved.

Dong had made up her mind to take up the unusual career ever since she was applying for college. "Everyone was against me when I applied to major in modern funeral technology and management. But I was determined."

After years of studying the professional skills of funeral services and relevant technologies, she chose to work as a body beautician, using technology to help her customers look their best before their physical body finally departs this earthly plane.

She feels her work is worthwhile whenever the bereaved show their gratitude for her efforts. "After about four years of work, I started to recognize the noble essence of my undertaking: treating life with dignity."

Dong's parents also changed their attitude toward her choice of work and began to feel proud of her.

In the run-up to Tomb-sweeping Day, also known as the Qingming Festival in the Chinese lunar calendar, on April 5, Dong and her colleagues are busier than ever. "During the busiest times of the year, I complete the makeup of more than 10 people in a day," she said.

The young woman has gotten used to life and death and seen through the impermanence of the world, much faster than her peers. "I now take life more seriously than ever before. Our lifetime is limited and thus we should cherish our life and people around us and go through each stage of our life with optimism."

Dong earnestly practices what she preaches. As the youngest in Babaoshan's beautician team, she always tells jokes and cheers her colleagues up in order to dispel any negative feelings accumulated at work.

"Though facing lifeless, icy bodies every day, I can feel the warmth hidden in my job," said Dong. 
Bengaluru, April 4 : Amid the hike of fuel prices, the Karnataka government has revised the electricity tariff in the state for financial year 2022-23, applicable from April 1, with consumers now having to pay an additional 35 paise per unit.

The Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission (KERC) has approved increase in energy charges by 5 paise per unit and along with it, there is an increase in fixed charges ranging between Rs 20 to Rs 30 per HP/KWh/KVA to the consumers to the recovery of gap of Rs 2,159 crore. The hike has been done considering the proposals of the Electricity Supply Companies (ESCOMs).

The overall average increase accounts for 35 paise per unit for FY 23, which accounts to increase by 4.33 per cent. The ESCOMs had sought an average increase of 185 paise per unit, accounting for 23.83 per cent increase, for a proposed revenue deficit of Rs 11,320 crore.

The revision is necessitated to recover the revenue deficit of Rs 2,159 crore which includes Rs 1,700.49 crores deficit for FY21. In order to enable the ESCOMs to carry out their business of supplying the electricity, which is the basic need of the society, the increase in the tariff has become inevitable. The KERC has also approved Aggregate Revenue Requirement (ARR) of KPTCL, ESCOM's for FY 23 to FY 25.

Energy Minister V. Sunil Kumar has earlier hinted about the possible revision of in power tariff revision, saying the development works taken up in the sector warranted a hike, and that increasing power tariff is inevitable.
New Delhi, April 4 : The GST Council has not recommended reduction of the 18 per cent GST rate on health insurance schemes, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman told the Parliament on Monday.

At present, GST on health insurance services is levied at a standard rate of 18 per cent.

"Health insurance, like majority of other taxable supplies, is standard rated at 18 per cent. In pre-GST regime also, health insurance was standard rated," Sitharaman told the Lok Sabha in a written reply.

"A significant relief in GST has been provided by way of exemption to above stated insurance schemes catering to economically weaker sections of the society and differently abled. Further, healthcare services are also exempt from GST." Health insurance schemes catering to the needs of economically weaker sections of the society and differently abled, such as the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana, the Universal Health Insurance Scheme, the Jan Argoya Bima Policy, and the Niramaya Health Insurance Scheme are fully exempt from GST.

According to Sitharaman, representations to reduce the GST on health insurance were placed before the Council in its 31st meeting held on December 22, 2018 and in its 37th meeting held on September 20, 2019.

"GST Council did not make recommendation for reduction of GST," she added.
New Delhi, April 4 : The IFSO unit of Delhi Police has arrested three more persons in connection with the multi-crore Chinese loan application fraud and extortion racket, taking the total number of arrestees till now to 11, an official said on Monday.

The racketeers were allegedly duping innocent people in the name of providing loan and extorting money from the people on the pretext of repaying the loan amount.

The three arrested persons have been identified as Harpreet Singh and Pankaj, both residents of Uttam Nagar, and Jitender, a resident of Kapashera village.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (IFSO), K.P.S. Malhotra, told IANS that during interrogation, it was revealed that Harpreet Singh and Pankaj were the key persons for maintaining the recovery group.

Harpreet and Pankaj were acting as managers of the loan recovery group. Through technical surveillance, the hideouts of Harpreet and Pankaj were identified in Haridwar, Malhotra said.

During interrogation, they disclosed that they were directly receiving instructions from two Chinese nationals, namely Akira and Amy.

During interrogation of the persons arrested earlier, it was revealed that they were receiving SIM cards for calling the victims from Jitender, who after his arrest revealed that he received the SIM cards or WhatsApp numbers from another person who is yet to be arrested.

The case came to light after a woman lodged a complaint with the IFSO unit of the Special Cell, alleging that she was being abused and threatened by some unknown persons who were sending her morphed and vulgar photographs to her family members, friends and relatives through social media.

"The complainant had taken a loan from a loan app namely Cash Advance (Danakredit); she repaid the same in time. But after repaying the said amount, she started getting threat calls and messages on WhatsApp from Cash Advance employees," Malhotra said.

It was further observed by the complainant that the alleged scamsters were using the profile picture of a 'senior police officer'.
New Delhi, April 4 : In a bid to reduce India's reliance on imported edible oil, the National Dairy Development Board is intending to encourage domestic production through oilseeds farmers that will be supported through cooperatives.

India continues to depend on imports to meet 50 to 60 per cent of its edible oil demand.

The country imported nearly 13.5 million MT of edible oil during 2020-21. Due to a sharp price rise in the international market, the total cost of imports during 2020-21 was Rs 1,17,000 crore.

"The emerging scenario of increasing edible oil prices has impacted domestic costs as well, leading to a renewed interest in domestic production," the NDDB said.

It said it has initiated a number of measures to support the Karnataka Cooperative Oilseeds Growers' Federation Ltd (KOF), a state level apex federation comprising of 3 regional oilseeds growers' unions spread across 15 out of the 31 districts in the state.

During 2021-22, KOF and its member unions together handled more than 38,500 MT of edible oil and had a combined turnover of about Rs 630 crore.
Kohima, April 4 : Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio on Monday said that if law and order situation in the state cannot be controlled, the Armed Forces (Special Power) Act, 1958 (AFSPA) might be re-imposed in the state.

In his address at a crucial consultative meeting with tribal Hohos and organisations on AFSPA, he said that all stakeholders had appealed for abolition of the draconian law and the Central government has finally heard the appeals of the people.

He appealed for co-operation with the government to ensure that no untoward incidents occur and urged all the stakeholders to seriously ponder how to properly maintain law and order in the state.

As the Naga solution is for all the Nagas, he stressed that the Nagas should harbour a sense of unity and oneness and not be selfish in their demands.

Rio thanked the civil society organisations, tribal leaders, and student bodies for cooperating and supporting the government. He said that the state government had formed a 22-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the Oting incident in Mon district where 14 people were killed and 30 others were injured by the security forces in December last year.

Congratulating the SIT members for their prompt investigation and submission of their preliminary reports, he said that once the final report is submitted and a case is filed, it would be made known to the public. The Centre had also formed a SIT and they have also submitted their report, he added.

United Democratic Alliance Chairman T.R. Zeliang also appealed for co-operation as the police would be handicapped without the peoples' support.

State Chief Secretary J. Alam said that after almost three decades, AFSPA was removed completely in three districts and partially lifted in four other districts and hoped that further progress will be seen in the days to come. Home Commissioner, Abhijit Sinha said that out of 72 police stations, AFSPA has been withdrawn in 15 police stations.

Tribal leaders, leaders of apex bodies, Hohos, civil society groups and student bodies would have to play an important role and would have to take responsibility for keeping the peace, he said.

Director General of Police, John Longklumer, maintained that once AFSPA is removed, the responsibility of law and order and maintaining peace will fall on the Nagaland Police. He informed that India Reserve Battalions of the state forces personnel have been deployed at strategic locations to ensure the maintenance of law and order.

While the Eastern Naga Students Federation sought total justice for all victims of the Oting incident, the influential Konyak Union boycotted Monday's meeting to protest "delay" in providing justice to the families and punishment to the armed forces personnel concerned.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah had announced reducing operation of AFSPA, which allows army and central paramilitary forces to conduct raids, and arrest anyone anywhere without prior notice or arrest warrant, in Nagaland, Assam, and Manipur, following vociferous demand by many political parties and NGOs.
New Delhi, April 4 : The Delhi High Court on Monday turned down a plea against the appointment of Delhi Chief Secretary Vijay Kumar Dev as State Election Commissioner for conducting the municipal elections in the national capital.

A bench of Justices Vipin Sanghi and Navin Chawla dismissed the plea filed by Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Dr Nand Kishore Garg, contending that the appointment is "politically motivated" as the Chief Secretary has been privy to all administrative and policy decisions of the city government.

Advocate Shashank Deo Sudhi appeared for the petitioner.

Earlier, another bench of the High Court had issued notice to the city government over the plea challenging the appointment of the Chief Secretary as Election Commissioner from April 21, alleging the possibility of manipulation of the outcome of the election process with the appointment.

It highlighted that the order is also in violation of the Constitution's Article 243K which enshrined the appointment of an independent Election Commissioner as interpreted and laid down by the Supreme Court.

Terming the order premature, the petitioner sought broad guidelines for the appointment of the Election Commissioner for ensuring the impartiality and neutrality of the candidate who would be an independent person of high integrity.

Dev, a 1987 batch IAS officer of AGMUT (Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Mizoram, and Union Territories) cadre, assumed charge as Chief Secretary in 2018, succeeding Anshu Prakash.

The last municipal elections were held in Delhi in April 2017. The five-year term of the elected members of the three corporations -- East, North, and South Delhi Municipal Corporations -- is set to come to an end in April 2022 and polls will be held to elect 272 new municipal councillors.
Jaipur, April 4 : After communal tension broke out in Karauli city of Rajasthan following stone-pelting at a motorcycle rally passing through a Muslim-dominated area on Saturday, the district administration has extended the curfew till April 7 along with continuation of internet suspension till further orders.

An Independent councillor, Matloom Ahmed, has been booked for allegedly inciting the violence in Karauli, sources said.

The sources added that Ahmed, who has been identified as the main conspirator of the violence, is absconding.

Ahmed has been accused of pelting stones at the rally, inciting violence and gathering crowd to attack those taking part in the rally.

As per sources, the Rajasthan Police have mentioned his name in the FIR and booked the accused under Section 307 of the IPC.

Meanwhile, the other accused persons arrested for the violence in Karauli were presented in the court by the police after their medical examination at the district hospital on Monday. All of them were sent to police custody for two days.

District Collector Rajendra Singh Shekhawat said that efforts are being made to maintain peace and order in Karauli.

He also held a meeting with the veterans of the district on Monday evening and appealed to them to restore peace in the area.

Meanwhile, amid the curfew on Monday, the examination of Rajasthan Board was conducted by the administration as per the schedule.

Government offices and courts were also opened on Monday on the instruction of the district administration, even as mobile units of the police kept patrolling the city.
Colombo, April 5 : Failing to secure opposition support to form an all-party cabinet, the Gotabaya Rajapaska government would lose its majority when the Parliament is convened on Tuesday, a ruling coalition MP has predicted.

Udaya Gammanpila, the former Energy Minister and a leader of one of the coalition parties in the government, tweeted: "The #SLPP Government will lose its majority in Parliament marking its Beginning of the End." Gammanpila also criticised Monday's appointment of four ministers for the new cabinet saying: "New cabinet is old wine in a new bottle." "Our demand is for an all party interim government to restore essential services and to hold a parliamentary election. People should decide their next leaders, not by anybody else," he added.

Another SLPP MP and former Minister Nimal Lanza told media that the government would definitely lose its majority in Parliament as over 50 lawmakers have decided to work independently from Tuesday. The MP urged government to hand over power to the opposition.

Lanza told media that once the group of 50 MPs withdraw on Tuesday, the government would lose the majority of 113 out of 225 total MPs in the parliament.

Meanwhile, the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), the main coalition partner of Rajapsaka's Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), announced that all 14 lawmakers would leave the government and stand independent at the parliament.

SLFP MP Mahinda Amaraweera told media that the decision to leave the government was taken as the government had not heeded to their requests over the last six months.

However following a meeting of the parliamentary group of the government on Monday night, MP and former Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage said that 132 MPs have assured of their support to the government at the parliament.

Gotabaya Rajapaksa, a former Defence Secretary in his brother Mahinda Rajapaksa's government, played a crucial role to end 26-year-long war against Tamil rebel Tigers. At the 2019 Presidential election, he was elected President with a sweeping 2/3 majority with over 6.9 million votes.

Lack of dollar reserves and depreciation forced economic crisis lead to severe shortages of fuel, LP gas, electricity and essential food and people are demanding Rajapaksa to give up power immediately.
New Delhi, April 5 : Union Home Minister Amit Shah told the Lok Sabha on Monday that he does not get angry, except when it comes to questions related to Kashmir.

Responding to opposition parties before starting the discussion on the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022, Shah said, "I usually never get angry. But when it comes to the Kashmir issue, I get angry." The Union Minister added, "I never reprimand anyone. My voice is loud while is a manufacturing defect," evoking laughter from the members of the House.

During the discussion on the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Bill in August 2019, there was a heated argument between Shah and Congress Parliamentary party leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury in the Lok Sabha.

Expressing anger over Chowdhury's statement, the Home Minister had said that he would give up his life for Kashmir.

On Monday, the opposition parties referred to that, to which the Home Minister responded.

Earlier, speaking on the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022, Shah said the bill will replace the Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920.

Explaining the utility of the bill, Shah said that with changing times, the new bill is extremely significant to bring about science and evidence required by courts to convict criminals and enhance the power of the investigative agencies.

He further said that in 1980 the Law Commission had also sent a suggestion to the government of India to make such a law, which was discussed for a long time.

After coming to power at the Centre, the NDA government discussed this law with the various state governments and other parties concerned. This law has been introduced only after studying all the aspects and laws applicable in many other countries of the world, he said.

Shah added that when the Minister of State for Home, Ajay Mishra Teni, introduced this bill in the Lok Sabha, it was opposed by the opposition parties citing individual liberty, human rights and several judgments of the Supreme Court.

He said the concerns of some MPs are justified but their concerns have also been addressed in this bill.

He added that the Union government is also introducing a model act for the prison inmates which will be sent to various state governments and help remove various concerns related to the bill. He Shah told the MPs opposing the bill that there is a need to view it in totality as change is the need of the hour.

The Home Minister also urged all MPs to view the bill from a different prism, saying that it will help the investigating agencies, increase the conviction rate and at the same time strengthen internal security as well as law and order.

Earlier on March 28, on behalf of Shah, Ajay Mishra Teni had introduced the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022, in the Lok Sabha.
New Delhi, April 5 : Union Minister of State for Science and Technology, Jitendra Singh on Monday said the ultimate objective and the litmus test of good governance is to bring the ease of living in the lives of common citizens.

Talking about the essence of good governance, Singh said, "Sometimes it seems that effective administration is the good governance, but as I think, it looks that sometimes zero government is also good governance." He was speaking at the launching event of the first edition of the annual report "Madhya Pradesh Sushashan and Development Report (MPSDR) 2022" on Monday evening.

Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan launched the report which has been prepared by the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Good Governance and Policy Analysis.

Speaking on the occasion, Singh said as soon as the BJP government came into power in 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave us the mantra of "maximum governance and minimum government".

He added that working on the same mantra, we (Union government) have repealed around 1,500 irrelevant laws in last eight years.

"Recently, we have started reaching out to the District Governance Index. Some states have implemented this. In Madhya Pradesh, the work is still going on and we will take help of this report to identify the index," Singh said.

Lauding the report, the Union Minister said Chouhan has made the state a role model from "Bimaru Rajya".

Launching the report, the Chief Minister said Madhya Pradesh is the fastest growing state of the country with a growth rate of 19.70 per cent. The state contribution in Indian economy has increased from 2.6 to 3.6 per cent, Chouhan added.

"We are working under the guidance of the Prime Minister. We used to be called a Bimaru state, if we see the journey of 15 years, Madhya Pradesh has become a developing state out of Bimaru state," the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister said addressing the gathering on Monday evening.

The MPSDR 2022 is the first of its kind document that brings forth the unique governance practices of Madhya Pradesh which includes community engagement and participation, robust policy measures, efficient delivery systems, evidence-based decision-making and comprehensive monitoring.

MPSDR 2022 aims to document and discuss the features of good governance, its monitoring framework and implications in key sectors in Madhya Pradesh.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic (Front) speaks during a press conference at the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) headquarters in Belgrade, Serbia, on April 3, 2022. Vucic declared his convincing victory on Sunday in the first round of the presidential elections, securing another five-year term. (Photo by Predrag Milosavljevic/Xinhua)

BELGRADE, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic declared his convincing victory on Sunday in the first round of the presidential elections, securing another five-year term.

According to preliminary results of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) revealed by Vucic, he won between 59-and 61 percent in the elections, while the coalition around the ruling SNS won 44 percent of parliamentary elections.

"I believe that we are facing numerous challenges, but that the most important thing for Serbia is to have good relations in the region, to continue on the European path, but not to lose traditional friendships," Vucic said in a speech at his party headquarters.

Vucic thanked his coalition partners from the previous government, including the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) and the Alliance of Vojvodina Hungarians (SVM), announcing the possibility of further partnership.

Vucic said that his results were based on the counted votes from 85 percent of polling stations. Serbian Republic Electoral Commission (RIK) announced that it will publish preliminary results on Monday.

Around 6.5 million registered voters casted ballots on Sunday to choose between eight presidential candidates, and 19 parties or coalitions for the parliament. 

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic (Front) attends a press conference at the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) headquarters in Belgrade, Serbia, on April 3, 2022. Vucic declared his convincing victory on Sunday in the first round of the presidential elections, securing another five-year term. (Photo by Predrag Milosavljevic/Xinhua)

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic (Front) attends a press conference at the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) headquarters in Belgrade, Serbia, on April 3, 2022. Vucic declared his convincing victory on Sunday in the first round of the presidential elections, securing another five-year term. (Photo by Predrag Milosavljevic/Xinhua)

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic (Front) speaks during a press conference at the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) headquarters in Belgrade, Serbia, on April 3, 2022. Vucic declared his convincing victory on Sunday in the first round of the presidential elections, securing another five-year term. (Photo by Predrag Milosavljevic/Xinhua)
United Nations, April 5 : The UN Security Council has issued a statement, welcoming the April 1 call by UN special envoy Hans Grundberg for a two-month truce announcement on Yemen and the positive response from the parties.

The council members underscored the opportunity a truce affords to alleviate the humanitarian suffering of Yemenis and improve regional stability, according to the statement issued by Council President Barbara Woodward.

They urged the building of confidence through measures such as, but not limited to, the re-opening of Taiz road, and the regular flow of fuel deliveries, goods and flights, in accordance with the agreed truce, it said.

The council members called on all parties to seize the opportunity provided by the truce and work with the UN special envoy to make progress toward a comprehensive ceasefire and an inclusive political settlement, Xinhua news agency reported.

They expressed full support for the envoy's political consultation efforts, reiterated the urgency of an inclusive Yemeni-led, Yemeni-owned process, under UN auspices, and underscored the importance of a minimum 30 per cent participation in them by women, in line with the Outcomes of the National Dialogue Conference as recalled by Resolution 2624 (2022).

They welcomed the Gulf Cooperation Council initiative for Yemeni-Yemeni dialogue which launched last week, in support of the UN's own efforts. They expressed deep concern about Yemen's humanitarian crisis and underlined the urgent need to fund the humanitarian response, according to the statement.
Tehran, April 5 : Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has urged the US to be "realistic" to help reach an agreement in Vienna talks aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

The Iranian diplomat said on Monday in a tweet that "the excessive demands" of the US could lead to a pause in the Vienna negotiation as Iran will "never give in" to such demands, Xinhua news agency reported.

Amir-Abdollahian also pointed out that "an agreement can be reached if the United States is realistic".

Earlier on Monday, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said the US should be responsible for protraction in Vienna talks.

Iran signed the JCPOA with the world powers in July 2015. However, former US President Donald Trump pulled the US out of the agreement in May 2018 and reimposed unilateral sanctions on Tehran, prompting the Islamic republic to scale back some of its nuclear commitments under the agreement in retaliation.

Since April 2021, eight rounds of talks have been held in Vienna between Iran and the remaining JCPOA parties, namely China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany to revive the deal.

Over the past weeks, reports from Vienna suggested that the negotiators were "close" to an agreement with few key issues remaining which required "political decisions" of the parties.
Venture Construction Group of Florida (VCGFL) was a proud Silver Sponsor at the Autism Speaks Palm Beach Walk. The 2-mile walk was held from 10:30 a.m. - 12 p.m. on March 6 at the Meyer Amphitheatre. Registrants had the option to walk individually or in teams.

Autism Speaks is dedicated to promoting solutions for the needs of individuals with autism and their families. The nonprofit provides advocacy and support and aims to increase understanding and acceptance of people with autism spectrum disorder. Autism Speaks is dedicated to advancing research into causes and better interventions for autism spectrum disorder and related conditions.

We are honored to support this incredible cause that continues to impact the lives of so many. We are committed to supporting innovative research and raising awareness, said Stephen Shanton, CEO and president of Venture Construction Group of Florida (VCGFL).

According to Autism Speaks, 1 in 44 children in the U.S. is diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Signs of autism usually appear by age 2 or 3. Some associated development delays can appear even earlier, and often, it can be diagnosed as early as 18 months. Early intervention affords the best opportunity to support healthy development and deliver benefits across the lifespan. Some people with ASD may require significant support in their daily lives, while others may need less support and, in some cases, live entirely independently. Autism Speaks has funded nearly $234M, primarily in scientific grants, resulting in an additional $1B of publicly-sourced autism-related funding.

The Autism Speaks Walk is the worlds largest fundraising event dedicated to improving the lives of people with autism. Together with parents, grandparents, siblings, friends, relatives and providers who support them, there is no limit to what we can do; and the funds raised help ensure people of all abilities have access to the tools needed to lead their best lives. VCGFL is an award-winning construction and restoration company committed to giving back and supports numerous organizations each year.

About Venture Construction Group of Florida

Founded in 1998, Venture Construction Group of Florida (VCGFL) is an award-winning leader in construction, restoration, renovations, roofing, storm damage repairs, and 24/7 emergency services throughout Florida, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Bahamas and the Caribbean. Specializing in residential, industrial and commercial projects, VCGFL assists homeowners, property managers, condominium boards, homeowner associations, association boards, hotels, and business complexes with general contractor services, roofing, specialty construction, historical restoration, water and flood mitigation, and property repairs due to fire, flood, water, wind and hurricanes. With offices in Boca Raton, Ft. Myers, Naples, Panama City Beach, Orlando, Stuart, Tampa, San Juan, and Nassau, VCGFL is committed to operational excellence and exceptional customer service. VCGFL takes care of the details every step of the way including roofing, siding, windows, drywall, flooring, paint, gutters to rebuilding properties after major storm events from hurricanes, tornadoes, and hailstorms. VCGFL has earned leading industry awards including Roofing Contractor Magazines Top 100; Better Business Bureau (BBB) Southeast Florida and Caribbean 2021 Torch Award for Ethics Finalist; Gold Coast Builders Association (GCBA) Silver PRISM Award for Safety Team of the Year, GCBA Gold PRISM Award for Craftsmanship- Commercial Exterior, GCBA Silver PRISM Award for Craftsmanship- Commercial Exterior, Owens Corning Pinnacle Award for Safety, Roofing Alliance MVP Award, Coatings Pro Contractor Award, Pro Remodeler Forty Under 40 Award, Qualified Remodeler Top 500 Remodelers Award, Qualified Remodeler Master Design Award, Florida Roofing and Sheet Metal Contractors Association S.T.A.R. Spotlight Trophy for the Advancement of Roofing Awards in Sustainability and Community Service. Shanton is a certified member of the WindStorm Insurance Network and is a WIND Certified Umpire, WIND Certified Appraiser, and WIND Certified Fellow. VCGFL carries advanced accreditations and is an exclusive certified National Storm Damage Center Preferred Contractor and Certified Member of the United Association of Storm Restoration Contractors. VCGFL is a proud member of Exterior Insulation and Finish Systems (EIFS) Industry Members Association (EIMA); Florida Roofing and Sheet Metal Contractors Association (FRSA); Gold Coast Builders Association (GCBA); Insurance Appraisal and Umpire Association (IAUA); National Association of Environmentally Responsible Mold Contractors (NAERMC); National Association of Home Builders (NAHB); National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA); NRCA Qualified Trainer; Property Liability and Resource Bureau (PLRB); Restoration Industry Association (RIA). VCGFL is a registered U.S. Federal Government Contractor and holds leading manufacturer certifications including Owens Corning Platinum Preferred Contractor, Mule-Hide Legacy Contractor, Certified CertainTeed Contractor, and Duro-Last Certified Contractor status. VCGFL credentials have been vetted and screened through independent third-party Global Risk Management Solutions. For more information, call 866-459-8351 or visit us online at http://www.VCGFL.com.

About Autism Speaks

Autism Speaks is dedicated to promoting solutions, across the spectrum and throughout the life span, for the needs of individuals with autism and their families. We do this through advocacy and support; increasing understanding and acceptance of people with autism spectrum disorder; and advancing research into causes and better interventions for autism spectrum disorder and related conditions. To find resources, join a fundraising walk or make a donation, go to http://www.AutismSpeaks.org.

Media Inquiries:

Alexis Bott

Elev8 Consulting Group

Ph: 386-243-5388

Web: http://www.elev8cg.com
By using Argo, clients ensure they have the best and most accurate information on how to prepare for a successful visa interview

BDV Solutions, a tech-enabled provider of labor solutions to U.S. employers and employment-based immigration services to foreign nationals, has acquired Argo Visa, the leader in providing consultative services to visa applicants by former U.S. visa officers.

Co-founded in 2018 by immigration attorney and former U.S. diplomat Chris Richardson, Argos staff of former consular officers has conducted over 1 million visa interviews during their careers with the U.S. Department of State. These former officers have considerable experience adjudicating nonimmigrant visas for tourism, studies, and employment, as well as immigrant visas for permanent residence in the U.S. Combined, they have worked in 34 different countries and speak 14 different languages.

By using Argo, clients ensure they have the best and most accurate information on how to prepare for a successful visa interview, said Richardson, who also serves as BDV Solutions COO and General Counsel. This unique service allows the visa applicant to proceed to their interview with confidence and be prepared to achieve a successful interview result.

Founded in 2011, BDV Solutions helps source employment for foreign nationals via the federal governments employment-based green card program. BDV has a strong track record of placing foreign nationals with a wide range of companies in a variety of industries. Our acquisition of Argo Visa is an exciting next step in our continued growth and diversification. Not only does it allow BDV to offer potential immigrants to the U.S. a wider suite of services, it also is a valuable tool for corporations that are looking to bring employees, advisors and customers into the country noted BDV Solutions CEO and founder Britt Vergnolle.

Argo Visa CEO Ron Vergnolle added: While Argos staff of highly skilled and experienced former officers offers the best path forward for aspiring visa applicants, it also complements BDVs ability to help U.S. employers find and retain much-needed workers. Visa applicants who work with us are in the best position to succeed in their interviews and join the U.S. workforce, where they are sorely needed.

About BDV Solutions

Headquartered in Greenville, SC, BDV is the largest independent company in the U.S. that specializes in closing the countrys chronic and growing labor gap by connecting employers to foreign nationals seeking to work legally in the country. BDV leverages its proprietary technology and business processes to assist U.S. companies and foreign nationals in navigating the complex U.S. immigration system. The company works with employers and foreign nationals across the country and in a variety of industries, including manufacturing, hospitality, foodservice, janitorial services, restaurant franchise groups, warehouses, and distribution centers, among others. New York-based private equity firm Astara Capital Partners, LLC, acquired a majority stake in BDV Solutions in November 2021. More information can be found at http://www.bdvsolutions.com

About Argo Visa

Argo Visas team of former U.S. consular officers speak 14 languages, have worked in over 34 countries, and have played a part in more than 1 million immigration visa application decisions. These officers were responsible for adjudicating nonimmigrant visas for tourism, studies, and employment, as well as immigrant visas for permanent residence in the United States. Argo is the world's leader in creating a cutting-edge technology platform that connects visa applicants with former visa officers to provide consultative services on the U.S. visa process. By using Argo, clients gain the best and most accurate information on how to prepare for a successful visa interview and benefit from the perspective of Argos team of highly skilled and experienced immigration experts.
To help our customers achieve greater business value, Fujitsu is paving the way to improved digital transformation technologies and open ecosystems.

Fujitsu Network Communications has announced that Shingo Mizuno, Global Head of the Fujitsu Network Business is transferring his base to the United States, effective April 1. Mizuno also is now acting President and CEO of Fujitsu Network Communications, replacing Doug Moore, who has been appointed CEO of Fujitsu North America.

Communications service providers are facing a radically different business environment, largely created by a convergence of technical and socioeconomic pressures, said Mizuno. To help our customers achieve greater business value, Fujitsu is paving the way to improved digital transformation technologies and open ecosystems.

Mizuno has been with Fujitsu for 33 years. He currently serves on the board of directors for the IOWN Global Forum, and contributes to industry committees for the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC), Association of Radio Industries and Business (ARIB), Photonics Electronics Technology Research Association (PETRA) and the ITU-Association of Japan. Mizuno holds a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering from Tokyo University of Science.

About Fujitsu

Fujitsu is the leading Japanese information and communication technology (ICT) company offering a full range of technology products, solutions and services. Approximately 126,000 Fujitsu people support customers in more than 100 countries. We use our experience and the power of ICT to shape the future of society with our customers. Fujitsu Limited (TSE:6702) reported consolidated revenues of 3.6 trillion yen (US$34 billion) for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2021. For more information, please see https://www.fujitsu.com/.

About Fujitsu Network Communications Inc.

Fujitsu Network Communications, Inc. is a leading provider of digital transformation solutions for network operators, service providers and content providers worldwide. We combine best-in-class hardware, software and services with multivendor expertise to enable cost savings, faster services delivery and improved network performance. Working closely with our customers and ecosystem partners, we design, build, operate and maintain better networks for the connected world. For more information, please see http://us.fujitsu.com/telecom or connect with us on LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/company/Fujitsu-network-communications.

Fujitsu (and design), 1FINITY, Virtuora and shaping tomorrow with you are trademarks of Fujitsu Limited in the United States and other countries. All rights reserved. All other company or product names mentioned herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. Information provided in this press release is accurate at time of publication and is subject to change without advance notice.
HealtheMed, a Minnesota-based healthcare solutions company, today announced its latest round of funding, designed to help the company expand awareness for its digital care service offerings that enable the states most vulnerable citizens to remain independent longer. The seed round of $1.2M was led by Panoramic Ventures and supported by OCA Ventures as well as other private investors, including Bob Schulz, co-founder and Partner Emeritus of Health Enterprise Partners.

Paid for by the Minnesota Department of Human Services, the companys integrated technology and clinical services solution, called Clinic@Home, is free to Medicaid waivered participants. The system delivers a unique combination of high technology, including telemedicine via a television, remote patient monitoring, and medication dispensing devices, with high-touch nurse guidance and patient training in the home.

As telemedicine and remote monitoring technologies have become more standard practice in healthcare, Medicaid waivered participants stand to benefit the most, as many suffer from physical, mental, and social challenges that prevent them from accessing healthcare via traditional means, said Austin Poole, Principal at Panoramic Ventures. Were pleased to welcome the HealtheMed team into our growing portfolio of healthcare companies that are making a real difference while also helping to bend the cost curve in healthcare.

According to Thomas Spencer, CEO of HealtheMed, Clinic@Home is the first solution designed specifically to help our nations most vulnerable population - Medicaid waivered participants - receive the health education, care, and remote monitoring services they need to remain independent in their homes. As an added benefit, Clinic@Home is also giving case managers the tools they need to manage their clients more proactively, efficiently, and successfully, which is critical during these times of extreme workforce shortages. By working with the Minnesota Department of Health Services, we have been able to demonstrate the positive impact our solution is having on both health outcomes and the total cost of care.

In a recent In90group research study of more than 50 case managers in Minnesota who have responsibility for Medicaid waivered clients, 85% indicated that their caseloads have increased over the past two years. Clinic@Home empowers these case managers to proactively know what is going on with each of their clients without requiring an at-home visit or tracking down care providers for information. Client social determinants data, along with the clients overall health picture, is shared monthly with case managers.

About HealtheMed

HealtheMed is a public benefit corporation dedicated to enriching the lives of underserved populations in the state of Minnesota. Clinic@Home, a first of its kind, digital system of care enables Minnesota Medicaid waivered clients to get better access to health care in their homes through its hybrid telemedicine platform. HealtheMeds mission is to sustain Minnesota Medicaid waivered participants by enabling access to the essential health and care services they need, in the comfort of their own home. To learn more about Clinic@Home from HealtheMed, visit http://www.healthemed.com or call 952.562.1235.

About Panoramic Ventures

Panoramic Ventures is a venture capital firm based in Atlanta that takes a "wider-view" approach to investing by targeting the Southeast and Midwest and placing a focus on diverse founders and university startups. Panoramic opens new doors for overlooked founders, giving more entrepreneurs access to capital to build leading tech companies. For more information, visit http://www.panoramic.vc or follow Panoramic Ventures on LinkedIn, Instagram, or Twitter @panoramicvc.
Data Lakehouse, Dataflow, Activate, Automate and Empower work together to create an eco-system of open technologies in the SkyPoint platform that create improved business outcomes.

SkyPoint Cloud (SkyPoint), the privacy-first customer data and artificial intelligence (AI) platform that enables consumer, financial services and healthcare brands to build deeper relationships with their customers, today announced new products that allow companies to build trust, while developing a better understanding of its customer base. Data Lakehouse, Dataflow, Activate, Automate and Empower work together to create an eco-system of open technologies in the SkyPoint platform that create improved business outcomes.

The latest products from SkyPoint solve the problem of siloed, unorganized data, allowing businesses to have a 360 view of customers.



Data Lakehouse - Integrated data warehouse and data lake that uses Delta Lake technology and Common Data Model, allowing customers to easily manage and unify disparate data and improve business decisions.

Dataflow - Dataflow pulls customer data from multiple sources into the SkyPoint platform. Since SkyPoint is built on Microsofts Common Data Model (CDM), Dataflow consolidates data from any application to standardize data to the Lakehouse and draw common insights.

Activate  Once customer profiles are brought into the system and de-fragmented with SkyPoint Resolve, Activate connects customer data to create customer segments, bringing the relevant information needed to understand a customers desires to the top. This allows businesses to ensure their message reaches the right customers.

Automate  Automate allows companies to export the information they need to any of the APIs they may be already using, like Klaviyo or Shopify. This provides businesses with the ability to work directly with their data in the format its analysts prefer.

Empower  Customers want to be sure the companies that have their data also protect it. Empower simplifies consent management and privacy compliance by making preferences accessible, centralized, and actionable. Paired with SkyPoint Vault, companies can rely on a cost-effective, comprehensive solution that isolates and secures sensitive data.

SkyPoints platform is built to scale with company growth. Businesses can trust a data foundation that will provide improved insights and conclusions for companies with tens of thousands to millions of customers. The platform is built to meet each companys unique needs.

SkyPoint provides all of the products a business needs to improve outcomes, said Tisson Mathew, CEO and founder of SkyPoint. Analysts and decision makers can focus on what they do best, without the cost and burden of building and managing an in-house team. With SkyPoint, leaders can concentrate on what will improve the customer experience, while providing the privacy and security customers need.

See SkyPoint in action  schedule a demo and learn more about how SkyPoint is driving business decisions here.

About SkyPoint Cloud

SkyPoint Cloud (https://skypointcloud.com/) is an industry-leading customer data platform (CDP), zero-trust data privacy vault, privacy compliance automation, analytics and AI solution for customer-centric brands in several industries including healthcare, retail, hospitality and financial services. SkyPoints platform enables organizations to take control of their customer data, deliver unmatched customer experiences and build brand loyalty. Industry leaders and more than 6 million end users currently use SkyPoint. SkyPoint Cloud was awarded The Development Stage award in the 2021 Oregon Entrepreneurs Network Annual Awards.

Media Contact

Matter Communications for SkyPoint Cloud, Inc.

skypoint@matternow.com
DPW DPW shares our vision for the future of procurement, using innovative technology to create a new ecosystem for the fair, sustainable, transparent and competitive trade of B2B goods and services. - Keith Hausmann, Chief Revenue Officer of Globality

Digital Procurement World (DPW), the worlds leading ecosystem dedicated to digitally transforming the procurement industry, today announced details of DPW Amsterdam 2022  the annual flagship conference that brings together the most innovative technology companies reshaping the procurement landscape, along with leading global corporations, and top industry thought leaders.

With Globality as headline Diamond sponsor, the event again takes over the historic Beurs van Berlage Conference Center in the heart of Amsterdam, from September 21-22, 2022, attracting attendees from across Europe and around the world to the bustling technology hub. There will be a virtual option for those who cannot attend in-person.

DPWs long-standing relationship with Globality began when the worlds first AI-powered platform and marketplace for B2B services sponsored the inaugural DPW conference in 2019. That event was described by analyst firm Spend Matters, as the best new procurement event in years.

Additional sponsors of DPW Amsterdam 2022 include scoutbee at Platinum level as well as McKinsey & Company as Knowledge Partner.

DPW is renowned as the leading global forum for showcasing cutting-edge digital procurement technology, said DPW Founder Matthias Gutzmann. We are delighted to once again have a high caliber of industry leading sponsors, led by Globality, McKinsey & Company and scoutbee, who are pushing the boundaries of how companies can transform their operating models to meet todays many challenges.

Globality is excited to again partner with DPW in bringing together procurement leaders from around the world, said Globality CRO Keith Hausmann. DPW shares our vision for the future of procurement, using innovative technology to transform the way global companies do business, creating a new ecosystem for the fair, sustainable, transparent and competitive trade of B2B goods and services.

DPW Amsterdam 20222 will be the biggest annual DPW conference yet with more than 5000 attendees expected to meet over 100 startups and hear 80 headline speakers including Gisbert Ruhl, former CEO of Kloeckner Steel, WIREDs senior innovation editor Jeremy White, and Taavi Roivas, the former Prime Minister of Estonia.

About DPW

DPW is the tech ecosystem for the global procurement industry, bringing together a diverse network of startup founders, investors, executives from technology and advisory firms, business leaders and academics to collaboratively tackle industry-wide challenges.

About Globality

Globality, the worlds first AI-powered platform and marketplace, is revolutionizing how companies buy and sell services. Globalitys digital solution replaces the archaic analog request for proposal, efficiently and effectively scoping needs, managing demand, matching companies with outstanding suppliers that meet their specific service needs and cutting the sourcing process from months to hours while delivering savings of 20% or more.

DPW Amsterdam 2022 is scheduled to take place virtually on 15-16 September. To find out more and to book your place, please visit conference.dpw.ai
Elie Azar, Founder, CEO and Managing Partner of White Wolf noted: Jonathan joins White Wolf at a time of rapid growth and will be actively involved in efforts to help further scale our business. His impressive reputation for achieving results makes him the ideal choice for the COO position.

Satter originally joined White Wolf Capital in July 2021 as a part-time Senior Advisor and member of the firms Advisory Board. Prior to affiliation with White Wolf, Satter served as Secretary of Management Services, reporting to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. In this role, Satter oversaw business functions, technology strategy, and personnel/workforce operations for the state, an enterprise with 100,000+ team members and $100 billion budget.

Prior to his public service, Satter cofounded or led two real estate services firms that were acquired by publicly traded and private equity backed firms.

Elie Azar, Founder, CEO and Managing Partner of White Wolf noted: Jonathan joins White Wolf at a time of rapid growth and will be actively involved in efforts to help further scale our business. His impressive reputation for achieving results makes him the ideal choice for the COO position.

In addition to his role as COO for White Wolf, Satter will continue his role as a board member for a number of White Wolf portfolio companies. Satter also serves as an outside Board member of Rendina Healthcare.

About White Wolf Capital

White Wolf Capital is a private investment firm that began operations in late 2011 and is focused on making both direct and indirect investments in leading middle market companies located in North America.

On the direct side, White Wolf Capital seeks both private equity as well as private credit investment opportunities in companies with $20 million to $200 million in revenues and up to $20 million in EBITDA. Typical situations include, management buyouts, leveraged buyouts, recapitalizations and investments for growth. Preferred industries include manufacturing, business services, government services, information technology, security, aerospace and defense.

In addition to making direct investments in operating companies, White Wolf Capital also looks to invest with other private fund managers as a limited partner. Targeted investment candidates are North American focused private credit funds looking to raise $50 million to $500 million in assets under management, with a focus on the lower-middle and middle-market.

For further information, please visit: http://www.whitewolfcapital.com.
World Hydrogen North America will kick-off with David Turk, Deputy Secretary, U.S. Department of Energy and Glenn Hargrove, Assistant Deputy Minister, Fuels Sector, Natural Resources Canada to discuss both governments' pathways to building hydrogen economies.

World Hydrogen Leaders and Decarbonfuse are excited to announce a stellar lineup of the people and companies that are building the hydrogen market in North America. The International Energy Agency (the IEA) estimated that a $1.2 trillion investment in hydrogen is needed globally in its 2021 Global Hydrogen Review. Due to the energy density of hydrogen, hydrogen has the potential to become a critical sustainable fuel and feedstock for industrial applications.

World Hydrogen North America will kick-off with David Turk, Deputy Secretary, U.S. Department of Energy and Glenn Hargrove, Assistant Deputy Minister, Fuels Sector, Natural Resources Canada to discuss both governments' pathways to building hydrogen economies. State and local incentives will play a pivotal role in hydrogen market supply and demand.

The North American hydrogen economy is quickly expanding to hydrogen producers, transporters, equipment manufacturers, and construction companies. Topsoe is leading the transition with a strong hydrogen technology portfolio, partnerships, and sustainability focus. Avangrid is aiming to become a top clean energy producer in the United States through wind and clean energy, including hydrogen.

Enbridge and LIFTEH2 are providing the midstream infrastructure and transportation solutions to bring hydrogen to market. McDermott is converting facilities and building new hydrogen production sources. Deloitte is taking a future of energy perspective to guide policy makers and corporates on tapping the potential of the hydrogen economy. Meet these companies and more on April 5th - 7th in Houston, Texas.

Green Power Global banked their 20 years of experience delivering clean energy research and live events, and focused their attention on providing powerful insights to their clients online. World Hydrogen Leaders began as a post-event networking platform, but was fast-tracked into the rich, hydrogen-centered content infrastructure it is today. The platform has grown to over 1,000+ members who rely on World Hydrogen Leaders insights, training courses, and events to propel the hydrogen transition.

About Green Power Global and World Hydrogen Leaders

World Hydrogen Leaders was launched in 2020 by green energy veteran Green Power Global, as the go-to knowledge & networking resource for executives and professionals. World Hydrogen Leaders already has over 1,000 members across the entire hydrogen value chain, who trust us as a source of industry intelligence. Discover more at https://www.worldhydrogenleaders.com/

About Decarbonfuse

Decarbonfuse is the community for climate and energy investors, engineers, and analysts. Follow the money flow of climate, technology, and energy investments to uncover new opportunities and jobs. Our mission is to bring together decarbonization data and news across industries so that our audience can make informed and sustainable decisions. Read more at https://decarbonfuse.com
RAMALLAH, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Ishtaye on Sunday said there is a need for an international initiative to fill the current political vacuum in light of Israel's destruction of the possibility of establishing a Palestinian state.

An official statement said that Ishtaye made the remarks during a meeting with the Swiss envoy to the Middle East Wolfgang Amadeus Brulhart.

During the meeting held in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Ishtaye accused the Israeli government of accelerating settlements building, confiscating land, and demolishing Palestinian homes in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

According to the statement, Ishtaye said that "it is necessary to compel Israel to abide by international law and respect the signed accords and treaties," adding that international law "must be indivisible and applicable everywhere and to all."

The Palestinians are looking forward to having a different approach from the international community towards finding a serious and quick solution in dealing with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Israeli settlement is the thorniest issue in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and one of the main reasons for the disruption of the last round of direct peace negotiations between the two sides in 2014.

In the June 1967 Middle East war, Israel occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which are claimed by the Palestinians, and has controlled them ever since.

Since then, the Palestinians have been seeking self-determination in a bid to establish a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. 
Summit BHC ("Summit"), a leading national provider of behavioral health and addiction treatment services based in Franklin, Tennessee, has named Dr. Brian Brooker as Senior Vice President of Quality and Compliance.

Brian brings a wealth of educational knowledge and experience to Summit, said Brent Turner, CEO of Summit. His leadership and vision will help guide Summits clinical delivery as we continue to provide the highest standard of care across our growing footprint.

Dr. Brooker comes to Summit from Signature Healthcare Services, where he was the companys Vice President of Clinical and Regulatory Services. He began his career serving 10 years in the U.S. Navy, and later returned to the Navy when he was selected to serve as an Independent Naval Instructor at the Academy of Health Sciences, teaching neuropsychiatry.

He is board certified in psychiatry and mental health, executive administration, anger resolution and healthcare accreditation. He holds a B.S. in nursing from Incarnate Word University, a masters degree from Columbia Southern University in healthcare administration and a doctoral degree from Nova Southeastern.

Im thrilled to begin work with the Summit leadership team and all of our clinical staff, Brooker said. Summit has earned an outstanding reputation for its regulatory compliance and standard of care. I look forward to leading our care teams as we seek to improve the lives we touch, and to contributing to the continued growth and improvement of Summits facilities.

About Summit

Headquartered in Franklin, Tennessee, Summit operates a leading network of behavioral health hospitals and addiction treatment centers throughout the country. The company's primary focus is on psychiatric and substance use disorder treatment within a flexible and dynamic continuum of care. The leadership team at Summit is composed of senior executives with decades of combined experience in behavioral healthcare. The company currently owns and operates 32 freestanding facilities in 19 states.
CNIs dedicated efforts toward this specialization led to becoming one of the first thirty 5G Cradlepoint partners in the United States.

CNI Sales, Inc. (CNI), a premier reseller and integrator of networking solutions and services, today announced that it has achieved 5G for Enterprise Branch Specialization from Cradlepoint, the global leader in cloud-delivered LTE and 5G wireless network edge solutions. The 5G for Enterprise Branch Specialization identifies and recognizes partner organizations that are leaders in positioning and selling Cradlepoints 5G for business solutions by meeting a series of sales, technical, and business proficiency criteria.

By receiving the specialization, CNI will support Cradlepoints efforts of selling the industrys most comprehensive portfolio of 5G solutions to meet the business imperatives of availability, interoperability, security, and manageability. CNI has provided wireless solutions to a variety of industries, like education, healthcare, government, and commercial. While in the past private LTE backup and out-of-band management met many end users needs, the private cellular CBRS allows CNI to expand its reach. CNIs dedicated efforts toward this specialization led to becoming one of the first thirty 5G Cradlepoint partners in the United States.

CNI started our relationship with Cradlepoint two years ago to help our existing healthcare customers with temporary COVID testing facilities. Our next step in our evolution with Cradlepoint was in a traditional sense, stated Jim Decker, Account Manager at CNI Sales. All of our customers can use LTE backup and/or LTE primary for quick network access at a new or branch location. Today, we not only focus on Cradlepoints traditional value, but we have also added Private LTE CBRS Private WAN into our offerings. The opening of the new private cellular spectrum options, like CBRS in the U.S., has paved the way for a powerful new option for enterprise wireless: your own private LTE and 5G network."

By combining its NetCloud platform with a clean-sheet-of-paper design for its new 5G modems and antenna systems, Cradlepoint is the first to deliver comprehensive 5G solutions for business. Specific capabilities include combining LTE, Gigabit-Class LTE, and 5G in a single wireless WAN; supporting all 5G spectrums, interoperating with existing customer SD-WAN and router infrastructures; and simplifying the entire network management lifecycle.

Cradlepoint is committed to leading the evolution of Wireless WAN and 5G and is both the first and best choice for customers in this space, said Eric Purcell, senior vice president of global partner sales at Cradlepoint. Our reseller, service provider, and technology partners play a crucial role in this mission. The addition of CNI Sales to our 5G for Enterprise Branch Specialization program is another important step in leading the path to 5G for business.

For more information on CNIs work in the industry, please visit https://cnisalesinc.com.

About CNI Sales, Inc.

CNI Sales is a family-owned, greater Philadelphia-based networking and security provider serving customers throughout the U.S. Through valued partnerships with leading and innovative vendors, CNI provides expert services delivered with no hassle. Operating by the golden rule for 25+ years has allowed business to continue to grow with some of the top large enterprises in the country, covering the healthcare, education, government, and commercial industries. CNI specializes in network infrastructure, network security, data storage, and cloud. The companys mission is to create seamless IT solutions tailored to any unique business needs so its customers can experience peace of mind knowing their data is protected and their network is reliable. We get IT. For more information, fill out a Needs Assessment at http://www.cnisalesinc.com/contact-us/.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/cni-sales-inc

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cnisales

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cnisalesinc/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/cnisales

CNI Media Inquiries

Diana Kirk

Marketing Manager

communication@cnisalesinc.com

+1 (610) 584-8040

About Cradlepoint

Cradlepoint enables the freedom to connect people, places, and things that drive more experiences, more ways to work, and better business results  anywhere. The company is a pioneer in Wireless WAN, offering advanced 4G and 5G routers and adapters  controlled through Cradlepoint NetCloudTM. Enterprise businesses and public sector agencies rely on Cradlepoint and its Cellular Intelligence to build a reliable, secure network wherever they need it, connecting fixed and temporary sites, vehicles, IoT devices, and remote employees. Headquartered in Boise, Idaho, Cradlepoint is a subsidiary of Ericssons Business Area Technologies and New Businesses division. It has international offices in Asia Pacific, Canada, Europe, India, and Latin America. http://www.cradlepoint.com

Cradlepoint Media Inquiries

Holly Langbein

Highwire PR

cradlepoint@highwirepr.com

+1 (916) 769-2199
For the second consecutive year, The San Diego Business Journal has acknowledged Maritza Diaz, CEO of ITJ, as one of the Women of Influence in Technology 2022. This honorific mention showcases female technology trailblazers' careers and accomplishments that continue to inspire women in the tech industry.

Since launching in 2019, Maritza Diaz helms ITJ, a technology services company based in San Diego, devoted to serving fast-growing, high-value market sectors that contribute to the growth of the Cali Baja region. With a Nearshore model, working with the highest quality software engineers, data scientists, and creative designers from across Mexico and Latin America, ITJ enables companies to create world-class software engineering centers of excellence in Tijuana, MX. The proximity between San Diego and Tijuana border is helping to create a thriving innovation ecosystem in the Cali Baja region allowing high-quality software engineering centers to settle and prosper.

"My team exemplifies the incredible digital talent that exists in our region. Engineers assist our clients in resolving very complex future difficulties, problems that have a large impact while also being gratifying. Amazing people behind the scenes make all the difference. This award goes to my team."

About Maritza Diaz

Maritza Diaz has established herself as a thought leader and advocate in the field of cross-border collaboration in the software industry between San Diego and Baja California to help leverage the region's strength to build a thriving innovation economy that leads the digital transformation for companies in California over the last seven years. Maritza is a seasoned technology executive with over 25 years of experience in IT and Software Engineering. She is a member of the Forbes Technology Council and is a member of the board of directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco where she represents San Diego.

About the award

The San Diego Business Journal's Women of Influence in Technology 2022 award is granted to outstanding and hardworking women in the tech sector who have made remarkable contributions in their field throughout time. The Top 50 Women of Influence 2022 are announced first, followed by SDBJ's spotlight on the 8 women of distinction.
Andrew Henkel Johnson & Quin President David Henkel states Andrew has been key in managing our major clients and instrumental in major company decisions over the past several years. He is supported by an exceptional management team, who have all been involved in the operation and growth of the company over the years.

Johnson & Quin, Inc. celebrates its 145th year in the printing industry, beginning as a ledger book printer in Chicago in 1876 and evolving into a national supplier of direct mail production and mailing. The company also announces the promotion of Andrew Henkel to President. After 33 years of leadership as CEO and President, David Henkel is handing over this key role to his son. Andrew has been with the company for 15 years, initially concentrating on sales and most recently as Vice President. During that time, his leadership has helped Johnson & Quin remain competitive in the direct mail industry. He was heavily involved in steering the company from older print technology to state-of-the-art color inkjet print and personalization which has been key to the companys growth.

Andrews new role as President is a logical signal of generational change, as well an important sign of continuity to our clients, prospects, vendors and employees, states David Henkel. Andrew has been key in managing many of our major clients and instrumental in major company decisions over the past several years. He is supported by an exceptional management team, who have all been involved in the operation and growth of the company over the years.

As a result of the Henkel familys strong leadership as well as the increase in mail volumes, Johnson & Quin is seeing significant growth in their clients programs. This has resulted in the need for more production equipment and staff to ensure meeting the higher quantities and schedules. After the initial impact of COVID, there has been a resurgence of direct mail due to the high response rates the media is experiencing as consumers adjust to the new normal with the ongoing pandemic.

To meet the higher demand and add capacity for new programs, Johnson & Quin is in the process of completing the installation of four high-speed inserters with the ability to customize the outer envelopes, as well as multiple high-speed bindery lines. A fourth Screen High-Speed Color Inkjet Press has also been installed to significantly increase the volumes of full color personalized forms that can be produced and mailed each month. These, along with other investments, will enable Johnson & Quin to produce an additional 150 million pieces annually.

With the increased volumes of mail in combination with the paper and labor shortages caused by the pandemic, the direct mail industry is seeing challenges in meeting the demand that have not been experienced in the past, according to Andrew Henkel. Luckily, we have stayed on top of the latest technology in equipment and information technology, collaborated closely with our vendor partners and adapted to the constantly changing issues to keep the mail moving into the postal system.

About Johnson & Quin

Throughout the years, Johnson & Quin has prospered by deploying the latest technologies and adapting to the changing marketplace. The company offers high-speed, high-volume direct mail production, supported by the latest technologies in data services, personalization, quality processes, certified data security practices and postal optimization. For over 145 years the company has been built on innovation, flexibility, and solid financial credentials that remain at the core of our business along with a focus on supporting our clients and their marketing programs. For more information, please visit Johnson & Quin.com.
The lockdown in Shanghai and rising cases in Western Europe have shown that multinational entities will have significant challenges going forward in maintaining a healthy workforce and intact supply chain, said Dr. Soumi Eachempati, co-founder and CEO, CLEARED4.

CLEARED4, the nations largest HIPAA-compliant health verification platform, is providing technology and COVID-19 management support for companies with a global footprint, and for those hosting conferences, events and trade shows with international guests. As COVID-19 becomes endemic, CLEARED4 is bolstering support for companies choosing to future-proof operations between waves. The companys clients include Netflix, T-Mobile, SunChemical, LiveNation, VVDN, Alterra Mountain Company, City University of New York, American Cancer Society, and many more.

As CLEARED4 continues to expand its service offerings, the platform can now interpret health passes from more than 100 countries. The platform has the ability to manage multiple countries vaccination and booster requirements, and provide HR management services.

It can take two to three months to onboard a technology partner, said Ashley John Heather, co-founder and president, CLEARED4. As we know, COVID-19 does not have a timeline, and a company needs to make quick decisions to keep its employees safe. Our platform is an inexpensive one-stop-shop for global organizations needing to keep abreast of changing requirements, protocols, and rising case counts that may affect international operations.

CLEARED4 is a turnkey platformused either as a frictionless, standalone experience or as a seamless integrated product in the app of any clientthat enables a users COVID-19 health status to be connected to any form of access control in real-time such as venue apps or specific employer tools. The flexible solution enables partners to pick any combination of COVID-19 symptom checking, test results and vaccination data to trigger access to an entire location such as a venue or a classroom or a specific zone within that location, using any form of unique identifier, including custom QR codes, government IDs, membership cards, building access cards, wearables and facial recognition.

The platform has also expanded to video proctoring, offering a long-term, cost-effective solution for clients. Video proctoring is tied to antigen testing that can be used for work, travel and events.

As the pandemic changes, the focus on COVID-19 will change. The lockdown in Shanghai and rising cases in Western Europe have shown that multinational entities will have significant challenges going forward in maintaining a healthy workforce and intact supply chain, said Dr. Soumi Eachempati, co-founder and CEO, CLEARED4. Many of our global partners understand the need to remain vigilant, and we are continuing to evolve our offerings to offer the best in class service.

For more information on CLEARED4, please visit CLEARED4.org.

About CLEARED4

CLEARED4 is the most trusted health validation platform for COVID-19 and infectious disease safety available today, helping organizations future-proof their operations. The platform enables its clients and users to return safely and confidently to businesses, schools and stadiums, globally. CLEARED4 captures, validates and matches users information to real-time health data including health surveys, temperature screening, integrated COVID-19 test results and vaccination status. All this information is then synchronized with third-party systems like door access, digital displays and other control systems. CLEARED4 also supports real-time communication via its HIPAA/FERPA-compliant platform to enterprise IT systems and partner apps. CLEARED4 automates complex health-related administrative tasks with consistent delivery of its fully interoperable and configurable platform that is quick to deploy, needing no additional software development.

CLEARED4 is helping the world reopen and stay open by issuing 10+ million safe access passes per month. CLEARED4 has been retained by organizations proactively protecting their workforce, students, visitors and fans. A partial list of CLEARED4 clients in the U.S. include corporations like Netflix, T-Mobile, Electronic Arts, Sun Chemical, Middlesex Savings Bank, law firms, hedge funds, retail shops including Spencer Gifts, venues such as Yankee Stadium, SoFI Stadium, AT&T Stadium, and educational institutions such as CUNY, Los Angeles City Colleges, School of Visual Arts, Georgetown Day School and Manhasset School District.
Today, the Seattle NFT Museum announced the third exhibition this year, titled The Climate Conversation, which will open on April 16th. This exhibit brings the climate conversation to center stage, displaying works that challenge trends and explore emerging technologies to solve mass energy consumption.

Ticket now on sale: Exhibition Opening Event, April 16th 6:30pm - 10:00pm PT

Seattle NFT Museum is hosting an opening event to launch the new exhibition. Attendees have the opportunity to hear directly from the artists and collectors on display, learning more about their work and inspiration and meeting them IRL to ask questions. Tickets are on sale now for the exhibition opening on Saturday, April 16th, 6:30pm-10:00pm. Purchase tickets here - https://www.seattlenftmuseum.com/visit

Exhibition Highlights

Featured Collection:

Open Earth #CarbonDrop

Featuring work by Refik Anadol, GMUNK, Sara Ludy, and Kyle Gordon, the Social Alpha Foundation presented a selection of the most talented NFT Artists in the world who auctioned 8 unique carbon net-negative nifties. With support from RNDR, and hosted by Nifty Gateway, all proceeds went to the Open Earth Foundation, a US-based research and deployment 501c3 nonprofit, raising funds to develop innovative open digital infrastructure for improved management of planet Earth helping track transparently the global progress on the Paris Agreement to avoid the existential risk of climate change.

The CarbonDrop was truly a before-after moment on how NFTs have empowered artists and creators to become a new power for philanthropy, supporting environmental and social causes that are as disruptive and inspiring as art itself. We have been honored to work with brilliant digital artists and a strong support network to make our work on climate change take off. Martin Wainstein, Executive Director, Open Earth Foundation

United Nations DigitalArt4Climate Collection "Humanity challenged by Climate Change" curated by Anna Dart

On November 13, 2021, thousands of delegates from over 200 countries and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) convened in Glasgow, Scotland for the biggest climate conference in history, COP26. For this special occasion DigitalArt4Climate, the first NFT Art Contest for Climate founded by GloCha in partnership with UN-Habitat, Unique Network, Exquisite Workers and Social Alpha Foundation brought together over 200 artists from 58 countries, all working at the intersection of art and technology in the hopes of inspiring a cleaner future. Unprecedented COP26 collection featured on CNN Philippines and WSJ+ champions Bricx Martillo Dumas, Eka, Amir Karimi, Chloe Hajjar, Kat Hassell, Elena Gris ,Gemma Quevedo, Davi Russo, Amazing Devya, Nico Lob, Judit Canela, Nicolle Rockstroh, Roger Haus, Exquisite Workers etc.

"Seeing the global climate change storm building up creates a lot of uncertainty, anxiety and a sense of hopelessness, but when we turn in our quest for answers on the question: What can I do, What can we do? towards culture and art, our minds brighten up and we feel inspiration and joy. Yes, we can build a haven - a societal and natural environment that nurtures and protects us when the storm hits. If we combine the transformative power of culture with the transformative power of technology, like we do with the DigitalArt4Climate initiative - we can build a movement of global angels that care for the common good and who care for Mother Earth" Miroslav Polzer, GloCha founder

We believe that through the process of appreciating art we witness the struggles and the brilliance of humanity and through the process of creating art we surrender to the brilliance within ourselves. Roger Haus, Exquisite Workers founder

Our generation has been blessed by the conspicuous opportunity to impact our world with the transformational power of Art and Blockchain together. Art is free, and looks for human expression and emotional impact on behalf of society. Blockchain allows flexible ownership models in a collective intelligence framework in search of a trustless financial system. By identifying our social priorities we can take advantage of this historical opportunity of merging art and technology to build the world we always dreamed about." Irina Karagyaur, Head of the Metaverse Growth at Unique Network

We have inherited incredible legacies from our common ancestors. Lets become the ancestors that next generations will be proud of. Let's be passionate, vulnerable and rebel for life. Lets look deeply at entirely new ways and tools to build a better world. When we act together, the whole thing is much more than the sum of the parts. Anna Dart, Exquisite Workers co-founder

Blockchain Curation: WAX

Featuring works by Robert Bohn, The Cheeseman, SENORLUPE, and Ty Carter, the WAX blockchain (Worldwide Asset eXchange) is the #1 metaverse blockchain for video games and NFTs, and the most utilized blockchain in the world with over 12 million accounts and 20 million daily transactions.

Best known as The King of NFTs, WAX is the leading NFT blockchain. It has successfully facilitated the trade of millions of NFTs from partners including Mattel, Hasbro, Funko, Sony, Capcom, MLB, Atari and more.

WAXs Delegated Proof of Stake mechanism is 125,000x more energy efficient and uses less than 0.00001% energy of Proof of Work chains, such as Bitcoin and Ethereum. As a result, Climate Care awarded WAX with a Carbon Neutral Certification in early 2021.

WAX was designed from the beginning to be incredibly energy efficient. That is why WAX NFTs use a tiny fraction of the energy of Ethereum and Bitcoin. In fact, WAX is 125,000 times more energy-efficient than Ethereum and WAX is already carbon neutral." - William Quigley, Co-Founder of WAX.

PFP Collection: Al Goanna

Al Goanna is a generative PFP project utilizing the Algorand blockchain. Their mission is to drive real world impacts, having planted 44K Trees and raised over 200,000A for their project tree fund. The PFPs chosen to display will be voted by the Al Goanna community. The Algorand blockchain seeks to be the most energy efficient proof of stake blockchain, partnering with ClimateTrade to further reduce their footprint.

"We are excited to be a part of the "climate conversation" and help change the narrative around Green NFTs. We are passionate advocates for the Algorand Blockchain and the nascent NFT eco-system that resides there. With the majority of our lives increasingly spent in digital spaces it is great to have the opportunity to take part in real life exhibitions such as this." - Ben

Seattle Artist: Maksim Surguy (@msurguy)

Maks Surguy is a digital artist and plotter enthusiast. He creates generative artworks that often come in digital and physical form at the same time. His artworks are often inspired by nature and are produced through heavy use of mathematics and coding.

This project embodies a unique take on a concept of "vector fields" within generative art. Vector fields often resemble the movement of wind in nature. Each artwork in this series was created using a set of unique mathematical formulas that shape the 3D representation of a "vector field". Each artwork is a 24 second-long looping video, revealing the resulting vector field as if it was drawn with light. As for a physical counterpart, each of the artworks can be accompanied by a machine-produced drawing or CNC-machined physical piece containing an imprint of the vector field representation. This NFT collection was minted on Tezos, an eco-friendly blockchain.

Creating an artwork on the blockchain and as a physical object at the same time provides new ways of ownership and brings new opportunities for global reach. Using only eco-friendly blockchains like Tezos, I am excited to combine digital and physical mediums to create artworks inspired by nature. Maks Surguy, artist

Seattle Collection: Neon Space

Neon Space is a collection of animated artworks based in a fictional space called Neon City. These artworks are owned and distributed as NFTs on the WAX blockchain. A cross-section of meme culture and vaporwave aesthetic, each collection represents a block of neon signs on the streets and storefronts of Neon City. Formed by a group of lifelong friends with credentials including audio engineer, visual effects artist, and graphic designer, Neon Space is the byproduct of four friends from Issaquah, WA. Louis Ramsay, Max Funke, Paul Heredia & Marc Hart.

Seattle NFT Museum Permanent Collection:

The launch of this exhibition will feature the first look of Seattle NFT Museums early permanent collection. The purpose of the permanent collection is to showcase and support as many artists as possible. The collection will be continually updated and always available to see online, with a select few on rotation at the physical museum. The first NFT on show was created by the Seattle-based team, NFT Worlds (https://www.nftworlds.com/). NFT Worlds was created to be the most powerful, cross-platform (computers/consoles), community-driven & developed metaverse platform of its kind.

Ticketing Information

Seattle NFT Museum is open to the public 11PM - 6PM Monday and Wednesday, 12PM - 6:30PM Thursday through Sunday. Daily tickets are available for purchase by visiting http://www.seattlenftmuseum.com. Admission is $15 for all visitors. Ticket proceeds directly contribute to the operating costs of the museum.

About Seattle NFT Museum

As a center for supporting the NFT creator and collector community, the Seattle NFT Museum is a physical space designed to explore the boundaries of digital art. Exhibits include featured artists, notable private collections, and educational displays. The museum hosts ticketed events, private showings, live mintings, and is open to the public for a suggested donation during business hours. Also available for booking private corporate events.
Bridgepoint Consulting Launch new office in Boston Bridgepoint is dedicated to providing experienced guidance and support so you and your team can concentrate on what matters most  building your business. Katy Booth, Director at Bridgepoint Consulting

Bridgepoint Consulting, an Addison Group company, is pleased to announce the launch of a new office in the Boston market. The growth reflects the continued momentum Bridgepoint has gained over the last several years.

Katy Booth, Director and Ross Goolsby, Principal will lead the expansion to the Boston market. Booth and Goolsby have established Bridgepoints name in the market and look forward to strengthening the companys foothold nationally.

Bridgepoint is dedicated to providing experienced guidance and support so you and your team can concentrate on what matters most  building your business, Booth said. Weve had the good fortune of forming long-term relationships with hundreds of clients, which weve continued to assist through numerous transitions and transactions. Im excited to expand on my previous Bridgepoint experiences and advance professionally in this new role and new market.

Booth has been a leader in the Systems Integration practice of Bridgepoint for over three years, focused on delivering NetSuite implementations to clients across the Private Equity, SaaS, and Manufacturing & Distribution industries. Booth will be relocating from Austin, TX, to Boston, MA.

In todays competitive and ever-changing market, top-tier talent is required to complete critical initiatives, optimize financial operations, and maintain a strategic advantage. Our outstanding team of professionals will continue to lead our clients to organizational transformation, and I couldnt be more excited to bring our expertise to a new market where we can deliver exceptional results to new partnerships, commented Goolsby.

Goolsby was recently promoted to Principal and will be instrumental in launching the Boston office. Ross has been a leader in the Financial Operations practice of Bridgepoint for over six years and led the expansion into the Houston market as Managing Director.

We are looking forward to Katys leadership and professional advancement as she takes on the role of Director in Boston, Manuel Azuara, Managing Principal at Bridgepoint, said. Her skills and expertise are essential as Bridgepoint expands our financial operations consulting services to this new market.

Bridgepoint will focus on bringing Financial Operations solutions to the Boston market and target and serve middle-market clients through their financial, technology, and risk expertise. Bridgepoints Boston office opening will also strengthen the companys relationship with ArcLight Consulting, a provider of comprehensive Human Capital Management (HCM) Cloud Implementation services, continuing to build cloud solutions in Boston through partnerships with Oracle and NetSuite. ArcLight Consulting, based in Burlington, MA, was acquired by Addison Group in 2021.

About Bridgepoint Consulting:

Bridgepoint Consulting, an Addison Group company, is a leading management consulting firm that helps companies throughout their business lifecycle. We offer a broad range of finance, technology and risk/compliance services to support clients from the startup phase all the way to IPO readiness and beyond. Since 1999, weve been helping executives and management teams reduce their business and operational risks, bridge resource gaps and improve overall performance. Whether an organization needs interim expertise to improve infrastructure and processes, or strategic management of a major transition or transaction, our team of qualified professionals can help. Additional offices include Austin, Dallas, Denver and Houston, with an additional presence in Seattle, Minneapolis, and Philadelphia. To learn more about Bridgepoint Consulting and how it can help serve your organization, please visit https://bridgepointconsulting.com.

About Addison Group:

Addison Group is a leading professional services firm specializing in talent solutions and consulting services, offering a full suite of capabilities across multiple sectors, including information technology, finance and accounting, healthcare, human resources, administrative, and digital marketing. With five consulting services brands (AIM Consulting, Bridgepoint Consulting, DLC, Kranz Consulting, Arclight Consulting) and four talent solution brands (Addison Group, Mondo, CVPartners, Beacon Resources). Addisons growing network of professionals, offices across the United States, and deep relationships in regional and local markets provide clients with a one-stop resource focused on building relationships, human connections, and helping consultants and clients find each other.

Even during significant national expansion, Addison has maintained a local consultative business approach dedicated to its people-first culture. Addison continues to be recognized with accolades for top performance and workplace culture, including Inc. 5000, Inc. Best Workplaces, Crains Fast Fifty, Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA) Staffing 100 List, and multiple Regional Top Workplaces. Learn more at https://addisongroup.com
These insights help plan sponsors determine the right steps to deliver positive retirement outcomes for their employees, especially as businesses are transitioning to the post-pandemic normal, said Eric Ryles, VP of Customer Solutions.

Judy Diamond Associates, a unit of ALM Global, LLC, has published the results of its sixth annual 401(k) Plan Benchmark Report. This in-depth analysis examines almost 600,000 active 401(k) plans, covering more than 90 million eligible workers and $6.8 trillion dollars in total retirement assets. 27 different industrial groupings were reviewed and segmented by size, from micro plans with 1-10 people to mega plans with 5,000 or more participants.

The complete 401(k) Plan Benchmark Report is available for free at: https://www.judydiamond.com/products/401k-benchmark-report/

This report presents unbiased, data-supported insights into the 401(k) plans offered by employers in a wide variety of industries, said study author Eric Ryles, Vice President of Customer Solutions at Judy Diamond Associates. These insights help plan sponsors determine the right steps to deliver positive retirement outcomes for their employees, especially as businesses are transitioning to the post-pandemic normal. Identifying and correcting retirement plan deficiencies is an important part of attracting and retaining talent.

The studys conclusions include:



While the overall numbers continued to climb, year-over-year growth rates fell dramatically.

Median Employee Contributions Per Participant grew by 7.8%, the biggest annual increase ever tracked, as many lower-dollar contributors stopped contributing entirely while high-dollar contributors were unaffected, thus driving up the median contribution.

Employer contribution matches managed to grow 1.7% in 2020, however this is a substantial slowing from the 7.2% growth observed in the 2019 plan year as many employers suspended or delayed matching contributions during the pandemic.

Learn more about Judy Diamond Associates, the leading provider of employee benefits lead generation & recruitment Tools at http://www.judydiamond.com.

About Judy Diamond Associates

ALMs Judy Diamond Associates is the premier provider of sales, prospecting, and plan analysis tools for the benefits brokers, financial advisors, plan providers, and carriers serving the employee benefits and retirement markets. With a promise for comprehensive and current data, Judy Diamond Associates offers instant access to 5500 plan data and a broad suite of analytical tools to support lead generation, relationship building, market research and plan analysis needs. Judy Diamond Associates business is built on a commitment to superb customer service and data integrity. Visit http://www.judydiamond.com for more information.

About ALM

ALM, an information and intelligence company, provides customers with critical news, data, analysis, marketing solutions, and events to successfully manage the business of business. ALM serves a community of over 6 million business professionals seeking to discover, connect and compete in highly complex industries. Please visit http://www.alm.com for more information, and visit http://www.alm.com/events/ to learn about our upcoming events. Please follow us on Twitter at @ALMMedia.
Atagi Plastic Surgery & Skin Aesthetics in Lone Tree, Colorado is excited to now provide HydraFacial Elite, an award-winning skin resurfacing treatment with zero downtime. HydraFacial Elite's patented vortex technology delivers hydrating and revitalizing serums to the skin. The end result is radiant, intensely revitalized skin!

Atagi Plastic Surgery & Skin Aesthetics in Lone Tree, Colorado is excited to now provide HydraFacial Elite, an award-winning skin resurfacing treatment that combines patented technology, medical-grade serums and state-of-the-art treatment additions for a wide range of complexion improvements with zero downtime.

The clinically proven benefits of HydraFacial Elite include:



Smoothing fine lines and wrinkles

Improving elasticity and firmness

Evening tone and enhancing vibrance

Smoothing skin texture

Diminishing brown spots

Improving oily and congested skin

Shrinking enlarged pores

Healthier, fuller looking hair

HydraFacial Elites three-step process:

1) CLEANSE + PEEL

Gentle exfoliation of dead skin cells and resurfacing

2) EXTRACT + HYDRATE

Remove debris from pores with patented vortex suction before applying intense moisturizer

3) FUSE + PROTECT

Replenish skin with antioxidants and peptides to maximize your glow

How HydraFacial Elite works

HydraFacial Elite uses a HydroPeel tip, which has a spiral design to create a vortex effect. This vortex action is paired with proprietary vacuum suction, which work in tandem to dislodge impurities and debris from skin cells with incredible comfort and ease. This vortex technology simultaneously delivers hydrating and revitalizing serums to skin. The end result is radiant, intensely revitalized skin!

HydraFacial Elite Boosters

HydraFacial has partnered with medical-grade skin care brands (Alastin, Epicutis, Murad, Sente, ZO Skin Health, Circadia) to formulate treatment boosters for targeted results. These boosters are formulated to target every possible skin concern, from fine lines and wrinkles to age spots, dullness and skin laxity. HydraFacial Elite has also designed results-driven serums including HydraFacial Keravive Peptide Complex Booster, which works to enhance scalp and hair health, and NassifMD Hydraglucan Intense Hydration Booster, which imparts radiance, shine and intense hydration to skin.

To learn more about HydraFacial Elite or to schedule a consultation at Atagi Plastic Surgery & Skin Aesthetics, please call (303) 872-5103 or visit us online.

About Dr. Tanya Atagi, MD

Honored by her peers as Top Doctor in Denvers 5280 magazine for several consecutive years, Dr. Tanya Atagi is one of only a handful of board-certified female plastic surgeons in Colorado. She has built her practice based on a combined passion for medicine and arts, providing a unique yet ideal skill set for a plastic surgeon who is committed to helping patients look and feel their very best.

After completing medical school at Stanford, Dr. Atagi received her plastic surgery training from the Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, followed by specialized fellowship training in Denver. She is board-certified by the American Society of Plastic Surgery and has published multiple papers on a wide range of topics including nerve regeneration, implantable medical devices, breast enhancement and the safety of implants.

About Atagi Plastic Surgery & Skin Aesthetics

Atagi Plastic Surgery & Skin Aesthetics is known throughout the Denver metropolitan area and beyond for exceptional service from a highly experienced and dedicated team. Acclaimed by patients for both the quality of their work and the most compassionate care, the staff at Atagi Plastic Surgery & Skin Aesthetics has been honored to serve clients for nearly two decades.

Committed to helping patients achieve total body health and beauty, Atagi Plastic Surgery & Skin Aesthetics provides a comprehensive selection of treatments, including liposuction, AccuTite, FaceTite, BodyTite, breast augmentation, tummy tuck, Morpheus8 RF microneedling, PRP skin rejuvenation, PRP hair restoration, PRP sexual wellness for men and women, PRP breast lift, bio-identical hormone replacement therapy, BBL  photofacial, Halo fractional laser skin resurfacing, MicroLaserPeel, Botox, dermal fillers, laser hair removal, Ultherapy skin tightening, Exilis skin tightening, Vanquish ME non-invasive fat removal, HydraFacial Elite, medical facials, medical-grade skin care products and much more.
CavSoft, a leading provider of estimating and takeoff software to the Australian construction industry, was acquired by JDM Technology Group. We are very pleased to welcome CavSoft and their customers. Their estimating software is an excellent addition to our global portfolio of construction software companies.

JDM Technology Group, a global group of leading software providers for the architecture, engineering, construction, maintenance, and operations industries, announced today that it has acquired Oxley, Queensland based, CavSoft. CavSoft is a leading provider of estimating and takeoff software for the Australian construction industry. The purchase closed on March 31, 2022, with approval from CavSofts founder and principal Paul Funnell.

CavSofts estimating software helps contractors in the plumbing, building, electrical, and civil works industries reduce estimating time so they can win more work and grow their businesses.

CavSoft will join Spearhead Software, a JDM Technology Group company with expertise in estimating software for the Australian electrical industry, based out of Kelmscott, Western Australia. Phil Johnstone, Managing Director of Spearhead Software, will lead CavSoft, while Spearheads Kerry Busby will assume responsibility for sales and client management. Founder and principal Paul Funnell will be advising throughout the transition.

In a statement on the sale, CavSoft founder Paul Funnell said, I am proud of the company I founded and the relationships that I have made along the way. I can think of no better legacy than the assurance that CavSofts customers and software will continue to be supported within the JDM Technology family of construction software providers.

We are very pleased to welcome CavSoft and their customers. Their estimating software is an excellent addition to our global portfolio of construction software companies, said JDM CEO Jim McFarlane. We are a private, family business focused on the long-term. This strategy continues to make the JDM Technology Group an excellent home for software companies.

CavSofts estimating and takeoff software are an excellent fit with the JDM Technology Group, added Phil Johnstone of Spearhead. JDM and Spearhead will continue to strengthen the CavSoft team and product by providing access to additional resources, technology, and support from our global family of construction software companies.

About CavSoft Software

CavSoft is a leading provider of estimating and takeoff software to the Australian construction industry. For more than 25 years, their intuitive, reliable software has helped plumbers, builders, electricians, and other contractors win more work and increase profits.

About JDM Technology Group

JDM Technology Group is a global software business focused on delivering business software systems for the architecture, engineering, construction, and operations industries with over 150,000 users served in 40 countries on 7 continents, employing over 550 staff. The JDM Technology Groups core philosophy is a long-term commitment to customer support and service coupled with providing the best possible solutions to customers.

JDM Technology Group companies include CavSoft, CSSP, CostCon, LEVESYS, Nimbus, Plusfactor, and Spearhead Software in Australia and New Zealand; Builder Software Tools, Computer Guidance Corporation, ConEst Software, Explorer Software, EPAC, IndustrySmarts, JOBPOWER, Maestro Technologies, MicroMain Corporation, MPulse Software, TeamWORKS, and Vision InfoSoft in North America; and Estimate, Integrity, RedSkyIT, Rendra, and Safran in the UK, Europe and the Middle East.
People attend an event to mourn victims of a mass shooting at a park in Sacramento, California, the United States, April 3, 2022. The Sacramento Police Department confirmed Sunday afternoon that six adults were killed and 12 other people were injured in a mass shooting early morning in the capital city of California. (Photo by Li Jianguo/Xinhua)

LOS ANGELES, April 3 (Xinhua) -- The Sacramento Police Department confirmed Sunday afternoon that six adults were killed and 12 other people were injured in a mass shooting early morning in the capital city of California.

The authority agreed that gun violence is truly a crisis in the local community and has been rising not only in Sacramento but across the nation.

Sacramento Police Chief Kathy Lester told a press conference that the shootings broke out after a large fight in downtown, and killed three men and three women. But she did not release any details about the suspect or a possible motive.

Nearby buildings were hit by gunfire and a stolen handgun was recovered at the scene, Lester said, adding that the investigators suspected that multiple shooters were involved in the tragic incident.

According to her, police were patrolling the area at about 2 a.m. local time (0900 GMT) when they heard gunfire. When police arrived at the scene, they found a large crowd gathering on the street and began lifesaving measures to multiple victims on scene. However, six victims were pronounced deceased at the scene.

In a video showed by local KCRA 3 news channel, some strong young men grappled with each other first in a street, then sound of gunfire could be heard in background. As the crowd of people running through the street, screams could be heard as they ran to safety.

KCRA 3 said they counted 76 gunshots in this video and called the incident as the fatalist shooting in the city's history.

Danni Chisick, a guest slept in a hotel near the scene, told KCRA 3 that she awoke to the sounds of gunfire, and when the shots stopped she realized that it was not just a little shooting.

Sergio Harris, a 38-year-old father of three, was one of the six people killed in the incident. His mother confirmed the bad news to KCRA 3, saying "for this to happen is crazy. I'm just to the point right now, I don't know what to do. I don't even feel like this is real. I feel like this is a dream."

Sunday's shooting, called by California Governor Gavin Newsom as "another horrendous act of gun violence," triggered a fury against the gun crimes in the local community.

"What we do know at this point is that another mass casualty shooting has occurred, leaving families with lost loved ones, multiple individuals injured and a community in grief," Newsom said in a statement, "The scourge of gun violence continues to be a crisis in our country, and we must resolve to bring an end to this carnage."

Sergio Harris' wife Leticia Harris also spoke to KCRA 3, saying "this is a sad and terrible act of violence that took the lives of many. I want answers, so I can have closure for my children."

Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg called gun violence "a sickness" and tweeted that "Rising gun violence is the scourge of our city, state and nation, and I support all actions to reduce it."

"We must do more, as a city, as a state and as a nation. This senseless epidemic of gun violence must be addressed," he noted.

Gun violence has been on the rise across the United States in the past few years, a trend fueled by a confluence of factors, from the economic and social disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic to the unrest during the 2020 elections, as well as a surge in gun sales.

More than 17,000 people have died or been injured due to gun violence in the United States so far this year, during which the country has seen at least 110 mass shootings, according to a database run by the nonprofit research group Gun Violence Archive.

On Sunday evening, U.S. President Joe Biden responded to the shooting in a statement, calling for banning ghost guns, or unregistered firearms, requiring background checks for all gun sales, and banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.

However, some argued that Washington should trail the gun violence problem from roots.

Retired Sacramento Police Chief Daniel Hahn called Sunday's shooting an "all too familiar tragedy," and noted that people must address the root causes and "come together with solutions to stop repeating cycles of violence." 

People mourn for victims of a mass shooting at a park in Sacramento, California, the United States, April 3, 2022. The Sacramento Police Department confirmed Sunday afternoon that six adults were killed and 12 other people were injured in a mass shooting early morning in the capital city of California. (Photo by Li Jianguo/Xinhua)

People mourn for victims of a mass shooting at a park in Sacramento, California, the United States, April 3, 2022. The Sacramento Police Department confirmed Sunday afternoon that six adults were killed and 12 other people were injured in a mass shooting early morning in the capital city of California. (Photo by Li Jianguo/Xinhua)

People attend an event to mourn victims of a mass shooting at a park in Sacramento, California, the United States, April 3, 2022. The Sacramento Police Department confirmed Sunday afternoon that six adults were killed and 12 other people were injured in a mass shooting early morning in the capital city of California. (Photo by Li Jianguo/Xinhua)

People mourn for victims of a mass shooting at a park in Sacramento, California, the United States, April 3, 2022. The Sacramento Police Department confirmed Sunday afternoon that six adults were killed and 12 other people were injured in a mass shooting early morning in the capital city of California. (Photo by Li Jianguo/Xinhua)
It is with great pleasure and honor that I tell this story of two extraordinary southern men during a tumultuous time in the history of the United States, Hardy said. This is a story about a time when Black people and white people did not associate with each other in parts of the south.

Author Kathryn J. Hardy has published the inspirational, true story of a dental school graduate on a USS Navy ship headed for Antarctica. Determined to uncover the secret of success, Johnny embarks on a journey to find love, wealth and happiness in the 1960s and 70s. Along the way, he crosses paths with a Black domestic worker named Otis. After returning, Johnny begins fighting for equal rights in Atlanta, Ga., with the help of his newfound sidekick, Otis.

The pair encounter injustices, sacrifices, unrest and near-death experiences. Through it all, the southern men rely on humor and courage to rise above troubling times in America and preach respect for people of all colors and from all walks of life. As they grew from young men with insatiable appetites for life, happiness, and success; each rose above troubled times to become the individuals they are today.

Hardy has gotten to know Johnny and Otis personally over the years. She has spent countless hours listening to their stories of adventure, success, love and even murder. Hardy shares the story of Johnny and Jazzbo with respect to all human beings. Their journey of life lessons created many remarkable experiences for Johnny and Otis.

One of the most prodigious parts of this book is the enormous accomplishments that followed their lives during the 1960s and 70s. In a short period of time, two very extraordinary men bonded in a then-uncommon relationship. As individuals, Johnny and Otis both accepted their pasts and looked to their futures, bonding an unbreakable friendship for a lifetime. Through each other, they discovered who they were as individuals and as humans, rather than through the racial prejudices of the time. Beating all odds, they were unstoppable, living their lives rather than wishing for a different existence.

It is with great pleasure and honor that I tell this story of two extraordinary southern men during a tumultuous time in the history of the United States, Hardy said. This is a story about a time when Black people and white people did not associate with each other in parts of the south.

Hardy emphasizes that the best way to learn life lessons is under unpredictable and less-than-perfect circumstances, and demonstrates how people survive racism through humanity, love and positive attitudes.

Johnny and Jazzbo

By Kathryn J. Hardy

ISBN: 978-1-6657-1453-2 (softcover); 978-1-6657-1455-6 (e-book)

Available through Archway Publishing, Barnes & Noble, Amazon and http://www.kathrynjhardybooks.com

About the author

Kathryn J. Hardy graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Art Education from Wesleyan College in Macon, Ga. She is an accomplished portrait artist, fashion and perfume designer. Through worldwide travels with her husband, Ron, Hardy discovered her love for writing. Through this outlet, her creativity has exploded into fiction and nonfiction works, offering a unique and inspiring view on life. For more information or an autographed copy, please visit http://www.kathrynjhardybooks.com.

General Inquiries, Review Copies & Interview Requests:

LAVIDGE  Phoenix

Haylee Elmore

480-998-2600 | helmore@lavidge.com


The Compression Works multi-functional, life-saving device stops traumatic bleeding resulting from non-compressible hemorrhages. We are diligently working to help support this effort to get the devices in the hands of those who can save the lives of those on the front lines and caught in the cross-fire of this conflict, said President and CEO of Compression Works, Inc. Scott Dodson.

Compression Works, Inc. maker of the Abdominal Aortic and Junctional Tourniquet-Stabilized (AAJT-S) device, announces a relief effort to support the people of Ukraine with its life-saving hemorrhage control solution. The AAJT-S devices are intended to help warfighters and civilians who have been injured as a result of the Russia invasion.

We were honored to have met Mr. Ivan Danchak, a Ukranian native who immigrated to the United States in 2004. After joining the U.S. military as an infantryman, he deployed to Al-Asad Iraq with the 3rd Infantry Division in 2010  2011. Like so many ex-patriate citizens, Mr. Danchak has family and friends still in Ukraine who are fighting for their freedom, homes and country following the invasion, said President and CEO of Compression Works, Inc. Scott Dodson. Mr. Danchak has been raising relief funds in the United States to purchase medical equipment for the war effort and we were humbled to have the opportunity to provide his group with devices to send to the region to help save lives, said Dodson.

The Compression Works device is designed to stop traumatic bleeding resulting from non-compressible hemorrhages. The AAJT-S is being used by the U.S. military, U.S. special operations forces, allied special operations units and in the pre-hospital EMS segment around the world to stop non-compressible hemorrhages and save lives. The U.S. Department of Defense estimates that more than 20% of injured soldiers can be saved if the bleeding that they endure at the point of injury can be stopped so that they can be stabilized and transported to definitive care. This also translates to civilians that are injured in conflicts and for traumatic pre-hospital injuries as well, added Dodson.

The AAJT-S can be used to stop bleeding in the upper and lower extremities, and is the only device FDA cleared for use on the abdomen. The device can also be used to stabilize pelvic fractures, has been studied to demonstrate equivalence to Zone 3 REBOA and is completely non-invasive, making it the most multi-functional, life-saving tourniquet available today. The device has documented lives saved for both upper and lower applications and has more than 70 peer-reviewed publications demonstrating its safety and effectiveness, said co-inventor and Chief Medical Officer of Compression Works Dr. John Croushorn.

As a newer citizen of the United States, my allegiance is to this country. My heart, passion and resources are being directed to Ukraine as my home country fights the tyranny of an invading army that is threatening democracy and the very lives of my family and friends still there, said Ivan Danchak. I am grateful for the support of Compression Works to help the freedom fighters and citizens of Ukraine who are being injured in this struggle, continued Danchak.

We are diligently working to help support this effort to get the devices in the hands of those who can save the lives of those on the front lines and caught in the cross-fire of this conflict, said Dodson. We encourage everyone to get involved to help the besieged country of Ukraine and its citizens who are fighting to preserve their country and the lives of those that they love.

To learn more about Mr. Ivan Danchaks relief efforts or to contribute, contact him at ksmdanchak@gmail.com or visit https://gofund.me/6f2930ba.

About Compression Works

Compression Works is the developer and manufacturer of the Abdominal Aortic and Junctional Tourniquet-Stabilized (AAJT-S) medical device. The company delivers innovative solutions to meet the most pressing and unmet needs of emergency healthcare providers and military medical caregivers. Compression Works is committed to hemorrhage control research, identifying capability gaps and developing technologies and products to help facilitate the delivery of quality life-saving care. The life-saving multi-use technology is used by the U.S. military, trauma centers, rural emergency departments, EMS and federal and local law enforcement agencies. The AAJT-S device is proudly manufactured and assembled in the USA. Compression Works is a veteran owned business dedicated to saving lives on and off the battlefield. http://www.compressionworks.com
Loai Bataineh Loai Bataineh was recognized among the Top 25 influential ex-pats and among the Top 100 CEOs in Oman for many years by OER Oman.

A seasoned and successful investment banker with over three decades of track record in commercial banking, investment banking, asset, and wealth management. He works with toptier GCC and American banks as a clients and business partners, as well as SWF and PE and Hedge Fund institutions across MENA.

Mr. Bataineh established the Investment Banking business within Oman Arab Bank SAOC back in 1998, which became the top-ranked investment banking outfit in Oman. Created opportunities, raised funds, successfully delivered over 50 corporate finance and advisory transactions, valued at over USD 8 billion. He advised debt restructuring on several transactions totaling over USD 1 billion. Managed more than USD 1.3 billion of assets under management and custody.

Loai Bataineh was recognized among the Top 25 influential ex-pats and among the Top 100 CEOs in Oman for many years by OER Oman. He worked closely with one of the biggest banks in Oman to spin off the business with a valuation of over USD 45 million. He was the founding CEO of one of the companies that the Capital Market Authority (CMA) in Oman regulated. A full-service investment banking firm with Assets under Management and Custody of over USD 1.3 billion. He delivered profits from the year of operations itself and dividends paid out to shareholders.

Loai Bataineh was an active presenter in Business forms, conferences and panel discussions and he contributes regular articles to business magazines and newspapers in both Arabic and English languages. He also was and is a board member of several companies and mutual funds publicly listed and regulated entities.

Mr. Bataineh is an active member of a lot of governments and Business committees within GCC. He has a tremendous network and relationship across GCC markets.


Image of DMI's Spring Expo event virtual lobby

Dynamic Marketing Inc. (DMI) is celebrating the success of their Spring Expo; a virtual event hosted through events platform vFairs. The event was exclusively hosted for DMI members, all independent appliance retailers, to keep informed and up-to-date on whats happening in the appliance industry straight from appliance giants.

The event was opened by DMIs own Director of Operations, Alan Joskowicz, who discussed the amazing achievements of DMIs membership and gave an overview of the company itself to new members. Attendees were then welcomed to join interactive webinar sessions and roam the virtual exhibit hall. Vendors were available to chat with attendees and shared product information with attendees in their virtual exhibit booths. Vendors featured in the exhibit hall included Electrolux, Samsung, Whirlpool, GE, and LG.

On the event day, high levels of engagement were reported. In fact, DMI noted:



Over 15 unique manufacturer/partner booths represented

Over 260 unique booth visits

Over 200 webinar views

DMI is much more than the longest-running, continuously operating appliance buying group in the US. We are a business partner to all our members, providing vital services and support. Using the vFairs platform over the past two years has helped our members learn from our manufacturer partners during COVID when in-person meetings werent possible. The customer support and technical expertise vFairs gave to our organization, our members, and our exhibitors was greatly appreciated. -Alan Joskowicz, DMI, Director of Operations.

We are so happy to have provided a platform that helped DMI and its members network and learn in order to improve their retail services, said Muhammad Younas, CEO of vFairs.

DMI is committed to providing its members with opportunities like the Spring Expo, where retailers can learn and stay up to date with the latest from large vendors. DMI Members have grown together over 80% in their sales in the last 3 years with positive signs this growth will continue throughout 2022.

If youd like to become a member of DMI, please visit their website to register or learn more.

About Dynamic Marketing Inc.

Dynamic Marketing Incorporated (DMI) is a private co-op business founded in 1957 originally from Brooklyn, New York now located in Hamilton Township, NJ. For over 60 years of business we have purchased consumer electronics and appliances at wholesale prices from various vendors, and then make them available to our members who sell the merchandise to end consumers through their storefronts. This concept helps Dynamic Marketing's members compete with other "big box" appliance and electronics retailers in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Connecticut.

About vFairs

vFairs strives to deliver top-class virtual events for all audiences with an intuitive platform that recreates physical events through an immersive online experience. With a range of powerful features and dedicated support for users worldwide, vFairs removes the hassles of physically organizing, exhibiting, and attending events such as conferences, trade shows, and career fairs. vFairs is a 2021 Mid-Market Leader in the Virtual Event Platforms Category by G2.
I always thought about opening a British Swim School one day, so when the opportunity to buy into the existing business presented itself, I jumped at the chance." - Kalaine Uddenberg, British Swim School franchisee

British Swim School, the nations leading learn to swim franchise company, welcomes its newest franchise owner, Kalaine Uddenberg, to the family.

Uddenberg recently purchased a majority share of the British Swim School franchise in Mississauga, which has been serving the Greater Toronto area (GTA) for the past five years. Prior to becoming the owner, Uddenberg was the companys aquatics director.

An elementary school teacher for more than a decade, Uddenberg is also a lifelong swim safety advocate. She has been a nationally licensed lifeguard for more than 17 years and is thrilled to combine her passion for teaching people how to swim with her desire to own a business.

I always thought about opening a British Swim School one day, so when the opportunity to buy into the existing business presented itself, I jumped at the chance, says Uddenberg. Our area is filled with beautiful lakes and rivers, as well as public and backyard pools  which provide plenty of risk if someone does not know how to swim."

There are approximately 500 drowning incidents (both fatal and non-fatal) each year in Canada, according to the Lifesaving Society. 92% of the drowning deaths that involve children three years and younger are attributed to a lack of adult supervision.

As a mom myself, I get how challenging it is to be a parent. We need to give our children survival skills so when they sneak out of our line of sight around a pool or other body of water, they will have a fighting chance should they fall in. I am thrilled to be part of the British Swim School mission  survival of the littlest.

British Swim School, a premier swim school franchise, launched in England in 1981. It was then brought to the United States and Canada and eventually grew to more than 200 locations.

We fell in love with Kalaine Uddenberg when she joined us as an Aquatics Lead. Now to have her as one of our franchise owners is an even bigger thrill. She has such incredible skills and knowledge when it comes to swim instruction. We could say we are lucky to have her in the British Swim School family, but it is the families in the Greater Toronto area that will benefit the most said Ashley Gundlach, British Swim School President.

British Swim School of Greater Toronto has several schools in Mississauga and Brampton. For more information about locations and class times, visit https://britishswimschool.com/greater-toronto/.

About British Swim School

British Swim School, the nations most established swim school franchise with over 40 years in business believes that every individual, regardless of age or ability, should have the opportunity to become a safe and happy swimmer. Offering lessons for babies, children, and adults, the brand is dedicated to its mantra, Survival of the Littlest, focusing first on the survival skills needed to survive a water accident, then moving on to stroke development and more advanced skills. Not only does British Swim Schools give peace of mind to countless families who seek the essential life skill the brand offers their children, the purpose-driven franchise offers an exceptional opportunity for entrepreneurs who seek a fulfilling business venture with a sound foundation, low investment, and easily scalable model. Part of the Buzz Franchise Brands family, British Swim School currently operates over 215 schools across the United States and Canada.

For more information about British Swim School, visit http://www.britishswimschool.com.

To learn more about the benefits of British Swim Schools franchising opportunities, visit http://www.britishswimschoolfranchise.com.
Greenberg Traurig Expands Finance & Restructuring Capabilities; Adds Thijs Elseman in Amsterdam Adding Thijs to our Amsterdam office is part of our strategic expansion in Europe and beyond with highly qualified lawyers in practices that meet the needs of clients now and that are poised to grow with clients needs," Greenberg Traurig Executive Chairman Richard A. Rosenbaum said.

The Amsterdam office of international law firm Greenberg Traurig, LLP welcomes Thijs Elseman as a Shareholder in its Finance & Restructuring Practice. Elseman joins Greenberg Traurig from De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek.

Thijs has the experience to further enhance the Finance & Restructuring Practice we established in Amsterdam in 2020 when Shareholder Sabine Schoute and Of Counsel Lilian Welling-Steffens joined the firm, as well as our Global Restructuring & Bankruptcy Practice, which recently expanded in London by adding John Houghton, Greenberg Traurig Executive Chairman Richard A. Rosenbaum said. Adding Thijs to our Amsterdam office is part of our strategic expansion in Europe and beyond with highly qualified lawyers in practices that meet the needs of clients now and that are poised to grow with clients needs. Despite the disruptive times the world is facing, we have been able to independently execute our strategic plans because of our commitment to the firms deeply rooted cultural values of empowerment, respect, trust, and financial discipline, and our unparalleled ability to respond to clients, and to opportunities nimbly, as one global, unified firm.

Elseman has more than 12 years of experience in corporate finance and restructuring. He advises companies, investment banks, financial institutions, and private equity investors on a wide range of corporate finance transactions. In addition, Elseman focuses on complex, distressed financing transactions and cross-border restructurings.

We are delighted to have Thijs join us, GT Amsterdam Co-Managing Shareholder Cees van Oevelen said. This is another confirmation of the success of our strategic expansion. Recently, we appointed Coco van Zuiden as a Shareholder, and also had Local Partner Robert Hardy join GT.

Shari L. Heyen and David B. Kurzweil, Co-Chairs of the firms Global Restructuring & Bankruptcy Practice, said, The plan is to continue to build out the restructuring group in both Europe and the United States. Thijs brings a wealth of experience. We very much look forward to our international collaboration.

Elseman added, I'm thrilled to join Greenberg Traurig and to work with my new colleagues. The firms global platform, excellent Global Finance and Bankruptcy & Restructuring Practices, and the momentum of Greenberg Traurig in Amsterdam, illustrated by the move to Valley on the Zuidas, offer a unique and exciting opportunity to build on the strong Finance & Restructuring team in Amsterdam.

Greenberg Traurig Amsterdam

Greenberg Traurig Amsterdam is an integrated part of global law firm Greenberg Traurig, LLP, which has more than 2400 attorneys, tax consultants, and civil-law notaries, in 42 locations in the United States, Europe, Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East. The firm, often recognized for its focus on philanthropic giving, innovation, diversity, and pro bono, reported gross revenue of over $2 Billion for FY 2021. The firm is consistently among the top firms on the Am Law 100, Am Law Global 100, NLJ 250, and Law360 (US) 400. On the debut 2022 Law360 Pulse Leaderboard, it is a Top 15 firm. Greenberg Traurig is Mansfield Rule 4.0 Certified Plus by The Diversity Lab and net carbon neutral with respect to its office energy usage. Web: http://www.gtlaw.com.
Grinnell Mutual has built a reputation for living its corporate values on every day. We call this the Grinnell Mutual Way. Grinnell Mutual continues to treat its employees as what they truly are: the most important factor in our business success, Vogts said.

Grinnell Mutual has received the 2022 Gallup Exceptional Workplace Award (GEWA). The award recognizes the most engaged workplace cultures globally.

By connecting employee engagement to every aspect of their culture, these organizations fuel the motivation and innovation that drive business results far beyond their competition around the world and give people what they really want from their careers and lives: belonging, learning, and growth, recognition, a great manager, and the opportunity to do what they do best every day.

Gallups 2022 GEWA winners have steered their organizations through another unprecedented and challenging year. They didnt slow down or hit pause during times of uncertainty. They stayed true to their organizational values. Gallup commends all the 2022 GEWA winners for their resiliency, determination, and commitment to making their people a priority, said Jim Harter, Gallups chief scientist of workplace management and wellbeing.

Jeff Vogts, Grinnell Mutuals vice president of Talent Development, said the companys culture of trust and respect has always been a draw for potential talent.

Grinnell Mutual has built a reputation for living its corporate values on every day. We call this the Grinnell Mutual Way. Grinnell Mutual continues to treat its employees as what they truly are: the most important factor in our business success, Vogts said.

The deep commitment we have to our employees and to keeping the promises we make to customers is fundamental to the way we do business. How we rose to the challenges of 2020 and 2021 and emerged not only whole, but even stronger as both an employer and an insurer, confirmed what we have always known, he said.

If you build a business around doing whats right  for the company, the customers, and each other  not only does employee engagement reflect that, the bottom line does, too. We are very happy to win this prestigious award for a second year in a row.

Because 70 percent of GEWA winners employees are engaged, those companies turnover rate is 43 percent lower, productivity is 18 percent higher, and profitability is 23 percent higher than at other workplaces.

Its amazing what can be accomplished when your team has a collective vision and purpose. Grinnell Mutual is an employee-focused company and we are so fortunate to have the best employees in the nation. Every day we receive wonderful stories about the great service our teams provide our customers, said Grinnell Mutual President and CEO Jeff Menary. They truly care about their company, their customers, their communities, and their co-workers. I believe the work and successes of our employees is the model of how businesses should operate.

Gallups meta-analysis on team engagement and performance is the most comprehensive workplace study ever conducted, with data on more than 2 million employees in 276 organizations across 54 industries and 96 countries.

Organizations with highly engaged employees significantly outperform their peers in important business outcomes, including customer ratings, safety incidents, shrinkage, absenteeism, quality, wellbeing, and organizational citizenship.

See all the 2022 winners page.

About Grinnell Mutual

Grinnell Mutual, in business since 1909, is the 107th-largest property-casualty insurance company in the United States and the largest primary reinsurer of farm mutual companies in North America. Its products are available in 17 states.

About Gallup

Gallup delivers analytics and advice to help leaders and organizations solve their most pressing problems. Combining more than 80 years of experience with its global reach, Gallup knows more about the attitudes and behaviors of employees, customers, students and citizens than any other organization in the world.

For more information please contact:

Jennifer Miller

Integrated Marketing Manager

marketing@grinnellmutual.com or jennifer.miller@grinnellmutual.com

641-269-8322
Dr Dermot Cotter The hazards associated with carbon dioxide often only become apparent should an incident occur due to the inherent characteristics of this colourless, odourless gas

With surging demand for sustainable refrigeration solutions, the Institute of Refrigeration (IOR) is taking once again a proactive role in the industry by hosting a Tech Talk webinar on Carbon Dioxide Hazard Assessments and Safety System Requirements. Dr Dermot Cotter, Managing Director at Star Technical Solutions, a leading specialist in refrigeration related CO2 hazard assessments in the UK, will present the webinar, which will take place on 7th April 2022 from 4:00 PM  5:00 PM BST.

As part of Stars ongoing education and advocacy efforts to encourage the use of refrigeration systems safe practices and the reduction of legislative compliance burden, Dr Cotter will share his expert knowledge and provide a detailed review of hazards and risks associated with the safe operation of carbon dioxide refrigeration systems as well as a template for a systemic approach to assessing of risk, emergency planning and facility awareness.

Dr Cotter said, It is crucial to highlight the hazards associated with carbon dioxide and I am pleased to present on this topic hosted by the Institute of Refrigeration. Current EU and UK legislation require refrigeration systems to operate safely in all circumstances. Still, the hazards associated with carbon dioxide often only become apparent should an incident occur due to the inherent characteristics of this colourless, odourless gas.

By presenting a standard hazard assessment approach for assessing carbon dioxide refrigeration systems and emphasising the legally binding responsibilities faced by owners and users of carbon dioxide equipment, I hope that we can create a safer working environment for operators, staff, contractors and visitors.

Dr Dermot Cotter has over 30 years of experience providing support and training on UK regulations and best practice codes for end-users and operators of industrial refrigeration operating on both F-gases and natural refrigerants. He is currently Managing Director of Stars consultancy arm, Star Technical Solutions. He was elected to the Board of Directors of the Cold Chain Federation, where he provides advice to its members on all matters related to refrigeration systems and insulated enveloipe. Dr Cotter has published numerous papers on behalf of the Institute of Refrigeration and the International Institute of Refrigeration, on the subject of refrigerant safety.

The Tech Talk series is one of the IORs key long-term projects to promote innovation and facilitate debate on critical issues related to the industry. With roots that stretch back for more than 120 years and with over 2,200 members, the charitable organisation acts in an advisory role to the refrigeration, air conditioning and heat pump sector.

The webinar is open to engineers, end-users, and industry stakeholders and is free to attend. A video recording of the session will be made available to those registering for the event but unable to watch live. To register and download the paper, visit https://ior.org.uk/events/carbon-dioxide-hazard-assessment-and-safety-system

To find out more information about Dr Cotter and Star Technical Solutions, visit https://www.star-ts.co.uk/
Effectively immediately, President and North American Chief Operating Officer Tom Galambos assumes the role of President and Global Chief Operating Officer, while Chief Technology Officer Jerry Hawk steps into the North American Chief Operating Officer position.

Hitachi Solutions America, Ltd., a global systems integrator with leading capabilities in Microsoft solutions and technologies, announced two executive promotions to accelerate its global evolution and better meet multi-national market demands. Effectively immediately, President and North American Chief Operating Officer Tom Galambos assumes the role of President and Global Chief Operating Officer, while Chief Technology Officer Jerry Hawk steps into the North American Chief Operating Officer position.

Todays announcement shifts our organizational structure so that we can focus on elevating our global presence and amplifying our ability to serve customers at global scale, said Hitachi Solutions America Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Hideji Morita. Toms vision and leadership and Jerrys business and technology acumen are the perfect combination to strengthen the company so we can respond faster to global challenges while continuing to drive deep, enterprise-wide value for customers. I have the highest confidence in Tom, Jerry, and the rest of our outstanding global team, and look forward to partnering with them to ensure continued success for the company now and in the future.

Tom Galambos will continue as President of Hitachi Solutions America, expanding his responsibilities to include those of the newly created Global Chief Operating Officer role reporting directly to Hitachi Solutions America Chairman and CEO Hideji Morita. In this strategic position, he will concentrate on building global growth and opportunities, aligning all Hitachi Solutions America regional businesses and resources, and increasing global execution. Galambos is a 10-year company veteran and has nearly three decades of experience developing business models and operations around the world. He has led North America for the last five years, successfully navigating the unprecedented times while building and growing a committed, world-class team that delivers award-winning business transformation with tangible customer value.

Im ready to take the company to the next level  to compete and win  on the global stage as a top Microsoft GSI, said Tom Galambos, president and global COO, Hitachi Solutions America, Ltd. Leveraging the breadth of Hitachi Ltd. capabilities, uniting our voice, expanding our reach, and optimizing our skills and services will not only strengthen our enterprise-ready position, grow mindshare with Microsoft, and create opportunity for internal and external growth, it will also allow us to truly meet the needs of our multi-national customers.

Jerry Hawk fills the vacated North American Chief Operating Officer role, and reports directly to Galambos. In this position, he is charged with deepening the companys industry capabilities and expertise; expanding the services, solutions, and technologies portfolio; ensuring continuing alignment with Microsofts go-to-market field strategy; and growing Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Azure cloud market share. Hawk joined Hitachi Solutions through the acquisition of Capax Global, the technology platform services organization he founded in 2006. As Chief Technology Officer for the past four years, Hawk has guided Hitachi Solutions technology strategy and roadmap, establishing the company as one of Microsofts most comprehensive global partners.

While were making changes to leaders and roles to better meet market challenges and position us for continued growth, our operating model, culture, focus, and strategy remain the same. Thats because these core pillars have created a solid organizational foundation and established us as a leader in delivering Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Azure solutions, said Jerry Hawk, COO North America, Hitachi Solutions America, Ltd. Im excited to build on that amazing momentum and continue to accelerate our abilities to drive data and business system modernization that results in value-based outcomes for customers.

About Hitachi Solutions America

Hitachi Solutions is a global systems integrator with leading capabilities in Microsoft solutions and technologies. Our skilled professionals combine advisory services, industry and technology expertise, and implementation excellence that encompass our customers people, processes, business applications, and technologies to support and accelerate their data and business system modernization initiatives. For more information visit global.hitachi-solutions.com.

About Hitachi Solutions

Hitachi Solutions, Ltd., headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is a core member of the Information & Telecommunication Systems business of Hitachi Group and a recognized leader in delivering proven business and IT strategies and solutions to companies across many industries. The company provides value-driven services throughout the IT life cycle from systems planning to systems integration, operation, and maintenance. Hitachi Solutions delivers products and services of superior value to customers worldwide through key subsidiaries in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, India, and Asia Pacific. For more information on Hitachi Solutions, please visit: http://www.hitachi-solutions.com.
Law Office of Blumenthal Nordrehaug Bhowmik De Blouw LLP For more information about the lawsuit against OSL Retail Services Corp., call (800) 568-8020 to speak to an experienced California employment attorney today.

The Sacramento employment law attorneys, at Blumenthal Nordrehaug Bhowmik De Blouw LLP, filed a lawsuit against OSL Retail Services Corp. alleging the company violated Labor Code  2699, et seq. seeking penalties for DEFENDANTs alleged violation of California Labor Code  201, 202, 203, 204 et seq., 210, 221, 226(a), 226.7, 227.3, 510, 512, 558(a)(1)(2), 1194, 1197, 1197.1, 1198, and 2802. The lawsuit against OSL Retail Services Corp. is currently pending in the Sacramento County Superior Court, Case No. 34-2022-00316065. To read a copy of the Complaint, please click here.

According to the lawsuit filed, OSL Retail Services Corp. allegedly failed to fully relieve Plaintiff and other Aggrieved Employees for their legally required thirty (30) minute meals breaks. Employees were also allegedly required, from time to time, to work in excess of four (4) hours without being provided the legally required ten (10) minute rest periods. The California Supreme Court defines off-duty rest periods as time during which an employee is relieved from all work related duties and free from employer control.

PAGA is a mechanism by which the State of California itself can enforce state labor laws through the employee suing under the PAGA who do so as the proxy or agent of the state's labor law enforcement agencies. An action to recover civil penalties under PAGA is fundamentally a law enforcement action designed to protect the public and not to benefit private parties. The purpose of PAGA is not to recover damages or restitution, but to create a means of "deputizing" citizens as private attorneys general to enforce the Labor Code.

For more information about the lawsuit against OSL Retail Services Corp., call (800) 568-8020 to speak to an experienced California employment attorney today.

Blumenthal Nordrehaug Bhowmik De Blouw LLP is a labor law firm with law offices located in San Diego County, Riverside County, Los Angeles County, Sacramento County, Santa Clara County, Orange County and San Francisco County. The firm has a statewide practice of representing employees on a contingency basis for violations involving unpaid wages, overtime pay, discrimination, harassment, wrongful termination and other types of illegal workplace conduct.

***THIS IS AN ATTORNEY ADVERTISEMENT***
Medical supplies donated by the Chinese government are seen at the Budapest Liszt Ferenc International Airport in Budapest, Hungary, on April 29, 2020. (Photo by Attila Volgyi/Xinhua)

As the world finds itself in a new period of turbulence and changes, it is particularly valuable and important not only for Hungary, but also for other countries in Europe and the rest of the world to stay independent, said Wang Yi.

BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- China and Hungary on Monday pledged to continue to enhance bilateral cooperation in various fields to build a stronger comprehensive strategic partnership.

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter Szijjarto made the remarks in a phone conversation.

Wang conveyed congratulations of the Chinese leaders over the Fidesz party's re-winning parliamentary elections under the leadership of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

The election result shows that the independent policy pursued by the Hungarian side is in line with the country's national conditions and the common interests of its people, and is firmly and broadly supported by the people, Wang said. He wished that the Hungarian side will achieve greater progress under the leadership of Prime Minister Orban.

Photo taken on May 27, 2021 shows the Kaposvar solar power plant in Kaposvar, Hungary. The plant was built by China National Machinery Import and Export Corporation. (Photo by Attila Volgyi/Xinhua)

Wang said as the world finds itself in a new period of turbulence and changes, it is particularly valuable and important not only for Hungary, but also for other countries in Europe and the rest of the world to stay independent.

Underlining the comprehensive strategic partnership between China and Hungary, Wang said that both sides should deepen cooperation, consolidate the political foundation, enhance their capacity to jointly resist risks and challenges, and safeguard each other's sovereignty, security and development interests.

Noting that a resilient Hungary is firm in overcoming difficulties, Wang said China will continue to staunchly support Hungary in preserving its independent choice of development path.

File photo shows Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi holding talks with Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter Szijjarto, in Guiyang, capital of southwest China's Guizhou Province, May 31, 2021. (Xinhua/Yang Wenbin)

For his part, Szijjarto conveyed appreciations of Prime Minister Orban for the Chinese leaders.

Szijjarto said he is glad to have the first phone conversation after the election with the Chinese foreign minister, which demonstrates the mutual trust and friendship between Hungary and China and the high level of their ties.

The Fidesz party's victory indicates the Hungarian people's trust in the party's domestic and foreign policies, he said.

Hungary will continue to firmly safeguard its legitimate interests, and is ready to deepen cooperation with China in various fields and promote their comprehensive strategic partnership to higher levels, Szijjarto said.

The two sides also exchanged views on relations between China and the European Union (EU).

Wang said the Chinese side will follow the important views elaborated by President Xi Jinping during the meeting with EU leaders via video link, work with the EU to tackle global challenges and implement the consensus reached by Chinese and EU leaders, so as to promote the healthy and stable development of China-EU relations.

Szijjarto said Hungary firmly supports EU-China friendship and will continue to play a constructive role in the development of EU-China relations with respect and a down-to-earth attitude. 
Mindy Anderson offers more than 20 years of leadership and industry-related experience, including luxury lifestyle and amenity management. I am looking forward to collaborating with our team of property management and lifestyle professionals, real estate developers, and the boards of the communities we manage to build strong relationships and engaged communities through our lifestyle offerings.

Mindy Anderson has been named Director, Lifestyle for FirstService Residentials South Region, overseeing lifestyle operations, programming, and amenities.

Anderson, who joined FirstService Residential in 2021 as a regional director in the South Region, offers more than 20 years of leadership and industry-related experience, including luxury lifestyle and amenity management.

I am very excited to be stepping into the role of Director, Lifestyle for FirstService Residential, said Anderson. I am looking forward to collaborating with our team of property management and lifestyle professionals, real estate developers, and the boards of the communities we manage to build strong relationships and engaged communities through our lifestyle offerings.

Prior to joining FirstService Residential, Anderson held senior roles at the Castle Group and WTS International, a luxury amenity management firm.

Anderson holds a Bachelor of Science in Exercise Science and Health Promotion from the University of South Florida. A native of Tampa, Anderson enjoys fitness and sporting activities in her spare time and supports a variety of causes, including the YMCAs Teen Leaders Club. She and her family live in Lithia, Florida.

About FirstService Residential

FirstService Residential is North Americas property management leader, partnering with more than 8,500 communities across the U.S. and Canada, including low-, mid- and high-rise condominiums and cooperatives; single-family communities; master-planned, lifestyle and active adult communities; and mixed-use and rental properties. HOAs, community associations, condos and strata corporations rely on their extensive experience, resources and local expertise to maximize property values and enhance their residents lifestyles. Dedicated to making a difference, every day, FirstService Residential goes above and beyond to deliver exceptional service.

FirstService Residential is a subsidiary of FirstService Corporation (FSV), a North American leader in the property services sector. For more information, visit http://www.fsresidential.com
Gargoyle Willie: an engaging novella that offers an engaging cast and important messages. Gargoyle Willie is the creation of published author Patrick Palmer, a graduate of Oral Roberts University who majored in French and minored in Education and Spanish.

Palmer shares, Ever since elementary school, Willie thought of himself as a freak of nature. His appearance gave him no reason to think otherwise. According to an elementary school classmate, he looked like a gargoyle. His teacher, a no-nonsense Catholic nun by the name of Sister Beatrice, scolded the class and asked him to stay after school, so she could give him some words of encouragement. If the Lord made him to be a clown, why shouldnt he be the funniest clown ever, so his Lord would applaud his performance?

Years later, after finishing college, he constructed and opened his own bar: Gargoyle Willies. Over time, he gained a loyal crew of friends and regular customers who were always around to support him.

One day, his assistant manager and fellow barkeep Angie Dulac suffered an instance of harassment from an offensive customer. The fury that Willie poured out on Creepazoid had far-reaching consequences that he may never have foreseen.

Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Patrick Palmers new book is an entertaining and creative romantic fiction.

Palmers love of languages is apparent within the pages of this engaging tale of one mans journey of personal and spiritual growth.

Consumers can purchase Gargoyle Willie at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble.

For additional information or inquiries about Gargoyle Willie, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919.
"We are excited to be writing the next chapters of our story as Primient, which is well positioned to make a positive impact in the industries we serve," CEO Jim Stutelberg

Primient enters the global food and industrial ingredients market with a strong portfolio of proven products and trusted application expertise across the food, beverage, paper, packaging, personal care, apparel, and animal nutrition industries.

Primient was established as the result of Tate & Lyle PLC (Tate & Lyle) selling a controlling stake in its Primary Products business in North America and Latin America to KPS Capital Partners, LP (KPS). The new privately held company is majority-owned and controlled by KPS, while Tate & Lyle retains a minority stake.

Primient employs more than 1,500 colleagues and operates six industrial plants in North America and Latin America and has an interest in two joint ventures. Each Primient location is an active community partner, dedicated to supporting local programs and organizations that are vital to the economic health of the area and improving essential services for all community members. The company has a proud legacy in agricultural entrepreneurship grounded in the ingenuity of agriculture pioneer and legend, A.E. Staley.

Our journey started more than 100 years ago when A.E. Staley founded the A.E. Staley Manufacturing Company in Decatur, Illinois, Primient Chief Executive Officer Jim Stutelberg said. And we are excited to be writing the next chapters of our story as Primient, which is well positioned to make a positive impact in the industries we serve  for our colleagues, customers, and local communities.

Michael Psaros, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of KPS, said, KPS is pleased to acquire a controlling interest in Primient. Over the past several months KPS and Tate & Lyle have worked closely together to establish Primient as an independent enterprise. Primient is now poised for success as a leading, independent, and focused manufacturer of critical corn-derived ingredients for both food and industrial markets. We look forward to working closely with Primients management team to improve the new companys assets and operations, accelerate the companys organic growth initiatives and pursue synergistic acquisitions.

The Primient portfolio includes expertise and solutions across a wide range of application areas including:



Acidulants  adding lasting taste, stabilization, and balance in products like foods and beverages

Animal Nutrition  developing animal feeds with high quality energy and nutrients to ensure animals have the nutrition they need to perform

Industrial Starches  corn-derived starches and adhesives that provide superior functionality and support across paper, packaging, and building applications

Personal Care additives  a range of products designed to give personal care formulators a variety of bio-based options

Sweeteners  providing excellent taste and functionality across applications from beverages and dairy to bakery, confectionary, snacks and more

For more information please visit: http://www.primient.com and follow us on LinkedIn.

Information about Primient:

Primient is a leading producer of food and industrial ingredients made from plant-based, renewable sources. We deliver value through deep technical, commercial, and operational excellence that is backed by our long-standing corn wet milling heritage. Wherever we are in the process, from field to customer, our priorities are focused on ensuring we produce the safest, highest quality products through practices that uphold both our responsibility and commitments to our people and our planet.

Information about KPS Capital Partners, LP

KPS, through its affiliated management entities, is the manager of the KPS Special Situations Funds, a family of investment funds with approximately $13.1 billion of assets under management (as of December 31, 2021). For nearly three decades, the Partners of KPS have worked exclusively to realize significant capital appreciation by making controlling equity investments in manufacturing and industrial companies across a diverse array of industries, including basic materials, branded consumer, healthcare and luxury products, automotive parts, capital equipment and general manufacturing. KPS creates value for its investors by working constructively with talented management teams to make businesses better, and generates investment returns by structurally improving the strategic position, competitiveness and profitability of its portfolio companies, rather than primarily relying on financial leverage. The KPS Funds portfolio companies currently generate aggregate annual revenues of approximately $15.2 billion, operate 165 manufacturing facilities in 26 countries, and have approximately 43,000 employees, directly and through joint ventures worldwide (as of December 31, 2021, pro forma for recent acquisitions and exits). The KPS investment strategy and portfolio companies are described in detail at http://www.kpsfund.com.

Information about Tate & Lyle PLC

Tate & Lyle is a leading global provider of food and beverage ingredients and solutions. Supported by our 160-year history of ingredient innovation, we partner with customers to provide consumers with healthier and tastier choices when they eat and drink. We are proud that millions of people around the world consume products containing our ingredients every day.

Through our expertise in sweetening, mouthfeel and fortification, we develop solutions which reduce sugar, calories and fat, add fiber and protein, and provide texture and stability in categories including beverages, dairy, bakery, soups, sauces and dressings.

We have more than 3,000 employees working in around 60 locations across 30 countries. Tate & Lyles purpose is Transforming Lives Through the Science of Food and through our purpose we believe we can successfully grow our business and have a positive impact on society. We live our purpose in three ways, by supporting healthy living, building thriving communities and caring for our planet.

Tate & Lyle is listed on the London Stock Exchange under the symbol TATE.L. American Depositary Receipts trade under TATYY. For more information, please visit http://www.tateandlyle.com or follow Tate & Lyle on Twitter or LinkedIn.
Randall Reed's Planet Ford Dealerships Repeat Historic Quadruple Triple Crown Honors When our amazing team first achieved this accomplishment, it was said to be a billion to one odds chance of it happening. Now, our Planet Ford locations have done it twice, said Randall Reed, owner of World Class Automotive Group.

History has been repeated! Ford Motor Company announced that every Randall Reed Planet Ford dealership location has earned the manufacturers highest honor, the Triple Crown Award.

The first time it was announced in 2018, it was an unprecedented event for an independent Ford dealer to earn this award at every single location within the same year. After earning it four times over for 2017, the Reed family of dealerships earned quadruple triple crowns, again, for 2021.

According to Ford, only 36 dealerships nationwide won the Ford Triple Crown for 2021. Of those, Randall Reeds family of Ford dealerships achieved earning four of the 36, and that is out of nearly 3,000 Ford dealerships in the country.

When our amazing team first achieved this accomplishment, it was said to be a billion to one odds chance of it happening. Now, our Planet Ford locations have done it twice, said Randall Reed, owner of World Class Automotive Group.

Fords Triple Crown recognizes the best of the best. While this is the second time the dealerships have won the honor simultaneously, its the 10th consecutive Triple Crown for Planet Ford in Humble, the ninth honor for Planet Ford 635 in Garland, the sixth for Planet Ford in Spring, and the third for Planet Ford Dallas Love Field.

To receive the highly sought-after Triple Crown, each dealership had to receive all of Ford's top awards, which include the President's Award for customer service; One Ford Elite for excellence in Sales, Service or Parts; and the Ford Customer Service Premier Club. All of the World Class Automotive dealerships, including Bill Fick Ford in Huntsville, Texas, have garnered the Ford Presidents Award, year after year.

For over 30 years, our family has proudly served our community always treating our customers like one of our own family members, said Shelby Reed, President of World Class Automotive Group. Our team not only works hard to meet our customers every auto need, they care that our customers are happy and totally satisfied.

Sherry Reed, co-owner of World Class Automotive Group agrees, Were thankful that our customers trust us with their auto needs. Helping people and making them happy is what our dealerships are all about.

About World Class

World Class Automotive is owned by Randall, Sherry, and Shelby Reed. The family-owned business is comprised of several dealerships throughout Texas, including Planet Ford in Spring, the #1 Ford dealership in Houston, Planet Lincoln in Spring, Planet Ford in Humble, Planet 635 Ford in Garland, Planet Ford Dallas Love Field and Planet Lincoln Dallas Love Field. Learn more at ReedHasIt.com.

*Based on retail ford sales reported by Ford annually since 1998.


Our continued expansion here will fuel Smiths efforts to provide our new and existing customers with the tailored support they need to mitigate ongoing disruptions in the semiconductor supply chain.

Smith, a leading global distributor of electronic components and semiconductors, today announces the relocation of the companys Berlin sales office. The new location adds significantly more space and conference rooms to accommodate in-person customer meetings and continued growth in the burgeoning German tech market.

Since opening last fall, the Berlin office has tripled its staff size and developed key opportunities with local customers. Dubbed as Silicon Allee, the city is home to numerous startups, automotive manufacturers, and medical and financial technology companies, as well as a highly skilled workforce. The new office is conveniently located for employees and visitors alike, sitting amidst the German capitals historic and professional hubs.

The European technology sector is growing at an unprecedented rate, and Berlin is no exception, said Cleat Kimbrough, Smiths President, EMEA. Our continued expansion here will fuel Smiths efforts to provide our new and existing customers with the tailored support they need to mitigate ongoing disruptions in the semiconductor supply chain.

The new office is located at:

Taubenstrae 20, 4th Floor

Berlin, DE 10117

Tel: +49 30.91.580.555

About Smith

Founded in 1984, Smith sources, manages, and distributes the electronic components that go into everything from mobile phones and computers to appliances and directional drilling systems. In 17 cities around the world, Smiths legion of employees communicates in 50 languages and dialects and buys and sells components 24 hours per day, generating global annual sales in excess of $3.4 billion in 2021. Smith is always moving: helping manufacturers navigate market shifts; customizing supply chain solutions; testing components using cutting-edge technology. The support of Smiths flexible Intelligent DistributionTM model optimizes customers supply chains from beginning to end, including offering customized options for IT asset disposition that deliver maximum ROI, sustainability, and security. Smiths testing and logistics hubs in Houston, Hong Kong, and Amsterdam cover critical areas like quality management, counterfeit prevention, and environmental safety. Smiths operations, purchasing, and sales worldwide are seamlessly integrated with the companys global IT infrastructure, offering real-time, global inventory and logistics visibility. Smith is the leading independent distributor of electronic components and ranks number eight among all global distributors. For more information, please visit http://www.smithweb.com or reach out to a Smith representative any time of day at +1 713.430.3000.

###
This book provides the tricks of the trade.

Throughout his military and civilian careers, Mark Riddle always strived to help his coworkers. He always searched for ways to work smarter, not harder.

In Solving the Riddle of Microsoft and Your Computer, Riddle provides a step-by-step guide for how to operate a computer, as well as various most-used Microsoft applications.

Everyone uses computers, Riddle said. This book provides the tricks of the trade.

From the basics, like how to modify a screen saver or printer settings, to providing details on the most used Microsoft Word functions, Riddle combines his experience working for the United States Space Force (USSF) with his degree in Computer Information Systems Management.

Ive always had a helpful spirit, Riddle said. I believe if we have a gift and are good at something, we should share it with others!

Solving the Riddle of Microsoft and Your Computer

By Mark Riddle

ISBN: 978-1-6655-4320-0

Available at AuthorHouse and Amazon

About the author

Mark S. Riddle is recently retired Government Civilian from United States Space Force (USSF) Space Operations Command (SpOC) where he served as Work Flow Manager for the largest SpOC division. Mark also served honorably in the United States Air Force for twenty-four years. He earned his Bachelor of Science degree from Colorado Christian University in Computer Information Systems Management. Mark also earned his Master of Science from Webster University in Space Systems Operations Management. He lives in Colorado Springs, Colo., with his wife Norma. To learn more about the author or his book, visit: https://www.authorhouse.com/en/bookstore/bookdetails/836143-solving-the-riddle-of-microsoft-and-your-computer.

###

General Inquiries:

LAVIDGE

Lindsey Gobel

317.435.2116

lgobel@lavidge.com


Join this webinar to get conceptual and technical insights to help identify and characterize functional lncRNAs in specific cancer contexts.

A fundamental question in cancer biology is to define the key oncogenic features of long non-protein coding RNAs (lncRNAs). These regulatory RNA molecules can exert function at multiple levels, from DNA replication to transcriptional and translational control. Therefore, lncRNAs can affect all aspects of cellular biology. Remarkably, cancer cells can become dependent on specific lncRNAs for their growth and survival. This dependency is amenable to therapeutic intervention using optimized RNA medicine strategies. CRISPR interference (CRISPRi) is a powerful tool to identify functional lncRNAs in specific cancer contexts.

The featured speaker will discuss the recent use of CRISPRi to systematically map lncRNA dependencies in multiple myeloma (MM). Focusing on the MM-promoting lncRNA RNA Regulator of Lipogenesis (RROL), Dr. Morelli will also describe in vitro and in cellulo molecular assays to dissect the mechanism of action of lncRNAs in cancer cells. Finally, he will describe an optimized platform to pre-clinically develop antisense inhibitors of lncRNAs and their testing in clinically relevant xenograft models.

Join this webinar to get conceptual and technical insights to help identify and characterize functional lncRNAs in specific cancer contexts.

A brief overview of Cellecta technologies will precede the main presentation

Join Eugenio Morelli, MD, Instructor in Medicine, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute & Harvard Medical School; and Paul Diehl, PhD, Chief Operating Officer, Cellecta, Inc., for the live webinar on Thursday, April 21, 2022, at 11am EDT (4pm BST/UK).

For more information, or to register for this event, visit Using CRISPR interference (CRISPRi) Viability Screens to Map Long Noncoding RNA Dependencies in Tumor Cells.

ABOUT XTALKS

Xtalks, powered by Honeycomb Worldwide Inc., is a leading provider of educational webinars to the global life science, food and medical device community. Every year, thousands of industry practitioners (from life science, food and medical device companies, private & academic research institutions, healthcare centers, etc.) turn to Xtalks for access to quality content. Xtalks helps Life Science professionals stay current with industry developments, trends and regulations. Xtalks webinars also provide perspectives on key issues from top industry thought leaders and service providers.

To learn more about Xtalks visit http://xtalks.com

For information about hosting a webinar visit http://xtalks.com/why-host-a-webinar/


Following the COP26 summit, Net Zero is a new video and podcast series in which 24 young climate activists from the Protect Our Planet (POP) Movement in association with Planet Classroom ask international thought leaders working on the environment the big questions as to how their nations are progressing towards their 2050 Net Zero pledges.

When it comes to fighting the climate crisis, civic participation is crucial. In the inaugural Net Zero video featuring Dr. Manuel Diaz (known as the Green Citizen of Venezuela), Climate Activist Ricardo Delgado monitors the challenges, the progress and the regenerative actions underway by Venezuelan citizens engaged in Climate Change to meet Net Zero goals. Dr. Diaz, who chairs the Green Life International Foundation, co-chairs the Green Citizen Foundation, and directs the Global Green, notes that each action has a consequence, a positive or negative effect, and adds that he always asks for the Environmental Confession. He calls on all Venezuelan citizens to be green citizens  You have to have love, and at this moment, it is the love of Mother Earth.

Watch the show: Net Zero Speaks with Manuel Diaz

Contact Information:

David Wine

David(at)cmrubinworld(dot)com

About the Protect Our Planet Movement

The Protect Our Planet (POP) Movement is an initiative designed to address the urgent need to share information and knowledge with the youth on solutions to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by the UN, mitigate climate change, and adapt to its growing impacts. Intended to ultimately reach the size, scale, and momentum to become a global movement, POP mobilizes the youth worldwide to take collective action needed to mitigate climate change and protect threatened ecosystems.

About the Planet Classroom Network

The Planet Classroom Network, organized by CMRubinWorld, brings together musicians, dancers, video game creators, filmmakers, activists, learning innovators and emerging technologists from around the world to entertain, educate and engage youth, and to provide a rich cultural experience for all. Content showcased for youth and by youth on the Planet Classroom Network is provided by 29 cultural organizations from around the world. Young people globally played a significant role in conceptualizing, creating, and producing the networks vision and programming.
The best way we can honor the sacrifices of others that have given us the life we are living is to live the best life we can

The troubled son of a World War II veteran suspects he traveled back in time with help from his fathers diary and a serendipitous encounter, where he is offered a second chance in life in John F. Bronzos new novel The Lonesome Shepherd (published by Archway Publishing).

It is September 1943, when the captured German submarine, U-830, fails to return to the surface with its American crew. Thomas Shields father was supposed to be on board that day but was ordered away at the last minute. Riddled with survivors guilt, Thomass father returns home and devotes his time to looking after the loved ones his deceased comrades left behind. Thomas, who feels ignored by his father, begins a dark journey fueled by his sense of abandonment.

As substance abuse and psychological issues cloud Thomass reasoning and path forward, he immerses himself in a rather dark and tragic existence  or so he thinks. He becomes less sure of what is real and what has simply been renting space in his head, when he meets a mysterious stranger who believes in second chances. He suspects he has been offered a second chance to reconcile the past and heal.

The best way we can honor the sacrifices of others that have given us the life we are living is to live the best life we can, Bronzo says.

The Lonesome Shepherd is available for purchase online at the Archway link above, from Barnes & Noble and on Amazon at: https://www.amazon.com/Lonesome-Shepherd-John-F-Bronzo/dp/1665717130.

The Lonesome Shepherd

By John F. Bronzo

Hardcover | 6 x 9 in | 244 pages | ISBN 9781665717144

Softcover | 6 x 9 in | 244 pages | ISBN 9781665717137

E-Book | 244 pages | ISBN 9781665717120

Available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble

About the Author"

John F. Bronzo is the award-winning author of the novels Mary Bernadette: Secrets of a Dallas Moon and Sagahawk by the Sea. Passionate about capturing the American experience in his works, John divides his time between New York and Florida and supports worthy causes with his writing.

Simon & Schuster, a company with nearly ninety years of publishing experience, has teamed up with Author Solutions, LLC, the worldwide leader in self-publishing, to create Archway Publishing. With unique resources to support books of all kind, Archway Publishing offers a specialized approach to help every author reach his or her desired audience. For more information, visit archwaypublishing.com or call 844-669-3957.
Determined to boost print medias interactivity, Lonely Planet has launched the Experience series, a set of travel guides featuring pull-out city maps, gatefold maps, and QR codes to unlock additional digital content from the Lonely Planet website. Since its acquisition by lifestyle media company Red Ventures in December 2020, Lonely Planet has sustained its print program while repositioning itself as a digital travel guidance company, according to an April 4 announcement.

Six Experience guides to Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Portugal, and Scotland roll out in April and May. Half a dozen titles are scheduled for release quarterlyin June, September, and November/December 2022totaling 24 new guides by years end. While the majority of the guides survey entire countries, one guide reviews Eastern Australia, and six more feature global cities: Barcelona, London, New York, Paris, Rome, and Tokyo. The guides are priced at $24.99, and the first slate is currently available to pre-order.

Before the pandemic, Japan and Iceland were two of our bestsellers, said publisher Piers Pickard, so past sales and visitor numbers helped determine the first list. Lonely Planet chose to debut the series with countries we think will be the most open and welcoming for international visitors, as well as destinations that are both well-loved and relatively easy for travelers to navigate, Pickard said.

The 260-page guides, with a trim size of 5x7, blend print and scannable digital links. Were experimenting with QR codes as an easy way of giving people access to more content, Pickard said. That means additional experiences that we love but couldnt fit in the physical book. For example, Experience Italy points readers to Romes Appian Way as well as to an online calendar of monthly weather and festivals that can be updated if a farmers market moves its location or an event promises unique ticketed opportunities. The tagline for our Experience guides is Get Away from the Everyday so [we want] to live up to that promise of local surprises, Pickard explained.

Lonely Planet also sought out regional authors who understand the tourism industry, and assigned four to eight of these writers per guide. Weve looked for people who know their home region intimately and can write perfectly in English, Pickard said. For example, Eyglo Svala Arnarsdottir [a travel editor] grew up on an Icelandic horse farm, and her expertise informed our Icelandic Horse Culture experience in the far north of the island.

While the announcement promises a new brand position, Lonely Planet (established in 1973) still depends on its 50-year history of offering travel advice. Clickable links will help travelers navigate Iceland, but horse-trekking in the Icelandic highlands remains fully analog.
MADRID, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Hundreds of people demonstrated in Madrid on Sunday to show their rejection of the conflict in Ukraine and NATO's intervention.

Demonstrators, organized by the popular assembly which was made up of independent organizations and associations, gathered in front of the Puerta de Atocha railway station and marched in the direction of the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

"Spain should not give in to NATO pressure anymore," because the effects of contributing to the conflict "are already harming various sectors with very serious effects," according to Lorena Cabrera, representative of Anti-Capitalist Associations, and several leaders of the organizations.

"We want peace for Ukraine and all countries," said Luis Arevalo, a protester from Madrid.

"We also reject Europe's growing involvement in Ukraine's military struggle, because they do so under the interests of the United States," he added.

According to the barometer of the ElCano Royal Institute presented on Friday, 48 percent of Spaniards are in favor of an intervention, compared to 52 percent against.

"The European Union (EU) should not join the confrontational strategies that are being promoted today from Washington in order to preserve its hegemony," said Xulio Rios, director of the Spanish Observatory of China Policy.

"Its commitment must be the democratization of international relations and not segmentation with increasingly warmongering overtones. (There should be) more social welfare and less military spending," said Rios. 
The 2022 Three Minute Thesis Competition, hosted by Purdues Graduate School, will take place at 7 p.m. April 12 in Stewart Centers Loeb Playhouse. The event is free and open to the public.

Ten graduate student participating in the cross-disciplinary competition will have three minutes to present their research and its significance to judges and audience members. The competition encourages students to develop the ability to explain their research effectively and succinctly in language appropriate for a nonspecialist audience. Participants will be judged on three criteria: their communication style, ability to help audience members comprehend their research, and their ability to engage listeners.

The competition, developed by Australias University of Queensland in 2008, challenges students to consolidate their ideas and crystallize their research discoveries. There are restrictions for participants; for example, only a single static PowerPoint slide is permitted and no props are allowed.

Audience members will have the opportunity to vote for a recipient of the People's Choice award. The winner of the competition will be presented with $2,000, a runner-up with $1,000 and a people's choice awardee with $1,000.

Those interested in attending are encouraged to register by Friday (April 8).

For more information about the Three Minute Thesis Competition, contact Brittany Ledman at wright63@purdue.edu.
By Elizabeth Kwiatkowski, 04/04/2022



ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

Elizabeth Kwiatkowski is Associate Editor of Reality TV World and has been covering the reality TV genre for more than a decade.

alum Blake Moynes has reacted to John Hersey 's comments he was "pissed off" about how Blake handled his breakup with Katie Thurston Katie and John, a San Diego bartender whom Katie eliminated during Week 2 of her journey on Season 17, went Instagram official with their relationship in late November 2021, only three short weeks after Katie and her winner, Blake, announced they had split.John and Katie appeared on Tuesday's episode of the "Off the Vine with Kaitlyn Bristowe " podcast, and John admitted he couldn't stand to hear Blake's November interview on the "Talking It Out with Bachelor Nation" podcast in which Blake had accused Katie of emotionally cheating during their relationship and said he was "flabbergasted" she was able to move on so quickly "What really pissed me off about that, like, listening to that podcast was when there started to be a narrative get painted that she was putting no effort in, and Blake was the only one putting effort in at the end," John complained to Kaitlyn.During a subsequent Q&A session on Instagram, Blake told his followers that he didn't want to "ignite" drama, according to Us Weekly.And when asked about John's slam, Blake replied that he and Katie are "allowed to have their opinions and share their side of things."Blake clearly chose to take the high road and added, "It's all good."Blake then posted an Instagram Story on Thursday night considering his DMs are overflowing with comments following John's heated interview."I read both [the positive and negative ones] because the negative ones are wild and crazy... But I want to say thank you to the ones who are always supportive... I am seeing it and I appreciate all that stuff," Blake said."I appreciate the negative stuff too but it hits me sometimes. The truth hurts sometimes."Katie insisted on "Off the Vine" that "there was no overlap" between her relationship with Blake and the start of her new romance with John.John therefore vented about Blake spinning a narrative last year."I tried not to say anything for a while, but when that narrative came to be out, I was just like, 'I can't stay silent about this.' Because I watched her suffer at the end, before there was anything between us. And it just pissed me off," John said.Shortly after Blake conducted that November interview, John released a statement via Reddit on Katie's behalf denying any "wrongdoing" on their part. John insisted that Katie did not cheat on Blake and the couple's relationship was "ALWAYS PLATONIC" until Katie officially became a single woman again."I met Blake and we hung out with Blake for a solid, what 12 [or] 18 hours? Something like that," John recalled on Kaitlyn's podcast."Yeah, I introduced Blake to the people in my life," Katie interjected, "including John [and our mutual friend Stephen] who are a huge part of my life during this whole Bachelorette journey.""And I did not have a negative opinion of Blake at all," John clarified, "like, we had fun together. We did an escape room and we hung out all day. But that's why when that happened, I was disappointed at first."John then accused Blake of trying to get Bachelor Nation on his side after his split from Katie."I realized -- I was, like, 'This is him capitalizing on this opportunity,' which I understand. I get how it works, like, seeing this world now for the past almost a year. It's crazy," John conceded."But when it was at the expense of my friend, I couldn't [deal]. It was frustrating."Viewers watched Katie accept Blake's marriage proposal on 's Season 17 finale, which aired in August 2021.Katie proceeded to move to San Diego, CA, and continue hanging out with John while Blake traveled to Africa to pursue his wildlife conservation efforts.Katie and Blake attempted to make a long-distance relationship work as people simultaneously questioned if sparks were flying between Katie and John.But Katie and John repeated on the podcast how they were just friends until a lightning bolt suddenly struck and made the pair realize they had romantic feelings for each other.John said he and Katie "very, very carefully" decided to risk their friendship for a shot at love together, and John called it "terrifying.""Once we made that decision [to leave the friend zone], you can't go back," John explained.And Katie shared how she owed it to herself to be happy and live her truth, without fear of how others may react to her choices."At the end of the day, I was like, 'Life is too short. I've gone through so much and I just want to be happy.' And so that's ultimately what we did; we owned our connection not knowing it would take us to this day," Katie explained.Katie and John have been defending and showing off their relationship ever since, and Blake recently told Ben Higgins and Ashley Iaconetti on their "The Ben & Ashley I: Almost Famous Podcast" that he's ready to start dating again, but only in the real world "I could probably talk to her and have a cordial conversation," Blake confirmed in late March.Interested in more The Bachelor news? Join our The Bachelor Facebook Group
Medical workers are seen before setting out for Shanghai at Nanchang Railway Station in Nanchang, east China's Jiangxi Province, April 3, 2022. A team of medical workers left Jiangxi Province Sunday for Shanghai to help aid the COVID-19 control efforts there. (Xinhua/Peng Zhaozhi)

BEIJING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- More than 38,000 medics from 15 provincial-level regions nationwide have rushed to Shanghai to aid in the battle against the resurging COVID-19 epidemic in China's financial hub, according to the National Health Commission (NHC).

Over 11,000 medics have assumed responsibility for work in temporary hospitals, and over 23,000 medical workers are responsible for collecting nucleic acid samples, according to Jiao Yahui, a senior NHC official. And nearly 4,000 people have been dispatched to support the work in the COVID-19 testing lab.

Nucleic acid testing teams with a daily handling capacity of 2.38 million test tubes have also been mobilized, the commission said.

Shanghai reported 425 local confirmed cases on Sunday. The megacity on Monday launched a citywide nucleic acid testing campaign. 
Athens, GA (30605)

Today

Scattered thunderstorms, some strong, early, becoming mostly clear after midnight. Damaging winds, large hail and possibly a tornado with some storms. Low 57F. Winds W at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms, some strong, early, becoming mostly clear after midnight. Damaging winds, large hail and possibly a tornado with some storms. Low 57F. Winds W at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
TEHRAN, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian on Monday urged the United States to be "realistic" to help reach an agreement in Vienna talks aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

The Iranian diplomat said in a tweet that "the excessive demands" of the United States could lead to a pause in the Vienna negotiation as Iran will "never give in" to such demands.

Amir-Abdollahian also pointed out that "an agreement can be reached if the United States is realistic."

Earlier in the day, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said that the United States should be responsible for protraction in Vienna talks.

Iran signed the JCPOA with the world powers in July 2015. However, former U.S. President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the agreement in May 2018 and reimposed unilateral sanctions on Tehran, prompting the Islamic republic to scale back some of its nuclear commitments under the agreement in retaliation.

Since April 2021, eight rounds of talks have been held in Vienna between Iran and the remaining JCPOA parties, namely China, Russia, Britain, France, and Germany, to revive the deal.

Over the past weeks, reports from Vienna suggested that the negotiators were "close" to an agreement with few key issues remaining which required "political decisions" of the parties. 
People gathered in Harmony Parking lot in Brattleboro on Friday, April 22nd for a street festival and parade in celebration of Earth Day. According to Nancy Braus of 350 Brattleboro, the goal was to celebrate the ways in which the community is working towards climate justice and to empower 
You are the owner of this article.
Katerina Brumer is from Burlington. They are a student at the University of Vermont studying animal science and wildlife biology. The opinions expressed by columnists do not necessarily reflect the views of Vermont News & Media.
BEIRUT, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The fourth Consultative Group (CG) meeting of the Reform, Recovery and Reconstruction Framework (3RF) on Monday warned against an escalating humanitarian crisis in Lebanon, a statement by the Delegation of the European Union to Lebanon reported.

The group emphasized the need for Lebanon to swiftly embark on a roadmap to exit this unfolding crisis through an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and a comprehensive economic stabilization and recovery program.

"The Lebanese government and parliament will have to find the political will to take collective steps beyond party politics; this will be an infusion of trust," it said.

The 3RF Consultative Group, which consists of the government of Lebanon, Lebanese civil society, the European Union, United Nations, the World Bank, and international donors, monitors progress and gives strategic direction to the reforms and activities under the 3RF. 
KIGALI, April 4 (Xinhua) -- A Rwandan court in the capital Kigali on Monday upheld a 25-year jail sentence for Paul Rusesabagina, a former hotelier portrayed as a hero in a film called "Hotel Rwanda."

Rusesabagina, 67, was last September convicted on eight counts related to acts of terrorism committed by the National Liberation Front (FLN) in 2018 which claimed the lives of nine civilians in Rwanda's southwest.

But prosecution in February appealed on grounds that the lower court had handed Rusesabagina a lenient sentence.

However, on Monday the appeals court led by Francois Regis said that "there was no reason to extend his sentence."

Rusesabagina, who was not in court Monday faced multiple charges including forming an illegal armed group, financing terror activities, murder, kidnap and arson in a trial he boycotted, claiming that there was "unfairness and a lack of independence."

Of the 20 other defendants in the case, the court reduced the sentence only for Callixte Nsabimana, known as Sankara, who was a spokesman for the FLN, to 15 from 20 years in prison for his role in terrorist attacks on Rwanda and mobilization for terrorism activities.

The court said Nsabimana was cooperative during the trial.

Rusesabagina was made famous by "Hotel Rwanda," where he saved over 1,000 ethnic Tutsis during the 1994 Rwandan Genocide against the Tutsi, which claimed more than 1 million lives.

However, survivors and experts disputed the story as exaggerated. 
Experts warn of millions of climate refugees and the disruption of economic growth in the region.

A vendor walks with her daughter through water at Kali Adem port, which was inundated by high tides amid to rising sea levels, north of Jakarta, Indonesia, Nov. 20, 2020.

The water level in the South China Sea has risen by 152mm since 1900, Chinese researchers have found, and the rate has accelerated in accordance with global warming.

A study published in the April issue of the Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology magazine said that the sea level in the South China Sea fell slightly from 1850-1900 period, but has continuously risen by 1.31mm per year on average for a total increase of 152mm ( 7 mm) from 1900-2015.

Researchers from the South China Sea Institute of Oceanology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) reconstructed the history of the South China Sea's sea-level shift using Porites coral, a widespread coral with a high growth rate, clear annual growth layer and sensitive response to the change of seawater environment.

The corals oxygen stable isotopes are an ideal proxy to indicate sea-level, they said.

The researchers analyzed the correlation between the oxygen stable isotopes of Porites coral, sea-surface salinity, and temperature, as well as the rainfall in the South China Sea; and then quantitatively reconstructed the annual sea-level record.

The study found that the sea-level rise in the South China Sea may be the result of a combination of solar activity and greenhouse gases; and human-caused global warming may have been the dominant factor behind the current rapid rise of sea level.

Clearly the findings of this study show the global community will have to do more to slow climate change, but we already knew climate change would cause the sea level to rise, threatening the coastlines of a number of countries  including minimally Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam, said Murray Hiebert, a senior associate of the Southeast Asia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C.

This will cause havoc for agriculture, fisheries, and tourism, which will create millions of climate refugees and disrupt economic growth in the region, Hiebert said.

Sea-level rise is caused primarily by two factors related to global warming: the added water from melting ice sheets and glaciers and the expansion of seawater as it warms, scientists say.

The 2012 US National Climate Assessment provided global sea-level rise scenarios that ranged from 0.2 to 2.0 meters by 2100.

Losing momentum

To slow climate change, it will be necessary to sharply reduce carbon emissions, said Murray Hiebert.

Many countries in the region had goals to try to achieve this, but these plans have been turned upside-down in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Now with the sharp drop in oil and gas exports from Russia and the rising prices on the international market, countries around the South China Sea will depend more on cheaper coal and pump more carbon into the atmosphere, the analyst said, warning that the years 2022 and 2023 will mark a major blow to arresting climate change.

This will be period in which we will lose much of the momentum that followed the COP26 summit late last year, he said.

Much of the focus on the South China Sea over the past decade has been on the territorial disputes between China and its Southeast Asian neighbors, as well as the geopolitical tussle between China and the United States over freedom of navigation in the contested waters.

Its time for competing nations to cooperate to avoid a looming environment catastrophe, experts said.
Authorities in Shanghai announced they would extend citywide lockdowns while they assessed recent mass COVID-19 test results, leaving residents facing further food shortages and lack of access to medical treatment.



A two-stage lockdown has been in place across the city of 26 million people since March 28, although some residential communities where infections were discovered before that date have been under tight restrictions for far longer.



The city will continue to implement closures and controls, and continue to strictly implement the stay-home policy except in the case of people seeking medical treatment due to illness," the Shanghai municipal government said in an April 4 announcement on its official Weibo account.



It said a mass, citywide COVID-19 tests had been completed on Monday, with further testing, review of results and evaluation to be carried out while residents stayed home.



Tens of the thousands of healthcare workers, including 2,000 military personnel, have been dispatched to the city to aid in the testing, isolation and quarantine operation under the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP)'s zero-COVID policy.



A front-line healthcare worker in the central city of Wuhan told RFA that some of his colleagues have been ordered to go to Shanghai to help with the testing program.



"Wuhan sent 1,000 people ... they told me yesterday it was to carry out PCR tests," she said.



Shanghai on Sunday reported 8,581 newly confirmed asymptomatic COVID-19 cases and 425 symptomatic COVID cases, calling on all residents to carry out rapid antigen tests at home.



A Shanghai resident who gave only the surname Feng said armed police had also been drafted into the city, with a constant roar of planes taking off at landing at an airport near her home.



"The armed police came on March 28 and 29, and there are a lot of armed police around right now," Feng said. "They had been keeping a low profile, but they are much more open since vice premier Sun Chunlan arrived here."



"Those of us who live near the airport were kept up all night because the rumbling sound from the military transports was so loud, and there were also helicopters flying constantly back and forth overhead," Feng said.



Sun urged the Shanghai authorities on Saturday to "make resolute and swift moves" to curb the pandemic.



'Keeping order'



Zhang Jin, an academic who lives in the downtown area of Puxi on the west side of the Huangpu river, said armed police are currently patrolling the gates of his residential community.



"There are special police with guns stationed at the gates of our community, because the older people on the neighborhood committee can't keep control of the situation," he said. "They're afraid there'll be some kind of incident in Shanghai, which would be a big deal, so they've been brought in to keep order."



But he said he thought the measures wouldn't be enough to contain the spread of the highly transmissible omicron variant of COVID-19.



"It's like a broken old paper lantern; you try to patch it up with sticky tape, and then another hole appears," Zhang said.



A leaked audio recording, apparently between a member of the public and a member of the city's Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), posted to social media on April 2, suggested that the authorities' capacity to implement Beijing's zero-COVID policy on the ground is under huge strain.



"Let me tell you this; hospital wards are full to bursting; there's no space left in isolation facilities, and there are no ambulances available because they are answering hundreds of calls a day," the official says. "This has totally overturned the image that Shanghai used to have [in the eyes of the rest of the world]."



"They are now writing down people's positive tests as negative ... our professionals and experts are being driven crazy because nobody is listening to what they have to say," the official says. "This pandemic has become a political disease, consuming so much manpower, material and financial resources."



Zhang agreed, saying all of China's COVID-19 measures are now purely political. "I heard there were people testing positive at the National People's Congress (NPC) [in March], but they weren't being allowed to report it [as a positive result]."



The secretary of one neighborhood committee admitted the system is now "a mess."



"I need decent policies coming down from higher up that I can explain to the residents, but that's not what is happening here, not at all," she said. "This job is leaving me physically and mentally exhausted, and my heart-rate is up to 100 beats per minute right now. I just can't do this."



"Right now I'm trying to order food supplies for residents [before it runs out], and I'm taking your call. I'm under a lot of pressure," the neighborhood official said.



Logistics nightmare



Shanghai residents have been taking to Twitter with fears that they could run out of food entirely, as takeout and supermarket deliveries are becoming less and less available in some districts.



Feng confirmed these reports, saying many of the delivery drivers have themselves been forced into isolation camps by the HealthCode app, while deliveries are being prevented from entering the city from elsewhere in China, leaving huge quantities of food to spoil at roadsides and be wasted.



Current affairs commentator Si Ling said the restrictions have made it well nigh impossible for logistics firms to operate in and out of Shanghai.



"Even if trucks can get into Shanghai, it's hard for them to get out," Si said. "A lot of logistics companies are therefore reluctant to send vehicles into Shanghai ... because they think it's too expensive and time-consuming."



"The Chinese government has made every aspect of the pandemic very bureaucratic, with huge amounts of red tape, and it hasn't taken the needs of logistics companies [part of the supply chain] into account," he said.



Sun's comment during her visit to Shanghai was interpreted by a leaked Zhejiang provincial document as showing hard-line support from CCP leader Xi Jinping for zero-COVID, despite the massive logistical challenges it brings.



Zhejiang and Jiangsu authorities are now being forced to accommodate tens of thousands of Shanghai residents after the city's own facilities filled up, according to online accounts, confirmed by writer and commentator Chen Feng.



"Basically, they will send 1,000 or 2,000 people per province, or about 900 people to a smaller province like Hainan," Chen told RFA. "This model has been evolved from the Wuhan and Xi'an [lockdowns] and the thinking is the same in [the northeastern province of] Jilin."



"Logically speaking, they have to harden their position now ... so people can see that [China] is the most successful [at dealing with COVID-19]," he said. "They can't go back on their announcement, so it's all about slogans and determination."



Expert missing



Meanwhile, prominent Shanghai disease prevention expert Zhang Wenhong, who posted critical comments of the zero-COVID policy to social media on March 23, hasn't been seen in public in recent days.



"He hasn't appeared in public, and he's been replaced now," U.S.-based doctor Yang Jingduan told RFA. "Clearly, this has more to do with politics than with pandemic control and disease prevention."



Former U.S. Army research virologist Lin Xiaoxu said Zhang's views were very much in line with the international consensus of experts on COVID-19.



"But Beijing just sticks to its original insistence on the so-called zero-COVID policy, because everything in China is dictated by politics," Lin said.



"Shanghai's epidemic prevention measures have taken the wrong route, because of huge pressure [on the municipal authorities] from the central government," he said, adding that the policy could cost Xi Jinping dear.



"If the Shanghai lockdown hits China's economy really hard, then different factions within the CCP's ranks will use this as an excuse to criticize the wisdom of the zero-COVID policy," Lin said. "This could lead to fiercer factional strife within the party."



He said internal dissent could scupper Xi's bid for an unprecedented third term in office at the CCP's 20th Party Congress later this year.



Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
The meeting comes days after Manila and Washington launched one of their biggest joint military exercises in years.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples Republic of China

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples Republic of China

Filipino Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. (left) sits across from Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi during a meeting in the district of Tunxi in Anhui province, China, April 3, 2022.

The top diplomats of the Philippines and China met over the weekend in a Chinese district and exchanged views on the South China Sea, Beijing said, amid fresh accusations from Manila over alleged Chinese aggression in the disputed waterway.

Filipino Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. and Chinese counterpart Wang Yi held talks on Sunday in Tunxi, Anhui province, days after Manila and Washington launched one of their biggest joint military exercises in years that observers described as a show of force.

On April 3, 2022, State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi held talks with visiting Philippine Foreign Minister Teodoro Locsin in Tunxi, Anhui province, said a statement on the meeting posted on the Chinese foreign ministrys website.

The two sides believe that maritime issues should be put in a proper place in bilateral relations, the statement added, without giving details.

Also without naming any nations or parties, Wang said Manila and Beijing should eliminate interference, and calmly and properly manage differences, so as to prevent the overall China-Philippines relations from being affected.

Wang added that China was willing to fast track key infrastructure projects in the Philippines and continue providing COVID-19 vaccine assistance, the Chinese foreign ministry statement said.

Attempts by the RFA-affiliated Benar News service to contact Locsins office for comment on the meeting went unanswered Monday.

The talks came amid this years joint Balikatan military exercises between the Philippines and the United States that involve about 9,000 troops from both sides. The exercises in the Philippines will go till April 8.

Wang and Locsins meeting comes after the Philippines in late March lodged a new diplomatic protest against China alleging that a Chinese coast guard ship maneuvered dangerously close to a Filipino vessel in the contested Scarborough Shoal earlier last month.

Chinas foreign ministry, meanwhile, insisted that it was within its rights when its ship allegedly engaged in what the Philippine Coast Guard described as close distance maneuvering in South China Sea waters.

Chinas envoy to Manila, Huang Xilian, did not say whether the issue of the Chinese coast guard ship was discussed at Sundays talks, but noted that the meeting of the two nations top diplomats produced fruitful results.

The talks included Chinas reaffirmation of its priority neighborhood diplomacy with the Philippines, the maintenance of amicable policies for continued and stable bilateral relations, and the peaceful and proper resolution of differences, Huang said.

China also reiterated its readiness to streamline key infrastructure projects construction with the Philippines.
Authorities in the southern province of Guangdong have moved to prosecute feminist activist and journalist Sophia Huang and fellow activist Wang Jianbing, rights groups reported.



Police issued a notification that they had transferred the cases of Huang and Wang to the Guangzhou municipal prosecution service on March 27, the Free Xueqin and Jianbin campaign said in a statement on its Github page.



"The Guangzhou police never allowed [their] lawyers to meet with them during the more than six months of investigation and detention, on the grounds that national security was involved," the statement said. "Now that the investigation has been completed, we expect [their][ lawyers to be able to read [the files] and meet with them without any problems."



It said Huang and Wang, who face charges of "incitement to subvert state power," have been transferred to the Guangzhou No. 1 Detention Center from the No. 2 Detention Center in Huang's case, and from solitary confinement "for interrogation" in Wang's.



"It is reported that in the last month they have been retransferred to the Guangzhou No. 1 Detention Center (Hougang North Street, Baiyun District, Guangzhou City, Guangdong Province)," the April 1 statement said.



Huang had planned to leave China via Hong Kong on Sept. 20, 2021 for the U.K., where she planned to take a master's degree in development with a prestigious Chevening Scholarship.



Wang, who is a labor and healthcare rights activist, had planned to see her off on her journey. But both were detained before she could board her flight.



The Japan-based group Human Rights Now said in a recent testimony to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva that the initial arrests were "due to social gatherings at Wang's apartment."



"The police acquired photos and a list of nearly 40 people who had participated in the gatherings from surveillance cameras installed at the apartments front door," it said in a video testimony to the Council.



"After the arrests, police continuously harassed and summoned the other participants for interrogation, asking them to identify material that they deemed as politically sensitive, and forcing them to sign false confessions that were drafted and fabricated by the police," it said.



"We urge the Guangzhou police to release Huang and Wang unconditionally as soon as possible," the group said. "We ... call for UN officials, independent experts, and governments to increase their monitoring of Huang and Wangs situation, as well as of all journalists and activists in China."



Wang Jianbing in an undated photo. Credit Wang's Facebook #MeToo activist



Before being targeted by the authorities in 2019, Huang had been an outspoken member of the country's #MeToo movement, and had carried out a survey of sexual harassment and assault cases among Chinese women working in journalism.



Huang was present at a million-strong protest in Hong Kong on June 9, 2019 against plans to allow extradition to mainland China, and was detained for "picking quarrels and stirring up trouble" in October 2019, before being released on bail in January 2020, a status that often involves ongoing surveillance and restrictions on a person's activities.



Her travel documents were also confiscated after her return, preventing her from beginning a law degree in Hong Kong the fall of 2019.



Huang had previously assisted in the investigation and reporting of a number of high-profile sexual harassment allegations against professors at Peking University, Wuhan University of Technology, Henan University and Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou.



Wang started to work in rural development after graduating in 2005, before joining the Guangzhou Gongmin NGO in 2014 and director and coordinator for youth work.



In 2018, he started advocacy and legal support work on behalf of workers with occupational diseases, and was a vocal supporter of China's #MeToo movement.



Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
Government promotes test as a success even as many Pyongyang residents witnessed missile explode in air.

General view of what state media reports is the "Hwasong-17" intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) on its launch vehicle in this undated photo released on March 25, 2022 by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

North Korea is attempting to discredit reports of a failed intercontinental ballistic missile launch, dismissing the accounts as hearsay even though many people in Pyongyang saw the rocket explode over the city, sources in the capital told RFA.

North Korean media reported on March 24 that it successfully completed tests of the new Hwasong-17 ICBM, attributing its success to leader Kim Jong Uns bravery. South Korean military authorities, however, reported Tuesday that the Hwasong-17 was involved in an earlier failed test launch on March 16. The March 24 launch was actually the older Hwasong-15 missile, they said.

The North Korean government is now denying rumors of loud sounds and flashes that could be heard and seen over Pyongyang on March 16.

I have heard on various occasions through meetings and gatherings that there have been baseless rumors circulating about missile explosions. These rumors undermine the defense technology of our republic, a Pyongyang city official told RFAs Korean Service March 30.

There is an emphasis from higher ups that we should not believe or get involved in these false rumors spread by hostile forces, and evil people who hold a grudge against our way of life, said the official, who requested anonymity for security reasons.

The official admitted that the so-called rumors were in fact true.

On the morning of March 16th, people in the districts of Sunan, Hyongjesan and Ryongsong heard a loud roar that seemed to pierce the sky and a bang sound and witnessed pieces of debris falling and smoking, he said.

I heard from a friend in the same department who has a house in Sunan  that his wife went outside to hang clothes and heard a big airplane passing by and heard a bang. After a while, she saw small pieces of shards falling nearby while smoking, the official said.

The official said that others in Ryongsong and Hyongjesan districts saw similar events unfold.

I even heard from a friend who lives in Ryongsong district that two people in Chungi-dong were struck by large pieces of debris falling, he said.

About a week after these testimonies, there was a report that the launch of new intercontinental ballistic missile Hwasong-17 on March 24th was a great success under the direct guidance of Kim Jong Un, said the official.

Pyongyang has not only been trying to pass off the launch on the 24th as the Hwasong-17, it is also trying to use the event to lionize Kim.

People say that Kim Jong Un seems like an actor in a well-produced music video on the TV reports he appears in. The missile launch failed, but I dont understand the governments effort to hide it, he said.

North Korea has sent agents into the provinces for damage control, a resident of South Pyongan province, north of Pyongyang, told RFA.

Last week, an executive appeared at the morning assembly at my company, saying there were rumors that a missile launch failed. He emphasized that we were not to believe the false rumors spread by evil forces intent on internally breaking us down, said the resident, who requested anonymity to speak freely.

But people are acknowledging the missile explosion as a fact. In Pyongyang as well as here, people saw flashing lights and smoke from the sky, and small fragments of debris fell here and there, she said.

The resident said others, including her cousin who lives in another South Pyongan town, saw flashing lights and heard bangs in the sky.

Although the incident has been witnessed by many, the authorities are dismissing it as a rumor spread by evildoers. There are many citizens who directly witnessed the explosion in the air, but I dont know what the authorities are afraid of that they would hide the truth, she said.

More sanctions

The U.S. Treasury Department Friday sanctioned five North Korean entities for their involvement in ballistic missile development programs in violation of several United Nations Security Council resolutions.

In a statement, the Treasury Department said the sanctions target a North Korean organization that conducts research and development of weapons of mass destruction and four of its revenue-generating subsidiaries.

The DPRKs provocative ballistic missile tests represent a clear threat to regional and global security and are in blatant violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions, said Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen in the statement.

The United States is committed to using our sanctions authorities to respond to the DPRKs continued development of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles. I also commend Japan for their actions today against the DPRK, and stand ready to continue to work together to counter the DPRKs continued threatening behavior, she said.

Analysts applauded the move.

Its a positive sign, in that the U.S. is taking action against North Koreas weapons development and testing, Soo Kim of the RAND Corporation told RFA.

But I would underscore that the latest designations are subsidiaries of organizations that should probably have been designated. So its unclear whether this will have teeth in terms of impact, she said.

Bruce Klingner of the Heritage Foundation, a group that promotes free enterprise and limited government, that there are any remaining North Korean entities to sanction, given its long and expansive history of violations of U.N. resolutions and U.S. laws.

It raises the question as to why Washington chose not to [sanction them] until now and how many other North Korean and other country entities the US could sanction but has not done so, Klingner told RFA.

Each U.S. administration has claimed to be tough on North Korea and other violators but chose not to fully enforce U.S. laws. Trump's maximum pressure was never maximum. Indeed, he announced he was not sanctioning 300 North Korean entities and 12 Chinese banks that had violated US laws. Sanctions, like diplomacy, are a tool that should be used in conjunction with other tools of international power, he said.

Translated by Claire Lee. Written in English by Eugene Whong.
Detained Myanmar journalists Han Thar Nyein, Ye Yint Tun, and Than Htike Aung are shown left to right in undated photos.

A total of 135 journalists have been arrested in Myanmar since the Feb. 1, 2021, military coup that overthrew civilian rule in that country, according to a local press freedoms group.

Among those arrested, 109 were men and 26 were women, while three other journalists were killed in the course of their work, said Han Zaw, a spokesman for Detained Journalists Information Myanmar, speaking to RFA.

Right now, 55 journalists  42 men and 13 women  are being held in detention, 22 of whom have now been convicted, and another six were given jail sentences in March, Han Zaw said. The detentions and arrests of journalists in Myanmar are still ongoing, he added.

Jailed in March were Han Thar Nyein, managing editor of Kamaryut Media; Than Htkine Aung, editor of Mizzima News; Neyin Chan Wai, a correspondent for the Bago Weekly Journal; Aung Zaw Zaw, editor-in-chief of the Mandalay Free Press; Ye Yint Tun, a correspondent for the Myanmar Herald; and freelance journalist Naung Yoe.

All were charged with defamation and obstruction of the countrys military and were given sentences ranging from one-and-a-half years to 11 years in jail, with Han Thar Thein also charged with violations of Myanmars Electronic Communications Act.

Conditions in Myanmar are now unsafe for journalists working for independent media groups, said veteran reporter Myint Kyaw, speaking to RFA from Myanmars commercial center and former capital Yangon.

There have been cases of torture, Myint Kyaw said. Not for everyone arrested, but there have been victims, and Myanmar has the second highest number of arrests after China, which means the second largest number of journalists arrested around the world, he said.

Its dangerous now to work for independent media, and its dangerous to report on any of the incidents now happening in the ongoing conflict, he said.

Veteran lawyer Khin Maung Myint told RFA that journalists arrested before June 2021 were charged only with defamation. But since June 30, charges under anti-terrorism and explosives statutes that allow for as long as 20 years have also been added, he said.

And though most of the journalists arrested were able to prove in court that they were simply carrying out their professional work when detained, none were released following their conviction at trial, he said.

'Enemies of the country'

Speaking to RFA, junta spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun said however that no journalists were arrested in Myanmar for doing their work but only for instigating violence.

On Armed Forces Day [March 27], more than 40 local media outlets and 26 local reporters working for overseas media attended the event, and they were able to work and write freely. Even RFA has reporters in Myanmar, Zaw Min Tun said.

If a journalist is doing the work of a journalist, we have no reason to arrest him. But if a journalist commits crimes and incites others to violence, we will arrest him not as a journalist but as a supporter of terrorism and a source of false news, he said.

Also speaking to RFA, Aung Kyaw  a senior correspondent for the Democratic Voice of Burma who was arrested and released in March last year  said that Myanmars military members hate the journalists held in interrogation camps and treat them as enemies of the country.

While I was being questioned, they would read news reports, and if they found something they didnt like, theyd hit me and torture me, even though those reports were published by other media, he said.

I told them that we were not a foreign news agency, that our news agency was officially registered in Myanmar, that we paid taxes to the country, and that we were paid only in kyats, not in dollars. But they wouldnt listen.

Soe Ya, editor-in-chief of the Delta News Agency, said that journalists are now fleeing Myanmar due to junta suppression, causing a loss of human resources in the countrys media.

Many journalists are leaving and moving to other countries to pursue their livelihood and because of the lack of security in Myanmar, he said. Our media world is now suffering a big loss because experienced people have to leave, as they cannot continue to survive in the present situation.

Translated by Khin Maung Nyane for RFAs Myanmar Service. Written in English by Richard Finney.
At least 50 Ukrainian civilians were evacuated from the besieged Azovstal steel plant amid the ruins of Mariupol, even as Russia continued to batter the strategic port city, Ukrainian officials said.



"Today we were able to evacuate from Azovstal 50 women, children, and elderly people," Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said on May 6 on her Telegram channel.



Vereshchuk added that, in the face of Russian attacks, the evacuation was extremely slowtomorrow morning we will continue the evacuation operation."

Live Briefing: Russia's Invasion Of Ukraine RFE/RL's Live Briefing gives you all of the major developments on Russia's invasion, how Kyiv is fighting back, the plight of civilians, and Western reaction. For all of RFE/RL's coverage of the war, click here.

The United Nations has scrambled to broker a deal to help evacuate some of the 200 civilians who are holed up along with an estimated 2,000 Ukrainian fighters in the massive Azovstal steel plant, one of the largest in Europe.



Ukrainian officials have accused Russian forces of disrupting an agreed evacuation process by firing on vehicles attempting to transport people out of the plant.



Russia confirmed that some 50 people had been evacuated but did not comment on Ukrainian allegations of attacks on those leaving.



Throughout the day, Russian forces continued their assault on the sprawling steel factory against the Ukrainian fighters holding out there.

Ukraine's General Staff said in its daily assessment on May 6 that Russians were using aircraft as part of the renewed assault on the plant.

"There are many wounded, but they are not surrendering," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on May 5 in his nightly video address. "They are holding their positions."

Mariupol itself has been largely razed to the ground by weeks of street-to-street fighting and heavy bombardment. Azovstal has turned into a last stand for the Ukrainians troops struggling to prevent a complete Russian defeat of the city.

Zelenskiy said that, if Russian forces killed civilians or troops who could otherwise be released, his government would no longer hold peace talks with Moscow.



He said there was basically nothing left of the once-flourishing port city, only "this little turf, this little structure, the Azovstal steel mill, or what remains of it."

The fight for Azovstal also comes amid speculation that Russian President Vladimir Putin wants a battlefield triumph that he can showcase on May 9 when Russia marks Victory Day -- the anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany.

"The renewed effort by Russia to secure Azovstal and complete the capture of Mariupol is likely linked to the upcoming 9 May Victory Day commemorations and Putin's desire to have a symbolic success in Ukraine," the British Defense Ministry said in its May 6 daily assessment.

"This effort has come at personnel, equipment, and munitions cost to Russia. Whilst Ukrainian resistance continues in Azovstal, Russian losses will continue to build and frustrate their operational plans in southern Donbas," the ministry said.

Losing Mariupol would deprive Ukraine of a vital port on the Sea of Azov. It would also give Russia the ability to establish a land corridor to the Crimean Peninsula and free up troops to fight elsewhere in the Donbas.

The Ukrainians holed up in Azovstal's labyrinthine tunnels and industrial infrastructure have been posting videos and photographs to social media, appealing to the international community.

Soldiers are "dying in agony" due to the lack of proper treatment, Captain Svyatoslav Palamar, deputy commander of the Azov Battalion, said in a video address on May 5. He pleaded for international help to evacuate the civilians and wounded fighters there.

Andriy Yermak, a top adviser to Zelenskiy, said on May 6 that nearly 500 civilians had been evacuated from the city and the Azovstal plant as part of a United Nations-led effort.



"The next stage of rescuing our people from Azovstal is under way at the moment. Information about the results will be provided later," Yermak said in a post on Telegram on May 6. Kyiv will "do everything to save all its civilians and military."

The fighting comes as Russia continues its offensive in the eastern Donbas, an offensive that has proceeded slowly and without major advances, as Ukrainian forces have blocked Russian movements and even regained territory.



Ukrainian forces have been increasingly equipped with heavy artillery and powerful anti-tank and antiaircraft weaponry supplied from NATO members.

Germany, which has come under pressure at home and abroad to step up its equipment supplies, said on May 6 that it would supply seven self-propelled howitzers to Ukraine after reversing its policy not to send heavy armaments to war zones.



Earlier, Berlin announced it would also be sending "Gepard" antiaircraft systems.



The Donbas offensive came after a thwarted campaign by Russian forces north of Kyiv in the early weeks of the war. The withdrawal of Russian troops from places like Bucha, near Kyiv, has led to a cascade of reports from witnesses who say Russian units committed atrocities that could amount to war crimes.



Rights watchdog Amnesty International said on May 6 there was compelling evidence that Russian troops had committed war crimes, including extrajudicial executions of civilians, when they occupied an area outside Ukraine's capital in February and March. Civilians also suffered abuses such as "reckless shootings and torture, the group said.



Russian troops had committed a "host of apparent war crimes" in Bucha, including "numerous unlawful killings," most of them near the intersection of Yablunska and Vodoprovidna streets, the report found.

With reporting by RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service and AP
Election authorities in Hungary announced initial vote counts suggesting Viktor Orban and his Fidesz party achieved a runaway victory at the polls on April 3.

Because of the country's complicated voting system, numbers are still likely to change slightly over the next week. But the likeliest result is that the right-wing ruling Fidesz will control a two-thirds majority in the next parliament, which lets it govern virtually unchallenged.

Observers were surprised at the landslide victory after preelection polls suggested a tight race. And even as ballots were still being tallied from elections that saw turnout of around 70 percent of Hungary's 8 million eligible voters, the apparent margin of victory and other factors likely gave those monitors cause for concern.

"A 'stolen election' implies that somebody broke all the rules. And, you know, what Orban's so good at doing is inventing the rules he needs to win," Kim Lane Scheppele, a Princeton professor and author of an influential work on The Rule Of Law And The Frankenstate, told RFE/RL hours after the polls closed.

Here are six takeaways from the Hungarian vote:

1. A Much Bigger Win Than Expected

"We won a victory so big that you can see it from the moon, and you can certainly see it from Brussels," Orban crowed in his victory speech.

Most preelection polls were showing a gap between Fidesz and the united opposition of between 4 and 7 percentage points, mostly in Fidesz's favor.

That's a sizable margin under any conditions. And built-in advantages like gerrymandering and the single-round, twin-ballot voting system are seen to favor Fidesz.

By early on April 4, the preliminary numbers suggested Fidesz might already have 136 of the parliament's 199 seats in its pocket, allowing it to hang onto the two-thirds majority that lets it change the constitution and any other legislation it wants.

In addition, a new right-wing party, My Homeland, which is a potential ally of Fidesz and is thought to have eroded right-wing opposition party Jobbik's voter base, looks to have won another seven seats.

"This is a complete shock," said Scheppele, who spent years in Hungary studying postcommunist constitution processes. "Nobody, I think, would be surprised if Fidesz won. What's completely shocking is the magnitude of the victory."

Hungarian polls are not always accurate, and are even notorious for their biases. But with 98 percent of the ballots tallied, Fidesz was poised to win 88 of the 106 districts that use a first-past-the-post system.

Fidesz led the party-list vote with around 53 percent to the United For Hungary opposition's 35 percent. "No poll registered that," Scheppele said. "The polls have never been that far off."

Seat allocations are certain to change slightly as embassy and so-called "near abroad" ballots come in. But numbers like that provide "way too big a lead to go away," Scheppele said.

2. Not A Level Playing Field

Hungary's opposition finally joined forces. But even a unified opposition proved little match for a champion of "illiberal" government sitting on three consecutive terms of total dominance since 2010.

In that time, Orban has rewritten the constitution and key aspects of electoral laws, and consolidated allies' control of nearly every major media outlet in the country.

By almost all accounts before the voting, the opposition was better organized than in any other elections of recent years.

Under the banner United For Hungary, it managed to pull off a primary last year that chose Peter Marki-Zay, a little-known mayor whose conservative roots helped deflect Orban's efforts at a culture war. But by election night, Marki-Zay was flanked only by his family delivering a concession speech.

There were no opposition allies in sight.

Marki-Zay even looked set to lose his own district by around 12 points. He said the united opposition "acknowledge the victory" of Fidesz, despite the "cheating" and "brainwashing" carried out by Fidesz and its friendly media, which made it "an unequal fight."

United For Hungary comprised the Hungarian Socialist Party; the Democratic Coalition; the formerly extremist right-wing movement known as Jobbik; the liberal Hungarian Green Party; the green Dialogue for Hungary party; and the centrist Momentum Movement.

Scheppele noted that a Fidesz-dominated media landscape made it very hard for Marki-Zay and his allies to get its message out.

Instead of describing it as a failure in its efforts, Scheppele said, "I think what it tells you is that they have to play on an unlevel playing field."

3. Orban's Enemies Are Multiplying

Orban immediately boasted that "We won best when everyone came together against us."

He cited "huge international power centers and organizations," an allusion to familiar Orban foes like the European Union or George Soros's democracy-promotion efforts.

And of course, he continued to paint Marki-Zay as a puppet of Ferenc Gyurcsany, a former prime minister whose leadership collapsed the political left in 2010.

Jennifer McCoy, a visiting researcher at Central European University's Democracy Institute from Georgia State University in Atlanta, noted that the "strong negative partisanship...which we're seeing in polarized countries" is alive and well in Hungary. "People are voting more against the other candidate than they are for their own candidate," she told a roundtable.

But Orban also named Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who called out the Hungarian leader by name last month for his reluctance to join his NATO and EU allies in helping supply weapons to Ukraine since Putin launched a large-scale war there six weeks ago.

Orban described Zelenskiy as an "opponent" on election night.

Mujtaba Rahman, managing director for Europe for the Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy, predicted that his "sweeping victory will embolden Orban further" to challenge the European Union generally and "left-liberal thinking," particularly if it's embedded within European conservative parties.

"Even more worrying," he said, "he will feel free to yet further befriend Vladimir Putin and other eastern autocrats."

"In short, Brussels should brace itself for new troubles, because everything that it found loathsome in Hungary's maverick PM previously will now certainly be intensified for at least the next few months -- but in all likelihood, for the next four years," Rahman said.

4. Possible Voting Irregularities

"It looks like a legally massaged election," Scheppele said as the early results came in. "This is how Orban operates," she added, "he makes legal everything he needs."

While Fidesz's overall victory is virtually assured, specific numbers and patterns -- and evidence of irregularities -- could still emerge.

Marki-Zay warned in his concession speech: "That this election was democratic and free is, of course, something we continue to dispute."

In addition to dual-track voting and other advantages that essentially require the opposition to outscore Fidesz by 4-5 percentage points in order to unseat Orban, analysts warned of the risk of "voter tourism."

That's because new legislation allows voters inside and outside the country to register in any district they choose. The change could allow votes to be mobilized, directed, or even transported to places where margins are tight, experts warned.

It could also deal a blow to one of the opposition's biggest achievements -- its ability to field joint candidates in each of the country's 106 single-mandate constituencies.

Hungarians are legally barred from acting as election observers. But the opposition managed to recruit some 20,000 volunteers to be present outside polling stations for what it called the Clean Vote project.

Widely shared images of vans dropping off groups of voters at polling stations hinted at an organized effort to move voters around. Clean Vote shared such videos on its Facebook page.

Scheppele says that she'll wait and see, but that Fidesz appears to have accrued 300,000 new voters. "And the question is: Who are the 300,000 new voters who didn't vote last time?" she said.

Those are the kinds of irregularities that could draw the attention of Hungary's election authorities in the coming days. But Scheppele says the National Election Office is under new leadership that is widely seen as "substantially closer" to Fidesz than in previous elections.

"This is something that we'll have to see," Scheppele said.

Meanwhile, a full-scale mission of outside observers is on the ground in Hungary.

For only the second time in its history, the OSCE's Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) requested a full observation mission to an EU member state, amid concerns over potential election fraud, media bias, and the use of state resources.

5. A Vote Overshadowed By War

Orban's response to the invasion and the 4 million refugees fleeing Ukraine has been grudging condemnation of territorial encroachment against that neighbor and joining Western sanctions, but also a firm refusal to directly help EU and NATO allies provide weapons and similar assistance to Ukraine and forces united behind Zelenskiy.

Over the years, Orban has carefully cultivated close diplomatic and trade ties with Moscow and Putin, including energy imports.

In February, with tensions high over tens of thousands of Russian troops on Ukraine's borders, Orban traveled to Sochi to see Putin and emerged with a deal to import additional natural-gas supplies from Russia.

Analysts blame an increasing reliance on Russian energy and a years-long feud with Kyiv over minority issues among ethnic Hungarians in Ukraine for his cautious hedging since the war.

"Hungarian society has completely turned around in connection with the war," Andrea Szabo, a political analyst, told RFE/RL's Hungarian Service.

Orban has spent years encouraging Hungarians to regard Russia and Putin as political allies in defense of traditionalist values, and his nonconfrontational position on the war, which could keep the gas flowing, appears to have resonated with many conservative voters. "What is surprising is that being perceived as being too supportive of Kyiv, not Moscow, is seemingly the greater political liability," Zsuzsana Vegh wrote for the Alliance for Securing Democracy, a German Marshall Fund institution, ahead of the elections.

6. Hungarian Democracy's Last Stand?

"We have heard a lot of nonsense recently about whether there is democracy in Hungary," AP quoted State Secretary Zoltan Kovacs as saying at an election-night event in the capital. "Hungarian democracy in the last 12 years has not weakened but been strengthened."

A Budapest-based conservative think tank, the Center for Fundamental Rights, called the April 3 vote "the most significant event of Hungarian democracy in the era following the transition away from communism."

It was historic, alright. But critics suggest it's for the wrong reasons.

On the cusp of a likely new term, Orban has already been in power for 16 of the past 24 years. That's a clear warning, they say.

"It's the kind of historic election that marks the end of democracy rather than a flourishing," Scheppele said. "When the government monopolizes the power of the media, when the government sets all the rules, when the government uses every aspect of incumbency to buy voters, when that works, that's not 'Three cheers for democracy.'"

She said that "to win by another two-thirds majority in the face of this is just only explainable by having monopolized all the crucial things that go into an election."

McCoy agrees. "I think it is important that all of those who believe in democracy watch carefully countries and leaders as they gradually erode democracy and entrench themselves in power," McCoy said. "It's a gradual process. And so it's often ignored, until it becomes very well entrenched, like this case."

Extreme gerrymandering, a lack of opposition access to the media, unregulated campaign financing, and the use of public funds in favor of the Orban candidacy were all important factors, according to McCoy.

"This election was almost unwinnable for any opponent, given the structural advantages that Fidesz had already created for itself," McCoy said.
KHARTOUM, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The repeated electricity outage amid a wave of heat, as well as the scarcity of cooking gas combined to aggravate the sufferings of the Sudanese people during the holy month of Ramadan.

Sudan's capital Khartoum and some other provinces witness a temperature as high as 44 degrees centigrade.

Al-Munzir Ahmed Al-Haj, a Sudanese meteorologist, told Xinhua on Monday that "early activity of Sudan's thermal low" led to the current heat wave.

The frequent power cuts, which last for about six hours a day, have bedeviled the Sudanese citizens in the baking hot.

Osman Dau Al-Bait, acting director of Sudan's electricity company, attributed in a statement on Monday the power outage to technical faults and some other reasons outside the scope of the electricity company.

He said the electricity administration was currently seeking to address the issue, expressing regret for the citizens over the wide power cuts during Ramadan.

In the meantime, the cooking gas distribution agencies and sales centers in Khartoum are crowded with citizens looking for cooking gas cylinders.

"We are suffering from a lack of cooking gas and a hike in its prices," Noha Osman, a housewife, told Xinhua on Monday.

The price of filling a gas cylinder (25 kg) reached 2,500 Sudanese pounds, while its price in the black market ranged between 11,000 and 13,000 pounds. The official exchange rate of 1 U.S. dollar is set at about 570 pounds on Monday.

Gas distribution agents indicated the great shortage was due to a fault in the main refinery, which caused a scarcity and a rise in the prices.

Sudan has been facing an economic crisis after the United States and international agencies suspended aid worth hundreds of millions of dollars after Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, the general commander of the Sudanese Armed Forces, declared a state of emergency on Oct. 25, 2021 and dissolved the Sovereign Council.

The U.S. has suspended 700 million dollars in economic aid to Sudan, while the World Bank failed to provide 500 million dollars to Sudan, which was expected in November 2021. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has also halted 150 million dollars in special drawing rights for Sudan.

Sudan's debt relief process under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative of the IMF has also been suspended.

Sudan has been plagued by an economic crisis since the secession of South Sudan in 2011, due to which Sudan has lost 75 percent of its oil revenues. 
The power of photojournalism lies in the storyteller's ability to capture fleeting moments that have lasting impact. It is also a profession fraught with peril, especially in times of war. Ukrainian photojournalist and documentarian Maksim Levin was killed while covering Russias invasion of Ukraine.*A Ukrainian presidential aide said that Levin went missing on March 13 in the Kyiv region and that his body was found near the village of Huta Mezhyhirska on April 1. Ukraine's Prosecutor-General's Office said that, according to, Levin was fatally shot twice with small-arms fire, by servicemen" of the Russian military. Levin, 40, leaves behind his wife and four children.Most of Levin's images centered on conflict, yet he also had a keen eye for capturing quiet moments that linger: A villager moving his animals to safety from an encroaching fire, a mourner in tears at a cemetery, or a simple photo of a woman giving a soldier a flower in appreciation.Here's a look at some of the stories Levin documented with his camera.*A previous version of this gallery said that Levin was a contributor to RFE/RL. He was not.
As Russian forces withdrew from the suburbs of Kyiv, they left a trail of death and destruction -- including mounting evidence of cold-blooded killings of Ukrainian civilians. Will this awful development change views of the war in Russia or the West? Alexander Clarkson, a lecturer at King's College London, joins host Steve Gutterman to discuss.
BELGRADE -- Incumbent Aleksandar Vucic, according to an early official count, has won Serbias presidential vote, while his ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) also appears to have taken the most votes in parliamentary elections.

The National Electoral Commission said on April 4 that with 87.7 percent of the ballots counted, Vucic had 59.5 percent, enough to avoid a runoff with his closest competitor, opposition candidate Zdravko Ponos, who is trailing in second place at 17.5 percent. Lawyer and politician Milos Jovanovic was third among the eight candidates running with 5.8 percent of the vote.

The deadline for announcing the final results is April 7.

In the concurrent parliamentary elections, the SNS led with 43.4 percent, while its longtime coalition partner, the Socialist Party of Serbia, was third with 11.7 percent. Ponos's United for Victory alliance obtained 13.1 percent of all ballots cast in the April 3 vote.

Vucic has already declared victory, saying in a televised acceptance speech that he would stay the course of balancing the country's European Union membership aspirations with Belgrade's close and developing ties with Moscow and Beijing.

"We will maintain the policy that is important for the Europeans, Russians, and Americans, and that is...military neutrality," he said.

"Serbia will try to preserve friendly and partnership relations in many areas with the Russian Federation," Vucic added, while admitting Moscow's war in Ukraine had impacted the campaign as voters sought stability.

Serbia gets almost all of its gas supplies from Russia, while its army has close ties with Russia's military.

Further adding to the tight relationship between Moscow and Belgrade, the Kremlin also supports Serbia's opposition to the independence of Kosovo by blocking its membership to the United Nations.

Ponos, a retired military general, remained defiant in defeat, saying that Vucic will be exposed for his mismanagement of the country.

These elections are [the] beginning of the end of Aleksandar Vucic. We will not waste this, he said.

While the nongovernmental Center for Research, Transparency, and Accountability (CRTA) said its observers submitted five criminal complaints to authorities over irregularities, election officials said the process had been carried out overall without major problems and in a democratic manner.

The issues mentioned by the CRTA included the buying of votes at polling stations, keeping parallel voter lists, violating the secrecy of the ballot, recording events at polling stations, as well as the presence of unauthorized persons at polling stations.

The elections were monitored by more than 4,000 observers, as well as delegations from the European Parliament, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, and the European Network of Election Observation Organizations.

Five years after winning his first term as president, Vucic remains the dominant force in Serbia, preaching peace and stability at a time when Europe is being rocked by its biggest conflict since the end of World War II with Russia's war against Ukraine.

But his critics complain he has tightened his grip on power through his control of the media and government to a point where a survey last month by the pollster Demostat showed 43 percent of the country didn't believe the elections would be free or fair.

"In recent years, the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) has steadily eroded political rights and civil liberties, putting pressure on independent media, the political opposition, and civil society organizations," Freedom House said in its latest assessment of Serbia, which it ranked 62nd out of 100 nations in its freedom index for 2021.
It's called the "Sweet Home" neighborhood -- but its streets are now burned out, the windows in the buildings are shattered. Current Time reporter Roman Sukhan visited the area during a tour of Irpin, near Kyiv, which has now been liberated from Russian forces.
MOGADISHU, April 3 (Xinhua) -- The special forces of the Somali National Army (SNA), Danab, killed seven al-Shabab militants and wounded others Sunday during a security operation at an area near Wisil town in Hobyo in Mudug region, central Somalia, a senior army official said.

Odowa Yusuf Rage, the SNA chief, said the forces also arrested two wounded militants and recovered weapons and a vehicle during the operation.

"Our forces recovered weapons, mainly four improvised explosive devices (IEDs), four AK 47 rifles and a vehicle during a special operation in Mudug region under Galmudug State in central Somalia," Rage said.

He stressed that the operation targeted the terrorists in the area to reduce their threat in the region, adding that they will continue such operations against the militants until stabilization is restored.

The operation came two weeks after Galmudug State concluded parliamentary elections in the region.

Government forces have intensified operations against al-Shabab in the southern regions, but the militants are still in control of the rural areas of those regions, conducting ambushes and planting landmines. 
TUNIS, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Tunisian President Kais Saied has called on the Independent High Authority for Elections (ISIE) to be ready to organize the legislative elections slated for Dec. 17, according to a statement released by the presidency on Monday.

During his meeting with ISIE Vice President Farouk Bouasker, Saied said "it is imperative to preserve the independence and the neutrality of the body."

For his part, Bouasker highlighted the elections' importance for the country's political future and its stability, in addition to the ISIE's critical role to ensure the elections' success.

Last week, Saied announced the dissolution of the Assembly of People's Representatives, or the parliament.

Tunisia's Islamist party Ennahdha (Renaissance) on Monday voiced its opposition to the dissolution of the Tunisian parliament.

According to a statement on its Facebook page, Ennahdha said the president's decisions "are in violation of the provisions of the constitution."

In December last year, Saied announced a constitutional referendum will be held in July this year, followed by parliamentary elections at the end of 2022. 
Images of dozens of bodies lying in the streets of the village of Bucha, near Kyiv, have been seen around the world, prompting accusations of war crimes against Russian forces. RFE/RL correspondent Levko Stek traveled there on April 3 shortly after its liberation by Ukrainian forces, witnessed the carnage in the streets, and spoke to residents about what happened there. At the time of publication, RFE/RL could not independently verify all of the accounts.
COLOMBO, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Monday extended an invitation to all political parties to join the government to find solutions to the ongoing crisis in the country.

The invitation came hours after cabinet ministers resigned from their posts.

In a statement, the President's Media Division said that the current crisis was a result of several economic factors and global developments and Sri Lanka should find solutions within a democratic framework.

"Considering this a national need, the time has come to work together for the sake of all the citizens and the future generations. The president invites all political parties representing in the parliament to come together to accept ministerial portfolios in order to find solutions to this national crisis," the statement said.

Sri Lanka's Central Bank Governor Ajith Nivard Cabraal also tendered his resignation to President Rajapaksa on Monday.

Sri Lanka has for days been facing public protests calling on immediate measures to be taken by the government to solve the economic crisis.

A state of emergency was declared in Sri Lanka on Friday and a 36-hour curfew came into place on the evening the next day which was lifted Monday morning. 
CANBERRA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The Australian government has made up ground on the Opposition ahead of the general election, a poll has found.

According to the latest edition of Newspoll, which was published on Sunday night, the governing Coalition's primary vote has improved a point to 36 percent compared to 38 percent for the Labor Party.

The two-point margin represents a significant improvement for the government from trailing 41-35 in mid-March.

By comparison, the Coalition received 41.4 percent of first preference votes in the 2019 federal election and Labor 33.3 percent.

Newspoll found that Labor leads the Coalition 54-46 on a two-party preferred basis.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison is expected to call the general election for May within days.

The poll was taken following Treasurer Josh Frydenberg handing down the federal budget for the financial year 2022/23, revealing billions of dollars in spending measures to address the rising cost of living.

Labor leader Anthony Albanese's budget reply speech was headlined by a 2.5 billion Australian dollar (1.9 billion U.S. dollar) pledge to fix a "crisis" in the aged care system.

Morrison's net approval rating -- which is measured by subtracting his disapproval rating from his approval rating -- rose two points to negative 12 while Labor leader Albanese's fell to the negative one.

Forty-three percent of voters identified Morrison as their preferred PM compared to 42 percent for Albanese, with 15 percent undecided. 
From 25 February 2022, the price of wheat for May on CBOT increased from 859.6 cents per bushel to a peak of 1,363.4 cents per bushel, corresponding to an increase of 58.6% within just two weeks. This time the peak has surpassed that of 2008, when the world agricultural sector experienced a severe crop failure due to the La Nina weather phenomena.

Supply disrupted

In a report released in early March 2022, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) cut Russia's wheat exports for the 2021 to 2022 season to an estimated 32 mn tons, down 3 mn tons compared to the estimated figure in the report in February 2022. Similarly, Ukraine's wheat exports are also forecast to decrease by 4 mn tons, to only 20 mn tons. The reason for this reduction is that export activities at important ports near the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov have either been disrupted or completely stalled since the conflict broke out.

However, the 3 mn ton reduction by USDA in Russian exports seems modest because it is only a decrease in exports due to difficult logistic problems. It is likely that in the next report to be released in April 2022, the US Department of Agriculture will continue to further cut the export estimate of Russia, because Russia has issued a ban on the export of cereals such as wheat, barley, corn, and rye. Specifically, the export ban period will take place between 15 March to 31 September 2022. According to a report of the Russian Ministry of Agriculture, as of 10 March 2022, the cumulative wheat exports for the 2021 to 2022 season have only recorded 26.8 mn tons, about 22% lower than in the same period in the 2020 to 2021 season.

Prices will rise

Global wheat supply was not only affected by the conflict alone, but also by the fact that production output did not expand to keep up with demand. The US Department of Agriculture estimates the current crop production at 778.5 mn tons, while the consumption demand for the 2021 to 2022 season is at 787.3 mn tons, an increase of about 0.6% compared to the previous season. Therefore, if the conflict factor is not taken into account, the output is also 8.8 mn tons short of demand.

The importance of the Black Sea region has been highlighted in the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine. This region supplies the wheat import needs of the Middle East and North Africa regions. Wheat products are considered an essential food of the people there, and this very large population faces a huge food shortage if the conflict in Ukraine continues. For a long time, these areas have depended on wheat supplies from the Black Sea region. This situation is similar to Europe's dependence on Russian gas.

The current disruption to wheat supply could lead to high prices that will affect the majority of the poor in the Middle East and North African regions, and potentially create social unrest, similar to that during the Arab Spring uprising in 2010 that spread across Egypt, Tunisia, and Yemen. Egypt is the world's largest wheat importer, and more that 50% of this proportion comes from Russia and Ukraine. Turkey, which is the world's third largest wheat importer, is even more dependent with nearly 90% of its supply coming from Russia and Ukraine.

During the current ongoing conflict which has disrupted the supply chain, Egypt and Turkey have both moved to ban the export of grains such as wheat and oilseeds, to avoid the risk of a domestic food crisis. Algeria is the fifth largest wheat importer in the world and the country has now banned the export of wheat as well. The current turmoil in Ukraine has caused many regions to find solutions to increase domestic wheat production in their own localities.

Global wheat supply

Egypt is likely to replace Russia for supplies to and from the US and Europe. Algeria is also looking at France for wheat supplies. China has moved to increase wheat imports after the removal of import restrictions on wheat from Russia. The reason is that the country's winter wheat production is expected to decrease by about 30% due to rainy weather.

For countries that can strengthen their wheat exports, now is the best time to increase their export market base. According to forecasts on the global supply of wheat by the US Department of Agriculture, Australia will increase wheat exports by 7.8%, to touch 27.5 mn tons, while India will increase by 21.4% to reach 8.5 mn tons. For North Africa and the Mediterranean countries, replacing the supply from the Black Sea with supply from India is a reasonable choice because although the transit time will be longer, it will come at a lower cost.

The current concerns are not only about the disruption in supply chain, but also reduction in the supply volume for the next season, from this year until next year, starting from May 2022. The conflict in Ukraine will most severely affect its production due to lack of labor, lack of fuel, and lack of fertilizer, as well as reduced farming areas due to consistent bombing. Ukraine's current wheat production is more than 30 mn tons per year, but if the conflict drags on for a long time, output could drop by 50% to 15 mn tons, which will cause a huge shortage in the global market. Fertilizer shortage and increase in fertilizer prices will not just occur in Ukraine, but it will remain an ongoing problem that will resonate globally due to skyrocketing oil and gas prices. Under these drastic conditions, wheat prices are expected to continue to increase globally.

Pham Tuan
Macky Sall sur le trafic d'arbres

La ceremonie de prise darmes marquant la celebration du 62e anniversaire de laccession du Senegal a la souverainete internationale, a la place de lIndependance, a Dakar, a ete l'occasion, pour le president Macky Sall, de rappeler sa desapprobation face a l'abattement d'arbres en Casamance pour etre exportes hors des frontieres senegalaises.





"La defense de nos forets, cest justement lune des missions principales actuellement en cours pour defendre la foret de Casamance. Mes instructions ont ete tres claires : nous ne pouvons plus accepter quun seul arbre soit abattu en Casamance pour etre exporte hors de nos frontieres", previent-il.




LOS ANGELES, April 3 (Xinhua) -- The Sacramento Police Department confirmed Sunday afternoon that six adults were killed and 12 other people were injured in a mass shooting occurred early morning in Sacramento, the capital city of the U.S. state of California.

At a press conference, Sacramento Police Chief Kathy Lester said that the shootings broke out after a large fight in downtown and killed three men and three women. But she did not release any details about the suspect or a possible motive.

Nearby buildings were hit by gunfire and a stolen handgun was recovered at the scene, Lester said, adding that the investigators suspected that multiple shooters were involved in the tragic incident.

According to her, police patrolling the area heard gunfire at about 2 a.m. (0900 GMT). When police arrived at the scene, they found a large crowd gathered on the street and began lifesaving measures to multiple victims on scene, however six victims were pronounced deceased at the scene.

In video showed by local KCRA 3 news channel, some strong young men grappled with each other first in a street then sound of gunfires could be heard in background. As the crowed of people running through the street, screams could be heard as they ran to safety.

KCRA 3 said they counted 76 gunshots in this video and called the incident as the fatalist shooting in the city's history.

Lester also issued a plea to the public at the press conference, asking for witnesses or anyone with recordings of the incident to contact police.

Gun violence has been on the rise across the United States in the past few years, a trend fueled by multiple factors, from the economic and social disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic to the unrest during the 2020 elections, as well as a surge in gun sales.

More than 17,000 people have died or been injured due to gun violence in the country so far this year, during which America has seen at least 110 mass shootings, according to a database run by the nonprofit research group Gun Violence Archive. 
When a mining company proposed to expand its coal operations in Montana, President Donald Trump's Interior Department said no environmental study was needed because the mine would have only a minor impact on climate change, discharging 0.04% of the earths total greenhouse gas emissions each year.

What the department left out, however, was the amount of planet-heating gases that would be spewed when the coal reached overseas ports, in Japan and South Korea, and was burned for fuel  97% of the mines total emissions during 11 years of scheduled operations, a federal appeals court said Monday.

For each year of its operations, the coal from this project is expected to generate more GHG emissions than the single largest source of GHG emissions in the United States, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said in a 2-1 ruling ordering a federal judge to re-examine the project.

Bull Mountains Mine No. 1 is operated by Signal Peak Energy on state and federal lands in south-central Montana. Its coal mining on federal land was initially approved by the Interior Department under President Barack Obama in 2015 but blocked by U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy in a suit by environmental groups. But after Trumps Interior Department conducted its own review in 2018 and found no significant impact, Molloy approved the project in 2020.

In Mondays ruling, the court said the case reflected increasing awareness of the perils of climate change. While Trump himself repeatedly denied the impact of fossil-fuel production on global warming, the court noted that the Interior Department, in its 2018 review, said the current period was the warmest in the modern history of human civilization, and that it is extremely likely that human activities, especially emissions of GHGs, are the dominant cause.

But the court majority said the Interior Department wrongly considered only the greenhouse gas emissions while the coal was being mined and transported by rail to a seaport in Vancouver, B.C., and disregarded the gases that would be emitted once the minerals reached their destinations abroad. Including those emissions would increase the mines share of the planets annual total from .04% to 3.33%, the court said.

Greenhouse gases are a global problem, Judge Morgan Christen wrote. Any assessment of local point source impact cannot exclude combustion-related emissions, regardless of where the coal is burned.

The court declined to order an immediate halt to mining on federal land and left that decision to Molloy.

Christen, an Obama appointee, was joined in the majority by Judge Johnnie Rawlinson, appointed by President Bill Clinton. In dissent, Judge Ryan Nelson, a Trump appointee, said courts should leave such decisions to federal agencies.

The environmental effects of GHG emissions have been hotly contested publicly and in the courts, Nelson wrote. The courts are ill-equipped to step into highly politicized scientific debates like this, which, he said, are intertwined with ... the behavior of 200 other sovereign nations  or the personal energy usage decisions of 7 billion people worldwide.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Nathaniel Shoaff, the Sierra Clubs lawyer in the case, said the ruling gives President Bidens administration, which argued in support of Trumps Interior Department, a chance to reassess the mine project and its approach to fossil fuels and climate change.

The bare minimum we should ask of the federal government, when it decides what to do about public lands is that its honest about the climate impacts of that decision, Shoaff said. If you dont prepare an Environmental Impact Statement for this project, then you dont prepare one for any mining project.

Lawyers for the government and Signal Peak Energy were not available for comment.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @BobEgelko
Yalonda M. James/The Chronicle

Four men were shot, two of them fatally, in San Franciscos Crocker Amazon neighborhood on Sunday, and police were looking for a gunman who sped away in a vehicle, authorities said.

Officers arrived at the Alice Chalmers Playground on Brunswick Avenue shortly after 4:30 p.m. and found four wounded victims, the Police Department said in a statement Monday morning. Two subsequently died at a hospital. The other two were taken to the hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening, police said.
It may pay more to work in the Bay Area compared with other regions of the U.S., but for middle-class residents, new research shows its a trade-off that increasingly means giving up buying a home.

Households earning around $80,000 to $165,000 qualify as middle income here, depending on the location and family size, compared with a national median income of $67,521. Even before pandemic bidding wars, it wasnt enough to keep up with soaring home prices: Just 24% of homes sold in 2019 in San Francisco fell into price brackets that middle-class buyers could afford, according to a report released Monday by UC Berkeleys Terner Center for Housing Innovation.

Those in the thick of the regions frenzied housing market say the barrier to entry has only gotten higher since the coronavirus upended daily life. Prospective buyers are borrowing cash or moving farther away. Residents who already own homes are going to extremes to keep them. Those shut out of homeownership are spending more on rent, widening inequality and increasing fears about essential workers like teachers being priced out for good.

To be able to qualify for any of these houses anywhere in the Bay Area, you have to have an average annual income of $235,000, said Tim Yee, a real estate broker and president of RE/MAX Gold Bay Area. Its crazy, and for first-time home buyers, its extraordinarily hard unless they have very wealthy parents.

In San Francisco, as recently as 2010, 47% of homes for sale were affordable to middle-class buyers  defined as those making 80% to 120% of the local median income  according to the report. Alameda and Santa Clara counties saw even steeper declines in affordable home sales, from almost 70% and 63% of homes sold in 2010, respectively, to just over 30% in 2019.

Though prices have been rising for decades, economists like Stanford Universitys Mark Duggan said little breaking points are getting harder to ignore. They range from anecdotes about truck drivers and teachers leaving the state to worker shortages at local institutions like his kids own Palo Alto schools.

My school district couldnt get bus drivers, so all the parents have to cobble together carpools, said Duggan, the director of the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research. My view as an economist would just be pay the bus drivers a lot more.

The pay problem

During the Bay Areas boom years from 1940 to 1960, the average home sold for around $15,000, equivalent to about $140,000 today, according to the Terner Center report. Rents averaged around $80 a month, or roughly $760 in todays dollars. Housing costs were largely in line with incomes, allowing factory workers, teachers, nurses and line cooks to spend less than a third of their incomes on housing.

With median home prices hovering around $1 million as of 2019, the report found 39% of middle-class Bay Area homeowners spend more than 30% of their income on housing.

For renters, the cost burden is even higher, showing how being shut out of homeownership can drain savings and reinforce wealth gaps. About 49% of middle-class Bay Area renters spent a higher portion of their earnings on housing in 2019.

The prospects are dwindling as costs continue to rise and incomes dont go up, said Terner Center policy director David Garcia, who has seen the pressure push more Bay Area workers to areas like his hometown of Stockton. Its not just kind of a coastal area problem, he said. These affordability issues are increasingly kind of seeping into more suburban and rural portions of the state.

Across California, about 52% percent of middle-income residents owned their home as of 2019, down from more than 59% in 2000. The numbers also mask stark racial divides. Almost two-thirds of Black middle-class households in California rent their homes, compared with 37% of white households, which the report attributes to factors including lower average pay, discrimination in home lending and the legacy of racist housing laws.

Income aside, the report highlights a severe lack of new homes and disproportionately expensive housing in areas that are building. As it stands, California ranks No. 49 for the fewest homes per capita, with 358 existing homes per 1,000 people, compared with the national average of 419 homes.

That imbalance is increasing pressure on lawmakers to consider more radical reforms. In addition to recent moves away from single-family zoning and increasing penalties for communities that refuse to build new housing, state Assembly Member Alex Lee, D-Milpitas, also sees an opportunity to increase support for social housing concepts already popular overseas in places like Vienna and Singapore.

Nick Otto/Special to The Chronicle

The Bay Area could increase housing for workers, students and others, he says, by repurposing public infrastructure like parking lots and shuttered schools and turning the sites into mixed-income housing. Under his bill, AB2053, a new California Housing Authority would both buy existing housing and build homes where higher-earning residents payments would help subsidize lower rents for neighbors.

I hope social housing would give a competitive option, Lee said. All the options are pretty bad right now.

Stay or go?

In the sweltering heat and paralyzing uncertainty of August 2020, Sharon Dolan had a big decision to make.

Her now-ex-husband had moved out of the Oakland fixer-upper they bought in 2008. So the longtime nonprofit and theater executive had to decide if she was going to find a way to keep the house, downsize or leave the Bay Area like many other artists she knows.

Nick Otto/Special to The Chronicle

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

With wildfire smoke choking out the sun, she got in her car and drove. First to a friends in western Massachusetts, then down the Atlantic coast, then into the Wests vast national parks.

I was kind of thinking about, Where would I live if I could live anywhere? Dolan recalled. The conclusion I came to was Im happy in the Bay Area.

With the help of a retired real estate agent, a plan emerged to refinance the house, buy out her ex and install a kitchenette to rent out the upstairs. Dolan said she was fortunate to find a good housemate.

The $2,500-a-month mortgage, plus property taxes and other ownership costs, would have been out of reach on Dolans pay alone, which in recent years has averaged slightly above Oaklands $80,000 median household income.

Nick Otto/Special to The Chronicle

I dont know if Im going to be able to stay in the Bay Area or ever retire, said Dolan, 62. But I have some equity.

Entire online subcultures exist for other Bay Area residents interested in various forms of house hacking to pay high mortgages or keep up an inherited family home. Other corners of Facebook and Reddit are populated by fed-up families mapping out exits to lower-cost states, plus all manner of hustlers looking to break into the market by taking out risky loans or targeting distressed properties.

Theres also the option of leaving. Though as a former Bay Area resident himself, Davis Realtor Greg Stidham knows it can be difficult to give up big coastal cities for more affordable inland areas.

Some first-time buyers are swayed, he said, by the chance to own the kind of three-bed, two-bath home where they can raise a family. He also sees transplants looking to cash out on Bay Area homes bought long ago, driving up the local market, but also offering a chance to put down roots before weddings, graduations, retirements and other milestones.

All those life events are still happening, he said, and this market doesnt care.

Lauren Hepler (she/her) is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: lauren.hepler@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LAHepler
Soon after Dr. Mai Fleming finished her medical residency in the Bay Area, she got to work on her Texas medical license. The family medicine doctor had no intention of moving there but invested nine months to master Texas medical law, submit to background checks, get fingerprinted, and pay hundreds of dollars in licensing fees.

Its a process she has since completed for more than a dozen other states  most recently New Mexico, in February.

Where I live is an area where abortion is really readily accessible, said Fleming, who practices in San Francisco. My approach has been to broaden access beyond my geographic bubble.

Fleming is among a wave of doctors, nurse practitioners, and other health care providers who are getting licensed in multiple states so they can use telemedicine and mail-order pharmacies to help more women get medication abortions.

But theyre increasingly being stymied by state regulations. Many states already restrict doctors ability to consult with patients online or by phone and/or dispense abortion pills through mail-order pharmacies. A crop of new legislation could shut them out, pushed by lawmakers who oppose abortion and argue the medication is too risky to be prescribed without a thorough, in-person examination.

So far this year, 22 states have introduced a combined 104 proposals attempting to restrict medication abortions, such as by prohibiting the mailing of abortion pills and/or requiring them to be dispensed in person, according to the Guttmacher Institute, which researches and advocates for abortion rights. Four of those proposals have already been enacted by South Dakota.

In Georgia, lawmakers are considering a measure that would require the pills to be dispensed in person and would prohibit anyone from sending them through the mail. The bill, which has passed one of two chambers of the Georgia Legislature, also requires pregnant patients to appear in person for tests to check for rare complications and gather other information, a common strategy antiabortion lawmakers have used to make medication abortion more difficult to obtain.

We wouldnt have a telemedicine visit and teach a woman how to perform a surgical abortion, said Bruce Thompson, a Republican state senator who introduced the measure in Georgia. Why would we do that with pills when, frankly, we have plenty of physicians or medical clinics around the state?

If it passes, Georgia will join the 19 other states that prohibit telemedicine for medication abortions.

In a medication abortion, people who are up to 10 weeks pregnant can terminate their pregnancies by ingesting two pills over 48 hours: mifepristone, which terminates the pregnancy, and misoprostol, which expels it. More than half of abortions in the U.S. in 2020 were medication abortions.

Last year, the FDA made it easier for health professionals to prescribe the drugs used in medication abortions by removing the requirement that they be dispensed inside a clinic or hospital. That opened the door for patients to consult with a certified doctor online or over the phone and get a prescription mailed by a licensed pharmacy.

Dr. Lester Ruppersberger, a retired OB-GYN and president of the Catholic Medical Association in 2016, opposes telemedicine abortion, saying patients should make the decision face-to-face with a doctor.

Women need testing beforehand, he said, as well as access to surgeons or OB-GYNs in case of complications afterward.

If somebody really wants an abortion, whether it's surgical or its medical, and the closest facility where you can safely get access to that particular procedure is three hours away, then you'll get in your car, perfectly healthy, and drive three hours to take advantage of the medical system, said Ruppersberger, who is the medical director of two crisis pregnancy centers in Pennsylvania that provide pregnancy care while discouraging abortion.

But some abortion providers saw the FDAs regulatory change as an opportunity to expand access for people in states that are restricting abortion.

For nearly two years, Fleming flew to Texas a few days a month to perform abortion procedures, but that ended in September 2021, when SB 8, a Texas law banning almost all abortions after about six weeks, went into effect. Since then, similar laws have been introduced or passed in Idaho and Oklahoma.

This summer, the U.S. Supreme Court likely will rule on Mississippis proposed 15-week abortion ban, a case that could end the national right to abortion enshrined by Roe v. Wade and leave the question up to states.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Now, Fleming primarily uses telemedicine to try to bring abortions to more people, despite the crackdowns. Many of her patients are from states with permissive abortion rules but live in rural or other areas where abortions are hard to find.

Ultimately this kind of work does broaden access to folks who have no other options, Fleming said. But its not actually solving the root issue and the restrictions that shouldnt exist in the first place.

At the crux of Flemings argument: No matter how many providers get licensed in states that allow telemedicine and mail-order abortion prescriptions, they cant provide those services in the growing number of states that dont.

Were reaching a point where the states with favorable regulatory situations are already served, said Elisa Wells, the co-founder and co-director of Plan C, which helps patients get medication abortions. Wells has awarded research grants to some providers to get their telemedicine practices up and running.

One of those doctors, Dr. Razel Remen, based in the Detroit area, has since obtained licenses in multiple states. Remen performs abortions at a Michigan clinic and can serve patients in Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, and New York and through telemedicine.

Joanne Spetz, director of the Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies at the University of California-San Francisco, said doctors interested in providing medication abortions across state lines can only do so much as more states shut down the practice.

These efforts to credential and train and educate more clinicians certainly can help to reduce the pressure on the system, Spetz said. But unless somebody wants to try to flout those state laws, it doesn't necessarily help.

Rachel Bluth writes for Kaiser Health News, an independent national newsroom providing in-depth coverage of health issues.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

The toll of Sundays deadly mass shooting in Sacramento began coming into focus Monday after officials announced the arrest of one related suspect and named the six people killed.

Dandrae Martin, 26, was arrested and booked for assault and illegal firearm possession charges, the Sacramento Police Department said Monday. Though few other details were released about how the shooting unfolded in a crowded downtown corridor, police said search warrants were served at three residences in the area, and at least two handguns were recovered.

Sacramento District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert said in a statement that while police were seeking multiple shooting suspects, Martin had been arrested on narrower gun-related charges.

This individual has not been arrested for any homicide related to this incident, Schubert said in a statement. The investigation is highly complex involving many witnesses, videos of numerous types and significant physical evidence.

The identities of the victims killed by gunfire  three women and three men  were confirmed by the coroners office, touching off a familiar cycle of intense grief and calls for gun reform. In Sacramento, one of several California cities where homicides have risen during the pandemic, the shooting marked the latest flash of violence during two years of turmoil.

The youngest person killed in the shooting was 21-year-old Johntaya Alexander, an aspiring social worker whod just rented her first apartment. The oldest was 57-year-old Melinda Davis, who had struggled for years to find stable housing in Sacramento and ended up back on 10th Street after a stint in a pandemic hotel room, according to a person that knew her.

Also among the dead were 21-year-old Yamile Martinez-Andrade, 29-year-old Devazia Turner, 32-year-old Joshua Hoye-Lucchesi and 38-year-old father of three Sergio Harris.

Seven of 12 surviving victims were released from Sacramento-area hospitals by Monday. They suffered from gunshot wounds ranging from minor to critical but stable, the Sacramento Police Department said in a statement.

The gunfire broke out as bars closed around 2 a.m. in a busy area near the Downtown Commons shopping mall, Golden 1 sports arena and the state Capitol. Police were seeking multiple shooters after a stolen handgun was recovered at the scene, and another handgun was later recovered while serving a search warrant.

In an indication of the sprawling crime scene near 10th and K streets, police said that investigators working overnight into Monday recovered 100 expended shell casings and identified at least three buildings and three vehicles struck by bullets in the area. No motive for the shooting was released, but law enforcement officials were reviewing videos previously uploaded to social media that appeared to show a fight in a crowd outside a row of popular bars and clubs.

We are aware of a social media video that appears to show an altercation that preceded the shooting, the Sacramento Police Department said in a statement. We are currently working to determine what, if any, relation these events have to the shooting.

Julius Thibodeaux, co-director of Sacramento gun violence reduction program Movement For Life, was awakened by a call around 3 a.m. Sunday about the shooting. He quickly mobilized his small team of mentors and violence interrupters to help support grieving families and try to prevent any escalation of the bloodshed.

The scramble marked a sharp contrast from just a few years ago, when Thibodeaux said programs to prevent and interrupt violence among young people ages 12 to 29 had yielded progress, like a record 28-month streak without a youth homicide in the city. But the pandemic has been a major setback, he said, with schools closed, desirable jobs in short supply, substance abuse surging and expiring emergency funding for services like mental health all driving a spike in violence.

With the shooting on Sunday, Thibodeaux said the instability seemed to come to a head in a flash of potential gang violence. Police did not respond Monday to questions about any alleged gang involvement, or provide additional details about the suspected shooters or the weapons they used.

This is not usual for Sacramento, especially the downtown, Thibodeaux said. Were seeing things get progressively worse.

As families struggled to process the loss of loved ones caught in the cross fire, local, state and national leaders grappled with what to do next. Similar to other recent California mass shootings in San Jose and Gilroy, it was a matter of hours before politicians began to release statements calling for reforms, including measures targeting assault weapons and untraceable ghost guns.

In Sacramento, videos uploaded to social media appeared to show rapid rounds of gunfire as people ran from the scene on Sunday. More than 100 photos and videos had been submitted to police via a public online portal since the shooting.

We want to thank the community for the overwhelming assistance that has been provided, police said in the statement. The Sacramento County District Attorneys Office will be reviewing all related evidence in this investigation to determine appropriate charges.

The deadly attack comes five weeks after another fatal blaze of gunfire in the state capital, when a man fatally shot his three daughters and another man believed to have been their chaperone on a supervised visit at a church in the Arden-Arcade area. Federal officials also charged five people last month in a gun-trafficking operation suspected to be working out of Sacramento County, which they said had illegally funneled more than 500 firearms to California from Georgia, though it was not clear that any guns tied to that alleged ring were used in Sundays mass shooting.

Statewide, gun rights groups have recently tested the states decade-old ban on assault weapons in court, fueling efforts by officials, including Gov. Gavin Newsom, to try to crack down on weapons in new ways. That includes a proposal to let private citizens sue gun sellers modeled after a controversial Texas measure to police abortion access.

We must do more than mourn, President Biden said in a statement about the Sunday shooting. We must act.

In Sacramento, Thibodeaux steeled himself for debates to come about guns and police budgets. He wondered whether any of it would help with the hard work of trying to ward off gun violence before it happens, rather than after a massacre.

Its easy to say, This is sad and this is tragic and I hate to see it, he said.

You really hate to see it? Invest your time and your money and do something.

Lauren Hepler (she/her) and Jessica Flores (she/her) are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: lauren.hepler@sfchronicle.com, jessica.flores@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LAHepler, @jesssmflores
Zack Fernandes has a problem with pub burgers. The huge, third-pound slabs of meat, the ridiculous stack of toppings, and don't even get him started on brioche buns.

"I think (they) are the stupidest thing that anyone has ever done to a burger," Fernandes tells Extra Spicy host and restaurant critic Soleil Ho on this episode of the podcast. Those two-hand monsters "run counter to what the burger is supposed to be to me, which is a snack."

Snackable, crispy-edged smashburgers are Fernandes' passion, and the only item on the menu at his Bay Area pop-up, Lil Eagle Burger. He serves them two ways: the Classic  "two thin smashed patties, American cheese and special sauce on a toasted potato roll"  and the Gritty  which is the same as the Classic but with a "whole mess of onions" smashed into the meat.

Eating three burgers in one sitting is not something Ho typically does. But, as they wrote last summer, Lil Eagle's burgers are "the distilled essence of the meat. In four or five swallows, its already gone; youll find yourself wanting another round, too."

On this episode of Extra Spicy, Lil Eagle Burger founder and chef Zack Fernandes joins Ho to discuss his first smashburger, why San Franciscans like standing in line and the therapeutic effect of working the griddle in the middle of the pop-up crush.

Extra Spicy is:

Hosted by Soleil Ho

Produced by Tea Francesca Price and Caron Creighton

Executive producer: Sarah Feldberg

Listen to the episode by clicking on the player above, or wherever you get your podcasts. Scroll down to read the transcript of an excerpt of Soleil Ho's conversation with Zack Fernandes, edited and shortened for clarity:

SOLEIL: I think this is the first time that someone that I've written a full length review about has come on the podcast. A while back, I wrote about your burger pop up Lil' Eagle Burgers, which is, you know, phenomenal...



Zack Fernandes: Thank you!

SOLEIL: I love it, big fan. And I'm curious, like what has happened since then? What does a review do to an operation like yours?

Zack Fernandes: Yeah, your review was terribly timed. [Both laugh]

You know, I guess we had planned what we thought would be a small event at Churn Ice Cream, which is an ice cream shop that sadly has shut down now. But we planned a very, very small event thinking that it would be a day on the more quiet end of the spectrum. And I think you, you folks went to publish the day prior to that. And so we were slammed. I mean, it was great! It was really nice to see people who, you know, have a lot of faith and I guess your writing and the recommendations of the Chronicle. And were willing to make trips some as far as the East Bay just to try something.

Food Guide Top 25 Restaurants Where to eat in the Bay Area. Find spots near you, create a dining wishlist, and more.

SOLEIL: What catapults you from wanting to fill this gap of making the burger that you want for yourself to eat and enjoy, to doing these pop-ups that are completely... I mean, I think they're sort of bananas like the work that you put into them is so intense...and you know, the lines of dealing with people  how do you how do you go from A to B here?

Zack Fernandes: Dumb luck. Honestly, I remember I bought this little 17-inch Blackstone griddle with the intent of making burgers for me and a couple of friends. I was like, "All right, if I want to make a good Smashburger, I need a griddle, so let me just buy this thing from Home Depot with the little one pound propane canister that you're supposed to go camping." After I did that, I felt like I needed to, it sounds kind of cheesy, but I felt I needed to share the experience with other people, just like people need to taste this. Not because I thought that what I was doing was so spectacular, but just because the format right? At the time Shake Shack hadn't opened in. I don't think Palo Alto had opened, San Francisco certainly wasn't open yet. And so I felt like people on the West Coast needed exposure to what in my mind was a very East Coast thing. And so I begged my neighborhood bar Timber & Salt, which at the time had started doing a pop-up series on Mondays. So when the restaurant was closed, they would open the bar, but because of their liquor license, they had to serve food. So usually they would have sandwiches and brownies and stuff like that. And I said, "Hey, can I please just come and sling some burgers? Pretty low risk stuff. It's only regulars that are here. And if they hate it, I'll never do it again."

SOLEIL: What do you get out of this besides, you know, I don't think you make that much money off of these, right?



Zack Fernandes: No, I don't. I cover my expenses. I think there's a path to profitability for sure. There could definitely be a business here. If I look at the numbers, I don't know if I'm ready to do that because one of my big problems is I don't think I'm ready for someone else to cook my food. The the bulk of the pleasure I get is from the process and from the feedback I get from customers. I don't know that I want anybody else picking up my smasher and smashing and serving a Lil Eagles Burger. So all of the personal satisfaction that I get from it the therapeutic effect of cooking the heat of the kitchen, the frenetic pace of the pop up that's all very personal to me. And and I think I need a direct connection to the food to get any benefit from it at all. And so it's hard to put into words what I what I get out of it, but it's certainly a rush.

For the full episode, listen to the interview by clicking on the player above, or by subscribing to Extra Spicy wherever you get your podcasts.
Tracy Goh, a San Francisco chef known for laksa, will bring her Malaysian cooking to a new restaurant in Noe Valley.

Called Damansara, the restaurant is slated to open this summer at 1781 Church St., formerly pizza spot Ardiana. Named after her hometown in Malaysia, itll focus on shareable small plates and laksa, Malaysias famous noodle soup.

One menu highlight will be spiral curry puffs, crispy fried snacks that look like small empanadas. Goh already has a loyal following for these puffs  the pastry is rich and flaky, made by painstakingly layering thin sheets of dough with oil by hand. Shell also serve classics like chicken satay with peanut sauce; toast slathered with kaya, the pandan-coconut jam; otak-otak, fish cake grilled in banana leaves; and fried chicken with a golden hue from salted egg yolks.

Before the pandemic, Goh announced plans to open Damansara as a noodle bar devoted to showcasing different styles of laksa. But the pandemic taught her the need to be flexible, so she landed on her small plates idea  with laksa  in case she has to pivot in the future.

The 1,100-square-foot space will always serve Gohs signature laksa, which is based on a shrimp-and-chicken broth enriched with coconut milk and aromatics like lemongrass, makrut lime leaves and torch ginger buds. Each bowl will be finished with boiled egg, tofu, fish cakes, shrimp and fresh herbs. Other types of laksa, such as the sour, tamarind-based asam laksa, will appear as rotating specials.

For diners who cant decide what to order, Goh is planning a $65 family-style prix-fixe that can feed two to four people. Damansara will start out with dinner  with beer and wine  before expanding to weekend brunch.

Celeste Noche/Special to The Chronicle

The opening is an exciting addition for San Francisco, where Malaysian restaurants are rare. Goh, who immigrated to San Francisco in 2012, started hosting pop-ups out of her apartment that year at the request of Instagram followers. After gaining a following, she decided to open her own restaurant in 2019, raising $47,000 from a crowdfunding campaign and joining nonprofit La Cocinas kitchen incubator program.

While fellow La Cocina chef Azalina Eusope shut down her two San Francisco Malaysian restaurants, Azalinas and Mahila, during the pandemic, Goh said she actually thinks the Malaysian food scene has grown over the past couple of years.

Food Guide Top 25 Restaurants Where to eat in the Bay Area. Find spots near you, create a dining wishlist, and more.

I think the pandemic in a weird way has brought more Malaysians into the food business. ... Some people had to pivot or find supplementary income, she said, noting the rise in Malaysian food delivery options, especially in the South Bay.

Goh was one of those people who started delivering food during the pandemic, and it brought her new fans in the East Bay and South Bay, she said. Once a month, she and other La Cocina chefs collaborated on an Asian snack box filled with treasures  like her curry puffs, which get a permanent home at Damansara.

Damansara. Opening this summer. 1781 Church St., San Francisco. www.instagram.com/damansarasf

Janelle Bitker is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: janelle.bitker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @janellebitker
Much like its impact on the wider restaurant industry, the pandemic has wreaked havoc on the fast food sector. A February survey of U.S restaurant operators, including of fast food establishments, found 50% of respondents identified recruiting and retaining employees as their top challenge for 2022.

Why is it so difficult? Because the fast food industry needs to take better care of its workers. Fortunately, new legislation that is circulating in the California Senate might help guide the industry to save itself.

The fast food industry is notorious for low wages, poor benefits, unsafe working conditions and a business structure that makes it very difficult for franchisees to improve conditions. Even before the pandemic, turnover was high and many workers said they were subject to illegal working conditions  such as being forced to do off-the-clock work or work in unsafe conditions.

Today in California, the situation is much the same. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics, many areas of California have a high employment level of fast food and counter workers. Many of these workers are women and come from Black and Latino communities that were already the most negatively impacted by the pandemic, earning just about the lowest wages in the state. And their working conditions are no better.

At a Jack in the Box location near Sacramento, for example, workers have waged several strikes after reportedly being subject to wage theft, pressured to work after testing positive for the coronavirus and even facing threats that management would call U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on activist workers. In February 2021, the California Labor Commissioner issued a $125,913 citation to a Los Angeles McDonalds franchisee after finding that the employer had illegally fired four workers who reported unsafe working conditions during the pandemic.

Most franchisees have low profit margins and little ability to profitably improve compensation on their own because of the terms of their franchising contracts with big brands, which deepens the challenges in the industry.

This is where the Fast Recovery Act, or AB257, comes in. Having already moved through the Assembly in January, the bill would, if passed by the Senate and signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, provide fast food workers with a platform to discuss wages and possibly improve working condition standards across the sector through the creation of a first of its kind statewide fast food sector council.

The council would bring together all the key players, including workers, state regulators, franchises and their parent companies, to investigate working conditions and make recommendations about safety, scheduling stability, training and minimum compensation for the entire industry. The Fast Recovery Act would also hold franchises and their parent corporations more accountable to labor laws.

Addressing a range of standards  rather than a single issue such as wages  is important because challenges such as turnover, scheduling practices and safety are often interrelated. Setting standards for the entire industry ensures similar work receives similar pay, enables all firms to compete on a level playing field, and is particularly helpful for closing racial and gender pay gaps.

Although sectoral councils were not commonly used in the latter part of the 20th century, there has been growing interest in them and other similar policies in recent years. Since 2018, three local governments  Seattle, Philadelphia and Detroit  and four states  Colorado, New York, Nevada and Michigan  have enacted laws to include workers and employers in the process of recommending or implementing workplace standards for an entire sector. These laws have primarily focused on agriculture, home care and domestic work. But additional states and sectors are considering implementing their own versions  such as bills to establish industry-wide standards for nail salon workers in New York and nursing home workers in Minnesota.

Some opponents of the bill claim that the Fast Recovery Act will give the sectoral council too much power and drive fast food chains away from California. But continuing business as usual is a losing strategy for an industry that is in a crisis of its own making. Moreover, research has shown that when workers are placed in an ongoing formalized role as part of a compliance body, it strengthens labor standards enforcement. This is exactly what the fast food industry needs if it wants to attract and retain the workers it so desperately needs.

California has a long history of leading the way on workers rights and worker protections, including becoming the first state to pass a $15 minimum wage in 2016  a breakthrough that paved the way for states across the country to take similar action.

With the Fast Recovery Act, California again has the opportunity to demonstrate to the country how government, labor and private business can work together to effectively meet the needs of workers, to solidify the building of momentum nationwide for including workers and employers in setting industry-wide standards and, ultimately, to save an industry that is sorely in need of reform.

David Madland is the author of Re-Union: How Bold Labor Reforms Can Repair, Revitalize, and Reunite the United States and is a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress.
NEW YORK, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The United States is promoting a second booster vaccine to protect aged people and those with underlying conditions or chronicle illnesses, as the average daily COVID-19 deaths dropped to 649 nationwide on Sunday with a minus 41 percent change over 14 days.

NURSING-HOME DEATHS DOWN

Deaths among American nursing home residents from COVID-19 appear to be at their lowest levels since the coronavirus first swept the country more than two years ago, according to the most recent data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Some 67 residents died during the week ending March 27. While that number could be adjusted in the coming weeks, it mirrors the lows last reached during June 2021 before facilities were hit with the Delta and Omicron variants, The New York Times cited the data.

Cases among nursing home residents rose sharply in the fall and winter, with deaths reaching 1,500 in January prior to a steady decline. Experts, however, raised little reason for complacency, as this group remains highly vulnerable to the virus for their age and underlying medical conditions.

Amid growing concern over a highly contagious subvariant of Omicron, with booster shots proved protective against severe illness, federal regulators already authorized second booster shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna coronavirus vaccines last week.

SECOND BOOSTER CONFUSION

The federal government offered little detailed guidance about who should get the additional booster dose and when. Instead, the CDC said on Tuesday that immunocompromised and older Americans could get a second booster while stopping short of recommending they do so.

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said that those most likely to benefit fall into two categories: those 65 and older; or anyone 50 and older with underlying medical conditions who are at higher risk for severe disease from COVID-19.

Some doctors and experts argued that "the agency's scant guidance left them responsible for complicated clinical decisions in a landscape with unclear and constantly evolving data," "leaving them unprepared and confused by the policy shift," reported The Washington Post on Saturday.

However, other experts agreed with CDC's decision, saying that risk varies widely from person to person, and doctors and patients should have the opportunity to make individual choices about a fourth shot based on a slew of factors, according to the report.

DIABETES PATIENTS WORRIED

After older people and nursing home residents, perhaps no group has been harder hit by the pandemic than people with diabetes, reported The New York Times on Sunday. Recent studies suggest that 30 to 40 percent of all coronavirus deaths in the United States have occurred among people with diabetes.

"People with diabetes are especially vulnerable to severe illness from COVID, partly because diabetes impairs the immune system but also because those with the disease often struggle with high blood pressure, obesity and other underlying medical conditions," said the report.

Diabetes patients hospitalized with COVID-19 spend more time in the ICU, are more likely to be intubated and are less likely to survive, according to several studies, one of which found that 20 percent of hospitalized coronavirus patients with diabetes died within a month of admission.

"Though researchers are still trying to understand the dynamics between the two diseases, most agree on one thing: uncontrolled diabetes impairs the immune system and decreases a patient's ability to withstand a coronavirus infection," the report added. 
Mayor London Breed is supporting a package of mental health conservatorship reform bills in the California legislature, expressing frustration that people with mental illness are deteriorating on the streets and calling for more options to get them into treatment.

Conservatorship, a controversial issue statewide, is when a judge appoints a conservator to make decisions about treatment for people with serious mental illnesses or chronic alcoholism who cant care for their basic needs.

Breed joined other big city mayors in California on a virtual news conference Monday to back a package of eight bills introduced by State Senator Susan Talamantes Eggman, a Democrat from Stockton.

In a passionate message, Breed said she is truly committed to helping those struggling with mental illness and addiction but frustrated by the lack of options to help people. She said San Francisco has tried to fill in the gaps in existing conservatorship laws with new programs and added voluntary treatment, but we are not doing enough.

San Francisco has invested millions to support this population but unfortunately the current tools we have are just not working. We are a city that leads with compassion, but what we are allowing to happen  is far from compassionate, she said. It is too many on our streets and it is really a disgrace. We see people every day who are in crisis.

The bills intend to reform the 1967 Lanterman-Petris-Short (LPS) Act that attempted to reverse mass institutionalization of people with mental illness by creating a system of court-ordered treatment based on specific requirements. A political movement has been growing in recent years to reform the half-century-old law and mental health treatment.

Gov. Gavin Newsom pushed for reform last month by proposing Care Court, which would create a mental-health-focused arm of the civil courts in every county, as a step before conservatorship. The plan would require counties to provide comprehensive treatment to those suffering from debilitating psychosis or be sanctioned if they dont. The people in the program would have to accept the care.

Conservatorship has long been a controversial issue in California, with disability rights advocates and critics protesting that mandated treatment violates civil liberties, pointing to Britney Spears case as an example. Critics also argue that more available and quickly accessible voluntary treatment would help instead. But proponents  among them mental health professionals and families whose loved ones are struggling  say the laws are too limited to help those who are too sick to care for themselves and lead to people deteriorating and even dying on the streets of San Francisco and cities across California.

In an effort to offer more options, San Francisco three years ago started a pilot program that aimed to help between 50 to 100 people struggling with severe mental illness and substance use. The city has conserved only two people so far under it, and blames bureaucratic delays and complicated requirements under the program.

Breed said shes been pushing to reform conservatorship laws since 2018. She added that she has personally worked with the health department to connect mentally ill people  some with families and friends who want to care for them  to resources and programs, only to find them right back on the streets.

She described a man shes known for many years who developed dementia and started to get a little violent and confused and ended up losing his housing. He is still homeless, she said.

When I see individuals like him, I get frustrated that we cant do more, Breed said. If we were out there in that same condition, I would want someone to step in and do something, no question.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Breed and the mayors of Sacramento, San Diego, Riverside and Fresno backed the proposed reforms.

The eight bills aim to address different issues, including modernizing the definition of grave disability under the LPS Act, the standard under which someone is conserved, from simply being unable to provide their own food and shelter to unable to provide for the basic needs of personal or medical care or self-protection and safety.

Other bills will streamline data about outcomes for people under conservatorships, regionally assess needs for treatment resources, create a dashboard to track mental health treatment beds, and set up a system to help counties reach their mental health treatment goals.

Another bill in the package would add an additional 30 days to allow someone to stabilize before considering conservatorship. Other bills would require courts to consider a report filed after an investigation about whether someone should be conserved and consider evidence. It would also clarify that courts are allowed to order medications as part of a treatment plan under assisted outpatient treatment.

California has a shortage of mental health beds compared to other states. The legislature plans to pump $6 billion into mental health reform in the coming years, including more than $2.2 billion to build, buy and rehab property to expand behavioral health treatment. These funds include $150 million, plus $55 million of federal funding, for mobile crisis support teams to people experiencing a behavioral health crisis.

Mallory Moench (she/her) is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mallory.moench@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @mallorymoench
In six years working at McDonalds restaurants in San Francisco, Jose Ramirez thought he had seen it all. Customers swearing over missing packets of sauce , flinging food trays over order mistakes, punching doors and windows after being asked to leave.

But the former employee never expected to witness a homicide.

That happened in February 2016, when an unidentified assailant shot the passenger of a car leaving the McDonalds parking lot in the Fillmore District  right across the street from a police substation.

The victim exited the car through the drivers-side door and made it a few steps before collapsing on the sidewalk, about 12 feet from where Ramirez said he hid under a table inside the restaurant as he tried to count the number of gunshots.

Someone died so close to me, and I feared for my own life that day, Ramirez, now 36, told The Chronicle through a Spanish translator. We all took cover. It was terrifying.

Fast-food employees are no strangers to shifts that test their ability to respond to crises. TikTok was abuzz last month with videos of drive-through employees at a Jack in the Box in Moreno Valley throwing drinks at a belligerent customer. Outside of a Carls Jr. in San Bernardino County, an employee found the body of an unhoused man in January. And that same month at a Burger King in Milwaukee, one employee accidentally shot and killed his teenage co-worker while trying to defend against an alleged robbery.

In San Francisco and across California, 911 call data shows fast-food workers regularly face disruptive and sometimes volatile situations, ranging from noise complaints and trespassing to assaults and armed robberies.

A nonprofit labor organization focused on raising the minimum wage analyzed 911 calls to make the case that fast-food companies should do more to protect employees. The Chronicles analysis of the data, along with federal labor statistics and additional research, shows that what happens in these restaurants often reflects neglected needs of communities  forcing fast-food employees to deal with some of societys most dire issues.

Samantha Laurey/The Chronicle

Calls for help

While much of the research related to these restaurants concerns the health effects of consuming fast foods, the Fight for $15 labor campaign that started in New York City sought to make a case about the social impact of working in such businesses.

The group studied 911 call data for locations of four well-known fast-food chains in nine major California cities. Its analysis showed San Francisco as having the highest rate of calls related to violent or potentially violent incidents in recent years  despite having the fewest fast-food restaurant locations included in the dataset.

Fight for $15 shared its data with The Chronicle, which conducted an independent analysis that categorized violent incidents differently, including only calls that fall under crime categories the FBI considers violent. Reported incidents from the call data dont mean someone was arrested for or convicted of a crime.

The largest category of calls for the entire subset of restaurant locations was disturbance, which, according to the nonprofits categorization, include a wide variety of disruptive and threatening activities, such as narcotic activity, indecent exposure, public intoxication, disputes between people, refusal to leave a property and screaming.

In cities with high call rates, there tends to be a small set of problem locations with an exceptional number of calls, the report said. Several of those locations generate multiple 911 calls a week. The Fillmore McDonalds, which belongs to a Census tract with a poverty rate above 30%, is among those locations. It generated more than 900 calls between 2017 and 2020, about a third of which were related to allegedly violent incidents.

The San Francisco Police Department declined The Chronicles requests for an interview, saying no one was specifically in charge of incidents at fast-food restaurants, and ignored follow-up questions.

About two miles from the Fillmore location, the Market Street McDonalds restaurant at Second Street had the third highest call volume between 2017 and 2020 among the San Francisco restaurants included in the study. There, Leydi Garma, 48, said she faced scary moments as a worker.

One involved a person who returned to the restaurant after being asked to stay away for unruly behavior. Garma said the person screamed and threw a wet floor sign at her and her coworkers before the manager intervened.

We locked the door for a few hours because we were afraid the person was still outside, Garma said. Luckily, they left.

The restaurant has no security guard, which Fight for $15 cited as a recurring problem for fast-food restaurants with high incident rates.

McDonalds, where four people interviewed by The Chronicle worked, didnt respond to questions about providing security guards to troubled locations, but said the chain has rigorous safety and security procedures in place.

Restaurant managers and crew at McDonalds corporate-owned restaurants undergo full training including a comprehensive workplace violence prevention program on safety and security practices, and we provide the same resources to franchisees to support their teams, Rob Holm, director of McDonalds Global Security, said in an email.

Holm added the restaurants use video surveillance and armored car cash pickups, and train their employees to keep the back doors closed. At the Fillmore location, for instance, Holm said the lobby closes at 10 p.m. to prioritize the safety of our employees.

Peter Ou, the owner and operator of the Market Street McDonalds, said via email that all employees receive workplace violence prevention training online and in-person, and are instructed to call 911 in any violent situation.

The Fight for $15 report, which was compiled by researchers from UC Berkeley and UCLA, contends that calling 911 is an inadequate recourse for complex societal problems.

When police are called to resolve low-priority issues like noise complaints, or noncriminal matters involving substance abuse, homelessness or mental health crises  matters for which they often lack the proper training  the results can be disastrous, the report said, pointing to research that shows the disproportionate impact of police use of force on Black Californians.

Many of the incidents reported in both the worker accounts and the data involve either spontaneous bursts of aggression that may be more effectively deterred or deescalated by the presence of an on-site security officer, or behavioral health crises better suited to a social worker or mental health professional, the report also said.

The median age of fast-food workers in 2020 was about 22, compared with 43 for security guards, 42 for social workers and 41 for mental-health counselors  occupations that would typically be involved in helping people in crisis, according to federal labor data.

The franchise business model that dominates the fast-food industry creates a layer of separation between workers and parties responsible for working conditions, a recent UCLA study states.

The franchisor  or the corporate company  is not liable for what happens at individual sites, noted Saba Waheed, research director at the UCLA Labor Center and lead author of the study, exacerbating the question of who is ultimately responsible for worker welfare and safety.

The rules are very individualized from location to location, Waheed said. And that puts it back on the workers to have to face and address the issues.

Ramirez said he and his coworkers were expected to continue working following the February 2016 shooting outside the Fillmore restaurant. Taking time off to deal with what happened was nonexistent, he said.

McDonalds said the allegations by Ramirez are disappointing and do not reflect the safe working environment of McDonalds.

Fight for $15 has thrown its weight behind AB 257, which would give fast-food workers a seat at the table in deciding the industrys workplace standards and safety regulations. The bill passed the state Assembly on Jan. 31 and is before the Senate. If passed, California could become the first state in the nation to convene a council on which fast-food employees have a say about worker protections.

Local governments do have the ability to enact zoning restrictions limiting where fast-food restaurants can operate. For instance, San Francisco neighborhoods such as Hayes Valley, Chinatown and North Beach currently ban chain restaurants from opening.

Even so, San Francisco, a dense metropolitan peninsula battling a deadly opioid epidemic and crippling housing affordability problems, has more fast-food restaurants per person (1.5 per 1,000) than most other California counties, U.S. Department of Agriculture data shows. That ratio was the second highest in the state, trailing Mono County.

Many of the restaurants are concentrated in downtown neighborhoods where the effects of poverty, food insecurity and homelessness are more pronounced, while higher-income neighborhoods like the Outer Sunset have few fast-food franchises.

Under-resourced neighborhoods tend to rely more on fast food as a source of nourishment  and possibly as a third place where people go that isnt home or work, said Catherine Keske, an economist and social scientist at UC Merced.

For Ramirez, the pressures of working in a third place mutated with a global health crisis.

Bronte Wittpenn/The Chronicle

The pandemics toll

Ramirez, who immigrated from El Salvador nearly 20 years ago, first got a job at the Fillmore McDonalds in 2016. He had worked in the fast-food industry for four years by then, and at odd construction jobs before that. At McDonalds, he applied to be a cashier but said he was mostly given janitorial duties  sweeping, mopping, cleaning the restroom and taking out the garbage.

He said he was grateful for the job, but unpredictable encounters with customers experiencing mental health issues began to wear on his own mental health.

Every other day, there was some kind of tense exchange, Ramirez recalled.

He requested a transfer and, by January 2019, was working at a McDonalds in the Bayview. He was still there two years later, when he contracted COVID-19 and took two weeks off in January to recuperate. He alleges he wasnt paid for those weeks, saying he was told upon his return that expanded access to sick leave during the pandemic was expired at the time.

While the first round of supplemental sick pay did expire at the end of September, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill reinstating the pandemic benefits in February and made them retroactive to Jan. 1, before Ramirez took time off. Ramirez said he was fired in February and has since filed a complaint with the California Department of Labor Standards, asking for back pay and to be rehired.

McDonalds said it was company policy not to comment on personnel matters.

The pandemic exacerbated issues faced by fast-food workers, according to a UCLA study released in January. The study found almost two-thirds of the roughly 430 Los Angeles County fast-food workers researchers heard from experienced wage theft such as being paid late or unpaid overtime rates, denied meal breaks or reimbursement for uniforms or equipment between June and October 2021. They also reported receiving insufficient hours to make ends meet, and well over half reported health and safety hazards on the job, amounting to injuries for 43% of workers.

Waheed, of the UCLA Labor Center, said workers enforcing COVID mandates such as asking customers to wear masks or to observe physical distancing requirements reported having some kind of negative interaction.

Half of the fast-food workers we surveyed also experienced verbal abuse, and over a third experienced violence such as threats, racial slurs and even assault, she said. And this is on top of dealing with wage theft, insufficient hours and other health and safety hazards.

As for Ramirez, who said the 2016 shooting wasnt the only one he witnessed while working at the Fillmore McDonalds, hes still looking for his next job. He often visits his former workplace where his partner still works. He said he worries about her safety.

When I know shes working, Im constantly thinking that something could happen, that a shooting can happen at any moment, he said. It makes me uncomfortable and fearful thinking that shes there. I dont want fast-food workers to keep experiencing that violence. I dont wish that upon anyone.

About the data The Chronicle obtained and independently analyzed data compiled by the nonprofit group Fight for $15 and a Union. The group requested and obtained 911 call data for the restaurant locations of four well known fast-food chains in nine major California cities between 2017 and 2020 from local police departments. The list of restaurants in this study does not include restaurants that are located inside other business establishments. For example, a McDonald's restaurant inside of a Walmart would not be included. Read more about its methodology and limitations here. Data summary: Franchises included in the study: McDonald's, Jack in the Box, Burger King and Carl's Jr. California cities included in the study: Fresno, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Riverside, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose and Stockton Restaurant locations analyzed: 643 Calls analyzed: 77,219 The authors of the study categorized the calls into nine incident categories based on their recorded descriptions: alarm, assault, criminal damage to property, criminal trespass, disturbance, sexual assault or other sex crime, theft, threat and other. These categories do not imply that charges have been filed or that anyone has been found guilty in court. Those nine categories are further split into two types: those that the study authors deemed were violent or potentially violent, and those that are not. The Chronicle took a different approach to determining violent versus nonviolent incidents, following the statutory definition of violent crime. We categorized assault, sex crimes and threat as violent and everything else as non-violent. Violent crimes are offenses that involve force or threat of force, according to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program. The authors of the study cautioned against the data's limitations, some of which stem from imperfect and incomplete record-keeping practices by police departments and varying formats the data came in, as well as human errors. See More Collapse

Shwanika Narayan and Yoohyun Jung are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: shwanika.narayan@sfchronicle.com, yoohyung.jung@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @shwanika, @yoohyun_jung
A group of mothers is calling on San Francisco city officials to crack down on people openly dealing and using drugs on city streets with a bold message that went up in Union Square on Monday afternoon.

Mothers Against Drug Deaths paid for a billboard that reads: "Famous the world over for our brains, beauty and now, dirt-cheap fentanyl.

The message is referring to the opiate that has flooded the city's street drug marketplace in recent years, intensifying the peril of addiction and leading to a staggering number of overdose deaths.

"Its dangerous and actually crazy because you can walk down a lot of the city streets and see hundreds of drug dealers out in the open," said Jacqui Berlinn of Livermore, who co-founded Mothers Against Drug Deaths. "You can literally watch them sell the drugs to an addict and then watch that addict walk a few steps away and use ...holding the foil in their hands, putting the needles in their arms."

Berlinn's 31-year-old son grew up in Livermore and is a fentanyl addict living on the streets of San Francisco.

"I spoke with my son yesterday," Berlinn told SFGATE. "It was a beautiful miracle that he called. He completely agrees with what were doing. He sees new faces coming to the city every day to buy fentanyl. He sees high school kids, theyre coming into the city and buying fentanyl and bringing it back to the suburbs."

Berlinn said her group's campaign is intended to warn tourists and families about the drugs on the city streets.

Parents worldwide should know that San Francisco is unsafe for children and families, Berlinn said in a news release. My son is at risk of dying because the San Francisco city government, with the support of Governor Gavin Newsom, refuses to arrest him for breaking the law and mandate treatment.

Fentanyl is a potent synthetic opioid that can be up to 100 times more powerful than morphine, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration says. A respiratory depressant, the drug can impact a user's ability to breathe.

The drug was created in the 1960s to manage pain after surgery, and its clinical use expanded in the 1990s with the introduction of the extended release patch that is typically used to treat advanced cancer pain. Illicit fentanyl started appearing on San Francisco streets in 2018, and is often mixed with other drugs such as heroin and cocaine to increase potency.

Overdose deaths rose rapidly with the arrival of fentanyl. The number of overdoses deaths linked to the drug increased from nine in 2009 to 230 in 2019, the city said in a report. In 2021, the city reported 474 deaths due to fentanyl, preliminary data shows. The San Francisco Department of Public Health issued an alert last month warning city residents of the risks of fentanyl after reporting three fatal and nine non-fatal overdoses in people who reportedly meant to use cocaine but were unintentionally exposed to fentanyl.

The city has taken several steps to address the fentanyl epidemic, including adding new drug and mental health beds and launching the Street Overdose Response team to provide care for people at high risk of overdose. In December, Mayor London Breed declared a state of emergency in the Tenderloin; that streamlined the city's permitting regulations in order to quickly open the Linkage Center that connects people living on the street and struggling with substance use and mental health issues to services. The declaration also allowed the city to hire 200 new behavioral health workers instead of going through the lengthy normal bureaucracy, said Andy Lynch, a spokesperson for the mayor's office.

The state of emergency expired last month, but Lynch said the mayor renewed aspects of the declaration that allowed city workers to serve as disaster service workers to respond to issues in the Tenderloin.

The mayor agrees that we need to break up open-air drug dealing in San Francisco," Lynch wrote in an emailed statement. "Police officers are making arrests every day, and in the last few weeks an additional 20 officers have been added to the Tenderloin neighborhood to support our emergency response initiative. The police have seized over 10 kilos of fentanyl in the Tenderloin area this year alone, which is roughly four times more than was seized over the same time period last year. We know more needs to be done to make more arrests, but there also needs to be accountability for the people who are dealing drugs, committing acts of violence, and making our communities less safe."
Some days PJ Jenkins just likes to look at his money.

He can't get to that money, which totals about $15,000 in cryptocurrency - it's been lifted from him by scammers. But thanks to the quirks of crypto, the cash sits visible to him online via the blockchain, taunting him.

"It's right there; everyone can see it. But I can't touch it," said Jenkins, still sounding a little dazed a few months after the swindle.

Jenkins isn't some greenhorn fresh to the world of money and crime. In fact, if anyone shouldn't have been duped in a scam, it's him - a 57-year-old retired cop from outside Atlantic City, who prides himself on his law enforcement wiles. He even used to direct security at a casino, his eagle eyes spotting the shady types who would take the house for a ride.

But over a months-long slow play - led by an attractive woman and fueled by a spate of confidence-winning gestures - Jenkins slowly gave his money to the crooks. He has little hope of ever recovering it.

As cryptocurrency investment in the United States skyrockets, Jenkins's story is no longer a rarity. Scams are rapidly multiplying in the lightly regulated province of crypto, experts say, each boosted wallet and disappeared dollar underscoring just how mainstream the thievery has become. The Federal Trade Commission estimates that Americans lost $750 million to crypto scams in 2021, and the number could rise this year.

Law enforcement has been slow to rise to the challenge. The Justice Department recently announced a new task force focusing on cryptocurrencies, but it's still very new and it remains to be seen how many scammers it can investigate, let alone arrest.

No one agency seems to have latched onto the scam that snatched Jenkins's money, even though a Washington Post analysis of the blockchain records available suggest it is truly of staggering dimensions - with likely more than 5,000 victims in multiple states and $66.3 million stolen since August.

Victims interviewed by The Post say, despite numerous attempts to alert law enforcement, they've yet to be contacted by authorities, leading them to believe no agency is even aware of the scam, let alone investigating it. Instead, they have organized on their own, in Reddit and Facebook groups, to commiserate and strategize.

Meanwhile, regulators and Congress have yet to develop a robust set of rules that would impose strict standards of behavior and enforcement. And the companies involved - in this case, the large crypto platform Coinbase and the currency Tether - have basically told the victims "buyer beware."

"This is really, really hard because crypto is so thinly regulated and folks are used to picking up the phone and calling 911," said Joe Rotunda, the enforcement director of the Texas State Securities Board, which investigates investment scams. "Oftentimes, the law enforcement agencies deal with violent crimes or street crimes. They simply don't have the resources necessary to prosecute a case like this and don't know where to turn."

Jenkins says that when he went to his local police station, they didn't understand what he was talking about. He tried contacting both the FBI and Securities and Exchange Commission via their websites but never heard back.

Like so many crypto investors who've been scammed, Jenkins tells a particularly American story, one in which a shiny new financial tool dangles the prospect of middle-class stability - but also lures criminals eager to take advantage of its anonymity and baffling complexity.

Jenkins thought he was savvy enough to use his crypto investments to swing a little extra money to supplement his income from his pension. Instead, he wound up losing some of that, too.

"American history is filled with episodes of fraud where a lot of people you wouldn't expect to get taken in, do," said Edward J. Balleisen, a Duke history professor who explored scams in his book "Fraud: An American History from Barnum to Madoff."

He cited "commodity-pool" scams from late 19th century that had Americans sending their money by mail to invest in "can't-miss" wheat futures. Those scams also took place "at the frontier of economic innovation," he said, where criminals find they can exploit the combination of consumer enthusiasm and government confusion.

"It would appear that's what we're living through now," he said.

The scam that ensnared Jenkins unfolded on an app made by the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase. It involved a niche crypto area known as "liquidity mining" and took the form of what activists have come to call "pig-butchering" - because the victim's wallet is fattened before the slaughter.

Jenkins lives in Absecon, N.J., a sleepy, family-oriented town eight miles from the seductive lights of Atlantic City. Much of his time, and money, are occupied with taking care of his 3-year-old nephew.

Crypto was the furthest thing from Jenkins's mind, when he first met "Alice" last September on the dating app Hinge. After he matched with her, the two began messaging via WhatsApp.

Every day, for weeks, they communicated - about life, family, the hurly-burly of the everyday, on one occasion even talking by video. Alice, who told Jenkins she was 37, provided a sympathetic ear. She called Jenkins by endearments and seemed eager to get to know him.

After more than a month, Alice began mentioning crypto investments, particularly something called "liquidity mining." She said Jenkins "could make money by simply 'lending' " crypto he wasn't using anyway.

"Dear blueberry, do you know how high its profit is?" she wrote in a message thread that Jenkins provided to The Post.

He asked how it worked. Alice described an operation that was nothing but upside. "Mining is not buying and selling. Like a mine, the mountains are full of ETH, and then we mine," she said, referring to the Ethereum cryptocurrency.

"I think this is the safest, because the funds are in their own hands," she added.

All he would need to do, Alice said, was buy a "mining certificate" - only $26, no big deal. Then he could begin depositing crypto to earn returns, a steady trickle of cash on the order of what bank savings accounts used to return decades ago.

Alice suggested Jenkins use Coinbase Wallet, an app made by one of the largest crypto trading exchanges in the United States. She also guided him to "CB-ETH.cc," a seemingly affiliated website slathered in Coinbase's signature blue. That site would handle the liquidity mining.

Jenkins was skeptical. He had worked for the New Jersey State Police protecting the State House in Trenton and for a time served as director of security at Resorts World, a casino in Queens, N.Y., about 120 miles north of Absecon. He was used to spotting all kinds of scams, and this smelled like one.

But a Google search confirmed for him that liquidity mining was a legitimate, if complicated, scheme, in which certain crypto exchanges pay to borrow cryptocurrency to fulfill their customers' orders.

As someone who lived off a pension, Jenkins was wary - "I never even like to loan someone more than $500," he said. But the stakes seemed low, and so were his ambitions. He wanted to make about $60 a day, enough to cover his $2,000 monthly mortgage payment.

So at the end of October, Jenkins bought about $4,000 in Tether, a so-called stablecoin based on Ethereum designed to be worth exactly $1. He then took that money and invested it in the CB-ETH liquidity mining website that Alice had directed him to.

After withdrawing his money from the account and then depositing it again over the next few days - to test that he really did still control the funds - he began steadily adding to it. If he worked his way up to $15,000, Alice had told him, bonuses would kick in that would net him 15 percent monthly returns - enabling him to hit his $2,000 earnings target.

"It seemed very legitimate. I mean, I could move the money," he recalled. He even encouraged two nephews and a family friend to put their money in, too.

After four weeks, Jenkins had invested $15,000 in the supposed mining operation. The Post could verify the dates and amounts of his investments because, like almost anything involving cryptocurrency, they were recorded on a blockchain - a list of transactions posted online. The Ethereum blockchain that he used can also record instructions to be automatically executed, called "smart contracts."

Checking his tally on the CB-ETH liquidity-mining site, Jenkins would see the "profits" tick steadily upward as time passed. He was headed toward $2,000 for the month. Perfect.

And then one day in early December, he got a call from his nephew. The nephew's money was gone. Had Jenkins heard anything? Jenkins said he hadn't but went to check his own wallet. All $15,000 of his money had disappeared, too.

The gains, it turns out, weren't real. The account balance on the CB-ETH site was an illusion, to keep Jenkins engaged - part of the pig-butchering. And there's no such thing as a "mining certificate," either. It was a sham, meant to get Jenkins to click a button.

When Alice told Jenkins to buy a certificate, she was actually having him execute a smart contract. That contract wasn't written in English, or even legal jargon. It was one solitary line of computer code written in the language of the Ethereum blockchain. Its function was to give her unlimited access to his money.

He hadn't realized it at the time, but Jenkins had signed his own permission slip to be robbed.

Frantic, Jenkins messaged Coinbase, which said that, "after a review," it couldn't help. It said Jenkins had given away his "12-word recovery phrase." (He had not.) He also messaged Tether, which said it couldn't help, either. And he messaged CB-ETH, which he was jarringly coming to realize was not legitimate.

Jenkins insisted to CB-ETH's online representatives that the removal of the $15,000 was an unauthorized transaction. That led only to Kafka-esque interactions in which he received responses like: "Smart contract is a kind of rule that cannot be interfered by the AI controller."

Contacted by The Post about the scams, Coinbase security officer Philip Martin said he couldn't comment on Jenkins's situation. But "some bad actors are going to get on the platform," he said. "When we find them, we work with the appropriate law enforcement organization and the appropriate regulators to prevent them from doing harm."

Martin said the company had been investigating liquidity mining scams since January. He said he wasn't sure if Coinbase would be reviewing its records to find and contact the victims.

The CB-ETH website did not respond to repeated requests for comment through its live-chat system.

Tether's chief technology officer, Paolo Ardoino, issued a statement in response to queries from The Post. "Tether takes all reports of theft, scam or loss very seriously," it said. "Tether will freeze wallets if the Company is notified via valid law enforcement requests but cannot fulfill arbitrary requests to freeze wallets where these conditions are not met."

Ardoino said that Tether has frozen wallets in at least one case involving the Secret Service, and that the company has helped users recover $80 million in the past year. He did not address Jenkins's case.

In a moment of dark comedy while Jenkins was messaging with CB-ETH, the system spat back a message that said, "You rated our customer service as bad." Jenkins got a good laugh out of that.

What he didn't get was his money. He could still see it living on the blockchain. But the blockchain noted clearly that it belonged to the thieves now. This brought its own torture. It's one thing to know abstractly that criminals have your cash. It's another to see them holding on to it.

"I feel stupid. I got slow-played," said Jenkins, who has a flair for the theatric and years ago even did a little spot acting when he lived in Los Angeles. "I'm used to scams with a quick hit, a get-out-and-go. But this is a whole different play."

Jenkins says he feels his case offers a broader social lesson.

"Security is my forte," Jenkins said. "If it can happen to me, I feel like it can happen to anybody."

- - -

Here's how The Washington Post uncovered the breadth of the scam. The analysis started with the crypto accounts belonging to Jenkins and four other victims, and then counted 616 additional accounts that saw the same pattern of stolen funds: first, approving the scammers to access their money, then the scammers moving it elsewhere.

The Post then examined the accounts to which those victims' money had been transferred, which uncovered an additional 4,425 accounts whose transactions fit the pattern - in total, 5,046 accounts with an average loss of more than $13,000 apiece.

The accounts' addresses are just a mishmash of letters and numbers. Even though Jenkins can see the money in Alice's wallet, there's no way to find her real name, contact information or even what country she is in.

Another victim, Troy Gochenour, lost more than $25,000, $19,000 of which came in loans he must still pay back. Gochenour, 48, delivers packages in his hometown of Columbus, Ohio, after moving back from New York during the pandemic.

A former crypto skeptic who remembers thinking "this'll never catch on," Gochenour began investing at the suggestion of a woman he met online. "She would text me every morning 'good morning,' every night, 'good night.'" But she never video-chatted with him, citing a phobia.

After his first investment of $5,000 disappeared in October, she denied his money was gone, but promised that if he brought his total investment up to $10,000, he'd earn a $3,000 reward. He invested the difference, taking out a loan to do so. That money disappeared, too. He took out another loan, then a third. That money also vanished.

"I was betrayed by somebody who I thought cared about me," he said.

Besides Jenkins and Gochenour, The Post spoke with three other victims of nearly identical scams. Savvy people in midlife are common victims, activists say.

"It's not just elderly folks; it's not just technically illiterate folks." said Jan Santiago, a spokesman for the crypto-scam victim group Global Anti-Scam Organization that has helped popularize pig-butchering as a term. "Traders, bankers, lawyers, doctors, nurses - they all fell for this and lost a large amount of their savings."

As a genre, the scam started with victims in China, then began to ensnare Chinese-speaking residents of other countries. "Now it has grown to include just anyone" of any background, Santiago said.

"There is a lot of manpower and time and energy put into effectively grooming the victims," added Grace Yuen, a Massachusetts-based spokeswoman for the victims' group.

One of the particular features of crypto scams is how close they sit to conventional investing. Because of its volatility, crypto trading can have the feel of gambling - fortunes are gained and lost before lunch. Subareas like liquidity mining are even blurrier - the idea that your money could earn double-digit percentage returns with no risk seems too good to be true. But there are legitimate liquidity-mining operators, so how to tell the difference?

"Liquidity mining is a hard one to understand for many investors," said Nick Furneaux, managing director at the U.K.-based investigative firm CSITech and author of the book "Investigating Cryptocurrencies." "It can be a legitimate way to make money. The problem is: Who can you trust?"

What bothers Jenkins the most - more than his naivete, more than the lost money - is the guilt. To achieve maximum effect, crypto scams often rely on the victims to do their work for them. Each nephew Jenkins recruited put in $6,000. The family friend plowed in $60,000. All of it is gone.

"It's the worst thing I've done in my life," Jenkins said; his brother didn't talk to him for months.

Furneaux said people can try to protect themselves by looking at when a domain was registered and avoiding newly created ones. But he said the industry also needs to do a better job of self-regulation. "I'm hoping social responsibility starts coming into play for more of these companies," he said.

Making the ecosystem safe for regular people is a "hard job," admits Dan Finlay, the creator of MetaMask, a competitor to the Coinbase Wallet app. But he says MetaMask has dedicated multiple security teams to investigating risks and plugging holes.

Jenkins believes one such hole in Coinbase Wallet contributed to his downfall. When Jenkins bought the "mining certificate," he clicked a prompt in the Coinbase Wallet app that did not clearly explain that he was signing over full access to his money.

Other wallets are more transparent about such requests, and Coinbase has come under fire for the lapse. Last August, BlockSecTeam, a China-based blockchain security firm, issued a blunt evaluation of the issue: "The Coinbase wallet hides the necessary information."

Asked about the hole, Martin, the Coinbase security chief, said "I'm not going to sit here and say Coinbase Wallet has the perfect [user interface]. Are there improvements we could make? Absolutely. And we will continue to do so."

Both Coinbase Wallet and MetaMask collaborate on a public list of 13,500 scam sites that are blocked in both apps. But the list doesn't include the sites that appeared to defraud Jenkins and Gochenour.

One seemingly easy fix would be to restrict outsiders' access to users' wallets, or at least require a human to interact with the user before control is given away. But crypto advocates say this is not possible: The "approval" process is key to many of the so-called decentralized finance tools necessary to achieve their goal of replicating or even replacing the regular financial system.

So far, nothing public has been done for the victims.

"The blockchain is kind of this permissionless frontier space," said MetaMask's Finlay. "You know, I don't know if every user understands how much they really are kind of on their own."

Jenkins said he realizes now just how vulnerable he is. But, perhaps surprisingly, he wants to keep investing in crypto.

"I just feel like there are ways to make money," he said. "Sure, some of it feels too good to be true. But if you treat it like gambling, if you have that mentality and approach it wisely, you can make a lot more than having it sit in a bank."

He added ruefully: "You just have to get a little lucky."
" " The coastline of Pitcairn Island in the South Pacific looks picture-perfect. Wolfgang Kaehler/LightRocket via Getty Images

The story seems quite implausible. In 1789, several sailors led by Fletcher Christian seized control of the HMS Bounty, then set Capt. William Bligh and his supporters adrift in the South Pacific sea. (The story was told in the movies "Mutiny on the Bounty" and "The Bounty.") Fearing prosecution if they settled in a local community, the British mutineers spent several months scoping out remote locales, picking up 19 Tahitian companions along the way. Eventually, the group decided to make their new home on a deserted volcanic island they'd discovered some 1,350 miles (2,170 kilometers) southeast of Tahiti. Today, against all odds, their descendants still live on that same subtropical island, Pitcairn.

Pitcairn is part of the four Pitcairn Islands, a British Overseas Territory considered one of the world's most remote inhabited islands. The other islands in the group, all uninhabited, are Ducie, Henderson and Oeno. Pitcairn is small  just 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) long and 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) wide. It's also rugged, with steep cliffs and no easy way for boats to dock. In fact, visiting ships still drop anchor several hundred yards from Bounty Bay, then are met by residents steering longboats.

Despite being settled for more than 200 years, Pitcairn's population hasn't changed much. While it reached a peak of 233 in 1937, today the island is home to just 50 or so residents, not many more than when the mutineers first arrived.

" " This map shows the location of Pitcairn Island, 1,350 miles southeast of Tahiti (French Polynesia). Encyclopaedia Britannica/Universal Images Group/Getty Images

With limited acreage and few residents, amenities on the island are minimal. There's a general store, health clinic, post office, museum, library, treasury and tourism center, plus Pulau School, which educates kids through primary school. (Currently, it has just three students.) After that, children typically receive their higher education at boarding school in New Zealand.

Since there's no airport on the island, residents are linked to the outside world mainly via a passenger/cargo ship, the MV Silver Supporter, that travels between French Polynesia and Pitcairn on a limited basis. The trip requires spending at least two nights at sea and there are just 12 visitor berths. The ship comes about once a month.

Interestingly, most native Pitkerners are Seventh-Day Adventists. Originally followers of the Church of England, the mutineers' religion, the group was converted in 1887 by an Adventist missionary and the only church on the island is a Seventh-day Adventist church.

Advertisement

How Pitkerners Make a Living

In the early days, the settlers on Pitcairn were self-sufficient, growing crops, constructing homes and crafting clothing. After American whalers discovered the island in 1808, ships began regularly stopping in, including English vessels that brought over books and various supplies. In 1898, Britain assumed control of the island and began providing additional assistance.

" " Pitcairn's public hall stands behind the anchor of the ship HMS Bounty, the vessel which brought Fletcher Christian and the rest to this island. Michael Dunning/Getty Images

By 1937, after searching for ways the island could become more self-sufficient, the British government landed on the idea of postage stamps. At that time, the island had no post office and had been using New Zealand stamps. Three years later, in 1940, the Pitcairn Islands opened its first post office. Its initial set of stamps were an immediate hit, quickly becoming popular with philatelists around the globe. Soon stamps were the island's largest source of revenue. However, revenue declined at the end of the 20th century with the general decline in letter writing and stamp collecting.

Today, while stamps are still available, the Pitkerners power their nano-economy by selling a well-regarded island honey, known for its rich, fruity flavor, as well as handmade crafts such as wood carvings, jewelry, clothing, soap and stationery. Its main private revenue generator, and one to which it is currently devoting much effort, is tourism.

In 2015, the British government established a marine reserve around the islands. At 324,000 square miles (834,000 square kilometers), it's the largest in the world. A few years later, in a bid to foster astro-tourism, Pitcairn applied to be named an International Dark Sky Sanctuary. It received this designation from the International Dark Sky Association in 2019, the only island group in the world to carry it. Pitcairn is also marketing itself to adventure travelers in search of unique, hard-to-access destinations and to cruise ship travelers.

Visitors can sign up to go whale-watching or fishing on one of the island's famous longboats. You can check out the grave of John Adams, one of the original mutineers, then swim in a sea-carved tidal pool. There's a guided tour down a 700-foot (231-meter) cliff, which features ancient Polynesian petroglyphs at the bottom, evidence of earlier inhabitants. And, if you're a certified scuba diver, you can explore the ruins of the HMS Bounty, which the mutineers sank after arriving to avoid being discovered by the British. (Wisely, they did first strip it of all useful items.) You can also simply wander around the island to take in the incredible views. Everything is well signed, and maps are available.

If Pitcairn's marketing efforts are successful, there may be one potential problem: lodging. There are no hotels or resorts on Pitcairn Island, although the tourism department helps arrange accommodations with local families. There is also a smattering of private homes and units for rent.

Advertisement

Searching for New Residents

Living on a remote tropical island may sound very enticing. But as we said earlier, Pitcairn's population has been decreasing since the end of World War II, with scores of young people opting to live elsewhere. Immigration, Pitkerners know, is key to their future.

To encourage new residents, the island is working to make immigration less onerous. It's now easier to obtain land for a home, for example, as well as subsidized medical treatment. Same-sex marriages are welcome. Yet despite these changes, the government warns you shouldn't move here on a whim. For life on such a remote island can be challenging, both physically and mentally.

Since there are so few people and so little contact with the outside world, islanders are expected to be able to perform a variety of tasks and pitch in as necessary. And while internet and cell service are available, the speeds and service quality aren't on par with what you'll find in developed and less insolated countries. There is only one television channel, too, although they're working on increasing coverage. As far as jobs, there may be a limited number of government jobs available, but many people support themselves through selling items to tourists or hosting them in their homes.

The government website warns that life on Pitcairn island is not for everyone. "It is not a place to get rich. The island's isolation and small size at times make life on Pitcairn physically demanding and emotionally challenging." Still, the website says, life there is diverse, both quiet and vibrant, and certainly never dull  probably the same conditions experienced by Fletcher Christian and crew more than 200 years earlier.

Now That's Horrible In 1999, British authorities discovered that for decades, nearly every Pitkern girl had been sexually abused -- and that nearly every Pitkern man had sexually abused someone. At the time, most islanders saw this as a "cultural practice" between preteen girls and older men rather than child abuse. Six men were convicted and sentenced to prison. Today, Pitcairn is vocal about its efforts to protect its children.
DAR ES SALAAM, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Tanzania in collaboration with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and Switzerland will launch a 5.1-million-U.S.-dollar program aimed at safeguarding young people by improving their health and wellbeing, a UNFPA official said Sunday.

"Young people as a key driver for any sustainable development need to be nurtured and empowered to attain their full potentials in overcoming the many barriers which may hinder them from attaining set goals," said Fatina Kiluvia, a program analyst for the UNFPA.

Kiluvia told a press conference in the commercial capital of Dar es Salaam that young people face many challenges ranging from gender-based violence and lack of sexual reproductive health rights and education, to sexually transmitted infections including HIV.

Kiluvia said the UNFPA in collaboration with the government of Tanzania and the Swiss government has come up with the three-year program which will focus on interventions that create a conducive socioeconomic, legal, policy environment and capacity development for adolescents and the youth.

The UNFPA Country Representative for Tanzania Mark Schreiner said the program to be implemented on mainland Tanzania and Zanzibar will start Monday.

"We are proud to support Tanzania in collaboration with the embassy of Switzerland in its effort to realize the sexual and reproductive health of adolescents and young people," said Schreiner. 
An analysis of satellite images by The New York Times rebuts claims by Russia that the killing of civilians in Bucha, a suburb of Kyiv, occurred after its soldiers had left the town.

When images emerged over the weekend of the bodies of dead civilians lying on the streets of Bucha  some with their hands bound, some with gunshot wounds to the head  Russias Ministry of Defense denied responsibility. In a Telegram post Sunday, the ministry suggested that the bodies had been recently placed on the streets after all Russian units withdrew completely from Bucha around Wednesday.

Russia claimed that the images were another hoax and called for an emergency United Nations Security Council meeting on what it called provocations of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha.

But a review of videos and satellite imagery by the Times shows that many of the civilians were killed more than three weeks ago, when Russias military was in control of the town.

One video filmed by a local council member Saturday shows multiple bodies scattered along Yablonska Street in Bucha. Satellite images provided to the Times by Maxar Technologies show that at least 11 of those had been on the street since March 11, when Russia, by its own account, occupied the town.

To confirm when the bodies appeared, and when the victims were likely killed, the Visual Investigations team at the Times conducted a before-and-after analysis of satellite imagery. The images show dark objects of similar size to a human body appearing on Yablonska Street between March 9 and March 11. The objects appear in the precise positions in which the bodies were found after Ukrainian forces reclaimed Bucha, as the footage from Saturday shows. Further analysis shows that the objects remained in those position for over three weeks.

The causes of death are unclear. Some of the bodies were beside what appears to be an impact crater. Others were near abandoned cars. Three of the bodies lay beside bicycles. Some have their hands bound behind their backs with white cloth. The victims were scattered over more than half a mile of Yablonska Street.

A second video taken on Yablonska Street shows three more bodies. One lies beside a bicycle, another near an abandoned car. Satellite imagery shows that the abandoned cars and the nearby body appear between March 20 and 21.

These are just some of the civilian victims discovered since Saturday. The Associated Press published images of at least six dead men lying together in the rear of an office building, some with hands tied behind their backs. The building is 1 mile west of the other victims found along Yablonska Street.

Another mile farther along, a photographer with the Times discovered the body of a man with a gunshot wound to his head lying beside a bicycle.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
WASHINGTON  Sen. Alex Padillas flight troubles could delay the Senates timeline for confirming Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, President Joe Bidens Supreme Court nominee.

As the Senate Judiciary Committee gaveled in Monday morning to advance Jacksons nomination, the California Democrat was notably absent. With the panel evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans, Padillas vote is critical.

Due to a passenger medical emergency, Sen. Padillas flight was turned back and returned to LAX, delaying his arrival to Washington, a Padilla spokesperson said. He boarded the first available flight this morning and will arrive this afternoon.

According to flight trackers, flights from Los Angeles International Airport this morning are due to arrive in Washington around 4 p.m., though it wasnt immediately clear whether Padilla was flying to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport or to Washington Dulles International Airport. Reagan is only five miles from the Capitol, but Dulles is about 40 miles away.

A committee spokesperson said the panel will wait for Padillas arrival to vote.

The evenly split committee is expected to deadlock along partisan lines on a vote to advance Jackson. An 11-11 vote would add another layer to the process to elevate Jackson to the high court, but likely wont stop her ascension to become the first Black female justice.

The vote will follow hours of statements from the panels 22 members.

Democrats praised Jacksons qualifications and experience, while Republicans explained their opposition.

Sen. Richard J. Durbin, an Illinois Democrat and the committee chairman, called Mondays vote a historic moment for this committee and for America.

This is the first time the panel has considered a Black woman for a seat on the Supreme Court. Republicans said they might have nominated Judge Janice Rogers Brown in 2005, but Democrats voiced opposition if she were tapped for the high court.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who voted to elevate Jackson to the D.C. Circuit less than a year ago but opposes her nomination to the Supreme Court, said she would not have been before this committee if Republicans were in charge of the Senate.

A deadlock Monday would be the first time the judiciary panel has split on a Supreme Court nominee in more than three decades. In September 1991, when Biden chaired the committee, it voted 7-7 to send Clarence Thomas nomination to the floor with a favorable recommendation. That motion failed, but the committee voted 13-1 to send the nomination to the floor without recommendation, and Thomas was confirmed the following month, 52-48.

If the committee vote is a tie, Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., will have to file a discharge motion to place Jackson on the executive calendar, a move that allows the chamber to take up the nomination the following day. Despite Padillas delayed arrival, that motion is expected to occur later Monday.

An identical process played out during the nominations of Justice Department officials Vanita Gupta and Kristen Clarke, as well as other judicial nominees who deadlocked in committee and are still awaiting confirmation.

The discharge process requires up to four hours of debate, equally divided between parties, and a simple-majority roll call vote.

As soon as Tuesday, Schumer is expected to file cloture on Jacksons nomination, kick-starting up to 30 hours of debate before two additional simple-majority votes: one to end debate and the other to confirm Jackson as retiring Justice Stephen G. Breyers successor, likely before the end of the week.

Democrats appear united in support of Jackson, and Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, has said she will vote to confirm her, assuring the final tally will be bipartisan.

Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah, two of the Republicans most likely to break ranks and join Collins, have not said how they plan to vote.
SAN FRANCISCO (BCN)

A teacher in a private San Francisco elementary and middle school was charged in federal court Friday with receipt of child pornography.

The charges against 33-year-old Charles Richard Barrett were announced in a news release from the office of U.S. Attorney Stephanie M. Hinds and Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent in Charge Tatum King. Prosecutors did not name the school in the news release.

Prosecutors said that in June of 2020, as part of an investigation into Barrett's partner, federal agents came into possession of a computer found in Barrett's residence and established that Barrett communicated with two suspected minors in 2013 and 2014 and received sexually explicit images involving minors from them.

The news release does not state whether Barrett was a teacher at the time of the incidents and makes no claim that the boys involved were his students.

The release offers a reminder that the charges contained in the criminal complaint are mere allegations. As in any criminal case, the defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in a court of law.

Prosecutors allege that between December 2013 and February 2014, Barrett received at least nine sexually explicit images from a boy who said he was 16 years old. The images were shared via text messages in which Barrett sent explicit images of himself to the boy.

Prosecutors allege this same scenario occurred in 2013 with another boy claiming to be age 16 and a high school student in San Francisco. Barrett is alleged to have received at least four sexually explicit images from the victim.

If convicted, Barrett faces a mandatory minimum of five years in prison.

Copyright  2022 Bay City News, Inc. All rights reserved. Republication, rebroadcast or redistribution without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Bay City News is a 24/7 news service covering the greater Bay Area.

Copyright  2022 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited.
Spring may look more like early summer by the end of the week.

The National Weather Service forecast for Sunday evening is for mild temperatures and continued dry weather conditions early in the week throughout the Bay Area. Then strong high pressure will build over the region through mid-to-late week.

By Wednesday, daytime temperatures will rise by 5-10 degrees above normal at the coast and by 10-20 degrees above normal throughout interior locations. By Thursday, the peak of the heat event, temperatures are likely to warm into the upper 70s to mid 80s near the coast with widespread 80s to lower 90s across the interior (15-25 degrees above normal).

While mild and above average, overnight temperatures are anticipated to cool adequately enough to limit greater, more widespread heat risks.

Two men were shot and killed and two more were injured Sunday afternoon on a San Francisco playground on the 600 block of Brunswick Avenue, police said Sunday night.

All four men were shot but alive when officers from Ingleside station arrived at 4:39 p.m. All four were transported to the hospital, where two later died. The other two men's injuries aren't considered life-threatening.

No arrests have been made. Police ask anyone with information regarding the case to call the SFPD 24-hour-tip line at (415) 575-4444, or text an anonymous tip to TIP411 and begin the message with SFPD.

The California Highway Patrol on Sunday evening cancelled the endangered missing advisory for a 7-year-old girl from Morgan Hill, missing since Friday evening.

"The child has been safely located and the suspect was taken into custody," the CHP tweeted.

Police were looking for Samira Jabr, the 30-year-old biological mother of 7-year-old Ophelia Bushman, who was last seen about 8 p.m. Friday.

Santa Rosa firefighters say part of a building collapsed of the 600 block of Fourth Street just before noon Sunday, but the business under the collapsed brick facade was closed and no one was injured.

Firefighters initially responded at 11:50 a.m. to a report of a partial building collapse and fire downtown. Upon arrival, they found no fire and surmised the report of smoke was just dust from the collapse.

A six-year-old Marina girl reported missing Saturday night has been found safe, according to a tweet early Sunday from the California Highway Patrol.

Emery Johnson, a special needs, non-verbal child had been last seen at 7 p.m. Saturday at Windy Hill Park in Marina in Monterey County.

The CHP's post included an acknowledgement to volunteers from the public: "Thank you to all members of our community who assisted in this search and rescue. Your actions truly made the difference."

The Dublin City Council will hold a special study session Tuesday before its regular meeting on the proposed Inspiration Drive Memory Care and Assisted Living projects on the Valley Christian Center property.

Fulcrum Development is proposing a 55-bed memory care facility and an 84-bed assisted living facility on the property. They are requesting a land use designation change on two of the site's 4.26 acres at 7500 Inspiration Drive.

In exchange for the zoning change, Valley Christian is agreeing to change the zoning on an adjacent five acres to give the city more open space.

The special meeting will take place at 6 p.m. in the Regional Meeting Room at Dublin Civic Center, 100 Civic Plaza, in Dublin.

Petaluma Police arrested a man on Sunday for allegedly burglarizing McDowell Elementary School.

A school alarm was activated at 9:20 a.m. and the school and police arrived to find Edgar Solorio allegedly in possession of school property, burglary tools, drug paraphernalia and what they believe was methamphetamine.

A representative from Petaluma City Schools took custody of the stolen property and secured the school. Solorio was arrested and transported to the Sonoma County Jail and booked on suspicion of burglary, possession of burglary tools, possession of drug paraphernalia, and possession of a controlled substance.

A federal judge charged an Oakland man Friday with allegedly selling fentanyl and methamphetamine in San Francisco's Tenderloin District.

The charges against 26-year-old Oakland resident Jose Alvarado were announced Friday in a news release from U.S. Attorney Stephanie M. Hinds and Drug Enforcement Administration Special Agent in Charge Wade R. Shannon.

Prosecutors allege Alvarado engaged in four transactions selling drugs to three separate undercover law enforcement officers between November 2021 and February 2022.

The charges include two counts of distribution -- one of five or more grams of methamphetamine and the other 40 or more grams of fentanyl -- each carrying a penalty of a minimum of five years in prison and minimum of four years of supervision following prison.

The National Weather Service forecast for Monday for the greater San Francisco Bay Area calls for warm temperatures under mostly sunny skies with highs in the 60s to low 70s with overnight lows in the 40s.

Copyright  2022 Bay City News, Inc. All rights reserved. Republication, rebroadcast or redistribution without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Bay City News is a 24/7 news service covering the greater Bay Area.

Copyright  2022 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited.
Olivier Douliery/TNS

After Amazon workers at a Staten Island warehouse successfully voted to form a union last week, media reports characterized the vote as the most significant win for organized labor in decades.

The Democratic Party is ostensibly pro-union, with the party platform from 2020 stating, "We know that strong American labor unions help increase wages and job standards for workers across the economy, which is why Democrats will prioritize passing the PRO Act and restoring workers rights, including the right to launch secondary boycotts." (The PRO Act passed the House but no action has been taken in the Senate.)
Page Content

Building on board gender diversity requirements, California passed AB 979 in 2020. This statute requires publicly held corporations headquartered in California to diversify their boards of directors with directors from "underrepresented communities," specifically those individuals who self-identify as Black, African American, Hispanic, Latino, Asian, Pacific Islander, Native American, Native Hawaiian, Alaska Native, or who self-identifies as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender. AB 979 required boards to diversify by Dec. 31, 2021.

Starting this year in March, the California Secretary of State will publish annual reports on its website documenting compliance with these diversification requirements. Companies that fail to timely comply will be fined $100,000 for the first violation and $300,000 for subsequent violations.

AB 979 has faced several legal challenges, similar to SB 826, which required gender diversity on boards of directors. The State of California is currently defending four different actions involving these bills. Crest v. Padilla I (Crest I) is a taxpayer lawsuit challenging the use of state taxes to enforce the requirements under SB 826. Crest I is currently pending a verdict in the trial court. A taxpayer challenge to AB 979 was brought by the same parties (Crest v. Padilla II) and is scheduled for trial in May of this year.

Meland v. Weber is an action seeking to enjoin enforcement of SB 826 is pending appeal in the 9th circuit after a denial of a preliminary injunction in that action.

And finally, an action was brought by Alliance for Fair Board Recruitment against the California Secretary of State challenging both SB 826 and AB 979 on equal protection grounds. The state of California recently filed a motion to stay the action pending outcomes of the trials in Crest I and II and the appeal in Meland.

Harold R. Jones is an attorney with Jackson Lewis in San Francisco.  2022 Jackson Lewis. All rights reserved. Reposted with permission.
In this post, we'll look at ten of the most useful pentesting tools. The practice of detecting and eliminating software, network, and system vulnerabilities is known as penetration testing. It's critical to find and repair any flaws before hackers can use them. In order to do pentesting effectively, you need the right tools. In this post, we will discuss the features of good pentesting tools in India and how to pick the right ones for your needs. We will also discuss the pros and cons of pentesting and give some tips on how to get the most out of this process.

10 Top Pentesting Tools With Explanation

Nmap: Nmap is a very popular pentesting tool that can be used to scan for open ports, identify running services, and even find security vulnerabilities. Nmap is available for free and is widely considered to be one of the best pentesting tools available. Astra's Pentest Suite: Astra's Pentest is a suite of tools provided by Astra Security that is very well known for penetration testing. They offer budget-friendly penetration testing options for organizations of all scales. Metasploit: Metasploit is another popular pentesting tool that allows you to exploit vulnerabilities in order to gain access to a system. Metasploit is available in both a free and a paid version. Wireshark: Wireshark is a packet capture tool that can be used to sniff network traffic and look for sensitive information such as passwords. Wireshark is a useful tool for pentesting that is absolutely free. Burp Suite: Burp Suite is a web application penetration testing software that may be used to identify security problems in online applications. Burp Suite comes in two flavors: free and premium. Aircrack-ng: Aircrack-ng is a wireless pentesting tool that can be used to crack WEP and WPA/WPA-PSK keys. Aircrack-ng is available for free and is a very useful tool for pentesting wireless networks. John the Ripper: John the Ripper is a password cracking program that may be used to attempt passwords using brute force or the word method. John the Ripper is available for free and is a very useful tool for pentesting password security. Hydra: Hydra is a password cracking tool that can be used to brute force passwords on a variety of protocols. SQLmap: If a hacker is able to gain remote access and exploit a SQL injection flaw, he or she may use the free version of sqlmap. SQLmap is available for free and is a very useful tool for pentesting web applications. Nikto: The program Nikto is a web server scanner that may be used to search for security vulnerabilities on a server. Nikto is available for free and is a very useful tool for pentesting web servers.

There are numerous different pentesting tools available, and they all have one thing in common: they're hard to understand. When choosing pentesting tools, it is important to consider your needs and the features of the tools before making a decision.

Features Of A Good Pentesting Tool

When it comes to pentesting, there are a lot of different tools that you can use. It is important to choose the right tools for the job, as well as have a good understanding of how they work. This part will go through some of the most essential features that good pentesting tools should have, as well as some of the finest ones accessible.

A good pentesting tool should have a few key features. First, it should be able to find vulnerabilities in systems and networks. Second, it should be able to exploit these vulnerabilities so that you can test their security. Third, it should be easy to use so that you can get the most out of your testing. Finally, it should be affordable so that you dont have to spend a lot of money on tools.

Pros and Cons Of Pentesting

Pentesting can be a great way to improve the security of your systems and networks. However, there are a few things to consider before diving in. First, pentesting is time-consuming and may take days or weeks to complete a comprehensive test. Second, pentesting can be expensive if you need to purchase multiple tools or hire someone to do it for you. Third, pentesting can be disruptive to your business operations since it requires you to shut down systems and networks while the test is being conducted.

Tips In Detail For Pentesting

Assuming youve decided that pentesting is right for you, here are some tips on how to get the most out of this process.

Begin by establishing a clear objective for your testing.

Second, choose the right tools for the job so that you can find and exploit vulnerabilities effectively.

Third, plan your tests carefully so that you dont disrupt your business operations more than necessary.

Finally, take advantage of resources like books, online courses, and forums so that you can learn as much as possible about pentesting.

Final Thoughts

Pentesting can be a very useful process for finding and fixing vulnerabilities in computer systems, networks, and applications. However, it is important to choose the right tools for the job and to use them correctly in order to get the most out of pentesting.

Pentesting is a valuable tool for keeping your systems secure, but it is only one part of a comprehensive security strategy. Be sure to implement other security measures such as firewalls, intrusion detection/prevention systems, and user education in order to keep your systems safe from attackers.

There are many different pentesting tools available, but some of the best ones include Astra's Pentest, Metasploit, Nmap, and Wireshark. The following are additional tools that offer all of the characteristics covered above, as well as several others. They are also very popular so you can find a lot of resources on how to use them effectively.

Author: Varsha Paul is a marketing specialist at Astra Security. She is a keen security enthusiast, loves playing with data, and has a passion for writing about technology.
In a proud moment for Indian-Americans, the artwork of a community student from Florida is all set to be displayed at the US Capitol

FREMONT, CA: Sraddha Karthik, a Grade 11 student from Tampa High School in Florida, has been named the winner of the annual Congressional Art Competition at the Tampa Museum of Art, in which high school students from all across Hillsborough County fought for a chance to exhibit their work in the US Capitol. According to a press statement published by Congresswoman Kathy Castor, Sraddha Karthik, who immigrated to the United States with her parents when she was one, won the top award with her graphite work "Pensive Gaze," which was done with delicacy and precision.

Sraddhas self-portrait explores the difference between perception and reality. According to the press release, she utilized multiple hues of graphite to create depth and perspective in her artwork. Sraddha has been sketching since she was seven years old when her parents enrolled her in an art class. Though she does not get much time, she tries to fit in as much art as she can as it helps her in expressing herself. The Congresswomans office commented that Sraddhas career in architecture, which she hopes to follow after high school, will be enhanced by art. Karthik has been competing in the Salvador Dali Museum annual art competition since eighth grade, and her work has been chosen to be displayed every year.

The media mentioned that this would be her first visit to Washington, DC, for her national presentation this summer. Her artwork will be displayed in the US Capitol for a year among the winners of congressional art competitions from across the country. She also commented that one of the best high school art competitions in the country takes place at the Tampa Museum of Art, and as the whole world is recovering from the pandemic, she is also grateful to her parents, instructors, and especially students who have turned to the arts for inspiration and connection.
To continue, please log in, or sign up for a new account.

We offer one free story view per month. If you register for an account, you will get two additional story views. After those three total views, we ask that you support us with a subscription.

A subscription to our digital content is so much more than just access to our valuable content. It means youre helping to support a local community institution that has, from its very start, supported the betterment of our society. Thank you very much!
Pleas fail and Bhutto hangs

Mr Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the former Prime Minister of Pakistan and once one of the worlds major statesmen, was hanged at 2am at the Rawalpindi District Prison. His execution came after President Zia rejected world-wide appeals for clemency from leaders of East and West. Mr Bhuttos last visitors were his Iranian-born wife Nusrat and his daughter Benazir. His body was then buried after a virtual paupers funeral.

Australia bans whaling, imports

The Prime Minister, Mr Fraser, announced a toughening of Australias policy against whaling with a ban on whaling within the proposed 200 mile fishing zone and a ban on importing whale products. Mr Fraser said the Government was changing from a policy of conservative utilisation to a vigorous and active policy of protection. He said Australia would also work towards an international ban on whaling.

Ban is urged on drink advertising

Products that were scientifically recognised as being harmful, such as cigarettes and alcohol, should not be advertised, said Dr James Lawson, the regional director of the NSW Health Commission, at the Australian Broadcasting Tribunals inquiry into TCN9s licence renewal application. He said that Tooheys advertisements and the association of sport with alcohol was image-building and harmful to the community.
The Parramatta Catholic diocese is under investigation by the NSW government over allegations it used school funds to buy parish properties, a parliamentary hearing has been told.

St Madeleines Primary School in Kenthurst is at risk of losing government funding after an independent committee recommended the Education Minister declare that it is operating for profit due to the purchases.

Greg Whitby is the executive director of the Catholic Education Diocese of Parramatta.

A parliamentary hearing on Monday was told that executive director of the Parramatta diocese, Greg Whitby, allegedly bought two properties to bail out a priest whose parish was in financial trouble.

Chair of the NSW upper house education committee Mark Latham asked Education Department secretary Georgina Harrison for details on the status of the investigation into the diocese.
I was never in any trouble with behaviour, or whatever. I just didnt show up, he says now. It got to the point where they kind of recommended  you cant come back. Then his parents found Riverside Grammar and he thrived. When he decided to push himself to get a VCE score needed to get into university, the flexible learning style meant he could work in a way that suited him, he says. Former and current students and parents of Riverside Grammar at the school with founder Jon Carnegie (left). Credit:Paul Jeffers Everyone here has such vastly different needs and requirements, but theyre all kind of not fulfilled by a normal school, he told The Age during a recent visit to the school, following an invitation from Dr Carnegie to meet current and former students. I dont think theres anything that my old school could have done.

Several parents at the meeting said they had been at a dead end trying to find alternative education for their children, and Riverside Grammars flexibility meant it had delivered in ways other schools had not. One father told The Age he wasnt sure if his son would be alive today if not for the school. He credited Riverside after seeing his son change from being suicidal and hating school to having a purpose and having his life back. A Department of Education spokesman declined to say who was legally responsible for students of Riverside Grammar. I never took into concern and never questioned whether or not the school is registered or not, didnt bother me. It was about that guy [Dr Carnegie], what he was doing, and what the community here was doing for my son. Thats all it was about. Mother Sue agreed the registration issue did not bother her.

When no school will take your child, and he wants to go to school, its very difficult. I wish there were more schools and places like this that could cater for all these kids who are at risk, because theres just such a lack ... Ticking those boxes for compliance, saying, Theres no handrail there, I couldnt care less. No boundaries But not all students were as happy with their experience. Jane (not her real name) was in her mid-teens when she attended Dr Carnegies school for two years from 2013. She had been bullied at her previous school, before her parents found Riversides predecessor, the Jon Carnegie School. At the time, there were about 15 students at a small campus on High Street in Kew. Essentially, I would go in every day, do whenever I wanted, she told The Age. I was 15 at the time, rebellious and would rock up at whatever time. There was one big room at the back, and we would sit there and do our work on our laptop. It was really bizarre, there was no real structure. Jon would sit us down and give us random lectures.

She told The Age she boarded for several months. I was locked in a mouldy room at the back with two teenage boys overnight, with no division, overnight, every night. I dont know how this was allowed. The entire way it operated was horrendous, Jane said. There were no licensed mental health professionals there, she added, even though many teens suffered from eating disorders, addiction problems and other serious issues. One memory in particular still troubles her. The Jon Carnegie School in Kew in 2014. Credit:Google Maps I was really depressed, I was staying in my room in the back. It was probably 10am because I hadnt woken up and I refused to get out of bed. I remember Jon giving a whole speech about why dont you get up? in front of everyone. He said, Well, if you wont get up, what will you take to stay in bed. What he did was he took an entire bottle of cola and poured it on my head. That was awful. Im so angry when I think about it.

This incident was witnessed by another student who attended for three years. Looking back, this woman is also troubled by her experiences there. Loading I get what he is trying to do, but there are no boundaries. Its inappropriate, she said. When you are a parent of a child, myself included, and their behaviour is extreme, parents are at their wits end, you dont know what to do, and Jon empathises with that and gives them this hope. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesnt. Dr Carnegie agreed that, during its early days, the Jon Carnegie School did not suit all students. We were trying to give our students a voice and create something for which there was no blueprint. We were trying to do a good thing, but I certainly accept there were times when I got it wrong, he said.

Dr Carnegie said that after the schools registration was cancelled, he tried to maintain an environment where young people could go, which at one stage meant the local library. Providing a place for these kids has always been one of our core aims and I felt it would be selling out if I were to quit. It was a low point and our boundaries and formal processes were certainly not up to standard at the time. Impossible to legislate Dr Carnegie told The Age that apart from a gap of about six months to a year, students have consistently been at the school since the registration was cancelled in 2012. Until last month, he said it had not been contacted or visited by the regulator. A Department of Education spokesman did not answer when asked whether the regulator had followed up after cancelling the schools registration almost 10 years ago, and declined to say who was legally responsible for students of Riverside Grammar.

The [Victorian Registration and Qualifications Authority] is currently investigating whether Riverside Grammar is compliant with the Education and Training Reform Act 2006 and does not comment on the details of open investigations, he said. It is an offence under the Education and Training Reform Act 2006 to carry on or conduct a school unless the school is registered. The VRQA can take action against unregistered schools. In the decade the school has been running unregistered and under the radar, all schools have had to introduce Child Safe Standards following the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, which found that isolated and highly controlled schools could provide more opportunities for abuse and make it difficult to detect and that a disproportionate number of survivors had been abused in residential boarding houses. The school was formerly named after founder Jon Carnegie. Credit:Paul Jeffers Several weeks ago, Victorias Education Minister James Merlino said he was extremely concerned about any entity masquerading as a school without the necessary regulatory oversight. The comments rankled Dr Carnegie.
Voters have strongly backed the $8.6 billion help for households in last weeks federal budget while drifting away from Prime Minister Scott Morrison and lifting their support for Labor to give the opposition a powerful lead ahead of the election.

Primary vote support for the Coalition has increased slightly from 33 to 34 per cent in the wake of the budget but popular support for Labor has jumped from 35 to 38 per cent despite billions of dollars in government spending.

Anthony Albaneses Labor party is ahead of the Coalition on primary vote after the federal budget was handed down.

Days away from the start of the official election campaign, Labor leader Anthony Albanese has overtaken Mr Morrison as preferred prime minister with a narrow lead of 37 to 36 per cent.

The findings are part of an exclusive survey that shows 50 per cent of voters believe the federal budget was good for the country as a whole but only 40 per cent see it as good for themselves and their households.
The former Liberal candidate at the centre of an ugly preselection battle against Scott Morrison in 2007 for the south Sydney seat of Cook has accused the Prime Minister of lying in his denials that he was involved in racial vilification against him.

Mr Morrison again on Monday rejected as malicious slurs the claim by Michael Towke that he had told party members they should not vote for him in the preselection because he was from a Lebanese family and because of rumours he was a Muslim.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison campaigning in Melbourne. Credit:Eddie Jim

Confronted by Network Ten on Monday and asked whether he believed the Prime Minister was lying, Mr Towke said: I think its pretty obvious he is. Hes got form on that.

Just ask Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull, [French President] Emmanuel Macron  there are a few people  and Barnaby Joyce has called him out as a compulsive liar, Mr Towke told the network.
Financial Services Minister Jane Humes office asked Hansard staff to delete references to a planned $10 cut to the price of medicines that did not make it into the budget after she mistakenly referred to it in Parliament.

Bureaucrats initially dodged questions over who had demanded the change, but Department Secretary Rob Stefanic confirmed in writing on Monday evening that Senator Hume had requested the amendment.

Senator Jane Humes office asked Hansard staff to delete references to a planned $10 cut to the price of medicines that did not make it into the budget. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

In Parliament last week, Assistant Treasurer Michael Sukkar and Senator Hume referred to a $10 reduction in the price of PBS medicines for all Australians, but this was not in the budget and these references mysteriously disappeared from Hansard.

While minor amendments to Hansard that do not alter the substance of what was said are usual, substantive changes without a formal correction of the record are controversial as Hansard is supposed to show the true record of what is said in the Chamber.
Political parties and candidates in Victoria could soon face fines worth tens of thousands of dollars for making inaccurate claims to voters.

The Victorian government, opposition and the Greens have all lent their support to the idea of so-called truth in advertising legislation, which exists in South Australia and the ACT and allows electoral commissions to rule on political ads that may not be factual.

Victorian Opposition Leader Matthew Guy. Credit:Luis Ascui

A bipartisan Victorian Parliamentary inquiry led by Labor MP Lee Tarlamis called for the change along with a series of new clamps on social media companies, including Twitter and Facebook, to thwart misinformation.

Labor supported the principle of the inquirys recommendations, which included encouraging social media companies to establish the identity of users before they are allowed to create an account, and funding a fact-checking organisation to operate during election campaigns.
Russias UN ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia said Russia would present further factual evidence to the Security Council on Tuesday. Speaking on Ukrainian television ahead of his UN appearance, Zelensky said the killings in Bucha showed Putins claim of needing to ensure denazification applied more to Russia than to Ukraine. European Union investigators will help probe claims from Ukrainian officials and charities that Putins forces massacred and raped civilians, with reports, images and video footage prompting calls for prosecutions of war crimes and crimes against humanity against those responsible. Western officials also believed China was ready to loan Russia significant amounts of money, in a move that would transform the relationship between the two autocratic states. The Chinese are very focused on the global economic aspects of the conflict, officials said, in a briefing attended by The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. Officials said while the Chinese were embarrassed by Russias actions in the UN and the disinformation it is putting out, there were no signs that Beijing was moving away from Moscow. But the atrocities in Bucha could influence any change.

Soldiers walk amid destroyed Russian tanks in Bucha, outside Kyiv. Credit:AP If the Chinese come to be associated with war crimes, then theyre going to want to review that quite carefully, Western officials said. Visiting Bucha on Tuesday morning (AEST), Zelensky labelled what he had witnessed on the streets as genocide. His government is warning it could be just the tip of the iceberg and besieged Mariupol would likely be much worse. These are war crimes and will be recognised by the world as genocide, Zelensky said while wearing a bullet-proof vest alongside military personnel. Bodies lie in a mass grave in Bucha outside Kyiv. Credit:AP

We know of thousands of people killed and tortured, with severed limbs, raped women and murdered children, he said. Its very difficult to talk when you see what theyve done here, he added, vowing to make sure those responsible are held to account. Russia is in its second year of a three-year term on the 47-member Human Rights Council, which cannot make legally binding decisions. But the councils decisions send important political messages and it can authorise investigations. Last month it opened an investigation into allegations of rights violations, including possible war crimes, in Ukraine since Russias invasion. Thirty-two members voted in favour of the resolution, brought by Ukraine. Russia and Eritrea voted against while 13, including China, abstained.

Loading A two-thirds majority vote by the 193-member assembly in New York can suspend a state for persistently committing gross and systematic violations of human rights. In Poland ahead of G7 and NATO talks in Brussels later this week, British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said Russia must be suspended from the UN body given strong evidence of war crimes, including reports of mass graves and heinous butchery. Truss said she would be working with allies to go further banning Russian ships from Western ports, cracking down on Russian banks and going after new industries filling Putins war chest, like gold. French President Emmanuel Macron called for Russian oil and coal imports to be targeted in a new wave of sanctions against Moscow.

He told French radio there were very clear clues pointing to war crimes, adding: What happened in Bucha demands a new round of sanctions and very clear measures. Germany reacted to the latest allegations of war crimes by expelling 40 Russian diplomats, with its Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock saying it was a response to the unbelievable brutality the Kremlin had unleashed in Ukraine. The French Foreign Ministry later announced it had expelled 35 Russian diplomats, saying their activities were contrary to our security interests. The West expects Russia has repositioned about two-thirds of its forces from around Kyiv, with many consolidating in Belarus where they are expected to be refit, resupplied and redeployed elsewhere in Ukraine. Moscow said it would respond in kind and slam shut the door on Western embassies.

Loading Ukrainian authorities said the Russian army had placed mines in childrens play areas, and booby-trapped front doors of apartments and alleyways. An evacuation convoy escorted by the International Committee of the Red Cross was still blocked in the eastern town of Manhush, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said. Earlier an ICRC spokesperson said one of its teams had been stopped during an attempt to reach Mariupol and was being held. US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Tuesday (AEST) that Russia probably planned to deploy tens of thousands of soldiers to eastern Ukraine as it shifts its focus.
The causes of death are unclear. Some of the bodies were beside what appears to be an impact crater. Others were near abandoned cars. Three of the bodies lay beside bicycles. Some have their hands bound behind their backs with white cloth. The victims were scattered over more than half a kilometre of Yablonska Street. A second video taken on Yablonska Street shows three more bodies. One lies beside a bicycle, another near an abandoned car. Satellite imagery shows that the abandoned cars and the nearby body appear between March 20 and 21. A destroyed mask and other gear left at the site where as many as nine Russian tanks and armored vehicles were destroyed on a forest road outside Dmytrivka, Ukraine, west of Kyiv . Credit:Ivor Prickett/The New York Times These are just some of the civilian victims discovered since Saturday. The Associated Press published images of at least six dead men lying together in the rear of an office building, some with hands tied behind their backs. The building is just over a kilometre west of the other victims found along Yablonska Street. Less than two kilometres farther along, a photographer with the Times discovered the body of a man with a gunshot wound to his head lying beside a bicycle.

Global outcry Perhaps it was the way the lifeless bodies, bloodied by bullets, and some with hands bound, had been left strewn about or shovelled into makeshift mass graves. Or the reality of seeing them up close in widely circulated photographs and videos. Loading There have been other atrocities in the weeks since Russia invaded Ukraine, concentrating much of its firepower on the dwellings and gathering spots of ordinary Ukrainians, but the international outrage they provoked has been eclipsed by the reaction to revelations that retreating Russian soldiers left many slain civilians behind near the Ukrainian capital, particularly in the suburb of Bucha. Many of the victims had been shot in the head. A coroner in Bucha said his team had collected dozens. The Russians fired at anyone as their tanks rolled through the town in the wars early days, some residents said.

The summary killings of civilians add to the growing body of evidence of numerous flagrant violations by Russian forces of the laws of war, as described in the Geneva Conventions and the International Criminal Courts definitions of what constitutes a war crime. Prosecutors in war-crime cases have a steep hill to climb. But experts in international law say the distressing images of civilians shot to death in Bucha and other towns vacated by the Russians, along with the accounts of witnesses, could provide a trove of documentation for investigations. Unlike other horrors of the Ukraine war, like the bombing of a maternity hospital, the flattening of a theatre where people were sheltering or the shelling of apartment houses, the killings in Bucha could not be cast as unintentional damage or easily denied by the Russians as propaganda. Whats different here is that you have images of civilians with their hands bound and executed  thats a completely different kind of crime, said Alex Whiting, a visiting professor at Harvard Law School who has worked on international war crimes prosecutions. This very much looks like a crime. Rachel Denber, deputy director of the Europe and Central Asia division of Human Rights Watch, which has been gathering evidence of war crimes in Ukraine, said the killings had generated so much shock in part because many of the other civilian deaths in the war had been caused by indiscriminate shelling and bombing  although that is no less an atrocity.
~President elect acted emotionally when he was declared President of the COM, Gibbs presented a list to form the executive council.~

MARIGOT:---Leader of the Rassemblement Saint Martin and Alternative Loui Mussington that merged for the March 27th, 2022 run-off territorial election was elected unanimously as the President of the Collectivity of Saint Martin on Sunday, April 3rd, 2022 at the installation (swearing-in) ceremony.

When the announcement was made that all twenty-three members of the incoming council voted in favor of Mussington as the President-elect he reacted emotionally as he did not expect the opposition members of the council to support him as the newly elected president of the council. President Mussington sat in his seat for a few moments and even wiped his tears after he was pronounced President-elect.

Loui Mussington fought long and hard to represent the country where he was born and raised. He began his political journey as an activist at the early age of 16. A fully rounded politician who served as a Regional and General Councilor before he was elected president of the Collectivity of Saint Martin.

The ceremony met with a snag when it was time for the election of the members of the Executive Council and the Vice Presidents of the council.

The election of the executive council had to be done within one hour after the election of the president. Even though there were fierce discussions between the ruling majority that obtained sixteen seats and the opposition members of the council, there was no consensus within the allotted one hour. One of the problems the majority faced was the parity by having one male and one female in the seats of the executive council, this was mandatory because the state services merged the two elections. However, the ruling majority took, an extra hour as mandated by law before they elected the members of the executive council. They are:

President Loui Mussington

Alain Richardson

Dominique Louisy

Frantz Gumbs

Martine Beldore

Michel Petit

Daniel Gibbs.

The elected members of the executive council were presented by the ruling majority RSM while outgoing president Daniel Gibbs also presented a list that was rejected by the majority.

For the election of the executive council leader of Generation Hope Jules Charville and Angeline Laurence voted in favor of the candidates submitted by the ruling majority. Therefore, the executive council received eighteen votes in favor and five blanks, clearly, TEAM Gibbs voted against the list because he presented a separate list.

The process then continued where the vice presidents were elected separately whereby the parity would not have to be respected.

Those elected Vice Presidents are as follows:

1 st Vice President Alain Richardson a former President of the Collectivity of Saint Martin, Richardson received eighteen of the twenty-three voted in favor.

Vice President Alain Richardson a former President of the Collectivity of Saint Martin, Richardson received eighteen of the twenty-three voted in favor. 2 nd Vice President Frantz Gumbs a former President of the Collectivity of Saint Martin, eighteen of the twenty-three voted in favor.

Vice President Frantz Gumbs a former President of the Collectivity of Saint Martin, eighteen of the twenty-three voted in favor. 3 rd Vice President Dominique Louisy, a newly elected member of the council but a long-time politician that stood side by side with President-Elect Loui Mussington throughout his political career. Eighteen of the twenty-three voted in favor.

Vice President Dominique Louisy, a newly elected member of the council but a long-time politician that stood side by side with President-Elect Loui Mussington throughout his political career. Eighteen of the twenty-three voted in favor. 4th Vice President Dr. Michel Petit, new to the Political arena whose father was the mayor for many years, Petit received seventeen of the twenty-three voted in favor.

Based on the election of the Executive Council and Vice Presidents showed that the decision-makers are retirees and it is expected that they will guide the younger elected officials on their team.

The leader of the Alternative Valerie Damseau will remain the director of the Tourist Office and will use her knowledge to continue to enhance the tourism product. First Vice President Alain Richardson has been elected President of SEMSAMAR. The other VP Presidents will be receiving their portfolios on Tuesday when the Council holds it meeting.

President-Elect Loui Mussington who strongly believed in bilingualism made the first part of his address in the English language. He thanked the voting population, especially the 4,734 persons that voted in favor of his political party making him victorious in this election.

President-elect also thanked the younger generation who voted and made their voice known and showed political maturity. Mussington said he is a true product of the Saint James community and Saint Martin in general. He praised his parents whom he described as humble and hard-working people. He credited his late mother who did everything she could to ensure all her children received higher education even though abroad. Thus, he called on the younger parents of Saint Martin to do the same, place your interest in your childrens education, do not allow them to be raised by the television.

The President-elect said that his government is the true change that the people of St. Martin wanted. He said his government will govern the island as a team of elected officials and not as a one-man show.

The RSMA government promised to have a nursing school on Saint Martin while dedicating more funds for scholarships for students wanting to excel in education. He said that his government is committed to quality education in Saint Martin, he assured that his government intends to move rapidly to secure an agreement with the state of France for full bilingual school programs while doubling the scholarship funds even for students that are studying overseas. The RSMA government promised to have a nursing school built on Saint Martin in order to increase the number of young professionals in the medical field locally.

Mussington said that they are very much troubled with the level of poverty on the island as such his government vowed to do whatever was necessary for partnership with the state to improve the living conditions of the people of Saint Martin.

The President said the road network is in a deplorable condition, thus they must act swiftly to improve the road network and utility, thus the construction of a new network will be given priority.

The President said that the details of their plan of action will soon be made public which will tackle the high unemployment level and social crisis and reduce tension within the society, they must tackle the economic stagnation and the revitalization of Marigot. The President also disclosed that the Port and Airport project will receive his governments support. He promised that first vice president Alain Richardson will present the economic platform to the general public.

In the meantime, the president called on the younger people to continue and make themselves resourceful and to take advantage of the different training programs that will be prepared by the Collectivity and the unemployment agency. He said that improving ones skills will be instrumental in accessing work opportunities.

President Mussington also committed his government to strengthen the cooperation between the two sides of the island therefore, they will collaborate closely with their counterparts and bring true meaning to cooperation while they will work efficiently on a joint cultural policy that would highlight the island's cultural identity.

The president declared that he is the President of all of St. Martin as this day marks a new beginning for Saint Martin.

Attending the ceremony on Sunday were Acting Governor Reynold Groenveldt and his wife, Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs, Chairlady of Parliament Grisha Heyliger Marten, Ministers Egbert Jurendy Doran, Ardwell Irion, Anna Richardson, Rodolphe Samuel, and Roger Lawrence along with other dignitaries from Sint Maarten.

Among those witnessing the ceremony are former senator Guillaume Arnell, former President Louis Constant Fleming, and former senator and Prime Minister of Sint Maarten Marcel Gumbs.

Inaugural Speeches delivered by the President-Elect Loui Mussington

English version

Inaugural Speeches delivered by the President-Elect Loui Mussington

French Version

Click here to view the photo album of the Installation Ceremony
Luxury specialists Gregory Druart and Victoria Mas will lead the brands new shop location, drawing on collective international real estate experience servicing clientele from around the world

Engel & Volkers today announced its expansion into the Caribbean markets of St. Martin and St. Barth with the opening of its newest shop location, Engel & Volkers St. Martin, led by license partners Victoria Mas and Gregory Druart. Mas is a native of France and brings a decade of experience in luxury real estate to this new venture. Previously, she spent many years with a private jet company, traveling the world and honing her expertise in high-end client service before settling in Dubai for a period of time to work with an international luxury brand. She now specializes in various segments of real estate in the islands, handling sales and rentals and serving clients both foreign and domestic. Druart is a successful international businessman with real estate experience spanning three continents, including work in the South of France, Moscow, Guangzhou, and the Caribbean.

Engel & Volkers St. Martins flagship location will open on the islands French side in Baie Orientale, directly on the beach, and will service the entire island of St. Martin as well as the island of St. Barth. Future growth plans include dedicated shops opening on the Dutch side of the island and on St. Barth.

I am thrilled to expand our presence in the Americas to include St. Martin and St. Barth, said Anthony Hitt, president, and CEO, Engel & Volkers Americas. The islands have long been an international resort destination, and paired with Victoria and Gregorys collective expertise in both navigating the local real estate market as well as in cultivating luxury client experiences, I am confident that the market here will thrive as part of our global brand and network of collaborative, discerning real estate professionals.

Known as the Friendly Island, St. Martin is highly influenced by European culture and is famous as much for its gastronomy as it is for its 37 beaches and more than 40 miles of picturesque coastline. The French/north side of the island offers a more traditional seaside stay experience and is home to the islands famous SXM music festival. The Dutch/south side of the island is known for its lively nightlife, bars, clubs and casino. The housing market here varies, offering options ranging from luxury beach villas to one-bedroom apartments, with a very healthy rental market.

St. Barth lies approximately 20 miles to the south of St. Martin, and is known for attracting celebrities and high-networth jetset clientele. The real estate market here resides largely at the highest end of the luxury spectrum. However, both islands offer attractive investment opportunities to international buyers, with no taxes in St. Barth and no housing or inheritance taxes on the Dutch side of St. Martin. Both islands also offer multiple direct flights to and from Canada, Europe and the U.S.

The real estate experience in the Caribbean is long overdue for a modern refresh, said Victoria Mas. One that understands and is able to cater to the evolving needs and preferences of sophisticated clients from all over the world. And quite simply, to reach a luxury market, you need a luxury brand. Engel & Volkers provides that fresh, forward-thinking approach to real estate, while at the same time, is already synonymous in the minds of our clientele with personalized, luxury real estate service. With the systems, tools, technology, and international platform and brand recognition that Engel & Volkers delivers, our business is now able to service consumers at an unparalleled level of expertise, reach and service.

Engel & Volkers operates a global network of over 13,500 real estate professionals in 34 countries. For more information, visit stmartin.evrealestate.com.
THE HAGUE/SABA:--- Representatives of three ministries in The Hague last week Thursday, March 31, attended a presentation about the Saba harbor project.

The Saba delegation, headed by Commissioner Bruce Zagers, gave a presentation to the Ministries of Home Affairs and Kingdom Relations (BZK), Economic Affairs and Climate (EZK), and Infrastructure and Water Management (IenW). This week, a second presentation will be given to the Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality (LNV), the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO) of the Dutch Government, and a few more civil servants who could not attend the first presentation last week.

The idea was to inform the ministries about the project to construct a new harbor at Black Rocks and upgrade the existing Fort Bay harbor and to get them familiar with the specifics of this project, and affiliated aspects such as economic development, spatial development, and nature management. Commissioner Zagers stated that it was important to create broad knowledge and understanding for this project as the impact on Saba is much more than just an infrastructure project. He noted that involving the other ministries can create funding opportunities to help close the gap in the budget of the harbor project.

While in the Netherlands, the Saba delegation also had a meeting with Ernst & Young (EY) about the Economic Impact Assessment (EIA) of the new harbor and the short- and long-term opportunities of this project, in terms of what it will bring to the island in job creation, tax revenues, increase in tourism and investment possibilities. It was agreed that EY will submit a proposal to do the EIA. Zagers said he expected that the EIA will help to validate the additional funding as the results will show that there will be positive consequences that are related to the other ministries.
THE HAGUE/SABA:--- The Saba delegation on Thursday, March 31 wrapped up a successful working visit to the Netherlands which included talks with members of the Dutch Government, Members of Parliament, and meetings with the ministries in The Hague.

On the agenda of the different meetings were topics such as the free allowance, poverty alleviation, the high cost of living/doing business, the banking challenges, the harbor project, waste management, water management, connectivity, school buildings, housing, energy and telecommunication.

30M Envelope

The 30 million euros envelope, allocated for the three Caribbean Netherlands islands, including Saba, in the coalition agreement of the Dutch Government was a much-discussed topic. The envelope, which contains funding for the increase of the free allowance and poverty alleviation, came up in the meetings that the Saba delegations had with the ministries as well as in the talks with the Ministers and Members of the Second Chamber of the Dutch Parliament.

Commissioner Bruce Zagers said that the talks with the Ministry of Home Affairs and Kingdom Relations (BZK) with regard to the division of the 30 million euros envelope were still ongoing. He stated that he was optimistic that the outcome for Saba would result in an improvement of the free allowance. Zagers explained that no definite decision was taken since the discussions were still ongoing between the ministries on this matter.

Optimistic

It is premature to say what the outcome will be, but we left The Hague with an optimistic feeling that something will be done to raise the free allowance to better enable the Public Entity Saba to carry out its tasks, said Zagers.

Clarity on the division of the 30 million euros envelope will be provided in the Spring Memorandum (Voorjaarsnota) of the Dutch Government in a couple of weeks. Other budgets are also available for nature and climate change-related projects in the Caribbean Netherlands. Because of the coalition agreement, there is renewed energy for the islands. It was positive to see that all ministries are again eager to contribute to investing in the islands, said Zagers.

Taskforce

The proposal to establish a high-level task force, a topic which was discussed on Saba with State Secretary of Kingdom Affairs and Digitization Alexandra van Huffelen during her visit to the island in February this year, was a recurring topic during the meetings with the ministries. This top-level team of high-ranking civil servants, which would supervise a working group, would focus on longtime, cardinal issues such as banking and notarial services, the cost of doing business, double taxation, and access to mortgages.

Zagers said that these challenges have been discussed since the transition and there has been little urgency from the National Government to find appropriate solutions for these long-overdue issues that are adversely affecting the islands. Establishing a high-level task force that has the mandate to focus on the critical banking issues, the cost and complexity of doing business and the lacking notarial services is paramount, he noted.

Saba Package

Other matters that were specifically discussed with the Ministry of BZK included the Saba Package 2.0 which will outline the ambitions of the Saba Government and the National Government for the coming years. The BZK Ministry is coordinating this agreement on behalf of the National Government, which will include the planned initiatives and funding sources from all other relevant ministries that are active on Saba. The delegation took part in several meetings with departments in the social and educational domain about shared ambitions and the need for structural funding in order to execute tasks and projects.

The Saba delegation consisted of Commissioner Bruce Zagers, Island Secretary Tim Muller, Head of the Finance Department of the Public Entity Saba Maureen Hassell, and policy advisors Nicole Johnson and Zelda Meeuwsen.
Welcome To SpoilerTV



We bring you a comprehensive and up to date spoiler service on all the major US TV shows and Movies. You can find specific show content by clicking the menu system at the top of the screen. We scour the Internet for spoilers as well as posting our own exclusive spoilers (Scripts, Casting Calls, Set Photos etc) as well as recaps and other fun articles and polls. We hope you enjoy your stay.




New York (United Nations), 3 April 2022 (SPS) - The United Nations Security Council will meet on 20 April to discuss the conflict in Western Sahara, indicated the United Kingdom, which chairs the UN executive body for the current month.



During this meeting, the personal envoy of the UN Secretary General for Western Sahara, Staffan de Mistura, will make a presentation on the conclusions of his first tour in the region, last January, and on his various meetings with international actors involved in the conflict in Western Sahara, according to diplomatic sources.



This meeting will also be an opportunity for the Special Representative for Western Sahara and head of the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO), the Russian Alexander Ivanko, to present a report on the situation on the ground with the development of military actions between the Sahrawi and Moroccan armies.



On 30 October 2021, the Security Council adopted resolution 2602 extending the mandate of MINURSO for a further year.



MINURSO was established by Security Council Resolution 690 of April 29, 1991, following the acceptance of the conflict settlement proposals by Morocco and the Polisario Front on August 30, 1988.



On 29 April 2016, the Security Council adopted Resolution 2285, calling on the parties to continue to demonstrate political will to engage in more resolute and substantive negotiations.



In his latest report on Western Sahara published in early October 2021, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was "deeply concerned about the sharp deterioration" of the situation in the Moroccan-occupied territory, calling the resumption of hostilities between Morocco and the Polisario Front a "major setback" for efforts to find a "peaceful, lasting and mutually acceptable solution to the Saharawi conflict.



062/T
CT State Police / Contributed

EAST HARTFORD  Connecticut State Police say an intoxicated driver crashed into one of their cruisers while going the wrong way on Interstate 84 over the weekend.

State police said an on-duty trooper was driving on I-84 west in the area of Exit 58 in East Hartford shortly before 5 a.m. Sunday when he saw a Chevrolet Malibu driving east in the westbound lanes.
State Rep. Sean Scanlon, D-Guilford, transitioned Monday from an exploratory campaign to a declared candidacy for comptroller, one of Connecticuts two open statewide constitutional offices in the 2022 election.

Barring late surprises, the announcement is another step toward filling out the Democratic and Republican lineups for the six statewide constitutional offices ahead of the parties nominating conventions, both set for May 6-7.

Democrats hold all six offices, with Gov. Ned Lamont, Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz and Attorney General William Tong having already filed for reelection and Treasurer Shawn Wooden expected to follow.

Secretary of the State Denise Merrill is not seeking a fourth term, and the three-term comptroller, Kevin P. Lembo, resigned in December due to health issues. His appointed successor, Natalie Braswell, is not running.

Both parties are anticipating primaries for secretary of the state. Three Republicans and three Democrats have declared for the office, with a fourth Democrat expected to join them.

Mary Fay, a three-term member of the West Hartford Town Council, is the only Republican candidate for comptroller. Scanlon currently has no serious competition for his partys nomination.

Rep. Harry Arora, R-Greenwich, is uncontested in his bid for the GOP nomination for treasurer, as Jessica Kordas of Norwalk is for the attorney general nomination. Kordas is a criminal defense lawyer.

There is no declared Republican candidate for lieutenant governor, a sign of deference to the GOPs presumptive nominee for governor, Bob Stefanowski. He will make his choice known in coming weeks.

The only crowded fields are for secretary of the state.

The Democrats running are Rep. Hilda Santiago of Meriden, Rep. Stephanie Thomas of Norwalk and Maritza Bond of New Haven. Sen. Matt Lesser, D-Middletown, has been raising money as an exploratory candidate.

The Republicans are Rep. Terrie Wood of Darien, Brock L. Weber of New Britain and Dominic A. Rapini of Branford.

The office of comptroller essentially maintains the states fiscal books and administers pensions and health care for state employees, retirees and their families.

Scanlon, the co-chair of the Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee and former co-chair of the Insurance and Real Estate Committee, has made health insurance reform a priority since his election to the General Assembly in 2014.

His announcement came in a video posted on social media.

The Republican nominating convention will be at Foxwoods Resort Casino. The Democrats will nominate their candidates at Xfinity Theatre, the indoor/outdoor amphitheater in Hartford.
BRIDGEPORT  Attorney Miles Gerety may have been the bellwether for the pandemic in the Bridgeport courts.

More than two years ago Gerety was in the midst of picking a jury for the Lonnie Mebane murder case when he told a judge he couldnt proceed because of his fear of COVID-19.

At that time few had even heard of the coronavirus by its formal name. It was still being referred to by President Donald Trump as the Chinese virus and there were no reported cases in Connecticut.

Gerety demanded to be tested for the virus and the case, even though more than half a dozen jurors had already been selected, was postponed.

A couple of weeks later, all cases in the state and federal courts were shut down because of COVID-19.

On Monday, Gerety was back in court, sitting beside his client, Mebane, preparing to resume jury selection for the case.

The 71-year-old Gerety laughed off suggestions that he somehow predicted the future of the pandemic in the state.

My sons an ER doctor in Baltimore and in early March (2020) he told me he had admitted a 57-year-old woman who was suffering from this virus and she had died, he said. That made me realize how bad this virus was going to be but I had no idea that it was going to be as bad as it was.

He said he was also cognizant of what was going on in Italy at that time with COVID-19.

It had hit very hard there and the government was taking a hard stance, he said. Friends living in Rome told me they were only allowed to travel in a small area.

It was early in March 2020 that Gerety stood up and told a judge, Even if we do get to start, it is irresponsible to have people sitting close together as jurors.

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic. On March 16, 2020, Connecticut trials, with the exception of those already in progress, were suspended and on March 20, 2020, Gov. Ned Lamont issued his Stay Safe, Stay Home, order to state residents.

I just thought it was going to be impossible to have jurors sitting next to each other, Gerety said on Monday. I just hope it is over.

Things seemed to be much better on Monday. Of the dozen people being questioned for jury duty in the Mebane case, only a few wore masks. One man wore his mask over his chin. And none of the prospective jurors expressed any fear of contracting COVID-19.

The 57-year-old Mebane is accused of fatally shooting 20-year-old Eric Diaz.

Police said Diaz, who was dealing heroin, was shot to death by Mebane on Sept. 14, 2017, during a drug transaction in Mebanes car.

Mebane is charged with felony murder, murder, first-degree robbery, criminal possession of a weapon, possession of a pistol without a permit, interfering with police and drug charges.
It is only a matter of time before water utilities in Connecticut are required to upgrade systems to remove what are being termed emerging contaminants. Now is the time for more utilities to prepare  and take advantage of federal funding.

Emerging contaminants, as a general matter, have dominated the landscape of drinking water regulatory compliance for the last several years. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, have become a heavy focus of water systems large and small.

These contaminants have major implications for the health of communities across the country/state and should be top of mind for all water suppliers, especially considering the new federal infrastructure funding which includes significant amounts for the treatment of these contaminants.

Complicating the issue, individual states have begun enacting varying regulatory limits, which typically have been far more stringent than federal guidelines, for some or all the same compounds.

In Connecticut, potential policies are being considered in conjunction with Gov. Ned Lamonts PFAS taskforce, but no state limits have thus far been set. To be prepared for new regulations and the funding now available to address them, water suppliers and purveyors should be informed of the challenges others have faced  and ways to mitigate them.

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances are a group of manmade chemicals that are linked to adverse health effects. Widespread detection in drinking water has caused the United States Environmental Protection Agency to examine whether more stringent regulations should be enacted. Monitoring these developments throughout many states in the Northeast has shown me that the solution is not one size fits all, although there are lessons to be learned in each case.

Some Connecticut municipalities, such as the town of Manchester, have taken proactive steps in assessing their vulnerability to the potential impact of PFAS. New York and New Jersey are among several states that have enacted local regulations regarding PFAS. When New Jersey set PFAS maximum contaminant limits in the first quarter of 2021, water suppliers were tasked with bringing their water supply into compliance. Atlantic City Municipal Utility Authority, like many other suppliers, was challenged by these new regulations. Atlantic City has two sources for its water supply: surface and groundwater. The wells established in this municipality are along a lake bordering the Atlantic City International Airport. Testing of several wells revealed levels which required emergency action to achieve compliance.

Striving to meet the established compliance schedule, an H2M team leveraged previous experience in treating chemicals in this family as well as prior relationships with manufacturer partners. Success required contractors and equipment to come together at the right time, ensuring all pieces were in place for the rapid deployment.

PFAS, of course, are only one example of contaminants that pose a threat to drinking water. Another threat is 1,4-dioxane. This is one of the more challenging contaminants to remove from water, as conventional filtration is generally ineffective. It has been successfully addressed on Long Island, which had the most concentrated levels in its groundwater supply wells in the United States. With accelerated pilot testing, followed by rapid deployment, drinking water suppliers on Long Island were able to comply with new regulations and protect the publics health, much like what was done in Atlantic City with PFAS.

The successful development and implementation of rapid deployment for emerging contaminants for numerous water suppliers in New York and New Jersey evolved from extensive water quality experience coupled with carefully applied, integrated modular design schemes. This allows the project approach to be adjusted to fit specific project needs and can be applied to any unique water quality in geographies across the nation.

With this approach, knowledge of challenges that may arise, and a significant amount of federal funding, there is no reason to hesitate in addressing these contaminants; regulations will come. Proactive planning is the only way to be ready when they do.

James J. Roberts is water/wastewater market director with H2M architects + engineers. The firms Windsor office is at 360 Bloomfield Avenue.
Many long-time Westporters may remember The Famous Artists School on Wilton Road.

Founded in 1948 as a correspondence art course by Norman Rockwell, Albert Dorne and 11 other famous United States artists and illustrators, it eventually boasted numerous other important faculty including Westports Harold von Schmidt and Stevan Dohanos.

During its heyday in the 1950s and 60s, the Famous Artists School had more than 40,000 students from all over the U.S. Hundreds of artists have credited the FAS for launching their careers.

The original courses taught illustration and design, consisting of 24 lessons, with a new one mailed to the student after they completed the previous one. Once an assignment was finished and returned, it was critiqued by one of the FAS professional artists.

Later, courses in fine art, cartooning, photography and writing were added. The success of the school came during the golden age of illustration before the advent of commercial photography and the swift rise of art movements towards abstract expressionism.

The FAS recruited students through ads placed in national and international publications, and even on matchbook covers, asking potential students to copy a simple line drawing, with the words draw me above the image. An applicant then submitted their copy for either acceptance or rejection to FAS.

The original 1948 price for the three-year course was $200, with an additional cost for supplies. Veterans could use the GI Bill. By the 1950s the price was $300.

One of their many ads headlined: 2 Art Lessons for free, followed by:Would you like to learn how to paint like the most successful artists of all time?

Elwood Smith, an illustrator associated with the Norman Rockwell Museum was a successful student. He wrote,I did what probably a million kids did. I drew either a cowboy or a pretty girls face to try and win a free course.

Lessons in painting, drawing, photography or writing were contained in large four-ring binders mailed to each student. For instance, lesson one contained 46 intricately written and well illustrated pages explaining, How to create pictures that tell a story through observation and understanding.

In 1952, FAS launched their inaugural issue of the Famous Artists Magazine with this statement: Discover how timeless the art of illustration is with this 32-page time capsule of great art instruction.

By 1960, the annual revenue of $7 million was eight times the sales of 1950, with European sales growing rapidly. By 1967, one officer of FAS wrote, we will soon have an empire on which the sun never sets. Unfortunately, bad investments unrelated to art ruined this golden egg and in 1972 FAS filed for bankruptcy.

In 1981 a firm based in Wilton acquired the remains of FAS and donated the archives to the Norman Rockwell Museum. According to a message on the schools website, FAS officially closed as of December 2016.

But for a long while, it made an important contribution to Westports reputation as an art town.

Miggs Burroughs is a lifelong Westport resident and full-time graphic artist since 1972. He is co-founder of The Artists Collective of Westport and a member of the Westport Arts Advisory Committee, among other accomplishments.

Ann Chernow has been a Westport resident since 1968. Her artwork has been exhibited locally and worldwide. Chernow is an honorary member of the Artists Collective of Westport, member of the Westport Museum Committee and other arts organizations.
Culture Minister Lucian Romascanu attended the Council of European Union's Culture Ministers on Monday, highlighting the actions taken by the institution he leads in support of Ukrainian refugee artists, according to a press release issued by Culture Ministry.

According to a Culture Ministry release, the agenda of the meeting also included the adoption of conclusions on the intensification of intercultural exchanges through the mobility of artists, and the conclusions on drawing up a European strategy for the ecosystem of cultural and creative industries.

The quoted source states that Romascanu underlined, in his interventions, the multiple actions promoted by the institutions of the Culture Ministry for the support of Ukrainian refugee artists. The minister also referred to the importance of allocating additional funds, especially to those in the first line of support for Ukrainians, as is the case in Romania. He also mentioned the signing by Romania, along with seven other states, of the declaration initiated by Poland to expand the area of sanctions against Russia in the cultural area, Agerpres.ro informs.

The culture minister also spoke about the need for common practices for the evacuation of mobile heritage affected by conflicts.

The Romanian side had fruitful talks with Commissioner Mariya Gabriel and other European ministers of culture, and concrete actions will be seen in the future, the release informs.
The support that the European Investment Bank (EIB) can provide for the development of the higher education institutions in Romania, the offer of support for the integration of Ukrainian refugees, as well as the possibilities for students to access loans through the European Investment Fund were the main topics discussed on Monday in Luxembourg by the Minister of Education, Sorin Cimpeanu, with the EIB Vice President Christian Kettel Thomsen.

"Alexandrina-Livia Rusu, Romania's ambassador to the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, also took part in this meeting, in which context she appreciated the good cooperation existing, at a high level, between the EIB, the Ministry of Education and higher education institutions in Romania," reads a press release.

An important topic on the agenda of the meeting was the support that the EIB can provide to the development of the higher education institutions in Romania, Agerpres.ro informs.

The Romanian officials also analyzed the support offer provided by the EIB for the integration of Ukrainian refugees, with a focus on support schemes designed for pupils and students.

Other topics included opportunities for cooperation within the PNRR (National Recovery and Resilience Plan) and in the context of the multiannual financial framework (2021 - 2027), as well as the possibilities for students to access loans through the European Investment Fund.

At the proposal of Minister Cimpeanu, during the meeting of the National Council of Rectors on April 8, the EIB will be able to present the general options for supporting the development of Romanian universities, but also the ways in which higher education institutions in Romania can participate in managing loan schemes for students.
Estonian Foreign Minister Eva-Maria Liimets said on Monday that at EU level, but also at the international community's one, more pressure should be put on Russia to stop the war in Ukraine.

She emphasized, in a joint statement at the end of consultations with Romanian counterpart Bogdan Aurescu, that Estonia and Romania must continue to coordinate their positions as NATO's Eastern Flank states.

Romania and Estonia have a lot in common, including a common European identity. We have similar views when it comes to neighborhood policy and transatlantic ties, but I think we can create an even closer connection between our two countries. After 100 years of diplomatic relations and 30 years since the restoration of diplomatic relations, we should find new ideas, refresh bilateral relations. I believe that tomorrow's business conference will give us new ideas. We have the same geographical position and the same approach when it comes to security issues. It is important that NATO takes a step forward and establishes a bolder defense policy. (...) Being on the Eastern Flank, it is important to coordinate our positions, as we do today, and to coordinate them in the B9 format, as happened last week, Eva-Maria Liimets said in a joint statement with Bogdan Aurescu, Agerpres.ro informs.

The head of Estonian diplomacy stressed the need to adjust the position of deterrence and defence in the context of concerns over the situation in Ukraine.

We are in a very difficult time and that is why we must continue to adjust our position of deterrence and defence, and we must continue to see how we can best help Ukraine and put pressure on Russia to stop this unfortunate war because we see innocent people dying in an unjust war that has been started by Russia and that has been going on for over a month. Thousands of civilians have died and we have had the crimes in Bucha (...) and, of course, Russia must to be held accountable for these actions and, most importantly, for the international community to take a stand and call on the International Criminal Court to launch an investigation without delay, because the Russian forces must be held accountable for these actions and, of course, the was criminals must be brought to court, said Eva-Maria Liimets.

According to her, the talks also included the topic of what the international community should do in addition to putting pressure on Russia to stop this war and help Ukraine restore its sovereignty and territorial integrity.

We must continue to put even more pressure on Russia to stop this war. And from our point of view, we must accelerate the next package of sanctions at EU level and implement sanctions as strong as possible to stop the cashflow from Russia to no longer be able to fuel the war machine. We should also sanction the energy sector, there should be no limits to sanctions, because this brutal and unjustified war must end. We also proposed that Russia be held accountable for the destruction of Ukraine's civilian infrastructure. This means that Russia must take part in rebuilding Ukraine, and we must start immediately. We should use Russia's frozen assets for this reconstruction, and we should use part of the payments for Russia, for gas, to rebuild Ukraine. We suggested opening a separate account that would act as a fund and collect money for gas and thus recover the costs of rebuilding Ukraine. From our point of view, it is very important to use every legal opportunity to put pressure on Russia to stop the war and then to hold them accountable for this war, Liimets said.

She recalled that Estonia and Romania were at the forefront of supporting Ukraine, noting that the Estonian side had provided 230 million euros in military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine.

Of course we continue to see what we can do more together and I would like to congratulate Romania for receiving so many refugees and for taking the initiative to support Moldova in accepting refugees, Eva Maria Liimets said.
Estonia's Foreign Minister Eva-Maria Liimets, who is currently paying a visit to Bucharest, said that Russia must be further isolated in terms of politics and economy, mentioning that it is important that the Russian-Ukrainian negotiations be carried out without military pressure.

Liimets participates in a debate organised by think tank-ul New Strategy Center, at the National Military Centre in Bucharest, alongside Romanian Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu.The international community must continue to support Ukraine. For the Ukrainian side it is important that negotiations be carried out without military pressure. It is important that we see dialogue between the sides, but I thing it is somehow naive to wait for long term results from these discussions. For the international community it is very important to continue supporting Ukraine economy-wise, as well as political-wise, in addition to military aids, so that the Ukrainian forces be able to defend their country until the peace negotiations reach a result. It is important that Russia felt that this is a strategic failure, as it is totally unacceptable to start a wide war in Europe killing thousands of civilians. We must continue to isolate Russia politically and economically, through sanctions, the Estonian Foreign Minister said.Liimets highlighted that the security situation in the region had changed after Russia breached the international agreements and the basic foundations of the European security architecture.There is no more confidence towards Russia. That is why we must continue to consolidate security, NATO's deterrence and defence posture, and the security of our countries. At the moment we see the fight between democracies and autocracies and we must focus on the security of our territories and defending democratic values, Eva-Maria Liimets said.She pleaded for the consolidation of NATO's Eastern Flank and hailed the Alliance's recent decisions, particularly those regarding the creation of four new battlegroups.We must continue to consolidate the deterrence and defence posture on NATO's Eastern Flank.(...) We see the situation in Europe has changed since 2016, when the member states established the current defence and deterrence posture and the concept of consolidated advanced presence. We have a war in Europe at the present moment and Russia's behaviour is unpredictable. We must make all these changes. We must clearly provide in the strategic concept that Russia represents a threat and stress that NATO's main task is collective defence. (...) In respect to Russia and the security situation in our region, it is clear that we cannot go back to the period before February 24. We must reflect these concerns in our strategic documents. We must reflect that in Europe there is a country that is willing to invade neighbouring sovereign states and we must be prepared to deal with this threat, Eva-Maria Liimets pointed out.According to the Estonian Minister, Russian President Vladimir Putin's statements referring to the shift in the security environment in Europe are unacceptable and concerning.Putin said that he would want to change the security environment in Europe. This means they not only want to invade Ukraine, but for NATO to withdraw the troops from our country or for us to cease NATO exercises in our countries or put an end to NATO enlargement. There are many requests from Russia that are unacceptable to us. According to the European security architecture, all sovereign states have the right to choose their security guarantees. Russia wants to change this concept, which is very concerning for us. We all want to see that the peace negotiations are successful and that peace is restored. Unfortunately, at the moment, Russia isn't showing the intention of withdrawing from Ukraine and contributing to restoring the territorial integrity of this country. Ukraine is under a huge pressure, Liimets said.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Bogdan Aurescu demands that the perpetrators of the Russian war atrocities in Ukraine be held accountable in the International Criminal Court, Agerpres reports.

"I strongly condemn the horrible atrocities committed in Bucha and other cities of Ukraine as a result of the Russian aggression against Ukraine. All perpetrators of such international crimes must be held accountable by international justice. Romania fully supports a thorough investigation by the International Criminal Court," Aurescu wrote on Twitter on Sunday.The bodies of at least 20 men in civilian clothes were found lying on a single street in Bucha, a city northwest of Kyiv which Ukrainian troops have just reclaimed from Russian forces, an AFP reporter wrote on Saturday. Ukraine has announced that Bucha has been freed of Russian control, but is ravaged by fighting.In recent days, the Russian forces have retreated from several towns near the Ukrainian capital city after their failed siege attempts.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has to act immediately to investigate the crimes committed in Bucha and other parts of Ukraine, for which Russia is accountable, Romania's Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu said after consulting with his Estonian counterpart Eva-Maria Liimets, Agerpres reports.

Aurescu said that the need to coordinate the positions of the two countries amidst the current security developments marked by the illegal aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine was underlined and strong condemnation was voiced of Russia's attacks on civilians."Today's consultations were very substantial, both in terms of intensifying our bilateral co-operation and in terms of coordinating our positions in the current security context marked by the illegal aggression of the Russian Federation in Ukraine. (...) Obviously, the main subject of our discussion was the grave security situation in Ukraine, which affects not only the region but also the entire European and Euro-Atlantic area. We underlined the imperative of the Russian military actions in Ukraine being halted immediately, of the Russian troops withdrawing from the soil of this country, and we once again firmly and strongly condemned the attacks of Russia on civilians," said Aurescu.He added that, together with his Estonian counterpart, he strongly condemned the crimes committed in Bucha and other parts of Ukraine."Clearly, there is no doubt that Russia is accountable for these crimes, because they were committed in a part of Ukraine when the area was occupied by the Russian armed forces. And it is very important that all those who committed these acts be investigated, brought to justice and held accountable for their actions - it is the reason why both Romania and Estonia and other countries of the international community asked the court's prosecutor way back on March 2 to launch an investigation into possible war crimes, crimes against humanity, crimes of genocide committed in Ukraine, including amidst the abusively started conflict, illegally launched by the Russian Federation on February 24. Given the context, we consider it extremely important that the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court and the experts who are part of the prosecutor's office move immediately to Ukraine to start the investigation in the areas of Bucha and other towns and cities that are already under the control of the Ukrainian authorities, in order to gather evidence in such a way that the cases that will be investigated are extremely solid, so it is extremely important for the International Criminal Court to act immediately in this case," Aurescu said.The head of the Romanian diplomacy mentioned that ways of common coordination were analyzed, and also with other allies and partners in order to continue pressure on the Russian Federation, to extend the isolation of the Russian Federation in the world."Romania supported and continues to support the strongest possible response from the international community, including the adoption of new packages of EU sanctions that are robust, soundly grounded, and likely to deter Russia from further escalating the conflict. Talks are in full swing at EU level to pass an additional package of such sanctions. Today, we also talked about the importance of energy security at European level and to our countries, including in the context of implementing the necessary measures to eliminate dependencies on the Russian Federation. I also reiterated that it is important to continue the efforts for the energy security of Ukraine and Moldova, which have to get our support."Aurescu said also discussed at the meeting were the efforts that Romania made and continues to make to manage the situation of refugees from Ukraine, to support refugees entering Romania and wishing to remain in the country.Regarding economic co-operation, Aurescu said talks focused on ways to boost bilateral trade, which this year is almost 47% up on the previous year."I agreed with the minister that we must continue to support the efforts of our business communities in this regard, and I mentioned earlier a bilateral business forum that will be held. I am convinced that we will be able to identify new avenues for co-operation for our business people," said Aurescu.He added that part of the consultations was also co-operation in other areas, with emphasis on digital transformation."In fact, a first meeting of the bilateral working group on digital transformation took place last week, and the decision to set up the group was taken during a 2021 visit to Tallinn by President of Romania Mr Klaus Iohannis. The aim of the working group is to capitalise on Estonia's e-government experience amid Romania's efforts to implement digital solutions. We also discussed today the important contribution of the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence in Tallinn, where Romanian experts also participate," Aurescu said.
The Minister of Health, Alexandru Rafila, declared in eastern Bacau, on Monday, that the Government will find a legal framework for distributing potassium iodide pills to the citizens, but that distribution will begin after an awareness campaign for the population regarding the usage of these pills, Agerpres reports.

The Minister of Health expressed his hope that family physicians will participate in the campaign for distributing the pills to the population.The Ministry of Health informed on Monday that together with the Government, an awareness campaign will be launched at the beginning of this week regarding how to administer and store the potassium iodide pills.In the following period, the Ministry of Health and the National Health Insurance House (CNAS) will establish the legal procedure for distributing the potassium iodide pills for the population, from ages between 0 and 40. The pill distribution will begin during the second half of April, the Ministry of Health also informed.
President Klaus Iohannis says images from Bucha and other Ukrainian cities must remind the world that "illegal aggression" in this country needs to be stopped, Agerpres reports.

"The Russian invasion of Ukraine has dire, indescribable consequences - images of Bucha and other Ukrainian cities must remind the entire world that we must stop this illegal aggression and that all those found responsible must pay. International justice should prevail!" president Iohannis wrote on Twitter on Sunday.The bodies of 410 civilians were found in the territories of the Kyiv region recently taken over by Ukrainian forces from the control of Russian troops, Ukrainian Attorney General Iryna Venediktova announced on Sunday.In the town of Bucha alone, northwest of Kyiv, nearly 300 people were buried in mass graves, Ukrainian authorities said.They accused the Russian military of committing a "massacre" in that locality and "horrors" in the now "liberated from invaders" regions, which sparked outrage in Europe and the United States, as well as calls for additional sanctions against Moscow.Russia has denied allegations that it killed civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, and that the images of the bodies were doctored by Kyiv.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bogdan Aurescu, will be on Monday and Tuesday in Berlin, at the International Support Conference for the Republic of Moldova (Moldova Support Conference), which he will co-chair with Annalena Baerbock, Germany's foreign minister, the country holding the G7 presidency, and Jean-Yves Le Drian, France's foreign minister, the country holding the presidency of the Council of the European Union.

The conference, co-organized by Germany, France and Romania, aims to launch the Moldova Support Platform and a call for donations from EU, G7 member states, international financial institutions and other states and international organizations, shows a Foreign Ministry (MAE) release sent to AGERPRES.

The initiative of the heads of diplomacy in Bucharest, Berlin and Paris aims to generate additional robust support for the Republic of Moldova at the political, financial and material level, as well as in terms of expertise for reforms, Agerpres.ro informs.

As a result of the military aggression launched by the Russian Federation against Ukraine, on February 24, the Republic of Moldova faced a serious humanitarian and economic crisis, amid a massive wave of refugees. These challenges have added to pre-existing difficulties, such as vulnerabilities in ensuring energy security and others, the MAE explains.

The international event was announced by the head of Romanian diplomacy on March 21 at a meeting of the Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels.

During the ministerial segment of the Berlin event, Minister Bogdan Aurescu will plead for the most consistent and rapid commitment of the participating states and, in general, of the international community in support of the Republic of Moldova. He also reiterated his strong support for giving the Republic of Moldova a clear prospect of joining the European Union, along with Ukraine and Georgia.

Aurescu will also present the concrete actions recently undertaken by Romania in support of the Republic of Moldova, in various forms - green corridors, fuel, energy resources, transport of essential materials, as well as the objectives of the Government of Bucharest for the next period regarding the granting of assistance to Chisinau.

At the same time, he will announce Romania's decision to grant an additional package of non-reimbursable financial assistance.

The ministerial segment of the conference will be followed by sectoral debates in the form of five round tables, aimed at identifying solutions on topics of immediate interest in the current context, such as the humanitarian situation of Ukrainian refugees on the territory of the Republic of Moldova and border management. Also, the debates will focus on longer-term issues, such as the fight against corruption, the consolidation of energy security and the strengthening of the economic and financial resilience of the Republic of Moldova.

Romania will be represented at the level of thematic working groups by the Ministry of Justice, at the round table on fighting corruption, by the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the round table on the humanitarian situation of refugees and by a representative of the Ministry of Energy for the round table on energy.
Deputies and senators held a moment of silence in the joint plenary session of the Parliament on Monday for those who died as a result of the Russian Federation's aggression in Ukraine.

"Please allow me to address a request to you, both in Ukrainian and in Romanian. Following the illegal aggression of the Russian Federation in Ukraine as a result of which thousands of innocent people have lost their lives, please agree to hold a moment of silence," MP Nicolae Petretchi said, Agerpres.ro informs.
The four MPs who met last week with the Russian ambassador in Bucharest have "no mandate whatsoever" to speak on behalf of the Romanian Parliament, Senate President Florin Citu said on Monday, adding that the possible sanctions for their act will be taken in accordance with the two Chambers' Rules of Procedure, Agerpres reports.

Referring to the sanctions the four could face, Citu said: "We'll look at the Rules of Procedure. I don't know if there is a sanction for that."Independent Senator Diana Sosoaca Iovanovici announced on Facebook that she and another three fellow lawmakers - deputies Dumitru Coarna, Mihai Lasca and Francisc Toba - met on Wednesday with the Russian ambassador in Bucharest Valery Kuzmin, advocating on the occasion Romania's "neutral stance", specifically Romania's "non-involvement in the war between the two belligerent states: the Russian Federation and Ukraine". According to Sosoaca, the four also proposed "the start of peace negotiations in the neutral framework offered by Romania".Social Democrat leader Marcel Ciolacu said that deputy Dumitru Coarna had no business at the Russian Embassy, and that the dissenter's local political organization has already submitted the documents for his exclusion from the party.
The president of the Senate, Florin Citu, said on Monday that inside the National Liberal Party (PNL) there was no discussion about the position he holds in the legislative forum, Agerpres reports.

"There was no decision, no discussion about the political position of the Senate presidency," Citu said in the Senate, asked if he had made a decision on the position he holds.He said that the alliance with the Social Democratic Party (PSD) was not one that he could 'digest'."It is clear that for me the alliance with PSD was not one that I could digest, it was not something normal, and the populist measures I absolutely never liked from any position because (...) they do harm to the Romanians, they are boomerang measures, maybe they look good on paper, but they will destabilize and destroy the economy. I saw this in 2017, 2019. (...) In the PNL there are people who then opposed the alliance with the PSD on the same grounds and maybe they will continue to do so. They've changed, maybe they'll go with the PSD, I wouldn't know. The second important thing is that it was very clear that the appetite for reforms was only with me, the reform of salaries, the reform of pensions, the reform of public administration - things that I am glad that I have put in the National Resilience and Recovery Programme (PNRR), because the 30 billion (euro, ed.n.) depend on these reforms, but it seems that only I want to make these reforms. By the end you will see how it will go on. (...) I will remain the same man surrounded by liberal principles and values," he said.On Saturday, Florin Citu resigned from the position of PNL president, the interim until the organization of the extraordinary congress of the party being taken over by Gheorghe Flutur.
The Speaker of Deputies Chamber, Marcel Ciolacu, on Monday stated that February 24 was the day that marked the beginning of the most serious security crisis since the end of the World War II triggered by the "unjustified, illegal and unprovoked invasion" of the Russian Federation against Ukraine.

"Starting with February 24 we are facing the most severe security crisis since the end of the World War II, triggered the unjustified, illegal and unprovoked invasion of the Russian Federation against Ukraine. By using this tribune, we are joining once again all those who are voicing their firm support for the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine within its internationally recognizes borders. We resolutely reject Russia's irresponsible conduct and call for an immediate and unconditional cessation of military action against Ukraine, as well as for the withdrawal of Russian armed forces from the entire territory of that country. The last few days have shown us horrible images, unbelievable for the Europe of the 21st century," Ciolacu told the joint plenum of the Parliament, during which the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, delivered a speech by video conference, Agerpres.ro informs.

He added that the images in Bucea that have traveled around the world have overwhelmed and revolted.

"We cannot accept that the perpetrators of these massacres remain unpunished, they must be brought to justice, they must be held accountable as soon as possible. In this sense, we fully support the detailed investigation by the International Criminal Court, Romania joining this approach as early as March 2", the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies transmitted.

Ciolacu assured the President of Ukraine that, as has happened so far, the citizens fleeing the war will find "the protection they need" in Romania.

"War is a tragedy from which no one wins, everyone loses. War only brings death, suffering and destroyed destinies. That is why my thoughts go to the ethnic Romanians from Chernivtsi, Odessa, from all over Ukraine. The Romanians in Ukraine fight these days for the freedom of the country in which they live and I believe, Mr. President, that this is the most sincere expression of the deep connection between our nations. Your courage and that of the people of Ukraine, regardless of ethnicity, the dignity and the determination with which you fight for freedom and the right to decide your own destiny, are an example to the whole world. The victory of Ukraine is a necessary victory both for the European future of your country and for the European course of the Republic of Moldova. The success of Ukraine means the victory of freedom, democracy and European values in this region of Europe", added Marcel Ciolacu.
Too many people lost their lives in the war in Ukraine, Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca said on Monday during a parliamentary session in which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy delivered a speech by video conference.

"Symbol of resistance in the face of barbaric and unjust aggression, you are, today, President Zelenskiy, the leader of a nation fighting for identity and freedom in this illegal and unprovoked war. Too many have lost their lives. Others have been forced to become refugees as a result of the brutal bombing and atrocities of Russian troops, indiscriminately on civilians, schools, hospitals, theaters. The atrocities in Bucha, which we learnt just yesterday, when Ukrainian troops entered the occupied areas around Kiev, shook us all. All these inhuman actions on the civilian population must be sanctioned by the international criminal courts, and we will do everything in our power to support those responsible in bringing justice," Ciuca said.

The Prime Minister expressed his admiration for the "tenacity, determination and courage of the Ukrainian people" in defending their country, democratic values and way of life. He mentioned that the Romanians are in solidarity with the Ukrainian people and have opened their "gates and souls" for the Ukrainian neighbors who have come to our country, Agerpres.ro informs.

"Our solidarity with the more than 650,000 neighbors and friends who came to Romania was manifested not only at the level of state institutions, but also at the level of non-governmental organizations, but most importantly, at the level of Romanians, of ordinary citizens who felt the drama of Ukrainian neighbors and they wholeheartedly wished to help them. I thank everyone for this effort, proof of humanity, solidarity and openness. It is important to understand that in societies with assumed European and democratic values you will always find reliable friends," said Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca.

He stressed that Romania will do everything in its power to ensure that Ukrainian citizens who have arrived here can have a normal and decent life. Ciuca mentioned that these people benefit from health services under the same conditions as Romanian citizens and can find a job. Legislative changes have been made in this regard and more than 1,100 Ukrainians are already working in Romanian companies.

"The more than 30,000 children from Ukraine can go to school in more than 50 Ukrainian-language schools and high schools, as well as using the other facilities provided by the Romanian Ministry of Education. We will continue to help both the Ukrainians who remained to defend their country and the refugees with humanitarian help, fuel and necessary resources. We have set up the European humanitarian hub in Suceava, through which we transfer aid from all over the world, and we are ready to carry out this lasting effort, with the support of the EU, the United Nations and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, as well as other partner states," Nicolae Ciuca said.

The Prime Minister offered assurances that the families of the Ukrainians who arrived in Romania are safe. He thanked President Zelenskiy for referring in his speech to Romanian citizens living in Ukraine.

"I am convinced that, just as we take care of your citizens, you will take care of the Romanian citizens as well. Thank you. Long live Romania! Glory to Ukraine!", Ciuca concluded his speech.
The President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said on Monday that he was convinced that Romania would participate in rebuilding his country after the war and mentioned that he wanted a dialogue to support the Romanian and Ukrainian communities of the two countries.

"I am convinced that Romania will support everything necessary for justice to prevail. (...) I am convinced that Romania and Romanian companies will participate in the programs for rebuilding Ukraine after the war. We'll propose our partners to take over rebuilding some regions that were destroyed by Russia. Our potential, our internal power is great, but we need help to rebuild life in Ukraine," Zelenskiy said in a video conference in the Romanian Parliament.

He thanked the Romanian people for their support of the refugees, Agerpres.ro informs.

"I thank the entire Romanian people for their help to the refugees from Ukraine. I hope that we will have the conditions for Russia to give up the war and for the people to return home to Ukraine. This experience of support and mutual respect and kindness among our peoples is a basis for an even greater closeness between our peoples and states. As far as the situation allows, I want to start a dialogue with Romania for the full protection of the Romanian communities in Ukraine and the Ukrainian communities in Romania, to ensure all the support we can provide. Our future is together in a European family," said the president of Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday that new sanctions were needed against Russia, saying it was necessary to close ports for Russian ships and stop the transit of goods to and from Russia.

"The fate of the whole of Central Europe and the Black Sea region is currently being decided on the territory of Ukraine. Therefore, defending Ukraine's freedom means protecting Europe's security. Sanctions have been imposed on Russia, but the war has been going on for 40 days. (... ) Russia must seek peace with Ukraine and with everyone, and therefore it must be deprived of all resources, primarily financial and economic ones. You must close the ports for Russian ships, stop the transit of goods to and from Russia. Do not import energy resources from Russia. There is no alternative, we can talk about several programs: oil in exchange for food, but other sanctions need to be imposed," Zelenskiy said in a video conference address to the Romanian Parliament.

He said that now the fate of the war is being decided and that Ukraine must be supported with arms, Agerpres.ro informs.

"Each politician in the democratic world must support Ukraine in any form with arms, because now it is decided who will win in this war: freedom or tyranny. Everyone must do everything possible for these Russian troops to answer before the law for crimes committed in the occupied territories of Ukraine", added the President of Ukraine.
In a speech to the Romanian Parliament delivered by videoconference on Monday, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy underscored that "people who want genocide in Europe" must be stopped.

"Dear Romanians, together we must stop these inadequate people who have become accustomed to not being punished, to being allowed anything. Together we must stop people who want genocide in Europe," Zelenskiy said.

He argued that Ukraine was not the last "target" of Russian aggression.

"Russian occupiers want to move through the city of Nikolaev to occupy Odessa, and from Odessa it is just a step to Moldova. State propagandists in Russia have long said that Moldova is a target for Russian expansion. That is why it is fundamental to defend the independence and statehood of Moldova, and that means security in the entire Danube region. The fate of the whole of Central Europe and the Black Sea is being decided on the territory of Ukraine," Zelenskiy said, Agerpres.ro informs.

The President of Ukraine also spoke about the 1989 Revolution that took place in Romania.

"In 1989, Nicolae Ceausescu ended his life, after many years in which it was very clear that this person was inadequate, that his wife and the Securitate were pulling the country down to poverty, isolation not only from the whole world, but isolation from everything that progress means. That regime was based only on fear, repression, power, and had nothing holy. The Romanian people rose up and defended themselves, overthrowing an inadequate regime. Ceausescu, his wife and his entourage could not be convinced of anything. At present, in Russia, those who propagate the war, those who give criminal orders, those who devise plans against the whole people and against the destruction of the Ukrainian state cannot be convinced of anything. These inadequate people have lost all connection with reality and are willing to sacrifice millions of lives to implement their crazy ideas. The second reason why Russia calls for genocide and does not hide it, and commits horrors that everyone has seen in Bucha is that they are convinced that European leaders will not be able to stop them because they are weak and Europeans will not be able to defend their values," Volodymyr Zelenskiy said.

Images from Bucha were presented at the beginning of the speech given by the President of Ukraine.

"The name of our city Bucha will remain for us in the history of the world, in the history of killing people. We know of over 300 tortured people, inhabitants of Bucha. Simple people, inhabitants of a simple city. Their hands were tied at the back and were shot in the back of their head or eye," the Ukrainian president added.

According to him, an article posted on the website of the Russian state agency Ria Novosti, entitled "What should Russia do with Ukraine?", justifies the genocide against Ukrainians.

"It is not just a text. This is one of the proofs for the future court against Russian war criminals. (...) They want to de-Ukrainize (...) Ukraine. The article reads that even the name of our state must be erased. The death of as many Ukrainians in the war as possible is desirable for them, and all this is written by the state agency of the Russian Federation, where nothing can be published without censorship. What is published is only what means an official position in the war with Ukraine. Anything that does not respect this position does not pass censorship. I want you to understand me correctly. They do not even hide, they talk very openly about the war against Ukraine and the purpose of this war. If our army and our people had not defended themselves, what they did in Bucha would have done all over Ukraine," Zelenskiy said.

The Ukrainian president added that there were reports that teachers had been killed in Bucha.
The Suceava plastic artist Paula Salar will be present with her creations this year at the international exhibition that brings together artists from several countries and their works, during the Venice Biennale, which takes place in May.

According to Paula Salar, the plastic composition entitled "Misterious soul of Venezia" is part of the international artistic project "Biennale Art Expo Venezia", which brings together under the high vibration of art, creators from all over the world.

The work of art, selected by a specialized international jury, was conceived in the form of a triptych and includes compositions of different sizes, chromatically, compositionally and structurally harmonized, in order to convey through expressiveness the artistic message, the paintings being made in acrylic technique on canvas, the size of the entire composition being of 80/90 cm, Agerpres.ro informs.

"I have created the three works harmoniously reunited compositionally, using chromatically and symbolically elements to represent Venice. It is that mysterious Venice, an apparition of an eternal woman who haunts the lagoon, wearing vestments in Venetian red tones, that colour of red earth often used in Renaissance paintings, the red that Cennino Cennini describes in his writing Il Libro dell'Arte, as being combined with lime white. The Venetian red has remained in art and history as the so expressive redness of Titian, Rembrandt and Vermeer, emphasizing that all the Renaissance were the people of the red - a representation of the deity, of the Virgin Mary, of everything that was festive, all bearing the seal of the red. The spectre woman, from one of the works, is fascinating as an appearance, and her gaze is forever hidden under the patinated, yet still shining mask of the times. Her eyes with a deep, mysterious light are almost magical," Paula Salar said.

The Suceava artist said she has chosen to use in one of her compositions the carnival mask, a traditional mask that symbolized and exteriorized the lower, almost demonic trends and which was worn precisely with the purpose of banishing them and added that "the mask operated as a kind of catharsis and did not hide, but on the contrary, revealed the lower trends that had to be banished".

The third painting included in the composition, 70/50 cm, gives the atmosphere of Venice, the red inflections, the shades of blues and greens defining its palette.

"The composition is conceived in the idea of a triptych, the paintings complementing each other, as in a story started by the plastic artist and continued by the viewer, the way their soul and mind want to interpret it endlessly," Paula Salar explained.

She expressed her confidence that, as she was impressed by the tens of thousands of viewers of her works in such international projects carried out in Miami (2016), New York (2018), Celano Jazz Festival - Italy (2019), she will, this year, through her creations, touch the souls of art lovers in Venice, too.
Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca demands that the international judiciary judge the "horrific crimes" committed in Ukraine by the "Russian soldiers".

"The horrific crimes committed in Ukraine by Russian soldiers must be tried and punished by the international judiciary. Children, women, civilians abused and killed in cold blood waiting for justice to be done to them," the prime minister said in a message posted on the Government's Twitter page on Sunday evening, Agerpres reports.The bodies of 410 civilians were found in territories in Kyiv region recently taken over by Ukrainian forces from the control of Russian troops, Ukraine's prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, announced on Sunday.In the town of Bucha alone, northwest of Kyiv, nearly 300 people were buried in mass graves, Ukrainian authorities said.They accused the Russian military of committing a "massacre" in this locality and "horrors" in the regions now "freed from the invaders", which sparked outrage in Europe and the US, as well as calls for further sanctions against Moscow.Russia has rejected Ukraine's accusations of killing civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha near Kyiv and claims that the images of bodies are fabricated by Kyiv.
Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca is taking part in a siting of the Romanian Parliament this evening that will be addressed by Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

Senate Chairman Florin Citu says that the plenary session where Zelenskiy will give a speech starts at 19:00hrs, EEST, adding that the Romanian Parliament's chairs will speak at the beginning of the sitting.

"I will speak first, then Marcel Ciolacu, speaker of the Chamber of Deputies. The prime minister is invited. (...) Everyone has 3 minutes and then Mr Zelenskiy has 15-20 minutes," Citu said, Agerpres.ro informs.

Asked if President Iohannis is also invited, Florin Citu said: "I talked to President Klaus Iohannis."

According to a memorandum by Citu to the standing bureaus, President Zelenskiy will address Parliament by videoconference and that simultaneous translation from the Ukrainian language will be provided.

The standing bureaus also received a letter from the Ukrainian Embassy in Romania confirming their availability for the 19:00hrs videoconference.
Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca on Monday welcomed a delegation of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) led by Assistant High Commissioner for Operations of the UNHCR Raouf Mazou to reconfirm the strategic framework for collaboration between the Romanian government and UNHCR based on the principle of complementariness in the management of the humanitarian crisis of refugees from Ukraine.

"These are times for solidarity, courage and humanity. The unprovoked, illegal and cruel war in Ukraine, as well as the humanitarian crisis that follows, show that the people are joining forces to help those in need. The solidarity and humanity of Romanians, the integrated response of the authorities, the civil society and officials of international humanitarian organisations have shown that Romania has been a pillar of support for the citizens and the nation of Ukraine," Ciuca is quoted as saying in a press statement.

He thanked the visiting UNHCR delegation for their involvement and underscored the importance of working together under Romania's integrated response mechanism to the ongoing humanitarian refugee crisis.

He presented Romania's response mechanism based on two levels of response, namely emergency response and response based on medium- and long-term protection measures, Agerpres.ro informs.

"We are continuing emergency humanitarian assistance with measures to facilitate the social integration of Ukrainian citizens who remain in Romania. Children and young people will have access to education, and those who want to have a job will be supported. All refugees will be provided healthcare services," said Ciuca.

The UNHCR officials are said to have congratulated the Romanian government for the strategic and operational organisation it has developed in such a short time since the beginning of the refugee crisis and expressed its readiness to implement a Ukraine refugee financial assistance system with support from the General Inspectorate for Immigration, as well as the intention to logistically support the Emergency Management Department in the event of massive inflows of refugees from Ukraine.

In his turn, head of Romania's Emergency Management Department (DSU) Raed Arafat detailed the support and operational co-operation with UNHCR at the border crossing points, and Madalina Turza, state adviser with the Chancellery of the Prime Minister, underscored the importance of working with UNHCR in the process of developing medium- and long-term integration and protection measures for Ukraine refugees.

"The Romanian government will continue to work strategically with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and with all national and international non-governmental actors to ensure an integrated response to the humanitarian situation of Ukraine refugees," according to the statement.
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky will deliver a speech in Romania's Parliament, the joint standing bureaus decided on Monday, Agerpres reports.

The President of the Senate, Florin Citu, said that the plenary session will start at 19:00, noting that at the beginning the presidents of the two Chambers of the Parliament will speak."I will speak first, then Marcel Ciolacu, president of the Chamber of Deputies. The Prime Minister is invited. We don't have a confirmation yet if he's coming. He also has a short intervention and then, depending on the time, the order of the interventions may change. Each speaker has 3 minutes and then Mr. Zelensky has 15-20 minutes (...). The time at which the speech of the President of Ukraine begins depends on whether or not the prime minister will participate," Citu said.According to the memorandum addressed by Florin Citu to the Permanent Bureaus, President Zelensky will address the Parliament through videoconference and simultaneous translation from Ukrainian will be ensured.The permanent offices also received a letter from the Ukrainian Embassy in Romania, confirming the availability for the videoconference at 19:00.
Photo taken on Aug. 6, 2020 shows Victoria Falls at the border of Zimbabwe and Zambia. (Xinhua/Wanda)



The tourism sector in Zimbabwe has continued to suffer due to the COVID-19 pandemic as tourist arrivals in the southern African country declined by 40 percent to 375,799 in 2021.



HARARE, April 1 (Xinhua) -- Tourist arrivals to Zimbabwe declined by 40 percent to 375,799 in 2021 due to the impact of COVID-19, a senior government official said Thursday.

Environment, Climate, Tourism and Hospitality Industry deputy minister Barbra Rwodzi said visitors to Zimbabwe have been decreasing since 2019.

"The country witnessed a decline in tourist arrivals from 2,294,259 in 2019 to 630,369 in 2020. The negative trend further continued in 2021 as arrivals suffered a further downfall of 40 percent to 375,799," she said.

Rwodzi was speaking at the launch of the country's tourism satellite account (TSA), designed to measure the sector's contribution to the economy.

Rwodzi said the TSA report revealed that there is low consumption of domestic tourism in Zimbabwe.

"We are cognizant of the low consumption of domestic tourism and we need to do more to champion increased internal tourism," she said.

According to the TSA, Zimbabwe's tourism sector accounted for 4.25 percent of the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) with a value of 1.03 billion U.S. dollars in 2018.

In 2019, the sector accounted for 6.3 percent of GDP with a value of 1.23 billion dollars.

The data also shows that tourism accounted for 1.56 percent of national employment levels in 2018, with around 100,000 jobs supported and created. 
As many as 1,332 new cases of people infected with SARS-CoV-2 were recorded in the last 24 hours in Romania, by 97 less than on the previous day, on almost 16,000 RT-PCR and rapid antigenic tests performed, the Health Ministry informed on Monday, Agerpres reports.

Of the new cases, 160 were in re-infected patients who tested positive more than 90 days after the first time they recovered from the disease.Most of the newly confirmed COVID-19 cases in Romania since the previous reporting were recorded in Bucharest City - 532, and in the counties of Hunedoara - 105, Ilfov - 81, and Cluj - 79.As of Monday, 2,861,426 cases of people infected with the novel coronavirus were confirmed in Romania.- Hospitalisations -As many as 2,565 people with COVID-19 are hospitalised at specialist care facilities across the country, by 28 more than the day before; 159 of this total are children.Out of the total number of hospitalised patients, 381 are in ICUs, by four less compared to the previous day. Of the 381 ICU patients, 327 are unvaccinated for COVID-19.- Deaths -According to the Ministry, another 12 Romanians infected with SARS-CoV-2 - 10 men and 2 women - were reported dead in the last 24 hours, including one case previously unaccounted for.Out of the total 12 fatalities, 10 were unvaccinated. The vaccinated patients were aged between 60 - 69 and between 70 - 79, respectively, and suffered both from underlying conditions.Since the beginning of the pandemic, 65,102 people diagnosed with the SARS-CoV-2 infection have died in Romania.
Russia must be completely isolated economically, Senate Chair Florin Citu told a joint plenary sitting of the Romanian Parliament on Monday.

"Mr President Zelenskiy, it is an honor to hear from you today in the Romanian Parliament. I want to thank you for accepting my invitation to deliver this speech. (...) Mr Zelenskiy, you are a hero, not only in Ukraine, but also in Romania, and, I believe in all countries that respect democratic principles and values. The courage and perseverance you have shown in this difficult period for Ukraine inspire us all, motivate us to be more united, because only together can we succeed in doing everything we set out to do and only together can we win," said Citu.

According to him, "the entire Europe needs to do more" because children, old people, women and innocent civilians are being killed every hour in Ukraine, Agerpres.ro informs.

"President Zelenskiy, I was and will remain one of the most vehement opponents of Putin's policy. The war he has been waging has no justification, and we have a duty to stop it by all means. Some may think it is too harsh a measure, but I do not think the answer is harsh enough for the atrocities inflicted on Ukraine. And it is important for you, Mr President, to find out directly from you about the critical situation in Ukraine," added Citu.

He emphasised that the Bucha massacre could not go unpunished.

"It is unacceptable what is happening in Ukraine now. Vladimir Putin is a criminal who defies any law, any international treaty, who has led Russia to an illegal war. The Bucha massacre must not go unpunished. Romania has already notified the International Criminal Court about crimes of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity committed on the soil of Ukraine. Mr President, in today's gesture to walk among the Ukrainians in Bucha, you have once again shown that you are a true leader to your people, and you deserve all the respect and admiration of leaders everywhere. That is why we have a duty not to remain passive," said Citu.
The request for President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky to address the Romanian Parliament on Monday, starting 19:00 will be discussed in the meeting of the two Chambers' Standing Bureaus, said Senate President Florin Citu, Agerpres reports.

"At 19.00, there will be speeches by the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies and President Zelensky," Citu said.Asked if there was a request from the Ukrainian Embassy, Citu said: "I don't understand this obsession with bureaucracy. Today at 19:00 President Zelensky is addressing the Romanian Parliament. I think we should all be honored by this. (... ) It is a request from me in the Joint Standing Bureaus".
Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca on Monday welcomed Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the US ambassador to the UN, the discussion of the two officials focusing on bilateral relations and the 25 years of Strategic Partnership between Romania and the United States, as well as on the security situation caused by the Russian military aggression in Ukraine and the situation of refugee management.

According to a press release of the Executive sent to AGERPRES, the Prime Minister started by presenting the security situation and the prospects of a long war in Ukraine, which determines a constant pressure and a necessary continuous and consistent effort for the management of refugees, for which Romania is prepared in cooperation with specialized humanitarian institutions, including the UN Refugee Agency.Nicolae Ciuca welcomed the exemplary cooperation of the Romanian civil society and of the citizens in the efforts of the authorities to manage the waves of refugees. The two high officials also expressed their shock and deep revolt against the atrocities and war crimes committed in Bucha, revealed after the withdrawal of Russian troops, crimes unanimously condemned worldwide.Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield welcomed the exemplary mobilization of the Romanian authorities and the way in which, "with kindness, hospitality, openness and full care," Romania succeeded to manage the wave of Ukrainian refugees.She especially emphasized the support given by Romania to the Republic of Moldova for the management of this flow of refugees, for the reduction of the costs that substantially put pressure on the budget of this state.At the same time, the US diplomat also evoked the substantial role of her predecessor US Ambassador to the UN, who later became Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, for bringing the two states closer together, for creating the vision of Western openness - NATO and the EU - towards Central and Eastern Europe, and for the Strategic Partnership between the United States and Romania, informs the Government.
The Russians and Vladimir Putin have committed 'war crimes' in Ukraine and they must be held accountable, the US Ambassador to UN, Linda Thomas-Greenefield, told a press conference held in Bucharest on Monday.

Speaking for the US, she said Vladimir Putin and the other Russians involved in his campaign committed war crimes in Ukraine, and that they all must be held responsible.

She added that Russia's propaganda denies everything that happens in Ukraine by saying that all the images and stories about the situation in Ukraine are fake. This is what the Russian propaganda says, she insisted, while showing, at the same time, that the journalists know the truth, the people in Ukraine who live and suffer know the truth, the same as the Ukrainians who are taking refuge in Romania and other countries, which means that Russia can go on with its lies and propaganda while everybody else sees the truth, the facts speaking for themselves.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield underscored that Russia is now being isolated in the UN Security Council and that, even with their right of veto, the Russians cannot cancel the unity that the Security Council created for itself, and the entire UN General Assembly, in fact. They can continue with the propaganda but nobody will listen to them and believe what they say, said the US diplomat, Agerpres.ro informs.
Russia's participation in the Human Rights Council is a farce and it is time for the UN General Assembly to suspend this country from the UN forum, US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield told a press conference in Bucharest on Monday, Agerpres reports.

According to her, the brutal, horrific attacks on civilians, documented yesterday by journalists in Bucha, have shocked and shaken the whole world back to reality, as the members of Russian forces have committed war crimes in Ukraine.Thomas-Greenfield spoke about the steps that will be taken to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council.On behalf of the US she said Russia must be held accountable, and that she was returning to New York to do two things: one - she will go to the Security Council on Tuesday morning and address Russia's actions firmly and directly; two - in close coordination with Ukraine, the European Union countries and other UN partners the US will demand Russia's suspension from the Human Rights Council.The diplomat recalled that 140 UN states had condemned Russia and called for swift, additional efforts.The images taken in Bucea and the disaster on the territory of Ukraine call for all the UN to rise to the level of statements doubled by action, as the organization cannot allow a member states that goes against all the fundamental principles of UN to continue to be in the Human Rights Council. Russia should not have a position of authority in this Council and it shouldn't be allowed to use its role in the Council as a propaganda tool to suggest that it has any legitimate human rights concerns. In reality, she continued, everybody can see every day, including yesterday, how little was Russia concerned with the human rights. Russia's participation in the Human Rights Council is a farce, according to the high US dignitary. It hurts the credibility of the Council and of the UN in general and it was simply wrong, she went on to day. That is why Linda Thomas-Greenfield insisted that the UN General Assembly suspends Russia from the Council.Before talking to the press, she met with Ukrainian refugees at the Bucharest North railway station.
Save Romania Union (USR) MPs will table a simple motion against Environment Minister Tanczos Barna, "because he is not interested in protecting the environment," USR leader Catalin Drula said on Monday.

The decision was made by the USR National Bureau, following a press investigation."Following the recorder.ro investigation, we see that this PSD-PNL-UDMR government is in collusion with the forestry mafia, and Mr Tanczos Barna has executed in the most obvious mob style a chief inspector of the Timisoara Environmental Guard, who disturbed the interests of PSD and PNL for the forestry mafia. He has been fired. For this we will call him before Parliament and ask him to explain what appears to be a 'blood oath' made with PSD and PNL to protect the forestry mafia," said Drula.According to him, "the mob, the parties and law enforcement have joined hands to make money in a kleptocratic, illiberal system.""USR is the only democratic opposition fighting against them. We will continue to fight for 2024," added Drula.
SUNSET HILLS  In the third year of the Chicken Sandwich Wars, St. Louis Bread Co. is debuting offerings of its own. It says it comes in peace.

Executives at parent company Panera Brands say theyre not competing with the likes of Popeyes and Chick-Fil-A driving the breaded-and-fried craze. Instead, they say theyre offering something new: premium, specially cooked chicken topped with unique ingredients and a secret recipe sauce. At $11, theyre roughly double the cost of most fast food fowl, but officials say itll be worth it.

Youre paying a little more for a whole lot more, said Sara Burnett, Paneras vice president of food beliefs, sustainability and PR. We think about this as being in a category of its own.

The company is counting on it to draw more men and younger customers to its bakery-cafes and get them to stay for dinner, traditionally a weak spot for Panera. Its been working on that in recent years with items like the teriyaki chicken bowl and flatbread pizzas. Now its turning to quick-serves hottest category.

Chicken sandwiches have been on fire since August 2019, when Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen introduced one. That provoked a response from Chick-Fil-A on Twitter and set off a social media frenzy. Within a week, Popeyes locations were selling out.

By 2021, more than a dozen chains had new sandwiches, including long-time players like Kentucky Fried Chicken. KFC called it its best chicken sandwich ever.

At the same time, Panera was working on its own version in an 18-month process of developing ideas and testing them out.

Now the country has the results: two Chefs Chicken Sandwiches with a quarter-pound of meat marinated in broth and a special blend of spices, seared and slow-cooked, and then finished signature or spicy.

The Signature Take gets garlic aioli made from a secret recipe, lettuce and parmesan crisps to mimic the crunch of a fried sandwich. The Spicy Take adds buffalo wing sauce to the aioli, ditches the greens and uses spicy pickle chips rather than parmesan crisps to deliver the crunch.

And consistent with Paneras clean ingredients policy: the chicken is raised without antibiotics and is free of artificial preservatives, sweeteners and flavors. Its really a step above, said Burnett, the food beliefs VP.

Analysts said the move makes some sense. They dont want to be left out, said Darren Tristano, CEO of Chicago consultancy FoodServiceResults. Paneras sandwiches are also positioned as healthier alternatives to the fast food variety in a way that could resonate with millennials and Gen Z consumers. And the price isnt that big of a deal, either: Customers walking into Panera know theyre going to pay more.

The sandwiches also give Panera another way to broaden its appeal from its bread-and-butter breakfast and lunch set, said Brian Yarborough, an analyst at Edward Jones. If theyre a hit, it would be another step toward full-day success.

But that carries risks, too. Having too much on a menu can confuse consumers, Tristano said. Much of the success in the fast-casual segment comes from doing one thing and doing it well: Chipotle burritos, Five Guys burgers, Firehouse subs.

Panera is tinkering with the chicken formula, too: The places having success with the trend so far have largely offered deep-fried, indulgent experiences, not seared and sous vide.

Its a totally different animal, Yarborough said.

The business news you need Get the latest local business news delivered FREE to your inbox weekly. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
ST. LOUIS  A national movement could soon be brewing change at your local Starbucks.

Workers at cafes in Ladue and Bridgeton became the first in the region to file for union elections last week. On Monday, their ranks doubled with announcements from two stores in St. Louis, one in Tower Grove South and one on Hampton Avenue just south of Forest Park.

More could be on the way.

The local baristas are joining thousands of others at more than 100 cafes across the country pushing to upend business-as-usual at one of Americas most iconic companies. The push coincides with a tight U.S. labor market bolstering worker bargaining power following two years of a pandemic. And if the Starbucks campaigns are successful, they could change more than just their stores, observers say: Dunkin Donuts and McDonalds could be next.

Tens of thousands of workers in the service sector dont unionize without a ripple effect, said Pete DeMay, organizing director at the Chicago & Midwest Regional Joint Board of Workers United.

Starbucks brushed off the announcements in a statement Monday. Weve been clear in our belief that we are better together as partners without a union between us, and that hasnt changed, it said. The number of stores seeking representation remains a small fraction of the Seattle-based coffee chains thousands of locations.

But that doesnt mean its not paying attention. The company has announced plans to raise average wages to $17 an hour from $14, and it recalled former CEO Howard Schultz to the top job in part to help deal with the union campaigns. On his first day back Monday, Schultz announced the company would suspend billions of dollars in stock buybacks  gifts to shareholders  to put money toward stores and employees.

The unions effort in Starbucks began last summer in Buffalo, New York, where employees filed for a union election in August citing longstanding issues with understaffing made worse during the pandemic.

They spent the next couple of months under a microscope: Top Starbucks executives flew in for listening sessions, national media outlets heralded a seismic shift for the company and U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders called the workers an inspiration.

Andrew Watson, a shift supervisor at the store on Hampton, thought the same thing. After the Buffalo employees won their vote in December, Watson and his co-workers started talking about duplicating the process here.

He wanted to do something about infrequent raises and cuts to staffing he says have left him doing the work of four people on some shifts. It wasnt a hard pitch. Everyone had been paying attention to the news, he said.

Watson predicted several other stores in the area would be following in his groups footsteps.

Such campaigns threaten to shatter Starbucks carefully cultivated image as an employer of choice. For years, the company has eluded organized labor by paying more than the rest of the service sector and offering benefits like health insurance. It has consistently been named as one of the best places to work in national surveys.

If you asked me 10 years ago if Starbucks would be unionizing, I would have said the chances were slim to none, said Brian Yarborough, an analyst at Edward Jones.

But DeMay, the Chicago organizer, said recent years have changed the game. Workers were already frustrated with lower wages and saddled with student debt before the pandemic. Then the virus showed that the company can do more if it chooses: It offered a $3-per-hour bonus to people who kept working in the early days of the crisis and two weeks of sick leave for those exposed to the disease.

I think young people, especially, have had enough, DeMay said.

Natalie Wright, a 23-year-old barista at the store in Tower Grove South, certainly has. She noted that former CEO Kevin Johnson was in line for tens of millions of dollars upon his retirement. Its crazy thinking about that when Im barely able to pay my rent sometimes, Wright said.

But paying for the changes demanded by unions will not be free.

Yarborough, the Edward Jones analyst, said that if the coffee chain has to pay more for employees, it will likely try one of two things to compensate: raise prices or invest in technology that allows it to employ fewer people.

Will consumers pay more at a cafe that already charges $5 for a grande latte?

Armando Cjapi, 40, of the Affton area, said he probably will. Looking down at his $3.80 espresso Monday afternoon outside the store in Tower Grove South, he said he could stomach $4.50.

But Eyasu Asfaw, who runs a taxi service and waited on Monday at the Hampton location for a $4.99 oat milk latte, said he might switch to QuikTrip.

The business news you need Get the latest local business news delivered FREE to your inbox weekly. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
ST. CHARLES  A St. Charles County jury has recommended a death sentence for a former Dent County sheriff's deputy convicted of murdering a woman in 2017.

The jury late Friday night recommended a death sentence for 54-year-old Marvin D. Rice, who was convicted of murdering Annette Durham, 32. Durham, who was killed in 2011, was the mother of his child.

A sentencing hearing before Circuit Judge Daniel Pelikan is set for May 23.

A judge in 2017 sentenced Rice to death after a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder. The Missouri Supreme Court later affirmed the conviction but ordered a new sentencing trial, held last week.

Rice was also sentenced in 2017 to life in prison for second-degree murder in the killing of Durham's boyfriend, Steven Strotkamp, 39, but the Missouri Supreme Court in 2019 overturned that case and ordered a new trial.

Rice's first trial was moved to St. Charles County from Dent County because of the publicity attached to the case, and because of Rices former job there.

The fatal shootings stemmed from a custody dispute between Rice and Durham over their son, who was conceived during an affair Rice had while he was a Dent County sheriffs deputy.

The son was born while Durham was serving a prison sentence.

Shake off your afternoon slump with the oft-shared and offbeat news of the day, hand-brewed by our online news editors. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
ST. LOUIS  St. Louis paid out $5.8 million in legal settlements in 2021 stemming from state and federal lawsuits, including a $5 million payout to a former city police officer beaten by his colleagues while working undercover.

The other settlements covered a variety of claims, including accusations of police misconduct and sexual harassment against a refuse division foreman and those of racial discrimination by the St. Louis sheriff, according to records the Post-Dispatch obtained through Missouris open records law.

The city on Friday provided the Post-Dispatch with nine legal settlements with plaintiffs totaling $795,500 in response to a public records request filed Jan. 7 for all monetary settlements of $25,000 or more.

The Post-Dispatch did not ask for the citys $5 million settlement with former police officer Luther Hall because the newspaper and other media reported it last year.

Hall alleged he was assaulted by fellow officers while working undercover during a 2017 street protest.

The largest of the nine settlements furnished Friday is a $325,000 payment to Charletta Williams of St. Louis, a city refuse division worker who sued the city in February 2021 alleging sex discrimination by her foreman.

Williams alleged her foreman told her he wanted her to be his top bitch, made inappropriate physical contact and sexual comments toward her, called her repeatedly on her cellphone, tried to get in her in his truck alone with him and waved a sex toy at her while in his office.

Williams was a probationary employee from March 3, 2020, until she was fired on April 24 of that year, her lawsuit said.

The settlement says the city denies that any of its actions with respect to plaintiff up to the date of this agreement were improper or unlawful.

The documents provided to the newspaper include a $115,000 settlement to the estate of Drew Burbridge, a deceased filmmaker from Kansas City who claimed he was beaten and pepper-sprayed during a 2017 mass arrest.

On Friday, court records show, a St. Louis woman dismissed a suit against the city alleging being hurt when she fell out of an unlocked stretcher at her home in September 2017 after paramedics responded to her having stroke-like symptoms.

Documents show Emelia Richars signed a settlement in September for $55,000.

Last year, the documents show, the city also paid a St. Peters woman $110,000 to end a 2019 lawsuit for injuries she suffered in November 2017 during a fall while walking in downtown St. Louis. Kimberly Berkley alleged an uneven sidewalk in the 1500 block of Walnut Street in downtown St. Louis caused her to fall.

On March 2, after a $60,000 settlement paid on behalf of officers Stephen Ogunjobi and Steven Landers, U.S. Magistrate Judge Nannette A. Baker dismissed a civil rights lawsuit filed by Sharon Morrow.

Morrow sued in July 2020, claiming officers violently arrested her on April 14, 2019, for filming two other arrests.

Morrow was downtown to distribute food and other supplies to the homeless, her lawsuit says. She tried to leave when ordered by police, but was blocked in by police vehicles, the suit says.

The cancer survivor was then pulled out of her vehicle by officers, who forced her arms behind her back and swept her legs out from under her, slamming her face first to the asphalt, the lawsuit says.

She suffered excruciating pain and neuropathy in her arms and hands and muscle stiffness that lasted months after her arrest, the suit said.

Police lawyers denied the lawsuits claims.

Morrow was charged with interfering with a police officer and resisting arrest, but the charges were later dropped, the suit says. Her settlement says it is not an admission of legal liability and neither side is the prevailing party.

Finally, a $70,500 payment settled a 2019 federal discrimination lawsuit filed by John N. Castellano III that claimed Sheriff Vernon Betts was not following department policy in making promotions of Black staffers.

Castellano, who is white, had unsuccessfully sought a promotion to sergeant.

The settlement also says Castellano will be transferred to a day shift and will receive training through Missouris Peace Officer Standards and Training program.

Castellano had to withdraw complaints to the Missouri Commission on Human Rights and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Shake off your afternoon slump with the oft-shared and offbeat news of the day, hand-brewed by our online news editors. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.

Joel Currier Joel Currier is a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter here: @joelcurrier. Follow Joel Currier Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Save Manage followed notifications Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today
ST. LOUIS  The U.S. Department of Justice is looking at the situation surrounding the dissolution of the once-powerful St. Louis-Kansas City Carpenters District Council and its ousted chief, Al Bond, a new court record shows.

Bonds lawyer cited the DOJ interest in his request for more time to respond to a lawsuit against his client and two companies that won a lucrative advertising contract from the St. Louis-based union council.

This is a complex case involving several areas of additional expertise on various matters pertaining to the Complaint, including, but not limited to, recent Department of Justice issues that as a matter-of-fact affect additional considerations as to the preparation of the pleadings going forward on this case, Bond lawyer John Goffstein wrote in the Friday court filing.

The request also suggests Bond is contacting defense firms in addition to Goffsteins firm to represent him.

Only within the last few days it has been necessary for Defendant, through counsel, to contact and review several defense and other firms to enter as co-counsel in and relation to this action, the court filing says.

The revelation came after U.S. District Court Judge Sarah Pitlyk denied an initial request for an extension filed Wednesday, ruling Bond must show good cause for the extension. The possible federal investigation was laid out in a second request for an extension from Bonds lawyer.

Goffstein declined to comment. A DOJ spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Though theres little additional information, and DOJ officials dont confirm ongoing investigations, the filing is the strongest indication yet that federal investigators are looking at the circumstances surrounding the September dissolution of the once-powerful St. Louis-based union and Bonds ouster.

At the national level, the United Brotherhood of Carpenters has been contending with a federal investigation following the 2019 indictment of George Laufenberg, who led the New Jersey Carpenters Pension, Annuity, Health and Training/Apprenticeship funds and was a former commissioner of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Following Laufenbergs indictment on charges he embezzled pension funds and helped another person steal via a low-show job, a federal grand jury in late 2019 issued subpoenas to other entities tied to the national union.

United Brotherhood of Carpenters President Douglas McCarron ordered the dissolution of the St. Louis-based carpenters council and merged it with the Chicago Regional Council of Carpenters, creating the Mid-America Carpenters Regional Council, which is now based in Chicago.

In St. Louis, Bond and the union were powerful players in development and politics, with a sizeable hand in the regions largely union construction workforce. They also were willing to publicly back candidates and high-profile issues, including the attempts to merge St. Louis and St. Louis County and lease St. Louis Lambert International Airport to a private operator.

UBC officials have been mostly mum on the reasons for the dissolution. Last month, the union finally disclosed that Bond was facing internal union charges for misappropriation of union funds, defrauding the union and violating its bylaws. Shortly after it dissolved, a Post-Dispatch review of the St. Louis District Councils regulatory filings also raised questions about some of its accounting policies.

More recently, a March lawsuit from the Mid-America Carpenters Regional Council highlighted two contracts Bond inked with advertising firms Interrail Outdoors LLC and Foxpoint Interactive LLC, both owned by James H. Neumann. The lawsuit alleged Bond in 2020 entered into contracts to pay Interrail $4 million for three electronic billboards, only one of which was ever built. The lawsuit also alleges the price was above market value and that Bond didnt take the agreement to the St. Louis unions board until a year later, after $3 million had already been paid.

The lawsuit also said that Bond entered into a 32-year deal with Foxpoint to sell advertising space at its properties, including one in Kansas City just across Interstate 70 from Kauffman and Arrowhead stadiums. The contracts purported to split advertising revenue, with 70% going to the union for the first seven years, but they allowed Foxpoint to deduct 15% for brokerage fees as well as costs relating to design or production, installation, taxes and fees.

Originally posted at 12:40 p.m. Monday, April 4.

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Britain donated an undisclosed number of Starstreak anti-aircraft missiles to Ukraine. Britain has already sent nearly 4,000 anti-tank weapons. Starstreak was designed at the end of Cold War and finally entered service in 1998. Britain has purchased 7,000 of these anti-aircraft missiles since then plus several hundred fire control units. Starstreak is expected to remain in service until at least 2030. In 2009, Britain upgraded the electronics and guidance system and called it Starstreak II. Both versions of Starstreak are 16.8 kg (37 pound) missiles fired from a sealed container, which is usually mounted on a vehicle, ship, or helicopter. There is also a shoulder launched version. The missile rapidly accelerates to supersonic speed (nearly one kilometer a second) and releases 3 warheads. Each of these weighs nearly a kilogram (2 pounds) and contains about 450 gr (a pound) of explosives and a guidance system. The maximum range of the system is 7 kilometers, so the target only has a few seconds to react. The warheads are meant to make a direct hit. At high speed, and with a tungsten front end, the warheads are devastating, even against most armored vehicles, but not tanks.

What really makes Starstreak unique among lightweight anti-aircraft missiles is its guidance system. Thats because Starstreak is laser guided and requires a trained operator to keep the missile on target until it hits. The upgraded Starstreak II has automatic target tracking, which makes it easier for a less skilled operator to score a hit. Most other portable anti-aircraft missiles (like SA-7 and Stinger) are fire and forget heat seekers but move more slowly and are vulnerable to countermeasures. Starstreak is largely immune to countermeasures so it gives the target much less time to react and the only thing a pilot can do is try to turn quickly enough so the Starstreak operator cannot keep the target in the cross hairs. This is hard to do against an experienced operator.

Starstreak was originally mounted on about 280 vehicles but that had been reduced to 210. Now the British Army has decided to add Starstreak to more vehicles. Armored vehicles carry an 8-missile launcher, while unarmored (pickup truck or hummer) vehicles carry a 3-missile launcher, which can also be used separately from the vehicle via a portable pedestal. There is also shoulder fired version that requires some practice because the guidance system requires the user to keep the launcher and the guidance system facing in the same direction as the target for a few seconds. At max range of 7 kilometers total flight time is about five seconds. Britain sent instructors to Poland, where the missiles were delivered and Ukrainian troops received training and then escorted the trucks carrying the missiles to a distribution center. Some of the training was using a remote user simulation that can also be used in Ukraine. This apparently worked because Ukraine reports that a Starstreak has already shot down a Russian helicopter.
Ukrainian forces have received military aid from 27 nations, some of it before the February 24 Russian invasion. In some cases, Ukraine had purchased additional numbers of some particularly useful items, like the Starlink terminals that can receive high-speed and encrypted Internet access via thousands of SpaceX Starlink satellites in service.

The most important donations have been the thousands of anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons delivered since the invasion began. These are usually the latest models and some had little or no combat experience. That was quickly remedied as Ukrainian forces used these weapons to defeat the seemingly superior Russian forces.

The Ukrainian have provided donor nations with data on the performance of their donated weapons, many of which had never been used so extensively against a modern force equipped with modern armored vehicles, jet fighters and helicopters. Donors were also told how easy it was for Ukrainian troops and civilian Territorial Defense personnel to learn to use the new weapons effectively. This enabled some donors to modify the usability of their weapons, especially the ant-armor and anti-aircraft systems.

Since the first Russian attack in 2014, the Ukrainians had been preparing for a possible full-scale Russian invasion. Thousands of civilians had joined Territorial Defense units before the invasion. Ukraine knew there would be a lot more volunteers if the Russians did attack and prepared for that by having enough uniforms and weapons available as well as brief but intense training courses developed to handle the influx. Ukraine expected some additional foreign aid and had already received or purchased weapons and equipment from NATO nations before 2022.

The Ukrainians had developed tactics for the Territorial Defense Units that emphasized using small groups of armed personnel to attack Russian support units, especially supply vehicles. That was quickly modified when the unexpected flood of aid came in, including thousands of portable anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons. Many Territorial Defense units were soon armed with these weapons so they could take on Russian tanks and other armored vehicles. This proved to be decisive in rapidly defeating Russian efforts to advance into Ukraine and capture major cities, especially the capital Kyiv.

Copies of the Russian war plan, as well as dozens of working Russian combat vehicles and hundreds of Russian troops were captured. The Russian plan expected the fighting to be over in 15 days with Kyiv captured and a pro-Russian government installed. The reality was that by day fifteen of the invasion about half of the Russian combat units; Battalion size task forces called BTGs or Battalion Task Groups, were destroyed or disabled by heavy losses. By the end of March many BTGs were withdrawn to Russia for rebuilding, a process that could take months. The rebuilding process quickly ran into problems when many of the armored vehicles held in reserve proved to be inoperable because of inadequate maintenance and security. Many of the replacement troops were conscripts, who serve only for a year and by law cannot be sent into a combat zone. Most of the BTGs used for the initial attacks had few or no conscripts and used volunteer troops who are paid more and have more military experience. Many of these contract (kontrackti) troops were now seeking to cancel their contracts and leave the military, which proved to be a riskier job than they were led to believe.

Many conscripts inside Ukraine simply surrendered at the first opportunity. Ukrainian troops and the government managed to let many Russian troops know that prisoners of war were well treated and families of the prisoners would be notified. The Russian government had imposed an information blackout on who their troops were in Ukraine and which of them were killed, wounded or captured.

Russia had few additional BTGs to replace those lost and by the end of March the Ukrainians were counter attacking and retaking Russian controlled towns and villages. The Russian supply lines were under attack day and night. The night attacks were effective because of the use of a small Ukrainian UAV equipped with GPS, a night vision camera, a laser range finder and a link to a nearby artillery unit via Starlink. The UAV patrolled Russian supply routes at night and, when a convoy was spotted trying the move safely in the dark, the artillery unit had the continually updated location of the trucks. That enabled the Ukrainians to fire at the convoy and destroy many of the vehicles while demoralizing the survivors who didnt believe the Ukrainians could detect them in the dark and call-in accurate artillery fire.

The Russians never expected something like this and, once they figured out how this worked, had another reason negotiate peace. The Russians offered to leave but keep some of the Ukrainian territory they already occupied, like the Donbas (portions of two provinces in eastern Ukraine) and the Crimean Peninsula, both of which Russia seized in 2014. The Ukrainians demanded the Russians get out completely. In the meantime, Ukrainians keep attacking and inflicting casualties and equipment losses as well as starving Russian units in Ukraine of essential supplies.

The donor nations continue their aid shipments and are adding new items, like NATO AWACS (Aircraft Warning and Control) aircraft operating over Poland and Romania near the Ukrainian border to detect and track hundreds of aircraft in the air up to 400 kilometers away. This enables the AWACS to cover most of the primary combat zones and pass the information on to the Ukrainian forces. This is also done with photo satellite surveillance but the AWACS data is real-time while the satellite photos are hours or days old. Adjacent NATO countries also supply medical facilities for badly wounded Ukrainian troops as well as civilians and refuge for millions of Ukrainians who have fled the fighting. The aid is usually flown into Poland where Ukrainian trucks or railroad trains take it across the border to weapons distribution centers.

NATO also took the lead imposing unprecedented economic sanctions on Russia. These sanctions were immediately felt by all Russians. In short, the extent of the resistance to the Russian invasion was far greater than the Russians, and many Ukrainians expected. How soon this will end the war is still uncertain but the donor nations now know how well their weapons work against modern combat vehicles manned by well-trained troops. The world and Russia now know how overrated Russian armed forces are. This is a lesson for every country.
VANCOUVER, British Columbia, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Vejii Holdings Ltd. (CSE: VEJI) (OTC: VEJIF) ("the Company'' or "Vejii"), a North American online marketplace for plant-based and sustainable products, is pleased to announce that Kory Zelickson, CEO, will present live at VirtualInvestorConferences.com on April 7th.

DATE: April 7th, 2022TIME: 1PM ESTLINK: https://bit.ly/3qe7F0M

This will be a live, interactive online event where investors are invited to ask the company questions in real-time. If attendees are not able to join the event live on the day of the conference, an archived webcast will also be made available after the event.

It is recommended that investors pre-register and run the online system check to expedite participation and receive event updates.

Learn more about the event at www.virtualinvestorconferences.com.

Recent Company Highlights

Largest US marketplace for sustainable and plant-based products

Positioned as the Amazon of Sustainability

Two acquisitions completed and integrated since launch

International expansion plans to the UK/EU in 2022

About Vejii Holdings

Headquartered in Kelowna BC, Vejii is a unified digital marketplace and fulfillment platform featuring thousands of plant-based and sustainable-living products from a growing list of hundreds of vendors. The platform offers an easy-to-use, omnichannel experience for both vendors and buyers, leveraging big data and artificial intelligence to elegantly connect brands with a targeted consumer base, both organically and through specialized marketing programs. Dynamic fulfillment services empower brands to offer tier-one service, with ongoing engagement being driven through features like smart lists, subscription programs, reordering functions, sampling programs, and more.

The Company also owns and operates US-based Veg Essentials LLC ("Vegan Essentials"), which operates VeganEssentials.com. A staple of the plant-based community, Vegan Essentials was established in 1997 and contributes more than 20 years of consumer insight, data, and buying power. VeganEssentials.com was awarded best online vegan store from 2005-2018, as well as best online vegan grocer from 2018-2021 by VegNews Magazine.

The Company also owns and operates VEDGEco USA Inc. ("VEDGEco"), which operates VEDGEco.com. Headquartered in Kailua, Hawaii and launched in 2020, VEDGEco is the first nationwide plant-based foodservice distributor, providing restaurants with high-quality plant-based options. With the goal of bringing the freedom of food choice to all restaurants and businesses, VEDGEco distributes plant-based products in bulk to the restaurant and wholesale food industry, as well as to consumers across the United States.

For more information, visit VejiiHoldings.com.

About Virtual Investor ConferencesVirtual Investor Conferences (VIC) is the leading proprietary investor conference series that provides an interactive forum for publicly traded companies to seamlessly present directly to investors.

Providing a real-time investor engagement solution, VIC is specifically designed to offer companies more efficient investor access. Replicating the components of an on-site investor conference, VIC offers companies enhanced capabilities to connect with investors, schedule targeted one-on-one meetings and enhance their presentations with dynamic video content. Accelerating the next level of investor engagement, Virtual Investor Conferences delivers leading investor communications to a global network of retail and institutional investors.

CONTACTS:Virtual Investor ConferencesJohn M. ViglottiSVP Corporate Services, Investor AccessOTC Markets Group (212) 220-2221[email protected]

Source: Virtual Investor Conferences
Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - April 4, 2022) - SLANG Worldwide Inc. (CNSX: SLNG) (OTCQB: SLGWF) ("SLANG" or the "Company"), a leading global cannabis consumer packaged goods ("CPG") company with a diversified portfolio of popular brands, today announced the appointment of Mr. Kevin K. Albert as an Independent Member of its Board of Directors. SLANG's Board of Directors is now comprised of 6 directors, 3 of whom are independent.

Mr. Drew McManigle, Interim CEO and Chairman of SLANG, said, "I am very excited to have an experienced business professional like Kevin join our Board, a seasoned professional with significant knowledge and expertise in the cannabis industry, a deep and fundamental understanding of finance and management, and a successful track record in M&A. We deeply appreciate Kevin's willingness to serve as a Director. We believe Kevin will bring significant business insight while providing skilled and experienced board level expertise to the task of building value for our shareholders and effectively managing and growing SLANG, as it positions itself from its turnaround stage into its growth stage."

Mr. Albert worked in the investment banking division of Merrill Lynch & Co. for 24 years. Now retired, he is currently managing a portfolio of private investments, the majority of which are in the legal cannabis industry. From September 2010 through December 2019, Mr. Albert was a Senior Partner of Pantheon Ventures LLC ("Pantheon") and a member of its six-person Partnership Board. For most of his nine-year tenure there, he was responsible for the firm's global business development, and during this time Pantheon's assets under management increased from approximately US$25 billion to approximately US$50 billion.

From 2006 until 2017, he also served as an independent director on the board of Merrill Lynch Ventures, LLC, a series of private equity partnerships offered to Merrill Lynch employees aggregating over US$1.8 billion of original committed capital. He currently serves as an independent director on the boards of Harborside Inc, Osiris Ventures, Inc. dba, NorCal Cannabis Company, Octavius Holdings Inc dba, Flow Cannabis Company, and Achari Venture Holding Corp I, a special purpose acquisition company targeting a merger with a non-plant touching cannabis company. Mr. Albert has a BA and an MBA from the University of California, Los Angeles where he continues to be involved as the Chair of the Board of Visitors of the Economics Department.

Mr. Albert noted, "I am excited to be joining SLANG at this time as I believe the Company has tremendous potential and is well positioned to expand its footprint and capture additional market share in its core markets. I look forward to working with the other members of the Board and the management team as we help drive growth at SLANG."

To be added to SLANG's email distribution list, please email [email protected] with "SLNG" in the subject.

About SLANG Worldwide Inc.

SLANG Worldwide Inc. is a global leader in the cannabis CPG sector with a diversified portfolio of popular brands distributed across the United States. SLANG specializes in acquiring and developing market-proven regional brands as well as launching innovative new brands to seize global market opportunities. For more information, please visit www.slangww.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains statements that constitute "forward-looking statements." Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, performance or achievements, or developments in the industry to differ materially from the anticipated results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements that are not historical facts and are generally, but not always, identified by the words "expects", "plans", "anticipates", "believes", "intends", "estimates", "projects", "potential" and similar expressions, or that events or conditions "will", "would", "may", "could" or "should" occur.

Forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable by management of SLANG at this time, are inherently subject to significant business, economic and competitive risks, uncertainties and contingencies that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in such statements. Investors are cautioned not to put undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Applicable risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to regulatory risks, risks related to the COVID-19 global pandemic, changes in laws, resolutions and guidelines, market risks, concentration risks, operating history, competition, the risks associated with international and foreign operations and the other risks identified under the headings "Risk Factors" in SLANG's annual information form dated April 29, 2021 and other disclosure documents available on the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. SLANG is not under any obligation, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation, to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as expressly required by applicable law.

Neither the Canadian Securities Exchange nor the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Media and Investor inquiries

[email protected]

KCSA Strategic Communications

Phil Carlson

[email protected]

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119118
U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan speaks to the media about the war in Ukraine and other topics at the White House in Washington, U.S., March 22, 2022. REUTERS/Leah Millis

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Russia probably plans to deploy tens of thousands of soldiers in eastern Ukraine as it shifts its focus to the country's south and east, U.S. President Joe Biden's national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Monday.

At this juncture we believe Russia is revising its war aims to focus on eastern and parts of southern Ukraine rather than target most of the territory," Sullivan told reporters at the White House.

The goal was likely to "surround and overwhelm" Ukrainian forces in the region, he said. Russia could then use any tactical success it achieves to propagate a narrative of progress and mask ... prior military failure.

Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion, which began on Feb. 24, is Europe's bloodiest since World War Two. Russia calls it a "special military operation" aimed at protecting civilians.

Sullivan said the Biden administration would announce fresh military assistance for Ukraine in coming days. He said further sanctions against Russian energy are on the table in talks with European allies.

Sullivan said the next phase may be protracted with Russian troops outnumbering Ukraine's. Moscow would likely seek to control a far broader swath of eastern Ukraine than separatists controlled prior to the invasion, he said.

In the south, Russia will likely seek to hold the city of Kherson to control the flow of water to Crimea, which it annexed in 2014. He said the Kremlin was expected to launch further air and missile strikes across the rest of the country.

Biden on Monday accused Putin of war crimes and called for a trial, adding to the global outcry over civilian killings in Bucha, a town recaptured by Ukrainian troops as Russian forces regrouped.

Russia categorically denied murdering civilians, including in Bucha. U.N. envoy Vasily Nebenzya promised Russia would present "empirical evidence" to the Security Council that its forces had not been killing civilians.

(Reporting by Nandita Bose and Alexandra Alper; Editing by Leslie Adler and Howard Goller)
LOS ANGELES, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The Harmonist's Sacred Water has been nominated at the prestigious 2022 US Fragrance Foundation Awards under one of its most notable categories, "Universal Luxury".

The Harmonist, a rising star in the fragrance industry, will compete with some of the world's most renowned brands, including Tom Ford, Christian Dior, Gucci, and Chanel.

Founded in 2016 by Lola Tillyaeva (Till), The Harmonist is inspired by the guiding principles of Feng Shui, and all of the brand's fragrances embrace aspects of the Yin and Yang duality and the five elements  wood, fire, earth, water, and metal. Each scent is carefully crafted to help the wearer find balance, harmony, and wellbeing.

Part of The Harmonist's Yang Collection, Sacred Water is a universal perfume with notes of citrus fruit, fresh spice, and minerality. The unique fragrance channels the Yang water energy, invigorating and soothing the wearer like the unfolding expanse of a tranquil sea.

"We are honored to announce that The US Fragrance Foundation has recognized The Harmonist for a second year. We are a young company with an established unique philosophy that inspires and creates harmony for our customers.

"It's a testament to our team's determination, innovation, and passion for fragrances to be nominated amongst some of the most well-known brands. We'd like to assure you that we'll continue to bring passion, love, and quality to the forefront of innovation in the perfume industry," said The Harmonist founder Lola Tillyaeva (Till).

In collaboration with Lola, internationally renowned Givaudan perfumer Guillaume Flavigny developed the fragrance, combining precious ingredients sourced sustainably, including Citron, Mandarin, Fresh Ginger, Magnolia, Orange Blossom, Laminaria Seaweed, Amyris, Grey Amber, and Cedar.

The US Fragrance Foundation will announce the award on June 9, 2022, at their annual awards ceremony in New York City.

Lola Tillyaeva (Lola Till)

Lola Tillyaeva (Till) is a Wellbeing Activist, Entrepreneur, Author, Humanitarian and the visionary behind The Harmonist. An inspiring voice within the wellness and beauty space, Lola published her widely appraised self-care book "Be Your Own Harmonist: Awakening Your Inner Wisdom for Physical, Mental and Emotional Well-being" in September 2020.

Originally from Uzbekistan, Lola created the Paris-based Maison de l'Ouzbekistan, a gallery that showcases the rich cultural heritage of Uzbekistan. Lola is also a devoted philanthropist and founded the "You Are Not Alone Foundation" in 2002 to provide homes and education to severely underprivileged children in Uzbekistan.

View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/lola-tillyaeva-tills-the-harmonist-nominated-at-2022-us-fragrance-foundation-awards-301516992.html

SOURCE Office of Lola Tillyaeva (Till)
NOTICE OF EXEMPT SOLICITATION

NAME OF REGISTRANT: AbbVie Inc.

NAME OF PERSON RELYING ON EXEMPTION: Employees Retirement System of Rhode Island

ADDRESS OF PERSON RELYING ON EXEMPTION: Office of Rhode Island General Treasurer Seth Magaziner, Rhode Island State House, 82 Smith St. #102, Providence, RI 02903

NAME OF PERSON RELYING ON EXEMPTION: Vermont Pension Investment Committee

ADDRESS OF PERSON RELYING ON EXEMPTION: Vermont State Treasurer, 109 State St., Montpelier, VT 05609

Written materials are submitted pursuant to Rule 14a-6(g)(1) promulgated under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Submission is not required of these filers under the terms of the Rule but is made voluntarily.

April 1, 2022

AbbVie Inc.

Shareholder Proposal on Independent Chair

Dear Fellow AbbVie Shareholders:

We urge you to vote FOR Proposal #5 asking the board to require an independent director as chair of AbbVie Inc.s (AbbVies or the Companys) (ABBV) Board of Directors at the May 6, 2022 Annual Meeting of Stockholders. The proponents of this resolution are AbbVie shareholders and members of the Investors for Opioid and Pharmaceutical Accountability (IOPA).

The company continues to face significant material legal, regulatory, financial and reputational risks. With ongoing controversies and legal challenges against the Company, we remain concerned that the Board is not providing the necessary oversight of AbbVies culture, strategy, and risk management.

We believe that a board led by an independent chair would better oversee these risks and would best serve the interests of the Companys shareholders.

This is not a proxy solicitation, to vote your proxy. Please DO NOT send us your proxy card, as it will not be accepted. Vote your proxy according to the instructions set forth in AbbVies proxy statement.

2

In adopting a policy to separate the CEO and chair positions, AbbVie has the opportunity to provide stronger oversight of material risks facing the company, as described below  including the ongoing legal, regulatory, reputational, and financial risks that have been continuously raised by regulators and shareholders.

59% of companies in the S&P 500 have separate CEO and chairman positions, an increase from 55% in 2020 and 37% in 2011.1 When separating these roles, companies have made public commitments to strengthening their corporate governance, while also benefiting from the leadership skills and business experience of two different individuals.

An independent board chair would eliminate the structural conflicts of interest caused by a combined CEO-Board Chair and clarifies where the authority of the CEO ends, and where responsibility of the independent board members begins.

Lack of Board Independence

While AbbVies lead director reviews and provides input to the board agenda, the lead director does not formally set that agenda or run the meeting. We believe both of these tasks are essential ingredients in fostering an independent board culture.

In its Statement of Opposition to our shareholder proposal, the company claims that [s]ince its inception in 2013, AbbVie has had a robust lead independent director role.2

We disagree.

Since AbbVie was spun off by Abbott Laboratories in 2013, Mr. Glenn F. Tilton has been the only person to hold the position of Lead Independent Director at the company. Additionally, Mr. Tilton has served on the board of directors at Abbott Laboratories since 2007.

Given his 15-year history with AbbVie and its predecessor, it strains credibility to objectively describe Mr. Tiltons current relationship with the Companys board of directors as independent.

Additionally, AbbVie limits investor rights to elect directors, allowing investors to vote on only a third of directors each year, making it difficult for investors to timely voice concerns about the Company.

The Company has proposed to adopt annual director elections in the past; those proposals garnered strong majority support but, to date, have fallen short of the 80 percent (of outstanding shares) required by the companys certificate of incorporation.

_____________________________

1 https://www.wsj.com/articles/microsofts-combination-of-ceo-and-chairman-roles-goes-against-trend-11623970653

2 https://investors.abbvie.com/static-files/91cf9d6a-8e6f-4059-9575-eda83b7e4623

This is not a proxy solicitation, to vote your proxy. Please DO NOT send us your proxy card, as it will not be accepted. Vote your proxy according to the instructions set forth in AbbVies proxy statement.

3

Need for Stronger Governance Oversight of Ongoing Legal, Regulatory, Financial and Reputational Risks

In its Statement of Opposition to our shareholder proposal3, AbbVie cites its self-described robust corporate governance practices in determining that the company doesnt need to change its board policies or practices.

Since 2013, AbbVie investors have paid out $3.4 billion in federal and state litigation and regulatory agency settlements.4

In an alleged effort to thwart competitors, AbbVie has filed numerous patent extensions to protect its market exclusivity, drawing scrutiny from federal regulators and legislators over concerns that those practices adversely affect competition.

Under threat of subpoena, AbbVie CEO Richard Gonzalez appeared before the U.S. House Oversight and Reform Committee in May 2021 to defend the Companys pricing schemes. In conjunction with the hearing, the Committee published a 57-page report.5 The opening paragraph of the report states:

This staff report describes the actions of AbbVie Inc. in repeatedly raising the prices of two of its blockbuster drugs: Humira (adalimumab) and Imbruvica (ibrutinib). These price hikes contributed to billions of dollars in corporate profits and enriched company executives while harming American patients and taxpayers. AbbVie pursued a variety of tactics to increase drug sales while raising prices for Americans, including exploiting the patent system to extend its market monopoly, abusing orphan drug protections to further block competition, and engaging in anticompetitive pricing practices.

In her closing remarks, Committee Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney concluded the facts showed that AbbVie raised prices on Americans for one simple reason: greed.6

Additionally, in August 2020, AbbVie paid the State of California $24 million to resolve an insurance fraud lawsuit over an alleged Humira kickbacks scheme7. AbbVie provided physicians with traditional kickbacks such as cash, meals, drinks, gifts, trips, and patient referrals to induce and reward Humira prescriptions, according to prosecutors. Along with payment, the settlement required AbbVie to make significant changes in its practices.

_____________________________

3 Ibid.

4 h ttps://violationtracker.goodjobsfirst.org/prog.php?parent=AbbVie

5 h ttps://oversight.house.gov/sites/democrats.oversight.house.gov/files/Committee%20on%20Oversight%20and%20Reform%20-%20AbbVie%20Staff%20Report.pdf

6 h ttps://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/554180-lawmakers-press-AbbVie-ceo-on-increased-prices-of-two-drugs-in-us

7 h ttps://www.insurance.ca.gov/0400-news/0100-press-releases/2020/release071-2020.cfm

This is not a proxy solicitation, to vote your proxy. Please DO NOT send us your proxy card, as it will not be accepted. Vote your proxy according to the instructions set forth in AbbVies proxy statement.

4

In a related development, a lawsuit filed by AbbVie investors which alleges that the company inflated its stock price by misleading the public about the effect a kickbacks scheme had on Humira's value, was certified as a class action in September 2021, against the strong objections of the Company.8

In August 2021, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission cited AbbVies illegal anticompetitive conduct as it called for legislation reinstating the FTCs authority to seek equitable monetary relief for consumers in competition cases.

In her contemporaneous statement, Holly Vedova, then-Acting Director of the Bureau of Competition, expressed her frustration at being unable to compensate consumers who were the victims of AbbVies and Besins anticompetitive conduct, despite proving that the companies engaged in illegal sham litigation. 9

Vote FOR Proposal #5 to require an independent chair at AbbVie Inc.

AbbVie should take this opportunity to strengthen its corporate governance as a means of addressing the needs of the Companys shareholders, employees, customers, and other stakeholders.

An independent chair is vital to ensure that tough questions of strategy, governance, culture, compliance, and risk are being adequately discussed, and independently overseen, at the board level.

By voting FOR Proposal #5, you can send a message to AbbVies board of directors that you value independent board leadership.

For further information, please contact Randy Rice, Senior Advisor, Policy & Communications at the Rhode Island Treasurers Office by e-mail at [email protected]

Sincerely,

Seth Magaziner, General Treasurer

State of Rhode Island

Thomas Golonka, Chair

Vermont Pension Investment Commission

_____________________________

8 https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/kickback-case-against-AbbVie-judge-rules-for-investors-to-certify-lawsuit-as-a-class-action

9 https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2021/07/ftc-withdraws-remaining-case-against-AbbVie-after-supreme-court-decision
An Army appellate court will soon take up the January decision by a Germany-based military judge that a unanimous guilty verdict will be required to convict an officer of sexual assault in his court-martial trial.

A hearing is set for April 14 at Fort Belvoir in Virginia, the U.S. Army Court of Criminal Appeals, which is the services highest court, said in a March 22 filing.

The court agreed to hear the case in response to an appeal by prosecutors, who argue that Col. Charles Pritchards decision in the case of Lt. Col. Andrew Dial was based on faulty legal reasoning.

Pritchard ruled that allowing a split guilty verdict would violate Dials Fifth Amendment rights by denying him equal protection.

Dial, a member of the Belgium-based Allied Forces North Battalion, was slated to stand trial in January in Kaiserslautern, Germany, on three counts of sexual assault.

However, the proceedings against Dial were delayed after prosecutors filed a challenge. Pritchard found that there is no rational basis for allowing military defendants to be convicted under a lower threshold than the one that applies in civilian courts.

In 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that split guilty verdicts are impermissible in state criminal trials. Unanimity of a jury conviction has long been required at the federal level.

Pritchard asserted that Congress has consistently narrowed the gap between the military and civilian legal systems, bringing the former more into line with the latter.

But prosecutors said Pritchard was incorrect in his argument that service members and civilians are similarly situated and are therefore entitled to the same constitutional protections when it comes to jury verdicts.

Because of the vastly different liabilities and privileges, service members and civilians are not alike in all relevant respects, they wrote in their appellate court filing.

On Jan. 13, Pritchard made a similar ruling in a case involving a Vicenza, Italy-based soldier facing court-martial over allegations of sexual assault. That case also has been postponed.

The Army Court of Criminal Appeals decision could have broader implications for the military justice system going forward. Military law experts have said its likely that defense attorneys will increasingly take cues from the Dial case and raise similar issues.

The military is the last U.S. legal jurisdiction to allow split guilty verdicts.
This story has been corrected

A U.S. Navy hovercraft delivered an Army surface-to-air missile defense system to a Philippine beach for the first time during recent amphibious drills involving U.S. and Philippine troops.

The March 29 drill marked the first-ever amphibious insertion of a Patriot missile system in the Philippines, 3rd Marine Division spokesman Maj. Kurt Stahl told Stars and Stripes in an email Monday.

The operation was part of Balikatan 22, an exercise involving 5,100 U.S. and 3,800 Philippine troops that began March 28 and wraps up Friday.

Four launchers and 130 soldiers from the Armys Bravo Battery, 1st Battalion, 1st Air Defense Artillery Regiment deployed from Okinawa for the drills, Stahl said.

The air-defense equipment and troops landed at Aparri on hovercraft deployed by the USS Ashland amphibious assault ship.

Following the landing, the Patriot missile system moved inland as part of a multiday rehearsal of a territorial coastal defense in northern Luzon, he said.

The Patriot battery supported Marines and Philippine troops practicing coastal defense, Stahl said in a phone interview earlier Monday.

Marines, equipped with portable Stinger air-defense missiles, focused on low-altitude air defense while the Patriot troops practiced defending against high-altitude threats, he said.

The Patriots have a capability we dont have in the Marine Corps, Stahl said.

Patriot Advanced Capability-2 missiles, for example, can travel up to 60 miles and reach as high as 20 miles, according to the Missile Defense Agency.

On Guam in September and November, a theoretical Patriot battery was incorporated into air-defense tests involving a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense battery and an Iron Dome air-defense system brought from Texas by the 2nd Battalion, 43rd Air Defense Artillery Regiment.

A Patriot battery deployed to Japans southern island of Amami during last summers annual Orient Shield exercise. Also last summer, 65 soldiers from the 38th Air Defense Artillery Brigade deployed to Australia with a pair of Patriot launchers, a radar, power plant, control station and brigade and battalion command posts during the biennial Talisman Sabre drills.
American soldiers in Iraq were awarded the Combat Action Badge for their response to an enemy attack that occurred days after the U.S.-led coalition transitioned from a combat mission to a strictly advisory and support role late last year.

Several members of the Armys Task Force Pioneer were recognized recently for their actions the night of Dec. 19, 2021, when rockets targeted the coalitions facility in Baghdads Green Zone, known as Union III.

In a ceremony at Union III on March 24, Lt. Col. Gregory Polk of the Fort Carson, Colo.-based 299th Brigade Engineer Battalion pinned the decorations on members of his own battalion and the 4th Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment. Both are part of the 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division.

The soldiers either responded directly to the threat or were within the radius of the kinetic effects of the munitions, said Lt. Col. Gina Flash McKeen, a coalition spokesperson, in an email last week.

Two Katyusha rockets were launched at the compound near the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, but caused no deaths or injuries, officials said in December. One was shot down by a C-RAM defensive battery, and one struck north of the coalition compound, damaging two civilian vehicles.

The CAB recognizes non-infantry soldiers who personally take offensive or defensive action while under hostile fire, and is intended to recognize the greatly expanded role those soldiers have in active ground combat, Army regulations say.

The coalition did not respond to a query last week about how many troops earned CABs for the December attack, but Army photos released online show dozens of recipients at the March ceremony.

Militia groups aligned with Iran have been blamed for dozens of rocket and suicide drone attacks, some of them deadly, launched against facilities housing Americans in Iraq in recent years.

Theyre part of an effort to drive the U.S. from the region and pay back a 2020 U.S. drone strike that killed Iranian general Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad.

The persistent threat of militia attacks drove the heightened security readiness posture and focused a considerable number of resources on the counter-UAV and counter-rocket, -artillery, and -mortar systems, or C-RAMs, at the State Departments Baghdad Diplomatic Security Compound, a government watchdog agency found.

The State Department planned to build hard covers for its diplomatic support hospital, dining facility and a secure fuel facility, the Lead Inspector General for the U.S.-led coalition said in a report released in February.

Militant groups conditioned the end of the attacks on the U.S. troops exit from Iraq.

Last July, President Joe Biden promised that combat troops would be withdrawn by the end of the year, and the coalition had announced the end of its combat mission in keeping with that pledge just days before the rockets fell on Union III last December.

But some 2,500 U.S. troops were to remain to help develop Iraqs security forces and support their fight against remnants of the Islamic State group. Sporadic rocket and drone attacks continued into this year.

Although the mission has changed, we retain the inherent right to self-defense in protecting coalition and Iraqi forces, McKeen said this week.
CAMP FOSTER, Okinawa  Japanese police have arrested two U.S. Marines on Okinawa in separate drunken driving incidents involving collisions since Wednesday.

Sgt. Austin Patton, 24, of Camp Hansen, and Gunnery Sgt. Edward Toppen, 37, of Camp Kinser, both admitted driving under the influence, though Toppen denied hitting another vehicle, police spokesmen told Stars and Stripes by phone on Monday. No one was injured in either incident.

Police took Patton into custody shortly after 4:40 p.m. Wednesday, an Ishikawa police spokesman said Monday. Patton rear-ended a truck while driving a Suzuki Jimmy south on Route 329 in Kin town, the spokesman said.

A breath test measured Pattons blood-alcohol content at 0.09%, three times Japans legal limit of 0.03%, the spokesman said. By comparison, all 50 U.S. states have set 0.08% as the legal limit for driving under the influence or driving while impaired.

Police referred Pattons case to prosecutors; he was released pending trial, the spokesman said.

Naha police stopped Toppen around 5:40 a.m. Sunday on northbound Route 58 in Urasoe after a hit-and-run was reported 10 minutes earlier at the Minato 2 crossing in Naha city, a department spokesman said. Toppens car fit the description of the hit-and-run vehicle, he said.

Toppens blood-alcohol content measured 0.06%, the spokesman said. He was still in custody Monday at Naha Police Station.

Government spokespeople in Japan typically speak to the media on condition of anonymity as a condition of their employment.
A Navy pilot killed last week in the crash of an aircraft in Virginia is being remembered for his passion for flying, outgoing personality and commitment to caring for others.

Lt. Hyrum Hanlon was killed Wednesday when a Navy E2-D Advanced Hawkeye crashed during routine flight operations near Wallops Island and Chincoteague, Va., the Navy said in a statement Friday. It wasnt clear what role Hanlon had on the flight. His age and hometown also werent released.

Two other service members aboard the aircraft survived the crash, but their names were not released. The cause is under investigation, the Navy said.

Hanlon was commissioned in the Navy from Arizona State University in May 2017. He reported to VAW-120, the Greyhawks Command and Control Squadron, in January 2021, according to the statement.

He was a student pilot nearing the end of his syllabus at VAW-120, Capt. Chris Hulitt, commodore of the Airborne Command and Control and Logistics Wing, said in a Sunday post on the VAW-120 Facebook page.

He was looking forward to joining an operational squadron, Hulitt said in the post. He was outgoing and beloved by students and instructors alike.

Friends on social media remembered Hanlon for his wicked smart intellect, gregarious spirit and love of flying.

Becoming a navy pilot was his dream and he was a damn good one, said Paul Crain in a Friday post on his Facebook page. Crain said Hanlon was one of the first friends he made in college.

Hanlon also was remembered for his kindness and caring.

I cant even count all of the times he gave me compliments or made me feel good about myself, or I saw him do the same to others, wrote Mattalynn Mason on her Facebook page Saturday. He just was such a genuine guy.

The Navy said it was working with local and state officials on salvage planning for the plane, which was partially submerged near Wildcat Marsh on the north part of Chincoteague, USNI News reported Friday.

In urging people to avoid speculation, Hulitt emphasized that investigators are looking into causal factors so that we can prevent events like this from happening again.
Stars and Stripes is making stories on the coronavirus pandemic available free of charge. See more stories here. Sign up for our daily coronavirus newsletter here. Please support our journalism with a subscription.

The disclosure of new COVID variants emerging in China and the rise of a potentially more transmissible strain in the U.K. has recast the spotlight on the ongoing risk of the virus, even as health experts say theres no reason to panic.

The World Health Organization said a hybrid of two omicron strains  BA.1 and BA.2  that was first detected in the U.K. and dubbed XE could be the most transmissible variant yet. It is estimated to spread 10% more easily than BA.2, which itself was more transmissible than the original omicron famous for its ease of penetration.

Meanwhile in China, which is experiencing its biggest outbreak since Wuhan, authorities have disclosed two novel omicron subvariants that dont match any existing sequences. Its unclear if the infections were one-off events of little significance, or if they may be a sign of problems ahead.

If the Chinese authorities efforts to constrain transmission are ineffective against a highly, highly transmissible virus, like an omicron variant, this could become a threat for the rest of the world, said Rajeev Venkayya, a former White House biodefense adviser who became the CEO of drugmaker Aerium Therapeutics in March. We know that uncontrolled transmission of the virus can lead to more viral evolution and an evolution around vaccines and therapeutics, potentially making them less effective, he said.

The continued circulation of COVID-19 nearly 2.5 years after it was first detected in China, driven by the development of mutations that allow infections to surge and deaths to batter the same locations again and again, remains a key issue for a world ready to live with the virus. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is holding a hearing this week to discuss what booster shots will be needed and how to select which specific strains of the virus they should target.

The number of infections from these new variants are tiny given the scope of the outbreaks that are still happening worldwide, and scientists have documented the emergence of many variations that have gone nowhere. The U.K. health authorities have recorded more than 630 cases of XE, underscoring that more information is needed.

We should monitor the new recombinants closely, but we should not panic at the moment, said Leo Poon, a virologist and University of Hong Kong professor who has tracked and written reports on the emergence of new strains.

Its not unexpected to see COVID recombinant variants, or a mix of two previous strains, particularly since the delta and omicron strains have been circulating widely, he said. Its likely that some people would be infected by both strains. If a variant were to be detected in multiple regions and was spreading in the community, then that would be of concern, he said.

Chinas recent disclosures on novel variants come at a very early stage of spread, making it hard to know how significant the findings are.

Officials in the eastern Chinese city Suzhou, about 110 kilometers from Shanghai, reported an infection with an omicron subvariant derived from BA.1 over the weekend. It didnt match any existing sequences in China or in the international database for viral sequences known as GISAID. It was found in a patient with a mild case of COVID, the citys health authorities said.

A second infection found in the northeastern city of Dalian was caused by a BA.2 subvariant that doesnt match any sequences of domestic or imported cases in the country so far. It was found in a fashion store clerk who was selling clothes imported from South Korea. Close to 400 close contacts were tested. All were negative.

The novel strains from around the world are now cropping up in Asia. The first infection caused by the XE variant in Thailand was detected on Saturday, while in February a different recombinant variant was found in two people who arrived in Hong Kong from Europe. The strain hasnt been detected in the community, and the two travelers recovered fully.

Most of the infections in China and Hong Kong, where more than half of the city is estimated to have been infected since the start of the year, stem from existing variants thus far, said Stephen Goldstein, a virologist from the University of Utah. So while the outbreaks are an emergency for the governments and public health officials, they dont currently represent a global health threat, he said.

I dont really expect a new variant to emerge from the omicron epidemics in Hong Kong and China, Goldstein said. That said, this virus has certainly surprised us before and we need to stay vigilant.
CAMP FOSTER, Okinawa  The Japan Air Self-Defense Force has repositioned a mobile radar unit on its southern island chain to strengthen defenses due to increased Chinese activity in the region.

Approximately 20 members of the 53rd Guard Team accompanied a TPS-102 radar unit to Yonaguni Island on Friday, according to a Self-Defense Force spokesman. The island, about 70 miles off Taiwans eastern coast, is Japans westernmost territory.

The troops relocated from Miyako Island, about 140 miles to the east, the spokesman said Monday.

The move will strengthen the defense of our country at a time when neighboring countries are increasing their activities around our country, the spokesman said, referring to China, whose coast guard frequently enters waters claimed by Japan around the Senkaku Islands, about 125 miles north of Yonaguni.

Not only their activities are increasing, but also their activity area is expanding, the spokesman said.

Government spokespeople in Japan typically speak to the media on condition of anonymity as a condition of their employment.

The spokesman declined to provide details on the TPS-102 radar system, other than to say it can detect anything that flies. The cylindrical unit is mounted on the back of a truck.

Japan has launched its aircraft 571 times to intercept approaching Chinese drones, fighters, bombers and surveillance planes through three quarters of fiscal year 2021, which ended Thursday, according to Air Self-Defense Force data. Thats 113 more than all of the previous fiscal year. Data for the final quarter has not yet been made available.

In March 2019, Japan deployed troops to three new bases in the countrys south aimed at solidifying defenses around the Ryukyu Islands  also called the Nansei Islands  which run south from Japans four main islands toward Taiwan.

Approximately 400 troops were stationed at a new garrison on Miyako. Plans call for 800 troops at the base, eventually.

Another 560 troops were placed on two bases on Kagoshima prefectures Amami Oshima, north of Okinawa but south of Japans main islands. A new command is also planned for Ishigaki Island, which lies between Yonaguni and Miyako.

A Japan Ground Self-Defense Force base with about 160 coastal surveillance troops was placed on Yonaguni is 2016, a Self-Defense Force spokesman said Monday.

The Ground Self-Defense Force plans to deploy an electronic warfare unit to Yonaguni as early as fiscal 2023, its spokesman said.

Japan bolstering its defenses on the southern island chain is in response to activity by China, the Air Self-Defense Force spokesman said.
CAMP HUMPHREYS, South Korea  Nearly 87% of South Koreans think their country ought to develop closer ties to the United States than to any other nation, according to a poll released Monday.

The survey found 86.8% of respondents believe Seoul should develop closer economic, foreign and security policy ties with Washington. The Federation of Korean Industries commissioned the poll, which was conducted March 24-28.

Just 5% of respondents said North Korea ought to be the top partner with South Korea, and 3.2% said China. The European Union was cited by 2.1%, and 1.4% said Japan.

The poll surveyed 1,000 people and had a margin of error of 3 percentage points. The federation, an association of large businesses, seeks to promote sound economic policies, according to its website.

The results come one month before South Korean President Moon Jae-in finishes his five-year term. Yoon Seok-youl, a former chief prosecutor elected president last month, is scheduled to be inaugurated May 10.

Moons critics accused him of prioritizing relations with North Korea over ties to the U.S. Following his summit meetings with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in 2018, Moon agreed to indefinitely postpone large-scale military exercises with U.S. troops to lower tensions on the Korean Peninsula, a frequent North Korean demand.

In contrast, Yoon, a member of the conservative People Power Party, has called for closer ties with the U.S., including the resumption of large-scale drills, while taking a hardline stance against North Koreas provocations.

We will rebuild the [South Korea]-U.S. alliance and boost the comprehensive strategic alliance, sharing liberal democracy, a market economy, and the key value of human rights, he said in a statement March 10.

FKIs survey comes five months after a separate poll found that 67% of respondents viewed the U.S.-South Korean alliance favorably. The findings of that poll by the Seoul-based Korea Institute for Defense Analysis represent a substantial increase in U.S. support over previous years, according to the institute.

Nearly 75% of FKI respondents believe the South Korean government should repair relations with Japan. Twenty-two percent said it was very necessary to improve relations and 52.9% said it was somewhat necessary. Another 18.5% of respondents said it was somewhat unnecessary while 6.6% said it was very unnecessary.

Moons government has at times been at odds with Tokyo, particularly as the two countries continue to spar over territorial disputes in the Dokdo, or Takeshima, islands and address reparations for Korean comfort women subjected to prostitution by Japan during World War II.

Conservative lawmakers like Yoon have campaigned to mend ties with Japan, calling for a future-oriented relationship based on a correct understanding of history, according to a policy outlook from Yoons presidential campaign.

Stars and Stripes reporter Yoo Kyong Chang contributed to this report.
LONDON - Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the self-exiled Russian oligarch and vocal Kremlin opponent, has called on Russian billionaires and officials who have fled Russia to publicly denounce President Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine as criminal.

"Public figures cannot leave quietly and then sit quietly. If you have left, then you should publicly dissociate yourself or we should be forced to suspect that you are acting on [the Kremlin's] behalf," Khodorkovsky said in an interview last week in his London office. "You should step up to the microphone and say that Putin is a war criminal and that what he is doing is a crime, that the war against Ukraine is a crime. Say this, and then we'll understand that Putin doesn't have a hold over you."

Khodorkovsky - who was Russia's richest man before he was arrested in 2003 and imprisoned for 10 years while his Yukos oil company was taken over by the Russian state - was referring in particular to the high-profile Russian oligarchs Mikhail Fridman and Pyotr Aven of Alfa Group. They were once his comrades among Russia's seven original oligarchs of the 1990s, who then controlled much of the country's economy. Fridman and Aven left Russia in the immediate aftermath of Russia's invasion of Ukraine only to be put under sanctions by Britain and the European Union over alleged close ties to the Putin regime.

Khodorkovsky was also referring to Anatoly Chubais, the Kremlin special envoy whose departure from Russia late last month made him the highest-ranking official to step down from his post and leave the country since the invasion. Chubais had overseen the 1990s-era privatizations of state-owned enterprises, which were the source of Khodorkovsky's, Fridman's and Aven's fabulous wealth.

They are among many in the Russian urban elite who have left the country in the aftermath of the invasion.

While Chubais has not made any public comment since his departure, Fridman and Aven have both given interviews in which they have complained about the impact the sanctions have had on their daily lives. They have said that the sanctions reflect a Western misunderstanding that Russians like themselves could have any influence over Putin's policies.

Both have refrained from directly criticizing Putin over his invasion of Ukraine, though Fridman, who grew up in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, told journalists after the imposition of E.U. sanctions that the war was "a huge tragedy" that "should be stopped as soon as possible." Fridman said he did not want to speak against Putin directly because it would not have any impact on political decision-making in Russia, while at the same time it would endanger the hundreds of thousands of his employees who remain in Russia.

Khodorkovsky said he agreed that it was naive to think that either Fridman or Aven could influence Putin to end the war. Putin has completely overturned the workings of power in Russia since the 1990s, when Russia's richest oligarchs were able to influence President Boris Yeltsin's government.

But Khodorkovsky said that if any of these billionaires want the sanctions against them to be lifted, they need to demonstrate their independence from Putin. He urged them to say they regret ever having anything to do with Putin and will never do so again. The suggestion that Putin could arrest the employees they'd left behind in Russia if they spoke out against the president, Khodorkovsky said, was no more than "cover."

"This is ridiculous to even hear. It means Putin has some kind of hold over you," he said. "And if there is a hold on you, then it means your resources are dangerous during the war." Suspicions would remain that they could be carrying out Kremlin orders, such as "paying for supplies," including goods officially under embargo. He said the tycoons could direct their associates to make these payments, and he warned that these individuals could also seek to influence European policymakers on Putin's behalf.

Khodorkovsky's comments could strike a nerve with Russian billionaires under sanctions who have been trying to deny connections with Putin. Khodorkovsky has long been seen by the wealthiest Russians as an outsider who paid a high price for his political ambitions at a time when Putin, early in his presidency, was seeking to eradicate any challenge.

While Khodorkovsky languished in a Siberian prison camp, others - including Fridman, Aven and Chubais - adapted to and then benefited from the Putin regime. Fridman and Aven made a point of steering clear of politics at a time when Russia's billionaires became increasingly beholden to the Kremlin.

Khodorkovsky said these men and others should shake off their fear and speak out, even if it means putting their own lives in danger. "This is a real war. People are dying every day," he said. "The regime for which you worked is killing people. Your personal fate compared to this does not mean so much. Take the risk."

He said that Russia's oligarchs bear a responsibility for not doing more "to stop the war criminal" and now must pay by taking that risk.

Khodorkovsky blamed Putin's decision to invade Ukraine on the president's increasing isolation and said a small number of people who did have access to him had been able "to distort his view of reality." As a result, Khodorkovsky predicted that Putin would eventually face a widespread backlash and that it could ultimately be his turn to pay.

"It was a mistake for him, because I don't know how long he could have remained in power had he behaved more calmly, but now it will be much more difficult for him," he said.
WASHINGTON  More Russian troops are pulling back from their advance on Ukraines capital city of Kyiv as invading forces intensify their attack in the separatist region of Donbas in the east, a senior U.S. defense official said Monday.

About two-thirds of the 20 fast-response units  known as battalion tactical groups  Russia had surrounding Kyiv in the wars first five weeks have turned back north into Belarus since last week, said the official who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

What we continue to believe is that [the Russian troops] are going to be refit, resupplied, perhaps maybe even reinforced with additional manpower and then sent back into Ukraine to continue fighting elsewhere, the official told reporters at the Pentagon.

While the vast majority of Russian forces deployed for the invasion remain in Ukraine, the 20 fast-response units that surrounded Kyiv represented nearly 17% of the 125 battalion tactical groups used by Russia to launch its war more than five weeks ago, the official said.

In total, Russia has about 168 of such groups, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told Russias state-owned TASS news outlet in August. Each unit has about 800 infantrymen.

Russias shift away from the capital city comes after weeks of stalled movement toward Kyiv. Russias Defense Ministry now claims their goal was always to liberate the Donbas region  not overthrow Kyiv and the Ukrainian government.

"Clearly the maximalist goals originally set out by Mr. Putin have not been attained, have not been reached, the U.S. defense official said. He made it very clear publicly what he was going after, no matter what their narrative is now."

The changed messaging is part of classic Russian behavior in attempt to save face in the public sphere, the official said.

[Putin] made it very clear he was after regime change in Ukraine, and a key piece of achieving that regime change was taking the capital city. He has failed to do that, and they are now moving away on the ground. They're moving away from Kyiv."

Indications of the refocus are now appearing elsewhere in Ukraine, as well, as the official said some forces north of the southern city of Mariupol may be aiming to push north to Donetsk, a separatist city in the Donbas region.

"Again, that's in keeping with what we said that they would want to close off that Donbas area, the official said.

While Russia for weeks has made more progress in southern Ukraine, their forces have now gotten pinched in between Kherson and Mykolaiv in the south, the official said.

We have analysis that they've shifted much more to a defensive posture around Kherson, the official said.

Still, Russia over the weekend launched airstrikes on Odesa in southeastern Ukraine, claiming to have struck an oil depot in the port city on the Black Sea.

Russias reasoning behind this is unclear and there are no major signs of an imminent amphibious assault on the region, the official said, though some Russian navy landing ships have been conducting security patrols south of Odesa.

It could be they are [preparing to] move on Odessa, the official said. It could be they're simply doing that to try to pin down Ukrainian forces there  make them think that there's something big coming in Odesa so they stay and try to protect the city."

Russia has also been refocusing their airstrikes on Izyum in eastern Ukraine near a Ukrainian joint-forces area, the official said.

Izyum, which is in the Kharkiv region, is important in organizing the defense of  the Donetsk region, the Ukrainian military said in a statement Friday announcing Russia had gained control of the city.

Previously, the [Russians] claimed that it is more reasonable to focus on the occupation of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, the Ukrainian military said in the statement. Therefore, regrouping was in motion over this week.

The Ukrainian military also predicted Russian forces moving from the Kyiv region would be directed at strengthening the units trying to attack the territory of the joint-forces operation near Izyum, according to the statement.

So far, Russia has launched more than 1,400 missiles since the war started Feb. 24, which "isn't a major change in the numbers" since Friday, the official said.
(Tribune News Service)  On a muddy spring afternoon in Corrales, N.M., Jessica Andrews inspects lettuce rows inside a warm greenhouse at Silver Leaf Farms.

The U.S. Navy veteran is starting a new career in agriculture now that she has returned to New Mexico from her post in Hawaii.

Andrews is hoping to reinvigorate a plot of family land in Espanola as a small farm.

I really love the idea of growing my own food to sustain myself and the local community, she said.

Andrews and 30 other New Mexico residents gathered in Albuquerque for Armed to Farm, a weeklong program that teaches military veterans how to run an agricultural business.

The National Center for Appropriate Technology has trained 900 veterans in the last decade through the free initiative.

A mix of classroom instruction and site visits gives the beginning farmers confidence and connections, said program director Margo Hale, who also leads the agriculture organizations southeastern region.

Theyre getting to see successful farms in action and get their hands dirty, Hale said. Its great for them to pick up ideas of things that might work for their own farms and ranches.

Training sessions include recordkeeping and goal setting, funding opportunities, soil health, planning and risk, beekeeping, water conservation and marketing.

The group visited local cattle ranches and hog farms to learn about selling products at farmers markets and restaurants.

Several urban farms taught the group how to make the most of small spaces and limited water.

Hale enjoys seeing the participants connect over shared experiences of military service and farming goals.

Veterans make really great farmers, she said, and we always need more people growing awesome food for their communities.

For Ashley Cook, an Army veteran who grew up on a Fort Sumner hay farm, the training will help her and her husband tackle challenges as they grow produce and raise chickens in a dry climate.

Weve learned so much in the classroom and at the farms that we never knew, and never knew to even ask about, Cook said.

The program showcases federal programs to fund rural businesses.

A focus on sustainability encourages the group not to just rely on the old way of doing things, Cook said.

We didnt realize that some of the practices that are currently being used on the farm are actually damaging the soil, and its something we can take back to help us improve, she said.

Amanda Cordero and Jon Erickson married after meeting while deployed on a Navy ship near Guam.

They joined the program to learn how to transform their barren plot of land north of Hatch back into a farming operation.

Its so important to have a connection to our food, Cordero said. Especially in this climate, learning about soil health and nutrients has been amazing.

This year the program is also hosting trainings in Texas, California and North Carolina.

The veterans said they feel a similar sense of community and mission in agriculture as they did during their time in the military.

Program participants can access NCATs consultations, technical assistance and webinars.

The agriculture community in New Mexico is so willing to help the newbies coming into it, Andrews said. Theyre like, this is what we know, this is where we messed up, these are lessons learned. Everybodys working together.

More Information

Go to armedtofarm.org to learn more about the sustainable agriculture training program for veterans.

Theresa Davis is a Report for America corps member covering water and the environment for the Albuquerque Journal.

(c)2022 the Albuquerque Journal (Albuquerque, N.M.)

Visit the Albuquerque Journal (Albuquerque, N.M.) at www.abqjournal.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
WASHINGTON  The White House on Monday announced an attempt to recruit veterans and troops leaving the service into some of the tens of thousands of vacancies in the commercial trucking industry.

President Joe Biden unveiled a new task force that will work with national veterans organizations to develop an action plan to attract veterans and service members into the industry, as well as figure out how to retain them in trucking jobs. At least one in 10 truckers are veterans, according to a census report from 2019.

The task force is part of a larger effort to bolster the trucking industry, which moves 72% of the countrys goods, according to the White House. Bidens administration has been under pressure to tackle supply chain issues that have disrupted the U.S. economy.

Speaking in front of the White House, Biden said Monday that the industry was one that we desperately need at full strength.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said there are 80,000 vacancies in the trucking industry, and about 300,000 truckers leave the profession every year.

We must do more and do better to recruit more people into the job and support them, so they choose to stay in the job, Buttigieg said.

Veterans are uniquely qualified for commercial trucking jobs because of their attention to detail and experience with teamwork, said Sarah Amico, the executive chairperson of Jack Cooper Holdings, a car shipping company. Bidens administration is also looking to recruit veterans to help cut the unemployment and underemployment rates among the veteran population.

If you can handle a tank, if you can handle an armored personnel carrier, you can sure as hell handle one of these suckers, Biden said, gesturing toward two semitrailers parked behind him at the White House.

The new task force will be led by Patrick Murphy, an Iraq War veteran, former congressman and former undersecretary of the Army. Murphys grandfather returned from his service in World War II and became a commercial truck driver, he said. His father, a police officer, worked as a trucker on the weekends.

What the task force is all about is to create that bridge between veterans and the trucking industry, he said. For my family, which was built and survived on that industry, that bridge is how we got through. It needs to be more accessible to veterans.

In addition to the task force, Biden announced other initiatives Tuesday that his administration is taking to improve the trucking industry.

The Transportation Department expanded trucking apprenticeships, and it provided $57 million at the start of this year to help states expedite commercial drivers licenses. The White House said the funding led to an increase of 112% in commercial drivers license processing in January and February compared to the same period last year.

The administration is working to combat predatory truck-leasing arrangements, improve workplace safety and add truck parking  actions they think will help keep truckers in their jobs.

In addition to recruiting veterans, the White House is attempting to increase the number of women in the trucking industry. About 7% of truckers are women, according to the American Trucking Association.

The bipartisan infrastructure bill approved in November created the Women of Trucking Advisory Board, which will report on challenges facing women drivers and women interested in joining the profession.

The administration is also planning a "day of action" in April to raise awareness for the prevention of sexual assault and harassment in the trucking industry. At that time, the White House will call on the industry to commit to creating safe work environments.

We have to keep it going with building a better economy around American manufacturing and the American supply chain, Biden said, addressing a group of truckers. This country will be counting on you more than it ever has. So, you should be able to count on us to keep investing in you and your families.
It's not just the cool winds that can often blow through Palma at this time of year, but there's a distinct freshness to this year's Princess Sofia Regatta.

Not only is it the biggest Olympic classes event in two years, with more than 1000 sailors from 62 countries lining up, but within the New Zealand contingent there are also new faces, new combinations and new equipment.

As many as 19 New Zealand sailors from seven of the 10 Olympic classes will compete this week in Palma, which has also been added to the Hempel World Cup Series circuit.

The most notable inclusion is a five-strong windfoiling squad of three men and two women who will be competing in their first international event since the iQFoil replaced the RS:X as the equipment to be used at the next Olympics.

The squad, who are coached by former Olympian JP Tobin, have been training and racing together in New Zealand but this is the first time for them to evaluate their progress against the international fleet.

Palma also represents the first international event for the new 49erFX pairing of Alex Maloney and Olivia Hobbs and both the 49erFX and 49er classes will be using the new sails and new masts that will be used throughout the Olympic cycle.

"There's an element of excitement with the Princess Sofia Regatta because we have some new sailors, new combinations and new classes," Yachting New Zealand high performance director Ian Stewart said. "It's not hard for the sailors to be motivated when there's less than two-and-a-half years until the next Olympics Games.

"It's really exciting for the windfoiling group who are racing against the international fleet for the first time. It's a young group with good potential for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles but there's also an opportunity there for Paris 2024."

The Princess Sofia Regatta typically represents the start of the European season as sailors build towards their class world championships. Most of those are scheduled for the second half of the year, with the exception of the ILCA 7 (Laser) whose world championships are next month in Mexico.

Tom Saunders will be competing in Palma in his first international event since winning last year's world title and will be joined in the fleet by fellow Kiwis George Gautrey and Luke Cashmore.

"For the ILCA sailors, Palma is a really purposeful countdown to the world championships in Mexico," Stewart said. "They've got the Princess Sofia Regatta and then another regatta in Hyeres at the end of the month to sharpen their skills before the world champs."

Racing in Palma gets under way for the ILCA, 470 and iQFoil sailors on Monday night (NZ time) and for the 49er, 49erFX, Nacra 17 and kitefoilers the following day.

New Zealand sailors competing at the Princess Sofia Regatta in Palma:

49er: Logan Dunning Beck and Oscar Gunn; Isaac McHardie and William McKenzie; Sam Bacon and Henry Gautrey

49erFX: Alex Maloney and Olivia Hobbs

ILCA 7: Tom Saunders, George Gautrey, Luke Cashmore

ILCA 6: Olivia Christie

Nacra 17: Micah Wilkinson and Erica Dawson

Men's iQFoil: Josh Armit, Thomas Crook, Eli Liefting

Women's iQFoil: Veerle ten Have, Brianna Orams
The Ministry of Health is reporting 10,205 community cases, 734 hospitalisations and 9 deaths.

There are 571 cases being reported in the Bay of Plenty and 267 in the Lakes district.

The seven-day rolling average of case numbers continues to decline, today's seven-day rolling average is 13,218, while the seven-day rolling average of cases as at last Monday was 16,102, says an MOH spokesperson.

"A reminder that from 11:59pm tonight, there is no requirement to use My Vaccine Pass. Businesses will still be able to use the system if they would like to.

"As restrictions around the pass ease, it is important for people to continue to follow public health advice to stay at home, away from school or work if youre feeling unwell. Another way to protect you and your whanau is to get vaccinated if you havent already done so.

"Vaccination remains our best defence against Covid-19 and getting boosted is an important way people can protect themselves, their whanau and their friends from the virus.

"Please if you are due for a vaccination, whether it be a second shot or booster, make an appointment today."

COVID-19 deaths

The deaths being reported today include people who have died over the past three days.

Delays to reporting can be associated with people dying with Covid-19, rather than from Covid-19, and Covid being discovered only after they have died, says the MOH.

"These deaths take the total number of publicly reported deaths with Covid-19 to 405 and the 7-day rolling average of reported deaths is 20.

"Of the people whose deaths we are reporting today, one person was from the Auckland region, three from Waikato, two from Lakes, two from the Wellington region, and one from Southern.

"One person was in their 50s, one in their 60s, one in their 70s, two in their 80s, and four were over-90.

"Five were men and four were women.

"Out of respect, we will be making no further comment."

Vaccinations administered in New Zealand

Vaccines administered to date: 4,025,670 first doses; 3,974,925 second doses; 34,383 third primary doses; 2,589,237 booster doses: 259,478 paediatric first doses and 90,890 paediatric second doses

Vaccines administered yesterday: 22 first doses; 65 second doses; 1 third primary doses; 866 booster doses; 95 paediatric first doses and 1,477 paediatric second doses

People vaccinated

All Ethnicities (percentage of eligible people aged 12+): 4,055,352 first dose (96.3%); 4,002,833 second dose (95.1%), 2,587,110 boosted (72.7% of those eligible)

Maori (percentage of eligible people aged 12+): 520,417 first dose (91.1%); 502,966 second dose (88.1%), 229,803 boosted (57.5% of those eligible)

Pacific Peoples (percentage of eligible people aged 12+): 281,568 first dose (98.2%); 276,432 second dose (96.4%), 136,939 boosted (59.3% of those eligible)

5 to 11-year-olds all ethnicities: 257,402 first dose (54%); 88,882 second dose (18.7%)

5 to 11-year-olds - Maori: 40,450 first dose (35%); 9,957 second dose (8.6%)

5 to 11-year-olds - Pacific Peoples: 23,307 first dose (47.2%); 4,768 second dose (9.7%)

Note that the number for People vaccinated differs slightly from Vaccines administered as it includes those that have been vaccinated overseas.

Vaccination rates for all DHBs*

Northland DHB: first dose (90.1%); second dose (87.9%); boosted (69.4%)

Auckland Metro DHB: first dose (97.2%); second dose (96.1%); boosted (71.3%)

Waikato DHB: first dose (95.1%); second dose (93.5%); boosted (68.3%)

Bay of Plenty DHB: first dose (95%); second dose (93.3%); boosted (67.8%)

Lakes DHB: first dose (93.2%); second dose (91.3%); boosted (68.4%)

MidCentral DHB: first dose (96.5%); second dose (95.2%); boosted (74.1%)

Tairawhiti DHB: first dose (93.2%); second dose (90.9%); boosted (68.3%)

Whanganui DHB: first dose (91.9%); second dose (90.4%); boosted (73.4%)

Hawkes Bay DHB: first dose (97.1%); second dose (95.4%); boosted (71.9%)

Taranaki DHB: first dose (94.6%); second dose (93.2%); boosted (70%)

Wairarapa DHB: first dose (96.4%); second dose (94.9%); boosted (74.7%)

Capital & Coast DHB: first dose (98.5%); second dose (97.8%); boosted (81.1%)

Hutt Valley DHB: first dose (96.6%); second dose (95.6%); boosted (76.9%)

Nelson Marlborough DHB: first dose (96.4%); second dose (95.1%); boosted (75.4%)

West Coast DHB: first dose (92.6%); second dose (91.2%); boosted (73.3%)

Canterbury DHB: first dose (99.7%); second dose (98.7%); boosted (75.9%)

South Canterbury DHB: first dose (94.9%); second dose (93.8%); boosted (76.3%)

Southern DHB: first dose (98.3%); second dose (97.2%); boosted (74.8%)

*Partially and second doses percentages are for those 12+. Boosted percentages are for 18+ who have become eligible 3 months after having their second dose

Percentages are based on 2020 HSU data - a health-specific population denominator. As the population continues to change over time, coverage rates can exceed 100%.

Hospitalisations

Cases in hospital: total number 734: Northland: 28; Waitemata: 111; Counties Manukau: 131; Auckland: 108; Waikato: 75; Bay of Plenty: 37; Lakes: 14; Tairawhiti: 3, Hawkes Bay: 33; Taranaki: 21; Whanganui: 5; MidCentral: 20; Wairarapa: 2; Hutt Valley: 21; Capital and Coast: 16; Nelson Marlborough: 13; Canterbury: 49; South Canterbury: 9; West Coast: 5; Southern: 33

Average age of current hospitalisations: 59

Cases in ICU or HDU: 25

Vaccination status of current hospitalisations (Northern Region only, excluding Emergency Departments): Unvaccinated or not eligible (50 cases / 14%); partially immunised <7 days from second dose or have only received one dose (9 cases / 2%); double vaccinated at least 7 days before being reported as a case (76 cases / 21%); Received booster at least 7 days before being reported as a case (98 cases / 27%); unknown (136 cases / 37%)

Cases

Seven day rolling average of community cases: 13,218

Seven day rolling average (as at Monday last week): 16,102

Number of new community cases: 10,205

Number of new community cases (PCR): 121

Number of new community cases (RAT): 10,084

Location of new community cases (PCR & RAT): Northland (407), Auckland (1,835), Waikato (878), Bay of Plenty (571), Lakes (267), Hawkes Bay (454), MidCentral (531), Whanganui (249), Taranaki (357), Tairawhiti (125), Wairarapa (92), Capital and Coast (745), Hutt Valley (390), Nelson Marlborough (398), Canterbury (1,664), South Canterbury (207), Southern (958), West Coast (76); Unknown (1)

Number of new cases identified at the border: 33

Number of active community cases (total): 92,505 (cases identified in the past 7 days and not yet classified as recovered)

Confirmed cases (total): 701,986

Please note, the Ministry of Healths daily reported cases may differ slightly from those reported at a DHB or local public health unit level. This is because of different reporting cut off times and the assignment of cases between regions, for example when a case is tested outside their usual region of residence. Total numbers will always be the formal daily case tally as reported to the WHO.

Tests
As part of the Governments ongoing response to Ukraine, new sanctions targeting oligarchs with close personal ties to Vladimir Putin or the Russian government will come into force at midnight tonight, Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta has announced.

The Government has approved sanctions on a further 36 individuals, all of whom are Russian oligarchs or their close family members with close ties to the Russian regime or the Russian President himself, says Mahuta.

This list includes some of Russias richest businesspeople, as well as chairs and chief executives of some of Russias biggest companies. They will not be able to travel to Aotearoa New Zealand, move assets here, or use our financial systems to hide from sanctions imposed by other countries.

New Zealand is appalled at reports over the weekend showing the targeted killing and abuse of civilians, as Russian troops withdraw from areas of Ukraine.

Through our sanctions, we are working with the international community to put real pressure on those supporting Putin and his regime, and send a clear message that this illegal invasion cannot continue, and that the brutality and inhumane acts from Russian troops cannot be tolerated.

This is the second round of sanctions since the passing of the Russia Sanctions Act just three weeks ago. The Governments first sanctions under the Act targeted 19 entities, President Putin and members of his national security council, as well as adding 364 individuals to New Zealands travel ban list.

Officials continue to work as quickly as possible to identify individuals and entities, while ensuring legal thresholds are met and due diligence is given. More measures will be enacted in the coming weeks, says Mahuta.

A full list of the individuals and entities impacted by the Russia Sanctions Act 2022 can be found on the MFAT website: www.mfat.govt.nz/Russia-Sanctions
The tide of people moving out of Auckland for greener pastures in other parts of the country has increased during the pandemic.

Official figures show close to 25,000 people have left the city in the past two years.

The flow of people moving out of Auckland is a long held trend in our internal migration patterns because the city gets its influx of people from births and international arrivals, the latter when borders are open.

But for some it appears Covid-19 has accelerated their plans to leave the big smoke.

Charlotte Connoley says experiencing a pandemic helped her realise how precious time is with her family.

"Where we lived everything was half an hour away whether it was the doctor or the scooter park or the library or the water or whatever and then further afield than that you had the traffic."

Connoley and her family moved out of Auckland in the new year, after she got a job offer she could not turn down, and now live in Bay of Plenty.

"Where we're located now the water's a kilometre down the road, the school's 500 metres up the road, all the outdoor activities that we like, water sports, biking, are just on our doorstep and really accessible."

Former Aucklander Tessa Sillifant stayed in the city for job opportunities when she arrived here from England 16 years ago.

She moved to Methven at the end of last year, chasing a long-held dream to live in the South Island - and also own a home.

"I know I can't afford to buy a house in Auckland so I wanted to be able to be in an area that I could settle longer term and I wasn't sure where that would be but I knew I'd like to be somewhere in the South Island."

Sillifant says lockdowns gave her a chance to remember her dream of living near the mountains.

"I literally just loaded up the car and drove down. I've been here a few months and I really like it here so I've managed to get a place for a year."

Auckland's net loss stood at 13,500 residents last year, a couple of thousand more than previous years.

What's to blame

Auckland Council's chief economist Gary Blick says housing affordability, alongside the city's liveability and productivity are to blame for the fall.

"Incomes in Auckland tend to be higher than other regions and we would expect the opportunities of a large and successful city to attract a net gain in residents," he says in a quarterly update.

"Yet these net losses show that plenty of people judge they would be better off living in other regions. This raises the question of whether Auckland's overall liveability is as good as it could be."

Sociologist and Massey University distinguished emeritus professor Paul Spoonley says the pandemic has also likely played a part in many people's decisions to move.

Photo: RNZ / Katie Scotcher.

"I think it's very much a function of Covid and the possibilities of people either losing their jobs in the main centres and looking to move somewhere else perhaps a little cheaper, or the possibility that they're now working from home or from a distance and so they have new possibilities of where they can live and work."

Working from home had certainly opened up options for many.

Connoley saysd when they moved to Plummers Point near Tauranga, her husband kept his corporate job in Auckland.

"We didn't feel the pressure to change his situation at this stage and I guess that's where Covid has benefited a lot of us because he can work from home two days a week so it really only means he's in Auckland three days."

As international borders open, it's expected Auckland will again attract migrants wanting to make their home here.

But Spoonley says there will also be a brain drain.

"What we pay in New Zealand and in Auckland is often not particularly competitive in terms of an international talent market.

"As we saw at the end of the global financial crisis there will be a very significant outflow from New Zealand. It is very concerning, we often talk at the level of a firm about the challenges of recruiting in a very tight labour market or retaining people, I think we've got to think about that as a country."

With Covid-19 still circulating it's difficult for modellers to predict how many people would leave New Zealand, and by how much Auckland might grow, he says.

-RNZ/Amy Williams.
Current Print Subscribers will be prompted to either login to their current site user account or to create a new one. A confirmation email will be sent when a new user account is created, which must be confirmed within three days in order to provide uninterrupted online access through your Print Subscription.

Once the email address is confirmed please provide your Account Number to activate your Print Subscription Service.
MaheshY1 BHPian



Join Date: Jun 2014 Location: Tapukara Posts: 381 Thanked: 904 Times

Re: Near identical cars, but Venue outsells the Sonet! Why? In my opinion, the simple reason is - jo dikhta h woh bikta h.



Hyundai just have this habit of making sure they have a sales outlet usually within walking distance from prime Maruti Arena and Nexa outlets. Maruties sell more because they have a larger sales and service network and they have a large network because they sell well. I'm assuming Hyundai have a disproportionate avg sales per dealership to no. of dealerships ratio compared to Maruti. They have a fairly strong dealership presence for about half of Maruti's sales.



The cars we see on the road and in our friends and family's garages also attract more sales because we have spent enough time with the car to fall in love with it. (You know potential buyers are usually emotional about their shortlisted vehicles during their pre-purchase phase.)



Kia have a solid presence in bigger cities but Hyundai have pretty much covered the entire country and their sales/service network is second only to Maruti's.



I'm also seeing this same phenomenon with Tata cars. The Nexon, Punch, Harrier and Safari are all overpriced and they still sell in good numbers. Even the Tiago and Altroz, which don't have the 'SUV' tag are doing pretty well. I'm sure someone who recently purchased a Tata car or is in the pre-purchase phase, will try to prove me wrong. But, I'll have to dismiss it as the emotions talking. I'm more interested in listening to the justifications for Tata Cars = VFM from someone who shortlisted one and then rejected it.



This is also because Tata are now copying Hyundai's moves. In Bhiwadi, I'm seeing a new Tata showroom under construction right next to a fancy Nexa dealership. Tata also moved into the Manesar NH8 location, where Hyundai and Maruti Arena are next-door neighbors.



While you are checking out a Brezza, you can also take a look at the Venue and the Nexon, which are a quick 50-100m walk away. And brings it full circle to the sales <-> dealership presence ratio. Last edited by MaheshY1 : 4th April 2022 at 10:46 .
WTF?! Razer's headsets boast many impressive features, but it appears the company forgot to mention that they're bulletproof. The seemingly believable claim comes from a Redditor who says his life was saved by one of the peripherals when it stopped a stray bullet.

Enough_Dance_956's 'Razed saved my life..' post includes several images of what appears to be a bullet hole in his window and a damaged Razer headset. According to the 18-year-old, who lives in Torrance, California, a stray bullet came through the glass last Wednesday and ricocheted off the headset they were wearing at the time. The projectile was deflected into a wall before it landed on the bed.

The headset in question was the original Razer Kraken. Having never shot any ourselves, it's hard to verify their ability to deflect a bullet, though the photos suggest it perforated the outer material and bounced off the metal inside. Enough_Dance_956 writes that they filed a police report and authorities took the bullet.

Being the internet, this could all be an elaborate hoax, especially when you consider it was posted on April 1. Some commentators say there is no corresponding hole in the mesh behind the window, but closer inspection shows it has bent and warped. Others question whether a bullet that allegedly came from a block away could enter the window at such an angle. It's also noted that if a stray bullet really did fly through the glass, it would have traveled over the wearer's head had they not been sporting the Krakens, given where it entered the headphones' band.

If the incident really did occur, it would have carried more believability if the poster didn't wait until April 1 to reveal it on Reddit. Nevertheless, a Razer Kraken representative offered to replace the $79 headset, but Enough_Dance_956 refused, saying they just wanted to thank the company.

Way back in 2016, a former Nokia executive claimed that a Nokia 301, first released in 2013, saved a man in Afghanistan by stopping a bullet. Shame it wasn't a Nokia 3310, which would have likely deflected it back to the shooter.

h/t: Windows Central
A hot potato: Google and Microsoft have been at it for decades, and the search giant has now brought Redmond's IT monopoly in the US government sector into the spotlight with a new survey. Commissioned by the Google Cloud team, the Public Opinion Strategies survey polled 2,600 American workers, 338 of whom were employed across federal, state or local governments. Besides a majority of these government employees showing concern for future cyberattacks, and being unsatisfied with Microsoft's workplace offerings, Google said that governments' reliance on Microsoft tech made them more vulnerable to hacking.

In a rather scathing blog post, Google criticized the dominance of Microsoft's productivity software currently in use across US federal and state governments for the security risks and vulnerability associated with the 'legacy' tools. While there is truth to Google's claims, the Public Opinion Strategies survey it has used to make them is also questionable in itself.

For starters, the survey is commissioned by Google Cloud, instead of being independent. And if that doesn't increase the risk of bias, the meaningful sample size on which Google has drawn its conclusion forms just 13 percent of the total, since just 338 out of 2,600 surveyed people are government employees.

With that said, what the survey does reveal is that over 50 percent of these government workers would rather have other products and services - besides Microsoft's legacy software - that could help them do their jobs better.

They also shared concerns about potential cybersecurity attacks and governments being more vulnerable to hacking since they mostly relied on Microsoft products like Word, Outlook, Teams, and OneDrive.

The efficacy of these tools was brought into question as well, with the survey responses split between users going in favor of Microsoft and those stuck using these services because switching to another vendor was difficult.

Google said that this situation also risked workers adopting 'shadow IT' practices, which involves using products and services at work that haven't been officially approved by their IT departments. The survey claims that the lack of diversity in available tools has led 35 percent of D.C metro government workers to use shadow IT, 41 percent of whom fall in the 20-34 age group.

In its response, Microsoft called Google's study 'disappointing but not surprising' in an email to NBC News. Frank Shaw, Microsoft CVP of communications, said that it was unhelpful of Google to create divisions in the security community during a time of heightened alert.

He also noted that Redmond would collaborate across the industry to defend its customers and government agencies and will support the US government with its best software and security services.
What just happened? Russia says it will halt cooperation with western nations on the International Space Station (ISS) until sanctions imposed on Moscow are lifted. Russia's space director, Dmitry Rogozin, made the announcement on social media, but NASA says it continues to support government space cooperation.

Rogozin, who heads Russia's Roscosmos space agency, said that the goal of the sanctions was to "kill Russian economy and plunge our people into despair and hunger, to get our country on its knees." He added that they "won't succeed in it, but the intentions are clear."

"That's why I believe that the restoration of normal relations between the partners at the International Space Station (ISS) and other projects is possible only with full and unconditional removal of illegal sanctions," Rogozin wrote in his Telegram account.

Rogozin tweeted that he appealed the sanctions in letters to NASA, the European Space Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). He also posted images of what are allegedly responses from each countrythe CSA confirmed the letter's authenticity to The Verge.

"   , ' *    ...   '       '         ' '  - . pic.twitter.com/rnMYiK9wal  "- (@Rogozin) April 2, 2022

"The U.S. continues to support international government space cooperations, especially those activities associated with operating the ISS with Russia, Canada, Europe, and Japan," states one letter, signed by NASA administrator Bill Nelson. "New and existing U.S. export control measures continue to allow cooperation between the U.S. and Russia to ensure continued safe operations of the ISS."

Rogozin said Roscosmos will determine a date for halting Russia's involvement with the ISS, which will then be reported to the Russian government.

Russia has continued to work with western partners, including the US, on the ISS since the country invaded Ukraine. Two Russian cosmonauts and a US astronaut returned to earth last Wednesday and landed in Kazakhstan, where they were met by Russian and NASA officials who cooperated during the recovery.

The New York Times notes that the agreement between nations participating in the space program runs until 2024, and the US wants to extend this until 2030. Russia previously said it planned to leave the ISS and launch its own space station into orbit by the end of the decade.

"All of our international partners including Roscosmos are making progress on moving towards station extension to 2030," said Kathy Lueders, NASA's associate administrator for space operations. She added that NASA is also working on other agreements with Russia.

In February, Rogozin warned that without the participation of Russia, which NASA relies on for the ISS's position and orientation in space, the station would (eventually) come crashing into the US, Europe, India, or China. But Elon Musk believes SpaceX could prevent this nightmare scenario.
What just happened? Belarusian World of Tanks developer Wargaming has announced that it is pulling out of Russia and Belarus following the invasion of Ukraine. The company says it has been conducting a strategic review of business operations worldwide over the last few weeks and has decided it will no longer own or operate any businesses in either country.

Wargaming wrote in a LinkedIn post that it transferred its live games business in Russia and Belarus to the local management of Saint Petersburg-based Lesta Studio, which is no longer affiliated with the company. Wargaming emphasized that it will not profit from this move but instead expects to experience substantial losses as a result of the decision.

During the transition period, live products will remain available in Russia and Belarus and will be operated by the new owner. Wargaming added that the company is also in the process of closing down its studio in Minsk, Belarus.

"Heads of Products and Services will be meeting with their teams shortly to discuss the impact of this decision on each department," the company wrote in the press release.

While Wargaming doesn't mention the reason behind its decision, Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the sanctions placed on it and Belarus will doubtlessly have led to the move.

Russian Victor Kislyi founded Wargaming in the Belarus capital of Minsk but moved its headquarters to Cyprus in 2011. It has over 19 offices globally, including in Australia, Paris, Chicago, Berlin, and England.

A few weeks ago, World of Tanks creative director Sergey Burkatovskiy came out in public support of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Wargaming, which employs hundreds of developers in Ukraine's capital of Kyiv, said that the statement was his own opinion, and it categorically does not coincide with the position of the studio. Burkatovskiy was fired from the company.
In context: It seems more and more these end users cannot reliably own anything. Many game and software developers have moved to games/software-as-a-service models (GaaS and SaaS, respectively). Manufacturers could apply the same idea to anything requiring firmware. We live in a time where a company has more control over our purchased devices than we do.

A car owner recently posted a video showing that this philosophy could be bleeding over into the automotive industry. On the r/mildlyinfuriating subreddit, the user posted a video showing how at least one button on the dash of his Audi Q4 E-Tron does not work because he had not paid for it.

The control in question is labeled "Sync" and is tied to the air conditioning system. It is used to toggle Audi's tri-zone climate control. Instead of simply not working, the button spits out a message on the infotainment center's screen saying, "Note: The function has not been purchased."

The Drive notes that in the US and UK, tri-zone climate control comes standard on Audi vehicles. However, in the user's home country of Denmark, it's a $758 add-on feature. The owner did not pay for it because he did not expect to use it, but he was surprised to see that fact pop up on the screen.

The post received nearly 120,000 upvotes in the last two weeks with thousands of comments  many of them snarky jabs at Audi for bringing microtransactions to cars. The message does not contain an option to purchase the feature, but there is no reason it couldn't. Manufacturers often release over-the-air updates to their vehicles to add functionality to them. So there is no reason they couldn't change the firmware to enable such a feature.

It raises the question of whether we will start seeing future vehicles with a list of options that we can purchase after the initial sale. A more important question is whether carmakers will start pushing subscription-based services that were once basic features of their vehicles.

Commenters on the post joke about paying to turn on airbags, but a more logical application would be turning once-standard features, like air conditioning, into subscription services. It sounds ridiculous, but it doesn't seem so far-fetched if you consider that many game and software developers have moved toward GaaS and SaaS models. There isn't anything holding carmakers back from doing this other than it's so far been untested waters. Nobody wants to suffer the public outrage at being the first.

"You will own nothing, and you will be happy."
Elon Musk talked about how much powerful the Raptor engines are, and SpaceX's design is something that the company boasts of for its soon performance with Starship. However, during this revelation, Musk also implied that there is nothing that can compare to the Raptor engines on its power output.

The CEO said that Tesla's electric motors could not compete with the Raptor.

Tesla's Electric Motors Cannot Compete with the Raptor

Musk answered a question that runs long for Tesla and SpaceX fans, particularly those that think that the Raptor engines may completely look into its transition to electric power. The tech CEO said that Tesla's electric motors and batteries could not compete with the Raptor engines that power the spacecraft of SpaceX.

The statement is massive, and coming from the founder and engineer himself, it may be something that the company would not showcase to the public in the coming years. However, it may soon happen for the company, but it would take a long time and advanced technology to turn SpaceX's operations electric, like Tesla.

The Raptor engine's power for the Starship's 33-engine layout can output three gigawatts, something batteries and motors cannot match, says the CEO.

Read Also: SpaceX To Launch Top Swiss Curator for First Mars Space Art Exhibition; Musk Meets With Anonymous Individual

Raptor pump power is over 100MW per engine & 33 engines, means over 3GW. Not even remotely possible for electric motors & batteries to compete.  Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 3, 2022

No Electric Motors for SpaceX's Starship?

Online blogger, Everyday Astronaut, talked about a theoretical use of the Tesla Model S Plaid version's power output, and it is about its capabilities to power Russia's RD-170 engine for its spacecraft. The content creator said that it might take at least 676 electric motors of the vehicle to power the rocket, and it does not yet include the number of batteries needed.

Elon Musk and Electrification

The multi-tech CEO previously hinted about making an electric jet, something that he pitched to the Marvel Cinematic Universe's genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist, Tony Stark. The tech CEO's line in the 2010 movie, "Iron Man 2," is something that he casually brought up back in 2020, and despite it being a hint, many people believe that it is something under development.

However, in his previous tweet about the Raptor and electric motors, there may be disputes about it.

There was also something that Microsoft co-founder, Bill Gates, mentioned in an interview, and apart from looking down on Tesla's capabilities, the tech magnate also said that electric airplanes or jets are not possible. That is because the batteries that will power its electric motors would be too heavy for a massive vehicle.

There are many hindrances to creating an electric airplane, particularly with a heavy electric drive system and its batteries. Musk's opinion weighs in on a massive point, particularly when saying that the Raptor engine is powerful enough to bring cargo to space, but not open up the possibility of an electric motor to power the Starship.

Related Article: Elon Musk Tesla: Supersonic eVTOL Jet is a Concept the CEO Wants, But It May Not Be Coming

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Isaiah Richard

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Tesla's 2022 Q1 report brought something new for the clean energy company at the start of this year, and it is something unexpected for them despite the massive performance last year. CEO Elon Musk said that it has been a difficult one for the company, and that includes the performance it had for the first three months.

Nevertheless, the company still delivered and increased its production this quarter.

Tesla's Q1 2022 Report: Production and Deliveries Increased

Tesla released its 2022 Q1 report to the public over the weekend, and it talked about the performance of the company in the early days of the year. The company increased its numbers to as much as 305,000 for its production and 310,000 for its deliveries in the first three months of the first quarter, stemming from January, February, and March.

These numbers are for the Tesla Model 3 and Model Y only.

The release is not yet a full report of the company's performance, rather only its first look back on its performance for the early year. Tesla said that it will bring its financial report by Wednesday, April 20, for the public to see and its investors to know. Users can catch the live updates via Tesla's website for its next event.

Read Also: Elon Musk to Host 'Biggest Party on Earth'? Expects 15k People to Be Invited to the 'Cyber Rodeo'

Elon Musk Reveals Q1 2022 to be a Difficult Quarter

Musk tweeted about the company's performance in Q1 2022 as the first report released earlier this weekend. The company talked about its production and delivery increases for this quarter, but Elon Musk revealed that it was an "exceptionally difficult quarter" for them, despite the massive numbers it posted.

The CEO said that it is because of China's COVID lockdown and the supply chain interruptions. However, the company and team's effort is what saved them from their problems.

Tesla and its Performance Now

The years and quarters in the past gave Tesla a massive high on its upwards climb on the charts, its numbers, performance, and other factors from the company. The recent venture of the company is a massive extension of its production and it focuses on the Gigafactory Berlin that recently opened for its European ventures.

However, there were a series of price increases for the clean energy vehicles that brought its starting price to around $44,000, and it is far from its affordable $38,000 mark. The company's releases for buyers are not eligible for the California rebates that will help buyers in their purchases as an incentive for the electric vehicle switch.

The recent performance of Tesla and its price increase is a massive indicator of the company's track in the previous months and 2022 is not that off to a great start as per its standards. Regardless, this is not yet the end of the line for Tesla, and the company focuses on the many features it brings to the table, focusing on its electric mobility.

Related Article: Tesla's Shanghai Factory to Reopen on April 4 as City Still Under Lockdown Due to COVID-19 Cases

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Isaiah Richard

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
KIEV, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Ukraine's imports and exports decreased significantly in March, the country's Economy Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said on Sunday.

Ukraine's imports dropped from 5.9 billion U.S. dollars in February to 1.8 billion dollars in March, Svyrydenko wrote on Facebook.

Meanwhile, exports were down to 2.7 billion dollars in March from 5.3 billion dollars in February.

Due to the blockade of ports, Ukraine's agricultural exports were particularly affected, according to the minister.

"The start of sowing and the work of the state to restore logistics are the basis of stabilization of the economy," the minister said. 
Twitter's "text selection" feature is likely coming to its Android app version, bringing the essential feature, which Apple iOS users have had for some time now.

Twitter 'Text Selection' Feature

It is worth noting that the Twitter app client for the mobile operating system of the iPhone maker has been sporting the feature that allows users to select text on tweets for a while already.

Meanwhile, as per a news story by Android Police, the prominent and reputable leaker, Jane Manchun Wong, revealed an upcoming feature on the Android app of Twitter.

The new functionality that the leaker shared suggests that the Android and iOS apps of Twitter will share a new similarity. It comes once the feature has been released on the mobile operating system of Google as well.

Android Police even further noted that it appears that the social media giant is now giving its Android app its much-needed love.

The news outlet went on to say that the Android version of the Twitter app is not as user-friendly as its counterpart for iPhones.

Twitter 'Text Selection' on Android

The leaker, Wong, revealed in one of her recent tweets that "Twitter for Android is finally working on the ability to select text on Tweet."

On top of that, Wong attached a screenshot of the Twitter Android app, wherein the new "text selection" feature is already available.

According to a recent report by Engadget, Wong has been reverse-engineering various mobile apps to unravel some of the new hidden features that its developers are currently working on.

Thus, Wong has leaked some of the previous features of numerous apps before it was even announced or released to see the light of day.

Read Also: Twitter to Add Feature That Will Let You Create GIFs Straight From the Camera on iOS

Twitter Android: Overview Selection

However, Engadget noted in its new story that some Android users got confused with the recent leak. It comes as some of these folks already have the ability to select text on the app of Twitter.

In fact, those who have been using Google Pixel mobile phones have been selecting text on the Android app of Twitter through the "Overview Selection" feature of the smartphone.

The said Pixel phone feature lets its users copy and paste text from any screen on their mobile devices.

Despite that, other Android smartphones have yet to have a feature that allows their users to copy and paste stuff on the Twitter app.

Related Article: Twitter Appears to Be Working With Instagram-like Close Friends Feature

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Teejay Boris

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Tesla Model 3 police cars debuted in Taiwan as the first-ever Tesla police fleet in the Asian country.

Tesla Model 3 Police Cars

Other countries, other than Taiwan, have been using Tesla EVs, such as the Tesla Model 3 and the Tesla Model S, as part of their police fleet.

It comes as some police departments have concluded that maintaining electric vehicles is much cheaper than their fuel-powered counterparts.

This time around, Tesla Model 3 EVs are now joining the police cars of another country, Taiwan.

As per a news story by Tesla North, the Kaohsiung City of Taiwan now has two new Tesla Model 3 EVs, which will be used by its police department as patrol cars.

The news outlet further noted that the two new EVs of the Kaohsiung City police are the first-ever Tesla patrol cars in the East Asian nation.

As it turns out, the Ching Chan Optical Technology and Tianzhen Foundation donated the two Model 3 sedans to the City of Kaohsiung. The move seeks to help the police force in the Taiwanese city to both prevent and detect crime.

Tesla North noted that the Tesla Model 3 is the best-selling EV in the world last Feb. 2022. But it is interesting to point out that another Tesla vehicle, the Model Y sits in the first spot.

Read Also: Second-Hand Tesla Model 3 More Expensive! Experts Claim Australia Fails To Handle EV Demand

Tesla Model 3 Police Cars Taiwan

The two new electric police cars cost about $115,000 in the United States dollars or $3.3 million in New Taiwan dollars.

Meanwhile, according to a recent story by Taiwan English News, the two Tesla vehicles will go separate ways in the Asian country.

The first Model 3 will be given to the Kaohsiung City Municipal Police Station. On the other hand, the other one is going to the criminal investigation team of the Hunei District.

Similar to the reason that other police departments in various parts of the world cited, the Chairman of Tianzhen Foundation, Chen Sung-tian, offered that the Tesla EVs have less maintenance costs.

Taiwan English News said in its report that the savings cost from the maintenance of the two new Tesla police cars could be used for other expenses of the department.

Meanwhile, the Kaohsiung City Government Police Department issued its appreciation for the donation, wherein it further praised the performance of the Model 3 sedan, which could help in both police morale and the overall social order in the city.

Related Article: Kyte To Offer Rented Tesla Model 3 Across the US! Monthly Subscription Fee and Other Details!

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Teejay Boris

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Facebook and Twitter are purportedly stopping a handful of GOP lawmakers from getting verified on their platforms.

According to the New York Post, the terms the aforementioned lawmakers are using are "stifled" and "censored," as they seem to struggle to get the coveted blue check beside their names on their social media accounts. Among these is Republican councilwoman Inna Vernikov (Brooklyn), who says that her request to be verified on Twitter was "denied without an explanation."

She even went on to say that the popular social media platform is "stifling conservative voices," being a conservative herself. But this wasn't the only time she complained about her social media platforms being "stifled," as Facebook notably disabled her account last year in the middle of her campaign.

Other GOP members include councilwoman Vickie Paladino of Queens. She also received a notification from Facebook telling her that her official account was disabled, prompting her chief-of-staff Nicole Kiprilov to say that there's an apparent "double standard" concerning right-wingers and left-wingers.

According to Kiprilov, it seems to be that right-wing politicians are being "censored more heavily" compared to their left-wing Democrat counterparts, saying that they're seeing "conservatives shut down all the time on social media."

Social Media 'Isn't Slanted Against Right-Leaning Users'

This statement was made in a report by New York University, which made the rounds last year. It came after then-president Donald Trump and other GOP members routinely criticized Facebook, Twitter, and even YouTube of alleged anti-conservative bias.

But as per the report by NYU (via USAToday), it was reportedly found that the aforementioned social media platforms are not against right-wing users. NYU Stern Center deputy director Paul Barrett claimed that there's no evidence to support these GOP lawmakers' claims of being suppressed online. The NYU report can be read in full online if you want to check it out.

Read Also: Introduction to Internet Censorship: Its Pros and Cons

Nevertheless, this didn't stop GOP lawmakers from wanting to push for "censorship lawsuits" shortly after the NYU report was released. In a report by the Associated Press, numerous Republican party members pushed to have social media companies face lawsuits for alleged strict control of content on their platforms.

Being Denied A 'Verified' Status Is Better--For Now

Despite the constant pushback from the GOP, Facebook and Twitter have still banned numerous high-profile right-wing politicians over the past few years. Former President Trump is obviously the biggest, but there are also several who got banned because of far more obvious reasons.

Among these is Georgia representative Marjorie Taylor-Greene, who was slapped by multiple social media bans-the latest being just this January-for allegedly spreading COVID-19 misinformation. It was revealed directly by Twitter that Taylor-Greene's account had "repeated violations" of the platform's rules concerning information about the pandemic.

They banned the Georgia representative's account permanently after it incurred five strikes, which is part of Twitter's new "five strike system" for filtering out COVID-19 misinformation, as reported by Engadget.

For now, though, it looks like Facebook and Twitter are only withholding from some Republican lawmakers the chance to get verified, as there are no recent high-profile bans.

Related Article: Trump Bashes Twitter After Banning US Rep. Greene! Former POTUS Urges Supporters to Leave the Platform

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by RJ Pierce

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
The Lapsus$ members have been arrested by the UK police recently, but still, it's not enough indication that the hacking group will stop its operations.

The latest report showed that the remaining members of the notorious crew are still continuing in stealing personal information from their victims. Some are reportedly hacking business entities and destroying their networks.

Lapsus$ Members Remain at Large

As Gizmodo initially reported earlier this week, some Lapsus$ teen members were currently facing charges because of their illegal activities. However, it's not the ideal time to celebrate eliminating this group since some members are found to be engaging in hacking crimes.

The tech publication found out that some bad actors infiltrated Globant, a huge software developer. What they did was hijack important information of the company such as passwords. Later, the hackers gained access to the 70 GB storage of the firm full of confidential information.

As of press time, the cybersecurity researchers have not yet disclosed the extent of the damage that the remaining Lapsus members have done.

In an interview with Gizmodo, Globant confirmed that some information was indeed accessed. It apparently became limited to their end which means that only a select number of documentation and source codes were rolled out to the clients.

"To date, we have not found any evidence that other areas of our infrastructure systems or those of our clients were affected," the company told the tech news outlet.

Related Article: Lapsus$, the Group that Hacked Okta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Samsung, is Being Led by a Teenager

Several Partners Might be Compromised

Android Police included in its recent report that Gizmodo has sought help from a person who knows how to handle cybersecurity issues. It was mentioned in the article that there were cases of data theft that took place in Globant.

If this is proven to be orchestrated by the notorious Lapsus$ cybercriminals, this might be a bad sign for the other companies who have partnered with Globant.

Being a global company means that it has already established a myriad of connections across the majority of the regions. The 19-year-old firm has reportedly collaborated with various tech titans such as Google Cloud, Apple, and Slack.

Furthermore, Okta, the latest victim that Lapsus$ hit , was also a partner of Globant. It is indeed alarming that the suppressed group of hackers is still operating even in few numbers.

This only proves that the arrests won't stop the cybercriminals from continuing their operations. It's always important to remain vigilant in everything you click on the internet. We never know when Lapsus$ will strike again or if there are surprise attacks that could take place in the next few days or weeks.

For more cybersecurity news, you can check our previous report on how to keep safe on the internet. This guide will help you choose to find a reliable VPN service provider for your privacy and security.

Read Also: LAPSUS$ Hacking Group Has Targeted Massive Tech Companies, But Who Are They?



This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Joseph Henry

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Diagnosed without my knowledge? "The number of infected is four times higher than the count"
Coming off its crest, the Comite River moves swiftly past the piers of the Joor Road bridge midmorning Saturday, Oct. 10, 2020. Heavy rains from an outer band of Hurricane Delta dumped between 6 and 10 inches of rain late Thursday and early Friday in the rivers drainage basin, sending up water levels on Friday and Saturday.
Louisianas U.S. senators  both Republicans  said Monday they opposed confirming U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson as the first Black woman to become a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Senate Judiciary Committee, with U.S. Sen. John N. Kennedy voting no, voted 11-11 along party lines. After a parliamentary move on the Senate floor, Jackson will likely get a confirmation vote sometime this week. She will need 51 of the 100 senators to back her confirmation.

A Baton Rouge Republican, U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidys position was one of the few being watched despite his having voted in July against Jacksons ascension to the federal appellate court. Several of Cassidys supporters in Louisiana were looking at his possible yes vote as an indicator of his interest in running for governor next year. They felt if he supported Jackson later this week that it might show an attempt to reach out independent and Democratic voters.

In a statement Cassidy called Jackson gracious and intelligent but he said she had the support of those who want an activist judge and therefore not worthy of his support when the full Senate is called upon vote later this week. When the political left opposed Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Coney Barrett, not because they were not qualified but because of their presumed jurisprudence, they established the criteria by which future nominees should be judged, Cassidy said in his prepared statement.

He was referring to the three nominees by Republican President Donald Trump: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett. The three Trump nominees, who were all confirmed, created a 6-3 conservative majority. Jackson, 51, would replace, if confirmed, retiring Justice Stephen Breyer, a member of the liberal wing on the high court.

Bill Cassidy confirms he's interested in running for Louisiana governor next year U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy confirmed to Politico what The Advocate | The Times-Picayune reported on Sunday: that hes seriously considering a run 

Kennedy also said he opposes Judge Jackson. As a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, he cast his vote sooner than Cassidy.

Kennedy, who has attracted national media attention with his cornball country quotes, started off his speech Monday by noting French existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre once said that life begins on the far side of despair. Then he explained that Sartre was basically saying: What you do is what you believe and everything else is cottage cheese, said Kennedy, who lives in Madisonville, a tony, boating community in St. Tammany Parish.

Kennedy then said he found Jackson  the first African American woman to be nominated to the high court  to be smart, well versed in the law and extraordinarily deft and artful in her ability to speak at length without saying anything of substance on critical questions, Kennedy said.

The scoop on state politics in your inbox Get the Louisiana politics insider details once a week from us. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up

I dont agree with the judge on where, based on her opinions, she draws the limits of judicial power. And I dont think she places as great an importance as I do on judicial restraint in a Madisonian system of checks and balances and separation of powers, and, for that reason, I will be voting no, Kennedy said.

Jackson said she believed in a limited role for judges during her confirmation hearings.

The 11-11 tie, along party lines Monday, was expected in the 22-member Senate committee.

The full Senate will have to discharge her nomination from committee, which probably will happen late Monday night or early Tuesday morning, to get action from the full Senate.

The Democratic majority then will file a procedural motion to stop the Republican filibuster to stop the vote on Jacksons confirmation.

The 100-member Senate is 50-50 Democratic to Republican with Vice President Kamala Harris casting the deciding vote. In Jacksons case, one Republican, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, of Maine, has announced her support and willingness to join the Democratic side.
Pierce Bush speaks about his grandfather and 41st President George H.W. Bush below an Avenger torpedo bomber, similar to the one Bush flew in the war, during the dedication of the George H.W. Bush Aviation Gallery in the US Freedom Pavilion: The Boeing Center at the National WWII Museum in New Orleans.
A San Francisco-based biotech advised by experts, including Moderna co-founder Robert Langer, has chosen Australia as its research base as it works to change the way the world detects cancer.

Earli is backed by high-profile investors including Salesforce founder Marc Benioff and Silicon Valley firm Andreessen Horowitz. The start-up was founded by serial entrepreneur Cyriac Roeding and Stanford University scientist Dr Sam Gambhir, a researcher into early cancer detection who lost his only son to brain cancer.

Cyriac Roeding is chief executive of US biotech Earli, which is basing its first human trials for a new cancer detection tool in Australia.

Roeding had co-founded Shopkick, an e-commerce app which sold to Korean firm SK Telecom for $US250 million ($331 million) in 2014. He was looking for his next venture and was prompted by an article he saw in a Stanford University magazine about Dr Gambhirs research to contact him. The pair later spun out Earlis core technology into a standalone company, along with gene therapy expert Dr David Suhy.

Earli is trying to address one of the key challenges in treating cancers: not finding them early enough. Instead of looking for cancer, what if we forced the cancer to reveal itself? Mr Roeding, chief executive of the business, said.
Lithium, rare earths, and iron ore miners provided strong support for the Australian stock exchange on Monday, while an opportunistic takeover bid between funds managers grabbed attention and saw target Pendal jumping as much as 24 per cent during the day.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 closed 0.3 per cent higher, up 19.9 points to 7513.7, just 75 points below Januarys high of 7589.

Its really comforting to see that we are getting close to where the market was in January, before it fell, senior client advisor at Shaw and Partners, Adam Dawes, said.

Perpetual chairman Tony DAloisio chose his moment to pounce. Credit:Steven Siewert

Mr Dawes said Perpetuals $2.4 billion bid for Pendal was one way to grow funds in-flows.

Consolidation in the sector has been well overdue and thats how these guys survive - they buy other businesses to keep things moving.

The offer saw Pendal closing at an 11-week high of $5.29, while Perpetual ended the session at a 13-month low of $31.97, down 6.6 per cent.

Overall the financial sector closed lower with the big banks declining ahead of Tuesdays Reserve Bank meeting, and a 3.2 per cent fall in Bank of Queensland.

However, Magellan Financial gained 9.4 per cent to its highest close in eight weeks at $16.79.

But it was the mining sector that underpinned Mondays gains, especially lithium producers.

IGO gained 4 per cent, Pilbara Minerals gained 5.5 per cent, Allkem gained 7.3 per cent, and Liontown Resources gained 9 per cent. Iluka jumped to new highs of $12.50 after announcing it would spend up to $1.2 billion on a rare earth oxide refinery with help from a $1 billion government loan.

And Lynas hit a decade high of $11.59, pushing its market cap over $10 billion for the first time after a rival highlighted the clear lack of (lithium) supply to meet the expected lift in demand on an investor call.

Iron ore prices edged close to $US160 per tonne despite Chinas manufacturing index falling below 50 points, indicating contraction. This saw gains in Fortescue, BHP and Mineral Resources.

A full lock-down of Chinese mega-city Shanghai dragged on oil prices late last week, but US crude firmed a little on Monday $US99.74 per barrel.

Biggest gains:

Pendal 18.1%

Telix 10.1%

Magellan 9.7%

Liontown 9%

Novonix 8%

Biggest declines:
Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size By any stretch, Helmut Newtons iconic 1975 shot of fashion model Elsa Peretti is gobsmackingly gorgeous. Peretti is rendered epically beautiful, a perfectly perfect ideal woman of her time, all slenderness and leggy legs, milky-pale decollete and waist  tres chic!  so slim a man could circle it with his hands. Helmut Newton, Elsa Peretti, New York, 1975. Credit: Helmut Newton Foundation Newton has Peretti braced against a dramatic New York backdrop in the skimpy, va-va-voom but ever-so-tasteful gentlemans club regalia of a Playboy bunny: fishnet stockings, high heels, opera gloves and naturally, ears. Phwoar. What a woman, what a shot. Forty-odd years on, photographer Martine Gutierrez shoots fashion too. But not like Newton. Boy, have times changed. Gutierrezs work syncs with the succession of cultural quakes and shifts  three waves of feminism, one so far of #MeToo and a global swell of post-colonial protest  that have impacted images of women since Newtons glamazons. The contemporary clincher is that Gutierrezs lens and gaze are most emphatically her own. She doubles as her own swimwear model in the 2018 photograph Queer Rage, Swimming Lessons? ... As If, a crystal example of the Newton-to-Now timeline. Posed, or more accurately, slumped beside an indoor pool, Gutierrez models a fash-mash of knitted ski-mask, lime-green rubber gloves, bangles stacked to the elbows and a neon bikini strapped on over a paint-splashed shirt and matching pants. Martine Gutierrez, Queer Rage, Swimming Lessons, 2018. Credit: Martine Gutierrez. Courtesy the artist and RYAN LEE Gallery, New York. Not gorgeous. Not sexy like Helmuts. Not even particularly aspirational unless you fancy drilling into Gutierrezs sub-visual politics and finding some there. But interesting, weird, compelling for its high quotient of chutzpah. Maybe even comforting for some women: Great colours. Nice bikini. And  yay  no pressure to look like [insert fashion models name here] to rock it.

Advertisement

Against Newtons ever-so-succinct reduction of Peretti to an object of desire for (CIS binary heterosexual) men and aspiration for women (Peretti was actually a fascinating woman, a gifted jewellery designer, artful socialite and muse to fashion designer Halston), Gutierrezs fashion shot (part of a 124-page self-produced magazine, Indigenous Woman) chimes truly with Now, as layered and complex as any real woman. Welcome to the already-sort-of-happening future of fashion photography and women in photography in general. Martine is an incredibly strong, fearless trans woman of Mayan heritage who brings all these clues to her culture and life into work that she positions in the fashion industry, explains Elias Redstone, creative director of PHOTO 2022, which will exhibit both photographers in the massive city-wide event. Helmut Newtons singular aesthetic and visual language, his striking black and white work, continues to impact the way we think about fashion imagery to this day, but presenting very bold, strong, powerful women through the male gaze. Lets pause a moment to broaden the scope of this story because, as Redstone rightly points out, the recent fraught history of women as subjects and artists in photography is only one of many fascinating threads among PHOTO 2022s tangled web of backstories. Loading In fact, Redstones guiding theme for the festivals 123 Australian and international photographers, organised into 90 free exhibitions kicking off around Melbourne from April 29, was the deliberately sprawling, open-ended Being Human. Naturally, interpretive versions have gone off, varied and shocking, like fireworks. It seemed an urgent subject to address at this time, Redstone says, to really unpack the human condition through the lens of photographers, visual artists: what is actually at the core of who we are? Weve got advances in science and genetics and the whole trans-humanist movement questioning the limits of the human body ... were these vulnerable mortal beings and at the same time theres this performative element, were challenging gender roles and identity ... how we present ourselves in the world, the way we perform for the camera on social media, how we consume imagery ... you can see how photography is so intrinsic to being human.

Advertisement

The theme netted some phenomenal work including (and yes, were back at the thrillingly vexed subject of women in art) by legendary US artist Cindy Sherman. She paved the way, challenging ideas of identity and societys expectations, famously inserting herself into the frame and playing around with these stereotypical roles women played in popular media, movies and advertising and were expected to play in real life, Redstone says. The festivals largest and most spectacular work, a 30-metre high print of Shermans 1980 self-portrait from her famous series Untitled Film Stills, will be mounted outside Fed Square opposite Flinders Street Station. It marks a watershed moment, both for women and for photography as a fine art, Redstone says. Cindy Sherman, Untitled Film Still, 1980. Credit:Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth.  Cindy Sherman In fact Shermans power as an artist rocketed around the time society was simultaneously, and somewhat confusingly, in a flap about a second wave of feminism and swooning (mostly via fashion glossies such as Vogue) over strong, powerful women such as Helmuts. With Judy Chicago and Cindy Sherman you really started to see the lens turn onto the bodies of women artists, says Lauren Rosewarne, associate professor at the University of Melbourne and author of several books on womens treatment by popular cultural mediums. Women started to actually be in control of themselves in the frame, meaning they could reshape the gaze, and challenge those hundreds of years of art and images in which they were often the subject painted in idealised presentations by men. So out there in the real world weve got these binary understandings of good women and bad women according to men but [feminist art and photography] gives us this different narrative about what women really are. She says inconvenient truths such as menstruation and the messy realities of childbirth and mothering, for example, were either non-existent or interpreted in socially palatable, patriarchal ways. Renowned Taiwanese photographer, artist and academic Annie Wang says even the word mother in Chinese is still closely related to sacrifice.

Advertisement

Historic and stereotypical representations of mothers are based on asking a woman to be a selfless figure, Wang writes by email, forcing [her] to believe that sacrifice is the only right way to not be a bad mother. Wangs fearless series of images for PHOTO 2022, The Mother As A Creator, includes a self-portrait of her signed and dated pregnant belly, a defiant snub for Taiwans deeply embedded social controls of women and their reproductive potential. In traditional Taiwanese culture, every adult female must become a mother, and take responsibility for giving birth to a male and rearing offspring for her husbands family, Wang says. Annie Wang, No.2 Pressing the camera shutter together (detail), 2002, from the series The Mother as a Creator, 2001ongoing. Credit:Courtesy the artist Wangs raw photographic record of her own and her sons self-contained, independent identities as their relationship develops, is also her powerful tilt at pitching her art as an agent of change. Motherhood is no longer synonymous with self-sacrifice, she says. It can be flipped into a positive experience that makes men appreciate and participate. Australian photographic artist Lisa Sorgini is in the same stereotype-flipping business. All those images of the saintly mother? Painted by men, she says. Its one of the most complex, multi-faceted relationships and experiences a person can have; carrying a baby, birthing a baby, raising a child into adulthood yet its been rendered absolutely one-dimensional by the male gaze. Lisa Sorgini, Joan and her son, Redfern, 2019. Credit:Courtesy the artist Sorginis PHOTO 2022 commission, Mother, smashes the stereotypes. I want to break that spell of perfection, that idea that we can be perfect mothers, perfect humans. It creates so much pressure for women to align with ideals that really just feed into consumerism and patriarchy, she says.

Advertisement

Sorgini points her lens unflinchingly at the realities of childbirth, breastfeeding and the hectic, messy, frustrating, good and bad business of parenting. Its not all love and purity and enjoying every minute, and thats healthy and normal, but a lot of mothers dont realise that. Her work reveals mothering as anything but the beatific portrayals familiar in art history and as an experience not exclusive to CIS binary women, but shared by parents of all abilities and gender identities. I want to break that spell of perfection, that idea that we can be perfect mothers, perfect humans. Lisa Sorgini I know other women [artists] have been portraying motherhood more realistically for a long time, but I think the difference now is were more visible, Sorgini says. That visibility arrived with eruptions of shared truths across social media, from stretch marks to cracked nipples, post-natal depression to rough days with screaming kids, a social revolution in its own right. True depictions of this difficult, messy thing can be so empowering, Sorgini says. Rosewarne agrees; truths about womens real experience, represented in photography and art, will inevitably bleed into social change. Its not meant to be misogynist, a lot of this stuff, but it has limited women, limited their boxes, she says.

Advertisement
Coming just a week after the Oscars slap heard round the world, Mondays Grammys were never going to be this awards seasons wildest water cooler event. But with a batch of unpredictable upsets and a surprise cameo from Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, boy did they try.

The Recording Academys crowning night has long had a reputation for head-scratching decisions after bestowing awards that routinely bypass cultural consensus or prevailing public opinion.

Jon Batiste accepts the award for album of the year for We Are at the 64th Annual Grammy Awards on Monday. Credit:AP

Criticisms over past awards have led to major institutional change at the organisation over the past year, including expanding its voter base and removing the secretive decision-making committees that led to singer The Weeknd boycotting last years ceremony.

Even so, this years instalment was an all-timer of Wait, what won? discombobulation.
Ive been a barista in Melbourne since 2011, long enough to know that in hospitality our wages are constantly being suppressed. Wage theft has shaped this industry. And every year, no matter whether its a boom or recession, the employers association demands a wage freeze. Without fail.

Meanwhile, venues are being run on a skeleton staff amid worker shortages and we are expected to do more than ever. Many of us are working to the limit to keep businesses open, but this isnt being reflected in our wages.

Barista Jamileh Hargreaves says low wages are a big problem in the hospitality sector. Credit:Simon Schluter

Im not worried about $7 coffees, and you shouldnt either, its a scare campaign. Im worried about staff burnout, which is real. Hospitality staff need a wage increase. Casualisation has eroded confidence in the sector, with many workers juggling multiple jobs to keep up with the cost of living.

What I do worry about is if this $7 coffee scare campaign succeeds, and the Fair Work Commission buckles under pressure from bosses and puts our wages in the freezer.
NSW Police detectives believe they have found the remains of a 24-year-old Malaysian national, who went missing following a suspected gruesome murder near Bathurst.

Jacky Kai Wong Chong was working as a marijuana crop sitter for a south-east Asian crime group at the end of December 2020 while ostensibly holidaying in Australia. Police say that Mr Wong was monitoring between 500 and 1000 plants.

Police searched a number of properties in relation to the alleged murder of Jacky Kai Wong Chong, inset. Credit:NSW Police

The group were growing commercial amounts of marijuana on a remote property about 40 kilometres from Bathurst before Mr Wong was killed due to a dispute over money with more senior members of the gang, police allege.

After three men were charged with murder in recent weeks, detectives have been searching the rural property in Killongbutta for Mr Wongs remains. Police say human remains were found about 3.30pm on Sunday.
Nothing foreshadows a federal election like a stampede of friendly appointments by a government getting its house in order in the dying days of its parliamentary term  just in case it doesnt crawl back into power come polling day.

Michaelia Cash and Pru Goward. Credit:John Shakespeare

Simply put, the cavalcade of names  more than 120 in the past fortnight  looks nothing less that a Liberal Party Christmas card list.

And on Monday we were handed a most excellent example of this practice of patronage and privilege by Attorney-General Michaelia Cashs latest appointments to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, which independently reviews government decisions.

Most notable, was the appointment of former NSW Coalition minister Pru Goward. Goward and husband David Barnett are close friends with Janette and John Howard, and Barnett even wrote a biography of PM25.
A former elite soldier has told the Federal Court that he warned war veteran Ben Roberts-Smith to pull his head in after he heard the decorated soldier had ordered the mock execution of a comrade posing as a prisoner.

The former soldier known as Person 31 said he was told in 2012 that Mr Roberts-Smith had directed another soldier, Person 10, to pretend to execute a fake Afghan prisoner during a training exercise.

Ben Roberts-Smith outside the Federal Court earlier this month. Credit:Louise Kennerley

He recalled seeing Persons 9, 10 and Mr Roberts-Smith from a distance in a mock Afghan compound during the exercise, he told the court.

After the training session, Person 31 said, a soldier dubbed Person 7 said words to the effect of: Oh, for f---s sake, Mr Roberts-Smith has had Person 10 do a scenario of executing a PUC, meaning a person under the control of Australian troops. He said he was told the soldier posing as the prisoner was Person 9.
The Victorian Ombudsman is investigating if the states public service has been undermined by the hiring of dozens of Labor apparatchiks for non-political positions.

Parliaments upper house voted in February to call on Ombudsman Deborah Glass to look into facts outlined in an Age investigation that found more than 30 senior public servants were formerly advisers to Premier Daniel Andrews or his ministers.

Adem Somyurek in State Parliament last year. Credit:Jason South

The watchdog, tasked with investigating public sector wrongdoing, confirmed she opened a probe after former Labor minister Adem Somyurek  who is the key subject of a live corruption inquiry  garnered parliamentary support to refer the issue to the Ombudsman.

The referral requested her to investigate allegations in the article published in The Age that ALP activists are stacked into the public service, thus compromising objectivity and professionalism and increasing the risk of corruption.
Premier Daniel Andrews key conduit to Melbournes Indian community, bottle shop owner Luckee Kohli, secured a $1 million state government grant for a Sikh temple with which he had previously been closely involved.

A lobby group formed by the Mulgrave supermarket owner and liquor retailer in 2018 secured the funding commitment in the lead-up to the election that year to refurbish the Blackburn Gurdwara. It was one of the many proposals that Mr Kohlis lobby group, the Australia India Strategy Group, claims it put to Mr Andrews on July 30 and that were funded a few weeks later.

Mulgrave businessman Luckee Kohli and Premier Daniel Andrews relaxing together.

Mr Kohli had been a member of the temples committee until 2014, when he left amid a dispute over the temples purchase of land from a company half-owned by his wife at price of $1.64 million. He has not returned to the committee but is now on good terms with its leadership and in 2019 received a certificate of appreciation for his services and support.

Several senior government MPs, Labor Party figures and members of Melbournes Indian community have questioned the relationship between Mr Andrews and Mr Kohlis lobby group, especially as the government had in 2018 established a different group, the South Asian Communities Ministerial Advisory Council, to formally communicate the needs of those communities.
Australian tenants face a worsening rental crisis, with competition for homes soaring as the proportion of vacant rental properties falls to its lowest level in years.

The national rental vacancy rate fell to 1 per cent in March, halving year-on-year, with all capital cities now operating in a landlords market, Domains latest Rental Vacancy Rate report found.

Australias rental vacancy rate dropped to 1 per cent in March. Credit:Peter Rae

Landlords in competitive markets are being inundated with applications amid the shortage of available rentals, and tenants are increasingly offering above the advertised price, or up to a years rent in advance, to try to secure a home, agents have reported.

Domains chief of research and economics, Nicola Powell, said Australia was facing a rental crisis, with already strained rental markets under increased pressure following the reopening of international and domestic borders.
Singapore: Carrie Lam, the Chief Executive who led the evolution of Hong Kong from liberal hub to tributary state of the Chinese Communist Party, will resign, putting an end to a 42-year career that saw her transform from social activist into an icon of Beijings authoritarian reach.

Lam came to power in 2017 promising to mend Hong Kongs social rifts but her five years in office saw it become more divided than ever.

Two million Hongkongers marched in the streets on one Sunday in 2019, protesting extradition laws that would have allowed fugitives to be tried in the mainland. A year later Beijing introduced national security laws that punished dissent with sentences of up to life in prison, indoctrinated children with patriotic education and forced bureaucrats, legislators and opposition MPs to swear an oath of loyalty.

Hong Kong chief executive Carrie Lam. Credit:Bloomberg

Lam, the daughter of a shipyard worker who started her career as an advocate for the poor, rose through the British civil service in Hong Kong to become either a pawn or facilitator for a Chinese government that had become fed up with Hong Kongs liberal sensibilities. Beijing used the protests as justification for restoring order to a city that had convulsed with violent clashes between students and police.
Washington: The gap in phone logs in the official White House records on January 6, 2021, is of intense interest to the House select committee investigating the attack on the US Capitol, one of the panel members said.

In an interview on CBS News Face the Nation, Jamie Raskin, a Democrat from Maryland, noted that a 7-hour gap in the phone logs for then president Donald Trumps communications that day covered the period when the Capitol assault was taking place.

White House call logs obtained by the House panel investigating the US Capitol riots do not list calls made or received by then-president Donald Trump as he watched the violence unfold on television. Credit:AP

Raskin said he and other committee members had been able to piece together some of Trumps activities during that time based on other peoples interviews and depositions, but holes remained.

Its a very unusual thing for us to find that suddenly everything goes dark for a seven-hour period in terms of tracking the movements and the conversations of the president, Raskin said.
I was technically married in the Five Points. Of course, New York's most infamous slum is nearly unrecognizable now, occupied by government buildings, the oldest sliver of Chinatown, and the eyesore prison where Jeffrey Epstein took his last breath. But in the years surrounding the Civil War, it was the site of wretchedly concentrated poverty as free Blacks and Irish immigrants crowded into racially integrated tenements and dance halls. It was also the laboratory of a kind of wonderful cultural alchemy. That's the subject of the new Broadway musical Paradise Square, which feels more packed than a Cow Bay flophouse.

It is set around the bar that Nelly O'Brien (Joaquina Kalukango) owns with her husband Willie (Matt Bogart), an Irish immigrant who has enlisted in the army with his buddy, Mike (Kevin Denis). Both are heading south to preserve the union, leaving the bar to the care of Nelly and Willie's sister, Annie (spunky understudy Kennedy Caughell at the performance I attended, but normally Chilina Kennedy).

Joaquina Kalukango plays Nelly O'Brien, and Matt Bogart plays Willie O'Brien in Paradise Square on Broadway.

( Kevin Berne)

Meanwhile, Annie's nephew Owen (A.J. Shively) arrives from Ireland at the same time Joah (Sidney DuPont), a formerly enslaved person, arrives via the underground railroad, on which Annie's reverend husband (Nathaniel Stampley) serves as a station master. Joah won't go on to Canada without his love, Angelina (Gabrielle McClinton), so the reverend agrees to let him stay above the bar. The only problem is, Annie has already promised that room to Owen, so they must share like a 19th-century Oscar and Felix.

Then the draft goes into effect, targeting all white men who cannot produce a replacement or $300. Cynical politician Frederic Tiggens (John Dossett) looks for a way to exploit this, and in grand NYC tradition also levies massive fines on Nelly's bar, which he dislikes for its race mixing (the establishment seems to be based on Pete Williams's dance hall at 67 Orange Street). Nelly comes up with a solution: a dance competition that will bring in booze revenue and offer one lucky winner $300. It's Gangs of New York meets Step Up with a somewhat needless C-plot involving Stephen Foster incognito (Jacob Fishel), using all of this to overcome his writer's block. It's a lot for a two-hour, 40-minute musical that takes itself very seriously.

The cast of Paradise Square performs a production number set around the 1863 draft riots.

( Julieta Cervantes)

One can at least appreciate the irony of the writers dinging the father of American music for cultural appropriation while simultaneously sampling from his songbook ("Camptown Races," "Old Folks at Home," "Angelina Baker," and "Oh! Susanna" all make appearances). It's the dramaturgical equivalent of the perfunctory land acknowledgement: Yes, someone stole this thing I'm now enjoying, and I feel bad about that, but I'm not giving it back. #SorryNotSorry.

Much of this confusion can be traced to this show's origin as another musical called Hard Times, which played off-off-Broadway in 2012. Larry Kirwan was the only writer back then of what was mostly a bio-musical about Foster's time in the Five Points. It's easy to see how the subject matter became increasingly problematic in the decade it took to bring a show like this to Broadway. New cooks entered the kitchen to fix the broth, adding ingredients and then departing: Craig Lucas and Christina Anderson are credited alongside Kirwan as book writers. Marcus Gardley was credited during the Chicago run, but has now vanished from the billing. Add to the mix pleasantly uplifting (yet mostly forgettable) new music by Jason Howland, and lyrics by Nathan Tysen and Masi Asare, and what we're left with is a stone soup musical, parts of which are still edible if you're willing to take the risk of ingesting an undissolved bouillon cube.

Sidney DuPont plays Joah, and as A.J. Shively plays Owen in Paradise Square on Broadway.

( Kevin Berne)

One aspect of Paradise Square that does feel fresh is Bill T. Jones's expansive choreography, which melds elements of Irish step and West African dance to give a striking visual expression of the kind of cultural exchange that happened in the Five Points  all without losing Jones's own iconic gestural style. In big production numbers like "Now or Never" we see the fusion of styles and techniques as healthy competition and gleeful appropriation pushes the form forward (this is the best answer to the Stephen Foster afterschool special). The entire ensemble of excellent actors really gets into it, and it is a joy to behold.

Sadly, such moments are fleeting in director Moises Kaufman's bleak and lurching production, encapsulated by Allen Moyer's supersize set: Its multiple levels convey the density of the Five Points, while its ever-rotating stage betrays the more is more attitude that prevails in Broadway design. Donald Holder has conscripted a regiment of LED lights, which he lines up against the upstage wall like a firing squad. Toni-Leslie James's costumes are period appropriate while allowing for movement (a must in this show). And sound designer Jon Weston achieves a nice balance, but never goes full Hollywood with the offstage noise of the 1863 Draft Riots  which seems like misplaced restraint right at the moment of climax.

Besides the dancing, the reason to see Paradise Square is Kalukango, who delivers a powerful performance as a woman trying to hold her fragile world together through what feels like the end times. She suspends the audience in awe throughout her solo numbers, "Heaven Save Our Home" and "Let It Burn." A tear streaming down her cheek, she roars to the back row, and we really do believe she could stop a rampaging mob with just the power of her voice. Unfortunately, she cannot singlehandedly save a Broadway musical suffering from an identity crisis.

Joaquina Kalukango stars in Paradise Square on Broadway.

( Kevin Berne)

With its sprawling cast, towering scenery, earnest ballads, and anthemic production numbers, Paradise Square feels like a Broadway musical from a different time  Les Miserables with banjos (the wicky-wicky guitar in Howland's orchestrations feels like an entirely different kind of throwback). This historical revisionism is almost beside the point when the fundamentals of good musical storytelling aren't there.

Is there a place on Broadway for epic historical musicals anymore? The continuing success of Hamilton suggests so, although that show benefits from a far more distinctive and confident authorial voice. And even though it wasn't a hit in its last Broadway revival, I keep hoping that someone will bring back Ragtime, a historical musical that successfully brought together its many moving parts, and which has only appreciated in value (Paradise Square lead producer Garth Drabinsky also produced that gem in 1998). Until then, we'll have to make do with the likes of Paradise Square, which (like all utopias) overpromises and underdelivers.
Videos

Sorry, there are no recent results for popular videos.
The newest members of the New York Police Department (NYPD) salute during their police academy graduation ceremony at the Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York on March 30, 2017. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

101 Law Enforcement Officers Shot in 2022, 17 Killed: Police Union

There have been 101 police officers shot this year while on duty as of April 1, a 63 percent increase from 2020, according to the latest figures released by a police union, which also includes numbers for premeditated ambushes along with a state-by-state data breakdown.

With more than 364,000 members, the National Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) is considered the largest police union in the country.

There have been 19 ambush-style attacks on law enforcement officers this year (36 percent from 2021 YTD), a recent report released by the FOP reads. These have resulted in 35 officers being shot, 5 of whom were killed by gunfire.

All across the country, our communities are seeing the real-life consequences of unchecked crime, National FOP President Patrick Yoes said in a March 28 statement. In addition, violence directed at law enforcement officers is skyrocketingits the worst I have seen in my 36 years in law enforcement.

In 2022, 17 officers have been killed as of April 1. The total number killed last year was 63, an increase of more than 34 percent from 2020. In 2021, 346 police officers were shot.

According to the report, Arizona, with 12, tops the list for the most officers shot in the line of duty this year. Texas followed with nine, then Missouri with eight, followed by New York and Georgia with seven each.

One of the worst kinds of attacks are those coming from premeditated ambushes that were perpetrated without any warnings and intended to deprive officers of their ability to defend themselves, according to the FOP. This has been attributed to a desensitization to evil acts that were once considered to be taboo.

In January, New York police officer Wilbert Mora, 27, and Detective Jason Rivera, 22, were fatally shot while responding to a domestic dispute. The officers were responding to a call by a woman who claimed that she needed help with her adult son.

The son, Lashawn McNeil, who was suffering from mental health issues, according to the mother, opened fire at the officers as they walked into the house. The incident received nationwide attention.

On Feb. 11, a domestic dispute in Arizona led to a shootout, injuring nine police officers and killing one suspect together with a female victim.

I cannot recall an incident in city history where so many officers were injured, Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego said during a press conference near the crime scene at 5400 West Elwood St. in South Phoenix.

On April 3, a shooting rampage took place in Sacramento, California, with at least 12 people being injured and six killed.

Words cant express my shock & sadness this morning. The numbers of dead and wounded are difficult to comprehend. We await more information about exactly what transpired in this tragic incident, Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg wrote in a Twitter post.

Yoes said in his statement, When police are viewed as the bad guys, criminals feel emboldened. When rogue prosecutors hand out slaps on the wrist to serious offenders, criminals understand they will face no significant consequences for their actions.

And when police are handcuffed by policies established by local officials and told not to enforce certain crimes, traffic codes, or other quality-of-life regulations, you create an environment in which the criminals feel safe and our citizens are scared.
2 Dead, 18 Others Wounded in Weekend Shootings in Chicago: Police

At least 18 people were shot and two killed in about a dozen separate shooting incidents across Chicago over the past weekend, said the Chicago Police Department in a Monday update.

A man was shot and killed by Chicago police on Sunday after he allegedly fired at officers, critically wounding two people in a hostage situation near the Ford City Mall on the Southwest Side, officials told NBC5, citing police spokesman Tom Ahern.

A 22-year-old man was shot and killed on the 2100 block of North Bingham Street about 11:30 p.m. Friday when two people opened fire following an argument, police told the Chicago Sun-Times. The victim was identified as Juan Lopez Mendez, who was killed after being shot in the chest.

In another incident, a 16-year-old boy was critically wounded on Saturday at 3 p.m. in the 800 block of East 54th Street in Hyde Park when someone shot him in the chest. The teen was taken to Comer Childrens Hospital and is currently in critical condition, officials said.

On Saturday evening, a 31-year-old man was shot while in a vehicle traveling on the Dan Ryan Expressway near 71st Street, according to the Illinois State Police. He was taken to a nearby hospital for non-life-threatening injuries, police said.

Authorities said that about a dozen more people were shot and wounded across the city from 6 p.m. local time on Friday, April 1, to 11:59 p.m. on Sunday, April 3.

Local media reported that at least three people were killed and another 14 were wounded in shooting incidents in Chicago last weekend.

Data provided by Chicago Police suggests that Chicago has seen fewer shootings and murders so far in 2022, although other crimes like carjackings are up from the previous year. Homicides are down about 7 percent year-over-year, the Sun-Times reported, while shooting victims are down 15 percent.

However, the data suggests that property crimes are up significantly in 2022 as compared with the previous year. For example, there have been 3,076 motor vehicle thefts reported so far this year, as compared with 2,048 during the same time period in 2021, the data shows.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, a Democrat, recently proclaimed that the reason why carjackings are higher is due to an increased number of unloved young people in the city. There are too many young people in this room that feel unloved, and we need to change that if we are going to change the trajectory of their lives, Lightfoot said, without elaborating, during an event last week.
A worker wearing a protective gear walks next to barriers that separate from the street a neighborhood in lockdown as a measure against COVID-19 in Jing'an district, Shanghai, on March 30, 2022. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

24 Countries Ask China Not to Separate Children From Parents Over COVID-19

Western diplomats have voiced alarm about the Chinese regime separating children from their parents as part of its COVID-19 virus curbs, a scenario already occurring in Shanghai despite widespread outrage.

Adhering to the regimes stringent rule of isolating all possible virus contacts, Shanghai has quarantined hundreds of children under the age of 6 after they tested positive for COVID-19, even though most of them have shown no symptoms.

The forced child separations and lack of information about the children after they were taken away have left many parents in distress, while footage of toddlers at a Shanghai medical facility left crying without adult attendance set off a storm of outrage over the weekend.

Concerns that Chinese officials might treat foreign citizens in a similar fashion prompted diplomats from more than two dozen countries to write to the Chinese foreign ministry urging Beijing against such a move.

We request that parents and children should never be separated regardless of the circumstances, stated a letter signed by the Consulate General of France in Shanghai dated March 31, a screenshot of which was circulated on Chinese social media and quickly became viral. The consulate said it was writing the letter on behalf of 23 other European countries, including Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and Norway.

Those who have exposure to patients but arent infected should be allowed to self-isolate at home rather than being sent to a centralized quarantine facility, and pets of owners who are in quarantine should be fed regularly, the letter stated.

The correspondence also came after expats in Shanghai complained about the difficulties living under the citys expansive lockdown that began three days earlier.

Workers in personal protective equipment (PPE) keep watch as residents queue for a COVID-19 test in a neighborhood placed under lockdown in Shanghai on April 4, 2022. (Qilai Shen/Bloomberg)

Echoing a surge of online pleas from those seeking medical help in Shanghai and other locked down cities, the diplomats also stressed that their citizens must be ensured timely emergency medical assistance during the lockdown.

France and Norways consulates in the city couldnt be reached by phone on April 4. A staff member at the Consulate General of Switzerland in Shanghai confirmed the document to be authentic and said they have signed on to the letter, and referred to the Shanghai Foreign Affairs Office for further information. The office didnt return phone calls for inquiries.

Related Coverage Chinas Draconian Lockdowns Are Fueling Rising Discontent

The British Embassy separately wrote a letter to the Chinese foreign ministry on the same day raising similar concerns, according to Reuters. That letters co-signatories include European Union states as well as Australia and New Zealand.

The embassy cited the lack of privacy and sanitation concerns at the mobile hospitals deployed recently. Isolating in diplomatic housing was a preferable solution and consistent with our Vienna Convention privileges, it said in the letter.

A father holds his daughter behind barriers that separate a neighborhood in lockdown as a measure against COVID-19 in Jingan district in Shanghai on March 29, 2022. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

The British Consulate-General in Shanghai has been raising its concerns about various aspects of the current COVID-19 policies in relation to all British Nationals in China, with the relevant Chinese authorities, a spokesperson for the consulate told Reuters.

The U.S. Consulate General in Shanghai, which didnt appear on either letter, didnt respond to a request by The Epoch Times for comment.

In all, more than 30 countries signed on to the letters voicing concern over Beijings COVID-19 policies, Reuters reported.

Wu Qianyu, an official with the citys health commission, said on April 4 that parents could only stay with their children if they are also infected. Children under the age of 7 will stay in Shanghai Public Health Clinical Centerwhere the videos first emergedif their parents dont qualify to accompany them. Other children will be sent to centralized quarantine centers, she said, adding that the policies may be adjusted in the future.

Her comments brought objections from many parents on Chinese social media.

Im also a father, and every time I see this topic, I just want to cry, one user wrote. Id rather get infected together, but I have to stay with my child.
Soldiers and policemen outside the CRS Turi prison after a riot in Cuenca, Ecuador, on April 3, 2022. (Fernando Machado/AFP via Getty Images)

At Least 12 Dead in Ecuador Prison Violence

QUITOAt least 12 prisoners died and another 10 were injured during a gang confrontation at a prison in Ecuador, the government said on Sunday, in a new episode of prison violence in the Andean country.

Violence in Ecuadorean prisons, which the government says is related to gang disputes over drug trafficking, killed 316 people last year.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights says the system is blighted by state abandonment and the absence of a comprehensive policy, as well as poor conditions for inmates.

The confrontation at the El Turi prison in the city of Cuenca took place early on Sunday, Interior Minister Patricio Carrillo told journalists.

Prisoners were trying to gain control of the prisons interior, he said.

Up to now 12 victims have been tallied on the exterior part and in the interior parts work is still being done and an evaluation being made, Carrillo said.

There is an organization that wants to have absolute power in the interior of the prison and there are some cells which have rebelled against them, he said.

The government is adopting measures to regain control of the prison, Carrillo added. Some 800 police and military personnel as present there, the government said earlier on Sunday.

About 90 inmates were evacuated after the incident, 10 of whom were injured, the head of the penitentiary system, Pablo Ramirez said.

There were no reports of escaped inmates, the government said.
A child watches a partial solar eclipse with a woman at the Sydney Observatory on May 10, 2013. (Saeed Khan/Getty Images)

Australia to Bring Aussies Along to Its First Trip to the Moon

The Australian Space Agency has launched a campaign to instil a sense of Aussie pride in its first space mission to the Moon, dubbed Australias boldest adventure yet.

In collaboration with NASA, the mission involves sending an Australian-made rover to the Moon and is expected to launch in 2026.

The projects symbol is a common sight for the everyday Australiana footprint of the iconic thong (flip flop)on the Moons surface.

GDay Moon postcard. (Australian Space Agency)

We want to bring all Australians on our first mission to the Moon, the Australian Space Agency said in a statement on April 4, which is accompanied by a short promotion video that highlights Australias unyielding desire to explore and venture further.

The Australian Space Agency reached an agreement with NASA on Oct. 13, 2021, to support the US space agencys Artemis mission to establish a permanent lunar base.

To carry out the mission, Australia launched a $150 million Moon to Mars Initiative.

This initiative will not only support NASAs endeavour to go forward to the Moon and then go on to Mars but also open doors for Australian businesses and researchers to access international space supply chains, create jobs in Australia, and support the economy through space technologies.

Australia has agreed to design, construct, and operate a 20-kilogram (44-pound) semi-autonomous rover for NASA to take to the Moon in search of oxygen.

The rover would extract oxygen from the soil on the Moon for the team to examine whether it is possible to sustain a human presence on the Moon and future missions to other planets.

The Australian Space Agencys headquarters is based in Adelaide, South Australia. (Australian Space Agency)

On March 24, the University of Adelaide launched a dedicated laboratory named the Exterres Laboratory to help fast track the development of Australian technologies for lunar missions.

Featuring a high-power laser, a vacuum furnace, a box furnace, and a large-scale 3D printer, the Australian Space Agencys Enrico Palermo said the research undertaken in the Exterres Laboratory would make significant contributions to Australias sovereign capability in off-world infrastructure operations.

It will also inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers and other explorers who are currently in our schools and universities to take up a career in space, Palermo said.
Andrew Forrest, Chairman, Minderoo Foundation speaks at The 2017 Concordia Annual Summit at Grand Hyatt New York on Sept. 19, 2017, in New York. (Riccardo Savi/Getty Images for Concordia Summit)

Australian Clean Energy Billionaire Meets With Biden, Manchin Over Hydrogen

Australia iron ore billionaire Andrew Forrest has met with U.S. President Joe Biden and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) to discuss the future of hydrogen power.

On April 3, Australias richest man spent an hour at the White House with Biden in a working meeting involving the commander-in-chief and his senior officials to discuss his ongoing plan to sell green energy to the United States.

I can say that youve got a president impatient to get the job done, Forrest told Sky News on April 3. Hes an action man, and he sees in us real action. He sees a solution through green hydrogen to global warming, one which can drive employment, drive investment, and drive down global warming.

Climate change has been declared as one of the Biden administrations priorities, with the president signing an executive order in December to reach net-zero emissions by 2045, including a 50 percent reduction in building emissions by 2032.

The meeting at the White House took place several days after Forrest struck a $50 billion green hydrogen agreement with German energy giant E.ON, which would include the production of 15 million tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030 and the exports of renewable hydrogen from Australia.

It has also been revealed that the Western Australian mining magnate recently convinced Manchin, a Democrat, to go into green hydrogen while also flagging his plans to replace coal-fired power stations in the United States with hydrogen hubs.

Its tragic in a place like Ohio, West Virginia. People are losing their jobs by the hundreds and even by the thousands. From coal-fired power stations, coal mining, and theres nowhere for the poor people to go, their skill is that, Forrest told Sky News on April 3. We come in and say, actually, you have everything you need for greenfinch. Youve got pipelines; youve got the industrial base. We just made the green electrons.

Senator Manchin really understands that, like it was an epiphany.

The billionaire argued that investing in hydrogen will reduce dependence on Russian fuels, as the only way to properly compete with Russia is not to buy LNG (liquid natural gas) at all.

My argument across Europe is dont compete with them, replace the product with a fuel which will not hurt Ukraine, cannot hurt Ukraine, and protect the environment, Forrest said.

Hydrogen storage tank concept. (magann/Adobe Stock)

However, the lead author for transport on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Professor of Sustainability at Curtin University, Peter Newman, cautioned that the technology is still in its infancy.

This is because, in its raw form, hydrogen as a gas cant be used aboard aircraft because of the high pressures involved, and converting hydrogen into liquid form poses its own challenges.

Hydrogen is too hard to compress and freeze[and requires temperatures of] minus 253 degrees celsius, Newman told The Epoch Times in March.

Newman outlined that producing hydrogen was rapidly becoming more affordable because of cheaper solar panels and electrolyzersin part thanks to the efforts of FFIbut that the step from hydrogen to a usable fuel remained unproven commercially.

Hydrogen wont work in planes unless it is converted into synthetic jet fuel, Newman said. Hydrogen is not hard to make; its just very expensive. Solar is cheap, hydrolyzers are getting cheaper, but the steps from hydrogen to synthetic jet fuel are expensive  major breakthroughs are needed.

A report released on Dec. 7, 2021, by the Australian Human Rights Commission highlighted worrying reports of solar, wind, and battery technology involving slave labor across the world, such as in China and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Chinathe worlds largest producer of solar panelshas also enslaved millions of ethnic Uyghur, Kyrgyz, and Kazakh citizens who have been found to be involved in the solar supply chain.

China is also the dominant supplier in Australias solar market, supplying 90 percent of Australias solar panelsincluding most of the panels in the nations largest operating solar farms.

Daniel Khmelev contributed to this report.
Australian Landslide Hits British Family, Father and Son Killed

SYDNEYA nine-year-old British boy and his father were killed, and the boys mother and brother were critically injured in a landslide on a hiking trail in Australias Blue Mountains national park on Monday, police said.

A 15-year-old girl from the same family survived and left the scene on foot, accompanied by emergency services, officers added.

The situation was heartbreaking, New South Wales ambulance superintendent Stuart Clarke told reporters.

The nine-year-old boy and his 49-year-old father died at the scene on the Wentworth Falls hiking track west of Sydney, police said.

The 50-year-old mother and 14-year-old son were winched out of the valley by a rescue helicopter after being sedated, New South Wales police told reporters.

The five were holidaying in Australia, police said. The British Consulate is assisting in the matter.

The landslip follows weeks of wet weather in Sydney. The Blue Mountains get 4 million tourists a year, the most of any national park in Australia.

The area was extremely dangerous and unstable for rescuers, Detective Superintendent John Nelson, from the Blue Mountains area command, said.

The injured hikers had suffered head and abdominal injuries, paramedics said.

Emergency services were called to Wentworth Pass, Wentworth Falls, around 1:40 p.m.

By Kirsty Needham
Signage is seen outside of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) headquarters in White Oak, Md., on Aug. 29, 2020. (Andrew Kelly/Reuters)

Biden Admin Cuts Off 14 More States From COVID-19 Treatment as BA.2 Variant Spreads

President Joe Bidens administration has ordered 14 additional states to stop using a COVID-19 treatment made by GlaxoSmithKline and Vir Biotechnology.

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said on March 30 that it has paused shipments of the drug sotrovimab to the states, bringing the total number of states that are no longer receiving doses to 22.

The states are Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin in the Midwest; Arizona, California, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington in the West; and Alaska and Hawaii.

Previously, eight states in the Northeast U.S. stopped receiving shipments of sotrovimab.

The U.S. government purchased millions of doses in 2021 and in January and distributed them weekly to states to provide to health care facilities.

Sotrovimab, a monoclonal antibody, was granted emergency use authorization for treating patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 who are designated as at high risk for progressing to severe cases.

But emerging data suggest that the drug doesnt work against BA.2, a subvariant of the Omicron coronavirus variant, according to U.S. regulators.

The shipments were halted because of the ruling, which came from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The FDA decided that any region where BA.2 is pegged as causing a majority of COVID-19 cases can no longer administer sotrovimab.

According to federal data, the number of such regions is growing as BA.2 displaces other strains of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, also known as SARS-CoV.2, the virus causes COVID-19.

Collectively, the states and territories that can no longer administer the treatment and to which shipments are paused make up five regions. HHS has divided the United States into 10 regions.

Testing indicates that other COVID-19 treatments retain some benefit against BA.2, including Pfizers Paxlovid pill.

Bebtelovimab, another monoclonal thats produced by Eli Lilly, also appears to work against the subvariant.

Glaxo and Vir said in a recent joint statement that they were aware of the FDAs actions.

GSK and Vir are preparing a package of data in support of a higher dose of sotrovimab for the Omicron BA.2 subvariant and will be sharing these data with regulatory and health authorities around the world for discussion, the statement reads.

The COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines Panel stated that its no longer recommending the monoclonal for treatment in any region because of the FDAs updates and the increasing prevalence of the BA.2 subvariant across all regions.

The panel, convened by the National Institutes of Health to recommend treatments for the disease, advises administration of paxlovid and Gilead Sciences remdesivir. In situations where neither are available, alternative therapies include bebtelovimab and Mercks pill molnupiravir.
President Joe Biden delivers remarks on COVID-19 in the United States in the South Court Auditorium on March 30, 2022. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Biden Responds to Sacramento Mass Shooting by Pushing More Gun Laws

President Joe Biden has said that more gun laws should be passed in Congress after a shooting in Sacramento, California, left at least six people dead and more injured over the weekend.

In response to the shooting, Biden said Congress needs to ban ghost guns, although theres no evidence that a ghost gunan unserialized and untraceable firearm that can be assembled after purchasing components onlinewas used during the Sacramento incident.

Require background checks for all gun sales. Ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, he said, without elaborating on what he meant by assault weapons or high-capacity magazines.

Gun control proponents and some officials have suggested that a high-capacity magazine is one that holds 10 rounds or more, but others have suggested that high-capacity means seven rounds or more.

Pro-Second Amendment groups have long said that the term assault weapon is intentionally misleading or vague, while others have said that a ban on such weapons would affect nearly all semiautomatic rifles and pistols. Fully automatic firearms havent been available for purchase in the United States since 1986, when Congress passed the Firearm Owners Protection Act.

Repeal gun manufacturers immunity from liability. Pass my budget proposal, which would give cities more of the funding they need to fund the police and fund the crime prevention and intervention strategies that can make our cities safer. These are just a few of the steps Congress urgently needs to take to save lives, Biden also said in response to the shooting.

Police officers work the scene on the corner of 10th and L street of a shooting that occurred in Sacramento, Calif., in the early morning hours on April 3, 2022. (David Odisho/Getty Images)

The state of California is among the states with the strictest gun laws.

The state has already enacted a ban on ghost guns, it requires background checks for all gun sales, it has banned assault weapons for decadeswhich applies to many semiautomatic firearmsand it has a ban on magazines that contain 10 or more rounds. A court in 2019 deemed Californias magazine ban unconstitutional, although that ruling has been placed on hold while the case is being appealed.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, also reacted to the shooting in the states capital city.

Sadly, we once again mourn the lives lost and for those injured in yet another horrendous act of gun violence, Newsom said in an April 3 statement. Jennifer [Newsoms wife] and I send our heartfelt condolences to the family, friends, and to the wider community impacted by this terrible tragedy.

Previously, the governor has called for more gun control provisions and in February threw his support behind a measure that would allow California residents to file lawsuits against firearms manufacturers and distributors.

Its time to go on the offensive with new measures that empower individuals to hold irresponsible and negligent gun industry actors to account, crack down on shameful advertising that targets our kids, and more, he said earlier this year.
Body of Missing 37-Year-Old Florida Mom Found in Shallow Alabama Grave

The body of a missing 37-year-old Florida woman who disappeared about a week ago has been recovered in a shallow grave in Alabama on April 2, authorities confirmed.

Cassie Carli, who has been missing now for about a weekwe discovered her body while executing a search warrant in Alabama, Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob Johnson told a news conference on April 3.

It was in a barn, in a shallow grave, so it is not the ending that we wanted, obviously. But were hoping to provide a little closure for the family, he said.

Authorities found the body just hours after Marcus Spanevelo, the ex-husband of the victim, was arrested in connection with her March 27 disappearance. Carli was last seen at the parking lot of Juanas restaurant in Navarre, Pensacola Beach.

A friend of Carli, Sam Porter, told ABC affiliate WXTL that she was slated to meet with her 4-year-old daughters father, Spanevelo, at Juanas restaurant on March 27.

Last week, police said they were able to confirm that the womans daughter, Saylor, was found safe. They also recovered Carlis vehicle at that time.

[Spanevelo] was totally uncooperative, he never cooperated at all with us, and that goes a long way, Johnson said, noting that he only said lawyer.

I mean  its your babys mother and she is missing, and you are not going to cooperate with authorities, then thats kind of telltale, he added.

Spanevelo was arrested on April 2 by officials in Lebanon, Tennessee, on charges that include tampering with evidence, providing false information about a missing person investigation, and destruction of evidence, the Santa Rosa County Sheriffs Office said in a statement.

The suspect could face additional charges after an autopsy is completed on Monday, which will reveal Carlis cause of death.

Raeann Carli, the younger sister of Carli, said in a video statement after authorities recovered her sisters body that Saylor is in a home with loving people and is safe.

Raeann told Fox News her sister felt extremely unsafe around Spanevelo and had warned her family about him.

Just in general, with her relationship with him, it has always been, she has had some fear of him, she said. Hes always controlling, and tried to be manipulative, and she had some fear of him in the past. And what hes capable of, or planning maliciously towards her.

From NTD News
When it comes to iconic food duos, your mind likely jumps to peanut butter and jelly or bacon and eggs. But theres one combo that is totally and completely underrated: broccoli and cheddar.

The king of casseroles and frozen meals, these classic ingredients are also integral parts in a creamy, savory comfort food: broccoli and cheddar soup. And while you can always head to your favorite cafe to partake in this particular soup, with this copycat Panera Bread recipe you can have bowls and bowls of broccoli cheddar soup at home in just about one hour.

What do you need to make broccoli cheddar soup?

This soup recipe can be made using common household ingredients. Its main components are butter, chicken or vegetable stock, half-and-half (or a 1-to-1 ratio of milk and heavy cream), frozen broccoli and carrots.

Panera Breads soup uses chicken stock, but if youre a vegetarian, you can easily swap this for vegetable stock. In fact, when we made this soup recently, we channeled our inner budget-friendly goddess and used homemade vegetable stock made in a slow cooker. This is one of our favorite ways to use food scraps, and the resulting broth makes a super scrumptious base for this (or any!) soup.

What do you serve with broccoli cheddar soup?

Homemade bread, duh! We baked up a simple no-knead bread recipe to serve with this soup, but it also works remarkably well with sourdough. Bake mini sourdough loaves and hollow them out for bread bowls if you really want to have fun with dinner. Not a sourdough fan? Try some brown bread or fluffy Parker House rolls. Topping this soup with homemade croutons is also a winning combo. If youre looking to totally recreate the Panera experience, serve with an amazing homemade sandwich or robust winter salad.

Can you freeze broccoli cheddar soup?

Looking to meal prep but worried that all of the dairy in broccoli cheddar soup wont make it a good freezer candidate? Dont worry, you can freeze this soup, though it does require a bit of finesse. First, make sure you dont freeze hot soup, it should be at least room temperature or have been refrigerated. Then, ladle single servings into plastic freezer containers or plastic freezer bags. Broccoli cheddar soup will keep in the freezer for two months.

How to reheat frozen broccoli cheddar soup

Dont just toss frozen broccoli cheddar soup in the microwave, it could separate and that wouldnt be very tasty. Instead, thaw it in your refrigerator overnight. (This is the best thawing method for most foods anyway!) Then, reheat it in a medium-sized pot over medium hit, whisking continually. This will help to keep the soup intact.

Broccoli cheddar soup is a family-friendly favorite and the perfect thing for a chilly weeknight. If your love of the good stuff is not satisfied with this recipe, consider more of our absolute best recipes for cheese lovers.

Copycat Panera Broccoli Cheddar Soup Recipe

Ingredients:

1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon butter

1 cup onion, finely diced

1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup of milk

1 cup heavy cream

4 cups chicken or vegetable stock

Salt and pepper, to taste

12 ounces frozen broccoli (about 2 1/2 cups)

1 cup shredded carrots

2 cups cheddar cheese, grated

Directions:

Step 1: Melt 1 tablespoon butter in a large pot or Dutch oven over medium-low heat.

Step 2: Saute 1 cup finely diced onion in butter, until soft. Remove softened onions from the pot and set aside.

Step 3: Increase heat to medium. Melt remaining 1/4 cup butter in pot, whisk in 1/4 cup flour, creating a roux. Whisk quickly for 5 minutes.

Step 4: Pour in 1 cup milk, 1 cup heavy cream while whisking.

Step 5: Pour in 4 cups chicken or veggie stock, whisking to combine.

Step 6: Season with salt and pepper to taste and bring to a simmer for 20 minutes.

Step 7: Add 2 1/2 cups frozen broccoli, 1 cup shredded carrot and cooked diced onions. Lower heat to low simmer. Cook until vegetables are soft, about 20 minutes.

Step 8: Remove soup from heat. Use an immersion blender to combine soup, but keep some medium-sized pieces of broccoli intact.

Step 9: Stir in 2 cups of grated cheddar cheese.

Step 10: Serve hot with warm, crusty bread and enjoy!

 2021 Tribune Publishing; Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC
China and Russia Likely to Lead New Bloc Rivaling the West Unseen Since Cold War: Analyst

The news that Sinopec, Chinas state-run oil refiner, has canceled plans for a half-billion-dollar investment in Russias energy sector does not portend a general decoupling of the economies of China and Russia.

On the contrary, it signifies a temporary halt to an economic partnership that is likely to grow in size and complexity as world powers regroup into new, rival blocs in the aftermath of Russias invasion of Ukraine and the massive sanctions that aligned nations have levied on the aggressor.

Thats according to Ross Kennedy, a senior fellow at the Securities Studies Group and founder of Fortis Analysis, who spoke to EpochTVs China Insider program on April 2.

A few weeks prior to Russias invasion, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a no limits partnership, a relationship that has not shown signs of diminishing even as Moscow becomes a pariah on the world stage over its ongoing assault on Ukraine. But Beijing has not yet rushed in to provide significant economic help to Moscow, cautious about being impacted by Western sanctions in the process, according to Kennedy, a logistics and supply chain expert.

Beijing, despite declaring pretty forcefully and openly that there are no limits on ties between Moscow and Beijing, still also has to take into consideration what the impact of sanctions may be. And right now theres a bit of a gray area [concerning] how capital flow is going to work between the two countries, particularly on the investment side, Kennedy said.

Calling China a consumption powerhouse that continues to need enormous amounts of energy and raw materials, Kennedy said that the availability and ease of goods produced in the Black Sea region and the eastern part of Russia still holds significant appeal for Beijing. Though Chinas rulers are wary for the moment about what contravening the sanctions on Russia might mean for Chinas economy. Hence Kennedy is skeptical about the long-term significance of Sinopecs decision.

I dont think this is an indicator that China is cooling its support of Russia. I dont think that it is really reflective of anything other than Sinopec, and other companies, being instructed by Beijing to just be a little bit more cautious right now and make sure that state-owned enterprises dont have exposure to Western sanctions, he said.

Despite the Sinopec decision, trade is still ongoing at a high volume between the two powers in such product groups as animal feed, vitamins and trace minerals, amino acids, building and construction materials, and other longstanding components of the Russia-China trade relationship, Kennedy said.

Rather than a decoupling, Kennedy sees the likelihood of Chinese state-owned enterprises ramping up their purchases of energy products and grain from Russia. In Kennedys analysis, China, India, and possibly other powers will take advantage of the lower prices of energy products available to be shipped by tanker from Russia as the latter power increasingly finds itself shut off from Western markets. A marked increase in non-dollar- and non-Euro-denominated transactions is highly likely, he added.

Its pretty clear that Moscow and Beijing and even some of the other countries of the world, like India and Iran, are working and collaborating pretty closely on having the ability to settle transactions among themselves, Kennedy said.

The increasing reliance on transactions that do not involve Western currencies or banking systems takes place under the rubric of BRICS, the group of powers composed of Russia, China, India, Brazil, and South Africa. Kennedy sees BRICS as the nexus of this growing consolidation and formation of a bloc rivaling Western democracies.

Besides the devastation of Ukraine and the imposition of massive sanctions, Russias invasion of her neighbor has helped start to usher in a new geopolitical landscape. The new bloc will not emerge overnight. Rather, it is in nascent form, Kennedy said.

We are seeing the emergence of Russia-China-led sphere of economic and geopolitical cooperation that will stand in contrast to what is more of an Anglosphere, or a transatlantic type of alliance among Canada, the U.S., and our NATO partners, Kennedy said.

I think as we look back in three years, five years, ten years, were going to see that its really two fully formed economic blocs that have some level of cooperation between them where necessary, he continued.

To the extent that trade and cooperation occur between the rival blocs, it will depend on facilitators that have a presence in both blocs, such as India, Saudi Arabia, and possibly the United Arab Emirates, Kennedy predicted. He called the new geopolitical configuration unprecedented since the days of the Cold War, when the world broke down largely of the Soviet Union, Western powers led by the United States, and a number of developing countries loyal to one or the other.

Michael Washburn China Reporter Follow Michael Washburn is a New York-based reporter who covers China-related topics. He has a background in legal and financial journalism, and also writes about arts and culture. Additionally, he is the host of the weekly podcast Reading the Globe. His books include The Uprooted and Other Stories, When We're Grownups, and Stranger, Stranger.
Workers and volunteers look on in a compound where residents are tested for COVID-19 during the second stage of a pandemic lockdown in Jing'an district in Shanghai on April 4, 2022. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

China Censors Activist Who Petitioned CCP Officials to End Harsh Zero-COVID Policy

A Chinese activist, who was released from jail in February after spending more than three years in prison for criticizing the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), recently issued a public petition demanding that Beijing end its harsh zero-COVID policy.

Ji Xiaolong, a resident in eastern Shanghais Pudong district, posted the petition on his social media accounts on Twitter, Facebook, Chinese media platform WeChat, and Chinas Twitter-like Weibo on April 2. He also submitted the petition to Shanghais public security apparatus.

Soon after making the petition public, Ji said Chinese authorities shut down his WeChat and Weibo accounts. He said they also approached his wife to try to silence him.

[They] tried to pressure my wife and threaten her. And Ive warned them [about their action], he said.

His petition, Cease Campaign-style Lockdown & Hand Out Relief, calls on Chinese authorities to immediately suspend the dynamic zero COVID-19 strategy.

Restore scientific and rational epidemic prevention and control policies, treat the epidemic objectively, carefully assess the trend of the epidemic, and adjust policies in a timely manner, the petition reads.

It also demands that Chinese authorities pay compensation to families of those whose loved ones have died because of not receiving timely medical treatment because of the lockdowns.

The petition also includes other demands, such as immediately release those detained for exercising their right to freedom of expression during the epidemic.

In an interview with The Epoch Times on April 3, Ji spoke about why he decided to write the petition and what has happened since he made his demand public.

I was hesitant.  I was only out of prison for over a month. I was afraid of going back to prison, he said, knowing that Chinese authorities would be upset about the petition.

A worker wearing protective gear walks next to barriers that separate from the street, a neighborhood in lockdown as a measure against COVID-19 in Jingan district in Shanghai on March 30, 2022. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

In January 2019, Ji was sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison after a court found him guilty of picking quarrels and stirring up trouble, a common charge the Chinese regime uses against activists and dissidents.

The guilty verdict was based on the fact that he had written political slogans such as Down with the [Chinese] Communist Party on public restroom doors while calling on others to do the same. He was released on Feb. 9.

Ji said he slowly became more confident that he would proceed with his plan. He recalled becoming depressed after being confined to his home for nearly 25 days since his release from prison because of local COVID-19 outbreaks.

What he saw in his community and in nearby areas amid the current lockdown in Shanghai also upset him. He said he saw how people had to go through different troubles to request medical care. For some, they died before their request was granted.

Eventually, Ji said he couldnt stay silent anymore and went ahead with his plan.

I was heartbroken. So I decided to use a peaceful and friendly methodwriting a petitionand deliver it to Shanghais security department and have them pass it on to [higher authorities], he said.

A health worker (C) wearing personal protective gear gestures to residents on a street during the second stage of a COVID-19 lockdown in Jingan district in Shanghai on April 1, 2022. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

In a Facebook post published on April 3, Ji wrote that more than 2,000 Shanghai residents had voiced support for his petition.

Shanghai is one of many places in China hit hard by the spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant since March. The spike in infection cases prompted Shanghai officials to begin enforcing a two-stage lockdown on March 28, with officials ordering people to stay home, launching mass testing, and quarantining all infected individuals and their close contacts. These methods are all part of Chinas zero-COVID policy.

There have been a lot of complaints among Shanghai residents since the lockdown began. Some demand to have more access to food and medicine, while others complain about how their children have been forcibly taken away.

Ji said a woman surnamed Zhao, a resident of Shanghais Yangpu district, called him after seeing his petition. The woman was upset about how her 81-year-old father died in late March when he refused to take a government-mandated nucleic acid test.

According to Ji, the womans father had a stroke after getting into a scuffle with authorities over the test, and died before arriving at a hospital for treatment.

Ji noted that the woman had called officials in Beijing seeking redress for her father, but didnt get any response. The woman said community officials threatened her not to speak out about the incident.

Despite efforts by Chinese authorities to silence him, Ji said hell continue to speak up for other Chinese people.

Chinese people must fight for their own freedom and dignity, he said. If we succeed today, our descendants may also enjoy a little bit more freedom and dignity.

Yi Ru and Lin Cenxin contributed to this report.
China Is Most Likely Threat to Face US in Military Conflict: Expert

The Biden administrations forthcoming national security strategy will consider China to be the most likely nation to become embroiled in an armed conflict with the United States, according to one expert.

Chinas size and global reach, however, means that the United States strategy of the last 30 years, to contain competitors and deny them objectives, is declining in efficacy.

That denial approach is a very handy way to try to deter someone, but it really only works when youre the predominant military power, said Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, a Washington-based think tank, during a recent interview with EpochTVs China Insider program.

The U.S. got used to that [idea] in the post-Cold War period, of being the biggest kid on the block.

Clarks comments followed the release of a factsheet by the Pentagon that outlined the new national defense strategy, a document that complements the forthcoming national security strategy. The sheet acknowledged the Chinese communist regime as the foremost strategic priority facing the United States, and outlined how the Biden administration may try to phase out some elements of that strategy of denial.

The factsheet says the strategy is essentially going to walk away from that idea of denial and punishment as being the tools for deterrence, Clark said.

Instead, [it will] look at this integrated set of tools, you know, economic tools, diplomatic tools, information tools, military tools, that theyre going to try to orchestrate together through this campaign effort.

Clark said that the new strategy was designed to keep Chinas communist leadership off balance, and to prevent them from becoming embroiled in an armed conflict with the United States, even as U.S. leadership recognizes China as the pacing threat to America.

The pacing threat language is really intended to drive the requirements process which DoD uses for defense planning, Clark said.

Its supposed to signify that China has the most capable military out there. So thats what the U.S. should be preparing for  It also means that China is probably the most likely or nearly the most likely threat the U.S. may face in a military confrontation.

That scenario planning will be used to drive the equipment requirements of each branch of the military from aircraft to naval vessels, as well as increasingly necessary upgrades to space-based systems.

The increasingly antagonistic competition between the United States and China has been described as a new Cold War, and assessments by the intelligence community continuously identify China as the leading threat to the United States across military, economic, and diplomatic spheres.

Compounding the complexity of the strategic situation is the Chinese regimes partnership with Russia, which national intelligence leaders have warned will only deepen in the coming yearsA projection that experts say will thrust the United States into the unprecedented position of having to contend with two nuclear near-peers at the same time.

Relatedly, contending with such an immense threat leaves little room for deterring smaller, regional threats around the globe.

While many may like to believe that, by focusing on conflict with the Chinese military, the U.S. would effectively also be preparing for conflict with smaller nations such as Iran, Clark said that this is not the case.

According to Clark, while the United States may develop the capabilities to fight smaller adversaries, dealing with China would have wide-reaching consequences for the very real problem of deployment.

Simply put, if the U.S. military is deployed to deal with all-out confrontation in the Indo-Pacific, it will not have the necessary resources present in other regions of the world to respond to emergent conflicts and crises.

For this reason, the Biden administrations new strategy will likely leverage increased ties with allies and partners to make up for the loss of American presence in other theaters.

The U.S. military will lack the capacity to maybe be as involved in places like the Middle East or in Europe, as they have been in the past, Clark said.

[Weve] already seen an effort on the part of the United States to sort of shift some of that burden to Gulf allies, and to European allies and NATO, which would allow the U.S. to focus more of its remaining capacity on places like the South China Sea and East China Sea.

The point demonstrated the difficulty that the United States is having in responding to China as a global, rather than a regional threat, and comes amid numerous emergent crises related to the Chinese regimes global ambitions such as its expanding footprint in South America and continued espionage efforts in the United States.

In all, Clark was hopeful that U.S. leadership was coming to understand the depth of the threat posed by Chinas communist government, but worried that such understanding was not yet being realized in the administrations strategic framework.

When you talk to folks in the Department of Defense, they understand and they describe China as being this global challenge now, Clark said. But they really havent figured out how to operationalize that.

Andrew Thornebrooke Reporter Follow Andrew Thornebrooke is a reporter for The Epoch Times covering China-related issues with a focus on defense, military affairs, and national security. He holds a master's in military history from Norwich University.
Workers and volunteers look on in a compound where residents are tested for the Covid-19 coronavirus during the second stage of a pandemic lockdown in Jing'an district in Shanghai on April 4, 2022. ( Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

China Reports New Omicron Subtype Near Shanghai as City Locks Down Residents

A new subtype of the highly transmissible Omicron variant has been found near Shanghai, where residents are currently under a lockdown.

The new iteration of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus was reported by municipal authorities in Suzhou, a city that borders Shanghai, on April 2. The strain was isolated from a local infected patient with the surname Yang on March 28.

Municipal officials said the isolated virus had evolved from the BA.1.1 branch of the Omicron variant. Whats more, the subtype did not match other COVID-19 variants already found in China, nor those found in the public virus tracking database GISAID.

Meanwhile, health officials in Dalian, a port city in northeastern Chinas Liaoning Province, also found a new subtype from a local infected patient on April 1, according to Chinas state-run media. The strain was said to not match any CCP virus found in China and had evolved from the BA.2 branch of the Omicron variant.

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, there are now thousands of coronavirus variants around the world. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), BA.1, BA.1.1, and BA.2 are the three most common lineages of the Omicron variant.

The World Health Organization (WHO), in its weekly epidemiological report published on March 22, declared that BA.2 had become the predominant variant around the world. The BA.2 stain has been nicknamed the stealth variant because it contains mutations that make it harder to detect.

The BA.1 strain was responsible for a large number of infections in the United States in late 2021. Now, BA.2, which is known to be more transmissible than BA.1 and BA.1.1, makes up the majority of new infections (54.9 percent) in the United States, the CDC announced on March 29.

The BA.2 variant is also mostly responsible for the new wave of infections in China, with Chinas commercial hub of Shanghai being one of the hardest-hit areas. On March 28, the city began enforcing a two-stage lockdown, with officials ordering people to stay home, restricting access to roads, shutting down non-essential businesses, and launching mass testing. These methods are all part of Chinas harsh zero-COVID strategy.

On April 4, Shanghai health officials reported a total of 9,006 new daily cases for April 3.

A day earlier, Chinas military, the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA), dispatched more than 2,000 medical personnel to Shanghai, according to state-run PLA Daily. One of their duties is to carry out nucleic acid tests.

There have been many complaints from Shanghai residents who are struggling to carry on with their lives amid the lockdown. Some demand having more access to food and medicine, while others complain about how their children have been forcibly taken away.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern smiles after cutting the ribbon to open Transmission Gully SH1 motorway in Wellington, New Zealand, on March 30, 2022. (Lynn Grieveson/Getty Images)

China to Remove Tariffs for Wood and Paper Imports From New Zealand

New Zealands (NZ) upgraded free trade agreement (FTA) with China will take effect from April 7, removing all tariffs for 12 wood and paper products imported from New Zealand.

The move is part of a deal, signed in January, that aims to upgrade the existing FTA, resulting in tariff-free access for 99 percent of New Zealands $4 billion (US$2.8 billion) wood and paper trade to China.

Tariffs for products such as tissues and writing paper will be gradually eliminated over a 10-year period.

The Ministry of Finance noted that the year 2022 marked the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations between China and NZ, and April 7 is the 14th anniversary of the signing of the China-NZ FTA.

The implementation of the agreed tariff rates will further promote trade and investment between the two countries, the ministry said in a statement to Reuters.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping and New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern shake hands before the meeting at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, on April 1, 2019. (Kenzaburo Fukuhara/Pool/Getty Images)

It comes amid a politically motivated trade war with New Zealands neighbour, Australia, over the past two years.

The trade war was declared amid worsening tensions between Australia and China after the Australian governments call for an inquiry into the origins of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) virus in April of 2020 angered the CCP who accused Australia of pandering to Washington.

It also escalated the CCPs pre-existing frictions over the Morrison government banning of Huawei from Australias 5G network following concerns regarding its potential for espionage.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinta Ardern noted in May 2021 that differences dont define relations between countries, but that the interests of the Chinese regime were becoming harder to reconcile.

As Minister Mahuta said last month, we need to acknowledge that there are some things on which China and New Zealand do not, cannot, and will not agree, Ardern said. This need not derail our relationship. It is simply a reality.

However, New Zealand China expert Anne-Marie Brady said the Ardern government has been too subtle in its approach to shifting its relationship with Beijing.

Professor Anne-Marie Brady acknowledged internationally as an expert on Chinese affairs recently presented a paper to a conference in the United States titled Magic Weapons (University of Canterbury).

Brady, a political science and international relations professor from the University of Canterbury, said the NZ government has sought to pursue an independent foreign policy while readjusting its China policies as it seeks to maintain a positive relationship with the communist regime.

The Ardern government needs to issue a new, whole-of-government China strategy, one that reflects current realities and steers the way for balancing economic versus security risks, she said.

Recently, Ardern called the security deal between Beijing and the Solomon Islands gravely concerning and said the government saw the act as the potential militarization of the region.

The prime minister said the Solomon Islands had switched its relationship away from Taiwan and toward Beijing since 2019 and noted that NZ would never be able to outspend the regime.

Daniel Khmelev and Daniel Y. Teng contributed to this article.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare inspect honor guards during a welcome ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, on Oct. 9, 2019. (Wang Zhao/AFP via Getty Images)

China Tries to Turn the Solomon Islands Into a Vassal State

America and allies should protect its democracy by getting tougher

News Analysis

New documents show that China seeks to expand its influence and military deployments in the Asia-Pacific islands nearly to the point of making one country, the Solomon Islands, into a vassal state.

Yet proposed policies to oppose Beijings latest expansionism rely on the same old failed soft diplomacy, economic incentives, and non-confrontation that create perverse incentives and push countries into the Chinese Communist Partys (CCPs) orbit.

The draft Sino-Solomon documents, titled as a framework agreement on security cooperation, demonstrate Beijings interest in advance arrangements for snap insertion of its security forces, and the use of a string of deep seaports globally for its increasingly far-flung naval activities.

The draft shows that Beijing is closing in on a security pact that, according to the Financial Times, would allow armed Chinese troops and police in the Solomon Islands to quell unrest, where the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) could build a naval base in the South Pacific, about 900 miles northeast of Australia.

The PLA Navy (PLAN) ships that dock in the Solomons could then supposedly protect Chinese citizens and infrastructure projects, according to the document. Local Chinese security personnel could provide extraterritorial policing and quell social unrest domestically.

Beijings move to militarize and domestically control the Solomons is a direct threat to American and Australian attempts to foster small and independent democracies in the region.

Were the CCP to insert military forces into the Solomons, it would be hard to dislodge them, even if public sentiment were against the PLA, as Beijing has a public history of bribes to politicians that barely scratches the surface, according to my source with knowledge of the matter.

Chinas cash for votes in the Solomons have allegedly reached as much as $615,000 per parliamentarian, according to reporting.

The Solomons public is largely against Beijings influence in the country, to the point that in November, residents rioted against the government and burned down a police station and parts of Chinatown.

A burnt-out truck sits in the Chinatown district of Honiara on the Solomon Islands on Nov. 26, 2021. (Charley Piringi/AFP via Getty Images)

Sadly, recent Chinese immigrants and other local ethnic Chinese, including second-generation immigrants, are bearing the brunt of the CCPs overweening attempts at influence. Three charred bodies were found within one of the burned buildings in Chinatown following the November unrest.

The draft agreement with Beijing includes a provision for extraterritorial policing by the regime in the Solomons.

The agreement included clauses that PLA vessels would be protected by Chinese security personnel when they docked in the Solomon Islands, according to the Financial Times. Chinese forces could also be called on to control social unrest in the country and to protect Chinese personnel and projects.

Beijing can point to precedent for inserting its security forces. In addition to over 100 Australian police and defense personnel, the Solomons government invited 10 police officers from China during the November riots.

Given the totalitarian nature of Beijings regime, the Solomons increasing security collaboration with the dictatorship should concern the United States and allies about Beijings growing influence in the Asia-Pacific. In 2019, the Solomons switched diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China, and the islands fall into Beijings orbit has since then only worsened.

Most Western analyses and reporting, other than in The New York Times, are rightly scathing in their assessment of the draft agreement, called symptomatic of Chinas Indo-Pacific empire and its Belt and Road colonialism, by the chief of the Australian National Universitys National Security College, Rory Medcalf, in the Financial Times.

Grant Newsham, a security expert who focuses on the Asia-Pacific, told The Wall Street Journal that the draft is basically a treaty for a protectorate.

Jonathan Pryke, at think tank Australias Lowy Institute, told the Journal, Its a pretty expansive security agreement that would be far greater than any agreement that China has made with any Pacific Island nation.

The prime minister of the Solomons, Manasseh Sogavare, justified the agreement, which calls for secrecy between the two nations, saying that American and allied liberal hegemony has failed.

As liberal hegemony is a contradiction in terms, Sogavare misunderstands one or both concepts. Liberalism, as applied to international relations, supports a world of free and independent democracies without any hegemonic power.

As the United States has since World War I been the worlds most powerful liberal democracy, the burden of policing transgressions against the liberal world order has tended, unfairly, to fall on Washington. This includes fighting off Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, Mao Zedong, Xi Jinping, and Vladimir Putin throughout Europe and countries like Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Ukraine, where the latter four dictators supported the illiberal expansion of authoritarian militaries.

Beijing supports its attempt to supplant the liberal world order with its own CCP hegemony by claiming that this costly responsibility borne by Washington is actually a form of hegemony or imperialism, which couldnt be further from the truth.

The Solomons permanent secretary for the Ministry of Police, National Security and Correctional Services, Karen Galokale, tried to downplay the draft security agreement in a comment to the Journal, saying, If ever there is any  such agreement, it will just be the same as what we have with countries like Australia.

(L-R) Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare, Solomon Islands Foreign Minister Jeremiah Manele, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, and Chinese State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi attend a signing ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, on Oct. 9, 2019. (Thomas Peter-Pool/Getty Images)

But Galokale elides on the fact that any security arrangement with an aggressive totalitarian power is the opposite of a defensive agreement with a fellow democracy. Through security agreements with Beijing, the Solomon Islands government is setting itself against, rather than for, democracy. It is choosing sides, and that side is the CCP.

The United States and Australia are attempting to counter Beijings growing illiberal influence in the Solomons through an incentive-heavy approach to increasing economic activity regionally. The United States plans to open an embassy in the country, where currently there is only a consulate. The closest U.S. Embassy is presently in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, over 800 miles from the Solomons capital city of Honiara.

However, even these planned diplomatic and economic improvements, which are part of the Biden administrations publicly ambiguous strategy of supposedly not asking countries to take sides against Beijing, have been too weak to stop the CCPs growing regional and international influence.

Worse, increasing economic engagement with the Solomons awards bad behavior. Based on perverse short-term incentives, other countries will rationally conclude that negotiating a PLA base might also get them economic benefits from democracies.

Conversely, Beijing has a disincentive-heavy approach to international politics, sanctioning or even attacking countries that cross the CCP. In February, Chinas navy shined a military-grade laser at an Australian surveillance plane over Australias own territorial waters.

Over the past five years, China has similarly attacked American planes. The lasers could damage the eyesight of pilots and are clear military provocations against the provision of global security that since the end of World War II has rightly been led by the democracies.

Beijings attempts at expanding its influence and military activities in the Solomons, or anywhere else, should be more vigorously opposed by the United States, Australia, Japan, and other democracies in the region, through sticks in addition to carrots. Doing so will require greater commitments by democratic leaders in the region to recognize Taiwan rather than Beijing. But it will also require a demand for more discipline among countries like the Solomon Islands, which should be expected to refuse any economic or military overtures from Beijing.

Those leaders and countries that do allow themselves to be used by totalitarian powers such as China should be voted out of power, with Western and allied encouragement, and economically sanctioned in order to guide their countries back to a path that is supportive of democracy on not just a local but a global level.

If the situation in the Solomons degrades to the level of a PLA military base close to a key democratic ally like Australia, those who believe in defending freedom should support a naval blockade of the island.

At some point, the gloves must come off against totalitarian powers like China, or they will just continue to expand geographically and militarily, to the detriment of democracys future.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Chinese Developers Stocks Suspended by Hong Kong Exchange After Missing Annual Reports Deadline

Many large Chinese property stocks were suspended from trading as of April 1 as part of a wave of Hong Kong-listed companies missing the deadline to submit annual financial reports.

The Hong Kong Stock Exchange froze 32 stocks on April 1, including embattled Chinese property developers, particularly those declared in default on their debts or looking to default, like Sunac China Holdings Ltd., Shimao Group Holdings Ltd., and China Aoyuan Group Ltd.

Shimao Groups shares were suspended as it would be unable to publish unaudited 2021 financial results on time due to the latest COVID-19 outbreak, according to its filing (pdf) to the exchange.

The pandemic had led to the lockdown of the companys Shanghai headquarters building; the date for the curbs to be removed was still unknown, Shimao said.

This financial report season was expected to be the worst in a decade for Chinese developers when they were plagued by a credit crunch, delayed submissions, and a flurry of auditor resignations.

China Aoyuan, for example, stated (pdf) last week that it requires more time to assess the potential provision for impairment, which may have a significant impact on its results. In late January, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu resigned as the companys auditor because of a disagreement over additional charges to cover different procedures.

Failure to produce timely audited reports is a warning of potential corporate governance and financial transparency problems, said Fitch Ratings, particularly when associated with a resignation or change of auditor close to reporting deadlines.

For some developers, rating agency downgrades were another factor for some developers delayed results. Sunac China Holdings said (pdf) that it would miss the result reporting deadline, citing issues relating to [its] offshore loans arising from recent downgrades by international rating firms and its proposed domestic bonds payment extension.

The company warned that it would likely report a 2021 net profit 85 percent below the level of a year before. Fitch Ratings, S&P Global Ratings, and Moodys Investors Service have all downgraded the company in the last two weeks, expressing worries about the companys liquidity and refinancing risks.

The sales outlook for the industry continues to deteriorate, with new COVID outbreaks and lockdowns increasing. Data service China Real Estate Information Corp. (CRIC) revealed that total contracted sales for the countrys top 100 developers fell 52.7 percent in March from a year before.

Under a special pandemic rule enacted in 2020, which exempts firms from reporting unaudited results by the deadline, HKEX allowed 192 other companies stocks to remain in play. Several Chinese developers took advantage of the exception, including Yuzhou Group Holdings, Ronshine China Holdings, and Guangzhou R&F Properties.

Fitch Ratings said that audit problems could induce severe funding issues and raise the risk of default, noting that it may be a signal that increases the wariness of potential lenders about [the companies] debt-repayment capacity, discouraging them from extending further loans.

Other troubled developers like China Evergrande Group (pdf) and Sinic Holdings Group (pdf) were already suspended from trading earlier.

According to HKEX rules, firms have been allowed to submit unaudited figures by March 31 due to COVID-related delays and to file the audited version by April 30 to avoid suspension.
Chinese Millionaire Quietly Expelled From Australia Over Foreign Interference: Report

A Melbourne-based millionaire was expelled from Australia allegedly over his involvement in Chinese intelligence work, according to recent reports.

Zheng Jiefu, a property developer, is alleged to have been providing information to Chinese intelligence on the U.S.-based billionaire-in-exile Guo Wenguilinked to former Trump advisor Steve Bannon and who has a storied past with Zheng.

According to The Age and Sydney Morning Herald newspapers, Zheng had been accused by Australias domestic spy agency of engaging in foreign interference on behalf of Beijing, including offering AU$20,000 to the Australian-based son of a human rights activist in Chinawhich in turn, would put pressure on his father to stop criticising the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Zheng has claimed that the money was merely a sign of charity.

The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) also suspect the millionaire assisted Chinese officials with searching for the Australian assets of CCP official Liu Yanpingformer head of the Ministry of National Security who has now been accused by the regime of a suspected violation of discipline and law.

Zheng also allegedly confirmed to ASIO in 2020 that he assisted a Chinese spy in carrying out mundane tasks in Australia, a move he claimed was to help curry favour with Beijing to help with recovering money stolen from his company in China by the Bannon-linked Guo Wengui.

Zheng has invested around AU$40 million into Australian property. He obtained permanent residency in 1998 but ended up staying in 2008 after attending his daughters graduationbuying an $8.25 million mansion in the Victorian coastal suburb of Brighton.

During his visit, Zheng had been accused by Guo of embezzling $2.5 million, forcing him to stay in Australia for fear of repercussions from Chinese communist authorities.

Since Australia passed new foreign interference laws in 2018, officials have quietly deported or investigated key figures alleged to be working for Beijing.

Last week it was revealed that two Chinese international students were refused entry by the Australian Border Force for not disclosing prior involvement in military training at universities in China.

While in November 2020, authorities charged the first person under the foreign interference laws65-year-old, Melbourne-based community leader Duong Di Sanh.

Meanwhile, controversial billionaire Huang Xiangmo, linked to Beijings United Front Work Department and a key figure in the downfall of Labor Senator Sam Dastyari, was denied citizenship and had his permanent residency cancelled in 2019.

ASIO stated on Feb. 14 that foreign interference and espionage had surpassed terrorism as the most serious threat facing the country, according to a Senate Estimates hearing.

The security body revealed it had disrupted a plot by an agent or puppeteer, acting on behalf of an unnamed foreign power, to bankroll potential Manchurian candidates for the Australian Labor Party (ALP) in the state of New South Wales (NSW) in this years upcoming federal election.
Conservative comedians Kevin Jackson (L), Tim Wilkins (C), and Brad Stine are Unapologetically American in their lampooning of leftists. Here, the trio pose backstage during a comedy tour stop in Scottsdale, Ariz., on March 31. (Allan Stein/The Epoch Times)

Conservative Comic Trio Wants to Win America BackOne Joke at a Time

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz.Three conservative comedians with three different styles of humor are all bound by a common belief that to be an American means never having to say youre sorry for speaking out.

Together, Brad Stine, Kevin Jackson, and Tim Wilkins make up the Unapologetically American Comedy Tour of 2022, taking no leftist prisoners as they fight to win America back through laughter.

On March 31, the stand-up comics delivered their message of raucous patriotic revival before a large conservative audience at Venue8600 in Scottsdale.

The show was billed on HappeningNext as an intervention for crazed Americans who are high on nonsense or political correctness: its time for a detox! Sorry, no cry closets or safe words allowed.

Whether the topic is race, Joe Bidens economic policies, COVID-19 restrictions, LGBTQ antics, or the woke cancel culture assault on American values, everything is fair game for these comics.

Their mission, since they chose to accept it, is to Make America Laugh Again.

Do Something Together

So, the idea that, one, black people should be getting reparations, is stupid. And white people should be payingstupid. Okay. Lets make a funny stupid little thing about it, and thats how we started, Jackson said during a backstage interview with The Epoch Times.

Heres the thing. Weve got all this insanity, and youre not supposed to talk about it. We needed to figure out how to do something together.

If we cant talk about it, nobody can, and then were done.

Jackson is also the host of a nationally syndicated conservative talk-radio show revolving around politics and pop culture, but with a heavy dose of comedy mixed in.

He makes no apologies for being fired as a FOX News contributor in 2018 for calling out those who accused then-Supreme Court justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh of committing sexual assault in his youth.

Florida comedian Tim Wilkins talks about his experiences with airline pilots during an Unapologetically American Comedy Tour in Scottsdale, Ariz., on March 31. (Allan Stein/The Epoch Times)

As the comedy tours organizer, Jackson said the shows real humor can be found in its hidden political messages. Although their comedic styles are very different, mines better, he joked. I like to focus on race and class.

Stine said of Jackson, When he doesnt get laughs, he sues. Hell go to litigation. Ive seen it happen.

Jackson also did a Reparations Comedy Tour a number of years ago, and he joked that having four white guys working under him was reparations enough.

No Conservative Voices in Comedy

Ive always been a big fan of these guys work, Jackson said of Stine and Wilkins. We always wanted to keep the concept going. So when the new series of politics came along, I said, Lets keep it going.

We all find there needs to be a voice for our comedy [and] for a way to defuse the issues and make light of the things we find important, said Stine, a 30-year veteran stand-up Christian comedian. Right now, its dominated by the left. Its all packaged by them and fed to the country.

Jackson said, Its sickening. Its not even comedy. Its just attacking us with no counter-voice. If we cant make those observations that the emperor has no clothes, whos gonna do it?

Sometimes, its hard to tell the difference between modern politics and comedy, since its all a comedy show now, the trio agrees.

Ive been hiding my views for 30 years, said Wilkins, a 20-year stand-up comedian, and TV and radio personality. Now, Im seeing we have to fight back. Everybody get behind us. Its time to defuse this.

The material they use is heavy on social commentary and how the ideal of Americas Founding Fathers is being discarded by the left.

Stine said he considers himself a constitutional originalist, believing in America not as judges have reimagined it, but solidly enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, which is not a living, breathing document, manipulated into something else.

Ultimately, the comedians cant make fun of everything. If we are stifled, then theres nobody left. Its crucial that we do it, he said.

When it comes to the COVID-19 pandemic, everything once hailed as scientific went out the window, according to Stine.

During his routine, he lampooned that the No. 1 symptom of COVID-19 is having no symptoms.

How are you feeling? the doctor asked.

Good, the patient answered.

Oh, thats too bad. You better get your affairs together, the doctor said.

Stine followed with a philosophical observation.

Two years ago, people were paranoid because they ran out of toilet paper, he said. What happened to America?

Today, Stine sees an existential threat to the existence of this country and a general lack of courage to do something about it.

We can play around all we want, he said. But there is a real problem whether we will exist or not. Thats what were trying to do is to get peopleAmericansto realize youre the government of the United States of America. Start acting like it.

Wilkins joked backstage, As of tonight, Im working for gas cards. I have to wrap my show quickly before they lose value.

A Slap in Face of Decorum

Regarding the delicate matter involving Will Smiths conduct at the 2022 Oscars, the comedians pulled no slapser, punches.

Will Smith already knew that he was slapping somebody who probably couldnt defend himself, Jackson said. Ive never known [Chris Rock] to be a pugilist of any type. Hes probably laughed his way and talked his way out of many fights.

Though Rock handled himself very well, Jackson said, I would have put a beat down on Will Smith. Hed be in a coma. Thats No. 1. No. 2  Will Smith hits like a girl.

No guy thats defending the honor of his woman is gonna slap a dude. If you insulted my wife, Im gonna lay you out in so many ways youre gonna be filleted. By the time you wake up, youre gonna be Rip van Winkle.

Of Rocks response, Stine said, To me, yeah, it was good the way he tried to reel it back in, but thats what you do when youre a host and a professional in that venue [and] assuming that people are going to take care of the problem. [But] youre on live television. What are you supposed to do?

In that instance, I would have accepted it and dealt with it later because I had a job to do. I was being filmed at that moment.

Wilkins said the lack of consequences for Smith means open season has been declared on comedians who offend people.

I think more people are going to take it upon themselves to charge the stage, throw drinks, be unruly. Its gotten progressively worse over the past decades, he said.

On this point, the comics were all of one mind: that Smiths public slapping of Rock wasnt staged.

He [Smith] is not that good an actor. Ive seen all of his movies, Wilkins said.
Speaking to supporters in San Jose, the capital, the 60-year-old Chaves said he accepted his victory with humility, and urged Figueres to help him move the country forward.

I humbly beg Jose Maria and his party to work together to make possible what Don Jose Maria himself called the Costa Rican miracle, he said, referring to Figueres father, Jose Figueres Ferrer, who served as president three times.

Lets put aside pettiness and vanity. Tonight we will begin together to serve our country, added Chaves, who is set to assume office on May 8.

Figueres has conceded.

I congratulate Rodrigo Chaves, and I wish him the best, he told supporters.

Caravans of cars sporting the flag of Chaves Social Democratic Progress Party (PPSD) crowded the streets of downtown San Jose in celebration.

Polls had shown Chaves to be a slight favorite heading into the election after he unexpectedly finished runner-up to Figueres in an indecisive first round of voting in February.

Chaves, who briefly served as finance minister for outgoing President Carlos Alvarado, has vowed to shake up the political elite, pledging to use referendums to bypass Congress to bring change.

If the people go out to vote, this is going to be a sweep, a tsunami, Chaves said after casting his ballot on Sunday.

On Twitter, Alvarado said he had called to congratulate Chaves and pledged an orderly handover of power.

Figueres campaigned on his experience and family political legacy in Costa Rica, a tourist destination and bastion of environmentalism long regarded as one of the most stable democracies in Latin America. But it has been grappling with growing social discontent and mounting national debt.

Chaves faces the challenges of reviving an economy battered by the COVID-19 pandemic, and alleviating the poverty in which about 23 percent of a population of 5.1 million live.

Growing income disparity makes Costa Rica one of the worlds most unequal countries, with unemployment of almost 15 percent.

In January 2021, the country agreed to $1.78 billion in financial assistance from the International Monetary Fund.

In return, the government vowed to adopt a raft of fiscal changes and austerity measures, but lawmakers have only passed a law to make savings on public sector workers benefits.

By Diego Ore and Alvaro Murillo
COVID-19 Curbs Hampered Young Childrens Social and Language Skills: UK Report

COVID-19 restrictions have delayed the development of young childrens social and language skills, leaving some babies struggling to understand basic facial expressions, a new UK report has warned.

Amanda Spielman, chief inspector at Britains education watchdog Ofsted, said the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus pandemic lockdowns have created some lingering challenges to education.

She said she is particularly worried about younger childrens development, which, if left unaddressed, could potentially cause problems for primary schools down the line.

The latest Ofsted report published on April 4 found that the lockdowns have continued to affect young childrens communication and language development, with many providers noticing delays in speech and language.

It said babies have struggled to respond to basic facial expressions as a result of reduced social interaction under the COVID-19 restrictions.

Several education providers said that wearing masks is continuing to have a negative impact on young childrens language and communication skills.

Children turning two years old will have been surrounded by adults wearing masks for their whole lives and have therefore been unable to see lip movements or mouth shapes as regularly, the Ofsted briefing said.

Some providers have reported that delays to childrens speech and language development have led to them not socialising with other children as readily as they would have expected previously, it added.

Children have also missed out on having conversations or hearing stories, with one provider saying young children seem to have spent more time on screens and have started to use accents and voices from programmes they have watched.

The report showed more delays in babies development, with children not learning how to crawl or walk as quickly as they usually would.

In schools, education inspectors found that lockdown restrictions are continuing to affect pupils knowledge.

Headteachers have raised particular concerns about children in reception year, who they said had delayed speech and language development.

For older secondary pupils in Year 11 and 13, inspectors found it was a challenge for teachers to help pupils catch up on content they had missed while simultaneously preparing them for exams.

James Bowen, director of policy for school leaders union NAHT, said: It is no surprise that the pandemic has had a major impact on some children. We know that repeated lockdowns have meant that most younger children have had reduced social interaction and it is perhaps unsurprising that this has affected their emotional development, social and speech and language skills.

PA Media contributed to this report.
A boy receives a free COVID-19 test at a St. Johns Well Child & Family Center mobile clinic set up outside Walker Temple AME Church in South Los Angeles on July 15, 2020. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

COVID-19 Screening Tests of Children Expensive and Burdensome: Physician

Screening testing of children without symptoms for COVID-19 may cause more harm than good and is an expensive intervention, physician and epidemiologist Dr. Tracy Beth Hoeg says.

Such a surveillance testing program is costing the Biden administration $10 billion. In January 2022, the administration announced that it would double down to keep schools safe by increasing the number of COVID-19 tests available to schools by 10 million per month.

Hoeg said these programs hardly ever lead to an improvement in their health.

I want to mention that proposing to do rapid screening testing in school settings such as K-12 or university settings is a highly expensive and burdensome intervention which will almost never lead to an improvement in their health.  And, again, if over 50 test results that say positive are actually negative, this will result in a lot of unnecessary quarantining, lost school days and worry, Hoeg told The Epoch Times in an email.

A recent study examined the real effectiveness and accuracy of three rapid antigen tests (from Abbott, Quidel, and LumiraDX) in adults who experienced no symptoms or were asymptomatic. Of the 623 who tested positive for COVID-19, the authors found that 62 percent were false-positive when confirmed with a quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) test, and only 38 percent were truly positive.

A BinaxNOW rapid COVID-19 test made by Abbott Laboratories is shown in Tacoma, Wash., on Feb. 3, 2021. (Ted S. Warren/AP Photo)

Hoeg, who was not involved in the study, said she wasnt surprised by the findings, as she and other experts had predicted last year that false-positive COVID test results in schools would be a major problem.

This is not surprising based on Bayesian statistics, Hoeg said. Given rapid tests are not perfect, if only a small fraction of the people you test actually have COVID, your chance of getting a so-called false-positive test result increases as the number of people you test who actually have COVID goes down.

Of the three manufacturers of the antigen tests used in the study, only Quidel replied to The Epoch Times inquiry.

The Results section of the JAMA study does not provide sufficient data to directly comment on the Sofia performance, a Quidel spokesperson told The Epoch Times via email. The data, as presented, supports the use of serial testing as part of screening programs introduced by the FDA in March 2020.

Signs outside a COVID-19 testing center in Camden, London, on Dec. 23, 2021. (Hollie Adams/Getty Images)

Screening testing differs from diagnostic testing in that its not testing people to treat them, but more to identify a potential outbreak.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said that screening involves testing asymptomatic individuals who do not have known or suspected exposure to COVID-19 in order to make individual decisions based on the test results.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) acknowledges that rapid antigen tests give better results when the individual tested has symptoms, however, the health agency claims that regular screening for COVID-19 in schools is a safe, effective way to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 and keep schools open for in-person instruction.

Many people with COVID-19, especially children and teens, dont have symptoms but can still spread the virus, so regular testing helps find infections before they can spread to others, the CDC said.

Dr. Arron Kheriaty, a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, disagrees with the CDC, saying asymptomatic people dont spread the virus, and the claim of asymptomatic spread being the driver of COVID-19 isnt based on science.

Given that no respiratory virus in history has been known to spread asymptomatically, this should not have surprised anyone, Kheriaty wrote in an op-ed. The specter of people with no symptoms being potentially dangerouswhich never had any scientific basisturned every fellow citizen into a possible threat to ones existence.

Danish Model

Denmark relaxed its recommendation on testing early last month, saying its not necessary to get tested unless there is a health professional reason to do so.

We recommend that you get tested if you experience symptoms of COVID-19 and are at increased risk for a serious course of illness due to COVID-19, the Danish Health Authority said.

For people who experience symptoms but are not at high risk of serious illness, the health authority recommends staying home, while individuals who live with or have had contact with an infected person dont need to get tested.

Hoeg said the United States should follow Denmarks testing recommendation.

This is a much more targeted sensible type of testing that is high enough yield to recommend but does not place undue burden on society at large, Hoeg said. Testing is recommended for symptomatic high risk.

I would add it also makes sense to get tested if you have symptoms, especially with a known exposure, and you live with or care for someone who is highly immune-compromised (for example frail elderly or bone marrow transplant recipient).

Norway has a similar guideline for testing, but goes further, in that testing children is not recommended, even if they have COVID-19 symptoms.

Jazmyn Finney is administered a CCP virus 15-minute rapid test at the student health center on campus at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University in Greensboro, N.C., on Feb. 3, 2021. (Gerry Broome/AP Photo)

Concerns

COVID-19 tests have come under scrutiny recently, with the FDA issuing warnings for three different at-home tests for the possibility of producing false-positive results, and the recall of three other rapid antigen tests that contained a potentially toxic substance, sodium azide.

For screening testing at schools, Hoeg said shes concerned about the unnecessary harm and the high cost, such as the program proposed in California that would require all schools, child care centers, and on-site afterschool programs to create regular testing plans.

In California, there is a proposed bill that would cost $1.5 billion for COVID screening testing in K12 schools. These tests would not only produce more false positives than true positives but would also be excessive measure for a disease that for children generally causes no symptoms or cold symptoms and does not with Omicron cause more severe disease than seasonal influenza, Hoeg said.

To me, this bill is an example of a double harmit is very expensive, and rather than improving health, it causes missed school days and disrupts families lives.

The bill has advanced to the state assembly Education Committee after it was approved in a committee vote of 92 on March 31.
COVID Jab Is Far More Dangerous Than Advertised

And that's for those over the age of 65.

October 26, 2021, Global Research published an interview with Dr. Peter McCullough, in which he reviews and explains the findings of a September 2021 study published in the journal Toxicology Reports.

STORY AT-A-GLANCE

According to a September 2021 analysis, based on conservative, best-case scenarios, the COVID shots have killed five times more seniors (65+) than the infection

In younger people and children, the risk associated with the COVID shot, compared to the risk of COVID-19, is bound to be even more pronounced

Data show higher vaccination rates do not translate into lower COVID-19 case rates

50% of reported deaths after COVID-19 vaccination occur within 24 hours; 80% occur within the first week. According to one report, 86% of deaths have no other explanation aside from a vaccine adverse event. A Scandinavian study concluded about 40% of post-jab deaths among seniors in assisted living homes are directly due to the injection

The study in the journal Toxicology Reports, states: (1)

A novel best-case scenario cost-benefit analysis showed very conservatively that there are five times the number of deaths attributable to each inoculation vs those attributable to COVID-19 in the most vulnerable 65+ demographic.

The risk of death from COVID-19 decreases drastically as age decreases, and the longer-term effects of the inoculations on lower age groups will increase their risk-benefit ratio, perhaps substantially.

A novel best-case scenario cost-benefit analysis showed very conservatively that there are five times the number of deaths attributable to each inoculation vs those attributable to COVID-19 in the most vulnerable 65+ demographic.

The risk of death from COVID-19 decreases drastically as age decreases, and the longer-term effects of the inoculations on lower age groups will increase their risk-benefit ratio, perhaps substantially.

McCullough has impeccable academic credentials. Hes an internist, cardiologist, epidemiologist and a full professor of medicine at Texas A&M College of Medicine in Dallas. He also has a masters degree in public health and is known for being one of the top five most-published medical researchers in the United States, in addition to being the editor of two medical journals.

Authors Defend Their Paper

Not surprisingly, the Toxicology Reports paper has received scathing critique from certain quarters. Still, corresponding author Ronald Kostoff told Retraction Watch that the criticism has actually been an extremely small fraction of the overall response, which by and large has been overwhelmingly positive and supportive. Kostoff went on to say: (2)

Given the blatant censorship of the mainstream media and social media, only one side of the COVID-19 vaccine narrative is reaching the public. Any questioning of the narrative is met with the harshest response  I went into this with my eyes wide open, determined to identify the truth, irrespective of where it fell. I could not stand idly by while the least vulnerable to serious COVID-19 consequences were injected with substances of unknown mid and long-term safety. We published a best-case scenario. The real-world situation is far worse than our best-case scenario, and could be the subject of a future paper. What these results show is that we 1) instituted mass inoculations of an inadequately-tested toxic substance with 2) non-negligible attendant crippling and lethal results to 3) potentially prevent a relatively small number of true COVID-19 deaths. In other words, we used a howitzer where an accurate rifle would have sufficed!

COVID Jab Campaign Has Had No Discernible Impact

Certainly, data very clearly show the mass vaccination campaign has not had a discernible impact on global death rates. On the contrary, in some cases the death toll shot up after the COVID shots became widely available. You can browse through covid19.healthdata.org (3) to see this for yourself. Several examples are also included at the very beginning of the video.

This trend has also been confirmed in a September 2021 study(4) published in the European Journal of Epidemiology. It found COVID-19 case rates are completely unrelated to vaccination rates.

Using data available as of September 3, 2021, from Our World in Data for cross-country analysis, and the White House COVID-19 Team data for U.S. counties, the researchers investigated the relationship between new COVID-19 cases and the percentage of the population that had been fully vaccinated.

Sixty-eight countries were included. Inclusion criteria included second dose vaccine data, COVID-19 case data and population data as of September 3, 2021. They then computed the COVID-19 cases per 1 million people for each country, and calculated the percentage of population that was fully vaccinated.

According to the authors, there was no discernable relationship between percentage of population fully vaccinated and new COVID-19 cases in the last seven days. If anything, higher vaccination rates were associated with a slight increase in cases. According to the authors: (5)

[T]he trend line suggests a marginally positive association such that countries with higher percentage of population fully vaccinated have higher COVID-19 cases per 1 million people.

The Kostoff Analysis

Getting back to the Toxicology Reports paper, (6) which is being referring to as the Kostoff analysis, McCullough says the analysis is definitely making news in clinical medicine. The paper focuses on two factors: assumptions and determinism.

Determinism describes how likely something is. For example, if a person takes a COVID shot, its 100% certain they got the injection. Its not 50% or 75%. Its an absolute certainty. As a result, that person has a 100% chance of being exposed to whatever risk is associated with that shot.

On the other hand, if a person says no to the injection, its not 100% chance theyll get COVID-19, let alone die from it. You have a less than 1% chance of being exposed to SARS-CoV-2 and getting sick. So, its 100% deterministic that taking the shot exposes you to the risks of the shot, and less than 1% deterministic that youll get COVID if you dont take the shot.

The other part of the equation is the assumptions, which are based on calculations using available data, such as pre-COVID death statistics and death reports filed with the U.S. Vaccine Adverse Event Reports System (VAERS).

Mortality Data

As noted by McCullough, two reports have detailed COVID jab death data, showing 50% of deaths occur within 24 hours and 80% occur within the first week. In one of these reports, 86% of deaths were found to have no other explanation aside from a vaccine adverse event. McCullough also cites a Scandinavian study that concluded about 40% of post-jab deaths among seniors in assisted living homes are directly due to the injection. He also cites other eye-opening figures:

The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention reports having more than 30,000 spontaneous reports of either hospitalizations and/or deaths among the fully vaccinated

Data from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services show 300,000 vaccinated CMS recipients have been hospitalized with breakthrough infections

60% of seniors over age 65 hospitalized for COVID-19 have been vaccinated

COVID Shots Are Failing Wholesale

When we put all these data together, we have clear-cut science that the vaccines are failing wholesale, McCullough says. The shots are particularly useless in seniors.

Again, based on a best-case conservative scenario, seniors are five times more likely to die from the shot than they are from the natural infection. This scenario includes the assumption that the PCR test is accurate and reported COVID deaths were in fact due to COVID-19, which we know is not the case, and the assumption that the shots actually prevent death, which we have no proof of.

All things considered, you are FAR better off taking your chances with the natural infection, as McCullough says. The Kostoff analysis also does not take into account the fact that there are safe and effective treatments.

It bases its assumptions on the notion that there arent any. It also doesnt factor in the fact that the COVID shots are utterly ineffective against the Delta and other variants. If you take into account vaccine failure against variants and alternative treatments, it skews the analysis even further toward natural infection being the safest alternative.

FDA and CDC Should Not Run Vaccine Programs

While the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the CDC claim not a single death following COVID inoculation was caused by the shot, they should not be the ones making that determination, as they are both sponsoring the vaccination campaign.

They have an inherent bias. When you conduct a trial, you would never allow the sponsor to tell you whether the product was the cause of death, because you know theyre biased.

We have actually fulfilled all of the Bradford Hill criteria. Ill tell you right now that COVID-19 vaccine is, from an epidemiological perspective, causing these deaths or a large fraction. ~ Dr. Peter McCullough

What we need is an external group, a critical event committee, to analyze the deaths being reported, as well as a data safety monitoring board. These should have been in place from the start, but were not.

Had they been, the program would most likely have been halted in February, as by then the number of reported deaths, 186, already exceeded the tolerable threshold of about 150 (based on the number of injections given). Now, were well over 17,000. (7) Theres no normal circumstance under which that would ever be allowed.

The CDC and FDA are running the [vaccination] program. They are NOT the people who typically run vaccine programs, McCullough says. The drug companies run vaccine programs. When Pfizer, Moderna, J&J ran their randomized trials, we didnt have any problems. They had good safety oversight. They had data safety monitoring boards. The did OK. I mean I have to give the drug companies [credit]. But the drug companies are now just the suppliers of the vaccine. Our government agencies are now just running the program. Theres no external advisory committee. Theres no data safety monitoring board. Theres no human ethics committee. NO one is watching out for this! And so, the CDC and FDA pretty clearly have their marching orders: Execute this program; the vaccine is safe and effective. Theyre giving no reports to Americans. No safety reports. We needed those once a month. They havent told doctors which is the best vaccine, which is the safest vaccine. They havent told us what groups are to watch out for. How to mitigate risks. Maybe there are drug interactions. Maybe its people with prior blood clotting problems or diabetes. Theyre not telling us anything! They literally are blindsiding us, and with no transparency, and Americans now are scared to death. You can feel the tension in America. People are walking off the job. They dont want to lose their jobs, but they dont want to die of the vaccine! Its very clear. They say, Listen, I dont want to die. Thats the reason Im not taking the vaccine. Its just that clear.

Bradford Hill Criteria Are Met  COVID Jabs Cause Death

McCullough goes on to explain the Bradford Hill criterion for causation, which is one of the ways by which we can actually determine that, yes, the shots are indeed killing people. Were not dealing with coincidence.

The first question wed ask is: Does the vaccine have a mechanism of action, a biological mechanism of action, that can actually kill a human being? And the answer is yes! because the vaccines all use genetic mechanisms to trick the body into making the lethal spike protein of the virus. It is very conceivable that some people take up too much messenger RNA; they produce a lethal spike protein in sensitive organs like the brain or the heart or elsewhere. The spike protein damages blood vessels, damages organs, causes blood clots. So, its well within the mechanism of action that the vaccine could be fatal. Someone could have a fatal blood clot. They could have fatal myocarditis. The FDA has official warnings of myocarditis. They have warnings on blood clots. They have warnings on a fatal neurologic condition called Guillain-Barre syndrome. So, the FDA warnings, the mechanism of action, clearly say its possible. The second criteria is: Is it a large effect? And the answer is yes! This is not a subtle thing. Its not 151 versus 149 deaths. This is 15,000 deaths. So, its a very large effect size, a large effect. The third [criteria] is: Is it internally consistent? Are you seeing other things that could potentially be fatal in VAERS? Yes! Were seeing heart attacks. Were seeing strokes. Were seeing myocarditis. Were seeing blood clots, and what have you. So, its internally consistent. Is it externally consistent? Thats the next criteria. Well, if you look in the MHRA, the yellow card system in England, the exact same thing has been found. In the EudraVigilance system in [Europe] the exact same things been found. So, we have actually fulfilled all of the Bradford Hill criteria. Ill tell you right now that COVID-19 vaccine is, from an epidemiological perspective, causing these deaths or a large fraction.

Zero Tolerance for Elective Drugs Causing Death

There may be cases in which a high risk of death from a drug might be acceptable. If you have a terminal incurable disease, for example, you may be willing to experiment and take your chances. Under normal circumstances however, lethal drugs are not tolerated.

After five suspected deaths, a drug will receive a black box warning. At 50 deaths, it will be removed from the market. Considering COVID-19 has a less than 1% risk of death across age groups, the tolerance for a deadly remedy is infinitesimal. At over 17,000 reported deaths, which in real numbers may exceed 212,000,(8) the COVID shots far surpass any reasonable risk to protect against symptomatic COVID-19. As noted by McCullough:

There is zero tolerance for electively taking a drug or a new vaccine and then dying! Theres zero tolerance for that. People dont weigh it out and say, Oh well, Ill take my chances and die. And I can tell you, the word got out about vaccines causing death in early April [2021], and by mid-April the vaccination rates in the United States plummeted  We hadnt gotten anywhere near our goals. Remember, President Biden set a goal [of 70% vaccination rate] by July 1. We never got there because Americans were frightened by their relatives, people in their churches and their schools dying after the vaccine. They had heard about it, they saw it. There was an informal internet survey done several months ago, where 12% of Americans knew somebody who had died after the vaccine. Im a doctor. Im an internist and cardiologist. I just came from the hospital  I had a woman die of the COVID-19 vaccine  She had shot No. 1. She had shot No. 2. After shot No. 2, she developed blood clots throughout her body. She required hospitalization. She required intravenous blood thinners. She was ravaged. She had neurologic damage. After that hospitalization, she was in a walker. She came to my office. I checked for more blood clots. I found more blood clots. I put her back on blood thinners. I saw her about a month later. She seemed like she was a little better. Family was really concerned. The next month I got called by the Dallas Coroner office saying shes found dead at home. Most of us dont have any problem with vaccines; 98% of Americans take all the vaccines  I think most people who are still susceptible would take a COVID vaccine if they knew they werent going to die of it or be injured. And because of these giant safety concerns, and the lack of transparency, were at an impasse. Weve got a very labor-constrained market. Weve got people walking off the job. Weve got planes that arent going to fly, and its all because our agencies are not being transparent and honest with America about vaccine safety.

Early Treatment Is Crucial, Vaxxed or Not

As noted by McCullough, the vast majority of patients require hospitalization for COVID-19 is because theyve not received any treatment and the infection has been allowed free reign for days on end.

To this day, the patients who get hospitalized are largely those who receive no early care at home, he says. Theyre either denied care or they dont know about it, and they end up dying. The vast majority of people who die, die in the hospital; they dont die at home. And the reason why they end up in the hospital, its typically two weeks of lack of treatment. You cant let a fatal illness brew for two weeks at home with no treatment, and then start treatment very late in the hospital. Its not going to work. Theres been a very good set of analyses, one in the Journal of Clinical Infectious Diseases  that showed, day by day, one loses the opportunity of reducing the hospitalization when monoclonal antibodies are delayed  No doctor should be considered a renegade when they order FDA [emergency use authorized] monoclonal antibody. The monoclonal antibodies are just as approved as the vaccines. I just had a patient over the weekend, fully vaccinated, took the booster. A month after the booster she went on a trip to Dubai. She just came back, and she got COVID-19!  I got her a monoclonal antibody infusion that day. [The following day] she started the sequence of multidrug therapy for COVID-19. I am telling you, she is going to get through this illness in a few days  Podcaster Joe Rogan just went through this. Governor Abbott was also a vaccine failure. He went through it. Former President Trump went through it. Americans should see the use of monoclonal antibodies in high risk patients, followed by drugs in an oral sequenced approach. This is standard of care! It is supported by the Association of Physicians and Surgeons, the Truth for Health Foundation, the American Front Line Doctors, and the Front Line Critical Care Consortium. This is not renegade medicine. This is what patients should have. This is the correct thing!  If we cant get the monoclonal antibodies, we certainly use hydroxychloroquine, supported by over 250 studies, ivermectin, supported by over 60 studies, combined with azithromycin or doxycycline, inhaled budesonide  full-dose aspirin  nutraceuticals including zinc, vitamin D, vitamin C, quercetin, NAC  we do oral and nasal decontamination with povidone-iodine. In acutely sick patients we do it every four hours, [and it] massively reduces the viral load  Fortunately, we have enough doctors now and enough patient awareness, patients who  understand that early treatment is viable, is necessary, and it should be executed.

Originally published Nov 18, 2021 on Mercola.com

References

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Faucis United Front Is Collapsing

Commentary

Last week, medical journalist Katherine Eban posted at Vanity Fair the results of a long and detailed investigation into the lab-leak theory of the origins of SARS-CoV-2. The subject is moving ever more to the front and center of efforts to find out exactly what was going on at the highest levels in early 2020 that resulted in the greatest societal, political, and economic upheaval of our lives.

How precisely did we move so quickly from the germ games of October 2019when the virus was already circulating in the United Statesto full-scale global lockdown by March? Why did Dr. Anthony Fauci, who in early February was downplaying the seriousness of the virus, flip to the other side (which we know from emails)? It was Fauci, according to many reporters, who tapped Dr. Deborah Birx to huddle with Trump and convince him that the only way to battle the virus was to shut down the economyas if anything like that was possible much less effective for controlling a respiratory virus.

For two years now, and despite endless writing and reflection, this change from the top has puzzled me. Lockdowns contradicted not only a century of public-health practice but even World Health Organization guidelines. Even on March 2, 2020, 850 scientists signed a letter to the White House warning against lockdowns, closures, and travel restrictions. Within days, everything changed.

There were hints of extreme measures in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention pandemic planning manuals since 2006, but the idea was hardly orthodoxy in the profession. Its also true that there were elite scientists who longed for the chance to try out the new theory of virus suppression. But how did Fauci and Birx, to say nothing of Jared Kushner, become converts of the idea to the point that they were able to convince Trump to betray everything he believed in?

This is quite probably where the lab-leak theory comes in. Its not so much about whether the virus was an accidental or even deliberate leak that matters so much as whether Fauci, Dr. Francis Collins, and Jeremy Farrar of the UKs Wellcome Trust believed it was possible or even likely. In that case, we have our motive. Did they deploy the chaos of lockdowns as a genuine if wildly misguided attempt to suppress the virus as a way of avoiding culpability? Or perhaps it was deployed as a kind of smokescreen to distract from a closer examination of the Wuhans labs funding sources? Or, possibly, there is a third reason.

We have a very long way to go before the full truth is out. But Ebans article adds tremendous detail about the great lengths to which our Fauci-led cabal of officials worked hard to suppress dissent on the question of lab versus natural origin. They kept papers from being posted on preprint servers, held Zoom sessions with authors in an attempt to intimidate them, and spent tremendous energy making it clear there would be a no-leak united front no matter what.

Eban writes, At the highest levels of the U.S. government, alarm was growing over the question of where the virus had originated and whether research performed at the WIV, and funded in part by U.S. taxpayers, had played some role in its emergence.

Ebans intrepid journalism now has former CDC Director Robert Redfield opening up about how he not only warned about the possibility of a lab leak but also that he was then excluded from all strategy meetings thereafter.

To Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the CDC at the time, it seemed not only possible but likely that the virus had originated in a lab. I personally felt it wasnt biologically plausible that [SARS CoV-2] went from bats to humans through an [intermediate] animal and became one of the most infectious viruses to humans, he told Vanity Fair. Neither the 2002 SARS virus nor the 2012 MERS virus had transmitted with such devastating efficiency from one person to another. What had changed? The difference, Redfield believed, was the gain-of-function research that Shi and Baric had published in 2015, and that EcoHealth Alliance had helped to fund. They had established that it was possible to alter a SARS-like bat coronavirus so that it would infect human cells via a protein called the ACE2 receptor. Although their experiments had taken place in Barics well-secured laboratory in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, who was to say that the WIV had not continued the research on its own? In mid-January of 2020, Vanity Fair can reveal, Redfield expressed his concerns in separate phone conversations with three scientific leaders: Fauci; Jeremy Farrar, the director of the U.K.s Wellcome Trust; and Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organization (WHO). Redfields message, he says, was simple: We had to take the lab-leak hypothesis with extreme seriousness.

In sessions from which Redfield was excluded from early February, Faucis chosen participants strategized a statement published in the form of a medical paper: The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2. The publication date was March 17, 2020, the day following Trumps lockdown press conference. The paper was in fact written as early as Feb. 4. Eban makes the salient point: How they arrived at such certainty within four days remains unclear.

[Redfield] concluded thered been a concerted effort not just to suppress the lab-leak theory but to manufacture the appearance of a scientific consensus in favor of a natural origin. They made a decision, almost a P.R. decision, that they were going to push one point of view only and suppress rigorous debate, said Redfield. They argued they did it in defense of science, but it was antithetical to science.

Two weeks following the drafting of the paper, Eban wrote, in a letter published in the influential medical journal The Lancet, [Peter Daszak of EcoHealth, which had funneled U.S. money to the Wuhan lab] joined 26 scientists in asserting, We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin.

Conspiracy theories! We know for sure that those never turn out to be true! Surely there was no such thing as a powerful cabal plotting to force a single orthodoxy on science in order to protect themselves from too much investigation into their own role in funding gain-of-function research. Except that this appears to be exactly what was happening.

This strategy of information suppression and intimidation of dissent, along with the manufacturing of a fake consensus that in fact didnt exist, continued through 2020 and arguably to the present. Among the other victims of such propaganda and smears were the authors of the Great Barrington Declaration. We know from emails that Fauci and Collins collaborated in a deliberate attempt to drum up a quick and devastating takedown.

It was a rather bizarre thing to do. The Great Barrington Declaration was a rather conventional statement of public health principles along with a warning against the devastating consequences of extreme measures of coercion. Today, it reads almost like a summary of what most people have come to believe after long and terrible experiences. Why did the Fauci cabal believe it was so very important to stop this statement?

What we need now is a clearer linkage behind the now-documented attempt to forge a single narrative on the lab leak question and the decision to forge a single narrative about the need to lock down, and thus overthrow a century of public-health practice. What was the motivation here? What were they discussing in private in those crucial weeks in February 2020 leading up to the disaster?

What is unbearably clear at this point is that this gangs obsession with covering up a possible lab leak, in the interest of keeping their own fingerprints off the deed, completely distracted the leadership of the National Institutes of Health from what it was supposed to be doing at the time. And what was that? Its not complicated. If you have a new pathogen sweeping a country, you want to focus on ways to keep vulnerable populations safe (for example, not forcing nursing homes to admit COVID-infected people) and discovering the best therapeutics to minimize severity for the general population.

This is not what happened. Instead, we had a plot against the U.S. president, the deliberate cultivation of mass panic, forced closures of schools and businesses, wild demands for mass human separation, travel restrictions, ineffective mask and vaccine mandates, and the general triumph of crank science over experience, at the great cost of human liberties and rights and hence social and economic well-being.

The reason for the chaos appears to be, in part, that during those crucial early months, public-health leaders in the United States had another private agenda centered not on health but on their own reputations and professional standing. Two years later, we live with the devastating consequences that have affected the whole of our lives.

From the Brownstone Institute

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Fears That Conversion Therapy Ban Could Criminalise Christian Prayer

Some British church leaders are concerned that the UK governments plans to press ahead with a ban on so-called conversion therapy could effectively criminalise prayer.

The proposed legislation will mean therapy to attempt to change peoples sexuality will be banned, and introduce a new criminal offence alongside sentence uplifts for existing ones.

On Thursday the Conservative government reportedly said it would initially drop plans for the ban entirely, according to a leaked document obtained by ITV News.

However, on Friday the government reversed course, with a government spokesperson telling The Epoch Times that the prime minister was committed to bringing forward legislation to ban conversion therapy.

The content, scope, and timing of the proposed bill will be confirmed in due course, he added.

State Overreach?

But some Christian clergy fear that with the new rules, authorities will be able to decide what they can and cannot pray for, restricting religious freedom.

The Rev. Jamie Franklin, who presents the popular religious current affairs podcast Irreverand, told The Epoch Times: Make no mistake: the implication of this legislation will be that the government will dictate what Christians can and cant pray for. It constitutes an egregious violation of religious liberty and is another example of pernicious state overreach.

The government defines conversion therapy as any efforts to change, modify, or suppress a persons sexual orientation or gender identity regardless of whether it takes place in a health care, religious, or other setting.

According to government research, the most common methods used in conversion therapy involve a combination of spiritual methods, such as prayer healing or exorcisms, and pastoral counselling, and psychological methods such as talking therapies.

Professional therapy bodies such as the UK Council for Psychotherapy have spoken out against conversion therapy, considering it unethical and potentially harmful.

Conversion therapy begins from the preconceived view that the clients sexual orientation or gender identity should be changed. Sexual orientations and gender identities are not mental health disorders. It is therefore unethical to offer a treatment a cure for them, it stated.

Critics say there is already an existing criminal law framework that prohibits offences of physical or sexual violence that may arise from conversion therapy.

The government said in its December consultation that it had identified gaps in the law and that it would take action to introduce new criminal and civil measures.

These include a new offence that will target talking conversion therapy for under-18s and the vulnerable, as well making sure that violent acts will be considered by judges as a potential aggravating factor upon sentencing.

Other measures include Conversion Therapy Protection Orders, support for victims, restricting its promotion, removing profit streams, and disqualifying people from holding a senior role in a charity.

Chilling Effect

Toby Young, editor of the Daily Sceptic and general secretary of the Free Speech Union (FSU) told The Epoch Times in an email that the law would inevitably have a chilling effect on free speech.

Today brought good news and bad news. The good news is the ban wont extend to providing therapy to transgender individuals. The bad news is the government still intends to waste precious parliamentary time on this entirely unnecessary bill. Conversion therapy for gay and bisexual people is already prohibited by numerous laws. We dont need another. Its just pointless virtue signalling, said Young.

Young pointed towards the FSUs recent response to the governments consultation.

Our concern is that conversion therapy, as currently under discussion, is too vaguely defined to form the basis of a new law and such a law would inevitably have a chilling effect on free speech, the FSU wrote.

Without a clear definition of conversion therapy, government-sanctioned protection orders amount to a fresh power for the state to impose free speech restrictions, especially on parents, who may have legitimate questions about their childs sexual orientation or gender identity or personal self-expression, it added.

Dangerous Territory

The Rev. William Philip from The Tron Church in Glasgow, Scotland, told The Epoch Times that there are marginal groups that participate in conversion therapy that are unhelpful and damaging.

We dont want to defend that, but those sorts of things are very covered by existing legislation, he said.

But he had concerns that the new legislation could criminalise preaching, prayer, and pastoral care.

He said that there is a real danger that it could outlaw the ordinary work of Christian churches and that the Christian call is for repentance to conversion.

Its very dangerous to criminalise the word of conversion. It very quickly becomes conversion itself. I think we are transgressing into quite dangerous territory with this kind of thing. Some people want to ban prayer. So if someone comes to their pastor and says they are having unwanted same-sex attraction, please would you pray for me, the danger of this legislation is that it potentially criminalises something as basic as Christian prayer and Christian teaching, he said.

Philip added that a major issue surrounding the legislations lack of clarity was that it could be inevitably used by activists to push a particular agenda way beyond what the intention was.

The church cant change its message, and we cant stop praying or calling people to repent and to follow Christ and His way. But we may find ourselves criminalised because of that, said Philip.
Gas Prices Edge Down as Washington Announces Release From Oil Reserves Again, Band-Aid Solution Claims Analyst

Gas prices in the United States edged down in the recent week as stocks increased, demand decreased, and the Biden administration announced an unprecedented release of oil from the countrys strategic reserves.

The price of regular gas averaged $4.18 as of April 4, down 1.3 percent from a week ago when prices were averaging $4.24, according to data from American Automobile Association.

Total stocks of gasoline rose by 785,000 barrels to 238.8 million barrels for the week ending March 25 when compared to the previous week, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). During this time, gasoline demand nationwide declined from 8.63 million barrels per day (bpd) to 8.5 million bpd.

Gas prices also faced downward pressure after the Biden administration announced that it will release a million additional barrels of oil per day on average into the market every day for the next six months. The oil will come from the countrys strategic petroleum reserve.

The scale of this release is unprecedented: the world has never had a release of oil reserves at this 1 million per day rate for this length of time, the White House said in a March 31 Fact Sheet. This record release will provide a historic amount of supply to serve as bridge until the end of the year when domestic production ramps up.

Opinions on the oil release from strategic reserves are mixed. Biden had ordered a similar release in November, adding 50 million additional barrels to the market. After Russia invaded Ukraine, 30 million more barrels were released. However, oil prices went up despite these actions.

Commerzbanks Carsten Fritsch argued in a report that the planned six-month oil release is likely to make sure that the oil market does not remain undersupplied during second and third quarters.

However, Stephen Brennock from oil broker PVM does not expect the oil release to make up for the shortfall created from the loss of Russian oil supplies, according to Reuters.

Roger Read, senior energy analyst at Wells Fargo Securities, pointed out that Washingtons planned release will only account for one percent of daily global oil production and five percent of U.S. consumption. Its unlikely to solve the problem, he said according to CNBC. In the end, its a little bit of a Band-Aid.

Meanwhile, oil analyst Patrick De Haan sees gas prices in America coming down this week. The US national average has declined 6c/gal over the last week to $4.173/gal while diesel has fallen 2.9c/gal to $5.097/gal, he said in an April 4 tweet.

#GasPrice declines will continue to outpace diesel and should fall another 4-9c/gal in the week ahead barring any unforeseeable changes in situations.
NEW YORK, April 2 (Xinhua) -- Before the COVID-19 pandemic began, the Black population in the United States was already more at risk than the white population of being exposed to gun violence, and the trend evolved in a disturbing way during the last few years, a recent study out of Boston University has revealed.

The study showed that in the five years before the pandemic began, Black children, compared to white children, were already at a significantly higher level of risk of being exposed to firearm violence. During the pandemic, that disparity grew even wider, as gun violence across the country increased.

Around 9 million U.S. children aged 5-17 lived in a neighborhood that experienced at least one fatal shooting each year from 2015 to 2019. Among those 9 million, the exposure risk for Black kids was 4.4 times higher than for white kids. For Hispanic kids, it was 2.1 times higher, according to the study.

During the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 9 million increased to 11 million and the majority of that increase was in Black and brown communities, according to the study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine on March 14.

"Not only were the disparities reproduced during the pandemic, they actually got more severe," Jonathan Jay, a professor at Boston University, was quoted by TIME magazine as saying in its report of the study. "The pandemic was just reproducing social disadvantages across multiple dimensions of marginalization, including race." 
Cars intended for an export wait at the port for loading, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues in Bremerhaven, Germany, on April 24, 2020. (Fabian Bimmer/Reuters)

German Imports, Exports Jump More Than Expected in February

German exports and imports jumped more than expected in February, the Federal Statistics Office said on Monday, as the effects of the war in Ukraine have yet to be reflected in foreign trade figures.

Seasonally adjusted exports rose 6.4 percent on the month, compared to a rise of 1.5 percent predicted by economists.

Imports increased 4.5 percent on the month, compared to an average forecast for a 1.4 percent increase.

The trade surplus increased to 11.5 billion euros ($12.70 billion) from a downwardly revised 8.8 billion euros the previous month.

($1 = 0.9078 euros)
Senate Bill S-233, an act to develop a national framework for a guaranteed livable basic income, is at second reading in the Canadian Senate. (The Canadian Press/Richard Plume)

Guaranteed Basic Income: Proposals Realities Concern Experts

A Senate bill proposing a guaranteed basic income (GBI) could lead to bigger debt and deficits, higher taxes, and greater dependence on government by providing a disincentive to work, experts tell The Epoch Times.

Bill S-233, introduced by Ontario Senator Kim Pate in November 2021, calls on the finance minister to develop a national framework to provide all persons over the age of 17 in Canada with access to a guaranteed livable basic income. This includes temporary workers, permanent residents, and refugee claimants.

While the bill by the Trudeau-appointed senator is not a Liberal government bill and may not have a path to passage, the concept of a universal basic income has consistently been a feature of national Liberal Party conventions.

A report by the Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO) from April 2021 estimated that a GBI program that guarantees individuals and couples at least $16,989 and $24,027 of income per year respectively would cost taxpayers $87.6 billion in 202223, rising to $93.3 billion in 202526.

Jack Mintz, a presidents fellow at the University of Calgarys School of Public Policy, raised concerns about this very expensive cost and its implications on debt and taxes.

We need to be a little bit more cognizant of the tax costs associated with these things, the economic costs of taxation, the problem of running big deficits, pushing huge costs onto future generations, the costs of putting ourselves into financial pressures because we end up running our debt too high and we dont raise the taxes to pay for all this stuff, he said. All these things are very important.

Bev Dahlby, a senior fellow with the Fraser Institute, expressed similar sentiments.

If youre increasing the amount of support, generally speaking, to people with lower incomes or standards of living now, and you have to do this in a fiscally sustainable way, youre going to have to [increase] tax revenues, Dahlby said.

And youre going to have to increase taxes on people at the higher-income levels or higher consumption standard-of-living levels.

Disincentives to Work

Mintz also pointed to the potential of such a program to disincentivize recipients from working.

To what extent do we provide cradle-to-grave support for people, and to what degree do we rely on their own initiative to try to have things themselves? This is an issue thats going to come back more and more because theres no free lunch out there. Somebody in the end has to pay for these things, he said.

University of Manitoba economics professor Wayne Simpson says, however, that the GBI has been examined in four experiments in the United States and one in Manitoba, and the composite picture suggests some positive effects for the recipients mental health and their pursuit of more education.

One of the fears was, people would go off and spend the money on either frivolous things or abusive things, [but] they didnt find evidence of either of those things. They found that people were dealing with their needs, their nutrition and medical and so forth. So I think that was a relatively positive result, but on a small scale, he said.

Regarding disincentives to work, Simpson acknowledged that there were small disincentives to work associated with the plan, which is what economists had always predicted. But he said the sizes of those effects were not very large.  You werent going to lose half your working population because of it. Youre talking about a few hours a year.

The PBO report said the disincentive to work will materialize in one of two waysby people deciding to potentially cut back their hours worked in order to increase the size of their GBI, and by lower-wage workers [deciding] to opt out of the labour force entirely as a result of a guaranteed income.

Across the provinces, households will reduce their hours worked by an estimated 1.3 percent on average, resulting in an estimated average reduction of 0.5 percent in the payroll, according to the PBO.

Mintz pointed out that the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) given out during the pandemic has provided fresh data on how free money can discourage employment.

A lot of people who were working part-time, under CERB [they] got a lot more than what they would get part-time at their work. And a lot of employers will tell you they had a very difficult time trying to get people back to work when they were getting $2,000 a month, he said.

They may have been afraid [of contracting COVID]. They didnt want to go back to work [maybe for that reason]. But still, once the benefits came off, they started all going back to work, he added.

A GBI might also discourage people from saving for retirement, because they know theyre going to get all the support when they retire. Also, it may encourage people not to work, to retire earlier rather than keep working, said Mintz.

So in fact a lot of economic studies found that there are a couple of areas where taxation, pension policy, things like that can have a significant influence on work behaviour. And retiring is one possibility.

Separate Health and Social Supports Still Needed

The GBI is intended to be a single payment that would be delivered by the tax system and that would replace the current complex system of income supports provided by separate federal and provincial programssuch as the guaranteed income supplement for seniors, disability benefits, and social assistance.

Making some of the current programs redundant could be a good thing. However, questions remain as to how such efficiencies might be offered by Bill S-233, since it calls for national standards for health and social supports that complement a guaranteed basic income program, and its also seeking no decrease in services or benefits meant to meet an individuals exceptional needs related to health or disability.

Last December, NDP MP Leah Gazan introduced Bill C-223, which contains the same text as Senate Bill S-233 introduced a month earlier. The two are part of a coordinated effort from within the House of Commons and the Senate, according to UBI Works, a non-profit advocating for the implementation of the GBI, also called UBI, or universal basic income.

Simpson says the GBI idea has been around for decades, and it endures, despite its costs, partly due to the attraction that using the tax system eliminates the bureaucratic process by which social assistance is administered.

He added that the argument for a basic income is really an argument about the cost of poverty to society in areas like health, education, and crime. And the federal and provincial governments have had some earlier experience delivering benefits through the tax system, such as the GST/HST credit, and negotiating to develop a transfer system, such as in the case of the Canada child benefit.

So those kinds of things have happened over time, Simpson said, while noting that the GBI is a different story.

This [the GBI] is a bigger deal because theres a lot more people involved, a lot more money. I wouldnt say that it cant happen, but I dont see any impetus for it at the moment, he said.
A file photo of then South Korean Finance and Economy Minister Han Duck-Soo addressing a press conference on March 23, 2005, in Seoul, South Korea. (Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images)

Han Duck-Soo to Return as South Koreas Next Prime Minister

South Koreas freshly elected president Yoon Suk-yeol has selected a former prime minister who served the country more than a decade ago to join his administration next month, according to local reports on Sunday.

Yoon nominated 72-year-old Han Duck-soo to be prime minister in his cabinet, restoring his role during the liberal Roh Moo-hyun administration from April 2007 to February 2008, The Korea Herald reported.

The new government is tasked with setting a foundation for a new leap for our economy in a serious environment and thoroughly preparing for an era where economy and security are combined as a single factor, Yoon said at a press briefing.

I believe nominee Han Duck-soo is the right person to oversee and coordinate the cabinet and carry out state affairs based on his abundant experience in both public and private sectors, he added.

Yoon cited Hans experience in various key positions in the public sector as the reason he chose him for the role. Han served under another liberal president, Kim Dae-jung, as the trade minister and chief secretary for policy planning from 1998 to 2003.

He also served as an ambassador to Washington during the conservative Lee Myung-bak administration from 2009 to 2012 and played a key role in negotiating a free trade agreement with the United States.

Han expressed his gratitude for the nomination but noted that he felt a huge responsibility to be nominated for the seat of prime minister in this very serious situation surrounding South Koreas economy and geography.

As the newly nominated prime minister, I will assist President Yoon Suk-yeol to create policies from the administrative branch that are drafted through constant discussions and communications, he said at the press briefing.

South Koreas president-elect Yoon Suk-yeol attends a ceremony of disbanding his presidential election camp at the National Assembly Library in Seoul, South Korea on March 10, 2022. (Song Kyung-seok/Pool via Reuters)

Meanwhile, Yoons spokesperson announced last week that the new president will send a delegation to the United States for policy consultations on the bilateral alliance and North Korea, among other things, ahead of the launch of his cabinet on May 10, Yonhap News Agency reported.

Yoon has decided to send the delegation for comprehensive, practical consultations on key pending issues with the U.S. side, spokesperson Kim Eun-hye told reporters, adding that Yoon may also send delegations to other countries if needed.

The conservative former top prosecutor will replace current liberal President Moon Jae-in next month. During his election campaign, Yoon had vowed to seek a stronger U.S. security commitment to deter North Korean military threats, saying that preemptive strikes may be necessary if Pyongyang displays signs of an imminent attack.

Yoon is expected to nominate his choices for foreign, defense, finance, and other ministers in the coming weeks.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Homeless Grandmother Sues Massachusetts City Over Home Equity Theft

A homeless 66-year-old grandmother is suing a city in Massachusetts for home equity theft after her home was seized for a tax debt and sold, but her equity in the property wasnt refunded to her.

The legal action takes aim at what some call home equity theft, which is widespread in Massachusetts, according to the Sacramento, California-based Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF), a public interest law firm thats representing the woman free of charge. PLF has stated that its committed to ending home equity theft across the country.

The legal complaint (pdf) in the case, Foss v. City of New Bedford, was filed on March 29 in Massachusetts Superior Court in Bristol County, Massachusetts.

In addition to New Bedford, Boston-based real estate investment company Tallage Davis also is named as a defendant.

On its website, Tallage Davis characterizes its work as a public service, stating that it purchases past due obligations of municipalities and takes over all of the risks as well as the legal and administrative costs and obligations required in the attempt to recoup monies previously owed to the municipality.

In any economic environment, revenues now are better than revenues later, the site reads. In difficult economic times, revenues now may mean being able to afford to keep an extra school teacher, police officer, or fire fighter.

The plaintiff, Deborah D. Foss, who has been living in her car, is challenging a state law that allows private investors to seize the equity that homeowners hold in their property over relatively small tax debts. Her car was towed because she couldnt pay the auto insurance, but she was able to get it back with help from her son, according to her attorneys. Her family and friends created a GoFundMe page to help Foss secure housing.

Foss lives on a small fixed income and suffers from chronic lymphocytic leukemia, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and neuropathy. She took care of her ailing mother for the past 10 years of her life, and when her mother died, she used the money from the sale of her mothers houseplus her own life savingsto buy a $168,500 home in New Bedford.

Foss lived downstairs and rented out the upstairs. The new home needed repairs that she couldnt afford and her tenant stopped paying rent. When Foss couldnt pay her 2016 tax bill to New Bedford, the city initiated a tax taking and 18 months later, sold its tax lien to Tallage Davis for $9,626the amount she owed the city. Tallage Davis took ownership of the property in September 2019.

PLF attorney Joshua Polk said hes hoping the court will make things right.

Obviously, the government has to have some mechanism to collect what is owed, but neither the government nor a private investor has any right to collect more than what is owed, Polk told The Epoch Times.

And thats a matter of constitutional law and basic human decency. I think home equity theft is cruel and unjust. And Massachusetts law shouldnt allow municipalities to enrich themselves or wealthy investors at the expense of those suffering from financial hardship, like Ms. Foss has been suffering here. So we hope that this lawsuit will help bring an end to the practice and get some justice for Ms. Foss.

The Epoch Times reached out for comment to New Bedford Mayor Jon Mitchell, but didnt receive a reply as of press time.

But William P. Cowin, a principal at Tallage Davis, provided a comment to The Epoch Times, quoting from a lengthy statement issued on March 29 by attorney Daniel C. Hill of Hill Law in Boston. Tallage Davis denies wrongdoing and says it carefully followed the law.

Hill said the title to the property was held in a real estate trust since 2015 and that the trust never paid any property taxes after acquiring the property. The case went to court, and in July 2019, Foss, the trustee of the realty trust, was given an opportunity to redeem the property by paying off the back taxes, or hire a lawyer to challenge the tax taking. She did neither, and was defaulted. The Court entered a foreclosure judgment on September 25, 2019.

In fall 2021, after Tallage Davis assumed ownership, it tried to help the occupants relocate.

The occupants signed an agreement under which they agreed to vacate the premises by November 30, 2021, in exchange for a monetary settlement, Hill said. The sisters did not honor that agreement.

The next month, an oil spill was discovered in the basement, and Tallage paid to temporarily re-locate the sisters to a hotel while the contamination was being remediated. The remediation, documented by the state, is still ongoing and Tallage has over $75,000 in clean-up expenses to date. The sisters vacated the property on Feb. 1 and Tallage paid the agreed-upon settlement funds, Hill wrote.
A student walks around the University of New South Wales campus in Sydney, Australia, on Dec. 1, 2020. (AP Photo/Mark Baker)

How Did Australian Universities Help Beijing Advance Its Goals

Commentary

An Australian Parliamentary committee on security and intelligence has concluded that the Chinese communist regime targeted Australian universities as part of a huge two-pronged exercise to firstly transfer Western knowledge and technology into China and secondly to deploy spies into the West.

Australian universities allowed themselves to be infiltrated and used, but this is not just an Australian problem. Rather China has run this exercise across the Western world, especially in Anglo-sphere countries.

Examining what happened in Australia serves as a case study of how naive university managements were suckered into helping the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) grow itself into an aggressive global actor.

It is worth starting by asking why Beijing targeted the universities. What does it want?

It seems Beijing wanted four things that the universities could help them get. Most important was technology transfer. China has been playing catch-up with the West and Beijing realized it could speed up Chinas development by getting its hands on Western intellectual property and knowledge.

The Chinese regime is not as good at developing new ideas as the West, but it is very good at building quality products once they have plans. So the CCP turned to data theft (using cyber warfare) and to infiltrating Western universities.

Secondly, Beijing needed to build a network of intelligence agents across the West. University students provide excellent cover for deploying spies. And because many Chinese students are allowed to stay on as migrants, Beijing discovered that this was a great way to create large permanent intelligence networks plus export large numbers of CCP-supporters to countries like Australia.

Beijing learned to turn Western policies of mass immigration and multiculturalism into tools that the CCP could use to build Chinas influence. And once Beijing invented a way to turn these students into Western-based academics it had the perfect model for intellectual property transfer.

Thirdly, Beijings hybrid warfare model of sowing discord in target societies required deep knowledge of local cultures in places like Australia, USA, and Canada. Sending hundreds of thousands of students was a way to collect this knowledge about weaknesses and divisions in Western societies. Further, these students also became proficient in English, an important skill for any hybrid warfare operative.

Fourth, Beijing spent a fortune building soft power mechanisms that were given the task of spreading messages of a benevolent and friendly communist China, plus cultivating China-friendly opinion leaders across the West.

Then-Chinese vice-chair Xi Jinping unveils a plaque at the opening of Australias first Chinese Medicine Confucius Institute at the RMIT University in Melbourne, on June 20, 2010. (William West/AFP via Getty Images)

Not surprisingly, Confucius Institutes were built on university campuses to help cultivate friendly academics, journalists, and teachers in targeted countries.

A bonus of this CCP-funded perception-shaping strategy was that the heads of these Confucius Institutes were appointed to important internal committees within Western universities from which they could then influence curricula and policy.

The point is, the CCP was incredibly successful in suckering Australian university managements into becoming compliant partners in building Beijings influence not just on university campuses, but across Australian society as a whole.

It is instructive to unpack how and why Beijing was so successful at getting university management and academics to play along and at gaming Australias university and research system.

Given that university management and academics are supposed to be so clever, one is left wondering how they could be so gullible?

Turns out those running Australias universities were naive globalistsunrooted cosmopolitans and believers in the one big human family idea.

These academics saw all humans as trusted partners in building their lefty dream of a peaceful globalized world. It never occurred to them that the CCP does not play by the same rules.

Consequently, as Australias spy agency ASIO noted, universities were wide open to being exploited by CCP operatives.

So what games did Beijing play to turn Australias universities into compliant agents of Chinas expansionist foreign policy, such that these universities became important portals for CCP infiltration and influence into the wider Australian society?

Grasping how so many of Australias university managers allowed themselves to become tools of the CCP requires understanding something about the managerial culture of these universities.

The Chancelleries of Australias universities have a cultural problem that Beijing learned to exploit. These Chancelleries have become creatures of the swamp by growing into large bureaucracies of Vice-Chancellors, Deputy-VCs, Pro-VCs, Provosts, and innumerable bureaucratized advisors.

One might say Beijings apparatchiks and the Chancellery apparatchiks discovered each other as ideal partners.

Australias Chancelleries are filled with educrat-managers. This educrat phenomenon grew out of the Dawkins Reforms to Australias universities when a Labor Party government turned the countrys universities into mass education degree factories run by these educrat-managers.

Dawkins was bad for students wanting quality education and bad for those wanting to be real academics. But was good for educrats who built careers by attending endless meetings, designing tick-a-box forms, and running (ever-growing taxpayer-funded) bureaucracies whose job it was to ensure that the forms were ticked.

People walk past signage for Australian universities in Melbournes central business district in Melbourne, Australia, on June 10, 2020. (William West/AFP via Getty Images)

Dawkins also turned out to be good for the flood of international students who were happy to come to a degraded university system that provided them with back-door immigration visas. Further, Dawkins was also good for Beijing because the educrat-managers turned out to be willing and compliant partners for a CCP desiring influence over universities.

The point is, that Australias Chancelleries are filled with administrative gamers. And rather than being interested in knowledge, ideas, quality education, and quality research, these educrat-gamers became interested in building their own empires (because empire size determines salary size).

As empire-builders, their primary focus became attracting large numbers of students into mass education degree factories. That means public relations and marketing took over, and a university management class emerged who built careers gaming marketing devices (like league tables).

Turned out the quickest way to empire-build was to recruit huge numbers of mainland Chinese students. To do this, Australian universities learned how to please Beijing, which set in motion many visits to China to learn what the Chinese wanted.

The CCP quickly set up a junket operation that entertained Australian professors and managers with five-star luxury as they got to experience the delights of China while learning how to please Beijing.

But most importantly, Australias Chancelleries employed bureaucrats whose job it was to ensure the university met those criteria set by the Shanghai league table of what Beijing regarded as a good university. This effectively meant handing over control of university policy to whichever CCP functionaries drew up the Shanghai league table.

Some of the Shanghai criteria concerned what Beijing wanted for its students. But other criteria involved research. Australian universities were rewarded if their academics engaged in co-research projects with China-based academics.

This steered Australian research towards projects that helped Beijing acquire intellectual property rights over research at Australian universities.

Australias Chancelleries soon worked out they could increase Beijings pleasure by employing academics from mainland China who then built research partnerships with former colleagues back in China. These academics were then eligible to apply for Australian research funds.

Hence, one ended up with research teams at Australian universities, funded by Australian taxpayers, but doing research useful to Beijing. This research scam was further intensified by Beijings Thousand Talents program.

Beijing would have had every reason to be self-satisfied with how they gamed the Australian university system, gamed Australias research funding system, and gamed Australias migration system.

On the other hand, Australian taxpayers should be less than impressed with how a swamp of highly paid educrats working in Chancelleries allowed Australian universities to become highjacked by those building the CCPs power.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
The remains of cars are seen in front of an apartment building destroyed during the Ukraine-Russia conflict in Mariupol, Ukraine, on April 3, 2022. (Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters)

Human Rights Watch Alleges War Crimes Against Ukrainian Civilians by Russian Forces

Human Rights Watch said on April 3 that it has documented a series of several instances of war crimes allegedly committed by Russian forces in Ukraine, including rape and murder, between Feb. 27 and March 14.

The documentation described by the rights organization includes a case of repeated rape and two cases of extrajudicial execution of a total of seven men.

The claims are based on interviews with 10 people conducted by Human Rights Watch. The Epoch Times has been unable to independently verify the claims and has reached out to Russias Ministry of Foreign Affairs for comment.

In one case, a woman identified as Olha told Human Rights Watch that a Russian soldier had repeatedly raped her on March 13 in a school in the Kharkiv region, where she and her family had been sheltering.

Olha said that the soldier also beat her and cut her face, neck, and hair with a knife. She said she later managed to flee to Kharkiv, where she was able to get medical treatment, with the rights group saying it had reviewed several photographs documenting her facial injuries.

A man walks past a school that was damaged by fighting in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on March 27, 2022. (Thomas Peter/Reuters)

In another case, Russian forces on Feb. 27 rounded up six men in the village of Staryi Bykiv, in the region of Chernihiv, and executed them, according to a local woman named Tetiana.

Most people were hiding in their basements because of shelling, and soldiers went door to door, said Tetiana, who told Human Rights Watch she had spoken to the relatives of four of the men who were killed.

Tetiana recounted that the Russian soldiers took six men from three different families, telling them that they were taking the men away for interrogation. She said that Russian soldiers instead took the men to the far end of the village and shot them.

A mass grave is seen behind a church in the town of Bucha, northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on April 3, 2022. (Sergei SUPINSKY/AFP via Getty Images)

In another case that reportedly took place on March 4, Russian forces summarily executed a man in Bucha, near Kyiv, and threatened to execute four others, according to a teacher who told Human Rights Watch she witnessed the killing.

The teacher, a woman who wasnt identified by name, said that Russian forces led about 40 people to a square in Bucha, checked their documents, and interrogated them.

She said that at one point the Russian soldiers ordered five men in the group to take off their boots and jackets and forced them to kneel on the side of the road.

Russian soldiers pulled their T-shirts, from behind and over their heads. They shot one in the back of the head, the woman told Human Rights Watch.

People react as they gather close to a mass grave in the town of Bucha, northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, on April 3, 2022. (Sergei Supinsky/AFP via Getty Images)

After several hours, the Russian soldiers took the people back to their homes, she said, while the four men remained kneeling when she left.

The young mans body was still lying where he had been shot when she was able to leave Bucha on March 9, she said.

The cases we documented amount to unspeakable, deliberate cruelty and violence against Ukrainian civilians, Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

Rape, murder, and other violent acts against people in the Russian forces custody should be investigated as war crimes.

Russia has denied targeting civilians in what it calls a special military operation to disarm Ukraine and oust its leadership, which it regards as dangerous nationalists.

Over the weekend, reports emerged claiming that Ukrainian civilians had been massacred by Russian forces in Bucha, prompting Western outcry and calls for more sanctions against Moscow.

Ukraines Ministry of Defense posted footage that appeared to show dead civilians, including some with hands tied behind their backs, their bodies scattered in the streets of the city.

Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraines foreign minister, said on Twitter that the Bucha massacre proves that Russian hatred towards Ukrainians is beyond anything Europe has seen since WWII, as he posted photos of dead civilians that were allegedly targeted by Russian forces.

The Epoch Times couldnt immediately verify the photos or footage.

Russias ministry of defense has denied claims that its forces have committed atrocities in Bucha, saying in a statement on April 3 that the photographs and videos published by the Ukrainian authorities alleging crimes by Russian troops in Bucha were a provocation.

Russia on April 4 ordered an official investigation into what Alexander Bastrykin, head of the Russian Investigative Committee, said was Ukraine spreading deliberately false information about Russian forces committing war crimes.
Workers load coal onto a truck at a coal depot near Lad Rymbai, in the district of East Jaintia Hills, India, on April 14, 2011. Daniel Berehulak/Getty Images

Indian State Cancels Adani Bids to Supply Imported Coal, Cites High Prices

Indias Andhra Pradesh state has canceled two bids from Adani Enterprises Ltd. for tenders to supply imported coal, due to high prices, despite the company being the sole bidder for one of the tenders, government officials said on April 3.

The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that Adani offered to supply 500,000 metric tons of South African coal for 40,000 rupees ($526.50) per ton in March 2022 and another 750,000 tons at 17,480 rupees ($238.08) in January.

They claimed that both offers were rejected despite Adani being the sole bidder for the 500,000-ton tender and offered a lower price for the 750,000-ton tender than another bidder, Agarwal Coal.

This would be the first time in recent years that a major government tender for imported coal has been canceled in India because of high costs, according to Reuters. There have been no other reports on the cancellation.

The officials claimed that Andhra Pradesh filed a tender the week of March 28 for urgent procurement of 100,000 tons of imported coal, following a 7 percent electricity shortage in the last three days of March.

B. Sreedhar, managing director of Andhra Pradesh Power Generation Corp. Ltd., said the current power shortfall was not as severe as 2021 but added that the state is relying on a hand-to-mouth existence.

We have not been able to build up stocks. Even though coal is available locally because of more mining, transportation is an issue, Sreedhar told Reuters.

South African coal prices reached a monthly high of $176.50 per ton in January 2022 due to an export embargo in Indonesia, before surging to $441.65 per ton in March as a result of the RussiaUkraine crisis.

While local utilities have been asked to increase coal imports to meet a domestic shortfall, officials warned that expensive imports might exacerbate the financial burden of state-owned distributors, which owe power generators nearly $15 billion.

Meanwhile, the Indian multinational conglomerate Adani is expected to build a 5.2-megawatt wind turbine prototype at Mundra, Gujarat, using technology from Germanys W2E Wind to Energy Gmbh. This will be Indias largest wind turbine, The Hindu Business Line reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

According to the sources, Adani aims to build the wind turbine prototype with a manufacturing facility in Mundra to step up production for self-consumption, domestic sales, and exports.

Reuters contributed to this report.
Infected Migrant Workers Blame Chinese Authorities for COVID-19 Spread at Hospitals; Authorities Dismiss as Rumors

Migrant workers from all over Chinas northeast have been recruited to Jilin Province, hard hit by COVID-19, to urgently build makeshift hospitals for quarantine. But entire teams of workers were subsequently infected as quarantine patients were sent to the hospitals as construction work was still being completed.

According to the workers, local authorities have concealed the cases and have not provided them any follow up care or assistance.

Several construction workers laboring at the Jilin Dahongtu mobile hospital told the Chinese language Epoch Times that hundreds of their colleagues became infected and that all of them were being moved around from one isolation center to another without treatment, left feeling neglected by the authorities.

Jilin, following Shanghai, is reporting its worst COVID-19 outbreak yet.

On April 1, Zhang Li, deputy director of the Chinese communist regimes Jilin Provincial Health and Health Commission, said at a press conference that Jilin Province had opened a total of 22 makeshift hospitals with 31,786 beds, and was treating 24,181 patients.

Residents line up for coronavirus screening during the COVID-19 lockdown in Changchun in northeastern Chinas Jilin province on March 12, 2022. (Chinatopix Via AP)

Jilin City officials admitted that infections had occurred at the makeshift hospital construction site in the North High-tech Zone of the city on March 28. However, local officials claimed there had been no virus transmission on the site, and that the rights and interests of the workers were being effectively protected and guaranteed.

However, many workers on the many construction sites have reported contracting COVID-19 from being in the vicinity of quarantined patients at the hospitals.

A number of workers at the construction site of Jilin Dahongtu makeshift hospital told The Epoch Times on March 31 about transmission of the virus at their work site and their impossible working conditions. They blamed the construction company and mismanagement by local authorities for their infections.

Worker Tan Congming (pseudonym) told The Epoch Times, When our construction was not yet complete, close contacts were sent in dozens of buses everyday to the makeshift hospital. Many of them tested positive and were taken away by 120 (the ambulance service) every day. Management didnt tell us anything at all, and the place has never been disinfected.

Worker Zeng Tao (pseudonym) told The Epoch Times, They sent patients in before the construction was completed. There were no protective measures. The outbreak in cluster among workers occurred on March 23, and many tested positive at the same time.

Since starting construction work in mid-March, workers have been forced to work 18 hour shifts. Other times, they have had shifts lasting 24 hours, after which they get only two hours of sleep before being called to work again.

The workers eat and sleep in their hundreds at the construction sites as well. They told The Epoch Times that the China Construction Eighth Bureau, which oversees their work, had not provided any workers with protective equipment.

The workers revealed that some of them tested positive at the construction site on March 22, but the leaders of the Eighth Bureau and Jilin City did not stop their work immediately, and even asked them to work overtime.

On March 24, these workers were transferred to concentrated quarantine sites and also moved around to different places, after which posts started appearing on social media that some workers had become infected with COVID-19.

Residents queue to undergo nucleic acid tests for the Covid-19 coronavirus at a residential area in Changchun in Chinas northeastern Jilin Province on March 11, 2022. (STR/AFP via Getty Images)

As far as I know, there may be more than 400 workers who have tested positive now, Tan, who also tested positive, said. He said he felt the risk of transmission was increased when the authorities moved them around from facility to facility.

Worker Ma Qi (pseudonym) told The Epoch Times on March 30 that more than 100 infected patients, including himself, were transferred from Bai city to the makeshift hospital at Jilin Womens College. It took seven hours.

We have not been given any medicine here, nor have we been tested. The patients who have coughed up blood or have a high fever have not been given any medicine. There are both close contacts and positive people sharing the same cabin, Ma said.

Ma said the conditions in the hospitals were poor: There are about 2,000 people in the makeshift hospital for quarantine. Eight people share a room with bunk beds, both men and women. The food provided is cold. There are old people and children in the room. One father and his two sons have to share a bed. The ventilation in the room is very bad.

The Epoch Times called the Northeast Branch of China Construction Eighth Engineering Bureau Co., Ltd., to inquire about the infection of the hundreds of construction workers and their quarantine and calls for compensation. A staff member said that it was all online rumors.

Interviewees have been given pseudonyms to prevent reprisal from the regime.

Gu Qinger and Gu Xiaohua contributed to the report.
Ive Got Nothing Left in the Tank: Tasmanian Premier Resigns Politics

The Tasmanian Premier Peter Gutwein has announced his sudden resignation from his position as premier and as a member for Bass on April 4.

Ive got nothing left in the tank, Gutwein said to the reporters at the press conference.

Unless you can give 110 percent to the role of premier, you shouldnt be doing this job, and I can no longer give more than 110 percent.

The premier thanked his family for their outstanding support, especially his wife, Amanda, for raising his son and daughter primarily in his absence and expressed that he wants to focus on family after over 20 years in politics.

Reflecting on his time as premier, Gutwein thanked his cabinet and colleagues, expressing that he was immensely proud of his states handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and believed that Tasmanias response was the best in the country by any measure.

We were the first state that took the step to ban cruise ships when it was needed. We were the first state to close our borders, which was quickly followed by other states, Gutwein said.

Tasmania has been able to emerge from a worldwide pandemic, with a nation leading economy. Jobs are at a record high, and the unemployment rate is at a record low.

Gutwein said that he leaves with the comfort of knowing that Tasmania is in far better shape than when we first came to government in 2014.

However, he said that the greatest highlight for him working as the premier has been the courage and compassion of Tasmanians.

There is no way like this place in the world, and the examples of common humanity and kindness that I have witnessed over the last two years will remain with me stay with me for the rest of my life.

Gutwein has advised the state cabinet and prime minister of his decision on April 4 and will remain as premier until the Tasmanian Liberal Party elects a new leader on the week ending April 10.

I will also resign as the member for Bass later this week [ending April 10], he said, announcing that the state parliament will be in a prorogue until returning from Easter.

When asked when he started thinking of resignation, Gutwein said that he had been contemplating for a couple of weeks. He said that the reopening of Tasmanian borders over the Christmas season completely drained him and also contributed to his decision.

Gutwein previously announced he was reducing his workload in September 2021 after being admitted to the hospital from a health scare, which was later diagnosed as fatigue from working.

He announced a transfer of his climate change and tourism portfolios to Environment Minister Roger Jaensch and former Education Minister Sarah Courtney, respectively, after returning to work on Sep. 7.

Courtney resigned from her position as Minister of Education on Feb. 10, after catching COVID-19 in France on leave, expressing she wanted to spend more time with her family.

The resigning premier said he currently has no job lined up and plans to spend time with his family and do as little as possible to refill his tank.

Gutwein was first elected to the Tasmanian Parliament in the seat of Bass in 2002 and has since continued to be re-elected for all the following elections.

In January 2020, he was elected Leader of the Tasmanian Liberal Party and the 46th Premier of Tasmania following the resignation of the previous premier, Will Hodgman, on Jan. 14, 2020.

The sudden news comes during election season, with the federal elections expected to be held in mid-May.
Jordan's Crown Prince Hamza bin Hussein delivers a speech to Muslim clerics and scholars at the opening ceremony of a religious conference at the Islamic Al al-Bayet University in Amman, Jordan, on Aug. 21, 2004. (Ali Jarekji/File Photo/Reuters)

Jordans Prince Hamza Renounces Royal Title Over Differences With King

AMMANPrince Hamza bin al-Hussein, a former heir to Jordans throne who was placed under house arrest last year, announced on Sunday he was giving up his royal title in protest over Jordans current policies.

Hamza was accused last April of trying to destabilise the monarchy in a foreign-inspired plot, but was spared punishment after pledging allegiance to King Abdullah, his half-brother.

In the letter published on his Twitter account, Hamza said what he had witnessed in recent years made it difficult for him to endorse policies pursued by Jordans institutions.

I have come to a conclusion that my personal conviction and principles my father (the late King Hussein) instilled in me are not in line with the path, directives, and modern methods of our institutions, he wrote.

Jordans King Abdullah II, second right, Prince Hamzah bin Al Hussein, fourth right in blue mask, Prince Hassan bin Talal, fifth right, and others arriving to visit the tombs of former kings, in Amman, Jordan, on April 11, 2021. (Royal Court Twitter Account via AP)

Hamza, 42, was named Crown Prince when King Hussein died in 1999 and Abdullah became king, but lost that title five years later when Abdullah installed his own son as heir.

Last year, he was placed under house arrest after making accusations about corruption and authoritarian rule. The feud shook Jordans image as a haven of stability in the unpredictable Middle East.

A former royal chief adviser and a minor royal were later sentenced to 15 years in jail for involvement in an alleged plot to bring Hamza to power.

Hamza last month issued an apology in which he pledged not to act against the interests of Jordans rulers.

His statement on Sunday was brief, saying he would continue to serve Jordan in his private life, without mentioning the king or any future role for himself.

Released on the first day of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, it was laced with religious terms likely to appeal to conservative Jordanians whose support Hamza is seen to have courted over the years.

Last years crisis prompted major Western and regional powers to rally behind King Abdullah in rare public support for a staunch U.S. ally that plays a pivotal role in regional security.

The monarch said the crisis had been the most painful because it came from both inside the royal family and outside.

By Suleiman Al-Khalidi
LASD Sheriff Alex Villanueva in an interview with EpochTV's California Insider program broadcast on Feb. 8, 2022. (Screenshot via The Epoch Times)

LA Sheriff Offers to Help Police Clean Up Hollywood

LOS ANGELESLos Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva is offering to have his deputies help clean the streets of Hollywood, which have been overrun in recent years by homeless encampments.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff has plans to make Hollywood feel safer despite it not being [LA Sheriffs Departments] patrol area, the department wrote on Twitter Sunday.

The sheriff compared the idea to last summers effort in Venice, where Villanueva led a walking tour on the boardwalk with deputies, reaching out to some homeless individuals to gauge their interest in receiving government-provided housing. Officials later cleared out a major homeless encampment in the area.

Like Hollywood, Venice falls within the jurisdiction of the Los Angeles Police Department [LAPD].

Were gonna go invade the beach again Memorial Day all the way through Labor Day, Villanueva told Fox11 on Saturday. Just so were sending that message that it is safe to vacation here for local residents, it is safe for tourists to make this a destination.

The LAPD declined to comment on the offer when reached by City News Service on Sunday.

Villanuevas efforts in Venice drew criticism from some politicians and community organizations. A statement put out by a coalition of local advocacy groups said: Time and time again, this approach has proven to fail in Los Angeles, and cause harm to people already dealing with crisis, trauma and the extreme lack of affordable housing across our region and especially on the Westside.

But the sheriff said the homelessness crisis within Los Angeles city limits prompted him to take action, and accused Councilman Mike Bonin and Mayor Eric Garcetti of hampering the LAPD in its ability to do its job with regard to encampments.

Im not going to blame LAPD whatsoever, Villanueva said. I think they can definitely do the job. Theyre more than capable, have good leadership. However, if theyre hamstrung by politicians that dont want them to do their job, well, then theyre left in a very, very bad situation.
A Russian national flag is seen at the roof of the Russian embassy in Kiev, Ukraine, on Sept. 18, 2016. (Gleb Garanich/Reuters)

Russia-Ukraine War (April 4): Moscow Warns of Symmetrical Response to Western Countries Expulsion of Russian Diplomats

The latest on the RussiaUkraine crisis, April 4. Click here for updates from April 3.

Moscow Warns of Symmetrical Response to Western Countries Expulsion of Russian Diplomats

Russia will respond proportionately to the expulsion of its diplomats from a number of Western countries, Russian ex-president and deputy head of security council Dmitry Medvedev said late on Monday.

Everyone knows the answer: it will be symmetrical and destructive for bilateral relations, Medvedev said in a posting on his Telegram channel.

Who have they punished? First of all, themselves.

On Monday, France said it would expel 35 Russian diplomats over Moscows actions in Ukraine and Germany declared significant number of Russian diplomats as undesirable,

If this continues, it will be fitting, as I wrote back on 26th February  to slam shut the door on Western embassies, Medvedev said. It will be cheaper for everyone. And then we will end up just looking at each other in no other way than through gunsights.

___

Ukraines President to Address UN Security Council on War

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will address the U.N. Security Council for the first time Tuesday at a meeting that is certain to focus on what appear to be widespread deliberate killings of civilians by Russian troops.

The dead were discovered after the withdrawal of Russian forces from a town on the outskirts of the capital, Kyiv, and have sparked global outrage and vehement denials from the Russian government that it was responsible.

The United Kingdom, which holds the council presidency this month, announced late Monday that Zelenskyy would speak at the open meeting called for Tuesday to discuss the situation in Ukraine.

Zelenskyy is to address the U.N.s most powerful body virtually after it receives briefings from U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, his political chief Rosemary DiCarlo, and U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths, who is trying to arrange an immediate humanitarian cease-fire and met with senior Russian officials in Moscow on Monday and will shortly be heading to Ukraine.

___

France and Germany to Expel Numerous Russian Diplomats

The French foreign ministry announced Monday that France has decided to expel numerous Russian diplomats, saying their activities were contrary to our security interests.

The announcement came hours after Germany said it was expelling 40 diplomats and Lithuania said it expelled the Russian ambassador and will recall its envoy in Moscow. No number was immediately given for how many are being expelled by France.

German news agency dpa quoted German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser as saying that the diplomats being expelled are those whom we attribute to the Russian intelligence services.

Faeser says that we wont allow this criminal war of aggression to also be conducted as an information war in Germany.

___

US to Build Case for Russia War Crimes in ICC or Other Venue

President Joe Biden will consult allies to ensure Russia and President Vladimir Putin pay the price for war crimes being committed in Ukraine, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Monday.

Speaking to reporters at the White House, Sullivan said he had yet to see evidence that Russian atrocities had risen to the level of genocide. He said consultations might take place at the International Criminal Court (ICC) or another venue.

The discovery of a mass grave and bodies shot at close range in Bucha, outside Kyiv, a town Ukrainian forces reclaimed from Russian troops, looked set to galvanize the United States and Europe into imposing additional sanctions against Moscow.

Sullivan said Russias permanent membership in the United Nations Security Council means any war crimes accountability could be blocked by Moscow there, he said.

___

US Seeks to Remove Russia From UN Human Rights Council

The United States moved to suspend Russia from the U.N. Human Rights Council as the State Department also announced it would collect evidence of war crimes that were allegedly committed in Ukraine.

U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said on Monday that European countries and other partners at the U.N., we are going to seek Russias suspension from the U.N. Human Rights Council following accusations that Russian forces massacred Ukrainian civilians in Bucha, located near Kyiv, over the past weekend.

Russian officials have denied that its forces carried out mass executions, alleging that video footage and photos released by Ukrainian officials were staged to create a provocation. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday said that such claims need to be investigated first.

Details provided by Ukrainian officials should be subject to serious skepticism, Peskov said, according to state-run media. Russian military officials, he further claimed, discovered evidence of video manipulation in connection to the Bucha incient.

Read the full article here

___



Ukraines President Urges Russia to Negotiate

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that Russia needs to move quickly to negotiate an agreement to end the war.

Speaking on a visit Monday to the town of Bucha outside Kyiv, Zelenskyy said evidence of alleged atrocities makes it hard to conduct talks with Russia.

Its very difficult to conduct negotiations when you see what they did here, Zelenskyy said, claiming that in Bucha and other places dead people have been found in barrels, basements, strangled, tortured. He added that the Russian leadership needs to think faster if it has what to think with.

Zelenskyy added that the longer the Russian Federation drags it out, the worse it will exacerbate its own situation and this war. Zelenskyy reaffirmed his criticism of former German Chancellor Angela Merkels opposition to Ukraines bid to join NATO, saying that she and other Western leaders who resisted the move should come to Bucha to see what the flirting with the Russian Federation leads to.

____

Russia to Resume Flights With 52 Friendly Countries, PM Says

Russia plans to end restrictions on flights to and from 52 countries after April 9, part of its plans to reduce measures taken to slow the spread of COVID-19, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said on Monday.

Russia plans to resume flights to and from Argentina, South Africa, and other friendly countries, Mishustin said, meaning those that have not joined the latest wave of Western sanctions on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine, which Moscow calls a special operation to demilitarise its neighbor.

Russia imposed broad travel restrictions at the start of the coronavirus pandemic in March 2020, many of which remain in force, but has gradually expanded the list of countries deemed safe for air travel.

Other countries with which Russia will resume flights after April 9 include Algeria, China, Lebanon, Peru, and Pakistan, Russias coronavirus task force said.

Mishustin also said Russia would be lifting restrictions on travel across the land border between Russia and China.

Russia has closed its airspace to airlines from 36 countries, including all 27 members of the European Union, in response to Ukraine-related sanctions targeting its aviation sector.

Punitive measures imposed by Western powers have also forced Western firms to terminate leasing contracts with Russian airlines for over 500 aircraft.

The sanctions also prevent Russian airlines from buying aircraft parts or maintenance services from Europe or the United States, adding to the pressure on the worlds 11th largest aviation market from a ban on using North American and European airspace.

_____

5 Arab Foreign Ministers in Moscow for Talks

Five Arab foreign ministers have traveled to Moscow for talks with Russias top diplomat on the war in Ukraine.

The Arab League says the foreign ministers of Egypt, Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, and Sudan will meet Monday with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. Ahemd Aboul Gheit, Secretary-General of the Arab League, will also join the meeting.

The pan-Arab organization says the ministers will then travel to Poland on Tuesday for talks with Ukraines Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba.

_____

Russia Starts Own Inquiry Into Ukraine Deaths

A Russian law enforcement agency says it has launched its own investigation into allegations that Ukrainian civilians were massacred in suburbs of Kyiv which were held by Russian troops, focusing on what it calls false information about Russian forces.

The Investigative Committee claims Ukrainian authorities made the allegations with the aim of discrediting Russian troops and that those involved should be investigated over possible breaches of a new Russian law banning what the government deems to be false information about its forces.

Russian law enforcement has launched several investigations since Russian troops entered Ukraine, typically into incidents such as the shelling of areas held by Russia-backed separatists.

____

Russia May Collect $321 Billion Windfall If Oil and Gas Keep Following

Russias energy revenue is expected to skyrocket this year if trading partners continue purchases of oil and gas from the sanction-hit country.

Russia will get an estimated $321 billion in energy exports in 2022, marking a surge of more than a third compared to last year, according to a Bloomberg analysis published Friday.

____

Russian Ambassadors Expelled

Lithuania and Latvia have announced the decision to downgrade their diplomatic relations with Russia, ordering Moscows ambassadors to leave the two Baltic states.

Lithuanias foreign minister, Gabrielius Landsbergis, announced on Monday that Lithuanias diplomatic representative would also be recalled from Moscow in the coming days.

Vilnius also decided to shut down the Russian consulate in the city of Klaipeda.

______

Russia Imposes Visa Restrictions on Citizens of Unfriendly Countries

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Monday introducing visa restrictions for citizens of countries that Moscow deems unfriendly in response to sanctions over Ukraine.

The decree, which comes into force on Monday, suspends Russias simplified visa issuance regime with some European Union countries as well as Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, and Iceland.

It also ordered the Russian foreign ministry and other bodies to decide on introducing personal entry restrictions on foreign citizens and stateless people who commit unfriendly actions against Russia, its citizens or its legal entities.

Last month the Russian government approved a list of unfriendly countries including United States, Canada, Britain, EU states and Ukraine, among others.

_____

US Urges Russias Ouster From UN Rights Body

The United States plans to seek a suspension of Russia from its seat on the U.N.s top human rights body in the wake of rising allegations that Russian forces may have committed war crimes in Ukraine, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said Monday.

According to a statement from her office, Thomas-Greenfield made the call for Russia to be stripped of its seat in the Human Rights Council in the wake of reports over the weekend about violence against civilians in the town of Bucha, near the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, after Russian forces pulled out.

Any decision to suspend Russia would require a decision by the U.N. General Assembly in New York.

Russia and the other four permanent members of the U.N. Security CouncilBritain, China, France, and the United Statesall currently have seats on the 47-member rights council, which is based in Geneva. The United States rejoined the council this year.

In New York, General Assembly spokeswoman Paulina Kubiak said on Monday that no request for a meeting on the issue has been received yet.

___

Russia Denies Growing Charges of War Crimes, Orders Probe of Ukrainian Provocation Over Civilian Deaths in Bucha

Russias top diplomat has dismissed Ukraines accusations that Russian troops committed atrocities against its civilians as a staged provocation.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the start of his talks Monday with U.N. Under-Secretary-General Martin Griffiths that Moscow sees the Ukrainian claim of a massacre of civilians in Bucha outside Kyiv as a provocation that posed a direct threat to global peace and security.

Lavrov noted that Russia has called for an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council but the UK that currently chairs it refused to convene it. He vowed to press the demand for holding the meeting.

Lavrov charged that the mayor of Bucha made no mention of atrocities against civilians a day after Russian troops left Bucha on Wednesday, but two days later scores of bodies were photographed scattered in the streets in what the Russian minister described as a stage-managed anti-Russian provocation.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that the Ukrainian claims that Russian troops had killed hundreds of civilians outside Kyiv cant be trusted, adding that we categorically reject the accusations. Peskovs comment in a conference call with reporters followed the Russian Defense Ministrys statement accusing the Ukrainian authorities of stage-managing what it described as a provocation to smear Russia.

Ukrainian authorities have said the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in areas outside the Ukrainian capital after last weeks withdrawal of Russian troops, many with bound hands, close-range gunshot wounds, and signs of torture. International leaders have condemned the reported atrocities and called for tougher sanctions against Moscow.

Peskov said that photo and video materials from the area reflected unspecified manipulations and urged international leaders to carefully analyze the facts and hear the Russian arguments before rushing to blame Moscow.

Peskov also said that Russia will keep pushing for the meeting of the United Nations Security Council, noting that Russia wants the issue to be discussed at the highest level.

Russias chief investigator on Monday also ordered an official examination of what he called a Ukrainian provocation after Kyiv accused the Russian military of massacring civilians in the town of Bucha.

____

Putin Hails Allies on Election Wins

Russian President Vladimir Putin has congratulated the Moscow-friendly leaders of Hungary and Serbia on winning elections.

In a letter sent Monday to Hungarys nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban whose right-wing Fidesz party won a landslide victory in Sundays vote, Putin said that despite the difficult international situation, the further development of bilateral partnership fully conforms to the interests of peoples of Russia and Hungary, according to the Kremlin.

Putin also congratulated Serbian President Alexandar Vucic on his reelection Sunday, saying that the outcome of the vote confirms a broad public support for his independent foreign policies. The Russian leader voiced hope that Vucics activities will help further strengthen the strategic partnership between Russia and Serbia.

____

Another Major Global Breadbasket May Halt Grain Exports

Kazakhstan is considering the introduction of temporary restrictions on the export of grain and flour to protect its domestic food market, Agriculture Minister Yerbol Karashukeev said on Monday, without specifying any dates. Kazakhstan is one of the top 10 grain exporters in the world, supplying over 70 countries.

____

Ukraine to Probe Alleged Russian Atrocities

Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the country will conduct a probe into alleged atrocities against civilians by Russian troops involving international investigators.

Zelenskyy claimed in an address that the world has seen many war crimes, adding that the time has come to make the war crimes committed by Russian troops the last such evil on Earth. He said that a special justice mechanism will be created to investigate the Russian atrocities with the participation of international prosecutors and judges.

Ukrainian authorities have claimed that the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in areas outside the Ukrainian capital after last weeks withdrawal of Russian troops.

Russia has rejected the accusations of killing civilians as a provocation by Ukrainian authorities and initiated a meeting of the U.N. Security Council to discuss the issue.

____

Ukrainian Authorities Claim More Civilian Casualties in Kharkiv

Ukrainian authorities are reporting more civilian casualties from the Russian barrage.

At least seven people were killed and 34, including three children, were wounded in a Russian rocket attack on Ukraines second-largest city of Kharkiv late Sunday, according to the regional prosecutors office. It claimed that 10 buildings were destroyed.

In the Black Sea port of Mykolaiv, regional Gov. Vitaliy Kim claimed at least one resident was killed and 14 others were wounded by Russian shelling late Sunday. Local authorities also reported more Russian strikes on Mykolaiv early Monday, but there was no immediate word of casualties.

_____

UK Says Russian Forces Continue to Refocus Their Offensive Into the Donbass Region

Britains Defense Ministry says Russia is continuing to build up both its soldiers and mercenaries in eastern Ukraine.

Russian forces are continuing to consolidate and reorganize as they refocus their offensive into the Donbas region in the east of Ukraine, the ministry said in an intelligence update posted on social media Monday.

It claims Russian troops are being moved into the area, along with mercenaries from the Wagner private military group.

Overnight, the UK claimed Russia was still trying to take the southern port city of Mariupol, which has seen weeks of intense fighting.

_____

European Leaders Accuse Russia of War Crimes

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez claimed Russian troops alleged atrocities against civilians in Ukraine should be judged in an international court and may amount to genocide.

Sanchez said Monday: I hope that everything possible can be done so that those behind these war crimes dont go unpunished, and that they can appear before the courts, in this case the International Criminal Court, to answer these alleged cases of crimes against humanity, war crimes and, why not say it, of genocide, too.

Polands prime minister accused Russia of being a totalitarian fascist state that has carried out atrocities against civilians in Ukraine.

Mateusz Morawiecki called Monday for an international commission to be formed to investigate the evidence emerging that Russian soldiers carried out executions of Ukrainian civilians.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said: The Russian authorities are responsible for these atrocities, committed while they had effective control of the area. They are subject to the international law of occupation.

French President Emmanuel Macron condemned with utmost strength the reported torture and killings of Ukrainian civilians by Russian troops in an interview Monday on France-Inter radio.

There is clear evidence of war crimes. It was the Russian army that was in Bucha, Macron claimed. We have told Ukrainian authorities that we were at their disposal to help with the investigation theyre carrying out. International justice must prevail. Those who committed these crimes will have to answer for them.

Macron joined leaders from around the world who are calling for stronger sanctions in response to the reports.

_____

Germany Says West to Agree More Sanctions on Russia After Bucha Accusations

Germany said on Sunday that the West would agree to impose more sanctions on Russia in the coming days after Ukraine accused Russian forces of war crimes near Kyiv, ratcheting up the already vast economic pressure on Russia over its invasion.

Russia on Sunday denied its forces were responsible for the deaths of civilians in the town of Bucha and said Ukraine had staged a performance for the Western media.

Reuters reporters said they saw corpses strewn across the town. One appeared to have his hands bound with white cloth, and to have been shot in the mouth. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia of carrying out a genocide.

The West warned of more sanctions.

Putin and his supporters will feel the consequences of their actions, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in a statement to reporters.

German Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht said the European Union should talk about ending Russian gas imports.

Germany, Europes largest economy, has so far resisted calls to impose an embargo on energy imports from Russia, saying its economy and that of other European countries are too dependent on them. Russia supplies 40 percent of Europes gas needs.

Italys Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said the events in Bucha were unleashing a wave of indignation that will lead to new sanctions and did not exclude that in the next few hours there could be a debate on the issue of imports of hydrocarbons from Russia, he told a program on Italys Rai 3 channel, adding Italy would not veto a fifth package of sanctions.

The Kremlin says the Wests sanctionsthe most burdensome in modern historyamount to a declaration of economic war and that Moscow will now look eastwards to partners such as China and India.

Still, cutting off Russian gasor more of Russias natural resourceswould wipe out growth in Europes biggest economies, send energy prices to records, and propel an inflationary shockwave through the global economy.

The world is much bigger than Europeand in fact Russia is much bigger than Europeso sooner or later we will have a dialogue no matter what people across the ocean want, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Channel One state television.

_____

Germany Is the Main Roadblock for Tougher Russian Sanctions, Polands Prime Minister Says

Germany is the main roadblock to imposing tougher sanctions on Russia, Polands Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki claimed on Monday during a news conference, adding that Hungary was not blocking them.

His comment comes after Prime Minister Viktor Orban won a national election on Sunday after facing criticism over an insufficiently tough stance on the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

We have to see that, regardless of how we approach Hungary, this is the fourth such win and we have to respect democratic elections  its Germany that is the main roadblock on sanctions. Hungary is for the sanctions, Morawiecki said.

_____

Greek Foreign Minister Leads Aid Mission to Odesa, Reopens Consulate

Greeces Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias arrived in Odesa on Sunday at the head of a humanitarian aid mission into the southern port city of Ukraine, the foreign ministry said.

The humanitarian aid was handed to the citys municipal authorities.

Dendias, 62, also aims to set up a continuous mechanism of distributing aid from Greece and to reopen the countrys consulate in the city.

The reopening of [Greeces] consulate will help distribute humanitarian aid and set up corridors for the Greek ethnic community to leave from any areas of Ukraine, if needed, via Odesa, the minister said after upon his arrival in Odesa, according to a statement from the Greek foreign ministry.

Missiles struck Odesa in the early hours of Sunday, the city council said in an online post.

Dendias said last month he planned to lead a humanitarian aid mission to the besieged city of Mariupol in Ukraine, where thousands of ethnic Greeks live, but intense fighting there meant the destination was subsequently changed to Odesa.

At least 10 ethnic Greeks have been killed and several have been wounded since Russia started attacking Mariupol. More than 150 Greek citizens, vessel crews, and ethnic Greeks have been evacuated from the region, according to the Greek government.

Ukraines troops have retaken more than 30 towns and villages around Kyiv, Ukrainian officials said on Saturday, claiming complete control of the capital region for the first time since Russia launched its invasion.

____

Latvia May Agree to Pay for Russian Gas in Rubles

Latvias main gas operator says it wont rule out paying for Russian natural gas in rubles, revealing that the new settlement method announced by Moscow is being evaluated from a legal and business perspective.

According to the first impression, the settlement procedure in Russian rubles does not formally violate the sanctions regime and is possible, Latvijas Gaze said in a statement.

_____

Japan Condemns Attacks on Ukraine Civilians

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters Monday that he strongly condemned the reported attacks on civilians in Ukrainian towns on the outskirts of Kyiv as violation to international law.

European leaders have already condemned the reported attacks, responding to images of bodies in the streets, including some with their hands tied behind their backs.

Kishida said Japan will firmly carry out what it should do while cooperating with the international society in possible further sanctions against Russia.

We must strongly condemn human rights problems and actions that violate international law, Kishida added.

Japan has imposed a series of sanctions against Russia in line with the United States and other Western nations.

___

Ukrainian Military Says Some Towns in Chernihiv Region Retaken

The Ukrainian military said that its forces have retaken some towns in the Chernihiv region and that humanitarian aid is being delivered.

The news agency RBK Ukraina said the road between Chernihiv and the capital of Kyiv is to reopen to some traffic later Monday.

Chernihiv is a city 80 miles north of Kyiv and it had been cut off from shipments of food and other supplies for weeks. The mayor said Sunday that relentless Russian shelling had destroyed 70 percent of the city.

Russian forces also withdrew from the Sumy region, in Ukraines northeast, local administrator Dmitry Zhivitsky said in a video message carried by Ukrainian news agencies Sunday. The troops had occupied the area for nearly a month.

In other areas recently retaken from Russian troops, Ukrainian officials said they have recovered hundreds of slain civilians in the past few days. Ukraines prosecutor-general said the bodies of 410 civilians have been recovered from Kyiv-area towns.

The Epoch Times is unable to independently verify the reports.

___

Ukraines Leader Asks for Help in Grammys Video

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has appeared in a video at the Grammy Awards asking for support in telling the story of Ukraines invasion by Russia.

During the message that aired on the show Sunday night, he likened the attack to a deadly silence threatening to extinguish the dreams and lives of the Ukrainian people, including children.

Zelenskyy told the audience: Fill the silence with your music. Fill it today to tell our story. Tell the truth about the war on your social networks, on TV, support us in any way you can, but not silence. And then peace will come to all our cities.

Following Zelenskyys message, John Legend performed his song Free with Ukrainian musicians Siuzanna Iglidan and Mika Newton and poet Lyuba Yakimchuk as images from the war were shown on screens behind them.

___

Ukraine: 410 Civilian Bodies Found Near Kyiv

Ukraines prosecutor-general said the bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Kyiv-area towns that were recently retaken from Russian troops.

Iryna Venediktova said on Facebook that the bodies were recovered Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. She said 140 of them have undergone examination by prosecutors and other specialists.

Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said the mayor of the village of Motyzhyn in the Kyiv region was murdered while being held by Russian forces. Vereshchuk added that there are 11 mayors and community heads in Russian captivity across Ukraine.

Russias Defense Ministry has rejected the claims of atrocities against civilians in Bucha and other suburbs of Kyiv.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
People gather in Parliament Hill as the trucker convoy protesting COVID-19 mandates and restrictions stages demonstrations in Ottawa on Jan. 29, 2022. (Limin Zhou/The Epoch Times)

Majority of Canadians Say Society Becoming More Divided: Survey

The majority of Canadians say they believe the country has become more divided, with respondents citing the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2021 federal election as the most divisive issues in the past year, a new survey indicates.

Conducted between March 7 and March 24 by the Canadian Hub for Applied and Social Research at the University of Saskatchewan, the national phone survey asked 1,011 people about the issues that divide them the most.

About 75 percent of the respondents said they believe Canadian society has become more polarized.

The majority said the COVID-19 pandemic (72 percent) and the 2021 federal election (73 percent) were the two most divisive issues over the past year.

About 40 percent of respondents say they have reduced contact with friends or family members over an argument about the pandemic or politics.

The survey also suggested that people on the Prairies were more likely than in other regions to believe that the issues of climate change and gun ban were dividing Canadians.

Respondents living in central Canada didnt think that the banning of guns was a divisive issue, the survey noted.

The survey indicated that Quebec respondents were less likely than those in other regions to believe that society has become more polarized.

Respondents in Quebec also said they were less likely than those in western Canada, including B.C., to have reduced their contact with friends and family due to differing views.

The survey is considered accurate within +/- 3 percentage points, with a 95 percent confidence level.

The Canadian Press contributed to this report
A 87-year-old man getting his booster shot at the vaccination center in Frankfurt, Germany, on Nov. 11, 2021. (Michael Probst/AP Photo)

Man in Germany Gets 90 COVID-19 Shots to Sell Forged Passes

BERLINA 60-year-old man allegedly had himself vaccinated against COVID-19 dozens of times in Germany in order to sell forged vaccination cards with real vaccine batch numbers to people not wanting to get vaccinated themselves.

The man from the eastern German city of Magdeburg, whose name was not released in line with German privacy rules, is said to have received up to 90 shots against COVID-19 at vaccination centers in the eastern state of Saxony for months until criminal police caught him this month, the German news agency dpa reported Sunday.

The suspect was not detained but is under investigation for unauthorized issuance of vaccination cards and document forgery, dpa reported.

He was caught at a vaccination center in Eilenburg in Saxony when he showed up for a COVID-19 shot for the second day in a row. Police confiscated several blank vaccination cards from him and initiated criminal proceedings.

It was not immediately clear what impact the approximately 90 shots of COVID-19 vaccines, which were from different brands, had on the mans personal health.

German police have conducted many raids in connection with the forgery of vaccination passports in recent months.

Germany has seen high infection numbers for weeks, yet many measures to rein in the pandemic ended on Friday. Donning masks are no longer compulsory in grocery stores and most theaters but it is still mandatory on public transportation.

In most schools in Germany, students also no longer have to wear masks, which has led teachers associations to warn of possible conflicts in class.

There is now a danger that, on the one hand, children who wear masks will be teased by classmates as wimps and overprotective or, on the other hand, pressure will be exerted on non-mask wearers, Heinz-Peter Meidinger, the president of the German Teachers Association, told dpa. He advocated a voluntary commitment by teachers and students to continue wearing masks in class and on school grounds, at least until the country goes on a two-week Easter holiday.

Health experts say the most recent surge of infections in Germanytriggered by the BA.2 omicron subvariantmay have peaked.

On Sunday, the countrys disease control agency reported 74,053 new COVID-19 infections in one day, while less than a week ago it reported 111,224 daily infections.

Overall, Germany has registered 130,029 COVID-19 deaths.

By Kirsten Grieshaber
Elon Musk attends the opening ceremony of the new Tesla Gigafactory for electric cars in Gruenheide, Germany, on March 22, 2022. (Patrick Pleul/Pool via Reuters)

Musk Takes 9.2 Percent Stake in Twitter After Questioning Its Commitment to Free Speech

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has taken a 9.2 percent stake in Twitter, according to a regulatory filing, becoming the social media giants biggest individual shareholder just weeks after questioning the platforms attitude toward free speech.

Musk bought 73.5 million shares of Twitter on March 14, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing released on April 4. Based on Twitters closing price on April 1, Musks stake was worth $2.89 billion.

News of the purchase sent Twitter shares soaring by more than 20 percent in pre-market trading on April 4, sharply boosting the value of Musks stake.

Musk posts regularly on the platform, where he has more than 80 million followers.

In a March 25 tweet, Musk wrote that free speech is essential to a functioning democracy and asked his followers whether they believe Twitter rigorously adheres to this principle.

In a follow-on tweet, Musk asked his followers to vote carefully, as the consequences of this poll will be important.

Over 2 million Twitter users weighed in, with 70.4 percent voting no.

A day later, sharing the results of the poll, Musk described Twitter as the de facto public town square, adding that failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy, before asking, What should be done?

While Musk hasnt commented publicly on his purchase of Twitter shares, and his filing didnt reveal any plans he may have for the company, the purchase could signal an effort on his part to influence how the company is run.

While any stake of less than 10 percent is considered passive, some analysts have suggested that Musk may seek change at the company.

We would expect this passive stake as just the start of broader conversations with the Twitter board/management that could ultimately lead to an active stake and a potential more aggressive ownership role of Twitter, Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities said in a client note on April 4.

Twitter has been repeatedly accused of censoring conservative viewpoints, claims the company denies.

On Jan. 2, Twitter permanently suspended Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greenes account for allegedly spreading COVID-19 misinformation.

Greene, a Republican, responded by calling Twitter an enemy to America and a company that simply cant handle the truth.

About a year prior, Twitter banned former President Donald Trump from the platform, claiming his recent Twitter posts were in violation of the Glorification of Violence Policy.

Trump reacted to his Twitter suspension with a series of tweets from the @POTUS account, accusing the social media companys employees of conspiring with his political opponents.

As I have been saying for a long time, Twitter has gone further and further in banning free speech, and tonight, Twitter employees have coordinated with the Democrats and Radical Left in removing my account from their platform, to silence meand YOU, the 75,000,000 great patriots who voted for me, Trump wrote in a tweet, which was deleted within minutes by Twitter, according to TechCrunch, which published screenshots of the removed missive.
Chuck Todd speaks during an event in New York in a 2015 file photograph. (D Dipasupil/Getty Images for AWXII)

NBC Hosts Hillary Clinton, Doesnt Ask About Payment of Fine for Steele Dossier

Former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton appeared on an NBC show over the weekend, but wasnt asked about a major development involving her campaign and the infamous dossier compiled by ex-British spy Christopher Steele.

Clinton, 74, was the Democrat nominee for president in 2016, but she ultimately lost to Donald Trump.

Before the election, Clintons campaign and the Democratic National Committee paid Steele through a law firm to compile the dossier, which was full of unsubstantiated, salacious allegations concerning Trump and his alleged links to Russia. The payments were labeled as legal services or legal and compliance consulting.

Addressing complaints that the payments werent reported correctly, the Federal Election Commission found probable cause that the campaign and committee violated federal law. The parties agreed to settle the case and pay fines, according to documents made public on March 30.

Just days later, Clinton appeared on NBCs Meet the Press.

Despite talking about Russias efforts to help Donald Trump in his 2016 campaign against Clinton, host Chuck Todd neglected to mention the fines or ask Clinton about them.

Jeffrey McCall, a communications professor at DePauw University, said what happened was a classic case of the journalism of omission.

Oftentimes, what is left out of a story or interview is more important than what is put in the story. That the NBC host failed to ask Clinton about the fines associated with the Steele dossier is another case of the establishment media trying to run interference for Clinton and protect her from scrutiny, McCall told The Epoch Times in an email.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks during the 2022 New York State Democratic Convention in New York on Feb. 17, 2022. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

Clintons campaign and the Democratic National Committee havent responded to requests for comment. Clinton, her campaign, and the committee havent commented publicly on paying the fines, which was done in a settlement that saw the parties admit no wrongdoing.

NBC didnt respond to a request for comment.

Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, said the development related to the dossier, which was heavily promoted by NBC and other legacy outlets, was significant.

For many of us we are not quite sure what the disconnect is between an interview on how Clinton would handle the next election and how her campaign was just fined for her handling of the last election, he wrote on his blog. This was not some trivial record-keeping violation. This was the concealing of the role of the Clinton campaign in funding and pushing a major scandaland allegedly lying about that role to reporters.

Marc Elias was an attorney with Perkins Coie, the firm the Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee paid during the 2016 campaign that funneled funding to Fusion GPS, a research company, to assist Steele with compiling the dossier.

Elias, who recently left Perkins, told multiple reporters that the firm wasnt involved in the dossier. Citing interviews with former Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and former Democratic National Committee Chair Donna Brazile, the Senate Intelligence Committee said leadership at the parties were unawareor at most marginally awarethat Perkins Coie had hired Fusion GPS. Podesta later told a House panel that he learned about the arrangement after the campaign.
John Robson: NDP Seldom Win Elections, But Theyre Good at Forcing Governments Hand to Overspend

Commentary

If government overspending is driving you crazy, dont worry. It will soon be free. I refer to mental health services, at least in the vision of the Ontario NDP. But also government overspending, which already is free in their vision and that of many others.

Some readers may object that the Ontario NDP is most unlikely to win the upcoming provincial election or any subsequent one. Others may ask Whats the Ontario NDP? But the answer is that its one of the most successful unsuccessful political parties in the world, primary because its vision of government spending as invariably bringing brilliant rates of return is pervasive in Canadian political culture despite the anguished cries of experience and economic theory alike.

Canadians do not generally elect our official socialists to office. Partly because they chose their garish colours and increasingly creaky name New Democratic Party back in the 1960s and neither has aged well. But mostly because the NDP has a disturbing habit of articulating the beliefs of the political classes with singular clarity. So after rubbishing them on the campaign trail, the Old Autocratic Parties, not just the Liberals but to an astounding degree the Conservatives, then implement their ideas. Hence Doug Ford and his populist Tory colleagues here in Ontario bringing mandatory critical race theory to schools via an NDP private members Bill 67.

Occasionally the NDP wins at a provincial level, usually bringing immediate, lasting buyers remorse. And they have never won federally, although Justin Trudeau has been called our first NDP prime minister, including by disgruntled members of his own party. But if you compare various dusty orange and brown NDP manifestos with shiny government policy today, you see again that those who stand for something, even something bad, often get the last laugh on those who only stand for office.

Including, I fear, the utterly forgettable leader of the Ontario NDP saying, Mental health care is health care We can take action to fix it  so in Ontario, youll get mental health care with your OHIP card, not your credit card. And on the cheap, for a mere $1.15 billion.

If you believe that estimate you need help, given how reliably public programs including health care overcharge and underdeliver. But youre not alone, because the critical component of the whole plan is that, the National Post reports, In addition to benefits to individuals mental health, the NDP says its plan would save billions of dollars because community care would lessen the need for critical care, and not as much productivity would be lost in the workforce. As well, the party said businesses offering health insurance would also see savings. And people believe it across the spectrum.

Red tie, blue tie, or orange bandana makes no difference. They think government reliably does things cheaper and better than private firms. Which is why advocates for whatever program are wont to say at every turn, We cant afford not to do it. Go ahead. Google it. And its no mere verbal tick. How often does any party, even if nominally Conservative, even propose abolishing a government program because its doing more harm than good, let alone follow through?

Over in Quebec, where they do things differently only they dont, Andre Pratte wrote in a National Post commentary that the nominally fiscally responsible Coalition Avenir Quebec arent just blowing the lid off spending at the first opportunity, or would be if the lid had ever been on. Including sending everyone making under $100,000 a cheque for $500 right before an election and calling a $6.5 billion deficit a balanced budget with absolutely no austerity. They also plan to dump $8.9 billion into socialized medicine over five years to restore the health-care system. For the umpteenth time in 40 years, as they acknowledge, while insisting that this time will be different.

Why? Health spending has risen there by $13 billion in the past 10 years, and at 35 percent of program spending, while lower than most provinces including Ontarios 43 percent, its slowly strangling virtually everything else including infrastructure, while waiting lists keep growing. But they honestly believe a la NDP that a dollar spent on public health care brings more than a dollar in benefits, so the worse it gets the more they cant afford not to spend.

Theyre no clearer on how exactly it works than Horwath. But look at all the free money: gains to individuals, savings in critical care, increased workforce productivity, cash pouring into the treasury and right back out again, and everybody wins. Wheeeeee! And whatever dismal outcome actually results, its only because we arent spending enough.

On the plus side, once the blob swallows counselling too, youll be able to line up for free help for Economic Derangement Syndrome. On the minus side, itll be shock therapy when they wheel in the bill.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Second-year medical student Nina Hadzimustafic delivers a COVID-19 booster shots at Jabapalooza, a pop up vaccine clinic, in Ottawa, on Dec. 20, 2021. (The Canadian Press/Justin Tang)

New COVID-19 Vaccine Policy for Federal Workers Expected Wednesday

The federal government is planning to update its policy on mandatory COVID-19 vaccines for its workers on Wednesday.

The Public Service Alliance of Canada has already filed a grievance against the existing policy which requires all federal public service members to be fully vaccinated even if they work at home.

The government is obligated to review the policy after six months and that timeline runs out this week.

PSAC president Chris Aylward says the union has been consulted, but he does not know what to expect from the new policy.

He says a few employees have been disciplined for their vaccine status and put on unpaid leave.

More than 98 percent of federal public workers have attested that they are fully vaccinated.
New COVID-19 Variant XE Found, Possibly More Transmissible Than Omicron: WHO

A COVID-19 Omicron subvariantknown as XEhas been found in the United Kingdom, said the World Health Organization in a new update.

The U.N. health body said (pdf) that the subvariant is compromised of genetic material from the two Omicron strains of BA.1 and BA.2.

The XE recombinant (BA.1-BA.2), was first detected in the United Kingdom in January and at least 600 cases have been reported so far, according to WHO. XE belongs to the Omicron variant until significant differences in transmission and disease characteristics, including severity, may be reported, it clarified.

WHO noted that early estimates suggest a community growth rate of 10 percent more than BA.2, although further evidence is needed.

Further confirmation of XE and other variants is becoming more difficult, according to WHO, which said that there has been a recent significant reduction in SARS-CoV-2 testing by several Member States. SARS-CoV-2 is another name for the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, which causes COVID-19.

Data are becoming progressively less representative, less timely, and less robust, the U.N. agency continued. This inhibits our collective ability to track where the virus is, how it is spreading and how it is evolving: information and analyses that remain critical to effectively end the acute phase of the pandemic.

Officials in the United Kingdom last week cautioned not to jump to any conclusions about XE and whether it spreads more quickly or whether it triggers more severe symptoms.

XE shows evidence of community transmission within England, although it is currently less [than] 1 percent of total sequenced cases, said the UK Health Services Agency in a report (pdf). Early growth rates for XE were not significantly different from BA.2, but using the most recent data up to 16 March 2022, XE has a growth rate 9.8 percent above that of BA.2.

As this estimate has not remained consistent as new data have been added, it cannot yet be interpreted as an estimate of growth advantage for the recombinant. Numbers were too small for the XE recombinant to be analyzed by region.

Since mid-January, the United States has seen a significant drop in cases, deaths, and hospitalizations from COVID-19. An Epoch Times analysis of federal health data published last week shows that as of April 1, hospitalizations reached the lowest level since August 2020.

Officials in China, however, have reported a significant surge in COVID-19 cases in recent days, sparking harsh lockdowns in large cities. In late March, the Chinese regimewhich employs and promotes a draconian zero COVID policymoved to completely shut down Changchun, a city of 4.5 million people, which will likely cause worldwide supply chain disruptions.
From buttermilk biscuits soaked in sausage gravy to chicken and waffles, Southerners know how to do breakfast right. Though breakfast can vary, even in the South, there is one iconic Southern breakfast dish you that stands out among the others: shrimp and grits.

For those who arent familiar with grits, its a type of porridge made from boiled cornmeal. On its own, grits are quite bland, so this staple is oftentimes served with other things to add flavor such as sausages, cheese or just butter. Its also worth mentioning that the sauce that the shrimp are cooked in isnt the same tomato-based, smokey barbecue sauce you would use when grilling ribs or chicken. This Louisiana-style sauce is usually made up of Worcestershire sauce, lemon juice, butter, Cajun or Creole seasoning and other spices, all sauteed together.

This recipe comes from food blogger Daniela Roebuck of Style and Sustenance who drew inspiration from eating barbecue shrimp and grits for breakfast during her trip to New Orleans. She transformed the usual porridge-like grits into circular patties with sausage, cheese and breadcrumbs to be served underneath Cajun-seasoned shrimp.

If you are a pescatarian, this can be a delightful recipe that will keep you full whether you choose to eat it for breakfast, lunch or dinner. All you need to do is replace the pork sausage with plant-based sausages. This flavorful dish is even worth indulging in when you go meatless for Lent. If you have seafood or shellfish allergies, it is easy to swap the shrimp out for boneless chicken thighs.

You definitely wont regret making this dish, it kind of works for any time of day. But dont just stop there. There are plenty of classic Southern recipes that are worth trying no matter which region youre from.

BBQ Shrimp with Sage Sausage and Smoked Gouda Grit Cake

Recipe courtesy of Daniela Roebuck of Style and Sustenance

Ingredients:

For the grit cake:

1/2 pound spicy sage sausage

1 cup quick grits

2 1/2 cups water

1 1/2 cup half and half

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

1 cup smoked gouda, shredded

1/2 cup chopped scallion

1 egg beaten with water

2 cups panko bread crumbs

For the BBQ shrimp:

1 pound jumbo 21/25 shrimp(peeled and devained)

2 tablespoons Cajun seasoning

2 tablespoons sausage pan drippings

2 cloves finely chopped garlic

1/2 cup white wine

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika

1/4 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

Juice of half lemon

Salt and pepper to taste

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

Fresh chopped parsley

Directions:

For the grit cake:

Step 1: In a non-stick pan or skillet, brown 1/2 pound of sausage until fully cooked. Drain and reserve pan drippings for later use.

Step 2: In a pot, prepare 1 cup grits as directed, combining 2 1/2 cups water, 1 1/2 cup half and half, 2 tablespoons butter and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Keep on a very low simmer stirring every 2 mins until done. Remove from heat and add in browned sausage, 1 cup cheese and 1/2 cup scallion. Reserve part of the scallion for garnish.

Step 3: On a parchment paper-lined baking pan, pour the grits and smooth into an even layer. Let cool completely. Cover and refrigerate until very firm, at least 2 1/2 hours or overnight.

Step 4: Cut out 4 rounds of the grits with a biscuit cutter. Dip rounds in egg wash and then cover fully in 2 cups panko. Repeat until you have 4 rounds. Heat 1/2 inch oil in a heavy skillet and fry 2-3 minutes per side till golden brown.

Step 5: Drain on the wire rack. Hold in the oven at 200F to keep warm.

For the BBQ shrimp:

Step 1: Season 1 pound shrimp with 2 tablespoons cajun seasoning.

Step 2: In a non-stick pan or skillet, sear shrimp for 1-2 mins on each side with sausage drippings. Remove shrimp and set aside to prepare the sauce.

Step 3: Add more drippings to the pan with chopped garlic, 1/2 cup wine and 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce. Add shrimp and the other seasonings to taste. Finish with 4 tablespoons butter and parsley on low heat until butter is incorporated.

Step 4: Spoon shrimp and sauce over grit cake. Garnish with scallion.

by Diamond Bridges

 2021 Tribune Publishing; Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC
People's Liberation Army soldiers at the Shek Kong barracks part of the Hong Kong garrison on June 30, 2017. (Dale De La Rey/AFP via Getty Images)

New Political Commissar for Hong Kong Garrison Appointed Amid Growing Tensions in South China Sea

Beijing appointed Rear Admiral Lai Ruxin as the political commissar of the Hong Kong garrison of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) on March 28.

Lai is the garrisons ninth Chinese Communist Party political commissar and the first commissar with a Navy background.

Before taking office, Lai was deputy director of the Political Work Department of the Northern Theater of the Chinese military.

Lai has earlier served in various roles in the PLA Navy, including being director of the cadre department of the Political Department of the South China Sea Fleet and the political commissar of the Guangzhou Marine Police District.

In June 2018, Lai served as the political commissar of the Naval Academy of China. In December of that year, he was promoted to the rank of rear admiral, and then transferred to the deputy director of the Political Work Department of the Northern Theater Command.

Lais appointment follows Beijing adding two warships to the garrison from the South China Sea Fleet on Oct. 26, 2021. The vessels Suqian and Jingmen are part of Chinas new generation of light frigates.

The CCPs naval reinforcement came at a time when the United States warned Beijing against its aggressive moves in the disputed South China Sea while Beijing claims that U.S. activities in the area raises the risk of conflict.

Since 2014, Beijing has claimed a wide swath of the sea, which the U.S. State Department says is inconsistent with international law as reflected in the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention.

Chinese structures and buildings at the man-made island on Johnson reef at the Spratlys group of islands in the South China Sea on March 20, 2022. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila)

Beijing is currently locking horns with Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Taiwan in a territorial dispute over reefs, islands, and atolls in the South China Sea. As part of that, China has built at least seven outposts in the Spratly Islands and 20 in the Parcel Islands.

China has fully militarized at least three of the islands that the regime built in the disputed area, Adm. John Aquilino, commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, said on March 20.

Military Exercises

From March 28 to April 8, the United States and its ally the Philippines have been conducting a live-fire military exercise, one of the largest in seven years, in the northern part of the Philippines.

The annual exercises, called Balikatan, (shoulder-to-shoulder), involve 8,900 defense personnel, of whom 5,100 are American. Its a way to make sure we can act together with our allies, said Andres Centino, chief of staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

U.S. Marines take part in a joint amphibious assault exercise as part of the annual Balikatan (shoulder-to-shoulder) U.S.-Philippines war exercises, off the waters of South China Sea on March 31, 2022 in Claveria, Cagayan province, Philippines. (Ezra Acayan/Getty Images)

Currently, nearby Malaysia is hosting the armed forces from four nationsAustralia, New Zealand, Singapore, and the United Kingdom, in the annual Bersama Shield 2022 training exercise.

The exercise is ongoing from March 19 to April 22, involving 36 aircraft and three ships.

Not long ago, the United States, Australia, and Japan had conducted a trilateral joint military exercise in the South China Sea, which ended on March 15.

9-dash line

A 2016 international ruling rejected the Chinese regimes nine-dash line claim to about 85 percent of the South China Seas 2.2 million square miles. The ruling said that Chinas claims had no historical basis and Beijing had violated the sovereignty of the Philippines by asserting territorial claims with its artificial islands built on reefs and sea rocks.

The CCP has rejected the ruling. It has deployed coast guard ships and Chinese fishing boats, which sometimes have fishermen with military training aboard, to intimidate foreign vessels, block access to waterways, and seize shoals and reefs.

Frank Fang contributed to this report.
Adam Andrzejewski, the CEO and founder of the government watchdog organization OpenTheBooks.com, in Washington on March 22, 2022. (Courtesy of the Conservative Partnership Institute)

NIH Working to Keep Taxpayers in the Dark by Stalling on Fauci Documents: Transparency Advocate

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is attempting to keep money spent on things like Dr. Anthony Faucis salary, the highest-paid U.S. government employee, hidden from members of the public, according to a transparency advocate.

There is a multi-layered strategy, funded by taxpayers, to keep taxpayers in the dark about how NIH is spending taxpayer money, Adam Andrzejewski, CEO and founder of OpenTheBooks.com, told Epoch TVs American Thought Leaders.

Andrzejewskis watchdog group discovered how much Fauci was getting paid and that he received a permanent pay bump in the early 2000s in part to prevent him from leaving the government.

In an effort to learn more about the top doctor, the group filed a Freedom of Information Act request on Jan. 28, 2021, asking for Faucis job description, disclosure documents, and other papers.

The NIH produced 51 pages of records in response to the request but did not provide any additional documents, nor did the agency produce records in response to two more requests from the group about documents related to Fauci, according to a lawsuit filed in federal court.

Theyre not complying with open records law, Andrzejewski said, triggering the suit and dozens of others from various groups.

The NIH said it did not violate the law. U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta, an Obama appointee, ordered the parties to try to work out a solution. The parties agreed to a production schedule of 300 pages a month but so far, the produced pages have amounted to virtually nothing of any value, Andrzejewski said, in part because some of the pages have been largely redacted.

Fauci has directed the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984. The institute, part of the NIH, did not respond to a request for comment.

Andrzejewski, who was removed as a Forbes contributor because of his reporting on Fauci, said he expects to see waivers for conflicts of interest, including a waiver regarding the doctors wife, Christine Grady, because she is the chief bioethics official at NIH.

The documents being sought should be immediately released by the NIH, he added. We shouldnt be having to engage in expensive litigation to open the books on Dr. Anthony Fauci or even to call for a nice repository of all the ethical studies from his wife, Christine Grady. All of this should be opened up. And this has public policy implications. If the Republicans take control the House, there is going to be endless oversight investigations of this entire COVID-19 response, with Dr. Fauci at the nexus of that hurricane. And so right now, they should get out in front of all of it and just open the books on everything, so the politicians, the pundits, the media, the people, so we can see how the sausage was made from A to Z.

Jan Jekielek Senior Editor Follow Jan Jekielek is a senior editor with The Epoch Times and host of the show, "American Thought Leaders." Jans career has spanned academia, media, and international human rights work. In 2009 he joined The Epoch Times full time and has served in a variety of roles, including as website chief editor. He is the producer of the award-winning Holocaust documentary film "Finding Manny."
The Pentagon logo is seen behind the podium in the briefing room at the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., on Jan. 8, 2020. (Al Drago/Reuters)

No Offensive Biologic Weapons in Ukrainian Biolabs: Pentagon

There are no offensive biologic weapons in the Ukrainian laboratories that the United States has been funding, a Pentagon official told Congress on April 1.

Deborah Rosenbaum, assistant secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical, and biological defense programs, told the House Subcommittee on Intelligence and Special Operations on April 1 that there are unequivocally  no offensive biologic weapons in the Ukraine laboratories that the United States has been involved with.

The Pentagon funds labs in Ukraine through its Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), a support agency within the Department of Defense for countering weapons of mass destruction, and U.S. and Ukrainian officials both say the labs seek to prevent bioweapons and pathogens.

According to a Pentagon fact sheet released in March (pdf), since 2005, the United States has invested approximately $200 million in Ukraine  supporting 46 Ukrainian laboratories, health facilities, and diagnostic sites.

The Biological Threat Reduction Program has improved Ukraines biological safety, security, and surveillance for both human and animal health, according to the fact sheet.

However, Russia has, in recent months, accused the U.S.-funded laboratories in Ukraine of developing biological warfare weapons. Such allegations were being aired on Russian state-run media even before Moscows invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.

The Russian Ministry of Defense issued a March 6 statement on Telegram accusing Ukraine of having destroyed disease-causing pathogens being studied at a lab in Ukraine that the ministry said is funded by the U.S. Department of Defense.

Russias allegations regarding the biological laboratories appeared to be repeated by the Chinese regime on March 7.

The World Health Organization stated in March that it advised the Ministry of Health in Ukraine to destroy high-threat pathogens to prevent any potential spills.

But analysts believe that the narrative being pushed by the Kremlin is part of its plan to create a false-flag operation in an attempt to justify using chemical weapons operations in Ukraine itself.

Rosenbaum told officials on April 1 that the department remains very concerned about the ability to get accurate and transparent information out to the U.S. public, as well as certainly our allies and the rest of the world.

So one of the things that the department has been doingand this is particularly related to the public health laboratories in Ukraine that is being tragically used by the Russians as a potential for a false flag operationfrom the White House on down to the Defense Department, as well as Department of State, as well as all of the vehicles that we have to be able to communicate accurate information out about this and the work that has been underway, she said.

Robert Pope, director of the DTRAs Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, told the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists in February that the labs might contain Soviet-era bioweapons and warned that the conflict in Ukraine could accidentally lead to the release of dangerous disease-causing pathogens.

I think the Russians know enough about the kinds of pathogens that are stored in biological research laboratories that I dont think they would deliberately target a laboratory, Pope said. But what I do have concerns about is that they would  be accidentally damaged during this Russian invasion.

Rosenbaum made her comments shortly after White House press secretary Jen Psaki cautioned officials to be on the lookout for Russia to possibly use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine or to create a false flag operation using them.

The White Houses concerns also have been repeated by NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg and the UKs Ministry of Defense, which said last month that it had seen no evidence to support the accusations made by Russia.
How does modern medicine see the aging of the human body? Scientists have discovered telomeres function as a biological clock. Telomeres are the ends of chromosomes, repeating sequences of non-coding DNA that protect chromosomes from damage, and get shorter every time a cell divides.

We now know there are harmful thinking patterns that can actually damage our telomeres, but are there ways to correct the process?

Reversing the Biological Clock

From a biological point of view, aging is a gradual and irreversible process; aging is manifested in the degeneration of cell: for example, the number of cells decreases and the total volume shrinks.

Replication of genes is influenced by telomeres and telomerase. These telomeres and telomerasean enzyme responsible for the length of telomerescan protect chromosomes; scientists also call telomeres the

biological clock.

When telomeres are stressed and shortened, it increases the likelihood that those cells will stop dividing and die. When this happens, the diseases we are more genetically vulnerable to more easily progress.

Therefore, if you can find a way to slow down the shortening of telomeres, you can delay aging.

Elizabeth Blackburn, PhD, won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2009 for discovering the molecular nature of telomeres, the ends of chromosomes that serve as protective caps essential for preserving genetic information, and for co-discovering telomerase, an enzyme that maintains telomere ends.

Telomeres listen to you, they listen to your behaviors, they listen to your state of mind, Blackburn, president of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California told StatNews.

In 2017, Blackburn wrote The Telomere Effect: A revolutionary approach to living younger, healthier, longer, revealing that one has more control over ones own aging than most of us might imagine. Based on reviews of thousands of studies, Blackburn concluded that you can actually lengthen your telomeres, and in effect, perhaps lengthen your life.

In the book, she outlined five thought patterns that harm our telomeres, and a strategy for lengthening them.

Cynical Hostility

One study Blackburn conducted looked at British civil servants, and found that men who scored high on measures of cynic hostility had shorter telomeres than men whose hostility scores were low.

What is cynical hostility?

Cynical hostility is defined by high anger and frequent thoughts that other people cannot be trusted, Blackburn and co-author Elissa Epel wrote. Someone with hostility doesnt just think, I hate to stand in long lines at the grocery store; they think, That other shopper deliberately sped up and beat me to my rightful position in the line!and then they seethe.

Such hostility was highly associated with increased risk of disease and mortality.

Pessimism

Pessimism has very serious negative effects on telomeres. In a smaller study, of about 35 women, Blackburn found that women scored high in pessimism had shorter telomeres.

In addition, a study of over 1,000 men also found that pessimism was a risk factor for poor health. When pessimists suffer from aging-related diseases, such as cancer or heart disease, the disease tends to progress faster, and in general pessimists tend to die earlier.

Rumination

There are many people whose thinking is often in a state of anxiety and self-compulsion, unable to let go of something, such as the lingering conflicts between family members and individual relationships.

Studies have found that obsession with these entanglements can also affect the bodys immune cells and shorten telomeres.

When you ruminate, stress sticks around in the body long after the reason for the stress is over, Blackburn and Epel wrote.

At the same time, people with more negative thoughts on the past or negative mind wandering (rumination) tended to have more clinical depression and anxiety disorders, which is also associated with shorter telomeres.

Thought Suppression

Everyone will encounter troubles. Sometimes we voluntarily push unpleasant thoughts away, without resolving them. This will also affect telomere length.

The late Harvard social psychologist Daniel Wegner, who pioneered this idea, once read an observation from Winter Notes on Summer Impressions, Fyodor Dostoevskys 1863 account of his travels in Western Europe: Try to pose for yourself this task: not to think of a polar bear, and you will see that the cursed thing will come to mind every minute.

That means the harder you push your thoughts away, the more they will steal your attention.

Distraction

We all know that many highly accomplished individuals have strong powers of focus and concentration.

However, many people are easily distracted by the external environment. Blackburns research found that when people are unable to concentrate and focus on the present, it also affects the length of telomeres.

Anti-Aging and Awareness

And on the contrary to these five negative patterns of thinking, Blackburns findings also show that the reverse is true. Positive thinking improves health on a genetic level.

The book contains a section: Thought awareness: Loosen the grip of negative thought patterns.

Thought awareness promotes stress resilience, Blackburn and Epel wrote. With time, you learn to encounter ruminations and say, Thats just a thought.

These five negative thought patterns are automatic ones, built-in habits that also tend to be exaggerated and controlling. With thought awareness, we free ourselves from such patterns.

The secret to the human mind, they explained, was that we dont need to believe everything our thoughts tell us. Being aware of our own thoughts, and where we are negatively biased, can help let go and stop the negative spiral.

The authors recommended activities like meditation and other similar mind-body exercises like long distance running, which has a meditative effect, because these exercises promote better thought awareness. With practice, we can cease thinking ourselves towards unhappiness (and therefore shorter, more disease-prone lives) and experience higher levels of resting stress hormones.
A worker wearing protective gear stands next to barriers during lockdown in Jing'an district, Shanghai, on March 31, 2022. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

Shanghai Hospital Grapples With Unreported COVID-19 Outbreak, Patient Alleges

A suspected wave of COVID-19 infections has hit local Shanghai hospitals as the country grapples with a record coronavirus surge, the severity of which has been hidden from hospital workers and local authorities, The Epoch Times has learned.

In the past few days, Shanghai and Chinas northeastern province of Jilin accounted for more than 95 percent of new infections across the mainland, with Shanghai seeing record highs. Local health officials announced on April 3 that 19 hospitals in Shanghai have partially suspended medical services because they were overflowing with COVID-19 patients.

A 70-year-old critical care unit inpatient, who was recently transferred to the citys Yangsi Hospital, hasnt been given the potassium he needs and is in critical condition, according to his family members. The man is now relying on six tablets a day to supply the potassium with no fruit or vegetable intake.

There is no longer a nutritional supply for those who are critically ill, said his son, who preferred to remain unnamed. My father had a heart attack, which led to a lung infection.

He told the Chinese edition of The Epoch Times on April 3 that Yangsi Hospital was put under lockdown, with people, including doctors, nurses, caregivers, patients, and accompaniers, confined to their own levels.

Ive heard of confirmed cases merged from the first, second, fourth, and fifth levels, but I alone cannot prove it.

The Epoch Times contacted Shanghai Yangsi Hospital that day; a doctor who answered the phone confirmed the lockdown but said he was barred from knowing how serious the outbreak was.

Im one of the staff here, but even I do not know how many [new infections] there are in the hospital, and its not proper for me to ask, either.

Health workers wearing protective gear prepare equipment in preparation for testing people for the COVID-19 coronavirus at a compound in Shanghai on March 23, 2022. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

The son said efforts to contact local authorities have led nowhere, and his post pleading for help on Chinas Twitter-like site Weibo was quickly censored and removed from the platform.

I was just confused that many efforts got wasted on this [rather than what truly matters], he said.

[My fathers] life and death now lie in the lap of the gods.

30 Cases Underreported

A patient revealed that another Shanghai hospital had concealed the extent of its current COVID-19 outbreak from authorities.

Wei Yan (pseudonym), said that at least 30 elderly people in Shanghai Tongkang Hospital had tested positive for COVID-19 as of April 1. She later found the outbreak numbers to have been underreported upon checking with local authorities.

The hospital is seeing a serious shortage of nursing workers as many have been pulled away. Worrying about her 95-year-old hospitalized grandmother, Wei decided to go to Tongkang Hospital as a volunteer, but the hospital later rejected her help, citing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCP) of Shanghai.

The hospital did not report the outbreak at all, she told the Chinese-language edition of The Epoch Times on April 2, following a fact check with the Shanghai center. No one at the CDPC knew there were positive cases in this hospital before I reported [them].

The Epoch Times repeatedly called Shanghai Tongkang Hospital for comment, but the calls went unanswered. Wei said that patients and their families, and even workers in the hospital were uninformed of what was happening due to the cover-up.

Shanghai reported a city record of over 9,000 COVID-19 cases on April 3, compared to 8,226 cases a day earlier.

The current two-stage lockdown in the financial hub, which began on March 28, has massively disrupted daily life and business operations. While it was initially scheduled to end at 5 a.m. local time on April 5, authorities said on April 4 that the city will remain under lockdown, as the military and 2,000 health care workers have been dispatched to Shanghai to help test all of its 26 million residents for COVID-19.

Gu Xiaohua and Gao Miao contributed to this report.
Nuremberg, 1947

20th-century German medicine offers a cautionary tale that we'd do well not to forget

Commentary

In the 1930s, German medicine and German health care institutions were widely considered the most advanced in the world. However, subtle but enormously consequential shifts had been underway decades before Adolf Hitler came to power, starting with the rise of the eugenics movement in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

In 1922, Alfred Hoche and Karl Binding, a psychiatrist and a lawyer, published an influential book, Allowing the Destruction of Life Unworthy of Life. A metaphor from this and other influential works captured the imagination of the German medical establishment, undermining the traditional Hippocratic ethic that had governed medicine since antiquity.

Instead of serving the health of the individual patient presenting for treatment, German physicians were encouraged to be responsible for the health of the social organismthe volkas a whole.

Instead of seeing afflicted individuals as sick and in need of compassionate medical care, German doctors became agents of a socio-political program driven by a cold and calculating utilitarian ethos. If the social organism was construed as healthy or sick, some individuals (e.g., those with cognitive or physical disabilities) were characterized as cancers on the volk. And what do doctors do with cancers but eliminate them?

The first people gassed by the Nazis werent Jews in concentration camps (that came later), but disabled patients in psychiatric hospitals, murdered under the Third Reichs T4 Euthanasia Program. Each of these death warrants was signed by a German physician. Even after the lethal regime turned its attention to Jews and other ethnic minorities, they continued to deploy quasi-public health justifications: Recall that the Jews were routinely demonized by the Nazis as spreaders of disease.

If physicians serve not the needs of sick and vulnerable patients, but are agents of a social program, the German example shows us what happens when that social program is misdirected by a corrupt regime.

When the atrocities of the Nazi doctors were revealed at the postwar Nuremberg trials, the world rightly condemned the German physicians and scientists who participated. That their actions were legal under the Nazi regime wasnt an adequate defense; these doctors were convicted at Nuremberg for crimes against humanity. To avoid such disasters in the future, the central principle of research ethics and medical ethicsnamely, the free and informed consent of the research subject or patientwas then clearly articulated in the Nuremberg Code. Here is the first of 10 points articulated in the Code:

The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential. This means that the person involved should have legal capacity to give consent; should be so situated as to be able to exercise free power of choice, without the intervention of any element of force, fraud, deceit, duress, overreaching, or other ulterior form of constraint or coercion; and should have sufficient knowledge and comprehension of the elements of the subject matter involved as to enable him to make an understanding and enlightened decision. This latter element requires that before the acceptance of an affirmative decision by the experimental subject, there should be made known to him the nature, duration, and purpose of the experiment; the method and means by which it is to be conducted; all inconveniences and hazards reasonably to be expected; and the effects upon his health or person which may possibly come from his participation in the experiment.

This principle was further developed in the Helsinki Declaration of the World Medical Association, the Belmont Report commissioned by the U.S. government in the 1970s, and subsequently codified under the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations in the Common Rule, the law governing human-subjects research in the United States.

Fast forward to 2020. In the face of the novel coronavirus, and the fears generated by media propaganda, the principle of free and informed consent was once again abandoned. The most egregious but by no means the only example was vaccine mandates enacted while the vaccines were still under emergency-use authorization, and thus by our federal governments own definition, experimental.

How and why was the bulwark of 20th-century medical ethics abandoned so quickly, and with so little opposition from the medical and scientific establishment? What were the immediate effects? What will be the long-term consequences of the shift back to a crass utilitarian ethic governing science, medicine, and public health during a pandemic?

Originally published on the authors Substack, reposted from the Brownstone Institute

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Storage tanks are seen at Marathon Petroleum's Los Angeles Refinery, which processes domestic & imported crude oil into California Air Resources Board (CARB), gasoline, diesel fuel, and other petroleum products, in Carson, Calif., on March 11, 2022. Picture taken with a drone. (Bing Guan/Reuters)

Oil Slips Below $104 as Reserves Release Counters Supply Fears

LONDONOil slipped on Monday in volatile trading as the release of strategic reserves by consuming nations eased concerns over tight supply amid Russias invasion of Ukraine and the lack of an Iranian nuclear deal.

Crude dropped by about 13 percent last week after President Joe Biden announced a record U.S. oil reserves release and as International Energy Agency members committed to further tapping reserves. Crude had hit $139 last month, its highest since 2008.

The massive release of 1 million barrels per day over a period of six months in the United States alone is likely to ensure that the oil market is no longer acutely undersupplied in the second and third quarters, Carsten Fritsch of Commerzbank wrote in a report.

Brent crude was down 67 cents, or 0.6 percent, at $103.72 a barrel by 1010 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude fell 57 cents, or 0.6 percent, to $98.70. Both contracts were up over $1 earlier in the session.

Russias invasion of Ukraine in February intensified supply worries that were already underpinning prices. Sanctions imposed on Russia and buyers avoidance of Russian oil have already led to a drop in output and raised fears of larger losses.

The reserves release will alleviate but not eliminate a supply deficit, oil broker PVM said.

In view of this, it will take a brave man to bet on oil prices finding a new home below $100 a barrel, said Stephen Brennock of PVM.

Additional downward pressure came from a truce in Yemen, which could ease threats to supply in the Middle East.

The United Nations has brokered a two-month truce between a Saudi-led coalition and the Houthi group aligned with Iran for the first time in the seven-year conflict. Saudi oil facilities have come under Houthi attack during the fighting.

Oil gained support from a pause in talks to revive the Iranian nuclear deal, which would allow a lifting of sanctions on Iranian oil. Iran on Monday blamed the United States for the halt.

By Alex Lawler
The logo of the U.S. National Security Agency is seen during a visit by U.S. President George W. Bush to the agency's installation in Fort Meade, Maryland, on Jan. 25, 2006. (Reuters/File Photo)

Oversight Watchdog Wants to Know Why 2 Intelligence Community IGs Were Overpaid

Presidentially appointed inspectors general (IG) at two key intelligence community agencies were collectively overpaid more than $168,000 between 2016 and 2020, but its unclear whether any corrective action has been taken, according to a Department of Defense (DOD) memo obtained by a nonprofit government watchdog.

Information about the overpayments is contained in a Jan. 25 memo from DOD Deputy Assistant Secretary for Civilian Personnel Policy Nancy Anderson Speight to Marguerite Garrison, DOD deputy IG for administrative investigations, who requested Speights review.

The Speight memo was obtained and verified by Empower Oversight Whistleblowers and Researchers, the Arlington, Virginia-based nonprofit that describes itself as a group that helps insiders safely and legally report waste, fraud, abuse, corruption, and misconduct to the proper authorities, and seeks to hold those authorities accountable to act on such reports by, among other means, publishing information concerning the same. A copy of the memo was also made available to The Epoch Times.

Susan Gibson is the IG at the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), while Rob Storch is the IG at the National Security Agency (NSA). Gibson was appointed by President Barack Obama in 2016 and Storch by President Donald Trump in 2018. Storch is also President Joe Bidens nominee to be the DOD IG, a nomination that has been pending in the Senate since November 2021.

In 2018, when Storch took over the NSA IG job, he was at Level II of the governments Executive Schedule, which set his annual salary at $187,000. He received pay raises through 2020 that increased his compensation to $197,300, according to the Speight memo.

Gibsons salary was incorrectly set by the NRO human resources office at $190,729 when she became the NRO IG. The correct compensation figure at the time of her appointment was $177,791. Gibson received three increases that put her salary at $218,650 by 2020, according to the Speight memo.

The problem, according to Speight, is that NSA and NRO had no legal authority to give Gibson or Storch annual pay increases in the absence of performance appraisals for each of them. As presidential appointees, the NRO and NSA IGs dont get annual performance appraisals.

An IG can be fired by the chief executive, with 30 days notice to Congress and a written explanation of the grounds for removal.

Federal personnel and ethics regulations require all federal employees to report such overpayments as soon as they become aware of them and to make arrangements for repayment to the government.

The Secretary of Defense can waive all or part of the repayment in the case of a DOD entity, but the waiver cant be applied if the employee should have known about the overpayment and failed to bring the problem to the attention of appropriate officials in a timely fashion.

An NSA spokesman told The Epoch Times late April 4 that the 2019 and 2020 pay increases are being reversed, and Storch will repay them as soon as the precise amount is calculated. A White House spokesman didnt respond to The Epoch Times request for comment on whether Biden was aware of the overcompensation issue when he nominated Storch for the DOD position.

Storch was asked about the overpayment by Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) following his presidential nomination confirmation hearing earlier this year before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

In a written response, Storch said that as soon as he learned of the issue, he unambiguously informed the agency officials with whom I spoke, and reiterated to the committee, that I never intended to receive and would not keep any funds if there was any question at all that they were appropriate.

I instructed my HR lead to follow up and, specifically, to reach out to CIGIE for guidancemy understanding is that the issue is still being researched and I will, as indicated above, immediately repay any and all funds that it is determined may have been incorrectly paid to me, he said.

An NRO spokesman didnt respond to The Epoch Times multiple requests for comment on Gibsons overpayments.

There are 76 IGs tasked with investigating waste, fraud, and abuse in major federal departments and agencies, with 29 of them appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. The other IGs are appointed by the heads of the agency at which they serve.

The IG positions were established with the enactment of the Inspector General Act of 1978 as a response to widespread media reporting of waste, fraud, and abuse at the General Services Administration, the federal governments housekeeping agency.

The IGs are represented within the executive branch by the Council of the Inspectors General for Integrity and Efficiency (CIGIE). A spokesman for CIGIE didnt respond by press time to The Epoch Times request for comment on the overpayment issue.

Jason Foster, Empower Oversights (EO) founder and president, said in a statement: Inspector General offices must be held to the highest standards of integrity. Independent watchdogs cannot abuse the publics trust and expect to escape the same measure of accountability they are charged with enforcing on others in government.

The [CIGIE] Integrity Committee is supposed to police the inspectors general, but if it cannot explain why it took no action on these allegations that would raise serious questions about whether it is capable of living up to its mission and the ideal expressed in its name.

Storch is listed on the CIGIE website as a member of the Integrity Committee. The NSA spokesman confirmed that Storch recused himself from the panels discussion of the overpayments he received. The spokesman also said that, while he couldnt confirm or deny whether the panel discussed issues related to other IGs overpayments, Storch would have recused himself in that instance as well.

EO said in its statement that it has filed five Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests seeking documents related to the alleged salary overpayments. In each of the FOIAs, EO informs the agencies that it has reason to believe the overpayment issue has been discussed at CIGIE meetings.

Specifically, one or both of the NSA-IG and the NRO-IG were allegedly in attendance on such occasions. Moreover, the whistleblower alleges that CIGIE leadership recently warned [presidentially appointed] IGs that the DOD memo had been sent to the CIGIE-IG, but that it had refused to investigate the excess salary payments to the NSA and NRO IGs, the FOIA requests state.
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooter Nikolas Cruz enters the courtroom before jury pre-selection in the penalty phase of his trial at the Broward County Courthouse in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., on April 4, 2022. (Amy Beth Bennett/South Florida Sun Sentinel via AP, Pool)

Parkland School Shooters Jury Selection Begins

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla.The first day of jury selection in the Parkland mass shooting trial was slow, methodical, and painstakinga process that is expected to drag on for two months.

More than 120 of the first 160 prospective jurors who filed through Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherers courtroom on Monday were dismissed. Most said it would be impossible for them to serve from June through September. Thats the amount of time it is expected to take for lawyers to present their cases in a trial that will end with a jury deciding whether Nikolas Cruz gets life in prison or a sentence of death for murdering 17 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in 2018.

A few were dismissed because of health issues, because they dont speak English fluently, or because they had already paid for extensive vacations.

A woman was dismissed when she began crying upon seeing Cruznot a new occurrence; that also happened to three women at an October hearing. Another prospective juror had a personal connection to Scherer, having taught her how to roller-skate as a child. Yet another had met Cruz in 2016 on a group outing, while one woman was excused after saying she couldnt serve on a jury because she needed to meet up with her sugar daddy every day.

Im seeing double. Ive seen a lot of people, Scherer said at the end of the day. For Day 1, things went rather smoothly.

Cruz, 23, sat between his attorneys, wearing a gray sweater and an anti-viral mask, four sheriffs deputies sitting nearby. He spoke only briefly at the start of the hearing, waiving his right to participate directly in the screening process. He pleaded guilty in October, meaning the jury will only decide if he gets death or life without parole.

Assistant Public Defender Melisa McNeill advises her client, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooter Nikolas Cruz, as Chief Assistant Public Defender David Wheeler (L) and Assistant Public Defender Tamara Curtis look on during jury pre-selection in the penalty phase of his trial at the Broward County Courthouse in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., on April 4, 2022. (Amy Beth Bennett/South Florida Sun Sentinel via AP, Pool)

Eight parents and other family members of some victims sat together in the courtroom. They declined to comment as they left.

Approximately 1,500 potential jurors, perhaps more, will be screened over the next few weeks as the pool is pared down to 12 plus eight alternates in a three-step process that will run through the end of May.

In the first screening, they are only being asked about hardships and conflicts. With the exception of the woman who met Cruz, they were not asked on Monday for their opinions about the death penalty or whether they could be fair. Those who said they could serve were given questionnaires to fill out in another room. The questionnaires will be given to lawyers in advance of the next round.

One prospective juror said she met Cruz in 2016 when she went with a group of friends to a lake cabin for a weekend and an acquaintance invited him along. The woman, who appeared to be in her early 20s, said she had few interactions with Cruz, but he seemed perhaps mentally not together. She was dismissed after saying she could not envision many circumstances where she would even consider voting for a life sentence.

Scherer seemed taken aback when one prospective juror said serving would be a financial hardship because she has to visit her sugar daddy daily. Scherer asked her to repeat what she said. She did. Scherer had her held over after dismissing other jurors. Under questioning, she repeated that again. She was finally dismissed. One prosecutor then called her wacky.

A woman visits a memorial setup at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., on Feb. 14, 2019. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

The Parkland shooting is the deadliest in the United States ever to make it to trial. Seven other U.S. killers who fatally shot at least 17 people died during or immediately after their attacks, either by suicide or at the hands of police. The suspect in the 2019 massacre of 23 at an El Paso, Texas, Walmart is still awaiting trial.

Death penalty trials in Florida and much of the country often take two years to start because of their complexity, but Cruzs was further delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic and extensive legal wrangling.

Tony Montalto, whose 14-year-old daughter, Gina, died in the attack, said before Mondays hearing that the trial has been a long time coming.

I just hope everyone remembers the victims, he said. Cruz, he said, told the world his plans on social media, carried out those plans in a cold and calculated manner and murdered my beautiful daughter, 13 of her classmates and three of her teachers.

The parents and spouses of victims who have spoken publicly said they are in favor of Cruzs execution. Montalto has not answered the question directly, but has said on multiple occasions that Cruz deserves every chance he gave Gina and the others.

When the prospective jurors who pass the initial screening return for individual questioning several weeks from now, both prosecutors and the defense can challenge any for cause. Scherer will eliminate candidates who lawyers from either side have convinced her would be prejudiced against their side. Each side will also get at least 10 peremptory strikes, where either can eliminate a candidate for any reason except race or gender.

For Cruz, a former Stoneman Douglas student, to get the death penalty, the jury must unanimously agree that aggravating factors such as the number of people he killed, his planning, and his cruelty outweigh such mitigating factors as his lifelong mental illness and the death of his parents.

If any juror disagrees, Cruz will receive a life sentence.

By Terry Spencer
Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with Ingushetia's regional head at the Kremlin in Moscow on March 30, 2022. (Mikhail Klimentyev/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images)

Putin Signs Decree Imposing Restrictions on Unfriendly Countries

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on April 4 to place visa restrictions on countries that have taken unfriendly actions against the Kremlin in recent weeks.

The decree was mandated in response to unfriendly actions of the European Union, according to the text of the order, state-run media reported. Russian news outlets published a photo of Putin signing the measure.

It ordered the Russian foreign ministry and other bodies to decide on introducing personal entry restrictions on foreign citizens and stateless people who commit unfriendly actions against Russia, its citizens or its legal entities.

Last month, the Russian government approved a list of unfriendly countries, including the United States, Canada, the UK, EU states, and Ukraine, among others.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said last month that the decree was developed in connection with the unfriendly actions of a number of foreign states.

This act will introduce a number of restrictions on entry to the territory of Russia.

After Russia sent tens of thousands of troops and armored vehicles into Ukraine on Feb. 24, the EU, United States, and other allied states implemented punishing sanctions against top Kremlin officials, the Russian central bank, oligarchs, and other financial institutions. Moscow has responded, in part, by demanding that natural gas payments be made with rubles, the Russian currency.

The remains of cars are seen in front of an apartment building destroyed during the UkraineRussia conflict in Mariupol, Ukraine, on April 3, 2022. (Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters)

European officials, meanwhile, are now considering more sanctions against Moscow after Ukrainian officials accused Russian forces of committing war crimes in Bucha, near the capital of Kyiv. Those officials published photos online of what they said were dead civilians who were executed by Russian troops; Moscow has categorically denied the allegations and said the pictures were staged as a provocation.

Germany and its international partners will agree to further sanctions on Russia in the coming days, a government spokesperson said on April 4, adding that he was confident the European Union would remain united on fresh measures.

Italy, which is also heavily reliant on Russian gas, said it has sufficient reserves to forgo using the Russian gas supply over the next few months.

A German economy ministry spokesperson said a gas embargo would have economic consequences for Germany, and so it should act prudently. Germany gets about 40 percent of its gas from Russia and has already activated an emergency plan that could lead to gas rationing if supplies drop too low.

Reuters contributed to this report.
As a child, Carmen Gloria Perez dreamed of traveling, pursuing art, and living a better life. Now, shes using her art to inspire children to dream big

Carmen Gloria Perez always dreamed about traveling the world. Then, when she was just 10 years old, her parents split up, and her mother took her from New York to Puerto Rico in hopes of starting fresh. Life was difficult, and her family had to rely on government assistance to get by. When I was that young, I remember thinking I didnt want to live my life that way forever. I wanted more, said Perez.

But she didnt know how to get there. Nobody in her family had gone to college or even traveled outside of the United States. Perez wanted to be the first to change that. She daydreamed endlessly about a better life. Her mind was filled with visions of going to college, landing a good job, and flying across different continents.

Perez has always had a particular fondness for the arts, but attending school in Puerto Rico, she did not have access to arts programs. We had no arts, no music, and there was no theater, Perez said. Her father was a bass player, but she was separated from him after she and her mother left the United States when she was 10, and that was the extent of her exposure to performing arts.

At one point, Perez said she wanted to take singing lessons after coming across some brochures. She told her mother about her plan and even offered to work a part-time job at a nearby grocery store to pay for the classes, but her mother wasnt on board. They didnt have access to proper transportation as they lived far away and the buses stopped running at 6 p.m.when the classes began. It seemed that life had other plans for Perez, and she was led to putting her creative dreams on hold for the time being.

Grasping New Opportunities

At 17 years old, Perez found a job near an Army recruitment office. She walked by it nearly every day on her way to work. I remember thinking, well, that could be an interesting way to go to college and travel the world, Perez said. The prospect of serving her country was also an added bonus. It took many more months before she decided to walk into the army recruitment office and take the pretest, on which Perez scored very highly. That night, she finally told her mother, who was surprised but supportive.

While serving in the Army, Perez got to achieve her dream of traveling the world. Her first duty station was in Germany, then South Korea. Once she returned to the United States, she was stationed in Alabama, and then Washington, D.C., where she decided to spend a few years after completing her service. Trained as a finance officer in the army, Perez went on to work closely with the U.S. Treasury while studying for her college degree in Government and International Politics, in the hopes of working for the U.S. Department of State. Her career seemed to be planned out for her.

However, everything changed again when Perez came across a newspaper ad for a weekend acting workshop. This time, she could take the class. She ended up enjoying the workshop so much that she chose to move to Hollywood and pursue acting at a professional level.

Perez considers her time spent in the army as pivotal in helping her become the person she is today. The army was very good for me, she said. Her choice to enlist in the military allowed her to transform her life and achieve her dreams of traveling the world and obtaining a college degree. Without this early career path, Perez may never have discovered her passions or had the opportunity to explore different career opportunities.

(Tarjei Krogh for American Essence)

Following Her Artistic Dreams

While pursuing a career in the acting industry, Perez said she got to learn a great deal about how to become a better listener. Acting is all about listening and reacting to what the other person is telling you or the situation, she said.

I think us as human beings, we are so multifaceted, she said. Perez views acting as a way to express all the sides that make up a person. Perez herself experienced a lot of pain after her parents got divorced, and she would often be forced to cover it up with a smiling face. She also struggled with a lack of confidence. I often had to cover up the pain by acting more confident and happier than I really was, she said. Through acting, she got to tap into difficult sides of herself and face some of her problems. Sometimes, I think its therapeutic, she said.

Painting became another way for her to learn to love herself and inspire self-love in others. It began with a spontaneous walk into an art store and has led to a full-blown career. That first day she bought her supplies, I didnt realize it was like three in the morning and I couldnt stop, she said. The next day, Perez completed her very first canvas painting. By the end of two months, she had made a total of 30 complete paintings.

Inspiring Children Through Storytelling

As a child, Perez enjoyed reading science fiction books and often fantasized about where she came from. Planets and stars were a source of fascination for her. I remember watching Star Wars, she told me. I always remember thinking how that type of storytelling is amazing, and how I wanted to tell stories like that, too, one day.

As an adult, Perez still believes it is good to be curious and question things as it helps open up new doors and possibilities. I think thats why Ive ended up doing all these things because Ive remained curious. Her love for storytelling led her to become a childrens book author and illustrator. After moving to Norway in 2017 in search of acting work, Perez decided to fill in the time between auditions with a new creative project. By combining her love of storytelling, art, and space exploration, Perez launched her Kid Astronomy series in the hopes of inspiring kids and fostering their curiosity in STEAM subjects (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics).

Part of Perezs mission in starting the astronomy book series was to offer children a good introductory foundation in the field of science and technologysomething she never got to experience herself. In her latest essay, titled Inspiring the Artemis Generation, Perez outlines the importance of STEAM subjects in an ever-changing world where the possibilities of what we create and where we go are infinitejust like our universe.

To encourage more children, Perez regularly offers all three copies of her Kid Astronomy series as free digital downloads on Amazon in the hopes of widening childrens access to educational books, no matter their background or circumstance. The books have been downloaded by thousands of people, which brings Perez great joy. I love it. That is my mission in life. I would love to help in any way I can, and if it is through my books, then it makes me really happy. I think thats why Im here, she said. Perez has also created a read-aloud video on YouTube so kids can easily follow along with her. According to her website, the very first book in her series, Thank You, Mercury! was featured by Book Authority as one of the Best Space Books of 2019 and was also included at the Space Science Institute as part of their Summer of Space program.

For Perez, all art forms are equally important, whether expressed through painting, acting, creating music, or writing. The world is a better place when we can first learn to love ourselves, so we can then love others better and hurt them less. Art can help us get there, she said. Her hope is to be able to portray these themes in her future stories and artwork.

This article was originally published in American Essence magazine.
Released Prisoners Saying Thank You With Their Lives

Texas Pastor Joe Fauss has worked in prison ministries since 1974.

Fauss sat in the cell with Karla Faye Tucker who, in 1998, was the first woman put to death in Texas in the 20th century. He has stood at the bars of an inmates cell who would receive the death penalty the next day.

But most of the inmates he reaches will someday be released back into the countrys general population. His staff at the nonprofit Calvary Commission in Smith County, Texas, want to get them ready to live life right.

Were trying to reach them with a simple message, Fauss told The Epoch Times on March 28. If God has changed you in prison, the best thing you can do now is say Thank you with your lives.

His lifetime of work with prisonersnearly 50 yearsisnt what Fauss originally set out to do.

The first time I set foot into a Texas prison in 1974, I asked the warden what I could do, Fauss said. He said, We already have a chaplain, and that seemed like the end of it.

But an officer sitting in the corner said, Preacher, if you really want to help them, do something for them when they get out.

That simple sentence resonated with Fauss. It would launch a career path still vital and growing in 2022, touching thousands of lives in the process.

Fauss was on the staff of Teen Challenge at the time, the nationwide ministry for troubled teens across the United States. It was founded by the Rev. David Wilkerson of The Cross and the Switchblade fame.

I asked David what he thought of aftercare for inmates. He said Ive never heard of anything like that, but released me from Teen Challenge to start it, Fauss said.

We believe God can take a prisoner and make him a preacher; he can take a murderer and make him a missionary, a prostitute and make her a woman of God, a spotless bride. How should you respond to God? With your life! You have a purpose now.

We have produced pastors, missionaries, medical professionals, businesspeople, and those who started missions. We have a Bible College and permission from the State of Texas to give AA degrees in Bible at the end of our two-year program.

Rev. David Herndon is an Assemblies of God pastor, leading the Church of the Living Hope in Tyler, Texas. Herndon was languishing in a cell as a drug addict 12 years ago when the Calvary Commissions outreach to his jail changed the course of his life.

It was a testimony by a guy who had drug addictions and life problems like mine that hit me, Herndon said. He told us we could be set free from it all and live a normal life. I thought, This is it. This is real.

After Herndon did his time, he went straight to Calvary Commission.

I went through the entire program. I got straight. I had a purpose, he said. I met my wife, got married, had kids. My goodness, so many miracles happened. I was living that normal life Id wanted so long ago.

Four years ago, Herndon was ordained and put in charge of the Living Hope Church, started by Joe Fauss years previously. Theres now a place in East Texas where former prisoners can go that understands them.

About 150 people attend regularly, Herndon said. Id say almost a third of them are former inmates.

Commitment works, Herndon said.

If there isnt a personal encounter with God, I dont think lasting change is possible, he said.

I hate to be a pessimist, saying thats true for every person in every situation. But from what Ive seen, short of the intervention of God, people are repeatedly headed back to prison because of a myriad of life problems.

I truly believe a strong commitment to God is what works.
There are quite a few movies that deal with aging and/or dealing with terminal illnesses, and living the last years of life to the fullest. These include little indie gems such as 2019s Edie to big-budget Hollywood fare of The Bucket List from 2008. However, fewer of these feature relatable, ordinary folks from the heartlandpeople who could easily live down the street in Smalltown, USA. After all, most U.S. citizens dont live in the big cities.

Director Alexander Paynes 2013-produced film (released in 2014) Nebraska perfectly fills that void. It showcases regular people dealing with life and death, along with plenty of drama and humorjust like in real life.

Bruce Dern plays curmudgeonly old Korean War Vet Woody Grant, who is in the beginning stages of dementia. His deteriorating mental state is exacerbated by his fondness for alcohol.

We first meet Woody as hes shuffling along a highway leading out of Billings, Montana, where he lives. Due to his rumpled appearance, a cop pulls over and brings him back to the towns local police station.

(RL) Son David Grant (Will Forte) and his father Woody (Bruce Dern) receive some choice parting words by wife and mother Kate (June Squibb) before departing on their road trip, in Nebraska. (Paramount Vantage)

Soon, his son David (Will Forte) shows up to take him back home. Thats when Woody first apprizes him of a crumpled up document in his pocket. He hands it over to David and tells his son that hes the winner of a million-dollar sweepstakes. When David informs him that its all just a mail scam used to con people into buying newspaper subscriptions, Woody stubbornly insists that hes won the money.

When David takes Woody back home to his wife Kate (June Squibb), she wastes no time launching into some scathing verbal assaults aimed square at her husband. It soon becomes apparent that Woodys flights from home are increasing in frequency. She tells David that Woody would be better off if they put him in a nursing home.

Davids older brother Ross (Bob Odenkirk) is likewise fed up with Woodys transient ways and troublesome temperament, and also wants their father in a home. But David says Dad just wants something to live for. Thats all this is about.

Its here that we learn that Ross career as a TV newsman is taking off, while Davids gig as a stereo salesman contributes to his angst.

The starkly beautiful landscape of Smalltown, USA is prominently featured, in Nebraska. (Paramount Vantage)

So when Woody asks David to take him to a town in Nebraska to claim his million-dollar reward, the latter agrees. After all, he doesnt have much going on in Billings and could use a few days away from his humdrum existence. He also sees it as an opportunity to spend some time with his father since their relationship isnt exactly cozy.

Father and son pack into the latters Subaru station wagon and, after a few last verbal lashes from Kate, take off on their trip to the neighboring state. During their road trip, we glean insights into Woody and Davids relationship through down-to-earth dialogue about their familial history, revelations, and deadpan humor.

When the two finally arrive at their destination, a small town in Nebraskathe familys original hometownall sorts of oddball characters come out of the woodwork. As former rivals, relatives, and friends alike begin to emerge from the dusty past, it becomes clear that many are just interested in Woodys supposed newfound wealth, including Woodys brazen former business partner Ed Pegram (Stacy Keach).

Fortunately, the rest of the family eventually trickles in from Billings to join Woody and David and back them upfrom there the movie takes a turn into more hopeful pastures (no pun intended) as they begin their healing journey together.

Woody Grant (Bruce Dern, L) with Ed Pegram (Stacey Keach) in Nebraska. (Paramount Vantage)

Easy on the Eyes and Soul

Something that really stands out is the films deft usage of black and white cinematography. The rolling hills and sprawling fields of both Montana and Nebraska are captured with utmost skill, particularly the stark natural beauty of Billings, Montana with its patches of snow and quaint roadside motels, hardware stores, bars, and other small businesses.

The films narrative is also straightforward; you never feel like youre being emotionally manipulated. This is partially due to the scripts believable dialogue, but its also due to the earthy performances by its outstanding cast. Both Dern and Keach stand out here as, respectively, a cranky old-timer with an interesting past, and a charismatic schemer. And June Squibb is hilarious as the cantankerous wife of Derns character.

Speaking of Squibb, she is the perfect example of how director Payne gives his characters depth, as opposed to making them caricatures. Although she initially seems constantly at odds with her husband, deep down she loves him in her own way. Later in the story she ferociously goes to his defense and its a scene worth seeing the entire film for.

Nebraska is easy on the eyes and soul. Its a redemptive and often humorous tale that shows its never too late to heal a fractured family.

Nebraska

Director: Alexander Payne

Starring: Bruce Dern, Will Forte, June Squibb

MPAA Rating: R

Running time: 1 hour, 55 minutes

Release Date: Nov. 13, 2013

Rated: 4 stars out of 5



Ian Kane is a filmmaker and author based out of Los Angeles. To see more, visit DreamFlightEnt.com or contact him at Twitter.com/ImIanKane
Minister of Defence Anita Anand rises during Question Period, on March 30, 2022 in Ottawa. (The Canadian Press/Adrian Wyld)

Robust Investments Coming for North American Defence: Anand

Defence Minister Anita Anand is promising to introduce a robust package of investments for North Americas aging defences in the coming months.

The promise follows years of warnings from military officials and experts about the state of the continents defensive network, parts of which are now obsolete.

The warnings have a new sense of urgency as tensions between the West and Russia continue to grow over the latters invasion of Ukraine.

Canada is also under intense pressure to spend more on its military, with many expecting new money for defence in this weeks federal budget.

Anand says she has had several discussions with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and will be moving ahead on upgrading the North American Aerospace Defence command, or Norad, in concert with Washington.

Those upgrades are expected to include measures to protect North Americas airspace and maritime territory, but also to detect and defend against threats from space and cyberspace.
Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) and deputy security council chief Dmitry Medvedev attend a meeting with members of the government in Moscow, Russia, on Jan. 15, 2020. (Sputnik/Dmitry Astakhov/Pool via Reuters)

Russia Threatens to Limit Vital Exports of Agriculture Products to Friendly Countries Only

A senior Russian government official has threatened to limit exports of agriculture products to friendly countries only amid sanctions from Western nations in response to its invasion of Ukraine.

Dmitry Medvedev, who previously served as Russias president from 2008 to 2012 and is now deputy secretary of the countrys security council, took to Telegram on April 1 where he warned of the potential move.

Medvedev said that many countries depend on supplies of food from Russia, a major global wheat exporter, writing: It turns out that our food is our quiet weapon. Quiet but ominous, according to Breitbart.

The priority in food supplies is our domestic market. And price control, he continued. We will supply food and crops only to our friends (fortunately, we have a lot of them, and they are not at all in Europe and not in North America). We will sell both for rubles and for their national currency in agreed proportions.

He then explained that Russia would not supply products and agricultural products to those countries it deems as enemies.

And we wont buy anything from them (although we havent bought anything since 2014, but the list of products prohibited for import can be further expanded), he continued. Russia previously imposed a ban on imports of certain agricultural products from the EU and other Western countries in 2014 after its annexation of Crimea.

Farmers harvest with their combines in a wheat field near the village Tbilisskaya, Russia, July 21, 2021. (AP Photo/Vitaly Timkiv)

Russia serves as a major global exporter of several commodities, including sunflower oil, barley, and wheat; the latter of which it mainly supplies to Africa and the Middle East.

It is the worlds largest exporter of wheat, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity, having exported $10.1B in wheat in 2020 alone, despite the global COVID-19 pandemic and various supply chain issues.

The European Union and Ukraine are its main competitors in the wheat trade, which manifests as items such as pasta, bread, cereal, and fried foods for consumers.

A ban on exports of certain agriculture products to so-called unfriendly countries could put further pressure on those nations that are already bracing for potential food shortages resulting from the Kremlins invasion of Ukraine and subsequent western sanctions.

Speaking of possible shortages, U.S. President Joe Biden said during a press conference at the White House on March 24 that its going to be real, noting that the price of these sanctions is not just imposed upon Russia, its imposed upon an awful lot of countries as well, including European countries and our country as well.

Biden said the United States and Canada may need to boost their food production to avoid shortages in Europe and other places.

However, it is unlikely that the United States would likely experience any significant shortages, whereas European countries that are more dependent on Russia for imports, as well as less economically developed nations, could see fewer products on supermarket shelves.

Medvedevs remark comes after Russian President Vladimir Putin set a deadline for customers from unfriendly countries, which includes all member states of the European Union, to start paying for Russian gas deliveries in roubles or face being cut off.

Multiple European buyers of Russian energy have so far refused to comply with the demand. However, Slovakias minister of the economy on Sunday said his country is willing to do so.
A sign for the Government of Canada's Communications Security Establishment (CSE) outside their headquarters in Ottawa in a file photo. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press)

Russian Cyber Threat a Heightened Concern for Canada, Says Security Official

With Canada sanctioning Russia for its invasion of Ukraine and supporting the latter with weapons and intelligence, an official with the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security (CCCS) says his agency is closely monitoring for potential retaliation from Russia in the form of cyber threats.

Im aware of the fact that the committee is currently concerned with the Russian attack on Ukraine, said Sami Khoury, head of the CCCS, during a meeting of the Standing Committee on National Defence on March 28.

I cannot speak about our specific operations within the framework of this presentation, but I can confirm that we are closely monitoring the cyber threat activities related to these military manoeuvres. Today were not aware of any specific threats to Canadian organizations in relation to events in and around Ukraine.

The CCCS is a component of the Communications Security Establishment (CSE), Canadas signals intelligence agency, similar to the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) or the British Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ).

While the Cyber Centre says that cyber crime remains the most likely threat to affect Canadian individuals and businesses, Khoury said the state-sponsored cyber programs of China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran pose the greatest strategic threat to Canada.

When asked by Conservative MP Kerry-Lynne Findlay to rate those threats in order of importance, Khoury said its difficult to compare the actors against each other, but warned that in the current context, we have to be mindful of the geopolitical tensions and  the Russian cyber threat.

An official from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) also testified before the committee and said the increased reliance on computer networks in daily life, including more people working from home, combined with the advances and proliferation of technology is dramatically changing the cyber threat environment.

It has become more complex, increasingly fluid, less predictable, and consequently, more challenging, said Cherie Henderson, an interim assistant director with CSIS.

Canadian companies and almost all sectors of our economy have been targeted and compromised, she said, noting that thousands of cyber attacks target Canadian entities every day and the trend is increasing.

Henderson said the national intelligence agencys two main cyber concerns involve defending against theft of intellectual property and attacks against critical infrastructure, an area she says could [be] very vulnerable.

The ability of cyber actors to take control of key infrastructure and wreak havoc has been demonstrated a number of times in recent years.

A Russian cybercrime group hacked into the largest fuel pipeline in the U.S. in April 2021, leading to its shutdown and shortages on the east coast. Colonial Pipeline had to pay a $4.4 million ransom to the hackers to resume operations.

Irans Natanz nuclear plant has also been targeted by a number of cyber attacks in recent years.

So far Russias known response has been limited to banning entry to most Canadian MPs as well as some members of pro-Ukraine organizations in Canada, but it warned at the time that every attack on Russia, whether on diplomatic missions, the closure of airspace, or the severing of economic ties will inevitably receive a decisive and not necessarily symmetrical rebuff.

We are aware of the connection between the Russian intelligence services and cyber criminal organizations, Khoury said, noting cyber criminals have been known to take sides between Russia and Ukraine during the ongoing conflict between the two countries.

From a Cyber Centre perspective, we have the task of defending the country, defending Canada, defending critical infrastructure against all sorts of threats, irrespective of whether it is nation-state or cyber criminal.
A view shows an armoured convoy of pro-Russian troops during the Ukraine-Russia conflict on a road near Mariupol, Ukraine, on April 3, 2022. (Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters)

Russian Forces Continue to Refocus on Offensive in Eastern Ukraine

British intelligence said Monday that Russian forces were continuing to consolidate and reorganize as they refocus their offensive in the Donbass region in the east of Ukraine.

Russian troops, including mercenaries from the Russian state-linked Wagner private military company, were being moved into eastern Ukraine, the UK Ministry of Defence said in an update.

The Epoch Times could not immediately verify the report.

Christo Grozev, the lead Russia investigator with investigative journalist group Bellingcat, said in a Twitter post Monday that Wagner mercenaries had been spotted in Donetsk, one of the contested regions in eastern Ukraine that make up the Donbass.

Russias defense ministry said Monday that Moscow-aligned troops of the so-called Donetsk Peoples Republic were developing the offensive, seizing a fortified area and liberating the city of Novobakhmutovka, claiming to have destroyed up to a company of Ukraines 25th Airborne Brigade in the fighting.

A member of a pro-Russian militia walks inside a house that was damaged by shelling, in the separatist-controlled city of Donetsk, Ukraine, on Feb. 28, 2022. (Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters)

Russia said it was continuing to strike Ukraines military assets, claiming to have destroyed 125 Ukrainian aircraft and 91 helicopters, 833 field artillery and mortars, and 1,936 tanks and other armored combat vehicles.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces forces said Monday that around 18,300 Russian troops have been killed in combat operations, while claiming to have destroyed 147 Russian aircraft and 134 helicopters, 330 field artillery systems, 647 tanks, and 1,844 armored combat vehicles.

The Epoch Times could not verify either sides account.

A Ukrainian service member inspects a destroyed Russian BTR-82 armored personal carrier (APC) in a village near a frontline near Kyiv, Ukraine, on March 31, 2022. (Serhii Nuzhnenko/Reuters)

Over the weekend, reports emerged claiming that Ukrainian civilians had been massacred by Russian forces in the city of Bucha, located near Kyiv.

Ukraines Ministry of Defense posted footage that appeared to show dead civilians, including some with hands tied behind their backs, their bodies scattered in the streets of the city.

Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraines Foreign Minister, said on Twitter that the Bucha massacre proves that Russian hatred towards Ukrainians is beyond anything Europe has seen since WWII, as he posted photos of dead civilians that were allegedly targeted by Russian forces.

The Epoch Times couldnt immediately verify the photos or footage.

People react as they gather close to a grave site in the town of Bucha, just northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, on April 3, 2022. (Sergei Supinsky/AFP via Getty Images)

Buchas deputy mayor, Taras Shapravskyi, was cited by Reuters as saying that 50 of some 300 bodies found in the city late last week after Russian forces had withdrawn were the victims of extra-judicial killings at the hands of Russian troops.

Russias ministry of defense has denied claims that its forces had committed atrocities in Bucha.

All photographs and video materials published by the Kyiv regime, allegedly showing some kind of crimes by Russian military personnel in the town of Bucha  are yet another provocation, the ministry said on April 3, according to state-run media.

Ukrainian soldiers patrol a street in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 2, 2022. (Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP via Getty Images)

Russia on Monday ordered an official investigation into the claimed Ukrainian provocation.

Alexander Bastrykin, head of the Russian Investigative Committee, announced a probe on the basis that Ukraine had spread deliberately false information about Russian forces committing atrocities against civilians in Bucha.

Western officials said more sanctions against Russia are needed following allegations of war crimes in Bucha.

There are very clear clues pointing to war crimes. It is more or less established that the Russian army is responsible [for the Bucha killings], French President Emmanuel Macron told France Inter radio on Monday.

What happened in Bucha demands a new round of sanctions and very clear measures, Macron added.
Nick Xenophon speaks to the press in the Adelaide Hills town of Stirling on July 3, 2016. (Brenton Edwards/AFP via Getty Images)

Senate Hopeful Faces Questions Over Previous Legal Work for Huawei Australia

Former South Australian Senator Nick Xenophon is busy defending his previous role providing legal workand occasional public advocacyon behalf of Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei.

Xenophon announced a week earlier that he would be running for the Australian Senate against former colleague Rex Patrick, who took Xenophons place when he retired from Parliament in 2017.

The former senators law firm, Xenophon Davis, was contracted by Huawei Australia to provide legal advice, during this time, Xenophon also publicly stated Huawei had been unfairly maligned following its ban from Australias 5G network in 2018 over security concerns.

On April 3, Xenophon said Huawei Australia was a separate business from its parent company in China, pointing out that it had a separate board.

[Former Foreign Affairs Minister] Alexander Downer, and John Brumbythe former Labor premier of Victoriawere key members of that board in years gone by, he told Sky News Australia. The business in Australia was confined to issues of 5G in relation to matters about their Australian operations.

Advertising for Huawei Experience Store Opening in Sydneys Hurstville on Sept. 24, 2020. (Epoch Times)

Interestingly, [Former Prime Minister] Malcolm Turnbull in his autobiography actually said they found the company did nothing wrong in Australia from a national security perspective, he added. But there was concern about what could happen down the track because the company is headquartered in China. I respect that.

Xenophon maintained that he supported the bipartisan approach to dealing with foreign policy and Beijing, which has seen the Australian government take a tougher approach to foreign interference, and defence against Beijing.

In late March, his former colleague Patrick compared Xenophons tenure working for Huawei to that of choosing to do PR work for the German companies Krupp or Messerschmitt in 1938.

Both companies worked for the Nazi regime in Germany in the lead-up to World War II.

Xenophon now says that he has not worked for Huawei for some time, though we dont know when he ceased. He now claims to support the Australian governments 5G ban on Huawei, Senator Patrick told Parliament.

As a declared Senate candidate, he should now, in the interests of transparency and accountability, disclose the full details of his contractual relationship with Huawei.

Xenophon called the comparisons to the Nazis pretty terrible and downplayed the need to be registered on the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme.

Doing legal work for Huawei does not need to be on the foreign registry. Its as simple as that, he said. The foreign registry is all about making sure people dont do things covertly, where people dont know who theyre actually representing.

Australia-China relations have become a much talked about issue in the current election race, notably with governing Coalition MPs lambasting the centre-left Labor Party for its handling of defence issues, particularly its record on defence spendingwhich reached a historically low 1.56 percent of GDP.

The treatment of the late Labor Senator Kimberley Kitching over her conservative-leaning policy position and her vocal criticisms of Beijing also drew the ire of fellow party members.

More recently, Coalition Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells claimed she experienced similar pressure from Liberal Party MPs for taking a strong stance on the Chinese Communist Party.
Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson testifies during her confirmation hearing to become a U.S. Supreme Court associate justice, in Washington, on March 23, 2022. (Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)

Judge Jacksons SCOTUS Nomination Advances to Senate Floor

Republicans Collins, Murkowski, Romney help break deadlock

The Senate cleared the way for a final floor vote to confirm Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson with a procedural vote late on April 4 after weeks of tough scrutiny and a deadlocked committee vote along party lines earlier in the day.

If confirmed, Jackson will be the first black woman to serve on the high court.

The 5347 procedural vote included support from all 50 Democrats and Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, and Mitt Romney of Utah. Earlier on April 4, the Senate Judiciary Committee deadlocked on a party-line vote of 11 to 11, forcing the extra procedural step.

The committee vote came later than expected for Democrats after Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) was held up by a delayed flight, forcing the vote to later in the day to guarantee its success in the equally divided Judiciary Committee.

Jackson, who was nominated by President Joe Biden to succeed Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, who is retiring, has been accused of a soft-on-crime attitude by Republicans who have cited her lenient sentencing decisions for those in possession of child pornography, as well as her apparent lack of a unified judicial philosophy.

On April 4, those conflicts were reopened as Republicans made a final attempt to derail Jacksons nomination.

While Republicans have emphasized that Jacksons sentencing decisions fell well below federal sentencing guidelines in every case that she wasnt bound by mandatory minimum sentencing laws, Judiciary Committee Chairman Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) has called the GOP criticisms demagogic.

It was unfortunate that some moments in the hearings came to that, Durbin said on April 4.

This action today is nothing less than making history. Im proud to be a part of it.

Judge Jackson is poised now to make American history, Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) agreed later in the hearing, expressing a common sentiment among Democrats during the final committee hearing.

In his opening statement, ranking Republican member Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) accused Democrats of hypocrisy over the issue of a nominees judicial philosophy.

During the week of hearings, Republicans pushed Jackson to elaborate on her judicial philosophy, but her answerswhich described a methodology that would work on a case-by-case basisleft Republicans dissatisfied and confused some Democrats.

Democrats responded to the attacks by saying that judicial philosophy doesnt matter.

During his statement on April 4, Grassley cited past statements by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) in which he argued for more rather than less emphasis on judicial philosophy, which Grassley called hypocritical.

Arguing for the importance of judicial philosophy, Grassley said its necessary for a Supreme Court justice to have an understanding of the fundamental principles of our constitution.

Jackson does not have a position on whether individuals possess natural rights, Grassley noted in reference to one exchange from her hearings.

Later on April 4, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) also expressed concerns over Jacksons lack of a clear judicial philosophy.

Judicial philosophy matters because there are a lot of consequences to having a bad judicial philosophy, Lee said, noting that judges without a judicial philosophy are more likely to be driven by their own personal politics in deciding the outcome of a case.

At another point in the hearing, Senate president pro tempore Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) also praised Jackson and decried GOP criticisms of the nominee.

Jackson put on a master class in what it means to be an independent, fair-minded judge, Leahy said, despite disrespectful behavior from Judiciary Republicans.

Leahy called for Republicans and Democrats to end tired tribalism and unite behind Jackson, who Leahy called one of the most well-qualified nominees that he had ever considered in his decades in the Judiciary committee.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) responded to Leahy by citing the treatment of the past three GOP nominees to the high courtJustices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrettwho advanced through the then-GOP-led committee on a party-line basis, and noted that in such an environment, it would be more odd if a single Republican member supported Jacksons confirmation.

Graham also added that Jackson, in her role as a judge and on the U.S. Sentencing Commission, had a chance to deter the crime [of child pornography] by imposing tougher sentences and she chose not to.

During another part of the hearing, Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) recounted a controversial exchange between herself and Jackson. In the exchange, Blackburn asked Jackson to define the word woman but she refused, saying she was not a biologist.

This exchange, Blackburn ruled, speaks volumes and shows that [Jackson] is beholden to the radical left.

On March 28, Republicans in the Senate Judiciary Committee placed a one-week hold on the confirmation vote in the committee, citing gaps in Jacksons record and incomplete records from the White House.

Democrats have taken to repeatedly mentioning that Judge Jackson has been confirmed by the Senate three timestwo of which were non-controversialusing votes for positions like the U.S. Sentencing Commission, Grassley said on March 28, when requesting the hold.

He warned against the Democrats efforts to compare the two, saying it is going to make it much harder to confirm anyone to those positions. It encourages senators to apply the same standard used for evaluating Supreme Court nominations to every single position.

In addition, Grassley said, Jacksons record is unfortunately  incomplete.

Thats because information has been withheld, he said, citing a laundry list of nonpublic documents from Jacksons time in the U.S. Sentencing Commission, 48,000 pages of documents held back by the Obama White House, and many others.

It appears the White House wants to hide [Jacksons] record.

So with so much information withheld, weve examined her record and there were a lot of questions about Judge Jacksons judicial philosophy.

With her confirmation advancing to the full Senate, Republicans have few options left to stop her confirmation.
Serbian President and presidential candidate Aleksandar Vucic (C) reacts after the results of the presidential election, in Belgrade, Serbia, on April 3, 2022. (Antonio Bronic/Reuters)

Serbias Incumbent President Vucic Set to Win Second Term

BELGRADESerbias incumbent President Aleksandar Vucic is set to win the presidential vote on Sunday with 59.8 percent of the votes, according to a projection by pollsters Ipsos and CeSID, based on a sample of the partial polling station count.

Zdravko Ponos, a retired army general representing the Alliance for Victory coalition, is set to come second with 17.1 percent of the votes.

In the parliamentary vote Vucics Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) is set to come first with 43.6 percent of votes, Ipsos and CeSID projections showed.

The United for Victory opposition alliance trailed behind with 12.9 percent of the votes.

The Socialist Party of Serbia, a long-time ally of the SNS, is seen third with 11.6 percent of the votes. The Nada (Hope) coalition and Moramo (We Must), an alliance of green movements and parties, garnered around 5.4 percent and 4.3 percent of votes respectively.

As the SNS would likely fail to secure enough of the 250-seat parliament to rule alone, it will have to seek coalition partners.

According to the State Election Commission preliminary data, turnout stood at 58.54 percent.

Vucic ran for a second five-year term on a promise of peace and stability just as Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb 24, which has put Serbia under pressure from the West to choose between its traditional ties with Moscow and aspirations to join the European Union (EU).

Vucic acknowledged conflict in Ukraine impacted the campaign and said Serbia has no plans to deviate from its balancing game between the EU membership bid and close ties with Russia and China, a major investor.

We will maintain policy that is important for the Europeans, Russians, and Americans, and that is  military neutrality.

Serbia will try to preserve friendly and partnership relations in many areas with the Russian Federation, Vucic said.

Serbia is almost entirely dependent on Russian gas, while its army maintains ties with Russias military.

The Kremlin also supports Belgrades opposition to the independence of Kosovo by blocking its membership to the United Nations.

Although Serbia backed two United Nations resolutions condemning Russias invasion of Ukraine, it refused to impose sanctions against Moscow.

CeSID and CRTA pollsters reported several irregularities, including photographing of ballots.

The opposition largely boycotted a parliamentary election in 2020, allowing Vucics SNS party and its allies to secure 188 seats in the 250-seat parliament.
A worker in protective overall stands in the middle of empty streets in a lockdown area in the Jingan district of western Shanghai on April 4, 2022. (Chen Si/AP Photo)

Shanghai Extends Lockdown of 26 Million as Military Deployed to Assist in Mass Testing

Shanghai has extended its stay-at-home order as reviews the results of a new round of COVID testing of the citys 26 million residents conducted on April 4.

The financial hub began its two-staged lockdown on March 28, which was to allow health workers to complete at least two rounds of mass testing.

The curbs, which have severely disrupted daily life and business operations, were originally scheduled to be lifted at 5 a.m. local time on April 5.

But in a notice released on April 4, Shanghai authorities announced the extension of lockdown, ordering residents not to step out of their homes before they complete the review of a new round of test results. They added that the mass screening was almost completed by late evening.

Authorities did not indicate when the curbs would be lifted.

Shanghai carried out 32 million tests during the staggered lockdown, city officials said at Sundays press conference. It also ordered a new round of antigen testing.

On Monday, many residents woke up before dawn for white-suited healthcare workers to swab their throats as part of nucleic acid testing at their housing compounds, many queuing up in their pajamas, standing the required two meters apart.

A worker in protective gear holds up a sign which reads ten to a group as residents line up for the mass testing in a lockdown area in the Jingan district of western Shanghai on April 4, 2022. (Chen Si/AP Photo)

Im scared that I could test positive, a local resident who was among the queues to receive a PCR test told The Epoch Times on Monday.

Under the Chinese regimes zero-COVID policy, people who test positive are sent to centralized quarantine, including the elderly and children. Reports have recently emerged that crying toddlers were separated from parents in quarantine facilities in Shanghai, sparking outrage over the strict measures.

Vice-Premier Sun Chunlan, who was sent to the densely populated city by the leader of the Chinese Communist Party, emphasized that Shanghai must stick to the regimes zero-COVID policy without any hesitation or wavering, state media reported on April 2.

Sun urged to test more and quarantine all infected and their close contacts, calling resolute and swift moves to stamp out the current outbreak driven by the fast-spreading Omicron variant.

To assist with the mandatory screening on Monday, the regimes military, the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA), deployed 2,000 medical personnel to the financial hub, PLA Daily said. Over 30,000 medical workers from nearby provinces have also been dispatched, state media reported.

Shanghai reported a record of 8,581 asymptomatic cases and 425 symptomatic cases on Monday. Residents and experts, however, suggest the outbreak may be more severe than whats officially disclosed, due to the regimes practice of covering up information that it deems harmful to its image.

Many residents have also lamented the growing financial and emotional costs of the strict measures, saying that Beijings heavy-handed COVID policy is worse than the threat posed by the virus itself.

Were all very tired, said Gao Ling (alias), who lives in the eastern part of Shanghai. People just want to survive, to be able to feed themselves, but now we dont have food.

We havent had any vegetables for three days. Do you want us not to worry? Its impossible, Gao told The Epoch Times on Monday.

Another resident, Geng Yun (alias), told The Epoch Times that she was under pressure to pay the monthly mortgage. As her residential compound has been locked down since April 1, she has been unable to work during this period.

The entrance to a noodle store is locked and sealed in the Jingan district of western Shanghai, on April 4, 2022. (Chen Si/AP Photo)

The city has been dysfunctional since last week. Sealed inside their homes, residents took to social media to plead for help as they were unable to obtain food. Further, the requirement of quarantining all potential patients has led to the citys hospitals and other facilities being overloaded. Non-COVID patients have also struggled to obtain medical care.

Meanwhile, business activity has been severely disrupted, with delays in trucking and deliveries. Logistic providers have warned of disruption to global supply chains due to the lockdown in the city that hosts the worlds busiest port.

Teslas factories in Shanghai, which had suspended production since March 28, were unable to restart production on Monday as planned, Reuters reported, citing an internal notice and unnamed sources.

Economists have warned that the full lockdown of the financial hub for two weeks could cost Chinas economy $29.8 billion.

Hong Ning, Gu Qinger, and Reuters contributed to the report.
Richard Sulik, leader of Freedom and Solidarity (SAS), arrives for a televised debate following the results of the country's parliamentary election in Bratislava, on March 1, 2020. (Vladimir Simicek/AFP via Getty Images)

Slovakia Walks Back Suggestion It Might Agree to Russian Ruble Demand

Slovak Prime Minister Eduard Heger has stated his countrys insistence on continuing to make energy payments in euros, after a minister of his government suggested that the country would remain open to obliging the Russian governments demand that energy payments from unfriendly countries must be made in the Russian currency.

In a Facebook post, Prime Minister Heger assured readers that Slovakia would proceed in line with the terms of the European Union when purchasing gas from Russia, insisting on the terms of preexisting contracts which stipulate that energy payments will be made in euros.

In this situation, unity is key and we insist on respecting contract conditions and payments in euros.

The European Commission has instructed companies whose contracts with the Russian government stipulate payments in euros or U.S. dollars not to comply with Russian President Vladimir Putins demands.

The prime ministers comments come after backlash to remarks made by Slovak Economy Minister Richard Sulik, who stated that it was essential for Slovakia to continue to receive fuel imports from Russia, even at the cost of doing business in that countrys currency of choice.

The gas must not stop, said Sulik on Sunday during a public television debate show. If there is a condition to pay in roubles, then we pay in roubles.

The brief controversy is a reflection of Slovakias unique dependence on Russian energy imports, which place the small Central European country in a tight spot as the European Union rallies its members to sanction the Russian state. Slovakia imports 87 percent of its natural gas and two-thirds of its oil from Russia, and the economic ministers fears of what would happen in the event that this supply is cut off are not unfounded.

The anxieties of Slovakia are a particularly acute instance of the fears and tribulations which confront the European Union more broadly, as the Western bloc prepares to face the consequences of cutting off the Russian energy supply if Putin enforces his ultimatum that all gas payments must be made in rubles.

Widely seen as an effort to prop up the Russian fiat currency after economic sanctions caused the ruble to plummet, Putins demand has drawn criticism from officials within the EU, who claim it is a violation of the contracts established with the Russian government that allow energy payments to be made in the fiat currencies of the European Union or the United States.

Since Putins announcement, the ruble has rebounded to nearly pre-invasion levels, with a current value of 84.25 per U.S. dollar (on February 24th, the day Russia initiated its invasion of Ukraine, the ruble was valued at 84.95 per U.S. dollar).

As of April 4, gas continues to flow through European pipelines despite the European Unions refusal to comply with Russian demands to pay in roubles. With the cold months quickly receding, Putins leverage on fuel prices is somewhat lessened in the short term. However, European consumers have faced highly inflated energy costs in the months since Russia invaded Ukraine, and for those countries which are particularly dependent on Russian fuel imports such as Slovakia, the economic costs will be particularly acute unless arrangements are made to facilitate alternative sources of energy in short order.
Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz speaks during the Starbucks annual shareholders meeting in Seattle, Wash., on March 18, 2015. Stephen Brashear/Getty Images

Starbucks Announces Suspension of Share Buybacks, White House Might Have Influenced Decision

Starbucks Corp.. has decided to do away with share buybacks and plans to boost investment into operations, the companys returning CEO Howard Schulz said in an open letter on April 4.

Starting immediately, we are suspending our share repurchasing program. This decision will allow us to invest more profit into our people and our storesthe only way to create long-term value for all stakeholders, Schultz said in the letter.

In October 2021, then-CEO Kevin Johnson had announced that Starbucks would spend $20 billion on buybacks and dividends over a three-year period.

However, the 2021 fiscal year ended with the company not repurchasing any shares as sales suffered due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Investors generally approve of share buybacks as it cuts down the number of outstanding shares, thereby raising the earnings per share.

Starbucks decision comes as Democrats, including President Joe Biden, have taken a stronger stance against share buybacks. In its recently published $5.8 trillion budget plan, the White House proposed new rules to limit stock buybacks, including making executives hold their company shares for several years and prohibiting them from selling the shares in the immediate years after a stock buyback.

This would discourage corporations from using profits to repurchase stock and enrich executives, rather than investing in long-term growth and innovation, the White House said.

The company is also facing a rising unionization drive among its American workforce, which is happening at a time when there is a nationwide labor shortage.

Starbucks has over 9,800 company-operated retail stores across North America, with thousands more that operate under licensing agreements. Employees at 10 stores have voted to join the SB Workers United union in the past several months, the union has said, with the most recent being the Starbucks Reserve Roastery at Chelsea Market in New York City, where employees voted 4636 to unionize April 1.

Just days before on March 29, Starbucks employees at a store in Knoxville, Tennessee, voted 87 to establish a union, thus becoming the first of the companys stores in the South to unionize.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) sent a letter to Schultz on March 22 ahead of his return as Starbucks CEO, criticizing the company for anti-union efforts. He asked Schultz to do the right thing by ending the union busting.

If Starbucks can afford to spend $20 billion on stock buybacks and dividends and provide a $20 million compensation package to its CEO, it can afford a unionized workforce that can collectively bargain for better wages, better benefits, safer working conditions, and reliable schedules, Sanders wrote in the letter (pdf).

In Schulzs open letter, the CEO indicated that he intends to work with employees and shareholders to design the next Starbucks. In the coming weeks, he said he plans to travel and connect with store employees as well as visit manufacturing plants around the world to get an idea of how to take the iconic brand into the next stage of its corporate evolution.

However, the company is facing new realities in a changed world, Schultz said.

Factors such as the COVID-19 pandemic, the supply chain crunch, political unrest, racial reckoning, and a rising generation which seeks a new accountability for business are the new challenges facing Starbucks, the CEO said.

This is Schultzs third time at the helm as CEO of Starbucks. This time, he is taking over as the interim CEO and will step down when a permanent chief executive is chosen by fall 2022, the company said. Former CEO Kevin Johnson announced his retirement in March 2022.
The sun rises behind the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington on Nov. 10, 2020. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

Supreme Court Rules for Navy Veteran, Makes It Easier to Sue for Malicious Prosecution

The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in the case of a New York man suing police for malicious prosecution to relax the legal standard for bringing such lawsuits in federal courts, overturning the tougher prevailing standard.

The case is Thompson v. Clark, court file 20-659. The high court agreed March 8, 2021, to consider the case and heard it Oct. 12, 2021.

The respondents are four New York Police Department (NYPD) officers: Pagiel Clark, Paul Montefusco, Phillip Romano, and Gerard Bouwmans.

The officers raided the home of petitioner Larry Thompson, a U.S. Navy veteran living in Brooklyn, N.Y., with his wife. At the time of the incident, the couple, parents of a one-week-old daughter, were caring for the wifes sister, who has cognitive challenges. On Jan. 15, 2014, the sister dialed 911 to report the baby cried when Thompson changed her diaper and mistakenly identified diaper rashes as signs of abuse.

Emergency response personnel arrived to find the wife sitting on the couch holding the baby safely. Unaware his sister-in-law had called 911, Thompson asked the technicians to leave and they complied, according to his petition filed with the Supreme Court. Then four NYPD officers arrived and said they were investigating possible child abuse and needed to look at the child.

The police entered over Thompsons objections, threw him to the floor, handcuffed him, and conducted a search without seeking a warrant. The technicians found no signs of abuse on the infants body and took her to a hospital, where the lack of abuse was confirmed. The police escorted Thompson out of the apartment building and put him in jail for two days. Prosecutors dropped the charges against him, and he sued.

The Supreme Courts decision was welcomed by Thompsons attorney, Amir Ali.

Until today, police officers who framed an innocent personfor instance falsifying or planting evidencecould get a free pass. After the bogus charges were dismissed, the innocent person whose life had been upended had no recourse in court. That unjust rule applied across most of the country, Ali said in an emailed statement to The Epoch Times.

Not anymore. Todays Supreme Court opinion unqualifiedly held that the innocent person can bring a federal civil rights action against the officer. This is a welcome and much needed step toward greater accountability when officers engage in misconduct and abuse the publics trust.

New York City Law Department spokesman Nicholas Paolucci told The Epoch Times by email, Were declining to comment.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote the majority opinion (pdf), which was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts, Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Amy Coney Barrett. Justice Samuel Alito filed a dissenting opinion, which was joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch.

Kavanaugh noted in the opinion that Thompson had been charged and detained, but the charges were dismissed before trial without any explanation by the prosecutor or judge. Thompson sued, claiming the officers maliciously prosecuted him without probable cause, contrary to the Fourth Amendment.

According to Heck v. Humphrey (1994), under federal civil rights law Thompson must show there was a favorable termination of the underlying criminal prosecution, the justice wrote.

That precedent held, according to a summary, that such a claim for damages cannot advance unless the plaintiff can prove the conviction or sentence had been reversed on direct appeal, expunged by executive order, declared invalid by a state tribunal authorized to make such determination, or called into question by a federal courts issuance of a writ of habeas corpus.

That standard is wrong, Kavanaugh wrote, finding that in a Fourth Amendment claim for malicious prosecution a plaintiff need only show that his prosecution ended without a conviction. Thompson satisfied that requirement in this case. The officers are still protected by the requirement that the plaintiff show the absence of probable cause and by qualified immunity. The decision of U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit was reversed and the case remand[ed] for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

In his dissent, Alito quoted from The Iliad by ancient Greek poet Homer, likening the Supreme Courts reasoning to the epic poems grim monster made of all lion in front, all snake behind, all goat between.

Today, the Court creates a chimera of a constitutional tort by stitching together elements taken from two very different claims: a Fourth Amendment unreasonable seizure claim and a common-law malicious-prosecution claim.

But this court has never held that the Fourth Amendment houses a malicious-prosecution claim, and the Court defends its analogy with just two sentences of independent analysis and a reference to a body of lower court cases. I cannot agree with that approach, he said.
Taiwan lawmaker Chiu Hsien-chih (middle in the first row) attends a rally urging the Chinese authorities to release Lee Ming-che, a Taiwanese pro-democracy activist, on March 18, 2022. Lee was arrested during a visit to mainland China in 2017 and sentenced by the Chinese communist regime to five years in prison on alleged subversion charges. (Courtesy of Chiu Hsien-chih)

Taiwan Lawmaker Accuses Straits Exchange Foundation Director of Promoting Beijings Political Agenda

A Taiwanese legislator accused a director of the Taipei-based Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) of promoting Beijings strategy to take over the self-ruled island amid Chinas ongoing incursions into Taiwans waters and arispace.

New Power Party (NPP) member Chiu Hsien-chih rebuked businessman John Peng, who is also an SEF director, on Facebook on March 29 for placing an advertisement in a local newspaper to underscore Taiwans peaceful reunification with China, which aligns with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) attitude on the issue.

He [Peng] is becoming the mouthpiece of the CCP, Chiu told The Epoch Times on March 31. His advertisement isnt convincing.

To fully understand the consequences of Beijings peaceful reunification, the legislator urged the public to explore the deplorable conditions of the people in the regions of Xinjiang, Tibet, and Hong Kong under the Chinese communist regime.

As the son of the butcher of Kaohsiung, he [Peng] lacks empathy for other peoples suffering under Chinas authoritarian rule, he said.

Chiu hinted that Pengs father, the late General Peng Meng-chi, was responsible for indiscriminate killing of locals in the southern city of Kaohsiung in the February 28 incident in 1947. Across the island, tens of thousands of civilians were slaughtered by the Nationalist troops during the revolt triggered by police beating a woman caught smuggling cigarettes.

Taiwans flag waves atop the tower of the Presidential Office in Taipei on January 13, 2021, as a planned trip to Taiwan by the United States UN ambassador Kelly Craft was scrapped in line with the US State Department cancelling trips abroad ahead of Joe Bidens inauguration. (Sam Yeh/AFP via Getty Images)

In the advertisement, Peng cited a 4-step roadmap that Beijing might take to defeat Taiwan without having to send in a single soldier. It consisted of crippling Taiwans military facilities with missiles; paralyzing the Taiwanese economy by bombing parts of utilities, including power plants and public transit, without hurting lives and livelihood; blocking every passage into and out of the island; and pressing for an ultimate talk.

However, the lawmaker dismissed Pengs alleged roadmap as a fantasy.

Ukraine has set a precedent for asymmetric warfare by its resistance to the Russian aggression, said Chiu. Vladimir Putin has yet to conquer the nation one month after his launch of the invasion. Russia has already paid a hefty price [for its action].

He also noted, The Taiwan Strait [as a barrier] would make the CCPs military attack more challenging. Meanwhile, China would face severe sanctions from the international community, according to Chiu.

Peng is intimidating the Taiwanese people in favor of Beijing, said the former NPP chair. Considering the quasi-governmental nature of the SEF, I dont think its appropriate for him to continue to sit on the board of the agency. Taiwan would face higher risks if the Tsai administration did nothing in response to his comments.

Additionally, Chiu hopes for closer ties between Taiwan and the United States. He urged the U.S. government to do more to deepen Taiwans involvement in international affairs, including recognizing it as an independent sovereign nation, whose population of 23 million is much larger than Luxembourg, Switzerland, or any other tiny European country.

The Epoch Times reached the SEF and John Peng via AGCMT Creation Corp., in which he served as its chairman, for comment. However, both declined to comment on the topic.
Despite the way its name sounds, glutinous rice does not contain gluten. Also known as sticky rice, these milky white grains instead contain amylopectin, which easily turns into a glutinous paste. This versatile grain is can be used for cooking porridge, steaming cakes, stir fry, mochi, brewing wine, and Asian rice wrap dishes. It is also very nutritious, and has a sort of healing effect on the stomach and spleen.

Glutinous rice can be fermented and simmered together with wheat sprouts to make maltose, which is good for digestion, invigorating the spleen, and replenishing qi, or energy, as it is known in traditional Chinese medicine. The lees, or hongzao, which are sediment from glutinous rice and red yeast, is a tonic remedy in traditional Chinese medicine for invigorating blood. Many traditional Chinese medicinal prescriptions use glutinous rice in the ingredients.

Besides medical functions, glutinous rice paste is mixed with mortar to make glutinous rice mortar, a high-strength binder commonly used in ancient construction. The Great Wall still stands today thanks to glutinous rice paste.

Dr. Yeh Chi-Min, the attending physician of Taiwan Weixin Clinic of Chinese Medicine, said that the rice that is regularly cooked for food (the long grain, medium grain, and short grain) is sweet in flavor and neutral in nature according to traditional Chinese medicine, while glutinous rice is sweet in flavor and warm in nature with higher nutritional value.

Glutinous rice can warm the spleen and stomach and nourish the qi. It also has an astringent effect, which is used to treat diarrhea and frequent urination. For example, if the cause of diarrhea in the elderly is caused by cold due to a weak stomach and intestines rather than a bacterial infection, glutinous rice can be used to make porridge, which has good healing results. For the elderly people who have nocturnal urination due to bladder weakness, it is recommended that they take porridge with lotus seeds, glutinous rice, and jujube, which is also of good healing results.

But although glutinous rice is more nourishing than ordinary non-glutinous rice, people should not eat it for every meal. The sticky nature of the rice makes it difficult to digest, and it should be eaten in moderation.

In addition, glutinous rice has a high glycemic index, moreso than white rice, which means makes the blood sugar rise faster, Dr. Yeh said.

Not Everyone Should Eat It

Dr. Yeh said that four types of people should eat glutinous rice with cautionchildren, those who are sick or who have just recovered from illness, people with weak spleen and stomach, and people with diabetics.

Children, people who are ill, or people who have just recovered from illnesses will have weak digestive function of the stomach and intestines. If eating sticky rice, one should eat only a small amount, and chew slowly and thoroughly.

Patients who are usually prone to flatulence, acid reflux, burping, gastritis, gastroesophageal reflux, and other poor spleen and stomach functions should not eat glutinous rice.

Diabetic patients should also take caution and should eat sticky rice with other grains, vegetables, or meat, if at all. Dr. Yeh recommends eating in the order of meat, vegetables, and then sticky rice so that the blood sugar rises slowly. But diabetic patients with poor blood sugar control should not eat sticky rice at all.

This is not the kind of food one should eat for breakfast, Dr. Yeh said, unless you have a really good digestive system.

In addition, there is a difference between old and new glutinous rice, Dr. Yeh said. Newly harvested glutinous rice is in effect stickier, and harder on those with weak digestive systems.
Police tape is shown in Toronto, May 2, 2107. (The Canadian Press/Graeme Roy)

Toronto Man, 20, Charged With Murder of Mother Whose Body Was Found in Bag

Toronto police say a 20-year-old man has been charged with second-degree murder after his mothers remains were found dismembered in a plastic bag.

Police say in a press release that Dallas Ly was set to appear in court at Old City Hall on Sunday after he was arrested on Saturday for the alleged murder of his mother, Tien Ly, 46.

Tien Lys body was discovered around 1:30 p.m. in east-end Toronto on Monday.

Police said there were obvious signs of trauma to the body, including dismemberment.

Police sought the publics assistance after the victims son went missing on Wednesday, saying they were concerned for his well-being.

The release says the investigation later determined Dallas Ly was allegedly responsible for the death of his mother.
Torrance Cherry Blossom Festival Draws Large, Happy Crowd

TORRANCE, Calif.The City of Torrance hosted the ninth annual Cherry Blossom Festival on April 3, in honor of the cherry trees gifted by a Buddhist organization, Soka Gakkai International, and to promote cultural diversity.

About a thousand residents attended the event, which featured over 40 vendors, Origami Arts, face painting, as well as multicultural performances including Pan-Asian Dancers and Taiko Drummers.

The Cherry Blossom Festival celebrates all things Pan-Asian, things that make Torrance, in particular, a wonderful community to live, work, and play, said John La Rock, community services director for the city. The opportunity for cultural education and appreciation is achieved by sharing experiences in art, music, foods, crafts, and social awareness.

A crowd attends the ninth annual Cherry Blossom Festival in Torrance, Calif., on April 3, 2022. (Alice Sun/The Epoch Times)

Sunny Seki, the author of bilingual childrens books including The Last Kappa of Old Japan, The Tale of the Lucky Cat, and Yuko-Chan and the Daruma Doll, was a crowd favorite.

I got a bunch of [his] books, said mother Erin Yamashita-Urevig, a Torrance resident. It was amazing.  He signed them to my boys.

Rimma Golub, a Playa del Rey resident who attended with her husband and son, said she especially enjoyed seeing and learning about traditional Korean dances.

Ive been [to] Thailand and Japan. However, I never had the chance to gain any knowledge about Korean culture, Golub said.

Cherry Blossoms at the ninth annual Cherry Blossom Festival in Torrance, Calif., on April 3, 2022. (Alice Sun/The Epoch Times)

Tucker Lemmer, a relatively new Torrance resident by way of the Boston area, said he was thrilled to be given the chance to so easily learn of different cultures.

Something like this is amazing because [Ive] never really had that chance to experience stuff like this, he said. Its eye-opening.

Nina Sua, a Fullerton resident who was invited to the event by her sister, said they enjoyed the food, the dances, and a breath of fresh air outside.

Its beautiful. It was fun seeing the different cultures and different dances and the pizza was delicious, she said.
Travelers at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport check the status of flights, including a few that were canceled, on displays inside a gate terminal in Seattle on April 1, 2022. (Ted S. Warren/AP Photo)

Travel Chaos Erupts After Thousands of Weekend US Flights Canceled or Delayed

Airlines canceled or delayed thousands of flights across the United States over the weekend as companies blamed severe weather in Florida for the chaos.

The Federal Aviation Administration confirmed on April 2 that it placed a limit on flying over Florida because of severe thunderstorms passing over the region.

About 3,400 flights were canceled on April 2 and April 3 and thousands more were delayed, data from tracking website FlightAware show, according to Fox News. Roughly 8,800 flights were canceled over the past weekend, FlightAwares numbers also show.

As of the morning of April 4, there were approximately 500 canceled and 1,050 delayed U.S. flights, according to FlightAware.

JetBlue Airways was among the most heavily affected on April 3, canceling about 30 percent of its flights, the website data show. As of April 4, more than 135 JetBlue flights were canceled.

A JetBlue spokesman blamed severe weather across the southern United States, while noting that air traffic control delays affected the industry.

We have unfortunately had to cancel flights this weekend, and todays cancellations will help us reset our operation and safely move our crews and aircraft back into position, the spokesman told WHDH in Boston.

Other companies that saw cancellations or delays en masse include Spirit Airlines, American Airlines, and Delta Air Lines. Spirit saw about 27 percent of its flights, or 223 flights, canceled on the morning of April 4.

Southwest Airlines stated that it suffered unspecified technology issues early on April 2 that affected its flights.

We are experiencing flight disruptions across our network today due to briefly pausing our service earlier this morning as we worked to resolve an intermittent technology issue, as well as ongoing weather challenges impacting multiple areas within our system, Southwest Airlines wrote on April 2.

Data from FlightAware show that Southwest saw about 980 flights canceled and 2,300 flights delayed across the United States over the weekend. The Dallas-based firm also told media outlets that ongoing weather challenges were impacting multiple areas within our system.

On April 1, Alaska Airlines canceled about 100 flights as off-duty pilots protested over contract negotiations, according to reports.

Alaska Airlines failed to properly plan for increased travel demand and take the steps necessary to ensure it attracted and retained pilots, the Alaska Airlines pilot union said in a statement.

Now, theyre trying to distract the public from their mismanagement and blame the pilots who helped save their company. Pilot leaders have been warning for years that pilots will choose to fly for other airlines due to an inadequate contract that will only exacerbate existing staffing challenges.
Former President Donald Trump, left, and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin walk in New York City in a file photograph. (Andrew Burton/Getty Images)

Trump Endorses Sarah Palin for Alaska Congressional Seat

Former President Donald Trump has endorsed former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin after she announced a bid for the congressional seat left vacant by a sudden death.

Wonderful patriot Sarah Palin of Alaska just announced that she is running for Congress, and that means there will be a true America First fighter on the ballot to replace the late and legendary Congressman Don Young, Trump said in a statement.

Young, a Republican who held Alaskas only seat in the House of Representatives for decades, died at age 88 on March 18.

Trump noted that Palin endorsed him while he ran for president in 2016 before continuing his praise of the former Republican vice presidential nominee.

Sarah has been a champion for Alaska values, Alaska energy, Alaska jobs, and the great people of Alaska. She was one of the most popular Governors because she stood up to corruption in both State Government and the Fake News Media, he said, adding that Palin is tough and smart and will never back down, and I am proud to give her my Complete and Total Endorsement, and encourage all Republicans to unite behind this wonderful person and her campaign to put America First!

Palin acknowledged the endorsement on social media, saying she was honored to receive the boost.

Youngs death means a special election will be held to fill the seat.

The all-party primary will take place on June 11, with the top four vote-getters advancing to the Aug. 16 special general election.

More than 50 people have declared their candidacy, including Republican state Sens. John Coghill and Josh Revak, Democratic state Assemblyman Christopher Constant, and Al Gross, the Democratic nominee for the seat in 2020.

Thats nice for Sarah, Nick Begich, one of the candidates, told The Epoch Times in an email about Trumps endorsement. Our campaign is excited about all the endorsements weve been receiving from respected Alaskans from across the state who are going to be the ones actually voting in and deciding this election. I think most Alaskans remember her as someone who quit on Alaska while she was Governor. Why should we trust her to not quit on Alaska now? This isnt reality tv, this is real life.

Gross added: This race is about Alaska. My opponent is getting a lot of support from outside, while Im taking my message right to Alaskans. I am focused on earning the support of Alaskans in this race.

Palin, who hasnt held an elected office since 2009, was one of the last entries.

She said she wanted to honor Youngs legacy by offering myself up in the name of service to the state he loved and fought for, because I share that passion for Alaska and the United States of America.

Whoever wins the special election will only serve until January 2023 unless they win the regular election in November.

Members of the House of Representatives face reelection every two years.

Both elections will utilize ranked-choice voting, which Alaska voters approved in the 2020 election.

The races end if one candidate receives a majority of the top ranking on ballots. But if no one does, the candidate who receives the fewest votes is eliminated, and the second choice of each voter who picked that candidate is counted toward the remaining candidates.

The process continues until a candidate has received a majority.
A Very Timely & Uplifting Series on Inspirational Historical Figures.

28min | Biography, History | 2022

Divine Messengers is a new series that recounts and celebrates the lives of particularly inspirational figures throughout history, ones who have left lasting imprints in their wake.

Each episode features a particularly brave individual who faced many challenges but ultimately stayed true to themselves, as well as their connection with the divine.

The first episode is about Johann Sebastian Bach, a famous German Baroque-era composerknown for his many masterworks, including the Brandenburg Concertos, Cello Suites, and the Mass in B Minor. He came from a large, multi-generational musically-inclined family, and many believe him to be the pinnacle of all of their distilled talents.

However, what many people dont know is that he also had a very abrasive personality and would often say what was on his mind, no matter the repercussions. Although his musical talents and gifts earned him the respect of many of the nobility of his dayalong with some choice positions within the musical world, his hot temper also gained him a plethora of enemies.

Christian Stamm as J.S. Bach in Divine Messengers. (Epoch TV)

Bach was also a very religious man (Lutheran) and most of his over 1,000 compositions were written for usage during worship. His profound faith in God can also be found in much of his secular compositions and scribbled notes. His reliance on the divine for his musical inspirations has given him the moniker of the Fifth Evangelist.

Bach was an uncompromising artist who refused to sully or limit his ambitious compositions, which he considered to be the harmonies of Heaven. When some of his critics considered his music to be too multifaceted and difficult to grasp, he retorted that while many people may not see what he created, if God does, hes done his job. Needless to say, Bach has had a profoundly positive and inspirational effect on much of the world, leaving behind an unparalleled musical legacy.

Cultivating Ones Character

Featured in the second episode, we learn that Socrates was born in 470 BC to a stoneworker and grew up in Athens. Like other patriotic youths of his age, he enlisted in military service and became a seasoned warriorfighting in at least three battles of the Peloponnesian War. He continued to serve in the army on and off until about age 50. One of the men he saved in battle later became his follower and mentions how Socrates turned down an award for valor.

He would often engage in long, trance-like states of meditation, sessions in which he was said to speak to the divine through his soul. This led to his visiting the Oracle of Delphi, who not only confirmed that Socrates did indeed have a connection with the divine, but that he was the wisest of all men.

Socrates (Vassilis Tsalis) leads some of his many followers in Divine Messengers. (Epoch TV)

Instead of becoming arrogant, he saw this prophecy as a sign that he needed to devote his life to finding someone wiser than himself since he modestly didnt quite believe himself to be that wise. Thereafter, he created a system called Dialecticsor methods of discovering the truth. In Platos Republic, Socrates describes this technique as A form of knowledge that treats the eye of the soul gently, takes it up from the mud and guides it up.

His many positive ideas and teachings on cultivating ones character brought him many followers. But it also gained him many enemies among powerful elites; those whom his insights revealed to be deceitful, self-absorbed, and/or power-hungry.

Throughout the ages, Socrates has had a profound effect on many different nations and cultures.

Prophetic Visions

The third episode is about Hildegarde von Bingen (also known as Hildegarde of Bingen), another visionary who was born in the Rhineland of Germany in 1098 to a noble family. She began to experience visions from a very young age, although no one else could see them.

Fortunately, her parents concluded that Hildegarde had a divine gift and she was enrolled at a local convent, fleshing out a core of women who were attached to the abbey. When she succeeded Jutta as prioress in 1136, her visions became both more frequent and vivid than ever and she received a message from God to write what you hear.

Hildegarde (Simone Walleck) receives a divine messege in Divine Messengers. (Epoch TV)

Thereafter, she received help from a committee of theologians (whod confirmed her visions), which assigned her a monk to record her visions in writing. The result is a powerful work titled Scivias, which consists of 26 prophetic visions that deal with such topics as redemption and the relationship between God and humanity.

Hildegarde risked becoming labeled a witch by proclaiming her divine visionary gifts to the church. But she did it anyway so that she could selflessly help others heal their bodies and souls. As with Socrates, she was instrumental in exposing corruption among many of the elites of society.

One of the things that is so fascinating about this series so far is that it is very well researched and reveals many elements about these important characters lives that arent too well known. For example, Bachs terrible temper, as well as his reliance on God for inspiration.

Another great takeaway from Divine Messengers is that even though many of these people lived hundreds (or even thousands) of years apart, they share similar characteristics and convictions, such as seeking out the eternal mysteries of life, and being truthful. Its an incredibly well-produced, uplifting, and inspiring series that I plan to cover more in the future.

Divine Messengers

Starring: Christian Stamm, Vassilis Tsaras, Simone Walleck

Running Time: 28 minutes

MPAA Rating: Not rated

Release Date: March 5, 2022

Rated: 4.5 stars out of 5

Watch on Epoch Cinemavisit the link here.

Follow EpochTV on social media:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EpochTVus

Twitter: https://twitter.com/EpochTVus

Ian Kane is a filmmaker and author. To learn more, visit iankanebooks.com or contact him at twitter.com/therealiankane.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
The Cabinet Office in London in an undated file photo. (Lauren Hurley/PA)

UK Governments Former Ethics Chief Fined for Attending Party During COVID-19 Lockdown

A former official who was responsible for propriety and ethics in the UK government has confirmed she has paid a fine for attending a party during the lockdown, in violation of CCP virus restrictions.

In a statement issued on April 4, Helen MacNamara, who served as director-general for propriety and ethics in the Cabinet Office between 2018 and 2020, apologised for her error of judgment.

MacNamara, who now works for the Premier League, said: I am sorry for the error of judgment I have shown. I have accepted and paid the fixed penalty notice.

According to UK media reports, she was handed the fine in connection with a leaving party held in the Cabinet Office on June 18, 2020, to mark the departure of a private secretary.

She was among the initial group of people to be issued with a fine following the Metropolitan Police investigation into illegal parties held in Downing Street and Whitehall in breach of Englands COVID-19 restrictions and is the first to confirm they have paid a penalty.

Britains Prime Minister Boris Johnson leaves from 10 Downing Street to take part in the weekly session of Prime Ministers Questions at the House of Commons, in central London, on March 30, 2022. (Tolga Akmen /AFP via Getty Images)

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has faced calls from both opposition parties and his own Conservative backbench MPs for him to resign over the so-called partygate scandal.

But Downing Street said on April 4 that Johnson has not received a fixed penalty notice.

Johnsons official spokesman declined to say whether the prime minister believes COVID-19 laws were broken.

The prime minister wants to comment at the conclusion of the process and not at the middle of it, he said.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said Johnson is unfit for office because he not only misled the public about this, he has presided over widespread criminality in his home and his office.

He called for the names of all senior officials fined for Downing Street parties to be made public.

Meanwhile, Cabinet ministers have sought to play down the impact of the scandal on Johnsons leadership.

Simon Hart, the Welsh secretary of state, told Sky News that the vast majority of his constituents want contrition and apology from the prime minister, but not his resignation.

He said the world has moved on and the war in Ukraine has helped to contextualise the scandal.

Speaking on TalkRadio, he said he was glad the partygate saga is now coming to a conclusion as were now dealing with something of such seriousness and such horror.

Jacob Rees-Mogg, Brexit opportunities minister, suggested Johnson had not misled Parliament over the row because he had simply been repeating incorrect information provided to him by officials.

The prime minister said he was told the rules were followed, but that turns out not to be correct, and we know that fines have now been issued, but the prime minister can only work on the information he is given, he told LBC.

PA Media contributed to this report.
Labour Party leader Keir Starmer leaves his home ahead of the weekly Prime Ministers Questions session in the House of Commons in London, on Jan. 12, 2022. (Leon Neal/Getty Images)

UK Labour Leader Has Confidence In Trident Row Shadow Minister

British Labour leader Keir Starmer has said he has confidence in a shadow Foreign Office minister who said he would be quite happy for Russia to be able to hack into the UKs Trident nuclear missile system and render it useless.

Keir gave his backing to Fabian Hamilton after the Mail on Sunday reported on a video clip from September 2019 in which the shadow minister made the remarks at a rally by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

The Labour leader also stressed that the opposition was absolutely unshaken in its support for Nato and Trident.

Asked by broadcasters about Mr Hamiltons 2019 remarks, the Labour leader said: Look, he made some comments a number of years ago. I have confidence in him but the Labour Party position is absolutely clear.

I went to Brussels myself to see the secretary general to talk about Ukraine and to make clear our unshakeable commitment to Nato and of course to the deterrent that comes with being part of Nato.

Keir also said: I have been very clear in relation to my position and the Labour Party position in favour of deterrence as a strong ally of Nato. We were there when the treaty was first signed and Nato was set up.

Our support for Nato is absolutely unshaken. I dont think I could have been clearer in the last few weeks about the Labour Party position on either Trident or Nato.

The video from 2019 shows Mr Hamilton, then serving as both a shadow defence minister and shadow Foreign Office minister, speaking about whether Russia has the capability to hack into the UKs independent nuclear deterrent.

Mr Hamilton said he did not know whether it was true or not that Russian hackers could render the nuclear deterrent entirely useless as had been suggested to him by an unnamed Labour colleague, but added he would be quite happy for Russia to do this, as long as we could do the same to theirs.

The Labour MP for Leeds North East was criticised by Defence Secretary Ben Wallace for his remarks, according to the Mail on Sunday, with the minister suggesting Mr Hamilton was backing Britains enemies.

During a visit to a nursery in north west London, Keir also stressed the UK needed a proper energy strategy from the Government rather than going cap in hand to dictators.

During the visit, in which the Labour leader met with parents to ask them about the rising cost of living, he said: We dont need energy rationing. We do need an energy strategy. And going from one dictator in Russia for your oil and gas, cap in hand to another dictator in Saudi Arabia is not an energy strategy.

We need a strategy that is fast-forwarding on renewables and on nuclear, retrofitting so that we can actually keep our houses and our homes warmer.

That is the strategy, the security strategy, that we need for this country and we dont have it from this Government.
Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson (C), Britain's Foreign Secretary Liz Truss (L), and Britain's military representative to NATO Ben Bathurst (R) leave NATO Headquarters following a summit in Brussels on March 24, 2022. (Henry Nicholls /Pool/AFP via Getty Images)

UK to Push for Tougher Sanctions on Russia, More Military Aid to Ukraine

The British government has said it will push for tougher international sanctions against Russia and further increase supplies of weapons to Ukraine.

Foreign Secretary Liz Truss will use a trip to Poland this week to call for more sanctions against Russia ahead of talks with NATO and G-7 allies later in the week, the Foreign Office said in a statement on Monday.

Tougher action against Russia is needed to strengthen Ukraines negotiating position in peace talks, said the statement.

Truss said: [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is yet to show he is serious about diplomacy. A tough approach from the UK and our allies is vital to strengthen Ukraines hand in negotiations.

Britain has helped lead the way with sanctions to cripple the Putin war machine. We will do more to ramp up the pressure on Russia and we will keep pushing others to do more.

Truss will also announce a 10 million ($13 million) civil society fund to support organisations working with survivors of sexual violence in Ukraine, following reports of alleged incidents of rape by Russian forces in the country.

Also on Monday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson expressed outrage at the reported discovery of mass graves outside Kyiv following last weeks withdrawal of Russian troops.

Calling the discovery sickening, Johnson said: The UK will not stand by whilst this indiscriminate and unforgivable slaughter takes place. We are working to ensure those responsible are held to account. We will not rest until justice is done.

Earlier, he used a video posted on social media to show his support for Ukraines war effort.

He said: All the tanks and guns in Vladimir Putins arsenal will never break the spirit of Ukraines people or conquer their homeland.

Britain will never waver from supporting our friends and I have not the slightest doubt that when this time of agony is over, Ukraine will rise again and take her place once more among free and sovereign nations.

The prime ministers official spokesman added, We will continue to speak with our allies about how we can move further and as much as possible in lockstep to continue to ratchet up the pressure.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Monday that Moscow sees the Ukrainian claim of a massacre of civilians outside Kyiv as a provocation that posed a direct threat to global peace and security.

PA Media contributed to this report.
Employees work on a drill well at a Sinopec exploration site in the Longgang gas field in Lishan, Sichuan Province. (Liu Jin/AFP/Getty Images)

Under Pressure of Sanctions, Chinas Sinopec Halts Investment in Russia

Bejing has openly opposed the West-led economic sanctions on Russia while insisting it would maintain normal trade exchanges with the country despite its invasion of Ukraine. However, Chinese authorities have recently urged state-run companies to be cautious about their investment in Russia, due to fears it may also be subjected to similar sanctions.

Quoting insiders, Reuters reported that China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec) recently suspended its plan to invest up to $500 million in a new gas chemical plant in Russia.

The plan involved joining Sibur, Russias largest petrochemical producer, for a project similar to the $10 billion Amur Gas Chemical Complex in East Siberia, 40 percent owned by Sinopec and 60 percent owned by Sibur, Reuters said.

Chinese Communist Party (CCP) mouthpiece, Xinhua News, stated in December that the Amur Gas Chemical Complex is a key project for Sino-Russian investment cooperation.

A source familiar with the matter told Reuters that Sinopec hit pause after realizing that Sibur minority shareholder and board member Gennady Timchenko had been sanctioned by the European Union and Britain last month, for being a long-time ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Sibur has not responded to the Epoch Times request for comment by press time.

The construction site of Russias petrochemical holding Siburs ZapSibNefteKhim plant on the outskirts of Tobolsk on Oct. 4, 2018. (Andrey Borodulin/AFP via Getty Images)

Insiders also told Reuters that Sinopec suspended talks over helping to market Russian gas producer Novateks natural gas in China over concerns that Sberbank, one of Novateks shareholders, is on the latest U.S. sanctions list.

According to Novateks official statement, Timchenko resigned from the companys board of directors on his own accord on March 21, 2022. He used to have one of the largest stakes in the company.

Novatek did not respond to the issue of Sinopecs suspension of negotiations in its reply to The Epoch Times, nor did it directly address the reasons for Timchenkos resignation.

But a source in Russia told The Epoch Times that Novatek had not received any official statement or document from Sinopec on the suspension of the investment project.

Sinopec claimed it was unclear of the matter in response to The Epoch Times reporters request for comment.

Expert: A Divided CCP

Dr. Frank Tian Xie, John M. Olin Palmetto Chair Professor in Business and Professor of Marketing, told The Epoch Times on March 28 that Sinopec paused its $500 million investment in the Russian petrochemical plant, obviously as a result of opposite opinions within the CCP.

According to Xie, the objection may come from anti-Xi Jinping factions, or it could arise from the opposition between the CCPs central committee and the State Council. The two often differ in opinions on issues such as economic operations, government control, and the CCPs undue regulation of economic activities.

The CCPs central committee and the State Council are likely to have different views and thoughts on the investment in Russian petrochemical project because the CCPs State Council usually focuses on the impact on the Chinese economy, he said.

The U.S. government, government officials, and even President Biden himself have repeatedly warned that if the CCP supports Russias invasion or supplies Russia with military equipment, the sanctions against Russia by the European Union and the United States will extend to the CCP, he said.

For this reason, the CCP stopped investing in Russia. Moreover, the CCP may not think highly of Russias economic prospects.

A man works at a filling station of Sinopec, Chinas state-owned oil company, in Shanghai, on March 22, 2018. (Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images)

Party Scholars Urge Beijing to Cut Ties with Putin

On March 25, the China-U.S. Impression website published a commentary titled, Looking forward to China Playing A More Positive Role in Bringing Peace between Russia and Ukraine. 

The author, Su Xiaoling, is the former editor-in-chief of the Chinese portal Influence China and a special researcher at the Beijing Reform and Development Research Association.

Su said that there is absolutely no justification or legitimacy for Russia to invade Ukraine and start a war that has resulted in a large number of civilian deaths.

Historically, the Chinese have never seen Ukrainians as enemies. In addition, China regards Ukraine as an important trading country, especially in military technology. Chinas Liaoning aircraft carrier was purchased from Ukraine and was originally named Varyag. China is also a major importer of Ukrainian corn and barley, Su wrote.

On the contrary, throughout the history of Sino-Russian relations, China has suffered from Russias [aggressiveness], as it is a clear fact that we lost a large area of our territory, she continued.

Even in modern times, there have been frequent conflicts between China and Russia. Russia oppressed China, still occupying Chinese territory, and at one point almost destroyed China with atomic bombs, Su wrote.

Prior to Sus commentary, another article by a CCP scholar sparked even more heated discussions.

The article, Possible Results of the Russian-Ukrainian War and Chinas Choice, was written by Hu Wei, the vice-chairman of the Public Policy Research Center of the Counselors Office of the State Council and the chairman of the Shanghai Public Policy Research Association.

Hu wrote that the Russian-Ukrainian war will help the United States regain its leadership status in the Western world. The West will be more united, and the power of the West will increase significantly, Hu wrote.

If Chinahe wrote in referring to the CCPdoes not take active action to adjust its stance, it will be further punished by the United States and the West.

China cannot be tied to Putin, and it needs to be cut ties as soon as possible, choose to stand with the mainstream in the world, Hu wrote.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin enter a hall for talks in the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, in this 2019 file photo. (Alexander Zemlianichenko/AP Photo)

Xie believes these voices from scholars within the CCP system reveal that the disagreements are symptomatic of the partys infighting.

The pro-Russian faction is under strong pressure from the opposition faction, he said.

China has indeed suffered a lot from Russia in the past, Xie said.

The CCP has also given Russia a large tract of territory. So under this circumstance, some of these remarks from anti-Russian Chinese will truly make the pro-Russians feel very uncomfortable. And the current situation indicates that the pro-Russian faction has to make a concession.

Epoch Times reporters Ellen Wan and Kane Zhang contributed to this article.
Spanish Civil Guards stand by the "Tango" superyacht, suspected to belong to a Russian oligarch, as it is docked at the Mallorca Royal Nautical Club, in Palma de Mallorca, in the Spanish island of Mallorca, Spain, on April 4, 2022. (Juan Poyates Oliver/Handout via Reuters)

Spain Seizes $90 Million Yacht Owned by Sanctioned Russian Oligarch

Spanish police acted on behalf of the US

On behalf of U.S. officials, Spanish police on Monday seized a luxury yacht believed to belong to Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg, the Department of Justice (DOJ) confirmed.

The $90 million vessel, dubbed Tango, was impounded by Spains Civil Guard and U.S. federal agents who descended upon the yacht stationed in the shipyard of Palma de Mallorca in the Mediterranean.

The DOJ said in a statement that U.S. authorities issued a seizure warrant for the 255-foot mega-yacht based on alleged violations of U.S. bank fraud, money laundering, and sanctions statutes committed by Vekselberg.

According to court documents, Vekselberg bought the Tango in 2011 and used shell companies to hide his interest in the Tango in order to avoid bank oversight into U.S. dollar transactions, thereby tricking American banks into processing them.

A number of documents and data storage devices were seized on board, Spains Civil Guard said in a statement, adding it had also uncovered a complex financial and partnership scheme designed to hide Vekselbergs ownership of the vessel.

The seizure marks the first time the DOJs newly formed U.S. task force, named KleptoCapture, impounded an asset belonging to a sanctioned individual with close relations to Russian elites.

A U.S. Homeland Security Police (HSI) agent climbs on board the Tango superyacht, suspected to belong to a Russian oligarch, as it is docked at the Mallorca Royal Nautical Club in Palma de Mallorca, in the Spanish island of Mallorca, Spain, on April 4, 2022. (Juan Poyates Oliver/Handout via Reuters)

The DOJ task force was launched last month with a goal to put the finances of Russian oligarchs under strain in a bid to pressure President Vladimir Putin to cease his invasion of Ukraine.

It will not be the last, said Attorney General Merrick B. Garland. Together, with our international partners, we will do everything possible to hold accountable any individual whose criminal acts enable the Russian government to continue its unjust war.

Vekselberg was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in April 2018 and later also included on a list of members of the inner circle of Putin targeted in retaliation for Russias attack on Ukraine, according to the DOJ.

Even if a sanctioned vessel is located outside the United States, making maintenance or insurance payments for the vessel using U.S. dollars could make the vessel subject to U.S. civil or criminal forfeiture, according to Andrew Adams, the head of the task force.

Spanish authorities have separately impounded three other superyachts suspected of belonging to Russians under EU sanctions over the past weeks.

Separately, $625,000 spread across nine different U.S. financial institutions was frozen as part of investigations into sanctions violations by Russian nationals, according to the DOJ.

Reuters contributed to this report.

From NTD News
People wait to receive their booster shot of COVID-19 vaccine at the lobby of Taipei main station ahead of Lunar new year in Taipei, Taiwan, on Jan. 24, 2022. (Ann Wang/Reuters)

US Discusses Opportunities for Taiwan to Participate at WHO Meeting

TAIPEIU.S. and Taiwanese officials have held talks on expanding Taiwans international participation including opportunities for the island to attend a major World Health Organization (WHO) meeting next month.

Taiwan is excluded from most global organizations due to objections from the Chinese regime. In particular, Taipei has complained that exclusion from the WHO has hampered efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

The U.S. State Department said in a statement Friday the meeting took place in Washington between high-level diplomats including Assistant Secretary for International Organization Affairs Michele J. Sison and Taiwans de facto U.S. ambassador Hsiao Bi-Khim.

This discussion focused on opportunities for Taiwans participation as an observer in the World Health Assembly in May and the possibilities for Taiwans participation at the International Civil Aviation Organization, it added, referring to another United Nations body.

Taiwan attended the World Health Assembly, the WHOs decision-making body, as an observer from 20092016. But the Chinese communist regime blocked further participation after the election of Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen, who the Chinese regime views as a separatista charge she rejects.

The Chinese regime claims the island as its own, despite the fact that Taiwan is a de facto independent country, with its own military, democratically-elected government, and constitution.

The G7 group of advanced industrialized countries have backed calls for Taiwans participation at the WHO. China and the WHO say Taiwan has been given appropriate access to COVID-19 information.

The State Department added that at Thursdays meeting the two sides also discussed Taiwans contributions through its membership or meaningful participation in other multilateral forums.

All participants recognized the importance of working closely with all those who share our concerns regarding attempts to exclude Taiwan from contributing its expertise, resources, energy, and generosity to the international community.
Monash University Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences in Melbourne, Australia. (Wikimedia Commons)

Victoria Announces Globally Recognized Biobank

The Victorian Labor Government has announced Australias first globally recognised biorepository, Biobanking Victoria, months after the state-funded laboratory received its accreditation from the National Association of Testing Authorities (NATA) in November.

Biobanking Victoria is the culmination of years of hard work by a highly dedicated team, said the Director of Biobanking Victoria, Prof. Melissa Southey.

The $10 million (US$ 7.5 million) facility backed by the Monash University School of Clinical Sciences received its NATA accreditation on Nov. 23, 2021, and currently houses 4.5 million biological specimens from 6 clinical trials.

In 2018, the Victorian Labor Government invested $1.5 million (US$1.13 million) into the facility as part of the Labor Governments Future Industries Fund to make critical discoveries and develop new treatments.

The biobank was developed in a collaboration with Rutgers University Cell and DNA Repository (RUCDR) Infinite Biologics in the U.S.

RUCDR Infinite Biologics, also known as Infinite BiologiX (IBX), is the worlds largest university-based biorepository.

The mission of IBX is to understand the genetic causes of common, complex diseases and to find diagnoses, treatments, as well as cures for these diseases.

According to Biobanking Victoria, the facility currently supports the reception, processing and storage of a biological materials including blood, saliva, solid tissues, breast milk, mouth swabs and fecal samples.

The lab also hosts technologies that will enable genetic extraction, sequencing and analysis from these samples.

Biobanking Victoria will drive growth across the states medical research sector and elevate Victoria as the destination of choice for commercial clinical trials, Minister for Innovation and Medical Research, Jaala Pulford said.

This facility is cementing the state as a global leader in medical research and will help to drive new breakthroughs for generations to come.

Biobanking Victoria has been collecting samples since 2018 and is undertaking studies to identify rare diseases in the world, with a recent breast cancer study bringing together 30,000 samples from Australian women.

The facility will be used by epidemiologists and researchers for precision medicine, genomics and clinical trials.

The announcement follows the Victorian Governments announcements into the health technology sector, including $5 million (US$ 3.8 million) into the Victorian COVID-19 biobank and $50 million (US$37.6 million) for mRNA Victoria for mRNA vaccine manufacturing.

The news of the facility comes amidst election season, with the Opposition Leader, Anthony Albanese releasing his 2022 budget response on March 31, challenging the Australian Prime Minister, Scott Morrison to call for a federal election now.

The federal elections are expected to be held in mid-May with the Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce predicting the date to be set on May 14.
A general view of the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne, Australia, on July 15, 2020. (Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

Victoria to Boost Elective Surgeries With $1.5 Billion Spending

The Victorian government has announced that it will spend $1.5 billion (US$1.12 billion) to reduce the states elective surgery waitlist backlog via a catch-up scheme expected to raise surgical capacity by 25 percent.

The COVID Catch-Up Plan, which is designed to increase surgical activity across the state to 125 percent of the pre-pandemic level by 2023, will drive up the total number of surgeries to 240,000 per year in 2024.

We know that COVID, twice, has hit elective surgeries hard, Acting Premier James Merlino told reporters on April 3.This plan will see record numbers of Victorians get the surgeries they need while making sure our frontline workforce is supported.

Due to COVID restrictions implemented in the past two years, the states non-urgent surgery waitlists have shot through the roof.

In January, the Victorian government put category two and three procedures on hold, with 80,000 people on the waiting list in the last update in December.

The acting premier said that Victorias health facilities would perform an extra 16,000 surgeries on top of the current capacity by the end of 2022.

The $1.5 billion package will derive from the Victorian governments funding after the federal government did not approve it in the 2022 budget.

We asked the Commonwealth for support for this initiative, and they have refused. Nevertheless, we are going ahead with it, Merlino said.

According to the scheme, the state government will convert the Frankston Private Hospital into a public surgery centre with a capacity of up to 9,000 surgeries a year from 2023.

And the number of services and surgery options at the centre will increase, with two new theatres scheduled to commence operation by early next year.

Another $475 million will flow into the broader network of public health facilities, providing additional same-day surgeries, more twilight and after-hours work and theatre improvements.

Furthermore, a $548 million investment will allow more public patients to be treated at private hospitals, with an additional 51,300 Victorians to receive non-urgent surgeries by June 2024.

The state will also set up eight additional Rapid Access Hubs that perform specific day surgeries such as hernia repairs, cataract surgery and joint replacements.

A general view of the Royal Womens Hospital in Melbourne, Australia, on July 16, 2020. (Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

In addition, the Victorian government will train 400 perioperative nurses, upgrade the skills of more than 1,000 nurses and theatre and sterilisation technicians, and recruit 2,000 highly-skilled healthcare workers from other countries with an over $80 million package.

It will also spend $20 million on surgical equipment and diagnostic machine upgrades.

Lisa Fitzpatrick, the Victorian secretary of the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF), said that the scheme received careful consideration and understood the logistics and the workforce development.

Anyone who spouts blame are simply proving they dont understand the health system or the workforce, including what our members have been through and are still experiencing as we move into the third year of the pandemic, she said.

The ANMF looks forwards to working with the Andrews Government and Department of Health representatives over the coming months to assist in making this ground-breaking plan a reality.

Meanwhile, deputy Opposition leader David Southwick said that the Labor government should have announced the funding two years ago.

It is simply not good enough for the government now to promise more money when they should have done in the first place, he told reporters.

In a related development, on April 1, 2020, Premier Daniel Andrews and Minister for Health Jenny Mikakos announced an injection of $1.3 billion into the healthcare system to boost the number of ICU (Intensive Care Unit) beds in the state to 4,000.

Nevertheless, the plan did not seem to materialise as the premier later backtracked on the announcement, and the number of Victorias ICU beds stood at 437 as of September 23, 2021, news.com.au reported.

Victorian MP Georgie Crozier questioned the Andrews government about the 4,000 ICU beds and the $1.3 billion spending in a state parliament session, but the premiers response did not directly answer her question.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban reacts in front of supporters after the announcement of the partial results of parliamentary election in Budapest, Hungary, on April 3, 2022. (Bernadett Szabo/Reuters)

Viktor Victorious

Commentary

I almost feel sorry for Anne Applebaum, staff writer for The Atlantic.

She has been railing against evil chaps such as Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban for who knows how many years.

Nevertheless, the benighted people of Hungary just handed him a crushing victory.

And it wasnt only Orban who won. His Fidesz party also picked up a slew of seats.

They now control 135 out of 199 seats in the Hungarian Parliament.

Sadness is abroad in what Sohrab Ahmari, op-ed editor of the New York Post, calls global liberaldom.

St. Matthew would have called it fletus et stridor dentium: wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Why didnt the voters listen to Applebaum (and Bill Kristol, Jennifer Rubin, Max Boot, and other anti-populist globalists)? Why?

According to The Narrative, its because Hungary isnt, not really, a democracy.

If Hungary really votes overwhelmingly against democracy and for corruption, wailed one EU-minded Twitterer, I cannot see why it should be accepted in the EU. Kick it out!

Lets parse that.

If a people votes for someone we dont like, its not democracy.

Weve seen that here in the United States.

In 2016, the people voted for Donald Trump.

But that was intolerable.

Hillary Clinton was the anointed candidate. She was a shoo-in. Donald (said the brethren) is ridiculous, repugnant, impossible.

Ergo, his victory in a free and open election was anti-democratic.

The wrong person won.

The victory, therefore, is illegitimate.

In America, that is, democracy means Democrats win.

Its hard, I know, to get ones mind around the logic.

But thats chiefly because the persuasive motor here isnt reason, not logic, but power.

For the Clintonistas, democracy means their right to rule.

Voting? Sure, theyre in favor of voting.

But Stalin had voting; so did Castro.

For them, as for Americas regime party, voting isnt the expression of the will of the people.

Its a process of certification.

The right candidate had already been selected. Voting was, at bottom, a matter of acclamation.

So it was supposed to be in Hungary.

Knowledgeable observers, even those sympathetic to Orban, worried that a change was nigh.

Orban has been in power since 2010. Many people felt that it was someone elses turn.

How horrible is Viktor Orban?

Cover the ears of children and maiden aunts.

Orban had been friendly with Trump. He is, right now, today, friendly with Vladimir Putin, at least officially.

Even worse, hes friendly with Tucker Carlson, who made him the subject of a friendly interview in Budapest some months ago.

Beyond the company he keeps, Orban is a conservative Christian.

Hes also a Hungarian nationalist.

The Western liberals, he told Carlson, cannot accept that inside the Western civilization, there is a conservative national alternative which is more successful at everyday life than the liberal ones.

America First is a very positive message here in Central Europe. If, for Donald Trump, America First, [then] for us, Hungary could be first as well.

In 2015, in a speech that Christopher Caldwell called probably the most important by a Western statesman this century, Orban said that Hungary must protect its ethnic and cultural composition. I am convinced that Hungary has the rightand every nation has the rightto say that it does not want its country to change.

Horrors! How un-EU-like!

I had something to say about Orban in this space last year when his electoral prospects seemed much less rosy.

One major impetus to Orbans success is down to Putin.

The Hungarians dont like Russia. They do like Ukraine.

They disapprove of Putins invasion of their neighbor.

Nevertheless, as Rod Dreher points out, a strong majority of them do not want Hungary to get involved in the war.

Why? Many reasons, but energy comes at the top of the list.

Hungary gets some 80 percent of its natural gas from Russia.

The Hungarians, Dreher notes, prefer not to freeze in the dark next winter for the sake of Ukraine.

Is that selfish?

Or is it merely practical?

The globalists, it almost goes without saying, think the Hungarians should freeze for the sake of their high-minded foreign policyjust so long as they themselves dont have to do so.

Over at Powerline, Steven Hayward has an amusing take on the tongue-clucking response to Orbans victory.

Quoting from an unhappy news article in The Wall Street Journal, Hayward does a little compare and contrast.

The Wall Street Journal sniffs that in Hungary, nearly all the largest TV and radio stations have been bought up by Mr. Orbans political allies.

Unlike, say, in the United States where such a situation could never occur, right?

Again, The Wall Street Journal deplores the fact that Orban used his majority in parliament to rewrite election laws, redraw voting districts, and permit mail-in ballots without identity verification from communities that favor him.

Sound familiar?

But heres the kicker. It is said that Orban is too close to, or sympathetic to, Putin, Hayward notes.

But remember when Hillary Clinton presented the Russians with a red reset button for closer relations?

It wasnt that long ago.

Nor was it so long ago that President Barack Obama told Russias then-president to hold tight: Tell Vladimir, he said, that hed have more flexibility after the election to accommodate the Russians on missile defense.

Orbans victory is a triumph for Hungarians.

Its also a welcome talisman for anti-globalist patriots in the West.

Its only the Anne Applebaums, Klaus Schwabs, and Goldman Sachses of the world who are in mourning.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
A restaurant advertising jobs looks to attract workers in Oceanside, Calif., on May 10, 2021. Mike Blake/Reuters

Warning Signs Show Great Resignation Not Slowing Down: Randstad Survey

The phenomenon of record numbers of workers quitting their positions may persist among employees who remain unsatisfied with their jobs, according to a survey (pdf) by Randstad NV, a global provider of employment services.

Dubbed the great resignation by experts, the trend has seen job openings outnumber individuals searching for employment opportunities, leaving employers scrambling to fill positions in an already struggling economy.

This in turn has seen many businesses offering attractive bonus schemes, wage increases, and numerous other perks in a bid to entice new workers.

The record number of workers quitting their jobs is being driven by a stronger desire among employees to enjoy life and an increase in individuals prioritizing their personal lives over their working lives in the post-COVID-19-pandemic age, Randstad says. Meanwhile, more and more employees are prepared to go elsewhere if their needs arent being met.

Randstads survey is based on responses from 35,000 employees across 34 markets and is one of the largest studies of its kind, according to the Dutch company.

It found that 83 percent of those surveyed want work hours that complement their lives, yet only a small portion of employers are meeting that demand, with just over one-quarter of employees stating employers are offering more flexibility in both areas.

A total of 60 percent of those surveyed said their employer currently allows flexible hours, while 47 percent said they have a choice of where they work.

Roughly 60 percent of those surveyed said their personal life is more important than work life, and about half said they would quit a job if it prevented them from enjoying life.

Furthermore, one-third of the participants in Randstads survey said they had left a job because it didnt fit their personal life.

Randstad says that the latest survey data points to warning signs that the great resignation may persist, while talent scarcity may also continue for the time being.

That is sort of a change today: Employees are more prepared to attach consequences to their unhappiness or not getting what they want, said Sander van t Noordende, who took over as CEO of the Dutch company March 29, in an interview with Bloomberg.

Employers really have to raise their game in terms of personalizing the work experience for every individual employee, van t Noordende said.

Randstads survey comes after the number of job openings in the United States reached 11.3 million in February 2022, just below the December 2021 revised figure of 11.4 million, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Meanwhile, resignations were at a high of 4.4 million, or 2.9 percent, up from 4.3 million in January 2022 but down slightly from a historical high of 4.5 million in November 2021.

Resignations in the retail industry were up by 74,000 and in durable goods manufacturing by 22,000. However, job resignations decreased by 30,000 in finance and insurance.

Other studies have presented similar findings, with a November Qualtrics Employee Experience Trends Report for 2022 suggesting that fewer people intend to stay at their current jobs this year compared to 2021.

That study surveyed nearly 14,000 full-time employees from 27 countries and found that just 65 percent of workers planned on staying in their current roles in 2022, compared to 70 percent in 2021.

Theyre prepared to quit their job if theyre not happy, van t Noordende said of workers participating in the great resignation.
WESTPORT  Supporting the community is one of the main goals of the Westport Womens Club.

So when the club was presented with a sizable grant to put into the town, the non-profit organization searched for what would touch and help everyone in Westport. It decided to donate a new ambulance to the Westport Volunteer EMS.

We thought maybe we could put money towards an ambulance because thats something that really impacts the whole town and thats something that we were really looking for with this grant, said Donna Richardson, the clubs community service chair.

The womens club received $150,000 from the Ruegge Family Endowment fund. That amount was then doubled when an anonymous donor matched the grant giving the club $300,000 to fund a new ambulance.

Richardson said she reached out to the town when the club first received the grant to see if there were any projects the money could be applied to. Town officials told her there wasnt anything in the works and suggested the money be applied elsewhere.

The club chose to instead answer the call put forth by the Westport EMS in a letter, which notified residents the ambulances needed to be replaced.

This will instantaneously impact the town, said Michael Burns, president of the Westport Volunteer EMS. Westport EMS serves the whole town which means anybody that lives, works or passes through the town. Its an obvious impact on everyone whether they need it or want it.

Burns said receiving the call from the womens club brought him to tears.

As a resident of Westport, I couldnt feel better having a community group such as this come together and make such a generous donation that benefits everyone in town, Burns said. Its just amazing and I have a permanent smile on my face.

Burns said the Westport EMS has a unique relationship when it comes to funding from the town. The town pays for the full-time EMS staff but the EMS has to raise its own money for supplies, equipment and vehicles.

A key part of that fundraising is the letters the EMS mails out.

In the recent letter, the EMS noted the ambulances are heading towards the end of their shelf life. Burns said an ambulance lasts for about ten years. The Westport EMS has a fleet of six vehicles, three of which are ambulances that are each eight years old.

On average, Burns said the EMS responds to nearly 2,500 calls per year. With the volume of calls and the age of the ambulances, he said its time to look at replacing them.

It will take about a year for the EMS to receive the ambulance from the womens club, due to the current supply chain and customization time.

In the meantime, the EMS is finding funding to replace the other two. Burns said the EMS received another donation that should cover a second ambulance. Westport EMS has asked the town to use funding from the American Rescue Plan Act for the third.

Burns said this is the first time that the EMS has asked the town to pay for a new vehicle. He said the ARPA funding presents a unique one-time situation.

Richardson said everyone from the club is proud of the accomplishment, adding its the biggest donation that they have done to date.

Its beyond words, she said.

serenity.bishop@hearstmediact.com
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

What started as a double murder Saturday morning in the Collinsville area has resulted in the deaths of three people after the suspect in those killings died Sunday morning.

Maj. Jeff Connor, chief deputy for the Madison County Sheriffs Department, announced at a Sunday evening media conference that the suspect in the double homicide, identified as Adam Cobb, 32, of the 1000 block of McDonough Lake Road, died at 4:40 a.m. Sunday from gunshot wounds sustained in a traffic stop near Hillsboro.

The victims of the Collinsville shooting were identified as Jamie L. Joyner, 30, of the same address, and Jessica Joyner, 34, of California.

Connor said it appeared that Jamie Joyner had told Cobb she was breaking up with him, and her sister had flown in from California to help her move out. Connor said they had pulled up with a U-Haul and a vehicle, there was some kind of altercation and both women, as well as a family dog, were shot and killed.

Police received a 911 call at 10:26 a.m. Saturday from one of the women. Connor said it was probably Jamie Joyner, based on the proximity of a phone to her body.

The call originally went to the Collinsville Police Department but was rerouted to Madison County.

You could hear a person in the background screaming, then a couple of what appears to be gunshots in the background, Connor said.

Because Madison County deputies were dealing with an armed, barricaded subject, Collinsville Police were the first to arrive at the scene.

Upon their arrival, they located two deceased females on the outside of the house, Connor said.

Cobb had fled the scene, but investigators were able to help track him down and that led to his apprehension, which was a pursuit that ended with the Illinois State Police.

This is just a tragic event, and our thoughts, our prayers go out to the Joyner family, and also to the Cobb family, Connor said. There are several families whose lives have been turned upside down by these events.

He said the investigation will continue until authorities have processed all the evidence.

According to the state police, an Illinois State Police Emergency Radio Network warning was sent out at about 11:14 a.m. Shortly after 1 p.m., law enforcement officers spotted Cobb on Illinois 127 near Hillsboro.

Officers pursued Cobb and attempted a traffic stop, joined by ISP troopers. Eventually, the pursuit crossed Illinois 16 north to U.S. 51.

After his vehicle became partially disabled, Cobb stopped on U.S. 51 just north of Pana at about 1:53 p.m. According to the ISP, Cobb exited the vehicle and pointed a gun at a state trooper, who fired at Cobb.

Cobb was taken to a regional hospital with serious, life-threatening injuries.

Officials have not identified the 26-year ISP veteran involved in the shooting.

The officer-involved shooting is under investigation and will be referred to the Christian County States Attorneys Office.
That release could not be found.
Nigerians are routinely forced to undergo torrid experiences which in many instances are not unavoidable when people are not sleeping on their jobs and importantly when they evince honour and integrity.

The recent fuel crisis in a fitting example. Not a few citizens suffered incalculable damages on their vehicles; then had to relive the unsavoury experience of punishing inconveniences and loss of valuable man-hour and time on long winding queues precipitated by the bad fuel that simply slithered through what is supposed to be a thorough quality test process.

Since then, we have been awaiting government action; however, they seem to have succeeded in allowing the matter slide into oblivion without a fall guy in their net. And, it was plain that no official was on the edge because they knew it will remain business as usual.

Also, the state of insecurity offers a sobering tale of absence of moral responsibility. The brazen attacks and abductions no least the one recorded on the Abuja-Kaduna train despite humongous investment on security is strong enough reason for someone to spontaneously resign. We have simply overlooked the fact that public office is built on trust and have allowed personal aggrandizement to cast heavy shadow over public interest.

It is trite to assert that we have got people of honour in short supply- public officers that are ready to take moral responsibility for their action or inaction as well as for those within their sphere of influence. And, that is where honour and integrity come to play.

In effect, people with honour and integrity will not flow with the current when is against their principles to do so; will exhibit the courage of their conviction and make their words a strong bond; their integrity will always shine through and will be ready to head to the exit door when it come under threat.

And, they are people always at hand to offer uncomfortable counsel without fear to their masters and will always reflect the standards of their calling and office in their work and exercise incorruptibility and accountability posture. Such people will simply lay down their tools in the face of honour tarnishing circumstances and against personal principles.

In the cases mentioned above somebody should have simply jump or be pushed as stated earlier. Patrick Dobel in his essay Ethics of Resigning stated that resigning from office is a critical ethical decision for individuals. The option to resign reinforces integrity, buttresses responsibility, supports accountability and can provide leverage. The moral reasons to resign flow from three interrelated moral dimensions of integrity. Individuals in office promise to live up to the obligation of the office. The promise presumes that individuals have the capacity to make and keep promises, the competence to do the tasks of office and the ability to be effective

Theres a surfeit of example of people who have taken the honourable path which remain strange to us. For instance, the former UK prime minister David Cameron showed courage and resigned simply on the strength of his failure on the BREXIT referendum.

Interestingly, in one fell swoop the entire Sri Lankan cabinet ministers as well as the central bank governor resigned their positions over the violent protest sparked by the worst economic crisis since independence- foreign exchange scarcity affected imports. In effect, the country is grappling with fuel and food shortages, power cuts etc. In fact, the extreme practice honour and integrity is common in Japan for instance in 2015, Ryoichi Kishi a Japanese committed suicide having blamed himself for the snapping of cable on a bridge which he was part of the design and construction in Turkey. His suicide note reads: I bear complete responsibility for what happened. Nobody else was at fault.

The public sector is rife with demonstrable cases of financial shenanigans, abuse of office/privileges, incompetence which for the most part, those that are culpable would prefer to stay put. They simply wont sacrifice their ego, perks of office and financial future. Unfortunately, public officers are unaffected by whatever form of negative public light that is cast on them. I believe so strongly that service to the nation thats draped in honour would make a world of difference to its growth and development.

We need a tectonic shift in our orientation on what public service constitutes. Again, we need to hold people accountable for their actions and inactions and apply the deterrence measure which is consequential. People of honour and integrity have so much to lose and will do anything to protect the rare quality in them. These are the type of men that we need in public service.

[email protected]


A group in South East, Prayer Network for Good Governance (PNGG) has urged Ndigbo to think home economically and invest in the zone in order to reduce insecurity in the land and provide employment opportunities for the teaming youths.

The group stated this in Abakaliki, Ebonyi State capital during the inauguration of its Ebonyi chapter. The inauguration was performed by the National Coordinator of the group, Apostle Chukwuma Igbo.

Igbo who lamented the disunity in the south east, said the group was formed to give voice to ndigbo as according to him, all the groups in the zone like Ohanaeze Ndigbo and other groups have not lived up to expectations.

If you look at what is happening in Nigeria, there are issues we needed the voice from south east but we didnt get one the issue of Igbo presidency, the rejection of women bill in National Assembly. We needed a voice to say one or few things while the bill should not be rejected.

There are other national issues like insecurity. You see other regions saying something against it, the Arewa Youths Assembly, you see them always defending their people, always contributing to national development but here, the groups we have as our leaders are busy fighting themselves; the Governors forum, the Ohanaeze Ndigbo, MASSOB, IPOB and other groups seem not to understand themselves. This is why we step in to galvanize voice. We are being marginalized but this marginalization cannot stop unless we speak with one voice politically and otherwise, he said.

Ebonyi State Coordinator of the group, Comrade Greg Esheya while briefing journalists after the inauguration, urged Ndigbo to think home economically and invest in it.

He explained that investing if the Igbo invest home, it will reduce insecurity in the land and provide employment opportunities for the teaming youths.

We all should think home economically. The Igbo are investors in other parts of the world but they have abandoned their homes. So, this body will call for a think home, a backward deliberation economically. An Igbo man should invest in his home. The market is there and when you invest in your home, you reduce insecurity in your homeland, employment opportunities will increase.

The experience of the civil war should guide us here. Any uprising in the North or any part of Nigeria, the Igbo are always the target, their economic establishments are destroyed. So, invest in your home, reduce insecurity. If the youths have jobs and we have infrastructure, we may not care much who is the President of Nigeria but we care because the dividends are not there.

Since after the civil war, the Igbo has continue to play second fiddle in the affairs of this nation. This time around, we are saying that for equity sake, for justice sake, Igbo should be giving the chance and it is not just give us chance. We know the nature of the Igbo man. Igbo can reinvent Nigeria, it is their nature to bring life where there is none.

As a body, we are calling for President of Igbo extraction in 2023 for the sake of equity and for the sake of good governance. We have the materials, we have those who can fit in that role and play it very well. The next election will be a referendum in this country to be or not to be, it is a referendum, it is not an ordinary election. If we make any mistake, that will be the end of this country, he stated.
The Amuwo Odofin Muslim Community Ladies Circle, Lagos, has enlightened that there is no radicalism in Islam, stressing that what is usually termed radicalism is people's misrepresentation and lack of willingness to follow the doctrine of Islam as prescribed in the holy Qur'an and Hadith of Prophet Muhamme

These are the words of the Chief Missionary of Ansar-Ud-Deen Society of Nigeria, Sheikh Abdulrahman Ahmad who was guest speaker at the 9th Annual Pre-Ramadan Lecture of Amuwo Odofin Muslim Community Ladies Circle held recently at Crystal Estate Green Park.

Speaking on the Lecture "Radicalism and Insurgency in Islam: The Family perspective", the renowned Scholar, cleared what he termed an erroneous belief that Islam breeds radicalism and insurgency. According to Sheikh Ahmad, what people termed as radicalism is absolute resignation to the will of Allah as encapsulated in the Holy Quran.

"Muslims who see others as radical are those that believe only in parts of the Quran that favour them, lack understanding and are too lazy to seek understanding of the teachings of the Holy Books and Sunnah of Prophet Muhammed and added that the wrong ascription to Islam, is also fuelled by haters of Islam.

Ahmad stressed the need for Muslims to believe wholeheartedly in the Holy Quran and allow it to be their guide.

He blamed insurgency like Boko Haram and banditry associated with Muslims because of their geographical location on non-beneficial knowledge they have been exposed to, lack of proper home training, government monumental failure which has resulted in lack of employment and abject poverty. There is also failure of the Ulamas who have joined the prosperity train, and abandoned teaching of the right values.

Parents he added, have major roles to play in educating their wards, giving proper home training, being sensitive to their feelings. Guiding them with the Quran, and the Sunnah of the Prophet should be sacrosanct in all homes, he added.

The second lecturer, Dr Khadijah Olaniyan-Shobowale of Department of Language, Art and Social Education, Lagos State University, Ojo, who spoke on Raising Muslim Youth in a Contemporary Society also highlighted the ills affecting youths of todays as the home, failed education system, the society and the youths themselves.

According to her, some parents have delegated their responsibilities to the least qualified in the Society. The Home she said should be haven for the children, the foundation, and the bedrock for all members of the family. Parents she added should be interested in the activities of their children and wards, create time to know their children, relate with them islamically while their emotional and financial needs should be met. We should know that we will account for the way we train our children before Allah she said.

The Government, she further said has forsaken its responsibilities, and is paying no attention to the failed education system. The Ummah she added, need to diversify, by holding program that will attract the Youths, like sports, educational program, learning of foreign language etc. Our madrasahs she emphasized, need complete overhauling, as moral values should also be prioritized alongside Quran and other lessons being taught.

She enjoined the Youth themselves to strive and learn more about their religion, you need to re- discover your religion, learn more about it and act it. You should be proud of your religion and not be ashamed to be called Muslims regardless of what some undesirable elements like boko haram are doing to dent the image of Islam. You should strive and learn more about your religion; do not just be contented with what your parents tell you about the deen, strive to learn more yourself.

The President, Amuwo Odofin Muslim Community, Alhaji Abdulhakeem Tairu in his keynote address appreciated the Committee for hoisting the flag of the Community and welcomed guests to the event. He appreciated Ar Rahman Ratibi, one of 15 Ratibis and Units, in the Muslim Community for graciously playing host to the event since inception.

The Chief Imam of Amuwo Odofin Muslim Community, Khaifah Sheik Soliu Mayaki blessed the congregation and sought protection for the years to come.

The Lady Vice President of the Muslim Community who doubles as the Chairperson of Ladies Circle Central Working Committee, Alhaja Rasheedat Adetutu Yakub earlier in her address said that the Annual Pre-Ramadan Lecture organized by the Ladies Circle Central Working Committed was one of Amuwo Odofin Muslim Community major programmes which aimed at setting the tone and getting members prepared for the Holy Month of Ramadan.
When a particular Journalist at a media parley asked Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, who was then the announced Governor-elect of Anambra State in the early hours of Wednesday, November 10, 2021 after the November 6 election, What significant shift should we expect from you?, the now incumbent governor and former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) responded to the question thus: You are asking me to give my inauguration day address and that will not happen for now, but I can tell you that our 72-page manifesto outlines our contract with the people of Anambra State, which is part of continuity, consolidation and transformation agenda to continue to build on the foundation laid by our forebears including Governor Willie Obiano who has given us an airport and relative improved security and the people trust him. The governor very humbly told the people during the campaign that the person he is supporting as his successor will do better than him, that is a very rare act of magnanimity and humility but that also places a lot of pressure on me. In the days ahead, we will get down on the transition process and we are not coming to learn on the job; we will hit the ground running from day one.

Against the backdrop of his choice of words in his reply to the Journalist as excerpted in the foregoing, there is no denying the fact that one of the takeaways is We will hit the ground running from day one. Again, one may not be wrong to say that not few people that heard him on the day of the parley might had doubtingly dismissed his assertion with mere wave of the hands as they would have classified him in the same category with typical politicians who are wont to make promises they hardly keep.

Ostensibly demonstrating the fact that he is not a typical politician that make promises he can hardly keep, the governor has hit the ground running as his administration few days ago placed restriction on movement for waste evacuation in Ogbaru Local Government Area (LGA) of the state to allow for massive waste evacuation and desilting of drainages. Mr. Arinzechukwu Awogu, the Chairman, Ogbaru local council who said this in a statement in Awka on Thursday urged residents of the area to comply with the directive.

Awogu said the restriction would take place from April 2 to April 4 from 7 a.m. and 6p.m daily, and added that the clean-up was in line with the promise by the governor to address the environmental challenges in Okpoko, Idemili and Sakamori LGAs of the state.

To this end, he urged various groups including religious organizations, market organizations, town unions, youth organizations and landlord associations to spread the message and ensure compliance.

The Anambra government will embark on a massive and intensive waste evacuation and de-silting of drainages in Ogbaru starting from Saturday, April 2 to Monday April 4.

Gov. Chukwuma Soludo has approved lockdown in Ogbaru LGA from 7.00a.m to 6.00p.m on each day of the exercise to guarantee success of the clean-up.

The citizenry is implored to cooperate with the government special committee led by the deputy governor Onyekachukwu Ibezim by minimizing vehicular movement.

We are also advised to drop refuse in the receptacles and waste bins and desist from dropping wastes in drainages, volunteer services are also invited from residents to ensure the success of the exercise, he said.

Awogu said the massive waste evacuation would address the problems of flooding, environmental hazard, public health issues and poor waste management in the area.

Unarguably pleased and delighted with the pragmatic efforts the governor has taken just few weeks after his inauguration, residents of Onitsha North and South heaved sighof relief as the governor was seen to have fulfilled one of his promises, which is that of desilting and evacuating mountain-like dumped wastes in the areas.

The residents witnessed the paradigm shift in governance in the state when the state Deputy Governor, Dr. Onyekachukwu Ibezim monitored the commencement of the exercise in the areas.

As gathered, various sizes of refuse dump sites were seen at various strategic points and junctions around Onitsha including the popular Ochanja roundabout and Awka road by Inland town axis, which not only threatened the health of the residents and road users, but also restricted them from accessing other parts of the town through the routes.

Nevertheless, the intervention of the Professor Chukwuma Soludo led administration in the areas is gradually restoring healthy environment and free access to other parts of Onitsha for the residents and road users.

Some residents that commented about the development, during the exercise, expressed happiness on the governments intervention, and described Professor Chukwuma Soludo and his Deputy, Dr Onyekachukwu Ibezim as God sent to the state, even as they promised to key into the state governments environmental sanitation initiative.

Addressing the residents, the Deputy Governor urged them to partner the Soludo administration in the move towards providing safe and healthy environment for the citizenry by keeping their surroundings clean and desist from dumping refuse in wrong places.

To anyone that has been watching the governors since his inauguration, it would not be in doubt to such person that the people of Anambra made an excellent choice by voting the former governor of the CBN to be the new governor of the state. Without any scintilla of exaggeration he would surely leave the state cleaner than he met it. It would be recalled that during my recent travel to Anambra State that I witnessed the clean-up going on as Soludo started work immediately after he ascends office. For the 3 days evaluation I personally carried out in Onitsha, that is when I traveled to witness his swearing-in, Upper Iweka was in a mess, and I was surprised to see that. So let us encourage him and his team with the good work.
Phuket Rajabhat University launches Andaman Biodiversity learning centre

PHUKET: Phuket Rajabhat University (PRU) has opened its Andaman Biodiversity Museum learning centre, which is open to the public.

environmentmarinenatural-resources

By The Phuket News

Monday 4 April 2022, 10:41AM

The centre was opened on Saturday (Apr 2) in honour of Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, the third child and second daughter of His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej (Rama IX) and Her Majesty Queen Sirikit of Thailand.

HRH Princess Sirindhorn celebrated her 67th birthday on Saturday, with officials throughout the country holding special ceremonies and, merit-making and blessing ceremonies in her honour.

The centre was developed under the Plant Genetic Conservation Project, royal initiative of HRH Princess Sirindhorn, explained PRU lecturer Dr Manop Chachiyo, Vice President for Student Affairs, who presided over the opening of the exhibition room and learning centre.

The centre is to be a learning resource for people of all ages to be educated about the conservation and restoration of Andaman biological resources, he said.

The centre was created as part of the Research and Development science centre at the university.

The opening event on Saturday featured a presentation of the exhibition Thai shellfish, Thai heritage, World heritage, showcasing coral species in the region.

Jom Patamakanthin, one of the leading shellfish experts in the country, delivered a special lecture on Biodiversity, the valuable heritage of the nation.

Dr Manop invited people of all ages and all walks of life to visit the centre.

It is open to people of all ages, to be a source of learning, conservation and rehabilitation of Andaman biological resources through sustainable practices, he said.
The Grammys paused to remember Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins just over a week after his sudden death in Columbia.

The Foos were nominated for Best Rock Performance, Best Rock Song and Best Rock Album and they won all three awards - but none were in attendance on the night as they grieved the huge loss of a bandmate and legendary musician.

Host Trevor Noah paid tribute to Taylor in a solemn moment during the ceremony, saying "this would have been the part of the show that I was introducing the Foo Fighters".
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

GRANITE CITY  Dozens of hillbillies and gnomes watched visitors entering the Granite City Moose Lodge on Saturday.

When I retired about six years ago I said, Well, I need something to do, said Paul Shane. So I started doing these gnomes and hillbillies and they really went over big.

Shane, who with his wife, Linda, is the co-owner of Crazy Bob Crafts, was among the vendors who gathered for the Small Business Extravaganza, an indoor fair featuring hand-made items by Granite City entrepreneurs.

I started whittling when I was about 8 years old, said Shane.

He said Saturdays extravaganza was one indication that Granite City is coming back economically.

Especially downtown, the way they are revitalizing it, a lot of businesses are going into downtown, Shane said.

Pam Murray of Simply Irresistible Bombs agreed that the city is experiencing a renaissance.

Our new mayor is bringing a lot to Granite City, Murray said. I think its amazing all of the events that hes really trying to pull together for small businesses.

Murrays local business produces hot cocoa, coffee and tea bombs. In the summer months she said it will have some fun ones, like sweet tea and lemonade bombs.

Its really fun; you put it into your mug and pour hot water or hot milk over the top of them, dissolve, stir and enjoy, said Murray, who liked Saturdays event because its hometown; its really nice to stay local and help out local businesses.

Glen Carbon resident Cheryl Proyaseng came to the Small Business Extravaganza on Saturday in search of some jewelry.

I think this will help to boost Granite City small businesses, mom and pops," she said. "They need all of the help they can get.

"I love craft fairs," she added. "I cant wait for spring because thats when they are all popping up. Any craft fair I see, I go to.

The extravaganza vendors were among the 40 small business that sell products at Sissys Space, a Granite City shop that also sells hippie-type items such as incense, tie-dye, kids games, dream catchers, clothes and bags.

These are all vendors in our store so we decided to get together as small businesses to promote shopping locally, said Sissys Space employee Hannah Groetecke.

We like to promote that," she said. "And hopefully we can bring new life to Granite City and more people open their own small businesses like we did.

Proceeds from Saturdays Small Business Extravaganza also supported the women of Granite City Moose Lodge No. 272.
April is a busy television season this year, with several shows just recently debuting new seasons  "Atlanta" on FX and Hulu and "Bridgerton" on Netflix  and several new shows recently debuting  "Julia" on HBO Go, "The Girl from Plainville" on Hulu and "Moon Knight" on Disney+.

There are also several shows either debuting or starting a new season this week, so here's a preview of some of those shows.

HBO Max

This week sees the premiere of several shows on HBO Max, including "Tokyo Vice," which debuts April 7; "The Invisible Pilot," which debuts April 4 and "A Black Lady Sketch Show," which airs the first episode of the third season on April 8.

"Tokyo Vice," starring Ansel Elgort as journalist Jake Adelstein, is based on Adelstein's memoir examining organized crime in Japan in the 1990s. Adelstein in the show is a journalist working in the highly competitive Japanese newspaper business who gains respect when he begins investigating the Yakuza. "Tokyo Vice" also stars Ken Watanabe, was created by J.T. Rogers, a Tony-winning playwright, and the first episode is directed by Michael Mann ("Heat").

"The Invisible Pilot," a three-part documentary, tells the story of Gary Betzner, who faked his death to live a double life of lawbreaking. The show is directed by Phil Lott and Ari Mark and executive produced by Adam McKay, among others.

"A Black Lady Sketch Show," which has included performers like Quinta Brunson ("Abbott Elementary") and Issa Rae ("Insecure") over its Emmy-winning two-season run, will air the first episode of season three.

Apple TV+

Apple TV+, fresh off an Oscar win for "CODA," may be looking for more prestige TV in the future and will kick off April with "Slow Horses" and air the first episode of the animated series "Pinecone & Pony" on April 8.

"Slow Horses," which aired its first episode on April 1, stars Gary Oldman in a British spy drama as Jackson Lamb, the supervisor of a MI5 division known as Slough House, where disgraced agents are sent. The series is based on a series of mystery-thriller novels and includes cast members like Jonathan Pryce and Kristin Scott Thomas.

"Pinecone & Pony," which begins its run on Friday, is a new animated series from DreamWorks animation and First Generation Films and comes from Canadian comic creator Kate Beaton ("Hark! A Vagrant"). The show is based on Beaton's best-selling book "The Princess and The Pony."

Hulu

Hulu will see "Love Me" kick off the month and the second season of "Woke" join the show this week, as the show is also hosting "Atlanta" throughout the month.

"Love Me," which explores modern love as experienced by different family members at different stages of life, includes stars like Hugo Weaving and Bojana Novakovic and comes from developer Alison Bell and director Emma Freeman. The show was first aired in Australia with Hulu buying the U.S. rights.

"Woke," which stars Lamorne Morris ("New Girl"), about cartoonist Keef Knight, was co-created by Keith Knight and Marshall Todd, is a live-action series with animated elements. Knight takes pride in keeping his comic "Toast & Butter" light and shying away from controversial issues until he is racially profiled and begins seeing and hearing inanimate objects talking to him.

Others

"Better Nate Than Ever," which began airing on April 1 on Disney+, is based on Tim Federle's young adult novel "Better Nate Than Ever" and is about a middle school theater kid Nate Foster (Rueby Wood) who attends an open audition for a Broadway musical with his best friend (Aria Brooks). The show also stars Lisa Kudrow as Nate's Aunt Heidi.

"The Outlaws," which also started airing on April 1 on Amazon Prime Video, comes from creator Stephen Merchant and is a mix of crime drama and comedy. The cast includes Christopher Walken, Eleanor Tomlinson, and Darren Boyd and the filming of the show included Walken painting over an original Banksy street art piece made for the show.
Since taking office, Gov. J.B. Pritzker has been gradually and quietly transforming the Illinois Prisoner Review Board, which is responsible for deciding whether to release some of the states most violent criminals from prison early, to fit his weak on crime agenda.

That is, until now.

Senate Democrats who covered for him for over a year finally had enough of his dangerous gamesmanship.

Until last month, the governor had been appointing some controversial members to the board, hiding them from public scrutiny and preventing them from participating in the constitutionally required Senate confirmation process. Some of those appointees had served for years without ever being confirmed, all while taking a taxpayer-funded $90,000 salary and, in some instances, casting votes to release convicted murderers.

The Illinois Constitution requires that appointees be vetted and confirmed by the Illinois Senate within 60 session days of their appointments. Pritzker, however, has repeatedly circumvented that process, using such tactics as withdrawing appointments before the 60-day deadline and then almost immediately reappointing them to start the clock over.

The issue came to a head in late March when Democrats finally allowed the unconfirmed appointees to come before the Senate Executive Appointments Committee and began to bring them to the full Senate for a vote. The governor withdrew one of his nominees, a convicted double murderer who had previously voted to release a cop killer he served prison time with. Then the first appointee the Democratic-controlled Senate took up was denied confirmation.

Last week, the Senate was scheduled to take up two more. One of these appointees resigned before the vote once it was clear there werent enough votes for confirmation, and the other was resoundingly rejected by the Senate that evening.

Why are lawmakers from both parties so concerned about the Prisoner Review Board? While I can speak only for myself, I think its safe to say that there is a lot of well-deserved concern when a state board is releasing convicted murderers back to the street at a high rate during a statewide spike in violent crime.

The statistics published on the boards website offer a glimpse into what is happening at the Prisoner Review Board under Pritzker, especially when we compare it with the record under other recent governors. Based on the annual reports dating to 2004, Pritzkers board leads the pack in the percentage of adult final discharges granted, releases granted to those imprisoned before 1978 (known as C-number inmates) and clemency petitions that were either granted, expunged or commuted. Pritzkers Prisoner Review Board released C-number inmates at a rate nearly three times as high as the board under Gov. Bruce Rauner, nearly eight times higher than Gov. Pat Quinns board and more than four times as high as Gov. Rod Blagojevichs board.

Indeterminate sentences also define C-number inmates. One such inmate, Ray Larsen, was sentenced to 100 to 300 years in prison for murdering a teen boy in 1972 on Chicagos Northwest Side. Larsen was released last year, then quickly disappeared and became a fugitive from justice. Police apprehended him days later, and his parole was revoked.

Also, according to the published data, Pritzker has granted 93% of clemency petitions. For perspective, the next highest was Quinn at 25%.

Now the Prisoner Review Boards membership is dwindling, and the governor has become unhinged. Weve seen all too often Pritzkers penchant for blaming the failures of his administration on someone else, but hes now taking it to a new level, making wild claims that Republicans are trying to dismantle government. At recent news conferences, when pressed about the situation with the review board, he has resorted to name-calling and talk of Facebook fakery, whatever that means.

This is the current process for Prisoner Review Board appointees: A Democratic governor appoints board members, and the Democrat-supermajority Senate confirms them. The governors appointees need 30 votes to be confirmed. There are 41 Democrats in the chamber. A full quarter of the senators from Pritzkers own party could vote no, and there still would be more than enough Democrats left to confirm his appointees.

So its unclear how the lack of members on the Prisoner Review Board falls at the feet of Republicans. In fact, the last confirmed member of the board was appointed by a Republican and confirmed unanimously in a bipartisan vote.

The reality is that the governor has repeatedly appointed individuals to serve on the Prisoner Review Board who are so controversial that he cant get the members of his party to confirm them. It would be easy to conclude that this fact is why Pritzker has been playing games with this process.

So what does the governor expect the members of the Senate to do? Should we not take our advise and consent responsibility nor our confirmation responsibility seriously? Does he think we should just blindly accept any appointee he puts forward, regardless of potential concern?

Pritzker has made it clear that he has no desire to acknowledge that the legislature is a co-equal branch of government and has the responsibility of ensuring that appointees to the Prisoner Review Board are well suited for the position.

Illinois system of executive appointments has worked quite well for generations, and only the lack of transparency, lack of accountability and political machinations of the current governor have derailed a process that has never been partisan and has never been a problem.

This isnt a political issue. This is a public safety issue, a justice issue and a commonsense issue.

Pritzker is failing all parties involved in this commonsense issue.
SOUTH ROXANA  The South Roxana Police Department plans to seek felony charges after a chase involving a suspected impaired driver ended with several auto accidents.

The name of the suspect is being withheld until formal charges are filed.

The incident occurred at about 12:03 a.m. Monday when South Roxana officers attempted to initiate a traffic stop on a suspected impaired driver. The driver fled, resulting in a vehicle pursuit that ended with a traffic crash in East Alton.

The suspect vehicle fled the scene with heavy damage, while the driver of the other vehicle was taken to a local hospital and treated for injuries.

South Roxana Police Chief Bob Coles responded to the scene and, during a canvas of the area, found the driver and vehicle parked behind a business on Fosterburg Road in Alton. Officers again attempted to take the suspect into custody, resulting in another chase that ended when the suspect rammed Coles police car.

Authorities said the suspect then fled on foot and after a short pursuit was taken into custody in Godfrey. The suspect was transported to the South Roxana Police Department awaiting formal charges.

The Illinois State Police is handling the investigation dealing with the police vehicle.

The suspect was transported to the South Roxana Police Department awaiting formal charges.

Coles thanked the Madison County Sheriffs Department and East Alton Police for their help. He also criticized state lawmakers for failing to support a bill that would increase penalties for those convicted of aggravated fleeing or attempting to elude a police officer.

House Bill 4585 would make a first offense a Class 2 felony instead of the current Class 4 felony. Subsequent offenses could be charged as a Class 1 felony instead of the current Class 3 felony. The bill, introduced Jan. 18 by state Rep. Amy Elik, R-Fosterburg, is currently sitting in the House Rules Committee.

Coles criticized Chicago-area legislators for refusing to consider the bill because it is a penalty enhancement.

Unfortunately, the elected officials in Chicago decided the safety of our citizens are not a concern and refused to even hear (the bill), he said. So for me to hear elected officials out of Chicago claiming they are pro-law enforcement, and the safety of our communities is their focus, is far from the truth.

I guess the approach should be let the impaired drivers go and hope the injuries they caused on one crash doesnt result in another crash where someone else dies, he added.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

EDWARDSVILLE  What started as a double murder Saturday morning in the Collinsville area has resulted in the deaths of three people after the suspect in those killings died Sunday morning.

Maj. Jeff Connor, chief deputy for the Madison County Sheriffs Department, announced at a Sunday evening media conference that the suspect in the double homicide, identified as Adam Cobb, 32, of the 1000 block of McDonough Lake Road, died at 4:40 a.m. Sunday from gunshot wounds sustained in a traffic stop near Hillsboro.

The victims of the Collinsville shooting were identified at Jamie L. Joyner, 30, of the same address, and Jessica Joyner, 34, of California.

Connor said it appeared that Jamie Joyner had told Cobb she was breaking up with him, and her sister had flown in from California to help her move out. Connor said they had pulled up with a U-Haul and a vehicle, there was some kind of altercation and both women, as well as a family dog, were shot and killed.

Police received a 911 call at 10:26 a.m. Saturday from one of the women. Connor said it was probably Jamie Joyner, based on the proximity of a phone to her body.

The call originally went to the Collinsville Police Department but was rerouted to Madison County.

You could hear a person in the background screaming, then a couple of what appears to be gunshots in the background, Connor said.

Because Madison County deputies were dealing with an armed, barricaded subject, Collinsville Police were the first to arrive at the scene.

Upon their arrival, they located two deceased females on the outside of the house, Connor said.

Cobb had fled the scene, but investigators were able to help track him down and that led to his apprehension, which was a pursuit which ended with the Illinois State Police.

This is just a tragic event, and our thoughts, our prayers go out to the Joyner family, and also to the Cobb family, Connor said. There are several families whose lives have been turned upside down by these events.

He said the investigation will continue until authorities have processed all the evidence.

According to the state police, an Illinois State Police Emergency Radio Network warning was sent out at about 11:14 a.m. Shortly after 1 p.m. law enforcement officers spotted Cobb on Illinois 127 near Hillsboro.

Officers pursued Cobb and attempted a traffic stop, joined by ISP troopers. Eventually the pursuit crossed Illinois 16 north to U.S. 51.

After his vehicle became partially disabled, Cobb stopped on U.S. 51 just north of Pana at about 1:53 p.m. According to the ISP, Cobb exited the vehicle and pointed a gun at a state trooper, who fired at Cobb.

Cobb was taken to a regional hospital with serious, life-threatening injuries.

Officials have not involved the 26-yeart ISP veteran involved in the shooting.

The officer-involved shooting is under investigated and will be referred to the Christian County States Attorneys Office.
IVY GOODMAN, Stonington, Girls, Lacrosse, Senior; Goodman scored 12 goals and had 13 assists in three games. Her seven assists in the Bears win over Waterford established a school record. She surpassed the 50-goal mark for the season in Stoningtons victory over Ledyard.

DEAN PONS JR., Westerly, Baseball, Senior; Pons, a senior, struck out 14 batters in the Bulldogs five-inning win against Wheeler School/Rocky Hill. Pons had an assist on the remaining out, throwing out a runner on a groundout. Pons allowed just one hit and walked only two.

KATIE PIERCE, Wheeler, Girls, Lacrosse, Sophomore; Pierce scored five goals and the Lions beat Griswold to earn their first victory of the season. Wheeler avenged an earlier loss to the Wolverines this season with the 15-4 victory.

WEEKO THOMPSON, Chariho, Girls, Track Sophomore; Thompson, a sophomore, bettered her school record in the discus at the Classical Classic meet. She finished first in the event and also won the shot put.

Vote

View Results
Britain has the fifth most affordable broadband of any country in the world relative to people's incomes, according to new figures.

The average broadband connection costs 26.39 per month according to comparison site Uswitch.

The only countries where getting online is more affordable are Israel, Lithuania, France, and Luxembourg.

With the average monthly income in the UK sitting at 2,266, broadband bills account for 1.16 per cent of the average Briton's salary.

Getting online: Britain doesn't offer the cheapest broadband deals in the world, but prices are competitive. The typical connection costs 1.16% of the average person's monthly income

Fast and affordable broadband has become increasingly vital over the last few years with more Brits being able to work from home for some of the time.

Catherine Hiley, broadband expert at Uswitch, said: 'It's fair to say that we have become increasingly dependent on reliable broadband over the last few years.

'While many people have made the switch to working from home, a record number of people have turned to the internet to stay entertained and connected.'

Where is it most expensive to get online?

Uswitch found Israel to be the most affordable country when it comes to broadband packages with an average cost of 18.67 a month  taking up just 0.78 per cent of a person's average monthly income.

While offering a lower average monthly broadband charge at 10.13, Lithuania comes in at second place as it accounts for 0.97 per cent of income where people earn on average 1,043 a month.

Meanwhile Colombia's broadband ranked as the most expensive. There, broadband providers charge an average of 18.69 - but it still ranks poorly as it takes up 5.63 per cent of Colombian users' income, as average earnings in the country are very low.

While Britain is not the cheapest overall, there are deals which undercut the average price.

For example, Uswitch offers a Hyperoptic connection which charges customers 17.99 per month (see 'cheapest broadband deals' below).

Plusnet comes a close second with its Unlimited Broadband and Phone Line deal at just 18.99 - a shave over Israel's average.

Cheapest broadband deals Provider Package Average Speed (Mbps) Perks Set up cost () Cost per month () Contract length Hyperoptic 50Mb Fibre Broadband 50 100 gift card N/A 17.99 24 months Plusnet Unlimited Broadband and Phone Line 10 60 reward card N/A 18.99 12 months Now Broadband Super Fibre & Anytime Calls 63 N/A 5 20 12 months Vodafone Superfast 1 38 N/A N/A 22 24 months Source: Uswitch, correct as at 1 April, 2022

UK lacking when it comes to broadband speed

As well as average broadband costs, Uswitch's research also analysed median download speeds - and the UK did not rank nearly as well as it did on price.

It found that Chile offered the fastest internet speeds overall at 189.36 megabits per second (Mbps).

In this category the UK did not make the top five, ranking just 26th overall for average broadband speed at just 61.69 Mbps.

Uswitch said that Chileans would need just over a minute to download a 1,500 MB HD film, while Brits would have to wait three minutes and 15 seconds to download a file of the same size and quality.

Hiley said: 'It's interesting to see that the UK ranks only 26th for median download speed, averaging less than the top-ranking country, Chile.

'These figures demonstrate that the UK still has a long way to go in terms of offering fast and reliable speeds.'

According to Uswitch the fastest broadband currently on offer is with Virgin Media which offers 1.13Gbps (gigabit per second), through its Gig1 Fibre Broadband deal.

Best broadband deals for speed Provider Package Average speed Perks Set up cost Cost per month () Contract length Virgin Media Gig1 Fibre Broadband 1.13 Gbps N/A N/A 62 18 months Virgin Media M500 Ultrafast Fibre Broadband 516Mbps N/A N/A 36 18 months TalkTalk Ulimited Fibre 150 and Phone Line 145Mbps 50 gift card N/A 29.95 18 months Vodafone Superfast 100 100Mbps N/A N/A 28 24 months Source: Uswitch, correct as at 1 April, 2022

But the UK is not the slowest provider by some distance. Languishing near the bottom is Turkey with a media download speed of just 26.34Mbps.

Hiley added: 'That's around seven times slower than Chile and would take two hours to download a standard HD film.'

Deals offering vouchers and other perks

The best speed or the cheapest deal may not always be a priority, however, with many seeking a deal that offers a bit of both.

And some broadband providers offer other perks like shopping vouchers for those that sign up, which may be preferable for some customers.

However, they are urged not to sign up to a deal for the vouchers alone and still make sure that the broadband they are getting meets their speed and price requirements.

BT offers a 100 virtual reward card through its Fibre 2 deal, costing 31.99 a month.

Check your speed needs: You could overpay for something that doesn't meet your usage needs Uswitch warns

For those looking for something slightly cheaper, TalkTalk offers a 80 gift card through its Unlimited Fibre 65 and Phone Line deal at 23.50 per month.

Whether they are looking for cheaper deal, faster speed or a voucher perk, customers can often benefit from switching.

There may be an exit fee to pay if they leave their existing provider before their fixed-term contract is up.

Best overall broadband deals Provider Package Average Speed (Mbps) Perks Set up cost Cost per month () Contract length BT (Uswitch Exclusive) Fibre 2 67 100 virtual reward card N/A 31.99 24 months TalkTalk Unlimited Fibre 65 and phone line 67 80 N/A 23.50 18 months TalkTalk Fibre 65 65 75 voucher 0 23.50 18 months Vodafone Superfast 2 67 N/A 0 25.00 24 months Virgin Media M100 Fibre Broadband only 100 95 voucher 0 24.00 18 months Source: Uswitch and Broadband Choices, correct as at 1 April, 2022

However, some providers will offer to pay this fee for switchers, and it is also possible to switch without penalty within 30 days if your provider increases your monthly bill.

Hiley said: 'With a reliable connection quickly becoming a fundamental backbone of almost every aspect of life, the need for seamless broadband connectivity grows even stronger.

'If your own broadband isn't up to scratch, or you feel like you're overpaying, then compare ultrafast broadband deals to determine your options.'
Decarbonisation: It's one of the biggest investment opportunities of the next 20 years, so how do you position your portfolio?

Ben Faulkner is communications director at EQ Investors, which provides sustainable investing advice to charities and wealthy investors.

Decarbonisation is one of the biggest investment opportunities of the next 20 years.

As one of the defining challenges of this generation, climate change is not just an environmental concern, but also an economic one.

Already, its changing how businesses operate, governments regulate, and individuals consume.

Transforming the fundamental workings of our globalised economy, away from its reliance on fossil fuels, will require significant innovation and investment.

It is estimated that $125trillion of climate investment is needed by 2050 to achieve net zero emissions.

The sustainable and green revolution will likely be at the scale of the industrial revolution, but be done at the speed of the technology and internet revolution.

Investors should consider funds or trusts investing in businesses that offer products and services that help others to reduce their emissions (climate solutions), companies that have already reduced their carbon emissions (low carbon leaders) as well as selected companies they see an opportunity to engage for change (transition companies).

>>>Funds and trusts to consider for YOUR portfolio: Find Ben's six tips below

Why is decarbonisation so important - and such a great investing opportunity?

Every year, more and more people around the world feel the effects of climate change through recurring extreme weather events that harm life and property and dislocate populations.

It is caused by greenhouse gas emissions, so tackling it is relatively simple in principle  we need to reduce emissions.

In 2015, the 196 signatories to the UN Paris Agreement agreed to keep global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, later revised to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

The International Energy Agency estimates that around $4trillion of investment is required every year and these unprecedented inflows will drive innovation and growth.

Changes will occur across all sectors as they find new ways to meet needs without the associated carbon emissions. Businesses with innovative products and services that provide solutions to the problem of carbon emissions are already positioned to grow.

Subsidies are helping to drive the electric car revolution, renewable energy is becoming price-competitive with fossil fuels, and energy efficiency breakthroughs are enabling greening of our buildings.

Investors can capture these opportunities by investing in companies that are leading the transition in their sectors and providing new ways to avoid carbon.

Investment portfolios should be positioned to capitalise on these themes.

- Biodiversity

- Circular economy

- Energy efficiency

- Green bonds

- Renewable energy

- Sustainable transport

Broad diversification (globally diversified across assets classes) is a sensible approach. Ultimately, most companies will need a net zero strategy.

Which sectors need to be decarbonised the most?

The largest proportion of annual emissions come from our energy use in industry, manufacturing, residential homes, plus our transportation needs. Other large contributors are agriculture (particularly animal farming) and industrial processes like making cement.

Since all these activities serve a purpose and we need to continue to provide such basic services as food, electricity, and housing, all these need to be decarbonised to tackle the climate crisis. See the graph above.

What funds and trusts might you consider for your portfolio?

ML Kayne Anderson Renewable Infrastructure (Ongoing charge: 0.59 per cent)

Portfolio of power companies that are actively building out capacity in the renewables space, as well as those companies actively retiring existing coal assets and replacing them with new renewable assets.

Ben Faulkner: Ultimately, most companies will need a net zero strategy

Ninety One Global Environment (Ongoing charge: 0.78 per cent)

Invests in companies with products and services directly linked to a quantifiable reduction in carbon emissions. Best-in-class for exposure to climate solutions.

Aviva Climate Transition Global Equity (Ongoing charge: 0.85 per cent)

Strategy that looks to push companies (via an engagement programme) to a credible path to net zero. Key aim is to get companies to sign up to the Science Based Targets Initiative which is the gold standard when it comes to corporate decarbonisation plans.

Greencoat UK Wind (Ongoing charge: 1.03 per cent)

Owns onshore and offshore wind generation assets across the UK, a great investment for those that need a stable dividend stream.

NextEnergy Solar (Ongoing charge: 1.12 per cent)

Owns solar generation assets in the UK and Italy, again a potential investment for those wanting a stable income.

Harmony Energy Income Trust (Ongoing charge: 1.54 per cent)

A relatively new trust following an IPO in November 2021, using cutting edge battery and energy storage technologies to help even out volatility in power generation that is inherent from renewable energy.

This is another suitable investment for investors that need a stable income stream in the longer term.
I'm going to give you some numbers  some very big numbers  that may help provide a little context on a recently-listed company I spoke to a few weeks ago.

It starts with the National Infrastructure and Construction Pipeline, which stands at 650billion over the next 10 years. Of that, 200billion will be invested by 2024/25, supporting 425,000 new jobs.

Projects such as HS2, upgrades to other parts of the struggling rail infrastructure and strategic roads upgrades will require an estimated 217,000 additional skilled construction workers in the period to 2025.

Hercules Site Services finds, trains and supplies skilled staff for large civil projects

That's a nightmare if you are a civil engineering company scratching around for trained-up labour to man your sites.

However, it's the perfect storm if your job is to find, train and supply the workforce required to drive forward these landmark projects.

This is exactly what Hercules Site Services does - it finds, trains and supplies skilled staff for large civil projects.

The figures quoted above reveal the infrastructure sector is booming and likely to stay buoyant for the next decade.

It's a point not lost on Brusk Korkmaz, who has been in the construction industry for 20 years and founded Hercules in his spare bedroom in 2008.

Last month, he listed the business on London's AIM market, raising 4million for a market capitalisation of just under 30million.

The proceeds will be used to build on the success to date, ensuring Hercules can take full advantage of some of the work on offer from clients such as Balfour Beatty, Keir and Thames Water.

Stepping back, the group supplies the full gamut of site workers.

So, for example, on the M4 (junctions 3 through 12) it provided 140 people including senior foremen, steel- and ground-workers and traffic marshals.

Not only that, it upskills its teams, provides apprenticeships, and keeps its workers abreast of all the health and safety and corporate social responsibility regulations.

In other words, Hercules is a one-stop shop. All of this is done using state-of-the-art digital capabilities to deploy and manage its workforce.

It has also found a niche, an interesting cross-selling opportunity, in the form of site suction excavation equipment.

The IPO proceeds will be used to ensure it has the systems and people in place to help staff some of the ambitious infrastructure projects outlined above.

Projects such as HS2, upgrades to the rail infrastructure and strategic roads upgrades will require an estimated 217,000 additional skilled construction workers in the period to 2025

The big current opportunity is HS2 Northern Section: Hercules is one of six companies tasked with finding the 4,000 workers required to deliver the ramp-up project.

'We are also well placed to supply the skilled labour required to deliver incredible projects such as the Lower Thames Crossing and National Highways, regional development programmes and water sector projects,' says CEO Korkmaz.

'You know, there's a massive growth opportunity and with the funds we raised we can capitalise on it.'

Looking ahead, Hercules has been included in partnerships and frameworks with blue-chip clients, Korkmaz confirms. 'So, inevitably this year and next we will see other big projects kicking off,' he adds.

In trying to benchmark Hercules it may be worth looking at some of the larger recruiters over this results season and assessing two things: profit margins and their susceptibility to the economic ebbs and flows.

The comparisons might just surprise a few people.

Of course, Korkmaz can't really speak to the valuation of the company he runs  that's for the market to decide.

However, he notes: 'We are operating in the infrastructure sector, working for blue-chip clients who are working on the massive government programmes.

'I think they and we are well placed in the market and the next 10 years seem really, really positive.'

How many other CEOs can say that about their business?
A taxpayer-backed investment firm has sacked a millionaire tech entrepreneur after he was charged with sexual assault.

Stefan Glaenzer has been dismissed by Passion Capital, which has received funding from the British Business Bank and owns a stake in the banking app Monzo.

Passion Capital said it 'recently learned of criminal charges brought against Stefan Glaenzer' and had cut 'all contractual commitments'.

Charges: Stefan Glaenzer has been dismissed by Passion Capital, which has received funding from the British Business Bank

Glaenzer is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates' Court in central London on Thursday.

The firm is 'actively seeking' to exercise any rights to stop him gaining financially from its success, and removing his involvement from its entities.

It added that Glaenzer 'had not had an active role with the firm since his departure in 2018'.

Although he reportedly ceased to be involved in investing decisions then, he is said to have continued as a manager of certain funds.
Builders' merchant Travis Perkins will no longer buy 'conflict timber' from Russia and Belarus because of the war in Ukraine.

French manufacturer Saint-Gobain has taken the same approach since the invasion by Russian president Vladimir Putin.

Leading forest certification organisations ruled last month that all products originating in Russia and Belarus would be considered 'conflict timber'.

Ban: Leading forest certification organisations ruled last month that all products originating in Russia and Belarus would be considered 'conflict timber'

A spokesman for Travis Perkins, which owns the retailer Toolstation, said: 'We work with our suppliers to make sure the timber we purchase comes from certified Forest Stewardship Council or Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification sources, and we have ensured that we have made no purchases of anything designated as conflict timber.'

The disrupted flow of supply is likely to push prices up, the trade body Timber Development UK said.

It also warned that it would take time for existing 'pre-conflict' timber to 'flush through the system'.
British retailers such as Asos and B&Q owner Kingfisher are being targeted by hedge funds making huge bets that they will struggle.

As the cost-of-living crisis spirals, short-sellers are targeting companies whose shares could drop.

Other targets include Boohoo, Aston Martin, Dixons Carphone and Royal Mail.

Struggle: Targets include Boohoo (pictured), Aston Martin, Dixons Carphone and Royal Mail

Research shows Britons are restricting spending to essentials, leaving purchases such as clothing, furniture and white goods on the shelves.

Investors can short a stock  or bet against it  by borrowing and selling it on the assumption its price will fall and they will be able to buy it back cheaper and pocket the difference.

Boohoo, Kingfisher, Naked Wines and AO World are among the top ten shorted stocks.

Others being lined up include leisure firms such as Cineworld, which is the most exposed, with 8.1 per cent of its shares being shorted.

Neil Wilson, chief analyst at the online trading platform Markets. com, said: 'There is a perfect storm for retailers and brands who have little to no pricing power. They're very exposed to rising input costs and falling consumer demand.'
Homebuyers who make their properties greener should get their stamp duty back, some of Britain's leading bosses have demanded.

The call for action from business chiefs including Chris O'Shea, head of the energy giant Centrica, came in a letter to Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng ahead of his energy security strategy, which is set to be revealed this week.

A stamp duty rebate is among a package of demands to promote energy efficiency amid a worsening cost-of-living crisis for households largely driven by soaring fuel bills.

Cash back: A stamp duty rebate is among a package of demands to promote energy efficiency

The letter  signed by members of the Sustainable Homes and Buildings Coalition including CEOs such as Carl Arntzen of boiler manufacturer Worcester Bosch and NatWest Retail's David Lindberg  sets out an eight-pronged plan.

This includes a proposal for 'stamp duty reform' to include a rebate to households that 'improved their energy efficiency within two years of buying', as well an adjustment to the tax 'based on the energy efficiency of a home'.

A source said: 'There really is no time to wait  the Government needs to think urgently and creatively about the problem looking at absolutely everything. Stamp duty reform could really move the dial.'

An existing homeowner moving into a 250,000 property could save 2,500 in stamp duty payments. This could rise to 15,000 for a buyer purchasing a 500,000 home.

In November, the average British house price exceeded 270,000 for the first time.

Other proposals in the letter include a public information campaign around energy efficiency, a doubling down on 'funding and ambition in the social housing sector' and a national housing audit to 'understand the exact state of the housing stock'.

The signatories say their demands are a response to a 'backdrop of unprecedented rises in the cost of energy and the heightened concerns over energy security'.

A Government spokesman said: 'Our Heat and Buildings Strategy set out a comprehensive package of measures to retrofit the nation's buildings.

'We are also accelerating our progress in upgrading the energy efficiency of England's homes, investing over 6.6billion to decarbonise homes and buildings and bringing in higher performance standards.

'Last week we announced plans to reform the VAT reliefs for families looking to install energy-saving materials.'
Kingsport, TN (37660)

Today

Thunderstorms, some strong this evening followed by occasional showers overnight. Damaging winds, large hail and possibly a tornado with some storms. Low 56F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms, some strong this evening followed by occasional showers overnight. Damaging winds, large hail and possibly a tornado with some storms. Low 56F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%.
To designer Nicole Miller, fashion was all around her while growing up. She remembers the time when you couldnt walk down 7th Avenue in Manhattan without seeing people dressed to the nines or looking chic while getting on a plane. Born in Paris and raised in the United States, Nicole became obsessed with fashion at an early age. She drew early inspiration from old pictures of her French mother in Paris and by reading the fashion magazines her mother had shipped in from France while her father ran a business in the garment district. Fashion was her world. As a kid, Nicole aspired to be a model. She idolized the top models of that 60s  Twiggy, Veruschka, and Jean Shrimpton, to name a few. Living in Western Massachusetts, she would jump at any chance to travel to New York just to shop and would return to her small town with her new edgy outfits. When she realized she would never be tall enough to be a runway model, she pivoted and turned her focus on designing clothes.

Related: 8 Things You Need to Become a Successful Fashion Entrepreneur

Directly after high school, she attended the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), where she received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in apparel design. There she studied 2D/3D design, illustration, life and fashion drawing as well as anthropology and art history. She spent a year in Paris at Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture where she mastered the classic French techniques of haute couture. During school, she had several internships, one of which started her legendary design career. Her internship experience was priceless. Working for a popular, hip and trendy designer, she enjoyed the process, designing, production and most of all, the fashion shows. Although working her dream job, she felt a void. She left to design raincoats, a personal passion of Millers as shes one to obsess over detailing and hardware. One of her raincoat designs was eventually featured in the New York Times among other publications.

Shortly after, Miller got her big break working for a new contemporary and sportswear company, P.J. Walsh that was just launching in the U.S. Within only a few years, she worked her way up to lead designer. The company ended up folding and Miller was forced to pivot again. This time, along with her business partner, they scrounged together $100,000 and took her former colleagues to start her own company, Nicole Miller, established in 1982.

Related: The Secret to Being a Successful Fashion Entrepreneur

For Miller, sketching never stops as she continuously ideates new designs, concepts and techniques. Though, through all the success, Miller has received her share of disappointment. During her first year in business, she had a problem with production not thoroughly inspecting a beaded top which fell apart when customers tried it on. All her profits had to be returned. Disappointments will come, and you have to be resilient and work through it. One day, you could think you made something great, but it doesnt sell. Becomes a really big reality check. Then you analyze and figure out why it didnt sell.

But rising from the ash can be magic. After the production debacle, Miller had designed an Asian blouson dress with a smocked elastic hip, somewhat avant garde for its time. The dress took off and increased the company revenue into the millions. It was the piece that got the company through the first year and versions of it were made by other designers. Duplication is the best form of flattery. Trends tend to go through some type of renaissance and Miller understands old designs may eventually be replicated. What Miller does not agree with is copying the exact design and claiming it as original.

If theres advice she can give to young designers, first is to develop your identity early. Although there are designers that are versatile, the more focused you are, the better you become as you grow as a designer She also recommends, Dont be stubborn. Allow yourself to expand. She credits her licensing business as part of the success of her company. Nicole Miller licensed products include eyewear, footwear, handbags, home goods, cookware and more. People have not wanted to do it. Ive done licenses and am really happy to do it.

Related: 10 Pieces of Advice I Wish Every Woman Could Hear

Being in business for four decades, Miller has received quite a bit of notoriety, but she takes the recognition in stride. Yes, people do ask if I am the Nicole Miller. I still get surprised since there are so many people with my name. She eventually plans to step away from the brand, but in the meantime, shell continue to enjoy the perks. My name is really good for restaurant reservations.

Copyright 2022 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved
ALBANY  IBM and New York state have formally announced an official coalition of tech companies, universities and government organizations that are supporting the effort to locate a multi-billion-dollar federal computer chip research program at Albany Nanotech.

The new 56-member group, which has been months in the making, has been officially named the American Semiconductor Innovation Coalition after the group wrote a white-paper that outlined its strategy and reasons why the program should be located in Albany with satellite hubs across the country.

The CHIPS Act, which was initially created by U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, is a $52 billion subsidy package for the computer chip industry to expand the chip industry's supply chain and manufacturing footprint in the U.S. to combat China's growing influence in the industry. It has yet to be passed by Congress but has the support of President Joe Biden.

The U.S. is worried that if China annexes Taiwan, it will cause a huge chip shortage in the U.S. and elsewhere since a huge amount of the advanced chips in the world are made in Taiwan by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. China itself is also gaining ground as a top chipmaker, which is bad news for U.S. political and military policy since China is seen as the biggest global threat to the U.S.

The CHIPS Act would provide billions of dollars in federal funding to any chipmaker that wants to build new factories in the U.S. It also would create two separate but aligned federal chip research labs called the National Semiconductor Technology Center and the National Advanced Packaging Manufacturing Program. Chip packaging is the technology used to put a protective envelope around chips and connect them to the devices that they operate.

The list of members of the American Semiconductor Innovation Coalition includes IBM and various New York state entities, including NY CREATES, the entity that manages Albany Nanotech for the state, as well as the State University of New York system, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, UCLA, MIT, Cornell University, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the University of Michigan, the University of Minnesota and several tenants at Albany Nanotech, including Applied Material and Tokyo Electron.

The new coalition, which has representation from 19 states and the District of Columbia, has already responded to a request for information from the U.S. Commerce Department, which would fund the labs.
ALBANY  Gov. Kathy Hochul's deal to build a new stadium for the Buffalo Bills is continuing to spark controversy.

On Monday morning, the deal was facing attack on two fronts as lawmakers prepare to finalize a state budget this week.

Michael Henry, a Republican candidate for attorney general, has filed a complaint with the Joint Commission on Public Ethics seeking an investigation into whether Hochul's involvement in the the deal violated state Public Officers Law. Henry cited a Times Union article published Monday which highlighted the potential conflicts of interests for the governor and her husband's employer, hospitality and food services giant Delaware North. Hochul's administration said the governor abided by all ethics rules.

In the letter Henry wrote to JCOPE, he noted that Hochul's top aide, Karen Persichilli Keogh, is married to a lobbyist at the firm Bolton-St. Johns, which has represented Delaware North. Henry suggests that could be another possible conflict of interest.

However, in February 2021 Bolton's lobbying contract with Delaware North was terminated. So it appears the lobbying firm hasn't worked for Delaware North for more than a year. (Part of the confusion may be that lobbying "terminations" are no longer posted on JCOPE's website, and have to be obtained from its press officer.)

On another front, the "Bills in Buffalo" committee, the Buffalo Chapter of the NAACP, and the City of Buffalo Common Council sent a letter on Monday to every member of the Legislature arguing that putting the stadium in downtown Buffalo  not suburban Orchard Park as planned  is the only solution "both fiscally prudent and socially responsible."

While the construction cost would be about $400 million more at the "South Park" site in Buffalo, the positive economic impact of a stadium would be vastly greater in Buffalo than Orchard Park, the groups argue.

Read the two letters here.

Michael Henry to JCOPE:

Groups' letter to Legislature:
Jae C. Hong/Associated Press

ALBANY  Thoroughbred trainer Bob Baffert will not be allowed to compete at New York horse racing tracks through at least July 2, the New York Gaming Commission said Monday, in an announcement that it would honor the suspension issued by Kentucky regulators.

Baffert, a renowned trainer, was suspended for 90 days in Kentucky after one of his horses, Medina Spirit, who placed first in the 2021 Kentucky Derby, tested positive for betamethasone, a drug that's not permitted on race day. Medina Spirit was disqualified and later died. Baffert also received multiple other drug violations in 2021 and preceding years.
Sure, exploring the 180-mile corridor from Grand Teton to Yellowstone National Park on foot or by bike is cool. But that rail trail cant beat the one that winds through our backyard.

New Yorks 750-mile long Empire State Trail, which runs from New York City to Canada and Albany to Buffalo, bested all others from coast to coast in Outside Magazines ranking of the top 25 rail trails in the U.S.

New York bookended the list. In addition to the Empire State Trail at the top, New York States 7-mile Keuka Lake Outlet Trail, which runs from Penn Yan to Dresden in the Finger Lakes  along which people can view the 40-foot Seneca Mills Falls  was ranked 25th.

Theres a lot of abandoned rail lines all over the country that are being converted into walking and biking trails, Seth McKee, Executive Director of the Scenic Hudson Land Trust and Land Programs, told the Times Union: Hudson Valley earlier this year. Its been great for local economies and quality of life.

Including New Yorks two trails, the Northeast captured six slots on Outsides list, including the 73-mile Delaware and Raritan Canal State Park Trail in New Jersey (ranked 11th), the 58-mile Northern Rail Trail in New Hampshire (ranked 12th), Rhode Islands 14-mile waterfront East Bay Bike Path (ranked 22nd), and Vermonts popular 13-mile Island Line Rail Trail (ranked 23rd), which connects users with such state treasures as the Green Mountains and Lake Champlain.

The West dominated the list of must-visit rail trails, like the under-development 90-mile Olympic Discovery Trail in Washington, which will connect nearly 140 miles from the Puget Sound to the Pacific Ocean upon completion, and the gorgeous 13-mile Moab Canyon Pathway in Utah, which terminates near another mountain biking and ATV trailhead.

Downtime is the best time Make the most of your Hudson Valley weekend, every week with our newsletter.

Outside Magazine describes the countrys nearly 25,000 miles of rail trails as having transformed Americas outdoor spaces. Here in the Hudson Valley, visitors flock to the popular Wallkill Valley Rail Trail in Ulster County, Harlem Valley Rail Trail, among others.

The Dutchess County Urban Trail joins 67 other rail trail projects across New York State, where there are currently 122 total rail trails. In Poughkeepsie, a new 2.7 mile urban rail trail at the CSX rail corridor is in the works.

The Empire State Trail, which is 75 percent off-road and 25 percent on-road, is the longest multi-use trail in the country, stretching from New York City to Albany with the Hudson Valley Greenway Trail, from Albany to Canada with the Champlain Valley Trail, and from Albany to Buffalo with the Erie Canalway Trail.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

ALBANY  New York's cannabis regulators kicked off public education efforts on Monday, focusing the first phase of a statewide media campaign on four messages: consumption of marijuana outside of the medical program is legal only for adults; those who choose to partake should smoke away from others; keep cannabis out of reach of children and pets; and refrain from driving while high.

Presenters played campaign segments at Monday's launch event, which was hosted by the Office of Cannabis Management (OCM) with speakers from the Office of Addiction Services and Supports (OASAS) and the state Department of Health. While the ads contain only simplified directions in a typical public service tone, event speakers elaborated on the rationale behind the messages.

"We know that the illicit cannabis market has been growing," said Dr. Chinazo Cunningham, the newly appointed OASAS commissioner. "We've seen candy and food infused with cannabis. We see marketing that often targets young people. And we don't know what the content of cannabis is right now."

Chris Alexander, the OCM's executive director, reminded the attendees that while cannabis is legal to use, the only regulated businesses selling products in the state are those within the medical program.

Alexander echoed Cunningham's note that the safety of unregulated cannabis being sold and gifted across the state is unknown, and that his office is working to shut down illicit operations.

But Alexander said his hope for the campaign, which his team is calling "Cannabis Conversations"  the same name as a series of public meetings held recently by Cannabis Control Board Chairwoman Tremaine Wright  is to start a genuine dialogue about the recreational industry before its first legal sales, which he expects will occur by the end of this year thanks to the state's recently announced conditional licensing plans.

"We've got 100 years of stigma to undo, to reeducate the state of New York on what cannabis is, how it can be used, how it can benefit their lives, but also the risks where they exist," Alexander said.

Allan Clear, who works in drug-user health for the state health department, said the campaign's messages should be useful for cannabis consumers as well as those concerned for their family or friends.

The results are in See the winners of each category of the 2022 Best of the Capital Region contest, as determined by popular vote.

"Whether you favored legalization or not, I think we can all agree, it's important to ensure that New Yorkers have fact-based information," Clear said, noting that research will be key as the state begins to "leave criminalization behind us and really focus on improving public health outcomes."

It has been a year since New York passed a law decriminalizing marijuana use, but Alexander said research conducted by his office in preparation for the campaign found plenty of the state's residents are out of the loop.

"We found that very few New Yorkers knew that we had legalized at all," Alexander said. "That was a big problem."

The newly launched education campaign will bring those residents up to speed, as well as focusing on the four key messages selected by regulators. It will begin with public service announcements in English and Spanish on television, radio, public transit, billboards and social media.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

ALBANY - Hank Greenberg tackled corruption as a federal prosecutor, advised top state officials as a counsel in state government and spoke from a critical legal pulpit as president of the New York State Bar Association.

But in more than 35 years practicing law, the Albany attorney has never seen anything like he'll be seeing soon.

Greenberg was scheduled to fly Sunday night to Poland to witness first-hand the extraordinary relief efforts under way to help refugees desperately fleeing their native Ukraine as the eastern European national is facing a vicious Russian invasion. Greenberg, a shareholder in the firm of Greenberg Traurig, is part of a delegation of observers from the Jewish Federation of Northeastern New York, part of the larger Jewish Federations of North America.

On Monday, the group will visit the border village of Medyka, population 2,800, where Ukrainians have fled to escape the Kremlin-led carnage on their homeland. In six weeks of war, more than 6 million Ukrainians have been displaced, with more than four million refugees, according to news reports.

Medyka, a village dating to the Middle Ages, is just about 50 miles west of Lviv, the Ukrainian city that only days ago was struck by two Russian missiles.

"This is a humanitarian crisis in the West  absolutely epic proportions," Greenberg told Law Beat. "The people that are going to be crossing the border that I'm going to see are going to be coming hundreds and hundreds of miles in some cases to get there."

Greenberg explained the purpose of the trip was to bear witness to the conditions, meet with refugees and bring knowledge of what he learned back to the Capital Region to share with as many people as possible. He said people may wish to donate to groups working to assist the refugees.

"What I want to do is call attention and raise awareness to an aspect of the war that perhaps doesn't get as much attention as the actual strategy of the war ... the consequence of war, the casualties of war, the refugees ... and calling attention to their plight," Greenberg said. "This is a humanitarian crisis we haven't seen in 80 years and it's only going to grow. We are just six weeks into the war."

Greenberg is of Russian, Polish and Ukrainian descent. All four of his grandparents immigrated from eastern Europe, but he previously held no intentions of visiting Russia or Poland or Ukraine.

Plans change when Europe faces a crisis it has not experienced since World War II, which ended in 1945. And Greenberg said history weighs heavily on the minds of all who lived through it and remember the horrors of Adolf Hitler's genocidal Nazi regime.

Now, the invasion of Ukraine comes under the orders of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"This is central Europe and we know what happens when a sociopath dictator marches into sovereign democratic nations and invents a pretext (for war)," Greenberg said of Putin. The Russian dictator has claimed the war is to accomplish the "denazification" of Ukraine  comparing the Ukraine, whose president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is Jewish and who lost relatives in The Holocaust  to Nazi Germany.

The results are in See the winners of each category of the 2022 Best of the Capital Region contest, as determined by popular vote.

"What's extraordinary in these polarizing times in which we're living, here is an issue that has literally unified the West around its opposition to what Putin is doing and unified support in this country for the Ukraine," Greenberg said. "You can't do enough."

Putin's forces have indiscriminately bombed civilian populations, attacked maternity wards, Red Cross centers, fired arms at a nuclear reactor and reduced the Ukrainian city of Mariupol to rubble, Greenberg noted.

For their part, the Jewish Federations of North America program has raised and allocated more than $41.9 million to help the Jewish community of Ukraine and others facing difficulties in the war. The local federation has raised nearly $100,000, it said in a news release.

The effort is intended to ensure displaced Ukrainians get the basics of life.

"These are people who are leaving their country  destination unknown," Greenberg told Law Beat. "They need, food. They need medical care. Many of the are victims experiencing PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) in the trauma of war. The cost of providing that kind of assistance is going to be staggering. And that's not even talking about when the war is over, the cost of rebuilding the Ukraine, rebuilding Mariupol."

Unlike the refugees he will meet, Greenberg's destination for this week is known. He was not nervous heading to the Ukrainian border, he said.

"The intensity, the experience, I'm sort of bracing myself for," he said. "Seeing that much human suffering in the raw is not something I've encountered before in my life."
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate

SCHENECTADY  The City Council started 2019 in a hurry, approving changes to CDTA taxi fees, battling with the mayor over his proposal to slash a city judgeship and launching a sidewalk replacement program.

Leaders proposed banning plastic straws, laid the foundation for a 180-day moratorium on new liquor stores and used their bully pulpit to take City Hall to task over its poor upkeep of distressed and city-owned properties.

And that was just the first six months.

Their remaining schedule was just as fast-paced: Lawmakers tweaked the sidewalk effort, expanded downtown's footprint, pondered how to address packs of kids on bikes and clashed with Mayor Gary McCarthy during a contentious budget year and over his administration's controversial snow removal policies.

That seems to be a high-water mark for productivity. In the year's since, the council's assertive approach faded. Lawmakers are now on the defensive amid years of infighting. Few legislative items are being proposed and passed.

Is Schenectady experiencing a failure to launch?

We act on whats proposed, said City Council President Marion Porterfield, who sets the agenda. We have to look at legislation being proposed for us to act on it.

The current council, which features several new members, is still getting its sea legs, Porterfield said.

Pedestrian business is churning: Every week brings procedural and symbolic resolutions that keep the government running, including procurements and equipment purchases, as well as the sale of city-owned properties.

There just hasnt been as much brought forward (from the City Council), Porterfield said.

Yet three months into a new session that has three rookie council members, the council's lone marquee accomplishment has been to open up applications for the civilian body weighing how to spend Schenectady's alloted American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding.

Several lawmakers have argued that they're still digging out from the pandemic. COVID-19s emergence in March 2020 slimmed down agendas and saw the body pivot to working with City Hall on navigating a reduced workforce, trimming costs and lobbying for federal relief.

Police reform sparked by the murder of George Floyd in May 2020 resulted in city police reevaluating operations with public feedback, a role guided by City Council.

The conclusion of the year-long reform process coincided with an 2021 election season marred by dysfunction, allegations of racism and power clashes. And while City Council depleted by two resignations had made efforts to discuss official business  cutting crime at corner stores, exploring residential parking fees and cracking down on fireworks and speeding  few steps resulted in actual policymaking.

At the same time, Albanys process for how to divvy out millions in relief fund began last April with a task force made up of almost four dozen members, a body that later issued a report breaking down a number of focus areas. It also recommended funding fewer  but more impactful projects  rather than spreading the money around the city.

The city of Albany expected to announce awards in late May or early June.

Albanys Common Council has also been deliberating legislation that would transfer power from the citys mayor to the council, including a proposal that would overhaul the citys approach to public safety and policing.

Porterfield acknowledges lawmakers can quicken their pace: "We're laser-focused on ARPA," she said.

And race, which animated last year's competitive contests, has left behind its fumes:

Members continue to grapple with the aftermath of a year that saw then-City Council President John Mootooveren accused of making committee picks based on race and the City Council chamber become a hotbed for racial debate.

Its coming to the surface and were addressing it, said Porterfield, noting all members will take implicit bias training this year.

The results are in See the winners of each category of the 2022 Best of the Capital Region contest, as determined by popular vote.

Councilman Carl Williams, who was elected last year, acknowledges the slower pace, but he views the approach as one designed to be thorough.

Theres a deliberate approach to be more transparent, Williams said.

Former Councilwoman Leesa Oliver acknowledged the blistering pace when she sat on the body and agreed newcomers needed time to acclimated.

We discussed a lot of things, said Oliver, who stepped down in early 2021. But how many were a waste of time?

Councilwoman Carmel Patrick said much of her work is quietly done behind the scenes, such as organizing tours of City Hall for young women. And talking individually with constituents about their concerns and quality-of-life issues is typically done away from the spotlight.

Like Williams, Doreen Ditoro has only been on City Council for four months. I cant speak to whats happened over the past three years, said Ditoro, who declined to comment further.

Mootooveren didnt respond for comment, while City Councilman John Polimeni said he was unavailable.

McCarthy agrees the pace has slowed, making him wary about how fast lawmakers can get the remaining $11 million in stimulus funds out the door.

Things are moving slower, but it has not hampered things or created any significant problems, he said.

He hopes council's do not drag their feet on one important matter: He was quick approval of $300,000 for a summer youth employment program.

This has been potentially adversely impacted and we might not be able to do it, McCarthy said.

 Steve Hughes contributed reporting
To commuters who try to dodge Albany residential parking rules by taking a free street space, then going out every two hours to move their car down the block: Nope. Clever, but nope.

Under the system in place since 2013, most visitors to neighborhoods near the Capitol can get only two hours of free street parking. To stop the practice of car-shuffling, the Common Council is looking at allowing authorities to ticket a non-permitted car thats been parked for more than two hours anywhere in the same designated zone.

Residents of Center Square, Mansion and other Capitol-area neighborhoods fought hard for the right to park near their own homes. In neighborhoods that were built before cars proliferated, many residences lack off-street parking. Before residential permits, you could have a back seat full of groceries, or an elderly relative who needed help getting inside, and no chance of parking within six blocks of your own front door. The result: double-parked cars and traffic snarls. And if you lived elsewhere and wanted to drive down to Lark Street to grab lunch, visit a friend, or go shopping on a workday? Forget it. The first-come, first-served parking model was bad for business and bad for residents.

It took years to overcome city and state resistance to a resident parking system. The rules reflect the fact that these areas are more than car storage lots for commuters. Theyre neighborhoods, and people are trying to live in them. The Common Council is right to protect that.

No special treatment

State Court of Appeals Associate Judge Jenny Rivera is among the 160 court employees statewide whose job is in jeopardy because of a failure to get vaccinated against COVID-19.

The 156 of them who arent judges were told to get inoculated, pronto, or get canned.

The four judges on the list will be referred to the state Commission on Judicial Conduct, which will weigh whether to discipline or remove them.

Judge Rivera and the other judges should be held to the same standard as any other state worker. If they are found to have no valid reason for vaccine refusal, they should be made to step down. There still a pandemic going on.

Let in some sunlight

Sign up for the Observation Deck newsletter Read the latest Times Union opinion, perspective and letters to the editor on Mondays by signing up for our Observation Deck newsletter.

How much did it cost to house an inmate at the Moriah Shock Incarceration Facility?

The Department of Corrections and Community Supervision says it wont tell, absent a Freedom of Information Law request. However, DOCCS readily offers up that the program has saved the department more than $1.59 billion since it began in 1987. Thats all fine and well, but it fits a pattern from DOCCS: It freely provides information that reflects well on its work, and stonewalls on information that might not.

In one sense, the inmate cost question is a moot point, since Moriah Shock was closed on March 10. But its hard for the public to judge whether the closure was a good move without all the relevant information, including cost per inmate. And secrecy over data snarls other matters that should be open to public analysis and debate. Earlier this year, for example, the Legal Aid Society sued DOCCS over a denied FOIL request, attempting to compel the agency to release a report on the rate of suicides in New York prisons.

Public information belongs to the public. Its not the agencys to parcel out as it chooses to fit its narrative.
TROY  An attorney for Rensselaer County Executive Steven F. McLaughlin is asking a judge to dismiss a two-count felony indictment filed against the former state assemblyman, who is charged with using campaign funds to pay off a $3,500 debt to a former aide.

The indictment handed up in December accuses McLaughlin of illegally using $5,000 in campaign funds  just weeks after winning election to his county position  to pay off a debt to his former Assembly chief of staff, Jennifer R. Polaro. He is also charged with falsely reporting the expense in campaign filings as a payment for political consulting service.

McLaughlin allegedly stole $5,000 in funds from his campaign account on Nov. 21, 2017  just weeks after winning election to his county post  and then falsely reported the expense in campaign documents filed with the state Board of Elections.

In a related case, which is also being prosecuted by the attorney general's office, Polaro was arrested in March 2020 and charged with grand larceny, a felony, and petit larceny, a misdemeanor, for allegedly withdrawing funds from the former assemblyman's campaign account and spending the money at Rivers Casino in Schenectady nearly five years ago. Polaro pleaded guilty two years ago to a misdemeanor larceny charge in Schenectady City Court.

She has been cooperating with law enforcement authorities and testified before the grand jury that indicted McLaughlin.

McLaughlin is accused of authorizing his campaign treasurer, Philip Vecchio, to write a check from the political account to Hudson Valley Strategies, a consulting firm owned and operated by Richard Crist, a GOP operative who is the county's operations director and a close political ally of the county executive. The indictment states that Crist allegedly deposited the check in the bank account of his firm, Hudson Valley Strategies, and then drafted a new check  for $3,500  that he gave to Polaro a few hours later.

In addition to the check, Crist also turned over an iPad and laptop computer that belonged to her and that McLaughlin had been using.

The motion filed recently by Benjamin W. Hill, McLaughlin's attorney, asserts that the sequence of events involving the payment is not larceny under New York penal law, in part because the campaign payment to Crist's firm for consulting services is not alleged to be illegal. The motion also contends that McLaughlin did not file a fraudulent document with the state Board of Elections when he listed a $5,000 payment for consulting services.

"The people adduced no proof whatsoever in the grand jury, circumstantial or direct, that the $5,000 payment to HVS was fraudulent, unearned, unauthorized, or otherwise illegitimate," Hill wrote in the motion. "Rather, all of the proof submitted to the grand jury focused on the existence of a debt owed to Ms. Polaro and HVS's $3,500 payment to her."

A response motion filed by the state attorney general's office, alleges the "pass-through" payment to Polaro was an illegal use of campaign funds. In the grand jury, Vecchio, who is an attorney and accountant, "testified that he was never told that any of the monies were intended for someone other than Crist," the motion states.

"The fact that the payment to Polaro was routed through HVS and Crist reveals the nefarious nature of the transaction," the attorney general's motion adds. "It is elementary that McLaughlin could have paid the debt to Polaro directly from his personal funds. Instead, McLaughlin set into motion a scheme whereby (his) campaign funds were used to settle this debt under the guise of the payment of 'consultation' fees to HVS."

McLaughlin and Polaro, who served as his district director in the Assembly before becoming chief of staff, had a troubled working relationship, including in 2017, the same year that she admitted withdrawing campaign funds during casino outings.

In December 2017, Polaro alleged that she was pressured by the lawmaker to retract her accusations four months earlier that he had roughed her up during a heated argument at his residence.

She told the Times Union that she had changed her story to "save" McLaughlin's political career.

Following the Aug. 7 argument at McLaughlin's residence, the aide recorded a conversation in which she could be heard telling the assemblyman: "You put your hands on me for the last time today. ... Did you ever think I was going to let you beat me up and get away with it?"

Minutes after the argument, Polaro sent a series of text messages to McLaughlin that included a close-up photograph that showed apparent bruises and small cuts near her ear. She also took a separate photograph of several deep scratches on her chest below her right shoulder.

"Awesome job Steve!!! Awesome. Mild concussion. Where would you like me to send the paper work," she wrote, according to a copy of the text messages obtained by the Times Union. "Not to mention the 2 tears in my earlob (sic). Along with multiple scratch and bruises."

"No clue what you are talking about," McLaughlin wrote back.

"Are you serious?!!" she responded. "You know exactly what I'm talking about ... beating the shit out of me."

McLaughlin also publicly denied Polaro's accusations. He pleaded not guilty to the criminal charges during his arraignment on Dec. 1 and stated publicly that he intends to fight the charges in court.
ALBANY  Gov. Kathy Hochul's recent announcement that funding for a new Buffalo Bills stadium included $418 million secured from the Seneca Nation brought immediate rebuke from the nation's president, who cast it as a "sweetheart deal" for the company that employs Hochul's husband.

Matthew Pagels, president of Seneca Nation, also noted that to secure the funds, Hochul's administration had briefly crippled the nation when her administration issued subpoenas freezing their key banking assets in order to leverage the payment to the state.

Hochul's office denies there was a conflict of interest involving the new stadium deal and her husband's role with Delaware North, a global hospitality and and food service company. But questions about that connection may continue, and lobbying records indicate another emerging issue involving the Seneca Nation.

Late last year, a top Albany lobbying firm, Dickinson & Avella, reported lobbying four top state budget officials  including state budget director Robert Mujica  on behalf of Delaware North. The topic was the "Seneca Nation Compact," according to state records.

The Seneca Nation Compact is a contentious 2002 agreement in which the nation agreed to pay substantial casino revenue to New York; it was that deal which Hochul succeeded in enforcing last week to secure $564 million from the Senecas.

A Division of Budget spokesman, Shams Tarek, said that the discussion with Dickinson & Avella was a "completely unrelated matter" to Hochul's securing the more than half a billion dollars.

Instead, in the the discussions with Hochul's administration, Delaware North was trying to shape certain aspects of a new gambling compact between the Seneca Nation and New York  an agreement that Hochul could well be charged with signing.

Delaware North and the Seneca Nation are fierce competitors over gambling customers in western New York, where the nation operates three casinos. The Seneca Nation contends that Delaware North is improperly allowed by the state to operate two gambling parlors in its "exclusive" gaming zone, which was created under the 2002 agreement: one near Buffalo and one in Farmington.

Late last year, according to the Division of Budget, Delaware North was pressing for "changes to operational restrictions placed upon them by the Seneca Compact," which expires in December 2023.

The original 2002 agreement was signed between then-Gov. George E. Pataki and the Seneca Nation. In January, Hochul said in a statement that she looked "forward to beginning discussions toward a new compact."

If a new compact is not reached by the end of next year, the three Seneca Nation casinos would not be allowed to operate. But Hochul could sign off on a new deal before then, including before she potentially wins a new term of office this year.

Asked about the emerging potential conflict of interest, Hochul's press secretary, Hazel Crampton-Hays, on Sunday said that the governor's counsel would "conduct a legal analysis of the circumstances to ensure compliance with recusal policies and applicable law."

The Seneca Nation's president noted that the state's discussions with Delaware North on how to potentially "further devalue the Seneca Nation's exclusivity" had occurred even before the Hochul administration had "substantive compact discussions with us, and months before the state extorted hundreds of millions of dollars from our nation."

Records also show that earlier this year, Dickinson & Avella lobbied the executive director of the state Gaming Commission, Robert Williams, about the "Seneca Nation Compact" on behalf of Delaware North.

Delaware North and Dickinson & Avella did not respond to requests for comment.

Recusal agreement

William Hochul is Delaware North's highly paid senior vice president, general counsel and secretary. In 2020, he made between $450,000 and $550,000 in salary from the company, according to the governor's financial disclosure statement.

After initial controversy arose about potential conflicts of interest, the governor's office in late October released recusal letters signed by the governor.

Hochuls declarations include that she will recuse herself "to the greatest extent permitted by law" concerning Delaware North and its lobbying interests reflected in any disclosures filed with the Joint Commission on Public Ethics.

Hochul also agreed to recuse herself from any matter having a direct, foreseeable and proximate impact benefiting Delaware North. And the major Buffalo Bills' stadium deal, which Hochul announced last Monday, presents another possible conflict that critics of the deal have seized upon.

Delaware North has operated lucrative concessions, premium dining and retail services at the Bills Highmark Stadium since 1992. If the company holds the contract at the new stadium, it could prove to be a windfall, especially with increased services that could include additional luxury suites and restaurant services.

Hochul's office says any Delaware North interest in the stadium deal is merely "speculative and indirect."

Gov. Hochul is committed to the strictest ethical standards and restoring trust in government," Crampton-Hays said. "Delaware North is not a party to the negotiations and any future decisions about vendors at the new stadium would be made by the Bills alone."

Delaware North's concessions contract expires at the end of the year, according to the Bills, and the services will be subject to competitive bidding by the team, which is owned by the Pegula family and could be won by Delaware North or another company.

Delaware North has said William Hochul was not involved in the stadium negotiations, and Hochul's office says he is recused from all of the company's state business activities and can't receive any incentive-based compensation based on Delaware North's business operations in New York.

John Kaehny, executive director of the good-government group Reinvent Albany, said it's difficult to understand from the outside whether Hochul is following the recusal agreements, since it's not being verified by a third party.

"They're not publicly putting out the instances where there was a recusal, why an issue was raised, or how they dealt with any issues," Kaehny said.

Nate McMurray, a former assistant general counsel at Delaware North, worked at the company for six years before leaving on unpleasant terms in 2020. He sued Delaware North and is in the midst of litigation with the company.

McMurray said Hochuls agreement to have the stadium in suburban Orchard Park  rather than downtown Buffalo  would be a major boon for concession sales.

Like an airport or amusement park, having the stadium in isolation gives the Bills a "controlled environment" to charge inflated prices for concessions, he said. If the stadium is built in downtown Buffalo, that would force the stadium to compete with restaurants and bars for customers.

"Money that is generated by sales in the stadium is so important to the Pegulas, and they work hand-in-hand with the Jacobs family (that owns Delaware North) to maximize profit," McMurray said. "Theyre getting a monopoly. The last thing they want is competition from the outside. They want people to go there and tailgate there."

The NAACP Buffalo branch also said that the stadium should be built in downtown Buffalo. Its president, Mark E. Blue, said the decision to place it outside of the city can be viewed as a sign of indifference toward "racial and socioeconomic justice and equity."

Hochul's office points to a state-commissioned study with the firm AECOM that was released in November. The study found that a stadium in downtown Buffalo would cost at least $350 million more than in Orchard Park, face significant delays and displace about 3,000 residents.

"I've made it clear to the Buffalo Bills organization that we wanted to accommodate both options and let them see the cost of downtown and Orchard Park, but not putting our finger on the scale," Hochul said in December. "If their desire is Orchard Park, it's Orchard Park. We've never said otherwise."

Staff writer Joshua Solomon contributed to this report.
ALBANY  The criminal justice issues consuming state budget negotiations have included whether to provide about $40 million in funding for upstate district attorneys to help their offices respond to stringent pre-trial discovery rules that took effect two years ago and have led judges to dismiss cases in which prosecutors could not meet new deadlines for turning over evidence.

Additional funding for public defenders also are part of those discussions, which have focused on adjusting bail statutes and changes in the handling of criminal cases involving adolescent offenders. The negotiations are unfolding as Senate Democrats and Gov. Kathy Hochul's office have reached a consensus on changes to multiple criminal justice statutes; the Assembly's Democratic majority have yet to sign off on the proposals.

Assembly Speaker Carl E. Heastie's office has been discussing the issues with prosecutors, including talks over the weekend with the district attorneys in New York City's five boroughs. Those conversations have taken place even though Heastie had said his conference would not negotiate policy issues in the budget.

"There were positive discussions between district attorneys and the advocates, without staffs on the call, and I think we landed in a good place," Heastie told reporters at the Capitol Monday morning. He said the specifics are still being drawn up.

However, district attorneys in upstate counties said they are facing different challenges than their counterparts in New York City, whose offices receive funding from the city. The situation also has been exacerbated by the statutory changes that provided arguably unclear directives for the judges who enforce the disclosure of evidence in criminal cases.

"Theres wasnt good guidance in the statute to guide judges on what to do and how to determine what happens with the case if the timing is not met," said Washington County District Attorney Tony Jordan, president of the District Attorneys Association of New York.

In a 10-point criminal justice plan drafted by Hochul's office that was made public last month, she had proposed three changes to "improve the discovery statute." One change would deem prosecutors in compliance if they failed to turn over a document but its contents were previously provided to a defendant in a different form.

Another change proposed by Hochul, whose office has consulted with prosecutors and public defenders, would allow a case to go forward once they had turned over all "locatable materials," as opposed to wording in the law that requires them to disclose unavailable materials. The plan would also exclude traffic infractions from the discovery requirements, which prosecutors said has made it hard to prosecute those violations.

Rensselaer County District Attorney Mary Pat Donnelly said that for many district attorneys outside of New York City the lack of resources to meet the pre-trial discovery mandates have been a "huge issue."

"Its a real challenge upstate for us to have to figure out how to make these directives work with the same budget that we had in 2019," said Donnelly, whose office did receive county funding to hire two employees devoted to helping process discovery matters.

"My colleagues around the state have not had the same experience. ... Were still six months-plus behind getting what we need from our 911 call center. Thats nobodys fault; there is simply an inability of personnel to get that done," Donnelly added. "Its a huge, huge issue, probably even surpassing our concerns about bail reform."

Donnelly and other district attorneys in the statewide association have given bipartisan support to the pre-trial discovery changes, but many said they are simply struggling to handle the increased workload that it created.

"You want to be turning over materials as quickly as possible," she said. "Quite frankly, what we really need is money ... if this is how the state feels discovery should be administered."

The pre-trial discovery changes, approved as part of the state budget in April 2019, mandated that prosecutors hand over evidence to a defendant or their attorney within 15 days of an arraignment. The changes were made, in part, so that defendants held in custody would not remain incarcerated while their cases languished. It also was intended to prevent defendants from taking plea agreements before they had a chance to review all of the evidence in their case, including information that might support their innocence.

Defense attorneys were among those who had lobbied for the pre-trial discovery changes, noting that months might go by before prosecutors would drop mounds of evidentiary records on them  often on the eve of a defendant's trial. Prosecutors have said the discovery rules have endangered witnesses or victims, whose statements to police are turned over to defendants who may threaten those individuals.

A "significant number" of district attorneys and defense attorneys are satisfied with where the Senate and executive chamber have landed on discovery, according to state Senate Finance Chair Liz Krueger, D-Manahttan.

"But is everybody happy?" Krueger said. "No."

Jordan, who became president of the district attorneys association in June, said they do not oppose the changes that were made to pre-trial discovery, but they need resources to be able to meet those obligations.

"It would seem as if theres a dual track happening where, how do we put money in the budget to address those needs ... and how do we tweak discovery to address the current needs," Jordan said. "We dont want our cases dismissed. We want to give defense (attorneys) everything and need money to do that. ... Theres no one in our organization that complains about having to do it. ... Where our issue is is you havent provided us with the funding to be able to do it."

Hochul's office and Democrats in the state Senate have been open to tweaking some of the criminal justice statutes that were overhauled in 2018 and 2019, including adjusting the rules to give judges and prosecutors more discretion on keeping the cases of violent adolescent offenders in youth part of adult court, rather than shifting them to Family Court.

But the Assembly's Democratic majority, which initially said it would not negotiate policy in the budget, has since walked back that position and has engaged in the ongoing deliberations.

"When you deal with a budget with lots of conversations around policy, its going to be late," Heastie said. "So here we are. But I think were making progress.

Lawmakers Monday extended payments to state workers through Thursday, although it does not mean a budget deal would necessarily be completed by then.

Hochul looked to quell concerns about the negotiations when she spoke to reporters Monday afternoon.

"I'll tell you this is a very normal budget process," Hochul said. "It'll be resolved in a matter of days. We're getting close."

As the governor discussed issues on the delayed budget, protestors demanding increased wages for home care workers pressed onto closed doors of the second floor at the Capitol, shouting to be heard for their top-line issue.
For our most loyal readers we share just a few topics that our on our mind tonight . . .



Check www.TonysKansasCity.com news gathering . . .

Rolling Tragedy Tonight

Motorcyclist injured in collision near Paseo, Armour boulevards in Kansas City, Missouri KANSAS CITY, Mo. - The Kansas City, Missouri, Police Department Accident Investigation Section responded to a two-vehicle collision just after 5 p.m. Sunday near Paseo and Armour boulevards. When a blue Ford Focus traveling north on Paseo Boulevard decided to make a U-turn in the roadway just past the intersection of Armour Boulevard, a green and black Kawasaki Ninja motorcycle struck the Ford.

More Deets On Lee's Summit Train Track Gunfire Death

Family of KC-area man killed on Amtrak train says it could have been prevented KANSAS CITY, Mo. - For the first time, family and attorneys are speaking publicly about 30-year-old Richie Aaron Jr.'s death on an Amtrak train earlier this year. Lee's Summit police responded to an armed carjacking on Jan. 14, 2022, in Lee's Summit. About the same time, police also responded to a shooting on an Amtrak train.

Advice For Local Families

Family of Oak Park teen who died from fentanyl asks parents to talk to kids KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Family and friends are coming together to remember a Kansas City teen lost to fentanyl. More than 100 people gathered Friday night to remember 16-year-old Ethan Everly. Brandon Everly, Ethan's dad, says fentanyl is the most dangerous poison out there. Clay County Sheriff Will Akin agrees.

Kansas City Aglow Tonight

Crimson and blue shine on downtown Kansas City skyline KANSAS CITY, MO (KCTV) --- The Kansas City, Mo., skyline will be honoring the Kansas Jayhawks on the eve of the national title game against the North Carolina Tar Heels. Yes, that's right: Kansas City, MISSOURI. It will be hard to miss crimson and blue if you're in KCMO on Sunday night.

Angel's Work Never Done

Karlie Kloss Melds Her Love For Wellness And Tech Karlie Kloss, model, mother, and entrepreneur has been pursuing her many ventures through the lens of balance. Throughout her career, she has juggled jet-setting around the world for designer campaigns, her ventures in tech with her program Kode with Klossy which allows young women to access learning opportunities in the coding and tech world.

Economy Conspires Against Prez

Worker shortage thwarts Biden's "millions" of jobs pledge President Biden's campaign pledge to create "millions" of jobs has hit a challenge: finding workers. Why it matters: Job potential from building out clean energy and "onshoring" - bringing home - overseas manufacturing hasn't panned out or has been overstated. His words have been more political statement than governing result.

MAGA Makes Nice?!?!

Trump says Jen Psaki has 'really beautiful red hair' and MSNBC wants to hire her because they need a redhead Trump referred to White House press secretary Jen Psaki as "the woman with the really beautiful red hair." The former president addressed reports that Psaki is poised to leave the White House and join MSNBC. Trump has a long record of commenting on women's appearances.

OBAMA COMEBACK?!?!

Obama to return to White House to celebrate health care reform WASHINGTON - Former President Barack Obama will return to the White House on Tuesday for the first time since he left office to promote the Affordable Care Act in an event alongside President Joe Biden, a White House official said.

Tugging On Musical Heartstrings Amid War

Zelensky Stuns Grammys With Surprise Cameo A couple of weeks ago, it seemed like a joke when Oscars host Amy Schumer suggested that Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky should Zoom into last week's ceremony to spread awareness about Russia's brutal war against his country.

Hottie Helps Save Lives

Nurse-Turned-Model Joins the COVID-19 Frontline Maggie Rawlins put her modeling career on hold to work as a registered nurse in New York during the coronavirus pandemic.

Off-Season Agenda Exposed

KC Chiefs, Texans could be shocking trade partners in 2022 NFL Draft It was not long ago that the Kansas City Chiefs and Houston Texans were on the same trajectory. The Texans led the Chiefs 24-0, in Arrowhead Stadium no less, during the 2020 AFC divisional round. The Chiefs made a stunning comeback, ultimately winning 51-31.

Forecast To Start The Week

Monday will be partly sunny, highs in low 60s Hide Transcript Show Transcript OVERNIGHT LOW DROPPING TO 42. TOMORROW, WE WILL HAVE SUNSHINE. NOT SO BAD WHEN IT COMES TO OUR FORECAST. WIND SPEEDS WILL BE SHIFTING TO THE NORTHWEST DIRECTION. HIGH TOMORROW 61 DEGRE.ES ON THE NINE-DAY FORECAST, MONYDA LOOKS GOOD. WIDESPREAD SHOWER ACTITIVY AND A COUPLE THUNDERSTORMS ON TUESDAY.

And this is the OPEN THREAD for right now. Hopefully, we'll have more for the Monday morning update.
This kind of shooting wouldn't even make the news in KCMO . . .

HOWEVER . . .

Gun violence is becoming more common amongst our exurb neighbors.



Take a look . . .



"The shooting happened between 10 and 10:30 p.m. Sunday on Shawnee Mission Parkway near Interstate 35.Traffic camera photos captured a lime green 2011 Dodge Challenger with black racing stripes that police believe to be the suspect vehicle."

Read more via www.TonysKansasCity.com links . . .

Merriam police looking for vehicle in relation to multi-victim shooting KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Merriam police are looking for a vehicle they believe was involved in a multi-victim shooting Saturday night. The shooting happened between 10 and 10:30 p.m. Saturday on Shawnee Mission Parkway near Interstate 35. Traffic camera photos captured a lime green 2011 Dodge Challenger with black racing stripes that police believe to be the suspect vehicle.

Merriam police search for car involved in shooting MERRIAM, Kan. - Police are looking for the person or people responsible for shooting several people in Merriam. The crime happened shortly after 10 p.m. on Saturday. Police released two surveillance pictures of a car they believe was involved in the shooting.

Developing . . .
Son charged in death of woman whose body was found in bag in Toronto's Leslieville area
Two of the four green-band-maxi-taxi routes yet to implement a fare increase will be doing so, come Monday.

Meantime discussions are underway with respect to raising fares on a third route, but the Route 3 Maxi-Taxi Association is giving its clients the opportunity to suggest a reasonable increase. Rynessa Cutting has more.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba in a phone call with Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney thanked Ireland for the readiness to insist on applying new severe EU sanctions against Russia.

Spoke with my Irish counterpart Simon Coveney. Informed on the horrendous Russian war crimes in Bucha. Grateful to Ireland for standing ready to insist on applying new severe EU sanctions. Russia must pay a much heavier price for its atrocities and sadism, the minster wrote on Twitter.

As Ukrinform reported, the cities of Irpin, Bucha, Hostomel, and the entire Kyiv region were liberated from Russian invaders. Mass killings of civilians by Russians have been recorded in liberated towns and villages. In particular, a mass grave was found in Bucha, liberated from the invaders, where almost 300 people are buried. Dozens of bodies lie on the streets, some of them with their hands tied.
The Ukrainian military discovered a Russian Buk missile system during special reconnaissance and search operations near one of the settlements.

The Command of the Special Operations Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said this in a Facebook post, Ukrinform reports.

The equipment was found by a group of the Special Operations Forces and fighters of the resistance movement.

Next to the abandoned surface-to-air missile system there was a Russian arms cache. "Soldiers of the Special Operations Forces are grateful to the Russian fascists for their gifts and are continuing their search in order to fully 'thank' them for the trophies," the statement said.

On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the beginning of a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Russian troops have been shelling and destroying critical infrastructure and residential areas of Ukrainian cities, towns and villages using artillery, multiple rocket launchers and ballistic missiles.

Martial law was imposed in Ukraine and general mobilization was announced.
Verkhovna Rada Chairman Ruslan Stefanchuk has said he is disappointed with the position by Tbilisi and Chisinau on the imposition of sanctions against Russia.

According to Ukrinform, Stefanchuk stated this on Facebook.

"I used to think that what unites Ukraine the most with Georgia and Moldova is that our countries were territorially 'bitten' by Russia. But today's position by Tbilisi and Chisinau regarding their neutrality in imposing sanctions on Russia has disappointed me. Well, a friend in need is a friend indeed," Stefanchuk said.

"But it is good that our peoples have a different opinion," he added.

Earlier, Moldovan President Maia Sandu said that Moldova will not join the sanctions against Russia because it fears the suspension of gas supplies from the aggressor country.

On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the beginning of a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Martial law was imposed in Ukraine and general mobilization was announced.
The International Committee of the Red Cross is urged to send its representatives to provide humanitarian assistance to illegally detained civilians in Kherson region.

"I urge you to send representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross to the Kherson region to provide humanitarian assistance to illegally detained civilians, fix their place of residence and help stop torture and release them from prison cells as soon as possible," Dementiy Bilyi, head of the Kherson regional department of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine, posted the corresponding appeal on Facebook, Ukrinform reports.

According to Bilyi, Russian invaders kidnap, beat, and torture civilians in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, in particular in Kherson region.

The number of people abducted by the occupiers is unknown. Eyewitnesses give examples of dozens of cases when the occupiers go to people's apartments and houses, conduct illegal searches, grab people, beat them.

Peaceful citizens are defenseless against brute force. They are not provided with legal assistance, judicial protection, their basic human rights and freedoms are ignored.

The occupiers hold the abducted people in prison cells in Kherson. The fate of many civilians has been unknown for many days.

The head of the Kherson regional department of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine also addressed the relatives of the abducted people and called on them to contact the hotline of the International Committee of the Red Cross Mission in Ukraine in order to activate the relevant mechanisms of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

As reported, residents of Kherson region regularly hold peaceful protests against the Russian aggressor. The Russian military uses force and weapons against people. Ukrainians are being wounded and detained.

Russian aggressors also abduct civilians in the region, including journalists, community leaders, members of local councils, and activists.

On February 24, Russian president Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Russian troops shell and destroy key infrastructure, massively fire on residential areas of Ukrainian cities, towns, and villages using artillery, MLRS, and ballistic missiles.

ol
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Greece Nikos Dendias has stated that his country will join the restoration of Odesa after the Russian-Ukrainian war.

The only thing I can say right now in these difficult times, is that we are going to be part of this future by helping you reconstruct this city and make it even more beautiful, even better, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Greece Nikos Dendias said during his meeting with the Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic integration of Ukraine Olga Stefanishyna.

What is clear even beyond the smoke of todays bombs is that Odessa will have a bright future, he added.

Dendias arrived in Odesa on April 3 and met with Mayor Hennadiy Trukhanov. Minister Dendias arrived in Odesa leading a humanitarian mission to resolve a number of diplomatic issues.

At dawn on April 3, Odesa was attacked from the air. Ukraines air defense forces shot down some enemy missiles. Odesa City Mayor Hennadiy Trukhanov said that some facilities of civilian infrastructure were damaged  high-rise buildings, roofs of private houses. He also assured the citizens that they should not worry about the possible lack of fuel at gas stations.

Photo credit: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Greece

ol
Russian terrorist forces are regrouping in eastern Ukraine and trying to improve tactical positions in some areas in the south.

"The enemy continues to conduct full-scale armed aggression against our state. The enemy command deploys elements of the operational structure of the offensive group and builds up the management system in order to prepare for an offensive operation in eastern Ukraine. The occupying forces are regrouping and trying to improve the tactical positions in some areas in southern Ukraine. The formation and redeployment of additional units of the Russian Federation to participate in hostilities in the territory of Ukraine continue," the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine posted on Facebook, informing about the operational situation as of 12:00.

As noted, the situation in Volyn direction has not changed, the units of the Armed Forces of the Republic of Belarus, up to four battalion tactical groups, continue to cover the border.

In Polissya direction, there is a high probability of missile and bomb strikes on military and civilian infrastructure by enemy planes operating from Belarusian airfields.

The General Staff also reports that enemy units of the Eastern Military District and airborne troops were moving from the territory of the Republic of Belarus to the Russian Federation. The weapons, military equipment and personnel are redeployed by rail and air.

According to available information, separate units of the 35th Combined Arms Army (Belogorsk) and the 36th Combined Arms Army (Ulan-Ude) of the Eastern Military District are located in the localities of Rechitsa and Yampol (Gomel region of the Republic of Belarus).

In Siversky direction, the enemy withdrew units of the Central Military District to Kursk region and began their further redeployment.

In Slobozhansky direction, the enemy continues to block Kharkiv, carries out artillery attacks on the city, regroups troops, strengthens the air cover of important facilities in the area of the town of Belgorod and areas of concentration of troops in Kharkiv direction.

To identify the positions of units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the enemy is conducting aerial reconnaissance in the area of the village of Barvinkove with the use of UAVs and tries to restore the bridge over the Siversky Donets River near the town of Izium. Outside Brazhkivka, the enemy conducted combat reconnaissance with the help of a tank company tactical group but failed and retreated to the previously occupied frontiers.

The General Staff also warns of a high probability of missile strikes on Kharkiv.

"There is still a high probability of air and missile strikes on civilian facilities in Kharkiv, preparations are underway for an offensive in the direction of Slovyansk. In Donetsk and Tavriysky directions, the main efforts of the enemy are focused in the areas of the localities of Rubizhne, Popasna. The aggressor prepares for the offensive on Severodonetsk and wants to gain full control over the town of Mariupol. Eight airstrikes have been launched on Mariupol today, street fights are ongoing. Ukrainian servicepersons defend the town," the report reads.

At the same time, the enemy completes the regrouping and replacement of units that lost offensive capabilities in order to resume active offensive operations.

In the Southern Buh direction, Ukrainian troops push back the occupiers in Kherson region. The enemy carried out aerial reconnaissance around Mykolayiv with the use of UAV.

In the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov operational zones, the activity of the enemy ship group in the Black Sea is reduced due to difficult weather conditions (storm raging with force up to 4). The rest of the enemy ships perform tasks in certain areas.

Photo: Stringer, Anadolu Agency

ol
Abducting, torturing, and executing local administration chiefs seems to be part of Russias playbook, as well as shifting blame onto Ukraine.

Thats according to British Ambassador to Ukraine Melinda Simmons.

Abducting, torturing, executing brave and resolute regional and local administration heads, even their families too - look like being part of the Russian playbook. Projecting these crimes on to Ukraine - also part of the plan. Both need calling out. And holding to account, Simmons tweeted Monday.

As Ukrinform reported earlier, the towns of Irpin, Bucha, Hostomel, and the entire Kyiv region were recently liberated from Russian invaders. Mass killings of civilians by Russian forces have been recorded in these settlements.

European Parliament President Roberta Metsola has been appalled by Russian atrocities.

Earlier, on April 1, Bucha Mayor Anatoliy Fedoruk said 280 bodies of slain civilians had been buried in mass graves. Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba called on the Group of Seven to impose new sanctions on Russia immediately.
Provocative e-mails allegedly sent on behalf of the regiment to government officials and journalists have nothing to do with the unit.

The Azov Regiment made an official statement on that matter on Telegram, Ukrinform reports.

Provocative e-mails allegedly sent by an Azov Regiment soldier targeted official e-mails of government officials, journalists and other persons. The sender himself and his position have nothing to do with the Azov Regiment, which is currently defending the city of Mariupol, write the Azov members.

They also note that the hosting from which the letters were sent is in Zurich, Switzerland. In addition, the e-mail address itself was registered recently, on March 22, 2022, presumably to spread discrediting information.

The Azov Regiment has published the letter and data about the fake hosting. Servicemen have stressed that the search for criminals has already begun.

It is worth noting that the fake provocative letter differs in style from Azov's message as it contains abusive words, defeatisms and anti-government slogans.

As Ukrinform reported, Ukrainian politicians, industrialists and entrepreneurs are urging CNN not to spread Kremlins disinformation narratives about the Azov Regiment, which is currently defending Mariupol and to remove from its website a column with gross distortions.

On February 24, Russian President Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The invaders are shelling and destroying key infrastructure facilities, carrying out massive shelling of residential areas of Ukrainian cities and villages using artillery, rocket-propelled grenades and ballistic missiles.
The United Kingdom will call a United National Security Council meeting tomorrow, April 5, to discuss mass killings committed by Russian invaders in Bucha, Kyiv region.

Permanent Representative of the United Kingdom Barbara Woodward announced this on Twitter, Ukrinform reports.

Weve all seen the harrowing images and reports from Bucha this weekend, of unarmed Ukrainian civilians shot with their hands tied behind their backs, of more than 800 bodies left in the street or dumped in mass graves, of women being raped in front of their children, she said.

Evidence of war crimes on the territory of Ukraine, including in Bucha, will be discussed at a meeting of the Security Council on Ukraine on Tuesday, Woodward said.

We'll use our Presidency of the Security Council to ensure there is transparency, accountability and that justice is done, she added.

The UK will call a #UNSC meeting tomorrow on #Ukraine. We will discuss the mounting evidence of war crimes, including from #Bucha.



We'll use our Presidency of the Security Council to ensure there is transparency, accountability and that justice is done. pic.twitter.com/eyQoDne7tX  Ambassador Barbara Woodward (@BWoodward_UN) April 4, 2022

As Ukrinform reported, Irpin, Bucha, Hostomel and the entire Kyiv region have been liberated from Russian invaders. Mass killings of civilians the Russian forces were recorded in towns and villages.

Bucha Mayor Anatoliy Fedoruk said that 280 people are buried in mass graves.

iy
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has addressed the Romanian parliament via video link.

Ukrinform provides the full text of his speech.

Dear Mr. President of the Chamber of Deputies!

Dear Mr. President of the Senate!

Dear Mr. Prime Minister!

Ladies and gentlemen, deputies and senators, guests!

Dear friends!

Romanian people!

I am grateful for this opportunity to address you and all your people.

A few hours ago I returned from the liberated cities of the Kyiv region - near our capital. It is these territories from which we expelled the Russian occupiers and saw what they had been doing to the Ukrainian people on our land. And I want you to see it now. What the occupiers left behind. I apologize - the video is brutal, but it's a reality...

The name of our city of Bucha is now forever in world history. In the history of war crimes. In the history of the extermination of people.

As of now, we know about more than 300 civilians tortured, executed or otherwise killed in Bucha. Ordinary residents of an ordinary city near Kyiv. Their hands were tied behind their backs, they were shot in the back of the head or in the eye, killed just in the streets. Civilian vehicles were crushed by military equipment. Vehicles with people! They raped women and girls...

And this is just the beginning of the investigation. Not all evidence has been collected yet. Not all burials have been discovered yet. Not all basements where the Russian military tortured people have been inspected yet. There is every reason to believe that the number of killed residents of Bucha and other Ukrainian cities nearby will be much higher than what we know today.

Why did the Russian military do that?

On the same day, April 3, when the world was horrified to see the bodies of those killed in Bucha, an article justifying the genocide of Ukrainians was published on the website of the Russian state news agency RIA Novosti. Its name is quite eloquent, I quote: "What should Russia do with Ukraine". And it's not just text. This is one of the proofs for the future tribunal against Russian war criminals.

The article describes a clear and calculated procedure for the destruction of everything that makes Ukrainians Ukrainians and our people themselves. Those whom they will not be able to break and conquer. It is said that "de-Ukrainization" and "de-Europeanization" of Ukraine should be carried out. It is said that even the name of our state should be erased. Virtually, it is said that the deaths of as many of our people in the war are only welcomed.

I want to emphasize once again: this is the website of the state news agency of Russia, where, under conditions of explicit state censorship, only materials that correspond to the official ideological position on the war against Ukraine can be published. What does not correspond to such a position would simply not pass censorship.

I want you to understand me: they are not even hiding. They openly speak about the purpose of the invasion of Ukraine. If our army had not withstood, if our people had not risen to the defense of the state, they would have done what they did in Bucha - but throughout Ukraine.

We know about the deliberate killings of teachers and educators in the temporarily occupied territories. We know about deliberate terror against all those whom the occupiers considered as activists, as people related to the army.

Even the mere presence of the national symbols of Ukraine, the state flag or coat of arms, in a person's apartment was already a reason for the occupiers to kill this person or at least threaten to kill him or her.

But why aren't they hiding?

Why do they even now, when everything is clear to the world, openly say how they want to destroy the whole nation?

There are two answers to this question.

You will understand the first answer very well.

In 1989, Nicolae Ceausescu finally ended his life. For many years it has been clear that this man had lost his adequacy. It has been clear that he, his wife, his entourage, his "Securitate" have been dragging your country and people down - to suffering, to poverty, to isolation not just from the world, but from everything advanced in the world.

That regime relied only on intimidation, repression, brutality and deception. There was nothing bright in it. The Romanian people revolted and defended themselves, saved themselves. Having overthrown inadequate power. Because that was the only way. Ceausescu, his wife, his entourage, his "Securitate" could not be convinced of anything.

It is also impossible to convince those who promote war in Russia now. Who give criminal orders. Who develop plans for the genocide of the Ukrainian people and the destruction of the Ukrainian state. These people are inadequate. They have lost all connection with reality and are willing to sacrifice millions of lives to realize their crazy ideas.

And the second reason why Russia is openly calling for genocide and why the crimes of the occupiers that everyone in the world saw in Bucha are possible is the belief of Russia's top officials that European leaders will fail, will be weak. That Europe will lack leadership. And that the nations of Europe are incapable of defending the values that have united the continent.

Ladies and Gentlemen!

Great Romanian people!

Together we must stop these inadequate people who are accustomed to impunity and therefore decided that they are allowed absolutely everything. Together we must stop those who want genocide in Europe.

Why must we do this together?

Each of you understands that Ukraine is not the last target of Russian aggression. Troops of occupiers are stubbornly trying to bypass our city of Mykolaiv to try to seize Odesa. And from Odesa there is one step to Moldova.

Russian state propagandists have long said that Moldova is also a target for Russian expansion. Therefore, the defense of Ukrainians of their own state is a fundamental prerequisite for security and independence of Moldova. And therefore a prerequisite for peace in the whole large region of the Danube.

Now the fate of the whole of Eastern and Central Europe and the Black Sea region is being decided on the territory of Ukraine. Therefore, to protect the freedom of Ukraine, to protect the freedom of Ukrainians is to guarantee the security of Europe.

What must be done?

Yes, it is true, sanctions were imposed on Russia for this war. But the war for our freedom has been going on for 40 days already. After 8 years of war in Donbas. Therefore, sanctions are not enough.

Russia must seek peace with Ukraine and with the whole of Europe. To this end, Russia must be deprived of all resources. First of all, financial and economic ones.

The European Union must finally adopt a principled decision and close ports to Russian ships.

Stop the transit of goods and any economic activity with Russia. Restricting the flow of money for Russian energy has no alternative.

One can argue about what the format should be: a full embargo on supplies or a program like "Oil-for-Food" - but it is necessary.

And not only that.

Every politician in a democratic world must defend the need to provide Ukraine with all the necessary weapons. Because it is on the battlefield that it is decided who will be the winner in this war - freedom or tyranny.

Everyone on whom it depends must do everything possible to quickly and inevitably bring to justice all Russian servicemen and their commanders guilty of committing crimes against civilians in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine.

Today, I reached an agreement with the European Union on the provision of financial and technical support to the Eurojust Joint Investigation Team, EU member states and the International Criminal Court.

I believe that Romania's leadership will be one of the decisive factors in restoring justice and protecting normal life both in our region and in Europe as a whole.

I am confident that Romania and Romanian companies will also take part in Ukraine's post-war reconstruction program. We invite our partners in Europe to take patronage over a city, region or industry that has suffered from Russia's aggression. Your potential, your inner strength can create a new example of leadership in building a civilized and peaceful life.

I am sincerely grateful to all the Romanian people for their kind treatment of Ukrainian immigrants who have found safety on your land. I hope that together we will be able to create such conditions as soon as possible, when Russia will give up the war, and so our people will be able to return home to Ukraine. And this experience of assistance in emergency situations, mutual respect, kindness between our people has already become the basis for even greater rapprochement of our states, our nations.

As soon as the situation allows, I want to start a dialogue with you on a new comprehensive agreement that guarantees the absolute protection and development of our national minorities - the Ukrainian community in Romania and the Romanian community in Ukraine.

Because our destiny is to be as close as we can. Our destiny is to be defenders of freedom in our region. Our destiny is to be together in the European family.

And I believe that very soon I will be able to address you with words of gratitude for Romania's support for Ukraine's accession to the European Union.

Thank you very much!

Glory to Romania!

Glory to Ukraine!
Activists from Ukraine, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and the UK on Monday blocked the A2 highway on the Polish-German border, demanding an end to EU trade with Russia.

They were holding national flags and photos of those killed by Russian invaders in settlements just outside Kyiv, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

Activists were calling on German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to "stop financing Russia's war crimes" by ending international trade with Russia.

"We, the citizens of Germany, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Great Britain, and Ukraine, demand that German Chancellor Olaf Scholz stop trading with Russia completely. For two weeks, the German government has been ignoring our appeals, so we have begun a peaceful blockade of the A2 main highway, which connects Poland and Germany, the activists said in a press release.

They emphasize that they want to "awaken conscience of the German people", as more than 100,000 Russian soldiers keep killing Ukrainians every day, while most Russians support the crime. Meanwhile, Germany "continues to trade with Russia, which supports Russian economy and actually sponsors the war."

It is noted that the money that German companies pay as taxes in Russia buys bombs, missiles, and shells, which are then used to kill peaceful Ukrainian people and children.

Stop financially supporting the occupiers! Behold the suffering of millions of Ukrainians who have been living in basements for more than a month, hiding from the Russian occupiers, activists said.

Activists have earlier twice blocked the movement of Russian and Belarusian trucks on the Polish-Belarusian border to draw attention to the assumption that trade between the EU and Russia in the face of Russian aggression against Ukraine was unacceptable.

According to the Deputy Minister of the Interior of Poland, Maciej Wonsik, at the Polish-Belarusian border, all trucks leaving Poland for Belarus are currently subjected to a very thorough inspection. Therefore, the waiting time for trucks at the border is now 80 hours.
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Boris Johnson has stated that the weapons and tanks of Putin's army will never break the spirit of Ukraines people.

All the tanks and guns in Vladimir Putins arsenal will never break the spirit of Ukraines people or conquer their homeland. Britain will never waiver from supporting our friends, and I have not the slightest doubt that when this time of agony is over, Ukraine will rise again and take her place once more among free and sovereign nations, Johnson said in his address released on Twitter.

He added that Ukrainians had defended their homeland with invincible courage and tenacity since the Russian invasion.

"We in Britain are lost in admiration for their valour and patriotism. Our job is to do everything we can to support them," the British PM added.

Putin will never break the spirit of Ukraines people or conquer their homeland.



Ukraine will rise again and take her place among free and sovereign nations once more.



 pic.twitter.com/0VWziRkRGO  Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) April 4, 2022

Johnson also outlined the assistance which the United Kingdom had already provided to Ukraine over the past few years, namely, training more than 22,000 members of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, supplying weapons, allocating 400 million pounds for humanitarian and economic aid. Moreover, 150,000 British families have already offered to shelter Ukrainian refugees.

On February 24, Russian president Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Russian troops shell and destroy key infrastructure, massively fire on residential areas of Ukrainian cities, towns, and villages using artillery, MLRS, and ballistic missiles.

ol
Russian armed aggression against Ukraine has confirmed the already obvious inability of international organizations to prevent and stop wars of invasion. This especially relates to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), whose main task is precisely that.

Permanent Representative of the United States to the organization, Michael Carpenter, believes that it is now time to reconceptualize the architecture of European security. This is including about a consensus which has been blocking the OSCEs effective work. Besides, the diplomat says Russian violations of the agreements signed and obligations undertaken cast doubt on the feasibility of further signing any such agreements with Russia in the medium and long terms.

Ukrinform spoke with the U.S. envoy to the OSCE about certain aspects of the OSCEs current work and its possible future role in Ukraine, as well as the U.S. efforts to help Ukraine protect its sky, the negotiations on security guarantees, and even on the catastrophic scenario involving the use by Russia of tactical nuclear arms.

I thought that surely the Russians would know better

- Mr Ambassador, the U.S. intelligence community has repeatedly warned Ukraine of the expected Russian invasion. Did you personally believe Putin would resort to this? Can you remember your first reaction to the initial reports of the invasion start?

We had a lot of detailed information that indicated that there was indeed likely to be a full-scale invasion. I, personally, was of course wondering if such an enormous miscalculation was even possible in the Kremlin, because, of course, the Russians have access to a lot of intelligence themselves.

I thought that surely they would know better and of course we had said repeatedly for many weeks, if not months, that any move into Ukraine would come with massive, severe, and unprecedented consequences. But, in spite of all that, it turns out that president Putin decided to invade with a huge force, and what I consider to be a massive strategic failure for the Russian Federation, and miscalculation.

U.S. working to provide Ukraine with systems to protect its sky

- The Russian army pursues bombardments of Ukrainian cities and villages. Now Ukraine needs a no-fly zone over its territory. Does Washington seem an opportunity to help Ukraine close its sky?

I think we do see an opportunity to help Ukraine close the sky through the provision of a number of different platforms that can accomplish that goal. I dont think its wise for me to elaborate on the specific types of systems here, in this type of interview.

But I can assure you that the United States is looking actively at providing a range of different military capabilities to help Ukraine defend itself and particularly to defend its cities against some of the medium-range missiles and air-attacks that Ukraine has experienced.

And we understand that this is urgent and we are trying to provide as much security systems in as rapid a timeframe as we possibly can. It is not easy because its not as if we had a number of systems just lying around on the shelf ready to use but we are really energizing every procurement aspect we have available to be able to get as much to Ukraine as quickly as possible.

As for the nuclear scenario  God forbid

- Some analysts suggest that Vladimir Putin, a new Hitler, in order to avoid Russian defeat in Ukraine and break Ukraines resolve to resist, could use tactical nuclear arms to strike the Ukrainian territory. As per their assessments, the lack of readiness on the part of the U.S. and NATO to close the sky over Ukraine could further inspire Putins thoughts to this end as he might suggest that the west will not respond militarily if it fails to do so today. What are your thoughts in this regard?

God forbid, first of all, that there would be such a catastrophic scenario.

Any employment of nuclear weapons breaks a very important taboo in the international system and it would be a gamechanger in terms of how countries around the world perceive this conflict. We already have incredible unity among most countries in the world and you saw this in the United Nations with a vote of 141 to 5 condemning Russias actions. But this of course would be a step above and beyond of what weve seen this far and, as I said, it would galvanize a lot of action from around the world.

I will say that even where we are today, though, is not as if we have to see any more suffering to galvanize further support for Ukraine. The suffering of the civilian population in Ukraine to this point has been immense and so thats why you had another announcement from the United States of still more sanctions. Were trying to find every entity across a variety of different sectors that is available for sanctioning, so that we can continue to tighten the screws and impose costs on the Kremlin. Its not that this will necessarily change the decisions of the man in the Kremlin but it will certainly degrade Russias war-machine. And new sanctions on technology companies are part of that effort. And we need to continue to look for ways to tighten these screws even further, to deny Russian the ability to prosecute this horrific war inside Ukraine.

The devil is in the details and we have to look at whats being put on the negotiation table

- At the Ukraine-Russia talks held in Turkey, the Ukrainian side formally put forward its proposals as to the new system of security guarantees for Ukraine, of which your country is also expected to be part. Is the U.S. ready to become a guarantor of Ukraines security according to the concept proposed by the Ukrainian side?

I am not as familiar with what these concepts look like in practice, so everything depends on the details of how these texts and things are formulated. Obviously were going to do everything possible to support Ukraine in the negotiations and to try to find a ceasefire and a resolution that protects Ukraines sovereignty and territorial integrity, I think thats very important. But the devil is, of course, in the details and we have to look at whats being put on the table.

And I dont think its also wise to negotiate in public, so I dont want to say what we would accept and what we wouldnt accept, because, lets see, first of all, what the Russians agree to. Because they put forward a lot of ideas but its not clear what they will actually abide by. And I think thats the bottom line  we will have to see what they will abide by.

European security architecture requires reconceptualization

- The war Russia is waging against Ukraine has ruined the entire international security architecture. As it turned out, there are no international organizations or treaties that are able to prevent and stop aggression launched by Russia. That is particularly relevant to the OSCE, whose main objective was to prevent such war from being unleashed in Europe. Is there any sense to maintain such an organization, especially if the aggressor power remains its member, while all decisions shall be approved exclusively by consensus? How do you see the future of the OSCE?

Well, certainly the OSCE has been challenged, it still does a lot of valuable work in many different countries, within OSCE areas. There are a lot of projects and a lot of programs that actually help improve the lives of human beings from Central Asia to the Western Balkans to Eastern Europe. But, youre right that when a large country like Russia and a nuclear power breaks all of the principles and commitments that are the basis for this organization, then clearly, neither security nor cooperation in Europe is possible and thats where we find ourselves today.

The challenge going forward is that it is very difficult to understand how we can conclude agreements with Russia over the medium and long term, when Russia consistently violates the agreements that it has signed up to thus far. And that is a real conundrum. How does one enter into agreement with a country that consistently violates agreements.

I dont necessarily have the answer to that but I think its going to require a reconceptualization of the European security architecture going forward in a way that we look much more at deterrence and defence among like-minded states, and less at trying to achieve consensus among all 57.

- At the same time, there are many staffers in the OSCE who represent Russia. How can these people today remain unbiased as regards the Organizations principles? How do other member states treat this situation?

In principal, individuals should be evaluated based on how they perform as individuals. In practice, of course, we know, as I said earlier, that Russia is violating all of the principles and commitments that undergird OSCE institutions and field missions. And, so, it is hard to see how individuals representing the Russian Federation can perform jobs that require a commitment to those principles and commitments, when the country that is seconding them is not just not abiding by those commitments but actively contravening them each and every day. So, thats another challenge that we face going forward and one that were going to have to address rather urgently.

Russians are not convincing a single person in the Permanent Council

- Speaking of your routine interaction with the Russian diplomats at the OSCE, are you seeing any shift in their position? Is there any readiness at all on their part to stop lying and defy Putins regime?

Well, yes and no. So, the Russian diplomats here at the OSCE are consistently spewing war propaganda and telling lies and spreading disinformation about the nature of Russias war against Ukraine. However, I will say that in the last few meetings that weve had in the Permanent Council, the Russian representatives, theyre making more perfunctory statements, theyre not outlining their positions in the same detailed sort of way they did a few weeks ago.

I dont know if thats just a temporary change but what I suspect is happening is that they know very well that theyre not convincing a single person in the Permanent Council. Everybody knows that what the Russian representatives are saying is pure disinformation and lies. And so, I think theyre focusing on what theyre saying to their domestic audience. They are doing media statements and they are talking to Russian official media. But inside the Permanent Council it is almost as if they have given up on trying to convince the other countries representatives as to their point of view. Because, frankly, nobody is buying it.

Belarus is not fit to be chair of the OSCE Security Cooperation Forum

- Belarus will soon chair the Security Cooperation Forum. What is your attitude to Belarus, a co-aggressor in the ongoing Russian war against Ukraine, serving as a chair in this OSEC body?

Yeah, I cant envisage that the participating states will engage meaningfully with the state that is a co-aggressor and whose last election was completely illegitimate. In this case, this is not a legitimate chair of the forum like the FSC which carries out important work, in this case I dont see how a state like Belarus can legitimately carry out that type of work. And I suspect that, what youll see, I dont want to get ahead of the situation and make any announcements right now but I suspect you will see that other participating states very much adhere to that view: That Belarus is not fit to be the chair.

Active discussions underway on OSCE return to Ukraine

- After Russia blocked the continuation of the OSCE mandate in Ukraine, how can the Organization strengthen its presence in the country? Is the Organization capable of playing any role in stopping Russias aggressive war in Ukraine?

Well, actually were very actively talking about how to get the OSCE back in, and again, I dont want to preempt any announcements that will be made, but there are active talks about getting the OSCE back into Ukraine in the very near-term future, by which I mean in a matter of days.

- Earlier, the OSCE launched a Moscow mechanism to study the human rights and humanitarian consequences of Russian invasion. What could be the OSCEs future role in documenting war crimes in Ukraine and massive violations of human rights and international humanitarian law?

Well, this is a very important topic and this is where the OSCE can play a role and is already playing a role because, as you say, there is a fact-finding team that is supported by ODIHR that is gathering information on humans rights violations as well as violations of international humanitarian law and war-crimes and also possible crimes against humanity. Because the scale of Russias atrocities are really off the charts, and so, it is very important to document these crimes and human rights violations, to collect and preserve the evidence, and to transfer it to the appropriate jurisdictions, such as the ICC or the ICJ. So that there is accountability at every level in the chain of command. And so we very much support this process.

The issue of peacekeepers should be on the table, but no conditions are in place to this end

- Various ways to stop Russias aggressive war against Ukraine are being discussed at the moment, including through deploying an international peacekeeping mission. How would you assess the idea?

Well, I think it certainly should be an option thats on the table and probably its one that has a lot of merit, if you think about the role of peace-keeping operations in other parts of the world. But, you know, the UN is the international organization with the most experience in peace-keeping. So, I think, if the time comes, when thats an appropriate tool that we can deploy, then I think we should certainly look at it.

At this point, however, I wouldnt be fooled by Russias pronouncements that it is decreasing its military campaign. I think that is a faint that is designed to detract from the fact that Russia is likely reorganizing its efforts to escalate the situation even further in the South-Eastern parts of Ukraine, particularly in the Donbas.

Ukrainians will never bow or submit to the imperial control of another power

- In your opinion, what military and political objectives did Putin set out, when launching a full-blown war against Ukraine? How would you assess his success in achieving these objectives at the current stage?

Well, Putins goals appear to be very very, almost medieval in nature, to conquer the territory of another state and incorporate it into the Russian almost imperial zone of influence. As to whether he will succeed, I have already said, I think that he is committed a strategic mistake, and that he will regret this decision and the Russian people will regret this decision, probably for generations to come.

Because regardless of what happens in the short-term on the battlefield, over the medium and long-term it is very clear that the Ukrainian nation does not want to be subjected to either Russian tyranny or any other type of foreign tyranny, and they will never bow or submit to the imperial control of another power.

And so, Putin should have known this from the start that he would not be greeted as some sort of liberator. But he miscalculated. So, I think, again, its a strategic failure in the medium to long run, regardless of what happens in the coming days and weeks.

But it is important for the United States to be able to support Ukraine, militarily and economically, financially, as well as with humanitarian aid to help Ukraine withstand this brutal onslaught and to survive and ultimately thrive as an independent sovereign democratic state.

Vasyl Korotkyi, Vienna
The German authorities are trying hard not only to prevent the Russian war from coming to their territory physically but from it being brought into German society.

This was stated by a spokesman for the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Germany, who spoke at a Moscow briefing on Monday, Ukrinform reports.

"It is important for us, and we have emphasized this since war-start, that the war should not be transferred to our society, by either Ukrainians, or Russians, or German Russians, many of whom are in Germany. This is Putin's war, not the war of the Russians in Germany, and certainly not the war of the Ukrainians in Germany," the spokesman said.

This is how he commented on the Russians holding their first large-scale rally under Russian flags since the start of Russian invasion on February 24. In Germany, the right to freedom of assembly applies, and the Constitution does not divide assemblies by their nature.

"Therefore, the security services remain very vigilant, and if there is a legal opportunity to intervene, they do so," said the spokesman.

At the same time, the federal government spokesman added, the authorities are asking Russian speakers in Germany to obtain information from various international sources and not to trust the Russian state medias disinformation campaign with its cynical interpretation of the events in Ukraine.

On Sunday, April 3, the Russians organized a "rally" in Berlin in support of Russia. For the first time since the beginning of the war, the flags of the aggressor power were widely used. The Ukrainian community is seeking a ban on public rallies in the German capital under flags used by the Russian army in Ukraine. It is planned to appeal to the Berlin Senate on behalf of Ukrainian and other organizations of Berlin and the city's residents, demanding that the use of Russian flags on the city streets be banned until the end of the war, and that the perpetrators be prosecuted.

It should be added that big anti-war rallies have been held across German cities since Russia invaded Ukraine.
Fact-checking and debunking Kremlin lies in its current form fails to prevent escalation and appears insufficient and ineffective.

How they start a war with a fake story

The Russian war against Ukraine officially started March 1, 2014, and was launched with a fake report manufactured by Russian special services and politicians. The Federation Council of Russia had to adopt the decision to allow Vladimir Putin to use the Russian Army beyond Russian borders, in Ukraine.

On the evening of March 1, 2014, the approval was granted because the Federation Council is totally controlled by the Presidents Administration. But, there was another task to fulfill before starting the war. Russian propaganda had to assure the Russian people that war is an inevitable thing, and Putin did not have another choice but to invade another country.

When the Federation Council worked on the necessary decision, the RT propaganda channel accused leader of the Ukrainian Right Sector Dmytro Yarosh calling on a Chechen leader Doku Umarov to make common cause against Russia. The evidence was a screengrab of an unconvincing Russian social media page VKontakte.

The statement pointed out that many Ukrainians up in arms supported Chechen militants in their fight against Russians and it is time to support Ukraine now.

According to the Right Sector representatives interviewed afterwards, the access to the page of their group in VKontakte was lost the day before because of a hack or mole job. People who got control of the page have posted the text Yarosh would have never written. In the text, he allegedly appealed to Doku Umarov, a Chechen terrorist, who had been killed by FSB in September 2013, calling on him to unite against Moscow.

Russian media circulated the message, purportedly penned by Yarosh, over the next three hours. Every Russian citizen heard that Ukrainian nationalists and Chechen terrorists are uniting against Russia. This is how Putin has got his excuse for starting the war.

The story got into the spotlight due to the Anonymous International hackers team (aka Humpty-Dumpty), who managed to hack the mailbox of Timur Prokopenko, the head of the Internal Affairs Department of the Russian Presidents Administration. Prokopenkos unofficial duty was to control the bloggers and social networking, as well as coordinating youth organizations.

On March 1, 2014, Prokopenko received an email from Aleksey Gromov, First Deputy Head of the President Administration. In this email, Gromov sent a screenshot of the post mentioned above from the Right Sector page. Right after receiving this letter, the information about the hoax started to spread through the media.

This case was published and explained in the White Book of Special information operations against Ukraine in 2014-2018. This is how Putin has started the war against Ukraine with the help of the fake.

Where does the Ukraine-U.S. biological labs story come from?

In February-March 2022, Russians used the same methodology to explain their domestic audience why they invaded Ukraine. This time it was not about some mythical national battalions  the story hugely supported by Western media in the last seven years. This time it was about the U.S.-controlled biological laboratories operating on the territory of Ukraine.

On March 6, 2022, Major General Igor Konashenkov, a spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry, stated that the Russian armed forces during their special operation discovered a U.S.-funded military biological programme running in Ukraine. He claimed to have received information from the staff of Ukrainian biological laboratories regarding the urgent destruction of especially dangerous pathogens on February 24: plague, anthrax, tularemia, cholera, and other deadly diseases.

Of course, Western media started to debunk the narrative supported by the MFA Russia. But, frankly speaking, nobody cared about this debunking effort anymore.

The story first unearthed on April 13, 2020, with the official request submitted by two Ukrainian MPs representing a pro-Russian force, Viktor Medvedchuk and Renat Kuzmin, to the Ukrainian authorities  president, prime-minister, SBU, and health ministry. The official request enjoyed the widest coverage in pro-Russian media in Ukraine the very same day. In the wake of this massive propaganda campaign, some of those media outlets were sanctioned by President Volodymyr Zelensky and the National Security and Defense Council.

Initially, Viktor Medvedchuk and Renat Kuzmin stated in their request that their concerns are based on reports by some European media. In their request, they have also provided links to these reports. One of those was published in August 2017 on the Serbia-based Pecat website by a local journalist Zoran Milosevic. Pecat is a Serbian magazine which never hid its pro-Russian attitudes, promoting Russian politicians in Serbia.

The cover of the Pecat magazine volume, in which the Russian Foreign Ministry published an extended interview with Sergey Lavrov about "brotherly Serbia" The cover of the Pecat magazine volume, in which the Russian Foreign Ministry published an extended interview with Sergey Lavrov about "brotherly Serbia"

The author of the report about biological weapons in Ukraine, Zoran Milosevic, was in his 60s working at the Russian-funded Institute for Political Studies in Belgrade. For his scientific work, he was awarded a medal "For Service to Russia" in 2004; then a medal of the Writers' Union of Russia for his research "Philosophical thought of St. Nicholas Velimirovic" in 2005; and then a diploma of the Russian Center for Science and Culture in the Republic of Serbia "Russian House" in Belgrade "for cooperation and friendship of the Serbian and Russian peoples" in 2008.

There is no wonder he got all those awards as in his numerous pseudo-scientific publications, he denied the very existence of the Ukrainian nation as such.

Another evidence, on which Viktor Medvedchuk and Renat Kuzmin were pressing, had been published on the website of Bulgarian non-governmental organization "Center for Middle East Studies," by Dilyana Gaytandzhieva. For the last 10 years, this Bulgarian journalist has been defending Russian interests in the information sphere, spreading the anti-U.S. narratives about Syria and criticizing countries that the Kremlin saw as hostile.

Before working for the Bulgarian Trud newspaper, Gaytandzhieva was employed by the fourth most-watched Bulgarian TV channel, TV7, controlled by Tsvetan Vassilev, the main shareholder in Corporate Commercial Bank. In 2013, 9.9% of Corpbank shares were purchased by Russias largest bank, VTB. In 2016, Bulgaria filed a $1.3 billion lawsuit against Tsvetan Vassilev, accusing the latter of using bank funds to acquire property and other assets that led to the banks subsequent liquidity crisis. In 2015, TV7 was taken over by Louvrier Investment Company, managed by Pierre Louvrier. The latter has links to Russian oligarch Konstantin Malofeev, who has been sanctioned by the European Union for his financial support to separatists in Eastern Ukraine. Simultaneously, Malofeev owns a conservative TV channel in Russia, Tsargrad TV, with Aleksandr Dugin as its editor-in-chief (2015-2016).

Sometimes Gaytandzhieva is used to cover Russian intelligence operations. Radio Slobodna Evropa reported that on November 17, a Youtube video was published where a member of the Russian Military Intelligence Service (GRU) allegedly handed a bribe to a "Serbian agent  a high-ranking official". Bellingcat representative Christo Grozev commented on this video and also confirmed that the person on the video is Georgi Kleban, who was in the position of Assistant Envoy for Defense at the Russian Embassy in Belgrade and later removed from that post in June 2019.

To distract the Serbian audience from the scandal with Russian intelligence, Gaytandzhieva published a fake story of Serbian weapons being illegally exported to Ukraine. According to Gaytandzhieva, Serbia-made 60-mm mortars M73 HE, produced at the Krusik factory, were supplied to Ukraine through the United Arab Emirates. But, the facts voiced by Gaytandzhieva dated back to 2016, and the evidence confirming the use of the 60-mm mines M73 HE is accompanied by comments either from representatives of the unrecognized Donetsk People's Republic, or those of Russian propaganda media, incluging Zvezda, run by Russias defense ministry.

American biological labs and reality

"Scientific and Technical Center in Ukraine" (STCU) was established on October 25, 1993, by an international agreement signed between the United States, Canada, Sweden, and Ukraine. Later, the STCU became a platform for investing in Ukrainian science, distributing millions of dollars among grant applicants from among Ukrainian scientists. It was registered as a foreign diplomatic mission.

The supervisory board included representatives of international bodies called upon to control non-proliferation of weapons: Eddie Mayer, the European Commission's representative on nuclear security, and Phil Dollif, the U.S. State Department's spokesman for non-proliferation programs.

STCU was a part of the programs financed by the U.S. authorities, including the Pentagon, aimed at non-proliferation efforts.

But, Viktor Medvedchuk was not the first to start the talk about biological laboratories in Ukraine. Former member of the pro_Russian Party of Regions and ex-MP Olena Bondarenko, speaking at the pro-Kremlin NASH TV channel, said that the Department of Defense of the USA created and funded 15 biological labs in Ukraine. This was six weeks before the official request filed by Viktor Medvedchuk and Renat Kuzmin.

Right after Medvedchuk's official request was tabled, the sham entity of DPR has also stated on April 26, 2020, that they are aware of 15 biological laboratories financed by the U.S. in Ukraine. On April 27, the next day, Ihor Kolomoyskiys 1+1 TV channel joined the bandwagon with one of the episodes of the Secret Materials TV program led by Yevhen Plinskiy.

The author of the report on 1+1 was a young journalist Volodymyr Tymophiychuk. He was also an aide to the Servant of the People MP, Oleksandr Kunitskiy, affiliated with Ihor Kolomoiskiy.

He was actively promoting his reporting piece on Facebook.

After the widest debunking and civil society inquiries, on May 8, 1+1 branded the report a superficial opinion and promised to pursue the probe. But, then on June 18, Kolomoiskiys TV channel decided to delete all videos of the report from their online platforms.

On April 22, 2020, the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv issued a very ineffective and weak statement on the issue that was later used by Russian propaganda in Ukraine as a sign of recognition of the existence of biological labs in Ukraine. My requests for interviewing the STCU head were never returned. In March 2022, Victoria Nuland also made an unclear statement that allowed Tucker Carlson of FOX NEWS to support the Russian propagandistic narrative about some mythical labs in Ukraine.

Debunking efforts fail to prevent wars

The fact-checking efforts related to this story continued even after the full-scale invasion against Ukraine unfolded. On March 15, 2022, the BBC News published their report to this end. Ukrainian Texty followed with an even more extensive and detailed piece.

However, this could not save 158 childrens lives that we have lost since the renewal of Russian aggression. This is why I keep repeating that the fact-checking and debunking initiatives which I had been supporting and participating in very actively for the last seven years are useless in stopping aggression and wars.

In my opinion, the voices of the Ukrainian government and the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv were too weak to create opposition to massive propaganda. The law enforcement that is supposed to defend peoples rights was too weak to stop the spread of life-threatening information, which should be prosecuted by the state in line with Article 259 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.

Pro-Russian TV channels that ensured massive coverage of this fake story among Ukrainian and Russian audiences were sanctioned by Volodymyr Zelensky too late to stop the process of justification of Russian aggression. And now, it is absolutely clear that even had the story with biological laboratories failed due to solid fact-checking, Russian propaganda would have found something else to justify the invasion.

This tells me that the slogan facts matter is correct but ineffective in stopping the disaster. And the Ukrainian dead children don't care if we were right or wrong discussing the new fakes circulated by the Kremlin.

Last two weeks I listened to online Twitter discussions on fact-checking and countering disinformation. I was very impressed by one of the phrases I heard from a moderator who was speaking about Russian disinformation: This is so absurd and ridiculous, but next week we will meet again to discuss it.

This approach drives me mad. I don't understand why international donors, their grantees and numerous fact-checking organizations keep talking about absurd things, knowing that discussing absurd things spread by Russian propaganda doesnt lead us to any effective way out of this trap.

For the past seven years, weve been talking about how the Kremlin lies to the whole world. We knew that the war with Ukraine started March 1, 2014, with a fake story about cooperation between Dmytro Yarosh and Doku Umarov. And this dinnt help us stop another lie about biological labs that justified the full-scale invasion against Ukraine on February 24, 2022.

Isnt it time to apply critical thinking to our efforts at critical thinking and fact-checking? Isnt it time to understand that millions of dollars spent for fact-checking work worldwide failed to prevent World War 3? Isnt it time to change the tune from this is absurd, but were going to fact-check it and debunk it toward this is dangerously absurd, this is why we wont talk about it but we punish those spreading this?

Dmytro Zolotukhin is a former Deputy Minister of Information Policy of Ukraine
In 2021, UNHCR challenged students to develop ideas to help refugees and the communities that welcome them. An artist built LEGO models of the best ideas.  UNHCR

At first, it looked like a room full of diplomats. Hundreds of smartly dressed people raising placards with country names. Small groups holding peace talks in the corner. Notes passed quietly from one person to the next. But actually it was a room full of secondary school students. Welcome to Model UN.

Model United Nations (MUN) encompasses a global set of conferences where students step into the shoes of diplomats and draft resolutions to solve global issues. In 2020, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, introduced the Model UN (MUN) Refugee Challenge. Since then, more than 40,000 students in 70 countries have researched, debated and developed ideas to help refugees. Ideas from years past have been presented at the High Commissioners Dialogue, a forum bringing together global decision-makers to discuss refugee protection.

Students come up with surprisingly good and innovative solutions during their MUNs, said Pauline Eluere, who leads on youth engagement at UNHCR.

We wanted to build support for refugees and show students that not only do their ideas matter to the real UN, but that they have the potential to be implemented.

In 2021, UNHCR challenged students to address the impact of COVID-19 on refugees, refugee womens rights, refugees social inclusion and the use of technology to empower refugees. Students proposed moving walkways that generate electricity, policies that guarantee equal pay for refugee workers, ideas to improve maternal health and more.

A committee of refugees and UNHCR staff judged the entries. On Friday, 1 April, UNHCR gave eight awards and eight special mentions for the best resolutions, as well as several awards for communications and social impact. The full list of winners can be found here.

UNHCR should continue making youth part of the solution, said Matias, a student from Colombia.



We have fallen in love with debating, just like in the real UN, and once we know that we can lead bigger change, it motivates us to do more.



The best ideas have been turned into LEGO scenes by an artist; a way to show we can all play a role in building a more welcoming world for refugees.

Here are the winning ideas:

Piezoelectric walkways in refugee camps

As part of the 2021 MUN Refugee Challenge, university students affiliated with MOVENU, Venezuela's Model UN initiative, recommended installing piezoelectric walkways in refugee camps.  UNHCR

University students affiliated with MOVENU, Venezuelas Model UN initiative, recommended installing piezoelectric walkways in refugee camps, which would generate electricity using friction and the weight of the people on the walkway. The project, Light with Every Step, could help power lights, cooking and more.

Equal pay for refugee workers

For their MUN Refugee Challenge entry, students taking part in the Open Eye MUN in the United Arab Emirates urged countries to create national minimum wages.  UNHCR

Middle-school, high-school and university students taking part in the Open Eye MUN in the United Arab Emirates urged countries to create national minimum wages to ensure that refugees are paid the same as citizens.

Maternal health services and daycare for refugees

As part of the 2021 MUN Refugee Challenge, students participating in MUNESEN in El Salvador focused on maternal health services.  UNHCR

High-school and university students participating in MUNESEN in El Salvador centred their debates on maternal health services. Their resolution focused on ensuring that all refugee women could access safe spaces during labour, with specialized medical workers and psychological counselling to prevent postpartum depression. They also proposed funding daycare centres.

Scholarships and affirmative action for refugees

As part of the MUN Refugee Challenge, students from the United People MUN in Indonesia encouraged host countries to protect refugees' right to education.  UNHCR

Middle-school and high-school students at the United People MUN in Indonesia called on governments to grant scholarships and reduce tuition fees for refugees, a priority of UNHCRs 15by30 campaign. They also suggested using affirmative action to increase refugee childrens enrollment in public schools and create interactions between refugees and local students.

Partnerships with community leaders to boost vaccination rates

For their Model UN Refugee Challenge, students from Inventure MUN in India focused on reducing vaccine hesitancy in both host and refugee communities.  UNHCR

Students from Inventure MUN in India developed a resolution encouraging authorities to create refugee-friendly health systems and improve health education in both refugee and host communities to reduce vaccine hesitancy. The students suggested working with community organizations to identify the reasons for hesitancy or lack of access.

Mental health facilities to overcome the trauma of war and the pandemic

As part of the 2021 MUN Refugee Challenge, students from LRIMUN in Nepal focused on mental and physical health.  UNHCR

Middle-school, high-school and university students from LRIMUN in Nepal highlighted the need to focus on refugees physical and mental health in public health policy. They wrote about integrating refugees in vaccination programmes. They also pressed for the creation of mental health facilities able to address the mental health issues refugees face as a result of the pandemic, and the trauma of fleeing war, violence and persecution.

Partnerships with internet providers to bridge the digital gap

As part of the 2021 MUN Refugee Challenge, students in Singapore urged refugee-hosting countries to improve refugees' access to communications.  UNHCR

Middle- and high-school students in Singapore urged refugee-hosting countries to improve refugees access to communications. They advised working with providers to distribute mobile phones and install satellite towers in refugee camps. They also suggested working with IT professionals to provide digital literacy workshops to refugees.

Entrepreneurship and self-defense training for refugee women

As part of the 2021 MUN Refugee Challenge, students in the United States focused on helping improvie education and skills for refugee women and girls.  UNHCR

High-school students from MUNAP in the United States set out to make education more accessible to refugee women and girls. Their resolution focuses on building temporary schools closer to where refugee girls live to reduce the distance they need to travel, as well as offering national curriculum to refugee women, alongside entrepreneurship lessons, self-defense training and career planning sessions.

Anyone organising a Model United Nations at the middle school, high school or university level throughout the year can join UNHCRs MUN Refugee Challenge. Please contact [email protected] for questions related to youth engagement at UNHCR.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) Monday assured Pakistan that it would continue its support "once the new government is formed." "There is no concept of suspension within the IMF programme," the Fund said in a brief statement issued in this regard

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 4th Apr, 2022 ) :The International Monetary Fund (IMF) Monday assured Pakistan that it would continue its support "once the new government is formed." "There is no concept of suspension within the IMF programme," the Fund said in a brief statement issued in this regard.

In a tweet, the Finance Ministry said that Finance Division and IMF remained engaged in data sharing and reform discussions as part of EFF.

"There is no truth to speculation about suspension of program. IMF has confirmed the same and also clarified that it remains committed to Pakistan's macroeconomic stability", it added.

Former spokesperson to the finance minister Muzammil Aslam said that the news item related to IMF program was conjectural.

Meanwhile speaking to a news channel, Pakistan-Kuwait Investment Company's Head of Research Samiullah Tariq said: "I think as the country is in a (political) transition, they need authorities for commitment regarding policies." The statement from the IMF also indicates that the seventh review has ended and the three-year Extended Fund Facility (EFF) has been put on hold for the third time since it began in May 2019.

In May 2019, Pakistan and the IMF reached a staff-level agreement on economic policies for a three-year Extended Fund Facility (EFF).

Under the agreement, Pakistan was to receive about $6 billion for a period of 39 months, and so far it has received almost half of it.
Bucha, Ukraine, April 3 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 3rd Apr, 2022 ) :Global outrage at accusations of Russian war crimes in Ukraine mounted on Sunday as the discovery of mass graves and "executed" civilians near Kyiv prompted vows of action at the International Criminal Court.

Britain, France, Germany, the United States, NATO and the United Nations all voiced horror at the reports of civilians being murdered in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv.

Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies were recovered from areas around Kyiv recently retaken from Russian forces.

Ukrainian officials on Saturday said nearly 300 bodies had been buried in mass graves in Bucha. AFP saw at least 20 bodies, all in civilian clothing, strewn across a single street.

Russia denied the accusations and said Ukraine staged footage of the corpses.

Bucha's mayor Anatoly Fedoruk told AFP that 280 bodies were buried in mass graves. One rescue official said 57 people were found in one hastily dug trench behind a church.

About 10 were either unburied or only partially covered by earth.

Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba called it a "deliberate massacre" while President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russian forces were committing "genocide".

His spokesman, Sergiy Nikiforov, said earlier the Bucha killing "looks exactly like war crimes".

"We found people with their hands and with their legs tied up... and with shots, bullet holes, in the back of their head," he told the BBC.

"They were clearly civilians and they were executed." US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the killings "a punch to the gut" while NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said the violence, unseen in Europe for decades, was "horrific" and "absolutely unacceptable".

Britain, France, Germany, Italy and the European Union all called for those responsible to be brought to book at the international tribunal in The Hague.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Russia's "despicable attacks" against civilians in Irpin and Bucha were "evidence that Putin and his army are committing war crimes in Ukraine".

Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Germany would draw up new sanctions with allies over the alleged war crimes.

UN chief Antonio Guterres said he was "deeply shocked" by images of mass graves in Bucha and called for an independent investigation.

But Russia's defence ministry on Sunday said "not a single local resident" in Bucha suffered violence, accusing Ukraine of bombarding its southern suburbs and falsifying images of corpses in "another production" for Western media.

Despite Western action targeting oligarchs and businesses -- and calls to go further -- the Kremlin said it was not possible to isolate Russia entirely.

The world is "much larger than Europe", Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian state television, adding: "Sooner or later we will have to build a dialogue, whether some overseas want it or not." - 'Tormented Ukraine' - Europe's worst conflict in decades, sparked by Russia's invasion on February 24, has already left some 20,000 people dead, according to Ukrainian estimates.

Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainians have fled the country, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighbouring countries in the last 24 hours alone, the UN refugee agency said, although Ukraine's interior ministry on Sunday said more than 500,000 Ukrainians have returned.

Nearly 6.48 million were estimated to be displaced inside Ukraine, the International Organization for Migration has assessed.

AFP journalists saw women, children and elderly people boarding a train at the station to flee the eastern city of Kramatorsk in the Donbas region as Moscow refocuses its offensive on southern and eastern Ukraine.

"The rumour is that something terrible is coming," said Svetlana, a volunteer organising the crowd on the station platform.

Pope Francis, on a visit to Malta on Sunday, made a plea for refugees fleeing the "sacrilegious war" in "tormented Ukraine" to be welcomed.

Several Western leaders, including US President Joe Biden, have already accused Russia's Vladimir Putin of being a "war criminal".

Human Rights Watch said Russian troops may have committed possible war crimes against civilians in occupied areas of Chernigiv, Kharkiv and Kyiv, including rape and summary execution.

Zelensky has also alleged Russian soldiers planted mines and other booby traps as they withdraw from northern Ukraine, warning returning residents to be wary of tripwires and other dangers.

- Odessa hit - The war crimes claims came as the strategic Black Sea port city of Odessa, which has largely been spared in the conflict, was hit by air strikes apparently targeting key infrastructure.

Plumes of thick black smoke billowed over the strategic port city, after a series of blasts shook residents awake at about 6:00 am (0300 GMT).

"We were woken up by the first explosion then we saw a flash in the sky, then another, then another. I lost count," one local man, Mykola, 22, told AFP.

Russia's defence ministry said it had targeted an oil refinery and three fuel storage facilities with "high-precision sea and air-based missiles".

The depots were supplying fuel to Ukrainian troops, it added.

Ukraine said its defences shot down some of the missiles.

The strikes came as top UN humanitarian envoy Martin Griffiths arrived in Moscow on Sunday before an expected visit to Kyiv to seek a halt to the fighting.

- Peace talks - On peace talks, Russia's chief negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said it was too early for a top-level meeting between Zelensky and Putin on ending the conflict.

He said Kyiv had become "more realistic" in its approach to issues related to the neutral and non-nuclear status of Ukraine but a draft agreement for submission to a summit meeting was not yet ready.

Ukraine has proposed abandoning its aspirations to join NATO and declaring official neutrality, if it obtains security guarantees from Western countries. It would also pledge not to host any foreign military bases.

It has proposed to temporarily put aside the question of Crimea, annexed by Russia in 2014, and two breakaway territories in the eastern Donbas region that Russia has recognised as independent.

Medinsky said Russia's position on Crimea and the Donbas "remains unchanged" and that talks would resume by video conference on Monday.

- 'Liberated' - As Russian forces withdraw from some northern areas, Moscow appears to be focusing on eastern and southern Ukraine, where it already holds swathes of territory.

UK Defence Intelligence said early Sunday that Russian air activity in the last week had been concentrating on southeastern Ukraine, "likely as a result of Russia focusing its military operations in this area".

But it said Russia was struggling to find and destroy air systems, which has "significantly affected their ability to support the advance of their ground forces".

Ukraine on Saturday claimed progress against Russian forces, saying Irpin, Bucha, Gostomel and the whole Kyiv region had been "liberated".

NATO's Stoltenberg, however, cautioned that Russia's claim to be pulling troops away from Kyiv was "not a withdrawal" but Russia repositioning its troops.

- Evacuation bid - Russia's efforts to consolidate its hold on southern and eastern areas of Ukraine have been hampered by the resistance of Mariupol despite devastating attacks lasting weeks.

At least 5,000 residents have been killed in the besieged southern port city, according to officials, while the estimated 160,000 who remain face shortages of food, water and electricity.
Around 2,000 security personnel and volunteers will perform security duties during the holy month of Ramzan

ISLAMABAD, Apr 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 4th Apr, 2022 ) :Around 2,000 security personnel and volunteers will perform security duties during the holy month of Ramzan.

According to a plan chalked out by Islamabad police on Monday the security personnel will perform special duties at 1032 mosques and 29 imambargahs.

Extra officials have been provided to police stations to ensure effective security duties at worship places and markets. Police stations have been directed to coordinate with administration of mosques and office-bearers of traders' unions in their respective areas.

A special drive against professional beggars would be launched and they would not be allowed to gather outside worship places. The police officials have been directed not to allow any gathering outside worship places.

The citizens have been asked to avoid unnecessary movement and keep documents for identification in case of any movement.

Halting points would be erected in jurisdiction of all police stations while administration of mosques would ensure proper lighting and parking arrangements.

The capital police chief directed to ensure foolproof security during Ramzan and ensure effective patrolling and vigilance in each sector.

He asked all SDPOs and SHOs to personally supervise the security arrangements and ensure deployment of police officials or private security guards where it was necessary.

The IGP said all station house officers would ensure search and combing operation in their respective areas while Special Branch would install gates outside all important mosques and imambargahs.

He said private security guards hired for the assistance of police should be briefed about security measures. He said police officials along with local administration should take review of all precautionary measures being adopted at mosques, imambargahs and markets.

He said patrolling by Rescue 15, falcon and eagle squads should be present around mosques.
(@FahadShabbir)

Former National Security Adviser (NSA) Dr Moeed Yusuf on Monday thanked Prime Minister Imran Khan for entrusting him with the responsibility of NSA

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 4th Apr, 2022 ) :Former National Security Adviser (NSA) Dr Moeed Yusuf on Monday thanked Prime Minister Imran Khan for entrusting him with the responsibility of NSA.

Dr Moeed, in a series of his tweets, also expressed thanks to the entire team of National Security Division and Strategic Policy Planning Cell for supporting him and contributing to the national cause.

He said,"Few individuals are fortunate enough to get an opportunity to serve their country in a high office. Even fewer get to do so at my age. By the grace of Allah, not only did I receive this honor, but it has been an incredible two-and-a-half-year journey that I will always cherish." He further said, "I want to thank PMIK for trusting me with this immense responsibility and allowing me to do justice to my role as the NSA." He also thanked all others who allowed the Office of the National Security Adviser and the National Security Division/Strategic Policy Planning Cell to contribute to the national cause.

"I am extremely grateful to my team for reposing trust in me when I was in office and ensuring that together we were able to achieve several milestones that will Insha'Allah (By the will of Almighty Allah) have a lasting impact for the country".

The NSA thanked the entire nation for supporting and criticising to perform well at his position.

"And to all Pakistanis, both those who appreciated my presence and those who critiqued my work, I am equally thankful. The former kept me motivated, while the latter forced me and my team to try even harder and become better at what we did," he added.

The NSA while expressing his satisfaction and contentment said, "Today, I leave extremely satisfied and content, most of all because I know that the NSA's office and the NSD are vibrant institutions with an exceptional team that will continue to make Pakistan proud." "It has been an absolute privilege and honor to serve our great country! Thank you again. Pakistan Paindabad!", he concluded.

Dr Moeed Yusuf was appointed as Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) on National Security Division and Strategic Policy Planning, with the status of Minister of State, on December 24, 2019.

Earlier, in October 2019, he was made chairman of Strategic Policy Planning Cell (SPPC) under the National Security Division (NSD).

However, after reviving the post of NSA the government elevated the rank of Dr Moeed Yusuf from SAPM to NSA equal to that of a Federal minister on May 17, 2021.

Dr Yusuf is the associate vice president at the Asia Center at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP). He is the author of Brokering Peace in Nuclear Environments: US Crisis Management in South Asia.

He has done Masters in International Relations and PhD in Political Science from Boston University.

He was a research fellow at the Frederick S Padree Centre for the study of the longer range future at the Padree school of Global Studies at Boston University's Political Science Department before joining USIP in 2010.

Dr Moeed Yusuf, during his two and a half years tenure, successfully accomplished the task of finalizing the country's first ever National Security Policy centered on the citizens and economic security while geo-strategic and geo-political imperatives also featured prominently in it to strengthen Pakistan's security and standing in the world.

He also organised the first of its kind "Islamabad Security Dialogue", a platform for local and international experts to open debate on core security issues. The event was held in 2021 during pressing times of COVID-19 and second iteration of the forum was held from March 17-18 under the theme together for ideas.

Prime Minister Imran Khan launched the first Policy Advisory Portal of NSD based over 100 think tanks of the country.

The Islamabad Security Dialogue 2022 was held from April 1-2 under the theme Comprehensive Security: Reimagining International Cooperation was held on key themes revolving around the National Security Policy.
(@FahadShabbir)

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 04th April, 2022) The European Union is mulling additional sanctions against Russia and relevant proposals will be discussed on Wednesday, The Financial Times reports.

"Further EU sanctions & support are on their way," President of the European Council Charles Michel said on Twitter on Sunday, drawing attention to the events in Bucha.

The Financial Times said on Sunday citing a diplomat with knowledge of the plans that EU ambassadors are expected to discuss a fresh round of anti-Russia sanctions on Wednesday.

The new restrictions could target individuals, but could also include a ban on Russian ships using EU ports. Export and energy supply restrictions are also possible, The Financial Times said.

Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said on Sunday that Western countries could introduce french sanctions against Russia over the Bucha incident.

The Kiev authorities and the media have been spreading video footage, allegedly from the Ukrainian town of Bucha near Kiev, with the bodies of allegedly dead people lying along the road. The Russian Defense Ministry said that all photos and videos allegedly evidencing the Russian troops' crimes in Bucha are yet another provocation, since Russian units completely withdrew from the town as early as March 30.

Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said in an interview with Newsweek that the US is deliberately hushing up the fact that after the withdrawal of Russian troops, Ukrainian forces subjected the city of Bucha to artillery fire, which could have led to losses among the civilian population.

According to Antonov, the Kiev authorities are shifting blame on Russia in what concerns Bucha, where not a single civilian was injured while the town was under the control of the Russian forces.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Sunday that the crimes committed by Ukrainian radicals in Bucha are meant to escalate violence and disrupt the Russia-Ukraine peace negotiations.

The West scaled up military assistance to Kiev, as well as anti-Russia sanctions, after Moscow launched a special military operation in Ukraine in the early hours of February 24. The move came after the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR) appealed for help in defending themselves against the Kiev forces. Russia said that the aim of its special operation is to demilitarize and "denazify" Ukraine and that only military infrastructure is being targeted. According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the goal is to protect the people of Donbas, "who have been subjected to abuse, genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years."
(@FahadShabbir)

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 04th April, 2022) Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh on Monday blamed the United States for holding back the talks in Vienna on the restoration of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) by tying them to its domestic issues.

Last week, the European Union announced that the Vienna negotiations were nearing the final stretch.

"The US is trying to hold the remaining subjects (in the Vienna talks) hostage to its internal issues, but Iran and Iranians could not be patient forever," Khatibzadeh said at a press conference, as quoted by Iranian news agency Tasnim.

According to the Iranian official, if the US administration wants to reach an agreement with Tehran it should make a political decision as soon as possible.

In May 2018, the United States withdrew from the JCPOA, which was signed by Iran, the United States, China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, Germany and the European Union in 2015. Thereafter, the US enacted hardline policies against Iran, prompting the latter to largely abandon its own obligations.

The eighth round of Vienna negotiations was launched in late December 2021 and resumed in early February after a short break. Last week, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian said that parties to the Vienna talks were close to reaching a new agreement.
WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 04th April, 2022) Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov says that the Kiev authorities are shifting blame on Russia in what concerns Bucha, where civilian casualties could have occurred as a result of an attack by Ukrainian forces.

The United States is deliberately hushing up the fact that after the withdrawal of Russian troops, Ukrainian forces subjected the city of Bucha to artillery fire, which could have led to losses among the civilian population, Antonov said in an interview with Newsweek.

The ambassador added that it is obvious that the Kiev regime is attempting to shift the blame for all of its wrongdoings on Russia, while the Russian troops provided nothing but support to the people of Bucha, having delivered over 450 tonnes of humanitarian aid to local residents.

None of the civilians were injured while Bucha was under the control of the Russian forces, Antonov emphasized.

The Kiev authorities and the media have been spreading video footage, allegedly from the Ukrainian town of Bucha near Kiev, with the bodies of allegedly dead people lying along the road. The Russian Defense Ministry said that all photos and videos allegedly evidencing the Russian troops' crimes in Bucha are yet another provocation, since Russian units completely withdrew from the town as early as March 30. Numerous viewers have pointed out that "dead" people in these videos are not still and can be seen moving and even getting up once the camera man's vehicle passes them.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Sunday that the crimes committed by Ukrainian radicals in Bucha are meant to escalate violence and disrupt the Russia-Ukraine peace negotiations.
(@ChaudhryMAli88)

The US Secret Service expends more than $30,000 to rent property in California to protect US President Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, who lives in a luxury estate in Malibu, ABC News reported on Monday

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 04th April, 2022) The US Secret Service expends more than $30,000 to rent property in California to protect US President Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, who lives in a luxury estate in Malibu, ABC news reported on Monday.

The Secret Service, which is responsible for protecting high-ranking officials and members of their families, is renting a Spanish-style home next to the four-bedroom property Hunter Biden has lived for the past year, the report said.

The agency has an obligation to protect the president and his family and typically rents an estate in close proximity to the place where the protectee lives, the report cited former Secret Service officer Don Mihalek as saying.

The agency had to do this in past administrations, and unfortunately, the housing market right now has driven the prices up substantially, Mihalek added.

Members of the Biden family, including Hunter, began to receive 24-hour protection when Joe Biden became the Democratic party's presidential nominee in June of 2020, according to the report.
(@FahadShabbir)

Inside a snow-capped train station on the Polish-Ukrainian border, Olga Korotkova waited quietly among dozens of Ukrainian families to go home to her war-torn country

Przemysl, Poland, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 4th Apr, 2022 ) :Inside a snow-capped train station on the Polish-Ukrainian border, Olga Korotkova waited quietly among dozens of Ukrainian families to go home to her war-torn country.

Przemysl station is much emptier than a few weeks ago, when tens of thousands of Ukrainian women and children poured out of their country each day in search of safety after Russia's February 24 invasion.

On the near-deserted platforms, volunteers in yellow vests helped a handful of families heave their luggage onto trains headed further west into Poland.

But near the departures board in the waiting hall, some also watched for updates on trains rolling back eastwards into Ukraine towards Lviv, Mykolaiv, Odessa or Kyiv.

Olga, her husband Slava and 10-year-old son Dima hoped to return to Mykolaiv, a port city under Russian fire on the shores of the Black Sea, after more than a month stranded abroad.

"When the war broke out, we were in Egypt," on holiday in the Red Sea resort of Marsa Alam, she said. "Then we were transported to Poland." Before they rushed off to passport control, Dima proudly said it will be his birthday next week.

- 22:35 to Kyiv - More than four million Ukrainians have fled Ukraine since the war started, with a huge proportion arriving in Poland, according to the United Nations.

But over half a million Ukrainians have also made the journey in the opposite direction, Ukrainian authorities have said, to the relative safety of the western city of Lviv, or further on towards the frontline.

Some 88,000 people have returned in the last week alone.

On one bench, a woman in a turquoise woolly hat said she and her daughter would be catching the 22:35 train to the capital Kyiv, where Russian troops have recently withdrawn from the outskirts, leaving a trail of killings in their wake.

She said she was very thankful to Poland for its welcome, but she missed her cat and her dog which are being looked after by friends.

On the platform for the Polish capital Warsaw, a family of four clutched at each other's puffer jackets in a desperate last embrace.

Two children and an older woman boarded the train, but a younger woman in a silver coat stayed behind alone. In tears, she wheeled her suitcase to the end of the platform, then stopped to watch the train slowly curve out of view.

A few hours later, she joined a queue of dozens filing through a door marked "no entry", towards the train for Lviv.

- 'I want to go home' - The train wheeled into the night towards Ukraine, soon stopping on the Ukrainian side of the border as officials moved from one compartment to the next, checking passports.

With the train at a standstill, a girl giggled delightedly as she ran up and down the carriage, pursued by a boy filming her on a large tablet. Laughter spilled from their compartment as they then replayed the video.

It was close to midnight, and long past curfew, when the train finally pulled up under the glass dome of Lviv train station.

Coats rustled as people zipped up to face the cold, and then ferried endless carrier bags of belongings into the corridor for a swift exit.

A young mother who gave her name as Ulyana stood in line for the door with her young daughter, as they make their way back to Zhytomyr, a town further east towards Kyiv.

"In Poland it was very good, but I want to go home."
WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 04th April, 2022) US officials are considering strengthening the sanctions campaign against Russia amid the latter's ongoing special military operation in Ukraine, The Washington Post reports citing two people familiar with the matter.

The additional sanctions could target economic sectors that have been exempt from restrictions, such as mining, transportation and more areas of the financial sector.

"Secondary sanctions" that would target countries that continue to trade with Russia have also been discussed, The Washington Post said on Sunday, adding that EU officials have been calling for new sanctions to be imposed already on Wednesday.

The Financial Times said on Sunday citing a diplomat with knowledge of the plans that EU ambassadors are expected to discuss a fresh round of anti-Russia sanctions on Wednesday.

The new restrictions could target individuals, but could also include a ban on Russian ships using EU ports. Export and energy supply restrictions are also possible, The Financial Times said.

Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said on Sunday that Western countries could introduce more sanctions against Russia over the Bucha incident. A similar view was expressed by President of the European Council Charles Michel on Twitter on Sunday.

The Kiev authorities and the media have been spreading video footage, allegedly from the Ukrainian town of Bucha near Kiev, with the bodies of allegedly dead people lying along the road. The Russian Defense Ministry said that all photos and videos allegedly evidencing the Russian troops' crimes in Bucha are yet another provocation, since Russian units completely withdrew from the town as early as March 30.

Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said in an interview with Newsweek that the US is deliberately hushing up the fact that after the withdrawal of Russian troops, Ukrainian forces subjected the city of Bucha to artillery fire, which could have led to losses among the civilian population. According to Antonov, the Kiev authorities are shifting blame on Russia in what concerns Bucha, where not a single civilian was injured while the town was under the control of the Russian forces.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Sunday that the crimes committed by Ukrainian radicals in Bucha are meant to escalate violence and disrupt the Russia-Ukraine peace negotiations.

The West scaled up military assistance to Kiev, as well as anti-Russia sanctions, after Moscow launched a special military operation in Ukraine in the early hours of February 24. The move came after the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR) appealed for help in defending themselves against the Kiev forces. Russia said that the aim of its special operation is to demilitarize and "denazify" Ukraine and that only military infrastructure is being targeted. According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the goal is to protect the people of Donbas, "who have been subjected to abuse, genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years."
Historian and Expert on American South, Confederate Monuments to Speak at University Forum April 12

Mon, 04/04/2022 - 14:24pm | By: David Tisdale

The nations leading expert on the controversies surrounding Confederate monuments and memorials in the age of Americas latest reckoning on race will be the next speaker for The University of Southern Mississippis (USM) University Forum in the programs first in-person presentation post-pandemic.

Dr. Karen L. Cox, professor of history at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and founding director of its graduate public history program will present No Common Ground: Confederate Monuments and the Ongoing Fight for Racial Justice Tuesday, April 12 at 6:30 p.m. in Bennett Auditorium on the Hattiesburg campus. Admission is free, and members of the university and local communities are invited to attend.

Dr. Coxs presentation will be based on her most recent book by the same title, which covers the history of Confederate monuments from the end of the Civil War through the summer of 2020. Her University Forum talk will convey how Confederate monuments have been at the center of battles over racial progress and include specific examples from Mississippi. She will also discuss the costs of Confederate memorialization in the state, including at Beauvoir in Biloxi, the last home of Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederate States of America.

In recent years, renewed attention to Confederate monuments and memorials reminded the country not only of the tragedy of the Civil War and slavery, but of its struggle to deal with its painful legacy of systemic racism and Jim Crow segregation. Advocates for removal of these physical symbols of the Confederacy see them as reminders of that painful legacy of racial oppression, while others celebrate them as historic artifacts marking their heritage and not an endorsement of racism.

Dr. Cox notes that most of these statues - hundreds of which remain in public venues across the U.S., even in states that did not secede from the Union or were even involved in the war - were erected during the late 1800s and early 1900s, when whites regained political power in the South following Reconstruction. This era witnessed the wide disenfranchisement of Black voters, legalized segregation and increased violence toward Blacks that included lynchings to intimidate and suppress their attempts at participation in the political process and society in general.

One of the main organizations responsible for the placement of these monuments, primarily in front of county courthouses and other public spaces, was the United Daughters of the Confederacy, which sought to both memorialize and change the narrative from one of defeat to that of an honorable people. Dr. Coxs book on this group, Dixies Daughters: The United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Preservation of Confederate Culture, is the winner of the 2004 Julia Cherry Spruill Prize from the Southern Association for Women Historians.

The monuments, Dr. Cox argues, are symbols of dominance and white supremacy, and should have no place in shared public spaces.

Monuments are never about who they say theyre about; theyre always about the generation who put them there, she said in a 2018 interview with the Asheville, N.C. Mountain Express.



Somehow, its all been sanitized, she continued in the interview. People want to say the monuments are just about honoring men who fought and died. People do not want to see the connection between the Jim Crow period and these monuments, while also noting that the placement of the monuments paralleled the rise in lynchings of that era.

"To reckon with the past, you need to know that past, and Karen Cox is one of the leading historians of the Confederacys post-Civil War legacy, said Dr. Andrew Haley, director of University Forum. In her Forum speech she will discuss the bifurcated story of how the South remembers its past and how our failure to find common ground means the controversy over Confederate memorialization continues. With Coxs visit, Forum wades into a contemporary controversy hoping we can provide a space to search for that common ground."

Dr. Cox earned her Ph.D. in history from USM in 1997. For her, it will be a homecoming of sorts to return to the university to discuss her book, as USM is where she initially wrote about monuments when it was a chapter for her dissertation on the United Daughters of the Confederacy.

I'm very excited to be part of the University Forum, which has a wonderful tradition of bringing engaging authors to campus, Dr. Cox said. I'm flattered to be part of that tradition, and also thrilled to see old friends again.

University Forum is presented by the USM Honors College. For more information about University Forum, visit https://www.usm.edu/honors/about-university-forum.php.
Christians across Britain and Ireland unite in prayer again imploring for peace in Ukraine amid growing international outrage over alleged atrocities committed by the Russian military in the Kyiv suburb town of Bucha.

By Lisa Zengarini

As war between Russia and Ukraine entered its 39th day with no signs of de-escalation, on Sunday, Churches and Christians in Britain and Ireland gathered again in ecumenical prayer for peace and for all those affected by the conflict.



The main demonstration was held in London in front of the Ukrainian Embassy. The event was attended, amongst others, by Bishop Kenneth Nowakowski of the Greek Catholic Eparchy of the Holy Family, who had also participated in another prayer gathering led in Trafalgar Square, on March 5, by Archbishop Gugerotti, Apostolic Nuncio to the United Kingdom.

News of atrocites in Bucha

It took place as news began to seep out about mass executions of civilians allegedly committed by Russian troops in the Kyiv suburb town of Bucha. Images reported by various media outlets, after Bucha was retaken by Ukrainians forces, showed a mass grave with hundreds of corpses and a number of dead civilians lying in the streets - some with their hands tied - who appeared to have been shot dead at close range.

Ukrainian authorities have opened an investigation and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said the Russian military had deliberately killed civilians in the town. For his part, President Volodimir Zelensky said that more atrocities against civilians may be revealed if Russian forces are driven out of other occupied areas.

Communal workers prepare to carry a corpse in a body bag in a street in Bucha

Shock and condemnation

The news has sparked shock and worldwide condemnation, and is likely to lead to more sanctions against Russia, who denies the Ukrainian allegations.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) acting general secretary Rev. Prof. Dr Ioan Sauca expressed abhorrence at these reported atrocities, and called for full investigation. War is a context inherently conducive to such brutality, which underlines the need for systems of legal accountability to prosecute perpetrators, in order to curb the worst in humanity, said Sauca. "Moreover, it underscores the urgent necessity of bringing this terrible conflict to an immediate end, for the sake of preventing yet more death, injury and destruction of communities.

Archbishop Shevchuk



Commenting on the news, the Major Archbishop Svjatoslav Shevchuk of Kiev remarked that Europe only saw such scenes in the liberation from the Nazi. Today Ukraine is seeing this, and it is very important that the whole world sees and hears it, he said.

[ Literally a few tens of kilometers from the centre of Kyiv, in the liberated towns, we see horrific war crimes. Mass graves with hundreds of lifeless bodies. Executed people lying in the streets, sometimes with tied hands. Naked bodies of women which they did not have time to burn ].

The very fact of being able to see the Russian army trying to take looted property out of Ukraine by the truckloads is heart-breaking, he added.

In his daily video message from Kyiv, the head of the Grek Catholic Church in Ukraine also, once again, expressed his gratitude to all those who are praying with Ukrainians in different parts of the globe.



He especially thanked the Association of Marian Shrines of Europe who, last week, sent a strongly worded letter to Russian President Vladimir Pution condemning the war and asking him to stop the bloodshed in Ukraine.

Pope Francis 'willing to do whatever needs to be done'

All along his Apostolic Journey to Malta from 2-3 April, Pope Francis too reiterated his heartfelt call for an immediate end of the war which he once again termed as sacrilegious.

Read also 03/04/2022 Pope Francis: 'We never learn, we are enamored of war and the spirit of Cain!' Pope Francis answers questions about the war in Ukraine and the possibility of a journey to Kyiv, during the short flight from Malta to Rome at the conclusion of his 36th Apostolic ...

At the press conference during his flight back to Rome he was asked about the feasibility of him visiting Kyiv, also in light of the latest developments. Pope Francis replied that he was willing to do whatever needs to be done, stating that war is always inhuman and an expression of what he called the spirit of Cain.

Russia is presently under the scrutiny of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) following an application filed by Ukraine on February 26. On March 16, 2022, the ICJ ordered Russia to immediately suspend its military operations in the country.
The United Nations group of climate experts is about to release its final report in the latest assesment period on how to combat climate change through lowering greenhouse gases and technologies reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

By Vatican News staff writer

The UN climate report will provide policy makers around the world with concrete ways on how to curb greenhouse gases. Entitled "Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change," the report to be released late Monday will look at how to restrict greenhouse gases that are warming the planet. Recommendations will likely address how to shift from fossil fuels over the coming years, as well as the move to other technologies that can reduce carbon dioxide in the earth's atmosphere.

Consensus needed to move forward

The report will be issued by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, but before that can happen, the member governments must find agreement on the findings it contains and how they are worded. Hopes are the consensus requirement will not water down the text and render recommendations less effective in addressing critically needed efforts to slow or halt climate change before it becomes a runaway planetary trend that puts the future of humanity at high risk.

IPCC scientists have underscored the challenge that to slow the rise in global temperatures under the 1.5C threshold in this century, greenhouse gas emissions must be halved by the end of this decade. According to scientists, rising global temperatures are already contributing to devastating extreme weather events around the world, with escalating impacts on economies and societies.

Tipping point for climate action

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres issued a dire warning on the eve of the the 26th Session of the Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, saying, We have reached a tipping point on the need for climate action. The disruption to our climate and our planet is already worse than we thought, and it is moving faster than predicted.


A documentary film, entitled 'With This Light,' about the life and legacy of Sister Maria Rosa Leggol, who helped nearly 90,000 Honduran children escape from poverty and abuse, was privately shown to Vatican officials and ambassadors to the Holy See in the Vatican on Monday.

By Deborah Castellano Lubov

A documentary film bringing to life the story of the 'Mother Teresa' of Honduras, Sister Maria Rosa Leggol, who helped nearly 90,000 Honduran children escape from poverty and abuse, was shown to Vatican officials and the diplomatic corps to the Holy See in the Vatican on Monday.

Her legacy lives on in modern-day Honduras. Initially, Sister Maria Rosa opened a first orphanage in 1964, and founded the non-profit organization Sociedad Amigos de los Ninos (SAN) in 1966. As time went on, she would build over 500 homes across Latin America.



Sister Leggol applied a holistic approach, impacting the lives of these children by creating jobs for their relatives and communities through a variety of visionary entrepreneurial and educational programs, as well as bringing healthcare to them through clinics and medical brigades.

She did not let dictatorships, military coups, nor natural disasters disrupt her plans.

Listen to our full interview:

Sister Leggol passed away at age 93 in October 2020 after contracting COVID-19.

A private screening of the documentary was organized by the Embassy of Honduras and LOsservatore Romanos Spanish edition and was followed by a panel discussion including Jessica Sorowitz, the executive producer of the documentary, and the films co-directors, Ms. Nicole Bernardi-Reis and Ms. Laura Bermudez.

At the end of today's private screening, Cardinal Oscar Andres Rodriguez Maradiaga of Tegucigalpa, Honduras, addressed those watching in the Vatican with a video-message where he said the archdiocese is gathering testimonies in the hopes that they can proceed with Sister Maria Rosa Leggol's cause for beatification. He encouraged all with testimonies to come forward.

During the film, there was a moment where the cardinal, during Sr. Leggol's funeral Mass, recalled all she had done and appealed to those mourning her to ask themselves: "How can I collaborate so that all she has done will not finish?"

Ms. Bernardi-Reis sat down with Vatican Radio to reflect on the life and mission of the religious sister whose faith moved mountains.

Ms. Bernardi-Reis, could you tell us about Sister Maria Rosa Leggol?

Sr. Maria Rosa Leggol was a 93-year-old Franciscan sister who, during the course of her life, created countless programs that helped over 87,000 children in Central America get out of poverty.



What were some of these projects that Sister Maria Rosa brought to life?

She had so many over 70 years of service that we've actually been trying to get a complete list and we can't! She began with homes for children. She herself was an orphan at the age of six and knew that she wanted to provide homes for children like the ones she didn't have herself. She had this really holistic approach. She felt people needed not only be taken care of, but needed to have dignity. She created jobs programs for them.

I get a little overwhelmed with how many things she did [smiling]. She worked with medical brigades opening over 150 clinics in the area. At one point in time, she had a hospice for children with AIDS. She created, in 2001, a girls' school, a really innovative girls' school for some of Honduras' poorest women, which taught also about gender studies, womens equality, as well as health and academics. In 2019, when she was 91, she was still creating jobs. She was constantly thinking about what people's needs were and providing for them.

What inspired you to get involved in co-directing this film?

Jessica Sorowitz, our executive producer, called me because I had directed another film about nuns and said, I have this amazing nun in Honduras, and I think she's really worthy of a film. So, I went down and met Sr. Maria Rosa and was really blown away by her and her service and her dedication to the people of Honduras, and her vocation which she received at the age of six. I really fell in love with her and the people of Honduras. We really involved and got to know the people of Honduras, who were instrumental in making this film.

How did Maria Rosa discover her vocation at age six?

She lived in a port town and she noticed some German nuns who arrived on a beach in their long black robes. At the time, she said they looked a little bit like "little red apples," because of course they were very hot. Maria Rosa's parish priest told her that they were there to help orphans and she said, "oh, I'm an orphan." And so she thought, they therefore have come to help me and others like me. God wants me to become a nun. She actually told the sisters that she wanted to become a nun, and one basically said, oh that's nice little girl. They said, If you really want to do that, come see us on Sunday. I don't think they thought she was going to, but she did. She jumped on a train and travelled quite a distance to reach them, basically saying, Sisters, here I am. This was what sort of began her vocation journey.

What message do you hope to share?

I hope it conveys that with faith, you can do anything.

What can we learn from her faith in your opinion?

In my opinion, what we can learn from Sor, is that with faith, you can do anything. She just knew she had to do something, and it would get done. Mountains would move. She constantly was getting these little miracles in her work. Once she went to the jail. In Honduras, at the time, they had children living in the jails with their parents. Those were the first kids that she took out of out of the jail to her first homes. And her board has said, "we don't have enough room." She took the children anyway, and then right behind her, came a truck with 40 beds that were being donated. And then right behind that truck was food. There was enough to accommodate and feed these children. You can't really beat that.

Could you share with us about this private screening in the Vatican, and its significance for you and those who have helped bring this work to fruition?

We just finished the film and we are still waiting to have a real premier. This is an extra special event for us because it's an intimate screening. When we started this project, we never would have imagined that we would be here, but it feels providential. This is the seat of the Catholic faith. It's just so amazing to be here and bring her story to the world.
Vietnams divestment and equitisation plans have opened several opportunities for investors while allowing additional funding options for the government.

To incentivize FDI in the SOEs, the government has been making several regulation changes, creating exciting opportunities for foreign investors.

While the process has been slow, the government continues to chip away and issue new decisions to further accelerate the divestment process.

For years, Vietnam has aimed to reduce its direct ownership in key state companies and promote private ownership. Nevertheless, equitisation and divestment have not yet taken place as scheduled and have experienced constant delays.

According to the Ministry of Finance (MoF), from 2016 to 2020, 180 state-owned enterprises (SOEs) were equitised. However, this included only 39 out of 128 enterprises on the list approved by the Prime Minister, meeting only 30 percent of the target. In 2021, three SOEs were equitised, but none were on the list approved by the Prime Minister.

Regarding the initial sale of shares, the total selling value was VND22.7 trillion (US$987 million), or 23 percent of the plan. For 2016-2020, the MoF said VND177.4 trillion was collected through divestment, about 6.5 times the book value.

Last year, only three SOEs completed the privatization process, citing the difficult economic environment due to the prolonged pandemic. It was estimated that 18 SOEs divested state capital worth VND4.4 trillion (US$192.4 million) for a combined book value of VND1.66 trillion (US$72.6 million) during the period.

Among the remaining SOEs that are required for privatization, those in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City make up 54 percent of the total, including 13 in the capital and 38 in the countrys southern hub. The others include six supervised by the Committee for State Capital Management (CSCM), four under the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT), and two under the Ministry of Construction (MoC).

Most recently on March 18, the Prime Minister signed a decision to deepen the restructuring of SOEs in 2021-2025 as well as target the completion of restructuring SOEs by 2025.

Decision No 360/Q-TTg aims to improve the operational efficiency and competitiveness of SOEs on the basis of technology, innovation, and management capacity. The move will facilitate more effective mobilization, allocation, and use of social resources while developing state capital and assets at enterprises.

By 2025, Vietnam expects to complete the restructuring process of SOEs, for which a minimum of US$10.84 billion in proceeds will be used.

Opportunities for foreign investors

The state divestment process is faced with several challenges but could be an exciting opportunity for foreign investors, especially as large banks and corporations are also on the list of government divestment plans.

For example, as large agriculture and forestry corporations are beginning their divestment projects, investors may consider investing in these sectors considering Vietnams comparative advantage in this industry in terms of market scale and growth, low labor cost, and stable political environment.

Besides the agriculture and water sectors, investors may also be interested in large, profitable SOEs in the tourism sector. The new list includes three leading travel businesses that own a range of luxury hotels, namely Saigontourist, Ben Thanh Group, and Hanoitourist.

Most of these businesses hold impressive property portfolios, with iconic hotels such as the Continental, Rex, and Majestic, as well as modern properties like the Caravelle Saigon. Investing in these enterprises may not only mean tapping into Vietnams profitable hospitality industry but also tapping into the real estate market in Vietnam.

Particularly now as Vietnam gradually opens up and international flights resume, there may be even further opportunities for business and investment in tourism and hospitality. It is advised that investors take advantage of the privatization of the national brand names to get involved in the industry at this stage.

Regulations facilitating the sale of SOEs

The government is working to strengthen the supervision and accountability of state firms as well as monitoring representatives at certain state corporations to create a healthy investment environment for foreign investors.

To facilitate the sale of SOEs, especially to foreign investors, the MoF came up with new supportive rules in the first half of 2019. Circular No.21/2019/TT-BTC provides a framework for book building, which is the process in which an underwriter attempts to determine the price at which an initial public offering will be offered.

This helps enterprises determine market interest and purchase power before a transaction. This is particularly helpful when it comes to major auctions involving foreign investors as it raises the efficiency and effectiveness of the first public sales of the enterprises.

Another Circular  No.03/2019/TT-NHNN was passed in May 2019, allowing overseas investors to make deposits in foreign currencies when they sign up for SOE auctions. This applies to both first-time sales of SOEs and state divestments, with transactions allowed to be carried out at all approved banks.

Government challenges

Many SOEs have announced their auction schedule for capital divestment plans, but many of them have been struggling to attract investors.

For example, in 2018, GENCO 3 was the first company of Vietnams state-owned electric utility EVN to be converted to a joint-stock company and listed on the Ho Chi Minh City stock exchange. But the companys IPO that year was not a success as it only managed to draw in US$8 million compared to a total offering of US$290 million.

In 2021, although the stock market grew and investment demand was greater than supply as the pandemic eased, the divestment of State capital was behind expectations. EVNGENCO 2 (Power Generation Corporation 2), for example, was only able to sell less than 1 percent of shares in the initial public offering session in early 2021.

More recently 122 million shares of Lien Viet Post Commercial Joint Stock Bank (LPB) were brought to auction by the Vietnam Post with a starting price of up to US$1.27, which is nearly 15 percent higher than LPBs market price. Only 800 shares were registered for purchase by a few individual investors.

Another auction of 35 million shares of Binh Duong Trade and Development JSC (TDC) with a starting price of US$1.22 per share was also a slump in terms of sales as only 50,000 shares were sold to four individual investors.

On auction day, TDCs market price was 10 percent lower than the starting price of the auction, not to mention the lengthy procedure for shares transfer.

Other auctions of companies with the capital portion of the State Capital Investment Corporation (SCIC) have been even canceled due to not having any investors participate.

Investment challenges

The major investment hurdles faced by foreign investors include the inability to acquire a controlling stake and delays in the transfer of ownership.

In addition, the lack of transparency in the divestment process, unreasonable evaluation of enterprises, poor management, existing company liabilities, and incompetent staff were highlighted as the other factors affecting investors sentiments.

Factors behind slow equitisation

The first factor that causes delay would be internal issues. Some firms may need more time to tackle internal issues prior to equitisation while others face difficulties in administrative procedures.

Another major obstacle to the equitisation process is the issue related to corporate valuation, bidding consultancy, and land use rights. Land use rights are a decisive factor that makes SOEs valuable to investors. However, conflicts and overlap among legal documents on land use right certificates have added to further delays.

For example, Agribank and Vinacomin face common obstacles in getting their real estate assets approved by the MoF due to their large size. To speed up equitisation, the government may remove the requirement of evaluating the firms annual land lease fee so that conflicts and overlap between legal documents can be avoided.

The governments anti-corruption campaign has also delayed the process with several divestments projects between 2011 and 2016 under investigation.

Subsequently, since the beginning of 2020, state privatization moved at a slow pace due to the COVID-19 pandemic as enterprises and local authorities had to perform mandatory requirements on pandemic prevention and control.

As a result, revenue from divestment and equitisation to the Enterprise Development and Arrangement Support Fund only reached US$16 million, which did not meet the requirements of revenue from the divestment of state capital in 2021 as per Decision 1950/QD-TTg.

Governments response and support

The government understands the challenges it has to deal with for more successful divestment projects to take place.

Vietnam has also committed to creating a level playing field for all businesses under its free trade agreements. In particular, Vietnam has committed to cutting state ownership under the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) and European Union  Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA).

In addition, at the request to speed up the restructuring of SOEs, the MoF has developed a draft project aiming to restructure SOEs, focusing on corporations in 2021-2025.

At the same time, the Prime Minister ordered a simplified administrative procedure for local equitisation, without losing brand and corporate identity.

The Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) also said that in 2022, it would focus on implementing the draft project on the restructuring of SOEs once approved. This includes the divestment of 17 large SOEs in key industries and fields for the development of the economy such as energy, industry, finance, agriculture, telecommunications, and infrastructure.

Further, in an effort to attract additional foreign investment, the Commission for Management of State Capital at Enterprises (CMSC) has been assigned to create a scheme to encourage foreign investment in the purchase of shares in SOEs. This was done under Resolution No. 58-NQ-CP issued in April 2020.

Plans for 2022

According to the MoF for the 2022 plan, the ministry is expected to remit US$440 million to the local budget from revenue from equitisation and divestment that has not been paid to the state previously.

It is estimated that the remittance to the local budget in 2022 is about US$440 million. Of which the amount collected from equitisation and divestment of state capital of the enterprises in Hanoi is about US$310 million, Ho Chi Minh City is at US$74.6 million, and another US$74.6 million for other localities.

For centrally-managed enterprises, the revenue from the equitisation and divestment in 2022 will depend on the divestment in enterprises managed by the State Capital and Investment Corporation (SCIC). The SCIC is a state-owned holding company formed as part of a range of reforms by the Vietnamese government.

Given the circumstances, the MoF has developed a plan to divest capital from six enterprises on the list according to Notice 281/TB-VPCP and is expected to remit US$880 million to the central budget from the divestment.

The MoF has also requested the SCIC to divest state capital in five enterprises including FPT Corporation, Bao Minh Joint Stock Corporation, Tien Phong Plastic Joint Stock Company, Vietnam Infrastructure, and Real Estate Joint Stock Company, and Bao Viet Group with the value of State capital at par value of US$81.2 million and expected revenue of US$370 million.

The MoF also plans for divestment of Hanoi Beer  Alcohol  Beverage Corporation (Habeco) with the value of State capital at a par value of nearly US$80 million and expected revenue of more than US$530 million.

As per the government source, it is expected that the revenue from equitisation and divestment to the central budget will reach about US$840 million by 2022 if the divestment of the above enterprises is successful.

Takeaways

The government understands the challenges it has to deal with for more successful divestment projects to take place.

SOE equitisation has brought positive changes. But there are several challenges, especially when the target investor is a foreign company. The government will need to continue to examine its approach, take more market-friendly measures to attract more investors to SOE equitisation such as increasing the limits on foreign ownership or application of tax preferences.
Australia provides new help to Ukraine. Wars mental health impact. New COVID fight. Cambodia disabled artist displays hope. A change of space command. Music transcends war. Jim Stevenson hosts VOA Asia.
A former president and a treasury minister from Costa Ricas outgoing administration faced off Sunday to become the countrys next leader.

Jose Maria Figueres, who led Costa Rica from 1994 to 1998, represents the National Liberation Party like his father, three-time president Jose Figueres Ferrer. Rodrigo Chaves was the surprise of the first round of voting in February. He served briefly in the administration of outgoing president Carlos Alvarado and represents the Social Democratic Progress Party.

Both men waged a bruising campaign that highlighted past controversies. Neither approached the 40% of the vote necessary to avoid a runoff in the first round of voting. The latest polling had them in a technical tie heading into Sundays vote.

More than 3.5 million Costa Ricans were eligible to vote, but with many voters underwhelmed by the options, turnout could be even lower than the 60% in February.

Lines formed before voting started at some polling places in San Jose, the capital, while others appeared nearly empty.

Juan Morales, a 68-year-old retiree, voted early to avoid any crowds.

I hope that everyone comes out to vote today, he said. I know that they dont like the candidates much, but we have to elect a president and voting is to take care of democracy.

Chaves' campaign is under investigation by electoral authorities for allegedly running an illegal parallel financing structure. He has been dogged by a sexual harassment scandal that drove him out of the World Bank.

Figueres has been questioned over a $900,000 consulting fee he received after his presidency from the telecommunication company Alcatel while it competed for a contract with the national electricity company. He was never charged with any crime and denied any wrongdoing.

While Costa Rica has enjoyed relative democratic stability compared with other countries in the region, the public has grown frustrated with public corruption scandals and high unemployment.

In the February vote, Alvarados party was practically erased from the political landscape, receiving no seats in the new congress. At the time of that first vote, the country was riding a new wave of COVID-19 infections, but infections and hospitalizations have fallen considerably since.
SYDNEY  A historic deal between India and Australia has many business leaders cheering, but industries left out of the agreement are urging Canberra to continue negotiations.

The interim pact announced Saturday comes after more than a decade of talks and analysts have said that Australia is eager to reduce its reliance on China  its biggest trading partner  after diplomatic tensions in recent years prompted Beijing to impose sanctions on some Australian goods.

Australian coal, wine and other commodities have been hit by various restrictions introduced by Chinese authorities. This dispute stems, in part, from Australias call for an independent inquiry into the origins of COVID-19. Beijing interpreted the demand as criticism of its handling of the virus that was first detected in Wuhan, China.

The agreement with India is an attempt by Australia to diversify its commercial ties.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said his government had not betrayed Ukraine by signing a trade deal with India, which has refused to condemn the Russian invasion.

Morrison said his government had discussed the war in Ukraine with India, adding that he did not think that anyone can question Australias commitment to supporting the people of Ukraine after Canberra imposed various sanctions and agreed to supply missiles.

The trade deal removes tariffs on more than 85% of Australian exports to India, including coal, wool and copper. It covers more than 95% of Indian goods imported by Australia, such as textiles, leather and jewelry.

Prime minister Scott Morrison said Saturday that the agreement would boost Australian prosperity.

We open one of the biggest economic doors there is to open in the world today, Morrison said. We have been working on this for many years; (the) last three-a-half-years in particular. We are opening the biggest door of one of the biggest economies in the world in India.

However, some agricultural industries including dairy, chickpeas and beef were left out of the interim agreement.

Rick Gladigau, president of the Australian Dairy Industry Council, hopes that a comprehensive free trade agreement will help local dairy farmers.

Something would be better than nothing to start with. You do not want to be left completely out of a free trade agreement, Gladigau said. This is why we are doing them for, so that there [are] benefits going both ways. I do not want to see that dairy gets nothing.

Both countries will continue to work towards a full free trade agreement.

India is Australias seventh-largest trade partner. Two-way trade in goods and services was worth $18.3 billion in 2020.
VOAs Ndimyake Mwakalyelye spoke to Eve Thompson, author of Leading Women of Africa, about the political advancement of women on the continent. Eve discusses the concept of her book which was due to the lack of Black women mentioned in educational materials. She shares stories detailing the leadership journey of African women, including former president of Malawi, Joyce Banda. Also, how she finds inspiration through working with historically disadvantaged and marginalized people in South Africa.
U.S. President Joe Biden called Monday for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin, condemning him for the atrocities allegedly committed by Russian troops that have been discovered in recent days in Bucha, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv.

"You may remember I got criticized for calling Putin a war criminal, Biden told reporters at the White House. Well, the truth of the matter, you saw what happened in Bucha. This warrants  he is a war criminal. But we have to gather the information."

"This guy is brutal and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous, and everyone's seen it," Biden said, referring to Putin as the U.S. leader returned to Washington after a weekend in his home state of Delaware. "Yes, I'm going to continue to add sanctions."

The bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Kyiv-area towns that were recently retaken from Russian forces, Ukraines prosecutor-general, Iryna Venediktova, said.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen tweeted Monday that the European Union will send investigators to Ukraine to help her document war crimes.

The U.S. State Department said that Washington, at the request of Ukraine, would support a multinational team of prosecutors who will collect evidence of alleged atrocities.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited war-devastated Bucha on Monday, telling his people on national television it is now harder to negotiate an end to the war with Russia as the atrocities committed by Moscows troops become more apparent.

With evidence of civilians tied together and shot at close range, a mass grave and bodies strewn on the streets of Bucha, Zelenskyy declared, These are war crimes and will be recognized by the world as genocide.

Moscow has denied accusations of killing civilians in Bucha, with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov characterizing the scenes outside Kyiv as a "stage-managed anti-Russian provocation."

Zelenskyy, wearing body armor and surrounded by military personnel in his first reported trip outside Kyiv since the February 24 Russian invasion, said, "It's very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here. The longer the Russian Federation drags out the meeting process, the worse it is for them and for this situation and for this war."

"We know of thousands of people killed and tortured, with severed limbs, raped women and murdered children," he said.

Later Monday, in a video address to the Romanian parliament, Zelenskyy said he fears there are more places where even worse atrocities have taken place.

We have every reason to believe that there are many more people killed, he said. Much more than we know now.

Ukranian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba echoed those comments Monday saying, The horrors that we have seen in Bucha is just a tip of the iceberg. During a news conference with British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss in Warsaw, he said, I can tell you without an exaggeration but with great sorrow, that the situation in Mariupol is much worse.

The Mariupol mayor said Monday that about 130,000 residents remain trapped there and that everything has been destroyed in the southern city, including all its municipal buses.

A spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross said that it had been unable for a fourth day to move an evacuation convoy and humanitarian aid into the city.

Russian troops pulled out of Kyiv suburbs in recent days to concentrate their attacks on Ukrainian cities near the Black Sea and in the contested Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. The scenes of devastation left behind in Bucha and other suburbs have galvanized condemnation of Moscow.

U.S. State Department spokesperson Ned Price said images from Bucha suggest these atrocities are not the act of a rogue soldier. They are part of a broader, troubling campaign. Those responsible for atrocities must be held accountable.

Lithuania expelled the Russian ambassador stationed in Vilnius and recalled its own ambassador from Moscow. Meanwhile, both France and Germany said they are expelling Russian diplomats from their countries.

Europe gets 40% of its natural gas and 25% of its oil from Russia, with European governments trying to find ways to reduce that reliance without curbing economic growth. Over the weekend, Lithuania announced it cut itself off entirely from gas imports from Russia.



German Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, who is also the countrys economy minister, said Europe can go "significantly further" in imposing sanctions against Russia. He said Germany, which has faced opposition for taking a longer-term approach to abandoning Russian energy imports, hopes to end Russian coal imports this summer and oil imports by the end of the year.



"We are working every day on creating the conditions for and steps toward an embargo," Habeck said. "We are on the right track."

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki assailed the French and German leaders by name for not doing more against Russia, while calling for actions "that will finally break Putin's war machine."

"President (Emmanuel) Macron, how many times have you negotiated with Putin? What have you achieved? ... Would you negotiate with Hitler, with Stalin, with Pol Pot?" Morawiecki asked. "Chancellor Scholz, Olaf, it is not the voices of German businesses that should be heard aloud in Berlin today. It is the voice of these innocent women and children."



He said, The bloody massacres perpetrated by Russian soldiers deserve to be called by name: This is genocide."

VOA's Jeff Seldin contributed to this report. Some information in this report came from Reuters and the Associated Press.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken sharply condemned Russia on Sunday, accusing it of committing war atrocities in Ukraine as the world saw its first glimpse of the bodies of dead Ukrainians left behind in the streets of the Kyiv suburb of Bucha after Russian troops departed the area.

You cant help but feel a punch to the gut, the top U.S. diplomat told CNNs State of the Union show. We cannot become numb to this. We cannot normalize this.

Blinken said the United States would be looking hard to document Russian war crimes throughout Ukraine even as Ukraine claims it has retaken control of the north-central region around the capital. Moscows troops have pulled back from the Kyiv territory to concentrate new attacks in southern Ukrainian cities along the Black Sea and in the contested Donbas region in eastern Ukraine.

Reflecting on the bodies found in the streets, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told CBSs Face the Nation show, Indeed. This is genocide. He said Ukraine is being destroyed and exterminated by Russian forces.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told CNN, It is a brutality against citizens we have not seen in decades in Europe. It is (Russian) President (Vladimir) Putins responsibility to end the war.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Twitter, I am deeply shocked by the images of civilians killed in Bucha, Ukraine. It is essential that an independent investigation leads to effective accountability.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Monday that the EU must be prepared to put more sanctions on Russia in response to the reported killing of civilians.

Ukraines chief prosecutor said Sunday that authorities have found 410 bodies in and around Kyiv, during an investigation concerning possible war crimes committed by Russia. Prosecutor General Iryna Venedyktova, said, however, that witnesses would have to be interviewed later because they are too traumatized by what they saw to speak now, according to a Reuters report.

Meanwhile, Human Rights Watchs director of Europe and Central Asia said, in a statement that The cases we documented amount to unspeakable, deliberate cruelty and violence against Ukrainian civilians. Hugh Williamson said, Rape, murder, and other violent acts against people in the Russian forces custody should be investigated as war crimes.

In a surprise videotaped appearance at the Grammys, the annual ceremony in the U.S. honoring the years top musicians, President Zelenskyy asked the gathering for help.

Support us in any way you can. Any, but not silence, he said. Our musicians wear body armor instead of tuxedos, they sing to the wounded, in hospitals, even to those who can't hear them.

Russias Defense Ministry contended in a statement Sunday that it had not killed civilians in Bucha and claimed that video footage and photographs showing the dead were yet another provocation by the West. Russia asked the U.N. Security Council to convene a meeting Monday to discuss the actions of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha.

However, Britain, which chairs the Security Council this month, said there would be no meeting Monday and that the issue could be discussed at the meeting on Ukraine already scheduled for Tuesday.

Both Blinken and Stoltenberg voiced skepticism about the immediate implications of the Russian military pullback from fighting near Kyiv, which Moscow once appeared to think might be captured within days of launching its February 24 invasion of eastern Ukraine and aerial bombardment of numerous targets.

They could be regrouping and then coming back to Kyiv, Blinken said, but added that the resistance of the Ukrainian fighters over the last five-plus weeks has shown that the will of the Ukrainian people will not be subjected to occupation by Russia.

Stoltenberg said, This is not a real withdrawal but a shift in strategy to the east and south.

Blinken said Western economic sanctions are taking a toll on Russia and predicted its economy would shrink 10% this year compared to a projected 3% year-over-year U.S. advance. He said the U.S. and its allies are looking to tighten sanctions they have already imposed on Russia and add more.

Blinken is traveling to Brussels for meetings this week with other NATO foreign ministers, looking to highlight the military alliances resolve to hold Russia responsible for continued fighting in Ukraine.

The Reuters news agency reports that Ukraine has retaken more than 30 towns and villages around Kyiv.

Zelenskyy, however, warned that what Russia has left behind in Kyiv and its nearby areas is a complete disaster, a territory with mined land, houses and equipment. The president claimed even the bodies of the dead have been mined.

In the besieged southeastern port city of Mariupol Sunday, residents continued to wait for an International Committee of the Red Cross humanitarian convoy designed to evacuate residents and bring humanitarian aid. The Associated Press reports that as many as 100,000 people are thought to be trapped in the city that has been surrounded by Russian troops for more than a month.
An early official count of Serbia's national election on Monday confirmed the landslide victory of President Aleksandar Vucic and his populist party - important allies of Russia in the volatile Balkans and in Europe.

Vucic scored an outright victory in Sunday's presidential vote with the backing of some 60% of the voters, while his Serbian Progressive Party gained 43% of ballots, according to a near-complete tally of the state election authorities.

The results mean that no runoff vote is needed in the presidential election and that Vucic's party will be able to form the next Serbian government in a coalition with junior partners in the 250-member assembly.

The main opposition group, United for Serbia's Victory, trailed the populists in the parliamentary election with some 13% of the votes. The group's presidential candidate Zdravko Ponos gained 17%, the official results showed.

Despite being so far behind nationally, the opposition groups appeared to be in a tight race with the populists in the capital, Belgrade, where ballots are still being counted.

Both the opposition groups and independent observers have listed a series of irregularities and incidents, including violent ones. Ruling populists have denied vote manipulation or pressuring voters.

Since the party came to power in 2012, Vucic has gradually clamped down on mainstream media and institutions, assuming complete control over the years. A former ultranationalist, Vucic has served as defense minister, prime minister and president.

Portraying himself as a guarantor of peace and stability amid the war in Ukraine, Vucic has refused to join Western sanctions against Russia despite formally seeking membership in the European Union for Serbia.

After declaring victory on Sunday evening, he said the new government will face tough decisions but will seek to maintain friendly relations with historically close Slavic ally Russia.

Most of the parties running in the election were right leaning, reflecting the predominantly conservative sentiments among Serbia's 6.5 million voters. For the first time, however, a green-left coalition made it into the parliament, reflecting rising public interest in neglected environmental problems in the Balkan country.

Turnout was nearly 60%, which is higher than recent votes.
The European Union said Monday it will hold discussions about a new round of sanctions on Russia, following the reported atrocities in Ukrainian towns that have been occupied by Russian forces.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in a statement that the EU will advance, as a matter of urgency, work on further sanctions against Russia.

Borrell said, "The massacres in the town of Bucha and other Ukrainian towns will be inscribed in the list of atrocities committed on European soil.

The sanctions are to be discussed this week. EU foreign ministers will be able to read over them on the sidelines of a NATO meeting later this week or at their regular meeting next week.

Borrells statement said the EU will offer assistance to Ukrainian prosecutors who are collecting and preserving the [evidence] of the war crimes.

The EU is also in support of the investigations into the crimes by the International Criminal Court and the United Nations human rights commissioner, the statement said.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken sharply condemned Russia Sunday, accusing it of committing war atrocities in Ukraine as the world saw its first glimpse of the bodies of dead Ukrainians left behind in the streets of the Kyiv suburb of Bucha after Russian troops departed the area.

You cant help but feel a punch to the gut, the top U.S. diplomat told CNNs State of the Union show. We cannot become numb to this. We cannot normalize this.

Blinken is traveling to Brussels for meetings this week with other NATO foreign ministers, looking to highlight the military alliances resolve to hold Russia responsible for continued fighting in Ukraine.

Blinken said the United States would be looking hard to document Russian war crimes throughout Ukraine even as Ukraine claims it has retaken control of the north-central region around the capital. Moscows troops have pulled back from the Kyiv territory to concentrate new attacks in southern Ukrainian cities along the Black Sea and in the contested Donbas region in eastern Ukraine.

Reflecting on the bodies found in the streets, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told CBSs Face the Nation show, Indeed. This is genocide. He said Ukraine is being destroyed and exterminated by Russian forces.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told CNN, It is a brutality against citizens we have not seen in decades in Europe. It is [Russian] President [Vladimir] Putins responsibility to end the war.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Twitter, I am deeply shocked by the images of civilians killed in Bucha, Ukraine. It is essential that an independent investigation leads to effective accountability.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Monday that the EU must be prepared to put more sanctions on Russia in response to the reported killing of civilians.

Ukraines chief prosecutor said Sunday that authorities have found 410 bodies in and around Kyiv, during an investigation concerning possible war crimes committed by Russia. Prosecutor General Iryna Venedyktova, said, however, that witnesses would have to be interviewed later because they are too traumatized by what they saw to speak now, according to a Reuters report.

Meanwhile, Human Rights Watchs director of Europe and Central Asia said, in a statement that The cases we documented amount to unspeakable, deliberate cruelty and violence against Ukrainian civilians. Hugh Williamson said, Rape, murder, and other violent acts against people in the Russian forces custody should be investigated as war crimes.

In a surprise videotaped appearance at the Grammys, the annual ceremony in the U.S. honoring the years top musicians, President Zelenskyy asked the gathering for help.



Support us in any way you can. Any, but not silence, he said. Our musicians wear body armor instead of tuxedos, they sing to the wounded, in hospitals, even to those who can't hear them.

Russias Defense Ministry contended in a statement Sunday that it had not killed civilians in Bucha and claimed that video footage and photographs showing the dead were yet another provocation by the West. Russia asked the U.N. Security Council to convene a meeting Monday to discuss the actions of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha.

However, Britain, which chairs the Security Council this month, said there would be no meeting Monday and that the issue could be discussed at the meeting on Ukraine already scheduled for Tuesday.

Some information in this report came from Agence France-Presse.
A little over six weeks ago, Yulia Zubova was starting a new job as an export manager for a home accessories company in Kyiv.

The 37-year-old, originally from Donetsk, had been waiting on the role for a long time.

It was my dream job, she told VOA via phone. It was a nice company that manufactured stylish lamps and other home accessories and sold them to many countries around the world.

Two days later, on February 24, Russia invaded Ukraine and Zubova, like other residents in Kyiv, was forced to leave her job and everything else behind.

For about a week, she stayed outside of Kyiv, wanting to help the war effort but not knowing how.

Then a friend working as a fixer with foreign reporters called.

He proposed (for) me to do the same in Kyiv, saying some journalist needed help, Zubova said. I took the job as a way to help my country during this difficult time.

In journalism-speak, fixers are local people who work closely with foreign reporters on everything from securing interviews, translating, and booking hotels to more crucial work including advising on possible threats and no-go areas.

Often these are journalists already established in their home country. But some like Zubova are new to the profession  and learning on the job while navigating a war zone.

This is my first time ever working as a fixer, Zubova said. I have only been doing it for three weeks or so.

Zubova had to quickly familiarize herself with the demands of the new job, relying heavily on her English-language skills and knowledge of Kyiv and its surroundings.

The first journalist I worked with was American, who has been living in France. He works as a freelancer for a British newspaper, she said.

Since then, she has been in such high demand that she had to refer some journalists to fellow fixers.

Before she started, Zubova says, a friend warned the job was not without danger.

He told me up front there is some risk with being a fixer. But nowadays even staying at home is a big risk for us in Ukraine, said Zubova.

Russian forces are accused of targeting civilians, including journalists, across Ukraine.

Since the beginning of the conflict, several journalists have been injured and at least seven killed, including Oleksandra Kuvshynova. The 24-year-old known as Sasha was assisting Fox News. She was killed by incoming fire alongside photographer Pierre Zakrzewski on March 14.

Fox paid tribute to Kuvshynova, describing her as incredibly talented and praising her work in helping the networks journalists navigate Kyiv.

Focus on safety

Attacks on the media have renewed conversations about the important role fixers and local journalists play, and the responsibility foreign news outlets have in ensuring the safety of everyone who works with them.

The situation is so dangerous for everybody everywhere in Ukraine, Daria Tarasova told VOA.

Before the war, Tarasova was editor-in-chief at Shuster Online, a show broadcast on YouTube in Ukraine. More recently, she has been helping a news crew with CNN.

With 15 years experience in journalism, Tarasova has a unique ability to connect people and local authorities with foreign journalists.

It is very important to show the whole world what is going on in Ukraine, Tarasova said. We are just trying to do what we can do.

With dangers mounting for journalists in Ukraine to cover the war, many international bodies and media organizations have launched safety and training programs.

Among them is the London-based Frontline Club, which is in the process of setting up a center to support freelance journalists in Ukraine.

British photojournalist Paul Conroy, who is on the board of trustees, is helping to get the center up and running.

Speaking to VOA from the side of a road in Poland, while driving to Ukraine late last week, Conroy estimated around 3,000 freelancers have headed to the war.

A lot of them are people who its their first time in a conflict zone because its so accessible, because its smack bang in the heart of Europe, Conroy said during the phone call.

The Frontline Club will provide first aid and hostile environment training for foreign freelancers or local journalists who need that kind of assistance on the ground, he said.

Conroy came under attack while on assignment in Syria with the late U.S. war correspondent Marie Colvin in 2012, and covered wars around the world. He emphasized the importance of fixers and local reporters in conflict zones.

Without the role that fixers play on the ground, there would be no international news as we know it, he said. From the moment you step in a country, you're out of your zone and you need somebody who knows the local situation, who knows the lay of the land.

When you step there, you are at the mercy of people's goodwill, and that goes not just (for) freelance journalists, also for international news organizations like AP [the Associated Press] and Reuters. They need fixers and without them, the news would look very different.

Sharing stories with the world

Oleksiy Muzhchyna, a 39-year-old working with foreign journalists, including a crew from the Qatari-funded Al Jazeera TV, said many Ukrainian fixers and journalists lack experience in covering conflict, which makes them more vulnerable to Russian attacks.

Most of the fixers and journalists in Ukraine have not received any training that would ensure their safety and that of the foreign journalists who are with them, Muzhchyna told VOA.

Before the war, Muzhchyna worked as a marketing manager in Kharkiv. Now he helps crews reporting on attacks on his city.

Muzhchyna says foreign news organizations have a responsibility to provide local fixers with the means of protection, because after all, fixers are responsible for the lives and safety of the [foreign] journalists.

But for export manager-turned-fixer Zubova, helping foreign journalists convey to the world what is happening in Ukraine outweighs the associated risks.

The new job is rewarding, so much so that Zubova said she may consider a career change after the war.

I like this job very much, she said. I feel like Im in the right place now.

The most interesting thing about this job is witnessing many important situations and talking directly to people to share their stories with the world, she said.


LA CIOTAT, FRANCE  In a quiet corner of the French Riviera, La Ciotat Shipyards said it is writing bills for mooring fees for the towering white superyacht Amore Vero, but it doesn't know who to send them to.

Customs agents seized the 86-metre vessel as its crew prepared to sail out of harbor on the night of March 2, two days after the European Union added Igor Sechin, the head of Russian state oil company Rosneft, to its sanctions list for the war in Ukraine.

France's finance ministry says the yacht belongs to a company controlled by Sechin  one of Russian President Vladimir Putin's oldest allies. The ministry declined to name the firm.

But Sechin  in a statement sent to Reuters by Rosneft  denied this.

Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said France had officially seized the Amore Vero  a measure that officials said gives the state custody over the yacht and leaves costs with the owner.

But authorities have not notified third parties of the vessel's status, leaving it unclear who is responsible for its upkeep, said two companies involved in servicing the yacht. As bills pile up, an executive at La Ciotat Shipyards said the company was unsure how to get paid.

"We're continuing to invoice," said Alice Boisseau, communications officer for La Ciotat Shipyards. Asked who would foot the bill, she said: "We don't know."

Boisseau declined to answer further questions. France's customs agency declined to comment on why it had not informed the shipyards of the yacht's status.

The questions hanging over the Amore Vero point to the complexities authorities face as they target the assets of Putin's allies, and the disruption being brought to some Businesses.

In the European Union, oligarchs' financial wealth remains largely untouched, but European states have frozen or seized physical assets, including properties and at least 11 superyachts.

John Dalby, owner of Marine Risk Management, which recovers maritime assets on behalf of insurers and banks, said Mediterranean governments had little experience in the legal intricacies of seizing superyachts.

"There's a lack of cohesion in what people are doing: between state actors and other third parties, like creditors," Dalby said, adding that he had spoken with authorities in the Mediterranean and the United States.

He said that creditors of seized yachts - such as fuel suppliers or crew management firms - could ask a court to sell the vessel to recoup their debts. France's customs agency did not comment.

Ownership

Russians own nearly one in every 10 superyachts, according to specialist website Superyacht Times.

Some of those owned by sanctioned individuals are moored in safe havens  such as Roman Abramovich's Eclipse and Solaris in Turkey  or are sailing in international waters beyond the jurisdiction of sanction-imposing states.

The Amore Vero had been in port in France undergoing a refit by luxury yacht specialist MB92 when sanctions were imposed, Le Maire said.

Authorities had seized rather than merely 'frozen' the Amore Vero because its attempt to leave port contravened the EU sanctions regime and broke French law, the minister said.

MB92, asked if it had received full payment for the refit or whether it expected to do so, told Reuters: "We are still waiting for formal notification from Customs that will clarify the official status of the vessel."

Maritime lawyer Pascal Flot said difficulties determining the ownership of megayachts might be one reason why French authorities had not notified third parties of the Amore Vero's status.

The super-rich often control their assets through a web of shell companies in offshore tax havens, Flot said. The Amore Vero sails under a Cayman Islands flag.

The customs office declined to comment.

'Nasty surprises'

The annual running costs of the biggest superyachts can amount to 10% of their value, Flot said, including the crew's salary, repairs, fuel, food, insurance, berth fees and onshore utilities.

For a vessel like the $540 million Sailing Yacht A, owned by coal and fertilizer baron Andrei Melnichenko and detained in the Italian port of Trieste, that could mean millions of dollars each month.

In Italy, frozen assets are managed by a publicly appointed administrator and maintenance expenses are borne by the state property agency. They must later be reimbursed by the owner or the state can sell the asset to recoup its expenses.

Italy's Agenzia del Demanio declined to comment. Representatives for Melnichenko did not reply to a request for comment.

In France and in Spain, the running costs of a 'frozen' or seized yacht remain the owner's responsibility. However, blocks on their bank accounts meant that sanctioned owners were often unable to make payment, said Rachel Lynch of the seafarer union Nautilus International.

Another risk for governments lay in vessels wrongly detained, said Giannis Markogiannis, a Greek lawyer specialized in international yachting law, insurance and taxation. A seized yacht whose ownership could not be linked to a name on the sanctions list had to be released, leaving the state liable for any deterioration in condition or damage during its immobilization, he said. Owners might also sue for loss of charter earnings or for prohibition of use.

"All those matters need to be carefully dealt with by the seizing state to avoid nasty surprises." Markogiannis said.
The influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called the South Korean defense minister a scum-like guy for talking about preemptive strikes on the North, warning Sunday that the South may face a serious threat.

Kim Yo Jongs statement came amid heightened tensions between the rival Koreas over the Norths spate of weapons tests this year, including its first intercontinental ballistic missile launch in more than four years. Some experts say her statement could signal that North Korea will conduct more significant weapons tests soon and take a hardline stance on South Korea.

The ICBM test March 24 that broke North Koreas four-year moratorium on big weapons tests was an embarrassment to South Koreas liberal President Moon Jae-in, who has pushed hard to achieve greater reconciliation between the countries and find a peaceful resolution to the North Korean nuclear crisis.

During a visit to the countrys strategic missile command Friday, South Korean Defense Minister Suh Wook said that South Korea has the ability and readiness to launch precision strikes on North Korea if it detects the North intends to fire missiles at South Korea. Seoul has long maintained such a preemptive attack strategy to cope with North Koreas growing missile and nuclear threats, but it was highly unusual for a senior Seoul official under the Moon administration to publicly discuss it.

On Sunday, Kims sister, Kim Yo Jong, issued blistering rhetoric directed at Suh and threats toward Seoul.

The senseless and scum-like guy dare mention a preemptive strike at a nuclear weapons state, Kim Yo Jong said in a statement carried by state media. South Korea may face a serious threat owing to the reckless remarks made by its defense minister.

South Korea should discipline itself if it wants to stave off disaster, she said.

Kim Yo Jong, a senior official in the Norths ruling Workers Party, is in charge of relations with Seoul and Washington. South Koreas spy service says she is the Norths No. 2 official behind her brother.

Pak Jong Chon, a secretary in the Workers Partys central committee, separately warned that any slight misjudgment and ill statement rattling the other party under the present situation may trigger a dangerous conflict and a full-blown war.

Pak said North Korea will mercilessly direct military force into destroying major targets in Seoul and the South Korean army if South Korea preemptively attacks North Korea.

Relations between the Koreas briefly flourished in 2018 after North Korea abruptly reached out to South Korea and the United States and expressed its willingness to put its nuclear program on the bargaining table. At the time, Kim Yo Jong visited South Korea to attend the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics and conveyed her brothers invitation for Moon to visit the North. Kim Jong Un and Moon eventually met three times in 2018.

But North Korea turned a colder shoulder on Moon and cut off ties with South Korea after its broader nuclear diplomacy with the United States collapsed in 2019 due to disputes over U.S.-led economic sanctions on the North.

Kim Yo Jongs remarks foreshadow another significant military test, said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul. Similar to how Moscow and Beijing try to gaslight the world that Russias invasion of Ukraine is somehow the fault of NATO, Pyongyang will blame its nuclear and missile advancements on the U.S.-South Korea alliance.

Analyst Cheong Seong-Chang at the private Sejong Institute in South Korea said that the back-to-back North Korean statements indicate that it will take hardline steps toward South Korea. He said that Pyongyang is sensitive to Seouls preemptive attack capability because it lacks military assets and capability to detect South Korean strikes in advance.

But Cheong worried that Seouls public comments on preemptive strikes would result in strengthening the voices of hardline officials in Pyongyang and raising tensions between the Koreas.

Moons single five-year term ends in May, when he will be replaced by conservative Yoon Suk Yeol, who openly discussed the preemptive attack strategy on North Korea during his campaign. His liberal rivals criticized him for unnecessarily provoking North Korea, but Yoon said he would pursue a principled approach on Pyongyang.

The United States has urged North Korea to return to talks without preconditions, but the North has rejected such an overture saying the U.S. must first drop its hostility toward it. Kim Jong Un has repeatedly vowed to expand his nuclear arsenal as a diplomatic stalemate with Washington continues.

Some experts say the Norths recent missile tests were meant to perfect its weapons technology, boost its leverage in future negotiations with the U.S. and secure stronger internal loyalty. They say North Korea could soon conduct another ICBM launch, a launch of a satellite-carrying rocket or a test of a nuclear device in coming weeks.
For full coverage of the crisis in Ukraine, visit Flashpoint Ukraine.

For the latest developments of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, all times EDT:

11:00 p.m.: Russia is closer to defaulting on its debt after its sovereign bond coupon payments were stopped.

The bond coupon payments were not authorized by the U.S. Treasury to be processed by the bank JPMorgan, Reuters reported. The bank was supposed to process the payments from Russia and a payment agent would distribute funds to bondholders.

But the U.S. Treasury is no longer allowing these payments to move forward. Today is the deadline for Russia to make another debt payment," a Treasury spokeswoman told Reuters. "Beginning today, the U.S. Treasury will not permit any dollar debt payments to be made from Russian government accounts at U.S. financial institutions. Russia must choose between draining remaining valuable dollar reserves or new revenue coming in, or default."

Russia still has a 30 day grace period to make the payments. The country has 15 international bonds outstanding with a face value of around $40 billion, Reuters reported.

9:33 p.m.: Russia's former president Dmitry Medvedev said on the social media app Telegram that Russia will expel diplomats from Western countries after Germany and France both announced Monday ordered a combined 75 Russian officials to leave.

"It will be symmetrical and destructive for bilateral relations," Medvedev, now the deputy head of Russias security council, said of the impending Russian expulsions.

7:48 p.m.: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he will address the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday as it hears Ukraine's allegations that Russia troops murdered civilians in the Kyiv suburb Bucha.

In his nightly video address, Zelenskyy also warned that even worse atrocities may be discovered in other places Russian troops occupied.

"Now, there is information that in Borodyanka and some other liberated Ukrainian towns, the number of casualties of the occupiers may be even much higher," he said.

6:16 p.m.: The New York Times says that satellite images from Bucha, Ukraine refute Russia's claim that the bodies of civilians found in the streets of Bucha were placed there after Russian troops withdrew. Russia's defense ministry said on Sunday the bodies  some with their hands bound and with bullet wounds to the head  "are another hoax, a staged production and provocation by the Kiev regime for the Western media" and that no bodies were on the streets when Russian troops left March 30. But the Times posted a video that suggests the corpses found after Russian troops retreated can be seen in satellite images from March 19.

5:06 p.m.: US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said Russia is "revising its war aims" to focus forces on Ukraine's south and east.

"Russia is repositioning its forces to concentrate its offensive operations in the eastern and parts of southern Ukraine, rather than target most of the territory," Sullivan said during a briefing Monday at the White House.

He said U.S. intelligence believes forces are starting to retreat from some areas around Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, but he also warned that doesnt mean citizens there or other cities are safe from attacks, as Russia will likely continue to launch air and missile strikes at targets across the country.

"We should be under no illusions that Russia will adjust its tactics, which have included and will likely continue to include wanton and brazen attacks on civilian targets," he said.

3:57 p.m.: It's called the Sweet Home neighborhood  but its streets are now burned out, the windows in the buildings are shattered. Reporter Roman Sukhan visited the area during a tour of Irpin, near Kyiv, which has now been liberated from Russian forces. He has this story for Current Time, a co-production between Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and VOA.

3:41 p.m.: The besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol is "on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe," with over 100,000 people still requiring evacuation, Mayor Vadym Boichenko said in a televised press briefing. Boichenko said that Russia was blocking all humanitarian aid headed to Mariupol, and that no evacuation buses had reached the city, CNN reported Monday. Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Verashchuk said a total of 2,405 people were evacuated along a humanitarian corridor route running from Mariupol to the Ukrainian-held city of Zaporizhzhia on Monday using the dwindling number of private vehicles left in the area. 1,553 of those came from Mariupol itself, The Associated Press reported.



3:25 p.m.: Ukraine informed the International Atomic Energy Agency on Monday that the morale and the emotional state of staff working at the countrys Zaporizhzhia nuclear facility were very low, Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said in a statement. Grossi has expressed concern about the stressful work conditions for personnel operating Ukraines nuclear facilities during the conflict, especially at the Zaporizhzhia and Chernobyl sites, which Russian forces controlled for five weeks before their withdrawal last Thursday, according to the statement.

3:03 p.m.: U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday praised the unity of NATO allies and partners, reflecting on the past 73 years of the alliance. He pledged that in the future, the U.S. would continue to work together with NATO to safeguard security and shared values. Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin on Monday wished NATO a happy 73rd birthday, saying, I have never seen the alliance more relevant than it is right now.



2:50 p.m.: The World Health Organization released new figures Monday, saying that there have now been 85 verified attacks on health care facilities in Ukraine since Russian troops invaded February 24. The WHO condemned the attacks, calling health care a fundamental human right.

2:36 p.m.: Tens of thousands of Russian IT workers and entrepreneurs have fled their homeland since the start of the war with Ukraine. The exodus continues  and it could have deep repercussions for Russias long-term economic growth and cybersecurity, experts say. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reports.

2:23 p.m.: Sergiy Gaiday, the governor of Ukraine's eastern Lugansk region, said on Monday that Russian forces "are preparing for a full-scale big breakthrough," and urged residents to leave the region as soon as possible, Agence France-Presse reported. Please dont wait for your homes to be bombed, he said.



2:16 p.m.: Western leaders should examine their own consciences before accusing Russian President Vladimir Putin of war crimes, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Monday. He said Moscow would hold a news conference later in the day to demonstrate that Western accusations that its soldiers killed civilians in Northern Ukraine were false, Reuters reported.

2:02 p.m.: VOAs Megan Duzor takes a look at four ways that war in Ukraine could end.

1:47 p.m.: Three Russian activists in the Urals city of Perm have been charged with "discrediting the Russian Federation's armed forces" for allegedly publishing at home copies of an online magazine that has been covering the war Moscow launched against Ukraine last month. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has the story.

1:26 p.m.: The horrific images and stories coming out of Ukrainian towns like Bucha in the wake of the withdrawal of Russian troops has led to international denunciations, including comments from U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a war criminal who should be brought to trial. But the path to holding the Russian president and other top leaders criminally responsible is long and complex, The Associated Press reported.



1:14 p.m.: Food prices across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region are soaring because of the war in Ukraine, the World Food Program Executive Director David Beasley said Monday.

1:08 p.m.: British Foreign Secretary Elizabeth Truss and Ukraines Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba briefed the media Monday in Warsaw, Poland, about alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine. What we have seen on the streets of Irpin and Bucha are scenes we will never forget, Truss said. We have seen butchery, evidence of rape and sexual violence, as well as the indiscriminate killing of civilians, she said. Kuleba added, I can tell you without exaggeration but with great sorrow that the situation in Mariupol is much worse. Truss pledged to bring the perpetrators to justice and said British police are providing technical assistance in the investigations.

1:00 p.m.: U.S. President Joe Biden called Monday for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin, condemning him for the atrocities allegedly committed by Russian troops that have been discovered in recent days in Bucha, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv. "This guy is brutal and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous, and everyone's seen it," Biden said, referring to Putin as Biden returned to Washington after a weekend in his home state of Delaware. "Yes, I'm going to continue to add sanctions." VOAs Ken Bredemeier has the story.

12:57 p.m.: Metro stations in Ukraines capital Kyiv have served as important safe havens during 40 days of war, especially when the city came under rocket fire. On Monday, metropolitan authorities opened some of the stations and allowed media to visit. VOAs Malik Mansur reported that the capital citys administration and a variety of charity organizations are providing humanitarian assistance to thousands of residents who have taken refuge in the subway, some living in train cars. Medical, psychological, and other services were being provided underground, to assist this sector of the population.

12:28 p.m. : The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, said on Monday the discovery of dead civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha raised questions about possible war crimes. "Reports emerging from this (Bucha) and other areas raise serious and disturbing questions about possible war crimes, grave breaches of international humanitarian law and serious violations of international human rights law," Bachelet said in a statement, saying she was horrified by the reports. On Monday, her office also released an update stating that 3,527 civilian casualties in Ukraine have been officially recorded since Russia began its invasion February 24, of which 1,430 were killed and 2,097 injured.

12:23 p.m. : Images of dozens of bodies lying in the streets of the village of Bucha, near Kyiv, have been seen around the world, prompting accusations of war crimes against Russian forces. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty correspondent Levko Stek traveled there shortly after its liberation by Ukrainian forces, witnessed the carnage in the streets, and spoke to residents about what happened there. At the time of publication, RFE/RL could not independently verify all of the accounts.

GRAPHIC WARNING: Viewers may find the content of this video disturbing.

12:11 p.m. : A senior U.S. defense official speaking with the media Monday called the discovery of dead civilians in Bucha, Ukraine, following Russias withdrawal from the area sickening and disgusting and added that further investigations should be conducted into the circumstances of the killings. He said the U.S. is moving quickly to help Ukraine with security assistance. VOAs Pentagon Correspondent Carla Babb tweeted his comments.

11:58 a.m.: A team from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was stopped during an attempt to reach Mariupol, Ukraine, to evacuate civilians and is now being held in the nearby town Manhush, a spokesperson told Reuters on Monday. ICRC spokesperson Jason Straziuso told Reuters the team was being held by police, without giving further details. "It's not a hostage situation," he added.

11:51 a.m.: The President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Peter Maurer, on Monday shared video from the destroyed Ukrainian town of Irpin on Twitter. He said the ICRC team that reached the area over the weekend saw heart-breaking scenes and he called on all parties to protect civilian life and dignity.

11:41 a.m. : Russia and Ukraine are two of the worlds biggest exporters of wheat. Sanctions against Russia and the war in Ukraine are driving up global wheat prices. VOA correspondent Scott Stearns reports from the Western U.S. state of Wyoming on what those higher prices mean for U.S. farmers.

11:23 a.m.: Russia's ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva Gennady Gatilov said Monday that an initiative by the U.S. and others to remove his country from the U.N. Human Rights Council would be unlikely to enjoy majority support, Reuters reported. "Washington exploits the Ukraine crisis for its own benefit in an attempt either to exclude or suspend Russia from international organizations, including the Human Rights Council here in Geneva," Gatilov said. Earlier Monday, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield said "Russia's participation on the Human Rights Council is a farce," adding, "And it is wrong, which is why we believe it is time the U.N. General Assembly vote to remove them."



10:52 a.m.: U.S. President Joe Biden called Russian President Vladimir Putin a war criminal on Monday and said he would call for a war crimes trial, as a global outcry mounted over civilian killings in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, Reuters reported.



10:48 a.m.: A senior U.S. defense official Monday said that Russian troops are largely consolidating themselves in Belarus before likely redeploying to the Donbas region. He said there is still a bitter fight underway for the southern city of Mariupol, that Russians forces have shifted to a more defensive posture around Kherson, that airstrikes are focused on the Izyum area, and he confirmed that Russia did strike an oil facility in Odesa. VOAs National Correspondent Jeff Seldin followed the briefing and shared details on Twitter.

10:45 a.m.: The United Kingdoms ambassador to the United Nations, Barbara Woodward, spoke Monday on Twitter about the harrowing images showing atrocities committed against civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha. This month, the U.K. is president of the U.N. Security Council, and will call a meeting Tuesday on Ukraine, to discuss the mounting evidence of war crimes, she said.



10:17 a.m.: A professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies on Monday discussed on Twitter whether alleged atrocities committed in Ukraine by Russian forces amount to genocide. Associate Professor Eugene Finkel, who teaches university courses on genocide, explained why he thinks Russias invasion did not start with clear genocidal intent, but has now evolved into one.

10:06 a.m.: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke on national television Monday from the town of Bucha outside Kyiv, where hundreds of civilians were found dead after Russian troops retreated last week, The Associated Press reported. Zelenskyy said the evidence of these atrocities makes it harder to hold talks with Russia. Its very difficult to conduct negotiations when you see what they did here, Zelenskyy said, adding that in Bucha and other places dead people have been found in barrels, basements, strangled, tortured. The Kyiv Independent shared photos from Zelenskyys visit to Bucha on Twitter.

9:46 a.m. : U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield explained why the United States, in collaboration with Ukraine and other Member States, will seek Russias suspension from the U.N. Human Rights Council. In comments posted on Twitter Monday, she said that images of devastation in Ukraine require us to now match our words with action. She said the U.N. should not allow Russia to use its seat on the Council as a tool of propaganda to suggest they have legitimate concern about human rights. Last week the president of the U.N. General Assembly was asked at a press briefing if this is possible and she said it is. A Member State can be suspended through a two-thirds majority vote, and that happened in 2011 in the case of Libya, according to VOAs U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer.

9:31 a.m.: Russian President Vladimir Putin, who embarked on what he calls a "special operation" in Ukraine partly to counter the expansion of the NATO alliance, may soon have a new NATO neighbor. Finland has an 810-mile border with Russia. Finland's leaders have discussed possible membership with "almost all" NATO's 30 members and will submit a review to parliament by mid-April, Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto told Reuters.

9:23 a.m.: A group of Russians and Ukrainians who immigrated to the U.S. and live in Los Angeles have flown to Hungary to help Ukrainian refugees there. Marina Ratina, ex-producer of the popular cartoon series Masha and the Bear, is among them. VOAs Angelina Bagdasarvan has the story.

9:11 a.m.: Military conscripts in the Russian-backed Donbas region have been sent into front-line combat against Ukrainian troops with no training, little food and water, and inadequate weapons, six people in the separatist province told Reuters. The new accounts are a fresh indication of how stretched military resources at the Kremlin's disposal are.

8:42 a.m.: U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield said Monday that the United States will ask the U.N. General Assembly to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council, Reuters reported. Thomas Greenfield is traveling in Romania, where she met with Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca to discuss a shared resolve to assist Ukraine, she said on Twitter. She also visited the World Central Kitchen operation in the capital Bucharest, and in a tweet thanked chef Jose Andres and his team for providing meals to Ukrainian refugees.

8:34 a.m.: In a quiet corner of the French Riviera, La Ciotat Shipyards said it is writing bills for mooring fees for the superyacht Amore Vero, but it doesn't know who to send them to.

Customs agents seized the 86-meter vessel as its crew prepared to sail out of harbor on the night of March 2, two days after the European Union added Igor Sechin, the head of Russian state oil company Rosneft, to its sanctions list for the war in Ukraine. France's Finance Ministry says the yacht belongs to a company controlled by Sechin. But Sechin denied this. Reuters has the story.

8:27 a.m.: Drug shortages persist in Russia, weeks after the start of the war in Ukraine, The Associated Press reported Monday. Experts and health authorities in Russia say the drug shortages are temporary  due to panic-buying and logistical difficulties for suppliers because of sanctions  but some remain worried that high-quality medicines will keep disappearing in the Russian market.

8:19 a.m.: The U.S. State Department on Monday launched its new Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy (CDP), according to an official statement. As a key piece of Secretary of State Antony Blinkens modernization agenda, the CDP bureau will address the national security challenges, economic opportunities, and implications for U.S. values associated with cyberspace, digital technologies, and digital policy, the statement said. The CDP bureau includes three units: International Cyberspace Security, International Information and Communications Policy, and Digital Freedom, it said.

8:08 a.m.: Russia maintained gas flows through key pipeline routes into Europe on Monday, despite uncertainty over payment terms and as European leaders called for more sanctions against Moscow after war crimes allegations in Ukraine, Reuters reported.

7:52 a.m.: Ukraines Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Monday that he had spoken with his counterpart, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, and he expressed gratitude for Chinas solidarity with civilian victims of the conflict. We both share the conviction that ending the war against Ukraine serves common interests of peace, global food security, and international trade, Kuleba said on Twitter.

7:47 a.m.: The international community continues to express shock and outrage following the emergence of evidence that Russian forces appear to have committed atrocities against civilians in Ukraine, as Moscow dismissed the reports as a provocation. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reports.

7:21 a.m.: The local governor said Monday that a significant accumulation of Russian troops and military equipment have been seen in Luhansk Oblast ahead of what is expected to be a major military offensive there, The Kyiv Independent reported.

7:10 a.m. : Ukrainian officials said the bodies of 410 civilians were found in towns around the capital, Kyiv, that were recaptured from Russian forces in recent days. In Bucha, northwest of the capital, Associated Press journalists saw 21 bodies. One group of nine, all in civilian clothes, were scattered around a site that residents said Russian troops used as a base. They appeared to have been shot at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs. In Motyzhyn, to the west of Kyiv, AP journalists saw the bodies of four people who appeared to have been shot at close range and thrown into a pit. Residents said the mayor, her son, and her husband  who had been bound and blindfolded  were among them, AP reported.

This image contains sensitive content which some people may find offensive or disturbing. Click to reveal This image contains sensitive content which some people may find offensive or disturbing - Click to reveal The body of a person, with hands tied behind his or her back, lies in a street, amid Russia's invasion on Ukraine, in Bucha, near Kyiv, April 3, 2022. According to local residents, the person was shot by retreating Russian soldiers.

6:54 a.m.: The European Union said Monday it will hold discussions about a new round of sanctions on Russia, following the reported atrocities in Ukrainian towns that have been occupied by Russian forces, VOA News reported. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in a statement that the EU will advance, as a matter of urgency, work on further sanctions against Russia. Borrell said, "The massacres in the town of Bucha and other Ukrainian towns will be inscribed in the list of atrocities committed on European soil.

6:29 a.m.: As he marked Mine Awareness Day on Monday, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called attention to the challenges facing Ukraine, saying it will take decades to clear the country of unexploded ordnance, landmines, and cluster munitions.

6:14 a.m.: Some Russian troops remained in the northern Ukrainian region of Chernihiv on Monday after pulling back from around the region's main city of Chernihiv, regional governor Viacheslav Chaus said. Russia said last week it would sharply scale back military activity around Chernihiv and the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, Reuters reported.

6:00 a.m.: U.S. federal agents and Spains Civil Guard are searching a yacht owned by a Russian oligarch on Monday at the Mediterranean island. The law enforcement officers boarded the yacht at the Marina Real in the port of Palma de Mallorca, the capital of Spains Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean Sea. Associated Press reporters at the scene saw police going in and out of the boat on Monday morning.

A Civil Guard source told The Associated Press that the yacht named Tango is a 78-meter (254-feet) vessel that carries Cook Islands flag and that Superyachtfan.com, a specialized website that tracks the worlds largest and most exclusive recreational boats, values it at $120 million. The source was not authorized to be named in media reports and spoke to AP on condition of anonymity.

5:00 a.m.: British foreign secretary Liz Truss plans to visit Poland on Monday to call for tougher action to tackle Russian aggression and to support Ukraine in peace talks, her office said in a statement according to Reuters.

Putin is yet to show he is serious about diplomacy. A tough approach from the UK and our allies is vital to strengthen Ukraine's hand in negotiations, Truss said.

4:30 a.m.: Four million people have fled Ukraine since the start of Russias invasion, according to U.N. data. The vast majority are women and children  populations that are especially vulnerable to human trafficking. Lesia Bakalets has the story, narrated by Anna Rice. VOA footage by Andrey Degtyarev.

3:30 a.m.: In its battleground intelligence report, the U.K. defense ministry said Monday that Russian troops are consolidating and reorganizing their offensive into the Donbas region. The report said Russia is also moving mercenaries from the Wagner Group into the area.

3:00 a.m.: French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday that more sanctions on Russia were needed after Ukraine accused Russian forces of the killings of civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, Reuters reported.

Macron told France Inter radio that there were very clear clues indicating that Russian forces were responsible for war crimes in Ukraine. Russia on Sunday denied its forces were responsible for the deaths of civilians in the town of Bucha and said Ukraine had staged a performance for the Western media.

2:20 a.m.: Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the country will conduct a probe into alleged atrocities against civilians by Russian troops involving international investigators, The Associated Press reported.

Zelenskyy said in an address that the world has seen many war crimes, adding that the time has come to make the war crimes committed by Russian troops the last such evil on Earth. He said that a special justice mechanism will be created to investigate the Russian atrocities with participation of international prosecutors and judges.

1:45 a.m.: Media watchdog groups are expressing concern over the fate of journalists who have disappeared in Ukraine after a Ukrainian photojournalist was found dead Saturday. VOAs Sirwan Kajjo has this story.

1:30 a.m.: The U.N. Security Council will discuss Ukraine on Tuesday  as scheduled  and will not meet on Monday as requested by Russia, said Britain's mission to the United Nations, which holds the presidency of the 15-member council for April, Reuters reported.

Russia had requested the Security Council convene on Monday to discuss what it called a provocation by Ukrainian radicals in the town of Bucha after Kyiv accused Russian troops of killing civilians there.

1:00 a.m.: Grandmothers, mothers and children account for most of those fleeing Russias war on Ukraine. Each refugee has a story as well as hopes for the future. VOAs Celia Mendoza reports from Medyka, Poland. Julia Riera contributed.

12:35 a.m.: Russian forces appear to be withdrawing from the region of Sumy Oblast in northern Ukraine, a local official says.

The regional governor confirmed the troop movement in a post on his Telegram page, CNN reported. Our troops were chasing them out of the Kyiv and Chernihiv regions and inflicting losses, Konotop area is not 100% free of the Russians. The Ukrainians are gradually finishing them off, Dmytro Zhyvytsky, head of the regional administration in the Sumy region wrote.

Sumy is near the Russian border and was the site of heavy fighting early in the invasion.

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
UNITED NATIONS  Moscow has called for a special U.N. Security Council meeting Monday to address claims that Russian forces committed atrocities against Ukrainian civilians in Bucha, a town outside Kyiv.

"In the light of heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in #Bucha Russia requested a meeting of UN #SecurityCouncil on Monday April 4," Dmitry Polyanskiy, Russia's deputy ambassador to the United Nations, said Sunday on Twitter.

Ukraine and Western leaders have erupted in outrage over the discovery of mass graves and hundreds of dead people in Bucha, a small town northwest of Kyiv.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy directly blamed Moscow for the "killings" of civilians.

Russia denied the accusations and said Kyiv staged footage of the corpses.

A senior Washington official swiftly slammed Moscow's U.N. move and said it was designed to "feign outrage."

"Russia is drawing from the playbook it used for Crimea & Aleppo: forced to defend the indefensible (here, the Bucha atrocities), Russia is calling a @UN Security Council meeting so it can feign outrage & call for accountability," tweeted Samantha Power, a former U.S. ambassador to the U.N.

"Nobody is buying it," added Power, who is the current administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development.

U.N. authorities have yet to publicly state whether a Security Council emergency meeting will take place Monday.
The Rwandan man portrayed as a hero in the movie "Hotel Rwanda" should not have his 25-year sentence extended to life in prison, a Rwandan court ruled Monday.

Paul Rusesabagina was convicted in September on eight terrorism charges for his role in a group opposing President Paul Kagame.

Rusesabagina said that he was a leader in the Rwanda Movement for Democratic Change but had no role in the group's armed wing, the National Liberation Front, which has carried out attacks.

He refused to take part in the September trial, calling it a sham, and was not present at Monday's ruling.

Prosecutors called the 25-year sentence too lenient.

His family has lobbied for his release, saying he is ill.

Rusesabagina saved around 1,200 people by sheltering them in a hotel during the country's 1994 genocide, which saw over 800,000 killed.

Some information in this report came from Reuters and Agence France-Presse
Medyka, Poland, is one of the busiest border crossings for people fleeing the war. Everyday refugees stream across the border form Ukraine, and at the same time volunteers are arriving to help. For VOA News, Julia Riera has the story.
The Taliban's return to power in Afghanistan in August following a chaotic U.S. withdrawal has led to "unprecedented" suffering among Afghans, a new survey finds.

According to a Gallup poll, 94% of Afghans "rated their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering."

Though it was the highest level since 2005, suffering has been on an upward trend since 2017, when the Taliban began a long offensive to take the country back, Gallup said.

Among women, 96% reported suffering, compared with 92% of men. There were no notable differences in the level of suffering among Afghanistan's regions.

Women are also pessimistic about their futures, Gallup said, as the Taliban have reneged on promises to reverse banning women from secondary and higher education. Women have been restricted from working in every field except health care and primary education.

The need for humanitarian aid in the country is desperate, but attention has shifted away from the country since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, Gallup said.

"Before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. and other countries pledged substantial amounts of aid. However, in the wake of the crisis in Ukraine, it is unclear how much additional aid will be forthcoming," Gallup said in a press release.
The United States said Monday it wants the U.N. General Assembly to remove Russia from the U.N. Human Rights Council, citing allegations of war crimes committed in Ukraine.

"Russia's participation on the Human Rights Council is a farce, said Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield. "And it is wrong, which is why we believe it is time the U.N. General Assembly vote to remove them."

Thomas-Greenfield based her call for Russias removal on allegations by Ukraine that Russian troops killed dozens of civilians in the town of Bucha.

Ukraine said it is investigating the killings, and Russia has denied any involvement.

A two-thirds vote by the 193-member assembly is required to remove Russia from the council.

The council, which is based in Geneva, is largely symbolic, but it can authorize investigations into human rights violations.

Russia is in its second year of a three-year stint on the 47-member council.

It has yet to comment on calls for its removal.

Since Russia's February 24 invasion of Ukraine, the General Assembly has passed two resolutions condemning the countrys actions.

Some information in this report comes from Reuters.
Senate bargainers have reached agreement on a slimmed-down $10 billion package for countering COVID-19, the top Democratic and Republican negotiators said Monday, but the measure dropped all funding to help nations abroad combat the pandemic.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat from New York, said the deal would give the government "the tools we need" to continue battling the disease. Senator Mitt Romney, a Republican from Utah, trumpeted budget savings in the measure that he said meant it "will not cost the American people a single additional dollar."

At least half the measure would have to be used to research and produce therapeutics to treat the disease, according to fact sheets distributed by Schumer and Romney, the two top bargainers.

The money would also be used to buy vaccines and tests. At least $750 million would be used to research new COVID-19 variants and to expand vaccine production, the descriptions said.

The agreement comes with party leaders hoping to move the legislation through Congress this week, before lawmakers leave for a two-week spring recess. It also comes with BA.2, the new omicron variant, expected to spark a fresh increase in U.S. cases. Around 980,000 Americans and over 6 million people worldwide have died from COVID-19.

Schumer blamed the GOP for the lack of global assistance, saying he is "disappointed that our Republican colleagues could not agree to include the $5 billion" from an earlier version of the measure. He said members of both parties want to craft a second spending measure this spring that could include funds to battle COVID-19 and hunger overseas and more assistance for Ukraine as it continues battling the Russian invasion.

Romney suggested an openness to considering future COVID-19 money. "While this agreement does not include funding for the U.S. global vaccination program, I am willing to explore a fiscally responsible solution to support global efforts in the weeks ahead," he said.

The accord represents a deep cut from the $22.5 billion President Joe Biden initially requested, and from a $15 billion version that both parties' leaders had negotiated last month. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, abandoned that plan after Democratic lawmakers rejected proposed cuts in state pandemic aid to help pay for the package.

The $15 billion plan had included about $5 billion for the global effort to fight COVID-19, which has run rampant in many countries, especially poorer ones. The overall price tag has shrunk, and the global money has fallen off, as the two parties have been unable to agree on more than $10 billion in budget savings to pay for it.


The decision by Cambodian authorities to revoke licenses of three news outlets is brazen intimidation a media watchdog says.

The Ministry of Informations decision impacts Bayong Times, Cambodia Today, and the online outlet Khmer Cover TV, or KCTV.

All three are accused of disseminating information that violates the ethics of journalism and business contracts being upheld, by the ministry, according to a March 15 letter from Sok Prasidh, Secretary of State at the Ministry of Information.

In an interview with VOA last week, Touch Yuthea of Cambodia Today, said he believes the decision is related to his news website reporting on irregularities in government contract bidding processes.

Cambodia Today in February reported on alleged irregularities in bidding for supplies for the Ministry of Labor and Vocational Training.

Some officials at the ministry have said they suspect irregular practices, which may have resulted in a loss of millions of dollars in annual losses to the national budget.

Yuthea told VOA that a senior official in the Ministry of Informations legislative department repeatedly asked him to drop the report. At first Yuthea did not agree. Later, not wanting friction with officials at the Ministry of Information, Yuthea says he decided to drop the report from his news website.

"I do not want to go too far with this issue. Yuthea said. But, by March 15, after I have made a compromise to end this trouble, the ministry issued a letter to terminate my license, he said.

Meas Sophorn, spokesman for the Ministry of Information, could not be reached for comment.

Yuthea said he was disappointed by the decision.

I want to play the role of a real news publisher. So, if there is any release [of] the information that affects, for example, the loss of national income, then it should be reconsidered because I protect the national money, Yuthea said.

Asking media to drop hot stories on government issues is harmful to freedom of expression and dissemination of true information," he added.

The editor said he doesnt think the license issue represents the decision of the ministry as a whole.

VOA Khmer attempts to reach publishers for the Bayong Times and KCTV were not successful.

Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has said that the ministry told all three publications the licenses would be restored if they corrected or removed certain content.

None of the outlets received warning and were not able to appeal the decision, according to RSF.

The loss of licenses is a gross violation of the freedom of publication as enshrined in article 41 of Cambodias constitution, Daniel Bastard, the head of RSFs Asia-Pacific desk, said in a statement.

This is brazen intimidation, and we call on the government to immediately restore the publication licenses to these three outlets. Press freedom must not be the collateral victim of the actions of a few corrupt officials, he added.

Nop Vy, executive director of the Cambodian Journalists Alliance Association, said that pro-government media outlets often lose publishing licenses.



But, he added, the loss of licenses is risky and even more dangerous for journalists who work in institutions that are not affiliated with the ministry or the government."

The ministry revoked licenses for seven media outlets in 2021, Vy says.



Cambodia has a poor press freedom record, ranking 144 out of 180 countries where 1 is freest in RSF's World Press Freedom Index.

Prime Minister Hun Sens government embarked on an offensive against independent media outlets in 2017 to maintain its grip on power, RSF said.



The media watchdog also cited the case of the defense minister last October allegedly ordering officials to punish provincial website operator Youn Chhiv for publishing an investigative report about illegal land seizures.

The journalist in that case was sentenced to a year in prison.

This story originated in VOAs Khmer service.

Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly described Sok Prasidh as Cambodia's Information Minister. Sok Prasidh is the Secretary of State at the Ministry of Information.
WASHINGTON  U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken sharply condemned Russia on Sunday, accusing it of committing war atrocities in Ukraine as the world saw its first glimpse of the bodies of dead Ukrainians left behind like trash in the streets of the Kyiv suburb of Bucha after Russian troops departed the area.

You cant help but feel a punch to the gut, the top U.S. diplomat told CNNs State of the Union show. We cannot become numb to this. We cannot normalize this.

Blinken said the United States would be looking hard to document Russian war crimes throughout Ukraine even as Ukraine is claiming it has retaken control of the north-central region around the capital. Moscows troops have pulled back from the Kyiv territory to concentrate new attacks in southern Ukrainian cities along the Black Sea and in the contested Donbas region in eastern Ukraine.

Reflecting on the bodies found in the streets, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told CBSs Face the Nation show, Indeed. This is genocide. He said Ukraine is being destroyed and exterminated by Russian forces.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told CNN, It is a brutality against citizens we have not seen in decades in Europe. It is [Russian] President [Vladimir] Putins responsibility to end the war.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Twitter, I am deeply shocked by the images of civilians killed in Bucha, Ukraine. It is essential that an independent investigation leads to effective accountability.

Russias Defense Ministry contended in a statement Sunday that it had not killed civilians in Bucha and claimed that video footage and photographs showing the dead were yet another provocation by the West.

Both Blinken and Stoltenberg voiced skepticism about the immediate implications of the Russian military pullback from fighting near Kyiv, which Moscow once appeared to think might be captured within days of launching its Feb. 24 invasion of eastern Ukraine and aerial bombardment of numerous targets.

They could be regrouping and then coming back to Kyiv, Blinken said, but added that the resistance of the Ukrainian fighters over the last five-plus weeks has shown that the will of the Ukrainian people will not be subjected to occupation by Russia.

Stoltenberg said, This is not a real withdrawal but a shift in strategy to the east and south.

Blinken said Western economic sanctions are taking a toll on Russia and predicted its economy would shrink 10% this year compared to a projected 3% year-over-year U.S. advance. He said the U.S. and its allies are looking to tighten sanctions they have already imposed on Russia and add more.

Blinken is traveling to Brussels for meetings this week with other NATO foreign ministers, looking to highlight the military alliances resolve to hold Russia responsible for continued fighting in Ukraine.

The Reuters news agency reports that Ukraine has retaken more than 30 towns and villages around Kyiv.

Zelenskyy, however, warned that what Russia has left behind in Kyiv and its nearby areas is a complete disaster, a territory with mined land, houses and equipment. The president claimed even the bodies of the dead have been mined.

Zelenskyy said Saturday in his nightly address, We should not cherish empty hopes that the Russians will simply leave our land. He said peace could only be gained through hard battles, negotiations and daily vigorous work.

Reports from Odesa, on Ukraines Black Sea coast, say a Russian missile strike on an oil refinery there has destroyed the facility. The Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement, "This morning, high-precision sea- and air-based missiles destroyed an oil refinery and three storage facilities for fuel and lubricants near the city of Odesa, from which fuel was supplied to a group of Ukrainian troops.

British military intelligence said Sunday that reported mines in the Black Sea are a serious risk to maritime activity. The agency said that the origin of the mines is disputed and unclear but is likely to be due to Russian military activity.

Ukraines chief negotiator has indicated, however, that talks between Zelenskyy and Putin could be possible after Moscows negotiators informally agreed to most of a draft proposal discussed during face-to-face talks in Istanbul last week, according to an Associated Press news report.

In the besieged southeastern port city of Mariupol Sunday, residents continued to wait for an International Committee of the Red Cross humanitarian convoy designed to evacuate residents and bring humanitarian aid. The Associated Press reports that as many as 100,000 people are thought to be trapped in the city that has been surrounded by Russian troops for more than a month.
Russia faced mounting international condemnation amid reports of possible war crimes committed by Russian forces in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha and other parts of Ukraine.

In a post on Twitter on April 3, European Council President Charles Michel said Moscow will face "further EU sanctions."

Michel said he was shocked by haunting images of atrocities committed by Russian army in Kyiv liberated region.

U.K. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said in a statement that her government has seen increasing evidence of appalling acts by the invading forces in towns such as Irpin and Bucha.

Bucha Mayor Anatoly Fedoruk said on April 2 that some 300 local civilians had been shot during the time the town was occupied by Russian forces. About 280 were allegedly dumped in a mass grave, while the rest were left in the streets.

Moving and graphic images of the bodies have been distributed on social media.

These are the consequences of Russian occupation, Fedoruk was quoted as saying.

Russia has not responded to the reports.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko told Germanys Bild newspaper that what happened in Bucha and other suburbs of Kyiv can only be described as genocide. He said Russian President Vladimir Putin bore responsibility.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dymtro Kuleba said the Bucha massacre was deliberate.

I demand new, devastating G7 sanctions NOW, Kuleba wrote in an April 3 post on Twitter, referring to the Group of Seven leading economies.

The accusations of alleged atrocities have emerged as Russian forces pull back from positions around Kyiv and the northern cities of Chernihiv and Kharkiv.

The New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on April 3 that it had documented several cases of Russian military forces committing laws-of-war violations against civilians in occupied areas of Chernihiv, Kharkiv, and Kyiv regions of Ukraine.

The NGO said that, on March 4, Russian forces in Bucha shot at least one man in the back of the head.

Truss said on April 2 that she was appalled by atrocities in Bucha and other towns in Ukraine and promised that perpetrators would be prosecuted.

In his post on Twitter, Michel said the European Union was assisting Ukraine in gathering of necessary evidence for pursuit in international courts.

The International Criminal Court had earlier opened an investigation into alleged war crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine.

The Human Rights Watch report included several allegations of rapes, two cases of summary executions involving seven victims, and other instances of threats and violence against civilians.

The cases we documented amount to unspeakable, deliberate cruelty and violence against Ukrainian civilians, Hugh Williamson, HRWs Europe and Central Asia director, was quoted as saying.
WASHINGTON  U.S. President Joe Biden called Monday for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin, condemning him for the atrocities allegedly committed by Russian troops that have been discovered in recent days in Bucha, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv.

"You may remember I got criticized for calling Putin a war criminal, Biden told reporters at the White House. Well, the truth of the matter, you saw what happened in Bucha. This warrants  he is a war criminal. But we have to gather the information."

"This guy is brutal and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous, and everyone's seen it," Biden said, referring to Putin as Biden returned to Washington after a weekend in his home state of Delaware. "Yes, I'm going to continue to add sanctions."

The bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Kyiv-area towns that were recently retaken from Russian forces, Ukraines prosecutor-general, Iryna Venediktova, said.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen tweeted Monday that the European Union will send investigators to Ukraine to help her document war crimes.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited war-devastated Bucha on Monday, telling his people on national television it is now harder to negotiate an end to the war with Russia as the atrocities committed by Moscows troops become more apparent.

With evidence of civilians tied together and shot at close range, a mass grave and bodies strewn on the streets of Bucha, Zelenskyy declared, These are war crimes and will be recognized by the world as genocide.

Moscow has denied accusations of killing civilians in Bucha, with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov characterizing the scenes outside Kyiv as a "stage-managed anti-Russian provocation."

Zelenskyy, wearing body armor and surrounded by military personnel in his first reported trip outside Kyiv since the Feb. 24 Russian invasion, said, "It's very difficult to talk when you see what they've done here. The longer the Russian Federation drags out the meeting process, the worse it is for them and for this situation and for this war."

"We know of thousands of people killed and tortured, with severed limbs, raped women and murdered children," he said.

The scenes of the devastation in Bucha and other Kyiv suburbs since Russian troops pulled out in recent days to concentrate their attacks on Ukrainian cities near the Black Sea and in the contested Donbas region of eastern Ukraine have galvanized condemnation of Moscow.

Western leaders are raising the possibility of further economic sanctions on Russia, including restrictions on energy imports. Europe, however, relies heavily on the purchase of several types of Russian energy, leaving the Western allies at odds as to the extent and timing of any cutback.

Europe gets 40% of its natural gas and 25% of its oil from Russia, with European governments trying to find ways to reduce that reliance without curbing economic growth. Over the weekend, Lithuania announced it cut itself off entirely from gas imports from Russia.



German Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, who is also the countrys economy minister, said Europe can go "significantly further" in imposing sanctions against Russia. He said Germany, which has faced opposition for taking a longer-term approach to abandoning Russian energy imports, hopes to end Russian coal imports this summer and oil imports by the end of the year.



"We are working every day on creating the conditions for and steps toward an embargo," Habeck said. "We are on the right track."

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki assailed the French and German leaders by name for not doing more against Russia, while calling for actions "that will finally break Putin's war machine."

"President (Emmanuel) Macron, how many times have you negotiated with Putin? What have you achieved? ... Would you negotiate with Hitler, with Stalin, with Pol Pot?" Morawiecki asked. "Chancellor Scholz, Olaf, it is not the voices of German businesses that should be heard aloud in Berlin today. It is the voice of these innocent women and children."



He said, The bloody massacres perpetrated by Russian soldiers deserve to be called by name: This is genocide."

Some information in this report came from Reuters and the Associated Press.
Show more Show less

Ukraines president has called Russias ongoing and unprovoked war a genocide while Western officials have condemned what they call atrocities committed by Russian forces in a Kyiv suburb. The U.S. secretary of state travels to Europe this week to meet with NATO allies. VOAs Arash Arabasadi has more. GRAPHIC CONTENT WARNING: The following video contains content which some people may find disturbing.
Listen, we will get to the Revolutionary War of it all, but first, we need to talk about Frasers Ridge  there are shenanigans afoot!! Ominous shenanigans. Malva Christie shenanigans. The last time we saw Malva, she was pulling up for a front-row seat to Jamie and Claire partaking in a little afternoon delight, but now shes gone full creep, baby. And I hate to say it, but this is probably just the beginning with whatever Malvas really up to.

And what shes up to is [checks notes] cutting fingers off the sin-eaters rotting corpse and making freaky seaweed-based love charms. Once a fisherfolk, always a fisherfolk, I guess. The women of the Ridge are out on a hike looking for a place for Bree to build her water wheel (shes building indoor plumbing for the Ridge!) when they come across the offering site. Malva plays it off well, tossing suspicion on Amy McCallum, who has been spending an awful lot of time with Brees husband, Roger. Maybe its a love charm for him, she wonders aloud. Malva uses Roger and Amys growing friendship to her advantage more than once in this episode: Later, when Roger catches her and Mr. Henderson having sex in the church, she blackmails Roger into keeping quiet about it by threatening to tell everyone that she saw him and Amy kissing and that everyone will believe her. Shes not wrong here, theyve been spending a lot of time together, and while devious, at the very least the threat opens Rogers eyes to how people might be perceiving his friendship with a widow, and he finally backs off. Malvas true intentions are yet to be revealed, but she has been hanging around with a lot of different men on Frasers Ridge and at the end of the episode, we find her cutting off more of the sin-eaters fingers (it never gets less weird to type any of that). So all signs point to things getting weird and terrible soon, as they are wont to do on Outlander.

Doesnt she know we dont have time for this shit? Jamie is over in Wilmington getting his first taste of what life is like deserting the crown to become a rebel. His first real conflict regarding his sudden change of heart is with none other than Lord John Grey. They always say the first cut is the deepest, which is true here. Just some grown-ass men tearing up over being on opposite sides of the coming war, nothing to see here, folks!!

So, how does this come to pass? Well, when the governor gets Jamies Indian Agent resignation letter that contains language like my personal convictions no longer allow me to perform the positions duties, the guys like, uh, this doesnt sound good. Jamie has a lot of influence in the area and a militia under his command, and if he turns rebel, well, itll be a big loss. So he calls in Lord John Grey to get the scoop, and while in the moment face-to-face John covers for Jamie, saying that he is a man of honor who would never break an oath to the crown, hes actually pretty suspect about a man he calls one of [his] dearest friends.

To figure out whats going on, John attends a big event that Jamie and Claire are attending, where the famed (and real historical figure) Flora MacDonald will be giving a speech about staying true to the crown and maintaining peace and unity in these uncertain times. Flora MacDonald is famous for helping Bonnie Prince Charlie escape Scotland alive after Culloden (we get a flashback to this famous 1746 escape and boat ride at the top of the episode), and now this one-time Jacobite is working for the English, trying to get Highlanders amped up for staying the course. Although its not always the most fun to get a history lesson wedged in between story beats, Im glad Outlander took the time to explain why former Jacobites, who were once so against the English monarchy, are now very much for it in the colonies. At first, it sounds counterintuitive, doesnt it? But, as Jamie and Claire discuss, so many of the Highlanders who survived Culloden saw firsthand what being on the losing side of a rebellion is like and have fought too hard to rebuild their lives to go up against the crown again. Everyone is exhausted, mostly.

That includes Aunt Jocasta, who, it turns out, is funding this Flora MacDonald event. When Jamie discovers this, after he and John have to stop the Sons of Liberty from tarring and feathering a local printer for printing Jocastas pamphlets, he knows so much of it is tied to her grief over losing Murtagh. Instead of backing the rebellion he lost his life for, she blames it for his death. She is funding the loyalists and even going so far as to buy a print shop in order to do it. A print shop that she hands over to Fergus to run. This alone terrifies Jamie, who just watched a printer almost get killed for doing his job. Fergus could be hurt or killed for printing materials against the English, but he could also be hurt or killed for printing ones in favor of the English. Its a dangerous time to be a printer, and he tells Jocasta that if anything happens to him (my son, he calls him over and over and Im swooning), hell blame her.

But, of course, another layer to this is that he and his aunt will soon be on opposite sides of the fight. Last week, when Jamie decided he was ready to let his rebel flag fly out in the open, he probably didnt think just how hard it would be to face some of the people closest to him who would undoubtedly become his enemy when the war starts. Sometimes being true to yourself is easier said than done. This brings us back to Lord John Grey: John thinks he knows Jamie would never betray an oath and that hes smarter than that. But he also has seen Jamies name on a list of people mingling with the Sons of Liberty, of rebels who are not hiding their affiliation anymore. At first, Jamie lies to his friend and assures him all is well. But he cant do that for long. Oh buddies, when John finds out when the next secret Sons of Liberty meeting in Wilmington is and Jamie tells him that hell be attending that meeting and it slowly dawns on John what he means, you can see his heart breaking in real-time. John Grey is easily one of the best characters on this show and David Berry is just so, so good even when only given smaller moments, but here, in this major character moment, holy hell, you will be moved. At once, John feels betrayed, fearful for Jamies life, and angry that Jamie could possibly think of him as the enemy. Is that how I appear to you, Jamie? As the face of tyranny? Both men (and your recapper) are holding back tears here. This is tearing them both up inside!! And you know that even though John hates it, he will try to delay the British soldiers coming to arrest the men at the meeting. No matter what, he will do anything to keep Jamie safe. He is cursed that way.

John upholds his promise and gives Jamie enough time to warn the other men that the British soldiers are coming to arrest them if they remain here. Theyve questioned Jamies loyalties since they saw him protecting that printer, but this proves which side Jamie is on once and for all. Jamie Fraser is a rebel now, and theres no turning back.

Other Notes

 When Flora arrives at the party, she notes that someone was trying to steal her emerald necklace, and although the man was arrested and the necklace returned, one emerald is still missing. Then, when Claire and Jamie are getting ready to leave Wilmington, for a fleeting moment, she thinks she hears someone whistling Colonel Bogey March, which doesnt exist at this time yet, but she brushes it off. But Claire isnt just hearing things: The song is coming from inside the jail, from the person in possession of Floras lost emerald. We dont see his face, but perhaps he knows how to whistle that tune thanks to its use in The Bridge On the River Kwai  because the guy sure looks like our time traveler from the 1960s, Wendigo Donner, and now he has a gem so that he can pass back through the stones. Add this to the list of more troubling things that shall soon pass.

 This episode has some genuinely great moments, but one of the best is Claire giving weed to Jocasta to help with her eye pain and watching the ladies, joined by Flora, get high and drunk and giggle together. Thats fun.

 Theres not a lot of Claire in this episode, but during the Ladies Gentlemans Club session, she has a flashback to her assault at Versailles and is so unmoored by it that she huffs some more ether that she brought along. Basically: Claire is in a really bad way and no one seems to see it yet.

 Fun fact! Cornelius Harnett from the Sons of Liberty ends up being a delegate for North Carolina at the Continental Congress and signs the Articles of Confederation. Jamies hanging out with the big dogs.

 Bree is building an indoor plumbing system all by herself, which is amazing and insane, but most people seem more excited that yes, in fact, she is pregnant. Hooray?

 Marsali seems so sad to be leaving the Ridge for New Bern! It will not be the same without her!

 Lizzie gets a touch of malaria, and Josiah and Kezzie are the ones left to tend to her. Im exhausted just thinking about where this is headed.

 Stephen Bonnets balls in a jar at the inn? Sure, why not?
This content is expired!

Unfortunely this content is expired and cannot be viewed anymore; if You are the owner of this content please login to our Website, go to our access panel and enable this content again.
Placeholder while article actions load

Big business can no longer take the support of conservative parties for granted. The 1990s saw a great uncoupling between left-wing parties and big labor, with President Bill Clinton embracing free trade and Wall Street and Prime Minister Tony Blair ditching Clause 4 (which committed the Labour Party to nationalization) and tea and sandwiches in Number Ten with trade union bosses. Are we now witnessing an equally momentous change on the other side of the divide: an uncoupling between conservative parties and big business?

In America, the House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has dismissed the Chamber of Commerce as irrelevant  I didnt even know the chamber was around anymore  while Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has criticized big business for trying to act like a woke parallel government. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida has lamented the way that business profits have become increasingly estranged from production and employment; Jeff Sessions, a former senator for Alabama, has argued that the belief that business leaders understand the economy best and have Americas national interest at heart is flawed and dangerous; and J.D. Vance, a would-be senator for Ohio, has tweeted that the legacy of Reaganite-Thatcherite conservatism is the rise of China, the decimation of the American family, and a lot of tax cuts for the rich.

Advertisement

The rising generation of conservative intellectuals, such as Oren Cass, Sohrab Ahmari, Nate Hochman, Christopher Rufo, Ben Shapiro, Gladden Pappin and Ross Douthat, are all, to varying degrees, skeptical about business and critical of zombie Reaganites. The fashionable causes on the right are national greatness, Catholic social thought and post-liberalism rather than Schumpeterian creative destruction. The Adam Smith ties of the 1980s are now museum pieces along with copies of Hayeks Road to Serfdom and Friedmans Free to Choose.

Business-skeptical conservatives are solidifying their position in the conservative establishment with a network of think tanks, magazines and training programs. The think tank American Compass, run by Oren Cass, is hammering out a post-corporate conservatism. Publications such as American Affairs and The American Conservative frequently sound as if they ought to be renamed the American Marxist or the American Spartacist. Ahmari, an Iranian-born conservative who used to work at the pro-market Wall Street Journal, has founded a new magazine, Compact, together with a fellow religious conservative and a Marxist proponent of labor populism. American Moment, a training institute that wants to identify, educate, and credential rising conservative stars, focuses on strong families, a sovereign nation, and prosperity for all.

Grass-roots conservatism has also taken a notably anti-corporate turn since the financial crisis and the bailout of the banks and car companies. In response to the Citizens United decision in 2010, Dale Robertson, the founder of TeaParty.org, pronounced that corporations are not like people. Corporations exist forever, people dont. Our founding fathers never wanted them; these behemoth organizations that never dieIt puts the people at a tremendous disadvantage. Conservatives have also taken a page out of the liberal playbook, boycotting and badmouthing corporations that they dont like.

Advertisement

This new business-critical conservatism naturally starts with opposition to corporate wokery: Rubio is even introducing a bill into the Senate to force companies to mind your own business and stop indulging in woke posturing. But this new conservatism goes deeper than that  and overturns most of the tenets of the business-friendly conservatism of the 1980s. The new conservatism focuses on the producer rather than the consumer. Is it really worth getting that Amazon parcel to you within 24 hours if it means that workers have to operate like robots? It puts a premium on pro-family policies such as family leave and near-universal tax credits for children, unencumbered by work requirements, all ideas that the Republican establishment has long anathematized. American Compass goes so far as to call for enhanced collective bargaining rights for workers, lamenting the labor movements slow descent into obsolescence.

The new conservatives are fiercely hostile to globalization and immigration on the grounds that they have delivered lower incomes for workers along with the destruction of Americas common culture. They are equally hostile to the technology and media industries on the grounds that they are degrading our common culture, indeed perhaps even our common humanity, while making a decadent oligarchy obscenely rich. The central idea of the new doctrine is that the common good must be forged by active government policy rather than allowed to emerge from the play of market forces.

British conservatives have echoed many of these themes. The most interesting thinkers on the right such as Nick Timothy and David Goodhart are preoccupied with communitarian questions  how we make a home in the world  rather than with the ideal functioning of the market. We do not believe in untrammeled free markets, Timothy famously wrote in the 2017 Conservative manifesto. We reject the cult of selfish individualism. Dominic Cummings, one of the leading architects of Brexit and for a while Boris Johnsons chief of staff, savaged British businesss leading lobbying group, the CBI, as a moribund irrelevance. In the 1980s Tory philosophy was summed up in Norman Tebbits phrase that the unemployed should get on their bikes to find jobs. Now the minister for levelling up, Michael Gove, says you shouldnt have to leave somewhere you love in order to have a truly fulfilling career.

Advertisement

It is easy to dismiss all this as so much verbiage. For all his corporation-bashing during the 2016 election campaign, Donald Trump ended up cutting taxes on the wealthy and lightening regulations on business, not least by starving the federal government of employees. And for all its populist rhetoric about redistributing opportunity, Britains Conservative Party is determined to deliver tax cuts in the run-up to the next election campaign. Rather than bashing corporate wokery with anti-business legislation, conservatives might be better off treating it as a business opportunity: The Daily Wire, which was co-founded by Ben Shapiro, plans to spend $100 million over the next three years on childrens entertainment.

But I think it would be a mistake to bet that the old pro-corporate conservatism will survive intact: Just as the upsurge in pro-market thinking on the right in the 1970s presaged the Reagan-Thatcher revolution, so the upsurge in national conservatism could presage a very different relationship between the right and business.

Start with hard realities. Corporations have abandoned their national moorings in favor of the global market (or whats left of the global market after Putins invasion of Ukraine) and are increasingly abandoning middle-of-the-road culture in favor of progressive social values (even Walmart Inc. is moving in this direction despite the roots of most of its customers in suburban and rural America). At the same time, the long-term decline of initial public offerings and the expansion of private financial markets have made it harder for regular people to invest in a future Google.

Advertisement

The past 30 years may have been good for the third or so of people who graduated from universities and work for global corporations. They have been much less good for the two-thirds who have seen their incomes stagnate and their jobs become more unforgiving. Both the Republicans and the Conservatives are reorienting themselves to voters who feel left behind by global capitalism, particularly toward older and less educated voters, because that is where they think future majorities lie.

Then look at history. Right-wing parties have a long history of skepticism about both business and markets, particularly if they clash with more fundamental conservative values such as national identity and social cohesion. Teddy Roosevelt devoted his career to disciplining corporate monsters and their masters, the malefactors of great wealth. Pat Buchanans 1996 campaign for the presidential nomination was powered by the idea that transnational corporations and crony capitalism were defiling Americas exceptional culture and identity.

On the other side of the Atlantic, Benjamin Disraeli chastised unfettered capitalism for tearing Britain apart into two nations between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy. Harold Macmillan believed in a middle way between socialism and laissez-faire capitalism, which, as the son-in-law of a duke, he always found rather vulgar. Edward Heath, another conservative prime minister, denounced the unacceptable face of capitalism. On Brexit, the most significant economic issue of the post-Thatcher era, the Conservative Party chose to defy the global business establishment in favor of a leap in the dark, with Prime Minister Johnson memorably declaring f*** business.

Advertisement

So far this business-skeptical conservatism is an intellectual muddle. The new conservatives are right that 1980s conservatism has become zombified  always advocating the same solutions (tax cuts and deregulation) regardless of the problems. Nobody these days looks to the Club for Growth for intellectual enlightenment. The new conservatives are also right that conservatism at its best is about the pursuit of a civilized life rather than economic growth for its own sake. Conservatism arose as a critique of the excesses of the French Revolution and its zeal for liberty, equality and fraternity. Today its future lies as a critique of postmodern liberalism and its zeal for a strange combination of unfettered individualism and group rights.

But the new conservatives, particularly their Catholic wing, seem to lack a conservative sense of balance. Their dream of imposing a common good on a society that disagrees about fundamental things is a formula for intensified culture wars. They also ignore the strikes, discord and malaise that many of the policies they favor, particularly those giving more power to producer interests, led to in the 1970s. Disraeli owes his place in the conservative pantheon not to his youthful antagonism to the market but to his mature success in combining the best of economic liberalism with the best of conservatism.

Still, for all its intellectual flaws, the new business-skeptical conservatism confronts the corporate world with serious practical problems. It removes a hitherto reliable safety net. Corporate types can no longer rely on Republicans or Conservatives coming to rescue them when the going gets tough, as it surely will as the cost-of-living crisis deepens. It opens the possibility of some interesting cross-party collaboration. Right-leaning Republicans and left-leaning Democrats increasingly see eye-to-eye on issues such as tariffs on trade, tax credits for families, intervention to support communities that have been decimated by globalization and the breaking up of big tech companies. And it raises the serious possibility of something much bigger: the creation of a fully-fledged new conservatism that uses a plethora of interventions in the market such as tariffs and wage subsidies to shift the balance of power from business to labor.

Advertisement

The Reagan-Thatcher era of pro-business conservatism looks increasingly like an aberration rather than a natural state of affairs.

More From Other Writers at Bloomberg Opinion:

 Companies Can Buy Off Labor Laws Too Cheaply: Paul J. Davies

 Gender Pay Gap Illuminates CEO Stock-Option Excess: Chris Hughes

 ESG Means No More Buying the World a Coke: Allison Schrager

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Adrian Wooldridge is the global business columnist for Bloomberg Opinion. He was previously a writer at the Economist. His latest book is The Aristocracy of Talent: How Meritocracy Made the Modern World.

More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com/opinion

2022 Bloomberg L.P.

GiftOutline Gift Article
Placeholder while article actions load

Poor-performing chief executives can sleep a little easier. Bill Ackman, one of the worlds best-known investors, has all but ruled out future activist campaigns in favor of a lower-key approach to influencing portfolio companies. Thats a commendable investment stance. But efficient capital markets still need the odd rabble rouser. Wp Get the full experience. Choose your plan ArrowRight Ackmans reputation has largely been defined by a small number of high-profile corporate conflicts, notably his short-selling attack on Herbalife Nutrition Ltd., the snacks and supplements business. That overshadows the fact that his listed vehicle, Pershing Square Holdings Ltd, mostly takes large stakes in companies, and those positions havent generated much strife recently.

Last week, Ackman told investors hes abandoning activist shorting, which involves selling borrowed shares in a target and talking down the business. His thinking on intervening as a shareholder was more nuanced. Pershing Square intends to keep all its interactions with companies cordial, constructive, and productive, he said, calling this a quieter approach.

Advertisement

Intentions arent promises; quieter doesnt mean silent. All the same, Ackmans default style will be essentially active rather than activist  nudging bosses in private, rather than embarrassing them in public and threatening to use shareholder polls to impose change.

He may be forging policy from necessity. Short campaigns are all-consuming and crowd out other strategies. You cant demonize one company where youre short and then rock up at another as an investor saying youre a supportive and constructive force. You get typecast, literally: As Ackman points out, his campaigns have inspired a movie and a book.

And whether as a shareholder or short seller, public battles are draining to wage and defend. The upside needs to be substantial to make them worthwhile. The reputational downside from failure is considerable.

Advertisement

Moreover, shouty shareholder activism works only in certain circumstances, and the opportunities may be diminishing. There needs to be a clear objective that can be delivered swiftly. Traditionally, this has involved optimizing a companys capital structure  usually by taking on more debt  or breaking up a business to remove a valuation discount versus the sum of its constituent subsidiaries. Ackman himself successfully urged burger purveyor Wendys Co. to spin off its Tim Hortons chain of coffee-and-doughnut shops.

Two of the most successful campaigns of recent history were the opposition to mall owner Unibail-Rodamco-Westfields jumbo rights offering and the removal of yoghurt-maker Danone SAs chief executive. To achieve such coups in France, among the toughest markets for activists, was a major milestone.

But those wins look anomalous. The low-hanging fruit of short-term activism has arguably been plucked. Where theres a good case for breaking off divisions, even the largest companies are voluntarily getting on with it (think General Electric Co. and Johnson & Johnson.) Where splitting up is easier said than done, gaining widespread shareholder support for separations is hard (witness the pushback against Elliott Management Corp.s campaign for a renewables carve out at utility SSE Plc).

Advertisement

Whats left tend to be trickier situations with the no obvious quick fix. Examples would be aerospace firm Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc, which attracted California-based ValueAct Capital in 2015 and, more recently, Vodafone Group Plc, the telecoms company targeted by Cevian Capital AB.

The question for lapsed activists like Ackman is what really distinguishes their approach from that of the conventional, engaged long-only investor. The answer should be that they can enhance a companys performance through securing a hotline to the boardroom. The ideal target will be one where problems have created a discount valuation, and where the investor has more expertise than other advisers. Moreover, the target board must see the investor as supportive, with credibility amassed from previous corporate engagements. These boxes arent all going to be ticked easily.

Constructive dialogue between investors and their portfolio companies should, of course, be the norm, and the end clients of investment firms often fret when their money is put to hostile use. But noisy troublemaking has its place. Now and then, we need activists to make an example of a poor-performing company. The threat of a proxy fight keeps managers on their toes. If Ackman and other veterans are now less willing to shame underperformers, hopefully the next generation of investment managers, eager to make its mark, will take up the activist cudgels.

Advertisement

More From Bloomberg Opinion:

 The Business Conference is Back, But Is it Better?: Tyler Cowen

 Matt Levines Money Stuff: The SEC Is Coming for SPACs

 Ukraine War Hastens Move to Private Markets: Mohamed El-Erian

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Chris Hughes is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering deals. He previously worked for Reuters Breakingviews, as well as the Financial Times and the Independent newspaper.

More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com/opinion

2022 Bloomberg L.P.

GiftOutline Gift Article
Placeholder while article actions load

While her son spent 891 days in Maryland juvenile detention over a stolen cellphone, Keisha Hogan found her voice. Last month  seven years after her son was released  she delivered an impassioned speech to state lawmakers, asking them to support proposed legislation that would prevent other Maryland youths from being incarcerated under similar circumstances.

Her son was 13 when he got arrested, his first encounter with the juvenile justice system. A judge ordered him to complete a 90-day wilderness program, a decision that went against advice from juvenile caseworkers, who recommended a letter of apology and counseling.

When his behavior continued to deteriorate, the judge ordered another placement, then another  until more than two years had passed.

When he finally came home, it was like letting a caged animal out, Hogan said. He lost things that nobody can give back.

Advertisement

Months later, her son was again entangled in the justice system, this time for vehicle theft. He landed in adult prison.

I would absolutely say the juvenile system in Maryland created a criminal, Hogan said in an interview last week. If you want to know how to create a criminal, go interview my son.

After years of research and discussion, state lawmakers are considering a bill sponsored by Sen. Jill P. Carter (D-Baltimore City) that would restructure the Maryland juvenile justice system, including by establishing new sentencing rules. Among the changes included in her omnibus bill: no confinement for first-time misdemeanor offenses unless the crime involves a gun.

That legislation  along with another bill from Carter that would require police to notify parents and let children talk to attorneys before law enforcement interrogations  represents the latest attempt by Maryland lawmakers at revising the juvenile justice system. Both bills have passed in the Senate and are awaiting a final vote in the House, which would send them to the governors desk.

Advertisement

This is a huge success, said Jenny Egan, who oversees the juvenile division for the statewide Office of the Public Defender.

We have to stop using cages as a backstop whenever the system fails our children.

Supporters of the bills call them a step forward in how the state treats at-risk children. But opponents, including some prosecutors, warn of unintended consequences and risks to public safety.

William Katcef, assistant states attorney in Anne Arundel County, testified in opposition to the omnibus bill during a recent committee hearing, arguing that the proposed changes go too far in allowing children to avoid charges or detention even for some serious crimes. He spoke on behalf of the Maryland States Attorneys Association.

There are any number of offenses that are misdemeanors that are pretty serious, he said, referencing the incarceration limits. I just dont think whats contained here  really makes any sense.

Advertisement

Carter, who sponsored the bills, said the overarching goal is public safety.

Children are different than adults, she said during the recent committee hearing about the omnibus bill. Despite this obvious truth, in our juvenile justice system, they are treated as if they are small adults.

Juvenile court was never intended to mediate schoolyard squabbles or mete out punishment for childish mistakes.

She said giving children opportunities to make better choices and showing them pathways out of crime could yield significant rewards down the line.

I feel strongly that once you stigmatize children and label them bad or not worthy, you almost create a fait accompli, she said. The way we create a better future is by making sure we meet the needs of our children now.

Can you imagine what that does to kids?

Advertisement

Before the coronavirus pandemic, two-thirds of incarcerated youths in Maryland were locked up on misdemeanors or probation violations, state data shows. That number has since fallen to about 40 percent, largely because of efforts to reduce the juvenile jail population during the pandemic, Egan said.

She said reducing the population even further will allow the Department of Juvenile Services to focus more resources and rehabilitation efforts on children displaying the riskiest behaviors.

Can you imagine what that does to kids, locking them up when theyre trying to find their place in the world? Egan said. What does it mean when adults tell you that you belong in handcuffs and a cell?

Research has shown that juvenile confinement tends to increase the odds that a young person will be rearrested in the future, in part because they get exposed to older youths who model criminal behavior.

Advertisement

According to a 2015 study commissioned by the Maryland Department of Juvenile Services to analyze its practices, whether a juvenile defendant ends up incarcerated depends largely on the jurisdiction of their case and the individual judge, which creates significant racial disparities in some communities. The study also found that Maryland youths were more likely to be incarcerated for a probation violation than a violent crime  roughly a 47 percent likelihood compared with about 19 percent.

Supporters said the proposed legislation would place much-needed limits on the discretion of individual judges tasked with sentencing juvenile defendants.

In addition to banning incarceration for most minor offenses, the juvenile justice omnibus bill would set a minimum age for children to face criminal charges: 10 for the most serious crimes and 13 for everything else.

Advertisement

Data shows 76 children 8 and under were arrested in 2019, though that number dropped to 20 last year.

The bill also seeks to set time limits for juvenile probation and improve access to diversion programs. As the system operates now, youths receive indefinite probation terms that end only when a judge has deemed them ready.

Sam Abed, secretary of the Department of Juvenile Services, said he supports the legislation, which resulted from the work of a bipartisan coalition. He said the department is ready and able to implement this if the bill becomes law.

A third bill proposed restrictions on the types of crimes that result in children being automatically charged as adults, but that legislation has gained little traction this session, which ends April 11. Advocates say they plan to reintroduce it next year.

Advertisement

Treat children as children

The other major juvenile justice bill moving through the General Assembly addresses police interrogations of children, who are more likely to waive their Miranda rights  often because they dont understand the consequences  and provide false confessions, advocates say.

Senate Bill 53 would add steps to the process before an officer can interrogate a child: Police would first have to tell a parent, guardian or custodian where the child was going and why. And an officer wouldnt be able to do an interrogation until the child had consulted with an attorney.

Prosecutors argued the bill would essentially become a roadblock to police investigations. If a police officer has to get defense attorneys permission for interrogations, said Laura Wilt from the Frederick County States Attorneys Office, that investigation is effectively over.

Advertisement

Anyone speaking truth will tell you that the attorney will advise the youths to not speak to the police every single time, Wilt said.

But supporters emphasized that the added requirements would not apply to investigatory questions  only to formal interrogations occurring after police have identified a suspect and read the person their Miranda rights.

An officer would be allowed to interrogate a child without first following the notification requirements under the bill if the information sought is necessary to protect against a threat to public safety  a source of immediate danger like an active shooter or bomb threat, according to Egan.

The bill additionally calls for any interrogation to be recorded and asks the state Court of Appeals to adopt rules around age-appropriate Miranda warning language to advise children of their rights.

Young people, whose brains are still developing, might have less impulse control and be more prone to risk-taking, more susceptible to the promise of immediate rewards and more likely to comply with authority, said Melissa Goemann, senior policy counsel for the National Juvenile Justice Network, an advocacy organization and membership network.

If we treat children as children, then they will develop greater trust in the system and be more receptive to getting help if its needed, Goemann said. And [they] will grow and develop in a more positive trajectory, in terms of getting a better education and being able to be a productive member of society in the future.

To Carter, the change marks a way of protecting children: Due process for children is something everybody should embrace, she said.

California and Washington state have passed similar laws mandating a child has a consultation with an attorney before an interrogation. Others have required recorded custodial interrogations and age-appropriate Miranda warnings. Some have also banned lying or using deception in youth interrogations, a step Marylands bills do not take.

Studies have found youths are overrepresented in false confessions; 63 percent of false confessors in one study examining 125 proven false confessions between 1971 and 2002 were under 25 years old.

Egan, from the public defenders office, said she has no doubt its possible to implement a system for counsel consultation across the state. Baltimore has something similar in place already, due to requirements in the police departments federal consent decree, she said.

And, to supporters, the benefits far outweigh any logistical challenge.

Even as adults, when were in intimidating situations, we pretend we know what people are talking about, Carter said. Having a lawyer there is just to make sure these children understand their rights.

 Baltimore Sun

GiftOutline Gift Article
Placeholder while article actions load

One killed, 11 hurt in concert shooting Wp Get the full experience. Choose your plan ArrowRight A 26-year-old man was fatally shot and 11 others were injured Saturday night at a concert in Dallas, police said. Officers were called just after 11:30 p.m. to reports of a shooting at a concert in the Oak Cliff neighborhood. Officers found Kealon Dejuane Gilmore near the stage with a gunshot wound to his head, police said. He was pronounced dead at the location, according to police.

Eleven people were hospitalized in connection to the shooting, police said Sunday afternoon. One person remained in critical condition, while the others were in stable condition. Three juveniles were among those shot and taken to hospitals, police said. Police had previously said 10 people were shot.

It appears that one person fired a gun into the air and someone else fired a gun toward the crowd at the concert, police said. The incident is still under investigation, according to police.

Advertisement

A VIP pass found outside of the venue  an open field scattered with outdoor lights and abandoned cars blocked by a metal gate and police cars  promoted the second annual Epic Easter Bike Out and Field Party. The event included live performances, an Easter egg hunt, trail ride and invited patrons to bring ATVs or horses.

 Dallas Morning News

Church still opposed to same-sex marriage

A top leader in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints reaffirmed the faiths opposition to same-sex marriage and changes that confuse or alter gender as debates over gender and sexuality reemerge throughout the United States.

Dallin H. Oaks, the second-highest-ranking leader of the faith known widely as the Mormon Church, told thousands of listeners gathered at a conference center at the churchs Salt Lake City headquarters that what he called social and legal pressures wouldnt compel the church to alter its stances on same-sex marriage or matters of gender identity that he did not specify.

Advertisement

The highest level of salvation, Oaks said, can only be attained through faithfulness to the covenants of an eternal marriage between a man and a woman.

Oaks also said church doctrine opposed changes that confuse or alter gender or homogenize the differences between men and women and warned that confusing gender, distorting marriage, and discouraging childbearing was the Devils work.

 Associated Press

States seek solutions as deaths rise

As the addiction and overdose crisis that has gripped the United States for two decades turns even deadlier, state governments are scrambling for ways to stem the destruction wrought by fentanyl and other synthetic opioids.

In statehouses across the country, lawmakers have been considering and adopting laws on two fronts: reducing the risk to users and increasing the penalties for dealing fentanyl or mixing it with other drugs. Meanwhile, Republican state attorneys general are calling for more federal action, while some GOP governors are deploying National Guard units with a mission that includes stopping the flow of fentanyl from Mexico.

Advertisement

Its a fine line to help people and try to get people clean, and at the same time incarcerate and get the drug dealers off the streets, said Nathan Manning, a Republican state senator in Ohio who is sponsoring legislation to make it clear that materials used to test drugs for fentanyl are legal.

The urgency is heightened because of the deepening impact of the drugs. Last year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported the nation had hit a grim milestone. For the first time, more than 100,000 Americans had died of drug overdoses over a 12-month period. About two-thirds of the deaths were linked to fentanyl and other synthetic drugs, which can be 50 to 100 times as potent as morphine, heroin or prescription opioids.

The recent case of five U.S. Military Academy cadets who overdosed on fentanyl-laced cocaine during spring break in Florida put the dangers and pervasiveness of the fentanyl crisis back in the spotlight.

 Associated Press

GiftOutline Gift Article
Placeholder while article actions load

Longer sentence for Rusesabagina rejected Wp Get the full experience. Choose your plan ArrowRight A Rwandan appeals court on Monday rejected a prosecution bid to extend a 25-year jail sentence to life in prison for Paul Rusesabagina, who was portrayed in the movie Hotel Rwanda sheltering hundreds of people during the 1994 genocide. Rusesabagina, 67, was convicted in September on eight terrorism charges related to the activities of an organization opposed to President Paul Kagames rule, and is being held in a Rwandan prison.

He denied all the charges and refused to take part in the trial, which he and his supporters denounced as a politically motivated sham.

He was not in court in Kigali on Monday to hear the decision from Judge Emmanuel Kamere, who said there was no reason to extend his sentence.

Rusesabagina has acknowledged having a leadership role in the Rwanda Movement for Democratic Change but denied responsibility for attacks carried out by its armed wing, the National Liberation Front. The trial judges said the two groups were indistinguishable.

Advertisement

Prosecutors in February called the existing sentence too lenient.

 Reuters

At least 12 killed in suspected rebel attack

Suspected rebels attacked a village in eastern Congo with machetes and guns, killing at least a dozen civilians, the army of the Democratic Republic of Congo and a survivor said Monday.

Fighters believed to be part of the Allied Democratic Forces rebel group staged the attack Sunday night in Masambo, about 31 miles from the city of Beni, an army spokesman said.

When Masambo was attacked, residents fled, some finding refuge in Kasindi on the border with Uganda and others in Beni.

The attack comes a few days after the start of trials for about a dozen rebels who were captured in combat by Congos army and were taken to Beni.

 Associated Press

Recorders from China crash sent to U.S.: The two black boxes from a Boeing 737-800 that plunged to the ground in China last month have been sent to the United States for analysis. The flight recorders have become central to solving the mystery of the March 21 crash, in which all 132 people aboard were killed. More than 200 of China Eastern Airlines' Boeing 737-800 jets have been grounded for two weeks now because there was no obvious reason for the plane's sudden nosedive.

Advertisement

Ecuador regains control of prison: Ecuador's government said it has retaken control of a prison in the city of Cuenca where 20 people were killed in a violent confrontation over the weekend. The violence at El Turi prison took place in the maximum-security cell block and was the result of disputes between members of the same gang for control of the wing, the government said. It was the latest incident of violence in Ecuadoran prisons, which the government usually attributes to gang fights over drug trafficking. Last year prison violence killed 316 people.

Greece arraigns woman in death of child: A woman accused of killing her hospitalized daughter was led under heavy guard to an Athens court for an arraignment as authorities investigate the deaths of two other daughters. The suspect, 33, was arrested last week after an anesthetic drug was found in tissue samples of her

9-year-old, who died in January. A panel of senior coroners is also reviewing the deaths of her two other children: a 3-year-old girl from liver failure in 2019 and a 6-month-old girl in 2021 from a suspected heart defect. Officials have not identified the woman.

Four students killed in shelling in Syria: Government forces shelled a rebel-held village in northwest Syria, the country's last major opposition stronghold, killing four students on their way to school, opposition activists said. The shelling targeted the village of Maaret al-Naasan in Idlib province. The students' principal said one was in ninth grade, two in eighth grade and one in seventh grade.

Advertisement

Incumbent wins in Serbian presidential vote: Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic overwhelmingly won reelection Sunday but his party will need a partner to form a government. Vucic won 58.55 percent of the vote, the State Election Commission said after counting 96.19 percent of ballots, though his Serbian Progressive Party fell short of a majority in concurrent voting for parliament.

 From news services

GiftOutline Gift Article
A rendering of the Allegheny Lock and Dam #2 project to electrify a dam near Highland Park Bridge in Pittsburgh. (Photo illustration by Rye Development)

Out of about 90,000 dams in the nation, few generate hydropower. A push to retrofit nonpowered dams could change that.
For many retail investors, BHPs decision last August to collapse its dual-listing structure and repatriate London-listed shares to the ASX may have seemed like a technical piece of financial engineering. But for index fund managers like IFM Investors Aidan Puddy the move was hugely significant.

As a result of the move, BHPs weighting in the benchmark ASX200 was suddenly going to jump from 5.2 per to 10 per cent. Or 12 per cent of the ASX100 and 14.8 per cent of the ASX50.

Global head of listed equities at IFM Investors, Aidan Puddy, says the reunification of BHP was a difficult, given moving prices and volumes. Credit:Luis Ascui

That was probably one of the biggest index changes we have ever had, Puddy explains.

Aidan Puddy is arguably Australias least-known mega-fund manager. He manages over $45 billion worth of stocks but has no public profile compared to stock picking superstars, because he focuses on index investing on behalf of institutional clients.
When Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed parliament last Thursday, Australian filmmaker George Gittoes and his musician wife Hellen Rose were just waking up in their new home in Kyiv, a few hundred metres from central Maidan square.

George Gittoes in Maidan square, Kyiv. Credit:Hellen Rose

Normally Maidan square, also known as Independence Square is like Martin Place in Sydney or Federation Square in Melbourne is completely packed with people but now there is barely anyone on the streets except for soldiers, said Gittoes in a video interview from his bed. Missiles zooming overhead could be heard in the background, and the old Soviet-era built apartment where he and Rose and have taken refuge on the fifth floor could be seen shaking.

We have had queries from our friends and families in Australia asking what people on the streets think about their President Zelensky addressing the Australian Parliament this week. On every corner we are pulled up by Ukraine soldiers asking to see our passports and press accreditation  once they realise we are Australian they smile, relax and welcome us. They are surprised and heartened that we have come all the way from Australia to support the Ukraine people, Gittoes says.

But they are all aware Australia is not a member of NATO and has not sent military advisers or helped supply weapons. Our government has committed to trade and banking embargoes, but as a country, we have little economic connection to Russia and do not depend on it as much as others for oil or gas.
Billionaire Chinese junket boss Alvin Chau, who enjoyed an $80 million cheque cashing facility at The Star, maintained his business with the casino despite warnings of his links to triads.

Mr Chau was described in a 2018 report about junket operator Suncity as a threat who would pose tangible criminal [and] reputational risks for the Hong Kong Jockey Club, an inquiry has heard.

Alvin Chau, founder and chairman of Suncity Group Holdings. Credit:Bloomberg

Alvin Chau is alleged to be a member of the Macau faction of the 14K triad society and the follower of former 14K leader Wan Kuok Koi (known as Broken Tooth Koi), the report said.

Skye Arnott, who is responsible for anti-money laundering and counterterrorism procedures at the casino, told the inquiry on Monday she first saw the report about August 2019 and agreed it suggested Mr Chau was not of good repute.
The federal government has expelled a millionaire businessman from Australia after accusing him of carrying out tasks for a Chinese intelligence operative and working covertly in a way that advanced Beijings interests.

The recent expulsion of property developer Zheng Jiefu is one of several cases in which long-time Australian residents have been deported or barred entry into the country because of their suspected ties to Beijings security or foreign interference apparatus.

Zheng Jiefu has been expelled from Australia. Credit:Joe Armao

Over the past three years, spy agency ASIO has quietly deported several Chinese businessmen and journalists, accusing them of ties to the Ministry of State Security or Chinese foreign interference agencies. ASIO, the federal government and human rights groups have warned for a number of years that Beijing was directing its proxies to approach members of the Chinese diaspora in Australia to put pressure on their relatives in China.

Official sources who cannot be named because they are not authorised to speak publicly, say ASIO accused Mr Zheng of engaging in foreign interference in Australia on behalf of China, a claim the wealthy businessman has denied.
In the late afternoon of March 22, blue-eyed, blonde-haired Eli Michael Resnik made his entry into the world oblivious to the history-making nature of his birth.

Eli is the first biological child born to a single man in Victoria through local surrogacy. His father, Shaun Resnik, was the first such man to be given official approval by the state government to have a baby under strict surrogacy laws last year.

Shaun Resnik with baby Eli. Credit:Jason South

Mr Resnik was in the delivery room as Elis surrogate mother, Melbourne woman Carla Pincombe, gave birth.

Id hoped to be the one to catch him as he was born and I did, Mr Resnik said. I just held him in my arms with his little umbilical cord. He was screaming away. It was outstanding. It was pure joy.
Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size On July 16, 1945, just before dawn, the age of nuclear terror began. A fireball brighter than the sun lit up the New Mexico desert. The watching scientists cheered and shook hands. This was the worlds first test of a nuclear weapon, and, contrary to fears that it could ignite an unstoppable chain reaction setting the whole world on fire, it had worked. And yet, exactly what that meant was sinking in too. The lead scientist of Americas secretive Manhattan Project to build the bomb, Robert Oppenheimer, said that words of Hindu scripture ran through his mind as he watched the mushroom cloud over the explosion: Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds. Less than a month later, the United States dropped two nuclear bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to force the countrys surrender and end World War II, killing hundreds of thousands of people. It remains the only use of nuclear weapons in war. Soviet espionage soon unlocked the secrets of that bomb, beginning a nuclear arms race that would spiral into the Cold War. But mutually assured destruction has long kept weapons locked away. Now, in invading Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin has conjured the spectre of nuclear war for the first time in decades, threatening the West with extraordinary consequences if they interfere, and taking the rare step of putting Russias nuclear defences on alert. Though neither side wants nuclear war, analysts warn Russia may yet consider using smaller, localised nuclear weapons to beat Ukraine into submission. Even a nuclear bluff could rapidly spiral out of control, as could conventional attacks on Ukraines nuclear power plants. Addressing Australias parliament from Kyiv on March 31, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Russias nuclear blackmail now loomed over all countries, the fears of the previous century reawakened. What is happening in our region has become a real threat to your country and your people as well, he said. So, are nuclear weapons likely to come into play? How would the West respond? And does nuclear deterrence still work today? The first test of a hydrogen bomb using nuclear fusion by the US during the Cold War in 1952. Credit:Getty Images

Advertisement

What are nuclear weapons and who has them? To understand the worlds most powerful weapon you have to start on a very small scale. Atoms are the building blocks of matter, and the nucleus of each is held together by a powerful force. In 1938, the race to harness this energy in an atomic bomb kicked off when two scientists accidentally split apart uranium atoms in Nazi Germany. Fears that the Nazis would be first to develop such a weapon inspired big investment by both the US and the UK (and interest from their then-ally the Soviet Union). The atomic bombs that the US unleashed in World War II work through a chain reaction known as nuclear fission  by splitting the atom of isotopes such as uranium and plutonium. During the Cold War, America and Russia made hydrogen bombs thousands of times more powerful than those dropped on Japan using a process known as nuclear fusion which works in reverse  binding together nuclei  in the same way the sun produces energy. (Oppenheimers opposition to the development of more powerful bombs later cost him his job.) Modern nuclear bombs use both fission and fusion. Today nine countries have nuclear weapons  the US, Russia, China, France, the UK, Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea  but the US and Russia hold 90 per cent of the worlds nuclear arsenal. (Thats estimated at 6000 nukes for Russia and more than 5000 for the US compared to a couple of hundred held by China, France and the UK, and only a few dozen for North Korea.) Treaties designed to disarm and stop the spread of nuclear weapons (such as the Non-Proliferation Treaty) mean the worlds arsenal has shrunk significantly since the end of the Cold War, down from a peak of about 70,000 weapons in 1986 to an estimated 12,700 today, according to the American Federation of Scientists, although this is often due to the retirement of older missiles. Countries such as Libya and Iran, which have attempted to create their own nuclear weapons since (or, in the case of Iraq, were thought to be trying), have often faced harsh sanctions and even war from the US and its NATO allies. Under the logic of nuclear deterrence, the fact the great powers hold nuclear weapons is said to make major wars less likely. But groups pushing for disarmament and not just non-proliferation of nukes warn that some countries, including China, are again increasing their nuclear arsenals, and the risk of a catastrophic nuclear war remains so long as nuclear weapons do. The warheads on just one US nuclear-armed submarine have seven times the destructive power of all the bombs dropped during World War II, including the two atomic bombs, says the Union of Concerned Scientists. And the United States usually has 10 of those submarines at sea.

Advertisement

The major nuclear powers have long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles (IBMs) designed to carry these warheads thousands of kilometres in minutes, as well as anti-missile defence systems to detect and shoot them down. In March, with the worlds eyes on Ukraine, North Korea broke its moratorium on testing IBMs and fired its most powerful missile yet, although the trial may not have been as big a success as it claimed. Nuclear arsenals have evolved to include less powerful or low-yield nukes too (sometimes called tactical or non-strategic nuclear weapons)  and experts say this carries its own risks. If the effect of a nuclear strike can be contained to a more localised area, and the radioactive fallout reduced, will that make countries more willing to break the nuclear taboo, the do not fire first principle that stopped the Cold War spiralling into nuclear armageddon? In 2017, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the US was housing nuclear weapons too close to Russia, as both sides accused the other of violating the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. Credit:Sputnik Kremlin Could nuclear weapons come into play in Ukraine? Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 in exchange for a guarantee that Russia would not interfere in its sovereignty. That means this war is not between two nuclear powers (as conventional clashes between India and Pakistan have been, for example). And peace negotiations could yet stop it. But if Putin turns to a weapon of mass destruction to break through strong Ukrainian resistance, such as a chemical (poison) or a tactical nuke, he will be crossing a line that could drag him into conflict with nuclear powers in the NATO alliance, particularly the US. As well as putting its nuclear forces on high alert for the first time since the Cold War, Russia reports its nuclear submarines are running drills and mobile nuclear missile launchers are roaming the forests of Siberia to practise secret deployments.

Advertisement

The prospect of nuclear war is now back within the realm of possibility, warned United Nations secretary-general Antonio Guterres on March 14. Retired Major-General Mick Ryan, formerly of Australias Defence Force, thinks it more likely Russia will unleash chemical weapons in Ukraine, but [the nuclear threat] is not zero. Experts say this is the worlds most dangerous nuclear moment since the Cold War. But the old Cold War had safeguards for most of it, says Dr Bobo Lo, a former Australian diplomat to Moscow. It wasnt perfect, but both sides felt they had an understanding on where the red lines lay. This new era has none of that. Fiona Hill, a former White House adviser on Russia, has said of the nuclear question: Every time you think, no, [Putin] wouldnt, would he? Well, yes, he would. And he wants us to know that, of course. Russian troops have already begun leaving the Chernobyl nuclear plant after getting significant doses of radiation. Yet nuclear weapons release not just huge explosive power but deadly radiation as well  tens of thousands of people who survived the blasts in Japan later died of radiation poisoning. Breaking a city siege with nukes, even low-yield ones, would cause serious ecological fallout for Russian troops moving in, Ryan says, and cross the Rubicon on nukes for a job that could have been done with regular bombing.

Advertisement

Trying to disguise such an attack, say by instead deliberately destroying Ukraines nuclear power plants  which include the largest in Europe  would also make occupation more complicated, although recent Russian attacks on plants suggest it may happen accidentally. Russian troops have already begun leaving the Chernobyl nuclear plant they captured on the first night of the invasion  the scene of the worlds worst nuclear meltdown in 1986  after getting significant doses of radiation from digging trenches at the contaminated site. Now, the one thing they might use nukes for is to destroy a significant concentration of the Ukrainian army, Ryan says. Because thats hard to kill. So that would probably be the most likely target, not a city. While the Cold War focused on shows of terrifying power that neither side dared unleash for real, many experts say smaller, tactical nukes are now the big threat as they could rapidly escalate a conflict. Both the US and Russia have been improving their designs in recent years  Russian military doctrine allows for their use, as well as chemical weapons, to defend Russia. Speaking of the Ukraine invasion in March, former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev reminded his audience that such a strike could be triggered even without an enemy using nuclear weapons first, adding that Russia was determined to defend the independence, sovereignty of our country, not to give anyone a reason to doubt even the slightest that we are ready to give a worthy response to any infringement on our country. Loading Given Putin has declared Ukraine is still part of Russia (despite the nation becoming independent in 1991), Ryan says the question of exactly what territory Russia considers its own is now crucial. Still, he thinks that Russian policy on tactical nukes is as much for show as anything else. The problem is when you call their bluff, and they seem to be not as tough as theyd been telling everyone  kind of like the US in Iraq in 2003  what do they do next?

Advertisement
Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has warned of the threat of radicalism in Australia after electoral signs bearing his image were defaced with anti-Semitic imagery.

Mr Frydenberg, who was born in Australia to Jewish parents, took to social media on Monday afternoon to share an image of a campaign sign where a swastika had been drawn on his forehead.

Vandalism is a crime. This kind of vandalism is obscene, the caption read.

It doesnt matter which political group is on the receiving end, its just not on. Our community deserves better. Swastikas are a reminder of a dark past and its our collective duty to say never again.
Medical entrepreneur Dr Glenn Haifer has made a grand return to the Sydney Harbour trophy home market this week, paying more than $60 million for the Darling Point residence of Lisa Allen, former wife of yachtie Matt Allen.

Haifer hasnt owned a piece of the prized waterfront housing market in more than four years, when he sold his half-completed home, Deauville, on Point Pipers Lady Martins Beach for $39 million to luxury car importer Neville Crichton and his wife Nadi.

The modernist-style residence was renovated in 2017 and listed for sale soon after.

It was about that time that the Allens listed their Darling Point home for sale with hopes of more than doubling their $32 million purchase price of 2013 from the estate of industrialist Sir William Tyree.

Alison Coopes, who listed it exclusively about six months ago after it was an open listing with a multitude of agents, declined to reveal the result, leaving it to sources to suggest it is in the low-$60 million range.
Five days after the war began, power, water and telecommunications were cut and shops closed. The daily task of getting water from a nearby public fountain became potentially deadly, as residents darted from house to house, hiding from bombs along the way. The family slept in their jackets and shoes in the corridors at night but after the balcony and windows from the apartment next door were blasted off, they moved into an underground bomb shelter. They gathered enough food supplies to last two weeks, rationing their meals to a piece of cheese for breakfast, a vegetable soup for lunch and a pancake made from flour and water cooked over a homemade fire. But even preparing food became life and death. As the bombings got closer and became more frequent it became more and more dangerous to venture outside to scour for wood to get a fire going. Ruban recalls, with a laugh, the thoughts that dominated her mind during this dark time, a dream that her big sister Vita would rescue her.

My dream was that Vita in Sydney would send a helicopter  Vita was my one hope, she says. By March 15, some who had been able to get to higher points, like the tops of buildings, to establish a phone connection began to spread the message that everyone needed to get out as the Russian assault was about to get even worse. Mariia Ruban (right) with her 8-year old daughter Margo and her sister Vita. Mother and daughter arrived in Sydney last week after leaving Mariupol with little more than the clothes on their backs. Credit:Louise Kennerley But news had also got out that the Russians had been targeting and killing civilians trying to escape through the so-called green corridors. So Ruban decided to stay in the Mariupol bomb shelter until the end.

But when a neighbour came and said he had three spots in his car and was leaving the city that day, Ruban says a spirit-like force told her to go. I had a strange feeling, some kind of god, some kind of spirit, not from this world was pushing me into the car, and without thinking I walked into the car. She left the city with nothing but the clothes on her back and a childrens backpack carrying little more than their passports. Driving out of Mariupol was the first time she saw the scale of destruction. There were tanks, the buildings were destroyed  it was like an apocalypse. I think its like a dream, a terrible nightmare, and that I will wake up one day and that its not true, that it never happened, she said.

I just hope this nightmare will finish, I still cant believe it. Loading The 84-kilometre drive to Berdyansk took 13 hours and required them to pass through five Russian checkpoints. I was very scared and every minute I prayed, she says. There they finally managed to squeeze on to a bus, standing for the 12-hour journey to Zaporizhzhia, as they passed through 10 more Russian checkpoints. She was finally able to reconnect to Vita, who immediately began organising a way to get her sister and niece to Australia. With great relief, Ruban and Margo flew via Poland, Helsinki and Bangkok before landing in Australia last week.

Ruban and Margo are two of 10.5 million Ukrainians, according to the UNHCR, who have been displaced by Putins war. But while she has found refuge in Australia the trauma is near. Rubans toes are swollen and numb. She has not been able to feel them since spending nights in the freezing cold without heating in Mariupol. She has not slept through a single night since the war began and keeps waking up to air-raid sirens that do not sound but pierce her mind. Her parents will not leave Ukraine. But there is a scene that keeps replaying in her mind. When she and Margo were leaving Mariupol, Rubans cousin Marina swapped herself out and at the last minute pushed her elderly mother into the car. She sacrificed herself to save her old mum. Every day, every minute I replay this over and over in my head and in my head I change the situation, I force her to get into the car, it doesnt matter if theres space or not. Im in shock because I didnt do that on the spot, I couldnt think at the time, she says.

With no communications in Mariupol, Ruban has not heard from Marina or her parents since. This dark silence clouds her every thought. Every second and every minute I think about them, how are they? Whats happening with them? Loading Ruban doesnt know how long she will stay in Australia. There is no more Mariupol, nothing. I am hoping to go back but for now I am too scared to go back to Ukraine. It is not safe. Margo is a little different. Ruban recalls her incredible strength throughout their ordeal, saying she never cried once during their time in Mariupol, even through the freezing nights when she slept on her mothers lap.
The views expressed by public comments are not those of this company or its affiliated companies. Please note by clicking on "Post" you acknowledge that you have read the TERMS OF USE and the comment you are posting is in compliance with such terms. Your comments may be used on air. Be polite. Inappropriate posts or posts containing offsite links, images, GIFs, inappropriate language, or memes may be removed by the moderator. Job listings and similar posts are likely automated SPAM messages from Facebook and are not placed by WFMZ-TV.
The Academy of Live and Recorded Arts (ALRA) announced this morning, without warning, that it would close - leaving 284 students without further education.

ALRA, which has two locations (North and South) caused anger amongst the theatre community, with the student's Twitter page saying all those in their final year were: "heartbroken... Our school has unexpectedly closed. Any industry PLEASE help the students who haven't been signed yet. We have missed so much with covid in 1st/2nd year and now the closed school."

Staff members were reportedly told via Zoom at 9am that they were fired with 28 permanent and 16 fixed-term jobs affected.

A statement from the drama school said the closure was due to: "losses made in the 20/21 financial year and the lack of significant new revenue streams".

However, a positive twist on the tale has emerged. the Rose Bruford College has quickly stepped in to continue to provide opportunities for students left in the lurch, saying in a statement that: "all students across foundation, undergraduate and postgraduate courses will be offered places to continue their education as students of Rose Bruford College."

Students based at ALRA North will receive tuition at the same site in Wigan, while students at ALRA South will be taught at a London location.

Rose Bruford's vice principal Mary Oliver said: "We are committed to supporting each individual student through the transition period and into a stable and productive learning environment."

Principal Clarie Middleton said: "We are very pleased with the level of trust and respect the Office for Students is placing in us to support ALRA students through this very difficult time.

"We are preparing to welcome all students who wish to join us and to support them in reaching their full potential."
When Betty Sanguin decided to end her life with medical assistance, one of her final requests was for it to take place at her church.

When Betty Sanguin decided to end her life with medical assistance, one of her final requests was for it to take place at her church.

Her family helped fulfil her wish. Surrounded by loved ones, including her six children, Sanguin, 86, died in March at her "crossing over" ceremony at Churchill Park United Church. The entire procedure took 15 minutes.

A lifelong volunteer, her life changed forever last spring when she was diagnosed with ALS, better known as Lou Gehrigs disease.

This was the first provision of medical assistance in dying (MAiD) to take place in a church in Manitoba.

Even though Sanguins symptoms included slurred speech and a weakened voice, her diagnosis came as a shock.

"My mom hoped that (it was) some other treatable condition that mimics ALS  she just didnt want it to be ALS," says Renee Sanguin, Bettys daughter.

Sanguin, who spent many years volunteering at Oak Table, which serves Winnipegs impoverished and vulnerable communities, alongside her husband, Gord, wasnt prepared for the news. She faced an unpleasant decline from the progressive and incurable motor neuron disease that leads to paralysis and respiratory failure.

Death typically occurs three to five years from the onset of symptoms. In Sanguins case, those started with speaking, eating and swallowing.

SUPPLIED Betty Sanguin on what she called her special day in March at Churchill Park United Church, the first of 919 medically assisted deaths in Manitoba to take place in a church.

"Her decline was so rapid. And you hear that with ALS, that its different for everybody," says Renee. "But within a very short period of time, (the doctors) were talking about a feeding tube because she couldnt eat and swallow anymore."

About 3,000 Canadians live with the disease, according to the ALS Society of Canada. The speed with which a person loses the use of their muscles varies  some deteriorate quickly, while others experience slow degeneration.

Doctors at the Motor Neuron Clinic at Deer Lodge Centre gave Sanguin a window of one to three years.

"My mom saw other people that were further along in their (ALS) diagnosis and all she knew is that she didnt want that. Thats what my mom struggled with the most," says Lynda Sanguin-Colpitts, Renees older sister.

By last summer, Sanguins health had declined rapidly. She depended on others for routine tasks and nurses stopped by daily. Her family set up home care while, at the same time, her husband of nearly 70 years was being treated for prostate cancer that had spread to his bones. He died in September.

Sanguins family soon realized that she could no longer live on her own, even with managed care. The disease had stolen her ability to feed herself, to swallow and her voice had weakened to a near-whisper.

She moved into Brummitt-Feasby ALS house in December, a Winnipeg-based home for ALS patients. It was donated by Lynn Brown and Faith Johnston, step-daughters of Dorothy Brummitt-Feasby, who died of ALS in 2000.

From the start, medical assistance in dying was discussed as an option among Sanguin and her doctors.

"There was a lot of openness about it; the idea that this call could be made when and if she ever felt ready," says Renee. "They normalize it as much as they can. My mom knew it was available and it was her decision, on her terms and in her own time. She didnt have to feel that she was doing this for anybody but of her own complete and total volition."

SUPPLIED Betty and Gord Sanguin were married for nearly 70 years when he died in September.

In the ensuing months, Sanguin learned more about her prognosis. A respirologist informed her of the long road ahead  pulmonary exercises, lung volume recruitment machines, the potential of a lung infection and all the work it would take to keep her lungs functioning.

ALSs assault on Sanguins central nervous system continued. By February, she could hardly walk and had lost her ability to speak, relying on text-to-speech software to communicate. Her breaking point was the thought of losing her independence.

"(Knowing that) she couldnt feed herself anymore was something she couldnt tolerate. She stopped being able to eat and enjoy food at all," says Renee. "She didnt want to be dependent on others or be cared for 24-7. That wouldve been intolerable for my mom."

The worsening symptoms, plus several frightening choking episodes, caused Sanguin to think more seriously about medical aid in dying. There were questions: when? How do you  how can you  know when its time to go? The choking had become so severe that Sanguin was afraid she was going to choke to death.

So, Betty met with a social worker, with whom she had a close relationship through palliative care, and asked her to speak to the medical team on her behalf. At Bettys request, they began the MAiD process.

"It was her decision. We had nothing to do with whether she chose it or not," says Lynda. "She realized that (MAiD) was an option. She didnt have to die from ALS, or suffocation, or pneumonia, or be in a hospital in her last days."

Once she was deemed eligible for medical assistance in dying, Sanguin began to plan. One of her requests was to die at her church  something never before done in Manitoba.

"I would say (in a church) was unique. But we were very happy to accommodate this lovely ladys request," says Colleen Barbour, client care coordinator with the Manitoba MAiD team. "Her family and the church made it all happen."

Barbour says if theres a special request or ritual that a patient wants, the MAiD team will look into the logistics to see if its feasible and try to make it happen.

SUPPLIED Betty Sanguin (from left) with daughters Renee Sanguin and Lynda Sanguin-Colpitts.

"Renee and the family took this all on themselves. They were the ones who liaised with the church and congregation and then came to us to ask, Would this be something that you could accommodate? And so we did," says Barbour. "It was quite simple for us to come in and participate from our end and allow this woman to be in this space that she really wanted to be, surrounded by people who loved her."

MAiD has been available in Manitoba since 2016 and is provided to legally eligible patients who give consent. To date, 919 patients have used the service  including 58 so far this year, according to a spokesperson from Shared Health.

According to Shared Health, safeguards have been put in place to protect vulnerable patients and help all patients to make an informed decision.

Barbour says Sanguins family "moved mountains" on her behalf.

"Just to be in the presence of that amount of support, love and understanding; to make what can be a really somber, difficult day, full of love, laughter and beauty, that doesnt get lost on our team. You could tell that (Betty) was so happy and appreciative and exactly where she should have been."

In attendance on the appointed day  which Sanguin coined her "special day"  were her children, grandchildren and more than 30 close friends, including Reverend Dawn Rolke. When the family inquired about the availability of the church, Rolke was committed to seeing it through.

"My response was, Yes, whatever Betty wants," she says. "We said wed do whatever we could to accommodate her request."

Rolke, a reverend for more than 25 years, says the idea of MAiD in the church felt natural for her because of her previous work and time spent in chapels as a spiritual care provider in hospitals and personal care homes.

"There were conversations about (MAiD) happening in the chapels as a safe space," she says. "My involvement in hospitals with their warm, hospitable chapels, I think thats what helped me visualize it."

SUPPLIED My mom knew it was available and it was her decision, on her terms and in her own time, says Betty Sanguins daughter Renee Sanguin.

Rolke says the family felt comfortable in the church as the Sanguin children grew up there.

"The family loved the beauty of the space and the light in the windows. They shared their memories of growing up there," she says. "Betty brought them back to where they started. It wasnt an unfamiliar space to them and that was moving in its own way."

On her "special day," Sanguin sat in a recliner surrounded by her children, her favourite music played, her handmade quilts were on display and her grandchildren sang to her.

"When we wheeled her into her ceremony, her eyes lit up when she saw all of her friends and family," says Lynda.

Shelley Cook | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Grief is one thing but watching somebody die is something entirely different. Lynda felt comfort knowing that her mom was able to make this important decision on her own.

"We were proud of our mom, and heartbroken, every emotion possible. She planned the service, my kids sang, and it couldnt have been more perfect," she says.

At the appointed hour, the MAiD team arrived and the guests exited the church. At her request, Sanguins children and grandchildren remained by her side and held her hand.

In the end, Sanguin was able to say goodbye.

"We got to hug our mom and say goodbye," says Lynda. "And just as importantly, my mom got to say goodbye to all the people that meant so much to her in her life."

sabrinacarnevale@gmail.com
OTTAWA - The federal government will consider whether to include booster shots in the next version of the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for its workers, the Treasury Board said as it reviews the rules.

Second-year medical student Nina Hadzimustafic delivers a COVID-19 booster shots at Jabapalooza, a pop up vaccine clinic, in Ottawa, on Monday, Dec. 20, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang

OTTAWA - The federal government will consider whether to include booster shots in the next version of the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for its workers, the Treasury Board said as it reviews the rules.

The government must review the need for the policy, which currently requires federal public servants to get two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine or face unpaid leave, after six months.

That timeline runs out this week and while Treasury Board has consulted with unions over the last several weeks, the Public Service Alliance of Canada says it is in the dark about which direction the government will go.

"They have said, 'You will see a renewed policy on April 6,'" Chris Aylward, national president of the union, said in an interview. "I have no idea what that renewed policy might look like."

While the review could deem the mandate is no longer necessary, the government could also opt to expand it to encourage more members of the public service to get a booster shot.

"Any decisions will be based on science and the advice of public health officials," Mona Fortier, president of the Treasury Board, said in a statement Monday.

As it stands, any worker in the core public administration, as well as the RCMP, must attest that they are fully vaccinated or risk being put on leave without pay.

The policy applies even to employees who work from home.

The policy document states the goal of the mandates is to protect employees, their colleagues and clients against COVID-19, and boost vaccine rates across the public service.

Fortier confirmed last week the definition of "fully vaccinated" is also being considered as part of the review.

More than 98 per cent of federal public workers have attested that they are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 with two doses as of March 28.

If the definition of fully vaccinated is changed, workers may need a booster to keep their pay.

Vaccination rates in the general population are similarly high, at about 90 per cent for those 18 years or older as of March 27. But uptake of boosters has been slower, at just 57 per cent.

Approximately 2,690 workers, representing about one per cent of the federal workforce, requested some kind of accommodation in the last six months.

Aylward said "very, very few" employees have been placed on leave.

Unions have pushed back on the vaccine mandate ahead of the six-month review.

The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada urged the government to determine when the policy will no longer be needed, given the high vaccination rate across the country.

"As provinces ease restrictions, the employer must do the same and allow members on Leave Without Pay (LWOP) to come back to work," the PIPSC said in a statement.

PSAC recently filed a grievance against the existing policy on behalf of all members who have been put on leave without pay because of their vaccination status.

Putting the unvaccinated on leave without pay is harsh, the union argued, and can be considered disciplinary and without cause.

PSAC also filed grievances against the policy in December 2021, on behalf of Treasury Board employees who work remotely, and earlier this month for Canada Revenue Agency employees who work from home.

The union said at the time the vaccine mandate for remote workers constituted an abuse of management, since people with little prospect of returning to physical workplace posed no reasonable threat to health and safety.

The government has made accommodations for people on certain medical, religious, or other grounds protected by the Canadian Human Rights Act.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

The six-month review comes as provinces have begun lifting public health restrictions, including vaccine mandates, across the country.

While the massive Omicron wave that washed over Canada in January and February has just receded, the country is likely already in the midst of a resurgence, chief public health officer Dr. Theresa Tam reported Friday.

Over the last several weeks she's suggested Canada is in a "period of uncertainty," and has emphatically advocated for people to get up to date on their vaccinations to protect themselves against severe disease.

In general, though, Tam said policy-makers are moving away from mandates for booster doses.

"We want Canadians to want to get it, because it makes sense from a serious outcome perspective," she said at a briefing on March 18.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 4, 2022.
TORONTO - Canadian miner Centerra Gold Inc. says it has agreed to sell its business interests in the Kyrgyz Republic and exit the country, settling a long-simmering dispute over one of the biggest gold mines in Central Asia.

A view of the Kumtor gold mine, in Kumtor 350 kilometers east of Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, Friday, May 28, 2021. Canadian gold miner Centerra Gold Inc. says it has agreed to sell its business interests in the Kyrgyz Republic to Kyrgyzaltyn JSC and exit the country. (AP Photo/Vladimir Voronin)

TORONTO - Canadian miner Centerra Gold Inc. says it has agreed to sell its business interests in the Kyrgyz Republic and exit the country, settling a long-simmering dispute over one of the biggest gold mines in Central Asia.

The Toronto-based company says the sale to Kyrgyzaltyn JSC includes Centerras two wholly-owned Kyrgyz subsidiaries, Kumtor Gold Co. CJSC and Kumtor Operating Co. CJSC, which operate the Kumtor Gold Mine.

Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

In exchange, Kyrgyzaltyn will give up its 26 per cent stake in Centerra and its 77.4 million Centerra common shares for cancellation, worth roughly $972 million.

The Kyrgyzstani government took over the Kumtor mine in May 2021 citing environmental and safety concerns, though the country has also long accused the company of not paying enough taxes.

Centerra has denied those allegations.

The company says the agreement, which requires the support of shareholders, is conditional on the release of all claims and the termination of legal proceedings related to the mine.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 4, 2022.

Companies in this story: (TSX:CG)
BEIJING (AP)  China has sent more than 10,000 health workers from around the country to Shanghai, including 2,000 from the military, as it struggles to stamp out a rapidly spreading outbreak in its largest city under its zero-COVID strategy.

Residents stand along a street during a mass testing day in a lockdown area in the Jingan district of western Shanghai, Monday, April 4, 2022. China has sent more than 10,000 health workers from across the country to Shanghai, including 2,000 military medical staff, as it struggles to stamp out a rapidly spreading COVID-19 outbreak in China's largest city. (AP Photo/Chen Si)

BEIJING (AP)  China has sent more than 10,000 health workers from around the country to Shanghai, including 2,000 from the military, as it struggles to stamp out a rapidly spreading outbreak in its largest city under its zero-COVID strategy.

Shanghai was conducting a mass testing of its 25 million residents Monday as what was announced as a two-phase lockdown entered its second week. Most of eastern Shanghai, which was supposed to re-open last Friday, remained locked down along with the western half of the city.

While many factories and financial companies have been allowed to keep operating if they isolate their employees, concern was growing about the potential economic impact of an extended lockdown in China's financial capital, a major shipping and manufacturing center.

The entrance to a noodle store is locked and sealed in the Jingan district of western Shanghai, Monday, April 4, 2022. China has sent more than 10,000 health workers from across the country to Shanghai, including 2,000 military medical staff, as it struggles to stamp out a rapidly spreading COVID-19 outbreak in China's largest city. (AP Photo/Chen Si)

The highly contagious omicron BA.2 form of the virus is testing China's ability to maintain its zero-COVID approach, which aims to stop outbreaks from spreading by isolating everyone who tests positive, whether they have symptoms or not. Shanghai has converted an exhibition hall and other facilities into massive isolation centers where people with mild or no symptoms are housed in a sea of beds separated by temporary partitions.

China on Monday reported more than 13,000 new cases nationwide in the previous 24 hours, of which nearly 12,000 were asymptomatic. About 9,000 of the cases were in Shanghai. The other large outbreak is in northeastern China's Jilin province, where new cases topped 3,500.

The Shanghai lockdown has sparked numerous complaints, from food shortages to limited staff and facilities at hastily constructed isolation sites. Some people who tested positive have remained at home for extended periods because of a shortage of isolation beds or transportation to take them to a center, the business news publication Caixin said.

Asked about the anxiety of parents separated from their children, Shanghai health commission official Wu Qianyu said Monday that they are required to be kept apart if the child tests positive and the parent tests negative, according to the Paper, an online news outlet.

In this photo released by Xinhua News Agency, residents wait to take nucleic acid tests at a community in Pudong New Area of eastern China's Shanghai city on Monday, April 4, 2022. China has sent more than 10,000 health workers from across the country to Shanghai, including 2,000 military medical staff, as it struggles to stamp out a rapidly spreading COVID-19 outbreak in China's largest city.(Ding Ting/Xinhua via AP)

If both test positive, the parent is allowed to stay with the child at an isolation site for children and receive any treatment there, Wu was quoted as saying at a news conference on Monday.

The China Daily newspaper said nearly 15,000 medical workers from neighboring Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces left for Shanghai early Monday from their hospitals by bus. More than 2,000 personnel from the army, navy and a joint logistics support force arrived on Sunday, a Chinese military newspaper said.

At least four other provinces have also dispatched doctors, nurses and other medical workers to Shanghai, the state-owned China Daily said.

Workers wearing blue protective clothing held up signs saying "Keep one meter distance" and "Do not crowd" as people lined up for testing in one part of western Shanghai. The testing was being done in batches, 10 people at a time. If the sample comes back positive, all 10 are tested individually.

Shelley Cook | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

While most shops and other businesses in Shanghai are shut down, major manufacturers including automakers General Motors Co. and Volkswagen AG say their factories are still operating. VW has reduced production because of a disruption in supplies of parts.

Businesses that are operating are enforcing "closed loop" strategies that isolate employees. Thousands of stock traders and other people in financial industries are sleeping in their offices, according to the Daily Economic News newspaper.

Three out of five foreign companies with operations in Shanghai say they have cut this years sales forecasts, according to a survey conducted last week by the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai and the American Chamber of Commerce in China. One-third of the 120 companies that responded to the survey said they have delayed investments.

Shanghai has set up temporary vegetable warehouses to boost supplies, and an online grocery delivery service has doubled the staff at one of its warehouses to try to keep up with demand, the official Xinhua News Agency said. City officials have apologized for the government's handling of the lockdown.

___

Associated Press researcher Chen Si in Shanghai and business writer Joe McDonald and researcher Yu Bing in Beijing contributed to this report.
LONDON (AP)  British travelers going abroad for the Easter holidays faced disruptions Monday as two main carriers, British Airways and easyJet, canceled dozens of flights due to staff shortages related to soaring cases of COVID-19 in the U.K.

FILE - British Airways planes parked at Terminal 5 Heathrow airport in London, Wednesday, March 18, 2020. British travelers going abroad for the Easter holidays faced disruptions Monday, April 4, 2022 as two main carriers, British Airways and easyJet, canceled dozens of flights due to staff shortages related to soaring cases of COVID-19 in the U.K. Budget carrier easyJet grounded 62 flights scheduled for Monday after canceling at least 222 flights over the weekend. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein, File)

LONDON (AP)  British travelers going abroad for the Easter holidays faced disruptions Monday as two main carriers, British Airways and easyJet, canceled dozens of flights due to staff shortages related to soaring cases of COVID-19 in the U.K.

Budget carrier easyJet grounded 62 flights scheduled for Monday after canceling at least 222 flights over the weekend, while British Airways said some three dozen out of its 115 flights canceled Monday were due to pandemic-related problems.

An easyJet spokesman said it is experiencing higher than usual levels of employee sickness as a result of high rates of COVID-19 infections across Europe.

The airline added that the number of cancellations represents a small proportion of the total of more than 1,600 flights planned for Monday.

Several of the British Airways cancellations were made at the last minute due to staff calling in sick, and about 25 others were a result of a decision taken in recent weeks to reduce its overall flight schedule.

Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

While the vast majority of our flights continue to operate as planned, as a precaution weve slightly reduced our schedule between now and the end of May as we ramp back up," the airline said.

Aviation has been one of the industries worst hit by the pandemic and airlines and airports are experiencing the same issues rebuilding their operations while managing the continuing impact of COVID, it added.

The Easter school holidays, which start this week, are the first time many families in Britain have booked trips abroad after two years of restrictions. All remaining virus measures, including mandatory self-isolation for those infected and testing requirements for international travel, were binned in February and March as part of the U.K.'s living with COVID plan.

But coronavirus cases across the U.K. have soared again with the rapid spread of the more transmissible omicron BA.2 variant, reaching record levels last week when official figures showed that some 1 in 13 people had the coronavirus.

Heathrow Airport, Europe's busiest, said it had anticipated delays this week because it expected to see the largest number of people traveling since the March 2020 lockdown.

The travel disruptions were made worse Monday after Eurotunnel said that services for travelers to Calais in France were delayed by hours due to a train that "stopped temporarily in the tunnel.
WINNIPEG - Canadian furniture maker Palliser is expanding its North American operations as new products coupled with soaring tariffs on imports from Vietnam and China increase demand for the company's furnishings.

WINNIPEG - Canadian furniture maker Palliser is expanding its North American operations as new products coupled with soaring tariffs on imports from Vietnam and China increase demand for the company's furnishings.

Palliser says it plans to grow its production capacity in Canada and Mexico by 30 per cent and add more than 700 new positions this year.

The company says it's adding a new 12,000-square-metre building to its upholstery manufacturing campus in Winnipeg and creating more than 300 new jobs at the site.

Palliser says it's also increasing production capacity in Mexico by expanding its manufacturing facilities and adding new shifts, which will create another 460 positions.

The furniture manufacturer says the expansion comes amid a spike in demand due to the success of its new product launches as well as new Canadian tariffs on furniture imports from Vietnam and China.

The company says its expansion includes a significant investment in equipment, material handling processes and automation technology.

Peter Tielmann, Palliser president and CEO, says the company's investment in new manufacturing facilities and expanded workforce reflects its commitment to the North American market.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

"Were eager to create new jobs right here in Manitoba, where our business is anchored, as well as in our Mexico facilities that primarily support our U.S. customers," he said in a statement.

"Its important for us as a company to continue to produce domestically, which reduces our environmental impact by lowering our emissions and carbon footprint."

In September, the Canadian International Trade Tribunal said the dumping and subsidizing of certain upholstered furniture originating in or exported from China and Vietnam had "caused injury to the domestic industry."

The independent quasi-judicial body said Palliser Furniture Ltd. of Winnipeg was the complainant in the case.

It imposed new anti-dumping and countervailing duties on furniture from the two countries to be collected by the Canada Border Services Agency.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 4, 2022.
LULEA, Sweden (AP)  For hundreds of years, raging blast furnaces  fed with coking coal  have forged steel used in cars, railways, bridges and skyscrapers.

Martin Pei, chief technology officer, SSAB, holds an engraved piece of steel made using the HYBRIT process in Stockholm, Sweden on Feb. 18, 2022. The steel-making industry is coming under increasing pressure to curb its environmental impact and contribute to the Paris climate accord, which aims to cap global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius (James Brooks via AP)

LULEA, Sweden (AP)  For hundreds of years, raging blast furnaces  fed with coking coal  have forged steel used in cars, railways, bridges and skyscrapers.

But the puffs of coal-fired smoke are a big source of carbon dioxide, the heat-trapping gas thats driving climate change.

According to the World Steel Association, every metric ton of steel produced in 2020 emitted almost twice that much carbon dioxide (1.8 tons) into the atmosphere. Total direct emissions from making steel were about 2.6 billion tons in 2020, representing around 7% of global CO2 emissions.

In Sweden, a single company, steel giant SSAB, accounts for about 10% of the country's emissions due to the furnaces it operates at mills like the one in the northern town of Lulea.

But not far away, a high-tech pilot plant is seeking to significantly reduce the carbon emissions involved in steel production by switching some of that process away from burning coking coal to burning hydrogen that itself was produced with renewable energy.

HYBRIT  or Hydrogen Breakthrough Ironmaking Technology  is a joint venture between SSAB, mining company LKAB and Swedish state-owned power firm Vattenfall launched in 2016.

The cost of renewable energy, fossil-free energy, had come down dramatically and at the same time, you had a rising awareness and the Paris Agreement" in 2015 to reduce global emissions, said Mikael Nordlander, Vattenfalls head of industry decarbonization.

We realized that we might have a chance now to outcompete the direct use of fossil fuels in industry with this electricity coming from fossil-free sources," he added.

Last year, the plant made its first commercial delivery. European carmakers that have committed to dramatically reducing their emissions need cleaner steel. Chinese-owned Volvo Group became the first carmaker to partner with HYBRIT. Head of procurement Kerstin Enochsson said steel is a major contributor to their cars carbon footprint, between 20 and 35%.

Tackling only the tailpipe emissions by being an electric company is not enough. We need to focus on the car itself, as well, she said.

Demand from other companies, including Volkswagen, is also sending a signal that there is demand for green steel. Steelmakers in Europe have announced plans to scale up production of steel made without coal.

The HYBRIT process aims to replace the coking coal that's traditionally used for ore-based steel making with hydrogen and renewable electricity.

It begins with brown-tinged iron ore pellets that react with the hydrogen gas and are reduced to ball-shaped sponge iron, which takes it name due to pores left behind following the removal of oxygen. This is then melted in an electric furnace.

If the hydrogen is made using renewable energy, too, the process produces no CO2.

We get iron, and then we get water vapor instead," said SSABs chief technology officer Martin Pei. Water vapor can be condensed, recirculated, reused in the process.

"We really solve the root cause of carbon dioxide emissions from steel making, he said.

Steel is a recyclable material, but demand for the alloy is expected to grow in the coming years, amid a push to transform society and build wind turbines, solar plants, power transmission lines and new electric vehicles.

Steel is a superb construction material. It is also possible to recycle steel again and again," said Pei. You can reuse steel as many times as possible.

The only problem today is the current way of making steel from iron ore emits too much CO2, he said.

By the end of this decade, the European Union is attempting to cut overall CO2 emissions in the 27-nation bloc by 55% compared to 1990 levels. Part of that effort includes making companies pay for their C02 emissions and encourage the switch to low-carbon alternatives.

Swedens steel industry has set out plans to achieve fossil-free operations by 2045. SSAB in January brought forward its own plans to largely eliminate carbon dioxide emissions in its steel-making processes by the end of the decade.

The companies are well aware of their possibilities and limitations in the current processes and that they have to do something about it, said Helen Axelsson, director of energy and environment at Jernkontoret, the Swedish steel producers association.

But according to the World Steel Association, over 70% of global steel production takes place in Asia, where steel producers don't have access to the same quantities of old scrap steel as countries that have been industrialized for a longer time. That's another reason why average emissions per ton of steel are higher in the global south.

Filip Johnsson, a professor in energy technology at Gothenburgs Chalmers University, said the vast amounts of renewable electricity necessary to make hydrogen and cleaner steel could make rolling out the HYBRIT process difficult in other parts of the world.

Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

I would say that the major challenge is to get loads of electricity and also to provide it sort of constantly, he said.

The small Lulea pilot plant is still a research facility, and has so far produced just a couple of hundred tons. There are plans to construct a larger demonstration plant and begin commercial deliveries by 2026.

___

Follow all AP stories on climate change issues at https://apnews.com/hub/climate.

___

Associated Press climate and environmental coverage receives support from several private foundations. See more about APs climate initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
WASHINGTON (AP)  Amid worries that the latest coronavirus variant could spark another rise in cases, Medicare announced Monday that millions of enrollees will finally have access to free over-the-counter COVID-19 tests at drug stores.

FILE - A home COVID-19 test kit is held, Feb. 3, 2022, in Seattle. Medicare says that millions of enrollees will finally have access to free over-the-counter COVID-19 tests at drug stores. Monday's announcement comes amid worries that the latest coronavirus variant __ BA.2 __ will spark another rise in U.S. cases. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, File)

WASHINGTON (AP)  Amid worries that the latest coronavirus variant could spark another rise in cases, Medicare announced Monday that millions of enrollees will finally have access to free over-the-counter COVID-19 tests at drug stores.

Shelley Cook | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

More than 59 million people with Medicare's Part B outpatient coverage will be able to get up to eight free at-home tests per month, or enough for an individual to test twice a week, as some doctors have recommended.

Medicare has lagged private insurance in following the Biden administration's directive to cover at-home tests because rules and regulations stood in the way, and officials had to find a work-around. This is the first time the health insurance program for older people and those with disabilities has covered an over-the-counter test at no cost to recipients.

Medicare's move could turn out to be prescient.

The BA.2 omicron variant now accounts for more than half of U.S. cases, having rapidly overtaken the original strain. That initial omicron wave this winter caused the biggest spike yet in virus cases, straining many hospitals to the limit. Since then, cases nationally have rapidly dropped to the lowest level since before last summer's delta surge. Coronavirus restrictions have been largely lifted. But some areas where BA.2 took hold early are seeing increasing cases.

Monday's announcement followed another precautionary move last week, when government health officials authorized a second round of booster shots for people 50 and older as well as those with weakened immune systems.

National pharmacy chains participating in Medicare's give-away include: Albertsons Companies, Inc., Costco Pharmacy, CVS, Food Lion, Giant Food, The Giant Company, Hannaford Pharmacies, H-E-B Pharmacy, Hy-Vee Pharmacy, Kroger Family of Pharmacies, Rite Aid Corp., Shop & Stop, Walgreens and Walmart.
A downtown office building designed by one of the most prominent architecture firms in Winnipegs history is up for sale.

A downtown office building designed by one of the most prominent architecture firms in Winnipegs history is up for sale.

Located at 222 Osborne St. N., the former headquarters of Green Blankstein Russell and Associates  which designed dozens of buildings in Winnipeg, including the current city hall, the former Winnipeg International Airport, the Manitoba Museum and Planetarium, the Wildwood Park housing development and the Centennial Concert Hall  is listed for $2.4 million.

The building on Osborne, designed by the firm, was built in 1951, and many of their more prominent designs originated within its mid-century modern style offices, which the firm would occupy until 1983.

In the nearly 40 years since, the free-standing, two-storey building has been occupied by a number of private businesses, including currently a law firm, a home-care business and an immigration specialist. Its undergone significant renovations, says Capital Group senior director of sales and leasing Bob Antymniuk, and is available for purchase and has space for lease.

"The present owner has done a marvellous job," Antymniuk said, adding that it could be a great fit for tenants in a variety of fields looking for downtown office space. "The outside obviously has great curb appeal, and the inside matches it."

(The Winnipeg Architecture Foundation feels subsequent owners didnt do the building any favours. "Unfortunately, new owners have modified the original aesthetic of the 222 Osborne Street building through a series of renovations, both internally and externally," reads the foundations summary of the building on its website.)

As it was originally built, the office emphasized natural light in all areas, the foundation notes, and was an early example of "steel and curtain" wall structure in the city. It featured a modular framework of nine units "almost forming a cube," with a central module removed; in its stead stood an elm tree, planted to mark the opening of the building.

The building has two 4,500 square-foot spaces and one 1,500 square-foot space available to lease at a rate of $14 per-square-foot. Located in close proximity to sites such as the legislative building and the Law Courts, Antymniuk said theres been significant interest in leasing, more so than purchasing to this point; the property fits modern needs, has good amenities like kitchens on each storey, Antymniuk says, and he said there is flexibility for interested parties.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Its definitely an interesting moment to be in the market for office space. According to Statistics Canada, as of late February, less than one quarter of Canadians with a job or business reported that they worked exclusively from home, with hybrid work plans up 0.9 percentage points over the previous month. That means that even as companies beckon employees back to their office, workers continue to exercise their ability to do the same work from home.

To Antymniuk, the fact theres been interest in leasing indicates theres still considerable value being placed by employers on sharing a workspace rather than working in separate locations.

The national first-quarter report from real estate firm Colliers, released in March, said that in Winnipeg, downtown office vacancy was at 14.5 per cent, a decrease as compared to the end of 2021. Meanwhile, asking net rent fees per square-foot downtown were up from just under $15 at the end of last year to $15.79; the average suburban figure was $16.49.

"With COVID restrictions easing," the Colliers report noted, "businesses continue to prioritize their spatial requirement decisions that have been on pause through the pandemic. While the formalizing back-to-work policies are evolving, on what scale and with what frequency remains to be seen." The report notes that in the city there has been an uptick in leasing activity, with "realistic" commitments from both the private and public sector beginning to materialize.

Many companies downtown, including some of the largest employers, are still favouring flexible work plans, which may see an uptick in interest with the potential arrival of another wave of COVID-19 infections in the province.

ben.waldman@freepress.mb.ca
BUCHA, Ukraine (AP)  Moscow faced global revulsion and accusations of war crimes Monday after the Russian pullout from the outskirts of Kyiv revealed streets, buildings and yards strewn with corpses of what appeared to be civilians, many of them evidently killed at close range.

Smoke rises in the air after shelling in Odessa, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

BUCHA, Ukraine (AP)  Moscow faced global revulsion and accusations of war crimes Monday after the Russian pullout from the outskirts of Kyiv revealed streets, buildings and yards strewn with corpses of what appeared to be civilians, many of them evidently killed at close range.

The grisly images of battered or burned bodies left out in the open or hastily buried led to calls for tougher sanctions against the Kremlin, especially a cutoff of fuel imports from Russia. Germany and France reacted by expelling dozens of Russian diplomats, suggesting they were spies, and U.S. President Joe Biden said Russian leader Vladimir Putin should be tried for war crimes.

This guy is brutal, and whats happening in Bucha is outrageous, Biden said, referring to the town northwest of the capital that was the scene of some of the horrors.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy left the capital, Kyiv, for his first reported trip since the war began nearly six weeks ago to see for himself what he called the genocide and war crimes in Bucha.

In his nightly video address, Zelenskyy pledged that Ukraine would work with the European Union and the International Criminal Court to identify Russian fighters involved in any atrocities.

A dog drinks water next to destroyed Russian armored vehicles in Bucha, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

The time will come when every Russian will learn the whole truth about who among their fellow citizens killed, who gave orders, who turned a blind eye to the murders, he said.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov dismissed the scenes outside Kyiv as a stage-managed anti-Russian provocation. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the images contained signs of video forgery and various fakes.

Russia has similarly rejected previous allegations of atrocities as fabrications on Ukraines part.

Soldiers walk amid destroyed Russian tanks in Bucha, in the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022. Ukrainian troops are finding brutalized bodies and widespread destruction in the suburbs of Kyiv, sparking new calls for a war crimes investigation and sanctions against Russia. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

Ukrainian officials said the bodies of at least 410 civilians have been found in towns around Kyiv that were recaptured from Russian forces in recent days.

The Ukrainian prosecutor-generals office described one room discovered in Bucha as a torture chamber. In a statement, it said the bodies of five men with their hands bound were found in the basement of a childrens sanatorium where civilians were tortured and killed.

Associated Press journalists saw dozens of bodies in Bucha, including at least 13 in and around a building that local people said Russian troops used as a base. Three other bodies were found in a stairwell, and a group of six were burned together.

A woman walks as smoke rises in the air in the background after shelling in Odesa, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

Many victims seen by AP appeared to have been shot at close range. Some were shot in the head. At least two had their hands tied. A bag of spilled groceries lay near one victim.

The dead witnessed by the news agency's journalists also included bodies wrapped in black plastic, piled on one end of a mass grave in a Bucha churchyard. Many of those victims had been shot in cars or killed in explosions trying to flee the city. With the morgue full and the cemetery impossible to reach, the churchyard was the only place to keep the dead, Father Andrii Galavin said.

Tanya Nedashkivska said she buried her husband in a garden outside their apartment building after he was detained by Russian troops. His body was one of those left heaped in a stairwell.

A lifeless body of a man with his hands tied behind his back lies on the ground in Bucha, Ukraine, Sunday, April 3, 2022. Associated Press journalists in Bucha, a small city northwest of Kyiv, saw the bodies of at least nine people in civilian clothes who appeared to have been killed at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs. (AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)

Please, I am begging you, do something! she said. Its me talking, a Ukrainian woman, a Ukrainian woman, a mother of two kids and one grandchild. For all the wives and mothers, make peace on Earth so no one ever grieves again."

Another Bucha resident, Volodymyr Pilhutskyi, said his neighbor Pavlo Vlasenko was taken away by Russian soldiers because the military-style pants he was wearing and the uniforms that Vlasenko said belonged to his security guard son appeared suspicious. When Vlasenkos body was later found, it had burn marks from a flamethrower, his neighbor said.

I came closer and saw that his body was burnt, Pilhutskyi said. They didnt just shoot him.

The lifeless body of a man lies on a dirt path in Bucha, Ukraine, Monday, April 4, 2022. Russia faced a fresh wave of condemnation on Monday after evidence emerged of what appeared to be deliberate killings of civilians in Ukraine. Some Western leaders called for further sanctions in response, even as Moscow continued to press its offensive in the country's east. (AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)

Russia's U.N. ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, insisted Monday at a news conference that during the time that Bucha was under Russian control, not a single local person has suffered from any violent action.

However, high-resolution satellite imagery by commercial provider Maxar Technologies showed that many of the bodies have been lying in the open for weeks, during the time that Russian forces were in Bucha. The New York Times first reported on the satellite images showing the dead.

In other developments, more than 1,500 civilians were evacuated Monday from the besieged and devastated port city of Mariupol in the south, using the dwindling number of private vehicles available to get out, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.

The charred body of a man along with five other people, lie on the ground in Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, April 4, 2022. Russia is facing a fresh wave of condemnation after evidence emerged of what appeared to be deliberate killings of civilians in Ukraine. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

But amid the fighting, a Red Cross-accompanied convoy of buses that has been thwarted for days on end in a bid to deliver supplies and evacuate residents was again unable to get inside the city, Vereshchuk said.

European leaders and the United Nations human rights chief joined the Ukrainians in condemning the bloodshed that was exposed after Russian troops withdrew from the area around Kyiv.

At the same time, many warned that the full extent of the horrors has yet to emerge.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy examines the site of a recent battle in Bucha, close to Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Apr. 4, 2022. Russia is facing a fresh wave of condemnation after evidence emerged of what appeared to be deliberate killings of civilians in Ukraine. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

I can tell you without exaggeration but with great sorrow that the situation in Mariupol is much worse compared to what weve seen in Bucha and other cities, towns, and villages nearby Kyiv, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.

Zelenskyy was due to speak to a previously scheduled U.N. Security Counsel meeting Tuesday. Britains U.N. ambassador, Barbara Woodward, said the session was certain to focus on the killing of large numbers of civilians in Ukraine.

Western and Ukrainian leaders have accused Russia of war crimes before, and the International Criminal Courts prosecutor has already opened an investigation. But the latest reports ratcheted up the condemnation.

Ira Gavriluk holds her cat outside her house, where his husband and brother were killed, in Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, April 4, 2022. Russia is facing a fresh wave of condemnation after evidence emerged of what appeared to be deliberate killings of civilians in Ukraine. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said the images from Bucha reveal the unbelievable brutality of the Russian leadership and those who follow its propaganda. And French President Emmanuel Macron said there is clear evidence of war crimes in Bucha that demand new punitive measures.

Im in favor of a new round of sanctions and in particular on coal and gasoline. We need to act, he said on France-Inter radio.

Though united in outrage, the European allies appeared split on how to respond. While Poland urged Europe to quickly wean itself off Russian energy, Germany said it would stick with a gradual approach of phasing out coal and oil imports over the next several months.

Nina Kirinchenko, 90, greets journalists next to her husband in part of a building that was converted as housing for 400 people, since its apartments were used by Russian soldiers during the occupation of Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, April 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

The U.S. and its allies have sought to punish Russia for the invasion by imposing sweeping sanctions but fear further harm to the global economy, which is still recovering from the pandemic. Europe is in a particular bind, since it gets 40% of its gas and 25% of its oil from Russia.

Polands prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, described Russia under Putin as a totalitarian-fascist state and called for strong actions that will finally break Putins war machine. Would you negotiate with Hitler, with Stalin, with Pol Pot? Morawiecki asked of Macron.

Russia withdrew many of its forces from the capital area in recent days after being thwarted in its bid to swiftly capture Kyiv.

In the courtyard of their house, Vlad Tanyuk, 6, stands near the grave of his mother Ira Tanyuk, who died because of starvation and stress due to the war, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, April 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

It has instead poured troops and mercenaries into the country's east in a stepped-up bid to gain control of the Donbas, the largely Russian-speaking industrial region that includes Mariupol, which has seen some of the heaviest fighting and worst suffering of the war.

About two-thirds of the Russian troops around Kyiv have left and are either in Belarus or on their way there, probably getting more supplies and reinforcements, said a senior U.S. defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an intelligence assessment.

Russian forces also appear to be repositioning artillery and troops to try to take the city of Izyum, which lies on a key route to the Donbas, the official said.

Burned cars and warehouses near the Antonov airport in Hostomel, outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, April 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)

On Monday, Russian shelling killed 11 people in the southern city of Mykolaiv, regional governor Vitaliy Kim said in a video message on social media. Kim said nine of the victims died at a public transport stop in the city center.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Zelenskyy appealed for more weaponry as Russia prepares a new offensive.

If we had already got what we needed  all these planes, tanks, artillery, anti-missile and anti-ship weapons  we could have saved thousands of people, he said.

___

Qena reported from Motyzhyn, Ukraine. Yuras Karmanau in Lviv, Ukraine, Lolita Baldor in Washington and Associated Press journalists around the world contributed.

___

Follow the APs coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
OTTAWA - Post-secondary schools and students are looking to the Liberals to make a down payment in the post-pandemic economy by boosting research spending in the federal budget coming this week.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, right, speaks with scientist Krishnaraj Tiwari during a visit to the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) Royalmount Human Health Therapeutics Research Centre facility in Montreal, Monday, Aug 31, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes

OTTAWA - Post-secondary schools and students are looking to the Liberals to make a down payment in the post-pandemic economy by boosting research spending in the federal budget coming this week.

Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland will deliver the government's next fiscal plan on April 7.

Universities Canada president Paul Davidson is expecting it to include some of the promises on research spending made during last fall's election, including funding 1,000 new Canada Research Chairs, and spending millions more annually on cutting-edge and "moonshot" research.

Davidson said making good on those promises could keep a cohort of researchers in Canada into the next decade rather than being snapped up in the global competition for talent that has heated up through the pandemic.

It would also keep Canada from falling behind peer nations like the U.S. and U.K. that have made funding research a pillar of their post-pandemic growth plans, he said.

"It's not all about the immediate relief," he said. "We're building a research ecosystem that supports Canada's innovation agenda, that supports our economic growth agenda, and that's why we're looking for investments."

It has been five years since a scientific advisory panel commissioned by the Liberals delivered a report showing how to boost funding for research and development that domestically had been slowly declining over the previous 15 years.

Multiple submissions on research funding were made to the House of Commons finance committee during its pre-budget consultations, collectively asking for billions in new spending on research scholarships, post-doctoral fellowships and granting agencies.

In its final report released in mid-March, the committee recommended $120 million more on a recurring basis for student scholarships, $40 million more annually to expand research capacity at colleges, and expand publicly funded intellectual property to maximize the benefits of COVID-related research.

Denise Amyot, president and CEO of Colleges and Institutes Canada, said industries and institutions need help to commercialize research more easily. She also said the funding pool should be separate for universities and for colleges to recognize there is a difference in their research focus.

"If we're serious about competitiveness, if we're serious about productivity, we need a specific fund to our colleges and universities to commercialize leading research," she said.

Davidson also said he expects the government to invest money into cybersecurity for researchers.

But the pressure to get all this spending committed now has waned since the Liberals struck a deal with the NDP to get support in key votes, including the budget, in exchange for NDP priorities like pharmacare and dental care.

The deal is designed to keep the minority Liberal government in office until 2025, which gives the government a longer runway to fulfil its election promises than previously expected.

Shelley Cook | Uplift A weekly review of funny, uplifting news in Winnipeg and around the globe that is delivered to your inbox each Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Davidson said the government could therefore use this budget to start a longer-term plan for research but spread out spending over subsequent years.

A longer time frame should give the government a chance to consider what research areas the country should focus on and the skills training required to get there over the next 10 to 15 years, said Elliot Hughes, who was an adviser to former finance minister Bill Morneau.

"Before we rush into saying we're going to do 'research,' let's try and tie that to a broader economic and skills training strategy so that there is some coherence, an alignment on all of those pieces," said Hughes, now a senior adviser at Summa Strategies.

"That takes time, and it takes focus, and it takes effort from a broad range of ministers and engagement from them."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 4, 2022.

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. A previous version incorrectly this report was first published April 2, 2022.
Grocery warehouse workers in Canada appear to be holding out for better pay and benefits after the second strike at a distribution centre in as many months.

The seafood counter is seen at a Metro store Monday, April 15, 2019 in Ste-Therese, Que., north of Montreal. Unifor says more than 900 full-time workers at Metro's Etobicoke warehouse distribution centre began strike action today after voting to reject a tentative agreement with the company. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz

Grocery warehouse workers in Canada appear to be holding out for better pay and benefits after the second strike at a distribution centre in as many months.

More than 900 workers at Metro Inc.'s Toronto-area distribution centre went on strike Saturday, following the nearly 200 workers at a Sobeys Inc. distribution centre in Quebec that walked off the job in February.

The job action comes as grocers post strong profits and executive bonuses while inflation eats away at the spending power of workers.

Canada's unemployment rate has also dropped below pre-pandemic levels, potentially giving workers more confidence in the bargaining process.

"The members have final say on the tentative agreement and have opted to turn down this offer," Chris MacDonald, Unifor assistant to the national president, said in a statement.

Metro said the offer included a six per cent wage increase in the first year, with total wage increases of 14 per cent over four years.

The grocer said the tentative agreement also included improvements to pensions and benefits.

"We are disappointed with the employees decision to strike but remain ready to go back to the table. We have implemented our contingency plan and our stores will remain open to serve our customers," Carmen Fortino, executive vice-president and division head for Metro in Ontario, said in a statement.

Unifor's MacDonald said the union bargaining committee is ready to resume negotiations "in the hope of bringing this strike to a speedy end."

The Etobicoke distribution centre supplies Metro and Food Basics grocery stores across southern Ontario. Some customers reported shelves were less full than usual, especially in the produce section, at some Metro-owned stores in the Toronto area.

Meanwhile, 190 workers at a Sobeys distribution centre in Terrebonne, Que., went on strike in February after negotiations between the company and the union broke down.

Kim Bergeron, a lawyer representing UFCW Canadas Local 501, said the pay and benefits are key sticking points. In an email, she said workers are set to vote on a tentative agreement on Friday.

Try our Dish The latest on food and drink in Winnipeg and beyond from arts writers Ben Sigurdson and Eva Wasney. Dish arrives in your inbox every other Friday. See sample. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

In late January, the union representing workers at a Sobeys warehouse east of Toronto said it ratified a four-year contract with "massive wage increases."

Unifor said the agreement covering more than 500 workers at the Whitby distribution centre included a full-time pay increase of 19.5 per cent over four years.

The grocer, owned by Empire Co. Ltd., also agreed to signing bonuses, doubled its RRSP contribution and added a sixth week of vacation at 26 years of seniority, the union said.

"Through collective bargaining, we were able to deliver a strong contract that includes a considerable pay boost for existing workers as well as future hires while also levelling the playing field for our part-time members," said Pat Twohey, Unifor Local 1090 bargaining chairman.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 4, 2022.

Companies in this story: (TSX:EMP.A, TSX:MRU)
MONTREAL - Canadian fashion mogul Peter Nygard's sexual assault and forcible confinement case in Quebec will return to a Montreal courtroom at the end of May.

The Nygard headquarters is shown in Winnipeg, Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Woods

MONTREAL - Canadian fashion mogul Peter Nygard's sexual assault and forcible confinement case in Quebec will return to a Montreal courtroom at the end of May.

Nygard's presence was not required today as his case was heard briefly before a judge in Montreal.

Lawyers agreed to push the case to May 25 to give his legal team time to deal with Nygard's other pending sex crime cases.

Nygard, 80, also agreed to postpone his right to a bail hearing in the Quebec file until the next court date.

Last week, he appeared virtually in Montreal court to face one count of sexual assault and one count of forcible confinement involving the same victim. The crimes allegedly took place between Nov. 1, 1997, and Nov. 15, 1998.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Lawyers told the court today that Nygard is not prejudiced by the delays because he is already detained in Toronto on similar charges and he is also the subject of an extradition warrant for sex-related charges pending in the United States.

Last fall, Nygard was charged in Toronto with six counts of sexual assault and three counts of forcible confinement in alleged incidents dating back to the late 1980s and mid-2000s. He has denied those allegations.

He was first arrested in Winnipeg in 2020 under the Extradition Act after being charged with nine sex-related counts in New York. Authorities in the U.S. allege he used his position in the fashion industry to lure women and girls.

Nygard has denied the allegations through his lawyer and had agreed to be extradited to the U.S. to face a charge of sex trafficking. Canada's justice minister has said he could be extradited once his Canadian criminal trials are complete.

The former head of a multimillion-dollar clothing company also faces a class-action lawsuit in the U.S. involving 57 women with similar allegations.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 4, 2022.
A cluster of Sri Lankans gathered near the Manitoba Legislative Building Sunday to raise awareness about the South Asian countrys turmoil and call for action.

A cluster of Sri Lankans gathered near the Manitoba Legislative Building Sunday to raise awareness about the South Asian countrys turmoil and call for action.

Shenaly Kuluppuarachchi, 25, was one of the 14 standing near the Osborne Street bus stop around 1:45 p.m. The group held signs stating "Save Sri Lanka" and "Stop Ruining Sri Lanka".

"Were really worried about our families because they dont have access to the basic necessities," Kuluppuarachchi said.

She said Sri Lanka is in economic crisis "due to corrupt government and a family regime."

"Our president and his entire family is controlling the country," she said, adding Sri Lankans dont have access to basic necessities like electricity and food.

The eastern country is also facing shortages of fuel and medicines.

Kuluppuarachchis parents, grandparents and other extended family are in Colombo, the countrys capital.

The University of Manitoba student said she usually stays in touch via Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp, but now she cant  social media platforms are blocked on the Sri Lankan end.

"Were really worried about our families," Kuluppuarachchi said. "(Sri Lanka is) very close to breaking into a civil war, actually  thats what I feel, personally."

The entire Sri Lankan cabinet handed letters to the countrys prime minister with offers to resign, Sri Lankas education minister told reporters Sunday. They did so due to the economic crisis, the minister said.

Those attending the Winnipeg rally were not an organized group. Rather, they were members of the Sri Lankan community who wanted to raise concerns. The meet-up spread on social media and through word of mouth.

"Weve been watching the news, and we just couldnt stand it anymore," Kuluppuarachchi said. "We just want this regime to end. We want to secure the future of all the children in Sri Lanka  we cannot sacrifice it all for just one (ruling) family."

The Rajapaksa family is heavily involved in the Sri Lankan government. The president, prime minister, and ministers of finance and irrigation are brothers.

Sri Lanka is, on paper, a democratic state.

Akbo Rupasinghe, who was at Sundays rally, said the regime was filled with "heavy nepotism".

"Things have gone from bad to worse," he said.

Protesters are being arrested in Sri Lanka, and the government isnt helping its people as prices skyrocket and people go hungry, Rupasinghe said.

Professionals, students and mothers with small children are defying emergency decrees and curfews to demand the presidents resignation.

"We want to show our brothers and sisters in Sri Lanka that were there with them," Rupasinghe said.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Sri Lankans across the globe have been taking to the streets with their concerns.

"We cannot reach our brothers and sisters back home, and they cannot reach us, so we have to voice the issues to the world," Rupasinghe said.

Kuluppuarachchi called on Canada for help.

"Sri Lankans deserve better than this," she said. "We would like international intervention at this time. I think we really need it."

 with files from John Woods and The Associated Press

gabrielle.piche@winnipegfreepress.com
OTTAWA  The Conservative party leadership front-runner has revived longstanding calls to ship oil from the Port of Churchill, an idea that remains controversial in northern Manitoba.

OTTAWA  The Conservative party leadership front-runner has revived longstanding calls to ship oil from the Port of Churchill, an idea that remains controversial in northern Manitoba.

"The Port of Churchill could be a potential port to transport our energy," Pierre Poilievre told a Winnipeg rally Saturday.

RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Its the same thing we were concerned about years ago, said War Lake First Nation Chief Betsy Kennedy, whose community sits along the Hudson Bay Railway linking Churchill to the south.

"Here in Manitoba, we have some very exciting possibilities if we can remove the gatekeepers," said Poilievre, whose campaign did not reply when asked whom hes referring to as gatekeepers.

The Ontario MP also argued a pipeline from Albertas oilsands to Churchill could carry up to 200,000 barrels daily. If elected prime minister at some point, he said hed launch consultations with First Nations, while issuing pre-approval for export licenses to ship oil.

"What stands in the way of these projects is excessive regulation and many delays," Poilievre said.

Yet, the idea of shipping oil through northern Manitoba has long had local push back.

"Its the same thing we were concerned about years ago," said War Lake First Nation Chief Betsy Kennedy, whose community sits along the Hudson Bay Railway linking Churchill to the south.

"If theres ever a derailment and theres any oil spillage, were just worried how thats going to affect the land and the rivers when that happens."

The railways former owner, Omnitrax, had sought to ship oil through its port but faced vehement opposition from the Keewatin Tribal Council, environmentalists and Manitobas former NDP government, especially after the deadly oil-train derailment in Lac-Megantic, Que., in July 2013.

The idea also got renewed push back from the Churchill Chamber of Commerce in 2017, after railway washouts led Alberta politicians to argue oil shipments could finance the lines reconstruction.

Kennedy sits on the board of Arctic Gateway Group, the local consortium that took over the railway and port in 2018.

Poilievres campaign did not contact the consortium ahead of his promise Saturday. However, the groups head, Sheldon Affleck, said hes open to Poilievres pitch. "The board is 100 per cent supportive of any safe initiative at the port of Churchill," he wrote Monday.

When Arctic Gateway took over in late 2018, consortium leaders said the port could be used for agricultural goods and potash, and possibly oil and gas if the rail bed was more secure. The group has since funded upgrades with an aim of reducing the number of derailments along its thawing permafrost, and replaced aging fuel tanks at the port.

Affleck argued Monday oil shipments could be facilitated through Canapux, a nascent technology that stores bitumen puck-shaped capsules covered in a polymer. The capsules are deemed much less volatile, even designed to float on water, until they arrive at a processor abroad to separate the polymer from the bitumen.

He said the railway has lacked stable business from a steady commodity since the 2015 dissolution of the Canadian Wheat Board.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

"Grain is not ideal because it requires last years crop for most of the volume," Affleck said, noting the harvest wraps up just as the port closes for the winter. "Grain can piggyback nicely on any other core business (but is) extremely difficult to do on its own consistently in a free market."

Manitoba Justice Minister Kevin Goertzen voiced his support for the idea, "because he loves Churchill and wants to see it thrive."

Churchill Mayor Mike Spence declined an interview request Monday.

For years, the town 1,000 kilometres north of Winnipeg has followed an economic strategy that calls for increased use of the port and railway, but was ambivalent on how natural resources would fit into that picture. Part of the strategy is a strong focus on eco-tourism and environmental research.

Local media reported Poilievre had filled the TYC Event Centre to its 600 capacity, plus an overflow room of 1,800 registrants at the adjacent Tavern United.

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca
NEARLY four years after Eduardo Balaquit was last seen alive, the location of his body remains a mystery  but there is no question why he was killed, a jury was told Monday.

NEARLY four years after Eduardo Balaquit was last seen alive, the location of his body remains a mystery  but there is no question why he was killed, a jury was told Monday.

Winnipeg Police Service handout Eduardo Balaquit was last seen in 2018. His body has never been found.

"This is a case of a man driven by desperation and the desperate measures he took on June 4, 2018, that cost Eduardo Balaquit his life," prosecutor Vanessa Gama told jurors in an opening address outlining the Crowns case against Kyle Pietz.

Pietz, 36, is on trial for manslaughter.

Prosecutors allege Pietz killed 59-year-old Balaquit while robbing him of his debit card and forcing him to disclose his PIN.

"What would it take for you to give your PIN to a stranger or to someone you are not close to?" Gama said. "The Crown will argue that a reasonable person could foresee at least a risk of bodily harm to a victim in the process of committing a robbery. Especially for something so deeply protected as a PIN."

Pietz had previously worked at the same Keewatin Street business  Westcon Equipment and Rentals  where Balaquit had a long-standing contract as a cleaner, Gama told jurors.

After Pietz finished his shift at Westcon on April 24, 2018, approximately $1,700 was stolen from a petty cash box.

"Mr. Pietz fingerprints would be found on a pamphlet that was used to jimmy a lock to the building," Gama said.

Pietz stopped showing up for work, quitting Westcon altogether May 16. By June 4, his personal cheques were bouncing and he had no money left in his bank account.

"For Kyle Pietz, it was financial rock bottom," Gama said.

Kyle Pietz leaves the Law Courts Building on Monday afternoon after the first day of his trial. (Winnipeg Free Press)

The evening of June 4, Balaquit arrived at Westcon, as he had every weeknight for the previous 22 years, entering his alarm code at 6:05 p.m., "and he was never seen or heard from ever again."

That same night, just before closing, a Westcon employee reported seeing Pietz circling the building.

"For Kyle Pietz, we say, desperate times called for desperate measures and for Kyle Pietz, Eduardo Balaquit would become the answer to his money problems," Gama said. "This is a case about financial desperation."

Balaquit was the first member of his family to immigrate to Canada and worked three jobs trying to make a better life for his children, son Edward Balaquit testified Monday.

"He wanted us to have more than he did," Edward said.

For Kyle Pietz, we say, desperate times called for desperate measures and for Kyle Pietz, Eduardo Balaquit would become the answer to his money problems.  prosecutor Vanessa Gama

Family members were immediately worried when Balaquit didnt return home that night and didnt answer his cellphone.

"He would never ignore a call from me, my sons or my family," said wife Iluminada Balaquit.

Iluminada and sons Edward and Erwin said Balaquit always returned home when expected and didnt suffer from any physical or mental health issues that might explain his disappearance.

"My explanation is something really bad happened to him," Iluminada said.

Iluminada Balaquit and sons Edward and Erwin said Eduardo Balaquit always returned home when expected and didnt suffer from any physical or mental health issues that might explain his disappearance. (Ruth Bonneville / Winnipeg Free Press files)

Edward said family members and volunteers spent nearly a month searching around Arborg, 100 kilometres north of Winnipeg, after learning police had identified it as "an area of interest."

Later in the trial, the Crown said, jurors will hear evidence Balaquits debit card being used to withdraw money at an Ellice Avenue convenience store the night Balaquit disappeared, and hear testimony from Pietz two sisters about who they believe is depicted in security video using the debit card.

Jurors will also hear testimony from a police officer who questioned Pietz the day after Balaquit disappeared.

"Listen closely to what Mr. Pietz told (police) was the reason he was at Westcon (June 4), what contact he had with Eduardo Balaquit and how long he said he was there for," Gama said.

Pietz remains free on bail. The trial is set for six weeks.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca
Red boots stepped to the beat of the music; Ukrainian flags waved in the air.

Red boots stepped to the beat of the music; Ukrainian flags waved in the air.

Rusalka Ukrainian Dance Ensemble ended their performance with the roar of applause only a sold-out house can elicit.

Zoloto Ukrainian Dance Ensemble performed to a full-house at the Stand With Ukraine Benefit Concert at Seven Oaks Performing Arts Centre Sunday. (John Woods / Winnipeg Free Press)

The Stand With Ukraine benefit concerts 526 seats were booked in two and a half days. Organizers then added a second show  also at the Seven Oaks Performing Arts Centre  which filled up in 23 hours, according to Carina Romagnoli, one of the organizers of Sundays event.

"Were completely overwhelmed by the generosity and support of the community," Romagnoli said.

By Friday afternoon, the event had raised over $50,000 for charity. At least 300 people had bought tickets to watch via live-stream, with some tuning in from Ukraine and Poland.

Linda Hunter, a member of O. Koshetz Choir, prepared for a "more emotional" than normal performance Sunday before the 3 p.m. show.

"I think (this is) absolutely necessary," Hunter said. "I think that Ukraine needs all the help that it can get, all the support."

Hunters grandparents immigrated from Ukraine, and shes been three times.

"To me, its home," she said. "Even though Ive never lived there, I feel that I have that connection."

Linda Hunter, right, signing with the O. Koshetz Choir. To me, its home, she said. Even though Ive never lived there, I feel that I have that connection. (John Woods / Winnipeg Free Press)

Ten Ukrainian choir and dance groups participated Sunday. Troyanda Ukrainian Dance Ensemble orchestrated the event: Romagnoli, Troyandas chairperson, and Jennifer Doroniuk, Troyandas creative director, had a text conversation about needing to do something for Ukraine when Russia invaded.

"We kind of had everything (for Stand With Ukraine) planned within a 48-hour time period," Romagnoli said.

They asked nine Ukrainian parties to join, and the responses flowed in.

"In Manitoba, theres such a strong and supportive Ukrainian community," Romagnoli said. "We had every ounce of faith that everybody would be completely on board, and we were absolutely right."

Word about the show spread via mouth and social media, leading to quick sales.

Rusalka Ukrainian Dance Ensemble also performed at the benefit. The money is being funnelled to the Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal, a program the Canada-Ukraine Foundation and Ukrainian Canadian Congress launched. Cash is spent on food, meals and hygiene products, according to the funds website. (John Woods / Winnipeg Free Press)

"I dont even have words to describe how it feels," Romagnoli said. "It makes me so proud to be a part of this community."

An adult in-person ticket cost $43.45, and customers could add a donation. A live-stream ticket was $20.

The money is being funnelled to the Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal, a program the Canada-Ukraine Foundation and Ukrainian Canadian Congress launched. Cash is spent on food, meals and hygiene products, according to the funds website.

"In Manitoba, I know we feel very hopeless and very helpless in what we can do to help," Romagnoli said. "By putting this show together, we feel this is kind of the one small action to help."

Romagnoli visited Lviv, a western Ukrainian city, in 2017 with Troyanda. Shes been keeping up with the news.

Romanetz Ukrainian Dance Ensemble were among the seven dance groups who performed Sunday at the benefit. Three choirs  Hoosli Ukrainian Male Chorus, Lyra and O. Koshetz Choir  performed at the benefit. (John Woods / Winnipeg Free Press)

"It hits home really hard, especially when youre watching the devastation happen on TV or on social media and you think back to, I stood right there a couple of years ago," Romagnoli said. "Its absolutely heartbreaking."

Mayor Brian Bowman spoke at the 3 p.m. concert. He said hed written to Lvivs mayor when Russia invaded and called the Ukrainian city Winnipegs "sister city".

"Winnipegs life and history is inextricably intertwined with the life and history of Ukraine," Bowman said. "I told the mayor, We would not be who we are if you were not who you are."

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

He called the local performances reminders of Ukraines courage and glory.

"I sat down and I read the program and was like, Holy, its like every dance group possible is here, which is nice to see," said Tifini Turner, who attended Sundays first concert.

Turner said she and her family had danced with Vitretz, one of the days performers, in the past. She had family and friends taking the stage.

Its not often the Ukrainian groups unite like this, unless its Folklorama, Turner said.

Three choirs performed Sunday  Hoosli Ukrainian Male Chorus, Lyra and O. Koshetz Choir. Seven dance groups took the stage, including Troyanda, Selo Ukrainian Dancers, Sopilka Ukrainian Dance School, Romanetz Ukrainian Dance Ensemble, Rusalka, Vitretz and Zoloto Ukrainian Dance Ensemble.

gabrielle.piche@winnipegfreepress.com
Just days after Indigenous residential school survivors received an apology from Pope Francis, the Manitoba government has announced it will support healing centres for survivors and their families.

Just days after Indigenous residential school survivors received an apology from Pope Francis, the Manitoba government has announced it will support healing centres for survivors and their families.

The province will invest $500,000 in funding for 10 centres across the province.

Mental Health and Community Wellness Minister Sarah Guillemard, along with Indigenous Reconciliation and Northern Relations Minister Alan Lagimodiere, said the facilities will advance reconciliation efforts.

"Manitoba is acknowledging past harms and responding to intergenerational traumas and needs of residential school survivors for support," Guillemard said in a statement Monday.

"We will partner closely with these Indigenous-led organizations to help bring about healing through traditional Indigenous ceremonies, safe mental health approaches and holistic community-based care."

Lagimodiere said the funding "strengthens Manitobas role in advancing reconciliation."

"It expands culturally holistic healing and trauma support services while strengthening family connections around the shared experiences of Manitobans who attended Indigenous residential schools."

Last Friday, in a historic recognition, Pope Francis, leader of the Roman Catholic Church, told a delegation of First Nations, Inuit and Metis representatives in Rome "with all my heart, I am very sorry," for the pain and suffering endured by generations of residential school students and their families.

The Pope said he is planning to visit Canada sometime this year to apologize in person to survivors.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

The province said the new funding is in addition to the $200,000 commitment madelast September to support programming and awareness for the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.

The $500,000 also is on top of funding by the federal government under the Indian Residential Schools Resolution Health Support Program for eligible survivors and their families.

The organizations to receive funding include: the Aboriginal Health and Wellness Centre of Winnipeg, Cree Nation Tribal Health in The Pas, Keewatin Tribal Council in Thompson, Anish Corporation at Swan Lake First Nation, the Sagkeeng Indian Residential School Wellness Centre in Pine Falls and the West Region Treaty 2 and 4 Health Services in Dauphin.

"This one-time funding acknowledges the important of supporting our survivors, their families and communities throughout the difficult process of locating unmarked graves at former Indian residential school sites in Manitoba," Eva Wilson Fontaine, of the Anish Corporation, said in a statement.

"It also ensures that survivors wont have to walk this journey alone."

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca
Ana Gomes has been trying to book a yurt since she moved to Canada in 2018 but has never been able to. This year she secured one in Tulabi Falls and applauded changes made to the frequently frustrating provincial booking system.

Ana Gomes has been trying to book a yurt since she moved to Canada in 2018 but has never been able to. This year she secured one in Tulabi Falls and applauded changes made to the frequently frustrating provincial booking system.

Gomes said the process took 15 minutes, compared to the two hours she waited last year just to come away empty-handed.

The Manitoba government rolled out its updated online booking system for provincial campgrounds on Monday morning.

The province reported 7,392 users logged into the system at 7 a.m. to book cabins, yurts and group areas.

I know there are challenges to get a virtual line system to work, but I feel the overall process was much better this year, Gomes said.

Updates to the system addressed technical glitches that caused the site to crash in the past when a large number of people were using it.

With over 5,800 reservations made Monday, 90 per cent of available bookings for cabins and yurts have already been claimed. The high demand left some Manitobans without a spot.

Kay Wetherill and her family often go camping in the summer and reserved a yurt in Bakers Narrows Provincial Park last year.

Wetherill tried to book the same yurt Monday but wasnt able to find an available slot despite logging into the system right at 7 a.m.

It was highly disappointing, she said. We go with another family and our kids grew up camping together. Were not going to be able to do that now.

Wetherill said she saw few changes to the system, but did notice a significant decrease in the wait time while in the queue.

Gomes and Wetherill both expressed the need for more yurts in the province.

Even if they tripled the number of yurts available, Im sure they would all go just as quick, Wetherill said. The price of a yurt isnt much higher than a campsite, so most people would say its the way to go.

During question period on Monday, Environment, Climate and Parks Minister Jeff Wharton said bookings for yurts and cabins were up about 300 per cent with the online booking system functioning as expected following recent improvements.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

The remarks came in response to questions by NDP critic Lisa Naylor, who pressed the minister on the Tory governments decision to use a Texas-based firm to process online payments for provincial park passes.

The cost of a single day park pass increased by $4.50 with the introduction of the new system in 2020. The contract cost the province about $565,000 in its first year.

Manitobans enjoy and will continue to enjoy some of the most reasonable rates across Canada, better yet probably in North America when it comes to visiting our parks, Wharton said.

Last week, Wharton told the Free Press further updates will complete a full overhaul of the booking system in 2023.

- with files from Danielle Da Silva

fpcity@freepress.mb.ca
My time in Rome last week was filled with many more stories than I could write, an ocean of information and emotion from having a front row seat to history in the making as Metis, First Nations and Inuit delegates shared their stories with Pope Francis  and received a personal apology in return.

My time in Rome last week was filled with many more stories than I could write, an ocean of information and emotion from having a front row seat to history in the making as Metis, First Nations and Inuit delegates shared their stories with Pope Francis  and received a personal apology in return.

It was a profoundly religious experience. Each day began at 6:30 a.m. with a mass conducted by one of the five bishops on the trip and was followed by a traditional Indigenous sunrise ceremony.

Women sang and drummed in St. Peters Square on Thursday before the First Nations delegates emerged from their meeting with the Pope. When asked why, one said: Our artifacts are nearby (in the Vatican Museum). They contain our ancestors spirits. We are singing so they wont be lonely.(John Longhurst / Winnipeg Free Press)

Each meeting with the Pope began with prayer, often conducted in the language of the Indigenous person doing the praying. Press briefings were infused with references to the divine, God or Creator. Sometimes they included songs, prayers and sacred ceremonies.

Delegates recognized there was something beyond humankind at work during the week. As Regional Chief Gerald Antoine put it: "There are powers greater than us out there, working their ways to line things up the ways they need to be."

When asked by a reporter if she thought the visit had taken too long to happen, Pixie Wells, a Metis from Abbotsford, B.C., said "Creator does things in Creators time. Creator made the timing right for us to be here now."

On Thursday, four women sang and drummed in St. Peters Square before the First Nations delegates emerged from their meeting with the Pope. When asked why, one said: "Our artifacts are nearby (in the Vatican Museum). They contain our ancestors spirits. We are singing so they wont be lonely."

Added Archbishop William McGrattan of Calgary of the time in Rome: "This work is divinely inspired, beyond our human ability to understand and recognize. I think we all sensed the presence of God, of Creator."

While there were many heavy times, filled with emotional stories of horror and trauma, there were also many lighthearted moments. The delegates loved to laugh. They clearly enjoyed being together, and many new friendships were formed.

Meeting the Pope was a huge highlight for many, especially for Catholics on the trip  and there were many among the delegates.

Meeting Pope Francis was a huge highlight for many, especially for Catholics on the trip  and there were many among the delegates. (John Longhurst / Winnipeg Free Press)

This isnt surprising. More than 500,000 Indigenous people in Canada identify as Catholics, something that some Canadians might find surprising given their terrible history at the hands of that church.

The meetings with the Pope generated some memorable experiences from some delegates.

When one delegate shook the Popes hand, she clasped her other hand over his and held it there for a moment. Her takeaway? "He has soft hands, like bread," she said with a smile.

When another shook his hand, she said to him: "Im not going to wash my hand for a week!" They both laughed when she said that, she said.

There were lots of media present from Canada, the U.S. and Europe. About 75 reporters were in Rome for the visit; the media scrums in St. Peters Square were tight and packed.

Indigenous representatives of the delegation fielded questions outside St. Peters Basilica after meeting with the Pope. (John Longhurst / Winnipeg Free Press)

Reporters could be an overbearing group at times, pushing cameras and microphones into the faces of delegates. But the delegates were patient in taking time to answer questions, even when it was hard.

Not only that, they thanked us for telling their stories to the world. More than one remarked it was the worldwide coverage of Kamloops that helped them get the attention they needed to begin the healing journey.

For journalists who are accustomed to mostly receiving criticism and hate mail, that was an unexpected and gratifying experience.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

While the delegates agreed the visit was worthwhile, they were aware not everyone back home did. Their Facebook pages were filled with angry and vitriolic criticisms of the trip. At one dinner, a delegate implored the others to turn off social media; it wasnt good for their souls or for the goals of the trip, he said.

That anger is real, and it needs to be taken into account  by the delegates, and also by the church. It will take a long time to heal the wounds of the past. Some will never find healing.

The story isnt over. Everyone agreed the visit, and the papal apology, was just the beginning of a long road ahead. Indigenous people and the church will need to continue to be in conversation in the months leading up to the Popes visit to Canada  perhaps as early as this summer  and beyond.

The final audience with the Pope was filled with all the solemnity one would expect from such an occasion. But when it ended, the Pope stood up, waved at the delegates and said "Thanks for the visit. Bye-bye." It was a special human moment, one that made everyone smile.

John Longhurst was in Rome last week to cover the papal visit by Indigenous people for the Free Press. See coverage of the visit at www.winnipegfreepress.com/papalvisit

faith@freepress.mb.ca
In February, representatives of the Manitoba Nurses Union met with Dr. Peter MacDonald, the chair of the provinces surgical and diagnostic recovery task force to discuss strategies to alleviate an enormous backlog of procedures. The timing could not have been better.

Opinion

In February, representatives of the Manitoba Nurses Union met with Dr. Peter MacDonald, the chair of the provinces surgical and diagnostic recovery task force to discuss strategies to alleviate an enormous backlog of procedures. The timing could not have been better.

The task force had only been created in December and had made little progress. And it only made sense that the task force brainstorm with the MNU; a serious and apparently growing shortage of nurses had the potential to cripple any catch-up plan.

According to MNU President Darlene Jackson, the meeting was generally positive and many different ideas were discussed. However, in the nearly two months since that one and only meeting, Jackson said it doesnt appear that anyone was really listening to the nurses.

Last week, the task force announced it is forging ahead with a plan to ramp up priority elective surgeries during the summer months. Although neither MacDonald nor Health Minister Audrey Gordon explained the full implications of that plan, the MNU confirmed later that government officials have warned nurses the summer surge in surgical slates would likely require the cancellation of planned vacations.

Jackson said she and MNU officials had cautioned MacDonald in February about any plan that required nurses to cancel vacations. After more than two years on the front line of the pandemic, during which time vacations were limited, nurses desperately need a chance to rest, Jackson said.

The MNU proposed several ideas to alleviate the need to cancel vacations: increased use of operating room technicians or licensed practical nurses (LPNs) to reduce the number of registered nurses needed for each procedure; the extension of existing OR shifts into evening hours rather than scheduling entirely new surgical slates.

Unfortunately, none of those ideas found their way into the task force update. As it stands now, Jackson said the task force plan could very well make a bad nurses shortage even worse.

"We told them to be careful because for a lot of our nurses, retirement is a real option," Jackson said. "If they started cancelling vacations, were afraid that a lot of nurses will just say, Thats it. Were done."

A request to speak to MacDonald to get his impression of the meeting with the MNU was, not surprisingly, ignored. As a result, Manitobans can only speculate about why the task force  and the government that created it  continue to plod ahead with its plan while ignoring the input of groups outside government.

All we know for sure is that ignoring the input of everyone and anyone outside government is standard operating practice for Manitobas Progressive Conservative government.

Throughout the pandemic, the PC government has made it a habit to ignore outside advice, and rely instead on internal subject matter experts. That approach would be entirely acceptable if  and this is the big if  relying solely on internal advice produced positive outcomes.

Unfortunately, ignoring outside advice frequently resulted in tragic outcomes.

When health care professionals asked the province to lock everyone down to mitigate a new wave of COVID-19, the province plowed ahead with the removal of social and economic restrictions and watched as the body count rose.

After having habitually ignored outside advice when it comes to the broad strokes of the pandemic response, it only makes sense the Tories could continue to ignore the input of doctors, nurses and scientific experts when it comes to strategies to reduce the surgical and diagnostic procedures backlog.

The nurses are hardly the only voice trying to help government.

For months, Doctors Manitoba, the main bargaining group for physicians in the province, has been proposing ideas on how to deal with the backlogs. Some of those ideas, such as increased use of operating room technicians or LPNs to reduce reliance on RNs in operating rooms, are identical to those proposed by nurses. So, if nothing else, there is consistency among those outside voices.

Unfortunately, there has also been consistency in the response by government.

The PC governments vaunted restructuring of Winnipeg hospitals  the centrepiece of its 2016 pledge to fix health care  has struggled because of an inability to find enough nurses to fully staff the three, larger emergency departments that were at the core of its plan. In that instance, as well, the province refused to work with the MNU and other nursing unions in advance of the restructuring.

Dan Lett | Not for Attribution A weekly look at politics close to home and around the world that is sent every Tuesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Why has the Tory government been so obstinate about applying that outside advice?

This is a government that does not have a good relationship with unions of any type. The botched efforts to freeze public sector wages, and interference in contract talks between the University of Manitoba and its faculty, are evidence of the disdain with which the Tory government views its bargaining groups.

And, in fairness, Manitoba is hardly the only province that has turned a deaf ear to external input.

From British Columbia to Saskatchewan and Ontario, front-line health care staff and their representatives have complained about being ignored by government when it comes to planning the pandemic response and efforts to address backlogs.

Government has tried to come up with solutions on their own, and failed in spectacular fashion. It really has nothing to lose by bringing those external voices closer to the decision-making table.

dan.lett@winnipegfreepress.com
While the Canadian Armed Forces hopes a gender-neutral dress code will attract more enlistments, the appearance of the uniform matters far less than the behaviour of people wearing the uniform. This is particularly true when the badges on the uniform indicate the wearer is of senior rank.

Editorial

While the Canadian Armed Forces hopes a gender-neutral dress code will attract more enlistments, the appearance of the uniform matters far less than the behaviour of people wearing the uniform. This is particularly true when the badges on the uniform indicate the wearer is of senior rank.

The military announced March 23 it will soon modify the separate dress codes that categorize men and women on clothing, hairstyles, makeup and jewelry, one of many measures designed to make the forces more attractive to young people considering their career choices.

Meanwhile, last Wednesday, a judge delivered a sentence in a case that is surely a high-level example of why military recruitment is dwindling. Jonathan Vance, who resigned from the forces top position after allegations of sexual harassment and sexual misconduct, received a conditional discharge, walking away from court without a criminal record.

The leniency shown to Mr. Vance has been decried as just another example of powerful military men getting away with sexual misconduct. That view is understandable given the larger context, which is dismaying. The Canadian military has in recent years been rocked by cascading claims from women who have been sexually harassed, a crisis that led to 11 current and former military leaders investigated and, in some cases, pushed out of the forces.

Chief among them was the chief of defence. It was while Mr. Vance held the forces most senior post that he was accused of sending sexually suggestive messages to one female officer and having an ongoing intimate relationship with another subordinate officer, both acts that violated internal regulations.

When his relationship became public, he initially denied it and asked the woman to also deny it, although she refused to join his deceit.

Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

An investigation by the military police into the sexual misconduct ended without charges. There was ample evidence, including tape recordings, but it was legally impossible for Mr. Vance to be tried under military law because his rank was too high, according to retired Supreme Court Justice Morris Fish.

Instead, he pleaded guilty in civilian court to a single charge of obstruction of justice, related to lies told to military police investigating allegations of his sexual misconduct. He was sentenced to 80 hours of community service, and was granted a conditional discharge.

Although the legal sentence was light by anyones standards, the misconduct of Mr. Vance and other high-ranking officers has sullied the reputation of Canadas military, worsening a recruitment drought that has left Canada with a shortage of thousands of troops as it faces growing demands to deploy soldiers home and abroad, including hundreds ordered to Europe in response to Russias invasion in Ukraine.

The epidemic of sexual misconduct has led both the federal government and the military to make substantial efforts to rebuild trust. A $900-million class-action lawsuit was settled in response to 19,000 claims submitted by former military and defence department employees, and Defence Minister Anita Anand and current top commander Gen. Wayne Eyre have each offered full apologies.

Even though the military now assures victims its safe to come forward, it will take time for potential recruits to view the forces as a place where they will be protected from harassment by people with power.

Perhaps Mr. Vance is the poster boy for the militarys better-late-than-never intolerance for sexual misconduct. He wore civilian clothes for his virtual court appearance on Wednesday, no longer allowed to wear the uniform he besmirched. The abrupt end of the career of Canadas top military officer, and the damage to his personal reputation, should serve to deter other officers tempted to abuse their authority.
OTTAWA  Manitobans might think everyone has caught COVID-19 in recent weeks, based on social media postings of positive antigen tests.

OTTAWA  Manitobans might think everyone has caught COVID-19 in recent weeks, based on social media postings of positive antigen tests.

However, residents of the Northwest Territories actually know when theres an uptick in novel coronavirus transmission, thanks to a website to report positive antigen tests  and a legal duty to do so.

Its just one example of an increasingly splintered network of gathering and reporting COVID-19 data, with provinces taking a hands-off approach to the pandemic after months of hard work to get consistent metrics.

"It reminds me of the early scramble for data at the very beginning of the pandemic, when there was just really variable information from different sources in different provinces," said Jean-Paul Soucy, a epidemiology PhD student at the University of Toronto.

"Were kind of seeing that again."

Soucy co-founded the COVID-19 Canada Open Data Working Group, which since early in the pandemic has been assembling the patchwork of information from official sources, to create comparable datasets.

The group created dashboards with information that appeared months later on the Public Health Agency of Canadas website, allowing comparisons of regional cases, mortality and hospitalizations.

Last week, Manitoba went blank on the agencys daily epidemiology map, as it ceased daily case reporting in favour of weekly updates. Its also joined a provincial trend of winding down molecular testing or sharing information on the demographics of those dying from COVID-19.

Last week, Manitoba went blank on the Public Health Agency of Canada's daily epidemiology map, as the province ended daily case reporting in favour of weekly updates. (PHAC)

"Its very much a mixed bag, when previously we saw it as pretty consilient across the provinces," said Soucy.

He noted in Manitoba, cases are being reported by region but not deaths. Newfoundland and Labrador has the opposite, with region-level data on deaths and hospitalizations but not cases.

Theres also no standard frequency for when provinces and health regions update their data.

"We really have a lot less information as a country, of where things are going," Soucy said.

Last month, Manitoba and federal officials said theyd both shift to reporting COVID-19 data similar to how influenza has been tracked for decades.

Every flu season since 1996, the FluWatch program has issued weekly reports on the severity of infections, and the strains circulating in Canada, based on a sub-sampling of cases that get genetically sequenced.

That involves hospitals across Canada testing a sample of patients for the novel coronavirus and having those samples sequenced to learn about strains, just as researchers do for the flu.

Yet, governments are asking Canadians to gauge their risk of COVID-19 while publishing less data or even stop-light coded levels of how much transmission is actually occurring.

"We have a shift in focus toward personal mitigation of risk, and at the same time reducing the amount of information that is being given," Soucy said. "That strikes me as a contradiction."

Meanwhile, Canada is a global laggard in testing for the novel coronavirus.

Among the 38 mostly rich countries who make up the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Canada has ranked among the bottom three during the past week, in terms of COVID-19 tests conducted per capita.

Thats according to data assembled by Our World in Data, a research project run out of the University of Oxford in England.

The series is smoothed by averaging daily figures over a rolling 7-day window. Not all countries report testing data on a daily basis. To generate this series Our World In Data assumes that testing changed equally on a daily basis over any periods in which no data was reported. This produces a complete series of daily figures, which is then averaged over a rolling 7-day window. Tests may refer to the number of tests performed or the number of people tested, depending on which is reported by the particular country. (Our World in Data)

In raw numbers, Canada reached its peak in testing during the Omicron variant surge, with 165,000 daily tests nationwide the week surrounding Jan. 10.

By that point, provinces restricted access to testing, leading to a steady decline. There were just under 40,000 tests conducted each day of the past week, a rate that hasnt been so low since June 2020, as the first wave abated.

Canadas top doctor said the provinces need to determine how much testing is sufficient.

"I cant tell you whether thats too much or too little, but it needs to be enough so that we can monitor trends," Dr. Theresa Tam said April 1.

"Jurisdictions are adjusting to what is a good, sampling size and distribution in terms of trends, analysis," she said, in response to questions from the Free Press.

"I meet with the provinces all the time, very frequently, to try and get that more consistent approach Ill be really disappointed if we went backwards and let go of the actual gains that we made during this pandemic."

Yet, University of Saskatchewan epidemiologist Nazeem Muhajarine argues the wide-scale suspension of PCR testing makes it hard to tell when provinces have entered a new wave.

"We have compromised our ability to really measure (new) cases of COVID-19," Muhajarine said last week. "That then compromises our ability to say with confidence that we are seeing a sustained increase in cases."

The result could be exponential growth that only gets noticed by hospitalizations and work absences, though Muhajarine noted wastewater trends can also help.

Ottawa has also scaled up work to provide more detailed and recent data from sewage detection of the coronavirus, which can indicate an uptick before large numbers of people start experiencing symptoms.

For now, Winnipegs wastewater data comes through a federal program that reports statistics two weeks late. Thats the incubation period for the coronavirus, making the sewage data of limited use.

Tam also has concerns about Manitoba curtailing its definition of a COVID-19 death, to exclude people who had certain illnesses.

Researchers believe many COVID-19 deaths go unreported, based on comparing the projected number of deaths pre-pandemic to those that occurred, known as excess deaths.

Stay informed The latest updates on the novel coronavirus and COVID-19 delivered to your inbox every weeknight. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Mortality surveillance is very important, and I personally think that in the Canadian context, we need to do better." Dr. Theresa Tam

"Mortality surveillance is very important, and I personally think that in the Canadian context, we need to do better," she said.

Soucy said Canada has been underwhelming in sharing information about COVID-19. He pointed out a dashboard the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services published on hospital capacity and COVID-19 patients in each state.

"That would be unthinkable here, in terms of health data availability," he said of Canada, arguing this matters for more than just data geeks.

"Transparency builds trust, (and) trust is the fuel that public health runs on."

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca
Storytelling is best done around a table as guests share stories and form deeper connections and an understanding of one another.

On this theme, the public is invited to register for My Big Fat Greek Dinner on Tuesday, April 26, a fundraiser for the inaugural Sandbar Storytelling Festival, planned for Oct. 14-15 in Winona.

The Greek dinner, a delectable five-course meal that will leave participants yelling Opa! will feature celebrity chef Gary Diomandes, who serves on the festival board. Vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free options will be available.

The event, which begins at 6 p.m. at the Blue Heron in Winona, 162 W. Second St., will also feature a live auction. Jon Kohner will auction off a variety of specialty dinners, Italian handbags, an autographed Vikings jersey, and more.

Anyone interested in donating higher-end auction items to help launch this event can contact Diomandes at gdiomand@smumn.edu.

The cost is $75 (+fee) and the event is limited to the first 60 to register at www.eventbrite.com/e/my-big-fat-greek-dinner-tickets-302917212537. Find the registration link at sandbarstorytellingfestival.org.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Adolescent Immunization Action Week, a call to action to urge parents to get their adolescents up to date on immunizations, is April 4 to April 8.

Across the country statistics show that immunization levels are lower than they were before the pandemic, including with teens. This is true for Minnesota and Winona County as well.

Many routine health care appointments were put on hold during the pandemic, including adolescent well visits and immunizations. This led the Unity Consortium to introduce the first annual Adolescent Immunization Action Week.

The Unity Consortium was formed in 2014 to provide action-oriented leadership, innovation, and education on preventive health and immunization for adolescents and young adults.

The Unity Consortium is encouraging parents to take steps to ensure adolescents are protected.

Immunizations offer protection from vaccine-preventable diseases, including meningitis, tetanus, diphtheria, whooping cough and HPV-related cancers.

Adolescent immunizations are timed to start protecting adolescents before they are likely to be exposed to serious, potentially life-threatening diseases. Its important to get up to date as soon as possible.

The Minnesota Department of Health and Unity Consortium urge parents and adolescents to schedule a well visit with their health care practitioner to get up to date on any missing vaccines.

Some vaccines require more than one dose to provide the best protection. Each recommended dose is important.

Take advantage of any upcoming school breaks or holidays to fit in those appointments.

Scheduling vaccinations now will ensure adolescents are up to date before returning to school in the fall.

Winona County Public Health offers low-cost immunizations for qualifying adults and youth.

For eligibility guidelines or to schedule an appointment, call 507-457-6500.

SEMCAC is providing free transportation to vaccine appointments in their new wheelchair accessible Vax Van. Anyone in Winona County can reserve a ride by calling SEMCAC at 1-800-528-7622 (#3).

For more information on Adolescent Immunization Action Week, visit the Winona County Health and Human Services Facebook page.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Police on the scene of a shooting at a concert in Dallas Saturday, April 2, that left one person dead and at least 10 others wounded.
The 1950 census marked the last time enumerators went door-to-door to gather data for the U.S. census. Photo by State Department-Mottar.
3:30PM As we bring the live election coverage to a close here is a run down of what just happened

No party gained an overall majority in the local election as independents still held the most seats with 23. However, both Labour and Plaid Cymru, who were in opposition during the last administration, made inroads, with the former gaining three seats and the latter four.

It takes their total number of councillors to 14 and nine respectively, with the Conservatives also winning nine seats, an increase of one, and the Liberal Democrats standing still on one.

It leaves question marks over who will rule Wrexham Council for the next five years. Power previously lay with a coalition of two independent groups run by incumbent council leader Mark Pritchard and deputy leader David A Bithell, alongside the Conservatives.

But before polling day on Thursday there were rumours of friction between the two independent groups, meaning a new alliance could be in the offing.

Cllr Pritchard, who was re-elected in Esclusham after his seat was uncontested, has said talks would be held over the next few days over the future composition of the council. Meanwhile, Labour group leader Dana Davies, who had a tight result in Ruabon after winning by just four votes, also said she would be open to discussions with other groups.

Several changes were made to ward boundaries in the area ahead of the election following a review by the Local Democracy and Boundary Commission. It saw the overall number of councillors in Wrexham increase from 52 to 56 and the number of wards from 47 to 49.

One of the shocks of the day saw Liberal Democrat Alun Jenkins lose his seat in Offa by just six votes after holding it for more than 50 years. He was defeated by Plaid Cymrus Katie Wilkinson who gained 212 votes compared to his 206.

Independent executive board members Sonia Benbow-Jones, lead member for childrens services and David Griffiths, lead member for housing, were also beaten. Mr Griffiths, who has been a councillor for the last 23 years, was defeated by 37 votes by independent Tina Mannering. Before the boundary changes, the two had represented different wards in Gwersyllt.

Ms Benbow-Jones lost by just six votes in Cefn West to Labours Stella Matthews, who is the mother of Labour leader Dana Davies. 

3:15PM Just checking the figures  we think it is Labour 14 and with all the independents in one, they are on 23.

Independent 23

Labour 14

Conservatives 9

Plaid Cymru 9

Liberal Democrats 1

3PM A huge thanks to Rich and the team at Knew Productions, along with Marcin at Red Iris Videography for helping out local democracy coverage, with camera gear and expertise! Likewise, Wrexham Glyndwr University for internet connectivity, and of course Wrexham Council who facilitated the whole count. We are now polishing a quick summary and packing up from the count  otherwise we will be in danger of covering the community council count that is due to start in ten minutes!

2:55PM No turnout or overall figures on voter registration yet, we will add them in later as / if and when they appear.

2:48PM It appears it was Ruabon being recounted possibly 3-4 times at the end there.

2:24PM Some new councillors floating around outside and some old ones, some group leaders as well. Word is talks will now take place over the coming days to see who offers whom what to form up an administration. Who has the biggest group? Who wants what job? Who gets to chair Scrutiny committees?

and perhaps most important, who can work with who?

2:01PM

A run down of the overall figures:

Independent 22

Labour 15 Labour 14

Conservatives 9

Plaid Cymru 9

Liberal Democrats 1

Non stated 1

2PM The sports hall goes quiet

The community council count will take place from 3pm  but the main event is complete, and Wrexham has a new council, just how it will shape up is yet to be known as there is no overall control. pic.twitter.com/JQVvnX8KIl  Wrexham.com (@wrexham) May 6, 2022

1:52PM That wraps up the County Council count!

1:50PM David A Bithell hangs on to his seat by 15 votes in Johnstown in what was a tight race.

1:47PM Just three more wards to go!

So far our tally has 14 Independents, one lib dem, nine Plaid Cymru, nine conservatives, 13 Labour, one non-alligned and five Wrexham independents.

1:40PM Just inputted the data for that load of results. Looks like the Johnstown huddle has just taken place, so could see a result there soon. If you see winning candidates exiting sharply, they are going to get a picture taken and get given a welcome pack!

1:28PM COUNT COMPLETE  apart from the one ward recounting.

1:25PM Possible recount on one ward underway  or some ballots being reinspected

1:23pm Count still going on in Johnstown. No sign of one of the incumbents, David A Bithell.

1:20 PM .and there was the flurry of results. Wrexham council stalwart for decades Alun Jenkins loses his seat by 6 votes.

1:03pm Looks as though Johnstown is the only ward still counting.

Results seem to be coming in a flurry after a few minutes break..

12:44PM Big batch of results in Mr Bancrofts hands.

12:40PM Thought there was a sniff of a recount in Cefn West, two animated candidates talking to the returning officer.

12:28pm: Heres how the results are looking so far.

Two new Plaid Cymru Councillors elected  Emma Holland for Gwersyllt North and Pete Howell for Gwersyllt South. Conservative Beverley Parry Jones Holds Bryn Cefn for the Conservatives.

Phil Wynn and Frank Hemmings both re-elected. Fred Roberts elected for the new Rhos ward as an independent

12:11PM Only four wards still counting.

12:05 PM It looks like the only wards counting now are the dual member ones  so could be wrapped up by 1pm possibly with a pile of results this hour.

11:59am: Three more votes in  Carrie Harper (Plaid) HOLDS Queensway, Graham Rogers (LAB) holds Hermitage and Paul Williams (Plaid) Regains Smithfield for Plaid from Labour

11:47am: Flurry of votes through, all incumbents holding their seats in those four announcements. Paul Blackwell, Marc Jones, Jeremy Kent and Brian Cameron all re-elected

11:40AM We have had a huddle for Grosvenor and now Gresford East. Results soon on those  the latter being a head to head Jeremy Kent (Cons) v Aimi Waters (Plaid Cymru).

11:32AM The Returning Officer Ian Bancroft is walking around with lots of papers going to some candidate groups  looks like things are picking up in terms of confirming results and possible further announcements shortly. Huddles of candidates some looking happier than others.

11:24AM: The first two results are in. Labour HOLD Wynnstay and Cefn East. Malcolm King and Derek Wright both re-elected.

11:15AM You might see some tables with big white sheets, they are being used in wards where there are two councillors being elected. People there have had two votes to use, so it makes things a little more complicated for the count. There does certainly seem to be inactivity on more tables, perhaps we are waiting for a fifth before the first declaration

11:03AM Looks like we could have a result soon, Wynnstay candidates being gathered

10:56am For those who are just joining us, welcome to the Wrexham Council count 2022!

Results will be announced in groups of five and this time, due to covid, there will be no candidates going up to the stage.

Once the winners are announced theyll be taken for the photos taken and given election packs.

Interesting counting method going on for the dual councillor wards which you should be able to see on our livestream.

10:43am: It looks as though the counting on some tables has begun. Still no indication when results will start being announced.

10:40AM Lots of clear tables as the verification process draws to an end.

10:21: Neighbouring Flintshire has started to announce votes. Still at the verification process here in Wrexham.

For coverage of Flintshire elections check out our sister site, Deeside.com

10:08am Apologies for the dodgy stream today  connection issues meaning the feed is buffering a fair bit.

10am: Voting and verification is now underway.

Clwyd South side of the hall, a few tables still waiting to be given votes to verify and count pic.twitter.com/hLldnVZrE2  Wrexham.com (@wrexham) May 6, 2022

9:40am: And were off! The counting and verification is about to get underway

Returning Officer Ian Bancroft is just outlining how the count will take place. County council first and then the community councils will begin at 3pm

There will be about five election announcements in one go, so theyre going to come through thick and fast today.

9:36am: Returning Officer Ian Bancroft has just announced the count will begin in five minutes time

Current council leader Mark Pritchard  who is also unopposed  has just arrived pic.twitter.com/ddim6bSYB2  Wrexham.com (@wrexham) May 6, 2022

9:30am: We finally have audio on the election feed. For those watching the tables nearest the camera are the votes for Wrexham wards and the ones at the other end are Clwyd South:

9:26am: The counting room is starting to fill up, so far everyone seems in good spirits.

Its a bit odd seeing some of these councillors in person for the first time in two years after all meetings were held remote since the start of the pandemic.

9:06am: The first of the candidates have started being left into the main count hall.

Our live video coverage of the count has also started for all those who enjoy watching our live feed.

8:49am: We are live from the count! Another day time count so hopefully no one was sat waiting at 10pm last night for the results to start coming through.

Candidates are starting to arrive but theyre being kept outside until 9am, when the verification and voting will take place.



Good morning Wrexham!

We have switched the site over to our live election coverage for todays count. Ballot boxes arrived at Glyndwr University sports hall from just after 10pm last night  video below  and have been securely held overnight.

Today will see the verification process start some point shortly after 9am of ballots made yesterday and postal votes, and then a count will take place for each ward.

There is no firm timetable due to the nature of counts, but we guess this could take all of this morning and into the early afternoon to complete for every ward in Wrexham.

A day time count means there is no wait for boxes to turn up and so we think we could see the first ward result as early as just before 10am.

This page should auto update, and hopefully the video feed will appear as the count process begins.
This is the sixth part of a series on films available online from the recent Berlin International Film Festival. The first part was posted February 16, the second February 20, the third February 22, the fourth February 26 and the fifth March 16.

The debut feature by Saralisa Volm, The Silent Forest (Schweigend steht der Wald), was one of the most intriguing contributions to the Perspectives on German Cinema section at this years Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale).

Henriette Confurius in The Silent Forest

Volms film was one of a number of recent movies directed by younger filmmakers attempting to combine important social issues with popular film genres such as crime dramas and/or thrillers.

As in Sleep, the film by Michael Venus, the woodsa longstanding symbol in German Romanticismbecome a place of horror. At the beginning of The Silent Forest, thick earthworms burrow through the forest floor, in reality the dark, tough soil of historyall the way back to the Nazi era.

The story takes place in 1999: Anja Grimm (Henriette Confurius) from Munich is undertaking her forestry internship in the village where she used to spend her holidays and where her father, a nature-loving teacher, disappeared without a trace two decades earlier. Anja wants to find out what happened.

When she goes to the glade where he was last seen, a man with a gun threatens her. It is the psychologically unstable Xaver (Christoph Jungmann), who was suspected of the murder 20 years ago, but was quickly released. Shortly after meeting Anja, Xaver kills his mother Anna and then tries to kill himself. Did Xaver also murder Anjas father?

When it becomes clear to the villagers that Anja is intent on finding out the truth, she is given the cold shoulder. Conflicts also arise among the villagers, including between a police detective Konrad Dallmann (Robert Stadlober) and his father Gustav (August Zirner), the original detective in the case. Gustav covered up the murder of Anjas father, which was committed not by Xaver, but by his mother Anna, in order to conceal an earlier, far more serious crime. This is revealed by Xavers sister Waltraud (Johanna Bittenbinder) to her son Rupert (Noah Saavedra).

1945 was the year of Nazi-organized death marches by concentration camp prisonersincluding by prisoners from the nearby Flossenburg camp. Many prisoners died of hunger and illness, others were shot by Nazi troops while trying to escape.

A portion of the local civilian population joined in the hunt for the victims, who were callously described as zebras because of their striped prison clothing and as though what was taking place resembled a safari. Sometimes children from the village joined in, like Xaverfor educational reasons, Waltraud told her son Rupert. The slain prisoners were buried in a pit in the forest. Anjas father, who noticed unusual features in the condition of the forest soil, was on the verge of uncovering the mass grave.

The Silent Forest only hints at what actually took place in 1945an old family photo on the wall, a father in uniform, a photo of a young woman with a swastika. In Xavers flat, Anja finds a childs drawing of prisoners being beaten bloody and a handful of gold teeth.

First and foremost, however, Volms film addresses the question of how subsequent generations deal with this dark legacy in a village where everybody knows one another. Grass cannot simply grow over such a monstrous crime. Under the surface, it poisons relationships right up to the present, spreading fear and guilt. Threats and blackmail continue.

Retired inspector Dallmann defends his 1979 cover-up as a necessary action for the economic survival of the impoverished village. Discovery of the mass graveItalian President Sandro Pertini had just visited the Flossenburg concentration camp in a highly published visit along with right-wing Bavarian premier Franz Joseph Strauss (Christian Social Union)would have sealed the fate of the entire district.

The fact that publicising the truth could result in financial disaster affects Rupert, who wants to attract tourists to the economically desolate region by exploiting the local woods as a Hansel and Gretel fairy-tale forest, with a witchs house and a treetop path. After Xaver kills his mother, Rupert is no longer creditworthy at the bank. No one will want to visit the woods where a mass murder has taken place.

Rupert played with Anja as a child and is attracted to her now, but does not join her relentless search for the truth. He believably plays a social type from the younger generation, horrified by the crimes of the past, but who ultimately adapts to the widespread view that it is better to move forward, focus on ones own interests and let sleeping dogs lie.

Konrad, the current policeman and Gustav Dallmanns son, agrees and provides the appropriately cynical gloss. The truth, he says, would ruin everyone.

Then Konrad explains how two years earlier the director of the Flossenburg concentration camp memorial had accompanied him to visit an old woman on a remote farm who was about to die. She had wanted to find peace and confess to the fact that a concentration camp prisoner had collapsed and been shot during a death march in front of her farm. She had buried the corpse on her property and her family had tended the anonymous grave for fifty years. Before dying, the woman wanted the victims bones to be removed and buried in a concentration camp cemetery, and his relatives informed.

And what did you do, Rupert asks. Nothing, answers Konrad: Some things have to be endured in silence. Is there not a kind of atonement in the agony of such a silence?

Noah Saavedra in The Silent Forest

Konrads father is the only one who appears relatively unbroken. He presents himself so confidently as a martyr that at a certain point suspicions arise that he could have had a Nazi background. One is reminded of the film The Conference, where the Nazi elite refer to the psychological strain on German soldiers conducting mass shootings as sacrifices they have to endure. In the end, Dallmann is ready to commit another crime. The film leaves open whether he succeeds or not.

The concrete to be poured over the countless bones of the concentration camp dead to bury them forever under the silent fairy-tale forest has not yet hardened. A living woman, Anja, has slipped into the mix 

The film ends like a shock video, as if the filmmakers wanted to cry out to the audience: Watch out, the storys not over, it is urgent to act!

Wolfram Fleischhauer wrote the screenplay based on his novel of the same title. Fleischhauer has also combined history with contemporary life in other novels (The Purple Line, Somewhere I Have Never Traveled, Three Minutes with Reality) seeking to bring the issues to a broad reading public. In 2003, he was nominated for the German Crime Prize for Somewhere I Have Never Traveled (English translation of Die Frau mit den Regenhanden).

The Silent Forest vividly conveys the manner in which former concentration camp employees, who tortured and committed mass murder, were able to live a completely ordinary life for decades in rural seclusionmere kilometres away from the site of their former crimes, and how the police and justice system covered up for themuntil someone emerges, like Anja, who seeks the truth and will not be fobbed off with myths and legends, like the fairy tale of Hansel and Gretel.

One of Germanys principal post-war fairy tales was the zero hourthe clean slate with which Germany was to commence its post-war development. In reality, a host of top West German politicians were former Nazis, occupying leading posts in the state, secret services, judiciary and police. One of the so-called fathers of the Basic Law was the business lobbyist Paul Binder (Christian Democratic Union), a former Nazi specialist in the Aryanisation of Jewish property; Hans Globke, commentator on the Nuremberg Race Laws, became head of Chancellor Konrad Adenauers office. Figures like Dallmann were part of the driving force behind the economic miracle of the 1950s.

Franz Josef Strauss, whose visit to the Flossenburg concentration camp in 1979 figures in the film, played a key role. As defence minister, Strauss promoted the rearmament of the German military and argued in favour of a nuclear capability. For his Psychological Warfare department, he appointed as adviser the former Nazi jurist Eberhard Taubert, who, among other things, wrote the script for the viciously anti-Semitic film The Eternal Jew (1940). Taubert worked as a top official in the Propaganda Ministry under Joseph Goebbels from 1933 to 1945.

These are widely known facts that have been the subject of many films. Volms The Silent Forest, however, directs our attention to the present in a compelling manner using haunting images.

In this context, the title of the film takes on a deeper meaning. The woods usually radiate peace and quiet, but the silence here is deceptive. On the surface, things are shrouded in mist and new life fills the treetops, but the forests roots reach deep into the past.

In other words, the problems of the 20th century were only temporarily obscuredunder a thick layer of lime that has once again broken up. The old ghosts of war and fascism are returning. And the outcome remains open.
Fully 36 years after their horrific crime, a Chilean Court sentenced 10 retired members of the Army for dousing in petrol and setting alight 19-year-old photographer Rodrigo Rojas and 18-year-old student Carmen Gloria Quintana, and leaving them to die.

Rodrigo Rojas de Negri (Museo de la Memoria y Derechos Humanos)

The Caso Quemados (case of the burnt ones) occurred on July 2, 1986 in the working class commune of Estacion Central in Santiago amidst ongoing demonstrations against depression-level unemployment, mass poverty and bloody repression brutality meted out by the military dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet.

After burning alive Rojas and Quintana, the military patrol headed by Captain Pedro Fernandez Dittus dumped the charred bodies in an irrigation ditch on the outskirts of Santiago, hoping the youths would die from the injuries. Rodrigo Rojas suffered second and third degree burns to the head, neck, trunk and extremities, involving approximately 65 percent of his body surface, dying from his injuries four days later; Carmen Gloria suffered burns to 62 percent of her body surface and had to undergo 50 operations over the course of months.

A cover-up was then organized lasting almost three decades. It included witnesses being kidnapped, and threatened with being disappeared, while human rights lawyers and courageous justices were threatened with abduction and worse.

The case was reopened in 2013 by roving judge Mario Carroza, assigned to investigate human rights cases. Fresh evidence was brought to light in 2015 when a former conscript after 29 years broke a military pact of silence, allowing Judge Carroza to sentence the patrol in 2019.

Funeral for Rodrigo Rojas de Negri (Credit: Paulo Slachevsky)

Last March 21, the fourth chamber of the Court of Appeals increased the sentences against retired officers Julio Castaner, Ivan Figueroa and Nelson Medina from 10 to 20 years prison for the aggravated homicide of Rodrigo Rojas and the frustrated homicide of Carmen Quintana.

The justices increased the sentences against Leonardo Riquelme, Walter Lara, Juan Gonzalez and Pedro Franco from three years to 10 years in prison for their role as accomplices and sentenced to three years Francisco Vasquez and Rene Munoz for their role as accessories.

Significantly, the justices also rejected the legal exception of res judicata (the case had already been adjudicated) applied to Fernandez Dittus and sentenced him to 20 years imprisonment as the author of the crimes of consummated homicide of Rodrigo Rojas de Negri and frustrated homicide of Carmen Gloria Quintana Arancibia.

The emblematic case was originally sealed in 1994three years into civilian ruleafter the Supreme Court upheld a 1986 Military Court ruling that convicted Captain Fernandez Dittus as the sole person responsible for unnecessary violence resulting in death and negligence for not rendering aid to the victims. He was sentenced to a mere 600 days in prison and served less than a year of that sentence.

In their 59-page ruling, the Appeals Court judges explained that res judicata did not apply in this instance because the initial investigation was spurious or illegitimate because of the way it was conducted; that is, without a real intention to clarify the facts and responsibilities in accordance with the historical truth a character that is reflected in a series of circumstances that are noticeable from the first moments of the process.

The ruling continues:

This is corroborated by the fact that (the investigation) was evidently closed without being truly exhausted, proof of which is that in the current trial the investigation carried out has made it possible, despite the greater time that has elapsed, to have clarity as to how the events really occurred, i.e., not as a consequence of a kick to a Molotov bomb by Mrs. Carmen Gloria Quintana, which would have initially left both victims with slight injuries, but because the accused were soaked in fuel by State agents, then ignited, extinguished and finally abandoned to their fate with injuries so serious that they ended up costing the life of one of them; all in the context of systematic human rights violations.

The judges explained that the original investigation disregarded official external reports implicating the Army and gave total credibility to the testimonies of the soldiers several of whom affirmed in the present investigation to have lied on instructions from their hierarchical superiors.

Carmen Gloria Quintana in 1987 (Wikimedia Commons)

Defense lawyer Hector Salazar, who has been involved in the case since 1986, said that justice is belated, but at least it is a step forward.

The whole journey has been very painful, Veronica de Negri, Rodrigos mother, told the news site La Voz de los Que Sobran in an interview that aired on March 23. The most painful thing is that these criminals are still in their homes as long as there is no ruling from the Supreme Court.

De Negri made the important observation that her struggle is not only about Rodrigo and Carmen, it is about all the victims of the dictatorship, of the Concertacion, of Pinera. Human rights were not only violated under the military dictatorship.

In the two and a half years since the massive anti-capitalist 2019 demonstrations rocked the country, more than 8,000 mainly young people suffered some form of state violence, including sexual abuse and torture. Over 500 suffered eye injuries, and over 50 died at the hands of Carabineros and the Armed Forces.

Her opposition to state terrorism was also a salvo against the new pseudo-left administration of President Gabriel Boric who has unleashed anti-riot police and Carabinero Special Forces against student demonstrations protesting paltry subsidies. Revealing sooner rather than later that his government will continue the brutal practices of his predecessor, in the last three weeks one student was shot with live ammunition by riot police, one student was severely beaten by lumpen informant types and remains in critical condition and a special forces vehicle ran over a female protester.
The WSWS is today republishing an excerpt from the 1986 statement How the Workers Revolutionary Party Betrayed Trotskyism to mark the 40th anniversary of the Malvinas/Falklands War. The statement was the product of a determined struggle carried out by the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) against the opportunism of the WRP, leading to its split with the ICFI in 1986.

By the time of the ten-week war between Britain and Argentina in 1982, the WRP was already in an advanced stage of political decay. Its leaderships inability to conduct a struggle against British imperialism while providing a revolutionary perspective for the British and Argentine working class during the war over the Malvinas/Falkland islands was an especially sharp example. In contrast, the ICFIs critique reprinted below powerfully articulates the principles of socialist internationalism and permanent revolution.

Appraising the political line of the WRP from 1973-1985, How the Workers Revolutionary Party Betrayed Trotskyism is an essential Marxist analysis of the degeneration of what had been the leading section of the international Trotskyist movement. In exposing the increasingly debased political opportunism of the WRP and its leaders Gerry Healy, Cliff Slaughter and Mike Banda, the statement provides a case study in Marxist analysis and the fight against revisionism. It should be read in full by all those wishing to educate themselves in the history of Trotskyism and the struggle for world socialist revolution.

***

The Malvinas War: How Healy Worked as an Imperialist Stooge

The outbreak of war between Britain and Argentina over the Malvinas islands in April 1982 exposed the political putrefaction of the central leadership of the Workers Revolutionary Party. Above all, it revealed that Healy, utterly corrupted by his prostitution of principles over the previous decade, now stood on the extreme right wing of the WRP, and well to the right of most Pabloite groups and even of sections of the Labour and Communist parties. After years of masquerading as a defender of national liberation movements, while functioning in reality as a petty agent and paid propagandist within the British labor movement of the colonial bourgeoisie, Healy proved incapable of conducting a principled struggle in defense of an oppressed nation confronting the onslaught of British imperialism.

The initial reaction of the WRP was politically confused, as Healy advanced the line that the war between Britain and Argentina was an inter-imperialist conflict. An editorial which appeared in the April 3, 1982 issue [of the News Line, the WRPs daily newspaper] presented Healys potted theory of the origins of the war:

Argentina is one of the Reagan administrations client states in Latin America, and it is significant that Washingtons protests have been purely formal. US imperialism wants to grab control of the Falklands for two basic reasons. Firstly, beneath the Atlantic waters around the islands are rich oil reservespossibly ten times the amount of oil in the North Sea. Secondly, the Pentagon is anxious to establish a communications base in the region to monitor the movement of shipping around Cape Horn.

This editorial concentrated on the crimes of the junta, and the reference to Britain came only in the second half of the statement. There was no reference to the historical right of Argentina to the Malvinas, which, parenthetically, the News Line continued for some time to refer to as Falklands. Significantly, the same issue carried a lead story on page two which was provocatively headlined, Argentina Invades Falklands.

The party line set down by Healy was summarized in the headline of the issue of April 5, 1982, which read, This is Not Our War. It claimed that The working class in Britain and Argentina have absolutely no interest in this war, which serves the interests only of the big oil monopolies, the arms manufacturers and the armed services chiefs.

Gerry Healy

The next day, beneath a headline which read The Main Enemy is at Home for British and Argentinian Workers, there was an indication of differences within the Party leadership. While the News Line lead hinted at the need for a General Election, the front page also carried an advertisment for an April 8th public meeting on the war, in which the following words appeared:

Falkland IslandsThis is not our war!Benn and the opportunism of the Labour leaders.

Throughout the Party and even on the editorial board, there was an instinctive demand for a campaign against Thatcher. But Healys office was opposed to this and ordered a public meeting to disassociate the WRP from any campaign against the government, with the public announcement centering its fire on the only parliamentary figure who had explicitly called for a General Election.

The News Line carried no report on the speeches given at the April 8th meeting, but did quote a resolution that had been carried overwhelmingly. It concluded with a call for a General Election.

This call for a campaign against Thatcher infuriated Healy and forced his hand. He drafted a political letter, dated April 10, 1982, to each member and cadre of the WRP, which was clearly a right-wing attack specifically aimed at silencing those in the Party who were, at the very least, critically supporting Benns call for the bringing down of the Tory government. It can be safely said that never in the entire history of the Fourth International had the principal leader of any national section resorted to such vulgar sophistries to justify capitulation to an imperialist government and to oppose the right of a semi-colonial country to defend itself against imperialist attack.

The letter began by fabricating a politically-fictitious scenario to misrepresent the essential class issues at stake in the war:

1.The inter-imperialist crisis over the future of the oil deposits in the vicinity of the Falkland Islands (!!) is a further powerful testimony of the break-up of the economic and political relations within the camp of world imperialism. Secretly (!), US imperialism supports Argentina, while professing friendship toward Britain. In reality, the driving force behind the hypocrisy of this two-faced relationship is the world-wide decline of US imperialism itself.

This bizarre theory of the origins of the conflict, contradicted by the indispensable role played by the United States in supplying and protecting the British fleet as it sailed into the South Atlantic, served as the basis for defining the war as an inter-imperialist crisis. This false characterization became the basis for denying political support to the Argentine masses in their struggle against British imperialism. The letter continued:

For Britain, driven to desperation about the future of its enormous investment in the North Sea, in the face of the world slump in oil prices, the consequences are catastrophic. If its phased-out Navy strives to resurrect the spirit of Pirate Drake, it has nothing to do with the future of the 1,800 semi-feudal old-style Englanders who inhabit the islands. Oil is the basic issue, especially if it can be produced more cheaply than in the North Sea, thus assisting the partial recovery of at least some of the burdens of excessive capital expenditure. So the Naval and nuclear juggernauts fly the flag in a military adventure whichthey cannot win (Emphasis in the original).

Healy knew even less about geography than he did about the Leninist principle of self-determination. He offered no economic analysis to substantiate his claim that Oil is the basic issue nor did he explain how deposits at the bottom of the South Atlantic, 8,000 miles from Britain, could be extracted more cheaply than oil in the North Sea. Moreover, Healy did not attempt to reconcile the contradiction between his claim that oil in the vicinity of the Falkland Islands will solve the problems of excessive capital expenditure in the North Sea and the reality of the billions of pounds sterling being spent by the British government to sail the fleet into the South Atlantic. This would all be comical were it not so politically disgusting.

The abysmal level of Healys political reasoning was also exposed in his categorical assertion that Britain cannot win. The prediction was not only wrong; it exposed the unseriousness with which he approached the political tasks of the WRP. If he really anticipated an imminent military catastrophe for British imperialism, two fundamental conclusions would have been immediately drawn by any Marxist. The first, was that the destruction of the British fleet in Argentina and a corresponding loss of thousands of lives would produce the immediate collapse of the Tory government and create, almost overnight, an intensely revolutionary situation. The second, flowing from the first, was that the WRP must work might and main for such a military defeat and prepare the party for the probable consequences. Healy neither drew the first conclusion nor worked on the basis of the second.

The letter was loaded down with banal non-sequiturs that could be mistaken for senile ramblings. The crisis of bourgeois rule was depicted as a problem of indecisive capitalist statesmen and great scandals. From the patriarch Macmillan (youve never had it so good Supermac) to Profumo. From Sir Harold and slagheap speculation, to Im a Tory now Marcia. From the New Horizon Kennedys to the disaster of the Bay of Pigs. From Nixon to Watergate. From Reagan to who knows what? etc., etc.

He finally arrived at the class nature of the war, and proceeded to quote a section from Volume 21 of Lenins Collected Works, dealing with the attitude of socialists toward war; and then immediately proved that he did not understand what he had quoted:

These Leninist principles are as basic to the Falkland Islands today as they were when he wrote them in 1915. We are dealing with our attitude towards imperialist war, as it is a conflict in reality between British imperial interests and those of the Argentine Junta acting as a front for the United States, in which War is the continuation of politics by other (i.e. by violent) means.

The Lenin quotation had stressed that Marxists deem it necessary to study each war historically (from the standpoint of Marxs dialectical materialism) and separately. As this was completely contrary to the subjectivism of Healywho denied the existence of any historical content within dialectical categories and who believed that the memorization of the names and sequences of the logical concepts, jotted down in the course of a confused reading of Hegel, could be used to justify his arbitrary impressions and supply the desired answer to any political problemhe refused to apply this correct logical-historical method to the study of the Malvinas War. The first casualties of his ignorant disdain for Marxism were the fundamental political categories of oppressed and oppressor nationswithout whose proper use it is impossible to define any war in the imperialist epoch.

Incapable of distinguishing between imperialist Britain and Argentina, Healy essentially reproduced the petty-bourgeois position of Shachtman, who in the 1940s characterized all wars, even the struggle of China against the Japanese occupation, as inter-imperialist conflicts. Like Shachtman, Healy concluded that it was impossible to base the partys position on an abstract characterization of the class character of the state involved in the war, but rather proceeded from a supposedly concrete examination of the realities of living eventsin this case, a dispute over oil with Argentina fronting for US imperialism.

Thus, Healy declared in words which should be branded on his backside: It is not (emphasis in the original) at all a question that historically the islands belong to Argentina as that cowardly organ of revisionism Socialist Worker implies... He also objected to the following statement which appeared in the newspaper of the British Pabloites, who declared that the British imperialists have no right to the territory against the rights of the Argentinians.

Healy then visited his wrath against the centrist MP Tony Benn who had the temerity to respond to the Malvinas War with a call for the bringing down of the Tory governmentwhich was, under the circumstances, to the left of Healys cowardly position. The WRPs theoretician gave a dazzling display of his practice of cognition by producing a series of sophistries aimed at justifying his dastardly opposition to Benns correct demand.

Benn can call for bringing Thatcher down, knowing full well that the chauvinism not only within the right-wing Labourites but the so-called left as well will ensure that the Tories will have a parliamentary majority and are immediately in no fear of their government being brought down.

While Benn at least was prepared to fight the chauvinism within the Labour Party and oppose the imperialist war openly, Healy, a political coward who was thoroughly intimidated by the dispatching of the British fleet, wrote off the possibility of any struggle against Thatcher.

Tony Benn (Creative Commons)

Within this context, Healys denunciation of Benn for parliamentary opportunism was sheer duplicity. In practice, he was defending the Tory government.

Healy then summarized his political conclusions:

a) The source of the crisis is the continued break-up of the economic and political base of world imperialism. b) For the workers in Britain and Argentina who have no country, the main enemy is at home. The war is not our war. It has arisen out of the totally REACTIONARY NATURE OF IMPERIALISM. c) The workers of Britain and Argentina must work for the defeat of their own ruling class. The ruling class who today intensify their campaigns to justify their war, will just as easily turn their guns on the working class in Britain as they have done in Argentina over many years past. d) The working class in Britain and Argentina, as Lenin explained, must actively prepare the defeat of their own ruling class by developing the struggle to turn imperialist war into civil war and thus take advantage of the growing weaknesses of the imperialist ruling class.

Having already defined the war incorrectly as an inter-imperialist conflict and having refused to give even critical support to Benns call for the bringing down of the Tory government, Healys reference to civil war was utterly hollow and hypocritical. Behind Healys vague and eclectic formulations lay a calculated opposition to any policy, slogan or practical activities that would bring the WRP into conflict with the capitalist state and disrupt the imperialist war. Thus, the letter did not put forward a single concrete proposal for action within the British labor movement. In this internal letter to the party cadre, in the midst of a war crisis, there was not to be found a single political slogan or a proposed tactical initiative.

Rather, Healy concluded his letter by instructing the members to fulfill petty organizational quotas set by the Party apparatchiks to meet the financial requirements of their London bureaucracy:

a) We need an increase of 1,800 News Line sales each and every day from Monday April 19th, 1982. We need that vital 20.000 towards the Youth Training Fund by the same date Monday April 19th. These are two essential and vital practices directly connected to the revolutionary struggle against imperialist war over the Falkland Islands. Without such practices we can use all the left words we like and do nothing more than disappear into the swamp of revisionism and reformist Labourism: Here we have the test of tests... We await with some anxiety your most revolutionary and practical answers by April 19th.

These paragraphs represented the most consummate and, in this case, politically sinister, opportunism: he attacked the call for a General Election and the bringing down of the Tories with disparaging sarcasmwe can use all the left words we likeand made the continued inflow of money into the center the test of all tests. These are the words of a man who had become utterly insensitive to the needs of the class struggle and the historical responsibilities of the Party he represented. Healy awaited with some anxiety not the reports from the field on the sentiments of the working class and the labor movements response to the party line but an increase of 1,800 News Line sales and that vital 20,000. His response to the war was not that of a Bolshevik nor even that of a left-centrist, but of a cowardly petty-bourgeois reformist careerist whose only concern was to defend the party coffers.

This time Healy had gone too far for even Michael Banda, who found it impossible to close his eyes to Healys shameless defense of British imperialism. With Healys letter already printed and on its way to Party branches, Banda issued a protest and demanded an immediate change in policy, along the line of the resolution that had been passed at the April 8th meeting. Seeking to head off a political scandal, Banda convinced Healy to recall his political letter and those which had gone out were collected and returned to the center. Banda then supervised a cut-and-paste redrafting of the Political Letter, dropping all attacks on the revisionists and Tony Benn and adding one crucial paragraph following the reference to Lenin:

There is one vital historical difference. The Argentine resistance to British imperialist interests invokes a powerful element of the National Liberation struggle, since the islands belong historically speaking to Argentina and the country has every right to have them returned. Hence the spontaneous mobilization of the masses demanding they should be returned.

This political shift was gradually worked into the policy of the News Line. On April 13, 1982 the News Line finally denounced The Thatcher governments imperialist war against Argentina and by the next day the WRP included in its front page May Day advertisement two new slogans: Down with Thatchers imperialist war over the Falklands! and Mobilize the working class to bring down the Tory government!

Three and a half years later, in the midst of the explosion that followed the exposure of Healys depraved abuse of female cadre, Banda glorified his own role in opposing Healys line on the Malvinas war. But as the facts show, his struggle against Healy was conducted in an utterly unprincipled manner, behind the backs of the Party membership and the International Committee.

At issue was not merely an episodic error in political analysis. Healys Political Letter was consciously directed against a section of the labor movement and those within the WRP who called for action against the Tories. In other words, Healys real starting point was not an incorrect evaluation of Argentinas claim to the Malvinas but an adaptation to the British imperialist establishment. His definition of the war as an inter-imperialist conflict was derived from his opposition to any mobilization of the working class in defense of Argentina.

Under these conditions, the failure of Bandaand, we might add, Cliff Slaughterto challenge Healy openly in front of the entire Party and the International Committeewas of a far greater political significance than the hasty and face-saving correction. No political explanation was offered to the membership about the circumstances surrounding the change in line. The first commandment of Bolshevism, to expose the right wing within the party, was violated. Later in 1982, when a member of the WRP Central Committee wrote to Banda and complained about the political cover-up, he was summarily expelled. All this amounted to a conscious cover-up of Healys role within the leadership as a political lackey of British imperialism. Banda, in effect, left the time-bomb ticking inside the WRP and the International Committee of the Fourth International. He knew, as did Slaughter and all those privy to the events of early April 1982, that Healy was politically unfit to continue inside the leadership of the Trotskyist movement.



In articles which appeared in the News Line during the war, scathing denunciations were made of various right-wing tendencies within the labor movement whose positions were similar or identical to Healys. In the issue of May 28, 1982, in response to a reader who confessed disgust with the pro-imperialist policies of the Labour Party leadership and who asked for an explanation of their role, the News Line replied:

The first and most important point to grasp is that Foot and his henchmen are not bad individuals who have committed a mistake and that our task is to try to correct them.

In another question about the war policy of the Militant group, which in no way differed from that of Healy, the News Line replied in its June 12, 1982 issue:

The Militant tendency is a group of renegade fake Trotskyists who provide a cover for the right-wing in the Labour Party. Masquerading as Marxists, the role of Militant is to try and block those moving towards serious revolutionary politics...In reality, they are abject reformists, adherents of the parliamentary road to socialism, and close collaborators with the bureaucracy against left-wing members of the Labour Party. Thus the call for a class stand against the war is merely a smokescreen behind which Militant, in fact, line up with the Labour right wing (as Healy did against Benn) and British and American imperialism in the reactionary imperialist war against Argentina.

In the August 1982 edition of Labour Review, Slaughter wrote a merciless analysis of the political line of Militant leader, Ted Grant. He used such phrases as farrago of nonsense, sentimental drivel, and hopeless confusion to characterize Grants Healyite equation of Argentina and Britain, warning that he strives to bend Marxism to fit his opportunism and betrayal. He mocked Grant for denying what every man and woman all over the world fighting against imperialism has understood... and he concluded that This treachery, masquerading as Marxism, must be exposed in every way possible, (pp. 11-15) But this rule did not apply to the central leader of the WRP.

Michael Foot attending a meeting of Scandilux (a cooperation forum between the Social Democratic parties of the North European NATO countries) on 19 October 1981 in The Hague (Creative Commons)

There is still another side to this lugubrious tale. In the course of correcting Healys grotesque right-wing line, Banda introduced a few opportunist novelties of his own. In a reply to a reader who asked what position the WRP would adopt toward the Argentine junta if it worked in that country, the response which appeared in the daily Questions & Answers column, for which Banda was politically-responsible, explained:

A section of the International Committee of the Fourth International in Argentina would unconditionally support the Argentine bourgeoisie against British imperialism... A Marxist party in Argentina must therefore form a united front with the bourgeois military junta in the fight against the predatory war of British and US imperialism. This must not involve any concession of the political independence of the working class and its revolutionary vanguard. (June 1, 1982)

This was a miserable caricature of Trotskys position: to speak of unconditional support to the Argentine bourgeoisie precludes genuine political independence of the working class; to offer the junta a united front was to abandon the political vocabulary of Marxism and to betray the working class.

In its leadership of the democratic struggle for national self-determination, the Argentine working class defends neither the bourgeoisie nor its functionaries in the military. As Trotsky wrote in the Transitional Program, In supporting the colonial country or the USSR in a war, the proletariat does not in the slightest degree solidarize either with the bourgeois government of the colonial country or with the Thermidorian bureaucracy of the USSR. On the contrary, it maintains full political independence from the one as from the other. Giving aid in a just and progressive war, the revolutionary proletariat wins the sympathy of the workers in the colonies and in the USSR, strengthens there the authority and influence of the Fourth International, and increases its ability to help overthrow the bourgeois government in the colonial country, the reactionary bureaucracy in the USSR. (New Park, p. 36)

Leon Trotsky

In the concrete conditions under which the Malvinas war arose, it was doubly treacherous to follow the policies suggested by Banda, which would have placed the would-be Trotskyists of Argentina in a united front not only with the junta but also with every rabid petty-bourgeois chauvinist in the country, including those who moon-lighted for Galtieri in his death squads.

The war was launched by the junta as a desperate diversion to forestall its imminent collapse. It then proceeded to conduct the war in a manner which guaranteed the maximum suffering for Argentine working class and peasant soldiers and the ultimate victory of British imperialism. In this situation, Trotskyists would have utilized the war to hasten the revolutionary overthrow of Galtieri and directed its agitation in pursuit of that goal. While not rejecting whenever necessary coordinated action with the government, insofar as our Party is not yet able to overthrow it, under no conditions would we explain such actions in terms that lent the slightest credibility to the regime or placed upon our Party responsibility for the juntas actions. At all times we would expose the treacherous nature of the bourgeoisie, the incompetence and depravity of its officers, and demand the arming of the workers and the formation of their own militias. At the same time, we would put before the masses our program for a workers and farmers government and the liquidation of Argentine capitalism through the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The WRPs whirlwind romance with the Argentine junta was the most quixotic product of Bandas elevation of armed struggle to the level of a strategy. This established a false criteria which enabled the WRP to hold open the prospect that a military conflict could transform a gang of jackbooted hirelings into intransigent opponents of imperialism and potential liberators of the working class. In its issue of June 17, 1982, the News Line defended its previous claim that Britain could never retake the Malvinas Islands by accepting the claims of the Argentine junta at face value and projecting a protracted war. This article, written under the supervision of Banda, respectfully quoted the fatuous claims of President Leopoldo Galtieri, Foreign Minister Costa Mendez, and Defense Minister Amadeo Frugoli and claimed that These are sentiments which are widely shared throughout Latin Americaas if there existed any real identity between these discredited tyrants, who were soon to be arrested and dispatched to prison camps, and the genuine anti-imperialist views of the masses.

The article then interpreted the Malvinas War as the starting point of a profound awakening of the national question and made no reference whatsoever to the Latin American proletariat and the class struggle. Full confidence was placed on the junta, and the News Line, accepting the empty boasts of the discredited generals, predicted that the war would go on. While Galtieri was hiding in the Presidential palace and mass demonstrations of workers were demanding his head, the News Line offered a shameless apology for the junta:

Whatever temporary settlement is reached today, the supply lines and the British positions on the islands themselves remain prime targets in the future for the Argentine armed forces. Had any Argentine Trotskyist attempted to assuage the anger of the masses with this sophistry, he would have rightly been strung up on a lamp-post in the Plaza del Mayo.

An even more incredible statement followed: A protracted war under these conditions will be a running sore that will turn the Malvinas into Thatchers Vietnam, a war which she can no more win than the United States win (sic) in South-east Asia.

This prediction proves that the WRP had not an ounce of confidence in the British working class and its revolutionary role. The junta now became the gravedigger of British imperialism, just as the Iranian military was soon to be proclaimed the executor of revolutionary tasks in the Middle East. It confirmed, moreover, that the so-called correction in April had been merely a political cosmetics job which did nothing to restore a proletarian class line in the WRP.

In a number of articles, Banda and the News Line attempted to give an orthodox cover for their attitude to the Argentine junta by references to Chiang Kai-sheks struggle against Japan in the 1930s. This was an utterly mechanical and invalid comparison. To equate the life-and-death struggle of the Chinese peoplestriving to secure for the first time their right to national existence, against the imperialist invaders who occupied their countrywith the diversionary war launched by the discredited junta in 1982 is a mockery of dialectical concreteness. The very fact that the Argentine Pabloites uncritically adapted themselves to the worst chauvinist elements played into the hands of the more astute bourgeois radicals, such as Alfonsin, who maintained their distance from the junta.

To sum up, the tasks of Trotskyists in Britain was to unconditionally defend the right of Argentina to self-determination and work at all times for the defeat of the British government and its military forces. In Argentina, Trotskyists had to defend national self-determination with their own, proletarian, methods, upholding at all times the political independence of the working class and the banner of revolutionary internationalism.

The inability of the WRP to conduct from the start of the war a principled policy in Britain or elaborate a revolutionary strategy for Argentine workers was bound up with the fact that Healy and Banda repudiated the Marxist conception of the capitalist state, endowed it with a liberating role, and attempted to make use of it, in one form or another, as an instrument of Party policy and the class struggle.
The last coronavirus protective measures expired across Germany over the weekend, even as around 300 people are dying every day from COVID-19 with more than 200,000 infections. The federal and state governments are taking their policy of deliberate mass infection to extremes in the interests of big business. They are making it clear there can be no restrictions whatsoever that may limit profit maximisationeven if this costs hundreds of lives every day.

On March 18, the Bundestag (federal parliament) passed a new Infection Protection Act that reduces the pandemic measures to so-called basic protections consisting of mandatory mask wearing and testing in a few places. The federal states were allowed to adopt a two-week transitional rule consisting of mandatory mask wearing, which most states did, with rules for accessing certain public venues for 2G individuals (those recovered or fully vaccinated) and 3G (those recovered, fully vaccinated or with a negative test). This expired on April 2.

Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (right) and Chancellor Olaf Scholz (both SPD) (Photo: SPD/Twitter)

From now on, masks will only need to be worn in nursing homes, hospitals and local and long-distance public transport. Masks are not compulsory in shops, nurseries or schools. In Germanys most populous state, North Rhine-Westphalia, state Education Minister Yvonne Gebauer (Liberal Democratic Party, FDP), explicitly instructed schools to no longer make masks compulsory. With an incidence rate of over 2,000 per 100,000 in some schools, this is tantamount to a policy of deliberate infection.

The new Infection Protection Act provides for the possibility of stricter measures in so-called hotspot areas, but even these are limited to mandatory FFP2 masks in more areas, a 1.5-metre social distancing rule indoors and 3G and 2G regulations. These are all completely inadequate measures, as the current wave of infections shows.

Moreover, the decision as to when a region is considered a hotspot lies in the hands of the state parliaments, and they are signaling their refusal to do so. Up to now, only two federal states, Hamburg and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, have declared that they will resort to the hotspot regulation. Baden-Wurttemberg, Bavaria, Berlin, Brandenburg, Lower Saxony, Rhineland-Palatinate, Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein have explicitly ruled this out.

The ruling class is fully aware of the consequences of its policies. A particularly foul role is being played by Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (Social Democratic Party, SPD), a trained medical doctor and epidemiologist, who regularly warns of the consequences of mass infections, which he then organises himself.

On Wednesday, he wrote on Twitter: Long COVID leaves tens of thousands chronically ill, that doesnt make it flu. We have no treatment. Even vaccinated people infected with Omicron are getting hit, so be careful. And on Saturday he said the risk of getting infected had rarely been higher than it is now. Epidemiologically, it would have been right to stick to the mask wearing requirement. But legally it was not possible ...

He could hardly have been more brazen. The legal basis for ending compulsory mask wearing and all other measures was created by the coalition government itself. Their first official act was to end the legal designation of a national epidemic emergency. Lauterbachs public crocodile tears over coronavirus deathsThat is not acceptable. Its a plane crash every day, he recently declaredare hypocrisy of the first order. He and the entire ruling class are responsible for these deaths.

With the governments latest decisions, many more will be added to the nearly 130,000 coronavirus deaths in Germany. The situation is out of control, and both the number of infections and the number of severe outcomes are increasing rapidly. Within one week, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) registered 1.5 million infections. The nationwide incidence rate is over 1,500. Some 123 districts have an incidence level of over 2,000, with 7 even over 3,000.

The actual numbers, however, are far higher. The overloading of public health offices and the lack of public testing capacities mean there is a very high number of unreported cases. Lauterbach himself recently admitted that the infection figures were actually more than twice as high. Moreover, individual states such as Baden-Wurttemberg and Brandenburg do not report their data every weekday.

The drastic levels of infection are also reflected in the peaking of sick leave due to illness with the virus. According to an evaluation by the Barmer Institute for Health Care Systems Research (BifG), for example, 52,100 people were unable to work due to infections in the week from February 13 to 19. At the crest of the first wave, the number was 25,100. On a national average, 139 out of 10,000 people are currently unable to work.

The ruling class, which sees the maximisation of profits endangered by high labour absences, is increasingly concerned. But instead of responding with protective measures, quarantine and isolation, rules continue to be adjusted to force even infected and potentially infected people into work.

In January, the quarantine period was shortened to 10 days, with a release option after 7 days. Now, a draft regulation by the federal Health Ministry and the RKI, which was sent to the federal states on Wednesday, envisages reducing quarantine for infected persons and contacts to as little as 5 days. The formal ordering of quarantine by the health authorities is to be dropped, effectively making quarantining purely voluntary.

Scientists and epidemiologists warn of the dramatic consequences of the present government course. Infections [will] thus also be carried back into the layers that have been able to protect themselves well up to nowin nursing homes, workshops for the disabled, i.e., the vulnerable groups, explained infection modeler Thorsten Lehr, professor of clinical pharmacy at the University of Saarbrucken.

There is already an increase in severe outcomes, which disproves the myth of Omicron as a milder variant. On March 31 alone, 2,061 people had to be hospitalised. The adjusted hospitalisation rate is already close to 15 per 100,000, which corresponds to about 12,000 hospitalisations per week.

Intensive care units are also filling up. Currently, 2,332 people require intensive care, and between 200 and 300 new people enter ICUs every day. At 9.4 percent, the proportion of free intensive care beds is already below the 10 percent level considered the threshold for hospital responsiveness and which hospitals try not to fall below.

The German Hospital Federation (DKG) also expects an even stronger increase in the number of intensive care patients. DKG Board Chairman Gerald Ga told Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland: We will also see a stronger increase in the number of patients in intensive care units in the coming weeks. The many staff absences are also particularly problematic. Three out of four hospitals must restrict services because staff are absent, he said. This is due to infections, quarantine, or care for children who have tested positive.

There is widespread popular opposition to the governments herd immunity policy. A survey by the opinion research institute Forsa (Institute for Social Research and Statistical Analysis), commissioned by broadcaster RTL, showed that a clear majority rejects the relaxation of the coronavirus protective measures: 65 percent consider the lifting of nationwide uniform measures premature; 69 percent think compulsory mask wearing should remain in place in most areas. While 61 percent think the introduction of compulsory vaccination is the right thing to do, only 16 percent believe the government will introduce it.
The Western powers success in goading Putin to launch a reactionary war in Ukraine has intensified economic and geopolitical rivalries around the globe, including in the far north. The major powers view the Arctic, with its vast natural resources and trade routes opening up due to climate change, as a key battleground.

Canada has a direct rivalry with Russia in the region over competing territorial claims behind which lie key economic and geostrategic interests for both countries. It therefore comes as no surprise that Canadian imperialism, which is playing an extremely provocative role in pushing for a US-NATO attack on Russia that would trigger a third world war, is seizing on the conflict to expand its military presence in the Arctic.

Canadian Army reservists conduct large-scale exercise at Fort Pickett (Credit: Virginia Guard Public Affairs)

Minister of National Defence Anita Anand is planning a trip to the Canadian Arctic to reinforce Ottawas sovereignty and security claims in the region. In mid-March, her office informed the premiers of the Northwest Territories, Nunavut, and Yukon that she will tour the territories to highlight the diplomatic and military issues in the region.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine, which was provoked by the US-NATO imperialist powers eastward march after the Stalinist dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, has provided the Canadian bourgeoisie with the perfect opportunity to proceed with long-planned military spending hikes. Anand made this clear in her speech at the 90th Ottawa Conference on Security and Defence on March 11. The conference was attended by high ranking Canadian military and NATO figures such as the Chief of Defence Staff General Wayne Eyre.

Anand stated, The work is happening now to ensure that we are prepared for any eventuality, including in terms of Arctic sovereignty. Eyre bluntly remarked that NATOs northern flank is a key area of concern for the Canadian military. Since the conference, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has reiterated the call for all NATO members to spend a minimum of 2 percent of their GDP on defence. Canada currently spends 1.39 percent on defence-related spending, up from 1.01 percent in 2014. The Trudeau government pledged in 2017 to increase military spending by over 70 percent within a decade.

But this is only a down payment for the war-mongering Canadian ruling class. Last August, the Trudeau government signed an agreement with the Biden administration to modernize the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), a Cold War-era binational continental defence structure established between Washington and Ottawa. A key goal of modernization for many senior military and foreign policy officials is to bring Canada into Washingtons ballistic missile defence shield, which seeks to make a war fought with nuclear weapons winnable.

Anand told the conference that Canada intends to announce a spending plan for the modernization of NORAD soon. The cost of modernizing NORADs radar systems, which were last updated in the 1980s, is estimated to be more than $11 billion. This equates to almost half of Canadas current annual defence budget. It is likely that the final cost will be much greater, as much of the technology is still in development. The proposed updates will include over-the-horizon and advanced maritime capabilities, which will be able to launch first-strike attacks on missile launching sites.

Several Arctic military exercisesall of which were scheduled long before the war in Ukraineare either currently underway or have recently been concluded. Operation Noble Defender was announced by NORAD in a press release dated February 15, 2022. The operation ran from March 14 to 17 and involved hundreds of personnel from Canada and the US, dozens of Canadian CF-18 and American F-22 fighters, refuelling and other support aircraft. Ron Hubert, an associate professor of political science at the University of Calgary, told the CBC that the fact that NORAD is going out of its way to make sure that you have an awareness of it, that that is being shared is obviously part of the signalling that we are giving to the Russians right now.

Another recent show of military force in the northern polar region was Arctic Edge. The US Northern Command announced the biennial exercise on February 8. Running from February 28 to March 17, the exercises included more than 1,000 US and Canadian personnel training for warfare in the Arctic.

The annual Canadian military Arctic exercise, Operation Nanook, is slated to take place this August in Cambridge Bay and Pond Inlet on the northern coast of Baffin Island. First undertaken in 2007 at the behest of the bellicose former right-wing Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper (who personally attended annually until the end of his term in office), the exercises are ultimately intended to project force in the Canadian Arctic to bolster Canadas sovereignty claims and take aim at Russia. While soldiers from Denmark and the US have participated over the past decade, they have not done so as members of NATO.

While Canada enjoys a close military-strategic partnership with US imperialism stretching back over eight decades, there is a longstanding dispute between the two countries over the border in the Beaufort Sea. Ottawa and Washington also disagree over the status of the Northwest Passage sea route through the Arctic Ocean. Canada claims that it is part of its internal waters, while the US, in its interpretation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)which it has never ratified, claims that the passage is international.

The American contention for international waters would give its ships customs-free transit through the Arctic, something that would be economically beneficial for its commercial ships, and militarily advantageous for projecting force against Russia in the region and resupplying its northernmost airbase at Thule, Greenland. The Canadian government wants to control access to the straits and collect any dues to affirm their sovereignty claims over the region.

The Northwest Passage was ice-free for the first time in recorded history in 2007, opening a long inaccessible route to international trade that is also much shorter than current intercontinental shipping lanes. Twenty million tons of cargo passed through the straits in 2018, double the amount from the previous year. A recent study published in the journal Nature Climate Change suggests summers in the Arctic Ocean could be entirely ice-free by 2035 . Manmade climate change is rapidly shrinking the area covered by arctic sea iceabout 2.8 percent per decade since NASAs National Snow and Ice Data Center began keeping records in 1979. Sea ice coverage in the Arctic Ocean is down by about 40 percent since then. This dramatic loss of sea ice will have a domino effect on the acceleration of climate change.

The Canadian Arctic comprises 40 percent of the countrys total land mass. It is home to vast stores of untapped mineral and energy wealth. It is estimated that 13 percent of the worlds undiscovered oil reserves lie under the Arctic seabed. Major mining operations by publicly traded companies such as Agnico-Eagle operate in the territories, extracting precious metals such as gold, silver, copper and zinc.

The Mary River open pit iron ore mine, owned by Baffinland Iron Mines at the northernmost tip of Baffin Island in Nunavut, is another example of a strategic resource in the region. Canada was the 8th largest producer of the metal in 2020, ahead of the United States, which was ranked 9th, but falling behind China, 3rd and Russia, 5th.

The mine was the site of Inuit protests in February 2021 because of the impact it has had on the environment and hunting, one of their chief means of securing an existence in what is still largely an undeveloped region. Residents of this remote region are generally impoverished and struggle to afford food, which costs on average three times as much as in the southern parts of Canada.

Concerns surrounding the sale of Hope Bay gold mine in Nunavut last year shows the lengths to which the Canadian government will go to protect what it considers to be its national security interests in the Arctic. The mine, which lies on the Victoria Strait in Nunavut, was bought by Agnico-Eagle in January 2021. The Canadian government blocked its sale to the Chinese state-owned Shandong Gold Mining Co. Ltd on national security grounds the previous month.

Over recent years, China has shown an interest in both the Northern Sea Route, which runs along the Russian Arctic coast, and the Northwest Passage, a fact that no doubt underlies Canadas jealous guarding of its privileges in the region. As Jody Thomas, Trudeaus national security adviser, put it in comments to the Ottawa Conference on Defence and Security in March 2021, We should not underestimate at all that threat of resource exploitation in the Arctic by China in particular. China has a voracious appetite and will stop at nothing to feed itself, and the Arctic is one of the last domains and regions left and we have to understand it and exploit it more quickly than they can exploit it.

Canadas sovereignty claims to the Arctic Archipelago were first made under the so-called Sector Principle, first raised in the Canadian Senate by Senator Pascal Poirier in 1907. The basic premise of the claim was that since most of the islands had been discovered by British explorers, all of the islands to the North of Canada between 141 and 60 meridians of west longitude up to the North Pole were in the possession of Canada. This arbitrary claim was made at a time when the imperialist powers were preparing to bloodily redivide the world in World War I. Denmark, Norway and the US all made claims and sent explorers to the Arctic region. While Norway withdrew its claims, Canadas ruling elite continues to have disputes with the US in the Beaufort Sea and with Denmark over Hans Island in the middle of the Nares Strait between Ellesmere Island and Greenland.

More recent attempts to bolster Canadas Arctic sovereignty claims resulted in the forcible relocation of Inuit in parts of Baffin Island and Northern Quebec to barren, inhospitable islands of the north. The relocations were coercively enforced by the federal Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in 1953 and 1955. Government officials, the Hudsons Bay Company and the Anglican and Roman Catholic Churches agreed upon this course of action the previous year as a means of populating the north. The Inuit were relocated to Grise Fiord on Ellesmere Island and Resolute on Cornwallis Island as a means of asserting the argument of effective occupation in relation to Canadian sovereignty claims. While an internal RCMP report from 2006 denies it, the Inuit claim that at least 20,000 Inuit sled dogs were killed during the 1950s and 1960s to force them to quit their traditional cultural practices and relocate to the new communities.
Australia is currently reporting an average of more than 57,000 new COVID-19 infections each day, higher than at any point during February or March. There are over half a million active cases in a country with a population of 25 million.

The Omicron BA.2 surge is underway as further evidence of the true impact of previous waves continues to emerge. New South Wales (NSW) Health last week announced 331 previously uncounted COVID-19 deaths that had occurred between January 1, 2020 and March 23, 2022. This represents more than 13 percent of the states total of 2,461 deaths, and almost 16 percent of NSW COVID-19 deaths this year.

A drive-through COVID-19 testing clinic at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, Saturday, January 8, 2022. (AP Photo/Mark Baker)

Of the newly reported deaths, 270 occurred in 2022, 58 in 2021 and 3 in 2020. While 131 of the deaths were in aged care facilities and 120 were in hospitals, 66 people died at home and 14 at unspecified other locations. In 75 cases, people died without having recorded a positive COVID-19 test with NSW Health.

More than 30 percent of the historical deaths were in working-class south-west Sydney, a region that was already known to be by far the worst-affected, with 26.7 percent of previously reported deaths in the state. The fact that this already disproportionate figurethe area houses just 12 percent of the NSW populationwas exceeded in the unreported deaths is a product of the massive underfunding of health, aged care and emergency services, especially in areas of socio-economic disadvantage.

The additional fatalities were discovered through the examination of death certificates submitted to the state Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages.

The NSW revelation points to broader issues of under counting and under reporting. According to an Australian Bureau of Statistics report released last week, 5,090 excess deaths were recorded in 2021.

The majority of these were in Victoria, where 2,782 more people died than would be expected in an average year. The states official COVID-19 death toll in 2022 was 705, indicating either massive undercounting of pandemic deaths, or, more likely, that most of the excess deaths occurred because hospitals, paramedics and the entire health system were overwhelmed by the surge of COVID-19 infections.

Victorias hospital system was forced to declare a code brown in January, meaning category one procedures, including urgent cancer and heart surgery, were postponed. Before the code brown, at the end of December 2021, 80,000 people in the state were already waiting for surgery, a number which has likely swelled far higher.

Officially, a total of 6,391 COVID-19 deaths have been recorded in Australia, including 4,091 in 2022 alone. The conditions have now been created for the current and future waves of the pandemic to cause even more infection, illness and death. Nationally, 2,642 people are hospitalised for the virus, the largest number since February 18.

The resurgence of the pandemic is the direct result of the let it rip program of all Australian governments, Labor and Liberal-National alike, and the shift to managing COVID-19 like influenza, meaning the removal of virtually all public health measures and the dismantling of testing, tracing, isolation and quarantine.

From April 18, international travellers to Australia will no longer be required to take a pre-flight COVID-19 test. Cruise ships, which have been significant disease vectors since the beginning of the pandemic, will again be allowed to dock at Australian ports from the same date.

The reopening of schools for face-to-face teaching, spearheaded through the close collaboration of Victorian Labor Premier Daniel Andrews and right-wing NSW Liberal-National Premier Dominic Perrottet, has been a major driver of the COVID-19 surge. In NSW, between March 21 and March 25, at least 80,000 more students were absent from public schools than usual.

In Queensland, 418 patients are being treated for COVID-19 in hospital, including 12 primary and secondary school students. A further 3,047 people are being managed under hospital in the home arrangements. A Queensland health worker told the World Socialist Web Site this morning, for three days in a row, there have been periods of time where there has not been a single free ICU bed in Brisbane, the state capital.

While Queensland is recording an average of more than 9,200 new infections per day, the state Labor government last Monday relaxed isolation rules, meaning people who have recovered from COVID-19 do not have to test or isolate for 12 weeks, even if they develop symptoms.

In Western Australia, an average of more than 8,000 COVID-19 cases are being recorded each day. Prior to the McGowan Labor governments reopening of the states border on March 3, a total of just 12,198 cases and 10 deaths had been recorded in the state since the beginning of the pandemic. Since the reopening, the state has registered 46 COVID-19 deaths.

In South Australia, there were 34,640 active COVID-19 cases yesterday, the second highest figure recorded throughout the pandemic. Last month, the Liberal Party suffered a heavy defeat in the state election, largely as a result of public concern over the growing pandemic and the governments let it rip policies.

Rejecting the clear mandate for action against the virus, the newly elected Labor government immediately moved to further dismantle restrictions. This has continued, with vaccine mandates for teachers, public transport workers, taxi and rideshare drivers and maritime workers lifted from today.

The official infection figures vastly understate the real scale of community transmission. University of South Australia Professor of Biostatistics Adrian Esterman told the Guardian: There are certainly far more cases than officially reported. This is primarily because about 30% of people infected with Omicron have no symptoms and, therefore, are unlikely to get tested.

Australian governments dismantling of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing regime and shift to self-administered rapid antigen tests (RATs) has also served to obfuscate the true spread. While it is mandatory to report positive RAT results, this is impossible to enforce, meaning many positive tests are not being counted. There is no requirement to report negative results, making it impossible to accurately gauge the overall positivity rate.

Additionally, as Monash University infectious disease modeller Dr Michael Lydeamore told the Guardian: The sensitivity of a RAT is not as high as a PCR. Thats a well-known limitation of RATs: they just wont detect as many people as PCRs.

Senior doctors and nurses last week told the Age Victorian emergency departments were facing the worst overcrowding in years, with patients waiting up to 12 hours to be seen. Last Tuesday night, 99 percent of the states ambulances were unavailable, largely due to hospital ramping.

The NSW ambulance network went into status three, its highest crisis level on four occasions over the past fortnight. In March, 27,000 more triple-zero calls were recorded in the state than in February. As of March 28, 4,296 NSW health workers were unable to work due to COVID-19 infection or exposure.

The crisis in the health system, the product of decades of cuts by Labor and Liberal-National governments, exacerbated by the pandemic, is driving health workers into struggle. Last Thursday, NSW nurses and midwives held their second statewide strike in six weeks, defying a government ban, and up to 25,000 other health workers and paramedics plan to hold stoppages this Thursday.

The Health Services Union and NSW Nurses and Midwives Association, which are entirely on board with the let it rip strategy of the government, are working to isolate the struggles, suppress any discussion of the pandemic itself, and divert workers anger into support for the Labor Party at the state and federal level.

This raises the urgent need for health workers to form their own organisations of struggle, rank-and-file committees, completely independent of the corporatised unions. Through such committees, workers could link up with other sections of the working class, including teachers, parents and transport workers, in Australia and globally, to take up a fight to eliminate the COVID-19 pandemic.
In early March, the World Socialist Web Site conducted an hour-long discussion with Davino Watson, an American citizen who was illegally imprisoned by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents for over three-and-a-half years.

Davino Watson

Watson had originally been detained by law enforcement for a minor infraction in 2008. Upon his release, he was detained again by ICE agents on suspicion of being undocumented. As the WSWS wrote, Watson would spend the next years of his life being shuffled across the country with no access to the outside world.

Finally able to obtain his release in 2011, Watson sought court remuneration for the injustices that were perpetrated against him. In 2014 he was awarded $82,000, a fraction of what he was owed by the United States justice system.

The WSWS began reporting on Watsons case in 2017, after a federal Appeals Court determined that he was not entitled to compensation because the statute of limitations to sue the United States government for its crime had passed while he was still locked up and fighting deportation. The WSWS wrote at the time that the cruel decision to bar him from compensation is a travesty of the judicial process and an attack on democratic rights.

Watsons wrongful incarceration occurred in the honeymoon years of the presidency of Democrat Barack Obama, who went on to be dubbed the deporter in chiefdue to his administrations record on immigrant rights. The current Democrat in the White House, Joe Biden, has only intensified this program, deporting more immigrants and refugees during his first year in office than the fascistic Donald Trumps administration did in its last year in office. The personal and social trauma caused by these policies is incalculable.

Though personally scarred by his treatment at the hands of the US state, Watson remains an immensely intelligent and productive individual. In addition to maintaining employment in New York City, he tries to assist others who have been incarcerated in the hope they dont have the same experience he did.

He also helps to remodel and paint home interiors for friends and acquaintances, a skill he acquired from his father. He is passionate about cooking and regularly volunteers to provide food at soup kitchens, serving the citys homeless population.

The WSWS has stayed in touch with Watson over the years. Watson recently contacted this reporter after having viewed the WSWSs online webinar Stop the Drive to World War III!, which was aired in late February in response to the NATO-Russia conflict over Ukraine. He agreed to speak to us about the impact of the pandemic, the deadly war in Ukraine, as well as the necessity for a genuine anti-war movement in the working class. His words carry an immense moral weight and speak to broader attitudes held within the working population.

The following is Watsons discussion with this reporter, edited for clarity and length.

***

Nick Barrickman: Thank you for taking the time to speak with us again. Its been a little while since we last spoke. Its been officially two years of the global coronavirus pandemic which has killed 6 million people worldwide, officially. In addition, a war between Russia, Ukraine and the various forces in NATO has broken out. There are nuclear-armed powers involved in this.

Davino Watson: Id like to speak about the pandemic first if I could. When the pandemic first hit people didnt really know what to believe. I remember seeing people rushing into stores, buying everything. There was a lot of false information that some people believed. It was like a scene out of a movie. I saw hospitals overcrowded with people infected  It was all very hard to watch.

It was also hard seeing the response from the US government and how it handled the situation. It was so unacceptable. All the life that was lost. China did a way better job, in my opinion.

I caught COVID twice. Im so glad that I am alright. The first time I caught it (in summer 2021) it was okay, but the second time I caught it, this Christmas, I thought I was going to die.

Ive had family, friends and friends of friends die. My mentor, Kiki Adebola, he was a counselor. He was really special to me and a lot of guys here in New York City. He died in the summer of 2020. Thats when I really started to take COVID seriously.

NB: Im sorry to hear about your loss. New York has become the epicenter of the pandemic in the US a couple of times. Given the degree of losses people have suffered and are still suffering, how do you see the attitude of the media and the government, treating the pandemic like it is over with?

DW: I remember seeing trailer trucks parked outside of hospitals [to store dead bodies during the first wave of the pandemic]. Today, people are still dying. The mask mandates are finished, and now theres a war happening. But COVID is still present. I think that is the war that we need to focus on.

NB: Thats an important point. The US media and political commentators are now entirely focused on the Ukrainian crisis. Thats not to say it isnt a humanitarian crisis. But its worth noting that more people are dying here every day due to COVID-19 than the wars present casualty rate.

DW: I agree. Ive seen that there were African students being mistreated by the Ukrainian government. They didnt have the right to flee the conflict as people of other races did.

[Note: African students studying in Ukrainian universities have spoken publicly that they have been denied access to escape routes by the authorities. Rabiatu Bah, a fourth-year medical student studying in Ukraine, recently told the Washington Post that fellow students and she were running from one train attendant to another, and they kept refusing to let us on, while allowing white passengers through. In covering the conflict, the WSWS has written previously about an obvious element of racism in the selective outrage of imperialist governments and the corporate media, which breathlessly discuss the plight of Ukrainian refugees while ignoring the equally terrible suffering of the black and brown victims of US imperialism in the Middle East and Africa.]

NB: Lets speak about the conflict, if we could, and the way its presented to the public.

DW: Its hard for me. I cannot watch the news for long. I saw an image of an elderly couple that was fired on while in their car. To see their bodies lifeless, its very difficult. They [NATO] are just protecting assets and their interests. The American people do not want a war. Working class people just want to go about our lives and live peacefully. Gas prices are going up, its taking a toll on people.

I believe that one thing that should happen is that working class people should go on strike all across the world. Theres got to be a movement against this war. The people need to come together to challenge the world leaders and get them to do better.

Were not going to work so that our money can be funneled into the wrong things. Weve been through so much. The timing for this war is something else. Were tired. We have enough going on right here that needs to be addressed.

NB: Have people that you know spoken with you about the war? Whats their attitude?

DW: They say, Stop the war, stop World War III. I havent come across one person that understands this war at all. I never imagined that I would ever see a world war in my lifetime. No one wants war.

NB: The US media is very focused on claims that Russian troops have committed war crimes. They should be investigated. But the WSWS also believes that the US government and the media are covering up many, many similar crimes that it has committed in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, Syria, and so forth.

DW: The striking of hospitals is a crime. When you do something like that, you show the world you dont care about life. But America is not innocent. We all know that. They have done a lot of things themselves. You mentioned Iraq, Syria. Id throw in countries in Africa, too. For America to be pointing a finger at Russia right now is hypocritical.

I saw how corrupt the American government is. The Department of Homeland Security, in its efforts to win its case against me, falsified documents against me. One of the documents claimed that I was caught with contraband. That was a lie. They attacked my character. They assumed that people would look at me differently because Im black. To me, that shows how much the [US government] cares about its own citizens.

[Note: Mark Flessner, Watsons attorney, told the WSWS in a 2018 interview: The [US] government got to do whatever it wanted to do to his client. He noted that the presiding judge in the appeal trial offered no adult supervision to the governments win at all costs strategy].

I feel like the media needs to do a better job. The World Socialist Web Site, you guys putting out the right information, the truth: thats what I live for.

Were living in really tough times right now. Theres so much pressure. I wake up and just have all these worries cross my mind: Theres COVID, theres a threat of World War III, theres an opioid epidemic. It feels like anything could happen.

This is why the World Socialist Web Site is very important to the working people across the world. Its here to expose the truth.

NB: I really appreciate you giving your thoughts on these things today.
The fortieth anniversary of the Malvinas/Falklands war has inevitably been seized on by the Conservative right to beat the patriotic drum, given that it falls amid NATOs proxy war in Ukraine.

Prime Minister Boris Johnsons backers had already been referencing a Falklands moment, in which the government is rescued from popular hostility towards its criminal handling of the pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis by a belief that opposing Russias invasion of Ukraine justifies a political amnesty for the Tories.

Such discussions reflect the position of media opinion formers rather than any popular sentiment among working people. Indeed, even the discussion of such a moment is politically risky, because the Malvinas/Falklands war is such a grotesque example of a hated government utilising a military adventure to divert and suppress popular opposition to terrible effect for the working class.

The UK warship HMS Invincible during the Falklands war (Creative Commons)

Writing in The Times April 1, Andrew Rosindell, a Conservative MP and the former vice-chairman of the Conservative Party, described the war as an example of Britain standing up to tyranny and dictatorship, in favour of democracy, liberty, freedom and sovereignty, before linking this not only to Ukraine but also to China, turning its head towards Taiwan, following their atrocities in Hong Kong

He was incensed that young people were unfamiliar with the war, complaining that it is absolutely atrocious it is not taught in schools in the UK.

Similar sabre rattling by the Tories has included a Christmas declaration to Falkland Islanders by Johnson proclaiming the UKs absolutely unaltered commitment to the Falkland Islands and their people. Argentinas Secretary of Malvinas, Antarctica and South Atlantic, Guillermo Carmona retorted that Malvinas is not Ukraine, but today the principle of territorial integrity is also compromised there.

Given that the UK and the NATO powers are waging a de facto war against Russia in part citing the territorial integrity of Ukraine, it would be wiser for Rosindell and his ilk to keep their mouths shut and rely on the supposed ignorance of the younger generation. For any genuine understanding of the 1982 conflict with Argentina in the South Atlantic confirms it as a filthy imperialist bloodbath that is viewed with disgust by broad masses from previous generations.

Then Tory Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher sent a massive British military force to the Malvinas in April 1982 consisting of 127 ships, 9,000 personnel, 70 aircraft and six submarines, beginning a 74-day war against a much weaker conscript army. The conflict claimed 900 lives, 255 British servicemen compared with 649 Argentineans, and three Falkland Islanders who died during Britains naval bombardment of Port Stanley.

Las Islas Malvinas are located 8,000 miles from the UK and just 400 miles from Argentina. They were a tiny fragment of Spains colonial empire in Latin America but had been explored and claimed as well by the British and French in the late eighteenth century. On the declaration of independence from Spain in 1816, the Argentineans asserted control of the islands.

Britain twice unsuccessfully attempted to invade Argentina, in 1806-1807. During the wars that finally led to successful Argentine independence (1816-1853), Britain occupied the Malvinas in 1833. Renaming them the Falklands, they were settled and have since been used to stake claims to oil and mineral resources in southern polar waters. In 1982, there were just 1,500 British inhabitants of the islands.

The military junta of General Leopoldo Galtieri sought to use Argentinas legitimate claim to the islands to divert social and political opposition at home. In March of that year, an Argentine scrap metal merchant landed on South Georgia, and Galtieri sent troops into South Georgia and the Malvinas on April 2.

Thatcher decided on a military response only in part to defend British imperialist interests in the South Atlantic. There were major domestic political calculations behind her determination to go to war.

In 1982, the Thatcher government was deeply reviled. Official unemployment figure stood at 3.6 million, with the unofficial total even higher. The Tories policies were meeting opposition in major industrial disputes and strikes, and even a threat to strike by nurses. Government plans to close 23 coal mines had to be shelved in 1981 because of the threat of strike action.

Against this domestic background, a task force was sent to reclaim the islands and a 200-mile exclusion zone around them was declared.

Galtieri had expected no military response, given that London was scaling down its military presence in the islands and Thatcher two years earlier had offered to hand over sovereignty to Argentina before leasing them back for 99 years.

The junta was also hopeful of sympathetic non-intervention from the US government, because of its record in torturing and murdering left-wing workers and students and its assistance to the CIA in arming and training the Contras in Nicaragua. However, whereas the US remained officially neutral throughout the conflict, the Reagan administration did reluctantly provide tactical and intelligence support to British forces given the countrys status as an important allyboth militarily and in Thatchers co-championing of a monetarist economic agenda of counter-reforms and attacks on wages, jobs, trade union rights and social provisions.

As important as Washingtons neutralisation for Thatcher was the support she won from the Labour Party and the trade unions. With the decision to send the task force, the Labour Party collapsed headlong into patriotic support for imperialist militarism.

Only 33 Labour MPs mustered an opposition to the war as Labour leader Michael Foot argued that the right-wing character of the junta justified supporting British imperialism, insisting in a speech to parliament that foul, brutal aggressionon the part of Argentinamust not be allowed to succeed.

Without Labours support, the conflict and its attendant atrocities would not have been possible. Together with the media, Labours warmongering allowed for a united effort to whip up patriotism around a supposedly just war against a fascist junta in a campaign that disoriented and confused broad sections of workers.

On April 25, British Marines easily overcame the Argentine garrison on South Georgia, prompting Thatchers notorious instruction to journalists to just rejoice at that news. On May 2, the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano was sailing outside the exclusion zone on a west-north-west course of 270 degrees away from the islands when she was sunk by torpedoes from nuclear submarine HMS Conqueror, causing the deaths of 323 Argentine servicemen. The Sun, owned by Rupert Murdoch, led with the headline, Gotcha!, which it was forced to remove due to widespread disgust. The following day, the HMS Sheffield was hit by Argentinean planes, killing 20 of its crew and forcing the ship to be scuppered. Another five British vessels were sunk during the conflict.

The ARA Belgrano sinking during the 1982 Falklands War (Wikimedia Commons/Public Domain)

At Goose Green, on the first day of land fighting, an outnumbered British force lost just 17 men, as against 250 poorly trained Argentinian conscripts. Argentine forces in Port Stanley surrendered on June 14, and the British declared an end to hostilities on June 20. Two days later, General Galtieri resigned. His junta collapsed within a year.

Nevertheless, despite Britains military superiority, more British servicemen lost their lives than in Iraq in 2003. Moreover, the intensity of hand-to-hand fighting left a legacy of post-traumatic stress disorder among hundreds of British and Argentinean veterans. More British servicemen committed suicide after the war than were killed during it.

The price paid by the working class more generally was very high. Thanks to Labour, Thatcher was able to stage a remarkable political recoverywith Labours nominally left leader playing the key role. Foot, a veteran pacifist and member of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, had been elected in 1980 due to the widespread disgust felt within the party over how the Labour government of James Callaghan had paved the way for Thatcher to come to power through its attacks on the working class.

Margaret Thatcher in 1983 (Creative Commons)

But as with Jeremy Corbyn 35 years later, Foot betrayed that sentiment and instead ensured that Thatcher won a second term in office.

In the June 1983 general election, the Tories won more than 40 percent of the vote, down slightly. Labour won only 27.6 percent, down more than 9 percent, losing most votes to the Alliance formed between the Liberals and the Social Democratic Party, the right-wing split from Labour formed in 1981.

Thatchers victory in 1983 opened the door to the wholesale attack on the living conditions of workers that reached its high point with the defeat of the year-long 1984-85 miners strike and the wholesale privatisation of essential services. For working people, smug references to the Falklands factor by Tories came to be viewed as an example of how millions had been temporarily fooled by their bitterest political enemies.

Lessons must be learned from such eventsabove all the need for working people to reject contemporary efforts to suppress opposition to the Tories utilising lies about the war in Ukraine also being about defending democracy against dictatorship.

Once again, the key role is played by the Labour Party. Writing in Prospect, leading Blairite Andrew Adonis asked, Is Ukraine Boris Johnsons Falklands? He replied, In the short term, the Battle of Kyiv has totally eclipsed partygate, and rightly so. We only have one government at a time, and it would be unconscionable for the Tories to start a leadership contest during a military invasion of democratic Europe the essential policy of the government has been correct in this crisis, and Johnson deserves particular credit for his decision some weeks agoin conjunction with Biden and the USto provide significant quantities of defensive arms to President Zelenskys heroic resistance.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer tells UK troops in Estonia "there's no room for party politics" (screenshot from video clip: Keir Starmer/Twitter)

Or, as party leader Sir Keir Starmer told British troops more simply during a visit to Tapa military base in Estonia, March 10, theres no room for party politics because the world faces a very grave situation.

The price paid for such political amnesties secured through lies is a heavy one. One of the more revealing responses to the Malvinas/Falklands anniversary was the account of Max Hastings in the Sunday Times, The Falklands at 40: the war that transformed Britain. Written by an ardent Thatcherite who boasts of being the first embedded journalist to arrive in Port Stanley, he makes clear the cynical political calculations behind his celebratory account of the war.

It is hard for anyone who did not live through those times to understand how Britains national spirit soared at news of the victory of the South Atlantic task force in that little war against a tinpot Latin-American dictatorship.

When he left to report the war, The coalminers were rubbing their hands at the prospect of adding Thatchers scalp to that of Ted Heath. The war was therefore necessary, he insists, to strengthen the hand of the British ruling class against the working class.

He openly admits, Thatcher sent the task force not because the national interest required itthe Falklands were wholly irrelevant to the real problems facing Britain in 1982but to save her own authority.

He asks, Was it all worth it? We could have given the Falkland Islanders 10 million apiece to move, for a total much smaller than the cost of the war and of fortifying the islands since And yet, and yet. I am among those who believe that the Falklands war was worth fighting, because it empowered Thatcher, as a victress, to achieve the astonishing transformation of Britain over which she presided in the years that followed.

What followed the political victory handed to Thatcher by Labour was an historically unprecedented transfer of social wealth from the working class to an emerging global oligarchy that has continued without let-up under successive Tory and Labour governments, and wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and elsewhere that have claimed millions of lives.

Now an attempt to play the same political trick is being made under conditions in which the working class stands on the edge of an economic abyss and the world faces the prospect of a military confrontation between nuclear powers. The price for any let-up in the class struggle would be far higher.

There is no indication that workers are ready to declare a truce with the Tories and the employers. Strike activity and opposition to government cuts are growing. What is needed now is for the working class to consciously reject all support for Britain and NATOs warmongering against Russia, and to unite opposition to war with a social and political struggle against the austerity drive of big business, the Johnson government and its Labour allies in a struggle for socialist internationalism.
As the conflict between NATO and Russia in Ukraine intensifies, raising the threat of nuclear war, Jean-Luc Melenchon, the presidential candidate of Unsubmissive France (La France insoumise), is backing NATO against Russia. He thus supports the aid to the Ukrainian nationalist far-right militias that he had explicitly criticized only three years ago.

Jean-Luc Melenchon (Wikimedia Commons)

This underlines the reactionary role of organizations that the mainstream media pass off as far left. Although the vast majority of the French population (69 per cent according to a recent poll) oppose participation in the war, Melenchon is not campaigning against the war. He has made no call to mobilize the 7 million voters who voted for him in the 2017 presidential elections. In this, he aligns himself with the CGT apparatus and the Pabloite NPA, who have also called for supporting NATO against Russia.

Melenchon accuses Putin of bearing the entire responsibility for the war, covering up NATOs warmongering campaign and its militaristic escalation against Russia.

Speaking on France Bleu Radios Ma France program last Friday, Melenchon said: I have always clung to the idea that we do not cross borders. The Russians have done it, they bear total responsibility for the situation, and it must be said that we are continually on the brink of total war.

Far from warning about the danger of the annihilation of humanity that a Third World War would pose, Melenchon applauds the economic sanctions imposed by the United States and the European Union against Russia and President Vladimir Putin. According to Melenchon, destabilizing him by destabilizing the oligarchs, that is to say the very rich who surround him and whose henchman he is, in a way, I think that will be effective.

In fact, the sanctions attack not only the Russian oligarchs but, more importantly, the jobs and living standards of masses of workers in Russia and around the world, including Europe.

The Socialist Equality Party opposes the Putin regimes invasion of Ukraine, which serves the interests of the Russian capitalist ruling class. The invasion of Ukraine, whatever the justifications given by the Putin regime, can only divide the Russian and Ukrainian working classes. It plays into the hands of US and European imperialism. But if Putin launched the war, the main responsibility lies with the NATO powers, especially Washington, who did everything to provoke Moscow into launching the invasion.

Having approved a coup led by the Ukrainian far right that installed a pro-NATO regime in Kiev in 2014, NATO provided billions of euros to arm the right-wing regime against Moscow. They refused to discuss security guarantees demanded by Moscow, while they armed Kiev and wanted to install missiles on Ukrainian soil, very close to Russia. After Russias invasion of Ukraine, NATO continues to support Ukraine with weapons, including combat drones and long-range anti-aircraft systems.

Melenchons positioning demonstrates his cynicism and conscious alignment with imperialism, even while he poses as a peace candidate in next weeks presidential election and evokes Jean Jaures. He occasionally calls NATO a useless alliance and advocates a non-aligned France. But, reprising his role during the Cold War of NATO against the Soviet Union, it is only to cover his support for imperialism with a few pacifist phrases.

Hiding his military alignment with Washington with a few anti-American nationalist jabs, Melenchon commented to the newspaper La Croix: NATO is a machine for creating trouble, an instrument of the declining American empire. But I distinguish this subject from Ukraine, because the responsibility for the war lies on Putins shoulders. It was not NATO that violated the border with its tanks.

In reality, since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 by the Stalinist bureaucracy, the imperialist powers have been leading the offensive. They have attacked Iraq, Somalia, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and Mali, to mention only the best known wars. Similarly, the NATO powers have systematically surrounded Russia in Eastern Europe to put pressure on it.

Melenchon was involved in these wars, as he was an adviser to President Mitterrand and a senior Socialist Party official during Mitterrands two terms in office, from 1981 to 1995. This was the period that saw the first Gulf War against Iraq in 1991, the first NATO interventions in Somalia and Yugoslavia, and the genocide carried out by the Mitterrand-backed regime in Rwanda in 1994.

In February 2014, after absorbing almost all of Eastern Europe, NATO gave its support to the coup led by far-right forces such as Svoboda and the Right Sector against the elected pro-Russian government of President Viktor Yanukovych.

Melenchon is fully aware that his position on Ukraine aligns him with neo-Nazi militias. Indeed, in 2014 he felt compelled to make some hypocritical criticisms of French foreign policy and its alignment with Ukrainian fascists.

On Russias annexation of Crimea by popular referendum, Melenchon said: the ports of Crimea are vital for Russias security, one can foresee absolutely that the Russians will not let it go through, they are taking protective measures against an adventurous putschist power, in which the neo-Nazis have an utterly detestable influence.

In 2018, Melenchon even criticized the reception of the president of the Ukrainian assembly, a member of the far-right Svoboda, by Francois de Rugy, the president of the National Assembly. Tomorrow de Rugy solemnly receives the Ukrainian anti-Semitic neo-Nazi Svoboda! Thats where forced Atlanticism leads, Melenchon wrote on his Twitter account.

Today, it is Melenchon himself who is becoming the madman of support for NATO and the Ukrainian far right, which he had criticized in the past. He states bluntly: I am not unaligned between Zelensky and Putin. It is quite clear that I am on the side of Zelensky against Putin. But behind Zelensky and his collaboration with far-right forces in Ukraine is NATO. Melenchons support for Zelensky goes hand in hand with his alignment with NATOs warlike approach against Russia.

Melenchon articulates policies to serve French imperialism. He adopts his cynical and nationalist rhetoric in line with decisions made by the ruling class.

When Trump was in power, the European imperialist powers came into conflict with the US. They criticized Trumps cancellation of the Iran treaty, asking whether the transatlantic alliance is dead. At the time, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that Europeans would in future have to fight for ourselves, and Trump even called NATO obsolete.

At the time, criticizing Trumps threats against Iran, Melenchon called for an anti-American alliance between Paris and Moscow. Before travelling to Moscow in 2018 for talks with the Stalinist United Communist Party (OKP), he said, I am absolutely against the American alliance, I want to leave NATO. He told the media, I came here to undertake a militant act: to say The Russians are our friends.

Today, and since the election of Joe Biden, Paris is aligning itself behind Washington against Russia. Melenchon is once again aligning himself with the policies of the ruling class.

Melenchon plays down the danger of nuclear war, which can break out at any time as tensions escalate, and recklessly encourages workers to believe that the great powers are not in danger of starting a nuclear war. About Putin, Melenchon said: Since nobody wants a nuclear war, he takes us on the back foot and does what he wants. And we now realize that no other strategy had been thought through apart from trying to scare him.

In fact, 60 years after the Cuban missile crisis, the war in Ukraine has brought the world to a point where the use of nuclear weapons is a real possibility. Faced with the danger of a nuclear war between Russia and the NATO powers that could break out at any time, killing millions of people in Europe, Russia, the US and around the world. This possibility is widely reported in the media and by senior NATO officials.

Recently, Sam Nunn, the former US senator and founder of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, presented a hypothetical scenario illustrating one of the possible paths to a global and catastrophic nuclear war that could be triggered by the Ukraine crisis. Following an escalation of military strikes between Russia and NATO, Nunn writes, there would be a risk of nuclear strikes being exchanged by both sides with catastrophic consequences:

within an hour, 82 million Americans are killed and the allied countries suffer the same fate. Most of them die instantly, while others will die of radiation in the days and weeks to come. Those who survive will have chronic health problems for the rest of their shortened lives, and their children will probably be born with genetic defects.

With his alignment with NATO, Melenchon sends a clear signal to the French ruling class. Two weeks before the first round of the presidential election, he was up in the polls (around 15 percent) in third place, nipping at the heels of the unpopular Macron and the neo-fascist Marine Le Pen. Against the backdrop of growing social anger against Macrons austerity, the ruling class sees Melenchon as a potential candidate to implement an anti-worker policy.

Geoffroy Roux de Bezieux, the boss of the French employers federation, Medef, said he considered Jean-Luc Melenchon ready to govern. Speaking on France 2s Elysee 2022 program, Roux de Bezieux gave a sign that one could not miss that the Medef is thinking about him as a potential president, saying: Yes, our disagreements are deep. But even we opponents recognize it: the lefts favorite for the presidential election is ready to govern, with a solid and coherent program.

The Socialist Equality Party issues the most serious warnings about Melenchons political role. If elected, he will pursue a policy of war and austerity as did his allies, the Syriza government in Greece in 20152019, and the PSOE-Podemos coalition government currently in power in Spain. Currently, that government is leading a force of 23,000 gendarmes against a nationwide strike by truckers against high living costs and exploding gas prices.

For workers and young people, the urgent task is to break with petty-bourgeois pseudo-left parties like LFI, and to build an independent movement in the working class against imperialist war and the danger of nuclear war.
The WSWS is organizing the working class to defend RaDonda Vaught and all health care workers against victimization for the crisis of the for-profit health care system.

Send in your statement of support by filling out the form at the bottom of this article. Sign up for ourHealth Care Workers Newsletterfor the latest on this struggle and others like it.

***

Nurses and other workers continue to share their support for RaDonda Vaught, the former nurse from Nashville, Tennessee. Vaught was unjustly convicted of criminally negligent homicide on March 25 for making a medical error and now faces the prospect of years in prison.

Registered Nurse Monica Quintana dons protective gear before entering a room at the William Beaumont hospital, April 21, 2021 in Royal Oak, Mich. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio, file)

Vaught readily admitted to her mistake. By contrast, her employer, the Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) in Nashville, Tennessee, first attempted to cover up the mistake and then, when it was revealed by an investigation by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the VUMC moved to completely scapegoat Vaught.

Below are some of the statements sent to the World Socialist Web Site.

Jamie, a nurse from Mississippi:

As a nurse, my number one priority is my patients safety, and yet the organizations that hire us do not ensure safe practices, safeguards, safe nurse-to-patient ratios and adequate staffing to keep their patients safe. And people are dying and will continue to die until the organizations responsible are held accountable and are required to make necessary changes. I support Nurse Vaught. I support patient and nurse advocacy.

Maria, a health care worker in the United States:

As a retired health care professional, reading the CMS statement of deficiencies, it is clear to me that Vanderbilt hospital didnt have the bare minimum of systems for safe medication administration in place.

A float nurse on a high-intensity care unit. A flawed MAR, where nurses have to look in two places to find orders. A failed automated medication dispensing system that leaves nurses without access to ordered medications so frequently that overrides are routine. No nurse/nurse check or nurse/pharmacist check on the override. A lack of bedside equipment. This outcome was inevitable.

Janet from New York:

Nurses work under very harsh conditions. Having 24 hours of tasks to do within a 12-hour shift is daunting. Pulling the wrong med off a shelf is inevitable under such a harsh workload. Criminalizing health care professionals wont solve the problem. If hospitals had plenty of well-trained staff, patient outcomes would be better. We need more nursing and support staff and more training and college programs for health care staff. We need single payer health care! The profit moves the health care money to the wrong place: gargantuan hospital executive salaries, Big Pharmas ridiculous profits, etc. Restore Ms. Vaughts license NOW!

Kara, a nurse in Illinois:

I stand for nurses across the country. We dont make enough money to essentially put my life on the line. An error that was not done in malice does not deserve jail time. We plead for leniency in sentencing.

Mary from Tennessee:

RaDonda reported the incident following protocol as she stated. If the Med had not been available (even with an override available), a nurse should not have access. Why was Vbilt using an accu system that was not working proper? She was thrown under the train for multiple errors of multiple people.

Elizabeth, a nurse in Delaware:

How can the hospital have no consequence and the nurse have all of the burden? They, as her employer, put her in this situation to begin with. I dont know ANY nurse that hasnt made a med error at least once in their career. We learn what situations to look out for and prevent every time we report these errors. After this, I dont think Id ever work for another hospital. (Sure, they ALL say patients are #1 but we ALL know whats #1 ... MONEY).

They cut costs constantly through not fixing or replacing equipment, not replacing staff and underpaying the ones they have. The training is less than optimal because they dont have enough staff to train new hires correctly. They let go of experienced nurses, to save money by hiring NEW grads who have no seasoned nurses to learn from. We KNOW where the cost savings go to .... Bonuses to the CEO, etc. for making necessary cuts to preserve the bottom line. Theyll spend money on new ad campaigns, new logos, etc. All the while telling you youll just have to do more with less. Patients need to know this!

Accountability lies at the feet of the BIG boss. Why didnt the CEO get charged? Why didnt the hospital get fined? Why didnt they support their staff? ... Why would ANYONE, patient or health care worker, TRUST this hospital? ... This just isnt right.

Amanda from New York:

Humans make errors. RaDonda did the right thing in reporting her error, errors are unfortunate, but they do happen. She should not be criminally charged with an error that occurred as partly in fault by her employer! Nurses are working short staffed, overworked, and underpaid. We will not let her be charged! We will fight back! Stay strong, sis!

Bob from Rhode Island:

I am writing to demand that clemency be granted to RaDonda Vaught. Criminalizing an inadvertent error made by a medical professional like Ms. Vaught sets a dangerous precedent.

Ashley, a nurse from New York:

RN from NYS showing my nursing sister support in the unimaginable circumstance of one of us being prosecuted for an error. Please stay strong and know we love you, support you, and will always be a fellow nurse.

Tamara:

I think the prosecutors themselves need jail time, and they need to be locked up for their inability to see clearly. Perhaps the jail time will give them time to convert to being human. They most definitely painted a gruesome picture about this RN who is a human and not a machine.

It is criminal that these facilities and hospitals overload nurses and caregivers. They are careless about your circumstances. They push you to do hard [work], though by law you must take a break. They know its not possible most of the time, and then the supervisor will say, Im going to write you up for not taking a break! They break the law all the time in an effort to make more money. The raise you get is like 50 cents. All I can say is look to the health care system for being at fault. Their greed and true lack of support is rampant.
Thousands of COVID-19 cases, including of the virulent Omicron strain, which gained a foothold in Pacific nations in January, are continuing to be recorded across the region. Tonga, Samoa, American Samoa, and Vanuatu all recently recorded their first COVID-related deaths.

The Pacific islands, which saw virtually no infections in 20202021 due to their geographic isolation, small populations and strict border controls, are now battling outbreakseven as local governments end restrictions in line with the global drive to open borders and economies at the expense of public health measures.

Medical staff of Papua New Guineas Defense Force received hands-on training on COVID-19 response. (WHO/ Papua New Guinea)

Health experts and aid organisations fear the virus could be devastating to the impoverished countries, made more vulnerable by fragile health care systems and high rates of noncommunicable diseases, such as diabetes and heart disease.

In Tonga, COVID-19 infections are continuing to climb as the kingdom reels from the destructive January 15 volcanic eruption and tsunami. Prime Minister Huakavameiliku Siaosi Sovaleni has recently been in self-isolation, along with half the cabinet, after testing positive for COVID.

On March 21, the government imposed a week of new lockdown rules after health authorities recorded a total of 1,819 active cases and the countrys first 2 deaths, a figure which has now risen to 6. Some COVID victims initially had their deaths attributed to other illnesses.

Before this year, Tonga, with a population of 105,000, had recorded just one COVID-19 case. By April 1 there were 6,423. The outbreak began with two port workers unloading ships bringing in aid to the capital Nukualofa following the eruption. The Australian navy vessel, HMAS Adelaide, had reported 23 of its crew were infected with the virus when it arrived on January 26, but the ship has not been confirmed as the source.

A lockdown in early February was eased by the government, allowing the virus to spread. Now a daily average of 229 new infections are being recorded. Tonga has administered 147,193 doses of COVID vaccines, enough to have vaccinated just 70.4 percent of the population. At the current rate, it will take a further 80 days to cover the next 10 percent of the population. This does not include booster doses needed to counter the Omicron variant.

Tonga is dealing with a double disaster. Editor of Matangi Tonga, Pesi Fonua, told Radio New Zealand that the volcanic eruption recovery has been severely hampered by the COVID-19 outbreak. Under the recent hard lockdown all businesses, including retail and petrol stations, were closed for a week. The public, with essential health workers exempted, were only allowed to venture out between 8am and 8pm to go to health facilities and tend to plantations.

The eruption of the Hunga Tonga Hunga Haapai volcano left more than 84 percent of the country covered with volcanic ash. The cost of recovery is estimated to be more than $US90 million. Officials estimate more than $US20m in damages to the agriculture sector, which involves roughly 86 percent of the population. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization has warned the ash could delay or stunt harvests and impact fisheries, crops and livestock.

At the end of March, Samoa, American Samoa and Vanuatu all reported their first COVID -related deaths. The Samoan fatality, of a 67-year-old man, came 13 days after the first community transmission case was detected on March 17. Fifteen initial infections were passengers on a repatriation flight from New Zealand in early March. Case numbers have since risen sharply to 2,331 with over 1,500 active. Health Ministry data shows that 101 children under five have tested positive, with infections significantly higher among those aged from 15 to 35.

The Samoan government extended an existing lockdown for another two weeks on March 24 because of the rapid community spread. Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mataafa said the surge in cases was expected and would continue to increase due to the transmissibility of the virus. Only 66 percent of the population is double vaccinated.

Notwithstanding the ongoing surge of the disease and risks involved, cabinet last week reduced the quarantine time for visitors to seven days. Over 200 passengers on a March 29 flight from New Zealand were the first to quarantine for a week rather than 14 days. The move is particularly reckless given New Zealand is grappling with an Omicron outbreak that has resulted in nearly 400 deaths so far. In October 2019, a measles outbreak in Samoa, originating in Auckland, led to 83 deaths, mostly of children.

Vanuatus Ministry of Health also confirmed the first two Covid-19 related deaths in the country on March 31. Minister Bruno Lengkon said the victims, a 22-year-old woman from Port Vila and a five-year old boy, both had underlying conditions. The total number of confirmed cases since the beginning of 2022 is now 3,881.

Authorities are blaming hesitation about vaccinations, especially in the capital. Only 27.7 percent of the 307,000 population is double vaccinated. Meanwhile, the first 20,000 AstraZeneca vaccines have been destroyed after they expired. The Ministry said they arrived on time but were not used soon enough.

Low vaccination rates across the Pacific are bound up with the policies of vaccine inequity, which have seen wealthy countries appropriate supplies of vaccines for their own use, as well as the low numbers of the necessary medical equipment and personnel to carry out mass campaigns. According to World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, 75 percent of the worlds vaccines have been administered in just 10 countries.

Vaccine access has been thwarted by nationalism, profiteering and opposition by the imperialist powers to any coordinated international campaign to combat the pandemic. The situation across the Pacific is exacerbated by the legacy of a century of neo-colonial domination, which has left the region with disastrously low levels of health and education infrastructure.

In Vanuatu, life expectancy is just 67 years for men, and 70 for women. Health expenditure per capita is under a quarter of the Western Pacific regional average. There is a severe shortage of qualified health care professionals and equipment. Travel restrictions due to the pandemic meant that overseas health specialists could not enter to undertake consultation and treatment work or for training of the local health workforce.

American Samoa recorded its first death from the virus on March 22. The number of COVID cases in the US territory has been climbing steadily since the first community case appeared in mid-February. Total cumulative infections have reached 2,751.

In mid-March, the StarKist Samoa tuna cannery, the territorys largest private employer, was allowed to reopen after being closed for two weeks due to the community spread of COVID. The chairman of the COVID-19 Task force, Lieutenant Governor Talauega Eleasalo Ale, said authorities decided to move away from mass and indiscriminate lockdown policies and place emphasis on self-responsibility.

Elsewhere across the region, the Solomon Islands has recorded 11,470 cases at a rate of nearly 300 a day and 133 deaths. Nauru last week confirmed its first two infections, both detected in quarantine after a flight from Brisbane. Kiribati has 3,066 cases and 13 deaths, forcing the government to extend a curfew for another month. The Cook Islands, despite registering 1,442 infections between March 19 and April 1, is preparing to reopen its borders to the world and ease remaining COVID restrictions.
It is an arduous task and huge challenge to combat the Omicron variant while maintaining the normal operation of core functions in a megacity with a population of 25 million, Chinese Vice Premier Sun Chunlan said over the weekend as she toured Shanghai amid its lockdowns. New cases have been climbing rapidly, necessitating harsh measures to bring the outbreak under swift control.

A health worker in protective suit takes a throat swab sample from a resident at an outdoor coronavirus testing site, Wednesday, March 23, 2022, in Beijing, China. (AP Photo/Andy Wong)

The outbreak in Shanghai is primarily a byproduct of local authorities having resisted employing more stringent measures earlier, allowing the situation to spiral to its current state.

The visit by Sun, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, served to assure the population that there would be unswerving adherence to the dynamic Zero-COVID approach and mobilizing COVID-19 testing capacity, medical personnel, and COVID-19 prevention supplies to support Shanghai in the fight against the epidemic.

It was also intended to quell concerns raised in Chinese social media, which had been gaining international interest about the death of a nurse suffering from an asthma exacerbation who was denied entry into a hospital. Additional concerns being raised are that the lockdowns were being extended beyond what authorities had promised and concerns over access to food and supplies.

However, consistent with President Xi Jinpings previous concerns over minimizing disruptions to the economic infrastructure, Sun stressed that key industries and institutions would operate under a strict closed-loop management that could ensure the normal operation of core functions and the stability of supply and industrial chains.

A concept borrowed from the Tokyo Summer Olympics in 2021 and applied to the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics meant that some large-scale manufacturers with the ability to house workers in their compounds and act quickly ahead of lockdown orders could continue running their operations. Reuter reported last week that GM, which said [last] Monday that its Shanghai joint venture was producing normally, declined to comment on the arrangements at its factory. A spokesperson said the company and its joint ventures had developed and were executing contingency plans with their suppliers to mitigate uncertainty related to COVID-19. SAIC [Chinese state-owned automaker in joint venture with GM] did not have immediate comment.

Shanghais two-phased lockdown was modified into a full-scale lockdown late Thursday night as new cases of COVID-19 were discovered, underscoring the silent uncontrolled community spread that had been underway for several weeks.

The National Health Commission of the Peoples Republic of China reported there had been 13,146 confirmed COVID-19 cases on Sunday, of which 11,691 were asymptomatic. In March alone, there were more than 100,000 infections reported.

Yesterdays numbers make for the highest single-day figure in China during the COVID-19 pandemic. The high number of asymptomatic cases has been attributed to both the character of the Omicron strain and early detection due to mass testing, a fundamental strategy for the Chinese Zero-COVID strategy.

Figure 1 Daily COVID cases China March 1 to April 3, 2022. Source WSWS

Zhang Boli, an academician from the Chinese Academy of Engineering and head of the Tianjin University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, explained that the increase in vaccination rates has helped boost population immunity. Health officials have reported that more than 3.27 billion doses of COVID vaccines have been administered.

Yet, those over 80 years of age and the most vulnerable are the least vaccinated in China. And a considerable number of those 60 and older have only received two doses. Like Hong Kong, a policy of allowing the virus to spread with meager mitigation measures would have deadly consequences.

Wu Zunyou, principal epidemiologist at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), told the Global Times about the vast number of asymptomatic cases , It is the result of our effective epidemic prevention work, namely the early identification of the epidemic, timely response, and the whole process management of all infected people, including the asymptomatic cases However, Wu acknowledged epidemic controls will grow more challenging if daily infections continue to rapidly rise above 10,000 in the city.

Resources are currently being mobilized to protect the health system in Shanghai. Health care workers from neighboring provinces are being mobilized to assist in mass testing and the building of makeshift hospitals to manage asymptomatic infections. Additionally, food and necessities are being directed to support the population with volunteers working round the clock.

According to the Shanghai Health Commission, the city launched a citywide COVID-19 antigen self-testing campaign to identify early cases based on a self-reporting system. This will be followed by Mondays citywide Nucleic Acid testing (PCR). In all, 32.74 million PCR tests have been conducted in the city since March 28, 2022, when the phased lockdown commenced. For this monumental undertaking, a sample collection site has been set up for every 3,000 residents, with the samples reaching testing institutes about once every hour.

However, rather than acknowledging the complex network of operations that have had to be mobilized in short order to ensure that millions are protected from infection and the virus can be suppressed and eliminated, the primary focus of the Western mainstream media is to take advantage of the chaotic nature of these developments and malign these efforts in the realm of public opinion.

In particular, the New York Times has chosen to focus on the separation of some children from their parents during the lockdown and mass testing, which was met with an outpouring of anger and frustration on Chinese social media.

They wrote, In the images [photos and videos], a series of hospital cribs, each holding several young children, appeared to be parked in the hallway of the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center in the citys Jinshan District. A video showed several of the children crying. The health center acknowledged that these images were authentic. And indeed, these are concerning. However, in the context of the outbreak and its dangers to the population, it is self-serving of the New York Times which is using this to discredit the tremendous effort undertaken in the face of the Omicron variant in Shanghai. The same leading press of American liberalism has repeatedly published demands for living with the virus.

Meanwhile 243,000 children in the US have lost a caregiver to COVID-19 over the last two years. Of these, 194,000 lost both parents. As Scientific American noted, The psychological and economic aftershocks can have lifetime negative impacts on their education and career. Meanwhile, as the BA.2 surge begins to catch steam, more than 700 people are dying from COVID-19 each day in the United States. Almost 1,500 children in the US have been killed throughout the pandemic, two-thirds of them during the last eight months, as a byproduct of the bipartisan policy of ensuring schools would remain open during repeated waves of infection.

Meanwhile, the Chinese CDC has said a new strain of the virus was isolated from a patient with mild COVID-19 symptoms in Suzhou, approximately 43 miles from Shanghai, which has never been sequenced before. According to Bloomberg, it appears to have evolved from the BA.1.1 branch of the Omicron variant .

Despite the stringent measures, the dynamic Zero-COVID strategy remains popular in China. The global experience with COVID-19, particularly in the US, where 1 million people have been killed by COVID-19, has not escaped the population. Dr. Q, a cardiologist in Shenyang, acknowledged that a live with the virus scenario in China would lead to the death of well over a million people. And I would be the first to catch it and bring it to my mother, who is over 70, and I fear what would happen to her.
Readers of the World Socialist Web Site in the UK have expressed their condemnation of Facebooks censorship of the anti-war video No Third World War! Against the Ukraine war, NATO aggression and German rearmament!

No Third World War! Against Ukraine war, NATO aggression and German armament! (English subtitles)

The video, which had been viewed by 20,000 within a short space of time, was deleted by Facebook last Saturday. Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei (Socialist Equality Party, SGP) chairman Christoph Vandreier said, This censorship is not only directed against us, but against the mass opposition to a world war. The socialist anti-war perspective of the SGP is to be banned and censored in the midst of deafening war propaganda for a third world war.

Hours after the SGP video was deleted, YouTube erased six years of the On Contact programme hosted by Chris Hedges, a well-known opponent of NATO warmongering.

Facebooks political censorship of the SGP video met with strong condemnation from workers and young people in Germany. The WSWS has now received protest messages from several readers in Britain.

Jude Jackson

Jude Jackson wrote, The US and NATO are intent upon bombarding us with their propaganda narrative through their own media outlets.

War served no purpose for workers, she continued. On the contrary, public monies are diverted from essential services such as health and education, and are ploughed into the war machine, enriching investors, stock companies and companies that produce the machinery of death and destruction.

Pointing to the criminal herd immunity policies of the Johnson government, Jude said COVID-19 is being allowed to spread, and health systems are collapsing under the unrelenting pressure of sick people and staff. Facebook, through its censorship, has picked the side of death and destruction. This is a criminal act and must be vigorously opposed! No to war! No to censorship!

Ben Roch

Software Developer Ben Roch wrote saying the video by the German section of the Fourth International, calling on the working class to take up the fight against capitalism to stop the drive to #WorldWarIII, was extremely informative. That is why Facebook censored it after 20,000 views. Watch and spread it on as many media platforms as you can! Build a Facebook Workers Rank-and-File Committee, for the defence of truth and the saving of humankind from #nuclear #apocalypse!

James Crump

Mental health worker James Crump said the censorship was deplorable but unsurprising. This deletion, linked to government efforts to suppress and criminalize dissent, is an attempt to utilize censorship to control the information the public receives about the proxy war waged in Ukraine between the US/NATO and Russia.

In the absence of such a principled anti-war perspective as argued for in the video, people will be more susceptible to being manipulated by the pro-NATO war propaganda that is being relentlessly churned out by politicians and corporate media outlets. That is why this blatant act of political censorship must be unequivocally opposed by all opponents of the US/NATO war drive.

Maxine Walker

Maxine Walker said there had been a grotesque disinformation and censorship campaign by the US, Britain and NATO in relation to the war in Ukraine, on a scale never before witnessed. They have to shout loud, lie and censor to disguise the blood-soaked history of imperialist NATO and particularly the US history of coups and interference in Ukraine now expanded to include regime-change in Russia.

Maxine said it was vital that opposition and socialist voices were heard. Otherwise, people may be led blindly into a world war that threatens humanity and all life with destruction. Therefore, all socialists and those that believe in democracy should condemn Facebooks censorship of the video No Third World War produced by the Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei.

Dr. Chris Porter, a senior lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University, noted that the video contained a truthful, well researched and politically engaged perspective on a matter of vital public interest, nationally and internationally.

It was not for the owners or administers of online platforms to determine, based on political or economic interests, whether or not such content is appropriate for hosting. Such acts of political censorship call into more urgent question the issue of private ownership and control of such important means of public information.

Jo Marsh, a teacher from London, wrote, Facebooks taking down of the SGPs video opposing war is an unacceptable act of censorship which must be opposed at all costs. The WSWS provides a lone voice against the pro-war propaganda in the majority of the worlds media and, as such, must be defended by all conscious workers and youth. There is a real and present danger that this conflict could escalate into a nuclear war which would signify the end of humanity as we know it.

Jan Knott, an electrician from Surrey, said, Its clear that the Ukraine crisis is being used by governments and media owners to step up their suppression of anyone who is opposed to war and capitalism. We know the SGP has been top of the watch list of the German intelligence services for several years. They hate the socialist ideas of the SGP and World Socialist Web Site and fear their growing support. I am certain the German state fingered the SGP to Facebook, although I suspect Facebook has long had its own watch list of anti-capitalist organisations.

Charles Birch, an office worker, said, The censoring by Facebook of the anti-war video produced by the SGP, the deletion of the work of journalists critical of US-led wars such as Chris Hedges and the imprisonment and torture of journalist Julian Assange, are all part of the antidemocratic and authoritarian measures being used by the state and big tech to silence opponents of war. This censorship must be opposed. We need freedom of speech to cut through the pro-war propaganda.

Jerome Stern from east London wrote, I wish to protest in the strongest possible terms at the removal of the SGP anti-war video from Facebook. This is an outrageous act of censorship. Nothing said in that video can be reasonably described as misinformation. It is an assessment of the part played by NATO in European power politics in general and its contribution to developments in Ukraine leading to the current crisis. It is based on factual evidence presented in the video.

The assessment involves interpretation of the significance of those facts and hence opinions but these are not in contradiction to known facts and so do not constitute misinformation. Rather the video seems to have been censored because it presents a narrative different from that endorsed by western governments, led by the United States. Freedom of speech, and of the press, is necessary to democratic government precisely because debate of ideas critical of prevailing orthodoxies is essential if democracy is to work in the service of the common good. Thus, censorship such as this is an attack on democracy itself.

Jonathan Hall

Jonathan Hall, a retired professor from London, wrote, Facebook's deletion of the SGPs anti-war video is clearly an abuse of power by a global capitalist cartel and should be opposed by everyone in favour of free speech. This is especially important when the overwhelming power of pro-war propaganda threatens to bring about catastrophic consequences.

We urge our readers to write further statements denouncing Facebooks censorship under the hashtags #StopCensoringSocialism and #DefendSGP and to disseminate the censored video and WSWS articles on the topic as widely as possible.
Text messages implicating Virginia Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, in Trumps January 6 conspiracy have exposed flagrant judicial misconduct by her husband, who voted on the Supreme Court to block access to documents by the congressional committee investigating the coup plot in which his own wife participated.

The exposure of egregious judicial misconduct by the reactionary Supreme Court justice has been met with conspicuous silence from the Biden White House, which is focused on achieving national unity with the Republicans in the context of the US-NATO war against Russia. Pressed on the issue over the past week, leading Democrats likewise declined to state that they would take any significant action against Clarence Thomas in response to the revelations.

Right-wing insurrectionists loyal to Donald Trump storming the US Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021 (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

On March 23, the Washington Post and CBS News reported the existence of at least 29 text messages between Ginni Thomas and Mark Meadows, then-President Donald Trumps chief of staff, following the November 2020 election. The text messages directly implicate both Ginni Thomas and Meadows in the plot to overthrow the government.

The messages are remarkable for the extent to which they establish the intimate involvement of Ginni Thomas in the highest levels of the coup plot, as well as for their semi-literate incoherence and embrace of fascistic QAnon tropes.

In one rambling text message, Ginni Thomas wrote: Biden crime family & ballot fraud co-conspirators  are being arrested & detained for ballot fraud right now & over coming days, & will be living in barges off GITMO to face military tribunals for sedition.

This message references and celebrates the QAnon narrative of the supposed storm, during which Trump will have abducted all of his left-wing opponents and transported them to overseas concentration camps, such as the infamous torture center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (GITMO).

It bears repeating that this embrace of mass fascist repression was sent by the wife of a US Supreme Court justice to the chief of staff of the then-US president.

The Ginni Thomas text messages reference other extreme-right tropes, including an imaginary financial system (the Quantum Financial System), together with material published by far-right figure Steve Pieczenik, who previously claimed that the Sandy Hook school shooting was a false flag operation, and who also claimed that 2020 ballots had been secretly watermarked with a special encryption code.

Meadows did nothing to distance himself from this deranged filth. Instead, at one point he replied: I will stand firm. We will fight until there is no fight left. Our country is too precious to give up on. Thanks for all you do.

One message encourages Meadows to throw the Trump administrations weight behind lawyer Sidney Powell, who briefly led Trumps pseudo-legal efforts to invalidate the election results. This is significant because Ginni Thomass husband Clarence Thomas would be among those ultimately responsible for deciding any legal challenge to the election results in his capacity as a Supreme Court justice. Ginni Thomas wrote: Sidney Powell & improved coordination now will help the cavalry come and Fraud exposed and America saved [sic].

Another message urges Meadows to read an email she sent to Trumps son-in-law, Jared Kushner, whom she references on a first-name basis as Jared.

The text messages suggest that many more emails, text messages and other communications regarding the conspiracy exist that have not yet come to light. In one ongoing case, attorney John Eastman, a key figure in the development of Trumps legal strategy for the coup, who was also a former clerk for Clarence Thomas, is fighting to shield his communications from discovery.

Even prior to the conspiracy that culminated in the January 6 coup attempt, according to recent reports, Ginni Thomas effectively functioned as a personal adviser to Trump. She would make personal trips to the White House armed with lists of allegedly disloyal staff members for Trump to purge, as well as lists of proposed replacements. Trump would reportedly exit these meetings with Ginni Thomas in a rage, shouting at his subordinates for their alleged disloyalty.

We all knew that within minutes after Ginni left her meeting with the president, he would start yelling about firing people for being disloyal, a former senior Trump administration official told the Daily Beast. When Ginni Thomas showed up, you knew your day was wrecked.

The lists of individuals to be purged were reportedly based on pure conjecture, rumor, or score-settling, while the hire lists were often filled with infamous bigots and conspiracy theorists, woefully under-qualified names, and obvious close friends of Thomas, according to the unnamed official.

Even prior to the January 6 coup plot, the role of Ginni Thomas in the Trump administration raised countless conflicts of interest. Under the American constitutional structure, Trump was the commander-in-chief and head of the executive branch, while Ginni Thomass husband sat on the Supreme Court, which is at the head of the judicial branch. Under the checks and balances system, the Supreme Court is tasked with ruling on the legality of the conduct of the Trump-led executive branch. Each and every one of the Supreme Court decisions regarding the legality of positions taken by the Trump administration from 2017 to 2020 are therefore tainted by the meetings between Ginni Thomas and Trump.

The case of Trumps 2017  Muslim ban  is a particularly egregious example of Clarence Thomass history of judicial misconduct. When Trumps racist immigration policy reached the Supreme Court, an amicus brief was filed in favor of the Trump administrations position by a reactionary lobbying group called the Center for Security Policy, which was founded by Frank Gaffney. Gaffney is a far-right bigot who once claimed that President Obama was Muslim and that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the 1995 Oklahoma City bombings. The Center for Security Policy brief supported Trumps policy on the grounds of open prejudice, claiming that the challenge of Islam must be confronted.

It subsequently came to light that Gaffneys group had paid $200,000 to Ginni Thomass lobbying firm Liberty Consulting, which advertises that it can give access to any door in Washington. Not only did Clarence Thomas refuse to recuse himself from the case, he also failed to disclose the existence of the $200,000 in payments to his wifes consulting company. He went on to vote in support of Trumps Muslim ban.

As part of her role at her Liberty Consulting firm, for four years Ginni Thomas has been giving out Impact Awards, a right-wing political award for courageous cultural warriors who are successfully fighting radical ideologues on the left. As a January article in the New Yorker observed, Many of the recipients have served on boards or committees with Ginni Thomas, and quite a few have had business in front of the Supreme Court, either filing amicus briefs or submitting petitions asking that the Justices hear cases. In some cases, these awards were presented with Clarence Thomas present in the room.

The Trump-Ginni Thomas meetings also raise additional questions about the conduct of the Trump administration and Trump himself, who declared on November 4, 2020 that he would demand that the Supreme Court halt the counting of votes: Well be going to the US Supreme Courtwe want all voting to stop.

Trump went on to state in December 2020, Whether its a justice of the Supreme Court, or a number of justices of the Supreme Courtlets see if they have the courage to do what everybody in this country knows is right.

Trumps statements raise the question of whether he, or any of his agents or accomplices, directly discussed his legal strategy for his case in the Supreme Court with his close adviser Ginni Thomas. If the legal strategy was discussed with Ginni Thomas, it strains credulity to imagine that she did not discuss it with her husband. If it was discussed with Clarence Thomas, did he discuss it with other members of his far-right bloc on the Supreme Court?

It is significant that the Ginni Thomas text messages with Meadows appear to reference at one point information she received from Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett, identified as ACB. The subject matter of the reference is alleged threats that ACB and others had been receiving. But if Ginni Thomas had access to ACB, a Trump nominee appointed to the Supreme Court only weeks prior to the election, then that raises the questionwhat else did they talk about? Was Ginni Thomas the conduit for conspiratorial messages between the Supreme Court and the White House?

Clarence Thomas was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1991 with the direct assistance of none other than then-Senator Joe Biden, who helped ram through his confirmation over objections that he had sexually harassed his subordinate Anita Hill while he was, ironically, the assistant secretary of education for the Office for Civil Rights. Biden presided over the infamous Senate Judiciary Committee hearings during which Hill was abusively interrogated and humiliated.

On the Supreme Court, Clarence Thomas aligned himself with arch-reactionary Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, with whom he frequently voted in a bloc. Scalia, like Clarence Thomas, displayed a blithe contempt for traditional norms of judicial ethics, once going on a private duck-hunting trip with President George W. Bushs vice president, Dick Cheney, while a case was pending against Cheney in the Supreme Court.

Thomas, together with Scalia, was part of the Supreme Court majority that facilitated the theft of the 2000 presidential election, halting the counting of votes and installing George W. Bush as president in the notorious decision in Bush v. Gore. During the proceedings, Scalia argued that the US Constitution did not give citizens the right to vote for the US president. It is clear that Trump and his accomplices hoped that Clarence Thomas and the rest of the far-right bloc on the court in 2020 would reprise the role of their predecessors 20 years earlier.

After Trump refused to acknowledge his defeat at the polls in November 2020, Clarence Thomas voted on the Supreme Court in favor of permitting a Trump-aligned lawsuit by the state of Texas, which was aimed at overturning the election results in four battleground states.

Next, when Pennsylvania Republicans filed a challenge to mail-in ballots properly received in their state after the date for in-person voting, Thomas dissented from the Supreme Court decision refusing to hear the case before the election results were determined, calling the majority decision inexplicable. He would go on to dissent from the ultimate decision on the case in February 2021, repeating Trumps claim that fraud is more prevalent with mail-in ballots.

Perhaps most significantly of all, Clarence Thomas subsequently voted to block the National Archives from turning over Trump administration documents to the House January 6 Committee, aligning himself with the positions taken by Trumps lawyers. This vote, above all the others, involved a direct and illegal conflict of interest because it effectively shielded his wife, who was herself involved in the conspiracy that the committee is investigating. Federal law prohibits judges from hearing cases in which their spouses have an interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding.

The Supreme Court is the highest body in the judicial branch, and there is no judicial procedure for disciplining or removing Supreme Court justices. Accordingly, the only procedure for disciplining or removing a corrupt justice is impeachment by the legislature. The last and only Supreme Court justice to have been subjected to this procedure was Samuel Chase, impeached in 1804 during the presidency of Thomas Jefferson for the far lesser offense of allegedly letting his partisan leanings affect his court decisions. Chase was acquitted by the Senate and remained in office.

The Ginni Thomas text messages further underscore the breadth and depth of the conspiracy to overthrow the government on January 6. Ginni Thomas herself attended Trumps fateful Stop the Steal rally in person, although she did not participate in the storming of the Capitol itself. It is now clear that the January 6 conspiracy embraced not only Trump and Republicans in the legislature, but sections of the army and police, lawyers, well-financed circles of Washington operatives, the leaders of violent fascistic street gangs, and reached its tendrils towards the Supreme Court itself.

Each additional exposure related to this conspiracy highlights the contrast between the scale of the conspiracy on the one hand, and the abject failure of the Democrats to arrest and prosecute the conspirators on the other, a pattern that is reflected in the response of leading Democrats to calls to impeach Thomas.

Directly asked on March 28 about the prospect of impeaching Thomas, Biden responded: I leave that to two entities: one, the January 6 Committee, and two, the Justice Department. Thats their judgment, not mine, to make.

House Speaker Nanci Pelosi likewise evaded a question on whether Clarence Thomas should resign. Responding to a reporters question last Thursday, Pelosi stated, I dont think he should have ever been appointed, but as to his resignation, she said, Im not going to go to that.

Statements by other leading Democrats have been similarly evasive, tepid and toothless. Democratic Senator Ron Wyden issued a statement demanding that at the bare minimum, Clarence Thomas recuse himself from any case released to the January 6th investigation, and should Donald Trump run again, any case related to the 2024 election. This statement is remarkable both for its timid appeal to Clarence Thomas not to be corrupt in the future and also for its acceptance of a scenario in which Trump may run again in 2024.

Democratic representatives Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have called for Clarence Thomas to resign or be impeached in the wake of the publication of Ginni Thomass text messages. Clarence Thomas should resign, Ocasio-Cortez wrote on Twitter on March 29. If not, his failure to disclose income from right-wing organizations, recuse himself from matters involving his wife, and his vote to block the Jan 6th commission from key information must be investigated and could serve as grounds for impeachment.

But these calls only serve as an effort to cover up the fact that the Democratic Party does not intend to do any such thing. Nearly 15 months after the January 6 coup attempt, the chief conspirators remain at large, including Trump himself.

The January 6 commission has secured the indictment of only one Trump operative: Steve Bannon, who openly disobeyed a congressional subpoena. Ginni Thomas, instead of being handcuffed and arrested, has merely been invited to voluntarily testify before the commission at some future date. If anything, the far-right forces behind the coup plot have been emboldened by the failure of the Democrats to take any serious measures to hold them accountable.
Seeking to cement his grip on the increasingly fascistic Republican Party ahead of the 2022 midterms and the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump held a campaign-style Save America rally in Macomb County, Michigan, on Saturday night, his first rally in the state in over 17 months.

The event was held in Washington Township. Macomb County voted narrowly for Trump in 2020, with Washington Township giving him his biggest margin of victory in the county. The rally was at an indoor venue holding about 5,500 people, making the turnout considerably smaller than at Trump rallies earlier this year in South Carolina, Texas and Arizona.

President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally for Senate Republican candidates in Valdosta, Ga. Dec. 5, 2020. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)

The event took place less than a month before a Michigan Republican Party nominating convention and served as an opportunity for Trump to promote his preferred batch of Republican candidates for the 2022 midterms.

His fascistic diatribe lasted for nearly two hours, during which he repeatedly claimed that the 2020 election had been stolen. He warned the far-right crowd that the biggest danger facing the country was not from Russia or China, but from sick and radical politicians who knowingly and unknowingly want to destroy our country.

Trump attacked President Joe Biden for the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan and coming to power of the Taliban. He claimed that Bidens weakness encouraged Russian President Vladimir Putin to invade Ukraine, something Putin would never have dared to do under his watch.

As in all of his stump speeches, Trump focused on anti-immigrant incitement. He denounced the corrupt media for hiding the supposed fact that the US southern border was being invaded by criminals. He accused Biden and the Democrats (falsely) of cutting funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, thereby allowing nests of killers to pour into the country.

Other Republicans speaking at the rally echoed Trumps fascistic attacks on immigrants and pledged their loyalty to the former president and would-be dictator, especially his central claim that the 2020 election was stolen by Democratic officials who needed to be held accountable. Trump lost Michigan by over 154,000 votes and was outpolled nationally by Biden by a margin of 7 million votes.

Nearly every speech at the event, including Trumps, included anti-Semitic insinuations against Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and the supposedly corrupting influence of his donations to the 2020 election process.

The threat of fascistic violence permeated the rally, with frequent calls from the crowd to lock up Trumps political opponents, including Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Attorney General Dana Nessell and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson. In light of the ongoing trial of the far-right militia members who sought to kidnap and possibly kill Whitmer in advance of the November 2020 elections, these threats are deadly serious.

Trump endorsed state-level Republican candidates Kristina Karamo, who is running for secretary of state, and Matthew DePerno, who is seeking the Republican nomination for attorney general. Both candidates advanced Trumps lies following Bidens victory that the election had been stolen and have since repeatedly claimed that the Biden presidency is illegitimate, earning Trumps approval.

Trumps intervention into the Republican primaries is part of a nationwide strategy to control the election apparatus in every battleground state.

In a report titled Replacing the Refs, States United Action found that as of March 1, 2022, 53 election deniers were running for governor in 24 states. The authors of the report defined an election denier as a candidate who either claimed that Trump was the winner of the 2020 election, participated in a Stop the Steal rally, or called for a forensic audit of the presidential vote.

The report also found there were 11 election deniers running for attorney general in 11 states and at least 22 election deniers running for secretary of state in 18 different states. Michigan is one of several states that has election deniers running in all three races.

In pledging his support to election deniers DePerno and Karamo, Trump said they would protect us from a corrupt election.

Karamo is a 36-year-old Christian fascist who gained Trumps favor after claiming she had witnessed election fraud at the TCF center in Detroit during the 2020 election. Karamo was one of the plaintiffs in the Texas lawsuit that reached the US Supreme Court in December 2020, seeking to invalidate millions of votes in Michigan, Georgia, Wisconsin and Arizona, four states Trump lost to Biden.

In a podcast she hosts called Solid Food, Karamo has stated her opposition to all mandatory vaccines as well as the teaching of evolution in schools. She asserts that the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol was not led by pro-Trump militias, but was instead perpetrated by Antifa radicals.

Building her bona fides with the fascists, Karamo appeared last October with other America First Trump-backed secretary of state candidates, such as Nevadas Jim Marchant and Arizonas Mark Finchem, at a QAnon conference in Las Vegas, Nevada.

In her speech Saturday, Karamo incited terrorist violence against Benson, whom she called an authoritarian leftist who doesnt care about the US Constitution. Karamo drove the crowd into a frenzy when she declared she had the right to redress my grievances to my government without being called an insurrectionist, without being called a big lie proponent. Echoing Trump, she attacked the corrupt media for protecting [Democratic House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi and Benson.

The Trump-endorsed candidate for Michigan attorney general, Matthew DePerno, spoke after Karamo. He promised that he would hold Whitmer, Benson and Nessell accountable for everything they have done, prompting shouts of Lock them up! from the crowd.

DePerno blamed Benson for letting Zuckerberg into our state with $8 million in illegal campaign finance violations. He continued: She allowed him to control your elections. She allowed him to put his collection boxes in Democratic-controlled locations and destroy your election. We will hold her accountable.

Backing the militias that stormed the Capitol in Lansing in April 2020 to oppose any measures to stem the spread of the coronavirus, DePerno pledged to end mask and vaccine mandates. He also attacked critical race theory as unconstitutional, and vowed to no longer allow these Democrats to teach our children to hate God, hate their country and hate their family.

Trump-endorsed candidate for Michigans 3rd congressional district John Gibbs spoke of his desire to oust RINOs (Republicans In Name Only), such as incumbent Republican Rep. Peter Meijer, who was one of 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Trump following the January 6 attack in Washington D.C.

The Republican speakers attacked immigrants, LGBTQ persons, coronavirus vaccines, mask mandates, critical race theory and their alleged socialist/communist opponents in the Democratic Party.

That Trump is free to continue to cultivate a fascist movement hell-bent on overturning democratic forms of rule is entirely the fault of the Biden administration, the Democratic Party and Attorney General Merrick Garland. Trump and the Republican Party are working to place the election machinery in every state in the hands of Trump acolytes who are committed to overturning elections that go the wrong way. They are being enabled by the Democrats, who have refused to prosecute the ringleaders of the coup attempt, beginning with the ex-president, and are engaged in a cover-up of the January 6 coup and the ongoing preparations for a new coup.

In an interview Sunday on ABCs This Week with George Stephanopoulos, White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain refused to confirm reporting in the New York Times that Biden had privately called for Trump to be prosecuted for inciting a coup. He told Stephanopoulos that he had never heard the president advocate for the prosecution of any person.
This weekend, a major campaign over alleged war crimes by Russian troops in Bucha, a city of about 28,500 inhabitants northwest of Kiev, swept the Western press.

The campaign marks a significant escalation of the war in Ukraine and comes right after Russia reported that two Ukrainian helicopters had entered Russian territory and bombed an oil depot in Belogorod on Friday.

Heavy smoke billows after a Russian bombardment on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, March 25, 2022. (AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)

The campaign is based on allegations by the Ukrainian authorities and army that Russian troops, while being in control of Bucha, tortured and murdered large numbers of civilians, with figures cited in press articles ranging widely, from a few dozen to over 400. Several bodies were reportedly found in ditches. Human Rights Watch has published a report, based on interviews with eyewitnesses in Bucha and other towns, that described rape and forms of torture, and called for an investigation into these as war crimes by Russian troops.

The Kremlin has denounced the claims of atrocities against civilians as a provocation by Ukrainian radicals and has called for an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on Monday. The Russian Foreign Ministry has pointed out that Russian troops had withdrawn from Bucha by Wednesday, March 30, one day after Russia had promised at peace negotiations that it would dramatically reduce its forces near Kiev.

The Kremlin also noted that a video message by Buchas mayor from March 31 makes no reference to any atrocities and that the images and reports only started circulating after Ukrainian troops and television had entered the town on Saturday, April 2.

The video message by Anatoly Fedoruk, indeed, shows the mayor exalted, proclaiming that all Russian orcs, as he called the Russian troops, had left the town, without any mention of atrocities or war crimes having been committed.

While the facts of what happened in Bucha and who perpetrated what crimes remain murky, two things are clear: First, the campaign brings the cynical hypocrisy of the imperialist powers over war crimes to a new level; and, second, it is used to significantly escalate the war.

The same imperialist powers that are now crying shock and horror at unproven allegations over killings by the Russian army have reduced large parts of the Middle East and North Africa to ruins. US wars since 2001 alone have claimed, according to conservative estimates, between 3 and 4 million civilian casualties.

In fact, the rhetoric of the press campaign over Bucha and the claims of a genocide and atrocities bear the hallmark of the imperialist propaganda that has preceded the launching of or the escalation of countless wars in defense of human rights since 1991, including in Yugoslavia, the Middle East and North Africa.

It is impossible to provide anything close to an exhaustive list of the war crimes that have been perpetrated by the US, as well as by British, Australian, French and German imperialism in the past decades. Future historians will have to fill volumes to document and analyze the crimes committed.

A few recent cases, however, should be recalled:

 The Kunduz Massacre in 2009, the single biggest war crime of the German army since the end of World War II, which resulted in at least 90 civilian deaths.

 The US siege of Mosul, Iraq, in 2014, that claimed an estimated 40,000 lives.

 The destruction of Raqqa, Syria, in 2017, by US forces, with over 1,600 civilian casualties.

In none of these cases, which have by now been abundantly documented, were those responsible held to account. Julian Assange, who has exposed some of the most horrendous crimes by US imperialism, has been cruelly tortured and confined for over a decade at the behest of Washington. He is now being threatened with extradition to the US and a 175-year prison sentence.

It should also be noted that on Thursday, Human Rights Watch published a report indicating that Ukrainian troops may have committed war crimes by shooting Russian prisoners of war in their legs and filming it. The Ukrainian army has, in fact, publicly announced such war crimes and has been engaged in a weeks-long social media campaign, sharing images of killed Russian soldiers. This itself constitutes a violation of the Geneva Convention for the humane treatment of prisoners of war. Of this, however, there has been almost no word in the Western press.

The campaign over Bucha now serves as the basis for a significant escalation of NATOs proxy war with Russia in Ukraine, just days after both Russian and Ukrainian negotiators evaluated peace negotiations as positive.

The response in Germany has been particularly hysterical. Germanys Chancellor Olaf Scholz described the dead bodies in Bucha as a war crime and announced further weapons deliveries to Ukraine as well as sanctions by NATO against Russia in the coming days.

Writing for the liberal Suddeutsche Zeitung, Stefan Kornelius raged that the revelations of dead bodies in Bucha showed that Ukraine was subject to a war of annihilation, directly comparing the ongoing war to Hitlers invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941. This is a conscious minimization and relativization of the crimes of German imperialism in World War II. As part of Hitlers war of annihilation against the Soviet Union, the Nazis occupied Soviet Ukraine, killing over 5 million Ukrainians, among them 1.5 million Ukrainian Jews.

Ukrainian nationalists, the antecedents of the Azov Battalion and other paramilitaries that are now functioning as shock troops by the imperialist powers and the Kiev government, participated in these crimes, perpetrating massacres against Jews, Poles and civilians who opposed fascism.

Now, the German ruling class is again relying on these far-right forces and seizes on the war as an opportunity to ram through a record 100-billion-euro war budget, tripling the countrys defense spendingsomething not even Hitler dared to do after coming to power in 1933.

Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelensky called the dead bodies in Bucha evidence of an unfolding genocide and effectively ruled out any significant progress in peace negotiations, stating, We can only have peace by fighting. His foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba said that now there could be no more hesitation about further weapon deliveries to Ukraine, We need weaponsnow!

In fact, Ukraine has been flooded with weapons by NATO, especially the US and now also Germany, which is sending tanks, drones and anti-tank weapons. According to the Washington Post, the Biden administration has spent $2.3 billion on defense support for Ukraine since coming into office. Of these, $1.6 billion were committed in the first five weeks of the war.

Last week, Biden announced another $500 million of budget aid for Ukraine. On Saturday, the Pentagon pledged yet another $300 million for military equipment, including drones, armored vehicles and machine guns.

These massive weapons deliveries have already had a major impact on the war. Even judging by figures provided by the Kremlin, Russian military casualties (1,351) are higher than the official Ukrainian civilian death toll, which stands at 1,232. However, the real death toll among Russian soldiers is widely believed to be much higher, with the Pentagon estimating that 7,000 Russian troops may have been killed.

According to the Economist, Russian generals are dying at a rate unprecedented since World War II. Reports suggest that as many as 18 high-ranking military commanders have been killed in combat, including several generals.

While the Economist cited a number of possible reasons for the high exposure of Russias highest-ranking militaryincluding poor equipment, logistics, and morale among troopsthe report also noted that NATO was likely helping Ukraine in intercepting Russian military communication and locating troops. Moreover, the Economist referenced a report by Yahoo News that revealed many years of US training of Ukrainian paramilitaries, including snipers. One former American official told Yahoo News, I think were seeing a big impact from snipers  the training really paid off.
Amazon's anti-union stance might spill into the apps for employees. The Intercept says it obtained internal documents detailing a planned worker chat app that, while meant to boost happiness, would include a blocklist focused heavily on silencing pro-union keywords. In addition to forbidding the use of the word "union," it would also block terms like "compensation," "pay raise," "ethics" and even "robots."

Other bans would focus mostly on keeping things positive, such as "rude" and "stupid." Most, however, appear centered on working conditions. Amazon supposedly decided on the words at an upper-echelon meeting in November 2021, when they outlined an app that would encourage "Shout-Outs" and offer digital rewards for providing value to the company.

The program linked to the app will reportedly launch in April. In a statement to The Intercept, however, Amazon spokeswoman Barbara Agrait said the initiative "has not been approved yet" and might be changed or scrapped.

If the program and its associated app launch, they would come at a tense moment. Amazon warehouse workers in Staten Island just voted to unionize, and those at a Bessemer, Alabama facility just had a highly contested rerun election where both sides accused each other of interference. While this app isn't about to hinder union organizers (they weren't likely to use Amazon-monitored chats), it could underscore the very labor concerns the company doesn't want employees to mention.
President Joe Biden speaks on the March jobs report at the White House in Washington, D.C., on Friday, April 1, 2022.

President Biden and first lady Jill Biden marked the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on Friday.

For so many around the globe, including fellow Americans all across the country, this sacred month is a time for reflection and spiritual growth. Communities come together to practice forgiveness and resilience, to show compassion and generosity of spirit to those in need, of giving, and to celebrate the many blessings of life with loved ones, Biden said in a statement.

This year, the simple act of breaking the fast will be an even more poignant reminder of the joys of health, family, and community. And we will continue to hold in our hearts all those families grieving a lost loved one who are facing an empty chair at the table, he added.

The president also took the opportunity to highlight Muslim communities in China, Myanmar and elsewhere that have been subject to persecution.

During this holy month, as Muslims everywhere honor Gods great mercy let us also renew our shared commitment to show kindness, mercy, and understanding to one another. Let us honor the simple yet profound truth that all people are equal in dignity and rights, he said. Thats why the United States will continue to speak out for human rights everywhereincluding for Uyghurs in China, Rohingya in Burma, and other Muslim communities all over the world.

During Ramadan  the holy month for Muslims  Muslims refrain from drinking and eating between dawn and dusk, breaking their fast after the sun sets (known as an iftar), according to Vox.

During that daytime period, Muslims also avoid engaging in sexual activity and smoking.

The holy month, which is based on a lunar calendar, is meant to be a time of studying the Quran, being more generous and charitable, praying more, and thinking about ones relationship with God, according to the news outlet.

There are close to 2 billion Muslims worldwide, according to the Pew Research Center in 2019.

Updated 11:08 a.m.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
Indian star Ram Charan is revelling in the success of S.S. Rajamoulis period action drama RRR (Rise Roar Revolt). The film released March 25 worldwide and scored a $65 million opening weekend, debuting in third place in the U.S. and second in the U.K. and Ireland.

Produced on budget of approximately $73 million by D. V. V. Danayya, RRR is a lavish, rambunctious entertainer crammed with eye-popping set pieces and death-defying stunts. Set in the 1920s, the historical fiction story by Vijayendra Prasad and Rajamouli see Indian freedom fighters Alluri Sitarama Raju (Ram Charan) and Komaram Bheem (NTR Jr) meet and become fast friends. Their common enemies are the occupying colonial British. The cast also includes Bollywood A-listers Ajay Devgn and Alia Bhatt.

More from Variety

The film, which was the leading film worldwide on its opening weekend, has now marched past INR8 billion ($105 million), according to industry estimates.

I did expect it to be a big hit, but the No. 1 tag I never expected  that was a beautiful surprise, Ram Charan told Variety. That was mind blowing for us, even for Rajamouli I feel.

The cast went through an extensive workshop process before principal photography commenced. Their characters were laid out in minute detail by Rajamouli, from childhood to teenage years through early adulthood. Ram Charans Alluri Sitarama Raju, for example, is well read, a yogi and excels in archery.

All these elements had to be embedded in my character when he begins the film, though everything is not going to be visually seen from the first scene, said Ram Charan. That was a very challenging part because you had only the scope to emote this much, I could not go all out. And meditation helps his character to withhold a lot of emotions, coming from his childhood to now what he is going through with his friend in the present. All this takes a lot of mental strength.

Story continues

The actor is also in peak physical condition in the film and the effort was not to create a modern chiseled gym-toned body fueled by protein shakes, but to be true to the 1920s period where gyms in India took the form of wrestling groups.

One of the talking points in the film is the Naatu Naatu dance number, shot in Kyiv, which is now a war zone due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Ram Charan got in touch with Rusty, who was in charge of his security. He burst out crying, and he said the situation is bad. He sent me ground level videos, which have not been seen in any of the television coverage. They were dreadful, said Ram Charan. I have seen bodies frozen, not in ice, but frozen due to being burned. If you touch it, probably they will turn into ashes. Rusty is now one of the Ukrainians fighting against the Russians. Ram Charan is helping him financially as well as emotionally.

I keep texting him, he keeps talking to me when the day ends, maybe they are relaxed a bit sitting in bunkers, sometimes its just a small talk just to pep him up. And he sends me pictures and we do a video chat, said Ram Charan.

The actor previously worked with Rajamouli on Magadheera (2009). Apart from reuniting with Rajamouli, one of the highlights of the RRR experience for Ram Charan was bonding with his co-star NTR Jr, who is also known as Tarak.

Working with my buddy Tarak and achieving the scale of success in our best director of Indias direction, this is the best any actor or any person in my shoes will ask for, said Ram Charan. I know there was so-called rivalry between us, but weve been friends even before RRR.

Next up for Ram Charan is Koratala Sivas Acharya, alongside his father, Indian cinema megastar Chiranjeevi. While Chiranjeevi has had cameos in Ram Charans films including Magadheera and Bruce Lee: The Fighter (2015), this is the first time they share significant screen time together. In the film, due to release on Apr. 29, Chiranjeevi plays a social reformer who fights against corruption while Ram Charan plays a new comrade who looks up to him.

Its a dream come true, Ive learned a lot. I dont think I stepped into Acharya as a co-star, Ive stepped into it as a student and Ive learned a lot from him, said Ram Charan. And the best part is he never hand held me through any of the shooting days. He let me live my character and he let me make mistakes. He let me do another take. But he didnt have any problem, never lost his cool, and that Im really thankful for.

Ram Charan is currently filming a project identified as RC15, directed by Shankar Shanmugam, known for his big-budget extravaganzas including Sivaji, Enthiran (aka Robot) and 2.0, all starring superstar Rajinikanth.

After that is a film with Gowtam Tinnanuri, who directed the hit film Jersey (2019). Details are under wraps at the moment.

Best of Variety

Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Click here to read the full article.
Pit Bull Adopted

courtesy best friends animal sanctuary

Bella the pit bull's eventful journey from neglected canine to beloved adopted pet has reached its happy conclusion.

According to a news release from Best Friends Animal Society, the formerly neglected dog, who gnawed off her own leg in an attempt to save herself, went to her new forever home on March 24.

Bella's story starts in Saginaw Country, Michigan, where a postal worker found the pit bull terrier painfully tangled up in her tether in a yard with no food, water, or shelter. Before her rescue, Bella chewed her back leg off at the thigh while trying to escape the tether she was stuck in. Saginaw County Animal Care & Control freed the malnourished and underweight dog and treated her injuries.

"Walking into the backyard and seeing Bella that day was unimaginably gut-wrenching," Desi Sage, the animal care and control officer who rescued Bella, said in a statement. "Against all odds, Bella overcame being left for dead."

After recovering from her physical injuries at Saginaw County Animal Care & Control, Bella started working on repairing the emotional damage left behind by the neglect she experienced. In an effort to provide the dog with the best care possible, Saginaw County Animal Care & Control put out a call for a rescue that had experience helping dogs overcome trauma.

RELATED: Beloved 3-Lb. Therapy Dog Norbert Celebrates 13th Birthday: He's 'Changed Lives for the Better'

Best Friends Animal Sanctuary, the largest no-kill pet sanctuary in the nation, answered the call and agreed to welcome the pet after reviewing Bella's medical and behavior history. Best Friends has a long history of helping neglected and abused pets, including caring for a number of the dogs rescued from Michael Vick's dogfighting ring.

Sage and her colleague Abbe Balderstone left Michigan early on January 15 with Bella on a three-day, 1,800-mile journey to Best Friend Animal Society's sanctuary in Kanab, Utah. The pit bull's road trip was funded by Saginaw residents Bob and Pat Schust, who covered the cost of Bella's 1,800-mile road trip, and Zach Webster of Thelen Subaru of the Thelen Auto Group in Bay City. Thelen Subaru loaned the car Bella and her travel companions used for the road trip and covered the cost of gas.

Story continues

"I'm beyond thankful to Best Friends Animal Sanctuary for ensuring that Bella will never endure such pain and agony again," Sage said upon bringing Bella to the sanctuary, per Best Friends Animal Society's release. "I believe this next chapter in her life will help her move forward and hopefully eventually land her in a loving home with people who truly see how special she really is."

Pit Bull Adopted

courtesy best friends animal sanctuary

RELATED: How Mac N Cheese Went from Dumped Rescue Pet to a 2022 Oscars Star and John Travolta's New Dog

Sage predicted Bella's future. In February, Kim Diehl and Jason Reding of Rockport, Illinois, visited Best Friends Animal Society's Utah sanctuary in hopes of finding a new pet after the death of their senior pit bull Roxanne, whom the couple adopted from the same sanctuary. The Diehl and Reding read about Bella before visiting the sanctuary and were excited to meet her when they arrived.

"The rest is history. Bella just has an irresistible face. It was love at first sight," Diehl said of the first walk she and Reding took with the pooch. "We brought her to stay with us at the sanctuary's onsite cottages for a week. She's so energetic and has such a bubbly personality. We grew to love her even more."

Pit Bull Adopted

courtesy best friends animal sanctuary

After this adorable encounter, Diehl and Reding applied to adopt Bella. Once they were approved to be the pup's parents, the couple flew to Denver, rented a car, and drove to Kanab to pick you the pit bull and drive her back to her forever home in Illinois.

Never miss a story  sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from juicy celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

"Her back story is very sad, and it's too bad that she had to go through that, but we intend to make up for all of that," Diehl said of the dog's future. "We intend to spoil her rotten."

Bella left Best Friends' sanctuary with a massive grin and enjoyed her leisurely road trip to Illinois. At home, the pit bill has quickly adjusted to a life of pampering.

"Bella has a bed on the floor next to me and has been sleeping through the night. It's hard to believe that she is potty trained, but so far, no accidents. We have so much love for this adorable girl," Diehl added.
Missiles struck Ukraines southern city of Odesa on Sunday, with Russia saying it had destroyed an oil processing plant and three fuel depots used by the Ukrainian military to supply its troops.

Towers of black smoke rose above the Black Sea port and residents told The Independent they heard a large explosion on Sunday morning which was so powerful it shook windows in the centre of the city.

Russian defence ministry spokesman Major General Igor Konashenkov said missiles were fired from ships and aircraft to strike the facilities, which he claimed were used to provide fuel to Ukrainian forces near Mykolaiv, more than 100km east of Odesa.

A woman in Odesa as black smoke rises above the Black Sea port following shelling (AP)

Odesas military administration said the rockets had been fired from the Crimean peninsula, which was annexed by Russia in 2014.

No casualties as for now. The rockets were fired from Crimea, hitting the oil storage, port and some civilian infrastructure, a spokesperson for the military administration told The Independent.

The spokesperson said he did not think that Sundays attack was the start of a wider assault on Odesa.

Landing for them in Odesa is suicide, but we are not sure what their plans are. They pulled out of Kyiv and the north [of Ukraine]  and might review their plans, he added.

Odesa is Ukraines largest port and the main base for Ukraines navy. It has been targeted by Moscow as it seeks a land corridor to Transnistria, a Russian-speaking breakaway province of Moldova that hosts Russian troops.

Since Vladimir Putin launched his invasion on 24 February, the Kremlins forces have tried to take Mykolaiv in an attempt to encircle Odesa. But over the last few weeks, Ukrainian forces have pushed back the invading troops towards Kherson, which remains Russian-occupied.

In a separate development, Greeces foreign minister Nikos Dendias arrived in Odesa on Sunday on a humanitarian aid mission and met with mayor Gennady Trukhanov. The Greek foreign ministry said it planned to set up a continuous mechanism of distributing aid from Greece and to reopen its consulate in the city.

Story continues

Greek foreign minister Nikos Dendias (centre) in Odesa with mayor Gennady Trukhanov (left) (Reuters)

Meanwhile, there was little sign of a breakthrough in efforts to negotiate an end to the brutal five-week war. On Sunday, Russias chief negotiator, Vladimir Medinsky, said talks were due to resume on Monday but added that a draft deal was not ready for any meeting between Mr Putin and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky.

He said that while Ukraine was showing more realism by agreeing to be neutral, renouncing nuclear weapons, not joining a military bloc and refusing to host military bases, there had been no progress on other key Russian demands.

I repeat again and again: Russias position on Crimea and Donbas remains UNCHANGED, he said on Telegram, adding that talks via video conference would continue on Monday.

Ukrainian negotiator David Arakhamia, meanwhile, said enough progress had been made for direct talks between the two leaders.

This map shows the extent of Russian invasion of Ukraine (Press Association Images)

Russia has recognised declarations of independence by the self-proclaimed republics of Luhansk and Donetsk in the Donbas area of eastern Ukraine, which rose up against Kyivs rule.

Ukraine said on Saturday its forces had retaken all areas around Kyiv, claiming complete control of the capital region for the first time since Russia launched its invasion.

The mayor of Bucha, a liberated town 3km northwest of the capital, said 300 residents had been killed during a month-long occupation by the Russian army, and corpses were seen in a mass grave and lying on the streets.

Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said that what happened in Bucha and other suburbs of Kyiv can only be described as genocide, with civilians having been shot with tied hands.
The 24th Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum - Credit: Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images

Several yachts belonging to Russian oligarchs have been commandeered by various law enforcement agencies in retaliation for Vladimir Putins invasion of Ukraine that started in late February. The latest is a $90-million, 255-foot vessel owned by owned by Putin crony Viktor Vekselberg, which Spanish authorities took hold of at the direction of the United States, the Justice Department announced on Monday.

The yacht, named Tango, was subject to seizure based on violation of U.S. bank fraud, money laundering, and sanction statutes, the Justice Department wrote, before noting that Vekselberg was using U.S. banks to maintain the boat despite not having proper licensing to do so from the Treasury Department.

More from Rolling Stone

The DOJ even released a sizzle reel of the Tangos seizure:

Vekselbergs name may sound familiar, as hes long been embroiled in Trump World. He attended Trumps inauguration in January of 2017, and from then until August of 2017 sent several payments totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars to Michael Cohen, Trumps former attorney and fixer, through a company called Columbus Nova. Vekselberg also attended a 2015 dinner in Russia with Michael Flynn, Trumps first national security adviser who resigned after just weeks on the job after it came to light that he lied about post-election conversations with Russias ambassador to the United States. The dinner Flynn attended with Vekselberg was hosted by RT, Russias English-language, Kremlin-controlled media network.

Vekselberg drew the interest of U.S. law enforcement in 2018 when the Justice Department slapped sanctions on him and other Putin-connected oligarchs in an effort to punish Russia for interfering in the 2016 election. A month later, Vekselberg was stopped and questioned as part of Special Counsel Robert Muellers investigation into the Trump campaigns connection to Russia. The New York Times noted at the time that Vekselberg himself was not suspected of any wrongdoing.

Story continues

Vekselberg, a multi-billionaire and one of Russias richest men, made his fortune by buying up assets after the fall of the Soviet Union. The Washington Post noted in 2018 that he has particularly expensive tastes, and is thought to own the worlds largest collection of Faberge eggs. Vekselbergs collection of luxury wares is now absent a yacht.

Today marks our taskforces first seizure of an asset belonging to a sanctioned individual with close ties to the Russian regime. It will not be the last, Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement announcing the boats seizure. Together, with our international partners, we will do everything possible to hold accountable any individual whose criminal acts enable the Russian government to continue its unjust war.

Best of Rolling Stone

Click here to read the full article.
In the Ukrainian town of Bucha, a corpse could be seen lying in the street, the mans arms tied behind his back. Other images from the Kyiv suburb showed bodies scattered in debris-strewn streets and some thrown into a mass grave.

In Motyzhyn, west of Kyiv, four people appeared to Associated Press journalists to have been thrown into a pit after being shot at close range. Residents told reporters the mayor and their family members, bound and blindfolded, were among them.

Ukrainian officials identified the mayor as Olha Sukhenko.

"Nobody expected this," Ukrainian Denys Dniprovskyi, 36, told USA TODAY via phone Monday from Kyiv, about a half-hour drive from Bucha. "It was some rumors, but the reality is much worse."

Photos and news reports of dead civilians in areas around the capital Kyiv, which was retaken by Ukrainian forces after a Russian retreat, have ratcheted up global outrage, possibly marking a pivotal moment six weeks into Russia's war in Ukraine.

The apparent slaughter of civilians, condemned by leaders across the globe, has prompted calls for a tough new round of sanctions from French President Emmanuel Macron and President Joe Biden, who called for a war crimes trial of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

'THIS GUY IS BRUTAL': Biden calls for war crimes trial for Putin for atrocities in Ukraine

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has denounced the killings as "genocide," a war crime. But asked by a reporter Monday, Biden declined to characterize the atrocities as "genocide."

"We saw what happened in Bucha. He is a war criminal," Biden told reporters.

Bodies lie on a street in Bucha, Ukraine , northwest of Kyiv, as Ukraine says Russian forces are making a "rapid retreat" from northern areas around Kyiv and the city of Chernigiv, on April 2, 2022.

Key evidence for war crimes investigations

Ukrainian officials said the bodies of 410 civilians were found in Kyiv-area towns recently retaken from Russian forces. In Bucha, 280 people were buried in mass graves, according to Oleksiy Arestovych, an adviser to Zelenskyy. That figure could not be independently verified by USA TODAY.

Story continues

State Department spokesperson Ned Price on Monday cited reports of violence against civilians in towns including Bucha, Irpin and Hostomel.

"We are seeing credible reports of torture, rape and civilians executed alongside their families. There are reports and images of a nightmare litany of atrocities, including reports of land mines and booby traps left behind by Putins forces," he said.

Price added: "The images we have seen and reports we have heard suggest these atrocities are not the act of a rogue soldier. They are part of a broader, troubling campaign."

The Associated Press said its journalists saw 21 bodies, including nine in civilian clothes apparently shot at close range at a site that locals said was used as a Russian base. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs.

One BBC journalist visited the basement of a Bucha home to find the bodies of five men in civilian clothes, their hands bound, who appeared to have been shot.

"It's very difficult to process it on a human level because all sorts of emotions hit you, and not all of them are useful," Maryan Zablotskyy, a member of the Ukrainian parliament, told USA TODAY via phone on Monday as he drove to Lviv. "What this means, not just for Ukraine but for generally the world as a whole, now they truly see the real face of Vladimir Putin  not only him but also his armed forces."

Despite the horrifying reports that continue to emerge from Bucha, it was the nearby town of Borodyanka that suffered the greatest number of civilian casualties in the Russian invasion, Ukraines prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, said on national television Monday.

Volodymyr Omelyan, Ukraines former infrastructure minister who recently joined the nation's volunteer Territorial Defense Forces in Kyiv, told USA TODAY he saw bodies of people in civilian clothes lying on streets in areas surrounding the capital city.

"It is nothing new for people who know history. But definitely for Ukrainians and for the civilized world, it's a great shock because it was hardly imaginable a such thing happening in the 21st century in the middle of Europe," Omelyan said from Kyiv over the phone.

Experts said the reports provide key evidence for war crimes and could help accelerate war crimes investigations.

"It's quite unusual to be able to get this kind of evidence of likely war crimes because it's unusual that the attacking military withdraws so rapidly from a front of occupied territory, and that Ukrainian forces and journalists and presumably war crimes investigators are able to get there quickly and document the situation," said Kathryn Sikkink, a professor of human rights policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.

She added that it will still be "difficult, if not impossible, to hold Putin or high-level Russian officials accountable for the invasion" because the International Criminal Court doesnt have a police force and other countries will not implement an arrest warrant within Russia.

PUTIN AND WAR CRIMES: Why Russian leaders are unlikely to be prosecuted

WHAT IS A WAR CRIME? Russia is accused of them, but what exactly constitutes a war crime?

Tipping point that changes Russia's approach ?

Whether the atrocities mark a tipping point that could change Russia's approach to the war is less clear. Some experts said they doubted international condemnation of the crimes would influence Putin's calculus.

"Though the rest of the world will rightly condemn Russia for these atrocities, it is unlikely that such condemnations will affect Putins war strategy or the behavior of his forces in Ukraine," said Arne Westad, a historian at Yale University.

After emerging reports over the weekend, Lithuania, Germany and France announced plans Monday to effectively expel some Russian diplomats. At the same time, some European nations are divided on whether to embargo Russian oil and coal.

The U.S. plans to impose new sanctions on Russia this week, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Monday.

Workers carry a body of a civilian man in town of Bucha, Ukraine.

Outrage over the killings, which Russia has denied, also could stymie peace talks.

"Its very difficult to negotiate when you see what they have done here," Zelenskyy told reporters during a visit to Bucha on Monday.

William Pomeranz, acting director of the Wilson Centers Kennan Institute, a Washington-based think tank that focuses on Russian and Eurasia research, said the apparent atrocities will likely influence public opinion for years to come.

"Clearly this massacre will influence public opinion," he said. "It just means the tensions between these two countries, if indeed Ukraine remains a country, will last for generations."

Whether the deaths influence Russian public opinion isnt clear given disinformation in Russia and arrests of protesters.

Russian media have shared images of mass graves and of bodies lying on the streets of Kyiv suburbs and have attributed the deaths to Ukrainian forces, said Nika Aleksejeva, a Latvia-based researcher with the Digital Forensic Research Lab at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank.

"The overwhelming narrative is that it is not Russian soldiers but Ukrainian who staged the scene for foreign journalists to shock the world, or who shot people with white armbands themselves," Aleksejeva said.

'The worst ghosts of World War II'

The suspected war crimes remind many historians of past Russian tactics, including the brutal leveling of the Chechen capital, Grozny, and the bombing and siege of Aleppo, Syria. Mass graves of hundreds of bodies have been uncovered in Chechnya in recent decades, Westad noted.

"Im afraid that we will find more of these sites in Ukraine when the Russian troops withdraw," Westad said.

John Randolph, director of the Russian, East European and Eurasian Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, said reports from the territories liberated by Ukraine invoke "the worst ghosts of World War II."

"The scenes out of Ukraine towns and villages and suburbs like Bucha repeat the killing fields of the Holocaust, with mass executions of bound citizens and bullets to the head," he said.

Dniprovskyi, who has been transporting food and medicine in and around Kyiv in recent weeks, said he's terrified to reach out to friends and old neighbors.

"I'm really afraid even to call them because I'm not sure they still alive," he said.

Omelyan, the former infrastructure minister, said he believes Russians are committing similar acts of brutality in other areas, including in the besieged city of Mariupol in southeastern Ukraine.

"The most awful pictures I'm 100% sure will come from Mariupol," he said.

Chris Kenning reported from Louisville, Kentucky. Contact him at ckenning@gannett.com or on Twitter at @chris_kenning. Grace Hauck reported from Chicago. Contact her at ghauck@usatoday.com or at @grace_hauck.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Bucha, Ukraine massacre: Graphic pictures show bodies, war crimes
Lila Ammouri and Susan Frazier took a trip to Switzerland where they died (Screengrab/Facebook)

At Pegasos, a voluntary assisted dying association in Basel, Switzerland, death costs 10,000 euros, or just over$11,000.

The figure includes paperwork and consultations, a prescription for the sodium barbiturate Nembutal, an appointment where the drugs are administered, cremation and couriering of the patients ashes home.

The deed is performed in a windowless cocoon room with soft lighting and comfortable sofas. Patients can choose whether to receive a lethal dose through an arm-fed tube which they control, or by drinking the lethal solution, along with an anti-vomiting drug.

Pegasos, based in Basel, Switzerland, offers a complete medical aid in dying service for $11,000 (Pegasos Association)

When the time comes, the patient can play their favourite song while holding the hand of a loved one. If the drug is taken intravenously, they slip off almost immediately and die shortly afterwards.

Doctors will then usually notify Swiss authorities, who attend the clinic afterwards to ensure everything was carried out within the legal framework.

Sisters Lia Ammouri, 54, and Susan Frazier, 4  high-achieving, popular and seemingly healthy, happy medical professionals  travelled to Basel from their home in Arizona via Chicago on 3 February.

Ms Ammouri, a palliative doctor, had dedicated much of her professional life to caring for people at the end of theirs.

Lila Ammouri, a palliative care doctor from Arizona, died by assisted suicide in Switzerland (Findatopdoc.com)

And Ms Frazier, a nurse, had recently been promoted to a senior leadership position at Aetna Health Insurance where they both worked. One colleague recalled her blasting The Final Countdown by Europe every Friday, so excited she was to reach the weekend.

The sisters laughter-filled stories always revolved around each other, friends recalled. Ms Frazier, who had a high-pressure job looking after acutely ill patients, was able to laugh the stress away.

They didnt tell any family or friends they were intending to end their ownlives, even booking return flights back to the US on 13 February and being expected back at work on 15 February.

Friends thought they might have been kidnapped, and that the spelling errors in their text messages was evidence that someone was impersonating them.

Story continues

Friend David Biglari said he became suspicious after he received a text from one of the missing sisters with an uncharacteristic spelling mistake (Fox10)

On Tuesday, a spokesman for the Basel-Landschaft public prosecutors office confirmed to The Independent that the sisters had died by suicide within the legal framework.

The public prosecutors office of the Canton of Basel-Landschaft confirms that the two US women died during their stay in Switzerland. They both committed suicide at an assisted suicide organisation, Michael Lutz told The Independent.

As tributes flowed to the womens sense of humour and kindness, their brother Cal and friends were left with many unanswered questions.

They were really special. They never hurt anybody, Cal Ammouri told The Independent.

Im never going to get over it. Im all alone now.

Pegasos is one of several Swiss-based organisations which offer access to end-of-life medical assisted dying for thousands of foreigners, sometimes referred to as suicide tourists.

At the time of publication, Pegasos had not responded to several questions from The Independent about its end of life programme.

Swiss law tolerates medically assisted dying in certain situations, as long as the patient is over 18, able to administer the dose themselves, and is not being advised by someone trying to pressure them or take advantage of them.

Due to strict laws around assisting suicide in most US states, hundreds of so-called suicide tourists have travelled to Switzerland to die over the past two decades.

Only about one in five Americans live in states that have passed what advocates refer to as medical aid-in-dying legislation.

The Oregon Death with Dignity Act, which came into law in 1997, was the first in the country to offer the terminally-ill the right to self-administer lethal drugs prescribed by a doctor.

Since then eight other states have passed similar laws, including California, Colorado, Hawaii, New Jersey, Maine and New Mexico, while Montana allows assisted dying via a State Supreme Court ruling.

Twelve more states, including Ms Ammouri and Ms Fraziers home state of Arizona, are currently considering bills.

Strict residency requirements make it difficult for terminally ill patients to receive medical aid if their state does not allow it.

Peg Sandeen is CEO of medical aid in dying advocacy group Death with Dignity (Death with Dignity/YouTube)

Peg Sandeen, CEO of advocacy group Death with Dignity, told The Independent: Every year, a few terminally ill individuals manage to move across state lines to a jurisdiction where Death with Dignity is legal. However, this option has proven difficult, both technically and physically, as moving when you are dying is a nearly impossible task.

The lack of mobility from being severely ill makes it hard enough, but finding a doctor willing to prescribe life-ending drugs to a new patient can be a bigger obstacle.

Portland-based non-profit Compassion and Choices filed a lawsuit challenging Oregons residency requirement last October on behalf of physician Nicholas Gideonse, alleging that the law was both discriminatory and profoundly unfair to dying patients at the most critical time of their life.

In the US, legislation around end-of-life care explicitly bans euthanasia, and only mentally-sound, terminally-ill patients can access a doctors prescription for medication they may decide to take to peacefully end their suffering if it becomes unbearable.

New York introduced legislation to allow medical aid in dying laws in 2016. The bill, which narrowly scraped through the health committee by 14-11, would require a patient to make a signed and dated request for the prescription witnessed by at least two individuals who vouch for their capacity to make an informed decision. It has been stalled in the state assembly since 2021.

Critics of medical aid in dying laws argue that those affected by disability or depression could be coerced into making the decision to end their lives, saying there were too few safeguards, and that it diminishes self-determination.

Ms Sandeen says that opposition to the death with dignity movement were typically well-funded national organisations with religious affiliations who cloaked their messages in slippery slope arguments.

According to analysis of medical aid in dying in Oregon shows there have been few complaints about coercion.

In 2019, the outgoing Disability Rights Oregon executive director (DRO), which has federal watchdog powers, wrote that he had never knowingly received a single complaint in the 22 years hed been in the role that a person with disabilities were being coerced to end their lives.

Compassion and Choices provided data showing that in nine states where with end of life legislation, 37 per cent of terminally ill patients who were prescribed a lethal drug didnt end up taking the medication.

Advocates argue that simply by having the prescription on hand, and knowing they can use it should the pain become too great, is an immense palliative relief in itself.

Figures from Oregons Death with Dignity Act report show increasing numbers of prescriptions are going unused (Oregon State Government)

In 2021, 383 Oregonians were issued with prescriptions, but only 238 of those were used, including 20 who had been prescribed the drug in previous years.

Supporters of medical aid in dying also want to see the word assisted suicide removed from descriptions of the practice.

They point to legislation which specifically prohibits suicide in several state laws.

And if a terminally ill person uses medical aid in dying, the death certificate does not list the cause as suicide, but rather the underlying disease the person was suffering with.

For groups like the Swiss-based Dignitas, everyone who is suffering from a terminal illness should be entitled to the right to die on their own terms, in their own home.

Dignitas aim is not that people from all over the world travel to Switzerland, but that other countries adapt their laws to implement end-of-life-options so that people have a choice and do not need to become a suicide tourist, a spokesperson for the Swiss-based group told The Independent.

And Pegasos strongly recommends patients should inform family members if they decide to take their life.

Discussing your plans with family members may lead to people saying what needs to be said before you go, its website states.

This helps bring closure and is infinitely better than leaving a life unspoken for and full of regret.
The Taliban on Sunday announced a ban on cultivating poppy flowers, which are used to make heroine, in a move seen as courting global approval while also putting farmers livelihoods at risk.

The order also forbids the production, use and transit of other narcotics.

As per the decree of the supreme leader of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, all Afghans are informed that from now on, cultivation of poppy has been strictly prohibited across the country, the Talibans supreme leader Haibatullah Akhundzada reportedly said at a news conference on Sunday.

Akhundzadas order warned that if anyone violates the decree, the crop will be destroyed immediately and the violator will be treated according to the Sharia law.

Amid the Talibans pursuit of international recognition since its takeover of Kabul in August, foreign leaders have encouraged the Taliban to control narcotics Afghanistan, which is the worlds biggest opium producer.

But with Afghanistans economy on the brink of collapse, the ban could drive already impoverished farmers into more dire conditions.

A 2021 U.N. report said that income from opiates in Afghanistan was between $1.8 billion and $2.7 billion and noted that much larger sums are accrued along illicit drug supply chains outside Afghanistan.

The report added that Afghanistan accounted for some 85 percent of global opium production in 2020 and supplied 80 percent of all global opiate users.

Near the end of its last period ruling over Afghanistan around 2000, the Taliban banned the poppy production, also seen as an attempt at garnering international legitimacy.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
Tyler Stableford/Getty Images

The US releasing oil from its emergency reserve will help stabilize prices this year, JPMorgan says.

Even if the US unlocks less than its target of 1 million barrels of oil a day, it would still help balance the market and steady oil prices.

But a bigger-than-anticipated loss in Russian oil supplies could leave a 'deep deficit' in the market in 2023.

The US plan to unlock an unprecedented amount of oil supply will aid in balancing the global oil market and keep prices steady in 2022, JPMorgan said Friday. But the firm also warned that a larger-than-expected loss in Russia's oil supply could kick crude prices up again next year.

The US plans to release 1 million barrels of crude oil every day from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve for the next six months, a move President Joe Biden called "a wartime bridge" to increase oil supply until production increases later this year to meet the demand for the commodity. Biden moved to address Americans paying near record-high gas prices after Russia's invasion of Ukraine in late February spurred fears of a worsening supply shortage and drove oil prices above $100 a barrel.

The planned release from the SPR equates to about 180 million barrels of oil that are set to enter the market.

JPMorgan said in a research note that it doesn't foresee the Energy Department releasing as much oil as the US government is targeting. However, what's likely to be released, combined with other pending adjustments in the oil market, should result in a balanced market this year. The investment bank left unchanged its oil price forecasts at $114 a barrel in the second quarter of 2022, and $101 a barrel in the second half of this year, with prices rising over $120 in the interim.

Balancing act

Insufficient bids and infrastructure constraints will likely lead the Energy Department to release only 850,000 barrels of oil a day from the SPR, missing the target of 1 million barrels a day, said the investment bank. Meanwhile, the US tapping its emergency reserves suggests there will be a delay in Iran bringing its own crude oil into the global market.

Story continues

The bank backed its view by pointing to the US Treasury Department's announcement Wednesday of new sanctions against Iran's ballistic missile program. The US is still working to reach a nuclear deal with Tehran that could result in Iran's return to the wider global oil market.

"We still expect the deal to cross the line given it is a key policy goal of the administration, but now assume that Iran begins delivering volumes from floating storage and increasing output starting in July 2022," Natasha Kaneva, head of global commodities research at JPMorgan, said in the research note.

The global oil market has been facing strong demand in part as COVID restrictions have largely waned worldwide. But there are signs of slowing, JPMorgan said in lowering its first-quarter 2022 demand outlook by 500,000 barrels of oil a day on fresh data from the US and Japan. In the US, it said surging gas prices have contributed to hurting fuel demand despite March marking the start of the driving season.

Accounting for recent trends in fuel demand, the bank now expects 2022 total oil demand to grow 3 million barrels a day year over year to average 100.5 million barrels a day, which is "only" 90,000 barrels a day above 2019 levels.

Russian risk

While the mix of the SPR release, the likely delay in Iranian exports, and slower demand should balance the market this year, Russia's output picture remains a risk, JPMorgan said.

"Crucially, we recognize that a release of oil inventories is not a persistent source of supply and if stranded Russian barrels average more than 1 mbd next year, this will leave 2023 in a deep deficit, rendering our $98/bbl price forecast for the year too low," with the idea that supply shortages put upward pressure on oil prices.

JPMorgan said its base case assumes the drop in Russian oil exports recovers from a loss of 2 million barrels a day in April, and a "perpetual" 1 million barrels daily after that. The risk, it said, is that the medium-term loss could be up to three times as high as its estimate. "Based on public [European Union] statements, we estimate that as of today, intentions are in place to diversify 2.7 mbd or almost 80% of Russian oil imports," said JPMorgan.

Oil prices pulled back after Biden's SPR announcement. West Texas Intermediate crude last week fell slightly under $100 a barrel and Brent crude, the international benchmark, on Friday hit an intraday low of around $102 a barrel, the lowest price since March 17.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Aerial view of an oil refining plant of state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) in Puerto La Cruz, Anzoategui state, Venezuela. YURI CORTEZ/AFP via Getty Image

The US may ban Russian energy imports in response to its military assault of Ukraine.

Washington reportedly met with Venezuela's government to discuss easing existing sanctions.

But the country's oil industry produces a fraction of what it did in its 1990s boom.

The US is reportedly mulling relaxing sanctions against Venezuela in a bid to secure a new source of oil following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

The US and Venezuela held their first high-level bilateral talks in years on March 5 in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas, according to media reports.

Washington is vying for reforms of Venezuela's oil industry to make it fit for exports by foreign firms, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The supply crunch as a result of sanctions against Russia has seen crude oil prices surge, jumping nearly 20% on Monday to almost $140 a barrel for the first time in nearly 14 years.

Russia is the world's third-largest oil producer, supplying about 10% of global supply.

The Caracas talks involved discussions about a temporary easing of sanctions imposed on Venezuela by the Trump administration in 2019, per the Wall Street Journal.

In attendance were the White House's top Latin America adviser, Juan Gonzalez, and US Ambassador to Venezuela James Story, who met with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his Vice President, Delcy Rodriguez, Reuters reported.

The US State Department and Venezuela's government did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Reuters reported that Venezuela pushed for a total lift on sanctions on its oil exports, sanctions on Maduro and other government officials, as well as a return to government control of Citgo Petroleum, a U.S. subsidiary of Venezuela's state-run oil company PDVSA.

In turn, Washington sought a guarantee of free presidential elections and a reversal on Maduro's defense of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the agency also reported.

But there are other challenges. Venezuela's industry is a far cry from its oil-producing boom in the 1990s when it produced 3.2 million barrels a day, now down to around 800,000, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Mismanagement has plagued the industry and the country's economic crisis there has also seen the flight of highly-trained engineers and other workers, the outlet added.

Read the original article on Business Insider
When it comes to weddings and special occasions, its often the bride that gets all the attention. The Joseph Abboud brand is out to change that.

At the end of 2020, Joseph Abboud, which is owned by the brand marketing firm WHP Global, launched a new made-to-measure suit offering called Bespoke Joseph Abboud that is manufactured at its factory in New Bedford, Mass. And with the unprecedented demand for formalwear due to the rescheduling of events during the pandemic, the brand is working feverishly to fill the demand.

More from WWD

Its no secret that the special occasion/wedding/tailored clothing business is back in full force, said Jeff Jones, vice president of merchandising for WHP, who oversees the Abboud brand. And thats reflected by the business in our Bespoke Joseph Abboud and within Mens Wearhouse locations.

WHP bought the Abboud brand from Tailored Brands, the parent of Mens Wearhouse, in 2020 for $115 million and as part of the deal, entered into a licensing deal with the retailer for the exclusive right to sell and rent the brands apparel in the U.S. and Canada.

Jones said the Massachusetts factory can produce up to 400 suits a day and is running at full capacity. The workers there manufacture two- and three-button suits, tuxedos, blazers and suit separates. That speaks to the desire from the groom to look his best, Jones said. And theres nothing like a custom suit tailored to you.

Bespoke Joseph Abboud is seeing interest in pieces other than the traditional black tuxedo.

The Bespoke Joseph Abboud collection is sold directly to consumers through the brands website where guys can book an appointment to have a stylist come to their home or office and help them create their own look. In addition, they can also visit one of the Mens Warehouse stores scattered throughout the country and work with the staff there to build a Joseph Abboud Custom suit.

Prices at Mens Wearhouse start at $799, Jones said, and at $950 for Bespoke Joseph Abboud.

Story continues

Jones said although black tuxedos are still popular among guys, some fashion shifts are happening. The new blue, which is a bit brighter than the traditional midnight blue, is among the most popular choices these days, along with texture, whether thats velvet, corduroy or other fabrics. And brighter colors are also finding fans.

Everything is on social media today, so they know theyre going to seen, he said. So guys are more willing to take risks.

Sign up for WWD's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

Click here to read the full article.
Billie Eilish honored the Foo Fighters' Taylor Hawkins during her performance at the 64th Grammy Awards, which took place just nine days after the drummer's sudden death at age 50.

Eilish, 20, took to the stage to perform her song "Happier Than Ever" in a custom oversized Willy Chavarria T-shirt with a picture of Hawkins' face on the front and his last name printed on the back in capital letters.

Hawkins died in Bogota, Colombia, on March 25 after complaining of chest pains at his hotel. A preliminary urine toxicology test found 10 different substances in his body, including THC, tricyclic antidepressants, benzodiazepines and opioids, according to the Attorney General's Office of Colombia. An investigation into the cause of death is ongoing.

RELATED: Grammys 2022 Performances: The Best Pics from the Music Superstars Taking the Stage

billie eilish

getty

Eilish had changed out of her all-black red carpet look from earlier in the evening, which included an oversized cape jacket and floor-length dress with a front slit that showed off a hint of her legs, plus chunky, rubber-soled black boots and sleek retro sunglasses.

For more on the 2022 Grammy Awards, listen below to our daily podcast on PEOPLE Every Day.

She continued to wear her shirt paying tribute to Hawkins for the remainder of the ceremony.

RELATED: Billie Eilish Doubles Down on Black in Dramatic Caped Grammys Look One Week After Her Oscars Win

Taylor Hawkins

Martin Philbey/Redferns

At the Oscars last week, Eilish told Access Hollywood that Hawkins' death was "incredibly heartbreaking."

"It was right before we went on stage [in Seattle, Washington]," she said of finding out about his passing. "And we got the news, and it really, really tore us all apart. It's horribly, horribly tragic."

"Taylor was such a legendary player. We were admirers of his work years before we got to meet him," her brother Finneas told the outlet. "And we only met him a handful of times. I wish we got to spend more time with him, but he couldn't have been a kinder, cooler, more generous person as well. And such a deeply inspiring person. We're just heartbroken."

Story continues

Hawkins was also included in the Grammys' In Memoriam segment, which featured performances by Ben Platt, Cynthia Erivo, Leslie Odom, Jr. and Rachel Zegler.

Ben Platt, Rachel Zegler, Cynthia Erivo, and Leslie Odom Jr.

Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty

RELATED: Grammy Awards Pay Tribute to Foo Fighters Drummer Taylor Hawkins with Segment Set to 'My Hero'

During the preshow telecast, the Foo Fighters swept the three categories in which they were nominated this year.

The band took home trophies for best rock performance for "Making a Fire," best rock song for "Waiting on a War" and best rock album for "Medicine at Midnight."

Check out PEOPLE's full Grammy Awards coverage to get the latest news on music's biggest night.

The Foo Fighters were scheduled to perform at the Grammys but announced on Thursday that they would not move forward with the performance.

The 64th Annual Grammy Awards, hosted by Trevor Noah, are airing and streaming live on Sunday from the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas.
SEVIERVILLE, Tenn.  Crews from the Tennessee Division of Forestry on Sunday continued to douse hot spots and fight the fires sparking near the Great Smoky Mountain National Park in Sevier County.

The Hatcher Mountain/Indigo Lane fire, the first to light on Wednesday morning, is nearly contained, and homeowners are beginning to take stock of the damage. The cause of the fire is still undetermined and under investigation.

Another smaller fire sparked near Seymour on Thursday but was 60% contained of Sunday afternoon.

At least 300 structures have been affected by the fires, which could mean anything from a burnt porch step to an entire cabin destroyed. Sevier County has posted an updated map on its Emergency Response webpage that marks each structure that has been assessed, as well as its condition.

For subscribers: Lessons learned from 2016 Gatlinburg wildfire likely saved lives in 2022 fires

Wildfire map: In light of Smokies fire in Wears Valley, track wildfires in Tennessee with this map

George Rainwater, the owner of Little Valley Mountain Resort Cabin Rentals, came up Sunday to survey the damage to his properties. He owns 35 cabins and operates a total of 80 for the resort in Sevierville.

Of the 80 properties he manages, only two were affected by the Hatcher Mountain/Indigo Lane fire, a number that likely would have been higher if firefighters from the Walden's Creek Volunteer Fire Department hadn't put in work Wednesday afternoon as the flames started.

Thats really the great story  how they were able to prevent this from being so much worse, Rainwater said.

Rainwater said Volunteer firefighters surveyed the areas as the fire started growing and moved out flammable material from near the cabins.

A tree with scorch marks on on Sunday, April 3, 2022 show where the Hatcher Mountain fire reached near a cabin near Valley Springs Way.

But some homes still caught fire, leaving a few cabins on Valley Springs Way with just the foundation left. Some structures looked nearly unharmed on Valley Springs Way, while others across the gravel road were completely burned down.

Story continues

Dolly Parton: 'Say a prayer' for East Tennessee as wildfires burn near her hometown

How to help: Here's how to help the East TN wildfire victims and first responders

Depending on which way the fire is coming, it may run through an entire structure and completely skip over others, said Ray Butler, a public information officer for the Tennessee Division of Forestry.

A Tennessee National Guard Blackhawk helicopter drops nearly 600 gallons of water onto the Cold Springs Hollow Road fire in Seymour, Tenn. on Sunday, April 3, 2022.

While the Hatcher Mountain/Indigo Lane fire is nearly contained, the Tennessee Division of Forestry is still working to douse hotspots in the area. Dillon Marsh, a forestry technician, has been spending his time pouring water over still-smoking areas to make sure they don't lift an ember that could ignite another area or home.

"We've basically been patrolling around all the all the cabins trying to put out hotspots in places where you see smoke in the stumps," Marsh said. "Anything that's around the cabin, that's a high profile area and the flames up it has potential to maybe get around the cabins and maybe catch fire."

In areas where its harder to get to from the ground, emergency authorities have been attempting to put out the fire from the air.

Helicopters, carrying 600 gallons of water each, have been going back and forth dousing different parts of the fire all day.

"This (Seymour) fire has been more difficult because of the very steep terrain, rocky slopes, (it's been) very hard for firefighters to access the mountains," said James Heaton with the Tennessee Division of Forestry.

How we got here

Wildfires sparked by dry, gusty wind conditions have burned more than 3,300 acres over four days beginning Wednesday. No fatalities have been reported, although two firefighters and a civilian were injured fighting the blazes.

The Cold Springs Hollow Road fire in Seymour, Tenn. on Sunday, April 3, 2022 is at 664 acres and 60% contained according to said Bruce Miller, spokesperson for Tennessee Division of Forestry.

The first fire, at Hatcher Mountain and Indigo Lane, was initially reported at about 11 a.m. Wednesday.

According to the National Weather Service, the Tennessee Valley and the Southern Appalachian region experienced high winds from the afternoon of Wednesday, March 30, through the afternoon of Thursday, March 31, The combination of high winds, dry ground (fuels), and low relative humidity produced a dangerous fire weather situation.

A Tennessee National Guard Blackhawk helicopter carries nearly 600 gallons of water to the Cold Springs Hollow Road fire in Seymour, Tenn. on Sunday, April 3, 2022.

Waldens Creek Volunteer Fire Capt. Jon Lanier described the fire blowing up extremely quickly due to 30-40 mph winds.

"The conditions went from two to three acres, to 20 acres within about 10 minutes," Lanier said. "Structures were going up. It just blew straight up the mountain."

Crews from all across the state pitched in to evacuate residents, protect structures and contain the fire. By Sunday afternoon, the Hatcher Mountain/Indigo Lane fire was reported to be at 98% containment, with 2,498 acres burned.

A second, smaller fire erupted Thursday near Cold Springs Hollow Road in Seymour. That 678-acre fire, on the line between Blount and Sevier counties, has burned two structures.

Knox News public safety reporter Liz Kellar contributed to this story.

Becca Wright: Higher education reporter at Knox News

Instagram | Twitter | Email | 865-466-3731

Enjoy exclusive content and premium perks while supporting strong local journalism. To get started, visit knoxnews.com/subscribe.

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: As wildfires in East Tennessee die down, victims return home to see damage
Heidi Klum, Tyra Banks, Alessandra Ambrosio and Candice Swanepoel star in new SKIMS icon campaign

Sandy Kim and Greg Swales

SKIMS just tapped some of the industry's biggest supermodels for its latest empowering  and super-sexy  campaign.

Heidi Klum, Tyra Banks, Alessandra Ambrosio and Candice Swanepoel have teamed up with Kim Kardashian's booming solutionwear brand, modeling pieces from the label's best-selling "Fits Everybody" collection for the new Icons campaign dropping April 4.

"Every woman is an icon. I see icons reflected in the women around me: my daughters, mom, and sisters," Kardashian tells PEOPLE exclusively. "The women I work with each day are iconic, and so are the women I worked with for this campaign  Tyra, Heidi, Alessandra and Candice. The list goes on!"

The supermodel foursome, who all earned the Victoria's Secret Angel title at different points in their career, model a variety of separates  restocked now on SKIMS.com  in the ads shot by brand collaborators Sandy Kim and Greg Swales.

Heidi Klum, Tyra Banks, Alessandra Ambrosio and Candice Swanepoel star in new SKIMS icon campaign

Sandy Kim and Greg Swales

"When we were developing the 'Fits Everybody' collection, it was with the intention to create underwear that would perfectly fit everybody," Kardashian explains. "To do this, we updated a fabric traditionally used as a 'one size fits all' and made it in our nine sizes  it also stretches to twice its size without ever losing shape, so it just molds to your body in the softest, comfiest way. I really believe that when we feel comfortable we're more confident and are able to show up as the best versions of ourselves."

RELATED: Kourtney Kardashian and Megan Fox Pose Topless Together for Racy SKIMS

As for what makes the mogul feel her best, Kardashian says, "I feel sexiest and most powerful in my professional pursuits and businesses like SKIMS, and personal relationships, most importantly being a mother. But also in taking time for myself to rest and recharge, and repeat!"

Ambrosio tells PEOPLE she's "honored" that Kardashian selected her as an icon.

Story continues

"To be honest, I believe that only others can call someone an icon so I have never thought of myself that way," she says. "For me icon means staying true to yourself and making sure to treat others the way you would like to be treated."

RELATED: Stars in SKIMS! See the Celebs Obsessed with Kim Kardashian's Shapewear Line

The Brazilian supermodel adds that the foursome had "the best time" on set.

"We have all been doing our own things so it was great to be together and catch up on everything that has been happening in our lives," she tells PEOPLE. "We chatted, laughed a lot but since we all have kids we all had to run home after so unfortunately no time for hanging out."

While she may spend the majority of her life in a swimsuit, Ambrosio says is the people she's surrounded by, not the clothes she wears, that make her feel good.

"I feel sexy when I am happy and around people that inspire me like this cool group of girls that I got to work with on the shoot."

RELATED: Does Kim Kardashian's Shapewear Line Live Up to the Hype? 12 PEOPLE Editors Tried It to Find Out

The added support of shapewear doesn't hurt either.

"Fits Everybody is about inclusivity and empowerment, two values that are important to me, so I am proud to join these women in promoting these messages," she says.

RELATED: Kim Kardashian's Friends (and Fans!) Star in Special SKIMS Ad to Celebrate 1-Year Anniversary

The Icons campaign includes a multi-city outdoor media roll-out with imagery now live in Miami, Chicago, New York City, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
As horrifying details of atrocities committed by Russian forces in Ukraine continue to emerge, Joe Biden has reiterated his view that Vladimir Putin is a war criminal  and has suggested he should face legal consequences for what his military is doing.

Speaking to reporters in Washington as he disembarked Marine One, Mr Biden said: You remember I got criticised for calling Putin a war criminal. Well, the truth of the matter  you saw what happened in Bucha  he is a war criminal... We have to get all the details so that this can be, so we can actually have a war crimes trial. This guy is brutal, and whats happening in Bucha is outrageous.

On Capitol Hill, the Senate Judiciary Committee is debating the nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson, who looks set to become the first Black woman to sit on the US Supreme Court.

The panel is evenly split down partisan lines and is expected to return a tied vote, but this will not stop the nomination from proceeding to the Senate floor, where Ms Brown Jackson appears to already have the support of 51 senators.

Meanwhile, the cost of a Secret Service command post to protect Hunter Biden as required by law has been revealed, though it is far less than the reported costs of protecting the Trump family, the spike in rental rates is having an impact.

Key Points

Biden calls for brutal Putin to face war crimes trial

Biden has privately said Trump should be prosecuted: Report

Obama to return to White House Obama to celebrate healthcare reform

Biden refers to Michelle Obama as 'vice president'

Biden and Obama to have lunch on Tuesday

20:43 , Oliver O'Connell

President Joe Biden and former President Barack Obama will have lunch at the White House tomorrow, and will host an event celebrating the Affordable Care Act, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki says.

They are real friends, not just Washington friends, she adds.

It will be Mr Obamas first visit to the executive mansion since leaving office in January 2017.

Story continues

.@presssec says @potus and @POTUS44 @BarackObama will also have lunch together tomorrow when the former president makes his first return trip to the WH since he left office in 2017. They will hold a healthcare event.  Kelly O'Donnell (@KellyO) April 4, 2022

White House says Russian atrocities part of Putins Ukraine plan

20:38 , Oliver O'Connell

Atrocities committed by Russian troops are almost certainly an act of policy rather than poor behaviour of individual troops says NSA Jake Sullivan.

Agree with @JakeSullivan46 that atrocities by Russian troops almost certainly an act of policy designed to depopulate cities, break spirit of Ukraine rather than simply terrible behavior by troops. Poorly led troops do many awful things but not systematic executions of civilians.  Richard N. Haass (@RichardHaass) April 4, 2022

Andrew Feinberg reports for The Independent from Washington, DC.

White House says Russian atrocities part of Putins plan for Ukraine

US and allies to roll out further sanctions against Russia

20:26 , Oliver O'Connell

The US and its allies will roll out further sanctions this week against Russia in response to the atrocities committed in Bucha in Ukraine.

There is no official conclusion by the US that what is happening in Ukraine constitutes genocide.

Further sanctions, "additional economic pressure" to be announced this week says President Biden's national security adviser in coordination with allies.  Kelly O'Donnell (@KellyO) April 4, 2022

NSA: West will not break'

20:18 , Oliver O'Connell

The Russians have now realised that the West will not break, says National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan detailing the Russian governments possible next moves focused on eastern Ukraine after pulling back from Kyiv.

Next stage of this conflict may very well be protracted, he says. During this renewed ground offensive in eastern Ukraine, Moscow will likely continue air and missile strikes across the rest of the country to do military and economic damage, and cause terror.

The Russians have now realized that the West will not break  National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan details the Russian governments possible next moves focused on eastern Ukraine after pulling back from Kyiv pic.twitter.com/lVbw0cc5PC  NowThis (@nowthisnews) April 4, 2022

Watch live as White House press secretary Jen Psaki holds briefing with US national security advisor

20:07 , Oliver O'Connell

Lindsey Graham: If GOP controlled Senate, Jackson would not have gotten hearing

19:47 , Oliver O'Connell

South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said on Monday that if Republicans controlled the Senate, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson would not have received a hearing.

Mr Graham made the remarks during the Senate Judiciary Committees confirmation vote for Judge Jackson weeks after her confirmation hearing. The South Carolina Republican noted how this would be the first time that he would vote against a Supreme Court nominee, having voted to confirm Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, both of whom Barack Obama appointed.

If we get back the Senate and were in charge of this body and theres judicial openings, we will talk to our colleagues on the other side, but if we were in charge she would not be before the committee, Mr Graham said during the confirmation vote hearing. You would have had someone more moderate than this.

Eric Garcia reports for The Independent from Capitol Hill.

Lindsey Graham: if Republicans controlled Senate, Jackson would not have a hearing

Secret Service rented command post to protect Hunter Biden costs $360k a year

19:10 , Oliver O'Connell

Secret Service agents assigned to protect President Joe Bidens son Hunter Biden use a $30,000 per month California rental house as a command post, according to an ABC News report.

Mr Biden, an attorney and former lobbyist who has recently been making a living as a visual artist, currently resides in Malibu, California, where he lives in a rented house which sources told ABC costs roughly $20,000 per month to rent.

Andrew Feinberg reports.

Secret Service command post to protect Hunter Biden costs $360k a year

Watch live as Biden outlines plans to tackle US trucking challenges

19:08 , Oliver O'Connell

Trucking a national priority says Buttigieg

18:58 , Oliver O'Connell

"Trucking is indeed a national priority," says @SecretaryPete with big trucks as the backdrop on the @WhiteHouse South Lawn. pic.twitter.com/AzjfLpgKWK  Steve Herman (@W7VOA) April 4, 2022

Biden delivering remarks on Trucking Action Plan

18:56 , Oliver O'Connell

Happening Now: President Biden delivers remarks on the progress made on the Trucking Action Plan to strengthen our nations supply chains. https://t.co/J7vdryu5ja  The White House (@WhiteHouse) April 4, 2022

Biden: Fox News destructive and Murdoch worlds most dangerous man, according to new book

18:30 , Oliver O'Connell

Joe Biden called Fox News one of the most destructive forces in America and billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch the most dangerous man in the world, a new book has claimed.

This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for Americas Future by New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns revealed that the president allegedly made the critical assessment to an unnamed associate, according to CNN.

Shweta Sharma reports.

Revealed: The man Joe Biden thinks is the most dangerous in the world

Delay in Scotus vote until this afternoon

18:20 , Oliver O'Connell

Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin has announced a delay in the committees vote on Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson due to a delay in Senator Alex Padillas travel plans.

It is my intention to recess subject to the call of the chair. I believe Senator Padilla will be back in time this afternoon for us to consider this nomination & a record vote.

Judiciary Chair Durbin announces delay in cmte's vote on SCOTUS nominee Jackson due to Padilla's flight delay:"It is my intention to recess subject to the call of the chair.I believe Sen.Padilla will back in time this afternoon for us to consider this nomination & a record vote." pic.twitter.com/eapBjcji6q  Craig Caplan (@CraigCaplan) April 4, 2022

Mr Padilla boarded a red-eye flight back from California only for it to return to Los Angeles due to a medical emergency.

Analysis: A moderate Republican freezes out his own party

18:00 , Oliver O'Connell

New Hampshires Chris Sununu is one of the relatively few Republicans who has a chance of flipping a Senate seat for his party while being an outspoken Trump critic. But the New Hampshire governor has disappointed his party by declining to take on Democratic incumbent Maggie Hassan, who won her seat by only 1,000 votes when elected in 2016.

The Independents Eric Garcia explains why Mr Sununu matters, and what his decision means for the Senate map after the vote this November.

How one moderate Democrat is freezing out Republicans in a senatorial race

Kamala Harris deputy chief of staff will leave White House

17:25 , Oliver O'Connell

Michael Fuchs, the former Clinton and Obama administration foreign policy adviser who has served as Vice President Kamala Harris deputy chief of staff since she took office, will depart the White House next month.

In an internal memorandum obtained by Reuters, Mr Fuchs wrote that he will remain on the job until May to ensure a smooth transition to his successor.

Andrew Feinberg reports from Washington, DC.

Kamala Harris deputy chief of staff will leave White House in latest shakeup

New study shows how Covid has hit poor Americans harder

16:50 , Andrew Naughtie

As the Biden administration tries to get Congress to allocate billions of dollars of new funds for Covid-19 relief, a new study from the Poor Peoples Campaign has detailed what it calls the immoral, shocking and unjust neglect of poor communities during the pandemic, reporting that Americans living in poorer counties died of Covid-19 at almost twice the rate of those in rich counties.

The study, based on income and death data from over 3,200 US counties, shows an even bigger gap during the Delta variant that made up the USs fourth coronavirus wave, when people living in the lowest income counties died at five times the rate of those in the highest income counties. The 300 counties with the highest death rates have an average poverty rate of 45 per cent, and household median incomes on average $23,000 lower than counties with lower rates. Many of the top twenty counties were sparsely populated areas in Georgia, Texas and Virginia, the report and an accompanying map of death rates and income online show.

Heather Timmons has the story.

US poor died at much higher rate from Covid-19 than rich

Watch: Merrick Garland on seizure of oligarchs yacht

16:25 , Andrew Naughtie

In a statement issued at the Justice Department, Merrick Garland has provided more information about the joint Spanish-American effort to seize a yacht belonging to sanctioned oligarch Viktor Vekselberg, one of the richest members of Russias elite.

$90 Million Yacht of Sanctioned Russian Oligarch Viktor Vekselberg Seized by Spain at Request of United Stateshttps://t.co/SfZ7j3io2j pic.twitter.com/pnbZgDKS8n  Justice Department (@TheJusticeDept) April 4, 2022

Biden on Putins war crimes'

15:57 , Andrew Naughtie

Heres the moment from today where Joe Biden made clear that he considers Vladimir Putin a war criminal, and that the events uncovered in the Ukrainian town of Bucha warrant a war crimes trial.

Biden on Putin's war crimes, "We have to get all the details so that we can have a war crimes trial." pic.twitter.com/MrOSA19nvR  Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) April 4, 2022

John Bowden has the story.

Biden calls for brutal Putin to face war crimes trial

Judiciary Committee prepares to vote on Ketanji Brown Jackson

15:21 , Andrew Naughtie

After the sometimes acrimonious and bizarre hearings held a couple of weeks ago, the Senate Judiciary Committee is soon to vote on whether to send the nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to the full Senate for a confirmation vote.

With no Republicans coming out to support the nominee  even those who went out of her way to praise her have backed away  the committee is expected to return a tied vote, after which Chuck Schumer will use procedural measures to bring the vote to the floor.

The Independents Eric Garcia is monitoring the proceedings as the committees Senators say their piece. Follow him below:

The Senate Judiciary Committee is getting ready to vote on Ketanji Brown Jackson's confirmation, where it is set to have a deadlock vote. The last nominee to have a deadlock vote? Clarence Thomas in 1991. The committee later had a 13-1 vote.  Eric Michael "Caleb Love Stan Account" Garcia (@EricMGarcia) April 4, 2022

Report: Covid aid bill upcoming after White House pleas

15:05 , Andrew Naughtie

Joe Biden has recently implored Congress to get on with passing a Covid-19 relief bill as the US recovers from the most acute pressures of the pandemic while the virus continues to circulate. It now seems that after a recent attempt to pass a funding package failed miserably, another is on the way  but it sounds set to fall short of the White Houses expectations.

A bipartisan Senate deal on $10 billion in Covid aid is expected to be announced as soon as today, per multiple sources. About half of the money would go to therapeutics. It would not include international covid aid. Fully offset. It is less than half the amount the WH wanted  Manu Raju (@mkraju) April 4, 2022

US to call for suspending Russia from UN human rights body

14:40 , Andrew Naughtie

The USs ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, is calling for Russia to be ejected from the UN Human Rights Council. Her announcement comes as western allies consider how to increase pressure on the Kremlin after this weekends horrific revelations of mass murder and other atrocities committed by Russian troops in Ukraine.

Two: In close coordination with Ukraine, European countries and other partners at the UN, we are going to seek Russias suspension from the UN Human Rights Council.  Olivia Dalton (@USUNSpox) April 4, 2022

US seizes its first Russian oligarch mega-yacht

14:05 , Andrew Naughtie

The Biden administration is reportedly considering ramping up sanctions on Russia given the flood of reports of war crimes being committed by Russian forces in Ukraine  but the sanctions already in place are still being enforced, with a joint Spanish-American operation seizing a super-yacht belonging to billionaire oligarch Viktor Vekselberg.

At the Marina Real in the port of Palma de Mallorca, a large group of Spanish Civil Guards and US federal agents boarded the boat, according to Associated Press reporters who were at the scene and saw the authorities early Monday morning.

Mr Vekselberg's US assets remain frozen and American companies have been forbidden from doing business with him and his entities.

Read more:

US seizes its first oligarch mega-yacht in Putin crackdown

ICYMI: Book reports Joe Bidens comments on Rupert Murdoch

13:15 , Andrew Naughtie

An upcoming book on the last weeks of Donald Trumps presidency and the first year of Joe Bidens includes a story about Mr Bidens views on Fox News and its ultimate proprietor, billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch  whom the now-president is said to have described as the most dangerous man in the world.

The Democratic president assessed Fox as one of the most destructive forces in the United States, the authors write in This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for Americas Future, and told an associate midway through 2021 that its corporate overlord, the Australian-born News Corp chairman Rupert Murdoch, was even more toxic than that.

Read more:

Revealed: the man Joe Biden thinks is the most dangerous in the world

Another Republican confirms no vote on Ketanji Brown Jackson

12:15 , Andrew Naughtie

As the Senate Judiciary Committee prepares to vote on Ketanji Brown Jacksons historic nomination to the US Supreme Court, more Republican senators are lining up with their party against her. The latest is Pennsylvanias Pat Toomey, who is retiring at the end of this year. In his statement, he cites Ms Brown Jacksons supposed inability to define her own judicial philosophy as a core reason for withholding his support.

My statement on the nomination of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson: pic.twitter.com/qR0Oc8jbIk  Senator Pat Toomey (@SenToomey) April 3, 2022

So far, only one GOP senator, Susan Collins, has said she will support the judge. While Ms Brown Jackson is thought to be all but a dead cert for confirmation thanks to a united Democratic caucus, there are still two Republicans thought to be considering voting for her: Lisa Murkowski and Mitt Romney.

ICYMI: Obama to speak at White House this week

11:46 , Andrew Naughtie

Barack Obama is reportedly set to make his first public appearance at the White House since leaving office. He will be speaking tomorrow at a public event to celebrate the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, which has survived more than a decade of Republican efforts to repeal it  and which the Biden administration is pouring money into as the US healthcare system tries to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic.

Read more below.

Obama to return to White House for health care event

Biden on Sacramento shooting

11:08 , Andrew Naughtie

Joe Biden yesterday released a statement on the mass shooting in Sacramento, which saw six people killed and 12 wounded. In the written remarks, he repeated what has become his standard call for concrete action to curb the USs devastating gun violence problem.

We must do more than mourn; we must act. That is why my Administration has taken historic executive action to implement my comprehensive gun crime reduction strategy  from standing up gun trafficking strike forces to helping cities across the country expand community violence interventions and hire more police officers for community policing. We also continue to call on Congress to act. Ban ghost guns. Require background checks for all gun sales. Ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. Repeal gun manufacturers immunity from liability. Pass my budget proposal, which would give cities more of the funding they need to fund the police and fund the crime prevention and intervention strategies that can make our cities safer. These are just a few of the steps Congress urgently needs to take to save lives.

Mr Biden campaigned heavily on gun safety reform, but like many of his other top priorities, the arithmetic of the US Senate has stymied his efforts to get the most ambitious of his plans passed into law.

Read more about the Sacramento shooting below.

Multiple gunmen killed six and wounded 12 in Sacramento shooting, says police chief

Report: Hunter Bidens Secret Service detail shelling out thousands for Malibu mansion

10:29 , Andrew Naughtie

As the Justice Departments investigation into Hunter Bidens business dealings and tax affairs heats up, ABC News reports that the Secret Service detail protecting the presidents son has spent more than $30,000 a month to rent a mansion in Malibu, California.

According to the story  which recalls various reports of Trump-owned businesses charging high rates to the agents assigned to protect the former president  the business of protecting presidents and their families is necessarily an expensive one, with agents obliged to rent housing near their protectees wherever they may be living or staying.

Typically, wherever a protectee sets up their residence, the Secret Service is forced to find someplace to rent nearby at market value, said [retired senior Secret Service agent Don Mihalek], noting that the agency is also renting out properties to protect President Joe Bidens residences in Wilmington and Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. This isnt new, Mihalek said. The Service has had to do this in past administrations, and unfortunately, the housing market right now has driven the prices up substantially. A White House official referred ABC News to the Secret Service for comment. Asked about the cost of the protection, a representative for the Secret Service said only: Due to the need to maintain operational security, the U.S. Secret Service does not comment on the means, methods, or resources used to conduct our protective operations.

Read more below.

NEW: The Secret Service detail protecting Hunter Biden has been paying more than $30,000 a month for a swanky Malibu mansion close to Bidens home, sources tell @ABC News. https://t.co/EyWSkYdEM3  ABC News (@ABC) April 4, 2022

Challenging the narrative on Bidens economic record

09:43 , Andrew Naughtie

Joe Bidens performance on the economy has become one of his opponents main targets, but while the problems facing millions of everyday Americans are undeniable, the reality of what has changed in the past year hasnt always cut through the news cycle.

And some of the coverage of the recent jobs numbers  which showed a continued uptick in employment  has been particularly downbeat. Its now starting to get some pushback.

A shocking data point that explains much of Bidens political troubles. More people think jobs have been lost over the last year (37%) than those who think theyve been gained (28%). Unemployment is at 3.6%. https://t.co/xwRNSeAqFs  Sam Stein (@samstein) April 3, 2022

We are in a different time where truth is under assault. The media has a new role: bringing truth to the people. Both sides are not created equal. https://t.co/PbjFMUbuBj  Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman) April 4, 2022

It would be nice if political reporters did some reflection on why voters have these false beliefs https://t.co/BUPQ0o3crr  Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 4, 2022

Wait, you guys are seriously attacking Biden because the unemployment rate is very low? https://t.co/HH0KoAIGnd  Ian Millhiser (@imillhiser) April 3, 2022

the coverage of biden's economic record is one of the most astounding things i have ever seen https://t.co/XGilFh079l  alien vs. redditor (@Theophite) April 4, 2022

US cancels ICBM launch to avoid Russia escalation

09:02 , Andrew Naughtie

The US Air Force has confirmed that a test of the Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) has been cancelled to avoid further escalating tensions with the government of Russia, which recently upgraded its nuclear forces to a higher alert level.

The Minuteman III is the USs only land-based ICBM, part of the so-called nuclear triad that also includes nuclear-armed submarines and strategic bombers.

Graeme Massie has the story.

US cancels ICBM launch to prevent relations with Russia getting worse

Biden called Fox News destructive and Murdoch the worlds most dangerous man, new book claims

07:45 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Joe Biden called Fox News one of the most destructive forces in America and billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch the most dangerous man in the world, a new book has claimed.

Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns revealed in their book titled This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for Americas Future that the president allegedly made the critical assessment to an unnamed associate, according to CNN.

Read the full story here:

Revealed: the man Joe Biden thinks is the most dangerous in the world

Biden is confident his son didn't break the law

07:39 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Joe Biden is confident that his son Hunter Biden didnt break the law, White House chief of staff Ron Klain said on Sunday.

Of course the president is confident that his son didnt break the law, Mr Klain said.

He added: The president is confident that his family did the right thing.

But again, he continued: I want to just be really clear. These are actions by Hunter and his brother. Theyre private matters. They dont involve the president. And they certainly are something that no one at the White House is involved in.

Biden refers to Michelle Obama as 'vice president'

06:12 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Joe Biden was the target of many a joke on social media after his latest faux pas, referring to Michelle Obama as the former vice president.

During a speech at the Commissioning Commemoration Ceremony of the USS Delaware, Mr Biden referred to the former first ladys legacy.

The president can be heard saying in the video: I am deeply proud of the work she [Jill Biden] is doing as first lady with the Joining Forces initiative she started with Michelle Obama when she was vice president and now carries on.

A White House transcript of the comments later noted and rectified the error.

Does Biden think Michelle Obama was Vice President?



pic.twitter.com/SyzKLsu378  Benny (@bennyjohnson) April 2, 2022

Biden has privately said Trump should be prosecuted: Report

05:41 , Maroosha Muzaffar

US President Joe Biden has said privately that he believes Donald Trump should be prosecuted over the 6 January attack on the US Capitol, according to a report.

Read the full story here:

Biden has privately said Trump should be prosecuted, report claims

Obama to return to White House Obama to celebrate healthcare reform

05:37 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Barack Obama is supposed to return to White House this week for an event on the Affordable Care Act, a source familiar with the White House told NBC.

It was reported that Mr Obama will be making his first visit to the White House since leaving office this Tuesday.

A White House official was quoted as saying that Mr Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris and Mr Obama will deliver remarks celebrating the success of the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid in extending affordable health insurance to millions of Americans as a part of the Presidents agenda to cut costs for American families.

The former president is also due to visit the White House again soon for the unveiling of Michelle Obamas official presidential portraits.
Apr. 4EBENSBURG, Pa.  Catholic schools in the Prince Gallitzin Quadrant have raised nearly $5,000 throughout the past few weeks to aid Ukrainian refugees in Poland.

The money was raised through dress-down days, individual donations and sales of T-shirts created by the Bishop Carroll Catholic High School art teacher, with each school finding its own "unique ways to support the cause."

"We wanted to do something for Ukraine and the people, especially with Father Andriy (Kelt) here on staff," said Jonathan Nagy, Bishop Carroll dean of students. "It is an act of compassion for those in need."

Kelt is the Bishop Carroll religion teacher and pastor at Protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary Ukrainian Catholic Church in Revloc and St. Mary's Ukrainian Catholic Church in Northern Cambria.

All of the money raised by the high school, All Saints Catholic School, Holy Name School, St. Benedict School, St. Michael School and St. Nicholas Catholic School, will be sent to the Eparchy of St. Josaphat of the Ukrainian Catholic Church to assist with the refugee crisis.

"I was really surprised with the amount of money we raised," Bishop Carroll student Hannah Hurtack said. "I'm glad we were able to help."

She lent a hand with the folding and organization of the T-shirts.

Hurtack said it was inspiring to see the communities come together and support the Ukrainian natives. For Kelt, the gesture is especially meaningful.

"In the past six weeks, we have seen truly heartbreaking images of pure evil, when Russia invaded a peace-loving country of Ukraine," he said in a statement. "It is one of the hardest things to watch especially the little children and women losing their lives, their homes, their whole way of life. While we have seen what evil humanity is capable of, we have also seen what good humanity is capable of."

Kelt added that he's thankful for the neighboring countries, such as Romania and Poland, for helping with food and shelter, as well as the help from others around the world and at home.

Story continues

"It means so much to me to see the Bishop Carroll community help take care of the suffering Ukrainians," he said. "The fundraiser that we had will help countless families who are without home and food. May God bless you for your generosity and support for the people of Ukraine, as we continue to pray for peace and the end of this senseless war."

Nagy shared a similar message.

"I am so proud of the efforts of all involved, especially the students," he said. "The concern shown towards the Ukrainian people by these young people is truly inspiring. They truly care about the people, and they should stand as a model to others."

T-shirt sales will continue and those interested in donating to the effort can do so by contacting the schools.
As the COVID-19 pandemic has made flexibility in travel a non-negotiable, some U.S. airlines have addressed the need in their policies  but there are just

In a February analysis conducted by travel search company Next Vacay, findings shared with Travel + Leisure show that major U.S. airlines including American Airlines, Delta, and Southwest meet customers' demands when it comes to flexibility.

The study specifically looked at airlines' change fees, refund options, flight cancelation policies, and travel insurance options at 10 U.S.-based carriers to see how their current standards stack up, by giving a higher score to those which were most accomodating to passengers.

"Whether it's across the globe or closer to home, many passengers are becoming more cautious about the reliability of flights as the travel industry attempts to get back to normal," the company's founder and CEO said in a statement shared with T+L. "Each airline has different specifications so make sure you do your research before booking your ticket to find the best option for the flexibility you're looking for."

Alaska airlines (R) and Southwest airlines aircrafts wait at the runway for takeoff at the San Jose del Cabo International Airport (SJD) in Baja California state, Mexico, on April 29, 2021.

DANIEL SLIM/AFP via Getty Images

The study deemed American Airlines as one of the most flexible as it doesn't have change fees on all domestic flights or short-haul and select long-haul international flights, and offers an option for a refundable ticket. Next Vacay also accounted for its strong partnership with Allianz Global Assistance, though they warn that tickets for the basic economy class are still not refundable or changeable.

Also on top was Southwest Airlines with no change fees and refundable tickets in select classes of Anytime and Business Select. Additionally, what makes the Dallas-based carrier stand out is that passengers can cancel up to 10 minutes before a flight departure for a refund. The only reason it was a notch below American is due to the fact that the company doesn't offer travel insurance with flight bookings, though they do with Southwest Vacations packages.

Story continues

United Airlines Boeing 737 on departure taxiing past a Delta Airlines plane at Seattle Tacoma airport.

Ceri Breeze/Getty Images

Delta and United were also among the most flexible since the former has no change fees for Main Cabin and up. United has no change fees for economy and premium seats, with refunds on select fares. Both also have insurance  Delta through Allianz and United through Travel Guard  but on United, passengers who cancel a Basic Economy ticket.

On the other end, Allegiant has some of the least flexible policies, charging $25 per person for each flight segment to change a booking. Also, 24 hours after the booking has been made, there will be a $75 cancelation fee per person for each segment with flight credit being issued for the remaining balance. Though that can be avoide by buying insurance through Trip Flex to avoid change fees.

Also notable is Alaska Airlines, which doesn't have change fees for its Main and First Class fares, only allows for one change and implements a $25 to $50 fee for same-day changes.
Jordanian Prince Hamzah Bin al-Hussein

KHALIL MAZRAAWI/AFP via Getty Prince Hamzah bin Hussein

Jordan's Prince Hamzah bin Hussein has renounced his royal title.

The son of the late King Hussein and Queen Noor announced on Sunday via Twitter that he was giving up his title of prince.

"Following what I have witnessed in recent years, I have come to the conclusion that my personal convictions which my father instilled in me, and which I tried hard in my life to adhere to, are not in line with the approaches, trends and modern methods of our institutions," Hamzah, 42, said.

"From the matter of honesty to God and conscience, I see nothing but to transcend and abandon the title of prince. I had the great honor of serving my beloved country and my dear people over the years of my life," he added. "I will remain as I have always been and as long as I live, loyal to our beloved Jordan."

RELATED: Royal Family Members Who Stepped Down, Forfeited Titles or Abdicated Altogether

When King Hussein died from cancer in 1999, Hamzah's half-brother Abdullah was crowned while Hamza was given the title of heir. However, King Abdullah stripped Hamzah of the title five years later and gave it to his own eldest son, Al Hussein bin Abdullah II.

Last year, Hamzah was reportedly put under house arrest after accusing the country's leaders of corruption amid a number of arrests linked to an alleged coup plot. However, a military official said Hamzah was ordered to halt activities "aimed at undermining the security and stability of Jordan."

Jordanian Prince Hamzah Bin al-Hussein

Salah Malkawi/Getty Prince Hamzah bin Hussein

In March, Jordan's court released a letter allegedly written by Hamzah to the king asking for forgiveness.

"Last year, our beloved Jordan endured trying circumstances and a regrettable chapter in its history," it said. "The months that have passed since have afforded me the opportunity to honestly look within and self-reflect, and I find myself compelled to write to you... hoping that we can turn the page on this chapter in our country's and our family's history."

Story continues

Jordanian Prince Hamzah bin al-Hussein

KHALIL MAZRAAWI/AFP via Getty Prince Hamzah bin Hussein

"I have erred, Your Majesty, and to err is human. I, therefore, bear responsibility for the stances I have taken and the offences I have committed against Your Majesty and our country over the past years, culminating in the events of the sedition case," he continued. "I seek Your Majesty's forgiveness, knowing that you have always been very forgiving. I apologise to Your Majesty, to the people of Jordan, and to our family, for my actions which, God willing, will not be repeated."
Mario Tama/Getty Images

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has released the third and final part of its monumental climate change trilogy: a report on what we can do to avert global climate catastrophe.

The answers wont please anybody.

Conservative media, naturally, will either ignore the report or dismiss its 3,675-page review of 1,202 climate change scenarios in the same way it dismisses any science it doesnt like (including climate science): as some kind of liberal plot.

But liberals may not like the report eitherbecause it shows how wrongheaded much of liberal environmentalism has been.

Like many seemingly apolitical acts (wearing a mask, drinking espresso), environmental conservation has lately become a badge of political identity. If youre a liberal, you save electricity, you cut down on your carbon footprint, maybe you even fly or drive less than you used to.

The UNs New Climate Change Report Should Make You Mad as Hell

This is all pointlessas scientists have said for decadesand the IPCC has said yet again in its report today.

Individual actions, however well-meaning, are utterly irrelevant to stopping global climate disruption. They may express ones ethical values, and are a perfectly fine way of doing so, but they dont move the needle on atmospheric greenhouse gases (GHGs). Worse, individual actions tend to mislead people into thinking thats the solution to saving the planeteach of us doing our part and changing our lifestylesthus giving a pass to the fossil fuel industry and other large-scale, systemic challenges.

Which is, no doubt, why British Petroleum invented the term carbon footprint in 2000: because it lets them off the hook.

In fact, says the IPCC, what must change to mitigate the worst of climate change is our societys collective reliance on fossil fuels for energy, transportation, agriculture, and industry. Were not talking about my electric car or you turning off the lights in the bathroom. No ones footprint matters. Were talking about the entire power grid, the infrastructure supporting gasoline cars, the government subsidies of fossil fuel exploration, and so on.

Story continues

There is a cause for optimism here, because, as the IPCC report details, the costs of renewable energysolar, wind, electric vehicle batteries, etc.have dropped precipitously in recent years. Moreover, there is now an increasing consensus of exactly which levers need to be pulled in order to make a differenceProject Drawdown is one excellent example of that.

But that optimism should be short-lived, because if making the switch is so easy, why havent we (at least in the United States) done it already?

The answer is obvious: the fossil fuel industry, which has spent $452 million on lobbying in the last ten years, and which dictates the political fortunes of the entire Republican Party (and even some Democrats).

Consider President Bidens climate plan, which would have made exactly the kinds of investments that the IPCC is recommending, while helping those dislocated by the shifts to adapt. After easily passing the House, it came within two votes of passing the Senate, stopped by Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, who, investigations have revealed, owes his personal and political fortune to West Virginias coal industry. Nice Maserati, Joe!

Had just one Senate seat gone the other way in 2020 (looking at you, Maine and North Carolina), the Biden plan wouldve passed and U.S. policy would look a lot like what the IPCC is calling for. That is what matterspolitics, not personal principle and sacrifice. (Oh, and kindly inform any friends on the Left who think there is no difference between the two major parties. Im too angry to do so.) And with the 2022 election looking bad for the one party that at least sort of, kind of wants to do something about this crisis, the most important thing you can do to save the planet is vote, and persuade others to vote, with the Earth in mind.

No amount of individual action will stop climate change. There is no such thing as doing your part when were talking about one big atmospheric soup. This is why the IPCCs report has chapters titled Energy Systems, Buildings, Transport, Industry, and so forth: because these are collective issues that must be solved collectivelythrough enacting policies that the fossil fuel industry has fought tooth and nail for nearly half a century now. Given that climate change is an existential threat to human civilization, this really is all that matters.

A second feature of the IPCC report that will annoy liberals is its belated emphasis on Carbon Dioxide Removal, or CDR. For decades, the mainstream environmental movement has downplayed most CDR methods, under the ominous-sounding term of geoengineering.

Of course, everyone likes planting trees, sure, but liberals tended to balk at more significant CDR proposals, like stimulating phytoplankton growth in the oceans to soak up GHGs (known in the IPCC report as ocean fertilization) or enabling airplanes to emit a bit more dust in their exhaust to reduce the amount of solar radiation that reaches the earth. Why? Perhaps because of the risks involved. Or because the proposal to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, rather than simply reduce our output of it, doesnt fit with the liberal emphasis on consuming less, zero-waste lifestyles, and other expressions of virtue.

But coral reefs do not care about your lifestyle. They care about mean temperatures rising more than 2 degrees, which would likely wipe out most coral reefs on the planet, and the vast ecosystems they support. And to lower those temperatures, CDR is one arrow in the quiver that absolutely must be utilized.

These Anti-Trans Laws Are Illegal, Immoral, and Ignorant

To be sure, rapidly reducing GHG emissions is the most important of those arrows. CDR is not a replacement for it. But, speaking as someone who first wrote about ocean fertilization in 1998, it is a huge step forward that the IPCC has acknowledged how important it is to the overall health of the planet. This may irritate some liberals, but it may also save the Earth.

Finally, its not just liberals and conservatives who will find this report irritatinganyone under the age of 30 should, as well.

My generation (X) and the ones preceding it have done a lamentable, pitiable, contemptible, and morally evil job at preventing catastrophe in the 21st century. We have lived large, in our SUVs (still not properly regulated as the trucks that they are) and McMansions, in our subsidies of the cattle industry so that the least affluent among us are driven to consume unhealthy beef and corn all the time, and most of all, in our lazy inability to shift our electric grid away from fossil fuels and to renewables.

If theres one thing this IPCC report makes clear, its that this wasteful selfishness cannot continuenot if we want to avoid the mass famines, refugee crises, dislocations, habitat losses, shifts in agriculture, and floods described in the previous part of the IPCC trilogy. (Part one in the IPCCs series of reports was about the causes of climate change; part two, the effects; part three, what can be done.) Those of us born in the last century have screwed over those born in this one. Our greed and indolence have bequeathed them a world already in chaos, and on the precipice of catastrophe.

Honestly, its time for most of us to exit the stage. Anyone who wont live to 2050 shouldnt be making policy that affects it. Weve done an absolutely miserable job so far.

The IPCC report shows us that we can do better. We can cut GHG emissions in half over the next ten years. We can avert the worst of global climate disruption, though not all of it. We canbut we havent so far. That has to change.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Get the Daily Beast's biggest scoops and scandals delivered right to your inbox. Sign up now.

Stay informed and gain unlimited access to the Daily Beast's unmatched reporting. Subscribe now.
The stars of Mosaic Street  (from left) Ama Ide, Kota Ishijima and Ema Grace  are what a modern, diverse Japan should look like (Yuki Matsuzaki)

Ive survived as an Asian actor in Hollywood for 22 years, and for the past few, Ive also helped them cast Japanese actors. And I watched up close how blatantly racist this casting process can be.

Hollywood firmly believes that Japanese is an ethnicity, and they insist that Japanese actors must look quintessentially oriental. The first thing producers want is that actors can pass as Japanese.

As some of you may know, modern Japan is quite diverse. Mixed-race Japanese are just as Japanese as I could ever be. But for Hollywood, they are absolutely not considered Japanese. And because Hollywood wants to contrast diverse America with homogeneous Japan, they go full-on racist.

You may consider me as a Japanese actor, but even I dont look oriental enough for them. I cannot tell you how many times I was asked at auditions: Are you Japanese? But youre so tall. Or: Are both your parents Japanese?

When I worked on Melissa and Joey in 2011, I was asked if my curly hair was real. I said yes, and they replied: But all Japanese are straight-haired. I explained to them that this isnt the case, but nonetheless, they straightened my hair because they felt that I didnt look authentic enough.

Hollywood needs to understand that it has created extremely offensive stereotypes by yellowfacing Japanese actors for many decades. Japan is a diverse country, and Japanese is not an ethnicity.

You cannot imagine how agonising it is for me when Im asked by young mixed Japanese actors for advice on how to make it in Hollywood. Because Hollywood has been shouting about the importance of diversity, they have been tricked into believing Hollywood is actually inclusive. It is not.

What should I tell them? Should I tell them the truth that Hollywood considers them second-class Japanese? Or they would never ever be cast because theyre born to the wrong parents?

Hollywood would rather cast Asian American actors than mixed Japanese because they believe some of them look more Japanese than mixed Japanese. And the sad part is that because the Asian American community often isnt aware of how mixed Japanese are treated, even when Asian Americans are cast for the wrong reasons, they praise Hollywood for advancing Asian American representation. I love the As-Am community, but this is not right.

Story continues

Of course, the Japanese industry is to blame as well. Believe it or not, Japan has literally zero minority representation, and Im not being hyperbolic. Though there have been hundreds of Japanese films where a gay man is a protagonist, not a single one of them has an openly gay man cast in that role.

Many mixed Japanese have experienced being treated as foreigners, even though they were born and raised in Japan. This is what happens when theres absolutely no representation  it impacts how people view their society and what they believe it should look like.

And here is what hurts me the most. The vast majority of mixed Japanese actors are registered with international talent agencies in Japan, and if you go to their websites, theyre listed as foreign talents. They are not foreigners. They are Japanese.

For the past 50 years, Japan has been putting out a completely fictitious version of homogenous Japan, and Hollywood has been telling the world what Japanese people should look like. In this echo chamber, we are tricked into believing that there are no mixed-race Japanese.

To keep up to speed with all the latest opinions and comment, sign up to our free weekly Voices Dispatches newsletter by clicking here

This is 2022, not the 1960s or 70s. Its been more than half a century since the Akira Kurosawa or YasujirA Ozu era. Every time we pay tribute to Kurosawa/Ozu/Samurai/Kaiju/Yakuza films and call them authentic, we are subscribing to a false ideal of homogenous Japan which doesnt exist in reality. This reinforces stereotyping and negates the existence of mixed Japanese.

I cannot stay silent anymore about one of the most blatantly racist practices Ive ever seen. And this is coming from a guy whos been in the US for two decades as a foreigner. Representation matters.

In order to fix this problem on both sides of the Pacific, we need to go big. Its time to help Japanese filmmakers understand that diversity makes films better, and abolish the racist stereotypes that Hollywood have been regurgitating for more than half a century.

Im getting the ball rolling with Mosaic Street, a Japanese/English crime drama set in a near-future Japan where diversity is already a norm, starring openly transgender actress Kota Ishijima, openly lesbian actress Ami Ide, and Afro-Japanese actress Ema Grace.

This is what Japan is supposed to look like  diverse and modern.

If you work in Hollywood, please consider casting a mixed Japanese actor for your next film. You dont need a reason to cast them. Just cast them for any of your characters. If you feel that you need to justify the casting, then youre doing it wrong. Together, lets right this wrong once and for all. Its long overdue.

Yuki Matsuzaki is a Japanese actor
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy responded on Sunday to the horrors revealed in gruesome photos and videos out of the Kyiv region attacked by Russian troops.

Mothers of Russian soldiers should see that. See what bastards youve raised, Zelenskyy posted on his Telegram channel. Murderers, looters, butchers.

Some of the graphic scenes the president was referring to are shown below.

Such photos and videos have been coming out of cities like Bucha and the Kyiv suburbs of Irpin and Hostomel, which Zelenskyy adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said looked like a scene from a horror movie.

Lifeless bodies of men, some with their hands tied behind their backs, lie on the ground in Bucha, Ukraine, on April 3. Associated Press journalists in Bucha, a small city northwest of Kyiv, saw the bodies of at least nine people in civilian clothes who appeared to have been killed at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs. (Photo: Vadim Ghirda via Associated Press)

Lifeless bodies of men, some with their hands tied behind their backs, lie on the ground in Bucha, Ukraine, on April 3. Associated Press journalists in Bucha, a small city northwest of Kyiv, saw the bodies of at least nine people in civilian clothes who appeared to have been killed at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs. (Photo: Vadim Ghirda via Associated Press)

Ukrainian troops have discovered brutalized bodies and widespread destruction in the area outside the capital. Authorities said they are documenting evidence as Ukraines military reclaims territory and Russian soldiers withdraw to focus on targeting fuel and ammunition supplies in southern and eastern Ukraine.

Graphic photos from Bucha showed bodies in the streets, some that Associated Press journalists in the area noted had their hands tied behind their backs and had been killed at what appeared to be close range. Other bodies were found wrapped in plastic, bound with tape and tossed in a ditch. Arestovych said some civilians were shot in the head, and some bodies showed signs of torture, rape and burning.

A lifeless body of a man with his hands tied behind his back lies on the ground in Bucha, Ukraine, on April 3. (Photo: Vadim Ghirda via Associated Press)

A lifeless body of a man with his hands tied behind his back lies on the ground in Bucha, Ukraine, on April 3. (Photo: Vadim Ghirda via Associated Press)

Zelenskyy on Sunday also slammed NATO for not inviting Ukraine to accession talks in 2008. During the alliances summit that year in Bucharest, Romania, members invited Albania and Croatia to accession talks with NATO.

Story continues

The many years of hard work within the Membership Action Plan have paid off, the NATO secretary-general said at the summit. Due to your hard work, Allies can be confident that your admission to the Alliance will strengthen NATO.

A dog lies next to a body of a man in a street in the town of Bucha, not far from the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, on April 3. (Photo: Sergei Supinsky/AFP via Getty Images)

A dog lies next to a body of a man in a street in the town of Bucha, not far from the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, on April 3. (Photo: Sergei Supinsky/AFP via Getty Images)

The alliance was also tasked with deciding whether to provide Georgia and Ukraine with MAP status. Neither nation received such status, and they were left with an open-ended promise of eventual, potential membership.

Bucharest, NATO Summit Declaration. April 3, 14 years ago. There was a chance to prevent, so that Russia did not come, Zelenskyy wrote in the same Telegram post on Sunday. Bucha, Kyiv region. Now. Russia has come.

The hand of a corpse buried along with other bodies is seen in a mass grave in Bucha, in the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 3. (Photo: Rodrigo Abd via Associated Press)

The hand of a corpse buried along with other bodies is seen in a mass grave in Bucha, in the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 3. (Photo: Rodrigo Abd via Associated Press)

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was asked on Sunday about the prospect of guaranteeing security to Ukraine should the country commit to neutrality as part of a negotiation with Russia to end the war.

All of this is up to the Ukrainians, which is to say that, if they negotiate something that meets their needs, that preserves their sovereignty, their independence, we will back it, Blinken told CNNs State of the Union. And were not going to be less Ukrainian than Ukrainians. Were not going to be more Ukrainian than Ukrainians. So, first and foremost, its up to them, to their elected representatives, to President Zelenskyy.

When it comes to the future, we and allies and partners are going to want to make sure that we do everything we can to ensure that this cant happen again and that Ukraine has the means to defend itself, to deter the Russian aggression, he continued. So, we will look at anything that we can do to back up that kind of outcome.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Editorial Board

Its still unclear whether the smoke around Hunter Bidens foreign financial connections actually indicates a fire. Thats what federal investigators are (and should be) exploring. But heres whats already clear about the investigation into President Joe Bidens son: The president hasnt responded by firing people, publicly lashing out at investigators or otherwise obstructing justice. Instead, he has responsibly stayed out of it. What a refreshing change from his predecessors campaign of obstruction and vengeance in response to legitimate questions about his own foreign entanglements.

What began as a federal inquiry into Hunter Bidens unpaid taxes during the Obama administration  while Bidens father was vice president  has since expanded to probe his profitable roles in troubled energy deals in Ukraine and China.

The probe was expanded during Donald Trumps presidency, under a Trump-appointed U.S. attorney, even as Joe Bidens political threat to Trump rose. Still, the same U.S. attorney has been allowed to pursue the case with the change of administrations. Contrast that to Trumps firing of FBI Director James Comey, his pardoning of cronies, his public trashing of investigators and other brazen steps designed to thwart the inquiry by the special counsel into Trumps troubling Russia connections.

To hear some tell it, the Hunter Biden saga is a smoking gun that implicates President Biden in influence-peddling and other nefarious doings. In fact, theres been no evidence of that reported. The younger Biden certainly tends to look shady with his documented past drug problems and his obvious attempts to leverage his family name to build what has been, to date, an unsuccessful business career. But if Joe Bidens detractors have proof of illegality or even impropriety on the presidents part, they have yet to show it.

What they do have is a sinister-sounding phrase  Hunters laptop!  that they wield as if its proof of something other than sound and fury designed to obfuscate a sober examination of the facts.

It does appear some documents that are part of the investigation were found on a laptop that the younger Biden left at a Delaware computer repair shop. But the existence of the laptop itself isnt especially relevant beyond its usefulness as a prop  which is how the Trump campaign used it when it sprung into the public discourse shortly before the 2020 election. And why not? They knew firsthand how well the equally irrelevant but sinister-sounding prop-phrase Hillarys emails! worked for them four years earlier.

If Hunter Biden is found to have broken the law, he should be convicted and punished. If theres any evidence that President Biden did anything improper, it should be revealed.

Meanwhile, its refreshing to have a president who responds to a federal inquiry into his own circle by staying out of the way and above the fray, instead of acting like a cornered mob boss.
Bethany Childers has joined York General as the Vice President of Human Resources and Development effective February 2022. Prior to joining the York General team, Childers worked as the Chief Operating Officer of Human Resources at State of Iowa/Department of Administrative Services. She has previous experience of over 22 years in health care human resources, working at Methodist Fremont Health (Fremont, NE), and Banner Health (Ogallala, NE).

Childers has a Masters degree in Organizational Leadership and HR and has several advanced Human Resources credentials including SHRM-SCP (Society of Human Resource Management  Senior Certified Professional), Certified Professional Human Resources through the HR Certification Institute, and is Just Culture Certified, (a course focusing on human factors, systems design, and performance management.)

Childers stated, Im so fortunate to have joined an organization where the mission and values match my own. For my husband Layne and I, moving back to our home state was important to us and York is located between our two daughters, who live in Lincoln and Aurora. The added benefit is it lands us only 20 minutes from our four grandchildren.

Childers continued, The staff here at York General are so committed to the communities they serve. They are the kindest individuals who go out of their way to deliver the best care while making a difference to our patients and residents as individuals. Im honored to join a team so compassionate and committed to excellence.

CEO Jim Ulrich concluded, Bethany brings a tremendous amount of experience to this position as well as a passion for Human Resources, Healthcare, and definitely working with people. She has a great vision of what the Human Resources Department can be and how they can serve all members of our team in an excellent fashion. We are excited that Bethany has joined York General.

Perennial Public Power District saluting lineworkers

Every year one day is set aside in Nebraska to honor and recognize electric utility lineworkers. Utility lineworkers are a unique group of individuals that support our power grid, and do so in all weather conditions, and at all hours of the day and night.

Monday, April 11 has been set aside as Nebraska Lineworkers Appreciation Day, followed by a National Lineworkers Appreciation Day on April 18.

We are blessed to have dedicated lineworkers here at Perennial that go above and beyond their essential duty, said Matthew Moffitt, Perennials general manager.

Our crews are some of the first people to respond to natural disasters and other events that have damaged a power line or power line structure, he added. It is common for residents and businesses to see crews from Perennial Public Power District arrive on the scene of an outage, whether the outage is because of equipment malfunction, a downed power line, restoring power following a traffic accident or after a storm, no matter what time of day.

Too often, people take electricity for granted and do not think about what it takes to keep power flowing, and often give it little thought until the power goes out. Nor do they realize the danger of the job and work that goes on behind the scenes to get power back on during sub-zero temperatures or on sweltering hot days in the middle of summer.

You can help spread the word and appreciation for lineworkers by showing your appreciation by going to Perennials Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/PerennialPublicPowerDistrict) and leave a post recognizing the lineworkers for the amazing job they do to make sure customers have electricity every day.

Flavors of York

The York Chambers 2021/22 Leadership York class will host Flavors of York County at Yorks Holthus Convention Center this Thursday, April 7. The class has done a great job putting this event together according to Chamber exec Madonna Mogul.

Mogul said the last Flavors event was held in April of 2019 and the class is looking forward to having a strong turnout. Advance tickets are on sale now and can be purchased here at the Chamber office or on the chambers website (https://yorkchamber.org/on-line-payment/). Tickets the day of the event are $20.

What the heck?

Two weeks in. Officially Ive been retired now for about a month but I dont count the first couple of weeks or so as we were wandering around the eastern part of the country. Im not sure Ive found my regular routine yet but I do know that it seems I have to get out of the house at least once a day. Thats what Linda has been telling other people.

Today (Tuesday) were going to head to Hartington to watch our grandson Alex at a track meet. Before, it was hard to do that in the middle of the week. Now, its wake up and take off. That seems to be the biggest thing Im looking forward to. The idea that every day is a Saturday.

I did deposit my last official paycheck Monday morning. Thats the scary part.
YORK  The York County Commissioners will convene in regular session on Tuesday, April 5, during which they will meet with representatives of Summit Carbon Solutions for an update on the companys proposed carbon dioxide pipeline through Nebraska which would include a leg through York County.

As explained during a meeting last December, this company is working with 31 partner ethanol plants, as they want to capture the carbon dioxide (which is a byproduct in the ethanol process) and then move the carbon dioxide through the pipeline to a site in North Dakota where it would be injected underground and stored. The project would span over five states, including Nebraska, where six ethanol plants would be participating.

The proposed project would include 314.71 miles of pipeline in Nebraska, which would include a pipeline leg from the Green Plains ethanol plant east of York straight to the Green Plains ethanol plant in Central City. A main pipeline leg would stretch from the Green Plains plant at Wood River angling northeast across the state, as well as another main leg connecting the Green Plains ethanol plant at Atkinson to the main pipeline east of Norfolk.

In York County, if the pipeline leg were to be built in the anticipated straight line from the York plant to the Central City plant, it would run at a southwest angle from the local plant, crossing land between Benedict and Bradshaw and then crossing the York County line near Polk.

Back in December, a representative of the company said they intend to survey the potential route in February and work toward acquiring land rights in March  when they meet with the York County Commissioners on Tuesday, they will provide an update on how that process has gone. The commissioners will also have an opportunity to ask questions about the project as it moves forward.

Also on Tuesdays agenda:

 Among the agenda items will be the boards consideration and authorization of the commissioner chairman to sign a hazardous material emergency response plan for the county.

 The board will consider the purchase of a Stryker evacuation chair for just under $4,000. This purchase has been discussed at length. The apparatus would be equipment used to help evacuate wheelchair-bound individuals from the basement and/or the second floor of the courthouse, should an emergency occur in which the elevator cannot be used.

 The board will talk about adding the sheriffs department, jail and communications center to the courthouse phone system.

 As the board of equalization, they will discuss tax roll corrections with the assessor.

The public is encouraged to attend the meeting, which will begin at 8:30 a.m., in the commissioners chambers, located on the main floor of the courthouse.

The public can also watch/listen to the meeting via Zoom at https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87930458104.

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
New Delhi: The Competition Commission of India (CCI) launched a probe into the behaviour of food aggregators Swiggy and Zomato, which are accused of delaying payments, imposing one-sided terms, and charging high commissions.

According to the fair trade regulator, there is a prima facie case for certain actions of Zomato and Swiggy.

CCI has requested its director general to conduct a thorough investigation into the claims and provide a report within two months.

"The Commission believes that there is a prima facie case with respect to some of Zomato and Swiggy activity, which necessitates an inquiry by the Director General (DG) to assess if the platforms' conduct has resulted in a violation of the requirements," the antitrust authority stated.

The National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI), which represents over 50,000 restaurant operators across the country, filed the complaint that led to the order.

In July of last year, the association filed a complaint with the antitrust commission, alleging data masking, deep discounting, and platform neutrality violations against Zomato and Swiggy.

"The magnitude of Zomato and Swiggy's anti-competitive activities have expanded manifold throughout the (Covid-19) pandemic, and despite multiple contacts with them, these deep-pocketed marketplace platforms are not interested in addressing restaurant concerns," it had alleged.

Live TV

#mute
New Delhi: Andhra Pradesh on Monday (April 4, 2022) got a new map as Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy inaugurated 13 new districts in the state. The new districts, which have been carved out from the existing 13 districts, increased the number of districts in the state to 26.

The move is aimed at the decentralisation of governance and balanced development.

Reddy launched the new districts in a virtual event that was attended by various MPs, MLAs, district collectors and superintendents of police.

The Chief Minister said that a new beginning has been made with the reorganisation of 13 districts to double the number. He said from the state capital to the village, his government was following the policy of decentralisation.

He said that the exercise was undertaken to ensure decentralised development of all regions by taking governance closer to the people.

Reddy added that the new districts have been formed in accordance with public opinion and claimed that while naming the new districts, the government took into consideration various factors, including the sentiments of the local people.

He stated that Andhra Pradesh, with a population of 4.96 crore, required new districts.

"Till yesterday, we had one district for a population of 38.15 lakh but now with the creation of 13 new districts, there is one district for a population of 19.07 lakh," he said.

He said his government had been focusing on decentralisation. The first step was taken with the formation of village and ward secretariats.

13 new districts in Andhra Pradesh

The names of the 13 new districts are as follows:

Alluri Sitharama Raju district at Paderu Anakapalli, Annamayya district at Rayachoti Bapatla, Chittoor, East Godavari district at Rajamagendravaram Kakinada at East Godavari district Konaseema district at Amalapuram Nandyal, NTR district at Vijayawada Palnadu district at Narasaraopet Parvathipuram Manyam, Sri Satya Sai district at Puttaparthy Tirupathi district and West Godavari District at Bhimavaram Ananathapuramu, Guntur, Krishna district at Machilipatnam Kurnool, Prakasam district at Ongole Sri PottiSriramulu district at Nellore Srikakulam, Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram and YSR district at Kadapa.

All the new districts have come into effect from April 4.

Earlier in the 2019 elections, YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) had promised to create one district in each of the 25 Lok Sabha constituencies.

(With agency inputs)

Live TV
New Delhi: Andhra Pradesh will now have 13 new districts, taking the total number of districts in the state to 26, informed a gazette notification issued by the Andhra Pradesh government on Saturday (April 2, 2022) night.

The Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy-led YSR Congress government also reshuffled IAS and IPS officers, and appointed collectors and Superintendents of Police to the newly-created districts.

The state government informed that all the new districts would come into being from today (April 4, 2022).

Earlier, in January, the Andhra Pradesh government issued a draft notification to carve out 26 districts from the existing 13 and invited suggestions and objections.

According to the officials in the Chief Ministers Office (CMO), the Chief Minister will launch district portals and handbooks to make it possible for people to understand the new districts.

Here's complete list of 26 districts of Andhra Pradesh:

Manyam district is carved out of Vizianagaram district

Anakapalli district is carved out of Visakhapatnam district

Alluri Sitarama Raju is carved out of Visakhapatnam district

Kakinada is carved out of East Godavari district

Konaseema is carved out of East Godavari district

Eluru is carved out of West Godavari district

Palnadu is carved out of Guntur district

Bapatla is carved out of Guntur district

Nandyal is carved out of Kurnool district

Sri Satya Sai district is carved out of Anantapur

Sri Balaji is carved out of Chittoor district

Annamaya is carved out of Kadapa district

N T Rama Rao district carved out of the existing Krishna district.

Reddy, during the poll campaign for the 2019 Assembly elections, promised that his party, if voted to power, would make every Lok Sabha constituency as a district.

The state has 25 Lok Sabha seats. One district was additionally created carving out the tribal areas in East Godavari and Visakhapatnam.

(With agency inputs)

Live TV
New Delhi: The CBI is no more a "caged parrot" but is truly performing its duty as India's top criminal investigating agency, Law Minister Kiren Rijiju asserted, saying there was a time when people sitting in the government sometimes used to become a problem in investigations.

He also said that the challenges some officers had faced in the past are "no more in existence".

The minister's remarks defending the agency came close on the heels of Chief Justice of India NV Ramana saying that the CBI's credibility has come under deep public scrutiny with the passage of time as its actions and inactions have raised questions in some cases.

In a tweet on Sunday, Rijiju said, "CBI is no more "Caged Parrot" but truly performing its duty as India's top criminal investigating agency".

He also shared a short video of his address on Saturday at the first-ever conference of investigating officers of the CBI.

In his address, Rijiju said that "there used to be a time, I remember very well, that the people who sit in the government, sometimes they become a problem in the investigation".

Zero tolerance towards corruption is the clear objective of Honble Prime Minister Shri @narendramodi Ji. pic.twitter.com/LSJvdcZdjj  Kiren Rijiju (@KirenRijiju) April 3, 2022

He said today there is a prime minister who himself is playing a lead role in the crusade against corruption.

"I know the difficulties when people in power are involved in corruption; when their compliances which are difficult to be met with... It becomes difficult for the CBI. Then we have heard some unsavoury remarks from the judiciary in the past. We have come a long way now," the minister said.

During a hearing of the coalfield allocation case in 2013, the Supreme Court had described the CBI as a "caged parrot".

Addressing the 19th D P Kohli Memorial Lecture of the CBI on April 1, CJI Ramana had also called for creating an "independent umbrella institution" to bring various investigating agencies under one roof.

The CJI said, "When it comes to the CBI, it possessed immense trust of the public in its initial phase. In fact, the judiciary used to be flooded with requests for transfer of investigations to the CBI, as it was a symbol of impartiality and independence."

"Whenever the citizenry doubted the skill and impartiality of its own state police, they sought an investigation by the CBI, as they wanted justice to be done. But, with the passage of time, like every other institution of repute, the CBI has also come under deep public scrutiny. Its actions and inactions have raised questions regarding its credibility, in some cases," Justice Ramana had said.

Live TV
New Delhi: After tasting defeat in all five states in the Assembly Elections 2022, Congress is now gearing up for action in Telangana. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will meet party leaders of the state on Monday to discuss the political situation prevailing along with brainstorming on the Assembly elections scheduled next year, reported ANI quoting sources.

The meeting with the senior leaders of the party will take place at Rahul Gandhi's residence.

This marks Rahul Gandhi's second meeting with the Telangana party leaders in the last seven day

During the meeting, discussion over the Paddy procurement issue will also be on the top agenda of Congress.

The meeting comes at a crucial time when state Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao is nourishing his national ambitions and calling on the parties to form a non-BJP and non-Congress alliance for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.

Notably, in the last Assembly elections in 2018 in Telangana, Congress joined hands with Telugu Desam Party, however, the elections were won by KCRs Telangana Rashtra Samithi.

Later, reports of an alliance between the Congress and KCRs party emerged.

However, last month, Telangana Congress chief Revanth Reddy dismissed possibilities of forging an alliance with the Telangana Rashtra Samithi party and said the grand old party will form an alliance with any party but Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao's as "he is not trustworthy".

"Congress would not forge an alliance with KCR and his party TRS at any cost because he is not trustworthy. We have seen him in 2004, 2009, 2014 and 2019. We can trust any other leader or party, but not KCR and TRS," Reddy told ANI.

Assembly Elections in the southern state are due next year.

Live TV
New Delhi: Covovax, the Covid-19 vaccine manufactured by the Serum Institute of India (SII), was reportedly recommended by the Covid-19 Working Group of the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (NTAGI) for vaccination of those aged 12 years and above, the official sources said on Sunday (April 3, 2022).

The Covid-19 Working Group has now recommended to the Standing Technical Sub-Committee of NTAGI that Covovax be included in the national vaccination programme for those aged 12 years and above, sources said.

Covovax was approved by India's drug regulator for restricted use in emergency situations in adults on December 28 and in the 12-17 age group, subject to certain conditions, on March 9.

Earlier, Prakash Kumar Singh, SIIs Director for Government and Regulatory Affairs had written to the Union Health Ministry recently, requesting for Covovax's inclusion in the immunisation drive.

"A meeting of the Covid-19 Working Group of the NTAGI took place on April 1 during which data of Covovax was reviewed, after which it recommended that the vaccine can be included in the national Covid-19 vaccination programme for inoculating those aged 12 years and above," one of the sources said.

Singh had stated that the Pune-based firm wanted to provide Covovax to private hospitals at Rs 900 per dose plus GST and was waiting for directions to supply it to the Centre. However, the price of the vaccine for the government was not mentioned.

India began inoculating children aged 12-14 from March 16. Biological E's Corbevax is being used to inoculate them.

In a letter to Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan, Singh was learnt to have said that private companies, educational institutes, social organisations, central government organisations and public sector undertakings were making requests for Covovax to inoculate their staffers, families and children.

"Under the visionary leadership of our CEO Adar C Poonawalla, we have developed, manufactured and obtained emergency use authorisation from our national regulatory authority for one more world-class Covid-19 vaccine, Covovax, for 18 years and above on December 28, and for children in the age group of 12 to 17 years on March 9, 2022," an official source quoted Singh as having written in the letter.

(With agency inputs)

Live TV
New Delhi: The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill will ensure that police and investigators remain two steps ahead of criminals, Home Minister Amit Shah said on Monday, urging the Opposition to not have any apprehensions over the draft law.

Replying to a discussion on the bill in the Lok Sabha, he said the Opposition members raising human rights concerns must also show concerns over the human rights of those targeted by criminals.

The bill will act as a defender of human rights of crores of law-abiding citizens, he said. Referring to concerns of some Opposition members over the misuse of data collected under the proposed law, Shah said the world is using database and "we too will have to use it", moving ahead with time.

Replying in the Lok Sabha on The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022. Watch live! https://t.co/fHeOuRuY5y  Amit Shah (@AmitShah) April 4, 2022

The database has been in use for two-and-a-half years to solve crimes, including automobile thefts, he said. Shah said data will be stored in protected hardware and those "who send samples (for matching) will be sent results and data will not be shared".

He said the bill has been brought in to ensure that police and investigators remain two steps ahead of criminals. There should be no apprehensions, he added. Next-generation crimes cannot be tackled with old techniques, he said. "We have to try to take the criminal justice system to the next era," Shah added.

Asserting that the BJP does not indulge in vote-bank politics, he said the Prevention of Terrorism Act was a law in the national interest and was repealed for the sake of "appeasement".

Live TV
New Delhi: A multi-department high-level meeting on air pollution in the national capital is scheduled to take place on Monday (April 4, 2022). The aim of the meeting will be to formulate a campaign against open burning of garbage, fires at landfill sites and dust pollution, officials said on Sunday.

The high-level meeting will be chaired by Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai and will be held at the Delhi Secretariat around noon. The meeting will also be attended by senior officials from the environment department, Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board, fire services, Public Works Department, Delhi Development Authority and municipal corporations.

Earlier, on Wednesday, Delhi Environment Minister directed the Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) to impose a fine of Rs 50 lakh on the East Delhi Municipal Corporation and take action against officials responsible for a massive fire at the Ghazipur landfill site.

Gopal Rai also informed that the government will plan a campaign against open burning of garbage and fires at landfill sites.

Meanwhile, days after a major fire in Ghazipur landfill site in east Delhi, civic authorities on Saturday said the process has begun to replace the old trommel machines with new, high-speed equipment that would eventually also double the waste-processing capacity to "three lakh tonne per month".

An estimated 140 lakh tonne of legacy waste is lying at the massive dump and processing it is a "challenging task," the East Delhi Municipal Corporation said in a statement.

"In order to reduce legacy waste at Ghazipur landfill site, EDMC has replaced the old-model trommel machines, and started installing the new-model, high-speed trommel machines. These machines will be operated in two shifts. In this way, the total waste disposal capacity of the corporation will be three lakh tonne per month," it said.
New Delhi: Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath on Monday (April 4) announced Rs 5 lakh for 3 PSE constables each for foiling the Gorakhnath temple attack. The Uttar Pradesh government has also handed over the case to Anti Terrorism Squad (ATS).

"Situation could have gone out of control, UP ATS and UP STF will look into the matter. 3 PSE constables who busted this incident to be given Rs 5 lakhs as declared by the CM," UP ADG (Law and Order) Prashant Kumar told ANI.

The announcement came after a man attacked two PAC constables with a sharp-edged weapon at the south gate of Gorakhnath temple on Sunday (April 3)and tried to enter the temple premises.

The accused was identified as Murtaza and has been arrested, the Police said. According to police, the accused tried to forcibly enter the temple premises on Sunday after raising the religious slogan of "Allahu Akbar".

"The man who attacked two of our personnel yesterday at Gorakhnath temple has been nabbed. He's a resident of Gorakhpur, sickle recovered from him. An FIR has been lodged against him. There could be terror angle in it, case to be transferred to ATS, Kumar added.

(With agency inputs)

Live TV
New Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday told Lok Sabha that his high-pitched voice does not reflect his anger but it is "a manufacturing defect" evoking smiles and laughter from the members.

Shah also said that he does not get angry except on questions related to Kashmir. Moving the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill 2022 for consideration and passage in the House, Amit Shah said that the bill was aimed at making the investigation of crime more efficient and expeditious and increasing the conviction rate.

The Union Home Minister sought to allay the apprehension of opposition members about the bill including the right to privacy. As opposition benches made some comments, Amit Shah said he will respond to the point made by "Dada".

As a Trinamool Congress member quipped in a lighter vein that the minister responds to Dada in an angry tone, the minister made everyone smile with his reply. "I never scold anyone. My voice is a little high-pitched. It is my manufacturing defect. I do not get angry, get so on question related to Kashmir," he said.

Replying in the Lok Sabha on The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022. Watch live! https://t.co/fHeOuRuY5y  Amit Shah (@AmitShah) April 4, 2022

Parliament had in August 2019 passed a bill to abrogate Article 370 from Jammu and Kashmir. During the passage of the bill, there was a heated exchange between Amit Shah and Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury.

Responding to Chowdhury, Amit Shah had then said "What do you think we are doing. We are ready to sacrifice our life for the country." The House later took up discussion on the bill that provides for legal sanction for taking appropriate body measurements of persons who are required to give such measurements to "make the investigation of crime more efficient and expeditious".

The bill seeks to define measurements to include finger impressions, palm-print and foot-print impressions, photographs, iris and retina scan, physical, and biological samples and their analysis.

It seeks to empower the National Crime Records Bureau to collect, store and preserve the record of measurements and for sharing, dissemination, destruction and disposal of records.

The bill also seeks to empower a Magistrate to direct any person to give measurements and empower police or prison officer to take measurements of any person who resists or refuses to give measurements. The bill was introduced in Lok Sabha by Minister of State for Home Affairs Ajay Mishra Teni.

Live TV
New Delhi: With 913 new Covid-19 infections being reported in the last 24 hours, India's total tally of COVID-19 cases rose to 4,30,27,784, according to Union health ministry data updated on Monday (April 4, 2022). India's daily Covid-19 cases drop below 1000 after 715 days.

India's daily #COVID19 cases drop below 1000 after 715 days; reports 913 fresh cases, 1316 recoveries and 13 deaths in the last 24 hours. Active cases: 12,597 (less than 13,000 after 714 days)

Death toll: 5,21,358

Daily positivity rate: 0.29% Total vaccination: 1,84,70,83,279 pic.twitter.com/ljFlSgLiap  ANI (@ANI) April 4, 2022

India also recorded 13 deaths in the last 24 hours, pushing the total death toll to 5,21,358. The country also reported 1,316 recoveries in a day.

The number of people who have recuperated from the disease has increased to 4,24,95,089, while the case fatality rate has been recorded at 1.21 per cent.

A reduction of 416 cases has been recorded in the active Covid-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours. The ministry also informed that the active cases comprise 0.03 per cent of the total infections, while the national Covid-19 recovery rate has been recorded at 98.76 per cent.

The nations daily positivity rate has been recorded at 0.24 per cent and the weekly positivity rate at 0.23 per cent.

The cumulative doses administered under the nationwide Covid-19 vaccination drive has exceeded 184.70 crore on Monday at 8 am.

The last 24 hours saw a total of 3,14,823 Covid-19 tests being conducted in the country and so far, over 79.10 crore tests have been done.

Meanwhile, Covovax, the Covid-19 vaccine manufactured by the Serum Institute of India (SII), was reportedly recommended by the Covid-19 Working Group of the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (NTAGI) for vaccination of those aged 12 years and above, the official sources said on Sunday (April 3, 2022).

The Covid-19 Working Group has now recommended to the Standing Technical Sub-Committee of NTAGI that Covovax be included in the national vaccination programme for those aged 12 years and above, sources said.

Covovax was approved by India's drug regulator for restricted use in emergency situations in adults on December 28 and in the 12-17 age group, subject to certain conditions, on March 9.

Live TV
New Delhi: A special investigation team, appointed by the Supreme Court, probing the Lakhimpur Kheri case has filed its status report and has recommended the Uttar Pradesh government to cancel the bail granted to prime accused Ashish Mishra twice.

According to media reports, the SIT investigating the case has stated that evidence substantiated that Ashish Misra, son of Union minister Ajay Misra Teni, was at the spot of the violence that killed eight people.

"The head of SIT wrote to the Additional Chief Secretary, Home Department, Uttar Pradesh on 10.02.2022 and 14.02.2022 respectively requesting an urgent appeal in the Hon'ble Supreme Court for cancellation of bail of the accused in view of the ongoing investigation and possibility of the threat to the witnesses including 98 witnesses who are provided protection," said the committee.

The report also informed that Ashish Mishra was aware of the change in the route taken by UP Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya on October 3, the day of the incident, to attend a function.

"It is also substantiated that the 13 accused (and three dead accused) went to the scene of the crime in a premeditated manner, using three vehicles in a convoy and driving them at a very high speed on a narrow road which was full of people gathered to protest," the report added.

"There are two letters sent by the SIT to the Additional chief secretary (home) of the Uttar Pradesh government by the monitoring judge who had written to the state to file appeal in SC to cancel bail of main accused Ashish Mishra," the SC bench, comprising Chief Justice N V Ramana and Justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli, had said.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court will hear the plea challenging the grant of bail to Ashish Mishra on Monday.

The prime accused in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case, Ashish Misra, was arrested on October 9 last year in connection with the violence that erupted in the area.

On October 3, 2021, major violence broke out in the Lakhimpur Kheri district in Uttar Pradesh, where 8 people were killed when farmers were protesting against UP Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya's visit to the area. Four farmers were mowed down by an SUV.

Live TV
New Delhi: The Uttar Pradesh government on Monday told the Supreme Court that Ashish Mishra, son of Union Minister Ajay Mishra Teni, who is accused of running over farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri, is `not a flight risk`.

The Uttar Pradesh government, represented by Mahesh Jethmalani, was responding to a petition by families of the farmers killed in the October 3, 2021 violence, challenging the bail granted to Mishra by the Allahabad High Court.

Asserting that the offence is `grave`, the state government told the court that `no words are enough' to condemn it.

It also maintained that it had `vehemently` opposed the bail in the high court.

However, Ashish Mishra is not a `flight risk` and security has been provided to the witnesses to ensure there is no tampering, the Uttar Pradesh government added.

The state government`s posture on the issue has expectedly angered the farmers who have been accusing the government of shielding Ashish Mishra.

Gursevwak Singh, elder brother of Gurwinder Singh, who was one of the four farmers who died, said, "It is because of this that we have been demanding that the case should be transferred to Delhi.

We all know that the proceedings are being influenced here. No action was taken against the union minister despite his video threatening farmers having gone viral.

The UP government`s attitude is different when it comes to criminals who are from their own party. There is no scope of justice in UP.

That is evident from the way an eyewitness was thrashed and his case was closed by the local police."

Satnam Singh, the father of 19-year-old Lovepreet Singh, who was killed in the violence, said, "Despite having all the evidence, we sometimes think that we are fighting a lost battle.

We all know that the state is trying to save the accused and the proof is now out in the open.

The minister is openly giving statements saying he proved his `innocence` by ensuring BJP`s win in Lakhimpur Kheri."

Jagdeep Singh, son of Nachattar Singh, who was seen tossed in the air by the speeding SUV, said, "There is no way we can get justice in UP.

The main accused was given bail easily despite the SIT submitting evidence in court calling the incident `premeditated` and `not an act of negligence.

The state government is now defending his bail. We are now going to approach the apex court to get the case transferred to Delhi or elsewhere to ensure justice for farmers."

Live TV
Gorakhpur: A man attacked two PAC constables with a sharp-edged weapon at the south gate of Gorakhnath temple here and tried to enter the temple premises, police said. The accused has been identified as Murtaza and has been arrested, they said. According to police, the accused tried to forcibly enter the temple premises on Sunday (April 3) after raising the religious slogan of "Allahu Akbar".

"Two of our Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) constables were injured after the accused tried to enter the temple with a sharp-edged weapon. He went to a PAC post near the gate and tried to attack the police," ADG, Gorakhpur zone, Akhil Kumar said. The accused, who was also injured in the attack, was held by the constables, he said.

The officer said the injured constables -- Gopal Kumar Gaur and Anil Paswan -- were given first aid at Guru Gorakhnath hospital and are undergoing treatment at BRD Medical College.

"The accused is also undergoing treatment at the district hospital. Initial investigation revealed that his name is Murtaza and is a resident of Gorakhpur," Kumar said.

He also said that the angle of terror cannot be ruled out as Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath often visits the region. "Strict action will be taken after probing the incident from all angles," the ADG added.

Meanwhile, the Uttar Pradesh government has decided to hand over the probe to the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) as the terror angle of the incident is not being ruled out. "The case has been transferred to ATS as we cannot rule out the terror angle in the incident and a detailed investigation has been initiated."Vipin Tada, SSP Gorakhpur told ANI.

(With agency inputs)

Live TV
New Delhi: Maharashtra minister Nawab Malik's judicial custody in a case linked to Dawood Ibrahim was on Monday (April 4, 2022) extended till April 18.

The NCP leader was arrested on February 23 by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money-laundering probe linked to the fugitive gangster and his aides. The NCP leader was in ED's custody till March 7 and was later sent to judicial custody till March 21.

On March 21, Malik was produced before a special court, designated to hear cases related to the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), and Special Judge RN Rokade had extended his judicial custody till April 4. The court had also allowed his application seeking a bed, mattress and chair in jail, but directed him to not misuse this permission.

Earlier on April 2, Malik had moved to the Supreme Court against an order of the Bombay High Court which had rejected his interim application seeking immediate release in a case of money laundering.

In his plea which was drafted by advocate Ankur Chawla, Malik had challenged the March 15 order of the division bench of the high court which had rejected the application saying just because the special PMLA court's order remanding him in custody is not in his favour, it does not make that order illegal or wrong.

After the Enforcement Directorate had arrested Malik under the provisions of the PMLA, he had filed a habeas corpus plea in the high court claiming that his arrest by the ED and the consequent remands were illegal.

The high court had said that Malik's counsel had argued before the PMLA court and vehemently opposed the ED's request for the minister's custody.

The central agency has accused Malik of being part of an alleged criminal conspiracy to usurp a property in Mumbai's Kurla area which currently has a market value of Rs 300 crore and belongs rightfully to one Munira Plumber.

Malik, however, had contended before the high court that he had bought the property in a bonafide transaction three decades ago, and Plumber has now changed her mind about the transaction.

(With agency inputs)
New Delhi: The National Testing Agency (NTA) is likely to begin the application process for National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) UG 2022 today.

National Eligibility cum Entrance Test- Undergraduate (NEET UG) 2022 will most likely be held in July, while the application process will start from April, according to media reports.

NTA is expected to release the notification in April on the official websites- nta.ac.in and neet.nta.nic.in. More than 16 lakh students are expected to appear for NEET UG 2022 examination this year.

It may be noted that the agency is yet to officially announce the NEET UG 2022 examination date and time. Students are advised to keep a check on the official website nta.ac.in.

NEET UG is held for admission to MBBS, BDS, AYUSH, Veterinary, BSc Nursing and Life Science courses.

Additionally, this year's application process for NEET UG has been divided into two phases: The candidates will have to submit a particular set of information before the entrance test in the first phase and the remaining information had to be submitted in the second phase before the NEET results were declared.

NTA has also removed the upper age limit for NEET UG for all candidates this year. NEET UG 2022 exam would be conducted in pen and paper mode in over 13 languages, including English, Hindi, Urdu, Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Marathi, Malayalam, Odia, Punjabi, Tamil and Telugu.

NEET UG 2022 will have 180 MCQs from Physics, Chemistry and Biology (Botany and Zoology). Each subject will have two sections the first section will have 35 compulsory questions while the second section will have 15 questions of which candidates need to attempt only 10.

Live TV
New Delhi: The Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech, while reacting to the World Health Organization (WHO) suspension of Covaxin supplies through United Nations agencies, said that is has received some feedback for its Covid-19 vaccine and will be doing some modifications.

Bharat Biotech also highlighted that there is "no impact on efficacy and safety of the Covid-19 vaccine Covaxin". "It's a routine inspection for Covaxin" which WHO carries out the post-EUL inspection, Bharat Biotech further said.

"It's (WHO post EUL inspection) a routine inspection for Covaxin," Bharat Biotech further said.  ANI (@ANI) April 4, 2022

Earlier, on Sunday, the company had also issued a statement on the same. "For the millions who have received Covaxin, the vaccine certificates issued still stand valid as there is no impact on efficacy and safety of the vaccine," read the statement issued by Bharat Biotech on suspension from WHO.

The vaccine manufacturer has further said that the company is slowing down the production of Covaxin for facility optimization.

"For the coming period the company will focus on pending facility maintenance, process and facility optimization activities," the statement read.

"As all existing facilities were repurposed for the manufacture of Covaxin, with continuous production during the past year, to meet the public health emergency of Covid-19, these upgrades were due. Certain highly sophisticated equipment which was required to enhance the process stringency was unavailable during the Covid-19 pandemic. It has to be stressed that the quality of Covaxin was never compromised at any point in time," it added.

In the statement, the company also assured the people that, to meet the global regulatory requirements, they are working to further improvements and upgrades to ensure that the production of Covaxin.

"Notwithstanding this excellent safety and efficacy record, Bharat Biotech is diligently working to further improvements and upgrades to ensure that the production of Covaxin continues to meet ever-increasing global regulatory requirements. Since patient safety is the primary consideration for any new vaccine, there can be no compromises in meeting operational excellence objectives," it said.

Additionally, the UN body also clarified its decision and said that there will be no issues related to the safety and efficacy of a vaccine.

"The risk assessment to date does not indicate a change in the risk-benefit ratio. The data available to WHO, indicate the vaccine is effective and no safety concern exists. For continuation of vaccination with alternative sources of Covid-19 vaccines countries should refer to the respective SAGE recommendation," it read.

On inspection by WHO, Bharat biotech said, "During the recent WHO post-EUL inspection, Bharat Biotech agreed with the WHO team on the scope of the planned improvement activities and indicated that they will be executed as soon as practical."

"It does not indicate a change in the risk-benefit ratio (for Covaxin) and the data, available to WHO, indicates the vaccine is effective and no safety concern exists," it said.

This suspension has been done after the WHO post-emergency use listing inspection that was conducted between March 14-22. After the suspension, there will be an interruption of supply of Covaxin production for export.

(With ANI inputs)

Live TV
Pune: Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president Sharad Pawar's statement on Sunday that he is not keen on becoming the chairperson of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) or leading an anti-BJP front appears to be a setback to the efforts of Opposition unity in the wake of recently concluded Assembly elections.

The Maratha Kshatrap, however, said that Congress cannot be excluded from any initiative aimed at providing an alternative to the BJP at the Centre, adding "I am not going to take up any responsibility to lead any front comprising various parties against the BJP."

Speaking to reporters in Kolhapur in western Maharashtra, the NCP chief also clarified that he won't lead the UPA, currently helmed by Congress, adding "recently, some youth workers of our party (NCP) passed a resolution asking me to become the chairperson of the UPA. But I am not at all interested in that position. I am not going to get into that. I will not take up that responsibility."

Pawar further said that if an attempt is made to provide an alternative (to the BJP), I am ready to co-operate, support and strengthen such bloc, adding "we have been doing it". "When it is said that the Opposition should come together then some facts need not be neglected. Mamata Banerjee's TMC is the strongest party in West Bengal and they enjoy people's support. At the same time, regional parties are also strong in their respective states," Pawar is quoted as saying by PTI.

According to him, Congress has a pan-India presence even though the Grand Old Party is not in power currently, adding "You will find Congress workers in every village, district and state in the country. Reality is that the Congress, which has a wide presence, must be taken on board while providing an alternative (to BJP)."

Queried on BJP leader Nitin Gadkari's statement that Congress needs to be strong, Pawar underlined the need for a strong opposition party for a healthy democracy.

Pawar further said, "If only one party is strong then it will become like (Russian President Vladimir) Putin. He and the Chinese president have resolved to lead their countries till they are alive. I hope India should not have such Putin."

Taking a dig at the BJP-led Central government, Pawar said that allegations were raised that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) is used for extorting money, adding "Before and after raids (are conducted) there are talks about settlements (with ED officials). If this is true and the government is not reining the agency, then the Centre should answer if anyone asks whether they are involved in corruption."

Pawar on 'The Kashmir Files'

Speaking about "The Kashmir Files", Pawar said the movie is made in such a way that the people of other religions will become angry, and reiterated that VP Singh's government, and not Congress, was in power at the Centre during the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from the Valley.

The NCP chief said, "Mufti Mohammad Sayeed had become the home minister of India at that time with the support of BJP. A section inclined towards Pakistan then started attacking Muslims who wanted to stay with India and also Hindus. It was the responsibility of the then ruling party to protect these people. But instead of protecting them, they asked Hindus to leave the Valley."

He said the film was not based on facts but it will promote racism and hatred. "If such film is promoted by the head of the nation and his party started distributing free tickets, this only means that they want to divide people and derive a political mileage," Pawar said without taking the names of PM Narendra Modi and BJP.

He said the situation in Gujrat was worse than in the Valley (during the post-Godhra communal riots in 2002), adding "Many people lost their lives but I never heard the then head of Gujarat coming forward to explain." Pawar said in a veiled swipe at Modi who was the chief minister of Gujarat at the time of the riots.

Raj Thackeray remains underground for months: Pawar

The NCP chief took a swipe at Raj Thackeray and said that the MNS chief stays underground for three to four months and suddenly surfaces to give a lecture, adding "This is his speciality. I don't know what he does for months". Raj Thackeray has recently alleged that NCP plays "caste politics".

Sharad Pawar on Sunday said the MNS president never takes a consistent stand on any issue and remains in "hibernation" for three to four months a year which is his "speciality".

Speaking at a rally at Shivaji Park in Mumbai on Saturday, Raj Thackeray had criticised Sharad Pawar, accusing him of "playing the caste card from time to time and dividing society."

"On the contrary, NCP brings together people from all the castes. Raj Thackeray should have studied the history of NCP (before making comments)," Pawar is quoted as saying by PTI.

Replying to a question on the MNS chief's speech in Kolhapur., Pawar said that the MNS chief talks about many things but lacks a consistent stand, adding "He spoke about NCP and caste politics. The fact is that Chhagan Bhujbal, and Madhukarrao Pichad among others had worked as the Leader of the House of NCP. Everybody knows which communities they belong to."

The NCP chief said that his nephew and Maharashtra deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar became the Leader of the House after completing 30 years in the Assembly.

(With Agency Inputs)

Live TV
New Delhi: India's High Commissioner to Sri Lanka Gopal Baglay has said that rice from India will arrive in the country soon under the $1 billion line of credit. The line of credit was signed during the visit of former Sri Lankan Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa's to India last month. The agreement was signed in Delhi in the presence of Indian foreign and finance minister.

Speaking exclusively to Principal Diplomatic Correspondent Sidhant Sibal, Baglay said, "Under the food the first consignment has is likely to arrive very soon, exports of rice from India. These things are providing relief to Sri Lankan people in the current situation."

The country is going through an economic crisis which has now become a political crisis as well with the cabinet of the Rajapakse govt handing over resignation.

The Indian envoy also assured the safety of Indian nationals, pointing out that the Indian commission is in touch with the authorities over the issue. According to unofficial statistics, it is estimated that around 14,000 Indian expatriates are living in Sri Lanka.

Q: How has India helped Sri Lanka under the current economic crisis?

A: In the past 3 months, we have from India extended support worth about $2.5 billion, 2 lines of credit--$500 million for fuel and $ 1 billion for food, medicine and essential supplies. Both lines of credit are in operation. Under $500 million line of credit for fuel, 4 consignments of diesel, petrol and aviation petrol have come.

Under the food the first consignment has is likely to arrive very soon, exports of rice from India. These things are providing relief to Sri Lankan people in the current situation. The Reserve bank of India has also extended currency swap of $400 million, and some other currency support they have provided to the central bank of Sri Lanka.

Q: What has been the situation of stranded Indian tourists, how has the mission reached out?

A: This is a very important question because Indian tourists are the largest group of tourists coming into Sri Lanka. So their safety and security, the safety and security of our citizens abroad is one of the most important questions for high commissions and embassies abroad. So we have actually been reached, we have been contacted by a number of people who want to come to Sri Lanka or are in Sri Lanka.

So far we have not come across any major or serious matter but what we have told people is if they have any problem, they can certainly contact us and the high commission will help them in the situation they are in. Sri Lankan tourist authorities, we are also in touch with them, we are in touch with the Sri Lankan govt, if there is any problem by our people, then with help of Sri Lankan authorities we will try and resolve it. So far, we have not come across any major difficulties.

Q: Any assurances from the Sri Lankan side to the foreign nationals, to the Indian nationals about their safety?

A: The Sri Lankan tourism authorities have reached out to the embassies and high commissions in Colombo and they have said that they will do everything possible to make the stay of tourists coming into Sri Lanka comfortable. As you know, Tourism is one of the three main foreign exchange earns for Sri Lanka and its importance is obviously very clear.

Live TV
New Delhi: Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson will be on India visit later this month as both sides are set to further firm up ties. The visit comes amid London's Indo pacific tilt and both sides hold talks on the free trade pact. He is expected to be in Delhi in the 4th week of the month. Both Indian PM Modi and British PM met last year in November on the sidelines of the Glasgow climate summit.

Last year, UK PM's India visit was cancelled twice. First in January, when he was the chief guest at India's republic day but due to covid crisis in his country it could not materialize, then in April when India was in the midst of pandemic wave. UK, as the chair of G7 last year also invited PM Modi as a guest, but that visit also could not happen due to the pandemic.

May 2021 saw a virtual summit between the 2 leaders who agreed on the 2030 roadmap. The roadmap provides a framework for UK-India relations across the health, climate, trade, education, science and technology, and defense.

The two countries also agreed to elevate the status of the relationship to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. With trade pact talks under way, one of the key outcomes of the virtual summit is to double trade by 2030. Trade between the UK and India is worth around 23 billion a year.

Just last month, UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss was in Delhi as part of a "wider diplomatic push" amid Russian invasion of Ukraine. This was her second trip to the country as Foreign Secretary following her visit last October and her third as a Secretary of State in 13 months. UK as part of its Indo pacific tilt post BREXIT, will join Indias Indo-Pacific Oceans Initiative and become a lead partner on maritime security issues, coordinating work with key partners in Southeast Asia.

Live TV
New Delhi: The World Health Organizations (WHO) suspension of supplies of Bharat Biotechs Covaxin is not related to safety or efficacy issues but only to supply for United Nations agencies, sources said on Monday.

"Received some feedback... will do those modifications. WHO has said nothing related to safety or efficacy," sources in Bharat Biotech were quoted as saying by ANI. "It`s (WHO post EUL inspection) a routine inspection for Covaxin," sources added. As per the sources, the WHO suspension of the Covaxin supply is only for the UN agencies.

"We are now only doing direct supplies to other countries and nine others under `Vaccine Maitri`," sources said. They further added that the suspension of supply will not impact the vaccine supply of Covaxin."We intend to apply for full licensure for Covaxin from the WHO," the Bharat biotech source said.

Sources further said that they haven`t received a final copy of the official report from the WHO yet, and "once we will receive the report we will reply to it". Recently, in a statement on WHO`s suspension of Covaxin, Bharat Biotech said, "For the millions who have received COVAXIN, the vaccine certificates issued still stand valid as there is no impact on efficacy and safety of the vaccine."

Bharat biotech has further said that the company is slowing down the Covaxin production for facility optimization and the company will focus on pending facility maintenance, process and facility optimization activities.

"As all existing facilities were repurposed for the manufacture of COVAXIN, with continuous production during the past year, to meet the public health emergency of COVID-19, these upgrades were due. Certain highly sophisticated equipment which were required to enhance the process stringency were unavailable during the COVID-19 pandemic. It has to be stressed that the quality of COVAXIN was never compromised at any point in time," the company sources said.

The company has also mentioned that they are working on further improvements and upgrades to ensure that the production of Covaxin continues to meet the increasing global regulatory requirements.

"Notwithstanding this excellent safety and efficacy record, Bharat Biotech is diligently working to further improvements and upgrades to ensure that the production of COVAXIN continues to meet the ever-increasing global regulatory requirements. Since patient safety is the primary consideration for any new vaccine, there can be no compromises in meeting operational excellence objectives," the company added.

The Hyderabad based Bharat Biotech`s anti-Covid Vaccine, Covaxin has been suspended by WHO under the Covax facility, announced the UN health body on Saturday, attributing it to deficiencies in manufacturing practices.

The WHO is today confirming the suspension of supply of Covaxin produced by Bharat Biotech through UN procurement agencies and recommending to countries that received the vaccine to take actions as appropriate," the WHO stated. However, the UN body has clarified that there will be no issues related to the safety and efficacy of the vaccine.

"The risk assessment to date does not indicate a change in the risk-benefit ratio. The data available to WHO, indicate the vaccine is effective and no safety concern exists. For continuation of vaccination with alternative sources of COVID19 vaccines, countries should refer to the respective SAGE recommendation," WHO said.

On inspection by WHO, Bharat Biotech has said, "During the recent WHO post-EUL inspection, Bharat Biotech agreed with the WHO team on the scope of the planned improvement activities and indicated that they will be executed as soon as practical."

This suspension has been done after the WHO post-emergency use listing inspection that was conducted between March 14-22.

Live TV
New Delhi: The Delhi Police has registered a case against the organisers of Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha and several speakers, including Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati, Priest of Dasna Devi temple, and Suresh Chavhanke, Chief Editor of Sudarshan News, for their inflammatory speeches during the event held in north-west Delhi`s Burari ground.

The programme was held on Sunday.

"Some of the speakers, including Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati, Priest of Dasna Devi Temple and Suresh Chavhanke, Chief Editor of Sudarshan News, uttered words promoting disharmony, feelings of enmity, hatred or ill-will between two communities," Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Usha Rangnani said.

The senior police official confirmed that a request letter for seeking permission for organising Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha was received in north-west Delhi from organiser Preet Singh, President, Save India Foundation.

However, the said request was denied on the ground that the organiser had no permission from the land-owning agency i.e. Delhi Development Authority for organising this sabha at the Burari ground.

Even though the request was denied, according to police, the organiser Preet Singh reached the Burari ground with his supporters on Sunday morning and started organising Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha.

"700-800 people gathered at the event place and invitees of the organiser started delivering speeches from the stage. Police also reached the place of the event and tried to maintain the order," Rangnani said.

It was at this time when Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati allegedly started making inflammatory speeches from the stage, exhorting Hindus to take up arms to fight for their existence.

Chavhanke said he is against giving equal rights. "Indian Muslims should get the same rights what Hindus are getting in Pakistan. Nothing more than that," he added.

Accordingly, the police registered an FIR under sections 188 ( Disobedience to order duly promulgated by public servant) and 153A (Promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony) of the Indian Penal Code at the Mukherjee Nagar police station.

Meanwhile, separate cases were also registered on the complaints of journalists who alleged that they were assaulted during the event.

The scribes had earlier on Sunday also alleged that they were detained by the Delhi Police from the venue and taken to Mukherjee Nagar police station.

However, DCP Rangnani denied all reports and said the reporters, willingly, on their own free will, to evade the crowd which was getting agitated by their presence, sat in a PCR van stationed at the venue and opted to proceed to the police station for security reasons.

The DCP further said two journalists of a news portal in their complaint alleged that at around 1.30 p.m., when they were rushing towards the exit, they were manhandled and assaulted by a group of people who also tried to snatch their mobile phone and I-Card. Notably, the journalists denied conducting a medical examination.

In this regard, a case under section 354 (Assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty), 323 (Punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), 341 (Punishment for wrongful restraint), 379 (Punishment for theft), 356 (Assault or criminal force in attempt to commit theft of property carried by a person) and 34 (Acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) was registered at the same police station.

In another complaint, an independent journalist who had also come to cover the event said that when he along with two other journalists were interviewing one person, then some people manhandled and assaulted him. The Police intervened and ensured their safety.

After their medical examination, a case was registered under sections 323 (Punishment for voluntarily causing hurt) and 341 (Punishment for wrongful restraint) of the IPC and an investigation was initiated.

DCP Rangnani informed that due legal action is being taken against those who are spreading rumours and misinformation using various platforms, including social media.

Live TV
Srinagar: A Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) jawan, who was injured in the terrorist attack in Srinagar, succumbed to his injuries on Monday. Two CRPF jawans were injured in the terrorist attack at Maisuma in Lal Chowk in Srinagar.

Sharing more information, an official said, "One among the two CRPF troopers who was critically injured in attack at Maisuma Srinagar succumbed to his injury in a hospital." The other CRPF official injured in the attack is stable, he added. The TRF has claimed responsibility for the attack on CRPF on social media.

Earlier in the day, terrorists fired upon two non-locals in Lajurah village of Pulwama. "Both the injured locals were rushed to a hospital. The area has been cordoned off," the police said.

Meanwhile, the Army claimed to have foiled an infiltration Bid. A statement from the Indian Army said, "Attempted infiltration bid by Pakistani terrorist in Naushera sector of Rajouri was foiled by alert troops. One terrorist was eliminated by the Indian Army. It further said, "On the night of 03/04 April 22, the body of one terrorist along with arms & ammunition have been recovered. The operation is in progress.''

Live TV
Los Angeles: Comedian Trevor Noah opened the 64th Annual Grammy Awards by alluding to Hollywood star Will Smith's controversial slap of Chris Rock during the Oscars 2022. The Grammys took place just one week after the Academy Awards, where Smith took to the stage and slapped Rock after the comedian made a joke about his wife Jada Pinkett Smith's bald head while presenting the documentary feature category, reports Variety.

"Don't even think of this as an award show," Noah said about the ceremony.

"It's a concert where we are giving out awards, we will be listening to music, dancing, sing, keeping people's names out of our mouths and we are going to give people awards all throughout the night. So let's get straight into it."

Questlove also addressed Smith's slap while presenting the Grammy for 'Song of the Year', saying: "All right, I am going to present this award and I trust that you people will stay 500 feet away from me. As they say it is far better to give than to receive. Well, I'm not so sure about that because last Sunday it felt pretty good to receive."

Questlove won the Oscar for documentary feature right after Will Smith slapped Chris Rock.

Both Smith and Rock discussed the incident themselves in the days after the Oscar ceremony. Smith apologised to Rock on March 28.

The actor published a statement on social media, writing: "My behavior at last night's Academy Awards was unacceptable and inexcusable. I would like to publicly apologise to you, Chris. I was out of line and I was wrong. I am embarrassed and my actions were not indicative of the man I want to be."

Rock waited until his March 30 stand-up comedy show in Boston to address the slap publicly, although the comedian mostly stayed away from talking about the incident.

Rock told the audience: "I don't have a bunch of shit about what happened, so if you came to hear that, I have a whole show I wrote before this weekend. I'm still kind of processing what happened. So, at some point I'll talk about that shit. And it will be serious and funny."

Mixed reports have since surfaced about how the Academy and Oscars producers should've handled the incident during the ceremony.

The Academy claimed it asked Smith to leave, but the actor refused. However, sources told Variety that Smith was never formally asked to exit the event.

Oscars producer Will Packer told 'Good Morning America' that he asked the Academy not to 'physically remove' Smith from the premises because it was not what Rock wanted. Although LAPD was reportedly ready to arrest Smith, Rock declined to press charges or file a report.

Smith announced on April 1 that he was resigning from the Academy.

He still faces "suspension, expulsion or other sanctions" from the Academy, which condemned his violent actions following the Oscars.

The next Academy board meeting is scheduled for April 18.
CHANDIGARH: With the number of new Covid-19 cases in India declining sharply, the Chandigarh Administration on Monday issued new orders saying that no penalty would be imposed for not wearing a face mask in public or workplaces from now onwards.

With this, the Chandigarh Administration also made face masks optional for the citizens as the Covid-19 situation continues to improve in the Union Territory and elsewhere.

No penalty to be imposed for not wearing face mask in public places/workplaces in Chandigarh. pic.twitter.com/Kf5qXtmSus  ANI (@ANI) April 4, 2022

The Chandigarh city logged one new Covid case today and the number of active cases rose to 18.

It may be noted that several states have lifted Covid-19 restrictions and made use of face masks optional in public places in view of significant improvement in the situation across the country.

The ML Khattar government in Haryana had on Saturday notified that wearing face masks in public places and workplaces was no longer mandatory.

The state government, however, advised the general public to adhere to the COVID appropriate behaviour and suggested that the use of face masks, sanitisers and maintaining social distance will help in keeping Covid-19 at the bay.

States which have removed mask mandate include Maharashtra, Delhi, and Telangana. The Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) had on April 1 decided that there will be no fine for not wearing a mask. In the national capital earlier, the fine for not wearing a mask in public places was Rs 500.

Maharashtra also lifted all Covid-related restrictions from April 2 - the Marathi New Year.

Live TV
New Delhi: For all Indian citizens, the Aadhaar Card is a must-have document. Every citizen of India is required to have an Aadhaar card, according to the Indian government. The Unique Identification Authority of India issues Aadhaar cards (UIDAI). Aadhaar is essential not only for government programmes, but also for financial services. It is also linked to bank accounts, automobiles, and insurance plans, among other things. The information on an Aadhaar card includes the person's name, date of birth, gender, address, and photograph.

The UIDAI has launched an online portal to allow people to update their personal information on their Aadhaar cards. You can change your information by downloading the form and submitting it to your nearest Aadhaar Seve Kendra.

When you switch to a new phone number, follow these procedures to change your Aadhaar-linked phone number.

Heres how to update phone number on Aadhaar card:
New Delhi. The account holders of the Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) gives you several financial benefits along with universal access to banking services.

PMJDY accounts are eligible for Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT), Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY), Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBY), Atal Pension Yojana (APY), Micro Units Development & Refinance Agency Bank (MUDRA) scheme. (Also read: Financial assistance upto Rs 18 lakh for 3 years, know details of the scheme)

Avail overdraft (OD) facility up to Rs 10,000 on Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan account

Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana account holders can get an overdraft (OD) facility up to Rs 10,000 in this zero balance account. The overdraft limit was earlier Rs 5,000, which was then doubled to Rs 10,000. Overdraft upto Rs 2,000 is available without conditions. To avail the overdraft facility, your Jan Dhan account should be at least 6 months old, else you can only get overdraft of up to Rs 2,000. There has also been an increase in upper age limit for overdraft from 60 to 65 years.

The PMJDY was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Independence Day address on August 15, 2014, and was simultaneously launched on August 28, 2014, to foster financial inclusion.

This national mission was launched to ensure people have access to financial services, namely, banking, remittance, credit, insurance, pension in an affordable manner.

Live TV

#mute
New Delhi: While lakhs of farmers are now waiting for the latest update on 11th installment of PM KISAN, they need not worry for eKYC deadline for a few more weeks.

Government has extended eKYC deadline for few more months till 22 May 2022. eKYC is MANDATORY for PMKISAN Registered Farmers. (Also read: Corona Kavach Policy gets 6-month extension, check policy details)

Deadline of eKYC for all the PMKISAN beneficiaries has been extended till 22nd May 2022, says the PM KISAN official website.

The Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) Scheme was launched by PM Modi in 2019. The Scheme aims to provide income support to all landholder farmer families across the country with cultivable land, subject to certain exclusions.

Under the Scheme, an amount of Rs 6000 per year is released in three 4-monthly instalments of Rs 2000 each directly into the bank accounts of the beneficiaries. In a financial year, PM Kisan installment is credited thrice through --Period 1 from April-July; Period 2 from August to November; and Period 3 from December to March.

Here is how to add name PM KISAN beneficiary list

- Visit official website of PM KISAN at www.pmkisan.gov.in

- Go to Farmers Corner.

- You will find the section in left corner of the home page of www.pmkisan.gov.in

- Tap on the New farmer registration option.

- Fill the details in the registration form.

- Now click on the Submit button.

- Your beneficiary application form will be submitted online.

ln the beginning when the PM-KISAN Scheme was launched (February, 2019), its benefits were admissible only to Small & marginal Farmers' families, with combined landholding upto 2 hectare. The Scheme was later on revised in June 2019 and extended to all farmer families irrespective of the size of their landholdings.

Live TV

#mute
New Delhi: Tesla Inc Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk has built a 9.2% stake in Twitter Inc, a regulatory filing showed on Monday, sending the micro-blogging site`s shares soaring 16% in premarket trading.

Late March, the silicon valley billionaire said he was giving "serious thought" to building a new social media platform.

Musk was responding to a Twitter user`s question on whether he would consider building a social media platform consisting of an open source algorithm and one that would prioritize free speech and where propaganda was minimal.

Musk, a prolific user of Twitter himself, has been critical of the social media platform and its policies of late. He has said the company is undermining democracy by failing to adhere to free speech principles.

Live TV

#mute
New Delhi: You may or may not like Alia Bhatt on the big screen but will surely love this girls apt mimicry of the actor to order a pizza, yes, a pizza but can we really blame her?

In a video that is going viral on social media, a girl by the name of Chandni, presumably a mimicry artist can be seen mimicking Alia Bhatt to prank a pizza delivery company and to make it sound real, she even mentions Ranbir Kapoor!

Watch the funny video here!

In the video, we can see the woman calling the pizza outlet and talking exactly like Alia Bhatt. The professional, who sounds a bit baffled by her voice asks her name to which, she replies its Alia, Alia Bhatt.

Then, in order to make the prank sound more realistic, the woman pretends to ask some Ranbir what pizza would he like to have and then inquire about veg pizzas.

The man, being a true professional, asks her about the order.

The girl then asks if they have anything in vegan, to which the pizza outlet professional says he would find something in veg.

The video, which was a part of an April Fools day prank, has gone viral on Instagram, and netizens are loving Chandnis talent as well as pizza biys professionalism.

Here are some of the best reactions served freshly from the comment section!

Alia rocked, delivery boy shocked, wrote an Insta user.

Bahat bura hua uske sath..he will have trust issues for the rest of his life! said another.

Okkkkk Im choking with laughter ?!? another user wrote.

Live TV
Kolkata: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday flayed the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre for skyrocketing fuel prices, and urged it to call an all-party meeting to find solutions to the ongoing economic problems.

Banerjee also alleged that the Centre allowed steep price hikes of petrol and diesel to divert attention from the atrocities carried out by the saffron party in non-BJP states.

"The Centre has no plans to deal with the fuel price hike. The BJP is responsible for this crisis; it's their return gift to the country after winning the Uttar Pradesh elections, she told reporters at the state secretariat.

Attacking the Centre, she said, "Coal comes from UP, Jharkhand, Rajasthan. The economic condition in India is worse than in Sri Lanka. I am not comparing our nation with Sri Lanka. But, in the last two weeks, the petrol & diesel prices have been hiked 10 times. Dont muzzle the voice of people.''

"Instead of using agencies like the CBI and ED against opposition parties, the Centre must convene an all-party meeting to resolve the ongoing economic problems," the Bengal Chief Minister added.

Mamata Banerjee also handed over the letters of govt jobs to the kin of those killed in the recent Birbhum violence. For one year, they will get Rs.10,000 per month. Later, they will get a permanent job with the state government, she said during the press conference.

Live TV
New Delhi: A 36-hour curfew, which was imposed in Sri Lanka in the wake of the political unrest, was lifted on Monday (April 4, 2022). All public transportation, including trains, Sri Lanka Transport Board (SLTB), and private buses, resumed their services after a nationwide curfew imposed by the government on Saturday was lifted.

Here are the latest developments in Sri Lanka:

Sri Lanka's Cabinet of Ministers resign

Sri Lanka's Cabinet of Ministers, including the prime minister's son, resigned Sunday night following protests over a deepening economic crisis in the country.

I have informed the sec. to the President of my resignation from all portfolios with immediate effect, in hope that it may assist HE & PMs decision to establish stability for the people & the govt of #LKA. I remain committed to my voters, my party & the people of #Hambanthota.  Namal Rajapaksa (@RajapaksaNamal) April 3, 2022

Speaking to reporters, Education Minister and Leader of the House, Dinesh Gunawardena said the Cabinet Ministers handed over their resignations to Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa. He, however, gave no reason for the mass resignation.

Sri Lanka's President Gotabaya Rajapaksa seeks unity government

Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Monday called for a unity government to deal with the country`s economic crisis.

"Considering this a national need, the time has come to work together for the sake of all the citizens and future generations," Rajapaksa`s media office said in a statement.

"The president invites all political parties representing in the parliament to come together to accept ministerial portfolios in order to find solutions to this national crisis," the statement added.

Protesters defy nationwide curfew, hold demonstrations

Widespread public protests were seen throughout the evening on Sunday in spite of the imposition of a curfew. Sri Lankan police fired tear gas and water cannons at hundreds of university students during a protest in the central province.

The enraged public has been demanding the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and has been protesting over the government's poor handling of the economic crisis where people are currently enduring long hours of power outages and scarcity of essentials.

Sri Lanka govt lifts block placed on social media platforms

On Sunday afternoon, the Sri Lankan government lifted a block it had placed on social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter and Whatsapp hours earlier. Telecommunications Regulatory Commission Chairman Jayantha de Silva said the measure was carried out on instruction from the Defence Ministry and aimed to "maintain calm".

Cause behind Sri Lanka's ongoing economic crisis

Critics say the roots of the crisis, the worst in several decades, lie in economic mismanagement by successive governments that amassed huge budget shortfalls and a current account deficit.

The crisis was accelerated by deep tax cuts Rajapaksa promised during the 2019 election campaign and enacted months before the COVID-19 pandemic, which wiped out parts of Sri Lanka`s economy.

(With agency inputs)

Live TV
New Delhi: The Chinese mainland added 1,366 new locally-transmitted Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours, the National Health Commission said on Monday (April 4, 2022). Of the locally confirmed cases, 425 were reported in Shanghai, where the military and thousands of healthcare workers have been sent to help execute coronavirus tests for all of its 26 million residents.

Shanghai, which began a two-stage lockdown last Monday that has been expanded to confine practically all residents to their homes, also registered 8,581 fresh asymptomatic Covid-19 cases. China's financial capital has now asked residents to self-test using antigen tests for Covid-19.

The new cases were detected amid the People's Liberation Army (PLA) dispatching more than 2,000 medical personnel recruited from across the army, navy and joint logistics support forces to Shanghai.

Multiple provinces such Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Beijing have sent healthcare workers to Shanghai, according to media reports, with some estimates putting the total number at more than 10,000.

It is China's largest public health response since it tackled the initial Covid-19 outbreak in Wuhan, where the novel coronavirus was first discovered in early 2020. The PLA had reportedly dispatched over 4,000 medical personnel to the province of Hubei, where Wuhan is, back then.

Last month, China had witnessed its worst outbreak since the pandemic broke out and the country had recorded over 56,000 infections -- more than the total cases in Wuhan two years ago.

Meanwhile, the country's Covid-19 death toll remained unchanged at 4,638 and the recovery of 1,848 patients brought down the number of patients currently undergoing treatment to 25,724, including 54 in critical conditions.

(With agency inputs)

Live TV
New Delhi: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan blocked a no-confidence vote he looked sure to lose on Sunday (April 3, 2022) and advised the president to order fresh elections, fueling anger among the opposition and deepening the country`s political crisis.

His actions have created huge uncertainty in Islamabad, with constitutional experts debating their legality and pondering whether Khan and his rivals can find a way forward.

The nuclear-armed nation of more than 220 million people lies between Afghanistan to the west, China to the northeast and nuclear rival India to the east, making it of vital strategic importance.

Since coming to power in 2018, Khan`s rhetoric has become more anti-American and he has expressed a desire to move closer to China and, recently, Russia - including talks with President Vladimir Putin on the day the invasion of Ukraine began.

At the same time, U.S. and Asian foreign policy experts said that Pakistan`s powerful military has traditionally controlled foreign and defence policy, thereby limiting the impact of political instability.

ALSO READ | All Sri Lanka Cabinet Ministers, except PM Mahinda Rajapaksa, resign amid economic crisis

Here is what the upheaval, which many expect to lead to Khan`s exit, means for countries closely involved in Pakistan:

INDIA

The neighbours have fought three wars since independence in 1947, two of them over the disputed Muslim-majority territory of Kashmir.

As with Afghanistan, it is Pakistan`s military that controls policy in the sensitive area, and tensions along the de facto border there are at their lowest level since 2021.

But there have been no formal diplomatic talks between the rivals for years because of deep distrust over a range of issues including Khan`s extreme criticism of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his handling of attacks on minority Muslims in India.

Karan Thapar, an Indian political commentator who has closely followed India-Pakistan ties, said the Pakistani military could put pressure on a new civilian government in Islamabad to build on the successful ceasefire in Kashmir.

On Saturday, Pakistan`s powerful army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa said his country was ready to move forward on Kashmir if India agrees.

The Sharif political dynasty has been at the forefront of several dovish overtures towards India over the years.

CHINA

Khan has consistently emphasised China`s positive role in Pakistan and in the world at large.

At the same time, the $60-billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) which binds the neighbours together was actually conceptualised and launched under Pakistan`s two established political parties, both of which want Khan out of power.

Opposition leader and potential successor Shehbaz Sharif struck deals with China directly as leader of the eastern province of Punjab, and his reputation for getting major infrastructure projects off the ground while avoiding political grandstanding could in fact be music to Beijing`s ears.

UNITED STATES

U.S.-based South Asia experts said that Pakistan`s political crisis is unlikely to be a priority for President Joe Biden, who is grappling with the war in Ukraine, unless it led to mass unrest or rising tensions with India.

"We have so many other fish to fry," said Robin Raphel, a former assistant secretary of State for South Asia who is a senior associate with the Center for Strategic and International Studies think-tank.

With the Pakistani military maintaining its behind-the-scenes control of foreign and security policies, Khan`s political fate was not a major concern, according to some analysts.

"Since it`s the military that calls the shots on the policies that the U.S. really cares about, i.e. Afghanistan, India and nuclear weapons, internal Pakistani political developments are largely irrelevant for the U.S.," said Curtis, who served as former U.S. President Donald Trump`s National Security Council senior director for South Asia.

She added that Khan`s visit to Moscow had been a "disaster" in terms of U.S. relations, and that a new government in Islamabad could at least help mend ties "to some degree".

Khan has blamed the United States for the current political crisis, saying that Washington wanted him removed because of the recent Moscow trip.

AFGHANISTAN

Ties between Pakistan`s military intelligence agency and the Islamist militant Taliban have loosened in recent years.

Now that the Taliban are back in power and facing an economic and humanitarian crisis due to a lack of money and international isolation, Qatar is arguably their most important foreign partner.

"We (the United States) don`t need Pakistan as a conduit to the Taliban. Qatar is definitely playing that role now," said Lisa Curtis, director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security think-tank.

Tensions have risen between the Taliban and Pakistan`s military, which has lost several soldiers in attacks close to their mutual border. Pakistan wants the Taliban to do more to crack down on extremist groups and worries they will spread violence into Pakistan. That has begun to happen already.

Khan has been less critical of the Taliban over human rights than most foreign leaders.

Live TV
New Delhi: Pakistan is once again witnessing a power-tussle and undemocratic change of government after Imran Khan, who closely missed the loss of the throne after a no-confidence motion against him was quashed. The leader urged the President to dissolve the elected government and call for fresh elections.

The ongoing political crisis, being called Imran Khans attempt to save face by Pakistan media, compelled many to question if the throne of Pakistan is jinxed as no PM in the history of the Islamic nation has completed a full tenure.

Is Pakistan's throne jinxed?

Pakistan, which was created in 1947 out of India after the fateful post-Independence partition, saw the change of powers more often than any other so-called democracy.

The jinx or ill-fate of our neighbours began just four years after its advent with the assassination of the first-ever elected PM of the country. Then the continuous power hustle between The Muslim League and other leaders led to the change of four prime ministers in just the span of 6 years from 1951-to 56.

This apart, Pakistan saw two undemocratic military rules from 1958 to 1973 and then in 1977 following the assassination of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

Assasinations of Pakistan PMs

Three prime ministers of Pakistan were assassinated and hence were unable to complete their tenure. This includes the first PM Liaquat Ali Khan, who was assassinated four years and two months after the service.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the elected leader of Pakistan was taken hostage by Military General Zia-Ul-Haq and was later assassinated.

Bhuttos daughter and the first female PM of Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto was also assassinated merely after 20 months of assuming control.

Military Rules in Pakistan

Pakistan has seen two military rules so far. First was when Mohammed Ayub Khan, an Army General forced Iskander Mirza to step down and became the President.

The 1956 Constitution of Pakistan was replaced with a new one in 1962 by him in which, the post of Prime Minister was abolished.

Pakistan had no PM between 1958 and 1973 except for a brief period when Yahya Khan, another army general appointed Nurul Amin as his PM. Yahya Khan resigned as the President after defeat in the Bangladesh Liberation war and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto became the President.

Bhutto became the elected Prime Minister of Pakistan in 1973 when the country adopted a new Constitution and established parliamentary democracy there.

However, Bhutto was deposed in a coup four years later in 1977 by military general Muhammad Zia ul Haq, who became the President a year later and assassinated Bhutto.

In 11 years, Pakistan had 7 PMs

From 2002 to 2022, Pakistan had at least 7 PMs coming and going into office with Yousaf Raza Gillani serving the longest after being ousted from power by the Supreme Court of India in 2012.

Nawaz Sharif and Imran Khan

Both Imran Khan and his predecessor Nawaz Sharif completed almost four years in PMO, however, failed to complete the entire tenure.

Nawaz Sharif, who was all set to create history by becoming the first Pak PM to serve a full term, resigned after the Supreme Court began trial in the Panama Papers case.

Similarly, Imran Khan, who became the PM in 2018, was denotified on April 2 after President Arif Alvi dissolved the National Assembly on the proposal of Imran Khan, who was facing a no-confidence motion in the parliament.

Khan will continue as Prime Minister till the appointment of a caretaker PM under Article 224 A of the Pakistan Constitution.

Live TV
New Delhi: A day after Sri Lanka's Cabinet of Ministers resigned following protests over a deepening economic crisis, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Monday (April 4, 2022) called for a unity government to help the debt-laden country.

"The president invites all political parties representing in the parliament to come together to accept ministerial portfolios in order to find solutions to this national crisis," Rajapaksa's media office said in a statement.

"Considering this a national need, the time has come to work together for the sake of all the citizens and future generations," the statement added.

Sri Lanka's Cabinet of Ministers resign

Sri Lanka's Cabinet of Ministers, including the prime minister's son, resigned Sunday night following protests over a deepening economic crisis in the country.

I have informed the sec. to the President of my resignation from all portfolios with immediate effect, in hope that it may assist HE & PMs decision to establish stability for the people & the govt of #LKA. I remain committed to my voters, my party & the people of #Hambanthota.  Namal Rajapaksa (@RajapaksaNamal) April 3, 2022

Speaking to reporters, Education Minister and Leader of the House, Dinesh Gunawardena said the Cabinet Ministers handed over their resignations to Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa. He, however, gave no reason for the mass resignation.

36-hour curfew lifted

A 36-hour curfew, which was imposed in Sri Lanka in the wake of the political unrest, has been lifted on Monday. All public transportation, including trains, Sri Lanka Transport Board (SLTB), and private buses, resumed their services after a nationwide curfew imposed by the government on Saturday was lifted.

Protesters defy nationwide curfew, hold demonstrations

Widespread public protests were seen throughout the evening on Sunday in spite of the imposition of a curfew. Sri Lankan police fired tear gas and water cannons at hundreds of university students during a protest in the central province.

The enraged public has been demanding the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and has been protesting over the government's poor handling of the economic crisis where people are currently enduring long hours of power outages and scarcity of essentials.

Sri Lanka govt lifts block placed on social media platforms

On Sunday afternoon, the Sri Lankan government lifted a block it had placed on social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter and Whatsapp hours earlier. Telecommunications Regulatory Commission Chairman Jayantha de Silva said the measure was carried out on instruction from the Defence Ministry and aimed to "maintain calm".

The developments come after Rajapaksa declared a state of emergency on Friday, following protests over the economic hardship faced by the people of the country.

Cause behind Sri Lanka's ongoing economic crisis

Critics say the roots of the crisis, the worst in several decades, lie in economic mismanagement by successive governments that amassed huge budget shortfalls and a current account deficit.

The crisis was accelerated by deep tax cuts Rajapaksa promised during the 2019 election campaign and enacted months before the COVID-19 pandemic, which wiped out parts of Sri Lanka`s economy.

(With agency inputs)

Live TV
LONDON: United Kingdoms National Health Services (NHS) has updated its list of official Covid-19 symptoms as free testing ended throughout the country this weekend. According to the reports, the NHS has added nine extra symptoms linked to Covid-19 to its official list.

It may be noted that the NHS updated its list of official Covid-19 symptoms on Friday afternoon after keeping it unchanged for close to two years during which the pandemic had spread throughout the country.

The NHS website previously listed only three symptoms: a high temperature, a new, continuous cough and a loss or change in smell and taste.

These symptoms had largely remained unchanged until now, but with more variants of Covid-19 being detected all over the world, the NHS decided to update its list with nine extra symptoms listed.

The new list of Covid-19 symptoms on the NGS website includes:

Shortness of breath

Feeling tired or exhausted

An aching body

A headache

A sore throat

A blocked or runny nose

Loss of appetite

Diarrhoea

Feeling sick or being sick

After listing the symptoms, the NHS website said, The symptoms are very similar to symptoms of other illnesses, such as colds and flu. The NHS website also advised that anyone who experienced any of those 9 symptoms listed on its website, "even if mild", should get tested as soon as possible.

It may be noted that the new UK government guidelines advise people with Covid-19 symptoms to simply stay at home and avoid contact with other people.

Live TV
[April 04, 2022] CGS Administrators LLC Celebrates Contact Center Excellence, Receives ICMI Site Certification The International Customer Management Institute (ICMI), the leading global provider of comprehensive resources for customer management professionals, today announces the CGS Administrators LLC (CGS) contact center has met the requirements for award and recognition through the ICMI Site Certification Program. The ICMI Site Certification Program was designed to reflect the best of existing international quality standards while maintaining focus on the unique contact center environment. CGS, which provides quality, cost-effective services and technical solutions to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), passed all six sections of the ICMI Site Certification Framework. "Our site certification is a stamp of approval for companies to show that they operate efficiently and offer a world-class customer experience. ICMI is wholly committed to elevating the strategic value of the contact center through an industry standard site certification program that validates optimal performance," said Tara Gibb, senior director, ICMI. "We applaud CGS on their achievement, which will help them deliver effective contact center operations and an industry-leading customer experience." ICMI's Site Certification Program supports a comprehensive call center management framework that engages a mix of specialized tools, cross-industry best practices, assessments and proven systems. This helps participating organizations deliver sustained contact center efficiency and effectiveness over the long term, including real fiscal impact on both top and bottom lines. Comprised of a multistep process, participants first take part in a formal assessment, followed by an improvement and implementation period, if necessary, then a final scoring against the ICMI customer management operatng standard which confirms they have met the criteria and requirements for certification.

Gary Warczak, director, CGS, said, "We are honored to receive this certification. It addresses our dedication not only to our team but also to our customers. We are committed to delivering an exceptional customer experience to our customers each and every day." This is the second time CGS has received site certification from ICMI. CGS was also certified in 2013. To learn more about ICMI site certification and professional certification as well, please visit www.icmi.com/consulting/site-certification. ABOUT ICMI

The International Customer Management Institute (ICMI) is the leading global provider of comprehensive resources for customer management professionals - from frontline agents to executives - who wish to improve customer experiences and increase efficiencies at every level of the contact center. Since 1985, ICMI has helped more than 50,000 organizations in 167 countries through training, events, consulting and informational resources. ICMI's experienced and dedicated team of industry insiders, trainers and consultants are committed to helping you raise the strategic value of your contact center, optimize your operations and improve your customer service. ICMI is brought to you by Informa Tech. About Informa Tech

Informa Tech is a market-leading provider of integrated research, media, training and events to the global technology community. We're an international business of more than 600 colleagues, operating in more than 20 markets. Our aim is to inspire the technology community to design, build and run a better digital world through research, media, training and event brands that inform, educate and connect. Over 7,000 professionals subscribe to our research, with 225,000 delegates attending our events, over 18,000 students participating in our training programs each year, and nearly 4 million people visiting our digital communities each month. Learn more about Informa Tech. About CGS Administrators LLC

CGS Administrators LLC (cgsmedicare.com) has provided quality, cost-effective services and technical solutions to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) for over 50 years, impacting the lives of over 24 million Medicare beneficiaries and over 103,000 health care providers and suppliers of medical equipment in 38 states. The company's expertise includes information systems technology, claims processing, customer service and payment safeguard functions. CGS is headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. About Celerian Group

Celerian Group (celeriangroup.com) is a consortium of companies that helps government and private health care plans navigate the complexities of benefits administration in a changed marketplace. As part of Celerian Group, CGS handles Medicare and Medicaid benefits administration, claims processing, member and provider services, provider credentialing, and education. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005113/en/

[ Back To SIP Trunking Home's Homepage ]
Five Aborted Late Term Babies Found: Is DC Metro Police Covering Up a Crime?

NEWS PROVIDED BY

PAAU

April 4, 2022

WASHINGTON, April 4, 2022 /Standard Newswire/ -- On Tuesday, April 5 at 11:00 A.M., a press conference will be held in Washington D.C. at the Hyatt Regency Washington on Capitol Hill, 400 New Jersey NW. Congressional Room CD, Lobby Level.

Contact: Randall Terry, Founder, Operation Rescue. 202-731-1271 (Note: Any interviews granted ahead of the Tuesday, April 5th Press conference must be embargoed until April 5th, 12 noon Eastern.)

On March 30, the FBI arrested and charged 9 pro-life activists under F.A.C.E (The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.) for an nonviolent direct action that occurred in 2020. If convicted, each of the defendants could face over 10 years in federal prison.

FBI Arrests

Aborted Babies Recovered in DC:

Prior to the arrests made by the FBI, one of the defendants privately arranged for the Metropolitan Washington D.C. Police homicide unit to pick up five recently discovered late-term aborted babies for forensic examination. (See letter below.) Their late gestational ages as well as their apparent sustained injuries potentially show violations of the Partial Birth Abortion Act as well as the Born Alive Infants Protection Act which are federal crimes

The Founder and Executive Director of Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU) Terrisa Bukovinac said "We are aware that the Metropolitan Police Department has stated they do not believe a crime has been committed against these babies under D.C. law. However, the laws in question are federal laws enforced by the U.S. Department of Justice."

The whistleblowers who received the fetuses, and the defendants arrested by the FBI, are connected. They will be present at the press conference.

A Funeral Mass and "naming ceremony" was offered for the deceased babies - with the babies present, in which each child was named.

At Tuesday's press conference the following questions will be answered:

 Where did the aborted babies come from?

 Did the Metropolitan Police Department test for oxygen in the lungs of these babies?

 Why did those arrested by the FBI choose Washington Surgi-Clinic for their protest?

 How were the fetal remains acquired?

 Who obtained the fetal remains?

 How many aborted fetuses were acquired in total, besides the five in police custody?

 What will happen to the remaining aborted fetuses (that have not been turned over to police)?

 Where are the fetuses now?

 What would have happened to these fetal remains had they not been recovered?

 What demands are the defendants, and those who obtained the aborted babies making of the Department of Justice?

 Who is Dr. Cesare Santangelo, and what is his role in the deaths of these children?

The press conference will be hosted by Terrisa Bukovinac.

Learn more about PAAU at www.PAAUNow.org

Media Contact: 202.731.1271

SOURCE PAAU

CONTACT: 202-731-1271
Congressional Candidate Lynz Piper-Loomis Addresses Her Primary Opponent's Pledges & Support of Legislation for the Trans Agenda, which is Un-Constitutional, Un-American, Toxic, & Evil. Lynz also Addresses Her Primary Opponent's Support of Other Initiatives & Legislation

NEWS PROVIDED BY

Friends of Lynz Piper-Loomis

April 4, 2022

NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C., April 4, 2022 /Standard Newswire/ -- Congressional Candidate Lynz Piper-Loomis released the following statement:

It is a devastating blow to SC-01 when we now have TWO candidates running for the PEOPLE'S SEAT that are supportive of the trans agenda that has waged war across this land. ANY history of commitment to this agenda and any current commitment to this agenda proves that both of these candidates are not fit to serve.

This ideology is a threat to our Constitutional Republic, which we CANNOT allow. Katie Arrington compromisingly signed the pledge for Equal Means Everyone.

This organization is notorious for endorsing those with far-left liberal agendas who campaign for the Democrat ticket. Equal Means Everyone supports education, activism, legislation, and calls to action supporting the LGBTQ & Trans agendas, Racial Justice, & Gun Restrictions--just to name a few.

Nancy Mace co-sponsored the Fairness for All Act. This piece of legislation allows transgender men in the bathroom with women. This transdemic indoctrination has weaved its way in throughout every societal sphere of influence for decades and now mutilates anyone of moral character or oppositional views.

The transgender indoctrination in the schools sets a precedent in grooming for trafficking. There is absolutely no conscionable reason for this programming of pornography and explicit sexual content in any place of society. Disney is a prime example. The pledge and voting records of my opponents express their support of this issue. These issues remain a continued threat to our Republic. Not on my watch.

Nancy Mace has caused catastrophe for our business owners as well as parents. She pushed mandatory mandates (masks & vaccines) until, of course, it was time for campaign season. Then she quickly changed her tune once she realized the great people of South Carolina District One DO NOT adhere to any ideology contrary to our U.S. Constitution. She was viewed on Fox News and CNN--on the same day wearing the same outfit--telling conflicting stories regarding her stance on vaccines. Click here to listen.

We can thank Katie Arrington, Nancy Mace, Joe Biden, and Pelosi for the gas prices at the pump. Katie voted for the gas tax (H3516) here in South Carolina that is fueling even more dollars at the pump. She complained about Governor Henry McMaster's push back against it and voted to override his veto. We now have elected officials at the South Carolina State House seeking a suspension of this costly blow to our economy.

Nancy Mace supported legislation with Biden and Democrats in regard to the tax on carbon emissions. (HR2820)

What about abortion? Nancy Mace creates a special classification for those whose life has value. Life conceived by rape or incest has no value to her. When we, as a society, begin to make determinations about whose life does and does not matter, we open a window into dark places we do not want to go in. Abortion is abortion. The most vulnerable among us is a baby in the mother's womb, the disabled, and elderly. If we can't get it right on life, we can't get it right on anything. I am pro-life.

Lastly, I will remind you of their anti-second amendment voting records. Katie Arrington voted against H3700, which was our state's constitutional carry legislation. She expresses that she voted for a better bill that places restrictions on the use of a handgun. Words can be flipped around in any direction and the result is still the same. Katie voted against our second amendment.

Nancy Mace voted for the NDAA, which has RED FLAG LAWS. Make no mistake. I meant what I said. I fully support 2A with no restrictions. I fully support non-federalized reciprocity so people do not have to register their freedoms. I'm proud to be the only pro-second amendment candidate in this race.

The issues we face are not Republican or Democrat. We are in an American crisis. I believe in America's core value of Sovereignty, that "WE THE PEOPLE" are the solutions to the problems we face, and that we should hold the power of governance.

Truly, the American people are the candidates and should be elected back into office. We, as American's have always believed the impossible is possible. We have always been an exceptional nation because we have refused the idea that one entity held power over us. Yet, we find ourselves with people like Nancy Mace and Katie Arrington that will compromise our God-given, irrevocable rights for votes or their own agenda.

I am the only candidate in this race who has the moral courage to withstand the heat of the tragic political environment to which we feel entrapped. Our only choice is to rid this country of the long-term politicians who have served themselves instead of We the People. We need to replace them with strong, disciplined citizens who bring fresh ideas and who are more than willing to serve the people of this district.

Choose wisely in 2022. Let's return to limited government, and the protections of our Constitution. I'll be your champion. A Vote for Piper-Loomis is a Vote for "We the People."

God bless you and keep you.

Respectfully,

Lynz Piper-Loomis

Candidate for U.S. Congress, SC-01
By Azernews

By Ayya Lmahamad

Bulgarian Energy Minister Alexander Nikolov has said that Bulgaria counts on the soonest start of gas supplied from Azerbaijan, Day.az has reported.

"If Russian gas is cut off, we will try to switch to alternative supplies," he said.

The minister stressed that by July 1, the construction of the gas interconnector with Greece should be completed and then the country will be able to count on gas supplies from Azerbaijan.

Earlier, Bulgarian Deputy Prime Minister Asen Vasilev said that the country hopes for supplies from Azerbaijan, LNG and the discussed mechanism of joint procurement of gas from the European Union.

Azerbaijan and Bulgaria agreed to supply 1 billion cubic meters of gas per year through the Greece-Bulgaria Interconnector beginning in 2021. However, because the IGB is still under construction, Azerbaijani gas is delivered to Bulgaria via the Kulata-Sidirokastro interconnection point. Currently, the country receives only one-third of this volume.

The IGB Project (Gas Interconnector Greece-Bulgaria) is being carried out by the joint venture company ICGB AD, which was established in Bulgaria in 2011 and is owned by Bulgarian Energy Holding EAD and IGI Poseidon.

The IGB gas pipeline will connect to the Greek national gas transmission system in Komotini and the Bulgarian national gas transmission system in Stara Zagora. The pipeline's planned length is 182 kilometers, with a capacity of up to 3 billion cubic meters per year in the direction from Greece to Bulgaria. The pipeline is designed to increase its capacity up to 5 bcm/y depending on market interest and the capacities of neighboring gas transmission systems.

A cooperation memorandum has been signed between ICGB AD and TAP AG regarding joint actions in relation to the future connection of the IGB pipeline and the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline.

The IGB project is critical in terms of increasing supply security and diversifying gas supplies for Bulgaria and the SEE region.
17:18 | Lima, Apr. 4.

In a post on Twitter, the minister condemned the acts of vandalism against civilians and the media.

"We understand and listen to the justified demands of truckers' unions, which are expressed as they exercise their free right to protest; however, we call for calm," Sanchez emphasized.

According to the Superintendence of Land Transportation of People, Cargo, and Goods (Sutran), groups of protesters have blocked traffic on various highways in six regions across the country.

It should be pointed out that certain incidents were reported in some cases.

Likewise, the minister addressed the private sector, noting that the Government has already exempted the Selective Consumption Tax (ISC) on fuels , as a measure to avoid an increase in prices of such resources and food.
?? En vivo | El presidente @PedroCastilloTe, junto con el titular del @MineduPeru, participa en la inauguracion de la institucion educativa PRITE Canto Grande en San Juan de Lurigancho.https://t.co/9T6e6s0rz6
YEREVAN, APRIL 4, ARMENPRESS. The Orion Summit 2022 will be held in Armenia on June 27.

The event is organized by Orion Worldwide Innovations - a startup growth and ecosystem acceleration hub - and is expected to gather founders of upcoming unicorn companies who will present their success stories and motivate young start-ups.

The summit will take place in Yerevans Matenadaran.

For the first time the Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) subject will be discussed as an important tool for rapid development of the startup eco-system of Armenia.

The Digital Julfa Network is planned to be announced during the event. Digital Julfa Network is an initiative bringing together the Pan-Armenian intellectual, technological, commercial and cultural potential, with the purpose of reviving a powerful network for the economic and intellectual positioning of Armenia and the Armenian nation.

The powerful 300-year-old network of Armenian merchants of New Julfa was an important route for commerce from the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean. Now, as a world-class evolution of innovation, we are launching the Digital Julfa network, which will unite the Armenian technological, financial, business, trade, legal and cultural potential, said Emma Arakelyan, CEO & Founder of Orion Worldwide Innovations and Co-Founding Partner of BAJ Accelerator.

CEO & Co-Founder of Orion Worldwide Innovations Armenia Diana Arzumanyan said that the summit is significant for the Armenian ecosystem.

The summit is important for the Armenian ecosystem. Its unique in its opportunity to listen to the founders of unicorn companies. Technology, banking, and other companies can join the event by offering speakers, sponsorship packages, and participate in a job fair, she said.
YEREVAN, APRIL 4, ARMENPRESS. Minister of Foreign Affairs of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan received today the delegation led by Head of the Great Britain-Armenia Friendship Group of UK Parliament Tim Loughton, the foreign ministry said in a news release.

The meeting sides highlighted the further deepening and strengthening of the relations between Armenia and the United Kingdom, emphasizing here the role of the parliamentary diplomacy.

The meeting touched upon the process of ongoing reforms in Armenia. In this context the British parliamentarians highly appreciated the democratic progress made by Armenia. Ararat Mirzoyan reaffirmed the commitment of the Armenian government to continue the process of strengthening democracy, rule of law, protecting human rights and fighting against corruption, and in this context valued the support of the United Kingdom.

The sides also discussed the current situation in the Nagorno Karabakh conflict zone and the Armenia-Azerbaijan border. Minister Mirzoyan presented in details the actions of the Azerbaijani armed forces on infiltrating into the village of Parukh in Nagorno Karabakh, targeting the civilian population and infrastructure, creating a humanitarian crisis in Artsakh, as well as the issues connected with the preservation of Armenian cultural and religious heritage in the territories that have come under the control of Azerbaijan.

The Armenian FM highlighted the efforts of the British parliamentarians aimed at condemning the human rights violations made by Azerbaijani troops during the 2020 war, the recent aggressive actions of Azerbaijan in the border with Armenia and in Nagorno Karabakh, as well as supporting the protection of rights of the people of Nagorno Karabakh.

The meeting sides touched upon the negotiations around a comprehensive peace treaty between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The Armenian FM highlighted the importance of starting negotiations within the frames of the OSCE Minsk Group, aimed at the final comprehensive settlement, including the clarification of the status of Nagorno Karabakh.

At the request of the guests, FM Mirzoyan also presented the Armenia-Turkey normalization process.
YEREVAN, APRIL 4, ARMENPRESS. Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan received the delegation led by Tim Loughton, the head of the Great Britain -Armenia Friendship Group of the UK Parliament, ARMENPRESS was informed from the Office of the Prime Minister.

The Prime Minister attached importance to the visit of the delegation to Armenia, expressing hope that it will give a new impetus to the further development of the Armenian-British relations, including in the inter-parliamentary sphere. Nikol Pashinyan noted that the Armenian government is interested in expanding cooperation with Great Britain in political, economic, cultural and other directions.

Tim Loughton expressed confidence that the cooperation at the parliamentary level will continue to further strengthen, and they will make every effort to contribute to the deepening of bilateral political and economic ties. He stressed the importance of the democratic reforms in our country and expressed confidence that their effective implementation will contribute to the further progress of Armenia.



The situation in the South Caucasus, in particular, around Nagorno Karabakh was touched upon.

Prime Minister Pashinyan presented his observations on the processes taking place around Nagorno Karabakh, stressed the importance of an adequate response of the international community to the un-constructive actions carried out by Azerbaijan. The Prime Minister touched upon the humanitarian issues arising from the Azerbaijani actions in Artsakh, the steps taken to destroy the Armenian cultural heritage in the territories that have passed under the control of the Azerbaijani armed forces, the opportunities for demarcation and delimitation of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border, unblocking of the regional infrastructure, as well as the Armenian-Turkish dialogue.
YEREVAN, APRIL 4, ARMENPRESS. Armenia is interested in further development of relations and cooperation with Armenia is interested in the further development of the relations and cooperation with Switzerland in all spheres, ARMENPRESS reports, citing the official website of the parliament of Armenia, Vice President of the National Assembly Ruben Rubinyan said during the meeting with the Charge d' Affairs of the Embassy of the Swiss Confederation to Armenia Stefan Kloetzli.

Stefan Kloetzli in his turn noted that Switzerland is ready to support Armenia in the reform process.

At the meeting the normalization process of Armenia-Turkey relations was touched upon.

The interlocutors spoke about the effective cooperation between the Friendship Groups of parliaments of the two countries, considered necessary the legislators active contacts and the exchange of experience.

The events being designed on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Armenia and Switzerland.
By Azernews

By Ayya Lmahamad

Azerbaijani Digital Development and Transport Minister Rashad Nabiyev paid a working visit to Georgia to familiarize himself with the progress of work on the project of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) railway.

As part of the visit, the minister visited the Akhalkalaki station. He was informed in detail about the progress of the BTK project and then inspected the infrastructure facilities at the site.

It should be noted that the volume of freight traffic on the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway is constantly growing. To date, more than 1 million tons of cargo have been transported along this route.

The Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway is of exceptional importance for turning Azerbaijan into a regional transport corridor. The agreement on the construction of the railway, which was put into operation in 2017, was signed during the meeting in Tbilisi by the Azerbaijani, Georgian and Turkish leaders in 2007.

The 828-km Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway stretches from the Azerbaijani coast of the Caspian Sea to the Georgian capital, and from there to Turkey, connecting the countrys extensive railway system and thus gaining access to European borders.

As of today, the railways cargo turnover is 6 million tons while passenger turnover is 1 million people. In the future, it may be increased to 3 million passengers and 20 million tons of cargo.

Last year, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey have signed a trilateral protocol on the development of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway project.
YEREVAN, APRIL 4, ARMENPRESS. The Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National Assembly of Armenia on European Integration Arman Yeghoyan raised the issues related to the security and humanitarian crisis in Armenia and Artsakh at the Conference of the Heads of the European Region Delegations of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Francophonie.

On September 27, 2020, when the world was battling the COVID-19 pandemic, Azerbaijan, with the help of its allies and mercenaries, launched a large-scale offensive against the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh. And despite some humanitarian organizations, heads of a number of states very quickly gave an accurate assessment of what was happening, it seems that was not enough. One of the first to respond to the situation was French President Emmanuel Macron, who openly stated that Azerbaijan had transferred jihadist groups from Syria to Nagorno-Karabakh to fight against Armenians. (Quote) "According to our reliable information, 300 militants arrived in Baku from Syria via Gaziantep. They are known and identified, they originate from the jihadist groups operating in the Aleppo region." Human Rights Watch has confirmed that Azerbaijan used cluster bombs during the war." Genocide Watch warned that Azerbaijan intends to annihilate the Armenian population of Nagorno Karabakh. (Quote) "Azerbaijan has invaded the territory of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic or Artsakh, with the aim of annihilating the Armenian presence in the occupied territories." Recently, the European Parliament adopted a resolution condemning the destruction of the Armenian cultural heritage of Nagorno Karabakh in the territories that have passed under the control of Azerbaijan," Arman Yeghoyan said, as reported by Armenpress.

He reminded that in a flagrant violation of international law, Azerbaijan targeted civilians and civilian infrastructure, bombed cities, used phosphorous bombs, and brutally executed the elderly who had not left their homes before the Azerbaijani advance. Arman Yeghoyan stressed that dozens of Armenian prisoners of war are still being held in Baku prisons, whom Azerbaijan refuses to return.

"And in these difficult days, the Armenian people, who had lived for thousands of years in their homeland, Nagorno Karabakh, did not receive the same support from the international community. Why? The question here was geopolitics or values? Even if we assume that the reason was geopolitics, even in that case, was the war in Nagorno Karabakh not connected in some way or another with what is happening in Ukraine today? I leave this as an open question that you can ponder over. And what do you think, how can any state, any government, expel any population from its hometown and village, what European state can do such a thing without receiving a European response? Nobody. But why was this possible in Nagorno Karabakh? This is another question that I leave open and suggest thinking about it, Arman Yeghoyan concluded.
Russian President Vladimir Putin can meet with his Ukrainian counterpart Vladimir Zelensky only when a specific written agreement is worked out between the two countries, as Tass informs, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

April 4, 2022, 10:50 Meeting between Putin, Zelensky possible only with prepared written agreement  Kremlin

STEPANAKERT, APRIL 4, ARTSAKHPRESS: "No, Putin has never rejected (a possible meeting with Zelensky - TASS). Putin has never ruled out such a meeting and this meeting, yes, hypothetically it is possible," the Kremlin official told the Russia-1 TV channel on Sunday.

"Yet on order for it (the meeting) to happen, it is necessary for a certain document to be generated by the two delegations. Not a set of ideas but a specific written document. Then the time will come for such a meeting," he stressed.

Responding to a question as to whether Russia can be certain that Ukraine will implement the new bilateral agreement, Putins press secretary said: "We have this experience (of Ukraine not fulfilling its obligations - TASS), we remember it, remember very well and act accordingly," he assured.
Russia on Monday will demand again the UN Security Council meet in session to discuss the Ukrainian militarys provocation in Bucha, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on her Telegram channel, Tass informs.

April 4, 2022, 14:52 Russia to demand convening UN SC session over Bucha provocation again

STEPANAKERT, APRIL 4, ARTSAKHPRESS: "Yesterday, the current UN SC president, Britain, acting in accordance with its worst traditions, once again refused to give consent to holding a Security Council meeting on Bucha. Today, Russia will demand once again the UN Security Council meet in session to discuss criminal provocations by the Ukrainian military and radicals in that city," Zakharova said.

The Russian Defense Ministry on April 3 dismissed the Kiev regimes charges its forces had allegedly killed civilians in the community of Bucha, the Kiev Region. The ministry recalled that Russian forces left Bucha on March 30 while faked evidence of alleged killings was presented four days later, when Ukrainian security service SBU agents arrived in the locality. The Russian Defense Ministry also said that on March 31 Buchas Mayor Anatoly Fedoruk said in a video address that there were no Russian soldiers in the community. Nor did he mention any locals allegedly shot on the streets.
The main direction of employment of the residents of Khnushinak community of Artsakhs Martuni region is agriculture.

April 4, 2022, 17:20 The residents of Khnushinak are waiting for lasting peace. Head of Community

STEPANAKERT, APRIL 4, ARTSAKHPRESS: The head of the community of Khnushinak Kamo Mursalyan told "Artsakhpress".

"The villagers live their normal lives, of course, waiting for lasting peace. The community has 535 residents.

Surb Astvatsatsin Church, built in the 19th century, is located in Khnushinak. Monuments have been erected in the village in memory of the victims of the Great Patriotic War and the Artsakh Liberation War," he said.

The head of the community informed that 91 students attend the village school . The village is gasified. The residents are provided with electricity, round-the-clock water supply.
By Luis Jaime Acosta

BOGOTA (Reuters) - At least 11 members of a group formed by former FARC rebels who reject a peace deal were killed in combat with soldiers in Colombia's jungle south, the army said on Tuesday.

The confrontation in a rural area of Puerto Leguizamo municipality, in the province of Putumayo near the border with Ecuador and Peru, took place on Monday.

The region has extensive cultivations of coca, the base ingredient in cocaine, and drug-producing laboratories, security sources say.

Four fighters from the group -- Segunda Marquetalia -- were also captured.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) officially demobilized under a 2016 accord with the government, but some members, including former commanders, reject the deal and continue to engage in drug trafficking and illegal mining.

The two dissident groups -- which count a total of about 2,400 combatants -- are considered a top security threat by Colombian authorities, who accuse them of massacring civilians and murdering human rights activists.

Colombia's nearly six decades of internal conflict have killed some 260,000 people.

(Reporting by Luis Jaime Acosta; Writing by Julia Symmes Cobb; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)
The suspected commander of Russian operations in Bucha has been named by Ukrainian sources amid demands for accountability over the atrocities by Vladimir Putins forces.

Lt Colonel Azatbek Omurbekov leads the 64th Separate Motorised Rifle Brigade which occupied the city in Kyiv region where troops are accused of massacring the local population, it is claimed.

Growing evidence points to barbarism in Bucha with local women and children reportedly raped and shot.

Ukrainian activists and web sleuths have allegedly identified the presence of Omurbekovs forces - which are normally based in the far east of Russia - and a number of other Russian military units.

Volunteers group Tretya Sila reported: In Bucha there was a military unit 51460 from the village of Knyaze-Volkonskoye, Khabarovsk region...

Watch: Tougher Russia sanctions urged over Ukraine 'war crimes'

Soon all these murderers, rapists and looters will be known by name.

InformNapalm volunteers named Omurbekov as unit 51460 of the 64th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade amid suspicions of grotesque war crimes in Bucha.

Also in the town, according to the Ukrainians, were forces from other several Russian units, although so far no other commanders have been named.

Russian sources have claimed Ukrainians were responsible for the atrocities in Bucha and other locations - and are the ones guilty of war crimes.
Auburn Community Hospital has sponsored a new Nursing Student Angel Fund to provide support to nursing students at Cayuga Community College in Auburn and Fulton.

The fund will assist with transportation to campus and clinical assignments, as well as expenses for the culminating pinning ceremony. The hospital donated $7,500 to establish the fund.

Auburn Community Hospitals commitment to our nursing students is extremely generous, said Guy Thomas Cosentino, the executive director of the Cayuga County Community College Foundation, in a news release. By creating the Angel Fund, they are assisting our students who have been hit with ever-increasing gas prices and other expenses. This fund will help defray students costs to go to and from their clinicals at Auburn Community Hospital or in Syracuse. Auburn Community Hospital is a vital part of our community and their support to help make sure our nursing candidates are able to focus on their studies and what they need to graduate says much about how great a partner they are. The hospitals additional help with our Pinning Ceremony will create lasting memories for our nursing graduates and their families.

Faculty in the program will recommend recipients for the fund, and will coordinate with the college foundation. The school's nursing program is one of the most successful associate degree programs in the state, with more than 95% of its graduates over the past decade passing the National Council Licensure Exam on their first attempt.

Scott A. Berlucchi, the hospital's president and CEO, added: The Colleges Nursing program is exceptional, and ACH has been the beneficiary of numerous nurses who have graduated from this program. Our goal is to continue building our relationship with nursing students from Cayuga and to have a position waiting for them when they graduate. We believe that these nursing students understand the value of being able to care for their friends and families at a community hospital that provides numerous opportunities for nurses to build a career locally. We hope this fund helps nursing students with their expenses and allows them to focus on being amazing nurses."

For more information, visit cayuga-cc.edu/academics/schools/health-sciences/nursing or auburnhospital.org.

Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is often described as Vladimir Putins war because it is understood that he is a dictator with absolute power. Russia is one of 50 countries that are currently controlled by dictators. Putins attempt to conquer and control Ukraine has highlighted the struggle between the dictatorships and the democracies of the world.

There is evidence that autocratic governments are not only increasing in numbers, but have become more repressive of their citizens, and aggressively expansionist toward their neighbors. It also seems to be true that many democratic countries are compromising democratic values and sliding toward autocracy.

Freedom House is a nonprofit organization that conducts research and advocates for democracy, political freedom and human rights around the world, producing a report each year since its founding in 1941. For more than the past 15 years, reports have shown a decline in democracies and an increase in dictatorships. The most recent report concludes that less than a fifth of people in the world now live in fully free countries.

In her book "Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism" published in 2021, Pulitzer prize-winning historian Anne Applebaum describes what has been happening in many democracies, and then addresses the psychological factors contributing to this decline.

She laments that the civil rights abuses of total authoritarian regimes such as China, Russia, Belarus and Venezuela have gone unchecked. But she is perhaps even more concerned about the weakening of democratic norms in many countries, including Poland, Hungary, India, Brazil and the Philippines. Citizens are supporting strong leaders who are gathering more power to themselves. And in these and other countries, an increasing percentage of voters are supporting candidates who openly express anti-democratic views. Loyalty to a particular leader becomes confused with patriotism.

Two situational factors that seem to be fueling these trends are the flow of immigrants into Europe and North America, and recently, the frustrations of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The United States is a strong democracy but the author says that some of these trends have shown up here as well. She describes our country as having turned inward in recent years, and becoming less supportive of democracies around the world. She says a significant percentage of Americans seem willing, under certain circumstances, to compromise democratic standards such as independent courts, election integrity and a free press. And some American political leaders have praised, and grown close to, dictators such as Vladimir Putin and North Koreas Kim Jong-un. She sees these trends as troubling to other democracies since the United States is seen as a model democracy to be emulated.

These recent infatuations with autocratic leaders are nothing new. During the rise of Nazism in Germany in the 1920s, some, including American hero Charles Lindbergh, expressed support and strongly opposed American involvement in World War II. Prominent literary figure Ezra Pound went further and was a strong spokesman for fascists in Germany and Italy. And more than a few Americans became infatuated with the Communist utopian state in the Soviet Union.

In his 1941 book "Escape from Freedom," psychologist Erich Fromm examined the psychological conditions that led to the rise of Nazism. He described the trend of history as flowing against our aspirations for freedom and democracy. Fromm reminds us that democracy is a recent innovation in human affairs. The vast majority of our ancestors were controlled by a dictatorial ruler of one kind or another. One reason may be that in our personal psychological development, all of us were once under the control of powerful adults. And the later psychological reality of being on our own can produce feelings of anxiety and meaninglessness, which tyrants can exploit.

In his Gettysburg Address, Abraham Lincoln expressed the fragile nature of this new democratic experiment: Let us highly resolve that these honored dead shall not have died in vain ... and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

The brutal Russian invasion of Ukraine and the heroic determination of Ukrainians to fight for their freedom have unified the worlds democracies, especially Western Europe and the United States, in a way that has not been seen in a long time. We have been reminded that freedom is not free and that the forces of tyranny require vigilance at home and a unified response abroad. It remains to be seen if this awakened resolve to confront tyranny and defend democratic values will be sustained and reverse the overall negative trends of recent decades.

Dr. Victor Garlock, a retired psychology professor at Cayuga Community College, is the author of The Gift of Psychology, a recently published collection of monthly articles originally published in The Citizen during the past six years. He is also author of the earlier book Your Genius Within: Sleep, Dreams, and Hypnosis. Dr. Garlock offers a limited number of personal counseling sessions at The Center, a holistic health center in Auburn. For information, call (315) 704-0319 or visit thecenter4wellness.com.

Love 1 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
The Cayuga County Sheriff's Office on Monday disclosed the identity of the person killed when he jumped from a moving Amtrak train on Saturday.

Sheriff Brian Schenck said Josimar Carmichael, 34, of Brooklyn, jumped from the moving passenger train and died as a result of his injuries. Carmichael boarded the train in New York City and was bound for Rochester.

The incident took place around 4:54 p.m. along CSX Railway tracks in the town of Brutus, just outside the village of Weedsport. First responders located Carmichael next to the tracks, and he was pronounced dead at the scene.

The sheriff's office is continuing to investigate along with Amtrak authorities. So far, authorities have not released information about why Carmichael jumped from the train.

The scene was difficult to reach, with the nearest roadway being an access road off Towpath Road in Brutus. Amtrak service was interrupted and police and firefighters from area agencies were still on scene several hours after the sun went down.

Man dies after jumping from Amtrak train in Cayuga County The Cayuga County Sheriff's Office said that a man was killed when he jumped from a moving Amtrak train just outside the village of Weedsport 

The sheriff's office said that it was assisted by New York State Police, Weedsport, Jordan and Throop fire departments and the Cayuga County 911 Dispatch Center.

Anyone with information relative to this investigation is encouraged to contact Detective Josh Blanchard at (315) 253-3902. Tips can be sent to tips@cayugacounty.us or be made anonymously at cayugacounty.us/452/Send-a-Tip. People may also call the sheriffs office at (315) 253-1179 and follow the prompts to reach any member or office.

Love 0 Funny 4 Wow 1 Sad 11 Angry 1
Instead of continuing in a crowded primary, one Syracuse-area Democrat is dropping out of one race for Congress to become the party's designee in a neighboring district.

Steven Holden, of Camillus, told The Citizen Monday he is now running in the 24th Congressional District, a 14-county district that stretches from the Buffalo area to the North Country. All or parts of eight towns in Cayuga County are part of the 24th.

Holden launched his congressional campaign in June 2021 with the goal of unseating U.S. Rep. John Katko, a four-term Republican congressman. At the time, the district was comprised of Cayuga, Onondaga and Wayne counties, plus western Oswego County.

Two other Democrats  Francis Conole and Sarah Klee Hood  entered the race last year. But there was increased interest after the state Legislature redrew New York's congressional districts and created a Democratic-friendly district, the 22nd. The new district covers all of Onondaga and Tompkins counties, along with parts of Cayuga, Cortland, Madison, Ontario, Schuyler and Seneca counties. Democrats outnumber Republicans by 50,000 voters.

With the new district lines, four more Democrats  Vanessa Fajans-Turner, Chol Majok, Josh Riley and Sam Roberts  announced their candidacies, creating the possibility of a seven-way June 28 primary election. To qualify for the primary, candidates must collect 1,250 valid signatures. Petitions must be filed this week.

As Holden circulated petitions, he was asked by Democrats in Ontario County if he would run in the neighboring 24th district. The party had difficulty finding a candidate to run in the new district, where Republicans have a 75,000-voter advantage.

"My candidate profile works better in that district," he said, noting his rural background  he grew up on a dairy farm in Oklahoma  and his U.S. Army service give him "crossover appeal." The North Country portion of the district includes Fort Drum, home of the U.S. Army's 10th Mountain Division.

Democratic leaders have coalesced behind Holden in the 24th district. He was told Sunday night that the party agreed to make him the candidate.

He won't need to circulate petitions in the new district. Democrats collected signatures for a placeholder candidate and will file those petitions this week. When the placeholder declines the nomination, the party will formally select Holden to fill the vacancy on the ballot.

Despite the registration numbers that favor Republicans, Holden thinks it's a winnable race for a Democrat, in part, because there is a Republican "civil war" in the district.

U.S. Rep. Chris Jacobs, a Republican, is the incumbent in the redrawn district. But three other Republicans  Mario Fratto, Andrew McCarthy and John Murtari  are challenging him for the nomination.

"We think we can pull this one out, even if it's a red district," Holden said. "It's happened before and it can surely happen again with the right type of person. I can do that."

Holden does not live in the 24th district  members of Congress are not required to live in the districts they represent. But if he wins the election, he is considering a move to Oswego County.

Politics reporter Robert Harding can be reached at (315) 282-2220 or robert.harding@lee.net. Follow him on Twitter @robertharding.

Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
By Azernews

By Laman Ismayilova

YARAT Contemporary Art Space has launched the first one-year Contemporary Art School in Azerbaijan in partnership with the Icharishahar State Historical-Architectural Reserve.

The presentation was held at the Museum of the 19th-21s Azerbaijani Painting.

Speaking at the event, curator of the YARAT Contemporary Art Space Farah Alakbarli, stressed the importance of the project in the development of contemporary art.

"In addition to organizing exhibitions and promoting contemporary art abroad for almost ten years, YARAT Contemporary Art Space has implemented numerous educational and research projects. Over these years, new personnel have been trained, experimental practices and art works by Azerbaijan's emerging artists have been presented to the audience, young talents are participating in seminars and daily studio practice to generate new ideas and works. I wish success to the project of the first one-year Contemporary Art School in Azerbaijan," said Farah Alakbarli.

Being unique in the field of contemporary art, the pilot school project is intended to become an important part of the country's cultural landscape in terms of developing experimental education with an aim to train talented youth and promote a programme of professional employment.

The major part of the educational programme of the school will be the authorial concept, formed on the content of the intersection of historical traditions and current events in the field of culture and arts.

The author of the concept is the curator of numerous exhibitions and projects also related to youth education in the field of contemporary art, Honored Artist Sabina Shikhlinskaya.

The Contemporary Art School will be located in the most important historical area of Azerbaijan including Icharishahar Historical-Architectural Reserve, YARAT building used for work with youth within the ARTIM project.

The Schools programme plans to implement theoretical and practical educational programmes for multidisciplinary artists, art managers, curators, and art researchers in the fundamental areas of contemporary art.

The basis of the training will include lectures and workshops by leading experts and specialists in their fields, current curators and artists, as well as art managers of local and foreign art institutions and organizations.

Upon completion of the theoretical programme of the school, it is envisioned to hold cultural and exhibition events in partnership with cultural organizations, galleries, creative centers, and museums, located in the area of

Many public and art initiatives are planned to involve the residents of the Old City in the creation of useful places for intellectual recreation. It invites not only the local audience but also tourists visiting the country to discuss the current needs and problems of modern society, combining the local color and national historical traditions of Azerbaijan with popular culture.

The project of the experimental Contemporary Art School aims to form an educational platform for the self-realization of not only established professionals, but also young representatives of creative fields.

A documentary film "ON SOZ - ON SOZ", dedicated to the 10th anniversary of the YARAT Contemporary Art Space was screened as part of the event.

In conclusion, some 29 students of the first one-year School of Contemporary Art in Azerbaijan, selected from 120 applicants, were presented to the guests of the event.
The Cayuga County Sheriff's Office said that a man was killed when he jumped from a moving Amtrak train just outside the village of Weedsport Saturday afternoon.

Cayuga County 911 dispatchers said that a report came in just before 5 p.m. saying that a person had jumped from a train.

The sheriff's office said that deputies responding to the CSX Rail in Brutus found a man next the tracks who was later pronounced dead.

Emergency radio broadcasts indicated that there was a person down near the railroad tracks in the area and that emergency medical treatment was going to be of no avail.

The scene was difficult to reach, with the nearest roadway being an access road off Towpath Road in the village of Brutus.

Amtrak service was interrupted and police and firefighters from area agencies were still on scene after the sun went down.

There are two sets of tracks that pass through the area and the incident involved the south set of tracks. A westbound Amtrak train was stopped near the scene of the incident, and authorities reported at one point that a CSX Rail freight transport would be allowed to slowly pass through the area on the northerly set of tracks.

An online service alert from Amtrak posted at about 5 p.m. indicated that Empire Service Train 281 was running about 20 late to Rochester after having departed from Syracuse. At about 6 p.m. Amtrak said that 281 was stopped west of Syracuse "due to law enforcement personnel activity" and that updates would be forthcoming.

A second Amtrak train was at the scene of the incident at about 7 p.m. and was preparing to take the passengers off the first train so that they could continue their journey. The company later reported that Train 283 would be used to accommodate customers for the remainder of their trip.

According to Amtrak's website, its Empire Service runs frequent daily trains between New York City and Albany, with some service continuing to the Finger Lakes region, Buffalo and Niagara Falls.

Emergency radio dispatches indicated that the train related to the incident would remain on scene and that an investigator from CSX Rail was en route.

The train involved in the incident reportedly began heading west again at about 8 p.m. and Amtrak reported that passengers would be arriving in Rochester about three hours and 20 minutes later than originally expected.

The sheriff's office is in charge of the investigation and said it is working in conjunction with Amtrak authorities. Investigators were still on the scene of the incident after 9 p.m. Saturday night.

The sheriff's office said Saturday night that the name of the person who was killed would not be released until notifications to family members had been made and that further information about the incident was expected to be released at a later date.

The sheriff's office said that it was assisted by New York State Police, Weedsport, Jordan and Throop fire departments and the Cayuga County 911 Dispatch Center.

Anyone with information relative to this investigation is encouraged to contact Detective Josh Blanchard at (315) 253-3902. Tips can be sent to tips@cayugacounty.us or be made anonymously at cayugacounty.us/452/Send-a-Tip. People may also call the Sheriffs Office at (315) 253-1179 and follow the prompts to reach any member or office.

Love 1 Funny 2 Wow 3 Sad 15 Angry 4
Dubai Police force first inducted Ghiath SUV to its fleet in 2018. The SUV is touted as one of the most capable police vehicles anywhere in the world.

Dubai Police boasts of some of the quickest, some of the most luxurious and some of the most powerful vehicles in its fleet. From Bugatti, Ferrari and Lamborghini models to Rolls Royce, Mercedes, Bentley and more, the Dubai Police force isn't an adversary you would want to see in your rear-view mirror. And now, the force is all set to include as many as 400 smart patrol vehicles over the next five years to its fleet courtesy Ghiath, an SUV made entirely in the United Arab Emirates by W Motors.

According to a report by The National News, Dubai Police will induct 400 units of the Ghiath patrol SUV to further bolster its crime-fighting capabilities. The Ghiath is widely seen as one of the most capable police vehicles anywhere in the world. At Dh196 million (approximately $53.3million), the fresh batch of the vehicles would also be one of the first to be entirely manufactured in the country. "We and W Motors have a common vision that revolves around keeping across the latest developments in the field of mobility and we look forward to using it to ensure the highest levels of public safety in Dubai," Dubai Chief of Police Lt Gen Abdullah Al Marri was quoted as saying.

What makes the Ghiath a mean-machine that has few rivals?

The Ghiath SUV has been part of the Dubai Police fleet since 2018, and for good reason. It boasts of an advanced communication system which is linked to the main command room of Dubai Police. It can constantly track cars deemed suspicious, from a considerable distance and is also equipped with an artificial intelligence system which was developed with the help of Safe City Group which specialises in AI, security forecasting and crime response. The other feature highlights include a 360-degree deployable periscope camera, eight exterior surveillance cameras and facial and licence plate recognition systems.. There is also a ginormous 16-inch main screen inside the cabin.

Under the hood is a toss up between two engine options - a 4.0-litre V6 or a 5.6-litre V8.

First Published Date:
The Flagstaff Fire Department rescued an injured rock climber who fell 15 feet Sunday, officials said.

Emergency crews were called to a spot off Lake Mary Road at around 6:40 p.m. Sunday on reports of the injured climber. Three FFD engines, Guardian Medical Transport and Coconino County Sheriff's Office Search and Rescue responded to the scene.

The first crew hiked in to find the injured climber and stabilized them, officials said. They then put the climber in a rescue basket and removed them down to the main road. Officials said the rescue was plagued by a number of "challenging obstacles," including the dark conditions. They ultimately removed the climber around 8 p.m.

The climber was in stable condition with an injury to the lower leg and foot Monday.

"Calls for service like this one are less frequent for the FFD, but we remain steadfast and diligent in our preparation and readiness for them so that we can respond efficiently at a moments notice," FFD Capt. Paul Sanders said in a news release Monday.

Sanders also expressed his gratitude for their regional partners who "seamlessly" stepped in to help.

Reporter Bree Burkitt can be reached at 928-556-2250 or bburkitt@azdailysun.com.

Love 2 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 2 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Taking a page out of Gov. Greg Gianforte's playbook, fellow Republicans Sen. Steve Daines and Rep. Matt Rosendale have written the Bureau of Land Management's leaders asking them to extend the protest period following the agency's approval of a revised grazing permit for American Prairie last week.

The protest period is 15 days. Following that, the BLM will consider any substantive protests from qualified commenters before issuing a final grazing decision. That will initiate a 30-day appeal period.

The Montana lawmakers' letter is addressed to Secretary of Interior Deb Haaland and BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning.

Last July, Gianforte asked the agency to extend the comment period on American Prairie's request to change its grazing leases on 63,000 acres of federally managed land. He also asked the agency to hold more in-person meetings.

The BLM partially acquiesced, extending the comment period but not holding any further in-person meetings.

Last week on March 30, the BLM announced a proposed decision to allow American Prairie's requested changes with some alterations. In its decision, the agency noted that it received more than 5,000 comments on American Prairie's initial and revised requests for changes.

If the proposal is finalized, American Prairie announced it plans to grow its current bison population from 813 animals to around 1,000 by 2025.

In comparison, there are more than 13,000 head of cattle grazing across American Prairie's 452,000 acres of land.

We understand that not everyone agrees with allowing bison grazing on public lands, but the BLMs decision makes it clear that our proposal is based on sound science and will benefit wildlife, the rangeland, and riparian areas, said Pete Geddes, vice president and chief external relations officer for American Prairie, in a press release.

Since 2001 American Prairie, which recently changed its name from American Prairie Reserve, has purchased more than 117,000 acres of land in Montana which is attached to more than 334,000 acres of leased federal and state land. The group's goal is to eventually create an intact prairie ecosystem complete with native wildlife, including bison.

The letter sent by Daines and Rosendale is the latest effort by the state's Republicans to challenge the north-central Montana nonprofit group.

In last years legislative session, Rep. Dan Bartel, R-Lewistown, sponsored a bill that would have banned nonprofits from buying agricultural land  an attack on private property rights that even some Republicans couldnt condone. The bill was voted down.

In 2019 the Legislature passed House Joint Resolution 28 requesting the BLM deny the grazing permit.

In 2018 the Legislature passed a bill, later vetoed by then Gov. Steve Bullock, that would have prevented American Prairie from converting its domestic bison herd into free-roaming wildlife.

Party officials contend American Prairie is a threat to traditional agriculture, the states largest industry.

Daines and Rosendale wrote the nonprofit's latest grazing proposal generated comments that "raise serious questions about how American Prairies proposed change of use will affect the local community and the state of Montana."

The BLM noted in its decision that it has, "also permitted bison on allotments in other areas of Montana, Colorado, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming," so American Prairie's request is not unusual.

The Bozeman-based Property and Environment Research Center hailed the BLM's decision, saying in a news release, "American Prairie represents a promising new model for conservation that relies on voluntary land acquisition, cooperation, and private management  not regulation, taxpayer dollars, or federal land acquisitions," said CEO Brian Yablonski. "The Bureau's decision supports this approach and helps American Prairie continue pursuing creative conservation solutions."

Love 4 Funny 2 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 6
The latest North Dakota coronavirus news: antibodies, farm aid and more.

Antibody testing

A nonprofit that supplies blood to hospitals in the Dakotas is offering COVID-19 antibody testing to people who donate blood.

Vitalant says that for a limited time, all donations will be tested and results will be available in donors online accounts about two weeks later. Donors also can find out if their plasma can be used to help COVID-19 patients with weakened immune systems.

Many people may be curious about their antibody status as more COVID-19 variants continue to emerge, Vitalant Senior Vice President Cliff Numark said. This testing also empowers donors to help the most vulnerable COVID-19 patients with their donation.

For more information, go to vitalant.org/antibody.

Vitalant serves about 900 hospitals nationwide, including about 85 in the region.

Hog help

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has updated eligibility terms and extended the application period for a program to assist hog producers.

The aid is for farmers who sold hogs through a spot market sale from April 16, 2020, through Sept. 1, 2020 -- the period in which producers faced the greatest reduction in market prices due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The Spot Market Hog Pandemic Program is part of USDAs Pandemic Assistance for Producers initiative and addresses gaps in previous assistance for hog producers.

USDAs Farm Service Agency is accepting applications through April 29, as hog producers will now be required to submit additional documentation. The deadline originally was Feb. 25, and it was later moved to April 15.

For more information, go to https://www.farmers.gov/coronavirus/pandemic-assistance/smhpp.

Testing and vaccines

A comprehensive list of free public COVID-19 testing offered in North Dakota can be found at health.nd.gov/covidtesting. That site also lists where free at-home test kits are being offered.

People can go to https://www.ndvax.org or call 866-207-2880 to see where COVID-19 vaccine is available near them.

County-level COVID-19 risks determined by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can be found at https://bit.ly/3Clifrq.

Guidance and resources for businesses are at https://bit.ly/3w0DpKj.

General information is at https://www.health.nd.gov/diseases-conditions/coronavirus.
North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum says state agencies may use their present budgets as a starting point for drafting new two-year spending plans. And although agency heads should consider inefficiencies, they wont have to identify potential cuts. The Republican governors guidelines come as state coffers are fattened by soaring oil prices and revenue is far exceeding forecasts. Burgum signaled he intends to include a state employee pay raise in his next two-year budget recommendation, though he did not provide details on how much he will suggest to lawmakers, who may adopt an equal raise for themselves.
The House passed a bill on Thursday to cap the price of insulin to $35 a month, which even had the support of 12 House Republicans. But Rep. Matt Gaetz (RFL) wasn't among them. Not only did the smug congressman vote against making the life-saving drug affordable for the more than 37 million Americans affected by diabetes, he also said, "the price of insulin increases as waistlines increase," and that people with diabetes should just exercise more and lose weight.

From Mother Jones:

In his newsletter Friday, Gaetz told his constituents that he opposed the bill because fat people, not Big Pharma, are responsible for driving up the cost of insulin. He suggested that Type 2 diabetes, which is often linked to obesity, could be cured if only people would workout more and lose weight, at which point they wouldn't need insulin anymore and the drug costs would fall without government intervention. Gaetz wrote:

While Democrat posturing of H.R. 6833 victimizes insulin payees as people with an uncontrollable disease that are being taken advantage of and need Big Brother to throw them a raft, lifestyle changes en masse would expeditiously lower demand and the subsequent prices of insulin. 90-95% of people with diabetes have type 2 diabetes, which "can be prevented or delayed with healthy lifestyle changes, such as losing weight, eating healthy food, and being active." Arbitrary price controls are no substitute for individual weight control. Since 2000, the number of diabetes cases in the U.S. has nearly doubled. The demand for insulin has increased and the requisite price increase has followed suit. In other words, the price of insulin increases as waistlines increase.

More than a quarter of Florida residents are obese, including Gaetz's favorite Palm Beach resident, former president Donald Trump. And more than 10 percent of the state's population suffers from diabetes, not all of which is caused by lifestyle factors. Gaetz's attempt to sympathize with then was probably not very convincing. "While I empathize with all Americans suffering from disease and will continue to fight Big Pharma, I voted against H.R. 6833," he wrote. "I will not see a reemergence of FDR price controls and join the Democrats in their attempt to pave the Road to Serfdom."
One of the interesting aspects of David Jenkins and Taika Waititi's wacky pirate comedy, Our Flag Means Death, is its exploration of same-sex pirate relationships, both platonic and otherwise. Taika touched on this in an interview and even offered up the pirate word for it, metalotage.

I was certainly aware that there was a lot of "friggin' in the riggin'" during "the golden age of piracy" (it gets lonely at sea, as the saying goes), but I wasn't aware of the concept of matelotage or what it meant. This piece on All Things Interesting offers some background.

In pirate communities of the 17th and 18th centuries, ships were male-dominated, tightly packed, and the ship's crew largely formed their own mores and rules. Matelotage developed in that environment where crew mates often knew one another more intimately than the wives and children they'd left behind on land.

In some cases, matelotage was affectionate, even fraternal; in others, it was romantic and sexual. But regardless of the nature of each relationship, pirates took the bonds of matelotage very seriously.

As far as historians can tell, matelotage began during the 1600s. The word derives from the French matelot, which means sailor or seaman. "Matey" likely also derives from matelot, making it a sort of cousin-word to matelotage.

It's believed that matelotage began as a strictly economic partnership. One pirate would agree with another that they could inherit the lion's share of their fortune after leaving "part to the dead man's friends or to his wife," according to The Invisible Hook by Peter T. Leeson. Some historians describe it as something like an informal will.

Read the rest.

Image: WikiCommons
By Trend

Trend's exclusive interview with Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio.

How did the Azerbaijan-Italy relations change over the last years taking into account the ongoing pandemic and overall macroeconomic situation?

Azerbaijan-Italy relations have a strategic nature. This year celebrate the 30th anniversary of our diplomatic relations. Despite the decrease in bilateral trade in 2020 due to the pandemic, our economies are quickly recovering and we are confident that this trend is set to consolidate in the coming months and years. Our trade relations still have a high, untapped potential. Moreover, despite the pandemic, we have been strengthening our partnership in every domain. We are proud of what we achieved so far and we look forward with full confidence to reaching together even greater goals together in the future.

How do you assess the contribution of Southern Gas Corridor to the energy security of Europe amid the ongoing energy crisis?

This infrastructure  whose implementation saw both Italy and Azerbaijan deeply committed - will contribute greatly to the growth, stability and prosperity of all actors involved. In terms of energy security, the creation of TAP has proven to be a far-sighted endeavor in the current juncture, as the only energy project in Europe not relying on Russias supplies.

What is the role of the Southern Gas Corridor for Italian gas market? How did it affect the gas prices in the country?

TAP strengthened our role as a regional gas hub in Europe, while ensuring greater competitiveness for our businesses and benefits for consumers in terms of reduced energy prices.

Is Italy interested in expanding the Southern Gas Corridor?

Our energetic partnership with Azerbaijan has grown over the years. Strengthening it is a priority for the Italian government. That can surely happen with the expansion of the Southern Gas Corridor.

Taking into account close relations Italy and Azerbaijan have in economy, especially energy sector, do you think EUs sanctions on Russia will in any way affect these relations?

Azerbaijan is one of our main energy partners. It is our first oil supplier, and now also the third supplier of natural gas. Energy therefore represents a crucial aspect of our bilateral cooperation, which has strengthened the strategic nature of our friendship over the years.

What development prospects could arise for Azerbaijan-Italy relations as EU is turning away from cooperation with Russia?

Azerbaijan is already a strategic partner for Italy. We continue to support the further strengthening of EU-Azerbaijan relations, regardless of the current dynamics. We aim to further develop our cooperation, especially in the energy sector, in line with our long-standing policy of diversification and based on the excellent results we have achieved so far in this field.

As the crisis in Ukraine is unveiling, economy experts forecast that several economy sectors all around the world could be affected. How does Italy plan on mitigating the crisis that could arise, especially that concerning food and energy security?

Supporting companies and citizens in facing the current crisis is one of the primary tasks of the Italian government. Our ultimate priority is to avoid any job loss. The Italian government is already implementing measures aimed at protecting citizens and businesses.

We approved a set of measures to reduce the cost of gasoline and diesel, which are essential for the agricultural and fisheries sector, as well as for logistics. We are also working to reduce the cost of gas, which affects the cost of electricity.

We are strongly committed to energy diplomacy for national and European security, strengthening collaborations with strategic and reliable partners, in order to decrease our excessive dependence on Russia. We promptly moved on multiple fronts to diversify our sources, prevent further tensions on global energy costs that are weighing on Italian businesses and families. In short, we are implementing an energy security plan for Italy.

After almost 30 years of occupation, Azerbaijan liberated its territories, which are rich of natural resources and have excellent business opportunities. In which ways could Italian companies be engaged in boosting the economy of these regions?

Italy looks with great interest at the opportunities offered by this beautiful country. Azerbaijan is an important economic partner for us. Italy is the first destination market for Azerbaijani exports. At the same time, many relevant Italian companies have invested here, mostly in the energy, infrastructure and transport sectors. I do believe that there is room for deepening further our bilateral partnership, especially in the sustainable and clean energy sector, where Italian companies have a globally recognized expertise. In addition, infrastructure and construction, communications and agro-industry are additional areas of interest for our companies, which could make an important contribution to the economic growth of your country. Not to forget the contribution Italy could provide to Azerbaijan in preserving and restoring its cultural heritage, given our renowned expertise in this field.
To say that New York City and Islam have had a strained relationship since 2001 would be an understatement. Following the horrific attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11, millions of Americans aimed their antipathy at all Muslims. Similar to the anti-Japanese sentiments that pervaded the country after Pearl Harbor, islamophobia took root in the hearts of a host of Americans. While the wounds haven't healed completely, the tension that American Muslims used to feel is slowly beginning to dissipate. One need look no further than the post linked above for a salient example of America's newfound tolerance for Islam.

Ramadan 2022 started on April 2nd, and, to celebrate the occasion, several Muslims poured into Times Square to offer the Tawareeh prayer. During the month of Ramadan, it's customary for (some) Muslims to engage in the Tawareeh prayer after the fifth and final prayer of the day. Tawareeh consists of reciting the Quran and lengthy acts of worship for the holy month of Ramadan. The gathering on April 2nd marked the very first Tawareeh prayer in the history of Times Square.
Daemen University in Amherst plans to open its own dental school.

Daemen's plan would add to the schools health sciences offerings  pending state approval and accreditation  and bring a second dental school to the Buffalo Niagara region, Daemen officials said Monday.

Amherst dentist Dr. Todd Shatkin of Shatkin Dental Health is partnering with the university to construct the Shatkin College of Dentistry in part of the Phillips Brothers Supply building on Kensington Avenue, close to Shatkins Amherst dental facilities and the towns growing Medical Spine along I-290.

The new college would help address a need for dental professionals in Western New York, said Daemen President Gary Olson. The University at Buffalos School of Dental Medicine is currently the only dental school in the area.

Theres a real need in Western New York and only one other nearby school of dentistry, and we will complement that, Olson said.

New York States Academic Dental Centers  comprising the dental schools at Columbia University, New York University, Stony Brook University, Touro University, UB and the University of Rochester  have estimated the state will have 1,024 fewer full-time dentists than are needed by 2025.

Daemen joins movement from college to university Achieving university status will support Daemens recruitment of international students, as universities are perceived as more prestigious than colleges in many countries, school officials said.

Dental schools, in addition to training the next generations of dentists, also function as safety nets for individuals who can-not afford dental care elsewhere, NYSADC says on its website.

Daemens proposed Shatkin College of Dentistry is a partnership between higher education and private business that will help the Buffalo Niagara economy grow and build its education and medical sectors, said Amherst Town Supervisor Brian Kulpa.

We see this as an immediate tie into Gov. Kathy Hochuls goal of producing a more and diversified healthcare workforce, Kulpa said.

Shatkin is investing $6 million to $7 million in the new college and Daemen will cover operating costs and about $500,000 to upgrade its anatomy labs, said Daemen Provost Michael Brogan.

Daemen began working with Shatkin on the plan more than two years ago and has submitted it for accreditation by the Chicago-based Commission on Dental Accreditation and the New York State Education Department.

The Commission on Dental Accreditation has accredited 15 new dental schools in the United States over the last 20 years.

Olson and Brogan said they are confident Daemen will receive the needed approvals and hope to open the new college in the fall of 2023. The program would accept 40 students per year, or 120 by the third year of a three-year program.

If approved, the college will differ from most dental schools by offering a year-round, three-year degree program instead of the four years it usually takes to earn a Doctor of Dental Medicine degree.

Graduating high school students could also take advantage of a 3+3 plan and get their bachelors degree in biology from Daemen in three years and their DDS in three more, to become dentists in six years instead of eight.

The year-round program will also mean more continuous care for area residents who can get lower-cost dental care through the program, Shatkin said.

The patients wont have to take the summer off, so there will be no break in care for patients, and we will be keeping the students engaged year-round as well, he said.

Shatkin has entered a lease-to-own agreement with Phillips Brothers that will allow him to buy the building at some point in the future, he said. For now, the building supply business is doing more custom ordering and less warehousing, so theres room to construct the new college space in about 15,000 square feet of the 39,000-square-foot building.

Were going to take a little under half the building, put a second floor on it and make a wonderful space for training future dentists, Shatkin said.

Training future dentists is not new for Shatkin; he and his team already provide advanced training at his facilities to students in New York Universitys Langone Department of Medicine.

In the new Daemen program, first-year students will take core courses and biology on campus and get pre-clinical training at Shatkins existing dental building about a half-mile away at 2500 Kensington Ave., he said. The next two years, students would get their clinical training at the new facility planned for 2525 Kensington.

Kulpa said Daemen announced the plan because it is poised to go to the town planning board this month.

He called Shatkins renovation of the building an adaptive reuse of an old industrial space that will add to the I-290 medical spine.

Olson said it will also add to Daemens offerings as a health sciences school that already has programs in nursing, pre-medicine, physical therapy and physician assistant studies, among others.

Buffalo Next Must-read local business coverage that exposes the trends, connects the dots and contextualizes the impact to Buffalo's economy. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
More than 150 employees at a Lewiston nursing home who have been working without a contract since the start of the year  and held a one-day strike last month  have landed a new deal that comes with wage increases, one-time bonuses and a jump in their employers' pension contribution.

The workers at Our Lady of Peace voted Friday to ratify a 20-month agreement with nursing home owner Ascension Living, according to the workers' union, 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East.

The agreement includes "new higher starting wage rates and significant raises that credit years of experience for all bargaining unit members," the union said.

Sign up for the Buffalo Next free newsletter The News' Buffalo Next team covers the changing Buffalo Niagara economy. Get the news in your inbox 5 days a week.

The deal also includes a one-time bonus of $1,000 for full-time workers and a $500 bonus for part-time employees. Workers kept their current health insurance plans but received increases in employer contributions to dental and eye insurance. The agreement also comes with a 7% increase in the employers' pension contribution.

Employees also will get a 10% increase to the payout of unused extended illness bank hours upon retirement, along with increases in shift differential among job titles. Caregivers included in the negotiations range from registered nurses to maintenance technicians to housekeeping aides, among other titles.

Nursing home workers in Lewiston plan to strike over staffing, wages More than 150 nursing home workers at Our Lady of Peace in Lewiston plan to hold a one-day strike Wednesday after negotiations with the facility's owner broke down last week over wages and staffing levels.

"We are pleased that Ascension Living is finally working with us to get more staff in the building to help us take care of our residents," Krista Diez, a licensed practical nurse, said in a statement.

Ascension Living, part of St. Louis-based Ascension, a $27 billion health system, said in a statement it was "pleased our represented associates have successfully ratified their new contract and are grateful to both bargaining teams for working diligently to reach this mutually beneficial agreement."

Kaleida update

There's a new venue hosting negotiations between Kaleida Health and the two unions representing more than 60% of its workers.

For the first couple weeks of negotiations, the two sides met at 1199SEIU's offices on Main Street in Buffalo. But on March 29, the unions learned the office would no longer be available due to a "structural emergency," according to a bargaining update issued Friday.

Effective March 30 and "for at least the next month," Kaleida, 1199SEIU and Communications Workers of America Local 1168 will meet in Buffalo General Medical Center's Swift Auditorium.

How Mercy Hospital strike set the stage for key contract talks at rival Kaleida Health The Catholic Health contract sets a benchmark that Kaleida Health officials will need to consider as they negotiate with their workers. It's work that starts Wednesday, when Kaleida and the unions representing about 6,300 of its workers sit down for their first joint bargaining session.

The two sides continue to discuss non-economic proposals but most of the conversations seem to come back to staffing, the unions said in the update.

"It doesn't matter what job title you have or what department you work in, having enough staff to provide high quality patient care is a problem," the unions said. "We are committed to negotiating a contract that deals with these staffing issues."

The current three-year contract expires May 31, but negotiations could go past that date.

Jon Harris can be reached at 716-849-3482 or jharris@buffnews.com. Follow him on Twitter at @ByJonHarris.

Buffalo Next Must-read local business coverage that exposes the trends, connects the dots and contextualizes the impact to Buffalo's economy. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Dr. Aaron Epstein, a surgical resident at the University at Buffalos medical school, had no idea he had won the nations second-highest civilian award last week.

That's because, for the past month, Epstein, 36, has been on the ground in Ukraine leading a team of medical experts training soldiers and civilians in combat care.

Epstein won the 2022 Citizen Honors Award for Service for his commitment to providing medical relief to communities in conflict zones, austere environments and disaster areas around the world, according to the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, which bestows the award.

Thats exactly what hes doing in Ukraine.

Epstein has built a humanitarian aid group he founded in 2015, the Global Surgical Medical Support Group, into a network of more than 1,000 medical experts that mobilizes to provide medical support in war zones and other areas of extreme medical need.

Teams of volunteers including former U.S. military medics have been deploying to join Epstein for two- to three-week stretches since the war began, he said in an email to The Buffalo News. They are training Ukrainians  some as young as high school age  to serve as combat medics, focusing on battlefield injuries such as penetrating wounds not typically seen in peacetime.

We are the only group providing surgical training here, especially in things like damage control surgery, trauma chest tubes, wound closures and vessel ligation, Epstein said. We have trained over 100 physicians. We have trained over 3,000 civilians in basic combat casualty care. We have trained another 500 Ukrainian soldiers in combat casualty care as well.

The group's previous missions include nearly a dozen to Iraq during the war against ISIS, New York City during the first wave of Covid-19 and the 2021 evacuation of 600 Afghans and U.S. citizens from a Kabul airfield.

Epstein said he got a letter from the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24. It said: We request all possible cooperation from the GSMSG in the field of training of doctors/surgeons.

He put the call out to his roster of surgical and medical volunteers. Want to go do something? Got your passport? it began.

Epstein said he cant disclose how many or where, but he has more than a dozen team members moving around to many cities.

We routinely are avoiding Russian artillery and cruise missiles. We routinely are working out of medical clinics but also bomb shelters and abandoned buildings. Really whatever is safe at the time, he wrote.

The group's teams are armed and able to defend themselves if fired upon. He did not describe what they've seen, but wrote, I guess to quote the original Blade Runner movie, I've seen things you people wouldn't believe ... 

He expressed outrage at Russian President Vladimir Putins bloody attacks on civilians.

We are fortunate and blessed in ways that most people in the U.S. take for granted, he said. And when something like Ukraine happens where a country invades another for no reason other than the delusions of a megalomaniac like Putin and causes a humanitarian disaster, it is our responsibility as capable individuals and collectively as a group, to do something about it. It is quite literally taking a stand for freedom in the face of tyrannical oppression.

Epstein, a Florida native, was on his way to start high school at the prestigious Phillips Exeter Academy private school in New Hampshire on Sept. 11, 2001, when his flight was rerouted due to the 9/11 attacks. Those events led him toward a career in national defense.

He interned at the State Department and studied Arabic and Middle Eastern culture while earning a bachelors degree in economics and international policy studies from Rice University in Texas. He went on to work at Northrup Grumman Corp. and earn a masters in intelligence and security studies from Georgetown School of Foreign Service in Washington, D.C.

But volunteer work as a medic led him to change course.

National security work just didn't seem effective when it came to engaging communities, he said. But treating someone's family member really brings you closer to them and them to you. The bonds are so much stronger if you genuinely show you care about someone else's well-being.

He founded GSMSG while in medical school at Georgetown University and has deployed it throughout his four-year residency at UBs Jacobs School of Medicine.

He doesnt know who nominated him for the Citizen Service award, which is second only to the Presidential Medal of Freedom in U.S. citizen awards.

I actually had no idea what this award was until I got a random phone call from the U.S. while in Ukraine that told me I had won, he said. I had to look it up and make sure it wasn't a scam.

What does it mean? Honestly, awards in general don't mean much to me, he added. I appreciate that there is a decision to grant some recognition, but Im going to keep doing the work regardless.

Buffalo Next Must-read local business coverage that exposes the trends, connects the dots and contextualizes the impact to Buffalo's economy. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
The main event still is at least seven years away, but the Army Corps of Engineers has plans afoot for a preliminary cleanup of radioactive and chemical waste at a government-owned site in Lewiston.

Brent LaSpada, the project manager, said Thursday a formal decision is to be released this summer, but the Corps has decided on a $24.5 million plan to remove waste scattered around the 191-acre Niagara Falls Storage Site.

The Corps expects to award a contract next March for removal of the waste, mostly buried at shallow depths at various points around the 10-acre Interim Waste Containment Structure.

That landfill is where the government wants to remove 193,000 cubic yards of material, including nuclear waste from the World War II atomic bomb project and postwar work with radioactive materials carried out by local industries that had federal contracts.

Next year's project, dubbed Phase 1 of the overall cleanup of the storage site, must be done in advance of the planned removal of the nuclear waste from its burial site, LaSpada said.

Were clearing out everything around the site to make sure its suitable for construction and industrial work to happen, so they have a clear path to go in and build any infrastructure they need to be able to work around the site to work on that next phase, the more complex phase of the project," LaSpada said in an interview.

A map of the property, released by the Corps last week, shows dozens of dots scattered around the property to mark the spots where Phase 1 work will be needed.

Phase 1 is to last about four years. It calls for the excavation of an estimated 7,127 cubic yards of soil, road beds and an old concrete building foundation contaminated by the radioactive and volatile organic chemicals.

Besides hauling that material to an out-of-state repository, which LaSpada says has yet to be chosen, about 3,302 gallons of groundwater with similar contamination are to be pumped out and sent away.

Foundations of three other old buildings are to be ground down to surface level, but will remain in place, the plan says. The site's condition then will be reviewed every five years.

"I'm absolutely excited about how fast it's progressing," Lewiston Supervisor Steve Broderick said. "I had my doubts it would happen so soon."

It will take about two years to design a plan for the cleanup, and about four and a half months to carry it out, according to a Corps fact sheet.

Although the exact schedule will be worked out with the eventual contractor, Phase 1 is expected to last until 2027, LaSpada said.

After that comes the actual removal of the nuclear waste in the 10-acre containment structure, where it's buried under 20 feet of clay. The cost of that has been estimated at $590 million.

Congress has yet to appropriate the money to pay for it, but the Army Corps has approved plans to start the waste removal in 2029, and a $35 million design contract was awarded last year.

The Niagara Falls Storage Site is the heart of the much larger Lake Ontario Ordnance Works site in Lewiston and Porter, where the government manufactured TNT during World War II after seizing the land from local farmers.

The CWM Chemical Services hazardous waste landfill and the Modern Corp. garbage disposal landfill both were dug on former LOOW land the government sold.

Other government work continued for the first 15 to 20 years after the war, such as a factory erected to try to produce rocket fuel.

After that effort fizzled, the government sold the land and a private owner leased some of the buildings as an elementary school, used by third-graders in the Lewiston-Porter School District from 1967-70.

Numerous alumni of that school have complained about health issues that cropped up later on.

The Buffalo News: Good Morning, Buffalo The smart way to start your day. We sift through all the news to give you a concise, informative look at the top headlines and must-read stories every weekday. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Former Buffalo Bills defensive end Alex Carrington was arrested in Lockport early Monday on various charges, including gun possession and driving while intoxicated, and had a stun gun used on him when he wouldn't comply with sheriff's deputies, the Niagara County Sheriff's Office said.

Deputies pulled Carrington over at 1:34 a.m. near a gas station at South Transit and Willow streets. Carrington had allegedly been speeding and driving without a headlight, according to a statement from the Sheriff's Office.

According to the Sheriff's Office, deputies "noted signs of potential intoxication." Deputies asked Carrington to get out of his vehicle, but he "refused all requests" to exit, the Sheriff's Office said.

Deputies said they also could see a magazine for a gun "in plain view," in what they said was the pocket of a door on the driver's side of the vehicle.

Carrington allegedly tried starting the vehicle. Deputies used a Taser and "were able to extricate Carrington from the vehicle," the Sheriff's Office said.

Deputies allegedly found a loaded handgun under Carrington's leg as he was being taken out of the vehicle. Two loaded, high-capacity magazines also were found in the vehicle, the Sheriff's Office said.

State troopers and Lockport police also responded to the scene.

Carrington was held for arraignment on charges of second- and third-degree criminal possession of a weapon, resisting arrest, obstruction of governmental administration, driving while intoxicated, driving with a suspended registration, as well as other vehicle and traffic violations, according to the Sheriff's Office.

Carrington, a third-round pick of the Bills in 2010, played 59 games over the course of six seasons in the NFL. He played 51 games with the Bills from 2010 through 2013, as well as in 2015. He started 10 games in his career, which included playing for the St. Louis Rams in 2014.

Carrington's arrest was first reported by WIVB-TV.

News Staff Reporter Mark Gaughan contributed to this report.

Reach Aaron at abesecker[at]buffnews.com or 716-849-4602.

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
By Trend

President of Turkmenistan Serdar Berdimuhamedov signed an order at a meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers, according to which a commission on transport, transit and logistics was formed from the Turkmen side, which will carry out activities jointly with the Azerbaijani Commission, Trend reports with reference to Jeyhun News.

Berdimuhamedov noted the important role of the work of this Commission in the implementation of major transport and logistics projects, transit and export potential of the two countries, as well as in strengthening cooperation between business communities.

At the same time, he gave a number of instructions to the head of the Transport and Communications Agency to take appropriate measures to increase transit cargo carriage.

The agreement on the establishment of the Turkmen-Azerbaijani Joint Commission on Transport, Transit and Logistics was signed on November 28, 2018.
NEW YORK (AP)  Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom, has never been so busy.

"A year ago, we might have been receiving one, maybe two reports a day about a book being challenged at a library. And usually those calls would be for guidance on how to handle a challenge or for materials that support the value of the work being challenged," Caldwell-Stone told The Associated Press. "Now, we're getting three, four, five reports a day, many in need of support and some in need of a great deal of support."

"We're on the phone constantly," she added.

Accounts of book bannings and attempted book bannings, along with threats against librarians, have soared over the past year and the ALA has included some numbers in its annual State of America's Libraries Report, released Monday. The association found 729 challenges  affecting nearly 1,600 books  at public schools and libraries in 2021, more than double 2020's figures and the highest since the ALA began compiling challenges more than 20 years ago.

The actual total for last year is likely much higher  the ALA collects data through media accounts and through cases it learns about from librarians and educators and other community members. Books preemptively pulled by librarians  out of fear of community protest or concern for their jobs  and challenges never reported by libraries are not included.

The number could well grow again in 2022, Caldwell-Stone said, as conservative-led school boards and legislatures enact more restrictions. Last week, the Georgia legislature passed a bill that would accelerate the process for removing books seen as "harmful to minors."

"Nothing would surprise me," Caldwell-Stone says.

The two most challenged books on the ALA's top 10 list have been in the news often: Maia Kobabe's graphic memoir about sexual identity, "Gender Queer," and Jonathan Evison's "Lawn Boy," a coming-of-age novel narrated by a young gay man. Both have been singled out by Republican officials.

Last fall in Virginia, Glenn Youngkin backed a local school board's banning of the two books during his successful run for governor. Around the same time, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster supported a school board's decision to remove "Gender Queer."

In Florida recently, Gov. Ron DeSantis criticized "Gender Queer" and "Lawn Boy" upon signing a law that would force elementary schools to provide a searchable list of every book available in their libraries or used in instruction and allow parents, DeSantis said, "to blow the whistle."

Kobabe and Evison noted during recent interviews an irony of their books being targeted: Neither set out to write a story for young people. But they gained a following among students with the help of the American Library Association, which has given each book an Alex Award for works "written for adults that have special appeal to young adults, ages 12 through 18."

"I think a big part of our books getting so much attention is that they're award winners and ended up being purchased by libraries all over the country," Kobabe said.

Others on the ALA list, virtually all cited for LGBTQ or racial themes, include Angie Thomas' bestselling "The Hate U Give," centered on a police shooting of a Black teen; George Johnson's "All Boys Aren't Blue," Juno Dawson's "This Book Is Gay" and Susan Kuklin's "Beyond Magenta." Two older works that have been on the list before also appear: Sherman Alexie's autobiographical novel "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" and Nobel laureate Toni Morrison's debut novel "The Bluest Eye."

The library association defines a "challenge" as a "formal, written complaint filed with a library or school requesting that materials be removed because of content or appropriateness." The ALA doesn't keep a precise figure for how many books have actually been removed, but cases have come up routinely over the past year. Last December, a school district in San Antonio, Texas, pulled hundreds of library books to "ensure they did not have any obscene or vulgar material in them."
SAN FRANCISCO (AP)  As Benito Luna-Herrera teaches his 7th grade social studies classes, he is on alert for signs of inner turmoil. And there is so much of it these days.

One of his 12-year-old students felt her world was falling apart. Distance learning had upended her friendships. Things with her boyfriend were verging on violent. Her home life was stressful. "I'm just done with it," the girl told Luna-Herrera during the pandemic, and shared a detailed plan to kill herself.

Another student was typically a big jokester and full of confidence. But one day she told him she didn't want to live anymore. She, too, had a plan in place to end her life.

Luna-Herrera is just one teacher, in one Southern California middle school, but stories of students in distress are increasingly common around the country. The silver lining is that special training helped him know what to look for and how to respond when he saw the signs of a mental emergency.

Since the pandemic started, experts have warned of a mental health crisis facing American children. That is now playing out at schools in the form of increased childhood depression, anxiety, panic attacks, eating disorders, fights and thoughts of suicide at alarming levels, according to interviews with teachers, administrators, education officials and mental health experts.

In low-income areas, where adverse childhood experiences were high before the pandemic, the crisis is even more acute and compounded by a shortage of school staff and mental health professionals.

Luna-Herrera, who teaches in a high poverty area of the Mojave Desert, is among a small but growing number of California teachers to take a course called Youth Mental Health First Aid. It teaches adults how to spot warning signs of mental health risks and substance abuse in children, and how to prevent a tragedy.

The California Department of Education funds the program for any school district requesting it, and the pandemic has accelerated moves to make such courses a requirement. The training program is operated by the National Council for Mental Wellbeing and available in every state.

"I don't want to read about another teenager where there were warning signs and we looked the other way," said Sen. Anthony Portantino, author of a bill that would require all California middle and high schools to train at least 75% of employees in behavioral health. "Teachers and school staff are on the front lines of a crisis, and need to be trained to spot students who are suffering."

Experts say while childhood depression and anxiety had been on the rise for years, the pandemic's unrelenting stress and grief amplified the problems, particularly for those already experiencing mental health issues who were cut off from counselors and other school resources during distance learning.

For children, the issues with distance learning were not just academic, said Sharon Hoover, professor of child psychiatry at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and co-director of the National Center for School Mental Health.

Child abuse and and neglect increased during the pandemic, according to Hoover. For children in troubled homes, with alcoholic or abusive parents, distance learning meant they had no escape. Those who lacked technology or had spotty internet connections were isolated even more than their peers and fell further behind academically and socially.

Many children bounced back after the extended isolation, but for others it will take longer, and mental health problems often lag a stressor.

"We can't assume that 'OK we're back in school, it's been a few months and now everyone should be back to normal.' That is not the case," said Hoover.

Returning to school after months of isolation intensified the anxiety for some children. Teachers say students have greater difficulty focusing, concentrating, sitting still and many need to relearn how to socialize and resolve conflicts face-to-face after prolonged immersion in screens.

Kids expected to pick up where they left off but some found friendships, and their ability to cope with social stress, had changed. Educators say they also see a concerning increase in apathy  about grades, how students treat each other and themselves  and a lot less empathy.

"I have never seen kids be so mean to each other in my life," said Terrin Musbach, who trains teachers in mental health awareness and other social-emotional programs at the Del Norte Unified School District, a high-poverty district in rural Northern California. "There's more school violence, there's more vaping, there's more substance abuse, there's more sexual activity, there's more suicide ideation, there's more of every single behavior that we would be worried about in kids."

Many states have mandated teacher training on suicide prevention over the last decade and the pandemic prompted some to broaden the scope to include mental health awareness and supporting behavioral health needs.

But school districts nationwide also say they need more psychologists and counselors. The Hopeful Futures Campaign, a coalition of national mental health organizations, last month published a report that found most states are struggling with mental health support in schools. Only Idaho and the District of Columbia exceed the nationally recommended ratio of one psychologist per 500 students.

In some states, including West Virginia, Missouri, Texas and Georgia, there is only one school psychologist for over 4,000 students, the report says. Similarly, few states meet the goal of one counselor per 250 students.

President Joe Biden has proposed $1 billion in new federal funding to help schools hire more counselors and psychologists and bolster suicide prevention programs. That followed a rare pubic advisory in December from U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy on "the urgent need to address the nation's youth mental health crisis."

In early 2021, emergency room visits in the U.S. for suspected suicide attempts were 51% higher for adolescent girls and 4% higher for adolescent boys compared to the same period in 2019, according to research cited in the advisory.

Since California began offering the Youth Mental Health First Aid course in 2014, more than 8,000 teachers, administrators and school staff have been trained, said Monica Nepomuceno, who oversees mental health programming at the California Department of Education.

She said much more needs to be done in the country's largest state, which employs over 600,000 K-12 staff at schools.

The course helps distinguish typical adolescent ways of dealing with stress  slamming doors, crying, bursts of anger  from warning signs of mental distress, which can be blatant or subtle.

Red flags include when a child talks about dying or suicide, but can be more nuanced like: "I can't do this anymore," or "I'm tired of this," said Tramaine El-Amin, a spokesperson for the National Council for Mental Wellbeing. More than 550,000 K-12 educators across the country have taken the Youth Mental Health First Aid course since it launched in 2012, she said.

Changes in behavior could be cause for concern  a child who stops a sport or activity they were passionate about without replacing it with another one; a typically put together child who starts to look regularly unkempt; a student whose grades plummet or who stops handing in homework; a child who eats lunch alone and has stopped palling around with their friends.

After noticing something might be wrong, the course teaches the next step is to ask the student without pressuring or casting judgment and letting them know you care and want to help.

"Sometimes an adult can ask a question that causes more harm than good," said Luna-Herrera, the social studies teacher at California City Middle School, a two-hour drive into the desert from Los Angeles.

He took the course in spring 2021 and two weeks later put it to use. It was during distance learning and a student had failed to show up for online tutoring but he spotted her chatting online on the school's distance learning platform, having a heated dispute with her then-boyfriend. Luna reached out to her privately.

"I asked her if she was OK," he said. Little by little, the girl told Luna-Herrera about problems with friends and her boyfriend and problems at home that left her feeling alone and desperately unanchored.

The course tells adults to ask open-ended questions that keep the conversation going, and not to project themselves into an adolescent's problems with comments like: "You'll be fine; It's not that bad; I went through that; Try to ignore it." What might seem trivial to an adult can feel overwhelming for a young person, and failure to recognize that can be a conversation stopper.

The 12-year old told Luna-Herrera she had considered hurting herself. "Is that a recurring thought?" he asked, recalling how his heart started racing as she revealed her suicide plan.

Like CPR first-aid training, the course teaches how to handle a crisis: Raise the alarm and get expert help. Do not leave a person contemplating suicide alone. As Luna-Herrera continued talking to the girl, he texted his school superintendent, who got the principal on the line, they called 911 and police rushed to the home, where they spoke to the girl and her mother, who was startled and unaware.

"He absolutely saved that child's life," said Mojave Unified Superintendent Katherine Aguirre, who oversees the district of about 3,000 students, the majority of whom are Latino and Black children from economically disadvantaged families.

Aguirre recognized the need for behavioral heath training early in the pandemic and through the Department of Education trained all of her employees, from teachers to yard supervisors and cafeteria workers.

"It's about awareness. And that Sandy Hook promise: If you see something, say something," she said.

That did not happen with 14-year-old Taya Bruell.

Taya was a bright, precocious student who had started struggling with mental health issues at about 11, according to her father, Harry Bruell. At the time, the family lived in Boulder, Colorado where Taya was hospitalized at one point for psychiatric care but kept up the trappings of a model student: She got straight As, was co-leader of her high school writing club and in her spare time taught senior citizens to use computers.

For a literature class, Taya was assigned to keep a journal. In it, she drew a disturbing portrait that showed self-harm and wrote about how much she hated her body and was hearing voices she wanted to silence.

Her teacher read the assignment and wrote: "Taya, very thorough journal. I loved reading the entries. A+"

Three months later in February 2016, Taya killed herself. After her death, Taya's parents discovered the journal in her room and brought it to the school, where they learned Taya's teacher had not informed the school counselor or administrators of what she had seen. They don't blame the teacher but will always wonder what if she had not ignored the signs of danger.

"I don't think the teacher wanted to hurt our daughter. I think she had no idea what to do when she read those stark warning signs in Taya's journal," said her father, who has since relocated with the family to Santa Barbara, California.

He believes legislation to require teacher training in behavioral health will save lives. "It teaches you to raise the alarm, and not just walk away, which is what happened to Taya."

***

MENTAL HEALTH DURING THE PANDEMIC
Its not exactly a budget issue, though it would have been better for Albany to agree on an effective new ethics regime as it negotiated the 2022-23 spending plan, now three days late. Still, it is essential that the governor and Legislature get their collective minds right on what New York needs and what its voters should demand: independent oversight.

Hochul is already there, based on comments she has made since taking office in August. Legislative leaders, meanwhile, seem pleased to hang on to the influence they wield on who gets to oversee their activities. And theres the rub: It will take all three  the governor, the Senate and the Assembly  to make any changes. Better still would be a constitutional amendment that creates effective, independent oversight. That would require the approval of New York voters.

As it stands, none of that seems likely to happen as part of the budget, unless Hochul uses the clout a New York governor owns to pull legislative leaders in line. Former Gov. David Paterson used that authority effectively, adding critical elements to routine measures that were needed to keep the government running after a late budget. Were not specifically suggesting Hochul take that step, but ethics reform is important enough that it wouldnt count as a misuse of power.

The existing ethics organization  the Joint Commission on Public Ethics, known as JCOPE  made its insufficiency public last year, when it reversed its dubious decision granting then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo ethical cover to write his book, American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic. Cuomo won that ruling based on a pledge not to use state personnel or resources.

But state employees did help with the book. Cuomo insisted they volunteered to help. JCOPE, suddenly finding its spine, rejected that explanation and reversed its ruling. In December, it moved to seize Cuomos $5.1 million payment; on Friday, Cuomo sued to keep the money.

The conflict opened a window on the weaknesses of JCOPE. Its ties to the public officials it is meant to oversee are just the start. Even worse, it can neither investigate nor find any official guilty of malfeasance unless two commissioners from their own political party vote for it.

Thus, by design or by accident, a minority of JCOPE commissioners can block action. In addition, the commission shuts out the public from its proceedings and is exempt from the states Freedom of Information and Open Meetings laws. You could hardly design a better emasculated public oversight board.

New York has long been identified as having one of the nations most corrupt state governments, as well as its most dysfunctional Legislature. Understanding that, its hardly surprising that lawmakers dont want anyone with any clout poking around in their affairs. No one should expect them to bow to that kind of change except under pressure from voters.

Hochul signaled the need for change in her State of the State address in January. She suggested an independent board with rotating members drawn from the deans of five of the states 15 accredited law schools. That idea appears to have failed, based on the Legislatures fierce determination to decide who gets to decide on its ethics. In that, its a different version of gerrymandered political districts, in which politicians choose their voters before voters ever get to choose their politicians.

More recently, a coalition of reform groups offered a compromise. Its plan would permit legislative leaders and statewide elected officials to each choose one member for a selection committee that, in turn, would choose five members for a new ethics commission. That, at least, would put the members beyond the grasping arms-length reach of elected officials.

Still, theres no obvious rush to include this in the budget. That, too, is in keeping with Albany tradition: Keep kicking it down the road and hope it goes away. That cant happen. JCOPE is the lesson: It was a phony ethics operation. New York, still trailing the corrupt odor of Tammany Hall, needs to use this moment to show voters that ethics matter in democratic government.

Earlier this year, Sen. Liz Krueger, D-Manhattan, pushed for a constitutional amendment to create a new ethics board in which most members would be appointed by a panel of judges. That would be an improvement over the current system, even given that most New York judges are elected under party affiliations.

Indeed, New Yorkers would benefit most from a constitutionally protected ethics structure that would resist political tinkering. That takes time. A constitutional amendment must be approved in a statewide referendum but only after two separately elected legislatures approve the proposed amendment.

Albany should move on two tracks: pursuing such an amendment while improving policies and transparency. The proposal by the good governments groups is a worthy possibility. It, or something like it, needs to be approved before the Legislature adjourns in June.

  

Whats your opinion? Send it to us at lettertoeditor@buffnews.com. Letters should be a maximum of 300 words and must convey an opinion. The column does not print poetry, announcements of community events or thank you letters. A writer or household may appear only once every 30 days. All letters are subject to fact-checking and editing.
The possibility that the Buffalo Bills might one day leave Western New York for a bigger market has hung over our heads for as long as I can remember. Beginning in the 1990s, when I was a kid growing up in East Aurora, Buffalos depressed economy and the NFLs desire to move into the Los Angeles and Toronto markets meant the Bills were a leading candidate for relocation.

Its True: Even the Bills Could Move, a 1997 New York Times headline warned after the Cleveland Browns absconded for Baltimore. A decade later, the ill-fated Toronto series, where the team played one home game each season in Canada, raised these fears anew.

But this week, after a quarter century, our worries might finally come to an end.

Gov. Kathy Hochul deserves full credit for working around-the-clock these past few months to get a deal done to build a new, state-of-the-art stadium and keep the Bills here in Western New York for the next 30 years.

The economic benefits that this agreement will bring are enormous:

 The single largest construction project in the history of Western New York;

 10,000 new, good-paying, union jobs;

 And enough economic activity and tax revenue to more than cover what the state is investing today  $1.6 billion over 30 years.

Yet, despite the facts, some critics are already raising complaints. They say Buffalo doesnt deserve this. Or they say its a bad deal. Or they say this investment should be spent elsewhere.

We cant let them succeed. Keeping the Bills in Buffalo is key for Western New Yorks economy, its culture, and its pride.

Now that Hochul has done her job, the state Assembly needs to do theirs. They should approve this investment and send it to the governors desk as soon as possible.

Rich Luchette

Washington D.C.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has sent a letter to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in connection with the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries, Azertag has reported.

His Excellency Mr. Ilham Aliyev, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan

Dear Ilham Heydar oglu,

Please accept my sincere congratulations on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of establishing diplomatic relations between our countries.

Over the past decades, great strides have been made for the development of relations between Russia and Azerbaijan, which are based on traditions of friendship and mutual respect. The constructive political dialogue and fruitful cooperation in trade, economic, scientific and technical, humanitarian and other spheres are expanding. Based on the trilateral agreements concluded last year and a year before, we are working jointly to strengthen stability and security in the South Caucasus region.

This year is remarkable for an important achievement  the signing of the Declaration on Allied interaction between Russia and Azerbaijan. I am confident that elevating the bilateral relations to a new, qualitatively higher level meets the fundamental interests of our people.

Dear Ilham Heydar oglu, I sincerely wish you the best of health, and all your fellow countrymen tranquility and prosperity.

Sincerely,

Vladimir Putin

President of the Russian Federation
University of Wisconsin-Stout will receive $306,108 in support from the Freshwater Collaborative of Wisconsin this year to enhance its water-related academic programs.

The funding is part of a statewide initiative, backed by the Wisconsin State Legislature and Gov. Tony Evers, to tackle 10 grand water challenges and support curriculum development, undergraduate research opportunities, career development, and field training experiences for students interested in studying water-related fields at the 13 UW System schools.

Funding includes support for eight projects led by UW-Stout:

Developing an easy-to-apply, integrated approach to modeling freshwater contamination from farm runoff using only commercial drones, cameras, and software, $116,832

Establishment and support of the Red Cedar Basin Monitoring Group, $71,730

Predicting Crop per Drop in Sandy Soils, $36,121

Establishment of the Center for Rural Opportunities, Prosperity and Sustainability, $33,759

Expanding LAKES REU to Wisconsin students, $29,382

Undergraduate student-faculty research engagement on developing rapid, easy-to-use and cost-effective test kits for the detection of E. coli/coliforms in water, $6,680

Building water projects into an environmental math course, $6,362

Development of People, Water and the Environment course, $5,242

UW-Stout also will collaborate on four projects led by or involving UW-Eau Claire, UW-River Falls, UW-Oshkosh and UW-Superior.

UW-Stout is extremely grateful for the resources provided via the Freshwater Collaborative of Wisconsin, said Glendali Rodriguez, provost and vice chancellor for Academic Affairs. Applied learning and collaboration are at the core of Stouts polytechnic mission, and UW-Stouts history of working on water challenges is robust.

Rodriguez cited UW-Stouts LAKES REU program, hosting the Red Cedar Watershed Conference and Center for Limnological Research and Rehabilitation.

UW-Stout faculty and staff across distinct academic disciplinary areas  biology, engineering, food science, mathematics, psychology and social sciences  collaborated on proposals focused on student success, community and regional problem-solving, and applied research and learning.

The Freshwater Collaborative resources will allow us to expand our impact, take things to a new level and continue to positively address water challenges within the region and state, Rodriguez said.

Overall, the Freshwater Collaborative of Wisconsin will support 42 grants to further develop UW System-wide water science programs, internships and research opportunities. High school and undergraduate students will have opportunities to participate in hands-on field and research experiences with faculty throughout the state, allowing them to develop a diverse range of skills.

The Collaborative is also partnering with industry, nonprofits and community organizations to increase career development opportunities for students. Grant descriptions are available at freshwater.wisconsin.edu.

Water is one of the fastest growing sectors of our economy, said Marissa Jablonski, executive director. With these funds, the 13 UW universities can expand training opportunities for students and prepare them to meet the needs of Wisconsins workforce and address our states biggest water challenges.

Wisconsin has abundant water resources; however, factors such as invasive species, pollution and climate change could significantly impact water safety and economic growth. The state and the Collaborative have identified 10 grand water challenges facing the state and are focusing research efforts on the top two: agricultural water management and water quality safety/emerging contaminants.

Startup funding was provided in 2019 by the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation and the UW System. In July 2021, the Legislature and Gov. Evers approved $5 million in the biennial budget to expand the Collaboratives ability to train water professionals and establish Wisconsin as a leader in water-related science and economic growth.

UW-Stout offers many undergraduate and graduate programs from science and social science fields that will be involved with the grants.

The universitys LAKES REU summer program, one of the grant recipients, is a federally funded Research Experience for Undergraduates. Students from a variety of disciplines work on water quality projects of importance to west-central Wisconsin.

About the Freshwater Collaborative

The Freshwater Collaborative of Wisconsin is a partnership of Wisconsins 13 public universities, connecting with industry partners, local communities, policymakers and advocacy groups. Its mission is to establish Wisconsin as a world leader in freshwater science, technology, entrepreneurship and economic growth.

It is training the next generation of scientists to solve global water resource problems through academic programs, collaborative research and career development across the UW System. Learn more at freshwater.wisconsin.edu.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
A time-tested opportunity for young musicians to showcase their talent outside of the classroom is back in full force.

Rockonsin, a youth garage band competition showcasing Wisconsin musicians, just opened its application period for the 2022 event. For its 18th year, the competition puts 7th-12th grade bands of all musical genres up against each other in a battle to determine who will compete in the state-level portion of the competition in Milwaukee.

The application period is open until April 30. The two-day competition (dates to be announced) will be conducted at Summerfest during its festival held over three weeks (June 23-25, June 30-July 7, and July 7-9).

Eau Claire-based drummer Trevor Long competed in the competition while he attended Eau Claire North High School with his bands Orion and Fictional Forever, advancing to the state competition and playing Summerfest in Milwaukee in 2014 on the Johnson Controls World Stage.

Rockonsin is a valuable experience, Long said. It gives young rock bands an opportunity to showcase their skills with other instruments other than their concert band instruments. I also think the experience is a great opportunity to grow as a musician. When I competed in it, I was forced to take a close look at my drumming and focus on certain things like maintaining tempo and playing with a good feel. I would tell any young musician in a band to give the competition a shot.

Interested bands are invited to send in one song (cover original) video of their bands performance with no entry fee attached. Three music industry professionals will review and score out all band application videos to determine the top 10 state finalist bands invited to Summerfest.

Each of the finalist bands selected will receive two Shure microphones, with the winning band also receiving a wireless vocal microphone system.

At the Summerfest competition, the winning and runner-up bands will each receive a 40-minute showcase gig at Summerfest 2022 in addition to receiving a professional recording session at Madisons Blast House Studios (12 hours for the winner and eight hours for the runner-up).

Bassist/vocalist Sam Hellman performed at Rockonsin while attending Eau Claire Regis High School with his band Rewind Society and said the competition does wonders for showing young musicians the potential for their musical careers once they graduate.

I think a competition like Rockconsin is an overall positive experience for young musicians, Hellman said. Not only do you get to connect with other like-minded individuals who have a passion for music, but you also expose yourself to valuable constructive criticism that you may not be receiving from your close friends and family. These things, combined with the opportunity to play live at Summerfest, can go a long way in keeping young musicians engaged and excited about growing as artists.

For more information on Rockonsin visit rockonsin.org.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Private Equity Fund Reportedly Plans to Buy Majority Stake in Japan Major Crypto Exchange

Source: AdobeStock / Koukichi Takahashi

A Japanese, Singapore-based private equity fund is allegedly set to buy a controlling stake in bitFlyer, Japans major crypto exchange.

Per Nikkei and CoinPost, the move has been made by the ACA Group, which has agreed on a deal with a coalition of shareholders of the firm bitFlyer Holdings. The latter owns the lions portion of the platforms shares.

The deal will reportedly cost ACA some USD 370 million, and Nikkei added that ACA plans to eventually sell bitFlyer after boosting its corporate value.

BitFlyer, however, was quoted as telling Nikkei that nothing has yet been decided.

But a seemingly acrimonious split between Yuzo Kano, bitFlyers Founder and CEO and other shareholders may have soured the process.

The media outlets noted that Kano, one of the leading figures in the Japanese crypto sector had been attempting to broker a sale. The CEO owns some 40% of the firm and had been negotiating a sale on his own  speaking to the likes of Huobi and the e-commerce platform Mercari about a deal. Kano reportedly values the exchange at just over USD 815 million.

CoinPost quoted Kano as stating he did not know anything" about the ACA deal.

Kano had reportedly spoken of a hostile takeover attempt on his social media pages, CoinPost noted, but it seems that other shareholders have spoken to ACA independently, with Nikkei writing: A group of bitFlyer Holdings shareholders, including venture capital investors, took charge of the sale negotiations.

The coalition appears to have won the support of Co-Founder Minefumi Komiyama, who owns some 13% of the exchange. Crucially, the domestic housebuilding giant Sekisui House, which also has a 13% stake, is expected to participate in the deal, which will reportedly see just over 50% of shares transferred to ACA. This would effectively leave Kano as a powerful minority shareholder, but no longer in charge of companys destiny.

Nikkei noted, however, that it was still possible that Kano could join the sale.

The shareholders group, the media outlet added, appears keen to recoup its investments quickly and had decided against pressing for a listing on a stock market. Japanese securities laws do not allow crypto-related firms to list, and an overseas listing was seen as time-consuming.

bitFlyer was founded in 2014, and per figures released last year had almost USD 4.7 billion worth of fiat and crypto in its custody.

____

Learn more:

- Japans SBI to Merge Its Crypto Exchanges a Year After Rival Takeover

- bitFlyer to Pioneer Blockchain-powered Home Rentals Platform



- bitFlyer Links Japanese, European Platforms to Boost Bitcoin Liquidity

- Japanese Exchange to Become First Licence-holding Platform to List Dogecoin



- Japans Crypto Exchanges Set to Speed Up and Simplify Crypto Listing Process

- Japanese Crypto Exchanges Told to Block Sanctioned Russians Crypto Transactions
To administer this COVID test, Todd Kautz had to lie on his belly in the snow and worm his upper body into the narrow den of a hibernating black bear. Training a light on its snout, Kautz carefully slipped a long cotton swab into the bears nostrils five times.

For postdoctoral researcher Kautz and a team of other wildlife experts, tracking the coronavirus means freezing temperatures, icy roads, trudging through deep snow and getting uncomfortably close to potentially dangerous wildlife.

Theyre testing bears, moose, deer and wolves on a Native American reservation in the remote north woods about 5 miles from Canada. Like researchers around the world, they are trying to figure out how, how much and where wildlife is spreading the virus.

Scientists are concerned that the virus could evolve within animal populations  potentially spawning dangerous viral mutants that could jump back to people, spread among us and reignite what for now seems to some people like a waning crisis.

The coronavirus pandemic has served as a stark and tragic example of how closely animal health and human health are linked. While the origins of the virus have not been proven, many scientists say it likely jumped from bats to humans, either directly or through another species that was being sold live in Wuhan, China.

And now the virus has been confirmed in wildlife in at least 24 U.S. states, including Minnesota. Recently, an early Canadian study showed someone in nearby Ontario likely contracted a highly mutated strain from a deer.

If the virus can establish itself in a wild animal reservoir, it will always be out there with the threat to spill back into the human population, said University of Minnesota researcher Matthew Aliota, who is working with the Grand Portage Reservation team.

E.J. Isaac, a fish and wildlife biologist for the reservation thats home to the Grand Portage Ojibwe, said he expects the stakes to get even higher with the start of spring, as bears wake from hibernation and deer and wolves roam to different regions.

If we consider that there are many species and theyre all intermingling to some extent, their patterns and their movements can exponentially increase the amount of transmission that could occur, he said.

Into the wild

Their research is meant to ward off such unwelcome surprises. But it carries its own set of risks.

Seth Moore, who directs the reservation biology and environment department, recently almost got bitten by a wolf.

And they sometimes team with a crew from the Texas-based company Heliwild to capture animals from the air. One chilly late-winter afternoon, the men climbed into a small helicopter with no side doors that lifted above the treetops. Flying low, they quickly spotted a deer in a forest clearing. They targeted the animal from the air with a net gun and dropped Moore off.

Wind whipped at his face as he worked in deep snow to quickly swab the deers nose for COVID, put on a tracking collar and collect blood and other biological samples for different research.

The men capture moose in much the same way, using tranquilizer darts instead of nets. They trap wolves and deer either from the air or on the ground, and trap bears on the ground.

They knew of the young male bear they recently tested because they had already been tracking it. To get to the den, they had to take snowmobiles to the bottom of a hill then hike a narrow, winding path in snow shoes.

When Kautz crawled part-way into the den, a colleague held his feet to pull him out quickly if necessary. The team also gave the animal a drug to keep it sleeping and another later to counteract the effects of the first.

To minimize the risk of exposing animals to COVID, the men are fully vaccinated and boosted and get tested frequently.

The day after testing the bear, Isaac packed their samples to send to Aliotas lab in Saint Paul. The veterinary and biomedical researcher hopes to learn not just which animals are getting infected but also whether certain animals are acting as bridge species to bring it to others. Testing may later be expanded to red foxes and raccoons.

Its also possible the virus hasnt reached this remote location  yet. Since its already circulating in the wilderness of Minnesota and nearby states, Aliota said its only a matter of time.

Looking for mutants

Close contact between humans and animals has allowed the virus to overcome built-in barriers to spread between species.

To infect any living thing, the virus must get into its cells, which isnt always easy. Virology expert David OConnor likens the process to opening a lock with the virus spike protein key.

Different species have different-looking locks, and some of those locks are not going to be pickable by the key, the University of Wisconsin-Madison scientist said.

But other locks are similar enough for the virus to enter an animals cells and make copies of itself. As it does, it can randomly mutate and still have a key that fits in the human lock. That allows it to leap back to humans through close contact with live animals, scientists believe.

Although spillback is rare, it only takes one person to bring a mutated virus into the realm of humans.

Some think the highly mutated omicron variant emerged from an animal rather than an immune-compromised human, as many believe. Virologist Marc Johnson of the University of Missouri is one of them, and now sees animals as a potential source of pi, the Greek letter that may be used to designate the next dangerous coronavirus variant.

Johnson and his colleagues found strange coronavirus lineages in New York City sewage with mutations rarely seen elsewhere, which he believes came from animals, perhaps rodents.

What scientists are most concerned about is that current or future variants could establish themselves and multiply widely within a reservoir species.

One possibility: white-tailed deer. Scientists found the coronavirus in a third of deer sampled in Iowa between September 2020 and January 2021. Others found COVID-19 antibodies in a third of deer tested in Illinois, Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania. Infected deer generally have no symptoms. Testing in many other wild species has been limited or absent.

Its possible that the virus is already perhaps circulating in multiple animals, said virology expert Suresh Kuchipudi of Pennsylvania State University, an author of the Iowa deer study. If unmonitored, the virus could leave people completely blindsided, he said.

Can it be stopped?

Ultimately, experts say the only way to stop viruses from jumping back and forth between animals and humans  extending this pandemic or sparking a new one  is to tackle big problems like habitat destruction and illegal wildlife sales.

We are encroaching on animal habitats like we have never before in history, Aliota said. Spillover events from wild animals into humans are, unfortunately I think, going to increase in both frequency and scope.

To combat that threat, three international organizations  the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Organization for Animal Health and the World Health Organization  are urging countries to make COVID surveillance in animals a priority.

In Grand Portage, Aliotas collaborators continue to do their part by testing as many animals as they can catch.

With icy Lake Superior sparkling through the evergreens, Isaac slipped his hand beneath the netting of a deer trap. A colleague straddling the animal lifted its head off the snowy ground so that Isaac could swab its nostrils.

The young buck briefly lurched its head forward, but kept still long enough for Isaac to get what he needed.

Nicely done, his colleague said as Isaac put the sample into a vial.

When they were finished, they gently lifted the trap to let the deer go. It bounded into the vast forest without looking back, disappearing into the snowy shadows.
South Middleton School District is exploring ways to encourage greater participation in a user fee meant to offset the cost of parts and repairs to laptop computers and other devices issued to students.

Only 24% of district families pay the optional fee of $20 per student per year, said Brian Ronan, district director of technology and technology support.

The current level of buy-in by families is not enough to keep pace with the costs, Ronan said. It leaves us hurting to find the money to ensure that all the equipment is in good repair and available to all the students. The $20 fee doesnt even cover a lost charger at this point.

The school board's technology committee discussed the fee during its March 28 meeting. There was talk early on of making the fee required for all students at all grade levels.

At first, committee chairman Eric Berry objected to that approach, saying that if the district wants to make the use of devices mandatory, it should cover all the repair costs.

But that was before he knew the actual dollar amount. On hearing that the fee was $20, Berry said, That makes it easier to swallow. Most people can afford that.

But board member Shannon Snyder said the $20 fee may be a hardship for some families. One goal of providing a computer or device to each student is to remove any barriers to access so that every child has the opportunity to learn the technology skills necessary to compete in college or the workplace, she said.

Ronan said the district could look at providing a waiver to families based on their eligibility for free or reduced price meals.

Snyder that as the parent of a Boiling Springs High School student, she wrote out a check that was held by the district, almost like a deposit, and voided out at the end of the school year when her son turned in his laptop computer without any damages.

While receptive to that idea, Ronan said he wants to talk to Tina Darchicourt, director of business and operations, to determine if the district has the ability to hold payments on upwards of 2,100 students for as long as nine months.

It may be a logistical nightmare to have all that money in limbo, Berry said. Its worth looking into.

Berry asked Ronan what would happen if greater participation in the fee brings in more money than is needed to cover the annual costs of parts and repairs. Where would that surplus go? Berry asked.

Ronan said the surplus could be rolled over into the next fiscal year to cover repair costs or set aside to purchase classroom technology.

The district would need fiscal data from at least two years to determine if greater participation in the fee would yield a surplus, Ronan said.

Berry suggested the district could reduce the fee from $20 to $15 depending on how well families respond to the need for a greater buy-in. Its about everybody pitching in a little bit, Berry said.

Ronan suggested having families pay the fee upfront for the first year only to carry it over into the following year if no repairs are needed. Its a good faith credit, Ronan said. It might make it easier for the business office to handle than holding checks.

The idea of rolling the fee over into the following year may motivate parents to make sure their child takes care of their laptop computer or device, Berry said.

Ronan said that approach could teach students the reality of digital citizenship and what happens when they are employed. When you get a job, you cant destroy the laptop that is issued to you, Ronan said.

Since the start of the current school year, there have been several cases where students have gone through multiple devices  the one that was issued to them and loaners given out during repairs, Ronan said. One student has gone through four devices.

Another option that is being explored is to have a different per capita rate depending on how many students are in a family, Ronan said.

Joseph Cress is a reporter for The Sentinel covering education and history. You can reach him at jcress@cumberlink.com or by calling 717-218-0022.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Want to see more like this? Get our local education coverage delivered directly to your inbox. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) said in a news release this weekend he will vote against confirming Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court.

While Judge Jackson undoubtedly has an impressive educational and professional background, her inability to define her own judicial philosophy makes it difficult to understand how she might approach the most important cases facing the nation today, tomorrow, and far into the future," Toomey said in a news release. "Rather than confine herself to one philosophy, Judge Jackson has only offered a methodology that is ultimately unhelpful for determining what her foundation is for interpreting statutory and Constitutional text.

The Senate Judiciary Committee kicks off Monday morning with a vote on whether to move Jacksons nomination to the Senate floor. Democrats will then wind the nomination through the 50-50 Senate, with a final vote in sight for President Joe Biden's pick to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer.

Jackson, 51, would be the first Black woman on the Supreme Court if she wins confirmation by the full Senate.

After more than 30 hours of hearings and interrogation from Republicans over her record, Jackson is on the brink of making history as the third Black justice and only the sixth woman in the court's more than 200-year history. Democrats  and at least one Republican  cite her deep experience in her nine years on the federal bench and the chance for her to become the first former public defender on the court.

"Judge Jacksons history of judicial activism is also highly concerning, and has led to at least two unanimous decisions by separate panels of the D.C. Circuit overturning her rulings for reaching beyond the scope of her authority," Toomey added in his news release.

In addition, the fact Judge Jackson has consistently imposed sentences for offenses related to child pornography not only far below those recommended under the Sentencing Guidelines, but also below the recommendations of prosecutors and the sentences imposed by some of her peers on the federal judiciary, is baffling to me. Due to Judge Jacksons admitted lack of judicial philosophy, her concerning judicial record, and the likelihood she will continue to reach beyond the limited role of the judiciary, I cannot support her appointment to the Court.

During her confirmation hearings, Jackson told the committee that nothing could be further from the truth and explained her sentencing decisions in detail. She said some of the cases have given her nightmares and were among the worst that I have seen.

It is expected that all 50 Democrats will support her, though one notable moderate Democrat, Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, hasnt yet said how she will vote.

Email Jeff at jpratt@cumberlink.com or follow him on Twitter @SentinelPratt.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
A physical altercation among multiple offenders at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center (ERDCC) in Bonne Terre on Sunday left one inmate requiring treatment for stab wounds, officials said.

Missouri Department of Corrections (DOC) Communications Director Karen Pojmann said six offenders were involved in a fight, and "one sustained injuries that appeared to be puncture wounds. He was treated at a hospital and returned to the facility later that day."

St. Francois County Ambulance District was dispatched to the prison at 5:46 p.m. Sunday. At 5:51 p.m., the Bonne Terre/Big River Fire Department was dispatched to the scene to establish a landing zone for an Air Evac helicopter.

The DOC did not release the identity of the inmate.

The reported stabbing is another added to the growing list of violent incidents that have reportedly taken place at ERDCC this year, including an inmate's death on March 27. At least three other stabbings are said to have occurred at the Bonne Terre facility within a single week at the beginning of February.

Officials have said that ERDCC is not adequately staffed.

Bobby Radford is a reporter for the Daily Journal. He can be reached at bradford@dailyjournalonline.com

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 7

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Mineral Area College Career Services and the Missouri Job Center in Park Hills will match job seekers with local employers at an outdoor hiring event from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m Wednesday in MAC's Quadrangle. In case of rain, the event will be moved into the Bob Sechrest Field House.

The community and MAC students are invited to attend the free event. Job seekers should bring their resume and will have the chance to speak with employers from our region who have a variety of current job openings. Resume assistance is available in advance through the Missouri Job Center or MAC Career Services.

"Here's a chance to get face-to-face with your potential next employer," said Alison Sheets, MAC career services director. "This is more than a job fair  its a hiring event. The companies in attendance all have jobs available right now and theyre ready to get them filled.

The Park Hills Job Center anticipates participation from more than 50 area employers in manufacturing, health care, mining, construction, government, retail, and food service industries.

Those who have already committed include ADB Companies; A1 Home Care; Ardagh; Cap America; Camp Allen Ministries; Department of Corrections; Effex Management; Farmington Presbyterian Manor; Forte; Iron County Medical Center; Jefferson County Government; Kindred At Home; Life, Inc.; Mercy Jefferson; Mers Goodwill; Paramount Staffing; Pense Brothers Drilling; Phoenix Home Health Care; Piva; SEMO Mental Health Center; Valley Springs Youth Ranch; YMCA of the Ozarks; and MTC Truck Driving School.

Theres no fee for employers to attend and theres still time to register. For more information or resume assistance, or to register as an employer, contact Missouri Job Center in Park Hills at 573-518-2639 or MAC Career Services at 573-518-3848.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has sent a letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin in connection with the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries, Azertag has reported.

Dear Vladimir Vladimirovich,

I sincerely congratulate you and in your person the friendly people of Russia on the significant anniversary  the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Russian Federation.

Over the past 30 years, Azerbaijan-Russia relations based on centuries-old traditions of friendship and good neighborliness have been successfully developing and strengthening in the spirit of strategic partnership and mutually beneficial cooperation in line with the principles of mutual respect, confidence and consideration of each other's interests.

Today, our interstate relations, which are characterized by active political dialogue, cooperation in trade, transport, energy, humanitarian and other fields, are causing a sense of great satisfaction. The sustainable growth of mutual trade and investment, the solid legal framework, the effective implementation of joint projects and initiatives in various fields are clear evidence of the dynamic development of bilateral relations.

It is particularly gratifying that this anniversary year of the establishment of diplomatic relations coincides with the signing of the Declaration on Allied Interaction between the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Russian Federation. This important document establishes that the relations between our countries have reached a qualitatively new, the highest level in 30 years.

It is beyond doubt that the regular high-level contacts, the mutual visits and meetings also have a positive impact on the development of relations between Azerbaijan and Russia and the deepening of joint activities.

I would like to emphasize the role of cultural and humanitarian relations in strengthening friendship, good neighborliness and mutual understanding between our peoples, which have deep historical roots and spiritual and cultural closeness. Cooperation in the fields of culture and education, comprehensive support for the Russian language and Russian culture in Azerbaijan at the state level, Russian-language education in Azerbaijani schools and universities confirm the importance we attach to the humanitarian agenda of our partnership.

The interregional cooperation is also an important part of our interstate relations. Azerbaijan extensively interacts with many subjects of the Russian Federation, thus creating conditions for the expansion of our relations at all levels.

I am confident that with our joint efforts we will be able to continue to address pressing issues of bilateral cooperation and open new opportunities for strengthening the relations between the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Russian Federation for the benefit of our peoples and countries.

Dear Vladimir Vladimirovich, I wish you good health, happiness and success, and the friendly people of Russia peace and prosperity.

Sincerely,

Ilham Aliyev

President of the Republic of Azerbaijan

Baku, 1 April 2022
The Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) congratulates Jim Dain of Pittsfield, Illinois, for snagging a monster 140-pound, 10-ounce paddlefish March 18 at the Lake of the Ozarks. The latest record breaks the previous record of 140-pounds, 9-ounces set in 2015 on Table Rock Lake.

Dain said he was on a fishing trip with his family and almost didnt get the boat out that day because the weather kept changing.

The forecast was calling for storms, and then it changed to no rain, so we went out, but it just kept getting colder, Dain recalled. We werent having much luck, but decided to fish for another hour so we took another turn. And thats when the drag on the reel started. It felt like a tree was on the line!

Dain said it took at least 20-minutes before they ultimately got the fish in the boat. After getting back to the boat ramp, Steven Henson of Bonne Terre, who happens to hold the Missouri state record for river carpsucker, was in the area and mentioned Dain should get in touch with MDC.

He was at the boat ramp and happened to hold a state record, said Dain. Hes looking at the fish and says to me, Boy, I think you should get that checked out because it could be a state record.

Dain contacted MDC Camden County Agent Tyler Brown, who advised him to go to Toms Slaughterhouse in Montreal to use a certified scale that could handle weight more than 100-pounds. His paddlefish is the second state record fish caught in 2022.

We got 16 one-gallon bags of meat out of this catch, laughed Dain. Weve fried it, grilled it and made paddlefish tacos the other night. Well be having paddlefish for a while!

Missouri state record fish are recognized in two categories: pole-and-line and alternative methods. Alternative methods include: trotline, throwline, limb line, bank line, jug line, gig, bow, crossbow, underwater spearfishing, snagging, snaring, grabbing, or atlatl.

For more information on state record fish, visit http://bit.ly/2efq1vl.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0
To celebrate its addition to the Virginia Landmarks Register and National Register of Historic Places, the Ivy Creek Foundation held a celebration of River View Farm on Sunday.

The farm was the home of Hugh Carr, who was born enslaved and bought 58 acres of what would become River View Farm in 1870, shortly after emancipation. Carr would be come one of the largest African American landowners in Albemarle County when he died in 1914.

The existing house was built in approximately 1880 and was home to Carr, his wife, Texie M. Hawkins, and their seven children.

The farm and its historic buildings, including a house and a barn, were added to the state Register of Historic Places in September 2020 and the National Register of Historic Places in December 2020. The celebration, held with Ed Brooks of the B.F. Yancey School Community Center, was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

River View Farm is a rare surviving example of the Union Ridge and Hydraulic Mills community of African American farmers, pastors, craftspeople and businessmen and women that flourished in the region and beginning in the final quarter of the nineteenth century, said Sue Erhardt, executive director of the Ivy Creek Foundation.

Teresa Leslie, a great-great-granddaughter of Hugh Carr and Texie M. Hawkins, said it meant a lot to her to have the property added to the registers.

Its almost like a spiritual base for me, to be able to come back and to connect with a history that a lot of people cant connect with, she said. I think that theyve done a really good job over the years, and in trying to preserve a lot of these buildings. If these buildings didnt exist, I would have never known the story.

Virginia Carr left home at a young age and moved to Plainfield, New Jersey, Leslie said, and married Maxwell Brown. They had one son, Kenneth Brown.

One of Carrs and Hawkins other daughters, Mary Carr Greer, became a teacher and principal for 20 years at the Albemarle Training School, the only post-elementary school available to African American students in the county during segregation. The training school was replaced in 1951 when Burley High School opened.

Her husband, Conley Greer, was Albemarles first African American agricultural extension agent, serving from 1918 to 1953. Conley Greer built the large barn on the River View Farm property in 1937 using U.S. Department of Agriculture plans.

The property is now more than 200 acres and operates as a public park jointly owned by Albemarle County and Charlottesville, and managed by the nonprofit Ivy Creek Foundation.

For the first time, community members were able to see the inside of the house Sunday, which the foundation has stabilized ahead of doing a more thorough analysis of the building.

We need this report to be done to decide, with the descendants, what we want to do with the house, Erhardt said. Do we want to make it a museum, an education space, a research space, and have community involvement with that?

The original house was built circa 1880 as a Virginia I-House, with two rooms over two rooms and a central hall on each floor. In 1915, after Mary Carr Greer and Conley Greer inherited the house, they added a wing to the back of the house.

Jody Lahendro, a historic preservation architect and Ivy Creek Foundation board member, gave tours of the house. He said the stabilization work put a Band-Aid on it to keep it whole so they have time to do research. Hes currently working on measure drawings of the house.

Well be doing the condition analysis of the building after that, he said. Well be then doing forensics  looking to do probes to try and figure out the exact changes that happened to the building over time. And then well come up with a rehabilitation plan for how to reuse the building and do all the repair work.

The foundation will soon be adding descendants of the family to its board of directors, Erhardt said, and is working to plan a reunion with the descendants, which would be the first since 2005.

Leslie said she keeps getting drawn back to the property because theres an important story.

Its an honor to come out and to see this and these incredible people, what they accomplished in their lifetimes, in that first generation out of slavery, she said. Theres so much to be learned about how we rebuild as we move forward.

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.
The University of Virginia Investment Management Company has announced a new framework for making responsible investments, but student and alumni sustainability groups want the university to do more  namely, fully divest from fossil fuels.

Climate change is an existential threat. Not just to nature, but to our entire global society  and we live in a capitalist society, and thats driven by financial investment, said Grey McLean, the founder of Wahoos for Sustainability, a UVa alumni group that advocates for the university to make sustainable choices.

The management company provides investment management services to UVa and associated organizations by investing the endowment and other long-term funds of UVa and associated organizations.

The UVa investment company released its Investor Responsibility Framework in March following the work of its Advisory Council for Investor Responsibility. That group was formed in June 2021 to guide the body toward making responsible and environmentally sustainable investments, a representative said. The framework takes a few steps toward more sustainability, including a commitment to align its investment portfolio to net-zero greenhouse emissions by the year 2050, if not sooner.

However, the management company has decided not to fully divest from fossil fuels.

Currently, fewer than about 0.05% of the companys investments are directly in fossil fuels. Wahoos for Sustainability and DivestUVA, a student organization focused on advocating for fossil fuel divestment, want to see that number down to zero.

We see an investment in a company as sort of an endorsement, or supporting them. And we believe that the best way to get to a future where there are no fossil fuels is to take away the moral license and delegitimize fossil fuel institutions, said Maille Bowerman, a student leader with DivestUVA.

The Investor Responsibility Framework includes four principles that fossil fuel producers must meet for University of Virginia Investment Management Company to maintain their investment  be transparent, adopt best practices, safeguard the environment and act with integrity.

We anticipate that these principles will evolve over time and that the application of them will be dynamic. Companies that do not meet the principles are not eligible for direct investment, the framework says.

But representatives from Wahoos for Sustainability and DivestUVA are skeptical.

It just feels like an oxymoron to responsibly invest in fossil fuels. One of the principles is fossil fuel producers must safeguard the environment. When has a fossil fuel company ever done that? said Aayusha Khanal, a student leader with DivestUVA.

Wahoos for Sustainability wrote a letter to University of Virginia Investment Management Company, asking the body to reconsider and divest from fossil fuels. DivestUVA released its own statement as well, and is one of five student organizations that signed on to the Wahoos for Sustainability letter. Both groups have met with company representatives in the past.

Profit is the only reason to maintain direct or indirect investments in fossil fuels. As our society and economy struggle to decarbonize, we believe it is unethical for UVA  a values-based organization dedicated to the public good  to profit from the continued burning of fossil fuels, the primary driver of the climate crisis, the letter says.

McLean said he received a response from the UVa management company stating that they look forward to reviewing the organizations concerns more closely in the coming weeks.

Representatives from Wahoos for Sustainability said that some progress has been made, and they are grateful to see the companys commitment to net-zero by 2050.

It is a meaningful commitment. The exciting part is that [UVIMCO] is embracing that as a responsibility they hold, McLean said.

Both groups said they still see this as a first step, and that divestment is vital.

In a statement provided to The Daily Progress, the CEO/CIO of the investment management group praised the new Investor Responsibility Framework and the work of the Advisory Committee.

UVIMCOs Investor Responsibility Framework underscores our commitment to environmental, social, and governance issues, while balancing our primary fiduciary responsibility to the University and associated organizations, said Robert W. Durden.

Bowerman and Khanal said they arent optimistic that the management company will make a change and divest from fossil fuels anytime soon, given the new framework. However, their organization is committed to advocacy going forward.

We want to really engage with the public and have them be involved in the advocacy work that were doing, because we want to show UVIMCO and the university that its not just a couple of students that want this, its hundreds if not thousands, Khanal said.

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
A developer wants Corvallis City Councils support and $400,000 to help with a $20 million, 60-unit low-income housing project.

City documents say staff is recommending the council approve an award of $400,000 in Affordable Housing Construction Excise Tax funding to build the proposed Rivergreen Apartments in Willamette Landing. The money comes from other developers doing business in the city, who pay a tax to help future affordable housing projects.

Applicant Green Light Development is also requesting a letter of support from the mayor and City Council for its state application.

The project site, which is zoned for both residential and commercial purposes, is on the northwest corner of Southeast Rivergreen Avenue and Southeast Midvale Drive. The development would include a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments for people at or below 60% of the area median income, according to city documents.

Qualifying individuals typically make less than $17 per hour and work jobs in the local community, which include restaurants, grocery stores, and various entry-level and service industry jobs, a funding application states. Our development seeks to blend into the surrounding neighborhood and become part of the larger community of Corvallis.

The Corvallis City Council is slated to decide on the $400,000 funding award and the letter of support at its meeting Monday, April 4.

Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Corvallis Gazette-Times.

The developer plans on working with community partners to feature resident services that may include health and wellness, budgeting, credit and finance, energy assistance, legal protection, mediation, eviction prevention, and employment and career advancement, according to the funding application.

The application also mentions a shortage of affordable housing options in Oregon, particularly for historically underserved and low-income communities. The applicant cites an Oregon Housing and Community Services report that Corvallis is the states most rent-burdened community.

New developments like the Rivergreen Apartments are essential to providing individuals and families with affordable housing options at a time when a lack of safe and stable housing options has led to an increase in homeless individuals and families as well as severe rent burdens, the applicant wrote.

The applicant also cites an Oregon Housing Alliance report stating Benton County faces a deficit of more than 4,500 affordable units available to individuals and families. The organization reports that close to 40% of renters are paying more than 50% of their income in Benton County.

The Rivergreen Apartments directly respond to the critical need for affordable housing in Corvallis and Benton County, the applicant states.

In April, Green Light Development plans to apply for state resources, including Local Innovation Fast Track funds, 4% Low Income Housing Tax Credits, and construction and permanent debt, according to city documents, which say the local funding would demonstrate support which would be helpful in leveraging state and federal resources.

The developer plans to reach slightly more than $20 million for the project by combining the $400,000 from Corvallis with $6.4 million in Local Innovation Fast Track loan funds, $6.8 million in permanent loan financing, and $6.06 million in 4% Low Income Housing Tax Credits equity, as well as $512,162 from a deferred development fee.

The council passed the Affordable Housing Construction Excise Tax ordinance on new residential, commercial and industrial development in 2016. The ordinance requires that the revenue be applied to projects and programs that expand the supply of affordable housing in Corvallis. The funding is available on a rolling basis.

The Affordable Housing Construction Excise Tax budget for fiscal year 2021-2022 is $1.3 million. City documents say the only other major expenditure for the budget year was $520,000 for a homeownership project in December.

The Affordable Housing Construction Excise Tax policy requires 60 years of affordability, and if awarded, the funding terms would be a zero-interest loan.

Oregon Senate Bill 8, passed in 2021, makes it easier to site affordable housing. Under the legislation, local government is prohibited from requiring a zone change or conditional use permit for affordable housing on property zoned for commercial uses.

Cody Mann covers Benton County and the cities of Corvallis and Philomath. He can be contacted at 541-812-6113 or Cody.Mann@lee.net. Follow him on Twitter via @News_Mann_.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Benton County was tied for Oregon's lowest unemployment rate in February, according to data released by the Oregon Employment Department last week.

The unemployment rate in Benton County fell to 3%, down from 3.1% in January, and the dip was due to modest gains in the local government and leisure and hospitality sectors.

Benton County was tied with much less populated Wheeler County in February. Wheeler County's unemployment remained unchanged from January.

Across the Willamette River in Linn County, the unemployment rate was 4.4%, down from 4.5% in January.

Employers pay about 39,800 workers across Benton County.

Economist Pat OConnor said Benton County's figures are a return to form. Corvallis and surrounding areas typically show strong employment and little volatility during recessions that spur layoffs and calls to the state for unemployment benefits elsewhere.

Good times or bad times, we always seem to have one of the lowest unemployment rates because of who we are, he said.

OConnor, who covers labor trends for the state in the mid-valley, said the sinking unemployment rate is another indicator that the Corvallis-area job market is stabilizing after a pandemic-induced recession.

Oregon State University weighs those numbers down, as workers with more education tend to hold on to jobs more commonly than workers with less education. More of the countys workforce with more education probably means smaller and more stable unemployment rates.

OSU is a big university in a relatively small county, OConnor said.

While higher-paid workers usually are the first axed in a recession, the economic region anchored around Corvallis and OSU saw in-person businesses close with low-paid, frontline workers staying home or switching industries.

O'Connor said that at the onset of closures tens of thousands of leisure and hospitality workers migrated to other industries with similar education requirements including warehousing.

Employers have struggled to fill job openings as they did before the recession.

Benton County unemployment generally has hovered between 3.1 and 3.2% since 2017. That rate bottomed out in December 2019  2.6% just before the start of the pandemic.

In April 2020, at the height of a coronavirus-spurred recession, Benton County unemployment reached 9.9%, led mostly by hospitality and leisure jobs.

The county has seen a 48% drop in hospitality and leisure unemployment, mostly defined by people who are working age and eligible for unemployment benefits taking jobs in food service roles.

Februarys numbers are well below the statewide average of 4% for the same period and 3.8% unemployment at the national level.

In Linn County, food service-related jobs still weren't back to their pre-pandemic levels.

"It's a reminder that certainly there are still a lot of industries trying to get back up to those levels," O'Connor said.

In February 2020, before COVID-19 hit Oregon and the state responded with restrictions that caused massive job losses, Linn Countys unemployment rate was 3.8%.

Linn County's unemployment rate surged to 13.9% in April 2020.

While the 4.4% unemployment rate for Linn County wasn't a return to pre-pandemic levels, that mark is still, by any historic measure, a great figure for Albany, Lebanon, Sweet Home and surrounding areas.

A few years ago, dipping below 5% in Linn County would have been cause for celebration and a new record  the state began tracking county-by-county data in 1990.

Alex Powers covers business, environment and healthcare for Mid-Valley Media. Contact him at 541-812-6116 or alex.powers@lee.net.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Colorado's hospitals are among the most profitable in the country, a new state analysis found, and the largest systems and facilities posted hundreds of millions of dollars in profit and most padded their reserves in 2020, despite the emergence of COVID-19.

The state is only one of two to be ranked in the top-10 on four different profitability metrics, according to the Department of Health Care Policy and Financing.

Hospitals here posted the sixth-highest total profits in the United States in 2020, from fifth last year and the highest in the country in 2018. Facilities in the Denver metro brought in more than $1.4 billion in profits in 2020, and profit margins statewide were 9.3% - down from 2019, but still near double-digits despite the disruptions caused by the pandemic.

When the COVID-19 crisis began two years ago, policymakers and hospital officials across the country expressed alarm about facilities' financial footing: Patient volume fell off a cliff, elective surgeries were canceled, and hospitals were scrambling to shift gears and prepare for COVID. Congress ultimately pushed billions of dollars in stimulus to hospitals, and more than a billion dollars found their way to Colorado's facilities.

That proved to be a lifeline for smaller facilities that kept them from "barely" breaking even, the agency found. But the federal stimulus was more than sufficient - roughly $330 million more - to account for larger hospitals' losses.

Ge Bai, a professor of health policy and management at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said that in the early days of the pandemic, policymakers were operating with little information and responded quickly. But she called Colorado's report evidence that hospitals were not financially weakened by COVID-19; indeed, she said, they were strengthened by it.

"Overall, I think the picture is theres nothing to worry about in terms of the hospital financial risks," she said Friday after reviewing the report, which she said was the first of its kind that she'd seen in the United States. "COVID-19 definitely made a dent in operating margins. Thats one factor - its not dramatic ... but still you see some drop in the margins. But it's not devastating, not lethal. Relief, for many hospitals - thats more than enough to offset or counter their loss."

In a statement sent by a spokeswoman, the Colorado Hospital Association said it couldn't fully comment on the report as it had not received a prior copy.

"However, this report seems to pivot between thanking hospitals for all that they did while at the same time criticizing hospitals for their fiscal responsibility," the organization wrote, "including having savings that were critical to hospitals ability to serve Colorado communities during the COVID-19 pandemic."

The association noted a recent ranking by the Commonwealth Fund, a national health care think tank, that ranked Colorado's health system as the sixth best in the nation. The state's lowest score on the report was for access and affordability, where it ranked 24th in the United States.

The hospital association stressed that facilities' financial reserves were critical to helping hospitals weather the beginning of the pandemic and to continue staffing their facilities despite rising costs for traveling providers and the impact of the "Great Resignation" on the health system.

According to the report, all of Colorado's hospital systems posted positive profit margins in 2020. For-profit HealthONE, the state's largest system, had an 18.5% profit margin in 2020; Centura's was 13.1% - better than pre-pandemic - and UCHealth's was just over 10%.

Kim Bimestefer, the executive director of the policy and finance department, specifically put a "spotlight" on UCHealth's financial health. She noted the nonprofit system had $6.6 billion in reserves and a 17.4% profit margin through the first three quarters of 2021.

With those figures in mind, Bimestefer asked, "what does it mean to be a not-for-profit at this point in time?"

Bai said that hospitals should have strong financial reserves to weather any financial hardships that come their way.

"But the problem in Colorado," she continued, "is they have so much."

The hospital association, in its statement, said those savings were crucial to enabling hospitals to provide "such a robust COVID response" while also "saying Coloradans money on health care, a fact often cited by state officials."

Banner Health, which made $587 million in total profit nationally in 2020, has $9.8 billion in reserves. SCL Health, which Bimestefer noted was about to be "gobbled up" by another system, made $349 million in national profit in 2020 with $3.1 billion in reserves.

In a specific contrast to UCHealth she gave a positive nod to Denver Health, the capital city's safety net hospital. Denver Health - which, unlike the other systems pulled out of the report, is not part of a national chain - has enough cash on hand to operate for 123 days, and its reserves total under $400 million; Bimestefer called those figures "efficient" and "appropriate."

The report found that Colorado hospitals spent $836.3 million in community benefits in 2020; they're federally required to provide a community benefit to justify not paying taxes. But the report notes that it's unclear "where and how the states nonprofit, tax exempt hospitals spend their community benefit dollars, nor can we properly determine if the community benefit investments match each communitys identified needs."

2020 played out differently for smaller hospitals, the agency's analysis found. While larger hospitals posted 5% profit margins from patient services, rural facilities' margins were 0.8%, according to the report.

"While urban hospitals profited regardless of federal stimulus dollars," according to the report, "rural hospitals would have been financially devastated without economic stimulus funding."

Those findings, Bai and the state officials said, are evidence that any future aid needs to be more targeted to hospitals who will need that money to stay above water.

But the report has use outside of the parameters of the pandemic. The analysis found that pre-pandemic hospital profits "largely went toward market share growth, vertical integration, capital investments and further building reserves"; meanwhile, "costs and hospital prices continued to increase."

It speaks to the state of the health system generally, Bai said, which has become increasingly consolidated. Hospitals merge with and acquire each other, and they pick up independent physicians groups along the way, too. Bimestefer said Thursday that in 2009, 26 hospitals in Colorado were part of a broader system. In 2022, that's shot up to 46, out of 84 statewide. Those mergers and acquisitions, she continued, increase costs and prices because there's less competition.

The state's report identifies a handful of potential solutions and next steps, including "improving the impact" of nonprofit hospitals' community benefits; increasing investment in rural facilities; and partner, in a variety of ways, to address and improve affordable and accessible patient care.
HEADLAND  With the recent opening of a new education center, Kingdom College has continued to grow since it first accepted students in 2018.

Located on South Main Street on the square in Headland, the colleges new education center is in what was once the site of a carriage house and stables. The property was heavily remodeled to make room for classrooms, a library and offices for instructors, Virginia Mayer, Kingdom College president and co-founder, said.

Some of the buildings original wood ceiling and brick interior walls were kept in the renovations. Concrete stained floors run through the main walkway between the classrooms and library and to a central information desk and offices where the colleges professors can meet with students.

Four classrooms as well as the offices feature large glass panes, making the building feel more open. Each smart classroom is equipped with cameras, microphones, large monitors, and electronic whiteboards so that students can attend classes virtually if need. Each classroom was adopted to cover the costs with small plaques outside each room offering thanks to the supporters.

Mayer admits that upon first sight it was hard to imagine the buildings potential. But with a love of archaeology  which was her first major  Mayer collected a bucket of dirt from the site.

I just want to look at everything, so Ive been sifting through the dirt trying to find stuff, and I actually found nails  from when they were shoeing horses with square-headed nails, she said.

Before opening the 5,000-square-foot education center, classes were held at Living Waters Counseling Center in Headland as well as the colleges administrative offices located not far from Headlands square. Headland United Methodist Church and Harvest Christian School also hosted classes. Mayer said some classes will still be held at Living Waters and other sites.

The college was born out of Living Waters Counseling Center, said Mayer, who is the counseling centers executive director.

Living Waters is helping support Kingdom College because were not accredited yet, Mayer said. It is hard to get students to come you absolutely have to have regional accreditation.

With a Christian education mission, Kingdom College offers an associate degree in Ministry Helps as well as an associate and a bachelors degree in psychology a bachelors and a masters degree in biblical studies and a masters degree in divinity, Christian clinical mental health counseling, and clinical psychology. The college also offers certifications in lay counseling, chaplaincy, and grief and bereavement counseling as well as dual enrollment for high school students.

Like Living Waters, Mayer said she was called by God to establish Kingdom College, and especially the program focused on Christian clinical mental health counseling  something Mayer said she saw a need for during the pandemic to help missionary families who were struggling.

Whos doing the work when the family is struggling, and they struggle just like all of us, she said. We felt like we needed, that God was leading us into the Christian clinical mental health, so that maybe we can place counselors globally.

Kingdom College has held three graduations since it started accepting students in 2018. It currently has about 44 students, Mayer said. The college is fully licensed and is working on accreditation through the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools  Commission on Colleges Transnational Association of Christian Colleges and Schools Council for Accreditation of Education Preparation and Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs.

Living Waters has 10 scholarships for students to pursue the grief and bereavement studies at Kingdom College because Mayer said the need is so great.

Tuition at Kingdom College is $275 per credit hour for undergraduate programs and $375 per hour for masters programs. There are also registration, facilities, and technology fees as part of enrollment.

When accreditation is in place, they will be able to go and get licensure just like anybody from Auburn or Alabama, Mayer said of students. More and more people are being drawn to Christian counseling.

Peggy Ussery is a Dothan Eagle staff writer and can be reached at aussery@dothaneagle.com or 334-712-7963. Support her work and that of other Eagle journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today at dothaneagle.com.

Want to see more like this? Get our local education coverage delivered directly to your inbox. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
By Azernews

By Sabina Mammadli

Azerbaijan continues to receive condolences over the deadly blast in a nightclub in the capital Baku on April 3.

In a statement posted on its Twitter account, the U.S. embassy in Azerbaijan said: "We commemorate the victims of the explosion in the nightclub in Azerbaijans Baku on April 3 and extend our deepest condolences to their families. We also wish the speedy recovery to all injured."

British ambassador to Azerbaijan James Sharp also shared his condolences.

"I express my deep condolences in connection with the death of a person as a result of a gas explosion in Baku on April 3 and wish recovery to all the victims," ??the diplomat tweeted.

Earlier, UN Resident Coordinator in Azerbaijan Vladanka Andreeva condoled over the blast.

"Sincere condolences to the families who lost loved ones in the tragic explosion in Baku yesterday. Wishing speedy recovery to the injured," the resident coordinator wrote on her Twitter page.

Azerbaijan earlier received condolences from Turkey, Israel, Russia, Ukraine, Greece, Romania, Latvia, and Qatar.

At about 03:00 on April 3, 2022, an explosion occurred in the "Location" nightclub located on Tarlan Aliyarbayov Street in Baku's Sabail district, after which a fire broke out. One person died and 31 were injured.

The person, killed during the blast, was identified as an employee of the nightclub - Maya Akhundova, 1979.

As reported earlier, the explosion occurred due to a leak in a cylinder with liquefied gas. Cylinders with propane (3 pcs.) were found inside the club. This object is not a user of natural gas and there are also no underground gas pipelines.

Additionally, some 14 cars, 1 apartment, and 2 non-residential objects were damaged.
BIRMINGHAMA former Vestavia Hills teacher has sued the school district in federal court, saying her contract was not renewed after she lodged multiple complaints alleging her school did not follow COVID policies.

In January and February 2021, Samantha Baulch, a civics and geography teacher at Louis Pizitz Middle School, filed complaints with the Alabama Education Association after two separate incidents in which a student notified her that theyd contracted the virus. Even though the students had been in class without a mask during their lunch periods, Baulch says the school did not ask for her seating chart to enact quarantine procedures and all her students remained in school.

She also sought accommodations from the school, including teaching in a larger classroom after she broke her foot and had a hard time social distancing. The lawsuit states that despite there being available space, her request for a larger room was not granted.

Baulch is a cancer survivor and is medically classified as immunocompromised. In her lawsuit, she said she believed she should have been protected from job discrimination and received reasonable accommodations for medical conditions under the America Disabilities Act.

After filing multiple complaints with AEA, her representative warned Baulch that her relationship with the district was becoming tense and advised her to take time off under the Family Medical Leave Act to protect against termination. The lawsuit alleges that after her complaints, the principal, Chris Pennington, became abrupt and terse with her.

On May 14, 2021, Pennington recommended her contract not be renewed for the next school year, saying only that the school is going to go in a different direction, according to the complaint. Before her removal, Baulch had never received a single corrective or disciplinary action at the school, and her previous written evaluations documented outstanding performance.

Baulch is seeking to make up pay lost after her contract was terminated, as well as other costs. Her suit was filed in the Northern District of Alabama.

Parents in the district filed a lawsuit against Vestavia Hills Schools in February alleging a failure to provide information regarding the districts COVID-19 policies as required by the Alabama Open Records Act. That suit is ongoing.

The school district has not yet filed a response to Baulchs suit.
An exhibition of 48 nude paintings, focusing on the beauty of women belonging to various places from the countryside to modern cities, has opened in Hanoi.

"We hope our artworks provide new and fresh perspectives to the public," said Minh Pho, one of the 10 artists with works displayed at the exhibition.

The paintings were in a variety of styles and on a variety of materials like silk, oil on canvas, lacquer, and others.

One of the group's two women members, Ha, said she has always been fascinated by the curves of women's bodies and brought three silk artworks to the exhibition, each depicting a young woman blending in with nature.

"Women's physical beauty in the spring is comparable to flowers waiting to bloom. Nature's harmony with the female body creates a gentle, sophisticated and natural beauty".

According to Pho, nudity is not a new topic in art and so the members need to "discover new things in old materials".

A lacquer painting titled 'Noi Loan' (Rebel) by Pham Ngoc My. Photo courtesy of the artist

Luong Xuan Doan, chairman of the Vietnam Fine Arts Association, said: "Each individual has a unique way of expressing themselves, resulting in diversity in their artworks. Nudity is defined here in a variety of ways and from a variety of perspectives, not just as a woman's body, but also as inner beauty manifested through eyes and body shape. What matters is what the artist wishes to convey through the painting".

The paintings in 'The Nude 1' at Vietnam Exhibition Centre for Culture and Arts - Gallery on Hang Bai Street are displayed alphabetically by the artists names. The exhibition will remain open until April 7.

An oil painting, 'Co Gai Phuong Dong' (Eastern Girl), by Minh Pho. Photo courtesy of the artist

The 10 have formed a group called Nude that has a long-term interest in nude paintings and plans to hold an exhibition every year.

They include Mai Huy Dung, Duong Tuan, Minh Pho (Nguyen Minh), Nguyen Minh Dong, Tuan Dat, Nguyen Truong Linh, Bui Anh Hung, Phung Huy, Pham Ngoc My, and Luong Thu Ha.

The group plans to hold 'The Nude 2' in HCMC in June 2023.
Vietnams honey exports to Taiwan rose by 57 percent last year to US$1.64 million, thanks to competitive prices and growing quality.

Oanh, a woman from the northern province of Hai Duong who is working in Taiwan, said Taiwanese increasingly prefer Vietnamese honey due to better prices than Thai products.

Last year Vietnam was the second largest natural honey exporter to Taiwan, accounting for nearly 10 percent of the latters total imports. Its export volumes rose by 44 percent to 382 tons, according to statistics from Taiwans Bureau of Foreign Trade.

In the first two months of 2022 exports quadrupled year-on-year to 46 tons.

Honeycombs harvested in the central coastal province of Khanh Hoa. Photo by VnExpress/Ngoc Thuy

Exporters said Taiwan is a promising market for honey due to growing demand.

Vietnam exports 54,000 tons of honey annually, 95 percent of it to the U.S.

But the U.S. has imposed a preliminary anti-dumping tax of over 410 percent on Vietnamese honey.

Its import tax on honey from other countries is around 30 percent.
A support program by Room to Read has helped change the lives of girls from under-resourced communities in Vietnam by providing resources for quality education.

Dinh Thi Kim Thuy, a girl who used to study with an oil lamp, can now stand on the stage and give fluent presentations in English, thanks to the program.

Thuy has lived on an impoverished island in Tra On District of Vinh Long Province since she was a child. She had to study with an oil lamp and draw a computer keyboard to practice computer science at home due to no electricity. Thanks to participating in the educational support program for schoolgirls, Thuy had the opportunity to pursue her aspirations.

Thuy was chosen as a delegate to share her experience in front of hundreds of people at the Hong Kong schoolgirl support gala in 2019.

She also shared her story with several organizations in Hong Kong as part of the program, including HSBC, MetLife, Hong Kong Broadband Network, Rosewood, etc.

Kim Thuy tells her story in front of hundreds of guests at Room to Read Hongkong Gala 2019. Photo by Room to Read

Vo Thi Thuy Dung (Long An Province), like Kim Thuy, used to be a shy, self-conscious girl.

Dung's family had moved 11 times since she was in third grade because of difficult circumstances. However, the small girl's desire to attend school remained unaffected.

In seventh grade, Dung was allowed to participate in an education assistance program for schoolgirls, which provided her with the incentive to continue her studies.

Thuy Dung went from a little girl who didn't dare to stand in front of a crowd to a business manager for a real estate company after actively seeking out her preferred career and daring to try her hand at higher positions.

Thuy and Dung were both part of the girls' education program from Room to Read - a global nonprofit focused on girls' education and child literacy, with programs in Asia and Africa.

This year, the program will be supported by Masterise Group, a real estate company, to conduct a variety of activities in schools across three districts Tam Binh (Vinh Long Province), Tra Cu (Tra Vinh Province), and Can Giuoc (Long An Province).

The two units will provide life skills education, counseling (individuals and groups), community-family-school connections, and material support for girls from under-resourced communities.

Sylvia Lee - Head of Marketing, Masterise Homes, stated that she was both proud and surprised to find that Masterise Group is one of the first local companies in Vietnam to partner with Room to Read.

"Masterise Group also aspires to encourage girls to have the required knowledge and create a brighter future for all through educational support," said Lee.

Masterise Group and Room to Read representatives. Photo by Masterise Group

Yen Nhi and Hoai Bang, both 12th-grade students at Vinh Xuan High School (Vinh Long Province) hail from poor circumstances but are not qualified for poor household certificates.

In 9th grade, Nhi had intended to leave school to work and support her family. Nhi was moved to tears when she saw the women mentors from the girls' education program arrive at the home of a student who had quit school to encourage her peers to return to school.

"I think, why people care about me so much, when I neglect myself, I want to quit school to go to work. Why do not I try to learn, so that I can have a good life, a better future," Nhi confided.

"My mother argued that life had been hard since she quit school in the past. That is why I do want a stable job that allows me to care for my parents and financial independence," said Bang.

Nhi and Bang have changed dramatically compared to the past, thanks to the support of teachers from the girls' education program.

They have learned a variety of important life skills, including team management, self-defense, learning how to socialize with others, and planning their future careers.

"I have the impression that I am growing up. It is not natural to have a girl like me right now who speaks confidently in front of a crowd. This is a long process of training," said Nhi.

Special 'second mothers'

Kien The Nga (Dai An  Tra Vinh Secondary School) had to alter her work schedule each day after accepting to be a collaborator in the girls' education program. She looks after her children in the mornings, drives them to school, and prepares lesson plans for teaching.

Nga has been the one who personally visits the girls' homes, counsels parents, and urges them to return to school for many years.

She also takes teaching classes to provide the children with basic life skills.

"I just want to spread the word that girls should have the same level of education as boys. There are numerous occupations that girls should be aware of, as well as identify their goals, and improve themselves. Women are half of the globe and each of them can decide "the world" in their hands," said Nga.

Students in the girls' education program attend a session. Photo by Room to Read

Nga is one of many collaborators in favor of the girls' education program.

Due to Covid-19, many girls' families experienced difficult circumstances in 2021, which forced them to leave school.

The program's collaborators have worked hard to convince the girls to return to school despite the Covid-19 lockdown. As a result, 16 students were recruited to continue their studies in the project areas.

"These are energizing journeys to pursue learning despite material and mental obstacles.

Some students cycle to school for 90 minutes each day, but they refuse to give up. Some students take a gap year after graduating from high school to work and save money to continue their studies. Some people have bravely fought the nephrotic disease to pass college tests," said a representative from the program.

Michelle Obama, former first lady of the U.S., once said, let girls learn, and they will show the world what they can do.

The stories of Kim Thuy and Nga motivated Masterise Group to support Room to Read with the desire to help girls achieve brighter futures through education.

"We hope Masterise Group's partnership will not only provide opportunities for children to acquire a comprehensive education but will also assist to extend this important program so that more girls can benefit from the support of businesses and the community," stated a Masterise Group spokesperson.
Hanoi to allow grade 1-6 students back in school this week

A first grader has her body temperature checked before entering class in Hanoi's outlying district of Me Linh, January 2022. Photo by VnExpress/Ha Linh

Almost one million students from first to sixth grades in all 30 districts of Hanoi will resume in-person classes from Wednesday.

According to a decision made Monday by the city's administration following a previous proposal by the Department of Education, kindergarten students will remain home.

In its proposal, the Education Department said the Covid-19 situation in the city has "positively changed" in recent times, with the number of patients that are teachers and students dropping significantly.

A survey conducted by the department on the two days of April 2-3 showed that more than 75 percent of parents of first-sixth graders agree to send their children back to school.

Since mid-2021, over 2.2 million kindergartners and students of Hanoi have had to stay home due to impacts of Covid-19.

Last November, the city allowed 9th graders to return to school and two weeks later, 12th graders.

Students from 7th to 11th grades returned to school on Feb. 8 and were followed soon after by primary school and 6th-grade students on the city's outskirts.

In the first three weeks of February, students from first to sixth grades in Hanois outskirts were allowed back in school but then had to revert to remote learning on Feb. 18 as the Covid-19 situation worsened across the capital.

Vietnam has not begun vaccinating children under 12 against Covid-19.

Students in Hanoi have remained home the longest of all localities due to Covid-19.

As of Saturday, the capital has recorded more than 1.49 million confirmed Covid cases since last April, when the fourth coronavirus wave surfaced.

In the past 14 days, the number of daily confirmed cases in the city has dropped by 7 percent against the previous two weeks.
The construction site of the route running parallel to the HCMC - Long Thanh - Dau Giay Expressway in HCMC's Thu Duc City, April 1, 2022. Photo by VnExpress/Gia Minh

A three-kilometer route running parallel to the HCMC  Long Thanh  Dau Giay Expressway has not been finished since its groundbreaking in 2017.

Costing VND869 billion ($38.2 million), the route along the expressway that links Ho Chi Minh City and its neighbor Dong Nai Province was initially scheduled for completion after two years.

Built under the build-transfer (BT) format, the project comprises two sections: a 2.7-kilometer one to link Mai Chi Tho Boulevard and Do Xuan Hop Street in Thu Duc City and a 600-meter one to connect D11 Street in Thu Duct with Ring Road No.2, which will connect Thu Duc City and districts 7, 8, 12, Binh Tan, Hoc Mon and Binh Chanh to help ease chronic traffic congestion by preventing container trucks passing through inner-city areas.

The project also includes three bridges, drainage, and lighting systems.

It is expected to ease the pressure on An Phu Intersection in Thu Duc City and boost the investment progress for projects to serve the relocation plan for Thu Thiem New Urban Area in the city.

But five years after its construction, the route remains unfinished and vehicles from downtown HCMC still have to gather at An Phu Intersection.

A representative from HCMCs Transport Department said the project is now 80 percent complete and obstacles related to site clearance and land fund payment procedures for the BT contract have caused the delays.

The HCMC - Long Thanh - Dau Giay Expressway and the construction site of the parallel route on its right side in late 2021. Photo by VnExpress/Gia Minh

In 2015, HCMC-based Nam Rach Chiec Co. Ltd proposed building the parallel route under the BT format. A year later, HCMCs administration decided to allow Nam Rach Chiec to commence with the project under the form of "choosing contractors in special cases," which means no bidding was needed.

On April 28, 2017, the city signed a BT contract with the investor to carry out construction.

However, aside from Nam Rach Chiec, city-based Tien Phuoc JSC also took part as an investor, forming a joint-venture with Nam Rach Chiec. The consortium then established Nguyen Phuong Real Estate Co., Ltd. to perform contractual requirements.

The then city deputy chairman, Tran Vinh Tuyen, signed a decision for Nguyen Phuong to use a piece of land of more than 14.8 hectares in a relocation area for Nam Rach Chiec residential area in Thu Duc City as part of the BT contract.

However, as concluded later by the State Audit of Vietnam (SAV), at the time of making the decision, the city had yet to determine the value of land use rights, which means the monetary value of land use rights over a specified land area in a specified land use term, for the investor to conduct other projects on the land.

Then in 2019, as the contract expired and the project had yet to proceed, the SAV requested that the city administration review and adjust the BT contract.

The city has currently assigned the municipal Department of Natural Resources to work on procedures to withdraw the land area it had used to pay for the contract.

Regarding site clearance issues for building the route, Thu Duc City has been tasked with boosting progress.
US employment situation following March's jobs figures

US Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh gave an update on the employment situation in the US in the wake of March's report which detailed how jobless figures have decreased slightly compared to February's data.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the American economy added 431,000 jobs in the month of March, and the unemployment rate was 3.6 percent, down from 3.8 percent in February. With 7.9 million jobs added since President Biden took office and unemployment close to pre-pandemic levels, this strong job growth continues our historic, worker-centered recovery.

The Administrations strategy to tackle the pandemic and grow the economy from the bottom up and the middle out has gotten America back to work and brought real wage gains for many of the hardest-pressed families. For example, average weekly earnings for non-supervisory employees in Leisure and Hospitality businesses grew much faster than price increases over the past year. In addition, labor force participation continued to grow, with significant gains among women aged 25-54.

The Department of Labor remains focused on empowering all workers with access to good jobs and the skills and supports they need to fill them. Through the Good Jobs Initiative and more, we are investing in apprenticeships and career pathways that not only expand opportunity and equity for marginalized workers, but also strengthen key supply chain industries thereby lowering costs for families and small businesses.

Its clear that a strong focus on public health and workers needs has gotten results, and this is no time to let up. We need to make continued investments in the tools that workers, employers and communities need to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and continue our historic recovery.
Ukraine demands "devastating" sanctions over alleged massacre

Ukraine's foreign minister called on the G7 on Sunday to impose "devastating" new sanctions on Moscow and accused Russia of carrying out a deliberate "massacre" in the town of Bucha outside Kyiv.

Ukraine said on Saturday its forces had retaken all areas around Kyiv and the mayor in Bucha, a liberated town 37 km (23 miles) northwest of the capital, said that 300 residents had been killed by the Russian army.

"We are still gathering and looking for bodies, but the number has already gone into the hundreds," Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said, according to his ministry.

"Dead bodies lie on the streets. They killed civilians while staying there and when they were leaving these villages and towns," Kuleba said.

Moscow has denied Ukrainian allegations that it has targeted civilians or carried out possible war crimes.

Kuleba called on the International Criminal Court to visit Bucha and other towns around Kyiv as soon as possible to gather evidence.

"I urge the International Criminal Court and international organisations to send their missions to Bucha and other liberated towns and villages of the Kyiv region, in cooperation with Ukrainian law enforcement agencies, to thoroughly collect all evidence of Russian war crimes," the ministry quoted him as saying.

"If I used to say that I will make every effort to bring the perpetrators to justice, now I am convinced that this is a matter of my life, which I will do until my last breath, until they are all held accountable," he said.




Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh addresses the meeting on April 3. (Photo: VNA)

Pointing out a soaring power demand as a result of the socio-economic development and post-pandemic recovery, the Government leader said ministries, sectors, and agencies have yet to act drastically enough to carry out his official dispatch, issued on December 24 last year, on economical and efficient power use and power supply in 2022 and beyond.

He said in 2021 and the first quarter of 2022, electricity supply and demand have been guaranteed, but power shortages occurred in some places and at certain points of time.

PM Chinh underlined the critical importance of keeping the power supply-demand balance in the time ahead, given complicated external factors and the economys demand.

He asked all-level authorities, sectors, and relevant agencies to improve their sense of responsibility, proactively take measures for ensuring the power supply with reasonable prices for economic and daily activities, and easing dependence on foreign electricity sources.

In the long run, it is necessary to boost sustainable energy development and power generation, step up power saving solutions, encourage domestic electricity production, facilitate innovation to achieve low-cost, safe, and effective power generation, and properly handle the relationship between input materials and power prices.

The PM also demanded authorities and businesses to continue a close watch on the market to make appropriate adjustments, work closely together to ensure effective power generation and supply, and overhaul mechanisms and policies on power, coal, and gas production to safeguard energy security.

At the meeting, the Vietnam Electricity (EVN) group said power supply will be basically ensured for the southern and central regions from now to 2025. Meanwhile, demand in the northern region, which accounts for nearly 50 percent of the countrys total, will rise faster than the national average.

However, the new generation sources that are set to be operational each year during 2022 - 2025 will continually be lower than the growth in power demand, which may lead to electricity shortages during May - July, the peak period of hot weather and also the dry season - when hydropower plants capacity may decline, the firm added./.
By Azernews

By Vugar Khalilov

Azerbaijans Military Prosecutor's Office has stated that human remains discovered in mass graves have been exhumed in Karabakh, Trend reported on April 4.

The Military Prosecutor's Office of Azerbaijan, jointly with representatives of the State Security Service, the State Commission for the Affairs of Prisoners of War, Hostages and Missing Citizens, the International Committee of the Red Cross and other relevant agencies exhumed human remains from the mass graves discovered in Shusha regions Dashalty village, Khojavand regions Edilli village, Aghdam regions Sirkhavand village, Khojaly region's Farrukh village and other territories, the report added.

The remains are thought to be of those who went missing during the first Karabakh war (1988-1994) with Armenia. The remains have been subjected to forensic, molecular, and genetic analyses, as well as other appropriate activities.

The Azerbaijani Military Prosecutor's Office has launched an investigation into the criminal case under the relevant articles of the Azerbaijani Criminal Code in connection with war crimes, terrorism, deliberate murders and other crimes against peace and humanity committed by Armenias armed forces and illegal Armenian armed groups against the Azerbaijani people.

The Azerbaijani Military Prosecutor's Office is conducting operational and investigative measures on a criminal case initiated under relevant Azerbaijani Criminal Code articles in connection with war crimes, terrorism, deliberate murders, and other crimes against peace and humanity committed by Armenias armed forces and illegal Armenian armed groups against the Azerbaijani people.

Several more body remains from the first Karabakh war (the 1990s) were unearthed during excavations in three areas around Farrukh village in Azerbaijan's Khojaly region on March 30.

The previous remains were discovered on March 29 during earthwork carried out by Azerbaijani servicemen in the village.

Military expert Adalat Verdiyev said that the discovery of human remains in Khojaly's Farrukh village once again demonstrates Armenia's anti-Azerbaijan atrocities.

The remains found in Farrukh village may belong to our citizens who died during the genocide committed by Armenian armed forces in Khojaly [city], or in the battles for the village. Well know about this for sure only after the DNA examination, Verdiyev underlined.

The expert stressed that almost the entire territory of Azerbaijan's Karabakh is covered with the blood of both Azerbaijani civilians and servicemen killed by Armenian armed forces in the early1990s.

Human remains were discovered several times during engineering and construction work on Azerbaijani territory recovered from Armenian occupation as a result of the 44-day war in 2020, he added.

"As the construction work in our liberated territories continues, such mass graves will be revealed. Despite the fact that 30 years have passed, thousands of our citizens will be able to learn about the fate of their relatives who went missing," Verdiyev said.

Along with Khojalys Farrukh village, a mass grave was also found in Khojavand regions Edilli village, he said.

One of the reasons why Armenians stubbornly refuse to leave the lands of Karabakh is the likelihood of finding the remains of most of the 4,000 Azerbaijanis who died during the first Karabakh war, Verdiyev underlined.

The policy of ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity carried out by Armenian armed forces against Azerbaijanis in the First Karabakh War is well known.

The Karabakh region bears the scars of these atrocities. Eyewitness testimony and research in Azerbaijani-controlled areas of the region have shown the presence of mass graves in the former Nagorno-Karabakh territory, proving such crimes.
Local people are examined at the program (Photo: VNA)

The activity was held with support from the Vietnamese Embassy and the Khmer-Vietnam Association in Cambodia.



Medicines worth at about 5,000 USD sponsored by the hospital were handed over to the patients free of charge, and aid packages comprising rice and cash raised by the Vietnamese Embassy.

Speaking at the event, Vietnamese Ambassador to Cambodia Nguyen Huy Tang emphasized that the activity was held on the occasion of the 55th founding anniversary of the Vietnam-Cambodia diplomatic ties (June 24, 1967  2022).

He wished the local families a safe and joyous Chol Chnam Thmay (New Year) festival, which falls on April 14-16 this year.

Since its operations in 2014, the Cho Ray-Phnom Penh Hospital has organized various charitable activities to improve quality of public health care.

Over the past years, the hospital organized an average of four free health check programs annually, examining about 300 people each time.

In the coming time, the hospital will organize more charitable activities and blood donation campaigns./.
The Board of Governors of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has formally approved the application of Article 8.3 of the agreement on establishing the bank to stop Russia and Belarus from accessing the bank's resources, Artem Shevalev, a member of the bank's board of directors from Ukraine, said on Monday.

"The absolute majority of the bank's shareholder countries, which represents 94.85% (!!!) of votes in the bank's capital, backed the decision," he wrote on Facebook.

Shevalev said that for the first time in the history of the EBRD, managers made this step.

"And the EBRD became the first international organization to make such a decision," Shevalev added.

He thanked Minister of Finance Serhiy Marchenko, Governor of the NBU Kyrylo Shevchenko and Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and their team for their assistance in making such a decision.

As reported, the EBRD notified on March 28 that it was in the process of closing offices in Moscow and Minsk. The Bank then reiterated its support for Ukraine and recalled that it had already agreed on an initial EUR 2 billion assistance package for Ukraine and a number of other states that were affected by the war.

The EBRD has not invested in new projects in Russia since 2014, but was quite active in Belarus until the middle of 2021.
Polish services have increased the checks of freight vehicles for entry into Belarus in accordance with the decisions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Finance, the Polish Press Agency reports on Monday.

"Every truck is checked in every possible way, not even for military materials, but for the so-called dual use goods which could be used for military purposes. This is an instruction from both the Minister of Finance and the Minister of the Interior," Deputy Minister of the Interior and Administration of Poland Maciej Wasik told the agency.

He acknowledged that as a result of a thorough inspection of transport, "waiting in line at the border can reach 80 hours."

He also said that "it would be best for the European Union to introduce an economic blockade of Russia" so that "as long as we close the Polish-Belarusian border through which transport moves to Russia, goods do not sail from Rostock or Hamburg to St. Petersburg."
JSC DTEK Zakhidenergo continues to buy out all the proposed interstate section capacity for exporting electricity to Poland at daily auctions for April, according to data on the website of NPC Ukrenergo.

According to the published results of the auction for April 2-6, the company bought 190 MW of distributed power for each hour of the day.

According to the data on the ENTSO-E website, from April 1 to April 5, exports are the same  in a flat schedule of 190 MWh all day.

As of April 6, data are not yet available.

As reported, on March 28, Ukrenergo resumed daily auctions for the purchase of interstate cross sections for the export of electricity to Poland. All import-export auctions were suspended on February 24 due to the entry of the Ukrainian power system into an isolated mode as part of synchronization with ENTSO-E.

The power systems of Ukraine and Europe switched to synchronous operation on March 16.
As of April 1, 2022, the KSE Institute estimated the damage to Ukraine's infrastructure from the war in the country at $68.2 billion, or almost UAH 2 trillion, while over the past week the estimate of losses increased by $5 billion, according to a press release of the analytical division of the Kyiv School of Economics (KSE), KSE Institute.

"Over the week, the damage caused to Ukraine's infrastructure during the war waged by Russia has increased by more than $5 billion. As of April 1, the total amount of damages is $68.2 billion," the KSE said, referring to the Russia Will Pay project.

"Since the beginning of Russia's military aggression on February 24, at least 533 institutions of secondary and higher education, 300 kindergartens, 196 healthcare institutions, 129 factories/warehouses are destroyed or damaged. The Ministry for Communities and Territories Development estimates that 6,800 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed. According to the KSE Institute, the total amount of damaged/destroyed residential real estate is about 26 million square meters," the report says.

"In addition, 54 administration buildings, 260 bridges and bridge crossings, 10 military airfields, 8 airports, 2 ports were damaged by the war. During full-scale Russia's invasion, the occupiers caused damage to Ukraine, destroying or damaging 64 religious buildings and 51 cultural objects," it reads.

As reported, the Office of the President, the Ministry of Economy and the analytical center at the Kyiv School of Economics, KSE Institute, launched the Russia Will Pay project, a portal to collect information about the destroyed objects in the country as a result of Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine.

On the special website https://damaged.in.ua/ you can provide information about the damage caused as a result of the war against Ukraine. In the future, this information will be used by the Ukrainian government as evidence in international courts for compensation by Russia for the damage caused.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine welcomes the decision of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to terminate access to the bank's resources for the Russian Federation and Belarus.

"These fateful decisions, initiated by Ukraine after Russia launched full-scale military aggression against our state with the support of Belarus, for the first time ever were officially adopted by resolutions of the Board of Governors No. 245 and 246 with the support of the vast majority of EBRD shareholders," the commentary published by the press service of the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry emphasizes.

The ministry thanked the leadership of the EBRD and Ukraine's international partners, who reaffirmed their support for Ukraine in making these decisions.

"We are grateful that they did not stand aside and thus condemned the atrocities resorted to by the Russian army against the Ukrainian people. The entire world community must condemn the atrocities of the Russian army and take effective measures to ensure that the inhumane and inhuman behavior of the aggressor country, which is also a permanent member of the UN Security Council, is immediately stopped," the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry stressed.

It is noted that although operations in Russia have been practically stopped since 2014, and Belarusian projects for state enterprises have not been financed for some time, the current decisions of the EBRD deprive Russian and Belarusian companies of access to such tools as additional financing and liquidity support, and also mean withdrawal of the EBRD from any assets associated with the Russian Federation.

"Along with the closure of offices in Moscow and Minsk, today's decision has become a logical continuation of the EBRD's policy of distancing itself from the aggressor state," the ministry stressed.

As reported, on April 4, the Board of Governors of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) officially approved the application of Article 8.3 of the charter to stop Russia and Belarus from accessing the bank's resources.

  
Head of Turkish Ministry of Defense announces readiness of country to take part in evacuation from Mariupol by sea

Turkey can take part in the evacuation of its citizens, as well as citizens of other countries, including Ukrainians, from Mariupol by sea, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said.

"On this issue, coordination with the authorities of the Russian Federation and Ukraine continues," the Turkish media quoted the minister as saying.

He noted: "We continue to provide humanitarian assistance to the people of Ukraine. Turkey also provides support in the evacuation."
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has invited former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy to visit Bucha and "see what the policy of concessions to Russia has led to."

"Today is the fourteenth anniversary of the NATO summit in Bucharest. Then there was a chance to take Ukraine out of the "gray zone" in Eastern Europe. Out of the "gray zone" between NATO and Russia. Out of the gray zone, in which Moscow thinks they are allowed everything. Even the most dreadful war crimes," he said in a video message on Sunday.

According to him, "under optimistic diplomatic statements that Ukraine could become a member of NATO, then, in 2008, refusal to accept Ukraine into the Alliance was hidden."

"The absurd fear of some politicians towards Russia was hidden. They thought that by refusing Ukraine, they would be able to appease Russia, to convince it to respect Ukraine and live normally next to us," Zelensky said.

"I invite Mrs. Merkel and Mr. Sarkozy to visit Bucha and see what the policy of concessions to Russia has led to in 14 years. To see with their own eyes the tortured Ukrainian men and women," Zelensky said.

At the same time, he said that he does not blame the West. "We do not blame anyone but the specific Russian military who did this against our people. And those who gave them orders. But we have the right to talk about indecision. About the path to such Bucha, to such Hostomel, to such Kharkiv, to such Mariupol," he said.

"Fourteen years ago, Russia's leader in Bucharest told Western leaders that there was no country like Ukraine. And we prove that there is such a country. It was and it will be," Zelensky said.
Crimes that the Russians have committed on nearly 300 residents of Bucha and in other cities around Kyiv should be called genocide and how to calculate the genocide, all the perpetrators of these crimes  both indirect and indirect  must be severely punished by the international tribunal, Prime Minister of Poland Mateusz Morawiecki has said.

"Mrs. President of the European Commission! Mr. President of the Council of Europe! I am asking for a quick call to the European Council on Russian crimes and EFFECTIVE SANCTIONS," he wrote on Sunday on Facebook.

Morawiecki said that the massacre in Bucha is more than an alarm signal for Europe and the whole world. "It's a heartbreaking cry for justice, for freedom, for the right to live. About basic and universal values," wrote the head of the Polish government.

He believes that the must confiscate Russia's assets in Western European banks, as well as confiscate the assets of Russian oligarchs, and break all trade relations with Russia as soon as possible.

"European money must stop floating to the Kremlin. Putin's bandit and increasingly totalitarian regime deserves only one thing - such SANCTIONS THAT WILL FINALLY START TO ACT! Ukraine needs to get more weapons so it can defend children and women from Bucha, Mariupol and hundreds of other places," Morawiecki said.

He said that this is a political and moral duty of Europe.

"Enough with the fake gestures and fake gestures. Enough is enough!" the Prime Minister of Poland said.
On Sunday, April 3, an examination of territories was conducted on the territory of Kyiv region, 4,997 units of explosive objects were seized, the State Emergency Service reports.

"As a result of the work carried out, the territory on an area of about 4.3 hectares and more than 21 km of highways was checked. Some 4,997 units of explosive objects have been found (of which there are 4,308 cartridges)," it said on the Telegram channel.

Eleven squads, 58 people and 18 pieces of equipment were involved from the State Emergency Service.
By Azernews

By Vugar Khalilov

One of the glorious pages in Azerbaijan's Karabakh war history, the 2016 April battles later dubbed the four-day war, bolstered a national soldier's combat spirit and paved the way for the ultimate victory gained by Azerbaijan over Armenia in 2020.

These battles demonstrated that the Azerbaijani people and state will never accept the occupation and Azerbaijan once again declared to the enemy that it would restore its territorial integrity at any cost. Four years later, the Azerbaijani Army has made history and ensured the country's territorial integrity.

On April 2, 2016, intensive artillery shelling of Azerbaijani frontline positions and settlements by the Armenian armed forces made the counter-offensive necessary.

As a result of four-day battles, the Azerbaijani army liberated several strategically important heights and restored control over 2,000 hectares of land. The positions in the direction of Tartar region's Talish village and Sugovushan settlement, Jabrayil region's Lalatapa height and Jojug Marjanli village, as well as Goranboy region's Gulustan village, were cleared of enemy forces.

The threat to the lives of Jojug Marjanli resisdents in the Jabrayil region was completely eliminated following the liberation of the Lalatapa height.

Strategic importance of battles

The breakdown of Armenia's defense line, which had previously been depicted as an "impassable barrier" in Azerbaijan's former occupied territories, was a strategically significant victory. Many people, including local and foreign experts, see the April battles as a dress rehearsal for the 44-day battle in 2020.

The operation carried out in response to Armenian provocations, was critical in revealing the balance of forces, clarifying the geopolitical landscape, and the range of interests and interests of regional powers.

The status quo, e.g. the occupation of Azerbaijans territories, completely satisfied Armenia and most of the major world and regional powers. Indeed, the April battles might be viewed as an attempt to bring the invading Armenia to peace.

Following the April battles, the Armenian military-political leadership began to make peace pledges, which it later rejected, and the negotiations became more intense.

The Armenian government, on the other hand, used a variety of strategies to slow down the process, postpone the resolution of the conflict, and, if feasible, leave it to time. But time worked in Azerbaijans favor.

Military reforms

The battles also speeded up the military reforms carried out in the Azerbaijani army.

Military-political expert Col Jalil Khalilov noted that the 2016 battles were extremely effective in modernizing the Azerbaijani army, increasing its defence and offensive capabilities, equipping it with modern military equipment and strengthening the personnels combat skills.

The April battles demonstrated that the Azerbaijani armed forces' efforts to promptly and efficiently coordinate the actions of all types of troops and military units, as well as to supervise the activities of all military units from a single command center, were highly successful, Khalilov added.

These fights have demonstrated that a military solution to the problem is feasible and that this option offers more tangible outcomes than failed diplomatic dialogue.

Myth-busting operation

One of the most significant consequences of the April battles was that Azerbaijan gained a military-psychological advantage, and stereotypes formed after the 1994 ceasefire agreement were shattered.

Until 2016, many thought that the new war would not change the status quo. This view, which had been in place for more than 20 years changed dramatically. The Azerbaijani army showed its combat skills and capabilities on the battlefield. This was the first major psychological blow to both Armenia and its supporters after the ceasefire (1994).

Despite the lack of progress in the negotiations after the cessation of hostilities, both international experts and parties in the negotiation process understood that Armenia was in an increasingly difficult situation.

Many events that took place from 2016 to 2020, in fact, showed that Azerbaijan was mobilizing all its resources to liberate its lands. Undoubtedly, Armenia was also preparing for war and this preparation was based on the euphoria of "punishing Azerbaijan for the last time".

Armenia desired to increase the size of the occupied territories (as evidenced by a well-known statement made by Armenia's defense minister in the United States at the time).

In Armenia and Azerbaijan, the level of moral and psychological readiness of the army, as well as the people, was different; the steps taken to increase military power corresponded with economic opportunities (the economic potential of Azerbaijan and Armenia is incomparably different); and finally, Azerbaijan was preparing for the war of the 21st century, while Armenia was still stuck in the distant 90s.

Historic victory

Although developments in Armenia following the change of administration initially created expectations for peace, these hopes were eventually proven to be baseless.

Strikes by Armenian troops against Azerbaijani military positions and civilian settlements in September 2020 triggered the conflict.

Azerbaijan's operations in response to large-scale attacks soon ended with the dismantling of the Armenian army and the liberation of hundreds of cities and villages.

The trilateral ceasefire deal signed by the Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian leaders on November 10, 2020, ended the three-decade conflict over Azerbaijans Karabakh region along with the seven adjacent districts that came under the occupation of Armenian armed forces in the war in the early 1990s.

The deal stipulated the return of Azerbaijan's Kalbajar, Aghdam and Lachin regions. Before the signing of the peace deal, Azerbaijan liberated 300 villages, settlements, city centers, and historic Shusha city that had been under Armenian occupation for about 30 years.

The statement also envisaged the construction of new transport communications connecting the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic and the western regions of Azerbaijan. This was, in fact, an act of capitulation by Armenia.

In light of the foregoing, the April 2016 fights yielded a variety of strategic outcomes that culminated in the historic triumph in 2020.

The myth of invincibility about the Armenian army received a serious blow for the first time and the obvious superiority of the Azerbaijani army on the battlefield was confirmed.

Azerbaijan significantly strengthened its diplomatic positions in the negotiation process.

From a moral and psychological standpoint, it has shattered the "winning status" that had developed in Armenian society, as well as in the political and military elite, over many years.

Azerbaijan has made a tremendous contribution to promoting national unity and solidarity, as well as popular confidence in victory.

Regional and global powers, notably the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs, had to view the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict in light of new circumstances, dramatically altering opinions of the impossibility of changing the status quo by force.

As a consequence of the April fights, each of these factors may be evaluated independently and can be regarded as a separate pillar of Azerbaijan's historic triumph in the 44-day war in 2020.
Since the beginning of the war, Russia's military has lost more than 18,000 soldiers in battles with the Armed Forces of Ukraine, AFU's General Staff has said.

"Total combat losses of the enemy from February 24 to April 4 approximately amounted to about 18,300 people, 647 tanks, 1,844 armored combat vehicles, 330 artillery systems, 107 multiple rocket launchers, 54 air defense systems, 147 aircraft, 134 helicopters, 1,273 units of automotive equipment, 7 ships/boats, 76 tanks with fuel and lubricants, 92 UAVs of the operational-tactical level," the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said on Facebook on Monday.

The enemy also lost 25 units of special equipment, including four long-range rocket launching systems.

As the General Staff said, the data on the losses of the Russian occupiers are being specified.

"Counting is complicated by the high intensity of hostilities," the message said.
Johnson: Russia's despicable attacks against civilians in Irpin, Bucha more evidence that Putin, his army committing war crimes in Ukraine

Russia's despicable attacks against civilians in Irpin and Bucha are more evidence that Putin and his army are committing war crimes in Ukraine, Prime Minister of the UK Boris Johnson has said.

Russia's despicable attacks against innocent civilians in Irpin and Bucha are yet more evidence that Putin and his army are committing war crimes in Ukraine. "No denial or disinformation from the Kremlin can hide what we all know to be the truth  Putin is desperate, his invasion is failing, and Ukraines resolve has never been stronger," Johnson said on Twitter on Sunday.

The British prime minister assured that he would do everything in his power to exhaust the resources of the military machine of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"I will do everything in my power to starve Putin's war machine. We are stepping up our sanctions and military support, as well as bolstering our humanitarian support package to help those in need on the ground," Johnson said.

He added that Deputy Prime Minister of the UK Dominic Raab has authorised additional financial support and the deployment of specialist investigators to Ukraine to support the International Criminal Court's investigation into atrocities committed by Russia in Ukraine.

"The UK has been at the forefront of supporting the International Criminal Court's investigation into atrocities committed in Ukraine, and Dominic Raab has authorised additional financial support and the deployment of specialist investigators  we will not rest until justice is served," Johnson said.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has announced the creation of a special justice mechanism in Ukraine to investigate the crimes of Russian occupiers.

"I have decided to create a special justice mechanism in Ukraine to investigate and prosecute every crime of the occupiers on the territory of our state. The essence of this mechanism is the joint work of national and international specialists: investigators, prosecutors and judges," he said in a video message on Sunday.

According to him, "this mechanism will help Ukraine and the world to bring to justice persons who in any way participated in this terrible war against the Ukrainian people and in crimes against our people."

"The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Prosecutor General's Office, the National Police, the Security Service, intelligence and other structures, according to their competence, should direct all efforts to ensure that the mechanism works immediately," he said.

Zelensky called on "all our citizens and friends of Ukraine in the world to join this work and help establish justice."

"The world has already seen many war crimes. At different times. On different continents. But it is time to do everything possible to make the war crimes of the Russian military the last manifestation of such evil on earth. Everyone guilty of such crimes will be included in a special Book of Torturers, will be found and punished," Zelensky said.
The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation continue to terrorize the civilian population of Kharkiv region, Regional Military Administration head Oleh Synehubov has said.

"Over the past 24 hours, the Russians launched 17 shelling in the areas of Saltivka, Piatykhatky [Kharkiv residential districts], Derhachi. As a result of the shelling of the Sloboda district of Kharkiv, seven people have been killed, 34 have been injured, including three children in serious condition. In the morning, shelling of residential areas continued. Some three more dead, seven wounded per day in the shelling of a residential area in Derhachi," he said on Telegram.

He explained such actions of the invaders by the failure of their military operations in the region.

"Their military operations in Kharkiv region have failed. No matter how the Russians want to loudly declare victories, they did not succeed and will not succeed thanks to our Armed Forces. Almost every day we destroy their aircraft, equipment and manpower! Therefore, they there is nothing left but to put pressure on the civilian population," he said.

He also said that Izium remains the hottest spot in the region.

"Active battles are being waged there. The Armed Forces of Ukraine is holding the line, actually preventing the enemy from entering Luhansk and Donetsk regions with large contingents. The enemy is losing quite large forces there every day," Synehubov said in a video message accompanying his post.
Pope's visit to Ukraine during the war would be historic

Pope Francis' visit to Ukraine would be historic, head of the PresidentS Office Andriy Yermak said during a telethon broadcast on Ukrainian television on Monday.

"We know that this decision [about the visit] is on the table, the Pope said it officially. He said very important words that he is ready to come at a time when there is a war," Yermak said.

"It would be a historic visit, it is very important for us," he also said.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov has said Ukrainian intelligence agencies are consistently identifying the invaders and murderers of Ukrainian citizens.

"After 39 days of rebuffing a full-scale Russian intervention, many of us are relieved to take good news. The Russian occupiers were defeated near Kyiv. The Ukrainian defenders won the first battle for the Ukrainian capital. Kyiv region was liberated from the enemy, which is also retreating in Chernihiv and Sumy regions to regroup forces and change the direction of strikes. This is indisputable evidence that the plans of the Kremlin have been thwarted," Reznikov wrote on Facebook.

At the same time, according to the minister, hundreds of civilians were brutally tortured by Russian soldiers.

"Only in Bucha, the number of dead is already higher than in Vukovar. Shots in the back of the head of women and men with their hands tied are absolute inhumanity. These killings are not perceived as part of the war. It is even difficult to qualify them as terrorism or as a crime... This evil simply cannot remain unpunished," he added.

The minister said that Ukrainian intelligence is consistently identifying the invaders and murderers, and everyone will receive a well-deserved punishment in due time.

"Heavy fighting continues in Kharkiv, Luhansk, and Donetsk regions. Ukrainian troops are pushing back the invaders in Kherson region. The city of Chernihiv remains in a difficult situation. The defenders of Mariupol, who have already become legends of our time, are fighting heroically," Reznikov said.
High Representative of the European Union Josep Borrell, on behalf of the entire Community, issued a statement in which he called the atrocities of the Russian occupiers the "true face" of the war that Russia is waging against Ukraine and assured that all those responsible will be brought to justice.

The text of the statement was distributed on Monday in Brussels.

"The European Union condemns in the strongest possible terms the reported atrocities committed by the Russian armed forces in a number of occupied Ukrainian towns, that have now been liberated. Haunting images of large numbers of civilian deaths and casualties, as well as destruction of civilian infrastructures show the true face of the brutal war of aggression Russia is waging against Ukraine and its people. The massacres in the town of Bucha and other Ukrainian towns will be inscribed in the list of atrocities committed on European soil," the message said.

Borrell blamed Russian authorities for these for "atrocities, committed while they had effective control of the area", as these areas were subject to international law of occupation.

"The perpetrators of war crimes and other serious violations as well as the responsible government officials and military leaders will be held accountable. The European Union supports all measures to ensure accountability for human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law in Ukraine by Russian Armed forces," the text says.

In this regard, Borrell stated that the EU fully supports the investigation launched by the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court into war crimes and crimes against humanity, as well as the work of the Commission of Inquiry. "The EU is assisting the Ukrainian Prosecutor General and Civil Society focused on collection and preservation of the evidences of the war crimes. We stand in full solidarity with Ukraine and the Ukrainian people in these sombre hours for the whole world. The EU will continue to firmly support Ukraine and will advance, as a matter of urgency, work on further sanctions against Russia. President Putin must stop this war immediately and unconditionally," the high representative said.
State Enterprise Antonov (Kyiv) reported that five more aircraft - An-12, An-22, An-28, An-132D and An-124-100-150 were damaged due to Russian aggression.

"The Armed Forces of Ukraine liberated Hostomel from Russian invaders, where the Kyiv-Antonov-2 airport is located, where test flights are carried out and which is the base of the Antonov Airlines aircraft. Unfortunately, the airport is not recognizable after the stay of the" Russian world." An-26, An-74 and An-225 aircraft, a control tower and an administrative building have been destroyed. An-12, An-22, An-28, An-132D and An-124-100-150 aircraft, hangars have been damaged," the enterprise said on its Facebook page.

Earlier, Antonov reported that before the Russian invasion, five An-124 aircraft were withdrawn from Ukraine; An-26, An-74 and An-225 Mriya aircraft were also ready to leave the country on February 24.

The enterprise proposes to establish the International Fund for the revival of the An-225 Mriya transport aircraft.
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba had a conversation with Minister of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China Wang Yi, thanked for solidarity in support of the victims among civilian Ukrainians.

"Had a call with State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi. Grateful to my Chinese counterpart for solidarity [in support of] civilian victims. We both share the conviction that ending the war against Ukraine serves common interests of peace, global food security, and international trade," Kuleba wrote on Twitter on Monday.
The command of the Russian army is preparing for an offensive operation in eastern Ukraine, and additional units of the Russian army are currently being regrouped and relocated, the press service of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reported on Monday.

"The enemy command, in order to prepare for an offensive operation in the east of Ukraine, is deploying elements of the operational construction of an offensive grouping and is building up the control system. The occupation troops are regrouping and trying to improve the tactical situation in certain areas in the south of Ukraine," the report says.

It clarifies that the formation and relocation of additional units of the Russian Federation to participate in hostilities on the territory of Ukraine continues.

There are no changes in Volyn direction, units of the armed forces of the Republic of Belarus with up to four battalion tactical groups continue to perform tasks to cover the border.

In Polissia direction, there remains a high probability of missile and bomb attacks on military and civilian infrastructure facilities by hostile aircraft taking off from Belarusian airfields.

"There is a movement of units of the Eastern Military District and airborne troops from the territory of the Republic of Belarus to the Russian Federation. The movement of weapons, military and personnel is carried out by rail and by air. According to available information, separate units of the 35 combined arms army (Belogorsk) and 36 combined arms army (Ulan-Ude) of the Eastern Military District is located in the areas of the settlements Rechitsa and Yampol (Gomel region of the Republic of Belarus)," the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine emphasizes.

They specify that in Siverske direction, the enemy has completed the withdrawal of units from the Central Military District to the territory of Kursk region and has begun their further movement.

In Slobozhanske direction, the enemy continues to block Kharkiv, makes artillery attacks on the city, regroups troops. Its strengthens the air defense cover of important objects in Belgorod area and areas of concentration of troops in Kharkiv direction.

"To clarify the positions of the units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the enemy is conducting reconnaissance in the area of the village of Barvenkove using UAVs, and is also trying to restore the bridge over the Siversky Donets River near the town of Izium. Near the settlement of Brazhkivka, by forces in a tank company tactical group, the enemy conducted reconnaissance by combat, had no success, retreated to the previously occupied lines," the AFU emphasizes.

It is clarified that there remains a high probability of air and missile strikes on civilian objects in Kharkiv, preparations are underway for an offensive in the direction of Sloviansk.

In Donetsk and Tavriyske directions, the main efforts of the enemy are concentrated in the areas of the settlements of Rubizhne, Popasna, preparation for the offensive on Severodonetsk, as well as gaining full control over the city of Mariupol. The enemy has inflicted eight air strikes on it today, street fighting continues. Ukrainian defenders are holding the defense of the city.

At the same time, the enemy completes the regrouping and replacement of units that have lost offensive capabilities in order to resume active offensive operations.

In the Southern Bug (Pivdenny Buh) direction, our troops are pushing back the occupiers in Kherson region. The enemy conducted aerial reconnaissance in the area of Mykolaiv with the use of UAVs.

"In the Black Sea and Azov operational zones, the activity of the enemy's naval grouping in the Black Sea has been reduced due to difficult weather conditions (storm up to 4 points). The rest of the enemy ship formations perform tasks in certain areas," the General Staff summed up.
Austrian FM speaks out against embargo on Russian gas, notes other opportunities for strengthening sanctions  media

Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg said that imposing an embargo on Russian gas is unproductive when European countries have other opportunities for new sanctions against Russia.

"We have always talked about sanctions, that they should strike at whom they are aimed at, and not come back to us like a boomerang," ORF television channel said, cited the official, specifying that they were talking about gas supplies.

According to him, in addition to the gas embargo, "there are enough other opportunities where [the EU] could tighten the sanctions valve."

Schallenberg said that he expects the adoption of new sanctions against Russia in the near future, and that the EU is working on a new package of sanctions, which "presumably will be approved this week."

Earlier, President of the European Council Charles Michel said the EU authorities are preparing for new sanctions against Russia.
During the war in Ukraine, 18 journalists were killed, 3 went missing, 8 were kidnapped, 13 media representatives were injured, the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy reports.

"The work of journalists during the war is a front line. Media representatives are often not only physically at the front and cover the course of military events, but are also warriors of the information front. Today they are debunking the Kremlin's endless absurd lies. We deeply appreciate everyone's contribution to our common struggle on the information front against a bloodthirsty enemy," the ministry said in a statement.

It is noted that according to the General Prosecutor's Office of Ukraine, Russia committed 74 crimes against media representatives, including 19 against citizens of other states: Great Britain - 5, the Czech Republic - 2, the United States -2, Denmark - 2, the UAE - 2, Russia - 2, Ireland - 1, Switzerland - 1, France - 1, Lithuania - 1.

In particular, among journalists 18 people were killed (15 men and 3 women), 8 people (4 men and 4 women) were kidnapped, 13 people were injured, 3 people disappeared without a trace, 15 journalists were intimidated.

In addition, at least 7 facts of shelling, which led to damage or destruction of TV towers, TV and radio stations, as well as 22 blockages and cyberattacks on the media, were recorded.

Thus, 31 journalists were injured in Kyiv region, 15 in Zaporizhia, 7 in Kyiv, 5 in Kherson, 5 in Donetsk, 2 in Crimea, 2 in Sumy, 2 in Odesa, and 1 in Chernihiv, in Mykolaiv - 1, in Luhansk - 1, in Kirovohrad - 1, in central Ukraine - 1.

"Ukraine cooperates with a number of international human rights organizations and daily informs them about the crimes of the Russian occupation forces against journalists who, in superhuman conditions, cover events on the front line," the report says.

The Ministry of Culture emphasizes that every death and every crime against representatives of the media will be investigated without fail, and those responsible will be prosecuted.

Among other things, the ministry expressed deep condolences to the families and loved ones of all the wounded, captured, missing and killed journalists.
Danish PM on murders of citizens in Bucha: Putin's crimes are heartbreaking, cruel, should never be forgotten

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said that the crimes of Russia in Bucha (Kyiv region) are cruel and should never be forgotten.

"You, like me, have probably seen photos of Bucha in Ukraine. The killing of civilians. Photos that I will always remember. Putin's crimes are heartbreaking, cruel and should never be forgotten," the minister said on Facebook.
Not a single bus for the organized evacuation of Mariupol residents can reach the city, only a conditional corridor for evacuation by private cars operates, humanitarian cargo also does not reach the residents of Mariupol, Mayor Vadym Boichenko has said.

"Unfortunately, the situation in Mariupol was, is and remains difficult. Today we are on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe: the city has been without electricity, without water, without food, without medicines for more than a month. Therefore, we insist that Mariupol should be given a complete evacuation and access to the city," Boichenko said during an online briefing on Monday in Kyiv.

At the same time, as the mayor emphasized, "the Russian Federation is blocking all humanitarian cargoes that are moving in the direction of Mariupol." According to him, not a single humanitarian cargo has reached the city.

Also, as Boichenko noted, there is no organized evacuation by buses from Mariupol. "To date, not a single bus that should have reached Mariupol to evacuate the city's residents has also reached the city," he said.

Boichenko recalled that since March 13, without a "ceasefire regime," it was possible to open a corridor for the departure of local residents in private cars to Berdiansk with further travel to Zaporizhia.

"Today this route works, but it works very difficult, intermittently. There are still 15 buses in Vasylivka, Zaporizhia region, they do not let our mission reach Berdiansk and evacuate the residents of Mariupol," the mayor said.

According to Boichenko, almost 90,000 Mariupol residents have been evacuated along the Berdiansk-Zaporizhia corridor.

In Mariupol itself, as the mayor specified, now there are more than 100,000 inhabitants. "We beg the international community to unite for the complete evacuation of the inhabitants of Mariupol," Boichenko said.

The Mayor of Mariupol also said that on Sunday, April 3, representatives of the International Red Cross went to Mariupol, but they were detained in Manhush. "Today, Mrs. Vereschuk is working to ensure that they are released so that they can get to the territory controlled by Ukraine," the mayor of Mariupol added.
President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen discussed with President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky the killings of Ukrainian civilians by the Russian military in Bucha, the EU is ready to send joint investigation teams to document war crimes.

"I spoke with President Volodymyr Zelensky about the atrocious murder of civilians in Bucha and elsewhere in Ukraine. The EU is ready to send Joint Investigation Teams to document war crimes in coordination with the Ukrainian Prosecutor General. Europol and Eurojust will support," she said on Twitter.

According to a statement on the European Commission website, the EU has set up a joint investigation team with Ukraine to collect evidence and investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity.

A global response is needed. Negotiations are underway between Eurojust and the International Criminal Court to join efforts and have the Court become part of the Joint Investigation Team, the statement said.

The President of the European Commission also said that she had instructed EU Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders to contact the Prosecutor General of Ukraine.

The Commission will provide all necessary technical and financial support to all EU-led investigations.
British Ambassador to Ukraine Melinda Simmons called for accountability for abduction, torture, and executions of courageous and determined heads of regional and local administrations in Ukraine, as well as members of their families.

"Abducting, torturing, executing brave and resolute regional and local administration heads, even their families too  look like being part of the Russian playbook. Projecting these crimes on to Ukraine also part of the plan. Both need calling out. And holding to account," Simmons said on Twitter on Monday.
Merkel's reaction to offer to look at Russian atrocities in Bucha shows Western elites still under dangerous illusions  Podoliak

The reaction of former German Chancellor Angela Merkel to the offer to look at the atrocities of the Russians in Bucha indicates that Western elites are still under dangerous illusions, Mykhailo Podoliak, adviser to the President's Office head, has said.

"Ms. Merkel's reaction to the offer to look at Russian atrocities in Bucha indicates that Western elites are still under dangerous delusions. A possible solution is to send photo documents about the Bucha massacre & the conclusions of forensic experts to the European politicians," Podoliak said on Twitter on Monday.

Earlier, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky invited former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy to visit Bucha and "see what the policy of concessions to Russia has led to." In turn, Merkel's spokeswoman said on Monday that the former chancellor "supports her decisions in connection with the NATO summit in Bucharest in 2008."

Merkel did not react in any way to the invitation to visit Bucha.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine respects the will of the Hungarian people in the parliamentary elections and hopes that Budapest will clearly condemn the crimes of the Russian Federation and reconsider its approach to helping Ukraine.

"We expect Budapest to clearly condemn these crimes [of Russia] and reconsider its approach regarding assistance to Ukraine so that it meets the current realities, the level of security threat from Russia and the level of atrocities of the Russian army," the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said in a statement released by on Monday.

The Foreign Ministry said that without security in Ukraine there will be no security in Hungary.

"Our state is the homeland of Ukrainian Hungarians, who are an integral part of Ukrainian society and whose identity we highly value. We must work together to bring victory over Russian evil in order to restore peace for the sake of the Ukrainian, Hungarian and other European peoples," the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said in the statement.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine emphasized that they respectfully perceive the will of the Hungarian people in the parliamentary elections.

"At the same time, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has no grounds to claim that he had to fight with the President of Ukraine on the way to victory in the elections. Firstly, neither Ukraine nor its President Volodymyr Zelensky took part in the political campaign in Hungary," the statement said.

The Foreign Ministry also noted that Zelensky is daily busy fighting Russian aggression and the Hungarian Prime Minister should be grateful to the President of Ukraine that the reality of the war did not reach the borders of Hungary thanks to the heroism of the Ukrainian people in curbing the aggressive actions of Russian President Putin.

"We hope that the new mandate will allow the Hungarian government, among other priority tasks, to focus on countering the aggressive policy of the President of the Russian Federation, on whose orders the Russian army commits atrocities against the Ukrainian people, and the facts of Russian war crimes against the civilian population, made public on the day of the Hungarian elections, in first of all, the massacres in Bucha, Irpin and Hostomel will not go unnoticed," the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said.
During the occupation of Konotopsky district of Sumy region, Russian servicemen tortured and killed a local resident, the Prosecutor General's Office (PGO) said.

"According to the investigation, servicemen of the Russian armed forces, in violation of the requirements of the Geneva Convention for the Protection of Civilian Population, during the occupation of Konotopsky region, detained a local resident, tied him up and tortured him, and then shot him in the chest," the department said in a Telegram channel on Monday.

According to the prosecutor's office, the body of a local resident was left on the outskirts of the village Simianivka, his Ukrainian passport lay nearby.

Under the procedural leadership of Konotopsky district prosecutor's office, a pretrial investigation is carried out into violations of the laws and customs of war (part 2 of Article 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).
Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories of Ukraine Iryna Vereschuk reported about 100 Turkish citizens who still remain in the besieged city of Mariupol, Donetsk region, while, according to her, earlier part of the citizens of this country, as well as Greek citizens, was able to leave the city as part of the evacuation.

"The Greeks managed to evacuate to a certain extent, when the corridors were still more or less open at the beginning of March, then the Turkish citizens managed to evacuate a little bit. In a word, the foreigners who were in Mariupol, as well as the Ukrainians, had the same conditions for evacuation: hard, very difficult, exhausting, but still, to a certain extent, they were evacuated. Now, when we talk about how many foreigners are left, we know that 100 Turkish citizens are waiting for evacuation," Vereschuk said during the telethon on Monday.

According to her, this was the reason for the attempt of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to agree with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the evacuation. "There are certain intentions, and this is true, for example, Erdogan, who promises that he will help both his citizens and our citizens, in particular, children and women, to get out. But we have heard this so many times that I am already very careful in I do not want to reassure you once again, let us let it happen, and then we will talk about it together," the deputy prime minister said.

Vereschuk said that attempts by representatives of other countries to agree on the organization of evacuation corridors from Mariupol have so far remained unsuccessful. She also said the Russian invaders do not let anyone into Mariupol. "There is no corridor, no agreements that would allow 20,000 to 30,000 people to leave at once," the deputy prime minister said.
By Trend

Russia and Azerbaijan are actively implementing the Action Plan for the development of key areas of cooperation through 2024, the Russian Foreign Ministry said, Trend reports.

The ministry made the statement dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

"An intensive political dialogue is being maintained at the highest and high levels. The accumulated solid legal base includes more than 150 interstate and intergovernmental agreements, the ministry said. This ensures the progressive development of trade, economic, military-technical, inter-parliamentary, cultural, humanitarian and regional ties.

According to the ministry, Russia is one of the leading foreign trade partners of Azerbaijan.

"The trade turnover between our countries has demonstrated resilience to pandemic challenges and continued to grow in 2021, the ministry noted.

The ministry also noted that the action plan includes six road maps for trade, transport infrastructure, and high-tech industries, improvement of the efficiency of the economy and tourism, and cooperation in the field of innovative development and digital technologies.

The Intergovernmental Commission on Economic Cooperation is working very effectively. At present, special attention is paid to investment cooperation and the creation of conditions for expanding the mutual presence of Russian and Azerbaijani companies in the markets of the two countries," the ministry further said.

Besides, the ministry emphasized that special attention is being paid to regional security issues in the South Caucasus.

Commitment to the top-level trilateral statements of November 10, 2020, January 11 and November 26, 2021 [between Russian, Azerbaijani and Armenian leaders following the second Karabakh war] remains an unconditional factor intended to ensure long-term peace, stability and prosperity in this region, the ministry added.

Its very symbolic that Russia and Azerbaijan are celebrating the 30th anniversary of diplomatic relations in a new capacity, the ministry noted.

On February 22 this year, in Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev signed a Declaration on Allied Cooperation between Russia and Azerbaijan. The provisions of this document are directed to the future, stressed the ministry.
Russian troops fired at Mykolaiv with cluster munitions prohibited by the Geneva Convention, Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych said.

"Cluster shells again. Stay away from windows. I will tell you all the information later," Senkevych wrote on the Telegram channel on Monday.

He also urged citizens not to publish photos and videos of shell impact sites.
Head of the President's Office Andriy Yermak says that the restoration of Ukrainian cities will begin immediately after they are liberated from Russian occupiers, the website of the President's Office reported on Monday.

"The president already has a plan for economic revival on the table. We do not hesitate a day, we think and prepare for how we can start today. I think that cities will be restored immediately after they are liberated," Yermak said in an interview with the 1+1 TV channel.

Corruption, excessive bureaucracy and a bloated state apparatus should be a thing of the past, he said. The Ukrainian economy must become human-centric, and the state must guarantee justice.

"We will rebuild the cities. The worst thing is that we will not return the dead people. There is nothing more precious than human life. And we will definitely rebuild everything else, we will rebuild it quickly," the head of the President's Office is convinced.

Yermak also supported the idea of creating a memorial to perpetuate all those who lost Ukraine in this war with the Russian occupiers.
According to Spiegel, the German Foreign Ministry declared 40 employees of the Russian embassy persona non grata, Federal Minister for Foreign Affairs Annalena Baerbock confirmed the decision to expel, but did not name the exact number of employees.

"The federal government today decided to declare undesirable a significant number of employees of the Russian embassy who here in Germany worked daily against our freedom and the unity of our society. Their work is a threat to those who seek our protection. We will not tolerate this," Baerbock said, cited by the ministry's press service.

Baerbock said the Russian ambassador was informed of the decision on Monday.
Kherson, surrounded by Russian troops, is running out of food, there are problems with medicines and fuel, the press service of Kherson City Council reports.

"Kherson is surrounded by invaders. We can't leave. They can't come to us. The city is running out of flour for baking bread, there are problems with medicine and fuel. Businesses have stopped, many have lost their jobs. But, city officials help people who can't buy their own food," the statement said.

It is also noted that Kherson residents support each other by organizing mutual aid centers, go on cleanup days, and clean up the city.

In addition, residents are facing pressure from the occupiers, who not only disperse peaceful protests, but also conduct raids.

"Orcs break into the houses of Kherson residents, take away clergymen, public figures, even managed to take away the director of the theater," the message says.

Despite this, Kherson residents continue to unanimously adhere to the pro-Ukrainian position, the city council reports.

"As unequivocal is the statement 'Kherson is Ukraine,' so unequivocal is the statement that the 'liberators' are occupiers, orcs, murderers. Kherson is the first Ukrainian city to rise to rallies. Unanimously, solidly, voluntarily," the report said.

"Two colors are relevant in Kherson  blue and yellow. On the building of the City Council  blue and yellow. A huge banner of blue and yellow descends along the wall from the roof to the bottom of the building. Local residents even paint the borders in blue and yellow. Nobody expects the Russian Federation here. Nobody wants it. Even collaborators do not want it  corrupt beings for who personal gain is greater than life. Kherson is a Ukrainian city. This is not just the personal opinion of one person or a small group of people. This is the opinion of almost 300,000 people of Kherson. Kherson is Ukraine!" the city council concluded.
As a result of shelling on Monday, April 4, two civilians were killed in Chuhuiv, Kharkiv region, the press service of Kharkiv Regional Prosecutor's Office said.

"According to the investigation, on April 4, 2022, the Russian invaders built artillery shelling of the city of Chuhuiv, Kharkiv region. As a result of a number of houses, injuries and destructions. In one of the residential buildings as a result of shelling, the victims of a 38-year-old man and a 63-year-old woman,"the office said.

On the fact of the shelling, the investigators of the SBU in Kharkiv region opened criminal proceedings under Part 2 of Article 438 (discovery of the inevitable customs of war associated with premeditated murder) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
France decides to expel about 30 Russian diplomats 

The French Foreign Ministry has decided to expel a group of Russian diplomats from the country, the BFMTV channel reported on Monday evening.

According to it, we are talking about "about 30 Russians."

The ministry itself has not yet confirmed this figure.

Earlier on Monday, similar measures were announced by some other European countries, including Germany.
Occupiers block ICRC reps in Manhush, who arrived there to help in evacuation of Mariupol residents

The Russian occupiers have blocked the representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) who have arrived in the village of Manhush, Mariupol district, Donetsk region, who have arrived in the town they have occupied.

"The ICRC representatives were stopped by the police in the village of Mangush, 20 kilometers west of Mariupol. The ICRC team was stopped on Monday during humanitarian activities aimed at organizing the safe passage of civilians," the ICRC press service said in a statement on Monday.

According to the statement, the ICRC has been in direct contact with colleagues "and is communicating with representatives of all parties to clarify the situation and allow them to resume their humanitarian work."

Earlier on Monday, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories of Ukraine Iryna Vereschuk said that the occupiers were not letting anyone into besieged Mariupol, in particular, representatives of the ICRC could not get there since Friday.

"As of this hour, the International Committee of the Red Cross is in, I do not know whether to call it captivity, hostage, they are being held in Manhush by the occupying power. They have been trying to reach Mariupol since April 1. This is the price of the agreements between Russia and the International Red Cross," Vereschuk said during the telethon on Monday afternoon.
Businessman and Peoples Deputy of the VIII convocation Igor Kononenko bought Nissan Navara cars for the special purpose battalion Skif. This is the first batch of cars for the needs of defenders in the conditions of the Russian-Ukrainian war.

It is a great honor for me to be here with you at this difficult time, and on behalf of my father, Igor Vitaliyovych Kononenko, I have the honor to hand over the keys to these cars, which, I am sure, you will find useful. Take care of yourself and take care of Ukraine!  said Vitaliy Kononenko, handing over the keys to the fighters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swjaQpt3AMk

Earlier, Vasylkivska Multidisciplinary Hospital of Intensive Care of Vasylkivska CSTY Council, Kyiv Regional Clinical Hospital, Regional Clinical Oncology Center of Kirovohrad Regional Council, Myronivsky Support Multidisciplinary Hospital and Kyiv City Clinical Emergency Hospital received cardiotonic, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory and antiallergic drugs from the Igor Kononenko Foundation.

The Foundation also donated first aid kits, which are designed to put on bandages on wounds and burns in order to stop bleeding and prevent re-infection of wounds. Such first-aid kits have already received bomb shelters in Kyiv, units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and Territorial Defense Forces.

In 2021, Igor Kononenko Charitable Foundation donated an Autel EVO II drone to the soldiers of the Special Operations Forces, as well as a generator, battery and tires for the soldiers of the 58th brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The Foundation allocated 248,000 hryvnias for the purchase of optics for two sniper systems. In 2020, it donated UAH 5.7 million to help fight Covid-19.

Igor Kononenko (Reference)

Date and place of birth: August 21, 1965, Kyiv, Ukraine.

Marital status: married to Liliya Kononenko in 1988; they have three children and one grandson.

Higher education. In 1989 he graduated with honors from the Kiev Automobile and Road Institute and received the qualification of a traffic engineer.

Career and business

19841986  Igor Kononenko served in the army.

19881990  worked as the secretary of the Komsomol committee of Kyiv Automobile and Highway Institute.

19901991  Deputy Director of the structural unit of the city headquarters of the student group.

19911992  Commercial Director of MP Transport.

19921994  Commercial Director of JSC Stock Exchange House Ukraine.

19942005  Deputy, First Deputy General Director, First Vice-President of Ukrainian Industrial and Investment Concern.

20042009  Head of the Supervisory Board of OJSC Kyiv Auto- Transport Enterprise  2240.

20092012  First Deputy, General Director of Ukrainian Industrial and Investment Concern.

Since 2012  Head of the Supervisory Board of PJSC Closed Non- diversified Corporate Investment Fund VIK.

Igor Kononenko is a shareholder of PJSC Closed Non- diversified Corporate Investment Fund VIK.

The fund owns 7 companies in the areas of construction, hotel business, trade and sports.

Companies whose shares are owned by PJSC Closed Non-diversified Corporate Investment Fund VIK:

 Sports and Health Complex MONITOR

 Saturn-Trans

 Yantra

 International Tennis Academy

 Medservice-Plus

 Japan Motors

 JSC International Investment Bank

 Private company Treck Holdings Coast S.L. (Spain)

 Private company Lancashire Big S.L. (Spain)

Political activity:

In 2006 Igor Kononenko became a deputy of Kyiv City Council of the V convocation.

In 2008, in early elections to Kyiv City Council of the VI convocation, Kononenko became a deputy head of the Committee of Kyiv City Council on Transport and Communications.

20102014  head of the parliamentary faction Initiative of Kyiv City Council of the VI convocation.

2014  member of Kyiv City Council from UDAR (member of the Standing Committee on Transport and Communications).

27.11. In 2014, he was elected MP with the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko (BPP).

From November 27, 2014 till August 29, 2019, he was the MP. He was a member of Verkhovna Rada Committee on Fuel and Energy Complex, Nuclear Policy and Nuclear Safety. Member of the Group for Inter-Parliamentary Relations with the Peoples Republic of China, Member of the Group for Inter-Parliamentary Relations with the Republic of Austria.

Since September 16, 2015  the first deputy head of the parliamentary faction Bloc of Petro Poroshenko (BPP).

In the local elections in 2015 Igor Kononenko headed the election headquarters of BPP Solidarity. According to the results of the elections, BPP Solidarity took the first place. The party was supported by the largest number of voters  19,52%.

Igor Kononenko was a member of Verkhovna Rada Committee on Fuel and Energy Complex, Nuclear Policy and Nuclear Safety. He was involved in the preparation of legislative initiatives, work with the expert community and the public.

Kononenkos work was aimed at improving the legislation of Ukraine in the energy sector, organizing cooperation with the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, Central Executive Authorities, enterprises and organizations of various forms of ownership, and the expert community.

As a member of the Committee, Igor Kononenko was involved in the implementation of the European integration policy in the energy sector, which is aimed at implementing the Association Agreement between Ukraine, on the one hand, and the European Union, the European Atomic Energy Community and their member states, on the other; as well as the Protocol on the Accession of Ukraine to the agreement on the establishment of the Energy Community.

Kononenko worked on the legislation regarding the energy security of Ukraine, which is one of the most important components of economic and, accordingly, national security of Ukraine.

As a result of Committees work, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted key laws, such as:

On the natural gas market,

On the electricity market,

On the National Commission for State Regulation in the Spheres of Energy and Utilities,

On the Energy Efficiency Fund,

On Amendments to Certain Laws of Ukraine regarding the provision of competitive conditions for the production of electrical energy from alternative energy sources. This is, in particular, the production of solar and wind energy.

Systematization and a comprehensive approach to the creation and improvement of the legislative field for regulating relations in the fuel and energy complex contributed to the reform of enterprises and institutions of the fuel and energy complex, the development of a competitive environment in the energy sector.

In addition, Igor Kononenko took an active part in the development and implementation of large infrastructure projects and the development of local self-government.

Igor Kononenko was involved in the reform of decentralization.

The state policy of Ukraine in the field of local self-government is based on the interests of residents of territorial communities and provides the decentralization of power  the transfer of a significant part of resources, authority and responsibility from the executive authorities to local self-government bodies. This policy is based on the provisions of the European Charter of Local Self-Government and the best world standards of public relations in this area.

Kononenko is the initiator of legislative initiatives:

615-VIII on Amendments to the Law of Ukraine On Housing and Communal Services regarding the proper social and economic protection of participants in the anti-terrorist operation and their families (on the fair appointment and provision of subsidies);

834-VIII. This law defines the legal, economic, organizational principles of the state registration of all rights that must be registered under this Law, and their encumbrances; and aims to ensure that the state recognizes and protects these rights and to create conditions for the functioning of the real estate market.

Kononenko is also the initiator of a number of legislative initiatives aimed to reform the road industry:

1762-VIII On the sources of financing for the road sector of Ukraine regarding the improvement of the mechanism for financing the road industry;

1763-VIII on Amendments to the Budget Code of Ukraine regarding the improvement of the mechanism for financing the road industry;

2304-VIII on Amendments to several legislative acts of Ukraine in the field of highways construction and operation.

These laws determine the specific features of the construction and operation of public highways of national importance under concession; have an impact on ensuring the rights and interests of the concessionaire (investor). Create transparent conditions in the field of road construction.

Sports and patronage

Kononenkos International Tennis Academy (ITA) provides free services to children with disabilities, athletes in the age category 85+, separately provides childrens packages, there are both preferential and group categories. ITA successfully cooperates with schools, providing free services to children who study in these schools.

In addition to the Academy in Pushcha-Vodytsa, MTA Arena was built in Zhulyany, another sports school was bought, and now it is the ITA Club with five clay tennis courts.

Together with his wife Liliya Kononenko, he is the head of CO Charitable Fund of Igor Kononenko.
Belarus' leader defended Russia's invasion of Ukraine and said he was doing ``everything'' to stop the war in a sit-down interview with The Associated Press on Thursday.
International interest in Lebanon has waned due to the Russian war in Ukraine, with this taking an economic and political toll as elections approach in May, writes Al-Ahram Weekly

The Russian war in Ukraine has added another dimension to the already complex economic and political crises that have been plaguing Lebanon. The severe deterioration in living standards in the country, as manifested in rising food and fuel costs, is certain to grow more acute due to the sudden spikes in the global prices of these commodities following the outbreak of the war.

The price of wheat has shot up by record amounts on the international markets because much of the world depends on wheat from Russia and Ukraine. Lebanon imports 66 per cent of its wheat from Ukraine and 12 per cent from Russia. The rest comes from nearby Moldavia and Romania.

Lebanese silos were once able to store a four to five-month strategic reserve of important grains. But these facilities were entirely destroyed in the Beirut Port explosions of August 2020, making Lebanon more dependent than other countries on regular shipments of wheat.

According to the Lebanese finance minister, the country has wheat reserves for only a month or a month and a half, and he has cautioned the public not to panic or to start hoarding flour. Such remarks have not been reassuring. Lebanon must find alternative sources of wheat, but switching sources would inevitably lead to price hikes.

Importing wheat from the US or South America would bring a steep rise in shipping costs, and it would also take longer. Relying on alternative markets in Germany or France would reduce shipping costs, but wheat from there would still cost more than the government has been spending to provide bread.

Any increase in the allocation for wheat would further burden a budget that is already severely strained due to the economic crisis that has been ongoing since October 2019.

Perhaps to compensate for this, the Lebanese minister of industry has prohibited the export of some foodstuffs produced in Lebanon without direct permission from his office. He said that he wanted to study how these foodstuffs might be used to meet the needs of the domestic market. The list includes meat, fowl, fish products, processed fruit and vegetables, some dairy products, cooking oil, and some milled products.

The question of fuel is even more problematic. Fuel in Lebanon is subsidised by the state, meaning that the government pays for it twice: once to import it from abroad and once to subsidise it. It is used to generate electricity for the national grid as well as to operate the private generators that people rely on during blackouts.

The operating hours of the national electricity grid in Lebanon have been sharply reduced over recent months, meaning that privately owned generators running on diesel have become the main source of electricity for hospitals, government offices, businesses and domestic use.

Since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, the cost of diesel in the global market has skyrocketed, translating into a 30 to 40 per cent price hike on the price of diesel in Lebanon. The owners of private generators have been forced to cut back their electricity generating hours, and 20 to 30 per cent of the consumers of these services have been forced to cancel their subscriptions.

Because the national electricity grid in Lebanon is so weak, the country could be plunged back into total darkness, as occurred in August last year. At that time, the problem was solved by urgent fuel deliveries. This time round, purchasing additional fuel from abroad at the new prices would tax the budget with heavy costs, if the government could afford them at all.

The transportation sector in Lebanon is also at risk. Rising fuel prices even before the Ukraine crisis had forced people to cut down their working hours in order to save on transportation costs. The operations of many public services were obstructed as a result, and some had to stop working for a while.

The police and army were among the most important institutions affected because many of their personnel could not afford the cost of transportation to report for duty.

In January, the government increased the transportation allowance it gives public and private-sector workers. This brought working hours back to normal for a while, but with the sudden surge in fuel prices due to the war the government may have to increase the allowance again.

Since last September, Lebanon has begun to expand its social-security networks, launching support programmes and instituting painful economic-reform measures that have entailed lifting subsidies on some basic goods and automatically causing their prices to go up.

The Ministry of Social Affairs has received over 580,000 applications for its Aman (Security) programme that targets the most impoverished Lebanese families. The programme is currently determining which applicants meet its criteria.

An estimated 150,000 families have qualified for monthly assistance worth about US$25 per family plus US$20 per family member up to six persons for a year. In addition, 87,000 of the families with the programme will receive schooling assistance for a year. Due to its limited resources, the ministry has been forced to eliminate some applicants in favour of needier ones, however.

The rapid economic deterioration in Lebanon has made it necessary to expand the safety net, and as the government began financial payments under the Aman programme, another one has been introduced.

Instead of reducing the prices of basic goods for all consumers, ration cards will now be distributed to the neediest. However, this programme, too, has run up against bureaucratic obstacles. One is that the World Bank wants to ensure that the Aman programme is fully transparent in how it registers and distributes aid before it supports another project such as the ration-cards programme.

Over the past three years, international donor agencies have lost confidence in government agencies in Lebanon, and they are insisting on major structural reforms before reopening the taps.

For example, the funds that the international community pledged to Lebanon after the Beirut Port explosions were held up until the formation of a government of technocrats, which did not happen until September 2021. In the year and a half before that, squabbling among the Lebanese political elites prevented the country from benefiting from the outpouring of international sympathy after the explosions. The international communitys enthusiasm for helping the country gradually dwindled.

The delay was also in large measure due to the stalled negotiations between Iran and the world powers over Irans nuclear programme.

Tehran, through conditions set by its Lebanese ally Hizbullah, dragged its feet on facilitating the formation of a new Lebanese government while it tested the pulse of the Western powers it was negotiating with over the resumption of the nuclear agreement.

The new government was only formed after a widely reported telephone conversation last September between the French and Iranian presidents that helped to kickstart a resumption of the negotiations and refreshed the climate for renewed support for Lebanon.

Three weeks ago, Iran and the West were on the verge of signing an agreement on Tehrans nuclear programme, but then Russia invaded Ukraine, diverting world attention from the talks in Vienna.

An agreement would have led to a breakthrough in Lebanon by mitigating the divided countrys political polarisation. But now that the talks in Vienna have been put on hold, so too has the opportunity to restore calm to Lebanon.

Iran has remained neutral on the war in Ukraine because it does not want to ruin the progress it has made in the talks. However, when Russia became the new target for Western sanctions, just as Iran was about to be released from their stranglehold, Moscow threw a spanner in the works.

It insisted on receiving written guarantees from Washington that Russia would not become a victim of further sanctions on the grounds of its involvement in Iranian oil, defence, and nuclear industries. The question now is whether Russia will find a back door out of the Western sanctions related to Ukraine thanks to its cooperative activities with Iran, or whether the US will refuse the guarantees and further postpone a deal with Iran.

Regardless of the outcome of the negotiations, Lebanon has lost a lot because of the Russian war in Ukraine. Perhaps the worst is that international attention has turned away from the country to support another more urgent cause, namely Ukraine and Ukrainian refugees.

The Syrian refugees in Lebanon have also lost out because of the declining international interest in helping them and the narrowing opportunity for a solution to the Syrian conflict that could pave the way to their safe and voluntary return to their homes.

While Russia is engaged in a heated confrontation with the West against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine, progress towards a political settlement in Syria is unlikely. No solution is possible without Russia, which dominates Syria militarily.

Until recently, Lebanon had expected the elections scheduled for mid-May to bring to power a new political elite that would usher in significant change in government policies and make it possible to rescue the countrys fragile economy.

However, with international attention now lying elsewhere, the Lebanese elites might see this as a chance to postpone the elections or to tamper with the polls in order to escape their anticipated punishment at the ballot box.

Despite shifting alliances and the rise of new political leaders from the grassroots movement that began in 2019 and other developments that have raised the hopes the Lebanese have pinned on the forthcoming elections, the growing complexity and duration of the war in Ukraine and the continued focus of international attention there could seriously jeopardise the polls and delay the political change that Lebanon so desperately needs.

The writer is a researcher at Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 24 March, 2022 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly

Search Keywords:

Short link:


By Trend

Uzbekistan will develop a new program to expand and support the use of renewable energy sources (RES), the spokeswoman of the Uzbek Ministry of Energy Elmira Bekmurodova told Trend.

According to her, by 2026 it is planned to increase the share of renewable energy sources in the total energy balance of Uzbekistan to 25 percent, which will save about three billion cubic meters of natural gas per year.

The spokeswoman noted that by 2026, the total installed capacity of solar and wind power plants in Uzbekistan will reach 8,000 megawatts.

"In accordance with the program to expand and support the use of RES, eight wind power plants with a total installed capacity of 4,000 megawatts will be built in Uzbekistan", Bekmurodova said.

She said that four such power plants will be built in 2023-2024 in the countrys Republic of Karakalpakstan, Bukhara and Navoi regions, and their total installed capacity will be 1,600 megawatts.

"In 2025-2026, four wind farms with a total installed capacity of 2,400 megawatts will be put into operation in Uzbekistan", the spokeswoman said.

Bekmurodova also said that solar power plants with a total installed capacity of 1,100 megawatts will be put into operation in the Navoi, Jizzakh, Samarkand, and Surkhandarya regions of Uzbekistan in 2023.

According to her, five solar power plants with a total installed capacity of 900 megawatts are planned to be commissioned in 2024 in Bukhara, Namangan, Khorezm, Kashkadarya and Fergana regions.

"In 2025-2026, solar photovoltaic power plants with a total installed capacity of 1,800 megawatts will be put into operation in Uzbekistan. By 2030, the total generation of small renewable energy sources with an installed capacity of up to 1 megawatt will be increased to 1,000 megawatts," Bekmurodova said.

The spokeswoman added that the management system for the use of renewable energy will also be improved in Uzbekistan.
Talks took place in Istanbul this week between representatives of Russia and Ukraine, but there may be little chance of an early end to the conflict in Ukraine.

In a frosty atmosphere and with no handshakes, Russian and Ukrainian negotiators began peace talks under the auspices of Turkey this week in the first face-to-face talks in two weeks between the two sides, raising hopes that there could be progress towards ending a conflict that has turned into a war of attrition in Ukraine.

The international powers are hoping for a ceasefire and a political settlement of the conflict that threatens the world with dire consequences if it escalates out of control and expands to neighbouring countries. However, the dynamics on the ground are not encouraging of the chances of success.

The talks started in a surreal atmosphere when the Kremlin was forced to dismiss reports that Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich suffered symptoms consistent with poisoning during an informal round of talks earlier this month, calling the reports part of the information war on the war in Ukraine.

The Ukrainian negotiators are seeking a ceasefire without compromising the sovereignty or territorial integrity of Ukraine, while the Russian negotiators want to ensure Ukraines neutrality, its non-joining of NATO, the recognition of the legality of its annexation of Crimea, and the protection of Russian minorities in eastern and southern Ukraine.

Both sides have played down hopes of an early breakthrough.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the sponsor of the talks, told the two sides that they had a historic responsibility to halt the fighting in Ukraine.

The Ukrainian negotiators have shared details of what has been covered at the talks in Istanbul, stating that Ukraine has proposed adopting a neutral status in exchange for security guarantees, meaning it would not join military alliances or host military bases.

The proposals would also include a 15-year consultation period on the status of annexed Crimea and could come into force only in the event of a complete ceasefire.

Ukrainian negotiator Oleksander Chaly said in comments broadcast on Ukrainian television that if we manage to consolidate these key provisions, and for us this is the most fundamental, then Ukraine will be in a position to actually fix its current status as a non-bloc and non-nuclear state in the form of permanent neutrality.

We will not host foreign military bases on our territory, or deploy military contingents on our territory, and we will not enter into military-political alliances. Military exercises on our territory will take place with the consent of the guarantor countries.

He said there was enough material in the current Ukrainian proposals to warrant a meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukraines president and lead negotiator in the talks with Russia, said that a security guarantees treaty with an enhanced analogue of NATOs Article 5 collective defence clause was discussed during the talks, adding that the guarantor states of the US, the UK, Turkey, France, Germany would be legally involved in protecting Ukraine from any aggression. There would be implementation through a referendum and the parliaments of the guarantor states.

There was no immediate Russian response to the Ukrainian proposals.

Meanwhile, European diplomats hope that the negotiations could be a path towards stopping further military and political escalation. French President Emmanuel Macron continued his efforts in this regard in a telephone call with Putin on Tuesday.

At the weekend, Macron warned against the use of inflammatory remarks after US President Joe Biden said Putin cannot remain in power, words he stood by in a press conference at the White House on Monday by saying I make no apologies.

Biden said he was not calling for regime change in Russia but expressing personal moral outrage over Russias invasion of Ukraine, defending the unscripted remarks he made at the end of a speech in Poland at the weekend.

Senior figures in the US administration immediately attempted to play down the comments.

Even at the height of the Cold War, there was red line stopping US presidents from calling for regime change in Moscow, whatever the two countries differences. The fact that this red line has been crossed by Biden is a source of European concern.

The Europeans are also anxious because on his tour in Poland Biden spoke very little about peace and talked instead about a long fight in Europe. We need to be clear-eyed: this battle will not be won in days, or months, either. We need to steel ourselves for the long fight ahead, Biden said.

Zelensky has not hidden his misgivings that Moscow could use the negotiations to re-mobilise its military forces and continue its advances to seize areas of eastern and southern Ukraine. He wants the West to strengthen its sanctions against Moscow and to provide his country with planes, tanks, and other military aid.

Hours before the start of the talks in Istanbul, Zelensky said that his country was prepared to declare its neutrality and was open to compromise over the contested eastern region of Donbas, in essence suggesting a reversion to the 2015 Minsk 2 Settlement.

But he also warned that if the ruthless war continued, the Ukrainian people would continue to pay for the weak Western sanctions with their lives, criticising what he described as the passive sanctions imposed by the West on Russia.

Ukraine cannot and will not agree with the passive sanctions position of some entities towards Russia. There should be no suspended sanctions packages  that if the Russian troops do something, then there will be some answer, he said.

If the sanctions packages are weak or do not work enough, and if they can be circumvented, it creates a dangerous illusion for the Russian leadership that they can continue to afford what they are doing now. And the Ukrainians pay for it with their lives. Thousands of lives, he said.

Urging other countries to act with courage, Zelensky said that Ukrainians should not die just because someone cannot find enough courage to hand over the necessary weapons to Ukraine. Fear always makes you an accomplice.

If someone is afraid of Russia, if he or she is afraid to make the necessary decisions that are important to us, in particular for us to get planes, tanks, necessary artillery, and shells, it makes these people responsible for the catastrophe created by Russian troops in our cities, he said.

However, putting more pressure on Russia could hinder the Istanbul negotiations and make a difficult situation even more difficult. Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov made Moscows view clear on Tuesday, arguing that the Western sanctions on trade with Russia were akin to total war and that the West had pushed the Kremlin into the corner with its NATO expansion.

In an interview on the US TV channel PBS, Peskov said that the punitive sanctions levelled against Russia were quite unfriendly and made the country feel as if it were at war with the US and its Western allies.

We entered the phase, the phase of a total war And we have to adapt ourselves to a new reality. You have to understand Russia, he said.

Russias Defence Ministry said Russia will drastically reduce military activity outside the cities of Kyiv and Chernihiv, and Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said on Tuesday that the main tasks of the first stage of the operation have been completed. The combat potential of the Ukrainian armed forces has been significantly reduced, which makes it possible to focus our main attention and main efforts on achieving the main goal  the liberation of Donbas.

His statement was a sign that Moscow may focus on the strategic Donbas region of Ukraine to ensure the division of the country into east and west, a scenario described as the Korean model after Koreas division of two states in the wake of World War II.

As a result, while the Russians and the Ukrainians may be talking about peace, each side is moving on the ground to tighten the noose around the other.

Because of the complexities of the historical relations between the two countries, the lack of trust, and the divergence of their demands, the expectations are that a new cold war between Russia and the West is inevitable. Regardless of the outcome of the talks, relations with Moscow will enter a phase of strategic hostility that will lead to a significant increase in military spending for the NATO countries and Russia.

This militarisation of Western-Russian relations will have disastrous results in addressing serious problems, foremost among them the challenges of climate change and global warming, the fight against poverty, and stopping conflicts in other regions of the world.

In this depressing scenario, Roman Catholic Pope Francis levelled strong criticism this week against the NATO countries for increasing their defence spending, describing it as madness.

He said the conflict in Ukraine was a product of the old logic of power that still dominates so-called geopolitics.

It is now clear that good politics cannot come from the culture of power understood as domination and oppression, but only from a culture of care, care for the person and their dignity, and care for our common home. The real answer is not more weapons, more sanctions, and more political-military alliances, he added.

What is needed is a different way of governing the globalised world, not by showing your teeth, as is done now, but a different way to frame international relations. I was embarrassed when I read that a group of states has committed to spending two per cent... of GDP on acquiring weapons as a response to what is happening now. Madness, Francis said.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 31 March, 2022 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi discussed in a telephone call on Wednesday the latest developments in the Ukrainian-Russian talks with Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelensky, the Egyptian presidency announced.

El-Sisi reiterated in the telephone call he received from Zelensky the need to prioritise dialogue and diplomatic solutions to settle the crisis, stressing Egypt's support for all efforts to reach a peaceful solution either at the bilateral, regional or international level.

This is the second call El-Sisi received from Zelensky, and the first was eight days ago.

In early March, Egypt was among the 141 countries that voted for a UN resolution at the General Assembly calling for a halt to Russias invasion of Ukraine and an immediate withdrawal of Russian forces from its western neighbour.

Egypt also called at the General Assembly for a quick political solution to the Russia-Ukraine crisis through peaceful means, warning of the impact of the crisis on the fragile global economy.

In early March, President El-Sisi voiced in a phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin Egypt's readiness to support the diplomatic endeavours that would facilitate reaching a political settlement between Russia and Ukraine to end the conflict and preserve international security and stability.

Cairo and Kyiv enjoy distinguished economic relations, with Egypt receiving 30 percent of its imported wheat from Ukraine before the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


The Arab Leagues Ukrainian crisis liaison group will hold meetings with Russian and Ukrainian foreign ministers in Moscow and Warsaw this week to seek a diplomatic solution to end the war.

The liaison group will meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Moscow and another meeting with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba in Warsaw on Monday and Tuesday.

The group will seek during the meetings to contribute to a diplomatic solution for the crisis, according to a statement by the General Secretariat of Arab League said on Saturday.

The group, which includes representatives from Egypt, Jordan, Algeria, Iraq, Sudan and the UAE (a current member of the United Nations Security Council), was formed out of the 157th session of the Council of the Arab League in March.

The group held a coordination meeting on Saturday ahead of the tour via video conference, which was attended by Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry.

Arab League Secretary General Ahmed Abul-Gheit has expressed his deep concern over developments in Ukraine, including their serious military and humanitarian consequences.

In a UN Security Council session held on 23 March, Abul-Gheit urged world powers to reach a solution to the crisis in Ukraine that serves the interests of all sides.

He also said he hopes the current situation will not affect the role of the UN in tackling other issues and crises, especially in the Arab region.

The Russian-Ukrainian conflict disrupted supply chains of wheat from the Black Sea ports to the Middle East and North Africa region, sending prices on the international markets soaring.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


The US State Department said Sunday it was following "extremely disturbing" accounts of killings in central Mali after the Sahel state's military said it killed over 200 militants in the volatile region.

On Friday, the Malian military said that between March 21-and 31 it had killed 203 combatants in an operation in the Moura area of jihadist-ridden central Mali.

However, the announcement followed social media reports this week alleging that large numbers of civilians had been killed in Moura.

AFP was unable to verify the Malian army's claimed death toll or the social media reports about civilian deaths.

Poor access to Mali's conflict areas and a relative lack of independent information sources means that figures provided by both the government and armed groups are difficult to confirm.

On Sunday, the US State Department said that it was following the "extremely disturbing accounts of large numbers of people killed" in Moura and offered its condolences to the families of "all civilians who died".

It noted in a statement that many reports suggested that operatives from Russian private military contractor Wagner had committed the killings, while others said that Malian armed forces had killed militants.

"These conflicting reports illustrate the urgent need for the Malian transition authorities to give impartial investigators free, unfettered, and safe access to the area where these tragic events unfolded".

The State Department called on Mali's army-dominated interim government to allow the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, known as Minusma, to investigate.

Failure to investigate will sow divisions, undermine the army's credibility, and "drive communities into the hands of violent extremist groups," it added.

An impoverished nation of around 21 million people, Mali has struggled to contain a jihadist insurgency that emerged in 2012, before spreading to neighboring Burkina Faso and Niger.

Vast swathes of the country are home to myriad rebel groups and militias, and thousands of soldiers and civilians have been killed in the conflict.

Mali's under-equipped army has often been accused of committing abuses. The United States and others also say that Russian private security firm Wagner has deployed hundreds of fighters to Mali.

Mali's interim government has repeatedly denied the claims, however, and regularly defends the record of its armed forces.

For instance, the Malian army stated Friday that it was guided by human rights and international law, calling for "restraint against defamatory speculations".

Minusma, the UN peacekeeping mission, said Saturday that it is "very concerned about the allegations of violence against civilians" in Moura.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Arab countries are willing to mediate between Russia and Ukraine to achieve an urgent halt of military operations in Ukraine, Egypts Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said on Monday.

Shoukry made the remarks in a press conference in Moscow for the liaison group of the Arab League (AL), which was formed during the 157th session of the Council of the AL in March to tackle the impacts of the Ukraine crisis on the Arab region.

The group includes representatives from Egypt, Jordan, Algeria, Iraq, Sudan, and the UAE  a current member of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC).

The Arab side has affirmed the need for continued direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, Shoukry said after a session of consultations between the liaison group and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in the presence of Secretary-General of the Arab League Ahmed Aboul-Gheit.

During the presser, Shoukry affirmed the Arab states keenness to mediate between the two parties of the conflict in order to start trust building procedures and pave the way for a sustainable political solution to the crisis.

The top Egyptian diplomat affirmed that the desired political solution between Russia and Ukraine should be achieved within the framework of respect for international law, the United Nations Charter, and the sovereignty of states.

This should ensure that the conflict is resolved in a peaceful and acceptable manner by both parties and in a way that leads to tackling the roots of the crisis, Shoukry said.

During the consultations with Lavrov, the liaison group called for the parties of the conflict to stop escalation and military actions, Shoukry said. The group also called for immediately resorting to peaceful and diplomatic solutions that are based on dialogue, Shoukry added.

The two sides also discussed how to overcome the economic repercussions of the crisis and to ensure that they do not harm the people of the region and the world, Shoukry said.

The Arab group also affirmed the need for continued coordination to preserve the security and safety of the Arab communities currently residing in the conflict areas and to facilitate the crossing of those wishing to travel into neighbouring countries.

Speaking during the presser, Abul-Gheit highlighted the serious economic impact of the crisis on the economies of the Arab countries, including on wheat imports, tourism, and development plans.

The Arab group is scheduled to hold consultations with Ukrainian FM Dmytro Kuleba in the polish capital of Warsaw on Tuesday to seek a diplomatic solution to end the war.

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, Egypt has called for a political solution to the crisis based on dialogue and warned of the global crisiss impact on the Arab countries in the political, security, and economic levels.

In a speech delivered at the 157th ordinary session of the Arab League Council at the ministerial level in Cairo on 9 March, Shoukry called for unified Arab efforts to avoid as much as possible the direct and indirect impact of the crisis on Arab nations.

Mitigation efforts

Since the start of the crisis, Egypt has been working to mitigate the impact of the crisis on the economy, including countering a surge in the prices of basic commodities.

In March, Egypt officially requested support from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to implement the countrys comprehensive economic programme amid the ongoing global challenges.

The cabinet said in a statement that the new request for IMF support possibly includes new financing to support the country's plans for comprehensive economic reforms.

Egypt also said it plans to diversify sources of tourism in light of an anticipated drop in visitors from Russia and Ukraine, which comprise the largest groups of tourists to the country.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


The US Defense Department approved Monday the sale of eight F-16 combat aircraft to Bulgaria for $1.67 billion, bolstering its air force as the regional threat has risen after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

"The proposed sale will improve Bulgaria's capability to meet current and future threats by enabling the Bulgarian Air Force to deploy modern fighter aircraft routinely in the Black Sea region," the Defense Security Cooperation Agency said.

The sale approval came amid continuing speculation that one of Washington's NATO allies could provide Ukraine with MIG-29 aircraft to fight Russian forces, and that such a move could involve the United States providing that ally with US aircraft in exchange.

Bulgari is one of the three NATO members that operate MIG-29s, which Ukraine pilots are capable of flying. The others are Poland and Slovakia.

But Pentagon spokesman John Kirby, who asked about the F-16 sale Monday, downplayed the suggestion it could be tied to Bulgaria providing MIG-29s to Ukraine.

During a visit to Bulgaria by US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on March 19, Prime Minister Kiril Petkov said there was no such deal.

"But being so close to the conflict, I have to say that currently, we will not be able to send military assistance to Ukraine," he said, adding that assistance would have to be approved by the Bulgarian parliament.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Two Ukrainian medical universities have asked the Egyptian authorities to allow Egyptian students who will continue their degrees online after fleeing the war-hit country to take their practical trainings at home in local private or government hospitals.

In a letter sent to the Egyptian Embassy in Kyiv, V.N Karazin Kharkiv National Medical University announced the resumption of its classes with online learning in the spring semester of the 2021/22 academic year for foreign students, including Egyptians who are not in the country currently due to the Russian invasion.

In other letters sent to the embassy, Ukrainian universities added that they would require a report from the medical institution on the skills acquired during the practical training that is signed by a doctor to allow students to enrol for the spring semester.

The Egyptian Embassy in Kyiv published on Sunday the letter it received from Karazin Kharkiv University on its Facebook page along with another letter from Bogomolets National Medical University.

Bogomlets said that it is returning to an online format in the spring-summer semester of the 2021/22 academic year due to the imposition of martial law following the Russian invasion.

The university added that students who want to receive certificates of their studies may claim them in-person.

Regarding financial debt or tuition fees paid by students, Bogomolets University stated that it is temporarily impossible to provide such information due to the high level of workload on university staff.

The letters were sent in response to an inquiry by the embassy about the status of Egyptian students enrolled in Ukrainian universities.

According to the Ministry of Emigration and Expatriate Affairs in late March, 1,270 of the Egyptian students who have returned from Ukraine underwent exams in late March to enrol in Egyptian universities in an initiative launched by the government upon the directives of President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi.

Before the Russian invasion, around 6,000 Egyptians lived in Ukraine, including 3,000 students, according to officials.

So far, 80 percent of the Egyptian students in Ukraine have left for other European countries, especially Poland.

Egypt has repatriated hundreds of Egyptians, mostly students, from war-torn Ukraine via Air Cairo flights, and is planning to help them continue their education at private and national universities.

However, a small percentage of Egyptian nationals are refusing to leave Ukraine, including students who want to continue their education in Ukraine or those who fear that their academic career may be affected if they leave the country, according to the emigration ministry.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Egypts Minister of Foreign Affairs Sameh Shoukry left for Moscow on Monday as part of Ukraine crisis liaison group of the Arab League (AL) to hold discussions with Russian and Ukrainian foreign ministers to help reach a diplomatic solution for the conflict.

The Egyptian foreign minister is set to hold meetings with Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov in the Russian capital on Monday and then with Ukrainian FM Dmytro Kuleba in the polish capital of Warsaw on Tuesday to seek a diplomatic solution to end the war.

The AL Ukraine crisis liaison group, which was formed during the 157th session of the Council of the AL in March, includes representatives from Egypt, Jordan, Algeria, Iraq, Sudan, and the UAE - a current meber of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC).

On Saturday, the crisis group held a coordination meeting on Saturday ahead of the tour via video conferencing, which was attended by Shoukry.

The Arab league has expressed deep concern over developments in Ukraine, including the military and humanitarian consequences.

In a UNSC session held on 23 March, AL Secretary-General Ahmed Abul-Gheit urged world powers to reach a solution to the crisis in Ukraine that serves the interests of all sides.

Abul-Gheit also said he hopes the current situation will not affect the role of the UN in tackling other issues and crises, especially in the Arab region.

The Russian-Ukrainian conflict has had major impacts on the whole world, including Arab countries, disrupting supply chains of wheat from Black Sea ports to the Middle East and North Africa and skyrocketing the prices of basic food commodities.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Egypt has extended condolences to Sudan over the drowning of more than 20 people when a boat carrying agricultural workers capsized in southeastern Sennar province last week.

The government and people of Egypt extend their sincere condolences to the government and people of brotherly Sudan and to the families of the victims, the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on Monday.

The ministry also wished a speedy recovery for the injured and stressed its support for Sudan over the tragic accident.

At least 23 women are believed to have drowned when the boat, which carried 29 people, capsized and sank in the Blue Nile in the Souki region, Sudans official news agency SUNA reported.

The captain, the only male who was on the boat, and five other passengers were the only survivors. The women, who were day laborers working on farms, were returning home when the boat sank.

Rescue teams have retrieved 13 bodies and a search is underway for the remaining 10 people who are unaccounted for, according to SUNA.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


The government is ready to offer all forms of support and facilitation necessary to host the headquarters of the African Medicines Agency (AMA) in Egypt, Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly said Sunday.

Madbouly made his remarks during a meeting with a delegation of the African Union (AU) Commission to discuss the establishment of a headquarters for the African Medicines Agency (AMA) in Egypt, in the presence of Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research and Acting Health Minister Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar.

He invited the AU delegation to pay a field visit to the New Administrative Capital's diplomatic district which can host the agency's HQ, asserting the great importance Egypt attributes to the AMA as organisational platform for African pharmaceutical industries and public health improvement in Africa.

Madbouly also reviewed Egypt's drug manufacturing capacities, including technological infrastructure and long-standing expertise.

Egypt has the largest the pharmaceutical city in the Middle East and oldest vaccine center in Africa and the Middle East Africa (VACSERA), Madbouly said.

Egypt is also one of the few manufacturers of COVID vaccines, the prime minister added, noting the Egyptian Drug Authority (EDA) had recently been accredited by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for home-made and foreign vaccines.

EDA Chairman Tamer Essam and Assistant Foreign Minister for African Organisations Ambassador Soha El-Gendy attended the meeting.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


By Trend

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh on Sunday condemned a deadly terrorist attack against the civilians in Herat, Afghanistan, Trend reports citing IRNA.

The foreign ministry spokesman sympathized with the families of the victims and prayed for the immediate recovery of those injured in the incident.

The terrorist attack in a recreation area in Herat left dozens of casualties on Saturday.

Khatibzadeh warned the Muslim Ummah to remain vigilant against the divisive conspiracies of the enemies.

The Iranian foreign ministry spokesman urged the Afghan ruling group to shoulder responsibility to step up security measures so as to ensure the security of the citizens.




A report on the repercussions of the Russia-Ukraine war on food security in Egypt by an Egyptian NGO says that the current solutions adopted by the government will help in the short run, but long-term solutions are also needed.

According to the new report titled Repercussions of the Russian-Ukrainian War on Food Security in Egypt issued by the Research and Studies unit at the Cairo-based Forum for Development and Human Rights (FDHRD) on Sunday, the Russian invasion to Ukraine caused many economic impacts globally.

For Egypt, chief among these was the decision by both countries to stop the export of wheat and other grains, as well as the rise in energy prices.

The effect of these impacts was compounded by the fact that Egypt is in the midst of its recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.

Egypt at the Global Food Security Index

The report highlights that according to the Global Food Security Index (GFSI) of the Economist Impact Center, Egypt scored 60.8/100 and ranked 62nd out of 113 countries, with its affordability (66.5 percent), food availability (60 percent), quality and safety ratio (60.7 percent) and natural resources and resilience (52 percent).

The index for the year 2021 revealed four strengths in Egypt's ranking: change in average food costs, food safety net programs, micronutrient availability and food safety. While weaknesses included: tariffs on agricultural imports, food standards and food diversity, the report added.

The report added that Egypt suffers from dwindling self-sufficiency, or the difference between production and consumption, of some agricultural products and crops, which forces the state to import from abroad to cover the deficit.

Egyptian food security is affected by dependence on outside sources, which exacerbates problems associated with food subsidies, including state spending deficits and the depletion of foreign exchange reserves, the FDHRD report read.

The report describes some of the internal and external challenges facing Egypts food security. Internal challenges include overpopulation, which has led to the destruction of agricultural land, and the high price of pesticides.

The Egyptian government has already identified the problem of the destruction of agricultural land as a major challenge and is addressing it.

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) could also have a substantial impact on Egypts water use and subsequently its agricultural production.

Given that agriculture consumes about 80 percent of Egypt's water resources, it will be the sector most affected by the reduced water supply, which is exacerbated by the filling of the dam in years of drought, the report said.

Egypt has been vocal over the past decade about its concern that the GERD would reduce its share of the Niles water. Thus, Egypt, along with Sudan, has been demanding Ethiopia sign a legally binding agreement on the filling and operation policies of the dam, but the upstream country has yet to do so.

Oil prices are also impacting Egypts food security by raising the cost of food imports, and the cost of transporting it locally.

Global crises have also played an important external role in challenging Egypts food security, whether it is coronavirus or recently the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Repercussions of the Russia-Ukraine War on Global Food Security

The impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in late February on global food security has its own section in the report.

Egypt is considered as one of the most affected countries by the Russian-Ukrainian war as a result of the direct connection to its food security, depending on the import of food grains mainly from the two parties to the conflict, the report said, adding that wheat imports represent about 62 percent of the total Egyptian wheat consumption.

Egypt imports more than its domestic production average of wheat, which is a major food component, as it represents about 35 percent to 39 percent of the calories consumed by the citizen while it receives from abroad about 13 million tons of wheat annually, to be the largest importer of wheat in the world, it added.

The report said that some countries had imposed export restrictions in response to higher prices like Moldova, Serbia and Hungary, while some countries have imposed export bans on certain grains. Indonesia, meanwhile, has tightened controls over the shipment of grain.

These trends, along with disruptions to exports from Russia and Ukraine, are likely to add further pressures that will lead to higher prices in the future, the report warned, adding that even under the most optimistic assumptions, global wheat prices will remain elevated throughout 2022 and are likely to continue into 2023.

Limits of Egyptian responses

The FDHRD mentioned several decisions taken by the Egyptian government to achieve food security, including banning the export of some food grains during the next three months, including beans, lentils, wheat, and flour of all kinds, as well as pasta of all kinds. The government is also stocking up on strategic commodities, increasing reserves of wheat, rice, oil, sugar and legumes from 3 to 12 months.

Nevertheless, the report says that those decisions are a short term solution and the Egyptian government needs to find more solutions on the long run.

These measures can relieve some of the pressures placed on the Egyptian economy, but they will likely affect Egyptian trade relations in the long run, as well as Egypt needs to explore options to reduce the gap between domestic supply and demand, the report said.

A copy of the report titled Repercussions of the Russian-Ukrainian War on Food Security in Egypt is available in English on the official website of FDHDR.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Iran said Monday it will only return to Vienna in order to finalise an agreement to revive its landmark 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, with the last steps dependent on Washington.

Tehran has been engaged in long-running negotiations in the Austrian capital to revive the deal, known formally as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), with Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia directly, and the United States indirectly.

"We will not be going to Vienna for new negotiations but to finalise the nuclear agreement," foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh told reporters in Tehran.

However, Iran said there were still outstanding issues that it was waiting on Washington to settle.

"At the moment, we do not yet have a definitive answer from Washington," Khatibzadeh said.

"If Washington answers the outstanding questions, we can go to Vienna as soon as possible."

The JCPOA gave Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear programme to guarantee that Tehran could not develop or acquire an atomic bomb -- something it has always denied wanting to do.

But the US unilateral withdrawal from the accord in 2018 under then-president Donald Trump, who reimposed biting economic sanctions which prompted Iran to begin rolling back its own commitments.

Final phase

The Vienna talks aim to return the US to the nuclear deal, including through the lifting of sanctions on Iran, and to ensure Tehran's full compliance with its commitments.

Iranian and US delegations in Vienna do not communicate directly but through other participants and the European Union, the talks' coordinator.

Nearly a year of negotiations have brought the parties close to renewing the 2015 accord.

But the talks were halted last month, after Russia demanded guarantees that Western sanctions imposed following its invasion of Ukraine would not damage its trade with Iran.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov later said Moscow had received the necessary guarantees from Washington on trade with Iran.

Among the key sticking points is Tehran's demand to remove from the US terror list the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the ideological arm of Iran's military.

Washington recently confirmed that sanctions on the Guards would stay.

On Wednesday, the US Treasury announced measures targeting several entities it accused of involvement in procuring supplies for Iran's ballistic missile programme.

A day later, Khatibzadeh said Washington's imposition of the fresh sanctions on the Islamic republic showed its "ill will" towards Iran.

On Monday, Khatibzadeh levelled further criticism at the US.

"Today, in the final phase, the United States seeks to deprive Iran of the economic benefits of the agreement," Khatibzadeh said.

On Sunday, however, Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said an agreement was "close", during a phone conversation with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

"We have passed on our proposals on the remaining issues to the American side through the EU senior negotiator, and now the ball is in US court," Iran's top diplomat said.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Two fuel ships have entered war-torn Yemen's port of Hodeida, the first shipment in months, said the rebels who control the city said Monday, after a UN-brokered truce went into effect.

Yemen has been embroiled in conflict between the government, supported by a Saudi-led military coalition, and the Iran-backed Huthi rebels since 2014, when the insurgents seized the capital Sanaa.

Since 2016, the coalition has enforced an air and sea blockade, with exemptions for aid flights, accusing Tehran of smuggling weapons to the rebels. Iran denies the charge.

"The fuel ship, Ceasar, has now arrived to the port of Hodeida after being held up for 32 days," the Yemen Petroleum Company (YPC), which is under rebel control, said in a statement.

On Sunday, it announced the arrival of the first boat after it had been "held up for 88 days".

Flights to and from Sanaa are to follow under the ceasefire deal.

Areas under rebel control -- which include much of the country's north and parts of the west -- have suffered a fuel crisis for months, with the Huthis accusing the coalition of detaining oil ships since the start of January.

But a two-month truce took effect Saturday, the first day of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, bringing a glimmer of hope in a brutal conflict that has killed hundreds of thousands and left millions on the brink of famine in Yemen, long the Arab world's poorest country.

Essam al-Moutawakel, a spokesman for the YPC, told AFP that the latest fuel shipments "will not end the fuel crisis, as the demand is very high... but it could alleviate its severity".

Under the UN-brokered agreement, all ground, air and naval military operations, including cross-border attacks, should cease.

In addition, 18 fuel ships are to be allowed into Hodeida port, a lifeline for Yemen, and two commercial flights a week can resume in and out of Huthi-held Sanaa airport.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


A group of migrants traveling by foot from southern Mexico to the United States disbanded Sunday, after Mexican authorities agreed to expedite immigration procedures following clashes.

The travelers, mostly from Central America, had left the southern Mexican city of Tapachula -- which borders Guatemala -- on Friday, but were stopped hours later by a roadblock set up by security personnel.

Scuffles broke out when they tried to ram their way through several rows of National Guard agents blocking their path with riot shields.

Activist Luis Garcia Villagran, who was accompanying the group, said authorities agreed to transfer about 200 people -- mainly from Venezuela, Colombia, Cuba and Nicaragua -- to southern Mexican states for their paperwork.

He had earlier blamed immigration authorities for causing the exodus by being too slow to process the group's asylum requests.

In a statement issued by the National Institute of Migration, the government agency called for the group not to "become hostages of the interests of third parties, who claim to defend their human rights".

It added that Mexican laws have established routes to maintain safe and orderly migration.

For years, undocumented migrants have traveled through the country, fleeing poverty and violence and hoping to cross the northern border.

While some pay traffickers to smuggle them in trucks, others join so-called caravans undertaking the long journey on foot, enduring hunger, exhaustion and the cold.

In response, Mexico has set up checkpoints to stop the migrants' advance.

US President Joe Biden's arrival to the White House a year ago -- carrying promises of a more humane approach towards immigration -- fueled an increase in the numbers of undocumented individuals making the journey.

This number is expected to ramp up next month after the United States on Friday announced it would end a public health order requiring the immediate expulsion of migrants at its southern border to prevent the spread of Covid-19.

Put in place in March 2020 in response to the pandemic, the border restriction will be lifted May 23.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly said on Sunday that the government gives top priority to industrial development by facilitating all the measures necessary for creating more industrial investments in various domains.

Madbouly made his remarks during a meeting in Cairo with Minister of Trade and Industry Nevine Gamea to discuss the ministry's efforts entrenching local industry and securing production inputs, in cooperation with the Federation of Egyptian Industries (FIE) and Chambers of Commerce.

As part of the ministry's efforts to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), the Egyptian Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency (MSMEDA) signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Amazon Egypt to help SME owners market their products, the minister said.

Gamea also highlighted the agency's commitment to supporting handicrafts and heritage enterprises that reflect Egypt's identity and offer modern products that appeal to different tastes.

Briefing the premier on the results of Egypt's participation in EXPO DUBAI 2020, Gamea said that the Egyptian pavilion had attracted over 1.5 million visitors from all over the world over the past six months.

The meeting also tackled the results of the ministry's talks with foreign delegations to probe cooperation in March.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


The Egyptian government allocated EGP 1.1 billion for the General Authority for Supply Commodities and the Agricultural Bank of Egypt in order to finance local wheat crop procurement from farmers, Minister of Finance Mohamed Maait announced on Monday.

The action came as per the directives of President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi to facilitate local wheat supply procedures amid the ongoing global crisis, the minister said.

The General Authority for Supply and the Agriculture Bank of Egypt will disburse this allocation as down payments to farmers, as the wheat harvest season began on 1 April  two weeks ahead of schedule.

Maait expounded that the government targets supplying roughly six million tonnes of local wheat at a total cost of EGP 36 billion in 2022, adding that the price of local wheat supply has increased by EGP 1,100 per tonne in 2022 compared to 2021.

The Cabinet said in March that it will extend an incentive valued at EGP 65 per ardeb (One ardeb is equivalent to 150 kg) to incentivise farmers to increase the wheat quantities they sell to the Ministry of Supply and Internal Trade.

The finance ministry is following up with the supply ministry on the daily local wheat supply situation, through which it is providing sums to finance further procurement for the sake of providing sufficient liquidity to farmers dues immediately, said Maait.

Egypt is the largest importer of wheat globally with a total of 12 to 13 million tonnes of wheat imports per year, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC) in 2020  an online data visualisation platform focused on the geography and dynamics of economic activities across the globe.

As per the UNs Food and Agriculture Organisations (FAO) data, Egypt imports over 80 percent of its needs of wheat from two key markets - Russia at 50 percent and Ukraine at 30 percent.

However, Egypt exported wheat in 2020 with a total cost of about $5 billion, according to the OEC, with Japan, Australia, the UAE, Canada, and Belgium being the primary markets of Egyptian wheat.

The minister explained that the states budget is able to deal positively and flexibly with the ongoing global economic crisis, pointing out that the governments priorities in this regard is sustaining the strategic stockpile of wheat and fulfilling citizens basic needs amid the current exceptional position of the global economy.

In March, Maait said that the global wheat price in global markets - especially due to disruption in wheat supply lines from Baltic countries amid the ongoing Ukrainian-Russian war - is anticipated to push up the cost of Egypts imports of the strategic commodity by about EGP 12 to 15 billion.

The minister also noted that Egypt will have enough wheat reserves to cover eight months of the local markets needs after the local harvest is delivered by mid-April.

To cope with the ongoing crisis, Egypts government seeks to import wheat from alternative markets, such as India  the second largest wheat producer globally  to fulfil domestic market needs.

Moreover, Egypts Ministry of Trade and Industry banned in March the export of wheat, fava beans, lentils, pasta, and all kinds of flour for three months from April to June.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


The Ukrainian government says that 18 journalists have been killed in the country since Russia's invasion began on Feb. 24.

The Ukrainian Culture and Information Ministry said in a statement on social media Monday that each of the deaths and other crimes against media representatives will be investigated.

The ministry added that another 13 journalists had been wounded, eight had been abducted or taken prisoner and three journalists were still missing.

It said that several crimes had been committed against journalists from 11 countries, including Ukraine.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


President Joe Biden on Monday called for a war crimes trial against Russian President Vladimir Putin and said he'd seek more sanctions after reported atrocities in Ukraine.

``You saw what happened in Bucha,'' Biden said. He added that Putin ``is a war criminal.''

Biden's comments to reporters came after Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Bucha, one of the towns surrounding Kyiv where Ukrainian officials say the bodies of civilians have been found. Zelenskyy called the Russian actions ``genocide'' and called for the West to apply tougher sanctions against Russia.

Biden, however, stopped short of calling the actions genocide.

The bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Kyiv-area towns that were recently retaken from Russian forces, Ukraine's prosecutor-general, Iryna Venediktova, said.

Associated Press journalists saw the bodies of at least 21 people in various spots around Bucha, northwest of the capital.

``We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue the fight. And we have to gather all the detail so this can be an actual -- have a war crimes trial,'' Biden said.

Biden lashed out at Putin as ``brutal.''

``What's happening in Bucha is outrageous and everyone sees it,'' Biden added.

White House officials said talks about ramping up new sanctions against Russia intensified after reports of alleged atrocities emerged. Biden said Monday that he would continue to add sanctions but did not detail what sectors the US may target next.

After unveiling an avalanche of sanctions in the first weeks of the war, administration officials in recent days have put more focus on closing loopholes that Russia might try to use to avoid sanctions.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, tweeted Monday that the European Union will send investigators to Ukraine to help the local prosecutor-general ``document war crimes.``

A Russian law enforcement agency says it has launched its own investigation into allegations that Ukrainian civilians were massacred in suburbs of Kyiv that were held by Russian troops, focusing on what it calls ``false information'' about Russian forces.

The Investigative Committee claims Ukrainian authorities made the allegations ``with the aim of discrediting Russian troops'' and that those involved should be investigated over possible breaches of a new Russian law banning what the government deems to be false information about its forces.

Biden noted that he faced pushback last month when he described Putin as a war criminal for the unfolding onslaught in Ukraine after hospitals and maternity wards were bombed. In his remarks on Monday, Biden made clear that the label still applied.

``This guy is brutal and what's happening to Bucha is outrageous, and everyone's seen it,`` Biden said.

Investigations into Putin's actions had begun before the new allegations of atrocities outside Kyiv.

The US and more than 40 other countries are working together to investigate possible violations and abuses, after the passage of a resolution by the United Nations Human Rights Council to establish a commission of inquiry.

There is another probe by the International Criminal Court, an independent body based in the Netherlands.

Meanwhile, Biden's chief envoy to the United Nations, Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, announced Monday that the US plans to seek a suspension of Russia from its seat on the UN's top human rights body in the wake of more indications Russian forces may have committed war crimes in Ukraine. That would require a decision by the UN General Assembly.

Russia and the other four permanent members of the UN Security Council - Britain, China, France, and the United States - all currently have seats on the 47-member-state rights council, which is based in Geneva. The United States rejoined the council this year.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Germany is expelling 40 Russian diplomats in response to the killings in Bucha and says further measures with partners are being prepared.

Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said Monday that the images received from the Ukrainian town following the withdrawal of Russian troops ``show an intent to destroy that goes beyond all boundaries.''

Baerbock said the Bucha images also reveal the ``unbelievable brutality of the Russian leadership and those who follow its propaganda.''

The German top diplomat said ``we must fear similar images from many other places occupied by Russian troops in Ukraine'' and that ``we must counter this inhumanity with the strength of our freedom and our humanity.''

She added ``it must also be clear that we must stand up for our freedom and be prepared to defend it.''

She said the Russian diplomats expelled ``have worked here in Germany every day against our freedom, against the cohesion of our society'' and that their work is ``a threat to those who seek protection with us.``

Baerbock said she told the Russian ambassador ``we will not tolerate this any longer.''

Search Keywords:

Short link:


France on Monday said it would expel 35 Russian diplomats as part of a joint European action after Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.

"France decided this evening to expel a number of Russian personnel with diplomatic status stationed in France whose activities are against our security interests," the foreign ministry said in a statement.

A ministry source, who asked not to be named, said 35 Russian diplomats would be expelled.

"This action is part of a European approach," the foreign ministry statement added. "Our first responsibility is always to ensure the safety of French people and Europeans," it said.

There has been outrage across Europe over killings in the town of Bucha near the capital where dozens of bodies were found in mass graves or littering the streets near Kyiv over the weekend.

The Kremlin has rejected Western accusations that Russian forces were responsible.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


By Trend

Ukraine could sit down at the negotiation table with Russia once it has security guarantees from other nations.

Thats according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who spoke with CBS, Trend reports citing Ukrinform.

Now we're interested in real, enforceable guarantees. Can be five countries, guarantors. Maybe even three will have a full-fledged defense for Ukraine will be involved to protect Ukraine. Then we can sit down around the table with Russia and then only I understand what this dialogue is about with Russia, Zelensky said.

According to the president, security guarantees should include a circle of countries who will be supporting Ukraine, these leaders in these countries will be assisting Ukraine in different capacities, following certain security conditions that have to be agreed between these security guarantor states.

As noted by the president, Ukraine will take a non-nuclear, non-bloc status, neutral status, but at the same time, gain membership in the European Union.

I need legal, powerful guarantees where there was a description about the weapons, human factor, sanction policy and preventive type of response, Zelensky explained, adding that "sanctions really are important but they are unable to stop aggression".

Because if tomorrow the war starts again, and only sanctions will have been introduced, well, that's about nothing, the president stressed.

Zelensky noted that as of today, we have not received them (security guarantees - ed.) yet from anyone and we have to get them.

"I would like to thank the United States and Biden administration and their bipartisan support in everything they're doing for us. But nevertheless, the United States has not provided the security guarantees to us," Zelensky said.

At the same time, the Ukrainian leader underlined that the United States is our strategic partner and they are supporting us. But security guarantees is when you have an enforceable document.
EU officials said Monday they were weighing new sanctions targeting Moscow in response to alleged atrocities against Ukrainian civilians by Russian forces that sparked a wave of international outrage.

Despite Russian denials of responsibility, condemnation was swift, with Western leaders, NATO and the UN all voicing horror at images of dead bodies in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, and elsewhere.

Local authorities said they had been forced to dig communal graves to bury the dead accumulating in the streets, including one in Bucha found with his hands bound behind his back.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky called Russian troops "murderers, torturers, rapists, looters" and warned in his nightly video message that "concentrated evil has come to our land."

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the bloc was urgently discussing a new round of sanctions as it condemned "atrocities" reported in Ukrainian towns that have been occupied by troops sent in by Russian President Vladimir Putin five weeks ago.

The proposals, which French President Emmanuel Macron said could target Russia's oil and coal sectors, could be discussed by foreign ministers on the sidelines of a NATO meeting on Wednesday and Thursday, or at their regular meeting early next week, an EU official told AFP.

Borrell also offered EU assistance in documenting evidence of the alleged atrocities, and Zelensky said he had created a special body to investigate.

The scale of the killings is still being pieced together, but Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered so far.

And Bucha's mayor Anatoly Fedoruk told AFP that 280 bodies were placed in mass graves because it was impossible to bury them in cemeteries still within firing range of Russian forces.

Satellite imagery firm Maxar released pictures it said showed a mass grave located in the grounds of a church in the town.

Municipal worker Serhii Kaplychnyi told AFP that Russian troops initially refused to allow residents to bury the dead in Bucha.

"They said while it was cold to let them lie there."

Eventually, they were able to retrieve the bodies, he said. "We dug a mass grave with a tractor and buried everyone."

AFP reporters in the town saw at least 20 bodies, all in civilian clothing, strewn across a single street.

'Clear indications of war crimes'

Zelensky's spokesman, Sergiy Nikiforov, said the scene in Bucha "looks exactly like war crimes."

Moscow rejected the accusations and suggested the images of corpses were "fakes" while calling for a UN Security Council meeting on what its deputy ambassador to the body called a "heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha."

"We categorically reject all allegations," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists.

But Macron said he was in favour of fresh sanctions since "there are very clear indications of war crimes. It was the Russian army that was in Bucha," he told France Inter radio.

In Germany, Chancellor Olaf Scholz's defence minister raised the possibility of an end to gas imports.

"President Putin and his supporters will feel the consequences," Scholz said.

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki of Poland, whose country has welcomed millions of Ukrainians fleeing the violence, called for an international investigation into what he termed a "genocide."

'Even worse things'

Zelensky warned that the worst could be yet to come as Moscow refocuses its attention on the south and east of the country, in a bid to create a land link between occupied Crimea and the Russian-backed separatist statelets of Donetsk and Lugansk.

"Russian troops still control the occupied areas of other regions, and after the expulsion of the occupiers, even worse things could be found there, even more deaths and tortures," he said.

Eight people were killed and 34 wounded in Russian attacks on two towns in southern Ukraine on Sunday, prosecutors in Kyiv said.

Europe's worst conflict in decades, sparked by Russia's invasion on February 24, has already killed 20,000 people, according to Ukrainian estimates.

Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainians have fled the country, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighbouring countries in the last 24 hours alone, the UN refugee agency said.

In the eastern city of Kramatorsk, women, children and elderly people were boarding trains to flee the Donbas region.

"The rumour is that something terrible is coming," said Svetlana, a volunteer organising the crowd on the station platform.

Russia has redoubled its efforts in Ukraine's south and east, including carrying out several strikes Sunday on the strategic Black Sea port of Odessa, which Moscow said targeted an oil refinery and fuel depots.

"We were woken up by the first explosion, then we saw a flash in the sky, then another, then another. I lost count," a 22-year-old resident, Mykola, told AFP.

Britain's defence ministry said recent Russian air activity had been focused on southeastern Ukraine, adding that heavy fighting was continuing in the devastated and besieged southern city of Mariupol.

"The city continues to be subject to intense, indiscriminate strikes," the ministry said in an update on Twitter.

The UN's top humanitarian envoy Martin Griffiths is expected in Kyiv soon after arriving in Moscow on Sunday in an attempt to halt the fighting.

And peace talks are scheduled to resume by video on Monday, though Russia's chief negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said it was too early for a top-level meeting between Zelensky and Putin.

He said Kyiv had become "more realistic" in its approach to issues related to the neutral and non-nuclear status of Ukraine, but a draft agreement for submission to a summit meeting was not ready.

Search Keywords:

Short link:


Suspected North Korean hackers last year stole a vast cache of data from Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering, which is manufacturing a new 3,000-ton submarine for the Navy.

They also recently attacked the state-run Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute, which was involved in the development of a small reactor to power nuclear submarines.

North Korea probably wanted the information to develop its own nuclear-powered submarines.

A staffer in the office of People Power Party lawmaker Ha Tae-keung, who revealed the hacking attacks last week, said, "Most of the data stolen from Daewoo was related to submarines."

The Defense Acquisition Program Administration admitted there was a hacking attack but denied that military secrets were stolen, saying the firewalls held out.

North Korean hackers have persistently targeted Daewoo, which has been building all of the Navy's submarines. The Chosun Ilbo was unable to confirm the exact documents that were stolen, but sources said they wanted information on the new Dosan Ahn Changho, a 3,000-ton attack submarine that was launched in 2018 and is about to be handed over to the Navy.

In 2016, hackers stole 40,000 files from Daewoo including 60 documents with classified information about the submarine's design, ballistic missile system and vertical launch system.


A 60-year-old man allegedly had himself vaccinated against COVID-19 dozens of times in Germany in order to sell forged vaccination cards with real vaccine batch numbers to people not wanting to get vaccinated themselves.

The man from the eastern Germany city of Magdeburg, whose name was not released in line with German privacy rules, is said to have received up to 90 shots against COVID-19 at vaccination centers in the eastern state of Saxony for months until criminal police caught him this month, the German news agency DPA reported Sunday.

The suspect was not detained but is under investigation for unauthorized issuance of vaccination cards and document forgery, DPA reported. He was caught at a vaccination center in Eilenburg in Saxony when he showed up for a COVID-19 shot for the second day in a row. Police confiscated several blank vaccination cards from him and initiated criminal proceedings.

It was not immediately clear what impact the approximately 90 shots of COVID-19 vaccines, which were from different brands, had on the man's personal health.


Britain is experiencing a record number of COVID-19 cases, with almost 5 million people, or 1 person in every 13 infected, according to official data.

The news of the spike in infections came on the same day that Britain stopped giving free rapid COVID tests to most of its population, as part of Prime Minister Boris Johnson's "living with COVID" plan.

Under Johnson's plan, people who do not have conditions that make them vulnerable to COVID-19 must pay for tests to find out if they have been infected.

The uptick is blamed on the highly contagious Omicron variant BA.2, which is also causing an increase in hospitalization and death rates. However, the number of infections is expected to start decreasing this month and next month, officials say.

"Any infection that spreads rapidly, peaks quickly and decreases rapidly on the other side," Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, told The Guardian.


U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken sharply condemned Russia on Sunday, accusing it of committing war atrocities in Ukraine as the world saw its first glimpse of the bodies of dead Ukrainians left behind like trash in the streets of the Kyiv suburb of Bucha after Russian troops departed the area.

"You can't help but feel a punch to the gut," the top U.S. diplomat told CNN's "State of the Union" show. "We cannot become numb to this. We cannot normalize this."

Blinken said the United States would be "looking hard to document" Russian war crimes throughout Ukraine even as Ukraine is claiming it has retaken control of the north-central region around the capital. Moscow's troops have pulled back from the Kyiv territory to concentrate new attacks in southern Ukrainian cities along the Black Sea and in the contested Donbas region in eastern Ukraine.

Reflecting on the bodies found in the streets, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told CBS' "Face the Nation" show, "Indeed. This is genocide." He said Ukraine is being "destroyed and exterminated" by Russian forces.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told CNN, "It is a brutality against citizens we have not seen in decades" in Europe. "It is [Russian] President [Vladimir] Putin's responsibility to end the war."

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Twitter, "I am deeply shocked by the images of civilians killed in Bucha, Ukraine. It is essential that an independent investigation leads to effective accountability."

Russia's Defense Ministry contended in a statement Sunday that it had not killed civilians in Bucha and claimed that video footage and photographs showing the dead were "yet another provocation" by the West.
Health authorities have announced additional changes to their pandemic response as the country moves into the endemic phase.

From April 11, state-run coronavirus testing facilities will no longer be offering rapid antigen tests but only PCR tests, and only to people at high risk. Others will do self-tests or go to a clinic or hospital.

The government will also stop paying compensation to families who lose a loved one to the virus. It has been making payments of W10 million per bereaved family to help cover cremation costs (US$1=W1,218).


North Korean hackers have stolen foreign technology to evade intercept defenses against hypersonic missiles, a UN report suggests.

The annual report by the UN Security Council's Panel of Experts overseeing sanctions against North Korea last Friday warns the North continues development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles and has probably stolen the intercept-evasion technology.

The regime has already succeeded in testing a hypersonic missile capable of flying at a low altitude along an irregular trajectory from a mobile missile launcher, which is hard to intercept with the existing defense systems of South Korea and the U.S.

Quoting the intelligence agency of a UN member state, the report speculates that North Korean hackers stole the technology for the development of such a missile.

Trading of raw materials and components needed for development of ballistic missiles is strictly banned by international sanctions, but they have been secretly supplied to the North by China and Russia, the report says.

It said O Yong-ho, a 60-year-old diplomat at the North Korean Embassy in Moscow, is in charge of procurement of Russian raw materials. The diplomat obtained from Russian companies or missile engineers 9 tons of stainless steel alloys used for liquid-propellant ballistic missiles and for submarine-launched ballistic missiles in 2018; a copy of the blueprint of Russia's TRDD-50 cruise missile in 2019; and a manual for ball bearings for solid missile propellants in 2020.

The North also allegedly bought stainless steel alloys, valves, pumps, and ball bearings for missile engines from a Chinese company in Dandong last year through an official at the Korea General Machinery Trading Corporation. North Korea's Munitions Industry Department bought materials for solid missile propellants such as aluminum powder through another North Korean official in the Chinese city of Shenyang in 2019 and 2020.

But Moscow and Beijing denied they have any information on North Koreans' purchase of contraband, while Russian and Chinese companies refused to respond to the report.


In the middle of February, Darya Chemeris was preparing for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. A resident of Korea for the past five years, Demeris has elderly parents in Kiev and is their only child. She worried that no one would be there to take care of them, so she tried to help them apply for visas to Korea.

But the coronavirus pandemic had made visa applications more complicated, and she was not able to complete the process before Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.

"In February I sent an e-mail to the embassy and we prepared and sent all the necessary documents," Chemeris said. "Then the war started and the embassy closed."

Her parents are among many who want to flee to Korea but are struggling with Korea's entry requirements. Korea still does not offer visa-free entry to Ukrainians even for short trips.

More than 4 million people have fled Ukraine since Russia's invasion, most to EU countries, and officials warn that some neighboring countries like Poland, Moldova and Hungary are reaching capacity.

Most Ukrainian refugees want to stay in Europe to remain close to their home country and their male family members who are trapped in the country by decree and forced to man the defenses. But some refugees with family in other countries want to go further. The U.S. announced on March 24 that it would accept 100,000 Ukrainian refugees.

"For most Ukrainians, Korea is too far, the flight is too expensive, and it's not easy to come here," said Tanya Karnydal, another Ukrainian expat here. "But some have family here. I wanted to invite my mom, for example, but it's impossible now."

The Korean government has announced a number of policies aimed at helping Ukrainians seeking to flee the war. On March 8, the Ministry of Justice unveiled a streamlined visa application process for Ukrainians with family in Korea, as well as for ethnic Koreans living in Ukraine. On Feb. 28, Korea granted all Ukrainians in Korea visa extensions until the situation in their home country stabilizes.

But there are calls for the Korean government to do more. Petro Pak, who came from Kiev, is the head of Asadal, an organization of Koreans in Ukraine that is advising people there on visa application procedures. In a March survey by the organization approximately 1,200 people said they want to come to the Korea.

"The problem is that due to the war, Ukraine has suspended the issuance of passports for travel abroad. Without this document, it is impossible to get a visa to Korea," Pak said. "Although Ukraine has started in some cases to resume issuing passports, the processing time takes 20 days or more."

Chemeris said that even the streamlined application process is impossible for her parents to complete. She has sent e-mails to the Korean embassies in Romania and Poland about appointments for her parents but has yet to hear back.

"The waiting time for visas is 14 days, and even then, there's no guarantee," she said. "And traveling in Ukraine can result in death."

Karyndal said she also knows a friend who sent an e-mail to the Korean Embassy in Poland two weeks ago but after one reply it simply stopped responding to her messages. "My friend's mom can't speak English, and she's not very good at Polish," Karyndal said. "How can her mom, who's over 50 years old, collect all these documents, go to Poland, and wait?"

Korea resumed visa-free entry for Russians on April 1. Ukrainian Ambassador to Korea Dmytro Ponomarenko criticized the difference in policies for Russians and Ukrainians in a Twitter post on March 25.

"Since 2006 Korean nationals can visit Ukraine visa-free, whereas Ukrainians still need a visa to enter Korea," Ponomarenko wrote. "It is a pity that at the time of Russia's brutal and unjustified war against Ukraine the Korean government decided to restore a visa-free regime with the Russian aggressor-state."

Some Ukrainians who are already in Korea have also fallen through the cracks of the automatic visa extension policy. Evelin Evy, an exchange student, has a student visa that was scheduled to expire during her winter break. Her extension application was denied three times because of clerical issues, and when Korea announced the automatic visa extension, hers was not included.

Since the visa has not been extended, she has not been able to register for government insurance or make money from part-time work. "It feels like there is no support for Ukrainian students," she complained. "I know it's not intentional, but now I can't make money, I don't have any health insurance."

Among those calling for more flexible immigration policies for Ukrainians is the Korean Bar Association. "The Korean government announced on Feb. 28 that Ukrainians in Korea would be granted stay extensions on humanitarian grounds so they could stay until the situation in Ukraine stabilizes," it said last week. "But considering the seriousness of the prolonged situation in Ukraine, such a measure is not enough. The Korean government should take further measures to accept refugees fleeing from Ukraine."

In response, the Foreign Ministry has only said that Korea is committed to helping Ukrainians, including through the streamlined visa application process.

Korea has an unimpressive record on refugees. Since it began accepting them in 1992, only a small fraction of asylum applications have been approved. From 1994 to 2020, the acceptance rate was a measly 1.5 percent.

This past summer, when Korea welcomed around 400 Afghans after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, it designated them "persons of special merit" rather than refugees because they had worked with Korean reconstruction teams there, apparently to discourage anti-immigrant sentiment.

Karnydal said she understands why Korea might hesitate to provide visa-free travel to Ukrainians. "My husband is Korean, and we know that Korea is a small country that has to worry about the economy, COVID, things like that," she said.

Still, she said, she hopes the Korean government will acknowledge the seriousness of the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine and loosen its migration policies for Ukrainians.
KYODO NEWS - Mar 17, 2022 - 14:32 | All, Japan

Japan's Self-Defense Forces launched a newly reorganized cyber-defense unit Thursday to enhance the country's response to attacks in cyberspace, a security domain that has played an increasingly important role in global conflicts.

The group, composed of around 540 personnel, is tasked with training human resources, supporting practical training, and managing information and communication networks.

The Japanese government sees the fields of outer space, cyberspace and the electromagnetic spectrum as key pillars in the military balance among nations and in boosting Japan's defense capabilities.

The establishment of the new cyber unit at the Defense Ministry headquarters in Tokyo reflects the urgent need to improve the SDF's capabilities in cyberspace.

"The threat of cyberattacks has been increasing and becoming more sophisticated day by day. As we face an urgent task to appropriately respond to it, the reorganization of the defense unit is a major step forward," Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi said in a ceremony to mark the launch of the unit.

The new unit combines cyber departments that had been dispersed among the Ground, Maritime and Air self-defense forces and will centralize cyber countermeasures.

Related coverage:

Japan guarded U.S., Australian military assets 22 times in 2021

Japan overturns decision to cancel U.S. drone acquisition

Japan's defense budget for 2022 hits record for 8th year
KYODO NEWS - Apr 5, 2022 - 00:01 | All, Japan

Japan's defense minister said Monday his ministry will consider requesting a larger budget for the next fiscal year to strengthen defense capabilities "drastically" to deal with China's intensifying military assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific region and North Korea's renewed missile and nuclear threats.

Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi said in an interview with Kyodo News that the ministry will go ahead with discussions on a controversial plan that would allow Japan, which has long held an exclusively defense-oriented policy under its war-renouncing Constitution, to acquire so-called enemy base strike capabilities.

"The defense budget is a major indicator that shows the nation's will," Kishi said. "We want to ensure a budget that is enough to strengthen our defense capabilities drastically" for the fiscal year through March 2024.

Japan's defense budget for the current fiscal year to March 2023 totaled 5.4 trillion yen ($44 billion), setting a record high for the eighth consecutive year and up 1.1 percent from the initial budget in the previous year. It increased for the 10th year in a row, and corresponds to about 1 percent of the country's gross domestic product.

Germany made a policy shift to increase defense expenditures to 2 percent of its GDP, the target for each North Atlantic Treaty Organization member, following Moscow's aggression on Ukraine.

"Our country must think (about a similar move) as well," Kishi said.

He said Japan needs to bolster its defense capabilities swiftly, given the increasingly severe regional security environment.

The minister's remarks reflect Tokyo's sense of urgency to counter Beijing's claims of sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands, a group of uninhabited islets under the control of Japan in the East China Sea. Diplomatic and defense experts have said Russia's unilateral attack on Ukraine could embolden China to attack Taiwan, which it views as a renegade province awaiting reunification by force if necessary.

Fears of increased North Korean military activities are also growing, as Pyongyang resumed the test-firing of intercontinental ballistic missiles last month for the first time since November 2017, and is reportedly preparing for a possible underground nuclear test.

Kishi said it is important to work together with the international community to deter China and to keep military emergencies in the Taiwan Strait from occurring.

Still, Japan should have capabilities such as to strike an enemy base to beef up deterrence so potential enemies believe they will have to "pay a price for attacking" the country, Kishi said.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has said the government will "examine all options necessary for national defense."

Kishi said it would be costly only to pursue bolstering capabilities to intercept missiles due to "rapidly advancing technologies" of North Korea in that area.
By Trend

Ankara is a significant regional power and the most dominant among all NATO member states, Kremlin said, emphasizing Russia's relations with Turkey, Trend reports citing Daily Sabah.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, in an interview with the Belarusian state television, touched upon relations with Turkey after negotiations between Russia and Ukraine were held in Istanbul.

He pointed out that President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an is a great and strong political leader and said: "Turkey is a very significant regional power and country. Our relations with Turkey are excellent."

He noted that there are different views on relations between the two countries and at some points, the sides do not fully agree with each other.

"But the relationship based on mutual interests is dominant, so the two countries are developing big economic projects."

"Turkey has always been a sufficiently large regional power, and Turkey has been a member of NATO for many years, he said. "However, despite this, it became the most dominant state among the NATO member sovereign states, especially during the presidency of Erdo?an. And this country is a country that has the luxury of defending its interests.

Citing that Turkish authorities told NATO and the United States that Ankara was not interested in participating in sanctions against Russia, Peskov said it is also economically important that Turkey and Russia continue the dialogue.

"This is very valuable. We attribute a lot of value to it, he said.

Referring to strengthening cooperation between Turkey and Russia in tourism and energy, he noted: "We have a good perspective with Turkey.

"We are pleased that Erdo?an has found the strength to defend and follow his interests, the interests of his country and is not in the mainstream (like Europe).

"As you know, now all Europeans are in the mainstream but on their own account, he said.

"They spend, Washington makes money. Because of its anger at Russia, Europe is shooting itself in the foot, he said.
KYODO NEWS - Apr 4, 2022 - 17:35 | World, All

Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam said Monday she will not run for a second term as chief executive of the territory in a leadership election slated for May 8.

Lam, who became the first female chief executive of Hong Kong in 2017 after being chosen as a Beijing-favored candidate, revealed her decision in a daily COVID-19 press briefing, citing family affairs.

It has been reported that the No. 2 official in Hong Kong, Chief Secretary for Administration John Lee, will join the race for the city's next leader.

"This is not a question of evaluating my performance or the performance of the SAR government in this term," Lam told journalists, referring to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region that exists under China's "one country, two systems" policy.

"This is a question of my personal wish and aspiration, and my personal wish and aspiration is entirely based on my family consideration," she said, without elaborating.

During her tenure, Lam, 64, became one of the most divisive leaders in the city after proposing a bill to allow extraditions to mainland China, a move that sparked a series of large-scale protests that eventually morphed into the 2019 pro-democracy movement.

Following the mass protests, Beijing imposed a series of measures to crack down on dissent in Hong Kong, including a sweeping national security law that criminalized acts of secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces.

Lam also led the city's fight against the coronavirus pandemic, adopting a stringent "zero-COVID" strategy mirroring that of the mainland.

Lam has said that she will complete her five-year term on June 30, bringing an end to more than 40 years of public service.

She expressed thanks to Beijing and her team for their support.

When asked about Lee's bid, Lam said she could "not comment on any prospective candidates," but said that she had yet to receive any resignation letters from senior officials.

Before being elevated to the No. 2 post in Hong Kong last month, Lee, who was formerly on the police force, served as secretary for security during a crackdown on pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily.

He also directed the security response to large-scale protests during the 2019 anti-government movement.

The nomination period for the chief executive election began on Sunday, with the election to take place on May 8.

Hong Kong's government earlier this month postponed the upcoming election to focus on its battle against surging COVID-19 infections fueled by the highly transmissible Omicron variant.

Related coverage:

Hong Kong lifts flight bans from 9 states, halves quarantine period

Hong Kong postpones chief executive election amid COVID-19 outbreak

China's Xi tells Hong Kong to contain COVID outbreak as "top priority"
KYODO NEWS - Apr 5, 2022 - 00:15 | All, World, Japan

Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi said in Poland on Monday he will take 20 Ukrainian evacuees to Japan on a government plane when leaving the Eastern European country later in the day.

"We have decided that 20 evacuees, who are wishing to travel to Japan but unable to secure means of transportation on their own, will get on a backup government plane when I return to Japan," Hayashi told reporters before leaving the capital Warsaw.

Hayashi had visited Poland since Saturday as a special envoy of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to show Tokyo's commitment to global efforts at helping Ukrainians fleeing the war. He left Warsaw on Monday afternoon and is set to return home Tuesday.

Earlier Monday, Hayashi held talks with his Polish counterpart Zbigniew Rau. Speaking to reporters alongside Rau after the meeting, the Japanese minister condemned the discovery of the bodies of 410 civilians in the Kyiv region announced Sunday by Ukrainian authorities following the withdrawal of Russian troops from the region.

Hayashi called it "extremely appalling" and "absolutely unacceptable." He also said Japan will accept "as many (Ukrainians) as possible" from a humanitarian perspective.

"I express my respect to and solidarity with Polish people who are responding to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, an outrageous act, at the forefront," Hayashi said, adding, "We will keep working with our strategic partner Poland to maintain the free and open international order."

The foreign minister also held talks with Polish President Andrzej Duda and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki.

Japan had been planning to take a few dozen evacuees on a government plane at the end of Hayashi's trip, as skyrocketing airfares following the Russian invasion have made Ukrainians in Poland reluctant to go to Japan even if they wanted to.

The government plans to provide support to the 20 evacuees for around six months after their arrival, from housing to employment to language learning, according to senior vice justice minister Jun Tsushima who accompanied Hayashi to Poland.

On Saturday, Hayashi met with his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba, who was also in the Polish capital Warsaw, assuring him of Tokyo's "firm resolve" to provide more humanitarian aid to Ukrainians.

The following day, Hayashi visited a border checkpoint and a refugee reception center in Medyka in southeastern Poland, which has seen refugees pour in from across the border with Ukraine, to see what aid Tokyo should provide to Ukrainian evacuees.

He also exchanged views with personnel of international organizations, such as the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, in Japan's temporary liaison office in Rzeszow, another city in the southeast.

As of Saturday, 4.17 million refugees had fled Ukraine since the start of the conflict, including 2.42 million to Poland, according to the UNHCR.

Since Moscow launched military attacks on Ukraine, Japan had accepted 393 Ukrainian evacuees as of Saturday, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said at a press conference in Tokyo Monday.

Kishida had initially planned to dispatch Justice Minister Yoshihisa Furukawa to Poland but decided to send Hayashi instead because Furukawa was found to be a close contact of a family member infected with the coronavirus.

Related coverage:

Japan foreign minister visits Poland-Ukraine border crossing point

Japan foreign minister in Poland to take Ukrainian evacuees

Hayashi to take 30 Ukraine evacuees to Japan after touring Poland








ISLAMABAD, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) has been contributing to the country's economic development while promoting regional connectivity and prosperity, Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said on Saturday.

"We envision Pakistan emerging as the gateway to China's western regions, Afghanistan and Central Asia" through CPEC, Qureshi said at the two-day Islamabad Security Dialogue.

Pakistan is endeavoring to reap peace dividends in Afghanistan in the form of enhanced connectivity and trade, he added.

Stressing Pakistan's policy of shifting from geo-politics to geo-economics, Qureshi said the country is advocating peaceful co-existence and win-win cooperation, adding that its location makes it a natural hub for economic confluence for different states.

"We are positioning Pakistan as an economic hub, a melting pot for positive global interests focusing on enhancing connectivity, development partnerships, and peace within our borders and beyond."

Qureshi said Pakistan will continue to support an equitable and inclusive global order where no one is left behind, adding that zero-sum perspectives must be shed.

"We need to focus on cooperation, rather than confrontation and must strive for a world of peace, progress and prosperity in which benefits of development are shared by all."





Produced by Xinhua Global Service
ANKARA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Turkey's exports climbed by 19.8 percent year on year to 22.7 billion U.S. dollars in March, Trade Minister Mehmet Mus announced Monday.

"This the highest export figure for March of all time," the Turkish minister said at a press conference in the capital Ankara, adding the momentum gained in exports in 2021 continues this year.

Meanwhile, the country's imports amounted to 30.9 billion dollars in March, with energy imports taking an important place, according to the minister.

Turkey's foreign trade volume in March reached 53.6 billion dollars, up 26 percent compared to the same month last year, Mus said.

Turkey aims to increase last year's 225.4-billion-dollar export record to 250 billion dollars in 2022, he added. 
RAMALLAH, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The Palestinian presidential spokesman warned on Monday that the Israeli escalation against the Palestinians would lead to more tension in the entire region.

Condemning Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid's visit to Damascus Gate in the Old City of East Jerusalem on Sunday, Nabil Abu Rudeineh said in a statement that this visit is "irresponsible."

"The ongoing behavior of the Israeli army and police and the actions of the Israeli settlers are provocative," Abu Rudeineh added.

The continued Israeli escalation in East Jerusalem and the Israeli settlers' assaults on Al-Aqsa Mosque are "a clear and blatant violation that proves Israel's lack of commitment to the understandings and the signed agreements," the spokesman noted.

On Sunday night, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said in a statement that 19 Palestinians were injured by Israeli police during clashes outside Damascus Gate in East Jerusalem following Lapid's visit.

In the 1967 Middle East war, Israel occupied the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, which are all claimed by the Palestinians, and has controlled or besieged them ever since.

Since then, the Palestinians have been seeking self-determination in a bid to establish an independent state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. 
JUBA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- South Sudan's main opposition, Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army-In-Opposition (SPLM/A-IO), has agreed to resume participation in the security mechanisms after recently opting out due to "unprovoked" attacks on its positions.

First Vice President Riek Machar, leader of the SPLM/A-IO, on March 22 announced announced his party's withdrawal from meetings of the crucial security mechanisms, such as the strategic defense and security review (SDSR), the joint transitional security committee (JTSC), the joint military ceasefire commission (JMCC), and the joint defense board (JDB).

"The SPLM/SPLA-IO leadership hereby lifts the suspension of participation in SPLM/SPLA-IO in the meetings of security mechanisms, namely JDB, JTSC, JMCC, SDSR Board, CTSAMVM (Ceasefire Transitional Security Arrangement Monitoring Verification Mechanism), as well as the National Transitional Committee (NTC) and Reconstituted Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission (RJMEC), with immediate effect," Machar said in a statement issued in Juba, the capital of South Sudan, on Sunday.

The decision followed a visit by Mohamed Hamdan Daqlu, deputy head of the Sudan Sovereign Council, who also held talks with President Salva Kiir and other signatories to the 2018 revitalized peace deal.

The parties also signed an agreement on the structure of a unified army command that will be in charge of the 83,000 unified forces once they are graduated.

"Today we signed the agreement on the structure of the army command in the unification and one week from now, all the forces who are in cantonment will begin the graduation of the first batch," said Tut Gatluak Manime, Kiir's advisor on security.

The SPLM/A-IO and the South Sudan People's Defense Forces (SSPDF) clashed last week in the oil-rich regions of Upper Nile and Unity states, leading to fresh fears of the fragile peace deal collapsing.

The United Nations Mission in South Sudan, the African Union, and the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) that brokered the peace deal have recently met all the parties to push them back to the negotiating table.

The transitional period ends in February 2023, and afterward that the world's youngest nation will hold its first national election. 
JERUSALEM, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett discussed Monday the Iranian nuclear deal and other regional issues with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi in a phone call, the Israeli Prime Minister's Office said in a statement.

Modi offered his condolences for the 11 people who were killed in a recent string of attacks in Israel, the office said.

Last week, Bennet postponed his planned visit to India, which was scheduled for April, as tensions between Israelis and Palestinians escalated. The phone call was the first of its kind between the two leaders after the postponement of the visit.

"The two agreed to advance an alternative date for the visit," the statement said, adding that the trip would mark the 30th anniversary of the establishment of official ties between the countries. 
Tourists are seen after arriving at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Terminal 1 in Paranaque City, the Philippines, Feb. 11, 2022. (Xinhua/Rouelle Umali)

Official said the number of arrivals in the Philippines has gradually increased since February when the travel restrictions over COVID-19 eased. The country now allows fully vaccinated international visitors to enter quarantine-free.

MANILA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- More and more inbound travelers visit the Philippines after the Southeast Asian country eases entry restrictions, allowing all fully vaccinated international visitors to enter the country without quarantine.

Filipino overseas worker Eyom Rivera, his wife, and his daughter are reunited with their families in the Philippines after arriving this Friday from Dubai where they have lived for the past four years.



The family were scheduled to visit home for a wedding in April 2020, but the pandemic derailed their plan. While waiting for the travel restrictions to ease, the couple decided to marry in a civil rite in Dubai, where their daughter was born.



When the Philippines loosened the travel rules, the young couple decided to go home and share their happiness with family members living in Albay province, approximately 500 kilometers south of Manila.



A tourist is seen after arriving at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Terminal 1 in Paranaque City, the Philippines, Feb. 11, 2022. (Xinhua/Rouelle Umali)

The Philippines' Bureau of Immigration recorded an uptick in the arrivals of overseas Filipinos and foreign tourists since the country eased the pandemic restrictions imposed over two years ago.



"The number of arrivals gradually increased since February when the travel restrictions eased," immigration spokesperson Dana Sandoval told a virtual press conference.



Sandoval said the daily arrival was less than 5,000 before February, while the number rose to around 9,000 after the opening and further increased to 12,000 by end-March.



From April 1, the Philippines reverted to pre-pandemic immigration entry rules, allowing fully vaccinated travelers from all countries to enter without quarantine.



Sandoval said most arriving travelers are holidaying Filipinos like the Riveras, and around 30 percent are foreign nationals.



Moonlight over beach in Batangas Province, the Philippines on Nov. 18, 2021. Batangas is one of the most popular tourist destinations near Metro Manila. (Xinhua/Rouelle Umali)

"The Koreans have been the top visitors, and those coming from the United States and Japan where many Filipinos live with their foreign families," Sandoval said, adding the bureau expects more tourists to flock into the country this summer.



"Historically, many foreigners from colder countries visit the Philippines because of our tropical climate," said she.



Before the pandemic struck, South Koreans and Chinese were the top visitors to the country, according to Sandoval.

"Our borders are open; more or less, we are already back to our pre-pandemic visa policies as we enter the new normal," Sandoval said.

However, she reminded travelers to adhere to basic health protocols, such as wearing a face mask, keeping a safe distance, or avoiding crowds to be safe and healthy.



The COVID-19 infections in the Philippines continue to fall. Department of Health's data showed average daily cases of less than 400 in the country with around 110 million population. Around 67 million Filipinos have been fully vaccinated as of April 1. 


Security personnel stand guard outside the National Assembly building in Islamabad, Pakistan, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Ahmad Kamal)

Pakistani President Arif Alvi on Sunday dissolved the country's National Assembly, or the lower house of the parliament, on the advice of Prime Minister Imran Khan after a motion of no-confidence by joint opposition against Khan was declared unconstitutional.

by Xinhua writers Misbah Saba Malik and Raheela Nazir

ISLAMABAD, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Pakistani President Arif Alvi on Sunday dissolved the country's National Assembly, or the lower house of the parliament, on the advice of Prime Minister Imran Khan after a motion of no-confidence by joint opposition against Khan was declared unconstitutional.

The session to vote on the no-confidence motion was convened on Sunday morning, during which the country's Minister of Information Fawad Chaudhry said that the motion is an "effective operation of regime change by a foreign government," which has joined hands with the local parties to topple the Pakistani government through the no-confidence motion.

Chaudhry said that the Constitution asks every citizen of Pakistan to be loyal to the country rather than a foreign power, questioning the constitutional validity of the motion brought on the directives of a foreign power, amid the chants of "the friend of the United States is a traitor" from the government benches.

Approving Chaudhry's argument, Deputy Speaker Qasim Khan Suri, who was chairing the session, rejected the no-confidence motion, citing article 5 of the Constitution that "no foreign government is allowed to conduct regime change operations against an elected government."

Following the rejection of the motion, Khan said in a televised address to the nation that he has sent an advice to the president to dissolve the National Assembly, calling for an interim government before going for fresh elections.

"Today, the deputy speaker foiled that agenda by rejecting no-confidence motion... A conspiracy was being hatched ... The nation will not let such kind of conspiracies succeed," Khan said.

The prime minister said that the Pakistani public will now use its right to choose its government through elections, adding that no foreign power should be allowed to make decisions through conspiracies.

"I want to tell my nation to start preparing for elections and not let any foreign power decide the future of Pakistan."

The no-confidence motion was moved by an alliance of major opposition parties of the country, which claimed to have 177 member representations in the National Assembly, five votes more than the required to de-seat the prime minister.

On March 27, while addressing a public gathering in Islamabad, Khan mentioned receiving a letter on March 7, a day prior to the filing of the motion in the National Assembly, from a Pakistani ambassador to a "powerful country" stating that the ambassador was informed about the motion even before it was moved, and warned of consequences if the country failed to de-seat Khan.

Khan later revealed that the United States showed displeasure when he visited Russia in February, telling Pakistani officials, in official communication with them, of regime change through the no-confidence motion.

A meeting of the National Security Committee on March 31 also took notice of the foreign attempt to topple the government and an official demarche was made through official channels to the U.S. embassy in Pakistan, Khan said.

Reacting to the government's move to call for early elections following the dissolution of the assembly, the leader of the opposition in the lower house Shahbaz Sharif said that the rejection of the motion by the deputy speaker of the National Assembly is unconstitutional.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, chairman of the opposition Pakistan Peoples Party, said that the government has violated the Constitution by not allowing voting to take place.

The opposition alliance refused to accept the dissolution of the National Assembly and submitted a petition to the Supreme Court of Pakistan, pleading to review the ruling given by Suri, set aside the prime minister's advice to the president to dissolve the National Assembly, and that parliament session should be summoned again to conduct voting on the no-confidence motion.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court of Pakistan took a suo-moto notice of the ongoing situation in the country, with Chief Justice of Pakistan Umar Ata Bandial holding an important meeting with their fellow judges to deliberate on the current political and constitutional crisis evolved after the opposition's no-confidence motion was rejected. 
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic speaks at the ceremony of the Remembrance Day for the Victims of the NATO Aggression, in Kraljevo, Serbia, March 24, 2022. (Xinhua/Shi Zhongyu)

Vucic said that his results were based on the counted votes from 85 percent of polling stations. Serbian Republic Electoral Commission (RIK) announced that it will publish preliminary results on Monday.



BELGRADE, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic declared his convincing victory on Sunday in the first round of the presidential elections, securing another five-year term.

According to preliminary results of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) revealed by Vucic, he won between 59-and 61 percent in the elections, while the ruling SNS won 44 percent of parliamentary elections.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic casts his ballots at a polling station for presidential, parliamentary and local elections in Belgrade, Serbia, April 3, 2022. (Photo by Predrag Milosavljevic/Xinhua)

Vucic said that his results were based on the counted votes from 85 percent of polling stations. Serbian Republic Electoral Commission (RIK) announced that it will publish preliminary results on Monday.

Around 6.5 million registered voters casted ballots on Sunday to choose between eight presidential candidates, and 19 parties or coalitions for the parliament.

A voter casts ballots at a polling station for presidential, parliamentary and local elections in Belgrade, Serbia, April 3, 2022. (Photo by Predrag Milosavljevic/Xinhua)
By Trend

Some of the leading Turkish defense industry companies will attend the 21st International Air and Space Fair (FIDAE) this year, which will be held in the Chilean capital Santiago, Trend reports citing Daily Sabah.

The participation of Turkish companies comes as the rapidly growing sector expands its area of potential purchasers.

This years fair is set to be held with the support of the Chilean Air Force Command on April 5-10.

FIDAE, which is held every two years, has been one of the most important defense fairs in the Latin American region since 1980 when it was held for the first time.

Turkish companies will try to take advantage of cooperation and marketing opportunities for regional countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Peru, particularly Chile.

The local companies will participate in the fair with the concept of the "Turkish National Pavilion" together with the Defense Industry Exporters' Association under the leadership of the Presidency of Defense Industries (SSB).

Defense giant Aselsan, Aspilsan, world-renowned pistol brand Canik, prominent defense company Havelsan, leading armored vehicle manufacturers Nurol Makine and Otokar, Repkon, Roketsan, T?SA? and Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) are among those who will be attending the fair.

During the fair, Turkish company officials will meet with decision-makers and other companies of the participating countries.

The official Turkish delegation will also hold talks with Chilean authorities and the representatives of participating countries.

Turkish defense industry companies will promote and present armored vehicle platforms, various manned and unmanned aerial vehicles, naval systems, weapon systems, electronic systems, ammunition, simulators, logistics support products and defense services within the scope of the fair.

Last year, Turkish defense giants attended another large-scale Latin American defense air, Expodefensa 2021, held in Bogota between Nov. 29-Dec. 1 and organized in association with the Colombian Defense Ministry.




NANNING, April 4 (Xinhua) -- A freight train left Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region on Saturday for Laos' Vientiane, marking the opening of Guangxi's first international freight train that runs via the China-Laos Railway.

Loaded with 165 tonnes of industrial products produced by companies in Guangxi, the train will arrive in Vientiane in three days, according to the China Railway Nanning Group Co., Ltd.

Compared with sea shipping and other traditional methods, the freight train can cut the transportation time by more than 10 days, which helps save companies' costs, said Qian Feng, general manager of the Sinotrans Limited Guangxi branch, a participant in the cross-border transportation.

"The operation of the China-Laos Railway has created convenient and efficient traffic conditions for Guangxi's products to enter the Laos market, and a number of companies interested in developing business in Laos have consulted us," said Qian.

The China-Laos Railway, which kicked off operation on Dec. 3, 2021, stretches over 1,000 km, linking Kunming, the capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province, with the Laotian capital Vientiane.





Produced by Xinhua Global Service
















LISBON, April 4 (Xinhua) -- The Portuguese government authorized an expenditure of 32.7 million euros (35.9 million U.S. dollars) for the purchase of medicines against COVID-19 in 2022, according to a government decree published on Monday.

The resolution of the Council of Ministers said that the expenditure is necessary "because of the evolution of the pandemic situation," and aims to ensure the Portuguese people have access to "therapeutic options for the disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus."

Signed by Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa, the order authorizes the acquisition of the antiviral drug Remdesivir, as well as funding for the storage and acquisition of vaccines against COVID-19.

The Portuguese government said that the expenditure is justified to "put an end to the pandemic" and provide "therapeutic alternatives to treat infected people", such as "monoclonal antibodies," "oral antivirals," and "immunomodulators".

Access to these medicines can only be granted through a centralized procurement procedure within the framework of the Strategy for COVID-19 Therapeutics program, whose management is the responsibility of the European Commission. (1 euro = 1.10 U.S. dollars) 
ADEN, Yemen, April 4 (Xinhua) -- A newly-reached ceasefire between Yemen's warring parties, which came into force on Saturday, has brought hope to the millions of citizens in the war-torn country, who have been locked in an abysmal humanitarian crisis.

However, analysts say they are not optimistic about the future of the truce, and it still needs a great amount of work to achieve lasting peace in Yemen.

NEW HOPE

An audible sigh of relief could be heard across Yemen, the poorest Arab country, when the United Nations Special Envoy for Yemen Hans Grundberg declared the ceasefire on April 1.

It is the first all-around ceasefire agreed by Yemen's warring parties in years, and has offered new hope for reducing violence and suffering in the brutal conflict, which caused "the biggest humanitarian crisis on earth," according to the UN.

In a statement, Grundberg said that the success of this initiative will depend on the warring parties' commitment to implementing the truce agreement and humanitarian measures.

The UN envoy pointed out that this truce aims to give Yemenis a necessary break from violence, and relief from humanitarian suffering, stressing that this truce can be renewed beyond the two-month period with the consent of the parties.

The Yemeni government and Houthi militia welcomed the ceasefire in separate statements on Friday. They also voiced their readiness to exchange all war prisoners and political detainees.

According to Adel Al-Shujaa, a political science professor at Sanaa University, the ceasefire is an important step toward alleviating the suffering of Yemenis who have been subjected to nonstop shelling and armed clashes for the past seven years.

On Sunday, just several hours after the announcement of the ceasefire, the Yemeni riyal gained almost 13 percent, a rare uptick for the country's currency that has lost more than half of its value since the start of the war.

Money traders confirmed to Xinhua that the riyal climbed for the first time in months, reaching 1,070 riyals against 1 U.S. dollar in the government-controlled areas, compared to 1,260 riyals a week earlier.

"We hope the peace can last and our life can be normal again," said Mohammed Weshah, a Sanaa resident who has lost a family member to an airstrike back in 2017.

Yemen has been mired in a civil war since late 2014 when the Houthi militia seized control of several northern provinces and forced the Saudi-backed government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi out of the capital Sanaa.

The Saudi-led Arab coalition intervened on March 26, 2015, to support the Yemeni government.

In a recent report, The United Nations said the war had killed more than 370,000 people by the end of 2021 and displaced around 4 million. Around two-thirds of the country's 30 million citizens are in need of humanitarian assistance.

TRUCE RIDDLED WITH OBSTACLES

When the third month of 2022 started, hardly anyone would have predicted a ceasefire could be reached in Yemen at its end.

For months, the Houthi group has stepped up their cross-border drone and missile attacks on oil and military facilities in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). In response, the Saudi-led coalition launched an array of retaliatory airstrikes that killed hundreds of people.

Fares Albeel, a Yemeni college professor and political commentator, told Xinhua that the ceasefire was rushed into effectivity, and the truce deal lacked powerful guarantees and observation teams on the ground to watch over the cessation of hostilities between the warring parties.

The ceasefire is possible because the Gulf countries are facing pressure from the international community as Yemen's humanitarian crisis has gone from bad to worse, said Albeel, adding that this does not mean that the Saudi-led coalition is happy to see a legitimatized Houthi presence in the country.

Al-Shujaa from Sanaa University also pointed to the fragility of the ceasefire as the reasons and regional players behind the country's years-long conflict are still in place.

"It seems that the regional powers are not currently convinced to put an end to Yemen's war," Al-Shujaa told Xinhua.

Al-Taher also expressed skepticism about achieving a lasting truce because both sides lack common ground on which to build peace, adding that there is widespread skepticism about the Houthi's sincerity in Aden, where the internationally recognized government is currently seated.

On Sunday, one day after the beginning of the ceasefire, the internationally recognized government accused the Houthis of frequently breaking the UN-brokered deal.

The Yemeni Defense Ministry said two attacks were repelled by pro-government army troops in the central province of Marib and in the southwestern province of Taiz.

On the other hand, the Houthi militia also claimed on Sunday that the pro-government forces breached the UN-brokered ceasefire in many contested areas across the war-ravaged country. 
ACCRA, April 4 (Xinhua) -- At least five persons lost their lives, and seven others were severely injured in a road crash along the Accra-Kumasi highway in Ghana on Monday, Police confirmed.

Ebenezer Tetteh, Spokesman for the Eastern Regional Command of the Ghana Police Service, said a van traveling from Kumasi, Ghana's second largest city to Accra, rammed into an articulated truck traveling in the opposite direction early Monday.

"Five persons on board the van, including the driver, died on the spot. Their bodies have been deposited at a morgue in the Eastern Region," he said.

Tetteh added that seven male occupants of the van were also severely injured and receiving treatment at a hospital in the Eastern Region.

"Investigations are underway into the actual cause of the accident, and we shall keep the public informed about the outcome of investigations," he added. 
SYDNEY, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Australia's national postal service, Australia Post, has released two postage stamps to mark the platinum jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II, as the nation commemorates her 70th year as Head of the Commonwealth.

The two stamps, unveiled to the public on Monday, depict portraits of Queen Elizabeth II from 1952, the year she rose to the throne, and 2019, highlighting her longevity as Head of the Commonwealth, which includes countries such as Australia, Canada, and New Zealand.

Australia Post Group Philatelic Manager Michael Zsolt said the latest additions form part of the service's tradition of honoring Queen Elizabeth II.

Queen Elizabeth II is the most featured person on Australian stamps, and the Australia Post was the first postal authority in the Commonwealth to produce a stamp for her birthday each year, Zsolt said.

The Australia Post had previously released stamps to celebrate the golden and diamond jubilees of Queen Elizabeth II, marking 50 and 60 years of her service.

While Queen Elizabeth II has very little involvement in the governance of Australia, she still plays a prominent cultural role in Australian life. Her image is also displayed on Australian coins and the five-dollar banknote.

The postage stamps and associated collectables are expected to go on sale from Tuesday. 
A member of the British Communist Party lays a flower in front of Macfarlane's tombstone, in Cheshire, Britain, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Li Ying)

CHESHIRE, the United Kingdom, April 3 (Xinhua) -- The late translator of the first English version of the Communist Manifesto, Helen Macfarlane, was commemorated by members of the British Communist Party on Sunday.

During the commemorative event in Cheshire, northwest England, members of the British Communist Party laid flowers on Macfarlane's tombstone, hailing her historical contribution in spreading Marxism.

Born in Scotland in 1818, Macfarlane was a revolutionary journalist and columnist. In February 1848, the Communist Manifesto, written in German, was published in London. Two years later, Macfarlane's English translation of the Communist Manifesto was published.

In a statement, Zheng Xiyuan, the Chinese Consul General in Manchester, paid tribute to the life and legacy of Macfarlane, describing her work "had a major impact on the international communist movement and the development of human history. It is well-known that the Chinese version of the Communist Manifesto was translated from the English and Japanese versions."

According to Kevan Nelson, the international secretary of Communist Party of Britain, Macfarlane's English translation of the Communist Manifesto impacted the British working-class movement at that time. Marxism still plays an important role in British society, helping people to better understand the problems of capitalism and inequalities.

Nelson noted that he was impressed by China's development led by the Communist Party of China and the Chinese government during the past years, acknowledging China's role in helping other countries' development through mutual cooperation.

"China's contribution to human development, not just within China, is profound," he said. 

Zheng Xiyuan, Chinese Consul General in Manchester, pays tribute to the life and legacy of Macfarlane, in front of her tombstone in Cheshire, Britain, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Li Ying)

A member of the British Communist Party holds flower in front of Macfarlane's tombstone, hailing her historical contribution in spreading Marxism, in Cheshire, Britain, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Li Ying)

Members of the British Communist Party hold flowers in front of Macfarlane's tombstone, hailing her historical contribution in spreading Marxism, in Cheshire, Britain, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Li Ying)

Members of the British Communist Party hold flowers in front of Macfarlane's tombstone, hailing her historical contribution in spreading Marxism, in Cheshire, Britain, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Li Ying)

Flowers and wreaths are seen on Macfarlane's tombstone, hailing her historical contribution in spreading Marxism, in Cheshire, Britain, April 3, 2022. (Xinhua/Li Ying)
Dhaka: A professor at a private college in Bangladesh has alleged that a "police officer" tortured her and threatened to kill her if she was put on a bindi. After this, the woman teacher has appealed to the higher officials of the police and demanded protection. According to media reports, the victim, Lota Sumaddaer, teaches at Tejgaon College.

On Saturday morning, she was on her way to college, meanwhile, on the way, she was tortured by a police officer to such an extent that she felt unsafe. In her complaint to the police, Lota said that the police officer on the bike used indecent words while making derogatory remarks about putting up a bindi on her. The woman professor said that when she resisted the police officer's action, they threatened to kill her.

Lota Sumadder said the accused police officer also tried to hit her with their bike, but she quickly went aside and saved herself. Utpal Barua, a high-ranking officer of the Sher-e-Bangla Nagar police station in the capital, said, "The professor does not remember the name of the accused police officer. But she gave a number of bikes to the police. On the basis of which the investigation is being carried out."

9th student came to meet online friend, raped

Indore youth lost his life due to online game, know the whole matter here

Befriended girlfriend's husband as a girl on FB, called to meet and then..."
NEW DELHI: External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar will visit Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday, and is expected to brief him on Sri Lanka's economic crisis and Pakistan's political turmoil.

Sri Lanka is in the midst of its worst economic crisis in its history. Due to a significant lack of foreign money, the island nation has been unable to pay for crucial imports, like fuel, resulting in power outages lasting up to 13 hours.

Following the resignation of Sri Lanka's cabinet on Sunday, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa asked all political parties, including the opposition, to accept ministerial positions and assist in the resolution of the country's current economic crisis on Monday.

Meanwhile, Pakistan is experiencing political unrest following Prime Minister Imran Khan's defiance of a coup attempt by calling new elections after dissolving Parliament.

It inflamed opposition rage and exacerbated the country's political predicament. The opposition denounced the deed as treacherous and promised to fight back.

Lavrov discusses Russia-India-China trilateral mechanism, development

Russian Foreign Minister holds bilateral talks with Jaishankar in Delhi

PM Modi to attend BIMSTEC virtual Summit today
In Bollywood and TV industry, couples are formed in the coming days and it does not take long for them to break. Yes, resentment among many couples and then reaching for divorce is not a new thing nowadays. Now there's another great news amidst all of this. In fact, actor Rohit Bhardwaj, who played the role of Yudhishthira in the highly liked 'Mahabharat' serial on Star Plus, has made a shocking revelation. Yes, he recently revealed about his personal life and said that he is going to get a divorce from his wife Poonam Bhardwaj after 16 years of marriage.

Apart from this, Rohit said that he and Poonam have been living separately for four years and he has not seen their daughter's face for two years. According to the media report coming out, why there was a need to get a divorce from his wife Poonam Bhardwaj, the actor has cited his trip to Indonesia in the year 2017 as the reason. In fact, Rohit said that he had gone on a trip to Indonesia for about a year and a half, only after returning from there, the situation changed. Rohit further said, "I have been living alone for the last 4-5 years. There were differences before, which grew, especially after I returned from Indonesia.''

Rohit also said, "I tried to end the dispute with my wife. But he couldn't save his marriage. Our relationship was struggling with issues of differences and compatibility. The divorce is in the process and should be in two months. Rohit Bhardwaj lost his mother due to a heart attack last year. He hasn't recovered from this shock yet. At the moment, Rohit is constantly travelling between Delhi and Mumbai. In fact, he has to stay in Mumbai in connection with work and is also taking care of his father living alone in Delhi.

Comedian Bharti Singh became a mother, but this wish remained unfulfilled

Bharti Singh's house echoes with a small guest's cry

Because of this, Guddi Maruti became famous by the name Tuntun
Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban on his party's parliamentary election victory on Monday, saying he looked forward to continuing to work with him to deepen the close and friendly connections between India and Hungary.

Hungary's nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban said victory in Sunday's national elections, claiming a mandate for a fourth term despite a still-uncompleted vote count showing his right-wing party in a solid lead.

"Congratulations, Prime Minister Viktor Orban, on your win in Hungary's parliamentary elections," Modi tweeted. I look forward to continuing to work with you to improve the close and friendly connections between India and Hungary."

Hungarian polls opened early Sunday in Hungary, giving voters the option of voting for a broad, Western-looking alliance of opposition parties or giving nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban a fourth consecutive term in government.

PM Modi likely visit Assam on April 28 to inaugurate Cancer Hospital

PM Modi to be troubleshooter of SL amid sinking situation!

'PM is secular in terms of price rise...', Congress takes a dig at PM Modi
By Trend

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Georgia David Zalkaliani has resigned from his position, Prime Minister of Georgia Irakli Garibashvili said at the governmental briefing, Trend reports via Georgian media.

The former Head of the Government Administration of Georgia, Ilia Darchiashvili, has been appointed to this position, the PM said.

Zalkaliani has been Georgias FM since June 21, 2018, and a Deputy PM - from January 21, 2021. The PM noted that Zalkaliani will continue to serve as an ambassador to the US.

Ilia Darchiashvili has been the Head of the Government Administration since 2021. Prior to that, he was the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Georgia to the Republic of Poland.
Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has stated that the United States has no compassion for Muslim countries in the region, as per the president's official website.

In a phone chat with his Iraqi counterpart Barham Salih on Sunday, Raisi said that it has become clear that the external force is just interested in its own interests and hegemonic aims.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani reportedly stated that Iran supports Iraq in advancing its unity, independence, security, and regional and international position, emphasising that any insecurity in Iraq would be detrimental to the entire area.

According to Raisi, the extent of Iran-"brotherly Iraq's and friendly" relations goes beyond that of two neighbours. Meanwhile, the Iraqi President emphasised the importance of strengthening bilateral collaboration with Iran in order to address regional difficulties, placing a high priority on regional stability and security.

Regional crises can be resolved exclusively by the countries in the region, without the need for outside intervention, Salih said.

Pakistan toward civil war! As soon as no-confidence motion rejected, opposition leaders created ruckus

Imran's government minister taunts opposition in a few moments, adopts 'captain's plan'

Imran's govt swung into action before voting on no-confidence motion, made this big announcement
In every nook and cranny of the city, what see you today are rap battles. And, all this has been made possible by All Nepal Thugs Family (ANTF) and rather its announcement on social media that the winner of the rap battle will get a cash prize of Rs 100,000.

But, more than the cash prize, the rare platform has attracted the youth. The youth are from the generation whose talents are not valued by society.

So, they carry some grievances towards that very society, their family and themselves. Grievances that have started a fire in their hearts, and that they want to pour out all that complaints, grievances, impulses, pain and frustration somewhere, that too poetically It is their way of expression and vocabulary of their life.

In the crowd, a 21-year-old lean young man named Sudeep Bhandari enters the crowd.

But, he is not known by his real name, and his stage name is super-famous. G-Bob stands in the middle of the crowd with judges on one side and his opponent on the other. The eager crowd is gathered to watch the growing tension between the two. The moderator announces, The first round starts now, lets go and passes the mic to G-Bob.

And, with his unique style, G-Bob rises to the top in the eccentric world of rap music. His confidence, his sharp wit, his uninterrupted creation and aggressive yet flawless delivery, all have made his presence so powerful and make it a sight to behold.

In reply, G-Bobs competitor, Sirupate scoffs and says he neither has nice shoes nor a way to hold his mic. Swiftly, G-Bob responds in his own style.

He comes quietly, wins the round and quietly, in the same way, gets lost in the crowd and the noise. But, his edgy words are still lingering in the air leaving people to wonder Who is he? Where did he come from? Where did he go?

Who is G-Bob?

G-Bob is a temporary resident of Godavari in Lalitpur whereas his ancestral home is in Gorkha. He passed grade 12 without going to school and enrolled as a student in a college to study for a bachelors in information technology.

He is carefree but brilliant and uses his life as content for his rap battles. A street poet by nature, always moving and very creative, his aspiration is to become an artist. Thus, Sudeep Bhandari became G-Bob.

Famous storyteller Saigrace Pokharel discusses G-Bob in one of his video series, saying, The words he chooses include the words used by old people and the slang used by contemporary youth. He is talented in his replies and is a complete package of literature, music and rap.

His unbeaten streak took him through the first, second and then third rounds of the ANTF rap battle. With his talent, he melted the hearts of the judges and opponents alike.

Similarly, his next rap battle with Maila became public on YouTube. And, his words spread like wildfire, from the dance floors of nightclubs to TikTok and from the YouTube trending section to the hearts of the youth.

Because his words resonated well with the people, G-Bob went viral overnight.

Where does he come from?

As the ANTF was beginning its preparation for the final clash, youth were eagerly awaiting his final battle. People were excited even though this rap battle was held in some unnamed street of Kathmandu, many even travelled to Kathmandu all the way from Tanahun.

In the meantime, rumours started circulating that someone abducted G-Bob. Where did he go? What is he doing? Nobody knows. His news put direct pressure on the organisers.

Behind the success, however, people did not know that this beloved rapper was losing one battle after another with himself. His drug addiction was squeezing the life out of him. This 21-year-old rapper has been struggling with his addiction for the last five years. Social media is flowing with videos of the rapper showing how sad his story is, where he is shown to be in an unconscious state.

The rap battle judges are equally enthusiastic about G-Bobs talent as they are about his addiction. Judge Surendra Gurung Hakim Dai had even warned him, G-Bob has always been a boy with his unique freestyle, but I told him I would disqualify him if he came stoned [with his dazed/ addicted face].

In one of the videos, the rapper is seen pouring out his grief and reveals that someone is blackmailing him by holding him hostage. His relationship with me was as a dealer and a user, said G-Bob in a video interview together with Koinch G. After my video with Maila, I was approached for an artistic project and this very person is now holding me hostage in Pokhara for three days.

G-Bob filed a complaint against those who allegedly abducted him. He appealed to the police to arrest the abductors, question them and leave them with a warning. He has been rescued, brought back to Kathmandu and placed in the correction centre. And, everyone is waiting for his comeback.

Life comes in between

But, life does not roll out as expected. It is not sure when he would go missing again. The final rap battle concluded without G-Bob and fans were furious with the organisers, accusing them that they hid G-Bob. Finally, G-Bobs mother on a Facebook live video clarified that he could not attend the finale due to his physical disability and even apologised on his behalf.

On the other hand, when the final was ongoing, G-Bob jumped out of the window of the rehab centre and ran to Gorkha, his ancestral home. The ANTF team also reached Gorkha overnight in search of him.

Video footage circulating shows a conversation between Hakim Dai and G-Bob. Hakim Dai says, There are allegations on us that we abducted you and did not allow you to perform in the finale. How did you jump out of there? You could have performed in the finale Do you even know how many fans were there that day chanting G-Bob G-Bob?

Next in the video, G-Bob does not seem to be conscious; rather he is only listening to Hakim Dai. Hakim Dai advises him to give up drugs and he could be the next Yama Buddha.

Today, g-Bob probably realised how drugs can be addictive and ruin life for there are signs that he expressed his wish to come out of the addiction.

This story was translated from the original Nepali version and edited for clarity and length.
Kathmandu, April 3

As climate change concerns are growing in Nepal, the country has entered into the Global Water Leadership in a Changing Climate programme recently.

In Nepal, the programme is being implemented in collaboration with the Global Water Partnership (GWP), UNICEF, Sanitation for All and Water, Drinking Water, Sanitation, Joint Monitoring Programme for Sanitation and the World Health Organization (WHO). The programme will run until 2024.

The programme has been implemented with the objective of supporting leadership development for improved water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services along with climate change adaptation, concerned officials say.

According to Surya Nath Upadhyay, the general secretary of the GWP Nepal and Jalsrot Vikas Sanstha (JVS), the motto of this program is to build a resilient society, and resilient institutions. The programme has begun and it is expected to help Nepal to build a resilient society and resilient institutions, Upadhyay says.

Likewise, highlighting the importance of the programme implementation in Nepal, the GWP South Asia Regional Coordinator Lal Induruwage praises Nepal for being ahead of 3,000 partners around the globe in terms of implementing the climate adaptation programme.

Speaking at a workshop organised in Kathmandu to discuss the preparations for the implementation of the programme, Dinesh Kumar Ghimire, the secretary at the Water and Energy Commission Secretariat (WECS), defined the programme as a part of the fulfilment of the governments commitment to the international community in terms of water management while minimising the climate change in water management.

The programme is being implemented in 10 countries including Nepal, Bangladesh, Chad, Central African Republic, Madagascar, State of Palestine, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda.

A 17-member programme coordination committee has been formed under the chairmanship of the secretary of the commission for the effective implementation of the programme.
Home  Just In  Nepals biggest university is fraught with sexual harassment cases. But, theres no mechanism to address it

When Narayani Devkota, an assistant professor at the Department of Sociology at Tribhuvan University, was a student at the same institution some years ago, she met professor late DP Bhandari at a restaurant for a conversation. While they shook hands with each other, Bhandari made her feel uncomfortable.

He rubbed my hand with some wrong intentions for quite some time, Devkota shared the incident during a recent discussion in Kathmandu, adding that the incident still makes her feel bad.

Stakeholders, students and professors included, confess this is just the tip of the iceberg as far as incidents of sexual harassment occur in the countrys biggest academic institution. Citing many of the cases go unheard, they say it is already too late to introduce an effective mechanism to control the problem.

Everyone suffers

Representational image of the #MeToo movement and sexual harassment cases. Photo: Pixabay

In May, a female staffer of the Tribhuvan University reportedly filed a complaint against Dambar Chemjong, the head of the universitys Anthropology Department, claiming he sexually abused her.

For many years, I have been abused by Chemjong, he even put pressure on me to have sex, she reported to the media.

Likewise, around six years back, when Pooja was working on her dissertation, Krishna Bahadur Bhattachan, a senior teacher at the university, offered to advise her at his residence. As reported, at his place, Pooja went through an unusual experience.

While seated on the sofa in his living room, Bhattachan began touching her, running his fingers along her back and rubbing against her thighs.

Reportedly, Bhattachan has sexually abused many other students like Pooja.

While the TU has been unsafe for many of its staffers and students, the university does not have any policy and appropriate modality to control it. According to the students and staffers, despite asking for such a policy and modality many times, the leadership has remained indifferent.

They do not even take part in discussions about such issues, says Bindu Pokharel, a professor at the Gender Studies Department, TU. This was evident in the event where Narayani Devkota shared her experience. The Gender Studies Department in the university says it had invited Vice-chancellor Dharma Kanta Baskota and Registrar Peshal Dahal for the event. Both had assured the organisers of their presence.

But, they did not show up.

Neither VC Baskota nor Registrar Dahal responded to Onlinekhabars repeated queries on what the university is doing to deal with sexual harassment cases.

Until such an issue will not be addressed, the perpetrators keep getting the courage to repeat the action, says Pokharel, adding, Thats why there must be a place where such issues will be acknowledged. If a perpetrator will be punished, it will alert the other potential perpetrator.

A threat to the education system

Tribhuvan University central office. Photo: Shankar Giri

Pokharel has seen many students who are unable to select their thesis supervisor comfortably. They fear being harassed by the supervisor. On the other hand, some male supervisors are also seen worried about whether they would also be accused of sexual harassment.

She complains that the condition is affecting the education quality.

Therefore, to improve the education quality, we need a modality and a policy to control sexual harassment in the university.

Pitambar Bhandari, an assistant professor at the Department of Conflict, Peace and Development Studies, also echoes Pokharel regarding the discomfort that students go through while choosing their supervisors for the thesis.

Many times, students have come to meet me personally and asked not to assign the specific teacher as their supervisor, says Bhandari.

Arguing for a separate policy and modality to control sexual harassment in universities, he says, The circumstances in a university are different; the national law cannot address the problems of sexual harassment there.

Sujat Sharmanear, a PhD scholar at the Gender Studies Department, says students are also disappointed to see that the place responsible to produce a skilled workforce for the country does not have any kind of mechanism that could not control sexual harassment.

Its so sad and disappointing to see that to date. The TU does not have anything that could control sexual harassment, says Sharmanear. We must initiate the movement that would mount pressure on the concerned authority.

Combatting ways

Representational image

Neeti Aryal Khanal, a sociology lecturer at the TU, believes the productivity of work only increases if the workplace is safe.

Harassment is one of the key reasons behind the low-quality education of the TU, she says.

She gives some ideas for possible modalities and mechanisms to control harassment in the workplace. According to her, first and foremost, a strong internal policy should be made to prevent and educate people about what constitutes sexual harassment in the workplace.

With that, she also says the policy should be finalised only after wider consultation with stakeholders, students, teachers and other concerned bodies.

The policy needs to introduce the strongest punitive measure to discourage perpetrators, she says.
OSU wheat varieties remain most popular for winter wheat crops

Media Contact: Alisa Boswell-Gore | Communications Coordinator, OSU Ag Research | 405-744-7115 | alisa.gore@okstate.edu

Oklahoma State University is responsible for the top eight hard red winter wheat varieties planted in Oklahoma this year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture-National Statistics Services March report.

Doublestop CL Plus is the No. 1 wheat variety planted for the 2022 wheat crop in Oklahoma, with Gallagher in second place, followed by Green Hammer, a newer variety placing in the top three for the first time.

Choosing a wheat variety to plant is a critical management decision that matches plant genetics with anticipated conditions on a given farm, said Brett Carver, OSU wheat genetics chair in the OSU Department of Plant and Soil Sciences. The NASS survey data indicates to me that Oklahoma wheat producers place considerable faith in OSU wheat genetics when making that decision. This further motivates OSUs Wheat Improvement Team to never take this continued trust for granted and to discover new solutions and opportunities for our wheat producers to use and capture.

OSU-developed wheat varieties were in the top four leading wheat varieties planted in the state for the fifth year in a row. Doublestop CL Plus and Gallagher have been the top two wheat varieties planted since 2018, while Endurance and Bentley have been in the top six. OK Corral skyrocketed to fifth place this year from 20th place in 2021. Other OSU varieties listed in the survey included Bakers Ann, Showdown, OK Bullet and Ruby Lee.

The following are the top eight varieties planted in 2022 according to percentage of seeded acres:

Doublestop CL Plus at 9%

Gallagher at 8.4%

Green Hammer at 7.9%

Smiths Gold at 6.2%

OK Corral at 2.9%

Endurance at 2.3%

Iba at 1.9%

Bentley at 1.5%

Carver said a common theme in the past seven growing seasons has been that producers want varietal protection from diseases and late-winter freeze events. He said it is always the hope that producers will consider more than one variety when planting.

What is even more pleasing to me as a wheat breeder is that our producers have chosen varieties with a wide genetic base for fungal disease resistance, which is essential to keeping disease epidemics at bay in any given year, he said.

According to the NASS report, wheat growers were surveyed by the USDA-NASS Oklahoma Field Office as part of the December Agricultural Survey and Crop Acreage and Production Survey. Funding was provided by the Oklahoma Wheat Commission in cooperation with OSUs Department of Plant and Soil Sciences.

The continued excellence demonstrated through the Wheat Improvement Teams breeding program has resulted in a set of wheat varieties that are unparalleled, and our wheat producers have truly benefitted, said Scott Senseman, associate vice president of OSU Ag Research. The relationship between this team and Oklahomas producers is an excellent example of how the land-grant system not only effectively works but has the ability to flourish.

To learn more about wheat variety development, visit Carvers 2021 Partners in Progress Wheat Report.
(Adds analyst comments, Yoon delegation visit to DC)

By Josh Smith

SEOUL, April 5 (Reuters) - North Korea opposes war but would use nuclear weapons if South Korea attacked, Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of leader Kim Jong Un, said on Tuesday, in a warning that analysts said is probably aimed at the South's incoming conservative president.

Kim Yo Jong, a senior official in the government and ruling party, said it was a "very big mistake" for South Korea's minister of defence to make recent remarks discussing attacks on the North, state news agency KCNA reported.

South Korean Defence Minister Suh Wook had said on Friday that his country's military has a variety of missiles with significantly improved range, accuracy and power, with "the ability to accurately and quickly hit any target in North Korea."

Both Koreas have increased displays of military strength after North Korea test-fired a range of increasingly powerful missiles this year. Officials in Seoul and Washington also fear it may be preparing to resume testing nuclear weapons for the first time since 2017 amid stalled negotiations.

Kim and another North Korean official issued earlier statements on Sunday condemning Suh's remarks, and warned that Pyongyang would destroy major targets in Seoul if the South takes any "dangerous military action" such as a preemptive strike.

Kim's criticisms are most likely aimed at South Korean President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol, who has called for a more muscular defence against North Korean threats, said Rachel Minyoung Lee, an analyst with the U.S.-based 38 North project, which monitors North Korea.

"Yoon's 'preemptive strike' comment made the headlines a few months ago, and Pyongyang is seizing Suhs remarks to make a point to the incoming South Korean administration," she said. "North Korea has thus far refrained from criticizing Yoon at any authoritative level, but it certainly seems to be laying the groundwork for it."

Story continues

The statements suggest Pyongyang is preparing the North Korean public for a possible shift in inter-Korean relations once Yoon takes office in May, Lee added.

A delegation from Yoon's team was in Washington this week to meet with U.S. officials, who reiterated their commitment to defending South Korea, according to a statement by the U.S. State Department on Tuesday.

In her statement on Tuesday, Kim said Pyongyang opposes war, which would leave the peninsula in ruins, and does not view South Korea as its principal enemy.

"But if south Korea, for any reason - whether or not it is blinded by misjudgement - opts for such military action as 'preemptive strike' touted by (Suh Wook), the situation will change," Kim added. "In that case, south Korea itself will become a target."

If the South Korean military violates North Korea territory, it will face an "unimaginably terrible disaster" and the North's nuclear combat force will have to inevitably carry out its duty, she said, noting that the South can avoid this fate by dropping any "fantastic daydream" of launching a preemptive attack on a nuclear-armed state. (Reporting by Josh Smith Editing by Chris Reese, Sandra Maler and Gerry Doyle)
ROCHESTER, N.H., April 04, 2022--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Albany International Corp. (NYSE:AIN) will release 2022 first-quarter financial results Monday, April 25, 2022 after the market close.

The Company will host a webcast to discuss results at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday, April 26. Interested parties are encouraged to listen to the webcast via the Companys Investor Relations website at www.albint.com.

Those without internet access may dial into the conference at 1-877-692-8955. Please provide your name, company, and access code 6740021 to the operator.

A replay of the webcast will be available on the website at approximately noon Eastern Time April 26.

About Albany International Corp.

Albany International is a leading developer and manufacturer of engineered components, using advanced materials processing and automation capabilities, with two core businesses. Machine Clothing is the worlds leading producer of custom-designed, consumable fabrics and process belts essential for the manufacture of all grades of paper products. Albany Engineered Composites is a growing designer and manufacturer of advanced materials-based engineered components for demanding aerospace applications, supporting both commercial and military platforms. Albany International is headquartered in Rochester, New Hampshire, operates 23 facilities in 11 countries, employs approximately 4,100 people worldwide, and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (Symbol AIN). Additional information about the Company and its products and services can be found at www.albint.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005822/en/

Contacts

John Hobbs

603-330-5897

john.hobbs@albint.com
TORONTO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ - Avalon Advanced Materials Inc. (TSX: AVL) (OTCQB: AVLNF) ("Avalon" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that it has signed a binding letter of intent with RenJoules International Ltd., an Essar Group Company ("Essar"), to become a strategic partner and co-developer in support of Avalon's plans to establish a regional lithium battery materials supply chain to serve the needs of future electric vehicle and battery manufacturers in Ontario and elsewhere.

Avalon Advanced Materials logo (CNW Group/Avalon Advanced Materials Inc.)

This agreement involves providing initial financial and development support for building a lithium refinery in Thunder Bay, Ontario that will be designed to accept lithium minerals concentrates, not only from Avalon's Separation Rapids Lithium Project north of Kenora, ON, but also from other aspiring new producers from the many lithium pegmatite resources that occur in northwestern Ontario. It will operate as a separate private business, called Avalon Lithium Inc., a newly established Avalon subsidiary in which Essar will become a co-owner.

With the agreement announced today, the partners will immediately begin the key next steps including; finalizing initial commercial terms and completion of final feasibility studies for both the refinery operations and lithium mineral concentrate production at the Separation Rapids site that will provide the initial feed for the refinery until other new producers also get started. This will also include finalizing the exact location for the refinery in Thunder Bay and proceeding with initial site preparation work both at Separation Rapids and the Thunder Bay site.

Present indications on demand for lithium battery materials produced in Ontario are supporting an initial production capacity for the refinery of 20,000 tonnes per annum of lithium hydroxide and/or lithium carbonate. This will require a capital investment in the order of C$500 million, which Essar and Avalon would jointly fund, with funding also anticipated from applicable Government programs and other private investors including Indigenous businesses in Northern Ontario. With construction planned to begin this year, it could be in operation by 2025. This will also create new economic development opportunities for First Nations to take advantage of lithium resources in their traditional territories to produce lithium mineral concentrates for purchase by Avalon Lithium Inc.

Story continues

Demand for lithium hydroxide and lithium carbonate continues to grow in North America as new electric vehicle and battery manufacturing capacity is established both in the U.S. and in Canada. Ontario is now well positioned to take advantage of the rapid growth with the recent announcement of Ontario's first-ever Critical Minerals Strategy, which Premier Doug Ford described as "the government's blueprint to connect industries, resources and workers in our province's north to the future of manufacturing in the south as we build up home-grown supply chains." Avalon Lithium Inc. will deliver on a key priority of the government's plan: "growing domestic processing and creating resilient local supply chains" and help the province become a global leader in the sector. Ontario's rich endowment in critical minerals in the North uniquely positions Ontario to create the full supply chains and take advantage of the demand for critical minerals in the emerging new advanced manufacturing sector of the economy.

Speaking on the partnership, Kush Singh, CEO, Essar Power Limited said, "We truly believe that green energy is "the future". This initiative of setting up a lithium refinery is a core part of Essar's global strategy of investments in the energy transition towards decarbonisation with a prime focus on Green Hydrogen and Storage. Lithium is a foundational critical mineral for the battery supply chain and with the Ontario government's stellar vision through its Critical Mineral Strategy, we are confident that this is the right location and time for our strategic partnership with Avalon and other stakeholders."

Avalon President Don Bubar commented, "While EV manufacturing and lithium battery materials production can be the initial catalyst for starting critical minerals supply chains in the North, it is just the beginning where innovation of new products and new efficient processing technologies for other critical minerals such as tantalum, cesium, and rare earths, can inspire future growth into other areas of advanced manufacturing including aerospace technology."

The agreement builds on growing Canada-India bilateral economic ties and supports clean energy and foreign direct investment objectives. The Company wishes to thank the Ontario division of Invest-in-Canada for introducing Avalon to Essar last year.

About the Essar Group

The Essar Group is a diversified business enterprise based in Mumbai, India that controls a number of subsidiary companies including Renjoules International Limited involved in the core sectors of Energy (Exploration & Production, Refining & Marketing, Power, Hydrogen), Infrastructure & Logistics (Ports, Storage Terminals), Metals & Mining, Technology & Retail (Shipping, Oilfield Services, Projects, Technology solutions etc.) Essar Global Fund Limited (EGFL), set up in 2005, invests in building and nurturing Essar Group assets, and creating value in these core sectors.

With Assets Under Management (AUM) of US$8.2 billion, as on 31 March 2021, and a net asset value of US$4.4 billion, the current investment portfolio of EGFL is future centric and value accretive. EGFL is now poised to transition its existing assets towards a greener economy and invest in businesses which will transform sector landscapes from carbon to a clean energy ecosystem. The returns from the transition will not only outperform benchmark returns but also contribute to a sustainable society within the framework of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) and transform sectors for a post carbon economy.

About Avalon Advanced Materials Inc.

Avalon Advanced Materials Inc. is a Canadian mineral development company specializing in sustainably-produced materials for clean technology. The Company now has four advanced stage projects, providing investors with exposure to lithium, tin and indium, as well as rare earth elements, tantalum, cesium and zirconium. Avalon is currently focusing on developing its Separation Rapids Lithium Project near Kenora, Ontario while continuing to advance other projects, including its 100%-owned Lilypad Cesium-Tantalum-Lithium Project located near Fort Hope, Ontario. Social responsibility and environmental stewardship are corporate cornerstones.

This news release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to statements that Essar intends to become a strategic partner and co-developer in support of Avalon's plans to establish a regional lithium battery materials supply chain to serve the needs of future electric vehicle and battery manufacturers in Ontario and elsewhere, that this agreement involves providing initial financial and development support for building a lithium refinery in Thunder Bay, Ontario that will be designed to accept lithium minerals concentrates, not only from Avalon's Separation Rapids Lithium Project north of Kenora, ON, but also from other aspiring new producers, that it will operate as a separate private business in which Essar will become a co-owner, that the partners will immediately begin the key next steps including finalizing initial commercial terms and completion of final feasibility studies for both the refinery operations and lithium mineral concentrate production at the Separation Rapids site, that this will also include finalizing the exact location for the refinery in Thunder Bay and proceeding with initial site preparation work both at Separation Rapids and the Thunder Bay site, that present indications on demand for lithium battery materials produced in Ontario are supporting an initial production capacity for the refinery of 20,000 tonnes per annum of lithium hydroxide and/or lithium carbonate, that this will require a capital investment in the order of C$500 million, which Essar and Avalon would jointly fund, with funding also anticipated from applicable Government programs and other private investors including Indigenous businesses in Northern Ontario, that construction is planned to begin this year, that it could be in operation by 2025, that this will also create new economic development opportunities for First Nations to take advantage of lithium resources in their traditional territories to produce, that Avalon Lithium Inc. will deliver on a key priority of the government's plan and help the province become a global leader in the sector. Generally, these forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "potential", "scheduled", "anticipates", "continues", "expects" or "does not expect", "is expected", "scheduled", "targeted", "planned", or "believes", or variations of such words and phrases or state that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will be" or "will not be" taken, reached or result, "will occur" or "be achieved". Forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements of Avalon to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on assumptions management believes to be reasonable at the time such statements are made. Although Avalon has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. Factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from expected results described in forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to market conditions, and the possibility of cost overruns or unanticipated costs and expenses as well as those risk factors set out in the Company's current Annual Information Form, Management's Discussion and Analysis and other disclosure documents available under the Company's profile at www.SEDAR.com. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Such forward-looking statements have been provided for the purpose of assisting investors in understanding the Company's plans and objectives and may not be appropriate for other purposes. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Avalon does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements that are contained herein, except in accordance with applicable securities laws.

Cision

View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/avalon-announces-partnership-agreement-to-establish-ontarios-first-regional-lithium-battery-materials-refinery-in-thunder-bay-301516840.html

SOURCE Avalon Advanced Materials Inc.
Canadas Food & Agri-Tech Engine supports sustainable innovation to advance climate action

GUELPH, Ontario, April 04, 2022--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Bioenterprise, Canadas Food & Agri-Tech Engine, is unveiling its commitment to supporting Canadas climate goals by welcoming five new sustainable innovation sponsors. Aramark, Bayer, BASF, MNP, and Norton Rose Fulbright are helping to drive the Engines sustainable innovation efforts that are supporting Canadas drive to be a leader in food sustainability and food security.

"We all want a better, more sustainable future and during this time of pivotal global change, we have a real opportunity to shape how we want to live, work and eat through sustainable innovation," says Bioenterprise Canada CEO Dave Smardon. "Innovation is influencing all aspects of our sector from soil health and animal welfare to bio-based products and waste reduction strategies  and we are thrilled that these corporate leaders will be working with us to support and advance sustainable innovation of all kinds."

As an organization, Bioenterprise Canada is committed to helping Canada reach its sustainability goals by offering individualized commercialization services to innovative food and agri-tech companies, delivering programming that supports sustainable products and cleantech solutions, encouraging collaboration between industry experts, accelerators, and research institutions, and taking an active role in educational events and public discussions around climate action.

"Weve made great strides in reducing the carbon footprint of our food and agriculture production, and innovation gives us a tremendous opportunity to do even more to help Canada reach its goal of net-zero emissions by 2050 while ensuring that we continue to contribute to global food security," says Bioenterprise Innovation Advisor Denise Dewar. "That makes it critical to have many different voices at the table to share expertise and challenge conventional thinking about what our collective future can and should be."

Story continues

The Engines innovation sponsors will be sharing and providing input with other food and agri-tech businesses on sustainable practices, participating in projects and programs to promote Canadas global efforts in food sustainability and security, and actively engaging in positive impacts on social issues. Theyll also play key roles in helping to bring new innovative products to market and become connected to the Engines national network of businesses, advisors, and researchers to advance their own corporate sustainability initiatives.

More information about the Engines sustainable innovation commitment, its sustainable innovation partners and examples of novel, sustainable innovations its programs support is available at https://bioenterprise.ca/sustainability/.

Bioenterprise Canada is Canadas Food & Agri-Tech Engine, bringing more than 15 years of industry experience and a national and international network of research institutions, academia, mentors and experts, government, and industry to help small and medium-sized businesses in the sector nationwide Connect, Innovate, and Grow. Through its experienced partner network, Bioenterprise Canada offers a wide range of expertise and support to its members, and partnerships with other industries help open doors to new technologies and platforms to help food and agri-tech businesses innovate and grow. Visit https://bioenterprise.ca/ to learn more.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005091/en/

Contacts

Dave Smardon, CEO, Bioenterprise Canada, dave.smardon@bioenterprise.ca or 519-821-2960
STOCKHOLM, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Elisa Polystar has acquired FRINX s.r.o, a Slovak telecom network automation software supplier. FRINX products and software will complement Elisa Polystar's zero-touch automation and analytics offering, which helps communications service providers (CSPs) automate their network management processes in a multivendor telecom network environment. The acquisition is consistent with Elisa's strategy to grow digital services internationally and accelerate development of its telecom software business under Elisa Polystar. With this transaction, Elisa Polystar is taking another step on its strategic journey to make self-driving networks happen.

Elisa Polystar Logo

FRINX is a privately owned software provider founded in Bratislava, Slovakia, in 2016. FRINX helps CSPs automate their network configuration management. Its products  proven by installations among leading CSP customers  are cloud-native, microservices-based and network vendor-independent. Today, the company has around 40 experts working in its projects. Following the acquisition, development of their product offering will continue as part of Elisa Polystar's automation business.

Elisa Polystar is a world-leading network automation and analytics solutions provider, serving over 120 CSPs globally. With its background as an international business of Finland's largest CSP, Elisa Polystar's solutions are proven and tested in live networks.

Network automation is a must for CSPs in order to cope with the massive rise in the amounts of data, adoption of new technologies and the overall increased complexity of telecommunication networks. It is about both reducing costs and enhancing the customer experience at the same time. As a result of this acquisition, the combined portfolio will be a good match for existing customer demand. Furthermore, the combined resources will allow Elisa Polystar to provide an accelerated path for their customers in the future.

Story continues

Gerhard Wieser, CEO and co-founder of FRINX: "We are excited about the possibilities for us and our customers that arise from joining Elisa Polystar. Elisa Polystar is a true pioneer in network automation and operates globally. By joining them, we get access to a global sales channel as well as increased machine learning capabilities and resources. For our own people, it means a chance to join an extended global network of software professionals with more opportunities for personal growth and broader career opportunities."

Kirsi Valtari, EVP for Automation at Elisa Polystar: "I am happy to welcome the very skilled FRINX experts to join our Automation team. FRINX products and software are a fantastic complement to our own suite of automation solutions, and we're excited about the possibilities for collaboration going forward. Together, we will be able to create new and even better ways to enhance the operations of customers of both Elisa Polystar and FRINX."

About FRINX:

FRINX builds software that enables customers to create automated, repeatable, digital processes to build, grow and operate their digital infrastructure. Communication service providers are choosing FRINX products and solutions to automate cloud assets, data centres, branch offices, core, edge and access networks.

The goal of automation is to provide programmatic interfaces to save time and resources in deploying infrastructure changes and to provide a cost-effective basis for adding new functionality and services. FRINX provides software that enables low-code workflow design and operation, analytics to support machine learning and intent-based infrastructure control to integrate devices and services from many networking vendors.

FRINX has offices in Bratislava, Slovakia and New York, NY. The company is now part of Elisa Polystar. www.frinx.io

About Elisa Polystar:

Elisa Polystar, part of Elisa Group, is an innovative provider of cloud-native automation and analytics solutions. Our products help CSPs to reduce both OPEX and CAPEX costs, while enhancing customer experiences.

Our portfolio  proven with hundreds of CSPs globally  integrates AI-driven analytics with automation. It unlocks the benefits of closed-loop network operations and optimisation, delivering self-driving networks. Our solutions are compatible with any network, as well as any service, including IoT and 5G network slicing.

With our background as an international business of Finland's largest CSP, Elisa Polystar's solutions are tested in live networks, and with the unique needs of operators in mind: by an operator, for operators. www.elisapolystar.com

MEDIA CONTACTS

Elisa Polystar

Inna Ott

Director of Marketing

Phone: +46 8 50 600 600

Email: inna.ott@polystar.com

Cision

View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/elisa-polystar-acquires-frinx-to-broaden-its-network-automation-portfolio-301515861.html

SOURCE Elisa Polystar
By Trend

Turkish National Defense Minister Hulusi Akar had a telephone conversation with Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov, Trend reports citing the press service of the Ministry.

During a telephone conversation, an exchange of views took place on the evacuation of civilians from Mariupol and the delivery of humanitarian aid.

The importance of an early declaration of a ceasefire was emphasized in order to avoid an increase in human casualties and to keep humanitarian corridors open for the evacuation of civilians.

It was once again stated that Turkey will continue to contribute to humanitarian assistance to Ukraine.
Don't miss CoinDesk's Consensus 2022, the must-attend crypto & blockchain festival experience of the year in Austin, TX this June 9-12.

Good morning. Heres whats happening:

Prices: Bitcoin and other major cryptos dipped early over the weekend but regained ground and were up late Sunday.

Insights: DBS Bank's decision to abandon its retail crypto plans did not affect affect the stock price of OSL parent BC Technology Group, and is unlikely to have a big impact on Singapore's crypto industry.

Technician's take: BTC's upside momentum signals remain intact.

Catch the latest episodes of CoinDesk TV for insightful interviews with crypto industry leaders and analysis. And sign up for First Mover, our daily newsletter putting the latest moves in crypto markets in context.

Prices

Bitcoin (BTC): $46,702 +1.2%

Ether (ETH): $3,544 +2.1%

Top Gainers

Asset Ticker Returns Sector Dogecoin DOGE +5.6% Currency Internet Computer ICP +5.4% Computing Filecoin FIL +4.9% Computing

Top Losers

"

There are no losers in CoinDesk 20 today.

"

Markets

S&P 500: 4,545 -0.3%

DJIA: 34,818 +0.4%

Nasdaq: 14,261 -0.2%

Gold: $1,925 +0.2

Bitcoin, ether rise late

Bitcoin started the weekend quietly, but by late Sunday, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization had soared past $47,300 at one point, a 2.6% gain from 24 hours earlier. BTC, which had dropped below $46,000 early Saturday, was more recently trading at about $46,700.

Ether, the second-largest crypto by market cap, followed a similar pattern dipping and then regaining ground to jump past the $3,550 level, up about 3% over the same time period.

Major altcoins were mixed, some rising and others falling slightly. Meme coin DOGE rose about 5% on at least one occasion from 24 hours earlier. DOGE alternative SHIB rose more modestly. SOL and ADA recently rose 3% and 2%, respectively. Terra's LUNA token was off about 2%.

Trading was off from higher levels earlier in the week as is often the case on weekends.

Story continues

Crypto's late weekend surge veered slightly from major equity markets' performance on Friday, which did little more than hold ground from the previous day. The tech-heavy Nasdaq and the S&P 500 fell slightly as investors seemed to be girding for the U.S. Federal Reserve and other central banks worldwide to continue more hawkish monetary policies.

Low interest rates and central bank stimulus that may jar an economy from a slumber lead to rising asset prices. But when inflation increases and the economy overheats, central banks reverse these accommodative policies, typically spurring higher market volatility.

Meanwhile, the macroeconomic environment remained as unsettled as it has been since Russia invaded Ukraine five weeks ago. After pictures emerged of horrific civilian casualties in Bucha, a town near the Ukraine capital Kyiv, Germany's defense minister, Christine Lambrecht, said in a television interview that the European Union should consider halting Russian gas imports.

EU bloc countries have resisted this action, fearful that it would send their economies into recession. Brent crude oil, a widely watched measure of energy prices was trading at $102 per barrel, a massive increase from where it started the year.

Still, the crypto rally late last month may not be over, said Joe DiPasquale, the CEO of fund manager BitBull Capital.

"Bitcon's consolidation above $46,000 will be key for bullish continuation toward the $50,000 milestone," DiPasquale said, striking a cautiously optimistic note. "While we did see rejection around $48,000, as long as BTC remains above $46,000, bulls can be hopeful of another move. If we lose these levels in the new week, another test of the low $40,000s is the probably scenario."

Insights

DBS crypto reversal hurts OSL, but only a little

DBSs about-face decision on a retail crypto exchange  canceling its plans to open one by the end of 2022  leaves us with two questions: Is this another chapter in Singapores continued tightening of crypto regulations? And will this stymie OSL, the Hong Kong-based institutional exchange that provides DBS with exchange software?

The answer to both is, not really.

Its not a secret that authorities in Singapore arent fans of retail crypto trading. Earlier this year, regulators banned direct-to-consumer marketing for exchanges and told crypto ATM operators to turn off their machines. It also put DeFiance Capital, one of the larger crypto funds in the city-state, on an investor alert list because it was wrongly perceived as being licensed or regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore.

But Singapore hasnt changed its tone on institutional investment in crypto. That has always been what the country has been interested in developing as a hub, not retail, which requires nanny-like regulations to ensure amateur traders leveraging their retirement savings dont get rekt when their crypto position is liquidated. Needing to regulate with a heavy hand isnt what Singapore wants.

If DBS were to actually launch a retail crypto exchange it wouldnt look like what many retail traders are used to seeing. There would be a limited selection of tokens, and decentralized finance (DeFi) would definitely be out of the question. While there would undoubtedly be an element of convenience because of the integration with the bank, it would be challenged to attract significant volume because it wouldnt be competitive with leading exchanges in terms of features.

In its recent earnings, OSLs parent, BC Technology Group, highlighted its Software-as-a-Service (licensing its exchange software to other entities) as a growth point.

The company cites service fees from SaaS of HK$10.1 million (US$1.2 million), an increase of 104.2% year over year, as a driver of this quarters growth, specifically naming its partnership with DBS as a way to expand the business past institutional only and on to retail.

But against group revenue of HK$352 million (US$45 million), this amount is insignificant.

OSLs institutional exposure and licensed status far eclipse that slight negative, Esme Pau, an analyst with Tonghai Securities, told CoinDesk. With [its] core business in serving professional investors. OSL is a proxy to digital assets institutionalization. In the broader scheme of things, increasing regulatory clarity is the definite future direction of travel for digital assets.

Investors didnt seem to care either. Even after the news broke, the stock continued its week-long winning streak on the Hong Kong markets up 5%.

Tonghai predicts the company will turn a profit in the medium term given the competitive moat it has of being the only licensed exchange in Hong Kong  a much larger, and less competitive, market than DBSs retail crypto play.

Technician's take

Bitcoin Holds Support Above $44K; Resistance at $48K-$51K

Bitcoin weekly price chart shows support/resistance, with MACD on bottom. (Damanick Dantes/CoinDesk, TradingView)

Bitcoin (BTC) bounced off short-term support at $44,000 as momentum improved.

The cryptocurrency is up 5% over the past week, although resistance at $48,000 and $50,996 could stall the rally, similar to what occurred in September of last year.

This time, however, pullbacks could be brief, so long as buyers defend support above $43,000-$45,000. Further, the significant loss of downside momentum, per the MACD indicator, over the past few weeks could encourage additional buying on price dips.

The relative strength index (RSI) on the daily chart is approaching neutral territory after an overbought reading appeared on March 28. That suggests a pause in the current price rally, which typically occurs during the beginning of the month.

For now, BTC is testing support around its previous breakout point at $45,000. Upside exhaustion signals, per the DeMARK indicators provided a timely countertrend reversal set-up earlier this week, although a continuation of that sell signal has not been confirmed. That means price action is currently neutral, pending a decisive break above or below the five-day price range.

Important events

Celo Connect digital conference featuring project leaders and investors

9:30 a.m. HKT/SGT(1:30 a.m. UTC): Australia and New Zealand Banking Group job advertisements (March)

10 p.m. HKT/SGT(2 p.m. UTC): U.S. factory orders (MoM March)

CoinDesk TV

In case you missed it, here is the most recent episode of "First Mover" on CoinDesk TV:

Sen Warren, Rep Lynch Propose Digital Dollar Projects, Lynch Explains the Difference; Rapper Jim Jones on His NFT Drop

Massachusetts lawmakers Elizabeth Warren and Stephen Lynch were in the spotlight as each pushed digital dollar proposals. Congressman Lynch joined "First Mover" to explain the bill he has co-sponsored. Jason Guthrie of WisdomTree weighed in on the controversial European Parliament crypto vote and other news moving the crypto markets. Plus, Rapper Jim Jones and Disrupt Art CEO Rob Richardson discussed their new NFT drop.

Headlines

DeFi Lender Inverse Finance Exploited for $15.6 Million: It is the third multi-million dollar crypto attack to make headlines in recent days.

Ethereum Founder Vitalik Buterin Praises 'Bitcoin Maximalism' (Maybe): The blockchain mastermind also took shots at Ethereum in a richly ambiguous April Fools post.

Does the Metaverse Need a Free Trade Agreement?: Its seeking to be the centerpiece of Web 3, but a successful metaverse could run headfirst into some old-style protectionist barriers like work permits and data blocks, trade policy expert Sam Lowe tells us.

Bitcoin Miner PrimeBlock Plans to Go Public With $1.25B SPAC Merger: The deal is expected to close in the second half of this year.

Kazakhstan Looks to Bring Crypto Exchanges to Central Asian Financial Hub: The exchanges would operate in the Astana International Financial Centre in cooperation with the Kazakhstani banks and government agencies.

Longer reads

7 Wild Bitcoin Mining Rigs: Here are some of the innovative and sometimes hilarious functions bitcoin miners have found for their rigs.

Today's crypto explainer: How to Buy a House With Crypto: US Edition

Other voices: Ben McKenzie Would Like a Word With the Crypto Bros (The New York Times)

Said and heard

"From this month on - no more Russian gas in Lithuania . Years ago my country made decisions that today allow us with no pain to break energy ties with the agressor. If we can do it, the rest of Europe  can do it too!" (Lithuania President Gitanas Nauseda on Twitter)... "The NFT show is no longer a stranger to the road. Believers in this newly popular form of digital asset have flocked en masse to various NFT-focused events in the past half-year, beginning with NFT.NYC in November and passing through Miami for NFT Basel. Even this years edition of South by Southwest in Austin, Texas, had a major NFT presence. (I was fortunate enough to attend all three.)" (CoinDesk NFT reporter Eli Tan) ... "My conversations this week with numerous Los Angeles-based digital artists opened up a different perspective. As they eagerly opened their iPhones to show me their latest NFT drop or other creative venture, it occurred to me theres an even more powerful source of permissionlessness being unleashed in this space: money." (CoinDesk Chief Content Officer Michael Casey)
OSLO, Norway, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Gaming Innovation Group Inc. (GiG) has today via its subsidiary Sportnco Gaming SAS (Sportnco) signed an agreement with existing partner GM Gaming Limited (GM Gaming), who operates the Betway brand in Portugal, for the provision of Sportnco's Sportsbook and player account management (PAM) for Betway.pt (Portugal).

This is the second sportsbook and PAM agreement between Sportnco and GM Gaming, the first of which saw the successful launch of the tier one operator in France. The new agreement will see GM Gaming migrate from its current sportsbook and platform.

The Portuguese market has demonstrated high growth across both Sportsbetting and casino with annual growth in 2021 of 32.1% and 29.9% respectively (H2 data). Sportnco have extensive knowledge and experience in delivering complex and highly regulated markets successfully, making them a top choice for operators like GM Gaming looking to migrate platforms or launch in such markets.

Herve Schlosser, Managing Director of Sportnco, said "Sportnco is delighted to be working with the Betway brand in Portugal. It makes us very proud when an existing partner places the trust and confidence in our technology to help continue to power their expansion within multiple jurisdictions. We are looking forward to strengthening our relationship with our long-term partner."

Raquel Goncalves at GM Gaming said: "We're really excited to continue our great relationship with Sportnco, a leading provider in the latest platform and technologies within the gaming sector, with this agreement. We're looking forward to this venture which will strengthen our product offering for the Betway brand in Portugal."



For more information:

Hessi Mocca, Head of IR, +46 737039820, hessi.mocca@gig.com

About Gaming Innovation Group (GiG)

Gaming Innovation Group is a leading iGaming technology company, providing solutions, products and services to iGaming Operators. Founded in 2012, Gaming Innovation Group's vision is 'To be the industry-leading platform, sportsbook and media provider delivering world-class solutions to our iGaming partners and their customers. GiG acquired leading sportsbook provider, Sportnco in 2022. Sportnco operates the leading B2B betting networks in France and Spain and is active in other European jurisdictions (Belgium, Portugal and Greece), as well as in South America and the US. Sportnco has been active since 2010, building strong partnerships with leading betting and gaming brands with its flexible platform, customisable offering, expertise in risk management and trading and speed to market. GiG's mission is to drive sustainable growth and profitability of our partners through product innovation, scalable technology and quality of service. Gaming Innovation Group operates out of Malta and is dual-listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol GIG and on Nasdaq Stockholm under the ticker symbol GIGSEK. www.gig.com.

Story continues

About Betway

Betway is part of Super Group: the global digital company which provides first class entertainment to the worldwide betting and gaming community. Super Group (SGHC) Limited is the holding company for leading global online sports betting and gaming businesses: Betway, a premier online sports betting brand, and Spin, a multi-brand online casino offering. Listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE ticker: SGHC), the group is licensed in multiple jurisdictions, with leading positions in key markets throughout Europe, the Americas and Africa. The group's successful sports betting and online gaming offerings are underpinned by its scale and leading technology, enabling fast and effective entry into new markets. Its proprietary marketing and data analytics engine empowers it to responsibly.

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/gaming-innovation-group/r/gaming-innovation-group-signs-partnership-agreement-with-betway-in-portugal,c3538950

Cision

View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/gaming-innovation-group-signs-partnership-agreement-with-betway-in-portugal-301516495.html

SOURCE Gaming Innovation Group
Over $10MM in reported revenue for the month

GREENVILLE, S.C., April 04, 2022--(BUSINESS WIRE)--GEM Mining, a bitcoin ("BTC") mining company headquartered in Greenville, South Carolina, published its mining production results for March 2022. March saw a month-over-month increase in bitcoin mined, the number of active miners deployed, hash rate, and reported revenue.

Key metrics include:

- GEM Mining produced 252.9 BTC in March, an increase of 26.1% compared to 200.5 BTC produced in February.

- GEM Mining reported $10.61MM in revenue in March, increasing 29.0% compared to $8.22MM in February.

- At the end of March, GEM Mining had an active miner fleet of 18,976 miners. This was an active miner fleet increase of 5.0%, compared to the 18,065 miners deployed at the end of February.

- In March, GEM Mining had a hash rate of 1.85 Exahash per Second (EH/s), increasing 4.5% compared to 1.77 EH/s in February.

- As of the end of March, GEM Mining has produced 676.0 BTC in 2022.

"GEM Mining closed Q1 on a high note with gains in all month-over-month production metrics," explained John Warren, CEO of GEM Mining. "I am happy to report that our Q1 2022 BTC production has already eclipsed our results for the entirety of 2021. We will continue to focus our efforts on rapidly deploying our mining fleet and efficiently producing BTC."

About GEM Mining

Headquartered in Greenville, SC, GEM Mining is a privately held, institutional-grade bitcoin (BTC) mining company. The company has over 18,900 miners currently active, with an additional 13,100 fully funded and hosted machines set to come online by the end of 2022. The companys active miner fleet accounts for over 1% of the global hash rate and is a 97% carbon neutral operation. For more information about GEM Mining, see gemmining.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005171/en/

Contacts

MEDIA CONTACT: Will Crockett | 703-944-4213 | will.crockett@wachsman.com
By Stefano Rebaudo

April 4 (Reuters) - Euro zone yields edged lower on Monday as bond markets consolidated after monetary tightening expectations drove German borrowing costs to their highest since February 2018.

Most analysts expect German yields to stay around the current levels in the short term, as the downside risks to the economy due to the Ukraine conflict will moderate the European Central Bank's (ECB) commitment to tame inflation.

Germany's 10-year government bond yields, the benchmark of the bloc, fell 1 basis point (bps) to 0.55%.

Investors watched for ECB speakers after German yields in March set their most significant monthly rise since 2009.

"Even if driven primarily by energy, the March 7.5% harmonised index of consumer prices (HICP) print will probably prevent (ECB officials) from pushing back against, excessive in our view, rate hike expectations," ING analysts said in a note.

Money markets are currently pricing in almost 60 bps of ECB rate hikes by year-end.

"It is notable that even the hawks are not advocating Fed-style shock therapy," ING analysts said.

The spread between German and U.S. 10-year yield, a gauge of monetary divergence between the two sides of the Atlantic, widened by 3 bps to 186 by 0741 GMT on Monday, but was still below March 28's 196.38, its highest since April 2021. .

U.S. two-year Treasury yields briefly hit their highest since early 2019 in early London trade on Monday on expectations that the Federal Reserve will deliver bigger rate hikes in the months ahead to tame inflation.

"The coming sessions will show whether Bunds can continue to defy the bearish U.S. Treasury curve inversion dynamics," Commerzbank analysts said in a note to clients.

"The track record of the U.S. curve is scary. An inverted curve correctly predicted every recession over the last 60 years, including the latest recession caused by the (coronavirus) pandemic," they added.

Story continues

The Federal Reserve will need to keep a careful eye on how the economy reacts as it raises interest rates, and scale the pace of its rate increases accordingly, New York Fed President John Williams said on Saturday.

According to Commerzbank, the current forward pricing sees Fed rates going above the "neutral" level, which the Fed estimates at 2.4%.

The neutral rate is the interest rate that supports the economy at full employment and maximum output while keeping inflation constant. (Reporting by Stefano Rebaudo; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell)
ReportLinker

The Global Field Activity Management Market size is expected to reach $2. 3 billion by 2027, rising at a market growth of 16. 3% CAGR during the forecast period. Field activity management refers to the use of software, procedures, and communication solutions to manage field activities, including physical assets, associated people, and equipment.

New York, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Global Field Activity Management Market Size, Share & Industry Trends Analysis Report By Component, By Deployment Type, By Enterprise Size, By Vertical, By Regional Outlook and Forecast, 2021 - 2027" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06249490/?utm_source=GNW

Field activity management software unifies and gathers data from mapping and scheduling, location data, and time and expense monitoring into a single platform, allowing for more efficient asset usage, visualization, tracking, and administration.



The key industry players would witness ample opportunities to expand their offerings due to the field activity automation and cloud-mobility integration, predictive analytics, and the rise of IoT and AI. In addition, field activity management solutions can offer information regarding product delivery, product inventory and dispatch, and work orders because of the integration of mobile capabilities. Moreover, this integration has also pushed field activity management companies to provide better, more affordable solutions to boost productivity.



Further, large enterprises and SMEs have benefited from improved service management solutions provided by cloud service providers. In field activities, the integration of Machine-to-Machine (M2M)-linked services and mobility is critical since it aids in the automation of work processes as well as real-time reporting based on analytics. This reduces human effort and allows tasks to be completed quickly.



While certain sectors are more likely to use field representatives as merchandisers, merchandising has a function in all parts of Field Activity Management. Moreover, field activity management solutions help to understand the aesthetics and science of effective product placement which demonstrates a commitment to customers and a brand and can aid in the growth of existing and new sales.



COVID-19 Impact



The global economy has been severely impacted by COVID-19. Energy, oil and gas, transportation and logistics, manufacturing, and aviation are among the financial and industrial sectors where the pandemic has had a large economic impact. As a result of the trillions of dollars lost, the global economy is anticipated to enter a recession. As a result of a rising number of countries implementing and prolonging lockdowns, economic activity is dwindling, which will have an influence on the global economy. Every citizen and government in society, including the federal, state, central, local, and provincial governments, has been in constant contact with one another to supply and receive real-time COVID-19 information. Still today, many countries are witnessing constantly increasing COVID-19 cases, with multiple infected cases on the rise.



Market Growth Factors:



The growing requirement to monitor field activities



In the last few years, the global number of field technicians has increased remarkably and would continue to rise even during the forecast period. Field activity firms are recognizing the need of ensuring that all resources are utilized correctly for business purposes and that field workers/technicians are doing their assigned jobs properly. These firms may find this problematic because they are unable to follow the live-work location due to their actual absence on the job. By installing an appropriate field activity management solution that can be integrated with ERP, CRM, and other relevant systems established in the organization, it is possible to achieve maximum efficiency of business processes and better productivity among the providers.



Growing deployment of Cloud-based field activity management



Organizations are migrating from on-premises field activity management systems to cloud-based field activity management solutions in order to reap the benefits of this technology. Field activity management suppliers are increasingly focusing on offering SaaS-based solutions that help cut costs and achieve higher Return on Investment. In addition, field activities firms are recognizing the need to ensure that all resources are being used correctly for business purposes and that field workers/technicians are doing their assigned jobs efficiently. Moreover, the transition towards the cloud helps the companies to easily track the progress and ensures timely completion of allotted assignments. Hence, these aspects are expected to open new growth avenues for the overall field activity management market during the forecasting period.



Market Restraining Factors:



Organizational security concerns around data confidentiality



The majority of field activity data is stored on corporate servers behind firewalls and security measures. Devices that access this data, on the other hand, are not protected in this way. Technicians mobile devices are vulnerable to attacks, especially if they are connected to insecure Wi-Fi networks on the job. As the world becomes more digital, the number of cyberattacks has increased in tandem. As a result, data security has become a big concern for businesses. Companies have low knowledge of the necessity for cyber-specific procedures to protect their data. With the transfer of data from the field to the cloud, there is a considerable increase in cybersecurity issues, since malevolent parties can attack servers, networks, and communication channels.



Component Outlook



Based on Component, the market is segmented into Solution and Services (Integration & Implementation, Consulting, and Training & Support). The services segment held a significant revenue share of the overall field activity management market in 2020. This is because these services are crucial in meeting the clients unique requirements. These services assist in the cost-effective implementation of field activity management solutions in order to effectively complete business processes within the timeline and budget.



Deployment Type Outlook



Based on Deployment Type, the market is segmented into Cloud and On-premise. In 2020, the Cloud segment obtained the largest revenue share of the field activity management market. By adopting cloud solutions, companies reap benefits like higher flexibility, scalability, affordability, operational efficiency, and reduced costs. Additional advantages of cloud-based systems include their efficiency when used by multiple users, lower upfront expenses, ease of implementation of new projects, no hardware investments, minimal maintenance costs, and reduced infrastructure costs. Hence, these factors would help the segment to witness higher demand during the forecasting period.



Enterprise Size Outlook



Based on Enterprise Size, the market is segmented into Small & Medium Enterprises and Large Enterprises. The Large Enterprises segment held a significant revenue share of the overall field activity management market in 2020. When it comes to assigning work orders to field workers and engineers, large enterprises face multiple issues. Work orders that arent managed well by large businesses might result in higher expenses and lower productivity. Customer loyalty and market share may be lost as a result of this. Large companies are focused on field activity management solutions to centralize their business processes and essential data from their employees and consumers.



Vertical Outlook



Based on Vertical, the market is segmented into Telecom, Construction & Real- Estate, Energy & Utilities, Manufacturing, Agriculture, Government, and Others. The telecom segment acquired the highest revenue share of the field activity management market in 2020. In the telecommunications industry, effective workforce management is a significant aspect in enabling process optimization and greater business efficiency. However, managing fieldwork ideally becomes considerably more difficult when there are a significant number of specialists in various disciplines and several geographic locations in various regions. This is where field activity management solutions come into play and help companies to manage different aspects related to field operations.



Regional Outlook



Based on Regions, the market is segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Latin America, Middle East & Africa. In 2020, North America emerged as the leading region in the overall field activity management market during the forecasting period. Over the last few years, businesses have been implementing the field activity management solution on a big scale. This region has been very quick to implement the most recent technical innovations, such as field activities, cloud computing, and IoT, into businesses. Additionally, there has been a rise in the number of data breaches with the increase in the usage of field activities and BYOD preferences.



The major strategies followed by the market participants are Partnerships. Based on the Analysis presented in the Cardinal matrix; SAP SE is the major forerunner in the Field Activity Management Market. Companies such as Bentley Systems, Inc., Spatial Networks, Inc. and Canvas Solutions, Inc. are some of the key innovators in the Market.



The market research report covers the analysis of key stake holders of the market. Key companies profiled in the report include Repsly, Inc., Spatial Networks, Inc., ProntoForms Corporation, Canvas Solutions, Inc., SafetyCulture Pty Ltd., Field Safe Solutions, Inc., FieldWireLabs, Inc., Bentley Systems, Inc., Esri, Inc., and SAP SE.







Recent strategies deployed in Field Activity Management Market



Jan-2022: GoCanvas joined hands with Device Magic, a mobile forms app that replaces unreliable paper forms with smarter, richer data collection. Following the collaboration, both the companies would be in a unique position to provide industry-leading work process solutions to small, mid-market, and large businesses. Moreover, customers would be benefitted from improved mobile data capture and process automation solutions as a result of the relocation.



Dec-2021: Esri joined hands with Microsoft, an American multinational technology corporation that produces computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services. Following the collaboration, the two companies would together analyze the imagery data obtained by satellite providers in space orbit. Moreover, ArcGIS Image technology of Esri would offer processing and analysis on imagery hosted in Azure Orbital, Microsofts Satellite Ground Station as a Service.



Apr-2021: SAP extended its partnership with Siemens Digital Industries Software, an American computer software company specializing in 3D & 2D Product Lifecycle Management software. The partnership aimed to help both entities to provide innovative solutions for the Service and Asset Lifecycle. Moreover, Siemens would offer SAP Asset Intelligence Network, SAP Asset Strategy and Performance Management, and SAP Enterprise Portfolio and Project Management, with an initial focus on discrete manufacturing.



Apr-2021: Fulcrum, a subsidiary of Spatial Networks, introduced new improvements in its no-code mobile workforce automation platform. With the help of new improvements, this platform can offer reference documents like safety data sheets, standard operating procedures, and process manuals, to field workers as attachments to their Fulcrum mobile apps. This latest capability would make it easier to maintain safe work settings and ensure consistent, high-quality results without having to carry burdensome paper documents.



Apr-2021: Fulcrum, a subsidiary of Spatial Networks, introduced the latest workflow capabilities. These new capabilities can enhance mobile team effectiveness by establishing data-driven processes for workgroups and business units, as well as extending and improving CRM apps, asset management platforms, and other enterprise systems using data collected in the field.



Feb-2021: ProntoForms introduced ProntoForms Teamwork. Technicians using ProntoForms Teamwork get a contextual view of what prior contributors have achieved. This ensures that productivity and quality are maintained regardless of how frequently projects are interrupted or handed over.



Jan-2021: Esri introduced ArcGIS Platform, a geospatial platform as a service (PaaS) for developers that require combining location capabilities into their apps, business systems, and products. Through this launch, the company aimed to help developers in getting access to high-quality content and capabilities they can readily plug into their apps, enabling them to be stick to a budget while providing massive value by decreasing time to market.



Nov-2020: Esri unveiled ArcGIS Field Maps mobile app. Moreover, ArcGIS Field Maps is a comprehensive tool that employs data-driven maps to assist mobile employees in collecting and editing data, finding information, and reporting their current location. For enterprises that have prioritized digital transformation from paper-based to digital field operations management, ArcGIS Field Maps would alleviate numerous workflow difficulties.



Jun-2020: Bentley Systems completed the acquisition of NoteVault, a San Diego-based provider of voice-based field automation for construction management. Through this acquisition, the company expanded its SYNCHRO digital construction environment with industry-leading mobile field applications to monitor and manage labor, materials, and equipment.



Oct-2019: Esri came into a partnership with 3DR, a leading US drone data company. Through this partnership, the two companies would expand the offerings of Esri in current drone imagery, Drone2Map for ArcGIS, with an end-to-end enterprise drone data and analytics solution for Esris ArcGIS platform. For users ranging from small operators to enterprise-wide drone projects, the ArcGIS Drone Collection provides scalable solutions. In addition, customers of Esri can now improve operational efficiency by utilizing the clouds elastic processing capabilities.



Oct-2019: ProntoForms entered into a partnership with ServicePower, a leading field service management (FSM) Software Company focused on transforming service experiences. Under this partnership, ProntoForms would help ServicePower to expand its FSM solution with agile app creation and next-generation mobile tools for field teams. Moreover, ProntoForms enhances ServicePowers capabilities in critical verticals such as HVAC, appliances, security, and electronics.



Oct-2018: Bentley Systems formed a partnership with Atos, a French multinational information technology service and consulting company. Following the partnership, the two companies would together provide a comprehensive solution to develop and operate digital twins for industry and infrastructure asset owners.



Jun-2018: SAP completed the acquisition of Coresystems, a Switzerland-based pioneer in crowd service and a leading field service management platform. Following the acquisition, the acquired company would become part of the SAP Service Cloud portfolio. The platform, which is powered by artificial intelligence (AI), offers real-time scheduling of field service activities as well as simple mobile apps that allow service workers in the field to do the installation, maintenance, and repair tasks.



Jun-2018: Repsly formed a partnership with Destini, the leading product locator and aggregator of store-level data across the U.S. and Canada. The partnership would strengthen the focus of Repsly to allow CPG brands to connect in-store activities with changing consumer demand.



Apr-2017: ProntoForms came into a partnership with FieldAware, the leader in made-for-mobile, cloud-based field service automation solutions. The partnership aimed to include next-generation data collection and workflow capabilities to field service software of FieldAware.



Scope of the Study



Market Segments covered in the Report:



By Component



 Solution



 Services



o Integration & Implementation



o Consulting



o Training & Support



By Deployment Type



 Cloud



 On-premise



By Enterprise Size



 Small & Medium Enterprises



 Large Enterprises



By Vertical



 Telecom



 Construction & Real- Estate



 Energy & Utilities



 Manufacturing



 Agriculture



 Government



 Others



By Geography



 North America



o US



o Canada



o Mexico



o Rest of North America



 Europe



o Germany



o UK



o France



o Russia



o Spain



o Italy



o Rest of Europe



 Asia Pacific



o China



o Japan



o India



o South Korea



o Singapore



o Malaysia



o Rest of Asia Pacific



 LAMEA



o Brazil



o Argentina



o UAE



o Saudi Arabia



o South Africa



o Nigeria



o Rest of LAMEA



Companies Profiled



 Repsly, Inc.



 Spatial Networks, Inc.



 ProntoForms Corporation



 Canvas Solutions, Inc.



 SafetyCulture Pty Ltd.



 Field Safe Solutions, Inc.



 FieldWireLabs, Inc.



 Bentley Systems, Inc.



 Esri, Inc.



 SAP SE



Unique Offerings



 Exhaustive coverage



 Highest number of market tables and figures



 Subscription based model available



 Guaranteed best price



 Assured post sales research support with 10% customization free

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06249490/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



__________________________

Story continues

CONTACT: Clare: clare@reportlinker.com US: (339)-368-6001 Intl: +1 339-368-6001




NEW YORK, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The Online Advertising Sourcing and Intelligence Report provides key information about the market. For instance, the Online Advertising Market will grow at a CAGR of 12.08% during 2022-2026.

Online Advertising Market

Key Players in the Online Advertising Sourcing and Procurement Market Include: Omnicom Group, Publicis Groupe, and The Interpublic Group of Companies

Get a detailed competitor analysis on our sample report: Download Now

Online Advertising Sourcing and Procurement Market Analysis

Analysis of the cost and volume drivers and supply market forecasts in various regions are offered in this Online Advertising Sourcing and Procurement research report. This market intelligence report also analyzes the top supply markets and the critical cost drivers that can aid buyers and suppliers devise a cost-effective category management strategy.

Get a FREE sample report to know more

Insights Delivered into the Online Advertising Sourcing and Procurement Market

This market intelligence report on Online Advertising Sourcing and Procurement answers to all the critical problems faced by investors who seek cost-saving opportunities in a competitive market. It also offers actionable anecdotes on the industry structure and supply market forecasts including highlights of the top vendors in this market. Our procurement experts have determined effective category pricing strategies that are attuned to the dynamics of this market which can be leveraged to maximize revenue generation against minimum investments on the products.

The reports help buyers understand:

Global and regional spend potential for Online Advertising Sourcing and Procurement for the period of 2022-2026

Risk management and sustainability strategies

Incumbent supplier evaluation metrics

Pricing outlook and factors influencing the procurement process

This Online Advertising Sourcing and Procurement Market procurement research report offers coverage of:

Regional spend dynamism and factors impacting costs

The total cost of ownership and cost-saving opportunities

Supply chain margins and pricing models

Story continues

For more information on the exact spend growth rate and yearly category spend: www.spendedge.com/report/online-advertising-sourcing-and-procurement-intelligence-report

This market intelligence report identifies the major costs incurred by suppliers and provides additional information on:

Competitiveness index for suppliers

Market favorability index for suppliers

Supplier and buyer KPIs

Table of Content

Executive Summary

Market Insights

Category Pricing Insights

Cost-saving Opportunities

Best Practices

Category Ecosystem

Category Management Strategy

Category Management Enablers

Suppliers Selection

Suppliers under Coverage

US Market Insights

Category scope

Appendix

About SpendEdge:

SpendEdge shares your passion for driving sourcing and procurement excellence. We are the preferred procurement market intelligence partner for 120+ Fortune 500 firms and other leading companies across numerous industries. Our strength lies in delivering robust, real-time procurement market intelligence reports and solutions.

Contacts

SpendEdge

Anirban Choudhury

Marketing Manager

Ph No: +1 (872) 206-9340

https://www.spendedge.com/contact-us

SpendEdge Logo (PRNewsfoto/SpendEdge)

Cision

View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/global-online-advertising-sourcing-and-procurement-market-to-witness-nearly-usd-320-24-billion-growth-by-2026-spendedge-301514912.html

SOURCE SpendEdge
GoalProfit Inc.

GoalProfit announces $655,000 in funding for their low-code retail optimization platform that makes customized data analytics accessible to retailers

GoalProfit announces $655,000 in funding for their low-code retail optimization platform that makes customized data analytics accessible to retailers

Austin, Texas, United States, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Zero backlog in data-intensive applications



Austin, US, and Helsinki, Finland (March 30, 2022) GoalProfit (www.goalprofit.com), a platform designed to empower retailers to build customized intelligence applications, announced the closing of a $655k pre-seed round. Founded by ex-IBM executives Maxim Morozov and Oleg Sidorkin, GoalProfit is on a mission to make big data solutions accessible to all retailers and help them to transform in the new post-COVID reality.

GoalProfits offering is based on a proprietary data engine that allows enterprises to process billions of data points at blazingly fast speed and arrive at more profitable, intelligent decisions. With GoalProfit, we help retailers craft and data-drive their merchandising decisions: price, promo, markdowns, inventories, demand, customer analytics, and many others.

This pre-seed round is led by Business Angels - Ali Omar, Henry Nilert, Pekka Ylitalo, Stas Baranov - and YellowRockets VC (San Fransisco, US) early-stage venture fund that focuses on robotics and automation. Since GoalProfits inception in early 2021, the company has released its platform and signed up several customers.

"We are on a mission to show that advanced big data solutions are accessible to all businesses," said Oleg Sidorkin, co-founder and CTO of GoalProfit. "Our solution is designed to bring the benefits of customized tools previously only available to large corporations. It gives any retailer the toolkit to explore their competitive advantage without the need for an expensive internal IT team."

Retail bankruptcies in 2020 hit the highest levels in more than a decade, and experts say there are more to come. There were dozens of retail bankruptcies in 2020, and experts say the pain isn't over yet. S&P Global Market Intelligence tallied 49 bankruptcies in the retail space as of mid-November.

Story continues

Pricing is by far the most powerful tool for earnings improvement. The first implementation of GoalProfit shows that data-driven pricing could improve gross margin by at least 4% while maintaining in-store traffic.

GoalProfit now offers a suite of intelligence applications for the retail industry. Price & Markdown optimization solutions are based on a fast data platform with low-code interfaces which could be customized for specific customer needs. API data integration can be established in days, and users are onboard with almost no learning curve thanks to the familiar XLS style interface.

"The $25 billion data and analytics software industry is an ideal starting point for GoalProfit. I've watched retailers spend incredible amounts of money with no return on their investment because of the slow and complex implementations," says Maxim Morozov, who previously worked in IBM and Nielsen in Customer Success."

I was amazed how fast and how flexible, enterprise-grade software the team has built in such a short time. The stars were aligned: the team has vast experience in the field, they have deep domain expertise, they understand the pain point of retailers, and above all, the technology is very powerful and easily customizable.  says Ali Omar, GoalProfit lead investor in this pre-seed funding round.

AI/ML technologies penetration rate in retail shows double-digit growth rates. We expect the same positive outlook for the next five years. The GoalProfit Platform is a high-performance analytical system for dynamic analysis and commodity price forecasting. Such solutions are becoming a key competitive factor for medium and large market players today. The distinctive feature of GoalProfit is the low code solution, easy installation and configuration, quick implementation, and unlimited performance.  says Valerie Bertele, YellowRockets.VC Partner.

The company has offices in Austin, US, and Helsinki, Finland, and will use the investment to grow its engineering and sales teams in Europe and the US.

About GoalProfit

GoalProfit is a global SaaS provider of a low-code retail optimization platform empowering retailers to build customized intelligence applications. GoalProfit is on a mission to make big data solutions accessible for all retailers and help them survive in a new post-COVID reality. Created by retail industry experts, GoalProfits SaaS solutions deliver a significant return on investment with a truly tailored user experience.

Better Prices. Higher Profits.



Attachment

CONTACT: Full Name : Maxim Morozov Company: GoalProfit Phone Number: +358 403 644 047 Website: https://www.goalprofit.com Email : maxim.morozov@goalprofit.com




Beating the Monday blues will be especially trying for Google employees this week. Starting today, workers are required to come into company headquarters three times a week. But according to Laszlo Bock, former chief of Google human resources and current CEO of Humu, this hybrid model wont be around much longer.

Bock says that after three to five years of flexible work models and hybrid plans, the normal in-office schedule will prevail at Googleand beyond. He predicts this transition will happen over the next few years, telling Bloomberg its the boil the frog method.

The purpose of the boil the frog method [is] to do it subtly and thereby avoid difficult questions and conflict, Bock told Fortune. But thats not only bad for trust and morale, its also not the best thing for employees or for the company.

Bock said his research at Humu shows that the perfect mix of employee productivity and worker happiness is a 3+2 schedule, in which three days are spent in the office, and two are remote. This combination, he says, gives individuals the chance to build relationships in-office and work on individual tasks that are easier at home.

But Bock says that executives are reluctant to accept permanent work-from-home models. This could be due to the large investment that companies make when buying luxury offices. But it could also have to do with management itself.

Most executives have been working in offices for 20 to 30 years, so its comfortable for them. Its the environment in which they know how to lead, he told Fortune. They want to go back to what is familiar, and they believe their experience trumps what Humus science shows: A hybrid model is better for productivity and happiness than being in the office five days a week.

When the pandemic hit in 2020, many white-collar jobs shifted to remote work for safety reasons. The tech sector readily adapted to this new format, as many employees learned that they liked the flexibility that working from home afforded them. But a new wave of companies, including tech giants like Meta and Apple, are starting to try to coax (or summon) their workers back to their headquarters.

Story continues

While some studies have shown that this shift to virtual work does not lead to a lack of employee productivity, Bock tells Fortune that this research is missing the full story. Its true that total workforce productivity hasnt changed, but workforce productivity per hour worked has dropped. People are working longer hours, taking fewer breaks, and working on weekends because its become impossible to turn off work. He adds that there is an emotional toll to working isolated without any teammates or coworkers present.

Bock said he thinks workers will likely begin to want to come into the office themselves when they see bosses giving more promotions and opportunities to staff who are in the building over those who work from home. The new power dynamic will likely force reluctant employees to get back to the office when trying to gain favor with their supervisors.

Bosses looking to push their employees back to their headquarters should make sure that there are obvious benefits to coming into work. Whether that be providing in-person coaching opportunities or free lunches, Bock suggests that employers make the perks to working in the office clear. He also urges companies to ensure that their promises hold weight.

Many companies will promise a great in-office experience but will fail to deliver, Bock said.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com
VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / March 4, 2022 / Hannan Metals Limited ("Hannan" or the "Company") (TSXV:HAN) (OTC PINK:HANNF) is pleased to provide an update on exploration programs at the Belen project area at the 100%-owned Valiente copper-gold porphyry project in central Peru (Figures 1 and 2).

Highlights:

Follow-up reconnaissance ridge-top soil sampling program at Belen has identified two large coherent copper and gold soil anomalies that extend along a 10-km trend that remains open in multiple directions. Soil geochemistry shows a transition from a larger copper-gold-molybdenum porphyry-style signature associated with Miocene-age intrusions to a peripheral gold+antimony+tellurium epithermal signature typically found in a shallow level epithermal system above a porphyry intrusion;

All copper and gold soil anomalies remain open to multiple directions and further sampling is ongoing to delineate the anomalies. Hannan will expand the current ridge-top soil program to cover the entire 10-km trend. Further results are expected shortly.

Michael Hudson, CEO, states "The Belen copper-gold porphyry target is developing strongly with analytical results continuing to demonstrate robust soil geochemistry over large areas, suggesting association with a zoned porphyry and epithermal mineral system. Due to the dense jungle vegetation and thin soil veneer, outcrops are rare. The low impact surface exploration by the Company has proven very successful in outlining prospective mineralized areas in a highly leached environment. Field and social teams are actively engaged in the area with the target shaping up rapidly to allow drill permitting to commence shortly."

A total of 149 soil samples taken to date show a transition from a copper-gold-molybdenum porphyry-style geochemical signature. The anomaly up to 1,461 ppm copper (Figures 3 and 5) extends over 1.6 km by 0.8 km and is associated with a Miocene-age cluster of monzonitic to dioritic intrusions. One outcrop channel sample assayed 1m @ 0.31 g/t gold and 380 ppm copper, hosted within a hornblende bearing feldspar porphyry with milky quartz-iron oxide veinlets. An outcropping intrusion in the vicinity was dated at 15.4Ma. Sub-crops in soil sample pits are strongly oxidized and leached (Figure 3 and 4) with associated silver, zinc, potassium and vanadium.

A peripheral gold-antimony-tellurium soil anomaly up to 85 ppb gold extends 2 km by 0.4 km (Figures 3 and 5) around the porphyry-style geochemical signature. This gold-antimony-tellurium association could be representative of a shallow level epithermal system above a porphyry intrusion. There are also indications of gold-copper-zinc anomalous areas that may reflect skarn-style mineralization also common in porphyry environments. Artisanal gold workings have been located downstream from the anomalous soil sampling area and Hannan geologists have panned gold from stream sediment samples.

Story continues

Hannan will expand the current ridge-top soil program to cover the entire 10-km intrusive trend with a systematic grid sampling program followed by trench sampling. Stream sediment samples will also be collected from creeks to rapidly determine the prospectivity of different areas. Hannan also plans to survey an extensive airborne magnetic survey over the Valiente project area. Field and social teams are actively engaged in the area, with Hannan's policy to undertake exploration activities only within areas where full support from local stakeholders exists.

Technical Background

All mineralized samples were collected by Hannan geologists. Samples were transported to ALS in Lima via third party services using traceable parcels. At the laboratory, rock samples were prepared and analyzed by standard methods. The sample preparation involved crushing 70% to less than 2mm, riffle split off 250g, pulverize split to better than 85% passing 75 microns. The crushers and pulverizes were cleaned with barren material after every sample. Samples were analyzed by method ME-MS61, a four acid digest preformed on 0.25g of the sample to quantitatively dissolve most geological materials. Analysis is via ICP-MS. Channel samples are considered representative of the in-situ mineralization samples and sample widths quoted approximate the true width of mineralization, while grab samples are selective by nature and are unlikely to represent average grades on the property.

All soil samples were collected by Hannan geologists using an in-house protocol for soil sampling in jungle areas. The samples were subsequently analyzed with a portable XRF deploying a protocol developed by Hannan for the San Martin project. The method is designed to minimize risk of contamination and ground disturbance. In most cases the sample media is the "B-horizon" of the soil profile. Only 100g of sample material is collected from each site. From the soil sample a pellet is being produced which is dried and analyzed by a portable XRF (pXRF). Certified reference material, blanks and field duplicates are routinely added to monitor the quality of the pXRF data. Gold was analyzed by ALS in Lima using a standard sample preparation and 50g fire assay sample charge.

About Hannan Metals Limited (TSXV:HAN) (OTCPK: HANNF)

Hannan Metals Limited is a natural resources and exploration company developing sustainable resources of metal needed to meet the transition to a low carbon economy. Over the last decade, the team behind Hannan has forged a long and successful record of discovering, financing, and advancing mineral projects in Europe and Peru. Hannan is a top ten in-country explorer by area in Peru.

Mr. Michael Hudson FAusIMM, Hannan's Chairman and CEO, a Qualified Person as defined in National Instrument 43-101, has reviewed and approved the technical disclosure contained in this news release.

On behalf of the Board, "Michael Hudson"

Michael Hudson, Chairman & CEO Further Information

www.hannanmetals.com

1305 - 1090 West Georgia St., Vancouver, BC, V6E 3V7

Mariana Bermudez, Corporate Secretary,

+1 (604) 685 9316, info@hannanmetals.com

Forward Looking Statements. Certain disclosure contained in this news release may constitute forward-looking information or forward-looking statements, within the meaning of Canadian securities laws. These statements may relate to this news release and other matters identified in the Company's public filings. In making the forward-looking statements the Company has applied certain factors and assumptions that are based on the Company's current beliefs as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to the Company. These statements address future events and conditions and, as such, involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the statements. These risks and uncertainties include but are not limited to: the political environment in which the Company operates continuing to support the development and operation of mining projects; the threat associated with outbreaks of viruses and infectious diseases, including the novel COVID-19 virus; risks related to negative publicity with respect to the Company or the mining industry in general; planned work programs; permitting; and community relations. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The Company does not intend, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation to, update or revise any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this news.

SOURCE: Hannan Metals Ltd.





View source version on accesswire.com:

https://www.accesswire.com/695804/Hannan-Copper-Gold-Soil-Sampling-Defines-Porphyry-Target-at-Belen-Peru




Russias invasion of Ukraine and penalizing sanctions against Moscow have roiled financial markets and wreaked havoc on global supply chains. And JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon thinks the worst is yet to come.

Dimon warned in his closely-read annual letter to shareholders on Monday that Russias ongoing invasion of Ukraine is expected to meaningfully slow the U.S. and global economy.

JPMorgan economists predict consequences from the war and resulting sanctions against Russia will reduce the countrys gross domestic product (GDP) by as much as 12.5% by the middle of this year. The potential spillover effects have also led the bank to cut its forecast for the rest of Europe, with their GDP projections now at an annual rate of 2% in 2022, compared to the pace of 4.5% economists had expected just six weeks ago.

Meanwhile, JPMorgan estimates the U.S. economy will advance roughly 2.5%, compared to the institutions initial forecast of 3%  but Dimon cautioned in the letter that forecasts were based upon a fairly static view of the war.

We do not know what its outcome ultimately will be, but the hostilities in Ukraine and the sanctions on Russia are already having a substantial economic impact, said Dimon, adding that many more sanctions could be added and spur further unpredictability.

JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon listens as he is introduced at the Boston College Chief Executives Club luncheon in Boston, Massachusetts, U.S., November 23, 2021. REUTERS/Brian Snyder

Along with the unpredictability of war itself and the uncertainty surrounding global commodity supply chains, this makes for a potentially explosive situation, he added.

Moreover, Dimon also warned the bank itself is positioned to lose as much as $1 billion over time in the first-ever comment JPMorgan has made over its potential losses from the war. Although the major bank said it is not worried about its direct exposure to Russia, the institution is concerned about the secondary and collateral effects the crisis and sanctions pose on so many companies and countries.

Dimon did not elaborate on an exact time frame or how the estimate was calculated, but a spokesperson for JPMorgan told Yahoo Finance the $1 billion loss could be related to potential distressed assets impacted by the war.

Story continues

The bank earned $48.3 billion in profit on revenue of $125.3 billion last year.

America must be ready for the possibility of an extended war in Ukraine with unpredictable outcomes, he wrote. We should prepare for the worst and hope for the best.

The conflict in Eastern Europe is only one of several headwinds clouding the global economic picture, according to Dimon. The confluence of the war, the stimulus-fueled recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, central banks quickly moving ahead to raise interest rates and the reversal of quantitative easing may dramatically increase the risks ahead, he said.

We are facing challenges at every turn: a pandemic, unprecedented government actions, a strong recovery after a sharp and deep global recession, a highly polarized U.S. election, mounting inflation, a war in Ukraine and dramatic economic sanctions against Russia, Dimon wrote. While all this turmoil has serious ramifications on our company, its effect on the world  with the extreme suffering of the Ukrainian people and the potential restructuring of the global order  is far more important.



Alexandra Semenova is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter @alexandraandnyc

Read the latest financial and business news from Yahoo Finance

Follow Yahoo Finance on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Flipboard, and LinkedIn
Around 76.5% of companies in Dubai registered growth in their businesses during Expo 2020, while 73.5% managed to build new business relations during the world's greatest show, according to a report commissioned by Dubai Chamber of Commerce.



In terms of services provided by Dubai Chamber during the event, 70.6% of respondents to the survey conducted as part of the report said they benefitted from networking, 47% benefitted from the Global Business Forum series and 47% benefitted from B2B meetings, reported Emirates News Agency WAM.



Titled, 'Business Integration for Growth, Digital Transformation and Global Partnerships' the report was developed by the Chamber in collaboration with Oxford Business Group.



In total, Dubai Chamber of Commerce organised 98 events during Expo 2020 Dubai, which were attended by more than 25,000 participants from over 130 countries. The Global Business Forums on Africa, ASEAN and Latin America saw the most participation, as the high-level forums were joined by government and business leaders, who attended in person and virtually.



The 12th edition of the World Chambers Congress and a series of Thematic Business Forums were also hosted by the Chamber, which were attended by chamber and industry leaders. The events identified global challenges and highlighted innovative solutions to drive sustainable economic growth.



Dubai Chamber of Commerce facilitated 1,500 bilateral business meetings between UAE investors and their global counterparts, and received 1,746 visiting delegations from over 60 countries during the mega event, which were joined by 3,350 government and business leaders.



Seven new economic and professional bodies were licensed by the Dubai Association Centre, which was established in collaboration with the Dubai Chamber of Commerce (one of the three chambers under Dubai Chambers alongside Dubai International Chamber and Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy), the Dubai Economy and Tourism and Dubai World Trade Centre.



The report reveals that revenue per available room (RevPAR) in Dubai in January 2022 increased to AED460 ($125) compared to AED293 ($80) in January 2021, marking an increase of 56.3% and outperforming Milan, the host city for Expo 2015, which recorded RevPAR of 54.5% in 2015.



There were 759 hotels and hotel establishments accounted for in Dubai in January 2022 compared to 711 in January 2021, while guest nights in January were at 3.04 million during the same month this year compared to 2.65 million in January 2021.



Arrivals at Dubai International Airport recorded growth of 12.7% in 2021 compared to 2020, while the UAE's non-oil foreign trade jumped 27% over 2020 and 11% over 2019, a growth trend largely driven by Expo 2020 Dubai.



Hamad Buamim, President & CEO of Dubai Chambers, described Expo 2020 Dubai as a historic milestone for the UAE and Dubai, and noted that the pivotal role that Dubai Chamber of Commerce played in facilitating partnerships between UAE companies and their global counterparts during Expo 2020 Dubai, and expanding Dubais rapidly growing Dubais maturing business ecosystem.



"Our goal is to be the best chamber in the world when it comes to driving competitiveness and growth. At Expo 2020 Dubai, we have been able to put this mission and vision into action. Our efforts in supporting the mega-event have helped to strengthen Dubais reputation as a place to do business.



"Building on our long-term strategy to embrace digital transformation, we adopted a hybrid format for the Expo 2020 events. Doing so has enabled us to expand our reach and engage with public and private stakeholders from around the world," he said.



Buamim emphasised the role of Expo 2020 Dubai is a stepping-stone to a resilient future shaped by innovation, international cooperation, and a more competitive and diversified economy supported by SMEs.
K92 Mining Inc.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- K92 Mining Inc. (K92 or the Company) (TSX: KNT; OTCQX: KNTNF) announces that it has filed a technical report (the Technical Report) containing an updated resource estimate on the Kora gold deposit and a maiden resource estimate on the Judd deposit, in Papua New Guinea. The Technical Report, titled, Independent Technical Report Mineral Resource Estimate Update Kora and Judd Gold Deposits, Kainantu Project, Papua New Guinea dated March 31, 2022, with an effective date of January 20, 2022, was prepared by Andrew Kohler (Geol), PGCert (Geostatistics), MAIG, Simon Tear BSc (Hons), EurGeol, PGeo IGI, EurGeol, and Anthony Woodward BSc (Hons), M.Sc., MAIG. Refer to the Companys news release dated February 23, 2022, for a summary of the key results, assumptions and estimates contained in the Technical Report. The Technical Report was prepared in accordance with National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects and is available under the Companys SEDAR profile (www.sedar.com) and on the K92 website at www.k92mining.com.

About K92

K92 Mining Inc. is engaged in the production of gold, copper and silver from the Kora and Judd deposits at the Kainantu Gold Mine in the Eastern Highlands province of Papua New Guinea, as well as exploration and development of mineral deposits in the immediate vicinity of the mine. The Company declared commercial production from Kainantu in February 2018 and is in a strong financial position.

The Company commenced an expansion of the mine based on an updated Preliminary Economic Assessment on the property which was published in January 2019 and updated in July 2020. K92 is operated by a team of mining company professionals with extensive international mine-building and operational experience.

On Behalf of the Company,

John Lewins, Chief Executive Officer and Director

For further information, please contact David Medilek, P.Eng., CFA at +1-604-416-4445

Story continues

CAUTIONARY STATEMENT REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION: This news release includes certain forward-looking statements under applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable, are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors which may cause the actual results and future events to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. All statements that address future plans, activities, events, or developments that the Company believes, expects or anticipates will or may occur are forward-looking information, including statements regarding the realization of the preliminary economic analysis for the Kainantu Project, expectations of future cash flows, the planned plant expansion, production results, cost of sales, sales of production, potential expansion of resources and the generation of further drilling results which may or may not occur. Forward-looking statements and information contained herein are based on certain factors and assumptions regarding, among other things, the market price of the Companys securities, metal prices, exchange rates, taxation, the estimation, timing and amount of future exploration and development, capital and operating costs, the availability of financing, the receipt of regulatory approvals, assumptions contained in the preliminary economic assessment, environmental risks, title disputes, failure of plant, equipment or processes to operate as anticipated, accidents, labour disputes, claims and limitations on insurance coverage and other risks of the mining industry, changes in national and local government regulation of mining operations in PNG, mitigation of the Covid-19 pandemic, continuation of the lifted state of emergency, and regulations and other matters. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.




ReportLinker

Major players in the local general freight trucking market are YRC Worldwide Inc, JB Hunt Transport Services Inc. , FedEx Corporation, XPO Logistics Inc, Knight-Swift Transportation Holdings Inc, American Rail Center Logistics, DHL, United Parcel Service, Challenger Motor Freight Inc, Creed Freight System, JR Traffic Service, LEASE-SERV TRANSPORTATION, Schneider national, Landstar, and Swift Transportation.

New York, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Local General Freight Trucking Global Market Report 2022" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06250368/?utm_source=GNW





The global local general freight trucking market is expected to grow from $121.99 billion in 2021 to $126.07 billion in 2022 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 3.3%. The market is expected to grow to $136.75 billion in 2026 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 2.1%.



The local general freight trucking market consists of sales of local general freight trucking services and related goods by entities (organizations, sole traders, and partnerships) that provide local general freight trucking services.General freight establishments handle a wide variety of commodities, generally palletized and transported in a container or van trailer.



Local general freight trucking establishments usually provide trucking within a metropolitan area that may cross state lines.Generally, the trips are same-day returns.



Only goods and services traded between entities or sold to end consumers are included.



The main types of local general freight trucking are truckload transportation, less-than-truckload transportation, intermodal transportation, dry-bulk transportation, and others. Intermodal transportation involves the movement of large-sized goods through more modes of transport in containers. The market is segmented by type into heavy trucks, medium trucks, and light trucks and by application into oil and gas, industrial and manufacturing, energy and mining, food and beverages, pharmaceuticals and healthcare, and others



Asia-Pacific was the largest region in the local general freight trucking market in 2021.North America was the second largest region in the local general freight trucking market.



The regions covered in this report are Asia-Pacific, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, South America, Middle East, and Africa.



The increase in e-commerce sales is expected to fuel the growth of the local freight trucking market in the coming years.E-Commerce refers to the purchasing and sale of products and services on the Internet.



The e-commerce industry relies on trucking to move their items from one location to another and impacts the trucking industry directly. For instance, according to the US Census Bureau, in 2020, the USA consumers spent $211.5 billion in the second quarter and increased by 31.8% from the previous quarter. The increase in e-commerce sales increases the demand to transport the goods and thereby drives the growth of the local freight trucking market.



The impact of COVID19 is expected to limit the growth of the local freight trucking market in the coming years.The transportation industry faces severe challenges due to coronavirus with disruption in the supply chain.



A decrease in demand led to a fall in the supply of raw material or end-products such as restaurant supply, live event equipment, among others. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the trucking industry lost more than 88,000 jobs in April 2020, a 5.8% decline from March, a 20.5 million job losses across the U.S., placing the nations total unemployment rate at 14.7%. A recent survey found that nearly half (48%) of carriers registered significantly lowered freight rates across the U.S. Therefore, the prevalence of COVID-19 restrains the growth of the local freight trucking market.



The integration of the Internet of Things (IoT) in the transportation sector is a key trend gaining popularity in the local general freight trucking market.The IoT is expected to change the transport sector by gathering data and vital information from market and technology developments related to data analytics and automation of mobility and provide benefits in fleet management and location tracking.



Companies around the world are finding more interesting ways to take advantage of the Internet of Things for greater productivity and efficiency. For instance, Kuehne + Nagel, a Swiss-based transport and logistics company, uses IoT for freight monitoring, which helps to warn about temperature, humidity, pressure, shock, and tilt at the parcel level.



The countries covered in the local general freight trucking market are Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Russia, South Korea, UK, and USA.

Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p06250368/?utm_source=GNW



About Reportlinker

ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.



__________________________

Story continues

CONTACT: Clare: clare@reportlinker.com US: (339)-368-6001 Intl: +1 339-368-6001




CHICAGO, April 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- According to the new research report, the "Military Simulation and Training Market by Application (Army, Aviation, Naval), Type (Live, Virtual, Constructive), Platform (Land, Maritime, Airborne), Solution, Environment (Synthetic, Gaming), Technology & Region - Global Forecast to 2027", published by MarketsandMarkets, the Military Simulation and Training market size is forecasted to grow from an estimated USD 9.2 billion in 2022 to reach USD 12.2 billion by 2027, at a CAGR of 5.6% during the forecast period. The Military Simulation and Training Market is going to be driven by the effects of defense spending and the technological developments made with respect to the display. Rising Geopolitical tensions and border disputes specially in Asian countries is another driver for Military Simulation and Training product.

MarketsandMarkets Logo

Ask for PDF Brochure: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/pdfdownloadNew.asp?id=661

Based on platform, the land segment is expected to grow at the highest CAGR of 6.2% during the forecast period. The growth in demand for military vehicles across the land, sea, and aerial platforms would drive the market growth. Several countries are modernizing their military fleets by inducting newer generation vehicle platforms. This is generating a simultaneous demand for simulation-based training for the military personnel on these platforms, thereby propelling the market prospects of the related military simulators.

Based on Application, Aviation makes the largest share of the market during the forecasted year.

The aviation segment is expected to have a larger market share in the forecasted year. This is majorly due to the complexity and risk involved in aircraft compared to the other end users. For example, a single mistake by pilots on board a military aircraft while landing or take-off will cost the lives of people on board and result in the loss of sophisticated military property and compromise the mission. Such complexity has forced the military authorities to incorporate simulator-based training for pilots. Moreover, the increasing adoption of newer generation aircraft that incorporate complex technologies in the military may require training for pilots to familiarize themselves with the latest equipment and systems. In such situations, providing hands-on experience may be difficult due to high-cost involvement. In such cases, the simulators act as the preferred option

Story continues

Browse in-depth TOC on "Military Simulation and Training Market"

270  Tables

56  Figures

268  Pages

Inquiry Before Buying: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Enquiry_Before_BuyingNew.asp?id=661

"North America is projected to makes the largest share of the market during the forecasted year."

The rising orders to replace the old navy fleet with new ones from the US and Canada and the rise in export of goods are the major factors driving the demand for new ship commanders and crew. This also leads to increased demand for military training systems. According to Boeing Technician Outlook 2019, North America is anticipated to require more than 193,000 aircraft technicians and maintenance crew between 2019 and 2038. This is anticipated to fuel the demand for maintenance crew training across the region during the forecast period

This region is expected to lead the market from 2021 to 2026, owing to increased investments and the adoption of advanced military simulators for all the platforms by countries in this region. The presence of prominent manufacturers and integrators of these Military Simulation and Training, including Lockheed Martin (US), Northrop Grumman (US), L3Harris Technologies, Inc. (US), and Raytheon Technologies (US), is also expected drive the market in the region over the forecast period.

Related Reports:

Simulators Market by Type (ATC, FMS, Driving, Vessel Traffic Control), Solution, Platform (Airborne, Land, Maritime), Technique (Live, Virtual & Constructive, Synthetic Environment, Gaming), Application, Region - Global Forecast to 2025

Flight Simulator Market by Platform (Commercial, Military, UAV, Helicopter Simulator), Type (Full Flight, Flight Training Device, Full Mission, Fixed based), Training (Virtual, Line), Solution (Product, Services) and Region - Global Forecast to 2025

About MarketsandMarkets

MarketsandMarkets provides quantified B2B research on 30,000 high growth niche opportunities/threats which will impact 70% to 80% of worldwide companies' revenues. Currently servicing 7500 customers worldwide including 80% of global Fortune 1000 companies as clients. Almost 75,000 top officers across eight industries worldwide approach MarketsandMarkets for their painpoints around revenues decisions.

Our 850 fulltime analyst and SMEs at MarketsandMarkets are tracking global high growth markets following the "Growth Engagement Model  GEM". The GEM aims at proactive collaboration with the clients to identify new opportunities, identify most important customers, write "Attack, avoid and defend" strategies, identify sources of incremental revenues for both the company and its competitors. MarketsandMarkets now coming up with 1,500 MicroQuadrants (Positioning top players across leaders, emerging companies, innovators, strategic players) annually in high growth emerging segments. MarketsandMarkets is determined to benefit more than 10,000 companies this year for their revenue planning and help them take their innovations/disruptions early to the market by providing them research ahead of the curve.

MarketsandMarkets's flagship competitive intelligence and market research platform, "Knowledge Store" connects over 200,000 markets and entire value chains for deeper understanding of the unmet insights along with market sizing and forecasts of niche markets.

Contact:

Mr. Aashish Mehra

MarketsandMarkets INC.

630 Dundee Road

Suite 430

Northbrook, IL 60062

USA: +1-888-600-6441

Email: sales@marketsandmarkets.com

Research Insight: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/ResearchInsight/military-simulation-virtual-training-market.asp

Visit Our Web Site: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com

Content Source: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/PressReleases/military-simulation-virtual-training.asp

Cision

View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/military-simulation-and-training-market-worth-12-2-billion-by-2027--exclusive-report-by-marketsandmarkets-301516523.html

SOURCE MarketsandMarkets
Minera IRL Limited

LIMA, Peru, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Minera IRL Limited (Minera, the Company or we) (BVL:MIRL) (CSE:MIRL) is pleased to announce that it has retained Maxwell Mercantile Inc. to assist it in developing and implementing an effective investor relations program, including advice with respect to the use of social media and investor awareness programs and assisting management in developing a strategy to expand the Companys exposure to the investment community.



Pursuant to a signed retainer agreement, Maxwell Mercantile Inc. is to receive a monthly retainer of US $10,000 over an initial term of eight months, and the Company has granted Maxwell Mercantile Inc. an option to purchase 4,600,000 ordinary shares at an exercise price of CDN $ 0.085 for a term of three years. The options will vest in installments over a period of thirteen months. The retainer agreement is subject to automatic renewal for successive terms of six months unless either party decides it does not wish to renew.

About Maxwell Mercantile Inc.

Maxwell Mercantile Inc. is a financial advisory firm based in Vancouver, Canada. Its Chief Executive Officer, Theodore Konyi, has over 30 years of experience having successfully completed more than US $200 million in private and public financing. Mr. Konyi has been involved either as a director or senior management for various publicly listed companies and was the co-founder of First Coal Corporation, which raised US $65 million privately and was subsequently sold to Xstrata Mining for US $153 million.

About Minera IRL Limited

Minera IRL Limited is the CSE and BVL listed holding company of Minera IRL S.A. and Compania Minera Kuri Kullu S.A., two precious metal mining companies engaged in mining exploration, development, and operations in Peru, with a primary focus on gold. Minera is led by an agile and experienced senior management team with extensive mining industry experience, particularly in South America. Minera operates the Corihuarmi Gold Mine located 5,000 meters above sea level in Central Peru while assessing opportunities to advance its Ollachea Gold Project located in the Department of Puno, Southern Peru. For more information, please visit www.minera-irl.com.

Story continues

On behalf of the Board of Directors of Minera IRL Limited

Gerardo Perez

Executive Chairman

Diego Benavides

CEO and Director

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:

Minera IRL Limited

Susan Gabbie

Manager, Communications

+51 1 418 - 1230

Pedro Valdez

Manager, Investor Relations

+51 1 418  1230

No stock exchange, securities commission or other regulatory authority has approved or disapproved the information contained in this news release.

Cautionary Statement on Forward-Looking Information

Certain information in this press release constitutes forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements in this press release include the expectation that, with assistance from Maxwell Mercantile Inc., the Company can develop and implement an effective investor relations program and expand its exposure to the investment community. Forward looking statements are based on assumptions. While management believes these assumptions and statements are reasonable in context, forward-looking statements are inherently subject to political, legal, regulatory, business, and economic risks and competitive uncertainties and contingencies. The Company cautions readers that forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause Minera IRLs actual results and future performance to be materially different than those expected or estimated future results, performance or achievements and that forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance, results, or achievements.

Minera IRL assumes no obligation, except as may be required by law, to update or revise them to reflect new events or circumstances. Risks, uncertainties and contingencies and other factors that might cause actual performance to differ from forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, Perus ability to contain the COVID-19 crisis, changes in and access to the capital or precious metals markets, and changes to legislative, political, social, health or economic developments both within Peru and in general.




Providing Clinicians Quick Access to Multiple Configurations and Trend Analysis All-In-One System

IRVINE, Calif., April 04, 2022--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nihon Kohden America, a global leader in precision medical products and services, today announced the expansion of the Life Scope G Series with the US market introduction of Life Scope G5 and G5Max, a new series of bedside monitoring systems. Created by clinicians, for clinicians- these patient monitors provide more data, more insights, and more efficiency for better patient outcomes.

The advanced features of Life Scope G5 and G5Max combine fully optimized, adaptable monitors with an enterprise level server and software applications customized to the needs of clinicians. With consistent user interfaces that are easy to use and streamline workflows, clinicians are empowered to spend more time with their patients and less with technology.

The Life Scope G5 is configured as an all-in-one system with a transport monitor nested in the back of the unit and is available in a 12.1" display. For a larger high-performance screen, the G5Max is available in 15.6" with a true flat tempered glass front. Both Life Scope G5 and G5Max allow users to configure the alarms to meet their clinical needs and reduce alarm fatigue. The Life Scope G5 and G5Max offer advanced EGG parameter monitoring such as continuous QTc or QRSd, advanced atrial fibrillation algorithm, enhanced review capability ST analysis and event recall.

With one continuous patient record, from admit to discharge, the Nihon Kohden patient monitoring system gives you more.

"Patients are our top priority at Nihon Kohden America, when we succeed, patients everywhere heal faster," said Eiichi (Eddie) Tanaka, President and CEO at Nihon Kohden America, "We designed the expansion of the Life Scope G Series to help accomplish one critical goal: allow clinicians to spend more time with their patients and less with technology."

Story continues

Beyond the worlds first pulse oximeter, Nihon Kohden leads with their 70-year heritage to set the bar high with industry-changing innovation for experts by experts. The various functions of the Life Scope G-series patient monitors were designed to empower clinicians and support an ecosystem of care thats always there. Providing high quality, patient-centered care, smarter technologies, and seamless patient transport, the Life Scope G-series deliver more.

About Nihon Kohden Corporation

Founded in Japan in 1951, Nihon Kohden is a leading manufacturer, developer, and distributor of medical electronic equipment, with subsidiaries in the U.S., Europe, Asia, and Latin America. The companys products are now used in more than 120 countries, and it is the largest supplier of electroencephalography products worldwide. A pioneer in transformational healthcare technology, Nihon Kohden has envisioned, designed, and produced revolutionary devices, such as pulse oximeters, arrhythmia analysis, low-invasive blood volume monitoring and wireless patient monitoring. For more information, visit us.nihonkohden.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220404005856/en/

Contacts

MEDIA CONTACT:

Madeline Moore

Marketing Communications Specialist

Madeline_Moore@nihonkohden.com
TORONTO, March 30, 2022 /CNW/ - It is with deep, heartfelt gratitude for his nearly three decades of service that the Council of Professional Engineers Ontario (PEO) announces the retirement of Johnny Zuccon, P.Eng., FEC, as CEO/registrar.



"On behalf of our Council, I thank Johnny for his many years of valuable and enthusiastic commitment to PEO, including his critical leadership as CEO/registrar over the past four years," said PEO President Christian Bellini, P.Eng., FEC.

Zuccon led PEO, Ontario's engineering regulator, during its most ambitious change project in its 100-year history. Beginning with a 2019 external regulatory performance review that identified areas where it could be more efficient, transparent and objective, PEO has since embarked on a multi-year, enterprise-wide transformation to achieve its change vision of becoming a modern regulator that delivers on its statutory mandate.

As it nears completion of the transformation, PEO has implemented several changes to improve its regulatory processes and better protect the public, including:

Creating a mandatory continuing professional development program to ensure Ontario engineers continue meeting standards of learning, and professional competence and conduct. The program goes into effect January 2023;

Re-examining its 12-month Canadian engineering experience requirement for licensure and how it might be modified to balance the interests of licence applicants (including internationally trained) and public safety;

Digitizing engineering licensing processes to enable faster and more efficient application and licence processing; and

Creating an anti-racism and anti-discrimination working group to develop recommendations for addressing any issues of racism and discrimination in all aspects of PEO's work as a regulator, organization and employer.

"Johnny leaves PEO in excellent shape to continue these important changes to our regulatory work, including committing to a governance model that provides strategic direction and high-level control; and making the organizational changes necessary to ensure we have the capacity and agility to achieve our objectives," said Bellini. "He will be greatly missed and we wish him well in his retirement."



Zuccon was appointed interim registrar by PEO Council in February 2018 and was formally appointed CEO/registrar in February 2019. Prior to this, Zuccon had a 23-year tenure with the regulator in various roles, including 15 years as a member of the senior management team.

Story continues

PEO Council, through the Human Resources and Compensation Committee, has begun the process for recruiting a new CEO/registrar.

Professional Engineers Ontario administers the Professional Engineers Act to serve and protect the public interest by licensing Ontario's 91,000 individual practitioners and engineering firms. Professional engineers can be identified by the P.Eng. after their names. When retaining the services of an engineer or engineering firm, the public may search the directories of licensed professional engineers and authorized professional engineering companies on the PEO website: www.peo.on.ca. Inquiries regarding unlicensed individuals and unauthorized companies may be made to PEO through its enforcement hotline at 416-840-1444 or 1-800-339-3716 ext 1444 or the e-mail address enforcement@peo.on.ca.

SOURCE Professional Engineers Ontario

Cision

View original content: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/March2022/30/c5592.html
Calgary, Alberta--(Newsfile Corp. - April 4, 2022) - Reem Capital Corp. (TSXV: REEM) ("REEM") is pleased to announce details concerning a proposed arm's length business combination (the "Transaction") with Kalron Holdings Ltd. ("Kalron"), a corporation formed under the laws of Israel.

Overview of Reem

Reem is a "capital pool company" under the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange (the "Exchange") and it is intended that the Transaction will constitute the "Qualifying Transaction" of Reem, as such term is defined in Exchange Policy 2.4 - Capital Pool Companies. The common shares of Reem (the "Reem Common Shares") are currently listed on the Exchange and Reem is a reporting issuer in the provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and Ontario. Reem was incorporated under the Business Corporations Act (British Columbia) (the "BCBCA") on March 29, 2021.

Overview of Kalron Holdings Ltd ("Kalron") and Seegnal eHealth Ltd ("Seegnal")

Kalron is a privately-held holding corporation that was established under the laws of Israel in 2017. Kalron is the sole shareholder of Seegnal, an Israeli based corporation which had operated under Teva Pharmaceuticals Industries Ltd. ("Teva") until its purchase by Kalron in December 2017. Seegnal provides patient-tailored software as a service (SAAS) system for one-glance managing & mitigating drug related problems while providing decision support to healthcare professionals at the point of care. Seegnal has developed, owns and is marketing a concept of addressing the need of detecting and solving drug-related problems, which has been determined as the fourth leading cause of mortality in developed countries.1 Seegnal's SAAS based software platform is a patient-tailored, clinicians'-friendly drug-related problem solution. Seegnal exclusively integrates at the point-of-care, unique patients'-specific data like genetics, food, results of lab tests, ECG, smoking and the effects of many concomitant medications, while delivering accuracy, sensitivity and specificity.

Story continues

Seegnal is currently selling its SAAS-based platform in the State of Israel and in the UAE. To date, Seegnal has also signed distribution agreements with several major entities in the US which are well established key-players in the field, and is preparing to launch the product in US hospitals in 2022, through its US wholly-owned subsidiary - Seegnal US Inc. Seegnal was founded by its CEO, Dr. Roni Shiloh, as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Teva in 2015. Dr. Shiloh, MD (with a strong background in Psychiatry) is the author of more than 40 manuscripts and textbooks on polypharmacy and drug interactions. Kalron was established by Dr. Shiloh and a large Israeli family office, and they jointly executed a management buyout of Seegnal from Teva in late December 2017.

Summary of the Proposed Transaction

Reem has entered into a non-binding letter of intent with Kalron dated April 1, 2022 (the "LOI") pursuant to which Reem and Kalron intend to complete the Transaction, and whereby Reem as it exists upon completion of the Transaction (the "Resulting Issuer") will continue the business of Kalron.

It is currently anticipated that the Transaction will occur as a merger, amalgamation or share exchange, the final structure of the Transaction being subject to receipt of tax, corporate and securities law advice for both Reem and Kalron. The LOI is expected to be superseded by a definitive agreement (the "Definitive Agreement") to be signed between the parties.

It is anticipated that each ordinary share of Kalron ("Kalron Shares") outstanding at the time of closing the Transaction ("Closing") (including the Kalron Shares issuable upon conversion of the Subscription Receipts (as defined below)) will be exchanged for an appropriately corresponding number of Reem Common Shares, with reference to the Offering Price (as defined below). Kalron will not receive any additional consideration for its shares. Prior to the Closing, it is intended that Reem shall consolidate the Reem Common Shares on such basis as is necessary to result in the deemed value of the Reem Common Shares being equal to $2,000,000. It is intended that the Reem Common Shares will be issued to holders of the Kalron Shares on the basis of one Reem Common Share for every one Kalron Share. Each outstanding option and warrant to purchase Reem Common Shares shall be adjusted so that the number of shares issuable on exercise, and the exercise price thereof, are adjusted to give effect to such consolidation.

Reem shareholder approval is not required with respect to the Transaction under the rules of the Exchange because the Transaction does not constitute a "Non-Arm's Length Qualifying Transaction" pursuant to the policies of the Exchange. However, the structure of the Transaction is being finalized and, based on the final structure as reflected in the Definitive Agreement, shareholder approval may be required under applicable law. Trading in the Reem Common Shares has been halted and is not expected to resume until the Transaction is completed or until the Exchange receives the requisite documentation to resume trading.

It is expected that upon completion of the Transaction, the Resulting Issuer, to be renamed "Seegnal eHealth Ltd.", will be listed as a Tier 2 Technology Issuer on the Exchange.

A more comprehensive news release will be issued by Reem in due course disclosing details of the Transaction, including financial information respecting Kalron, the names and backgrounds of all persons who will constitute insiders of the Resulting Issuer, the issued and outstanding securities of each of Reem and Kalron, the terms of the exchange of securities of Reem and Kalron, the applicable security exchange ratios, the details of any meetings of the shareholders of Reem and Kalron, required to approve the Transaction and matters related thereto (as applicable), and information respecting sponsorship, once a Definitive Agreement has been executed and certain conditions have been met, including satisfactory completion of due diligence.

Concurrent Financing

In conjunction with, or prior to the Closing, it is expected that Kalron will complete a brokered private placement of subscription receipts of Kalron ("Subscription Receipts") to raise gross proceeds of at least $3,000,000 (the "Private Placement") at a price acceptable to Kalron in its sole discretion (the "Offering Price"). Each Subscription Receipt will be automatically exchanged immediately prior to the completion of the Transaction (without any further action by the holder of such Subscription Receipt and for no further payment) for one Kalron Share upon satisfaction of certain escrow release conditions.

Forward Looking Information

This press release contains statements that constitute "forward-looking information" ("forward-looking information") within the meaning of the applicable Canadian securities legislation. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, are forward-looking information and are based on expectations, estimates and projections as at the date of this news release. Any statement that discusses predictions, expectations, beliefs, plans, projections, objectives, assumptions, future events or performance (often but not always using phrases such as "believe", "estimate", "expect", "intend", "projected" or variations of such words and phrases or stating that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will" be taken to occur or be achieved) are not statements of historical fact and may be forward-looking information.

More particularly and without limitation, this press release contains forward-looking statements concerning the Transaction (including the terms and timing thereof), the continued business of the Resulting Issuer, the issuance of additional news releases describing the Transaction, the name of the Resulting Issuer, the trading of the Reem Common Shares on the Exchange, the listing of the Resulting Issuer on the Exchange, and the holding of shareholder meetings in connection with the Transaction, launch of products by Seegnal in US hospitals in 2022 and the expansion of the Seegnal business. In disclosing the forward-looking information contained in this press release, Reem has made certain assumptions, including that: all applicable shareholder and regulatory approvals for the Transaction will be received; that the Transaction will be completed on mutually acceptable terms and within a customary timeframe for transactions of this nature and the acceptance of the Seegnal products by customers in the United States. Although Reem believes that the expectations reflected in such forward-looking information are reasonable, it can give no assurance that the expectations of any forward-looking information will prove to be correct. Known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors may cause the actual results and future events to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information. Such factors include, but are not limited to: availability of financing; delay or failure to receive board, shareholder or regulatory approvals; and general business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties. There can be no certainty that the Transaction will be completed on the terms set out in the LOI or at all. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on the forward-looking information contained in this press release. Except as required by law, Reem disclaims any intention and assumes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information to reflect actual results, whether as a result of new information, future events, changes in assumptions, changes in factors affecting such forward-looking information or otherwise.

Completion of the Transaction is subject to a number of conditions, including but not limited to, execution of a binding definitive agreement relating to the Transaction, Exchange acceptance and, if applicable pursuant to Exchange requirements, majority of the minority shareholder approval. Where applicable, the Transaction cannot close until the required shareholder approval is obtained. There can be no assurance that the Transaction will be completed as proposed or at all.

Investors are cautioned that, except as disclosed in the management information circular or filing statement to be prepared in connection with the Transaction, any information released or received with respect to the Transaction may not be accurate or complete and should not be relied upon. Trading in the securities of a capital pool company should be considered highly speculative.

The TSX Venture Exchange Inc. has in no way passed upon the merits of the proposed Transaction and has neither approved nor disapproved the contents of this press release.

Reem Capital Corp.

For further information, please contact:

Arthur H. Kwan, Chief Executive Officer

Reem Capital Corp.

Email: arthur_h_kwan@hotmail.com

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this news release.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange, Inc. nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the polices of the TSX Venture Exchange) has in any way passed upon the merits of the Transaction and associated transactions and neither of the foregoing entities has in any way approved or disapproved of the contents of this press release.

The securities have not been and will not be registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended and may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an applicable exemption from the registration requirement. This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy nor shall there be any sale of the securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful.

NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO U.S. NEWSWIRE SERVICES OR FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

1 Miles Hacker, Pharmacology, 2009 (https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/adverse-drug-reaction); Ernst FR, Grizzle AJ: Drug-related morbidity and mortality: updating the cost-of-illness model. J Am Pharm Assoc. 2001, 41 (2): 192-9; and Jason L et al., Journal of American Medical Association 1998; 279: 1200-1205.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/119179
Sorenson Communications

Ariel Alternatives, LLC completes purchase of majority stake in Sorenson

Partnership to enable the expansion of Sorensons inclusive communication options for Deaf, hard-of-hearing, and additional diverse populations worldwide

Newly appointed CEO and board directors bring enhanced product, security, and regulatory expertise to leadership team

SALT LAKE CITY, April 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Sorenson (or the Company), the leading U.S. communications provider for people who are Deaf and hard-of-hearing, announced today that private investment firm Ariel Alternatives, LLC has completed an acquisition of 52.5% of the Companys common equity from existing shareholders, including Blackstone Credit, a fund managed by Franklin Mutual Advisers, and private credit accounts managed by KKR at an enterprise valuation of $1.3 billion. The selling shareholders will continue to own a minority interest in the company. Ariel Alternatives is the private equity subsidiary of global asset manager Ariel Investments, LLC, the first Black-owned investment firm in the U.S.

Sorenson has been the leader for over 20 years in delivering accessible communications, technology and services to the Deaf and hard-of-hearing communities in the U.S. and, more recently, in the United Kingdom. Sorensons Internet Protocol Captioned Telephone Service (IP CTS) for people with hearing loss, video, in-person American Sign Language and British Sign Language interpreting have modernized the way people who are Deaf and hard-of-hearing communicate. This acquisition will not affect Sorensons current services.

Today, Sorenson processes more than 140 million conversations annually, and is one of Americas largest private employers of Deaf people. Ariel Alternatives investment is expected to enable Sorenson to connect even more people worldwide using the Companys accessible and inclusive services, by expanding those services to additional 21st century communications platforms. Sorensons existing presence in Europe includes a flagship customer in France, and its United Kingdom affiliate, Sign Language Interactions. Sign Language Interactions was recently named by the U.K.s Office of Communications as the official provider for the U.K.s new Emergency 999 Video Relay Service (VRS).

Story continues

This transaction is the first of Ariel Alternatives strategic initiative Project Black, its mission to scale sustainable minority-owned businesses. Through this effort, Ariel Alternatives seeks to transform portfolio companies like Sorenson into minority business enterprises (MBEs) and position them as leading suppliers to Fortune 500 companies, supporting business diversity. Ariel Alternatives also aims to help portfolio companies generate jobs, economic growth, and equality within underrepresented populations. These impact objectives include but are not limited to: increasing the accessibility of products to underserved communities; the hiring of diverse people from entry level to the boardroom; the purchasing of contracts with minority-owned vendors and suppliers; and philanthropic partnerships with organizations supporting civil rights.

Sorenson Chief Executive Officer Jorge Rodriguez commented: We are thrilled to partner with Ariel Alternatives. Their investment will enable us to optimize our capabilities, evolve our systems, platforms and approaches to improve the overall Deaf and hard-of-hearing communication experience, and accelerate R&D and next-generation technology investments to promote functional equivalency across the diverse communities we serve. I couldnt be happier that we have closed such a monumental transaction, given our thesis of accessibility, inclusion and economic opportunities as underlying tenets of our mission to support underserved and underrepresented groups.

Senior Managing Director of Blackstone Credit and Sorenson board member David Posnick added: Sorenson has done a phenomenal job of serving the Deaf and hard-of-hearing communities. I am confident the Ariel Alternatives partnership will extend Sorensons service reach, providing communication language access to broader populations.

Ariel Alternatives has leveraged its extensive network of minority executives to introduce Sorenson to recently appointed CEO Jorge Rodriguez and new board members, including Chairman Paget Alves, and directors Vonya McCann, Colonel J. Carlos Vega and Maria Teresa Lensing. In addition to being people of color, these executives bring critical product, security, and regulatory expertise to Sorensons leadership team as the Company evolves and enhances its focus on innovation, consumer protection, and compliance.

Mr. Rodriguez (Sorenson CEO) was previously the President and CEO of multiple America Movil companies and brings more than thirty years of telecommunications and management experience. Mr. Alves (Sorenson board Chairman) most recently served as the Chief Sales Officer and President of Business Markets Group for Sprint Corporation. He is a board member of Assurant, Inc.; International Game Technology, PLC; Synchrony Financial; and Yum! Brands, Inc. He is also on the advisory board for Ariel Alternatives Project Black initiative. Ms. McCann (Sorenson board director) will provide increased regulatory expertise and a dedicated, board-level focus on ensuring strong compliance at Sorenson. She was a Senior Vice President for Government Affairs at Sprint Corporation, following a long career in both communications and government. Ms. McCann was nominated by President William J. Clinton and confirmed by the U.S. Senate as Ambassador and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Communications and Information Policy. Col. Vega (Sorenson board director) is an experienced cybersecurity professional and a retired U.S. Army Colonel with over three decades of security leadership experience and two decades specializing in cybersecurity operations. With demonstrated capability leading large and small-scale organizations to achieve difficult IT, security, and operational objectives, Col. Vega has led teams in high-stress environments characterized by demanding standards and intense operational schedules. He has led professional operations, research, and technology teams in preparation for demanding missions that include combat and support missions in the most hostile environments. Ms. Lensing (Sorenson board director) currently serves as Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer for engineering, infrastructure, and operations at McKesson, where she is strongly focused on engineering design and operational excellence to optimize performance levels. Previously, she held various leadership positions with AT&T and Rockwell Collins. Ms. Lensing is the recipient of numerous business awards and has served on the Hispanic IT Executive Council for the HITEC 100  100 Most Influential Hispanic Leaders in Technology.



Sorenson has recently hired and will continue to engage additional ethnic minority, Deaf and hard-of-hearing leaders, advisors, and directors. In addition, the Company is establishing a Deaf Advisory Council that will recommend ongoing best practices for conducting business in the community it serves.

Sorenson was advised by Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP and Credit Suisse. Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP served as lead legal counsel to Ariel Alternatives, with Greenberg Traurig LLP serving as co-counsel.

To see this announcement in American Sign Language and British Sign Language, visit the Sorenson press page.

About Sorenson

Sorenson taps the power of language for human relationships to thrive. As one of the worlds leading language services providers and the worlds leading provider of accessible communication for Deaf and hard-of-hearing people, Sorenson combines patented technology with human-centric services to connect signed and spoken languages. Sorenson offers caption and video relay services, over-video and in-person sign language and spoken language interpreting, real-time event captioning services, and post-production language services. For more information on how we advance human connection, visit www.sorenson.com.

Press Contact

Ann Bardsley

Director of Public Relations

Sorenson 801-287-9400

abardsley@sorenson.com




OSHAWA, ON, April 4, 2022 /CNW/ - Unifor welcomes today's announcement that federal and provincial investments for General Motors have been finalized and will help secure a third shift at the Oshawa plant and Canada's first full assembly line retool to build electric commercial vehicles in Ingersoll.

Unifor members stand together at the GM Oshawa test track in front of a Chevy Silverado assembled at the Oshawa plant and a BrightDrop commercial electric vehicle being built by workers at the CAMI plant in Ingersoll. (CNW Group/Unifor)

"This is a proud moment for Unifor members at General Motors," said Shane Wark Unifor Assistant to the National President. "Today's funding announcement was years in the making and shows how much we can accomplish when autoworkers, automakers, and governments work together."

The federal and provincial government have now finalized funding agreements of $259 million each as part of the General Motors $2 billion investment in both plants. The investments deliver on promises made to Unifor during consecutive rounds of collective bargaining negotiations with General Motors in 2020 and 2021.

In Oshawa, plans are in place to commence production of light-duty Silverado trucks and add a third shift at the plant this summer bringing the total number of direct jobs to 2,600.

"Adding a third shift at GM Oshawa is great news for workers and their families. These investments are vital to making our city, the region and the auto sector as a whole much stronger," said Jason Gale, Local 222 Plant Chairperson in Oshawa.

The funding will also support the re-tooling of GM's CAMI Assembly Plant in Ingersoll, which will become Canada's first mass-market producer of electric commercial vans. Unifor members will begin assembling the automaker's new line of BrightDrop electric delivery vehicles by the end of this year.

"CAMI workers are leading the way with Canada's first fully electric vehicle assembly line. Today's announcement means a very bright future for our members, our community and all of southwestern Ontario," said Mike Van Boekel, Unifor Local 88 Plant Chairperson at CAMI.

Story continues

Unifor is Canada's largest union in the private sector, representing 315,000 workers in every major area of the economy. The union advocates for all working people and their rights, fights for equality and social justice in Canada and abroad, and strives to create progressive change for a better future.

SOURCE Unifor

Cision

View original content to download multimedia: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/April2022/04/c3006.html
Samsung Electronics and Western Digital have entered into a far-reaching collaboration to drive standardisation of next-generation storage technologies for broader ecosystem support and customer adoption.

For this they have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for a unique collaboration to standardise and drive the broad adoption of data placement, processing and fabrics (D2PF) storage technologies.

The companies will initially focus on aligning their efforts and creating a vigorous ecosystem for Zoned Storage solutions. These steps will enable the industry to focus on countless applications that ultimately create greater value for customers.

Widespread alignment

This marks the first time that both Samsung and Western Digital have come together as technology leaders to create widespread alignment and stimulate awareness for important storage technologies.

Focusing on enterprise and cloud applications, the partnership is expected to spur a range of collaborations around technology standardisation and software development for D2PF technologies like Zoned Storage.

With this collaboration, end-users can have confidence that these emerging storage technologies will have support from multiple device vendors as well as from vertically integrated hardware and software companies.

Essential foundation

Storage is the essential foundation for how people and businesses consume and use data. To enable todays needs and tomorrows next big ideas, we must innovate, collaborate and keep pace as an industry in bringing new standards and architectures to life, said Rob Soderbery, EVP and GM, Flash Business Unit at Western Digital.

In order for a technology ecosystem to be successful, overall frameworks and general solution models must come together so they do not suffer from fragmentation, which delays adoption and adds unnecessary complexity for software stack developers.

Soderbery added: For years Western Digital has been laying the foundation for the Zoned Storage ecosystem by contributing to the Linux kernel and open-source software community. We are excited to bring these contributions to this joint initiative with Samsung in facilitating wider adoption of Zoned Storage for users and application developers.

Holding a special meaning

This collaboration is a testament to our relentless effort to exceed customers needs now and in the future, and holds special meaning in how we anticipate it will actively grow into a larger basis of engagement for Zoned Storage standardisation, said Jinman Han, Corporate EVP, Head of Memory Sales & Marketing at Samsung Electronics.

Our collaborative efforts will embrace hardware and software ecosystems to ensure that as many customers as possible can reap the benefits of this highly important technology."

The two companies have already kickstarted an initiative around Zoned Storage devices, including ZNS (Zoned Namespaces) SSDs and SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording) HDDs. Through organisations such as SNIA (Storage Networking Industry Association) and the Linux Foundation, Samsung and Western Digital will define high-level models and frameworks for next-generation Zoned Storage technologies.

Open and scalable data centre architectures

With a commitment to enable open and scalable data centre architectures, they have founded the Zoned Storage TWG (Technical Work Group), which was approved by SNIA in December 2021.

The group is already defining and specifying common use cases for Zoned Storage devices, as well as host/device architecture and programming models.

In addition, this collaboration is expected to serve as a starting point to expand zone-based (e.g. ZNS, SMR) device interfaces, as well as future-generation, high-capacity storage devices with enhanced data placement and processing technologies.

At a later stage, these initiatives will be expanded to include other emerging D2PF technologies such as computational storage and storage fabrics including NVMe over Fabrics (NVMe-oF).-- TradeArabia News Service
Photograph: Luis Alvarez/Getty Images

We all know that our small business owners are the lifeblood of the US economy. There are approximately 30 million of us and we provide more than half of the jobs in this country. Everyone seems to love us. Politicians court us. Big brands tip their hats to us. Each year we celebrate our small business community with Small Business Week, Small Business Saturday, National Entrepreneurship Month and many other days honoring independent workers and minority business owners.

Yay for us! But you know what? As much as Im an advocate and a voice for my fellow small business brethren, even I have to admit that not all small business owners are worthy of such praise. Some, in fact, are not worthy at all.

Related: Turns out the Great Resignation may be followed by the Great Regret | Gene Marks

There are the restaurant owners  like these in California, Michigan and Oregon to name just a few  who blatantly and recklessly defied local Covid regulations and put their customers and employees at risk of dying from something other than the E coli in their food. Or the dentist in Wisconsin who broke his patients teeth in order to submit false insurance claims (wow!).

And lets not forget the seemingly incalculable number of small business owners  like the operators of a tech company and a baking business in Massachusetts, the genius who ran a real estate firm in Pennsylvania, the serial fraudster from Delaware and the twin brothers who oversaw multiple businesses in California  who all defrauded the federal government by submitting fake claims for Covid relief funds because, hey, why should that money go to people who actually needed it, right?

Or how about the manufacturer in Georgia who was ordered to pay $250,000 after firing a disabled employee? Who does that? Or the regional water services company in Minnesota that was told to cough up $45,000 to an employee who was unfairly terminated due to the color of her skin? Who does that too?

Story continues

Turns out a lot of business owners do that. And other bad things too.

If you dont believe me then check out the tallies the government keeps. For example, less than a month ago the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission released detailed breakdowns of more than 67,448 charges of workplace discrimination claims the agency received in just its past fiscal year. The agency said it secured $439.2m for the victims of discrimination in the private sector and state and local government workplaces through voluntary resolutions and litigation. The Department of Labor recently reported thousands of cases from 2021 where businesses in industries ranging from auto repairs to landscaping services underpaid or mistreated employees.

And its not just employees getting defrauded. For example, there are the independent entrepreneurs that make their money being social media influencers but who then dupe unwitting people into giving them free stuff in return for fake promises of a mention. Or the fraudulent freelancers operating on well-known online platforms that take money in return for doing no work at all. Or the independent contractors  like this one in Philadelphia  who allegedly collected payments for jobs such as bathroom renovations and home reconstruction in return for  spoiler alert: not doing the work. The Federal Trade Commission this year received more than 2.8m reports of consumer fraud against businesses ranging from deceptive credit repair services to those monsters that are robo-calling my mobile phone in the middle of the night.

So what have I learned from all this research? Its that even though it rankles me when people accuse small businesses of seeking profits over their employees welfare, or paying too little, or acting offensively or defrauding their customers, I have to admit that in some cases ... these people may have a point. Its sad. But I cant deny it.

Of course, the vast majority of small business owners are good people who run good businesses and who care about their employees. But there are still more than just a few that, frankly, are not. So now when someone does accuse a business owner of doing something unseemly my kneejerk reaction isnt to automatically dispute that persons claim. Because maybe, just maybe, theres some truth to that story.
Ukainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

RONALDO SCHEMIDT/AFP via Getty Ukainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made a rare trip outside the capital city of Kyiv on Monday, venturing to one of the most devastated parts of the country  the suburb of Bucha, where Russians were recently accused of killing some 300 civilians (and, in some cases, torturing civilians) during their occupation.

Russian forces  who have denied committing such atrocities, insisting they were faked  withdrew from Bucha, which sits northwest of Kyiv, over the weekend, reportedly leaving behind a wake of destruction and horror stories from area residents.

One coroner who lives in Bucha told The New York Times he and his team had collected more than 100 bodies in recent weeks. Only three of the bodies, the coroner said, were Ukrainian soldiers. The others were civilians and most had died as a result of being shot or hit with shrapnel.

The Times and other outlets including CNN have further described the horrors of bodies laying in the middle of the street and people shot through the head while riding their bicycles or crushed by a tank while attempting to drive out of the town.

Without any electricity for refrigeration at the morgue, a mass grave became the only solution  and a signal to the world.

RELATED: Zelenskyy Remembers How His Family Woke Him Up to Say a War Had Started

Speaking to Reuters on Sunday, Bucha Mayor Anatoliy Fedoruk said: "Corpses of executed people still line the Yabluska street in Bucha. Their hands are tied behind their backs with white 'civilian' rags, they were shot in the back of their heads. So you can imagine what kind of lawlessness they perpetrated here."

Russia has denied any involvement in the killing of the hundreds of civilians in Bucha, with the country's Ministry of Defense saying the images of bodies on the streets of the town  taken by seasoned journalists for outlets across the world  had been "staged" and that "not a single" civilian had been injured in Bucha, per the Times and other reports.

Story continues

Speaking to the press during his trip to Bucha, 44-year-old Zelenskyy  wearing a bullet-proof vest  said in footage obtained by Sky News: "These are war crimes and this will be recognized by the world as genocide."

"We know that thousands of people have been killed and tortured," he said, his expression darkening. "Their limbs were cut off. Raped women, killed children. I think that this is ... actually genocide."

RELATED VIDEO: Volodymyr Zelenskyy is a Comedian-Turned-President and Now a Wartime Hero

Zelenskyy's trip to Bucha followed a weekly, videotaped address in which he spoke about the atrocities on Sunday.

"The world has already seen many war crimes. At different times. On different continents. But it is time to do everything possible to make the war crimes of the Russian military the last manifestation of such evil on earth," he said, CNN reports.

Zelenskyy continued then: "I want all the leaders of the Russian Federation to see how their orders are being fulfilled. Such orders. Such a fulfillment. And joint responsibility. For these murders, for these tortures, for these arms torn off by explosions that lie on the streets. For shots in the back of the head of tied people. This is how the Russian state will now be perceived. This is your image."

The latest accounts of civilian deaths spurred further condemnation of Russia. President Joe Biden said there should be a "war crime trial" and the U.S. said it wanted Russia suspended from the United Nations' Human Rights Council.

Russian invasion of Ukraine

SERGEY BOBOK/AFP via Getty Russian invasion of Ukraine

RELATED: Meet the Female-Only Carpool Keeping Ukrainian Women and Children Safe in Poland

Russia's attack on Ukraine continues after their forces launched a large-scale invasion on Feb. 24  the first major land conflict in Europe in decades.

Details of the fighting change by the day, but hundreds of civilians have already been reported dead or wounded, including children.

The invasion, ordered by Russian President Vladimir Putin, has drawn condemnation around the world and increasingly severe economic sanctions against Russia.

With NATO forces massing in the region around Ukraine, various countries have also pledged aid or military support to the resistance. Zelenskyy has called for peace talks  so far unsuccessful  while urging his country to fight back.

Putin insists Ukraine has historic ties to Russia and he is acting in the best security interests of his country. Zelenskyy vowed not to bend.

"Nobody is going to break us, we're strong, we're Ukrainians," he told the European Union in a speech in the early days of the fighting, adding, "Life will win over death. And light will win over darkness."

The Russian attack on Ukraine is an evolving story, with information changing quickly. Follow PEOPLE's complete coverage of the war here, including stories from citizens on the ground and ways to help.
THOSE WHO use the BelmontFerry Farm Trail can now access the stretch beneath the Chatham Bridge, with some periodic limitation.

That portion of the path has been closed as crews work on the bridge, which reopened in October after a major rehabilitation project but is still being completed.

Construction work along a pedestrian trail that passes underneath the Chatham Bridge on the Stafford County riverbank is substantially complete! local Virginia Department of Transportation spokeswoman Kelly Hannon said in an email.

The trail isnt quite ready for full-time duty, though.

Hannon said the trail will periodically close for pedestrian safety during daytime hours on weekdays through April 22, which is the completion date for the Chatham Bridge rehabilitation project.

Crews are finishing up grading work in the area, along with other final punchlist items.

The bridge, which spans the Rappahannock River between Fredericksburg and Stafford, was closed in June 2020. Crews removed the top of the structure and built a new deck on the original concrete piers, which underwent major rehabilitation.

trail work

Sections of the Virginia Central Railway trail in Spotsylvania County will be closed this month.

According to a notice from the county, sections of the VCR trail running alongside and across Harrison Road between Salem Church Road and Gordon Road will undergo repairs and maintenance.

The closures are scheduled to start Monday and run through April 29.

I95 bridge project

VDOT tweeted a video Wednesday of crews lowering massive steel beams onto the northbound Interstate 95 bridge, marking another milestone for the project.

The bridge is the second new span being built for the I-95 Rappahannock River crossing project, which is adding six new lanes in the median of the interstate from State Route 3 in Fredericksburg to U.S. 17 in Stafford.

The new southbound lanes and bridge opened in October.

The northbound crossing lanes and bridge are slated to open in the summer of 2024.

American Legion bridge

The overpass on Staffords American Legion Road is closing Monday for a replacement project related to the I-95 express lanes extension.

Work on the American Legion span will mirror that done on the new Truslow Road bridge, which reopened a year ago.

The span will first be demolished, work that is estimated to take four to six weeks to complete.

Crews will build a new two-lane bridge that will be slightly wider and lengthened to accommodate any future I95 widening.

The new overpass also will allow crews to build two new reversible express lanes as part of the 10-mile extension in the median of I95 from south of the State Route 610 exit to U.S. 17 in Stafford.

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.
OMAHA  Cass County will receive $285,971 in payments in lieu of taxes from the Omaha Public Power District.

Thats up from $277,106 from last year, according to OPPD, which made the announcement last Friday.

Altogether, OPPD is distributing more than $37.5 million of these payments to 11 southeast Nebraska counties it serves. That overall total is an increase from $34.4 million distributed last year, the company said.

The amounts of these payments in lieu of taxes are based on five percent of OPPDs gross revenues from the previous years retail electricity sales in incorporated cities and towns. They take the place of property taxes.

County treasurers distribute the funds among various government agencies.

These funds will benefit local schools and other governmental agencies across our service territory, making a direct impact on our customers lives, said OPPD Board Treasurer Rick Yoder, who represents Cass County. Our annual payments in-lieu-of-tax is just one example of how we care for and honor our communities.

In addition, OPPD pays general sales taxes, gasoline taxes, motor vehicle license fees and permit fees like any other business, the company said.

Below are the payments made to each county (rounded to the nearest dollar):

Douglas: $26,860,700

Sarpy: $9,192,316

Washington: $663,793

Saunders: $325,027

Cass: $285,971

Dodge: $143,127

Nemaha: $38,835

Johnson: $14,483

Richardson: $13,659

Otoe: $3,844

Colfax: $3,821

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
PLATTSMOUTH  A Plattsmouth man will serve additional time in state prison for failing to abide by many terms of his post-release supervision.

Michael D. Winchel, 45, appeared in Cass County District Court on Monday morning for a sentencing hearing. He was arrested on Dec. 30 after failing to appear for a court hearing that week. He has remained in Cass County Jail since his arrest.

Winchel was placed on the Nebraska Sex Offender Registry in 2011 after he was convicted of two felony charges of enticement of a minor for indecent purposes. He drove into a parking lot in downtown Plattsmouth and asked three young teenage girls to get into his car. He offered alcohol to one of the victims and tried to prevent one of the girls from leaving the car.

Winchel was sentenced to a prison term of two to four years for the crimes. He was also placed on the Nebraska Sex Offender Registry for 25 years. People on the Nebraska Sex Offender Registry are required to report any address changes in a prompt manner.

Winchel spent 60 days in Cass County Jail in 2015 after he failed to tell authorities that he had moved to a different apartment in Plattsmouth. He moved to a location in Iowa later that year and reported that address change.

Police became concerned when they did not receive an update from him in 2020. They learned Winchel had moved to Plattsmouth without notifying anyone about his address change.

Judge Michael Smith ordered Winchel to serve one year in state prison in November 2020 for failing to report the new address. Winchel began serving 18 months of a post-release supervision term after completing his prison sentence.

Authorities learned Winchel then violated many of his post-release supervision requirements. He failed to report to drug testing appointments five times and missed office appointments with probation officials two times. He also admitted consuming alcohol.

Deputy County Attorney Richard Fedde asked the court to send Winchel to prison. He said Winchel had twice been convicted of failing to report an address change and had other entries in his criminal history. The list of previous charges includes violation of a protection order, attempted third-degree assault, attempted burglary, enticement of a minor for indecent purposes and three convictions of driving under the influence of alcohol.

Given the fact that this is the second time this has happened, he is not a suitable candidate to remain on post-release supervision, Fedde said. Id ask that he serve the remaining time he has on post-release supervision in prison and have his post-release supervision revoked.

Defense attorney Julie Bear said Winchel had already served one year for the underlying charge of violating the sex offender registry. She asked for a prison term that was shorter than 18 months.

Smith ordered Winchel to serve 12 months in the Nebraska Department of Corrections. He will receive credit for the time he has spent in Cass County Jail.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
One of the Taliban's first moves upon seizing power in Afghanistan was to take extreme measures to tackle the country's drug epidemic.



To that end, thousands of addicts have been rounded up, beaten, and marched off to prison, where they have been forced to go cold turkey among hardened criminals for months.



Dawood, who was rounded up along with hundreds of other addicts in the southwestern province of Farah, says the harsh methods employed by the prison were ineffective. Within weeks of his release two months ago, he was using again.



"I have been suffering from this disease for 10 years. I was sent to prison by the Taliban's government, but the treatment didn't work," he told RFE/RL's Radio Azadi. "I want to go to a rehabilitation center, because they provide better treatment."

Afghanistan is home to an estimated 3.5 million addicts, a number that accounts for nearly 10 percent of the population. While there were some 100 drug-treatment centers operating in the country before the hard-line Islamist group returned to power in August, many that depended on foreign funding are closed or struggling to remain open. Government facilities, meanwhile, are overwhelmed with the new forced arrivals.



The leading drugs of choice in Afghanistan are opioids that derive from the opium poppy that flourishes in the country despite years of eradication efforts and attempts to sow alternative crops.



But aside from heroin and morphine, an increasing number of Afghans are now hooked on crystal meth, which drug traders have learned to produce from ephedra plants that grow wild in the central highlands.



The Taliban banned opium-poppy cultivation in 2000-2001, the last growing season before it was ousted from power following the U.S.-led invasion of the country. But over the next two decades of war, the extremist group was accused of using the proceeds from opium production to feed its insurgency. Today, Afghanistan is well-entrenched as the world's leading producer of opium, generating up to $2.7 billion in income in 2021.

WATCH: Taliban Says Afghan Prison Offers Treatment For Drug Users

In his first press conference in August, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid vowed that the group would again ban opium poppy cultivation and trafficking. Months later Mujahid backtracked, saying a ban would deny Afghans a major source of income.



However, on April 3, Mujahid announced a new decree by Taliban Supreme Leader Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada that banned opium-poppy cultivation and drug manufacturing. The decree also ordered the destruction of opium crops and prohibited the trade and transport of a range of drugs.



Last year, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, marked the fifth straight that the opium harvest in Afghanistan exceeded 6,000 tons -- enough to flood the world market with up to 320 tons of pure heroin and supply 80 percent of the world's opiate users.



After foreign troops withdrew and the Taliban toppled the Western-backed Afghan government, the militants swiftly launched a crackdown on the addiction crisis that they helped to create.



Taliban fighters began rounding up large numbers of addicts from the streets of Kabul, Kandahar, and other Afghan cities, often using whips and the barrel of a gun to force them into rehab.



Some were forcibly taken to overcrowded clinics that often resemble prisons. Others were sent to actual penitentiaries that have been largely cleared of Taliban fighters imprisoned by the previous government.



Once incarcerated, shaven-headed addicts enter their forced withdrawal without the aid of treatments such as counseling and methadone, a drug commonly used to relieve addicts' pain as they are cut off from heroin.



Officials at the Taliban prison in Farah Province that housed Davood claim to have successfully treated more than 2,000 addicts in the past seven months.

The director of the facility, Mullah Lal Mohammad Zakeri, told Radio Azadi that imprisonment is better for addicts than rehab clinics because onsite doctors can treat the incarcerated patients. Once released after two to six months in prison, he said, rehabilitated patients must sign a pledge that they will stay off drugs.



Salem Sadid, a local psychologist in Farah, does not agree that coercion is the best medicine.



"There are big differences between treating drug addicts in prisons and proper addiction-treatment centers," Sadid told Radio Azadi. "If patients think they are being forced to quit addiction...they will never accept treatment."



"No one can quit drugs if they are not ready to," Sadid added. "The only way a drug addict can quit is to satisfy himself and prepare himself psychologically, which is not possible in prison."



Hamed Elmi, a doctor who heads a 100-bed drug-rehabilitation center in Farah, echoed Sadid's comments. The treatment of addicts in prison is neither practical nor effective, he told Radio Azadi.



"In prison, the addict is merely hospitalized as a prisoner," Elmi said. "But he is not given the necessary medicine and medication. There is no counseling in prison. An addicted person needs counseling, and that is why they end up [being treated] in prison for a long time."
The worlds leading analytics platform, Tableau, a Salesforce company, has appointed former Senior Director at Microsoft, Rita Tenan, as Area Vice President, Public Sector, Tableau EMEA.

In this role, Tenan will be responsible for leading the regional Public Sector team at Tableau, driving forward this priority area and equipping civic organisations with tools to better utilise and understand their data.

Tenan brings with her more than 10 years of experience at Microsoft, as an expert in driving growth initiatives and managing sustainable business development.

Track record

We are delighted to welcome Rita to the Tableau family, said Dan Pell, SVP, Tableau EMEA. Her experience of the public sector coupled with her track-record managing teams to drive sustainable growth makes her a perfect fit for our organisation. It is so important to support the public sector in better understanding whats happening so they can act decisively. Rita will ensure the sector can continue to leverage data as a strategic asset and will be a driving force ensuring frontline teams have the information they need to act decisively."

Having already supported public sector customers across EMEA, particularly through recent challenging times, Tableau sees the appointment of a dedicated AVP for the region as the next step in their commitment to the sector.

Its an absolute privilege to join a company that has built an iconic brand with innovation, customer needs and transformative outcomes at its heart. Tableau enables the public sector to quickly connect to all of their data, and derive relevant, purposeful insights with ease in order for them to best serve their stakeholders, said Tenan.

Leveraging technology

I cant wait to immerse myself in the community and to work with the talented Tableau team, as we continue to leverage technology to help governments across the various geographies adopt powerful solutions to make a difference.

Tenan graduated from Ecole de Commerce with multiple degrees in International Business Management before beginning her career at business intelligence firm Fisher International with responsibility for mainframe and security solutions throughout EMEA.

She then worked for software company Dynasoft, managing sales for Europe Central and South. In her next role, Tenan sat on the Board of Directors at Unisys, as Vice President leading the Italian services practice. Tenan's diverse and extensive experience earned her a series of senior roles at Microsoft - initially serving as Public Sector Director in Italy, rising to lead the EMEA Government Industry team and ultimately becoming Senior Director of Strategic Partnership Team in the region.-- TradeArabia News Service
Five Aborted Late Term Babies Found: Is DC Metro Police Covering Up a Crime?

NEWS PROVIDED BY

PAAU

April 4, 2022

WASHINGTON, April 4, 2022 /Christian Newswire/ -- On Tuesday, April 5 at 11:00 A.M., a press conference will be held in Washington D.C. at the Hyatt Regency Washington on Capitol Hill, 400 New Jersey NW. Congressional Room CD, Lobby Level.

Contact: Randall Terry, Founder, Operation Rescue. 202-731-1271 (Note: Any interviews granted ahead of the Tuesday, April 5th Press conference must be embargoed until April 5th, 12 noon Eastern.)

On March 30, the FBI arrested and charged 9 pro-life activists under F.A.C.E (The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.) for an nonviolent direct action that occurred in 2020. If convicted, each of the defendants could face over 10 years in federal prison.

FBI Arrests

Aborted Babies Recovered in DC:

Prior to the arrests made by the FBI, one of the defendants privately arranged for the Metropolitan Washington D.C. Police homicide unit to pick up five recently discovered late-term aborted babies for forensic examination. (See letter below.) Their late gestational ages as well as their apparent sustained injuries potentially show violations of the Partial Birth Abortion Act as well as the Born Alive Infants Protection Act which are federal crimes

The Founder and Executive Director of Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU) Terrisa Bukovinac said "We are aware that the Metropolitan Police Department has stated they do not believe a crime has been committed against these babies under D.C. law. However, the laws in question are federal laws enforced by the U.S. Department of Justice."

The whistleblowers who received the fetuses, and the defendants arrested by the FBI, are connected. They will be present at the press conference.

A Funeral Mass and "naming ceremony" was offered for the deceased babies - with the babies present, in which each child was named.

At Tuesday's press conference the following questions will be answered:

 Where did the aborted babies come from?

 Did the Metropolitan Police Department test for oxygen in the lungs of these babies?

 Why did those arrested by the FBI choose Washington Surgi-Clinic for their protest?

 How were the fetal remains acquired?

 Who obtained the fetal remains?

 How many aborted fetuses were acquired in total, besides the five in police custody?

 What will happen to the remaining aborted fetuses (that have not been turned over to police)?

 Where are the fetuses now?

 What would have happened to these fetal remains had they not been recovered?

 What demands are the defendants, and those who obtained the aborted babies making of the Department of Justice?

 Who is Dr. Cesare Santangelo, and what is his role in the deaths of these children?

The press conference will be hosted by Terrisa Bukovinac.

Learn more about PAAU at www.PAAUNow.org

Media Contact: 202.731.1271

SOURCE PAAU

CONTACT: 202-731-1271
Petrofac, a leading provider of services to the global energy industry, has been awarded a major decommissioning contract by the Australian Government in the nations offshore oil and gas sector.



Petrofacs Australia team based in Perth, WA, has been contracted to complete Phase 1 of the decommissioning of the Northern Endeavour FPSO (Floating Production, Storage and Offtake) facility.



The contract, awarded by the Federal Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources, follows a stringent selection and due diligence process by the Government of Australia. The value to Petrofac of Phase 1 has the potential to be up to AUD$325 million ($236 million).



The contract sees Petrofac as Outsourced Operator responsible for decommissioning and disconnection of the FPSO from its subsea equipment, and temporarily suspending the wells. Disconnection of the FPSO is expected to occur over approximately 18 months. Petrofacs scope includes the provision of its unique integrated services, working with both local and global suppliers.



The Northern Endeavour is a 274-metre long FPSO facility, currently not producing oil, moored between the Laminaria and Corallina oil fields about 550 kilometres northwest of Darwin in the Timor Sea.



Josie Philips, Petrofacs Regional Director, Australia, said: "This contract builds on 15 years of working in Australia and is further proof of our growing and long-term ambitions in the country. A critical element will be upskilling the local workforce to meet the challenges of billions of dollars of decommissioning work in Australia now and in the future. It is Petrofacs aim to be a local company, growing local jobs, local skills and the local supply chain. Im delighted that we have Monadelphous and Linch-pin already on board."



Nick Shorten, Chief Operating Officer for Petrofacs Asset Solutions business, said: This contract recognises our unrivalled decommissioning credentials, as the only tier one contractor with the in-house capability to manage all well and asset decommissioning phases. The contract builds on our existing track record for delivering well operator and project management services for clients globally, having successfully delivered numerous multi-well decommissioning campaigns.



Together Petrofac and its supply chain partners, including Monadelphous and Linch-pin, will ensure the safe and cost-effective removal of the FPSO from the field in accordance with good industry practice. All activities will be done in close consultation with the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA) to make sure strict safety and environmental protections are in place.  TradeArabia News Service
Like a zombie that keeps coming back from the grave, a draft proposal to impose budge-busting collective bargaining on local government keeps resurfacing at the Capitol. Whats even more troubling is that Gov. Jared Polis, who wisely shot down previous versions of this bad idea earlier this legislative session, remains in negotiations with the sponsors.

Lets hope its just a courtesy he is showing his fellow Democrats who control the House and Senate. Maybe hes just stringing them along until he runs out the clock on the session. If so, good. But just in case he is seriously entertaining the latest pitch from lawmakers on the matter, lets make this crystal clear: Governor, bury this monster once and for all.

Its bad enough when local governments, acting on their own as some have, permit collective bargaining for their employees. That cedes power over the public purse to organized labor, strapping taxpayers over a barrel forever more.

But its far worse when state government traipses onto local turf. It flouts the historic right of Colorados cities, counties, school districts and other local entities to set their own policies. And it undermines those local governments commitment to answer to their own taxpayers.

It is little comfort that the latest proposal for a collective-bargaining mandate, according to reports by our news affiliate Colorado Politics, would be imposed on fewer local entities than was the case in earlier drafts. That newest draft, circulating in recent weeks and reportedly the subject of current talks with the Governors Office, only would require the states colleges and universities  as well as all 64 counties  to engage in collective bargaining. That would mean recognizing unions representing those agencies employees and negotiating pay and other issues with them. It still would be an eventual budget-buster for those entities.

Collective bargaining requires an employer to negotiate things like pay and benefits with a union under threat of a settlement being imposed by an arbitrator if negotiations stalemate. That simply doesnt belong in the public sector. Unlike a private company, which answers only to its shareholders, a county or a public college is owned by the taxpaying public. Taxpayers have a right to expect those institutions to operate with their means.

Local governments must have the flexibility to reconfigure staff or postpone raises in an economic downturn, when tax revenue slumps. That flexibility is gone when a union steps in. Under collective bargaining, the government would in all likelihood have to make good on negotiated pay and benefit hikes by slashing other basic services.

It was a blow to the state budget when Polis signed collective bargaining into law for state employees in 2020. It is guaranteed to hobble state budget writers in the Legislature and, ultimately, all the states taxpayers for years to come. From now on, the officially sanctioned state employees union will be able to bare-knuckle its way to a hefty pay-and-benefits package at the bargaining table with the state  and the taxpaying public will have to pay up. But the state Legislature has no business whatsoever forcing this unwise policy on those local governments without even giving them or their taxpayers a say.

The purpose of government  state, local or federal, for that matter  isnt to create high-paying jobs. It is to provide essential services to the taxpayers who foot the bill. Lets not make it impossible for the government to fulfill that basic responsibility.
Colorados construction industry workforce faces three big challenges in coming years: Aging workers who will soon be retiring faster than replacements can get trained; a booming housing market thats driving demand and a glaring under-representation of women construction workers.

Thats according to studies from industry associations and local construction officials, who outlined ongoing plans to recruit and retain more women construction workers and managers.

Maja Rosenquist, senior vice president of Mortenson Construction, said ongoing programs, and recently inked partnerships, should help decrease the massive gender gap in an industry where only 10.9 percent of workers are female, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics.

Were being very focused and intentional about our female workforce, said Rosenquist, who has been on the business side of the construction industry for more than 20 years.

The Home Builders Associations of Colorado Springs and metro Denver, and the Association of General Contractors in Denver, have also been ramping up efforts in recent years with a Careers in Construction program that targets women and people of color while theyre still in high school.

Started by the Housing and Building Association of Colorado Springs in 2015, its now in 29 high schools, with 1,600 students enrolled. They can earn certificates recognized by the U.S. Department of Labor, internships and job leads.

If it werent for CICC I would not be where I am today especially as a woman because it is intimidating going into a field such as construction which is still very male oriented, wrote Teagan Nevada, a Manitou High School graduate who landed a construction job, in a testimonial for the program. However, it is less intimidating knowing I am well prepared and have a strong reliable resource at my disposal.

It's a far cry from a time earlier in her career when Rosenquist found her name scrawled in a decidedly non-complimentary way inside a construction site port-a-potty. Denver construction magnate Linda Alvarado, owner of Alvarado Construction, told Forbes magazine last year the same thing happened to her.

What Im seeing today is a lot of companies are lifting their heads up and saying what we have been doing is not cutting it', Rosenquist said of efforts to get more female construction workers. Everybody is on their own journey and working at their own pace. Its going to be a tough challenge to solve.

Mortensons work in the area has included hosting Womens Skills Nights, efforts focused on hiring more women, and creating a culture of support for those women. That includes making sure theyre getting skilled worker, and management roles  not just holding signs or sweeping the floor.

Our industry does have a history of relegating women into very low-level roles, she said.

In early March, Mortenson inked a multi-year deal with Habitat for Humanity to create a Women Build Program to provide training and more involvement from Mortensons women leaders. Mortenson's employees have volunteered to help build Habitat homes for years.

Mortenson really approached this relationship as a collaboration. Together, we envisioned new ways to work together to support their goal of bringing more women into construction while advancing our goal of creating and maintaining affordable, stable housing, said Jeanne Fischette, Habitats director of sponsorships, in a news release.

The new program includes quarterly skills building classes taught by Mortensons women leaders, teambuilding days on Habitat construction sites, Women Skills Nights and an intensive two-day training session coming in May.

On a recent snowy day at the under-construction Slate Hotel where Mortenson and 4240 Architecture are finishing a 250-key hotel in the former Emily Griffith Opportunity School on 12th and Welton streets, Craft Resource Manager Kedmia Milam talked about her journey into a construction management career.

There were a lot less women here that when I joined 11 years ago, Milam said. But I know that weve worked very hard to hit higher numbers throughout these last five years. Weve come close to 20% (female workers) here and in Utah.

Craft workers are the skilled workforce, like laborers, carpenters, heavy equipment operators, etc. Milam manages teams larger than 100 in both states. About 18% are female.

Milam said she knows upper management has her back.

It just give me the courage because I know that I will bring diversity into the conversation and a very different point of view, she said. They recognize the importance of being able to speak up.

And the old cliche of hard-hatted construction workers wolf whistling women has largely gone by the wayside, Rosenquist said.

Weve been super clear around the zero tolerance on any kind of bias motivated action or discrimination, Rosenquist said. Its just something thats not going to be tolerated.

She pointed to an example of an entire project team of 1,500 being shut down to re-iterate those zero-tolerance policies.

We are making a much bigger deal about it, she said.

Theyve also ramped up retention efforts when it comes to being flexible for child care schedules, and making sure theres no wage disparity between men and women workers.

Weve always done a good job at that, but it doesnt mean we dont need to double-check it, Rosenquist said. We had a third-party audit we completed last year to make sure we dont have any disparities there.

At a recent Women in Construction Week event at Empower Field at Mile High, Rosenquist said she was encouraged by the number of male participants.

I feel like its working when I see our men just as excited about it as our women are, and thats what I saw last week, Rosenquist said. I saw a ton of our men volunteering and attending the events we were hosting. They were advocating for how important their role is in all this.
Qatar Airways has certified TPConnects Technologies as its technology partner enabling travel service providers to seamlessly integrate with Oyrx Connect, the airlines NDC-offering.



The integration will be done through TPConnects NDC Aggregator Platform or integration via TPConnects NDC API or via NDCMarketplace.com, an exclusive NDC-enabled retailing and distribution technology solution.



Sellers will have access to a wide range of Offer & Order Management along with NDC features such as branded fares, rich content, ancillary products & services.



Rajendran Vellapalath, CEO of TPConnects, said: We are pleased to welcome Qatar Airways into the growing list of NDC airlines using TPConnects NDC Solutions. By enabling direct connectivity between airlines and travel companies, we are enabling unlimited retailing possibilities without being constrained by limitations of legacy systems.



Our expertise and experience as a leading provider of innovative travel technology solutions will help deliver richer experience for travel sellers to capitalize on the full range of Qatar Airways products and services. added Vellapalath.  TradeArabia News Service
The biggest convention held annually in Colorado Springs returns this week to The Broadmoor, with the Space Symposium expected to draw more than 10,000 people to the four-day event.

The symposium resumed in August 2021 after a 2-year absence triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic with a hybrid online and in-person event that attracted about two-thirds of its usual attendance. This week's event will be the first since 2019 to return to the symposium's typical attendance levels, enough to fill more than 12,000 rooms in 24 hotels, generating an economic impact of $12 million, according to Visit Colorado Springs.

"We will be back bigger and better than ever, big enough where all the major players are coming back," said Tom Zelibor, CEO of the Colorado Springs-based Space Foundation, which hosts the annual symposium. "Our participant numbers will be right back where they were at 14,000, which includes the 10,000 attendees from 40 countries, the employees of The Broadmoor, our volunteers, speakers and support staff."

The symposium's agenda is packed with more than 200 speakers, including Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall; Gen. John "Jay" Raymond, commander of the U.S. Space Force; Gen. James Dickinson, commander of U.S. Space Command; Josef Aschbacher, director general of the European Space Agency; Pam Melroy, deputy administrator of the National Aeronautical and Space Administration; and Chiraq Parikh, executive secretary of the National Space Council.

COVERAGE THIS WEEK Return to Gazette.com and DenverGazette.com for full coverage and exclusive features from this week's Space Symposium at The Broadmoor.

No participants are expected from either Russia or China, and attendees from Ukraine seem unlikely.

One big name that hasn't yet been confirmed is British billionaire Richard Branson, founder of The Virgin Group, who will receive his space "wings" for making a short flight to the edge of space last year. Also during the symposium, the foundation will present five annual awards for lifetime achievement, public affairs, space exploration, space achievement and education, and will honor three technology advancements in its Space Technology Hall of Fame.

Just as important are the 275 exhibits spread over two of The Broadmoor's largest exhibit halls where aerospace companies display their latest technology and meet potential customers to set the stage for or seal multimillion-dollar deals. The deal-making continues at dozens of receptions, parties and other events during the symposium spread throughout the resort's 2,500-acre campus.

The foundation has added a new wrinkle to this year's symposium  three new half-day "tracks" or parts of the program on space finance, space exploration and artificial intelligence that will be offered at the nearby Cheyenne Mountain Resort.

All Space Symposium programs had been offered at The Broadmoor, but Zelibor said the event had "maxed out" the resort's capacity. The Broadmoor added the 171,000-square-foot Bartolin Hall last year to accommodate the growth in exhibits at the symposium.

"The symposium is back up to its normal size, and a group using that much space touches almost every business in Colorado Springs," Visit Colorado Springs CEO Doug Price said. "Getting a hotel room this week will be nearly impossible."

This year's symposium isn't just maxing out meeting rooms  the foundation filled all 16 hotels in which it had rooms set aside by mid-March and had to add six more, the most ever for the event. Price said most of the hotel rooms in the Colorado Springs area have been reserved by symposium participants, leaving few available for any last-minute arrivals.

"Even though we did this in August, now eight months later people are excited to get back (to the symposium) in person. This is a big deal for us (the foundation) and the space community," Zelibor said. "The space ecosystem is growing so rapidly  forecast to more than double from $447 billion last year to $1 trillion by the end of the decade  that there is a lot of desire to see what is going on and driving the economics of it."

The foundation also is recruiting a record number of volunteers  up to 350  for the symposium to help with guest support and check in, speaker and VIP support and security, said Jennifer Walters, the nonprofit's senior manager of operational integration. About half of the volunteers return each year to help with the annual event, including active-duty and retired military personnel.

The foundation also is expanding the symposium to its Discovery Center museum at 4425 Arrowswest Drive, where it will host a free Family Symposium 2-7 p.m. Wednesday with 10 other organizations to offer participants opportunities to learn about science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics for space exploration.

While the event is returning to full in-person participation, the foundation will still offer all sessions of the symposium, video access to all exhibits and a virtual chat room for networking on its Symposium 365 online platform. The online platform was launched by the foundation in late 2020 after the 2020 symposium was postponed a second time as a way for the foundation to offer its program year-round.

The foundation relies on the symposium for about two-thirds of its revenue, so having the event twice in one year has helped to trigger a 50% increase in revenue for the nonprofit.

As a result, the staff at the foundation has grown from fewer than 60 to 90, the most in its nearly 40-year history, for its educational programs, public affairs efforts, fundraising and other operations. The nonprofit had to cut its staff by nearly 20 last year following a loss of nearly $6 million in 2020 from the symposium cancellation .

Among the foundation's efforts to become less dependent on the symposium is the Space Commerce Institute, started in February to provide classes, consulting and other help to space entrepreneurs. The foundation also operates a program that helps space startup companies develop a business plan, secure financing, find key staff, and offer other assistance .

The staff growth has resulted in the foundation expanding its offices into new adjacent space donated last year to the nonprofit by the El Pomar Foundation. The donation included forgiving a $4.1 million loan and converting a seven-year lease-purchase agreement into a gift.

The foundation also is in the early stages of a $50 million fundraising campaign expected to last up to five years that will finance renovation and building out a major expansion of the Discovery Center.
Lynn Bowman, right, and Carmen Franklin hike along the Templeton Trail in Palmer Park in December on another unseasonal day in Colorado Springs. The two decided to take advantage of the nice weather and walk the whole distance around the park.
Rep. Ras Smith, a Democrat from Waterloo who ran for governor before dropping out of the race, has joined the leadership team for Mike Frankens campaign for the U.S. Senate.

Smith will serve as political director, according to a news release from the Franken campaign.

Franken, a retired admiral from Sioux City, is one of three Democrats running for the partys nomination in Iowas U.S. Senate election this year.

The others are former U.S. Rep. Abby Finkenauer of Cedar Rapids and Minden physician Glenn Hurst.

In addition to his work over three terms in the Iowa Legislature, Smith aided President Joe Bidens 2020 campaign in Iowa and Bidens campaign leading up to the 2020 Iowa caucuses.

The Franken campaign also has added Ellen Goodmann Miller to its communications team. Miller, from Dubuque, worked on Smiths gubernatorial campaign. She also worked on Bidens 2020 presidential campaign in Iowa and his caucus campaign.

VETS ENDORSE FRANKEN: VoteVets, a progressive advocacy organization, endorsed Mike Franken in Iowas U.S. Senate race.

Franken, a U.S. Navy veteran from Sioux City, is one of three Democrats running for the partys nomination in Iowas U.S. Senate election this year.

The others are former U.S. Rep. Abby Finkenauer of Cedar Rapids and Minden physician Glenn Hurst.

These candidates have a wealth of knowledge and experience to keep our country and communities safe, but also have demonstrated a commitment to others above self, which is what we need more of in our public officials, Jon Soltz, an Iraq War veteran and chairman of VoteVets, said in a news release.

SENATE PRIMARY FORUM: Mike Franken and Glenn Hurst, two of the three Democrats running in Iowas U.S. Senate primary, are scheduled to participate in a candidate forum April 16 at Maquoketa Valley High School in Delhi.

The event is scheduled to run from 1 to 3 p.m.; doors open at 12:30 p.m. Face masks are recommended and appreciated, according to event organizers.

The event is being hosted by the Democratic parties in Delaware, Dubuque, Jackson and Jones counties.

UNION ENDORSES MATHIS: The Transport Workers Union of America, AFL-CIO, endorsed state Sen. Liz Mathis of Hiawatha, the Democratic candidate for Congress in Eastern Iowas new 2nd Congressional District.

The union represents more than 150,000 workers nationally, including mechanics, baggage handlers, disease control inspectors, bus operators, dispatchers, ramp agents, flight attendants and bike share workers.

BLACKBURN KEYNOTES: U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, a Tennessee Republican, will headline the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalitions 22nd Annual Spring Kick-Off on Saturday in Clive.

The event is scheduled to be held in the Horizon Event Center and will begin at 5:30 p.m.

Iowa Republican leaders also expected to speak include Iowa U.S. Sens. Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst, and Iowa U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks.

Love 0 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
GREENSBORO  Creative Greensboro is accepting proposals from Greensboro-based artist leaders and organizations interested in working with the 2022 Neighborhood Arts Residency Program (NARP).

Two artists or nonprofit arts organizations will be selected; one to partner with the Random Woods neighborhood, and one to partner with the Mill District. Each will be contracted for a six-month arts residency beginning in June that includes community engagement, programming, and a culminating visual arts installation in the neighborhood, according to a news release from the city of Greensboro.

Each partner will receive $22,500 to support residency activities, along with in-kind use of city facilities. Proposals may be submitted by 5 p.m. May 2 at creativegreensboro.com.

The neighborhoods chosen for the program were identified for reinvestment in the Housing GSO plan. This is the second year of the program. In the first year, residency partners worked in Dudley Heights, Glenwood and Kings Forest.

Arts can lead the way for community development, said Greensboros Chief Creative Economy Officer Ryan Deal. We are excited to continue expanding our investment in arts opportunities in historically-rich areas. Every neighborhood in Greensboro, especially those that have faced a lack of investment through the years, deserves the opportunity to reflect their unique identity through arts programs and installations close to home.

For more information about the Neighborhood Arts Residency Program, contact Karen Archia, Community Partnerships Coordinator, at 336-433-7362 or karen.archia@greensboro-nc.gov.
CHARLOTTE  Is Jessica Browns voter registration card worth the paper its printed on?

Its complicated.

For North Carolinians like Brown, who have been released from prison and are still on felony supervised probation, their right to cast a ballot was thrust into uncertainty last week, bringing more questions to an already complicated and confusing system.

In a strange way, she said, it feels familiar  like all the jobs that gave her an offer only to pull back once they looked up her prior charges of money laundering and wire fraud.

I was so excited when I found out that had happened, that North Carolina was going to allow me to vote again, Brown said. How can you look at me and say, You dont deserve to vote? I paid my price. They levied a sentence on me, I paid it. I did everything they asked of me.

A state court ruled last week the law barring people such as Brown from voting was unconstitutional, but Republican lawmakers asked the court to put a hold on its ruling until appeals are complete.

On Monday, however, attorneys representing ex-offenders and civil rights groups who sued over the law in 2019 instead asked the state Supreme Court to take over the case before the Court of Appeals can intervene. Exceptionally urgent questions are contained within the case, the plaintiffs said, and a ruling by the Court of Appeals to delay the trial judges ruling will lead to confusion so close to the primary.

Meanwhile, the voting rights of another Charlotte resident, Travis McClain, also remain in limbo. McClain was released from federal prison in February but said he has a year left of probation.

I cant tell you how excited I am to vote, he said prior to learning about the notice to appeal.

Like Brown, McClain said temporarily losing his right to vote has been just one hurdle of many that makes adjusting to life outside prison more difficult.

You do your time. You pay your debt to society, and you get out and its like, What did I even do that time for? he said. I cant even do things that every American citizen can do.

McClain has a lengthy criminal history, including drug and gun crimes, and pleaded guilty in 2018 to racketeering conspiracy, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. He was released in March 2020 but was arrested again months later for violating parole. He was released in February.

Between sentences, McClain, 29, said he found it difficult to get a job or find stable housing. Employers often wouldnt return his calls. Landlords refused to rent him space or return his application fee.

Youre stuck, he said. You go back to doing things youre not supposed to do or youre going to be outside living under a bridge or something. Its hard.

McClain said he wishes he avoided crime entirely, but that the restoration of some voting rights appears indicative of a larger trend toward giving people a fair shot at successfully transitioning to life after prison.

The three-judge panel in Wake County found last week the state law barring people already released from prison from voting violated their rights generally and the law was racially motivated, one piece of a long and often violent history of Black disenfranchisement.

Complicating matters further, an attorney for the N.C. Board of Elections sent an email Wednesday to all 100 county election boards telling them to hold off on processing any voter registration applications from people who would have their voting rights restored under the new court ruling.

The attorney asked local boards to keep all registration requests on hold because they believed an order from the N.C. Supreme Court last year may conflict with the new ruling.

Across the state, about 56,000 people have been released from prison but are still not allowed to vote.

In its ruling, the three-judge panel gave a brief history of how the state law fit into a longer effort to keep Black people from voting.

In the years following the Civil War, white former Confederates in North Carolina took advantage of a different law that prohibited any person who had been whipped as punishment for a crime from voting. Utilizing this, white lawmen arrested Black people en masse and whipped them in public to nullify their right to vote.

In the 1870s, state law changed to make anyone convicted of a felony unable to vote unless a judge restored their rights. The state, though, stripped the ability of Black communities to elect their own judges and instead gave the state legislature the authority to appoint them, according to testimony provided to the court.

The legislature, in turn, appointed white judges who were unlikely to restore voting rights for Black people convicted of felonies.

Several small changes occurred from the 1870s to the 1970s, but the law remained substantively the same. During 1973, the three Black members of the General Assembly persuaded their 167 white colleagues to implement changes, including removing the requirement to petition a judge.

Since then, rules governing who can vote after release from prison have been confusing to many, including those directly impacted.

Brown said she filled out her voter registration form late last year and received her voter registration card in February.

Her parole officer, Brown said, was unable to provide input as to whether she could legally vote or not. Someone from the government office in charge of SNAP benefits, also called food stamps, asked Brown if she wanted to register to vote when she was applying for benefits. That person told her she was able to register and helped her fill out the paperwork.

Now, Brown is uncertain about her future as a North Carolina voter and said many recently released people want to vote but worry theyll accidentally violate the law if they try.

The news of a potential hold on her voting rights, she said, was pretty devastating.
" " The digestive tube, extending from the esophagus to the anal canal, is composed of a wall with four layers (from the inside out): the mucosa, submucosa, muscularis extera and serosa. Holding the tube in place is the mesentery. BSIP/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

While it may never achieve the rock star status that the heart, liver or lungs enjoy, the mesentery was officially given full organ status in 2017, bringing the total number of organs in the human body to 79. Not familiar with it? Well, the mesentery is a band of tissues in the digestive system that begins at the pancreas and continues through the small intestine and colon, holding these organs in place.

The process for status upgrade to organ began in 2012 when researchers from the University of Limerick in Ireland determined the mesentery is self-contained. Before that, it was widely accepted that the mesentery was composed of multiple attached pieces, rather than functioning as a continuous organ.

Advertisement

Besides self-containment, there's one other bit of criteria to being named an organ  it must perform a critical function. From the get-go, scientists knew that the mesentery kept the gut in place by attaching it to the abdominal wall, which in and of itself is pretty important. "There are no reported instances of a Homo sapien living without a mesentery," researcher and University of Limerick professor J. Calvin Coffey told Discover magazine in 2017.

" " Digital representation of the small and large intestines and associated mesentery. University of Limerick

The mesentery is also where all abdominal organs develop. If this doesn't happen properly during fetal development, all kinds of things can go wrong. For instance, intestines may twist or collapse, which can cause tissue death or blocked blood vessels.

Lymph nodes are also located in the mesentery, and that's important because these nodes help the body fight off infections as they contain immune cells and also trap viruses, bacteria, etc.

Lastly, the mesentery, when needed, can produce C-reactive protein. This protein is a warning shot of sorts that the body is experiencing inflammation.

In 2021, scientists published a study in Nature confirming that there is only one mesentery in the body to which all abdominal digestive organs are connected and that across animal species, abdominopelvic organs (stomach, liver, intestines, etc.) are organized into mesenteric and non-mesenteric domains.

The mesentery discovery even prompted an update to the medical textbook "Gray's Anatomy." Not too shabby for a heretofore largely overlooked body part.

Now That's Interesting Leonardo da Vinci was truly ahead of his time, as the artistic (and obviously scientific) visionary sketched the mesentery many moons ago, depicting it as a continuous structure.
Main_Content







April 4, 2022

Media contacts:

Deidre McCabe, Director, Office of Communications, 410-767-3536

Andy Owen, Deputy Director for Media Relations, 410-767-6491





Maryland Department of Health celebrates Public Health Week in Maryland

Coinciding with National Public Health Week, event recognizes the contributions of the public health profession in the state





Baltimore, MD  Following Governor Larry Hogans recent proclamation of April 4 - 10 as Public Health Week in Maryland, the Maryland Department of Health (MDH) will celebrate the occasion by recognizing the contributions of public health workers and highlighting issues that are important to the health of the states communities.





On behalf of our entire state, I just want to thank all of you for using your talents to help us honor and show our appreciation for our healthcare heroes, said Governor Hogan during his announcement on Friday. Ive talked a lot over the last two years about what it means to be Maryland Strongyou are the definition of Maryland Strong.





Public Health Week in Maryland coincides with National Public Health Week 2022 and shares its theme: Public Health is Where You Are. This years theme acknowledges that promoting and protecting health is critical not just to the public as a whole, but also to local communities in particular.





The COVID-19 pandemic has placed our public health workers front and center and they responded professionally and with great fortitude, said MDH Secretary Dennis R. Schrader. I am grateful to Marylands public health workforce and the professionals that have served our local communities and the entire state to meet the numerous challenges brought about by the pandemic.





No matter where we are, we can all take part in building toward a healthier future, said Deputy Secretary for Public Health Dr. Jinlene Chan. I am especially thankful for the local health departments and community-based organizations in every jurisdiction of the state that work tirelessly, year in and year out, to serve the state from the grassroots level.





For daily updates, and to see public health workers in action across the state, Marylanders can follow MDH at http://www.twitter.com/ MDHealthDept and at Facebook.com/MDHealthDept.

###

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 at http://www.twitter.com/ MDHealthDept and at Facebook.com/MDHealthDept.




A grant from the Montana History Foundation may help unravel mysteries that some Chinese people buried a long time ago in Montana have taken to the grave.

Among the $212,147 the foundation recently awarded for 28 projects across Montana was $10,000 for Montanas Chinese Cemeteries: Translating and Interpreting what Remains. The foundation states the Butte-based Mai Wah Society will use the money to translate and interpret Chinese headstones in four cemeteries in Billings, Bozeman, Butte and Helena.

The group will also create a website featuring the projects findings.

Charlene Porsild, president and chief executive officer of the Montana History Foundation, said her group feels cemetery preservation projects such as these share the vital history of ethnic communities and their influence on the state.

The memory of each burial site touches a part of Montanas communal past and has great value for present and future generations, she said.

Mark Johnson, an expert in the Chinese experience in Montana and a fellow with the Institute for Educational Initiatives at University of Notre Dame, will head up the project.

Its not as easy as it sounds.

Johnson said the Chinese language evolved and many of the Chinese tombstones are written in traditional Chinese characters.

The Helena resident said many of the Chinese who settled in Montana were from Taishan, a southern county of China, and the project will need experts to help unravel the tombstones.

Johnson said he will have the help of Genevieve Leung, linguistics professor at the University of San Francisco and director of the universitys Asian Pacific Studies program, and Peter Lau, a retiree fluent in both Taishanese and English who spends six months each year in Taishan. Johnson will do the research using digital databases and local archives.

Johnson said he will relay the information to the two experts. He hopes the study will unveil the identities of the Chinese Montanans and get both sides of it  the Chinese aspect and how they lived their lives here.

I think we will learn some interesting trends and patterns about the people who came to Montana, Johnson said, when they came, what conditions were like in China.

He said traditionally, five or seven years after being buried, the bodies were repatriated back to China.

Johnson said the study could help find their second burial site in China.

If we can just begin to tell the story of the Chinese in Montana with more fullness, recognize their individuality, their humanity and their culture ...  Johnson said.

The grant proposal says "an optimistic hope is to connect with surviving relatives through Peter Laus efforts, further linking Montana with specific villages in Taishan County."

Ten tombstones will be reviewed at Chinese Row at Forestvale Cemetery near Helena, Johnson said. He said there are about 10 headstones each at Mountainview Cemetery in Billings and Sunset Hills Cemetery in Bozeman.

He said Butte's Mount Moriah has the most, with more than 20 Chinese headstones.

Johnson said that at its height, the Chinese population of Montana was 2,532 in 1890. He said their story is told in his book The Middle Kingdom under the Big Sky: A History of the Chinese Experience in Montana (University of Nebraska Press, 2022). More information is available at www.BigSkyChinese.com.

Zachary Coe, the community outreach manager for the history foundation, said its a pleasure to work on cemetery projects because they offer a unique perspective on the past and have the potential to enlighten areas of Montanas history people may not realize exist.

This work and the people doing it are a great reminder about the importance of historic preservation, he said.

Johnson said many of them were stripped of their identity.

I hope (we) can give that back to them, Johnson said.

Assistant editor Phil Drake can be reached at 406-231-9021.

Love 12 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte has requested meetings with the Biden administration on potential land exchanges that could put more than 29,000 acres of state trust lands within the Flathead Reservation into tribal ownership while the state could receive compensatory federal lands.

The Montana Water Rights Protection Act, ratifying the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes' water compact, was signed in 2020 by former President Donald Trump as part of federal omnibus legislation. It received support from all three members of Montanas congressional delegation at the time: Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, and Republicans Sen. Steve Daines and Gianforte when he was in the House of Representatives.

The act allows for the state of Montana to transfer certain state trust lands located within the reservation to the tribe. In exchange, the state would receive other federal lands as new state trust lands.

In a March 28 letter to the U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Department of the Interior, Gianforte requested meetings to commence discussions on potential land exchanges. The letter notes that the secretaries should prioritize the exchanges during the five-year period following enactment of the act last September.

There are a number of critical items that will require further discussion among the departments, the state and CSKT, including the identification and availability of those state trust lands that could ultimately be included in the land exchange proposal, the letter states.

The act identifies nearly 37,000 acres of state trust lands. However, analysis from the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation determined only about 29,000 acres could be eligible for transfer. The letter notes eligible lands include those currently adjacent to tribal lands.

Non-trust lands such as state parks are not eligible.

CSKT Tribal Chairman Tom McDonald said in a statement he appreciated the governor and DNRC Director Amanda Kaster for committing to implement the water compact.

"The state land exchange process is a win-win-win for the state, the tribes and the American taxpayer, he said. It provides significant economic benefits for the state and its ability to provide a well-funded education system through land consolidation, it allows for improved resource management through the return of tribal homelands, and it saves taxpayers billions by resolving complex liability."

The Governors Office and Department of Natural Resources and Conservation said in sending the letter that many state trust lands within the Flathead Reservation are difficult to access and checkerboarded through other land ownerships. Currently most trust lands are either grazing leases or managed for timber production.

If state lands are transferred, leases will be canceled on March 1 of the year following the exchange. Any future leasing decisions would go to the CSKT or Bureau of Indian Affairs and be subject to tribal or federal laws and rules.

The state would seek to exchange for lands with better public access and greater revenue generating opportunities, the Governor's Office said in a press release. State trust lands are managed primarily to benefit public education through leasing and sales. Any exchanges would require approval of the Montana State Board of Land Commissioners.

While there is not a specific land exchange proposal at this time, the state has begun examining the eligibility of state trust lands within the reservation to participate in the exchange," said Shawn Thomas, DNRC Trust Lands Division administrator. "We will regularly engage with lessees who may be affected by any future exchange under the MWRPA (Montana Water Rights Protection Act).

Gianforte said in a statement that he expects the transfer process to take several years.

Primarily the CSKT Water Compact settled more than 10,000 tribal water right claims both on and off the reservation. The tribes relinquished claims to most off-reservation water rights in exchange for 211 on-reservation water rights, 10 off-reservation water rights and co-ownership of 58 other water rights. The act also set up a $1.9 billion trust fund to settle damage claims and rehabilitate the century-old Flathead Indian Irrigation Project.

Additionally the act provided for the transfer of the National Bison Range near Moiese to the tribe, which occurred last year.

A spokesperson for Interior said the agency had no comment on the letter.

USDA did not respond to a request for comment.

Tom Kuglin is the deputy editor for the Lee Newspapers State Bureau. His coverage focuses on outdoors, recreation and natural resources.

Love 2 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
I read the story on the proposed Fire opencut mine near Libby with great interest and frustration. Libby Rep. Steve Gundersons HB 599 is now paving the way for Thompson Contracting Inc. to develop a 14.4-acre gravel pit near his constituents homes, regardless of their concerns about noise, dust or water quality impacts. Honestly, the whole situation reminds me of Frankenstein: Dr. Frankenstein worked so hard to create something he could be proud of that he didnt realize he created a monster. And just like in Frankenstein, if the cause of the suffering isnt dealt with, its just going to get worse.

During the 2021 legislative session, people across Montana labored to defeat HB 599 due to the harmful impacts it would have on air quality, water rights, water quality, noise, dust and property rights. The Legislature turned a deaf ear to overwhelming public concern, even after hearing that a neighbor to a Gallatin County gravel pit had an appraiser decrease her property value by 50% after an opencut operation opened near her home.

The majority of legislators, including Rep. Gunderson, shrugged off these community concerns or claimed they were false. Proponents wrongly (and somewhat callously) said that only rural Montana would suffer the consequences of this misguided bill. They were wrong. All Montanans near proposed opencut gravel operations will suffer from the consequences of changes in the law, regardless of whether they are in rural areas or in more populated parts of the state.

Im sorry to see the people of Libby suffer the same fate as others across this state. Due to the passage of HB 599, Montana Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) has fewer tools available to protect Montanans. The new law eliminates DEQs ability to protect people from the noise or visual blight of an opencut gravel mine, regardless of its size or location. DEQ can no longer mitigate fire danger or dangerous traffic impacts to communities. It can no longer limit operating hours, leaving neighbors to suffer through late night or early morning heavy equipment noise and truck traffic on their roads.

Rep. Gundersons bill also eliminated the opencut permitting programs ability to consider surface or groundwater impacts and offsite sedimentation. When we took a closer look, we were told that another section of DEQ deals with water issues, but most of those water pollution discharge permits are called general permits, meaning the public has no opportunity to comment on water issues related to a specific opencut mining operation. When all of these concerns were raised before the Legislature, they were ignored. Worse, we were told these issues werent true and they only applied to rural areas. Its clear that legislators failed to read the bill before pulling the lever to create a monster.

The problem is so much worse than Frankenstein, however. Instead of just one monster, there are about 1,869 opencut mining operations in this state, and many have an abysmal record. After the Legislature passed this harmful legislation, MEIC started investigating whether opencut mines are complying with reclamation requirements. After reviewing documents received in a public information request, we analyzed the DEQs data. What we found was disturbing.

The state seems more focused on issuing permits than with following up to make sure the operator is following the law, complying with its permit, and reclaiming the property. Among other things, a review of DEQs opencut mine files shows there are:

 778 opencut mines with expired reclamation dates,

 169 mines that were mining past their reclamation date from 2015 through 2020, and

 185 operators with permitted sites that failed to even submit their annual reports by the deadline.

These numbers should give legislators, DEQ, and the people of Libby serious pause. Legislators gutted the law last session. But what the Legislature takes away, it can also restore.

The Legislature can fix the problems that were caused by HB 599, and they should do so for the sake of the folks in and around Libby, as well as all Montanans impacted by these mines near their homes and businesses.

We would like to work with Rep. Gunderson to fix his law in order to protect public health, water quality, water quantity and property rights. We would like him to restore DEQs ability to say no to mines in the wrong location or to mitigate the harm a mine may cause to nearby landowners.

Let him have the courage to fight his own monster as Dr. Frankenstein never did.

Anne Hedges is the director of policy and legislative affairs for the Montana Environmental Information Center.

Love 6 Funny 2 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1
DECATUR  Corbin Hawkins has loved planes and flying all his life.

He wants to study aerospace engineering in college and this summer, will attend the Air Force Junior ROTC Flight Academy at Bowling Green State University, Ohio. At the end of the eight-week course, he'll have a private pilot's license.

I wanted to broaden my horizons and have the chance to learn how to fly a plane by myself, he said. I think it will help me with my college. I think knowing how to fly will help me with that.

Corbin, 17, is a junior at LSA High School. His mother, Monica, found a two-week program first, but then this came up. Only 120 students are chosen for the Junior ROTC flight schools nationally, and the cost is entirely covered by the United States Air Force, with no expectation that Corbin will sign up for the Air Force one day.

It's $25,000, Monica Hawkins said. The Air Force pays for everything: room, board, classes, everything.

Instead, the hope is that students like Corbin will encourage other young people to pursue getting a pilot's license to increase the number of licensed pilots, said Jeff Hawkins, Corbin's dad. And maybe some of them will decide to join the Air Force.

I've always loved flying in planes, Corbin said. To have the chance to actually learn to fly on my own is a golden opportunity.

He had to fill out a lot of paperwork, undergo a physical by an Air Force flight physician, get letters of recommendation, and obtain a student pilot's license  something like a learner's permit when learning to drive.

They're going to be putting in 10 to 12 hour days, Monica Hawkins said. They won't have time for anything else.

They said we're going to have to study most of every day, Corbin said. I'm guessing we have to learn the code words and the instruments and when you talk to (air traffic control).

The family visited NASA when Corbin was in kindergarten, and he's been to NASA space camp at Kennedy Space Center several times until he'd finished all the available levels. Getting a pilot's license was the next logical step.

Monica Hawkins said Corbin decided at a very young age that he was interested in aeronautics and he has never once wavered, as some kids do.

He always knew he was interested in flying, she said. He's never changed his mind.

Contact Valerie Wells at (217) 421-7982. Follow her on Twitter: @modgirlreporter

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Want to see more like this? Get our local education coverage delivered directly to your inbox. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Since taking office, Gov. J.B. Pritzker has been gradually and quietly transforming the Illinois Prisoner Review Board, which is responsible for deciding whether to release some of the states most violent criminals from prison early, to fit his weak on crime agenda. That is, until now. Senate Democrats who covered for him for over a year finally had enough of his dangerous gamesmanship.

Until last month, the governor had been appointing some controversial members to the board, hiding them from public scrutiny and preventing them from participating in the constitutionally required Senate confirmation process. Some of those appointees had served for years without ever being confirmed, all while taking a taxpayer-funded $90,000 salary and, in some instances, casting votes to release convicted murderers.

The Illinois Constitution requires that appointees be vetted and confirmed by the Illinois Senate within 60 session days of their appointments. Pritzker, however, has repeatedly circumvented that process, using such tactics as withdrawing appointments before the 60-day deadline and then almost immediately reappointing them to start the clock over.

The issue came to a head in late March when Democrats finally allowed the unconfirmed appointees to come before the Senate Executive Appointments Committee and began to bring them to the full Senate for a vote. The governor withdrew one of his nominees, a convicted double murderer who had previously voted to release a cop killer he served prison time with. Then the first appointee the Democratic-controlled Senate took up was denied confirmation. Last week, the Senate was scheduled to take up two more. One of these appointees resigned before the vote once it was clear there werent enough votes for confirmation, and the other was resoundingly rejected by the Senate that evening.

Why are lawmakers from both parties so concerned about the Prisoner Review Board? While I can speak only for myself, I think its safe to say that there is a lot of well-deserved concern when a state board is releasing convicted murderers back to the street at a high rate during a statewide spike in violent crime.

The statistics published on the boards website offer a glimpse into what is happening at the Prisoner Review Board under Pritzker, especially when we compare it with the record under other recent governors. Based on the annual reports dating to 2004, Pritzkers board leads the pack in the percentage of adult final discharges granted, releases granted to those imprisoned before 1978 (known as C-number inmates) and clemency petitions that were either granted, expunged or commuted. Pritzkers Prisoner Review Board released C-number inmates at a rate nearly three times as high as the board under Gov. Bruce Rauner, nearly eight times higher than Gov. Pat Quinns board and more than four times as high as Gov. Rod Blagojevichs board.

Also, according to the published data, Pritzker has granted 93% of clemency petitions. For perspective, the next highest was Quinn at 25%.

Now the Prisoner Review Boards membership is dwindling, and the governor has become unhinged. Weve seen all too often Pritzkers penchant for blaming the failures of his administration on someone else, but hes now taking it to a new level, making wild claims that Republicans are trying to dismantle government. At recent news conferences, when pressed about the situation with the review board, he has resorted to name-calling and talk of Facebook fakery, whatever that means.

The reality is that the governor has repeatedly appointed individuals to serve on the Prisoner Review Board who are so controversial that he cant get the members of his party to confirm them. So what does the governor expect the members of the Senate to do? Should we not take our advise and consent responsibility nor our confirmation responsibility seriously? Does he think we should just blindly accept any appointee he puts forward, regardless of potential concern?

This isnt a political issue. This is a public safety issue, a justice issue and a commonsense issue.

Pritzker is failing all parties involved in this commonsense issue.

Illinois state Sen. Jason Plummer, R-Vandalia, is the minority spokesperson for the Senate Executive Appointments Committee.

Love 1 Funny 1 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0
My husband and I and our friend Linda were in the airport, planning to get dinner (I wanted calamari) before Lindas flight left Monterey for Las Vegas.

On our way into the restaurant, we passed an elderly woman leaning on the arm of someone I assumed to be her daughter.

Noticing a corsage (orchids?) pinned to the womans jacket, I said, Beautiful flowers!

And her daughter said, Its her birthday today! Shes 102!

So while my husband and Linda waited to get a table, I got to know the birthday girl.

Its your birthday? I said.

Yes, she said, laughing, and Im stuffed!

Her name was Helen, and she didnt look stuffed. She looked radiant and not a day over 70.

I wish you couldve seen her.

Happy birthday! I said. Then I added what I always say to loved ones and friends (even friends Ive just met in the airport) on their birthdays: Im so glad you were born!

Thanks! she said, beaming.

Helen and her daughter werent traveling. They are locals in an area known for great restaurants. But like many of their neighbors (including my husband and me), they like the food in the airports restaurant. Especially the calamari. So they chose it as the spot to celebrate Helens 102nd birthday.

We chatted a bit, then went our separate ways. Funny, how we can meet someone in passing and think of them as friends.

Friendship is always a gift, but it takes different forms. Some friends, like Helen and her daughter, come into our lives for only a moment. Others stay for years, in good times and bad, until one day, somehow, we lose touch. But if were lucky, we have one friend (or if were really lucky, a few) who show up and stick with us forever. Linda is one of my forever friends.

My husband and I were newlyweds years ago when his job changed and we moved 500 miles from family and friends on the Monterey Peninsula in California, to a town my mother called Las Vegas of All Places.

Im a firm believer that home is where you make it. So we made Las Vegas our home. We loved the desert, having a pool and swimming at midnight. We loved the people we met and especially the visits from our grown kids and others who were guests at our hotel.

But in our 12 years in Vegas, my only close friend (aside from my husband and a few checkers at Trader Joes) was Linda.

We were introduced by our husbands, who worked together at a newspaper. Thanks to similar backgrounds and senses of humor, Linda and I grew close right away. We couldve been sisters. In some ways, we are. We would meet once a week or so to talk and laugh about everything and nothing. I called her my oasis in the desert.

Then my husband retired, and we moved back to California to be closer to our kids and all the grandkids they were giving us.

Linda and I kept in touch with texts and phone calls. But four years passed without our seeing each other. Then last week, she flew to Monterey, for a face-to-face, heart-to-heart, real visit.

My husband left town and let us have the house. So for five days and four nights, Linda and I talked and laughed about everything and nothing and celebrated being forever friends.

Our farewell dinner at the airport was great. Especially the company. And the calamari. Then we walked to the check-in line for her flight, hugged long and hard and said our goodbyes.

Driving home, I thought of something I learned long ago: People leave, but love remains.

Im not sure when Ill see Linda again. If not in this life, then on the porch in heaven.

But if were blessed, like Helen, to live to 102, I hope we celebrate our forever friendship, along with all our loved ones and friends. Over dinner. At the airport. With calamari.

Sharon Randall is the author of The World and Then Some. She can be reached at P.O. Box 922, Carmel Valley, CA 93924 or www.sharonrandall.com.
Bristols leaders are working to find a better approach to the citys homeless population.

Its been years since a working group was formed to advance the idea of bringing a day center  or a one-stop shop for the homeless  to Bristol, but the concept has yet to materialize.

For Margaret Feierabend, a Bristol, Tennessee councilwoman and former mayor, the need for a day center in Bristol  the only member of the Tri-Cities without one  is obvious.

We dont have a place where people can shower, do laundry, get their mail, easily access case management [and] get referred if they need to, Feierabend said.

Efforts to locate a day center in Bristol are still alive, despite unfruitful past attempts.

Feierabend is also on the board for Family Promise of Bristol, a nonprofit organization that helps find housing for the homeless and has helped people remain in their existing homes.

Family Promise has taken charge of Bristols fledgling day center effort and is working on a partnership with the Bristol Salvation Army to potentially house a center downtown on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, according to Dottie Havlik, board president at Family Promise of Bristol.

A lot of people dont know who to call, where to go or how to get help, and thats mainly what we want to do with the day center, Havlik said. To have people there to sit with you, help you and work through all that is so vitally important.

The vision, according to Havlik, is to provide services like laundry facilities, showers, case management and other resources to the homeless on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, the days when the Proverbs 3:27 Mission Center, a day shelter at Hunt Memorial United Methodist Church, is closed.

We are still talking about how we could do that, Havlik said.

The idea would be to have Family Promise staff operate the center, called A Place to Be, according to Havlik.

The Salvation Army wanted to partner with Family Promise to use our staff to provide those services, Havlik said. We are already working with people without homes and already have the education to do that.

Since last summer, Family Promise of Bristol has hired staff and provided services to more than 120 households, Havlik said. Its current caseload is more than 60 households.

Maj. Brooks Gilliam of the Bristol Salvation Army said the project is in the beginning stages.

A big-picture strategy

Although establishing a day center would fill a community need, not everyone is in favor of locating it downtown.

Weve heard from many business leaders who do not support the day center concept being physically located in our downtown, Beth Rhinehart, president of the Bristol Chamber of Commerce, said.

The chamber is teaming up with the United Way to address homelessness in Bristol through a big-picture strategy, according to Rhinehart.

We are stepping in to facilitate a strategic plan to be able to help those who need it, and to also do everything we can to do whats best for the community, Rhinehart said.

With plans to meet with city leaders and to bring in an experienced facilitator to put together a plan, the group will seek input from all stakeholders, according to Rhinehart.

The plan will take big-picture strategy into consideration, Rhinehart said. It is a community-wide, big-picture strategy that will have short-, medium- and long-term goals associated with it to best address the challenges that we are all experiencing.

That doesnt mean abandoning a day center.

I think before we take steps out into this, we need to have the plan, Rhinehart said. I think that plan is going to have everyone to the table, and I hope that plan includes a day center.

Kingsport center fills need

The recent formation of the New Day Center at the Salvation Army of Kingsport grew out of a similarly team-focused mindset.

Last summer, city leaders met with the Salvation Army and other players about the idea, and less than a year later, the center was up and running in the dining hall of the Kingsport Salvation Army.

Since its inception, the center located on Dale Street in downtown Kingsport has helped more than 20 people find housing and has guided six individuals to substance abuse programs, according to Corps Officer Capt. Aaron Abram.

It does take everyone working together, Abram said. That really is the strength of what we are doing.

The United Way of Greater Kingsport, the Kingsport Housing and Redevelopment Authority and the city of Kingsport each have representatives at the center almost every weekday to work together through what Abram calls a partnership of presence.

About a dozen people utilize the center daily and are fully engaged in working on steps given by the case manager, Abram said. Currently focused on case management, recovery counseling, job searches and housing assistance, the center is expected to add services like laundry, shower facilities and skills training.

Jonathan Anderson, homeless services liaison at the United Way of Kingsport, says the center has expedited the housing process.

It allows them to get off the street quicker and move into housing faster, Anderson said. Not only is that good for individuals experiencing homeless, but its good for our businesses; it is good for our city leadership [and] our neighborhoods.

According to Abram, locating a day center in the downtown district isnt the worst of ideas.

Its a place where people can go to, rather than be downtown, or be anywhere in the city, kind of trying to figure things out for themselves, Abram said. When theyre in one place, working a program to move toward self-sufficiency, I think thats a benefit.

Regina Strickland, a corps mission assistant at the Kingsport Salvation Army, which serves lunch daily, said lunch numbers have doubled to around 60 people a day since the day center opened.

I think we are definitely headed the right way, Strickland said. The community definitely needs the day center.

Abrams advice to Bristol would be to give a day center a chance.

Believe in people until they can believe in themselves, Abram said. Thats what we are seeing is sometimes people need to know that someone else believes in them to finally believe in themselves again.

Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
HICKORY  Catawba Valley Community College has signed an articulation agreement with Montreat College for its business administration and accounting programs.

Montreat College is an excellent institution for students to continue their academic career and meet their career goals, said Brice Melton, CVCC Vice President for Teaching and Learning and Chief Academic Officer. Montreat College faculty members and administration are responsive and excited to meet the needs of CVCC students. This latest articulation agreement with Montreat will allow CVCC students to seamlessly complete their business or accounting bachelors degree in two years after their CVCC graduation.

In order to be eligible for direct transfer, students at Catawba Valley Community College must earn an AAS degree in Accounting and Finance and be seeking to complete their Bachelor of Science (B.S.) degree through Montreat Colleges Accounting program.

CVCC students must also submit a Montreat College AGS Application for Admission; provide official, final transcripts for all college courses taken; maintain an overall grade point average of 2.0 on a 4.0 scale or higher in all previous college work attempted; provide an official final high school or equivalent transcript (if transferring less than 12 semester credits or college credit); and receive American Council on Education (ACE) verification demonstrating any eligible CLEP and DSST examinations and non-collegiate military training.

Montreat will transfer up to 66 semester hours of credit, which will be applied to their general education core curriculum requirements, their accounting major requirements and their general elective requirements toward the 120 credits required for the B.S. in Accounting at Montreat.

For more on the transfer programs offered at CVCC, visit https://www.cvcc.edu/Academic-Resources/Programs/College-Transfer.
In recent years, for better or worse, milk prices in the U.S. are determined increasingly by forces at play in other parts of the world. It was rapidly growing demand from China that helped propel prices upward in 2014. And it was a global oversupply of milk and a slowdown of import demand that weighed on prices in the years after. Our expectation this time around is an extended period of higher, albeit more volatile, prices.

Repeat of history?

The obvious similarity between 2014 and today is the high prices for dairy commodities, energy, and feed. In February 2022, Brent crude oil prices surged above $100 per barrel, a price level not seen since 2014.

Between 2011 and 2013, corn prices averaged over $6 per bushel, straining dairies margins. RaboResearch estimates the average U.S. on-farm corn price to be $5.60 per bushel for the 2022 marketing year. If the Black Sea region is unable to export corn, RaboResearch estimates that average will climb to $5.77 per bushel in 2022 to 2023.

Another area that may feel like deja vu is the global trade activities and geopolitics in 2014. Leading up to 2014, we experienced multiple years of strong growth in import demand from China. In 2010, China imported 780,000 metric tons (MT) of dairy products. By 2014, imports had doubled to 1.56 million MT. In recent years Chinas import demand has grown steadily, then dramatically in 2021, with 24% year-over-year growth (YOY).

The other major disruption to global import demand in 2014 was Russias annexation of the Crimea peninsula. In response to that action, much of the world, including the European Union (EU) and the U.S., imposed sanctions on Russia.

Where the deja vu stops

What ensued last time weighed on global markets. RaboResearch expects a different outcome for dairy prices this time around.

In 2014, Russia responded to the sanctions with an embargo on dairy imports (among others). Annual global exports to Russia fell from 500,000 MT in 2013 to below 100,000 MT by 2015. The embargo primarily impacted the EU, with the 27 nations needing to find new buyers for the lost export volume. That shift weighed on global markets.

The product volume that lost its would-be home in Russia couldnt find a new home in China. In 2015, Chinas imports fell 22%. The decline was mostly driven by a slowdown in whole milk powder (WMP) imports. Until that point, New Zealand had been in growth mode, expanding its production by an average annual growth rate of 7% from 2010 to 2014, largely enabled by Chinas growing demand for WMP. When that demand fell, WMP inventories backed up in Oceania.

Meanwhile, the EU prepared to lift its 30-year-old quota on milk production. Producers were eager to capitalize on the higher milk prices. After remaining stable under the quota system, milk production grew by 4.5% YOY in 2014, representing an additional 829,000 MT of milk solids hitting global markets.

The combination of the lost exports to Russia and China and higher global milk production resulted in a significant volume of milk without a clear buyer on the global stage. As a result, much of it headed into driers and became skim milk powder (SMP). Government and private inventories of SMP grew dramatically and hung over markets for several years. Between 2015 and 2017, the European Commission purchased intervention stocks of SMP totaling 380,000 MT. Global markets were aware that any uptick in powder prices would result in more of that powder being released onto the markets.

What should soften the blow?

While Chinas import demand has grown steadily in recent years, that strength began to slow during the second half of 2021. Chinas purchasing will continue to be slower in 2022 and will likely reflect a double-digit drop from 2021.

A slowdown from the No. 1 buyer of global dairy commodities would be a bearish factor in normal conditions. This time around, however, slower milk production out of the major global milk producing regions will soften the blow.

Base programs and tiered pricing programs continue to limit the ability of producers to expand in many regions of the U.S. Replacement heifer inventories are low, which will make rebuilding the milk cow herd a challenge.

New Zealand production growth has plateaued in recent years and is expected to see flat to even negative growth in milk production in the years ahead. The countrys restrictive environmental regulations, including the Zero Carbon Act, and efforts to include livestock in the countrys emissions trading scheme are all threatening to reduce livestock numbers. The prospect of similarly restrictive environmental regulations in the EU will likely limit livestock numbers in its major milk producing areas.

The impact of conflict

The possible direct damage of the current Russia-Ukraine conflict to dairy trade was already done in 2014. Trade routes and export patterns have already been altered. Now RaboResearch is watching for the indirect market impacts.

High energy prices and Europes dependence on Russia as a major supplier of natural gas will have impacts on the processing sector. Transportation costs will climb, and so will the cost of spray drying milk powders, an energy intensive process. If processing slows, global markets for milk powders and whey could tighten, providing more lift for prices.

Another factor includes the high wheat price and what that means for products that are traditionally complementary to dairy. Could, for example, high wheat prices and tight supplies drive the price of pizza higher? And that does not include the higher fuel costs for delivery.

The U.S. dairy impact

RaboResearchs base-case scenario is a 1% gain in domestic demand across 2022 with somewhat weaker export demand growth. On balance, the limited supply growth will struggle to keep up with demand, and dairy prices should stay higher for longer.

There is a large amount of uncertainty in global markets, heightened by a volatile geopolitical landscape. Overall, we have moved out of the seven-year rut of low prices. However, its not going to be a smooth ride.




Even before the pandemic, but especially since, calls for change have been heard in the dairy industry from nearly every group involved  farmers, processors, cooperatives, haulers, and more. The details vary depending on the perspective, but they are generally calling for fairness, resilience, and transparency. There is no doubt the impetus in these groups is there. But, consensus between groups does not always seem to be.

Changing that stalemate was the goal of the New York Dairy Roundtable hosted in November. Leaders of the Northeast Dairy Producers Association (NEDPA) developed the idea to bring together industry stakeholders to discuss future challenges and opportunities to dairying in the region. We wanted everybody to be in the same room to have that conversation together, explained NEDPA vice chair Keith Kimball during a follow up discussion at the Northeast Dairy Management Conference.

Those present at the roundtable included dairy farmers like Kimball, representatives from dairy processors and Farm Credit, and, most notably, the agriculture committee chairs of the state Senate and Assembly. Kimball highlighted two main messages that were discussed during the event: workforce development and business uncertainty.

Significant labor shortages were emphasized by every member along the supply chain, from farmers to truck drivers to processing plants. They advocated that a better job needs to be done in educating young people about these types of career opportunities. There are a lot of really good jobs in agriculture, and maybe that doesnt always come across, Kimball noted during the conference.

On the business side, Kimball explained that the participants stressed to their legislators that the cost to operate in the state can put them at a competitive disadvantage compared to other parts of the country or the world. Instead of additional charges and fees, farmers and processors encouraged tax incentives and grants that could attract new facilities and support the companies that have already developed in the state.

To the plant

Barney McConnell, the director of transportation for Dairy Farmers of America (DFA), added during the conference that the infrastructure bottlenecks impacting milk hauling and processing come from a variety of factors. He started with the fact that there are not enough 24-hour plants and said that shutdowns on weekends and holidays are done to help retain employees but also create complications. Reroutes to accommodate shutdowns add another layer of uncertainty.

It takes all of us, McConnell said of a smooth supply chain. Its not all on the farm, its not all on the hauler, and its not all on the plants. The entire process depends on people and machines which can call in sick or break down with no notice, so flexibility is critical.

In order to help each other, McConnell seconded Kimballs point about promoting jobs in agriculture, noting that a lack of milk truck drivers stems from a lack of experience and training. Additionally, he advised farmers to have adequate on-farm storage and a good window of time for the milk truck to come. He also noted that plants shouldnt view milk trucks as extra storage because it creates long lines and route delays.

To continue the dialogue started at the roundtable in November, NEDPA is still engaged in discussions with trade organizations and is having monthly follow-up meetings with the state department of agriculture and markets. The goal is to maintain a roundtable discussion annually so that all parties can come together to discuss challenges and solutions, Kimball shared.

To comment, email your remarks to intel@hoards.com.

(c) Hoard's Dairyman Intel 2022

March 31, 2022
Will global dairy demand outpace growth over the next decade? Dairy economist Mary Ledman predicts that it will.

During a panel discussion at the Professional Dairy Producers of Wisconsin (PDPW) Business Conference, Rabobanks Ledman forecast that milk supply growth around the globe will be minimal over the next decade, while prices will remain elevated. She expects both the United States and European Union to grow in production, but it will happen at a slower rate in Europe due to environmental and sustainability constraints being placed on the Netherlands and potentially other countries.

Meanwhile, Ledman sees demand for global dairy products growing about 3% annually from 2020 to 2030. By the end of this decade, it appears that three regions  China, Southeast Asia, and Africa  will account for over 60% of global dairy demand. Demand in these regions will be largely driven by population growth and increased per capita consumption.

Ledmen predicts there will be a 20-million-ton shortage between supply and demand by 2030. While some may worry about dairy alternatives displacing our products, she doesnt see that as a big threat. There is enough world demand for dairy proteins, she noted. We need all the protein we can get.

The major dairy players

The world leader in both milk production and consumption is India. Cows and water buffalos in this country make 200 million metric tons of milk annually. However, roughly half of this milk never reaches a pasteurizer.

The European Union follows behind in second, with 160 million metric tons of annual production. In third place is the United States, with 100 million metric tons. Among all countries, the U.S. leads the world when considering milk that actually enters the human food chain and can be sold via modern-day food safety standards.

While New Zealand and Australia are farther down the list on the production side, these two island countries are major players when it comes to exports. In fact, New Zealand exports 95% to 98% of its milk production annually, making it the largest dairy exporting nation in the world.

The European Union and the United States are involved in export markets, but to a smaller extent than New Zealand. Thats because both countries are home to large, affluent domestic markets. Last year, the European Union exported 15% of its dairy products, and 15% to 18% of U.S. milk is exported annually in the form of cheese, whey, and milk powder.

When it comes to milk buyers, China is by far the largest dairy importer. Mexico follows behind as a distant second.

The current situation in Ukraine and Russia is on many peoples minds, but Ledman does not expect that to have a negative impact on dairy prices. She believes prices have more of an upside risk than a downside risk currently. She said her position on this could change if China joined Russia in the conflict and we had to levy sanctions on China, where NATO nations would not export to the Asian country.

That could change the landscape, since China is a major importer that absorbs about 30% of global dairy trade. If New Zealand lost the ability to trade with China, for example, that would unleash a lot of milk powders on to other markets, namely Mexico, the next largest dairy importer and the United States biggest dairy market. Ledman does not anticipate that China will make this move, but she acknowledged that the possibility is out there.

To comment, email your remarks to intel@hoards.com.

(c) Hoard's Dairyman Intel 2022

April 4, 2022
To mark International Womens Day 2022, Information Age is publishing a special series, Women in IT Leadership. We speak with 15 women in various tech roles across Australia about how they got their start in the IT industry, their approach to leadership, and how to encourage more females into technology careers.

Today we speak with Julie Canepa, CIO at Cisco.

#iwd2022 #breakthebias

**

For someone who has featured in the top 50 chief information officers in Australia by CIO Magazine for the last five years, working in IT was not in Julie Canepas original game plan, until the dotcom boom.

Id come out of university, travelled and had a few odd jobs, which werent very satisfying, but I was aware of the hype surrounding the dotcom boom.

During this period she recalls a shortage of people to fill technology roles.

I heard so much buzz and energy about what was happening in this industry in California, and the lack of people to fill the tech roles. So I decided to throw my hat in the ring.

She found that she could add value almost immediately.

I had the technical aptitude and good people skills which meant that I could bring value right away. I loved trying to solve engineering and tech problems. So far, its been such a fun adventure!

Julie has now been in the IT industry for over 25 years, leading IT initiatives in a wide variety of global and regional roles. Today, she is CIO, Cisco Asia Pacific, Japan and Greater China, and is responsible for driving strategy to enable business and IT alignment.

Twenty five years of adventure and thrills

Her love of the industry is the change and thrills.

Its the constant change that keeps me engaged. IT is not a place that stays still. This is a relatively young industry. I love that we are writing the rules and shaping the future for something as impactful as technology.

As we saw when the pandemic hit, it changed our lives. Where would we be if we didnt have this technology?

Julie says being part of the changes in society and how technology can help is a part of the job she loves.

I love that I am constantly learning and working with smart people, this fuels me. I love that its dynamic, too. Its a fun and exciting place to start your career. Youre constantly learning and you have to reinvent yourself. Its like running a race.

There are lots of different career paths inside of IT and this can sometimes be misrepresented. The challenge, she adds, is the fast past of the change.

As a mother of three, juggling a career can be challenging.

I admit I find it difficult, but the technology we have makes it possible for me. We have flexible working and great tech to help.

On the industry front, Julie says finding new talent to come into the industry along with bringing in diverse perspective, is critical.

This is really important. What we work on today is shaping our future for tomorrow. We need diverse perspectives here. I am really passionate about diversity in this industry.

Julie is an executive sponsor at women in Cisco to attract and support women in the industry. She is also a board member for the Diversity Council of Australia.

She is still concerned by the lack of percentage of women in IT.

When I started back in the USA, only 33 per cent were women. We havent made a lot of progress in the last 26 years of my career. This is a challenge we need to overcome.

She has seen the benefit of having women role models in her own career.

I was fortunate enough to work under two female CIOs and this helped so much. Having female role models gives women confidence that they can do it. I may not have come to where I am in my career, had I only had one kind of leader.

"I want to encourage women to join IT. You dont have to have all the criteria, put yourself out there  you wont believe what you bring to the table. Its a great career path.

Julie Canepa is a Member of ACS.
Your experience may be just as valuable as a degree to some employers. Photo: Shutterstock

A limited pool of cyber security expertise is causing Australian employers to poach skilled cyber staff more often than in other countries, according to new figures suggesting Australian universities are well behind global benchmarks in teaching desirable skills.

Just one in five hiring managers said they consider candidates credentials when deciding whether a candidate is qualified, industry body ISACA found in its new State of Cybersecurity 2022 study  which also discovered that just 27 per cent require their cyber security hires to have university degrees.

Thats almost half the 52 per cent global figure  suggesting that Australian employers have given up on waiting for universities to close the cyber security skills gap.

Rather, they are looking past formal qualifications to instead focus on issues such as candidates prior hands-on cyber security experience  named as the top factor by two-thirds of hiring managers  and recommendations from previous employers, used by one in three hirers.

Other indications suggest that universities simply arent producing the kind of workers that companies want, with 62 per cent of respondents reporting a skills gap in the soft skills of existing cyber security professionals  many of whom have been working in cyber security jobs for many years.

The soft skills gap was even wider, at 73 per cent, among recent graduates  and it is much worse in Australia than the global average of 54 per cent.

Such findings reinforce concerns that Australian universities are churning out technically-focused graduates from courses that arent teaching or developing the soft skills that employers actually want.

Key in-demand soft skills include communication, critical thinking and problem-solving capabilities  all widely desired characteristics that are, by some accounts, expected to dominate all jobs by 2030.

More poaching than a Sunday brunch

Disaffection with universities cyber security training is so high that 55 per cent of respondents to the ISACA survey generally dont believe applicants are well qualified.

With skilled cyber security employees recognising both that they require soft skills and that those skills will improve their employability, ISACA found that cyber security staff were far more likely to be poached from rivals in Australia than elsewhere.

Fully 71 per cent of cyber security professionals had left their jobs because they were recruited by other companies  well ahead of the 59 per cent figure globally  suggesting that the Australian market is struggling more than most to supply enough skilled cyber security experts.

Previous studies have found many workers leaving because their employers arent giving them training in soft skills  yet despite all the poaching, two-thirds of ANZ respondents reporting understaffed cyber security teams.

Local industry, it seems, simply cant find enough candidates with the qualities theyre actually looking for.

The pandemic put a strain on organisations that saw vulnerabilities appear in security systems during the migration to support remote working, said Jo Stewart-Rattray, a member of ISACAs Information Security Advisory Group.

Demand increased rapidly for security professionals in a time that international and state border restrictions were imposed, creating lack of access to this essential workforce and a reduced talent pool.

Recruitment searches are running for months  half of ISACA respondents said it take three to six months to find qualified cyber security candidates  and more companies now say they have more unfilled cyber security roles this year than last.

The findings suggest that Australias efforts to close the cyber security skills gap, for example by increasing diversity and recruiting from other industries, are failing to fix the problem despite the industry adding over 26,000 new workers.

With large-scale cyber security efforts quickly absorbing these workers  industry giant CyberCX has over 400 staff, for example, while consulting giants PwC, MTX and Deloitte have added hundreds of tech staff and new Budget allocations will add 1,900 cyber security experts to the Australian Signals Directorate  supply simply cant keep up with demand for cyber skills.

Chronic shortfalls have driven companies to consider new ways of attracting talent, but with budgets also straining  just 29 per cent of ISACA respondents said they had appropriate cyber security budgets, much less than the 42 per cent figure globally  companies willingness to compete for skills may be plateauing.

The Great Resignation is compounding the long-standing hiring and retention challenges the cyber security community has been facing for years, and systemic changes are critical, ISACA director for professional practices and innovation Jonathan Brandt said.

Flexibility is key. From broadening searches to include candidates without traditional degrees to providing support, training, and flexible schedules that attract and retain qualified talent, organisations can move the needle in strengthening their teams and closing skills gaps.
A woman who received a gunshot wound on Sunday night died near the place where she was found beside a vehicle in a driveway on Flag Street off Old Greensboro Road, Winston-Salem police said.

Police said they responded to the 2200 block of Lula Street nearby just after 7 p.m. Sunday, after they received reports of the discharging of firearms.

While officers were on the way to Lula Street, someone called to say that a woman was unresponsive at the Flag Street location nearby.

On arrival, police found a 20-year old identified as Bria Tiera Robinson suffering from a gunshot wound in the 2200 block of Flag Street.

Emergency medical responders said that Robinson died at the scene.

Police said their preliminary investigation showed that the shooting was not a random act, but released no other information about the state of their investigation.

Robinsons next of kin were told about her death. The Criminal Investigation Division of the Winston-Salem Police Department assumed investigation of the case.

Robinsons death marks the citys 12th homicide for 2022, as compared to seven homicides for the same time frame in 2021, police said.

Authorities are asking anyone with information to call the Winston-Salem Police Department at 336-773-7700 or Crime Stoppers at 336-727-2800.
Vida Stabler was a 1970s teenager the first time she saw her own people, the Umoho, represented in artwork.

She walked with her Omaha Central High School art class across the lawn north of the school and entered the Joslyn Art Museum.

What she found, in a collection of watercolors including a portrait called Omaha Boy, would influence her career spent teaching the traditions of the people also known as the Omaha.

That expertise recently brought Stabler, now 64, back to the museum and again in front of the paintings of famed artist Karl Bodmer. Now, it was she who commanded the audiences attention.

Museumgoers fanned out around her as she sat and pointed to the frame behind her on the wall: Omaha Boy.

What would his life have been like, she asked, this child of her tribe standing for a portrait in 1833? Who was this boy posing at a trading post a few miles from where, a century later, the Joslyn would be built on the lands of the Umoho?

Stablers answers to those questions are why the museum invited her and other Natives  including people whose tribal ancestors are depicted in the paintings  to take a leading role in the current exhibit, Faces From the Interior.

The exhibit, on display through May 1, features 90 watercolor portraits Bodmer painted after an epic 1830s journey up and down the Missouri River. His portrait subjects: Native people of the Northern Great Plains.

The collection, considered a defining body of Western art, is now on view oh-so-close to where Bodmer once set up his easel.

But the paintings arrived here only after a wild journey. They went by boat to Bodmers Paris studio, then languished in a German castle before a post-World War II discovery brought them back stateside. Omaha energy company Northern Natural Gas bought the collection and loaned it to Joslyn in 1962. The loan became a gift in 1986, after Northern became Enron  but before Enron became infamous.

Faces is the first Joslyn exhibit focused solely on Bodmers portraits. Its also the beginning of the museums effort to study the works from an Indigenous perspective, said Joslyn chief executive Jack Becker.

Its a collection that should be seen from multiple points of view, Becker said.

Native artists, activists and educators now have a voice in how these works  their own family portraits  are displayed and interpreted. Their insights tie the challenges their tribes wrestle with today to the pressures that U.S. policies put on the people Bodmer painted.

Visitors walking the gallery can experience these contributions: companion art pieces, video documentaries, written and audio messages.

Stabler, speaking at a gallery talk, looked at Bodmers painting of the Umoho boy wrapped in a bison robe. She saw his forehead streaked with vermillion, the bangles circling his wrist, a plume tied in his hair.

If ever I saw an elegant young Umoho boy, that was him, Stabler said.

She said he would have lived in a warm earth lodge. He would have collected wood and hauled water. He would have learned about his tribal clan in the ceremonies that brought people together in a circle representing the cosmos.

Hes not much different, she said, from the children she teaches today, at Umoho Nation Public School in Macy, the Omaha Reservation town, pop. 1,045.

Were resilient, she said. Even though we live in a whole different world, there is something beautiful and innate about our children.

Stablers approach to preserving her language and teaching it to her students was influenced by Bodmer and his employer.

In 1832, Bodmer was hired by a German prince, Maximilian of Wied-Neuwied, on a mission to study the plants, animals and people of what he called The natural face of North America and its aboriginal population.

The prince sensed he was running out of time. Settler encroachment, disease and U.S. government policy had already decimated some Native tribes.

Arriving in Boston on Independence Day, 1832, Maximilian wrote, I looked in vain for the original American race, the Indians; they have disappeared from this region. Steaming up the Missouri past Bellevue in Spring 1833, he saw survivors scarred and blinded by smallpox.

The princes and artists trip to visit Northern Great Plains tribes fell squarely between Lewis and Clarks expedition, begun in 1804, and the Homestead Act of 1862. From open prairie, to private ownership, in less than one lifetime.

What Maximilian and Bodmer brought back to Europe in journals and paintings is now considered one of the most accurate pre-photography records of the American West.

Recently, Omaha artist Steve Tamayo studied the Bodmer painting Wahktageli, Yankton Sioux Chief to recreate the mans feathered headpiece in three dimensions for the exhibit.

Tamayo, a member of the Sicangu Lakota tribe, worked in his studio, teaching his grandson, Izzy Tamayo, at his side. He cut cloth, trimmed eagle and hawk feathers, stretched sinew and deer hide, and mixed mineral pigments to craft the piece. Each notch in a feather and each red stripe represent a battle achievement, he said.

Bodmers documentation is meaningful to Tamayo in light of government policy that aimed to strip Native people of culture and language. As an artist, he tries to revive cultural identity.

Working with the Joslyn is an awesome opportunity to show that this way of life still exists, but we need to teach the next generation.

The portraits have helped Lestina Saul-Merdassi of Omaha reconnect with her heritage. She recently greeted museum visitors in the Dakotah language, then translated: Its good that you are all here, and I greet you all with a heartfelt handshake.

Looking up, she explained, I had to read that off my phone, because Im in the process of relearning my language.

Saul-Merdassi, a member of the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate tribe, is an addiction counselor, a powwow dancer and an advocate in the MMIW movement to raise awareness of missing and murdered indigenous women.

She saw herself in one of the few portraits Bodmer made of a woman.

When we talk about our history, not everything is all powwows and beauty, she said. Some of us are still healing from what our ancestors went through. By turning to tradition: Were on the mend.

The exhibits perspective is part of an orientation shift happening in the art world, said exhibit curator Annika Johnson, the Joslyns first-ever associate curator of Native art. The new role will continue into the future thanks to an endowment established by museum board chair Stacy Simon.

Johnson works to build relationships with Native people within and beyond museum walls. She launched a Native art advisory committee, opens the Joslyns archives to Native elders and tribes and mentors Native students.

This work to preserve and share Native art and history is crucial, said Stabler, who learned something from the Bodmer collection.

If we dont write things down, maybe were going to miss something, she said. Will we have the time to teach that lesson, or tell that story? Or will they be forgotten?

The Flatwater Free Press is Nebraskas first independent, nonprofit newsroom focused on investigations and feature stories that matter.

The Flatwater Free Press is Nebraskas first independent, nonprofit newsroom focused on investigations and feature stories that matter.

Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
The Nebraska Supreme Court upheld a three-year jail sentence for a former Nebraska public defender who accepted cocaine as payment for legal services.

In an opinion published Friday, the Supreme Court affirmed the lower court's sentence and denied a new trial for Jon Worthman, who served as the elected public defender in Box Butte County for nearly two decades. Worthman was convicted in 2021 of cocaine possession with intent to distribute.

Jeffrey Lujan, described in the opinion as a "mid-level drug dealer," was represented by Worthman in various legal proceedings beginning in 2018. After multiple run-ins with police, Lujan became a confidential informant for the Western Nebraska Intelligence and Narcotics Group task force in November 2019.

When task force members interviewed Lujan about potential targets, he mentioned that he had previously delivered cocaine to his attorney and would be willing to do so again. By December, a plan was in motion to catch Worthman in the act.

According to court documents, Worthman agreed to buy an ounce of cocaine from Lujan for $500. As part of the transaction, some of Lujan's legal debt would be forgiven. The task force set up a controlled transaction, providing Lujan with cocaine from the Nebraska State Patrol evidence locker and fitting him with a live audio and video recorder.

Worthman only brought $100 for the ounce of cocaine, which Lujan accepted. Worthman was promptly arrested. In an initial interview, he said he was only there to collect attorney fees and had no idea why Lujan "threw" a bag of cocaine at him. Worthman then said he bought cocaine from Lujan in the past but denied being a dealer.

At trial, Lujan testified that he paid Worthman for legal services in cocaine. According to Lujan, Worthman indicated that the cocaine was being used to bribe a local prosecutor into dropping or reducing charges against Lujan and his associates.

In reality, according to the court opinion, this was nothing more than a ruse to get free cocaine. In one instance, Worthman told Lujan that 2 ounces of cocaine would ensure that his cousin would receive probation instead of jail time, even though probation was the likely outcome of the case.

Worthman was found guilty of possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute, a felony. In March 2021, he was sentenced to the mandatory minimum term of three years' imprisonment.

Worthman motioned for a new trial, which was denied by the district court. He then appealed the conviction and sentence, at which point the Supreme Court added the case to its docket.

Worthman argued that he was not a dealer and that the cocaine was for personal use. But text messages shown at trial revealed that Worthman had previously bought large amounts of cocaine from Lujan, according to the opinion.

A task force member testified at trial that Worthman bought so much cocaine that if a single person consumed it they would "probably have a heart attack."

The Supreme Court found that the circumstantial evidence was enough to support a conviction.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
A Lincoln man's murder trial started Monday with the state painting a picture of a fatal confrontation between a drug dealer who saw a carload of young people "that were obviously up to no good."

The defense countered the government sometimes gets it wrong and did here, that Majdal Elias, who is facing a second-degree murder charge and three weapons charges for the death of 15-year-old Ali Al-Burkat, wasn't the shooter.

At the end of a two-week trial, that will be the question for the jury.

But Monday in opening statements, Deputy Lancaster County Attorney Jeff Mathers said Al-Burkat was about two weeks shy of his 16th birthday when he was shot and killed, a passenger in the back seat of the car.

Just before 10 p.m. on Sept. 29, 2019, he said Elias, a 26-year-old who admittedly sold marijuana he brought back from Colorado, spotted the suspicious-looking car at his apartment complex and followed it, flashing his headlights, pulling alongside it, pointing a pistol and yelling something like "you're busted."

"And then he fired that Glock 9 mm pistol into and at that car," Mathers said.

He said one of the four shots went through the trunk lid, through the back seat and into the lower back of Al-Burkat, traveling through his right lung and his heart, stopping just inside his chest wall.

He probably died almost instantly, Mathers said.

"The evidence in this case will all point in one direction. It will all point to Majdal Elias as being the person that shot into that car and killed Mr. Al-Burkat," he said.

He said video and DNA evidence, cellphone records and firearm analysis all will point to it.

On the other side, Elias' attorney, Chad Wythers, said the government just gets it wrong sometimes.

"We all know there are innocent people sitting in prison for crimes they did not commit," he said. "That comes from situations where there might be some evidence tying a person to a crime even though the person was innocent."

The Beatrice 6 comes to mind, Wythers said, evoking Nebraska's most infamous case of six people exonerated decades later for a Beatrice woman's rape and murder committed at another man's hands.

"In this case, I believe the evidence will show that there's two separate stories that get intertwined and conflated and confused," he said.

Wythers said the first story is about Karrar Al-Mansuri conspiring with five others, including the carload of young people, to rob another Lincoln man who lived at The Links apartment complex of marijuana and money that night.

He said they bought a gun off the street and some marijuana and smoked it. They pulled hoods over their faces and got gloves from Walgreens and headed to The Links, where they got into a fight, "and surprise, surprise, gunshots are exchanged, too."

After the fatal shooting, police focused on people who lived at The Links and owned light-colored Ford Explorers, the kind of SUV the shooter drove.

That's where the other story, the one about Elias, comes in, Wythers said.

He said the people in the car with Al-Burkat when he was shot didn't ID Elias as the shooter until after Elias was busted a month later for selling marijuana.

"Of course, merely because someone is selling a product that is legal in 26 states and has a few guns that doesn't mean he's a murderer," Wythers said.

The state is set to begin presenting its case Tuesday.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
A Lincoln man will have a confiscated shotgun returned to him nearly two years after he completed probation for a non-violent and non-gun-related offense.

The Nebraska Supreme Court, in an opinion published Friday, determined a lower court erred when it denied Matthew Zimmers request to have his shotgun returned. Zimmer, 37, had made multiple attempts to get the firearm back after he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor stemming from an incident in November 2018.

Thats when police were called to Zimmers Lincoln residence in response to a disturbance between Zimmer and an ex-girlfriend, according to court documents. No arrests were made and officers left the scene.

Officers were dispatched to the same area minutes later when five separate neighbors called police to report hearing three gunshots, according to the probable cause affidavit. When officers returned to the residence, they characterized Zimmer as uncooperative, intoxicated and hostile. He was placed into emergency protective custody and housed at a mental health facility.

The ex-girlfriend allowed police to search the home once Zimmer was in custody. Police found a shotgun, ammunition and a spent shell casing. Zimmer denied that he had fired a gun, but he was initially charged with and taken into custody for discharging a firearm within city limits.

Prosecutors did not pursue the firearm charge. Instead, Zimmer was charged with refusing to comply with police orders, a misdemeanor. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to six months of probation.

At sentencing, lawyers for Zimmer argued that the shotgun should be returned to Zimmer or his mother. The firearm was one of the only things that Zimmer had inherited from his deceased father, according to the court opinion.

The court decided that it would hold the weapon until Zimmers successful completion of probation, at which point it would consider releasing it to him or his mother.

After completing probation in April 2020, Zimmer filed a motion to have his property returned, which was twice denied by Lancaster County Court. At both hearings, prosecutors argued that Zimmer had made comments about retrieving his gun during the confrontation with police, and stated that the firearm formed the basis for the police officers orders to Zimmer.

Zimmer appealed to the district court, which affirmed the county courts decision. He then appealed to the Nebraska Court of Appeals, at which point the Nebraska Supreme Court put the case on its docket.

In reviewing the case, the Supreme Court noted the general rule is that seized property, other than contraband, should be released to the rightful owner once criminal proceedings finish. If the government wishes to keep the property, it must prove a compelling and legitimate reason.

The Supreme Court found that the state failed to present a legitimate reason for continuing to seize the property.

The courts analysis notes that multiple shots were reportedly fired, but only one shell casing was found in Zimmers home. Zimmer continuously denied firing a weapon and no evidence was presented to suggest that his gun had been fired. He did not have the firearm on his person during the confrontation with police.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Leilani Bell always thought she would get into the medical field when she was older, perhaps as an X-ray or MRI technician.

So when she signed up for classes her junior year at The Career Academy, Lincoln Public Schools' career-readiness focus program, Bell naturally picked the health sciences pathway.

But soon, Bell had a change of heart.

"I kind of realized I didn't really want to do that," Bell, now a senior, said. "It was a lot of book work, and it was a lot of sitting in the classroom."

She thought about dropping out of TCA altogether, but Director Josh Jones had another idea: Why not try one of the other 16 pathways offered, perhaps something more hands-on? Bell thought about an automotive career, and welding was the closest pathway TCA offered.

"I did it, I joined and I loved my first semester," said Bell, whose home high school is Lincoln High.

She's pretty darn good at it, too.

Bell recently placed first in a district welding competition through the National FFA Organization, scoring a record 198 out of 200 possible points on the test, which has both written and hands-on components.

"She got one question wrong," said TCA welding instructor Mike Yueill. "I've never had (a student) like that."

Bell competed on a team of four, and three of those students, including Bell, won individual titles. Bell's team also beat out nearly 50 others for the team title.

Learning she had earned the highest score ever seen in districts was "kind of a shock," but she knew she had done well. After the test, she went through the scrap bins and looked at her competitors' welds, many of which were the wrong size or were left unfinished.

"I am really nosy," Bell said with a laugh.

Several girls have gone through the welding program at TCA, but Bell is the lone female in her class this year. She doesn't think much about being a minority in a male-dominated field, but said it feels nice to be an example to others.

"The boys accepted her right off the get-go," Yueill said. "She knew some from school already, so that helped, and she's basically smarter than the rest of them. ... She's the one that always has the homework, she's always prepared for class."

There are 50 students enrolled in the welding pathway at TCA, with plans to add additional sections next year. Students start off by learning theory and safety procedures before welding on site.

It's a field that is in high demand. It's so high, in fact, local companies have reached out to TCA looking for workers.

"Every welding shop out there is dying for people," Yueill said.

When Bell first started welding, it was a lot easier than she expected. The biggest challenge was getting to know how the machinery works, but once you practice enough, "you get pretty used to it," she said.

Bell plans to attend SCC to study welding this fall and she's open to different career paths, including being a welding teacher.

"There are so many different things you can do."

For now, she's focused on the state competition, which will be Thursday at TCA's Southeast Community College location as part of the 2022 Nebraska Agricultural Education Career Development Events in Lincoln.

It'll be another chance to show off her skills in a field she didn't even know about until recently.

"I'm super-excited."

Contact the writer at zhammack@journalstar.com or 402-473-7225. On Twitter @zach_hammack

Love 5 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Want to see more like this? Get our local education coverage delivered directly to your inbox. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Researchers from the University of Nebraska and Creighton University are continuing to assess individuals' perceptions living in proximity to the AltEn ethanol plant near Mead.

A survey designed by the University of Nebraska Medical Center to measure the perceived health risks related to AltEn has been put online to help reach a greater number of people living in Saunders County.

Dr. Eleanor Rogan, the interim chair of the Department of Health Promotion in UNMC's College of Public Health, said the questionnaire is modeled on the Community Assessment for Public Health Emergency Response created by the Centers for Disease Control.

"This is a common way to get some insight into what kinds of health problems people are experiencing, to narrow down the search for adverse health effects that may actually be caused by the exposure, or an event," Rogan said.

It's also "much faster and less expensive than actually medically examining everyone for everything," she added.

The 40-question survey, which takes about 15 minutes to complete, asks for basic household information, the level of awareness and feelings residents may have about AltEn, as well as physical and mental health conditions they have experienced since the plant started operating in 2015.

Residents who respond to the survey will also be asked to identify when any symptoms may have started, and if they believe their health conditions could be connected to the biofuel plant's activities.

AltEn used seeds coated in pesticides to manufacture ethanol, leaving behind toxic solid and liquid waste products. The Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy ordered the plant to shut down in February 2021 for numerous violations of state environmental regulations.

More than 215 people of the 1,000 who received the survey by mail earlier this year have returned it, Rogan said, and more than 150 people have signed up to provide a blood or urine sample to be analyzed for any of the chemicals found in high concentrations at AltEn.

The samples will be taken at the Saunders County Medical Center in Wahoo and analyzed at the Nebraska Public Health Laboratory in Omaha.

The survey will remain active through the end of May, Rogan said. UNMC plans to analyze the data and make the aggregated, non-identifiable information public at a later date.

Individuals whose blood or urine samples show the presence of toxic compounds will be provided specific advice for contacting a physician, Rogan added.

If an ongoing funding source can be secured, individuals will also be asked to participate in a medical registry which will track any health issues they develop for years to come.

The massive project to study AltEn's affect on air quality, surface and groundwater, and the health of humans, wildlife and pollinators was first proposed a year ago.

At that time, UNMC pegged the cost of the study at $1 million per year for 10 years. Earlier this year, the cost of the study was reduced to $7.8 million.

Private donors helped get the project moving forward last year as the research team sought other funding to keep it going, and Sen. Carol Blood of Bellevue introduced a bill (LB1048) this year appropriating $10 million in federal funds to put toward the research.

The Legislature's Appropriations Committee did not include Blood's bill in any of the budget packages it forwarded to the floor for debate.

But last week, lawmakers advanced another bill (LB1068) with an amendment from Blood attached appropriating $1 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds to continue the study over the next year.

LB1068, introduced by Sen. John Stinner of Gering, will need to pass two more rounds of consideration in the final seven days of the 60-day session before it can be sent to Gov. Pete Ricketts' desk for his signature.

Meanwhile, Rogan said a town hall in Mead is being planned to communicate next steps in the research study, which includes ongoing sampling of soil, surface and groundwater, and air to study their movement in the environment.

The perceived health risk survey can be found at www.unmc.edu/env-pollution.

Reach the writer at 402-473-7120 or cdunker@journalstar.com. On Twitter @ChrisDunkerLJS

Love 0 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Three men were arrested Thursday after they allegedly raped a 43-year-old Grand Island woman at an apartment building in the 900 block of North Boggs Avenue.

The Grand Island Police Department arrested Adam Chambers, 44, and Simon Benn, 41, both of Grand Island, and Abdikarin Ali, a 49-year-old homeless man.

When Grand Island Police officers arrived at the apartment, they found the woman unconscious and lying in a bed. She had a pair of pants tied tightly around her neck, according to police.

The woman said the three men had sexually assaulted her. During the reported sexual assaults, she said, Ali had placed his hands around her throat, which impeded her breathing, Grand Island Police said in a report; she also said that during the sexual assaults, Chambers and Benn grabbed her by the back of the neck, partially covering her throat, which impeded her breathing as well.

During a search as part of the arrest, Grand Island Police reported, a meth pipe was found in Alis right coat pocket.

Police are still trying to pin down when the alleged sexual assaults occurred, Capt. Dean Elliott said. Its possible that the crimes occurred over a two-day period between Tuesday and Thursday.

The crime was still ongoing when officers arrived, Elliott said. The victim had messaged a friend, who called 911.

The woman received hospital treatment, Elliott said.

Ali was arrested for second-degree trespassing, possession of drug paraphernalia, two counts of first-degree sexual assault, sex trafficking and strangulation.

Chambers and Benn were both arrested for three counts of first-degree sexual assault, sex trafficking and strangulation.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 1
OMAHA  A prolific Omaha gang member will spend more than two decades in prison for plotting a failed home invasion while on parole for a previous murder conviction.

Rufus E. Dennis, 43, was sentenced to 22 years in federal prison Friday for the attempted home invasion and various gun charges.

Dennis planned the home invasion while he was out of prison on parole. He had served as a getaway driver in a 1995 killing, leading to a second-degree murder conviction. He was paroled in 2016 after spending 20 years behind bars.

Within two years of being paroled, Dennis was named a suspect in two drug-related killings: the shooting of 25-year-old Laron Rogers in 2017 during a purported marijuana deal, and the robbery and murder of Frederick Green, 57, in 2018.

Dennis denied involvement, and officers never had enough evidence to press charges. But a detailed plan for a violent robbery eventually landed him back in custody.

According to the indictment, evidence showed that Dennis cased a home occupied by a single mother, two young children and the childrens elderly grandmother multiple times in January 2020.

The FBI obtained recordings of Dennis detailing his plans for the home invasion, in which he said he would leave no witnesses behind. His plan was to pose as a utility repair technician and use a Taser on the woman when she opened the door. He also planned to shoot anyone who saw his face.

A convicted felon, Dennis was barred from possessing a firearm. He attempted to obtain a gun from an undercover officer, offering to trade a stolen assault rifle in his possession for multiple handguns.

The getaway driver and lookout whom Dennis recruited to assist with the home invasion was an FBI informant.

On the morning of the planned invasion, officers with the Greater Omaha Safe Streets Task Force and FBI agents executed a search warrant at Dennis home, where they found a stolen assault rifle with his DNA on it. It was the same gun that Dennis had attempted to trade with the undercover officer for handguns. He was arrested.

Dennis was convicted of attempted interference with interstate commerce by way of robbery, possessing a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence and felon in possession of a firearm.

Chief U.S. District Judge Robert Rossiter took an upward departure from federal sentencing guidelines in handing down the 270-month sentence, because Dennis intended to murder victims during the planned home invasion, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorneys Office. His status as a parolee was also taken into consideration.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
SCOTTSBLUFF  The Summit Road at Scotts Bluff National Monument is a vital part of the parks history, which will now be reflected in the parks name, according to an April 1 Facebook post.

The monument was one of several national parks and monuments sharing supposed big news Friday. According to social media posts from parks across the country, there was a Bigfoot sighting, a new riverboat ride, reattachment of mountain summits and a new feature for visitors.

The Scotts Bluff National Monument Facebook post announced that Scotts Bluff National Monument had been redesignated Scotts Bluff National Summit Road.

This makes us the first National Summit Road in the National Park System, the post read.

The park even included a quote from spokeswoman April F. Day (April Fools Day), who said, This is an exciting day for all Americans. No longer will visitors be confused about what the most popular activity at this important historic site in western Nebraska is. Its all about the road, baby.

The end of the post uses the hashtag April Fools Day, giving readers another indication that the post was a joke. No, Scotts Bluff National Monument did not change its name.

It is an April Fools joke and I hope that people will find it enjoyable, said Ittai Levine, interpreter and park ranger.

Officials at the national parks had fun highlighting local attractions through their April Fools Day jokes.

Zion National Park introduced the new Zion Dutchman riverboat. Yellowstone National Park captured a photo of Bigfoot taking a selfie. Grand Canyon National Park announced that visitors to Mather Point will be able to view Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone from the South Rim of Grand Canyon because of the inter-park landmark loan system. The hardest job was for maintenance crews at North Cascades National Park Service Complex in Washington. They announced in preparation for the busier peak season, crews will be reattaching the steepest mountain summits that were loaned to ski resorts.

Eric Grunwald, the lead interpreter at Scotts Bluff National Monument, came up with the idea for this years April Fools Day joke.

We just wanted to do something for April Fools Day because a lot of national parks do a social media post for that day, Grunwald said. We thought about something that in the realm of things seems like its reasonable, but in a way its totally ridiculous at the same time.

Summit Road offers visitors an easy drive to the top of the monument, with views overlooking the cities of Scottsbluff, Terrytown and Gering as well as a distant view of Chimney Rock. Because most visitors use Summit Road during their visit to the monument, Grunwald thought it would seem believable to say the name was incorporated into the landmarks official name, not realizing how believable it would seem.

For sure, I thought some people would think it was real, but I was a little bit surprised by how many people were fooled by the post, Grunwald said.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
The delivery of Judith Rasmussens Braille ballot was stalled in the mail.

Rasmussen, who is blind, said she has always used Braille ballots to vote since they were first offered by the Madison Clerks Office, one of only a few offices that create the ballots in Wisconsin.

Ahead of the April 5 election, she requested her Braille ballot and was told that it had been put in the mail by the clerks office on March 16. When it still had not arrived a week later, she requested and received a typical absentee ballot. But she couldnt fill that out herself: theres no way for a blind person can read it.

So she called a friend who had to come over to her apartment and read the ballot out to her. She replied how she wanted the ballot filled out on her behalf, and she had to trust that friend to be honest in filling out the ballot and not making any mistakes. Then, she had him put the ballot into an envelope so she could drop it into the outgoing mail in her apartment building.

By having to rely on someone else to help her vote, Rasmussen gave up the privacy that most voters have over their ballot.

By having to rely on the United States Postal Service to deliver her ballot, Rasmussens ability to have her vote count could have been lost entirely. She does not know if it will have arrived by the end of the day Tuesday, the deadline for absentee ballots to have arrived.

Mailing it this time, I did put it in my outgoing mail a week ago. But our mail in Madison goes all the way to Milwaukee before it comes back here to be distributed, she said in a Monday phone interview. Im unsure whether it will be delivered by (Tuesday) to be counted.

Being able to vote absentee is an important provision for people with vision impairment and vision loss. Being able to vote at the polls is equally important, said Denise Jess, executive director of the Wisconsin Council of the Blind & Visually Impaired, where Rasmussen works. We (people who have visual impairment) have so many transportation and access barriers.

Jess called it "a huge benefit" to allow ballots to be delivered on behalf of another because "if I trust you and I put my ballot into your hands, then I know my vote will count.

"If I put my ballot out in a mailbox, even then I have to trust the postal network," she continued. It leaves us intensely vulnerable."

How Braille ballots work According to Wisconsin Council of the Blind & Visually Impaired Executive Director Denise Jess, just 2% of visually impaired and blind people actually can read Braille. Just saying Heres a Braille ballot is not sufficient" to allow people who have a visual impairment to vote, Jess said. Jess has been visually impaired since birth but never learned to read Braille. She said she prefers to vote in person, using the specialized technology required to be available at polling places. It keeps polling places accountable and ensures that she, as a blind person, is seen by the public. Still, for some voters, like Judith Rasmussen, absentee ballots in Braille are the preferred mode of voting. I can do it by feel. Heres how it works: Each races title and the names of the candidates are "printed" in Braille. Then, next to each name is a vertical line of raised dots. The voter is instructed to use a pen to write over the raised dots. Because Braille takes up more space than print and also requires specific paper, those ballots tend to be significantly bigger and are not fed into voting machines. Instead, when a Braille ballot is delivered to a polling place, the ballot will be remade by a poll worker on a separate ballot, which then can be fed into the machine in place of the Braille ballot. At polling places, it is common for accessible voting machines to be made available, which often have headsets through which visually impaired voters can listen to ballots read aloud and use a tactile device to make selections. Thats one of the few ways visually impaired voters can be sure their vote is secret. With Braille voting or absentee voting with assistance from another, the voter is entrusting another person to transcribe their desires correctly and honestly.

Overlapping laws

Laws in recent decades have aimed to make it easier for people with disabilities to vote. But the changes have been questioned and challenged by some who fear election fraud if laws are loosened too much.

The result has been inconsistent interpretations of state law, as seen in Wisconsin during the ongoing spring election.

If someone were to try to deliver an absentee ballot, such as their spouse or friend or anyone else, to the village halls of Mount Pleasant or Caledonia, election officials there would reject it. They say the voter or the USPS, must be the one to deliver the ballot.

In the City of Racine, if the person delivering the ballot says that they are "an authorized representative" of the voter, then the ballot will be accepted.

Advocates for both sides of Racine's interpretation say that the relevant state law is unambiguous in their favor.

It reads, in part, that "the envelope (containing the absentee ballot) shall be mailed by the elector, or delivered in person, to the municipal clerk issuing the ballot or ballots."

Those opposed to how Racine is interpreting the law point out that state law does not explicitly allow ballots to be delivered on behalf of another person, and thus shouldnt be allowed.

Those on the City of Racines side argue that the law does not preclude having someone else deliver your ballot. They also cite the federal Voting Rights Act which states that "any voter who requires assistance to vote by reason of blindness, disability, or inability to read or write may be given assistance by a person of the voters choice, other than the voters employer or agent of that employer or officer or agent of the voters union."

In court

One Waukesha County judge ruled in January that, under his reading of the law, ballot harvesting/delivering ballots on behalf of another in Wisconsin is illegal.

That judge, Michael Bohren, also issued an injunction that bars the Wisconsin Election Commission from giving advisement that indicates it is legal how ballots can be delivered on behalf of another, that injunction is not binding to any of the more than 1,800 clerks statewide charged with running Wisconsin's elections.

The case is expected to be settled by the Wisconsin Supreme Court this summer.

Wanggaard: State law being violated

State Sen. Van Wanggaard, R-Racine, alleges that the City of Racine is violating state law and has taken to publicly criticizing the citys policies.

The City of Racine is willfully ignoring state law when it comes to absentee ballots, he said in a Sunday afternoon news release that called for "sanctions" on Racine Mayor Cory Mason and/or City Clerk Tara Coolidge."

In a follow-up phone interview Monday, he said: You cant deliver anyone elses ballot, period.

After noting the federal law that the city is citing, Wanggaard replied: First of all, this isnt a federal election. On Tuesday, only local elections and referendums, and regional court judge seats, are on ballots in Wisconsin.

Wanggaard then said that the citys policy is not making any distinction between if the voter is someone who is an average voter or who has one of those issues, such as those who are blind or have a physical disability.

For someone to designate another to deliver their ballot, citing the federal law allowing it for those with disabilities, Wanggaard said the person delivering the ballot should have to prove that youve got a blind person that theyre doing that for.

The City Clerk's office says it is taking those delivering ballots at their word, without seeking proof of another party's disability.

Racine is advocating for ballot harvesting, Wanggaard continued, referring to the practice of one person collecting a number of absentee ballots and delivering them all to a clerks office at once. That is illegal. That is not the intent of the law. Theres plenty of opportunity for people to vote  there are so many ways that people are allowed to vote, and people get a little bit ridiculous.

On dropboxes Judith Rasmussen said that in 2020, at the peak of COVID-19 fears, she once dropped off an absentee ballot in a dropbox to vote. Dropboxes are not currently being used anywhere for voting in Wisconsin, although they were used widely in both right-leaning and left-leaning areas leading up to the 2020 election. One time during the pandemic, some friends did pick me up, drove me to the dropbox, where she was able to drop her Braille ballot into the dropbox herself, Rasmussen said. The dropboxes are a good idea  The more people who can vote in this democracy, the better. Many Wisconsin Republicans are looking to ban ballot dropboxes, while state Sen. Kathy Bernier, a Republican who previously worked as a local clerk, has proposed allowing but limiting their use to four dropboxes at most per municipality.

'Intensely vulnerable'

Jess said it is absurd for it to be legal to have someone assist you with filling out your ballot, but then have it be illegal for that same person to drive it over to a polling place and drop it off.

Its a huge barrier, Jess said. For many folks with disabilities  because we do not drive, getting that ballot to the clerks can be a challenge.

Responding to Wanggaard's complaint, Coolidge said in an email: "The City of Racine is accepting absentee ballots in person from the voter, or an agent or authorized representative of the voter. Those returning absentee ballots in person have been asked to answer if they are the voter or an agent or authorized representative of the voter, if they state no they have been turned away and the ballot was not accepted."

Coolidge continued: "I have long fought for EVERY (Coolidge's emphasis) citizen who is legally able to vote to have an opportunity to vote. This includes Americans with disabilities who may be unable to physically return their ballot. I refuse to be the obstacle that prevents Americans with disabilities from submitting their absentee ballots. Although I am not a policy maker, nor an elected official, I take democracy extremely seriously and wish those on either side of the aisle would fact check prior to making announcements that attempt to tarnish the integrity of our democratic process."

She added that neither "Sen. Wanggaard nor his staff called or contacted the City of Racine Clerks Office."

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
MADISON  The big-screen, dark-theater, hushed-crowd experience of taking in a flick at the Wisconsin Film Festival is back for the first time since 2019.

Festival organizers canceled the multiday event in 2020 and offered it in an online-streaming format in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 2022 lineup, which begins April 7 and runs through April 14, returns to its traditional format, offering more than 150 films for viewers to enjoy in theaters on the UW-Madison campus and the AMC Madison 6 Cinema at Hilldale Mall.

The festival is an experience, said Mike King, artistic director for the festival. Its not just the movies. Its going to the theater, seeing the crowds, seeing it on the big screen, having that sort of communal, emotional experience. Weve all been watching things in isolation so itll be amazing to see things in this environment again.

This years offerings include documentaries, animated movies and foreign films. Along with film restorations, including one starring a late UW-Madison alumnus whose name has become controversial on campus, there are plenty of new films and the return of popular categories such as Wisconsins Own, spotlighting recent works with Wisconsin connections.

Single tickets are on sale at wifilmfest.eventive.org. Viewers can buy tickets for particular works for $12 or an entire festival pass for $325. For the first time in the festivals 24-year history, theres free admission for UW-Madison students. If a seats available and students show their WisCard, the seat is theirs.

We just want to give something to the campus and students, King said. We want to welcome them to the joy of moviegoing and expose them to the film festival.

Plenty to see

Theres plenty to see at the festival that you wont be able to view at your local movie theater, such as The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent. The action comedy stars actor Nicolas Cage playing himself in what the film guide describes as his ultimate role.

Jim Healy, a consulting programmer for the festival, recommends Symphony for a Massacre, a 1963 French film that was given a limited U.S. release and hasnt been shown much in the past 60 years. The gangster thriller film explores a fantastic criminal underworld where a group of gangsters pools their resources together to pull off a drug deal but a snake among the group betrays the others.

Another pick sure to draw crowds is To the End, which just premiered at Sundance Film Festival and is a follow-up to Knock Down the House, a documentary about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and three other women campaigning in the 2018 congressional primaries. Knock Down the House won the festivals audience award when it was shown in 2019 before it premiered on Netflix.

To the End takes the audience behind the scenes of AOCs signature proposal, the Green New Deal, and introduces them to the indefatigable drive of young activists taking the problem of climate change into their own hands.

Rachel Lears, who directed both documentaries, will join the audience for the screening.

The festival will honor the late UW-Madison alumnus and horror filmmaker Stuart Gordon, who died in 2020, by showing three of his movies. Viewers can enjoy Re-animator, Dolls and Wonderful Ice Cream Suit.

Gordons daughters and Dennis Paoli, co-screenwriter of Re-animator and several other Gordon films, will be there for the screenings, Healy said.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
On this week's "Center Stage" political podcast, Milfred and Hands play and comment on U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson's latest political ad in which he blames the media for getting President Joe Biden elected.

That's not what Johnson said last fall, when he was caught on camera at a GOP rally saying Trump lost because not enough Republicans in Wisconsin voted for him, and that nothing was obviously skewed with the 2020 election in the state.

Click the play button to listen.

Johnson, R-Oshkosh, once a tea-party darling, said he wasn't going to run for reelection this year and used to support term limits. But he's broken that promise to voters, seeking to become another lifer congressman.

Milfred and Hands wonder what happened to the free-trade supporter and deficit hawk who has turned into Trump's biggest apologist, constantly looking back to the past election rather than focusing on Wisconsin's future.

Johnson is considered the most vulnerable GOP U.S. senator in the country this fall. Yet as an entrenched incumbent, he still stands a strong chance to win, our opinionated political podcasters say.

Find and follow Center Stage, with Milfred and Hands on Apple Podcasts, iTunes, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Spotify or your favorite podcasting app. You also can listen to past episodes of "Center Stage" and see the podcast's webpage by clicking here.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0
LINCOLN  Nebraska District Court Judge James Doyle IV of Lexington was invited to sit with the Nebraska Supreme Court on March 31.

Doyle heard arguments in the case of State v. Ellis. After being convicted of first-degree murder, the appellant, Roy Ellis, seeks post-conviction relief and argues that his trial counsel failed to adequately challenge the DNA evidence that was used to convict him at trial.

Doyle sat in place of Chief Justice Mike Heavican, who was recused from the case. The court session was held in the Supreme Court Courtroom of the Nebraska State Capitol in Lincoln.

Doyle was joined by guest Judge Leo Dobrovolny of Gering on this case who sat in place of Justice John Freudenberg, who also was recused from the case.

Seven justices make up the Nebraska Supreme Court: Chief Justice Mike Heavican and six associate justices. On occasion, a justice must recuse him or herself from a case, and a judge from a district court or the Court of Appeals is asked to sit with the Supreme Court.

The March 31 oral arguments can be viewed on the high courts archives.
Nebraska Sen. Deb Fischer says she will not support Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's nomination to the Supreme Court.

Fischer said Jackson was not clear about her judicial philosophy when she met her. "She instead described certain steps when examining a case, including looking at the public meaning of the laws text," Nebraska's senior senator said.

Fischer said she believes justices must adhere strictly to the text of the Constitution as written without limiting the rights it guarantees.

"Given these considerations, I will oppose her nomination," Fischer said in a press release.

Nebraska's other senator, Ben Sasse, had already signaled he will vote against Jackson's nomination.

Fischer's announcement that she'll oppose the nomination is not surprising. Only one Republican senator  Susan Collins of Maine  has signaled they will vote to confirm President Joe Biden's pick.

The final Senate vote is expected to come late this week. With Collins' support, Democrats have at least a one-vote cushion in the 50-50 Senate.

Jackson, who would replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer, would become the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.
An ancient grain native to the Horn of Africa, called teff, is growing in popularity in the United States. It is being grown in the American West and Midwest. Growers note its increasing appeal as a super food that is rich in iron.

One of those farmers is Tesfa Drar. He grew up helping his parents raise teff in what is now Eritrea.

When he came to the United States for college in 1981, he missed injera, the flatbread made out of teff that is popular in the Horn of Africa.

Tesfa said, I decided to bring 20 pounds [of teff] from home and I planted it at the University of Minnesota, where I was studying. He added, From there, I gave it to different colleges and universities for research.

Tesfa now grows the grain in northern Nevada. His company Selam Foods sells it online on a website that shares cooking suggestions for injera and information about the history of teff. The grass is one of the oldest domesticated plants in the world.

Tesfa farms more than 2,400 hectares of land in Nevada, Minnesota, and in six other states. His operation in northwestern Nevada is near Winnemucca, a town that has 24-hour casinos as well as a farming community that grows potatoes, alfalfa, wheat and corn.

In recent years, more farmers are reacting to the growing demand for foods that do not have gluten in them by planting teff. Land committed to teff production has exploded in recent years, reports the University of Nevada-Reno. It estimates the crop is grown in at least 25 U.S. states.

Down the road from Tesfas place, at Desert Oasis Teff and Grain in Fallon, John Getto and his son Myles say they are growing ancient grains for modern tastes. They sell a lot of teff to buyers in California and smaller amounts locally or online.



Nevada has the perfect climate for teff, which is the nice part, Myles Getto said. It is hot. Very, very hot. Very little rainfall, but we do irrigate our teff. Its just a good climate to grow teff in.

University of Nevada-Reno researchers are working to develop shorter, more drought-tolerant kinds of teff. John Cushman, a professor who directs the biochemistry graduate program, said that such research is especially important for farmers in Nevada, Americas driest state.

Cushman said, As the western United States is getting drier and drier due to global climate change, we felt it important to make an investment in some alternate crops.

Alternate is a term that means offering a choice or different from what is usual.



Bob Dexter added teff to his usual crops on his farm along the Carson River.



I wanted to grow something besides cattle food, said Dexter. He has grown wheat, barley and alfalfa. But he said: I wanted to raise something that was good food for people to eat. And when I found out about the teff, it looked like a good fit for what we have here to work with in our climate.



Tesfa Drar said the high-fiber super food has global appeal, adding that teff can be used to make all kinds of foods that are popular in America.



Teff can be used for making cookies, for making pancakes, porridge, and you can make it for pizza, Tesfa said.  Now we are working with Pizza Hut to provide them gluten-free teff so they can make it for pizza.

Im John Russell.

Tewelde Tasfagabir reported this story for VOANEWS. Tresor M. Matondo contributed to it. John Russel adapted it for VOA Learning English.

_______________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

domesticated  adj. : adapted over time (as by selective breeding) from a wild or natural state to life in close association with people

casino  n. a building used for gambling, a game of chance in which the goal is to win money

gluten  n. a protein especially in wheat that is important to making bread but that some people avoid eating

irrigate  v. to supply crops and plants with water

drought  n. a long period of time during which there is very little or no rain
The American space agency NASA is carrying out final testing on its new rocket that aims to help return humans to the moon.

NASA says its Space Launch System, or SLS, is the most powerful rocket ever built. U.S. officials have said the rocket was designed to begin a new generation of human space exploration.

SLS is the first rocket designed to carry both astronauts and supplies on a single mission. It is part of NASAs Artemis program, which aims to land the first woman and first person of color on the moon.

Artemis has a goal to land American astronauts on the moon no earlier than 2025. Last year, NASA pushed back the planned launch. It would be the first moon landing by astronauts since NASAs Apollo 17 mission in 1972.

NASA is calling the first launch of the SLS rocket Artemis 1. There will be no crew on the spacecraft during the first mission. SLS will carry NASAs Orion spacecraft on a test mission to fly around the moon.

NASA announced last year that it had chosen American company SpaceX as its partner to land the next astronauts on the moon. SpaceX has already completed several missions to carry astronauts to the International Space Station. SpaceX uses the Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft.

SpaceX also is developing and testing a human landing system (HLS) designed to put humans on the moon. NASAs plan for the future calls for its SLS rocket to transport astronauts on the Orion spacecraft to lunar orbit. From there, astronauts would transfer to SpaceXs HLS to be transported to the surface of the moon.

SpaceX has also developed a super heavy space vehicle called Starship. Company chief Elon Musk has said Starship is designed to transport astronauts to the moon, as well as possibly Mars. Unlike the SLS rocket, Starship is designed to be reusable. SpaceX plans to carry out a test flight to launch Starship into orbit sometime this year.

In addition to Starship, NASA announced earlier this month that it is seeking additional proposals from American companies to develop moon landers. The landers are to transport astronauts between lunar orbit and the moons surface.

NASA said landers should have the ability to link up with a future, lunar orbiting space station it plans to create called Gateway.

In preparation for its upcoming flight, SLS was recently transported to a launch structure in Cape Canaveral, Florida, for final testing operations. One of the next major tests for the system is called a wet dress rehearsal.

This preparation will involve engineers fully loading the rockets main fuel tanks with liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. Then, a simulated launch countdown will take place. The countdown will stop seconds before the rocket's four RS-25 engines start. All other systems are to be fully examined and tested in the coming weeks.

Information from the tests will help decide when the rocket will be launched.

During the test mission, Orion will aim to travel 450,600 kilometers from Earth, and thousands of kilometers beyond the moon. NASA said this will be farther than any spacecraft built for humans has ever traveled. The mission is expected to last four to six weeks.

Im Bryan Lynn.

Bryan Lynn wrote this report for VOA Learning English, based on reports from NASA, Reuters and The Associated Press.

We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments section, and visit our Facebook page.

Quiz - NASAs Most Powerful Rocket in Final Testing Before Launch Start the Quiz to find out Start Quiz

____________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

mission  n. an important project or trip, especially involving space travel

dress rehearsal  n. the final rehearsal, or practice, for a live show or event

simulate  v. to do or make something that looks real, but is not
A 22-year-old man was arrested in Indiana on Saturday in connection to a March 30 shooting that left two injured in the Wisconsin Dells.

Mason Acuna was taken into custody by U.S. Marshalls in Lafayette, Indiana, in relation to the shooting, Wisconsin Dells Police Chief Nicholas Brinker said in a statement.

At about 6 a.m. Wednesday, police and EMS units were dispatched to the area of Denny's restaurant and the Best Western hotel on South Frontage Road, in Wisconsin Dells on a report of two people with gunshot wounds, Brinker said. The people, who were not identified, were taken to area hospitals.

An initial investigation determined that the shooting happened in the vicinity of the 600 block of Vine Street, and a bullet casing was discovered there, Brinker said.

The identity of the suspect was known prior to his arrest on Saturday but wasnt released to protect the integrity of the ongoing investigation, Brinker said.

Mason is currently being held at the Tippecanoe County Jail in Lafayette, Indiana awaiting extradition Brinker said.

Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Madison is slowly moving from online to in-person committee meetings after two years of nearly exclusive online sessions due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

But the City Council hasn't decided when to return to in-person or hybrid meetings once the appropriate technology is in place to keep an option to participate online. The city and Dane County are awaiting completion of technology improvements to allow hybrid meetings.

The county will have initial training over the next two months and expects to resume in-person sessions and start hybrid meetings in mid-June.

Hybrid meetings are those that will be mostly in-person but allow some participation using video technology.

This week, the multi-jurisdiction TIF Review Board will meet in person at noon Wednesday in Room LL-110 of the Madison Municipal Building, 215 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., and the Madison Public Library Board will gather in person at 5 p.m. Thursday at the Alicia Ashman library branch, 733 N. High Point Road.

Still, just seven of 56 city committee meetings scheduled for April are listed as in-person with the rest online. In March, only four of 89 meetings, plus a retirement party for retiring Fire Chief Steven Davis, were held in person.

In mid-March 2020, as the pandemic took hold, the city initially canceled all meetings and slowly began to restart some online by the end of that month. By mid- to late May 2020, most meetings resumed online with only a light smattering of in-person meetings during the rest of 2020 and 2021. The county also moved meetings online in March of 2020.

On March 1, Public Health Madison and Dane County lifted its latest mask mandate as the omicron surge ebbed and case rates and hospitalizations decreased.

Panelists choose

Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway has told committees they can vote on whether to continue meeting virtually or online  with sufficient notice for any change in format  and the panels have been making their own decisions.

"In general, it's important if members of a committee get to know each other in a way that's difficult to do on Zoom," Rhodes-Conway said.

The city, which has more than 100 boards, committees and commissions, will likely be able to equip only six to eight rooms for hybrid meetings, the mayor said, adding, "It's going to be a bit of a scheduling dance."

City Council President Syed Abbas, 12th District, said he expects the council to discuss a return to in-person meetings at its April 19 or May 10 meeting, meaning the council could return to in-person sessions as soon as late May. He said bringing the council back to in-person meetings can help establish rapport among members and that having an online option for the public makes sense.

"This council has never had a meeting in person and it has really hampered their opportunity to build relationships with each other and their relationships with staff," Rhodes-Conway said. "I think it's long past time to meet in person."

Abbas said he thinks hybrid is "ideal," preserving benefits realized from online sessions such as access and convenience.

The county sees the same advantages.

"We have seen a marked uptick in community engagement with the ease of access that virtual meetings provide, and we do not want to lose that," said Karin Peterson Thurlow, chief of staff for the County Board. "(But) the expectation will be that members of a body be present in person, unless noticed otherwise."

'Low' virus level

Currently, Dane County's COVID-19 community level is ranked as "low," with levels calculated by looking at hospital beds being used, hospital admissions, and the total number of new cases in an area. The CDCs recommendations for people living in areas of low transmission include staying up to date on COVID vaccines and getting tested if experiencing COVID symptoms.

"We of course encourage everyone who takes part in these in-person meetings to make decisions based on their own comfort level when it comes to COVID precautions, such as masks and social distancing," said Morgan Finke, spokesperson for Public Health. "We are glad that we are in a position as a county to see these opportunities to come together and discuss issues that are important to our city coming back in person."

The county first adopted a mask order in June 2020, following a statewide order that was eventually struck down by the state Supreme Court. In early June 2021, when cases of COVID-19 declined dramatically after vaccines became widely available, the county lifted its order. In mid-August, when the delta variant of the coronavirus surged, the department reinstated the mask requirement, lifting it on March 1.

The BA.2  a sub-variant of Omicron, BA.1  was first detected in the county on Jan. 28. As of March 24, a total of 163 cases of BA.2 had been identified in Wisconsin, Public Health says.

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Four months until the fall partisan primary, some statewide Republican candidates are objecting to their party's endorsement process, prompting the state party to consider for the first time in more than a decade a "no endorsement" option at next month's party convention.

The party discourse further underscores a divided GOP seeking to take back the governor's office and hold on to a U.S. Senate seat  with some, including anti-establishment gubernatorial candidate Kevin Nicholson and a growing number of county parties, calling for an end to the endorsement process completely.

Mark Jefferson, executive director of the Republican Party of Wisconsin, said he anticipates the conventions rules committee will meet before the May convention in Middleton to determine whether or not to allow a no endorsement option on the upcoming ballot.

I expect there will probably be a vote by the full convention as to whether a no endorsement option is allowed on the ballot," he said. "No matter what the rules committee decides, I expect the convention attendees will take up that question and vote on it.

The Republican Party of Wisconsin's 2022 endorsement policy was approved by the party's executive committee in December and stipulates that candidates for lieutenant governor and attorney general must raise by March 15 at least $50,000 in campaign donations from at least 300 individual donors  not including contributions from the candidate, their immediate family or most political action committees. Candidates for governor or U.S. Senate must raise at least $100,000 from at least 1,000 individual donors.

The party's executive committee will determine the full list of names to be included on the endorsement ballot in the coming weeks.

Lancaster Mayor David Varnam, who announced his campaign for lieutenant governor in August, said he fell about $24,000 and 65 individual donors short of the state party's threshold. Varnam, who is vice chair of the Grant County Republican Party, said he campaigned in nearly 50 Wisconsin counties and has received key endorsements from groups like Wisconsin Right to Life PAC and Wisconsin Family Action PAC  factors he said should be weighed when determining a candidate's viability.

"I think the bottom line is that the standard was too high," Varnam said. "Viability means more than how much money you raised."

Lieutenant governor candidate Ben Voelkel, a former senior aide to U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson who met the necessary threshold to seek the party's endorsement, said he thinks it's a mistake to limit the number of candidates who are able to speak at the convention, which will be attended by hundreds of county delegates from across Wisconsin.

"I just think that sends the wrong message and I think its a mistake and I hope the party reconsiders," said Voelkel. "Im hopeful they will make sure as many voices as possible can be represented."

Close to two dozen county parties, including the Republican Party of Dane County, have called on the state party to allow delegates to choose not to endorse any candidate or skip the endorsement process completely.

Nicholson told the state Republican Party in February he was not seeking an endorsement and urged the party not to endorse any candidates before the primary. However, he later asked that delegates consider including his name on the endorsement ballot, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Nicholson reiterated in a statement to supporters Friday that he opposes the state party's endorsement process, but said he has asked that his name be included on the ballot as a stand-in for a "no endorsement" option.

Established policy

The state party's constitution requires an endorsement vote for any statewide race. While the party used to allow a "no endorsement" option, that was removed in 2009. Candidates must secure 60% of delegate's votes to receive an endorsement.

Eliminating the endorsement process entirely would require an amendment to the partys constitution, which could not occur before Mays convention, Jefferson said.

If they want to amend it for future years, that is a path that can be pursued by the party leaders and the grassroots," he said.

The fundraising threshold is designed to ensure that all candidates who speak at the upcoming convention have the support to conduct a viable statewide campaign. Other viability qualifications require a candidate to have filed all necessary paperwork, be in good standing with their respective county Republican party and have an established campaign plan demonstrating their ability to mount a statewide run for office.

The grassroots want to give the candidates a fair chance to get their message out and I think the candidates owe the grassroots in return assurances that they can run a competitive race and win," Jefferson said. "I think it boils down to that.

A notice of the threshold requirements was sent to all candidates on Jan. 14, two months before the deadline to meet that goal.

'Stacks the deck'

"That automatically puts a huge obstacle in my way," said Kyle Yudes, who joined the race for lieutenant governor in October.

Yudes, a political newcomer from Eau Claire, said the funding threshold unfairly favors candidates like Sens. Patrick Testin, R-Stevens Point, and Roger Roth, R-Appleton, who are able to transfer funds from their previous campaign efforts into their lieutenant governor campaign. Testin joined the race back in September while Roth, a former Senate president and congressional candidate, entered the race in February.

It really stacks the deck against somebody like me or a lesser-known candidate," Yudes said. "Thats just not right."

Johnathan Wichmann launched his campaign for governor about two years ago before switching to the lieutenant governor race in February. Wichmann said he made the shift after Rep. Timothy Ramthun, R-Campbellsport, joined the gubernatorial race, which Wichmann said would likely split their votes in the primary.

Wichmann, who also has been invited to speak at the state's convention, said a fundraising requirement ensures that any candidate on the endorsement ballot has proven their ability to be viable in a statewide election.

"I understand a minimum donation threshold," Wichmann said. "If youre running for a statewide office and you can only raise $2,000-$3,000, who are we kidding, right?

"The ones who are making the biggest stink about it are the ones who didnt qualify or didnt get enough support," he added. "They understand (a party endorsement) is a bonus. I just feel theyre making a big stink because they didnt get enough traction."

Wichmann did take issue with allowing established lawmakers to transfer funds from previous efforts into a new campaign.

"If youre already an elected official and you decide to change lanes  say youre a senator and you want to go for lieutenant governor  I think you should start from scratch like everyone else," he added.

Testin, who said he raised more than $200,000 after successfully defending his Senate seat in 2020, said it's up to the state party's executive committee to determine who will, and will not, be on the endorsement ballot, but he added it's ultimately the voters who decide.

"We still have a primary that will take place, regardless of if theres an endorsement or not," Testin said. "It does open a lot of doors and resources that otherwise might not be there if they are not endorsed.

Roth did not respond to a request for comment.

The winners of the Aug. 9 GOP primaries for lieutenant governor and governor will be paired together for the Nov. 8 general election to face Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, who is seeking a second term.

Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
The U.S. Senate reached a tentative deal on funding for coronavirus vaccines and other treatments and supplies. The package is for about $10 billion, less than the $22 billion the Biden administration campaigned for.

A compromise plan is better than none. Democrats and Republicans need to finish ironing out the details and get the bill signed before Congress goes on recess April 9. Then, if needed, Congress can approve additional funding.

The rise of the BA.2 subvariant, a less deadly but more contagious form of omicron, should remind us that the pandemic is not yet over, despite the wishes of the COVID-weary to declare victory and give up the fight. The fight requires funding.

Federal regulators just approved additional Pfizer and Moderna booster shots for individuals older than 50 or who are immunocompromised. A slowdown in funds will hamper the effort to deliver the new boosters to all who are eligible.

The issue has regional implications. Cases have increased in Erie County recently, though hospitalizations have fallen and the mortality rate has remained about the same. Other Western New York counties show a similar trend.

The region, and the country, are certainly in a better place than they were when the delta, then omicron variants swept the nation last year, but COVID-19 remains potent. Washington needs to treat it that way.

With funding at risk, the U.S. has begun to pare down a program that covers the costs of giving COVID tests, treatments and immunizations to uninsured Americans. If those costs are shifted to health insurance providers, they can eventually be passed on to consumers in higher premiums.

Republicans and Democrats last week remained divided on the amount in the package to support global vaccinations. The Biden administration had requested $5 billion, while GOP lawmakers indicated the bill would include about $1 billion for that category. Its an insufficient amount.

Sen. Christopher A. Coons, D-Del., told the Washington Post he would keep pushing for a higher amount. There are 2.5 billion people unvaccinated in the world, and that is an ongoing daily risk to the United States, Coons said.

Cutting back on the efforts to immunize populations in other countries would be short-sighted. Closing the vaccination gap between rich and poor nations isnt just a humanitarian imperative, it is in the best interests of the United States.

Atul Gawande, who leads global health at the U.S. Agency for International Development, pointed out in a recent Washington Post opinion column that having insufficient vaccination coverage in poorer countries gives coronavirus more chances to mutate into a new variant. The world knows that happens because it has suffered its consequences. ...

Helping all countries protect their populations by supercharging vaccination campaigns is our best hope to prevent future strains from emerging and ending this pandemic once and for all, Gawande wrote.

The BA.2 subvariant has led to a surge of cases in Europe and is now the dominant variant in the United States, making up 55% of new cases. BA.2 cases in New York have increased 55% in the past 14 days.

Vaccines are not the only weapon against coronavirus. Without continued funding, the federal government will be unable to keep purchasing monoclonal antibodies and antiviral treatments that reduce the severity of COVID-19, an illness that has killed close to 1 million Americans. The White House also needs additional funds for surveillance activities to catch future waves of the virus, including wastewater monitoring.

The White House has been promoting the transition to a next normal, when Americans will learn to live with COVID-19. That requires managing the threat, not ignoring it.

Preventing epidemics is more cost-effective than dealing with the outcomes later. The Senate should get this funding package passed, then plan to return to the table for more money down the road as circumstances evolve and the battle to contain the virus continues.
In recent weeks, revelations about political activity by Virginia Thomas, the wife of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, have evolved from alarming to beyond the pale.

First came a New Yorker investigation in January that detailed numerous ways Thomas and her political lobbying firm, Liberty Consulting, are linked to right-wing groups with high-stakes cases before the court on abortion, affirmative action and gun rights. In some instances, she was paid by groups filing amicus briefs that her husband would presumably read in the course of his deliberations.

Then came a New York Times investigation showing how Thomas used her husbands relationship with then-President Donald Trump to try to influence policy and personnel decisions in the White House. It also reported that she helped unite various groups participating in the Jan. 6 rally that resulted in the deadly attack on the Capitol as Congress was certifying Bidens election. (Virginia Thomas rejected the report in an interview with the Washington Free Beacon, saying that she did not help organize the rally, but that she attended it until she got too cold.)

Most recently, a Washington Post investigation revealed that after the 2020 election, Virginia Thomas repeatedly pressured Trumps chief of staff, Mark Meadows, to pursue efforts to overturn Joe Bidens victory. In a series of jaw-dropping text messages  Help This Great President stand firm, Mark!!! and The majority knows Biden and the Left is attempting the greatest Heist of our History, among them  Virginia Thomas spread falsehoods as she urged the presidents team to attempt to reverse the election results. All this was happening as Trump and his allies vowed to take their cockamamie allegations of election fraud to the Supreme Court.

Those cases, of course, were so flimsy that they never made it to the nations highest court, preventing us from knowing if Justice Thomas would have recused himself from ruling on the matter in which he clearly had a conflict of interest.

But in January, we got a glimpse of the justices frightful lack of judicial ethics. Thats when the Supreme Court rejected Trumps plea to shield his White House records  which included communication with Virginia Thomas  from the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack. Only one justice sided with Trump and dissented from the ruling: Clarence Thomas.

What a disgrace.

Of course Thomas should have recused himself from that case. And he must, for the sake of fairness and public trust, recuse himself from any other Jan. 6 cases that may come before the court.

Beyond that, the disturbing chain of events demonstrates that the Supreme Court desperately needs stronger ethics rules. The nine justices of the Supreme Court  the most powerful judges in the country  essentially police themselves now when it comes to ethics. While theyre supposed to be guided by the same code of conduct that other federal judges must follow, justices decide whether to recuse themselves in any given situation. That must change.

The Supreme Courts power rests in the trust it earns from the public. Americans may not agree with every ruling from the court, but they need to trust that the justices decisions are fair, backed by integrity and driven by sound interpretations of the law. There is no room for personal favors from the bench. Its time for the Supreme Court to establish a code of ethical conduct  and stick to it.
In the world of investing, there's a constant tug-of-war between growth and value. Between diversification and concentration. Between large-cap and small-cap stocks. It's a game of trade-offs, where the individual investor must decide which strategy and qualities matter most to them.

If investing were a spectrum of risk, then diversification, large-cap, and value would be considered safer while concentration, small-cap, and growth could be considered riskier.

So how come Warren Buffett, the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A)(NYSE: BRK.B), who is known for his prudent investing style, falls into both the large-cap and value "safe" categories, but he has set up Berkshire with a surprisingly concentrated portfolio? Here's why the strategy makes sense and how Buffett's portfolio allocation could help you become a better investor.

Bold bets

Buffett is one of the greatest investors of all time. The compound annual growth rate of Berkshire Hathaway between 1965 and 2021 is a staggering 20.1% -- which is one of the best long-term track records out there. The growth rate was closer to 30% during Buffett's earlier years when he managed less money and could take more risks.

Yet Buffett didn't get that outperformance by sticking with the status quo. He got it by thinking independently, making major bets on companies he believes in, and most importantly, sticking with many of those companies over the long term.

Today, Berkshire Hathaway owns $358.7 billion in public securities. Of that amount, 66% is concentrated in Apple, Bank of America, and American Express. Seventy-six percent is in the top five holdings. And 87% is in the top 10 holdings.

On the surface, having 45% of a portfolio in Apple stock may look extremely risky. But Buffett is known for his shrewd research, high conviction, and preference to go with only his best ideas. In his younger years when Berkshire was much smaller, Buffett invested in small-cap value stocks in a concentrated fashion. Today, he invests in large-cap value stocks. But throughout his career, Buffett has always stayed within his circle of competency, which is value investing.

Doubling down

Berkshire Hathaway is famous for buying back its own stock and doubling, tripling, and quadrupling down on its best ideas instead of buying other securities that the company doesn't believe in as much.

Berkshire began buying Apple stock in 2016 and has consistently added to the position since then. A more recent example is Berkshire's accumulation of Chevron and Occidental Petroleum stock, which, over the last few years, went from nonexistent in Berkshire's portfolio to its ninth and 10th largest holdings, respectively.

The lesson here is that if -- and this is a big if -- an investor puts in the time to know the ins and outs of a company, and they believe in that company long-term and want to keep following it closely over time, then it does make sense to go overweight into a handful of your best ideas.

Keep in mind that Buffett had the temperament not to sell his favorite companies during the 2018 U.S.-China trade war bear market, the COVID-19 crash of 2020, or even the recent sell-off. In sum, going with a highly concentrated portfolio over a largely diversified one makes sense for a specific kind of investor. However, you could argue that a larger, more diversified portfolio makes more sense than a concentrated one for folks who don't have time to keep up with the companies they hold or may lack the patience to stick with those companies in the event the market crashes.

More than meets the eye

It's worth mentioning that Berkshire's stakes in publicly traded securities can be a bit misleading. Berkshire Hathaway, which has a market cap of $785.2 billion or more than double the value of the public securities it owns, has major holdings in wholly owned insurance businesses, railroads, services companies, energy companies, utilities, and more.

In this vein, the "real" weighting of Apple among Berkshire's overall holdings is more like 20%. What's more, Berkshire produces earnings from its other businesses, which provide cash flows to keep the company running. Thanks to these other businesses, Berkshire is less like a fund and more like a conglomerate that operates different business units and invests extra cash into other companies.

The greatest lesson of all

Retail investors are more like Berkshire Hathaway than they may realize. If you're investing the right way, then you're doing it over a multi-year or probably multi-decade time horizon. Just like Berkshire, your income doesn't come from selling stocks, but rather, from your job or business.

For an investor who is interested in following a handful of companies and doesn't need the money they invest anytime soon, I think that operating a concentrated portfolio of your best ideas with companies you are passionate about is a great way to invest. However, there is absolutely nothing wrong with passive long-term investing in an index fund or a portfolio of 20, 50, or even 100 stocks if that lets you sleep better at night.

10 stocks we like better than Berkshire Hathaway (B shares)

When our award-winning analyst team has a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.*

They just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now... and Berkshire Hathaway (B shares) wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys.

*Stock Advisor returns as of March 3, 2022

American Express is an advertising partner of The Ascent, a Motley Fool company. Bank of America is an advertising partner of The Ascent, a Motley Fool company. Daniel Foelber has the following options: long April 2022 $162.50 calls on Chevron and short April 2022 $165 calls on Chevron. The Motley Fool owns and recommends Apple and Berkshire Hathaway (B shares). The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2023 $200 calls on Berkshire Hathaway (B shares), long March 2023 $120 calls on Apple, short January 2023 $200 puts on Berkshire Hathaway (B shares), short January 2023 $265 calls on Berkshire Hathaway (B shares), and short March 2023 $130 calls on Apple. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Idahos public education system scored several wins during the 2022 legislative session concluded this week. As president of the Idaho State Board of Education, Id like to thank the legislators and Idaho Governor Brad Little for making historic investments in our students, our schools and institutions and in the dedicated educators throughout our state who keep our system running while dealing with tremendous challenges, especially these past two years.

K-12

Idahos public schools budget will increase overall by nearly 6% next year including an historic 11%increase in state funding. The budget includes $47 million in added literacy dollars to help young students learn to read by the 3rd grade. These literacy funds will be used by schools to pay for extended time literacy intervention programs such as optional full-time kindergarten to provide literacy intervention to struggling students.

Other noteworthy education legislation that became law include:

$105 million in ongoing funding for school districts and charters to use to improve health insurance plans for teachers and their families while lowering out-of-pocket costs resulting in higher take home pay. Educators will also receive $1,000 bonuses in recognition of their extraordinary efforts since the pandemic began.

One-time funding for instructional staff and pupil services staff equal to the estimated amount that would have been distributed through the career ladder for one additional year of service and an approximate 7% increase to the salary-based apportionment for school administrators and classified staff.

Dyslexia screening and training for teachers who work with students identified as having characteristics of dyslexia. House Bill 731 will have a positive impact on thousands of Idaho students affected by dyslexia, by identifying characteristics early so that they can receive appropriate interventions to help them learn to read.

A rural educator incentive program designed to encourage new teachers to work in rural districts by offering funds to help pay student loans or reimburse them for additional education costs such as earning credits to qualify for additional content area teaching endorsements or high level degrees.

Higher Education

Our public four-year higher education institutions will see an 8% increase in state funding next year as part of an overall higher education budget that includes funding to cover employee salary increases. As a result, for the third year in a row, our college and universities will not request tuition increases when the Board meets next month in Moscow. This is a certainly positive development both for our students and our institutions.

Community Colleges

Idahos four community colleges will see nearly 10% in new state funding, which I see as a critical investment given the role the community colleges have in career technical education and meeting the statewide private sector demand for a skilled workforce.

Medical Residency Programs

This year the legislature made historic investments in expanding physician training residency programs  from Coeur dAlene to Pocatello. As of the year 2020, Idaho ranked 50th in the nation for the total number of active physicians per 100,000 population, and more than 30% of these physicians are age 60 or over. Absent aggressive intervention, Idaho is facing a severe physician shortage exacerbated by rapid population growth. National data show that a majority of physicians practice medicine in the states where they did their residencies, which is why expanding residency programs in Idaho is a good return on investment.

Campus Infrastructure

State leaders made another a huge investment in higher education this year  allocating nearly $220 million in capital projects and for addressing deferred maintenance paid by the Permanent Building Fund. Thats about five times the average amount of Permanent Building Fund dollars that higher education received over the last five years.

Heres a breakdown of the capital projects:

College of Southern Idaho: $10 million to build an automotive and agricultural diesel mechanics facility

North Idaho College: $3.3 million to remodel a diesel mechanics bay and build an aerospace training laboratory

College of Western Idaho: $10 million to construct a health science building and $5 million to build a horticulture building

Colleges of Eastern Idaho: $13 million for its Future Tech facility

Idaho State University: $3 million for a pedestrian railway crossing at ISUs Idaho Falls campus and $3.4 million to build the Leonard Hall Pharmacy building

University of Idaho: $900,000 to improve the McCall Outdoor Science School campus

Deferred maintenance at all institutions: approximately $170 million

I cannot emphasize enough how important these Permanent Building Fund dollars are to help us provide first class learning facilities for our students and address a massive backlog of maintenance issues at all of our campuses. The citizens of Idaho have hundreds of millions of dollars invested in our campuses and the funding made available this year will go a long way in helping us keep our higher education assets functioning.

With a record-setting state surplus and an infusion of federal American Rescue Plan dollars, our elected leaders seized an opportunity and made a real difference for public education at all levels. During this legislative session, Governor Little and the majority of legislators demonstrated their commitment to our students and our educators and I commend them for it.

Kurt Liebich is the president of the Idaho State Board of Education.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
The Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Partnership, which represents stakeholders from across the spectrum of public land interests  including recreation, forest products, conservation, wildlife, hunting and fishing  has filed an objection to the draft management plan for the Nantahala and Pisgah national forests, which was issued earlier this year.

The U.S. Forest Service will consider the objection as it crafts its final management plan, which will provide a framework for how the 1.1 million acres of Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests and their resources will be managed for the next 20 years, according to a news release.

The Pisgah National Forest covers 512,758 acres. It includes federal forest land in McDowell County and is divided into three Ranger Districts: the Grandfather, Appalachian and Pisgah districts. The Grandfather District has its headquarters in Nebo, according to online sources.

The Partnership has collaborated with the Forest Service for nearly a decade on this management plan. As part of its comments on the draft forest plan in 2020, the Partnership stressed the importance of addressing possible conflicts in the plan itself and submitted language that would help accomplish that goal. However, the latest draft plan did not include that approach, suggesting conflicts would be addressed on a case-by-case basis as the plan was implemented. The Partnership Objection contends that this approach will substantially stall projects and delay much-needed restoration.

The Partnerships Objection identifies these main areas where conflict resolution is needed in the plan:

Resolve conflict and increase efficiency during project implementation by changing land allocations to protect a wide range of interests, including young forests, wilderness areas and eligible wild and scenic rivers.

The Partnership encourages an ambitious timber strategy that can support local communities without negatively impacting important ecologically sensitive areas, especially when coupled with controlling non-native invasive species and addressing the road maintenance backlog.

Along with land allocations that are sensitive to recreationally important places, the plan should better provide for sustainable recreation through improving the management of climbing, paddling, mineral hunting, mountain biking, equestrian use and all forest visitation.

This will reduce conflict between recreationists, the Forest Service and natural resources, while encouraging collaboration and exceptional and sustainable visitor experiences.

Establish a 256,000-acre old-growth patch network using a cap-and-trade approach that includes a process for identifying old growth during projects. This approach would allow the Forest Service to replace lower quality patches of old growth with higher quality patches of old growth, should higher quality patches be encountered during projects.

Such flexibility would reduce project-level conflict, ensure project-level success and result in a higher quality old-growth network.

Address the concern that Natural Heritage Natural Areas (NHNAs) could be negatively impacted by management actions without consideration for their rare or unique values.

The plan released leaves 54,000 acres of NHNAs potentially open to commercial timber harvest and road building. These acres are home to 10 federally listed species, 173 state listed species, and 129 species of conservation concern.

The Partnership requests that standards be added to the plan that further describe coordination with the Natural Heritage Program, including guidance on how and when some Natural Area boundaries could be re-mapped at the project level (if appropriate).

Include collaboratively supported, ecological treatments into their timber management program.

The Partnership urges the Forest Service to be more ambitious in creating and maintaining open forest woodland habitat, or forest conditions where sunlight reaches the forest floor. Such conditions support a wide variety of vegetation and tree species critical to ecological health.

However, such ecological restoration treatments must be paired with commercial timber harvests that support local economies.

For more information on the Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Partnership, contact Ashleigh Sherman at ashleigh@darbycommunications.com. The Partnerships full objection is available to view at https://npforestpartnership.org/plan-revision-comments/.

In 2013, the Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Partnership was formed by a variety of forest stakeholders to foster civic engagement and positive guidance in creating the best possible management plan revision for the Nantahala and Pisgah national forests. The Partnership strives to create a lasting voice for innovative management and public investment in the public forests of North Carolinas mountains for the future. For more information, visit https://npforestpartnership.org.
Prince Hamzah, half-brother of Jordans King Abdullah II, relinquished his princely title on Sunday, Arab News reports.

In a letter posted on his Twitter account, Prince Hamzah said he gave up his title because his personal convictions and the values instilled in him by his father are not in line with the approaches, trends and modern methods of our institutions.

Hamzah also indicated that he was honored to have served his country and people by holding the title previously and would continue to be loyal to Jordan and serve the country, people, and the message of (our) fathers and forefathers in his private life as much as he could.

This comes after he penned an apology letter in March to the monarch noting that he took responsibility for his wrongdoings for his involvement in the countrys high-profile sedition case.

I apologize to our Jordanian people and our family (Hashemite) for these mistakes, Prince Hamzah wrote in the letter.
The UAE is offering a prize money of up to $2 million for startups that can propose cutting-edge agri-tech solutions for food production and management in the country, Zawya reports.

Initiated by the UAE Ministry of Climate Change and Environment, the prize is part of this years edition of the global FoodTech Challenge that invites innovations related to two critical tracks: food production, and food loss and waste, the media notes.

The competitors include early-stage start-ups, including international university-based research teams, individual entrepreneurs and small firms.

The initiative aims at addressing the availability and abundance of food and exploring next gen, nutrient-rich alternatives, as well as ensuring sustainability across the food supply chain and the planet.

Participants will also earn the opportunity to scale up their business model within the UAE. Applications are being encouraged from around the world, with a priority on agri-tech concentrated nations.
In South Sudan, rival leaders signed an agreement Sunday on a key military provision of the 2018 peace deal, after mediation by neighboring Sudan. The two sides agreed to form a unified armed forces command.

This unified armed forces command has long been one of many critical unresolved issues delaying implementation of the 2018 pact to end five years of civil war.

President Salva Kiir and his rival, Vice President Riek Machar, have agreed to create a unified command of the armed forces.

Peace is a matter of security and today we have (reached) an important step, said Martin Abucha, who signed the agreement on behalf of Machars opposition party, the SPLM/A-IO.

This is to inform everyone that we are for peace and we are all working for peace, added Kiirs security adviser, Tut Gatluak.

Tensions between forces loyal to Kiir and former rebel leader Machar have escalated recently, raising fears in the international community of a return to widespread conflict in the worlds youngest nation.

Both men were present at the ceremony in the capital Juba for the signing of the agreement, which stipulates a 60-40 split of key leadership positions in the army, police and national security forces. Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, currently the number two in Sudans post-coup ruling council, had arrived in Juba on Friday.

Sudan drafted the proposal after Salva Kiir issued a presidential decree on March 25 on the formation of the command structure, a decision that was quickly dismissed by Machar as a unilateral action.
Turkish Drone Attacks Target Assyrian Town, Assyrian Official in Syria

As Turkey ramps up attacks in North and East Syria, Turkish drone strikes have hit two vehicles within three days, leaving one dead and four injured.

The first attack occurred on Friday in the area of al-Qahtaniyah (Tirbespiye) near the Turkish border. According to a statement by the security forces of the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES), one person was killed and two injured in a vehicle targeted in the strike.

The statementof the security forces condemned the attack and urged the international community to take action to prevent further Turkish attacks.

The town of al-Qahtaniyah is historically an Assyrian settlement, with a population of around 17,000.

In a separate attack on Friday, Turkey shelled the M4 highway and a village in Ayn Issa, without casualties.

In a more recent attack on Sunday, a Turkish drone hit a vehicle carrying a member of General Command of the Syriac Military Council and his translator. Council member Orom Maroge and the translator were both injured in the attack.

A statement by the Communications Centre of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the major armed force in AANES, said that the vehicle was on its way to a power station in Tall Tamr accompanied by a Russian military vehicle when it was hit.
Uganda expels Rwandan opposition figure Robert Mukombozi in what appears to be a new sign of warming relations between Kampala and Kigali after years of tension.

The Ugandan presidents son, Muhoozi Kainerugaba, announced Saturday on Twitter the expulsion of the opponent, calling him an enemy of Rwanda and Uganda.

Robert Mukombozi, a Rwandan born in Uganda, worked as a journalist for local media before moving to Rwanda, but he fell out with the government and is living in exile in Australia, according to Ugandan intelligence.

However, his destination was not specified. Kainerugaba, who is army chief and special adviser to the president, said only that he had been sent back to where he came from.

President Musevenis son has been instrumental in rebuilding relations with Kigali, including holding talks with Kagame that led to the reopening of their shared land border in January after three years of closure.

In February, he promised to put an end to the illegal and criminal activities of the RNC in Uganda, saying the party had nearly led the two countries into a stupid war.

The expulsion of Mr. Mukombozi, a member of the exiled Rwandan National Congress (RNC), follows a pledge by the powerful son of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni to crack down on the opposition party, which Kigali considers a terrorist organization.

The presence on Ugandan soil of opponents, but also of rebels seeking to overthrow Rwandan President Paul Kagame, has long been a source of tension between the two neighbors.
The authorities and the higher education and university unions have reached an agreement on the salary scale after three months of strike action that paralyzed the academic year in public universities. The report of the professors union, announces that the mobilization has won a number of claims.

The compromise was reached at dawn on Saturday at the end of the work of the joint commission that began earlier this week in the suburbs of Kinshasa. The discussions were stormy and tense, said a trade unionist who participated in the protest movement.

According to him, the State has compensated for the loss of income. The updated salary scale provides for a little more than $2,100 per month for a junior professor, an increase of more than 60% after six years of loss of purchasing power, due in particular to the devaluation of the Congolese franc. A professor emeritus, the most senior of the academic body, will earn $3,400 and will receive a small annual research bonus of $320. These provisions are expected to be implemented starting next year.

Another satisfaction of the teachers is that the government has committed to compensate for the salary shortfall of the last six years by purchasing vehicles. These are to be delivered this quarter. In addition, all civil servants in all sectors should see their basic salary increased by 40% at the end of this month. But it is only from 2023 onwards that the heads of works will receive bonuses which will increase from 300 to 600 dollars.

According to the teachers union, the application of the provisions announced by the government will be regularly monitored by a joint committee.
Percentage of adolescent young caregivers reporting various issues and difficulties as a result of their caring responsibilities. Credit: Clare Mackenzie / Faculty of Education University of Cambridge

Around 3 in 10 adolescent young caregivers in the UK think about self-harming, and more than 10% contemplate harming othersoften the person for whom they are caring, new data show.

The figures are from the first ever cross-national study of the health and well-being of adolescent young caregivers: people aged 15 to 17 with caring responsibilities for a family member or friend. Researchers surveyed 2,100 adolescent caregivers in six different countries, alongside 5,000 non-caregivers of the same age.

The results raise urgent concerns about the specific pressures and mental health impacts of caring on young people approaching adulthood. Although the study provides evidence that some adolescent caregivers benefit from the experience, a significant number showed signs of poor well-being and distress. Girls appear to be particularly at risk.

Asked whether, because of caring, they had thought about harming themselves, 14% of the entire sample of adolescent caregivers said they had, but the figure was twice as high among caregivers in the UK (28%). The percentage of all UK adolescents who actually self-harm is thought to be 13% to 19%.

A total of 6% of the entire sample, and 12% of those in the UK, said that because of caring they had considered hurting someone else. Within this group, about 45% (across the entire sample) said that the other person was the care recipient. There was no evidence that these young caregivers represented a real threat to others, but the finding is indicative of the constant pressure and feelings of isolation that characterize their day-to-day lives.

Numerous other findings similarly indicate that many adolescent caregivers are struggling to cope. A total of 36% across all six countries, and 56% in the UK, said their mental health had deteriorated because of their responsibilities. Overall, 17% (37% in the UK) said their performance at school had suffered and 15% overall (36% in the UK) reported being bullied about caring. Psychometric tests further revealed significant numbers whose well-being levels and experience of caring were "of potential concern."

The pan-European study, the Me-We Young caregivers project, aims to understand how best to protect the mental health and well-being of adolescent young caregivers, using data gathered from caregivers aged 15 to 17 in Italy, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.

Many of the UK results are worse than the six-country average. While this is partly because the UK sample involved a disproportionate number of adolescents with very demanding care responsibilities, it probably also reflects the high prevalence of mental health problems among UK adolescents.

Professor Saul Becker, from the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, who is part of the project team, said, "A significant number of adolescent young caregivers are experiencing real difficulty, isolation and distress. The results do not mean they would actually hurt someone, but it is clear they sometimes feel desperate. That can manifest itself in various ways: They may get into trouble at school, think about hurting themselves, or feel as though they want to lash out."

Percentage of young caregivers who had thoughts of self-harm or harming others as a result of caring responsibilities. Credit: Clare Mackenzie / Faculty of Education University of Cambridge

Andy McGowan, head of engagement at Caring Together, which supports caregivers in the East of England, said the results reflected a specific constellation of pressures affecting the 15-17 age group.

"At this age their caring responsibilities often grow," he said. "They then have to balance those commitments with challenges that affect all adolescents: college work, applying for university, or trying to get a job. The pressure just builds and builds. A substantial number feel absolutely at the end of their tether and as if there's no 'off' switch; no way out."

The exact number of adolescent young caregivers in the UK is unclear. According to the 2011 census there were at least 178,000 people aged five to 17 with caring responsibilities, and 83,500 within the adolescent 15 to 17 bracket. These reports are known to undercount the true extent of caring among children and adolescents, however. BBC data have indicated the total number of caregivers aged five to 17 could be nearer to 800,000, with approximately 334,000 aged 15 to 17.

Of the 2,099 adolescent young caregivers surveyed in the new research, most (69%) cared for a family member. 16% cared for more than one relative and 22% for both a family member and friend. The majority cared for parents, although in Italy 59% were responsible for grandparentssuggesting that in some countries young people are supporting shortfalls in eldercare among aging European populations.

Overall, the greater an adolescent's caring responsibilities were, the more likely they were to experience serious difficulties. Girls, who typically shouldered more than boys, also tended to report lower well-being. According to one standard test, in which a score of 50 represents "extremely high well-being" and adolescent non-caregivers scored an average of 37, female caregivers in the UK averaged just 29.

Most adolescent caregivers said they did receive some support, but this finding should be treated with caution. "What they are getting varies in quality and quantity, and often there is very little evidence it is having an effect," Becker said. "It's no great surprise that a significant proportion who do get some help are still in distress."

The report argues that support for adolescent caregivers needs to be widened far beyond the available services such as young caregiver projects. Researchers suggest the eventual goal should be a "No Wrong Door" system combining health, education, social care and other services, in which any trusted adult to whom a young caregiver turns can either provide, or ensure they receive, appropriate help.

"Young caregivers are less likely to approach social services, but they might feel they can talk to a teacher, their GP, or someone outside school," Becker said. "We need a system in which every agency that touches on their lives is working together on this."

McGowan said, "The challenges adolescent young caregivers experience are very specific and individualized. They might be educational or employment-related, or problems with transport, finance, or housing. Young caregiver services can only do so much about that; other services need to be on board as well. As it stands, the available support for managing their transition into adulthood is patchy at best."

Explore further Taking care of the young caregivers

More information: The first cross-national study of adolescent young carers aged 1517 in six European countries, International Journal of Care and Caring (2022). The first cross-national study of adolescent young carers aged 1517 in six European countries,(2022). nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/7534326
Hospital length of stay, complications, hospital readmission within 90 days, and revision surgery at two years do not differ for cementless total knee replacement (CL-TKR) versus cemented fixation (CEM) TKR, according to a study presented at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, held from March 22 to 26 in Chicago.

Kyle Alpaugh, M.D., from Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and colleagues reviewed 598 primary unilateral TKRs (170 CL-TKRs and 428 CEM-TKRs) of the same design from 2016 to 2018 to examine early complications and treatment failure, defined as any reoperation.

The researchers found that patients undergoing CL-TKR were younger and more often male. Computer assistance was used less frequently for CL-TKR. Less operative time was required for CL-TKR (82.6  21.4 versus 109.1  24.6 minutes), but the groups did not differ in terms of mean length of stay (57 versus 60.5 hours). Ninety-day readmission did not differ between CL-TKR and CEM-TKR (1.8 versus 0.9 percent). At two years, survivorship free from revision was 96 and 95 percent for CL-TKR and CEM-TKR, respectively. CL-TKR failure was 1 percent (two cases) due to aseptic loosening; both cases underwent isolated tibial component revision, with no additional complications.

"The biggest question now is whether or not cementless total knee replacement will have better long-term durability and fixation than cemented knee replacement," coauthor Brian P. Chalmers, M.D., of the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City, said in a statement. "Following these patients to assess long-term outcomes is the next step."

Explore further Younger knee replacement patients more likely to require reoperation

Copyright  2022 HealthDay. All rights reserved.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

The American College of Cardiology's Global Heart Attack Treatment Initiative (GHATI) reports continuing improvements in quality care delivery for heart attacks in low- and middle-income countries with the use of data collection and localized education around guideline-directed medical therapy, according to data from the program's second year. The findings were presented at the American College of Cardiology's 71st Annual Scientific Session.

ST-elevation myocardial infarctions (STEMIs), the deadliest type of heart attack in which an artery in the heart is completely blocked, cause about 3 million deaths per year in low- and middle-income countries. While a person who suffers a heart attack in the U.S. or Europe has a 95%-97% chance of survival, the odds are significantly worse in low- and middle-income countries. ACC launched GHATI in 2019 to improve heart attack outcomes in these countries by working directly with medical centers on targeted improvements.

By the end of its second year, the program had tracked STEMI treatment metrics and outcomes for more than 4,000 patients at 39 medical centers in 18 countries on five continents. The findings revealed significant improvements in key clinical endpoints, including cardiogenic shock upon arrival at the hospital, cardiac arrest, left ventricular ejection fraction below 40% and survival at discharge, since the start of the program. Researchers also observed a continued rise in the adherence to guideline-directed medical therapy, with up to 92% of cases receiving this level of careup from 90% after the program's first year.

"We're very happy to see the trends of improvement over the two-year period of data acquisition," said Cesar Herrera, MD, Americas Representative to the ACC Assembly of International Governors, director of the CEDIMAT Cardiovascular Center in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and the program's current chair. "Measuring these data points, offering guidance to participating hospitals and encouraging them to follow guidelines seems to be working."

While program leaders plan to design interventions in the coming years aimed at further improving care practices and health outcomes at participating sites, the first two years of the program were focused on enrolling medical centers, ensuring personnel understood ACC guidelines and facilitating baseline data collection. GHATI roughly doubled the number of sites enrolled between its first and second years, with countries in the Middle East and Latin America accounting for much of this growth. To participate in the program, which is free and voluntary, hospitals agree to collect certain data points related to STEMI care and then share the deidentified data with GHATI.

"The great thing about registries is that once you tell people what you're measuring and why, just the fact that people are measuring and caring about those metrics can have a tremendous effect [on performance]," Herrera said. "To see the continuing improvements over time is pretty amazing."

The two-year findings offer encouraging evidence that clinical endpoints improved for STEMI care, despite the widespread disruptions in health care caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Herrera said. Researchers reported the primary combined endpoint dropped by an average of 3.1% between the last quarter of 2019 and the third quarter of 2021 across GHATI sites.

The results also showed a sustained high rate of reperfusion therapyprocedures to open the blocked arterywhich was reported in 95% of STEMI cases. Three-quarters of patients who received percutaneous coronary intervention, the most common type of reperfusion therapy, underwent the procedure within 90 minutes of first medical contact, the critical time interval needed to save heart muscle from permanent damage and possible death. Despite an overall upward trend in this metric, this level still falls short of the recommended goal of achieving reperfusion within 90 minutes for at least 90% of STEMI patients, suggesting a possible opportunity for further improvement, Herrera said.

The data also highlighted that the time it takes for patients to get to the hospital after first medical contact can be quite long in many places. Herrera said about two-thirds of the countries represented in GHATI do not have an emergency response service like the 911 service used in the U.S. He added that in some places, practices may be constrained by technological limitations, such as a lack of echocardiographic machines for assessing left ventricular ejection fraction.

The researchers are planning additional analyses to understand the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on care delivery and to examine how differences in a country's income level may affect STEMI care.

In a separate study shared at ACC.22, researchers reported on gender disparities observed in STEMI care across GHATI sites. Findings from that study revealed that only about 19% of STEMI patients treated at GHATI sites were women, about half of the proportion of women treated for heart attacks at U.S. hospitals. Herrera said further research is needed to understand what may be driving this disparity, though factors such as attitudes and behaviors, access to transportation and access to care could play a role in limiting the number of women who make it to the hospital after experiencing heart attack symptoms in low- and middle-income countries.

Explore further Program works to improve global heart attack care
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Wylie James Prescott, 3, had to wait more than a year after his autism diagnosis to begin behavioral therapy, even though research shows early treatment of autism can be crucial for children's long-term development.

His mother, Brandie Kurtz, said his therapy wasn't approved through Georgia's Medicaid program until recently, despite her continued requests. "I know insurance, so it's even more frustrating," said Kurtz, who works in a doctor's office near her home in rural Wrens, Georgia.

Those frustrations are all too familiar to parents who have a child with autism, a complex lifelong disorder. And the pandemic has exacerbated the already difficult process of getting services.

This comes as public awareness of autism and research on it have grown and insurance coverage for treatment is more widespread. In February, Texas became the last state to cover a widely used autism therapy through Medicaid. And all states now have laws requiring private health plans to cover the therapy, applied behavior analysis.

Yet children from Georgia to California often wait monthsand in many cases more than a yearto get a diagnosis and then receive specialized treatment services. Therapies that can cost $40,000 or more a year are especially out of reach for families who don't have insurance or have high-deductible health plans. Children from minority communities and those who live in rural areas may face additional barriers to getting help.

"You would never allow a kid with cancer to experience these waits," said Dr. Kristin Sohl, a pediatrician at University of Missouri Health Care and chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics' Council on Children With Disabilities Autism Subcommittee.

During the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, many families canceled in-home services, fearing infection. Virtual therapy often didn't seem to work, especially for nonverbal and younger children. With fewer clients, some providers laid off staff or shut down entirely.

And treatment services always face high turnover rates among the low-wage workers who do direct, in-home care for autism. But COVID-19 made the staffing problem worse. Companies now struggle to compete with rising wages in other sectors.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that autism affects 1 in 44 U.S. children, a higher prevalence rate than ever before. Autism symptoms can include communication difficulties and repetitive behaviors and can be accompanied by a range of developmental and psychiatric health conditions.

Early diagnosis of autism can make a difference, Sohl said. Symptoms of some kids who begin their therapy by age 2 or 3 can be greatly reduced.

Diagnoses are typically done by developmental-behavioral pediatricians, psychologists, psychiatrists and neurologists, all of whom are in short supply. The shortage of developmental pediatricians is especially acute. Even though they do three more years of fellowship training than a general pediatrician does, developmental pediatricians typically earn less.

General pediatricians with training can also do assessments, but insurers often require a specialist's diagnosis before paying for services, creating a bottleneck for families.

"If we solely rely on specialists, we're setting ourselves up for failure because there aren't enough of us. We need the insurance companies on board," said Dr. Sharief Taraman, a pediatric neurologist and president of the Orange County, California, chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Even in a metro area, getting a child an appointment can take months. "We cannot get these families in fast enough," said Dr. Alan Weintraub, a developmental pediatrician in suburban Atlanta. "It's heartbreaking."

Some parents pay cash for an evaluation with a private specialist, worsening disparities between kids whose parents can afford to skip the wait and those whose parents cannot.

Once a child has been diagnosed, many face an equalor longerwait to get autism therapies, including applied behavior analysis, a process that aims to improve social, communication, and learning skills. These sessions can take more than 20 hours a week and last more than a year. ABA techniques have some critics, but the American Academy of Pediatrics says that most evidence-based autism treatment models are based on ABA principles.

Accessing such treatment largely depends on insurance coverageand for many families how well Medicaid pays. The Georgia Medicaid program reimburses well for ABA, Georgia doctors said, while Missouri's pay is low, leading to a scarcity of options there, Sohl said.

In California, Medicaid reimbursement rates vary by county, and wait times for ABA range from about three to 12 months. In the rural northern reaches of the state, where few providers work, some families wait years.

During the first year of the pandemic, Claire Hise of Orange County was thrilled with the ABA therapist who worked with her son. But in January 2021, the therapist quit to go back to school. The company she was working with sent others. Hise had to train each new therapist to work with her son, a difficult process that always took more than a month. "It's a special relationship, and each kid with autism is an individual," Hise said. "It takes time."

By then, they were out the door, replaced by another after no more than four to six weeks. Sometimes the family waited weeks for a replacement.

Hise tried switching to another company, but they all had a six-month waitlist. "He's already so far behind," Hise said. "It's really a year I feel we've lost."

The average age of diagnosis in the U.S. is about 4 years old, but Black and Latino children on average are evaluated later than white kids.

"The impact on families having to wait for diagnosis or treatment can be devastating," said Kristin Jacobson, founder of the Autism Deserves Equal Coverage Foundation, an advocacy group in California. "They know in their gut something is seriously not right and that there is help out there, and yet they are helpless to do anything about it."

Araceli Barrientos helps run an autism support group in Atlanta for immigrant families, for whom language barriers can cause additional snags. It took her more than a year to get her daughter, Lesly, diagnosed and two more years to secure further treatment.

Sabrina Oxford of Dawson, in rural southwestern Georgia, had to take her daughter Jamelyn more than 150 miles to the Marcus Autism Center in Atlanta to get her diagnosed. "You don't have any resources around here," Oxford said.

Dr. Michelle Zeanah, a behavioral pediatrician, draws families from 60 mostly rural counties to her clinic in Statesboro, Georgia. "There's a massive shortage of people willing and able to do an autism diagnosis," she said.

Getting insurance to pay for autism treatment can be another frustrating process for families. Therapy denials can be triggered by clerical errors or missed paperwork. Insurer approvals can be especially difficult for older children, who can be less likely to get treatment services than younger ones, said Dr. Donna Londino, a child and adolescent psychiatrist at Augusta University in Georgia.

Many children with autism also need speech, occupational, and physical therapy, all of which are generally easier to secure than behavioral therapy. But even then, Weintraub said, the insurers push back: "They really dictate how many services you can have. These families, literally, meet obstacles at every turn."

David Allen, a spokesperson for AHIP, an insurance industry trade group formerly known as America's Health Insurance Plans, said insurers often require prior authorization to ensure that autism services are "medically necessary and evidence-based" and that patients are treated by "providers with appropriate education and training in treating autism."

Tracy-Ann Samuels of New York said she paid out-of-pocket for speech and occupational therapy for her son, Trey, now 15. Two years ago, after 18 months on a waiting list, he finally got ABA services covered by insurance.

"He's doing so great," she said. "My son was nonverbal. Now he's talking my ear off."

Explore further New data suggests 1 in 44 US children affected by autism

2022 Kaiser Health News.

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Projected COVID-19 Incident Deaths Model-based projections of COVID-19 deaths in 2022 following the lifting of nonpharmacologic interventions in California, Montana, Florida, Tennessee, Massachusetts, and Ohio, assuming an effective reproduction number of 5.0 (A) and 3.0 (B). Credit: JAMA Health Forum (2022). DOI: 10.1001/jamahealthforum.2022.0760

As COVID numbers fall and mandates lift, the question remains: Is it possible to avoid trade-offs between returning to pre-pandemic lifestyles and an uptick in COVID-19-related deaths?

To find an answer, investigators at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston Medical Center, and Georgia Tech conducted a simulation study that projected the future of the COVID-19 pandemic in every state.

The analysis, which is published in JAMA Health Forum, assumes the current pace of vaccination is maintained into the future, and models different dates of lifting mandates. In most states, relaxing masking mandates and other restrictions resulted in some "rebound" in COVID-19-related deaths; however, delaying the date of lifting mandates did little to lessen the eventual rise in deaths.

"The inevitable rebound in mortality was directly attributable to the omicron variantwhen we repeated the analysis, assuming the infectivity of the previous alpha and delta variants, the model did not project such rising mortality after relaxing mask mandates," says co-first author Benjamin P. Linas, a professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine.

One of the strongest predictors of the extent of the rebound surge in mortality after relaxing mandates was the degree of immunity in the community at the time of lifting the mandate. Therefore, communities with a high percentage of residents who are vaccinated and/or who have had COVID-19 are likely to have lower death rates.

"A difficult trade-off lies on the horizon," says co-senior author Jagpreet Chhatwal, director of MGH's Institute for Technology Assessment. "While there is ample evidence in our analysis that a March 2022 lifting date leads to rebound mortality in many states, the simulation also suggests that with the omicron variant, whenever states do remove mandates will face the same difficult choice between increased COVID-19 mortality and the freedoms of returning to a pre-pandemic norm."

"The one intervention that can mitigate this impossible choice is ongoing COVID-19 vaccination with boosters," adds Chhatwal, who is also an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School.

Even though a delay in lifting mask mandates or restrictions on social gatherings will likely not entirely prevent future surges in COVID-19-related deaths, the findings could potentially aid state public health officials as they weigh different options. "Arguments to remove restrictions must explicitly make the case for lifting restrictions within a cost-benefit framework examining the cost of restrictions versus the cost of COVID-19 mortality," says cofirst author Jade (Yingying) Xiao, a Ph.D. student at Georgia Tech. "At the same time, those who favor maintaining restrictions must recognize that 'just a little longer' will not suffice."

The researchers note that the highly transmissible delta and omicron variants will likely continue to take a major toll across the country, but if a less transmissible viral strain were to become dominant, rebounding morbidity and mortality rates would be substantially lower. "Were this the case, it would likely be possible to more safely remove restrictions at the beginning of the second quarter of 2022," says cosenior author Turgay Ayer, director of Business Intelligence and Healthcare Analytics at the Center for Health and Humanitarian Systems at Georgia Tech.

More information: Benjamin P. Linas et al, Projecting COVID-19 Mortality as States Relax Nonpharmacologic Interventions, JAMA Health Forum (2022). Benjamin P. Linas et al, Projecting COVID-19 Mortality as States Relax Nonpharmacologic Interventions,(2022). DOI: 10.1001/jamahealthforum.2022.0760
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

A University of Texas at Arlington faculty member and nurse practitioner (NP) said she hopes to bring more attention to an underrecognized condition.

Lynda Jarrell, clinical assistant professor at the College of Nursing and Health Innovation (CONHI), is author of "Asthma-COPD Overlap: The NP's Role in Diagnosis and Management," published in the February 2022 volume of the journal The Nurse Practitioner.

In it, Jarrell discusses how patients may not have just asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), but rather clinical symptoms reflective of both, known as asthma-COPD overlap (ACO). A different treatment plan is necessary to consider the full extent of the overlap, and not recognizing it could lead to increased mortality.

"Asthma-COPD overlap patients have worse outcomes than patients with either disease alone," she said. "Correct diagnosis is extremely important."

Jarrell hopes her article contributes to a clear definition of ACO, specific diagnostic treatment and evidence-based guidelines for treatment. She also hopes to spark more writing on ACO, particularly in nursing journals, to increase nurse practitioner knowledge and improve patient outcomes.

"It's important that nurse practitioners know and understand ACO because they may be the first person to see this patient and to diagnose them," she said.

More information: Lynda Jarrell, Asthma-COPD overlap, The Nurse Practitioner (2022). Lynda Jarrell, Asthma-COPD overlap,(2022). DOI: 10.1097/01.NPR.0000806392.71827.cc
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

The investigational drug vupanorsen reduced total levels of non-high-density lipoprotein (non-HDL) cholesterol by up to 28% in patients with high cholesterol who were already taking a cholesterol-lowering statin medication, in a study presented at the American College of Cardiology's 71st Annual Scientific Session. In addition, vupanorsen lowered levels of triglycerides by up to 57% and levels of angiopoietin-like 3 (ANGPTL3), the protein the drug was designed to target, by up to 95%. The drug had more modest effects on low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol and apolipoprotein B (ApoB) levels.

High levels of non-HDL cholesterol in the blood are associated with a high risk of cardiovascular disease. This risk can be mitigated with cholesterol-lowering drugs such as statins. However, researchers said there is an unmet need for additional cholesterol-lowering strategies for patients who still have high cholesterol after taking statins.

"Vupanorsen reduced non-HDL cholesterol at all doses studied in a statistically significant way and cut triglyceride levels in half. Whether these reductions would be sufficient to translate into a clinically meaningful cardiovascular risk reduction remains unclear," said Brian Bergmark, MD, cardiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital, investigator for the Thrombolysis in Myocardial Infarction (TIMI) Study Group and the study's lead author.

Vupanorsen is an experimental drug designed to lower non-HDL cholesterol by reducing the production of ANGPTL3, a protein that inhibits enzymes involved in the metabolism of triglyceride and cholesterol. For the trial, researchers enrolled 286 patients at 55 medical centers in the U.S., Canada and Poland. Before the study, participants had non-HDL cholesterol of 100 mg/dL or higher, triglycerides of 150500 mg/dL and were already taking a statin.

Participants were randomly assigned to receive either a placebo or one of seven vupanorsen doses ranging from 80 milligrams once per month to 160 milligrams every two weeks via subcutaneous injection. At 24 weeks, those taking vupanorsen had a significant reduction in non-HDL cholesterol, on average, achieving the study's primary endpoint. Additionally, those patients taking vupanorsen had a 41.3%56.8% reduction in triglycerides, a reduction in low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol of up to 16.2% and a reduction in apolipoprotein B (ApoB) levels of up to 15.1%. ANGPTL3 levels were reduced by 69.9%95.2% in those taking vupanorsen.

Participants taking vupanorsen at higher doses saw an increased rate of injection site reactions and elevations in liver enzymes. In addition, the researchers found that vupanorsen use was associated with dose-related increases in liver fat accumulation. This was unexpected, as findings from laboratory studies in animal models suggested the drug could potentially help to lower fat content in the liver.

"Regardless of the future of this compound, we did find out some information that may be quite relevant for future studies," Bergmark said. "There are numerous other compounds targeting this pathway or adjacent metabolic pathways through similar mechanisms, and it will be interesting to see how this plays out for other agents."

Bergmark said it is unclear whether the drug could hold greater benefits for people with particular lipid disorders that lead to extremely high levels of non-HDL cholesterol. He added that a larger sample size could potentially shed more light on how the drug works to reduce cholesterol.

This study was simultaneously published online in Circulation at the time of presentation.

Explore further Best statins for reducing cardiovascular risk in people with diabetes found

More information: Brian A. Bergmark et al, Effect of Vupanorsen on Non-High-Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol Levels in Statin-Treated Patients With Elevated Cholesterol: TRANSLATE-TIMI 70, Circulation (2022). Journal information: Circulation Brian A. Bergmark et al, Effect of Vupanorsen on Non-High-Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol Levels in Statin-Treated Patients With Elevated Cholesterol: TRANSLATE-TIMI 70,(2022). DOI: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.122.059266
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

For severely immunocompromised patients, a bone marrow transplant restores immune defenses and allows them to resume normal life. But after observing the nasopharyngeal system, where the body's first line of immune defense is deployed, scientists from the Institut Pasteur, Universite Paris Cite, Inserm and the Paris Public Hospital Network (AP-HP), in collaboration with the Imagine Institute, demonstrated a failure in the immune mechanisms of some of these patients. The results of this study, published in the journal Blood on February 14, 2022, could pave the way for more effective treatment.

In patients with severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID), the immune system is compromised and unable to deal with the onslaught of microbial attacks from the environment. Alain Fischer, a founding member of the Imagine Institute at Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital (AP-HP), has followed these patients for the past 30 years and knows them well. "SCID patients need to be treated with an allogeneic bone marrow transplant, sometimes combined with pre-transplant chemotherapy to prevent graft rejection," explains the physician and immunologist. "This procedure cures patients and restores their immune system, but we had never previously taken a detailed look at what was happening in the nasal mucosa." The immune response machinery is highly complex and involves several components: agents in the innate immune response, which are particularly active in the mucosa of the gut, lungs and nose, and agents in the adaptive immune response, which circulate in the blood and lymph.

To help elucidate the way in which the innate immune system is regulated, James Di Santo, Head of the Innate Immunity Unit (Institut Pasteur/Inserm), proposed comparing the post-transplant immune systems of immunocompromised patients with the immune systems of healthy patients from the "Milieu Interieur" cohort. "We already had nasopharyngeal samples taken with a simple nasal swab from some 1,000 subjects, and we were able to study the immune response using these samples," says the scientist. "The idea was to take the same type of samples from immunocompromised patients, together with a blood test, to observe the differences."

The scientists soon saw significant differences in some patients. Although in the healthy subjects and most of the immunocompromised patients the entire nasopharyngeal system had generally geared up to respond to attacks by forming a protective mucus layer, producing a large quantity of antibodies (especially IgA antibodies) and immune cells, and maintaining the microbiota, the nasal mucosa was disrupted in some transplant patients. In patients who were partially immunocompromised and had received only limited pre-transplant chemotherapy, the nasopharyngeal region had a smaller quantity of mucus, fewer IgA antibodies and cytokines and a prevalence of pathogenic bacteria. In other words, the mucosal immune system in these individuals was less active in dealing with daily attacks from pathogens. Their blood samples also revealed a selective deficiency in some circulating immune cells.

"We know that the immune cells in the blood produce cytokines, which stimulate the production of antibodies, and these antibodies in turn have the task of neutralizing pathogenic bacteria. If there is an absence of immune cells in the blood, it triggers a chain reaction, ultimately leading to an imbalance in the microbiota known as dysbiosis," explains James Di Santo. For the first time, the scientists were able to observe innate immunity mechanisms in action in the nasal mucosa in humans. This discovery could also prompt physicians to adjust their transplant protocol. "Patients who fail to recover their ability to produce IgA antibodies are potentially more vulnerable to respiratory infections," explains Alain Fischer. "We can compensate for this with an antibody replacement therapy, but the results of this new study also suggest that pre-transplant chemotherapy should be offered more systematically to ensure that their immune system is fully rebuilt."

Explore further Discovery of an innate immunological memory in the intestine

More information: Pedro Goncalves et al, Defects in mucosal immunity and nasopharyngeal dysbiosis in HSC transplanted SCID patients with IL2RG/JAK3 deficiency, Blood (2022). Journal information: Blood Pedro Goncalves et al, Defects in mucosal immunity and nasopharyngeal dysbiosis in HSC transplanted SCID patients with IL2RG/JAK3 deficiency,(2022). DOI: 10.1182/blood.2021014654
A child receives a polio vaccine. Experts say that polio vaccines will have to be administered long after the disease has been eradicated to prevent recurrence. Credit: Smartshiva1988 (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Injectable_Polio_Vaccine.jpg), CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en)

Polio eradication has advanced remarkably, despite the COVID-19 pandemic. The limitations on travel and movement during the pandemic contained the spread of poliovirus in endemic countriesAfghanistan and Pakistan. Even circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus (cVDPV) cases that accounted for most polio-related paralysis in recent years, have dropped.

But the impact of the pandemic on health and routine immunization systems might make it more difficult to keep the world polio-free, even after the last case. To avoid recurrence, polio vaccines will have to be administered long after polio is eradicated.

The disruption of routine immunization systems due to COVID-19 saw a global drop of about seven percent for two sets of childhood vaccines' estimated coverage in 2020, with eight million more children missing vaccine doses as a result. Ninety percent of 105 countries reported disruptions to immunization services, according to a paper in The Lancet.

That said, the crippling, pediatric disease polio, first recorded in an Egyptian painting 3,500 years ago, is definitely on its way out. There were no symptomatic cases of wild polio between the end of January and mid-November 2021the longest period in modern history, without any new polio paralysis cases. At the end of 2021, there were five cases of wild poliovirus (compared to 140 cases in 2020) and 643 cases of cVDPV (compared to 1,113 cases in 2020).

The Global Polio Eradication Initiative's plan to be officially rid of wild polio and of cVDPV by 2026 seems on course, although a recent report of a wild poliovirus case in a three-year-old girl in Malawi has raised serious concerns. The first case of wild poliovirus in Africa in more than five years, it underlines the risk of infections in the future.

Thousands of biological samples around the world may still contain live polioviruses. Some immunocompromised children were given oral polio vaccines, which have a weakened live poliovirus, and they might keep shedding the virus for the rest of their lives.

We must now think about stopping polio recurrence, by integrating polio prevention into immunization systems. The WHO's Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE) meeting in October 2021, acknowledged that "countries have different epidemiological risks and supported the use of injectable polio vaccine (IPV)-only schedules in countries in polio-free regions with high routine immunization coveragethat decide to withdraw bivalent oral polio vaccine (OPV) before certification of eradication."

As routine immunization systems are under stress, the SAGE said that, once adequate supplies are available, countries could consider adopting hexavalent (six-in-one) vaccines, as soon as they decide to modernize their Expanded Programme on Immunization, by increasing the IPV regimen from two to three or more doses. Hexavalent vaccines can reduce the number of injections, making vaccination more acceptable to parents.

In South Africa, where hexavalent vaccines are used, 86 percent of caregivers felt that three or more injections in a single visit were excessive for their children. Recently a South African expert told us that improvements in uptake translate into increased vaccine coverage. GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, has a planning process through 2022 and 2023, on how to incorporate hexavalent vaccines into its programs.

Countries in Europe and North America have all been using combination vaccines for several years. But most countries currently using oral polio vaccines rely on a different type of combination vaccinea whole-cell vaccine, to prevent pertussis, or whooping cough. These combination vaccines have complex manufacturing processes and are challenging to formulate.

Future shortages of combination vaccines, and probably of the IPV containing combination vaccine, seem highly likely, as confirmed through an independent modeling exercise. It takes five years or more, from planning to the first vials of a vaccine being shipped; and much longer for producers to recoup the large investments required. Yet, most vaccine purchases are made on shorter tenders, with uncertainty about demand.

Without some guarantee of future demand for combination vaccines in the post-polio era, vaccine producers are unlikely to invest now. That is true even of the biggest vaccine developers, and more so for emerging producers in Africa and Asia. Policymakers see these as crucial to future health security in geographies that may not have access to vaccines produced out of traditional hubs.

We are both part of a group called RISERoutine Immunization to Secure Eradicationthat brings together experts in infectious diseases, supply chain management, financing and policymaking. At a recent meeting, we agreed to work with the polio community to develop an "advance guarantee mechanism" to give producers the assurances they need to invest now. Over the next few months, we will be consulting and working to propose a mechanism that finance institutions, donors and implementing countries can adopt.

Among the lessons from COVID-19 is that the world has to plan better to deal with infectious diseases. Polio is one of humanity's oldest foes. Extraordinarily brave immunization workers have almost wiped it out. We must plan now to make sure that it can never come back.

Explore further Lessons we can learn from polio vaccination campaigns

More information: Kate Causey et al, Estimating global and regional disruptions to routine childhood vaccine coverage during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020: a modelling study, The Lancet (2021). Journal information: The Lancet Kate Causey et al, Estimating global and regional disruptions to routine childhood vaccine coverage during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020: a modelling study,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(21)01337-4

Provided by SciDev.Net
Dual y-axis chart demonstrating the total number of codes per theme (blue bar chart) and the proportion of caregivers who discussed an issue within the theme (red line chart) among caregivers of individuals with childhood glaucoma. Credit: Ophthalmology Glaucoma (2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.ogla.2022.02.005

Even with more advanced treatments and early intervention, caregivers of young people living with childhood glaucoma face profound challenges with no cure or way to reverse the damageand always facing the prospect of their child losing their sight.

The new Flinders University study found high levels of anxiety, fear and initial shock among caregivers, some of whom have been diagnosed with genetic glaucoma themselves.

Childhood glaucoma describes a group of rare conditions affecting approximately 1 in 30,000 children across Australia. It is largely a genetic condition, with almost 40% receiving a genetic diagnosis.

"At the start, diagnosis of the childhood condition (at birth or up to 18 years) can be stressful or traumatic experience for caregivers," says ophthalmology researcher Lachlan Knight in his Ph.D. study of 35 primary caregivers of childhood glaucoma cases.

"Caregivers face a number of psycho-social wellbeing risksfrom feelings of guilt and regret about their child's delayed diagnosis to fear and anxiety related to medical and social support, and later loss of control as their child develops medical autonomy," he says in an article in Ophthalmology Glaucoma

"This study raises concerns for caregivers' quality of life, even though many of them develop positive coping strategies to manage their responsibilities."

Study participants are quoted as saying: "When she was born and got the diagnosis  I kind of shut off from her. It was too painful  " and "I felt very helpless because I couldn't get answer to questions  Would she have any eyesight after all this was over?"

More support and strategies for managing caregiver burden are required, including social as well as medical support, the South Australian researchers say, adding a diagnosis could affect families' family planning decisions.

Genetic counseling was sought by 57% of caregivers to understand their risk of passing on any genetic variants that may cause glaucoma in their child.

Seeking social and professional support groups and systems was the most common strategy, commencing with help from partners and parents, and also through open communications with their child and friends about their experiences.

Along with guilt, some caregivers expressed frustration at lack of awareness and knowledge of childhood glaucoma from health care professionals or peers. Almost half of respondents spoke of feeling overprotective of their child's health, regardless of the age of the child or vision status.

Explore further New glaucoma test 15 times more likely to detect high risk patients

More information: Lachlan S.W. Knight et al, The Caregiver Experience in Childhood Glaucoma, Ophthalmology Glaucoma (2022). Lachlan S.W. Knight et al, The Caregiver Experience in Childhood Glaucoma,(2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.ogla.2022.02.005
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

When should patients and family members undergo genetic assessment for a heart condition? Find out in an international consensus document published in EP Europace, a journal of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) and presented at EHRA 2022, a scientific congress of the ESC.

"This is now the reference document that all clinicians should use to decide whether genetic testing is indicated for patients with inherited cardiac diseases and their relatives," said lead author Professor Arthur Wilde of the Academic Medical Centre, Amsterdam University Medical Centres, the Netherlands. "We provide strict criteria on who should be assessed and recommend which genes should be examined."

The aim of genetic testing in patients with an inherited cardiac disease is to determine the cause. In some conditions this helps clinicians make a precise diagnosis, provides information about prognosis, and determines the treatment. For example in long QT syndrome, which is potentially lethal but treatable, a normal electrocardiogram (ECG) does not exclude the condition and genetic testing is required to clarify the diagnosis. The specific genetic variant impacts both prognosis and therapeutic choices.

Once a genetic cause is identified in the patient, family members, including children, can be screened. The document outlines in which conditions relatives should receiving genetic testing. In long QT syndrome, for example, family members should be tested. "Many of these conditions start with a cardiac arrest in a young individual who dies or almost dies," said Professor Wilde. "The way to avoid that happening in a family members is by genetic testing in conjunction with clinical screening. Those who are affected can be treated, for example with medications or with a defibrillator to correct a fatal heart rhythm, and those who are unaffected can be reassured."

Genetic counselling is essential and should start even before clinical and genetic testing are performed. A diagnosis can be life-changing as it "may provoke significant anxiety or aggressive treatment", states the document. Professor Wilde said that the consequences of a positive diagnosis should be explained before any examinations. "For instance, if an individual has no symptoms but his or her sibling has a serious inherited cardiac disease, the first question should be 'do you want to know whether you have this condition, yes or no?'," he said. "A diagnosis may trigger difficulties with insurance, getting a mortgage, and so on. He or she needs to be informed before making any decisions."

The paper provides recommendations on genetic testing for four groups of heart conditions caused by genetic defects: inherited arrhythmia syndromes, cardiomyopathies, sudden cardiac death or survivors of unexplained cardiac arrest, and congenital heart disease. The most common of these is hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which affects at least one in 500 individuals.

The chapter on congenital heart disease also provides detailed advice on genetic testing in pregnant women and offspring. Professor Wilde said: "This is a rapidly moving field and genetic testing is recommended for conditions in which there is a high likelihood of identifying the cause. As for all genetic cardiac conditions, testing for congenital heart defects should be coordinated by cardiologists and clinical genetics specialists with support from genetic counsellors."

In addition to conditions caused by single genetic defects, the authors describe how genetics can play a role in the manifestation of more common heart conditions such as coronary artery disease and heart failure. Professor Wilde explained: "These conditions are not caused by one genetic variant but in some patients there is a genetic component. Researchers are investigating how the combination of frequently occurring genetic variants may cause or influence susceptibility to disease. This is an emerging field and it is too early to make recommendations."

The international consensus statement on genetic testing for cardiac diseases was developed by the European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA), a branch of the ESC; the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS); the Asia Pacific Heart Rhythm Society (APHRS); and the Latin American Heart Rhythm Society (LAHRS).3 It is also published in Heart Rhythm, the official journal of the HRS, Journal of Arrhythmia, the official journal of the APHRS, and Journal of Interventional Cardiac Electrophysiology, the official journal of the LAHRS.

Explore further Advice to prevent consequences of interference in cardiac device patients published today
A sales clerk holds a pistol during an auction in Rochester, Wash., on Oct. 20, 2017. A study published in Annals of Internal Medicine on Monday, April 4, 2022, suggests people who live with handgun owners are murdered at more than twice the rate of people who live in homes without such firearms. Credit: AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File

Most U.S. gun owners say they own firearms to protect themselves and their loved ones, surveys show. But a study published Monday suggests people who live with handgun owners are shot to death at a higher rate than those who don't have such weapons at home.

"We found zero evidence of any kind of protective effects" from living in a home with a handgun, said David Studdert, a Stanford University researcher who was the lead author of the Annals of Internal Medicine study.

The study has several shortcomings. For example, the researchers said they could not determine which victims were killed by the handgun owners or with the in-home weapons. They couldn't account for illegal guns and looked only at handguns, not rifles or other firearms.

The dataset also was limited to registered voters in California who were 21 and older. It's not clear that the findings are generalizable to the whole state, let alone to the rest of the country, the authors acknowledged.

But some outside experts said the work was well done, important and the largest research of its kind.

"I would call this a landmark study," said Cassandra Crifasi, a gun violence policy researcher at Johns Hopkins University. "This contributes to our understanding of the potential causal relationship between guns in the home and homicides," she said.

California is unusual in that it offers gun ownership data and other information not obtainable in almost any other state. That allowed the researchers to follow millions of people over many years to try to better establish what happens when a person begins living in a home with handgun, they said.

The study focused on nearly 600,000 Californians who did not own handguns but began living in homes with handguns between October 2004 and December 2016either because they started living with someone who owned one or because someone in their household bought one.

The researchers calculated that for every 100,000 people in that situation, 12 will be shot to death by someone else over five years. In comparison, eight out of 100,000 who live in gun-free homes will be killed that way over the same time span.

"The rates are low" and the absolute risk is small, but it's important to consider the increase in a person's risk of being killed, Studdert said.

Those numbers suggest the risk rises 50%, but Studdert said it's actually higher: In a separate calculation designed to better account for where people live and other factors, the researchers estimated the risk was actually more than twice as high.

Separately, the researchers found that those who lived with handgun owners had a much higher rate of being fatally shot by a spouse or intimate partner. The vast majority of such victims84%were women, they said.

The study was confined to California, but the risk is likely even greater in states with less stringent gun laws and where gun ownership is more common, Crifasi said.

Previous research estimated that nearly 3% of U.S. adults became new gun owners between January 2019 and April 2021, which translates to about 7.5 million Americans. Of those, about 5.4 million previously lived in a home with no guns.

For decades, studies have shown guns in the home raise the risk of a violent death. Much of that work, including an earlier study by Studdert and his colleagues, focused on suicide.

The new study goes further in addressing the perception that handguns are still worthwhile because of the safety they provide against being murdered, some experts said.

"The reason people have guns in their home is for protection from strangers," said David Hemenway, director of the Harvard University's Injury Control Research Center. "But what this is showing that having a gun in the home is bad for people in the home."

Explore further When a handgun is in the home, suicide risk quickly rises

More information: David M. Studdert et al, Homicide Deaths Among Adult Cohabitants of Handgun Owners in California, 2004 to 2016, Annals of Internal Medicine (2022). DOI: 10.7326/M21-3762. David M. Studdert et al, Homicide Deaths Among Adult Cohabitants of Handgun Owners in California, 2004 to 2016,(2022). DOI: 10.7326/M21-3762. www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M21-3762 Christine Laine, Firearm Injury in the United States: Time to Confront It as the Epidemic It Has Become, Annals of Internal Medicine (2022). DOI: 10.7326/M22-0865. www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M22-0865 Journal information: Annals of Internal Medicine

 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

New results from the North American COVID-19 STEMI (NACMI) registry reported a 25% reduction in early mortality in year 2021 compared to 2020 among patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) and COVID-19 infection and zero deaths for patients vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2. STEMI is a severe heart attack that that affects the heart's lower chambers when the artery to the heart is completely blocked.

The NACMI registry is a collaboration between SCAI, the American College of Cardiology (ACC) and the Canadian Association of Interventional Cardiology. The registry was established in 2020 with the aim to define baseline characteristics and management strategies and outcome data for COVID+ patients presenting with STEMI. Sixty-four medical centers across North America and Canada contributed data to the registry. In the initial findings, it was reported that 33% of North American patients with both COVID-19 and a STEMI died in the hospital.

In the current study, patients who in 2020 were positive for COVID-19 and had experienced a STEMI were compared with patients treated in 2021 who had received vaccination against SARS-CoV-2.

586 patients were examined, 227 who were treated in 2020 before vaccinations were made available and 359 in 2021 after emergency use authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Of the patient population, more than 70% were male and nearly 75% were aged 55 and over. Close to 70% had high blood pressure and nearly 45% were diabetic. Comparative to 2020, the proportion of Caucasian patients was higher, and patients presented more frequently with typical ischemic symptoms.

When looking at outcomes in 2021, the research team found that survival was significantly better when compared to 2020 with mortality dropping from 33% in 2020 to 23% in 2021. Also, patients treated in 2021 who were vaccinated were less likely to experience sever respiratory illness and of significant note, there were no hospital deaths among the population, while patients were unvaccinated experience a higher death rate (22%).

"The management and outcomes of STEMI patients with COVID-19 infection during the pandemic is evolving towards that of STEMI patients prior to the pandemic although mortality remains high for unvaccinated patients," stated Santiago Garcia, MD, lead author of the study.

"NACMI is a unique collaboration between SCAI, ACC, and CAIC that has allowed us to develop the largest registry of STEMI in patients with COVID-19 in the world," said Timothy D. Henry, MD, president of SCAI and study chair. "The unique insights from NACMI enable us to improve care for these high-risk patients."

Dr. Garcia will present the results during the ACC.22 Scientific Sessions and the full study is now available in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC).

Explore further International COVID registry finds inequities in heart attack outcomes based on ethnicity

More information: Santiago Garcia et al, Trends in Clinical Characteristics, Management Strategies and Outcomes of STEMI Patients with COVID-19

Original Investigations, J Am Coll Cardiol. (2022). Journal information: Journal of the American College of Cardiology Santiago Garcia et al, Trends in Clinical Characteristics, Management Strategies and Outcomes of STEMI Patients with COVID-19Original Investigations,(2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.jacc.2022.03.345
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Many people have felt the sudden and uncontrollable urge to eat a certain food. These urgesknown as cravingsare very common, mostly during pregnancy. At this stage, the mother's body undergoes a series of physiological and behavioral changes to create a favorable environment for the embryo's development. However, the frequent consumption of tasty and high calorie foodsderived from the cravingscontributes to weight gain and obesity in pregnancy, which can have negative effects on the baby's health.

"There are many myths and popular beliefs regarding these cravings, although the neuronal mechanisms that cause them are not widely known," notes March Claret, lecturer at the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences of the University of Barcelona and head of the IDIBAPS Neuronal Control of Metabolism Group. Claret leads, together with the researcher Roberta Haddad-Tovolli, a study published in the journal Nature Metabolism that provides new evidence on the alterations of the neuronal activity that drive cravings in an animal model.

Dopamine and compulsive eating behavior

According to the results, during pregnancy, the brain of female mice undergoes changes in the functional connections of the brain reward circuits, as well as the taste and sensorimotor centers. Moreover, just like pregnant women, female mice are more sensitive to sweet food, and they develop binge-eating behaviors towards high calorie foods. "The alteration of these structures made us explore the mesolimbic pathway, one of the signal transmission pathways of dopaminergic neurons. Dopamine is a key neurotransmitter in motivational behaviors," notes Claret, member of the Department of Medicine of the UB and the Diabetes and Associated Metabolic Diseases Networking Biomedical Research Centre (CIBERDEM).

The team observed the levels of dopamineand the activity of its receptor, D2Rto increase in the nucleus accumbens, a brain region involved in the reward circuit. "This finding suggests that the pregnancy induces a full reorganization of the mesolimbic neural circuits through the D2R neurons," notes Haddad-Tovolli. "These neuronal cellsand their alterationwould be responsible for the cravings, since food anxiety, typical during pregnancy, disappeared after blocking their activity."

The team led by Claret and Haddad-Tovolli showed that persistent cravings have consequences for the offspring. They affect the metabolism and development of neural circuits that regulate food intake, which leads to weight gain, anxiety and eating disorders. "These results are shocking, since many of the studies are focused on the analysis of how the mother's permanent habitssuch as obesity, malnutrition, or chronic stressaffect the health of the baby. However, this study indicates that short but recurrent behaviors, such as cravings, are enough to increase the psychological and metabolic vulnerability of the offspring," concludes Claret.

The conclusions of the study could contribute to the improvement of nutritional guidelines for pregnant women in order to ensure a proper prenatal nutrition and prevent the development of diseases. Among the participants in the study were Guadalupe Soria and Emma Munoz-Moreno (IDIBAPS), Analia Bortolozzi (IIBB-CSIC-IDIBAPS) and Emmanuel Valjent (INSERM and University of Montpelier).

Explore further Study finds links between circadian rhythms, metabolism and addiction

More information: Roberta Haddad-Tovolli, Food craving-like episodes during pregnancy are mediated by accumbal dopaminergic circuits, Nature Metabolism (2022). www.nature.com/articles/s42255-022-00557-1 Journal information: Nature Metabolism Roberta Haddad-Tovolli, Food craving-like episodes during pregnancy are mediated by accumbal dopaminergic circuits,(2022). DOI: 10.1038/s42255-022-00557-1
A newly identified set of protein biomarkers could allow breast cancer screening in breast milk or blood serum. Credit: Danielle Whitham, Clarkson University

A simple blood test for women of all ages and risk levels could one day be possible thanks to a new set of protein biomarkers that researchers identified using breast milk.

"Although mammograms are a useful tool for catching breast cancer early, they aren't typically recommended for low-risk women under 40," said Danielle Whitham, a doctoral candidate at Clarkson University in New York. "Because the biomarkers we found in breast milk are also detectable in blood serum, screening could potentially be done in women of any age using blood or breast milk."

The newly identified biomarkers are for a specific type of cancer called invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC), one of the most common types of breast cancers. However, the researchers say that their approach could be used to identify biomarkers for other types of breast cancer.

"If our future studies are successful, it could change how women are monitored for breast cancer and aid in earlier diagnosis," said Whitham. "This could even lead to a higher survival rate in women."

Whitham will present the research at the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology annual meeting during the Experimental Biology (EB) 2022 meeting, to be held April 25 in Philadelphia.

"We used breast milk because it contains proteins, epithelial cells and immune cells, all of which provide a great deal of information about what is happening in a woman's body during a crucial time in breast development," said Whitham.

For the study, breast milk samples were obtained from three women diagnosed with breast cancer and three women without cancer. Using liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry, the researchers compared the relative levels of certain proteins between the two groups to identify differences in the women with cancer. The analysis revealed 23 proteins that were dysregulated. All the proteins that showed differences were previously shown to play a role in cancer or tumor development.

Now that the researchers have identified a biomarker set, they plan to confirm it with a larger group of women. Then, they will test the protein biomarkers' applicability in blood serum. If those tests are successful, a blood test could be developed to be used on women of any age to monitor protein changes for detection of breast cancer.

Explore further Antioxidant, inflammation levels may reveal new diagnostic tool for breast cancer

Provided by Experimental Biology
Transmission electron micrograph of SARS-CoV-2 virus particles, isolated from a patient. Image captured and color-enhanced at the NIAID Integrated Research Facility (IRF) in Fort Detrick, Maryland. Credit: NIAID

A new animal study has provided important insights into how COVID-19 SARS-CoV-2the virus responsible for COVID-19can lead to long-term pain. The new findings also point to a potential therapy for COVID-related pain.

"A significant number of people suffering from long COVID experience sensory abnormalities, including various forms of pain," said Randal (Alex) Serafini, an MD/Ph.D. candidate from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. "We used RNA sequencing to get a snapshot of the biochemical changes SARS-CoV-2 triggers in a pain-transmitting structure called dorsal root ganglia."

Using a hamster model of SARS-CoV-2 infection, the researchers found that infection left a gene expression signature in the dorsal root ganglia that remained even after the virus cleared. The signature matched gene expression patterns seen in pain caused by other conditions.

Serafini will present the new research at the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics annual meeting during the Experimental Biology (EB) 2022 meeting, to be held April 25 in Philadelphia.

"Our findings could potentially lead to new therapies for patients suffering from acute and long COVID, as well as other pain conditions," said Serafini. "Our study also shows that SARS-CoV-2 causes long-term effects on the body in drastically new ways, further underscoring why people should try to avoid being infected."

The experiments involved a hamster model of intranasal COVID-19 infection that closely reflects symptoms experienced by people. The researchers observed that SARS-CoV-2-infected hamsters showed a slight hypersensitivity to touch early after infection, which became more severe over time, up to 30 days. They then performed similar experiments with the Influenza A virus to determine if other RNA viruses promote similar responses.

In contrast to SARS-CoV-2, Influenza A caused an early hypersensitivity that was more severe but faded by four days post-infection. Analysis of gene expression patterns in the dorsal root ganglia revealed that SARS-CoV-2 caused a more prominent change in expression levels of genes implicated in neuron-specific signaling processes compared to influenza.

Additional experiments showed that four weeks after recovering from viral infection, flu-infected hamsters had no signs of long-term hypersensitivity while SARS-CoV-2-infected hamsters showed worsened hypersensitivity, reflecting chronic pain. The hamsters that had recovered from SARS-CoV-2 had gene expression signatures similar to those seen in the dorsal root ganglia of mice affected by pain that was induced by inflammation or nerve injury.

To dive deeper into the molecular machinery associated with altered sensation in SARS-CoV-2-infected infected hamsters, the researchers applied bioinformatic analyses to the gene expression data they had obtained. The analysis predicted that SARS-CoV-2 downregulates the activity of several previously identified pain regulators and a protein called interleukin enhancer binding factor 3 (ILF3).

This downregulation occurs at times when pain behaviors in SARS-CoV-2-infected hamsters were very mild, despite heavy systemic inflammation. In contrast, Influenza A-induced hypersensitivity was severe at these timepoints. ILF3 has not yet been studied in the context of pain but is a potent cancer regulator.

Based on these findings, the researchers hypothesized that mimicking the acute effects of ILF3 could serve as a new pain treatment strategy. To test this prediction, the researchers administered a clinically tested anti-cancer drug that inhibits ILF3 activity. They found that it was indeed very effective at treating pain in a mouse model of localized inflammation.

"We think therapeutic candidates derived from our gene expression data, such as ILF3 inhibitors, could potentially target pain mechanisms that are specific to COVID patients, both acutely and chronically," said Serafini. "Interestingly, we saw a few cancer-associated proteins come up as predicted pain targets, which is exciting because many drugs have already been developed to act against some of these proteins and have been clinically tested. If we can repurpose these drugs, it could drastically cut down therapeutic development timeline."

The researchers are working to identify other compounds that could be repurposed while also keeping an eye out for novel compounds that might inhibit ILF3 activity.

Explore further Researchers find COVID-19 virus causing testicular damage and atrophy

Provided by Experimental Biology
Comparisons of wet tumor masses between sedentary (SED) and treadmill (TM) exercised tumor (+T) bearing mice. Credit: Louisa Tichy, University of North Carolina at Greensboro

A new study has identified yet another benefit of keeping up your exercise routine. In experiments performed with mice, researchers found that exercising prior to developing cancer was associated with slower tumor growth and helped reduce the effects of a cancer complication known as wasting syndrome, or cachexia.

Cachexia is a metabolic wasting disorder that affects up to 80% of patients with advanced cancer and is associated with about a third of all deaths from cancer. People with cachexia experience severe progressive muscle wasting, a decline in heart structure and function and an overall poorer quality of life.

"Most exercise, especially aerobic exercise, is easily accessible and affordable," said Louisa Tichy, a graduate student in Traci Parry's lab at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. "Therefore, engaging in consistent aerobic exercise such as running is a cost-effective way to reduce the risk of cancer and cancer complications."

Tichy will present the new research at the American Society for Investigative Pathology annual meeting during the Experimental Biology (EB) 2022 meeting, to be held April 25 in Philadelphia.

Previous research has shown that exercise could have anti-inflammatory effects and might positively impact cancer cachexia by slowing its development and preserving cardiac structure and function. However, very few studies have focused on preconditioning.

Tumor volume comparison between sedentary (SED) and treadmill (TM) exercised tumor (+T) bearing mice. Credit: Louisa Tichy, University of North Carolina at Greensboro

"Our preclinical study indicated that preconditioningor exercise prior to tumor bearing appears to play an important cardioprotective role during cancer cachexia by preserving cardiac structure and function," said Tichy. "It also helped stunt tumor growth, even when animals did not exercise during the tumor-bearing period."

For the new study, the researchers studied mice that either exercised on a treadmill for eight weeks or did not perform any exercise. After the eight weeks, the researchers induced cancer in some of the exercised mice and some sedentary mice while keeping some mice from both groups cancer-free to act as controls.

The researchers found that mice with cancer and a sedentary lifestyle had poorer heart functionas measured with echocardiographythan the mice that exercised prior to cancer induction. Also, mice in the exercised group had a smaller tumor volume and a 60% smaller tumor mass than mice in the sedentary group.

Comparison of fractional shortening as a measure of cardiac function between sedentary (SED) and treadmill (TM) exercised with (+T) or without (+NT) tumors. Credit: Louisa Tichy, University of North Carolina at Greensboro

"This data is crucial in identifying the significance of exercise and the best timing of exercise as a protective and preventative measure against the detrimental effects of cancer cachexia," said Tichy.

The researchers are working to understand the underlying proteins and pathways that are affected by cancer and exercise so that this information can be used to inform exercise interventions. They also point out that creating safe and effective exercise interventions for cancer patients would require evaluating the best intensity, duration and timing of exercise in preclinical models before moving to studies in people.

Explore further Investigating the effect of iron supplementation on skeletal muscle atrophy in cancer patients

More information: 689.9 - Cardioprotective Effects of Preconditioning Exercise in the Female Tumor-Bearing Mouse, Experimental Biology (EB) 2022, 689.9 - Cardioprotective Effects of Preconditioning Exercise in the Female Tumor-Bearing Mouse, Experimental Biology (EB) 2022, www.eventscribe.net/2022/EB202  =Tichy&mode=presinfo

Provided by Experimental Biology
Harry Bruell holds a framed photo of his daughter, Taya, while sitting for a photo in his office in Santa Barbara, Calif., Wednesday, March 9, 2022. Taya killed herself when she was 14. Taya killed herself when she was 14. Taya was a bright, precocious student who had started struggling with mental health issues at about 11, according to her father. At the time, the family lived in Boulder, Colorado where Taya was hospitalized at one point for psychiatric care but kept up the trappings of a model student. Credit: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong

As Benito Luna-Herrera teaches his seventh-grade social studies classes, he is on alert for signs of inner turmoil. And there is so much of it these days.

One of his 12-year-old students felt her world was falling apart. Distance learning had upended her friendships. Things with her boyfriend were verging on violent. Her home life was stressful. "I'm just done with it," the girl told Luna-Herrera during the pandemic, and shared a detailed plan to kill herself.

Another student was typically a big jokester and full of confidence. But one day she told him she didn't want to live anymore. She, too, had a plan in place to end her life.

Luna-Herrera is just one teacher, in one Southern California middle school, but stories of students in distress are increasingly common around the country. The silver lining is that special training helped him know what to look for and how to respond when he saw the signs of a mental emergency.

Since the pandemic started, experts have warned of a mental health crisis facing American children. That is now playing out at schools in the form of increased childhood depression, anxiety, panic attacks, eating disorders, fights and thoughts of suicide at alarming levels, according to interviews with teachers, administrators, education officials and mental health experts.

Benito Luna, a 7th-grade social studies teacher at California City Middle School, poses for a photo outside the California City Middle School in California City, Calif., on Friday, March 11, 2022. Since the pandemic started, experts have warned of a mental health crisis facing American children that is now visibly playing out at schools across the country. Credit: AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes

In low-income areas, where adverse childhood experiences were high before the pandemic, the crisis is even more acute and compounded by a shortage of school staff and mental health professionals.

Luna-Herrera, who teaches in a high poverty area of the Mojave Desert, is among a small but growing number of California teachers to take a course called Youth Mental Health First Aid. It teaches adults how to spot warning signs of mental health risks and substance abuse in children, and how to prevent a tragedy.

The California Department of Education funds the program for any school district requesting it, and the pandemic has accelerated moves to make such courses a requirement. The training program is operated by the National Council for Mental Wellbeing and available in every state.

"I don't want to read about another teenager where there were warning signs and we looked the other way," said Sen. Anthony Portantino, author of a bill that would require all California middle and high schools to train at least 75% of employees in behavioral health. "Teachers and school staff are on the front lines of a crisis, and need to be trained to spot students who are suffering."

Experts say while childhood depression and anxiety had been on the rise for years, the pandemic's unrelenting stress and grief amplified the problems, particularly for those already experiencing mental health issues who were cut off from counselors and other school resources during distance learning.

Harry Bruell, left, and wife, Jenny, hold hands while chatting in their home in Santa Barbara, Calif., Wednesday, March 9, 2022. Their daughter, Taya, killed herself when she was 14. Taya was a bright, precocious student who had started struggling with mental health issues at about 11, according to her father. At the time, the family lived in Boulder, Colorado where Taya was hospitalized at one point for psychiatric care but kept up the trappings of a model student. Credit: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong

For children, the issues with distance learning were not just academic, said Sharon Hoover, professor of child psychiatry at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and co-director of the National Center for School Mental Health.

Child abuse and and neglect increased during the pandemic, according to Hoover. For children in troubled homes, with alcoholic or abusive parents, distance learning meant they had no escape. Those who lacked technology or had spotty internet connections were isolated even more than their peers and fell further behind academically and socially.

Many children bounced back after the extended isolation, but for others it will take longer, and mental health problems often lag a stressor.

"We can't assume that 'OK we're back in school, it's been a few months and now everyone should be back to normal.' That is not the case," said Hoover.

Returning to school after months of isolation intensified the anxiety for some children. Teachers say students have greater difficulty focusing, concentrating, sitting still and many need to relearn how to socialize and resolve conflicts face-to-face after prolonged immersion in screens.

An unidentified student rests on his desk as the Mojave Unified School District Superintendent Katherine Aguirre, center rear, addresses students before their spring break at California City Middle School in California City, Calif., on Friday, March 11, 2022. Since the pandemic started, experts have warned of a mental health crisis facing American children that is now visibly playing out at schools across the country. Credit: AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes

Kids expected to pick up where they left off but some found friendships, and their ability to cope with social stress, had changed. Educators say they also see a concerning increase in apathyabout grades, how students treat each other and themselvesand a lot less empathy.

"I have never seen kids be so mean to each other in my life," said Terrin Musbach, who trains teachers in mental health awareness and other social-emotional programs at the Del Norte Unified School District, a high-poverty district in rural Northern California. "There's more school violence, there's more vaping, there's more substance abuse, there's more sexual activity, there's more suicide ideation, there's more of every single behavior that we would be worried about in kids."

Many states have mandated teacher training on suicide prevention over the last decade and the pandemic prompted some to broaden the scope to include mental health awareness and supporting behavioral health needs.

But school districts nationwide also say they need more psychologists and counselors. The Hopeful Futures Campaign, a coalition of national mental health organizations, last month published a report that found most states are struggling with mental health support in schools. Only Idaho and the District of Columbia exceed the nationally recommended ratio of one psychologist per 500 students.

In some states, including West Virginia, Missouri, Texas and Georgia, there is only one school psychologist for over 4,000 students, the report says. Similarly, few states meet the goal of one counselor per 250 students.

Harry Bruell looks at photos of his daughter, Taya, saved in his smartphone while sitting for a photo in his office in Santa Barbara, Calif., Wednesday, March 9, 2022. Taya killed herself when she was 14. Credit: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong

President Joe Biden has proposed $1 billion in new federal funding to help schools hire more counselors and psychologists and bolster suicide prevention programs. That followed a rare pubic advisory in December from U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy on "the urgent need to address the nation's youth mental health crisis."

In early 2021, emergency room visits in the U.S. for suspected suicide attempts were 51% higher for adolescent girls and 4% higher for adolescent boys compared to the same period in 2019, according to research cited in the advisory.

Since California began offering the Youth Mental Health First Aid course in 2014, more than 8,000 teachers, administrators and school staff have been trained, said Monica Nepomuceno, who oversees mental health programming at the California Department of Education.

She said much more needs to be done in the country's largest state, which employs over 600,000 K-12 staff at schools.

The course helps distinguish typical adolescent ways of dealing with stressslamming doors, crying, bursts of angerfrom warning signs of mental distress, which can be blatant or subtle.

Taya Bruell's journal that she kept as part of her literature class assignment is photographed in Santa Barbara, Calif., Wednesday, March 9, 2022. Taya was assigned to keep a journal. In it, she drew a disturbing portrait that showed self-harm and wrote about how much she hated her body and was hearing voices she wanted to silence. Her teacher read the assignment and wrote: "Taya, very thorough journal. I loved reading the entries. A+" Three months later in February 2016, Taya killed herself. Credit: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong

Red flags include when a child talks about dying or suicide, but can be more nuanced like: "I can't do this anymore," or "I'm tired of this," said Tramaine El-Amin, a spokesperson for the National Council for Mental Wellbeing. More than 550,000 K-12 educators across the country have taken the Youth Mental Health First Aid course since it launched in 2012, she said.

Changes in behavior could be cause for concerna child who stops a sport or activity they were passionate about without replacing it with another one; a typically put together child who starts to look regularly unkempt; a student whose grades plummet or who stops handing in homework; a child who eats lunch alone and has stopped palling around with their friends.

After noticing something might be wrong, the course teaches the next step is to ask the student without pressuring or casting judgment and letting them know you care and want to help.

"Sometimes an adult can ask a question that causes more harm than good," said Luna-Herrera, the social studies teacher at California City Middle School, a two-hour drive into the desert from Los Angeles.

He took the course in spring 2021 and two weeks later put it to use. It was during distance learning and a student had failed to show up for online tutoring but he spotted her chatting online on the school's distance learning platform, having a heated dispute with her then-boyfriend. Luna reached out to her privately.

Mojave Unified School District Superintendent Katherine Aguirre, left, and Benito Luna, a 7th-grade social studies teacher, meet with his students at California City Middle School in California City, Calif., on Friday, March 11, 2022. Since the pandemic started, experts have warned of a mental health crisis facing American children that is now visibly playing out at schools across the country. Credit: AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes

"I asked her if she was OK," he said. Little by little, the girl told Luna-Herrera about problems with friends and her boyfriend and problems at home that left her feeling alone and desperately unanchored.

The course tells adults to ask open-ended questions that keep the conversation going, and not to project themselves into an adolescent's problems with comments like: "You'll be fine; It's not that bad; I went through that; Try to ignore it." What might seem trivial to an adult can feel overwhelming for a young person, and failure to recognize that can be a conversation stopper.

The 12-year old told Luna-Herrera she had considered hurting herself. "Is that a recurring thought?" he asked, recalling how his heart started racing as she revealed her suicide plan.

Like CPR first-aid training, the course teaches how to handle a crisis: Raise the alarm and get expert help. Do not leave a person contemplating suicide alone. As Luna-Herrera continued talking to the girl, he texted his school superintendent, who got the principal on the line, they called 911 and police rushed to the home, where they spoke to the girl and her mother, who was startled and unaware.

"He absolutely saved that child's life," said Mojave Unified Superintendent Katherine Aguirre, who oversees the district of about 3,000 students, the majority of whom are Latino and Black children from economically disadvantaged families.

Mojave Unified School District Superintendent Katherine Aguirre, right, greets students before the spring break at the California City Middle School in California City, Calif., on Friday, March 11, 2022. Since the pandemic started, experts have warned of a mental health crisis facing American children that is now visibly playing out at schools across the country. Credit: AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes

Aguirre recognized the need for behavioral heath training early in the pandemic and through the Department of Education trained all of her employees, from teachers to yard supervisors and cafeteria workers.

"It's about awareness. And that Sandy Hook promise: If you see something, say something," she said.

That did not happen with 14-year-old Taya Bruell.

Taya was a bright, precocious student who had started struggling with mental health issues at about 11, according to her father, Harry Bruell. At the time, the family lived in Boulder, Colorado where Taya was hospitalized at one point for psychiatric care but kept up the trappings of a model student: She got straight As, was co-leader of her high school writing club and in her spare time taught senior citizens to use computers.

For a literature class, Taya was assigned to keep a journal. In it, she drew a disturbing portrait that showed self-harm and wrote about how much she hated her body and was hearing voices she wanted to silence.

Taya Bruell's pencil drawings of her face and self-harm are seen in her journal she kept as part of her literature class assignment in Santa Barbara, Calif., Wednesday, March 9, 2022. Taya killed herself when she was 14. After her death, Taya's parents discovered the journal in her room and brought it to the school, where they learned Taya's teacher had not informed the school counselor or administrators of what she had seen. They don't blame the teacher but will always wonder what if she had not ignored the signs of danger. Credit: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong

Harry Bruell, right, and wife, Jenny, sit for a photo with an urn containing the ashes of their daughter, Taya, in Santa Barbara, Calif., Wednesday, March 9, 2022. Taya killed herself when she was 14. Taya was a bright, precocious student who had started struggling with mental health issues at about 11, according to Bruell. At the time, the family lived in Boulder, Colorado where Taya was hospitalized at one point for psychiatric care but kept up the trappings of a model student. Credit: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong

Her teacher read the assignment and wrote: "Taya, very thorough journal. I loved reading the entries. A+"

Three months later in February 2016, Taya killed herself. After her death, Taya's parents discovered the journal in her room and brought it to the school, where they learned Taya's teacher had not informed the school counselor or administrators of what she had seen. They don't blame the teacher but will always wonder what if she had not ignored the signs of danger.

"I don't think the teacher wanted to hurt our daughter. I think she had no idea what to do when she read those stark warning signs in Taya's journal," said her father, who has since relocated with the family to Santa Barbara, California.

He believes legislation to require teacher training in behavioral health will save lives. "It teaches you to raise the alarm, and not just walk away, which is what happened to Taya."

Explore further Pandemic took a toll on teen mental health, US study says

 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Adolescents with severe obesity may not pursue metabolic bariatric surgery for weight loss due to lack of information, difficulties with access to care, and because of social stigma, according to a newly published study led by a University of Colorado School of Medicine researcher.

Eric G. Campbell, Ph.D., professor of medicine at the CU School of Medicine and director of research at the University of Colorado Center for Bioethics and Humanities, and his co-authors interviewed 14 young adults between the ages of 19 years and 25 years who underwent metabolic bariatric surgery in the past five years. The goal of the study was to better understand issues that prevented these young adults from undergoing the surgery while they were adolescents.

The study identified a general lack of information about the surgery, social stigma, and issues with costs as primary factors limiting access. The article was published in the journal Surgery for Obesity and Related Diseases on March 22.

"Reduced access to metabolic bariatric surgery for adolescents with severe obesity removes care that could dramatically improve their quality of life and reduce mortality," said Campbell. "Previous studies have shown that metabolic bariatric surgery is the most effective treatment for adolescents with severe obesity, so health care providers should make sure they are knowledgeable about this care option and recommend it in appropriate cases."

In the study, the young people who were interviewed described their experiences with health care providers. In some cases, their physicians did not discuss the possibility of metabolic bariatric surgery. "It was never offered to me under the age of 18," one interviewee said. "I never would have known it was an option for me."

According to Campbell: "Metabolic bariatric surgery is one part of the reasonable standard of care for adolescents with severe obesity and it is both unprofessional and unethical for health care providers to withhold this information from an adolescent who is a potential candidate."

Others described resistance to consideration of the surgery. Another study participant said: "A lot of people have the mindset that bariatric surgery is an easy way out. I don't know, I just think there's a stigma behind it." Another said their insurance declined to cover the costs of the care.

While the number of people interviewed for the study was small, an estimate of the number of youth in the United States with severe obesity is 4.5 million. Providing care to help those youths have healthier lives is critical because obesity in adolescence is strongly predictive of obesity in adulthood. The article cites another study that finds 77% of obese children ages 9-11 will remain obese as adults.

All but two of the authors on this study were affiliated with the University of Colorado School of Medicine at the time of the research. One of the authors, Thomas Inge, MD, Ph.D., is the country's foremost expert on metabolic bariatric surgery in adolescents and children. He was in Colorado when the research was conducted, and is now surgeon-in-chief at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago and professor of surgery and pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

According to Inge: "As our work shows, adolescents with severe obesity face many significant barriers to accessing metabolic bariatric surgery. It is essential that we as physicians actively address these barriers to a safe and effective treatment for the disease of severe obesity, which robs so many youth of their health, well-being, and years of life."

Explore further Bariatric surgery reverses low testosterone levels in male teens with obesity

More information: Eric G. Campbell et al, Barriers to Metabolic Bariatric Surgery in Adolescents: Results of a Qualitative Study, Surgery for Obesity and Related Diseases (2022). Eric G. Campbell et al, Barriers to Metabolic Bariatric Surgery in Adolescents: Results of a Qualitative Study,(2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.soard.2022.03.010
Densely populated places like New York City will implement vastly different guidelines on vastly different timelines than rural areas, where the virus spreads very differently. Credit: Fred Hsu via WikimediaCommons, CC BY-SA

No one gave a second thought to the safety of dining out before the pandemic. Fast-forward to today, and it's normal to wonder whether there is a city, state or federal policy around whether you need a mask or proof of vaccination to eat in a restaurant. The public policies around dining and many other activities have changed multiple times over the course of the pandemic. These rules are also often different from place to place. For millions of parents like my wife and me, the guidelines regarding children can be especially frustrating, as they seem to change constantly.

I am the former director of the University of Virginia's Center for Health Policy and a practicing surgeon. I have followed both the development and rapid implementation of public policy in response to COVID-19, and I, like many people, have struggled to stay up to date.

Typically, meaningful changes to federal health policy happen at a glacial pace. But the modern world has never faced a public health crisis that has changed as quickly as the pandemic. The constant back and forth of rules can be frustrating, but policy changes aren't usually a sign of mistakes. Rather, they show that for the most part, policymakers are getting things right over and over again.

Rapid changes require rapid responses

The continued evolution of the coronavirus and resultant public policy changes don't look like a normal public health crisis. It's happening like a hurricane.

The danger of a hurricane depends heavily on the strength and path of the storm, and these things can and do change unexpectedly. Government officials use the best evidence available to give general information or orders to take certain precautions, shelter in place or evacuate an area, all within a very narrow window of time. Sometimes evacuation orders for a town or region will be issued, only to have a hurricane strike elsewhere.

This virus has similarly changedand continues to changevery quickly. In a little over two years, researchers have found dozens of COVID-19 variants. Many of these have clinically important differences in their transmissibility, the severity of the illness they cause and the degree to which they are preventable and treatable with existing therapies.

When the coronavirus first emerged, health officials knew very little about it and did not have systems in place to track or predict its behavior; there was a hurricane approaching and the world had neither satellites nor weather models. But as epidemiologists and public health officials gained greater understanding of the virus, they quickly gained the ability to deploy effective countermeasures and adapt as the virus also changed.

University researchers and the pharmaceutical industry rapidly developed COVID-19 tests. Mask testing began at once. And as soon as scientists mapped the coronavirus's genome, work began to quickly use existing mRNA vaccine technologies to develop a vaccine in record time.

Public health done fast

With science and situations on the ground evolving rapidly, policymakers had no choice but to be equally as nimble. This has manifested in two unique ways.

First is the use of executive power. Both Presidents Trump and Bidenas well as a host of governors from coast to coasthave leveraged executive orders to shorten the time between the development and implementation of policies. Executive orders are also much easier to roll back or reinstate as coronavirus cases ebb and flow over time, and states in particular have relied on the ability to do this.

Second is the fast-tracking of drug and vaccine approvals. The normal process by which the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approves new drugs is slowusually around a 10-year process or so, depending on the treatment. Drug companies can use the FDA's emergency use authorization process to speed this up slightly, but not by very much. To shorten this process even more, the FDA created a fast-track program specifically intended to accelerate the approval of treatments and vaccines for COVID-19. As a result, it took less than a year for vaccines to get emergency use authorization from the discovery of the coronavirus.

Just as a hurricane response needs to adapt to conditions on the ground and implement the best available information at a moment's notice, so too has the pandemic response.

Different places, different policies

Hurricanes are intensely local and relatively short-lived. The pandemic is like dozens of different hurricanes repeatedly hitting all over the U.S. simultaneously. This has created a complicated web of policy that can and should be different depending on where you are and what bodies govern there.

The U.S. Congress, state governors, city mayors, departments of health and even local school boards have each needed to develop and implement policies for their own hurricanes at their own levels of control.

Despite its complexity, this approach to public policy is another example of getting it right over and over. New York City public health officials must respond to the unique situation in New York at any given time. These actions may be very different from the issues confronted by the mayor of Barstow, Californiaa far smaller, far more rural city. Local conditions require local solutions, all of which can evolve over time. This is very different from most other public health problems in the U.S. During flu season, for example, the correct response tends to be relatively similar from place to place.

Getting it right over and over again

I and many others have been guilty on occasion of thinking of policymakers as backpedaling when guidance changes back and forth or being inconsistent when one state makes a certain decision while another does something else. But I've come to appreciate that that isn't the correct framing.

As variants emerge, targeted policies to counteract the new reality follow in quick order. Reinstating mask requirements after they have been dropped or recommending additional vaccine doses between waves may seem like 180-degree course corrections. But in reality, these policy changes are the right reactions to the hurricane of COVID-19 that continues on its meandering path across the globe.

When the next change comes, I submit that you shouldn't be frustrated or angry. Rather, we should all applaud the fact that researchers and public health experts are getting it right over and over again.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

UK medical students are missing out on comprehensive abortion care education, amid highly variable curriculum provision and multiple barriers to effective teaching cited by their educators, finds research published online in BMJ Sexual & Reproductive Health.

Given how common the procedure is, to say nothing of its legal, ethical, and emotional complexities, it is essential that future doctors receive comprehensive education on abortion care, insist the researchers.

And whatever a doctor's personal cultural or religious beliefs, all doctors need to know about the clinical complications of abortion so they can treat patients effectively in an emergency, they add.

One in three women in the UK will have an abortion before the age of 45. And the importance of abortion education has been emphasised by several medical bodies, including the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, the Institute for Medical Ethics, and the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).

Because of its complex legal history in all four UK nations, and the attendant ethical issues, the researchers wanted to find out the extent to which abortion features in medical school curricula and the scope of the ethico-legal and clinical aspects of abortion teaching.

They sent two separate surveys to ethics leads and clinical curriculum leads in obstetrics and gynaecology, sexual health, and women's health at the 33 UK medical schools that were publicly funded as of February 2019.

The surveys were similar in structure, and both included time spent on teaching abortion, teaching methods, content, assessment, barriers to teaching, and desire for further guidance on teaching abortion care.

In all, 25 medical schools responded to at least one survey. Of these, six responded to both. Some 40% (13/32) of clinical surveys and 55% (18/33) of ethico-legal surveys were completed.

All ethico-legal survey respondents said their medical school provided compulsory education on ethical and legal aspects of abortion care. But this wasn't the case for clinical survey respondents, although most (85%) said that teaching on the clinical aspects of abortion care was compulsory.

One medical school provided optional clinical education, and one respondent stated that they didn't provide any clinical education as the procedure was illegal in their location at that time (Northern Ireland).

The number of hours spent on abortion teaching varied widely, ranging from less than 1 hour to more than 8 on ethico-legal aspects, and under 1 hour up to 5-6 hours on clinical aspects.

A period of 1-2 hours was the most commonly cited in each of the surveys: 9 (50%) ethico-legal respondents; 6 (46%) clinical respondents.

Lectures were the most popular teaching method while multiple-choice questions were the most popular format for assessments.

Some medical schools also assessed ethico-legal aspects of abortion in objective structured clinical examinations. But only around a third (31%; 4/13) of clinical leads indicated that abortion was included in clinical assessments.

"Students often establish the importance of a topic based on its value in assessments: if it is not assessed, it is deemed to be less important. This may also have negative implications for future service provision, as medical student exposure to a subject influences their career choices in later years," write the researchers..

All ethico-legal respondents said that their institution's teaching covered current UK law on abortion and doctors' right to conscientiously object to participating in abortion care.

Topics covered in clinical teaching were inconsistent among medical schools, however, with no single topic covered by all of them.

"Worryingly, this is likely to produce significantly different abortion-related knowledge among graduates from different institutions," warn the researchers.

More than half (56%) of ethico-legal curriculum leads felt they experienced barriers to delivering abortion teaching, particularly insufficient curriculum time and too few qualified or willing staff to teach it.

Most (85%) clinical respondents also reported experiencing barriers to teaching. Nearly half (45%) felt that abortion was a sensitive topic and that this acted as a barrier while nearly 1 in 5 (18%) had ethical concerns about teaching abortion.

Around three out of four respondents to each survey wanted further guidance on how best to teach abortion care.

"Open-access educational resources on abortion are available [eg Making Abortion Safe] and, if used, may help address some of the barriers cited by educators," point out the researchers.

"This, in turn, could improve the quality of abortion teaching in UK medical schools, equipping future doctors with the knowledge, attitudes and skills to treat people seeking abortions with confidence and respect," they conclude.

Explore further New study identifies small yet essential workforce providing abortions in the US

More information: Abortion education in UK medical schools: a survey of medical educators, BMJ Sexual & Reproductive Health (2022). Abortion education in UK medical schools: a survey of medical educators,(2022). DOI: 10.1136/bmjsrh-2021-201387
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

A colleague recently admitted on a morning Zoom call that she forgot how old she was. "No, really!" she said, wide-eyed and sincere. "I had to think about it and do the math."

Time and memory have gotten, well, a bit murky. For many, the pandemic has made days, even years, blur into one. The main culprit: the sameness of days, a hallmark of the coronavirus pandemic when many jobs went remote, we traveled a lot less, and our interactions with most people went digital. Your last birthday party might have been spent in a Zoom meeting with friends and family, in the same part of your house that doubles as your office.

"It might seem counterintuitive that your memory would be worse if you're doing less each day. If there's less that happens, then shouldn't that be easier to remember?" says Janice Chen, an assistant professor in Psychological and Brain Sciences at Johns Hopkins University's Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, and an expert on episodic memory. "But when every day has a lot of overlapping elements like being in the same room, having the same routine, talking to the same people, then the memories for these events or days interfere with each other, making memory worse. There are fewer unique cues to trigger your memory for one specific day or thing you did."

There's growing evidence of the COVID-19 pandemic's impact on our perception of time and memory, both past and future. A September 2021 study noted that 150 female first-year psychology students at an Italian university found a significant decrease in both working memory and prospective memory (intentions or future planning) during the prior year. And an ongoing study led by cognitive neuroscientist Donna Rose Addis at the University of Toronto has surveyed 735 people globally to determine what impact, if any, the pandemic has had on how people remember their past and envision their future. In May 2021, the participants were asked to recall an event they had described to researchers a year earlier. Seventy-five percent of people could recall the general idea of the event. They knew, for example, they went on a particular walk somewhere. But only half could remember fine level of detail, such as the weather that day or who they were with.

Nearly 70% of respondents felt their days were very similar, and that day-to-day sameness was associated with increased anxiety and depressive symptoms in people who had no previous history of depression. Those same people also saw their futures as more constrained. The more monotonous their days were, the more negative and less detailed their thoughts about the future.

Chen says episodic or autobiographical memory requires you to mentally time travel to a specific moment, and if you can't, it just becomes a fact you know. "I know I must have made coffee yesterday, but I have no concrete memory of it. You can't really place that moment," she says.

What helps embed or anchor memories, psychologists say, are emotion, novelty, and unique markers, like a song playing in the background or the unseasonal heat on a morning run. For autobiographical memory, emotion plays a very strong role in making moments of your life vivid memoriesthink 9/11, a presidential assassination, the day you met the love of your life.

Ian Phillips, who explores the intersection of philosophy and psychological science, says the absence of salient markersevents such as a trip abroad that create a sense of "before" and "after"also makes it more difficult to recall how long it's been since an event happened.

"If you try and tell the story of these past two to three years, for many of us the story has not been a gripping one," says Phillips, a professor in Philosophy and in Psychological and Brain Sciences at the Krieger School. "Personally, I spent a lot of time at my desk, having Zoom meeting after Zoom meeting, and it's not a very interesting story to tellor remember."

When asked how the pandemic memory fog will impact us going forward, the researchers interviewed for this piece don't anticipate any lasting effects and say that as our lives return to normal, so will the texture of our memories. They also say that people will remember this time differently based on their situations. Some of us will struggle to remember pandemic period details like a trip to the mall, but those who have experienced major traumaserious illness, the death of a family member, financial upheavalwon't have the privilege of forgetting.

"But I don't worry that people will be unable to get back on the horse when our environment changes again," Chen says. "The principles of memory stay the same. I think people will adapt."

Phillips adds that the creation of markers to help embed memories is very much within our control. For the memory smudged, he encourages people to try new things, get outside, meet people, and break out of routines. "As you do more, that allows you to accurately and more healthily judge when, where, and what happened to you."

And, for better or worse, not forget how old you are.

Explore further How our environment affects what we remember
ZAMBOANGA CITY  Eight villages in the southern Philippine province of Sulu are now free from the influence of the pro-ISIS group Abu Sayyaf...
The inaugural James Welch Native Lit Festival this July will bring nationally recognized Indigenous writers to Missoula for three days of panels, and the opportunity to talk about Welchs legacy and their own writing with their peers.

The lineup includes award-winning visiting writers Louis Erdrich and Tommy Orange alongside Montanans such as Debra Earling, Heather Cahoon, Chris La Tray and more.

As far as they can tell, theres never been a Native literature festival like this, said lead organizer and writer Sterling HolyWhiteMountain. More often, writers find themselves in situations where its almost always us, talking specifically for non-Native people.

They hope to stir conservation about Welch, the Blackfeet-Gros Ventre author of the acclaimed novels, Winter in the Blood and Fools Crow.

He is the Native Renaissance writer that is referenced the most often by Native writers, HolyWhiteMountain said. "And yet publicly, in the larger sort of American discourse, he's the one that is most often left out of that conversation."

The late authors wife, Lois Welch, the former director of the University of Montanas Creative Writing Program, said she thought the idea of a festival in his honor was wonderful.

Nobody is paying as much attention to Jim as I would like, she said, adding she's happy the festival concept was being raised and led by a Blackfeet writer. She and Welch attended numerous literary festivals over the years, and she said this event is not only unique, its singular with its all-Native lineup of speakers.

The festival is officially being staged through an independent nonprofit with a planning committee that includes Cahoon, Lois Welch, Kim Anderson, who founded the Montana Festival of the Book, and others. Theyre applying for and have received grants. The University of Montanas Native American Studies Program is co-sponsoring and they have the support of the UM Presidents office.

Theyre holding a fundraiser in July at the Zootown Arts Community Center, with all-Native stand-up comedy.

Legacy

The festival encourages Indigenous authors to engage with one other in talks on stage, in a way that they do all the time in private. There's value in people being able to see that, regardless of their race, HolyWhiteMountain said.

It can also provide younger Native people some exposure to older, established artists so they could see if its something that they knew they wanted to do with their lives.

The dates are July 28-30 in Missoula, which was picked because of the relative ease of travel and the fact that Welch attended the University of Montana and made the city his home  he and Lois bought a house in the Rattlesnake. The idea for the conference dates back to 2014. Organizers made several attempts at a workshop of some kind in Browning but it fell apart due to logistics, such as the travel distance from airports and lodging, he said.

The venues thus far include the Wilma, the University of Montana, and the Missoula Public Library. At this point, theyre planning on making them free so anyone can attend. All the talks will be recorded and posted on YouTube to build an archive of writers talking about their work. That way younger artists, who might be living in isolated areas, can have the resources to work through questions about themselves and their work.

The guests' works have earned widespread acclaim. Erdrich (Turtle Mountain Chippewa Pemina Band) won the Pulitzer Prize for The Nightwatchmen. Tommy Oranges novel There There, was nominated for that prize as well. Novelist Kelli Jo Ford (Cherokee) won praise for her debut, Crooked Hallelujah. Rebecca Roanhorse has published a fantasy novel, Black Sun, and has won awards in the genre like the Hugo and Nebula. David Treuer (Ojibwe) was a finalist for the National Book Award for his nonfiction survey, The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee: Native America from 1980 to the Present.

Montanans include M.L. Smoker (Assiniboine, Sioux), the states poet laureate from 2019-21, Cahoon, a poet and assistant professor of Native American Studies at the University of Montana; Debra Earling (CSKT), a former UM creative writing professor and author of the novel Perma Red; La Tray (Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians) won the Montana Book Award for One-Sentence Journal: Short Poems and Essays from the World at Large and Adrian Jawort (Northern Cheyenne), who edited Off the Path, a two-volume series of Indigenous writers. The full list is online at jameswelchfestival.org.

As an example of the style of events, a panel called We Talk, You Listen will feature three writers  Brandon Hobson ("Where the Dead Sit Talking") with Orange and Ford  in conversation with each other. (The title comes from a book by the academic Vine Deloria Jr.)

The event will be held every other year, with the 2024 installment leaning more toward poetry. The types of panels could expand to include screenwriting, comic books,visual arts; and by the third year, screenwriting for film and TV.

Welch's career

Welch died at age 62 in 2003, after a yearlong struggle with lung cancer. Born in Browning in 1940, his family moved around for work, and he grew up on the Blackfeet and Fort Belknap reservations.

He studied for an MFA at the University of Montana and counted the poet Richard Hugo as a mentor. He published his debut, a collection of poems called Riding the Earthboy 40, in 1971. (Welchs father leased a 40-acre farm they named after a Blackfeet family that went by Earthboy.)

You'd be hard-pressed to find an American writer who was as good at poetry as he was at fiction, and has works in both genres that function as touchstones, HolyWhiteMountain said. The collection has remained in print for more than 50 years, with only a half-decade span at the beginning when it was not, according to Lois.

Welch shifted time periods and genres from book to book. Winter in the Blood is a contemporary novel; Fools Crow a historical epic from the Blackfeet perspective; The Indian Lawyer a modern-day thriller about a Blackfeet attorney; The Heartsong of Charging Elk, another historical outing, this time focused on an Oglala Sioux man who travels to France. "Killing Custer" revisits the Battle of Little Bighorn from an Indigenous perspective.

Lois recalled that when Welch was first asked to teach at the University of Washington in 1981, the number of Native authors in print was much lower than is today. He had to teach his own books, which can lead to a certain awkwardness.

Regarding his influence, she said he was thrilled that a younger generation of Native writers was following in his footsteps, getting published and circulated. He just watched it happen and was happy for it.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 4 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0

Stay up-to-date on what's happening Receive the latest in local entertainment news in your inbox weekly! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
The Montana Commissioner of Political Practices found Missoulas three municipal judges made multiple Montana campaign finance and practices violations.

Last fall, a volunteer for a competing judge candidate filed complaints with the commissioner accusing Jennifer Streano, Eli Parker and Jacob Coolidge of financially coordinating campaign efforts. The allegations say the judges raised contributions as individuals, then essentially pooled the money for management and coordination by Westridge Creative, a campaign consulting firm.

While the commissioner's office concluded the trio did violate campaign laws, enforcement remains in limbo. The commissioner is only tasked with investigating campaign violation complaints and determining if evidence of law-breaking exists.

The three candidates won their elections last November. The complaint was filed by Rosalie Sheehy Cates, a volunteer campaign treasurer for Ethan Lermans campaign. Lerman was running in Department 3 against Coolidge.

Three separate decisions by the commissioner's office were filed for each accused candidate.

The findings note that coordination itself is not a violation of the states campaign finance law. If an expense is shared between two or more candidates for an election, each candidate is required to disclose the activity on the relevant finance report filed with the commissioners office.

Specifically, coordinated expenditure activities shall be treated and reported as an in-kind contribution from an expenditure by the person funding, facilitating or engaging in the activity, the decision reads.

Many of the findings involve in-kind contributions. In-kind donations arent money contributions to candidates, but instead are gifts and services to aid in campaign efforts.

Streano was found to have not reported four in-kind contributions from Parker and four from Coolidge. She accepted in-kinds totaling $644.33 from her two colleagues, which violated Montana campaign finance and practices rules.

Parker also failed to disclose four in-kinds from each of his two colleagues, the decision filing says. He accepted contributions of $633.50 from Streano and $644.33 from Coolidge, both over the limit of in-kind contributions in Montana.

In the commissioners judgment of Coolidge, it says he didnt disclose and properly report four in-kind contributions from Parker and four separate in-kinds from Streano. Additionally, Coolidge accepted $644.33 in in-kind contributions that exceeded Montanas campaign contribution limits from Parker, and another $633.50 from Streano.

The trio also didnt include paid for by attribution messages on campaign T-shirts, also a violation of campaign law.

In their response to the original complaint filed in the fall, Streano, Parker and Coolidge say Cates failed to provide evidence of any actual and specific coordinated expenditures. The judges maintained the three were running separate campaigns with separate bank accounts, and there was no co-mingling of funds. They asked for the complaint to be dismissed.

Streano, Parker and Coolidge declined to comment on Monday while the matter is still pending. WestRidge declined to comment as well.

The decision is referred to the Lewis and Clark County Attorneys Office for consideration of civil prosecution in a district court. If the county attorney waives the right to prosecute, or fails to within 30 days, the matter returns to the commissioner for possible prosecution.

Most matters like this are resolved by payments of a negotiated fine, according to the commissioner's filings.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 2 Wow 2 Sad 0 Angry 2

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.
It looks like Missoula will get a new Mormon church temple in the near future.

Over the weekend, at a conference for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, church president Russell M. Nelson announced plans to build 17 new temples in cities across the globe.

Missoula was on the list, but no specific location was given. There are already two relatively smaller-sized LDS facilities in Missoula. Together, they are known as the Missoula Stake, which is a level below a temple. A stake is composed of at least five wards, also known as congregations.

Mitch Staley, a communications representative for the church's activities in Montana, said the Missoula Stake covers the Bonner and Clinton areas as well. He noted that many people in Montana have to drive long distances to go to a temple.

"This is exciting news for sure," he said.

A spokesperson for the church's national media relations department said more details about the temple's location in Missoula will be released in the coming months.

In a press release, the church said Montana is home to more than 50,000 Mormons and more than 125 congregations of the church.

While Mormon meeting houses are open to the general public and often used for community meetings, Mormon temples are reserved for members of the church observing sacred ceremonies and special gospel ordinances, according to church officials.

The Missoula, Montana temple will be the third temple for the state, the press release said. The first, the Billings Montana Temple, was dedicated in November 1999. The Helena Montana Temple was announced in April 2021.

A groundbreaking event for the Helena temple was held in June of 2021, and the building is supposed to be 10,000-square-feet with a center spire. The church said it will be the first temple built using modular construction methods, meaning the building is constructed off-site.

Other cities listed included Cusco, Peru, Austin, Texas and Brazzaville, Republic of Congo.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 3 Funny 0 Wow 5 Sad 14 Angry 2

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.
The year 2021 had the second-highest estimate on record for rainbow trout along the Craig section of the Missouri River, a state fish biologist said.

That stretch of the river, which runs from Wolf Creek Bridge to Craig, saw an estimated 6,611 rainbow trout 10 inches or longer per mile, Jason Mullen of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks told people Wednesday at a meeting of Pat Barnes Missouri River Trout Unlimited held at Montana Wild in Helena. That more than doubles surveys from the past two years -- in 2019 FWP saw an estimated 2,860 rainbows per mile in the section. The long-term average for the stretch is about 3,400 rainbows and 570 browns.

The highest estimate was 7,068 rainbow trout 10 inches and greater in 2012.

The count of brown trout along that same stretch was 362 per mile, which Mullen said was a little below the long-term average but still within the realm of what he has seen in past. In 2019 the survey found 390 brown trout per mile over 10 inches in length.

He said 2020 saw a huge number of small fish and 2021 saw more medium-sized fish, more than is usually seen.

For the Cascade section of the river, they counted 1,694 rainbow trout 10 inches or longer per mile and 320 brown trout. In 2019 those numbers were 1,100 and 238 respectively.

Mullen said they were seeing fat, healthy fish, and did not see many skinny baby fish.

He also said the FWP was starting to get a lot more reports of northern pike in the river.

Mullen said they looked into it.

We caught only one, but they are not in there in great numbers, we think, he said.

Mullen said the pike are moving throughout the river in the early spring and looking for a place to spawn. He said they received reports of catching them downstream in Cascade, but are not getting consistent reports throughout the river.

Mullen, who has been in his position since 2014, also discussed flows, water temperatures and angler use for those sections of the Missouri River. He said those sites have been monitored since 1982.

He said river flow was measured in 2021 at 4,000 cubic feet per second. He said they like to see a minimum flow of 4,100, which he said maintains side channels and keeps them wetted.

Mullen said there was a peak of 5,000 cfs in February, which was related to NorthWestern Energy generating more hydropower.

Mullen said Montana went into summer with 3,000 cfs, which is where it is at today and where it is expected to maintain throughout the year.

We are still in drought conditions, he said.

He said the most probable scenario was not filling Canyon Ferry and it would remain 4 feet less than full.

Its looking like pretty poor water conditions for this year as well, he said.

Mullen said current conditions indicate 2022 may be similar in terms of low flows and high water temperatures unless there is some significant spring precipitation.

Mullen said the river temperatures were seeing a daily maximum of 73 degrees a few days.

He said water temperatures beyond Craig were beyond 73 degrees, which is warm. He said they implemented hoot owl conditions, which limited hours of fishing through Aug. 17, because of moderate temps. He said 2000 was the last time such restrictions were implemented.

He said the Missouri River ranked second in the state in 2019 in terms of angler days, which is a count of one person fishing for any part of a day, at 154,6289. Madison River, which had 172,944, was first.

Angler days, which are counted every other year, have been higher in past counts. It was 170,736 in 2017 and 183,479 in 2015.

The Missouri ranked second to the Madison with 154,628 angler days. Madison had 172,944.

He said the river generates $60,179,182 for the states economy.

It is a huge economic driver, he said.

Montana State News Bureau Deputy Bureau Chief Tom Kuglin contributed to this story.

Assistant editor Phil Drake can be reached at 406-231-9021.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
During a League of Women Voters of the Helena Area webinar on Montana's Constitution hitting the half-century mark, speakers warned listeners that the states voting rights are under attack and if legal challenges to bills passed by the 2021 Legislature fail, it could pack a wallop at the polls.

The League held a webinar Tuesday, Montana's Constitution at 50: Voting Rights Experts on Protecting Montanans' Right to Vote, which featured Jeremy Johnson, a Carroll College associate political science professor; Alex Rate, legal director with ACLU Montana; attorney Mike Meloy; and Keaton Sunchild, political director of Western Native Voice.

Johnson said the Montana Constitution that passed in 1889 was criticized for benefiting corporations and not recognizing the needs of the state.

He said the League of Women Voters lobbied the public hard to change Montanas Constitution in the 1970s. Johnson said they wanted the new Montana Constitution to be in compliance with the U.S. Constitution's federal statutes on voting and wanted to encourage citizen participation in the electoral process in Montana.

One aspect the 1972 Montana constitutional convention concentrated on was concerns about voting and elections.

He said the general government and amendment committee that formed during the convention reviewed elections and suffrage. The committee did not always concur, but there was agreement elections needed to be more effective and meaningful.

In debates it was pointed out the main reason for voter registration was to avoid voting fraud, Johnson said. Some delegates noted that in states like North Dakota, which had poll booth registration, that fraud was virtually nonexistent.

Johnson said that in the end, the state Constitution said that all elections are to be free and open and no power civil and military shall at any time deny the right of suffrage.

Now a new specter has emerged, Johnson said, adding there is a fundamental political pushback on voting rights.

Voting rights must be protected, Johnson said. As a community we must again rally to preserve voting access.

Attorney Mike Meloy said that then-Gov. Steve Bullock during the COVID-19 pandemic issued an executive order that would allow counties to have absentee ballots.

Johnson noted that the increase in voters benefited Republican candidates in 2020 due to absentee ballots. Republicans won handily in the 2020 election, sweeping executive offices and remaining the majority in the Legislature.

Meloy said it still boggles his mind that the Montana Legislature a few months later passed bills to change elections.

Meloy mentioned several bills. He said House Bill 176 prohibited people from registering to vote on election day. He said HB 169 kept students from using student ID as a primary form of identification when going to vote.

Meloy said HB 530 imposed restrictions on what people could do to help others from getting absentee ballots to election administrators. Senate Bill 319 restricts political committees from being involved in voter ID and get-out-to-vote efforts on campus facilities.

He said House Bills 176, 169 and 530 have been challenged by several groups in state courts.

These bills may seem to you to be, individually, not so significant, but when theyre taken together, the impact of these pieces of legislation severely restrict people with disabilities, people who have trouble getting to the polls, the elderly, Native Americans, low-income people, working-class people, Meloy said. They have a fairly profound effect on the right to vote.

He hoped for success as legislation goes to court in June in Yellowstone County.

Rate spoke on the negative impact of the voting restrictions on Indigenous communities.

Its an unfortunate reality that disenfranchising Native American voters is the natural outflow of the colonization and genocide that is the hallmark of the United States of America," he said.

He said it was in the 1920s that Native Americans got the right to vote and efforts since have been made to disenfranchise the voting power of Native Americans nationwide.

Rate said court action was one way for Native Americans to fight back.

He said he was part of the Wandering Medicine case that established satellite voting locations on reservations throughout Montana. He said many Native Americans live in remote areas and often encounter hostility when they go to nearby towns.

Rate said it was a low point of his legal career when satellite voting would be open only two out of five days. He said he has had to take some counties to task for dragging their feet.

Voting rights in Montana are at risk and continue to be at risk, given the current political climate, he said, adding that the rights of Indigenous folks on and off the reservation are under enormous risk. He said sometimes litigation is necessary.

We should all be grateful and sing a love song to our modern Constitution and the district courts and the Montana Supreme Court which have jealously guarded those protections Rate said.

Sunchild said it wasnt until the 1972 convention that a lot of the obstacles that kept Native Americans from the polls went away and a lot of voter protections were added.

One of the arguments to expand voter rights was that many Native Americans served in World War II.

He said the passage of the federal Voting Rights Act in 1965 cleared the way for the 1972 Montana Constitution to have the protections it does now.

Sunchild said there were legally questionable laws passed in last legislative session. He said it was important to their members to keep voting with tribal ID. He said that is working its way through the courts now.

He said Native American Voice is now in a constant cycle of going to court for voters' rights. Now it is built into his groups budget to add funding for legal challenges.

Assistant editor Phil Drake can be reached at 406-231-9021.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Idaho and Montanas successful recovery of the gray wolf was a significant achievement in species conservation. In less than 10 years, not only were biological recovery targets for gray wolves met, they were exceeded. Unfortunately, delisting of the wolf has been mired in politics rather than informed by science. Last month, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland authored an editorial, devoid of facts but flushed with alarmist rhetoric, perpetuating the false narrative that Idaho and Montanas wildlife management policies are driving gray wolves to extinction. Whats more, the Secretary disregarded both the spirit and procedure of the Endangered Species Act by explicitly threatening emergency listing. The Secretarys editorial demands a response.

Gray wolves were brought to the Northern Rockies in 1995, and by the mid-2000s, their rapid population growth had far outpaced expectations. With the gray wolf fully recovered, Idaho and Montana resumed state wildlife management authority in 2011. However, three scenarios are written into the states post-recovery plans outlining the conditions that could lead to a species status review:

One: if wolf populations in the Northern Rockies Management Unit fall below 100 wolves during one year. Both states far surpassed this number with an estimated 1,177 wolves in Montana and 1,543 in Idaho last year.

Two: if wolf populations in either state fall below 150 wolves for three consecutive years in a row. Gray wolf populations have consistently remained above 1,000 wolves for over ten consecutive years in Montana. Similarly, Idahos wolf populations have significantly exceeded the target number for more than 20 years, remaining above 1,500 in the last three consecutive years.

Three: if a state law or management objective makes changes that significantly increases the threat to the wolf population. Idaho expanded hunting licenses in 2021, not to endanger wolf populations but to reduce their growing threat to the ecosystem. The Fish and Wildlife Services 2009 delisting rule warned that a Northern Rockies population above 1,500 wolves, which Idaho alone currently exceeds, would result in eventual habitat degradation.

Like Idaho, Montana adopted new hunting regulations this year. This plan was adjustable  allowing the Commission to respond to changing conditions mid-season  and maintained science-based quotas, which even if fully met, assured wolf populations were maintained at a level nearly five times the recovery threshold. Montanas wolf season concluded last week and the total harvest was on par with past seasons and actually less than the previous four years.

The Secretary wrote that we must find solutions that allow wolves to flourish. We agree, and are proud that Idaho and Montana succeeded in doing just that. If the gray wolf doesnt meet the criteria for a status review, it certainly does not meet the criteria for an emergency listing. Those pushing for such action are relying on emotional appeals, red-herrings, and fear-tactics  not science or the law.

If the Secretary is serious about following the science and the law and recognizing decades of hard work by states, the Secretary must promote, rather than disparage, state management authority. She must acknowledge Idaho and Montana have demonstrated a pertinent ability to sustain a healthy wolf population for over a decade. This is the true mark of success for species recovery, and we cannot afford for Secretary Haaland to undermine this legacy for political, partisan gain.

Montana Senator Steve Daines and Idaho Senator Jim Risch.

You must be logged in to react.

Click any reaction to login. Love 2 Funny 2 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 9
Asheville is the place to be for vegan and vegetarians looking for a meal.

Diners dont have to look too far to find menus that offer dishes made sans meat or animal by-products without having to substitute everything on a pre-existing dish.

The city has many chefs and cooks dedicated to the cuisine style or making sure options are well-represented on their menus  and theyre not only found at brick-and-mortar restaurants.

Vegan Peruvian Pop-up

Recently, West End Bakery launched a beer and wine night program during which area culinary artists are invited to take over the kitchen.

Part of what were trying to do is pop-ups every Thursday, said Catherine McConachie, co-owner.

Carola Gutierrez will host a Vegan Peruvian Pop-up at West End Bakery in Asheville on March 17 and 31. Pictured: Causa Limena

West End Bakery will host the Vegan Peruvian Food Pop-Up with Carola Gutierrez. The special dining event will be at 7 p.m. March 17 at the bakery, 757 Haywood Road.

The bakery will transform with an ambiance created by candlelight and an elegant table setting and served several courses from a curated fine dining menu.

The guest chef schedule rotates. Gutierrez is confirmed to prepare vegan dinners March 17 and March 31. Tickets are $45 per person and are available for purchase on Eventbrite.

On March 17, Gutierrez, a native of Lima, Peru, will prepare a five-course dinner. The first course will be Tradito  vegetables in aji amarilla and rocoto sauce. The second course is Aguadito, which is a cilantro, vegetable and rice soup. Next, Ocupa, which are potatoes and an ocopa sauce thats made with peanut and black pepper. Then, Aji de Champinones, mushrooms in a creamy aji amarilla sauce over white rice. The dessert will be bread pudding made with Peruvian chocolate and golden berries.

Gutierrez struggled to find Peruvian cuisine and food that wasn't fried, so she began making her own variations more than eight years ago, she said.

"In the U.S., you have more possibilities of other types of vegan proteins, plant-based stuff, and I enjoy that a lot," Gutierrez said.

Story continues

A course wine-pairing is offered with a wine flight available for an additional cost of $25.

Other dinners hosted by Gutierrez have sold out quickly, and the upcoming events are expected to draw a crowd, McConachie said.

In Asheville, there is very much a strong vegan community, McConachie said. It speaks to how tight and how strong the vegan community is in Asheville and how willing to support events like this they are.

For more about West End Bakery and the pop-up series, visit westendbakery.com and follow on Instagram @westendasheville.

The Smokin Onion Food Truck parked at Ginger's Revenge in Asheville.

The Smokin Onion Food Truck

The Smokin Onion, launched last September, offers vegan and vegetarian food only with many gluten-free items offered. The signature dishes are mainstays with new specials offered every other week.

The plant-based menu features items such as buffalo cauliflower bites and bahn-mi tacos.

Everything on our truck is from scratch, so we make all of our seitan, crabby patties, bread, said Kiimia Schultz, co-owner.

Two bestsellers are The Town Gyro and the Crabby Patty.

Theres no other place in town that has anything like the Crabby Patty. Its really unique, Schultz said. Its a jackfruit crab cake and we make our own remoulade and house-made buns.  We top it with our crispy fried onion, she said.

The Town Gyro is a vegan dish offered at The Smokin Onion, a food truck in Asheville.

The Smokin Onion rolls out twice weekly and plans to increase to four days a week in the summer. The locations rotate with popular spots but can often be found at Highland Brewing, Gingers Revenge or Cellarest Beer Project.

The best way to know when and where to find them and to view the updated menu is via Facebook or Instagram @thesmokinonion. The website will launch soon at www.thesmokinonion.com.

The Trashy Vegan

The Trashy Vegan is preparing to open a brick-and-mortar restaurant later in the year. For now, customers can find the food truck parked around town serving familiar comfort food prepared vegan.

"We try to take things that are typically not seen as vegan at all or associated with veganism  like a burger  and do those vegan, co-owner Joel Boggs told the Citizen Times. And (we) try to do them as well as possible ... so people realize that there are vegan options pretty much for anything out there and you're not really compromising on taste or flavor."

The Trashy Vegan's classic cheese burger.

The Trashy Vegan keeps it classic with a cheeseburger made with an Impossible patty and Violife cheddar cheese on a bun by local bakery Rise Above Bakehouse. The burger is topped with ketchup, mustard, eggless mayo, diced onion, lettuce, tomato and locally sourced seasonal pickles from Sweet Brined.

In March, The Trashy Vegan is at Cascade Lounge from 4-8 p.m. on Fridays, Cellarest Beer Project from 2-6 p.m. on Saturdays and Gingers Revenge from 2-6 p.m. on Sundays.

Keep up with The Trashy Vegan on Instagram @the_trashy_vegan.

Bun Intended

Bun Intended offers an array of Thai street food from curry to rice bowls with something for meat and plant-based lifestyles.

Vegan and vegetarian dishes have been high in demand, so the eatery takes care to offer a variety of plant-based options.

Veggie Bao at Bun Intended, a restaurant and food truck in Asheville.

Its becoming a growing trend and more and more people are straying away from meats, whether its for climate reasons or animal cruelty reasons," said Kyle James, co-founder. "Weve seen it over the years  more and more people with health reasons are choosing to eat vegan and vegetarian. So thats something we will always be focusing on as we continue to grow, is making sure that we can provide more vegan and vegetarian options in various ways."

Other popular items include cucumber salad and papaya salad.

Everything is made in-house using local produce and protein sources, James said.

The protein that we specialize in is tofu, so we do a tasty crispy tofu that can be on a veggie bao  which is vegetarian, James said. And the curry bowl is homemade curry sauces with crispy tofu on top. Thats a large bed of rice, sauteed veggies, raw veggies to finish and crispy tofu on top  that would be vegan.

Bun Intendeds brick-and-mortar restaurant is inside the S&W Market, 56 Patton Ave. in downtown Asheville.

The food truck can be found at New Belgium Brewing every Monday, and it's often at Highland Brewing. View the menu and calendar with locations at bunintendedavl.com.

Tiana Kennell is the food and dining reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA Today Network. Email her at tkennell@citizentimes.com or follow her on Twitter/Instagram @PrincessOfPage. Please help support this type of journalism with a subscription to the Citizen Times.

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Asheville vegan, vegetarian options at food trucks, pop-up restaurants
There was much to talk about Thursday night at the first in-person meeting of the Butte Natural Resource Damage Restoration Council in about two years.

The two biggest topics presented at the meeting were the Blacktail Creek Riparian Actions and an update on phase two of the Parrot Tailings Waste Removal Project.

Blacktail Creek Concerns

The $20.5 million Blacktail Creek Remediation was put under the purview of the Montana Department of Environmental Quality in 2020 under a consent decree. The Blacktail Creek Project Manager Will George presented on the projects status at the meeting, and received an earful from Butte-Silver Bow Chief Executive J.P. Gallagher and a couple of BNRC board members.

It seems to me a lot of time has been wasted, said Jon Sesso, board member and former Superfund coordinator in Butte. Sesso wanted to know why the DEQ is starting the Blacktail Creek project now when the Consent Decree was signed in 2020.

Im just curious about what happened in 2021, he said. George said he couldnt fully answer that question because he started with the DEQ in late 2021, and couldnt speak to what happened before that.

Sesso also wanted to know why the data gap analysis wasnt going to be started until this winter, and why it couldnt start during this spring and summer. George explained that there are many plans that need to be submitted and approved by the EPA before the data gap analysis testing can begin and the report can be completed.

The data gap analysis refers to the part of the project where the contractor investigates and makes a report of what information is missing before the project can start the design and construction phases. This information includes the extent of the waste in the area, the amount of de-watering required during construction, and how to work around certain pieces of civil infrastructure like the interstate to the south of the site.

At the end of the questions from the board and public, Carolina Balliew, federal Superfund section supervisor, said that a lot of what happened during 2021 was internal planning within the DEQ and not public-facing. She also said there was some turnover during the year, and it took some time to hire George and get him up to speed.

Gallagher said he agreed with Sesso and had concerns of his own. He said he reached out to George and others at the Montana DEQ via email earlier this week asking why local firms such as Pioneer Technical Services and Water and Environmental Technologies werent chosen to conduct the data gap analysis of Blacktail Creek, and never got a response.

George explained that per state procurement laws, the DEQ can choose up to three contractors to do the data gap analysis according to criteria of knowledge, skills, ability and availability. The top three candidates were Hydrometrics Inc. in Helena, Haley & Aldrich in Missoula, and Spectrum Engineering and Environmental in Billings. Ultimately George said he chose Spectrum Engineering to conduct the data gap analysis.

I have to answer to the public about the monies that are being spent, Gallagher said. And Im having a hard time that I never got a response from you or anybody on this project. He pointed out that Spectrum Engineering didnt have the equipment required to do the work and was having to rent it, which will cost the project money.

Balliew apologized for the lack of response, explaining that she was out of the office for a couple of days.

Board member John McKee echoed Gallaghers comments.

The environmental engineering companies in this town literally wrote the book on Superfund cleanup in the basin, and the companies youve hired have learned from what these people actually invented, engineered and figured out, McKee said. And so I think theres going to be some surprise in this community when people have to answer to why a local firm wasnt chosen, not because a local firm should be chosen, but because they wrote the book on how to do it.

When it comes time to do the construction work associated with the project, which most likely wont start until 2024, Balliew said the project will go out to bid, and a local firm could possibly be chosen for that.

Project Budgets

Gallagher asked George if the DEQ has an estimate for what the entire project will cost, and George said he didnt at this time, but there was an estimate for the data gap analysis, which is $358,602.39.

Jim Ford, environmental science specialist at the Natural Resource Damage Program, presented an update on the Parrot Tailings project, the first phase of which started in 2018.

The newest thing he shared at the meeting was the budget of the Parrot Tailings project, which he said hadnt been presented yet.

He explained that the Parrot Tailings project received $16.5 million from the Upper Clark Fork River Basin Aquatic and Terrestrial Restoration Plan, $15.3 million from the Butte Area One Restoration Plan, and $5.2 million from the Butte-Silver Bow Groundwater Restoration Plan.

Although not set in stone, Ford said the project expects to have $5 million to $7 million left over from the project $37 million pot, of which 51% will go to the Upper Clark Fork Restoration Plan, 35% will go to the Butte Area One Restoration Plan and 14% will go to the Butte-Silver Bow Groundwater Restoration plan.

Although the Blacktail Creek Remediation is in the very early stages and the DEQ cant yet anticipate how much will be left over, the first million dollars that are left over will go to the Match Fund for Future Lined Creek Channel, as decided by Gov. Greg Gianforte. The money remaining after that will be allocated to the three restoration projects in the same way as money left over in the Parrot Tailings project.

Sesso said that he expects a lot of money to be left over from the $20.5 million allotted to the remediation of the Blacktail Creek site, which spans about two acres. The cost of this project shouldnt even be one-third of that amount. Sesso said. And even if you do spend that one third, I think you should have plenty of money.

Sesso was Butte-Silver Bows planning director for 26 years before retiring in 2017, but he stayed on as Superfund coordinator through 2020. He oversaw Superfund issues and negotiations here for years and also represented Butte in the Legislature from 2005 to 2020, the last eight as Democrat Senate minority leader.

Other Parrot Tailings Updates

Other things Ford shared at the meeting was that the projects clean backfill source, which was going to be clean overburden, was changed to the lunchroom backfill borrow site. This was because the original backfill didnt meet their backfill requirements.

He went on to say that because the backfill was near the site, not only will the contractor for the project save money, but it will save more than 136,000 cubic yards being hauled through Butte, which equals almost 20,000 haul truck trips through town. He said these trips are the thing the NRDP was hoping to reduce the most.

Ford also brought pieces of the material that will be used for the evapotranspiration covers for the project. This will be the first of its kind modern mine waste cap in Butte which will allow for multiple land uses as well as much more robust vegetation including trees and shrubs, he said in an email.

He said at the meeting that the cover system, which will need about 90,000 cubic yards of material, will cost 90 cents a yard for the first 50,000 yards and 50 cents a yard for all the yards thereafter. It will cover about 18 acres of wastes, Ford said near the end of his presentation.

Ford also provided an updated project schedule, and said if it stays on the timeline it should be wrapped up by the end of 2023, Ford said.

Love 2 Funny 5 Wow 2 Sad 2 Angry 2
Inflows to Missouri River basin reservoirs above Sioux City, Iowa, were well below average in March, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported on Monday, as much of Montana continues to suffer from severe to extreme drought.

The March runoff of 1.5 million acre-feet (MAF) was 48% of average for the month. The updated 2022 upper basin runoff forecast is 17.8 MAF, 69% of average, approximately 2.6 MAF less than the March 1 forecast.

Runoff was well below normal due to dry soil conditions and well below normal precipitation across the entire Missouri River basin, said John Remus, chief of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Missouri River Basin Water Management Division, in a press release. Due to the lack of plains snowpack in 2022, below-average mountain snowpack, and dry upper basin conditions, we expect upper Missouri River Basin runoff to be below average.

Water in Fort Peck Reservoir measured 2,222.9 feet at the end of March, 11 feet lower than at this time last year and 13 feet lower than in 2020.

Water conservation measures, such as minimum winter releases and reduced flow support for navigation, are implemented as the amount of water in the reservoir system declines, Remus said.

The six reservoirs above Sioux City, Iowa, contain 48.4 MAF, which is 7.7 MAF below the top of the carryover multiple use zone. That zone is designed to provide service to the eight authorized purposes, though at reduced levels, through a long-term drought, Remus said.

Mountain snowpack in the upper basin is accumulating at below-average rates. The April 3 mountain snowpack in the Fort Peck reach was 75% of average and the mountain snowpack in the Fort Peck to Garrison reach was 71% of average.

Much of southwestern Montana has snowpack of between 70% to 89% of normal, according to the Natural Resources Conservation Service. Only northwestern Montana is in the 90% to 109% range. Large portions of eastern and northeastern Montana have no snowpack or less than 50% of average.

By April 1, about 95% of the total mountain snowpack has typically accumulated. Mountain snowpack normally peaks near April 15. Currently, plains snowpack in the upper basin is essentially nonexistent with only trace amounts in southern North Dakota and northern South Dakota remaining.

Public meetings to update the region on current hydrologic conditions and the planned operation of the reservoir system are scheduled for April 11-15 in seven communities along the river. The one in Fort Peck will be held on April 11 at 10:30 a.m. in the Fort Peck Interpretative Center.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1
BP's stake in Russia's Rosneft was $14 billion. Shell held $3 billion in Russian assets. Exxon held over $4 billion. Before they succumbed to international pressure to divest, they eagerly consorted with oligarchs and the war criminal Vladimir Putin, used him to increase profits, and undermined Ukrainian democracy in the process. Now their corrupt GOP lackeys want us  the American taxpayer  to cover Big Oils losses while they hold us hostage at the gas pump.

The rockets lobbed at Ukrainian civilians cost money. That money came from the multinational oil and gas companies. They funded Putin until the world made them divest from Russia. That same corruption that infects Russia and that defenders of democracy in Ukraine sought to root out from their government now has its sights back on us. They turn once again to the Republican Party  who like always  will do whatever bidding oligarchs require. They want our money to cover their losses from their corrupt Russian investments in the name of energy independence.

My GOP opponent for Congress, scandal-ridden Ryan Zinke, said the quiet part out loud when meeting with big oil lobbyists back in 2018: Our government should work for you." But our government should work for Americans  not multinational corporations. The interests of Shell, of Exxon, of Saudi Aramco are in direct opposition to the interests of the American people.

If we really want to talk about energy independence, Montana has already shown the country the model: investments in renewable energy. Over half of our Montana energy production is renewable. We export over half of our total energy produced to the entire region. Montana renewables power the West.

Even with corruption and subsidies for fossil fuels, the free market would rather invest in more efficient and affordable energy production like wind, solar, and hydro. Out of half a dozen new energy projects in Montana all but one of them are wind and solar. Energy independence means not relying on big oil, their investments in Russia, or their manipulation of our politics. It means relying on Montana.

For decades our state has relied on fossil fuel extraction. Montana coal production hasnt been declining due to radical leftists, but the free market. Its being replaced by safer, cleaner renewable energy. The latest governmental energy report says it all, Montana has substantial renewable energy resources(and) some of the best utility-scale wind power potential in the nation.

When policy makers bemoan untapped oil wells in Texas, or un-fracked gas deposits in Colorado, they should really be talking about Montanas untapped wind and solar. They are resources of strategic importance for the nation's security and prosperity. Democrats must steal the language of the extractive industry in support of renewable energy and we must call out Republicans who support Putin and his big-oil patrons against our national security and independence.

The truth is that America can harness Montana's wind and solar potential without ruining our environment, we can be an international model for 21st century resource extraction: Clean, renewable, and with lasting enrichment of the communities on the ground. Montanans hold a resource that could lead the nation out of dependence on oil that funds war and ruins our atmosphere, and of fracked gas that poisons water and defiles the landscape.

With the right policies, with the next generation of politicians that aren't bought by big oil, we can bring prosperity to Montana by utilizing the resources of our beautiful home for the greater good of the country. The only thing stopping us is the wholesale purchase of our government by private industry.

America could lead the world in renewable energy if we had the political will to root out rampant corruption in our government, the same corruption we see in oligarchies across the world. President Bidens stalled Build Back Better (BBB) legislation invests $555 billion in clean energy  it is our last best chance to save our country and my generations future.

Our current path is unsustainable, it is immoral, it harms the land and people  and it enriches violent oligarchs across the world. Soon, my generation will tire of corrupt politicians, of a government sold to private industry. Let's hope there's still something left to save.

Tom Winter is a former Montana state legislator (House District 96). He is now based in Polson working in telecommunications to bring broadband to underserved rural and native communities.

Love 3 Funny 2 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
ARCHIVED - Storm brings rain, wind and snow to southern Spain: weather outlook April 4-7



Several areas in Spain have already registered the coldest April morning in 40 years

Storm Ciril blasted through northern Spain over the weekend , bringing sub-zero temperatures and snow in many areas while leaving the south relatively unscathed. However, thats all about to change from Monday April 4 as yet another storm, this time originating in the Canary Islands, is set to sweep up through the Gulf of Cadiz, lowering thermometers considerably and leaving strong storms, gusts and waves of up to six metres in its wake.

Spain welcomed April with decidedly wintery weather that left much of the country frozen with a late spring snowfall; in the Catalan Pyrenees, the mercury plummeted to 15 degrees below zero, while Zamora and Valencia recorded on Sunday April 3 the coldest April morning in 40 years.

The situation this week is looking little better according to Aemet, which has placed 21 provinces and the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla on orange alert for rain, snow, waves and frigid temperatures on Monday April 4.

The emerging storm will create cloudy skies across the southern half of the country and the Balearic Islands, with abundant and persistent rainfall, particularly in the southwest of Andalucia

As all eyes turn south, the day-time temperatures will increase in the north of Spain but drop in the south and midlands on Monday.

There is to be little change on Tuesday April 5, with Andalucia once again expected to receive the worst of the rainfall. Cloudy and overcast skies will predominate and the showers will most likely turn stormy further south. The mercury will continue falling in the south and the Canary Islands, and frosts cant be ruled out.

There are no weather warnings in place for Wednesday April 6, but the instability will continue in the southeast in general, with rains and showers sweeping in from west to east. The temperatures will thankfully begin to rise across the country, however, and the frosts will be isolated to mountainous areas.

The situation will improve considerably on Thursday April 7 when an anticyclone is expected to bring stability to much of Spain, However, due the approach of a new Atlantic front, there is a probability of weak and scattered rainfall in the north and west.

Daytime temperatures will continue their upward trend to reach a maximum of 23C in Alicante

Image: Aemet
WEST LIBERTY  The Iowa State Patrol has not yet released the names of three people injured in a crash on April 1. One person suffered serious injuries and was taken by West Liberty EMS to the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics. The other two received minor injuries and refused transport.

According to the minimal crash report, at about 5:07 p.m. Thursday, April 1, a 2012 Dodge Challenger was traveling eastbound on U.S. Highway 6, and at the same time, a 2009 Kia Sportage was traveling westbound on U.S. 6. The two vehicles sideswiped each other at Bancroft Avenue in West Liberty. Both vehicles were removed from the scene by Teds Towing. All three people involved were wearing seat belts.

The crash remains under investigation by the Iowa State Patrol. Assisting at the scene were the Muscatine County Sheriffs Office and West Liberty EMS and Police.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Iowa Republican U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley said he would not vote to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, Democratic President Joe Bidens nominee to fill an upcoming vacancy to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Grassley, the ranking Republican member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, took issue with some of Jackson's judicial decisions while calling her "very personable and engaging" in a statement issued Monday ahead of the committee's vote on her nomination.

"Having carefully studied her record, unfortunately, I think she and I have fundamentally different views on the role judges should play in our system of government," Grassley said, according to prepared remarks posted Monday morning ahead of the committee meeting. "Because of those disagreements, I can't support her nomination."

Grassley, in shared prepared remarks, said he disagreed with Jackson's interpretation of provisions put into law by the First Step Act. The 2018 bipartisan criminal justice reform legislation, which Grassley sponsored, reformed sentencing laws and made a number of reforms aimed at reducing recidivism and improving conditions in federal prisons.

Under a "compassionate release" provision in the First Step Act, Jackson reduced the sentence of Keith Young, who was convicted in 2018 of drug and weapons trafficking charges, from a previously mandated 20 years to 12 years.

Grassley argues that part of the law wasn't retroactive.

"Judge Jackson misused a motion for compassionate release to re-sentence a dangerous drug kingpin," Grassley said of the legislation he sponsored.

The committee, which is made up of 11 Democrats and 11 Republicans, is expected to deadlock on the confirmation vote. Democratic leadership can still move the vote forward to the full Senate, which would vote at a later date.

Jackson needs a simple majority to be confirmed in the evenly divided U.S. Senate, where at least one GOP Senator, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, has said she plans to vote for Jackson. Moderate Democratic U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia has also indicated he will support Jackson's confirmation, providing two swing votes that all but guarantee her confirmation.

Previously, Grassley said Jackson was "very graceful, very smart in her answers," and said he was gratified that Jackson outlined a stricter judicial interpretation in answers to questions from Grassley.

He'd also praised Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., for "running a fair hearing." Though he did take issue with some documents not being provided to the committee, a sentiment he reiterated on Monday in his statement.

Grassley chaired the Judiciary Committee from chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee from 2015 to 2019, overseeing several confirmation hearings including the hearings of now-Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

"Throughout this process, Ive focused on thoroughly and fairly assessing Judge Jacksons record. I think Ive done that. We need confidence that judges will interpret the laws as they are written. Judge Jacksons re-interpretation of laws Ive helped write does not give me that confidence," Grassley wrote.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 9
BERLIN (AP)  Temperatures on Earth will shoot past a key danger point unless greenhouse gas emissions fall faster than countries have committed, the world's top body of climate scientists said Monday, warning of the consequences of inaction but also noting hopeful signs of progress.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change revealed "a litany of broken climate promises" by governments and corporations, accusing them of stoking global warming by clinging to harmful fossil fuels.

"It is a file of shame, cataloguing the empty pledges that put us firmly on track towards an unlivable world," he said.

Governments agreed in the 2015 Paris accord to keep global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) this century, ideally no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit). Yet temperatures have already increased by over 1.1C (2F) since pre-industrial times, resulting in measurable increases in disasters such flash floods, prolonged droughts, more intense hurricanes and longer-burning wildfires, putting human lives in danger and costing governments hundreds of billions of dollars to confront.

"Projected global emissions from (national pledges) place limiting global warming to 1.5C beyond reach and make it harder after 2030 to limit warming to 2C," the panel said.

In other words, the report's co-chair, James Skea of Imperial College London, told The Associated Press: "If we continue acting as we are now, we're not even going to limit warming to 2 degrees, never mind 1.5 degrees."

Ongoing investments in fossil fuel infrastructure and clearing large swaths of forest for agriculture undermine the massive curbs in emissions needed to meet the Paris goal, the report found.

"To keep the 1.5-degree limit agreed in Paris within reach, we need to cut global emissions by 45% this decade," said Guterres, the U.N. chief. "But current climate pledges would mean a 14% increase in emissions."

In a summary negotiated with governments over the past two weeks, the panel concluded that returning warming to 1.5C by 2100 would require removing vast amounts of carbon dioxide  the main greenhouse gas  from the atmosphere. Many experts say this is unfeasible with current technologies, and even if it could be done it would be far costlier than preventing the emissions in the first place.

The report's authors said they had "high confidence" that unless countries step up their efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions, the planet will on average be 2.4C to 3.5C (4.3 to 6.3 F) warmer by the end of the century  a level experts say is sure to cause severe impacts for much of the world's population.

"We are on a pathway to global warming of more than double the 1.5-degree limit agreed in Paris," said Guterres. "Some government and business leaders are saying one thing  but doing another."

"Simply put, they are lying," he added. "And the results will be catastrophic."

Despite the tough words by Guterres and report co-chairs, the full report, numbering thousands of pages condensed into a summary by governments and scientists, doesn't single out individual countries for blame.

However, the figures show much of the carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere was released by rich countries that were the first to burn coal, oil and gas when the industrial revolution really got going in the 1850s.

The U.N. panel said about 40% of emissions since then came from Europe and North America. Just over 12% can be attributed to East Asia, which includes China. The country took over the position as world's top emitter from the United States in the mid-2000s.

The report isn't without some hope, however.

Its authors highlight myriad ways in which the world can be brought back on track to 2C or even, with great effort, return to 1.5C after that threshold has been passed. This could require measures such as the removal of CO2 from the atmosphere with natural or artificial means, but also potentially risky technologies such as pumping aerosols into the sky to reflect sunlight.

Among the solutions recommended are a rapid shift away from fossil fuels toward renewable energy such as solar and wind, the electrification of transport, more efficient use of resources and massive financial support for poor countries unable to pay for such measures without help.

In February a landmark United Nations science report said climate change is about to get much worse and likely make the world sicker, hungrier, poorer, gloomier and way more dangerous in the next 18 years:

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0
Hybrid working provides employees with the best of both remote and office working environments, which is why businesses are hungry for technologies that support this new way of work.

This is according to Lenovo South Africa General Manager Thibault Dousson, who was speaking to MyBroadband at the South African launch of the companys exciting new Smart Collaboration products.

People often feel disengaged when working exclusively from home, said Dousson.

Even though they have the technology that can support the work they are doing, it doesnt feel like they are engaging with people.

Dousson said Lenovos Smart Collaboration tools are the perfect solution for businesses adapting to the modern workplace and can help them solve this challenge.

Lenovos Smart Collaboration tools make you feel like you are back in the office, and obviously people collaborate better with a personal connection, said Dousson.

Thats why I believe for people using these tools, productivity is going to go up. You are allowing your employees to work from anywhere with more flexibility, and are also allowing them to connect a lot better than before.

Awesome new devices

Dousson highlighted his favourite Lenovo Smart Collaboration devices, which include the ThinkSmart View and ThinkSmart Cam.

I have been using it for close to six months now and the ThinkSmart View has been changing my life in terms of how I operate with Microsoft Teams and Zoom, he said.

It allows you to have a mini room system which is very compact with amazing sound quality and a superb screen.

Dousson said his favourite feature of the ThinkSmart Cam is how it uses AI to zoom and focus on subjects.

We were running a virtual work event, and one of the ladies had the camera in her kitchen, and the camera was tracking and following her wherever she was going.

The tracking ability is so incredible that some people were asking whether her husband was following her with the camera. This technology is absolutely amazing to watch.

ThinkShield security

Hybrid working has caused increased security concerns for IT managers, however, and Lenovo has taken note of this. The companys solution: ThinkShield.

We have an array of hardware and software defences that comprise the Lenovo ThinkShield, which protects your data, your machine, and your identity, said Dousson.

If you connect to a foreign Wi-Fi system as a guest, ThinkShield will let you know if that Wi-Fi is actually secure, and if not, it will allow you to connect with certain restrictions to protect you and keep you online.

Dousson encouraged businesses to learn more about Lenovos Smart Collaboration tools here.
South Africas top online publication is News24, with a readership of 12 million unique monthly browsers in March 2022.

News24 is followed by BusinessTech with 6.5 million readers, TimesLive with 5.5 million, and The South African with 3.2 million.

The ranking is based on the IAB South Africa (IAB SA) and Narratiives March 2022 traffic report, which ranks South Africas top online publications.

Narratiive is the official traffic measurement partner of the IAB SA and provides accurate traffic statistics for South African websites.

South Africas top online publications run Narratiive website tags, making it possible to produce an accurate like-for-like readership comparison.

To run a large online publication is a challenging job. You have to be on top of the news 24/7 and ensure you cover all major events.

The editors of most of South Africas top publications are seasoned journalists who typically have over a decades online news experience.

News24s editor in chief is Adriaan Basson, who started his career fifteen years ago as an investigative journalist and Mail & Guardian.

BusinessTechs managing editor is Gareth Vorster. He started as a journalist in the UK 20 years ago and, on his return to South Africa, served as ICT editor of BusinessLive before joining BusinessTech.

The table below provides an overview of South Africas largest news publications and the editors who run these publications.
Samsung and its retail partners are offering an attractive R10,000 guaranteed trade-in value for various Apple, Huawei, and Samsung flagship smartphones that launched as far back as 2017.

Lets get something out of the way  I dont believe you need to upgrade your smartphone every year or two.

I probably would have stuck it out with a smartphone for four or five years if it werent for battery degradation and short software support periods.

But Samsung South Africa changed my mind this year after its director of integrated mobility, Justin Hume, revealed a R10,000 guaranteed trade-in promotion on several smartphone models when buying the Galaxy S22.

Their only requirement is that the phone needs to turn on and remain powered without being plugged in, and it must not be blacklisted.

Your trade-in device can be severely damaged, and you will still get the full R10,000. That includes having a cracked screen, broken camera, dented body, and other damage.

This was music to my ears, as I recently had a mishap with my beloved Galaxy S20.

I had been the owner of this compact powerhouse for about a year by the 2020 December holidays.

That was when it somehow picked up a large crack in the left bottom corner of its display.

An unfortunate fall only days later put another hole in the display and extended the existing cracks over the entire bottom half of the screen.

While the S20 still performed very well and met my daily needs with no issue, the cracks in the display quickly became obtrusive.

As the phone was well outside of its warranty, I went online in the hopes of finding a cheap solution for a fix.

I discovered plenty of DIY kits for replacing the front glass  the only part of the screen that was damaged.

These sold for between R900 and R1,500, but I soon learnt that employing them required sophisticated tools and delicate handiwork.

With great hesitation, I proceeded to various cellphone repair shops.

To the horror of my wallet, they could only replace the entire screen, including the LCD, which would cost no less than R5,000.

I could probably only get R10,000 for the phone after repairing the screen if I wanted to sell it. So I let it be  until Samsungs Galaxy S22 launch and trade-in offer came along.

Order and trade-in experience

To use the offer, you first need to buy a Galaxy S22 smartphone or opt for trade-in while buying from Samsungs online store.

As the latter could leave me without a phone if the collection courier happened to be faster than the delivery of my new device, I opted for the former.

I chose the standard Galaxy S22 and bought it directly from Samsung South Africas online store.

This allowed me to add an accessory at a R2,000 discount, effectively bringing the phones price down to R16,999.

Once I had my stunning new green Galaxy S22, I proceeded with the trade-in.

Using the post-sale R10,000 trade-in link, I entered details of my old device, including its damaged screen and IMEI, before being offered R10,000.

I then had to enter the IMEI of the Galaxy S22, provide my bank account number for the R10,000 payment, and an address for collection.

After submitting my details, I promptly received an email from Regener8, Samsungs trade-in facilitator, confirming my trade-in application.

They asked for a preferred date and courier address to collect my trade-in device.

After responding, they provided a tracking number and instructions to backup my files and factory reset the phone.

The following pictures show that I put my cracked Galaxy S20 back in its original packaging, but this is not required.

The courier arrived as scheduled around lunchtime on Thursday, 17 March 2022, and carried my old S20 off to the assessment facility.

A few hours later, Regener8 confirmed they received the Galaxy S20 and were assessing it.

On Saturday, 19 March 2022, the company confirmed my device powered on as required, and I qualified for the R10,000.

They then asked that I confirm my banking details and said that payment would be made on 28 March 2022.

The money was paid two days late, after I had logged a query, and Samsung apologised for the delay due to unprecedented demand for the offer.

I also qualified for free Galaxy Buds Live worth R2,000, which was delivered on 29 March 2022.

If trade-in offers like these become a common occurrence at Samsung, they wont be losing this customer anytime soon.
In this months exhibit at the Napa Library, Chris Sauer shares the beauty he has found in the natural world with photos he refers to as natural abstracts that beckon the viewer to see his subjects as theyve never seen them before.

Rocks jutting from water appear to be in the clouds. Humble grasses and tumbleweeds are ennobled. Flowers and trees can look like watercolor paintings.

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.

Retired from a professional career in the field of environmental restoration, Sauer's photographic focus frequently centers on landscapes.

An outdoorsman, he hikes trails here and abroad seeking what fascinates him and often waiting for the perfect moment when the lighting is best.

That photo on metal is Iguazu Falls in Argentina, Sauer said, pointing to a dramatic waterfall during an interview at the library last week. It is one of the 10 natural wonders of the world.

Sauer has traveled to many countries. Three weeks after he and his wife Bonnie were married, they were sent to live in Saanopu, Western Samoa by the Peace Corps. They lived in a thatched hut for two and a half years while teaching English to teenage students.

Even though Sauer had a nice Nikon camera as a wedding present, there are no photos in this exhibit from their Peace Corps days.

You had to send film to New Zealand and it took months to get the images back and I hadnt developed my technical photo skills yet, he explained.

Returning to the U.S. Sauer got a job teaching English but felt stifled teaching in a classroom, so he started a landscape business, which led to a 30-year career as Bay Area manager for the California Conservation Corps.

Sauers work involved teaching others about plants and nursery management as well as leading teams in planting in areas where there was a need such as places burned by fires.

The couple moved to Napa in 1978 and raised their son and daughter here.

Along with former Napa Valley Unified School District Superintendent John Glaser and his wife Carol, Sauer and his wife were co-owners of Napa Sunrise Montessori.

We had children in the school, Sauer said. Bonnie was certified for Montessori and was head teacher. We had a whole staff working.

Sauer is a member of the Napa Photographic Society. This is his third photo exhibit in the library. Each year 12 applicants are selected during an annual art call to exhibit their work for one month. In previous exhibits, Sauer focused on water and architecture in its many evolutionary states.

I'll point my camera and click the shutter at anything that moves or doesn't move, as long as it captures a bit of my imagination, Sauer said. I like to examine the world around me.

The opening reception for Sauers photographic exhibition at the Napa County Library is Friday, April 8, from 6:15 to 7:30 p.m. Registration is required to attend. Register at https://chrissauer.eventbrite.com.

Wearing masks is not required but recommended. The library is at 580 Coombs St., Napa.
With April designated as National Public Schools month, it is timely to feature one of Napa Countys most beloved educators from the past, Dee Thomas, D.T., Davis.

In addition to dedicating 57 years of his life to preparing the local youths for their future, Davis also became an authority on local history, especially the legacy of the local Native American culture.

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.

His love of Napa County history began at an early age. Born on his family ranch in Yountville in 1872, he began early to amass his large collection of Napa County oral histories of his pioneer settler neighbors. It was his good fortune to become acquainted with those pioneers and their stories. In later years, the dissemination of that knowledge would be central to his professional life.

After completing his grammar school education, Davis attended the Oak Mound School for Boys. This private, college preparatory school was located on Randolph Street in Napa.

After he graduated in 1892, Davis accepted his first teaching position and for the next 10 years, Davis taught at the Oak Grove School located in Monticello.

While in the Berryessa area, Davis became familiar with the various Native American sites in the Monticello Valley. At these sites, Davis conducted archeological digs, cataloging and documenting details about each site and its artifacts. With each discovery, his fascination and appreciation grew for the local Native American communities.

Davis eventually left Monticello to teach briefly in Rutherford and then Calistoga. In 1904, Davis settled in Napa.

From 1904 to 1922, Davis served as the principal of the Lincoln Grammar School on Main Street. It was the first of four public schools to be located on that parcel. There would eventually be a total of three different Lincoln school buildings. The fourth is the present-day New Tech High School.

An amusing side note relating to the first Lincoln school and Davis, and recounted years later by a student, the late Gladys Ransford Wilson, Davis was caught off guard by the prank of ringing that schools bell carried out by some of his female students. Purportedly, he had held those girls in such high esteem, Davis was exceedingly disheartened and disappointed by that disruptive action of those impish girls.

In the fall of 1922, Davis became the principal of the then newly constructed Intermediate School for grades 7 and 8. At that school, Davis served as administrator until his retirement in 1938.

Although ending his career in public schools was a difficult decision, Davis now had the time to devote to organizing his collection of local Native American artifacts. As part of that endeavor, Davis returned to the classroom to share details of his vast collection as well as his knowledge of Napa County history. His class at the Napa Junior College (now Napa Valley College), History 43A: Napa County  Topography and Natural Phenomena, always filled quickly with eager-to-learn students.

In 1948, 76-year-old Davis fully retired from his professional education career. That same year, the students at Napa High School expressed their appreciation for Davis with a special dedication in their yearbook.

It read, To say that Dee T. Davis is an educator would be an understatement. It is true that he has been teaching for 57 years but you cannot label a man like him and say that, this is his field ... It is to this man who helped to preserve the memory of Napa County that we dedicate the book.

Also, the Napa School District named the Menlo Avenue elementary school Napa in his honor and memory in 1954.

For the last four years of his life, Davis continued to dig, study and catalog the Native American artifacts of Napa County. He spent a considerable amount of time in the Monticello area before its scheduled 1957 flooding to create Lake Berryessa.

Some individuals criticized his methods but Davis felt it was his responsibility to rescue and preserve as many relics as possible from their planned oblivion. His reason was to provide a greater understanding of the pre-exploration history of Napa County.

Davis had hoped to leave his 1,600 pieces of local Native American artifacts to Napa Valley College for research and display as a legacy. But, instead, it was donated to the Lowie Museum of Anthropology at UC Berkeley.

Although his collection is no longer in its place of origin, Davis did leave a local legacy of possibly an even greater value. Those who spent time with Davis became connected with the countys past and were instilled with a sense of community and a desire to learn.

Rebecca Yerger is a Napa County historian. Contact her at yergerenterprises@yahoo.com.
Following the lead of the Napa Valley Unified School District, and the cities of Calistoga and American Canyon, the Napa City Council is scheduled to declare a climate emergency on Tuesday.

The council resolution declaring the climate emergency does not set a mandate of net zero-climate pollution by 2030, though it does set a general goal of achieving net-zero pollution. That essentially means the city would reach a balance between greenhouse gas emissions produced and greenhouse gasses removed from the atmosphere.

The resolution does note an urgent, swift effort is needed to meet the net-zero goal by 2030.

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.

The scientific evidence indicates that an urgent global climate mobilization effort to reverse global warming is needed as quickly as possible towards net zero climate pollutants from public and private operations within the City by 2030, states the relevant portion of the resolution.

Much of the resolution text is dedicated to establishing that climate change is human-caused  according to a broad scientific consensus  and represents a growing danger to humanity. It notes the window of opportunity for long-term preservation of the climate is rapidly closing, and that Napa County and California have already experienced adverse effects from climate change, such as prolonged fire seasons, rising temperatures and severe droughts.

There is some action contained in the resolution: it directs city manager Steve Potter to develop partnerships with schools, businesses and community organizations to educate, mobilize, expand and accelerate support for action on climate change to achieve a goal of net zero climate pollution.

Potter is also directed to document climate goals and practices that support climate protection actions in the citys draft general plan  the citys primary long-term planning document that, when passed likely later this year, will be in place until 2040.

Additionally, Potter is directed to recommend available resources for creating specific strategies to take on climate change in the citys budget review and approval process. And hes directed to evaluate all planning and policy decisions through a climate change lens, in support of the zero net emissions goal

Councilmember Beth Painter said she doesnt think the resolution is the right place for specificity. She said the value of the resolution is that it will establish climate change action as a clear focus of the city.

The big picture point or purpose of the resolution is to make it clear that this is a priority for the city moving forward, Painter said. I think the resolution captures that in a lot of ways in terms of looking through the lens of climate change. We need to just keep working together on all of the best ways to do our part.

Painter added that the resolution is important in part because climate change is a new, swiftly encroaching challenge that government agencies don't traditionally have the resources or internal structures to tackle  unlike other issues like housing or road infrastructure. It also serves as a recognition that the city needs to be nimble in figuring out how to structure its approach to the issue, she said.

"How we looked at this three years ago, five years ago, is different than how we look at it today, and it will probably be different a few years from now," Painter said. "We really need to start doing things a little bit differently.... Five years ago I would have said theres no way Im buying an electric car, I cant afford it, and thats not how I feel today. When you think about how quickly things are changing even though sometimes it doesnt seem that way, I think actually theres been a lot thats happened very quickly."

Painter also noted the resolution  like the resolutions by the other Napa government agencies before it  was inspired by a presentation made by NVUSD seniors Emily Bit and Alisa Karesh, representatives of Napa Schools for Climate Action, back in January.

The two students urged the council to ban new gas stations  which American Canyon, with a temporary ban, and Calistoga have already done. They also urged the council to pledge to decrease emissions to net-zero by or before 2030, and to consider a temporary moratorium on forest and woodland removal until Napa County strengthens its water quality and tree protection ordinance.

Jim Wilson, a member of local environmental group Napa Climate NOW! whos worked closely with the student activists, said the students have been working to convince local governments to pass climate emergency resolutions since late 2018.

Wilson said that, to him, the substance of the climate challenge is leadership. Whats helped move climate action forward in Napa County, he said, is leadership from the students and from certain local government leaders to bring the importance of mitigating climate change to the rest of the leadership structure.

We have some leaders who have shown some real leadership where they basically step up, Wilson said. The way I see it is were doing it for the kids  we have to.

The Napa Schools For Climate Action students were successful at convincing the NVUSD board to pass a climate emergency resolution back in 2019, and succeeded again with Calistoga and American Canyon last year, Wilson said.

Chris Benz, another member of the climate group, wrote in an email that the climate emergency resolution is a very important step toward devoting resources and staff time to taking on climate change and increasing the citys resiliency to it.

Bayard Fox, also a member of the climate group, said in an email the majority of the Napa City Council appear to see climate change as a priority, and the Napa Countys other jurisdictions  Calistoga, American Canyon, Yountville and St. Helena  are also making great efforts.

The more active commitment from all local municipalities, the more the county and the state will follow, Fox wrote. If we adopt strong language (not watered down like the General Plan) then we will force the city staff to adapt to this all-encompassing priority.

In other news, the City Council will be receiving a report on the federal Napa River Dredging Project and is scheduled to provide direction on Capital Improvement Program proposals for the upcoming 2022-23 fiscal year.

You can reach Edward Booth at (707) 256-2213.

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.
Biden to sign new arms package for Ukraine worth at least $100 million

Armenia's third President Serzh Sargsyan in France Square

Resistance Movement to hold rally tomorrow in Vanadzor, women's march to take place in Yerevan

European Parliament: Ankara deliberately 'destroyed' its chances of joining EU

NEWS.am digest: Large scale protests continue in Yerevan, people forcibly arrested

Scholz to take part in G7 Ukraine discussion with Zelenskyy

Germany to supply Ukraine with seven self-propelled howitzers

Resistance Movement rallies in France Square

Al-Monitor: More niceties, zero progress in third round of Turkey-Armenia peace talks

Apple, Google, Microsoft to introduce passwordless authorization before end of 2023

Japan may start letting tourists into country in June

Investigative Committee: Criminal case opened into hooliganism committed by marchers in downtown Yerevan

Six people injured in building explosion in Madrid

Dollar, euro continue rising significantly in Armenia

Swiss police seize more than 500kg of cocaine from cargo for Nespresso factory

Law enforcement apprehend 59 people during Fridays civil disobedience actions in Yerevan

Karabakh official: Azerbaijani truck committed deliberate crime in Artsakh

Policeman hits woman during protest action in Yerevan

Committee to Protect Journalists: Armenia law enforcement obstruct journalists covering Yerevan protests

Armenia ruling force MP calls on police to inspect opposition 'shelters' where drugs may be kept

Artsakh Police investigating Armenian car crash caused by Azerbaijani convoy

Situation gets tense on Marshal Baghramyan Avenue in Yerevan, ex-president Kocharyans son also there

Police apprehend 48 people during civil disobedience actions in Yerevan

Police special forces forcibly remove Armenia ex-Police chief from opposition march in Yerevan

Situation gets tense during opposition march in Yerevan

Ararat Mirzoyan briefs US Senator McConnell on details of Armenia-Turkey normalization process

Azerbaijan holding international regatta in occupied Armenian Mataghis town of Karabakh

Many members of US Congress give green light for F-16s to Turkey

Law amendments propose that Armenia councils of elders members will also be able to be elected community leaders

Resistance Movement holding marches in Yerevan in 4 directions

Armenia parliament holding special sitting

Copper prices falling

Armenia FM Mirzoyan, US Senator Menendez stress inadmissibility of provoking tension by Azerbaijan

Oil rises in price

Bishkek reports that Uzbekistan border guards shoot, kill 3 Kyrgyzstan citizens at border

Azerbaijani military convoy throws Armenian taxi into gorge in Artsakh (PHOTOS)

Armenia Police: All roads open in Yerevan, provinces

Armenia FM in US, meets with International Republican Institute Eurasia regional director

US Strategic Command chief warns of deterrence crisis against Russia, China

Armenia ex-Prosecutor General, Investigative Committee former chief to remain in custody

Newspaper: Armenia President reacts to oppositions struggle

Mississippi becomes last US state to recognize Armenian Genocide

Resistance Movement rally ends: Citizens remain on France Square

Erdogan and Macron discuss Turkey-France relations and Ukraine

CNBC: Elon Musk to become interim CEO of Twitter

Saghatelyan: Tomorrow from 12:00 we will completely paralyze Yerevan from four directions

Finland ready to cut off gas supplies from Russia

Resistance Movement marchers return to France Square

NEWS.am digest: Large scale protests continue in Yerevan, people forcibly arrested

Greece accuses Turkey of stoking tensions in Aegean Sea

Resistance Movement rally starts in central Yerevan

US Embassy in Havana resumes issuing visas to Cubans

Bloomberg: UK and Japan will help Asian countries reduce dependence on Russian oil

Dollar, euro gain considerable value in Armenia

FLYONE ARMENIA cancels Yerevan flights to, from Lyon, Paris until June 10

Annual inflation in Turkey reaches 69.97% in April

Armenia population as of January 1 announced

Poland builds 50 kilometers of fence on border with Belarus

Azerbaijan promises Europe gas in the hope of loyalty to Baku's crimes

Australia allocates $1.4 billion to modernize its Navy

Peskov says events unrolling in Armenia are countrys internal affair

Grigoryan: Discussions on setting up Armenia-Azerbaijan commission may be completed in near future

Red Cross: No Azerbaijani detainees in Armenia

Armenia official: Peace agreement with Azerbaijan also means solution to Karabakh issue

Armen Grigoryan: There is need to get answers to questions in order to organize Armenia, Azerbaijan leaders meeting

Security Council chief: Baku's statements on Armenia territories belonging to Azerbaijan do not contribute to peace

Armenia official comments on Azerbaijan president's words about 'Zangezur corridor'

Armen Grigoryan: Armenia and Azerbaijan could exchange enclaves

FT: Erdogan used mediation between Russia and Ukraine

Person dies after being hospitalized from one of tents at France Square in Yerevan

Armenia to get 22.6M loan from International Bank for Reconstruction and Development

Armenia ruling force MP: Oppositions goal is not saving Karabakh but changing of power

President says Artsakh continues to maintain its vision for future, toward independence

Oppositions uncrowded marches show lack of public support, says Armenia ruling force lawmaker

Trade in Armenia increased by over $1 billion, PM says

Scuffle breaks out during civil disobedience march in Yerevan, police attempt to apprehend opposition MP

Pashinyan to Bennett: I am hopeful that Armenian-Israeli relations will flourish in near future

Armenia ruling power legislator: This opposition has always run away from truth

Civil disobedience motorcade being held in Yerevan

EU to ban Russians from buying European real estate

US defense industry facing problems due to supply of weapons to Ukraine

Armenia FM holds discussion at Atlantic Council, speaks about process of normalization of relations with Turkey

Newspaper: Armenia opposition MPs to lose their parliamentary mandates?

Newspaper: Artsakh President says we would not have had so many casualties if war had started half year later

Civil disobedience march kicks off in downtown Yerevan

Civil disobedience actions resume in Yerevan

Blinken tests positive for Covid

Denmark, Finland support European Commission proposal on Russian oil sanctions

Bulgaria to seek exemption from EU proposed Russian oil embargo

Biden says he is ready for additional sanctions against Russia

Switzerland braces for serious power shortage

Uruguay freezes ambassador appointment to Ankara after Cavusoglu's gesture

Czech Republic to seek exemption from proposed EU embargo on Russian oil imports

Charles Michel on the likelihood of Moldova's EU membership

Resistance Movement actions to resume tomorrow early morning

Elon Musk is invited to UK Parliament for buying Twitter

Disobedience march reaches France Square, rally starts

US crude oil shipments to Europe hit highest level in April

NEWS.am digest: Large-scale protests being held in Armenia to demand PMs resignation

Armenia Defense Minister meets with Georgian PM
The Kremlin said on Monday it categorically denied any accusations related to the murder of civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, and said Ukrainian allegations on the matter should be treated with doubt, Reuters reported.

Ukrainian authorities said on Sunday they were investigating possible crimes by Russian forces after finding hundreds of bodies strewn around towns outside the capital Kyiv after the Russian withdrawal from the area.

"This information must be seriously questioned," Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call.

"From what we have seen, our experts have identified signs of video falsification and other fakes."

Peskov said that the facts and chronology of the events in Bucha did not support Ukraine's version of events and urged international leaders not to rush to judgment.

"We categorically deny any accusations," said Peskov.

"The situation is undoubtedly serious and we would ask that many international leaders not rush with their statements, not rush with their baseless accusations, request information from different sources, and at least listen to our explanations."

Peskov said that Russia's diplomats would press on with their efforts to convene a U.N. Security Council meeting to discuss what Moscow has called "Ukrainian provocations" in Bucha despite their first effort to arrange such a meeting being blocked.

"The initiative itself of raising this topic to the platform of the U.N. Security Council suggests that Russia wants and demands that this topic be raised at the international level," Peskov said.

Dmitry Peskov declined to comment on whether the furor over Bucha would affect peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv, which had been set to resume via videoconference on Monday.
A hefty EU-wide tariff on Russian energy imports could prove more efficient than an outright ban although even a full embargo would have a limited impact on most countries, Frances economic analysis council said on Monday, Reuters reports.

While a full embargo would be "manageable" for EU economies, the cost would vary widely, hitting Lithuania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Finland, Czech Republic the hardest, the Conseil d'Analyse Economique, which is attached to the French prime minister's office, said.

"It (a tariff) could allow the small but most exposed countries ...to continue to access some Russian gas imports while drying up imports to larger and less exposed countries that are more able to substitute away from Russian imports," the council said in a study.

For example, a 40 percent tariff could reduce the impact on countries most exposed to energy imports from Russia to between a quarter and a third of the impact of a direct embargo, the study found.

The Baltic states and Poland are pushing for a complete halt to energy imports from Russia, while Germany is resisting. Berlin, however, said it is gradually moving toward an embargo.

The Conseil d'Analyse Economique said that a full energy ban could on average cause a loss of gross national income of 0.2-0.3%, working out to 100 euros ($110) per adult.

In Germany, the EU's biggest economy, the hit to gross national income could range from as little as 0.3% to as much as 3%, the council said.

France, the bloc's second-biggest economy, would be among the countries least impacted with an economic loss of 0.15-0.3% as it is far less dependent on Russian energy imports.
Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan received the UK-Armenia Parliamentary Friendship Group of the British House of Commons, headed by Tim Loughton, the press service of the Foreign Ministry reported.

During the meeting, the interlocutors discussed further deepening and strengthening of relations between Armenia and the United Kingdom, highlighting the role of parliamentary diplomacy in this regard.

The sides touched upon the process of reforms in Armenia. In this context, the British parliamentarians commended the democratic progress of Armenia. Ararat Mirzoyan reiterated the commitment of the Government of Armenia to continue the process of strengthening democracy, rule of law, protection of human rights, uncompromising fight against corruption, appreciating in this context the support of the United Kingdom.

The sides discussed the situation in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone and in the Armenia-Azerbaijan bordering area. Minister Mirzoyan presented in detail the incursion of the Azerbaijani armed forces into the village of Parukh in Nagorno-Karabakh, the actions of targeting the civilian population and infrastructure and creating a humanitarian crisis in Artsakh, as well as issues related to the protection of Armenian cultural and religious heritage in the territories fallen under the Azerbaijani control.

Ararat Mirzoyan emphasized the efforts of British Parliamentarians towards condemning the human rights violations committed by Azerbaijani armed forces during the 44-day war and the aggressive actions of Azerbaijan in the bordering area of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, as well as their humanitarian consequences, and supporting the rights of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh.

The negotiations on a comprehensive peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan was touched upon. The Foreign Minister of Armenia stressed the need to launch negotiations within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairmanship, aimed at a comprehensive final settlement, including the clarification of the status of Nagorno-Karabakh.

At the request of the guests, Minister Mirzoyan also referred to the process of normalization of Armenia-Turkey relations, the statement reads.
Armenian News - NEWS-am presents the daily digest of related top news as of 04.04.22:

Two days before the Pashinyan-Aliyev meeting in Brussels on April 6, Baku said there will be progress in the process of normalization of relations when Armenia rejects its territorial claims to Azerbaijan.

As Assistant to the President of Azerbaijan Hikmet Hajiyev, noted, Azerbaijan has handed over to Yerevan the draft of the basic principles of the peace agreement.

He insisted that the 5-point document includes the principles of the Helsinki Accords.

"Armenia and Azerbaijan must recognize each other's territorial integrity, sovereignty and inviolability of borders, as well as refrain from the use of force and the threat of force against territorial integrity," he said.

Armenia, in turn, said that Baku's proposals are acceptable, but it supplemented them with its proposals and said it is ready to start talks immediately on the basis of complete principles. Azerbaijan did not respond to Armenia's proposal.

Meanwhile, OSCE Chairperson-in-Office Zbigniew Rau called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to participate in peace talks in good faith.

The OSCE Chairman-in-Office also welcomed the diplomatic initiative aimed at normalizing relations between Armenia and Turkey.

Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio, who is in Yerevan, met yesterday with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, President Vahagn Khachaturyan and Speaker of the National Assembly Alen Simonyan.

He also visited the Tsitsernakaberd Memorial of Armenian Genocide and laid flowers . At a joint press conference following his meeting with his Italian counterpart, Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan reaffirmed the readiness of the Armenian side to start negotiations for a peace agreement with Azerbaijan under the mandate of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs.

Armenian opposition parties called on everyone to join the rally, which will be held on April 5 at Freedom Square in Yerevan.

The opposition accused the current government of fulfilling the demands of Turkey and Azerbaijan.

According to the, the current government is ready to include Karabakh in Azerbaijan

We appeal to everyone - to parties and individuals, to intellectuals and non-governmental organizations, to Armenians from Armenia, Karabakh and the Diaspora. Let's stand shoulder to shoulder and jointly present our demands, the opposition parties said in a statement,

French President Emmanuel Macron said he wants to completely block the export of Russian coal and oil to the European Union following the events in the Ukrainian city of Bucha.

Bucha lies 37 km northwest of Kyiv and this weekend when journalists visited, it was a scene of shattered buildings and streets full of corpses.

The French President said that this week he will discuss the issue of further sanctions against Russia with his European partners.

Macron also expressed readiness to assist Ukraine in investigating the events in Bucha.

https://news.am/eng/news/694790.html

Meanwhile, the economy minister of Slovakia, which relies on Russian natural gas for around 85% of its demand, said the country could not be cut off from Russian gas flows, Reuters reported.

Slovak Economy Minister Richard Sulik said, if there is a condition to pay in rubles, then we pay in rubles. Sulik added Slovakia would continue to work on a common approach with the EU.

And Lithuania, which was nearly 100 percent reliant on Russia for gas in 2015, said late Saturday that it has now cut itself off entirely.

"Seeking full energy independence from Russian gas, in response to Russia's energy blackmail in Europe and the war in Ukraine, Lithuania has completely abandoned Russian gas," Lithuania's energy ministry said.

In the meantime, Germany, which has been reliant on Russian gas imports, has been resistant to an energy blockade, even as it has supported other hard sanctions on Russia and even provided Ukraine arms. But German Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht said Sunday that the EU should at least discuss pulling the plug on Russian gas imports, one of Europe's last major financial lifeline for Moscow.

The supply of Turkish Bayraktar UAVs to Ukraine is painfully perceived by the Russian society, Russian Ambassador to Turkey Alexey Yerkhov told Aydnlk newspaper of Turkey.

The business is business explanations are not understood among the Russian society, as your drones kill our soldiers; the Bayraktars are bought for that very purpose, he noted.

The 2022 Grammy nominations were announced back in November with the expectation that winners would be revealed on Jan. 31but after the ceremony was delayed due to COVID-19, Musics Biggest Night finally arrived on Sunday, Billboard reported.

Jon Batiste led all 2022 nominees with 11 nods, while both Olivia Rodrigo and Finneas went into the show with nominations in all the Big Four categories: record, album and song of the year, along with best new artist. But who emerged the nights biggest winner? Well, both Silk Sonic and Foo Fighters swept all their respective categories, and Doja Cat and SZA teamed up for a surprise win in a Big Four category.

Meanwhile, the President of Ukraine brought a touching moment to the 64th annual Grammy Awards Sunday, CNN reported.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy offered a video speech that began "The war. What's more opposite than music."

Zelenskyy has been outspoken in gathering international support for his country since it was invaded by Russian military forces in February.

He tied that to the music industry's biggest night by saying, "The war doesn't let us choose who survives and who stays in eternal silence."
Story Highlights 94% of Afghans rated their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering

96% of Afghan women and 92% of men suffering

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Taliban's recent decision to renege on its promise to allow girls to attend school past sixth grade is a stark reminder of how much life has changed for Afghans since the group returned to power last year -- and Gallup's surveys in the country show it hasn't been for the better.

As the Taliban completed its takeover of Afghanistan last year, nearly all Afghans (94%) rated their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering. This was not only a record high for Afghanistan, but also the highest level of suffering that Gallup has measured for any country since 2005.

Line graph. The percentages of Afghans who rate their lives highly enough to be considered thriving, struggle or suffering. In 2021, no respondents in Afghanistan rated their lives highly enough to be considered thriving, while six percent were considered struggling. A full 94% rated their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering.

Gallup classifies individuals as "thriving," "struggling" or "suffering" according to how they rate their current and future lives on a ladder scale with steps numbered from zero to 10, based on the Cantril Self-Anchoring Striving Scale. Those who rate their current lives and anticipated lives in five years a 4 or lower are classified as suffering.

Gallup surveyed Afghanistan as the Taliban took control and the U.S. completed its withdrawal, further exacerbating the already bleak economic situation in Afghanistan. However, suffering has been on an upward trend since 2017, as Taliban-fueled violence increased and continued to rise in the face of a prolonged Taliban offensive that seized control of more parts of the country.

Nearly All Afghan Women and Men Are Suffering

Suffering among Afghan women is now nearly universal, with 96% of women in the country rating their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering. For the first time since 2012, the percentage of women suffering is modestly higher than the 92% of Afghan men considered suffering. For much of Gallup's trend, Afghan men have been more likely than women to be suffering.

Line graph. The percentages of Afghan men and women who rate their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering. In 2021, 96% of Afghan women and 92% of Afghan men rated their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering.

Afghan women are particularly pessimistic about the trajectory of their lives in the future. This is not surprising given that the Taliban has restricted women from working in any industry other than healthcare or primary education, curtailed women's ability to travel on their own, and banned them from secondary and higher education. When asked how they would rate their lives in five years on a scale of zero to 10, the average score was 1.8 in 2021, the lowest level in Gallup's global trend for women in any country. For men, the average score in 2021 was 2.1.

Suffering Ubiquitous in Afghanistan

There is, generally, little difference in the levels of suffering seen across the regions of Afghanistan. None of the respondents in any region rated their lives highly enough to be considered thriving. And across all regions, 87% or more of Afghans rated their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering.

When examined by income level, all of the poorest Afghans rated their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering. Only among the wealthiest, those in the top 20% for income, were fewer than nine in 10 suffering. None of the respondents at any income level rated their lives highly enough to be considered thriving.

Afghans' Life Evaluations, by Income Level Struggling Suffering % % Poorest 20% 0 100 Second 20% 1 99 Middle 20% 3 97 Fourth 20% 6 94 Richest 20% 14 86 Data collected in 2021. No respondents at any income level rated their lives highly enough to be considered thriving. Gallup

Bottom Line

Afghans are experiencing suffering on an unprecedented scale. In no other country since the trend began in 2005 has a larger percentage of the population rated their lives poorly enough to be considered suffering. And Afghans have little hope that their situation will improve anytime soon. For Afghan women in particular, the future is bleak without access to education for the country's girls.

In recent weeks, global attention has shifted away from Afghanistan, but the crisis in the country has not abated. Humanitarian aid agencies have previously issued desperate calls for funding to provide assistance, including the largest single country aid appeal ever by the United Nations.

And, before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. and other countries pledged substantial amounts of aid. However, in the wake of the crisis in Ukraine, it is unclear how much additional aid will be forthcoming.

To stay up to date with the latest Gallup News insights and updates, follow us on Twitter.

For complete methodology and specific survey dates, please review Gallup's Country Data Set details.

Learn more about how the Gallup World Poll works.
Top health experts from the United States and the Americas promoted the evolution of a more consumer-focused industry as they explored the range of innovations spurred by the devastating pandemic at the Business of Health Care Conference, which carried the theme Technology, Access, and the New Normal.

University of Miami President Julio Frenk opened the hybrid forum, which featured a live event on campus that also was streamed, highlighting that the pandemic has provided the most dramatic illustration that health careat the crossroads of nearly every dimension of societyhas exposed troubling inequalities in terms of access and quality.

At this junction more than ever, health care is at the threshold of a new erawith greater challenges and greater opportunities than have been present ever before, said Frenk, a former health minister for Mexico who is now navigating his sixth pandemic as a public health expert.

Health is a means for collective and individual advancement and therefore the way we care for health is an indicator of the success of a society, Frenk added. Health care is a bellwether of how society achieves its most important goalspromoting well-being, development security, and social justice.

Ernest Grant, president of the American Nurses Association, acknowledged that while nursing shortages are not new to the industry, the current pandemic-exacerbated scenario is unprecedented. As a remedy, he urged Congress to support increased funding for training and education.

Were seeing a confluence of people getting ready to retirethe average age of bedside nurses is 50and about 19 percent of our nursing workforce is readying to retire in the next few years, Granted reported. General population growth and an increase in the numbers of elderly requiring care are fueling the need for more nurses, at a time when reports of abusive patient behavior are on the rise.

We need to address these workplace issues and put into place a safe working environment so that people will want to come into nursing and other areas of health care and stay, Grant said.

Joseph Fifer, president and CEO of Healthcare Financial Management Association, cited statistics indicating patient use of telehealth had leaped from 13 percent pre-pandemic to 83 percent. Yet Rachel Villanueva, president of the National Medical Association, the largest and oldest national organization representing Black physicians and hospitals, pointed out that many in underserved communities were able to access only by phone, not the preferred video visit, because of poor internet service.

Pat Geraghty, president and CEO, GuideWell and Florida Blue, again the conferences principal sponsor, moderated the opening session to assess the impact of technologies and access on patients and providers.

The panelists all concurred that telehealth has emerged as a tremendous asset and one of the true legacies of the pandemic, yet cited the need for best practices to be developed and shared to improve efficiencies and address the range of variations that have surfaced in this delivery method.

Norma Sue Kenyon, vice provost for innovation and chief innovation officer for the Miller School of Medicine, moderated an afternoon session assessing new technologies.

Jay Wohlgemuth, chief medical officer at Quest Diagnostics, shared the companys efforts launched during the pandemicproviding tests in parking lots, in retail stores, and self-testing kitstoward a more consumer-centric system.

The question is: How do we transform our health care system? Its about doing everything possible [for patients] in the home, the rest in the community, and bringing them in if they really need it. And sometimes they do, Wohlgemuth said. We need to be thinking differently about where people are going to engage with the health care services they need.

Christopher Schoen, a former University student and founder and COO of the Schoen Clinic in Germany, discussed the new MindDoc app, which provides some 250 hours daily of mental health services to patients.

Germany has enacted a law that allows for this and other [health care service] apps to be included within a subscription that allows patients to get this kind of care, and these laws are going to become more standard practice, he said.

Eugenio Minvielle, founder and president of Innit, discussed his firms new platform that helps patients make better decisions about their food choices.

Technology can help make food a proactive actor in all our decisions. Were helping people to think of food as a pillar to health and wellnessnot just an afterthoughtand so were empowering them with real-time information to help them make better decisions, Minvielle explained. The platform is helping to create an ecosystem that provides for better diagnosis through a personalized food experience.

Kelly Jo Golson, chief brand and consumer experience officer for Advocate Aurora Health, noted that the emergence of these and other technologies had exposed the inequities to access that Frenk had mentioned.

The inequalities are staggering, and we cant afford not to address them, Golson said. Well all have to lean into technology to reimagine the delivery of services. We have to be held accountable for all to have access. We cant just hand out devices. We all have a role to play with consumers and patients to help narrow that gap.

Alex Azar, former secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and an adjunct professor of business and senior executive-in-residence with the Miami Herbert Business School since last fall, discussed the political landscape of health care in the final panel of the day moderated by Karoline Mortensen, associate professor and associate dean of business programs.

The former health secretary shared his experience in Operation Warp Speed, public-private partnership to develop the vaccines to fight the virus, as well as his insights on challenges facing the health care systemcatastrophic costs, transparency, and innovative developments.

He recounted his efforts to advance legislation through the Tri-Agency Rulethe Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury (tri-agencies) requiring full transparency for health care costs that include list price, the negotiated discount by plan, and the cash pay amount.

Steven Ullmann, director of the business schools Center for Health Management and Policy and the architect of the annual conference, indicated the success of the hybrid effort and said planning and support for the conference next year were already in place.
Govt suspends some US poultry imports, cites bird flu

Imports of poultry from areas of seven US states have been suspended. File photo: AFP

The government has suspended imports of poultry meat and products, including eggs, from some parts of the United States following outbreaks of H5N1 avian influenza, it said on Monday.



The Centre for Food Safety (CFS), a unit of the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department, said that it had suspended imports from specific areas in seven US states  namely Kansas, Minnesota, Maine, New York, Nebraska, Iowa and South Dakota.



A spokesman said: "The CFS has contacted the American authorities over the issues and will closely monitor information issued by the [World Organisation for Animal Health] and the relevant authorities on the avian influenza outbreaks. Appropriate action will be taken in response to the development of the situation."
Sources, however, said that a new cabinet will be sworn in, with opposition members in it, the Daily Mirror reported.

This follows a proposal by several parties, that a new interim government must be appointed to ensure political stability.

Earlier, reports said Prime Minister Rajapaksa is likely to step down from his position in the coming hours after both he and President Gotabaya Rajapaksa have agreed to form an all party interim government, the Daily Mirror reported.

Following a meeting with the 11 party alliance members, a proposal had been submitted by the members that an all party interim government should be formed immediately with a new Prime Minister to ensure political stability in the country.

Both the Rajapaksas had given a favourable response with sources stating that Mahinda Rajapaksa had agreed to step down for a new SLPP MP to be appointed to the Premiership to ensure immediate political stability.

Sources said that the name of Dinesh Gunwawardena had been proposed as the new Prime Minister but this was yet to be confirmed.

From the main opposition SJB's side, the name of Harsha De Silva has been proposed as the new Finance Minister to replace Basil Rajapaksa.

--IANS san/

( 235 Words)

2022-04-03-22:12:05 (IANS)
The two brothers on Sunday met several political allies who demanded the removal of their younger brother and Finance Minister Basil Rajapasa who is blamed for current economic crisis.

Reports in a section of media indicated a new Prime Minister is to be appointed either from the party or opposition in a bid to form a caretaker government. However, on Sunday night, Prime Minister Rajapaska denied certain media reports that he would step down from the post.

Resisting emergency law and curfew imposed to prevent Sunday's protest initiated by a social media campaign, people and university students got onto the streets demanding President Rajapaksa step down.

Despite blocking of the social media by military, people from various parts of the country gathered to streets and chanted "Gota go, give our country back".

Following violent protest near President Rajapaska's house at Mirihana in Colombo suburbs on Thursday night, powerful emergency law followed by curfew was imposed.

Dried-up dollar reserves and depreciation have denied the island nation with fuel, LP gas, electricity and some daily essential food.

--IANS sfl/vd

( 230 Words)

2022-04-03-22:18:06 (IANS)
Russia has been continuing to open humanitarian corridors in AKiev, Chernigov, Sumy, Kharkov and Mariupol directions, one to Russia and one through the territories controlled by the Kiev authorities towards the western borders of Ukraine since March 4, but the Ukrainian sides are "thwarting" the efforts, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Sunday. "The Russian Armed Forces have opened an additional humanitarian corridor for the evacuation of civilians and foreign citizens from Mariupol to Zaporozhye (with an intermediate point in Berdyansk). At the same time, we are forced to state that the declared humanitarian operation was thwarted by the Kiev authorities, who were actually unable to control neo-Nazi-minded militants and ensure the safety of the specified corridor," the Defence Ministry said in a statement. It said that the Ukrainian side has announced four more corridors in the Zaporozhye direction on March 31 but none of them in the direction of Russia. The Russian armed forces, as well as the formations of the Donetsk and Lugansk people's republics, strictly observe the ceasefire on all routes, including those declared by the Ukrainian side, it added. The Russian Defence Ministry also said that the section of the route adjacent to the city of Mariupol was repeatedly shelled with mortars and heavy machine guns by AFU units and nationalist battalions. As a result, the humanitarian convoy could not pass from Berdyansk to Mariupol. "Once again, we draw the attention of the United Nations, the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), the International Committee of the Red Cross and other international organisations to the criminal policy of official Kiev against Ukrainian citizens and gross violations of international humanitarian law," it said. It also said that on the personal requests of France's President Emmanuel Macron and Germany's Chancellor Olaf Scholz to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the armed forces are reopening the humanitarian corridor from Mariupol to Zaporozhye with an intermediate point in Berdyansk. Russian authorities also said that their Armed Forces, without the participation of the Ukrainian authorities, have evacuated 18,182 people to Russia from dangerous areas of Ukraine on Saturday, as well as the Donetsk and Lugansk people's republics, 3,412 of them children. So far since the beginning of the special military operation, 527,607 people have already been evacuated, of which 108,219 are children. They also said that the border of the Russia was crossed by 64,227 personal vehicles. "From Mariupol through the humanitarian corridor in the eastern direction, without any participation of the Ukrainian side, 115,347 people have already been rescued from the lawlessness organized by the nationalists, including 3,235 people over the past day," said. Russian officials also claimed that "Neo-Nazis" continue to hold over 4.5 million civilians as a "human shield" in Kiev, Kharkov, Chernigov, Sumy and more than two dozen other large settlements. In addition, 6,472 foreigners from 18 countries remain hostage to the militants of territorial defence battalions. "The Ukrainian side continues to block more than 60 foreign vessels in the ports of Kherson, Nikolaev, Chernomorsk, Ochakov, Odessa, and Yuzhny. The threat of shelling and high mine danger created by the Kiev authorities in their internal waters and territorial sea do not allow ships to safely go to the open sea. The Ukrainian authorities, in an attempt to evade responsibility for creating a mine danger in the Black Sea, are trying to blame the Russian Federation for this." "Every day from 0800 to 1900 (Moscow time), a humanitarian corridor opens, which is a safe lane in the south-west direction from the territorial sea of Ukraine, with a length of 80 and a width of 3 nautical miles," the Russian Defence Ministry stated. They also charged the Ukrainian side, as before, for not confirming the readiness to ensure the safety of the exit of foreign vessels to the assembly area and in every possible way avoided cooperation in resolving this issue. "Once again, we call on the International Maritime Organisation and the management of ship owners' companies to influence official Kiev to take measures aimed at unblocking and ensuring the safety of the exit of foreign vessels from the ports of Ukraine." --IANS ams/vd ( 696 Words) 2022-04-03-23:08:03 (IANS)
Imran Khan was on Sunday de-notified as the Prime Minister of Pakistan, in wake of the dissolution of the National Assembly by the President, reports said. However, under Article 224 of the Constitution of Pakistan, he can continue as the Prime Minister for 15 days till the appointment of a caretaker Prime Minister, Geo News reported. He will not be empowered to make decisions that an elected head of the government can make, it added. A notification from the Cabinet Division said: "Consequent upon dissolution of the National Assembly by the President of Pakistan, in terms of Article 58(1) read with Article 48(1) of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, vide Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs' SRO No. 487(1)/2022, dated 3rd April, 2022, Mr Imran Ahmad Khan Niazi ceased to hold the Office of the Prime Minister of Pakistan, with immediate effect." There is still, however, no clarity over how a caretaker Prime Minister will be appointed as the Prime Minister and Leader of Opposition, who make the appointment, are no longer in office, after the dissolution of the National Assembly. The de-notification comes hours after a day of fast-paced developments as now former Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri abruptly dismissed the no-confidence motion as "unconstitutional", saying that it was backed by "foreign powers". Following the dismissal of the no-confidence motion, President Arif Alvi dissolved the National Assembly upon the advice of the ex-Premier. Imran Khan - addressing the nation shortly after the session's adjournment - sought fresh elections and asked Pakistanis to gear up for the polls as the Opposition lashed out at the government's act of dismissing the motion as "unconstitutional". --IANS vd ( 285 Words) 2022-04-03-23:20:02 (IANS)
New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI/BusinessWire India): LC Nueva Investment Partners, a partnership between Singapore headquartered Lighthouse Canton and Delhi based Nueva Capital, today announced that it has achieved a first close of INR224.8Cr / USD$30Mn on its venture capital (VC) fund, LC Nueva AIF. "India's private market has been growing exponentially - a robust ecosystem that we are proud to be working closely with our investors and founders alike to mobilize capital for purpose." Commented Sumegh Bhatia, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director for LC Capital India, the Indian arm of Lighthouse Canton. "We have had a strong reception from our global investors for the fund since it was launched in February and we are targeting to raise INR 300Cr / USD$40Mn in total. We have partnered with Nueva Capital on this strategy, and the investment team consists of private equity industry veterans Sohil Chand and Ashish Chand. Their in-depth knowledge in both investments and the Indian startup scene is what makes this fund so unique." Sohil Chand is founding partner and chief investment officer for LC Nueva AIF. He was previously head of India for Norwest Venture Partners, a USD$10Bn global early to late-stage venture and growth equity investor, and earlier helped set up the private equity business for Goldman Sachs in India. The industry veteran has sizeable deal experience with key investments in National Stock Exchange, Thyrocare, Snowman Logistics, IRB Infrastructure, Swiggy, Cremica, OnMobile, and more. Commenting on the Fund's strategy and investment approach, Sohil said, "We have strong conviction in the startups we are empowering, and hence 25 percent of LC Nueva AIF's fund commitment will come directly from the sponsors. Together with Lighthouse Canton, we are investing in ambitious future winners, scaling the vision of these emerging businesses to shape the future of India's startup ecosystem. We are excited to be working with Lighthouse Canton and their international network of investors and partners, to give Indian startups the necessary step up and spotlight they deserve on the global stage." Over the Fund's 8-year lifespan, LC Nueva AIF will invest in 25 - 30 Indian companies at the pre-series A and series A stages. The investment committee's approach is sector-agnostic, with a proclivity towards health-tech, consumer-tech, fintech & education-tech businesses, steering clear of capital-intensive businesses. A sizable part of the fund will be reserved to back the winners in the subsequent rounds. In the last decade, internet penetration in India has grown rapidly and it now has over 700 million users accessing the internet. This digital reach has led to the emergence of technologically enabled businesses solving conventional problems in innovative ways. The Indian startup ecosystem is amongst the top three globally and VC and private equity strategies investing in India have been extremely popular over the past few years. According to a report by IVCA-EY, India startups received USD$2.5bn/Rs. 190bn worth of PE/VC funding in February, which was more than double that from the previous year. Having emerged as one of the most attractive investment opportunities, the sector has seen substantial foreign and domestic venture capital flows into India. Working with both investors and founders of pre-series A and series-A Indian startups, the fund is uniquely empowering startups. To date the fund has already invested in 17 companies and deployed INR75.75Cr/ USD$10.1Mn capital. Notable investee companies include India's first pre-owned car leasing subscription service, Pumpumpum; India's fastest-growing diagnostics and precision medicine company, Redcliffe Lifetech; India's first men focused intimate hygiene company, Svish; and leading SAAS based company for small merchants to setup an online presence, Dukaan. Each company is put through a rigorous selection process by the investment team. Analyzing each business carefully, the team uses an institutional-level assessment, spending significant time with founders and their management teams to understand their vision and business models, selecting only those who meet their strict criteria. The venture team has years of experience and a long-standing track record of investing in and nurturing future winners early on in their journeys. Ultimately, the firm sees this as a chance to partner with the founders and their management teams to scale and take their businesses to the next level. While providing companies with the necessary capital, the firm is also actively involved with the founders and their companies as they evolve through their lifecycles. Leveraging its asset management and wealth management business capabilities, Lighthouse Canton's Founders' Ecosystem provides founders added value through other venture investments, and business solutions as well as personal wealth management services. From providing capital and strategic insights through their growth phases, through to mentorship and providing operational and management support as they seek further funding and prepare for exit rounds; the firm is committed to helping these companies and their founders enhance performance and plan for their personal and business legacies. This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)
Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], April 4 (ANI/BusinessWire India): Amazon India announced the launch of the Amazon Smbhav Entrepreneurship Challenge 2022. Designed around the theme of 'Make in India', the initiative will provide participating startups from anywhere in the country a chance to showcase their business proposition and get a chance to win cumulative cash prizes up to INR 65 lakhs and other rewards. Amazon has collaborated with the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, National Innovation Foundation (an autonomous body of the Department of Science and Technology), and the NIF Incubation and Entrepreneurship Council, Fireside Ventures and Freshworks to advance the objective of reaching startup founders across Indian cities and nurture grassroot innovations from the deepest pockets of the country. Amazon Smbhav Entrepreneurship Challenge is open to startups across all industries, verticals and business models. The top 250 startups will get access to a network of startup founders, rewards from Amazon and partner organizations, and mentoring sessions designed to equip them for the pitch days. The top 25 startups can access support for market linkages, global exposure, exclusive rewards and perks, and an opportunity to showcase their businesses to potential customers, approach leading investors and be mentored by industry experts. The winners will be chosen through customer votes and a cross discipline jury panel. Amazon will announce the winners at the third edition of its annual flagship summit Amazon Smbhav being organised on the 18th & 19th of May. The winning startup from the final round will be crowned 'Amazon Smbhav '22 Startup of the Year' with a cash prize of INR 40 lakhs, and the first and second runners up will win cash prizes of INR 15 lakhs and INR 10 lakhs respectively. Dr Jitendra Singh, Hon'ble Union Minister of State (Independent Charge), Science & Technology and Earth Sciences says, "I am pleased to deepen our partnership with Amazon on this mission of creating opportunities. Amazon Smbhav Entrepreneurship Challenge 2022 would look forward to scouting eligible entities in large numbers and I am confident that this kind of a purposeful partnership will bring digitization in MSMEs, enabling them to contribute to India's economic growth. In line with the Hon'ble Prime Minister Narendra Modi's call to build an Atmanirbhar Bharat, I am proud to announce my Ministry's partnership with Amazon on this Challenge to empower talented entrepreneurs across Tier 2/ Tier 3 cities and rural areas to reach their fullest potential. India might still be the 3rd largest start-up ecosystem in the world but ours is the ecosystem where the grassroot innovators have equal opportunities." Manish Tiwary, Country Manager, India Consumer Business, Amazon India said, "Throughout India, startups are setting new benchmarks in problem solving and delivering products and solutions for customers not just in India, but across the world. At Amazon, we support and celebrate builders, entrepreneurship and innovation, and the Smbhav Entrepreneurship Challenge 2022 is part of our commitment to enable startups and emerging brands across India realise their full potential and contribute to India's economic progress." Kanwaljit Singh, Founder & Managing Partner, Fireside Ventures said, "Indian startups are making waves across the world and are touching new heights with cutting edge innovation. There is immense potential for Indian brands to strengthen their foothold in the global stage and drive the next phase of India's growth story. We at Fireside Ventures are delighted to be partnering with Amazon for the Smbhav Entrepreneurship Challenge 2022 - Make in India and play our part in supporting rising entrepreneurs spearhead towards success." Earlier this year, Amazon signed an MoU with the NIF Incubation and Entrepreneurship Council (NIFientreC) to accelerate grassroots innovation, local economy and livelihoods across rural India. As part of the MoU, NIFientreC, with Amazon's help will bring together experts from various fields, to hold masterclasses, workshops, and other interactive training programs on all aspects of product distribution and its availability for the end-user in the most convenient ways. This collaboration will help promote the creativity and innovation of students and budding entrepreneurs specializing in consumer-based technology innovation at a grassroot level and accelerate the growth of a digital India. This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)
Sao Paulo [Brazil], April 4 (ANI/PRNewswire): Aiming to expand access to clean energy and contribute to the popularization of electromobility in the country, Horwin Brasil, an electric motorcycle company, has partnered with the Brazilian CBMM, the world's leading specialist in Niobium technologies. The objective of the agreement is to apply a lithium-ion battery with Niobium in electric two-wheel vehicles. "The partnership with Horwin Brasil is important, as it accelerates the application of ultra-fast recharge batteries with Niobium in motorcycles as well," says Rogerio Marques Ribas, manager of the CBMM Battery Program. According to Horwin Brasil's CEO, Pricilla Favero, this project prototype will be presented in the first half of 2022. Horwin's CR6 model motorcycle will be used, which has 6,200W of engine power and up to 150 km of autonomy. "With CBMM's expertise and pioneering spirit, added to our highly skilled team in developing new solutions, the expectation is that the motorcycle with a Niobium battery will be available in the Brazilian market as early as 2024. "We work so that, soon, anyone will be able to use an electric motorcycle with ultra-fast charge of up to ten minutes. In addition to this recharge differential, Niobium batteries bring significant benefits in terms of safety and battery life, as they allow up to 20,000 charges under a relatively wide range, which alone is the greatest advance for this sector in recent times," complements Pricilla. Ribas adds that the technology to be used in the electric motorcycle's battery is the result of more than three years of research and development by collaborating CBMM and Japanese company Toshiba Corporation. The CBMM manager explains that "the use of Niobium oxide in the anode of lithium-ion batteries provides special features for this component. Being a very stable element, it allows safer and more efficient operations. Furthermore, due to its more open crystal structure, which facilitates lithium intercalation, it allows a full recharge in less than ten minutes, without damaging the battery." He adds that, due to these unique characteristics, batteries with Niobium are safer and have a much longer useful life than traditional batteries." Toshiba Corporation explains that "Toshiba has been focusing our attention on the possibility of Niobium Titanium Oxide (NTO) as a next-generation anode material that will help increase the battery capacity while maintaining the excellent characteristics of lithium titanium oxide (LTO), the conventional anode material of SCiB. NTO has roughly three times higher theoretical volume capacity density than LTO while providing the advantages of LTO such as long life and rapid charging." INNOVATION Ribas reinforces that "CBMM already works with several companies in the automotive industry, whether in vehicular structures or in developing Niobium applications for electric mobility". An example is the partnership with Volkswagen Caminhoes e Onibus - VWCO. Announced in 2021, it provides for the application of Niobium batteries in large electric vehicles, which will begin to be tested in 2023, at the VWCO factory, in the city of Resende, state of Rio de Janeiro, and later at CBMM's industrial plant in Araxa, in the state of Minas Gerais, both in Brazil. Horwin Brasil is part of the Horwin Global group, today with more than 700 distributors worldwide, and exporting to more than 60 countries. Horwin's focus has always been on developing a high-powered electric motorcycle with superior design, quality, and technology. All Horwin products reflect this. In Brazil, we already have a distribution center in Manaus and, by the end of 2022, each region of the country will have a Horwin distributor / dealer. We at Horwin Brasil, from the second half of 2024, will use this new Niobium battery technology on all our motorcycles, charging in less than ten minutes. CBMM is the world leader in the production and commercialization of Niobium products and has been in the market for over 60 years. CBMM is headquartered in Brazil, with subsidiaries in the United States, the Netherlands, Singapore and Switzerland and representative offices in China. CBMM manufactures and supplies niobium products and develops applications for the infrastructure, mobility, aerospace, health and energy sectors. The company has more than 400 clients in 50 countries. Its business model is guided by solid corporate governance and is based on guaranteed supply and development of new technologies in partnership with the most renowned research centers worldwide. Find out more about Niobium technologies Website: www.Niobium.tech LinkedIn: Niobium.tech Instagram: @Niobium.tech Twitter: Niobium_Nb Youtube: Niobium.tech This story is provided by PRNewswire. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PRNewswire)
Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], April 4 (ANI/BusinessWire India): Indian School Finance Company (ISFC) the first sector specific NBFC in India catering to K12 school and skill segment wins "Prestigious Brands of Asia 2021-22" and it's MD & CEO Sandeep Wirkhare was honoured with "Marketing Meister Award", presented by Herald Global & BARC Asia, in an event organized in Goa. ISFC focuses on providing finance to the budget private schools for their infrastructural development, working capital, digital upgradation & cost-free student fee financing. The company has expanded in 13 states of India with 22 branches & caters to schools in 150+ locations. The company is incubated and supported by internationally acclaimed impact investors to create an impact in quality of learning. Having helped underserved schools in farther geographies the company has enhanced the quality of education amongst the bottom of pyramid children. ISFC used pandemic as an opportunity to transform itself into a new age scalable business model in its version 2 where it has launched multiple digital products and is transforming itself towards fintech model while retaining its strength over the school infra financing. One of the most affected NBFC due to prolonged school closures, more than any other country, the company faced survival and continuity challenges. Through innovative customer engagements, shareholders & lenders support, the team ensured the company was quick to turn around back into profitability by Q3 of financial year 2021-22. "We utilized the pandemic period to transform into a scalable relationship-based business model & launching innovative products through digitization. Collaborating with top Edtech players to increase the available universe for funding exponentially. One of the quickest turn-around into profitability despite prolonged closure of schools. This was made possible with the support of our customers, employees and the stakeholders, who believed in us at every stage" said Sandeep Wirkhare, MD & CEO, ISFC. ISFC not only give loans to educational institutes, it ensures that the support continues for holistic development of such Schools & Colleges. The company engages with schools to help them in quality enhancement as well. ISFC aims to boost learning in schools by aiding digital and physical infrastructure with customized fee financing, special benefits to existing customers, and additional facilities like providing school ERP solutions and integration with content delivery companies to help schools start their operations. The company has adapted to the change through digitization and process automation for the whole loan life cycle for all its products. The underwriting under its digital product is done through a unique cutting edge underwriting algorithm that is capable of assessing vegetable vendors to a high tax paying individual in salaried or self-employed segments equally effectively. ISFC assists budget private schools and other educational institutions in capacity building through infrastructure development, thereby enabling students to access quality education. The company has created a very strong presence and is widely known amongst the schools in tier 2, 3 & 4 towns in India as a lender to this credit underserved segment where mainstream lenders could not focus due to product complexities. It has helped more than 5,000 schools to create better infrastructure mostly in semi-urban and rural geographies thereby impacting the quality of education for about 7 million students. This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)
Hyderabad (Telangana) [India], April 4 (ANI/BusinessWire India): Global Pharma Tek & Capleo Global expand its footprint by opening a new office in Hyderabad. Founded by Ramesh Anumolu in 2011, Global Pharma Tek has offices in the USA, Canada, and Europe and has 300+ employees. Global Pharma Tek (GPT) is one of the leading service provider conglomerates in Workforce Solutions, Clinical Research, and Trading. The opening of the new office in Hyderabad is an opportunity for Global Pharma Tek to expand its services in Trading, Clinical Research. The company also plans to start operations and strategy consulting for companies across the globe in the life sciences industry. Capleo Global, the sister concern of Global Pharma Tek has a major focus on workforce solutions and payroll services, catering to various industries across the Globe. The new office is also an opportunity for Capleo Global to expand its operations in workforce solutions, and payroll services for domestic and international clients. The company is on a hiring spree and wants to double the team. The new hires will represent a significant expansion and are particularly interested in hiring fresh graduates, recruitment professionals, sales & marketing and pharma/clinical professionals across various levels. "We are very excited about the new office in Hyderabad. We have seen rapid growth during the past few years. The decision to open a new office in Hyderabad and hire more people is a logical step in our business strategy. This move helps us expand the ability to serve our global clientele and future markets at a rapid pace," said Ramesh Anumolu, CEO. This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)
Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], April 4 (ANI/PRNewswire): The MDRT Family of Brands, which includes MDRT for high-performing financial services professionals, the MDRT Academy for aspiring MDRT members, and MDRT Global Services for leaders in financial services, has added to the portfolio of honors available for exceptional members - and their companies. MDRT has redefined and added new categories within its annual Company Rankings which recognizes Indian companies as well that successfully invest in membership growth, retention and longevity. In addition to this, MDRT Global Services is introducing the MDRT Culture of Excellence Awards, which recognizes agency leaders who cultivate excellence in productivity, retention, recruitment and more. With these new initiatives, the MDRT Family of Brands recognizes and elevates the exceptional performance of companies and financial services professionals. Six Indian companies including, India's largest private sector bank by assets, HDFC Bank, India's largest insurance company, LIC India, and some of the leading Indian private insurance companies such as, TATA AIA Life Insurance, HDFC Life Insurance, IndiaFirst Life Insurance and Max Life Insurance feature in MDRT's Top 100 Global Companies List. MDRT, is the Premier Association of Financial Professionals, a global, independent association of the world's leading life insurance and financial services professionals from more than 500 companies in 70 markets. MDRT membership is recognized internationally as the standard of excellence in the life insurance and financial services business. MDRT Expanded Company Rankings Using a more holistic approach to measuring achievement, MDRT will restructure and add new categories to its Company Rankings beginning in 2022. These new categories will recognize companies that achieve excellence in the areas of MDRT membership growth, retention and longevity - areas which demonstrate a commitment to investing in their advisors' personal and professional development. The eight new rankings include: Top 25 Companies - Total Membership Growth Top 25 Companies - Percentage of Membership Growth Top 25 Companies - Total Members who Rejoined Top 25 Companies - Percentage of Members who Rejoined Top 25 Companies - Total Number of 5-9 Year Members Top 25 Companies - Percentage of 5-9 Year Members Top 25 Companies - Total Number of Qualifying and Life Members Top 25 Companies - Percentage of Qualifying and Life Members "MDRT membership growth, retention and longevity are critical to companies that want to generate success within their ranks and demonstrate a commitment to excellence," said Randy Scritchfield, CFP, LUTCF, MDRT President. "These new categories provide an opportunity to celebrate the financial service professionals who achieve and maintain career long success with their MDRT membership and acknowledge the important role their companies play in supporting that success." MDRT Global Services Culture of Excellence Award With the MDRT Global Services pilot program underway as the newest addition to the MDRT Family of Brands, members of this unique association are actively honing their leadership skills and establishing an MDRT culture of excellence within their agencies. The Culture of Excellence Awards provide a framework for measuring success within MDRT Global Services, evaluating applicants according to an agency scorecard, which was developed following extensive research into key benchmarks for agency success. The benchmarks identify six key aspects of successful agencies, including promotion, retention, recruitment, persistency, Whole Person, and membership in MDRT's Family of Brands - aspects which set the requirements for award qualification. To qualify for the Gold, Platinum and Diamond awards, agency leaders must meet three, four or five of the following criteria, respectively: Production: 25% increase in production year-over-year Retention: 75% annual retention Recruitment: 20% annual agency recruitment rate Persistency: 13-month persistency rate of 90% Whole Person: Agency community involvement, MDRT Global Services Learning Engagement score (measured by attendance at webcasts, Annual Meeting/Global Conference, and completion of assigned modules in Harvard ManageMentor) Membership in MDRT Family of Brands: 100% of agents must be members of MDRT or the MDRT Academy. "These awards establish a new standard of excellence for global financial services leaders," said Ian Green, Dip PFS, MDRT Immediate Past President. "Successful leadership is so much more than just great numbers, which is why these rigorous awards also focus on MDRT's Whole Person concept and commitment to growth as evident by engagement within the MDRT Family of Brands." MDRT Global Services Culture of Excellence Awards applications will be accepted between January and March of 2023, with winners announced in May 2023 and honored at a special awards ceremony at the MDRT Annual Meeting and MDRT Global Conference. Click here for more information about the Culture of Excellence Awards. MDRT, The Premier Association of Financial Professionals, is a global, independent association of the world's leading life insurance and financial services professionals from more than 500 companies in 70 markets. MDRT members demonstrate exceptional professional knowledge, strict ethical conduct and outstanding client service. MDRT membership is recognized internationally as the standard of excellence in the life insurance and financial services business. For more information, please visit https://www.mdrt.org/ and follow them on Twitter @MDRtweet. As the newest offering under the global MDRT Family of Brands, MDRT Global Services was created exclusively for the financial services field and home office leaders. As a separate, individual membership association with innovative program offerings, MDRT Global Services provides its members with exceptional value and leadership growth opportunities. MDRT Global Services membership allows increased engagement within the MDRT community while allowing leaders to develop a culture of excellence within their respective organizations. To learn more visit mdrtgs.org. The MDRT Academy is an association for financial professionals striving to reach MDRT-level production. Those who join receive exclusive access to MDRT-member insights, gold-standard content and performance-driving features tailored to their specific needs - and it's all available through an intuitive website and mobile app. The MDRT Academy also offers goal setting and performance-tracking tools, monthly webcasts featuring MDRT members, Performance Guides, as well as hundreds of MDRT-approved articles, videos and podcast episodes. Learn more at mdrtacademy.org. This story is provided by PRNewswire. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PRNewswire)
New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI/PNN): Inkxpert, Inc. has been a marketing communications company catering to the content and marketing needs of the world since 2013. The company represents a team of professional writers with years of experience in various industries, including technology, finance, healthcare, automobile, sports, fashion & lifestyle, education, and travel & tourism, amongst several others. Inkxpert is known for delivering nothing but top-quality. Every individual in the team is a highly experienced technical writer who has worked with world-leading companies like PwC, Deloitte, Accenture, Capgemini, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Amazon, Walmart, Abbott, Biocon, etc. With such brand names, quality becomes an "obvious" factor -- and the company has been making no expectations delivering the same. It is one of the reasons and explanations for why and how the company managed to bag 5000+ clients globally. Last year, when the entire business world was suffering from COVID-19 and the global economy was the worst hit by nationwide lockdowns, Inkxpert got funding from a couple of prominent Silicon Valley venture capital firms like Hudson Venture Investments and KSA Partners. It accelerated the company's growth: In the Series A round of seed funding, Inkxpert got a whopping investment of $4.2 million, pegging its market valuation at $7 million. "Over the years, our foremost priority has been to hire experienced writers with domain expertise. Each client's business and service domain is different. To understand the core concept of any business, a particular writing consultant with relevant industry experience is assigned so there is perfect alignment with the client's requirements. That's how we create a wow experience." says Vineet Gupta, GM Operations, Inkxpert India. Inkxpert grew quickly throughout the ongoing pandemic when most companies were trying to make a balance with the new remote working norms, which the company was already doing for years. Finding good writers, especially for technical content for the IT industry, is a tedious task. Not to mention the commitment one needs that most freelance writers can't promise. Inkxpert addressed the same even before entering the market. With a personal team of a writer, editor, and SEO specialist assigned to each client, the company ensures quick turnaround times for project delivery. The more experienced writers in the team have been wearing multiple hats of editors, proofreaders, and copywriters throughout their careers, which ensure that you get an orange if you ask for an orange and not a tangerine -- details and quality matter. Inkxpert follows a rigorous approach ensuring strict adherence to quality before the client receives the first version of the content. As soon as the dedicated writer for the project is done writing the content, the editor ensures it meets with client's requirements and gives it a finishing touch. Once done, the SEO specialist makes sure the content is SEO-optimized and runs quality and plagiarism checks. The client then reviews the content and makes suggestions, if any. Clients can pick any existing plans: NANO, MICRO, MINI, and MAXO, as per their needs and requirements. Alternatively, they can request a customized approach. Inkxpert, Inc. is a marketing communications company headquartered in New York and Mumbai. It fosters value in businesses with quality content, covering various domains, such as technology, healthcare, automobile, sports, fashion & lifestyle, education, BFSI, and travel & tourism. The company has got it all covered, from copywriting to SEO blogs, website content, blogs, brochures, whitepapers, press releases, and any other form of content. Inkxpert contributes 20% of profits to the education of underprivileged children with its "Inspire In Ink" campaign. This story is provided by PNN. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PNN)
New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI/PNN): In these modern times, customers are increasingly trying to find the most optimal solutions, and the progress of globalization allows them to place orders in almost any country in the world. The availability of the Internet and the use of software development standards allow US customers to place orders in India, looking for qualified developers or IT companies. It is at this moment that the price for the end customer rises, due to the chain of intermediaries. If you remove intermediaries from this chain, then IT companies will be able to communicate directly with customers. We're proud to present iBench.net, a platform where IT companies from India can offer their programmers' services based on the outstaffing model, and provide examples of work so that the customer can order outsourcing services. Customers can communicate directly with company representatives. At the same time, the IT Company can conclude contracts, and discuss all the details of the transaction without intermediaries. In this case, the platform takes a monthly fixed cost. Even if you are a private developer, you can register on iBench and offer your services to customers. And by inviting your friends or colleagues to the platform, you can get a completely free subscription. iBench has clients from countries such as the United States of America, Germany, Sweden, Belgium, UK, Australia and now they are ready to be launched in the markets of India, for the Indian IT agencies or companies providing leading as well as fresh businesses with complete IT solutions from a team of remote developers. They work to assist the fundamental business targets like sales exponential growth, cost reduction and customer acquisition with the clients closely to formulate the appropriate IT outsourcing such as website, portals, e-commerce systems, mobile applications etc. Moving towards creating a successful business, the key always remains in the way one handles their development strategies and it impacts every department or area within the company such as sales accounting, resources, manufacturing, marketing, finance and vendor management. We are a species that's very well equipped with the new technological changes around us and a relevant business application aligned with business goals and implemented smoothly can add tremendous value to your organization, saving you time, effort and money while ensuring smooth operations. The iBench platform was created by an iBench core team from Ukraine. Denis Eremenko, Founder/CEO iBench has 15 years of experience in IT technologies, business analysis and project management. When developing the iBench platform, he and his team used best practices and ideas gained from many years of experience. The head offices of the company are located in Montenegro and Dallas, USA. For more details, visit: https://ibench.net/ This story is provided by PNN. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PNN)
Gurugram (Haryana) [India], April 4 (ANI/NewsVoir): VOW (Voices of Women); an exclusive online writing contest for women powered by IBM and presented by We-Ace has provided a platform for women to share their thoughts on trending topics and current affairs. In most societies, women have been told to stay quiet and not share their opinion on any matters but on the contrary, women have done much better than society expects them to. This blogathon contest is a one-of-its-kind blogging contest for women to get their voices heard and stage varied thoughts, ideas and opinions; on burgeoning topics, themes and issues that matter to the women. This joint initiative of We-Ace and IBM has empowered many women to raise their voices and talk about the workforce and their role in business and society at large. This second edition of VOW-Voices of Women brings together women from diverse backgrounds to engage in a discussion around larger trends, developments, and barriers in the face of building a more diverse and inclusive workplace and culture. 1000+ women from across corporates and colleges came forward and registered for VOW. Eminent thought leaders and industry experts from IBM have joined the event as jury panel members. On Behalf of IBM, We-Ace reached out to 100+ organizations and colleges to bring along every woman who wished to showcase their talent on such a platform. The team got an overwhelming response from the women cohort where they shared inspiring blogs based on this year's theme - Bespoke Skilling. Winners are awarded with exciting prizes like iPad, Kindle etc and winning blogs are featured on leading partner publications. A jury member of the event and Chief Finance Officer, IBM India/South Asia, Tejaswini Rajwade shares her experience and says, "It was a privilege to be part of the Voices of Women jury which provided a platform for women to be heard on a topic very relevant in today's world. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the blogs with their refreshing take on the topic." "I am passionate about building an inclusive workforce and embracing a culture of diversity and am enthused to see the tremendous response to the contest," she added. Another jury member Amit Sharma, Managing Partner, Global Delivery, IBM Consulting felt honored to be part of the jury of the blogathon and expressed, "The energy, passion and drive of the participants was very apparent, with some very high quality and memorable submissions. My congratulations to the winners and more importantly, a big thank you to all those who made time to participate and made this event a success." This year, the entries were invited on the following theme: Given that women are unique in the way they approach, build and experience their career journey - do they need bespoke skilling? If yes, what ecosystem do they need to come forward and aspire to learn, grow and ace at different life stages of their career? Share your thoughts and ideas on the topic in 800 to 1000 words. The winner of this year's blogathon Harini Srivastava termed VOW as an enthralling event. "It makes one tap on the inner value system, which in turn becomes an introspective session at a personal level. Heartfelt thanks for the Intriguing experience," Harini says. The second runner up of this year's blogathon Mamta Mohan quotes, "I couldn't deny the tempting offer to write a blog on one of my favorite subjects - Women Empowerment. As they say, pen is mightier than the sword, this platform that was provided by We-Ace for writing a socially relevant blog helped me pen my first ever blog and I am indebted to VoW for bringing out the writer in me that had gone into hibernation." The third runner up of this year's blogathon Lavanya Ramamurthy expresses, "How skilling should be done for women is a forward-thinking topic that is personally very close to her heart too as she leads the gender ERG for Swiss Re APAC. Picking 2 lines from her blog, When intent and skill work together, you can create magic! Everybody does well when the women do well." The platform was also open for voting and the three popular choices awards were awarded to Rashmi Pandit from Morningstar, Meena Muthukumar from SSN College of Engineering and Yamini Naga Satya Pilla from DVR & Dr. HS MIC College of Technology. We-Ace is a leading global network of over 100k+ women aspiring to ace their careers. As agents of change for gender-balanced workplaces, the company's mission is to engage, enable and employ women professionals to be in decision-making roles. Women can connect and network with the best in the industry through hiring drives, career fairs, skilling labs, CXO meets and various other industry led live sessions. Women aspiring to upskill can select from a wide range of life-stage enablement, self enhancement, functional and technical courses that start from as low as Rs. 99/-. This story is provided by NewsVoir. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/NewsVoir)
Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], April 4 (ANI/PRNewswire): The world's leading producer of naturally brewed soy sauce, Kikkoman Corporation, today announces the introduction of the first set of recipes co-created with several top chefs in India. Kikkoman seeks to promote new encounters between ingredients, people, and food cultures, something that Kikkoman has focused on for decades around the world. The 'Kikkoman Honjozo Authentic Soy Sauce Experience' programme was launched in October 2021 as part of these efforts to make this most popular naturally brewed soy sauce an everyday ingredient for all restaurants and households in India. This first set of custom-made recipes are part of this programme. Kikkoman aims to introduce 100 recipes a year, featuring multiple cuisines including Indian dishes, that will be introduced to both home and professional chefs in India. They are introducing over 50 recipes in the first instance as the first set of custom-made recipes for India. Working with top professional chefs, Kikkoman seeks to spread awareness about how Kikkoman Soy Sauce can be used in day-to-day cooking to make every meal more delicious. In the first set of recipes for India, Kikkoman has worked with its Brand Ambassadors in Mumbai--Chef Vicky Ratnani (leading chef & restauranteur), Chef Seefah Ketchaiyo and Chef Karan (owners of Seefah restaurant in Mumbai), as well as Prashant Issar (who runs Ishaara in Mumbai)--to create unique recipes for professional chefs using Kikkoman Soy Sauce as a key ingredient. Additionally, some easy-to-make recipes have also been developed for everyday cooking for home chefs. Extra care has been taken to ensure these recipes can be easily prepared in all Indian kitchens. Our recipes will soon be uploaded on Kikkoman India's digital platforms, including Instagram and YouTube. Kikkoman's all-purpose authentic soy sauce--brewed naturally using the centuries-old Honjozo method--has been used to blend different flavours and combinations to prepare both popular and unique dishes. These new recipes range from Asian cuisine that includes Japanese, Chinese and Thai, to Continental, Italian, Indian, Mexican and Indian-Chinese dishes. Behind this collaboration is Kikkoman's understanding that recipe development should be where food culture meets authentic naturally brewed Kikkoman Soy Sauce. It is something they have been doing around the world--matching our soy sauce with local ingredients and cuisines to create new delicious experiences. For example, in 1957 when Kikkoman opened its subsidiary in the USA, in San Francisco, a range of multiple recipes were developed in order to have Americans be able to use Kikkoman Soy Sauce in their everyday cooking. These recipes were placed as neck-hangers on Kikkoman Soy Sauce bottles at all retail locations, and from these cookbooks were compiled for Americans to appreciate the versatility of Kikkoman Soy Sauce in their cuisine. As a result, Kikkoman Soy Sauce is now a popular everyday all-purpose seasoning in America, an essential ingredient. Teriyaki sauce which uses Kikkoman Soy Sauce as its base is now firmly established in America, bringing new delicious experiences to thousands of restaurants and the majority of households. In the same way, Kikkoman has worked across over a 100 countries in the Americas, Europe, Asia, and Oceania to develop new recipes with local cuisines. From these years of experience, it is understood that the fusion of Kikkoman Soy Sauce and local food culture through its unique recipes is able to co-create new delicious experiences across the world. India is a land of multiple diverse cuisines. The country's rich food culture has its roots in centuries-old traditions, but food culture is ever-dynamic and constantly evolving. With an infinite scope for creating delicious new dishes, Kikkoman aims to leverage this opportunity to showcase the appetising experiences that Kikkoman Soy Sauce can bring to the table by connecting with professional chefs, next-generation students of the culinary and the hospitality industry which are 2 million strong, as well as the wider community at large. Vicky Ratnani, Kikkoman India Brand Ambassador, who uses Kikkoman Soy Sauce in not only Japanese but also Indian and Western dishes, said, "There are countless possibilities that the Kikkoman Soy Sauce offers, something that not many Indians know yet. The idea is to inspire and educate both professional and home chefs through the new recipes that I and many other chefs in India will create. In fact, I believe Kikkoman Soy Sauce will be a crucial ingredient in Indian kitchens in the near future." Osamu Mogi, Director, Senior Executive Corporate Officer, International Operations Division, Kikkoman Corporation stated, "Kikkoman has a deeply comprehensive vision for India, and these recipes are just the beginning of an exciting journey that forms part of the Kikkoman Honjozo Authentic Soy Sauce Experience. We believe the varied recipes prove how versatile our soy sauce actually is. With sincere respect for the long history and flourishing culture in India, we want Kikkoman Honjozo Soy Sauce to be a part of Indian food culture, not just "a foreign ingredient". 'Becoming a part of local food culture' is our basic business philosophy. In the past, in European countries and in the United States, we successfully achieved the localization of soy sauce by proposing recipes that incorporate local cooking methods and local ingredients. Applying the same strategy, we would like to expand the traditional Japanese seasoning of soy sauce into a seasoning loved by people in India. There will be regular regional meetings and an annual conference bringing together professional chefs and home chefs, industry leaders, government representatives, academics, and media, both from Japan and India. We would like to see some great chemical reactions among the participants and the birth of new culinary innovations in India." Lastly, these are simply the first set of recipes co-created for the Indian market. It is a market they hope to work with for the next 100 years and beyond. Kikkoman seeks to further develop thousands of recipes in India for Indian chefs, recipes for both home and professional cooking. Kikkoman's 'Honjozo Experience' movement comprises three elements--developing talent and fostering exchanges among chefs; educating everyone on the use of soy sauce through cooking sessions and contests; learning about the contribution Kikkoman Soy Sauce can make by experimenting through R&D in food culture. From professional chefs to student chefs--all chefs will have an opportunity to innovate, experiment and learn to use soy sauce to cook up a storm. Through cooking contests, videos, discussions and workshops, and more, the 'Honjozo Experience' movement will bring together chefs, students, restaurants, hoteliers, the media, industry leaders as well as government representatives to explore how Kikkoman Soy Sauce can enhance any and every dish served in India. Brewed naturally, using only the four basic ingredients of soybeans, wheat, salt and water, Kikkoman Soy Sauce works like magic to elevate the flavour of any dish to another level. As such, hundreds of Indian chefs have already started using this soy sauce after its launch in February 2021. Moreover, Kikkoman plans to continue collaborating with many chefs in India as part of a great 'adventure' to experiment and co-create new delicious experiences using Kikkoman Soy Sauce with the objective of enhancing dishes across all cuisines, be it Japanese, Chinese, Asian, Western or Indian dishes. With a history spanning over 350 years and based in Japan, the current Kikkoman corporate entity was established through the merger of 8 families in 1917. The company's internationalization strategy began some 60 years ago, with its entry into the United States market. Kikkoman has become a global business, expanding to over 100 countries, with 11 soy sauce production sites worldwide that distribute its products all over the world to millions of consumers. Kikkoman India is solely responsible for importing all Kikkoman products, and shall manage all production, marketing, sales, and distribution in India. This story is provided by PRNewswire. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PRNewswire)
Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], April 4 (ANI/NewsVoir): 'Acrysil Limited', leading global manufacturer of "Composite Quartz Kitchen Sinks" with German Technology, has announced that its wholly owned subsidiary 'Acrysil UK Limited' has agreed to acquire 100 per cent shares of 'Tickford Orange Limited' (TOL), UK along with its wholly owned operating subsidiary 'Sylmar Technology Limited' (STL). STL is a manufacturer, distributer and customizer of high-quality solid surface products for kitchen and bathroom, for both domestic and commercial purposes for markets across United Kingdom. STL has 3 key brands Maia, Minerva and Metis. Its manufacturing and distribution facility is centrally located in Alfreton, Derbyshire, UK. It's a leading player in the UK solid surface market with an estimated 35 per cent market share. It generates 80 per cent of its revenue from sale of kitchen products and remaining from bathroom and marine related products. STL had a turnover of ~14m in each of the two years leading up to the COVID-19 pandemic with the turnover for the CY20 (COVID impacted) being ~11m. Further, for the CY21 (COVID impacted) STL had a turnover of ~12m. STL is profitable and benefits from solid financial base and continued growth. STL has an excellent relationship with its suppliers and purchases materials globally, benefiting from a range of quality materials being supplied. STL has a strong existing operational management team in place which runs the business operation on a day-to-day basis. The Company has longstanding customer base consisting of leading high street names including Selco, Homebase, Hafele, Magnet, Moores, Fairline etc. STL has been built on an ethos of 'customer service without compromise' - STL enjoys strong customer relationships and has worked with its largest customers for a significant number of years. Acrysil UK will acquire 100 per cent equity shares for a total consideration 11m. The acquisition will be funded through mix of debt and internal accruals. The acquisition is in line with Acrysil strategy to establish itself as a dominant player in the global kitchen and bathroom segment. Commenting on the above, Chirag Parekh, Chairman & Managing Director, Acrysil Limited said, "This acquisition will now allow us to further strengthen our presence and market share in UK market and gain access to a loyal customer base thus providing potential new sales channels and cross-selling opportunities. This will help us build upon our offerings within the kitchen segment and provide access to the bathroom segment. STL has an outstanding reputation in the market and has been sourcing and manufacturing solid surface products for 35 years. The acquisition was a natural fit for us, as STL is a highly innovative company, focused on continuous R&D to create new products and to fill existing gaps in the marketplace thereby enjoying a strong brand re-call and market share. This acquisition will catapult us into new orbit of growth." Acrysil Limited was incorporated in 1987 and is engaged in manufacturing of Composite Quartz kitchen Sinks. The Company started its operations with help of technical collaboration with "Schock & Co." of Germany and one of the largest manufacturers of Quartz Sink in Asia. The company has a manufacturing plant at Bhavnagar, Gujarat and has a total installed capacity of 840,000 sinks per annum as on date and further 360,000 sinks capacity addition which is expected to come on stream in Q2FY23. Company is also into manufacturing of stainless-steel kitchen sinks with the core focus on Quadro Sinks and dealing into a complete range of built-in Kitchen Appliances under its own "Carysil" Brand having varieties of Kitchen Chimneys, Dishwasher, Cook-tops, Built in Ovens, Wine-Chillers etc. The Company also offers Bathroom solutions like Premium Sanitary ware, Washbasins, Composite 3D Tiles to name a few under its "Sternhagen" Brand. Statements in this document relating to future status, events, or circumstances, including but not limited to statements about plans and objectives, the progress and results of research and development, potential project characteristics, project potential and target dates for project related issues are forward-looking statements based on estimates and the anticipated effects of future events on current and developing circumstances. Such statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties and are not necessarily predictive of future results. Actual results may differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements. The company assumes no obligation to update forward-looking statements to reflect actual results changed assumptions or other factors. This story is provided by NewsVoir. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/NewsVoir)
New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI/TPT): PageTraffic, one of India's top digital marketing agencies and a leader in the industry for over two decades, is celebrating its twentieth year in business. Founded by entrepreneur Navneet Kaushal, PageTraffic has helped clients from startup companies to Fortune 500 corporations achieve success through innovative digital marketing strategies. Twenty years ago, Navneet Kaushal's quest to make digital marketing more engaging and responsive led him on an entrepreneurial journey that resulted in PageTraffic being born. The company started out as a small venture after he did his MBA but now it has grown into one of most trusted agencies for SEO services! Since 2002, PageTraffic has served over 10,000 clients, with a client retention rate of 96 per cent! "Back in 2002, when we first opened our doors, we could not have envisaged the path ahead," says Navneet Kaushal. Fast forward to 2022, PageTraffic has 120 youthful, creative, and vibrant employees across Chicago, London, Mumbai, New Delhi, and Noida. The founder has gone global, and PageTraffic has worked on campaigns in 36 countries. The twenty-year growth story of PageTraffic, SEO Services company, has been phenomenal. To put things in context, PageTraffic has grown 12,400 times, which is a remarkable achievement. Navneet Kaushal is an inspiration to many young entrepreneurs who can learn from his achievements. He earned his MBA, and he is a living example of how anyone can succeed if they work hard and persistently toward their goals. The staff at PageTraffic, which provides a full range of digital marketing services, has worked tirelessly to achieve the company's success. Social media management, brand communications, web development, content marketing, pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns, and search engine optimization (SEO) are just a few of the services offered by the firm. The vision of PageTraffic is to emerge as a globally respected organization that leverages cutting-edge and innovative digital technologies delivered by a dedicated and creative team to create engaging relationships for its clients. PageTraffic's team has helped businesses from every sector be successful on the internet including restaurants & hospitality; finance and insurance; legal firms, heavy equipment/manufacturing, dental practices -- just to name a few! PageTraffic has become one of the most reputable SEO companies in India, including being the renowned SEO Company in Delhi too. PageTraffic, a leading SEO company, also announced that they have successfully helped businesses in every major sectors rank higher on Google and other search engines. The company's cutting-edge technology and experienced team of experts have helped clients from a wide range of industries achieve better visibility and increased traffic. In a statement, the CEO of PageTraffic said: "We are proud to have assisted businesses in every major niches with their SEO needs. Our service deliverables are constantly evolving to meet the needs of our clients, and we will continue to provide unmatched service and results." Navneet Kaushal adheres to the belief that "if you look after your people, your people will look after your customers, and your business will take care of itself." PageTraffic owes a debt of gratitude to all of its workers, who have been a part of the company since its start and have contributed to its exponential growth. PageTraffic credits all of its success and prosperity to its staff, who have been their most valuable asset. To summarize, Navneet always emphasizes the fact that results speak for themselves. And after 20 years of working, PageTraffic has been one big result that stands out till now! The company intends to reach a turnover of 100 crores in the next few years, and their 10-year targets are ambitious, which they plan to achieve with the help of their dedicated team. PageTraffic has had an eventful journey over the past 20 years, with impressive milestones achieved along the way. Their success is attributed to their focus on delivering tangible results for their clients, which has resulted in them becoming one of Asia's leading Search and digital marketing companies. PageTraffic is excited to announce their plans for the future. They are aiming high and hoping to achieve great things in the years to come. Their goal is to soar high into the future, and they believe that with hard work and dedication they can make this happen. They are committed to providing the best possible online marketing service to their clients and continuing to grow as a business. You can also visit https://www.pagetraffic.com to know more about their Services and offerings. This story is provided by TPT. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/TPT)
New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI/BusinessWire India): UK-based Feedback Medical, a specialist clinical communications company with over 20 years of experience, provides innovative medical imaging technology to enhance clinical communication, and provides access to, and storage of, medical information. Now in India, Feedback Medical announces that its cloud TB screening service is now live at the Evangelical Hospital Khariar in Odisha with its innovative Bleepa Box, enabling remote image transfer, part of the broader Bleepa communications platform. The pilot project was announced just after World Tuberculosis Day (24 March 2022) on the sidelines of the 74th National Annual Conference of the Indian Radiological and Imaging Association (IRIA). The Bleepa Box is a small tablet device that can connect to any imaging machine such as an X-ray machine. The DICOM standard images are transferred from the imaging machine onto the Bleepa Box and then automatically pushed to Bleepa, which is a medical imaging communications app. From here, an artificial intelligence solution can help to assess and provide an AI-based diagnosis in real time, so that the HCPs at the hospital can access specialist support and initiate timely treatment, in case of a positive diagnosis. The use of the Bleepa Box for TB screening and diagnosis requires a 3G or 4G wireless connection. Speaking about the company's plans for India, Dr Thomas Oakley, CEO, Feedback Medical, said, "India has made massive strides in the development and adoption of medical technology to support the diagnosis and treatment of diseases. We are confident that our pilot programme will demonstrate the value of the Bleepa Box to help rapidly screen for and diagnose TB, particularly in remote, resource-scarce locations where this has been a challenge." The service sees digital X-rays, securely transmitted via mobile networks, to the cloud where the images are analysed by Feedback Medical's partner Qure.ai, before being shared with clinicians. Using Bleepa's pioneering capabilities a screening result can be available within minutes of an X-ray being acquired, almost anywhere in India. The impact of this technology means that TB screening can now be expanded to rural areas where digital imaging was difficult to deliver, enabling current TB screening services to reach more people. The pilot, run in partnership with Qure.ai and Amazon Web Services, will now move into an evaluative stage where the system benefits will be measured as patients come through. Bleepa's adoption by hospitals in the English NHS has demonstrated considerable time-saving benefits and a reduced administrative burden in referral pathways. Feedback Medical is hopeful that other companies and organizations will see the value in this program for TB screening and come forward to support and expand its reach. This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)
Ranchi (Jharkhand) [India], April 4 (ANI/BusinessWire India): Unemployment, quality of jobs, and quality of income among the youth of India have remained the biggest challenge. There are numerous job opportunities for the youth in urban areas and metro cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, and Pune but due to the lack of opportunities in smaller cities, millions of youths are forced to migrate to metro cities to struggle to build their career. Founder of Webpulse Solution Pvt Ltd & Brand Empower Pvt Ltd, New Delhi - Rahul Ranjan Singh, who himself was a small-town boy, born in Aurangabad, Bihar, brought up in a small town of Jharkhand, Latehar, but now a successful young entrepreneur in Delhi for over a decade, believes that unemployment crisis can be solved if the focus gets shifted towards small towns of India and then India will boom. To grow a tree, the focus should be on the roots more than the branches of the tree. Similarly, to solve the problem of unemployment, if the focus is shifted towards generating employment opportunities in smaller cities and villages, where expenses of living are much lesser than that of in metropolitan cities. Rahul says, he belonged to a middle-class family, and he was observing the living conditions of his family, his colony and the youths in his city and so he left for Delhi right after completing 12th with a fear of spoiling his life in the small town. This is the condition of all the youths of small cities, who know that if they need a better career, a bright future, they must leave for Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore kind of big cities to sharpen their skills. "I had to struggle a lot in the beginning, to develop skills and due to determination and hard work I could succeed and I am successfully running Web Development, Digital Marketing and Branding Company in Delhi. But all the youths from smaller cities might not succeed like me due to tough life and high expenses of metro cities," he said. Rahul added, "Therefore, I decided to set up a branch office of my company in my own state Jharkhand so that there could be a platform of skill development and job opportunities for the youths of small towns of Bihar & Jharkhand, instead of migrating to Delhi like me. Right after the first lockdown due to the pandemic, when the world knew the idea of working from home, I thought why not open a branch office in Ranchi, Jharkhand and build a team of youth over there. This idea worked and within a year, I shifted the office to a bigger space with a capacity of 200 employees and named the space - "Webpulse IT Park ". The idea behind this branch office was to give the job to the skilled youth of Jharkhand and develop the skills of unskilled youths. This idea worked and today, I have a bigger team in Ranchi Branch at Webpulse IT Park than the head office in New Delhi." Rahul Ranjan Singh has been trying to motivate other entrepreneurs in metro cities to generate such employment opportunities in smaller cities of India. This will not only make smaller towns prosperous but also stop the increasing population in metro cities which increasing due to the migration of youth from smaller towns. At Webpulse IT Park in Ranchi, youths from all the cities of Jharkhand are getting job opportunities for the positions of Business Development Executives, Customer Support Executives, Web Developers, Web Designers, SEO Executives, Content Writers etc. More than 50 youths have got jobs and they are working for clients from all over India & the world. Rahul said that plan is to employ 200 youths in the next 6 months. In the world of technology, where work can be done from anywhere, using the internet and electricity, such innovations should be started by more entrepreneurs in smaller towns. More than 50 per cent of successful entrepreneurs in metro cities belong to smaller towns and they should think about improving the lives of youths in their towns. Rahul Ranjan Singh said that the responsibility of job creation should not be totally put on the shoulders of the state and central government. If one lakh entrepreneurs start a branch in small towns of India by generating 100 jobs in each of the branches, one crore youths can get job in India. Such efforts by the entrepreneurs of India can control the crisis of job employment to a big extent. One crore job will help 1 crore families. A small effort by masses brings big results. This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)
Gujarat [India], April 4 (ANI/PNN): India is at par with other western and European countries because of its state-of-the-art facilities, excellent infrastructure, expert healthcare professionals, conventional healthcare therapies, and quality nursing facilities. Cost is one vital factor that makes India lucrative for medical tourism. Apart from modern medical procedures, India is known for ancient health and wellness methods such as Ayurveda, Yoga, and Naturopathy. A broad spectrum of hospitals in India caters to medical tourism. Addressing the 2022 post-budget webinar of the Union Health Ministry and Family Welfare, our Prime Minister emphasized facilitating universal access to India's quality and the cost-effective healthcare system. It will boost medical tourism and provide more income opportunities for citizens in Gujarat. Because of medical tourism people prefer to treat their illnesses closer to home, but obstacles, such as long waiting periods, high treatment costs, and other factors, would force them to cross borders for the best and most efficient medical care. Medical tourists are those people who travel to a foreign country to receive quality healthcare services. There is a significant growth in the globalization of health that has led to the rise of medical tourism. Medical Tourism, in recent years, has become a growing sector in our country. Medical Tourism in India, in mid-2020, was estimated to be worth around USD 9 billion. Medical Tourism in Gujarat Gujarat has a competitive edge over other states in terms of medical tourism. This is due to the state's world-class facilities, super-specialty hospitals, excellent doctors, zero waiting time, reasonable prices, and cutting-edge infrastructure. Previously, the private sector had a minimal role in Gujarat's healthcare sector. However, it has now evolved into a booming industry. The local government support is also essential to sustain the market. Vibrant Gujarat Initiative Vibrant Gujarat, a successful initiative that improves the state's economic relations, also benefits the healthcare industry in Gujarat. This project brought about a radical change in the state hospitals, which got further accelerated by the arrival of international healthcare providers. Many hospitals in the state have substantial experience providing healthcare to NRGs. Most of them have national and global accreditations like JCI and NABH certifications. Government of India and Medical Tourism Consecutively, the Indian government has also implemented comprehensive strategies to enhance medical tourism in India. One of the most critical developments is to provide simple, quick, and special visas to any foreign traveler visiting India on medical grounds. Amongst the other states of India - Gujarat is emerging as the leading state for medical tourism. Ahmedabad, the most influential city in Gujarat - has acquired the distinction of being the country's most renowned destination; for medical treatments. Top Medical Treatments in Gujarat A handful of the top medical treatments in Gujarat are - Cardiology, - In Vitro Fertilization, - Dental Care, - Spine Treatment, - Cancer Treatment, - Plastic Surgery, - Wellness, and - Holistic Care through Indian Systems of Medicine. The advancement in digitalization has enhanced the visibility of prominent doctors, surgeons, and hospitals. Medical professionals and hospitals can now display their specialties, skills, healthcare packages, and other relevant details online. Prospective patients across the world have easy access to this type of information. Medical Tourism consultants in Gujarat In this industry, many companies work as collaborators and service providers. MediFlam Pvt Ltd is one such example. MediFlam is the most effective and robust digital healthcare provider in the country. MediFlam assists and guides international patients to avail the best quality treatment facilities and medical services. They are renowned as the best Medical Tourism consultant in Gujarat. They not only facilitate top medical treatments to international patients but also handle all of their travel arrangements. Final Words Lastly, Tourism in Gujarat is also one of the lucrative aspects that aid in medical tourism in the state. Medical tourists can travel and explore this diverse state in addition to receiving treatment. The main attractions are Asiatic lions, a diverse terrain, friendly locals, rich heritage and culture. Plus, Ahmedabad has excellent air connectivity with several international destinations. This story is provided by PNN. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PNN)
Gurugram (Haryana) [India], April 4 (ANI/PR Newswire): Mamaearth and Femina launched Beautiful Indians, a property established to celebrate the goodness stories of the most beautiful Indians. The first edition of Mamaearth-Femina Beautiful Indians, announced last month, is a nationwide search to award goodness ambassadors. Since the launch of the initiate, over thousands of individuals across the country shared real-life stories of kindness, generosity, love and the goodness they witnessed in others that have helped them sail through a few of the most challenging phases. People shared stories about ordinary people, celebrities, content creators, and organizations who came forward to extend a helping hand. With an intent to celebrate the most loved goodness stories, Mamaearth and Femina began the quest to find Goodness Ambassadors to embark upon the journey of finding the most beautiful Indians. After extensive search, Mamaearth and Femina have onboarded six industry leaders to be a part of their goodness panel. These changemakers have inspired the world with their work and are committed to contributing towards making the world a better place through their actions. * Varun & Ghazal Alagh: Meet Mamaearth co-founders, Ghazal and Varun Alagh, who are driven by purpose and passion to add goodness to the lives of the people and the planet by striving to build an eco-friendly future, and by redefining the beauty business, one product at a time. * Taheera Kashyap Khurana: Author and filmmaker Tahira is a strong icon of influence for women's empowerment through her characters. She is the co-founder of Indian Women Rising, a cinema collective that sheds light on Indian female filmmakers across the world. * Harteerath Singh Ahluwalia: Director of the non-governmental organization Hemkunt foundation which has worked effortlessly through the pandemic to provide humanitarian relief to society. * Ambika Muttoo: As Editor-in-Chief of Femina, Ambika has galvanised the heritage brand with unusual covers and features to offer stories of achievement and goodness to inspire women across the diaspora. *Shefali Shah: Known for her portrayals of strong female characters, the prolific actor spent the lockdown building bridges between resources and those in need using her reach on social media. She also donates earnings from her paintings to charity through Concern India Foundation. The initiative requires people to share stories of the Goodness ambassadors around them on the website. An individual can initiate this by nominating themselves or someone else who has been conducting selfless acts of goodness. Sharing goodness stories on www.femina.in/mamaearth-beautiful-indians-2022 is one way to get involved. The nationwide hunt for 'goodness' stories will culminate in an event honoring these Beautiful Indians and inspiring stories that promise to make the world a better place with their goodness-filled action. A brand established on the founding principles of Honesty, Natural and Safety, Mamaearth believes that goodness starts with the small things that each one of us can do every day. It resides in the little choices we can make in our daily lives. The brand added goodness inside their products by being animal cruelty-free (PETA certified), toxin-free, plastic positive and through the plant goodness initiative. It was time to celebrate goodness inside others by celebrating the Beautiful Indians. Founded by husband-wife duo Ghazal Alagh and Varun Alagh, Mamaearth is Asia's first brand with Made safe certified products that offer toxin-free & natural baby care, and personal care products. Driven by innovation and using the best of nature and science, the brand caters to all personal care needs of young, aspirational and increasingly conscious Indian consumers. In a short span of 5 years, Mamaearth has created a product portfolio of 140+ products packed with goodness inside, has reached over 5 million customers in 500 Indian cities servicing 14000 pin codes, and is the fastest-growing FMCG brand in India. Mamaearth products are available on www.mamaearth.in, major eCommerce platforms like Amazon, Nykaa, Flipkart and over 30000 point of sales across the country. Honasa Consumer Pvt Limited (HCPL), is a digital-first consumer brands company creating the FMCG conglomerate of the future. A company built on the values of Honesty, Natural ingredients and Safe care, HCPL caters to the needs of millennial consumers through innovative products, evolved propositions, direct to consumer marketing, and e-commerce fulfillment. Currently catering to over 1000 cities in India with brands like Mamaearth, The Derma Co., Ayuga & Aqualogica, HCPL is building an ecosystem that helps benefit the consumers and community at large. Backed by Sequoia, Sofina Ventures SA, Evolvence, Fireside Ventures, and Stellaris Venture Partners, HCPL has become a billion-dollar personal care House of Brands in just 5 years. Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1763984/Mamaearth_Logo.jpg This story is provided by PRNewswire. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PR Newswire)
New Delhi [India], April 4 (ANI/BusinessWire India): Local Dukaan, a one-stop destination E-commerce marketplace, offers Indian Local Retailers the service to launch their business online with just a few clicks & sell their products to local consumers at 0 per cent commission. This is an initiative by Webpulse Solution Pvt Ltd - a Delhi based Website Development, Mobile App Development, Digital Marketing & SEO Company to help local shopkeepers to come to digital space at no cost. The company's strategy to empower local shopkeepers is totally unique & different from all other eCommerce marketplaces and apps. Free eCommerce Website in no time LocalDukaan.com is a unique platform where within 1 minute, shopkeepers can register their shop and get an eCommerce Website of their stores Free of Cost. They can start uploading their products through the seller panel on LocalDukaan.com or LocalDukaan Seller App (available on both platforms - LocalDukaan Seller App android & LocalDukaan Seller App iOS). Products uploaded by shopkeepers not only get featured on the eCommerce Website but also on the LocalDukaan.com eCommerce Search Engine. No delay in getting customers' payments One of the unique features of LocalDukaan.com is that sellers get their own payment gateway integrated with their eCommerce Website & consumers pay directly to the sellers. LocalDukaan.com does not want to play as a middleman to process the payment between sellers and buyers. Founder & CEO of Webpulse Solution Pvt Ltd & Brand Empower Pvt Ltd - Rahul Ranjan Singh said, "We are not interested in deducting any fees and commission per sales by retailers and shopkeepers, thus we are integrating payment gateway of retailers directly so that they get online payments from consumers using credit cards, debit cards, net banking, mobile wallets etc. within 3 - 4 days, which is the actual time by any payment gateway to process the payment. Currently, all big eCommerce Marketplaces and platforms in India take 15 to 45 days to release the retailers'/merchants' payments and this causes big trouble for the small retailers/merchants as they don't have a good backup of funds to survive." Quick Local Self-Delivery The objective of LocalDukaan.com is to connect consumers with their neighbourhood shops to buy their products online instead of visiting their physical stores. Customers expect home delivery, thus LocalDukaan.com offers an eCommerce website to retailers so that they can list their products online for their local consumers to be able to place their orders online 24X7, even when the physical store is closed at the midnight. Moreover, using the Local Dukaan marketplace for advertising their business will be proven to be an effective and efficient approach to start selling their products instantly. LD Sellers have the liberty to do the self-delivery to their local customers' doorstep. Catering to the needs of all the industries Starting from the art or apparel to the cake or cuisines, no matter what kind of business shopkeepers are dealing in, they can register their shop on LocalDukaan.com through the website or mobile apps - LocalDukaan Seller App (available on both android & iOS). Amongst all the advantages, interacting with the Local Dukaan platform is a plus point for the business as it provides advertising and selling facilities with zero % commission. Unlike other e-commerce websites or purchasing supermarkets, the Local Dukaan demands no extra charges, moreover, at 0 per cent commission, one can establish or grow the business worldwide using the LD advertising feature. In this contemporary era, all businessmen are inclined to the online shops and want to upgrade or enhance their business profitability using digitalization. The Local Dukaan has the capability and unique team of technical experts who have made e-commerce incredibly easy. As the pandemic has affected industries and businesses badly, to overcome the losses that happened in the lockdown, Local Dukaan has come into the picture to help the local shopkeepers and retailers to get the same income through online orders. Seeing the current scenario of comfort, more and more individuals are looking for options to buy or purchase necessary or needy items using online apps to avoid time consumption. Today's generation has a very hectic work schedule, moreover, COVID-19 has changed the mindset of people to shop online rather than offline. In the 21st century, people are tech-savvy and like to be in the digital world because online services are providing comfort as well as reducing travelling and selection time. If you are interested in registering with an E-commerce store then, look no further than Local Dukaan as it is serving 90 days free trial for the newcomers. In addition to that, Local Dukaan understands every aspect of retailers or sellers to drive the business through digital commerce. This platform has been introduced to promote the #VocalforLocal initiative taken by our honourable Prime Minister Narendra Modi as well as bringing the local shops to grow like other supermarkets and mall shops. It is the right time for the Local Dukaans and shopkeepers to join Local Dukaan. Also, pack your back to grow the business with Local Dukaan. This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)
The conversations regarding Will Smith and Chris Rock's Oscars slap incident are not ending anytime soon. Comedian Trevor Noah opened the 64th Annual Grammy Awards by making a sly reference to the infamous altercation on Sunday. "Don't even think of this as an award show. It's a concert where we are giving out awards, we will be listening to music, dancing, sing, keeping people's names out of our mouths and we are going to give people awards all throughout the night. So let's get straight into it," Trevor said while kick-starting the musical ceremony. Questlove also addressed Will Smith's slap while presenting the Grammy for song of the year, Variety reported. Questlove said, "All right, I am going to present this award and I trust that you people will stay 500 feet away from me. As they say it is far better to give than to receive. Well, I'm not so sure about that because last Sunday it felt pretty good to receive." Questlove won the Oscar for documentary feature right after Will Smith slapped Chris Rock. Also, earlier, in the pre-show, Nominated comedian Nate Bargatze came out wearing a black crash helmet and quipped, "They said comedians have to wear these now at awards shows," before complaining, "It doesn't even cover your face." For the unversed, the conflict arose after Rock, who was presenting the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature, seized the moment to crack a few jokes, including one about Smith's wife Jada Pinkett Smith's shaved head. He compared the 50-year-old actor's appearance to that of Demi Moore's look in 'G.I. Jane'. Jada, who recently opened up about living with alopecia areata, was visibly upset, rolling her eyes from her seat. Seconds later, Smith walked onstage and approached Rock, smacking him in front of the audience. The 53-year-old actor also shouted to a stunned Rock, "Keep my wife's name out of your f---ing mouth." When Smith won Best Actor later in the ceremony, he apologised to the Academy and his fellow nominees but didn't mention Rock by name. In his tearful speech, he spoke about acting out of love and protection, saying, "Love makes you do crazy things." The 'King Richard' actor went on to publicly apologise to Rock on social media the following day. (ANI)
Keem collected his joint win with Lamar alone after the latter did not attend this year's Grammy Awards ceremony. This was Lamar's 14th Grammy win, and Baby Keem's first.

After being presented the award by Ludacris, during his acceptance speech, Keem expressed gratitude for his family, Lamar, his hometown of Las Vegas, and, "the women that raised me to shape me to become the man I am today."

'Family Ties' provided an opportunity for Keem to showcase his wit and wordplay, hence even in the stacked category, it wasn't a shock that this song won. Lamar added an unforgettable touch that couldn't be ignored either.

Other nominees in the category included Cardi B for 'Up', J. Cole for 'My Life', Drake for 'Way Too Sexy', and Megan Thee Stallion for 'Thot Shit'. (ANI)
Taking to her Instagram handle on Monday, the 'Gangubai Kathiawadi' star posted a sunkissed picture in which she can be seen posing with a bunch of yellow flowers.

Alia can be seen in a yellow outfit and accessorized it with a layered chain necklace.

Soon, the post got flooded with likes and compliments in the comments section.

"Beautiful," Priyanka Chopra commented with a heart-eyed emoticon.

Samantha Ruth Prabhu dropped a heart emoticon.

"Favorite," a fan added.

Meanwhile, on the work front, Alia was last seen in SS Rajamouli's magnum opus 'RRR' with co-stars Ram Charan, Jr NTR and Ajay Devgn.

Up next, she will be seen in Ayan Mukerji's 'Brahmastra', co-starring her beau Ranbir Kapoor. The movie will also feature megastar Amitabh Bachchan, Nagarjuna Akkineni and Mouni Roy. 'Brahmastra' will release on September 9, 2022.

Alia is also set to make her Hollywood debut with Netflix's international spy thriller 'Heart of Stone', joining Hollywood superstars Gal Gadot and Jamie Dornan. (ANI)
Taking to his Instagram handle on Monday, Arjun posted a picture from 2010, two years before his Bollywood debut 'Ishaqzaade'.

In the caption, he wrote, "Back to the future... 2010. What if we could go back for a brief moment to appreciate it all... simpler times simpler minds simpler lives everything just felt simpler."

On the work front, Arjun has multiple projects in the pipeline including 'The Ladykiller' with Bhumi Pednekar and 'Ek Villian Returns' with Disha Patani and Tara Sutaria. He will also be seen in 'Kuttey' alongwith co-stars Tabu, Radhika Madan, Konkona Sen Sharma, Naseeruddin Shah, Kumud Mishra and Shardul Bhardwaj.

Meanwhile, Arjun's ladylove Malaika Arora was discharged from the hospital on Sunday after suffering minor injuries in a car accident on Saturday. The accident took place when Malaika was returning from Pune and some cars collided with each other near Khalapur Toll Plaza on the Mumbai-Pune highway. (ANI)
Amid the ongoing economic crisis in her home country, Jacqueline Fernandez shared a message extending support to the Sri Lankan people on her social media. Taking to her Instagram handle, the former Miss Sri Lanka, 36, wrote, "As a Srilankan, it is heartbreaking to see what my country and countrymen are going through." Amplifying the voice of her countrymen, the 'Kick' actor wrote, "I have been flooded with a lot of opinions since this began from around the world. I would say, do not be too quick to pass a judgement and vilify any group based on what is shown. The world and my people do not need another judgement, they need empathy and support." She added, "2-minutes of silent prayer for their strength and well-being will bring you much closer to them than a comment based on a loose grasp of the situation." Concluding her message, Fernandez said that she is "hoping this situation comes to an end soon and through means which are peaceful and for the benefit of the people. Praying for immense strength to those dealing with this. Peace to all! Can stand united, if divided, the country will be ruined." On Saturday, Sri Lanka has imposed a three-day island-wide curfew after mass protests erupted in Colombo over public discontent with the government's efforts in dealing with the economic crisis that has gripped the country. As many as 644 people were arrested in Western Province during the night for violating the curfew imposed to prevent an alleged Arab spring-style coup, Colombo Gazette news portal. Sri Lankan President on Friday had declared a country-wide state of emergency to ensure "public security and maintenance of public order." (ANI)
A hilly tract of Western Ghats near the scenic and proposed eco-tourism spot Muthachipara in Kerala's Kozhikode district is slowly losing its calm, and the residents are undergoing harrowing experiences of blasts and landslide threats from a stone quarry in the locality. At Porali hills, a land of settler farmers, more than 53 home buildings, a school building, and a Church is affected due to the blasting activities by the private quarry operator, Porali Quarry Action Council constituted to oppose the quarry project, told IANS. Action council leader Iype Vadakkethadam, comparing the fragile region to Kavalappara in neighbouring Malappuram district, where more than a dozen people died due to a landslide, said if something happens in this landslide-prone region, the loss will be huge due to the dense population. "The quarry is causing landslide threat as it is operating on a hillside. Geologically, the quarry is situated at the foot of a big hill of which a major portion is a rock. A large quantity of rock has already been removed from the bottom of this hill structure and countless daily blasts make the hill vulnerable to landslides," he said. The loud noise of heavy machines like jackhammers and excavators along with sudden shocking blasting sounds has spoiled the peaceful living atmosphere, he said. While talking about the social, economic, and environmental impacts of the quarry menace, an award-winning green activist from the district, Prof T. Shobhindran blamed the nexus between quarry owners, hardcore criminals, and politicians. Further, he stressed the need to act against quarrying in Kerala, a state that faces floods, landslides, and rapid climate changes. National Green Tribunal, court orders, and quarries The plea of Porali Quarry Action Council before the NGT said the quarry is abetting Reserved Forest and adversely affecting the flora and fauna in the area. As per studies conducted about landslides happening in similar landscapes, the rainwater will saturate the soil and later the readily weakened hill structure will slide down, devastating the area and lives. A minor landslide has already occurred in the area recently. Pollution of freshwater resources and resulting water scarcity is another problem, it pointed out. The petitioner stated that not only rock stones are extracted from the Earth's surface, but a large quantity of topsoil is also removed which is loosely heaped in the boundary of the quarry owner's land. It later spreads to shallow areas through rainwater streams from the hill, spoiling freshwater sources like ponds and natural streams, which are sources of water for daily needs and farming. Considering the plea, the green court directed Kerala State Pollution Control Board, State Environmental Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA), and District Magistrate, Kozhikode district to act on the matter. In the order dated March 30, the tribunal asked the Committee to meet within two weeks and furnish its factual and action taken report within two months. Earlier in December last year, the NGT had constituted a seven-member joint committee to study the impact of blasting in various stone quarry sites in Kerala with nonel detonation technology at distances of 50 m, 75 m, 100 m, 125 m, 150 m, 200 m and 250 m. Nonel is a shock tube detonator designed to initiate explosions, generally for the purpose of demolition of buildings and for use in the blasting of rock in mines and quarries. In November last year, the Supreme Court had held that the quarries in the state should be at least 200 metres away from residential areas agreeing with an earlier NGT order. Notably, the Kerala government had reduced the minimum distance for quarrying to 50 m in 2016, a move that claimed to boost the development works in the state. --IANS jw/pgh ( 639 Words) 2022-04-03-22:34:05 (IANS)
The Tirunelveli Roman Catholic diocese opened a school in Anthoniyarpuram in Tamil Nadu Thoothukudi district in 1940 to educate the children of palmyra climbers. Situated in a quiet hamlet surrounded by lush green palmyra trees, it was upgraded to a middle school in 2003. However, trouble began here as the school management recently ran out of funds, but not to let it go defunct, the entire village, which overwhelmingly has palmyra climbers, joined together to run the school and arrange the necessary funds. The local residents set up a 'Kalvi Nidhi Kulu' or education fund committee and opened a pathaneer (sap or juice tapped from fronds of palmyra tree) outlet along the Tirunelveli-Thoothukudi highway and started selling the juice or sap of palmyra trees. "The palmyra drink or pathaneer is purchased by the Kalvi Nidhi Kulu at wholesale prices and we sell it to customers from our outlet at the Thoothukudi-Tirunelveli highway and the money earned is used to meet the expenses of the school," School Committee President, Siluvai Anthony told IANS. He said that the climbers tap around 600 litres of Pathaneer per day during the peak months of June, July, and August and around 500 litres are sold in no time at a price of Rs 100 per litre. The balance of pathaneer is used to make 'Karupetti' which is a sugar supplement used in tea and coffee. The school, at present, has 163 students, including 95 in primary and 68 in middle school and Anthony said that most of the students have passed the school with good marks. He said that the palmyra climbers also benefit from this project as they need not wait for hours on roadside to sell pathaneer and they get a ready market. Also, the children of the palmyra climbers are getting an education from the school. However, the village, which has 400 families, is falling short of palmyra climbers as many have opted for other professions and only nine climbers are now remaining in the area. The school authorities also said that the support extended by the local people for running the school is immense. "The support extended by the local people by generating money selling pathaneer is of immense help in running the school. The school approaches other people for support during the lean months of palmyra climbers," Jaison Raja, of the school management, told IANS. --IANS aal/vd ( 411 Words) 2022-04-03-22:50:04 (IANS)
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will meet party leaders of Telangana today in the evening and discuss the political situation prevailing along with brainstorming on the Assembly elections scheduled next year in the state, said the sources. Discussion over the Paddy procurement issue will also be on the top agenda of the meeting. The meeting with the senior leaders of the party will take place at Rahul Gandhi's residence. This is Rahul Gandhi's second meeting with the Telangana party leaders in the last seven days. The meeting comes at a time when state Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao is nourishing his national ambitions and calling on the parties to form a non-BJP and non-Congress alliance for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Notably, in the last Assembly elections in 2018 in Telangana, Congress had an alliance with the Telugu Desam Party, however, could not stop the return of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi's KCR government. Earlier last month, Telangana Congress chief Revanth Reddy dismissed possibilities of forging an alliance with the Telangana Rashtra Samithi party and said the grand old party will form an alliance with any party but Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao's as "he is not trustworthy". "Congress would not forge an alliance with KCR and his party TRS at any cost because he is not trustworthy. We have seen him in 2004, 2009, 2014 and 2019. We can trust any other leader or party, but not KCR and TRS," Reddy told ANI. (ANI)
Delhi Police have registered three FIRs in connection with the alleged hate speech delivered at a Maha Panchayat organised on Sunday in New Delhi's Burari ground, and said that legal action is being taken against those spreading rumours on social media. The first FIR has been filed for organising the programme without due grant of permission from the police. The police have filed an FIR against the organiser of the event (Preet Singh, founder of the Save India Foundation). The second FIR has been filed against the alleged mishandling of journalists present at the event. The third FIR has been filed for spreading misinformation (hate speech) on social media. "A request letter for seeking permission for organizing Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha was received in North-West District from organizer Preet Singh, President, Save India Foundation, Mangolpuri, Delhi. The request was denied by North-West District police on the ground that the organizer had no permission from the land-owning agency i.e. DDA for organizing this Sabha in Burari Ground," Delhi Police said in a statement. The police said that organiser of the event Preet Singh started the Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha which was attended by nearly 800 people despite being denied permission. "Some of the speakers including Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati, Priest of Dasna Devi Temple and Suresh Chauhanke, Chief Editor of Sudarshan News uttered words promoting disharmony, feelings of enmity, hatred or ill will between two communities," said police in its statement. A case was registered in Mukherjee Nagar after which the investigation was initiated. The police also received complaints from journalists who alleged mishandling and assault at the event during reporting. "A complaint was received in PS Mukharjee Nagar from two journalists of a News Portal who had come to Burari Ground for reporting the event of Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha. In their complaint, they had alleged that on April 3, at around 1.30 pm, when they were rushing towards the exit, they were manhandled and assaulted by a group of people who also tried to snatch the mobile phones and I-Card of journalists," the police said. "Another complaint was also received from an independent/ freelance journalist who had also come to Burari Ground for reporting the event of Hindu Mahapanchayat Sabha. He had alleged that on April 3, at around 1 pm, when he along with two other journalists were interviewing one person, then some persons manhandled and assaulted him. A case was registered," the police further added in its statement. Yati Narsinghanand, head priest of Ghaziabad's Dasna Devi Temple, on Sunday exhorted Hindus to take up arms and alleged that if a Muslim becomes the Prime Minister, 50 per cent of Hindus will convert and 40 per cent will be killed." Narsinghanand, the priest who is also accused in the Haridwar hate speech case, was speaking at an event organised by Preet Singh, founder of the Save India Foundation. Singh was one of the organisers of an event at Jantar Mantar last year where anti-Muslim slogans were raised. He was arrested by the Delhi Police in connection with that case and is currently out on bail. Narsinghanand, too, is out on bail in connection with the Haridwar case. "Only in 2029 or in 2034 or in 2039 a Muslim will become the prime minister. Once a Muslim will become the PM, 50 per cent Hindus will convert, 40 per cent will be killed and the remaining 10 per cent will either live in refugee camps or in other countries in the next 20 years," Yati said according to a video of the event circulated on social media. (ANI)
The meat shop owners in Hubli say that there is no impact on their business amid the call for the boycott of 'Halal' meat. Nagraj Pattan, a meat shop owner in Hubli said, "There has been no impact at least in our area. Some ask for halal and some jhatka meat and we provide both as per their requirements." "Row over 'Halal' meat hasn't yet affected my business. In fact, there has been an increase in the demand for meat amid the ongoing festivals of Varshadodaku, Kannada New Year of Ugadi and Ramzan," said another meat vendor. Mahesh Tenginkai, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) general secretary, Karnataka said, "There is no impact as such on the business of meat vendors here." The 'Hindu Jana Jagruthi Samiti' along with Bajrang Dal and some right-wing activists recently claimed that Muslims perform rituals according to their faith before killing animals for 'Halal' meat, which is then consumed by Hindus. They organized a campaign to boycott 'Halal' meat and urged people to buy meat only from Hindu meat sellers. The controversy came ahead of the 'Varshadodaku' festival, which is celebrated a day after the Kannada New Year of Ugadi, when the meat is in much demand as several communities across the state, including Hindus, organize a non-vegetarian feast. The Opposition has condemned the Basavaraj Bommai government over the 'Halal' meat row, calling it election propaganda of the BJP. Bommai had earlier said that the state government will look into the 'Halal' meat issue as "serious objections" have now been raised about it. Asked about the call for the boycott of 'Halal' meat by some right-wing organizations, Bommai had said, "As far as my government is concerned, we are not right-wing or left-wing, only growth wing." (ANI)
The Rajasthan police on Monday arrested 46 people and detained seven others for interrogation following a stone-pelting incident during a religious procession in Karauli on Saturday. The Inspector-General (IG) of Police, Bharatpur Range, Prasanna Kumar Khamesra said, "After stone pelting took place during the procession in Futa Kot area Main Bazaar Karauli on Saturday, the police acted promptly and arrested 46 people and detained seven people for interrogation." "13 accused have been arrested in connection with the incident in the case registered at Police Station Karauli and 33 people have been arrested for violating curfew order. 07 people have been detained for questioning. A total of 21 two-wheelers and four-wheelers were also seized by the police," Khamesra added. IG Prasanna Kumar Khmesra said, "In view of the sensitivity of the incident, he immediately reached Karauli on the spot and took stock of the situation along with Superintendent of Police Karauli Shailendra Singh Indoliya, called the necessary police force and Rajasthan Armed Constabulary (RAC) from other districts of the range and imposed it on the spot for peace and order." Police Headquarters, for close supervision of the situation, has sent ADG Sanjib Kumar, IG Bharat Lal Meena, DIG (Crime branch) Jaipur Rahul Prakash, DCP Mridul Kachawa, and DCP Jaipur Narayan Togas to Karauli, informed the police. IG Khamesra added, "To maintain law and order in the area, the situation is being closely monitored by police patrolling at various places in the city. A flag march was conducted in the city by the police force." The situation is under control but a curfew has been imposed in the city as a precautionary measure, he added. Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) was imposed in the Karauli district of Rajasthan on Saturday and the internet was shut down after stones were pelted during a 'Shobha Yatra' procession that day. Section 144 was imposed in Karauli from 6:30 pm on April 2 till 12 am on April 4. (ANI)
To ensure free and fair voting, adequate armed forces have been deployed at the 534 polling stations across the state.

Md. Noman Ahmad, Circle Officer deputed at Aurangabad block said, "All preparations have been done by the administration and people can vote peacefully."

The legislative council of Bihar consists of a total of 75 seats. The current strength of members in the legislative council is 51 against the total strength of 75, as all 24 seats of the local authority category are vacant since July 2021.

Among the NDA allies, BJP is contesting on 12 seats followed by JD(U) on 11 seats, and Pashupati Paras' Rashtriya Lok Janshakti Party on one seat. On the other hand, from the Opposition, RJD is contesting 23 seats while its ally CPI the remaining one seat. The Congress is going solo and is contesting 16 seats out of 24.

The results of the elections will be announced on April 7. (ANI)
A cache of arms and ammunition was recovered by the troops of the Indian Army and Special Operation Group (SOG) from a village along the Line of Control (LOC) in Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir, during a joint operation on Sunday. An official statement issued by the Defence PRO, Jammu said, "The search operation was conducted based on specific intelligence inputs, by the Poonch Brigade of White Knight Corps and SOG Poonch in village Noorkote of Tehsil Haveli, District Poonch." As per the statement, two AK-47 rifles, two AK 47 magazines, one 223 bore AK shape gun with handgrip, two magazines of 233 bore AK shape gun, one Chinese Pistol, one Chinese pistol magazine, 63 AK-47 rounds, twenty rounds of 223 bore AK Shape gun and four Chinese pistol rounds, were recovered during the searches. "Once again the enemy's nefarious designs of disturbing the peace process in J-K have been foiled by the alert security forces," added the statement. (ANI)